Protest Crowd Storms Presidential Palace in Sri Lanka as Fuel and Food Shortages Create Desperation, Prime Minister Resigns, President Tries to Hang on


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on July 9, 2022 | Sundance

It was not long ago when we noted the absence of food will change things.   While Dutch farmers are fighting the government and trying to keep producing food, in Sri Lanka the shortages of food and fuel have reached a boiling point.  Angry citizens have taken control of the presidential palace, set fire to the Prime Minister’s house, and overwhelmed government offices.

Fearing for his life, “Sri Lankan Prime Minister Ranil Wickremesinghe said he would resign after just two months in office after protesters stormed and occupied the president’s residence and office amid public anger over the country’s deepening sovereign-debt crisis.” (WSJ link)

The U.S. State Department and the ambassador to Sri Lanka, Julie Chung, are asking for protestors to remain peaceful as if their hunger is ‘transitory’.  However, videos from the country highlight the futility of platitudes amid tens of thousands of angry citizens who are desperate.  It is a hot mess that’s likely to surface in other nations quickly.

(Via WSJ) – Braving tear gas and water cannons in the capital, Colombo, protesters—many waving the national flag and wearing helmets—also entered the president’s office on Saturday, in one of the largest antigovernment demonstrations in the country this year.

Television news footage showed large crowds overrunning security barricades before breaching the official residence of President Rajapaksa. Some were later seen taking a dip in the compound’s swimming pool. Videos purportedly filmed by protesters and shared widely on social media showed scores of men rifling through drawers, sitting in chairs and lounging on a four-poster bed inside a bedroom of the residence. One man was shown doing bicep curls in a gym. (more)

The crisis had been building for weeks as the protesting crowds had continued to get larger.

As noted by the Wall Street Journal report, “responding to calls by protest organizers to congregate in Colombo for mass demonstrations this weekend, Sri Lankans from far and wide improvised around acute fuel shortages by piling into semitrailer trucks, trains and overcrowded buses to reach the capital. Some walked miles to join the demonstrations.”

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This next video shows how large the crowd was just before they stormed the buildings.

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There is no way to stop a crowd of this size.  I’m not sure how many people are in/around that compound, but it looks like hundreds of thousands.

Neil Oliver, The Governing Class Discovers that People Owning Nothing Does Not Make Them Happy


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on July 9, 2022 | Sundance

In his weekly monologue Neil Oliver gives his perspective on the changing of the guard at #10 Downing Street.  Meet the potential new boss, same as the old boss etc.   While drawing attention to the detached and aloof viewpoints of the self-installed ‘ruling class’, Oliver riffs one of the best lines from this week:

“Two years ago, I gave scant thought to acronyms like WHO, UN, WEF.  Now I watch them with the same attention I give to dogs that look like they might bite.”…

Damned if that isn’t the truth.  WATCH:

[Transcript] – The running of this country has precious little to do with we, the people – that much becomes more obvious every day. Ever more blatantly the powers that be are treating us like the sitting tenants in a property they want to knock down so they can sell the plot for profit to their pals and assorted foreign carpet baggers.

We the people, with our individual opinions and ambitions and dreams are just in the way of their anti-human fantasy of a so-called progressive future. They got fed up waiting for us to die of old age in our armchairs, in front of three bar electric fires we can’t afford to switch on, and have set about demolishing the old place while we’re still living in it.

Love him or loathe him – and I’ve been no fan of him or of any of the leaders we find ourselves saddled with in the West – PM Boris Johnson was brought down last week not by the millions who had voted for him, as might have been appropriate given any meaningful understanding of the concept of democracy – but by a hellish coupling of media and the self-worshipping political class that appointed themselves judge, jury and executioner. Together they wanted Johnson gone, and so he was gone.

The party atmosphere after his resignation – the glee and the gloating by those journalists that had conspired and shared in the taking of his scalp was plain to see. I really don’t think it’s supposed to be that way.

In the aftermath of Johnson’s defenestration there was a suggestion from former Tory PM John Major that the process of anointing the next leader of the Conservatives should bypass party members altogether – presumably in case troublesome proles with their taste for Brexit and borders, even for Britain itself, picked the wrong person again. Far better, thought the likes of Major, if Tory MPs just exercised their superior intellects and morals and did the choosing for them.

