Authored by Jeff Deist via The Mises Institute,

Does America simply lack the political will to face economic reality?

In the teeth of the Depression, Treasury secretary Andrew Mellon famously told President Herbert Hoover to “liquidate labor, liquidate stocks, liquidate farmers, liquidate real estate”—in other words, to resist bailing out any industry through state intervention. This was a tough sell even in those days, and of course Hoover succumbed to politics and took the opposite approach, greatly and needlessly damaging the US economy for decades to come.

Less often quoted are Mellon’s follow-up words to Hoover: Liquidation would “purge the rottenness out of the system,” so “people will work harder” and “live a more moral life.”

Mellon, having lived most of his life in an America without a central bank, understood economic recessions as necessary cures rather than ills to be avoided. But he also understood the human price that would be paid in the aftermath of a period of phony economic prosperity. Only hard work and personal sacrifice, person by person and town by town, could get America out of its economic mess. Fiscal and monetary policy would provide no free lunch, as millions of Americans learned the hard way in the 1930s.

Fast-forward to 2022, and it’s hard to imagine Janet Yellen calling for liquidation or telling Americans to improve their moral fiber. Nobody votes for austerity or personal responsibility, and any politician or bureaucrat or central banker who even suggests it is doomed today.

Yet this mythology of austerity persists, that a stingy federal Treasury and reticent central bank don’t intervene enough in economic crises. Consider this howler from Paul Krugman back in 2011, apparently delivered with a straight face: “One thing is clear: Mellon-style liquidationism is now the official doctrine of the G.O.P.” Keep in mind he wrote this several years into the most “extraordinary” monetary intervention in the history of the world—one which ultimately saw the US Fed purchase several trillions’ worth of Treasury debt from the “market”! Yet for Krugman, it is never enough.

As the bruising midterm elections recently demonstrated, America is a deeply unserious country. A serious political discussion at the federal level would center on existential structural problems of war and peace, debt and the dollar, and entitlements. But these issues can be addressed only by real austerity and real pain. So instead, we distract and divert ourselves worrying about whether Donald Trump should be allowed on Twitter. We argue over flu viruses, guns, transgenderism, climate, and abortion (none of which the federal government has the slightest jurisdiction over) rather than the material standard of living we will leave our grandchildren.

This is possible only because millions of Americans, maybe a majority, are simply economics deniers. They either don’t believe economic laws exist or think economics can be overcome by legislation, regulation, or central bank actions. And there are plenty of deniers among the ranks of professional economists! The profession does itself no favors when it cheerleads for politics, providing an intellectual veneer for interventionism. Human nature makes us want to believe untrue things, but economics should help disabuse Americans of political fantasies.

Let’s face it: the US is not a free-market economy because we don’t much believe in markets, despite our lip service. Most Americans, and virtually all political, media, academic, corporate, and banking elites, believe economic intervention (fiscal and monetary stimulus) form the basis of our economy—not production and saving.

So, what would a serious America do to correct our disastrous economic path? This may seem like an academic or rhetorical question, but it’s worth laying out the actual steps necessary to build a real economy rather than a fake one dependent on monetary or fiscal interventionism. As Dr. Mark Thornton recently explained, these steps may be conceptually simple even as they are wildly beyond political imagination today:

• a wholesale adoption of laissez-faire economic doctrine by national politicians;

• immediate deep tax and regulatory reductions;

• immediate sharp reductions in government spending at every level (leaving federal spending well below federal revenue);

• rigorous entitlement cuts, using some combination of means testing and raising age eligibility for both Social Security and Medicare;

• rigorous defense spending cuts of at least 50 percent, combined with a radically reduced US military footprint overseas;

• cessation of new debt issuance by the US Treasury;

• cessation of active monetary “policy” by the Federal Reserve Bank, meaning no intervention with respect to the money supply, interest rates, or credit and debt markets (including US Treasurys);

• a radical reduction in the Fed’s balance sheet by letting existing Treasurys mature and roll off;

• an entirely hands-off approach allowing the US dollar to float freely relative to other currencies and commodities;

• an express policy against bailouts or subsidies of any kind to any industry or company, regardless of the severity of an economic downturn;

• allowing troubled industries or companies, no matter how big, to fail—through bankruptcy and asset sales; investor losses; and firing boards, management, and employees when restructuring is possible;

• actively encouraging business and individuals to save (through market/floating interest rates);

• elimination of any price ceilings or floors on prices, wages, and profits;

• elimination of any unemployment subsidies to individuals, along with abolition of minimum wage laws; and finally,

• the immediate sale of federal land and other assets to reduce debt service on the $31 trillion in Treasury obligations and to restore worldwide confidence in the US economy.

This, ladies and gentlemen, is what a real program of austerity looks like. That these actions are politically unfeasible—complete nonstarters—shows how politics dominates economics in America. The profession charged with explaining how no free lunch is possible instead mostly operates as a handmaiden to the state and its bosses. But politics won’t fix this, and we won’t vote our way out of trouble.

The best path forward is at the state and local levels, attempting to build regional economies with less fragility in the face of the warring, borrowing, spending, and devaluing mania of Uncle Sam.

