"25 Or 6 To 4" (opens in separate window)
russia collusion hoax, pt-4
friday, march 15th, 2024
Tuesday’s explosive news -- that long before the FBI launched Crossfire Hurricane on July 31, 2016, the U.S. intelligence community had asked foreign intel agencies to surveil 26 people connected to Donald Trump -- raises the question of whether our intelligence community colluded with the Clinton campaign in these efforts. After all, it was then-Biden campaign adviser and now-Secretary of State Antony Blinken who “set in motion the events that led to” 51 former intel officials issuing the public statement that falsely framed the Hunter Biden’s laptop story as Russian disinformation.
[FULL TITLE: "Did Our Intelligence Agencies Suggest The Russia Hoax To Hillary Clinton’s Campaign?"]
If a Biden campaign adviser conspired with some of the biggest names in the intelligence community a month before the 2020 election to bury the damaging scandal, it is no stretch to think the Hillary Clinton campaign might have sought an assist from the same folks to interfere in the 2016 presidential election.
We’ve also long known the Clinton campaign funded the Steele dossier, the primary evidence used by the FBI to obtain four Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act wiretap orders against a Trump campaign associate. The Clinton campaign’s efforts to peddle the Russia-collusion hoax to the FBI and the media are likewise well-established.
But did the Clinton campaign’s plot to portray Trump as a Russian asset also involve the intelligence community, and if so, when did those efforts start?
Open-source material suggests the Clinton campaign’s efforts to push the Russia angle against Trump began in June 2016, when the Democrat law firm Perkins Coie contracted with Fusion GPS, which in turn retained Christopher Steele to investigate Trump’s connections to Russia. While there are several connections between the Clinton campaign and members of the intelligence community beginning in July, there is a dearth of evidence suggesting coordination between the two before then.
That does not mean there was none, or that the Obama administration’s intelligence community wasn’t seeking to help Clinton by enlisting its foreign Five Eyes allies — the United Kingdom, Canada, New Zealand, and Australia — to target Trump. The evidence to date, however, and specifically sources’ recent statements to journalists Matt Taibbi, Michael Shellenberger, and Alex Gutentag, suggest our intelligence agencies launched the Russia-collusion hoax months before the Clinton campaign joined in full force.
Revisiting the timeline, however, suggests something further: that members of the intelligence community may have hinted that the Clinton campaign should advance a Russia-collusion narrative premised on the same sort of intel coming from the foreign intelligence services.
Here, we have two key data points. First, declassified handwritten notes from former CIA Director John Brennan memorialized him briefing then-President Obama on intelligence that Clinton, on July 26, 2016, had approved “a proposal from one of her foreign policy advisers to vilify Donald Trump by stirring up a scandal claiming interference by Russian security services.”
Second, two weeks earlier, then-Clinton campaign foreign policy adviser and former U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright spoke at the “2016 Race to Change the World” conference in Cambridge on July 11-12, 2016. Albright’s fellow speakers included, among others, Sir Richard Dearlove, the former head of MI6, and Sir Malcolm Rifkind, the former defense and foreign secretary. Also in attendance was Stefan Halper, who would later serve as a confidential human source for the FBI during the Crossfire Hurricane investigation. Halper had also reportedly served as a source for the CIA.
The organizer of that conference, Steven Schrage, has publicly claimed that during the various events, Halper ignored Trump campaign volunteer Carter Page until after Dearlove arrived. Halper then “seemed desperately interested in isolating, cornering, and ingratiating himself to Page and promoting himself to the Trump campaign,” according to Schrage.
Page would soon be the Democrats’ poster boy representing Trump’s supposed collusion with Russia. It isn’t that Page was present at that conference that should catch people’s eyes, however, but that Albright, Dearlove, and Halper were. Because according to Brennan, two weeks later, on July 26, 2016, one of Hillary’s foreign policy advisers pitched the Russia-collusion hoax.
The crumbs all lead to Albright, who fits the description and had just returned from Cambridge, where she had conversed with individuals connected to foreign intel agencies, including one of the Five Eyes that Brennan had tasked with connecting Trump associates to Russia. If so, that would mean individuals connected to the foreign intelligence communities were not merely gathering intel on Trump and his associates to share with U.S. intelligence agencies but that they also conspired with the Clinton campaign to further the Russia-collusion hoax.
There's an irony here, however, as Brennan also gathered evidence on Clinton and her campaign’s plot to paint Trump as a Russian stooge to distract from her own scandals.
So it seems our intelligence community spies on everyone. But it only puts its knowledge to use when it wants to get back at someone -- and then it has six ways from Sunday to do so.
© 2.15.2024 by Margot Cleveland, "The Federalist".
A Day In The Life.
Up at 7a on Friday, I went thru my finger stick to check my BSL (Blood Sugar Level) and recorded it on my Diabetes 2 chart, made coffee and breakfast, took two 50mg Tramadol and a 300mg Gabapentin for various pains, fired-up the Win-7 Pentium HP desktop to let 32 million lines of code load, had a couple smokes in the semi-cool garage and checked the day's errands list.
