Saraa Carter
-
Judge orders Biden’s DHS to release files on agents accused of censoring election ‘misinformation’January 27, 2023
Missouri Attorney General Andrew Bailey and Louisiana Attorney General Jeff Landry made headway in countering federal agents involved in suppressing what liberal tech labeled “misinformation” on social media. The Attorneys General moved to release testimony from five Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) employees after learning of their participation in the Biden administration’s counter-“disinformation” efforts. […] -
‘Coordinated effort’ to hide Hunter Biden information: Treasury denies request for reportsJanuary 27, 2023
The United States Treasury Department has denied Republicans’ request for reports and documents which deal with the President’s son, Hunter Biden. In a bizarre response, Treasury legislative affairs chief Jonathan Davidson sent a letter to the House Oversight and Accountability Chairman James Comer saying they need more detail as to why the panel its seeking […] -
Trump: Tanks to Ukraine could escalate to use of ‘NUKES’January 26, 2023
Former President Donald Trump stated bluntly on Truth Social, “FIRST COME THE TANKS, THEN COME THE NUKES. Get this crazy war ended, NOW. So easy to do!” Trump was referring to the escalation of war in Ukraine. He, like many other commentators and lawmakers, are warning that the decision to continue sending weapons – and […] -
Run Gen Z founder: Conservatives must win back America’s youthJanuary 26, 2023
Run GenZ founder Joe Mitchell joined The Sara Carter Show podcast to discuss how America’s youth have been hijacked by the radical left and what can be done to win them back. Mitchell, who was the youngest person to be elected to the Iowa House at 21, admitted that many of the people he attended college with […] -
Shocking Video: Pfizer Director admits internal discussions to ‘mutate’ COVID, ‘preemptively develop new vaccines’January 26, 2023
A latest video from Project Veritas may be one of the most shocking undercover investigations yet. The video unearths “Pfizer is internally discussing the possibility of mutating the Covid virus themselves in order to taylor a vaccine to sell to the public” Project Veritas’ James O’Keefe explains. The undercover video has gone viral and already […]
Daily Beast
-
Sam Smith’s New Album Should Sound More Thrilling Than ThisJanuary 28, 2023
Tasos Katopodis/Getty In the age of Spotify, it’s not too often that you’re force-fed music you don’t want to hear. Even so, I have vivid memories of trying and failing to avoid Sam Smith and Kim Petras’ chart-topping collaboration “Unholy” last October when it was all over my Instagram feed.
It was specifically during the weekend of BravoCon, when every Real Housewife and Bravolebrity (aka about 40 percent of who I follow) was posting Reels of themselves posing in a photo booth, with “Unholy” playing over it. Whenever the song started blaring from the app, I immediately scrolled down. Everything about it was a little too intense and, conversely, unserious. The opening line, “Mummy don’t know daddy’s getting hot,” felt unbearably cheesy to me. And I hated how Smith’s vocals sounded against that spooky choir. Suffice to say, it was the first time in a while I thought I vehemently disliked a song as opposed to just feeling unimpressed.
Emphasis on “thought.”
-
How Donald Duck Inspired Me to Go to the HimalayasJanuary 28, 2023
Photo Illustration by Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/Getty/Everett It was Donald Duck who first introduced me to the Himalayas. Just as my travels to Central Asia and all the countries ending in “stan” were perhaps inspired by Donald’s many escapades in Farawaystan, the seeds for my current expedition had been sown by Carl Barks. As a child, I fell asleep with Donald Duck and I woke up with Donald Duck–in fact, I actually learned to read with Donald Duck. My father only ever read Donald Duck magazines to me in bed, and when he fell asleep, which he often did, I would have to carry on reading by myself.
When I got older, I of course read other things, and I was fascinated by the home atlas. We did not have a globe, but we had several thick atlases. In my imagination, I travelled all over these maps, and nowhere were the names more magical than in the brown and white mountain range between India and China: Hindu Kush. Thimpu. Lhasa. Hunza. Kathmandu. Sikkim. Karakoram. Annapurna. And the most beautiful name of all: Himalaya. I never tired of repeating the sounds to myself: Hi-ma-la-ya.
In one of my favorite stories from Duckburg, Carl Barks allows Uncle Scrooge to have a breakdown. His condition is serious: he can no longer bear to look at or hear about money. In the end, Donald and his nephews take Scrooge to the hidden valley of Tralla La high up in the Himalayas, where apparently money does not exist. The valley is so isolated that they can only parachute in, but all their efforts pay off: they find an earthly paradise, where the people are joyful, happy and harmonious.
-
White Grocery Tycoon’s Mayoral Campaign Has Ticked Off Michelle Obama and Black PhiladelphiansJanuary 28, 2023
Photo Illustration by The Daily Beast / Getty / Instagram It was too good to be true–until it absolutely wasn’t.
Philadelphia grocery tycoon-turned Democratic mayoral candidate Jeff Brown stunned voters in December when he released a very buzzy campaign ad featuring former first lady Michelle Obama singing his praises.
As one of the few white candidates running in the crowded race of 11 Democratic mayoral hopefuls–appealing to the Black vote is crucial. For years, Brown has garnered a reputation for placing his many ShopRite grocery stores in predominantly Black neighborhood food deserts. At first, it looked like he was making waves by running the first televised campaign ad of the election cycle showcasing such good deeds. Now it appears to be backfiring right before his very eyes.
-
This Bride’s Dream Wedding Was Upstaged by Bloody Murdaugh TrialJanuary 28, 2023
Photo Illustration by Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/Getty/Associated Press/Ashlyn DeLong For over a year, Ashlyn DeLong and her fiance, Josh, have been dreaming about their January wedding at the Walterboro Wildlife Center.
One of their “top venues,” DeLong said she booked the multi-purpose South Carolina event hall— which includes an outdoor amphitheater—for her ceremony last January to ensure that their 205-person wedding had no major hiccups. But last week, the couple—who are to be wed next weekend—faced a major obstacle when they learned that across the street from their romantic venue, notorious South Carolina lawyer Alex Murdaugh is being tried for the heinous murders of his wife and son.
And to make matters more surreal, Walterboro Wildlife Center is currently being used as a makeshift media center for the dozens of journalists from across the country who have descended on the small town to cover what has been deemed as the “trial of the century” in the Palmetto state.
Got a tip? Send it to The Daily Beast here
-
Cops Can’t Be Allowed to Just Make Up Reasons for Pulling People OverJanuary 28, 2023
Photo Illustration by Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/Getty Drivers who break traffic laws risk penalties. But innocence did not protect Mario Rosales when a police SUV pulled up behind his Ford Mustang at a red light on June 17, 2022, in Alexandria, Louisiana.
Mario signaled and turned left on green. He did not speed, litter, swerve out of his lane or drive under the influence of drugs or alcohol. He had done nothing illegal.
Neither had his girlfriend, Gracie Lasyone, who was in the passenger seat.
-
Disney’s Next 100 Years Need to Focus on One Thing: AnimationJanuary 28, 2023
Photo Illustration by Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/Everett From the humble beginnings of Walt and Roy Disney animating in a garage 100 years ago this month, Disney has become the most recognizable entertainment brand in the world. Just saying the name Disney conjures up countless images of classic animation: Sorcerer Mickey in Fantasia, Cinderella dancing with Prince Charming, the “Circle of Life” sequence in The Lion King, and Elsa letting it go in Frozen, to name a few.
The Walt Disney Company has taken over the world, and while doing so, its identity has shifted considerably—especially since the mid-2000s. A corporation synonymous with animation continues to produce animated movies, sure, but its scope is far bigger than Walt could have ever fathomed. After bolstering its animation brand by acquiring rival studio Pixar in 2006, Disney added Marvel in 2009, Lucasfilm in 2012, and freaking 21st Century Fox, of all things, in 2019.
As Disney puts its hand into every proverbial cookie jar (or honey pot, as Winnie the Pooh would have it), its reach has become monumental. But while the company’s scope increases, its identity becomes less and less clear—especially where its once-lifeblood, Disney Animation Studios, is considered. Its second century is on its way to looking quite different from its first—but it’s not too late to turn things back around.
-
The Best Performances at the Sundance Film FestivalJanuary 28, 2023
Courtesy of Sundance This is a preview of our pop culture newsletter The Daily Beast’s Obsessed, written by editor Kevin Fallon. To receive the full newsletter in your inbox each week, sign up for it here.
