Hundreds of years after the American Colonies united in a stand against tyranny, we have yet again experienced tyranny in this land first hand. This trend should be of no surprise as ever since the mid 1780s this nation’s government has gotten increasingly intrusive and abusive of the people.
This week, in the House of Representatives voting almost unanamously along party lines (with all but 4 GOP house members in favor) passed a bill [Community Safety and Security Act of 2018, H.R. 6691] that as Reason reports in this article:
… the bill “would label seemingly nonviolent offenses such as burglary of an unoccupied home and fleeing as violent offenses.”
“The bill would also label as violent conspiracy to commit any of the listed offenses, even when no violent acts have occurred,”
Yes, the government loves to ratchet up the number of people that could come under their NET of “violent offenders”. This is especially helpful when the FEMA buses (i.e. Redcoats – just doing their jobs) show up in your neighborhood and people flee .. yes, THOSE people can then be shot on sight because they committed a VIOLENT act of running away.
You can’t make this up!
The bill passed 247 to 152 … WITH 4 Republicans and 148 Democrats voting Nay.
The timing of this with almost total GOP approval along with the FEMA comms test to the nation coming up later this month is indeed interesting:
This is an awesome “opportunity” for the police state, prison revenue and overall tyranny taken to the next level. This administration is not about wanting to diffuse the power struggles in our culture but almost desires to ratchet it up a notch to see if it can get something started under “their” watch.
Now don’t be surprised that the Democrats did not vote FOR this .. they only didn’t because the other “flavor” sponsored the bill .. if their president had been behind this you can believe they would have loved this too. More power to the government, what can go wrong with that?
Just remember, the annual renewal of the NDAA means that anyone “seen” as having terrorist ties can be taken far from society with no judicial recourse. This bill is just another way to open up the net even wider, especially when communities protest EVEN PEACEFULLY, that those what flee will be consider violent and will now be treated as such.
Holly Harris, the executive director of the U.S. Justice Action Network, said in a statement to Reason. “At a time when we have bipartisan support for criminal justice reforms that will safely reduce incarceration and better prioritize public safety, passing a bill that does just the opposite makes no sense at all.”
Yes it does make sense Holly. What politicians SAY they are doing is rarely correlated to WHAT they are doing. Know that police, FBI, ATF, FEMA, the Prison-Industrial-Complex and all their cousins will use this bill to their advantage.
Donetsk People’s Republic leader Alexander Zakharchenko
No sooner had I posted a couple days ago about Novorossiya federation in the eastern areas of Ukraine that emerged in 2014 and word comes of possible escalation on the Kiev government’s fight in two eastern provinces with assistance from the US, of course. A tip-off toward this trend that might neglect the Minsk II Agreement agreed to (Ukraine, Russia, France and Germany) on 12FEB2015 (to a protocol that was agreed to the previous September 2014 called Minsk I) was the assassination of a leader of the unrecognized Donetsk People’s Republic leader Alexander Zakharchenko on 31AUG2018.
This “match” was lit to activate those in Russia who believe that Putin is too passive when it comes to these two provinces in Ukraine that are saturated with Russian culture / language. Putin actually urged these breakaway republics (Luhansk (LPR) and Donetsk (DPR)) NOT to ask for reunification with Russia for geopolitical reasons. The US/NATO wants a fight to break out here just like they hope a fight will break out in Syria.
The latest detailed map for the Minsk II Agreement lines between Ukraine and “rebel” forces can be seen at this excellent site.
The rebels are attempting to hold this all together as the leader’s wife met with them on the front lines as articulated in this article:
Wife of the DPR Head Nataliya arrived to the front to talk to soldiers. She told them to tell all the questions and problems to the Commanders and that she would take part, and do everything possible to help.She asked them to save that her husband Alexandr Zakharchenko started in 2014.
The rebels have been getting Intel that things are brewing again, courtesy of the United States as outlined in this article and quoted below:
According to DPR Deputy Commander-In-Chief Eduard Basurin:
“(o)ur intelligence (indicates) that subdivisions of (Kiev’s) 128th Brigade are on full alert. Main attack force was deployed on the Mariupol direction” near Donbass. An offensive could start any time.