Nothing gets you in trouble like the Truth.It was a damp, overcast, cool 60° with cooler temps than the past two Spring-like days. We had a t-storm late last night, with more forecast for today and tonight. I fired-up the furnace to take the chill off, and scanned the news and weather sites. The Turkish-grind, French Dark Roast Coffee (Coffee Fool Co) was very good. Some new Kona "Rise and Shine" coffee arrived yesterday afternoon, from Monarch Coffee Farm, in Hawaii.
I tuned into the "Chris Stigall Show LIVE" (CS Show) from 6-9a, and then the "Chris Plante Show LIVE" (CP Show) 9-12noon, and finally to the Rob Carson Show LIVE (RC Show) 12-3p.
The Top 11+ Worst/Most Annoying Commercials of The Day/Week/Month/Year (so far) I Hear Everyday On Talk Radio: Popeye's Chicken(shit) "Wings Are Here"; O'Reilly Auto Parts; Medi-Share Health Insurance; McDonald's "Hamburglar Burger Reviews"; Karz-4-Kidz; Biden's 2024 "Moving Us Forward"; Select Quote Insurance; Burger King's "You Rule"; Chick-Fil-A; Sports Betting, and more, I'm sure. Good thing I have a MUTE BUTTON on my Logitech MK-710 Keyboard.
After the last of the Apple Bread for breakfast toast, I checked the day's errand list: drop-off 2023 Taxes at CPA's offices, FIVE GUYS Burgers & Fries for 2 Dbl Cheeseburgers & 2 Large Fries (BEST anywhere!), but their prices have skyrocketed@! -- 2 Dbl Cheeseburgers, 2 Large Fries $38.46 -- and finally to Rite Aid to p/u a waiting Rx. I'm sure I'll think of something else along the way. Leaving at 12:30p, traffic was its usual 'Heavy Friday Flow', with more-than-plenty of Road Construction Chokepoints everywhere. I couldn't even get out of my own street -- it was closed -- so I had to detour over a mile and take some side streets to get to a main road. Sucks to be me. After 3 stops, I finally got home around 2:30p, for what should have been a 45-50min trip.
Nothing gets you in trouble like the Truth.After a massive burger and huge portion of the best fries, anywhere, I started crashing from the morning's caffeine, and hit the LR couch for a couple hours. High for the day was an unusually warm 78°, for this time of year. I'm enjoying it. Up just before dark, I closed up the condo, watched the evening news, History's "Ancient Aliens" and switched over to Discovery's "Gold Rush" for the rest of the evening. By 11:30, I was fading, and unplugged.
Up at 7:30a on Saturday, from a restless night of VERY VIVID DREAMS, and waking several times during the night. I felt tired from it, as with the past 3-4 nights. It was a sunny, clear, nippy 39°, so I fired-up the furnace to 74°, turned-on the garage heater, made coffee, and fired-up the HP desktop to check the news and weather. It took me a little while to realize that it was Saturday, as the week had passed so fast. Heh. The new Kona Coffee was very good, and helped clear my foggy mind. I had Rye Toast w/ Philly Cream Cheese and lounged around until 12noon, before getting ready for the day.
"Joe Biden is an inflation MACHINE... I think the Biden White House would lower the average IQ of an entire city." Hilarious comments by Sen John Kennedy (R-LA). Watch the video, and read the comments. LOL.
I had lunch, Sis stoped by for a visit, and I watched the IMSA (Int'l Motor Sports Ass'n) 12 Hours of Sebring (FL) Endurance Race (9:40a - 9:40p), to an exciting finish. I watched a couple of hours of History's "The UnXplained" until 1a, and unplugged.
Nothing gets you in trouble like the Truth.Up at 7a on Sunday, it was an ominously dark and cloudy, 48°, as snow and rain cells moved thru the area. I scanned the news headlines from several sources, and weather forecasts, on the trusty HP Desktop. The storm cells passed thru, and it looked like a nice day ahead, albeit a little cooler. I had breakfast, did some paperwork, did a load of laundry, and some computer maintenance via Norton 360, Norton Premium Utilities, CCleaner Pro and MalwareBytes Premium programs.
After a HUGE lunch, I watched some F1-TV replays of the first 3 Grand Prix Races (22 races this season) of this season -- Bahrain, Qatar and Saudi Arabia -- and by 6p, was closing-up, as temps were quickly dropping. I skipped dinner, watched the news, and because Sunday night is another NBC (Nothing But Crap) Night, I watched some recent past streaming episodes of "Gold Rush" on Discovery (ROKU). By midnight, I'd had enough. Lights out.
Awake and up at 5:15a on Monday -- the last Monday of Winter & TOMORROW IS THE FIRST DAY OF SPRING! -- to ZERO-DARK-THIRTY, 37° and a cooler week ahead, forecast. BFD, it's still Winter, and I expect more freezing temps, cold, snow etc. I made a carafe of the new Monarch Kona Coffee, and it was spectacular! Delicious and fragrant. I tuned into the "CS Show" until 9, made a 2nd carafe of the delicious Monarch Kona Coffee, and went with the "CP Show" until 12noon. I scanned the news headlines and re-checked the weather sites. Everything is all about Trump's use of an adjective and a simple phrase, "bloodbath, and not people", in a comment about the auto industry and China's plan to destroy the industry. Better get used to the corrupt DNC-Media picking out selected words weekly, to use against Trump. And they're still peddling the "dictator" schtick crap. Dumbasses.
