Ukraine In NATO? Foreign Ministers Flex (Jaw) Muscles in Bucharest
Click on the headline to read the full story from Ron Paul Institute
At the NATO foreign ministers summit in Bucharest this week, Member states talked tough about endless support for Ukraine "whatever it takes." They also reiterated a 2008 pledge to eventually welcome Ukraine as a Member. Are they serious? Also today: Biden's neocons are reportedly considering sending Patriot missiles to Ukraine despite Russian warnings that it would be a major escalation. How far will they go? Today on the Liberty Report: Ukraine In NATO? Foreign Ministers Flex (Jaw) Muscles in Bucharest Click on the headline to read the full story from Ron Paul Institute
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NATO on Tuesday doubled down on its pledge to eventually admit Ukraine during a meeting of the alliance’s foreign ministers in Bucharest, Romania, a position that played a major role in provoking Russia’s invasion. The Romanian city was where NATO initially made the promise to Ukraine back in 2008, and at the time, US officials acknowledged that attempting to bring the country into the alliance could spark a war in the region. “We made the decision in Bucharest in 2008 at the summit,” NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said on Tuesday. “I was there … representing Norway as Prime Minister. I remember very well the decisions. We stand by those decisions. NATO’s door is open.” In a joint statement, the NATO foreign ministers, including Secretary of State Antony Blinken, said that they “reaffirm” the decisions that were made at the 2008 Bucharest summit. CIA Director William Burns wrote a cable in 2008, when he was the US ambassador to Russia, that said promising NATO memberships to Ukraine as well as Georgia touches a “raw nerve” in Russia and raises serious security concerns for Moscow. Burns wrote: “Not only does Russia perceive encirclement, and efforts to undermine Russia’s influence in the region, but it also fears unpredictable and uncontrolled consequences which would seriously affect Russian security interests.” Burns said in the cable, which was released by WikiLeaks, that Russia was particularly concerned about Ukraine. “Experts tell us that Russia is particularly worried that the strong divisions in Ukraine over NATO membership, with much of the ethnic-Russian community against membership, could lead to a major split, involving violence or at worst, civil war. In that eventuality, Russia would have to decide whether to intervene; a decision Russia does not want to have to face,” he wrote. The pledge to admit Ukraine into NATO didn’t lead to a civil war right away, but one was sparked after former Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovych was ousted in a US-backed coup in 2014. Separatists in the eastern Donbas region rejected the more Europe and US-friendly post-coup government and declared independence. Starting after Yanukovych was ousted, NATO began a deep partnership with Ukraine by sending troops to train the country’s military, and the US began providing Kyiv with anti-tank missiles during the Trump administration. Yahoo News revealed earlier this year that the US deployed CIA paramilitaries to the frontlines of the Donbas war in 2014 to train Ukrainian forces. During the lead-up to Russia’s February 24 invasion, Russia presented the US with a list of security demands. Chief among them was the issue of NATO expansion, which Russia wanted to be rolled back. Moscow was also seeking a guarantee that Ukraine won’t ever join NATO, but the US refused to entertain the idea even though President Biden had acknowledged that Kyiv wouldn’t be joining the alliance anytime soon. Shortly after Russia’s invasion, Ukrainian President Voldymr Zelensky said he was told privately that Ukraine won’t be joining NATO. “I requested them personally to say directly that we are going to accept you into NATO in a year or two or five, just say it directly and clearly, or just say no,” Zelensky said in March. “And the response was very clear, you’re not going to be a NATO member, but publicly, the doors will remain open.” While NATO doesn’t plan on admitting Ukraine as a full member anytime soon, the alliance has big plans for the country. POLITICO reported in October that NATO is developing a 10-year plan to rebuild Ukraine’s military and arms industry with a focus on shifting the country from using Soviet equipment to primarily using NATO weapons. The report said the plan would make Ukraine a “default” member of NATO, a situation that will never be acceptable to Russia. Reprinted with permission from Antiwar.com. NATO Doubles Down on Pledge to Eventually Admit Ukraine Click on the headline to read the full story from Ron Paul Institute The meet-up location of NATO foreign ministers on November 29-30— Bucharest — was where ten years ago, former US President George W. Bush persuaded America’s transatlantic partners that Ukraine and Georgia should one day join their military alliance. The foreign ministers duly “reaffirmed” that decision yesterday and left it at that. However, their statement on the conflict in Ukraine emphatically stated that the NATO “will never recognise” Russia’s incorporation of four Ukrainian regions and underscored the alliance’s resolve to “continue and further step up political and