Florida Surgeon General Advises Communities to Cease Water Fluoridation

Florida surgeon general urges localities to stop fluoridating water

By and FOX 13 News Staff

Florida Surgeon General opposes fluoride in drinking water

FOX 13’s Carla Bayron reports on Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo announcing new guidelines that advise all cities and counties statewide to stop adding fluoride to drinking water.

Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo announced new guidelines on Friday, advising that all cities and counties statewide stop adding fluoride to drinking water.

Dr. Ladapo spoke at a news conference in Winter Haven, which made headlines last week after the city announced that fluoride will no longer be added to its water supply by the end of the year.

Dr. Ladapo news conference on fluoride in water

Florida Surgeon General Dr. Joseph Ladapo spoke in Winter Haven on Friday, saying all communities statewide should stop adding fluoride to drinking water.

“It is public health malpractice with the information that we have now to continue adding fluoride to water,” Dr. Ladapo said, mentioning studies that point out the possibility of excessive fluoride exposure causing lower IQ levels and mental health issues among children.

The debate over whether fluoride poses a health hazard when ingested goes beyond the brain, with critics arguing it could also cause dental and bone diseases. Supporters of fluoridation, though, consider it one of the greatest public health achievements of the last century.

Dr. Ladapo’s stance on the issue is in line with that of Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., President-elect Donald Trump’s nominee for secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services. Kennedy has said he would recommend removing fluoride from drinking water nationwide.

The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is now studying the issue more, as well, although it could take up to three years to find out the results.

“In September, a recent federal judge in San Franciso made a ruling against the EPA that stated that fluoride in drinking water at the current recommended level of 0.7 milligrams per liter poses a unreasonable risk of hazard to child IQ because there’s not enough of a margin of safety between the hazard level and the exposure level added to community drinking water,” said Dr. Ashley Malan, an assistant professor with the Department of Epidemiology at the University of Florida.

The history of fluoride in drinking water dates back generations, with researchers saying it is the primary source of fluoride for Americans and is a tool to help reduce tooth decay.

Officials lowered their recommendation for drinking water fluoride levels in 2015 to address a tooth condition called fluorosis, that can cause splotches on teeth and was becoming more common in U.S. kids.

There are other sources of fluoride in toothpaste and mouthwash. It also occurs naturally in many foods, like potatoes, spinach, grapes and most seafood. Black tea and white wine also contain fluoride.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention says parents should not use fluoride toothpaste for children under 2 unless recommended by a dentist, use only a pea-sized amount of toothpaste for children 2 through 6, and avoid fluoride mouthwash.

[…]

Via https://www.fox13news.com/news/florida-surgeon-general-announcing-new-guidance-water-treatment

The Great Cholesterol Scam and the Dangers of Statins

statins cholesterol

A Midwestern Doctor

Story at-a-glance

  • The primary approach to treating heart disease is to prescribe costly cholesterol-lowering statins (to the point over a trillion dollars have now been spent on them). Unfortunately, these highly toxic drugs have minuscule benefits (e.g., at best taking them for years extends your life by a few days)
  • Statins are also one of the most frequent causes of pharmaceutical injuries (e.g., they are notorious for causing muscle, nerve, or liver damage and significant cognitive impairment). This is because statins work by blocking the body’s production of various essential nutrients
  • Many of these failures can be explained by the fact there is very little evidence cholesterol actually causes heart disease. Rather, heart disease results from (cholesterol containing) atherosclerotic blood clots accumulating at the sites of past injuries to the blood vessels
  • In this article, we will review the dangers of statins, the actual causes of heart disease, and how this knowledge can be integrated to develop a healthy approach to cardiovascular health

Medicine depends upon recurring sales to large markets. In turn, as comedian Jimmy Dore shows, the War against Cholesterol and the relentless promotion of statins is one of the most harmful things the medical industry has done to America:

The Statin Damage Crisis

Less severe reactions to a toxin are much more common than severe ones. Because of this, if you see a cluster of severe reactions, it indicates that far more, less severe reactions are occurring as well (which is how after learning a few people in my social circle had died suddenly from the COVID vaccines, I was able to correctly predict the almost unfathomable scale of the nonfatal COVID vaccine injuries that would hit America).

statins adverse events

Likewise, if you see a large number of less severe reactions to a pharmaceutical, you can predict far more severe injuries are lurking in the background. In turn, available data shows statins injure roughly 1 in 5 recipients, most frequently with:

  • Muscle damage (e.g., muscle pain and inflammation)1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10,11,12,13
  • Fatigue14,15 (especially with exertion and exercise)16
  • Diabetes17,18,19,20,21 (particularly in women)22,23,24
  • Liver dysfunction and failure25,26

Likewise, even more severe injuries can also occur far too frequently such as:

  • Psychiatric and neurologic issues such as depression, confusion, aggression, and memory loss27,28,29,30,31,32,33,34,35,36
  • ALS-like conditions and other central motor disorders (e.g., Parkinson’s disease and cerebellar ataxia)37,38,39,40,41

Note: A more detailed list of statin side effects can be found here.