Nothing gets you in trouble like the Truth.Has ANYONE EVEN noticed how quickly our "Ukraine problem" went away, vanished, ZZZZZZZIP? At least from the top of my read-list of US news media websites. The original idea, as cooked-up by departed State Department strategist Victoria Nuland, was to make the Ukraine shithole an international problem for Russia, but instead we (Nuland) made it a problem for everybody else, especially ourselves in the USA, since it looked like a weak attempt to kick-start World War Three. Now she is gone, but the plans she laid apparently live on in the corrupt, criminal State Dept nest of vipers. Another $60-billion was "earmarked" for the Ukraine project of suicide -- most of it to be laundered (90%) through Raytheon, General Dynamics, and Lockheed Martin etc etc -- so instead Joey Bidet the CIA sent Ukraine's President Zelenskyy a few reels of Bidet's favorite "Hazel" TV show episodes. And magically, the Turd World Ukes have disappeared from the headlines and our wallets. Suits me just fine. It's an EU neighborhood war; let them fund and proxy-fight it. Not us. It will cost us TRILLIONS to rebuild that almost fully-destroyed, turd world shithole.
I left at 12:30p for my usual Monday errand trip south to DeVon's Cleaners in Dallastown, and Weis Market on the way home. No stops today at the pharmacy, or anywhere else. The Daffodils, Yellow Forsythia, Saucer Magnolias, Star Magnolias, various Flowering (as opposed to Fruiting) Pears, Flowering (as opposed to Fruiting) Cherries, Flowering (as opposed to Fruiting) Plums, PJM Rhododendrons, and a few more plants, I'm sure. I stopped at Weis Market just to get some Gold Peak Sugar Free Tea, Rye Bread, 3-4 Onion Bagels and some fruit. Well, once again the trip netted a full cart and $117.40 for the tab. Heh.
I unloaded and put stuff away, when I got home, had some of the delicious Shrimp Fried Rice that Sis had made for me on Sunday -- THAT was the problem why I got so much stuff: food shopping on an empty stomach! My bad. My R/S lower back, hip and leg were hurting all day, ostensibly from the evil Sciatica Nerve Pain, and a 500mg Bayer Aspirin Caplet only helped a little. More paperwork, and quickly it got dark. I closed-up, had some dinner, and watched the FNC version of the news vs NEWSMAX. I watched Discovery's "Curse of Oak Tree Island" and Motor Trend's "Iron Resurrection" until midnight, and called it a day. My cleaning lady's in at 8:30a, so I'll be up early.
Nothing gets you in trouble like the Truth.Up at 6a, to a cold 33° and dark morning, with a nice day forecast. I made coffee, had an Onion Bagel and scanned the news headlines. Our *First Day of Spring*, and we got a 15min burst of heavy snow flurries around 8a, as squalls blew thru from Lake Erie. Otherwise, mostly blue sky and windy. After tuning into the "CS Show" until 9a, I switched to the "CP Show", and began charging the 3 huge electric blinds in my office-sunroom's 4ft x 9ft windows. JoAnne finished cleaning and left at 11:30. Rite Aid Pharmacy called with 2Rxs ready, but what I really needed wasn't, so there's no hurry to get the others picked-up. I had a light lunch and waiting for Sherry to arrive at 1p.
Happy First Day of Spring!
Everything I've said about the criminal, illegal alien invaders being an army, has come true, now that a corrupt judge has ruled that illegal alien invaders can posses firearms. THEY ARE NOW ARMED, AND CAN BEGIN KILLING AMERICAN CITIZENS. Nice, huh? Thanks, Bidet you asshole scumbag traitor.
Sherry and I drove over to the cavernous and desolate York Galleria to walk for a while, and talk. We had a great time,as we always do, and will get back together on Friday (today). She left around 4:30, with a stop before going home. I had some dinner, watched the news, History's "Curse of Oak Island" and Discovery's "Homestead Rescue", until midnight. Lights out.
Up at 6a on Wednesday, a nippy 40°, ZERO-DARK-THIRTY morning, I fired-up the furnace and garage heater, made coffee, had a smoke in the garage, and tuned into the "CS Show". I had R/S back/hip/buttock pain, so I took 2 50mg Tramadol. The new Monarch Kona Light Roast Coffee was as good as I remember it, just two days ago. I scanned the news headlines and checked-in on the AccuWeather.com weather site.
Nothing gets you in trouble like the Truth.The number of American Embassies around the world, abandoned by the Bidet&Co Leftist Regime, stands at 11 US Embassy evacuations. Cut-and-run cowards, The leftist State Dept and Bidet&Co. Trump would have never done that, and we'd never be in situations of such world unrest, that he'd have to.
I did a couple errands right after 12, came home, had Shrimp-Fried Rice & Egg for lunch, and hit the LR couch for 2hrs. When I tried to get up, something 'exploded' in my R/S hip/buttock -- a nerve was lit on fire, like an ice pick and blowtorch hitting the hip/buttock simultaneously, and kept me on the couch, until the pain somewhat subsided. Just moving my right leg was extremely painful, so I stayed there for 'a while', until the fiery pain subsided. Damn! I remember that happening back in 2010, when I had severe/acute Sciatica, got 3 Epidural shots, got addicted to Oxycodone and vodka, and went thru detox, and got back to myself. Not going there again. I took a 500mg Bayer Aspirin, saved the 50mg Tramadol for the morning, and began to feel a little better.
