12/16 -- US Senate sends $768 billion military spending bill to Biden; How Could They Have Done This to the Children?
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Thomas L. Knapp
Dec 16, 2021, 7:02:23 AM12/16/21
to Freedom News Daily
Freedom News Daily, 12/16/21
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https://liberty-intl.org/
Produced by the staff of Rational Review News Digest
https://news.rationalreview.com/
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Today's Freedom News:
1) US Senate sends $768 billion military spending bill to Biden
2) China: Lithuanian embassy closes over Beijing regime’s Taiwan temper tantrums
3) JFK assassination: National Archives releases nearly 1,500 documents
4) Iran: Regime allows IAEA to reinstall cameras at Karaj nuclear facility
5) Syria: Regime soldier killed in alleged Israeli airstrike
6) Ethiopia: Regime thugs abduct journalist
7) Chauvin pleads guilty in federal court to violating George Floyd’s civil rights
8) Fed sets stage for earlier, faster interest rate hikes as inflation soars
9) FL: Broward county school district to pay $26 million to shooting victims
10) NYC: Regime weighs cutting off natural gas hookups for new buildings
11) Parker Solar Probe makes historic pass through Sun’s atmosphere
12) Blinken Cuts Short Asia Trip After Covid Case Among Travelling Group
13) SC: Former gubernatorial candidate John Warren launches Bitcoin venture
14) US House votes to hold Trump’s ex-chief of staff in contempt
15) EPA Sued Over Refusal to Close Deadly Pesticide Loophole Decimating [sic] Honey Bees
16) France: Regime expands ghettoization scheme with third booster requirement for over-65s
17) “Alarmingly incoherent”: NYT columnist implores Biden not to run for reelection
18) UK: Supreme Court rules against gender-neutral passports
19) NYC: Adams names first female police chief
20) VA: Resident holds armed burglary suspect at gunpoint
Today's Freedom Commentary:
251) Free Talk Live, 12/15/21
52) The Bryan Hyde Show, 12/15/21
53) My History Can Beat Up Your Politics, 12/14/21
54) Ron Paul Liberty Report, 12/15/21
55) Political Theater with Jason Dick, episode 231
56) Punk Rock Libertarians Podcast, episode 377
57) The Argument, 12/15/21
58) The Tom Woods Show, episode 2025
59) Bloggingheads.tv, 12/14/21
60) Conflicts Of Interest, episode 2011) How Could They Have Done This to the Children?
22) If You Want More of Something, Subsidize It (Population Edition)
23) The Paperwork Coup
24) The “Acid Rain” Scare and the Science-Industrial Complex
25) Led by Jeremy Corbyn, the British Left Opposes Vaccine Mandates as Anti-Worker and Repressive
26) Biden’s Democracy Summit Suggests That Things Are About to Get a Lot Worse for Democracy
27) Covid-19 Economic Zombification
28) Current Dispute Over ICBMs: A Quarrel Over Fine-Tuning the Doomsday Machinery
29) The Sham of Biden’s Democracy Summit
30) Feckless Endangerment
31) Every Market Bubble Is a Time Machine
32) Predictions take paying attention
33) The Assange Issue Is NOT Complicated
34) Attract Government Attention and Get Your Name Run Through a “Terrorist” Database
35) Interest Rates, Money Supply, and GDP
36) The new Dark Ages
37) Forget Kamala Harris’s “likeability,” she’s can’t even do her job
38) Disease And Purpose In Ivan Ilyich
39) The ghost of Georgia 2008 should be haunting Kiev right now
40) Will We See Deflation in the Next 12 Months?
41) Shadow Courts for Fossil Fuels Want a Green Makeover
42) What a 40-Year Inflationary Peak Is Doing to Your Wages
43) Meet the (One-sided) Press
44) Biden’s child care proposal is broken. Consider properly funding the Child Tax Credit instead.
45) How to Politicize a Tornado
46) An Open Letter to California Public Recreation Officials
47) Brutal and Unreformed — Sam Peckinpah’s “Straw Dogs” at 50
48) One-party rule is toxic everywhere, including California
49) Ten Predictions For the Year Ahead in Labor
50) FDIC Chairman McWilliams Is Wedged In A Political Power Play
Today's Freedom Podcast and Video:
51) Free Talk Live, 12/15/21
52) The Bryan Hyde Show, 12/15/21
53) My History Can Beat Up Your Politics, 12/14/21
54) Ron Paul Liberty Report, 12/15/21
55) Political Theater with Jason Dick, episode 231
56) Punk Rock Libertarians Podcast, episode 377
57) The Argument, 12/15/21
58) The Tom Woods Show, episode 2025
59) Bloggingheads.tv, 12/14/21
60) Conflicts Of Interest, episode 201
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_____ Today's Freedom News _____
1) US Senate sends $768 billion military spending bill to Biden
Source: Politico
“The Senate overwhelmingly approved a compromise $768 billion defense [sic] policy bill on Wednesday, sending a bipartisan rebuke of President Joe Biden’s original Pentagon plans back to him for his signature. The Senate voted 88-11 to pass the National Defense [sic] Authorization Act. The blowout comes just over a week after the House approved the final defense [sic] bill. Biden is expected to sign the measure, despite Congress'[s] endorsement of a $25 billion increase to defense spending the administration didn’t request. … Seven Democrats, three Republicans and Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont opposed the legislation in the final vote. … The bill’s budget boost includes more weapons purchases, increased research and development efforts and larger programs aimed at [justifying the spending by pretending there are threats from] China and Russia.” [editor’s note: $76.8 billion instead of $768 billion MIGHT pass the smell test as “defense;” this is just Military-Industrial Complex welfare – TLK (12/15/21)
https://www.politico.com/news/2021/12/15/senate-sends-768b-defense-policy-bill-to-biden-524734
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2) China: Lithuanian embassy closes over Beijing regime’s Taiwan temper tantrums
Source: National Public Radio [US state media]
“Lithuania said Wednesday that it has closed its embassy in Beijing and pulled its last diplomat out of the Chinese capital, a move that came amid a spat over the European Union nation allowing Taiwan to open a representative office in its capital, Vilnius. … Beijing previously expelled the Lithuanian ambassador and withdrew its ambassador from Lithuania after the Lithuanian government allowed self-ruled Taiwan, which has a democratic system, to open an office in Vilnius. The office opened in November and bears the name Taiwan rather than Chinese Taipei, which is used by the International Olympic Committee and many foreign nations to avoid offending China.” (12/16/21)
https://www.npr.org/2021/12/16/1064740067/lithuania-closes-embassy-in-china-after-last-diplomats-leave-amid-taiwan-spat
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3) JFK assassination: National Archives releases nearly 1,500 documents
Source: Fox News
“The National Archives and Records Administration on Wednesday released nearly 1,500 confidential documents related to the assassination of former President John F. Kennedy. The government agency released the files Wednesday via their website. Historians, political scholars and believers in a wide range of theories about Kennedy’s assassination immediately began poring over the documents. … NARA explained in a brief statement on their site that the institution was ‘processing previously withheld John F. Kennedy assassination-related records to comply with President Joe Biden’s Memorandum for the Heads of Executive Departments and Agencies on the Temporary Certification Regarding Disclosure of Information in Certain Records Related to the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy, requiring disclosure of releasable records by December 15, 2021.'” (12/15/21)
https://www.foxnews.com/us/jfk-assassination-national-archives-releases-nearly-1500-confidential-documents
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4) Iran: Regime allows IAEA to reinstall cameras at Karaj nuclear facility
Source: Al Jazeera [Qatar state media]
“The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has been given access once again by Iran to a centrifuge parts manufacturing facility in Karaj to replace cameras that were damaged or destroyed when the site was targeted by a sabotage attack in June this year. On Wednesday, Iran said it ‘voluntarily’ agreed to grant access to the global nuclear watchdog in an effort to prevent misunderstandings, according to a report by Nournews, an outlet close to Iran’s security forces. The report added that security and judicial investigations into the attack, which was blamed on Israel, were concluded and that the IAEA recently agreed to Iran’s request and condemned the attack.” (12/15/21)
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/12/15/iran-allows-iaea-to-re-install-cameras-at-contested-karaj-site
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5) Syria: Regime soldier killed in alleged Israeli airstrike
Source: Jerusalem Post [Palestine]
“A Syrian soldier was killed in an alleged Israeli airstrike targeting sites in southern Syria on Wednesday night, according to the Syrian state news agency SANA. Material damage was also reported. The report claimed that most of the Israeli missiles were shot down by Syrian air defenses. … The latest airstrike comes just over a week after an alleged Israeli airstrike targeted containers at the Latakia port in northwestern Syria. The Latakia area is a stronghold for Russian forces in Syria, with the Russian Khmeimim Air Base located near Latakia.” (12/16/21)
https://www.jpost.com/breaking-news/syrian-soldier-killed-in-alleged-israeli-airstrike-on-syria-688860
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6) Ethiopia: Regime thugs abduct journalist
Source: Edwardsville Intelligencer
“A freelance video journalist accredited to The Associated Press in Ethiopia has been detained by police in the capital, Addis Ababa, the news organization said Wednesday. Amir Aman Kiyaro was detained under the country’s new war-related state of emergency powers on Nov. 28 after returning home from a reporting trip. He has not been charged. Officials with the Ethiopian Media Authority, the prime minister’s office, the foreign ministry and other government offices have not responded to repeated requests from the AP for information about him since his detention. State media on Wednesday reported his detention, citing federal police, and said he was accused of ‘serving the purposes’ of a terrorist group by interviewing it. The report said local journalists Thomas Engida and Addisu Muluneh also were detained.” (12/15/21)
https://www.theintelligencer.com/news/article/Freelance-journalist-accredited-to-AP-detained-in-16704665.php
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7) Chauvin pleads guilty in federal court to violating George Floyd’s civil rights
Source: CNN
“Months after he was convicted of murder, former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin pleaded guilty in federal court Wednesday to civil rights charges related to the death of George Floyd. Chauvin also pleaded guilty in a separate federal case in which he was accused of depriving the rights of a 14-year-old in Minneapolis in 2017 for allegedly kneeling on the back and neck of a handcuffed, non-resisting teenager. As part of the plea agreement, Chauvin faces a sentence of between 20 and 25 years in prison. Prosecutors requested that he be sentenced to 25 years in prison to be served concurrently with his current 22 and a half year 22 and a half year sentence on state murder charges.” (12/15/21)
https://www.cnn.com/2021/12/15/us/derek-chauvin-federal-plea-change-wednesday/index.html
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8) Fed sets stage for earlier, faster interest rate hikes as inflation soars
Source: USA Today
“In an effort to rein in price increases that hit a 39-year high last month, the Fed on Wednesday agreed to clear the way for earlier and faster interest rate hikes in 2022 by accelerating the phaseout of its bond-buying stimulus. The turnabout, which Fed Chair Jerome Powell signaled during congressional testimony late last month, came after consumer prices spiraled higher, reaching 6.8% annually in November, and the unemployment rate tumbled to 4.2% that same month. … To set the stage for earlier rate increases, the Fed said it would pare back its Treasury and mortgage bond purchases by a total $30 billion a month, up from the $15 billion it announced in November. The faster wind-down puts the central bank on track to conclude the bond purchases — which are aimed at pushing down long-term rates, such as for mortgages — by March instead of June.” (12/15/21)
