Saturday, March 4, 2023

Discover Credit Cards Will Track Gun Purchases From April

ORIGINAL LINK
Discover Credit Cards Will Track Gun Purchases From April

Authored by Naveen Athrappully via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

Credit card provider Discover Financial Services will soon allow its network to track purchases made using payment cards at gun stores—triggering criticism that such activity leads to targeting gun owners.

A pile of credit and debit cards in a file photo dated July 18, 2018. (Andrew Matthews/PA)

In September, the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) had launched a Merchant Category Code (MCC) for gun retailers. ISO is the organization responsible for classification of merchant categories used by payment cards. Discover told Reuters that it plans to implement the code beginning April. “We remain focused on continuing to protect and support lawful purchases on our network while protecting the privacy of cardholders,” the company said.

Discover’s decision has attracted strong criticism online. “This is a MASSIVE problem Congress needs to address, IMMEDIATELY!” Lauren Boebert (R-Colo.) said in a March 3 tweet.

“Discover Card will begin tracking firearm purchases starting next month. There are more than 50 million Discover cards in use right now. They are coming for your guns little by little,” Congressman Troy E. Nehls (R-Texas) said in a March 3 tweet.

“It’s called a Social Credit System. I have been warning ppl this is coming. This is just the tip of the iceberg,” said radio host Doll Arntzen.

Social Credit System is a national credit rating system used by Beijing that ranks and blacklists people in China based on criteria approved by the communist regime.

“American citizens should be able to exercise their Second Amendment rights without fear of being tracked or discrimination against. We’re solving this in West Virginia with the Second Amendment Financial Privacy Act. Congress needs to follow our lead,” said Riley Moore (R-W.Va.) in a tweet.

Intrusive Action

In a Feb. 27 post, the National Rifle Association’s (NRA) “lobbying” arm Institute for Legislative Action (ILA) pointed out that Discover’s statement to Reuters did not provide an explanation as to how the company will determine which purchases are suspicious enough to warrant reporting.

Discover also did not reveal whether customers will be provided with any information in case their purchases have triggered an alert.

“Use of the MCC can only inform a credit card company that a certain amount of money was spent at what is considered a firearm retailer. It cannot be used to track what was actually bought, much less determine why the purchase was made,” the post said.

“Thus, the program inherently poses a risk to consumers of needlessly intrusive and harassing consequences for completely lawful and innocent conduct.”

Tagging Gun Purchases, Legislation

A Discover company spokesperson told Reuters that other payment network firms have also decided to impose the new MCC code in April, without naming the firms. “We were following the industry for consistent implementation,” the spokesperson said.

Back in September, Mastercard, Visa, and American Express also announced that they will be assigning category codes for sales that take place at gun stores and on gun-related purchases from stores dealing in sporting goods.

Discover is a minor player in the U.S. credit and debit card industry, only accounting for 2 percent of the $9.56 trillion in purchases made through the payment methods last year. Visa had a 61 percent share, followed by Mastercard with 26 percent, and American Express with 11 percent.

Meanwhile, states are taking action to counter payment firms’ moves to track gun purchases. On Jan. 12, West Virginia introduced the Second Amendment Financial Privacy Act which bars financial institutions from disclosing financial records “in a manner that singles out or discriminates against any person based on activity protected by the Second Amendment to the United States Constitution.”

The bill warned that the new MCC code for gun purchases will pave the way for “unprecedented surveillance” of individuals who abide by Second Amendment activity as well as “unprecedented information sharing” between the

Tyler Durden Sat, 03/04/2023 - 18:30

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Another FBI Whistleblower Says He Was Forced To Inflate Domestic Terrorism Numbers

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Another FBI Whistleblower Says He Was Forced To Inflate Domestic Terrorism Numbers

Another FBI whistleblower has stepped forward to tell the House Select Subcommittee on the Weaponization of Federal Government that the agency had him boost domestic terrorism figures by dividing cases into multiple subdivisions.

FBI Special Agent Garret O'Boyle from the Kansas City field office told Congressional investigators that the agency had him divide a single domestic terrorism case into "four different cases," so that the FBI could go to Congress and say "look at all the domestic terrorism we’ve investigated," Fox News reports.

"Where, really, I was working on one case," O'Boyle continued. "But, the FBI can then say, well, he actually had four, and so we need you to give us more money because look at how big of a threat all this domestic terrorism is."

He also said that the FBI created a specific threat tag for pro-lifers "THREATSCOTUS2022" amid the leak of the Supreme Court's opinion in Dobbs v. Jackson Women's Health Center - as opposed to the raging pro-abortionists nationwide.

According to O'Boyle, the threat tag was shifted and "began focusing on pro-life adherence."

"When this threat tag came out, it was like, why are you focusing on pro-life people?" he said in an interview reviewed by Fox News. "It’s pro-choice people who are the ones protesting or otherwise threatening violence in front of Supreme Court justices’ houses."

Tyler Durden Sat, 03/04/2023 - 20:00

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Teen Girls Drowning in Sadness, Despair & Suicidal Thoughts: CDC



Almost six out of ten girls felt persistently sad or hopeless and about one in three seriously considered suicide in 2021, according to new data released by the Centers for Disease Control (CDC).

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Friday, March 3, 2023

America's War



In 2002, with a little help from National Defence, we brought to McGill the (then) president of the Club of Rome, Prince Hassan, who made a contribution to the Pluralism, Religion, and Public Policy conference I was co-chairing and to the book that came out of it, Recognizing Religion is a Secular S

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Health care workers cry foul on FDA claiming it didn’t prohibit Ivermectin for COVID-19



(Natural News) Dr. Yusuf Saleeby has practiced medicine for more than 30 years. He serves patients in South Carolina and until recently had never faced an investigation from his state medical board.

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US Department of Defence controlled the Covid Vaccine Programme from the start



New documents reveal the US Department of Defence (“DoD”) Controlled the Covid programme from the start, the military’s investigative newspaper Armed Forces Press has said. The US Food and Drug Administration (FDA”) vaccine approval process was theatre.

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BREAKING: DOD CONTROLLED COVID ‘VACCINES’ FROM THE START UNDER NATIONAL SECURITY PROGRAM – LIED THE ENTIRE TIME – Were NEVER ‘Safe and Effective’



BREAKING: DOD CONTROLLED COVID ‘VACCINES’ FROM THE START UNDER NATIONAL SECURITY PROGRAM – LIED THE ENTIRE TIME – Were NEVER ‘Safe and Effective’ I am reposting this important article from the Armed Forces Press.

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Not so fast Dr. Aseem Malhotra, not so fast; "I am sorry" please utter those words "I am sorry for the role I played initially in pushing the lunacy & mRNA technology injections"; I applaud you

I will write about this once, for Dr. Malhotra is now a strong warrior on our side, the right ‘evidence-informed, trustworthy’ side, and I begin with praise and welcome but with this sugar, there is some lemon coming. First, to Dr.