I skipped dinner because of the pain, watched History's "American Pickers" until midnight, and quit for the night.
Up at 8a on Thursday, to a clear, sunny 27° morning, I still had lower back/buttock/leg Sciatica pain, so I took 2 50mg Tramadol and a 500mg Bayer Aspirin, upped the heat, made the new Kona Coffee, and had a couple smokes in the garage. I missed most of the "CS Show", so I plugged into the "CP Show" until noon. I had the last Onion Bagel, slathered with Irish Butter, for breakfast, and took some boxes from yesterday 4 deliveries, to the basement, unpacked them and put the many products on one of my 17 'prepping' shelves.
Nothing gets you in trouble like the Truth.Yesterday, while on XX, I posted an article called, "The EPA Is About To Outlaw Your Car", and a little while later when the newer DC-based Fox article appeared on their website, an article called, "Biden finalizes crackdown on gas cars, forcing more than half of new car sales to be electric by 2030", and they both generated some interest. But the real takeaway is this post, from a F******r named "Bratch", about the powers behind the destruction of our world: "China and Blackrock – Biden EPA Rolls Out USA Auto Mandates Forcing EV’s to Make-Up Two-Thirds of Passenger Vehicles – Who Benefits?". That post is SERIOUSLY WORTH THE READ! A LOT of good information there. [Here are the two articles that I posted on XX's site: here and here.]
Are you ready for the (predicted) "Black Swan" Event? Last year, Catherine Herridge (CBS reporter) predicted on CBS that a major national security crisis with an unpredictable high impact on the globe would occur." [The term “black swan event,” popularized by Nassim Nicholas Taleb in his 2007 book, ‘The Black Swan,’ describes an unpredictable or unforeseen occurrence.] On Tucker's Twitter Network, Ron Paul explains what he thinks is coming. All my years of 'prepping' food, guns, ammo etc won't help at all; many, many, many millions of us are going to die. NOTE: We have to subscribe to TCN for $6/mo, to hear the full Ron Paul interview. No thanks, not me. If I find the video with that interview in its entirety, I include it here, for all of us to view.
Nowhere to go, nothing to do, and no one to do it with.I lounged around until 12:30p, got ready for the day, and had nowhere to go and nothing to do. Good day to nurse the Sciatica pain, with aspirin and some rest. Heh, for the 3rd time in the past 14yrs, the corrupt, weaponized DoInJ (Dept of Injustice) dirtbags are suing Apple for how Apple has used its locked-down ecosystem to build a monopoly on the iPhone. Well, no shit Sherlock Idiots! Since the iPhone was invented a revolutionized the industry, it's been a monopoly. No, I've never had, and don't have, a "SmartyPants" iPhone. Here's everything about the suit.
I had lunch, fed the birds and squirrels, and listened to the "RC Show" during the afternoon, while doing computer work. Friend and neighbor Joe stopped by to say goodbye, as he and his new wife have sold their unit, put everything into storage, and are headed west to find a "friendly and cheaper red state" to live in a single floor condo, as we all get older and hate climbing stairs. I'm thinking along the same lines, if my back and hip problem continues or gets worse. In 2010, it went away; now, I'm not so sure.
I got a couple hours 'couch-time', took another 500mg Bayer Aspirin and just tried not to relive the pain I had yesterday. After supper, I did computer work and checked the list of specs for my possible new computer. It was an NBC Night (Nothing But Crap) for TV, so I worked on other options for a 'new Win-7 Pro' Legacy Computer and started to have secopnd thoughts about replacing my trusty old HP.
By 11p, I'd had enough debating myself, and let it go until tomorrow. Lights out.
Tomorrow starts another week here in the "Journal", and it's another clear week, which I like. The Drs app'ts come next month, in force, and continue for 1-2 months. Like every year prior. I'll enjoy the lack of it, while I can.
Are Ramadan Jihad Cells Already In The US?
Two recent interviews — one with former Navy SEAL and Blackwater founder Erik Prince and one with Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., — pointed to the gathering threat of terror violence inside the country this year.
Aside from these two and a few more, though, there seems to be scant attention being paid to the likelihood that a confluence of threat indicators will erupt into street violence on a scale we’ve not seen since the summer of 2020.
This year, the Islamic month of Ramadan begins on March 10.
It runs until sundown on April 10.
Against the backdrop of Israel’s ongoing Swords of Iron military operation against Hamas in the Gaza Strip, a month that even in less tumultuous years often sees an accelerated pace of jihad attacks globally, this year’s Ramadan likely will be the occasion for even more renewed calls for attacks against Jews in Gaza, Judea, Samaria, the rest of Israel, and the United States (U.S.) homeland as well. Indeed, U.S. imams already have begun calling for the killing of Jews on a genocidal scale.
Intelligence officials warned in January 2024 that Hezbollah may be plotting terror attacks inside the homeland this year.
Also in January, a group of former senior FBI officials sent a letter to congressional leaders warning of a “new and imminent danger.”