practical support” to Kiev. The NATO General-Secretary Jens Stoltenberg who is the mouthpiece of Washington, warned that despite Ukraine’s bravery and progress on the ground, Russia retains strong military capabilities and a large number of troops, and the alliance will continue to support Kiev for “as long as it takes … we will not back down.” Such pronouncements betray the absence of any new thinking although developments on the ground are showing that Washington’s best-laid plans are floundering. And there are also growing signs of disunity on Ukraine issue among the US’ European allies and between the latter and the Biden Administration. The neocons in the Biden team who are the driving force in the Beltway are still full of passionate intensity. The flicker of hope that the moderate opinion voiced in the famous statement by 30 Democratic lawmakers recently was brusquely snuffed out. Moscow has drawn appropriate conclusions too, as evident in the Russian Foreign Ministry stance that it makes no sense in the prevailing climate of unremitting hostility from Washington to hold the Bilateral Consultative Commission under the Russia-US New START Treaty, which was originally scheduled to take place in Cairo on November 29 – December 6. Again, nothing much need be expected out of the French President Emmanuel Macron’s meeting with President Biden at the White House tomorrow. Macron still hopes to be the western leader to accept President Putin’s surrender terms and go down in history books, but in reality his credibility is in shatters in Europe and Atlanticist circles in particular, and even within France. Europe’s number one priority at this juncture, which is a turning point in the conflict in Ukraine, ought to be its strategic autonomy to act in its own interests. But that requires deep thinking as to what is it that Europe wants to be autonomous about, and secondly, the understanding that deep down, a strategic interest cannot be reduced to security interests. In our new Hobbesian world, a world of competing economic zones, Europe’s first goal should be to achieve strategic economic autonomy. But is that goal attainable anymore when its energy security that gave underpinning to its prosperity and industrial might has been smashed to smithereens in the depths of the Baltic Sea by unseen hands? Be that as it may, the unfolding events in Ukraine are sure to create a new dynamic. The visible acceleration of the Russian offensive in Bakhmut in the most recent weeks is dramatically shortening the timeline for the capture of the city from several weeks ahead to the next few days at the most. Similar signs are appearing in Maryinka and Ugledar in the Donbass region, too. If Bakhmut is the lynchpin of the Ukrainian defence line in Donbass, Maryinka is from where Ukrainian forces are bombarding Donetsk city; and, the capture of Ugledar will enable the Russian forces to move toward Zaporozhye city and conclusively ward off any future challenge to the land bridge to Crimea and to the ports in the Azov Sea. The common thread here is that the ongoing beefing up of the Russian forces deployed in Donbass after the mobilisation of nearly 400,000 soldiers is beginning to show its first results. For once, Russian forces are outnumbering Ukraine’s and Russian fortifications have been significantly strengthened. The fall of Bakhmut will signal that the Battle of Donbass, which is the Russian special military operation’s leitmotif, is entering its final phase. The Ukrainian defence line in Donbass is crumbling. Russian control of Donbass is at hand in a conceivable future. What happens next? The Russian objective may be to push the Ukrainian forces further away from the Donbass region and keep the steppes to the east of Dnieper river as a buffer zone. Indeed, the Dnipropetrovsk oblast is also rich in mineral resources, containing large deposits of iron ore, manganese ore, titanium-zirconium ore, uranium, anthracite coal, natural gas and oil and lignite coal and is the major centre of Ukraine’s steel industry, apart from being a region of intensive grain growing, animal husbandry, and dairy industry. Its loss will be a crippling blow to Kiev. In political terms, the narrative of victory in Kiev — that Ukraine is winning the war and is about to capture Crimea, etc. — is becoming unsustainable for much longer. Meanwhile, Europe too is struggling with its demons — unable to shake off the idea of a price cap on Russian oil that is sure to boomerang and further aggravate Europe’s energy security; need to step up imports of LNG from Russia still, which is far cheaper than from America; Europe not being in a position to respond to the launch of the highly consequential inflation reduction act in the US or migration of European industry to America; EU’s inability to strengthen the international role of the euro for absorbing some of the world’s surplus savings, and so on. Therefore, at this defining moment faced with an imminent escalation of the conflict in Ukraine in the coming weeks, the neocons in the US are having their way to step up the arms supplies to Ukraine. The neocons invariably win the turf battles in the Beltway, especially under a weak president. If the Republicans step up the investigations on Biden, his dependency on the neocons will only increase during the period ahead. The regime-change-in-Russia propaganda is not going to wither away even under the emerging stark realities of the emerging ground situation in Ukraine. The neocons’ aim, as the investigative historian Eric Zuesse put it succinctly, is “to destroy Russia so fast that Russia won’t be able to destroy America in retaliation.” The sheer absurdity of the thought is self-evident to everyone but the neocons. So, they are going to argue now that the cardinal mistake the US made in Ukraine was its failure to put boots on the ground in that country in 2015 itself. Reprinted with permission from Indian Punchline. Conflict in Ukraine is Doomed to Escalate Click on the headline to read the full story from Ron Paul Institute
