Today’s News 15th April 2019

• Turkey And Russia Create A $1 Billion Join Investment Fund

  Turkey’s Hurriyet Daily has confirmed Russia and Turkey have agreed to create a “Russia-Turkey Investment Fund” following President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s visit to Moscow early last week, where he met with President Putin to more broadly discuss technological cooperation, closer military ties and the future of action and local ceasefires in Syria. 

  The initiative was announced by the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF), Russia’s sovereign wealth fund, and Turkey Wealth Fund (TWF) last week connected to the summit.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  

  “At the initial stage the investments in the funds’ projects will amount to 200 million euros. The total size of the Russia-Turkey Investment Fund is 900 million euros,” the RDIF said in a statement. 

  The agreement of the new cooperative venture was signed in the presence of Erdoğan and Russian President Vladimir Putin, and will be central to assisting joint Russian-Turkish projects in the areas of technology, healthcare, and urban infrastructure. 

  “This is an important milestone for TWF and we believe initiating investments through RTIF in focused sectors will cement the relationship of both sovereign investment funds and further strengthen the relationship between Turkey and Russia,” the managing director of the Turkey Wealth Fund, Zafer Sönmez, said in a media release.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  

  The TWF is described as follows: 

  Turkey’s wealth fund, established in 2016, holds the total or part of shares of several Turkish companies such as flag carrier Turkish Airlines, telecommunications giant Türk Telekom, state-owned lenders Ziraat and Halk, Turkish Petroleum and Borsa Istanbul.

  Its portfolio also includes the petroleum pipeline company BOTAŞ, the postal services company PTT, and the national lottery Milli Piyango.

  According to the fund’s website, its mission is to develop and increase the value of the country’s strategic assets and consequently provide resource for our country’s primary investments.

  More broadly, the newly established Russia-Turkey Investment Fund further suggests that Turkey is fast moving into Moscow’s orbit. 

  For starters, Putin and Erdogan have already met multiple times this year, which doesn’t bode well for the White House’s ultimatum weeks ago saying that “Turkey must choose.” 

  It appears Turkey’s “choice” is becoming evident. Washington and Ankara have been in a diplomatic showdown and crisis surrounding blocked orders of Lockheed’s F-35 stealth fighter due to Turkey’s plan to receive Russian S-400 anti-air defense systems this summer. 

  Erdogan again affirmed last week amid US ultimatums, “those who ask or suggest we backtrack don’t know us,” and told reporters just after meeting with Putin, “If we sign a deal on an issue, that’s a done deal. This is our sovereign right, no one can ask us to back down.’’

  

• Rogue State? – Britain Railing Against International Norms & Laws

  Via TruePublica.org.uk,

  Leaving aside Britain’s past, most particularly that of empire, the country is not just continually moving towards authoritarianism it is beginning to demonstrate all the early signs of a rogue state. These are strong words but the actual definition of a rogue state is –  “a nation or state regarded as breaking international law and posing a threat to the security of other nations.” Examples such as the illegal invasion of Iraq, Syria and latterly Libya are very clear. Irrespective of the technicalities, they all broke the rules of International laws or norms. But other examples demonstrate how lawless Britain as a state really is.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  Chagos

  Here, an entire population were forcibly removed from their island homeland at British gunpoint to make way for a US Air Force nuclear base, the people were dumped destitute over a thousand miles away, their domestic animals gassed by the British army, their homes fired and then demolished. To achieve this, Britain maliciously threatened the Mauritian government into ceding the Chagos Islands as a condition of its Independence.

  Recently, the International Court of Justice found that the British occupation of the Chagos Islands was unlawful by a majority of 13 to 1. Britain rejected this ruling.

  Ex British ambassador Craig Murray wrote – “this represents a serious escalation in the UK’s rejection of multilateralism and international law and a move towards joining the US model of exceptionalism, standing outside the rule of international law. As such, it is arguably the most significant foreign policy development for generations. In the Iraq war, while Britain launched war without UN Security Council authority, it did so on a tenuous argument that it had Security Council authority from earlier resolutions. The UK was therefore not outright rejecting the international system. On Chagos it is now simply denying the authority of the International Court of Justice; this is utterly unprecedented.”

  Weapons and war crimes

  Britain’s arms and munitions sales are now regularly in the news. Even The Lords international relations committee said that British weapons were “highly likely to be the cause of significant civilian casualties” in various countries where illegal wars, acts of genocide and war crimes are being committed. A quick online search lists numerous examples.

  Israel

  Then there is Britain’s relationship with Israel, which is taking a battering due to internal politics and finger-pointing over claims of racism. Fundamentally though, the issue is about war crimes being committed against the Palestinian people. British arms sales to Israel is at best questionable, especially the news that British made sniper rifles were used to kill and injure thousands of Palestinians recently. But Britain’s support in this genocidal war again goes against all international norms where the conflict is described by Amnesty International as an “abhorrent violation of international laws.” It added that – “This is another horrific example of the Israeli military using excessive force and live ammunition in a totally deplorable way. This is a violation of international standards, in some instances committing what appear to be wilful killings constituting war crimes.”

  In addition, UK policy is allowing trade with ‘Israeli’ goods from illegal settlements in the occupied territories. The British government has stated that it does not even keep a record of imports into the UK from these illegal Israeli settlements. Acquiescing in this illegal trade by an occupying power is a violation of international law. The December 2016 UN Security Council Resolution, to which the UK agreed:

  ‘reaffirms that the establishment by Israel of settlements in the Palestinian territory occupied since 1967, including East Jerusalem, has no legal validity and constitutes a flagrant violation under international law”

  Libya

  Mark Curtis, a British foreign policy expert and historian writes about Britain’s illegal attack of a soverign state – Libya: “British bombing in Libya, which began in March 2011, was a violation of UN Resolution 1973, which authorised member states to enforce a no-fly zone over Libya and to use ‘all necessary measures’ to prevent attacks on civilians but did not authorise the use of ground troops or regime change promoted by the Cameron government. That these policies were illegal is confirmed by Cameron himself, who told Parliament on 21 March 2011 that the UN resolution ‘explicitly does not provide legal authority for action to bring about Gaddafi’s removal from power by military means.” Today, Libya is a failed state and overrun by militant factions.

