Jan 15

Today’s News 15th January 2022

  • Sullivan: Chances That Russia Invades Ukraine "High"
    Sullivan: Chances That Russia Invades Ukraine “High”

    Authored by Dave DeCamp via AntiWar.com,

    Continuing the narrative that Russia is planning to invade Ukraine, National Security Advisor Jake Sullivan claimed on Thursday that the threat of a Russian invasion is “high” after days of talks between Western powers and Moscow.

    “There is no illusions on the part of any of us who have been dealing with this issue about what the prospects are for potential conflict and potential military escalation by Russia,” Sullivan said.

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    Russia has repeatedly denied that it is planning to invade Ukraine and insists that its military movements in the region are a response to increased US and NATO activity. During talks this week, the US and NATO rejected Russia’s demands for NATO to halt its eastward expansion.

    Following a meeting of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) that included Russia, the US ambassador to the OSCE also warned of war in Europe. “We’re facing a crisis in European security. The drumbeat of war is sounding loud, and the rhetoric has gotten rather shrill,” Ambassador Michael Carpenter told reporters.

    Sullivan said the Western talks with Russia this week were “frank and direct” and that the US would now consult with allies on how to proceed. The Kremlin described the meetings as “unsuccessful” and said the two sides were far apart on key issues.

    Sullivan said there has yet to be an agreement between the US and Russia on more meetings. But in Moscow, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov said dialogue between the two powers was always happening at some level. “I must reiterate that dialogue is still underway at many levels and in many directions,” he said.

    Also on Thursday, Moscow warned against a piece of legislation introduced Wednesday by Senate Democrats that would pave the way for sanctions on Russian President Vladimir Putin and other Russian officials. “We view the appearance of such documents and statements extremely negatively against the background of an ongoing series of negotiations, albeit unsuccessful ones,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said.

    While no progress was made concerning Ukraine during this week’s flurry of diplomacy, the two sides did agree to eventually hold more talks on arms control and missile deployments.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 23:40

  • Iran Promotes Video Depicting Assassination Of Trump At Mar-a-Lago
    Iran Promotes Video Depicting Assassination Of Trump At Mar-a-Lago

    Iranian state media and the official website of the country’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei has published a video this week depicting an imagined assassination of Donald Trump, which features his Mar-a-lago resort. 

    The 90-second animated video shows the former US president at what it calls “Trump’s House” playing golf. It was reportedly created as part of a “contest” to commemorate the two year anniversary of the Jan.3, 2020 drone killing of IRGC commander Qassem Soleimani. 

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    The video, titled “Revenge is Inevitable” is clearly meant as a direct threat against Trump. The sequence of events leads to the moment a drone circling overhead launches a strike on the former president. 

    The animation came out Wednesday and quickly grabbed headlines in the West. The Jerusalem Post describes it as follows: 

    A remote-controlled four-wheeled drone infiltrates the Florida site with the aid of an Iranian military hacker deactivating security cameras — A hacker who has a picture of Soleimani on their desktop background.

    The video then shows footage of Mar-a-lago being surveyed through the heads-up display of an aerial vehicle. At the bottom of the HUD is written “AC-130: Cleared to enemy personnel.” The Lockheed/Boeing AC-130 gunship is an air-to-ground support variant of the C-130 Hercules and is not known to be operated by the Iranian military. The HUD looks similar to that in the popular video game Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, and may in fact be lifted from that game. 

    A red MAGA hat even appears, as JPost continues to detail of the video…

    The Iranian ground drone enters the golf field where Trump, complete with a red “MAGA” hat, is playing. The hacker — whose desktop background has changed to a picture of the Dome of the Rock labeled “2040” and “By next 25 years” — Then hacks the phone of a member of Trump’s entourage. He is sent  a text message that says “Soleimani’s murderer and the one who gave the order will pay the price.”

    The silhouette of an aircraft, possibly a Shahed Saegheh drone, then flies above Trump, and a button is pressed.

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    The final message that flashes across the screen reads “Revenge is Definite” before the video closes with an image of Qassem Soleimani. 

    The video was met with fierce reaction particularly among some Republicans in Congress. For example, Sen. Lindsey Graham stated on Twitter as it began to circulate widely on Thursday, “In case you were wondering who we are dealing with when it comes to the Iranians – this video says all you need to know.”

    Last month, Iranian president Ebrahim Raisi called for the arrest of both Trump and Pompeo, saying in a speech, “If Trump and [former Secretary of State Mike] Pompeo are not tried in a fair court for the criminal act of assassinating General Soleimani, Muslims will take our martyr’s revenge.”

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 23:20

  • Fully Vaccinated Australians In Hospital For COVID-19 Surpass Unvaccinated
    Fully Vaccinated Australians In Hospital For COVID-19 Surpass Unvaccinated

    Authored by Daniel Khmelev via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

    For the first time, New South Wales (NSW) has seen more fully vaccinated patients hospitalised with COVID-19 compared to the number of unvaccinated patients as the Omicron outbreak continues to edge toward its peak.

    Emergency Medicine Specialist Dr Kevin Maruno and medical team take a suspected COVID-19 patient in to the isolation ward in the Red zone of the Emergency Department at St Vincent’s Hospital in Sydney, Australia on Jun. 4, 2020. (Photo by Lisa Maree Williams/Getty Images)

    Data published by the NSW government’s COVID-19 Critical Intelligence Unit has revealed that as of Jan. 9, 68.9 percent of COVID-19 patients aged 12 and over in hospitals had two doses of the vaccine, with 28.8 percent unvaccinated.

    The number of double-dose vaccinated patients in intensive care units (ICUs) also surpassed those of the unvaccinated, with 50.3 percent of the vaccinated presenting to ICU with COVID-19, more than the 49.1 percent who are unvaccinated.

    However, based on the data presented, unvaccinated individuals appear to be six times more likely to be hospitalised and nearly 13 times more likely to be sent to ICU than those who are fully vaccinated.

    This is considering that the number of unvaccinated patients appears to be over-represented in the figures—7.3 percent of the NSW population aged 12 and over at the time were unvaccinated, but they made up half of the COVID-19 ICU patients in the NSW Health system. At present Australia does not permit alternative treatment approaches utilised and available in other countries, such as ivermectin and hydroxychloroquine.

    Percentage of COVID-19 hospitalisations in New South Wales based on weekly reported data by the NSW COVID-19 Critical Intelligence Unit between Oct. 31, 2021 and Jan. 9, 2022. Vaccinated refers to those receiving two doses of an eligible vaccine. The graph has been smoothed for days between each reported week end. Points between Dec. 12, 2021 and Jan. 2, 2022 have been linearly interpolated due to data unavailability. (The Epoch Times)

    According to NSW Health, 95.1 percent of people aged 16 and over have received the first dose of a COVID-19 vaccine, and 93.7 percent have received two doses as of Jan. 11.

    The rise in the proportion of hospitalisations amongst the fully vaccinated comes both amid the spread of the Omicron variant of the CCP virus in Australia, along with the loss in the efficacy of the available COVID-19 vaccines.

    A spokesperson for NSW Health told The Epoch Times on Jan. 11 that Omicron had supplanted Delta as the primary variant spreading in NSW, but that it also appeared to be less dangerous than its predecessor.

    “The Omicron variant is associated with a lower rate of hospitalisation and ICU admission,” the spokesperson said.

    While the state recorded 32,155 cases of the virus on Jan. 9, 2,030 were hospitalised, and only 159 had been sent to ICU. As of Jan. 12, the total number of cases has jumped to 53,909, with 2,242 hospitalised and 175 in ICU.

    “NSW Health urges the community to continue to practise COVID-safe behaviours to keep themselves and the community safe, including wearing a mask indoors, maintaining physical distancing, and practising hand hygiene.”

    People arrive to be vaccinated at the New South Wales Health mass vaccination hub at Homebush in Sydney, Australia, on Aug. 23, 2021. (Photo by Lisa Maree Williams/Getty Images)

    The spokesperson also reminded those eligible to receive their third booster dose of an available COVID-19 vaccine—which can now be done four months after receiving the second dose—to raise the effectiveness of immunity granted by the vaccine.

    “We continue to encourage everyone who has not yet done so to get vaccinated and anyone who is now eligible for their booster dose to get it without delay. The COVID-19 vaccines available in Australia are safe and very effective at reducing the risk of serious illness and death.”

    In the United States, it has been reported that 2 out of the three available COVID-19 vaccines dropped below 50 percent efficacy after six months, according to a study published in November 2021.

    To combat this, NSW has mandated booster shots for all education staff, joining other states that have implemented vaccine booster requirements.

    NSW is also currently working to better understand the effects of the new COVID-19 variants.

    “NSW Health is prioritising the whole genome sequencing of COVID-19 for patients in ICU in order to better understand the impact of both the Delta and Omicron variants,” the spokesperson said.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 23:00

  • Watch: Mexican Drug Cartel Carpet Bombs Rivals With Drone
    Watch: Mexican Drug Cartel Carpet Bombs Rivals With Drone

    A modified consumer drone was used in a bombing raid on a rival drug cartel in Mexico on Monday. Video from the cartel-operated drone shows several bombs were dropped on a rival camp in a new turf war. 

    According to the Spanish-language daily newspaper El Pais, the drone was operated by the Jalisco New Generation Cartel (CJNG) and bombed a rival cartel in the state of Michoacan. At least one person was injured in the attack. The entire incident was caught on video. 

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    A second video shows the camp’s destruction after a series of bombs were dropped. Then the drone abruptly spirals out of control and crashes to the ground. It was likely the drone was shot down by small arms fire. 

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    Founded in 2009, CJNG is considered one of Mexico’s most dangerous and powerful cartels. The cartel has flooded the US with fentanyl and methamphetamine and unleashed a war among rivals to control supply chains into the US. 