Five major mainstream media outlets, including the New York Times, have issued a letter calling the US Administration to drop the charges against Wikileaks founder Julian Assange. Assange has been a political prisoner in the UK since 2019. Also today: Twitter announced an end to its Covid "misinformation" policy...and the White House freaks out. Also: More demands from global welfare queens in Ukraine. Watch today's Liberty Report: Finally! MSM Outlets Call For Charges Against Assange To Be Dropped. Click on the headline to read the full story from Ron Paul Institute In history books as well as in politics every story is shaped by where one chooses to begin the tale. The current fighting in Ukraine, which many observers believe to already be what might be considered the opening phase of World War 3, is just such a development. Did the seeds of conflict arise subsequent to Russian leader Mikhail Gorbachev’s consent to the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991 after having received a commitment from the United States and its allies not to advance the West’s military alliance NATO into Eastern Europe? That was a pledge that was quickly ignored by President Bill Clinton, who intervened militarily in the former Yugoslavia before adding new NATO members from amidst the ruins of the Warsaw Pact. Since that time NATO has continued its expansion at the expense of Russian national security interests. Ukraine, as one of the largest of the former Soviet republics, soon became the focal point for potential conflict. The US interfered openly in Ukrainian politics, featuring frequent visits by relentlessly hawkish Senator John McCain and State Department monster Victoria Nuland as well as the investment of a reported $5 billion to destabilize the situation, bringing about regime change to remove the pro-Russian government of Viktor Yanukovich and replace it with a regime friendly to America and its European allies. When this occurred it inevitably led to a proposed invitation to Ukraine to join NATO, a move which Moscow repeatedly warned would constitute an existential threat to Russia itself. Finally, Moscow tried assiduously to negotiate a solution to the developing Ukraine crisis in 2020-2021 but the US and its allies were not interested, allowing the corrupt Ukrainian government of Volodymyr Zelensky to refuse any accommodation. So Russia itself has perceived that it has been misled or even lied to repeatedly by the US and its allies. It has been particularly vexed by the looting of its natural resources by mostly Western oligarchs operating under protection afforded by the feckless President Boris Yeltsin between 1991 and 1999, a puppet installed and sustained through US and European interference in the Russian elections. Just when Russia was on its knees, perhaps intentionally, there arrived on the scene in 1999 former KGB officer Vladimir Putin who, as Prime Minister and later president, proceeded to clean house. Ever since that time, Putin has very carefully explained himself and what he has been doing, making clear that he is no enemy of the West but rather a partner in a relationship that respects the interests and cultures of all players in a global economy that maximizes freedom and individuality. Given the danger of dramatic escalation of the current situation in Ukraine, with talk coming from both sides about the conditions for the use of nuclear weapons, an October 27th speech made by President Vladimir Putin at the 19th meeting of the Valdai International Discussion Club, held near Moscow, should be required reading for the Joe Bidens and Jens Stoltenbergs of this world. The theme of the meeting was A Post-Hegemonic World: Justice and Security for Everyone. The four day-long session included 111 academics, politicians, diplomats and economists from Russia and 40 foreign countries, including Afghanistan, Brazil, China, Egypt, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Iran, Kazakhstan, South Africa, Turkey, Uzbekistan and the United States. In his speech, Putin laid out his vision of a multipolar world in which there is no concept of a politically hegemonic “rules based world order” which substitutes “rules for international law.” And, he observed, the rules have themselves been regularly dictated by one country or group of countries. Putin instead urged a transition into a willingness to accept that all countries have interests and rights that should be respected. Interestingly enough, Putin, since assuming leadership of his country, has been unwavering in his demand that all countries in the world be granted respect, by which he means that local interests and cultures