By Kathleen Merrigan

Chemical fertilizers applied to fields end up running into rivers and lakes, causing huge algae blooms that die and decompose, depleting oxygen in the water and creating “dead zones” that can’t support fish or other aquatic life.

Farmers are coping with a fertilizer crisis brought on by soaring fossil fuel prices and industry consolidation. The price of synthetic fertilizer has more than doubled since 2021, causing great stress in farm country.

This crunch is particularly tough on those who grow corn, which accounts for half of U.S. nitrogen fertilizer use.

The National Corn Growers Association predicts that its members will spend 80% more in 2022 on synthetic fertilizers than they did in 2021. A recent study estimates that on average, this will represent $128,000 in added costs per farm.

In response, the Biden administration announced a new grant program on March 11, “to support innovative American-made fertilizer to give U.S. farmers more choices in the marketplace.”

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) will invest $500 million to try to lower fertilizer costs by increasing production. But since this probably isn’t enough money to construct new fertilizer plants, it’s not clear how the money will be spent.

I direct the Swette Center for Sustainable Food Systems at Arizona State University and have held senior positions at the USDA, including serving as deputy secretary of agriculture from 2009 to 2013.

In my view, producing more synthetic fertilizer should not be the only answer to this serious challenge. The U.S. should also provide support for nature-based solutions, including farming practices that help farmers reduce or forgo synthetic fertilizers, and biological products that substitute for harsher chemical inputs.

Too much fertilizer in the wrong places

All plants need nutrients to grow, especially the “big three” macronutrients: nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium. Farmers can fertilize their fields by planting crops that add nitrogen to soil naturally or by applying animal manure and compost to soil (video below).

Since World War II, however, farmers have relied mainly on manufactured synthetic fertilizers that contain various ratios of nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium, along with secondary nutrients and micronutrients.

That shift happened because manufacturers produced huge quantities of ammonium nitrate, the main ingredient in explosives, during the war; when the conflict ended, they switched to making nitrogen fertilizer.

Synthetic fertilizers have greatly enhanced crop yields and are rightly credited with helping to feed the world. But they aren’t used evenly around the world.

In poor regions like sub-Saharan Africa, too little fertilizer is available. In wealthier areas, abundant synthetic fertilizers have contributed to overapplication and serious environmental harm.

Excess fertilizer washes off of fields during storms and runs into rivers and lakes. There, it fertilizes huge blooms of algae that die and decompose, depleting oxygen in the water and creating “dead zones” that can’t support fish or other aquatic life.

This process, eutrophication, is a major problem in the Great Lakes, the Chesapeake Bay, the Gulf of Mexico and many other U.S. water bodies.

Excess nitrogen can also contaminate drinking water and threaten human health. And fertilizers, whether animal-sourced or synthetic, are a significant source of nitrous oxide, a potent greenhouse gas.

What’s causing the crisis

One reason U.S. fertilizer prices have spiked is that farmers are beholden to imports. COVID-19 disrupted supply chains, especially from China, a major fertilizer producer. And the war in Ukraine has cut off access to potash, an important potassium source, from Russia and Belarus.

Another factor is that the fertilizer industry is highly concentrated. There is little competition, so farmers have no choice but to buy fertilizer at the market price. Several U.S. state attorneys general have called on economists to study anti-competitive practices in the fertilizer industry.

The USDA in June invited public comment on competition and supply chain concerns in fertilizer markets.

But out of 66 specific questions the department posed with this request, only one addresses what I believe is the key issue: “How might USDA better support modes of production that rely less on fertilizer, or support access to markets that may pay a premium for products relying on less fertilizer?”

#China’s🇨🇳#fertilizer exports from January to May tumbled to the lowest level in four years, signaling that supply constraints persist on the global market even as prices retreat from a record. https://t.co/i9bW9Ojlpd pic.twitter.com/Meh9ePbB7p

— Farm Policy (@FarmPolicy) June 10, 2022

Rethinking how to grow crops

I see an opportunity for the Biden administration to take a fresh look at biological products as substitutes for synthetic fertilizers. This category includes biofertilizers and bionutrients — natural materials that provide crop nutrition.