On Sunday, DPR spokesman Daniil Bezsonov said large numbers of US and Canadian military personnel arrived in Ukraine ahead of what may be a major offensive in Donbass, saying:
“Our intelligence noticed the arrival of a large number of foreign servicemen to the 56th motorized infantry and 406th artillery brigades near Urzuf.”
“The arrival of a group of high-ranking military officials from the US and Canadian armed forces to the headquarters of (Kiev’s) Operational Command East was also noticed.”
“(I)t seems that the command of Ukraine’s ‘unified forces operation’ allocates the central role in an offensive to the 36th marines brigade, 56th mechanized infantry and 79th assault airborne brigades.”
“Nazis from the Azov group will be tasked to back the offensive in the rear. All these operations will be commanded by the military from the United States and Canada, or, in other words, by NATO military.”
I find it no coincidence that the US would choose this time to escalate pressure in both eastern Ukraine and Syria. The neo-cons in Washington DC are itching for a fight somewhere as elections loom on the horizon and having a conflict break out that the US could “police” and ensure “humanitarian” efforts are made would look good on the Trump administration AND would bring in the war-hawk Democrats under the DC neo-con umbrella. Unifying the remnants of the McCain era allies that crossed political aisles is a win-win for any administration that is in power, because if the Deep State is happy, then the government, politicians and MIC are all happy.
I swear, DC stands for Dysfunctional Central .. where sociopaths and psychopaths hook up.
In a previous post, I outlined that path that the strategists in Russia have chosen since being disrespected in the 1990s by US/NATO advances in Russia’s “backyard”.
… the Russians have been quietly embarking on a strategic path toward learning from the fall of an over extended USSR and towards technological transformation to allow their “Tier 2” status not to render themselves defenseless from pressures from the outside. THIS is what defense is all about ..
This spring, Russia announced several technological advancements in various states of development that place quote a bit of the US’s military technology in early obsolescence. From this in depth article by Donald W. Miller Jr. MD at Lew Rockwell, six technological areas have been successfully realized by a country that spends only 10% what the US spends in their annual military budgets. The late John McCain as recent as three years ago in 2015 said:
“Look, Russia is a gas station masquerading as a country.”
Boy did he get this one wrong. After the US federal government released the “2018 Nuclear Posture Review: U.S. nuclear deterrence policy, strategy, and force posture” on 02FEB2018, Russia coolly waited almost a month and on 01MAR2018 released their bombshell:
President Vladimir Putin gave his annual State of the Nation speech to the Russian Federal Assembly in Moscow. The last third of his 2-hour, 13,340-word speech dealt with nuclear treaties and nuclear weapons.
As an overview to kick off this defensive method to retain sovereignty in the 21st century as nations that don’t want to end up like Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya went like this:
“Any use of nuclear weapons against Russia or its allies, weapons of short, medium or any range at all, will be considered as a nuclear attack on this country. Retaliation will be immediate, with all the attendant consequences. There should be no doubt about this whatsoever.”
This ain’t no gun-free zone. This isn’t a 3rd tier nation like Iraq with an antiquated military wrecked by sanctions, this is a 2nd tier nation who has taken the strategy to “shock-n-awe” without killing innocent people. Yet again, the US intelligence community was too busy with politics than achieving their main goal for this nation, to provide “data” so that this country will never be surprised, ideally. [NOTE: I purposely did NOT use the word “again” after that statement because the US government was NOT surprised on 11SEP2001 (WTC & Pentagon 9/11), and they were NOT surprised on 07DEC1941 with the attack on Pearl Harbor]
The first of six technological advances is the Sarmat heavy intercontinental ballistic missile.
Heavy as in the ability to place 10 tons in near earth orbit with a range that allows a trajectory that goes over the SOUTH pole on the way to the US mainland. If you ever heard of the Maginot Line in France during WWII, you know how quickly this “defense” was made obsolete by Hitler’s German military’s “trajectory”. The article states:
This new generation of thermonuclear warheads are both multiple independently targetable reentry vehicles (MIRV) and maneuverable reentry vehicles (MARV). The Sarmat ICBM carries ten 750-kiloton nuclear warheads, 7.5 megatons, enough destructive power precisely dispersed to wipe out the state of Florida.
