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The US Government Sees Silicon Valley As Part Of Its Propaganda Machine

how revealing is it that someone could be forbidden by the White House from purchasing a giant social media company on the grounds that they’re not sufficiently hostile toward Moscow?

 As far as the US empire is concerned, Silicon Valley is just an arm of the imperial propaganda machine. 

 the White House summoned top social media influencers to a briefing in which they were instructed how to talk about the Ukraine war.

Silicon Valley is being used to manipulate the way people think about world events via algorithm manipulation, censorship, and sophisticated information ops like Wikipedia in an entirely unprecedented way that is becoming more and more important to imperial control as the old media give way to the new. 

 https://caitlinjohnstone.substack.com/p/the-us-government-sees-silicon-valley Caitlin Johnstone, Oct 22

The Biden administration is reportedly considering opening a national security review of Elon Musk’s business ventures which could see the plutocrat’s purchase of Twitter blocked by the White House, in part because Musk is perceived as having an “increasingly Russia-friendly stance.”

Bloomberg reports:

Biden administration officials are discussing whether the US should subject some of Elon Musk’s ventures to national security reviews, including the deal for Twitter Inc. and SpaceX’s Starlink satellite network, according to people familiar with the matter.

US officials have grown uncomfortable over Musk’s recent threat to stop supplying the Starlink satellite service to Ukraine — he said it had cost him $80 million so far — and what they see as his increasingly Russia-friendly stance following a series of tweets that outlined peace proposals favorable to President Vladimir Putin. They are also concerned by his plans to buy Twitter with a group of foreign investors.

The “group of foreign investors” the Biden administration is reportedly worried about oddly includes Prince Alwaleed bin Talal of Saudi Arabia, who has already been a massive Twitter shareholder for years. The White House certainly never had a problem with foreign investors there before.

“Officials in the US government and intelligence community are weighing what tools, if any, are available that would allow the federal government to review Musk’s ventures,” Bloomberg writes. “One possibility is through the law governing the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States [CFIUS] to review Musk’s deals and operations for national security risks, they said.”

“Musk, the world’s richest person, has taken to Twitter in recent weeks to announce proposals to end Russia’s war and threaten to cut financial support for Starlink internet in Ukraine,” says Bloomberg. “His tweets and public comments have frustrated officials in the US and Europe and drawn praise from America’s rivals.”

“If the Twitter acquisition was to be reviewed by CFIUS for national security reasons, the agency could recommend to President Biden that he nix the deal — something Musk himself has tried and failed to do in recent months,” writes Business Insider’s Kate Duffy on the Bloomberg scoop.

Indeed Musk has already indicated that he’d find it funny if the Biden administration blocked his purchase of Twitter, a $44 billion buy that the Tesla executive has made every legal effort to back out of. But how revealing is it that someone could be forbidden by the White House from purchasing a giant social media company on the grounds that they’re not sufficiently hostile toward Moscow?

Neither Bloomberg nor any other mainstream members of the imperial commentariat appear to take any interest in the jarring notion that the US government could end up banning the purchase of an online platform because it views the purchaser as having an unacceptably “Russia-friendly stance.” Not only is it uncritically accepted that the US government mustn’t allow the purchase of a social media company if the would-be buyer isn’t deemed adequately hostile to US enemies, many mainstream liberals are actively cheering for this outcome:

This just says so much about how the US government views the function of Silicon Valley megacorporations, and why it has been exerting more and more pressure on them to collaborate with the empire to greater and greater degrees of intimacy. As far as the US empire is concerned, Silicon Valley is just an arm of the imperial propaganda machine. And empire apologists believe that’s as it should be.

None of this will come as a surprise to anyone who’s been paying attention to things like the drastic escalations in online censorship since the war in Ukraine began, including on Twitter, or the ongoing expansion of internet censorship protocols that were already well underway before this war started. It will also come as no surprise to people whose ears pricked up when the White House summoned top social media influencers to a briefing in which they were instructed how to talk about the Ukraine war. It will also come as no surprise to those who paid attention to the public outcry when it was discovered that the Biden administration was assembling a “disinformation governance board” to function as an official Ministry of Truth for online content, or when the White House admitted to flagging “problematic posts” for Facebook to take down, or when Mark Zuckerberg admitted that the censorship of the Hunter Biden laptop October surprise in the last presidential race was done in conjunction with the FBI.

It is abundantly clear to anyone paying attention that Silicon Valley tech companies are a major part of the imperial narrative control system. The US empire has invested in soft power to an exponentially greater degree than any other empire in history, and has refined the science of mass-scale psychological manipulation to produce the mightiest propaganda machine since the dawn of civilization. Silicon Valley is being used to manipulate the way people think about world events via algorithm manipulation, censorship, and sophisticated information ops like Wikipedia in an entirely unprecedented way that is becoming more and more important to imperial control as the old media give way to the new. 

Narrative control centers like Silicon Valley, the news media and Hollywood are just as crucial for US imperial domination as the military. That the US government is weighing intervention to stop the purchase of an online platform, because it lacks confidence that the would-be owner would reliably advance US information interests, is just the latest glimpse behind the veil at the imperial agenda to control human understanding and perception. 

October 23, 2022 Posted by | media, USA | Leave a comment

US could directly intervene in Ukraine – ex-CIA chief

Rt.com 23 Oct 22, The US and its allies may join the conflict between Moscow and Kiev even if there is no threat to NATO, David Petraeus believes.

The US and its allies might directly intervene in the ongoing conflict between Moscow and Kiev, even if there is no threat to any NATO member states, retired US Army general David Petraeus told France’s L’Express weekly on Saturday.

Washington might form a new coalition of the willing in such a scenario and use it instead of NATO, Petraeus, who also briefly served as the CIA director, believes.

Russia could take some actions in Ukraine that would be “so shocking and so horrific” that it would prompt a response from the US and other nations, he said, adding that they “might react in one way or another, but as a multinational force led by the US and not as a NATO force.”

The military alliance would still likely be bound by its treaty and would only join the conflict if Article 5 is invoked, i.e. if one of its members is attacked, the general believes. Petraeus also said that Moscow is not interested in escalating the conflict and turning it into a global war. A wider conflict is “the last thing” Russian President Vladimir Putin needs right now, he added……………………………. https://www.rt.com/news/565160-petraeus-us-intervene-ukraine-conflict/

October 23, 2022 Posted by | USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

The Nuclear Site That Can’t Be Cleaned Up

‘Atomic Days: The Untold Story of the Most Toxic Place in America’ exposes the story of a Washington state complex that poses dangers that—like the nuclear industry itself—cannot be contained.

 https://portside.org/2022-10-23/nuclear-site-cant-be-cleaned October 23, 2022 Ron Jacobs , In what I consider to be something between coincidence and synchronicity, I began reading journalist Joshua Frank’s newest book on the dangers of the Hanford Nuclear Reservation, Atomic Days: The Untold Story of the Most Toxic Place in America, the day after the California state legislature extended the Diablo Canyon Nuclear Power Plant’s license to operate for another five years. 