Examples include microorganisms that extract nitrogen from the air and convert it into forms that plants can use, and fertilizers converted from manure, food and other plant and wood wastes.

Another category, biostimulants, comprises natural materials that enhance the uptake of plant nutrients, reduce crop stress and increase crop growth and quality.

Examples include algae and other plant extracts, microorganisms and humic acids — complex molecules produced naturally in soil when organic material breaks down.

In the past, critics dismissed natural products like these as “snake oil,” with little scientific evidence to show that they worked. Now, however, most experts believe that while much remains to be learned, current biofertilizers “offer huge potential in terms of new and more sustainable crop management practices.”

Studies have demonstrated many benefits from these products. They include less need for fertilizer, larger crop yields, enhanced soil health and fewer carbon emissions.

Large synthetic fertilizer companies like Mosaic, OCP and Nutrien are distributing, acquiring or investing in these biological technologies.

Agribusiness giant Bayer has partnered with Ginkgo Bioworks in a joint venture called Joyn whose mission is to create “sustainable ag biologicals for crop protection and fertility that meet or exceed the performance of their chemical counterparts.”

Offering more choices

Panicked U.S. farmers facing daunting fertilizer prices are looking for options.

In public comments on USDA’s fertilizer initiative, the Illinois Corn Growers Association urged the department to investigate why farmers apply fertilizers at levels higher than necessary, while others noted a shortage of agronomists sufficiently trained to guide farmers on how best to sustainably fertilize their crops.

I believe now is an opportune time for USDA to offer incentives for adopting biologicals, as well as practices that organic farmers use to replace synthetic fertilizers, such as crop rotation, composting and raising crops and livestock together.

[…]

Via https://childrenshealthdefense.org/defender/chemical-fertilizers-algae-blooms-dead-zones/

Kelley Beaucar Vlahos

Responsible Statecraft

‘No boots on the ground’ seems like an empty assurance considering this new report from the New York Times.

The Central Intelligence Agency is operating in Kyiv and has been for some time, according to new reporting by the New York Times. So, while Biden has insisted on “no U.S. boots on the ground” in Ukraine, there are soft-soled operatives, otherwise known as American spies, providing  intelligence and other tactical assistance to Ukraine in its war with Russia.

Sounds like Americans are in this war, like it or not.

The news, based on sourcing from current and former U.S. government officials, is part of a broader report about a “stealthy network” of U.S. and European commandos and spies in “cells” run by the Pentagon’s European Command “to speed allied assistance to Ukrainian troops.” Much of this is operating from military bases in France and Germany and elsewhere. But as the NYT points out, there are European commandos and CIA agents working on the inside.

The commandos are not on the front lines with Ukrainian troops and instead advise from headquarters in other parts of the country or remotely by encrypted communications, according to American and other Western officials, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss operational matters. But the signs of their stealthy logistics, training and intelligence support are tangible on the battlefield.

Several lower-level Ukrainian commanders recently expressed appreciation to the United States for intelligence gleaned from satellite imagery, which they can call up on tablet computers provided by the allies. The tablets run a battlefield mapping app that the Ukrainians use to target and attack Russian troops.

As usual it appears that the administration wants to have it both ways: assure the American people that it is being “restrained” and that we are not “at war” with the Russians, but doing everything but planting a U.S. soldier and a flag inside Ukraine. The CIA, as you will recall, has increasingly had an operational combat focus since 9/11,  running elaborate secret prisons overseas, engaging in enhanced interrogations (torture) and manhunting with armed drones and commando teams over the last 20 years. There may be a sliver of daylight between the CIA operatives there today and the U.S. special forces that left Ukraine after Russia invaded, but given the circumstances, is it a meaningful one? Is it all about who is pulling the trigger?

