“Charity” Accused of Sex Abuse Coordinating ID2020’s Pilot Program For Refugee Newborns

A refugee family hold numbered placards as they pose for a photo during a census conducted by the Thai authorities at Mae La refugee camp in 2014. Photo: Reuters

A biometric identification program backed by the ID2020 alliance will see its new “digital id” program rolled out for refugee newborns in close coordination with a charity tied to Wall Street and prominent Western politicians whose workers have been accused of sexually exploiting refugee children.

By Whitney Webb

Source: Unlimited Hangout

iRespond, an international non-profit organization that is “dedicated to using biometrics to improve lives through digital identity,” has begun piloting a new biometric program for newborns among the predominately Karen refugee population along the Myanmar-Thailand border, a program it soon hopes to “quickly deploy” at a greater scale and make available to the general global population. The pilot program is being conducted as part of the controversial ID2020 alliance, backed by Microsoft, the GAVI vaccine alliance and the Rockefeller Foundation, and with the International Rescue Committee (IRC), a non-profit organization deeply tied to the Western political elite and Wall Street with a controversial track record of silencing numerous sex abuse and fraud allegations.

The new program, an extension of iRespond’s “voluntary” biometric identification program in the Mae La refugee camp, “will create a record of a birth, attested by a trusted clinic, with a goal of changing the life trajectory for the participants.” Through the program, “a guardianship relationship between the newborn and the mother is established and linked to digital and high security physical identity documents.”

However, iRespond’s CEO, Scott Reid, told Biometric Update that these credentials do “not carry the same weight as a true birth certificate,” but asserts that the organization’s biometric “birth attestation” program “could leapfrog the traditional barriers to establishing identity.” Despite the fact that iRespond’s quasi-birth certificates would seemingly serve little purpose in areas where actual birth certificates are readily available, the organization notes that “once the pilot is completed, iRespond is ready to quickly deploy the solution at scale” for mass use around the globe. “Product development” on adapting their platform for newborns began earlier this year and Reid notes that having an iRespond-provided biometric “birth attestation” will enable “access to vital services such as healthcare, social protection, education and banking.”

The pilot program is being conducted at the Mae Tao clinic, which is largely funded by the CIA cut-out USAID as well as the governments of Germany and Taiwan, the Open Society Foundations and the International Rescue Committee (IRC). The IRC is very active in the day-to-day functions of the clinic (financed by a USAID-funded project) and it is also intimately involved in iRespond’s digital identity program, including its new pilot program for newborns and its earlier efforts to supply Mae La’s residents with biometric identity.

Food or Sovereignty

iRespond’s work in Mae La in conjunction with IRC was first announced by the ID2020 alliance in September 2018. The ID2020-funded pilot program, the announcement states, was to be “led by Alliance partner iRespond and will be conducted in close partnership with the International Rescue Committee (IRC).” It aims to provide biometric identities to the approximately 35,000 individuals inhabiting the area, with the newer program aiming to ensure that babies born in the community are also made participants by default upon birth. It notes specifically that “the pilot will offer blockchain-based digital identification, linked to individual users through iris recognition, for refugees accessing the IRC’s services in the Mae La Camp in Thailand.” Having a “digital identity” would allow refugees “to access improved, consistent healthcare within the camp” with plans for the same system to eventually “electronically document both educational attainment and professional skills to aid with employment opportunities.”

A year later, the program, featured in a lengthy profile in Newsweek, was revealed to be “just the first step in an effort that aims to equip the camp’s entire refugee population with secure and portable “digital wallets” that will hold not just their medical records but also educational and vocational credentials, camp work histories and myriad other records,” ostensibly including financial activity. This is particularly likely given that iRespond is partnered with Mastercardanother ID2020 partner that is closely allied with the company, Trust Stamp, a biometric identity platform that also doubles as a vaccine record and payment system. In addition, IRC’s strategic plans for Mae La through 2020 include “expand[ing] micro-enterprise development and village savings and loans associations,” such as those offered by ID2020 partner Kiva, among others, who link biometric identity to the receipt of loans.

iRespond’s system, not unlike Trust Stamp’s, is also slated to serve as a vaccine record. Larry Dohr, iRespond’s head of Southeast Asia operations, told Reuters in April that “a biometric ID system can keep a record of such people [who have previously tested positive for Covid-19] and those getting the vaccine.” Dohr added that “we can biometrically identify the individual and tie them to the test results, as well as to a high security document. The person then has ‘non-refutable’ proof that they have immunity due to antibodies in their system.” Dohr then refers to such “proof” as a “very valuable credential.”

Notably, in press releases and news reports, iRespond executives emphasize how their biometric identity system, based on iris scans and powered by Microsoft, will “protect privacy” and allow “control and ownership of identity data belong to the holder.” However, the Mae La project does not offer this degree of control and ownership, with Newsweek noting that“Eventually, [iRespond and their collaborators] aim to offer the refugees a level of fine-grained control over what pieces of personal information are shared with others.” In other words, such control over their personal information has not yet been made available to them, despite the public portrayal that this functionality is a base component of iRespond’s system.

What is particularly noteworthy about iRespond’s and IRC’s digital identity efforts is that, while it is a “voluntary” program, destitute refugees wishing to access healthcare and other services IRC provides in the area, including access to clean water, must have their irises scanned in order to reap those benefits. It is highly unlikely that such individuals are not only uninformed about any potential risks of providing their biometrics for use in a pilot program, but are not in a stable enough state to make an informed decision on the matter, as their precarious position would see them choose urgent healthcare needs, etc. over privacy. It increasingly seems that Mae La was chosen as the pilot project because its residents were highly unlikely to decline participation, especially when healthcare access and other basic needs provided by IRC are dangled as carrots on a stick and only accessible upon participation in iRespond’s biometric identity program.

This program is remarkably similar to the World Food Programme’s recently implemented “Building Blocks” initiative, which  is funded by the US, German, Dutch and Luxembourgian governments. Building Blocks uses a blockchain-based biometric identity system “to expand refugees’ choices in how they access and spend their cash assistance” in Syrian refugee camps within Jordan. Now, “over 100,000 people living in the camps can purchase groceries by scanning an iris at checkout” as part of the checkout. Those who do not participate are unable to access their WFP “cash benefits” since they are available exclusively through this biometric system, leaving refugees the choice between surrendering their biometric data and food.

Equally noteworthy is the fact that those financially supporting the Mae La project and similar projects, particularly the ID2020 alliance, are “hopeful” that iRespond’s efforts in Mae La will some day be rolled out on a global scale. Indeed,Newsweek noted that “many of the funders [of the Mae La project]—part of what’s known as the ID2020 alliance, which includes Accenture, Microsoft and the Rockefeller Foundation—hope the Mae La project could eventually serve as a blueprint for the world’s millions of stateless people, as well as citizens of developed nations and everyone else.”

Biometric Enclosure

According to iRespond’s rather spartan website, their biometric identity platform “primarily relies on iris biometrics, the best modality after DNA for accuracy and reliability.” It further describes its platform as follows:

“When a new participant is enrolled, an encrypted biometric template is created from their iris scan and a randomly assigned 12-digit number is drawn from a pool of 90 billion numbers. On subsequent visits, the identity of the participant is verified when their template is matched and the system returns the original 12-digit unique identifier.”

iRespond’s platform also “easily integrates into healthcare, humanitarian aid, research, and human-rights applications,” and it has been used to grant refugees and other vulnerable populations access to food, healthcare, and other forms of aid provided by foreign NGOs operating in these areas. It has also been used to keep track of participants in clinical drug trials. iRespond’s platform in the latter case was used by the U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in conjunction with Johns Hopkins School of Public Health (both are iRespond partners), to track participants in clinical HIV treatment trials in Senegal as well as an additional Johns Hopkins study in South Africa. It has also been used to track recipients of the controversial HPV vaccine in Sierra Leone, where it was used “to track patients who have not completed their vaccination series.”

It is also being used among “vulnerable groups” in Myanmar by the NGO Population Services International (PSI) to “track demographics and the timing of positive HIV tests.” By analyzing these details, “we uncover which groups are most vulnerable to becoming infected,” according to PSI’s country representative for Myanmar.

The non-profit’s platform is powered by its main tech partner and another ID2020 member, Microsoft. iRespond’s platform “couldn’t exist without the cloud,” according to its CEO Scott Reid, and Microsoft supplies iRespond with a $60,000 grant to its Azure cloud system, allowing the organization to use it free of charge. In addition, Microsoft donated 39 tablets to iRespond that are used by the organization in the various places it operates “to enable flexibility in the field.” “The number of people we have helped has rapidly gone from the tens of thousands to the hundreds of thousands, and we look forward to soon working on behalf of many millions of people. These Microsoft tools are helping to make it possible,” iRespond’s Larry Dohr stated in a Microsoft profile.

Eric Rasmussen, iRespond’s president and chairman of the board, is a particularly interesting character who has been quite frank about the rationale behind the creation of iRespond. “When you understand who someone is, you understand what they’re entitled to, whether that’s national citizenship, international refugee support, or simply food distributions,” Rasmussen told Microsoft last year.

In addition to his key role at iRespond, Rasmussen is a professor at the Google-backed “Singularity University” as well as chairman of the board at InSTEDD, a “global NGO specializing humanitarian informatics, particularly around health in resource-poor economies” that is partnered with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, the CDC, Google and UNICEF. In addition, Rasmussen is also the CEO of a “profit-for-purpose” company called Infinitum Humanitarian Systems (IHS). IHS works closely with USAID and the State Department as well as U.S. military intelligence agencies and intelligence/defense contractor Booz Allen Hamilton. Prior to his roles at iRespond, IHS and InSTEDD, Rasmussen was the Principal Investigator in humanitarian informatics for the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) and made multiple war time deployments to Bosnia, Iraq and Afghanistan.

“Charity” of the Predator Class

More troubling than the background and associations of iRespond are those of their partner in the recently announced newborn biometric identification initiative, the International Rescue Committee (IRC). The IRC describes themselves as responding “to the world’s worst humanitarian crises and help[ing] people whose lives and livelihoods are shattered by conflict and disaster to survive, recover and gain control of their future.”

Despite the IRC framing itself as a “humanitarian” venture, its board is stuffed with a sordid mix of Wall Street criminals and war criminals. For example, its board is co-chaired by Timothy Geithner, former Treasury Secretary during the 2008 financial crisis bail-outs and current President of Wall Street titan Warburg-Pincus, and Susan Susman, an Executive Vice President at Pfizer. Its board of advisers includes war criminals Henry Kissinger and Madeleine Albright as well as Condoleezza Rice and Colin Powell. Also present are current and former leaders and top executives at McKinsey, Morgan Stanley, Goldman Sachs, Kroll Associates (“the CIA of Wall Street”), PepsiCo, Bank of America, Lehman Brothers, Citigroup and the World Bank. Another advisor is former chairman and CEO of AIG Maurice “Hank” Greenberg, a name that will likely be familiar to those who have researched the September 11th attacks and Wall Street financial crimes in general.

