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Authored by Caitlin Johnstone via Medium.com,

Most human suffering is due to believed mental stories, from the psychological suffering of the individual to the large-scale suffering caused by international power structures who advance violence and oppression via propaganda. We must evolve a new relationship with narrative.

Most people’s lives are dominated by mental story, so whoever can control those stories controls the people. The good news is that all we need to do to reclaim our world from the controllers is to reclaim our stories. The barrier between us and freedom is as thin as a fairy tale.

I talk about fighting establishment narrative control a lot, not because it’s the best way to change things, but because it’s the only way. The public will never, ever use the power of their numbers to change things so long as they’re being successfully propagandized not to.

We are bulldozing a paradise while praying we go to Heaven when we die. We are killing off giant-brained leviathans in our own oceans whose mental lives we know little about while searching the stars for intelligent life. We are burning our home in our search for a sense of home.

The most condescending sound in the known universe is Bill Maher’s voice.

Joe Biden could slip into a coma tomorrow and they’d still wheel him out to the debates with the words “NOT TRUMP” scribbled on his forehead in sharpie. And he’d continue to poll in the mid-to-high twenties.

We are about three years from watching President Biden say he’s working with Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher to win the Cold War, soiling himself at the podium, and then CNN pundits earnestly discussing his similarities and differences to President Obama.

It feels like we’re overdue for another media tour by Steven Pinker to tell us that things are better than ever and our discontent is just imaginary.

“Why doesn’t the left look at Israel exactly the same as every other country, hmmmmmmm???” Because it isn’t exactly the same as every other country. It plays a crucial role in the empire’s geostrategic maneuverings in the Middle East. It’s not about Jews or Judaism, it’s about imperialism.

One of the absolute stupidest things about US politics is how they made regime change in Iran vs regime change in Syria a partisan wedge issue, and partisans only question possible false flags based on which of those agendas their team cheers for.

If the political/media class wants to treat “proxy forces” and “Iran” like they mean the same thing, then they should have also been saying things like “USA fires rockets into Damascus” and “American troops sodomize Gaddafi with bayonet”.

It infuriates the empire propagandists to no end that after years of carefully crafting a very specific narrative about what’s happening in Syria, anti-imperialist journalists can just fly on over there and look around and report on the things they are seeing.

The US outsources all its ugliest aspects so that American voters don’t have to look at them. It outsources its torture, it outsources its slavery, it outsources its wars, and it outsources the the holding cells for its political prisoners.

In old-style British imperialism, they’d invade your country and replace your flag with theirs. In new-style US imperialism, your country keeps its flag, and the takeover can happen so slyly that the nation’s citizens sometimes don’t even know it’s occurred. It’s much more efficient.

All empires throughout history have had some kind of positive narrative about why it’s right that they should be conquering and dominating the world. The US-centralized empire with its bogus “freedom and democracy” schtick is no different.

If you were to combine all the very worst possible kinds of government with all the very worst possible government actions and roll them all together to create a single nation, that nation would look exactly the same as Saudi Arabia.

The maneuverings of establishment power structures are always made to protect the power they already have and/or to try and obtain more. It’s never anything more exotic or otherworldly than that: the mundane, primitive drive to try and control as many other humans as possible.

International alliances are often thought of as matters of secondary importance, as just something governments do when possible to make themselves a bit safer, wealthier, etc. Actually, uniting nations into one power structure is the goal, and it’s what alliances are really for.

I love a conspiracy enthusiast who can research with an open mind and live comfortably with the fact that there’s a lot we don’t know due to government opacity. I dislike the all-too-common other kind who pretend they know everything about everything and scoff at everyone else.

There are two kinds of people in conspiracy circles: those who have an intellectually honest relationship with what they know and don’t know, and the bullshitters who fake knowing things they don’t. It’s possible to get quite popular in conspiracy circles by faking it. Many do.

There’s an implicit default assumption among the political/media class that US government agencies have earned back the trust they lost with Iraq, despite their having made no changes whatsoever to prevent another Iraq-like horror from reoccurring, or even so much as apologizing.