The Russians may not see the distinction and consider this news as further evidence that their war is more with Washington and NATO than with Ukraine. For this and other reasons the NYT report has sparked a heated debate on social media.

Heer, who is a writer for The Nation, responded to Sipher by saying that military decisions are “subject to civilian oversight,” to which Sipher, whose Twitter profile says he is at the Atlantic Council and is “former CIA Clandestine Service,” quipped, that’s to be done “through elected representatives.”

Right. And I have a bridge to sell you in Fallujah.

Perhaps two percent of Congress through the House and Senate intelligence committees is aware the CIA is operating in Kyiv but like everything — from the 20-year war in Afghanistan to specific operations like the assassination of Qasem Soleimani in 2020 —  the whole process has a whiff of retroactive rubberstamping with no room (or interest) for debate in Congress. Operational secrecy and security are no doubt the fig leaf, but when we’re not supposed to be in a war we aren’t supposed to be in a war, right?

“I don’t think people realize that right now the spigot from Congress is fully open. Money, weps, intel, whatever they need,” tweeted Jack Murphy, journalist and Iraq/Afghanistan vet. “The American public is not being appropriately informed about what our government is up to as basically every single op DOD/CIA proposes is getting the green light.”

But then again the CIA acted with impunity through much of  its formative years, and it wasn’t until the Church Committee brought all the nastiness to light in the 1970s that the American public was made aware of it. Still, the agency continued to fight bloody proxy wars in places like El Salvador and Nicaragua — and let’s not forget Afghanistan in the 1980s. Are we to believe that there is any more stringent oversight today?

Which brings us to the million dollar question — what do we expect to come from this particular (proxy war) for which the U.S. is engaged well beyond just sending assistance. My Quincy Institute colleague George Beebe, who spent years engaged in Russia analysis for the CIA, wonders if Washington even knows how far it is going here.

“This is reminiscent of the ‘sunk cost’ phenomenon that caused Washington to increase its involvement in Vietnam from a handful of advisors to half a million troops in direct combat,” he tells me.

[…]

Via https://responsiblestatecraft.org/2022/06/27/cia-ops-commandos-in-ukraine-can-we-just-admit-we-are-fighting-this-war/

On June 24th, 2022, HB1495 was signed into law. This bill prevents the state from requiring businesses to check vaccination statuses as a condition of employment.

From the bill:

The state of New Hampshire and its political subdivisions shall not:

I. Require any business to require the vaccination of any customer or employee except as specified in RSA 141-C:20-a, I; or

II. Require any business to require or check for the possession of any documentation for certifying vaccination or immunity status.

III. This section shall not apply to state agencies certifying a medical facility, or a provider which is subject to a valid and enforceable Medicare or Medicaid condition of participation that imposes a vaccination requirement.

Note that this does not prevent free-association of businesses; businesses in NH are free to require vaccinations if they choose. The state simply is not authorized to require that of them.

Also important to consider is that New Hampshire has some of the lowest unemployment in the country, meaning that there is no shortage of employee choice on this matter.

Religious and medical exemptions for healthcare providers required

HB1604 was signed into law on June 24th. This bill requires state hospitals and medical facilities to grant religious and medical exemptions from vaccination requirements, provided that any request for a medical exemption shall include the supporting documentation required by federal regulation.

Rose Rambles

There is now an overwhelming body of hard evidence that categorically proves that the American Big Pharmaproducers of Covid ‘vaccines’ committed intentional and egregious fraud in the roll-out of their extremely dangerous and deadly injections.

The true scope and magnitude of their fraudulent corporate conduct is only now coming to light; nevertheless, the irrefutable proof of premeditated fraud which has already been accumulated is so incriminating that Big Pharma will eventually collapse.

Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson are not the only Big Pharma companies that have poisoned to death and/or sickened countless American citizens; all the other vaccine manufacturers are also culpable of perpetrating a multi-decade criminal conspiracy.  For example, both the mandatory childhood vaccination schedules and voluntary adult flu shot programs have been rife with fraud and malicious intent as the rapidly growing number of serious vaccine injuries and deaths clearly indicates. See: FLASHBACK: COURT RULES VACCINES CONTRIBUTE TO AND CAUSE SIDS DEATHS

In point of fact, the great number of vaccine-induced injuries and post-vaccination deaths suffered by school children, which have occurred uninterruptedly over many years, is proof positive that Big Pharma knowingly committed a murderous fraud as they continue to today.

Let’s face it: When even a former BlackRock executive comes out and makes these damning statements, the end is near for the entire Big Pharma international crime syndicate.

Intentional Vax Fraud Committed by Big Pharma
Strips Liability Shield — Former Blackrock Exec

Conclusion

It’s not only Big Pharma that’s in BIG trouble with the American people.

The corporate Mainstream Media is also a willful accomplice in this genocidal scheme that is killing trusting citizens across the USA.  For they could never have deliberately killed this many people were those two co-conspirators — Big Media & Big Pharma — not thicker than thieves.

If there’s any doubt about the sheer depth and breadth of this highly organized and well planned Covid depopulation scheme, the following video will forever erase it.

BOMBSHELL! Opening Statements at Grand Jury Investigation
Into Covid Crimes Against Humanity (Video)

All of this unprecedented litigation concerning COVID-19 crimes against humanity translates to one very firm and unmistakable conclusion as far as the Big Pharmacorporate criminals are concerned:

Which means that Big Pharma will crash and burn in a day and a night after the U.S. citizenry takes them to court for the massive and highly calculated fraud that defines their unparalleled Covid crime spree.  Because once they committed that intentional fraud, they immediately relinquished their corporate shield of liability.

Even more significantly, Pfizer, Moderna and Johnson & Johnson recklessly exposed themselves — both corporately and the individual corporate officers, scientists and physicians — to criminal prosecution for mass murder.

Given the enormity and gravity of this ongoing global crime wave, the only expected outcome of the future legal proceedings is that these rogue companies will be shut down as fast as they terminated the Arthur Andersen accounting firm in 2002 after the Enron Scandal was fully prosecuted.

KEY POINT: It was the U.S. Supreme Court that handed down the original landmark decision which essentially ruled that “FRAUD VITIATES EVERYTHING” via: United States v. Throckmorton 98 U.S. 61.  “There is no question of the general doctrine that fraud vitiates the most solemn contracts, documents, and even judgments” reads the final decree.  Therefore, Big Pharma, as a result of its many patently fraudulent Covid ‘vaccine’ endeavors, has forever nullified all indemnification agreements, legislated protections, and especially its corporate shield of liability.

This is why “Fraud Vitiates Everything” is such a critical legal basis upon which to launch every civil lawsuit against and criminal prosecution of the involved Big Pharma vaccine makers.  In light of the historical fact that their fraudulent conduct has been institutionalized over decades, there are now volumes of actionable evidence that can be used to take these corporate serial criminals down—FOREVER!

[…]

Via https://roserambles.org/2022/06/25/big-pharma-is-about-to-be-sued-out-of-existence-because-fraud-vitiates-everything-june-25-2022/

Robert Schmad

Washington Free Beacon

A coalition of 20 black congresswomen, led by “Squad” member Ayanna Pressley (D., Mass.), on Thursday wrote a letter to President Joe Biden that urged him to declare a public health emergency in anticipation of a Supreme Court decision to overturn Roe v. Wade.

The Court on Friday overturned the seminal 1973 abortion-rights decision.

The congresswomen urged the president to use “any and all executive authorities” to work against the Court’s decision—including “declaring a public health emergency and national emergency.”

The Court’s decision does not prohibit abortion but rather returns the issue to the states, a majority of which allow the procedure. Just 5 percent of Americans consider abortion the most important issue facing the country, Gallup reported last month. By contrast, 55 percent say that inflation under President Joe Biden is the most important issue, the Washington Free Beacon reported.