    The Drug Enforcement Administration described CJNG as “one of Mexico’s most violent and prolific drug trafficking organizations.” The very fact the cartel is using consumer drones strapped with bombs, which mimic ones used in Syria by terror organizations, is alarming. 

    Meanwhile, it’s only a matter of time before cartel violence spills over into the US. Several months ago, heavily armed drug cartel members shot at Texas Guardsmen stationed at an observation post. 

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 22:40

  • Why "Smart Guns" Won't Shake Up The Gun Market
    Why “Smart Guns” Won’t Shake Up The Gun Market

    Submitted by Bearing Arms. 

    Smart guns, or firearms that can identify the correct user, sound an awful lot like the solution to a lot of problems. It’s something anti-gun forces have wanted to see a long time and, frankly, it seems like something a lot of pro-gun people should be all about, too.

    However, we’re not.

    Don’t get me wrong, most of us like the idea of guns that really can’t be used if they’re stolen. The issue is…well, there are a ton of issues, really.

    Yet over at Reuters, they think smart guns are about to shake up the market.

    Personalized smart guns, which can be fired only by verified users, may finally become available to U.S. consumers after two decades of questions about reliability and concerns they will usher in a new wave of government regulation.

    Four-year-old LodeStar Works on Friday unveiled its 9mm smart handgun for shareholders and investors in Boise, Idaho. And a Kansas company, SmartGunz LLC, says law enforcement agents are beta testing its product, a similar but simpler model.

    Both companies hope to have a product commercially available this year.

    LodeStar co-founder Gareth Glaser said he was inspired after hearing one too many stories about children shot while playing with an unattended gun. Smart guns could stop such tragedies by using technology to authenticate a user’s identity and disable the gun should anyone else try to fire it.

    They could also reduce suicides, render lost or stolen guns useless, and offer safety for police officers and jail guards who fear gun grabs.

    Sure, they could possibly do all that.

    They could also refuse to recognize a user, get hacked, or simply fail to operate when you need it.

    I get that the companies say they’ve addressed that problem, and they may well have. LodeStar claims that it provided a PIN pad as a backup in case the fingerprint reader doesn’t work, for example. How you’re supposed to key in a PIN in a high-stress situation is beyond me, but that’s supposed to make us all feel better about these guns.

    However, there’s something else to be considered here, something you’d expect Reuters to understand. That’s how a market works.

    See, smart guns are a product without any real market. Your average gun buyer has little to no interest in a smart gun. Especially since it’s unlikely to be available at a similar cost to something like a Glock or Smith & Wesson M&P.

    After all, why spend more for a gun with absolutely no track record? Our standard firearms are esWsentially using century-old technology that has more than proven itself.

    “But law enforcement is testing them out. Surely they’ll provide a track record, right?”

    I don’t think so. After all, I’m skeptical of those claims. Look at what SmartGunz said about that, as well as the price:

    SmartGunz would not say which law enforcement agencies are testing its weapons, which are secured by radio frequency identification. SmartGunz developed a model selling at $1,795 for law enforcement and $2,195 for civilians, said Tom Holland, a Kansas Democratic state senator who co-founded the company in 2020.

    So, we don’t know which departments are testing this so we can’t even ask the cops how it works for them, and we get to pay more than three times what a regular firearm costs?

    Sign me the hell up.

    Honestly, I like technology. I’m not an early adopter, though, because I’ve seen too much technology show up with a bang and then fizzle into nothing. I waited to get a VCR until we knew whether to go VHS or Beta. I didn’t go with DVD until I knew it would be around a while. I waited to go with BluRay until HDDVD was a thing of the past.

    But I do love seeing new technology take hold.

    One of these days, we probably will have smart guns on our shelves. However, these manufacturers are deluding themselves if they think we’re going to trip over ourselves to buy guns that we can’t trust for three or four times the cost.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 22:20

  • General Electric Abandons Biden's Vax Mandate After SCOTUS Ruling While Nike Doubles Down
    General Electric Abandons Biden’s Vax Mandate After SCOTUS Ruling While Nike Doubles Down

    Now that the Supreme Court has blocked President Biden’s push to mandate vaccinations for all workers at companies with more than 100 workers, companies are finally backing away from the government’s edict. To wit, General Electric has just announced that it has abandoned its vaccine require  

    According to Bloomberg, the maker of jet engines, wind turbines and medical scanners confirmed the decision Friday via email. GE is the first major company to announce a halt after SCOTUS’s decision Thursday to block the centerpiece of President Joe Biden’s push to boost COVID vaccinations.

    Vaccine rules have taken on greater significance as the surging omicron variant has disrupted companies’ plans to order workers to return to the office.

    Without the federal mandate, which would have applied to employers with 100 or more workers, the choice is now up to individual workers.

    Of course, not every company is backing away from the rule now that SCOTUS has shot it down: Nike, for example, is charging full-steam ahead.

    To wit, Nike sent a defiant letter to its remaining unvaccinated employees warning that they will be fired by Jan. 15 if they fail get vaccinated against COVID. Republicans attacked Nike’s mandate, but the company held its ground.

    Unfortunately for Nike’s remaining unvaccinated employees, social media accounts belonging to Democratic “grass roots” organizations are cheering Nike on.

    A separate rule that would apply to federal contractors remains in limbo after it was blocked by a federal judge last month, but if it’s blocked, we suspect companies to which it would apply will react in a similar fashion. After all, what company wants to take on additional responsibilities?

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 22:00

  • Malone: 'Mass Formation' Deployed On You After Over 200 Years Of Study
    Malone: ‘Mass Formation’ Deployed On You After Over 200 Years Of Study

    Authored by Robert Malone via “Who Is Robert Malone” Substack,

    Today in “factchecking the factcheckers”, junior academics cited by Forbes, Associated Press, Reuters and The Independent have just not done their homework concerning the work of Professor Dr. Mattias Desmet of the University of Ghent in Belgum. All I can say about this is that I hope that their naive, ignorant, grandstanding statements to the press are brought up during their future Academic Tenure and Advancement reviews.

    But there has been an amazingly coordinated effort to shoot the messenger and actively character assassinate (or “defenstrate”) me as a surrogate while avoiding any reference to the highly credentialed academic Professor Dr. Mattias Desmet who actually developed the theory and has documented the extensive evidence in an upcoming academic book. So, what can we learn from this in the short term?

    Clearly, Google was not the only corporation triggered by Joe Rogan podcast # 1757 which previously reached #1 podcast ranking worldwide, has been referred to as “the most important interview of our time” and has been seen by over 50 million viewers. But what absolutely has been generated by all of the coopted reactionary press and Big Tech titans metaphorically tripping over their shoelaces is a massive trove of real time data validating the brilliant Mass Formation intellectual synthesis developed by Professor Desmet over the last two years.

    In this coordinated propaganda and censorship response, we can clearly see the hands of the BBC-led Trusted News Initiative, the Scientific Technological Elite, the transnational investment funds and their World Economic Forum allies which control Pfizer and most of Big Pharma, Legacy Media and Big Tech (and many national governments) acting in real time to suppress a growing awareness by the general public of having been actively manipulated using crowd psychology tools to generate clinically significant fear and anxiety of COVID-19 (otherwise known as “Coronaphobia”) to advance their agendas on a global scale. Multiple governments have now admitted to actively using fear and ‘Mass Formation’-related theories as a tool for totalitarian population control during this outbreak. This is occurring at the same time that Omicron is destroying the legitimacy of government and WHO propaganda concerning the “Safe and Effective” mRNA vaccines and associated mandates.

    But what confuses me is why the western press is all following the same narrative as Forbes, which is now owned by a Chinese media holding company. Is this all really just about China wanting to advance a New World Order agenda, and working in a coordinated fashion together with captured western legacy media and their transnational fund overlords?

    Break out the popcorn, because we have an “approved narrative” dumpster fire in progress.

    “I don’t see how people could claim that ‘mass-formation’ doesn’t exist or has never been scientifically studied. The term just refers – it goes without saying – to the process of the formation of a mass or a crowd. Mass formation has been studied for over 200 years, beginning with such scholars as Gustave Le Bon, Freud, McDougal, Canetti, Hannah Arendt, etc. In the twentieth century, psychologists such as Ash and Sheriff have studied mass formation experimentally.

    Some of these scholars did explicitly use the term mass-formation, others didn’t. But what they studied was basically the same: the way in which individual’s mental states is influenced by their tendency to conform to group thinking. I myself have over 100 publications on Web of Science, a large part of them focusing on how individuals’ personality structures is influenced by their relationships with other people. Once you understand the basic mechanisms through which individual’s personality is in the grip of the opinion of other people, you understand the elementary mechanisms at work in this enormous psychological process that is happening when a mass emerges in a society.

    In my upcoming book: The psychology of totalitarianism, I analyze and describe the way in which the psychological process of mass formation got stronger and stronger throughout the last two centuries and eventually leads to totalitarian thinking and in the end also to the emergence of totalitarian states.”

    – Mattias Desmet, Professor of Clinical Psychology at Ghent University in Belgium

    Please follow this link for Professor Dr. Desmet’s Prior Academic Works

    Abridged from M. Desmet: “The Psychology of Totalitarianism”

    ‘Mass Formation – brief summary 

    • Totalitarianism is characterized by processes of large scale mass formation. 

    • Four conditions are needed for large scale mass formation:

    1.       A large amount of people must feel alone and isolated. 

    2.       Their lives must feel pointless and meaningless. 

    3.       There must be high levels of free floating anxiety, and 

    4.       There must be high levels of free-floating frustration and aggression.

    *If under these conditions a narrative is distributed through the mass media which indicates an object of anxiety and provides a strategy to deal with this object of anxiety, then all the free floating anxiety might be associated to this object and a huge willingness might be observed to participate in the strategy to deal with the object of anxiety.