Sadly, effective marketing has made the medical profession remarkably resistant to acknowledging these frequent side effects of statins.

Statin Neurotoxicity

“Many statin victims say that abruptly, almost in the blink of an eye, they have become old people.” — Duane Graveline MD42

Dr. Graveline awoke to this issue after being started on a statin and then developing global amnesia (which is really scary) which disappeared once he stopped the statin.43

“When I suggested, on the basis of my 23 years as a family doctor, that perhaps my new medicine was the cause of my amnesia, the neurologist replied, almost scoffingly, that ‘Statins do not do that.’ He and many other physicians and pharmacists were adamant that this does not occur.”

Eventually, he was persuaded to try again.

“The year passed uneventfully and soon it was time for my next astronaut physical. NASA doctors joined the chorus I had come to expect from physicians and pharmacists during the preceding year, that statin drugs did not do this and at their bidding I reluctantly restarted Lipitor at one-half the previous dose.

Six weeks later I again descended into the black pit of amnesia, this time for twelve hours and with a retrograde loss of memory back to my high school days.”

Later he discovered:

“Perhaps stockholder loyalty explains why Pfizer management knew over a decade ago, during the first human use trial of Lipitor, of the cognitive impact to come when Lipitor was released to the public. Of their 2,503 patients tested with Lipitor, seven experienced transient global amnesia attacks and four others experienced other forms of severe memory disturbances, for a total of 11 cases out of 2,503 test patients.

This is a ratio of 4.4 cases of severe cognitive loss to result from every 1000 patients that took the drug. Not one word of warning of this was transmitted to the thousands of physicians who soon would be dispensing the drug.”

Because of this and other debilitating long-term complications (e.g., previously an extremely fit individual, he developed chronic exhaustion), Graveline became an expert on statin injuries and, in 2014, wrote “The Statin Damage Crisis,”44 a book which explains why these drugs are so dangerous.

Why Statins Are Harmful

Statins work by inhibiting an easy to target enzyme that is necessary for the production of cholesterol. Unfortunately, blocking that enzyme disrupts a variety of other vital physiologic processes. Let’s review what that enzyme does:

medication blocking

Since each of these enzymes is essential for the body, many problems can ensue.

Note: Some of the other affected biomolecules include nuclear factor-kappa B, tau proteins, and selenoproteins.

Cholesterol

Cholesterol has a few different essential functions in the body. These include:

It is the precursor to many different hormones.

The brain’s synapses (which, amongst other things, form memories) require cholesterol to function. Since cholesterol is too big to enter the brain, glial cells (support cells of the nervous system) synthesize it within the brain. Statins, unfortunately, inhibit glial cell production of cholesterol.

Cognition is highly dependent upon cholesterol. For example, one study45 found that minor cognitive impairment could be detected in 100% of statin users if sufficiently sensitive testing was done (again illustrating how minor injuries are more common than severe ones). Likewise, a variety of more severe adverse effects on cognition are also observed:

“A patient’s rapid descent into dementia after a statin is started is much too often written off by their doctor as senile brain changes or beginning Alzheimer’s when the real culprit is their statin.”

[…]

Numerous studies have also found a significant association46 between low or lowered cholesterol levels and violence. Likewise, statin dementia is often characterized by aggression.

Finally, one of the most concerning side effects of statins is their tendency to cause ALS (a truly horrible rare disease — curiously also seen in association with the COVID-19 vaccines). This correlation is further supported by many reports of statin ALS improving once the statin is stopped.47

CoQ10

CoQ10 is an essential nutrient that both the mitochondria (which power the human body) and the stability of our cell walls depend upon. CoQ10 deficiency caused by statins is generally considered the most common cause of their side effects. This is really sad because those side effects could have been prevented if CoQ10 had been given with the statin. Unfortunately, this is unlikely ever to happen, as doing so would be equivalent to an admission statins could cause harm.

