NIGEL FARAGE AT CENTER OF CONTROVERSY (AGAIN)

LONDON—The collision of Brexit cheerleader Nigel Farage, a regal private bank, the BBC and the Conservative Party exploded into a quintessentially British scandal this week, costing the job of one of the country’s top bankers and igniting a debate over how lenders protect their reputations without discriminating against outspoken clients.

The damage was apparent on Wednesday. Alison Rose, chief executive of NatWest one of the biggest banks, resigned under pressure from the government, with calls for fresh scrutiny into how banks decide whom to allow as customers. The tightly woven and overlapping British power centers – banks, media, and politicians in the corridors of power—all played their role.

The origins of the affair began weeks before, when Farage, a British TV presenter known as the godfather of Brexit, waged a public battle with Coutts – an exclusive private bank owned by NatWest – after the bank closed his account.

Farage said Coutts, famed for banking the late Queen Elizabeth II, ditched him because of his pro-Brexit and anti-woke views. During a charity dinner, Rose sat next to the BBC’s business editor and told him that Farage was axed because he wasn’t a profitable customer. The journalist wrote a story the next day and later said he had relied on a “trusted and senior source.”

Farage ultimately landed a sucker punch. He acquired a 40-page document from Coutts that included a list of his political views that the bank felt created “significant reputational risks of being associated with him.”

The document described Farage’s views as “xenophobic and racist” and said he was “considered by many to be a disingenuous grifter,” charges Farage has denied. This, combined with the fact that Farage had for some time failed to meet the financial criteria for banking at Coutts, led the bank to conclude it should shed him as a client. When Farage paid down his mortgage early, he was ousted.  (WSJ, 7/26/2023)

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PLOTTING A DEAL WITH RUSSIA OVER UKRAINE.   

One of the main reasons Nato is proving to be so reluctant to provide Ukraine with a clear timeframe for membership is the stiff opposition the proposal has received from the Biden administration.

In public, US President Joe Biden is keen to give the impression that he is fully committed to backing Ukraine’s battle for survival. But it is a different story behind-the-scenes, where Biden and his senior officials are more interested in ending the war in good time for next year’s US presidential election contest.

Consequently, rather than upsetting the Kremlin by openly backing Ukraine’s Nato membership bid, the Biden administration’s real objective is to explore possible options for ending hostilities this year.

Prior to the summit, US President Joe Biden made his opposition to the proposal perfectly clear, declaring that he did not believe Ukraine was “ready for membership in Nato,” and pointing out that there was no unanimity within the alliance “about whether or not to bring Ukraine into the Nato family now, at this moment, in the middle of the war.”

Biden’s obsession with ending the conflict helps to explain the recent initiative undertaken by a delegation of high-ranking US foreign policy experts and former national security officials to hold secret talks with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov in New York in April.  Such a deal would be nothing short of a sell-out of the Ukrainian people, and their heroic fight to protect their country from Russian aggression.  (Con Coughlin, Gatestone, 7/26/2023)

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SECOND RUSSIA-AFRICA SUMMIT IN ST. PETERSBURG

The second Russia-Africa Summit takes place in St. Petersburg on 27-28 July. This comes at a time of a major geopolitical shift, which African leaders may see as offering beneficial opportunities.

The previous summit, in 2019, led to the signing of 92 agreements, contracts and memoranda of understanding worth over $11 billion. Several African countries (Nigeria, for one) have benefited from these agreements, especially in areas of energy generation and education.

This time, many countries on the continent are facing a cost of living crisis. But how likely are they to get help from Russia? Its invasion of Ukraine has led to sharp increases in fertiliser and grain prices, pushing up food prices and raising food insecurity on the continent.

The second complication in the engagement is the controversial role of the Wagner group in several African countries. The third is that the state of Russia’s economy limits President Vladimir Putin’s ability to offer Africa any meaningful economic assistance.  (The Conversation,  South Africa, 7/25/2023)

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DEMOS IN ISRAEL WORST IN 75 YEARS

Thousands of demonstrators were camped outside Israel’s Parliament on Sunday as lawmakers debated a key part of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plan to overhaul the judiciary, a proposal that has set off perhaps the country’s gravest domestic crisis since its founding 75 years ago.

Talks were continuing to seek an 11th-hour compromise over the bill, which aims to limit the ways in which the Supreme Court can overturn government decisions. But the monthslong dispute over the judicial overhaul has become a stand-in for deeper rifts in Israeli society between those who want a more secular and pluralist state and those with a more religious and nationalist vision.  (NYT, 7/24/2023)

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CHINA PLANS WAR ON AMERICA THROUGH THE ARCTIC

This month, Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post reported that the Shanghai-based Polar Research Institute of China revealed that “China has completed the field testing and evaluation of an underwater listening device that will be deployed on a large scale in the Arctic Ocean.”

The innocuous-sounding report tells us that China intends to wage war against the United States and Canada from the Arctic.

Other than this buoy, the institute said, China had “never planted a listening device there.”

That assertion is not truthful. Last fall, the Canadian military, according to Canada’s Globe and Mail in February, removed buoys placed by China in Canadian waters in the Arctic.

“China is now covertly preparing the groundwork for militarization of the largely undefended northern territory and critical Arctic sea routes.” — Charles Burton of the Ottawa-based Macdonald-Laurier Institute, to Gatestone, July 2023.

China is not only pressing the United States and Canada from the north. In the other direction, China is establishing military bases in South America and the Caribbean and is infiltrating saboteurs across the border with Mexico. The Biden administration is allowing a hostile state to go hard against America from all sides. A menacing China is now everywhere in the Western Hemisphere.  (Gordon G. Chang, Gatestone, 7/24/2023)

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POINTS TO PONDER

• The Republican House Speaker has argued that Joe Biden’s family business dealings merit an impeachment inquiry. Kevin McCarthy accused the US president of stonewalling congressional investigations and claimed he would seek recourse, in the “strongest hint yet” his party is prepared to try and impeach the president. McCarthy said Biden’s administration had set out to “deny Congress” its powers, arguing this is “something we haven’t seen since Richard Nixon.”  (The Week, 7/26/2023)

• Concerns over a global food crisis are mounting as the West continues to look for safe ways to export Ukrainian grain following the ending of the Black Sea Grain Initiative. Last week the Kremlin announced that it was terminating its participation in the agreement that had allowed Ukraine to export its grain by sea despite Moscow’s naval blockade. Ukraine is a major producer of grain and other foodstuffs, meaning millions of people who face hunger around the world, as well as those who have been affected by the cost-of-living crisis, will potentially struggle even more.
  (The Week, 7/26/2023)

• Hair and beauty salons across Afghanistan will shut in the coming weeks. Their closure, which has been ordered by the Taliban, will lead to the loss of around 60,000 jobs. The decision “further restricts spaces open to Afghan women,” said the BBC, as they are “already barred from classrooms, gyms and parks.” An Afghan women told the broadcaster that it’s “common” for men to ban their daughters from wearing make-up or going for a beauty treatment.  (The Week, 7/26/2023)

• The ripple effect of the Koran burning in Sweden continues.  Now there are calls in Lebanon to cut ties with Sweden following the burning of the Islamic holy book by a Swedish pastor.  (MEMRI, 7/26). What’s happening here is that the Islamic world is increasingly ganging up on the West, refusing to permit any criticism of Islam.   Here in Michigan the city of Hamtramck, the city that has the first all-Muslim council in the US, has now forbidden all displays of LGBTQ symbols, flags and other supportive displays.  As the Muslim population increases, so intolerance will increase. 
• With so much to watch and so little time to watch it in, millions of TV viewers are choosing to watch streamed shows at higher speeds, of up to twice the normal pace. A survey by YouGov found that 27% of people use the function at least sometimes; 13% speed up podcasts and 8% speed up music. “It is being respectful of your time,” one speed demon told The Sunday Times.  (The Week, 7/24/2023)

• The longer people worked in new, more efficient ways, the less time they spent on the job, according to findings from a series of four-day-workweek trials conducted in the U.S., Canada, the U.K. and Ireland over the past 18 months. After six months, workers reported less burnout, improved health and more job satisfaction, and had cut their average work time by about four hours to 34 hours a week. Those who continued the schedule for 12 months reduced working times to about 33 hours a week, with better reported health and work-life balance, researchers say.  (WSJ, 7/26/2023)

• The region’s burn centers report a rise in injuries to people who touch hot door handles, walk barefoot or fall on scorching pavement—even briefly. Pavement burns often result in worse injuries than exposure to flames, boiling water or chemicals. They are riskiest to those who can’t get up immediately such as elderly people who might faint from dehydration and patients with conditions that cause loss of feeling in their feet. Doctors advise staying indoors on hot days, but if you have to go out, wear shoes, socks and a hat; drink plenty of water; and let people know where you will be.  (WSJ, 7/26/2023)

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COMMENTARY

There are more slaves in today’s world than there ever were in the days of the transatlantic slave trade.