"Many Didn't Take it For Irrational Reasons" [Google blocked original posting]

You mean like maybe they didn’t want their fucking dad to die from experimental gene therapy technology that never worked on anything ever…that was bum-rushed through three months of bullshit trials? Like that kind of irrational reasoning?

ChatGPT replaces humans in 50% of US companies that use the AI bot: Report [Google blocked original posting]

"Nearly half of US companies currently using ChatGPT said the chatbot has already replaced workers, a recent survey revealed. This comes OpenAI CEO Sam Altman's warning that the AI chatbot shouldn’t be relied on for “anything important"". Earlier this month, job advice platform Resumebuilder."

Don’t Fall For The Wuhan Trap! Establishment Suddenly Admits Covid ‘Escaped’ From Biolab [Google blocked original posting]

The U.S. Energy Department and FBI Director Christopher Wray recently revealed to the public the COVID-19 virus “most likely” came from the infamous Wuhan Institute of Virology.

Top 10 myths told by covid “experts” that are now completely debunked [Google blocked original posting]

(Natural News) Misinformation about the Wuhan coronavirus (Covid-19) continues to run rampant as government officials and public health “experts” refuse to admit they were wrong about pretty much everything.

CDC Received Concerning Private Reports of Post-Vaccine Myocarditis, While Dismissing Concerns Publicly [Google blocked original posting]

It’s no secret by now that the CDC is not a particularly trustworthy or competent organization. Their documented failures on virtually every aspect of pandemic policy have been consistent and discrediting.

Five Lessons from Three Years of Authoritarianism  [Google blocked original posting]

Three years ago few of us knew the impending storm that was brewing; one that would upend the very fabric of global democracy, destroy whole communities, businesses and families and cause a vast number of children and adolescents to become unmoored and disengage from society, among many other... 

NBC Reporter Goes To Crimea, Shocks Viewers By Telling The Truth [Google blocked original posting]

Mainstream media correspondents for major US networks rarely, if ever, report from inside Crimea and certainly are nowhere near Russian-held territory in eastern Ukraine.

Why is Neurotoxic Fluoride Still Being Added to Our Drinking Water? [Google blocked original posting]

I never questioned whether fluoride was good for me until I hit the “period of enlightenment” in my twenties. I had no issue drinking tap water, always used a “#1 dentist-approved” fluoride toothpaste, and opted for fluoride treatments during cleaning.

Thursday, March 2, 2023

13 Numbers That Show How Dramatically We Have Failed America’s Children



The kids are not okay, and it is time for us to face the truth.  As long as I have been writing, surveys have shown that the mental health of our young people has been steadily getting worse.  But now we are learning that things really took an enormous turn for the worse during the pandemic.

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Eight Alarming Cover-ups and Contradictions in the East Palestine Train Wreck Chemical Nightmare Now Spreading Across Multiple States



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Insurrection not! Most Americans say FEDS instigated Jan. 6

ORIGINAL LINK
The U.S. Capitol is overrun by a mob on Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2021. (Video screenshot)

The U.S. Capitol is overrun by a mob on Wednesday, Jan. 6, 2021. (Video screenshot)

Sixty-one percent of Americans in a new poll think it's likely that government agents helped provoke the Jan. 6 riot at the nation's Capitol, which Democrat leaders and most of the liberal media have labeled an "insurrection."

The survey by Rasmussen Reports of 1,000 "U.S. likely voters" contacted Feb. 26-28 also found overwhelming majorities in favor of releasing all the surveillance video footage of the Jan. 6 events, after a politically-charged, Democrat-led investigation into Jan. 6 released only partial portions of the videos.

A flash bang grenade explodes in the crowd of unsuspecting Trump supporters on Jan. 6, 2021 at the U.S. Capitol (Courtesy Gateway Pundit)

A flash bang grenade explodes in the crowd of unsuspecting Trump supporters on Jan. 6, 2021 at the U.S. Capitol (Courtesy Gateway Pundit)

"Sixty-one percent (61%) of voters believe it is likely that undercover government agents helped provoke the Capitol riot, including 39% who think it’s Very Likely. Thirty percent (30%) don’t think it’s likely undercover agents helped provoke the riot, including 18% who say it is Not At All Likely," reports Rasmussen.

Seventy percent of Republicans, and 57 percent of both Democrats and unaffiliated voters, believe it is "at least somewhat likely" that undercover government agents helped provoke the Capitol riot," the survey found.

Meanwhile, a new federal GAO report "faulted a number of law enforcement agencies for allowing the riot to develop" on Jan. 6, WND reports. Then-House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Leader Chuck Schumer refused President Trump's offer of security help that day, and with chaos growing, numerous live J6 videos show people streaming into the Capitol building with security guards holding the door open for them and even taking selfies with rally attendees.

WND is now on Trump's Truth Social! Follow us @WNDNews

Regarding the release of J6 surveillance video, "Eighty-six percent (86%) of Republicans, 78% of Democrats, and 75% of voters not affiliated with either major party believe it is important that the public be able to view all the videos of the Capitol riot," according to Rasmussen, which reported the results Thursday.

Only 17 percent of those polled did not think it's important for the public to see all the Jan. 6 videos, the poll found.

Last month, Gateway Pundit and various conservative social media accounts publicized newly released J6 video showing D.C. police firing stun guns into peaceful protesters protesting at the Capitol, as WND reported. House Speaker Kevin McCarthy has pledged full access to 41,000 hours of J6 surveillance video to Fox News journalist and talk show host Tucker Carlson. McCarthy said the full array of video footage also will be made available to J6 defendants.

Only 47 percent of all "Likely Voters" polled said they think the Democrat-run congressional committee investigating Jan. 6 "did a good or excellent job," while 38 percent said it did a "poor job."

Here are some other findings from the poll:

  • "Voters under 40 are more likely than their elders to suspect the Capitol riot was provoked by undercover agents"
  • A majority of voters don’t think President Joe Biden "has kept his campaign promise to unite Americans"
  • One-third of those polled endorse a GOP congresswoman’s recent call for a “national divorce” between red states and blue states
  • Most voters give the federal government low ratings for its response to the train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio

SPECIAL OFFER: Get the one book that definitively exposes how the events of Jan. 6, 2021, are being exploited by the Democratic Party and the national news media to criminalize political protest and free speech in America. President Donald Trump praises investigative reporter Julie Kelly’s sensational book, “January 6: How Democrats Used the Capitol Protest to Launch A War on Terror Against the Political Right” as “a complete exposé of the left’s efforts to create violence and then exploit the violence to smear the Republican Party." Get your copy of Julie Kelly’s “January 6” at a DISCOUNTED PRICE at the WND SUPERSTORE!