[…]

Some of the common energy-related side effects of statin CoQ10 deficiency include:

Mitochondrial damage Lack of energy Chronic fatigue syndrome
Congestive heart failure and fluid retention Shortness of breath Gout

Some of the side effects of statin CoQ10 deficiency weakening cell wall integrity include:

  • Pancreatitis
  • Rhabdomyolysis (rapid breakdown of skeletal muscle tissue)
  • Tendon and ligament inflammation and rupture
  • Hepatitis

[…]

Two of the most common consequences of statins CoQ10 depletion are myopathy (muscle pain, tiredness, weakness, and cramps) and peripheral neuropathy (numbness, tingling, or burning sensations, particularly in hands and feet).

Although myopathy is the most commonly reported side effect of statin usage, much of it (e.g., myositis) goes undetected. This is because the symptoms are often not accompanied by blood work showing muscle enzyme elevations and can only be detected by biopsies (which are rarely done relative to blood work).

One of the sadder things about statins is how aggressively they are pushed on diabetics (under the logic that since diabetics have an increased risk of heart disease, it is critical they take a statin to prevent them from having a heart attack). To highlight the absurdity of this, statins are well known to significantly increase your risk of diabetes (multiple studies have found this49), which I suspect is again due to them impairing mitochondrial function.

Similarly, peripheral neuropathy is a condition diabetics are well known to be at a high risk of. In one study, it was found that the risk of neuropathy (e.g., burning pain with tingling or numbness of the extremities) was increased by 14 to 26 times (depending on the type) for long-term users of statins.50 Likewise, other nerve issues, such as neurodegeneration, can be caused by statins.

[…]

Nuclear Factor-Kappa B

The small cardiovascular benefit from statins may come not from lowering cholesterol but from their anti-inflammatory properties, as they inhibit NF-kB, a key immune system component involved in inflammation (which causes heart disease). Statins also lower C-reactive protein, another inflammatory marker. However, by suppressing the immune system, they may reduce protection against infections and increase cancer risk.51

For example, a Japanese study found that 13.3% of lymphoid cancer patients had been on statins, compared to only 7.3% of non-cancer patients.52 In the PROSPER trial (a major statin study), while statins slightly reduced heart attack deaths, they were linked to a significant rise in cancer deaths, effectively neutralizing the cardiovascular benefit. Including nonfatal cancers, the difference between the control and statin groups grew each year.53

In addition to this, arguing that some of the benefit of statins “preventing heart attacks” is due to them causing a fatal cancer before you have time to have a natural heart attack, this situation is somewhat analogous to what was seen with the COVID vaccines (which also cause cancer).54

There, the “benefit” of the COVID vaccines preventing COVID was outweighed by them causing serious conditions such as heart attacks and strokes, but if one only focused on them preventing COVID (which many did), the vaccines could be portrayed as life-saving, even though they overall did the opposite.

[…]

Medical Mythologies

To sell a blockbuster drug, it’s often necessary to cement a cultural mythology behind it. For example, the antidepressant industry spent years convincing the public depression was due to a “chemical imbalance” (when in reality — raising serotonin causes suicidality), and as a result, despite the chemical imbalance theory having been disproven, over 13%55 of Americans take these dangerous, unnecessary and highly addictive drugs (a figure that sadly continues to rapidly rise).56

One of the cleverest campaigns I’ve seen within the medical industry is the widespread belief that heart disease is due to fat clogging the arteries much like they do for a drain pipe.

This marketing slogan in turn is remarkably persuasive as it is easy to understand (e.g., people without a medical background will feel confident repeating it to others), easy to visualize, and highly likely to elicit an immediate sense of disgust. But is it actually true?

The Clot Thickens

Malcolm Kendrick57 has extensively explored cholesterol, including a major mystery in cardiology — the fact that there is no common thread between the well-known risk factors for heart disease. For example, to calculate the risk of heart disease, England uses a calculator58 that combines the adjustable risks for heart disease (e.g., age) with the conditions most strongly associated with causing heart disease.