must be considered legitimate and worthy of acceptance by all as long as they permit individual freedom and are similarly respectful of the interests and national traits of others. A relaxed and jocular Putin spoke for over an hour in his opening remarks and then fielded questions for another two and a half hours from the audience. In response to a question, he assessed the sanity of White House advisers who would “spoil relations with China at the same time they are supplying billions-worth of weapons to Ukraine in a fight against Russia… Frankly, I do not know why they are doing this…Are they sane? It seems that this runs completely counter to common sense and logic… This is simply crazy!” The Russian president emphasized several points which elaborated his views. First, he observed that US/Western hegemony “denies the sovereignty of countries and peoples, their identity and uniqueness, and disregards any interests of other states… [The] rules-based world order” only empowers those making the “rules.” Everyone else must obey or face the consequences. Putin also decried the West’s tendency to make rules and then ignore them when circumstances change. He noted how economic sanctions and “cancel culture” are being used cynically to weaken local economies while also demeaning the cultures and national traits of foreign adversaries. He observed, for example, how Russian writers and composers are being banned purely to send a political message and punish Moscow for its foreign policy. Putin explained that Russia is an “independent, original civilization” which “has never considered itself an enemy of the West.” Moscow “simply defends its right to exist and develop freely. At the same time, we ourselves are not seeking to become some kind of new hegemon.” He then provided his analysis of what it developing, saying that the world is confronting a global storm which no one can ignore. “We are standing at a historic milestone, ahead of what is probably the most dangerous, unpredictable and at the same time important decade since the end of World War II. The West is not able to single-handedly manage humanity, but is desperately trying to do it, and most of the peoples of the world no longer want to put up with it.” We can decide “either to continue to accumulate a burden of problems that will inevitably crush us all, or to try together to find solutions, albeit imperfect, but working, capable of making our world safer and more stable.” So, Vladimir Putin is issuing a call to arms for a transition to a multipolar world, which will inevitably change the playing field both in international relations and in the global economy. No longer will the United States and its allies be able to claim “rule of law” when using coercive force to punish competitors. The drift away from using dollars as the world’s reserve currency, mostly for energy transactions, is already taking place as major trading partners like India, China and NATO member Turkey have ignored restrictions while continuing to buy up Russian energy exports, negating to a certain extent the sanctions put in place by Washington and Europe. The death of dollars as the reserve currency will make it more difficult for the US Treasury to print money without any backing as many nations will no longer be willing to accept what will be increasingly seen as a fiat currency produced by a government that is actually drowning in debt. Putin might, of course, be proven wrong and the current global system might well be able to limp along for the foreseeable future. But if he is right, those developments transitioning into a multipolar world would mean a de facto decline and fall of the United States as the world hegemon while anything even remotely like a dollar collapse would have catastrophic effect on the US import driven economy as well as on ordinary Americans. Some kind of partial default on US Treasury debt is not unimaginable. And Putin might well be right in his prediction that the change is coming and there is nothing that the United States and its friends can do to stop it. In any event, the political and economic adjustments that are certainly coming in one way or another will certainly play out as the Ukraine conflict continues to simmer. The tragedy is that what is developing is self-inflicted, completely avoidable and unresponsive to any actual United States interest, but that is another story. If Ukraine turns to open warfare with more direct US involvement and economic dislocation, international pressure to dismantle the post-World War 2 status quo will inevitably increase. No matter how it develops, what is occurring right now will force the perennially tone-deaf politicians in and around the White House to begin to rethink America’s place in the world and its options as a major power. No one can predict how that will go and the process will make compelling theater as America’s two major political parties take up positions to make the case that the other party is solely at fault. It is impossible to foresee how far that bloodletting will go. Reprinted with permission from Unz Review. Vladimir Putin’s Vision of a Multipolar World Click on the headline to read the full story from Ron Paul Institute Russia has decided to use the force necessary in Ukraine. The Russians have begun to destroy the Ukrainian lines of communications — the