The Most Revolutionary Act

Uncensored updates on world events, economics, the environment and medicine

The Most Revolutionary Act
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About stuartbramhall

Retired child and adolescent psychiatrist and American expatriate in New Zealand. In 2002, I made the difficult decision to close my 25-year Seattle practice after 15 years of covert FBI harassment. I describe the unrelenting phone harassment, illegal break-ins and six attempts on my life in my 2010 book The Most Revolutionary Act: Memoir of an American Refugee.

North Carolina Child Protection Services Threatening to Seize Children from Parents in Red Cross Shelters that are Shutting Down

by Brian Shilhavy
Editor, Health Impact News

Earlier this month (October, 2024), we published a report from Hannah Stutts, the owner of JAKS Stables in Western North Carolina, where she serves as the dispatch of relief efforts in isolated towns that still need help after the devastation following Hurricane Helene, where they had distributed over 10,000 body bags, and still needed more. See:

10,000 Body Bags Were Not Enough – Updates from on the Ground in North Carolina Disaster Relief

Hannah just published an update where she states that Red Cross shelters are now closing down and forcing homeless families out, and that North Carolina Department of Social Services (DSS) is threatening to take their children away from them if they have nowhere to go.

If you’re wondering why the State of North Carolina wants to take these children into custody and place them into the Foster Care system, while doing NOTHING for the parents, the answer is that there is MASSIVE state and federal funding that creates a huge motive to seize these children, while very little to no funding is available to help their parents, especially with housing issues like this.

The Foster Care and Adoption business in the U.S. creates huge financial incentives to local governments to take children into custody, and if they do not meet their quota of children taken into custody, they lose out on that funding.

And when a disaster strikes, such as this hurricane, even MORE federal funding is allocated.

Much of the funding available to child welfare services is through “mental health”, where “free” mental health services are often made available to families in distress, and once you are attached to a “mental health” label, you can basically kiss your life goodbye, because now you are in the government’s database with a legal mental health diagnosis, which they can use to either take your children away, or even put YOU away because now you have a “mental illness” diagnosis.

That funding for “mental health” increases in times of disasters.

In North Carolina, it was just announced that the North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services received $2.9 million in federal funding to help increase “crisis counseling services for people impacted by Hurricane Helene.”

The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services today announced $2.9 million in federal funding to help increase crisis counseling services for people impacted by Hurricane Helene.

The funding is part of the Crisis Counseling Assistance and Training Program administered by the U. S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA), which is available to states to address behavioral health care needs and support relief for people in disaster-impacted communities. (Source.)

So even if homeless hurricane survivors are not in a shelter that is now closing down, if a “mental health” worker comes to interview them, and the homeless disaster survivor pours out their heart to a “mental health” professional including how hard it is to take care of their children, they will have a solution for you, but it is probably one you are not going to like, as you could lose your children forever to the U.S. child trafficking system known as “foster care and adoption.”But if you are a biological parent you do!

If, however, you are already on the Government payroll in this system already raising other people’s children through Foster Care or Adoption, then there is plenty of help available to you to keep on fostering or parenting other people’s children.

The North Carolina Department of Health and Human Services says 2,773 foster kids are accounted for in the 25 Western North Carolina counties included in the disaster declaration.

The nonprofit Foster Family Alliance (which also receives government funding from child welfare services) is on the ground now supporting 90 foster families.

Trucks and helicopters full of formula, diapers, medical supplies and toys are making their way to children. (Source.)

The State of North Carolina is making a special effort to make it easier for foster homes to get by during this disaster, by basically waiving all the licensing fees and requirements that are necessary to be a State-approved foster home, as long as the disaster lasts, which as we learned during COVID, could last for many years.

10A N.C. Admin. Code 70E .0703, .0704, requires medical examinations for all members of the foster family to be dated  within 12 months of submitting a new foster home application or foster home re-licensure. During the state of emergency,  this requirement will be waived until the state of emergency has expired.

10A N.C. Admin. Code 70E .1108 regulates fire and building safety of licensed foster homes. During the state of emergency,  the fire and building safety inspection prior to relicensure will be waived…

10A N.C. Admin. Code 70E .1109 and .1110 provide the health and environmental regulations for licensed foster homes.  During the state of emergency, the requirements that the home and yard shall be maintained and repaired, windows and  doors used for ventilation shall be screened, household equipment and furniture shall be in good repair, and running water  will be waived until 30 days after the expiration of the state of emergency.

10A N.C. Admin. Code 70E .1111 states the requirement for foster home room arrangements. During the state of emergency,  the following requirements will be waived until 30 days after the state of emergency expires: bedrooms shall not serve dual  function, no daybed, convertible sofa, or other bedding of temporary nature shall be used for the exclusive sleeping area of  the child, and separate and accessible drawer space and closet space for personal belongings and clothing shall be available for each child. (Source.)

So if you do not have adequate housing for your foster children, and are forced to make do with temporary shelter, like living in a tent in your front yard, no problem. You’re covered.

And if you were under investigation for your state-approved foster home and you were facing the loss of your license to be able foster children because you were sexually abusing and/or sexually trafficking your foster children, no problem. You’re covered, and you don’t need to renew your license as long as this emergency lasts.

If, however, you are the biological parents of your children and are raising and taking care of your children WITHOUT any help from the government, and now find yourself homeless with no means to find another home yet, too bad.

You’re NOT covered, and the government is now going to come in and put your children into the child trafficking system known as “foster care and adoption,” so a good Christian family can now take your children and give them a “forever home.”

And if your children are not up-to-date on all their vaccines, don’t worry, because the child welfare department will take care of that too, and for free!

Via https://vaccineimpact.com/2024/north-carolina-child-protection-services-threatening-to-seize-children-from-parents-in-red-cross-shelters-that-are-shutting-down/

The Biden-Harris Administration Wasted Nearly One Billion on Misinformation

They Wasted Nearly One Billion on Misinformation

By  Ian Miler

The party of “Science” apparently misled hundreds of millions of people on the actual science surrounding the Covid-19 pandemic. Stop the presses.

Starting in early 2020, the combined efforts of Dr. Anthony Fauci, the CDC, the Department of Health and Human Services, and their partners in the media caused an untold amount of damage to society and public health and might have even created conditions for increased Covid spread. How? By repeatedly, profoundly, and often purposefully communicating inaccurate information while spending hundreds of millions of dollars to get their preferred messages across.

Now, a new, massive 113-page report from the US House of Representatives Energy & Commerce Committee has detailed the remarkable abuses from the Biden-Harris administration and the manner in which they communicated during Covid.