I talk about Iraq all the time because that’s what everyone should be doing. It’s never been addressed, never been resolved, yet the US war machine and its propaganda apparatus have marched on as though it never happened. It’s a very large elephant in a very important room.

The Trump administration’s relentless fumbling, ham-fisted attempts to manufacture consent for a war with Iran remind me of of a really awkward loser constantly asking the prettiest girl at the office for a date again and again. Give it up, dude. She ain’t into you.

Many on the left care about domestic policy a lot more than they care about foreign policy. Meanwhile, foreign policy is the foremost priority of the establishment they’re trying to take down. This arrangement works out very nicely for the powerful.

“Peace through strength” just means “We’ll take money away from the poor and the needy and use it to beef up our already bloated military so we can bully the world into obedience.” That’s not peace, that’s tyranny.

It shouldn’t be too much to ask for one of America’s two mainstream parties to put forward at least one presidential candidate who opposes all military mass murders and has no plutocratic loyalties. That is not actually an unreasonable thing to demand. Don’t lose sight of this.

You can thank Obama for normalizing the “campaign as a progressive and govern as a Reaganite” strategy which now has Americans mostly clueless as to which Democratic primary candidate will actually represent their interests.

You are infinitely more qualified to report the news than the propagandists of the mainstream media. Even a teenager making a sloppy, amateurish first-time Youtube video about current events is superior to an MSM talking head who’s paid to lie. Be the press.

The establishment doesn’t fear Trump. It doesn’t fear Bernie, and it doesn’t fear Tulsi. It fears you. It fears the people. A single politician they can deal with. The public rising up and using the power of their numbers to force change is what keeps your rulers up at night.

*  *  *

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Researchers at the University of Buffalo (UB), funded by the Army Research Office (ARO), have developed a new plastic that could be used for advanced body armor, combat helmets, ballistic plates, and or even armor for vehicles.

The UB-led research team, fascinated by mollusk-grown gems, used inspiration from nature to create a lightweight plastic that is 14 times stronger and eight times lighter than steel and “ideal for absorbing the impact of bullets and other projectiles,” UB Now said.

The findings were published in a recent edition of the journal Applied Polymer Materials, published by the American Chemical Society (ACS).

“The material is stiff, strong and tough,” says lead author Shenqiang Ren, a professor in the Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and a member of UB’s RENEW Institute. “It could be applicable to vests, helmets and other types of body armor, as well as protective armor for ships, helicopters, and other vehicles.”

The new lightweight plastic is an advanced version of ultrahigh molecular weight polyethylene (UHMWPE).

Researchers said while developing the UHMWPE-based material; they examined “mother of pearl, which mollusks create by arranging a form of calcium carbonate into a structure that resembles interlocking bricks. Like, mother of pearl, the material has an extremely tough outer shell with a more flexible inner backing that’s capable of deforming and absorbing projectiles.”

Evan Runnerstrom, the ARO program manager, said UB’s new plastic might “lead to new generations of lightweight armor that provide both protection and mobility for soldiers.”

Runnerstrom said the UHMWPE-based material is easier to mold into intricate shapes that would make it more affordable to create protection for soldiers, vehicles, and other Army assets.

The new plastic is so advanced that it could replace Kevlar, a heat-resistant and durable synthetic fiber, used in the production of ballistic plates.

The ability for the new plastic to rapidly dissipate heat further helps it absorb the energy from a bullet and or shrapnel.

The team even blended the UHMWPE-based material with silica nanoparticles, which created an even strong armor.

“This work demonstrates that the right materials design approaches have the potential to make big impacts for Army technologies,” Runnerstrom said.

The next step for researchers would be creating ballistic plates of the new material for live-fire testing.

 

Authored by Eoin Higgins via CommonDreams.org,

A U.S. drone attack killed 30 pine nut farmers and wounded at least 40 others in Afghanistan Wednesday night, the latest killing of innocent civilians by American forces as the “war on terror” enters its 19th year. 