This week:
Best of Park City
-
Janelle Monáe Is an All-Time Great ‘RuPaul’s Drag Race’ JudgeJanuary 28, 2023
Photo Illustration by Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/MTV How it took 15 whole seasons to get musician, actress, and Men’s Wearhouse platinum rewards member Janelle Monáe as a guest judge on RuPaul’s Drag Race is far beyond me. (Well, unless you count Vanity Milan’s ill-fitting runway look from Season 4 that helped land her in the bottom, which I do not.) Monáe has been such a visible icon in the queer community for so long that looking back to realize she had never judged on a panel before seems like a case of the Mandela Effect.
But tonight, Monáe finally graced us with her presence, and what a light she brought to the entire affair. There have only been four weeks and five episodes of Drag Race Season 15 thus far, and it seems like each week, the queens’ performances flip a parabola. Sometimes, they soar to blissfully wacky heights in the Snatch Game; and others, they roll their ankle in a biscuit heel during a painful acting challenge.
This week, Drag Race maintained a welcome steadiness throughout, thanks in part to the calming aura of Monáe leveling out a shaky design challenge. But first, like Snatch Game, the Reading Challenge has come early this season.
-
Tyler Posey Is Very Game for a ‘Teen Wolf’ MusicalJanuary 28, 2023
Photo Illustration by Elizabeth Brockway/The Daily Beast/Amazon When Teen Wolf concluded its six-season run in 2017, it hardly felt like the show was going away forever. Sure, its subject matter is no longer en vogue—in 2023, shirtless werewolves are hardly the mythical creature du jour, the era of Twilight is long gone, and squeaky-clean superheroes have pretty much come to monopolize the sci-fi-action genre. And yet, in its time on the air, the MTV series managed to build one of the most ardent (and horniest) fanbases on social media (“Sterek” posts still appear on my Tumblr homepage nearly six years later).
It would be strange and, frankly, a bit silly if MTV didn’t eventually rekindle the onetime mega-popular series. Not to mention, the online omnipresence of Teen Wolf fan-favorite Dylan O’Brien has certainly driven demand for a revival.
However, it was Teen Wolf’s titular star who ultimately did the dirty work of reuniting the cast for a feature film—or who at least voiced what MTV was already thinking.
-
Wife of Iconic Bookstore Owner ‘Held Hostage’ in ChinaJanuary 28, 2023
Courtesy of Yu Miao Yu Miao, the former owner of the legendary Jifeng Bookstore in Shanghai, never imagined that his wife’s trip to China to care for her ailing mother would devolve into something of a hostage situation.
The 50-year-old ex-bookshop manager, who moved to Florida with his family in 2018, received an unexpected call from his wife, Xie Fang, two days before her Aug. 1 flight back to the U.S. Fang had been staying with her mother in China since January of last year, with the intention of returning in the summertime.
But those plans never came to be.
-
Cops Kept Beating Tyre Nichols as He Screamed for His MotherJanuary 28, 2023
Luis G. Rendon/The Daily Beast/Associated Press MEMPHIS—On Friday, officials released video of the fatal beating of Tyre Nichols, a 29-year-old Black man, by local cops earlier this month. Even by the standards of a country with a long legacy of police violence, the footage was breathtaking in its brutality.
The redacted clips provide at least some detail on the events leading up to Nichols’ tragic death, which quickly led to the firing of five cops—all Black men—who attacked him. The officers were arrested and charged with murder on Thursday. Two deputies from the Shelby County Sheriff’s Office have also been relieved of duty pending an investigation after body-cam footage showed them at the scene, the sheriff announced late Friday.
The video shows that what began as a traffic stop quickly became a violent assault. Then, within minutes, a large group of officers—far more than the five facing charges—were taking part in a sort of mass viewing of an unarmed Black man writhing in pain.
-
Fox News Host: I Didn’t See Any ‘Death Blows’ in Tyre Nichols FootageJanuary 27, 2023
Fox News Fox News host Jesse Watters says he didn’t see “any death” blows in the damning body-cam footage of the fatal beating of Tyre Nichols at the hands of five Memphis cops.
The footage shows the cops pull Nichols over for a traffic stop before aggressively tossing him on the pavement as they shout threats and draw their guns.
“Bitch, put your hands behind your back,” one cop said. “I’ll knock your ass the fuck out,” he followed up, before tasering Nichols.
-
Ghislaine Maxwell’s Family Stages Insane Prince Andrew Bath Sex PhotoJanuary 27, 2023
Mark Richards - WPA Pool / Getty Images Ghislaine Maxwell’s family have released a bizarre photograph of two people in a bath at her former London home with photographs of Prince Andrew and Virginia Giuffre stuck to their heads in an extraordinary attempt to discredit Giuffre.
Giuffre claims that she and Prince Andrew engaged in sexual activity in the bath. Maxwell’s side says the photos show this is impossible.
In fact, the somewhat insane photograph will do little to discredit Giuffre, not least because there is clearly plenty of room in the bath for two people. Plus, in a 2011 interview, she only claimed that Andrew played with her feet in the bath. She said she and Andrew got into the bath where “he started licking my toes, between my toes, the arches of my feet.”
-
A Wild New Study Casts Doubt on the True Role of Nature’s ‘Love Hormone’January 27, 2023
Getty Images “Omnia vincit amor,” wrote the poet Virgil over 2,000 years ago at the end of a collection of bucolic poetry, the first recorded instance of the phrase “love conquers all.” Important context is that this moment was not actually triumphant: In the eclogue, the heartbroken speaker is bemoaning an unrequited love.
Still, this bold declaration about the power of love seems to have struck a cultural nerve, and it’s something we would all like to believe is true. Well, now we have scientific evidence that it is: Prairie voles. that were missing a biological receptor for the so-called “love hormone” did just fine at bonding with their mates, delivering pups, and nurturing their young. This research was published on Jan. 27 in the journal Neuron.
Unlike similar species, prarie voles mate for life. Until now, it was assumed oxytocin played a critical role in encouraging monogamy among the species.
-
Alan Cumming Gives Back OBE Award Due to ‘Toxicity of Empire’January 27, 2023
Bruce Glikas/WireImage Decorated film and theater actor Alan Cumming announced today that he will be giving back the Order of the British Empire award given to him by Queen Elizabeth II because of his misgivings about “being associated with the toxicity of empire.”
“I want to tell you about something I recently did for myself,” Cumming wrote in an Instagram post early Friday morning. “Fourteen years ago, I was incredibly grateful to receive [the award] in the 2009 Queen’s birthday honours list, for it was awarded not just for my job as an actor but ‘for activism for equal rights for the gay and lesbian community, USA.’ Back then the Defense of Marriage Act ensured that same sex couples couldn’t get married or enjoy the same basic legal rights as straight people, and Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell ensured that openly gay, lesbian or bisexual people were barred from serving in the military. (Incidentally both these policies were instituted by the Clinton administration).”
The Scottish actor, who is bisexual, continued: “The Queen’s death and the ensuing conversations about the role of monarchy and especially the way the British Empire profited at the expense (and death) of Indigenous peoples across the world really opened my eyes. Also, thankfully, times and laws in the US have changed, and the great good the award brought to the LGBTQ+ cause back in 2009 is now less potent than the misgivings I have being associated with the toxicity of empire (OBE stands for Officer of the British Empire). So I returned my award, explained my reasons and reiterated my great gratitude for being given it in the first place. I’m now back to being plain old Alan Cumming again.”
-
Mary Jane, Meet Margo Grass–Dad Grass’s Newest CBG CollabJanuary 27, 2023
Scouted/The Daily Beast/Dad Grass. Scouted selects products independently. If you purchase something from our posts, we may earn a small commission.
Move over Mary and Jane–Margo Price needs space to pass, because she has just been crowned Dad Grass’s “Baddest Mamma Jamma.”
That’s right–smoke-enthusiast brand Dad Grass has teamed up with the Grammy-nominated artist to create special edition packs of its Mom Grass Hemp CBG Pre Rolls. CBG, short for cannabigerol, while still in the early stages of competing with CBD for the title of “Chillest Cannabis Compound,” is said to help soothe the mind and body. CBG and CBD are both non-psychoactive, meaning they are meant to produce a calming effect without the psychoactive properties of THC (the main ingredient in marijuana that may affect changes in mood and mind when taken).
-
Fox News Expert Insists No Evidence of Pelosi Break-In as Video of Break-In PlaysJanuary 27, 2023
Fox News Criminal defense attorney and regular Fox News guest Brian Claypool was left utterly humiliated on Friday when he suggested there was no evidence that Paul Pelosi’s attacker broke into his home—all despite the release of a security video showing exactly that.
In fact, Fox News anchors had to air the actual footage of the break-in for Claypool, who had just appeared on the network the night before to discuss the impending release of the tapes.