The letter says that pro-life measures are “unprecedented and calculated attacks on our bodily autonomy” that harm “the lives and freedom of Black women.” While black women get more abortions than women of any other race, just 32 percent of black Americans support abortion on demand without restrictions, a Gallup poll found in 2020.

The letter’s call comes as threats of pro-abortion violence intensify against churches, pro-life organizations, and Supreme Court justices. While the Department of Homeland Security sounded the alarm about a wave of violence following the Court’s decision, the Biden administration, which supports abortion rights, has done little to stem the tide.

Pressley was not the only prominent far-left Democrat to sign the letter. Fellow “Squad” members Ilhan Omar (Minn.) and Cori Bush (Mo.), as well as Los Angeles mayoral candidate Karen Bass, also called for a post-Roe public health emergency.

A Treatise for our Health Officials Who Appear to be Either Ignorant or Averting Their Eyes

This is the first of a eight part series on vaccine injuries.

Most people will know someone by now who has suffered a sudden medical event in recent months, whether that is a heart attack, a stroke, odd neurological symptoms, shingles, a collapse, blood clots, stillbirth, miscarriage, sudden death or odd skin rash.  Many of these events are occurring in young people who previously would not have been expected to experience them.

A variety of explanations have popped up in the media recently – long covid, climate change, the weather, holiday heart, atmospheric conditions, Sudden Adult Death Syndrome (SADS), post-pandemic stress disorder, just one of those things…

We are not convinced.  At NZDSOS we are concerned that these significant medical events and deaths are occurring following vaccination and that a causal link should be assumed until proven otherwise.  We are not convinced that our health officials are recording, monitoring or investigating these medical events and deaths adequately as possible vaccine injuries.

We are not the only ones concerned.  Numerous scientists and doctors worldwide have been saying (shouting) the same thing although they have been censored and banned from usual media outlets so you may not have heard them.  Some Australian politicians have been ringing alarm bells and asking serious questions.  Not so in New Zealand.

Insurance companies in America and Germany have observed a 40% increase in all-cause mortality in the second half of 2021 among millennials (25-44 yr olds).  The Department of Defense in America, which keeps very thorough medical records, has noticed astronomical rises in rates of illness, pregnancy loss, congenital abnormalities and death among military personnel who are generally young, fit and healthy people.

The Pfizer vaccine trial tried to hide an increase in all-cause mortality while claiming (correctly) the vaccine reduced covid-related deaths.  There’s not much point taking a medical product if all you are doing is substituting one cause of death for an increased risk of a different cause.

Doctors seem to assume that because they are doctors, they know all about vaccines.  Our recollection of training about vaccination at medical school is that it consisted of: “Here’s the schedule, go forth and administer it.”  GP training does not enlarge upon this.  We certainly were not taught vaccine toxicology, let alone history. It is not clear whether specialty training or the current medical curriculum has more education about vaccines and immunisation than we received.  Have our colleagues who have been recommending this vaccine actually looked at any of the science around it?  It is not a normal ‘vaccine’, and some of our colleagues who took their frontline worker shots were clueless about this in our conversations with them.

Vaccine Injuries – Symptoms

The NZDSOS online clinic is assessing and treating a number of patients, many of whom have been injured by the vaccines, or at least whose symptoms have started in close proximity to vaccination.  Some happily took the vaccine unaware of any potential risks, others were vaccinated against their better judgement or against their wishes in order to continue living their lives. A few speak of the spiritual and psychological torture they felt. Perhaps their intuition was trying to warn them.

The table below details many of the symptoms that are being reported to us and also to the Health Forum NZ.  We are curious how GPs are interpreting these symptoms, if not to vaccine injuries.

Symptoms of Vaccine Injuries

Can such a long and varied list of symptoms really be due to vaccine injuries?

At the Vaccines and Related Biological Products Advisory Committee (VRBPAC) Meeting on October 22, 2020, a presentation was given titled “Plans for Monitoring COVID-19 Vaccine Safety and Effectiveness”.  The slide below lists possible adverse events that were expected to be seen.  These listed medical events were not randomly selected but were based on evidence from the clinical trial data and from data previously known about the vaccine technology and components.

