Sunday Talks, Former DNI John Ratcliffe Gives His Opinion of “Chinese Spy Balloon” Story


Posted originally on the CTH on February 5, 2023 | Sundance

The more I see how much attention was exhausted focusuing on the Chinese balloon, the more I am inclined to believe the attention was manufactured by internal deep state operatives.

Secretary of State Anthony Blinken cancelled his trip to China over the spy balloon issue, and beyond the general cancellation, he also cancelled a rare meeting with Chairman Xi.   Xi never almost never meets with foreign ministers, only Presidents and Prime Ministers.  So, what gives?  Did the intelligence community expose the balloon crossing to stop the Xi/Blinken meeting?  I don’t know, but something is fishy.

Former Director of National Intelligence (DNI) John Ratcliffe gives his .02 cents.   Ratcliffe takes the position that it was an intended spy and surveillance operation by China, and it was successful. WATCH:

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Sunday Talks, Cohn and Brennan Talk Gleefully About the Return of the Service Driven Economy Under Biden, Happy with No Wage Growth


Posted originally on the CTH on February 5, 2023 | Sundance

This is one of those interviews where you don’t have to take my word for what is being said, Gary Cohn and Margaret Brennan are gleeful about the January jobs report and the overall return of the U.S. economy to a service driven system with low wages.   Seriously, this is them celebrating out loud.

In order to calm the Wall Street apoplexy about his election victory, President Trump selected Gary Cohn to be an economic advisor early in the administration.  However, it was also no surprise that President Trump did not follow Cohn’s advice, and quickly dispatched him after Cohn protested.  In this interview the worldview of Cohn is typically globalist, multinational and Wall St centric.

Talking about the January jobs report, Cohn literally gets everything wrong from the position of Main Street USA.  Cohn also celebrates what he calls the “renormalization of the new economy.”  Continuing with his thought process Cohn states, “A lot of the jobs that we saw were jobs in the service industry, the service, the industries coming back very strong because we’re starting to see the economy go back to what we historically think of the economy,” he said.  This is exactly how Wall Street, and the multinationals look at the U.S. economy.

The next part that both Cohn and Margaret Brennan celebrate is even more sunlight. “The interesting thing about last month’s unemployment numbers is we brought people back to work, but we did not have to entice them with pay,” Cohn stated. “So, the monthly, the month over month number in wage gains was 30 basis points. The prior month was 40 basis points. So, we’re seeing we’re getting people back into the labor force for a lower wage than we were prior to this,” he said.   With higher prices (inflation) crushing the middle-class and service workers, the multinationals Cohn represents are celebrating that they don’t have to pay workers higher wages.  WATCH:

[Transcript] – MARGARET BRENNAN: So 517,000 new jobs, but a lot of companies, particularly in tech, are announcing layoffs. So exactly where’s the economy headed?

GARY COHN: So, it’s interesting. We did see the 500,000 plus new jobs, which was quite surprising, I think, to many of us. But I think what we’re actually seeing here is a renormalization of the new economy. A lot of the jobs that we saw were jobs in the service industry, the service, the industries coming back very strong because we’re starting to see the economy go back to what we historically think of the economy. For the first time, we’ve seen occupancy rates in offices in major cities over 50%. When you see occupancy rates go up, you need the service sector to work. Think about people going back into the office. They need parking attendants. They need people to work in the buildings. They need security. They need people to clean the buildings. People stop for coffee when they go into the buildings. They go out to lunch. They go to bars. For the- for that to happen, you need the service sectors to come back to work. So the 120,000 service sector employees that came back to work, that 100% correlates with people going back to what is the new normal. It may not be five days a week in the office, but it’s enough days in the week in the office where you need the service sector to come back to work. The interesting thing about last month’s unemployment numbers is we brought people back to work, but we did not have to entice them with pay. So the monthly, the month over month number in wage gains was 30 basis points. The prior month was 40 basis points. So we’re seeing we’re getting people back into the labor force for a lower wage than we were prior to this.

MARGARET BRENNAN: And that’s a little bit hopeful for you on the inflation front.

