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De Omnibus Dubitandum - Lux Veritas

Sunday, June 30, 2024

2024 Election, Europe

By Rich Kozlovich

This is the second in what looks like to be a series or articles dealing with the transition going on in European politics, the first was, Europe's Left is Rattled.

There are two things the recent European Parliament elections substantiates.  One, Europe's far right has now been mainstreamed.  Two,  they're getting more successful by the day.  There's a third thing that must be understood.  The European right isn't like  American conservatism.  They're more like the Republican RINO's, as a result, we're going to see a lot of incoherence down the road, and it may derail a lot of good intentions and actions, so American conservatives shouldn't get overly excited over all this.

The foundational social structures of Europe lend incoherence to everything that goes on, and has always been a problem, and will always be a problem.   That's foundational to understanding what really is going on with this European Parliament election and the upcoming national elections. I think what’s happening in France right now is the precursor to what will happen with this “right wing” movement in Europe.

Conservatives in America are all excited, and they shouldn’t be. Europe has no understanding of what America conservatism is, and don’t want to, and what they’re going to accept will not be conservative by any American standard.

Europe is a dysfunctional continent with historical paradigms that are foundationally socialist in nature. They all had kings, top down government, and changing the leadership, and calling it democracy, doesn't make it so. What they do, is what they are, and they’re all socialists at an intellectual, emotional, and practical level, and that's not going to change. It's culture, and culture is king.

They not only speak different languages, they’re cultures are highly varied, and they see reality through binoculars that are held backwards, and always have. 150 years ago or so Bismarck stated the United States was a real country, while Europe was a geographical designation, and nothing has changed. 

So, let's take a look at what's happening.

The EU.

The EU leadership is filled with insane economic policies and and social views that are foundationally suicidal, and Europeans are saying so.  The nauseating stench coming from Francis and grovelling G7 leaders, can no longer be ignored.  

Michal Barron states, European 'Far Right' Issues a Stinging Rebuke to Elites, but he notes this isn't as big as it looks, and it isn't being driven by Nazism or white supremacy, it's being driven by the consequence of all this immigration from Africa and the Middle East by people who don't want to assimilate, and are:

"committing violent crimes or are violently trying to impose what Europeans regard as their oppressive religious restrictions on native European young women and gay men. Or massacre journalists who run cartoons of the prophet.  Similar increases in immigration from culturally hostile backgrounds help explain why Britain's Conservatives are about to be swept from power after 14 years and why."

This is the same problem all over Europe, they're sick of this New Woke Jihadism.  What's the solution from the elites?  Double down on all the things that are destroying Europe.  EU’s Ursula von der Leyen says it’s time we ‘put a price on carbon’, and Olivia Murray asks,  are you ready to pay for each breath you take? What happens when you can no longer afford the bill? 

Europeans have become aware of the fraud behind all this climate insanity, and the elites real goals, and they don't like it.  They know:

"the European Union, in cahoots with the globalist tyrants, has been hellbent on forcing the planet into a state of submissive chaos. Their end game is to destroy the world as we know it in exchange for their oppressive dystopia. But their elitist-funded power surge has been ground-faulted by strong resistance from freedom-loving people across Europe. They have tasted freedom, if only by proxy. By way of our presumed nemesis, social media, the world has learned a valuable lesson from Donald Trump: put your country’s people first!"

It would be interesting to see Europe embrace the actions of Javier Milei, the new President of Argentina and how he's now controlled inflation, for the first time in decades in Argentina, and he's draining the swamp, which has never been done in Argentina.  This is the story that needs telling in Europe.

 On May 15th it was reported Argentina's inflation  dropped to single digits for the first time in months.  Inflation peaked at  25.5 percent under the previous administration, a remnant of the socialist governing mentality, and like all socialist solutions, it was a failure.   The previous administration, which is still heavily represented in Argentina's legislature, and is fighting Milei's efforts to fix the mess they've created, yet his policies have  still managed to reduce inflation to a single digit.....In just five months.

FRANCE

France is now and has always been a social nightmare and to understand that, you need to understand Charles de Gaulle, as he epitomizes what it means to be French:

imperious, reserved, and ungracious. He was given to “terrifying and unpredictable rages, which were usually sparked by an imagined (or genuine) slight.” This contributed to the already inherently contentious relationship he was obliged to endure with his London hosts. Jackson cites many examples of his distrust and dislike of the English. “Hour after hour he ranted against the perfidy of the British,” Jackson notes on one occasion. “It is not enough for them to have burnt Joan of Arc once,” de Gaulle said.......Churchill wrote at the time that “there is nothing hostile to England that this man may not do once he gets off the chain.” 

In spite of the fact he really had nothing to offer the British, they continued to fund him and he continued to denigrate them.  Then he decided he's do better with America and but that didn't work out either:

De Gaulle, who had once hoped for so much from America,” Jackson explains, “now worked himself up into a paroxysm of fury against the United States. He started referring regularly in conversation to the threat of American ‘imperialism’.” Describing a wartime meeting with President Franklin Roosevelt, he later wrote: “As is only human, the desire to dominate was dressed up as idealism.” During a conversation with a “Free French” delegate to the US government who tried to defend American foreign policy, then under the direction of Secretary of State Cordell Hull, de Gaulle “screamed”: “You tell that old fool Hull from me that he is an asshole, a moron, an idiot. To hell with them. The war will sweep them away and I, France, will remain and I will judge them.”

The fact is DeGaulle once said he didn't care what happened to the allies as long as France remained.  The delusional greatness of France by the French is like a genetic disorder, and it permeates all they say and do.   

