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How To Solve Violence In The US? End Democrat-Run Cities And Bring Back Asylums

How To Solve Violence In The US? End Democrat-Run Cities And Bring Back Asylums

Authored by Brandon Smith via Alt-Market.us,

One of the most common strategies used by the political left to attack 2nd Amendment supporters is to ramp up the anti-gun hype every time a crime involving a gun is committed. They don’t care much about the tragedy itself, they only care about how they can use it for political gain. However, it’s very important to understand that this is not only about removing gun rights for leftists – It’s also about creating a false association in the public consciousness that guns = crime.

That is to say, they want to condition people to believe that once guns are gone, crime and murder will be gone also. But, firearms have been an integral part of American society for hundreds of years, and gun ownership has been present through times of relative peace as well as times of increased violence.

In the case of countries like the UK with incredibly strict gun laws, muggings, rape and homicides have been rising with knife attacks in particular increasing by 80%. While it is technically more difficult to murder a person with a knife, it’s also a lot easier for larger, stronger assailants and gangs to succeed in harming people when those people have no equalizer. Disarmament makes life EASIER for criminals, not harder.

So, if guns are not the catalyst for rising violence, then what is?  In reality, the very people who want guns taken from the hands of law abiding Americans are the same people largely responsible for the spike in homicide rates. Imagine that…

In the US, violent crimes and murders are exponentially higher in Democrat run cities, many of them with increased gun control measures. In fact, of the top 30 most violent cities in the US, 27 of them are Democrat controlled. Wherever leftists dominate politically, violence, theft, rape and murder are sure to follow. Anti-gun proponents often try to cite high homicide numbers in certain conservative states like Texas, but the majority of those crimes are actually committed in cities run by leftists.

The truth is, blue cities are dragging red states and the rest of the country down. According to the statistics, in theory, if the public was to replace all Democrat city politicians with conservative leadership murder rates would immediately plunge across the US by virtue of policy.

But what is it specifically about Democrat leadership that leads to far higher crime? There are other trends to consider, such as incarceration rates in any given state or county, severity of punishment for violent crimes and repeat offenders, and let’s not forget a subject a lot of people don’t want to talk about – The separation of the mentally ill from the rest of society. Leftists often support revolving door policies for criminals, reduced sentences for violent crime (if the perpetrator is a minority) and they are adamantly opposed to incarceration for those with dangerous mental illness.

They’re happy to take away the 2nd Amendment rights of innocent Americans, but they have no interest in keeping criminals in prison or keeping mentally unstable people away from normal society. Perhaps because their goal is NOT to reduce violence, but to use exponential violence in society as a reason to erode the constitution.

Incarceration does in fact work, far better that gun control does. But in order to understand the incarceration rate and its effectiveness in stopping violence, we have to look at two systems simultaneously – Prison incarceration and mental asylum incarceration. The following data shows US incarceration per capita in various prison systems for the past century:

The next graph shows homicide rates per capita for between 1900 to around 2010

And this graph shows homicide rates from the 1960’s up to the 2020s.

One issue that is immediately noticeable is that prison numbers spiked massively starting in the mid-1980s, after which homicide rates began to plunge. Also note that less incarceration in the early 1900s coincides with much higher murder rates across the nation. But what about that dip in murders from the 1930s to the 1960s? What caused that?

Well, it’s not necessarily an economic problem as many progressive might suggest. The country was hitting peak prosperity in the 1920s and murder rates were still sky high. On the opposite end, the system was still in depression turmoil in the 1930s to 1940s, but homicide rates plunged. So, what caused violent crime to fall in that era?

The only factor that seems to coincide with this period of relative peace is the sudden increase in psychiatric incarceration from around the 1930s onward.

While prison rates remained low and mostly static between the mid-1930s to the mid-1960s, the number of mental asylums holding dangerous patients was growing. And, like magic, violence in the US dropped off a cliff.

By extension, as asylums began to shut down in the 1970s, murders jumped back once again to record highs. Without asylums and with low prison incarceration, homicides spread like wildfire and it did not stop until the mid-1980s when prison rates spiked. In other words, the prison system and the legal system had to finally pick up the slack left behind as the mental asylums disappeared.

Finally, take note of the recent jump in homicides and violence in the past few years in graph #3 – It matches almost exactly with falling incarceration trends in Graph #1.  This has been mostly encouraged by Democrat policies in blue cities and blue states. Also keep in mind that the Democrats of today are part of a new woke cultism – They are not necessarily the same Democrats from 30 years ago. Woke Democrats want all barriers to criminal activity removed, including incarceration.