EDITOR’S NOTE: Long the world’s most Christian nation, America today is being taken over by a new “official” national religion, one being imposed on the entire populace by every major societal institution, from government, media and big tech, to academia, entertainment and business.

This new state religion is Wokeism. “Going woke” conjures up visions of someone claiming to be acutely sensitive (“awake”) to “systemic social and political injustice.” And not just alleged bigotry against blacks, but toward every other “minority” as well, from LGBT folk – especially everything transgender and “nonbinary” – to “undocumented immigrants.” All of them, being VICTIMS, intrinsically more virtuous than the shameful oppressor class: primarily heterosexual white males.

This new “woke” consciousness has turned America upside-down – from the nationwide Antifa and Black Lives Matter riots in 2020, to tearing down of historic monuments, to demanding multi-million-dollar reparation payments for blacks, to appointing transgenders as top government officials, to rampant reverse discrimination in every area of life, to the U.S. military imposing mandatory “diversity training” and transgender pronoun use on all personnel, causing recruitment to disastrously plummet.

Yet there is hope. Being “saved” – which in Wokeism is called being “woke” – is largely a matter of worshipping victimhood by becoming an “ally” and “defender” of all the many victim classes, and a determined enemy of the straight white male oppressor class. Thus, “joining the righteous” as an ally – even if one is cursed to be a straight white male – opens the door mercifully for salvation, even to the most wretched.

That is the power of the religion of Wokeism. And it’s explored as never before in the February 2023 issue of WND’s critically acclaimed monthly Whistleblower magazine. If you’ve ever wondered, for example, exactly how the most radical elements in American society are successfully pressuring the biggest corporations into adopting the most outrageous and immoral policies imaginable, even when doing so permanently damages and devalues the company, the stunning answers are in this issue of Whistleblower, titled “WOKEISM: AMERICA’S OFFICIAL STATE RELIGION.”

Content created by the WND News Center is available for re-publication without charge to any eligible news publisher that can provide a large audience. For licensing opportunities of our original content, please contact licensing@wndnewscenter.org.

SUPPORT TRUTHFUL JOURNALISM. MAKE A DONATION TO THE NONPROFIT WND NEWS CENTER. THANK YOU!

The post Insurrection not! Most Americans say FEDS instigated Jan. 6 appeared first on WND.



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Government Reports & Pfizer Documents prove COVID Vaccination is causing Depopulation & we now have evidence it was the plan all along



If we told you 20 million people had died across just the ‘FIve Eyes’ & 26 countries across Europe over the past two years resulting in the most excess deaths seen in half a decade wouldn’t you at least be a little bit curious to find out why?

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Larry Summers says the economy could be headed towards a ‘Wile E. Coyote moment’



“I think the economy is vulnerable to a Wile E.

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Poison pills in COVID 'virus' & why we must investigate Fauci, Francis Collins, Baric, Daszak etc. & jail them if wrong is shown; the manufactured virus's spike is deadly as is the vaccine's spike



I am closer to concluding that we are all injured in varying degrees, due to exposure to the virus, regardless of natural immunity. Or recovery. I think this virus hurts us all. I do not think it is as clean as exposure, then immunity, and that is it.

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Hospitals remain in the red, giving the government leverage to again pay them for government-imposed forms of care [Google blocked original posting]

From Becker’s Hospital Review we see an unsurprising trend worsens: fewer people going to hospitals, although it seems there are more people with medical conditions folloowing cases of COVID and especially the COVID injections. Patients are wary.

Subprime Auto Lender And Used Car Retailer Collapses As Distress Cycle Finally Arrives [Google blocked original posting]

… which was to be expected: after all the latest consumer credit report from the Fed revealed an exponential spike in the amount of new car loans, which increased by more than $2,000 in one quarter, from just over $38,000 (a record), to $40,155 (a new record).

‘Worst Public Health Mistakes in History,’ Witness Tells COVID Pandemic Oversight Committee



Miss a day, miss a lot. Subscribe to The Defender's Top News of the Day. It's free. The agenda for the subcommittee, chaired by Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R-Ohio), focused on government policy pertaining to COVID-19, including vaccine mandates and other public health guidance.

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This is intentional deception: "Cycling teacher, 44, felt ‘a disruption’ in her body. 3 days later, she had a ‘widow maker’ heart attack"

https://www.today.com/today/amp/rcna71959

Not like we don't have evidence that the vaccine is associated with heart issues... not mentioning it as a potential causal factor makes this story seem likely to be a form of planted misdirection

A widow maker heart attack occurs when the main artery, called the left anterior descending artery, is significantly blocked, according to the Cleveland Clinic.

Harr never lost consciousness or went into cardiac arrest. And she doesn't have any obvious risk factors, like underlying health conditions or genetic markers, that would put her at a higher risk for having a serious heart attack like this, she says.

The only potential risk factor she can think of was the mild COVID-19 infection she had a few months prior to the heart attack. That, coupled with the stress of having to temporarily close her fitness business in 2020, may have contributed to her risk, she says.

Wednesday, March 1, 2023

Animals Dying Across Ohio State Parks After East Palestine Train Derailment

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Animals Dying Across Ohio State Parks After East Palestine Train Derailment

After a catastrophic train derailment in East Palestine, Ohio, early last month, President Biden, Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg, corporate media outlets, Ohio Governor Mike DeWine, Environmental Protection Agency, and some local officials have ensured air monitoring and water sample tests show everything is under control. 

But is it? Well, not according to the local newspaper Ohio Star. Reporter Hannah Poling said a confidential source told her that a wildlife biologist and consultant for the federal forestry received hundreds of reports over the last several days from forestry workers discovering "hundreds of dead animals in Ohio's parks." 

Several labs across the country have received specimens of whole minks, deer, elk, worms and livers of such animals, and they are finding toxicities that are off the charts, the source said. 

"These highly toxic levels are the exact chemicals that were released from East Palestine. Wayne National Forest and Shawnee State Forest in Ohio, are downriver from East Palestine and are two parks where samples are from," the source continued. 

Meanwhile, the BBC reported: 

Nearly 45,000 animals have died as a result of a toxic train crash this month in an Ohio town, environmental officials have said.

 The figure from the Ohio Department of Natural Resources updates the initial estimate of 3,500 animals dead after the 3 February derailment.

The source also told the Ohio Star that Governor DeWine attempted to block scientists from entering state parks:

The governor and the railroad were blocking scientists from getting soil samples in East Palestine, but they were able to still grab some for testing. Likewise, the soils are highly contaminated," the source said.

The source claims that the Ohio governor only uses his own hand-picked scientists to "give him the results he wants."

"It is heartbreaking to me that politicians like DeWine make an issue like this political. It should not be. He should be doing all he can to protect people, animals and the environment and not just cover his own behind," the source added.