According to the movie “The Sound of Freedom,” 200 million children are slaves at this time, victims of human trafficking.   The abuse they suffer is not just sexual – they are abused constantly, in different ways, wherever they are.  It is about an organization that tries to free slaves, focusing mainly on children in the movie.  It’s a very moving film.  The subject matter is alien to most of us but is handled tastefully in the movie. 

Just as Harriet Beecher Stowe’s book “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” boosted the anti-slavery movement and led directly to the American Civil War, so it is hoped this movie will wake up Americans to the need for a new anti-slavery movement.

Revelation 18:13 writes of this end time, the end time commercial trading system, and shows that slavery is very much a part of the modern world.  ^“Merchandise of gold and silver, precious stones and pearls, fine linen and purple, silk and scarlet, every kind of citron wood, every kind of object of ivory, every kind of object of most precious wood, bronze, iron, and marble; and cinnamon and incense, fragrant oil and frankincense, wine and oil, fine flour and wheat, cattle and sheep, horses and chariots, and bodies and souls of men.“  (Rev. 18:12-13)

Be sure to see the movie.  Being a serious film, it won’t be at the cinemas long (it comes out on DVD end of September).  “Barbie” did better at the box office.

US DEBT CEILING NEARING CRISIS

Dollar softer as US debt ceiling crisis unresolved, inflation data eyed (https://wkzo.com/2023/05/09/dollar-softer-as-us-debt-ceiling-crisis-unresolved-inflation-data-eyed/)

The US treasury is set to run out of cash in early June, which means the country is rapidly approaching a fiscal breaking point. That’s why President Joe Biden is huddling with House Speaker Kevin McCarthy and other congressional leadership on Tuesday for urgent debt ceiling discussions.

The June deadline poses a Catch-22 for McCarthy, whose options are to hold the government hostage or compromise on Republican demands by striking a deal with the Democrats. The latter would lead to a backlash from his own party and likely cost him his job.

Why this matters:  The debt ceiling is the limit on how much the government can borrow from the US treasury to pay its bills. The US functions at a massive deficit, so the government has to borrow money to pay for things like Social Security, veterans’ benefits, and Medicare.

The US officially hit its limit back in January and has been operating under “emergency measures” ever since, enabling the US to fulfill its financial obligations. But the government’s ability to borrow through these measures could dry up as early as June 1. If a deal isn’t reached before then, the government stops functioning and could wind up defaulting on its debt – a historic first that would plunge global markets into crisis. (Gzero Signal, 5/9/2023)

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Netanyahu tells members of Congress that Iran could threaten ‘every city in the US’ — Speaking to US lawmakers in Jerusalem, prime minister says Tehran is as dangerous as ’50 North Koreas,’ after defense minister warns Greek counterpart of Iran’s uranium enrichment.  (https://www.timesofisrael.com/liveblog-may-4-2023/)

TERRORIST’S MOTHER CONDONES KILLINGS OF 3

The mother of the Hamas terrorist who killed Lucy, Maia, and Rina Dee said the following about the Jewish people: “The Jews are our enemies. We should fight them, devour them with our teeth.”

“Anyone with courage in his heart cannot accept what the Jews did to us.”

With parents and examples like this, it’s no wonder why there is a flourishing hate filled jihadist culture thriving in Judea and Samaria and beyond within the Arab Muslim world.   (Israel Unwired, 5/8/2023)

A DIFFERENT WORLD

Iranian Official Public Announcement:  If A Woman Is Caught Without Her Hijab Inside A Car, It May Be Impounded; Syrian Islamic Scholar:  It Is Better For A Wife To Endure ‘Disciplinary’ Beatings Than Get A Divorce And Lose Her Children. (MEMRI, 5/5/2023)

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The coronation of King Charles won’t just be an amazing spectacle —The west needs to grasp what it says about nation and religion

Procession down the Royal Mall, London; dress rehearsal for coronation of King Charles III

On Saturday, Britain’s King Charles III will be crowned in London’s Westminster Abbey.

The coronation, which will be viewed by millions around the world, promises to be a spectacle of ceremony and magnificence for which the British have no rivals.

Even this week’s dress rehearsal, which was carried out in the middle of the night, was attended by crowds of spectators and produced awe-struck responses to the mile-long military procession taking the gold state coach to the abbey from Buckingham Palace.

The significance of the event, however, goes far deeper and wider than all the pomp and circumstance. The coronation makes two statements of great importance for today’s world about the place of religion in public life and the importance and meaning of the nation.

Both religion and nation are currently opposed, scorned and vilified by the dominant progressive elites of western culture. Many such people also oppose the monarchy, viewing it as an anachronism redolent of hereditary privilege that has no place in a modern democracy.

Throughout the west, there is now an all-out assault on the very idea of the nation along with its inherited culture. This is fueled by a determination to impose supposedly universal values that will usher in the unity of all mankind.

This onslaught involves an attempt to dismember the traditional nuclear family; vilify white society, normative sexuality and men; and hijack education and replace knowledge and rationality with propaganda and the suppression of dissent.

At the core of this agenda — whose echoes can also be heard in the anti-government protests that have been rocking Israel — lies the aim of exiling religion from the public square.

The monarchy in Britain embodies both religion and nation. The core of the coronation is a religious dedication. Dressed in a simple shirt, the King will be anointed with holy oil and in this private ritual will take his monarchical oath of service to God.

Few realize that the British monarchy is patterned on Jewish history. Early English kings even believed they were descended from King David. They appreciated the revolutionary aspect of ancient Israel: its monarch was not the supreme ruler, a status which invites tyranny and despotism, but was himself answerable to God, the one true king over all.

The British coronation rite is modeled on the accession of King Solomon as described in the Book of Kings. Solomon was escorted to the throne by both religious and military leaders, as will happen to Charles, and was anointed by Zadok the high priest, represented this weekend by the Archbishop of Canterbury.

The choir in the abbey will raise the roof with Handel’s sublime “Zadok the Priest,” and the holy oil will have been brought from Jordan, part of the original Land of Israel.

Jews know better than anyone that what keeps a nation together is continuity — the adherence to principles, traditions and rites that shape a people and are handed down through the generations.

Britain, however, is a very different nation from the one that greeted the late Queen Elizabeth II when she was crowned more than 70 years ago. Demographically, it is far more diverse, with a plethora of different cultures and faith.

This will be acknowledged at the coronation. Britain’s Chief Rabbi Sir Ephraim Mirvis, and the equivalent representatives of Britain’s Muslim, Sikh, Hindu and Buddhist communities, will step forward towards the King at the end of the ceremony and extend to him their good wishes and blessings.

To ensure the Chief Rabbi does not break Shabbat, he and his wife will spend the night before the coronation at St. James’s Palace so they can walk to the abbey, and his words will not be amplified by a microphone.

In addition, a Jew, a Muslim, a Sikh and a Hindu will present the King with artifacts that play a part in the ceremony — the Imperial Mantle, the sovereign’s ring, a pair of ceremonial bracelets and the coronation glove.

There is relief among traditionalists that, while these gestures are a sensitive nod towards diversity, the core principle underpinning the coronation has not been eroded. This is that the monarch swears to defend the Protestant Christian faith.

Although when he was Prince of Wales Charles stated his wish to be “defender of faith,” he will in fact retain the all-important definite article and swear to be “defender of the faith.”

An increasing number of people can’t see the point of this in a society where religious belief is now a minority pursuit. However, Christianity remains key to the nation’s integrity and sense of itself.

Christian values are fundamental to the west. Justice and the rule of law, compassion and putting others first, above all respect for every individual’s humanity as created in the image of God — all come from the Hebrew Bible and the Christianity that cemented them into western culture.

The idea that minority cultures can only thrive without that umbrella structure is mistaken. In its absence, groups will fight other groups for power and the weakest will go to the wall.

America, which has neither a monarchy nor an established religion, nevertheless subscribes to those values. Biblical precepts and the example of ancient Israel are explicitly referenced through America’s foundational institutions.