So, let's view French leadership, and the concept of French "harmony", starting with their current President Emmanuel Macron, who is Europe's nightmare.  We find the French chose Le Pen’s Populists over Macron, so in a desperation move Macron decided to dissolve the government and called for fresh elections hoping this election can be overturned by another in a few weeks, which seems unlikely.  His move may actually put the populists in power. And even Former French President Francois Hollande, a totally failed former President, has decided to run from the far left in a new party, New Popular Front. 

How far was Macron willing to go to stay in power?   

[his] odd decision to dissolve the National Assembly to seizing dictatorial powers for two months or longer, it looks like Macron is floundering.  As Jonathan Miller at The Spectator says, his party will probably come in third behind “the rightish Rassemblement National and the ultra-leftist New Popular Front, a coalition of trots, Antifa activists, and loopy greens.”

Since that's not working he now warns of ‘civil war’ if France chooses the populists. In short, it appears to me he's advocating violence, and it's happening.

  • Marine Le Pen’s Right-Wing Party Wins in First Round - President Macron’s election gambit might have been a mistake. His party is losing big time. Turnout is 60% higher than usual, and Marine LePen’s right-wing party won a large portion of the vote in the first round.  The media calls LePen and her party far-right, but she’s just right-wing. Macron told the people to vote for his party, or they might face a Civil War. He came in last...............
  • Globalists Fume, Leftists Cry, Muslims Riot and Burn: Right-Wing Wins First Round in France - The savages are rioting, looting, shooting and setting cities on fire.  “Far right” blare the headlines. “Far right” is anyone who is rational, reasonable and doesn’t march in lock-step with the lunatic left.  The people have had enough. The left has destroyed the continent with mass Muslim immigration, unsustainable social welfare, and submission to Islamic law. This is a last grasp for freedom and the last gasp of Western civilization.  The left has started to riot..........

GERMANY

Germany has a massive immigration problem and like most of Europe a massive crime problem perpetrated by these immigrants, especially the Muslim immigrants.  And finally Germans are sick of it.  Germany is a land where rapists go free and their critics go to jail.

Nothing more clearly exposes how European countries have submitted to their Islamic masters than what happened after a Muslim gang rape in Hamburg. This is the West’s future unless it starts pushing back now...............

According to Michael Haltman’s 2010 summary of Dr. Hammond’s famous analysis of patterns of Muslim immigration, when Muslims are nearly 10% of the population, they will already have worked “to get the ruling government to allow them to rule themselves...under Sharia,” and “they tend to increase lawlessness as a means of complaint about their conditions.” 

As if to demonstrate the truth behind these conclusions, two months ago, Hamburg’s Muslims were on the march........yield now before we kill you—is working. A truly horrific report has emerged from Hamburg, where gang rapists got a pass, while someone who dared to complain got prison:

A 20-year-old woman in Hamburg, Germany, has been sent to prison after making “hateful” remarks towards a migrant who was involved in the gang rape of a child. The woman is just one of 140 people being investigated for making “harmful comments” towards the rapists.

Olivia Murray asks:  "If they couldn’t enrich their home nations, how are they supposed to enrich ours?"  These Muslim immigrants have no intention of assimilating, i.e., becoming westernized, and even commit "honor killings" against their children who do.  We call that murder.

Well, the violence against the right in France is the same in Germany, which should clarify this isn't just spontaneous, it's organized and promoted among the leftist factions. 

  •  Leftists Call for Killing of Right-Wing Voters at ‘Anti-Extremism’ Protest in Germany - Left-wing protesters in Germany called for supporters of the populist Alternative for Germany (AfD) party to be killed during a rally against political extremism. Amid nationwide protests over the weekend, in which organisers claimed over a million people rallied against the right-wing AfD party, it was ironically the left which seemingly exposed itself as harbouring extremists.....

NORDIC NATIONS

The Nordic population has been devastated by the insane immigration polices of their leaders, and some are resisting, and we shouldn't be shocked at how this is turning out, and as the US Imposes Sanctions on Nordic Resistance Movement in Fight Against White Supremacy we need to understand, this isn't going to stop them. 

They're scary, and are referred to as "specially designated global terrorists," by the U.S.  State Department, because this group "is the largest neo-Nazi group in Sweden and has branches in Norway, Denmark, Iceland and Finland, where it has been banned since 2020." But this is in response to the crime, violence, and riots perpetrated by these mostly Muslim immigrants, and the fact so many are on welfare and refuse to work.  

This is just the beginning of what ugly politics looks like. And be assured, at some point it won't stop with Muslims, and these nitwit Nordic leaders brought this on themselves and their people.

UNITED KINGDOM

Let's start with the ruling party in the UK as of right now are the Tories.  It's clear the Tories are being flushed down the toilet as they've slumped to their lowest support in polling history.  In a warning against Farage,  a U.K. Conservative MPs Sign ‘Hindu Manifesto’ in Run-Up to General Election.  

Are they Tories, I don't know but in the UK at times the terms are interchangeable.  The real solution by the Tories have come up with is to turn to "Brexit Betrayer" Boris Johnson. in hopes of saving them from "20 years" in opposition".  However, the polls show they will not be the opposition party, it will be Nigel Farage's Reform Party.  And they brought this on themselves  Half of UK voters say Tories deserve to be totally wiped out…Including Their Own Supporters!

The lies on border control and taxation from the UK Conservative party seem to be coming home to roost, with a poll finding a plurality of voters believe the party deserves total electoral oblivion. The Conservative Party, governing the United Kingdom for the past 14 years, won back-to-back elections with promises of strident border control at voting time, but ultimately forgotten once returned to power.