Age Sex Ethnicity
Smoking Diabetes High BMI
Postcode Angina, or heart attack in first degree relative under the age of 60 Atrial fibrillation
Raised blood pressure History of migraines Chronic kidney disease
Rheumatoid arthritis Severe mental illness Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE)
Variation in two blood pressure readings On atypical antipsychotic medication Using steroid tablets
Total cholesterol/HDL ratio Diagnosis of erectile dysfunction

Likewise, in a 2017 study, the records of 378,256 English patients were analyzed by an AI system to determine what characteristics put them at the highest risk for a cardiovascular incident in the next 10 years. From that, they found that the ten greatest risk factors59 (in order) were:

  1. Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease
  2. Oral corticosteroid prescribed
  3. Age
  4. Severe mental illness
  5. Ethnicity South Asian
  6. Immunosuppressant prescribed
  7. Socio-economic status quintile 3
  8. Socio-economic status quintile 4
  9. Chronic kidney disease
  10. Socio-economic status quintile 2

[…]

Via https://articles.mercola.com/sites/articles/archive/2024/11/15/statins-cholesterol.aspx

Trump Reportedly Opposes Israel’s Annexation of West Bank

Former US President Donald Trump makes a speech as he attends the 2024 Conservative Political Action Conference (CPAC) at the Gaylord National Resort and Convention Center in National Harbor, Maryland, United States on February 24, 2024 [Celal Güneş/Anadolu Agency

Middle East Monitor

Newly-elected United States’ President, Donald Trump, is in opposition to Israel’s reported plans to annex the Occupied West Bank, sources from his Republican Party have revealed.

According to Israeli outlet, Ynet News, a senior Republican Senator close to the President-elect has said that “Trump will not approve annexation” of the West Bank.

Such a move is reportedly seen by the new President as one that would be “a mistake for Israel” which would worsen its international standing – already severely damaged after over a year of the Occupation’s bombardment and invasion of the Gaza Strip.

Trump is also apparently primarily concerned that any official annexation could further disrupt and severely derail efforts to finally reach a normalisation between Israel and Saudi Arabia – a key priority for the incoming Trump administration, with Republican Senator, Lindsey Graham, particularly working on that goal.

The reported comments by the unnamed sources follow increased speculation in recent weeks over Trump’s appointments of controversial figures in his incoming administration, with many of the relevant roles being filled by radically pro-Israel figures who favour annexation of the West Bank

[…]

Via https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20241120-trump-opposes-israel-annexation-of-west-bank-republican-sources-say/

Pentagon running out of missiles – after Dec 1, that will be big problem.

Inside China Business | November 20, 2024

Protracted wars in the Middle East and Ukraine are draining the US arsenal of interceptor missiles. The problem is especially severe in Palestine and in the Red Sea, where dozens of missiles are launched monthly against incoming rockets and drones. Pentagon officials are urgently pushing weapons makers to produce more, but are bumping up against capacity and CAPEX constraints. In another blow, China just announced an export ban on dual-use metals that are critical to the manufacture of missiles and other aerospace applications in the defense sector. Magnesium and tungsten, in particular, are two key materials necessary for the production of missiles, but where China effectively has monopolized the refining and production. China’s export ban will take effect on 1 December.

Resources and links:

Wall Street Journal, Pentagon Runs Low on Air-Defense Missiles as Demand Surges https://www.wsj.com/politics/national…

Nikkei Asia, China to tighten export curbs on critical metals ahead of Trump’s return https://asia.nikkei.com/Spotlight/Sup…

Six Strategic Metals Widely Used in the Military Industry https://www.samaterials.com/content/s…

Magnesium in Defence https://www.magnium.com.au/defence-metal

Forbes, The Titanium Supply Chain For The Aerospace Industry Goes Through Russia https://www.forbes.com/sites/willyshi…

UK signals it would arrest Netanyahu

UK signals it would arrest Netanyahu

RT

Britain would most likely honor the International Criminal Court’s arrest warrant against Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu if he came to visit, a spokesman for 10 Downing Street has said.

The Hague-based ICC announced on Thursday it was seeking Netanyahu on charges of war crimes and crimes against humanity in connection with the Gaza conflict. Israel and the US have denounced the move.

“The UK will always comply with its legal obligations as set out by domestic law, and indeed international law,” a spokesman for Prime Minister Keir Starmer told British media on Friday.

However, he added that domestic procedures linked to ICC arrest warrants have never been used by the UK, because no one wanted by the court has ever visited the country.

Earlier in the day, Home Secretary Yvette Cooper said it “wouldn’t be appropriate” for her to comment on the warrant, as the ICC is an independent institution.

“We’ve always respected the importance of international law, but in the majority of the cases that they pursue, they don’t become part of the British legal process,” she told Sky News. “What I can say is that obviously, the UK government’s position remains that we believe the focus should be on getting a ceasefire in Gaza.”

Emily Thornberry, the Labour MP who chairs the Foreign Affairs Committee, was more direct when she spoke to the outlet, however.

“If Netanyahu comes to Britain, our obligation under the Rome Convention would be to arrest him under the warrant from the ICC,” said Thornberry. “Not really a question of should, we are required to because we are members of the ICC.”