Biden, CDC Partners Literally Wasted a Fortune to Lie to the American People

The report details a number of unbelievable inaccuracies in 2021 coming from the Biden administration’s communications team and the CDC’s messaging apparatus. Fauci and Francis Collins’ National Institutes of Health were also responsible, creating guidance using taxpayer money, nearly $1 billion per the report, that misled millions of people and caused unimaginable harm in the process.

While the Biden-Harris administration’s public health guidance led to prolonged closures of schools and businesses, the NIH was spending nearly a billion dollars of taxpayer money trying to manipulate Americans with advertisements—sometimes containing erroneous or unproven information. By overpromising what the Covid-19 vaccines could do—in direct contradiction of the FDA’s authorizations—and over emphasizing the virus’s risk to children and young adults, the Biden-Harris administration caused Americans to lose trust in the public health system,” Committee Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers (R-WA) said after the report’s release. “Our investigation also uncovered the extent to which public funding went to Big Tech companies to track and monitor Americans, underscoring the need for stronger online data privacy protections.”

One of the most damaging, and woefully incorrect messaging campaigns centered on vaccine efficacy against infection. As the report details, Biden’s “Stop the Spread” campaign was a pervasive marketing effort in conjunction with the CDC that claimed vaccines would end the pandemic by reducing infections. That had enormous knock-on effects, including decreasing trust in all vaccinations and ultimately harming public health.

“The entire premise of the Biden-Harris ‘Stop the Spread’ campaign was that if you got vaccinated for COVID-19, you could resume daily activities because they said vaccinated people would not spread the disease,” said Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations Chair Morgan Griffith (R-VA). “Despite lacking scientific basis, the administration bought into this CDC claim and misled the American public. As a result, vaccination coverage with other vaccines appears to have declined, I believe because of a growing distrust of information coming from our public health institutions.”

This campaign was even more disingenuous and purposefully misleading than previously realized. The “Stop the Spread” publicity blitz hid in plain sight a message from the CDC that even they didn’t know whether the vaccines actually stopped infection or transmission. The report shared a screenshot of a page from the Biden administration’s marketing that specifically said “science” wasn’t sure how well the vaccines worked against infection.

Yet the Biden administration made life-altering policy decisions such as vaccine mandates, discriminatory entry processes, and military vaccination requirements regardless. And that was in addition to the less quantifiable impacts like nudging millions of people to follow their preferred course of action.

CDC Guidance Exacerbated Existing Problems

The report also explains how the Biden administration relied heavily on guidance from the CDC, an organization that thoroughly disgraced itself during the pandemic. There were several examples highlighted, chief among them that CDC “experts” went far beyond what even the FDA claimed Covid vaccines could do.

Without evidence, the report says Biden’s marketing claimed that “COVID vaccines were highly effective against transmission.” Within just a few months, it was clear that all the available evidence pointed towards the exact opposite direction. Per the report, this had a “negative impact on vaccine confidence and the CDC’s credibility when proven untrue.”

The CDC also had “inconsistent and flawed messaging about the effectiveness of masks,” which created seemingly endless mandates and, again, overconfidence in an ineffective policy. Some of those mandates even continue to this day.

That’s just the tip of their misinformation. A wealth of data and public embarrassments for the CDC confirmed that the organization “consistently overstated the risk of COVID-19 to children,” the report states. That fear-mongering had disastrous consequences, from unnecessarily terrifying parents to prolonged school closures and lack of socialization—setting an entire generation of children back in the process.

Still, after being repeatedly and profoundly proven wrong, the CDC has demonstrated they’ve yet to learn their lesson. In late 2024, the CDC continues to recommend Covid-19 vaccines for babies starting at six months old. That makes the US a global outlier compared to European nations that have maintained at least some level of intellectual honesty.

How Do We Fix CDC Abuses?

The report detailed several recommendations to fix these organizations after their disastrous work during the pandemic. Even implementing just a select few, listed below, would do wonders for fixing the institutional rot that influenced these mistakes.

  • Congress should consider clarifying responsibility for evaluating the safety of vaccines and streamlining existing reporting systems for capturing vaccine injuries and adverse reactions.
  • HHS and its agencies should embrace a culture of transparency and accountability.
  • The CDC and federal public health officials should not attempt to silence dissenting scientific opinions.

Also highlighted in the report is how the CDC and NIH used their weight in their attempts to censor scientists who dissented from their preferred narratives. Beyond their mistakes, profound inaccuracies, and nearly unlimited spending, their censorship efforts are equally concerning.

As we learned during Covid, if there’s one thing “experts” hate, it’s being told that they were proven wrong. Instead of learning, adjusting, and apologizing, they move to censor, criticize and mislead. This new report is the latest confirmation of these unacceptable “mistakes.” And reaffirms the importance of ensuring they never happen again.

[…]

Via https://brownstone.org/articles/the-biden-harris-administration-wasted-nearly-one-billion-on-misinformation/

Volkswagen Plans Closure of 3 Plants in Germany, Cutting Tens of Thousands of Jobs

Ulrich Rippert

With Volkswagen management planning a radical cost-cutting program, Central Works Council Chairwoman Daniela Cavallo, of the IG Metall trade union, announced yesterday that at least three German plants are to be closed and tens of thousands of jobs cut.

On Monday morning, the works council invited workers to information meetings at all German plants. Some 25,000 employees gathered at the main plant in Wolfsburg alone. A works council leaflet, which was distributed en masse on Monday, begins with the words: “It is a declaration of war of historic proportions on its own workforce and entire home regions at the heart of the Group.” It continued:

In connection with job losses for tens of thousands of us, the Board of Management intends to enforce the following: close at least three VW factories in Germany, shrink virtually all plants still existing in Germany, also separate from previous core areas and, on top of that, enforce massive pay losses for the remaining employees.

All this is “not sabre rattling” as a tactic in the current round of collective bargaining, the VW works council explained, as the board really wants all this and considers that the cost-cutting plan has “no alternative and no room for concessions.” The Central Works Council was informed in advance, but the Board of Directors refused to come clean to its own employees. “That is why your works councils are now forced to inform you about this.”

The financial daily Handelsblatt quoted from an internal strategy paper, which is referred to as a “poison list” in management circles. According to the paper, further massive social attacks are planned. They include, among other things, major wage cuts, the outsourcing of individual administrative areas and pay freezes for the years 2025 and 2026.

Chief Human Resources Officer Gunnar Kilian said in a media release that the Board of Management had decided not to disclose any further details about the planned measures in the cost-cutting programme: “We adhere to the principle agreed in codetermination to first conduct the discussion about the future of Volkswagen AG internally with our negotiating partners.”