Furthermore, mental illness in the US is on the rise. Over 42% of Gen Z has been diagnosed with at least one mental health condition and psychiatric drugs are doing little to help. We have minimal mental illness facilities in place to deal with the influx of unstable people permeating society. We are about to REPEAT the pattern of the early 1900s, with a lower prison population and no asylums, violence will likely continue to spiral out of control.

To be sure, in the past there were some terrible practices involving mental health establishments and it doesn’t do anyone any good to repeat those mistakes. In the early days of psychiatry they caste a wide net that caught a lot of dangerous people, but they also locked up anyone with marginal mental problems as well. This led to abuses.

That said, it’s foolish to dismiss the numbers; asylums worked. They helped to reduce murders dramatically. At least 1% of the human population has psychopathic traits (including lack of empathy) and these people cause at least 30% of all crime in the US. At least 3% of the human population exhibits psychotic tendencies, which means they are prone to abrupt violence without treatment.  Something has to be done to address the mentally unstable in our nation. Their odds of recidivism are extremely high, and they will keep committing the same crimes over and over again until they are stopped.

This is the elephant in the room that the political left doesn’t want to talk about. They try to hide it with social justice platitudes and feel-good welfare programs, but these things are clearly useless. Separating dangerous and insane people from the rest of the population is the only sure method for saving lives in the long run and keeping civilization intact.

The solution is simple and two-fold: Get rid of leftist leaders in major cities that set violent repeat offenders free, and bring back mental health facilities to lock up the crazies if necessary. This is the ONLY WAY to stop the avalanche of violent crime that awaits Americans as the next few years unfold.

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Tyler Durden
Fri, 06/02/2023 – 23:40

Hong Kong Set To Become Crypto Trading Hub, Opens Exchange Licensing Ahead Of Retail Trading

Hong Kong Set To Become Crypto Trading Hub, Opens Exchange Licensing Ahead Of Retail Trading

After years of brutal crackdowns, crypto trading is coming back to China… or at least Hong Kong for now.

On Thursday, Hong Kong took a step toward becoming a cryptocurrency hub with the start of applications for licenses to run trading platforms and exchanges, Nikkei reported. Trading of cryptocurrencies in the Chinese territory has been restricted to institutional investors and other professionals since 2018, but Hong Kong’s new regulations will allow retail trading as soon as the second half of 2023, which means that HK will soon emerge as the conduit by which billions in Chinese retail savings mysteriously disappear into the outside world, a function that until not too long ago was served by Macau.

Officials said the city’s move to welcome crypto, which comes amid global regulatory headwinds for the industry, is backed by safeguards for investors.

“Hong Kong’s comprehensive virtual assets regulatory framework follows the principle of ‘same business, same risks, same rules’ and aims to provide robust investor protection and manage key risks,” said Julia Leung, CEO of the Securities and Futures Commission. “This will enable the industry to develop sustainably and support innovation.”

Requirements for obtaining a license include capital of at least 5 million Hong Kong dollars ($638,000), measures to combat money laundering and the appointment of experienced managers.

“Operators of virtual asset trading platforms who are prepared to comply with the SFC’s standards are welcome to apply for a licence,” the commission said in a May 23 notice. “Those who do not plan to do so should proceed to an orderly closure of their business in Hong Kong.”

More than 80 companies have expressed interest in obtaining a license, authorities say. Mainland Chinese companies are particularly eager to enter the Hong Kong market, because they face a total ban on providing cryptocurrency-related services at home.

A subsidiary of Chinese state-owned property developer Greenland Group plans to apply for a license, local media report. Online lender ZA Bank said on May 24 that it would partner with licensed companies to offer trading services for individuals.

“We welcome the licensing guidelines issued yesterday by the Hong Kong SFC, and we are excited to offer the new investment opportunities brought by virtual assets to our users,” ZA Bank CEO Ronald Iu said.

In Asia, South Korea and Singapore have taken the lead in regulating the crypto market, attracting some businesses that fled the U.S. and other countries. Hong Kong was regarded as being tough on the industry after China’s move to ban related services in 2021, but the city has reversed its stance.

In October, Hong Kong announced a policy of promoting virtual currencies. An exchange-traded fund (ETF) tracking bitcoin listed on the Hong Kong exchange in December.

“The fact that an international finance hub like Hong Kong is setting out to create and support a crypto trading environment means a boost of investor confidence in the industry,” said Eddie Chou, a blockchain lecturer and fintech consultant.

A cloud has hung over Hong Kong’s status as an international financial hub since China imposed a national security law in 2020 that critics say erodes the city’s autonomy.

