- Operation Gotham Shield: U.S. Gov't To "Simulate Nuke Blast Over Manhattan"
Something has aroused the interests of the American people… perhaps one too many coincidentally 'useful' event means government facilitators have jumped the shark? (via Google Trends)
Which is perhaps why, after discovering Project Gotham Shield, SHTFplan.com's Mac Slavo warns, a false flag watch is now active.
A general alert is out for something major in the near or immediate future. Hopefully, it is just another false alarm, instead of another false flag. Either way, danger is at hand.
Given all that is going on in the world, it is downright eerie to discover that the federal government is once again staging mock disasters that draw disturbing parallels with current world events.
In just a few days, during April 24-26th, Operation Gotham Shield will commence.
It is a tabletop, joint agency exercise involving FEMA, Homeland Security and a myriad of law enforcement and military agencies. WMD, chemical and biological units will all be on hand as a response is tested for a “simulated” nuclear detonation over the United States’ foremost urban center, in the iconic and densely populated island of Manhattan and nearby shores of New Jersey.
The potential for a more explosive false flag to spin out of control, by hijacking and ‘converting’ the simulated actions, is all too real.
This is closely related to the mechanism that many researchers believe was at work on the day of 9/11, nesting a false flag attack inside of a series of large-scale training operations which invoked emergency powers and simulated attacks in locations that were actually hit.
According to the Voice of Reason:
On April 18th thru May 5th, 2017, state, local, and federal organizations alike are planning for Operation Gotham Shield 2017 — a major nuclear detonation drill in the New York-New Jersey area, along with the U.S.-Canadian border.
During this exercise, 4 nuclear devices, 2 of which are rendered “safe” during the U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) Vital Archer Exercise, and one successful 10kt detonation in the NYC/NJ area, along with one smaller detonation on the U.S./Canadian border are to take place.
Among the organizations involved are:
– U.S. Department of Energy (DOE)
– U.S. Department of Defense (DOD)
– U.S. Domestic Nuclear Detection Office (DNDO)
– U.S. Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI)
– U.S. Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA)
– U.S. Northern Command (NORTHCOM)
– State of New Jersey Office of Emergency Management
– State of New York Office of Emergency Management
– City of New York Office of Emergency Management
The following document comes form The Nevada National Security Service. Their primary role with the government is to help ensure the security of the United States and its allies by supporting the stewardship of the nuclear deterrent, providing emergency response capability and training, and contributing to key nonproliferation and arms control initiatives.
Will anything catastrophic happen during or after that window of time? Will North Korea really attack the U.S. mainland? Will someone else do so, and blame their overseas enemies?
No one who knows the answers to these questions is willing to talk. For now, all we can do is watch, wait and listen.
Don’t jump to fear and speculation, but don’t lie down or look away either.
These will be trying times.
* * *
Full Gotham Shield 2017 Presentation below:
- Flying Is About To Get Even More Miserable…Well, At Least For Poor People
At a time when you would think the airlines would be a little more image conscious, you know because of that whole beating customers and dragging them off the plane thing that United did, they’re apparently doubling down on efforts to make “Flying The Friendly Skies” the most miserable experience ever.
After years of finding new ways to charge for ‘perks’ that used to be standard (want to use our aisle to access your seat…that’ll be a $10 fee, please), according to the Wall Street Journal, airlines are getting ready to implement a whole new set of restrictions on their poorest customers. So, for those of you who have grown accustomed to lavish perks like free overhead bin space, get ready for your new reality.
Battling it out with discount carriers, the world’s biggest airlines are rolling out ultracheap economy-class tickets, or cutting back sharply on basic amenities for their lowest-paying customers. At the same time, they are pulling out the stops to lavish their premium fliers with more perks.
American, United Continental, and Delta all now offer super-low fares, dubbed “basic economy,” that strip out even once-standard allowances, such as carry-on baggage or a choice of seat before boarding.
Those are now extra for these ticket holders, who also generally board last. But the fares are competitive with discount airlines such as Southwest Airlines Co. A United basic economy ticket between Washington and Minneapolis for travel in early May was recently listed as low as $128, $20 less than a regular economy fare. Some of the cheapest fares passengers can get on discount carriers are for seats so basic they don’t recline even an inch.
“When we look at economy, we are looking at a commodity product, without a doubt,” BA Chief Executive Officer Alex Cruz said in November.