That danger, they wrote, arises from the ongoing mass invasion of military-age men from all over the world, among whom surely are not only Chinese Jungle Tigers but also Islamic terrorists seeking vengeance against Jews and for U.S. support of Israel.
Epoch Times show host and reporter Roman Balmakov interviewed Erik Prince at the March 2024 CPAC (Conservative Political Action Conference. During the interview, entitled “Terrorist Sleeper Cells Are Already in the U.S.,” Prince told Balmakov that one reason he believes the Biden administration is so reluctant to strike back in any meaningful way against Iranian terror proxies — much less any Iranian target itself — is that the Iranian regime has already surged unknown numbers of military fighters across our wide-open southern border.
Prince suggested that such fighters — whether Iran’s own IRGC (Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps), Quds Force, or proxy jihadis from HAMAS, Hizballah, or Houthis — could be flown on Iran’s Mahan Air from Iran to Venezuela.
Then from there, they could head north through the Darien Gap that lies between Colombia and Panama, and then on up to and across the U.S. southern border.
Combined with other hostile military forces already certainly here, to include Chinese Jungle Tigers and Hezbollah cadres, these forces are likely forming cells, conducting pre-attack casing, surveillance, and training, and getting ready to launch combined attacks inside the homeland later in 2024, or should the U.S. do anything to upset Iran’s mullahs.
On March 3, 2024 Sen. Roger Marshall, R-Kan., joined FOX News’ “Sunday Morning Futures” program with Maria Bartiromo.
Sen. Marshall warned about Chinese triads operating across America.
Triads are transnational organized crime syndicates based in Communist China, but operating globally, including the U.S.
It must be understood that these triads operate with the full knowledge and at least tacit acquiescence of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP).
Sen. Marshall noted that in Kansas and the U.S. more broadly, there has been “an explosion of human trafficking.”
Specifically, he was talking about a proliferation of massage parlors in Kansas as well as other states.
Those massage parlors, plus other Chinese fronts like hair or nail salons, are evidence not only of human smuggling and the enslaved Chinese women who work there, but also of a sophisticated money laundering operation.
Sen. Marshall spoke also about the flood of fentanyl trafficking across that southern border, a drug trade that he pointed out dates back to the era of Mao Zedong, when methamphetamine precursors were first sent into the U.S. in collaboration with the Mexican cartels.
Now, in addition to that early Chemical Warfare (CW), the CCP in collusion with the Mexican cartels, are smuggling fentanyl chemical precursors into Mexico, with American users the ultimate intended target.
With over 100,000 drug deaths in the U.S. every year, and most of those due to fentanyl (sometimes laced into other counterfeit drugs often bought online), there is no question that the CCP is waging Chemical Warfare against the U.S.
Sen. Marshall called out the Biden administration for permitting the drug and human trafficking across the U.S. southern border with Mexico, despite the clear national security implications that put our entire nation in danger.
On a final note, the Washington Examiner and other news outlets reported in early March 2024 that the Biden administration has flown some 320,000 illegal aliens directly from unknown Latin American countries into the U.S. to unsuspecting American communities that Customs and Border Protection (CBP) refuses to identify.
The secret airlift was kept secret from the American public to minimize the numbers of illegals being processed through U.S. southern ports of entry via the CBP One cell phone app.
America’s friends, allies, and enemies alike all see this happening. They all know that those with malign intent have a free pass into the U.S. under the Biden administration.
As the FBI officials wrote in their letter to Congress, “the warning lights are blinking.”
© 3.13.2024 by Clare Lopez, "Front Page Magazine".
Our Fake, Fake, Fake World.
Will our historical era be remembered as the “Age of Fakes”? We have fake news, fake meat, fake elections, fake genders, fake vaccines, fake budgets, fake democracy, fake truths, fake hate, fake Russian collusion, fake insurrections, fake climate emergencies, fake freedoms, fake outrage, fake speech crimes, fake money, fake justice, fake intellects, fake women, fake borders, fake wars, and even a fake president. In some ways, it is a very silly time to be alive.
Fake president, shit-for-brains Joey Bidet&Co's "mental elevator" hasn't gone to the "top floor", in many years.So much of our fake world has been built on two monstrously fake foundations: fake progress and fake liberalism. Presidents Theodore Roosevelt and Woodrow Wilson redefined progress as something that only Big Government can provide. Instead of celebrating human innovation, artistic achievement, work ethic, and private entrepreneurship as the essential ingredients for any prosperous future, progressivism insists that nothing of value can be achieved without a strong centralized government and a bloated administrative Deep State. President Franklin Delano Roosevelt then picked up the Big Government cudgel by redefining liberalism as a collection of freedoms that only government can provide. Instead of recognizing human liberty as diametrically opposed to coercive State power, FDR’s “New Deal” style of liberalism insists that only new laws, new social programs, new regulatory agencies, and newly discovered rights can ever make people free. In the last century of perverse word games, progressivism and liberalism promised progress and liberty and instead burdened Americans with the heavy weight of the government’s chains.
America’s commitment to individual liberty, private property, and free speech once distinguished it from all other countries in the world. When it began betraying those commitments and exporting a brand of “rules-based international order” scarcely different from those devised under monarchical empires of the past, it became a global ambassador for fake freedom. And in a world where freedom is fake everywhere, happiness appears to be fake, too.
