Posted originally on Feb 3, 2024 By Martin Armstrong
QUESTION: What do you think about the series Domina? Is it true to history?
GK
$22.99 on Amazon Prime
ANSWER: It is an excellent series. This deals with the fall of Rome after the Civil War between Octavian and Marc Antony, which was a proxy war funded by Cleopatra. It was so good, I have watched it more than once. Livia was renoun for her intelligence, but also for her stunning beauty.
Posted originally on the CTH on January 31, 2024 | Sundance
Earlier today, President Donald Trump participated in a roundtable discussion with the Teamsters executive board, its president and members at the annual meeting in Washington DC. President Trump chose to attend the conference as he continues to focus on Main Street blue collar workers who helped fuel the MAGA 2016 victory.
The blue collar MAGA coalition is expected to play a major role in the November election – particularly in Midwestern swing states like Wisconsin and Michigan. The America First agenda delivered significant gains for U.S. manufacturing workers throughout President Trump’s first term. At the conclusion of the meeting with Teamsters, President Trump delivered comments to the oppositional media. [The audio improves at 01:50 of the video] WATCH:
Posted originally on the CTH on January 31, 2024 | Sundance
During a House Homeland Security Committee hearing yesterday, Representative Robert Garcia (Democrat-CA) wanted to deliver a snarky retort about the unsecure southern border, complete with graphics and talking points. Unfortunately, what followed was an exhibition in just how detached and silly the Democrats are. Representative Garcia obviously doesn’t know where the idea for a border moat with alligators came from.
Back in 2011, Barack Obama went to give a speech in El Paso, Texas, proclaiming the security of the border. Using his customary style of ridicule against any political opposition, Obama said the Republicans were likely to ask for a moat with alligators. WATCH:
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This speech became somewhat funny, as the insecure nature of the border and thousands of illegal aliens crossing daily stood in direct contrast with the proclamations of Obama. Indeed, the “whatever it takes” meme sprang up from this speech as people said sure, get alligators, get gun turrets, get sharks with lasers in their eyes, or piranhas, or whatever… BUT, SECURE THE DAMN BORDER. Ultimately, it was the Lightbringer who was embarrassed within the pushback.
Fast forward 13 years, the border is still not secure, the border crisis is worse than ever, and Democrat Representative Garcia revises the “alligator moat” remarks thinking it was some snarky comment that originated from MAGA republicans. WATCH:
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The issue is that the border is not secure. Fullstop. That’s the problem.
The left consistently says that Republicans have these silly demands to secure the border; to wit the smart Republican says, “ok, sure, whatever…. whatever works, do that. Even if it means sharks, lasers, alligators or piranhas – who cares?” The point being emphasized is that the border is not secure, and no amount of anything the left says delivers anything about a secure border.
Ask any leftist what secure border lockdown measure they will support, and they will say “nothing.” Because their intent is always a wide-open border.
So, why debate them? Just laugh at them, ridicule them, mock them, and move on. They are too stupid to see their own stupid nature.
Posted originally on the CTH on January 29, 2024 | Sundance
While Turkey is a NATO ally, Recep Erdogan strategically refused to participate in the process to ostracize Russia. True to Erdogan’s strategic political interests of being an influence broker, Turkey is the only NATO country that does not participate in the sanctions regime against Russia. Next month Russian President Vladimir Putin will travel to Turkey for diplomatic discussions.
Turkey represents the literal gateway for most Western travel into and out of Russia. However, first things first. Despite the position of Turkey, notice how Hungary receives all the EU admonitions for not supporting the Ukraine side of the conflict, while NATO/EU never criticize Turkey who never even joined the EU/Western sanctions regime. Inside that hypocritical contrast there is a revealing story.
Turkey established themselves as the neutral entity for future brokering negotiations between Russia and Ukraine. Turkey has multiple geopolitical ties to Russia, including the purchase of Russian military equipment. Apparently, despite the severity of the original sanction demand, Western interests -specifically the U.S. government- had no issue with Turkey proactively taking their ‘neutral’ position. Always remember this.