“Without Beijing’s approval and backing, there can be no policy change in Hong Kong,” an asset management executive here said. “They may intend to treat it as an exception like Macao, the only place in China where casinos are allowed, and use it as a testing ground” for crypto.

That is precisely what Beijing is doing, because even in China the local elite understands that as a result of the massive Chinese capital account monetary firewall, the country needs some way to transfer some of those trillions in savings offshore.

For now, Hong Kong regulators are promising a firm hand.

“Our regulations will be tight,” Eddie Yue, chief executive of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, said at the Bloomberg Wealth Asia Summit in May. “We will let the industry develop and innovate. We will let them create the ecosystem here, and that actually brings a lot of excitement. But that doesn’t mean light-touch regulation.”

Tyler Durden
Fri, 06/02/2023 – 23:20

Family Of College Student Who Died From COVID-19 Vaccine Sues Biden Administration

Family Of College Student Who Died From COVID-19 Vaccine Sues Biden Administration

Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

The family of a college student who died from heart inflammation caused by Pfizer’s COVID-19 vaccine has sued President Joe Biden’s administration, alleging officials engaged in “willful misconduct.”

George Watts Jr. in a file image. (Courtesy of the Watts family)

U.S. Department of Defense (DOD) officials wrongly promoted COVID-19 vaccination by repeatedly claiming the available vaccines were “safe and effective,” relatives of George Watts Jr., the college student, said in the new lawsuit.

That promotion “duped millions of Americans, including Mr. Watts, into being DOD’s human subjects in its medical experiment, the largest in modern history,” the suit states.

The Public Readiness and Emergency Preparedness Act allows lawsuits against certain people if they have engaged in “willful misconduct” and if that misconduct caused death or serious injury.

COVID-19 vaccines are covered by the act due to a declaration entered during the Trump administration in 2020 after COVID-19 began circulating.

DOD’s conduct and the harm caused as alleged within the four corners of the lawsuit speaks for itself,” Ray Flores, a lawyer representing the Watts family, told The Epoch Times via email. “I have no further comment other than to say: My only duty is to advocate for my client. If the DOD conveys a settlement offer, I will see that it’s considered.”

The suit was filed in U.S. court in Washington.

The Pentagon and the Department of Justice did not respond to requests for comment.

Watts Suddenly Died

Watts was a student at Corning Community College when the school mandated COVID-19 vaccination for in-person classes in 2021. He received one Pfizer dose on Aug. 27, 2021, and a second dose approximately three weeks later.

Watts soon began experiencing a range of symptoms, including tingling in the feet, pain in the heels, numbness in the hands and fingers, blood in his sperm and urine, and sinus pressure, according to family members and health records.

Watts went to the Robert Packer Hospital emergency room on Oct. 12, 2021, due to the symptoms. X-rays showed clear lungs and a normal heart outline.

Watts was sent home with suggestions to follow up with specialists but returned to the emergency room on Oct. 19, 2021, with worsening symptoms despite a week of the antibiotic Augmentin. He was diagnosed with sinusitis and bronchitis.

While speaking to his mother at home on Oct. 27, 2021, Watts suddenly collapsed. Emergency medical personnel rushed to the home but found him unresponsive. He was rushed to the same hospital in an ambulance. He was pronounced deceased at age 24.

According to a doctor at the hospital, citing hospital records and family members, Watts had no past medical history on file that would explain his sudden death, with no known history of substance abuse or obvious signs of substance abuse. His mother described her son as a “healthy young male.”

Dr. Robert Stoppacher, a pathologist who performed an autopsy on the body, said that the death was due to “COVID-19 vaccine-related myocarditis.” The death certificate listed no other causes. A COVID-19 test returned negative. Dr. Sanjay Verma, based in California, reviewed the documents in the Watts case and said that he believed the death was caused by the COVID-19 vaccination.

Pfizer did not respond to a request for comment.

Watts Took Vaccine Under Pressure

The community college mandate included a 35-day grace period following approval by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) of a COVID-19 vaccine.

The Moderna, Pfizer, and Johnson & Johnson vaccines were given emergency use authorization early in the pandemic. The FDA approved the Pfizer shot on Aug. 23, 2021. It was the first COVID-19 vaccine approval. But doses of the approved version of the shot, branded Comirnaty, were not available for months after the approval.

Read more here…

Tyler Durden
Fri, 06/02/2023 – 23:00

Tanks, F-16 Jets Won’t Be Ready For Ukraine Counteroffensive: Pentagon

Tanks, F-16 Jets Won’t Be Ready For Ukraine Counteroffensive: Pentagon

Ukraine continues to tout that its planned major counteroffensive is coming and is imminent, event after Russia’s significant victory over the strategic Donetsk oblast city of Bakhmut. 