The symptoms caused by many of the above conditions are very similar to those being reported to us.

In contrast to this list of serious medical conditions, doctors in NZ, as well as the public, have been advised that the Pfizer vaccine is ‘safe and effective’.  We have been given a list of common adverse effects that may occur, such as sore arm, fatigue, headache and told these will last a few days at most.  Mainstream media has even gone so far as to state categorically that “Long-term side effects of Covid-19 vaccination are not a thing”.  How can they possibly know that when the vaccine has only been in existence for 2 years?

[…]

Via https://alicespringstomind.com/2022/06/27/vaccine-injuries-new-zealand-doctors-speak-out/

Kit Knightly

Offguardian

A few hours ago the Supreme Court of United States (SCOTUS) confirmed their ruling overturning Roe v. Wade, the case which set the precedent for abortion as a human right in the US back in the 1970s.

As soon as this decision was first “leaked” a few months ago it became the trending topic all across the US and to a certain extent the rest of the anglosphere. Since it was confirmed this afternoon, the already supercharged dialogue has reached new heights.

Pro-choice pundits, politicians and celebrities have been flooding the cyber public square with comparisons to the Handmaid’s Tale and other forced memes. They argue abortion-on-demand is a fundamental right, and take up the rather unsettling position that having an abortion is a point of pride.

On the other side of the divide Christians, traditionalists and republican politicians argue for the sanctity of all life, regardless of context or complication.

Both sides are entrenched to the point of hysteria, and not really looking like budging.

As with most things, the reasonable ground is somewhere in the middle.

Regardless of the law, women will sometimes seek out abortions, and it’s probably best they have access to safe, clean places to do so. That said, the use of abortions as a form of contraception is both obscene and impractical, and aborting viable mid or late term babies is revolting – both in concept, and in practice.

None of that really matters though, because the Roe v Wade finding isn’t even about abortion, it’s about Federal overreach. The Justices made that clear.

Though it has gotten lost in 250 years of ever-expanding centralization, the USA originated as a loose federation of quasi-independent states, with the central federal government having strictly limited powers to overrule local legislation.

Simply put, the Constitution lays out all the powers of the federal government, and anything not specifically mentioned therein is de facto a matter for states on an individual basis.

For decades federal governments used SCOTUS decisions to get around these limitations, relying on precedents rather than actual legislation in order to control state laws from Washington DC.

Roe v Wade is a classic example of this, and reversing it changes only one thing: abortion law will revert to a state-level matter, not a federal one.

…but is it even really just about that?

On a deeper level, there seems to be a prolonged campaign in place to violently divide the United States, perhaps to the point of outright civil war.

From Black Lives Matter to January 6th, the 2nd amendment to Roe v Wade, there is an increasing supply of hot-button issues accompanied by a deluge of divisive rhetoric.

Both sides are being encouraged to take to the streets, protest, mock, yell and scream without any search for common ground.

The office of the Presidency is degraded more every term, with a crass blowhard followed by a jittering dementia patient.

Some states are even openly talking about seceding.

At the end of the Cold War, Russia was economically raped and globally humiliated. It came within inches of shattering into a dozen or more failed states. As the big money players head East, and the hegemonic powers turn from the US Empire to a new globalist powerbase, you have to wonder if the US is destined for the same fate.

Just as the USSR had to fail, and be seen to fail pour encourager les autres, perhaps the US – with its history of individualism and personal liberty – is considered surplus to requirements in the new age of faux collectivism.

Whatever America became at its Imperial zenith, its constitutional foundation has always arguably been the most egalitarian on Earth. Could it be that those ideas enshrined in the Bill of Rights are considered an impediment to the “progressive” New World Order?

[…]

Via https://off-guardian.org/2022/06/24/is-roe-v-wade-really-about-abortion/