Debunking a slew of right-wing conspiracies about the brutal attack on former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s husband, Friday’s release of the 911 call, police body-cam video, and security footage showed alleged attacker David DePape violently swinging a large hammer to bust through a door before entering the home through a broken window.
-
Why Merrick Garland Should Fire Special Counsel Durham NowJanuary 27, 2023
Consolidated News Pictures Attorney General Merrick Garland should fire special counsel John Durham. Durham, a previously well-respected United States Attorney for Connecticut, was assigned in 2019 by Trump’s Attorney General William Barr to review the origins of the so-called Russia probe–Crossfire Hurricane–that became the Mueller special counsel investigation.
As reported by The New York Times, Barr had been “egged on” by the former president to support Trumpworld’s efforts to discredit the Mueller investigation by opening an investigation to investigate the investigators.
At that time, Durham was not made a special counsel–which would have been inappropriate because special counsel are usually drawn from outside the ranks of current Justice Department employees-but simply given an assignment. That is not an uncommon practice in the Justice Department and similar to what Attorney General Garland did in assigning the Chicago U.S. Attorney to conduct a preliminary investigation of classified documents found at President Biden’s private office and residence in Delaware.
-
Fox News Finds a Reason to Be Mad at Louis C.K.January 27, 2023
Fox News If winning the Grammy Award for Best Comedy Album last spring didn’t cement Louis C.K.’s post-#MeToo comeback, then getting attacked on Fox News for something that has nothing to do with his admitted history of sexual misconduct almost certainly will.
On the heels of a big headlining stand-up show at Madison Square Garden this weekend, Louis C.K. went on Joe Rogan’s podcast and made some jokes about immigration that already have Fox News commentators up in arms.
He began with a “both sides” message that painted conservatives as “racist” and liberals as “stupid” when it comes to the border before offering up a deliberately provocative suggestion on how to solve things.
-
George Santos’ Campaign Might Face a New Criminal ProbeJanuary 27, 2023
Photo by Anna Moneymaker/Getty Images As financial questions continue to swirl around George Santos, his campaign might face a new criminal investigation.
The Federal Election Commission notified the treasurer for the Santos campaign and his other political committees that they “may have failed to include the true, correct, or complete treasurer information” when they erroneously named a new treasurer earlier this week, according to filings posted on Friday.
That new treasurer—professional GOP political accountant Thomas Datwyler—replied in emailed letters on Friday, informing the FEC through his lawyer that he “is not the treasurer for this committee, did not file or authorize the filing of [the form], and did not authorize [the form] to be signed on his behalf.”
-
The Best Valentine’s Day Gifts for Your Dog Because Pups Are LoveJanuary 27, 2023
Scouted/The Daily Beast/The Foggy Dog Scouted selects products independently. If you purchase something from our posts, we may earn a small commission.
Having a human Valentine doesn’t preclude you from also wanting to spoil your pup. It may be that we just prefer them to chew a rope toy instead of our favorite shoes, but anything that keeps our pups from getting bored while we work from home is a blessing to us both. As the owner of a new rescue dog, his collection of toys and gear to keep him occupied during the day is still a little slim, so I've been shopping all things doggo.
These cute Valentine’s Day-inspired treats and gifts are perfect for the holiday of love season. Scroll through to grab a few for you and your beloved pupper.
-
Ronna McDaniel Re-Elected RNC Chair After Race of AccusationsJanuary 27, 2023
Photo Illustration by The Daily Beast / Getty Ronna McDaniel secured re-election as the Republican National Committee’s chair on Friday, managing to tamp down an internal mutiny in the GOP for her fourth term as the leader of the RNC.
Despite last-ditch efforts to dethrone her, challenger Harmeet Dhilion—and longshot sideshow candidate Mike Lindell—weren’t able to pull off the upset.
As members descended upon a pricey Waldorf Astoria resort in Dana Point, California this week, Dhillon’s prospects didn’t seem all too dim. However, according to several committee members who spoke with The Daily Beast, it quickly became clear Dhillon wasn’t going to have enough wiggle room to hit a majority of 85 votes.
-
Mike Lindell Swore He’d Win the RNC Chair Race. He Got Smothered.January 27, 2023
Photo Illustration by The Daily Beast / Getty It was a miracle he was even there at all.
Mike Lindell never really had more than an elementary understanding of how the Republican National Committee operated. Nevertheless, he insisted it was only a matter of time before he’d be in the GOP’s corner office.
Except, there was one major problem with his plan: It was all a dream. He never had the support of the actual members.
-
This Portable Campfire Was the Best Part of My VacationSeptember 1, 2021
Photo Illustration: Scouted/The Daily Beast/Amazon Scouted selects products independently. If you purchase something from our posts, we may earn a small commission.
Have you ever found that product that seemed too good to be true and then it turned out better than you had hoped? That was me with this portable fire pit. I had seen it on Instagram and Tik Tok and was skeptical that it would even work, but let me tell you, dear reader, it’s pretty great.
What immediately drew me to the Radiate Portable Campfire was, well, the fact that it was portable. Encased in a tin that’s reminiscent of the ubiquitous butter cookie tin everyone’s mom/grandma kept buttons lives a mixture of recycled pulp briquettes made from paper that’s surrounded by recycled soy wax. All you do is light the pulp and allow the flame to spread across the wax.
ZeroHedge
-
Escobar: Can You Smell What The Year Of The Rabbit Is Cooking?January 28, 2023Escobar: Can You Smell What The Year Of The Rabbit Is Cooking?Tyler Durden Fri, 01/27/2023 - 23:45
The New Silk Roads, or BRI, as well as the integration efforts of BRICS+, the SCO and the EAEU will be on the forefront of Chinese policy...
Liu He studied economics at Renmin University in China and got a Master’s from Harvard. Since 2018, he’s one of China’s Vice Premiers – along with Han Zheng, Sun Chunlan, and Hu Chunhua. He’s a Director of the Central Financial and Economic Affairs Commission and heads the China Financial Stability and Development Committee. Anyone around the world who wants to know what will drive China’s economy in the Year of the Rabbit must pay attention to Liu He.
Davos 2023 has come and gone: an extended exercise in Demented Dystopia with peaks of paroxysm.
At least a measure of reality was offered by Liu He’s address.
A limited but competent analysis of what he said is infinitely more useful than torrents of barely disguised Sinophobic “research” vomited by U.S. Think Tankland.
Liu He pointed to some key numbers for the Chinese economy in 2022. Overall 3% growth may not be groundbreaking; but what matters is value-added for high-tech manufacturing and equipment manufacturing going up by 7.4% and 5.6% respectively. What this means is that Chinese industrial capacity continues to move up the value chain.
Trade, predictably, reigns supreme: the total value of imports and exports reached the equivalent of $6,215 trillion in 2022; that’s an increase of 7.7% over 2021.
Liu He also made it clear that improving the wealth of Chinese citizens remains a key priority, as enounced in the 2022 Party Congress: the number of middle class Chinese, by 2035, should jump from the current 400 million to an astonishing 900 million.
Liu He pointedly explained that everything about Chinese reforms revolves around the notion of establishing “a socialist market economy”. This translates as “let the market play a decisive role in resources allocation, let the government play a better role.” That has absolutely nothing to do with Beijing privileging a planned economy. As Liu He detailed, “we will deepen SOE [State-Owned Enterprises] reform, support the private sector, and promote fair competition, anti-monopoly and entrepreneurship.”
China is reaching the next level, economically: that translates as building, as fast as possible, an innovation-driven commercial base. Specific targets include finance, tech, and greater productivity in industry, as in applying more robotics.
On the fin-tech front, a resurgent Hong Kong is bound to play an extremely important role starting by 2024 – most of it in consequence of several Wealth Management Connect mechanisms.
Enter, or re-enter the key role of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area – one the key development nodes of 21st century China.
What is known as the Greater Bay Area’s Wealth Management Connect is a set up that allows wealthy investors from the nine mainland cities that compose the area to invest in yuan-denominated financial products issued by banks in Hong Kong and Macao – and vice-versa. What this means in practice is opening up mainland China’s financial markets even further.
So expect a new Hong Kong boom by 2025. All those dejected by the collective West’s morass, start making plans.
Dual circulation hits Eurasia
As expected, Liu He also referred to the key Beijing strategy for this decade: “A new development paradigm with domestic circulation as the mainstay and domestic and international circulations reinforcing each other.”
The dual-circulation strategy reflects the Beijing leadership’s emphasis on simultaneously boosting China’s self-reliance and its vast export market footprint. Virtually every government policy is about dual circulation. When Liu He talks about “spurring of China’s domestic demand” he’s sending a direct message to global exporters – Eastern and Western – focusing on this ever-growing, gigantic mass of Chinese middle class consumers.