GARY COHN: Yeah, and I think this is natural. I think what we’ve seen is, after all the stimulus that was put in the system over the last three months, people are running out of the stimulus money. We saw that in the fourth quarter of last year. We saw consumer spending slow down. We saw debit balances on credit cards go up. We started to see delinquencies go up. And you know what happened? People actually did the right thing and they went back to work. They’re engaged and they reenter the workforce. And I think we saw a lot of that in the January numbers.

MARGARET BRENNAN: So these more positive signs have led Bank of America, for example, to say recession still in the cards, but not until after March. I wonder what your thoughts are on that. And as CEOs warned about borrowing costs going up as a result of the Fed hiking. They are tightening belts. So how far off is this recession?

GARY COHN: Well, we’ve got a couple of phenomena going on. Interest rates have been going up, so borrowing costs have been going up for companies. On the flip side, the dollar has been weakening. So the multinational corporations in the United States who repatriate earnings from offshore, those repatriated earnings have become more valuable. I think the people that have been really worried about a recession in the first and second quarter of this year, I think after what we’ve seen this week with both Chairman Powell’s announcements and the data in unemployment, I think that recession is off the table for Q and one in Q2 of this year. You know, we’re going to get another employment report before the next Fed meeting and we’ll see where the economy’s going. But it does feel like we’re in relatively good shape here. The question is going to be how does the Federal Reserve handle what’s going on in the economy? Are we going to continue to have to increase wages to draw people back in the labor force, or are people coming back in the labor force because they need to? And we’re not going to have wage inflation if that happens. The Federal Reserve is actually in a very good place.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Let me ask you about something the Fed chair said this week. He said Congress has to lift this debt ceiling. I’m throwing one of the things that could screw up your- your rosy prediction at you. He said no one should assume that the Fed can protect the economy from the consequences of failing to act in a timely manner. He’s warning he’s not making plans for a default. You’re on your own if it happens.

GARY COHN: Yes.

MARGARET BRENNAN: Should there be a plan for the Fed to step in? I mean, I know legally it’s in question here, but I talk to people on Capitol Hill who say Wall Street is not taking this seriously enough. The politics are really bad around the debt ceiling.

GARY COHN: The politics are very bad. You know, the one thing is every American, every American is holding the US government to raise the debt ceiling. The full faith and credit of the US dollar and the US dollar being the reserve currency is imperative to our economic well-being as a country. We ultimately have to get the debt ceiling raised. That said, what’s going on here is not something out of the ordinary. If you look at debt ceiling raises over the last 40 or 50 years, no matter which party is in the minority, about 50% of the time, debt ceiling raises come with some amendments attached- attached to them from the other party. So this is quite an. Normal, the process that we’re going through.

MARGARET BRENNAN: You don’t sound overly concerned.

GARY COHN: Like I’m always concerned when we’re dealing with debt ceiling, but I have a feeling that we will get there in the end when we have no other choice. You had this- you had the speaker here last week and he felt confident that we would get there when we had no other choice. The speaker met with the president of the United States this week. The two of them came out of the meeting relatively confident. I feel they both understand there is no choice. In the end of the day, we have to raise the debt ceiling. The question is, can the Republicans get something in the legislation, attach the debt ceiling legislation that they want that they feel like is a win and the Democrats are willing to give it to? Historically, that is what’s happened numerous times.

MARGARET BRENNAN:  Yeah. And the risk there is real. I want to ask you as well about China. Mark Warner was here with us last week and he said technology competition with China is the biggest issue of our time. He’s worried about things that- like your company does IBM, in terms of quantum computing. Is enough being done to keep America competitive on that front?

GARY COHN: Well, we’re starting you know, if you look at where we’ve been this year, you know, we passed the CHIPS Act in the United States, which, you know, is- is- is something that’s not a normal motion for us in the United States for the federal government to pick and choose–

MARGARET BRENNAN: To subsidize.

GARY COHN: –an industry, and and to subsidize. It really is not a normal action- is an action that, you know, historically I probably not would have been have supportive. I was extremely supportive of the CHIPS Act, we at IBM was extremely supportive of the CHIPS Act. If we learned nothing else from the pandemic, we learned that there are certain goods that are necessity goods for this country to have, and we are overly reliant on places like China. And if we don’t find ways to change the manufacturing system in the supply chain and move it back to the United States where we can take care of ourselves, we have made a catastrophic miscalculation. Chips are one of those areas where we cannot depend on the rest of the world and run our manufacturing business and continue to grow our economy. Pharmaceuticals is another area where we really have to move that industry and that manufacturing back to the United States. So I think we really have to evaluate what are the most crucial and sensitive businesses or industries that we cannot live within the United States. And we’re going to have to make real investments in those here in this country.