Since 2013, the IRC has been led by David Miliband, the Tony Blair “protégé” who Bill Clinton once called “one of the ablest, most creative public servants of our time” and who worked closely with then-U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton while serving as the U.K.’s Foreign Secretary. So close was Miliband to the Clintons, that he was being considered for a “top U.S. government job” if Hillary Clinton had won the 2016 election.

In the years since joining the IRC, Miliband’s salary as the group’s president has ballooned to nearly a million dollars annually (up from approximately $240,000 when he arrived at the organization in 2013). In addition, the group has been mired in scandal since Miliband became its president. For instance, it was revealed in 2018 that IRC was one of several U.K.-based charities where “workers [were] alleged to be in sexually exploitative relationships with refugee children” including through “sex-for-food scandals” where “sexual abuse was so endemic that the only way for many refugee families to survive was to allow a teenage girl to be exploited.” Reports further alleged that IRC and other charities named in the report, including Save the Children, had known of the egregious abuse for years prior to the allegations being made public and chose not to act.

That year, it was also found that the IRC had “silenced 37 sex abuse, fraud and bribery allegations,” resulting in the U.K. government, which had previously funneled millions to the organization, cutting off its funding entirely. Despite the troubling revelations, no IRC workers accused of wrong-doing were ever prosecuted.

Given the fact that the IRC’s board and presidency is stuffed with professional exploiters, from Wall Street to the public sector, it is hardly surprising that this “charity” would be caught doing the same under the guise of providing “aid” to the world’s most vulnerable populations, who they apparently view as easy prey.

Foxes in the Hen House

In the several media profiles of the iRespond-IRC biometric identity effort, the initiative is described as helping to prevent the exploitation of the world’s most vulnerable, particularly forced labor and sex trafficking. However, if that really were the case, why is this program being executed by iRespond, whose president and chairman has close ties to the U.S. military and intelligence communities, and the IRC, backed by a legion of war criminals and financial predators?

The U.S. military, a close partner of iRespond’s Eric Rasmussen, is notorious for its role in the trafficking of persons for forced labor, while many of its key contractors – like DynCorp — have been the subject of numerous scandalsregarding the sexual abuse or sex trafficking of war-torn or otherwise vulnerable populations. On the other hand, the IRC’s mix of backers like Madeleine Albright, infamous for her comment on the murder by sanctions of half a million Iraqi children being “worth it,” and Henry Kissinger, notorious for his words about using food as a weapon to force populations into subservience and to reduce third-world populations, is equally anathema to the publicly professed purpose of the iRespond-IRC biometric identification program.

Not unlike the “sex-for-food” scandal in which IRC was once embroiled, this new initiative is placing refugees in the position of taking part in a massive technocratic experiment if they wish to eat or access other basic services. Though certainly not as egregious as a sex crime, it is nonetheless another means of exploiting the world’s most vulnerable populations under the guise of “helping” them, when those really being aided are the technocratic elite who aim to take this biometric identification program global in short order.

Stories Of Economic Despair From America’s Worst Economic Downturn Since The Great Depression Of The 1930s

By Michael Snyder

Source: End of the American Dream

The economic pain that we are witnessing right now is far greater than anything that we witnessed during the last recession.  U.S. GDP declined by 32.9 percent on an annualized basis last quarter, more than 100,000 businesses have permanently shut down since the COVID-19 pandemic first hit the United States, and more than 54 million Americans have filed new claims for unemployment benefits over the last 19 weeks.  Up until just recently, a $600 weekly unemployment “supplement” and a federal moratorium that prevented many evictions had helped to ease the suffering for millions of American families, but both of those measures have now expired.  As a result, a tremendous amount of economic pain which had previously been deferred will now come rushing back with a vengeance.  Millions of American families are no longer going to be able to pay their bills, and experts are warning that we could soon see an “eviction crisis” that is absolutely unprecedented in American history.

48-year-old Thomas Darnell of West Point, Mississippi never thought that he would be in this position.  He had been a factory worker for over 20 years until he lost his job in May, and since then he hasn’t been able to find another.  And then on top of everything else, everyone in his house caught COVID-19…

First, he was furloughed for three weeks in April and then laid off in May. Then things got worse: His entire household of seven, including himself, his wife, three kids and daughter-in-law, along with his baby grandson, contracted coronavirus after they saw their immediate family over the Independence Day weekend.

“I’m tired and shaky. Even after a few weeks, I’m still trying to recover,” Darnell says, who has since been cleared of the virus but still has lingering symptoms.

He is concerned that employers will be scared away by his recent illness, and he is becoming desperate because he is running out of money.

With no health insurance and no paychecks coming in, Darnell and his wife have gotten to the point where they have to make a choice between buying insulin or buying groceries

He can’t afford health insurance, which has added to his anxiety because he and his wife are both diabetic, he says. Like Bolei, Darnell and his wife have been forced to make a grueling decision between either paying for their medications or keeping food on the table.

“Do we buy insulin or groceries? It’s a hard juggle,” Darnell says. “I’m willing to make less money and start working again to get health insurance, but no one is hiring.”

The weekly $600 unemployment supplements from the federal government had helped to keep them going for a while, but now those payments have ended, and the immediate future is looking quite bleak.

In Richmond, Virginia, a mother of eight named Shamika Rollins wasn’t sure how she was going to make it when her hours as a home health aid were reduced.  Unpaid bills started piling up, and then she got an eviction notice a few weeks ago.  The following comes from CBS News

Shamika Rollins’ eight children share two bedrooms in Richmond, Virginia. But she’s worried about losing their home after she says she received an eviction notice in June.

“First thing, I panic, and then next thing, I look, and I’m like, I got my kids. And it’s like, okay, now you gotta figure this out,” she told CBS News correspondent Adriana Diaz.

If a miracle does not happen, Rollins and her eight children will soon be out in the street, and this is causing her to have “a lot of sleepless nights”

“I have a lot of sleepless nights,” Rollins said. “My mind is constantly racing, you know, what’s your next move?”

Sadly, there are millions of other Americans in the exact same position.

In fact, experts are projecting that up to 40 million Americans could be evicted from their homes during this pandemic.

Many small business owners are also facing heartbreaking choices during this downturn.  A restaurant owner in Delaware named Alex Heidenberger “hasn’t paid the mortgage on his home the past four months” as he desperately tries to keep his once profitable restaurants alive…

Heidenberger, who typically draws about $20,000 a month in profit from the restaurant, now receives nothing. He says he hasn’t paid the mortgage on his home the past four months. He served lifeguard duty for a couple of weeks, mostly to help a beach crew depleted by COVID-19 quarantines but also to make some cash.

“I’m working harder than I have ever worked in my life,” he says, adding that he puts in about 80 hours a week at the two restaurants. Yet, “I have no money… This is all I think about. I don’t sleep.”

The COVID-19 pandemic has hit the restaurant industry particularly hard.  Americans are not eating out as regularly as they once did because of the virus, and it is probably going to remain that way for the foreseeable future.

In Massachusetts, a restaurant owner named John Pepper once had eight thriving locations, but at this point only two of them remain open

John Pepper used a PPP loan to pay employees and reopen four of his eight Boloco restaurants when Massachusetts lifted its shutdown order in early May. But with the money spent and business at the restaurants down as much as 70%, Pepper had to again close two locations. The staff of 125 he had before the virus outbreak is down to 50.

“A lot of this is out of our hands at this point,” Pepper says. “At this moment, I don’t see getting my full payroll back.”

Overall, we are facing a “restaurant apocalypse” in the U.S. that is unprecedented in size and scope.

According to one estimate, we could lose more than a third of all of our restaurants by the end of this calendar year

As many as 231,000 of the nation’s roughly 660,000 eateries will likely shut down this year, according to an estimate from restaurant consultancy Aaron Allen & Associates provided to Bloomberg News. This will bring the industry’s steady growth to a halt and mark the first time in two decades that U.S. restaurant counts don’t climb. Restaurants have already shed millions of jobs this year, economic data show.

What we are watching is truly horrifying.  So many hopes and dreams went into each one of those restaurants that are shutting down, and countless restaurant owners are going to be completely financially ruined by all of this.

For other Americans, this economic downturn has put their very lives at risk.  In Colorado, 70-year-old Catherine Azar was already dealing with heart problems and diabetes, and now she is in danger of being thrown out into the street

“It’s hard for me to conceive of someone being willing to put another person out in the street in the middle of a deadly pandemic, and I’m high risk. I’m 70. I have heart issues and I’m diabetic,” Azar said.

Rollins and Azar are just two of the 43 million Americans at risk of eviction in the coming months. For context, about 1 million Americans were evicted in 2010, the year after the Great Recession.

How long do you think that a 70-year-old woman with heart problems and diabetes would last on the street or in a shelter?

And as millions upon millions of Americans get evicted during the months ahead, the shelters are all going to fill up really fast.

America simply was not prepared for an economic downturn of this nature, and the truth is that much bigger challenges are still ahead.

So please do not look down on anyone that needs help right now, because soon you may find yourself in the exact same position.

COVID19, The Great Reset & The New Normal

By Derrick Broze

Source: Activist Post

Clearly, 2020 has been unlike any previous year in the last century or so. The world is currently battling against an infodemic of propaganda spewing from the corporate media and official health authorities. Yes, people are sick and dying. However, the statistics make it clear that COVID-19 simply does not warrant a total lockdown of the planet and further destruction of the economy. 

Regardless, nations around the world are using COVID-19 as an opportunity to grab more surveillance and police state powers, institute mask and vaccine mandates, accelerate the push towards a completely digital world, enact more corporate bailouts, and generally, extreme control and involvement in citizens lives. The sheer magnitude of the COVID-19 operation is unparalleled, with the most recent similar event being the attacks of September 11, 2001. As with the 9/11 attacks, the predator class is using COVID-19 as the excuse to push plans and agendas which predate the spread of the novel coronavirus.

Even so, the COVID-19 operation is unlike any other event to take place in modern history because the results of this event are affecting people in every single nation on the planet and will continue to for years to come. Also, unlike 9/11 – which took place over the course of one morning – the COVID-19 operation is taking place daily for months on end. The effects of this constant bombardment with fear and panic are taking a toll on the hearts and minds of free people all around the world. Quite simply, the people are ready for this to end and they will do almost anything to achieve this goal. It is within this space of fear and uncertainty which the predator class has now begun to insert themselves, ready to present the “solution” to our ills.

