How The Globalism Con Game Leads To A ‘New World Order’

This article was originally published by Brandon Smith at Alt-Market.com

When globalists speak publicly about a “new world order” they are speaking about something very specific and rather sacred in their little cult of elitism. It is not simply the notion that civilization shifts or changes abruptly on its own; rather, it is their name for a directed and engineered vision — a world built according to their rules, not a world that evolved naturally according to necessity.

There are other names for this engineered vision, including the “global economic reset,” or the more general and innocuous term “globalism,” but the intention is the same. The ultimate goal of the new world order as an ideology is total centralization of economic and governmental power into the hands of a select and unaccountable bureaucracy made up of international financiers. This is governance according the the dictates of Plato’s Republic; a delusional fantasy world in which benevolent philosopher kings, supposedly smarter and more objective than the rest of us, rule from on high with scientific precision and wisdom. It is a world where administrators become gods.

Such precision and objectivity within human systems is not possible, of course. Human beings are far too susceptible to their own biases and personal desires to be given totalitarian power over others. The results will always be destruction and disaster. Then, add to this the fact that the kinds of people who often pursue such power are predominantly narcissistic sociopaths and psychopaths. If a governmental structure of high level centralization is allowed to form, it opens a door for these mentally and spiritually broken people to play out their twisted motives on a global stage.

It is important to remember that sociopaths are prone to fabricating all kinds of high minded ideals to provide cover for their actions. That is to say, they will adopt a host of seemingly noble causes to rationalize their scramble for power, but in the end these “humanitarians” only care about imposing their will on as many people as possible while feeding off them for as long as time allows.

There are many false promises, misrepresentations and fraudulent conceptions surrounding the narrative of globalism. Some of them are rather clever and subversive and are difficult to pick out in the deliberately created fog. The schemes involved in implementing globalism are designed to confuse the masses with crisis until they end up ASKING for more centralization and less freedom.

Let’s examine some of the most common propaganda methods and arguments behind the push for globalization and a “new world order”…

Con #1: Globalism Is About “Free Markets”

A common pro-globalism meme is the idea that globalization is not really centralization, but decentralization. This plays primarily to the economic side of global governance, which in my view is the most important because without economic centralization political centralization is not possible.

Free markets according to Adam Smith, a pioneer of the philosophy, are supposed to provide open paths for anyone with superior ideas and ingenuity to pursue those ideas without interference from government or government aided institutions. What we have today under globalism are NOT free markets. Instead, globalism has supplied unfettered power to international corporations which cannot exist without government charter and government financial aid.

The corporate model is completely counter to Adam Smith’s original premise of free market trade. Large corporations receive unfair legal protection under limited liability as well as outright legislative protection from civil consequences (Monsanto is a perfect example of this). They also receive immense taxpayer funded welfare through bailouts and other sources when they fail to manage their business responsibly. All this while small businesses and entrepreneurs are impeded at every turn by taxation and legal obstacles.

In terms of international trade being “free trade,” this is not really the case either. Only massive corporations supported by governments are able to exploit the advantages of international manufacturing and labor sources in a way that ensures long term success. Meanwhile economic models that promote true decentralization and localism become impractical because real competition is never allowed. The world has not enjoyed free markets in at least a century. What we have today is something entirely different.

Con #2: Globalism Is About A “Multipolar World”

This is a relatively new disinformation tactic that I attribute directly to the success of the liberty movement and alternative economists. As the public becomes more educated on the dangers of economic centralization and more specifically the dangers of central banks, the globalists are attempting to shift the narrative to muddy the waters.

For example, the liberty movement has railed against the existence of the Federal Reserve and fiat dollar hegemony to the point that our information campaign has been breaking into mainstream thought. The problem is that globalism is not about the dollar, U.S. hegemony or the so-called “deep state,” which in my view is a distraction from the bigger issue at hand.

The fact is, globalist institutions and central banks permeate almost every corner of the world. Nations like Russia and China are just as heavily tied to the IMF and the Bank for International Settlements and international financial centers like Goldman Sachs as any western government.

Part of the plan for the new world order, as has been openly admitted by globalists and globalist publications, is the decline of the U.S. and the dollar system to make way for one world financial governance through the IMF as well as the Special Drawing Rights basket as a mechanism for the world reserve currency. The globalists WANT a less dominant U.S. and a more involved East, while the East continues to call for more control of the global economy by the IMF. This concept unfortunately flies over the heads of most economists, even in the liberty movement.

So, the great lie being promoted now is that the fall of the U.S. and the dollar is a “good thing” because it will result in “decentralization,” a “multi-polar” world order and the “death” of globalism. However, what is really happening is that as the U.S. falls globalist edifices like the IMF and the BIS rise. We are moving from centralization to super-centralization. Globalists have pulled a bait and switch in order to trick the liberty movement into supporting the success of the East (which is actually also globalist controlled) and a philosophy which basically amounts to a re-branding of the new world order as some kind of decentralized paradise.

Con #3: Nationalism Is The Source Of War, And Globalism Will End It

If there’s one thing globalists have a love/hate relationship with, it’s humanity’s natural tribal instincts. On the one hand, they like tribalism because in some cases tribalism can be turned into zealotry, and zealots are easy to exploit and manipulate. Wars between nations (tribes) can be instigated if the tribal instinct is weighted with artificial fears and threats.

On the other hand, tribalism lends itself to natural decentralization of societies because tribalism in its best form is the development of many groups organized around a variety of ideas and principles and projects. This makes the establishment of a “one world ideology” very difficult, if not impossible. The first inclination of human beings is to discriminate against ideas and people they see as destructive and counter to their prosperity. Globalists therefore have to convince a majority of people that the very tribalism that has fueled our social evolution and some of the greatest ideas in history is actually the source of our eventual doom.

Nationalism served the globalists to a point, but now they need to get rid of it entirely. This requires considerable crisis blamed on nationalism and “populist” ideals. Engineered war, whether kinetic or economic, is the best method to scapegoat tribalism. Every tragedy from now on must eventually be attributed to ideas of separation and logical discrimination against negative ideologies. The solution of globalism will then be offered; a one world system in which all separation is deemed “evil.”

Con #4: Globalism Is Natural And Inevitable

As mentioned earlier, globalists cannot have their “new world order” unless they can convince the masses to ask for it. Trying to implement such a system by force alone would end in failure, because revolution is the natural end result of tyranny. Therefore, the new world order has to be introduced as if it had been formed by coincidence or by providence. Any hint that the public is being conned into accepting global centralization would trigger widespread resistance.

This is why globalism is always presented in the mainstream media as a natural extension of civilization’s higher achievement. Even though it was the dangerous interdependency of globalism that helped fuel the economic crisis of 2008 and continues to escalate that crisis to this day, more globalism is continually promoted as the solution to the problem. It is spoken of with reverence in mainstream economic publications and political discussions. It receives almost religious praise in the halls of academia. Globalism is socioeconomic ambrosia — the food of deities. It is the fountain of youth. It is a new Eden.

Obviously, this adoration for globalism is nonsense. There is no evidence whatsoever that globalism is a positive force for humanity, let alone a natural one. There is far more evidence that globalism is a poisonous ideology that can only ever gain a foothold through trickery and through false flags.

We live in an era that represents an ultimate crossroads for civilization; a time of great uncertainty. Will we seek truth in the trials we face, and thus the ability to create our own solutions? Or, will we take a seemingly easier road by embracing whatever solutions are handed to us by the establishment? Make no mistake — the globalists already have a solution prepackaged for us. They have been acclimating and conditioning the public to accept it for decades now. That solution will not bring what it promises. It will not bring peace, but eternal war. It will not bring togetherness, but isolation. It will not bring understanding, but ignorance.