But, while while flying in the back of the plane is starting to feel a bit more like a cattle stampede than a pleasurable prelude to a vacation, flying in the front of the plane is about to get even more luxurious, including everything from fully-reclining seats to comforters from Saks Fifth Avenue…because a regular blanket just won’t work for some folks.
But at the front of the plane, the same carriers are showering premium passengers with ever more comfort. Middle East and Asian airlines are among those leading the way, with U.S. carriers trying to catch up. American Airlines has upgraded its business class. Delta last year unveiled plans for business-class suites, effectively small cabins that can be closed off from others, with fully reclining seats. The suites should feature on planes this year.
United on intercontinental routes is introducing an upgraded business class, called United Polaris, to try to keep pace with its nearest rivals. The cabin sports fully reclining seats, bedding by Saks Fifth Avenue and noise-canceling headsets. United is rolling it out on its San Francisco-Hong Kong route. A round-trip ticket for a May flight lists at about $5,000.
British Airways, meanwhile, is spending about $500 million to upgrade its premium classes. BA, which popularized the fully reclining business-class seat in the mid-1990s, is planning a new business-class seat design.
So while the ‘millionaire, billionaire, private jet owners’ are sleeping in first class…
…we wish you main streeters the best of luck maintaining your sanity in ‘last class.’
- Paul Craig Roberts On President Trump's 'Disappearance'
Authored by Paul Craig Roberts via The Strategic Culture Foundation,
In my long experience in Washington, vice presidents did not make major foreign policy announcements or threaten other countries with war. Not even Dick Cheney stole this role from the weak president George W. Bush.
But yesterday the world witnessed VP Pence threaten North Korea with war. “The sword stands ready,” said Pence as if he is the commander in chief.
Perhaps he is.
Where is Trump? As far as I can tell from the numerous emails I receive from him, he is at work marketing his presidency. Once Trump won the election, I began receiving endless offers to purchase Trump baseball caps, T-shirts, cuff-links, coffee mugs, and to donate $3 to be entered into a raffle to win some memorabilia. The latest offer is a chance to win one of “personally signed five incredible photographs of our historic and massive inauguration.”
For Trump, the presidency is a fund-raising device. If his VP, National Security Advisor, Secretary of Defense, UN Ambassador, CIA Director, whoever, want to start wars wherever, that’s just more memorabilia to raffle off for a $3 donation.
As a result of Trump’s failure to govern his own government, we have VP Pence telling Russia and China that there could be a nuclear exchange on their borders between the US and North Korea. Although Pence is not smart enough to know, this is not something Russia and China will accept.
Washington worries about North Korea having nuclear weapons, but the entire world worries that Washington has nuclear weapons. And so many of them. World polls have shown that the majority of the world’s population are far more concerned about the threat to peace posed by Washington and Israel than by Iran, North Korea, Russia and China.
Pence prefaced his “the sword stands ready” remark with “the United States of America will always seek peace,” which after Serbia, Somalia, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Yemen, Pakistan, and Syria is as false a statement as it is possible to make. From Washington’s perspective it is always Washington’s victims that are “reckless and provocative,” never Washington.
The US stands for war. If the world is driven to Armegeddon, it will be Washington, not North Korea, Iran, Russia, or China, that brings life on earth to an end.
- Is China Trying To (Slowly) Burst Another Stock Market Bubble?
The pressure point in Asian stock markets this week has been the decline in Chinese equities (the biggest weekly drop in 4 months).
Despite a stellar performance of the economy the outlook for the Shanghai Composite Index isn’t promising as the government is taking advantage of better growth to spur deleveraging.
For a market relying more on liquidity than fundamentals, China’s worsening monetary conditions index suggests tough times ahead…
As a reminder, the Shanghai Composite Index, notorious for its wild swings over the past two years, has gone 86 trading days without a loss of more than 1% on a closing basis, the longest stretch since the market’s infancy in 1992.
The last 4 days have highlighted the unusual effect in Chinese stocks.. each time the Shanghai Composite dropped over 1% (red dotted line) it was miraculously lifted to ensure it closed with a loss less than 1%…
As Bloomberg reports, authorities favor a steady stock market because it helps companies fund investment and repay debt by issuing new shares, which could help boost economic growth, according to Yin Ming, a vice president at Baptized Capital in Shanghai.
“The national team is behind it,” Yin said. “State funds will likely continue to be a market stabilizer.”