Israel “rejects with disgust the absurd and false actions leveled against it by ICC,” Netanyahu’s office has said. The US “fundamentally rejects” the decision and is “deeply concerned” by the “troubling process errors” that led to it, a spokesperson for the National Security Council said on Thursday.

So far, the Netherlands, Switzerland, Ireland, Italy, Sweden, Belgium, and Norway have announced they would comply with the ICC warrant, while France has said the warrant is legitimate but actually arresting the Israeli leader would be “legally complex.”

[…]

Via https://www.rt.com/news/608076-uk-netanyahu-icc-arrest-warrant/

Nilo-Saharan: Africa’s Hardest Languages

 

https://cdn.britannica.com/92/22192-050-31D6A7A7/Distribution-Nilo-Saharan-languages.jpg

Episode 10 Nilo-Sarahan Africa’s Hardest Languages

Language Families of the World

Dr John McWhorter

Film Review

While Afro-Asiatic languages are spoken mainly in northern and Niger-Congo languages in southern Africa, the Nilo-Saharan languages are spoken in central Africa. This family consists of roughly 100 languages that arose when the Sahara Desert was still grassy savanna.

The two best known Nilo-Saharan languages are Fur (spoken in Darfur) and Masai, spoken by Masai tribesmen (found in Kenya and northern Tanzania).

The four written Nilo-Saharan languages are Luo, Kalenjn, Dinka and Nuer.

With so few common words in different Nilo-Saharan languages, it’s extremely difficult to construct a proto-Nilo-Saharan language. However all but two languages in this family use similar words for “will” and “cow.”

In general, African languages are most likely to have similar words for cattle, given that pastoralism arose in Africa around 9,000 before most languages split off from their proto language root. There are somewhat fewer similar words for concepts developing more recently, eg agriculture and cultivated foods, which emerged around 7,000 BC. Most words for domesticated sheep and goats, which appeared around 6,000 BC, are borrowed from Afro-Asiatic languages.

One similarity found among most Nilo-Sahaan languages is that the pronoun “I” nearly always contains an “a” sound, the pronoun you an “i” sound and the pronouns he/she/it an “e” sound. Also most Nilo-Saharan languages lack a “d” sound, which may relate to the common practice of mutilating the lips with jewelry.

Africa, Ethiopia, Southern Omo Valley, Mursi Tribe. Mursi woman without ...

The Dinka language uses tones (like Chinese) to convey specific meanings. Fur has lots of of irregular plurals.

It’s believed the three click language families (see The History of African Click Languages ) were the first to emerge in Africa.

The five major African families are Osmotic, Khoison, Niger-Congo, Afro-Asiatic, Nilo-Sarahan. The two minor African families are Mande and Ijoid (spoken in Congo).

Malagasy, the language spoken on the island of Madagascar is an Austronesian language.

Film can be viewed free with a library card on Kanopy.

https://www.kanopy.com/en/pukeariki/watch/video/6120000/6120020

The counter-insurgency is “on” – against Trump’s ‘storm’

Alastair Crooke

More than just a dangerous provocation aimed at Russia, the ATACM and Storm Shadow attacks represent an attempt to turn foreign policy on its head.

“The Deep State whispered to Trump: ‘You cannot withstand the storm’. Trump whispered back: “I am the storm”. The war is on. The Deep State has launched a war of disruption to disable Trump’s ‘storm’. This week’s ATACM strike was but one part to an inter-agency counter-insurgency – a political strike directed at Trump; so too are all the inter-agency false narratives attributed to the Trump camp; and so too, the escalating provocations directed at Iran.

Be assured the Five Eyes are full participants in the counter-insurgency. Macron and Starmer openly conspired together in Paris ahead of the U.S. announcement to promote the ATACMS strike. The inter-agency grandees clearly are very fearful. They must worry that Trump may expose the ‘Russia Hoax’ (that Trump in 2016 was a Russian ‘asset’) and put them in jeopardy.

But Trump understands what’s afoot:

“We need peace without delay The foreign policy establishment keeps trying to pull the world into conflict. The greatest threat to Western civilization today is not Russia. It’s probably more than anything else ourselves There must be a complete commitment to dismantling the entire Globalist Neo-con establishment that is perpetually dragging us into endless wars, pretending to fight for freedom and democracy abroad while they turn us into a Third World country and a Third World dictatorship right here at home. The State Department, the Defense bureaucracy, the intelligence services and all of the rest need to be completely overhauled and reconstituted. To fire the Deep Staters and put America first – we have to put America First”.