On Wednesday, negotiations between management and IG Metall on a new company collective bargaining agreement will enter the second round. During the first round in September VW rejected IG Metall’s demands for a 7 percent wage increase and instead pushed for savings. According to Cavallo, VW is now demanding a 10 percent wage cut and pay freezes in the next two years.

Many VW workers are shocked. The largest European carmaker already announced a “cost-cutting policy” in the summer and terminated the employment guarantee that had been in place for decades. But Monday’s announcements exceeded all fears. The VW Group has long been known in Germany for relatively high wages and social benefits with jobs considered crisis-proof, from apprenticeship to retirement.

The works council chief’s apparent indignation on Monday was, however, all for show. In truth, the works council is involved in all management discussions and is directly involved in the preparation of the plans to shut plants. The works council and IG Metall are responsible within management for designing the social attacks in such a way that resistance to them can be suppressed. The confidentiality up to now was also agreed upon and the announcement now made by the works council two days before the next round of negotiations was deliberately calculated.

Cavallo and her IG Metall colleagues speak of an attack “on us” and try to present themselves as representatives of workers’ interests. The reality is the opposite. The fact that the works council speaks of “historic” attacks, but has so far not initiated any combat measures against them, shows this. In no other German company is the cooperation between the owners, management and trade unions as close and sophisticated as at Volkswagen.

Head of Human Resources Gunnar Kilian, who is responsible for the plan to shutter plants and for layoffs, was General Secretary of the works council before moving to the Board of Directors. He was considered the “closest confidant” of Cavallo’s predecessor Bernd Osterloh and his “mastermind.”

The VW Group has in the past been described as the epitome of social partnership and as a “German codetermination model.” IG Metall and the works council, together with an army of full-time officials, ensure that the decisions of the Executive Board and Supervisory Board are implemented smoothly.

The head of IG Metall traditionally serves as Deputy Chairman of the Supervisory Board of the Group, assisted by the works council, which, due to statutory codetermination, together with IGM, occupies half of the Supervisory Board. The other half is accounted for by Porsche Holding, which is controlled by the Porsche and Piech families and owns 53 percent of the ordinary shares, the Emirate of Qatar (17 percent) and the Social Democratic Party-governed state of Lower Saxony (20 percent).

The VW Group is thus practically dominated by a triumvirate of trade unions, works councils and the SPD. Ex-IGM head Jörg Hofmann, General Works Council Chairman Daniela Cavallo and Lower Saxony Minister President Stephan Weil (SPD) sit on the eight-member Supervisory Board, where all important decisions are discussed.

In order to repel the planned attacks and to defend all plants and jobs, it is necessary to break the conspiracy of the trade union apparatus, works council and SPD and to initiate a genuine struggle. This requires the establishment of independent rank-and-file committees in which all VW workers who seriously want to fight join forces. The first initiative has already been taken last month with the founding of the VW Rank-and-File Committee.

Rank-and-file committees already exist in several car plants and have joined forces to form a network. It is part of the International Workers Alliance of Rank-and-File Committees (IWA-RFC), which coordinates the growing struggles of the working class worldwide. The development of rank-and-file committees at VW must be geared towards making the fight against the savage cost-cutting at VW part of a systematic, international counter-offensive by workers throughout the automotive and parts industries.

The cost-cutting at VW is part of a global offensive by the car companies, which—supported by national governments and trade union bureaucracies—are fighting a bitter battle for market share and higher returns, and are using the switch to electric mobility to lay off hundreds of thousands.

Ford is shutting down its plant in Saarlouis and is now attacking the workers in Cologne and Valencia. With Stellantis, “hardly a stone remains on top of another,” as the daily FAZ writes. The CEO Carlos Tavares, who is notorious as a “cost killer,” is destroying thousands of jobs in the US and Italy. The Opel plant in Eisenach is not spared either, and of the 15,000 jobs that once existed at the Opel main plant in Rüsselsheim, only 8,300 remain.

A veritable massacre is taking place in the supplier industry. ZF Friedrichshafen is destroying 14,000 jobs and Continental 7,000. Almost daily, smaller companies with several hundred employees close. The software group SAP is also cutting 10,000 jobs, ThyssenKrupp is cutting its steel division, the chemical group Bayer is destroying 5,000 jobs and BASF is closing two sites in Cologne and Frankfurt-Höchst.

[…]

Via https://www.globalresearch.ca/volkswagen-closure-3-plants-germany/5871347

 

 

Class of 2018 CIA/Pentagon Democrats Continue to Advance Hawkish Policies in Congress

Source: republicbroadcasting.org

Jeremy Kuzmarov

In March 2018, Patrick Martin of the World Socialist Web Site published a political pamphlet entitled “The CIA Democrats.”

In it, he wrote that “an extraordinary number of former intelligence and military operatives from the CIA, Pentagon, National Security Council and State Department” were “seeking nomination as Democratic candidates for Congress in the 2018 midterm elections.”[1]

Some of these candidates, like Elissa Slotkin, a former CIA operative with three tours in Iraq,[2] were recruited as part of a “red-to-blue” program targeting vulnerable Republican-held seats.

In the 2018 race, there were far more former spies and soldiers seeking the nomination of the Democratic Party than for the Republicans. Martin wrote that there were so many “spooks” that with a “nod to Mad Magazine,” one might call the primaries “spy vs. spy.”[3]

CovertAction Magazine has kept tabs on the “spook-soldiers” who were elected as part of the Class of 2018 and followed their careers in Congress. (according to Martin, 30 spook-soldiers won primaries and 11 were elected to Congress).

[…]

Below is a summary of the five key members of the 2018 class we have tracked:

1. Elissa Slotkin

A conservative Democrat endorsed by Liz Cheney (R-WY) who is now running for the U.S. Senate, Slotkin is the wealthy heiress of the Hygrade Foods fortune and has supported a bill to boost funding to local police.

Prior to her election to Congress, Slotkin put her stamp on the U.S.’s disastrous Ukraine policy as Acting Assistant Secretary of Defense for International Security Affairs following the U.S.-backed Maidan coup in 2014.

In February 2021, Slotkin was appointed Chairwoman of the Intelligence & Counterterrorism Subcommittee within the House Committee on Homeland Security. In that capacity, she pleased her former employer by hyping threats to public safety from domestic extremists and alleged foreign terrorists, while pushing for ever more draconian anti-terrorism legislation than what was already on the books.

Slotkin’s category of domestic extremists included people who oppose pandemic restrictions, despite their harmful effects on mental health and violation of constitutional liberties, along with those whom she brands as “conspiracy theorists”—a term that was made pejorative by the CIA in the 1960s in order to try to validate the corrupt Warren Commission and its false conclusion that Lee Harvey Oswald was the lone JFK assassin.