So one wonders, is China desperate to delever the speculative fervor in their markets… but do it just 1% at a time? Can the 'market' really be that well centrally planned? We will see…
If the 6-month lag in Chines commodities is anything to go by, the breakdown in Chinese stocks is nowhere near over…
- "Everything's Worse" – Where India's Disintegration Is Set To Begin
Authored by Jayant Bhandari via Acting-Man.com,
Everything Gets Worse (Part XII) – Pakistan vs. India
After 70 years of so-called independence, one has to be a professional victim not to look within oneself for the reasons for starvation, unnatural deaths, utter backwardness, drudgery, disease, and misery in India.
Intellectual capital accumulated in the West over the last 2,500 years — available for free in real-time via the internet — can be downloaded by a passionate learner. In the age of modern technology, another mostly free gift from the West which has significantly leveled the playing field, societies that wanted economic convergence with the West, such as Japan, Korea, Singapore, HK, China, etc., have either achieved it rapidly, or have strongly trended toward it.
More than 28,000 children less than six years of age have died in just one province, Madhya Pradesh, over the past year. Because these deaths were due to diseases resulting from malnourishment, the government attributed every single death to disease rather than malnourishment.
Given that Indian prime minister Narendra Modi has been at the helm for only three years, it is hard to blame him in general for any of the above mentioned monstrosities marring daily life in India. The best the head of the executive of an extremely diverse and complicated country can achieve is to nudge the Titanic in the right direction.
The problem is that Modi has actively sped the Titanic toward collision with an iceberg, from which he himself will not emerge unharmed. He must be blamed for his naiveté, his upside-down understanding of economics and a complete lack of awareness of the realities of life, his narcissism and obsession of making a hero out of himself, and an utter lack of self-respect that drives him to seek solace in Hindu fanaticism. He and his party have been a catalyst fanning the flames of nationalism and fanaticism among Indians.
Farmers demonstrating in Delhi to point out their plight. More than 12,600 farmers and agricultural laborers committed suicide in 2015 in what is one of the world’s poorest countries. On average, life is worse for Indians than it is for Africans.
However, sociopaths exist in every society. If you get rid of one, another one enters the scene. In the end, it is Indians who deserve to be blamed for elevating Modi and his BJP to their positions. In the end, it is Indians who deserve to be blamed for hollowing out and destroying institutions the British left behind over the past 70 years.
In the irrational and tribal society of India, Modi perfectly symbolizes and unconsciously exploits the thinking process of the common man, who tends to deal with problems by doing even more of what created the problems in the first place.
A rational person (particularly one whose perception is otherwise skewed by political correctness) faces a huge uphill task and high levels of frustration, when trying to comprehend the actions of irrational people and societies. He won’t be able to understand that the irrationality of some people is so pronounced it can keep them from connecting two simple dots right in front of them.
Some 3,000 children die every day from illnesses related to poor diets. Of those who survive, 44% of the children under the age of 5 are stunted. 72% of infants and 52% of married women have anemia. With respect to this India is ranked on the same level as North Korea and Sudan.
It is difficult or me to judge whether Pakistan is better or worse off by comparison, but I received many complaints in response to an earlier article in this series (in which I had presumed Pakistan to be somewhat worse off than India), mostly based on tribalism. But let’s try to bring some balance to the issue anyway.
On the World Happiness Report, India is ranked in 122nd position. Pakistan is ranked much higher, in 80th position. Pakistan’s per capita GDP is US$1,550, India’s is US$1,719. The difference is very small. Moreover, Pakistan has to spend a fortune to cater to refugees, to defend itself against problems from Afghanistan, as well as a much bigger foe, namely India. Pakistan also suffers from instability spilling over from Afghanistan and Iran.
As a result Pakistan is spending a much higher proportion of its government revenue on the military than India. If the external conditions of the two countries were similar, Pakistan would presumably be richer than India.
I also received several introspective messages from Pakistanis, who averred that Pakistan was descending into chaos, and similar statements were made by Indians as well. Most Pakistanis asked me to keep their names confidential, as speaking out against the Pakistani army or Islam could easily lead to unwelcome consequences such as beheading. A small minority in India is less concerned about speaking out, but this is changing quite rapidly.
A silly, well-orchestrated routine that is conducted every day at Indo-Pak border. Ironically, both Indian and Pakistani forces work and practice this routine together, to keep it well-synchronized. The bravado and bravery is all superficial theater.