MARGARET BRENNAN: And we’ll keep talking about it with legislators. Have to figure out how to pass some of those laws. We’re going to take a quick break. And when we come back, we’ll be talking with four members of the freshman class and the 118th Congress.

[Transcript link]

Sunday Talks, House Intel Chairman Mike Turner Discusses Likely China Objectives with Massive Surveillance Balloon


Posted originally on the conservative tree house on February 5, 2023 | Sundance

House Select Committee on Intelligence (HPSCI), Chairman Mike Turner (R-OH) appears on Meet the Press to discuss his perspective on the motive of China to send a massive surveillance balloon over key U.S. military facilities.

According to Chairman Turner, it appears (a) the balloon was designed to capture some intelligence that satellites cannot; and (b) the flight path of the surveillance balloon was steered to cover areas housing key the strategic military bases and missile defenses. WATCH (Transcript Below):

CHUCK TODD: Joining me now is the Republican Chair of the House Intel Committee, Mike Turner of Ohio. Chairman Turner, welcome back to Meet the Press.

REP. MIKE TURNER: Good morning, Chuck.

CHUCK TODD: All right. Let me start with what you know here. So the decision to take this down – what more have you learned? And you’re part of the so-called Gang of Eight. I don’t think you guys have gotten a personal briefing, but I know staff has. What more can you tell us about the take-down operation?

REP. MIKE TURNER: Yeah. Well, clearly the president taking it down over the Atlantic is sort of like the quarterback—sort of like tackling the quarterback after the game is over. The satellite had completed its mission. This should never have been allowed to enter the United States, and it never should’ve been allowed to complete its mission. If you ask somebody to draw an X at every place where our sensitive missile defense sites, our nuclear weapons infrastructure, our nuclear weapon sites are, you would put them all along this path. Clearly, this was an attempt by China to gather information, to defeat our command and control of our sensitive missile defense and nuclear weapon sites. And that certainly is an urgency that this administration does not recognize.

CHUCK TODD: Do you think we should have a policy that just anything that enters our airspace that’s a balloon from China gets shot down immediately?

REP. MIKE TURNER: Well, first off, you have to understand this administration didn’t just fail here; they failed to prepare after the first time this happened during this administration. The administration has already admitted, which I’ve been briefed on, that China has done this before in the continental United States during this president’s tenure –

CHUCK TODD: When did that happen?

REP. MIKE TURNER: I – you have to let them release it; I can’t release classified information, but they can tell you.

CHUCK TODD: Were you also briefed on – there was apparently two or three incidents in the previous administration as well.

REP. MIKE TURNER: Well, that’s what they’re saying now. But I think that the administration needs to come forward, because this is not an ability to say that this is a crisis that was handed to them. This is a crisis that has developed as a result of this president during his administration allowing China to do a similar act before, not responding and then clearly in this one, not seeing the urgency of what was unfolding. I mean, the president allowed this to go across our most sensitive sites, and wasn’t even going to tell the American public. If you hadn’t broken this story, the American public would not have even known. There was no attempt to notify Congress, no attempt to put together the Gang of Eight. I think this administration lacks urgency.

CHUCK TODD: Do you – the Pentagon says that they were able to use some countermeasures that blocked or limited the ability of China to extract information from this balloon. Do you buy that?

REP. MIKE TURNER: No. And certainly you don’t either. Here’s the thing that’s interesting. The administration says there was nothing for them to gain here. This was quite a risk by China, quite a calculation that they would take a balloon, put it up in China, take it across the United States where it’s clearly going to be discoverable by us. They clearly had some information that they were trying to garner, that they can’t garner from space, so they did not have otherwise.

CHUCK TODD: What could that be? Have you – I mean what – you’re pretty familiar with this. What is it that they think they could have gotten from a balloon? Or what can be done with a balloon that can’t be done with a satellite?