Back in 1981, I spent a few days in jail for protesting the opening of the Diablo plant as part of a direct action initiative called by the Abalone Alliance, an anti-nuclear advocacy group. We were reasonably concerned about the dangers it could pose: For starters, it was built on an earthquake fault. Then there’s the question of nuclear waste disposal, the impacts these sites have on the water sources, and the industry’s relationship to the building and stockpiling of nuclear weapons.

Frank’s in-depth reporting of the Hanford site illuminates similar threats to those posed by Diablo and other nuclear plants. Constructed beginning in the spring of 1943, the Washington state nuclear production complex was built to create and stockpile plutonium and purified uranium for weapons of war. The site was chosen for its remoteness and ease of access to one of North America’s great rivers, the Columbia. Empowered by the War Powers Act of 1941, the United States government took the land from residents who lived, fished, and farmed there—descendants of settlers and Indigenous people alike—and developed it to serve as a plutonium processing plant for the Manhattan Project.

Like so much of the nuclear bomb project in its early years, the construction of the Hanford site involved dangerous shortcuts. The rationale given had to do with the war engulfing the world and the United States’ rush to develop a nuclear weapon, the desire to cut costs in that development, as well as the lack of practical knowledge among the scientists and engineers involved. Naturally, like virtually every other industrial element of war-making in the United States, the bulk of the research, development, and construction of nuclear weapons, even at these early stages, was privatized.  

In fact, as Frank describes in his book, the Army Corps of Engineers lieutenant general in charge of the Manhattan Project, Leslie Groves, contracted with the DuPont Corporation to find a suitable site for the processing plant that ended up in Hanford. As Frank explains, a consistent theme is the sacrificing of safety for the sake of profit. Even so, many if not most of the contracts exceeded the original contract costs by millions.

Atomic Days also discusses the cleanup of the Hanford Reservation; a process that officially began in 1989. As Frank carefully documents, not only has this cleanup been less than successful, it has often created a bigger mess than that which it was supposedly cleaning up. In addition, the way the process is being done almost guarantees cost overruns and a task that will never be complete. Much of this is traceable back to the original construction of the site, especially of the nuclear waste storage containers. Once they started leaking, the task became one of how to stop the leakage and prevent more from occurring. In response, plans were designed to create a waste treatment plant. Like so much else associated with the nuclear industry, and Hanford in particular, this led to more dangers. Once again, many of these risks could have been avoided if profit were not the primary motive. 

Frank relates tales of scientists being ignored after warning management that the fixes it preferred were not workable in the long term. He writes about a culture of fear inside the project—a culture fed by the employees’ sense of allegiance to their nation and the importance of their role in defending that nation. It is this allegiance that is manipulated by corporate interests into something close to its opposite. It is also a part of the basis for employees ignoring safety protocols at their own risk and poisoning themselves and the environment surrounding Hanford. As is the case in many government and corporate cultures, whistleblowers are punished and silenced. This allegiance was not always limited to the workers inside, many residents of nearby towns refused to believe reports of radioactive material being released and accidentally leaking when the reports first came out.

As if to verify Frank’s assertions, I lived in western Washington for seven years (1985-1992) and knew very little of the dangers. With the exception of a couple friends who were scientists and antinuclear activists, most locals knew less than I did. A friend who grew up in Kennewick, Washington, a town just a few miles away from Hanford, would argue with me, convinced that the site was completely safe, even though people he knew who had worked there were diagnosed with cancer in their thirties. 

The Hanford Nuclear Reservation is testament to the war machine’s inhumanity. The fact that its primary purpose was the production of an element that remains deadly poisonous to humans and other life forms for tens of thousands of years is a damning testament to the suicidal nature of too many human pursuits. In writing Atomic Days, author Joshua Frank has done a great public service. The fact that he has done so in a narrative style that is both accessible and instructive makes one hope his story will be read by many.  

October 23, 2022 Posted by | environment, USA | Leave a comment

Biden’s diplomatic nuclear faux pas regarding Pakistan

US President brought up Pakistan’s nuclear programme with shockingly undiplomatic language

Express Tribune Ozer Khalid October 21, 2022

At a Congressional Campaign Committee reception in Los Angeles on October 14, US President Joe Biden brought up Pakistan’s nuclear programme with shockingly undiplomatic language. He mentioned Pakistan twice at the public form first vis-à-vis China, then stating that Pakistan is “one of the most dangerous nations in the world” which has “nuclear weapons without any cohesion”.

Tragically, these were not off-the-cuff remarks and ramblings, as an official White House transcript indicated President Biden meant what he said, leading to strong rebuttals from PM Shehbaz Sharif and FM Bilawal Bhutto-Zardari and a demarche by the Pakistan’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs.

Biden’s remarks lacked explanation, context and coherence. Ely Ratner, US Assistant Secretary of Defense, last month reminded that “US interests associated with defense partnership with Pakistan were primarily focused on counterterrorism and nuclear security”.

Given Washington’s mounting rivalry vis-à-vis Russia and China, it could be that Biden’s comment was a veiled threat at isolating Pakistan if it continued to pursue rapprochement with Moscow and Beijing. If so, it would be déjà vu of the ‘either you are with us or against us’ ultimatum issued by George W Bush post-9/11. Whatever his intentions, it was irresponsible of Biden to leverage regional-bloc politics to make unsubstantiated remarks about Pakistan’s secure nukes…………………..

Pakistan ill-deserves such unwarranted remarks given its impeccable nuclear stewardship with the Strategic Plans Division and diligent adherence to international IAEA best practices.

The Nuclear Threat Initiative (NTI) report ranked Pakistan as the most “improved country” on Safety and Security of Nuclear Assets, ahead of India. Pakistan demonstrated exemplary restraint and sangfroid in response to India’s “accidental” firing of a BrahMos cruise missile that landed across the border in March, 2022. The BrahMos incident was a clear violation of global nuclear safeguards for which India faced no accountability.


In March 2022, an International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) mission confirmed that Pakistan’s updated nuclear safety regulations by the Pakistan Nuclear Regulatory Authority strengthened its nuclear and radiation safety. This includes the modernisation of Pakistan’s National Radiation Emergency Coordination Centre (NRECC) which strengthens Pakistan’s ability to respond to a nuclear or radiological emergency.

At the request of the Government of Pakistan, the IAEA’s Integrated Regulatory Review Service confirmed the country’s strengthening arrangements for regulatory inspections, authorisations, emergency preparedness and response, occupational radiation protection and environmental radiation monitoring.

The IAEA confirmed safety of Pakistan’s five civilian operating nuclear power reactors and that the country successfully implemented all 13 recommendations adequately addressing 29 out of 31 suggestions.