Whilst the long-range ATACM launch on ‘deep Russian pre-2014 territory’ is no game-changer – it will not change the course of the war (ATACMS regularly are – at 90% – downed by Russian Air Defences); the salience of this act however, is not strategic; rather, it lies with the crossing into the realm of direct NATO attacks on Russia.

Colonel Doug MacGregor reports that two sources are telling him that “Russian nuclear rocket forces are on full alert. They are at the highest level of readiness ever achieved. It suggests that Russia has taken this crossing of the line very seriously”.

Yes, it was a provocation, and President Putin will respond appropriately. He has to – but not necessarily through nuclear escalation. Why? Because the war in Ukraine is moving rapidly in his direction, with Russian forces closing-in on the Dnieper east bank. Effectively, facts on the ground will be the outcome determinant, leaving little point to external mediation.

But more than just a dangerous provocation aimed at Russia, the ATACM and Storm Shadow attacks represent an attempt to turn foreign policy – literally – on its head. Instead of policy being aimed directly at a rising foreign adversary threatening U.S. hegemony, it is being transformed into a loaded weapon locked onto America’s domestic war. It is aimed specifically at Trump – to ‘hog tie’ him in, and to divert his attention to wars that he does not want.

Logic suggests that Trump would want to keep clear of Netanyahu’s scheming for a war against Iran. But the ‘Israel Firsters’ and the Lobby (as Professor Jeffrey Sachs argues) long have had effective control over Congress and the U.S. military – more than does the President. Explains Sachs:

“Because the Zionist Lobby is so powerful, Netanyahu basically has had control over the Pentagon to fight wars on behalf of Israeli extremism. The war in Iraq in 2003 was a Netanyahu War. The attempt to overthrow Bashar al-Assad in Syria, the overthrow of Moamar Gaddafi – All were ‘Netanyahu Wars’”.

The important point is that Netanyahu can ‘do what he does’ because it was always planned this way – a plan that has been 50 years in execution. The ‘Israel First’ strategy was fully embraced by Scoop Jackson (a two-times Presidential candidate). And just so the policy could not be rolled back, Scoop insisted on Zionists staffing the State Department, and that neo-cons and Zionists hold the reins at the NSC. That same pattern continues until today.

At bottom lies the ultimate boondoggle by which the political class of both U.S. parties become wealthy and afford the campaign costs of remaining legislators: “It’s quite a dandy deal that the Israel Lobby or the Zionist Lobby puts in, say, a hundred million dollars into campaigns and it gets trillions out –trillions, not billions, trillions out [in government] expenditures. And so, when Netanyahu speaks, it’s bizarre to me, but it is not Trump who is appointing or naming [those ‘Israel Firsters’ who are part of his Team, but Netanyahu]”, Sachs says.

When Netanyahu describes Trump’s ‘Israel First’ nominations as his ‘dream U.S. team’, the explanation is not difficult to see. On the one hand, Trump has a ‘Revolution’ to conduct in America and wants his nominations to office approved. And, on the other, Netanyahu has a further war he wants the U.S. to fight for him.

“The ‘Big Ugly’ was always a description of the battle that few understood”,another commentator notes:

The Senate is factually the core of republican opposition to MAGA and President Trump. The visible battle consumes the most attention. However, it is the less-visible battle against the entrenched ideological Republicans that proves to be the hardest”.

“The Republicans in the upper chamber will not relinquish power easily. They have a multitude of weapons to use against the (Trump) insurgency … We are seeing this play out now in the alignment of Republican Senators who stand in opposition to Trump’s nomination of Matt Gaetz as Attorney General, [as] this recent report [explains]”.

“The basic outline is that the senate leadership will reluctantly support Matt Gaetz for Main Justice, where ‘support’ means they will not directly oppose; in exchange for the nomination of FBI Director Mike Rogers [a co-founder of the ‘Never Trump’ group] to defend inter-agency interests at FBI”.

The prospective Republican Senate Leader, John Thune, will play his cards carefully in order to extract maximum damage. He has leverage by trying to connect Trump to Netanyahu’s carnage in the region.

Thune, whilst announcing huge quantities of weapons for Israel, said:

To Our Allies in Israel, and to the Jewish People Around the world, my message to you is this: Reinforcements are on the way. In six weeks, Republicans will reclaim the Senate Majority, and we will make clear that the United States Congress stands squarely In Israel’s Corner”.