But Joint Chiefs chairman Gen. Mark Milley has been quoted in The Associated Press this week as confirming that US Abrams tanks and F-16 fighter jets which the US and Western countries have previously promised Ukraine will not be ready in time for the counteroffensive. He said the approved training on these sophisticated and advanced weapons systems for Ukrainians has begun, but that it will take “considerable time”.

“Everyone recognizes Ukraine needs a modernized Air Force,” Milley said. “It’s going to take a considerable amount of time.” 

President Biden had last month belatedly approved giving European countries the ability to transfer F-16s to Ukraine, but Ukrainian pilots – long experienced only on Soviet and Russian-made aircraft, must be trained extensively on the US-designed and produced aircraft. This could take six months to a year or more.

According to the AP, “Milley said detailed planning on class sizes, the types of flying tactics and locations for training was underway now between the U.S. and allies such as the Netherlands and the U.K. that have already pledged to provide F-16s.”

It’s as yet unclear whether the US itself is going to eventually provide the jets directly to Ukraine forces, or if simply it will support third party countries giving them. 

The U.S. has not said yet whether or not it will provide jets, but President Joe Biden has said the U.S. will support F-16 training.

As for Abrams tank training, which has already been underway, “About 200 Ukrainian soldiers began an approximately 12-week training course in Germany on the U.S. tanks over the weekend to teach them how to maneuver, fire and conduct combined arms operations with the advanced armored system,” the AP details. Support crew for tank fueling and fuel truck maintenance are also undergoing instruction, and that makes up another 200 troops. 

In total about 300 tanks have been pledged by the Western allies, including German-made Leopard 2 tanks and UK Challenger main battle tanks. Washington is expected to deliver 31 seventy-ton Abrams tanks to Kiev by the fall.

Tyler Durden
Fri, 06/02/2023 – 22:40

The $200 Billion Electric School Bus Bust

The $200 Billion Electric School Bus Bust

Authored by Duggan Flanakin via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

The Beatles once sang, “All you need is love.” But will Kamala Harris’ professed LOVE for electric school buses – plus the $1 billion in taxpayer subsidies she announced last October – be enough to usher in the new paradise?

Hmm. Let’s do the math.  The $1 billion in rebates pledged is to help purchase 2,500 electric school buses in some 391 school districts around the nation.  But there are in fact about 500,000 school buses transporting children to and from school, to and from ball games and other events, nearly every school day. 

By simple calculation, this suggests it will take a $200 billion investment just to replace existing school buses – which must be done, Kamala tells us, by the 2030 deadline or else CHILDREN WILL DIE.

Do factories, batteries, and other raw materials exist to build (or retrofit) 500,000 school buses – and every other vehicle in America today – by 2030? By 2050? Does that much money exist? Does that much electricity exist?

To be sure, the demand (from mostly leftist school boards) is out there. Nearly 2,000 school districts applied for the free money last year, pushing the demand SO HIGH “that the EPA had to double the amount of funding” from the initial pledge of $500 million.” Should Kamala keep her job in 2024, the EPA’s Clean School Bus Program is committed to handing out another $4 billion over the next five years.

Nearly 2,000 school districts applied for the first round of rebates from all 50 states, including Washington, D.C., U.S. territories, and federally recognized tribes. The demand was so high “that the EPA had to double the amount of funding” from its initial pledge of $500 million, a White House official tells Parents on background.

A total of 391 rebates were awarded, and the Vice President anticipates thousands more applications as the EPA’s Clean School Bus Program awards a total of $5 billion over the next five years. That’s 12,500 down, just 487,500 to go!

School districts NOT getting the federal free money are faced with a much different scenario. Even the smaller electric school buses today cost about $250,000 compared with just $50,000 to 465,000 for a diesel-powered bus of the same size. The larger battery-electric buses can run from $320,000 to $440,000 versus just $100,000 for a diesel bus.

Take the Dallas (TX) Independent School District, which has about 860 buses. To replace the entire fleet with large diesel buses would cost, therefore, about $86 million.  But those 860 buses, if battery-electric, would cost a minimum of $275 million. And that does not include the cost of charging stations and retraining mechanics. That’s over three times as many taxpayer dollars the school district would have to extract from voters.

All this, of course, has been under the assumption that electric school buses are just as reliable as diesel-powered buses – and that they can keep children warm in winter and cool on hot days as well as buses with diesel engines.