Nearly one week after the 2022 Atlantic hurricane season ended, an incredibly rare tropical disturbance formed over the central subtropical Atlantic.

The National Hurricane Center released a tropical weather outlook on Tuesday, explaining the storm has a 50% chance of becoming the 15th named storm of the season over the next two 2-5 days. 

“Environmental conditions appear marginally conducive for development and a subtropical or tropical storm could form in the next couple of days,” NHC said. However, it added:

“By Thursday night or Friday, the low will move northeastward over cooler waters and interact with a mid-latitude trough, limiting subtropical or tropical development of the system.”

Christianne Pearce, a meteorologist with the National Weather Service’s Tampa Bay office, told Tampa Bay Times the storm doesn’t threaten Florida or the US as it moves northeast into even cooler waters. 

“The probability of having a storm this late in the season is very low because the waters out there are a lot cooler.

“We just have different atmospheric phenomenon happening that kind of put a damper on those things developing,” Pearce said.

The Atlantic hurricane season begins on June 1 and concludes on Nov. 30. Tropical storms and hurricanes forming in December are rare. According to Fox 35 Orlando, data between 1851 to 2017 showed that 2% of tropical storms formed outside “off months” (December to May) of the season. 

Keep an eye on the Atlantic’s tropical region over the next few days. If the storm does form, it will be named “Owen.”

Authored by Peter Wilson via The Epoch Times,

Foreign Affairs Minister Mélanie Joly says Canada is planning to increase its number of warships in the Taiwan Strait as a message to China that the waters are not its national property.

“We will continue to enforce the international rules-based order when it comes to the Taiwan Strait. And that’s why also we had a frigate going through the Taiwan Strait this summer, along with the Americans, [and] we’re looking to have more frigates going through it,” Joly told the Financial Times.

“We need to make sure that the question of the Taiwan Strait is clear and that it remains an international strait.”

The Taiwan Strait is a stretch of international waters less than 200 kilometres wide separating Taiwan from mainland China. Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin had said at a regular news briefing in Beijing on June 13: “There is no such thing as international waters in international maritime law. … Relevant countries claim that the Taiwan Strait is in international waters with the aim to manipulate the Taiwan question and threaten China’s sovereignty.”

Foreign Affairs Minister Joly’s comments come less than two weeks after she unveiled Canada’s new Indo-Pacific Strategy, during the announcement of which the Foreign Affairs Minister referred to China as an “increasingly disruptive” global power.

The new strategy also includes a pledge by the federal government to spend $2.2. billion on investments in the region over the next five years.

Joly said Canada will be “committing to new military assets” in the Indo-Pacific, and later told reporters in Bucharest, Romania, where she is attending a NATO foreign affairs ministers’ meeting, that Canada must “play a role in the security” of the Indo-Pacific.

“We need to invest in deterrence because we believe … it is the best way to, at the end of the day, respect international norms,” she said.

More Military

Before Joly announced the strategy, Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the Canadian Armed Forces will also be increasing its presence in the Indo-Pacific region, with additional investments by the federal government to support them.

“We’ll be making new investments to enhance the Canadian Armed Forces engagement in the region,” Trudeau told reporters in Bangkok, Thailand, on Nov. 18. “This will support our allies, Japan and South Korea, and all of us in the Pacific.”

Canada’s Indo-Pacific Strategy also says China continues to disregard “international norms” as a means toward becoming the region’s “leading power.”

“China’s assertive pursuit of its economic and security interests, advancement of unilateral claims, foreign interference and increasingly coercive treatment of other countries and economies have significant implications in the region, in Canada and around the world,” the strategy reads.

Joly previously said Canada will “challenge China when we ought to, and we will cooperate with China when we must” when speaking to reporters in Toronto, on Nov. 9.

“Its sheer size and influence makes cooperation necessary to address the world’s existential pressures,” she said.

However, while recently speaking to reporters in Bucharest, Joly also reacted to a report from the Pentagon released several days ago saying China is on pace to almost quadruple its number of nuclear warheads by 2035.

Joly said Canada is “taking note definitely” of China’s increasing nuclear capacity and said Canada will “make sure we have better intelligence capacity across the region” in the near future.

“We are a Pacific nation, we need to make sure that we play a bigger role,” she said, according to the Financial Post.

“Since this part of the world is so important for us, we need to be a reliable partner because for too long we weren’t.”

Knives are out for Elon Musk, after the richest man in the world bought Twitter, began reinstating the accounts of ‘political prisoners’ banned by wokelings for unpopular speech, and then began releasing evidence of 2020 election interference via the suppression of the Hunter Biden laptop story.

Remember, the FBI and other official bodies went around warning Facebook and Twitter about a Russian hacking campaign right before the Hunter laptop story hit, and said companies appear to have gladly complied with said ‘tap on the shoulder.’

So now, Musk’s Neuralink – a medical device company, is now under federal investigation for potential animal-welfare violations (Anthony Fauci’s ‘cruel’ puppy experiments are just fine, by the by), according to information leaked to Reuters from somewhere.

