Tag: finance

Authored by Rob Slane via TheBlogMire.com,

Read Part1: The Year We Lost The Plot here…

Read Part 2: The Year We Let Ourselves Be Infantilised And Dehumanised here…

Read Part 3: The Year We Sold Our Liberties For A Medical Tyranny here…

It is a curious fact that the Bible contains the phrase “Fear not” many times, whereas the word “nice” is never used (except of course in some of the really marshmallowy modern translations). Some websites tell us that we are exhorted not to fear 365 times, which would be lovely for someone making a book titled, “Round the year with no fear” – but alas it is not so. There aren’t 365. Nevertheless, however many times the phrase or sentiment is used, it is precisely that number more than the number of times the exhortation to be nice is used.

Yet, you’d hardly know it to look at the state of many churches at the moment. There seems to be an overwhelming emphasis on being “nice”, which generally means never saying anything provocative or dangerous or which could be seen as being judgemental. Yet when along came a virus, fear seemed to be in plenteous supply.

I must admit to being more than a little stunned by the reaction of many churches this year. Whatever calamities befall us in life, Christians are exhorted to overcome by seeing them as a “light momentary affliction,” which is “preparing for us an eternal weight of glory beyond all comparison.” (2 Corinthians 4:17). This does not mean never fearing. Rather, it means that we are to overcome that fear through faith. So in Psalm 91, the Psalmist can say:

“You will not fear the terror of the night, nor the arrow that flies by day, nor the pestilence that stalks in darkness, nor the destruction that wastes at noonday.”

And he says this not because he’s a stoic, but because he’s just said this:

“I will say to the Lord, “My refuge and my fortress, my God, in whom I trust.”

True belief in the death, resurrection and ascension of Jesus Christ is supposed to equip the Christian to overcome fear. Yet it has seemed to me that the reaction of much of the church to a coronavirus with an Infection Fatality Rate of around 0.2% – 0.26%, has really been no different to that of the non-Christian. What could have been a glorious time for the church to shine, with national leaders exhorting the nation to repent, exhorting people to overcome their fears by embracing the Gospel of the death, resurrection and ascension of Christ, became a non-event.

But this is not the half of it. Fear of the virus has shaped the way many have responded to the most astonishing powers over churches for eight centuries. You have to go back to 1208 to see such a closure of churches, which was done by a Papal Interdict (interestingly enough on 23rd March – the same day as Lockdown began) which lasted for six years.

Not quite six years this time, but a third of a year no less! And no, the state did not close churches during the Spanish Flu, yet when a virus of less than a tenth the lethality of Spanish Flu came on the scene (and far, far less than this for under 60s), the church largely rolled over. What was most incredible, was the lack of crying out to God for deliverance. And here it matters not whether people thought the Plague had come to town, or that the reaction to the virus was massively disproportionate, the response should have been the same: much anguished and fervent prayer for deliverance, which is the pattern set out in Scripture, and is how our ancestors would have reacted.

I understand there may have been nervousness back in March, when some feared we were about to see a sort of Plague coming our way. However, at the very least the churches could have said to the Government, “Okay, you’ve said three weeks and we’ll hold you to that. But if you cannot come up with an evidence-based justification as to how opening churches and letting healthy people gather together is detrimental, we’re going to defy you and do it anyway.”

Defiance? Hardly! Not only do the majority of the churches in the country seem to think the state has absolute jurisdiction over the church (it doesn’t), but they have allowed it to reshape the way they worship, including singing, the covering of faces with bits of cloth, and the ceasing of physical gatherings and physical fellowship. The irony of course is that this is done ostensibly in obedience to God, yet the Bible commands us to worship God together physically (Hebrews 10:25); to cultivate fellowship together physically (Acts 2:42); and to sing loudly (eg. Psalm 47:1).

Many churches have kidded themselves that this can all be done remotely, over Zoom. Well, no. If God says we are to gather physically together, sing together, and have close fellowship together, it’s very likely that if these things are not done for months on end, you are going to find churches emptying and fraying at the seams. Furthermore, many of the things which have been foisted on us by state diktat have amazingly been turned into expressions of how we are to love our neighbour. Take masks. Back in March the state told us repeatedly not to wear them. Then in July, when the epidemic was over, they told us to wear them. And many in the church not only went along with this unscientific drivel, but the likes of the Archbishop of Canterbury turned it into an expression of how we are to love one another. Before 2020, the idea that a state mandate could be connected with Christian love would have seemed faintly absurd. But it it seems that Government has now acquired the Power of Love, to add to its many other astonishing powers!