On the geopolitical and geoeconomic Big Picture, Liu He was diplomatically circumspect. He just let it filter that “we believe that an equitable international economic order must be preserved by all.”
Translation: the New Silk Roads, or BRI, as well as the integration efforts of BRICS+, the SCO and the EAEU will be on the forefront of Chinese policy.
And that brings us to what should become one of the key stories of the Year of the Rabbit: the renewed drive along the New Silk Roads.
Few better than the Chinese, historically, understand that from Samarkand to Venice, from Bukhara to Guangzhou, from Palmyra to Alexandria, from the Karakoram to the Hindu Kush, from deserts that used to engulf caravans to gardens of secluded harems, a formidable pull of economic, political, cultural and religious factors not only linked the extremities of Eurasia – from the Mediterranean to China – but determine and will continue to determine its centuries-old history.
The Ancient Silk Roads were not only about silk but also spices, porcelain, precious tones, fur, gold, tea, glass, slaves, concubines, war, knowledge, plagues – and that’s how they turned into the symbol of Eurasia-wide “people to people exchanges”, as Xi Jinping and the Beijing leadership extol it today.
These processes involve archeology, economics, history, musicology, compared mythology; so, keeping up with the past, the New Silk Roads also mean all manner of exchanges between East and West. The perpetual history of non-stop trade, in this case, is only the material base, a pretext.
Before silk there was lapis lazuli, copper, incense. Even if China may have only opened itself to the outside world on the 2nd century B.C. – because of silk – Chinese tradition, in the oldest Chinese novel, The Chronicle of the Son of Heaven Mu, tells the tale of Emperor Mu visiting the Queen of Sheba already in the 10th century B.C.
The exchanges between Europe and China may have started only in the 1st century B.C. The men who actually traversed the Eurasian immensities were actually few. It’s only in the year 98 that the Chinese ambassadorship of Gan Ying departs for Da Qin – that is, Rome. He never arrived.
In the year 166, the Antoninus Pius ambassadorship, allegedly sent by the Emperor himself, finally hits China; but in fact that’s just an adventurous merchant. For 13 centuries there was a huge exploratory void.
Despite the prodigious advances of Islam and the omnipresence of Muslim merchants since the 7th century, it’s only in the 13th century – at the time of the last Crusades and the Mongol conquest – that Europeans picked up again the road towards the East. And then, on the 15th century, the Ming emperors succeeding the Mongols totally closed China to the outside world.
It’s only due to a certain extent to the Jesuits in the 16th century that a meeting finally happened – 17 centuries too late: Europe finally started to acquire some knowledge of China, even as it dreamed about it over and over again, since chic Roman patricians were enveloped in transparent silk robes.
It’s only around 1600 that Europeans seem to have become aware that Northern China and Southern China are on the same continent. So we may conclude that China really became known in the West only after the “discovery” of the Americas.
Two worlds ignored each other for so long – and still, all along the watchtowers in the middle of the steppes, trade kept moving from one side of Eurasia to another.
Now it’s time for another historical push – even as a discombobulated Europe is kept hostage by a cabal of imperial Straussian neo-cons and neoliberal-cons. Duisburg, in the Rhur valley, the world’s largest inland port, after all remains the key Iron Silk Road hub across BRI, linked by endless railways to Chongqing in China. Wake up, Young German: your future is in the East.
-
Visualizing Remittance Flows & GDP Impact By CountryJanuary 28, 2023Visualizing Remittance Flows & GDP Impact By CountryTyler Durden Fri, 01/27/2023 - 23:25
The COVID-19 pandemic slowed down the flow of global immigration by 27%.
And, as Visual Capitalist's Richie Lionell details below, alongside it, travel restrictions, job losses, and mounting health concerns meant that many migrant workers couldn’t send money in the form of remittances back to families in their home countries.
This flow of remittances received by countries dropped by 1.5% to $711 billion globally in 2020. But over the next two years, things quickly turned back around.
As visa approvals restarted and international borders opened, so did international migration and global remittance flows.
In 2021, total global remittances were estimated at $781 billion and have further risen to $794 billion in 2022.
In these images, Richie Lionell uses the World Bank’s KNOMAD data to visualize this increasing flow of money across international borders in 176 countries.
Why Do Remittances Matter?
Remittances contribute to the economy of nations worldwide, especially low and middle-income countries (LMICs).
They have been shown to help alleviate poverty, improve nutrition, and even increase school enrollment rates in these nations. Research has also found that these inflows of income can help recipient households become resilient, especially in the face of disasters.
At the same time, it’s worth noting that these transfers aren’t a silver bullet for recipient nations. In fact, some research shows that overreliance on remittances can cause a vicious cycle that doesn’t translate to consistent economic growth over time.
Countries Receiving the Highest Remittances
For the past 15 years, India has consistently topped the chart of the largest remittance beneficiaries.
With an estimated $100 billion in remittances received, India is said to have reached an all-time high in 2022.
This increasing flow of remittances can be partially attributed to migrant Indians switching to high-skilled jobs in high-income countries—including the U.S., the UK, and Singapore—from low-skilled and low-paying jobs in Gulf countries.
Rank Remittance Inflows by Country 2022 (USD) 1 India $100,000M
2 Mexico $60,300M 3 China $51,000M 4 Philippines $38,000M 5 Egypt, Arab Rep. $32,337M 6 Pakistan $29,000M 7 France $28,520M 8 Bangladesh $21,000M 9 Nigeria $20,945M 10 Vietnam $19,000M 11 Ukraine $18,421M 12 Guatemala $18,112M 13 Germany $18,000M 14 Belgium $13,500M 15 Uzbekistan $13,500M 16 Morocco $11,401M 17 Romania $11,064M 18 Dominican Republic $9,920M 19 Indonesia $9,700M 20 Thailand $9,500M 21 Colombia $9,133M 22 Italy $9,000M 23 Nepal $8,500M 24 Spain $8,500M 25 Honduras $8,284M 26 Poland $8,000M 27 Korea, Rep. $7,877M 28 El Salvador $7,620M 29 Lebanon $6,841M 30 Israel $6,143M 31 United States $6,097M 32 Russian Federation $6,000M 33 Serbia $5,400M 34 Brazil $5,045M 35 Japan $5,000M 36 Portugal $4,694M 37 Ghana $4,664M 38 Jordan $4,646M 39 Czech Republic $4,539M 40 Haiti $4,532M 41 Ecuador $4,468M 42 Georgia $4,100M 43 Kenya $4,091M 44 Croatia $3,701M 45 Peru $3,699M 46 Sri Lanka $3,600M 47 West Bank and Gaza $3,495M 48 Jamaica $3,419M 49 Armenia $3,350M 50 Tajikistan $3,200M 51 Nicaragua $3,126M 52 Kyrgyz Republic $3,050M 53 Senegal $2,711M 54 Austria $2,700M 55 Switzerland $2,631M 56 Sweden $2,565M 57 United Kingdom $2,501M 58 Hungary $2,404M 59 Bosnia and Herzegovina $2,400M 60 Slovak Republic $2,300M 61 Moldova $2,170M 62 Azerbaijan $2,150M 63 Tunisia $2,085M 64 Zimbabwe $2,047M 65 Luxembourg $2,000M 66 Netherlands $2,000M 67 Myanmar $1,900M 68 Algeria $1,829M 69 Albania $1,800M 70 Somalia $1735M 71 Congo, Dem. Rep. $1,664M 72 Malaysia $1,620M 73 Kosovo $1,600M 74 Denmark $1,517M 75 Latvia $1,500M 76 Bolivia $1,403M 77 Belarus $1,350M 78 Cambodia $1,250M 79 Bermuda $1,200M 80 South Sudan $1,187M 81 Uganda $1,131M 82 Mali $1,094M 83 South Africa $1,019M 84 Sudan $1,013M 85 Argentina $966M 86 Montenegro $920M 87 Finland $880M 88 Bulgaria $850M 89 Slovenia $800M 90 Australia $737M 91 Madagascar $718M 92 Turkey $710M 93 Canada $700M 94 Lithuania $700M 95 Togo $668M 96 Greece $665M 97 Costa Rica $654M 98 Estonia $626M 99 Qatar $624M 100 Iraq $624M 101 Gambia, The $615M 102 Tanzania $609M 103 Norway $600M 104 Panama $596M 105 Burkina Faso $589M 106 Hong Kong SAR, China $571M 107 Paraguay $554M 108 Mozambique $545M 109 Niger $534M 110 Cyprus $527M 111 Lesotho $527M 112 Mongolia $500M 113 Rwanda $469M 114 Fiji $450M 115 North Macedonia $450M 116 Guyana $400M 117 Cabo Verde $375M 118 Kazakhstan $370M 119 Cameroon $365M 120 Cote d'Ivoire $360M 121 Liberia $351M 122 Afghanistan $350M 123 Ethiopia $327M 124 Samoa $280M 125 Mauritius $279M 126 Saudi Arabia $273M 127 Malta $271M 128 Malawi $267M 129 Zambia $260M 130 Tonga $250M 131 Comoros $250M 132 Ireland $249M 133 Suriname $221M 134 Benin $209M 135 Lao PDR $200M 136 Timor-Leste $185M 137 Sierra Leone $179M 138 Guinea-Bissau $178M 139 Trinidad and Tobago $172M 140 Mauritania $168M 141 Iceland $164M 142 Eswatini $148M 143 Belize $142M 144 Curacao $131M 145 Uruguay $127M 146 Chile $78M 147 Vanuatu $75M 148 St. Vincent and the Grenadines $70M 149 Grenada $69M 150 Botswana $56M 151 St. Lucia $55M 152 Bhutan $55M 153 Djibouti $55M 154 Dominica $52M 155 Burundi $50M 156 Aruba $44M 157 Namibia $44M 158 Guinea $41M 159 Solomon Islands $40M 160 Oman $39M 161 Antigua and Barbuda $35M 162 St. Kitts and Nevis $33M 163 Marshall Islands $30M 164 Kuwait $27M 165 New Zealand $25M 166 Macao SAR, China $17M 167 Angola $16M 168 Kiribati $15M 169 Cayman Islands $14M 170 Sao Tome and Principe $10M 171 Seychelles $9M 172 Maldives $5M 173 Gabon $4M 174 Palau $2M 175 Papua New Guinea $2M 176 Turkmenistan $1M Total World $794,059M Mexico and China round out the top three remittance-receiving nations, with estimated inbound transfers of $60 billion and $51 billion respectively in 2022.