https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2021/12/15/fed-meeting-interest-rates/8902953002/
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9) FL: Broward county school district to pay $26 million to shooting victims
Source: US News & World Report
“The Broward County, Florida, school district will pay more than $26 million to the families of 17 people killed and some of those injured in the 2018 Valentine’s Day massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. Board members approved the two legal settlements on Tuesday. A total of $25 million will be shared by 51 plaintiffs, including families of the 17 dead as well as students and staff who were injured at the Parkland school. The families also reached a settlement with the FBI last month that will pay them over $127 million for its failure to possibly prevent the attack. The district will also pay $1.25 million to Anthony Borges, who suffered some of the most severe injuries. His lawyer split off from the larger case, saying Borges will have a lifetime of expensive medical needs, according to the South Florida Sun Sentinel.” (12/15/21)
https://www.usnews.com/news/us/articles/2021-12-15/florida-district-to-pay-26-million-to-shooting-victims
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10) NYC: Regime weighs cutting off natural gas hookups for new buildings
Source: Seattle Times
“New York City lawmakers are poised to decide Wednesday whether to prohibit most new buildings from using natural gas, a move that would make the nation’s most populous city a showcase for a climate-change-fighting policy that has been both embraced and blocked around the country. The measure is expected to pass the City Council and subsequently receive Mayor Bill de Blasio’s signature. If all that happens, most construction projects submitted for approval after 2027 would have to use something other than gas or oil — such as electricity — for heating, hot water and cooking. Some smaller buildings would have to comply as early as 2024, while hospitals, commercial kitchens and some other facilities would be exempt.” (12/15/21)
https://www.seattletimes.com/business/nyc-weighs-cutting-off-natural-gas-hookups-for-new-buildings/
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11) Parker Solar Probe makes historic pass through Sun’s atmosphere
Source: BBC News [UK state media]
“The US space agency (Nasa) is calling it a historic moment — the first time a spacecraft has flown through the outer atmosphere of the Sun. The feat was achieved by the Parker Solar Probe, which dipped, for just a short while, into a region around our star that scientists call the corona. It occurred in April, but the analysis of data has only now confirmed it. Parker had to withstand intense heat and radiation but gathered new insights on how the Sun works. ‘Just as landing on the Moon allowed scientists to understand how it was formed, touching the Sun is a gigantic stride for humanity to help us uncover critical information about our closest star and its influence on the Solar System,’ said Nicola Fox, the director of Nasa’s heliophysics science division.” (12/15/21)
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-59661827
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12) Blinken Cuts Short Asia Trip After Covid Case Among Travelling Group
Source: NDTV [India]
“US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has cut short his trip to Southeast Asia due to a COVID-19 case among his travelling party, a State Department official said on Wednesday. The decision was made to mitigate the COVID-19 risk and prioritise health and safety, and Blinken had expressed by phone his deep regret to the foreign minister of Thailand, where he was due to attend meetings on Thursday, State Department spokesperson Ned Price said.” (12/15/21)
https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/us-secretary-of-state-antony-blinken-cuts-short-asia-trip-after-covid-case-among-travelling-group-2653006
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13) SC: Former gubernatorial candidate John Warren launches Bitcoin venture
Source: San Francisco Chronicle
“John Warren, the multimillionaire businessman who forced South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster into a GOP runoff,Warren announced his investment in GEM Mining on Wednesday. He and four other founding partners, all in South Carolina, decided to form the venture last year as the Bitcoin marketplace began booming, Warren told The Associated Press ahead of the official launch. ‘We saw huge opportunities with our connections to mining,’ Warren told AP. He said the Greenville-based company will be the largest of its kind in South Carolina, and that he hopes it will soon be among the top handful in the country.” (12/15/21)
https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Former-SC-gov-candidate-John-Warren-launches-16703462.php
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14) US House votes to hold Trump’s ex-chief of staff in contempt
Source: Canadian Broadcasting Corporation [Canadian state media]
“The U.S. House of Representatives voted Tuesday to hold former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows in contempt of Congress after he ceased to co-operate with the Jan. 6 Committee investigating the Capitol insurrection — making it the first time the House has voted to hold a former member in contempt since the 1830s. The near-party-line 222-208 vote is the second time the special committee has sought to punish a witness for defying a subpoena. … The House vote sends the matter to the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington, where it will now be up to prosecutors in that office to decide whether to present the case to a grand jury for possible criminal charges.” (12/15/21)
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/mark-meadows-contempt-house-1.6286323?cmp=rss
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15) EPA Sued Over Refusal to Close Deadly Pesticide Loophole Decimating [sic] Honey Bees
Source: Common Dreams
“After waiting nearly five years for the Environmental Protection Agency to respond to a petition calling for the closing of a regulatory loophole which has proven deadly for honey bee colonies (spelling disaster for farmers’ crops, food security, and biodiversity) two advocacy groups are suing the agency and demanding officials take immediate action to end the use of harmful pesticides known as neonics. Joined by Pesticide Action Network (PAN) North America, the Center for Food Safety (CFS) filed the lawsuit saying the petition it sent to the EPA in April 2017 regarding the continued use of neonics, or neonicotinoids, provided ‘the legal blueprint to solve this problem and the legal impetus to do it.’ ‘While EPA fiddles, grave harm to bees and other pollinators continues,’ George Kimbrell, CFS legal director and counsel in the case, said Tuesday. ‘That delay must end.'” (12/15/21)
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/12/15/epa-sued-over-refusal-close-deadly-pesticide-loophole-decimating-honey-bees
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16) France: Regime expands ghettoization scheme with third booster requirement for over-65s
Source: France 24 [French state media]
“France on Wednesday begins implementing a new tightening of rules in the fight against Covid-19, meaning people aged 65 and over will lose the validity of their health pass unless they have had a third booster shot. The health pass was introduced in the summer and makes full vaccination against Covid-19, a recent recovery or negative test obligatory for visiting any restaurant or cafe, inter-city train travel and going to cultural venues like cinemas or museums. … The government says some 400,000 people aged 65 and over who are eligible for the booster shot have yet to take it, which is 12 percent of those aged 80 and above and 10 percent of those aged 65 to 79. People in the 65 plus age group who have failed to take up the booster shot will see the QR code in their health pass generated by a mobile phone app automatically dis-activated.” (12/15/21)
https://www.france24.com/en/europe/20211215-french-adults-over-65-without-a-covid-booster-shot-to-lose-health-pass-benefits
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17) “Alarmingly incoherent”: NYT columnist implores Biden not to run for reelection
Source: Fox News
“New York Times columnist Bret Stephens on Tuesday implored President Biden to not seek reelection in 2024 and announce his intentions as soon as possible so potential Democratic contenders could begin making preparations to replace him. In a piece headlined, ‘Biden Should Not Run Again, and He Should Say He Won’t,’ Stephens, a conservative and strong critic of Donald Trump, argued that Biden’s age, as well as his seemingly ‘uneven’ cognitive state, needed to be candidly discussed because it wasn’t healthy for him, his office, the Democratic Party, or the country to remain in limbo about what to do if he decides not to run. Stephens also argued it would be ‘liberating’ for Biden’s presidency if he announced he wouldn’t run, and that it would energize a currently ‘listless’ Democratic Party.” [editor’s note: That might be the first step in ensuring 2024 politics will be as bizarre as it appears it will be – SAT] (12/15/21)
https://www.foxnews.com/media/new-york-times-columnist-biden-re-election-should-alarmingly-incoherent
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18) UK: Supreme Court rules against gender-neutral passports
Source: ABC News
“A British activist lost a legal challenge at the U.K.’s highest court Wednesday to the government’s policy of not allowing gender-neutral passports. … A panel of judges unanimously dismissed the appeal, saying the gender of passport applicants is ‘a biographical detail which can be used to confirm their identity by checking it against the birth, adoption or gender recognition certificates provided and other official records.'” [editor’s note: Why would a traveler’s identity be any of the regime’s business? – TLK] (12/15/21)
https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/uk-highest-court-rules-gender-neutral-passports-81766387
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19) NYC: Adams names first female police chief
Source: BBC News [UK state media]
“New York City’s police force will be led by a woman for the first time in its 176-year history, Mayor-elect Eric Adams announced on Wednesday. Keechant Sewell, 49, is a 23-year veteran of the Nassau Police Department in nearby Long Island, where she became chief of detectives in September 2020. For Mr Adams, the move fulfills a campaign pledge to name a female commissioner. The NYPD is the largest police force in the US. Speaking to media on Wednesday morning, Mr Adams (a former NYPD captain) said that women often are ‘sitting on the bench’ and ‘never allowed to get in the game’ when it comes to policing. ‘That is stopping today,’ he said. Ms Sewell, who is originally from the New York borough of Queens, previously served in New York’s Nassau County narcotics and major case units, and as a hostage negotiator.” (12/15/21)
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-59672998
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20) VA: Resident holds armed burglary suspect at gunpoint
Source: Times News Express
“A Virginia burglary suspect armed with a knife was arrested Sunday after an armed resident held the intruder at gunpoint until authorities could arrive. Jonah Smith, 47, was arrested and charged with burglary with a weapon and attempted malicious wounding over a Dec. 12 incident that happened before 8:22 a.m. in the 10600 block of Railroad Court in Fairfax, Virginia. Smith, who was unknown to residents, entered a home through an unsecured door without force and refused to leave, according to the City of Fairfax Police.” (12/14/21)
https://timesnewsexpress.com/news/newsusa/virginia-burglary-suspect-held-at-gunpoint-by-would-be-victim-until-police-arrived/
_____ Today's Freedom Commentary _____
21) How Could They Have Done This to the Children?