The farmers had just finished work and were sitting by a fire when the strike happened, according to tribal elder Malik Rahat Gul.

“Some of us managed to escape, some were injured, but many were killed,” said farm laborer Juma Gul.

Reteurs reported that there may be more farmers missing:

Haidar Khan, who owns the pine nut fields, said about 150 workers were there for harvesting, with some still missing as well as the confirmed dead and injured.

A survivor of the drone strike said about 200 laborers were sleeping in five tents pitched near the farm when the attack happened.

In a statement, Colonel Sonny Leggett, the spokesman for the U.S. campaign in Afghanistan, said the attack was aimed at “Da’esh (IS) terrorists in Nangarhar” province. 

“We are aware of allegations of the death of non-combatants and are working with local officials to determine the facts,” said Leggett. 

However, Leggett said, the blame for the massacre is squarely on IS and the Taliban — not U.S. forces. 

“We are fighting in a complex environment against those who intentionally kill and hide behind civilians, as well as use dishonest claims of noncombatant casualties as propaganda weapons,” Leggett said. 

Human rights group Amnesty International, in a statement, said that the strike was “unacceptable and suggests a shocking disregard for civilian life.” 

“U.S. forces in Afghanistan must ensure that all possible precautions are taken to avoid civilian casualties in military operations,” said Amnesty.

In a tweet, journalist Emran Feroz said his reporting from the region indicates that the reality of U.S. policy with respect to attacks in Nangarhar is different than Leggett’s claims. 

“Seems that recent drone strikes in Nangarhar’s Khogyani district ended in a total massacre killing far more than 30 civilians,” said Feroz. “When I visited Khogyani in 2017, locals told us that drone strikes against farmers and other civilians are taking place regularly.”

Rita Siemion, the director of National Security Advocacy at Human Rights First, told Common Dreams that the U.S. military cannot knowingly continue to use a process that repeatedly kills civilians by mistake. 

“Mistakes can happen, but this strike is part of a pattern that suggests that there are serious flaws in the Pentagon’s targeting processes that need to be addressed,” said Siemion. “Knowingly using a process that fails to adequately distinguish between civilians and combatants would violate the laws of war and be detrimental to the overall mission.”

In a tweet, The Intercept‘s Mehdi Hasan noted just how little attention the massacre perpetrated by the U.S. military was likely to receive.

In terms of Afghanistan making an appearance on the US news agenda, this should cause more outrage and anger than Trump inviting the Taliban to Camp David – but it won’t. https://t.co/RBvqXDmQRz

— Mehdi Hasan (@mehdirhasan) September 19, 2019

MSNBC host Chris Hayes tweeted Thursday that Americans should pay attention to the attack and try to put themselves in Afghan shoes. 

“It is so easy to read this and be upset or shake your head and still see it as an abstraction,” said Hayes. “But take a second to play through a missile from, say, Iran landing in Iowa and killing 30 farmers and what that would do to domestic politics.”

More and more women are flocking to plastic surgery to correct a devastating condition known as “resting bitch face”, according the New York Post.

“Resting bitch face” is a condition wherein you look – well, bitchy – due to your normal, everyday facial expression. It’s also sometimes just referred to as simply “being from New York City”. 

Hope Davis, one woman who got surgery for the condition after her friends uploaded “a batch of unflattering photos to Facebook and Instagram”, said: 

“I was like, ‘Oh great, I look mad in the middle of the party’. I looked like a sourpuss.”

Davis didn’t comment on whether or not she actually was “mad in the middle of the party” – a road we hope she considered before having someone slice her face open. Perhaps she just wasn’t having a good day at the time.

But it’s too late to look back now. She, like many other women, turned right to a plastic surgeon. 

Dr. David Shafer, a double board-certified plastic surgeon and medical director of Shafer Plastic Surgery & Laser Center in Midtown, said he’s familiar with the request to deal with “RBF”, as he called it, and said its a common request that he gets several times each week.

Davis instructed Shafer that she didn’t want a ‘Joker’ smile, but rather a “pleasant resting look”. 