The Great Reset

As every student of power and deception knows, the easiest way to achieve victory over your opponent is to guide them to a predetermined destination which benefits your agenda. If you can do this while convincing your opponent that they are consciously making their own choices and the path is for their own good – well, you are all but guaranteed success. I believe the evidence indicates this is the strategy we are seeing unfold during the COVID-19 operation.

The predetermined path we are being led down is known as “The Great Reset” and was announced in early June by the World Economic Forum. Regular readers will remember that on October 18, 2019, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation partnered with the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security and the WEF on a high-level pandemic exercise known as Event 201. Event 201 simulated how the world would respond to a coronavirus pandemic which swept around the planet. The simulation imagined 65 million people dying, mass lock downs, quarantines, censorship of alternative viewpoints under the guise of fighting “disinformation,” and even floated the idea of arresting people who question the pandemic narrative.

The launch of The Great Reset was supported by Klaus Schwab, the founder and executive chairman of the World Economic Forum; England’s Prince Charles; Antonio Guterres, Secretary-General of the UN; and Kristalina Georgieva of the International Monetary Fund. The kick-off was truly an international event with the participation of Ma Jun, the chairman of the Green Finance Committee at the China Society for Finance and Banking and a member of the Monetary Policy Committee of the People’s Bank of China. The event was also supported by Bernard Looney, CEO of BP; Ajay Banga, CEO of Mastercard; and Bradford Smith, president of Microsoft.

During the launch of The Great ResetPrince Charles stated that humanity cannot waste time because we need to put nature at the heart of how we operate.” UN Secretary-General Guterres called for “more equal, inclusive and sustainable economies and societies” that can face pandemics, climate change, and other global challenges.

In an opinion piece published in The Globe and Mail, Klaus Schwab provided more details on the goals of The Great Reset (emphasis added):

COVID-19 lockdowns may be gradually easing, but anxiety about the world’s social and economic prospects is only intensifying. There is good reason to worry: a sharp economic downturn has already begun, and we could be facing the worst depression since the 1930s. But, while this outcome is likely, it is not unavoidable.

To achieve a better outcome, the world must act jointly and swiftly to revamp all aspects of our societies and economies, from education to social contracts and working conditions. Every country, from the United States to China, must participate, and every industry, from oil and gas to tech, must be transformed. In short, we need a “Great Reset” of capitalism.

Schwab goes on to describe several crises facing humanity, including rising government debt, unemployment, and increasing social unrest. Combined with COVID-19, these crises will leave the world less sustainable, less equal and more fragile. “We must build entirely new foundations for our economic and social systems,” Schwab writes. He details the 3 main components of TGR agenda, specifically fairer market outcomes, investments in “equality and sustainability,” and harnessing the innovations of the Fourth Industrial Revolution.

When it comes to producing “fairer market outcomes,” Schwab calls for governments to improve coordination in tax, regulatory, and fiscal policy. He also calls for upgrading trade agreements and moving towards a “stakeholder economy.” When he speaks of equality and sustainability, Schwab means that current and future government stimulus and relief packages should be used to create a new system that is “more resilient, equitable and sustainable.”  He also calls for more “green” urban infrastructure and incentivizing industries to improve their environmental record.

Finally, Schwab calls for utilizing the innovations of “the Fourth Industrial Revolution” to support public good. The 4IR is another pet project of Schwab which was first announced in December 2015. To put it simply, the 4IR is the digital panopticon of the future, where digital surveillance is omnipresent and humanity uses digital technology to alter and, hopefully, improve our lives. Sometimes known as “The Internet of Things,” this world will be powered by 5G and 6G technology.

“Ubiquitous, mobile supercomputing. Intelligent robots. Self-driving cars. Neuro-technological brain enhancements. Genetic editing. The evidence of dramatic change is all around us and it’s happening at exponential speed,” Schwab wrote for the announcement of the 4IR.

Of course, for Schwab and other globalists, the 4IR also lends itself towards more central planning and top-down control. The goal is a track and trace society where all transactions are logged, every person has a digital ID that can be tracked, and social malcontents are locked out of society via social credit scores.

In fact, much of this call for a Great Reset is already playing out. For example, Mastercard and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation-funded GAVI recently announced a partnership with AI-powered “identity authentication” company, Trust Stamp. As MintPress News reported, “The program, which was first launched in late 2018, will see Trust Stamp’s digital identity platform integrated into the GAVI-Mastercard “Wellness Pass,” a digital vaccination record and identity system that is also linked to Mastercard’s click-to-play system that powered by its AI and machine learning technology called NuData.

This is why astute readers are skeptical when they hear Schwab say, “the pandemic represents a rare but narrow window of opportunity to reflect, reimagine, and reset our world to create a healthier, more equitable and more prosperous future.”

Who exactly is Schwab speaking to when he speaks of a more prosperous future? How long has this Great Reset been in the works? The answers to these questions can help us understand the true goals of this agenda.

As researcher Brandon Smith reportedChristine Lagardeformer head of the IMF, discussed a global reset as far back as 2014. “The reset is often mentioned in the same breath as ideas like “the New Multilateralism” or “the Multipolar World Order” or “the New World Order.” All of these phrases mean essentially the same thing,” Smith writes.

Smith correctly notes that the Great Reset is not a response to the pandemic, but rather, “the global reset as implemented by central banks and the BIS/IMF is the cause of the collapse. The collapse is a tool, a flamethrower burning a great hole in the forest to make way for the foundations of the globalist Ziggurat to be built.”

New Normal, Same World Order

In early July, Schwab and French author Thierry Malleret released a book outlining the vision of The Great Reset. The book, Covid-19: The Great Reset, explores what the post-pandemic world might look like. “Will there be enough collective will to take advantage of this unprecedented opportunity to reimagine our world, in a bid to make it a better and more resilient one as it emerges on the other side of this crisis?,” Schwab and Malleret pondered at the release of the book. The two men believe COVID-19 triggered “momentous changes and magnified the fault lines that already beset our economies and societies.” They also predict that falling oil prices and a freeze in tourism could lead to a wave of massive anti-government demonstrations.

“One path will take us to a better world: more inclusive, more equitable and more respectful of Mother Nature. The other will take us to a world that resembles the one we just left behind – but worse and constantly dogged by nasty surprises,” the authors argue.

In the book, Schwab expands upon the initial announcement of The Great Reset. Once again he calls for the 4th Industrial Revolution and the digitalization of everything, powered by 5G technology. However, Schwab goes even further in his book, calling for rethinking the “social contract” society has with governments.

Schwab also calls for a nature based or green economy. In January 2020, the WEF released their report, Nature Risk Rising: Why the Crisis Engulfing Nature Matters for Business and the Economy, as part of their New Nature Economy series of reports. The report is “the first of a series of New Nature Economy reports, prepared through the Nature Action Agenda, a platform that aims to encourage a movement of businesses, governments, civil society, academics, innovators and youth to disrupt business-as-usual approaches.”

A second report, The Future of Nature and Business, was released in July. Once again, the WEF states that COVID-19 presents an “opportunity, to change the way we eat, live, grow, build and power our lives to achieve a carbon-neutral, ‘nature-positive’ economy and halt biodiversity loss by 2030. Business as usual is no longer an option.

In a companion report, the WEF provides some detail on what it means to change the way we eat. Another set of policy measures that would stimulate more resource-efficient food systems entail directing stimulus packages towards R&D to support the diversification away from diets based on resource intensive animal proteins, and towards four main categories of alternatives – aquatic, plant-based, insect-based and laboratory-cultured,” the report states. This push for alternatives to animal proteins has coincided with a rise in laboratory created fake meat, including products funded by the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. 

Interestingly, the companion report also calls for “corporate bailout packages for the meat sector” which “could accelerate these developments.” Coincidentally, because of COVID-19, the Trump administration awarded $15.5 billion in relief aid for the meat and dairy industry. Once again, the predictions and declarations of these global institutions appear to play out in reality as perfect as any scripted TV show.

The calls for a Great Reset greatly mimic previous programs and initiatives put forward by other globalist organizations, including the United Nations. Researcher F. William Engdahl provided much-needed clarity in a recent piece on the announcement of The Great Reset. Engdahl notes that, “the declaration by the World Economic Forum to make a Great Reset is to all indications a thinly-veiled attempt to advance the Agenda 2030 “sustainable” dystopian model, a global “Green New Deal” in the wake of the covid19 pandemic measures. Their close ties with Gates Foundation projects, with the WHO, and with the UN suggest we may soon face a far more sinister world after the covid19 pandemic fades.”

Strategic Intelligence, Strategic Partners, and Event 201

In March, the WEF launched the COVID Action Platform which is essentially a call for global government in response to COVID-19. The answer, WEF believes, is to have greater global cooperation, move away from the nation-state, and tackle the world’s problems as one international community.

Along with the launch of the Action Platform, the WEF released an impressive graphic as part of their “Strategic Intelligence” platform, which outlines the wide ranging ways their plans will effect and shape the world of the 21st century and beyond. From the media’s role in the pandemic to finding a vaccine, the graphic attempts to provide details on this centrally planned future being promoted by the WEF. I encourage all readers to spend an evening going down the rabbit hole that is the COVID Action Platform for a better understanding of where we are headed.

With the launch of The Great Reset, the WEF also launched a Strategic Intelligence graphic detailing how their plans will unfold. The Great Reset graphic details how everything from drones, blockchain, the future of energy, LGBTI inclusion, and 3D printing will play a role in the New Normal. Once again, I encourage readers to take a dive into this graphic to gain clarity on what the WEF and their partners have planned for the coming decade.

The WEF promotes itself as the “International Organization for Public-Private Cooperation.” They partner with a variety of private companies, philanthropic outlets, and governments to achieve their goals. Researcher Steven Guinness recently outlined how the WEF partners with various institutions to accomplish their stated aims and how the Strategic Intelligence platform is “co-curated with leading topic experts from academia, think tanks, and international organizations.”

“‘Co-curators‘ are perhaps the most important aspect to consider here, given that they have the ability to ‘share their expertise with the Forum’s extensive network of members, partners and constituents, as well as a growing public audience,’” Guinness writes. “It is safe to assume then that when co-curators speak, members and partners of the World Economic Forum listen. This in part is how the WEF’s agenda takes shape.”

As Guinness notes, the co-curators of the Strategic Intelligence road map of the globalist vision include Harvard university, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Imperial College London, Oxford University, Yale and the European Council on Foreign Relations. Several of these institutions continue to play an influential role in shaping the narrative around COVID-19.

The WEF’s highest level of partnership is known as Strategic Partners. There are only 100 international companies listed as Strategic Partners. Each partner receives an invitation if they have “alignment with forum values.” These partners “shape the future through extensive contribution to developing and implementing Forum projects and championing public-private dialogue.”

The WEF’s Strategic Partners include Johnson & Johnson, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Bill Gates is also a long time “Agenda Contributor” for the WEF.  As mentioned above, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation partnered with the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security and the WEF on the Event 201 pandemic exercise in October 2019. Johnson & Johnson were also partners in the exercise.

