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The devastating reality of the Arizona forensic audit

Bernard Kerik
Newsmax
Tue, 15 Jun 2021 19:01 UTC
arizona ballots
© Courtney Pedroza/Getty Images
Early voting lasted from October 7th through the 30th in Arizona, which had a record number of early voters.
Democrats and the mainstream media have been aggressively denouncing the Maricopa County, Arizona election audit from the beginning.

At first I didn't understand why.

I thought that it was because they were afraid of what the results would be, but I now believe it's something far worse.

The Democrats aren't "just" afraid of the outcome - but they're afraid that the audit results will be irrefutable and unimpeachable. They know that their efforts to discredit the audit process in Arizona will not stand up to scrutiny and here's why.

The Arizona audit is being run impeccably, utilizing security and surveillance procedures with a longstanding track record of effectiveness.

To say that I was impressed after viewing the audit process for myself would be a massive understatement. I've spent decades working in security and law enforcement at the highest levels, and this is exactly the level of conscientiousness and attention to detail that I would demand for a sensitive or high-profile investigation.

They're not trying to reinvent the wheel; they're using the same methods casinos have used for decades to catch cheaters.

It's common knowledge that casinos are exceptionally good at catching cheaters, and if anybody tries to pull a fast one during the Arizona audit, they face the same long odds of getting away with it.

Before a person can even enter the premises, their name must be on a pre-approved list. After winding their way through a maze of corridors, they arrive at a security checkpoint where their ID is checked.
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Family

China weighs ending all limits on childbirth in 2025

Zachary Evans
Yahoo News
Fri, 18 Jun 2021 18:57 UTC
chinese moms
Chinese officials are considering lifting all restrictions on the number of children parents can have by 2025, the Wall Street Journal reported on Friday.

The government may begin the process by lifting birth restrictions in provinces where the birthrate is lowest, a person familiar with the matter told the Journal. Others familiar with the deliberations said China may enact policies that explicitly encourage couples to have children.

Government researchers in China's northeast Jilin Province said in February that officials must encourage childbirth.

"Ending birth restrictions is not enough to reverse the trend of negative population growth in our province," the researchers wrote. "It is also necessary to introduce policies to encourage childbirth based on real-world conditions."

The potential move is intended to counter the effects of China's aging population. Premier Xi Jinping told Communist Party leaders that responding to the aging of China's population is a matter of national security, Chinese state-owned paper Xinhua reported last month.
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NPC

America's soup-brained President says the US never interferes in other countries elections


Caitlin Johnstone
Wed, 16 Jun 2021 12:00 UTC
biden
Listen to a reading of this article
During an astonishingly sycophantic press conference after the Geneva summit with Vladimir Putin, President Biden posited an entirely hypothetical scenario about what the world would think of the United States if it were interfering in foreign elections and everybody knew it.

When AP's Jonathan Lemire asked the president of the most powerful government in the world what "consequences" he'd threatened the Russian leader with should the Kremlin interfere in US elections going forward, Biden meandered his way through one of his signature not-quite-lucid word salads, and then said the following:

"Let's get this straight: How would it be if the United States were viewed by the rest of the world as interfering with the elections directly of other countries, and everybody knew it? What would it be like if we engaged in activities that he is engaged in? It diminishes the standing of a country that is desperately trying to make sure it maintains its standing as a major world power."

Comment: It's telling of how corrupt the US press have become that, whilst fawning over Biden's delirious claims, a simple search through their own archives shows relatively recent reports detailing the extensive nature of US coups abroad:
However, it all perhaps makes much more sense when one considers that it was only this year that the media knowingly covered up the coup that happened on US soil, that stole the Presidency from Trump and gave it to Biden: Aklso check out SOTT radio's: Newsreal #33: Strange Days in DC - Military Checkpoints as US Capital Awaits 'Virtual Inauguration'

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Eye 1

Biden-Putin meeting shows Russia-US relations are set for a return to the Cold War-era. Strangely, that might be an improvement

Fyodor Lukyanov
RT
Thu, 17 Jun 2021 12:30 UTC
Putin Biden
© Alexander Zemlianichenko/Pool via REUTERS
US President Joe Biden and Russia's President Vladimir Putin meet for the U.S.-Russia summit at Villa La Grange in Geneva, Switzerland June 16, 2021.
The long-anticipated summit between Russian President Vladimir Putin and his US counterpart, Joe Biden, was, a total, if modest, success. Aside from the hype, it achieved its goals of cooling tensions after years of circus antics.

While the fears were originally bigger than the hopes, the worst possible outcomes failed to materialize, and the summit served its purpose of getting Moscow and Washington to sit down and do business. Both leaders signed up to a well-polished joint statement that denounced nuclear war and signaled their determination to formulate new principles underpinning strategic stability and cybersecurity.