Source: Brownstone Institute
by Vinay Prasad
“School closure was the greatest self inflicted wound of the pandemic. Sensible European nations did not close primary school at all, or only for 6 weeks, but places in the USA remained closed for more than a year. This was a net negative for the health and well-being of children, and will damage this nation for years to come. … But the experts did not stop with closure. To this day, children suffer some of the harshest restrictions. … Some have claimed that our policies to children reflect ‘following the science.’ They do not. There is no science to support primary school closure. No science supported prolonged (>1 year) closure for any age. No science supported outdoor cloth mask mandates for young kids, and no science supported deviating from the WHO guidance. These policies meanwhile have devastating consequences for the well-being of children.” (12/15/21)
https://brownstone.org/articles/how-could-they-have-done-this-to-the-children/
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22) If You Want More of Something, Subsidize It (Population Edition)
Source: Garrison Center
by Thomas L Knapp
“I can’t help notice a contradiction when prominent progressives who claim to believe that overpopulation is a problem simultaneously support paying Americans to have more kids. And that’s exactly what schemes like the child tax credit come down to. It’s a time-worn truism: If you want more of something, subsidize it. If you want less of something, penalize it. True, those same progressives generally support using foreign aid to subsidize ‘family planning’ elsewhere, but if overpopulation is the concern, that amounts to bailing water out of the bow of the boat and pouring it into, rather than off, the stern. At best. At worst … well, paying rich white people to breed and paying poor black and brown people not to sounds like something I’d expect to hear from a Tucker Carlson guest panel on ‘replacement theory.'” (12/15/21)
https://thegarrisoncenter.org/archives/16487
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23) The Paperwork Coup
Source: The Atlantic
by David A Graham
“Evidence about the insurrection suggests that although the mob was an obvious threat to human life, it was never an especially serious one to American democracy. … Meanwhile, we now have a better sense of how dangerous what we might call the ‘paperwork coup’ was. The theory under which Trump and his cronies attempted to steal the election was not especially elaborate or persuasive, but it didn’t need to be. It was coherent, and if a few things had happened differently — most especially, if Vice President Mike Pence had gone along with it — the result would have been chaos at the least and possibly a second Trump term and widespread conflict at worst.” (12/15/21)
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/12/trumps-coup-before-january-6/620998/
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24) The “Acid Rain” Scare and the Science-Industrial Complex
Source: Ludwig von Mises Institute
by William L Anderson
“[B]ecause covid-19 became a political malady, the political side has overwhelmed the medical/scientific aspect of this virus and its effects, because mystification happens to be politically useful. In other words, politics ultimately overwhelms science, and when politics comes to the fore, science itself disappears and is replaced by something akin to Lysenkoism, which is the ultimate result when everything in society becomes politicized. Much of the present corruption — no other word will suffice — of science via politics has come through environmentalism, and I present the case of acid rain as proof. While most readers probably are not familiar with the subject, forty years ago it was the environmental crisis.” (12/15/21)
https://mises.org/wire/acid-rain-scare-and-science-industrial-complex
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25) Led by Jeremy Corbyn, the British Left Opposes Vaccine Mandates as Anti-Worker and Repressive
Source: Glenn Greenwald
by Glenn Greenwald
“The shorthand label ‘anti-vax’ once had a clear and concise meaning: namely, those who reject the prevailing western scientific orthodoxy that vaccines are a safe and effective means of protecting humans against infectious diseases by training the immune system to combat a pathogen in advance. … But exactly as we have seen with so many other political labels — terrorist, racist, fascist, white nationalist, anti-Semite — this once-descriptive, precise and useful phrase has metamorphized far beyond its original meaning into something barely recognizable or cogent. That transformation has been deliberate, with a clear motive: to weaponize the term into a potent political insult designed to compel submission to decrees from institutions of authority and stigmatize dissenters, threatening them with reputation destruction.” (12/15/21)
https://greenwald.substack.com/p/led-by-jeremy-corbyn-the-british
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26) Biden’s Democracy Summit Suggests That Things Are About to Get a Lot Worse for Democracy
Source: Town Hall
by Rachel Marsden
“How precious is it that President Joe Biden still seems to genuinely believe that the United States is the ultimate guardian and arbiter of democracy worldwide? It’s not like the U.S. itself isn’t struggling with the concept, and Biden really isn’t making things better. American voters have long realized that those who are ultimately elected have the kind of financial hurdles to overcome that make it incredibly difficult for the Average Joe to participate, let alone win. Then, once they get to Washington, these elected representatives often succumb to the seductive siren song of special interests with deep pockets and an agenda that serves the elites to the detriment of the average citizen’s interests. The average voter ends up feeling like the democratic process and those selected through it are serving other masters.” (12/15/21)
https://townhall.com/columnists/rachelmarsden/2021/12/15/bidens-democracy-summit-suggests-that-things-are-about-to-get-a-lot-worse-for-dem-n2600564
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27) Covid-19 Economic Zombification
Source: American Institute for Economic Research
by Daniel Fernandez
“Economists and finance specialists are warning of the potential arrival of a new ‘Minsky moment’ in increasing numbers. The last time this term was used with such conviction was in 2008, at the onset of the Great Recession. … According to Minsky, when things are going well in an economy and income expectations are met, corporations begin to err on the side of optimism and excessively increase their debt. This causes a shift from a stable situation (in which hedge companies are the norm) to an unstable one (in which Ponzi companies are the norm). In a Ponzi situation, the economy will experience widespread defaults and a financial and economic crisis. An economy is said to be in a Minsky moment if debtors are unable to pay down their debts (a speculative situation) or unable to pay the interest and the principal (a Ponzi situation).” (12/15/21)
https://www.aier.org/article/covid-19-economic-zombification/
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28) Current Dispute Over ICBMs: A Quarrel Over Fine-Tuning the Doomsday Machinery
Source: Common Dreams
by Norman Solomon
“Nuclear weapons are at the pinnacle of what Martin Luther King Jr. called ‘the madness of militarism’. If you’d rather not think about them, that’s understandable. But such a coping strategy has limited value. And those who are making vast profits from preparations for global annihilation are further empowered by our avoidance. At the level of national policy, nuclear derangement is so normalized that few give it a second thought. Yet normal does not mean sane. As an epigraph to his brilliant book The Doomsday Machine, Daniel Ellsberg provides a chillingly apt quote from Friedrich Nietzsche: ‘Madness in individuals is something rare; but in groups, parties, nations, and epochs, it is the rule.’ Now, some policy technocrats for the USA’s nuclear arsenal and some advocates for arms control are locked in a heated dispute over the future of ICBMs: intercontinental ballistic missiles.” (12/15/21)
https://www.commondreams.org/views/2021/12/15/current-dispute-over-icbms-quarrel-over-how-fine-tune-doomsday-machinery
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29) The Sham of Biden’s Democracy Summit
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
by Jacob G Hornberger
“With his two-day ‘Democracy Summit’ last week, President Biden continues renewed efforts by the U.S. national-security establishment to revive its old Cold War racket against China and Russia. The purpose of the summit, of course, was to highlight the fact that the United States has a democratic political system while China and Russia, who were not invited to participate in the summit, do not. Biden’s democracy summit, however, is one great big sham. That’s because for all practical purposes, the U.S. has a one-party political system, just like China does.” (12/15/21)
https://www.fff.org/2021/12/15/the-sham-of-bidens-democracy-summit/
-----
30) Feckless Endangerment
Source: Common Sense
by Paul Jacob
“The Biden administration sure knows how to look feckless when it comes to standing up to China. The administration has decided that the best way to protest Chinazi aggression against Hong Kong democracy and freedom — and against the lives and freedom of millions of Uyghurs — is to announce a ‘diplomatic’ boycott of the Beijing-sponsored Olympic games, scheduled to be held in February. U.S. participation would continue as before: athletes will perform, sports fans will attend, and corporations will make money. What will be missing? Government officials. Viewers around the world won’t notice any difference, of course. They don’t tune in to watch muckety-mucks photo-bombing the medal ceremonies. Even Jimmy Carter, loath to be outdone in the fecklessness department, knew that the way for the U.S. to boycott the 1980 Moscow-hosted Olympics in protest of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was to actually boycott the Olympics.” (12/15/21)
https://thisiscommonsense.org/2021/12/15/feckless-endangerment/
-----
31) Every Market Bubble Is a Time Machine
Source: American Consequences
by Dan Ferris
“Fish gotta swim, birds gotta fly … And I have to tell you that this is a bubble. Here in American Consequences, I write to you about the investment themes, stories, and ideas I find impossible to ignore. I can’t resist the urge to share them with you. And as you know, the massive market bubble we’re living in has been No. 1 among those ideas this year. Once I see data that tells me stocks are more expensive today than any time in history … including the dot-com and 1929 peaks … it’s too hard for me to look away. I realize being bearish can be annoying, so today I’ve included a few of the most compelling types of stocks investors should consider buying right now.” (12/15/21)
https://americanconsequences.com/every-market-bubble-is-a-time-machine/
-----
32) Predictions take paying attention
Source: Eastern New Mexico News
by Kent McManigal
“This past spring I noticed a bigger than usual crop of the plant that becomes tumbleweeds when it dies and the wind blows. I told a few people to be ready for an epic tumbleweed season this year. Then, I failed to see many tumbleweeds last month and wondered what had happened to them all. It turns out they had all gone to Oasis State Park to plot their attack. So, I was right about the bumper crop, but I missed where they were going. I can’t win ‘em all. Some things are easy to predict based on what you see happening in the world around you, but you have to pay attention to your surroundings. When you watch government counterfeiting trillions of dollars and calling it a stimulus, you can predict Inflation.” (12/15/21)
https://www.easternnewmexiconews.com/story/2021/12/15/voices/opinion-predictions-take-paying-attention/170663.html
-----
33) The Assange Issue Is NOT Complicated
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“The most powerful regime on the planet imprisoning a journalist for journalistic activity is as brazen and obvious an act of tyranny as you could possibly come up with, and yet you still get pseudoleft pundits acting like you’re some kind of weird freak for expecting them to oppose it. The Assange issue is not actually complicated. The most powerful government in the world is trying to extradite a journalist and try him under the Espionage Act for exposing its war crimes. It is that simple. This isn’t some super complex subject that you defer to the experts on. … It’s such a blatant abuse of government power that virtually everyone would normally be ideologically opposed to it, but because there’s been so much media spin on it for so long people don’t see it.” (12/15/21)
https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2021/12/15/the-assange-issue-is-not-complicated-notes-from-the-edge-of-the-narrative-matrix/
-----
34) Attract Government Attention and Get Your Name Run Through a “Terrorist” Database
Source: Reason
by JD Tuccille
“In 2021, it’s unfortunately not surprising to learn about routine federal surveillance of people who attract official attention. We live, after all, at a moment when freedom looks haggard and unloved even in liberal democracies and a record number of journalists are behind bars. That the practice of running people’s names through multiple government databases appears to be routine doesn’t bode well for the United States, let alone the world beyond. … Given the range of tools available to the feds, it’s not a shock that their use has become rote. What’s the point of having vast (if unreliable) databases on people’s activities if you’re not going to use them?” (12/15/21)
https://reason.com/2021/12/15/attract-government-attention-and-get-your-name-run-through-a-terrorist-database/
-----
35) Interest Rates, Money Supply, and GDP
Source: Cobden Centre
by Alasdair Macleod
“That the world is on the edge of a monetary and economic cliff is becoming increasingly obvious. And becoming more obviously permanent than transient, price inflation will almost certainly lead to rising interest rates. Rising bond yields, falling equity markets and debt-triggered insolvencies will naturally follow. According to the economists prevalent in official circles, a prospective mix of so-called deflation and rising prices are contradictory, should not happen at the same time, and therefore cannot be explained. Yet that is the prospect they now face.” (12/15/21)
http://www.cobdencentre.org/2021/12/interest-rates-money-supply-and-gdp/
-----
36) The new Dark Ages
Source: spiked
by Joel Kotkin
“If ignorance is bliss, the Western world should be ecstatic. Even as colleges churn out degrees and collect fees, and technology makes information instantly accessible, the basic level of literacy, as measured by such things as reading books and acquainting oneself with the past, is in a precipitous decline. Rather than building a vital world with our technological culture, we are repeating the memes of feudal times, driven by illiteracy, bias and a rejection of the West’s past. Over half of American adults have a reading level below the equivalent of sixth-grade level (11- to 12-year-olds), and book reading outside of school or work among the young in particular has declined markedly. … This loss of literacy comes at a time when much of our education and literary establishment has embraced censorship, while on the right there’s an increasingly Pavlovian embrace of book-banning.” (12/15/21)
https://www.spiked-online.com/2021/12/15/the-new-dark-ages/
-----
37) Forget Kamala Harris’s “likeability,” she’s can’t even do her job
Source: Fox News Forum
by Karol Markowicz
“This week, Fox News reporter Peter Doocy asked White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki ‘Is Vice President [Kamala] Harris still in charge of addressing the root causes of migration from El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala?’ It wasn’t a trick question and yet the answer was clearly complicated. Harris has largely been out of the spotlight on the issue since being handed over the reins in March of 2021. Psaki responded that yes, Harris was still in charge. The problem was that a few days earlier Guatemalan President Alejandro Giammattei had told Fox News that neither Harris nor anyone from the Joe Biden White House has been in contact with him since June. … With all the focus on whether Harris is likeable, not enough attention gets paid to the fact that she’s generally just not competent enough in the roles being assigned to her.” (12/15/21)
https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/kamala-harris-likability-job-karol-markowicz
-----
38) Disease And Purpose In Ivan Ilyich
Source: The American Conservative
by Auguste Meyrat
“Writers like Albert Camus and Franz Kafka told stories of dehumanized protagonists living out meaningless lives and meeting their deaths like dumb animals, but their novels more often seem like a copout from the human condition rather than realistic treatments. By contrast, in his novella The Death of Ivan Illych, Leo Tolstoy tells the story of a protagonist who tries to avoid the search for meaning only to be forcefully confronted with it as he dies a slow, painful death. It is far more realistic, and it illustrates deeper truths about the nature of humanity and its need for meaning.” (12/15/21)
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/disease-and-purpose-in-ivan-ilyich/
-----
39) The ghost of Georgia 2008 should be haunting Kiev right now
Source: Responsible Statecraft
by Andrew Cockburn
“Current war-party bombast in the cause of Ukraine, supposedly menaced by massed hordes of Russian armored divisions, routinely evokes the 2008 war in the Caucuses in which, according to the tub-thumpers’ preferred narrative, Russia attacked Georgia without provocation only to be forced to withdraw thanks to Washington’s steely resolve. It is therefore worth recalling what actually happened.” (12/15/21)
https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2021/12/15/the-ghost-of-georgia-2008-should-be-haunting-kiev-right-now/
-----
40) Will We See Deflation in the Next 12 Months?