    • At the same time, the field of attention gets narrower until it only contains the part of reality that is indicated by the narrative and people lose their capacity to take into account the other aspects of reality (what makes them often utterly irrational).

    Development of mathematical models to describe this process are currently in progress in a collaboration between Professor Desmet, Dr. rer. nat. habil. Norbert Schwarzer and Dr. Troy Vom Braucke. This work is building upon prior academic modeling work including the following volumes:’

    Earlier seminal academic works regarding mass formation upon which Professor Desmet has based his theory include the following

    Use of fear to control behavior in Covid crisis was ‘totalitarian’, admit scientists

    Members of Scientific Pandemic Influenza Group on Behaviour express regret about ‘unethical’ methods.

    The Telegraph. By Gordon Rayner, 14 May 2021

    A State of Fear by Laura Dodsworth

    A State of Fear: how the UK government weaponised fear during the Covid-19 pandemic

    This is a book about fear. Fear of a virus. Fear of death. Fear of losing our jobs, our democracy, our human connections, our health and our minds. It’s also about how the government weaponised our fear against us – supposedly in our best interests – until we were the most frightened country in Europe.

    Fear is the most powerful emotion. Hardwired into humans, fear is part of our evolutionary success. But that also makes it one of the most powerful tools in the behavioural psychology toolbox and it has been used to manipulate and control people during the pandemic.

    In one of the most extraordinary documents ever revealed to the British public, the behavioural scientists advising the government said that a substantial number of people did not feel threatened enough by Covid-19 to follow the rules. They advised the government to increase our sense of ‘personal threat’, to scare us into submission.

    But why did the government deliberately frighten us, and how has this affected us as individuals and as a country? Who is involved in the decision-making that affects our lives? How are behavioural science and nudge theory being used to subliminally manipulate us? How does the media leverage fear? What are the real risks to our wellbeing?

    Ahead of any official inquiry into the handling of the Covid-19 pandemic, Laura Dodsworth explores all these questions and more, in a nuanced and thought-provoking discussion of an extraordinary year in British life and politics. With stories from members of the general public who were impacted by fear, anxiety and isolation, and revealing interviews with psychologists, politicians, scientists, lawyers, Whitehall advisers and journalists, A State of Fear calls for a more hopeful, transparent and effective democracy.

    More references:

    The Rape of the Mind: The Psychology of Thought Control, Menticide, and Brainwashing by Joost A.M. Meerloo. 1961

    In 1933 Meerloo began to study the methods by which systematic mental pressure brings people to abject submission, and by which totalitarians imprint their subjective “truth” on their victims’ minds. In “The Rape of the Mind” he goes far beyond the direct military implications of mental torture to describing how our own culture unobtrusively shows symptoms of pressurizing people’s minds. He presents a systematic analysis of the methods of brainwashing and mental torture and coercion, and shows how totalitarian strategy, with its use of mass psychology, leads to systematized “rape of the mind.” He describes the new age of cold war with its mental terror, verbocracy, and semantic fog, the use of fear as a tool of mass submission and the problem of treason and loyalty, so loaded with dangerous confusion. The “Rape of the Mind” is written for the interested layman, not only for experts and scientists.

    To end, the book written in 1841 entitled: “Extraordinary Popular Delusions and The Madness of Crowds” is one of the first works on this subject.

    by Charles MacKay (Author)

    …originally published in 1841. This includes the preface, which is often omitted from abridged versions.In this book, Charles Mackay discusses the irrational behaviors of crowds in the economy, war and magic. He gives several different examples of market bubbles, such as the Mississippi Scheme and the infamous Tulip Mania in the Netherlands. Ever since it was written, investors have used it as a guide to help identify boom and bust cycles. Extraordinary Popular Delusions and The Madness of Crowds has had an important influence on economists in understanding of crowd psychology and feedback loops.

    *  *  *

    Subscribe to Who is Robert Malone

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 21:40

  • Looters Raid Union Pacific Trains In Los Angeles, Searching For Amazon And UPS Packages
    Looters Raid Union Pacific Trains In Los Angeles, Searching For Amazon And UPS Packages

    California leads the way in transitioning the US into what could be considered a third-world country. Progressive leadership in the state has lowered theft of $950 or less from felonies to misdemeanors, allowing for a wave of smash-and-grab robberies. 

    Organized retail crime gangs no longer target large department and or boutique stores, snatching high-value merchandise from shelves but instead raid containers double stacked on train cars. 

    “A section of the Union Pacific train tracks in downtown Los Angeles has been littered with thousands of shredded boxes, packages stolen from cargo containers that stop in the area to unload,” CBS Los Angeles reported Thursday evening.

    CBSLA photojournalist John Schreiber tweeted shocking videos of torn-apart packages by looters after they raided containers. Many of the boxes on the ground were from Amazon and UPS. 

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    “I’m told by law enforcement these UPS bags are especially sought after by thieves opening cargo containers… they are often full of boxes with merchandise bound for residential addresses. More valuable than say, a cargo container full of low-value bulky items like toilet paper,” Schreiber said. 

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    Here’s another stunning view of the looting aftermath. 

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    The reporter said containers on this route had been targeted multiple times. 

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    It appears organized retail crime gangs are becoming more brazen in their thefts as progressive leadership sits back and lets their city crumble under the weight of lawlessness. Some liberals are turning against their party as they see their chances for reelection fade. 

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 21:20

  • China Reveals AI News Anchor, Almost Indistinguishable From Real Human
    China Reveals AI News Anchor, Almost Indistinguishable From Real Human

    By Shawn Lin of The Epoch Times,

    “Hello everyone, I am the artificial intelligence news anchor on National Business Daily. I am the virtual twin of the original host. I have been running—reporting the news—undetected for 70 days now,” the AI news anchor N Xiaohei revealed itself to its television viewers on Dec. 20, 2021, after 1700 hours of a continuous live news broadcast.

    (R) A screenshot image of the real-life news anchor on the “N Xiaohei Finance” program (L) N Xiaohei’s AI-rendered virtual twin in a blue background.

    On the same day, the Chinese state-controlled media National Business Daily (NBD) and the AI company Xiaoice jointly announced the official launch of their collaborative live news broadcasting TV programs run entirely by AI—the first of its kind.

    The TV program is named “AI Business Daily.” It will broadcast financial news 24 hours a day, seven days a week, hosted by two AI news anchors—named N Xiaohei and N Xiaobai—technically supported by Xiaoice.

    N Xiaohei and N Xiaobai are virtual replicas of two real-life news anchors—a man and a woman. The Xiaoice Framework uses data collected from the two real-life anchors to train its AI models. Meanwhile, Xiaoice Neural Rendering (XNR) technology makes the virtual humans’ facial expressions and body movements look real and natural.

    AI anchors have appeared in China’s TV programs in the past, but they could be identified immediately back then. Since the test launch of AI Business Daily on Oct. 11, 2021, N Xiaohei’s Douyin account—the Chinese version of TikTok—has accumulated over 3 million fans despite the real person not appearing on air for 70 days. Xiaoice, in collaboration with NBD, has demonstrated its ability to develop virtual replicas that are almost indistinguishable from real humans through advanced AI learning and rendering technologies, according to the Chinese state-run Xinhua News Agency.

    According to the report, Xiaoice Framework’s small-sample learning technology allowed the two virtual humans to complete their training cycle in one week. Chinese business commentator Zeng Xiangling said that long training cycles were needed to train AIs in the past, whereas short training cycles significantly reduce the high cost of developing AIs.

    Not only that, the Xiaoice Framework’s technical driver makes the end-to-end automation on AI possible, enabling the AI to collect, edit, and broadcast financial news all by itself. From reading financial information, generating text and graphs, and synchronizing with the pre-trained virtual anchor, the AI could broadcast a complete live video on the network without any human assistance.

    “The era of an unwearied, safe, and reliable AI Being has arrived,” Xiaoice CEO Li Di said. “It is going to provide a steady news output.”

    According to an NBD report, AI news anchors are modeled using deep learning neural network technology, enabling them to broadcast in Mandarin, English, and other languages. The advanced AI technology is now being used to upgrade and transform the Chinese media industry as well as its film industry. Since the success of the AI Business Daily program, each NBD news channel will now also fully collaborate with Xiaoice to create AI TV programs.

    Xiaoice, or “Microsoft Little Ice,” is an AI system developed by Microsoft Asia in 2014. The company was formerly known as the AI Xiaoice Team of Microsoft Software Technology Center Asia. It is Microsoft’s biggest independent AI R&D team. In July 2020, Microsoft spun off its Xiaoice business into a separate company, allowing it to operate as an independent entity in China and other Asian countries. The Xiaoice Framework is one of the world’s complete artificial intelligence frameworks with the largest AI interactions globally.

    Xiaoice CEO Li Di said in October 2021 that a large number of AI subjects were created in the past two years, and the number will rapidly expand. Li expects AIs to eventually outnumber the human population while incorporating diversity and individual customization.

    On Oct. 20, 2021, the ninth day after NBD’s AI TV test launch, China’s State Administration of Radio, Film, and Television, released the section of the “14th Five-Year Plan” detailing its strategy for news broadcasting and audiovisual networks. The plan proposes to strengthen AI applications in its news production and broadcasting, such as promoting the widespread use of virtual anchors in TV programs and improving news production and broadcasting efficiency using AIs.

    AI Risks

    Artificial intelligence does not need to eat or sleep, nor does it get sick or need overtime pay, and now it can actively generate news content. However, many are also very concerned about the rapid development of AI.