REP. MIKE TURNER: Well, the key obviously is not just the balloon. The key is the payload that was attached to it, which you’ve reported is, you know, the size of three buses. That’s obviously huge. And it was being commanded and controlled by mainland China, and delivering data and information back to mainland China. Again, if you look at the path, and you put X’s where all of our sensitive missile defense and nuclear weapons facilities are, I believe that they were trying to gain information on how to defeat the command and control of our nuclear weapon systems and our missile defense systems. That’s a crisis. That certainly should’ve had an urgency to the president, and not just wait until this gets to the Atlantic to take it down.

CHUCK TODD: Do you at all accept – I mean, it sounds like he did put the order in on Wednesday to shoot it down, and then it’s the military that said, “Hey, it’s not safe yet.” Do you accept that?

REP. MIKE TURNER: Yeah, no. There’s no excuses here. When this first occurred last time during this administration — remember, this is the third year of this administration — they should have been preparing for this. They knew what this was. They know what the balloon is, what its capabilities, maneuverability is, from having observed previous actions by China. They should have been prepared. They seemed not only to be unprepared, but to even be waiting. You know, where is the balloon going to go? What are they trying to do? That’s not how you look at the actions of an adversary. China is a self-declared adversary. They are clearly expanding their military capabilities. They are tripling their nuclear weapons capabilities. They’re fielding hypersonic weapons, they’re expanding in space. In this instance, this president should’ve taken this as an urgency, and so should’ve our military. This should have been taken down before it entered the U.S. airspace, when it was over Alaska.

CHUCK TODD: This, there’s some sort of surveillance technology with this balloon. There’s been some speculation that it might have the capability of launching its own drone – sort of miniature drones to do extra surveillance. Do you know anything about that, or has there been any reports to confirm any of that?

REP. MIKE TURNER: No. I have not been briefed on that. But I can tell you — and we’re supposed to be briefed this week as to what we know. But I think what we can believe is that this administration says, “We don’t really know.” And if we don’t really know, how they keep telling the American public this is not a threat, that there was no need to act is just extraordinary to me. This administration does not understand the urgency of taking action to protect our national security –

CHUCK TODD: What do you believe the actual threat is right now? What is it that they’re trying to do? I mean, you see this as just a simple military exercise by the Chinese.

REP. MIKE TURNER: Absolutely. I mean, they didn’t go and look at the Grand Canyon; they went and looked at our nuclear weapon sites and the missile defense sites throughout the country. And whatever was in this humongous payload — I mean, there wasn’t a camera on this thing. I mean, I’m certain there were cameras, but at the same time, this was huge. The expanse that was there, and what they were trying to accomplish obviously was important enough to China to take the risk of something that was overt. This was not covert, this wasn’t secret. They did it in such a grand scale. They knew that the United States would know, and they did it anyway.

CHUCK TODD: So was it the right call for Secretary Blinken to postpone his trip?

REP. MIKE TURNER: Sure. But if you noticed – and I have a great deal of regard for Secretary Blinken – but if you notice, he didn’t cancel it until it was already public, and there was public scrutiny of the fact that he was going.

CHUCK TODD: Well, there’s some that argue that it shouldn’t have been canceled, that this should be immediately they – we should be immediately confronting them. What do you make of that idea?

REP. MIKE TURNER: What should’ve happened is the first time this happened during this administration, there should have been outrage. They should have addressed this with China. They should have prepared for when this balloon was coming. They should have understood that there was a great deal of risk at our national security. And they should have been prepared the moment this balloon was launched, because they knew what this was like, they knew what it was capable of, and they should have responded.

CHUCK TODD: So what now should be the American response here? What would you like to see going forward in our, in response to this incursion?

REP. MIKE TURNER: Well I – first off, the president needs to shift and understand that he has urgent national security matters. You can’t just act like nothing matters if it matters to our adversaries. If our adversaries think this is important, we need to thwart it and we need to respond. With respect to this balloon, obviously, you know, the administration’s indicated they’re going to try to collect whatever is left of having this strewn across the ocean to see what we can learn there. We’re going to find what signals intelligence that the administration might have been able to capture, and from that, understand what this was doing. But they need to make clear to all our adversaries, “You’re not going to get to come to the United States and take a tour of our most sensitive military sites and have a free shot.”