A super-hawk on Ukraine, Slotkin was part of a congressional delegation that met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, whom she characterized as a “man who has risen to the occasion in war.” Slotkin subsequently told an NPR reporter: “I think we got to give them [Ukraine] what they need….This is a black and white issue. Our weapons have made a huge difference.”

When the war with Ukraine broke out, Slotkin supported a bill that aimed to expedite security assistance to Ukraine, and another designed to eliminate Europe’s energy dependence on Russia.

Inserting a clause into the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) that would direct the Pentagon to better capitalize on commercial innovation in Michigan’s auto industry, Slotkin has sponsored the “Dictator Act” which would investigate whether the Chinese government is helping Vladimir Putin evade Western sanctions.

Described as a “moderate” or “conservative” Democrat of the kind the CIA and plutocratic elite that it serves likes, Slotkin is one of only five Democratic House members who voted against an amendment to prohibit support to and participation in the Saudi-led coalition’s military operations against the Houthis in Yemen—a genocidal operation.

Endorsed by the American-Israeli Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) because of her strong pro-Israel stance, Slotkin further voted against H.Con.Res. 21, which directed President Joe Biden to remove U.S. troops from Syria within 180 days.

When asked by a reporter about her favorite CIA movie, Slotkin tellingly responded: “Zero Dark Thirty” which glorified the use of torture in the hunt for Osama bin Laden.

In the same interview, Slotkin praised the CIA’s Hollywood liaison office, which she said helps Hollywood to “really understand what is going on”—comments that are in line with the CIA’s official cover story for their PR operations in Hollywood, and make it seem like the Agency is merely concerned with greater accuracy, not covering up its crimes or trying to rehabilitate its public image.

2. Abigail Spanberger (D-VA)

Spanberger grew up in Richmond, Virginia, holds an MBA from Purdue University’s Krannert School of Management (now Business), and taught English literature at the Islamic Saudi Academy in Northern Virginia. She worked as a CIA case officer from 2006 to 2014 in the Middle East after previously working on money-laundering and narcotics cases for the U.S. Postal Service.[4]

Today, Spanberger serves on the U.S. House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, which is supposed to provide oversight of the CIA and other intelligence agencies!

When the Democratic Party nominated her to the party’s leadership table, the World Socialist Network concluded that the Democrats had “made what amounts to a pledge of allegiance to [a] program of imperialist aggression.”

Promoting a hard line on China and advancing strong support for NATO, Israel and greater military surveillance at the U.S.-Mexico border, Spanberger is conservative on economic and criminal justice issues but liberal on social issues like abortion.

The World Socialist Website described Spanberger as “one of the more notorious right-wing figures among House Democrats when she denounced the political impact of the mass protests against the police murder of George Floyd.”

On a conference call of House Democrats after the 2020 election, Spanberger declared, “We need to not ever use the word ‘socialist’ or ‘socialism’ ever again,” adding that the party would get “fucking torn apart in 2022” if it did not suppress policies such as Medicare for All.[5]

Stating her firm belief that “the United States of America is the world’s superpower, and we have a responsibility to be a stabilizing force,” Spanberger had the backing of Foreign Policy for America, a political action committee promoting the anti-Russian campaign being waged by the Democrats and the military-intelligence apparatus.

Spanberger used her bully pulpit to defend the intelligence agencies for allegedly “providing good information that allowed presidential administrations to make good decisions on policy initiatives and engagement with foreign countries.”

She also led the charge about Russian election meddling, stating: “The fact that Donald Trump would at times seemingly take the side of foreign adversaries over the well-sourced intelligence of the intelligence community [in denying Russian election meddling on his behalf] is troubling as an American—not just as a former intelligence officer.” [6]

Echoing Kamala Harris, Spanberger criticized Trump for meeting with North Korean leader Kim Jong Un, stating that “I think any time we see the president of the United States warmly greeting an authoritarian leader and later professing to have fallen in love with him, no matter how tongue-in-cheek those comments are, is deeply concerning.”

But Spanberger was later silent when Joe Biden met with Saudi Prince Mohammed bin Salman and many other autocratic foreign leaders allied with the United States.

And as a member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, Spanberger voted to provide billions of dollars in military aid to Ukraine—whose president banned 12 opposition parties and sanctioned terrorist attacks on political rivals and journalists.

As a reflection of her hawkish views, Spanberger has led the attempt to get the State Department to designate Russia as a State Sponsor of Terrorism. Spanberger told MSNBC that she believed the U.S. should be as “absolutely supportive of Ukraine as we possibly can” and to “give them enough weapons to win this war.”

[…]

3. Jason Crow (D-CO)

Crow is a member of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence and House Foreign Affairs Committee, who served in the 82nd Airborne Division in Iraq and as an Army Ranger in Afghanistan from 2004 to 2006.

Crow is a gung-ho supporter of the war in Ukraine, advocating for providing more long-range missiles and rockets to Ukraine and more advanced fighter jets capable of striking inside Russia.

Holding close friendships with Ukraine military and political leaders, Crow claims against all evidence that Putin engaged in an “unprovoked war” in Ukraine—the CIA’s line—and that Putin is intent on reforging the Russian empire.

Crow supports the New Cold War and the Pentagon’s arms build-up targeting Russia and China, calling Xi and Putin dictators who “would love to see the democratic free nations of this world fail.” Crow claims that “Taiwan would eventually fall if we’re not able to help Ukraine win.”

He calls for turning Ukraine into a heavily armed “porcupine” over the long term so the country could never be swallowed by Russia. Crow is part of the NATO parliamentary assembly, which is NATO’s Congress. Endorsed by AIPAC, he is also an Israel hawk.

One of Crow’s biggest donors, revealingly, is Palantir Technologies, a data-analytics company founded with CIA seed money, which has played a key role in the Ukraine War by tracking Russian military movements and helping Ukraine to coordinate battlefield maneuvers along with bomb targeting.[7]

Palantir additionally signed a major cooperative agreement with the Israeli Defense Ministry and has provided Artificial Intelligence (AI) software used by the Israeli Defense Forces (IDF) for bomb targeting and for accumulating data on Palestinians in the occupied territory. There is concern that the company’s AI software platform also is being weaponized against ordinary Americans.

4. Jared Golden, (D-ME)

Jared Golden is a Marine Corps veteran who served combat tours in Afghanistan and Iraq and was elected with the class of 2018 to Congress in Maine.

A conservativre Blue Dog Democrat who was named Vice Chairman of the  of the Seapower and Projection Forces Subcommitte of House Armed Services Committee, Golden supported gargantuan military budgets under the National Defense Authorization Acts (NDAA).