Polls from countries around the world continue to show that humans are dreadfully unhappy. With new gadgets, pop stars, and trending hashtags being constantly unveiled, shouldn’t the global population be sufficiently entertained? With a never-ending string of celebrities advocating for the “most important” causes in our lifetimes, shouldn’t lonely people be inundated with purpose? Or could it be that we humans — regardless of race, religion, or nationality — are wired to seek something more than the shiny knockoffs, fleeting pleasures, and engineered emergencies that devilishly vie for our attention? Maybe somewhere beyond the ill-used brain of every social media addict is a lonely soul desperate for authentic truth. Perhaps a growing share of the population sees this glittery globalist cage as disappointingly fake. What happens when the world is driven mad by frauds, hoaxes, and shams?
Social revolutions begin. In search of meaningful lives, people will reject the fake authorities that control them. One of the first things to go will be today’s fake academic institutions because they no longer serve any purpose. Consider how far the state of Western education has fallen. During the time of our Founding Fathers, education was seen as the silver bullet against social inequality. It was widely understood that providing Americans with the foundations of civilizational knowledge equipped them with the tools to build better lives. Benjamin Franklin started the first lending library in the colonies. Thomas Jefferson established the University of Virginia on a farm once owned by James Monroe, and both James Madison and the Marquis de Lafayette were present for the school’s inaugural banquet. Their dedication toward creating an educated and self-sufficient society stood in stark contrast to the European colleges that catered to an entrenched aristocracy. The men who changed the course of human history with the Declaration of Independence, the U.S. Constitution, and the Bill of Rights understood that the promotion of learning across all social classes simultaneously promotes individual liberty over government tyranny. Destroying a ruling class’s monopoly on knowledge destroys its monopoly on power.
Note that knowledge is the key here — not the mere obtainment of some fancy degree. Neither Abraham Lincoln nor Thomas Edison had much in the way of formal education, but both were highly educated men who profoundly shaped this country. Mark Twain’s humorous wit is not less remarkable because he never attended high school, nor is the prose of John Steinbeck or William Faulkner less incisive because neither finished college. Degrees mean nothing if the knowledge that they represent is fake.
Yet what does a conferred degree mean today? Does it mean that a student has proven mastery in the arts and sciences, or does it mean that he has been deemed a politically correct cog for a world suffering from groupthink? Do universities still reward genius, hard work, and merit, or are they factories for producing intellectual mediocrity? The thing about a real education is that nobody can give it to you; it has to be pursued and earned. As colleges transitioned toward treating degrees like one of FDR’s government-bestowed rights, they stopped producing genuine thinkers. Fake educations and fake degrees have instead produced a society ill-equipped to fight for individual liberty against the threats of resurgent government tyranny. Fake experts maintain authority only when citizens lack the intellectual discernment to object. It’s as if the government’s funding of fake intellectuals has been part of the “progressive” plan all along.
So social revolution will begin in the schools — or away from the schools, that is. Interest in homeschooling will continue to grow. Young minds that bristle at the rigid and dogmatic worldviews currently being inculcated inside overpriced colleges will discover that there are better ways to learn. Real thinkers will rebel against intellectual prisons that prioritize “woke” nonsense over the rich record of Western scholarship. Parents will refuse to subject their children to the racist and sexualized curricula of Marxist indoctrination camps disguised as classrooms. Degrees that are earned without rigor will be understood as expensive fakes. Then one day, some entrepreneur will decide that it is more important to hire people who can actually keep planes from falling out of the sky than to staff up with politically correct fools who know only how to protest against hydrocarbon energy and for Hamas terrorists. Because academic institutions have betrayed their purpose, employer-administered entrance exams and other merit-based tests might even replace the usefulness of college degrees. The government’s stranglehold over thinking people is already crumbling.
Vladimir Lenin ominously boasted, “Give me four years to teach the children and the seed I have sown will never be uprooted.” John D. Rockefeller selfishly insisted, “I don’t want a nation of thinkers, I want a nation of workers.” These sentiments have destroyed American genius and resiliency for the last century, and the harm that they have caused cannot be undone overnight. A nation taught not to think for itself is a nation that knows no other course of action than to obey.
However, when government artifice and manipulation become so outlandish that everything appears fake, traditional control mechanisms fall apart. Long-slumbering populations awaken from their State-induced hypnotic trance much like a hungry bear does from hibernation — shaky at first but ferocious in short order. Just as Central European countries trapped behind the Iron Curtain rebelled against the fake premises of Soviet communism, freedom-minded peoples of the West are already rebelling against the fake premises of the World Economic Forum’s “climate change” communism and “build back better” buffoonery. They will not eat the bugs or censor their own speech. They are not willing to let Klaus Schwab, Bill Gates, and other fake experts control their lives with CBDCs and digital IDs. They are not willing to live in a national security surveillance State that provides their children with fake futures.
This fake “new world order” is not making anybody happy, and as people begin thinking for themselves, they are learning to disobey.
© 3.13.2024 by J.B. Shurk, "American Thinker".
Note to Black Lives Matter: Literacy -- The White Man -- Made Civilization.