The Ann Arbor (MI) Public Schools Board of Education learned recently from its environmental sustainability director, that the electric school buses they bought have “a lot of downtime and performance issues” and “aren’t fully on the road.” Moreover, the infrastructure upgrades needed to use these buses, which were estimated at just $50,000, “ended up being more like $200,000.”

To the surprise of many educators, electric school buses may break down and require towing. As with any electric vehicle, this poses risks not common to gasoline- or diesel-powered vehicles. One is that they are heavier – and thus require larger tow trucks (remember, tow trucks only tow the cabs of 18-wheelers, not the trailers). Towing capacity should be about half the weight of the towing vehicle, and the typical electric school bus weighs 36,000 pounds.

Another thing the electric bussers ignore is the wear and tear on bus tires, which cost about $3,000 per set (likely higher by now, with inflation). Goodyear notes that electric school bus operators have to consider the extra weight of the buses, which makes balancing the tires for load capacity and durability even more important – and more frequently done. The extra weight also means that the tires do not last as long as on lighter weight diesel buses.

Electric bus enthusiasts like Kamala Harris will tell you that spending an extra $150 billion or so is worth the price to theoretically save children from diesel exhaust (despite the major improvements in diesel technology and much cleaner diesel fuel mandated in recent years). But they are silent about the number of actual lives lost by children mining the raw materials for electric vehicle batteries.

Using data supplied by Pacific Gas & Electric, Colorado journalist Cory Gaines noted that the $260,000 cost differential between diesel and electric school buses means that any school district wanting to take advantage of the predicted much lower operating costs will need major help with the huge upfront capital costs. Which means both federal and state subsidies – and higher taxes to pay for the subsidies.

Noting that electric buses have longer downtimes and higher towing costs, plus require (again upfront) costs for installing and maintaining charging stations – and other hidden costs, the payback on the electric school bus (at an average of 16,000 miles per year, a high-end estimate) comes out to about 20 years – longer than the lifespan of the bus. And that’s if nobody dies or is injured by a school bus fire.

Gaines, who runs the Colorado Accountability Project on Facebook, gives an additional caveat for buses operating in cold climates (like the Colorado mountains, the Great Lakes region, and Alaska, where today there is but one electric school bus).

Unlike diesel buses that scavenge waste engine heat for passengers, electric buses have to divert battery energy into heat. On very cold days, the amount of energy needed to keep children warm could exceed the amount used to travel the route. That may not matter on short trips to and from school — but imagine a basketball or hockey team on a bus trip to a game across the state.

Charging the battery for an electric school bus takes up to eight hours using AC power, but with a diminished range in cold weather taking children on long bus trips for any purpose might require an extra day on the road in each direction. That means an extra day each way of feeding and housing the children (and keeping watch over them).

Or school districts could just say, Sorry, kids, no more school travel. We can’t afford it!

Duggan Flanakin is a senior policy analyst at the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow who writes on a wide variety of public policy issues.

Tyler Durden
Fri, 06/02/2023 – 22:20

AR & VR Adoption Is Still in Its Infancy

AR & VR Adoption Is Still in Its Infancy

In its quest to making the metaverse the next big thing in tech, Facebook’s parent company Meta unveiled a new virtual and mixed reality headset on Thursday.

Starting at $499.99, the Quest 3 is much more affordable than the Quest Pro that was launched last fall, while offering performance that is far superior to its predecessor, the Meta Quest 2.

“Quest 3 is our first mass-market offering to deliver both cutting-edge VR and MR experiences in a single device, setting a new benchmark for future headsets,” Meta said in its announcement, clearly nodding towards Apple, which is expected to unveil its own long-in-the-making VR/AR headset at its Worldwide Developers Conference next week.

“Ultimately, our vision is to enable you to move through all realities in a way that’s intuitive and delightful,” Mark Rabkin, vice president of VR at Meta said.

“Going beyond the rigid classifications of ‘virtual reality’ and ‘mixed reality’ to deliver truly next-gen experiences that let you effortlessly blend the physical and virtual worlds.”

But, as Statista’s Felix Richter notes, while Meta has already invested billions in that vision, so far it remains just that: a vision that has yet to come to life.

According to estimates from Statista Market Insights, users of AR and VR devices are still few and far between, with growth projections until 2027 nowhere near the scale that would make mixed reality “the next computing platform”, at least for now.

Infographic: AR & VR Adoption Is Still in Its Infancy | Statista

You will find more infographics at Statista

Statista estimates that 98 million people will be using VR hardware this year, while 23 million will be dabbling with more advanced AR technology. By 2027, both AR and VR are expected to have surpassed 100 million users worldwide, but that’s still a longshot from the billions of smartphone users across the planet.