For President Biden to single out a responsible nuclear steward like Pakistan, with resilient nuclear safeguards, commands and controls in place with no reported incidents, while remaining conspicuously silent on serious incidents from India raises consternation……………………………………………………………… more https://tribune.com.pk/story/2382629/bidens-diplomatic-nuclear-faux-pas

October 21, 2022 Posted by | politics international, USA | Leave a comment

Golden Rule sails for peace to Burlington: ‘If we do nothing, we go nowhere’

Michaele Niehaus, The Hawk Eye, 21 Oct 22,

A group of about 20 southeast Iowa residents and city officials gathered Thursday near the Port of Burlington to welcome the Golden Rule and its crew, as well as recognize the importance of activism and kindness.

The refurbished, 64-year-old, 34-foot wooden sailboat has been navigating the shallowing waters of the Upper Mississippi River for the past month to spread a message of peaceful activism. It is carrying on its mission of worldwide nuclear disarmament that began in 1958, when a group of Quakers set sail from Hawaii to the Marshall Islands in protest of the nuclear weapons testing that was taking place there.

The sailboat never made it there, and the crew were arrested while en route.

Their mission and arrests spurred an attempt to sail a 50-foot boat there by Earle Reynolds, a doctor who was investigating the effects of ionizing material on the children of Hiroshima.

“So (Reynolds and his family) sailed down there and this guy got arrested. So between the two trials, his trial and the Golden Rule trial, there was enough national press to reach the president’s attention, and in the year that his family sailed, the president stopped testing under the provision that the USSR would stop testing. And so eventually things carried on and it ended up with John F. Kennedy signing the test ban treaty,” first mate Stephen Buck told The Hawk Eye from inside the cabin while holding a copy of Reynolds’ book, “The Forbidden Voyage.”

While the trials received much attention, the Golden Rule itself did not. It wasn’t until it sunk in Northern California’s Humbolt Bay in 2010 that its mission was resumed by Veterans for Peace, who were instrumental in the five-year effort to refurbish the ketch.

“We’re carrying on the original mission, which was an urgent need to stop bomb testing in the Pacific, above ground, in the air. And they were sending significant pollution of radioactive material to people who populated the Pacific, poisoning the land, poisoning the food, and those people are still here,” Buck said………………………………………………………….

Captain Kiko Johnston-Kitazawa noted the progress made on lessening the number of nuclear weapons and nuclear testing, but said the problem has not gone away.

“The last few years, all the bigger countries are bragging about, oh, we’ve got a bigger, more destructive (weapons) and we’re going to use it, so it’s time to pay attention again,” he said, noting that progress can be made through activism, such as with the Golden Rule, as well as on an individual level. “If we all continuously try to be the kind of people who treat every other person kindly, that grows into communities and countries likewise, and that is how you eliminate the root causes of war, so both are important.”…………………………………………………………..

The Golden Rule’s progress can be followed by visiting share.garmin.com/goldenrule, and those wishing to join its crew for a day or longer can apply by visiting vfpgoldenrule.org/crew-application/.  https://www.thehawkeye.com/story/news/local/2022/10/21/golden-rule-sailboat-brings-nuclear-disarmament-message-to-burlington/69569236007/

October 21, 2022 Posted by | USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

U.S. Nuclear Reactors Among The Oldest In The World

Forbes, Katharina Buchholz 21 Oct 22,

The latest edition of the World Nuclear Industry Status Report shows that U.S. nuclear power plants are among the oldest in the world. The country’s 92 reactors currently in operation have a mean age of 41.6 years. The only nuclear fleets in the world that are older are those of Switzerland (46.3 years) and Belgium (42.3 years). However, these programs are a lot smaller than the United States’, which is currently the largest in the world. Also older are the singular reactors in use in Armenia and the Netherlands.

The U.S. was among the first commercial adopters of nuclear energy in the 1950s, explaining the number of aging reactors today. A building boom between the 1960s and 1970s created today’s nuclear power plants in the United States. Of the five reactors completed in the 1990s and the one finished in 2016, all were holdovers of delayed construction projects from the 1970s experiencing roadblocks due to regulatory problems and mounting opposition to nuclear energy.

The opposition the nuclear power industry has faced as well as the nuclear accident at Three Mile Island in 1979 ultimately caused the fact that today, the most recent construction start date of a completed U.S. nuclear reactor is 1978. ………………………………………………

U.S. construction woes

The U.S. meanwhile remains one of only 15 countries which the World Nuclear Industry Status Report lists as actively pursuing nuclear energy. Two new reactors were started at Vogtle power plant in Georgia in 2013 but have not yet been completed. The approval process was lengthy in the aftermath of the Fukushima disaster and delays continued after the groundbreaking, culminating in the bankruptcy of the reactor construction company. The U.S. government stepped in with a loan so that the project would be finished. One of the units is expected to become operational shortly around 17 years after its initial proposal.

The construction of two reactors in Utah is scheduled to begin next year and finish in 2030, after the proposal had already been introduced in 2007. Additionally, company NuScale is expected to build six small reactors in Idaho by 2030 using a new modular technology. Looking at past delays, however, the accuracy of these timelines as well as the ability of nuclear power to remedy current energy woes quickly or significantly—in the U.S. and elsewhere—is likely limited. While opposition to nuclear energy has softened given the current crisis, large parts of the population continue to reject it and local opposition to new projects will doubtlessly be as fierce as ever.  https://www.forbes.com/sites/christinero/2022/10/21/the-generational-divide-over-nuclear-power/?sh=5d8d990a6b13

October 21, 2022 Posted by | safety, USA | Leave a comment

Archbishop renews call for dialogue on ridding world of nuclear weapons

BY CATHOLIC NEWS SERVICE Albuquerque, N.M. — October 19, 2022,

The world still has not learned “the essential lesson” of the Cuban Missile Crisis that “the only way to eliminate the nuclear danger is through careful, universal, verifiable steps to eliminate nuclear weapons,” said Archbishop John C. Wester of Santa Fe, New Mexico.

“It is the very nature of these weapons that the possession of any nuclear weapons is an existential danger to all,” he said. “And Pope Francis has been explicitly clear that ‘the possessing of nuclear weapons is immoral.'”

He renewed his call “for dialogue on the existential issue of eliminating nuclear weapons” and said New Mexico’s congressional delegation should help lead this dialogue,” given that the federal government spends billions in the state on weapons production while New Mexico “remains mired at the bottom of numerous socioeconomic indicators.”

st nuclear war Aug. 9, 2017. (CNS photo/Eduardo Munoz, Reuters)

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The world still has not learned “the essential lesson” of the Cuban Missile Crisis that “the only way to eliminate the nuclear danger is through careful, universal, verifiable steps to eliminate nuclear weapons,” said Archbishop John C. Wester of Santa Fe, New Mexico.

“It is the very nature of these weapons that the possession of any nuclear weapons is an existential danger to all,” he said. “And Pope Francis has been explicitly clear that ‘the possessing of nuclear weapons is immoral.'”