power grid, bridges, roads and railroads — without which Ukraine’s forces can’t be resupplied. Once the destruction of the lines of communication is completed, Russia’s army, particularly its extensive artillery, will present Ukrainian forces with the unpleasant reality that they are vastly outgunned and outnumbered. How far west Russia chooses to advance is an open question but it must be assumed that in addition to the four oblasts already claimed — Luhansk, Donetsk, Zaporizhzhya and Kherson — they’d want at least Mykolayiv and Odesa. With those two additional oblasts Russia would have absorbed most of the territory referred to as Novorossiya (New Russia) and deprive what’s left of Ukraine access to the Black Sea. In addition, Odesa shares a border with Transnistria, a breakaway Moldovan state which has hosted a small (two battalions) Russian Army presence since 1995. Once the Russian advance begins, NATO can either accept Russia’s victory or engage the Russians with NATO forces. While a compelling case can be made that this conflict should have been seen as a local matter with an inevitable outcome, there’s little to suggest NATO’s leadership is capable of drawing that conclusion. Unfortunately, Russia is a formidable adversary. Russia leads the world in air defense systems. NATO air forces would be engaging Russia’s S-400 air defense system. The S-400 is generally regarded as the world’s best widely fielded system. NATO member Turkey, for example, purchased the export version of the S-400 over NATO objections and in preference to the US Patriot system. The Russian S-500, an improvement of the S-400, has only recently entered production and is currently deployed at critical sites in Russia. Russia has an estimated five year lead over the US in hypersonic missiles. The US has no defense against hypersonic missiles, which travel at hypersonic speed and can vary their flight paths. While the US is still conducting hypersonic tests, Russia has fielded four different hypersonic missiles within their existing missile system families — Kinzhal, Kalibr, Iskander and Tsirkon — so far. They also have a hypersonic glide vehicle, the Avengard. Among the highest value military targets anywhere is a US Navy aircraft carrier. Should NATO enter a war with Russia, the US Navy’s carrier task force in the Ionian Sea is an obvious Russian target. How can it successfully defend itself against Russia’s simultaneous and probably massive hypersonic and conventional missile attack? The inability of a carrier task force, the linchpin of the US Navy’s surface fleet, to survive a missile attack would have enormous implications and an immediate real-world impact. Should the Russians sink a carrier task force, Taiwan would, for example, have to rethink any illusions it has about the US coming to its aid in a conflict with China and become far more amenable to a soft conquest similar to the Chinese takeover of Hong Kong. The US Navy’s core missions are Power Projection, Sea Control, Strategic Deterrence and Strategic Sea Lift. While the US Navy has excellent submarines which play an important role, the Navy’s core missions require a powerful surface fleet, currently built around aircraft carriers. Building capable and survivable modern warships is a complex and time consuming process. It’s what makes the Navy the most inelastic and capital intensive service. When it comes to defending the United States against a capable adversary, the Navy is also America’s most essential service. The US currently has in excess of 850 bases around the world. Boots on the ground give the US influence of a sort the Navy can’t match and are essential to those who see the US as the world’s policeman. Inexcusably, the cost of these bases and the extended (and counterproductive) efforts in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria and now Ukraine, have come at the expense of the Navy and America’s defense. While the US Navy is, by far, the world’s largest Navy in tonnage, China’s Navy has more ships and an ambitious naval construction program. China’s fleet is expected to continue its rapid growth while the US Navy is expected to shrink. Congress has begun to address the US Navy’s limited ship yard capacity but continues to limit the Navy’s budget in preference to the other services. Funding and ship yard capacity aren’t the only serious problems which need to be addressed. The Buy American Act of 1933, the Trade Agreements Act of 1979 and the Berry Amendment — which has existed since the beginning of WWII and became permanent law in 1993 — are the principal military construction domestic content laws. While this is a complex legal subject constrained by a number of factors, waivers of critical components which permit the use of foreign components in domestic military construction are overdue for review, as America’s deindustrialization has greatly expanded the need for waivers. The case for additional waivers is also furthered by permitting consideration of the cost of components. All of this combines to leave military construction vulnerable in a future conflict. Congress should recognize the necessity of quickly moving to 100% US components and understand that initial costs incurred in domestic production are a one time cost. Military construction requirements can be an important catalyst for US manufacturing which, in a conflict, will prove essential. For the last twenty years, the Russians and the Chinese have sought to strengthen their armed forces while America’s leadership has, on a bipartisan basis, been obsessed with the Middle East. As a result, a persuasive argument suggests the US is no longer unbeatable. Let’s hope it isn’t too late to change course. McConnell is a Colonel, US Army Reserves, Retired and graduate of the US Army War College. Formerly a Member of the New Hampshire House of Representatives. Russia’s Winter Offensive and NATO’s Response Click on the headline to read the full story from Ron Paul Institute