Source: CounterPunch
by Dean Baker
“I’m not worried at this point about a deflationary spiral, but I see what, to my view, is a plausible scenario where the CPI actually goes negative in the next twelve months. I go through the categories and my predictions component by component below, but there are four main items driving the story that I’ll mention here. First, I assume a sharp reversal in new and used car prices. The 11.1 percent increase in the former and 31.4 percent increase in the latter, have added 1.5 percentage points to the inflation rate over the last year. This run-up is due to the well-known shortage of semi-conductors. It seems that manufacturers are overcoming this shortage and getting up to normal production levels. This may lead to a situation where they are not only meeting normal demand, but actually could be overproducing and needed to markdown prices.” (12/15/21)
https://www.counterpunch.org/2021/12/15/will-we-see-deflation-in-the-next-12-months/
-----
41) Shadow Courts for Fossil Fuels Want a Green Makeover
Source: The American Prospect
by Lee Harris
“When residents of Abruzzo noticed a drilling platform for the Ombrina Mare oil field being installed less than six miles off the coast, public campaigns drew tens of thousands of protesters to oppose the extraction. In 2015, the Italian parliament ruled that companies could no longer drill so close to the shoreline. Two years later, Rockhopper Exploration, a U.K.-based company that had purchased a license to explore for oil in the area, sued the Italian government over that ban. Although the company said it had invested some $29 million in the project, according to an attorney representing Italy, it sued for $275 million in damages, citing the loss of expected future profits.” (12/15/21)
https://prospect.org/environment/shadow-courts-for-fossil-fuels-want-a-green-makeover/
-----
42) What a 40-Year Inflationary Peak Is Doing to Your Wages
Source: Libertarian Institute
by Ryan McMaken
“According to new data released Friday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, price inflation in November rose to the highest level recorded in nearly forty years. According to the Consumer Price Index (CPI) for November, year-over-year price inflation rose to 6.8 percent. It hasn’t been that high since June 1982, when the growth rate was at 7.2 percent. … It’s unclear to what degree inflation might already be entrenched, but year-over-year growth in the CPI has been over 5 percent for the past six months—and on a clear upward trajectory. At the same time, inflation is taking a bite out of workers’ purchasing power. November’s numbers on average hourly earnings suggest that inflation is erasing the gains made in workers’ earnings.” (12/15/21)
https://libertarianinstitute.org/articles/what-a-40-year-inflationary-peak-is-doing-to-your-wages/
-----
43) Meet the (One-sided) Press
Source: Antiwar.com
by Paul W Lovinger
“When President Biden held his two-hour conversation with his counterpart, Vladimir Putin, on December 7, the American news media dutifully repeated what the White House had released: a warning by Biden to leave Ukraine alone — or else! But didn’t Putin have anything to tell Biden? Is there a Russian side to the matter? Not as far as some media are concerned.” (12/15/21)
https://original.antiwar.com/paul_lovinger/2021/12/14/meet-the-one-sided-press/
-----
44) Biden’s child care proposal is broken. Consider properly funding the Child Tax Credit instead.
Source: Niskanen Center
by Will Raderman
“When it comes to establishing effective programs, legislative design matters. In its current iteration, the child care proposal included in the Build Back Better Act (BBB) contains enough flaws to seriously stand in the way of its intended aims. … Absent upgrades to the Build Back Better child care proposal, legislators should consider reallocating the funds to the expanded Child Tax Credit (CTC).” (12/14/21)
https://www.niskanencenter.org/bidens-child-care-proposal-is-broken-consider-properly-funding-the-child-tax-credit-instead/
-----
45) How to Politicize a Tornado
Source: The Pamphleteer
by Davis Hunt
“Axios Nashville took the opportunity of devastating tornadoes in Tennessee, Illinois, Indiana, and Kentucky to shill the goo-goo-ga-ga idea that the ‘climate crisis’ may be making tornadoes worse. They shared the cute graphic above that is supposed to make the case, but actually says next to nothing about anything. I guess without God and Science, you have Climate Change and poorly rendered data art. The above graphic shows the number of ‘favorable days per decade’ since 1979 in which a tornado is likely to happen. In West Tennessee, the graphic shows that over the past decade, there have been an additional 2.5 days per decade since 1979 wherein a tornado could occur. The graphic says nothing about damage from tornadoes or the actual number of tornadoes. That’s probably because the danger posed by tornadoes has never been less threatening …” (12/15/21)
https://pamphleteer.co/newsletter/no-151-how-to-politicize-a-tornado/
-----
46) An Open Letter to California Public Recreation Officials
Source: Coyote Blog
by Warren Meyer
“New California rules are set to effectively end the ability of RVers to use generators to produce power in California …. The danger is that with this ban, and without investment on public lands, public campgrounds will lose relevance to a lot of the recreating public. The recent upsurge in interest by new demographics in camping in the outdoors will almost certainly be reversed. For years — and some of you are probably tired of hearing me on this — I have been arguing that the #1 improvement that public campgrounds should be considering is electrification. I fully understand that agencies like the USFS tend to have an immediate negative reaction to such proposals, fearing that it would over-develop the wilderness. But I argue the opposite — electrification would make campgrounds MORE rather than less natural.” (12/14/21)
https://coyoteblog.com/coyote_blog/2021/12/an-open-letter-to-california-public-recreation-officials.html
-----
47) Brutal and Unreformed — Sam Peckinpah’s “Straw Dogs” at 50
Source: Quillette
by Charlotte Allen
“December 22nd will be the 50th anniversary of the release of Sam Peckinpah’s Straw Dogs, a film so marked by violent killings and violent sex that, according to Peckinpah’s biographer, David Weddle, a third of the audience walked out of its premiere before the end. But most of those who remained, Weddle reports, hooted and cheered as protagonist David Sumner, a hitherto-passive American academic played by Dustin Hoffman, ruthlessly repelled a passel of homicidal home-invaders besieging the English farmhouse where he lived with his wife. … Straw Dogs was one of a clutch of films released during this period that examined the lethal conflict between savage rubes and clueless city sophistos — a counterpart to Ted Kotcheff’s grim Australian psychodrama, Wake in Fright (also 1971), and John Boorman’s Southern backwater classic, Deliverance (1972).” (12/14/21)
https://quillette.com/2021/12/15/brutal-and-unreformed-sam-peckinpahs-straw-dogs-at-50/
-----
48) One-party rule is toxic everywhere, including California
Source: Orange County Register
by Matt Fleming
“Gov. Gavin Newsom survived the recall and looks likely to cruise to reelection in 2022. So now what? I ask because though the state’s voters felt keeping in office Newsom was the best of the options, it’s undeniable that Californians are frustrated with the lack of solutions coming out of Sacramento, which is overwhelmingly Democratic. And because it’s overwhelmingly Democratic, criticism of Sacramento might seem partisan, but it’s not. It’s important that everyone, no matter their partisan affiliation, ask themselves: ‘How has an overwhelmingly Democratic ruling class addressed the problems in my life?’ … For those who might be already typing a ‘What about?’ email to me pointing to states run by a Republican supermajority where there’s a lack of improvement, my universal response is that you’re only proving my point about this not being partisan. It’s about a complacent ruling class that feels no threat of political competition.” (12/14/21)
https://www.ocregister.com/2021/12/14/one-party-rule-is-toxic-everywhere-including-california/
-----
49) Ten Predictions For the Year Ahead in Labor
Source: In These Times
by Hamilton Nolan
“This is the time of year when many publications are busy preparing their ‘Year in Review’ pieces. Boring! We already lived through the past year. We know what happened. Instead, let’s look ahead to 2022 -- the year that will be, probably. One of the most valuable lessons that a journalist can learn is: Never make predictions. You will inevitably end up looking dumb. That said, here are ten predictions for the year to come in the labor movement. I feel pretty confident about these. And with any luck, none of you will remember to look back at them a year from now to check my work. 1) Higher ed becomes a serious player in the union world. … 2) Culture wars in the union world. … 3) The economic situation for workers gets worse. … 4) The political situation gets worse, too. … 5) No major organizing numbers. … 6) More name brand union shops….” (12/15/21)
https://inthesetimes.com/article/2022-unions-strike-wave-amazon-starbucks-labor
-----
50) FDIC Chairman McWilliams Is Wedged In A Political Power Play
Source: Cato Institute
by Norbert Michel
“Two Board members have picked a fight — over a request for information, of all things, that wasn’t even blocked — to essentially give control of the FDIC to the head of a separate regulatory agency.” (12/14/21)
https://www.cato.org/commentary/fdic-chairman-mcwilliams-wedged-political-power-play
_____ Today's Freedom Podcast and Video _____
51) Free Talk Live, 12/15/21
Source: Free Talk Live
"Omicron is nothing to fear :: Mark still trashes the Free State Project :: Mark hates the FSP, not New Hampshire :: The community in New Hampshire :: Omicron variant is just the flu :: Anti-aging vaccine :: Political polarization :: Covid-19 proved that polarization has already reached a tipping point :: Show: 2021-12-15 Aria, Lori, Bonnie." [Flash audio or MP3] (12/15/21)
https://soundcloud.com/freetalklive/free-talk-live-2021-12-15
-----
52) The Bryan Hyde Show, 12/15/21
Source: The Bryan Hyde Show
“Politics is a leading cause of enemy-driven thinking. That’s why I find less and less relevance for it in my own life as time goes by.” [various formats] (12/15/21)
https://anchor.fm/bryan-hyde/episodes/2021-December-15-The-Bryan-Hyde-Show-e1boe9e
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53) My History Can Beat Up Your Politics, 12/14/21
Source: My History Can Beat Up Your Politics
“Harris and the Vice Presidency in a Historical Context.” [MP3] (12/14/21)
https://myhistorycanbeatupyourpolitics.wordpress.com/2021/12/14/harris-and-the-vice-presidency-in-a-historical-context/
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54) Ron Paul Liberty Report, 12/15/21
Source: Ron Paul Liberty Report
“Omicron ‘Shocker’: It’s’ Mostly Hitting The Vaxxed.” [Flash video] (12/15/21)
http://www.ronpaullibertyreport.com/archives/omicron-shocker-its-mostly-hitting-the-vaxxed
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55) Political Theater with Jason Dick, episode 231
Source: Roll Call
“Images are everything: Our photographers on a momentous year.” [various formats] (12/15/21)
https://rollcall.com/podcasts/political-theater/images-are-everything-our-photographers-on-a-momentous-year/
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56) Punk Rock Libertarians Podcast, episode 377
Source: The Daily Liberator
“Jussie found guilty, New Zealand cig ban, Ghislaine’s knockers and more!” [various formats] (12/15/21)
https://www.thedailyliberator.com/prl-podcast-episode-377-juicy/
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57) The Argument, 12/15/21
Source: New York Times
“Is Democracy’s Fate the Media’s Fault?” [Flash audio] (12/15/21)
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/15/opinion/the-argument-role-of-press-in-a-democracy.html
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58) The Tom Woods Show, episode 2025
Source: The Tom Woods Show
“Lessons From the Ron Paul Revolution.” [various formats] (12/14/21)
https://tomwoods.com/ep-2025-lessons-from-the-ron-paul-revolution/
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59) Bloggingheads.tv, 12/14/21
Source: Bloggingheads.tv
“Varieties of Psychedelic Experience | Robert Wright, John Horgan, Nikita Petrov.” [Flash video] (12/14/21)
https://bloggingheads.tv/videos/63308
-----
60) Conflicts Of Interest, episode 201
Source: Libertarian Institute
“Biden Allows Israel to Sabotage Iran Talks.” [various formats] (12/14/21)
https://libertarianinstitute.org/kyle/coi-201-biden-allows-israel-to-sabotage-iran-talks/
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Today's Freedom News:
1) US Senate sends $768 billion military spending bill to Biden
2) China: Lithuanian embassy closes over Beijing regime’s Taiwan temper tantrums
3) JFK assassination: National Archives releases nearly 1,500 documents
4) Iran: Regime allows IAEA to reinstall cameras at Karaj nuclear facility
5) Syria: Regime soldier killed in alleged Israeli airstrike
6) Ethiopia: Regime thugs abduct journalist
7) Chauvin pleads guilty in federal court to violating George Floyd’s civil rights
8) Fed sets stage for earlier, faster interest rate hikes as inflation soars
9) FL: Broward county school district to pay $26 million to shooting victims
10) NYC: Regime weighs cutting off natural gas hookups for new buildings
11) Parker Solar Probe makes historic pass through Sun’s atmosphere
12) Blinken Cuts Short Asia Trip After Covid Case Among Travelling Group
13) SC: Former gubernatorial candidate John Warren launches Bitcoin venture
14) US House votes to hold Trump’s ex-chief of staff in contempt
15) EPA Sued Over Refusal to Close Deadly Pesticide Loophole Decimating [sic] Honey Bees
16) France: Regime expands ghettoization scheme with third booster requirement for over-65s
17) “Alarmingly incoherent”: NYT columnist implores Biden not to run for reelection
18) UK: Supreme Court rules against gender-neutral passports
19) NYC: Adams names first female police chief
20) VA: Resident holds armed burglary suspect at gunpoint
Today's Freedom Commentary:
251) Free Talk Live, 12/15/21
52) The Bryan Hyde Show, 12/15/21
53) My History Can Beat Up Your Politics, 12/14/21
54) Ron Paul Liberty Report, 12/15/21
55) Political Theater with Jason Dick, episode 231
56) Punk Rock Libertarians Podcast, episode 377
57) The Argument, 12/15/21
58) The Tom Woods Show, episode 2025
59) Bloggingheads.tv, 12/14/21
60) Conflicts Of Interest, episode 2011) How Could They Have Done This to the Children?