He renewed his call “for dialogue on the existential issue of eliminating nuclear weapons” and said New Mexico’s congressional delegation should help lead this dialogue,” given that the federal government spends billions in the state on weapons production while New Mexico “remains mired at the bottom of numerous socioeconomic indicators.”

Wester made the comments in an Oct. 14 reflection on the 60th anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis, “regarded as the closest that humanity has ever come to global nuclear annihilation,” he said.

A month earlier, he took his summons to begin meaningful conversations to achieve full nuclear disarmament to the annual United Nations prayer service in New York.

In August, he apologized for the atomic bombings of Japan in 1945 and to Indigenous New Mexicans, uranium miners and scientists suffering from ill health related to the nuclear weapons industry in the state.

He also released a pastoral letter Jan. 11: “Living in the Light of Christ’s Peace: A Conversation Toward Nuclear Disarmament.”……………………..

“Robert McNamara, defense secretary under President Kennedy, said that we survived the Cuban Missile Crisis only by plain dumb luck,” Wester said. “In my own childhood, I had to practice the futile exercise of ‘duck and cover’ in school.”

“It deeply pains me to think of young boys and girls growing up today with renewed nuclear threats that should have been decisively dealt with and resolved 60 years ago,” he added.

st nuclear war Aug. 9, 2017. (CNS photo/Eduardo Munoz, Reuters)

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Albuquerque, N.M. — October 19, 2022

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The world still has not learned “the essential lesson” of the Cuban Missile Crisis that “the only way to eliminate the nuclear danger is through careful, universal, verifiable steps to eliminate nuclear weapons,” said Archbishop John C. Wester of Santa Fe, New Mexico.

“It is the very nature of these weapons that the possession of any nuclear weapons is an existential danger to all,” he said. “And Pope Francis has been explicitly clear that ‘the possessing of nuclear weapons is immoral.'”

He renewed his call “for dialogue on the existential issue of eliminating nuclear weapons” and said New Mexico’s congressional delegation should help lead this dialogue,” given that the federal government spends billions in the state on weapons production while New Mexico “remains mired at the bottom of numerous socioeconomic indicators.”

Wester made the comments in an Oct. 14 reflection on the 60th anniversary of the Cuban Missile Crisis, “regarded as the closest that humanity has ever come to global nuclear annihilation,” he said.

A month earlier, he took his summons to begin meaningful conversations to achieve full nuclear disarmament to the annual United Nations prayer service in New York.

In August, he apologized for the atomic bombings of Japan in 1945 and to Indigenous New Mexicans, uranium miners and scientists suffering from ill health related to the nuclear weapons industry in the state.

He also released a pastoral letter Jan. 11: “Living in the Light of Christ’s Peace: A Conversation Toward Nuclear Disarmament.”

For 13 days in October 1962, President John F. Kennedy convened a small group of senior officials to debate how to address the newly discovered presence of Soviet nuclear-armed missiles in Cuba, which is just 90 miles from the United States.

Some in the group wanted a military solution, such as an invasion or air strikes, and others sought a diplomatic solution to remove the missiles. The U.S. eventually agreed to Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev’s offer to remove the Cuban missiles in exchange for the U.S. promising not to invade Cuba.

Now, 60 years later, President Joe Biden “is invoking that dreaded name of Armageddon to describe what could potentially occur in the crisis over Ukraine,” Wester said.

Biden was responding to suggestions by Russian President Vladimir Putin that possibly tactical nuclear weapons could be used in Russia’s war against Ukraine.

“Robert McNamara, defense secretary under President Kennedy, said that we survived the Cuban Missile Crisis only by plain dumb luck,” Wester said. “In my own childhood, I had to practice the futile exercise of ‘duck and cover’ in school.”

“It deeply pains me to think of young boys and girls growing up today with renewed nuclear threats that should have been decisively dealt with and resolved 60 years ago,” he added.
 

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That the world’s nuclear weapons states “have no intention to honor their pledge to eliminate nuclear weapons,” he said, “is made abundantly clear yet again by the failure of the recent Review Conference of the (Nuclear) Non-Proliferation Treaty to make any progress whatsoever toward global nuclear disarmament.”

“Yet the U.S. and other nuclear weapons powers sternly denounce the new Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons, which the Vatican was the first nation-state to sign,” he said.

Wester said the nuclear powers’ alternative to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty is investing “trillions of dollars … into so-called ‘modernization’ programs that will keep nuclear weapons forever.”

They “intentionally ignore” the treaty’s “50-year-old obligation to enter into serious negotiations leading to nuclear disarmament,” he added.

Investing in such modernization programs helps fuel “a new nuclear arms race” and “robs society of resources that could help humanity achieve its full potential” in many areas, including education, health care and addressing climate change, Wester said.

It will be “extremely hard work” to abolish nuclear weapons and have this “concretely verified,” he said, but humanity cannot “continue to survive with nuclear weapons.”…………

He said the Archdiocese of Santa Fe has “a special responsibility” to “help lead humanity toward nuclear weapons abolition.”

“More money is spent on nuclear weapons research and production in the Archdiocese of Santa Fe than any other diocese in the country because of the Los Alamos and Sandia National Laboratories,” he explained.

Perhaps these labs provide “new verification technologies that could help underpin a future world free of nuclear weapons,” he suggested.

“Congress should have the courage to begin to help lead us toward a future world free of nuclear weapons,” Wester said. “In particular, I call upon the New Mexican congressional delegation to end their support for unneeded, exorbitantly expensive plutonium pit production for nuclear weapons.”

He said New Mexico’s congressional members tout expanding nuclear weapons production programs as jobs programs, but these federal dollars “appear to stay in privileged enclaves” of the state, he noted, while New Mexico has the most children living in poverty and declining per capita income relative to the other 49 states.  https://www.ncronline.org/news/archbishop-renews-call-dialogue-ridding-world-nuclear-weapons

October 19, 2022 Posted by | Religion and ethics, USA | Leave a comment

An Elementary School Near a Nuclear Dump Site Is Teeming With Radioactivity

A recent analysis found dangerous, radioactive compounds at levels as high as 22 times background rates on the Missouri school’s grounds.

Gizmodo By Lauren Leffer 17 Oct 22, [good map and aerial view]

Dangerous, radioactive particles are all over an elementary school in suburban St. Louis, according to a recently published analysis by Boston Chemical Data Corp.

The testing follows an earlier assessment by the Army Corps of Engineers that also found elevated levels of radiation near Jana Elementary School in Florissant, Missouri. However, the new report—which included indoor testing and more extensive samples from the school grounds—is even more startling, confirming fears of contamination.

Based on dust and soil samples collected in August, scientists found harmful, radioactive material in multiple locations inside the school, including the gymnasium, and kitchen—as well as on the grounds. In an outdoor, kindergarten play area the researchers determined levels of the isotope lead-210 were more than 22 times the expected background level. In addition to the radioactive lead isotope, the Boston Chemical scientists also found high levels of radium-266, polonium-210, multiple isotopes of thorium, and other compounds in and around the school.