    Mr. Wang, a 20-year IT industry expert in Japan, told The Epoch Times that artificial intelligence has far surpassed humans in terms of calculation methods, performance, and learning ability. But the biggest problem is that it has no ethics, morals, or personal values. If this AI technology is in the wrong person’s hands, it could be devastating to mankind.

    The current robotics technology is also very advanced. Some robots can even surpass humans or animals in many physical activities. Once AIs are given the ability to act physically, humans may not have the power to resist, granting the people in control of the AIs the ability to do whatever they desire, Wang added.

    Senior media professional Shi Shan told The Epoch Times that the Chinese regime has no bottom line for fraud.

    “[The CCP’s] AI technology can now produce a close-to-perfect virtual news anchor, but what is next? A fake politician? A party leader? Perhaps it has already been done,” Shi said. “The CCP is great at deceit. The international communities now have to pay close attention to the authenticity of China’s audiovisual programs and other media content.”

    Big Data

    Big data is the key to AI research and development: the more relevant data, the better the AI is trained. While rapidly developing its own artificial intelligence, the CCP deliberately limits the flow of Chinese data abroad.

    China uses its massive population for gathering and developing its local AI technology. Tang Bohua, a patent examiner in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, told the Chinese publication of The Epoch Times that the CCP’s lack of regard for human rights and privacy opens up a huge data set for them, while the United States’ respect for these rights keeps data sets incomplete.

    On Jan. 4, the CCP introduced a new version of its “Cybersecurity Review Measures.” The newly updated rules will require all Chinese network platform companies with data on more than 1 million users to undergo a security review before listing abroad.

    A law professor at Taiwan’s National Taipei University of Technology, Christy Jiang, told Radio Free Asia on Jan. 4 that she believes the one-million user threshold most likely included all Chinese tech companies that may be seeking listings overseas.

    A Strategic Priority

    The CCP has prioritized AI development in recent years, making it a “key national development strategy.” It has mandated AI into many aspects of ordinary life, not only to surveil and control its people but also to use its massive population to spur development.

    To bolster the rapid development of AI, the CCP has issued a number of supporting policies and regulations, including its “Made in China 2025” and “13th Five-Year Plan.”

    In 2017, China’s State Council issued the “New Generation Artificial Intelligence Development Plan,” emphasizing the significance of AI in helping the government understand and control society.

    “Artificial intelligence technology can accurately perceive, predict, and early-warn the major trends of society. [It can] grasp people’s cognition and psychological changes and proactively decide the responses. [This technology] will significantly improve the ability and level of social governance. It is irreplaceable for effectively maintaining social stability,” according to the plan.

    “It will have a profound impact on government management, economic security, social stability, and global governance.”

    Hong Kong finance and economics columnist Alexander Liao said the CCP believes the emerging technology revolution—artificial intelligence—can bring new life to the authoritarian system, which was on the verge of collapse.

    In 2013, the CCP proposed the “Modernization of National Governance System and Governance Capacity” plan and adopted it five years later in its 2019 plenary. According to Xinhua News Agency, a Chinese state-run media, the project is “a series of institutional arrangements aimed to make China’s governance system increasingly complete, scientifically standardized, and operate more effectively.”

    In 2014, the CCP launched the “Social Credit System,” which linked the social behavior of all ordinary citizens with the large-scale monitoring system in mainland China. It adopted facial recognition and big data analysis technology to carry out large-scale social control with AI.

    By 2020, the system has been integrated into almost all public service fields, including employment, education, loan services, travel ticket purchases, and more. This control method has been fully popularized in the form of “health codes” during the CCP virus pandemic.

    “All measures of ‘modernization of governance’ are the basis for strengthening the CCP’s authoritarian rule to ultimately achieving totalitarian control, and everything is rooted in artificial intelligence,” Liao added.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 21:00

  • Pilot Shortage Forces Delta, American Air To Cut Regional Flights
    Pilot Shortage Forces Delta, American Air To Cut Regional Flights

    A pilot shortage has led Delta Air Lines Inc. and American Airlines Group to slash regional flights around the country, prolonging travel pains that first emerged during Christmas Eve. 

    Bloomberg reports Delta will slash a quarter of its flights through the first half of this year. American is expected to drop 580 March flights at its wholly-owned Piedmont Airlines and a number of flights at its regional partners SkyWest Inc. and Mesa Air Group Inc.

    The shortage is not just because pilots call out sick for COVID-19 as the omicron variant spreads rapidly. There is a lingering pandemic effect of thousands of pilots who retired in early 2020, and now there’s not enough as travel rebounds. 

    During an earnings call on Thursday, Delta CEO Ed Bastian told investors that 100 to 200 pilots will be added to the roster every month into 2023. 

    By the second half of this year, the airline is “pretty confident” that it would restore flights that were cut in the first half, President Glen Hauenstein said on the call.

    American has adjusted upcoming schedules “to mitigate any future travel disruptions” because of pilot shortages at regional carriers, a statement from the airline read. 

    Recently, United Airlines Holdings Inc said it would reduce its near-term flight schedule as 3,000 workers contracted COVID-19. Also, Alaska Air Group Inc. slashed flights by 10% in January as it struggled with staffing shortages.

    Since Christmas Eve, staffing shortages and adverse weather conditions have canceled more than 20,000 flights, making this past holiday season one of the worst travel periods in years. 

    Reduced flights and staffing shortages will continue in the months ahead.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 20:40

  • "We've Got A Gun At Every Door In The House": Border Rancher Sees 2,400% Increase In Illegal Aliens On Property
    “We’ve Got A Gun At Every Door In The House”: Border Rancher Sees 2,400% Increase In Illegal Aliens On Property

    By Charlotte Cuthbertson of The Epoch Times,

    Ranching and smuggling are respectively the primary legitimate and illegitimate economic drivers in Cochise County, Arizona.

    Rancher John Ladd on his property that abuts the U.S.–Mexico border near Naco in Cochise County, Ariz

    Much to John Ladd’s frustration, the two industries intersect on his ranch, which is sandwiched between the U.S.–Mexico border and highway 92, a convenient smuggling pick-up road.

    Ladd’s ranch shares 10.5 miles of border with Mexico and in mid-2019 had an average of 12 illegal aliens traversing his land daily, with Border Patrol catching about half. Now, he says, it’s about 300 a day and Border Patrol catches about 30 percent on a good day. The numbers started escalating the same time the 2020 presidential election swung Joe Biden’s way.

    “I’m not going to say there’s no hope, but nothing’s going to change as long as Biden’s there and his administration,” Ladd told The Epoch Times on Dec. 8.  “And so what are we going to do? Just let them come through?”

    The illegal immigrants traversing Ladd’s ranch aren’t seeking asylum—they’re mostly young, single men dressed head-to-toe in camouflage clothing and doing everything they can to avoid law enforcement and get to Phoenix.

    “These people can’t turn themselves in, they’ll get deported. These are the bad people. We’re dealing with the worst of the worst,” Cochise County Sheriff Mark Dannels said.

    Dannels’s border team has placed hundreds of trail cameras throughout the county since 2017 to detect illegal aliens, traffickers, and smugglers.

    “We put our cameras in areas where Border Patrol wasn’t going,” he said. “We went to the river areas, we went into the mountain areas, we went to the desert areas,” he said. The money for the cameras was raised from private donations—Dannels refuses to accept government money that has strings attached.

    The border wall’s accompanying road, lights, cameras, and sensors remain unfinished since January 2021 when President Joe Biden halted all border wall construction, in Cochise County,

    Four years ago, the sheriff’s border team, called SABRE (Southeastern Arizona Border Region Enforcement), rid Ladd’s ranch of drug smugglers, which was the biggest problem at the time.

    “There were 37 experienced smugglers [on his property] that are now sitting in prison,” Dannels said in 2019.

    The drugs are still coming across, but the cartels are making an endless amount of cash with human smuggling, so they’ve added a lucrative new revenue stream. Currently, Dannels’s cameras are detecting about 6,000 illegal aliens per month in the county, while Border Patrol is detecting an additional 10,000.

    Detective Jake Kartchner, who is part of the sheriff’s border team run by Sgt. Tim Williams, said each illegal alien must pay the Sinaloa cartel between $7,000 to $9,000 on average to get across the border.

    Getting across the border and to a road is the first step. Next, a smuggler receives a GPS location of a group, loads them up, and heads to Phoenix. The drivers are mostly U.S. citizens who are recruited via social media and paid about $1,000 per alien transported to Phoenix, according to the sheriff’s office.

    “It’s like the cartel Uber. They just stage in public places all along the roadways waiting to get called up to go pick them up,” Dannels said. He said 900 to 1,000 smuggling vehicles have been tracked in the county each month.

    Ladd said he has watched vehicles load up on highway 92 after crossing his property.

    “Those cars aren’t even stopping—they’re slowing down and they’re running along and open the door and jump in and off they go,” he said. “It’s very well coordinated.”

    No state law against smuggling illegal aliens exists in Arizona and the federal government isn’t prosecuting juvenile drivers or those transporting five or fewer aliens, according to Cochise County Attorney Brian McIntyre.

    Illegal immigrants who just crossed the border into the United States from Mexico, in Cochise County, Ariz

    “They’re Running”

    Cochise County shares 83 miles of international border with Mexico and sits in the southeast corner of Arizona, abutting New Mexico. The landscape consists of remote desert and mountain passes.

    Border Patrol apprehensions in the Tucson sector, which encompasses Cochise County, almost tripled in 2021 compared to 2020.

    In fiscal year 2021, border agents apprehended more than 190,000 illegal aliens in the sector, compared to 66,000 the year before. Thousands more evaded capture—including many on Ladd’s ranch.

    “This new invasion, they don’t want to get caught. This isn’t like Texas, where they’re coming, ‘Here I am.’ They’re running,” he said.