22) If You Want More of Something, Subsidize It (Population Edition)
23) The Paperwork Coup
24) The “Acid Rain” Scare and the Science-Industrial Complex
25) Led by Jeremy Corbyn, the British Left Opposes Vaccine Mandates as Anti-Worker and Repressive
26) Biden’s Democracy Summit Suggests That Things Are About to Get a Lot Worse for Democracy
27) Covid-19 Economic Zombification
28) Current Dispute Over ICBMs: A Quarrel Over Fine-Tuning the Doomsday Machinery
29) The Sham of Biden’s Democracy Summit
30) Feckless Endangerment
31) Every Market Bubble Is a Time Machine
32) Predictions take paying attention
33) The Assange Issue Is NOT Complicated
34) Attract Government Attention and Get Your Name Run Through a “Terrorist” Database
35) Interest Rates, Money Supply, and GDP
36) The new Dark Ages
37) Forget Kamala Harris’s “likeability,” she’s can’t even do her job
38) Disease And Purpose In Ivan Ilyich
39) The ghost of Georgia 2008 should be haunting Kiev right now
40) Will We See Deflation in the Next 12 Months?
41) Shadow Courts for Fossil Fuels Want a Green Makeover
42) What a 40-Year Inflationary Peak Is Doing to Your Wages
43) Meet the (One-sided) Press
44) Biden’s child care proposal is broken. Consider properly funding the Child Tax Credit instead.
45) How to Politicize a Tornado
46) An Open Letter to California Public Recreation Officials
47) Brutal and Unreformed — Sam Peckinpah’s “Straw Dogs” at 50
48) One-party rule is toxic everywhere, including California
49) Ten Predictions For the Year Ahead in Labor
50) FDIC Chairman McWilliams Is Wedged In A Political Power Play
Today's Freedom Podcast and Video:
51) Free Talk Live, 12/15/21
52) The Bryan Hyde Show, 12/15/21
53) My History Can Beat Up Your Politics, 12/14/21
54) Ron Paul Liberty Report, 12/15/21
55) Political Theater with Jason Dick, episode 231
56) Punk Rock Libertarians Podcast, episode 377
57) The Argument, 12/15/21
58) The Tom Woods Show, episode 2025
59) Bloggingheads.tv, 12/14/21
60) Conflicts Of Interest, episode 201
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_____ Today's Freedom News _____
1) US Senate sends $768 billion military spending bill to Biden
Source: Politico
“The Senate overwhelmingly approved a compromise $768 billion defense [sic] policy bill on Wednesday, sending a bipartisan rebuke of President Joe Biden’s original Pentagon plans back to him for his signature. The Senate voted 88-11 to pass the National Defense [sic] Authorization Act. The blowout comes just over a week after the House approved the final defense [sic] bill. Biden is expected to sign the measure, despite Congress'[s] endorsement of a $25 billion increase to defense spending the administration didn’t request. … Seven Democrats, three Republicans and Independent Sen. Bernie Sanders of Vermont opposed the legislation in the final vote. … The bill’s budget boost includes more weapons purchases, increased research and development efforts and larger programs aimed at [justifying the spending by pretending there are threats from] China and Russia.” [editor’s note: $76.8 billion instead of $768 billion MIGHT pass the smell test as “defense;” this is just Military-Industrial Complex welfare – TLK (12/15/21)
https://www.politico.com/news/2021/12/15/senate-sends-768b-defense-policy-bill-to-biden-524734
-----
2) China: Lithuanian embassy closes over Beijing regime’s Taiwan temper tantrums
Source: National Public Radio [US state media]
“Lithuania said Wednesday that it has closed its embassy in Beijing and pulled its last diplomat out of the Chinese capital, a move that came amid a spat over the European Union nation allowing Taiwan to open a representative office in its capital, Vilnius. … Beijing previously expelled the Lithuanian ambassador and withdrew its ambassador from Lithuania after the Lithuanian government allowed self-ruled Taiwan, which has a democratic system, to open an office in Vilnius. The office opened in November and bears the name Taiwan rather than Chinese Taipei, which is used by the International Olympic Committee and many foreign nations to avoid offending China.” (12/16/21)
https://www.npr.org/2021/12/16/1064740067/lithuania-closes-embassy-in-china-after-last-diplomats-leave-amid-taiwan-spat
-----
3) JFK assassination: National Archives releases nearly 1,500 documents
Source: Fox News
“The National Archives and Records Administration on Wednesday released nearly 1,500 confidential documents related to the assassination of former President John F. Kennedy. The government agency released the files Wednesday via their website. Historians, political scholars and believers in a wide range of theories about Kennedy’s assassination immediately began poring over the documents. … NARA explained in a brief statement on their site that the institution was ‘processing previously withheld John F. Kennedy assassination-related records to comply with President Joe Biden’s Memorandum for the Heads of Executive Departments and Agencies on the Temporary Certification Regarding Disclosure of Information in Certain Records Related to the Assassination of President John F. Kennedy, requiring disclosure of releasable records by December 15, 2021.'” (12/15/21)
https://www.foxnews.com/us/jfk-assassination-national-archives-releases-nearly-1500-confidential-documents
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4) Iran: Regime allows IAEA to reinstall cameras at Karaj nuclear facility
Source: Al Jazeera [Qatar state media]
“The International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) has been given access once again by Iran to a centrifuge parts manufacturing facility in Karaj to replace cameras that were damaged or destroyed when the site was targeted by a sabotage attack in June this year. On Wednesday, Iran said it ‘voluntarily’ agreed to grant access to the global nuclear watchdog in an effort to prevent misunderstandings, according to a report by Nournews, an outlet close to Iran’s security forces. The report added that security and judicial investigations into the attack, which was blamed on Israel, were concluded and that the IAEA recently agreed to Iran’s request and condemned the attack.” (12/15/21)
https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2021/12/15/iran-allows-iaea-to-re-install-cameras-at-contested-karaj-site
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5) Syria: Regime soldier killed in alleged Israeli airstrike
Source: Jerusalem Post [Palestine]
“A Syrian soldier was killed in an alleged Israeli airstrike targeting sites in southern Syria on Wednesday night, according to the Syrian state news agency SANA. Material damage was also reported. The report claimed that most of the Israeli missiles were shot down by Syrian air defenses. … The latest airstrike comes just over a week after an alleged Israeli airstrike targeted containers at the Latakia port in northwestern Syria. The Latakia area is a stronghold for Russian forces in Syria, with the Russian Khmeimim Air Base located near Latakia.” (12/16/21)
https://www.jpost.com/breaking-news/syrian-soldier-killed-in-alleged-israeli-airstrike-on-syria-688860
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6) Ethiopia: Regime thugs abduct journalist
Source: Edwardsville Intelligencer
“A freelance video journalist accredited to The Associated Press in Ethiopia has been detained by police in the capital, Addis Ababa, the news organization said Wednesday. Amir Aman Kiyaro was detained under the country’s new war-related state of emergency powers on Nov. 28 after returning home from a reporting trip. He has not been charged. Officials with the Ethiopian Media Authority, the prime minister’s office, the foreign ministry and other government offices have not responded to repeated requests from the AP for information about him since his detention. State media on Wednesday reported his detention, citing federal police, and said he was accused of ‘serving the purposes’ of a terrorist group by interviewing it. The report said local journalists Thomas Engida and Addisu Muluneh also were detained.” (12/15/21)
https://www.theintelligencer.com/news/article/Freelance-journalist-accredited-to-AP-detained-in-16704665.php
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7) Chauvin pleads guilty in federal court to violating George Floyd’s civil rights
Source: CNN
“Months after he was convicted of murder, former Minneapolis police officer Derek Chauvin pleaded guilty in federal court Wednesday to civil rights charges related to the death of George Floyd. Chauvin also pleaded guilty in a separate federal case in which he was accused of depriving the rights of a 14-year-old in Minneapolis in 2017 for allegedly kneeling on the back and neck of a handcuffed, non-resisting teenager. As part of the plea agreement, Chauvin faces a sentence of between 20 and 25 years in prison. Prosecutors requested that he be sentenced to 25 years in prison to be served concurrently with his current 22 and a half year 22 and a half year sentence on state murder charges.” (12/15/21)
https://www.cnn.com/2021/12/15/us/derek-chauvin-federal-plea-change-wednesday/index.html
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8) Fed sets stage for earlier, faster interest rate hikes as inflation soars
Source: USA Today
“In an effort to rein in price increases that hit a 39-year high last month, the Fed on Wednesday agreed to clear the way for earlier and faster interest rate hikes in 2022 by accelerating the phaseout of its bond-buying stimulus. The turnabout, which Fed Chair Jerome Powell signaled during congressional testimony late last month, came after consumer prices spiraled higher, reaching 6.8% annually in November, and the unemployment rate tumbled to 4.2% that same month. … To set the stage for earlier rate increases, the Fed said it would pare back its Treasury and mortgage bond purchases by a total $30 billion a month, up from the $15 billion it announced in November. The faster wind-down puts the central bank on track to conclude the bond purchases — which are aimed at pushing down long-term rates, such as for mortgages — by March instead of June.” (12/15/21)
https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2021/12/15/fed-meeting-interest-rates/8902953002/
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9) FL: Broward county school district to pay $26 million to shooting victims
Source: US News & World Report
“The Broward County, Florida, school district will pay more than $26 million to the families of 17 people killed and some of those injured in the 2018 Valentine’s Day massacre at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School. Board members approved the two legal settlements on Tuesday. A total of $25 million will be shared by 51 plaintiffs, including families of the 17 dead as well as students and staff who were injured at the Parkland school. The families also reached a settlement with the FBI last month that will pay them over $127 million for its failure to possibly prevent the attack. The district will also pay $1.25 million to Anthony Borges, who suffered some of the most severe injuries. His lawyer split off from the larger case, saying Borges will have a lifetime of expensive medical needs, according to the South Florida Sun Sentinel.” (12/15/21)