When globalists eventually try to sell us on a full-blown new world order, they will pull out every conceivable image of heaven on Earth, but they will do this only after creating a tangible and ever present hell.

******

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Putin Warns: Foreign Powers Are Trying To Meddle In Russia"s Affairs

Perhaps because he fears retaliation for his government"s deliberate - and unsubstantiated - interference in last year"s US presidential election, Russian President Vladimir Putin is apparently worried that foreign powers might interfere in Russia’s upcoming federal election. So, nearly a year after US intelligence agencies first blamed Russia for conspiring against their preferred candidate, Hillary Clinton, and throwing the vote to Trump, Putin is ordering Russia’s security services to “erect a safe barrier” to prevent foreign powers from meddling in federal elections set for March.

In a speech to security and intelligence personnel on Wednesday, Putin urged everybody in attendance to work tirelessly to try and prevent foreign influence from creeping into Russian society and politics, according to Russia Today.

Putin’s request, which is an obvious, if indirect, sleight against the US despite the recent “collusion” between US and Russian intelligence that helped prevent a terror attack in St. Petersburg.

“There is a great responsibility on the intelligence services to erect a safe barrier against external meddling in our social and political life, and to counteract the work of foreign security agencies, which are doing all they can to ramp up their level of activity in Russia,” Putin said.

Russia’s security services should also remain alert as terrorists from Muslim-majority areas of the former Soviet Union return home, and try to carry out attacks in densely populated urban centers.

“Agents must work to destroy the financial and recruitment networks, and to prevent radicals from influencing youths, and spreading the ideology of hate, intolerance, and also aggressive nationalism,” he said.

Earlier this year, Putin said that up to 7,000 Muslims from the former Soviet Union, primarily from predominantly Muslim regions in the Caucuses and Central Asia, had flown to Syria and Iraq to join Islamic State. Since Syrian Army forces - aided by Russian troops and aircraft - drove ISIS out of Syria, many of its former foreign fighters have tried to sneak back into their home countries.
 

Mysterious Gold Dealer"s Testimony Puts Erdogan On Shaky Ground

Authored by M K Bhadrakumar via The Asia Times,

As on the soccer field in his youth, so in a tumultuous political career spanning four decades: Turkey’s president Recep Tayyip Erdogan has consistently shown his mettle as a fighter who won’t be satisfied with anything short of total victory. 

But in the battle that is now unfolding around him, and which is besieging him, there isn’t going to be a winner.

What is at stake is survival – the chance to live another day, even if in some ignominy. That much is clear from the opening testimony in a federal courtroom in New York on Wednesday from the Turkish-Iranian gold trader Reza Zarrab, who allegedly helped Tehran sidestep US sanctions to export oil with the connivance of corrupt Turkish high officials and then to launder the income.

When the principal accused becomes the star witness in a US court, he has possibly struck a deal with the authorities. The remaining ambiguity is with regard to when it was that Zarrab struck the deal – was it when he landed in Miami 18 months ago, ostensibly to show his young son around Disneyland, or before he was spirited out of Turkey to America on the express understanding that he’d get clemency for providing hard evidence to nail Erdogan.

Zarrab explained before the court the elaborate scheme he orchestrated to free “a few billion euros” of Iran’s sanctioned oil using funds deposited in the Turkish state-owned Halkbank which were used to buy gold that was subsequently smuggled to Dubai and sold for cash. (The FBI also nabbed a senior functionary of Halkbank, Hakan Atilla, who is on trial.)

Turkish gold trader Reza Zarrab is shown in a court room sketch as he appears in Manhattan federal court in New York. Photo: Reuters / Jane Rosenberg

Zarrab named a confidant of Erdogan, the former Turkish Economy Minister Zafer Caglayan, as having taken bribes amounting to over US$60 million and also implicated Turkey’s Aktif Bank, which is part of a holding company headed at the time by Erdogan’s son-in-law, Berat Albayrak (the current energy minister). Zarrab is due to testify again. We have only seen the tip of the iceberg.

Meanwhile, Turkey’s main opposition leader, Kemal K?l?çdaro?lu, revealed on Tuesday that Erdo?an’s close circle – including his brother, his son and his executive assistant – made transactions worth around US$15 million to an off-shore company called Bellway Limited in the Isle of Man (a tax haven) in late 2011 and early 2012. Kilicdaroglu produced documentary evidence and promised to revert with more such disclosures.

Top Turkish officials and senior leaders of the ruling party have made the counter-allegation that all of this is a political conspiracy orchestrated by Islamist preacher Fetullah Gulen, who lives in the US. They say Gulen and his American mentors are making a second attempt to remove Erdogan from power after the failed military coup two years ago. The Turks believe that CIA officials sponsored Gulen’s exile in Philadelphia.

Evidently, the US establishment has been preparing the case file for quite some time – and the effort predates the Trump presidency.

The Turkish side have kept President Trump personally out of the firing line.

There is, in fact, an eerie similarity here to what the Russians have been saying – namely, that Trump himself desires a good working relationship with Russia and President Vladimir Putin, but, alas, the Washington establishment is pursuing a contrarian agenda.

Erdogan’s strategic defiance of Washington seriously hurts US interests. Without Turkey’s cooperation, America’s military presence in northern Syria is unsustainable. Turkey’s entente with Russia and Iran undermines US regional strategies.

Add to that Turkey’s S-400 missile deal with Russia, Erdogan’s hostility toward Israel and support of Qatar in its rift with Saudi Arabia, the downhill slide in Turkey’s relations with major European countries and its lackadaisical attitude toward NATO, and it’s not hard to see how the West might view Erdogan as a hurdle that must somehow be overcome.

Zarrab can help irreparably damage Erdogan’s reputation, and even implicate his family members and close aides as criminals.

Worse still, heavy penalties of billions of dollars could be levied on the Turkish banks involved, crippling the country’s economy. And sanctions could be imposed.

Suffice to say, Erdogan has a choice between capitulation or the desecration of the house he has built in a long and hugely successful political career. Time is running out. Erdogan is circling the wagons. He may feel tempted to ride the wings of Turkish nationalism. There is still no credible political figure who can seriously challenge him in Turkish politics. He is daring and charismatic. The next elections are due only in 2019.

But that is to cast an eye at the horizon.

Significantly, US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson quietly digressed during a speech on trans-Atlantic relations in Washington on Tuesday to pose a riddle to no one in particular – whether Turkey would be better off partnering with Russia and Iran or aligning with the West.

On the eve of Zorrab’s testimony, Tillerson seemed to hint at a passage that Erdogan has not taken, toward a door that he has never opened – one that leads into the rose-garden.

Gold up $10 - You Ain"t Seen Nothin" Yet

Originally posted by Soren K. Group on Marketslant.com

Update 10:55 am: like clockwork, the hourly and 4 hour charts that warned of overbought risk proved good guides. Gold pulled back $5.00 since this post. Now to watch the rest play out. 

4 hour VBS says slow down. a little... 

 

Original post  9:35AM

Why Gold up $11.00 is Still Not a Breakout.

No Whammies: First to get it out of the way... We are knocking on wood, because  while we have not seen what Gold can truly do in this cluster-uck of a global situation, we must remember that governments are always looking for new ways to undermine the renewed confidence in Gold"s remonetization. Even as Gold climbs and undermines confidence in FIAT currencies globally like a snowball rolling down hill reinforces its own descent, Supranationals are keenly aware of its potential to undermine national control over money.