What's more, their respective ambassadors are finally returning to their posts - a positive sign, if even only a symbolic gesture of goodwill. In reality, no matter how hard foreign diplomatic missions work or how many people they employ, they can rarely if ever tip the scale when there is no political will at the top.

Judging by what the presidents said though, they covered a lot of ground in the brief, yet rather substantive, meeting. Now, they may well end up striking a deal or two - like the spy swaps in the good old days of the Soviet Union - but any such arrangement would be an isolated case with no lasting effect on bilateral relations.

Comment: See also:

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HAL9000

UK's Ministry of Defense report urges embrace of human augmentation to fully exploit drones and AI for warfighting

Chris Cole
Drone Wars
Wed, 09 Jun 2021 00:00 UTC
military drone
The MoD's internal think-tank, the Development, Concepts and Doctrine Centre (DCDC) along with the German Bundeswehr Office for Defence Planning (BODP) has published a disturbing new report urging greater investigation of - and investment in - human augmentation for military purposes. The following is a brief summary of the 100+ page document with short comment at the end.

'Human Augmentation - The Dawn of a New Paradigm' argues that humans are the 'weakest link' in modern warfare, and that there is a need to exploit scientific advances to improve human capabilities.
"Increasing use of autonomous and unmanned systems - from the tactical to the strategic level - could significantly increase the combat effect that an individual can bring to bear, but to realise this potential, the interfaces between people and machines will need to be significantly enhanced. Human augmentation will play an important part in enabling this interface."
human augmentation
Suggested human augmentation to explore for military purposes includes the use of brain interfaces, pharmaceuticals and gene therapy. Humans, argues the report, should be seen as a 'platform' in the same way as vehicles, aircraft and ships, with three elements of 'the human platform' to be developed: the physical, the psychological and the social (see image below).
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Attention

Between the lines of the Biden-Putin summit

Pepe Escobar
Asia Times
Thu, 17 Jun 2021 20:59 UTC
Demented and Putin
© AFP / EyePress News
Russian President Vladimir Putin and US President Joe Biden hold their summit in Geneva at the first such meeting since 2018.
Let's start with the written word.

In Geneva, the US and Russia issued a joint statement in which "we reaffirm the principle that a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought."

Assorted Dr Strangeloves will cringe - but at least the world has it in writing, and may breathe a sigh of relief with this breakthrough of sorts. That doesn't mean that a "non-agreement-capable" US military-industrial complex will abide by it.

Moscow and Washington also committed to engage in an "integrated bilateral strategic stability dialogue in the near future that will be deliberate and robust." The devil in the details is in which "near future" the dialogue will progress.

A first step is that ambassadors are returning to both capitals. Putin confirmed that the Russian Foreign Ministry and the State Department will "start consultations" following the new START-3 treaty extension for five years.

Equally important was the actual Rosebud in Geneva: the Minsk protocol. That was one of the key drivers for the White House to actually ask the Kremlin for the summit - and not the other way around.

The US establishment was shaken by the lightning-flash military buildup in Russian territory contiguous to Donbass, which was a response to Kiev's provocations. (Putin: "We conduct exercises on our territory, but we do not conduct exercises dragging equipment and weapons to the US border.")

The message was duly received. There seems to be a change of posture by the US on Ukraine - implying the Minsk protocol is back.

But that can all be - once again - shadow play. Biden said: "We agreed to pursue diplomacy related to the Minsk agreement."

To "pursue diplomacy" does not necessarily mean strictly abiding by a deal, already endorsed by the UN Security Council, that is being disrespected by Kiev non-stop. But at least it implies diplomacy.

A benign reading would reveal that some red lines are finally being understood. Putin did allude to it: "In general, it is clear to us what our US partners talk about, and they do understand what we say, when it comes to the 'red lines.' But I should say frankly that we have not gone as far as placing the emphases in detail" sufficiently to "distribute and share something."

So no detail - at least not yet.
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Attention

Unthinkable Thoughts - '....powerful people and organizations have engineered this pandemic with deadly intent'

Josh Mitteldorf
Josh Mitteldorf Science Blog
Mon, 10 May 2021 20:34 UTC
This essay is inspired by Dr Mercola's announcement last week that (reading between the lines) his life and his family's have been threatened if he doesn't remove from his web site a peer-reviewed study demonstrating the benefits of vitamin D and zinc in prevention of the worst COVID outcomes. In the present Orwellian era, where propaganda and deception are ubiquitous, one of the signposts of truth that I have learned to respect is that the most important truths are the most heavily censored.

BioWeapon
© Activist Post
This is not what I enjoy writing about, but as I find dark thoughts creeping into my consciousness, perhaps it is better to put them on paper with supporting logic and invite my readers to help me clarify the reasoning and, perhaps, to point a way out of the darkness.