Demonetization Pain Continues Unabated
When Narendra Modi announced on 8th November 2016 that he was demonetizing 86% of the monetary value of all currency in circulation, he gave three major reasons for doing so: to end corruption, to end terrorism and to eliminate counterfeit currency. Ironically, all three are now in far worse condition than they were previously, and even worse than the predictions I made in this series of essays (Part XI is linked here).
Many ATMs in India still dispense no cash. The economy is in shatters. This had to happen, as any new cash is rapidly moving under the carpets of the financial powerful that hoard currency. Small businesses are traumatized by the lack of access to cash – many are closing for good. People continue to avoid making non-essential purchases. Even food demand has failed to recover. Poor people very likely are still forced to go to bed half-hungry.
No-one knows whether there are famines in parts of India, as none of the mainstream media are covering the issue. Not unlike North Koreans or the Chinese during the times of Mao, Indians today, particularly members of the so-called educated class, simply cannot see what Modi or their nationalistic paradigm does not want them to see.
Indian banks and other financial institutions are extremely unethical. Since privatization was implemented in the 1990s, they have charged fees and commissions for accounts that were never agreed upon. Indians never fight, so this continues. After the demonetization exercise, these mysterious charges have started to appear more often.
Then they deduct certain services and financial taxes, and most people don’t make the effort to try to understand them. Indians are getting very tired of the banks – not for moral, but simply for financial reasons. Bank websites are extremely unwieldy. They require a sequence of passwords and OTPs (one time pad codes), which have an automatic expiry date.
Getting the whole sequence right to make an online payment without having these websites freeze during the procedure leaves one with a sense of accomplishment. Most people prefer to walk down to their banks to get bank officials to perform such online transactions. India is simply not ready for the digital age. This experiment in going cashless will end in a disaster.
Similar to every tyrant, Modi likes to think that tax collection should be at the heart of society. He imagines a society in which subjects dance around the state. The problem is, one can perfect the tax system or minimize corruption, but with a per capita GDP of $1,718, India simply does not have the required productivity.
Bank charges, rapacious tax authorities and massive amounts of time lost in dealing with the lack of cash have hurt whatever little productivity the Indian economy may have had. And by forcing digitalization, Modi has merely shifted liquidity from the informal to the formal sector.
Even in the western world, most big corporations are in bed with governments. In India, romping in bed with the State is all they ever do. For the moment, these corporations are huge beneficiaries of shift of resources to the banking system.
But without the spine that is the informal sector, the formal sector cannot benefit for very long. Eventually even the formal economy will succumb and take a massive hit.
Bank credit growth in India plummets to 60 year lows.
Corruption is bigger today, with most people complaining that they have to pay almost twice as much as usual in bribes, as bureaucrats and politicians try to make up for any real or assumed loses they faced as a result of the demonetization process. Counterfeiting of banknotes is a bigger problem today than it likely ever was.
Kashmir – Where India’s Disintegration Is Set to Begin
The last professed reason for Modi’s demonetization decree was to end terrorism and to solve the problems in Kashmir. The situation in Kashmir has deteriorated rapidly, while the law and order situation is generally worsening around the country, as vigilantes are given free reign.
An African student in India being thrashed merely for being African. Racism against Africans is rampant in India, and the hostility is growing.
Sacred cow enforcement squad: Cow vigilantes have become a regular feature of the Indian landscape, with Muslims and lower-caste people being killed and thrashed on a regular basis (one of the five men beaten up in this video later died). The Muslim community is increasingly isolated. This cannot end well in a country with the world’s second biggest Muslim population.
Hindu Yuva Vahini, a group of fanatics, founded by none other than the current Chief Minister of Uttar Pradesh, Yogi Adityanath, roaming freely, with swords drawn (UP is India’s most populous state with nearly 200 million inhabitants). Once the genie of lawlessness is out of the bottle in this irrational society, it will be centuries before it can be put back in again. This is a disaster waiting to happen.
Immediately after his appointment, Yogi Adityanath created “Anti-Romeo” squads, whose job is to harass any couples deemed to be unmarried. In spite of the fact that the police has no such constitutional authority, the courts have been silent spectators. Vigilante Hindu fanatics have even dragged couples from private properties to the police station. Instead of police charging these fanatics, they end up interrogating the couples dragged to the station. As I have said repeatedly, only hollowed out structures remain of the institutions the British left behind.
There has been an unprecedented increase in human rights violations by the Indian army in recent days in Kashmir
Another short video showing the Indian army in action in Kashmir
The Indian army recently used a man as a human shield in Kashmir. Not only celebrities and journalists voiced their approval, India’s Attorney General, one of the main guardians of the law, justified it by saying: “peculiar situations require peculiar measures”.