Such astonishing betrayals, now impossible to hide and increasingly a matter of common conversation in Britain, are reflected in a Public First survey reported by The Daily Telegraph which found that 46 per cent agree the Tories “deserve to lose every seat they have”, an event that would be without parallel in 400 years of British political history.....

If the polls are to be believed the Labour party will win this election in a landslide, so what are they offering to do.  Labour Party Looks to Push Trans Ideology in Schools.

The left-wing Labour Party may look to scrap government guidance telling schools to teach children that there are only two biological sexes, which would easily be overturned given the failure of the Conservative government to put the policy into law.  Shadow education secretary Bridget Phillipson said that if elected — as is widely predicted to happen — a Labour government would review guidance from Rishi Sunak’s government which told educators to refrain from teaching far-left gender ideology as a fact.

Apparently the Labour party thinks Islamophobia is the greatest threat to the British people, so, they're advocating ‘Zero Tolerance"......Labour Party Leader Starmer Vows Government Crackdown on ‘Islamophobia’

Labour Party leader Sir Keir Starmer said that if elected, his government would take a hardline approach in policing “Islamophobia” as he looks to sure up Muslim support before the July 4th general election in Britain. The government needs to take a “zero tolerance” approach to supposed anti-Islam statements not only made in real life but online as well, Sir Keir Starmer said in a video with London Mayor Sadiq Khan marking the of the Muslim holiday Eid al-Fitr.

I'm not sure what that means since they've once again arrested  Tommy Robinson.

Independent journalist and anti-grooming gangs activist Tommy Robinson is facing contempt of court charges. The Conservative Party-controlled Attorney General's Office (AGO) has initiated potential contempt proceedings after the far-left 'Hope Not Hate' group – the UK equivalent of the Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) – funded by George Soros, alleged he violated a court order..............This latest attempt to drag Robinson in front of the courts follows a case brought against him by the Metropolitan Police, collapsed in an embarrassing fashion. The London police force arrested and pepper-sprayed Robinson after he refused to comply with an order to leave a march against anti-Semitism, claiming his mere presence in public was “likely to cause harassment, alarm, and distress to others.”  Police bail conditions after this arrest included a near-total ban on entering London, but a judge ultimately determined officers had no lawful order against Robinson when they detained him.

Apparently the "zero tolerance" is really for those speaking out and exposing what Muslim immigrants are doing.  Which of course bodes well the question, how much farther can they go to get "zero tolerance"? 

"There Will Always Be An England!" Maybe Not!  Some time back England suffered a massive terrorist attack killing these people:

The 22 Manchester victims

The victims included 22 people, seven of whom were children, murdered by what the Mayor of Manchester called an "extremist".   He fails to tell the world exactly what kind of extremist he was.  Was he was an extremist vegan, or an extremist conservative, or an extremist Christian?   No, no, that can't be true because he would have let the world know how outraged he is if it was a Christian or conservative.  So let's just take a big shot in the dark and say he was......well, let's see.......how about an extremist Muslim? Wow!  What a lucky guess!!!!!!!  Here's the link to my entire There Will Always Be and England, Maybe Not series. Maybe the polls are wrong.

Nigel Farage's Reform Party is on a role, and it's clear he's headed to a seat in Parliament, and there's a better than average chance he may become Prime Minister in 2029.  And as in all the rest of Europe, the left resorts to violence, as he's been attacked, not serious but the pattern exists.  Farage says  Capitalism is Dead, We’re Living in Corporatism:

Economic growth is being strangled by an “unholy alliance” of big business, big banks, and big government and protecting blue-collar workers means standing up for true capitalism, Nigel Farage tells Breitbart London. 

He ran an ad saying , Britain is Broken:

Nigel Farage’s Reform Party had one of their scheduled broadcasts tonight and breaking with that convention, it broadcast a black screen with simple text reading “Britain is Broken. Britain Needs Reform.” The image remained static for five minutes and was silent, giving viewers plenty of time to reflect. Farage said of the spot: “Your TV isn’t broken, but Britain is. I hope you enjoy our Party Election Broadcast.”

I know the polls show massive support for the Labour party, but there are other polls that are interesting, especially among these young voters who will be voting economics, and Catholics who will be voting values.  

Gen Z Shifts: Farage’s Reform Party Surpasses Conservatives With Young Voters.Nigel Farage's Reform Party has surpassed Prime Minister Rishi Sunak's Conservatives (Tories) in recent opinion polls, including among younger voters. According to a YouGov survey, Reform is more than twice as popular as the Tories among the 18- to 24-year-old age group, at 15 percent support to the Tories’ 7 percent.

Farage Hails Gen-Z Voters Turning Rig Reform Surges on Social Media ‘Very Different to Millennials. I See a Lot More Ambition’- “It’s happening”, Nigel Farage tells Breitbart as the battle for social media heats up and shows his Reform Party enjoying a commanding lead across platforms by practically any metric. Reform UK party leader Nigel Farage hailed the work ethic and increasingly right-wing views of the youngest voters in the United Kingdom, noting in just three weeks of the General Election campaign since he took back control of the party he founded, support had increased.

Catholic Voters May Sway UK Election Next Month - As the July 4 UK General Election nears, the Catholic Union of Great Britain emphasizes that the moral convictions of 4.5 million Catholic voters will likely be a decisive force in shaping the outcome. According to a recent Catholic Union survey, over 90% of its members and supporters plan to vote in the upcoming election, a participation rate significantly higher than the national average.

Well, as the journalist in the movie Charlie Wilson's war said: We'll see!

The Answers Are All in the History Books, And The Answers Are Not Pretty

Definition leads to clarity, clarity leads to understanding, understanding leads to wisdom, wisdom leads to good decision making.