  Extrajudicial assassinations and even a kill list

  Reprieve’s report entitled Britain’s Kill List accused the Conservative government of extreme deception of parliament. Officially, Britain has never had a so-called ‘kill list’ but David Cameron had to admit to an extrajudicial assassinations programme in the Middle East, which we at TruePublica reported. All such killings break the most fundamental of international laws and norms as detailed HERE.

  The Reprieve introductory paragraph reads -“On September 7th, 2015, Prime Minister David Cameron came to Parliament and announced a “new departure” for Britain, a policy of killing individuals the Security Services and the military do not like, people placed on a list of individuals who the UK (acting along with the US and others) have identified and systematically plan to kill. The mere admission that there is a Kill List certainly should, indeed, have been a “departure” for a country that prides itself on decency. Unfortunately, it was not a “new departure” at all, as we had been doing it secretly for more than a decade.”

  Statelessness

  Britain has once again broken international norms. The goals of UNHCR’s stateless campaign, a Global Action Plan to End Statelessness 2014 – 2024 introduced a guiding framework comprised of 10 Actions to be undertaken by states. In the case of high-profile ‘ISIS Bride’ runaway from Bethnal Green to Baghuz, Shamima Begum, the UK disregarded Actions 4 and 9:

  Action 4: Prevent denial, loss or deprivation of nationality on discriminatory grounds.

  Action 9: Accede to the UN Statelessness Conventions.

  But Britain’s has its own laws. Section 40(2) of the 1981 British Nationality Act states the Home Secretary won’t make any individual rendered stateless as a result. Under this, the UK Home Secretary Sajid Javid’s decision to revoke Begum’s citizenship breaks UK law and international norms.

  Political prisoner

  Then, there is the persecution of Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks, which is now seven years old. Ecuador has protected Assange for the past half decade from being turned over to Washington until his arrest by British police yesterday. By definition, Assange is the only political prisoner in western Europe.  A United Nations legal panel ruled that Assange should be allowed to walk free and be compensated for his “deprivation of liberty” and that his detention was illegal.

  Assange has been nominated for a Nobel peace prize every year since 2010. His really big crime was releasing film of an American helicopter gunship killing civilians and journalists in Iraq. Britain is more than just complicit of it attack of fundamental and important press freedoms in arresting him.

  Assange’s lawyer criticised the British government for being poised to arrest and extradite Assange to the United States. “That a government would cooperate with another state to extradite a publisher for publishing truthful information outside its territory sets a dangerous precedent here in the UK and elsewhere,” she said. “No one can deny that risk. That is why he sought asylum in the Ecuadorian embassy.”

  Surveillance

  The UK government’s record on bulk data handling for intelligence purposes saw the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) ruling that state surveillance practices such as those practised in Britain violated human rights law. United National Special Rapporteur on Privacy Joe Cannataci said Britain was setting a bad example to the world and that Britain’s surveillance techniques on its own citizens was – “worse than Orwell’s 1984.” The highest courts in Britain have ruled against the government on mass surveillance.

  In 2014, British spies were (illegally) granted the authority to secretly eavesdrop on legally privileged attorney-client communications, according to documents. The documents were made public as a result of a legal case brought against the British government by Libyan families who allege that they were subjected to extraordinary rendition and torture, where Britain was proven to be in violation of international laws, in a joint British-American operation that took place in 2004.

  A lawyer, in this case, said – “It could mean, amazingly, that the government uses the information they have got from snooping on you, against you, in a case you have brought. This clearly violates an age-old principle of English law set down in the 16th century – that the correspondence between a person and their lawyer is confidential.”

  In addition, just one of the many operations carried out by the British state was called Optic Nerve. It illegally went about capturing images from webcams of millions of completely innocent citizens accused of nothing. Between 3% and 11% of the images captured by the webcams were sexually explicit in nature and deemed “undesirable nudity.” The public has not been reassured that these files still exist or not that were taken to build an illegal facial recognition system the government had not declared.

  Surveillance operations such as – Muscular, Socialist, Gemalto, Three Smurfs, XKeyScore, Upstream and Tempora are all examples of extreme surveillance systems being used in Britain that would be completely unknown if it had not been for Edward Snowden – another political prisoner. All such operations would be deemed illegal in court and of breaking international laws or norms in normal democratic countries.

  Health and Safety

  In 2015, the Government pushed through a law that exempted a large number of self-employed people from the protection of the Health and Safety at Work Act. The Government managed to get away with reducing the level of protection because the self-employed are not covered by the European “Framework Directive”, which is the regulation that sets minimum standards that countries have to comply with.

  At the time the TUC pointed out to the Government that there were other international laws that the UK had signed up to in many other non European countries that did cover the self-employed including those of the International Labour Organisation (ILO) and the Council of Europe.

  Disability

  The UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities examined the British government’s progress in fulfilling its commitments to the UN convention on disabled people’s rights, to which the UK has been a signatory since 2007.

  Its report concludes that the UK has not done enough to ensure the convention, which enshrines the rights of disabled people to live independently, to work and to enjoy social protection without discrimination – is reflected in UK law and policy.

  Although it praises some initiatives by the Scottish and Welsh governments to promote inclusion, it is scathing of the UK government’s inconsistent and patchy approach to protecting disability rights and its failure to audit the impact of its austerity policies on disabled people.