    Ladd said his family has to stay more vigilant than before and ensure everything is locked up.

    “We’ve got a gun at every door in the house. We had to go through all that again with the family—you better understand if you’re gonna shoot somebody, the consequences, and you better make sure you’re really in danger,” he said.

    Ladd said two of the ranches on the Mexican side directly across from him are owned by the Sinaloa cartel and the owners of the other two have been told to stay off their property after dark.

    Although he’s not looking to sell, Ladd said the border has halved the value of his ranch since it was placed into a family trust in 1983. He had to get the ranch reappraised eight years ago when his mother died and the value had plummeted by half, he said, adding that improvements worth $2 million to $3 million had been undertaken during that time.

    “In the appraisal they said, ‘This ranch’s southern fence is the border,” Ladd said. “That was the first sentence in the appraisal.”

    His ranching costs are also higher as he deals with cut fences, gates left open, and more scattered herds.

    “The amount of labor involved to get cattle now is three or four times what somebody 50 miles north has to put up with,” he said.

    McIntyre said residents want to feel safe on their property.

    “You’re not going to feel safe if you’ve got 100 people across your property line at night,” he said.

    “And you don’t know that they’re armed and you don’t know who’s coming to pick them up and where they’re going to pick them up. It is a violation.”

    A Border Patrol agent pulls tires behind his vehicle to smooth out the road to make detecting footprints easier, near Naco in Cochise County, Arizona

    TV Ads in Mexico

    Kartchner said the sheriff’s office is currently investigating a new phenomenon involving television ads allegedly being broadcast in southern Mexico, spurring illegal immigration.

    “The commercials are pretty much telling them—from what we’ve gathered—’It doesn’t matter your immigration status, we’ll hire you,’” he said. The commercials are encouraging illegal immigrants to get to New Jersey, Oregon or Chicago and work will be provided, Kartchner said.

    “They’ll freely tell you why they’re coming across,” he said of the illegal aliens they catch. He said up to 60 percent of them are currently saying they came because of the advertising.

    Ladd said he believes most illegal immigrants coming across his land end up being indentured servants to the cartel to pay off their smuggling debt.

    He’s bracing for another frustrating year in 2022 as the flow continues unimpeded.

    “The plan is to let everybody come,” he said, referring to the Biden administration. “And they’re all gonna vote democratic. I think that’s the biggest thing that people have finally understood—that’s what he’s doing.”

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 20:20

  • Apple's Mixed Reality AR/VR Headset Faces Delays Due To Overheating, Cameras And Software
    Apple’s Mixed Reality AR/VR Headset Faces Delays Due To Overheating, Cameras And Software

    We regret to inform you that the transformation of your daily life into The Matrix has been delayed by several months, at least. The next big widely anticipated AR/VR release – a headset launch from Apple – appears to have run “head first” into a reality check. 

    The company’s planned mixed-reality headset product has been delayed by “at least a few months,” according to a new Bloomberg report. The device had been planned for an unveiling at Apple’s annual Worldwide Developers Conference in June. 

    But Apple is now battling “development challenges related to overheating, cameras and software” that may have pushed the timeline for the product’s release back from its late year 2022 expected date.

    The headset, which hasn’t been discussed publicly by the company, has been “years in the making”, the report says, indicating it has been in development since as early as 2015. 

    Apple’s hope for the product is to produce a product more aesthetically pleasing than current AR goggles – most of which have flopped as commercial releases. VR headsets, however, have been slightly more successful. Numerous Apple Insider websites have referred to the project by the name “Apple Glass”. 

    The company expects its product will be an “expensive niche item”, but will combine the functions of AR and VR headsets. 

    Apple’s 2023 developers conference will focus on virtual reality and augmented reality, the report says. This includes support for those features in iOS 16, slated to be unveiled in June. 

    Apple is also working on a set of AR-only glasses that it hopes to debut “later this decade”. The company is still working on solving problems related to temperature fluctuations due to the two processors that will be included in the device. 

    The company reportedly has over 2,000 employees working on its AR and VR hardware. 

    Meta is also working on a mixed-reality headset which will serve as competition for Apple. 

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 20:00

  • Beijing Initiates "Olympic Bubble" Measures For Pandemic Control
    Beijing Initiates “Olympic Bubble” Measures For Pandemic Control

    Authored by Jenny Li via The Epoch Times,

    A coronavirus outbreak in Beijing’s neighboring city of Tianjin comes just four weeks before the start of the Winter Olympics in the Chinese capital.

    This means all 15 million Tianjin residents are barred from entering Beijing which is 100 kilometers away. Meanwhile, Beijing’s so-called “Closed Loop” or “Bubble” measures for the Winter Olympics are now in full swing. The Olympics begin Feb. 4.

    On Jan. 9, the Jinnan District Center for Disease Control and Prevention in Tianjin reported that 20 more people tested positive through COVID-19 PCR testing, a day after 20 others were found to have the virus. Those infected are linked to educational facilities, and the outbreak has spread to at least three schools.

    The Tianjin Center for Disease Control and Prevention conducted genetic sequencing of the virus in two of the cases and identified the virus at the new Omicron variant.

    On Jan. 9, the Tianjin municipal government decided to carry out nucleic acid testing on all its staff. Other testing measures for the public are likewise taking place.

    “People in four districts, Jinan, Dongli, Xiqing, and Nankai are taking nucleic acid testing today,” Mr. Zhang from Nankai District, Tianjin told The Epoch Times on Jan. 9.

    “The rest will take them tomorrow. Nankai District has notified the closure of the district. People in Jinan District have basically all done nucleic acid yesterday,” he said.

    “People were still lining up at 3:00 am. At four o’clock in the morning, the inspectors started going door to door to administer nucleic acid [testing] to elderly people who had not taken it.”

    Meanwhile, the Tianjin Municipal Examination Institute announced that all interviews for a teacher qualification examination scheduled for Jan. 9 had been canceled.

    “There is a teacher qualification exam these two days,” Zhang said.

    “I learned online that those who finished the exam on the 8th were required to quarantine, but it was announced at 11.30 p.m. yesterday that the test on the 9th was canceled,” he said.

    “A lot of people came to Tianjin [for the exam] and live in a hotel. Now they just can’t go back. They may need to quarantine at their own expense. I saw someone saying online that he had no money, no food, and couldn’t go out.”

    On Jan. 9, Beijing Center for Disease Control and Prevention issued a notice urging “Beijing residents not to go to Tianjin unless it is necessary, and Tianjin residents do not come to Beijing unless it is necessary.”

    Officials at the Yingsi checkpoint on the Beijing-Shanghai Expressway told the state-run Beijing News that they had turned back many people and vehicles entering Beijing over the past two days.

    The official request is understood not to be a “travel advisory” but an executive order.

    In October 2021, Beijing issued a clear order banning entry into Beijing of the so-called “four categories of people,” including “people in the county with one or more local COVID infection(s) and those with travel history in that county within 14 days”. In other words, as long as there is a confirmed positive case of COVID-19 in a county, everyone from that county is not allowed to enter Beijing, including Beijing residents who stayed there within 14 days.

    Zhang said the authorities are not concerned about the treatment of those who are ill from the virus.

    “The media and the government have always focused on how many people have been tested positive,” he said. “But how many have been infected, and how many have been isolated, but how are these patients doing? How long does it take to recover? How effective is the treatment? Almost nothing is seen. Why is there no follow-up on concerns about lasting adverse effects from vaccines?”

    Other than being nervous about the outbreak in Tianjin, Chinese Communist Party (CCP) authorities are further worried that the virus could spread from Xi’an in Shaanxi Province, through similarly named Shanxi Province, plus Henan, and Hebei provinces, and then on to Beijing.

    The cities of Zhengzhou and Xuchang in Henan Province, south of Beijing, have been hit by the virus. Henan is a major transportation route into Beijing and currently all passengers traveling by train through the province will not be allowed to enter Beijing.

    Another province joining Shaanxi and Hebei provinces is Shanxi. On Jan. 6, the Shanxi Provincial Office of Epidemic Prevention and Control issued a notice requiring people not to go out of the province unless necessary. The notice also requires people entering or returning to Shanxi to immediately report to their workplaces, communities, or hotels and take nucleic acid tests.

    On Jan. 9, the Epidemic Prevention and Control Office in Jincheng City, Shanxi Province said that because “the epidemic situation around our city is becoming increasingly severe,” it will be “strictly” tightening controls. Among such measures are prohibiting access to county and village roads in Henan Province to Jincheng and discouraging the return of foreign vehicles and people with a history of travel to Henan Province via high-speed, national, and provincial roads and high-speed trains.

    With the 2022 Winter Olympics set to kick off in Beijing on Feb. 4, the CCP hopes to demonstrate its “institutional confidence” to the world with its anti-epidemic measures.

    Beijing has also carried out its “bubble management” in the lead-up to the event to ensure that people associated with the Games, including members of foreign sports teams and Chinese participants, do not come into contact with other “ordinary Chinese.”

    Given that pandemic data released by the CCP is largely regarded as illogical, it is generally not recognized by the international community. It is incomprehensible for the international community that the city of Xi’an with a population of some 12 million people has been sealed off after less than 100 officially positive infections have been found.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 19:40

  • Dr. Oz Slams "Petty Tyrant" Fauci, Challenges Him To Debate On COVID
    Dr. Oz Slams “Petty Tyrant” Fauci, Challenges Him To Debate On COVID

    Senate candidate Dr. Mehmet Oz – who is running for one of Pennsylvania’s US Senate seats as a Republican – slammed Dr. Anthony Fauci on Thursday and challenged the NIH chief to a debate while blasting him as a “petty tyrant” who had mishandled the response to the COVID pandemic.