The latter have significantly increased funding for the Portsmouth naval shipyard in Kittery, Maine and provided funds for developing new naval destroyers and F-35 jets and CH-53k helicopters, which will benefit Pratt & Whitney’s factory in North Berwick, Maine, and the Hunting Dearborn factory in Fryeburg, Maine.

Rejecting calls for a ceasefire in the Israel-Gaza War, Golden voted in favor of a bill that would provide an additional $14.3 billion to support Israeli military operations in the Gaza strip, and organized a letter signed by himself and other members of Congress advocating for President Biden to give F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine. [8]

[…]

5. Mikie Sherrill (D-NJ)

Equally reprehensible is the record of Mikie Sherrill, a former U.S. Navy helicopter pilot who flew missions in Europe and the Middle East, and served as a Russian policy officer, working at the Commander-in-chief of the U.S. Navy, Europe.

A conservative Democrat who has voted with Joe Biden 100% of the time, Sherrill received over $300,000 from the financial industry in 2023-2024.

Sherrill has served on the House Armed Services Committee and Select Committee on the Strategic Competition Between the United States and Chinese Communist Party, a relic of the Cold War which promotes Sinophobia and confrontation with China.

On her website, Sherrill wrote that, serving on the House Armed Services Committee, she was able to “significantly increase funding for Picatinny Arsenal—a major military research and manufacturing institute in her district—which remains the Army’s leading research institution for armaments and ammunition.”

Sherrill continues: “Beyond supporting the critical research and development programs at Picatinny, I am also proud to support the many defense technology companies that call NJ-11 home and are on the cutting edge of modernizing our Armed Forces. Many of my provisions in the FY23 National Defense Authorization Act support funding for our local defense industrial base and businesses.”

Sherrill is an anti-Russia and anti-China national security hawk.

[…]

She favors continued military support to Israel and a growing police state at home. She boasts on her website about supporting the Domestic Terrorism Prevention Act of 2022, which she claims would “better equip our law enforcement with information related to possible attacks and their relationship with hate crimes.”

In May 2022, Sherrill and then-Representative Mike Gallagher (R-WI), Chairman of the Select Committee on Strategic Competition Between the United States and Chinese Communist Party, participated in a strategic-operational war game, “Dangerous Straits: Battle for Taiwan 2027,” with the Center for a New American Security and NBC’s Meet the Press.

[…]

Via https://covertactionmagazine.com/2024/10/21/class-of-2018-cia-pentagon-democrats-continue-to-advance-hawkish-policies-in-congress/

Cuba Becomes Associate Member of BRICS

[Source: automagazine.pt]

Jeremy Kuzmarov

Cuba was accepted with 12 other countries as an associate member of BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa) at the 16th BRICS summit in Kazan, Russia in late October.

The other new associate members, which bring the BRICS grouping to over 4.6 billion people, or 57% of global population, are Algeria, Belarus, Bolivia, Indonesia, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Nigeria, Thailand, Turkey, Uganda, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam.

The expansion of BRICS grants the new associate member countries the status of “partners,” a position that could open the door to full BRICS membership in the future.

Cuban President Miguel Díaz-Canel was absent from the Kazan summit because he was dealing with Cuba’s recent nationwide blackout, a product of an outdated infrastructure system and Hurricane Oscar’s destruction. Both challenges are amplified crises due to the draconian U.S. blockade on Cuba, which restricts the import of key infrastructural needs by financial, economic, and diplomatic coercion.

Díaz-canel wrote on X that: “#Cuba is honored to enter as a partner country in the #BRICS, five letters and a great hope for the countries of the South, on the arduous path towards a more just, democratic, equitable, and sustainable international order.”

Díaz-canel’s remarks were echoed by Cuban Foreign Minister Bruno Rodríguez Parrilla, who attended the Kazan summit.

He spotlighted the potential of the New Development Bank—headed by former Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff—as a “favorable financial alternative for countries in the Global South” that could help “reduce the influence of the U.S. dollar,” which Rodríguez Parrilla said is “frequently used as an instrument of pressure that has a very negative impact on the quality of life of many of our people.”

Rodríguez Parrilla noted that Cuba was happy to join BRICS since it had “emerged as a key player of growing relevance, authority and leadership on the global geopolitical stage and a real hope for the countries of the South in their complex path towards” a better future.

Cuba stands to benefit in particular from alternative economic arrangements and trading alliances that could help offset the crippling effects of the U.S. economic blockade, a cruel form of punishment that costs Cuba an estimated $455 million per month.

Kazan Summit

Attended by representatives of 36 countries (20 were heads of state), the Kazan summit took place amidst the backdrop of impending global war caused by the relentless aggressiveness of the United States and allies like Israel.

A summit communiqué called for ending the Ukraine war “through dialogue and diplomacy,” expressed “grave concern” at the “mass killing and injury of civilians, forced displacement and widespread destruction of civilian infrastructure” in Gaza, and criticized the Israeli assault and bombardment of southern Lebanon. The communiqué additionally cited “the disruptive effect of unlawful unilateral coercive measures, including illegal sanctions” on economic life.”

As a remedy for the latter, delegates proposed creation of an independent payment infrastructure, called “BRICS Clear,” which aims to reduce dependence on the U.S. dollar and will render obsolete sanctions applied by the U.S. that restrict bank transfers under the current SWIFT international messaging system.[1]

Delegates to the Kazan summit further endorsed the use of local currencies in financial transactions between BRICS countries and their trading partners.

Russian President Vladimir Putin proposed the establishment of a BRICS “investment platform” to foster physical economic growth, and the creation of a BRICS Grain Exchange to ensure fairer pricing and help ensure food security in developing countries while taking food supplies out of the hands of international speculators.

Over time Putin said that the exchange could grow into a broader commodity exchange including for oil, which would help ensure fair pricing and energy security across the Global South.

Chinese Premier Xi Jinping opened the Kazan summit by calling on BRICS to “help guide the world along the overarching trend of peace and development.”

Xi asked the other leaders: “Should we allow the world to descend into the abyss of disorder and chaos, or should we strive to steer it back on the path of peace and development?”

He answered that the BRICS shared an “unwavering determination” and “willpower” to build “a shared future for mankind,” while voicing support for expanding the BRICS “in light of the rise of the Global South” and need to “enhance the representation and voice of developing nations in global governance.”

Speaking before President Xi, Putin emphasized in his speech the need for tightened cooperation between the BRICS countries and its new members in the realm of technology, education, efficient resource development, trade and logistics, finance and insurance, stating that “we have assumed responsibility for the future of the world, not only in word, but also in deed.”

Putin later told the BRICS Plus/Outreach session: “All our countries share similar aspirations, values and a vision of a new democratic world order that reflects cultural and civilizational diversity. We are confident that such a system should be guided by the universal principles of respect for the legitimate interests and sovereign choice of nations, respect for international law and a spirit of mutually beneficial, honest co-operation.”