  Trust

  Breaking international laws and norms has a long-term effect, mainly that of detriment to national security, long-term interests and trust. There is an assumption, of course, that international law cannot be enforced but in today’s world, international sanctions can be as damaging as using force. Those sanctions could be economic or diplomatic in nature. And if Britain wants to be an international player, it very strongly needs to appreciate and adhere to international laws and norms.

  

• China Could Turn Taiwan Into The Next Lebanon: State Media Warns

  Via AlMasdarNews.com

  China has issued another firm warning to Taiwan amid the ongoing turmoil between the two east Asian nations.

  According to the Chinese publication The Global Times, the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) of China has many options on the table, including the possibility of turning Taiwan into another Lebanon.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  

  “The PLA has many choices, including crossing the ‘middle line,’ flying over the Taiwan island and even turn Taiwan into a Lebanon-like situation,” the newspaper said. “These choices don’t necessarily lead to war. They are enough to force Taiwan authorities to readjust their radical policies.”

  The “Lebanon-like situation” is a reference to the fourteen-year-long (1975-1989) civil war in which the small Levantine country became a battleground for foreign entities like Israel, Syria, and the Palestine Liberation Organization(PLO).

  Israel ultimately used Lebanon to fight their proxy war against the Palestine Liberation Organization, while also curbing Syria’s influence from the southern part of the country.

  “Washington is choosing the wrong place, time and opponent to flex its muscle in Taiwan Straits,” warned Global Times. If the U.S. military stations forces in Taiwan, China will attack, the article said. If the U.S. sells advanced fighters like the F-16V to Taiwan, the People’s Liberation Army will respond.

  Meanwhile, the National Interest reported that this warning came in response to U.S. National Security Adviser John Bolton complaints about Chinese J-11 fighter jets crossing the middle line of the Taiwan Strait.

  “It marked the first time in almost twenty years that Chinese aircraft have done this, with Taiwanese fighters scrambling to intercept them,” the National Interest added.

  

• Frankenstein Designer Kids: What You Don't Know About Gender-Transitioning Will Blow Your Mind

  Authored by Robert Bridge via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

  Puberty-blocking drugs, mastectomies, vaginal surgery and fake penises – all with zero chance of reversal – these are just some of the radical experimental methods being used on children. The madness must stop.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  Imagine that you are the parent of a five-year-old boy who innocently informs you one day that he is a girl. Of course, the natural reaction would be to laugh, not phone up the nearest gender transitioning clinic. You have no idea how your little boy came to believe such a thing; possibly it was through something he heard at the daycare center, or maybe a program he saw on television. In any case, he insists that he ‘identifies’ as a female.

  Eventually, possibly at the encouragement of your local school, you pay a visit to a physician. You hope this medical professional will be able to provide you and your child with some sound counseling to clear up his confusion. Prepare yourself to be disappointed. Your doctor will be forced, according to state and medical dictate, to follow the professional guidelines known as ‘affirmative care.’ It sounds nice and harmless, doesn’t it? In fact, the program could be best described as nothing short of diabolical.

  The Medical Harms of Hormonal and Surgical Interventions for Gender Dysphoric Children

  Following the ‘affirmative care’ approach, the doctor is required to follow the child’s lead, not vice-versa, as many people believe the doctor-patient relationship in this particular case would best work. In other words, if the child tells the doctor that he believes he is a girl, the doctor must comply with that ‘reality’ no matter what biology tells him or her to be the case. But this is just the beginning of the madness.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  As the child’s parent, you will be encouraged to start referring to your son as your ‘daughter,’ and even permit him to choose a feminine name, as well as matching clothes. Teachers will be instructed to let your son use the girl’s bathroom while at school. The question of the social stigma attached to such a lifestyle change, complete with bullying, is rarely brought into the equation. Therapists will seldom discuss with the parents the social implications of such a mental and physical change; indeed, many will insist the changes are ‘reversible’ should the child one day have a change of heart. If only things were that easy.

  Let’s pause for a moment and ask what should be the most obvious question, especially among medical professionals: ‘Is it not terribly naive to support the fleeting belief of a child, who still believes in Santa Claus, that he/she is the opposite sex? Isn’t there a very high possibility that the child is just confused and the thought will pass? Moreover, why did we never hear about such episodes just 10 years ago, yet today we are led to believe it is some sort of epidemic?’ Instead of working with the child and his newfound identity from such an obvious approach, in the majority of cases the child will be placed on the fast-track to gender transitioning. This is where the horror story begins.

  One parent, ‘Elaine,’ a member of the advocacy group Kelsey Coalition whose daughter underwent “life-altering medical interventions,” came to understand that the transition is immensely harmful to the future health and well-being of her child.

  “Once the teenage years begin, affirmative care means giving young people cross-sex hormones,” Elaine said during a panel discussion organized by the Heritage Foundation.

  “Girls as young as twelve are prescribed testosterone for lifetime usage, while boys are given estrogen. These are serious hormonal treatments that impact brain development, cardiovascular health and may increase the risk of cancer.”

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  This leads us to the operating table, where adolescents, lacking the mental maturity necessary to make such a huge life-altering choice, are exposed to the knife of irreversible surgical manipulation. Double mastectomies on girls, for example, as well as the fashioning of false penises derived from flesh borrowed from other parts of the body, are just some of the unprecedented procedures now available.

  Elaine mentioned the high-profile story of one Jazz Jennings, who was diagnosed with ‘gender dysphoria’ and raised as a girl since the age of five. He was treated with hormones at the age of eleven, and at the age of 17, Jazz underwent surgery to remove his penis and create a simulated vagina out of his stomach lining.

  “After surgery, Jazz’s wounds began separating and a blood blister began to form. An emergency surgery was performed. According to Jazz’s doctor, ‘As I was getting her on the bed, I heard something go ‘pop.’ When I looked, the whole thing has split open.’”