Impact on National GDP
While India tops the list of countries benefitting from remittances, its $100 billion received amounts to only 2.9% of its 2022 GDP.
Meanwhile, low and middle-income countries around the world heavily rely on this source of income to boost their economies in a more substantive way. In 2022, for example, remittances accounted for over 15% of the GDP of 25 countries.
Rank Remittance Inflows by Country % of GDP (2022) 1 Tonga 49.9% 2 Lebanon 37.8% 3 Samoa 33.7% 4 Tajikistan 32.0% 5 Kyrgyz Republic 31.2% 6 Gambia, The 28.3% 7 Honduras 27.1% 8 South Sudan 24.8% 9 El Salvador 23.8% 10 Haiti 22.4% 11 Nepal 21.7% 12 Jamaica 21.2% 13 Lesotho 21.0% 14 Somalia 20.6% 15 Comoros 20.1% 16 Nicaragua 19.9% 17 Guatemala 19.8% 18 Armenia 18.9% 19 West Bank and Gaza 18.5% 20 Cabo Verde 18.2% 21 Kosovo 17.3% 22 Uzbekistan 17.0% 23 Georgia 16.2% 24 Moldova 15.4% 25 Montenegro 15.0% 26 Ukraine 13.8% 27 Marshall Islands 11.0% 28 Guinea-Bissau 10.9% 29 Bosnia and Herzegovina 10.1% 30 Albania 9.8% 31 Senegal 9.8% 32 Jordan 9.6% 33 Philippines 9.4% 34 Fiji 9.2% 35 Liberia 9.0% 36 Dominican Republic 8.8% 37 Dominica 8.6% 38 Serbia 8.6% 39 Togo 7.9% 40 Morocco 7.9% 41 Pakistan 7.7% 42 Vanuatu 7.6% 43 Timor-Leste 7.5% 44 Suriname 7.3% 45 St. Vincent and the Grenadines 7.3% 46 Kiribati 7.2% 47 Egypt, Arab Rep. 6.8% 48 Ghana 6.1% 49 Mali 5.9% 50 Grenada 5.8% 51 Zimbabwe 5.3% 52 Croatia 5.3% 53 Belize 5.3% 54 Sri Lanka 4.8% 55 Madagascar 4.7% 56 Vietnam 4.5% 57 Bangladesh 4.5% 58 Tunisia 4.5% 59 Cambodia 4.4% 60 Sierra Leone 4.3% 61 Mexico 4.2% 62 Nigeria 4.1% 63 Rwanda 3.8% 64 Ecuador 3.8% 65 Latvia 3.6% 66 Romania 3.6% 67 Niger 3.6% 68 Kenya 3.5% 69 Bolivia 3.2% 70 Burkina Faso 3.2% 71 Myanmar 3.1% 72 North Macedonia 3.1% 73 Mongolia 3.1% 74 Eswatini 3.1% 75 Azerbaijan 3.0% 76 Mozambique 3.0% 77 St. Kitts and Nevis 2.9% 78 India 2.8% 79 St. Lucia 2.7% 80 Guyana 2.6% 81 Colombia 2.6% 82 Congo, Dem. Rep. 2.6% 83 Solomon Islands 2.4% 84 Luxembourg 2.4% 85 Mauritius 2.4% 86 Sudan 2.3% 87 Uganda 2.3% 88 Malawi 2.3% 89 Belgium 2.2% 90 Sao Tome and Principe 2.0% 91 Afghanistan 2.0% 92 Slovak Republic 2.0% 93 Antigua and Barbuda 2.0% 94 Bhutan 2.0% 95 Cyprus 1.9% 96 Portugal 1.8% 97 Thailand 1.7% 98 Belarus 1.6% 99 Mauritania 1.6% 100 Estonia 1.6% 101 Malta 1.5% 102 Peru 1.5% 103 Czech Republic 1.5% 104 Djibouti 1.4% 105 Burundi 1.3% 106 Paraguay 1.3% 107 Hungary 1.3% 108 Slovenia 1.2% 109 Aruba 1.2% 110 Lao PDR 1.2% 111 Benin 1.1% 112 Israel 1.1% 113 Poland 1.1% 114 Lithuania 1.0% 115 France 1.0% 116 Bulgaria 0.9% 117 Algeria 0.9% 118 Zambia 0.9% 119 Costa Rica 0.9% 120 Palau 0.8% 121 Panama 0.8% 122 Cameroon 0.8% 123 Tanzania 0.7% 124 Indonesia 0.7% 125 Spain 0.6% 126 Iceland 0.5% 127 Trinidad and Tobago 0.5% 128 Austria 0.5% 129 Cote d'Ivoire 0.5% 130 Seychelles 0.4% 131 Korea, Rep. 0.4% 132 Italy 0.4% 133 Germany 0.4% 134 Sweden 0.4% 135 Denmark 0.3% 136 Malaysia 0.3% 137 Namibia 0.3% 138 Switzerland 0.3% 139 Finland 0.3% 140 Botswana 0.3% 141 Greece 0.2% 142 Ethiopia 0.2% 143 Qatar 0.2% 144 Russian Federation 0.2% 145 Brazil 0.2% 146 China 0.2% 147 South Africa 0.2% 148 Iraq 0.2% 149 Guinea 0.2% 150 Netherlands 0.2% 151 Uruguay 0.1% 152 Kazakhstan 0.1% 153 Hong Kong SAR, China 0.1% 154 Argentina 0.1% 155 Norway 0.1% 156 Japan 0.1% 157 Maldives 0.08% 158 Turkey 0.08% 159 United Kingdom 0.07% 160 Macao SAR, China 0.07% 161 Ireland 0.05% 162 Australia 0.04% 163 Oman 0.04% 164 Saudi Arabia 0.03% 165 Chile 0.02% 166 United States 0.02% 167 Gabon 0.02% 168 Kuwait 0.01% 169 Angola 0.01% 170 New Zealand 0.01% 171 Papua New Guinea 0.01% 172 Turkmenistan 0.001% Known primarily as a tourist destination, the Polynesian country of Tonga banks on remittance inflows to support its economy. In 2022, the country’s incoming remittance flows were equal to almost 50% of its GDP.
Next on this list is Lebanon. The country received $6.8 billion in remittances in 2022, estimated to equal almost 38% of its GDP and making it a key support to the nation’s shrinking economy.
-
Canada's Bill C-26: Yet Another Government Power GrabJanuary 28, 2023Canada's Bill C-26: Yet Another Government Power GrabTyler Durden Fri, 01/27/2023 - 23:05
Authored by Mark Jeftovic via EasyDNS.com,
Soviet Era Ethos Stomps Privacy and Due-Process
Another doozy from the Canadian government.