CHUCK TODD: How aggressive should we be about these balloons that are in the Western Hemisphere, not over our airspace, but we know there’s reports that there’s one of these balloons in Latin America right now?

REP. MIKE TURNER: Right. Well, I think all of these – if the administration had, when they became aware that China was deploying this capability, if they had been aggressive to determine how to capture them, how to exploit the technology, how to thwart the technology, we would be in a different place today. And I think, you know, the same is true for the other balloons that you’re seeing.

CHUCK TODD: All right, I’m going to – we’re running out of time – but before I let you go, you and others in the Gang of Eight have asked for a briefing on all of the classified documents that have been discovered from President Trump, President Biden, and Vice President Pence. Where are we on that?

REP. MIKE TURNER: You know, what’s striking about this, Chuck, is that the Biden administration told the American public that they raided Donald Trump’s home because it was a national security risk. But what we found in the intelligence community and in the intelligence committee is that the Biden administration had not engaged at all anyone who was in national security on the issue of threats from these documents. It took Congress to step in and say, “We want a security threat.” And then they tried to deny giving the briefing to us from that threat. What’s interesting is that the moment this balloon became public, I got a notice not from the administration that I’m going to get a briefing on this balloon, but they have to rush to Congress now to talk to us about Donald Trump’s documents. You can see they want to change the news.

CHUCK TODD: So you’re going to get a briefing on Trump’s documents, but –

REP. MIKE TURNER: There’s nothing scheduled on the balloon, but they’re scheduling Donald Trump.

CHUCK TODD: Anything on Biden or Pence?

REP. MIKE TURNER: It’s included, yes.

CHUCK TODD: That will all be included. When is that, this week?

REP. MIKE TURNER: Yes, it’s supposed to be this week. We’ll see whether or not the balloon happens first. It certainly should. Again, urgency. This administration needs to understand we do have national security urgent matters.

CHUCK TODD: Mike Turner, Chair of the House Intel Committee, Republican from Ohio.

REP. MIKE TURNER:Thank you.

CHUCK TODD: Thanks for coming in, sharing your perspective with us —

REP. MIKE TURNER: Thank you.

Only in America


Armstrong Economics Blog/Politics Re-Posted Feb 5, 2023 by Martin Armstrong

Only in America where we have Democratic politicians preaching about the greed of the rich at a $10,000.00 a plate campaign fund-raising event held at John Kerry’s home. Yes it was $10,000 to get in.

Categories: Politics

DNC Approves Obama, Clyburn Plan for South Carolina to Lead 2024 Democrat Presidential Primary, Media Call It “The Biden Plan”


Posted originally on the CTH on February 5, 2023 | Sundance

In the last several weeks I have been saying to watch the state of South Carolina for how both Republican and Democrats wings of the UniParty, RNC and DNC respectively, plan to use South Carolina as the mechanism for the 2024 illusion of choice.  What I call the RNC and DNC roadmaps.

Essentially the RNC/DNC constructs are the roadmaps, from the club system – two private corporations, to control the 2024 primary election outcomes.

This is all about controlling the mechanisms of elections and creating the illusion of choice while the invisible hands of the club officers control the operations.

You might remember how South Carolina was the inflection point for Biden in the 2020 primary.  It was the SC primary when former President Obama (Black Lives Matter) and Congressman James Clyburn (AME Church network), aligned to select Joe Biden as the control mechanism to ensure Bernie Sanders was defeated.

Team Obama was operating with a sense of urgency because momentum was with Sanders and all other candidates including Biden were fractured.

Obama and Clyburn selected Biden due to his ability to be controlled.  Most of the Obama administration now operates inside the Biden administration controlling the outcomes.   Part of the ‘what’s in it for me’ aspect from Clyburn was the promise of increased influence and affluence.  Including the pre-approval, first right of refusal for the Biden VP pick (ultimately Kamala Harris).

For 2024 the movement of South Carolina is being pushed to the base voters of the DNC through the social justice narrative about needing a more diverse state for the first DNC primary contest.  No good Democrat political activists can counter that culturally approved party position.  Predominately white states are bad, more diverse states are good. Thus, under this “diversity” premise, there can be no opposition or dissent from the party base.  The justification is a political minefield.