  Elaine called the case of Jazz a “medical experiment on a child” that “has been playing out on television for the past 12 years.” It should be noted that a similar drama-packed scenario captivated the nation with the high-profile, made-for-television sexual transition of Caitlyn Jenner, born Bruce Jenner, the former Olympic gold medalist, who was quite possibly the greatest American athlete of all time.

  The obvious question is ‘how many impressionable children, many experiencing their own bodily changes in the form of puberty, were persuaded to decide in favor of gender transitioning (something that a child could have only heard about from some external media or source, unless the parents engage in such odd discussion topics at the dinner table) after watching these celebrity persona?’ By now, few people would doubt the powerful influence that TV celebrities have over people, and especially adolescents. In fact, that is the entire notion behind the idea of a ‘positive role model.’ I am not sure Caitlin Jenner would qualify for such a part.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  According to Michael Laidlaw, M.D., these children, who are experiencing what the medical community has dubbed ‘gender dysphoria,’ will move beyond their condition either naturally or with the assistance of a therapist. Meanwhile, according to Laidlaw, citing studies, many of the girls and boys who display symptoms have neuro-psychiatric conditions and autism.

  “Social media and YouTube, things like that, binge-watching YouTube videos of transitioners seem to be playing a role…as well as contagion” in popularizing the idea among the masses.

  The movement is predicated upon the modern liberal idea of ‘gender identity,’ which has been defined as a “person’s core internal sense of their own gender,” regardless as to what the biological facts of their sex prove.

  Dr. Laidlaw presented perhaps the best case against parents and their children rushing to the conclusion that their children need puberty blockers, for example, or extreme doses of hormones, when he discussed what happens when a person is diagnosed with cancer.

  “If a child or somebody you knew had cancer, would you want pathology results, would you want imaging to prove [the condition] before you give harmful chemotherapeutics,” he asked. Yet we are allowing children and adolescents to undergo irreversible chemical and surgical procedures without being able to see any evidence that shows the presence of ‘the opposite sex’ in the patient.

  In other words, the medical community is monkey-wrenching with not only Mother Nature, but with the lives of children, with radical and irreversible experiments that have not been proven to promote the happiness and wellbeing of those on the receiving (or subtracting) end.

  “We are giving very harmful therapies on the basis of no objective diagnosis,” Dr. Laidlaw said.

  Laidlaw was forced to repeat what has been widely known for millennia.

  “There are only two sexes,” he said.

  “Sex is identified at birth, nobody assigns it. Doctors don’t arbitrarily assign this person to be a boy and this person to be a girl. We all know how to identify it.

  “I would say ‘ask your grandmother who doesn’t read the scientific journals, and they will tell you exactly how to identify boys from girls.’”

  

• Why The Death Of 'King Dollar' Would Benefit American Workers

  Though the Saudis have denied it, reports last month that the Kingdom was privately threatening to ditch the dollar as the currency of choice for its oil trade have helped reignite speculation that the greenback could soon lose its reserve currency status, as a few financial luminaries have warned.

  Though many mainstream financial analysts categorically dismiss the idea that the dollar’s dominance is in any way under threat, reports about the threats to the petrodollar have prompted many to question how exactly, does the average American benefit from the dollar’s reserve currency status, and would the greenback’s fall from grace have a negative, or positive, impact on the livelihood of the averagee American worker?

  Well, economist Steve Keen has a few theories about what might happen if the dollar stops being the vessel via which a large plurality of global trade is conducted. And he shared his views with Erik Townsend during this week’s episode of MacroVoices.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  When most people think about the risks associated with the dollar losing its reserve status, runaway inflation probably ranks high on the list. But Keen believes these risks are probably overblown,for several reasons. First, importers often hedge out foreign exchange risk between two and five years out. And even once the dollar’s weakness starts to bite, company’s will often simply absorb some of the margin pressure to maintain market share. While prices might move marginally higher, Keen doubts the outcome would destabilize large swaths of the US economy, as the reserve alarmists have warned.

  The real impact would be felt by Americans wanting to travel overseas, who would see their purchasing power collapse as the costs of traveling abroad skyrocket.

  Erik: Now, most of the products that you see at Walmart in the United States are imported from China. It seems to me that, if this were to occur and there was a marked devaluation of the US dollar versus other currencies, that would result in a massive inflation shock in the real economy in the US because we don’t have the manufacturing capacity to make widgets in the United States. That’s all gone offshore, to the detriment, perhaps, of the American worker.

  But we don’t have that capacity. So if, all of a sudden, we have to pay much higher prices in dollars in order to generate the same price in yuan or yen or whatever for the imported goods, doesn’t that result in a really big inflation shock inside the US?

  Steve: It can. Inflation shocks, you have to look at them in a proper empirical context.

  And most economists simply assume any currency devaluation will lead to an equivalent inflation spike in the country that is devaluing.

  What actually happens quite frequently is firms will try to – first of all, you have long-term contracts determining prices that are often set out two to five years in advance, particularly for industrial goods.

  But mainly we have importers putting a markup on their imports for their profit level. They are willing to cut their markup to hang onto market share to some extent. So you don’t see a 100% pass-through of that sort of thing. You might see 30% pass-through. So if you had a 10-15-20% devaluation in the economy in the American dollar, then you could see, yes, a 5 or 7 maybe – I wouldn’t say going beyond 10% – spike in the inflation rate.

  But, yes, you could see that spike occurring. And it would also – obviously cramp the style of any Americans wanting to go on overseas holidays. So there would definitely be a decrease in the American living standards. And it would bring home to people, too, the extent to which you have been deindustrialized and relied upon this exorbitant privilege to get over it. If the exorbitant privilege goes, then you wear the full consequences of being deindustrialized in the last 25 years.

  Similarly, worries that a weaker dollar would cause interest rates in the US to skyrocket are also overblown, Keen believes. Just look at Japan: Interest rates have been mired near zero for 15 years now, regardless of what’s been happening with the yen. Because it’s not the external market that sets interest rates in the US – that’s now the Federal Reserve’s job.