https://www.usnews.com/news/us/articles/2021-12-15/florida-district-to-pay-26-million-to-shooting-victims
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10) NYC: Regime weighs cutting off natural gas hookups for new buildings
Source: Seattle Times
“New York City lawmakers are poised to decide Wednesday whether to prohibit most new buildings from using natural gas, a move that would make the nation’s most populous city a showcase for a climate-change-fighting policy that has been both embraced and blocked around the country. The measure is expected to pass the City Council and subsequently receive Mayor Bill de Blasio’s signature. If all that happens, most construction projects submitted for approval after 2027 would have to use something other than gas or oil — such as electricity — for heating, hot water and cooking. Some smaller buildings would have to comply as early as 2024, while hospitals, commercial kitchens and some other facilities would be exempt.” (12/15/21)
https://www.seattletimes.com/business/nyc-weighs-cutting-off-natural-gas-hookups-for-new-buildings/
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11) Parker Solar Probe makes historic pass through Sun’s atmosphere
Source: BBC News [UK state media]
“The US space agency (Nasa) is calling it a historic moment — the first time a spacecraft has flown through the outer atmosphere of the Sun. The feat was achieved by the Parker Solar Probe, which dipped, for just a short while, into a region around our star that scientists call the corona. It occurred in April, but the analysis of data has only now confirmed it. Parker had to withstand intense heat and radiation but gathered new insights on how the Sun works. ‘Just as landing on the Moon allowed scientists to understand how it was formed, touching the Sun is a gigantic stride for humanity to help us uncover critical information about our closest star and its influence on the Solar System,’ said Nicola Fox, the director of Nasa’s heliophysics science division.” (12/15/21)
https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-59661827
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12) Blinken Cuts Short Asia Trip After Covid Case Among Travelling Group
Source: NDTV [India]
“US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has cut short his trip to Southeast Asia due to a COVID-19 case among his travelling party, a State Department official said on Wednesday. The decision was made to mitigate the COVID-19 risk and prioritise health and safety, and Blinken had expressed by phone his deep regret to the foreign minister of Thailand, where he was due to attend meetings on Thursday, State Department spokesperson Ned Price said.” (12/15/21)
https://www.ndtv.com/world-news/us-secretary-of-state-antony-blinken-cuts-short-asia-trip-after-covid-case-among-travelling-group-2653006
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13) SC: Former gubernatorial candidate John Warren launches Bitcoin venture
Source: San Francisco Chronicle
“John Warren, the multimillionaire businessman who forced South Carolina Gov. Henry McMaster into a GOP runoff,Warren announced his investment in GEM Mining on Wednesday. He and four other founding partners, all in South Carolina, decided to form the venture last year as the Bitcoin marketplace began booming, Warren told The Associated Press ahead of the official launch. ‘We saw huge opportunities with our connections to mining,’ Warren told AP. He said the Greenville-based company will be the largest of its kind in South Carolina, and that he hopes it will soon be among the top handful in the country.” (12/15/21)
https://www.sfgate.com/news/article/Former-SC-gov-candidate-John-Warren-launches-16703462.php
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14) US House votes to hold Trump’s ex-chief of staff in contempt
Source: Canadian Broadcasting Corporation [Canadian state media]
“The U.S. House of Representatives voted Tuesday to hold former White House chief of staff Mark Meadows in contempt of Congress after he ceased to co-operate with the Jan. 6 Committee investigating the Capitol insurrection — making it the first time the House has voted to hold a former member in contempt since the 1830s. The near-party-line 222-208 vote is the second time the special committee has sought to punish a witness for defying a subpoena. … The House vote sends the matter to the U.S. attorney’s office in Washington, where it will now be up to prosecutors in that office to decide whether to present the case to a grand jury for possible criminal charges.” (12/15/21)
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/mark-meadows-contempt-house-1.6286323?cmp=rss
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15) EPA Sued Over Refusal to Close Deadly Pesticide Loophole Decimating [sic] Honey Bees
Source: Common Dreams
“After waiting nearly five years for the Environmental Protection Agency to respond to a petition calling for the closing of a regulatory loophole which has proven deadly for honey bee colonies (spelling disaster for farmers’ crops, food security, and biodiversity) two advocacy groups are suing the agency and demanding officials take immediate action to end the use of harmful pesticides known as neonics. Joined by Pesticide Action Network (PAN) North America, the Center for Food Safety (CFS) filed the lawsuit saying the petition it sent to the EPA in April 2017 regarding the continued use of neonics, or neonicotinoids, provided ‘the legal blueprint to solve this problem and the legal impetus to do it.’ ‘While EPA fiddles, grave harm to bees and other pollinators continues,’ George Kimbrell, CFS legal director and counsel in the case, said Tuesday. ‘That delay must end.'” (12/15/21)
https://www.commondreams.org/news/2021/12/15/epa-sued-over-refusal-close-deadly-pesticide-loophole-decimating-honey-bees
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16) France: Regime expands ghettoization scheme with third booster requirement for over-65s
Source: France 24 [French state media]
“France on Wednesday begins implementing a new tightening of rules in the fight against Covid-19, meaning people aged 65 and over will lose the validity of their health pass unless they have had a third booster shot. The health pass was introduced in the summer and makes full vaccination against Covid-19, a recent recovery or negative test obligatory for visiting any restaurant or cafe, inter-city train travel and going to cultural venues like cinemas or museums. … The government says some 400,000 people aged 65 and over who are eligible for the booster shot have yet to take it, which is 12 percent of those aged 80 and above and 10 percent of those aged 65 to 79. People in the 65 plus age group who have failed to take up the booster shot will see the QR code in their health pass generated by a mobile phone app automatically dis-activated.” (12/15/21)
https://www.france24.com/en/europe/20211215-french-adults-over-65-without-a-covid-booster-shot-to-lose-health-pass-benefits
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17) “Alarmingly incoherent”: NYT columnist implores Biden not to run for reelection
Source: Fox News
“New York Times columnist Bret Stephens on Tuesday implored President Biden to not seek reelection in 2024 and announce his intentions as soon as possible so potential Democratic contenders could begin making preparations to replace him. In a piece headlined, ‘Biden Should Not Run Again, and He Should Say He Won’t,’ Stephens, a conservative and strong critic of Donald Trump, argued that Biden’s age, as well as his seemingly ‘uneven’ cognitive state, needed to be candidly discussed because it wasn’t healthy for him, his office, the Democratic Party, or the country to remain in limbo about what to do if he decides not to run. Stephens also argued it would be ‘liberating’ for Biden’s presidency if he announced he wouldn’t run, and that it would energize a currently ‘listless’ Democratic Party.” [editor’s note: That might be the first step in ensuring 2024 politics will be as bizarre as it appears it will be – SAT] (12/15/21)
https://www.foxnews.com/media/new-york-times-columnist-biden-re-election-should-alarmingly-incoherent
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18) UK: Supreme Court rules against gender-neutral passports
Source: ABC News
“A British activist lost a legal challenge at the U.K.’s highest court Wednesday to the government’s policy of not allowing gender-neutral passports. … A panel of judges unanimously dismissed the appeal, saying the gender of passport applicants is ‘a biographical detail which can be used to confirm their identity by checking it against the birth, adoption or gender recognition certificates provided and other official records.'” [editor’s note: Why would a traveler’s identity be any of the regime’s business? – TLK] (12/15/21)
https://abcnews.go.com/International/wireStory/uk-highest-court-rules-gender-neutral-passports-81766387
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19) NYC: Adams names first female police chief
Source: BBC News [UK state media]
“New York City’s police force will be led by a woman for the first time in its 176-year history, Mayor-elect Eric Adams announced on Wednesday. Keechant Sewell, 49, is a 23-year veteran of the Nassau Police Department in nearby Long Island, where she became chief of detectives in September 2020. For Mr Adams, the move fulfills a campaign pledge to name a female commissioner. The NYPD is the largest police force in the US. Speaking to media on Wednesday morning, Mr Adams (a former NYPD captain) said that women often are ‘sitting on the bench’ and ‘never allowed to get in the game’ when it comes to policing. ‘That is stopping today,’ he said. Ms Sewell, who is originally from the New York borough of Queens, previously served in New York’s Nassau County narcotics and major case units, and as a hostage negotiator.” (12/15/21)
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-59672998
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20) VA: Resident holds armed burglary suspect at gunpoint
Source: Times News Express
“A Virginia burglary suspect armed with a knife was arrested Sunday after an armed resident held the intruder at gunpoint until authorities could arrive. Jonah Smith, 47, was arrested and charged with burglary with a weapon and attempted malicious wounding over a Dec. 12 incident that happened before 8:22 a.m. in the 10600 block of Railroad Court in Fairfax, Virginia. Smith, who was unknown to residents, entered a home through an unsecured door without force and refused to leave, according to the City of Fairfax Police.” (12/14/21)
https://timesnewsexpress.com/news/newsusa/virginia-burglary-suspect-held-at-gunpoint-by-would-be-victim-until-police-arrived/
_____ Today's Freedom Commentary _____
21) How Could They Have Done This to the Children?