2020 has exposed a feebleness and a hollowness at the heart of many churches, as well as a lack of proper theological framework with which to look at the whole Covid situation and frame a response to it. Instead, many churches have let the likes of Johnson, Hancock, Whitty and Vallance do their thinking for them, implementing whatever hairbrained schemes these people come up with to perpetuate the fear and hysteria which they have stoked up all year long. I suspect that many of those same churches will be wringing their hands next year, as the policies they failed to challenge throughout this year come to home to roost and we see untold misery coming upon millions, with the poorest suffering most.

The result of all this is that the church is being decimated, and the watching world has not exactly been given a wonderful lesson about how faith in the King of Kings and Lord of Lords can help us become “more than conquerors”. If the church is to recover from this – which I have no doubt it will in time – a lot of very serious questions need to be asked, followed by repentance, followed by a massive work of reformation.

The feebleness must go. The hollowness must go. The niceness must go. The paltry theology must go. The marshmallow must go.

None of what I’ve said above is nice. Then again, it wasn’t meant to be. But it was necessary.

There is potential for conspiracy gold in a 2018 patent filed by aerospace engineer Dr. Salvatore Cezar Pais, who works for the Naval Air Warfare Center Aircraft Division, a research organization within the Navy that specializes in electromagnetic drives and superconductors. 

The patent (US10144532B2) describes “a craft using an inertial mass reduction device comprises of an inner resonant cavity wall, an outer resonant cavity, and microwave emitters. The electrically charged outer resonant cavity wall and the electrically insulated inner resonant cavity wall form a resonant cavity. The microwave emitters create high-frequency electromagnetic waves throughout the resonant cavity causing the resonant cavity to vibrate in an accelerated mode and create a local polarized vacuum outside the outer resonant cavity wall.” 

The shape of this plane is one that resembles a flying triangle. 

In August of 2019, The Drive filed Freedom of Information Act requests with the Navy to shed more light on the patent. While it’s still unknown if those requests have been answered, further investigation through the U.S. Patent and Trademark Office’s (USPTO) Public Patent Application Information Retrieval database revealed that superconductors and the electromagnetic field generator, may in fact, already be in operation in some manner.

If the technologies described in the patent are already operational, does this mean the Navy is building UFOs?

Authored by Eric Zuesse via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

Some of the top owners of America’s President-Elect Joe Biden are entirely secret because a corrupt U.S. Supreme Court, in the infamous 2010 Citizens United case, encouraged not only corruption but corruption that’s entirely secret or “dark money.” 

However, most of the individuals who purchased Biden to become the U.S. President did so under the previously existing laws, which require public reporting of their donations.

Here, then, are the top ten publicly known donors to the Biden campaign, but these are all via some sort of Political Action Committee or PAC, and therefore most are in conjunction with other billionaires and centi-millionaires, instead of entirely solo donations:

Top Contributors, federal election data for Joe Biden, 2020 cycle

totals include subsidiaries and affiliates.

1. Bloomberg LP [Michael Bloomberg] $56,796,137

2. Future Forward USA [largely Dustin Moskowitz] $29,917,229

3. Priorities USA/Priorities USA Action [Hillary backers] $25,841,199

4. Asana  [Moskowitz & Rosenstein] $21,937,902

5. Sixteen Thirty Fund [dark money] $19,874,655

6. Democracy PAC [George Soros] $19,000,000

7. Senate Majority PAC [Democratic billionaires] $12,371,874

8. American Bridge 21st Century [largely Soros] $10,260,573

9. Paloma Partners [Donald Sussman] $9,016,248

10. Euclidean Capital [James Simons] $7,006,805

Source: OpenSecrets

The 11th-largest (which will now be shown) happens to be not Democratic billionaires but Republican billionaires. However, Michael Bloomberg, the former Republican Mayor of NYC, was Biden’s largest donor, and therefore could also be considered to be a Republican donor to Biden’s campaign.

Defending Democracy Together [Republican billionaires] $6,776,862

In other words: the distinction between Republican billionaires and Democratic billionaires is no longer quite clear. Although the manicured PR for each of the two major Parties accentuates the ideological differences between the two, those differences have greatly decreased, except that on the U.S. Supreme Court the Republican ‘Justices’ are far-right (extremist conservatives) whereas the Democratic ‘Justices’ are centrist (liberals). None are, at all, progressives. Progressives don’t exist on that Court. The numbers and natures of that Court’s unanimous decisions make clear that no leftist jurist (progressive or otherwise) sits there. Whereas some billionaires are centrist and others are far-right, none are any sort of leftist. Nor does any leftist candidate for national political office receive any donation from any billionaire but only from poor and middle-class donors. Both of America’s Parties represent mainly the interests of billionaires, and this has been documented in the only scientific studies that have been done of the subject. America is an aristocracy not a democracy.