Hoary old Tory and arch-remainer Michael Heseltine’s cage was evidently rattled by all the noise and in predictable style he was instantly crowing that the passing of Johnson should mean the end of Brexit.

Once more the proof that those regarding themselves as our intellectual superiors still regard a decision made by an undeniable majority of British people only as evidence of the stupidity of the great unwashed.

In displays of audacity and temerity that are beyond the reach of adjectives, those that plotted Johnson’s demise are falling over one another to take his place. It’s like looking through a microscope at something revolting happening in a petri dish. Former chancellor Rishi Sunak had his slick and glossy show reel ready for broadcast before his former boss had delivered his resignation speech. I wonder when he performed for that instead of doing more damage to the economy. I don’t feel like having any of their names in my mouth, I really don’t.

So I will just say that for me the thought of any that stood for lockdowns, for damaging children’s physical and mental wellbeing, that oversaw the crashing of the economy, watched uncounted lives physically and mentally destroyed, advocated mask wearing on the street and cheer led the unholy pressure to take experimental injections or lose jobs and or reputations as a consequence … that called for digital vaccine passports or anything like them … that won’t shout from the highest hill that the green agenda and Net Zero are a disaster and must be scrapped immediately … the thought of any that demanded it all, or stayed silent while it all played out, should now occupy No. 10 and contemplate more of the same in the months ahead makes me sick to my stomach.

For me the change of PM is nothing more than a change of drivers on a train. The train we’re on is going where it’s scheduled and timetabled to go, on rails already laid, and in the face of its forward momentum we the people, it would seem, count for nothing.

From behind one podium after another, western leaders and their lackeys talk more and more openly about a liberal world order – even a rules-based liberal world order. The more I hear and see about a world ordered by self-described liberals and their rules, the less I like it. I certainly don’t recall ever being invited to vote for it. Two years ago I gave scant thought to acronyms like WHO, UN, WEF. Now I watch them with the same attention I give to dogs that look like they might bite.

At some point in the past – and I missed that point too, whenever it was, I will freely admit – the governing class decided they were done with serving us and that they own us and rule us instead. That cancerous thought has metastasized in recent years, so that it’s not just governments and their bureaucrats and preferred scientists who presume to lord it over us, to tell us what to do, what to think.

That same deranged thought is there throughout the greediest capitalist corporations now as well. The technocrats took free speech by the throat long ago, so as to preserve and push their own self-described progressive ideologies. Now that same superiority complex is everywhere else as well.

Halifax bank got on their high horse about pronouns and loftily declared that customers who didn’t like seeing staff wearing such on their badges should take their business elsewhere. And so, customers duly did, right enough, taking their hard-earned cash with them.

Since when did money-grubbing corporations decide it was appropriate to start telling customers what to think about sex and gender?

Ice Cream vendors Ben and Jerrys got on their soap box to criticize the British government’s plan to offshore asylum seekers to Rwanda – when surely their time would be better spent learning more about obesity and diabetes and their likeliest causes.

So here we are – we the British people are held in low regard not just by politicians and their ilk, not just by the awkward savants of the search engines and social media platforms, but even by High Street banks and ice cream vendors.

It feels like there is a club somewhere, or a positive feedback loop, in which everyone involved, and it’s definitely not us – politicians of all stripes, faceless bureaucrats, journalists, bankers and corporations – feels entitled to make all the decisions about every aspect of our lives and then to tell us how it’s going to be. We the people are to be downtrodden, demoralized and deceived.

In the wider world, it is farmers who are the latest citizens pushed beyond breaking point. In a replay of the Truckers’ protest in Canada that so captivated many of us, gave us hope however brief that an end to the deliberately destructive madness might be in sight, there are tractor protests in the Netherlands, in Germany, in Italy, in Poland.

When those who grow and raise the food we eat are angry and scared enough to down tools and take to the streets to fight for their very existence, when those who drive the trucks that bring us everything we depend upon for our daily lives have done likewise … perhaps it’s finally time to pay attention to the unfolding catastrophe.