Tyler Durden
Fri, 06/02/2023 – 22:00

Authoritarianism Keeps Surging In Western “Free Democracies”

Authoritarianism Keeps Surging In Western “Free Democracies”

Authored by Caitlin Johnstone,

Today in tyranny we’ve got three stories on the rapidly increasing authoritarian abuses in western “free democracies”.

Let’s dig in.

1. Grayzone reporter detained by British counter-terrorism police for doing journalism.

The Grayzone’s Kit Klarenberg was detained by “six anonymous plainclothes counter-terror officers” who “grilled him for over five hours about his reporting” upon returning to Britain on the 17th of May, according to a new report by Grayzone editor Max Blumenthal.

Blumenthal reports that Klarenberg was asked many questions about The Grayzone and his work with the independent outlet, saying police “seized the journalist’s electronic devices and SD cards, fingerprinted him, took DNA swabs, and photographed him intensively,” threatening him with arrest if he didn’t comply.

Blumenthal writes that the police action was likely a retaliation for Klarenberg’s reporting for the outlet, which has angered British officials and establishment media figures with the inconvenient information it has reported about their behavior:

Klarenberg’s interrogation appears to be London’s way of retaliating for the journalist’s blockbuster reports exposing major British and US intelligence intrigues. In the past year alone, Klarenberg revealed how a cabal of Tory national security hardliners violated the Official Secrets Act to exploit Brexit and install Boris Johnson as prime minister. In October 2022, he earned international headlines with his exposé of British plans to bomb the Kerch Bridge connecting Crimea to the Russian Federation. Then came his report on the CIA’s recruitment of two 9/11 hijackers this April, a viral sensation that generated massive social media attention.

Among Klarenberg’s most consequential exposés was his June 2022 report unmasking British journalist Paul Mason as a UK security state collaborator hellbent on destroying The Grayzone and other media outlets, academics, and activists critical of NATO’s role in Ukraine.

Asserting that Klarenberg did nothing more nefarious than engaging in “the same journalistic practice that the West’s most prominent legacy newspapers, from The New York Times to The Washington Post, depend on to break news themselves,” Blumenthal says it appears that “British authorities did not detain Klarenberg for any legal breaches, but because he reported factual stories that exposed the national security state’s own violations of both domestic and international law, as well as the malign plots of its media lackeys.”

Blumenthal himself was subjected to legal harassment and intimidation in the United States a few years back, arrested and charged with having committed “assault” while reporting on imperial efforts to drive the Venezuelan government out of its embassy in Washington DC. The charges were later dropped.

The Grayzone has been doing some of the best independent reporting in alternative media over the last few years, and should wear its now-evident status as a thorn in the empire’s side with pride.

2. South Australia passes draconian anti-protest law.

Reacting to recent inconvenient demonstrations by environmental activists, the state of South Australia has just rapidly shoved through legislation — without consulting the public — to exponentially increase the penalties for unauthorized protesting. Demonstrators will now face up to three months in jail and fines of $50,000 if they are deemed guilty of the extremely vague offense of “obstructing a public place” with their protesting.

The Human Rights Law Center expresses the following:

South Australia is the latest jurisdiction to impose severe penalties on people for engaging in peaceful protest, joining New South Wales, Tasmania, Victoria and Queensland who have passed anti-protest laws in the last five years. South Australia’s anti-protest laws carry the harshest financial penalties in Australia.

The Bill is excessive and will have a chilling effect on the right to protest in South Australia. The Bill is also potentially unconstitutional and in clear breach of well-established principles of international human rights law.

South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas acted shocked and offended that anyone could possibly think life-altering penalties for vaguely-defined protest activities might have some effect on protest activities, saying, “One of the things that I have found rather disconcerting around some of the commentary on this piece of legislation is that somehow, it curtails or diminishes people’s right to protest, which is simply not true.”

Hilarious.

Now would probably be a good time to repeat my periodic reminder that Australia is the only so-called democracy in the world which has no national charter or bill of rights of any kind. A lot of attention went into the Australian government’s authoritarianism when its strict Covid measures were in place, but the fact of the matter is that this country has been diving headlong into tyranny since long before Covid, and continues to do so now that the lockdowns are long over. There simply aren’t enough checks and balances in place to prevent this from happening, and not enough will from the public to fight for them while fighting is still possible.