Given all of the domestic headlines in the USA, there is a very good reason for Americans to keep paying attention to all things that happen in the orbit of Russia right now. Many people ponder the issue of a dollar-based central bank digital currency; however, only a few people have paid attention to the self-fulfilling prophecy of the CBDC that was created by the Russian sanctions regime.
Those who ask about the possibility/probability of a dollar-based CBDC, and the possibility of the timeframe therein, should always be referenced back to the Western financial sanctions against Russia. It was that triggering point that put the USA and Western alliance on the irreversible path to the U.S CBDC, and the process is no longer a matter of “if” because the determining issue is no longer (primarily) in U.S. control.
The de-dollarization of half the trade globe, the general cleaving of finance that followed the Russian sanctions (see the efforts of BRICS+), has essentially created a system where major economic nations are trading between themselves in non-dollar-based exchanges. India trades with Russia in Rupes to Rubles. China trades with Russia on old fashioned ledgers of value (due to proximity somewhat of a quasi-bartering system); Iran, Saudi Arabia, Egypt, South Africa and a host of non-Western nations are all in various stages of direct trade in national currency outside the dollar zone.
At the core of the issue behind the question of a U.S. or dollar-based Central Bank Digital Currency, you will find this global financial cleaving. Intra-Western trade (USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Japan and the EU) is still done in dollars, and trade done into the Western system is still done in dollars. Ex. if China wants to trade into the USA, they must complete transactions in dollars. However, trade from grey zone to grey zone nation is no longer contingent upon dollars.
Very few people are talking about these new financial trade alternatives. Yet ultimately, this cleaving is likely what will result in a dollar-based U.S CBDC. Remember, the need for alternative trade currencies was triggered in time by the immediacy of the sanctions against Russia. I do not believe the Western financial alliance thought the Russian allies could assemble the alternative so quickly.
If the DoS and CIA truly believed the sanctions would cripple Russia, it’s then likely our institutions vastly underestimated the prior diplomatic talks that preceded those sanctions. As a big picture consequence, no geopolitical issue is as connected to your kitchen table as anything that connects with Russia. So, pay close attention to how Russia is engaged by the rest of the non-Western world (grey zone), and you will get a good idea about the speed and timing of a pending U.S. CBDC.
As soon as the grey zone trade is predicted to take place in non-dollar terms, the U.S CBDC will be fast-tracked. The only way for President Donald Trump to stop the CBDC process would be to immediately end the Russia-Ukraine conflict and subsequently remove the sanctions. [And that might not even work.] As long as there are financial trade blocks based on dollars and who we like, there will be an easy justification for the financial cleaving to continue.
RUSSIA – Russian President Vladimir Putin will visit Turkey next month in a rare foreign trip to a NATO nation, according to a Kremlin announcement on Monday.
Yuri Ushakov, a top adviser to Putin on foreign policy matters, told the Interfax news outlet that “a visit is being prepared.” As to the purpose of the visit, Ushakov added: “I can say that Ukrainian issues will probably be one of the main subjects of negotiations.”
Though a key NATO nation, Turkey and its president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, serve as a rare diplomatic bridge between the Kremlin and its Western rivals. Since Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine on February 24, 2022, Ankara has supported Ukraine with military supplies while refusing to join Western sanctions on Moscow.
Turkey has positioned itself as a mediator between the two nations, hosting two rounds of peace talks in Antalya and Istanbul in 2022. Turkey was also key to the Black Sea Grain Initiative that temporarily facilitated the export of agricultural products from southern Ukrainian ports amid Russia’s naval blockade.
Following a phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky at the beginning of this month, Erdoğan said Ankara remains ready to help “establish lasting peace, stability and prosperity in our region.”
“We have previously acted as a host country for direct talks between the parties to the conflict,” the president said. “We are, as before, ready to do our best in this matter and act as a mediator….Ukraine in order to take joint steps with Russia certainly needs to soften its position.”