    Sen. Rand Paul – who, like Dr. Oz and Dr. Fauci, is himself also a doctor – would likely be proud of his Dr. Oz, since the TV doctor who is running for the Senate in his first stab at a political career also happens to be a Republican. Dr. Oz also represents a “qualified” voice, making his criticism of Fauci seem more credible.

    Oz slammed Dr. Fauci in a clip posted to twitter: “It’s past time Fauci faces the fact that he got COVID wrong. So, doctor to doctor – let’s debate. This Doctor is in, are you?” Oz said in a tweet Thursday. “Let’s get the facts straight here. You and me. Let’s have a debate, doctor to doctor, and give the American people the truth about COVID-19. I’m game. Anytime. Anywhere. Dr. Fauci, are you in?” Oz said in the campaign video.

    https://platform.twitter.com/widgets.js

    Dr. Oz said on Newsmax Thursday that he wants to debate Fauci on subjects like the need for a vaccine mandates, the benefits of natural immunity and the efficacy of drugs like monoclonal antibodies.

    After making a name for himself on the Oprah Winfrey Show, In 2009, Dr. Oz started “The Dr. Oz Show,” The health-themed talk show will end Jan. 14 as Oz starts his run for office ahead of November’s mid-term vote.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 19:20

  • The Double Helix Of Entwined Pandemic And Economic Strategy
    The Double Helix Of Entwined Pandemic And Economic Strategy

    Authored by Alastair Crooke via The Strategic Culture Foundation,

    Three years ago, I said to an American Professor from the US Army War College in Washington, in respect to the campaign to return American lost Blue Collar jobs to Asia, that these jobs would never return.  They were gone for good.

    He retorted that that was precisely so, but I was missing the point, he said. America did not expect, or want, the majority of those humdrum manufacturing jobs back.

    They should stay in Asia.

    The Élites, he said, wanted only the commanding heights of Tech. They wanted the intellectual property, the protocols, the metrics, the regulatory framework that would allow America to define and expand across the next two decades of global technological evolution.

    The real dilemma however, he said was:

    “What is to be done with the 20% of the American workforce that would be no longer needed: that was no longer necessary to the functioning of a tech-led US economy?”

    In fact, what the Professor said was but one facet of a fundamental economic dilemma. From the seventies and eighties onwards, US corporations were busy offshoring their labour costs to Asia. Partly, this was to cut costs and increase profitability (which it did) — but it also represented something deeper. 

    From the outset, the US has been an expansionary empire ever digesting new lands, new peoples, and their human and material resources. Forward motion, the continuous military, commercial, and cultural expansion became the lifeblood of Wall Street and of its foreign polity. For, absent this relentless expansion, the civic bonds of American unity fall into question.  An America not in motion is not America.  This forms the very essence of US leitkultur.

    Yet it only added further to the dilemma highlighted by my friend above. The expansion was accompanied by a flood of Wall Street credit expansion across the globe.  The debt burden exploded, and has become top heavy, balancing unsteadily on a pinhead of genuine underlying collateral.

    It is only now – for the first time since WW2 – that this relentless US strategic expansionary impulse has been challenged by the Russia-China axis.  They have declared ‘enough’.

    Yet, there was always another side to this dynamic of western structural transition. Its foundations, as the Professor suggested, no longer lay with the socially necessary labour contained in manufacturing drab products such as cars, telephones, or toothpaste. But rather, the core of it largely has come to reside in highly flammable debt-leveraged speculations on financial assets like stocks, bonds, futures, and especially derivatives, whose value is securitised indefinitely.  In this context, the 20% (or more likely 40%) of the workforce, simply becomes redundant to this highly complex, hyper-financialised, networked economy.

    So, here we have the second dilemma: Whilst the structural shrinking of the work-based economy inflates the financial sector, the latter’s complex volatility can only be contained through a logic of perpetual monetary doping (perpetual liquidity injections), justified by global emergencies, requiring ever greater stimulus.

    How to face this dilemma?  Well, there’s no going back.  That’s not an option.

    In this context, the Pandemic regimen becomes symptom of a world so far removed from any real economic self-sufficiency – adequate to sustain its existing workforce – that the dilemma may only be resolved (in the view of the élites) through facilitating the continuing attenuation of the old economy, whilst financial assets must be replenished with regular additions of liquidity.

    How to manage it? With the gradual abolishing of the traditional labour content to commodities (either from automation, or off-shoring), corporations have used the woke ideology to reinvent themselves. No longer do they produce just ‘things’ – they manufacture social output. They are stakeholders in society, ‘manufacturing’ socially desirable outcomes: diversity, social inclusivity, gender balance and climate responsible governance. Already, this transition has produced a cornucopia of new ESG liquidity flowing through calcified economic arteries.

    And the Pandemic, of course, justifies the monetary stimulus, whilst the follow-on climate ‘health’ emergency is prepared in order to legitimise further debt expansion, for the future.

    Financial analyst Mauro Bottarelli summarised the logic of this as follows:

    “A state of semi-permanent health emergency is preferable to a vertical market crash that would turn the memory of 2008 into a walk in the park.” 

    Professor of Critical Theory and Italian at Cardiff University, Fabio Vighi, has noted too the “Incurability” of what he calls “the Central Banker’s Long-Covid” condition” — that the injection of such a huge monetary stimulus as we have seen, was only possible by turning the engine of Main Street ‘off’, as such a cascade of liquidity ($6 Trillion) could not be allowed to flow willy-nilly into the Main Street economy (in the view of the Central Bankers), as this would cause an inflationary tsunami à la Weimar Republic. Rather, its’ main thrust has served to further inflate the virtual world of ever more complex financial instruments.

    Inevitably however, coupled with supply-chain bottlenecks, the gush of liquidity has caused Main Street inflation to rise, and hence imposed further hurt on the ground.  The aim of managing the manufacturing attenuation on the one hand (small business ‘lockdown’), whilst liquidity flowed freely to the financialised sphere (to postpone a market crash) has failed.  Inflation is accelerating, interest rates will rise, and this will bring adverse social and political consequences in its wake: i.e. anger, rather than compliance.

    At the heart of the predicament for those who run the system is that, should they to lose control of liquidity creation – either as a result of interest rate rises, or from increasing political dissent – the ensuing recession would take-down the entire socio-economic fabric below.

    And any severe recession would likely wreak havoc on the western political leadership, too.

    They have opted therefore instead, to sacrifice the democratic framework, in order to roll out a monetary regime rooted in a cult of corporate-owned science & technology, media propaganda, and disaster narratives – as the means to progress towards a technocratic ‘aristocratic’ takeover over the heads of the people. (Yes, in certain ‘circles’, it is thought of as a newly rising aristocracy of money).

    Professor Vighi again:

    “The consequences of emergency capitalism are emphatically biopolitical. They concern the administration of a human surplus that is growing superfluous for a largely automated, highly financialised, and implosive reproductive model. This is why Virus, Vaccine and Covid Pass are the Holy Trinity of social engineering.

    ‘Virus passports’ are meant to train the multitudes in the use of electronic wallets controlling access to public services and personal livelihood. The dispossessed and redundant masses, together with the non-compliant, are the first in line to be disciplined by digitalised poverty management systems directly overseen by monopoly capital. The plan is to tokenise human behaviour and place it on blockchain ledgers run by algorithms. And the spreading of global fear is the perfect ideological stick to herd us toward this outcome”.

    Professor Vighi’s point is clear. The vaccine campaign and the Green Pass system are no stand-alone health disciplines.  They are not about ‘the Science’, nor are they intended to make sense.  They are primordially connected to the élites’ economic dilemma, and serve as a political tool too, by which a new monetary dispensation can displace democracy.  President Macron spoke the unstated out loud, when he said: “As for the non-vaccinated, I really want to piss them off. And we will continue to do this, to the end. This is the strategy”.

    Italian PM Draghi similarly has escalated attacks on the unvaxxed, making vaccines mandatory for all the over 50s, and imposing significant restrictions on anyone over 12. Again, though ‘following the science’ is the mantra, these measures make no sense: the Omicron variant predominantly infects the double vaxxed, not the unvaxxed. 

    Two days ago, a leading Nobel Prize winning Virologist, Dr Montagnier and a colleague, confirmed this “obsolete” aspect of vaccine mandates. Writing in the Wall Street Journal, they write: 

    ” … mandating a vaccine to stop the spread of a disease requires evidence that the vaccines will prevent infection or transmission (rather than efficacy against severe outcomes like hospitalization or death). As the World Health Organization puts it, “if mandatory vaccination is considered necessary to interrupt transmission chains and prevent harm to others, there should be sufficient evidence that the vaccine is efficacious in preventing serious infection and/or transmission.” For Omicron, there is as yet no such evidence. 

    The little data we have suggest the opposite. One preprint study found that after 30 days the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines no longer had any statistically significant positive effect against Omicron infection, and after 90 days, their effect went negative—i.e., vaccinated people were more susceptible to Omicron infection. Confirming this negative efficacy finding, data from Denmark and the Canadian province of Ontario indicate that vaccinated people have higher rates of Omicron infection than unvaccinated people”.

    This is rarely, if ever, admitted. Both Macron and Draghi are desperate: They need to ‘liquify’ their economies – and soon.

    Indeed, Dr Malone, the father of the mRNA vaccines, wrote of those who point out such inconsistencies and illogicalities – just two months before his Twitter account was suspended – in a rather prophetic Twitter post:

    “I am going to speak bluntly,” he wrote.

    “Physicians who speak out are being actively hunted via medical boards and the press. They are trying to delegitimize us and pick us off, one by one.”

    He finished by warning that this is “not a conspiracy theory” but “a fact.” He urged us all to “wake up.”