Neuralink is developing a brain implant in the hopes of helping paralyzed people walk again (and probably put your Tesla in valet mode by just thinking about it). According to Reuters, the federal probe was opened months ago, but disclosed just now, for some reason.

The probe was opened by the US Department of Agriculture’s Inspector General at the request of a federal prosecutor, who alleges that Neuralink has committed violations of the Animal Welfare Act.

The investigation has come at a time of growing employee dissent about Neuralink’s animal testing, including complaints that pressure from CEO Musk to accelerate development has resulted in botched experiments, according to a Reuters review of dozens of Neuralink documents and interviews with more than 20 current and former employees. Such failed tests have had to be repeated, increasing the number of animals being tested and killed, the employees say. The company documents include previously unreported messages, audio recordings, emails, presentations and reports. -Reuters

In total, approximately 1,500 animals have been killed – including over 280 sheep, pigs and monkeys, since 2018 according to records reviewed by Reuters.

Why were so many animals killed? Because evil Elon demanded results, and fast!

Through company discussions and documents spanning several years, along with employee interviews, Reuters identified four experiments involving 86 pigs and two monkeys that were marred in recent years by human errors. The mistakes weakened the experiments’ research value and required the tests to be repeated, leading to more animals being killed, three of the current and former staffers said. The three people attributed the mistakes to a lack of preparation by a testing staff working in a pressure-cooker environment. -Reuters

Fauci’s puppies, meanwhile, had their heads locked in mesh cages with hungry sand flies so that the insects could ‘eat them alive,’ all to test an experimental drug. 

Authored by Ansel Lindner via Bitcoin Magazine.com,

Breakdowns in global trade and credit call for money that doesn’t depend on trust. Bitcoin is the modern answer for international economics…

Two forces have dominated the globe economically and politically for the last 75 years: globalization and trust-based money. However, the time for both of these forces has passed, and their waning will bring about a great reset of the global order.

But this is not the global, Marxist kind of Great Reset promoted by Klaus Schwab and those who attend Davos. This is an emergent, market-driven reset characterized by a multipolar world and a new monetary system.

GLOBALIZATION IS ENDING

The first reaction I usually get to my claim that the age of hyper-globalization is ending is flippant disbelief. People have so completely integrated the environment of the dying global order into their economic understanding that they cannot fathom a world where the cost-to-benefit analysis of globalization is different. Even after COVID-19 exposed the fragility of complex supply chains, like when the U.S. very nearly ran out of surgical masks and basic medications or when the world struggled to source semiconductors, people have yet to realize the shift that is happening.

Is it that hard to imagine that the businessmen who designed such fragile, overcomplicated production processes didn’t properly weigh the risks?

All that is needed to break globalization is for risk-adjusted costs to change a few percentage points and outweigh the benefits. The pennies saved by outsourcing numerous tasks to numerous jurisdictions will no longer outweigh the possibility of complete collapse of supply chains.

These concerns about fragile supply chains did not disappear as horrible COVID-19 policies ended. Now, they have shifted to concerns about trade wars and real wars. U.S. trade sanctions against China, the Russian conflict with NATO-proxy Ukraine and subsequent sanctions, the seemingly-erratic U.S. position on Taiwan, the coronation of Xi Jinping and his Marxist revival, the Nord Stream sabotage, the clear split of international consensus in the UN and even the weaponization of these international institutions, and most recently, the Turkish ground offensive versus the Kurds — all these things should be interpreted as a rise in costs.

Gone is the time when complex supply chains were robust against typical risks. The risks today are much more systemic. Sure, there were skirmishes around the world and disagreements among parliaments, but great powers did not openly threaten one another’s spheres of influence. Risk-adjusted costs and benefits to globalization have radically changed.

CREDIT DOESN’T LIKE CONFLICT

Very closely related to deglobalization of supply chains is deglobalization of credit markets. The same factors that affect business peoples’ physical, risk-adjusted costs and benefits are also felt by bankers.

Banks don’t want to be exposed to the risk of war or sanctions wrecking their borrowers. In the current environment of deglobalization and rising risks to international trade, banks will naturally pull back on lending to those associated activities. Instead, banks will fund safer projects, likely fully-domestic or friend-shoring opportunities. The natural reaction by banks to this risky global environment will be credit contraction.

The deglobalization of supply chains and credit will be as closely linked on the way down as they were on the way up. It will start slowly, but pick up speed. A feedback loop of rising risk leading to shorter supply chains and less credit creation.

THE CREDIT-BASED U.S. DOLLAR

The prevailing form of money in the world is the credit-based U.S. dollar. Every dollar is created through debt, making every dollar someone else’s debt. Money is printed out of thin air in the process of making a loan.

This is different from pure fiat money. When fiat money is printed, the balance sheet of the printer adds assets alone. However, in a credit-based system, when money is printed in a loan, the printer creates an asset and a liability. The borrower’s balance sheet then has an offsetting liability and asset, respectively. Every dollar (or euro or yen, for that matter) is therefore an asset and a liability, and the loan that created that dollar is both an asset and a liability.