In addition to those and other donations that were made either entirely or mainly by particular billionaires, Biden’s campaign utilized “bundlers,” or well-connected wealthy individuals who invited other well-connected wealthy individuals to their private fund-raising parties for Biden’s campaign; and the list that the Biden campaign assembled of all its bundlers who raised at least $100,000 for the campaign will be presented here.

However, first will be noted the hostile reader-comments reactions when the early version of this list – which then was of bundlers who had raised at least $25,000 for the campaign – was made public at the Democratic Party website which is written and run by Taegan Goddard, “Political Wire,” which headlined on 27 December 2019, prior even to the earliest of all the state primaries and caucuses, “Biden Discloses His Bundlers”, and the 36 reader-comments there were overwhelmingly hostile, such as “Gee Taegan, could you make it seem any more suspicious and improper?” 

Those readers were angry that a Democratic Party news-site would publish an indication that their Party utilizes the same corrupt practices that the Republican billionaires’ Party does. They weren’t grateful for the non-partisan information they had just received, but wanted it not to have been made public. No other news-site did publish it — only Goddard’s site did.

And, when, at the end of all of the campaigns the Biden organization issued its legally obligatory final financial reports, on 1 November 2020, neither Goddard nor any other news-site published it: “Once burned, twice shy,” and Goddard didn’t want to get “burned” again.

*  *  *

On 27 November 2007, C-Span showed a Joe Biden Town Hall. A brief clip from that was posted online as “User Clip: Joe Biden 2007, Money in Politics”, and here’s my transcription from what I consider to be the most revealing (about Biden’s values) part of it:

Source: c-span.org

27 November 2007, Iowa Town Hall

(0:40-) “People who accept money [from lobbyists] aren’t bad people. But it’s human nature. You go out and bundle $250,000 for me, all legal, and then you call me after I am elected, and say “I would like to come and talk about something.” You didn’t buy me, but it’s human nature, you helped me. I’m going to say, “Sure, come on in.” … What it does mean, it means that the front of the line is always filled by people whose pockets are filled, people who are special interests. Most of you are no part of any special interest.”

He went on there to promise that if elected President he will change that, by campaigning constantly (AFTER winning the Presidency — not BEFORE) against the corrupt system which had made him President. He thinks that his audience will believe in the tooth-fairy, if only he tells them that the tooth-fairy exists and that he’s it. The deceptive irrelevant line from all of the corrupt candidates is the same: “I’m the most electable one!” But corrupt people constantly lie, and nobody is actually certain whom the “most electable” one is; but that’s really not even the question here. What the Democratic primaries are actually about isn’t about beating Trump. He’s not even a candidate in the Democratic primaries. They’re not about ‘beating Donald Trump’, but instead about whom the person will be that’s going to be running against Trump in the general election. The primaries won’t be selecting the next President. They will only narrow the field of contenders, to two. Which two? That’s the question here.

Of course, lots of Democrats think that any Democrat will be better than Trump. And lots of Republicans believe that Trump is better than any Democrat.

Biden was talking there regarding not the billionaires but the merely wealthy and well-connected individuals who had raised in the hundreds of thousands of dollars for him — each one of them.

The billionaires aren’t in “the front of the line,” nor even in any “line”; they are instead maybe visitors for private meetings with the President, or else on the phone with him, or else (if the matter is illegal) maybe sending one’s private agent to meet privately with that billionaire’s private agent. This is how the business of the U.S. Government — the business of America’s ‘democracy’ — is getting done, nowadays. My own guess is that the two biggest owners of Joe Biden now are Michael Bloomberg (representing mainly the financial industries or “Wall Street”) and Bernard Schwartz (representing mainly the military industries or “MIC”).

As for any mere voter, that person gets his or her ‘news’ from corporations that are owned by and/or serve the billionaires (such as Bloomberg or Schwartz or Bezos or Musk or etc.), and gets his or her views from that ‘news’, so is less than being a pawn on the American chessboard, where that aristocracy are  the ‘king’. The country is jointly controlled by the Republican billionaires and the Democratic billionaires.

A reasonable expectation would be that Biden will serve the billionaires, though his rhetoric will be phrased to be acceptable to the voters. So, that will be no basic change. America will remain an aristocracy, no democracy.