Following along several other bills winding their way along the Road to Serfdom…
-
Bill C-11 regulates the internet under the CRTC and paves the way toward institutionalized content moderation, the requirement for licenses to publish online, and regulation of user generated content (in Senate)
-
Bill C-36 the Online Harms Bill sought to designate political dissent as “hate speech” and invoked penalties for criticizing politicians (not sure where this one is at the moment).
-
Bill C-18 throws a funding lifeline to Canada’s flailing agitprop industry (a.k.a the mainsteam media), in that it will require tech platforms to pay licensing fees for content the media outlets post there (passed third reading in November). This bill will reward big media conglomerates like Bell, while freezing out small and independent organizations.
Here comes another one, Bill C-36: An Act respecting cyber security, amending the Telecommunications Act and making consequential amendments to other Acts, which passed first reading last June.
It’s been largely flying under everybody’s radar so far. The Canadian Civil Liberties Association has been actively raising awareness and Michael Geist had Brenda McPhail, their Director of the Privacy, Technology and Surveillance Program on his podcast last October.
We mentioned C-26 in AxisOfEasy #273 citing Gowling WLG’s coverage of it by Brent Arnold (Brent Arnold sits on the Internet Society Canada Chapter board, as do I, but I am writing this post from my role as easyDNS CEO, and not ISCC.)
The Government Hereby Grants Itself The Following Powers:
The new bill is ostensibly a cyber-security and critical infrastructure bill, but it is riddled with nebulous, open-ended terms, Kafka-esque secrecy provisions, onerous penalties and conspicuously absent of any semblance due process:
It effectively subjects Canada’s telecom and internet sectors to the whim of unelected bureaucrats and political functionaries.
Am I being bombastic? You tell me: given that the legislation that grants them the power to order a telecommunications service provider “to do or stop doing anything“.
“Part 1 amends the Telecommunications Act to add the promotion of the security of the Canadian telecommunications system as an objective of the Canadian telecommunications policy and to authorize the Governor in Council and the Minister of Industry to direct telecommunications service providers to do anything, or refrain from doing anything, that is necessary to secure the Canadian telecommunications system. It also establishes an administrative monetary penalty scheme to promote compliance with orders and regulations made by the Governor in Council and the Minister of Industry to secure the Canadian telecommunications system as well as rules for judicial review of those orders and regulations.”
I guess it all comes down to what you mean by “anything”.
Speaking of anything, the government can deem “any” service or system a vital service or system – which then makes that entity subject to requirements, that…
(a) authorizes the Governor in Council to designate any service or system as a vital service or vital system;
(b) authorizes the Governor in Council to establish classes of operators in respect of a vital service or vital system;
(c) requires designated operators to, among other things, establish and implement cyber security programs, mitigate supply-chain and third-party risks, report cyber security incidents and comply with cyber security directions;
(d) provides for the exchange of information between relevant parties; and
(e) authorizes the enforcement of the obligations under the Act and imposes consequences for non-compliance.
Each one of these bullet points opens a can of worms unto itself, combined they have the potential to effectively nationalize Canada’s information infrastructure.
The penalties for non-compliance are onerous: $1 million per day for individuals and $15 million /day for any other entity.
But wait, there’s more:
Under C-26, orders are filed in secret, telecommunications service providers (TSPs) can be ordered to cut off any user (including another TSP) while being barred from even informing the entity that it’s happening, let alone why.
The contents of said orders are secret and not even divulged to the target. I recommend listening to the Michael Geist / Brenda McPhail podcast above to understand the threat to Canadians’ privacy.
Me, sitting here with my easyDNS hat on, running an internet service provider, I’m dialled in on the due process aspects.
More accurately, the complete absence of due process. We’ve got twenty-five years experience of being told by various governments and their agencies to forgo due process and do things that would otherwise disrupt businesses, individual rights and even the network itself if we listened to them.
Being told to do or stop doing “anything” seems overly broad.
It gets worse:
Similar to previous legislation, there are provisions for warrantless entry into places of business, or private homes, to search, copy or remove anything they deem relevant – including documents or telecommunications equipment.
C-26 also permits the government to share data with foreign entities. Again, this is all done without any of the privacy safeguards most citizens think they have as a constitutional right, because this bill, and this government, mostly ignores that those rights exist.
Non-Hypothetical Example
Last year, around this time, the same government that is introducing this bill arbitrarily enacted bank account seizures, not only against protestors, but also targeting crowdfunded contributions to their fundraisers.
This was done under the aegis of the Emergencies Act, however the seizures started before the EA was even ratified in Parliament, and the list of fundraising contributors was largely sourced from a third-party spreadsheet that was hacked from a foreign crowdfunding platform.
Nevermind that the entire thing went away within a week – rationalized as “mission accomplished” (the reality was the measure sparked a run on banks and nearly blew up the Canadian financial system),
Not much mention of this in the MSM, oddly…
The 2022 invocation of the Emergencies Act made it clear that our government is perfectly willing to act unilaterally, without due process, in contravention of basic human rights to unbank people at whim.
Bill C-26 will give them a veneer of Soviet-era legislation to unperson you in the online realm.
What Can You Do?
While I said I’m not speaking with my ISCC hat on today, the Internet Society Canada Chapter is one of the civil society bodies that does its level best to bring informed, rational commentary and input to the policy making process. Membership includes a couple ex-CRTC commissioners and even a recent appointee to the Order of Canada.
Consider signing up as a member today and help us bring a clue to the process, or alternatively, get behind the Canadian Civil Liberties Association.
You can also make your views known to your MP. They don’t care if they get your vote or not, so don’t even bother telling them you won’t vote for them. You have speak their language, e.g
“I know you don’t care about my vote – but I feel strongly enough about this issue to make the maximum allowable personal contribution to your opponent, and fund raise for them wherever I can”.
In my case they at least started replying to my emails after that.
-
-
Thai Rice Prices Jump As Global Food Crisis ReignitesJanuary 28, 2023Thai Rice Prices Jump As Global Food Crisis ReignitesTyler Durden Fri, 01/27/2023 - 22:45
Soaring rice prices is the latest example of persistent food inflation. The grain is responsible for feeding billions of people, and prices were relatively stable last year while wheat soared until now.
Since November, Thailand's white rice prices jumped to two-year highs, up 23% to $523 per ton.
"Strong demand lies at the heart of the rally, with some importers buying more of the grain to replace wheat after the war in Ukraine disrupted supplies. Some consumers have also been stocking up ahead of festivals, while a strengthening Thai currency has helped push up dollar-denominated prices," Bloomberg explained.
Thailand, the world's second-largest rice exporter, has seen increasing demand from Indonesia and Iraq, said Chookiat Ophaswongse, honorary president of the Thai Rice Exporters Association.
"Iraq has been diligently buying our rice every month," said Ophaswongse, adding the Middle Eastern country was the largest buyer last year.
However, as Thai rice gets more expensive, buyers in China and Malaysia are swapping for inexpensive alternatives.
Expensive rice will pressure many of the world's households that rely on the grain. The problem with rice is that it's a staple, and rising prices could fuel discontent or, worse, food riots.
What's more alarming is that the Food and Agriculture Organization's food price index, which tracks international prices of the top traded food commodities worldwide, remains at levels associated with triggering the Arab Spring, a series of anti-government protests across the Middle East in the early 2010s.
The good news is that upside momentum in food commodity prices has dramatically slowed, if not reversed, in some cases, though the rise in rice prices is a concern because billions of people rely on the grain for survival.
... and China is shifting into a net food importer that might put upward pressure on food prices this year.
-
Here's What Happens To Society When The System FailsJanuary 28, 2023Here's What Happens To Society When The System FailsTyler Durden Fri, 01/27/2023 - 22:25
Authored by Fabiann Ommar via The Organic Prepper blog,
When the system begins to fail, society can quickly crumble. Two such events have occurred recently...
Let’s reflect on the Brumadinho mining dam disaster and see about the recent cartel attack in Culiacán, Mexico, in order to discuss how these kinds of events can affect our daily lives, particularly during times of crisis.
In his work, Selco explains what occurs to individuals and society as a whole when the system completely fails. He’s unmatched and possibly one of the greatest sources to look at because of how effectively his blunt and honest style is to convey the drama and urgency of the unthinkable.
I haven’t experienced a civil war, but I can speak about other SHTFs, such as Thirdworldization, or crime that occurs when a crisis arises.
The recent events in Mexico serve as the ideal illustration.