As TLAV has previously documented, the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation operates in a similar fashion to the WEF: their publicly stated goals mask a global control agenda. Thus, it should come as no surprise that Klaus Schwab, founder of the WEF, is a former attendee and member of the Steering Committee for the secretive Bilderberg Group.

The WEF itself is akin to a more public Bilderberg Group which brings together around 3,000 business leaders, international political leaders, economists, celebrities, and journalists for a five day conference to discuss global issues. The WEF meets every January in Davos, Switzerland, to discuss their agenda. The elitism of the WEF has resulted in Schwab and his cohorts being nicknamed The Davos Class.

In January 2021 the theme of the WEF meeting will be “The Great Reset.” It’s important that we keep an eye on the WEF and their push for the Great Reset as we draw closer to election 2020 and a potential Dark Winter. Klaus Schwab, Bill Gates, and their ilk are determined to present themselves as the saviors of humanity. They are using the COVID-19 panic as an opportunity to push their agenda while selling it as the cure to our problems.

This predator class attempts to mask their true intentions with flowery language designed to lull the waking masses back to sleep. To be clear, our world is absolutely, without a doubt existing in an unsustainable paradigm. We do have growing income inequality, police violence, failing healthcare systems, and insufficient food production systems. These problems were apparent before COVID-19 and the fragility of these systems has indeed become more obvious in recent months. However, these psychopaths would prefer if we allowed them to stay in the driver’s seat as they careen us into a future of technocratic control and the end of individual liberty.

While Schwab and Gates would prefer that the people of the world submit to their vision, we must stand against this push for centralization of power and technology. The Great Reset is coming, and perhaps, it should come. We have many issues facing our species that need to be addressed. However, central planning, surveillance, and loss of individual liberty is not the answer. The answer is decentralization, opting out en masse, non-compliance, and non-participation in the systems which have brought us to this predicament.

We, as free people, must decide what path we intend to take. Will we stand by and allow the predators to seize control of all resources and power for the coming generations? Or, will we finally break free from their violent systems and initiate a Great Reset which benefits the people, from bottom to top?

The answer depends on you.

Question Everything, Come To Your Own Conclusions.

Military Escalation in the Middle East: Is Israel Planning a Multi-Front War against Its Arab Neighbors?

Top US and Israeli Military Officials Meet Unannounced in Southern Israel

By Timothy Alexander Guzman

Source: Silent Crow News

If you watch the US mainstream media’s 24 hour news coverage on recent events around the world no matter what time of the day it is, Covid-19 and China dominate the headlines while ignoring recent escalations in the Middle East involving Israel and its Arab neighbors as they come closer to another war in an already devastated region.  The Times of Israel reported that the Israeli government “sent a message to Hezbollah warning the Lebanese terror group against any retaliatory action in response to the killing of one of the organization’s fighters in an airstrike in Syria on Monday night, which was attributed to Israel.”  According to various reports, Israel has killed one of Hezbollah’s fighters Ali Kamel Mohsen Jawad in another cross-border attack in Syria last week and now fears that Hezbollah will retaliate, but Israel’s military and intelligence community has issued a statement aimed at Hezbollah, Lebanon and Syria warning them not to retaliate considering that Israel would most likely launch a multi-front attack on all entities involved.  The report said that “the airstrike attributed to Israel on Monday night hit weapons depots and military positions belonging to Syrian regime forces and Iran-backed militia fighters, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.”  For the record, The Syrian Observatory for Human Rights (SOHR) is a UK government funded pro-opposition group to the Assad Government.  In a statement by the Israeli army, “The IDF holds the Syrian regime responsible for the fire against Israel earlier today” and that “the IDF will continue operating with determination and will respond to any violation of Israeli sovereignty.”  What was revealing was an unannounced meeting between the US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff General Mark Milley and Israel’s top military leaders including Defense Minister Benny Gantz:

US Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley, made an unannounced visit to Israel, meeting with Defense Minister Benny Gantz, IDF chief Lt. Gen. Aviv Kohavi and Mossad director Yossi Cohen, along with other top brass. 

Israeli television commentators speculated on the possible significance of the visit, particularly regarding the threat posed by Iran and its Lebanese ally Hezbollah. “In light of a situational assessment in the IDF and in accordance with the Northern Command’s defense plan, the IDF’s deployment will change in both the military and civilian arena. with the goal of strengthening defenses along the northern border,” the IDF said in the statement. In a tacit threat, the IDF preemptively warned Beirut that it sees the state of Lebanon as “responsible for all actions emanating from Lebanon”

Something big is about to take place as the IDF “cleared some troops out of positions directly along the border, moving them deeper into Israel, so that they would not represent a clear target for Hezbollah, while still allowing them to defend the frontier” according to the report.  However, Milley’s visit at the Nevatim Air Base in southern Israel is significant according to another report by the Times of Israel ‘US military chief visits Israel to talk regional threats, amid tensions in north’ stating that “the visit came at a time of heightened tensions with Iran and its allies across the Middle East.” General Milley was briefed by Israel’s Intelligence agencies including Mossad and Israel’s military intelligence unit, Aman on the threat they face from Iran and its allies.  After the briefing, Gantz declared that “the need to continue the pressure on Iran and its proxies that threaten regional and global stability” signaling to it’s neighboring enemies “not” to test Israel.

Lebanon has two major problems to deal with besides another catastrophic war, for starters it has a severe economic crisis with a collapsing currency.  The other problem is their newly discovered offshore oil and gas reserves which the US and Israel would love to get their hands on.  Lebanon’s offshore oil reserves is estimated to be at 865 million barrels and has gas reserves that range from 25 trillion cubic feet (an estimate published in 2018 by the Chatham House which is part of the Royal Institute of International Affairs, a think tank based in London) to 96 trillion cubic feet in 2013, an estimate claimed by the Lebanese Energy Minister at the time, Gebran Bassil.  Either way, Lebanon hosts Hezbollah on its territory and has discovered an abundance of natural resources in its offshore territories, its a prime target for Israel and the US.

War Will Begin in the Middle East, Not Asia?

The recent incident involving Iran’s Mahan air passenger plane traveling from Tehran to Beirut over Syria and a US F-14 fighter jet who apparently came dangerously close to the plane according to Iranian media is a sign of aggression that sends a message to Iran and its allies including Hezbollah that the US and Israel is prepared for war.  Israel does not want Washington to focus on China since the upcoming US elections are months away and Israel is not sure what is going to happen come this November with Trump and his pro-Israel administration.  Israel cannot afford to have Washington start a new war with China so for the time being tensions between the US and China will lead to a new Cold War 2.0.  The Middle East is an important region that remains a strategic part of the world’s economy with its valuable natural resources, a fact too important to ignore for western Big Oil interests and Israel.  The meeting between US and Israeli military officials is significant and should be taken seriously, but the world is consumed with news on Covid-19 and China. Another Middle East war can happen either before or after the November elections and that depends on how desperate Israel becomes.  Israel can pull Washington’s strings and ignite a war between the US and Iran before the situation intensifies in the South China Sea.

War is inevitable and it will begin in the Middle East and end on the US mainland with an already declining economy and a society that is falling apart.  Non-stop protests continue to destroy many US cities with the possibility of more riots to to come if the never-Trump crowd or the Democrats lose the elections in November.  However, while the world is occupied by a virus and the tensions in the South China Sea continue between the US and China and an upcoming Presidential election, a new conflict between Israel and its Arab neighbors is a real possibility, making it one of the most dangerous periods in human history.

COVID-19 Does Not Exist: The Global Elite’s Campaign of Terror Against Humanity

By Robert J. Burrowes

There is no COVID-19 virus. It does not exist. If you ask any doctor or scientist in the world to show you a scientifically-verified proof that it does exist, they will not be able to show you one.

Given that it has not been scientifically established that the COVID-19 virus exists, it is therefore clear that everything being done supposedly in the effort to tackle the ‘virus’ is being done for another purpose and COVID-19 is being used to conceal this fact.

However, with the elite-driven narrative being endlessly promoted by the World Health Organisation, governments, the medical and pharmaceutical industries, along with the corporate media, the truth is being obliterated.

And the reason for this is obvious: Any serious consideration of the underlying evidence, as I have documented previously, clearly indicates that the global elite is conducting a coup against humanity and using the fear it generates around COVID-19 to distract people from paying attention to what is happening in the background. For this reason, the coup continues to gain pace with only an insignificant number of people yet aware of the coup and its ongoing and increasingly devastating impacts.

‘How is the elite doing this?’ you might ask. Far too easily, unfortunately.

In essence, key individuals in the World Health Organisation (WHO), governments, the medical and pharmaceutical industries, as well as the corporate media are lying to you about this. They are lying to you, consciously or unconsciously, for essentially one of three reasons (essentially determined by where the individual fits in relation to the elite’s ongoing execution of its coup):

1. they are lying as an outcome of their complicity in the coup (given the perceived benefits to them personally, at least in the short term),

2. they are lying as an outcome of their ignorance (by not investigating and considering the evidence for themself and submissively accepting the elite narrative), or

3. they are lying as an outcome of their fear (of the adverse personal repercussions they would expect for resisting the elite narrative that there is indeed a virus).

And, so far, the elite is successfully executing its coup because the many voices contradicting its narrative – such as those individual doctors powerful enough to present the truth about the so-called ‘virus’ – are being denied a forum in any elite-controlled outlet such as the corporate media or they are being censored (including removed from accessible sites on the internet).

If what I have written above sounds incredible given the worldwide response supposedly to tackle the ‘virus’, the evidence presented below, together with the references to further documentation, will give you plenty to consider (provided your own fear will allow you to do so).

But before presenting this evidence, it is worth being aware of some of the existing adverse impacts of the coup:

1. The sudden destruction of the global economy has impoverished tens of millions of people in industrialized societies through unemployment, making them even more vulnerable to homelessness and other misery, as well as precipitating the death of millions of people projected to die of starvation in Africa, Asia and elsewhere because of the disruption of global food production and supply. See ‘WFP chief warns of “hunger pandemic” as Global Food Crises Report launched’ and ‘COVID-19 could kill more people through hunger than the disease itself, warns Oxfam’.

2. There has been a dramatic increase in violence against children and women all over the world and particularly in some contexts with a recent United Nations Population Fund report highlighting that an ‘additional 5.6 million child marriages can be expected because of the coronavirus pandemic, which resulted in a short-term increase in poverty and the shutdown of schools’. In addition, the ‘current pandemic is also expected to have a massive impact on the projected growth of harmful practices on women’s bodies’ including female genital mutilation (FGM). See ‘Child Marriage, FGM and Harmful Practices on Women’s Bodies to Increase Because of COVID-19’.