Only a nation whose citizens are united by a common culture within a delineated territory can defend those values and that territory, and thus protect civilization itself. (Melanie Phillips, 5/5/2023)

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TO THE POINT

• Canada has expelled a Chinese diplomat following claims that Beijing tried to intimidate a Canadian politician and interfere in the country’s elections. In a statement, Canada’s Foreign Minister Mélanie Joly declared Toronto-based diplomat Zhao Wei “persona non grata.” The Canadian Security Intelligence Service found an accredited Chinese diplomat in the country had targeted opposition lawmaker Michael Chong, and his relatives in China, after he supported a motion to condemn China’s treatment of its Uyghur Muslim minority group.   (The Week, 5/9/2023)

• Two million households in the UK missed or defaulted on at least one mortgage, rent, loan, credit card payment or bill last month, according to Which. The consumer group found that 700,000 of this number had missed their housing payments. The Mirror said that a “significant number” of those surveyed – 3.1% – also missed mortgage payments in the last month as Bank of England interest rates continued to climb. The “shock figures” come among a “backdrop of rising costs putting a strain on UK households in recent months,” said the paper.  (The Week, 5/9/2023)

• Scott Baio has had enough of California. The actor is so sick of its left-wing politics, and the crime, the homelessness, the lawlessness, and the grim future it holds, after 45 years he is taking his family with him and leaving.

• Vladimir Putin’s annual Victory Day speech was shorter than usual, and the number of troops on parade in Moscow was the lowest since 2008. (Spectator, 5/9/2023)

• KING’S CORONATION:  TV companies gave a great deal of attention to anti-monarchist groups in the UK during the coronation of King Charles III.   Nothing was said about failed republics.   Next door France is still experiencing riots and turmoil with talk of a new French Republic (the 6^th); former colony Nigeria is witnessing a contested result following an election; while the US cannot sort out its debt problem or stop mass shootings (200+ so far this year). 

COMMENTARY – A TROUBLESOME PRIEST

Just as the king cannot get directly involved in politics, it’s time the same rule applied to the Archbishop of Canterbury.   The Archbishop has been critical of Britain’s policy toward so-called asylum seekers.   These asylum seekers are primarily young men who want to live in a country that offers greater opportunity.   Some are attracted by illegal activity that offers quick money with minimal risk.

Very few women are in their midst.

Why is the archbishop so concerned about the asylum seekers?   They are unlikely to join his church, with its watered-down teachings and pro-gay agenda.   

Clearly this man, with a senior role in Britain’s hierarchy, is a liberal-socialist, which remains the dominant mood amongst the UK’s establishment.

Allowing Syrians, Albanians, Eritreans, and others into a small island will only increase ethnic tensions.   It also means greater pressure on housing, the National Health Service and other venerated institutions.

This is not the way it should be.  Note the following verse in Acts.

“From one man He made every nation of men, that they should inhabit the whole earth; and He determined their appointed times and the boundaries of their lands.”  (Acts 17:26)

For centuries, the British Isles was the ancestral home of the Anglo-Saxon-Celtic peoples.   It is clearly not the intent of the British government, now or any government in the last fifty years, to maintain this.   Already, over 20% of the country is non-white, probably more.   London and Birmingham, the two biggest cities, are majority non-white.

If the plan is to make the whites a minority, the government should be honest and say so.

It would certainly help things if the archbishop would shut up.

In the famous words of Henry II in 1170:  “Will nobody rid me of this troublesome priest?”

DEATH OF THE QUEEN

Queen Elizabeth II died on September 8^th.

If you have been watching the commentary at various times during the week, you will have noticed how religious it’s all been.  The British people are not very religious, but the Queen was.   Churches have been full.

There was some speculation about the double rainbow that appeared in the sky soon after her death.

The celebrations were the last hurrah for the country, faced with serious economic problems predicted for the next 12 months.

One scripture that comes to mind in thinking of the life of this exceptionally popular monarch is Matthew 23:11 “The greatest among you shall be your servant.” She was an exceptional head of state to all fifteen of her territories and a dedicated servant to the 56 nations of the Commonwealth.

Hopefully, the emphasis on service and duty will be followed by her successor.   It has not always been the case.

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Germany’s Scholz Invited UK’s Truss to Berlin – German Spokesperson
BERLIN (Reuters / USNews.com, 7 Sep 2022)

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz spoke to Britain’s new Prime Minister Liz Truss by phone on Wednesday and invited her to visit Berlin soon, a German government spokesperson said. “They exchanged views on current topics. The Chancellor has invited his British counterpart to Berlin for an inaugural visit soon,” said the spokesperson in a statement, adding Scholz also conveyed his congratulations to Truss on taking office.  There were no further details.  (https://www.usnews.com/news/world/articles/2022-09-07/germanys-scholz-invited-uks-truss-to-berlin-german-spokesperson)

Germany must accept leading military role, says defense minister German Defense Minister Christine Lambrecht has said Germany must take on a leadership role militarily, whether it wants to or not.  “Germany does not have to be afraid” of doing so, she said. (12 Sept 2022, Deutsche Welle)

“Germany’s size, its geographical situation, its economic power — in short, its clout — makes us a leading power whether or not we want to be one. Militarily as well,” she said in a keynote security address in Berlin.  Her remarks come as Europe is struggling to come to terms with the fallout from Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, with Germany rethinking its defense strategy after decades of major dependence on Washington for its security. “The war in Ukraine has shown everyone, even us Germans who are used to peace, that states need armed forces as a last resort — that is, whenever an enemy is determined to use invasion, destruction, murder and forced displacement” as means to serve its interests, she said.  . . . Lambrecht confirmed that Europe’s security was still guaranteed by its most important ally, the US.  “But this ally has been forced to shift its main focus of attention to security in the Pacific region,” she said.  This meant that Europe, and above all Germany, had to play a more important role . . . 

“Germany is ready to take the burden off America in Europe and thus make a decisive contribution to sharing the load fairly,” Lambrecht said.
(https://www.dw.com/en/germany-must-accept-leading-military-role-says-defense-minister/a-63089386)

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EU TRADE WAR

The EU may be at the threshold of its next trade war, according to remarks pertaining to today’s appointment of Liz Truss as the next Prime Minister of the United Kingdom. It is caused by the dispute between Brussels and London over the Northern Ireland protocol, which, becoming effective in the aftermath of Brexit, imposes the establishment of a customs border between Great Britain and Northern Ireland, obligating London to comply with single market regulations in Northern Ireland. Given the fact that, until now, the EU has only been willing to allow minor corrections to the protocol, even though it is provoking serious tensions in Northern Ireland, the British government is preparing to institute changes unilaterally. It has been reported that Truss could suspend parts of the protocol soon after taking office. Such a move could provoke a “trade war” between the EU and Great Britain, Katarina Barley (SPD), Vice President of the EU Parliament, was quoted to have said. The damage that would ensue from that trade war, would add to the severe damage inflicted on the economies of Germany and the EU from their sanctions on Russia. In addition, because of the power struggle with Beijing, there is also a danger of a slump in business with China.   (German Foreign Policy, 9/7/2022)

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US AIR STRIKES ON SYRIA

US forces carried out airstrikes in Syria on Tuesday, targeting groups affiliated with Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps. The airstrikes took place in the Euphrates River Valley, in the administrative region of Deir ez-Zor.

Washington said the strike was intended to defend US forces from recent attacks. A statement by US Central Command cited an August 15 attack on American forces as an example.

The airstrike is important because the US has rarely retaliated for dozens of attacks carried out by the IRGC and its proxies against its forces over the past several years. These attacks increased in 2019 and have resulted in harm to US personnel in Iraq. Under the Trump administration, the rising tensions led to America killing IRGC Quds Force head Qasem Soleimani and Iraqi militia leader Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis.  (Seth Frantzman, MEF, 8/24/2022)

GENOCIDE IN NIGERIA

• The Christians of Nigeria are, in fact, being purged in a genocide, according to several NGOs Every two hours, one Christian there is killed.
• “Heavily armed bandits, many of whom are said to be ethnic Fulanis, are waging their own form of Jihad; killing, abducting and terrorizing worship centers and educational institutions owned by churches as well as impoverished communities in the North and Middle Belt regions.” — (Vanguardngr.com. June 19, 2022, Nigeria)
• The Biden administration’s response to the jihadist onslaught against Christians in Nigeria . . . has been to remove Nigeria from the State Department’s list of Countries of Particular Concern: nations that engage in, or tolerate, violations of religious freedom.
• “The landlocked Sahel state [Burkina Faso], one of the world’s poorest countries, is in the grip of a nearly seven-year-old jihadist insurgency. Thousands of people have died and nearly two million have been driven from their homes.” — Guardian.ng, June 28, 2022, Burkina Faso.  (“Where is the Media?”, Raymond Ibrahim, Gatestone, 8/14/2022)

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AMERICA IGNORING PROBLEMS – Too many Americans are blithely dismissing threats that could prove cataclysmic.  by Mitt Romney a Republican senator from Utah.
Illustration by Paul Spella, The Atlantic, July 4, 2022

Even as we watch the reservoirs and lakes of the West go dry, we keep watering our lawns, soaking our golf courses, and growing water-thirsty crops.