Governments Rule: They are now battling this war on 2 fronts. The Bitcoin effect which reminds people that money is money because people agree it is so, and not because  a government declares it to be so. There was a time before nation-states  when money was borderless and universal.  But nationalism and monetary controls created captive tax bases and monetary cattle for politicians to milk and if necessary slaughter with inflation or depression. Bitcoin has re-awoken the public to the notion that money is universal. Pre-Bretton woods, that was still so. Gold was money. The USD backed by Gold was the currency. 

The Wall is To Keep You In: Make no mistake about it. Governments are building walls around their citizens. walls to keep domestic consumption inside them. Walls that let corporations benefit from global pricing, essentially creating arbitrage for these companies to buy cheap elsewhere, and then sell to the domestic sheep their Governments keep penned in. Governments Can Stay Irrational Longer than We can Stay Liquid. So, do not underestimate the power of the incumbent politicians to keep those pesky alternatives to FIAT subdued and in their proper place.

• Gold: they can  do whatever they want to keep it in check. Confiscate, manipulate, sever deliver-ability, CUSIP it, loan it, increase FRB and rehypothecation. The list goes on.


• Bitcoin: Same idea. Listing on an exchange opens the spigot for FRB and futures selling.  Infinite shorts on limited supply that took Gold down, is coming to BTC.

Another way is to deny BTC deposits unless higher hurdles are met by US

banks to "know their customer". What cannot be destroyed or co-opted

will be controlled. BTC  is about to come to daddy and the  FED  is

going to try to tame it. Or at least regulate US ownership.

Government has put all its eggs and controls in one basket after the TBTF 2008 disaster. The border collies that herd our monetary risk actually consolidated things in even fewer baskets using exchanges , a la Fannie Mae, to keep a closer eye on things while increasing systemic risk. And with that exchange power comes exchange oversight and loss of autonomy in a crisis. 

VBS UPDATES - Gold Warming Up.

Gold is in a momentum sandwich now. Volatility is overbought short term, nowhere intermediate term, undervalued long term.

1. The 60 minute was triggered hours ago and may be overbought. = POOR RISK REWARD UP HERE. Do nothing


2. The 4 hour says  we are NOT in a breakout yet, but a 4 hour breakout will likely be extremely powerful if it comes and propel us to August highs. =  NO SIGNAL, POSSIBLE OVERBOUGHT FOR NOW Buy a signal when it comes


3. The Daily looks to be headed for a momentum trigger if we close above $1289.=   RISK REWARD TRADE SIGNAL ON CLOSE ABOVE $1289 - Risk- reward below


4. Meanwhile the Monthly is waiting for the go ahead to confirm what the smarter hedge funds are likely already doing, getting long for 2018 allocation flow. - SIGNAL PENDING November Close. MACRO ALREADY BULLISH

So one can imagine this scenario as possible if not likely: We close above $1289. The  market pulls back or drifts. If the hourly gives a signal higher again, it will drag the 4 hour along for the ride. Then we will have a serious breakout play in terms of volatility and hopefully follow through in direction.

• Bullish- Buy call spreads. Bearish- Buy puts in a rally. Long term bullish- be long already and be ready to swing trade this market like a mofo.

Gold is doing what we have said it would do since last month. And so far, while November may almost be over, we are seeing the signs of it being a worthwhile place to pin on your charts  as the beginning of the next significant surge higher. So, if November  is memorable, Then 2018 will likely be unbelievable.

HOURLY - Needs to Chill

Gold has had a nice run and Volatility is due for a break or "inhale". Do not be surprised  if we pull back a bit.... next chart gives confirmation that we should be careful

4 HOUR  - Key to Next Move

This chart says we are NOT in a momentum based buy breakout yet and warns of an over extension and subsequent pull back while the hourly catches its breath. Then we see a breakout set up

DAILY - Risk Reward Trade is Here

The Daily chart says a settlement above $1289 gives the go ahead for a nice set up to be long risking a print under $1289 with a 3 day target of  $1313.00

 

MONTHLY -This is  What a Break out Looks Like

This holy grail of charts has already given us the buy signal based on what hedge funds use to "punt" Gold on the long side. On our own system, a November close will determine if the momentum has the ability to increase upwardly. If it does, then we will have 2 compelling, complementary systems saying buy dips to $1255, and buy rallies above the August high. Last time we had a potential widening on the VBS with the market above the Fund Indicator (Yellow line) was August/ September  2009. That signal sent the market up relentlessly for 3 years from approximately $1000 to $1700, assuming you bought and sold when the "Fund Activity" indicator advised as much.

That is a breakout. And while we have called for $1700 as a target recently, that is not the projected target. We have to handicap our own system, if not the global power structure that can keep a damper on things if needed.  The original signal set up is $50 one way technically still unknown... then $200 in either direction thereafter. There will be volatility. The monthly chart Bolinger band outer boundaries tell you where it will begin

Suffice to say, if $1200 is the new base area, and we MAY be getting a signal come November end that another 2 year rally is to start.. at what price do you think that puts Gold ?

 

RELATED

• Why We"re Buying Physical Gold with a $1700 Target - SKG


• Gold Macro Analysis: A November to Remember


• Gold Likely to Reignite Above $1294 Spot

Good Luck

Ben Garrison On Mending A Fractured America

Authored by Ben Garrison via GrrrGraphics.com,

Earlier this week I was on the Jesse Lee Peterson show out of LA.

It was a short segment early in the morning and we briefly discussed the NFL kneelers. I spoke about how they offended the fans, the veterans, and US history in general. I pointed out that black Americans have just as much stake and heritage in this country as anyone else. The first person to die in the Revolutionary War was Crispus Attucks, a black man. There were black Minute Men. I mentioned Andrew Jackson and the black battalion that was vital in defeating the the British in the Battle of New Orleans.

Peterson had one call for me - a woman who angrily denounced Andrew Jackson and how those slaves were forced to fight. I was taken aback by this, because those men were heroes and veterans to be honored regardless of slavery. Shamefully, some of those men did not get their freedom, but it does not take away from the fact that they put their lives on the line for their country. I might have added that nearly 600,000 ‘privileged’ white men died in the Civil War to end slavery.

The kneelers seem to have forgotten that.

Increasingly our country is divided.

 

Civility is being replaced by name calling–and even violence.

 

People want others with whom they disagree to lose their jobs.

 

Accusations of sexual impropriety are widespread.

 

Censorship is being implemented by the tech left.

 

Rational debate is replaced by name calling and fear.

 

Racial hatred is very real and always has been, but it seems worse nowadays—and our first ‘black’ president, Obama, actually set back race relations.

 

Too many people now hate our country, our history and our culture.

What is that culture? For most of our history it has been predominately European and Christian. For years we’ve had a huge influx of immigrants ‘of color’ who have a lot of children. White people will soon be a minority in the USA. There are some on the alt right calling for the protection of whites by means identity politics and segregation. Many black nationalists also want the return of segregation, after they fought so hard against it. Muslims naturally segregate themselves and demand special food, special treatment, and Sharia Law, which is completely at odds with our Constitution. The rich are getting stupendously richer and segregate themselves in gated communities. Three men in America now control more wealth than the bottom half of the US population.

Immigrants, illegal and otherwise, are now encouraged to keep their own cultures and languages. Some consider the traditional melting pot to be offensive - they say it’s ‘racist’ and ‘nativist.’

The end game of that kind of thinking will be the proliferation of ‘no go’ Balkanized zones in the United States. Trump’s brand of nationalism may be the glue needed to keep our country together. At least for a while longer.

"Meddling"? The US State Department"s New Program To Take On Hungarian Media

Authored by Daniel McAdams via The Ron Paul Institute for Peace & Prosperity,

Hypocrisy may be the only consistent guiding principle of US foreign policy.