Inhaling, ingesting, or even simply skin contact with these particles can cause “significant injury to humans,” said the report.

Jana Elementary is bordered by a small stream called Coldwater Creek. And though it may look picturesque, the waterway is polluted by the nuclear legacy of World War II.

A 21.7 acre area upstream from Jana Elementary, called the St. Louis Airport Site (SLAPS), served as a storage and dumping ground for radioactive material produced as part of the Manhattan Project for decades. There, nuclear waste leaked into the ground and headwaters of the Coldwater Creek, and flowed down the tributary of the Missouri River. The stream, which frequently floods, then spread that contamination even more broadly—into soil, buildings, home gardens and elsewhere.

In 2019, a federal report confirmed that people who lived along the creek and in its floodplain between the 1960s and 1990s likely faced an increased risk of leukemia, bone, and blood cancers. And the analysis of Jana Elementary brings renewed concern about ongoing exposure.

When she learned of the report, she “was heartbroken,” said Ashley Bernaugh, president of the Jana parent-teacher association whose son attends the school, to National Public Radio. “It sounds so cliché, but it takes your breath from you.” ………………. more https://gizmodo.com/nuclear-waste-radioactivity-missouri-1849667056

October 18, 2022 Posted by | environment, USA | Leave a comment

US rehearses dropping nuclear bombs in Europe

WSWS, Andre Damon@Andre__Damon, 17 Oct 22,

The aircraft will rehearse dropping B61 “tactical” thermonuclear bombs, each of which is up to 20 times more powerful than the weapon that destroyed Hiroshima in World War II, killing as many as 126,000 civilians.

The aircraft will rehearse dropping B61 “tactical” thermonuclear bombs, each of which is up to 20 times more powerful than the weapon that destroyed Hiroshima in World War II, killing as many as 126,000 civilians.

While nuclear training exercises are usually presented as routine, nonthreatening, and not targeting any specific country, this year NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg made clear that the exercise is intended as a threat to Russia.

In a speech that mentioned Russia five times, Stoltenberg announced, “Next week, NATO will hold its long-planned deterrence exercise, Steadfast Noon.” He added, “Russia knows that a nuclear war cannot be won and must never be fought.”

As of 2019, the United States had 150 “tactical” nuclear warheads stationed throughout Europe as part of the NATO nuclear arsenal, including in Belgium, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands and Turkey.

On Sunday, one day ahead of the scheduled nuclear drill, China told its citizens living in Ukraine to evacuate the country, citing the “grave security situation.”

In June, the NATO alliance published a document pledging to “deliver the full range of forces” needed “for high-intensity, multi-domain warfighting against nuclear-armed peer-competitors.”

In announcing the Steadfast Noon exercise, NATO said the training flights include  “14 countries and up to 60 aircraft of various types, including fourth and fifth generation fighter jets, as well as surveillance and tanker aircraft.” It added that “US B-52 long-range bombers” will “fly from Minot Air Base in North Dakota” to take part in the exercise.

The flights will take place “over Belgium, which is hosting the exercise, as well as over the North Sea and the United Kingdom.”

NATO added, “No live weapons are used,” which is a relief because the weapons involved in the drill would irradiate several hundred square miles and disperse fallout in multiple countries.

On October 7, President Joe Biden said the world is at risk of nuclear “Armageddon,” implying that the rapid escalation of the war in Ukraine could lead to nuclear war between the United States and Russia.

“We have not faced the prospect of Armageddon since Kennedy and the Cuban Missile Crisis,” Biden said.

Biden added that he did not think “there’s any such thing as the ability to easily (use) a tactical nuclear weapon and not end up with Armageddon.”

In February, he warned that sending offensive weaponry to Ukraine would trigger “World War III.” Since that time, the US has sent hundreds of armored vehicles, advanced long-range missile systems, and other high-end weapons to Ukraine.

In an article published last week in Politico, former CIA Director Leon Panetta wrote that the US intelligence agencies believe the odds of the war in Ukraine spiraling into a nuclear war are as high as one in four.

“Some intelligence analysts now believe that the probability of the use of tactical nuclear weapons in Ukraine has risen from 1-5 percent at the start of the war to 20-25 percent today,” Panetta wrote.

On Friday, the Guardian reported that governments are making plans to prevent “panic” should the war in Ukraine escalate into a nuclear conflict. “West makes plans to avoid panic if Russia uses nuclear bomb in Ukraine” was the headline of its report, which cited an unnamed official as saying that governments are carrying out “prudent planning for a range of possible scenarios.”

The NATO nuclear exercise is set to occur at virtually the same time that Russia carries out its “grom” nuclear exercise. While NATO has been loudly announcing its nuclear bombing exercises, no similar announcement has come from Russia.

That has not, however, prevented NATO officials from vocally denouncing the as yet unannounced Russian exercise as a provocative escalation…………………………………….

In this super-heated atmosphere, the US-led nuclear training exercise raises the prospect of a major miscalculation. It is a well-known fact that the annual NATO Able Archer exercise during the Cold War almost led to a full-scale nuclear war in 1983, when the leadership of the Soviet Union became convinced that the United States was actually going to launch a nuclear attack………………  https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2022/10/17/lkbs-o17.html

October 18, 2022 Posted by | USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Biden’s National Security Strategy Is a Defense of US Domination, Not Democracy

In the new National Security Strategy, Biden also lays out an ambitious plan to adapt the U.S. military to confront China in the Asia Pacific and Russia in Eastern Europe. These entail massive new investments in both conventional and nuclear weaponry. The president’s military budget for 2022 is already about $750 billion, with further increases expected in coming years.

Biden’s National Security Strategy Is a Defense of US Domination, Not Democracy, Ashley Smith, Truthout 17 Oct 22.

The Biden administration just released its new National Security Strategy. It is designed to restore and enforce Washington’s domination over global capitalism and the international state system against pretenders to its throne as the imperial hegemon.

As the document puts it, the world order is at an “inflection point;” “the post-Cold War era is definitely over, and a competition is underway between the major powers to shape what comes next.” This is a new predicament for the U.S.

 After the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, Washington resembled a modern-day Rome with unrivaled geopolitical, economic, and military power to enforce free trade globalization and its attendant inequalities within and between nation states.

Over the last two decades, however, the U.S. has suffered relative decline and now confronts imperial rivals like China and Russia as well as regional ones like Iran among others. Beijing and Moscow are developing their own strategies to pursue their respective imperialist and local assertions of power, most dramatically demonstrated by Beijing’s threat to annex Taiwan and Russia’s horrific colonial war on Ukraine……………………………………………………………….

The New Asymmetric Multipolar World Order

Over the past two decades several developments have cracked this unipolar moment, led to the relative decline of the U.S., and ushered in today’s new asymmetric multipolar world order. The long neoliberal boom from the early 1980s to 2008 led to the rise of new centers of capital accumulation like China, Russia, Brazil, India and South Africa.