  Steve: So I can see it as giving America quite a severe jolt. But it won’t be something which causes interest rates to go sky-high. They will still be held in a band by the Federal Reserve. You might see rises in corporate rates and so on, but not large rises in the rates on American government debt.

  Circling back to the inspiration for this topic, Townsend asked Keen if he really believes the Saudis seriously considering ditching the dollar, or if these leaks are merely idle threats. Keen believes it’s the latter, given how dependent the Saudis are on American support in the form of both supplying arms and purchasing oil. The real risk for the dollar lies in Europe and China. Europe’s search for an alternative to SWIFT, which was inspired by Trump’s decision to ditch the Iran deal, was a major catalyst for this.

  As Trump’s belligerence toward America’s enemies and allies has made the dollar’s reserve status “intolerable” for many, Keen believes there’s a “one in three” chance that the dollar loses its reserve status within ten years.

  Erik: Steve, let’s come to the current risks that the US dollar faces in terms of maintaining its reserve currency status and talk about how real they are. Is this talk from Saudi Arabia just saber-rattling? Or are they really serious about ditching the dollar? Likewise, we had another comment last week from, I believe it was a former undersecretary of the UN, calling for a global currency to replace the US dollar as the world’s reserve currency. Are these things really at risk of actually happening?

  Or is this just talk?

  Steve: I think it’s at risk of happening. I don’t think the Saudis are going to go through with it though, because they’re incredibly intimately tied up with American military power and it would just be too dangerous for them to do that. But I know China and Russia and, to some extent, Europe are talking about it because they are sick of the extent to which this is being used as a bullying tool by America. Particularly – just one recent example – the decision not to let Iran use the SWIFT system for international payments.

  That could never have happened if the American dollar wasn’t the reserve currency. And you get American imposing its political will on the rest of the world using the fact that it’s the reserve currency. And of course that’s become intolerable under Trump. So I think the odds are, let’s say, one in three of a serious breakdown in that in the next 10 years.

  That’s not to say that this couldn’t be stopped, but the more the US tries to impose its will on the rest of the world, the more likely other world powers will rebel.

  But it could also be prevented. It’s one of these things – it doesn’t have the weight of financial numbers behind it like I could see with the credit crunch back in 2008 to say a crisis is inevitable.

  But, certainly, there will be strains on the system and the American dominance can’t be guaranteed. And the more America now tries to assert that dominance, the more likely it is to encourage one of those alternatives to be developed.

  As history has proven time and time again, no reserve currency reigns forever…

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  …So, With America’s allies and enemies looking for ways to mitigate their reliance on the dollar, what, ultimately, would be the impact if the world decides to ditch the greenback?

  While the decline in demand would probably cause the dollar to weaken, that could benefit the American working class. Given that President Trump’s confrontation approach to diplomacy has caused this process to accelerate, as Europe, Russia and China have repeatedly, this is one way in which what Keen describes as Trump’s leveraging America’s reserve-currency status as a “thug’s tool” (by threatening sanctions against its enemies), could circuitously benefit the working class Americans who make up a large portion of his base.

  Obviously, it’s going to mean a reduction in demand for American dollars on foreign exchange markets, which must mean a fall in the price over time. And it will be complicated by the usual spot and hedge markets and so on. But, yes, seeing a fall in the value of the dollar, unless America’s financial sector could no longer use the fact that it was American to have the power it has over financial institutions elsewhere in the world, so that the scale of the financial sector would be pulled back, your manufacturing sector would be more competitive. But, as you know, you don’t have the industrial pattern you used to have.

  You’ve still got some outstanding corporations and outstanding technological capability. But you don’t have that machine tool background. The skilled workers that used to exist there aren’t there anymore. So there would be a serious shock to America with more expensive goods to be imported from overseas and a slow shift towards having a local manufacturing capability, making up for the damage of the last 25 years.

  I can see a lot of social conflict out of that as well, but a positive for the American working class, who really have been done over in the last quarter century. And that’s partly the reason why Trump has come about. And, ironically, Trump is part of the reason why this might come to an end, given how much he’s used his bombast and the American reserve currency status as a thug’s tool in foreign relations rather than an intelligent person’s tool.

  In summary, although every reserve currency in history has lost its status as its economic dominance has faded, the US might be the first to lose that status because of an organized rebellion that it helped provoke via its willingness to use sanctions and other tools as a weapon for punishing its adversaries and rewarding its friends.

  Listen to the full interview below:

  

• Caitlin Johnstone Warns Trump Supporters Are Hurting Assange With Their 4-D Chess Talk

  Authored by Caitlin Johnstone via Medium.com,

  At a time when everyone should be out in the streets shaking the earth and protesting the Trump administration’s prosecution of Julian Assange for exposing US war crimes, those who continue to support this president have one message and one message only when it comes to the WikiLeaks founder: Don’t do anything. Relax, wait and see, trust Trump, and don’t do anything. Trump is about to save Assange, and save us all. Do nothing.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  Who do you guys think this strategy benefits, exactly?

  These are all people who say they support Assange and WikiLeaks, who say they support free speech and oppose the deep state, and yet what they are doing today hurts Assange and helps the unelected power establishment known as the deep state just as much as the hysterical Russiavape dupes who are overtly smearing Assange today.

  To be clear, not everyone who voted for Trump is doing this; many are aggressively opposing this administration’s prosecution of Assange and vocally withdrawing all support for him. But the ones who are engaged in the behavior I’m describing are all helping to kill the loud and aggressive opposition to Assange’s imprisonment which is so desperately needed right now, and they’re helping everyone they claim to oppose. The pussyhat-wearing Assange haters and the MAGA hat-wearing Assange lovers are on the same side on this issue, mindlessly working toward the exact same agenda: the permanent imprisonment of a truth-telling journalist.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  Every time President Trump advances a longstanding evil agenda of America’s permanent government, I see my social media notifications swarmed with Trump supporters telling me that it is actually a good thing, because it’s secretly a brilliant strategic chess move that the 45th president is taking against the deep state.