The next defensive weapon is the Kinzhal Hypersonic Missile that is launched from 60,000 feet above the earth from a high altitude aircraft like the MIG-31BM.
This missile is 26 ft. long, can accelerate to a speed of Mach 10 (7,500 mph), and executes evasive maneuvers along its flight trajectory.
Mach 10 and a 1200 mile range puts all current air defense technologies in the obsolete category.
Third on Putin’s list was the Avangard Hypersonic Glide Vehicle. The Sarmat, mentioned above, launches up to 16 of these EACH with 500 kiloton nuclear warheads. This glide vehicle’s speed is clocked at Mach 20 which is approximately 15,000 MPH.
President Putin described it this way: “It flies to its target like a meteorite, like a ball of fire. The temperature on its surface reaches 1,600-2,000 degrees Celsius [3,600 degrees Fahrenheit] but the cruise bloc nevertheless stays reliably guided.”
The fourth emerging technology that Russia will be using for its defense is a yet to be named (publicly) low-flying, terrain-hugging Nuclear Powered GLOBAL Cruise Missile. Testing from “ground-launch” site is underway
The fifth is an Underwater Nuclear Drone with a 5000 mile range at speeds of 50-80 knots and can descend to depths of 3000 feet equipped with a 2,50 or 100 megaton warhead. Placed well, these could trigger tsunamis that would generate waves ranging from 300 to over 1000 feet!
The sixth item, to be used for critical anti-missile defense is the Combat Laser which is most likely powered by a miniaturized nuclear reactor.
As a way of involving the people in these innovative technological projects, Putin invited the Russians to name these last three:
Putin invited Russians to submit names for the three yet unnamed weapons on a web portal set up for that purpose. For the underwater drone, Russians chose “Poseidon,” after the Greek god of the sea. For the nuclear-powered cruise missile, they chose “Burevestnik,” the Russian name for the Storm Petrel seabird, whose presence mariners believe foretells bad weather. And for the combat laser, “Peresvet,” after the medieval warrior monk, Alexander Peresvet, who died taking part in a 14th century battle against invading Mongols.
So, where does this leave the US military which has been spending 10x more than Russia?
The U.S. military has no such weapons—no hypersonic missiles or glide vehicles, no nuclear-powered cruise missiles or underwater drones, and no megawatt combat lasers.
The hub of America’s global navy, the aircraft carriers, are now highly vulnerable to these weapons. When you add up the the Ford-class carriers in the queue, 14 of them totaling $200B USD, you have to wonder at what point does the US military regroup and innovate, catch-up or remain in denial as to their eroding supremacy.
Beyond this, the F-35 program has proven to give the military a 2nd rate aircraft that is nowhere near the capability of the Russian SU-57. Another area where the US has failed to keep up is in their Littoral class ships that under-perform when compared to the Russian Corvette option which at half the displacement of the US equivalent, while able to launch cruise missiles (Kalibr-NK missile) up to 1500 miles away which the Littoral class can not do. In the submarine department, 4th generation Russian subs started being deployed in 2014 and for the US it is estimated to be 2030.
The list goes on to include Russian S-400 and U.S. Patriot Missiles, Helicopters, Civil Nuclear Power .. all of these areas show significant lag on the US’s part to stay competitive.
The positive effect of this is it may keep the US Empire more humble in its reach around the world knowing that at any time, Russia could strategically and surgically strike defensively should the US arrogance play out. Bullies do tend to overplay their cards.
Then you will experience for yourselves the truth, and the truth will free you. (John 8:32 The Message – paraphrase of the Bible)
You see, for some time now I have been “incensed” at the lies I have been told all my life. This started when as a young man attending a church that had a culture where everyone showed up on Sunday mornings with no smiles, with no joy, almost like a gathering of people doing their duty. The “dominie” (Dutch word for pastor, Scottish for schoolmaster) was pressed to ensure that everyone was very aware of their sins and their performance for the past week which seemed to be within the Calvinist tradition. In this environment, I opened the Bible in front of me and read from the books of the New Testament about people following Jesus who were full of joy, and hope and laughter, even in the middle of the storms of life while living in an oppressive empire!