As inflation mounts and the national debt balloons, progressive politicians vote for ever more spending.  As the ice caps melt and record temperatures make the evening news, we figure that buying a Prius and recycling the boxes from our daily Amazon deliveries will suffice.  When TV news outlets broadcast video after video of people illegally crossing the nation’s southern border, many of us change the channel.

And when a renowned conservative former federal appellate judge testifies that we are already in a war for our democracy and that January 6, 2021, was a genuine constitutional crisis, MAGA loyalists snicker that he speaks slowly and celebrate that most people weren’t watching.

What accounts for the blithe dismissal of potentially cataclysmic threats? The left thinks the right is at fault for ignoring climate change and the attacks on our political system. The right thinks the left is the problem for ignoring illegal immigration and the national debt. But wishful thinking happens across the political spectrum. More and more, we are a nation in denial.  (Mitt Romney, The Atlantic, 8/15/2022)

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CHINA TO OVERTAKE US

• The [Harvard Belfer Center] report, “The Great Economic Rivalry: China Vs. the US,” predicts that at the current rate China will overtake the US economically within a decade.
• When it comes to trade, China has now displaced the US. “When this century began, China was knocking on the door of the WTO and the U.S. was the leading trading partner of most major economies. Today, China has overtaken the U.S. to become the largest trading partner for nearly every major nation . . . by 2018, 130 countries traded more with China than they did with the U.S . . .” — The Belfer Report.  (Gatestone, 8/17/2022)

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CHINA USING CHINESE IN US

Can Americans of Chinese descent be loyal to both America and China?

No. China’s Communist Party has made itself an existential threat to America and every other society. . .  The promotion of tianxia [ruling “All under Heaven”] means, among other things, that the Party views the U.S. government as illegitimate and America as nothing more than a tributary society or colony.

Although we [“Chinese-Americans”] technically do not have an obligation to prove our loyalty to America, we must, as a group, understand that a hostile power is trying to weaponize us. Xi Jinping has openly called on us to become a subversive force, to help him destroy the country we now call home.  (Gatestone, 8/23/2022)

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TO THE POINT

• Germany’s defence minister said the country must assume a leading military role in Europe. Speaking to the German Council on Foreign Relations, Berlin’s defence minister said the US would remain Europe’s main protector and there could be “no substitute for the American nuclear deterrent for the foreseeable future” but tensions between the US and China over Taiwan and Washington’s pivot to the Asia-Pacific region meant “we are called on to do more than before for Europe,” adding: “Germany is prepared to make a decisive contribution to fair burden-sharing.”  (The Week, 9/13/2022)

• Aldi has surpassed Morrisons to become Britain’s fourth largest supermarket chain. The discount grocer enjoyed an 18.7% jump in sales in the 12 weeks to September 4 that boosted its share of the overall grocery market to 9.3%, according to figures released by Kantar. Lidl also experienced a surge in sales, which were up 20.9%. “Rampant inflation is prompting consumers to tighten their belts,” said The Times, and they are increasingly “turning to discounters amid soaring food prices.” (The Week, 9/14/2022) Both Aldi and Lidl are German owned.

• “Germany’s size, its geographical situation, its economic power — in short, its clout — makes us a leading power,” declared German Minister of Defense Christine Lambrecht. As Lambrecht affirmed yesterday in a speech to the German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP), Germany is “a leading power … also in the military sphere.”  In the future, the Bundeswehr must play “a more important role in our political thinking and action.” In her speech Lambrecht focused on the new National Security Strategy that the government plans to adopt still this year. The strategy, being drafted under the auspices of the foreign ministry, reflects on a national level the EU’s “Strategic Compass” – a sort of military doctrine – and NATO’s new Strategic Concept. Since the Strategy’s implementation will entail considerable costs, it is necessary to win broad public acceptance – for example by introducing a “National Security Day.” The ambitious plans are in stark contrast to the failure of German military missions over the past few years.   (German Foreign Policy, 9/14/2022)

TRUSS BECOMES UK PM

Liz Truss, the new Prime Minister of UK. (Photo: Neil Hall / EFE, https://en.mercopress.com/2022/09/07/truss-announces-new-cabinet-to-face-the-storm))

What do you do when there are three potential lead articles in the same week?  I’ve always tried to put the most important news item first.   We don’t always get it right, but I like to think we do most of the time.  This week, the new British prime minister, the German energy crisis and the future of the United States could each have been the “lead.” 

So, why did I choose Liz Truss as #1?   Because that was the first article I chose for the newsletter.   I saved the blogpost under the title “Liz Truss new UK PM.”  As I added other articles, it remained the title of this week’s newsletter.

However, the German energy crisis, could easily be the #1 story, with great implications for Germany and Europe.

Last week, I led on a news source that claimed Germany is about to have the third most powerful military in the world.   That has great implications for anybody with even a rudimentary knowledge of twentieth century history. 

To ensure the energy needed for the military (and domestic) roles is going to be a major challenge for the new German Chancellor.   This issue could fracture the unity of the West.

The third issue is the possible breakup of the United States.  This certainly could happen but may not.  We can only wait and see.   In Mark’s gospel, Jesus said, that “A house divided against itself cannot stand.”  (Mark 3:25).Be sure to read all three “articles.”   They will help you keep abreast of major developments in the news.

As expected, UK Foreign Secretary Liz Truss won the Conservative Party leadership race on Monday and will become the next British PM, replacing the disgraced Boris Johnson. Truss — a political chameleon who’s popular with the Tory base — beat former Chancellor of the Exchequer Rishi Sunak, a moderate technocrat, by a comfortable margin of 57% of party member votes. She now faces tough challenges at home and abroad. First, a looming recession compounded by a cost-of-living crisis and an energy crunch. Truss, who fancies herself as a modern Margaret Thatcher, plans to announce big tax cuts and perhaps a temporary freeze on energy bills for the most vulnerable Brits — which her economic guru has warned would be fiscally irresponsible. Second, a likely collision course with the EU over the Northern Ireland protocol. Brace for rocky times ahead as Truss tries to convince Brussels to renegotiate the post-Brexit trade deal, which scrapped a hard border between Northern Ireland, part of the UK, and the Republic of Ireland, an EU member state. (No surprise then that Brussels is hardly looking forward to her moving into No. 10 Downing St.) On Tuesday, Truss will travel to Scotland to meet with Queen Elizabeth II, who as per tradition will ask her to form a government.  (Gzero Signal, 9/6/2022)

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TRUMP PREDICTED GERMAN ENERGY CRISIS IN 2018 UN SPEECH

Mainstream media at the time called Trump’s comments ‘outrageous,’ ‘inaccurate,’ and ‘highly misleading.’

A flashback video making its rounds online this week shows then-President Donald Trump warning during a 2018 speech at the UN that Germany could soon be “totally dependent on Russian energy.“  After the 45th president put the Germans on notice, the nation’s UN representatives and the mainstream media scoffed at his warning. 

. . . Shadi Hamid, a Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institute, posted on Twitter Sunday mocking mainstream media for fact-checking Trump on a future prediction.

Now, Germany and several other European countries are experiencing an energy crisis that could have deadly results . . .  Articles with titles such as “Germany Is Already Struggling to Keep the Lights On” and “Why Germany’s Energy Crisis and Euro Weakness Spell Trouble For The Euro Zone” are flooding media outlets.

Russia reduced the supply of natural gas flowing to Germany in response to sanctions and could completely cut them off if necessary.  While “Germany is considering operating its 3 remaining nuclear reactors that are scheduled to be shuttered by the end of the year through this winter,” according to the Institute for Energy Research, the nation still relies on Russia for most of its uranium fuel.  The Institute for Energy Research also points out, “Germany also gets 34 percent of its oil from Russia and 53 percent of its hard coal supplies.”