However, that said, that justification is a ruse, a pretense intended to cloud and protect the Club roadmap.  In reality, team Obama are fulfilling the prior pledge to James Clyburn.

Obama got to choose the 2020 candidate based on his Obama’s needs to protect himself from scrutiny, and now Clyburn gets the 2024 power position to select the next nominee.

That’s the non-pretending reality that everyone will say is ‘conspiracy theory’, it isn’t.

The RNC club roadmap for Ron DeSantis is also looking to South Carolina, New Hampshire and Georgia as control mechanisms to stop President Trump from winning the nomination.   This has been part of a plan in the works for a long time (mid 2021).  The Nikki Haley and Tim Scott operations in South Carolina are part of the strategy; along with Chris Sununu in New Hampshire (despite backpedaling caused by CTH sunlight).   Brian Kemp is being leveraged in Georgia, and within the big picture push overall, the establishment is leveraging the Republican Governor’s Association (RGA) as an institution to have a much bigger role in 2024.  Just keep watching.

PHILADELPHIA — Democrats on Saturday voted overwhelmingly to remake the party’s presidential nominating calendar, embracing President Biden’s push for South Carolina to be the first state to hold its contest in 2024 and replacing Iowa amid calls for greater racial, geographic and economic diversity in the process.

The move by members of the Democratic National Committee was long expected, but it does not guarantee the calendar will ultimately be enacted as designed. In December, Biden asked DNC leaders to move up South Carolina, which sealed his comeback victory in the 2020 Democratic primary, to the first slot. Under the new plan, New Hampshire and Nevada would hold their primaries a week later, followed by primaries in Georgia and Michigan.

The vote here Saturday morning came at the DNC winter meeting, where Biden and Vice President Harris spoke Friday to some of the party’s most active members from across the country. Biden, who has yet to officially announce his reelection plans but has said he intends to run for a second term, was greeted by cheers of “four more years” as he took the stage.

[…] Iowa, a state that has an overwhelmingly White population, drew criticism during the 2020 Democratic primary for its lack of diversity and the inaccessibility of its caucuses, which are held on a winter weekday night and pose participation barriers for those who may have work, are disabled or have other obligations. In 2020, the Iowa Democratic Party also struggled to tabulate the results, leading to more criticism of their caucus system.

With South Carolina, the state that resuscitated Biden’s presidential bid in 2020, Democrats are elevating the role Black voters, a crucial voting bloc for the party across the country, will play in selecting the party’s nominee. “This calendar does what is long overdue,” DNC Chair Jaime Harrison said before the vote. “It expands the number of voices in the early window, and it elevates diverse communities that are at the core of the Democratic Party. (read more)

If the private corporation known as the DNC can overcome the New Hampshire legislative challenges, that puts California Governor Gavin Newsom at a disadvantage because the DNC Club is deferring to James Clyburn.  Congressman Clyburn will select a racially qualified non-white candidate, likely female, to win the first set of state contests.  The corporate apparatus will circle the wagons in favor of that candidate (it will not be Biden).

If the DNC club cannot overcome the legal and legislative challenges (New Hampshire example), then Gavin Newsom is more likely to gain DNC boardroom support.  It depends on how well the corporation can Lawfare their interests into position.

On the private corporation side of the RNC, the billionaire class, multinationals, Wall Street and corporate establishment control officers have already pre-selected Ron DeSantis to play the role of Jeb! in 2024.

The RNC wants the money, and the billionaires, multinationals and Wall Street will be perfectly okay with the DNC selection because the RNC is not ideological.

From their perspective inside the RNC club, it doesn’t matter who wins; just as they were similarly positioned, unaffected and ambivalent in supporting Hillary ’16.

For both the RNC and DNC this is about the illusion of choice (for voters) and ultimately a controlled outcome (for DC).   Once people finally make this reality part of their analysis, things really start to get clear.

If you doubt this is the reality of the 2024 situation, collect the data, apply the scientific method and prove this is not a controlled outcome.  You won’t be able to do it, because there are already too many aligned receipts visible from the DeSantis management operation.  It is from those receipts that predictions, essentially tripwires, are able to be constructed.  The formality of the plan is how and why the South Carolina tripwire was predicted months ago.