Trump will need to play his cards carefully, too. Since, for his purposes, the absolute priority are his two domestic wars: First, “dismantling the entire Globalist Neocon Establishment”, and secondly, ending the out-of-control government expenditure that has bloated the Deep State boondoggle and turned the U.S. real economy into a shadow of its former self.

Trump needs those radical reform nominations to pass, even if he has to sacrifice one or two to secure Senate approval for the others. The Israel First nominees, needless to add, will be approved seamlessly.

Of the two ‘entanglement’ threats to Trump’s reform agenda, Russian escalation is the lesser of the two. The Ukraine war is motoring steadily towards some form of dénoument. One that works for Russia. Putin is in the driving seat, and does not need a major war with NATO. Nor does Putin need Trump’s ‘art of the deal’. A resolution of some sort will occur without him.

However, Trump’s role will be important subsequently to define a new border between the security interests of the Atlanticists and those of the Asian heartland (including China and Iran).

The other putative war – Iran – is the more dangerous to Trump. Jewish political influence and the Lobby has taken the U.S. into multiple disastrous wars before. And now, Netanyahu desperately needs a war and he is not alone. Much of Israel is clamouring for war that would end ‘all the fronts’ facing it. There is a profound conviction in this prospect as the solution and the ‘Great Victory’ that Netanyahu and Israel so desperately need.

The ground has been dug-over, both by propaganda that Iran’s nuclear programme is ‘staggeringly vulnerable’ (which it isn’t), and by the media’s onslaught that replays the meme that to attack Iran now represents a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, with Hizbullah and Hamas already weakened. War with Iran – totally erroneously – is thus being sold as an ‘easy war’.

There is an unshakeable certitude that it must be so. ‘We are strong, and Iran is weak’.

Who will roll-back the Israel Firsters? They have the momentum and the fervour. A war against Iran will fare badly for Israel and the U.S. The wide ramifications likely will precipitate precisely the severe financial and market crisis that could derail Trump’s ‘Storm’.

[…]

Via https://strategic-culture.su/news/2024/11/22/the-counter-insurgency-is-on-against-trump-storm/

Full list of 124 countries that must arrest Netanyahu for the ICC

Countries that are party to the ICC

Soon after the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued its arrest warrants for Benjamin Netanyahu and Yoav Gallant, the EU’s foreign policy chief issued a reminder.

“These decisions are binding on all states party to the Rome Statute, which includes all EU member states,” Josep Borrell posted on X.

The Israeli prime minister and former defence minister are accused of “the war crime of starvation as a method of warfare and the crimes against humanity of murder, persecution, and other inhumane acts”.

All 124 members of the Rome Statute, the treaty that established the ICC, are now compelled to arrest the two Israelis and hand them over to the court.

It is likely that both leaders will restrict their travel so as not to be detained – something Russia‘s Vladmir Putin has done since being indicted by the ICC in March last year.

Some member states have previously flouted their obligation: both South Africa and Jordan failed to arrest Omar Hassan al-Bashir when the Sudanese autocrat visited them, drawing the ire of human rights groups and the ICC.

Many of the states that will be compelled to hand over Netanyahu and Gallant are allies of Israel, including the UK, France, Germany and Hungary.

The ICC does not have enforcement powers, instead relying on the cooperation of member states to arrest and surrender suspects.

France and the Netherlands have both already indicated that they would act on the warrants if needed.

[…]

Via https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/full-list-124-countries-must-arrest-netanyahu-icc

 

Trump names (non BlackRock) hedge fund founder Scott Bessent as pick for Treasury secretary

FILE PHOTO: Republican presidential nominee and former U.S. President Donald Trump attends a campaign event in Asheville, ...

WASHINGTON (AP) — President-elect Donald Trump announced Friday that he’ll nominate billionaire hedge fund manager Scott Bessent, an advocate for deficit reduction, to serve as his next treasury secretary, one of several personnel decisions that he unveiled as he closed out the workweek.

The announcements showed how Trump was trying to balance competing perspectives as he pursues an aggressive and sometimes contradictory economic agenda that includes cutting taxes, reducing government spending, putting tariffs on foreign imports and lowering prices for American consumers.

Trump said Bessent, who is closely aligned with Wall Street and could earn bipartisan support, would “help me usher in a new Golden Age for the United States.”

Bessent, 62, is the founder of hedge fund Key Square Capital Management, after having worked on-and-off for Soros Fund Management since 1991. If confirmed by the Senate, he would be the nation’s first openly gay treasury secretary.

He told Bloomberg in August that attacking the U.S. national debt should be a priority, which includes slashing government programs and other spending.