By Rich Kozlovich

There are some historians I've read a lot over the years.  Nikole Hannah-Jones and the blatant falsehoods of her 1619 Project, the leftist corruption of the FDR administration, and more.  Yet we still see society embracing the very things history proves are disastrous.  The fact is all this screaming about racism in America is a corrupt scam destroying America.  And it's provable.  

There's no reason for society and these highly educated politicians to fail to see all this.  We have the history that tells the real story, it's recorded history, and it's history that's incontestable.  Yet, they fail to act on that history. 

I think is an excellent writer and one of my favorite historians.   Recently he published this piece, The Logic in All the Madness, Biden's agendas may have fundamentally changed America for decades, saying:

Most Americans believe it is unhinged to deliberately destroy the border and allow 10 million illegal aliens to enter the country without background audits, means of support, any claims to legal residency, and definable skills.............

Most Americans poll strong support for Israel. They oppose the Biden effort to triangulate by revisiting the old Obama nihilist agendas of emboldening the Iranian/Hezbollah/Hamas/Houthis axis to play off against our traditional allies of Israel and the more moderate Arab regimes.....

.......by allowing leftist campuses to normalize anti-Semitism and pro-terrorist advocacy, and by destroying the once close alliance of Israel and the United States, the left feels it will be almost impossible to go back to the pre-Obama/Biden years. Their legacy, they hope, is a mendicant Israel utterly dependent on U.S. largess—a condition itself predicated on essentially destroying the idea of a secure Jewish state within its present borders.

  • Salman Rushdie: A Palestinian State Would Be Hamas "Is this what the progressive movements of the Western Left want to create?”
  • Israel Cannot Maintain The Status Quo In Gaza Sha'i ben-Tekoa If Israel, having achieved a military victory, returns control over Gaza to the same radicals who control it now, she is re-committing to slow suicide. ..... Indeed, like the Nazis, the Brotherhood’s religion has had a 1,400-year history of mass murdering Jews, starting with the decapitation of hundreds at the Khaibar Oasis, a slaughter carried out by Muhammad himself.  In every century thereafter, Muslims massacred Jews.............

We're facing some serious economic issues that will be difficult to overcome, but we're facing some serious demographic issues that may be more difficult to overcome.  The left’s promotion of the gay agenda and the denigration of a traditional heterosexual society, and the nuclear family, along with the environmentalist’s demands we have less children to save the planet is having, and will have, devastating long-term demographic consequences.   

Then we have Muslim immigration, and make no mistake,  Muslims don’t buy into any of that. They have children - lots of children - and in many western nations they’re openly practicing polygamy, and European nations are allowing it. At what point is there a point of no return? If these leftist multiculturalist schemes continue western civilization is soon to become an Islamic nightmare. 

  • A Nation That Doesn't Control its Borders, Isn't a Nation
  • Prominent Muslim Declares: 'We Are On The Road To The White House' - The Islamic Takeover of America Unveiled
  •  Israel Cannot Maintain The Status Quo In Gaza Sha'i ben-Tekoa If Israel, having achieved a military victory, returns control over Gaza to the same radicals who control it now, she is re-committing to slow suicide. .......A self-respecting Israel must finally gird its loins (a Biblical expression), and demand its right to sovereign ownership of Gaza. And as the legitimate landlord, it will have the authority to evict squatters, who, in the last election and via every opinion poll since, have supported the Muslim Brotherhood/Hamas, whose goal is to finish Hitler’s work. Indeed, like the Nazis, the Brotherhood’s religion has had a 1,400-year history of mass murdering Jews, starting with the decapitation of hundreds at the Khaibar Oasis, a slaughter carried out by Muhammad himself.  In every century thereafter, Muslims massacred Jews. They butchered them in Toledo, Spain, in 1066; so did the rampaging Al-Muwahiddun (Almohades) in 12th-century Andalusia and North Africa. The Muslims expelled the Jews from Yemen in 1679; murdered hundreds in Algiers in 1805; and that’s just the shortlist...............

What's going to happen to Europe in five years?  It will continue to cease to exist as we know it. Violence is going to erupt all over Europe as the native populations begin to realize these leftists controlling their lives commitment to "multiculturalism" is a suicide pact with those who hate and despise everything Europe is or was. And there will be violence on the order of chaos!  

Even if the native population just sits down to die the Muslim population will translate all the violence that's going on in Muslim dominated lands to Europe, forcing all native Europeans into dimmitude, and killing the rest, including those of a different Muslim sect, whom they consider heretics. We will see the one thing we've all felt was impossible - an out and out religious war.  

Europe is breeding itself out of existence, as is Russia.  Even if they stand up against the insanity and drive Muslims out of Europe, and that's what they will finally conclude will have to be done if they're to survive (Think Spain after the defeat of the Moors) they will not have the numbers to properly rebuild their economy and America will not have the economic wherewithal to bail them out is we did after WWII, since America will be having it's own economic reality check trying to meet the financial obligations of Social Security and Medicare, not to mention the national debt.   

Europe will be on it's own and then will turn to the United Nations to provide for their security and economy, and that's a leaky vessel if there ever was one. Europe is doomed! And so is Russia!

One question remains. Currently Europe is ruled by socialists favoring internationalism. With the recent elections we're seeing a trend to turn to socialists of a nationalist flavor.  Actually, it doesn't much matter because they still won't have the population necessary to restore their economy, and even if Europeans realized the demographic time bomb they're facing and started have a ton on babies it would still take twenty years before that could make any difference. 

Russia has Putin and he's merely playing a delaying game with all his seemingly clueless actions in the Ukraine and the Middle East. Putin's trying to save the ethnic Russian people. But no matter, Europe is doomed and so is Russia! In thirty years they won't have a majority of ethnic Russians in their own country.