Over the past several decades, many of us who were associated with the humanities noticed, within the ranks of its academic practitioners, an incipient displeasure with Western civilization taking hold and gradually developing into outright hostility.
This attitude was at first manifested by a growing reluctance to engage with the vast literary output of Western man, whose creative strivings were summed up dismissively as the work of “dead white males” and consequently deemed irrelevant to the late twentieth century and beyond. If “educators” had their way, those geniuses would be silenced, for as white men, they have nothing to contribute, and therefore they had no reason to continue their conversation with the world.
Eventually, the literary achievements of the entire West were under assault (as well as the attainments in most other fields of creative endeavor), which meant that the prodigious accomplishments of European women were now included in the body of work that had become anathema to modern “scholars” ensnared by the fashionable allure of the current zeitgeist. The position women held on the intersectional totem pole was not enough to offset their inescapable association with the European colonizer.
This trajectory of shifting values is something the general public became cognizant of only gradually and with varying degrees of alarm. But it has been analyzed in depth by intellectual giants as far back as 1987, when Allan Bloom published The Closing of the American Mind. Roger Kimball of New Criterion has canvassed the development of this antipathy to the Western tradition in both the latter publication and his own books. But despite the erudition that these and other great thinkers have brought to bear on this subject, the dismantling proceeds apace.
A recent headline from Seattle provides evidence for just how commonplace destructive ideas have become in our educational institutions as they have trickled down from the universities, reinforcing the truth of Allan Bloom’s assertion that “what is influential in the higher intellectual circles always ends up in the schools.” A Seattle high school English teacher presented students with materials commonly found in anti-racism training manuals, in this case decrying the most important component of literary efforts (and civilizational progress): the love of reading and writing. The pamphlet averred, among other things, that a love of reading and writing is a characteristic of white supremacy. What interpretation could students glean from this assertion but that reading and writing should be viewed with mistrust or even avoided?
Decades ago, I found it shocking that anyone would openly disparage the staggering achievements of the Western literary mind, male or female, let alone that this assessment would become de rigueur in academia. It was as if someone were attempting to wrench the great passion of my life right out of my arms. Further, and more important, it had become obvious that the barbarians were dismantling the high points of achievement in civilization generally.
Now I am left numb with disbelief that any high school English teacher in the anglosphere could in all seriousness propose that reading and writing are activities “bad” by association with something our culture condemns. This attack is directed no longer toward the “high points of civilization,” but rather toward the building blocks of civilizational development — and maintenance.
According to Jason Rantz from KTTH talk radio in Seattle, “as part of the Black Lives Matter at School Week, World Literature and Composition students at Lincoln High School in Seattle were given a handout with definitions of the ‘9 characteristics of white supremacy’” and were told that “Worship of the Written Word is white supremacy because it is ‘an erasure of the wide range of ways we communicate with each other.’” According to this worksheet, white people “hyper-value written communication because it’s a form of ‘honoring only what is written and even then only what is written to a narrow standard, full of misinformation and lies.’”
If I were a smart-aleck, I would recommend that the illiterate agitators who come up with these ideas go back in time and say all this to the (white) Greeks, who for centuries listened to poets recite the Homeric epics. Or tell this to the Sumerians, who, while also part of an oral poetic culture, invented writing for the practical purpose of record-keeping. And then tell the Chinese. And while you’re at it, the Mayans — the people of these last three cultures having each independently invented systems of writing.
Given the pervasiveness of these vacuous ideas under the reigning educational regime, we must ask, why the institutionalized attack on reading and writing, and why under the aegis of Black Lives Matter at School? When I searched the phrase “the invention of writing,” I couldn’t help but notice forums devoted to disputing the widely accepted claim that no sub-Saharan country ever invented a writing system. Well, if any one of them did, why don’t black educators and their white allies in DIE encourage study of these African accomplishments in celebration of black history rather than condemning a system of communication that was invented by brown and yellow people to enable them to transact business?
Or could it be that this particular ill chosen cudgel is simply useful for beating white people over the head — for being white?
Jocelynn Cordes has published a collection of her essays under the title “Critical Musings from a Traditionalist.”
© 3.15.2024 by Jocelynn Cordes, "American Thinker".
The Government Is Not Your Daddy.
It’s no secret that many Democrat voters have “daddy” issues. They grew up in homes without strong, loving fathers and desperately seek from government what they never found in their youths: a protective authority figure and lifelong role model.
When Democrats with “daddy” issues find their way into power, they force their own psychological deficiencies upon the broader populace. Why? Because they try to play “father” to their constituents but have no idea how a good father is supposed to behave. They scream and shout because they confuse insults and tantrums with masculinity. They reimagine the ideal male leader as someone who would enjoy wearing make-up and behaving like a teenage girl. They demand that male “allies” relinquish any say over the healthy delivery of their unborn children. Instead of taking personal responsibility for missteps in life, they blame their problems on the nebulous “patriarchy” — or rather, the failed fathers of the past!
After punishing all the good men as stand-ins for all the weak men who never properly parented them, Democrats are left with the wimpiest, least wise leftovers of the sorry lot. Then some angry, man-hating leftist with zero self-awareness uploads a video onto social media demanding to know where all the good men have gone. Well, you chased them away, you trans-obsessed, insult-spewing, sniveling punk!