Doctors use techniques like injecting fillers into the face and Botox to achieve the look. The procedure takes about 10 to 20 minutes and can cost between $500 to $5,000. It generally lasts “up to two years”. 

Shafer said:

 “The worse the ‘bitch face,’ the more effective the Botox. If you always look dumpy, or unfriendly … people are going to react to you differently.”

Shafer said that requests to fix “RBF” have more than doubled over the last year. He claims it is due to a shift in focus to the lower face, “popularized by the Kardashians” and the prevalence of selfies, which force people to look downward at their phone, accentuating their resting bitch faces.

Davis said: “Nobody can quite put their finger on it, but they notice something’s different. People have definitely complimented me saying, ‘Oh you look so pretty and cute today.’ ”

Park Avenue plastic surgeon Dr. Melissa Doft said: “People gravitate to women who they perceive as happy.”

“It helps make patients look less sad,” she continued. 

But, as Davis will unfortunately find out, hacking your face apart isn’t necessary going to make you happy on the inside. 

She concluded:

 “I caught a glimpse of myself out of the corner of my eye, and it gave me a positive vibe because I looked happy. This whole time, [I was focused on] how I project to the world, but I wasn’t paying attention to how I project to myself.”

Maybe they’ll have plastic surgery for your soul at that point…

Authored by Rusty Weiss via The Mental Recession

CNN anchor Don Lemon has found what he considers to be the true angle on the Justin Trudeau blackface scandal – that President Trump is a bad man.

Orange man bad, as they say.

Trudeau was featured in a 2001 photo from a Time magazine report dressed in brownface makeup for an “Arabian Nights” party held at the private school in which he taught.

He was apologetic about the whole affair.

“I shouldn’t have done that. I should have known better, but I didn’t and I’m really sorry,” Trudeau said. “I take responsibility for my decision to do that.”

“I shouldn’t have done that. I should’ve known better. It was something that I didn’t think was racist at the time but now I recognize that it was something racist to do and I’m deeply sorry.”

Prime minister of Canada Justin Trudeau wore blackface at 2001 costume party. He’ll say he’s sorry, & liberals will forget it ever happened.

Just like they did with Ralph Northam, Jimmy Kimmel, Howard Stern, & Robert Downey Jr.

But if a conservative did it, they’d be ruined. pic.twitter.com/ojim3V59nj

— Mark Dice (@MarkDice) September 18, 2019

Imagine this was an image of President Trump. And imagine he apologized for doing something stupid in his past. Do you think Lemon, or anybody in the media for that matter, would be forgiving?

To nobody’s surprise, Lemon’s fellow beta male in Trudeau was praised for his apology. Not only did he praise Trudeau, but Lemon took a shot at Trump over a scandal that has absolutely nothing to do with him!

“Wow, a leader apologizing. It seems odd, doesn’t it?” Lemon said following a clip of Trudeau’s statement. “Because we have one who doesn’t.”

Nice leap in logic there, Don. Is it any wonder the President has repeatedly labeled Lemon the “dumbest man on television”?

The CNN ‘journalist’ fawned over Trudeau’s apology to end the segment as well.

“I do have to say this before we go: think about it however you want to think about it. When someone apologizes- wow!” Lemon gushed. “We don’t often see that here, especially in a world leader who is saying ‘I should’ve known better and I’m sorry.’ You can feel about it however you want, but that, to me, that does mean a lot.”

Wow Don Lemon is outraged about Justin Trudeau wearing brownface

Oh wait no he’s not, he’s commending him and using it as a way to take a shot at President Trump pic.twitter.com/ndCDDVeeEq

— Quoth the Raven (@QTRResearch) September 19, 2019

Again, no amount of apology from a Republican would ever suffice in Lemon’s world. But liberals who do this – perfectly okay. That’s why you can have a Ralph Northam or Justin Trudeau blackface scandal and both men can emerge unscathed.

The double standard is sickening.