Putin’s spokesman Dmitry Peskov elaborated on the BRICS’s purpose and principles, in order to explain why the BRICS is not closed to any nation, even members of NATO or the EU (the admission of NATO-member Turkey as a new BRICS “partner state” served to prove his point):

“There is a political will that unites countries that share the same vision of development prospects. Be it political development, economic development, cultural development and so on. It is an atmosphere in which each other’s interests are taken into account. It is an atmosphere where there are no hegemonic aspirations,” he said.

These latter comments offered a jibe at the U.S. whose hegemonic aspirations have led the world to the brink of World War III.

The BRICS summit makes clear, however, the growth of a huge resistance bloc of nations that is intent on stopping the drive to war while establishing a more egalitarian global economic order.

Barriers to Success and Need for a New Socialist Internationale

One potential barrier to success of the BRICS is divisions among the member states, which is what crippled the non-aligned movement during the first Cold War.

The World Socialist Website (WSWS) pointed out in an article on the Kazan summit that “BRICS member or candidate states, including India and Pakistan or Iran and Saudi Arabia, have repeatedly fought or threatened to fight wars with each other.”

Brazil has also made a point of excluding Venezuela from BRICS because of criticism it has of its government, though Venezuela has been a crucial country in trying to lead Latin American countries towards a path of resource nationalism and away from dependence on the U.S.

[…]

Via https://covertactionmagazine.com/2024/10/28/cuba-becomes-associate-member-of-brics/

 

Indo-European Languages Spoken in Europe

Episode 3 Indo-European Languages in Europe

Language Families of the World

Dr John McWhorter

Film Review

The Germanic subfamily of Indo-European languages includes, German, English, Dutch, Swedish, Norwegian, Danish, Icelandic, Yiddish and Afrikaans. All are descended from Gothic, which only survives as a written language.

Goths (and their language) seem to have originated in Denmark and migrated north to Scandinavia and South as far as Italy. The Goths used words like blood, bone, hand, run, stone, drink and good, all words that have no known Proto-Indo-European roots. It’s believed the Goths borrow these words from indigenous peoples who inhabited Europe prior to their arrival.

McWhorter also makes the point that there are three dozen Romance languages in addition to French, Spanish, Italian, Portuguese and Romanian. These include French Provencal and Occitan (spoke in southern France); Romansh (spoken in Switzerland), Sardinian, Sicilian and Piedmontese (spoken in Italy); and Aromanian (spoken in Romania).

The Balto-Slavic sub-family includes the Baltic languages Lithuanian and Latvian, Russian, Polish, Czech, Slovak, Ukrainian, Belorussian, Bulgarian, Serbo-Croatian and Bulgarian.

Greek is its own sub-family.

The Celtic sub-family includes Irish Gaelic, Scottish Gaelic, Welsh, Cornish and Breton (spoken in Brittany France). The Celts originated in the area around Austria and migrated both east and west. Celtic cloth patterns are found on Chinese mummies and plaid and twill patterns linked to Scotland have been traced back to the Caucasus mountains.

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

https://www.kanopy.com/en/pukeariki/watch/video/6120000/6120006

Electric bin lorry bursts into flames in central London

 image

London's West End was closed off to traffic early Monday morning after an electric bin lorry caught fire

By Paul Homewood

Time to stop this madness before somebody dies:

An electric bin lorry burst into flames on Monday, forcing roads across London’s West End to close.

Specialist crews were deployed to the fire after the £580,000 electric lorry caught alight in the morning.

The lithium battery-powered trucks were recently launched under Sadiq Khan, the Mayor of London, as part of a green initiative to reduce carbon emissions in the capital.

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2024/10/28/bin-lorry-on-fire-central-london/

Via https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2024/10/28/electric-bin-lorry-bursts-into-flames-in-central-london/

Agenda 2030’s 15-minute cages being built in the Netherlands

By Rhoda Wilson

What does life look like in 15-minute cities that have already been realised in the Netherlands? How can we recognise the transformation of our cities into smart cities and, in particular, how can we prevent it? Dutch activist Maartje van den Berg discusses this in a recent interview with KLA.

Last week alternative news channel KLA interviewed Maartje van den Berg to discuss “smart cities” and 15-minute cities in Holland.

“These so-called ‘smart cities’ and ‘15-minute cities’ of ours [in The Netherlands] are being sold to us as being ‘green’ and ‘healthy’.  And at the same time, people should live in their own neighbourhoods and be happy being in them where everything is in their own surroundings and you don’t need to go out.  And if you need a car, because they are made car-free zones, and if you need to go out [of your neighbourhood] you’d better share a car with somebody else.  They’ve made hubs outside cities where you can share a car or share bicycles,” she said.

This is not only being planned, she explained, it is already being implemented in small towns and municipalities all over Holland.  And in 2025, in three months, Amsterdam is going to be introducing “zero carbon emissions” zones. Where “diesel trucks and vans are not allowed to enter our cities,” van den Berg said.  At the same time, they are building hubs where shared cars will be stored and accessed.

Last year a vehicle-free zone was trialled in Amsterdam. For six weeks, the major road in Amsterdam was blocked with physical barriers to stop vehicles from entering or leaving Amsterdam.  “A lot of people got really annoyed but also really alarmed because ambulances were not able to pass through and a lot of accidents happened,” she explained.

The municipality of Amsterdam had to concede that their pilot project using physical barriers to “make Amsterdam more ‘green’ and ‘healthy’” had failed.  So instead, the municipality decided to introduce “intelligent entrance” into Amsterdam.  “Intelligent entrance” means installing “licence plate recognition cameras,” van den Berg said.

“On 1 January 2025, 14 municipalities will introduce the ‘zero carbon emissions’ zones and [people will] get fined if they enter [these zones] with a diesel truck.”

Licence Plate Recognition (“LPR”), also known as Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR), is an image-processing technology used to identify vehicles by their licence plates.  Over the years we have seen councils and local governments in several countries introducing ANPRs.

As van den Berg said, “the same thing is going in Germany with the cities. They [are] also introducing zero emission zones.  And they [are] doing the same in Belgium and France, and in Portugal and Spain … The financing is coming from the European Union for all these programmes called Horizon 2020. … and the Green Deal.  All the [EU] governments signed the Green Deal … so they’re all applying these policies.”

This year we have also seen Oxford City Council forge ahead with what they refer to as “bus gates.”   As in Amsterdam, Oxford also previously piloted physical barriers to create low-traffic neighbourhoods (“LTNs”)which were met with protests from residents.  London’s Mayor Sadiq Khan has for years been attempting to implement his version of LTNs called Ultra Low Emission Zone (“ULEZ”) which has also been met with resistance.  And the Isle of Man is planning to install ANPR at its entry and exit points.