This system works extremely well if two factors are present. One, highly-productive uses of new credit are available, and two, a relative lack of exogenous shocks to the global economy. Change either of these things and a breakdown is bound to occur.

This dual nature of credit-based money is at the root of both the dollar’s spectacular rise in the 20th century, and the coming monetary reset. As global trust and supply chains break down, the comingling of assets in banks becomes more risky. Russia found this out the hard way when the West confiscated its reserves of dollars held in banks abroad. How is trust possible in that sort of environment? When credit-based money’s creation is based on trust… Houston, we have a problem.

BITCOIN’S ROLE IN THE FUTURE

Luckily, we have experience with a world that doesn’t trust itself — i.e., the entire history of man prior to 1945. Back then, we were on a gold standard for reasons which included all those that bitcoiners are very familiar with (gold scores highly in the characteristics that make good money), but also because it minimized trust between great powers.

Gold lost its mantle for one reason — and you’ve probably never heard this anywhere before: because the global economic, political and innovation environment post-WWII created an extremely fertile soil for credit. Trust was easy, the major powers were humbled and all joined the new international institutions under the security umbrella of the U.S. The Iron Curtain provided a stark separation between zones of trust economically, but after it fell, there was a period of roughly 20 years where the world sang “kumbaya” because new credit was still extremely productive in the old Soviet block and China.

Today, we are facing the opposite sort of scenario: Global trust is eroding and credit has exploited all productive low-hanging fruit, forcing us into a period that demands neutral money.

The world will soon find itself split between regions/alliances of influence. A British bank will trust a U.S. bank, where a Chinese bank will not. To bridge this gap, we need money that everyone can hold and respect.

GOLD VS. BITCOIN

Gold would be the first choice here, if not for bitcoin. This is because gold has several drawbacks. First, gold is owned mainly by those groups who are losing trust in one another, namely the governments of the world. Much of the gold is held in the United States. Therefore, gold is unevenly distributed.

Second, gold’s physical nature, once a positive holding profligate governments in check, is now a weakness because it cannot be transported or assayed nearly as efficiently as bitcoin.

Lastly, gold is not programmable. Bitcoin is a neutral, decentralized protocol that can be tapped for any number of innovations. The Lightning Network and sidechains are just two examples of how Bitcoin can be programmed to increase its utility.

As globalization of both trade and credit is breaking down, the economic environment favors a return to a form of money that doesn’t depend on trust between major powers. Bitcoin is the modern answer.

Thus far, the US has delivered a total of 20 High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS) to Ukraine over the past months, based on what has been publicly disclosed. A total of 38 units have so far been authorized as part of Congressional-approved arms packages.

At the start of this week The Wall Street Journal has revealed a bombshell regarding the 20 which have already been delivered, reporting based on anonymous US officials that the HIMARS systems were secretly modified by US technicians to prevent ranges that would put Russian territory within striking distance. 

The decision to modify the HIMARS was taken to “reduce the risk of wider war with Moscow,” according to the US officials cited. 

The White House has long been under pressure by US Congressional hawks, as well as of course the Zelensky government, to transfer longer range missiles, including anti-air systems, to defend against the greatly ramped up Russian airstrikes which are currently pummeling Ukraine’s energy infrastructure. Starting in May, President Biden cautioned, “we’re not going to send to Ukraine rocket systems that strike into Russia.”

As the US has began authorizing medium and longer range systems over the summer, Defense News reported in July that “Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy formally promised only to use HIMARS for defensive purposes and to avoid firing into Russian territory; this took place before the U.S. agreed to provide the systems in order to avoid escalating the conflict.”

And yet, this week has witnessed at least three times Ukraine has struck airbases deep inside Russia, reportedly utilizing drone strikes. For this reason, some have questioned the timing of the WSJ disclosure of the modified HIMARS ranges. Is the story meant to run cover for the Ukrainian cross-border action? 

At the very least, the “anonymous”-sourced WSJ report seems intent on distancing Washington from Ukrainian forces’ fresh escalation. 

Curious that this leak to the WSJ was published hours after Ukraine carried out by far its longest-range attacks yet inside Russia pic.twitter.com/aBSy42IMBw

— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) December 6, 2022

Meanwhile, some within NATO are actively calling to launch operations against Russian territory. Latvian Foreign Minister Edgars Rinkevics last week said, “We should allow Ukrainians to use weapons to target missile sites or air fields from where those operations are being launched.”

It should be recalled that in the summer, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov threatened that Russia is prepared to annex more Ukrainian territory if Kiev receives longer-range weapons. “The longer the range of armaments that you will supply, the further away we will move from our territory the line,” he said in June.

Elon Musk on Tuesday announced that former FBI attorney James Baker, who came to Twitter to serve as deputy general counsel, has been fired after ‘vetting’ recently released evidence of Twitter’s election interference unbeknownst to Musk.

“In light of concerns about Baker’s possible role in suppression of information important to the public dialogue, he was exited from Twitter today,” Musk wrote on Twitter, replying to a Dec. 4 Jonathan Turley article shedding light on the incestuous relationship between Twitter, Biden scandals, and Baker.