There have been countless reports of health concerns by the residents of East Palestine and surrounding communities following the derailment of ten railcars carrying hazardous materials, including vinyl chloride, that first responders eventually burned off. 

After the burn, "some residents say they have been diagnosed with bronchitis, lung issues, and rashes that doctors and nurses suspect are linked to the chemical exposure," said Ohio Star. 

According to local TV station WKBN, residents have sent a list of demands for Norfolk Southern and the federal government, outlining the much-needed help their community deserves after a botched response

Below is the list of demands:

  1. Relocation for anyone who wants it. Folks don't feel safe and aren't getting their questions answered. Anyone who wants to be relocated to hotels or safe housing should have the opportunity to do so, paid for by Norfolk Southern.
  2. Independent environmental testing. The EPA must immediately begin and continue to test soil, water, and air, including for dioxins throughout the region, and commit to regular public meetings to explain findings. Norfolk Southern must pay for an independent scientist, hired by residents, to represent the community and participate in all technical meetings regarding testing, cleanup, and safety plans.  
  3. Ongoing medical testing and monitoring: We still don't know what the short and long-term health impacts of this disaster will be. Federal Health & Human Services must provide ongoing health monitoring to evaluate those in the impacted region, guarantee health coverage, and Norfolk Southern must cover the cost.
  4. Dispose of the toxic waste safely: The EPA cannot take the solid waste from the derailment and dispose of it in the Heritage Thermal toxic incinerator, in nearby East Liverpool, that has already been polluting our communities for years. This will only further spread the contaminants. Norfolk Southern must stop destroying evidence – we need a safety plan before resuming cleanup from the derailment site.
  5. Norfolk Southern pays 100% of the costs. Taxpayers shouldn't foot this bill. Norfolk Southern made this mess, they should clean it up. The company must commit to paying 100% of the costs for testing, relocation, cleanup, medical monitoring and costs, and an independent science advisor.

The Biden administration's lack of leadership and physical presence after the train derailment was a crucial mistake. What happened is that Biden's opponents, such as former President Trump, seized on this opportunity for political points ahead of the 2024 presidential election cycle. Trump met with local officials and residents last week. Some have said this is "Biden's Katrina." 

Tyler Durden Wed, 03/01/2023 - 19:20

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SCOTUS Says Domestic Spying Is Too Secret to be Challenged in Court

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Officials shield government abuses from litigation by claiming “national security.” The Supreme Court declined to weigh in.

By J.D. Tuccille

Global Research, March 01, 2023

Reason 27 February 2023

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***

Abusive government behavior has again been found to be too sensitive to national security to face legal challenges in the court system. Last week, the U.S. Supreme Court declined to review a lower court’s dismissal of the Wikimedia Foundation’s lawsuit against a National Security Agency surveillance program revealed a decade ago by Edward Snowden. With “state secrets privilege” barring litigation, that leaves upcoming congressional debates over renewal of the law authorizing the program as the only recourse for civil liberties advocates.

“The U.S. Supreme Court today denied the Wikimedia Foundation’s petition for review of its legal challenge to the National Security Agency’s (NSA) ‘Upstream’ surveillance program,” Wikimedia announced February 21. “Under this program, the NSA systematically searches the contents of internet traffic entering and leaving the United States, including Americans’ private emails, messages, and web communications. The Supreme Court’s denial leaves in place a divided ruling from the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Fourth Circuit, which dismissed Wikimedia’s case based on the government’s assertion of the ‘state secrets privilege.’”

“This decision is a blow to the rule of law,” commented Alex Abdo, of the Knight First Amendment Institute at Columbia University, which worked with Wikimedia and the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). “The government has now succeeded in insulating from public judicial review one of the most sweeping surveillance programs ever enacted. If the courts are unwilling to hear Wikimedia’s challenge, then Congress must step in to protect Americans’ privacy by reining in the NSA’s mass surveillance of the internet.”

The “Upstream” surveillance program at issue collects “communications ‘to, from, or about’” a foreign target designated under Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act, according the NSA. In the clearer language of the Electronic Frontier Foundation, “upstream surveillance involves collecting communications as they travel over the Internet backbone, and downstream surveillance (formerly PRISM) involves collection of communications from companies like Google, Facebook, and Yahoo.”

As Edward Snowden revealed and the NSA conceded, this broad surveillance may be authorized against foreign targets, but frequently scoops up Americans—often deliberately. “The government is increasingly using these broad and intrusive spying powers in run-of-the-mill criminal investigations against Americans, circumventing their Fourth Amendment rights,” the ACLU warned in 2020.

Wikimedia argues that the NSA’s surveillance discourages people from using Wikimedia’s Wikipedia to research sensitive topics for fear of attracting government attention. The organization points to a 2016 article in the Berkeley Technology Law Journal that reported “a statistically significant immediate decline in traffic for [privacy-sensitive] Wikipedia articles after June 2013, but also a change in the overall secular trend in the view count traffic, suggesting not only immediate but also long-term chilling effects resulting from the NSA/PRISM online surveillance revelations.”

But in court, federal attorneys insisted that the NSA’s surveillance programs are such secret-squirrel stuff that national security would suffer if the nation’s snoops were compelled to explain how their activities can possibly square with constitutional protections for individual rights. The court bought it.

“In a divided ruling on Wednesday, the 4th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said that the lawsuit must be dismissed after the government invoked the ‘state secrets privilege’, which meant that a full exploration of the issue in a court would damage national security,” Reuters reported in 2021. That decision was left to stand last week by the Supreme Court.

As I’ve pointed out before, state secrets privilege has a sketchy history, evolving from bad official behavior after a 1948 plane crash that killed several civilian observers. When the observers’ widows sued in United States v. Reynolds, the government argued that information about the plane was too super-secret to be revealed in court (a complete lie concealing official negligence, by the way). The Supreme Court agreed that some things are too sensitive to reveal in legal proceedings and gave officialdom a free pass to invoke the phrase “national security” as a shield against accountability. That disturbs even some modern members of the Supreme Court.

While not entirely questioning the existence of state secrets privilege, it “is no blunderbuss and courts may not flee from the field at its mere display,” Justice Neil Gorsuch wrote last year in a dissent joined by Justice Sonia Sotomayor to the majority’s invocation of the privilege in United States v. Zubaydeh. “Recent history reveals that executive officials can sometimes be tempted to misuse claims of national security to shroud major abuses and even ordinary negligence from public view.”

That case involved detention and torture at a black site in Poland under circumstances the government clearly found embarrassing. The Wikimedia lawsuit involves allegations of widespread domestic snooping that also reflect poorly on the powers that be. Political inconvenience is a lousy reason for preventing legal challenges to unconstitutional and criminal government conduct.