No longer fearing the wrath of a Republican-controlled Senate, Tony "The Science" Fauci is settling into his post-retirement gig: making the rounds on mainstream news outlets hectoring Americans about taking more boosters. He's even threatening that schools might "need" to be shut down again. Also today: Republicans in the House call for MORE long-range missiles to Ukraine. Finally, Liz Cheney accused of politicizing the January 6th Committee. Watch today's Liberty Report: Fauci's Back...And He Wants You To Take The Shot! Click on the headline to read the full story from Ron Paul Institute True Colors: J6 Staff Lash Out at Liz Cheney for Allegedly Burying Parts of the Investigation11/28/2022 There is a deepening division on the J6 Committee as staffers turn on Liz Cheney over the final report on the January 6th riot. Angry rhetoric is flying with staffers accusing the Committee of becoming a “Cheney 2024 campaign” while both the Cheney spokesperson and Committee spokesperson lashed out at the staff members as “disgruntled” and producing shoddy or biased work. The underlying issue, however, is important and revealing. The Committee’s color coded teams include a “Blue Team” on the failure to prepare adequately for the riot. That part of the investigation is reportedly being dumped or reduced. Members of the “Green” and “Purple” teams are also reportedly irate. Cheney was soundly defeated in her primary in Wyoming and will soon leave Congress. She is being pushed by some Democrats as a possible surprise candidate for House Speaker if they could get a few Republican votes. That seems highly unlikely. The Republicans are likely to end up with the identical margin held by the Democrats for the past two years. Alternatively, some Democrats want Cheney to run for president either to dog Donald Trump in the primary debates or to run as an independent to siphon off votes in the general election. That seems to be the suspicion for some staffers in the Washington Post story. Fifteen former and current staffers, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal deliberations, expressed concerns that important findings unrelated to Trump will not become available to the American public…If true, the report will largely track the virtual exclusive focus of the hearings with open references to the 2024 election as an overriding concern. Some of us have lamented that the J6 Committee could have been so much more than a one-sided, highly partisan investigation. House Democrats barred two Republican members originally selected by GOP leaders, who then boycotted the panel in response. Even with the GOP boycott, the Committee could have followed the type of balanced inquiry that pursued allegations tied to the Pearl Harbor attack or Watergate. It could have insisted on balanced hearings with witnesses and dissenting views. Nevertheless, the committee revealed important, often disturbing details. It was important for Americans to hear from figures like former attorney general Bill Barr and White House lawyers who struggled to counter unfounded advice given to Trump by outside lawyers on challenging the 2020 election. There were painful scenes of Capitol police overwhelmed at barricades and members of Congress hunkered down in offices. Yet, the focus on a single approved narrative gave the hearings the feel of an infomercial selling a product that most of us bought two years earlier. Now, staffers are turning on Cheney who appears to have objected to parts of the final report and wants the report to focus on Trump. Cheney’s spokesman Jeremy Adler said that the staffers in the other teams produced “subpar material” full of “liberal biases.” Tim Mulvey, the spokesperson for the committee, criticized the staffers speaking to the media as “disgruntled” and added that “they’ve forgotten their duties as public servants and their cowardice is helping Donald Trump and others responsible for the violence of January 6th.” It is obviously hard to address the alleged shoddy work on these other teams or claims of liberal bias. However, the “Blue Team” was a particular interest for some of us. The J6 Committee virtually ignored the issue despite ample questions over decisions by Congress leading to the riot. The Democrats in the final hearing hammered away at documents showing that the agency knew about violent threats in the days leading up to Jan. 6th. However, the Democrats have refused to pursue the lack of preparations on Capitol Hill as a focus of the hearing. On the day of the riot, many of us noted (before the breach of security) that there was a relatively light police presence around the Capitol despite the obvious risk of a riot. Once the crowd surged, they quickly were able to gain access to