Here"s a prime example of the "do as we say, not as we do" that is the core of how Washington does business overseas: In the same week that the the US Justice Department demanded that the Russian-backed RT America network register as a foreign propaganda entity or face arrest, the US State Department"s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor (DNL) has announced that it is launching a program to massively interfere in NATO-partner Hungary"s internal media.

So the US Justice Department is cracking down on RT America for what it says is manipulation of US domestic affairs while the US State Department announces a new program to manipulate Hungary"s domestic affairs.

The State Department"s new program would send three-quarters of a million dollars to Washington-selected Hungarian media outlets to "increase citizens’ access to objective information about domestic and global issues in Hungary." On what authority does the United States pick winners and losers in Hungary"s diverse media environment? Since when does one government have the right to determine what news is "objective" in another country? Hungary is not a country to be "regime-changed" -- it is a full democracy where the will of the people is regularly expressed at the ballot box and where the media competes freely in the marketplace of ideas.

Washington"s Hungarian media project is clearly meant to interfere in that country"s domestic political environment. Here are the stated objectives of the US government"s Hungary program:

The program should improve the quality of local traditional and online media and increase the public’s access to reliable and unbiased information.

 

...

 

Projects should aim to have impact that leads to democratic reforms, and should have the potential for sustainability beyond DRL resources. (emphasis added)

The State Department"s Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights, and Labor identifies its mission in this call for grantees as "promoting democracy and protecting human rights globally." So what is it doing in Hungary? Hungary has had nearly three decades of democracy since 1989 and hardly needs the United States to tell it what kind of media is allowed (subsidized) and which kind should be suppressed.

In reality this is a US government program to ensure that the Hungarian media follows Washington"s policy line. Hungarians are all too familiar with this kind of toxic interference from an outside superpower: it was called the Soviet Union. Does Washington really seek to take on that role?

Stab in the back

This US government intervention in Hungary"s internal affairs must feel like a stab in the back to Orban and his government. Orban was an early -- and rare -- supporter of candidate Donald Trump among his European colleagues. Indeed, where Brusssels saw Trump as a gauche loudmouth, Orban openly admired the soon-to-be-president"s position on immigration and particularly on the mass immigration of mostly Muslim "refugees" that has proven to be disastrous for so many European countries. Likewise, Viktor Orban"s Fidesz party has managed to retain a high level of popularity through two election cycles by embracing and promoting the kind of nationalism that characterized Trump"s successful campaign.

Orban"s early support for Trump appeared to have paid off. Where Fidesz had struggled to make any headway at all under GW Bush or Obama"s State Departments, both of which were openly hostile, one of President-elect Trump"s first moves was to invite Orban to the White House. Orban, for his part, hailed Trump on inauguration day, welcoming in an era where national interest takes precedent over multilateralism.

As recently as last month, President Trump praised Viktor Orban, saying that the "strong and brave" Hungarian Prime Minister is "on my guest list.”

Then Trump"s State Department launched a program to undermine Hungary"s national sovereignty by interfering in the Hungarian media market. It seems national sovereignty is a one-way street for Washington no matter who occupies the Oval Office.

Hypocrisy...or policy consistency?

But perhaps it"s inaccurate to accuse the US government of hypocrisy in this case. After all, pressuring RT America with the intent of silencing the news network and spending our tax dollars propping up US-friendly media outlets in the Hungarian countryside are actually two sides of the same coin: the US government will tell you what kind of media you are allowed to consume.

If you are a media network in the United States that allows voices who oppose Washington"s neocon-dominated foreign policy they will shut you down. If you are a news outlet in the Hungarian countryside that spews the US party line, they will prop you up. Both cases are the same: your media will toe the US government official line or else.

*  *  *

Note to Washington: This is not 1950. Hungary has been a fully free and democratic country with plenty of free elections under its belt. It does not need you to come in and attempt to manipulate its newspapers and broadcast media. What would you do if China sent in a few million dollars to prop up US publications who agreed to push the Beijing line? What about if Tehran sent some money to publications pushing the Ayatollah party line? You cannot even tolerate RT America -- which is largely staffed by Americans but dares to feature prominent Americans who challenge the neocon foreign policy line. Hands off Hungary!

Note to Viktor Orban: You risked arrest -- and worse -- in June, 1989 when you directly confronted the communists who were occupying your country. Now that Hungary"s freedom has been won -- in no small way due to your efforts -- do not allow Washington"s neocons to take it away from you! If you do not confront this violation of Hungarian sovereignty, the neocons will continue to increase the pressure. The neocons want you out! Just this week, neocon commentator Anne Applebaum wrote that you are a "neo-Bolshevik" who has "little to do with the right that has been part of Western politics since World War II, and...no connection to existing conservative parties." Do a little research and you will notice that Applebaum is a member of the International Advisory Council of the Center for European Policy Analysis -- the organization your own government funded for a big conference this summer! Neocon knives are out for you. You"d be smart to make a better assessment of who are your friends and enemies in the United States...before it"s too late.

Friedman: Almost All Countries In Europe Have Border Issues

Authored by George Friedman via MauldinEconomics.com,

For centuries, Europe has fought wars over borders. In the 19th century and the first half of the 20th century, Europe’s borders shifted wildly. As empires fragmented, new nations arose and wars were waged.

After 1945 and the beginning of the Cold War, a new principle emerged on the Continent. The borders that existed at the end of World War II were deemed sacrosanct—not to be changed.

Europeans knew that border disputes had been one of the reasons of the two world wars and that even raising the legitimacy of post-war borders risked igniting passions that led to violence.

Similarly, untouchable were the existing spheres of influence on the Continent. There was the East and the West, and neither would mess with the other.

Thus, when the Soviets crushed independence movements in Hungary and Czechoslovakia, the United States refrained from any military action (not that there were many options). When Yugoslavia chose a pro-Western neutrality over membership in the Warsaw Pact, the Soviets didn’t intervene.

But in the early 1990s, everything changed.

Border Issues Arise, Again

In 1991–1992, two things happened.

First came the fall of the Soviet Union; then came the signing of the Maastricht Treaty and the creation of the European Union. Border issues began to drive events again.

The border of the Soviet Union collapsed, and a multitude of countries popped up to reclaim their past. There were many questions about borders that were mumbled about.

But for Eastern European countries, other problems took precedence: establishing national sovereignty, finding their place in a Europe that they longed to join, and building a new life for their people. They let the border issue drop—for the most part.

Yugoslavia and the Caucasus were exceptions that drove home the lesson of European borders. There, outside the framework of the EU and of little consequence to others, more than 100,000 people died.

Compare this to the Velvet Divorce of the Czechs and Slovaks, which took place within the context of future European states and left no one dead.

After this, and with Yugoslavia and the Caucasus in mind, the European Union tried to reinstate the principle that borders were sacrosanct. It provided what it had promised—peace and prosperity—and treated borders as anachronistic. No one was supposed to care where the lines were drawn. But there was a problem.

The Europeans Union’s Oversight

The European Union had affirmed the principle of national self-determination while avoiding the question of what a nation actually was. A nation was, under the bloc’s definition, any political entity that was in place when the EU was formed. There was little consideration after that.

This is why Catalonia is so important, along with Scotland. The Scots rejected a divorce by a startlingly narrow vote. One would have expected 90% of Scots to want to remain in the United Kingdom. Slightly more than 55% wanted to.

This means secessionists are within striking distance of secession—which would not only divide Scotland from England, but would also maintain the divide among the Scots.

Add to this another critical element. Catalonia has been part of Spain for a long time, but it has considered itself a unique nation apart for an even longer time. Spain will not legalize an independence vote.

The underlying questions are the ones the Europeans tried to bury, particularly after Yugoslavia: What is a nation, and what rights does it have? Both Scotland and Catalonia are nations. Do they therefore have a right to national determination or have they lost that right?