. . . CNN reported the pipeline shutdown is “reigniting fears that Moscow could completely shut off gas to Europe, which is racing to stockpile supplies ahead of the winter.”

. . . German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Cabinet met for an energy summit on Tuesday, telling the media, “Coal power plants are being connected to the power grid again, bit by bit, and as you know, we are also looking into whether it makes sense to restart nuclear power plants for the winter through a careful stress test.”

“We’re in a much better situation now than was foreseeable several months ago and we are much more able to deal with the threats coming from Russia over the cutting off of gas supplies,” he added.  Meanwhile, Germany’s largest natural gas importer, Uniper, asked the government for an additional €4 billion ($4 billion) bailout this week.

The people of the world need to get prepared immediately for a rough winter. . .  (yournews.com 8/30/2022)

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American policy is splitting, state by state, into two blocs – This will have profound implications for the union. (The Economist, 3 Sept 2022)

To understand the future of America, don’t head to Washington, DC. Instead, talk to the governors of its most conservative state, Mississippi, and its most progressive one, California.

Bespectacled and calmly confident, Mississippi’s Republican governor, Tate Reeves, is on a high. It was his state’s 2018 ban on abortion after 15 weeks of pregnancy that returned the issue to the Supreme Court, setting the stage for the reversal of Roe v Wade in June, a decision which gave all state governments the freedom to decide their own abortion regimes.

In August, at the Conservative Political Action Conference in Dallas, Mr. Reeves boasted of his state’s other bans:  on vaccine mandates; on teaching critical race theory; on transgender students taking part in school sports on the basis of the gender with which they identify.  “I think Mississippi has led on social and cultural issues for years,” he says, and he plans to keep that lead. Though he declines to say which policies he and the Mississippi legislature will target next, “there will certainly be opportunities for us to do [more].”

Some 2,700km (1,700 miles) away, California’s governor, Gavin Newsom, is as depressed as Mr. Reeves is upbeat. “It’s the great unravelling,” he says. “All the progress that I’ve enjoyed in my 50-plus years, all being unravelled, in real time.”

Those policies reflect America’s growing ideological polarisation. “State policies vary more than they ever have before,” says Chris Warshaw of George Washington University, co-author of a forthcoming book, “Dynamic Democracy.”

To quantify the divergence among states, Mr. Warshaw and Devin Caughey of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology analysed 190 policies from the 1930s to 2021. On the whole, states have become more liberal. They have unwound, for example, racial restrictions, bans on women serving on juries and laws criminalising sodomy…

. . . Let’s stay together

The most extreme outcome would be if today’s disunity led again to a real possibility of secession. That remains highly unlikely. But in a recent survey of nearly 9,000 Americans conducted by researchers at the University of California, Davis, half the respondents said there would be a civil war in America within the next few years. Searches for “secession” shot up in the aftermath of the 2020 election. If 2024 sees a constitutional crisis in which states, rather than just individual politicians within them, use new powers to reject the result the voters intended, the country’s constitution, and its constituent parts, will face a serious test.

In his book Mr. French lays out several scenarios for secession. When asked what the odds are of one of them actually coming true, he asserts a continued belief that the United States will stay united. “But for the first time in my life,” he adds, “I’m not certain of that.”   (The Economist, 9/3/2022)

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Russian spies suspected of infiltrating German government, according to report — The domestic intelligence service is said to be investigating 2 officials who work on energy supply.

BERLIN — Two senior officials at Germany’s economy ministry are being investigated over allegations of spying for Russia, newspaper Die Zeit reported on Wednesday.  According to the article, the Federal Office for the Protection of the Constitution (BfV), Germany’s domestic intelligence service, is looking into the case of two civil servants “who are involved with energy supply in key positions” and might be Kremlin moles.  If confirmed, the case would represent a spectacular security breach at a highly sensitive time for Germany and for Europe. The economy ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.  The powerful ministry is under the leadership of Economy and Climate Minister Robert Habeck, who also serves as Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s deputy. It is playing a key role in preparing Germany to cope with an energy crisis as Russian President Vladimir Putin cuts gas deliveries in response to Western sanctions over his invasion of Ukraine. (Politico.eu. — https://www.politico.eu/article/kremlin-espionage-reportedly-suspected-german-economy-ministry/)

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China has waived the debt of some African countries. But it’s not about refinancing . . .

The Trump administration accused China of ensnarling developing countries by extending credit to debtors Beijing knows lack the solvency to pay it back. As (former) US vice-president Mike Pence put it in 2018:  China uses so-called ‘debt diplomacy’ to expand its influence … offering hundreds of billions of dollars in infrastructure loans to governments from Asia to Africa to Europe and even Latin America. Such “debt traps” are deliberately being created so China can force poor African states to vote with it in the UN General Assembly, support its positions on Taiwan or acquire valuable real estate in Africa that can be converted into military bases. Or so the narrative goes. Chinese public and private lenders accounted for 12% of the continent’s US$696 billion external debts in 2020. Ghana and South Africa are particularly worried about a vicious cycle of downgrades by the rating agencies, and rising trade imbalances. Most of Africa’s debts to China are owed by five states – Angola, Ethiopia, Kenya, Nigeria and Zambia.  (August 31, 2022, Extracts,  https://theconversation.com/china-has-waived-the-debt-of-some-african-countries-but-its-not-about-refinancing-189570)

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TO THE POINT

• Saudis complain about Netflix – The Saudi media regulator and the six-member Gulf Cooperation have demanded that Netflix removes all content deemed to violate “Islamic and societal values and principles,” according to Saudi media and The Guardian. Illustrating the report, Saudi state TV showed blurred clips from the animated show Jurassic World: Camp Cretaceous, in which two teenage girls kiss, and footage from the French movie Cuties. It also accused the streaming service of “promoting homosexuality by focusing excessively on homosexuals.”

• Nearly 50% of British children now grow up outside the traditional two-parent household. According to a report published today by Rachel de Souza, the children’s commissioner for England, almost a quarter of families are headed by a lone parent, compared with the EU average of one eighth. De Souza said she will revise the “family test,” which is applied to all new domestic laws and policies, to put families “at the heart” of policymaking.  (The Week, 9/1/2022)

• The German government has announced a €65bn (£56.2bn) package of measures to address rising energy costs. The new support will include one-off payments to the most vulnerable and tax breaks to energy-intensive businesses. Energy prices have soared since Russia invaded Ukraine in February and EU officials have warned of an impending “crunch point” when countries start to feel acute economic pain while also still being asked to help the Ukrainian military and humanitarian effort, said Politico.   (The Week, 9/5/2022)

• Condemned to Lead’ Europe, German Chancellor Struggles for Impact.    Facing its worst crisis since World War II, Europe is looking for leadership.  Olaf Scholz is trying to take up the role but faces a tepid response.  (by Erika Solomon, 2 Sept 2022, New York Times)

• China Daily: No Matter How Many US Politicians Visit Taiwan, How Many Military Exercises The US Stages In The Region, They Will Not Change The Island’s Status; Chinese News Agency Reaffirms The ‘One-China Principle’ Over Taiwan (MEMRI, 9/1/2022)

• As rumours swirl, Pope Francis names new cardinals – Pope Francis, who recently raised the possibility of retiring due to his declining health, will create 20 new cardinals on Saturday — many of whom could one day choose his successor.  It is the eighth consistory since the 85-year-old was elected in 2013, but is being particularly closely watched for signs of the kind of Catholic Church he hopes to leave behind.  The new cardinals include men known for their progressive views and their pastoral work, and they hail from around the world: from Brazil to Nigeria, India, Singapore and East Timor.  After Saturday’s swearing-in at St Peter’s Basilica, they will join a two-day meeting of all cardinals starting Monday.  (25 Aug 2022, Yahoo, by Clément Melki, AFP /Yahoo)

• Boris Johnson is in line for an £18,000 “golden goodbye” and an annual allowance of up to £115,000 after resigning. The former PM will receive severance pay of £18,860 – a quarter of his prime ministerial salary of £75,440 – “just for stepping down,” said the I news site, and will also be eligible for the public duty costs allowance, which allows ex-PMs to claim staffing, office and other expenses of up to £115,000 a year.  (One pound is $1.15)  Johnson is also expected to make millions from his memoirs, journalism and public speaking.  (The Week, 9/7/2022 )

NUCLEAR WAR A BIG ISSUE – AGAIN

Today, the Chinese nuclear arsenal could destroy most of the United States. The North Koreans have a stockpile of bombs. And the Russian Federation, which inherited the Soviet nuclear arsenal, has launched a major war against Ukraine. As the war began, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered his nation’s nuclear forces to go on heightened alert and warned the West that any interference with the invasion would have “consequences that you have never experienced in your history.” Suddenly, the unthinkable seems possible again.