Putin last visited a NATO nation in 2020 when he traveled to Germany to meet with then-Chancellor Angela Merkel. His Western travel options have been limited by his war on Ukraine and the arrest warrant issued for him in 2023 by the International Criminal Court over alleged related crimes. (read more)
I really do not like Turkish President Recep Erdogan. His political policy is full of dangerous self-interest (Muslim Brotherhood) and thirst for power (recreation of the Ottoman empire). However, on the issue of ending this Russia-Ukraine conflict, I will admit Erdogan has positioned himself very well.
If Trump wins in November, Erdogan will play a major role in the end of hostilities.
You might even say Erdogan holds the key to eliminating the self-fulfilling prophecy of a US CBDC that Obama/Biden created.
Posted originally on the CTH on January 28, 2024 | Sundance
In his own words, Senator James Lankford says if President Trump was president today the border crisis would not exist, because the existing law would be enforced. Simultaneous to this, the same Senator Lankford says the new law he proposes will create significant border enforcement.
If the executive branch can ignore the current border enforcement law (they can and do), what makes Lankford believe new legislation will not be ignored by the same executive branch (they will)? This non-pretending reality frames the essential point: the element of “enforcement” is not within the legislative branch, so the entire effort is a moot exercise. WATCH:
Margaret Brennan is especially annoying in this interview.
[Transcript] – MARGARET BRENNAN: And we’re joined now by Oklahoma Republican James Lankford. He’s in Oklahoma City this morning. Good morning to you, sir, it has taken you two months to get this bipartisan deal. Do you have the support of your fellow Republicans to actually vote this through?
SEN. JAMES LANKFORD: Well, actually, I wish it would have taken only two months. It’s taken about four months to be able to go through this, we started in October. Everyone’s looking to be able to read the bill at this point. That’s the key aspect, we’re working on the final aspects of it to try to be able to get it out. So everyone can get a chance to read it. Right now, they’re all functioning off of internet rumors of what’s in the bill, and many of them are false. So people want to be able to just see it, read it and go through it. And to be able to see the dramatic change that this really makes and how we handle our immigration system, and how we work to be able to secure our border completely. That’s been the simple request of Americans, whether you’re Republican, Democrat, or independent, people just want a secure border, where we have legal immigration, but we’re not promoting illegal immigration. And that’s what we’ve seen in the last three years.
MARGARET BRENNAN: So you don’t have a vote count yet?
SEN. LANKFORD: Do not have a vote count yet on this because everybody’s got to be able to read it to be able to go through. But I do feel very positive about it because even the initial feedback has been good.
MARGARET BRENNAN: So you just heard the details laid out there by our immigration correspondent, how do you balance the shutdown power that would be in these new authorities versus the right to claim asylum?
SEN. LANKFORD: Yeah, this is similar to what we had to under Title 42, during the pandemic time period, where we reach a crisis point to say we can’t actually operate. So we don’t have that authority. Right now, as the United States, we’ve reached crisis points. For instance, when we got four or 5,000 people crossing the border, we can no longer process those individuals. So right now, the Biden administration is just releasing them into the country. That’s what’s driving the mayors in Denver, in Chicago, in New York City and other places around the country crazy to say, when the border gets crowded, you just release them to our cities, and it causes all the chaos in these cities. This is a new authority to say, when we can no longer detain and deport, when we can’t process the people and actually make a decision right there at the border, then we’ll actually turn those folks back around to Mexico and say, “We can no longer do this.” That gives the authority to the United States into law enforcement, rather than the authority, just the criminal cartels. Right now. The cartels can just rush our border, they’ll get through as many people as they want to be able to get through. We can not have criminal organizations running our southern border, we have to be able to run our southern border.
MARGARET BRENNAN: So parole authority has been a sticking point for Republicans throughout. I know the administration has used it in a novel way to resettle 1 million people. So how are you changing that authority?