And what are the consequences if the Catalans disagree?

No Solution

This is not the only such issue festering in Europe.

Hungary was partitioned between Romania and Slovakia. Does it have a right to reclaim these lands? Belgium was a British invention binding the Dutch and French in an unhappy marriage. Can they divorce? Lviv used to be a very Polish city, and now it is part of Ukraine. Can western Ukraine secede and its people rejoin the countries they were citizens of before 1945?

The European Union promised universal prosperity if everyone suspended the question of borders and ignored their identities. It was a good bargain. But times have changed, and economic problems make borders much more important.

Europe, of course, has no solution to the problem.

That we would be talking about an independent Scotland and Catalonia in 2017 would seem preposterous. No economist would see it as a rational discussion.

Nations matter because Europe is merely a continent, and the EU is merely a treaty. It is a useful entity, and being useful is the only thing that justifies it. If it loses its utility, it loses its legitimacy. And that would also mean that the boundaries it has set would wither and die.

Almost all current nations in Europe have border issues and some parts that want to be independent. Most are quiet at the moment. But they are watching Scotland and Catalonia. And they know where border issues in Europe lead.

*  *  *

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McCain As Metaphor

Authored by Justin Raimondo via AntiWar.com,

Some people are living symbols, sheer embodiments of a concept that fits their persona as snugly as their skin: e.g. the Dalai Lama personifies Contemplative Piety, Harvey Weinstein is the incarnation of Brazen Vulgarity, and John McCain’s very person exudes the sweaty blustery spirit of Empire.

His entire history – born in the Panama Canal zone, son of an admiral, third-generation centurion, the War Party’s senatorial spokesman – made it nearly impossible for him to be other than what he is: the country’s most outspoken warmonger and dedicated internationalist.

As George Orwell remarked, “After forty, everyone has the face they deserve,” and in McCain’s case this is doubly true. That Roman head, fit for a coin of high denomination, looks as if it might sprout a crown of laurel leaves at any moment:  Grizzled brow, wrinkled with the tension of an inborn belligerence, eyes alight with a perpetual flame of self-righteous anger, McCain is Teddy Roosevelt impersonating Cato the Elder. In the extreme predictability of his warlike effusions, he’s become a bit of a cartoon character. Who can forget his enthusiastic rendition of “Bomb bomb bomb Iran!” to the tune of “Barbara Ann”?

The Senator from Arizona represents something relatively new on the American scene: the emerging class of colonial administrators, Pentagon contractors, and high-ranking military personnel, and their families, many of them stationed overseas. These people have a material interest in the expansion of our role as global cop, they number in the tens of thousands, and they are strategically placed in the social order, with enough social power to constitute an influential lobby.

As the prototype of this mutant species of Homo Americanus, McCain is the perfect enemy of the new nationalism that handed the White House to Donald Trump and sundered the Brits from the EU. It’s no surprise he’s become the antipode of the Trumpian “America First” foreign policy doctrine – a doctrine that is almost never implemented, but that’s another column. His latest philippic perfectly summarizes the spirit and content of the brazen imperialism that is his credo and the credo of his class, We get the whole grand tour of McCainism as a worldview, from the rather odd idea that “America is an idea” and not an actual place to the glories of the “international order.” There is much shedding of blood “to make a better world” – a cause we are told has “made our own civilization more just, freer, more accomplished and prosperous than the America that existed when I watched my father go off to war on December 7, 1941.” Now here is crackpot Keynesianism with a vengeance: the destruction of World War II was good for the economy!

Having “liberated” the world from itself, the United States, as the champion of World Order, is in danger of turning away from its sacred duty to always be shedding lots and lots of blood on behalf of Others. And we know just who McCain is talking about:

“To fear the world we have organized and led for three-quarters of a century, to abandon the ideals we have advanced around the globe, to refuse the obligations of international leadership and our duty to remain ‘the last best hope of earth’ for the sake of some half-baked, spurious nationalism cooked up by people who would rather find scapegoats than solve problems is as unpatriotic as an attachment to any other tired dogma of the past that Americans consigned to the ash heap of history.”

The idea that we led and organized the world for the entire postwar era erases the cold war from history, a neat trick given McCain’s record. And as for our “ideals” and this “last best hope” business, none of that is worth a single American soldier – nor does it have anything to do with a soldier’s proper job, which is protecting this country. Yet what is one to expect from someone who actually believes “we live in a land of ideals, not blood and soil.” Blood never comes into it for McCain unless it’s being shed in some ill-conceived totally unnecessary war. And as for soil – there is none. There’s just “ideals,” floating in a void.

While admitting that the Trumpian version of American nationalism is somewhat undercooked – and, perhaps, not all that digestible – one has to wonder: where does a supporter of the Iraq war, who assured us it would be a glorious victory, get off calling anybody or anything half-baked?

McCain doesn’t even try making a coherent argument: instead, he simply lies by claiming that, having taken the road to Empire, “we have become incomparably powerful and wealthy as we did.” It’s utter nonsense, of course: empires are an expansive luxury. We spend more on the military than the top ten powers combined, and the national debt is at historic heights. We’re effectively bankrupt thanks to out-of-control military spending and McCain’s favored wars of choice.

The idea that we have a “moral obligation” to enforce McCain’s beloved “international order” is rooted in the crazed post-millennial pietism that has motivated so much that is mischievous in American history. The old religious impulse that motivated Prohibition and the “anti-vice” campaigns of the nineteenth century has, today, been secularized and internationalized. The old fundamentalists sought to remake the country, their secular successors seek to remake the world. This accounts for the quasi-religious tone of McCain’s remarks, this talk of “moral obligation” and “shame” if we fail to take up the burden of Empire, manfully and willfully, because “We will not thrive in a world where our leadership and ideals are absent. We wouldn’t deserve to.”

In other words: Americans have no right to live their lives in peace, and to leave others in the same condition: they must perpetually be sticking their noses in other peoples’ business, sniffing out “injustice” and making sure the trains run on time.

McCain hails the crusade to “help make another, better world” – yet the American people don’t want another world, they want to live in this world in peace and security, rather than sacrificing themselves to some imaginary “duty” to uplift the world on Uncle Sam’s shoulders. That’s one reason why Trump is in the White House and McCain is on the outside looking in.

Pat Buchanan Asks: "Is Liberalism A Dying Faith?"

Authored by Patrick Buchanan via Buchanan.org,

Asked to name the defining attributes of the America we wish to become, many liberals would answer that we must realize our manifest destiny since 1776, by becoming more equal, more diverse and more democratic - and the model for mankind’s future.

Equality, diversity, democracy - this is the holy trinity of the post-Christian secular state at whose altars Liberal Man worships.

But the congregation worshiping these gods is shrinking.

And even Europe seems to be rejecting what America has on offer.

In a retreat from diversity, Catalonia just voted to separate from Spain. The Basque and Galician peoples of Spain are following the Catalan secession crisis with great interest.

The right-wing People’s Party and far-right Freedom Party just swept 60 percent of Austria’s vote, delivering the nation to 31-year-old Sebastian Kurz, whose anti-immigrant platform was plagiarized from the Freedom Party. Summarized it is: Austria for the Austrians!

Lombardy, whose capital is Milan, and Veneto will vote Sunday for greater autonomy from Rome.

South Tyrol (Alto Adige), severed from Austria and ceded to Italy at Versailles, written off by Hitler to appease Mussolini after his Anschluss, is astir anew with secessionism. Even the Sicilians are talking of separation.

By Sunday, the Czech Republic may have a new leader, billionaire Andrej Babis. Writes The Washington Post, Babis “makes a sport of attacking the European Union and says NATO’s mission is outdated.”