Washington’s attempt to lock in its dominance through wars to control the Middle East and its strategic energy reserves blew up in its face. Its defeat in Iraq led retired General William Odom to call the war “the greatest strategic disaster in United States history.”……………………………………………….

Biden’s New Imperial Strategy

Recognizing this new order, the Biden administration has abandoned the post-Cold War strategy of integrating all states under its umbrella in favor of great power rivalry with China, Russia, and regional adversaries. The president aims to refurbish the U.S. empire to outcompete, contain, confront and weaken these rivals.

Biden’s National Security Strategy disguises a nationalist strategy as a U.S.-led global contest of democracies against autocracies. It includes a new industrial policy meant to increase the competitiveness and security of U.S. corporations. The Biden administration has issued a “Buy American” executive order, pushed to secure supply chains by onshoring manufacturing or “friend shoring” it to strategic allies, and poured money into the high tech industry through the $280 billion CHIPS Act.

Biden wants to pressure states in both the Global North and Global South to fall into line by joining proposed new trade pacts. His administration is currently pushing a new trade agreement in Asia, as well as a “Build Back Better World” plan for development in the Global South — an explicit attempt to counter China’s Belt and Road Initiative. Washington is also cajoling U.S. allies to follow it in banning sales of high end microchips to China and Russia, barring Chinese companies from supplying hardware for their 5G systems, and restricting Chinese access to strategic research and development.

In the new National Security Strategy, Biden also lays out an ambitious plan to adapt the U.S. military to confront China in the Asia Pacific and Russia in Eastern Europe. These entail massive new investments in both conventional and nuclear weaponry. The president’s military budget for 2022 is already about $750 billion, with further increases expected in coming years.

Biden intends to maintain and expand the U.S.’s imperial reach through existing and new military alliances. Thanks to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, he has been able revitalize NATO and add both Sweden and Finland to its membership, consolidating Washington’s dominion over Europe.

In the Asia Pacific, the U.S. established a new pact, AUKUS, with Australia and the U.K. to facilitate sales of nuclear submarines to Canberra. Biden has doubled down on pre-existing formations like the QUAD, which in addition to the U.S. includes Australia, India, Japan, the Association of Southeast Asian Nations, and the so-called Five Eyes Intelligence Oversight and Review Council made up of Australia, Canada, New Zealand, Britain, and the U.S. He even convinced the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) to confront China in Asia.

The U.S. versus China and Russia…………………………………………………….

Biden’s main preoccupation, however, is not Russia, but China. The National Security Strategy declares that China is “the only competitor with both the intent to reshape the international order and, increasingly, the economic, diplomatic, military, and technological power to advance that objective.” Biden cynically exploits China’s imperial and repressive record in Hong Kong, Xinjiang, and Taiwan to rally the world behind Washington’s trade pacts, development plans and military alliances.

The key flashpoint in the U.S. conflict with China is Taiwan. Beijing threatens to seize the country, while Washington promises to arm it to the teeth and defend it against any invasion. Lost in this imperial battle is the Taiwanese people and their struggle for self-determination free of both powers…………………………………..

Biden’s “Democratic Despotism”

Biden’s new imperial plan is riddled with lies, hypocrisy and contradictions, all characteristics of what W. E. B. Du Bois long ago denounced as the “democratic despotism” of U.S. imperialism. These falsehoods undermine Biden’s claim that his plan is in the interests of the world’s people.

On the domestic front, Biden has prioritized corporate profit and the military over social programs to benefit working class and oppressed people. While he boasts of investing in social reforms, the truth is that aside from stimulus checks most of those promised in the original version of “Build Back Better” fell by the wayside as his administration poured money into the Infrastructure Act and Inflation Reduction Act, both of which will benefit big business and do little to mitigate let alone reverse climate change.

Globally, Biden’s pretension to building a capitalist international of democracies against autocracies is even less convincing. The U.S. itself has a system of elections in which corporate money largely dictates the results, a government that nakedly serves big business, an unelected Supreme Court controlled by far-right appointees…………………

Abroad, Washington’s “democratic” track record includes everything from toppling elected governments in countries like Iran and Guatemala to brutal imperialist wars …………………………………………………more https://truthout.org/articles/bidens-national-security-strategy-is-a-defense-of-us-domination-not-democracy/?eType=EmailBlastContent&eId=8eb908cc-5486-4a82-9789-c8d5359afc8f

October 18, 2022 Posted by | politics international, USA | Leave a comment

Tulsi Gabbard dares to challenge Washington’s war machine

The former presidential candidate has shown that opposing regime-change policies is the one taboo that the ruling class won’t tolerate, Rt.com, Tony Cox, a US journalist who has written or edited for Bloomberg and several major daily newspapers. 15 Oct 22,

Tulsi Gabbard’s rapid transformation from rising Democratic star to demonized outcast –  culminating this week with her decision to leave the party – has exposed the one thing on which every powerful person in Washington can agree: war is good.

It’s the one thing, in fact, that everyone must agree on, if they expect to attain any power and have a long and prosperous career in American politics. Those who don’t will be kept on the fringes, at best. If they speak out too effectively, they’ll be branded a traitor. As former congressman Ron Paul and his son, Senator Rand Paul, have proved, they’ll never be taken seriously as a presidential candidate and won’t be allowed to contest, regardless of how many debates they win. 

Gabbard has illustrated this reality better than anyone. Consider how much she brought to the table when she entered Congress in 2013, how touted she was as the next big thing, then look at how seemingly little it took for her to be essentially excommunicated. Her fall from grace was astonishingly quick, and illuminating.

Then just 31, she came from one of the most reliably blue states, Hawaii, as the youngest lawmaker to ever represent her district. She’s non-white. In fact, she checked a couple of those identitarian boxes that the Democrats love so much, becoming the first Hindu member and the first Samoan-American voting member of Congress. She’s a war veteran. She’s articulate and comes across as a person who passionately believes in what she’s saying.

……………………………. CNN and other legacy media outlets began fawning over Gabbard as the “next superstar” and “the one to watch.” MSNBC suggested that Hollywood might want to make a movie about her, and CNN commentator Ana Navarro quipped, “I don’t know, but in a battle, I want her in my trench.” 

……………………………….. When Gabbard ran for president in the 2020 race, she brought her anti-war message to the primary debates

…………. With the media portraying her as an anti-LGBTQ bigot and a “Russian asset,” Gabbard’s career in Congress was also soon to end. She chose not to seek re-election …………

However, Gabbard continued to speak out against warmongering, especially after Russia began its military offensive against Ukraine in February, triggering rebukes from Democrats and Republicans alike. She became even more of a political pariah when she warned that Biden’s policy of fighting a proxy war against Russia was pushing Americans closer to nuclear disaster. After she raised concern about claims of US-funded biolabs in Ukraine, Senator Mitt Romney accused her of spouting “treasonous lies.”…………………..