The same question applies to all Western countries including the United States is why do western cultures need Somalis, Afghans, Eritreans, Iraqis, Iranians, Syrians, etc?  The answer?  We don't need them and we shouldn't want them since they don't want to assimilate, they want to destroy, and the policies being carried out by the Democrats and the Biden administration actually enable that destructive behavior, and may take decades to repair, if it can be done.  

Taking a look at what the Democrats have done to the nation's major cities seems to me these major cities are doomed, and may take decades to return, if ever. 

The only thing Muslims support is perpetrating violence, robbery, rape, having slaves, having multiple wives, the end of women’s rights, the end of freedom of religion and the end of any legitimate form of democracy and dhimmitude. Dhimmitude is where non-Muslims are taxed by Muslims. We need to get this: Islam is antithetical to Democracy.  Islam isn't a religion!  Islam is a political criminal movement masquerading as a religion. Just because they've managed to go on for over 1400 years is immaterial. 

Can anyone not wonder that leftism is a form of insanity?   Everything they promote and support is anathema to Muslims and yet they stand shoulder to shoulder in support of Muslim immigration into western cultures, the destruction of Israel by Hamas, Hezbollah, and Iran.  Make no mistake about this.  If Muslim culture dominates the west they will eviscerate the leftists who supported them.  These "Fags For Hamas" demonstrators must be insane, because they'd be among the first to be thrown off high buildings. 

This is Islam, and Islam means “submission”, and it’s not just rhetoric to Muslims. They are deadly serious about everyone submitting to Islam, and they will use any and every form of violence to make that happen, including the murder of other Muslims with whom they disagree, and that isn’t a small number.  If someone says they want to kill you, believe them.

Western civilization is descending into a leftist multicultural Islamic nightmare right out of Dante’s Inferno filled with bestial appetites, violence, perversion, fraud, malice, hatred of their fellow man and intellectual fraud.

This is the disaster leftists have made for society, and now we're going to have to deal with it.  Make no mistake about this, if western civilization is to survive it must collectively recognize Islam is a cancer that must be eradicated from their society, but that’s not going to happen as long as multicultural socialists continue to rule. 

It's time we started paying attention to history, because that's where all the questions have the correct answers, and the historical lies being promoted in America's education institutions must be attacked, and punished by suing them and ending their funding.  The "historian" liars like Zinn and Nicole Hannah-Jones must be challenged and called to task, if history is to be the firm paved walkway leading to the stepping stones of the future.  

Do They Really Want Masks? Or is It Just Another Masquerade?

By Robin Itzler

Editor's Note:  This is one of the commentaries selected from Robin's weekly newsletter Patriot Neighbors. Any cartoons appearing will have been added by me.  If you wish to get the full edition,   E-mail her at PatriotNeighbors@yahoo.com to get on her list, it's free.  RK

Seattle encourages people to wear masks.  That insanity worked so well in the 2020 “scamdemic,” that some progressives want an encore. If they try hard enough, maybe a lockdown, too.

In Seattle, Washington, Dr. Eric Chow, King County’s chief of communicable diseases, is encouraging people to take preventative measures, including wearing masks, as COVID cases increase. Of course, it depends on what your definition of increase is … is. For the week ending April 27, only ½ of 1 percent (0.5%) of hospital emergency room visits involved a COVID diagnosis. 

As of the week ending June 15, COVID patients made up about 1.5 percent of hospital emergency visits. Washingtonians are ignoring the vaccine, which likely means they will ignore any suggestion to wear a mask. 

Statewide, only 19 percent are current with their COVID vaccinations. Should they expect a knock at their door?

New York gov. wants masks in subways, yet since 1845, New York State had a ban against wearing masks. Obviously, that was to prevent the Ku Klux Klan (or like-minded organizations) from causing mayhem against minorities. 

Then came COVID and that ban was lifted so the state could mandate masks. With all the violence in New York, specifically by pro-Hamas thugs in New York City, Gov. Kathy Hochul has suggested putting the mask ban back in place. 

There would be “common-sense exemptions.” Someone wearing a keffiyeh and carrying a sign celebrating the October 7 massacre in Israel might still claim they have a medical reason for a face covering. 

Let’s wait and see if this mask ban happens since leftist groups like the ACLU will probably want to protect the rights of Hamas terrorists.

The End Of "Chevron" Deference

 

The rush of end-of-term decisions from the Supreme Court, not to mention last night’s presidential debate, gives me many more potential topics to write about than I could ever get to. How to choose? On the subject of the presidential debate, I doubt that I have anything to say that a hundred others have not said in the past 24 hours. So then, which of the latest crop of Supreme Court decisions is the most important? 

On that last question, my vote goes to Loper Bright Enterprises v. Raimondo. This is the case that has rather emphatically overruled the 1984 case of Chevron v. Natural Resources Defense Council.

If you have read something about either the new Loper Bright case or the prior (1984) Chevron case, you have undoubtedly seen the issue of the two being defined in terms of “deference”: that is, when the legality of a regulatory action of a federal agency is challenged in court, should (or must) the court “defer” to the interpretation that the agency itself has given to the governing statute, or to the challenged regulation? Or is the interpretation of statutes and regulations fundamentally the job of the courts, which therefore must not be left to the agencies.

When put in these terms, the issue seems dry and technical, and it’s hard to see why it is important. But it is hugely important. The reason is that this issue of what they call “deference” is a big piece of what puts the government on a one-way upward growth ratchet.