Platform Promise: Keep the Muslim masses out of the motherland.

To ethnonationalists, their countrymen are not equal to all others, but superior in rights. Many may nod at Thomas Jefferson’s line that “All men are created equal,” but they no more practice that in their own nations than did Jefferson in his.

On Oct. 7, scores of thousands of Poles lined up along the country’s entire 2,000-mile border — to pray the rosary.

It was the centennial of the Virgin Mary’s last apparition at Fatima in Portugal in 1917, and the day in 1571 the Holy League sank the Muslim fleet at Lepanto to save Europe. G. K. Chesterton’s poem, “Lepanto,” was once required reading in Catholic schools.

Each of these traditionalist-nationalist movements is unique, but all have a common cause. In the hearts of Europe’s indigenous peoples is embedded an ancient fear: loss of the homeland to Islamic invaders.

Europe is rejecting, resisting, recoiling from “diversity,” the multiracial, multicultural, multiethnic and multilingual future that, say U.S. elites, is America’s preordained mission to bring about for all mankind.

Indeed, increasingly, the indigenous peoples of Europe seem to view as the death of their nations and continent, what U.S. liberal elites see as the Brave New World to come.

To traditionalist Europeans, our heaven looks like their hell.

Thus Poles fall on their knees to pray to the Virgin Mary to spare them from threats of an Islamic future, as their ancestors prayed at the time of Lepanto, and of Vienna in 1683, when the Polish King John Sobieski marched to halt the last Muslim drive into the heart of Europe.

European peoples and parties are today using democratic means to achieve “illiberal” ends. And it is hard to see what halts the drift away from liberal democracy toward the restrictive right. For in virtually every nation, there is a major party in opposition, or a party in power, that holds deeply nationalist views.

European elites may denounce these new parties as “illiberal” or fascist, but it is becoming apparent that it may be liberalism itself that belongs to yesterday. For more and more Europeans see the invasion of the continent along the routes whence the invaders came centuries ago, not as a manageable problem but an existential crisis.

To many Europeans, it portends an irreversible alteration in the character of the countries their grandchildren will inherit, and possibly an end to their civilization. And they are not going to be deterred from voting their fears by being called names that long ago lost their toxicity from overuse.

And as Europeans decline to celebrate the racial, ethnic, creedal and cultural diversity extolled by American elites, they also seem to reject the idea that foreigners should be treated equally in nations created for their own kind.

Europeans seem to admire more, and model their nations more, along the lines of the less diverse America of the Eisenhower era, than on the polyglot America of 2017.

And Europe seems to be moving toward immigration polices more like the McCarran-Walter Act of 1950 than the open borders bill that Sen. Edward Kennedy shepherded through the Senate in 1965.

Kennedy promised that the racial and ethnic composition of the America of the 1960s would not be overturned, and he questioned the morality and motives of any who implied that it would.

So, why is liberalism dying?

Because it is proving to be what James Burnham called it in his 1964 “Suicide of the West” — the ideology of Western suicide.

What we see in Europe today is people who, belatedly recognizing this, have begun to “rage, rage, against dying of the light.”

Caught On Tape: UNLV Professor Blames Trump For Las Vegas Massacre

Authored by Mitchell Gunter via CampusReform.org,

Just days after the horrific massacre in Las Vegas, and just 5 miles away from the scene, a University of Nevada-Las Vegas professor told her class that President Trump is to blame.

In a video obtained by Campus Reform, UNLV Assistant Professor Tess Winkelmann is seen addressing her History 407 class.

Referring to Trump, Winkelmann noted that “when he got elected, I told my classes three semesters ago, some of us won’t be affected by this presidency, but others are going to die. Other people will die because of this.”

"I don’t know whether these events would have inevitably happened whether or not he got elected, but he has the same rhetorical powers every president has, to encourage or discourage,” she continued.

“So far, all he has done is to encourage violence.”

Winkelmann also charged President Trump with equating “right nationalism” with “anti-racism,” referring to the president’s comments on the violence in Charlottesville, VA.

She then asserted that Trump has “threatened nuclear violence against North Korea, and other places,” proclaiming that “words, especially coming from someone who is the President, have consequences.”

Some students weren’t happy with Winkelmann’s comments.

One UNLV student, who spoke with Campus Reform on condition of anonymity, called the speech a “politically-driven rant” to make the point that “President Trump somehow incited this violence.”

“We just experienced one of the worst mass shootings in U.S. History. It’s a mile [sic] away, and we don’t know what happened, we don’t know why it happened, and we’re pushing political agendas, and that’s what this is about, taking advantage of the situation for political belief, when we should be uniting, healing as a community,” the student remarked.

“At every chance the President got, he condemned this violence. The professor is taking away from the dialogue that should be happening to attack the President,” the student added.

“Professors are in a position of trust, and they’re abusing it to promote their political ideology or agenda. I think it’s dangerous when you blame the President for a massacre, and basically shut down students who disagree.”

“I think it is despicable that a professor at an institute of higher learning, one that is located in the same city in which this attack occurred, would use her platform to spew such hatred and divisive rhetoric,” agreed another student, who also wishes to remain anonymous.

The second student did, however, say the incident was not entirely surprising because “this professor had previously made comments in opposition to Trump.”

Campus Reform reached out to Assistant Professor Tess Winkelmann, but did not receive a response in time for publication.

McMaken: Stop Wrapping The Flag Around Pro Sports

Authored by Ryan McMaken via The Mises Institute,

Desperate to fill hours and hours of air time on 24-hour news channels, media corporations have made sure the discussion of the correct posture of National Football League players has been front and center. 

Apparently, before grown men can chase a little toy around a grassy field for a few hours, it"s absolutely essential that they take part in a variety of pro-government rituals. This was not always the case, though, and prior to the twentieth century, it was hardly expected that a ballgame be preceded by a recitation of the national anthem or any other song of national allegiance.

Indeed, the current pantomime in which NFL players are expected to stand at attention for the national anthem is of extremely recent origin. As Tom Curran pointed out on Comcast Sportsnet, prior to 2009, football players "weren"t on the field for the national anthem and instead generally remained in the locker room." 

And why did players start making a display of their "patriotism" in 2009? It turns out the government gave them taxpayer money to do so: 

In 2009, Barack Obama"s Department of Defense began paying hundreds of thousands towards teams in a marketing strategy designed to show support for the troops and increase recruitments. The NFL then required all players and personnel to be on the sidelines during the national anthem, in exchange for taxpayers dollars. Prior, the national anthem was played in the stadium but players had the option of staying in the locker room before heading out to the field.

Furthermore, teams that showed "Veteran"s Salutes" during games were paid upwards of $5.1 million dollars.

In total, 6.8 million in taxpayer money was doled out to sports teams - mostly NFL teams - for so-called "paid patriotism." 

When the Pittsburgh Steelers elected to stay in the locker room during the anthem this past Sunday, this was denounced by many as "boycotting" the national song, although this would have just been standard practice a decade ago. 

Playing the Anthem: A "Tradition" Promoted by War

Not surprisingly, if we look into the history of playing the national anthem at sporting events, we find war was an important factor. 

Before the First World War, playing the national anthem or sporting events was quite rare. No one expected it to be done, and hiring a band was expensive. 

According to mlb.com, the most conspicuous early use of the national anthem was at game 1 of the 1918 World Series during World War I. Unexpectedly, during the seventh-inning stretch, a military band played the national anthem in an effort to liven up a reportedly surly and war-wearied group of spectators.  

Use of the anthem spread from there. The anthem"s use expanded even more during the Second World War, as Matt Soniak notes: 

During World War II, baseball games again became venues for large-scale displays of patriotism, and technological advances in public address systems allowed songs to be played without a band.