One must reflect on what it means if the country’s Attorney General has no clue what the rule of the law actually means. Voting was almost non-existent in recent elections. The army is stressed out and desperate. Those not in Kashmir and with no skin in the game happily pass judgment from their couches.
There is no political mechanism in place for Kashmir to secede. Secession through violence – which looks increasingly inevitable, particularly in view of Modi’s heavy-handedness – will be extremely chaotic. Its reverberations will be heard across the world, and might start the fragmentation of India as a political entity.
- Failing Malls Turn Empty Parking Lots Into Carnivals To Generate Cash
It should come as no surprise that America’s malls, the wonderlands of the 80s, are in big trouble. After slowly losing market share to online competition for years, brick-and-mortar retailers have finally succumb to changing consumer habits which has resulted in a massive surge in bankruptcies and store closings.
Of course, as we’ve pointed out before, mall owners have tried just about everything to fill their empty spaces including the addition of grocery stores, doctors’ offices and even high schools.
But while most mall owners have been trying to figure out how to fill up the inside of their stores, they apparently overlooked another very ‘valuable’ asset: their empty parking lots.
With customer traffic sagging, U.S. retail landlords are using their sprawling concrete lots to host events such as carnivals, concerts and food-truck festivals. They’re aiming to lure visitors with experiences that can’t be replicated online — and then get them inside the properties to spend some money.
“Events draw people to come to the shopping center,” said Keith Herkimer, whose company, KevaWorks Inc., is working with big landlords including GGP Inc. and Simon Property Group Inc. to produce outdoor events. “They generate revenue for the owner and offer a chance for cross-promotion, so they can try and drive more customers into the stores.”
The idea, obviously, is to attract customers for experiences that can’t be replicated online with a focus on everything from movies nights to carnivals.
Retail landlords have already made a push toward experience-driven offerings by adding restaurants, movie theaters and activity centers for children. Many malls are also adding rotating stores around for only a short time — known as pop-up shops — that are meant to attract young customers who see shopping as an event.
Now, events are reaching beyond the malls themselves. Herkimer’s task is to bring crowds to parking lots with events that generate as much as $60,000 a week for mall owners from the largest outdoor events.
The idea is gaining traction. Next month, Simon Property is having the first carnival in its Round Rock Premium Outlets parking lot, about 20 miles (32 kilometers) north of Austin, Texas. Similar events are being held for the first time at locations such as Central Mall in Port Arthur, Texas, managed by Jones Lang LaSalle Inc., and a Cheyenne, Wyoming, mall owned by CBL & Associates Properties Inc. In July, Simon Property’s Orland Square Mall, southwest of Chicago, will be holding its first parking-lot food-truck festival, with plans for live music performances, Herkimer said.
Meanwhile, REIT investors are finally starting to understand that while carnivals may help to pay the electricity bills of America’s malls they do little to help generate a return on the hundreds of millions of dollars worth of retail square footage that lies empty inside the stores.
- "Total Chaos" – Cyber Attack Feared As Multiple Cities Hit With Simultaneous Power Grid Failures
Authored by Mac Slavo via SHTFplan.com,
The U.S. power grid appears to have been hit with multiple power outages affecting San Francisco, New York and Los Angeles.
Officials report that business, traffic and day-to-day life has come to a standstill in San Francisco, reportedly the worst hit of the three major cities currently experiencing outages.
Power companies in all three regions have yet to elaborate on the cause, though a fire at a substation was the original reason given by San Francisco officials.
A series of subsequent power outages in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and New York City left commuters stranded and traffic backed up on Friday morning. Although the outages occurred around the same time, there is as of yet no evidence that they were connected by anything more than coincidence.
The first outage occurred at around 7:20 a.m. in New York, when the power went down at the 7th Avenue and 53rd Street subway station, which sent a shockwave of significant delays out from the hub and into the rest of the subway system. By 11:30 a.m. the city’s MTA confirmed that generators were running again in the station, although the New York subways were set to run delayed into the afternoon.
Later in the morning, power outages were reported in Los Angeles International Airport, as well as in several other areas around the city.
Via : Inverse
The San Francisco Fire Department was responding to more than 100 calls for service in the Financial District and beyond, including 20 elevators with people stuck inside, but reported no immediate injuries. Everywhere, sirens blared as engines maneuvered along streets jammed with traffic.