3. The lockdowns have imprisoned people in their homes (with its seriously adverse psychological, social and physical repercussions) and laws have been introduced regarding ‘social distancing’ and other measures (including mask-wearing which I will discuss below) that have eviscerated rights and freedoms it took centuries to win. For the details, see ‘The Elite’s COVID-19 Coup against a Terrified Humanity: Resisting Powerfully’.

In response to growing concerns on a number of points, 600 doctors signed a letter to US President Donald Trump to end the ‘lockdown’ – see ‘“Mass casualty incident”: 600 doctors sign letter to Trump calling for end to lockdowns over health concerns’ – which has since been signed by thousands. See ‘Literally Thousands of Doctors and Scientists Have Come Out Against Fauci’s Lockdowns Including a Nobel Prize-Winning Biophysicist. The Media Just Doesn’t Want You to Know’.

4. Despite the ‘diagnostic’ tests for COVID-19 being ‘scientifically meaningless’ – see COVID19 PCR Tests are Scientifically Meaningless’ – (how can they not be when there is no virus?) compulsory vaccination (again, against a non-existent virus) is being threatened – see 120 Covid-19 Vaccine Projects are Underway – in direct violation of Article 6 of the ‘Universal Declaration on Bioethics and Human Rights’ despite the extensively documented record of vaccines causing devastating harms including massive lethality. For a taste of the vast literature on this point, see ‘Gates’ Globalist Vaccine Agenda: A Win-Win for Pharma and Mandatory Vaccination’.

As Dr Stefan Lanka has explained about vaccines generally:

Only ignorant people who blindly trust in the state authorities who are ‘testing’ and approving the vaccines can regard vaccination as a ‘small harmless prick’. The verifiable facts demonstrate the danger and negligence of these scientists and politicians, who claim that vaccines are safe, have little or no side-effects and would protect from a disease. None of these claims is true and scientific. See ‘The Misconception Called “Virus”: Measles as an example’.

Moreover, this vaccination will be used to dramatically expand surveillance both via biometric ID and ‘immunity passes’. See ‘ID2020 and partners launch program to provide digital ID with vaccines’ and ‘Mass-Tracking COVI-PASS Immunity Passports Slated to Roll Out in 15 Countries’.

  1. Other measures to expand surveillance (apart from through vaccination) are being introduced. These include ‘contact tracing’ despite the fact that even ‘A WHO study on influenza pandemics in 2019 came to the conclusion that contact tracing is not useful from an epidemiological point of view and “is not recommended in any circumstances”.’ See ‘Facts about COVID-19’. But that is precisely the point: Contact tracing is not about epidemiological usefulness; it is about surveillance.
  2. Critically, several measures necessary to implement the so-called fourth industrial revolution, including the deployment of 5G, which will reduce human individuals to digitized identities without effective rights and freedoms, are being accelerated. See Techno-Tyranny: How The US National Security State Is Using Coronavirus To Fulfill An Orwellian Vision.
  3. While much human activity has been brought to a standstill, this has not included any of the violence which has not only continued unchecked but has expanded. Apart from the dramatic increase in violence against children and women all over the world noted above, wars, threats of war, sanctions, the military violence of occupations in places such as Palestine, Tibet and West Papua, the structural violence that systematically exploits (that is, loots) countries in Africa, Asia and Central/South America, the ecological violence that destroys lands, oceans and atmosphere have all proceeded as usual with the caveat that there has been a reduction in the emissions of some industrial and other waste products although this is hugely problematic in one critical sense. See ‘Will COVID-19 Trigger Extinction of All Life on Earth?’
  4. And four distinct paths to human extinction – nuclear war, the climate catastrophe, the deployment of 5G and biodiversity collapse – have been accelerated, inadvertently or otherwise, by the coup. See ‘The Elite’s COVID-19 Coup to Destroy Humanity that is also Fast-Tracking Four Paths to Human Extinction’.

COVID-19 Does Not Exist

Despite these and many other adverse impacts already happening in response to the COVID-19 crisis, as noted at the beginning, it has never been scientifically established that the COVID-19 virus actually exists. More fundamentally, according to Dr Stefan Lanka: ‘Contrary to what most people believe, there are no pathogenic viruses.… All claims about viruses as pathogens are wrong and are based on easily recognisable, understandable and verifiable misinterpretations…. A real and complete virus does not exist anywhere in the entire “scientific” literature.’ See ‘The Misconception Called “Virus”: Measles as an example’.

To reiterate in the words of two other authors: ‘there is no original scientific evidence that definitively demonstrates that any virus is the cause of any disease’. See What Really Makes You Ill? Why everything you thought you knew about disease is wrong. But you can read more in ‘Dismantling the Virus Theory – The “measles virus” as an example’ and watch the video interview The Real Science of Germs: Do Viruses Cause Disease?

In addition, and specifically in relation to COVID-19, according to Dr Andrew Kaufman, ‘there is no evidence of anyone dying from any novel illness’. See ‘Unmasking the Lies Around COVID-19: Facts vs Fiction of the Coronavirus Pandemic’. So what has happened?

As Dr Kaufman explains: Early scientific papers on the subject suggested an association (not causation) between a novel coronavirus ‘with human to human transmission and severe human infection’ whereas a subsequent key ‘scientific’ paper that made a claim which helped drive the global response to COVID-19 ‘flat out lied’ about their results: ‘Following the first outbreaks of unexplained pneumonia in Wuhan, China, in late 2019, a new coronavirus was identified as the causative agent in January 2020.’ See ‘Identification of Coronavirus Isolated from a Patient in Korea with COVID-19’. In fact, Dr Kaufman points out: ‘they cannot reference any science to back that up whatsoever’.

Moreover, subsequently to this paper, another article – see ‘I study viruses: How our team isolated the new coronavirus to fight the global pandemic’ – declared ‘The emergence of a new coronavirus in a market in Wuhan, China, in December 2019 set in motion the pandemic we are now witnessing in 160 countries around the world’. But again, Dr Kaufman counters, ‘no evidence was provided at all’ to support this claim: ‘just flat out lies’. For the details and citation of all the scientific sources for this explanation of how the COVID-19 ‘rumour mill’ got started, see ‘The Rooster in the River of Rats’ or ‘Koch’s Postulates: Have They Been Proven for Viruses?’

Finally on this point, pathologist Dr Stoian Alexov, President of the Bulgarian Pathology Association, has stated that he and his colleagues across Europe:

have not found any evidence of any deaths from the novel coronavirus on that continent.

Dr. Stoian Alexov called the World Health Organization (WHO) a ‘criminal medical organization’ for creating worldwide fear and chaos without providing objectively verifiable proof of a pandemic.

See ‘“No one has died from the coronavirus”: Important revelations shared by Dr Stoian Alexov, President of the Bulgarian Pathology Association’.

Fortunately, as awareness of the fact that the COVID-19 virus does not exist gradually spreads, more people are challenging the official response to the engineered crisis on that basis. For example, one group of doctors has written to the British Prime Minister Boris Johnson challenging Public Health England to ‘show proof’ that a virus exists. See Challenge to Public Health England that they must show Proof that a Virus Exists which Causes COVID-19 or Declare there is No Virus and end the Vax and Trax Programmes.

But it is clear that the engineered crisis and the measures supposedly being taken to combat the non-existent ‘virus’ are being used to mask the truth, including the elite coup, and so actions aimed at elite agents, such as governments, must inevitably fail.

Unscientific Responses to the Non-existent Virus

The unscientific nature of the supposed threat posed by the ‘virus’ is, of course, matched by the unscientific response with countries imposing lockdowns suffering far worse outcomes – measured psychologically, socially, economically and otherwise – than countries, such as Japan, South Korea, Belarus and Sweden which did not follow this course. In any case, countries that did impose lockdowns could only use lies and statistical manipulation to make it appear that COVID-19 has been the cause of death among some of those who are recently deceased. For a taste of the extensive documentation, see ‘Facts about COVID-19: July 2020 Update’ and ‘COVID 19 Is A Statistical Nonsense’.

Given that the negative impacts of the lockdown are extensively documented, there have been many attempts (of many different kinds) occurring all over the world to end them already. See, for example, ‘“Mass casualty incident”: 600 doctors sign letter to Trump calling for end to lockdowns over health concerns’, ‘Vaccine Group Sues Trudeau Government for “Draconian and Unjustifiable” Response to COVID-19’ and ‘Popular Uprising against 2nd Covid Lockdown. Belgrade Liberated! The Govt Backs Down’.

But another way in which this unscientific response to the non-existent ‘virus’ is manifesting is immediately obvious if one examines the scientific evidence in relation to the effectiveness of masks in preventing cross infection. As it turns out, as explained in a long series of documented scientific studies, as distinct from the inaccurate claims promulgated by elite agents,

the research demonstrates that masks are at best ineffective, and at worst horribly counterproductive; that is, masks cannot achieve the purpose for which they are, supposedly, intended but they can achieve some very unhealthy outcomes.

But who among the general population is seeking out and considering this evidence (which the WHO, governments, the medical and pharmaceutical industries, the education systems and the corporate media are not going to present)?

For just a sample of the evidence about the ineffectiveness and dangers of wearing a mask, see the following:

‘Nevertheless, the question of the effectiveness of masks can be asked. In the case of influenza epidemics, the answer is already clear from a scientific point of view: masks in everyday life have no or very little effect. If used improperly, they can even increase the risk of infection.’ See ‘Facts about COVID-19: July 2020 Update’.

In a recent study published in The New England Journal of Medicine, the five co-authors stated ‘We know that wearing a mask outside health care facilities offers little, if any, protection from infection.’ See ‘Universal Masking in Hospitals in the Covid-19 Era’.

In his recent article ‘Masks Don’t Work: A Review of Science Relevant to COVID-19 Social Policy’ documenting the results of his research, physics professor Dr Denis G. Rancourt concludes:

No RCT [randomized controlled trial] study with verified outcome shows a benefit for HCW [health care workers] or community members in households to wearing a mask or respirator. There is no such study. There are no exceptions.

Likewise, no study exists that shows a benefit from a broad policy to wear masks in public.

Furthermore, if there were any benefit to wearing a mask, because of the blocking power against droplets and aerosol particles, then there should be more benefit from wearing a respirator (N95) compared to a surgical mask, yet several large meta-analyses, and all the RCT, prove that there is no such relative benefit.

Masks and respirators do not work.

By making mask-wearing recommendations and policies for the general public, or by expressly condoning the practice, governments have both ignored the scientific evidence and done the opposite of following the precautionary principle.