    As the Telegraph has noted, British Scientists on a committee that encouraged the use of fear to control people’s behaviour during the Covid pandemic have admitted its work was “unethical” and “totalitarian”. The scientists warned in March 2021 that ministers in the UK needed to increase “the perceived level of personal threat” from Covid-19, because “a substantial number of people still do not feel sufficiently personally threatened”. Gavin Morgan, a psychologist on the team, said: “Clearly, using fear as a means of control is not ethical. Using fear smacks of totalitarianism”.

    Another SPI-B member said:

    “You could call [it] psychology ‘mind control’. That’s what we do … clearly we try and go about it in a positive way, but it has been used nefariously in the past”. Another colleague cautioned that “people use the pandemic to grab power, and drive through things that wouldn’t happen otherwise … We have to be very careful about the authoritarianism that is creeping in”.

    The problem goes deeper than a little ‘nudge psychology’ however. In 2019, the BBC established the Trusted News Initiative (TNI), a partnership that now includes many main-stream media. TNI was ostensibly designed to counter foreign narrative influence during election times, but it has expanded to synchronise all elements of messaging, and to eliminate deviation across the broad realm of media and tech platforms.

    These synchronised ‘talking-points’ are more powerful (and insidious) than any ideology, as it functions not as a belief system or ethos, but rather, as objective ‘science’. You cannot argue with, or oppose, Science (with a capital ‘S’). Science has no political opponents. Those who challenge it are labelled “conspiracy theorists,” “anti-vaxxers,” “Covid deniers,” “extremists,” etc. And, thus the pathologized New Normal narrative also pathologizes its political opponents: stripping them of all political legitimacy. The aim obviously, is their forced compliance. Macron made that plain.

    Separating the population on the basis of vaccination status is an epoch-making event. If resistance is quashed, a compulsory digital ID can be introduced to record the ‘correctness’ of our behaviour and regulate access to society. Covid was the ideal Trojan horse for this breakthrough. A global system of digital identification based on blockchain technology has long been planned by the ID2020 Alliance, backed by such giants as Accenture, Microsoft, the Rockefeller Foundation, MasterCard, IBM, Facebook, and Bill Gates’ ubiquitous GAVI. From here, the transition to monetary control is likely to be relatively smooth. CBDCs would allow central bankers not only to track every transaction, but especially to turn off access to liquidity, for any reason deemed legitimate.

    The Achilles’ heel to all this however, is the evidence of genuine popular resistance to the suppression by the tech platforms of all dissenting opinion (however well-qualified its source); by the refusal to allow people informed choice about their medical treatment; and by arbitrary restrictions that may involve loss of livelihood being imposed by decree, and underpinned by emergency laws, restricting popular protest.

    But more significantly and paradoxically, the Omricon variant may cut the legs from under those political leaders intent on doubling-down.  It is quite possible that this mild (barely lethal), yet highly contagious variant, may prove to be Nature’s ‘vaccine’, giving us a wide measure of immunity – ostensibly better than that offered by the ‘vaccines’ from Science! 

    Already, we observe European states are confused and at odds with each other – taking diametrically opposed policy lines: some ending restrictions, and some decreeing more and more. Other countries, like Israel, are reducing restrictions and shifting to a herd immunity policy.

    Of course, the corollary to the collapse of the technocratic initiative to liquify the over-leveraged economy might well be recession.  That unfortunately, is the logic of the situation.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 19:00

  • What You Need To Know Ahead Of Weekend Winter Storm
    What You Need To Know Ahead Of Weekend Winter Storm

    A fast-moving snowstorm could wreak havoc along the U.S. East Coast over the Martin Luther King Jr. holiday weekend, according to meteorologists at private weather forecasting firm BAMWX. 

    The storm will spread wintry precipitation across the Northern Plains and Upper Midwest into the Mid-Mississippi Valley on Saturday. The winter storm will begin to move up the Southeast into the Northeast U.S by Sunday morning. 

    Weather models are forecasting this could be a powerful storm and leave parts of the interior Northeast with substantial snowfall. Estimated snowfall totals show much of the heaviest snowfall will be west of the I-95 corridor. 

    The latest cold spell and prospects of colder weather in NYC through the second half of the month have ignited bullish bets in natural gas futures. 

    Natural gas futures are expected to record their largest weekly gain since late November. 

    Even though the storm is about 48 hours away from the Northeast, probabilities are rising that cold air will accompany the system and produce an all-snow event versus a wintry mix. What this means is heating demand will surge. 

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 18:40

  • Why Democrats Make Energy Expensive (And Dirty)
    Why Democrats Make Energy Expensive (And Dirty)

    Authored by Michael Shellenberger via Substack,

    Progressives say they care more about working people and climate change than Republicans and moderate Democrats. Why, then, do they advocate policies that make energy expensive and dirty?

    Progressive Democrats including Sen. Bernie Sanders and Rep. Pramila Jayapal, the head of the House progressive caucus, have sent a letter demanding the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) investigate whether “market manipulation” is causing natural gas prices to rise 30 percent on average for consumers over last winter, an astonishing $746 per household.

    But the main reason natural gas prices are rising is because progressives have been so successful in restricting natural gas production. Sanders, Jayapal, and Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC), as individuals and as part of the Congressional Progressive Caucus, have successful fought to restrict natural gas production through fracking and to block natural gas pipelines, including the Atlantic Coast pipeline.

    In 2020, Sanders celebrated efforts by progressives to cancel the Atlantic Coast pipeline. Today, New England is facing rolling blackouts. “Getting [natural] gas to [progressive Senators Ed] Markey and [Elizabeth] Warren’s Massachusetts is so difficult,” reports The Wall Street Journal, “that sometimes it comes into Boston Harbor on a tanker from Russia.”

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    Democrats aren’t the only reason the United States isn’t producing enough natural gas to keep prices at the same low levels they’ve been at for the past decade. There is higher demand as the economy emerges from covid. There is greater demand for natural gas internationally due to a bad year for wind energy in Europe. And President Joe Biden, for his part, has resisted many progressive demands to restrict oil and gas production.

    But the main reason there isn’t enough natural gas production is because of successful progressive Democratic efforts to restrict natural gas production in the United States, Europe, and other parts of the world in the name of fighting climate change, as I was one of the first to report last fall. Sanders and Jayapal talk about “market manipulation” and “profiteering” but to the extent there is any of either it’s because of inadequate supplies of natural gas and the pipelines to transport it.

    Successful shareholder activism, known in the industry as “ESG” for environmental, social, and governance issues, resulted in less investment in oil and gas production, and more weather-dependent renewables, which result in higher prices everywhere they are deployed at scale. Even ESG champions including Financial Times, Goldman Sachs, and Bloomberg all now acknowledge that it was climate activist shareholder efforts that restricted oil and gas investment.

    Such efforts also directly led to increasing carbon emissions. Last year saw a whopping 17 percent increase in coal-fired electricity, which resulted in a six percent increase in greenhouse gas emissions. It was the first annual increase in coal use since 2014. The reason for it was because of the scarcity and higher price of natural gas, coal’s direct replacement, not just in the U.S. but globally, since the US exports a significant quantity of natural gas.

    The other reason the U.S. used more coal in 2021 is because progressive Democrats are shutting down nuclear plants. “When a nuclear plant is closed, it’s closed forever,” noted Mark Nelson of Radiant Energy Group, an energy analytics firm, “whereas coal plants can afford to operate at relatively low levels of capacity, like just 30 to 50 percent operation, and thus wait for natural gas prices, and thus demand for coal power, to rise.”

    Progressives like Sanders, Jayapal, and AOC claim to care more about poor people, working people, and climate change than either Republicans or moderate Democrats, who they defeat in Democratic primary elections. Why, then, do they advocate policies that make energy expensive and dirty?

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    Strategic Ignorance

    A big part of the reason progressives make energy expensive appears to be that they just don’t know very much about energy. The fact that they are demanding that FERC investigate higher prices suggests they want to keep energy prices low. But it could also mean that their letter is just public relations cover so they are not blamed for raising energy prices.

    Indeed, it would be naive to think that Sanders and other progressives didn’t realize that blocking pipelines, opposing fracking, and subsidizing renewables would make energy expensive, given that making energy expensive has been the highest goal of their main climate advisor, Bill McKibben, who subscribes to the Malthusian view that there are too many humans and we must restrict energy and development.

    If renewables were cheaper than the status quo then the policies they advocate — no permitting of pipelines, restrictions on fracking, and subsidies for renewables — would not be necessary. Besides, mainstream energy experts and journalists today admit that weather-dependent renewables make electricity expensive.

    Read more here…

    *  *  *

    Michael Shellenberger is a Time Magazine “Hero of the Environment,”Green Book Award winner, and the founder and president of Environmental Progress. He is author of just launched book San Fransicko (Harper Collins) and the best-selling book, Apocalypse Never (Harper Collins June 30, 2020). Subscribe To Michael’s substack here

    Donate to Environmental Progress

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 18:20

  • Soros-Backed Baltimore State's Attorney Indicted On Federal Perjury Charges
    Soros-Backed Baltimore State’s Attorney Indicted On Federal Perjury Charges

    Baltimore City State’s Attorney Marilyn Mosby is in trouble again. A grand jury indicted her on Thursday for lying on mortgage applications when she used the excuse COVID-19 related hardships to withdraw tax-free funds from her retirement account to purchase vacation homes in Florida, according to local news Fox Baltimore.  

    Mosby was among the first law enforcement officials supported by left-wing billionaire George Soros in his quest to remake the criminal justice system in the United States.

    Mosby, a Democrat, lied about work-related financial hardships from COVID-19 to request early withdrawals of $90,000 from her retirement account. Under the federal CARES Act, it allowed emergency distributions of up to $100,000 in the event of a layoff, reduced work hours, and or furlough. 