Unfortunately, the Supreme Court’s decision leaves little recourse for determining the extent of domestic surveillance by the NSA and seeking its end. The spy agency says it cut back after “inadvertent compliance incidents related to queries involving U.S. person information.” But that leaves the public taking the NSA at its word and wondering just what is going on behind the scenes.

Edward Snowden revealed just how far we should trust the intelligence apparatus.

The Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act‘s Section 702, which authorizes the Upstream surveillance at issue in Wikimedia’s litigation, is up for reauthorization this year, and the NSA very much wants to retain its broad power. It faces calls for reform from civil libertarians outside government, but also from Republicans and Democrats concerned about intrusive spying on Americans.

“While surveilling foreign targets under the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA), the US government collects exabytes of data pertaining to American citizens,” Rep. Thomas Massie (R-Ky.) objected earlier this month. “The Constitution requires a warrant to query that vast database for Americans. End warrantless spying now.”

Similarly, Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) has long called for the intelligence community to reveal how many Americans it sweeps up, and for curbs on such snooping.

With litigation against domestic spying thwarted by the invocation of “state secrets privilege,” Congress, for all its many faults, may be the last line of defense.

*

Note to readers: Please click the share buttons above. Follow us on Instagram and Twitter and subscribe to our Telegram Channel. Feel free to repost and share widely Global Research articles.

J.D. TUCCILLE is a contributing editor at Reason.

Featured image is from Medical Extremism

The original source of this article is Reason

Copyright © J.D. TuccilleReason, 2023

https://www.globalresearch.ca/scotus-says-domestic-spying-too-secret-challenged-court/5810500



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Kari Lake files election integrity case with the Arizona Supreme Court

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kari%20lake.jpg?h=d1cb525d&itok=CJwybSIi

Lake vowed to take her case to the Arizona Supreme Court after the appeals court ruled against her

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Chris Hedges: Russiagate Spells Journalism's Death

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Chris Hedges: Russiagate Spells Journalism's Death

Authored by Chris Hedges via ScheerPost.com,

The media caters to a particular demographic, telling that demographic what it already believes - even when it is unverified or false. This pandering defines the coverage of the Trump-Russia saga...

Reporters make mistakes. It is the nature of the trade. There are always a few stories we wish were reported more carefully. Writing on deadline with often only a few hours before publication is an imperfect art. But when mistakes occur, they must be acknowledged and publicized. To cover them up, to pretend they did not happen, destroys our credibility. Once this credibility is gone, the press becomes nothing more than an echo chamber for a selected demographic. This, unfortunately, is the model that now defines the commerical media.

The failure to report accurately on the Trump-Russia saga for the four years of the Trump presidency is bad enough.

What is worse, major media organizations, which produced thousands of stories and reports that were false, refuse to engage in a serious postmortem. The systematic failure was so egregious and widespread that it casts a very troubling shadow over the press. How do CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS, MSNBC, The Washington Post, The New York Times and Mother Jones admit that for four years they reported salacious, unverified gossip as fact? How do they level with viewers and readers that the most basic rules of journalism were ignored to participate in a witch hunt, a virulent New McCarthyism? How do they explain to the public that their hatred for Trump led them to accuse him, for years, of activities and crimes he did not commit? How do they justify their current lack of transparency and dishonesty? It is not a pretty confession, which is why it won’t happen. The U.S. media has the lowest credibility — 26 percent — among 46 nations, according to a 2022 report from the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. And with good reason.

The commercial model of journalism has changed from when I began working as a reporter, covering conflicts in Central America in the early 1980s. In those days, there were a few large media outlets that sought to reach a broad public. I do not want to romanticize the old press. Those who reported stories that challenged the dominant narrative were targets, not only of the U.S. government but also of the hierarchies within news organizations such as The New York Times. Ray Bonner, for example, was reprimanded by the editors at The New York Times when he exposed egregious human rights violations committed by the El Salvadoran government, which the Reagan administration funded and armed. He quit shortly after being transferred to a dead-end job at the financial desk. Sydney Schanberg won a Pulitzer Prize for his reporting in Cambodia on the Khmer Rouge, which was the basis for the film “The Killing Fields.” He was subsequently appointed metropolitan editor at The New York Times where he assigned reporters to cover the homeless, the poor and those being driven from their homes and apartments by Manhattan real estate developers. The paper’s Executive Editor, Abe Rosenthal, Schanberg told me, derisively referred to him as his “resident commie.” He terminated Schanberg’s twice-weekly column and forced him out. I saw my career at the paper end when I publicly criticized the invasion of Iraq. The career-killing campaigns against those who reported controversial stories or expressed controversial opinions was not lost on other reporters and editors who, to protect themselves, practiced self-censorship.

But the old media, because it sought to reach a broad public, reported on events and issues that did not please all of its readers. It left a lot out, to be sure. It gave too much credibility to officialdom, but, as Schanberg told me, the old model of news arguably kept “the swamp from getting any deeper, from rising higher.”

The advent of digital media and the compartmentalizing of the public into antagonistic demographics has destroyed the traditional model of commercial journalism. Devastated by a loss of advertising revenue and a steep decline in viewers and readers, the commercial media has a vested interest in catering to those who remain. The approximately three and a half million digital news subscribers The New York Times gained during the Trump presidency were, internal surveys found, overwhelmingly anti-Trump. A feedback loop began where the paper fed its digital subscribers what they wanted to hear. Digital subscribers, it turns out, are also very thin-skinned. 

“If the paper reported something that could be interpreted as supportive of Trump or not sufficiently critical of Trump,” Jeff Gerth, an investigative journalist who spent many years at The New York Times recently told me, they would sometimes “drop their subscription or go on social media and complain about it.” 

Giving subscribers what they want makes commercial sense. However, it is not journalism.

News organizations, whose future is digital, have at the same time filled newsrooms with those who are tech-savvy and able to attract followers on social media, even if they lack reportorial skills. Margaret Coker, the bureau chief for The New York Times in Baghdad, was fired by the newspaper’s editors in 2018, after management claimed she was responsible for its star terrorism reporter, Rukmini Callimachi, being barred from re-entering Iraq, a charge Coker consistently denied. It was well known, however, by many at the paper, that Coker filed a number of complaints about Callimachi’s work and considered Callimachi to be untrustworthy. The paper would later have to retract a highly acclaimed 12-part podcast, “Caliphate,” hosted by Callimachi in 2018, because it was based on the testimony of an imposter. “‘Caliphate’ represents the modern New York Times,” Sam Dolnick, an assistant managing editor,said in announcing the launch of the podcast. The statement proved true, although in a way Dolnick probably did not anticipate.