3. State Department dismisses questions about Ukrainian imprisonment of US citizen for speech crimes.

At a press conference last week the State Department’s new spokesman Matthew Miller flatly brushed off questions about whether the US government was doing anything about the fact that commentator Gonzalo Lira has been arrested and charged with what amount to speech crimes by the Ukrainian government.

Here’s the State Department’s transcript of the exchange:

QUESTION: Thanks. Liam Cosgrove with Epoch Times. So this was a couple weeks ago, but I haven’t seen an official statement on it. A U.S. citizen who is residing in Ukraine has been arrested and that he was a California-born man; he was in the past like a Business Insider contributor, and he had a YouTube channel. He was an outspoken critic of Zelenskyy’s regime. The Ukrainian SBU released a press release saying he was arrested for justifying Putin’s invasion. So ultimately, it added up to speech. And I spoke with Congressman Ted Lieu, a Democrat, and he said he urges the State Department to engage its authorities to work out some sort of negotiation to get him released. So are you guys aware of this? How do we feel about our allies detaining U.S. citizens for speech abroad?

MR MILLER: So I will say in general that we’re aware of the report. We obviously support the exercise of freedom of speech anywhere in the world, and I’ll leave it at that.

QUESTION: So you guys aren’t working to get him released?

MR MILLER: I’m going to leave my comments where I just left them.

It’s not every day a US spokesperson gets asked a question that’s so inconvenient that they just overtly refuse to answer it without even pretending to provide an explanation for doing so.

Lira, a US citizen, is reportedly facing five to eight years in prison for having “publicly justified the armed aggression of the Russian Federation” and “publicly justified the armed aggression of the Russian Federation,” per the SBU.

Are Americans okay with their government risking a very fast, very radioactive third world war to defend the freedom and democracy of a nation that imprisons US citizens for speech crimes? I guess we’ll never know, because nobody’s asking them.

If western governments need to keep ramping up censorship, propaganda and the persecution of journalists in order to defend western freedom and democracy, is it really freedom and democracy? And, is it worth defending?

*  *  *

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Tyler Durden
Fri, 06/02/2023 – 21:40

US Ditches More New START Treaty Obligations After Tactical Nukes Transferred To Belarus

US Ditches More New START Treaty Obligations After Tactical Nukes Transferred To Belarus

The New START Treaty, which is the final nuclear arms treaty between the United States and Russia, continues to fall apart after on Thursday the Biden administration said it would walk away from multiple key obligations stipulated under the agreement, after Moscow already effectively ended its participation earlier this year.

The State Department announced in a Thursday fact sheet that the US will initiate “Four lawful countermeasures in response to the Russian Federation’s ongoing violations of the New START Treaty” which it deemed “proportionate” and “reversible.” Further, Russia has been notified in advance of the move.

But the fact sheet underscored that “The United States continues to abide by the treaty’s central limits, and to fulfill all of its New START obligations that have not been included within these countermeasures.”

Crucially, the most important of the countermeasures bans all Russian inspectors from visiting US territories. This was the most important aspect to the agreement, given that among the nuclear reduction treaty’s chief aims is to ensure inspection and monitoring of each side’s nuclear arsenal by the other. However, it had already been on pause since 2020 in relation to Covid restrictions and lockdowns.

Related to central monitoring protocols, the US is also backing away from basic information-sharing with the Kremlin. Washington will now withhold “notifications required under the treaty, including updates on the status or location of treaty-accountable items such as missiles and launchers.”

Additionally, data will no longer be shared about future missile tests, including “telemetric information on launches of US ICBMs and SLBMs,” according to the State Department.

All of this comes very dangerously as nuclear saber-rattling continues in relation to the Ukraine war. Russia has recently ordered tactical nukes to be hosted on Belarusian territory – a move the West has condemned.

Russian officials have long explained that the country’s nuclear doctrine has not changed, warning that nuclear weapons can be deployed only if sovereign Russian territory and the population comes under existential threat. And yet, cross-border attacks from Ukraine have only intensified, including increasing incidents of ground troop incursions, with the use of military hardware, some it provided by NATO allies.

Russia has at the same time accused the West of backing these brazen attacks, and has warned of continued escalation. Putin’s “red lines” continue to be crossed, almost daily at this point.

Tyler Durden
Fri, 06/02/2023 – 21:20

Federal Judge Blocks ATF Pistol Brace Rule For Major Gun Group

Federal Judge Blocks ATF Pistol Brace Rule For Major Gun Group

Submitted by Gun Owners of America,

On Thursday, Joe Biden planned to enact the largest gun ban in U.S. history—a ban on up to 40,000,000 pistols.  

But at the eleventh hour, the executive order gun ban was gutted by three federal courts. 