At the same time that municipalities or local governments are installing cameras in Holland, they are removing parking spaces, van den Berg said.  It is already difficult to find parking spaces but “by the end of 2025, 10,000 [parking] places [will be] removed … and new parking permits are no longer being issued.”

It’s not only driving privately owned vehicles that they are trying to control, if not abolish. Smart meters, for example, are being installed in people’s homes, she said.

While rolling out tolls of surveillance, in preparation for switching from gas to electricity, the Dutch government is also building “transformer houses.”  “In the coming years, there are going to be 50,000 ‘transformer houses’ being installed in residential areas,” van den Berg said.  “People don’t like it.”  The electricity transformers are noisy and emit electromagnetic fields.

Previously all homes were powered by gas and the Netherlands was significantly impacted by the destruction of the Nord Stream Pipeline and, as with Germany, it affected the country’s energy supply. Additionally, van den Berg said, “We had big gas fields in the north of Holland and they said they were going to close them.  And they have been closed.”

Why would they do this when the gas supply was so obviously disrupted? “They want to make this transition, energy transition, towards electricity,” she said, even though there is not enough electricity to supply the country’s needs.

“That’s why we have … areas without electricity supply.  [ ] These wind turbines only give electricity when the wind is blowing.  And there is not always sun, very much so in the winter times.  So, [“renewable” energy sources such as wind and solar] is not working out and people are realising more and more that it is not a steady electricity grid.”

Because Holland is a relatively small land area, the wind turbines and large solar farms are close to people’s homes.  “A lot of people are warning about the health risks,” she added.

Because Holland is a relatively small area of land, the wind turbines and solar farms are close to where people’s homes are.  “A lot of people are warning about the health risks,” she added.

All over Holland data centres are being built, she said.  “There’s a big one being built, a mega data centre [for] Google, in the north of Holland.  Google bought land to build their data centre.”

Not only is the “transition” to electric, digital and state surveillance an excellent control grid, we have to wonder if economies are deliberately being destroyed. Van den Berg agrees. “It is about wrecking the economy,” she said.  “That’s what Agenda 2030 is about.  It’s about wrecking our economy.”

“Because these ‘transitions’ like the digital transition, the energy transition, the smart cities, they’re not working out.  And it is meant to wreck because this is Agenda 2030 and The Great Reset.”

There is a Dutch Government plan or roadmap called the ‘National Strategy on Spatial Planning and the Environment’.  Currently, it is a draft report. “It was written in 2021 during [the covid] lockdown,” van den Berg said.

“The report says that “Holland is going to meet urgent social challenges such as climate warming and climate change, and we need to go to digital connectivity and accessibility for all and housing, which is a really big problem for Holland. And you see that our government [and] our municipalities are applying this new strategy plan,” she said.

“And this is where one of our hopes lies,” she said.

She explained, “Each local government or municipality had to write their own strategy for spatial planning and the environment.  All these transitions and Agenda 2030 are in these new strategies.  And so, people can go to their Town Hall, together with local parties who serve our interests, and they can speak in the Town Hall and say, ‘Listen, we don’t want it [ ] solar panels on our streets, we don’t want transformer houses’ and people are actually really doing it.  They’re going to their Town Halls.”

There is also a significant citizen movement to use cash.  Van den Berg explained, “We always say, ‘Don’t buy your food and drink at a supermarket, only pay cash and if you cannot pay cash – leave’.  And say to the people, ‘Please cash is also a valuable way of paying and you should allow it and we won’t come back’.”

“And it’s really working out because a lot of places are letting people pay with cash more and more.”

As well as reading their local government’s strategy on special planning and the environment, van den Berg recommends people read Jacob Nordangård’s book ‘Rockefeller: Controlling the game’ and Kees Van Der Pijl’s book ‘Pandemie van de angst: Opstap naar een totalitaire maatschappij?’ (‘Pandemic of Fear: A Step Towards a Totalitarian Society?’), which has been translated into English. Unfortunately, we were not able to find where the English translation can be purchased online.

[…]

Via https://expose-news.com/2024/10/28/15-minute-cages-being-built-in-holland/

Over 30 US Schoolchildren Die Suddenly This Week As Deaths Surge Among COVID-Vaxxed

The People’s Voice

At least thirty US school children whose parents were told the COVID mRNA shots were “safe and effective” died suddenly and unexpectedly in the US this week as the death toll continues surging among the vaccinated and boosted.

Many of the children died of medical emergencies including cardiac arrest and strokes as doctors warn they are now regularly witnessing “once-in-a-lifetime” disorders in children.

“This is the new normal… turbo cancers, died suddenly. My friend lost three friends in one week! Turbo cancers like this were virtually non-existent before the COVID shots,” explained MIT scientist and vaccine researcher, Steve Kirsch.

How long before we as a society can have an open and honest discussion about what is happening to the Covid-vaccinated before our eyes?

Lillian Costello

13-year-old Lillian Costello of Norton, died suddenly and unexpectedly on Tuesday at the Sturdy Memorial Hospital in Attleboro.

According to a GoFundMe fundraiser, Lilly was a seventh-grade student at the Norton Middle School and a proud member of the Student Council. She also enjoyed being a member of the Photography Club and participated in cheerleading.

Finley Kruchten

Finley Kruchten suffered a “massive pulmonary embolism” while in class at Denmark High School in early October, according to his family’s GoFundMe page.

Finley was taken to Northside Forsyth Hospital and then to Northside Gwinnett Hospital where he was pronounced dead.

Lucy Nash

Kentucky fourth grader Lucy Nash died suddenly and unexpectedly after suffering a cardiac arrest.

“On the first day of school Lucy collapsed and had a cardiac event,” a GoFundMe page for the family reads. “Her little brain went many minutes without oxygen while they were trying to save her life.”

Ovet Gomez-Regalado

Ovet Gomez-Regalado, a 15-year-old Kansas high school student, died two days after suffering a medical emergency. The football player collapsed suddenly on the field at practice.

The 15-year-old collapsed and died after performing 40 minutes of light drills, according to the school district in Hopewell, Virginia.

Leslie Noble

Meanwhile, staff at Franklin High School, Baltimore are mourning the sudden loss of 16-year-old Leslie Noble, a member of the school’s football team.

The teen died while participating in light drills during the first practice of the season on Wednesday in Reisterstown and experiencing a medical emergency.

“I saw a bunch of firetrucks, ambulances, and all I knew was they said that a child had collapsed on the field,” said Sharon Johnson, a staff member at Franklin High School.