I had a post all the way back in March 2017 that laid out the stakes in this “Chevron deference” game. The occasion for the post was that Neil Gorsuch had been nominated to the Supreme Court by newly-elected President Trump, and in some decisions that Gorsuch had written as an appeals court judge he had staked out a position critical of this deference. In one case, Gorsuch had written that “Chevron seems no less than a judge-made doctrine for the abdication of the judicial duty.” Gorsuch’s position on this subject became an issue in his confirmation. However, he was confirmed, and took his seat in April 2017.

My post re-framed the question not in the dry terms of “deference,” but rather in terms of how such judicial abdication allows the government to grow without check:

"Chevron deference" is the ultimate unfettering of the government to enable it to expand as much as it wants, and with nothing to stop it.  Of course every agency interpretation of a statute or regulation will be in a way to give the agency itself more power!  For Exhibit A, look to the EPA under Obama, which has interpreted the term "waters of the United States" to cover every puddle and wet spot (in order to claim jurisdiction over a good half of all private land) and has determined that a colorless, odorless gas (CO2) is a "danger to human health and welfare" (in order to claim jurisdiction over the entire energy sector of the economy).

Loper Bright is explicit that Chevron is getting overruled. Chief Justice Roberts is the author of the majority opinion. The basis for the decision is fairly narrow, mainly that the Administrative Procedure Act of 1946 provides that when a regulation is challenged, the courts will decide “all relevant questions of law.” Justices Thomas and Gorsuch, in separate concurrences, point out broader reasons why Chevron deference was fundamentally wrong. Thomas notes that such deference is in conflict with the separation of powers, and the basic function of the courts to interpret the law. Gorsuch makes the point that the courts must not favor either side in a case before them, but the Chevron rule fundamentally alters that rule to favor the government.

Will the overruling of Chevron bring about a significant change in the dynamic of endless government growth? I think so, but perhaps not immediately. Note that Loper Bright is coming now near the end of a Biden term, where the odds seem to increasingly favor the return of a Republican administration in 2025. Such a new administration will be highly likely to seek large-scale roll-backs of recently issued regulations, most notably in the areas of climate and energy. 

The Chevron doctrine has been useful to agencies in regulatory roll-backs as well as expansions. Obviously there have been far fewer roll-backs than expansions over the past many decades. But indeed the Chevron case itself arose in the context of a regulatory roll-back by EPA during the Reagan administration, which roll-back had been blocked by the DC Circuit. The DC Circuit is currently dominated by Biden and Obama-appointed judges, who can be expected to resist regulatory roll-backs of a new Trump administration.

So this process will take years to play out. But overall, my view is that the end of Chevron is good news for those resisting the growth of the government.

Defending Tax Competition

June 29, 2024 by Dan Mitchell @ International Liberty

At the risk of understatement, I don’t admire very many politicians.  Among leaders who have passed away, I obviously was a fan of Thatcher and Reagan. Among those still alive, my obvious favorite is Javier Milei of Argentina.

 

Because of my support for tax competition, however, I may have to add Hans-Rudolf Merz to my list.  He’s certainly not famous. Especially now. But at one point, he was the Finance Minister of Switzerland.

My admiration for Merz is not simply because he is from a well-governed nation. Instead, I want to praise him for openly (and correctly) defending tax competition.  Though we’re going to have to dig into the archives. Here are some excerpts from a 2005 article that I recently discovered.


Finance Minister Hans-Rudolf Merz has defended the Swiss tax system after the European Commission questioned low corporate tax rates in some cantons. …“For Switzerland, tax competition is not only a theoretical concept. It represents one of the constitutive elements of our system of state and self-understanding,”

Merz said on Friday. “Competition ensures diversity and quality of supply, innovative entrepreneurship, and low prices for consumers. “This forces the policies and administration of competing locations to offer an attractive combination of public services and a tax burden that is as low as possible.” …“The realpolitik alternative to tax competition is a tax cartel. Cartels, however, are seldom advantageous for the citizen.”

Very well stated. And several winners of the Nobel Prize in Economics would agree.  Unfortunately, Merz’s position has not prevailed over time.  Switzerland has been bullied into being part of the global corporate tax cartel that has been pushed by the OECD and the Biden Administration.  But thanks to people like Merz, Switzerland almost always is on the right side, even if it doesn’t always prevail.

P.S. Some British politicians also have defended tax competition (see here, here, and here).

P.P.S. Another former Swiss Finance Minster also deserves praise, in his case for being the father of his country’s very successful spending cap.


Mining the planet for renewable energy

Reliable energy, human rights, land impacts, air and water pollution, lost wildlife get ignored 

By Paul Driessen 

This election year, several critical issues dominate voter concerns. Illegal immigration across unsecured borders by migrants, criminals, sex traffickers and terrorists. Anti-police policies, reduced prosecution of criminals and rising crime. Unprecedented prices for food, clothing, housing and other necessities.

Parental roles in education and sex changes for children. Threats to our republic and democracy from unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats who use their powers to persecute, prosecute, silence and even imprison opponents, and control our lives.

Also crucial: control over energy – the lifeblood of our civilization, jobs, health and prosperity.

Will America shut down coal, gas and nuclear electricity generation before it has sufficient reliable replacements? Will we have electricity when we need it, or only when it’s available, especially after we’re forced to convert gasoline cars and gas stoves, furnaces and water heaters to electric models?

What will families pay for that electricity and everything we eat, drink, build and use? Where will we get plastics, paints, pharmaceuticals, and thousands of other products made from oil and gas they want to lock in the ground? What will happen to our jobs, health, living standards – and personal choices about where we live, what we eat, what car we can drive and how far, whether we can fly places for vacation?

We’re told a great energy and economic transformation is underway – and is essential to prevent a “climate crisis.” In reality, the crisis exists in computer models, headlines and politicized science, but not in actual temperature and weather records.