A new report from the U.S. Army Combat Capabilities Development Command states that the Ballistic Low Altitude Drone Engagement (BLADE) prototype is ready to conduct further trials to protect high-value military assets from small unmanned aerial system attacks. 

The BLADE is a dome of protection that uses a set of systems to combat against small drone attacks, can be mounted on various tactical vehicles providing troops and military assets with close-range protection. 

The BLADE is integrated with the Common Remotely Operated Weapon Station (CROWS) and uses advanced fire control and precision targeting enablers to detect, track, and defeat small drones. CROWS includes a sensor suite and fire control software that allow soldiers to engage targets remotely. CROWS tracks targets with several sensors, including a camera and thermal optics. The new system can be stationary or mounted on most tactical vehicles. 

Once the BLADE identifies and locks onto a target, it will fire an electronic attack on small incoming drones with short bursts of fire.

A successful test occurred earlier this summer at Fort Dix, New Jersey, proved the new system is ready for additional, more rugged field tests against drone swarms.

BLADE is expected to be mounted on M1 Abrams tanks, M2 Bradley infantry fighting vehicles, and Stryker wheeled armored fighting vehicles.

The Army said BLADE is at “final Level 6 technology readiness demonstration for the BLADE system will be conducted later this year.”

“Technology readiness levels refer to the maturity of a technology and range from Level 1 to Level 9. Level 6 is a model or prototype that has been tested in an operational environment, such as an aircraft or vehicle. Once we get a technology to the point where it can transition out of CCDC, which is typically Level 6, it transitions to program managers and program executive offices who make the technology a program of record, which means funding has been approved so the program can move forward.”

The proliferation of small drones on the modern battlefield, especially in Syria, and more recently, the Saudi Aramco drone/cruise missile attack over the weekend, have allowed terrorist organizations to exploit defense gaps in lower altitude air space. 

The first instance of where small drone attacks became very alarming was in Syria early last year. When terrorists strapped bombs to a swarm of small drones and attacked the Russian Khmeimim airbase.

In August of last year, a drone packed with explosives detonated near Avenida Bolívar, Caracas, where Nicolás Maduro, the President of Venezuela, was addressing the Bolivarian National Guard. 

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro unharmed after an assassination attemp by drones pic.twitter.com/AMBZTEu6An

— China Xinhua News (@XHNews) August 5, 2018

Earlier this year, Houthi rebels used an explosive-packed drone to target Yemen’s military leaders at an army parade. 

The moment Houthi suicide drone exploding above the dias of the Saudi backed Yemeni army parade: pic.twitter.com/qhjH1RkG2J

— Carl Zha (@CarlZha) January 10, 2019

Then over the weekend, a highly disruptive small drone attack, claimed by the Houthi rebels, knocked out 5.7 million barrels per day (bpd) of total Saudi oil output, which equates to about half of their production – causing oil prices across the world to spike. 

Massive fires at 2 Saudi Aramco oil facilities caused by drone attacks – Riyadhhttps://t.co/HRA4TpGP8Tpic.twitter.com/ljc5AC7aMI

— RT (@RT_com) September 14, 2019

All of these incidents prove that the rapid proliferation of small drones on the modern battlefields and across the world have created a significant defense gap that companies, corporations, and militaries are rushing to fix. The solution could be the BLADE. 

Authored by Minxin Pei via Project Syndicate,

On October 1, to mark the 70th anniversary of the People’s Republic, Chinese President Xi Jinping will deliver a speech that unreservedly celebrates the Communist Party of China’s record since 1949. But, despite Xi’s apparent confidence and optimism, the CPC’s rank and file are increasingly concerned about the regime’s future prospects – with good reason.

In 2012, when Xi took the reins of the CPC, he promised that the Party would strive to deliver great successes in advance of two upcoming centennials, marking the founding of the CPC in 1921 and the People’s Republic. But a persistent economic slowdown and rising tensions with the United States will likely sour the CPC’s mood during the 2021 celebrations. And the one-party regime may not even survive until 2049.