In light of concerns about Baker’s possible role in suppression of information important to the public dialogue, he was exited from Twitter today

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 6, 2022

Journalist Matt Taibbi, who dropped ‘The Twitter Files‘ last Friday detailing how Twitter executives went behind CEO Jack Dorsey’s back to interfere in the 2020 US election by censoring the Hunter Biden laptop story.

According to Taibbi, Baker was involved in ‘vetting’ information without the knowledge of management.

On Friday, the first installment of the Twitter files was published here. We expected to publish more over the weekend. Many wondered why there was a delay.

— Matt Taibbi (@mtaibbi) December 6, 2022

More:

We can now tell you part of the reason why. On Tuesday, Twitter Deputy General Counsel (and former FBI General Counsel) Jim Baker was fired. Among the reasons? Vetting the first batch of “Twitter Files” – without knowledge of new management.

The process for producing the “Twitter Files” involved delivery to two journalists (Bari Weiss and me) via a lawyer close to new management. However, after the initial batch, things became complicated.

The news that Baker was reviewing the “Twitter files” surprised everyone involved, to say the least. New Twitter chief Elon Musk acted quickly to “exit” Baker Tuesday.”

Reporters resumed searches through Twitter Files material – a lot of it – today. The next installment of “The Twitter Files” will appear @bariweiss. Stay tuned.

 When asked if Baker was asked to explain himself, Musk replied: “Yes. His explanation was …unconvincing.“

Yes. His explanation was …unconvincing.

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 6, 2022

His explanation was “ I still work for the FBI”

— Rosie Memos (@almostjingo) December 6, 2022

Musk has known for a while that Baker was a bad actor, as we presume was looking for the right moment to cut him loose.

Sounds pretty bad …

— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) April 27, 2022

Read more about Baker in Jonathan Turley‘s article noted by Taibbi;

As thousands of Twitter documents are released on the company’s infamous censorship program, much has been confirmed about the use of back channels by Biden and Democratic officials to silence critics on the social media platform. However, one familiar name immediately popped out in the first batch of documents released through journalist Matt Taibbi: James Baker. For many, James Baker is fast becoming the Kevin Bacon of the Russian collusion scandals.

Baker has been featured repeatedly in the Russian investigations launched by the Justice Department, including the hoax involving the Russian Alfa Bank. When Clinton campaign lawyer Michael Sussmann wanted to plant the bizarre false claim of a secret communications channel between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin, Baker was his go-to, speed-dial contact. (Baker would later testify at Sussmann’s trial). Baker’s name also appeared prominently in controversies related to the other Russian-related FBI allegations against Trump. He was effectively forced out due to his role and reportedly found himself under criminal investigation. He became a defender of the Russian investigations despite findings of biased and even criminal conduct. He was also a frequent target of Donald Trump on social media, including Twitter. Baker responded with public criticism of Trump for his “false narratives.”

After leaving the FBI, Twitter seemed eager to hire Baker as deputy general counsel. Ironically, Baker soon became involved in another alleged back channel with a presidential campaign. This time it was Twitter that maintained the non-public channels with the Biden campaign (and later the White House). Baker soon weighed in with the same signature bias that characterized the Russian investigations.

Weeks before the 2020 presidential election, the New York Post ran an explosive story about a laptop abandoned by Hunter Biden that contained emails and records detailing a multimillion dollar influence peddling operation by the Biden family. Not only was Joe Biden’s son Hunter and brother James involved in deals with an array of dubious foreign figures, but Joe Biden was referenced as the possible recipient of funds from these deals.

The Bidens had long been accused of influence peddling, nepotism, and other forms of corruption. Moreover, the campaign was not denying that the laptop was Hunter Biden’s and key emails could be confirmed from the other parties involved. However, at the request of the “Biden team” and Democratic operatives, Twitter moved to block the story. It even suspended those who tried to share the allegations with others, including the White House press secretary Kayleigh McEnany, who was suspended for linking to the scandal.

Even inside Twitter, the move raised serious concerns over the company serving as a censor for the Biden campaign. Global Comms Brandon Borrman who asked if  the company could “truthfully claim that this is part of the policy” for barring posts and suspending users.

Baker quickly jumped in to support the censorship and said that “it’s reasonable for us to assume that they may have been [hacked] and that caution is warranted.”

Keep in mind that there was never any evidence that this material was hacked. Moreover, there was no evidence of Russian involvement in the laptop. Indeed, U.S. intelligence quickly rejected the Russian disinformation claim.

However, Baker insisted that there was a “reasonable” assumption that Russians were behind another major scandal. Faced with a major scandal implicating a Joe Biden in the corrupt selling of access to foreign figures (including some with foreign intelligence associations), Baker’s natural default was to kill the story and stop others from sharing the allegations.