Among the Dutch farmers the anger was pushed above boiling point by government diktats regarding emissions of nitrogen and ammonia into the environment. Plans to reduce those emissions by as much as 70 percent will, farmers say, put many of them out of business altogether. They say it’s not about saving nature, but about leftist government plans to change land use in the Netherlands, forcing farmers to sell their land and to cut the national cattle herd by as much as 50 per cent.

Dutch farmers are among the most productive in the world – exporting 100 billion dollars worth of dairy and crops every year. Their banners say No farmers, no food.

The world is in a time of food insecurity and still governments would apparently prefer to contemplate a future in which people will suffer in every conceivable way. And in the future presently shaping up, people will most definitely suffer. Those governments are plainly not in the business of fixing anything, rather making matters worse.

Canadian PM Justin Trudeau – he that forcibly shut down the truckers’ protest in his own county and seized their bank accounts – has his country on a similar path to that of the Dutch. In a time of global food insecurity – blamed in part on war in Ukraine – ideologically driven administrations are stamping their metaphorical boots down upon their farmers’ backs.

In Holland, shots have been fired – allegedly by police, at one tractor. This is how basic things are becoming, how near the bone. Here in the west, in the 21st century, we are being prepared not just for a future without cars, but a future of less energy… less warmth… and even less food.

I knew there was something badly wrong with all that’s going on when I realized my response to what was happening, to all that we were being told, was physical. All of this actually makes me feel ill, to my bones.

I have never in my life before listened to government policy – and to the policies of governments all around the world – and felt endangered. But I do now. If you feel that too – a deep physiological response to the last two years, and a growing sense of something malevolent – then you are not alone. Sometimes it feels like society itself has been poisoned – and that all that society is being offered is yet more poisonous nonsense.

We should notice that it is from among us, the ordinary people, that the farmers and the truckers come – so that it is we who really have the power that matters in the end.

In Sri Lanka, they’re quite a bit further down the line than us – although hardly out of sight. Thousands of people, driven beyond endurance by economic collapse and the worst food and fuel shortages in living memory, found they had nothing left to lose. I read this morning about protestors there storming and occupying their president’s official residence in the city of Colombo.

Desperate people and desperate measures. It’s interesting to note that, contrary to what Klaus Schwab and his World Economic Forum might think … it turns out that when some people find they actually do own nothing anymore – they’re really not very happy at all. (LINK)

WHO Do You Think You Are? Nations Reject Pandemic Treaty


Armstrong Economics Blog/Corruption Re-Posted Jun 9, 2022 by Martin Armstrong

All the world leaders supporting the Great Reset were eager to relinquish complete power to the World Health Organization (WHO). The WHO wanted to seize the ability to force health mandates on the global population. The Pandemic Treaty would have allowed the WHO to bypass national laws and implement their will on the people.

A message from the WHO:

The COVID-19 pandemic has exposed gaps in the governance, financing and systems needed to keep the world safe from epidemics and pandemics. There is an emerging global consensus around the need for an international treaty or other legally binding instrument, to provide the framework for a more coherent and coordinated response to future epidemics and pandemics.

Botswana was the first nation to say, “NO.” Then the entire continent of Africa declined to join the treaty, which is no surprise considering that these health organizations use their nations and people for experimental purposes. Russia, India, China, South Africa, Iran, Malaysia, and Brazil also rejected the treaty.

“National sovereignty is not something to be handed over to WHO or other entities and to be renounced just to join a club of seemingly advanced nations,” Brazil’s Bolsonaro said after threatening to exit the WHO. Former President Trump attempted to exit the WHO, but Joe Biden dragged America back into the organization. Trudeau does not care about the Canadian people and has continued to fight Parliament tooth and nail to hand his nation to Schwab on a silver platter.

We are not completely safe. “They have not given up though – far from it,” warned Queensland, Australia, Member of Parliament Stephen Andrew. “Instead, they did what they always do and ‘pivoted.’ At their request, a new working group was convened to make ‘technical recommendations on the proposed amendments which will [be] re-submitted along with the Pandemic Treaty, at the 77th Health Assembly meeting in 2024.”