After reviewing more than 50 articles on masks in the medical literature and documenting her case, Dr Sherri Tenpenny concludes as follows:

There are NO randomized, controlled trials (RCT) with verified outcomes that show a benefit to healthcare workers or community members for wearing a mask or a respirator. There is no such definitive study. Likewise, no study exists that shows a benefit from a broad policy to wear masks in public. See ‘Coronavirus Pt 4: Masks Don’t Protect’ and, for your convenience, Tenpenny has cited the relevant passage from 35 of the articles she researched in this document: ‘Conclusion Regarding Masks: They Do Not Work’.

But if you want to read more, you can access each of the 50 articles Tenpenny cited or check out these as well: ‘Coronavirus: Face masks could increase risk of infection, medical chief warns’ and ‘Coronavirus Fact-Check #6: Does wearing a mask do anything?’

Or watch this video presentation: ‘Why Face Masks Don’t Work, According to Science’.

So if there is no virus and face masks do not work to prevent infection anyway, why are we being told to wear them and, increasingly, being terrorized into wearing them under threat of punishment if we do not? For just two of many examples, see ‘Soon, You Will Need to Wear a Mask to Enter Virtually Every Major Retail Store in America’ and ‘Total Masking: Victoria’s Coronavirus Response’.

Because the face masks, like other elements of the supposed strategy to tackle COVID-19, are simply being used to terrorize us into not resisting the ongoing elite coup. See ‘The Mask as a Symbol of Subjugation’, ‘The New (Pathologized) Totalitarianism’ and ‘The Hidden Agendas of Masks, Distancing, and Tracing’.

And it is largely working with most people projecting their fear onto the non-existent ‘virus’ and then ignorantly endeavouring to ‘protect’ themselves from it by wearing a mask (or going along with other measures supposedly intended to ‘prevent infection’).

So if you are wondering why virtually everyone is being caught up in this, there are very good psychological reasons. One of them is that virtually all humans are terrorized into obedience as children. Consequently, resisting orders from those considered to be ‘in authority’ is virtually unthinkable. I have explained this submissive obedience in the article ‘Contemplating Human Extinction Terrifies Most People: A Strategy for Survival’.

But there is another, more subtle, reason too.

COVID-19 and the Psychology of Projection

For the vast bulk of the human population, considering the fundamental evidence of what is taking place – and acknowledging that the global elite is conducting a coup against us with all that this entails – is truly terrifying. Moreover, recognizing that if we are to resist this coup, we will need to make a courageous and strategically-focused stand to defend ourselves is frightening for most people as well.

And the global elite knows this. It is for this reason that they are terrorizing us in the first place. The elite does not want people resisting the coup and it certainly does not want them resisting the coup effectively.

Hence, the global elite is exploiting our fear – by projecting it onto COVID-19 – so that we submissively go along with its coup. How is the elite doing this? Let me explain the psychology of projection, very simply.

If, when you are a child, you are scared of something but that ‘something’ is truly terrifying and inescapable – that is, you are denied any safe opportunity to feel your terror and to take action in response to it so that you can make yourself safe – your mind will precipitate one response and, if necessary, a second response to defend you in the short term.

The first response will be to significantly dampen (and possibly completely suppress) your awareness of just how terrifying the ‘something’ that is scaring you actually is so that you are not overwhelmed to such an extent that you become incapacitated. This response is intended to enable you to act powerfully to get yourself out of the terrifying situation and into a context in which you feel safe.

Ideally, following any such incident when you again feel safe, you need time to recover emotionally. Fundamentally, this means that you need time to focus on feeling the terror and other feelings that were raised during the incident so that these feelings are fully felt and expressed, rather than suppressed more deeply into your unconscious.

If, however, there is no opportunity for this emotional recovery, your mind will have no choice but to more deeply suppress your awareness of these feelings so that you can resume functioning more or less as previously. I say ‘more or less’ because you won’t be functioning precisely as previously because the unconscious terror will now be playing a part in your emotional life and, therefore, playing a part in shaping your behaviour.

However, your unconscious mind – which is enormously powerful – has not given up on enabling you to heal from the terrifying incident and, therefore, its second response is to later trick you into believing that something else, that is far less frightening, is what is really scaring you so that you can safely access and feel your terror in relation to the original incident. Your mind does this so that the terror that was initially suppressed, in order to allow you to devise and implement a strategy for immediate survival, can now be released.

By using these two responses, your mind enables you to survive in a terrifying environment so that, hopefully at some point soon, you can devise and implement a strategy to escape that environment. But also by allowing you to subsequently believe that something that is actually quite safe by comparison is what was really scaring you in the first place, it gives you the opportunity to feel your fear and act it out without (or with profoundly reduced) fear of the consequences.

In the short term, this pair of responses by your mind can enable you to survive something truly terrifying: it minimizes the risk that you will be immobilized (frozen) in terror and thus unable to survive a dangerous situation. In essence, in evolutionary terms, these responses have tremendous survival value in the short term.

If, however, you are not able to escape the truly terrifying situation in the short term and you remain trapped in the situation indefinitely, your unconscious mind will continue to both suppress awareness of the terror and ‘trick’ you into subsequently believing that it is something else that is frightening you.

Unfortunately, beyond the very short term, this mental trick is highly dysfunctional. It leads the individual to eventually ‘forget’ (deeply suppress their awareness of) the original and true source of what is terrifying them and to believe that the safe ‘target’ they unconsciously chose subsequently is actually the genuine threat.

In the jargon of psychology, this is called ‘projection’ or ‘transference’ because the victim is now blaming something other than the true cause of their terror.

This has profound societal consequences too for the simple reason that an elite can effectively nominate the ‘something’ onto which our terror is projected. And it can do this very easily by simply parading a target or ‘legitimized victim’ as terrifying which, in effect, gives ‘permission’ for us to feel scared of the target it has nominated. But in directing our fear in a certain direction, they are also invariably intent on manipulating our behaviour in response.

Historically, this has been demonstrated rather endlessly with the manipulation of our fear crucial to the achievement of certain elite ends, politically and otherwise. For example, racism (fear of other far less frightening Africans) exploded to justify the slave trade, Nazism exploited fears to mobilize Germans against far less frightening Jews (among others), Israeli leaders project the fear of Israelis to exploit far less frightening Palestinians and the entire US ‘war on terror’ has been conducted on the basis of projecting people’s unconscious terror at far less frightening Muslims. As I mentioned, however, the list of possible examples is virtually endless.

In each and every case, however, the terror exploited had its origin in something much earlier in the life of these individuals than the current circumstance exploited by elites. It had its origin during early childhood.

And this origin can be traced directly back to the parenting and teaching models virtually universally used by human beings. As I have explained many times previously, but to briefly reiterate here: virtually all human beings are terrified for the same reason: the child-raising process that sociologists like to label ‘socialization’ should be more accurately labeled ‘terrorization’. This is because from the moment of a child’s birth, parents, teachers, religious leaders and adults generally regard themselves as responsible for terrorizing the child into obedience of the commands, rules, conventions and laws that define the nature of permissible behaviour in their society.

But because evolutionary pressures do not predispose any individual to obey the will of another – for the simple reason that obedience has no evolutionary functionality – it takes enormous terrorization during childhood to ensure that the child surrenders their Self-will at the alter of obedience. To achieve this outcome and largely unknowingly, parents, teachers, religious leaders and other adults in the child’s life use a large range of behaviours from the three categories of violence that I have labeled ‘visible’ violence, ‘invisible’ violence and ‘utterly invisible’ violence. See Why Violence? and Fearless Psychology and Fearful Psychology: Principles and Practice.

At its most obvious, all children are routinely threatened with violence and actually punished with violence (usually in each of its three forms: ‘visible’, ‘invisible’ and ‘utterly invisible’) for ‘disobedience’ (that is, for following their own Self-will rather than obeying orders to submit). See ‘Punishment is Violent and Counterproductive’.

And, as preposterous as I know this sounds to those reading it for the first time: The fundamental outcome of this process is that all children end up utterly but unconsciously terrified of their parents, teachers, religious figures and other significant adults in their life.

But never given adequate safe opportunities to feel this terror, each child ends up projecting it onto something or a series of targets including those ‘legitimized victims’ approved by an elite, local or otherwise.

Hence, in the current world context, this results in the bulk of the human population submitting to direction by the global elite to project their fear onto COVID-19 and then behave as ordered, rather than pay attention to the elite coup and resist it. For summaries and documentation of the evidence in relation to each of these points, see ‘The Elite’s COVID-19 Coup: Fighting for Our Humanity, Our Liberty and Our Future’ and ‘The Elite’s COVID-19 Coup to Destroy Humanity that is also Fast-Tracking Four Paths to Human Extinction’.

The elite does this by triggering our unconscious fear through endless reporting of the ‘threat’ posed by COVID-19, issuing warnings, announcing deaths supposedly caused by the ‘virus’ (and concealing that the death rates are not even comparable to deaths caused by a serious influenza), and placing increasingly onerous limits on our rights and freedoms (through such measures as lockdowns and mask-wearing). And because virtually everyone has so much suppressed terror and needs outlets onto which this can be projected, the coup is being conducted virtually without resistance.

As I have explained before, just because the global elite is able to do this does not mean that it is sane. In fact, it is completely insane and that is precisely why it is conducting this coup but unable to see its catastrophic outcome for the elite as well. See ‘The Global Elite is Insane Revisited’.

So what can we do?

Well, if we are to effectively resist the elite coup and fight for human survival, it would be useful to start by giving yourself time to focus on feeling your emotional responses – fear, anger, sadness, pain, dread…. – to whatever is generating an emotional reaction: COVID-19, the elite coup, the imminent threats of extinction or anything else. See ‘Putting Feelings First’.

This is necessary so that you can engage meaningfully and strategically in the effort, whatever issue you choose to fight.

So once you have a clearer sense of your emotional reactions to this knowledge and have allowed yourself time to focus on feeling these feelings, you will be in a far more powerful position to consider your response to the situation. And, depending on your interests and circumstances, there is a range of possible responses that will each make an important difference.

Fundamentally, you might consider making ‘My Promise to Children’ which will include considering what an education for your children means to you, particularly if you want powerful individuals – not ones who are submissively obedient and project their terror – who can perceive reality and resist violence. See ‘Do We Want School or Education?’

You might consider supporting others to become more powerful. See ‘Nisteling: The Art of Deep Listening’.

If you wish to strategically resist the elite coup against humanity, you can read about nonviolent strategy, including strategic goals for doing so, from here: Coup Strategic Aims.

Remaining pages on this website fully explain the twelve components of the strategy, as illustrated by the Nonviolent Strategy Wheel, as well as articles and videos explaining all of the vital points of strategy and tactics, such as those to help you understand ‘Nonviolent Action: Why and How it Works’.

Given the complexity of the configuration of this conflict, however, which involves the need to fight simultaneously to retain our essential humanity, defeat the elite coup and avert near-term human extinction, it is important that our tactical choices are strategically-oriented (as are those listed at the Strategic Aims page nominated above). Hence, three further considerations assume importance.