There was a time when citizens of the United States cared about nuclear weapons. The reality of nuclear war was constantly present in their lives; nuclear conflict took on apocalyptic meaning and entered the American consciousness not only through the news and politics, but through popular culture as well. Movie audiences in 1964 laughed while watching Peter Sellers play a president and his sinister adviser in Dr. Strangelove, bumbling their way to nuclear war; a few months later, they were horrified as Henry Fonda’s fictional president ordered the sacrificial immolation of New York City in Fail-Safe. Nuclear war and its terminology—overkill, first strike, fallout—were soon constant themes in every form of entertainment. We not only knew about nuclear war; we expected one.

But during the Cold War there was also thoughtful engagement with the nuclear threat. Academics, politicians, and activists argued on television and in op-ed pages about whether we were safer with more or fewer nuclear weapons. The media presented analyses of complicated issues relating to nuclear weapons. CBS, for example, broadcast an unprecedented five-part documentary series on national defense in 1981. When ABC, in 1983, aired the movie The Day After—about the consequences of a global nuclear war for a small town in Kansas—it did so as much to perform a public service as to achieve a ratings bonanza. Even President Ronald Reagan watched the movie. (In his diary, he noted that The Day After was “very effective” and had left him “greatly depressed.”   (The Atlantic, 6/1/2022)

“The nuclear danger was growing before the invasion (of Ukraine).  North Korea has dozens of warheads.  Iran, the UN said this week, has enough enriched uranium for its first bomb.  Although the new START treaty will limit Russia’s and America’s intercontinental ballistic missiles until 2016, it does not cover weapons such as nuclear torpedoes.  Pakistan is rapidly adding to its arsenal. China is modernizing its nuclear forces and, the Pentagon says, expanding them.”  (The Economist, 6/4/2022)

UK TARGETED BY RUSSIANS:   “…tune into the state owned Russian television channel Russia-1.  ”Just one launch, Boris,” warned Dmitry Kiselev, the station’s main news presenter on May 1^st, “and England is gone.”  In case this message proved too subtle for the British prime minister, or the audience at home, Mr. Kiselev laid out the launch options he had in mind.  One was a Sarmat intercontinental missile (ICBM) shown streaking towards Britain. Another was a Poseidon thermonuclear torpedo, designed to whip up an isotope-laced tsunami. “Having passed over the British Isles, it will turn whatever might be left of them into a radioactive desert,” enthused Mr. Kiselev, “Unfit for anything for a long time . . .”  Every few days, some Russian official is making explicit nuclear threats.”   (“Thinking the Unthinkable,” /2022, 6/4)

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IS THE PENTAGON LOSING TAIWAN?

“We have no competing fighting chance against China in 15 to 20 years. Right now, it’s already a done deal; it is already over in my opinion.” — Nicolas Chaillan, former first Chief Software Officer for the Air Force, who resigned in protest over the Pentagon’s slow pace of technological development, citing China’s fast advancements in artificial intelligence, machine learning, and general capabilities in cybersecurity,  (Financial Times, October 10, 2021)

“By the time the Government manages to produce something, it’s too often obsolete.” — Preston Dunlap, the Pentagon’s first Chief Architect Officer, responsible for promoting technological innovation at the Pentagon, who also resigned, labelling the Pentagon “the world’s largest bureaucracy;” The Japan Times, April 19, 2022.  (Judith Bergman, 6/6/2022)

MONKEY POX LINKED TO SEX

A leading adviser to the World Health Organization described the unprecedented outbreak of the rare disease monkeypox in developed countries as “a random event” that might be explained by risky sexual behavior at two recent mass events in Europe.

In an interview with The Associated Press, Dr. David Heymann, who formerly headed WHO’s emergencies department, said the leading theory to explain the spread of the disease was sexual transmission among gay and bisexual men at two raves held in Spain and Belgium. Monkeypox has not previously triggered widespread outbreaks beyond Africa, where it is endemic in animals.

“We know monkeypox can spread when there is close contact with the lesions of someone who is infected, and it looks like sexual contact has now amplified that transmission,” said Heymann.

That marks a significant departure from the disease’s typical pattern of spread in central and western Africa, where people are mainly infected by animals like wild rodents and primates and outbreaks have not spilled across borders.   (CBS news, 5/24/2022)

British health officials reported 77 more cases of monkeypox Monday, raising the total to more than 300 across the country.  To date, the UK has the biggest identified outbreak of the disease beyond Africa, with the vast majority of infections in gay and bisexual men.  (Lansing State Journal, 6/7/2022)

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ATTEMPTS TO FREE UP GRAIN

The EU is obstructing UN efforts to avert global hunger being caused by war and sanctions. The plan provides for the transit of Ukraine’s huge grain reserves over Belarus for shipping via ports at the Baltic Sea. The plan endorsed by UN Secretary General António Guterres is considered to be the only viable alternative to the recently blocked grain-transport via the Black Sea. Of course, the EU is not ready to allow the prerequisites for the plan’s successful implementation and to lift its sanctions against Belarusian fertilizer exports. UN Secretary General António Guterres is in favor of lifting these sanctions to secure the global supply of fertilizers. In a highly symbolic step, Brussels toughened its sanctions against Belarusian fertilizer producers last Friday. On the other hand, UN efforts to jump-start the export of Ukrainian grain via the Black Sea are gaining momentum. Russia and Turkey are paving the way for initial shipments from Odessa.  (German Foreign Policy, 6/7/2022)

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TO THE POINT

• Experts have warned that a “storm” of bankruptcies is on the horizon, The Telegraph reported. During the first three months of the year, around 137,000 businesses closed their doors for good in the UK, a jump of nearly a quarter on the same period in 2021, and there were also nearly 5,000 voluntary insolvencies in England and Wales – the highest level since the Insolvency Service launched its survey in 1960. “There is a storm coming,” said Simon Bonney, managing director of Quantuma, a restructuring firm based in the Square Mile.  (The Week, 6/6/2022)

• Gunmen killed more than 50 people in an assault on a Catholic church in Ondo state in Nigeria during mass on Sunday. The attackers targeted the St Francis Xavier Catholic Church in the town of Owo as the worshippers gathered on Pentecost Sunday, gunning down parishioners and detonating an explosive device, local media reported. President Muhammadu Buhari said “only fiends from the nether region” could have performed this “dastardly act.”  (The Week, 6/6/2022)

• Pope Francis will attend a ceremony founded by one of the few Pontiffs who stepped down from the role during their reign, fuelling speculation he is set to retire. Following rumours in the Italian and Catholic media, the Vatican announced that the Pope will visit the city of L’Aquila in August for a feast initiated by Pope Celestine V. The Telegraph notes that although traditionally popes are expected to hold their post until death, there have been some exceptions, including Celestine V.  (The Week, 6/6/2022)

• Fish and chip shops are looking to Norway as Russia’s invasion of Ukraine threatens their business, The Times reported. Bosses have warned that a third of chip shops may have to close if tariffs on fish from Russia add to the pressure they are under from shortages of sunflower oil, flour and potato fertiliser. The National Federation of Fish Friers and the Frozen at Sea Fillets Association will speak to the Norwegian Seafood Council at a conference this week at the port of Alesund.   (The Week, 6/6/2022)

• British Pro-ISIS Preacher Urges Queen Elizabeth II On Her Platinum Jubilee To Embrace Islam To Save Herself From Hellfire/2022  (MEMRI  6/7/2022)

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FINAL THOUGHT

For the first time (and probably the last) Britain and some Commonwealth countries celebrated the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee.  That’s seventy years on the throne.  February 6^th was the actual day that she became Queen, but it’s too cold to celebrate anything in February.  So the four-day celebration took place in June, around the annual Trooping the Color, the queen’s official birthday.

Her long reign is a first for Britain.  Only Louis XIV of France reigned longer (1643-1715), but he was only five when he became King.   Until he turned 18 the country was ruled by a Regency, so the first 13 years don’t count.   Anyway, the queen could live another couple of years, which would make her the longest serving monarch ever.