The Brazilian uprising of January 8th took place as I was just beginning to write about it, so the immediacy of the situation took priority.
However, here’s the quick rundown:
The Sinaloa Cartel launched a significant offensive against the Mexican government and military in the first week of January in response to the detention of their leader.
“Mexican authorities have captured Ovidio Guzmán, a son of incarcerated drugs kingpin Joaquín “El Chapo” Guzmán, prompting a wave of retaliatory attacks from cartel gunmen in the northern city of Culiacán.
After a night of violence, gunmen exchanged fire with security forces, blocking roads with burning vehicles and shooting at army helicopters and police aeroplanes bringing reinforcements to the city.
According to one resident, heavy fighting raged for hours after Guzmán – a key figure in the Sinaloa cartel since the arrest of his father – was arrested in the city early on Thursday.” [source]
(If a few good books about this topic are TLDR, but you still want a broad view on this, I advise watching the Netflix’s original series Narcos. It’s Hollywood, so a little dramatized for entertainment, but it still gives a good outline of the major players and events.)
A well-armed, organized, numerous, and deadly gang of criminals put on a massive and scary exhibition of strength and firepower.
You’ve probably seen the videos making the rounds on social media and in the news, of passengers trying to take cover from the gunfire inside of an airplane, sicarios attempting to take down helicopters, groups firing heavy artillery towards the troops in the streets and avenues, and drug soldiers raiding homes.
An entire region of a democratic nation was in dread as a result of the Sinaloa Cartel offensive to put pressure on the government and force the release of Guzmán. The estimated death toll from the conflict is 19 accused cartel gunmen and 11 members of the military and law enforcement.
I’ve witnessed enough cartel activity to know that there are generally many more ‘unofficial’ victims and collateral in these drug wars, so I’m sure there are more to add to that total. It’s still ongoing, too, I’m sure – just not as openly as it has been.
The fact that such savagery produced significant stir in a populace accustomed to the cartels and their ways says something about the ferocity of the struggle, even though it may startle my first-world colleagues. Not to mention that it all took place not far from the US.
Think of that for a moment: paramilitary criminal groups directly attacking the government of a sizable democratic state.
And this is not unprecedented.
Something similar occurred in Brazil over two decades ago. In May 2006, the PCC – also known as First Command of Capital, a well-known criminal organization – unleashed a wave of violent attacks against the police and government officials and buildings. That happened in São Paulo, the wealthiest state in Brazil and the 16th in the world.
The gang instigated a mutiny in 76 jails to oppose the transfer of more than 700 of its members to highest security prisons. Then, street members were ordered to indiscriminately target police, police stations, state prosecutors, and other authorities. The forces responded by sending out a full contingent to confront the assailants.
Wild rumors and curfew announcements kept the terrified population indoors. Buses did not leave the garages (more than 40 were set on fire), and shops, schools, and businesses remained closed. My city, which has 13 million residents and is the biggest in Brazil, had deserted streets for days. At the end of the attack, there were 60 agents and 500 civilian casualties (PCC members and other suspects), and more than a hundred were injured. In ten days only.
About organized crime.
It’s enormous, it’s all around us, growing in the underground. Most of the time, we only see and hear about it when something of magnitude erupts, or if we investigate it. Some individuals don’t even know it exists, how it functions, how powerful and pervasive, as well as how deadly it can be. They think it’s like in the movies, but it’s very different in reality.
When everything is normal, mafias, cartels and other organized criminal operations stay more or less contained and operating mainly underground. They keep expanding and filtering into civil society through corruption or threats (plata o plomo – silver or lead). But also in more surreptitious, sophisticated, and “official” ways, such as financing everything from the election of local leaderships and politicians to the graduation of lawyers and promotion of DAs.
Tax revenue falls during a slump. Institutions deteriorate as a result of underfunding of the governmental apparatus. Of course, this also applies to the crime-fighting infrastructure. Criminals feel empowered and come out, making the situation worse. Though it has money and power, organized crime is not listed in the S&P 500 or the Nasdaq. That is to say, crime always tends to increase during economic downturns.
Why is this relevant?
If you watched the videos of the sicarios fighting the forces in the streets of Jesús María, Mazatlán or Los Mochis; or if you follow the actions of drug cartels, mafias and other criminal organizations in the real world, you probably know the answer to that question already. If not, let me explain it:
There’s a huge contingent of organized groups out there whose routines are a constant of firearms, violence, deception, and bloodshed. These people practice with guns daily on real targets; their “range” is the city’s streets. The idea that normal people will be dealing with untrained neighbors (or even trained ones) coming solo or in groups to their doors food in case SHTF is a fantasy for the most part.
I’m not referring to regular people turning violent due to hunger or despair or psychopaths wreaking havoc on the broken society. These criminals are all that and more, but they’re also merciless warriors accustomed to a routine of danger, confrontation, and death. It’s not that they’re capable of violence: all they know is violence. For them, it’ll be business as usual whether the system stays up or breaks down.
It’s a constant war for turf, money, narcotics, power, and plenty more.
And this battle is vicious and ferocious, bestial even – a blend of modern warfare, where the most advanced equipment money can buy gets mixed up with medieval tactics. It’s the sicarios trying to knock down a Black Hawk with anti-aircraft 0.50 and M134 miniguns, side-by-side with beheadings, dismemberments, and other horrible activities routinely employed to punish and apply lessons, instill terror on the adversary, or simply display brutality, audacity and savagery. A typical punishment is the “microwave oven”, which consists of putting the snitch or enemy inside a pile of old car tires and set them ablaze.
That may seem overly graphic, but it’s the reality. There are entire populations living on the fringe (of cities, of society) immersed in this. When a group of gangsters raid your house or come for you for whatever, you know it’s hit the fan. You have no options, and no one to ask for help.
Organized crime won’t go away.
It’s a world with very different laws and rules, like any place where the system is failing, from economic, moral, and social decadence, inside the world we all live in. More important, as Thirdworldization pushes on everywhere, the various implications of organized crime will reach closer to the ordinary citizen.
Here’s another example.
January 25th marks the fourth anniversary of the collapse of the Brumadinho mining reject dam in Brazil’s southeastern state of Minas Gerais.
“It felt like being inside a giant blender.”
Alessandra de Souza, 43, was preparing lunch with her family when they heard a loud blast splitting the air. The noise echoed through the valley and was heard by Luiz de Castro while he was working in the mining complex.
“I was twisting and turning uncontrollably and getting crushed by rocks, sticks, cars, parts of houses, and everything that came crashing down, breaking people, animals, and everything in its path.”
Luiz de Castro was installing lamps at the mining complex when he heard a massive bang from a close distance. He thought it was a truck tire popping or something, but his friend knew better.
“No, it’s not that!” the friend said. “Run!”
Dashing up a staircase, caked in mud and pelted by flying rocks, Castro clambered to safety. He watched as a tsunami of mud swallowed and buried alive 157 of his co-workers sitting in the cafeteria. It took rescue workers days to reach them.
The deluge of toxic mud stretched for five miles, crushing everything on its path: homes, offices, animals, and people. (Excerpts from a NYT article by Shasta Darlington, James Glanz, Manuela Andreoni, Matthew Bloch, Sergio Peçanha, Anjali Singhvi, and Troy Griggs.)
A true SHTF and a terrible tragedy, but hardly a surprise.
The mudslide – 11.7 million cubic meters of mining waste, the equivalent of almost 5,000 Olympic swimming pools – advanced quickly through the mine’s offices, resulting in 270 dead (259 officially confirmed and 11 still missing).
Minas Gerais is Brazil’s second-largest producer, and there are almost fifty dams built like the one that failed — enormous reservoirs of mining waste held back by little more than walls of sand and silt. And all but four of the country’s 87 dams have been rated by the government as equally vulnerable or worse.
Even more troubling is the fact that 27 of them are situated upstream above towns or cities with a population of over 100,000. It’s a massive warning sign, yet nobody notices until something bad happens. A similar catastrophe that occurred in 2015 resulted in the deaths of 19 individuals and the contamination of 12 cities along the Rio Doce valley—two significant failures in just three years.
Thirdworldization and the making of SHTF.
A crude and cheaply built reservoir of mining waste sitting upstream of a major community has all the ingredients for an SHTF. The warning indicators of the presence of structural problems that could cause a collapse were ignored by the mining corporations and the authorities, and the monitoring systems had stopped working.
Brazil is a large exporting nation and had been benefiting greatly from the 2000s commodities boom, which saw industrial giants like China devouring critical commodities like metals, grains, and everything they could get their hands on to support a string of two-digit GDP growth.