Greg Gutfeld made this point on a recent episode of The Five when discussing the exodus of black and Hispanic voters from the Democrat party: “They’ve alienated men in order to please miserable activists, and men are like, ‘Hey, we know when we are not wanted. We will see ourselves out. We know what a woman is, right? We know what is best for our kids. We know what it takes to protect our cities and our families, and we are tired of apologizing for laughing at funny jokes and having natural testosterone.’” Because the Democrat party is filled with fake men and phony fathers, it continues to shove real men and fathers away. Then, when Democrat voters find that their trusted “authority figures” have squishy backbones, too, their “daddy” issues spiral out of control. They need more laws, more mask mandates, more punishments; they become desperate for some governmental “daddy” to tell them what they can and cannot do.
This hits at a major distinction separating Democrats from the liberty-loving conservatives whom leftists naturally resent. Liberty-lovers do not confuse the government for their own parents. Government is, at best, a nuisance and, at worst, a thuggish bully. It does not exist to keep you safe at night, to put food on the kitchen table, to teach you right from wrong, or to furnish you with love. Government is a bureaucratic machine that specializes in using the threat of force and the application of actual violence to coerce strangers into doing exactly what the State wishes them to do. Depending on the government to behave like a loving parent is like depending on one of James Cameron’s cybernetic Terminators for a soothing hug. Both have the kind of uncaring programming that makes most embraces fatal. Still, for Democrats with “daddy” issues, those bureaucratic Terminators are the closest things to family that they’ve got. They’d gladly put their trust in a brutal and dogmatic State that occasionally pats them on the head and promises to take care of them. It’s psychological abuse disguised as “caring government.”
This fraudulent parent-child construct produces nothing but servile citizenry. In a healthy family, parents nurture their children until they become competent, self-sufficient adults. Good parents supervise what their children learn, keep them from harm, and guide them along their journey to adulthood. The love and respect between a parent and child never go away, but the relationship is not meant to produce lifelong juveniles stuck in a permanent state of dependency. Children grow to become capable adults; those adults have children of their own; and the cycle promotes a strong, healthy society.
When governments act as false parents, however, they are not interested in transforming juveniles into adults. They do not seek to create competent citizens who are capable of taking care of themselves. They do not want to produce a population strong enough to think for itself. Because a citizen’s self-sufficiency eliminates his dependency on government, bureaucrats must infantilize grown adults for the rest of their lives. The State is not equipped to be a parent, but it is an ideal machine for mass-producing slaves.
I suspect that part of President Trump’s popular appeal comes from his refusal to treat adults as if they were still children.
Parents sometimes have to “pretend” around their young children. To keep them safe from the terrors of an often dark world, they “bend the truth” here and there. When a family seeks shelter during a tornado, or a parent is laid off from work, or a relative is diagnosed with a scary illness, parents will look into their children’s eyes and say, “Everything will be all right.” That’s what good parents do when the best that they can do for their children is to soothe their worries with fearless love and steady support.
Adults, on the other hand, should be able to speak bluntly to each other without concern that an unvarnished truth will “trigger” another adult to melt into a trembling, catatonic puddle of tears. Trump told NATO countries that they should pay their full financial commitments to the alliance if they really fear for their own security, and the fainting class screeched, “How dare he tell the truth so publicly?” Trump (allegedly!) pinpointed Haiti and other unstable nations as “S-hole countries,” and celebrities came out of their mansions to pretend Haiti is just as luxurious as Hollywood. Trump told Americans there is a dangerous invasion of foreign nationals crossing our open borders, and the corporate news propagandists denounced his accurate assessment as intolerably “racist.”
Time and again, the pundit class has insisted on treating American adults as if they were children too young to understand harsh realities. President Trump is the first national leader in most Americans’ lives to show them respect by plainly speaking the truth.
A lot of people did not quite understand how long their government had been treating them like toddlers until Donald Trump’s frank speech jolted them awake. He questioned the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, excoriated globalism’s destruction of America’s middle class, and refused to search for the constantly shifting line denoting what is “politically correct” to say out loud. He called out “journalists” for spreading fake news, criticized monetary policies that have transferred Americans’ wealth to foreign adversaries, and rebuked “allies” that facilitate illegal immigration into the United States. When threatened by foreign regimes, he threatened them back in direct and unequivocal terms. When speaking of rising crime in the United States, he did not worry about the criminals’ feelings. When his enemies used the Intelligence Community, Department of Justice, and politically partisan judges to threaten his freedom, he never hesitated to call out the abuse and corruption taking place. At first, a lot of Americans thought, “He can’t say that!” Over time, however, a lot of those same Americans wondered, “Why shouldn’t he be able to say that?” Why must we censor our own speech and pretend that untrue things are true simply to avoid the possibility of feeling uncomfortable? Are we not all adults? Are we not capable of speaking to one another candidly?
One of the most important things President Trump has done for our country is to stop pretending that things are fine when they clearly are not. Pretending is for young children. Facing hard truths head-on is for adults. Childish Americans must grow up because the government can never be their “daddy.”
© 3.17.2024 by J.B. Shurk, "American Thinker".