Traffic lights were out at scores of intersections, and cars were backing up on downtown streets as drivers grew frustrated and honked at each other.
Via: SF Gate
The cause of the outage has not yet been made clear, though given the current geo-political climate it is not out of the question to suggest a cyber attack could be to blame. It has also been suggested that the current outages could be the result of a secretive nuclear/EMP drill by the federal government.
As we have previously reported, the entire national power grid has been mapped by adversaries of the United States and it is believed that sleep trojans or malware may exist within the computer systems that maintain the grid.
In a 2016 report it was noted that our entire way of life has been left vulnerable to saboteurs who could cause cascading blackouts across the United States for days or weeks at a time:
It isn’t just EMPs and natural disaster that poses a threat to the grid, but there is also the potential for attacks on individual power substations in the vast network of decentralized and largely unguarded power grid chain. A U.S. government study established that there would be “major, extended blackouts if more than three key substations were destroyed.”
Whether by criminals, looters, terrorists, gangs or pranksters, it would take very little to bring down the present system, and there is currently very little the system can do to protect against this wide open threat.
Whether the current outages are the result of a targeted infrastructure cyber attack or simply a coincidence, most Americans think the impossible can’t happen, as The Prepper’s Blueprint author Tess Pennington highlights, a grid-down scenario won’t just be a minor inconvenience if it goes on for more than a day or two:
Consider, for a moment, how drastically your life would change without the continuous flow of energy the grid delivers. While manageable during a short-term disaster, losing access to the following critical elements of our just-in-time society would wreak havoc on the system.
- Challenges or shut downs of business commerce
- Breakdown of our basic infrastructure: communications, mass transportation, supply chains
- Inability to access money via atm machines
- Payroll service interruptions
- Interruptions in public facilities – schools, workplaces may close, and public gatherings.
- Inability to have access to clean drinking water
It is for this reason that we have long encouraged Americans to prepare for this potentially devastating scenario by considering emergency food reserves, clean water reserves and even home defense strategies in the event of a widespread outage. The majority of Americans have about 3 days worth of food in their pantry. Imagine for a moment what Day 4 might look like in any major city that goes dark.
This exclusive clip from American Blackout shows what an American Blackout might look like:
- The Simple Reason Why A Second American Civil War May Be Inevitable
Authored by Daniel Lang via SHTFplan.com,
America has always had its divisions, and Americans have never really been a monolith. We’ve always been a nation of many nations. The culture of New England is different from the culture of the Deep South, which is different from the cultures in the West Coast or the Midwest. People living in the cities have different beliefs than people who live in the countryside. Within those areas, there are ethnic, linguistic, and religious enclaves. It’s always kind of been like that (probably to a lesser degree in the past), and somehow we’ve been able to find enough common ground to keep this country together for more than a century.
However, something has changed. You can feel it in the air. Our nation has clearly never been this divided since the Civil War. A lot of people noticed it after the last election, but the truth is that these divisions have been deepening for decades, and they’re just now reaching a very noticeable breaking point. That’s obvious enough when you look at how the left and the right have been going at each other. It used to be a war of words, but it’s turning into something very dark.
Consider what happened last week in Berkeley after Trump supporters and counter protesters clashed for the third time. 21 people were arrested and 11 were injured (that we know of), six of who had to be taken to the hospital. At least one person was stabbed. The police confiscated confiscated knives, stun guns, and poles. One Trump supporter admitted to being surrounded, pepper sprayed, and beaten with sticks by a mob of “protesters.”
But wait, that’s not the dark part. After these groups clashed, the leftist protesters took to Reddit and admitted that they lost this particular battle (I can’t believe I’m using the word “battle” to describe it), and that it was time for them to attain more combat training and better weapons, including firearms.
Do you see what’s going on here? Conservative demonstrations, which used to be placid affairs (remember the Tea Party protests?) are now turning violent as conservatives grow tired of restraining themselves, and are no longer afraid to hit back. Liberal demonstrators are responding by ratcheting up the level of force that they’re going to bring to the next street battle. It’s a tit for tat that keeps escalating, and I shudder to think of where it’s going to end up.
Honestly, I think we’re in the early stages of a second civil war. I can’t say what it’ll look like precisely, but I can tell you that our nation is on this path, and it’s not clear how we can get off of it. In fact, I fear that it may be inevitable, and there’s a very simple reason why.