SEN. LANKFORD: Yeah, humanitarian parole is still- is still an issue for us. But it’s been an authority that every President has had to have basic humanitarian parole, but as you mentioned, this administration has used humanitarian parole in a way no other administration has. They’ve said, if you’ll just tell us in advance that you’re coming, come to a port of entry, the first day you get here, we’ll hand you a work permit, and we’ll release you into the country under parole. Well, that’s actually attracting more people, of course, people from around the world are going to want an American work permit to show up. So instead of deterring immigration, they’re literally incentivizing illegal immigration,. They’re handing people a parole and a work permit day one. That has to stop, we can’t just have a system where we have that. In between the ports of entries, when it gets crowded, they’ll just release them under a parole authority there. And they’re just released in the country. We don’t know if they qualify for asylum. We don’t know where they are. By the hundreds of thousands people are just being released in the country. And we have no tracking on them at all. That has to stop. This is a national security issue for us. May I remind you that we’ve had 50 people come across our border that we’ve interdicted, that are on the terror watch list. Just in the past four months, we’ve had tens of thousands of people that came across our border that were identified as a national security risk. Those individuals should not just be waived into the country.
MARGARET BRENNAN: So the conservative Wall Street Journal editorial board called this the best chance in years to fix asylum law and parole loophole. But Donald Trump, who is the front runner to be your party’s nominee in 2024 is telling Republicans not to support this. Here’s what he said last night in Las Vegas.
(SOUND ON TAPE)
FORMER PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP: A lot of the senators are trying to say respectfully they’re blaming going to me– I said that’s okay. Please blame it on me, please, because they were getting ready to pass a very bad bill. And I’ll tell you what a bad bill is– I’d rather have no bill than a bad bill.
(END SOUND ON TAPE)
MARGARET BRENNAN: Can you get this passed without Donald Trump’s approval?
SEN. LANKFORD: Well, I’m looking forward to President Trump having the opportunity to be able to read it like everybody else. There’s a lot of misinformation out there right now that I hear this comment that it waives in 5,000 people, it hands out work permits that- all those things are not true. There’s just a lot of internet rumors that are running around on this right now. We’re looking forward to getting the information out and I can say, there is no question no matter what your political persuasion is, we would not have had the immigration crisis we’re experiencing right now, if President Trump would have been president the last three years. There’s no way we would have had 8 million people illegally cross our border, because he would enforce those different authorities and would have made sure that we actually secure a border. But even while he was president, he was specifically asking Congress to change the standard on asylum to be able to tighten up, to be able to give them additional funds for deportation. All of those things are in this bill. So if he were to be president, this would be new authorities that he had actually asked for when he was president before.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Right. And I just- you just said that he has not read this bill. He doesn’t essentially know what he’s talking about. So this deal–
Sen. Lankford: — Well, I’m not saying that. I’m just saying there’s just a lot of rumors that are out there about the bill. And I want to make sure everyone has a chance to be able to read it before they make a final judgment.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Right. So the deal you just said would give any future president and the current one new authorities. So on the trail, Trump has vowed to block legal immigrants based on their beliefs to end birthright citizenship, to carry out mass deportations, and he has not ruled out separating kids from their parents. Would you trust Donald Trump with these new authorities?
SEN. LANKFORD: I would actually because these are not only new authorities that had been asked for by multiple presidents, whether it be President Trump, President Obama, President Bush before that, this is a basic thing that we have to have for our national security. When we talk about asylum, right now you cross the border, and you literally say, I have fear in my country, and you’re released into the United States and await a 10-year hearing. No one thinks that actually makes sense to have a 10-year backlog for just saying the magic words. I have fear in my country. We don’t really know if they qualify for asylum. We don’t know their criminal record. We don’t know anything else about it. That absolutely has to change. That’s been an issue for a very long time that changes this in law.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, we will have to see where we are on the vote count. But I want to ask you, back in 2022, Donald Trump endorsed your reelection. And in that endorsement, he said, “James Lankford is strong on the border.” Has anything changed with your thoughts about endorsing Donald Trump for president?