the building. Conservative media have featured a video showing an officer standing by as crowds poured into the building. That obviously does not mean that there was not violence or that Capitol police did not bravely fight to protect the building. Most of us have denounced the riot as a desecration of our constitutional process. Moreover, at some point, officers may have shifted to deescalating as crowds surged into the building. The question is why there were not more substantial barriers, like those used at the White House. Instead, some barriers were composed of a few officers using their bikes. The available evidence indicates that the House was warned and that the need for National Guard deployments were discussed. There is a concern that, after criticizing such deployment and fencing around the White House in the earlier riots, the Democrats did not want to be seen following the same course. An Inspector General report indicated that police were restricted by Congress in what they could use on that day. Previously, it was disclosed that offers of National Guard support were not accepted prior to the protests. The D.C. government under Mayor Muriel Bowser used only a small number of guardsmen in traffic positions. That focus was rejected by the Committee members and there were no dissenting views voiced on the Committee as well as a virtual bar on opposing explanations or interpretations of evidence. The GOP is now expected to fully investigate what the Congress knew and what it did in the days leading to the breach of the Capitol. Clearly, Cheney and others did not believe that the Blue Team full findings were ready to be released. However, those findings could be reviewed by the new GOP majority as it seeks full disclosure on why the Capitol was so quickly overrun on January 6th. Reprinted with permission from JonathanTurley.org. True Colors: J6 Staff Lash Out at Liz Cheney for Allegedly Burying Parts of the Investigation Click on the headline to read the full story from Ron Paul Institute Senator Ed Markey (D-MA) recently got in touch with his inner mobster and threatened Elon Musk — the new owner of Twitter and the CEO of electric car company Tesla and space ventures company SpaceX. He told Musk, “Fix your companies” or “Congress will.” As part of this threat, Markey referred to an ongoing National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) investigation into Tesla’s autopilot driving system and Twitter’s 2011 consent decree with the Federal Trade Commission (FTC). Markey has done more than make threats: He is one of a group of Democratic senators who wrote to the FTC urging an investigation into whether Musk’s actions as the new owner of Twitter violated the consent decree or consumer protection laws. Since FTC Chair Lina Khan wants to investigate as many businesses as possible, it is likely she will respond favorably to the senators’ letter. President Biden has also endorsed an investigation into the role foreign investors played in financing Musk’s Twitter purchase. Biden may be concerned that Musk is not likely to ban tweets regarding Hunter Biden’s business deals. Concerns that Musk would allow tweets containing information embarrassing (or worse) to the Biden administration point to the real reason many Democratic politicians and progressive writers and activists are attacking Musk. They support efforts to suppress conservative, libertarian, and other “non-woke” speech on social media. They view the prospect of a major platform refusing to silence those who dissent from the woke mob or the Democratic Party establishment as a threat to their power. Musk further angered the left by committing what, to many Democrats (and Liz Cheney), is the ultimate hate crime — allowing Donald Trump back on Twitter. The threat against Musk shows the threat to liberty is not just from big tech; it is from the alliance between big tech and big government. Some conservatives think that increasing government’s power over social media is the correct way to make big tech respect free speech. However, increasing the US government’s power over social media can just end up putting more power behind government threats like those from Rep. Markey. Expanded government control over how social media companies conduct their business can also further incentivize the companies to work with the federal government to shut down free speech. Once the government steps in with increased regulation, the risk is that greater government control over what is communicated on social media will follow. The question will just be who is calling the shots on the exercise of that control. Will the result be an increase of the liberal or “woke” pressure on social media companies to silence conservatives, libertarians, opponents of teaching critical race theory and transgenderism in schools, and those who question the safety and effectiveness of covid vaccines? Alternatively, will a new sort of pressure become dominant, maybe pressure to comply with conservative or Republican preferred limits on speech? Either way, liberty loses. Big tech companies silence their users to curry favor with politicians and bureaucrats, often after “encouragement” from politicians and bureaucrats. Therefore, to end big tech’s censorship, Americans should demand that all government officials — including the president — not violate