While there is technically no time limit on dictatorship, the CPC is approaching the longevity frontier for one-party regimes. Mexico’s Institutional Revolutionary Party retained power for 71 years (1929-2000); the Communist Party of the Soviet Union ruled for 74 years (1917-1991); and Taiwan’s Kuomintang held on for 73 years (from 1927 to 1949 on the mainland and from 1949 to 2000 in Taiwan). The North Korean regime, a Stalinist family dynasty that has ruled for 71 years, is China’s only contemporary competition.

But historical patterns are not the only reason the CPC has to be worried. The conditions that enabled the regime to recover from the self-inflicted disasters of Maoism and to prosper over the last four decades have largely been replaced by a less favorable – and in some senses more hostile – environment.

The greatest threat to the Party’s long-term survival lies in the unfolding cold war with the US. During most of the post-Mao era, China’s leaders kept a low profile on the international stage, painstakingly avoiding conflict while building strength at home. But by 2010, China had become an economic powerhouse, pursuing an increasingly muscular foreign policy. This drew the ire of the US, which began gradually to shift from a policy of engagement toward the confrontational approach evident today.

With its superior military capabilities, technology, economic efficiency, and alliance networks (which remain robust, despite President Donald Trump’s destructive leadership), the US is far more likely to prevail in the Sino-American cold war than China. Though an American victory could be Pyrrhic, it would more than likely seal the CPC’s fate.

The CPC also faces strong economic headwinds. The so-called Chinese miracle was fueled by a large and youthful labor force, rapid urbanization, large-scale infrastructure investment, market liberalization, and globalization – all factors that have either diminished or disappeared.

Radical reforms – in particular, the privatization of inefficient state-owned enterprises (SOEs) and the end of neo-mercantilist trading practices – could sustain growth. But, despite paying lip service to further market reforms, the CPC has been reluctant to implement them, instead clinging to policies that favor SOEs at the expense of private entrepreneurs. Because the state-owned sector forms the economic foundation of one-party rule, the prospect that CPC leaders will suddenly embrace radical economic reform is dim.

Domestic political trends are similarly worrying. Under Xi, the CPC has abandoned the pragmatism, ideological flexibility, and collective leadership that served it so well in the past. With the Party’s neo-Maoist turn – including strict ideological conformity, rigid organizational discipline, and fear-based strongman rule – the risks of catastrophic policy mistakes are rising.

To be sure, the CPC will not go down without a fight. As its grip on power weakens, it will probably attempt to stoke nationalism among its supporters, while intensifying repression of its opponents.

But this strategy cannot save China’s one-party regime. While nationalism may boost support for the CPC in the short term, its energy will eventually dissipate, especially if the Party fails to deliver continued improvement in living standards. And a regime that is dependent on coercion and violence will pay dearly in the form of depressed economic activity, rising popular resistance, escalating security costs, and international isolation.

This is hardly the uplifting picture Xi will present to the Chinese people on October 1. But no amount of nationalist posturing can change the fact that the unraveling of the CPC’s rule appears closer than at any time since the end of the Mao era.

Climate activist parents are freaking out their kids, according to a group of psychologists working with the University of Bath – who say they are receiving a growing number of cases in which children are ‘terrified’ of climate catastrophe and have “eco-anxiety.” 

According to The Telegraph, “Protests by groups such as Extinction Rebellion, the recent fires in the Amazon and apocalyptic warnings by the teenage activist Greta Thunberg have prompted a “tsunami” of young people seeking help.

A group of psychologists working with the University of Bath says it is receiving a growing volume of enquiries from teachers, doctors and therapists unable to cope.

The Climate Psychology Alliance (CPA) told The Daily Telegraph some children complaining of eco-anxiety have even been given psychiatric drugs.

The body is campaigning for anxiety specifically caused by fear for the future of the planet to be recognised as a psychological phenomenon.

However, they do not want it classed as a mental illness because, unlike standard anxiety, the cause of the worry is “rational”. –The Telegraph

“A lot of parents are coming into therapy asking for help with the children and it has escalated a lot this summer,” said Bath teaching fellow and CPA executive Caroline Hickman. 