In reality, there is no energy transformation. In 2023, wind and solar power generated 2.7% of the world’s primary energy; 81.5% came from fossil fuels. Between 1965 and 2023, North America and Europe cut their fossil fuel consumption almost in half; but over the same period, the rest of the world consumed seven times more than those two regions reduced their use. Emissions went up even more, because China, India and other developing countries require minimal pollution controls on power plants and vehicles.

In reality, a transition to an all-electric economy with no fossil fuels means millions of acres of America’s wild, scenic and agricultural lands would be covered with wind turbines, solar panels, transmission lines, and warehouses filled with batteries that can spontaneously erupt in flames.

In reality, we don’t know whether there are enough accessible metal and mineral deposits on Planet Earth to extract all the raw materials required to manufacture the turbines, panels, batteries, transmission lines, electric vehicles, transformers and other equipment the energy transformation would require – just for the United States, much less for the entire world.

We don’t know how many billions of tons of rock would have to be mined, processed and disposed of; how many millions of acres would be impacted; how many millions of tons of toxic air and water pollution would be emitted; what human rights would be violated to get those metals and minerals.

One of the most basic and vital metals for the energy transformation is copper. Average worldwide ore concentrations (0.04%) mean miners would have to remove some 40,000,000 tons of overlying rock and extract, crush and process nearly 25,000,000 tons of ore to get 110,000 tons of copper – enough for just the first 30,000 megawatts of President Biden’s offshore wind plan.

Worse, mining is essentially banned in the United States – and the Biden Administration has vetoed world-class mines that could have met US needs for copper (and other metals) for decades to come. And the problem isn’t just President Biden or the Biden Administration. It’s governors like Gavin Newsom and Gretchen Whitmer, and countless activists and mostly Democrat politicians who support these policies.

Recent studies question whether mining companies can even produce enough copper just for the electric vehicles people are told they must buy – much less for wind and solar power; to say nothing of a full US (or global) energy transformation. Again, that’s just the copper.

A 2022 International Energy Agency report examines the need for essential metals and minerals in energy transitions. Onshore wind installations, the report says, require nine times more materials than combined-cycle gas generating plants, to produce the same amount of electricity. Offshore wind installations require fourteen times more. (These IEA numbers do not include materials for transmission lines or backup power for windless-sunless periods.)

The IEA says its projections are “highly dependent” on how quickly and stringently the world actually tries to reach zero greenhouse gas emissions in power generation and all energy uses; on which wind, solar, battery and other technologies dominate; and on whether countries also try to utilize low-carbon (natural gas) or no-carbon (batteries) equipment in mining, materials processing, manufacturing and transporting wind turbines, solar panels, batteries, vehicles and other technologies.

However, the IEA calculates, demand for aluminum, copper, cobalt, graphite, iron, nickel, lithium, rare earths, concrete and other “green” energy materials is expected to skyrocket by 5, 20, 40, 50 or more times current global requirements by 2040.

The Agency says numerous “challenges” to actually acquiring those materials include actually finding producible deposits, plus land use, water scarcity and pollution, air pollution, toxic mining waste management, corruption and bribery, worker and nearby resident health and safety, and child labor.

Meeting these challenges, the IEA says, will require “systematic approaches,” the “development of institutions and the rule of law,” “inclusive legal frameworks,” “responsible” and “robust” pollution and waste management frameworks, “sustainable practices,” “international coordination,” “capacity building and knowledge sharing,” greater “transparency” and, ultimately, “international minerals governance.”

These actions will all help foster “sustainable and responsible supply chains that contribute to a low-carbon economy” worldwide, the IEA assures us.

But will these wishful terms survive collisions with the real world? Developing nations view coal, oil and gas as their key to jobs, modernity and prosperity. China, Russia and their allies perceive the West’s fixation on climate change and green energy as opportunities to control US and EU supply chains, geo-political options and military-economic capabilities.

The biggest wind energy project in the USA will soon blanket 1,600 square miles (1.25 times Delaware) of New Mexico, to generate 3,500 MW about 30% of the year. The Palo Verde nuclear plant in Arizona generates 4,200 MW from 6 square miles almost 24/7/365.

A Bloomberg research team says the world will need at least $200 trillion to stop global warming by 2050. Others estimate $275 trillion

How can we head this economy-and-environment-killing craziness off at the pass?

Wise decisions at the ballot box are essential, of course. But state and local governments should enact laws requiring that utilities explain how they will generate wind and solar replacement power on windless winter nights, before they shut down a single coal, gas or nuclear power plant – or get approval for a single wind or solar project. (Those are just a few of the actions they can take.)

They should also demand full details on where raw materials will come from, and at what dollar, human rights and environmental costs – to state and local communities ... and our planet.

America’s jobs, health, living standards, and right to choose our homes, cars and food depend on it.

Paul Driessen is senior policy analyst for the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (www.CFACT.org), and author of articles and books on environmental, climate and human rights issues.

Saturday, June 29, 2024

P&D and The Week That Was

Truth is the Sublime Convergence of History and Reality

De Omnibus Dubitandum (Everything is to be questioned)

 This Link will take you to My Commentaries.  This Link will take you to My Commentaries by topic.  This Link will take you to My Global Warming Commentaries

By Rich Kozlovich 

Another week has flown by and this week there's a lot news for celebration, contemplation, and understating, which starts with definition.  And the left isn't liking this idea of defining reality as it truly is rather than the myths they've been turning out, and getting away with it.