the First Amendment. We must work to put an end to government officials pressuring or even “encouraging” social media platforms either to silence any American citizen because of his opinions or to downplay or suppress any news story. The way to protect free speech online is to separate tech and state. Separate Tech and State Click on the headline to read the full story from Ron Paul Institute National Public Radio yesterday posted an article titled “Twitter has lost 50 of its top 100 advertisers since Elon Musk took over, report says.” The article relies on a report from the liberal site Media Matters for America founded by Democratic operative David Brock. The report lists companies that have publicly pulled their advertising and the article strongly suggests that it is due to the pledge of Elon Musk to restore free speech protections on the social media site. These companies are well within their free speech rights to boycott the company or suspend their support in light of possible changes on content. However, customers also have the right not to support companies that do not support their free speech rights. The NPR article contains this graph: Chevrolet, Chipotle Mexican Grill, Inc., Ford, Jeep, Kyndryl, Merck & Co. and Novartis AG all issued statements about halting Twitter ads or were reported and confirmed as doing so. The others ceased advertising on the platform for a “significant period of time following direct outreach, controversies, and warnings from media buyers.A quick review of these companies shows that many use the same vague rationale of Chipolte that they want to wait to “gain a better understanding on the direction of the platform under its new leadership.” These companies have not expressly called for censorship. They simply say that they will not advertise with the company until that they are satisfied with the company’s new “direction.” The assumption is that the companies were fine with the “direction” of the old Twitter in limiting free speech. In the very least, it did not seem to be a sufficient concern to prompt them to make public statements suspending advertising in prior years. The companies have remained silent on why the prior “direction” did not appear to be a corporate concern. They did not apparently view the prior Twitter policies as barriers to advertising. Specifically, these companies appeared to have no objections to the company maintaining one of the world’s largest and most notorious censorship systems. The blocking of the Hunter Biden laptop story did not appear to be a barrier for advertisers. The blocking of individuals offering opposing views on Covid, climate change, transgender policies or other issues was not an apparent barrier. Yet, the announced intention to restore free speech protections has warranted these suspensions. There is also a concern that these suspensions have followed a campaign from many on the left to pressure advertisers to pull advertising funds. The public statements have been celebrated by those seeking to coerce Musk into restoring censorship on the platform. The campaign is also ramping up as Musk threatens to reveal back channel communications related to the censorship of political and social commentary. The disclosures could prove embarrassing for many in the political and media establishment. There is even a campaign on the left to ban Twitter from the Apple and Google stores to pressure Musk to relent on censorship. This could create a massive war between the establishment and these companies against Musk and many citizens over free speech. Musk is reportedly preparing for such a ban. Companies like Disney have faced backlash over taking political positions in states like Florida. However, for the most part, companies assume that consumers will be driven by their products rather than their policies in making purchase choices. They may be right, but these companies are viewed by many as supporting an anti-free speech campaign. That could be a question for some consumers. For shareholders, these decisions raise questions of whether corporate executives are serving their interests in joining an effective boycott against Twitter. The reason for their withdrawal of advertising remains intentionally vague but the timing and message seems quite clear. The move to pull advertising can lead many customers to question the “direction of the leadership” of these companies on free speech. If these companies do not want the restoration of the prior Twitter censorship policies, they should state so. They should also state what they are demanding from Musk if it is not the censorship or the banning of individuals. These companies may insist that they do not want to have advertising associated with unpopular or offensive posters, particularly given the “general amnesty” for previously banned accounts. While it did not seem to be a problem to be associated with one of the world’s largest censorship companies, it is clearly their right to associate or disassociate with any company. It is also the right of consumers to choose to disassociate with companies due to their position on free speech. Reprinted with permission from JonathanTurley.org. Companies Join Call to Suspend Advertising with Twitter Click on the headline to read the full story from Ron Paul Institute |
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