The symptoms are the same [as clinical anxiety], the feelings are the same, but the cause is different,” she added. “The fear is of environmental doom – that we’re all going to die.”

The report specifically cites 16-year-old climate activist Greta Thunberg, who made headlines this year in her support for Extinction Rebellion – the group which aims to raise climate awareness through “die-ins” and mock funerals for the future of humanity. 

“Thurnberg argues that the EU must cut its carbon emissions by 80 per cent by 2030 to avoid an existential crisis – double the target set by the Paris Accord – while Extinction Rebellion demands the UK achieve net-zero emissions by 2025,” according to the Telegraph. 

“Parents need to find some words to talk about it that is age-appropriate and not terrifying,” said Hickman. 

“You need to separate what is fact from what is unknown: tell them some species are going extinct and some humans are being harmed, but don’t say we’re all going to die, because that isn’t true. What you don’t want is that child to collapse in a well of depression saying “what’s the point in going to university,” or “what’s the point of doing my exams”, which I have heard children say.”

CPA recommends parents use a four-stage approach to explain climate change to their children without causing “eco-anxiety.” 

Parents should first gradually introduce them to the known facts, then ask them how they feel, before acknowledging that the ultimate outcome is uncertain.

Finally, parents should agree practical steps to make a difference, such as by cutting down on non-recyclable waste and choosing food with a better climate footprint. –The Telegraph

Maybe you can ease childrens’ eco-anxiety by telling them not to worry; everyone they know, or have ever known, or will ever know is going to die someday – including them. 

Authored by Martin Armstrong via ArmstrongEconomics.com,

I have heard what I thought was every excuse for governments to raise taxes and seize money, but this is one I quite honestly thought was something too low for even the police.

New South Wales police have come up with the most bizarre excuse to rob your money I have ever heard of. They now claim that driver safety is the main reason for this new initiative to confiscate whatever coins you have in your car. They have the audacity to claim that “Loose coins within cars are a safety hazard.” (see Double Bay Today)

They claim that a driver may perhaps bend down to pick up a coin and get into an accident. What’s next? They confiscate your phone and then sell it back to you after you are done the driving?

Australia has become perhaps the MOST aggressive country in Western Culture to hunt down its own citizens for money. They follow school children and then investigate how the parents are paying for the school. The Australian Tax Office (ATO) has applied for access to everything to hunt for money. They want access to phone calls, emails, posts, and SMS text messages.

Australians could face two-year jail sentences and fines of up to $25,200 under proposed laws that limit the use of cash to $10,000 — a move some groups argue would create an Orwellian state by giving authorities greater control over people’s finances. The government’s slogan – Cash is for Criminals. Thus was hidden in the 2018 Australian Government budget claiming it would save $5.3 billion by banning cash payments of $10,000 or more. Australian Treasurer Scott Morrison said it was a crackdown on the black economy.

Instead of reform, they are reforming ways to hunt their own citizens. Australia began as a penal colony. The king needed money so just about anything you did from stealing an apple to any minor issue landed you not in prison, but they would sell you to a plantation for 5 years and transport you to a foreign land and leave you there. If they could torture you and get you to confess to one of 240 felonies, they carried the death penalty where the king could confiscate all your assets and throw your family out on the street. Prisoners would die under torture to save their families.

The King is Dead – Long Live The Tax Extortioner

We actually owe the Fifth Amendment and the right to remain silent to John Lilburne (1614 – 1657). He defended himself vigorously in court, quoting from the works of the great jurist Sir Edward Coke (1552-1634) whose work the Institutes was the seminal statement of English law.

The Miranda decision by the Supreme Court quoted this right to remain silent enshrined in the Constitution of the United States known as the Fifth Amendment right against compelled Self-Incrimination. Lilburn proudly declared:

“Another fundamental right I then contended for, was, that no man’s conscience ought to be racked by oaths imposed, to answer to questions concerning himself in matters criminal or pretended to be so.”