For the first time ever, microplastic particles were detected in the placentas of unborn babies, according to researchers who warn these “potentially harmful (plastic) particles is a matter of great concern.”

The study, published in the journal Environment International and titled “Plasticenta: First evidence of microplastics in human placenta,” found microplastics in four placentas of women who had pregnancies and births. 

Researchers noted microplastics were found on both the fetal and maternal sides of the placenta and in the membrane within which the fetus develops.

A dozen plastic particles were found in the four placentas, mostly 10 microns in size (0.01mm), meaning they were small enough to travel through the bloodstream and were analyzed to have come originally from packaging paints or polymers and personal care products.

“In total, 12 microplastic fragments (ranging from 5 to 10 μm in size), with spheric or irregular shape were found in 4 placentas (5 in the fetal side, 4 in the maternal side and 3 in the chorioamniotic membranes); all microplastics particles were characterized in terms of morphology and chemical composition. All of them were pigmented; three were identified as stained polypropylene a thermoplastic polymer, while for the other nine it was possible to identify only the pigments, which were all used for man-made coatings, paints, adhesives, plasters, finger paints, polymers and cosmetics and personal care products.”

Antonio Ragusa, director of obstetrics and gynecology at the San Giovanni Calibita Fatebenefratelli hospital in Rome who led the study, told The Guardian that “it’s like having a cyborg baby: no longer composed only of human cells, but a mixture of biological and inorganic entities.”

Researchers concluded: 

“Due to the crucial role of the placenta in supporting the fetus’ development and in acting as an interface with the external environment, the presence of potentially harmful plastic particles is a matter of great concern. Further studies need to be performed to assess if the presence of microplastics may trigger immune responses or may lead to the release of toxic contaminants, resulting in harm.”

In August 2019, high levels of microplastics were found in the Alps to the Arctic. Another report has shown these harmful plastics were turning up in human stool. 

What’s clear is that the world could have a plastic problem where babies are born pre-polluted. Still, more studies need to be conducted to prove nanoparticles of plastic are dangerous for humans. 

Authored by Alexander Rubinstein & Jeb Sprague via The GrayZone.com,

The longest piece of legislation in United States history, containing both a coronavirus relief package and the annual omnibus spending package, quickly passed through Congress on December 22, with little opposition. While technically separate bills, the omnibus and stimulus were debated and passed together, at the same time.

The massive piece of legislation – a staggering 5,593 pages in length – lays bare the priorities of the US government, prioritizing regime change in foreign nations and the imperatives of empire over the basic needs of Americans. In just a few hours, it passed through the House of Representatives by 359-53, and through the Senate by 92-6.

While the US public was forced to grovel for months for a $600 direct payment, the same piece of legislation pumps billions of dollars into “democracy programs” – US government code for regime-change operations via civil society NGOs – and foreign military assistance. The measly $600 survival checks pale in comparison to the massive foreign spending on regime change and titanic allocations to prop up US-friendly authoritarian militaries.

On so-called “Democracy Programs” alone, the legislation appropriates $2.417 billion, and $6.175 billion on the “Foreign Military Financing Program.” Another $112.9 million is appropriated for “International Military Education and Training.”

$6 billion more is allocated toward the domestic procurement of US Air Force missiles and US Navy weapons of war. This is in addition to the $740 billion defense bill passed earlier in December.

By contrast, the stimulus package comes at a value of $900 billion, with the largest portion devoted to business bailouts. The Federal News Network reports that the $1.4 trillion omnibus includes $671.5 billion allocated to “base defense spending,” with another $77 billion going to “overseas contingency operations.”

Stimulating regime change and intervening in the Global South

The legislation stipulates: “$300,000,000 shall be made available for a Countering Chinese Influence Fund to counter the malign influence of the Government of the People’s Republic of China and the Chinese Communist Party and entities acting on their behalf globally.”

In Hong Kong, where CIA cutout the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) has given financial support to activist groups leading riots that rocked the city for months on end, the United States is now devoting $3 million for local destabilization efforts, including “internet freedom,” activists’ legal fees, and “democracy programs.”

Similarly, the legislation devotes $8 million to NGOs for activities in Tibet or to support the Tibetan government-in-exile. It appears that, every fiscal year between 2021 and 2025, it allows for the additional appropriation of $8 million per year to support Tibetan communities in Tibet, as well as $6 million per year to support them in Nepal and India, and another $3 million per year for “Tibetan governance.”