It’s because Americans have been self-sorting themselves along geographic and political lines for a long time. A book titled “The Big Sort” made light of this trend back in 2008.
Basically what’s going on, is that Americans are moving to communities that align more with their politics. Liberals are moving to liberal areas, and conservatives are moving to conservative communities. It’s been going on for decades. When Jimmy Carter was elected in 1976, 26.8% of Americans lived in landslide counties; that is counties where the president won or lost by 20% of the vote.
By 2004, 48.3% of the population lived in these counties. This trend continues to worsen. As Americans move to their preferred geographic bubbles, they face less exposure to opposing viewpoints, and their own opinions become more extreme. This trend is at the heart of why politics have become so polarizing in America.
We’re also seeing the same trend emerge online with social media. Despite the fact that the internet allows us to be exposed to more opinions that ever before, people choose to follow online voices that they already agree with. They’re slipping into digital bubbles that are comparable to their geographic bubbles.
This trend is irreversible as far as I can tell. That’s because it’s tied to innovation. As our country became more interconnected with roads and Americans gained more mobility, we chose to move to like-minded places. We’re given the internet, the greatest source of information in human history, and we use it to seek out only the information that reinforces our current beliefs.
We’re self-sorting at every level. Because of this, Americans are only going to grow more extreme in their beliefs, and see people on the other side of the political spectrum as more alien.
You can see how this is creating the perfect breeding ground for a real, physical war. The polarization makes it easier to dehumanize the other side. The self-sorting creates definable geographic boundaries that are necessary for a war. It spawns two sides with beliefs that are so divergent, that they cannot coexist.
We’re becoming two distinct nations with two competing visions for what the country should be. Two visions that are diametrically opposed. We used to be a nation of many nations that was held together, because there was still some common ground on what it means to be an American above all else. Now we can’t even agree on that.
Once the last shreds of common ground and understanding dissipate, a moment that is rapidly approaching, another civil war will be impossible to avoid. I wish I knew what the solution is, but I don’t. All I can say is, unless Americans go out of their way to listen to people on other side, whatever that side may be, there’s going to be a lot of blood in the streets.
- Eight Venezuelans Electrocuted To Death While Looting Bakery Amid Massive Protests
Venezuela’s ongoing protests against the Maduro regime took tragic turn when at least 12 people were killed overnight during looting and violence in Venezuela’s capital. Most of the deaths took place in El Valle, a working class neighborhood near Caracas’ biggest military base where opposition leaders say a group of people were hit with an electrical current while looting and trying to steal a refrigerator from a bakery.
The chaos turned deadly when looters entered a bakery protected by an electric fence and tried to remove a refrigerator. The accounts varied, but one opposition leader said 13 people were hit with an electrical current after tossing containers filled with water and making contact with the refrigerator’s power cord.
Criminal investigators look for evidence in front of a bakery, after it was lootedDaniela Alvarado, 25, who sells vegetables in the El Valle area, said the looting on Thursday night began after police officers fired tear gas and buckshot at demonstrators blocking a street with burning tires.
“People starting looting the businesses and yelling that they were hungry and that they want the government out,” said Alvarado. “We’re afraid (the stores) are going to run out of everything, that tomorrow there won’t be any food.”
“Yesterday around 9 or 10 (p.m.)things got pretty scary, a group of people carrying weapons came down … and started looting,” said Hane Mustafa, owner of a small supermarket in El Valle cited by Reuters, where broken bottles of soy sauce and ketchup littered the floor between bare shelves.
Empty shelves, a day after a night of looting in El Valle neighborhood in Caracas“The security situation is not in the hands of the government. We lost everything here,” said Mustafa, who said he could hear the looting from his home, which is adjacent to the store. Dozens of businesses in the area showed signs of looting, ranging from empty shelves to broken windows and twisted metal entrance gates.
According to AP, the Public Ministry said the violence left 11 people dead in El Valle, all men between the ages of 17 and 45. Another death was reported east of Caracas in El Sucre. Six other people were injured. “This was a war,” said Liliana Altuna, whose butcher shop was ransacked by looters armed with guns who grabbed everything in sight.
A demonstrator throws a molotov cocktail during clashes with riot policeOpposition leaders accused the government of repressing protesters with tear gas and rubber bullets but standing idly by as businesses were looted. Meanwhile, Foreign Minister Delcy Rodriguez pointed the finger at the opposition, saying armed groups controlled by the government’s foes were responsible for the attack at the hospital.