After a months-long legal battle with the federal government, Gun Owners of America secured one such preliminary injunction in Texas v. Garland, preventing the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives (ATF) from prosecuting any GOA members under this new rule.  

Similar rulings were issued by two other federal courts to members of two other advocacy organizations as well—the plaintiffs in Mock v. Garland and SAF v. ATF.  

In effect, the Biden Pistol Ban crumbled before it even got off the ground. 

Without the injunction, ATF could have already begun kicking in doors and confiscating “illegal” unregistered pistols. 

But even though the injunctions are not nationwide, it is now nearly impossible for ATF to differentiate the pistol owners they can prosecute from the Gun Owners of America members and other protected persons. 

Notably, Gun Owners of America isn’t satisfied with this limited injunction. In fact, GOA had argued for a nationwide injunction, but the courts refused and only granted limited relief to its members. 

That’s why GOA is also urging activists to contact Congress and urge them to provide oversight and to protect all gun owners nationwide

Using the Congressional Review Act, the ATF rule could be reversed, and the agency could be prohibited from ever enacting a similar rule in the future. 

Two joint resolutions of disapproval have already been introduced. H. J. Res. 44, introduced by Rep. Andrew Clyde, has 189 sponsors in the House of Representatives and S. J. Res. 20, introduced by Sen. Kennedy, has 47 sponsors in the Senate.  

Public calls for Speaker McCarthy to hold a vote to block the pistol brace rule have only mounted in recent weeks, with several coalitions calling for immediate action—including 27 Attorneys General currently suing the Biden Administration, 2A influencers with over 30,000,000 combined followers, and numerous members of the gun industry. 

*   *   *

We’ll hold the line for you in Washington. We are No Compromise. Join the Fight Now

Tyler Durden
Fri, 06/02/2023 – 21:00

Russia Says US Hacked ‘Thousands’ Of iPhones In Espionage Operation

Russia Says US Hacked ‘Thousands’ Of iPhones In Espionage Operation

Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSB) on Thursday accused the United States of conducting an espionage operation that compromised thousands of iPhones using sophisticated surveillance software.

A customer tests a smartphone during the launch of the new iPhone XS and XS Max sales at “re:Store” Apple reseller shop in Moscow on Sept. 28, 2018. (Tatyana Makeyeva/Reuters)

Moscow-based Kaspersky Lab says that dozens of their employees’ devices were compromised as part of the operation.

In a statement, the FSB said that the targets included domestic Russian subscribers, as well as foreign diplomats based in Russia and the former Soviet Union, Reuters reports.

“The FSB has uncovered an intelligence action of the American special services using Apple mobile devices,” said the FSB in a statement, adding that the plot revealed “close cooperation” between Apple and the National Security Agency (NSA). The FSB did not provide any evidence of Apple’s cooperation.

Kaspersky CEO Eugene Kaspersky said on Twitter that dozens of his employees’ phones were compromised in the operation, which his company described as “an extremely complex, professionally targeted cyberattack” that had targeted workers in “top and middle-management.”

Kaspersky researcher Igor Kuznetsov told Reuters that his company had independently discovered anomalous traffic on its corporate Wi-Fi network around the start of the year. He said Kaspersky did not circulate its findings to Russia’s Computer Emergency Response Team until earlier on Thursday. -Reuters

More from Kaspersky via Twitter;

Kaspersky says that disabling iMessage will defeat the hack.

According to the FSB, the Americans had compromised diplomats from China, Syria, Israel and NATO members

“The hidden data collection was carried out through software vulnerabilities in U.S.-made mobile phones,” said Russia’s foreign ministry in a statement. “The U.S. intelligence services have been using IT corporations for decades in order to collect large-scale data of Internet users without their knowledge.”

Reuters notes that “The United States is the world’s top cyber power in terms of intent and capability, according to Harvard University’s Belfer Center Cyber 2022 Power Index, followed by China, Russia, the United Kingdom and Australia.”

Russian officials said the plot had been uncovered as part of a joint effort by FSB officers and those of the Federal Guards Service (FSO), a powerful agency that runs the Kremlin bodyguard and was also once the KGB’s Ninth Directorate.

Officials in Russia, which Western spies say has constructed a very sophisticated domestic surveillance structure, have long questioned the security of U.S. technology. -Reuters

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said that all officials in the Putin government knew that gadgets such as iPhones were “absolutely transparent.”

“Using them for official purposes is unacceptable and prohibited,” he said, adding that they were free to use iPhones for private communications.

Tyler Durden
Fri, 06/02/2023 – 20:40