"The Star-Spangled Banner" was played before games throughout the course of the war, and by the time the war was over, the pregame singing of the national anthem had become cemented as a baseball ritual, after which it spread to other sports.

But even after the war, the habit of playing the anthem at every game was not firmly in place until the Vietnam war. 

In most cases, the use of the anthem was not directly subsidized as it was with the taxpayer-funded paid-patriotism scam. Usually, team owners quite voluntarily employed the anthem as a marketing gimmick. In times of war, team owners were happy to use the anthem as a type of advertising to make an emotional connection between the customers — i.e., the spectators — and the team"s product. Wrapping a commercial product in the flag and apple pie to increase sales is hardly unique to pro sports. But pro sports may have used this tactic more successfully than any other industry. 

Unfortunately for the NFL, this tried-and-true marketing strategy may be backfiring as the teams" employees — and surely many spectators as well — see no problem with using the anthem ritual as an opportunity to make a political statement. The result has been a marketing nightmare for the league. 

Although this has been taken up by politicians such as Donald Trump as a matter of critical importance, it really should be viewed as just a private business matter. Tho Bishop has noted that, as private firms, each team should be free to discipline or fire any employee who might cause customer displeasure or a loss of revenue for the team. The question of course, is whether it might be even worse — in terms of earnings — for a team to eliminate its most talented athletes. That"s a business decision the owners will have to make. 

Everything Is Political

To a certain extent, though, the pro sports industry has called down the current controversy on itself. Having wrapped their product in the political garb of Old Glory and the national anthem for decades, team owners are now having to pay the piper. Since many of their customers now expect pro sports to be political — but only political in a way that matches their particular ideology — team owners now face a headache that could have been totally avoidable. 

It didn"t have to be this way. In recent years, many reasonable observers have complained that society is becoming increasingly politicized. Today, it"s easy to find ways in which once apolitical activities have been ruined by ideological posturing. Late night talk shows are now essentially hard-left propaganda. Selling tacos is denounced as "cultural appropriation," and every Hollywood awards show is now a series of political speeches. In the case of professional sports, however, there"s nothing recent about this sort of politicization.

For nearly a century, pro sports have been politicized through their habitual use of the American state"s symbols and songs. The Pentagon knows this, which is why it so enthusiastically shoveled millions of dollars of taxpayer money at the NFL as part of an advertising blitz. But even back in 1918, the US government knew the potential of politicizing sporting events. This is why, during the 1918 World Series, the Navy made sure it had a recruiting station at Wrigley Field. 

While US Freaks Over NFL, Study Shows Only 25% of Americans Know the 3 Branches of Gov’t

The latest “Divide and Conquer” trend in the United States is centered around the debate over which side is more patriotic—but a new study suggests that while many Americans claim to love the United States, only 25 percent of Americans could list the three branches of the government they so adamantly support.

According to the results from the annual Annenberg Constitution Day Civics Survey, only a quarter of Americans, or around 26 percent, can name all three branches of government, and more than one-third of Americans surveyed, or 37 percent, cannot name any of the rights guaranteed under the First Amendment.

Knowledge of the three branches of government—legislative, judicial and executive—is something many grade-school children are quizzed on, but the idea that adults in the U.S. aren’t aware of who makes up the government they are paying to create rules for them is unsettling. Even when money is being taken out of each of their paychecks, they still are not paying attention to who is spending it, and how its destination impacts the future of the nation.

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Then there is the result from the survey that claims more than one-third of Americans cannot name the rights guaranteed to them under the First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Those rights—which include freedoms of speech, religion, the press and peaceful protest of the government—are now at the center of the great NFL debate.

When President Trump took to Twitter to call for NFL team owners to fire any players who took a knee during the National Anthem, he was violating the First Amendment. While a player’s decision to kneel may lead to him being fired based on the fact that his team is losing sponsors who do not support his actions, and the team’s owner now sees the player as a deterrent, his decision is acceptable because it is happening in the private sector.

… trump taking a veiled shot at colin kaepernick, says owner should say: "get that sonofabitch off the field right now… he"s fired!!" pic.twitter.com/ttbOd0VrPG

— fake nick ramsey (@nick_ramsey) September 23, 2017

The National Football League is a private organization. Donald Trump is a government official. Ultimately, football players are hired based on their ability to bring in revenue for their team. If a player’s actions are impacting how much revenue his team is generating, then his contract will end as a result, and it is simply business. But when a government official interferes and demands his firing, in this case, it crossed a line between government and its citizens that is guaranteed by the First Amendment.

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Whether Americans are aware of what the branches of government are, or what rights they have under the Constitution, they are still American citizens by birth. However, the survey found that more than half of Americans are also uninformed about the rights of noncitizens. According to the results, 53 percent of respondents “incorrectly think it is accurate to say that immigrants who are here illegally do not have any rights under the U.S. Constitution.”

The annual Annenberg Constitution Day Civics Survey is conducted by the Annenberg Public Policy Center of the University of Pennsylvania. It obtained results from 1,013 adults in the United States from Aug. 9-13.

As The Free Thought Project has reported, it was not until 2009 when the Department of Defense began “paying for patriotism” that NFL teams were present on the field during the National Anthem. Judging an individual’s love for his country by his demeanor during a song before a football game also begs the question: What’s Worse, a Kneeling Millionaire or 300,000 Vets Neglected to Death?

At the end of the day, true change is not going to come from the amount of controversy that is generated over a football player kneeling before a game. It will come when Americans stop getting distracted by “Divide and Conquer” propaganda, when they start becoming educated on how their government is spending the money it steals from their paychecks, and when they truly take ownership of their rights.

A Veteran Asks, ‘What’s Worse, a Kneeling Millionaire or 300,000 Vets Neglected to Death?’

Naturally, Americans are up in arms because a bunch of folks who get paid millions of dollars to throw around a leather ball decided to kneel during the national anthem. I find this ironic for several reasons.

First off, I’d like to clarify that choosing to not watch football because someone did something you disagree with is entirely your choice and your choice alone. Just like NFL players can make the decision to kneel during the anthem, you can make the decision to change the channel. It’s called freedom, it is awesome, and I highly recommend it.

That being said, I’d like to draw attention to two points, one being the idea of a country whose leader shames others and calls for the termination of their employment for practicing their right to disagree with the government, and two, why are people so upset over a bunch of kneeling millionaires?

Donald Trump was well within his right to say whatever he wants about the NFL players, up to and including calling for the NFL to fire them. It’s called freedom, and you don’t have to like it to participate in it. But, if Trump really wanted the players to start standing up for the anthem, calling for them to be fired is not only on the verge of tyrannical, but it’s nowhere close to a solution.

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Respect is earned. It is not mandated through threats or abuse of power or forced through the barrel of a gun. If there was one thing I learned in the Marine Corps it’s that good leaders are ones that lead by example. Those leaders who demanded respect without first earning it were the reason for me turning down a 5-figure tax-free reenlistment bonus to stay in.

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Leaders, and I use that term loosely, who want something from you and don’t have the common decency or fortitude to first apply themselves and find a peaceful and mutually beneficial way to get it are not leading by example and deserve no respect. Sadly, in America, leaders haven’t done these things in a long time. In America, through propaganda and fear, our leaders are demanding and mandating respect—without earning it. This is the definition of tyranny.

If Donald Trump really wanted the football players to start standing during the national anthem, then he should ask them what it is they want. If the dozens of millionaires taking knees can’t articulate a rational and well thought out list of requests, then they are merely publicity hounds buying into the divide. Colin Kaepernick could do this, and he’s has taken action to try to resolve his grievances.