The exact same conservative media from the ’16 Ted Cruz assembly will be supporting the DeSantis operation in 2024; most already are.  Additionally, with the help of the professional management and branding group, a massive psychological operation on behalf of RdS began over a year ago.  This is a UniParty script already written, with only one big disruption in the way….

That disruption has two elements.  The first is Donald J Trump; the second is YOU.

Wait, What? – Tucker Carlson Discusses Details and Questions of Chinese Spy Balloons


Posted originally on the CTH on February 3, 2023 | Sundance 

Apparently, the Chinese spy balloon isn’t the first.  Additionally, according to the Pentagon, there are several more floating around over various countries.  All of that said, what exactly is going on here and why doesn’t anyone just get rid of it?

These and other questions are posed by Tucker Carlson who seems as confused as anyone else about what exactly the nature of these Chinese Balloon things are all about.  WATCH:

It does seem a little silly that our entire media apparatus is fixated on a Chinese balloon which could simply be destroyed if that was what the U.S. government really wanted to do.  It’s all a little odd at this point…

I mean, what the heck else is going on while everyone is fixated on this balloon.

WASHINGTON DC – Not everyone in Washington is freaking out about the suspected Chinese spy balloon flying high over the United States. Some former officials say it’s giving U.S. diplomats exactly what they need: more leverage over Beijing.

The Chinese airship forced the U.S. military to scramble fighter jets, prompted lawmakers to demand answers from the Biden administration and led Secretary of State Antony Blinken to indefinitely postpone his trip to Beijing this weekend.

But Blinken was going to China without much hope of getting concessions on major issues such as Beijing’s support for Russia’s war on Ukraine, its human rights abuses or its threats to Taiwan. Now, some former officials who’ve worked on international negotiations say he may be in a stronger position, though that advantage may fade over time.

“This event definitely strengthens the hands of the United States,” said Heather McMahon, a former senior director at the President’s Intelligence Advisory Board. “Anytime an espionage operation is exposed, [it] gives the advantage to the targeted nation.”

Blinken was preparing to see top officials in China on Sunday and Monday in a follow-up to President Joe Biden’s meeting with Chinese paramount leader Xi Jinping in Bali in November. At the time, Biden pledged to “maintain open lines of communication” with Beijing amid worsening bilateral tensions.

The Pentagon’s announcement Thursday of an alleged Chinese surveillance balloon hovering over Montana changed that plan. In canceling Blinken’s trip, at least for now, the State Department said the incident “would have narrowed the agenda in a way that would have been unhelpful and unconstructive.” (read more)

According to the Politico ‘spin’, the appearance of the balloon is a good thing.

President Trump Delivers Subtle Advice to Joe Biden on How to Handle Chinese “Spy Balloon”


Posted originally on the CTH on February 3, 2023 | Sundance 

In his customarily subtle way, where ‘subtle’ is like a brick through a window, President Trump delivers advice to Joe Biden about how to deal with Chinese Chairman Xi Jinping’s spy balloon:

“SHOOT DOWN THE BALLOON!”

Personally, I like the added emphasis with the exclamation point.  However, now that President Trump has recommended this approach, the Biden team have to take shooting down the balloon off the table – or else they will look like they are following Trump’s advice. lolol

Some days I just miss the way he says, Chy-na.

Shawn Farash has some fun with this below:

Beyond Hubris – Joe Biden Says He Takes No Blame for Inflation


Posted originally on the CTH on February 3, 2023 | Sundance

Not only does the buck not stop with Biden, the installed occupant of the White House refuses to admit the buck even started with him. It did!

During remarks to the press today, even Brian Deese looked stunned as Joe Biden incredulously claimed he didn’t cause the rampant inflation that is crushing middle class Americans. Oh, he started it alright…. He not only started it, but he also created it.

The combination of the January 2021 immediate move to block any domestic energy development, in combination with the April 2021 unneeded explosion of deficit spending triggered both a supply side and demand side inflationary impact; with the former continuing to put massive upward pressure on prices still. WATCH:

The lies from the lying, liar who lies, just flow so easily from his mouth.

A pox on all their houses.

Marjorie Taylor Greene on Ukraine, Speakership Fallout, Big Tech, CIA/FBI and More | SYSTEM UPDATE #33


Glenn Greenwald published originally on Rumble on: Feb 1, 7:00 pm EST