  When I say that this happens every time, I’m not being hyperbolic to make a point. I mean it happens every single time, without a single, solitary exception, always. It happens with such clockwork reliability that I preemptively addressed it in the article I wrote when Julian Assange was arrested, saying, “I am going to have a zero tolerance policy for QAnon cultists who try to tell me that this is actually 5-D chess by Trump to overthrow the Deep State. Stay out of my comments, stay out of my social media notifications, stay the hell away from me, and please rethink your worldview.”

  I said this because I knew it was coming, and indeed it did. All sorts of theories have been concocted since Assange’s arrest which people cite as proof that Trump is actually protecting Assange with his administration’s indictment and extradition request, instead of working to imprison a journalist for exposing US war crimes, which is actually what’s happening.

  They tell me that Trump is bringing Assange to America for trial because he can only pardon him after he’s been convicted. This is false. A US president can pardon anyone at any time of any crime against the United States, without their having been convicted and without their even having been charged. After leaving office Richard Nixon was issued a full presidential pardon by Gerald Ford for “all offenses against the United States which he, Richard Nixon, has committed or may have committed or taken part in during the period from January 20, 1969 through August 9,1974.” Nixon had never been charged with anything. If Trump were going to pardon Assange he could have done it at any time since taking office, instead of issuing a warrant for his arrest in December 2017 and executing it on Thursday after a series of international legal manipulations. A pardon is not in the plans.

  Another common belief I keep encountering is that Trump is bringing Assange to America to get him to testify about his source for the 2016 Democratic Party emails in exchange for a pardon, thereby revealing the truth about Russiagate’s origins and bringing down Clinton and Obama. This is false. Everyone who knows anything about Assange (including the Trump administration) knows that he will never, ever reveal a source under any circumstances whatsoever. It would be a cardinal journalistic sin, a violation of every promise WikiLeaks has ever made, and a betrayal of his entire life’s work. More importantly, imprisoning a journalist and threatening him with a heavy sentence to coerce him into giving up information against his will is evil. If you believe your president is doing that, the last thing you should be doing is cheering for him.

  But that isn’t what Trump is doing. Trump is pursuing the imprisonment of a journalist for exposing US war crimes, so that he can scare off future leak publishers and set a legal precedent for their prosecution.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  I’ve been engaging people in debates on this subject online so I can understand their arguments well enough to address them, and what I’ve learned is that they don’t really have any. Those who believe Trump is actually secretly helping Assange and helping the American people by prosecuting a journalist have no basis for their belief other than pure faith that Trump is good, therefore anything he does must be good. It’s the exact mirror image of Russiagate hysterics, and it benefits the exact same corrupt establishment.

  The mental contortions that people are doing to avoid the cognitive dissonance between their support for Assange and their support for Trump is truly something to behold. For the last 24 hours QAnon adherents have been telling me that Assange holding a Gore Vidal book when arrested is an undeniable signal that he’s in coordination with the Trump campaign to bring down the Deep State, and that I’m crazy for being unable to see that. Turns out it was actually a book that Assange wanted to read while he was waiting to be processed at the courthouse, which makes sense since Vidal’s “History of the National Security State” covers a subject that Assange has devoted his entire life to.

  QAnon is such a brilliant propaganda construct. With some cryptic posts on an anonymous message board, whoever is behind that psyop has succeeded in manipulating a vocal and impassioned sector of Trump’s base into applauding every single step he’s taken in advancing the dystopian agendas of his predecessors as a brilliant 4-D chess move against the establishment. I’ve been told that his bombing of Syria actually took out an Iranian nuclear base, that he’s helping to free the Venezuelan people without harming anyone, that he’s fighting the deep state in Iran, that his dangerous escalations against Russia are just a show because he and Putin are working together (a comical overlap with the Russiagate crowd), and last year they were telling me that Assange isn’t in the embassy at all because Trump had already covertly rescued and pardoned him. There are people who honestly believe that there is a revolution against the establishment underway which is being led by a plucky alliance between the President of the United States, the Prime Minister of Israel, and the Crown Prince of Saudi Arabia. It’s that bad.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  QAnon followers make up a minority of Trump’s base, but the insanity of the QAnon psyop bleeds into the greater MAGA crowd and helps normalize the kind of thinking which leads people to conclude that a blatant prosecution of a journalist for telling the truth about the US political construct is actually a strategic maneuver against the establishment. The enthusiastic promotion of this narrative has an undeniable and pernicious chilling effect on opposition to Assange’s wrongful imprisonment, which should be an issue upon which the right and the true left agree.

  I’ve never pushed away Trump supporters because I believe isolating into ideological echo chambers makes the left impotent and stupid, and many of them have followed me since I started this gig because they agree with some of what I’ve got to say. I don’t know how many MAGA people I still have in my readership after all the stuff I’ve been writing about their president, but those of you who are still out there, please, for the love of God help get this idea out there. This is a time where everyone who supports WikiLeaks should be flooring the gas pedal, and all the “Don’t do anything, trust the plan, wait and see” rhetoric is keeping one foot on the brakes.

  Assange should have been pardoned already, long ago, if not by Obama then by Trump. There is no excuse whatsoever for this not to have happened already, let alone for Assange to be behind bars at the behest of this administration. Stop saying “wait and see”. We’ve already seen. The time to protest is now. Get your foot off the brakes, and aggressively demand that your president cease doing what he is doing. Make this an election issue. Trump can’t afford to lose his base, but if you keep saying “wait and see” the narrative manipulators will keep moving back the line you’d sworn you’ll never let him cross until before you know it you’ve got another four years of another Bushbama while Assange remains locked in a cage.