“This election cycle is the last chance for the U.S. to grow our way out of this mountain of debt without becoming a sort of European-style socialist democracy,” he said then.

As of Nov. 8, the national debt stands at $35.94 trillion, with both the Trump and Biden administrations having added to it. Trump’s policies added $8.4 trillion to the national debt, while the Biden administration increased the national debt by $4.3 trillion, according to the Committee for a Responsible Federal Budget, a fiscal watchdog.

Even as he pushes to lower the national debt by stopping spending, Bessent has backed extending provisions of the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act of 2017, which Trump signed into law in his first year in office. Estimates from different economic analyses of the costs of the various tax cuts range between nearly $6 trillion and $10 trillion over 10 years. Nearly all of the law’s provisions are set to expire at the end of 2025.

Before becoming a Trump donor and adviser, Bessent donated to various Democratic causes in the early 2000s, notably Al Gore’s presidential run. He also worked for George Soros, a major supporter of Democrats. Bessent had an influential role in Soros’ London operations, including his famous 1992 bet against the pound, which generated huge profits on “Black Wednesday,” when the pound was de-linked from European currencies.

Bessent previously told Bloomberg that he views tariffs as a “one time price adjustment” and “not inflationary,” and he said tariffs imposed during a second Trump administration would be directed primarily at China. And he wrote in a Fox News op-ed this week that tariffs are “a useful tool for achieving the president’s foreign policy objectives,” such as encouraging allies to spend more on defense or deterring military aggression.

In addition, Bessent has floated ideas for how Trump could put pressure on Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell, whose term expires in May 2026. Last month, Bessent suggested Trump could name a replacement chair early, and let that person function as a “shadow” chair, with the goal of essentially sidelining Powell.

But after the election, Bessent reportedly backed away from that plan. Powell, for his part, has said he wouldn’t step down if Trump asked him to do so, and added that Trump, as president, wouldn’t have the authority to fire him.

Trump repeatedly attacked Powell during his first term as president for raising the Fed’s key rate in 2017 and 2018. During the 2024 campaign, he said that as president he should have a “say” in the central bank’s interest rate decisions. Presidents traditionally avoid commenting on the Fed’s policies.

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Via https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/trump-names-hedge-fund-founder-scott-bessent-as-pick-for-treasury-secretary

UN Using Africa as a Testing Ground for Controversial Digital ID Systems

Silhouette of a person against a vibrant, abstract background with shades of orange and yellow.

Didi Rankovik

The United Nations (but not only) has clearly chosen to focus its push on introducing digital ID systems to some of the world’s developing countries, particularly in Africa.

What’s referred to in reports as “a comprehensive initiative” is now taking place across the continent, driven by the UN development agency UNDP, as well as the UN Innovation Network, and even UNESCO (Education, Scientific, and Cultural Organization). This is one of the components of what’s known as the UN’s Global Digital Compact.

Such initiatives are sold in those countries as a way to develop better access to services and improve “digital inclusion.”

Related: Digital ID, Bill Gates vaccine record, and payments system combo to be trialed in Africa 

But opponents around the world say the schemes create large, centralized surveillance networks prone to misuse, particularly without stringent safeguards in place.

After the UN agencies previously formalized their initiatives in Kenya, it is now the turn of Ethiopia and Eswatini (formerly Swaziland) where similar programs are being launched in cooperation with their governments.

In Ethiopia, the government is organizing ID card registration in what’s said to be a large-scale effort that encompasses financial services, healthcare, and education.

In Eswatini, the UNDP, together with the country’s government, carried out a digital readiness assessment. The goal was to find out if Eswatini’s digital infrastructure in various sectors is capable of implementing digital ID programs at this time.

It would appear not since the result of the evaluation revealed more money needs to go into developing that infrastructure, as well as training staff, and further developing both public and private digital services. The latter are supposed to take on an increasingly important role, as has previously been done in other African countries.

UN’s representative in Eswatini is quoted as saying that the results of the assessment program will be used to put together a roadmap to improve digital infrastructure and associated employee skills – that would then lead to the introduction of digital IDs.

Eswatini government officials spoke along the same line, saying that the country’s Digital Transformation Strategy will benefit from the results of the UN’s assessment, eventually leading to “integrated digital services.”

Various digital ID projects, either discussed or tested elsewhere in the world are typically unpopular, facing low uptake and constant pushback from both privacy and security advocates.

[…]

Via https://reclaimthenet.org/n-digital-id-initiatives-africa