One can hope that the voters will continue to elect leaders that fight for medical autonomy, as handing over full power to a corrupt organization will truly place us in a dystopian world void of freedom.

European Debt Crisis Explained


Armstrong Economics Blog/Humor Re-Po sted Jun 7, 2022 by Martin Armstrong

The European Union failed to consolidate debt when creating its European utopia. Policymakers are solely to blame for creating their debt crisis, and it is hard to believe that no one saw this coming. The creation of the euro and European Union was so poorly planned that it is another example of comedy writing itself.

Canadian Multinational Executive Outlines Tech Initiative to Create Consumer Carbon Footprint Tracker


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on May 24, 2022 | Sundance

It is important to remember the ultimate goal of the ‘climate change’ promotors (World Economic Forum) is not an energy system that changes the global climate. The goal of the ‘climate change’ group is to create a carbon trading system; a new financial mechanism (a global tax program) to control human activity on a world-wide basis.  This system also needs a digital identity in order to work {hint-hint}.

You cannot tax or trade things you cannot track.  As a result, there was always going to be a need for an individual tracking and monitoring system that would connect to the global digital identity and determine the carbon footprint.  The carbon taxing and trading system will be more financially lucrative than any stock exchange or monetary banking system.  It is the ultimate human control mechanism, and the preferred way to redistribute wealth under the guise of global equity.

Of course, the system will beta test as a consumer demand product until the government steps in to take over the allocation and distribution equity part.  In this video segment, Alibaba Group president J. Michael Evans boasts at the 2022 World Economic Forum about the development of an “individual carbon footprint tracker” to monitor what you buy, what you eat, and where/how you travel.  WATCH:

The individual carbon tracker is the baseline for a global carbon trading system that involves everyone; at least, everyone connected to the outlook of western government.

Carbon allocation creates the financial metric that replaces currency.  You buy and sell carbon credits allowing you to engage in specific functions within society, like dining, traveling, home ownership and type, vehicle or transportation type, even the clothes you can purchase. Hence, “carbon trading” is the term most people are familiar with.

In essence, you are a parasite to earth; therefore, you must offset your derogatory footprint on the planet by paying a fee to exist.  If you cannot pay for the carbon credits needed to engage in the transaction (travel, home ownership, cooling, heating, etc.) you cannot engage in the regulated activity.

The carbon exchange process is at the end of the slippery slope created by a digital identity.  The 5G telecommunications network is designed to use geolocation and behavioral tracking that will connect your digital identity to your individual behavior and facilitate the carbon footprint tracing process.   We are already passed the “if” stage.

European Union Pushing for Mass Surveillance


Armstrong Economics Blog/European Union Re-Posted May 16, 2022 by Martin Armstrong

Censorship is now normalized in the West. The European Union has concocted its own way to spy on citizens under the pretense of protecting children from predators. The “chat control” law, if passed, would permit the EU to access private, chats, emails, text messages, and calls. The program will even allow the government to view messages sent on gaming systems such as X-Box. We have reached dystopian levels of mass surveillance.

The legislation would allow the government to view communications in real-time. The European Parliament passed a similar law in July 2021 on a smaller scale. This new adoption would no longer be voluntary and will involve the entire population. There were opposing members when the initial measure passed in July, and 72% of EU citizens said they opposed mass surveillance.

German Pirate Party Member of the European Parliament Patrick Breyer called it “totalitarian logic” and warned that “our post, our smartphones or our bedrooms could also be generally monitored. Unleashing such denunciation machines on us is ineffective, illegal and irresponsible.” That day has now come as the union is requesting unlimited access to our private lives.

Edward Snowden warned that this breach of privacy would span across the globe. The government no longer needs warrants or probable cause. If you ever feel alone, remember that the government is always there with you.