Gerth, a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter who worked at The New York Times from 1976 until 2005, spent the last two years writing an exhaustive look at the systemic failure of the press during the Trump-Russia story, authoring a four-part series of 24,000 words that has been published by The Columbia Journalism Review. It is an important, if depressing, read. News organizations repeatedly seized on any story, he documents, no matter how unverified, to discredit Trump and routinely ignored reports that cast doubt on the rumors they presented as fact. You can see my interview with Gerth here.

The New York Times, for example, in January 2018, ignored a publicly available document showing that the FBI’s lead investigator, after a ten month inquiry, did not find evidence of collusion between Trump and Moscow. The lie of omission was combined with reliance on sources that peddled fictions designed to cater to Trump-haters, as well as a failure to interview those being accused of collaborating with Russia.

The Washington Post and NPR reported, incorrectly, that Trump had weakened the GOP’s stance on Ukraine in the party platform because he opposed language calling for arming Ukraine with so-called “lethal defensive weapons” — a position identicalto that of his predecessor President Barack Obama. These outlets ignored the platform’s support for sanctions against Russia as well its call for “appropriate assistance to the armed forces of Ukraine and greater coordination with NATO defense planning.” News organizations amplified this charge. In a New York Times column that called Trump the “Siberian candidate,” Paul Krugman wrote that the platform was “watered down to blandness” by the Republican president. Jeffrey Goldberg, editor of The Atlantic, described Trump as a “de facto agent” of Vladimir Putin. Those who tried to call out this shoddy reporting, including Russian-American journalist and Putin critic Masha Gessen were ignored.

After Trump’s first meeting as president with Putin, he was attacked as if the meeting itself proved he was a Russian stooge. Then New York Times columnist Roger Cohen wrote of the “disgusting spectacle of the American president kowtowing in Helsinki to Vladimir Putin.” Rachel Maddow, MSNBC’s most popular host, said that the meeting between Trump and Putin validated her covering the Trump-Russia allegations “more than anyone else in the national press” and strongly implied — and her show’s Twitteraccount and YouTube page explicitly stated — that Americans were now “coming to grips with a worst-case scenario that the U.S. president is compromised by a hostile foreign power.” 

The anti-Trump reporting, Gerth notes, hid behind the wall of anonymous sources, frequently identified as “people (or person) familiar with” — The New York Times used it over a thousand times in stories involving Trump and Russia, between October 2016 and the end of his presidency, Gerth found. Any rumor or smear was picked up in the news cycle with the sources often unidentified and the information unverified.

A routine soon took shape in the Trump-Russia saga.

“First, a federal agency like the CIA or FBI secretly briefs Congress,” Gerth writes.

“Then Democrats or Republicans selectively leak snippets. Finally, the story comes out, using vague attribution.”

These cherry-picked pieces of information largely distorted the conclusions of the briefings. 

The reports that Trump was a Russian asset began with the so-called Steele dossier, financed at first by Republican opponents of Trump and later by Hillary Clinton’s campaign. The charges in the dossier — which included reports of Trump receiving a “golden shower” from prostituted women in a Moscow hotel room and claims that Trump and the Kremlin had ties going back five years — were discredited by the FBI.

“Bob Woodward, appearing on Fox News, called the dossier a ‘garbage document’ that ‘never should have’ been part of an intelligence briefing,” Gerth writes in his report.

“He later told me that the Post wasn’t interested in his harsh criticism of the dossier. After his remarks on Fox, Woodward said he ‘reached out to people who covered this’ at the paper, identifying them only generically as ‘reporters,’ to explain why he was so critical. Asked how they reacted, Woodward said: ‘To be honest, there was a lack of curiosity on the part of the people at the Post about what I had said, why I said this, and I accepted that and I didn’t force it on anyone.’”

Other reporters who exposed the fabrications — Glenn Greenwald at The Intercept, Matt Taibbi at Rolling Stone and Aaron Mate at The Nation — ran afoul of their news organizations and now work as independent journalists.

The New York Times and The Washington Post shared Pulitzer Prizes in 2019 for their reporting on “Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and its connection to the Trump campaign, the President-elect’s transition team and his eventual administration.”

The silence by news organizations that for years perpetuated this fraud is ominous. It cements into place a new media model, one without credibility or accountability. The handful of reporters who have responded to Gerth’s investigative piece, such as David Corn at Mother Jones, have doubled down on the old lies, as if the mountain of evidence discrediting their reporting, most of it coming from the FBI and the Mueller Report, does not exist. 

Once fact becomes interchangeable with opinion, once truth is irrelevant, once people are told only what they wish to hear, journalism ceases to be journalism and becomes propaganda.

*  *  *

NOTE TO READERS FROM CHRIS HEDGES: There is now no way left for me to continue to write a weekly column for ScheerPost and produce my weekly television show without your help. The walls are closing in, with startling rapidity, on independent journalism, with the elites, including the Democratic Party elites, clamoring for more and more censorship. Bob Scheer, who runs ScheerPost on a shoestring budget, and I will not waver in our commitment to independent and honest journalism, and we will never put ScheerPost behind a paywall, charge a subscription for it, sell your data or accept advertising. Please, if you can, sign up at chrishedges.substack.com so I can continue to post my now weekly Monday column on ScheerPost and produce my weekly television show, The Chris Hedges Report.

Tyler Durden Wed, 03/01/2023 - 21:40

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Bankruptcies Absolutely Soar As America’s Absurd Debt Bubble Begins To Implode

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I am so alarmed by the economic numbers that have been coming out recently.  I wrote about some of them in an article that I posted yesterday, and I am going to write about some more of them today.  Ever since the end of the Great Recession, Americans have been piling up debt at a staggering pace, and now that debt bubble is starting to implode.  There isn’t really a precedent for this, and so we can’t look back at past events in order to project what will happen next.  But it should be obvious to all of us that things will soon start getting really bad in this country.

It was only a matter of time before bankruptcies began to soar, and according to CBS News that is precisely what is happening…

The end of federal pandemic aid is putting many Americans and businesses under mounting financial pressure, leading to a spike in bankruptcies.

Total bankruptcy filings in January shot up 19% in January to 31,087, up 19% from a year ago, according to data from Epiq, a legal research firm. The number of Americans who filed for bankruptcy across Chapters 7, 11 and 13 shot up 20% in January from a year ago.

I am particularly concerned about the number of large companies that are now being forced into bankruptcy.  According to Zero Hedge, large companies are filing for bankruptcy at the fastest pace that we have seen since the days of the Great Recession…

The spike in defaults was not a fluke, and according to Bloomberg data, one month later – as of the end of February – no less than 39 large companies had filed for bankruptcy in the US so far this year, as February’s pace matches that of January; the YTD total represents the fastest pace of companies filing for bankruptcy since the immediate aftermath of the global financial crisis in 2009.

As I keep warning, one sector to keep a very close eye on is commercial real estate.