“We reject and do not accept those irresponsible declarations,” said Henrique Capriles, a former opposition candidate for president who the government recently barred from running for public office.
Nine other people have been killed in violence associated with a wave of anti-government demonstrations in the past three weeks in which protesters have clashed with security forces in melees lasting well into the night. Nine other people have been killed in violence associated with a wave of anti-government demonstrations in the past three weeks in which protesters have clashed with security forces in melees lasting well into the night.
People holding a placard that reads ‘No more deaths, Maduro’The violence began Thursday night and stretched into Friday in El Valle, an area historically known as a hot spot for political protest. Witnesses said masked looters wielding knives and guns descended on an area known as “the little market” filled with bakeries, supermarkets and butcher’s shops.
“They left us with nothing,” said Manuel Martinez, who was directing cleanup and repairs at a destroyed grocery store. “What they did wasn’t because of hunger,” he added. “It’s vandalism.”
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Earlier Friday, officials said that one of the dead was Mervins Guitian. The young Venezuelan man was fatally shot when he was returning home late from work Thursday and got caught in the middle of late-night street clashes. Vicente Paez, a local councilman, said Guitian was an employee of a Caracas-area city governed by an opposition mayor but didn’t join the protests. It wasn’t clear who shot him and there was no immediate comment from authorities.
Venezuelan social media was ablaze late into the night with grainy cellphone videos of light-armored vehicles plowing down dark streets to control pockets of protesters who set up burning barricades in several neighborhoods.
Demonstrators run away from tear gas during clashes with policeVice President Tareck El Aissami said Friday the country is facing an “unconventional war” led by opposition groups working in concert with criminal gangs. He said opposition claims government forces were responsible for launching tear gas at the maternity hospital were another attempt to demoralize a people who have “decided to break ties with the bourgeoisie forever.”
Police fire tear gas toward opposition supporters during clashesMeanwhile opposition members said they have no intention of easing up on protests. “Twenty days of resistance and we feel newly born,” opposition lawmaker Freddy Guevara said at an outdoor news conference Thursday as residents looking out from balconies in a neighborhood at the heart of the protest movement cheered loudly in support.
The next planned protest is Saturday, when opponents are being asked to dress in white and march silently to commemorate the victims of the demonstration. Sit-ins to block major highways are planned for Monday.
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As reported on Friday, General Motors announced early Thursday that it was closing its operations in Venezuela after authorities seized its factory in the industrial city of Valencia, a move that could draw the Trump administration into the escalating chaos engulfing the nation. A number of major Latin American governments, including Mexico, Argentina and Brazil, called on Venezuela to take steps to increase democratic order and halt the violence that has been swirling around the protests.
The recent controversial, and subsequently reversed, Supreme Court ruling reinvigorated Venezuela’s fractious opposition, which had been struggling to channel growing disgust with Maduro.
Opponents are pushing for Maduro’s removal through early elections and the release of dozens of political prisoners. The government last year abruptly postponed regional elections that the opposition was heavily favored to win and it cut off a petition drive aimed at forcing a referendum seeking Maduro’s removal before elections scheduled for late next year.
But the government hasn’t backed down. Already drawing criticism for the GM seizure, Maduro announced late Thursday that he wanted an investigation into cellphone operator Movistar for allegedly being part of the “coup-minded march” organized by his adversaries Wednesday. That march was the largest and most dramatic the country has seen in years. He said the subsidiary of Spain’s Telefonica “sent millions of messages to users every two hours” in support of Wednesday’s protests.
As tensions mount, the government is using its almost-complete control of Venezuela’s institutions to pursue its opponents. On Wednesday alone, 565 protesters were arrested nationwide, according to Penal Forum, a local group that provides legal assistance to detainees. It said 334 remained in jail Thursday. In light of the 100,000 political opponents arrested or fired by Turkey’s president Erdogan ever since last summer’s “failed coup” attempt, Maduro may have to pick up the pace.
Opposition leaders have promised to keep up their protests, demanding that Maduro’s government call general elections, free almost 100 jailed opposition activists and respect the autonomy of the opposition-led Congress. They are calling for community-level protests across the country on Friday, a white-clad “silent” march in Caracas on Saturday to commemorate those killed in the unrest, and a nationwide “sit-in” blocking Venezuela’s main roads on Monday.
With protests now assured on a virtually daily basis, what little was left of the economy is assured to grind to a halt. The only question is how much longer can the protests continue before the army flips its allegiance from the regime, and Maduro is replaced.
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