    However, the $90,000 was used to purchase two vacation homes in Kissimmee, Florida, and Long Boat Key, Florida, in May 2020. 

    The indictment claims Mosby had no financial hardship due to the virus pandemic as her annual salary of $248,000 was paid in full that year. 

    She’s been slapped with two counts of perjury originating from false statements of COVID-related financial distress and charged with making false statements on two mortgage applications. 

    Mosby also failed to disclose a $45,000 tax lien to the federal government. The Internal Revenue Service went after her in 2020. 

    Mosby’s attorney, A. Scott Bolden, released this statement:

    Marilyn Mosby is innocent, has been innocent, and we look forward to defending her in the court of law, and presenting evidence of her innocence to a jury of her peers. We will fight these charges vigorously, and I remain confident that once all the evidence is presented, that she will prevail against these bogus charges—charges that are rooted in personal, political and racial animus five months from her election.

    None of this should come as a surprise because this is Maryland politics. Corruption and fraud go hand and hand in Baltimore City. Disgraced former Mayor Sheila Dixon was charged more than a decade ago for embezzlement. Ex-Mayor Catherine Pugh was sentenced to three years of jail in 2020 for wire fraud and conspiracy to defraud the US government. And now it’s Mosby’s turn to take center stage. 

    Mosby’s husband, Nick Mosby, the president of the Baltimore city council, could be next.  Let’s hope newly elected Mayor Brandon Scott doesn’t fall down the hole of his predecessors. 

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 18:00

  • The Fed Has Triggered A Stagflationary Disaster That Will Hit Hard This Year
    The Fed Has Triggered A Stagflationary Disaster That Will Hit Hard This Year

    Authored by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.us,

    I don’t think I can overstate the danger that the U.S. economy is in right now as we enter 2022. While most people are caught up in the ongoing drama of Covid-19, a REAL threat looms over the nation in the form of a stagflationary tidal wave. The mainstream media is attempting to place the blame on “supply chain disruptions,” but this is a misrepresentation of the issue.

    The two factors are indeed intertwined, but the reality is that inflation is the cause of supply chain disruptions, not the result of supply chain disruptions. If we look at the underlying stats for price rises in essential products we can get a clearer picture.

    Before I get into my argument, I really want to stress that this is a precarious time and I suggest that people prepare accordingly. In just the past few months I have seen personal expenses rise at least 20% overall, and I’m sure it’s the same or worse for most of you. Stocking necessities and safe-haven investments with intrinsic value like physical precious metals are a good choice for protecting whatever buying power your dollars have left…

    Higher prices everywhere

    The Consumer Price Index (CPI) is officially at the highest levels in 40 years. CPI measurements often diminish the scale of the problem because they do not include things like food, energy and housing which are core expenses for the public. CPI calculations have also been “adjusted” over the past few decades by the government to express a more positive view on inflation. If we look at the inflation numbers at Shadowstats, calculated according to the same methods they used in the 1980’s, we see a dramatic increase in CPI which paints a more dire (but more accurate) picture.

    U.S. food prices have spiked to levels not seen since 2008 at the onset of the credit and derivatives collapse that brought about tens of trillions of dollars in Federal Reserve bailouts.

    If we look beyond the 2008 crisis, food costs do not see a similar jump until the 1980s. Rising food prices in the US are often obscured by creative accounting and “shrinkflation” (shrinking packages and rising prices), but if we look at global food prices the average is a 30% jump in the past year.

    Rental and home prices have also gone into the stratosphere. Rental costs went up around 18% in 2021, and this is an extension of a trend that has been prevalent for the past decade. Prices have been rising for a while, it’s just that now the avalanche has accelerated.

    Home prices are currently out of the range of most new potential home buyers. Values jumped 16% in the past year alone, with the average property costing $408,000. Home sales continue to remain elevated compared to two years ago despite inflating prices for one reason and one reason only – the mass migration of Americans away from the draconian mandates and bureaucracy of blue states into more conservative states.

    I live in Montana, a primary destination for people relocating, and from my experience the majority of these people are conservatives seeking to escape the vaccine and lockdown mandates in places like California, New York and Illinois. They see the writing on the wall and they are trying to get ahead of the economic and social calamity that will surely befall such states.

    I would also note that home sales have finally begun to flatten in the past six months but prices are not dropping, which is a trend that I think needs to be explored further because it illustrates the larger issue of stagflation.

    When inflation becomes stagflation

    Understand that prices are not just rising because of increased demand (demand is starting to fall in many sectors), prices are rising because of increased money supply and dollar devaluation which is not yet being reflected in the Dollar Index.

    Take a look at U.S. GDP and you will see that for the past several years it has tracked in tandem with price inflation. Obviously, if prices inflate then this means people are spending more, which then leads to higher U.S. GDP; it’s like magic, right? In other words, inflation makes it seem as though U.S. GDP is always improving.

    However, this has not been the case in the past couple of years.

    Official GDP has flattened despite the fact that U.S. money supply and inflation have rocketed higher. What does this mean? I believe it is a sign of stagflation and a reckoning in 2022. If we examine inflation adjusted GDP numbers from Shadowstats we see that GDP has declined rather aggressively in the past couple of years.

    We can also see odd tendencies in oil and gasoline prices. While it’s true that gas prices have been higher in the past, this does not address the full context of the situation. U.S. travel spending has declined 12% since 2019 and airline travel has dropped at least 21% in the past year. Average gasoline usage dropped after 2019 and still has not recovered. Yet, gas prices continue to rise? In other words, travel demand is stagnant but prices are INCREASING – this is another signal of inflationary pressures and dollar devaluation. Oil is priced in dollars globally, and therefore any inflation in the dollar will be readily visible in oil. This would help explain why pandemic paranoia and reduced travel have not caused gas prices to drop.

    If the current momentum continues the majority of necessities in the U.S. will not be affordable for most people by next year. We are looking at a fast-moving decline in production along with a swift explosion in prices. In other words, a stagflationary disaster.

    This is the Federal Reserve’s fault

    I and many other alternative economists have been warning about the inevitable inflation/stagflation crisis for years, but the most important factor to understand is WHO is responsible this event?

    The mainstream financial media is going to protect the government and the Federal Reserve at all costs during this breakdown. They are going to blame Covid, the lockdowns here and overseas as well as the supply chain bottleneck.

    The Fed is the true culprit, though.

    While there have been many American Presidents and other politicians that have supported the Fed in its inflationary activities, the central bank itself needs to be held accountable for the downturn that is about to occur. This is a process that started back at the founding of the Fed, but spread like cancer after the crash of 2008 and the introduction of 12+ years of stimulus and bailout measures along with near-zero interest rates.

    The inflationary end-game

    The pandemic is the perfect cover for the inflationary end game. In 2008 the response to the crisis was to print and pump dollars into banks and corporations in the U.S. and around the globe. This money supply was held in corporate coffers and in central banks overseas, which slowed the effects of inflation. This set the precedent for subversive stimulus policies by giving the Fed a blank check to do whatever it wanted.

    In 2020, the Fed created trillions more but this time the money was injected directly into the U.S. economy through Covid stimulus checks, PPP loans and other measures. In the alternative economic field we call this “helicopter money.” These dollars triggered a massive retail buying spree in 2020, but with more dollars in the economy chasing less goods prices are now spiking much higher.

    The big discussion today is whether or not the Fed will taper their asset purchases, reduce their balance sheet and raise interest rates to counter inflation?

    The fact is it won’t matter; inflation/stagflation will continue or even accelerate as the Fed tapers. With a taper comes the threat of a flattening yield curve in Treasury bonds as well as the danger of bonds and dollars being dumped by foreign investors and central banks. If the trillions upon trillions of dollars being held overseas come flooding back into the U.S., inflation will continue at its current pace or erupt even higher. In fact, the world’s ownership of dollars reached a 26-year low recently. The global transition away from the dollar, toward inflation-resistant investments, has already begun.

    This is not a policy error

    I explained this Catch-22 threat in my recent article The Fed’s Catch-22 Taper Is a Weapon, Not a Policy Error. In that essay I outline the Fed’s documented history of creating economic disasters that conveniently end up benefiting their friends in the international banks.

    I also explained (with evidence) how the Federal Reserve actually takes its marching orders from the Bank for International Settlements, a globalist institution which along with the International Monetary Fund and World Economic Forum is openly seeking a one-world economic system and one-world currency system.

    I do not believe that the Fed’s actions are a product of ignorance or stupidity or basic greed. I do not believe the Fed is scrambling to keep the U.S. economy afloat. I believe according to the evidence that the Fed knows exactly what it is doing. The pandemic offers a perfect scapegoat for an engineered crash of the U.S. economy which the Fed is trying to facilitate.

    Why? Because the more desperate people are financially, the easier they are to buy off with false promises and a loaf of bread. They are easier to control. On top of that, with the U.S. economy reduced to second- or third-world status, it is easier to sell the public on the predetermined solution – total global centralization and far less freedom.

    As the stagflationary crash plays out, never forget who was really the cause of the public’s suffering. In the fog of national crisis it is easy for the establishment to shift blame and responsibility and to cloud the truth. The inflation calamity is about to get much worse, and as it does we need to rally newly awakened people to take action against the central bankers and globalists behind it.

    *  *  *

    With global tensions spiking, thousands of Americans are moving their IRA or 401(k) into an IRA backed by physical gold. Now, thanks to a little-known IRS Tax Law, you can too. Learn how with a free info kit on gold from Birch Gold Group. It reveals how physical precious metals can protect your savings, and how to open a Gold IRA. Click here to get your free Info Kit on Gold.

    Tyler Durden
    Fri, 01/14/2022 – 17:40

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