The bill also allocates $3.3 million for the US government-backed media outlet Voice of America, and $4 million to the similarly operated Radio Free Asia every year between fiscal years 2021 and 2025, in order “to provide uncensored news and information in the Tibetan language to Tibetans, including Tibetans in Tibet.”

In perhaps the most bizarre appeal to a regime-change activist lobby, an entire section of the bill is devoted to defining US policy “regarding the succession or reincarnation of the Dalai Lama.”

The bill also directs the secretary of state to establish a US consulate in Tibet.

Meanwhile, aid to a number of countries is conditioned on their taking part in Washington’s economic aggression. For example, $85.5 million in assistance to Cambodia is contingent on it “taking effective steps” to enforce “international sanctions with respect to North Korea,” and “assert[ing] its sovereignty against interference by the People’s Republic of China.”

As for Latin America, the legislation stipulates that “not less than $33,000,000 shall be made available for democracy programs for Venezuela.” By contrast, the legislation appropriates $461.3 million for Colombia, a country which has seen massacre after massacre and scores of political assassinations — with more than 290 human rights activists killed in 2020 alone.

While 20 percent of the funds are not releasable until Colombia shows it is “taking effective steps to hold accountable perpetrators of gross violations of human rights in a manner consistent with international law,” given Washington’s record in the country, it will likely give the green light regardless of the facts on the ground.

Globally, $70 million is made available to support “internet freedom,” with an additional $2.5 million potentially available “to surge Internet freedom programs in closed societies.”

Meanwhile, a Ronald Reagan-inspired program aimed at expanding US influence and the “war on drugs” in the Caribbean, the Caribbean Basin Security Initiative, is being given a $74.8 million injection.

The combined Corona Package/Omnibus includes $74m for the Caribbean Basin Security Initiative.

The CBSI w/its roots in the Reagan founded CBI is an important mechanism for the “war on drugs” & gains US influence in security agencies across the region.

Pg.184 of my recent book: pic.twitter.com/4CP8Lnfm8v

— Jeb Sprague (@JebSprague) December 22, 2020

In Zimbabwe, where former President Robert Mugabe passed away in 2017, the government is still not off the hook. The legislation states: “The Secretary of the Treasury shall instruct the United States executive director of each international financial institution to vote against any extension by the respective institution of any loan or grant to the Government of Zimbabwe.” This language is aimed at depriving the cash-strapped African nation of international relief.

$15 million is going toward “democracy programs” in South Sudan, while $60m is being repurposed away from the “Global War on Terrorism” and “made available for assistance for Sudan”.

In central Africa, $325 million is being earmarked for assistance to Congo, with some part of this appearing to be intermingled with “peacekeeping” operations.

The phantom Russian menace

With $453 million appropriated for assistance to Ukraine, $290 million for “countering Russia,” $173 million for NATO, and $132 million for NATO ally Georgia, the legislation comes close to appropriating a billion dollars toward new cold war policies against Moscow.

The rationale for this spending may be the re-emergence of an old menace; a hint buried more than 5,000 pages into the document states that it is US policy “to not recognize any incorporation of Belarus into a ‘Union State’ with Russia, since this so-called ‘Union State’ would be both an attempt to absorb Belarus and a step to reconstituting the totalitarian Soviet Union.”

In one striking example of how hell-bent the legislation’s authors are on regime change and confronting Russia, the following phrase appears verbatim nine times: “The Government of Belarus, led illegally by Alyaksandr Lukashenka.”

The legislation also demands a report from the director of national intelligence, the secretary of state, and the secretary of treasury that identifies all of Lukashenka’s assets and those of his family, plus “identification of the most significant senior foreign political figures in Belarus, as determined by their closeness to Alyaksandr Lukashenka.”

The insistence on such information seems aimed at fast-tracking a list of entities to impose sanctions, in an effort to destabilize the country and make it ripe for a takeover by the US- and EU-backed opposition leader Svetlana Tikhanovskay, whose name appears six times in the legislation.

Along with detailed attention on cyber activities in Belarus, the bill explains how US officials will put together a comprehensive strategy and cost estimate for carrying out various operations aimed at the country, one of which includes: “Expand independent radio, television, live stream, and social network broadcasting and communications in Belarus to provide news and information, particularly in the Belarusian language, that is credible, comprehensive, and accurate.”

Middle East madness

As the incoming administration of President-elect Joe Biden has promised not to condition aid to Israel in any circumstance, including potential annexation of the West Bank, Congress has rushed to pump the apartheid regime full of fresh cash.