  Don’t let them do this to you. Use your power now.

  *  *  *

  Everyone has my unconditional permission to republish or use any part of this work (or anything else I’ve written) in any way they like free of charge. My work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece please consider sharing it around, liking me on Facebook, following my antics on Twitter, throwing some money into my hat on Patreon or Paypal, purchasing some of my sweet merchandise, buying my new book Rogue Nation: Psychonautical Adventures With Caitlin Johnstone, or my previous book Woke: A Field Guide for Utopia Preppers. The best way to get around the internet censors and make sure you see the stuff I publish is to subscribe to the mailing list for my website, which will get you an email notification for everything I publish. For more info on who I am, where I stand, and what I’m trying to do with this platform, click here.

  Bitcoin donations:1Ac7PCQXoQoLA9Sh8fhAgiU3PHA2EX5Zm2

  

• The Truth About Brexit In 135 Words

  Confused about Brexit? Here is One River’s Eric Peters summarizing everything you need to know in exactly 135 words:

  * * *

  “They’re all liars mate,” said my London cabbie. “May was a Remainer. How were we going to get a good deal when our negotiators don’t want to leave?” he asked.

  I shrugged. “They’ll stall until they can say it’s not what people want no more — happened in every country that ever wanted a referendum or held one,” he said.

  “The EU paid to move a Land Rover factory from the Midlands to Slovakia where they earn 5 pound for every 25 we make – so our boys are out of work and the company makes more profit. How’s that right?,” he said.

  “For every two pound we put into the EU, we get one back.”

  So I asked if Brtiain held another referendum, which way it’d go? “We’re split in two mate, we’re absolutely shattered.”  

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

   

   

  

• Chinese Tycoon’s Son Buys $3.8 Million Bugatti In Vancouver With Dad’s Credit Card, Complains About Taxes

  Almost exactly two years ago, at the peak of the Vancouver housing bubble which was the result of an unprecedented money-laundering funds flow by Chinese oligarchs and tycoons into the Western Canadian real estate market, we brought you “The Rich Chinese Kids Of Vancouver“, which as the title suggests, profiled the spoiled offspring of some of China’s richest.

  You will know them by their Lamborghinis: hundreds of young Chinese immigrants, along with a handful of Canadian-born Chinese, have started supercar clubs whose members come together to drive, modify and photograph their flashy vehicles, providing alluring eye candy for their followers on social media.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  

  Because they are rich, they are confident they own the town: “occasionally, the need for speed hits a roadblock. In 2011, the police impounded a squadron of 13 Lamborghinis, Maseratis and other luxury cars, worth $2 million, for racing on a metropolitan Vancouver highway at 125 miles per hour. The drivers were members of a Chinese supercar club, and none were older than 21, according to news reports at the time.”

  Since those crazy days of 2016, the Chinese invasion of Vancouver has eased (certainly crushing the local real estate market as noted in ““Ghastly” Vancouver Home Sales Crash By 46%, Lowest Since 1985“), and following the imposition of some substantial, if hardly draconian, anti-money laundering measures by Canada as well as real estate purchasing curbs, the rich Chinese kids of Vancouver phenomenon – which just accidentally coincided with the second great cryptocurrency bubble – gradually faded into the background.

  But it certainly did not die and every now and then we get a stark reminder of just how much funds China’s “0.1%” transfers overseas (in fears that China’s own economic collapse is only a matter of time). A reminder such as this one from the South China Morning Post, which writes that the son of a Chinese tycoon is buying a C$5.1 million (US$3.8 million) custom Bugatti sports car in Vancouver, using his daddy’s Union Pay credit card, according to a picture of the invoice the young man posted on Instagram to complain about Canadian taxes.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  

  In a move that could make even the Kardashians blush, Ding Chen published a copy of the bill bearing his father Chen Mailin’s name on his Instagram stories, with an exasperated message overlaid in Chinese: “These taxes … my heart feels tired”.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  

  The photo, which was posted around noon on Thursday and set to vanish 24 hours later, had been roughly edited to scrawl out most figures, except the taxes.

  But, as the SCMP calculates, the 5% federal goods and services tax of C$210,404.25 reveals a pre-tax price of C$4.2 million (US$3.1 million), the approximate list price of a Chiron. Additional provincial taxes of C$697,939 (US$522,100) bring the total purchase price to about C$5.1 million.

  The cherry on top: the bill includes a 1.7 per cent Union Pay fee, which, if imposed on the pre-tax price, would work out to C$71,400 alone – about the price of a BMW M3.

  Perhaps fearing retaliation from China’s ongoing anti-corruption campaign, just one hour after the SCMP article was published, Chen’s Instagram account was closed or locked down.

  To be sure, the image will spark some serious inquiries from the Chinese Communist Party which will want to inquire just how the junior tycoon managed to pay using his daddy’s “gas card”: the problem is that after an aggressive crackdown against money-laundering by Beijing in 2016 and 2017, China’s Union Pay credit cards have been the subject of increasing scrutiny as a conduit for money out of the mainland. China has an annual cash export limit of US$50,000, and Union Pay says it enforces an annual overseas cash withdrawal limit of 100,000 yuan (US$14,880).

  Yet while overseas purchases of more than 1,000 yuan (US$149) must be reported to Chinese regulators, there is no general limit on spending, and there is no suggestion that the purchase of the car is improper.

  The bill, from Vancouver Bugatti dealer Weissach Group according to a visible phone number, was issued to Chen Mailin, whose name was clearly displayed. The address of his home on Vancouver’s Drummond Drive was whited-out but still readable.

  The address is that of a palatial home purchased by Chen Mailin in 2015 for C$51.8 million (then US$40 million), in what was then believed to have been the biggest residential transaction ever conducted in Canada.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  

  But who is Chen Mailin (i.e. “daddy”)?