Mining industries were accelerating their expansion plans and operating at full throttle, without much rigorous oversight or restriction from the part of authorities, while everyone was benefiting from record exports and significant inflows of foreign investment. Brumadinho is yet another tragic illustration of how an undesirable combination of large and powerful (i.e., influential) companies operating in a substandard, inefficient, and corrupt “thirdworldized” environment and can result in disasters with nasty consequences.
The crisis keeps brewing.
The US congress should be debating the debt ceiling yet again about the time this post goes live. Depending on the way this turns, the decisions will have a vast array of consequences, from moderate to severe, now and in the future. This impasse has been recurrent and ever more tense, another sign of financial and political crisis – or more ThirdWorldization.
The US is, in fact, bankrupt. My country is, too. Europe is also in financial trouble. Japan, the United Kingdom, and, very likely China are as well. Everybody is drowning in debt: countries, corporations, businesses, families, and people. Though that hasn’t yet had a significant effect on the system, it has been boiling and showing occasionally.
There are countless levels of “broke,” and I could delve into this subject as I have in the past, but to emphasize that crucial contrast one more time: SHTF never hits the same way everywhere. Said differently, life in a “broke” nation that holds the world’s reserve currency (and a sizable army to back it up), or one with high-speed trains and highways, and stronger institutions will never be the same as in a place without these things.
That doesn’t mean, though, that more developed nations won’t be affected.
They will because: 1) the crisis is global; 2) everything is interconnected; and: 3) there are many ways this can happen. I’ve presented two in this article, but SHTF can also result from things like mass migration, authoritarianism, terrorism, pervasive corruption, a shortage of energy, and more.
I’m not really saying anything new. A major conflict might result from all those crises. That has been the elites’ go-to response in the past, so who knows. Up until that, it will be a steady slide into a situation where institutions get overwhelmed, infrastructure deteriorates, workers cross their arms, and criminals feel empowered.
To be sure, SHTF happens; however, when a crisis is present, it happens more frequently, and the repercussions are typically more serious and widespread. That results from the system becoming increasingly unstable and handicapped. We can talk about ways to prepare and overcome that, but until then, remain vigilant and stay safe.
* * *
Fabian Ommar is the author of Street Survivalism: A Practical Training Guide To Life In The City and The Ultimate Survival Gear Handbook
Wayne Dupree
-
Ronna McDaniel Retains Role As RNC Chair; What’s Next?January 28, 2023
Following a heated election that was sparked by calls for new leadership within the party, Ronna McDaniel was elected to a fourth term as the chairwoman of the Republican National Committee (RNC) on Friday by a secret ballot vote of the members. McDaniel defeated two opponents, including MyPillow CEO Mike Lindell and California attorney Harmeet Dhillon, who vehemently disputes the outcome of the 2020 presidential election. She garnered 111 votes, compared to Dhillon’s 51 and Lindell’s 4. Additionally, former Rep. Lee Zeldin (R-NY), who ultimately decided against running for RNC head, garnered one vote. #BREAKING | Ronna McDaniel wins 4th -
Four-Star General Predicts The U.S. And China Will Clash By 2025; Gives Subordinates InstructionsJanuary 28, 2023
A four-star Air Force general predicted that the United States and China will be at war in two years and instructed his subordinates to prepare by firing “a clip” at a target and “aiming for the head.” Gen. Mike Minihan, commander of Air Mobility Command, wrote in a document issued on Friday that NBC News was able to receive, “I pray I am incorrect. My instinct is I’ll fight in 2025. With approximately 50,000 service men and close to 500 aircraft, Air Mobility Command is in charge of transportation and refueling. In the letter, Minihan predicted that because both Taiwan -
Memphis PD Releases Horrific Bodycam Video Of Brutal Beating Delivered By Five Police OfficersJanuary 28, 2023
Tyre Nichols was brutally beaten by five police officers on January 7; the injuries he sustained ultimately led to his death. The disturbing bodycam video was released by Memphis PD. Four videos in all showing the complete series of events were provided by the authorities. The explicit footage is for adult audiences only; use caution. Before the footage of the police confrontation was made public, the family of Nichols, who passed away after the traffic check descended into violence, pleaded for peace. CLICK HERE FOR AN AD FREE EXPERIENCE AND ACCESS TO VIP ARTICLES Three days after the traffic stop -
Hey Joe, Are Those Classified Docs in Your Pants, Or Are You Just Happy to See Us?January 27, 2023
Kevin McCarthy is on a roll…and I hope it doesn’t stop anytime soon. He’s been a complete savage lately, ripping PBS reporters a new one, dragging Schiff and Swalwell through the mud, and now, going after Joe and his classified docs mess. And speaking of classified docs, I read a great bit from The Spectator, where they talked about how what Biden did was so much worse than what Trump did. From The Spectator: There are several key points, however, that we can look at to determine just how badly Biden mishandled his materials. First, while there are competing arguments -
After Watching Bodycam Footage, Many People Aren’t Buying Pelosi “Hammer Attack” StoryJanuary 27, 2023
Well, they finally released the Pelosi “Hammer attack” bodycam footage and it probably won’t surprise you to hear that not everyone is buying the “official story.” Now, I don’t really want to get into any deep conspiracy theories here, and I will remind everyone that that the suspect, David DePape is on trial right now – the speediest trial known to mankind, I might add – and police confirm that Pelosi was attacked with a hammer by a stranger who entered his house because he wanted to confront his wife, Nancy Pelosi. That’s the official story. NBC News reported that -
TJ Holmes, Amy Robach Future At ABC Is Now Decided; Both Are OutJanuary 27, 2023
Not more than a few days after it was made public that TJ Holmes and Amy Robach will be participating in mediation with ABC during their on-air leave… there has been a significant change or improvement. For those unaware, their relationship—which began while they were both still legally married to other people—was made public in November 2022. Pictures of them together showed them cuddling and having fun while they weren’t working. Several weeks later, ABC put them on indefinite hiatus, and new co-hosts took over GMA3. ABC has been looking into what happened ever since. CLICK HERE FOR AN AD -
Shocking Body Cam Footage Of Paul Pelosi Attack Released!!January 27, 2023
On Friday, officials in San Francisco revealed body camera footage from the October attack on Paul Pelosi, the husband of Democratic Representative Nancy Pelosi. After a consortium of news sites filed a motion in San Francisco on January 11 demanding that the footage be made public, the judge granted their request. In a pretrial hearing, prosecutors said that on October 28, a nudist activist who had broken into the Pelosi home in an attempt to kidnap the then-House speaker attacked Paul Pelosi. Prosecutors have named 42-year-old David DePape as the activist who attacked Paul Pelosi because he couldn’t find -
Five Memphis Police Officers Fired And Charged With Beating Driver; Reminiscent Of Rodney KingJanuary 27, 2023
Tyre Nichols was beaten by Memphis police officers for three minutes while being treated like “a human piata” in a “savage” incident that was reminiscent of the infamous police beating of Los Angeles driver Rodney King in 1991, the family’s counsel claimed on Monday. According to attorney Ben Crump, police footage watched by the family on Monday shows Nichols being shocked, pepper sprayed, and detained after the 29-year-old FedEx worker and father was stopped over while coming from a suburban park where he had snapped photos of the sunset on Jan. 7. Another attorney, Antonio Romanucci, claimed that Nichols, a -
Georgia National Guard Troops Activated Ahead Of Anti-Cop ProtestsJanuary 27, 2023
In preparation for potentially violent anti-police protests in Atlanta this weekend, Georgia’s Republican governor, Brian Kemp, proclaimed a state of emergency on Thursday. After demonstrators in masks tossed rocks, set off fireworks, and set fire to a police vehicle in front of the Atlanta Police Foundation office over the weekend, the governor activated 1,000 National Guard troops and will deploy them to quell any more unrest. “Georgians respect peaceful protests, but do not condone acts of violence against persons or property,” the governor’s directive reads. CLICK HERE FOR AN AD FREE EXPERIENCE AND ACCESS TO VIP ARTICLES Unless the governor -
Before and After Pics of Man Who Turned Himself Into an “Alien”… Mental Illness or Demonic Possession?January 27, 2023
I looked at these pictures and I wondered, is this mental illness or demonic possession? And I think landed on mental illness, but I also believe there are some really dark and evil spirits surrounding this young man, who, is slowly but surely destroying his entire bod at the tender age of “thirty-something.” He’s a tattoo artist who has undergone several mutilation surgeries to morph himself into an “alien” (looks more lie a demon to me), and has injected so much ink into his body-including his eyes, that he’ll probably be dead within a decade, or at the very least,