Of the $6.1 billion appropriated for funding foreign militaries, a whopping $3.3 billion – more than half – “shall be available for grants only for Israel,” and must be “disbursed within 30 days of enactment of this Act.”

Additionally, it appears that $500 million is appropriated for “Israeli Cooperative Programs,” which includes weapons procurements.

While it is difficult to interpret different allocations and far-distanced portions of the legislation going to the same target, one thing is clear: loads of money has been appropriated to a far-away apartheid state, as Americans remain unprotected from rent-related water shutoffs under the legislation.

Meanwhile, any aid to the Palestinian Authority will be held up if its officials initiate or support any kind of investigation at the International Criminal Court (ICC) that seeks the prosecution of Israeli nationals for crimes against humanity.

In neighboring Syria, which has been constantly bombed by Israel since the outbreak of the foreign-backed proxy war against the country’s government, Congress has appropriated $40 million toward” non-lethal stabilization” – in other words, destabilization assistance.

While the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) has largely been defeated, $710 million to counter the group remains “available until September 30, 2022”.

Iran, meanwhile, is mentioned 22 times in the legislation.

The ‘”Afghanistan Security Forces Fund” of $3 billion will “remain available until September 30, 2022,” and is geared toward the “security forces of Afghanistan, including the provision of equipment, supplies, services, training, facility and infrastructure repair, renovation, construction, and funding…”

The legislation also appropriates $250 million to reimburse the governments of Jordan, Lebanon, Egypt, Tunisia, and Oman on border security spending, with $150 million going to Jordan, a geostrategic lynchpin that shares a borders with Iraq, Israel, Syria, Saudi Arabia, and the Palestinian West Bank.

Another $241.4 million of appropriations through the “Department of State, foreign operations, and related programs” will be made “available for assistance to Tunisia.”

Egypt’s military, notorious for its repressive crackdowns on dissent, is due to receive a colossal $1.3 billion, according to the guidelines established in the Camp David Accords.

While US citizens continue to suffer the economic fallout of haphazard government shutdowns that have been largely ineffective in dealing with the coronavirus pandemic, Congress poised passed a greatly reduced stimulus packaged alongside a massive handout to corporate America and its foreign client states.

Now it is up to the outgoing president – ironically notorious for his ‘America First’ rhetoric – to sign the legislation into law. Reports indicate he intends to do just that.

As Deutsche Bank’s chief credit strateigst, Jim Reid, writes, “central banks have driven us here and in turn have also driven Bitcoin to the spectacular year.”

It’s also why in an addendum to his latest monthly survey, Reid explicitly asked Deutsche Bank’s clients around the globe where they thought bitcoin would end 2021.

Here are the answers: a vast majority think it goes higher with only 27% thinking under $20,000 in 12 months. 41% think between $20-49,999 in various buckets with 12% thinking over $100,000.

On an average basis, survey respondents think it will be over $40,000 by then, nearly double current levels.

Authored by Alex Murashko via The Epoch Times,

Cities throughout Orange County, California, are standing by Sheriff Don Barnes as he fights a court order demanding the release of 1,800 prisoners from county jails.

In a Dec 11 court order, Barnes was told to pare down Orange County’s jail population as the centers grapple with rising COVID-19 infections. But the region’s top cop is challenging the order, and refusing to release the inmates.

On Dec. 21, more cities joined a movement to support Barnes’ decision. During special city council meetings, the cities of Irvine, Mission Viejo, and Westminster voted unanimously to file legal briefs supporting Barnes’ challenge. The cities joined Newport Beach and Yorba Linda, which filed briefs on Dec. 18.

“Public safety has always been our top priority,” said Mission Viejo Mayor Brian Goodell in a press release announcing the city’s decision.

“Our City Council wholeheartedly supports Sheriff’s Barnes’ appeal to keep these criminals off our streets and his plan to appropriately respond to coronavirus issues in the jail system.”

Other cities set to hold special meetings on Dec. 21 to discuss the issue included Dana Point, Los Alamitos, and San Clemente.

“The COVID-19 pandemic is serious and presents a risk, but that risk does not outweigh the necessity of holding dangerous offenders in custody,” Barnes said recently. “We cannot start 2021 with a court-ordered crime spree.”

Judge Peter Wilson’s 32-page ruling on Dec. 11 stated that Barnes’ “deliberate indifference to the substantial risk of serious harm from COVID-19 infection to … medically vulnerable people in [his] custody violates their rights under the California Constitution.”