First, choose/design tactics that have strategic impact, that is, they fundamentally and permanently alter, in our favor, the power relationship between the elite and us.

Second, when tactical choices are made, focus them on undermining the elite coup, not just features of it, such as ‘social distancing’ or the lockdowns. At its most basic, this can be achieved by using tactical choices that mobilize people to act initially, as is happening, but then inviting them to consider taking further, more focused, action as well (such as those nominated in the strategic goals referenced above). This is important because existing actions will have little impact on key underlying measures, such as those being taken by the elite to advance the fourth industrial revolution.

Third, choose/design tactics that also have strategic impact on the greatest threats to human survival, including the collapsing biodiversity on Earth, the threat of nuclear war, the climate catastrophe and the deployment of 5G. Given the incredibly short timeframe in which we are now working to avert human extinction, while people are mobilizing it is important to use this opportunity to give them the chance to perceive the ‘big picture’ of what is taking place – beyond lockdowns and other measures supposedly being used to tackle COVID-19 – and to act powerfully in response.

Fortunately, as more people become aware of the deeper strands of what is taking place, the energy to break the lockdowns, resist other limitations on our rights and freedoms (such as contact tracing, COVID-19 testing/temperature checks, mask-wearing and vaccinations) as well as resist the coup itself will gather pace. As I have previously outlined, using a locally relevant focus, or perhaps several, for which many people would traditionally be together – a cultural, religious or sporting event, a nonviolent action, a community activity such as working to establish a community garden to increase local self-reliance, a celebration and/or a return to work – we can mobilize people to collectively resist.

If you wish to focus on powerfully resisting one of the primary threats to human existence – nuclear war, the deployment of 5G, the collapse of biodiversity and/or the climate catastrophe – you can read about nonviolent strategy, including strategic goals to focus your campaigns, from here: Campaign Strategic Aims.

You might also consider joining those who are powerful enough to recognize the critical importance of reduced consumption and greater self-reliance as essential elements of these strategies by participating in The Flame Tree Project to Save Life on Earth. While you over-consume or are dependent on the elite for your survival, in any way, you are vulnerable.

In addition, you are welcome to consider signing the online pledge of The Peoples Charter to Create a Nonviolent World.

Or, if you want something simpler, consider committing to:

The Earth Pledge

Out of love for the Earth and all of its creatures, and my respect for their needs, from this day onwards I pledge that:

  1. I will listen deeply to children. See ‘Nisteling: The Art of Deep Listening’.
  2. I will not travel by plane
  3. I will not travel by car
  4. I will not eat meat and fish
  5. I will only eat organically/biodynamically grown food
  6. I will minimize the amount of fresh water I use, including by minimizing my ownership and use of electronic devices
  7. I will not own or use a mobile (cell) phone
  8. I will not buy rainforest timber
  9. I will not buy or use single-use plastic, such as bags, bottles, containers, cups and straws
  10. I will not use banks, superannuation (pension) funds or insurance companies that provide any service to corporations involved in fossil fuels, nuclear power and/or weapons
  11. I will not accept employment from, or invest in, any organization that supports or participates in the exploitation of fellow human beings or profits from killing and/or destruction of the biosphere
  12. I will not get news from the corporate media (mainstream newspapers, television, radio, Google, Facebook, Twitter…)
  13. I will make the effort to learn a skill, such as food gardening or sewing, that makes me more self-reliant
  14. I will gently encourage my family and friends to consider signing this pledge.

Conclusion

Under cover of a ‘virus’ that does not exist, the global elite is social engineering a massive restructuring of world society to suit their own ends. If they achieve their aim, your existence as any sort of individual with meaningful rights and freedoms will have been terminated.

Apart from these ongoing disastrous outcomes, the elite coup is also unwittingly accelerating four paths to human extinction: nuclear war, the climate catastrophe, the deployment of 5G and biodiversity collapse.

To have any chance of defeating the elite coup and fighting effectively to avert our own extinction, we must fight strategically.

Fundamentally, this means recognizing that lobbying (that is, begging) elite agents, such as governments, simply reinforces the power of the elite to control us. It is only when we take action ourselves to both build our own power (which includes that of our children and those with whom we work) while campaigning strategically to undermine the power of the global elite itself that we take crucial steps to liberate ourselves from its violence, in all of the forms that this violence takes.

Given that the elite coup is jeopardizing our individuality, our liberty and our future, it is time for us to decide whether we are human beings or a planet of sheep.

Biodata: Robert J. Burrowes has a lifetime commitment to understanding and ending human violence. He has done extensive research since 1966 in an effort to understand why human beings are violent and has been a nonviolent activist since 1981. He is the author of ‘Why Violence?’ His email address is flametree@riseup.net and his website is here.

Why Does It Feel Like We’re in “Life During Wartime”?

By Charles Hugh Smith

Source: Of Two Minds

The laughably hopeless hope is that by propping up the corpses, the populace will discern some faint flicker of life in the decaying carcasses and return to their free-spending ways.

Call it cultural synchronicity, but it increasingly feels like we’re living in the 1979 Talking Heads song Life During Wartime, which was anchored by the lyric “This Ain’t No Party, This Ain’t No Disco, This Ain’t No Foolin’ Around.” Indeed.

It also feels like Life During Wartime because the propaganda is so blatant and intense: we’re winning the war on Covid-19, and our wars on everything else, too, of course, as war is the favored metaphor and favored policy at the end of the Empire.

The ceaseless propaganda is that “a vaccine is right around the corner.” The inconvenient reality is that Corporate Insiders Pocket $1 Billion in Rush for Coronavirus VaccineWell-timed stock bets have generated big profits for senior executives and board members at companies developing vaccines and treatments.

In other words, wartime profiteering isn’t just allowed, it’s encouraged–yet another sign that we’re in the final decay/collapse phase of Imperial Pretensions.

It’s easy to mix up the propaganda and the counter-propaganda, because they’re both so extreme. There is no middle ground, only pre-packaged positions which dictate which “data” is cherry-picked to support the political partisanship that’s being defended.

Is Data Our New False Religion? (June 23, 2020)

In a world of thousands of unread papers published in hundreds of scientific journals no one even reads and a corrupt culture of “science for sale,” there’s a veritable orchard to cherry-pick.

“Robert Horton, editor in chief of The Lancet, one of the most respected professional peer reviewed publications in the world dealing with biomedical research had this to say in an editorial published by The Lancet in April of 2015:”

“The case against science is straightforward: much of the scientific literature, perhaps half, may simply be untrue. Afflicted by studies with small sample sizes, tiny effects, invalid exploratory analyses, and flagrant conflicts of interest, together with an obsession for pursuing fashionable trends of dubious importance, science has taken a turn towards darkness.”

source: What is medicine’s 5 sigma?

“And this, published in 2009, by Dr. Marcia Angell, former editor of The New England Journal of Medicine, another world leading publication in medical research:”

“It is simply no longer possible to believe much of the clinical research that is published, or to rely on the judgment of trusted physicians or authoritative medical guidelines. I take no pleasure in this conclusion, which I reached slowly and reluctantly over my two decades as an editor of The New England Journal of Medicine.”

Skeptical of medical science reports? (ncbi.nlm.nih.gov)

Metaphorically speaking, the civilian populace believes “we’re winning” until the bombs start dropping on their homes. For some reason, this doesn’t feel like “winning.”

The V-shaped recovery is the propaganda war the status quo must win, for this is the narrative battle for the hearts and minds of the populace. The fear here is that should the populace lose confidence in The V-shaped recovery, they might reduce their borrowing and spending and increase their saving, dooming an economy that depends entirely on marginal spending funded by debt to keep from imploding.

As the chart of the rising wedge model of breakdown below illustrates, when big-ticket costs ratchet higher like clockwork–rent, property taxes, childcare, higher education, debt, healthcare, etc.– while income stagnates for the bottom 90%, any drop in spending, no matter how modest, breaks the system because any reduction in spending reduces tax revenues, corporate profits and debt payments below the critical threshold.

This is why the Federal Reserve is so keen on bailing out bankrupt-in-all-but-name corporations and banks: The laughably hopeless hope is that by propping up the corpses, the populace will discern some faint flicker of life in the decaying carcasses and return to their free-spending ways.

This is also why “stimulus” is being scattered from helicopters: the hope is that by substituting borrowed trillions for earned trillions, people will substitute magical thinking for clear-eyed recognition that the era of “growth” has transitioned into the era of DeGrowth, a state of affairs that signals the demise of all the bloated, sclerotic institutions operated to benefit insiders and Corporate America’s cartels and monopolies: the most protected bastions of the era, colleges and hospitals, are going broke and closing.

As Marx noted, “everything solid melts into air” when it’s no longer financially viable. Helicopter “stimulus” just creates a temporary illusion of solidity.

And then there’s the immense profitability of Big Tech pushing propaganda, partisanship, anger and indignation: If you’re not terrified about Facebook, you haven’t been paying attention.

The foundations are collapsing, but by all means, please keep your eye on the decaying corpses: didn’t an eyelid flicker in that one? I could swear that one moved its foot…

This is “life in wartime,” where the battles are waged in narratives, confidence and magical thinking.

Forget the V, W or L Recovery: Focus on N-P-B (June 29, 2020)

The Fed’s Casino Is In Flames, But Please Continue Gambling (June 18, 2020)

Our Wile E. Coyote Economy: Nothing But Financial Engineering (June 12, 2020)

Unstoppable: The Greatest Depression and the Reverse Wealth Effect (June 10, 2020)

Twitter QAnon Purge Gives Bigger Monopoly to Corporate Media

By Tony Cartalucci

Source: Land Destroyer

News outlets like CNN reported on Twitter’s move to purge the QAnon movement from its platform.

Articles like, “Twitter cracks down on QAnon accounts,” would claim Twitter fears QAnon’s rhetoric online could eventually lead to “offline harm.”

There is no doubt that QAnon has been behind absurd conspiracy theories and verified lies circulating online – suspiciously absurd. Banning it from Twitter because of alleged fears its activity will lead to “offline harm” is even more absurd .
Despite making absurd claims that demonstrably never materialize or providing evidence that is later revealed to be clearly fabricated, nothing QAnon has done differs from what the corporate media does on a daily basis. In many ways they are one in the same – dividing and distracting the public while US special interests advance their agenda unnoticed and unopposed.
QAnon allegedly made false claims that Hillary Clinton’s arrest was imminent – she was never arrested. Conversely, the corporate media regularly claims that various world leaders in nations targeted by Western regime change have “fled,” are “dead,” or otherwise “ousted from power” – with lies spread by the Western media over the alleged “fates” of still incumbent leaders like Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad, Venezuela’s President Nicolás Maduro, and North Korean leader Kim Jong-un coming to immediate mind.
The Western corporate media also helps sell various wars of aggression.