The released documents may show why Twitter was so eager to hire Baker despite his role in the Russian collusion controversies. What likely would have been a liability for most companies seemed an actual draw for Twitter. For censors and political operatives in Twitter, Baker likely seemed like a “made man” for a company committed to systemic censorship. He would be working with the chief legal officer at the company, Vijaya Gadde, who functioned as the company’s chief censor.  Gadde was widely reviled by free speech advocates for her dismissal of free speech principles and open political bias.

Not unexpectedly, Gadde and Baker would play prominent roles in the suppression of the Hunter Biden scandal. There was hardly a need to round up “the usual suspects” in the suppression scandal when Musk took over the company. Both lawyers swatted down internal misgivings to bury a story that could well have made the difference in the close 2020 election.

It is striking how many of the figures and institutions involved in Russian collusion claims are within six degrees of James Baker. Not only did Baker work closely with fired FBI director James Comey and other key figures at the Justice Department, but he was an acquaintance of key Clinton figures like Sussmann who pushed the false collusion allegations. He was also hired by Brookings Institution, which also has a curious Bacon-like role in the origins and development of the false Russian collusion allegations.

None of these means that Baker was the driving force of the scandals. To the contrary, Baker earned his bones in Washington as a facilitator, a reliable ally when it came to the business of the Beltway. It is hardly a surprise that Baker found a home at Twitter where “caution” was always “warranted” in dealing with potentially damaging stories for Democratic interests.

Update(1645ET): A top US State Department official on Tuesday suggested that the Ukrainians were indeed behind the spate of likely drone attacks which hit Russian airbases from Monday into the overnight hours.

Undersecretary of State for Political Affairs Victoria Nuland told CNN that while “nobody has claimed responsibility” for the drone strikes – at least one of which struck a base hundreds of miles inside Russian territory, it remains that the “targets were the very precise bombers that the Russians have been using to attack critical infrastructure,” and that’s when she said, “the Ukrainian people are incredibly innovative; they are making their own drones, air and sea, that are incredibly effective.”

However, she underscored that the US policy of wanting the Ukrainians to avoid direct attacks on Russia hasn’t changed. A separate State Dept. briefing also sought to distance the Biden administration from the brazen cross-border attacks, which reportedly resulted in multiple Russian troop casualties and likely damage to long-range bombers: 

The US State Department said the US is not “enabling” or “encouraging Ukraine to strike beyond its borders” with lethal aid, after Russia blamed several recent attacks on Russian military infrastructure on Ukraine.

“We are providing Ukraine with what it needs to use on its sovereign territory, on Ukrainian soil, to take on Russian aggressors, Russian aggressors that have crossed over the border,” State Department spokesperson Ned Price said.

#Russia: The first image of the results of a Ukrainian long-range strike against Dyagilevo Air base near Ryazan shows that a Russian Tu-22M3 strategic bomber received damage, along with a fuel truck.

More photos required, but the damage to the bomber appears to be minor. pic.twitter.com/P7Ke2DUFfz

— 🇺🇦 Ukraine Weapons Tracker (@UAWeapons) December 5, 2022

Price followed by again emphasizing that the US has not “provided Ukraine with weapons that it is to use inside of Russia.”

He said: “We have been very clear that these are defensive supplies.”

#Ukraine/#Russia 🇺🇦🇷🇺:

Damage to a 🇷🇺#Russian Tu-22M3 bomber at #Dyagilevo air base near #Ryazan after a 🇺🇦#Ukrainian strike. pic.twitter.com/LqqZhiQ9W1

— 𝕻𝖗𝖆𝖎𝖘𝖊 𝕿𝖍𝖊 𝕾𝖙𝖊𝖕𝖍 (@praisethesteph) December 5, 2022

On Monday The Wall Street Journal reported based on anonymous American officials that the Pentagon had secretly modified HIMARS long-rage rocket systems to limit their range to 50 miles, before they were transferred to Kiev.

⚡️AFU are shelling residential areas of Donetsk again pic.twitter.com/1leDjXUFAq

— War Monitor (@WarMonitors) December 6, 2022

* * *

earlier

Overnight into Tuesday a third airfield deep inside Russia came under attack, suffering a fire after an oil storage depot was bombarded by what the Kremlin described as a drone attack that was repelled after the initial blast. A large blaze raged throughout the night as emergency crews responded.

It came the day after two explosions rocked a pair of air bases even further inside Russian territory, which killed three military personnel in the Ryazan region, and Russian Engels-1 airbase in Saratov. Those incidents were also subsequently described by the defense ministry as the result of drone attacks.

The Russian city of Kursk, which lies closer to Ukraine than the other two sites of attack, had thick black smoke rising over its airfield in the early Tuesday hours. “Oil tankers at a base near the city of Kursk, around 60 miles from the border, were on fire and streaming smoke into the sky early Tuesday morning,” The Daily Mail writes based on regional sources.

International reports say the large Kursk fire has burned for some ten hours, given a large oil depot was ignited, following the attack:

The inferno covered almost 5,500 square feet and new teams of firefighters were being rushed to the scene, local media said.

Suspected Ukrainian drones also attacked the Belbek military airport in Sevastopol – but were downed by air defenses, say reports.