SEN. LANKFORD: No, it hasn’t at all. Obviously, he’s been very engaged, as I’ve mentioned already on it, none of the things that are happening in the last three years in the border would have happened if Donald Trump was actually president. He knows I’ve been very passionate about the border. This is an issue I’ve worked on for a very long time. He and I worked together when he was in the White House on some of his border policies. And when he did his big proposal, that was a legislative proposal, because again, President Trump proposed new laws and new issues on this, because we know that we have gaps in the system. So if you want to be able to secure the border, you can have President Trump to be able to come in to actually secure the border, because he’s going to focus in on that. But if he comes in and is elected by the American people to come this November, he’s going to want these additional authorities in this because it will help every president from here on out.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Yeah, but you’re not endorsing him?
SEN. LANKFORD: I actually haven’t endorsed anyone on it. But he’d be a much better president than what we’re dealing with right now, definitely on national security.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Okay. Before I let you go, I want to get your reaction to the news that he was ordered to pay $83 million to a person that a jury found he defamed after a separate jury found that he had sexually assaulted her. Does it give you any pause about him returning to office?
SEN. LANKFORD: It doesn’t. Obviously, these are legal cases. I don’t want to jump in the middle of a legal case. It’s been interesting the number of legal cases that have come up against President Trump and then have failed and had been dropped or had been kicked out of the courts on it. This one’s actually went through. He’s already said he’s going to challenge it. So let the courts actually make their decisions and let the American people make their decisions. We got states like Colorado that are trying to be able to block the people of Colorado from being able to choose who they vote for. Let the American people decide this in November.
MARGARET BRENNAN: Well, the Supreme Court might decide on that one. We will have to leave it there for today, James Lankford. We will be focusing on what progress you were able to make. We’ll be back in just one minute.
“Today, America’s heart is heavy. Last night, three U.S. service members were killed—and many wounded—during an unmanned aerial drone attack on our forces stationed in northeast Jordan near the Syria border. While we are still gathering the facts of this attack, we know it was carried out by radical Iran-backed militant groups operating in Syria and Iraq.” (LINK)
A few more details are starting to emerge including the number of “many wounded.” According to recent media reports 25 were wounded along with the 3 killed.
Yahoo – “Biden said the United States “will hold all those responsible to account at a time and in a manner our choosing.”
There was no immediate reaction from Jordan, a kingdom bordering Iraq, Israel, the Palestinian territory of the West Bank, Saudi Arabia and Syria.
U.S. troops long have used Jordan as a basing point, and the attack took place in northeast Jordan near the Syrian border. U.S. Central Command said 25 service members were injured the attack in addition to the three killed.
Some 3,000 American troops typically are stationed in Jordan.
Jordanian state television quoted Muhannad Mubaidin, a government spokesman, as insisting the attack happened outside of the kingdom across the border in Syria. The conflicting information could not be immediately reconciled.” (more)
I guess we are not supposed to remember this earlier announcement from three months ago:
…”I have also activated the deployment of a Terminal High Altitude Area Defense (THAAD) battery as well as additional Patriot battalions to locations throughout the region to increase force protection for U.S. forces.”… (link)
Apparently, there are drones capable of outwitting the THAAD defense system, or something.
Posted originally on the CTH on January 28, 2024 | Sundance
A story surfacing in Politico about the collapse of the office of the United States Trade Representative (USTR) and the inability of the entire trade policy group to find any willing trade partners was entirely predictable.
You might remember how the insufferable U.S. business media constantly said the Trump trade team was not going to be successful because the administration was disliked by global trade partners. Every Trump trade approach from tariffs to section 301 compliance, to U.S. demands around foreign policy tied to the economic Trump Doctrine was decried by U.S. multinational corporations as too divisive, too intransigent. However, Donald Trump and his trade wolverines racked up more trade wins and established more trade agreements than any administration in history.