 Gabbard’s effectiveness as a communicator makes her dangerous to the war machine. She makes clear that US policies have nothing to do with the real security and economic interests of the American people.

“We have too many people in Washington who are warmongers, subservient to the military industrial complex, and continuing to put their own selfish interests and the interests of their donors first, with no mind for the cost and consequence that their decisions have on the American people,” she said in a Fox News interview on Tuesday.

“That’s exactly what we’re seeing right now with President Biden and leaders in Congress, whose decisions are actively pushing us to the brink of a nuclear holocaust, of which they may have their bunkers where they’ll be safe, but we the American people will have no shelter, no place to go, no place to hide, and face the consequences that could destroy all of humanity and the world as we know it.”  https://www.rt.com/news/564594-tulsi-gabbard-democratic-party-us/

October 16, 2022 Posted by | politics, USA | 4 Comments

Protests in 40+ US Cities Demand De-escalation as Poll Shows Surging Fear of Nuclear War

“Anyone paying attention should be worried about the rising dangers of nuclear war, but what we really need is action,” said one organizer.

Common Dreama, JULIA CONLEY, October 14, 2022,

As new polling showed this week that Americans’ fear of nuclear war has steadily grown since Russia invaded Ukraine in February, anti-nuclear campaigners on Friday called on federal lawmakers to take action to mitigate those fears and ensure the U.S. is doing all it can to deescalate tensions with other nuclear powers.

Anti-war groups including Peace Action and RootsAction organized picket lines at the offices of U.S. senators and representatives in more than 40 cities across 20 states, calling on lawmakers to push for a ceasefire in Ukraine, the revival of anti-nuclear treaties the U.S. has exited in recent years, and other legislative actions to prevent nuclear catastrophe.

“Anyone paying attention should be worried about the rising dangers of nuclear war, but what we really need is action,” Norman Solomon, co-founder of RootsAction, told Common Dreams. “Picket lines at so many congressional offices across the country convey that more and more constituents are fed up with the timidity of elected officials, who’ve refused to acknowledge the extent of the current grave dangers of nuclear war, much less speak out and take action to mitigate those dangers.”

The most recent polling released by Reuters/Ipsos on Monday showed that 58% of Americans fear the U.S. is headed toward nuclear war.

……………….. “The level of anxiety is something that I haven’t seen since the Cuban missile crisis,” Peter Kuznick, a history professor and director of the Nuclear Studies Institute at American University, told The Hill. “And that was short-lived. This has gone on for months now.”

Campaigners at “Defuse Nuclear War” picket lines on Friday called on members of Congress to allay those concerns by:

  • Adopting a “no first use” policy regarding nuclear weapons, to restrict when the president of the United States can consider a nuclear strike and signal that the weapons are for deterrence rather than the fighting of wars;
  • Pushing for the U.S. to reenter the Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, which it withdrew from in 2002, and the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces (INF) Treaty, which it left in in 2019;
  • Passing H.R. 1185, which calls on the president “to embrace the goals and provisions of the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons and make nuclear disarmament the centerpiece of U.S. national security policy;”
  • Redirecting military spending, which makes up half the country’s discretionary budget, to ensure Americans have “adequate healthcare, education, housing, and other basic needs” and that the U.S. is taking far-reaching climate action; and
  • Pushing the Biden administration to take nuclear weapons off “hair-trigger alert,” which enables their rapid launch and “increases the chance of a launch in response to a false alarm,” according to Defuse Nuclear War organizers.

…………………………… In addition to Friday’s pickets, campaigners are organizing a Day of Action on Sunday, with supporters holding demonstrations, handing out fliers, and prominently displaying banners calling for a deescalation of the nuclear threat.  https://www.commondreams.org/news/2022/10/14/protests-40-us-cities-demand-deescalation-poll-shows-surging-fear-nuclear-war?fbclid=IwAR3U681WT7zPDYNqRo7B1uo_KQUkqnnkBnFvwZIZ0ZYHQamAT6qgP8sX4XU

October 16, 2022 Posted by | public opinion, USA | Leave a comment

‘The Hell With It’: SpaceX CEO Musk Reverses Position On Funding Satellite Internet For Ukraine

 https://www.rferl.org/a/musk-starlink-ukraine-funding-spacex/32084855.html 16 Oct 22

SpaceX CEO Elon Musk now says that his company will continue to pay for the Starlink satellite Internet service for Ukraine, a day after suggesting SpaceX could no longer afford it.

“The hell with it,” Musk said on Twitter. “Even though Starlink is still losing money & other companies are getting billions of taxpayer $, we’ll just keep funding ukraine govt for free.”

Musk activated Starlink, a network of more than 2,000 satellites orbiting the Earth and thousands of terminals on the ground, in late February after Internet services were disrupted because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

Starlink has cost SpaceX $80 million thus far and the cost will exceed $100 million by end of year, Musk said on Twitter on October 7.

He told his more than 108 million Twitter followers on October 14 that SpaceX cannot fund the network “indefinitely” amid reports that he has asked the Pentagon to step in.

He issued the statement after CNN reported that SpaceX sent a letter to the Pentagon last month saying it could not continue to fund the Starlink service in Ukraine and that it may have to stop funding it unless the U.S. military gives the company tens of millions of dollars a month.

The Defense Department later confirmed that it received a request from Musk to take over funding for the satellite network. The official said the issue has been discussed in meetings and senior leaders are weighing the matter.

October 16, 2022 Posted by | business and costs, USA, weapons and war | Leave a comment

Radioactive waste from WWII nuclear weapons found in Missouri school

 https://www.fox10phoenix.com/news/radioactive-waste-from-wwii-nuclear-weapons-found-missourischool 16 Oct 22, FLORISSANT, Mo. (AP) – There is significant radioactive contamination at an elementary school in suburban St. Louis where nuclear weapons were produced during World War II, according to a new report by environmental investigation consultants.

The report by Boston Chemical Data Corp. confirmed fears about contamination at Jana Elementary School in the Hazelwood School District in Florissant raised by a previous Army Corps of Engineers study.

The new report is based on samples taken in August from the school, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Boston Chemical did not say who or what requested and funded the report.

“I was heartbroken,” said Ashley Bernaugh, president of the Jana parent-teacher association who has a son at the school. “It sounds so cliché, but it takes your breath from you.”

The school sits in the flood plain of Coldwater Creek, which was contaminated by nuclear waste from weapons production during World War II. The waste was dumped at sites near the St. Louis Lambert International Airport, next to the creek that flows to the Missouri River. The Corps has been cleaning up the creek for more than 20 years.

The Corps’ report also found contamination in the area but at much at lower levels, and it didn’t take any samples within 300 feet of the school. The most recent report included samples taken from Jana’s library, kitchen, classrooms, fields and playgrounds.