This includes the US invasion of Afghanistan in 2001, the US invasion of Iraq in 2003, US interventions in Libya and Syria from 2011 onward and US-backed regime change in Ukraine in 2013-2014.

Collectively these conflicts have killed over a million people and driven millions more from their homes. This “offline harm” – the direct result of lies told by the Western corporate media – has not only gone completely unaddressed by Twitter – it is enabled by Twitter.
Twitter – along with other US tech giants like Facebook and Google – aided the US government in sowing chaos across North Africa and the Middle East in 2011, precipitating wars that are still raging today, claiming lives, and effecting “offline harm” impacting millions of people.
The banning of the more absurd QAnon movement will pave the way for other purges – eventually eliminating any alternative to the corporate media and its demonstrably dangerous and dishonest narratives. QAnon’s absurdity will make it easy for Twitter to justify its ban, but the momentum toward greater censorship across Western social media will eventually impact accounts and movements previously difficult to justify banning.
US-based “social media” platforms – Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, etc. – are no longer truly social media. They are clearly transforming into centralized programed media where corporate monopolies create content that is consumed, removing the public, independent organizations, and competitors’ role in creating content, contributing to discussions, offering alternative views, and interacting with one another.
It is important that this fact be fully recognized and exposed as well as the creation of alternative platforms – especially overseas where US-based “social media” has been fully weaponized and used to undermine sociopolitical and economic stability.

Masked, Homeless, and Desolate

By Edward Curtin

Source: Off-Guardian

Personality is persona, a mask…The mask is magic…Larva means mask; or ghost…it also means mad, a case of demoniacal possession.”
Norman O. Brown, Love’s Body

Walk the streets in the United States and many countries these days and you will see streaming crowds of people possessed by demons, masked and anonymous, whose eyes look like vacuums, staring into space or out of empty sockets like the dead, afraid of their own ghosts. Fear and obedience oozes from them. Death walks the streets with people on leashes in lockstep.

That they have been the victims of a long-planned propaganda campaign to use an invisible virus to frighten them into submission and shut down the world’s economy for the global elites is beyond their ken. This is so even when the facts are there to prove otherwise.

It is a clear case, as Peter Koenig tells Michel Chossudovsky in this must-see interview, that is not a conspiracy theory but a blatant factual plan spelled out in the 2010 Rockefeller Report, the October 18, 2019 Event 201, and Agenda 21, among other places.

Who can wake the sleepwalkers up in this cowardly new world where culture and politics collude to create and exploit ignorance?

Fifty-five years ago on, July 20, 1965, Bob Dylan released his song “Like a Rolling Stone.” It arrived like a rocking jolt into the placid pop musical culture of the day. It was not about wanting to hold someone’s hand or cry in the chapel. It wasn’t mumbo-jumbo like “Wooly Bully,” the number one hit. It wasn’t like the pop pap that dominates today’s music scene. It wasn’t Woody Guthrie in slow time.

It beat you up. It attacked. It confronted you. Maybe, if you were alive then, you thought Dylan was kidding you. You thought wrong. Bitching about his going electric was a dodge. He was addressing all of us, including himself.

Still is. But who wants to hear his recent “Murder Most Foul” and read Dylan’s scathing lyrics about the assassination of JFK, the killing that started the slow decay that has resulted in such masked madness. “And please, Don’t Let Me Be Misunderstood,” he tells us in capital letters for emphasis. Exactly what all the mainstream media have done, of course, and not by accident.

There are no alibis.

“How does it feel/To be on your own/with no direction home/A complete unknown/Like a rolling stone?”

It was in the mid-1960s when confidence in knowing where home was and how to get there disappeared into thin air. If you left mommy and daddy, could you ever get back from where you were going? Who had the directions?

Absolutes were melting and relativity was widespread. Life was wild and the CIA was planning to make it wilder and more confusing with the introduction of LSD on a vast scale. MKUltra was expanding its scope. Operation Mockingbird was singing so many tunes that heads were spinning, as planned.

The national security state killers were in the saddle, having already murdered President Kennedy and Malcolm X as they sharpened their knives for many more to come. The peace candidate, Lyndon Baines Johnson, had been elected nine months earlier with 61.1% of the popular vote and went immediately to work secretly expanding the war against Vietnam. War as an invisible virus. Who knew?

Who, but a small anti-war contingent, wanted to know?

War takes different forms, and the will to ignorance and historical amnesia endure. War is a disease. Disease is weaponized for war. In 1968 Richard Nixon was elected on a “secret plan” to end the Vietnam War and then ramped it up to monstrous proportions, only to be reelected in 1972 by carrying 49 out of 50 states.

Who wants to know now? The historian Howard Zinn once said correctly that this country’s greatest problem wasn’t disobedience but obedience.

What’s behind the masks? The lockstep?

On the same day that Dylan released “Like a Rolling Stone,” Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara, just back from a “fact-finding” trip to Vietnam, recommended to LBJ that U.S. troop levels in Vietnam be increased to 175,000 and that the U.S. should increase its bombing of North Vietnam dramatically.

This was the same McNamara who, in October 1963, had agreed with JFK when he signed NSAM 263 calling for the withdrawal of 1,000 military personnel from Vietnam by the end of 1963 and the remainder by the end of 1965. One of the moves that got Kennedy’s head blown open.

Poor McNamara, the fog of war must have clouded his conscience, confused the poor boy, just like Secretary of State Colin Powell holding up that vile vial of “anthrax” at the United Nations on February 5, 2003 and lying to the world about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq.

Powell recently said, “I knew I didn’t have any choice. He’s the President.” How “painful,” to use his word, it must have been for the poor guy, lying so that so many Iraqis could be slaughtered. Of course, he had no choice. These war criminals all wear masks. And have no choice.

Masks, or demonic possession, or both. You?

Also in that fateful year 1965, far out of sight and out of mind for most Americans, the CIA planned and assisted in the slaughter of more than a million Indonesians, led by their man, General Suharto. This led to the coup against President Sukarno, who two years earlier had been on good terms with JFK as they worked to solve the interrelated issues of Indonesia and Vietnam. Their meeting planned for early 1964 was cancelled in Dallas on November 22, 1963.

And the politicians and media luminaries came out in their masks and told the public that communists everywhere were out to get them.

It’s tough being on your own. It hurts to think too much. Or think for yourself, at least. To obey an authority higher than your bosses. “I was tricked” is some sort of mantra, is it not?

You never turned around to see the frowns on the jugglers and the clowns
When they all did tricks for you

Dylan was lost and disgusted when he wrote the song. His own music sickened him, which, for an artist, means he sickened himself. He had just returned from a tour of England and was sick of people telling him how much they loved his music when he didn’t. He needed to change.

What else is the point of art but change? If you’re dead, or afraid of getting dead, you aren’t going to change. You’re stuck. Stuck is dead. Why wear a mask if you know who you are?

Knowledge, or more accurately, pseudo-knowledge or mainstream media lies, is a tomb “the mystery tramp” sold to us, a place to hide to avoid pain and guilt.

I have read more books than anyone I know. It sickens me.
I know too much. That sickens me.
I sicken myself. All the news sickens me.
I know so much no one believes me.
As Francesco Serpico once told me: “It’s all lies.”
Of course. Dylan and Serpico are blood brothers.
Only art tells the truth. Real art.

Not bullshit pop art. Some say “Like a Rolling Stone” is about Edie Sedgwick, “the girl of the year” in 1965 and one of Andy Warhol’s superstars. Perhaps to a degree it is, but it’s far more than that. It’s about us.

Poor Edie was poisoned by her wealthy family at a young age and barely had a chance. She was an extreme example of a rather common American story. People poisoned in the cradle. Thinking of her got me thinking of Andy Warhol, the death obsessed hoarder, the guy who called his studio “The Factory” in a conscious or unconscious revelation of his art and persona, his wigs and masks and the hold he has had on American culture all these years. Isn’t he the ultimate celebrity?

Warhol once took my photo on a deserted street. His and my secret but this is the truth. West 47th Street on an early Sunday morning, 1980. I guess he thought he was doing art or collecting images for his museum of dead heads. When I asked him why, he said I had an interesting face.

I told him he did too, rather transparent and creepy, but I didn’t want to capture him. He was a ghost with a camera, a face like a death mask, trying to capture a bit of life. I told him I didn’t give him permission to shoot me, but he turned and walked away into the morning mist. The shooters always just walk away in pseudo-innocence.

I then went down the street to the Gotham Book Mart that was my destination and asked James Joyce why he had written “The Dead,” and Joyce, secretive as ever, quoted himself, “Ed,” he said, “Think you’re escaping and run into yourself. Longest way round is the shortest way home.” Now that was direction.

Only those who know how to play and be guided by intuition are able to escape the living tomb of so-called knowledge; what Dylan called, lifelessness. But that was from “Desolation Row,” released as the closing track of Highway 61 Revisited on August 30, 1965. The only acoustic song on the album. Slow it down to make the point another way. “Like a Rolling Stone” was the opening track.

Do you feel all alone or part of a masked gang roaming the streets incognito? Miss and Mr. Lonely, does that mask help? How do you feel?

Desolation means very lonely. From Latin, de, completely, solare, lonely.

Does that mask help? Do you feel alone together now, one of the crowd?

Do you really want to know about desolation row? It’s here. It was here in 1965, too. Only the true lonely know how it feels to really be all alone.

The Umbrella People, those who some call the deep state or secret government under whose protection all the politicians work, say they want to protect us all from death and disease. They are lying bastards who’ve gotten so many to imitate their masked ways. They can only sing a mockingbird’s song.

Listen to real singers. Dylan has arched the years, as true artists do. Who has paid close attention to what he said this year about the assassination of President Kennedy in his song, “Murder Most Foul”? Or were many caught up in the propaganda surrounding corona virus, and rather than contemplating his indictment of the U.S. government and its media accomplices, were they contemplating their navels to see if a virus had secreted itself in there. Viruses lurk everywhere, they say, and the corporate media made certain to circulate a vaccine about the truth in Dylan’s song. This is normal operating procedure.

We are still on Desolation Row.

“Take Off the Masks.” That was the title of a book by Rev. Malcolm Boyd that I reviewed long ago. He was a gay priest who decided that his mask was a lie. He came out into the light of truth. He had guts.

It is time for everyone to take off the masks. Escape from Desolation Row by seeing what’s going on behind our backs.
Listen to Dylan, long ago – today:

At midnight all the agents
And the superhuman crew
Come out and round up everyone
That knows more than they do
And they bring them to the factory
Where their heart attack machine
Is strapped across their shoulders
And then the kerosene
Is brought down from the castles
By insurance men who go
Check to see that nobody is escaping
To Desolation Row
Praise be to Nero’s Neptune
The Titanic sails at dawn
Everybody’s shouting
“Which side are you on?”