Governments have made so many promises to win votes that they cannot keep. When in danger of being exposed, they turn on their own citizens and hunt them down for money. This is how Empires, Nations, and city-states collapse into dust.

Earlier this month, we reported how Gov. Larry Hogan pledged $21 million to assist Baltimore City in their efforts to stop the spread of the murder crisis. Hogan also endorsed the use of a controversial surveillance plane program that would fly thousands of feet above to record every movement of people and vehicles in the city.

Now The Baltimore Sun is reporting that three spy planes could soon be flying overhead, in a $6.6 million surveillance program that would be entirely funded by outside donors for three years. 

The Sun obtained emails from Ross McNutt of Ohio-based Persistent Surveillance Systems and officials in Mayor Bernard C. “Jack” Young’s office that expressed support in the program. 

Each plane has sensors that can monitor up to 32 square miles at a time, and each would fly 45 to 50 hours a week, McNutt said. 

“With these three coverage areas, we would be able to cover areas that include 80 to 90 percent of the murders and shootings in Baltimore,” McNutt wrote in an email last month to Sheryl Goldstein, Young’s deputy chief of staff.

As early as 2015, we reported that Persistent Surveillance Systems was flying a Cessna 182T Skylane over the streets of Baltimore during the riots. It turned out the plane was a secret FBI aerial surveillance program.

In a follow-up piece, “Meet The FBI’s Secret Eye In The Sky Overseeing The Baltimore Riots,” we postulated that the spy plane monitoring the riots may have been equipped with night vision equipment provided by Persistent Surveillance Systems, a company which has worked with the Baltimore Police Department in the past. Here’s a schematic (via WaPo):

The funding for the $6.6 million surveillance program would be covered by Texas philanthropists Laura and John Arnold, who also funded the 2016 pilot program. 

“While we have not formally committed to additional funding, we have expressed significant interest in a proposal to restart the program if it has support from Baltimore city leaders and the broader community,” John Arnold said. “We will wait to see a formal proposal before making a firm commitment.”

Police Commissioner Michael Harrison met with McNutt last month about the spy planes – no decision on the program has been made.

Council President Brandon Scott has been a supporter of the program but has mentioned that when the plane flew in 2016 – there was no meaningful evidence that it reduced murders.

As we noted several weeks ago, Baltimore is on track for record homicides this year, expected to surpass the 300th mark in the near term.

Supporters of the spy plane program “see it as the best thing for Baltimore, and they don’t want to see Baltimore miss out on this opportunity,” McNutt said. “It’s personal to them.”

Millie Brown, the founder of Tears of a Mother’s Cry, an organization that supports mothers who have lost children to gun violence, said she is “110 percent behind” McNutt’s spy plane program.

“Having the eye in the sky is a no-brainer with all of the bloodshed that we have in our city. We have someone that’s offered to pay for it,” Brown said. “There are so many murders and robberies that could have been solved if we would have had that plane up in the sky.”

David Rocah, a senior staff attorney at the ACLU of Maryland, warned against the return of the spy plane program. 

“What was one plane is now three, and the coverage is, instead of half the city, the entire city, and the duration of surveillance is now the entirety of the daylight hours, essentially,” he said. “What is being created is the permanent surveillance of everywhere that everyone in Baltimore goes every time they walk out the door. That has always been the design and intent and this further clarifies it. And that is something that simply should never be done in a free country, period.”

Earlier this month Rocah condemned McNutt’s lobbying effort.

“It’s being pushed by people outside of Baltimore,” Rocah said. “It’s a cynical attempt to use the failings of public safety in Baltimore as a government power grab. There’s nothing more despicable than that.”

The possible resurrection of the spy plane program, and the tripling of its size, comes as the city is imploding on itself, suffering from a murders crisis, opioid epidemic, a wide gap in wealth/health/education inequalities, and deindustrialization. 

We said this earlier this month, and we’ll repeat it for the second or third time: “There’s no meaningful policy in place to turn Baltimore around in the next decade. So in the meantime, if you value your life, stay away from Baltimore.”