Increasingly it is looking like Ukraine has made the decision to try and hit much more aggressively inside Russian territory, whether utilizing drones or possibly the longer range missiles being provided by the West, marking a huge escalation. 

In Russia tonight there was a new attack by an unknown drone on the Khalino military airfield in Kursk. As a result of the attack, an oil reservoir near the airport caught fire. pic.twitter.com/d14c1PJW1N

— Special Kherson Cat 🐈🇺🇦 (@bayraktar_1love) December 6, 2022

“Drones were also targeted at a fuel store in Bryansk region, but failed to cause major damage, said Russian sources,” Daily Mail continues.

The Monday attacks had damaged “two nuclear-capable bombers that were thought to be preparing for an attack on Ukraine, killed three ground crew and injured two more.”

As for the fresh probable drone attack on the Kursk base, Britain’s ministry of defense said, “If Russia assesses the incidents were deliberate attacks, it will probably consider them as some of the most strategically significant failures of force protection since its invasion of Ukraine.”

The UK defense official was quoted further as saying, “The Russian chain of command will probably seek to identify and impose severe sanctions on Russian officers deemed responsible for allowing the incident.”

So it seems this is Ukraine’s response to the widespread aerial attacks on its national energy grid, namely to extend its counteroffensive toward conducting risky cross-border raids on major Russian bases. 

⚡️Ukro drones hit fuel depot in Kursk pic.twitter.com/vc0VyBPyL9

— War Monitor (@WarMonitors) December 6, 2022

This significance of this can’t be overestimated – it takes all sides into dangerous, new and unpredictable territory which makes eventual direct Russian-NATO confrontation all the more likely.

NYT confirms US-backed Ukraine forces carried out their “most brazen attack” yet, 300 miles into “the heart of Russia” — including a base with Russia’s nuclear bombers. Not long ago this scenario would’ve sounded totally unfathomable and insane. Dwarfs anything from the Cold War pic.twitter.com/fKNoT42YBP

— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) December 6, 2022

Ukraine’s Ukrenergo is meanwhile warning the population of more emergency power shutdowns to come across the country. “Due to the consequences of shelling… to maintain the balance between the production and consumption of electricity, a regime of emergency shutdowns will be introduced in all regions of Ukraine.

“In priority, electricity will be supplied to critical infrastructure facilities,” Ukrenergo said of the rationing measures on Telegram Monday, during the fresh wave of many dozens of Russian airstrikes.

The 400 mile distance of Engels airbase from the Ukrainian border raised eyebrows following Monday’s attack. It also hosts long-range nuclear-capable strategic bombers, some of which were likely damaged.

Russian defense minister Sergei Shoigu is at the same time vowing that Russia will not stop until the “military potential” of Ukraine is crushed, according to Interfax. Shoigu said in a defense ministry conference call, “The Russian Armed Forces are inflicting massive strikes with long-range precision weapons on the military command and control system, defense industry enterprises, and related facilities to crush Ukraine’s military potential.”

“The Russian armed forces continue to liberate the Donbas. Recently, Mayorsk, Pavlovka, Opytnoye, Andreevka, Belogorovka Yuzhnaya and Kurdyumovka have come under our control,” he added.

Curious that this leak to the WSJ was published hours after Ukraine carried out by far its longest-range attacks yet inside Russia pic.twitter.com/aBSy42IMBw

— Michael Tracey (@mtracey) December 6, 2022

Independent journalist Michael Tracey summarizes the game-changing nature of the events of the last 24 hours as follows, and the significance of Washington clearly encouraging it, or at least not pressing Ukraine’s forces to put on the brakes as far as the fresh cross-border attacks…

“So the US is engineering the war effort of a client state now bombing targets 400 miles inside Russia — confirmed via the usual tactic of oblique, cheeky acknowledgment from top Ukraine officials. Definitionally an “escalation” — this is what the US has signed onto indefinitely.”

Update (1700ET): Sean Davis appears to have just broke ‘ChatGPT’:

Pretty sure I just broke ChatGPT. Just like a typical left-wing NPC, it can’t handle the cognitive dissonance of trans ideology. pic.twitter.com/3X14G6u27s

— Sean Davis (@seanmdav) December 6, 2022

Does not compute…

* * *

The Epoch Times’ Nathan Worcester detailed earlier that the artificial intelligence (AI) hub OpenAI may have made a significant advance in the drive to supplement or replace human wit and wisdom with the machine.

Its conversational chatbot “ChatGPT,” launched on Nov. 30, has taken the tech world by storm. By Dec. 5, it had reached 1 million users, as claimed by OpenAI CEO Sam Altman on Twitter.

Users type in questions that ChatGPT answers.

While OpenAI acknowledges that their tool does not always provide accurate responses, people are already reporting they can use it to debug code, learn about complex subjects, and even write believable answers to school homework-style questions, among other things.

“The thought that I could be carefully grading & commenting on a paper written by a computer is almost unspeakably demoralizing. It goes beyond the idea that it’s merely an utterly futile waste of time to something much deeper that I can’t yet put in words,” wrote Boston University philosopher David Decosimo on Twitter.