In September 2021, PIMCO acquired Columbia Property Trust Inc. in a blockbuster multi-billion dollar deal

In September that year, Pacific Investment Management Co. said it was acquiring Columbia Property Trust Inc., which owned 19 office buildings in New York, San Francisco, Washington, D.C., and other cities. The deal valued Columbia at $3.9 billion.

But now here we are less than two years later and Columbia is failing.

In fact, it has just defaulted “on more than $1.7 billion of debt backed by seven of its buildings”

Columbia has now defaulted on more than $1.7 billion of debt backed by seven of its buildings, according to people familiar with the matter, which makes it one of the biggest office defaults during the pandemic period.

This is just the beginning.

We really are on the brink of the worst commercial real estate crisis in U.S. history, and it is going to be a complete and utter nightmare.

Meanwhile, U.S. consumers are also drowning in debt like never before.

Over the past couple of years, vehicle prices have escalated dramatically, and at this point millions of Americans are making monthly vehicle payments “of $1,000 or more”

For the typical American, a new car is increasingly out of reach. Today, about two out of 13 people are making monthly car payments of $1,000 or more. For many, there’s no choice: They have few or no public transportation options and need a car to get to work, bring children to school and buy groceries.

I couldn’t imagine paying over $1,000 a month on a vehicle.

That is insane.

But this is the reality of living in this day and age.

As Steve Cortes has pointed out, Americans have also accumulated more than a trillion dollars in credit card debt…

A Trillion dollars in Credit Card debt.

What does it mean, especially for working class families?

Answers here in a new Cortes #ChalkTalk pic.twitter.com/uNcTebpA44

— Steve Cortes (@CortesSteve) February 21, 2023

The average rate of interest on credit card balances recently hit an all-time record high, and rates are likely to only go higher from here.

Sadly, we are also in the early stages of the worst housing crash since 2008.

As I detailed in a previous article, U.S. home prices have now declined for six months in a row.

And we have just learned that mortgage applications have fallen to the lowest level that we have seen in 28 years

Applications for a mortgage fell for the third week in a row and now sit at a 28-year low for the second-straight week, according to data released Wednesday.

With mortgage rates half a percentage point higher over the past month, home buyers are pulling back even as the spring home buying season should be heating up.

Just think about that for a moment.

Even during the darkest days of 2008 and 2009, the number of mortgage applications never dropped this low.

If you have been waiting for the housing bubble to burst, you can stop, because it is already happening.

The Federal Reserve could certainly help the industry by reducing interest rates, but instead Fed officials just keep insisting that rates need to go even higher.

So a lot more pain is ahead for the housing sector and for the economy as a whole.

And this comes at a time when millions of Americans will soon have less money in their pockets because food stamp benefits are being reduced

Putting food on the table will be a lot harder for millions of Americans starting in March.

Food stamp recipients will each receive about $90 a month less in benefits, on average, as a pandemic hunger relief program comes to an end nationwide three years after Congress approved it.

Every household in the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, or SNAP, as food stamps are formally known, will see their monthly benefits shrink by at least $95. Some larger families could experience monthly reductions of $250 or more, according to the left-leaning Center on Budget and Policy Priorities.

The days ahead are going to be incredibly challenging.

But the truth is that 2023 is just going to be a warm up for what is coming in 2024 and beyond.

Do you remember how horrible 2008 and 2009 were?

Well, it is time to get ready for the sequel.

Decades of incredibly foolish decisions have brought us to this point, and now a full-blown economic nightmare is about to break loose.

***It is finally here! Michael’s new book entitled “End Times” is now available in paperback and for the Kindle on Amazon.***

About the Author: My name is Michael and my brand new book entitled “End Times” is now available on Amazon.com.  In addition to my new book I have written six other books that are available on Amazon.com including “7 Year Apocalypse”“Lost Prophecies Of The Future Of America”“The Beginning Of The End”, and “Living A Life That Really Matters”. (#CommissionsEarned)  When you purchase any of these books you help to support the work that I am doing, and one way that you can really help is by sending copies as gifts to family and friends.  Time is short, and I need help getting these warnings into the hands of as many people as possible.  I have published thousands of articles on The Economic Collapse BlogEnd Of The American Dream and The Most Important News, and the articles that I publish on those sites are republished on dozens of other prominent websites all over the globe.  I always freely and happily allow others to republish my articles on their own websites, but I also ask that they include this “About the Author” section with each article.  The material contained in this article is for general information purposes only, and readers should consult licensed professionals before making any legal, business, financial or health decisions.  I encourage you to follow me on social media on Facebook and Twitter, and any way that you can share these articles with others is definitely a great help.  These are such troubled times, and people need hope.  John 3:16 tells us about the hope that God has given us through Jesus Christ: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.”  If you have not already done so, I strongly urge you to invite Jesus Christ to be your Lord and Savior today.

The post Bankruptcies Absolutely Soar As America’s Absurd Debt Bubble Begins To Implode appeared first on The Economic Collapse.



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Don’t Fall For The Wuhan Trap! Establishment Suddenly Admits Covid ‘Escaped’ From Biolab

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The U.S. Energy Department and FBI Director Christopher Wray recently revealed to the public the COVID-19 virus “most likely” came from the infamous Wuhan Institute of Virology.

After years of the establishment dismissing allegations the virus somehow escaped or was intentionally released from the lab, the truth is now being admitted.

However, many political commentators and politicians are weary of the government’s unforeseen pivot on the issue.

Senator Josh Hawley (R-MO) noted Chris Wray “made it sound like #Covid was part of a bioweapons program” in his recent statement.

Chris Wray made it sound like #Covid was part of a bioweapons program

— Josh Hawley (@HawleyMO) March 1, 2023

National Post journalist Natalie Winters also noticed Wray’s peculiar wording when he said Covid leaked from the Wuhan facility in a “potential lab incident,” instead of “accident.”

He says “incident” not “accident.”

👀 https://t.co/PeLNdpf4nu

— Natalie Winters (@nataliegwinters) March 1, 2023

At one point during Wray’s interview with Fox News, he threw China under the bus by claiming, “the Chinese government, it seems to me, has been doing its best to try to thwart and obfuscate the work here.”

However, as Infowars and others have thoroughly covered, the Wuhan lab where the virus was created was a joint venture between the Chinese and U.S. governments.

The CIA, NIH and DARPA all have connections to the BSL4 laboratory.

In addition to the American government, shady characters such as Hunter Biden, Klaus Schwab, Dr. Anthony Fauci, Moderna CEO Stéphane Bancel and others have ties to the controversial lab.

Independent journalist WarClandestine, who was the first to break the Ukraine biolab bombshell, commented on Wray’s remarks on Tuesday.