 

There's been a lot written about the Trump/Biden debate, and what a disaster it was for Biden.  Olivia Murray had an excellent piece stating what sane people have always known about Biden.  He's a wreck, and has always been a wreck. She went on to note there's a battle in the upper echelons of the Democrat party, and they all want power, including Biden's machine.  No one will give up.   Jill likes being First Lady, and if Biden isn't President the "de facto immunity" he has over his criminal activity will disappear, and she might even be implicated.   

This is going to go down ugly.  Chip Roy Files Resolution Calling on Chlamydia Harris to Invoke the 25th Amendment, that must really excite the Democrat hierarchy since she's disliked even more than Biden, and believe it or not, may even be dumber than Biden.  At least Biden has an excuse now, he's lost his mind.  What's her excuse?  

What I really find exciting is Biden's staff has declares war in the press.  The press the author is talking about here are the press that grovelled, pandered, lied, and twisted reality to accommodate the Democrats and Joe Biden.  The author calls them the "traveling press pool". 

A better definition would be the "traveling cesspool"!   Schadenfreude, the left always eat their own. 

But the real issues facing the nation is posed by Victor Davis Hanson  saying the madness of Biden’s agendas may have fundamentally changed America for decades. Unhinged immigration, massive spending adding to the national debt, with interest payments to hit one trillion dollars a year very soon..... let's say that again.  One Trillion Dollars in interest payments on the horizon.  This is a must read article!  

There's a lot here about economics, and today I received John Mauldin's weekly report (subscribe, it's free, and I think worth your time) entitled, Debtors and Creditors.  I'm going to have to cogitate on this before I can originate an article of my own.  This lends some clarity on who owns our debt, and what I think is are complicated borrowing schemes.  It also seems to me that if an individual perpetrated this kind of financing they'd end up in prison.  It also lends some clarity on BRICS.

There's an inevitably factor here when reality reaches it's apex, and that reality will not be ignored by rhetoric.   Passionately claiming there were no American tanks rolling through the streets of Baghdad didn't make it so. 

Then there's the Israel/Hamas war.  There is a legion of writers who just know how the create peace between Israel, Hamas, Hezbollah, Iran, and for that matter all of "radical" Islam.  Some are good hearted, like this man, but, some are blatantly stupid because here's the harsh truth about Hamas, and Islam, as stated by Andrea Widburg.  “A rabbit cannot force a fox to be a vegetarian!”

There can be no peace between Islam and the world let alone Islam and Israel, because Islam practiced as preached by Mohammad forbids it.  It's called jihad, which is incumbent on all Muslims.   

Finally some of the tin hat members of the Supreme Court were finally able to take off their tin hats and actually render some excellent decisions, especially ending the disaster that was the Chevron ruling.  They've also ruled to free "unjustly imprisoned J6ers, and civilize America’s cities".   

The three far left nitwits remained nitwits demonstrating their total lack of understanding of the law and the courts position in that system, and Amy Barrett joined them in one of the decisions.  What a disappointment she has been, even worse than Roberts, Kavanaugh, and Gorsuch.  All of the tree nitwits, and the four halfwits will be there for years.

Here are this week's offerings.  Six of my own, and twenty four excellent posts by others.  Let's  start out with the Cartoon of the Day and John Droz, Jr's The Media Balance Newsletter: 6/24/24

Enjoy!   

My Commentaries 

  1. Joe Biden: Do You Hear a Flushing Sound?
  2. Points to Ponder
  3. 2024 Election: The Nation As I See It!
  4. Media People are Arrogant, Overpaid, and Under Smart
  5. Archbishop Vigano: Is a Schism on the Horizon?
  6. My Gazette: Christian Persecution, Part IV

Commentaries 

  1. Open Borders America: DACA Arrest Records By Kelli Ballard
  2. The Election and Terrorist Events: A Where and When Assessment By Tom Budds
  3. Thinking Critically and Joe Biden By Common Sense
  4. Shocker: Progressive Women Angry and Obsessed Over Republican Gals Leesa K. Donner
  5. My Assessment of the Debate A Non-Political Perspective! By John Droz, Jr.
  6. What's the Opposite of Critical Thinking?By John Droz, Jr.
  7. Every Leftist Cause Begins as Humanitarianism and Ends as Terrorism By Daniel Greenfield
  8. What I Saw at a Terrorist Rally Outside a Synagogue  By Daniel Greenfield
  9. First Muslim Senator Keeps California a Sexual Abuse Sanctuary State  By Daniel Greenfield
  10. Is the Tide Turning to Freedom By Robin Itzler
  11. When Polling Was Private By Robin Itzler
  12. On The Democrat Side By Robin Itzler
  13. Can the Damage the Left and Joe Biden Are Doing to the Nation Be Fixed?  By Robin Itzler
  14. Debate, Two Presidents With Two Different Views of America  By Robin Itzler
  15. Industry Fraud Brings Down Boeing Planes By John Klar
  16. This Energy Transition Thing Really Is Not Happening By Francis Menton
  17. New York's Energy Transition Guru Responds To Basic Questions By Francis Menton
  18. The Looming Fiscal Crisis By Francis Menton
  19. The OECD’s Tax-and-Spend Agenda for the United States By Dan Mitchell
  20. Foreign Aid and Conditionality By Dan Mitchell
  21. Europe’s Economic Woes: Right Description, Wrong Prescription By Dan Mitchell
  22. CBO Data Confirms America’s Fiscal Problem Is Excessive Spending By Dan Mitchell
  23. The New York Times Grades Biden’s Economy on a Curve By Dan Mitchell
  24. DOD’s Innovative Micro-Reactor Tied Up and Down in Red Tape By Dave Patterson

Permanent Links

  1. 45 Communist Goals to Destroy America as Listed in the 1963 Congressional Record
  2. My Seven Rules of Geopolitics
  3. The John Boyd Legion of Honor 

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