In hindsight, it seems that there were times when I took it upon myself to dig for the truth. When given Child-craft encyclopedias as an 8 year old I read the World Book encyclopedias instead. Later in life, when studying towards a Bachelor of Science degree in Ministry and Leadership I expanded my research far beyond the text books supplied. A bit later in life, after hearing contrary thoughts to the political view of President Bush’s “War on Terror”, I looked beyond the US government/media spin and to source material on what really happened both BEFORE and after 9/11! Of course once you have doubts about the government/media story about 9/11, you go on to other events like The Gulf of Tonkin incident and Vietnam War, JFK’s assassination, Pearl Harbor’s “surprise”, sinking of the Lusitania, the sinking of the USS Maine in Havana harbor, the events leading up to the first shot at Ft. Sumter, the War of 1812, the transition from the Articles of Confederation to the US Constitution coup d’tat and even events during and right after the American Revolution.
Looking back, I find myself “Gratefully Disillusioned”, a term that reflects satisfaction in turning over so many “sacred cows” in life, that I do feel very free to say and do what my heart encourages me towards in my everyday life. I no longer have to measure what I hear and see with a “holy narrative” that someone (government/media/religion) has propped up as “truth” to be preserved, I can in fact entertain a thought without accepting it!
So what does this all have to do with Abraham Lincoln? Everything. Of all the presidents we have had in the United States, there is none other that has received such a “holy place” in our political understanding of America than this man. His assassination in fact was the major turning point in this because before the day he died, he in fact was not well like at all both in the South and in the North or Western regions of the United States. The timing of his assassination, just before Easter, setup the political mouthpieces (including many New England clergy) to seize this moment to deify a man for political means that has lasted over 150 years. How appropriate for this man to be chosen for this USE by all political parties, for as a man he was at his core a political animal!
While there have been over 10,000 books written about Lincoln, only a minority have really unpacked his real effect, his real life and his real character. These include Edgar Lee Masters’ 1931 classic, ‘Lincoln the Man‘, a 1943 book, ‘The Deification of Lincoln‘, by historian Ira D. Cardiff and lately the books ‘Lincoln Unmasked‘ and ‘The Real Lincoln‘ by Thomas DiLorenzo.
This week, another epic truth-telling book was released, ‘Lincoln As He Really Was‘ by Charles T. Pace in which Thomas DiLorenzo writes the Forward. Some context setting quotes follow as this book may consume the balance of my Labor Day weekend!
So here are a few quotes that reflect on the character of Abraham Lincoln before his death in 1865:
Murray N. Rothbard once said about Lincoln in an (online) essay entitled “Just War”: Lincoln was a “master politician,” said Rothbard, defined as one who is a masterful “liar, conniver, and manipulator.” He makes any “master politician” or our time look amateurish by comparison.
.. about his personal life, while there is nothing inherently wrong with not going to church EXCEPT if a majority of authors on Lincoln have led many to believe that all Lincoln’s Bible references infer that he was in fact a Christian, they have led you down the wrong path. One needs to hear what those closest to Lincoln said about him:
Lincoln never joined a church, and both his law partner William Herndon and his wife Mary Todd said he was not a Christian. His White House assistant, Colonel Ward Lamon, called him “an infidel.” His close associate Judge David Davis, whom he appointed to the Supreme Court, wrote that Lincoln “had no faith, in the Christian sense of the term.” But his mother read him Bible stories as a child, and later in life he studied the Bible for political purposes – to use religious rhetoric to sway the masses to favor his political positions.
Political animals, like the ones we have in the 21st century, tend to be crude in their day-to-day life:
[Lincoln was] a “zealous party man” who honed his skills, such as they were, of personally attacking his political opponents with often over-the-top ad hominem assaults ..
None of Lincoln’s family members voted for him, nor did 20 of the 23 ministers in his hometown of Springfield, Illinois. He did not even carry his own county in the 1860 election. These are the people who knew him best.
Lincoln invited no family members to his wedding; chose not to attend his own father’s funeral; and is said to have never had a real friend.