I’m not quite sure all these other NFL players would be such good leaders—like Kaepernick—if asked what it is they want.

If it’s police brutality they are protesting, where were most of these folks when Obama was in office? It’s not like police brutality and racist policing practices suddenly became an issue once Trump took over in 2017. Where were all these NFL players when Obama was filling prisons with black people for possessing a plant? Where were all these NFL players when Obama continued to wage the drug war which is proven to lay far more waste to the rights of those with darker skin than to those with lighter skin? Outside of just a few of them, they were nowhere to be found, that’s where.

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That brings me to my second point—the folks that are angry at these football players taking knees—because it disrespects our country, our troops and our veterans. Again, these folks have every right to voice their opinion, be angry, and boycott the NFL. It’s called freedom, and it’s awesome, and I highly recommend it.

That being said, if a person taking a knee during a song is disrespectful to our troops and veterans, what, exactly, is it considered when 307,000 of those veterans die waiting for care they were promised by this country? If a person taking a knee during a song is disrespectful to those who fought for our country, what is it considered when that country looks the other way when there over 40,000 of those veterans living on the streets with no home? If taking a knee at a football game is disrespectful, what then, is it considered when Americans remain silent as a veteran kills himself or herself every 65 minutes, every single day, every single month, of every single year?

If this song and flag represent the land of the free and people kneeling down makes others angry because it is an insult to that freedom, then how does one view the NSA surveillance grid? Is a person taking a knee worse than the United States of America creating the largest spying network the world has ever seen—one that the Stasi would’ve killed for—and using it on innocent Americans?

Is a person kneeling more offensive than the TSA groping babies, cancer patients, the elderly, and the disabled, despite never stopping a terror attack? Is a knee more offensive to freedom than the United States creating, maintaining, and financing the largest prison population the world has ever seen through the enforcement of victimless crimes?

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Is a rich football player kneeling really that much more offensive than the Commander in Chief making one of the largest weapons deals in the history of the US with the largest state sponsor of terror in the world, Saudi Arabia? Is a knee more offensive than calling Saudi Arabia our ally after they were exposed for financing the horrific attacks on 9/11?

Where is the outrage? Call me a traitor, call me unpatriotic, call me whatever you want, tell me to move to Somalia and eat shit and die, because—freedom baby. However, I’ll always stand against tyranny, even if that means pissing people off for telling the truth. In an empire of lies, telling the truth is a revolutionary and often hated act.

If we can agree on one thing in this sea of vitriol and disagreement, let us remember that this country was born through protest. Slavery ended because of protest. The Declaration of Independence was a protest. It was not order-following and blind compliance that created America—it was disobedience.

Patriots And Protesters Should Take A Knee For The Constitution

Authored by John Whitehead via The Rutherford Institute,

By all means, let’s talk about patriotism and President Trump’s call for “respect for our Country, Flag and National Anthem.”

At a time when the American flag adorns everything from men’s boxers and women’s bikinis to beer koozies, bandannas and advertising billboards (with little outcry from the American public), and the National Anthem is sung by Pepper the Parrot during the Puppy Bowl, this conveniently timed outrage over disrespect for the country’s patriotic symbols rings somewhat hollow, detracts from more serious conversations that should be taking place about critical policy matters of state, and further divides the nation and ensures that “we the people” will not present a unified front to oppose the police state.

First off, let’s tackle this issue of respect or lack thereof for patriotic symbols.

As the U.S. Supreme Court has made clear, Americans have a right to abstain from patriotic demonstrations and/or actively protest that demonstration, for example, by raising one’s fist during the Pledge of Allegiance. Likewise, Americans have a First Amendment right to display, alter or destroy the U.S. flag as acts of symbolic protest speech.

In fact, in Street v. New York (1969), the Supreme Court held that the government may not punish a person for uttering words critical of the flag. The case arose after Sidney Street, hearing about the attempted murder of civil rights leader James Meredith in Mississippi, burned a 48-star American flag on a New York City street corner to protest what he saw as the government’s failure to protect Meredith. Upon being questioned about the flag, Street responded, “Yes; that is my flag; I burned it. If they let that happen to Meredith, we don’t need an American flag.”

In Spence v. Washington (1974), the Court ruled that the right to display the American flag with any mark or design upon it is a protected act of expression. The case involved a college student who had placed a peace symbol on a three by five foot American flag using removable black tape and displayed it upside down from his apartment window.

Finally, in Texas v. Johnson (1989), the Court held that flag burning was protected speech under the First Amendment.  The case arose from a demonstration near the site of the Republican National Convention in Dallas during which protesters marched through the streets, chanted political slogans, staged “die-ins” in front of several corporate offices to dramatize the consequences of nuclear war, and burned the flag as a means of political protest.

In other words, if freedom means anything, it means that those exercising their right to protest are showing the greatest respect for the principles on which this nation was founded: the right to free speech and the right to dissent. Clearly, the First Amendment to the Constitution assures Americans of the right to speak freely, assemble freely and protest (petition the government for a redress of grievances).

Whether those First Amendment activities take place in a courtroom or a classroom, on a football field or in front of the U.S. Supreme Court is not the issue: what matters is that Americans have a right—according to the spirit, if not always the letter, of the law—to voice their concerns without being penalized for it.

Second, let’s not confuse patriotism (love for or devotion to one’s country) with blind obedience to the government’s dictates. That is the first step towards creating an authoritarian regime.

One can be patriotic and love one’s country while at the same time disagreeing with the government or protesting government misconduct. Indeed, real patriots care enough to take a stand, speak out, protest and challenge the government whenever it steps out of line.

It’s not anti-American to be anti-war or anti-police misconduct or anti-racial discrimination, but it is anti-American to be anti-freedom.

America requires more than voters inclined to pay lip service to a false sense of patriotism. It requires doers—a well-informed and very active group of doers—if we are to have any chance of holding the government accountable and maintaining our freedoms.

After all, it was not idle rhetoric that prompted the Framers of the Constitution to begin with the words “We the people.”

This ultimate responsibility for maintaining our freedoms rests with the people.

Third, we need to stop acting as if showing “respect” for the country, flag and national anthem is more important than the freedoms they represent.

Listen: I served in the Army. I lived through the Civil Rights era. I came of age during the Sixties, when activists took to the streets to protest war and economic and racial injustice. As a constitutional lawyer, I defend people daily whose civil liberties are being violated, including high school students prohibited from wearing American flag t-shirts to school, allegedly out of a fear that it might be disruptive.

I understand the price that must be paid for freedom. None of the people I served with or marched with or represented put our lives or our liberties on the line for a piece of star-spangled cloth or a few bars of music: we took our stands and made our sacrifices because we believed we were fighting to maintain our freedoms and bring about justice for all Americans.

Love of country will sometimes entail carrying a picket sign or going to jail or taking a knee, if necessary, to preserve liberty and challenge injustice. And it will mean speaking up for those with whom you might disagree. Tolerance for dissent, we must remember, is a vital characteristic of the citizens of a democratic society.

The problems facing our generation are numerous and are becoming incredibly complex.

As I make clear in my book Battlefield America: The War on the American People, we’re at a very crucial crossroads in American history. We have to be well-informed, not only about current events but well-versed in the basics of our rights and duties as citizens. If not, in perceived times of crisis, we may very well find ourselves in the clutches of a governmental system that is alien to everything for which America stands.

Therein is the menace to our freedoms.

So stop falling for the distractions. Stop allowing yourself to be fooled by propaganda and partisan politics. Stop acting as if the only thing worth getting outraged about is whether a bunch of football players stand or kneel for the National Anthem.

Stop being armchair patriots and start acting like foot soldiers for the Constitution.