  As often happens in China, his rags to riches story is yet another shocker: the 49-year-old Jiangsu province businessman is a former duck farmer who founded what is now a skyscraper-building property and investment conglomerate, Nanjing Dingye Investment Group, of which he is chairman. He is a former member of the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference, China’s legislative advisory body. And, citing a corporate disclosure, the SCMP notes that Chen Mailin is also a permanent Canadian resident (just in case Beijing decided to issue a fatwa on the nouveau-riche billionaire).

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  

  Ding Chen – who bears a striking resemblance to Chen Mailin – is the businessman’s son, according to the tycoon’s assistant at Chunghwa Investment company in Vancouver. The assistant told the South China Morning Post on Thursday to call Ding Chen on Friday at a nominated time, but the call went through to voicemail and has not yet been returned.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  

  Patrick Kam, a salesman for Weissach Group, Bugatti’s official dealer in Vancouver, said only one Bugatti Chiron had been sold and delivered in Vancouver. “It’s a very esoteric car,” he said.

  Curiously, Kam said that particular car had not been bought with a Union Pay card. But he said he was “not at liberty to discuss sales that may or may not be in the works”. Still, a Union Pay credit card would indeed be accepted at Weissach if someone wanted to use it to buy a C$4 million car, or any luxury vehicle. “Yeah, it’s a regular mode of payment that we take,” said Kam.

  Just as profiled in our post from April 2016, Ding Chen’s Instagram feed is filled with scenes of conspicuous consumption across the world, including a $30 million Bombardier Challenger jet with his name, “Ding”, emblazoned on the tail in Montreal; straphanging on the Hong Kong MTR with an Audemars Piguet watch on his wrist; and posing in Gucci leisure wear in Las Vegas, Nevada, and Shanghai.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  

  Other photos apparently show his new Bugatti Chiron in various stages of completion as it undergoes extensive customisation. “It’s on its way. #bugatti #chiron #w16,” he posted on February 26, with a photo of a mostly dismantled Chiron in a laboratory-like workshop. “The next stage!” he posted on March 12, with a photo of a Chiron, still wheelless but with body work attached.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  

  Ding Chen’s big-spending father, meanwhile, has been the subject of media scrutiny in Vancouver ever since buying the Drummond Drive home. As we noted at the time, Chen Mailin was mentioned in a 2012 Canadian court ruling in which prominent Vancouver realtor Julia Lau claimed he was a friend who loaned her C$30,000 out of C$131,000 in undeclared cash. The money had been seized by Canadian border authorities in 2010 from a car broker named Jason Edward Lee as he tried to board a flight to Las Vegas.

  Lau said the money was intended to replace funds she had already given Lee, via wire transfer, to buy her a Porsche in the US. Lee claimed the wired funds never arrived in his account.

  The judge in the case found that Lee had instead “squandered” the wired funds at a casino.

  Lee, who told Canadian authorities the C$30,000 came from a “loan shark”, according to the ruling, was found dead of a heroin overdose in the boot of his car, with zip ties around his wrists and ankles, about a month after Canadian authorities seized the cash. There was no suggestion in the court case that Chen Mailin is a “loan shark”.

  Meanwhile, business as usual continues as China’s wealthiest can’t wait to transfer their savings offshore, even as Beijing, now facing its first current account deficit in modern history, is desperate to open up its own corrupt and crony capital markets to yield-starved foreign investors who in turn will make sure that Ding Chen ends up buying many more Bugattis before he too is mysteriously found deceased of a “heroin overdose” in the boot of some (super)car himself.

  

• NY Dems Reject Tuition Aid For Gold Star Kids After Doling Out millions For Illegal Students

  Authored by Rob Shimshock via Campus Reform,

  New York State Assembly Democrats denied hundreds of thousands of dollars in tuition money to relatives of Gold Star veterans on Tuesday but granted $27 million for illegal aliens’ college tuition in a state budget earlier in April.

  <!–[if IE 9]><![endif]–>

  In a 15-11 vote, New York’s Assembly Higher Education Committee decided not to allocate more money to a $2.7 million program that currently helps 145 students related to or dependent on disabled and deceased combat veterans to pay college tuition, the New York Post reported.

  “We will make every effort to ensure going forward, we have some additional resources allocated to the program so that as an entitlement, it is not falling short of the needs of our military families,” Democrat Assemblywoman Deborah Glick said, according to the Post.

  Not all Democrats opposed the veteran funding bill, however.

  “I voted for the bill because I think it’s important, especially after that FDNY firefighter was killed in Afghanistan, so heartbreaking,” Democrat Assemblywoman Judy Griffin said, reported the Post.

  “But I voted yes knowing the bill would be held because it was a tough budget year and as the chairwoman said, there just wasn’t the funding in the budget. But now we know for next year, [so] we will make it a priority and hopefully pass it.”

  New York Democrat Gov. Andrew Cuomo also signaled that he would support the bill, which provides merit-based awards with a $24,250 ceiling per student, if it made it past the Assembly, according to Stars and Stripes.

  “We have a moral obligation, a social obligation to help those families who lost their provider, their loved one, in service to this nation,” Cuomo said, according to Stars and Stripes.

  “Assemblywoman Glick should be ashamed of herself,” Republican state Sen. Robert Ortt, who sponsored the proposed funding, said.

  “We set aside $27 million dollars for college for people that are here illegally…apparently $2.7 million is all that the families of soldiers who are killed, get. If you’re a child of a fallen soldier, you do not rank as high and you know that by the money.”

  This comes after Campus Reform highlighted in a video earlier this week how a lesser-known federal statuteprohibits illegal immigrants from receiving “any postsecondary education benefit unless a citizen or national of the United States is eligible for such a benefit.” 

  Currently, 18 states, including New York offer such benefits to illegal immigrant students. 

  

Digest powered by RSS Digest