Wilson also stated in the ruling that Barnes’ action and inaction showed “conduct that may unnecessarily expose inmates in his custody to significant risks to their health and safety.”

Opponents to Wilson’s order said the greater safety risk would be to release criminals in jail for crimes such as murder and pedophilia into the general public.

“This is extremely alarming for all of us in any city that we live in,” said Westminster Police Chief Mark Lauderback, who spoke before the council’s vote.

“When you’re being told to release a large number of inmates who should be doing time in serving their sentence, and they are going to be released early, it’s very alarming.”

He called for an effective alternative that would help curb COVID-19 numbers in jail while keeping the public safe.

“Yes, we have a pandemic going on; yes, it is very scary for everybody in the medical field and a society to be living with such a medical nightmare; but doing this without actually taking a look at the consequences of the actions of the judge, I think we need to find a better solution,” Lauderback said.

The Garden Grove City Council also moved to support Barnes.

“If forced to comply with the court order, we are aware you will need to release approximately 1,800 inmates, which both you and the Orange County District Attorney have stated unequivocally poses a significant risk to public safety,” Garden Grove Mayor Steve Jones said in a Dec. 18 letter.

“Specifically, you identified that of the 700 inmates considered medically vulnerable under the Center of Disease Control and Prevention’s Guidelines, 59 inmates are incarcerated for murder, 39 inmates for attempted murder and 90 for child molestation.”

The mayor’s letter said that there have already been significant impacts on public safety related to the release of prisoners by Orange County and the state related to COVID-19. More than 22,000 inmates have been released by the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation since the pandemic began.

“The release of so many prisoners in such a short time frame is straining state and local law enforcement who are not only addressing traditional law enforcement issues but responding to law enforcement issues associated with the pandemic,” Jones wrote.

On Dec. 18, Orange County recorded its first COVID-19-related inmate death when Eddie Lee Anderson, 68, died about a week after testing positive for COVID-19. The Theo Lacy Facility inmate was transferred to a hospital on Dec. 13 for treatment.

According to the Orange County Sheriff’s Department, 1,512 inmates have tested positive for the virus since the beginning of the pandemic. The sheriff’s website indicates that as of Dec. 21 there are currently 835 inmates with the disease.

With apparently little else left to sanction in Syria, the United States is now going after Bashar al-Assad’s wife and even extended family members which have long resided in London.

A Tuesday statement from Secretary of State Mike Pompeo indicated the US is imposing sanctions on Syria first lady Asma al-Assad, blaming her in part for prolonging the war and blocking a peaceful political settlement through her charities and civil society organizations. 

Of course, in Washington-speak “stalling efforts to reach a political resolution” means simply that Bashar Assad has refused to step down and flee the country, which would ultimately put the secular Baath state in the hands of the jihadi fanatics.

Pompeo’s statement specifies that “The Department of State today is imposing sanctions on Asma al-Assad, the wife of Bashar al-Assad, for impeding efforts to promote a political resolution of the Syrian conflict pursuant to Section 2(a)(i)(D) of Executive Order 13894.” It adds that “Asma al-Assad has spearheaded efforts on behalf of the regime to consolidate economic and political power, including by using her so-called charities and civil society organizations.”

Recall that just before the war in Syria got started Asma was widely praised in the West for her beauty and philanthropy, even being profiled in a glowing Vogue magazine piece headlined “A Rose in the Desert” (March 2011). More recently the Syrian first lady has survived breast cancer, and is said to have fully recovered.

Hey, remember when @vogue gushed over Asma Assad, “A Rose in the Desert”? #SyriaStrikes #SyriaAirstrike pic.twitter.com/JizH4yMNmO

— Patrick Poole (@pspoole) April 7, 2017

But the US is now going so far as to sanction members of her family, some of which have lived in England for decades, foremost among them Bashar’s father-in-law, the respected Syrian-English cardiologist Fawaz Akhras: 

“In addition, we are sanctioning several members of Asma al-Assad’s immediate family, including Fawaz Akhras, Sahar Otri Akhras, Firas al Akhras, and Eyad Akhras as per Section 2(a)(ii) of EO 13894. The Assad and Akhras families have accumulated their ill-gotten riches at the expense of the Syrian people through their control over an extensive, illicit network with links in Europe, the Gulf, and elsewhere,” the US statement reads.

Asma’s father has long been a cardiologist at Cromwell Hospital in South Kensington, London along with running a private practice.

The family has been in Britain so long that Asma was born and raised there by her Syrian parents before marrying Bashar.