You would think by now people would want a change.   But that is not the case.  She is consistently the most popular royal, with an approval rating way above that of any politician.   The lowest figure I’ve seen is 69%, with her heir, Prince Charles, coming in at a mere 19%.   Prince William, Charles’ heir, is somewhere in between.

What makes her so popular?   During the Jubilee, there was an interesting article in The Australian, by Australian Angela Shanahan.

“Young people, especially in Britain, who in general have discarded most of the intrinsic values of family, religion, even democracy, sometimes become very defensive of “our Queen.”  Criticize her at your peril!   Perhaps for many young people she is a sort of granny figure.  She represents something that is often missing in the lives of the young today:  stability and continuity.”   (“In a world of crumbling values Queen carries on,” Angela Shanahan, The Australian, 6/4/2022)  

It isn’t just the fact that she has lived so long – it’s more that she upholds the traditional values that society long ago discarded.

Proverbs 14:34 reminds us that there is a choice for all global leaders.  “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people.”   They can choose righteousness or sin.   The Queen represents righteousness, while her children, unfortunately, have all clearly sinned.  So the respect isn’t there.

Charles is trying to live a more righteous life.    William is, too.   So there is hope for the future.   The Queen has set a very good example, which the next generation (and the one after that) will do well to follow.

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IS AMERICA HEADED FOR A SYSTEMS COLLAPSE?

Venezuela’s Collapse Is the Worst Outside of War in Decades, Economists Say (headline NY
Times May 17, 2019). Butchers have stopped selling meat cuts in favor of offal, fat shavings and cow hooves, the only animal protein many of their customers can afford.

In modern times, as in ancient Rome, several nations have suffered a “systems collapse.” The term describes the sudden inability of once-prosperous populations to continue with whatever it was that had ensured they could enjoy the good life as they knew it.

Abruptly, the population can’t buy – or even find – once plentiful necessities. They feel their streets are unsafe. Laws go unenforced or are enforced inequitably. Things stop working every day. The government turns from reliable to capricious, if not hostile.

Consider contemporary Venezuela. By 2010, the once well-off oil-exporting country was mired in a self-created mess. Food became scarce, and crime became ubiquitous. Radical socialism, nationalization, corruption, jailing opponents, and the destruction of constitutional norms were the culprits.

Between 2009 and 2016, a once relatively stable Greece nearly became a third-world country. So did the UK in its socialist days during the 1970s.

President Joe Biden’s young presidency may already be leading the United States into a similar meltdown.

In modern times, as in ancient Rome, several nations have suffered a “systems collapse.” The term describes the sudden inability of once-prosperous populations to continue with whatever it was that had ensured they could enjoy the good life as they knew it.

Who could have believed a year ago that America would now beg Saudi Arabia and Russia to pump more oil—as we pulled our own oil leases and canceled pipelines and oil fields? (Victor Davis Hanson, Epoch Times, 1/2022)

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US targets ISIS leader.  President Biden announced Thursday that the US conducted a pre-dawn operation in northern Syria that took out ISIS leader Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi. Al-Qurayshi, who replaced Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi as ISIS leader in 2019, reportedly detonated a suicide vest as the Americans moved in, killing himself and family members. The operation was a rare tactical move by the Biden administration, which has veered away from getting embroiled further in Middle East conflicts. The timing was significant following an ISIS prison raid and bid to free some 12,000 ISIS members and their families, which stoked fears of an ISIS comeback. While ISIS sleeper cells have launched many attacks in recent years and remain active in some areas, some analysts believe that the group’s reach and clout remain limited.  (Gzero Signal, 2/4/2022)

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In the pipeline: would Germany side with Russia in a conflict? by Wolfgang Münchau, from Spectator UK magazine, 22 Jan 2022

[It’s worth reading this entire article]:

If Russia were to invade Ukraine, would Germany side with the Russians?  For most of our post-war history, that would have been an absurd question, but things are changing fast in Europe.  In the wake of recent events, it would not be irrational for Vladimir Putin to bet that if push came to shove, he could count on German neutrality – or even support.

The Ukraine crisis continues apace, with up to 100,000 Russian troops now gathered near its border. The obvious question is: what would happen if Putin were to invade? It would split the EU, exposing its energy dependence on Russia, ruin what is left of transatlantic relations and force Germany to choose sides. Officials in Kiev are convinced that this choice has already been made and that Germany is actively colluding with Russia, as witnessed by the construction of the massive Nord Stream 2 pipeline.

This new pipeline – built, but not yet approved – can transport 150 million cubic litres of gas from Russia to Germany every day. It also allows Russia to do what it likes in Ukraine without worrying about interrupting supply to Europe’s gas markets. In Kiev, it stands to reason that the Russian threat intensified soon after the 760-mile pipeline was completed. But in Germany, there is denial – and no sense of crisis.

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MORE GERMAN TROOPS FOR EASTERN EUROPE?

The German government should immediately deliver “weapons and munitions” to Ukraine and, in the course of five years, increase Germany’s military budget to up to 3 percent of the country’s GDP – possibly to more than €100 billion. These demands are being made by the President of the German Council on Foreign Relations (DGAP), Thomas Enders. Enders also calls for “the introduction of compulsory service or the draft for men and women,” to “be able to create a rapidly mobilizable reserve for homeland defense.” He also mentions the deployment of more German troops in Eastern Europe. He attacks German government policy during the Ukraine crisis as “irresponsible.” NATO’s plans to deploy units, such as those in Poland and the Baltic countries also in other countries in eastern and southeastern Europe, are creating new splits in the region. Whereas Romania, for example, is in favor of the measure and the French military is already considering establishing a presence in that country, Bulgaria, Slovakia and Hungary are opposed. More than 50 percent of the Slovaks consider Russia a strategic partner.  (German Foreign Policy, 1/31/2022)

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THE FUTURE OF EUROPE

• “There is a growing threat that seeks to transform the European Union into an ideologically charged federalist super-state; a corporation which disregards national identity and sovereignty, and therefore democracy, plurality and the interests of the citizens of the nations that form the Union. This drift endangers the Union itself by moving away from the Christian European ideals on which it was founded . . .  We should cooperate and join forces to protect Europe from enforced ideologies and anti-democratic drift that are leading to its downfall.” – Joint Statement, Madrid Summit, January 29, 2022.  (Gatestone, 2/5/2022)

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ISRAELI ARABS POSE BIGGEST THREAT TO ISRAEL

• Israeli decision-makers are consumed with the lethal threat posed by Iran and its Lebanese proxy Hezbollah, but a no less insidious threat has gone virtually unnoticed: the Israeli Arabs’ growing rejection of Israel’s Jewish nature and their systematic subversion of state sovereignty and governability.
• On the face of it, the participation of the Islamist Ra’am party in the motley ruling coalition established after the May 2021 nation-wide Arab riots seems to point in the opposite direction. For what can conceivably offer a better indication of sociopolitical integration than the inclusion of an Arab party in an Israeli government after a 45-year break? Yet, while the participation of an Arab party in the Golda Meir and Yitzhak Rabin governments (1974-77), let alone the participation of Labor and Likud Arab ministers and deputy ministers in successive governments, implied acceptance of Israel’s Jewish nature (as did outside support by small Arab parties in the 1950s and 1960s), Ra’am is an avowedly anti-Zionist party committed to the substitution of a Muslim theocracy for the State of Israel.   (“Why Israel’s Arabs are its biggest threat,” Efrain Karsh, Spring 2022, Middle East Quarterly)

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How Bad is Crime in L.A.?
Barbed wire at The Grove. Home invasions in Hollywood. Smash mobs at CVS. Are we just being paranoid, or is the city really falling apart? — by Peter Kiefer, January 27, 2022, Los Angeles magazine.