Already in January, 2020, two ideas about COVID were emerging. One is that there were people and institutions who seemed to have anticipated the event, and were planning for it for a long time. Gates, Fauci, the World Economic Forum, and Johns Hopkins School of Medicine were among the prescient. (I credit the (now deleted) videos of Spiro Skouras.) Second was the genetic evidence suggesting that COVID had a laboratory origin. Funders of the scientific establishment have lost their bid to ridicule this idea, and it has now leaked into the mainstream, where it is fused with the classical yellow peril propaganda: "China did it!". I have cited evidence that America is likely equally culpable.

The confluence of these two themes suggests the dark logic that I take for my topic today: Those who knew in advance, not only that there would be a pandemic but that it would be a Coronavirus, were actually responsible for engineering this pandemic.

Immediately, I think: How could people capable of such sociopathic enormities be occupying the most powerful circles of the world's elite? And what would be their motivation? I don't have answers to these questions, and I will leave speculation to others. But there's one attractive answer that I find less compelling: that it's a money-maker for the large and criminal pharmaceutical industry. The new mRNA vaccines are already the most profitable drugs in history, but I think that shutdown of world economies, assassinations of world leaders, deep corruption of science, and full-spectrum control of the mainstream narrative imply a larger power base than can plausibly be commanded by the pharma industry.

Instead, I'll try to follow the scientific and medical implications of the hypothesis that COVID is a bioweapon.
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USA

How to defend free speech

Tevi Troy
National Affairs
Tue, 01 Jun 2021 00:00 UTC
Megaphone guy
© Redbubble
Any survey of contemporary life on America's campuses reveals that our institutions of higher learning are no longer devoted to free inquiry and the pursuit of truth. Instead, they appear riddled with speech codes, "safe spaces," banned speakers, protests, and cancelations of those who express disapproved ideas. Students bemoan "microaggressions" and being "triggered" as faculty advance ahistorical theories that diminish America's achievements and exceptionalism.

The stifling campus atmosphere has led conservatives to worry about the potential for new generations of Americans to appreciate and uphold our freedom and equality under the law. Even some non-conservatives have become concerned. As free-speech advocates Greg Lukianoff and Jonathan Haidt warn:
"[a] movement is arising, undirected and driven largely by students, to scrub campuses clean of words, ideas, and subjects that might cause discomfort or give offense."
Though it has no single point of origin, the current wave of censorship can be traced roughly to 2014. That year, student activists were emboldened by a series of victories as they successfully prevented mainstream speakers like Condoleezza Rice, Christine Lagarde, and Ayaan Hirsi Ali from speaking on campus. For a time, conservatives, civil libertarians, and many on the left believed such impulses against free expression would evaporate as students graduated from college. These former students, they insisted, would enter the professional world, where they would be forced to dismiss campus theories as unreasonable and impractical.

Comment: Free speech, by definition and adherence, should not require defense nor constraint.

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Brain

After Geneva summit, Biden shows his preference for fantasy narratives extends beyond the US to Russia as well

Nebojsa Malic
RT
Wed, 16 Jun 2021 21:19 UTC
Biden AF1
© Martial Trezzini/Reuters
US President Joe Biden departs Geneva Airport • Cointrin, Switzerland • June 16, 2021
President Joe Biden's understanding of Russia and the world appears to be based on the same sort of self-deceiving narratives as his concept of the US, if his solo press conference following the Geneva summit is anything to go by.

Parsing Biden's words is a thankless task, because whatever he actually says, his White House handlers and the compliant media will quickly 'clarify' if it clashes with their narrative. With that caveat in mind, some of his remarks at Wednesday's solo press conference in Geneva, following the meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin, could be considered revealing.

"As usual, folks, they gave me a list of the people I'm going to call on," Biden admitted at the start, "they" being the White House staff, presumably.
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X

House votes to repeal 2002 Iraq War authorization

Kevin Freking
AP
Thu, 17 Jun 2021 00:00 UTC
Barbara Lee
© House Television/AP
Rep Barbara Lee (D-CA)
The Democratic-led House, with the backing of President Joe Biden, passed legislation Thursday to repeal the 2002 authorization for use of military force in Iraq, a step supporters said was necessary for Congress to reassert its constitutional duty to weigh in on matters of war while detractors worried that it would embolden militia or terror groups operating in the region.

The repeal legislation was passed overwhelmingly by a vote of 268-161. Forty-nine Republicans voted for the bill. Only one Democrat, Rep. Elaine Luria of Virginia, voted against it.

Supporters said repeal would not affect U.S. military operations around the world, but could prevent current and future presidents from relying on it to conduct unrelated military actions. The White House says there are no ongoing military activities reliant solely upon the 2002 authorization.

The 2002 authorization was directed against the Saddam Hussein regime, authorizing the "necessary and appropriate" use of force to "defend U.S. national security against the continuing threat posed by Iraq" and to "enforce all relevant Security Council resolutions regarding Iraq."

Comment: Is Congress finally taking something off the books? Volumes of legislation are passed each year with hardly a glance at what is stipulated nor time given to evaluate the needs and legalities. Approve now; read later.

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