From KORUS (Korea/US) to the Middle East, Saudi Arabia, India, Japan, European energy deals, massive changes with China, new Ag agreements, demanded technology sector investment back in the USA, and the successful renegotiation of NAFTA (Canada, Mexico, USA) into the USMCA – all of it was stunning in scale, scope and success. Trump’s global trade success was exactly the opposite of every predictive declaration by the professional media. All of the Trump strategic policy shift created the framework for the largest domestic expansion of the U.S. economy, evident in every 2019 economic metric prior to the pandemic.
Biden took office with the full support of the lying liars who lie in the media, and they said Biden’s team was a shoo-in for success. Again, exactly the opposite has happened.
The ideological leftists who came with the Obama/Biden plan forcibly tried to push their Green New Deal policies into every trade agreement. The result and response from all U.S. trade partners has been a massive failure of epic proportions.
Despite the international pontifications around support for the globalist energy policies, ie. the “Build Back Better” bulls**t pushed by western government, the World Economic Forum and the globalists, when it comes to where the rubber hits the road no nation is willing to attach themselves to the economically destructive millstone demands of U.S trade. In material fact, many of the BBB agenda priorities are now completely rejected by the same politicians who promoted them.
In part, we in the USA are suffering through some of the most horrific inflationary economic outcomes from this Biden ‘Green New Deal’ program. Any nation that aligned itself is feeling the same impact in direct proportion to how close they followed the program. The more ‘Green’ compliant the nation, the more the economic hardship upon the citizens within that nation. This is just the non-pretending reality of the thing.
So, it doesn’t come as any great surprise to see a thoroughly rejected and dejected career trade group now walking to the exits with zero accomplishments for their last three years of effort.
WASHINGTON – Frustration with a stalled trade agenda and unhappiness with the leadership of President Joe Biden’s trade chief is pushing more than a half-dozen senior trade officials out the door, according to four current and former administration officials with knowledge of the departures.
The exits include the White House’s point person on international economics and two of the three deputy U.S. trade representatives responsible for implementing the Biden administration’s “worker-centered” trade policy.
The exodus comes after Biden’s trade agenda ran aground on multiple fronts in 2023: failing to reach a green steel and aluminum deal with the European Union and pulling out of trade talks that were part of the U.S.-crafted Indo-Pacific Economic Framework in November. The administration, meanwhile, remains internally divided on other key trade policy decisions, like how to regulate digital information flowing across the globe.
Those headwinds — and the realization that little real progress is likely to be made in an election year during which former President Donald Trump will put a glaring spotlight on trade — have convinced some officials it’s time to move on. Adding to the frustration: simmering discontent with the management practices of U.S. Trade Representative Katherine Tai.
[…] Biden’s “worker-centered” trade agenda was designed to smooth over frayed relations with close trading partners and win back those blue-collar workers in battleground states. But his sweeping plans to reshape global trade rules haven’t assuaged concerns from Democrats who worry that Trump will again use trade issues as a cudgel against them in the industrial Midwest — a region that could determine control of Congress and the White House in November.
That disconnect has forced USTR to freeze, abandon, or dramatically scale back its signature initiatives and negotiations, leaving some top lawmakers and staffers frustrated. In particular, Wyden and Sen. Sherrod Brown (D-Ohio) are fuming that the administration hasn’t matched the Trump administration’s accomplishments on trade, like the binding labor and environmental standards that Democrats got inserted into the rewrite of NAFTA that Trump signed in 2020.
“Sen. Brown and I have consistently said that you need the kind of proposal that you saw in the U.S.-Mexico-Canada Agreement where you open up markets for business and you have tough enforcement,” said Wyden, “and a lot of what’s been put up doesn’t meet that test.” (read more)
Go figure!….
Want success?…
Want trade deals that lift the USA economy?…
Want USA “deflation,” yes, the actual lowering of prices for goods and services?…
Want lower costs of goods, and lower prices for consumers by leveraging the size of the USA market?…
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This is a library of News Events not reported by the Main Stream Media documenting & connecting the dots on How the Obama Marxist Liberal agenda is destroying America
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