Source: Brownstone Institute
by Vinay Prasad
“School closure was the greatest self inflicted wound of the pandemic. Sensible European nations did not close primary school at all, or only for 6 weeks, but places in the USA remained closed for more than a year. This was a net negative for the health and well-being of children, and will damage this nation for years to come. … But the experts did not stop with closure. To this day, children suffer some of the harshest restrictions. … Some have claimed that our policies to children reflect ‘following the science.’ They do not. There is no science to support primary school closure. No science supported prolonged (>1 year) closure for any age. No science supported outdoor cloth mask mandates for young kids, and no science supported deviating from the WHO guidance. These policies meanwhile have devastating consequences for the well-being of children.” (12/15/21)
https://brownstone.org/articles/how-could-they-have-done-this-to-the-children/
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22) If You Want More of Something, Subsidize It (Population Edition)
Source: Garrison Center
by Thomas L Knapp
“I can’t help notice a contradiction when prominent progressives who claim to believe that overpopulation is a problem simultaneously support paying Americans to have more kids. And that’s exactly what schemes like the child tax credit come down to. It’s a time-worn truism: If you want more of something, subsidize it. If you want less of something, penalize it. True, those same progressives generally support using foreign aid to subsidize ‘family planning’ elsewhere, but if overpopulation is the concern, that amounts to bailing water out of the bow of the boat and pouring it into, rather than off, the stern. At best. At worst … well, paying rich white people to breed and paying poor black and brown people not to sounds like something I’d expect to hear from a Tucker Carlson guest panel on ‘replacement theory.'” (12/15/21)
https://thegarrisoncenter.org/archives/16487
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23) The Paperwork Coup
Source: The Atlantic
by David A Graham
“Evidence about the insurrection suggests that although the mob was an obvious threat to human life, it was never an especially serious one to American democracy. … Meanwhile, we now have a better sense of how dangerous what we might call the ‘paperwork coup’ was. The theory under which Trump and his cronies attempted to steal the election was not especially elaborate or persuasive, but it didn’t need to be. It was coherent, and if a few things had happened differently — most especially, if Vice President Mike Pence had gone along with it — the result would have been chaos at the least and possibly a second Trump term and widespread conflict at worst.” (12/15/21)
https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/archive/2021/12/trumps-coup-before-january-6/620998/
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24) The “Acid Rain” Scare and the Science-Industrial Complex
Source: Ludwig von Mises Institute
by William L Anderson
“[B]ecause covid-19 became a political malady, the political side has overwhelmed the medical/scientific aspect of this virus and its effects, because mystification happens to be politically useful. In other words, politics ultimately overwhelms science, and when politics comes to the fore, science itself disappears and is replaced by something akin to Lysenkoism, which is the ultimate result when everything in society becomes politicized. Much of the present corruption — no other word will suffice — of science via politics has come through environmentalism, and I present the case of acid rain as proof. While most readers probably are not familiar with the subject, forty years ago it was the environmental crisis.” (12/15/21)
https://mises.org/wire/acid-rain-scare-and-science-industrial-complex
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25) Led by Jeremy Corbyn, the British Left Opposes Vaccine Mandates as Anti-Worker and Repressive
Source: Glenn Greenwald
by Glenn Greenwald
“The shorthand label ‘anti-vax’ once had a clear and concise meaning: namely, those who reject the prevailing western scientific orthodoxy that vaccines are a safe and effective means of protecting humans against infectious diseases by training the immune system to combat a pathogen in advance. … But exactly as we have seen with so many other political labels — terrorist, racist, fascist, white nationalist, anti-Semite — this once-descriptive, precise and useful phrase has metamorphized far beyond its original meaning into something barely recognizable or cogent. That transformation has been deliberate, with a clear motive: to weaponize the term into a potent political insult designed to compel submission to decrees from institutions of authority and stigmatize dissenters, threatening them with reputation destruction.” (12/15/21)
https://greenwald.substack.com/p/led-by-jeremy-corbyn-the-british
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26) Biden’s Democracy Summit Suggests That Things Are About to Get a Lot Worse for Democracy
Source: Town Hall
by Rachel Marsden
“How precious is it that President Joe Biden still seems to genuinely believe that the United States is the ultimate guardian and arbiter of democracy worldwide? It’s not like the U.S. itself isn’t struggling with the concept, and Biden really isn’t making things better. American voters have long realized that those who are ultimately elected have the kind of financial hurdles to overcome that make it incredibly difficult for the Average Joe to participate, let alone win. Then, once they get to Washington, these elected representatives often succumb to the seductive siren song of special interests with deep pockets and an agenda that serves the elites to the detriment of the average citizen’s interests. The average voter ends up feeling like the democratic process and those selected through it are serving other masters.” (12/15/21)
https://townhall.com/columnists/rachelmarsden/2021/12/15/bidens-democracy-summit-suggests-that-things-are-about-to-get-a-lot-worse-for-dem-n2600564
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27) Covid-19 Economic Zombification
Source: American Institute for Economic Research
by Daniel Fernandez
“Economists and finance specialists are warning of the potential arrival of a new ‘Minsky moment’ in increasing numbers. The last time this term was used with such conviction was in 2008, at the onset of the Great Recession. … According to Minsky, when things are going well in an economy and income expectations are met, corporations begin to err on the side of optimism and excessively increase their debt. This causes a shift from a stable situation (in which hedge companies are the norm) to an unstable one (in which Ponzi companies are the norm). In a Ponzi situation, the economy will experience widespread defaults and a financial and economic crisis. An economy is said to be in a Minsky moment if debtors are unable to pay down their debts (a speculative situation) or unable to pay the interest and the principal (a Ponzi situation).” (12/15/21)
https://www.aier.org/article/covid-19-economic-zombification/
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28) Current Dispute Over ICBMs: A Quarrel Over Fine-Tuning the Doomsday Machinery
Source: Common Dreams
by Norman Solomon
“Nuclear weapons are at the pinnacle of what Martin Luther King Jr. called ‘the madness of militarism’. If you’d rather not think about them, that’s understandable. But such a coping strategy has limited value. And those who are making vast profits from preparations for global annihilation are further empowered by our avoidance. At the level of national policy, nuclear derangement is so normalized that few give it a second thought. Yet normal does not mean sane. As an epigraph to his brilliant book The Doomsday Machine, Daniel Ellsberg provides a chillingly apt quote from Friedrich Nietzsche: ‘Madness in individuals is something rare; but in groups, parties, nations, and epochs, it is the rule.’ Now, some policy technocrats for the USA’s nuclear arsenal and some advocates for arms control are locked in a heated dispute over the future of ICBMs: intercontinental ballistic missiles.” (12/15/21)
https://www.commondreams.org/views/2021/12/15/current-dispute-over-icbms-quarrel-over-how-fine-tune-doomsday-machinery
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29) The Sham of Biden’s Democracy Summit
Source: Future of Freedom Foundation
by Jacob G Hornberger
“With his two-day ‘Democracy Summit’ last week, President Biden continues renewed efforts by the U.S. national-security establishment to revive its old Cold War racket against China and Russia. The purpose of the summit, of course, was to highlight the fact that the United States has a democratic political system while China and Russia, who were not invited to participate in the summit, do not. Biden’s democracy summit, however, is one great big sham. That’s because for all practical purposes, the U.S. has a one-party political system, just like China does.” (12/15/21)
https://www.fff.org/2021/12/15/the-sham-of-bidens-democracy-summit/
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30) Feckless Endangerment
Source: Common Sense
by Paul Jacob
“The Biden administration sure knows how to look feckless when it comes to standing up to China. The administration has decided that the best way to protest Chinazi aggression against Hong Kong democracy and freedom — and against the lives and freedom of millions of Uyghurs — is to announce a ‘diplomatic’ boycott of the Beijing-sponsored Olympic games, scheduled to be held in February. U.S. participation would continue as before: athletes will perform, sports fans will attend, and corporations will make money. What will be missing? Government officials. Viewers around the world won’t notice any difference, of course. They don’t tune in to watch muckety-mucks photo-bombing the medal ceremonies. Even Jimmy Carter, loath to be outdone in the fecklessness department, knew that the way for the U.S. to boycott the 1980 Moscow-hosted Olympics in protest of the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan was to actually boycott the Olympics.” (12/15/21)
https://thisiscommonsense.org/2021/12/15/feckless-endangerment/
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31) Every Market Bubble Is a Time Machine
Source: American Consequences
by Dan Ferris
“Fish gotta swim, birds gotta fly … And I have to tell you that this is a bubble. Here in American Consequences, I write to you about the investment themes, stories, and ideas I find impossible to ignore. I can’t resist the urge to share them with you. And as you know, the massive market bubble we’re living in has been No. 1 among those ideas this year. Once I see data that tells me stocks are more expensive today than any time in history … including the dot-com and 1929 peaks … it’s too hard for me to look away. I realize being bearish can be annoying, so today I’ve included a few of the most compelling types of stocks investors should consider buying right now.” (12/15/21)
https://americanconsequences.com/every-market-bubble-is-a-time-machine/
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32) Predictions take paying attention
Source: Eastern New Mexico News
by Kent McManigal
“This past spring I noticed a bigger than usual crop of the plant that becomes tumbleweeds when it dies and the wind blows. I told a few people to be ready for an epic tumbleweed season this year. Then, I failed to see many tumbleweeds last month and wondered what had happened to them all. It turns out they had all gone to Oasis State Park to plot their attack. So, I was right about the bumper crop, but I missed where they were going. I can’t win ‘em all. Some things are easy to predict based on what you see happening in the world around you, but you have to pay attention to your surroundings. When you watch government counterfeiting trillions of dollars and calling it a stimulus, you can predict Inflation.” (12/15/21)
https://www.easternnewmexiconews.com/story/2021/12/15/voices/opinion-predictions-take-paying-attention/170663.html
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33) The Assange Issue Is NOT Complicated
Source: Caitlin Johnstone, Rogue Journalist
by Caitlin Johnstone
“The most powerful regime on the planet imprisoning a journalist for journalistic activity is as brazen and obvious an act of tyranny as you could possibly come up with, and yet you still get pseudoleft pundits acting like you’re some kind of weird freak for expecting them to oppose it. The Assange issue is not actually complicated. The most powerful government in the world is trying to extradite a journalist and try him under the Espionage Act for exposing its war crimes. It is that simple. This isn’t some super complex subject that you defer to the experts on. … It’s such a blatant abuse of government power that virtually everyone would normally be ideologically opposed to it, but because there’s been so much media spin on it for so long people don’t see it.” (12/15/21)
https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2021/12/15/the-assange-issue-is-not-complicated-notes-from-the-edge-of-the-narrative-matrix/
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34) Attract Government Attention and Get Your Name Run Through a “Terrorist” Database
Source: Reason
by JD Tuccille
“In 2021, it’s unfortunately not surprising to learn about routine federal surveillance of people who attract official attention. We live, after all, at a moment when freedom looks haggard and unloved even in liberal democracies and a record number of journalists are behind bars. That the practice of running people’s names through multiple government databases appears to be routine doesn’t bode well for the United States, let alone the world beyond. … Given the range of tools available to the feds, it’s not a shock that their use has become rote. What’s the point of having vast (if unreliable) databases on people’s activities if you’re not going to use them?” (12/15/21)
https://reason.com/2021/12/15/attract-government-attention-and-get-your-name-run-through-a-terrorist-database/
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35) Interest Rates, Money Supply, and GDP
Source: Cobden Centre
by Alasdair Macleod
“That the world is on the edge of a monetary and economic cliff is becoming increasingly obvious. And becoming more obviously permanent than transient, price inflation will almost certainly lead to rising interest rates. Rising bond yields, falling equity markets and debt-triggered insolvencies will naturally follow. According to the economists prevalent in official circles, a prospective mix of so-called deflation and rising prices are contradictory, should not happen at the same time, and therefore cannot be explained. Yet that is the prospect they now face.” (12/15/21)
http://www.cobdencentre.org/2021/12/interest-rates-money-supply-and-gdp/
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36) The new Dark Ages
Source: spiked
by Joel Kotkin
“If ignorance is bliss, the Western world should be ecstatic. Even as colleges churn out degrees and collect fees, and technology makes information instantly accessible, the basic level of literacy, as measured by such things as reading books and acquainting oneself with the past, is in a precipitous decline. Rather than building a vital world with our technological culture, we are repeating the memes of feudal times, driven by illiteracy, bias and a rejection of the West’s past. Over half of American adults have a reading level below the equivalent of sixth-grade level (11- to 12-year-olds), and book reading outside of school or work among the young in particular has declined markedly. … This loss of literacy comes at a time when much of our education and literary establishment has embraced censorship, while on the right there’s an increasingly Pavlovian embrace of book-banning.” (12/15/21)
https://www.spiked-online.com/2021/12/15/the-new-dark-ages/
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37) Forget Kamala Harris’s “likeability,” she’s can’t even do her job
Source: Fox News Forum
by Karol Markowicz
“This week, Fox News reporter Peter Doocy asked White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki ‘Is Vice President [Kamala] Harris still in charge of addressing the root causes of migration from El Salvador, Honduras, and Guatemala?’ It wasn’t a trick question and yet the answer was clearly complicated. Harris has largely been out of the spotlight on the issue since being handed over the reins in March of 2021. Psaki responded that yes, Harris was still in charge. The problem was that a few days earlier Guatemalan President Alejandro Giammattei had told Fox News that neither Harris nor anyone from the Joe Biden White House has been in contact with him since June. … With all the focus on whether Harris is likeable, not enough attention gets paid to the fact that she’s generally just not competent enough in the roles being assigned to her.” (12/15/21)
https://www.foxnews.com/opinion/kamala-harris-likability-job-karol-markowicz
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38) Disease And Purpose In Ivan Ilyich
Source: The American Conservative
by Auguste Meyrat
“Writers like Albert Camus and Franz Kafka told stories of dehumanized protagonists living out meaningless lives and meeting their deaths like dumb animals, but their novels more often seem like a copout from the human condition rather than realistic treatments. By contrast, in his novella The Death of Ivan Illych, Leo Tolstoy tells the story of a protagonist who tries to avoid the search for meaning only to be forcefully confronted with it as he dies a slow, painful death. It is far more realistic, and it illustrates deeper truths about the nature of humanity and its need for meaning.” (12/15/21)
https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/disease-and-purpose-in-ivan-ilyich/
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39) The ghost of Georgia 2008 should be haunting Kiev right now
Source: Responsible Statecraft
by Andrew Cockburn
“Current war-party bombast in the cause of Ukraine, supposedly menaced by massed hordes of Russian armored divisions, routinely evokes the 2008 war in the Caucuses in which, according to the tub-thumpers’ preferred narrative, Russia attacked Georgia without provocation only to be forced to withdraw thanks to Washington’s steely resolve. It is therefore worth recalling what actually happened.” (12/15/21)
https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2021/12/15/the-ghost-of-georgia-2008-should-be-haunting-kiev-right-now/
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40) Will We See Deflation in the Next 12 Months?