“No one has attempted to ‘thwart and obfuscate’ the origins of SARS-CoV-2 more than the US government, and it’s not even close. The FBI literally instructed private Tech companies to silence journalists who reported on the lab origins of SARS-CoV-2… Wray is projecting,” he accurately noted.

No one has attempted to “thwart and obfuscate” the origins of SARS-CoV-2 more than the US government, and it’s not even close.

The FBI literally instructed private Tech companies to silence journalists who reported on the lab origins of SARS-CoV-2…

Wray is projecting. https://t.co/vF7AJlhJu8

— Clandestine (@WarClandestine) March 1, 2023

Commenting on a Twitter post where far-left talk show host Cenk Uygur finally admitted Covid leaked from the Wuhan lab, Clandestine wrote, “Do we think the Big Pharma propagandists just suddenly woke up? No. They are shifting their defense. After 3 years of denial, they are retreating to ‘okay it came from a lab, but it was China’s fault’. They aren’t admitting defeat, it’s the next phase of the cover up.”

Do we think the Big Pharma propagandists just suddenly woke up?

No. They are shifting their defense.

After 3 years of denial, they are retreating to “okay it came from a lab, but it was China’s fault”.

They aren’t admitting defeat, it’s the next phase of the cover up. https://t.co/CQjq0UeyhK

— Clandestine (@WarClandestine) February 28, 2023

The journalist also accused the FBI and mainstream media of diverting attention away from the Deep State’s involvement in the creation of COVID-19.

The FBI instructed Big Tech to censor Americans who were talking about the lab origins… now all the sudden the FBI wants to pretend they are concerned about the bioweapon origin?

This is an extension of the cover up.

Diverting attention away from Deep State involvement.

— Clandestine (@WarClandestine) March 1, 2023

Journalist Glenn Greenwald highlighted how fascinating it is to witness the media’s position after MSM backed the government’s claims Covid came from a wet market where someone ate a diseased bat.

“They have no way out,” he said of the media. “Fauci told them Covid’s zoonotic origin was proven, and the lab leak theory debunked. They all repeated this for 18 months, and now know it was untrue.”

Watching media corporations and their liberals allies grapple with the WSJ's revelation is fascinating. They have no way out.

Fauci told them COVID's zoonotic origin was proven, and the lab leak theory debunked.

They all repeated this for 18 months, and now know it was untrue.

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) March 1, 2023

Greenwald also pointed out the absurdity that the lab leak theory was once deemed “racist” while the media at the time ran with the thesis Covid came from a “filthy, primitive Chinese bat-eating wet markets.”

It's a major journalistic scandal that the NYT's main COVID reporter mocked the lab leak theory as racist.

All that should have mattered to her was the truth.

But the "lab leak" theory was always the least racist and xenophobic theory given Fauci's support for the Wuhan lab.

— Glenn Greenwald (@ggreenwald) March 1, 2023

When it comes to the truth behind who originally created the COVID-19 virus, all signs point to the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill as Infowars has reported since October 2020.

The chimeric coronavirus research being done at the U.S. university was then moved to the Wuhan, China lab after the Obama administration halted dangerous gain-of-function research.

Dr. Peter McCullough during an interview this week commented on the American government blaming China for the virus escape while it has been publicly known for years Covid was made by the Deep State.

“There’s no way it didn’t come from the lab in China,” he said. “So, the wet market story was an attempted cover-up that didn’t hold water. Now, all the agencies involved are trying to position themselves, most recently the Department of Energy.”

Dr. McCullough continued, “Turns out the Department of Energy is part of this biopharmaceutical complex. They’re in there with DARP and BARDA, the NIH, HHS, there’s so many other divisions, the intelligence community. They’re all involved with coronavirus and biological threats.”

No Other Explanation: It's Already Been Published That C19 Came from a Lab – Dr. @P_McCulloughMD

In 2015, Ralph Baric and others "published papers in Nature Communications … They said it. 'We made the virus! We made a chimeric Coronavirus in the Wuhan lab!' And they thank… https://t.co/FpBGRUNndW pic.twitter.com/YJNa3qMvbl

— The Vigilant Fox 🦊 (@VigilantFox) March 1, 2023

Larry Johnson of The Gateway Pundit provided an insightful glimpse at the Covid origin situation now that the American government is blaming China.

“Put yourself in the position of Xi Jinping. You know that the virus that started the global pandemic was leaked accidentally from your lab. But you also know that the Americans, including the eminent Dr. Fauci, helped fund the research. Yet only your country is being blamed. Would that give you a case of the red ass? I think so. What the Biden Administration is doing is dangerous and short sighted. Exclusively blaming China is going to strengthen the resolve of China to align itself more closely with Russia and be less cooperative with the United States.”

The people of the world deserve the truth about the Covid virus that wreaked havoc on global economies and health, and allowed the introduction of the deadly experimental mRNA jabs that led to massive profits for Big Pharma and their cronies.


Don’t forget to visit the Infowars Store to do your part in the battle against globalism by purchasing great products such as dietary supplements, books, t-shirts, survival gear and much more.

Unlike legacy media outlets funded by Big Pharma and other groups, Infowars relies on YOUR SUPPORT to remain on air!




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Where Lyme Disease Came From and Why It Eludes Treatment

ORIGINAL LINK: https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/R3M2YXMLTDDBP7/ref=cm_cr_dp_d_rvw_ttl?ie=UTF8&ASIN=B07PHMMCTZ

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A new book called Bitten: The Secret History of Lyme Disease and Biological Weapons by Kris Newby adds significantly to our understanding of Lyme disease, while oddly seeming to avoid mention of what we already knew.

Newby claims (in 2019) that if a scientist named Willy Burgdorfer had not made a confession in 2013, the secret that Lyme disease came from a biological weapons program would have died with him. Yet, in 2004 Michael Christopher Carroll published a book called Lab 257: The Disturbing Story of the Government’s Secret Germ Laboratory. He appeared on several television shows to discuss the book, including on NBC’s Today Show, where the book was made a Today Show Book Club selection. Lab 257 hit the New York Times nonfiction bestseller list soon after its publication.

Newby’s book reaches the same conclusion as Carroll’s, namely that the most likely source of diseased ticks is Plum Island. Newby reaches this conclusion on page 224 after mentioning Plum Island only once in passing in a list of facilities on page 47 and otherwise avoiding it throughout the book. This is bizarre, because Newby’s book otherwise goes into great depth, and even chronicles extensive research efforts that lead largely to dead ends, and because there is information available about Plum Island, and because Carroll’s best-selling book seems to demand comment, supportive or dismissive or otherwise.

In fact, I think that, despite the avoidance of any discussion of Plum Island, Newby’s research complements Carroll’s quite well, strengthens the same general conclusion, and then adds significant new understanding. So, let’s look at what Carroll told us, and then at what Newby adds.