Armstrong on USA Watchdog April 12th, 2022


Armstrong Economics Blog/Armstrong in the Media Re-Posted Apr 16, 2022 by Martin Armstrong

Dr. Jackie Stone Put it All on the Line to Treat the Ill During the Pandemic: Zimbabwe Throws Criminal Charges at Her


Posted originally on TrialSite New by StaffApril 12, 2022

TrialSite chronicled the efforts of Dr. Jackie Stone in Zimbabwe during the worst stages of the pandemic. Born in Zimbabwe, Dr. Stone has been fascinated by research since a young age, and her commitment to caring for people during the pandemic has been legendary. While her off-label ivermectin-based combination regimen was identified with the saving of many lives in this southern African country, the medical establishment isn’t too keen on thinking outside of the box, even during the worst pandemic in a century. Dr. Stone now faces a court trial with criminal charges for merely treating COVID-19 patients with an early outpatient treatment protocol based on a combination of off-label treatments that includes ivermectin. This, even though Dr. Stone treated many in the Zimbabwe government and military successfully. In fact, for a while, the Medicines Control Authority of Zimbabwe (MCAZ) authorized access on an emergency basis for research—which amounted to care in this low-and middle-income country. The regulatory agency did a turnaround with ivermectin due to the results in the clinic of Dr. Jackie Stone.

Articles about Dr. Stone and Zimbabwe can be found at TrialSite. A fighter to the end originally of English and Norwegian descent, curious, and tough, yet elegant and empathetic, she grew up in the bush in this part of Africa, as her father was involved with geology and mining. Dr. Stone’s ethos, integrity, and commitment to doing good should have led her to awards from groups such as the World Health Organization.

Together Trial Mainstream Media Interpretations Could Put Low-Cost Regimen at Risk in MICs

Stone recently got together remotely with TrialSite’s founder Daniel O’Connor to discuss her concern with the Together Trial. While mainstream media have pounced on the findings, at least a dozen physicians and scientists are findings various issues with the data. 

Ed Mills, the principal investigator, did the right thing investing his time as well as raising money to study repurposed drugs. While the Together trial’s primary endpoint failed to show efficacy for ivermectin, even Mills went on the record in a private email declaring ivermectin proponents should be upbeat about some of the data generated in the study. But Mills’ data was taken by mainstream media and used as a weapon to attack the use of the drug worldwide. This isn’t Dr. Mills’ fault–again he took the time to investigate the drug as well as other important repurposed drugs.

But Stone’s concern centers on the needs of low and middle-income countries (LMICs) for low-cost, available regimens for early care. Stone told TrialSite, “in poor and up-and-coming countries we don’t always have the luxury of waiting around for gold standard evidence. Rather, in the case of the pandemic, we need to move fast, and we did, leading to the saving of many thousands of lives.”

She continued, “My concern now is that papers such as the New York Times or Wall Street Journal pounce on data, often misinterpreting quotes from the PI can lead to a cutting off of life-saving approaches in LMICs such as my country.”

“Dr. Stone’s commitment to LMICs cannot be denied based on a clear track record of success. With COVID-19 came politics around the use of off-label drugs such as ivermectin, and unfortunately, Dr. Stone is caught in the middle of a political battle, but she is one of the most resilient individuals I have ever come across,” reports TrialSite’s O’Connor.

What about Together?

Dozens of scientists and doctors now pour through data of the Together Trial. Recently, Dr. David Wiseman, affiliated with TrialSite, shared a dozen bullet points of concern associated with Together, including inputs from Dr. Flavio Cadegiani and others that TrialSite poses as questions.