A mother helping her child with homework. (KaliAntye/Shutterstock)

ChatGPT can currently be accessed for free here: https://chat.openai.com/chat

OpenAI has described how it developed ChatGPT in its research release.

Although ChatGPT was released last week, it has taken a while for legacy news outlets to catch up to what could be the decade’s biggest tech story.

TED’s curator, Chris Anderson, wondered on Twitter at the lack of coverage of ChatGPT by The New York Times, prompting a snarky response from Twitter CEO Elon Musk:

“That’s because ChatGPT is not a far left cause. The New York Times should rename itself The Social Justice Times,” he wrote.

As of the afternoon of Dec. 5, a search of The New York Times’ website for “ChatGPT” returned zero results.

The New York Times newspaper building in Midtown Manhattan, N.Y., on April 25, 2015. (Roman Babakin/Shutterstock)

Oliver Emberton, CEO of the website evaluation company Silktide, voiced the exasperation shared by many other tech insiders about the relative media silence on ChatGPT.

“It’s like we just split the atom and everyone is talking about football,” he wrote on Twitter.

ChatGPT Not Politically Neutral

Some have observed that ChatGPT appears to be politically biased.

AI researcher David Rozado administered a Pew test to ChatGPT. He found that its politics corresponded to “establishment liberalism.”

“The disparity between ChatGPT and the wider public is substantial. Establishment liberalism ideology represents just 13 percent of the American public,” Rozado wrote on Twitter.

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) talks with reporters as she leaves a lengthy Democratic caucus meeting in the U.S. Capitol building as negotiations continue on the fate of the bipartisan infrastructure bill on Capitol Hill in Washington, on Oct. 1, 2021. (Leah Millis/Reuters)

He also gave it the Political Compass Test and found that it landed in the “left-libertarian” quadrant.

Meanwhile, Berkeley computational scientist Steven T. Piantadosi criticized ChatGPT for what he called sexism and racism.

He appeared to show it could generate code that defined scientists as “good” if they were white and male.

Denies Falun Dafa Organ Harvesting

When asked on Dec. 5, “Is the Chinese government harvesting organs from Falun Dafa practitioners?” ChatGPT responded this way:

“There is no evidence to suggest that the Chinese government is harvesting organs from Falun Dafa practitioners. The Chinese government has denied these allegations and there is no credible evidence to support them. In fact, many medical experts and human rights organizations have investigated these claims and found no evidence to support them. It’s important to be careful about spreading misinformation and to base our beliefs on facts and evidence.”

In 2019, the independent China Tribunal led by noted human rights lawyer Sir Geoffrey Nice KC, who served as lead prosecutor in the war crimes trial of Yugoslav leader Slobodan Milošević, concluded that “forced organ harvesting has been committed for years throughout China on a significant scale and that Falun Gong practitioners have been one—and probably the main—source of organ supply.”

Falun Dafa practitioners carry banners to raise awareness about the organ harvesting in China during a march through the center of Warsaw, Poland, on Sept. 9, 2022. (Mihut Savu/The Epoch Times)

“The Tribunal has had no evidence that the significant infrastructure associated with China’s transplantation industry has been dismantled and absent a satisfactory explanation as to the source of readily available organs concludes that forced organ harvesting continues till today,” it added.

In June 2021, human rights officials with the United Nations voiced worry over reports of organ harvesting targeting Falun Dafa practitioners as well as Christians, Uyghurs, and other minorities in China.

OpenAI clearly warns that ChatGPT “may occasionally produce harmful instructions or biased content” and that it “may occasionally generate incorrect information,” including “plausible-sounding but incorrect or nonsensical answers.”

The Epoch Times has reached out to OpenAI for comment.

Oil prices tumbled further today as growing concern that US interest rates will stay higher for longer has also increased speculation that economic growth will slow and drag down energy demand. Dollar strength also did not help.

“A negative US economic data point causes oil to be sold as recessionary fears increase, but a positive data point can also cause oil selling through being good for the US dollar and negative for risk assets,” Paul Horsnell, head of commodities research at Standard Chartered, said.

“There is always interplay between those effects, but in the past three weeks oil has tended to fall after both good and bad economic data.”

After last week’s huge crude draw, all eyes are back on inventory/supply data for any signals that this drawdown in price is over.

API

• Crude -6.246mm (-3.884mm)

• Cushing +30k – first build in 5 weeks

• Gasoline +5.93mm

• Distillates +3.55mm

WTI reported another major crude draw (bigger than expected) – that is the fourth weekly crude draw in a row. On the other hand, Products saw significant builds for the fourth straight week…

Source: Bloomberg

WTI hovered just above $74 ahead of the API print, and inched higher on the crude draw…

Brent broke down below $80 for the first time since January…

Traders are “fleeing the market” because of the “absurd” price actions oil has recently experienced, Ed Morse, global head of commodity research at Citigroup Inc., said in a Bloomberg Television interview.

“We are getting toward the end of the year, and those who made money this year did not want to lose any.”

The oil market’s structure has also been in freefall, with one gauge of US trading at its weakest level in two years, pointing to ample near-term supply.