Source: CounterPunch
by Dean Baker
“I’m not worried at this point about a deflationary spiral, but I see what, to my view, is a plausible scenario where the CPI actually goes negative in the next twelve months. I go through the categories and my predictions component by component below, but there are four main items driving the story that I’ll mention here. First, I assume a sharp reversal in new and used car prices. The 11.1 percent increase in the former and 31.4 percent increase in the latter, have added 1.5 percentage points to the inflation rate over the last year. This run-up is due to the well-known shortage of semi-conductors. It seems that manufacturers are overcoming this shortage and getting up to normal production levels. This may lead to a situation where they are not only meeting normal demand, but actually could be overproducing and needed to markdown prices.” (12/15/21)
https://www.counterpunch.org/2021/12/15/will-we-see-deflation-in-the-next-12-months/
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41) Shadow Courts for Fossil Fuels Want a Green Makeover
Source: The American Prospect
by Lee Harris
“When residents of Abruzzo noticed a drilling platform for the Ombrina Mare oil field being installed less than six miles off the coast, public campaigns drew tens of thousands of protesters to oppose the extraction. In 2015, the Italian parliament ruled that companies could no longer drill so close to the shoreline. Two years later, Rockhopper Exploration, a U.K.-based company that had purchased a license to explore for oil in the area, sued the Italian government over that ban. Although the company said it had invested some $29 million in the project, according to an attorney representing Italy, it sued for $275 million in damages, citing the loss of expected future profits.” (12/15/21)
https://prospect.org/environment/shadow-courts-for-fossil-fuels-want-a-green-makeover/
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42) What a 40-Year Inflationary Peak Is Doing to Your Wages
Source: Libertarian Institute
by Ryan McMaken
“According to new data released Friday by the Bureau of Labor Statistics, price inflation in November rose to the highest level recorded in nearly forty years. According to the Consumer Price Index (CPI) for November, year-over-year price inflation rose to 6.8 percent. It hasn’t been that high since June 1982, when the growth rate was at 7.2 percent. … It’s unclear to what degree inflation might already be entrenched, but year-over-year growth in the CPI has been over 5 percent for the past six months—and on a clear upward trajectory. At the same time, inflation is taking a bite out of workers’ purchasing power. November’s numbers on average hourly earnings suggest that inflation is erasing the gains made in workers’ earnings.” (12/15/21)
https://libertarianinstitute.org/articles/what-a-40-year-inflationary-peak-is-doing-to-your-wages/
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43) Meet the (One-sided) Press
Source: Antiwar.com
by Paul W Lovinger
“When President Biden held his two-hour conversation with his counterpart, Vladimir Putin, on December 7, the American news media dutifully repeated what the White House had released: a warning by Biden to leave Ukraine alone — or else! But didn’t Putin have anything to tell Biden? Is there a Russian side to the matter? Not as far as some media are concerned.” (12/15/21)
https://original.antiwar.com/paul_lovinger/2021/12/14/meet-the-one-sided-press/
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44) Biden’s child care proposal is broken. Consider properly funding the Child Tax Credit instead.
Source: Niskanen Center
by Will Raderman
“When it comes to establishing effective programs, legislative design matters. In its current iteration, the child care proposal included in the Build Back Better Act (BBB) contains enough flaws to seriously stand in the way of its intended aims. … Absent upgrades to the Build Back Better child care proposal, legislators should consider reallocating the funds to the expanded Child Tax Credit (CTC).” (12/14/21)
https://www.niskanencenter.org/bidens-child-care-proposal-is-broken-consider-properly-funding-the-child-tax-credit-instead/
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45) How to Politicize a Tornado
Source: The Pamphleteer
by Davis Hunt
“Axios Nashville took the opportunity of devastating tornadoes in Tennessee, Illinois, Indiana, and Kentucky to shill the goo-goo-ga-ga idea that the ‘climate crisis’ may be making tornadoes worse. They shared the cute graphic above that is supposed to make the case, but actually says next to nothing about anything. I guess without God and Science, you have Climate Change and poorly rendered data art. The above graphic shows the number of ‘favorable days per decade’ since 1979 in which a tornado is likely to happen. In West Tennessee, the graphic shows that over the past decade, there have been an additional 2.5 days per decade since 1979 wherein a tornado could occur. The graphic says nothing about damage from tornadoes or the actual number of tornadoes. That’s probably because the danger posed by tornadoes has never been less threatening …” (12/15/21)
https://pamphleteer.co/newsletter/no-151-how-to-politicize-a-tornado/
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46) An Open Letter to California Public Recreation Officials
Source: Coyote Blog
by Warren Meyer
“New California rules are set to effectively end the ability of RVers to use generators to produce power in California …. The danger is that with this ban, and without investment on public lands, public campgrounds will lose relevance to a lot of the recreating public. The recent upsurge in interest by new demographics in camping in the outdoors will almost certainly be reversed. For years — and some of you are probably tired of hearing me on this — I have been arguing that the #1 improvement that public campgrounds should be considering is electrification. I fully understand that agencies like the USFS tend to have an immediate negative reaction to such proposals, fearing that it would over-develop the wilderness. But I argue the opposite — electrification would make campgrounds MORE rather than less natural.” (12/14/21)
https://coyoteblog.com/coyote_blog/2021/12/an-open-letter-to-california-public-recreation-officials.html
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47) Brutal and Unreformed — Sam Peckinpah’s “Straw Dogs” at 50
Source: Quillette
by Charlotte Allen
“December 22nd will be the 50th anniversary of the release of Sam Peckinpah’s Straw Dogs, a film so marked by violent killings and violent sex that, according to Peckinpah’s biographer, David Weddle, a third of the audience walked out of its premiere before the end. But most of those who remained, Weddle reports, hooted and cheered as protagonist David Sumner, a hitherto-passive American academic played by Dustin Hoffman, ruthlessly repelled a passel of homicidal home-invaders besieging the English farmhouse where he lived with his wife. … Straw Dogs was one of a clutch of films released during this period that examined the lethal conflict between savage rubes and clueless city sophistos — a counterpart to Ted Kotcheff’s grim Australian psychodrama, Wake in Fright (also 1971), and John Boorman’s Southern backwater classic, Deliverance (1972).” (12/14/21)
https://quillette.com/2021/12/15/brutal-and-unreformed-sam-peckinpahs-straw-dogs-at-50/
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48) One-party rule is toxic everywhere, including California
Source: Orange County Register
by Matt Fleming
“Gov. Gavin Newsom survived the recall and looks likely to cruise to reelection in 2022. So now what? I ask because though the state’s voters felt keeping in office Newsom was the best of the options, it’s undeniable that Californians are frustrated with the lack of solutions coming out of Sacramento, which is overwhelmingly Democratic. And because it’s overwhelmingly Democratic, criticism of Sacramento might seem partisan, but it’s not. It’s important that everyone, no matter their partisan affiliation, ask themselves: ‘How has an overwhelmingly Democratic ruling class addressed the problems in my life?’ … For those who might be already typing a ‘What about?’ email to me pointing to states run by a Republican supermajority where there’s a lack of improvement, my universal response is that you’re only proving my point about this not being partisan. It’s about a complacent ruling class that feels no threat of political competition.” (12/14/21)
https://www.ocregister.com/2021/12/14/one-party-rule-is-toxic-everywhere-including-california/
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49) Ten Predictions For the Year Ahead in Labor
Source: In These Times
by Hamilton Nolan
“This is the time of year when many publications are busy preparing their ‘Year in Review’ pieces. Boring! We already lived through the past year. We know what happened. Instead, let’s look ahead to 2022 -- the year that will be, probably. One of the most valuable lessons that a journalist can learn is: Never make predictions. You will inevitably end up looking dumb. That said, here are ten predictions for the year to come in the labor movement. I feel pretty confident about these. And with any luck, none of you will remember to look back at them a year from now to check my work. 1) Higher ed becomes a serious player in the union world. … 2) Culture wars in the union world. … 3) The economic situation for workers gets worse. … 4) The political situation gets worse, too. … 5) No major organizing numbers. … 6) More name brand union shops….” (12/15/21)
https://inthesetimes.com/article/2022-unions-strike-wave-amazon-starbucks-labor
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50) FDIC Chairman McWilliams Is Wedged In A Political Power Play
Source: Cato Institute
by Norbert Michel
“Two Board members have picked a fight — over a request for information, of all things, that wasn’t even blocked — to essentially give control of the FDIC to the head of a separate regulatory agency.” (12/14/21)
https://www.cato.org/commentary/fdic-chairman-mcwilliams-wedged-political-power-play
_____ Today's Freedom Podcast and Video _____
51) Free Talk Live, 12/15/21
Source: Free Talk Live
"Omicron is nothing to fear :: Mark still trashes the Free State Project :: Mark hates the FSP, not New Hampshire :: The community in New Hampshire :: Omicron variant is just the flu :: Anti-aging vaccine :: Political polarization :: Covid-19 proved that polarization has already reached a tipping point :: Show: 2021-12-15 Aria, Lori, Bonnie." [Flash audio or MP3] (12/15/21)
https://soundcloud.com/freetalklive/free-talk-live-2021-12-15
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52) The Bryan Hyde Show, 12/15/21
Source: The Bryan Hyde Show
“Politics is a leading cause of enemy-driven thinking. That’s why I find less and less relevance for it in my own life as time goes by.” [various formats] (12/15/21)
https://anchor.fm/bryan-hyde/episodes/2021-December-15-The-Bryan-Hyde-Show-e1boe9e
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53) My History Can Beat Up Your Politics, 12/14/21
Source: My History Can Beat Up Your Politics
“Harris and the Vice Presidency in a Historical Context.” [MP3] (12/14/21)
https://myhistorycanbeatupyourpolitics.wordpress.com/2021/12/14/harris-and-the-vice-presidency-in-a-historical-context/
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54) Ron Paul Liberty Report, 12/15/21
Source: Ron Paul Liberty Report
“Omicron ‘Shocker’: It’s’ Mostly Hitting The Vaxxed.” [Flash video] (12/15/21)
http://www.ronpaullibertyreport.com/archives/omicron-shocker-its-mostly-hitting-the-vaxxed
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55) Political Theater with Jason Dick, episode 231
Source: Roll Call
“Images are everything: Our photographers on a momentous year.” [various formats] (12/15/21)
https://rollcall.com/podcasts/political-theater/images-are-everything-our-photographers-on-a-momentous-year/
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56) Punk Rock Libertarians Podcast, episode 377
Source: The Daily Liberator
“Jussie found guilty, New Zealand cig ban, Ghislaine’s knockers and more!” [various formats] (12/15/21)
https://www.thedailyliberator.com/prl-podcast-episode-377-juicy/
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57) The Argument, 12/15/21
Source: New York Times
“Is Democracy’s Fate the Media’s Fault?” [Flash audio] (12/15/21)
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/12/15/opinion/the-argument-role-of-press-in-a-democracy.html
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58) The Tom Woods Show, episode 2025
Source: The Tom Woods Show
“Lessons From the Ron Paul Revolution.” [various formats] (12/14/21)
https://tomwoods.com/ep-2025-lessons-from-the-ron-paul-revolution/
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59) Bloggingheads.tv, 12/14/21
Source: Bloggingheads.tv
“Varieties of Psychedelic Experience | Robert Wright, John Horgan, Nikita Petrov.” [Flash video] (12/14/21)
https://bloggingheads.tv/videos/63308
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60) Conflicts Of Interest, episode 201
Source: Libertarian Institute
“Biden Allows Israel to Sabotage Iran Talks.” [various formats] (12/14/21)
https://libertarianinstitute.org/kyle/coi-201-biden-allows-israel-to-sabotage-iran-talks/
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