Together Trial Questions: Ivermectin

#Question/Concern Issues for Discussion with Together Trial
1.Did the ivermectin arm of Together run later than the placebo arm, a time when a more virulent strain was present in that part of Brazil?
2.Why wouldn’t the protocol call for screening for ivermectin use—after all the drug was used in many parts of Brazil.  Were those participating already using the drug? It would be hard to prove now.
3.The critics fret about the lack of reported boosts in gastrointestinal side effects in the ivermectin arm leading to what they believe is a fundamental problem with the study—either A) placebo group was on ivermectin or B) those taking ivermectin were not administered real study drug
4.Were these placebo pills produced to look identical to the study drug?  As the drug is commonly used, this would have unblinded the study.
5.Together used ivermectin alone yet the early care community uses the drug in combination with other economical safe drugs such as antibiotics, steroids, as well as nutraceuticals such as vitamin D, C, and zinc. The study of ivermectin alone doesn’t mean much to frontline doctors.
6.Together started up to 8 days post symptom onset, but frontline ivermectin proponents declare the drug should be given immediately upon symptomatic infection. The P.1 variant also saw a faster progression to severe illness only compounding the problem.
7.In the Together study, they used a dose of (0.4 mg per kilo per day) which many critics called inadequate for ill patents–was the study underdosed?
8.Given ivermectin proponents suggest using the drug till symptoms are resolved, why did the Together protocol only call for use for 3 days?
9.Why did the protocol call for administration of the drug on an empty stomach when proponents declare the drug works best when associated with consumption of fatty food?
10.Why is so much basic data missing from the study results such as Recruitment Period, Recruitment Locations, Recruitment and allocation order per sit, Description of how the molecules and placebo were produced or compounded to look identical (otherwise loss of blinding); why is there missing age data for 98 patients?  Other gaps in data or anomalies are present for those interested
11.Some basic math shows that the numbers listed in the trial paper for the different arms and outcomes in the trial do not add up to the totals and percentages that they give – either a gross mathematical error or fraud. To see many of the strange mathematical discrepancies which invalidate the trial conclusions, go to investigative journalist Phil Harper’s article: Moreover Wiseman declares And the alteration of the death count in the trial data raises serious questions:

Seeking more information about Dr. Stone?

For all of those interested in Dr. Stone’s story check out the many articles published in TrialSite along with this important letter authored by Dr. Eleftherios Gkioulekas, Professor of Mathematics Undergraduate Program Coordinator at The University of Texas — Rio Grande Valley School of Mathematical and Statistical Sciences in Edinburg, Texas.

Call to ActionTrialSite suggests a fund to support Dr. Stone in her legal battle if needed.

Zelenskyy Gives British Prime Minister Boris Johnson a Guided Tour of The Great Western Battle to Save Kyiv


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on April 9, 2022 | Sundance

To get a better context for the catastrophic and dangerous war zone that is Ukraine, yesterday European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen and European Commission Vice President Josep Borrell Fontelles visited President Zelenskyy in Kyiv {link}.  The primary purpose of the meeting was to affirm the intent of the EU to accept Zelenskyy into the Union.

Earlier today, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson also went into the war zone, toured the extreme chaos and battleground, and met with Zelenskyy (video below).

(Via MSM) – The UK is to send 120 armored vehicles and new anti-ship missile systems to Ukraine, Downing Street announced Saturday, after Prime Minister Boris Johnson paid an in-person visit to Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Johnson and Austria’s Chancellor Karl Nehammer made separate visits to Zelensky on Saturday, the latest in a string of leaders to travel to the country during the ongoing Russian invasion.

Johnson posted on Twitter that his visit to Kyiv was “a show of our unwavering support for the people of Ukraine” and announced a new package of financial and military aid.

“Ukraine has defied the odds and pushed back Russian forces from the gates of Kyiv, achieving the greatest feat of arms of the 21st century,” the UK PM said in a statement.

He praised Zelensky’s “resolute leadership” and the “invincible heroism and courage of the Ukrainian people,” adding that the UK “stands unwaveringly with them in this ongoing fight … we are in it for the long run.”  Later in his nightly address posted on social media, Zelensky thanked the UK and Johnson. (read more)

As seen in video promoted by the NATO alliance, Johnson and Zelenskyy ignored the threat of bombs, missiles and artillery that could be raining down upon them, and bravely walked without flak jackets, vests or even helmets despite the chaos.

Unfortunately, the cinematography produced by the western NATO alliance failed to capture the smell of burning diesel fuel from the aftermath of hundreds of tanks and weeks of street-to-street urban warfare.  However, it does appear that Johnson was prepared for hand-to-hand combat if any angry shopkeeper stepped out of line.   Courage is, as they say, contagious.  Footage below:

Rebel News on the WEF Infiltration of Governments


Aemstrong Economics Blog/WEF Re-Posted Apr 9, 2022 by Martin Armstrong

These people are against Democracy where the people make decisions. Republics are authoritarian regimes in sheep’s clothing. They run pretending one thing and then do everything in their power to accomplish undemocratic goals.