Lincoln was a master story teller, many of which were notoriously vulgar and crude. He never passed up an opportunity to make a speech, writes Pace, as he spent years honing the skills of the master politician. He could sound like an abolitionist in front of a Massachusetts audience, and the exact opposite in Southern Illinois. His speeches were always vague and his positions hard to pin down, the hallmark of a successful politician. He viewed politics as “life itself” and was intensely partisan, routinely denouncing his political opponent as “villains.” He was a “born politician,”
By 1864, what did people think?
During his lifetime Lincoln was actually the most hated and detested of all American presidents, as documented by historian Larry Tagg in ‘The Unpopular Mr. Lincoln: The Story of America’s Most Reviled President‘. For example, on page 435 of his book Larry Tagg cites an 1864 Harpers Weekly article that compiled a list of terms that the Northern press used to describe Lincoln including “Filthy Story-Teller, Ignoramus Abe, Despot, Old Scoundrel . . . Perjurer, Liar, Robber, Thief, Swindler, Braggart, Tyrant, Buffoon, Fiend, Usurper, Butcher, Monster . . .”
After Lincoln’s April 14th, 1865 assassination:
New England pastors who had excoriated Lincoln for four years all of a sudden “rewrote their Easter sermons to include a new, exalted view of Lincoln as an American Moses, a leader out of slavery, a national savior who was not allowed to cross over into the Promised Land” himself. Senator James Grimes of Iowa boasted that the Republican Party’s deification of Lincoln “has made it impossible to speak the truth about Abraham Lincoln hereafter.”
Even 80 years later in 1943 historian Ira D. Cardiff wrote:
… that by then Americans were not even “interested . . . in the real Lincoln. They desire a supernatural Lincoln, a Lincoln with none of the faults or frailties of the common man . . . a savior, leading us to democracy and liberty – though most said readers are not interested in democracy or liberty.” Moreover, said Cardiff, “a biography of Lincoln which told the truth about him would probably have great difficulty in finding a publisher.”
Hopefully I have your attention, and if you are ready and like me have been:
.. incensed that you have been lied to all your life by the politically-controlled/politically-correct education establishment. If so, ‘Lincoln as He Really Was‘ is a must-read as a first step in your rehabilitation as an educated American citizen – or as the citizen of any other country. It will be especially helpful in allowing your children and grandchildren to have an opportunity to learn the truth about this important aspect of American history.
So now I am off to my reading nook .. take care this holiday weekend (in the United States) .. talk to y’all again next week!
-SF1
PS About the author of this book:
Apologia MY EDUCATION IN COLLEGE was scientific — mathematics, physics, chemistry, zoology; in medical school it was the study of man’s structure, his form, his gross and microscopic qualities, his function, his diseases. There not a mention was made of Lincoln — the course of study being only a steady search for scientific truth. The doctor, like the farmer, is, in his limited sphere, looking for reality. In clinical experience, both in training years and in my own practice, I saw men and women who served to the best of their ability the needs of the sick. In my mature years I finally had time to read outside my profession. I read of America’s supreme figure: “Honest Abe.” I learned that whatever he was, he was certainly no doctor. He lived a different life.
There were two Lincolns — the myth and the man.
Charles T. Pace Greenville, North Carolina
Pace, Charles T.. Lincoln As He Really Was (Kindle Locations 165-172). Shotwell Publishing LLC. Kindle Edition.
I do hope that this is what you picture when you hear “North Korea”. The darkness on the Korean peninsula is in fact the country of North Korea, and we (USA) helped.
You might think “they deserve it”, that they are “evil” (as if you believe George W. Bush when he said):
… but he also said Iraq had WMDs (of course what he didn’t say is that we GAVE Iraq these in the 1980s and expected that they were still there).
What if what you know about North Korea has been mainly a government/media spin that didn’t just start in 2017 when North Korea toyed with intercontinental ballistic missiles. It didn’t start in 2002 either when President Bush lumped them in with Iran and Iran. So what did North Korea do?
Like in my previous post about Iran, we need to go back a few years, a few decades actually to really get a big picture of how North Korea has actually behaved or misbehaved.