Unfortunately, the long list of deaths continues, including unnamed victims whose families have requested their identities remain anonymous due to their age.

For example, a 14-year-old girl whose family requested anonymity suffered a medical emergency during a PE class in Houston. According to Marshall Middle School:

“Today was a very difficult day for the Marshall MS community. A student at Marshall Middle School suffered a medical emergency on campus today. EMS responded to the school quickly and the student was transported to the hospital. The student’s parents were quickly notified and responded to the school.”

However, in an email to parents, provided to us by a Marshall Middle School parent, the principal said, “One of our eighth-grade students died. This loss is sure to raise many emotions, concerns, and questions for our entire school, especially our students.”

[…]

Via https://thepeoplesvoice.tv/over-30-u-s-schoolchildren-died-suddenly-this-week-as-deaths-surge-among-covid-vaxxed/

Federal Judge Upholds Florida Ban on Lab-Grown Meat, as Other States Propose Similar Bans

florida flag, lab grown chicken and gavel

The ban will remain in place while the lawsuit challenging its legality moves through the courts. Upside Foods, which makes a cultivated chicken product, sued to overturn the ban, which was signed into law on May 1.

A federal judge earlier this month rejected a request by California-based Upside Foods for a preliminary injunction against Florida’s new law banning the manufacture, distribution and sale of “cultivated,” or lab-grown meat.

Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis signed the ban into law on May 1, making it a second-degree misdemeanor to produce or sell lab-grown meat in the state. The law took effect in July.

Upside Foods, which makes cultivated chicken, sued Florida in August, alleging the ban is unconstitutional and violates two federal laws that preempt Florida from imposing the ban.

A preliminary injunction is typically issued in a lawsuit if the court finds the plaintiff has a good chance of winning its case — a “substantial likelihood of success on the merits,” However, Chief U.S. District Judge Mark Walker said Upside’s argument, which boiled down to “if it’s a poultry product, states can’t ban it,” was insufficient.

Just because a product falls within the scope of the federal Poultry Products Inspection Act and is under the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s (USDA) regulatory authority does not mean a state is “expressly preempted from banning the sale of that particular kind of poultry product,” Walker wrote.

Upside argued that the ban imposed ingredient and manufacturing requirements that clashed with provisions of the Poultry Products Inspection Act. However, Walker said Upside was unable to identify any federal law or regulation that created an “ingredient requirement” for cultivated meat. He also said that because the company didn’t produce its lab-grown meat in Florida, the manufacturing ban didn’t affect its premises, operations or facilities.

The ruling means the ban will remain in place while the lawsuit challenging its legality moves through the courts.

“We are not surprised by the judge’s rejection of Upside’s preliminary injunction,” Florida Sen. Jay Collins, who co-sponsored the original bill, told The Defender. “The dangers of cultivated meat far outweigh any misleading environmental claims. Floridians will not be lectured by billionaires like Bill Gates on how to feed their families.”

Upside’s attorney, Suranjen Sen from the Institute for Justice, said in a press release that the company plans to appeal the decision and is “confident that the courts will ultimately recognize that Florida cannot ban products simply to protect local industries from honest competition.”

A bench trial is set for Monday, Aug. 18, 2025.

Upside struggled to become profitable

Lab-grown or cultivated meat is produced from cultured stem cells taken from live animals or an animal cell bank and then reproduced in bioreactors using techniques borrowed from Big Pharma.

The cells are “fed” a mixture of sugars, amino and fatty acids, salts and vitamins to make them proliferate quickly. Once they’ve grown into a mass or a sheet — depending on the manufacturer — they are formed into meat-looking shapes like cutlets or nuggets.

Although the companies promote lab-grown meat in part by claiming it has environmental benefits, the process is energy-intensive. Research from the University of California, Davis, found that cultured meat’s environmental impact is likely “orders of magnitude” higher than real meat, based on current production methods.

Attorney Ray Flores, who worked in the natural health industry for 35 years, told The Defender that even if it provides environmental benefits, “Any environmental benefit is greatly outweighed by the possible dangers that these cutting-edge products may pose to one’s health.”

An investigation by The New York Times revealed several incidents during the development of some of Upside’s products that raised safety concerns. The company in 2018 found its chicken cell line contaminated with mouse cells. And in 2019, the cell line was found to be contaminated with rat cells.

Yet, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) said Upside’s meat was safe for human consumption in 2022, and the USDA approved the sale of products by Upside Foods and Good Meat — the first two companies to go through the regulatory approval process — in June 2023.

That approval made the U.S. the second country in the world, behind Singapore, to allow sales of lab-grown meat. In January, Israel green-lighted the sale of steaks made from cultivated beef cells, The Associated Press reported.

Since the USDA approval, however, Upside has struggled to become profitable.

Upside doesn’t have products available in stores. Partnerships with restaurants are primarily how the company gets its products to consumers.

It had sold its lab-grown chicken to one restaurant in Miami and was planning to showcase it at Miami’s Art Basel event before the ban took effect, according to the judgment.

However, Crunchbase reported that the company halted its plans to develop a major facility in Glenview, Illinois, and restaurants that had tried it out have since pulled it from their menus. San Francisco Michelin-star restaurant Bar Crenn, its final sale venue, confirmed it was pulling the lab-grown meat from the menu in February.

In the original complaint, Upside and the Institute for Justice claim that the “growing patchwork of conflicting state laws governing cultivated meat” makes it more difficult for Upside to partner with national meat distributors “who generally will not carry products they cannot lawfully sell in every state.”

It also makes it more difficult for them to partner with restaurants. If not for the ban, they said, they would be reaching out to several restaurants to create partnerships.

Following the Florida ban, Upside laid off 26 workers.

More states move to ban lab-grown meat, federal regulators eye labeling requirements

A few weeks after Florida passed its bill, Alabama passed a similar law making the manufacture, sale or distribution of food products made from cultured animal cells a Class C misdemeanor, with fines ranging from $100 to $10,000.

Iowa’s governor in May signed a bill prohibiting schools from buying lab-grown meat products and requiring clear labeling for lab-grown meats sold in other venues.

Five other states have proposed similar laws. And in August, Nebraska Gov. Jim Pillen signed an executive order banning the state government from purchasing it.

The USDA and the FDA share regulatory responsibility for cultivated meat products. Under the Biden administration’s 2022 plan to advance biotechnology and biomanufacturing innovation, the USDA also announced plans to issue draft guidance on the pre-approval consultation process and the agencies plan to propose rules for labeling cell-cultured meat and poultry sometime in 2024.

[…]

Via https://childrenshealthdefense.org/defender/federal-judge-upholds-florida-ban-lab-grown-meat-cultivated-chicken/