Levels of the radioactive isotope lead-210, polonium, radium and other toxins were “far in excess” of what Boston Chemical had expected. Dust samples taken inside the school were found to be contaminated.

Inhaling or ingesting these radioactive materials can cause significant injury, the report said.

“A significant remedial program will be required to bring conditions at the school in line with expectations,” the report said.

The new report is expected to be a major topic at Tuesday’s Hazelwood school board meeting. The district said in a statement that it will consult with its attorneys and experts to determine the next steps.

“Safety is absolutely our top priority for our staff and students,” board president Betsy Rachel said Saturday.

Christen Commuso with the Missouri Coalition for the Environment presented the results of the Corps’ study to the school board in June after obtaining a copy through a Freedom of Information Act request.

“I wouldn’t want my child in this school,” she said. “The effect of these toxins is cumulative.”

October 16, 2022 Posted by | USA, wastes | Leave a comment

U.S. tax-payers’ aid to Ukraine $67.5 billion – Taiwan will be the next beneficiary

Nothing But Welfare Queens: American Aid to Zelensky and Tsai Ing-wen

Libertarian Institute, by Patrick Macfarlane | Oct 13, 2022,

As it pertains to the American public, Ukraine’s response to the Russian invasion can be summed up with two words: “Zelensky demands.”

To date, Washington elites and their politicians have been happy to provide—at public expense—lining their own pockets in the process.

As of this writing, U.S. aid for Ukraine has reached approximately $67.5 billion, a figure greater than Russia’s entire 2021 military budget. According to the State Department, this support includes $15.2 billion in direct military assistance. The support comes although 60-70% of lethal aid never reaches the front lines, according to a now-redacted CBS interview with on-the-ground activists.

Not only is the American taxpayer supporting much of the Ukrainian military, it is also supporting the Ukrainian government. The same working class Americans who were deemed “nonessential” in 2020—who saw their businesses shuttered and burned down—now have to pay entitlement programs both at home and in Ukraine. As of September 30, 2022, the U.S. has provided $13 billion in “direct budget support,” which is ostensibly used;

…to pay government salaries, meet pension obligations, maintain hospitals and schools, and protect critical infrastructure[,] support continuity operations at the national, regional, and local levels, support for [sic] the health sector, agricultural production, civil society, [and enable] programs to hold Russia and its forces accountable for their actions in Ukraine.

Although American taxpayers have already matched Russia’s 2021 military budget, Ukrainian president Vlodomyr Zelensky only demands more. During a Tuesday phone call, President Biden reviewed Washington’s latest $625 million dole to Zelensky. It includes, inter alia, 4 additional High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS), 16 155mm Howitzers, 75,000 155 mm artillery rounds, 500 precision-guided 155mm artillery rounds, 16 105mm Howitzers, 30,000 120 mm mortar rounds, and 200 MaxxPro Mine Resistant Ambush Protected Vehicles.

This latest boon notwithstanding, in the same phone call, Zelensky urged Biden to provide Ukraine with air defense systems that would be used to shoot down Russian planes.

………………… Republicans like Taylor-Greene, Gaetz, and Hawley understand the cost of empire: endless warfare, a decaying homefront, and a beclowned international reputation. They understand that a war between the U.S. and Russia will be unlike anything Americans have ever experienced. Although they cloak their condemnation of war with Russia in criticism of “weak Joe Biden,” they understand it is the West that provoked this conflict and seeks to prolong it “to the last Ukrainian.” They know that the conflict—even if it remains by-proxy—is a cost war-weary working class Americans do not want and cannot afford.

They must, then, realize that the same Washington elites waxing American fat off the Ukraine conflict are cultivating Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen as a Zelensky in-waiting.

Although U.S. military aid to Taiwan traditionally comes by way of arms sales, that may soon change. Senators Bob Menendez and Lindsey Graham have introduced the Taiwan Policy Act—a piece of legislation that would radically overhaul Sino-American relations.

In short, “the Taiwan Policy Act would give Taiwan $6.5 billion in military aid, give the island the benefits of being a ‘major non-NATO ally,’ expedite arms sales to Taipei, and require sanction in the event of Chinese aggression.” The bill would also authorize up to $2 billion in loans to Taiwan.

On September 14, the bill passed the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. Rather than passing it as a standalone piece of legislation, the bill’s supporters currently seek to incorporate “much” of the bill into the $817 billion 2023 National Defense Authorization Act. As of Wednesday, it is not clear exactly which provisions would be incorporated.

As above noted, the Taiwan Policy Act was introduced in the Senate on June 16, 2022 by Senators Bob Menendez and Lindsey Graham. Both Menendez and Graham are ardent supporters of Ukraine and Zelensky.

Graham met with Zelensky in July to hand deliver a plaque of his proposed Senate resolution to designate Russia as a State Sponsor of Terrorism. Since the Russian invasion, Graham has made regular appearances on Fox News whipping up lethal aid for Ukraine while calling for regime change in Moscow.

Menendez, as Chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, has spearheaded Washington’s Ukraine support. In January, he began and continues to lead the comprehensive U.S. sanctions campaign against Russia. In March, Menendez lambasted Congressional Republicans, mainly Senator Rick Scott (R-FL), for undermining Ukraine aid. In May, Menendez, among others, introduced a Senate resolution approving the bids of Finland and Sweden to join NATO (something Josh Hawley correctly opposed).

On June 23 Menendez specifically invoked the 75th anniversary of the Marshall Plan to stoke support for Ukraine, but the Marshall Plan came after WWII, not during it, when similar support further involves the U.S. in the conflict.

Republicans opposing U.S. support for Ukraine should take note that both Menendez and Graham have repeatedly met with Taiwanese President Tsai Ing-wen to pledge American support for Taiwan. In their latest visit on April 15, 2022, president Ing-wen called Lindsey Graham a “pillar of strength for Taiwan in the U.S. Congress” and dubbed Menendez one of Taiwan’s “staunchest friends.”

In his meeting remarks, Graham likened U.S. support for Ukraine to its support for Taiwan, saying:……………………………………………….

Menendez echoed Graham’s sentiment in his own remarks, shedding light on Washington’s Ukrainian plans for Taiwan:…………………..

Menendez followed up these remarks with an op-ed in The New York Times, stating:…………………………

These remarks should terrify working class Americans. Essentially, Menendez is proposing a redoubling of military support for Taiwan—the same “preventive policy” which played a large role in provoking Putin to invade Ukraine. We simply cannot afford it.

The above-named Congressional Republicans were right to oppose aid to Ukraine. For those same reasons, they should oppose adding Tsai Ing-wen to the same dole as the entitled and ungrateful Zelensky. Like Rand Paul, they should oppose the Taiwan Policy Act in all its forms.  https://libertarianinstitute.org/articles/nothing-but-welfare-queens-american-aid-to-zelensky-and-tsai-ing-wen/

October 14, 2022 Posted by | business and costs, USA | 6 Comments

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