One year ago in this Anti-Media article, Darius Shahtahmasebi shared in part:
In the early 1950s, the U.S. bombed North Korea into complete oblivion, destroying over 8,700 factories, 5,000 schools, 1,000 hospitals, 600,000 homes, and eventually killing off perhaps 20 percent of the country’s population. As noted by the Asia Pacific Journal, the U.S. dropped so many bombs that they eventually ran out of targets to hit:
“By the fall of 1952, there were no effective targets left for US planes to hit. Every significant town, city and industrial area in North Korea had already been bombed. In the spring of 1953, the Air Force targeted irrigation dams on the Yalu River, both to destroy the North Korean rice crop and to pressure the Chinese, who would have to supply more food aid to the North. Five reservoirs were hit, flooding thousands of acres of farmland, inundating whole towns and laying waste to the essential food source for millions of North Koreans.”
While “technically” a United Nations action, the US Congress never declared war on North Korea, and yet technically, North Korea is still at war. Once a cease-fire was agreed to, North Korea faded into the “dark” (see picture at the top of this post) not unlike Cuba.
Going back even farther, you will better understand the real tragedy as Eric Margolis points out in this Lew Rockwell article:
In 1950, at the time of the Korean War, North Korea’s economy was larger than that of South Korea thanks to Japan’s colonial industrial policies. Korea’s Communists, like their allies in China, took the lead in fighting Japanese occupation. America suffered heavy casualties fighting North Korean forces.
To many Koreans, particularly young ones, North Korea is the authentic Korea while South Korea remains a well-off but politically powerless American semi-protectorate. The humiliating collapse and impeachment of South Korea’s first female president, scandal-ridden Park Geun-hye, only reinforces the South’s image as a rudderless ship in stormy seas.
Wow, so who is the “grown-up” now? South Korea with all the lights is but an obedient kid to the American Empire while North Korea attempts to almost go it alone. Its 60 warheads (only one-fourth of what Israel has) are its only asset (i.e. gun) in negotiating anything in this world these days.
The US Empire in typical fashion can’t seem to let this chapter go as the US is passionate about proving itself as the world’s policeman. Eric Margolis share from this Lew Rockwell article some tough truth about the US “mismanagement” of past “regimes” that do not want to play “ball” with the American Empire:
After Washington overthrew the rulers of Iraq and Libya, it became painfully apparent that small nations without nuclear weapons were vulnerable to US ‘regime change’ operations. The North Koreans, who are very eccentric but not stupid, rushed to accelerate their nuclear weapons and delivery systems.
Almost equally important, North Korea boasts one of the word’s biggest armies – 1,020,000 men, 88,000 crack special forces, and an trained militia of over 5 million. The North’s weapons are obsolescent; its small air forces and navy will be vaporized by US power but its troops are deeply dug into the mountainous terrain and would be fighting from prepared positions. War against North Korea would be a slow and bloody slog– even a repeat of the bloody, stalemated 1950-52 Korean War in which 39,000 Americans and at least 2.5 million Koreans died. I’ve been in the deep North Korean-dug tunnels under the Demilitarized Zone. A full division can be moved through in only 60 minutes.
Ever since being soundly beaten in Vietnam and fought to a draw in Afghanistan, the US military has preferred to attack small countries like Panama, Grenada, Somalia, Yemen, Iraq and Syria. The Pentagon is not eager to tangle with the tough North Koreans. Estimates of the cost of a US invasion of North Korea have run as high as 250,000 US casualties and tens of billions of dollars.
So now what? Why can’t we leave North and South Korea alone to resolve their differences and maybe capitalize on their similarities? Well how about pure economics, the true source of peaceful relations in the long haul as outlined in this Russia Today article:
The project to unite the Korean Peninsula with a gas pipeline has been discussed for a long time, but official talks started in 2011. The negotiations were frozen after relations between Seoul and Pyongyang deteriorated.
In March, Seoul announced that it is ready to resume the project. According to South Korea’s Foreign Minister Kang Kyung-wha “if the North participates in talks on Northeast Asia energy cooperation, it would serve as a catalyst that helps ease geopolitical tensions in the region.”
It is things like that that give me hope that cooler heads will prevail and that the true free market could improve the lives of some many people all around the globe. Just LEAD US Empire .. or get out of the way!