But now Washington is going after them, apparently blaming even relatives outside of Syria for fueling the war. The irony is tragic and thick, considering just who it is that Washington has been supporting throughout the conflict.

* * *

Meanwhile, in a recent address to Syrian lawmakers in Damascus, President Assad launched into a surprisingly blunt and cogent diatribe against Neoliberalism:

Assad owns the libs: “Liberalism is about turning people into animals”. NATO is using neo-liberalism and a form of subterfuge against eastern nations. We have proof. pic.twitter.com/PAvfERefqo

— Syrian Girl 🎗️🇸🇾 (@Partisangirl) December 21, 2020

Submitted by PlanetFreeWill ,

The COVID spending bill passed Monday allows federal bureaucrats to increase the amount of foreign labor they hired as millions of Americans are jobless due to the economic contractions caused by COVID-19 and government lockdowns.

On top of all the handouts to foreign governments and other waste of taxpayer money, a provision in the 5,593 page bill allows the Department of Homeland Security and Labor Department to “increase the total number of aliens” hired under H-2B foreign visas.

According to the bill, the foreign hiring can take place if the “needs of American businesses cannot be satisfied in fiscal year 2021 with United States workers who are willing, qualified, and able to perform temporary non-agricultural labor.”

As Breitbart’s John Binder highlights, this is could exacerbate the trend of DHS allowing employers to over-hire foreign labor under the H-2B visa program that has been shown to drive down American wages:

DHS Secretaries over the last four years have repeatedly allowed businesses to import more H-2B foreign visa workers above the annual cap of 66,000. Continuation of the policy would come as 24.5 million Americans are unemployed or underemployed. About 17.8 million of those are jobless.

The H-2B visa program has been widely used by businesses to drag down the wages of American workers in landscaping, conservation work, the meatpacking industry, the construction industry, and fishing jobs, a 2019 study from the Center for Immigration Studies finds.

When comparing the wages of H-2B foreign workers to the national wage average for each blue-collar industry, about 21 out of 25 of the industries offered lower wages to foreign workers than Americans.

As shown in the table below, the H-2B foreign labor disproportionately effects the construction, fishing, meatpacking, and plumbing industries:

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, there were 10.7 million Americas unemployed in the month of November.

Perhaps some of the hundreds of millions of dollars being sent to foreign governments to secure their borders could have been allocated to training Americans for the types of jobs that will undoubtedly be replaced by the cheap labor.

But no, that actually would have made this bill a “stimulus package” and not the special interest smorgasbord the American people were handed from the blind signatures of their “representatives.”

1/4 This is the spending bill under consideration in Congress today. I received it just moments ago, and will likely be asked to vote on it late tonight. It’s 5,593 pages long. I know there are some good things in it. I’m equally confident that there are bad things in it. pic.twitter.com/SoWXnEWYfV

— Mike Lee (@SenMikeLee) December 21, 2020

Famed Boston-based pizza reviewer and stock pumper Dave Portnoy has spent the last couple of years reviewing a slice of pizza from mom and pop restaurants. 

Portnoy’s YouTube account called “One Bite Pizza Reviews” has hundreds of videos of him reviewing pizza slices from small shops up and down the East Coast, mainly in the Northeast. 

Even during the pandemic, Portnoy continued the pizza reviews though being on the ground and seeing the first-hand devastation of government lockdowns and restrictions have had on small businesses, more specifically the restaurant industry, forced him to launch a fund to save dying eateries. 

Called the Barstool Fund, more than 31,600 Barstool supporters have raised $2 million and supported three restaurants so far. 

On the Barstool Fund’s website, Portnoy goes on a rant about how “no one in the government seems to care” about small businesses. 

He said the government has “no plan, no relief, no bailout” for mom and pop shops. 

Portnoy said Marcus Lemonis told him, “to put his money where his mouth is,” referring to supporting small business. He said he started the fund, and Barstools will donate $500k. 

Portnoy said his Barstool Fund “isn’t the best plan” – indicating that the “best plan” is for the government to bail out these mom and pop shops before they lose their livelihoods. 

Portnoy lays out a set of rules for restaurants that want to access his fund. One of the major requirements is that they must be paying their employees. From there, he said a deal can be worked out with the shop as to how much money they need every month. 

We assume some of Portnoy’s newly minted stock market millionaire followers on Twitter can spread the wealth to help the cause. 

Fox News’ Tucker Carlson recently interviewed Portnoy about the Barstool Fund. 

As we must remind readers, it’s not the virus pandemic that is killing small businesses, it’s the government enforced lockdowns and restrictions.