To put it mildly, these are scary times in Los Angeles. Since November, there have been dozens of dramatic smash-and-grab heists at Nordstrom, Louis Vuitton, Saks Fifth Avenue, and other high-end stores. The Grove, victim of several such “smash mob” attacks, started installing barbed-wire-like fencing around its property every night to deter invaders, while the tony boutiques of Rodeo Drive have added dozens of security guards to patrol their floors. From South L.A. (where a CVS was ransacked by a mob of looters) to Studio City (where a man was attacked while taking out the garbage from his house, then tied up along with his disabled son and forced to watch while his home was plundered) to Hancock Park (where a mother pushing a baby in a stroller was robbed in her driveway and 24-year-old Brianna Kupfer was stabbed to death while working at a furniture on North La Brea on January 13), you can all but smell the fear on the streets. Even in zip codes where violent crime was once unheard of, residents are starting to sweat.  (https://www.lamag.com/citythinkblog/how-bad-is-crime-in-l-a/)

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Blood pressure warning over long-term paracetamol use — by Philippa Roxby, BBC Health reporter, 6 Feb 2022

People with high blood pressure who take paracetamol on prescription could be increasing their risk of heart attacks and strokes, a study suggests.  Doctors should think about the risks and benefits to patients taking it over many months, the University of Edinburgh researchers say.  Taking the painkiller for headaches and fevers is safe, they stress.  Other experts say research in more people over a longer time frame is needed to confirm the findings.  Paracetamol is widely used around the world as a short-term remedy for aches and pains but also prescribed to manage chronic pain, despite little evidence of its benefit for long-term use.  Half a million people – one out of every 10 – in Scotland were prescribed the painkiller in 2018.  High blood pressure affects one out of every three people in the UK.  

The study tracked 110 volunteers, two-thirds of whom were taking drugs for high blood pressure, or hypertension.  In a randomised trial, they were asked to take 1g of paracetamol four times a day for two weeks – a common dose for patients with chronic pain – and then dummy pills, or placebo, for another two weeks. 

(https://www.bbc.com/news/health-60289790)

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EARTHQUAKES RATHER THAN RUSSIAN GAS

The power struggle that the West is waging against Russia is provoking a long-term hike in natural gas prices in Germany as well as a tendency toward unreliable supplies. This results from the German government’s plans to rely more on liquefied gas imports in the future. Liquefied gas is more expensive than pipeline gas, and is also more unreliable, in the current situation. Liquefied gas tankers can be diverted to another destination at any time, if higher prices can be obtained. In addition, liquefied gas is “nearly as harmful to the climate as coal,“ an expert at Germany’s Federal Environment Agency explains. Industry representatives confirm that the Nord Stream 2 pipeline will still not be commissioned, even though it could remedy Germany’s current gas shortage, which is taking on serious proportions. Gas is more expensive than ever. Germany’s gas storage facilities’ levels are lower than they have ever been at this time of the year. The supply would collapse, if there were a cold spell for only a week. Berlin is insisting on importing gas from Groningen – preventing the shutdown of that gas field in spite of the risk of earthquakes.  (German Foreign Policy, 2/6/2022)

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ST ALBANS PUB CLOSES AFTER 1200 YEARS 

We bring you only really important news!!!

The ‘oldest pub in Britain’, St Albans Ye Olde Fighting Cocks, has gone into administration after 13 centuries of serving the community.

Announcing the heartbreaking news in a statement on Facebook, landlord Christo Tofalli said that escalating business rates, taxations and the pandemic had had a devastating impact on the pub.

The pub was reportedly established in 793AD, and the building itself dates back to the 11th century. Cock fighting took place in the main bar in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, which gives the pub its name.

Ye Olde Fighting Cocks is at the heart of St Albans, and the pub will be a devastating loss for many in the community.  (Isabella MacRae)

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TO THE POINT

• In April, the country (France) will vote. The next day, it will be possible to tell what direction the country — and with it, Europe — will take. Will it submit — or not?  (“Will France wake up and defend her freedom or not?”  Gatestone, 2/6/2022)

• Today marks 70 years since Queen Elizabeth II acceded to the throne, following the death of her father, King George VI. Her Majesty was proclaimed Queen throughout the UK and Commonwealth in the early hours of 6 February 1952.  (https://twitter.com/RoyalFamily?  (2/6/2022)

• Intercepted communications obtained by Washington have revealed that some Russian officials think a major invasion of Ukraine would be costlier and more difficult than Vladimir Putin and other Kremlin leaders realise. The news comes after the French and Russian presidents showed no sign of de-escalating the Ukraine crisis yesterday, despite lengthy talks at the Kremlin aimed at negotiating a peaceful way forward. Moscow publicly denies any plans to invade, but Western powers have become increasingly concerned by the possibility of a Russian military move.   (The Week, 2/8/2022)

• Russia to expel German broadcaster after Russia Today (RT) blocked in Germany — Deutsche Welle boss says retaliation by Moscow, including closure of its bureau, is ‘total overreaction.’   (https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/03/russia-to-expel-german-broadcaster-after-rt-banned-in-germany)

• Headline on Tucker Carlson featuring Harry and Meghan:   “Fake Duchess and Brain-dead husband.”

• UK:  The worst of rising food prices is “yet to come,” the chairman of Tesco has warned. John Allan told the BBC that there could be a 5% surge in spring because “we are impacted by rising energy prices [and] suppliers are impacted by rising energy prices”. The supermarket chief said he was aware that the combination of higher energy prices, national insurance increases and hiked food costs would “squeeze the hardest-up still harder.” The country finds itself in a “parlous” situation, said The Observer, with hard-pressed families facing “the worst threat to their economic wellbeing for many years.”  (The Week, 2/7/2022)

• The Queen at 70.   February 6^th marked the occasion of the Queen’s 70^th year since ascending the throne in 1952.   It’s major news in the UK and much of the Commonwealth.   However, it belies the fact that the UK has declined considerably in those seven decades. 

• TRUCKER’S STRIKE IN CANADA – one thing is for sure that government is totally out of touch with people.   And not just in Ottawa.   The same goes for Washington DC, London and Canberra.

• FALKLANDS UNDER THREAT: Foreign secretary Liz Truss has described the Falklands as being “part of the British family” and insisted that China “must respect” the islands’ sovereignty. When Argentinian president Alberto Fernández met with Xi Jinping at the Beijing Winter Olympics, they inked an agreement that reasserted China’s support for Argentina’s claim to the South Atlantic islands. Fernández also backed Xi’s “one-China policy,” which claims sovereignty over Taiwan.  (The Week, 2/7/2022)

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FINAL THOUGHT 

Say goodbye to the church!

A recent article in the Lansing newspaper pointed out that churches across the board have lost 50% of their attendees during Covid.  Driving around I see more churches than usual up for sale.

I find it quite disturbing that so many people no longer attend church.  People give all kinds of excuses.   A popular trend is to stay home and invite over other church members, only compounding the problem.   They believe such gatherings fulfill the admonition to “Forsake not the assembling of yourselves together”  (Hebrews 10:25).   One problem with this is that so many people in the congregation are left out, those who are less popular, less talkative, less social.

This flawed reasoning would ultimately lead to the death of the church, all churches.   Taken to its logical conclusion, nobody would attend.  Then, where would we be?   Without the church we would not know the dates of holy days or be able to organize a Feast site.

In Isaiah 58 we read that we should not be doing our own pleasure on the Sabbath.

This includes informal gatherings with fellow believers.  

“If you turn away your foot from the Sabbath,
From doing your pleasure on My holy day,
And call the Sabbath a delight,
The holy day of the Lord honorable,
And shall honor Him, not doing your own ways,
Nor finding your own pleasure,
Nor speaking your own words,
¹⁴ Then you shall delight yourself in the Lord;
And I will cause you to ride on the high hills of the earth,
And feed you with the heritage of Jacob your father.
The mouth of the Lord has spoken.”

Church services in most churches rarely last more than 60-90 minutes.    That leaves plenty of time before or after services for social gatherings.

We don’t want to be the first generation since Jesus Christ to weaken the church by non-attendance.    It seems to me that this is another sign that we have entered the Laodicean era of the church, the last prophesied era of the church before Christ’s return.

“And to the angel of the church of the Laodiceans write,

‘These things says the Amen, the Faithful and True Witness, the Beginning of the creation of God:  “I know your works, that you are neither cold nor hot. I could wish you were cold or hot. So then, because you are lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will vomit you out of My mouth.  Because you say, ‘I am rich, have become wealthy, and have need of nothing’ – and do not know that you are wretched, miserable, poor, blind, and naked.”  (Revelation 3:14-17)

BRITAIN’S FATAL UNWILLINGNESS TO CONFRONT ISLAMIC EXTREMISM

Sir David Amess was stabbed to death in Leigh-on-Sea in Essex on October 15 (Image: Getty Images)

Douglas Murray is the Assistant Editor of the Spectator.   This article followed the murder of a British Member of Parliament (MP), by a 25-year-old Somali Muslim immigrant.   Very little attention was paid to the fact that he was a Somali Muslim, as if this was irrelevant.   Yet, not for the first time, a Muslim murdered British people.   The country is in denial.

More than any other country in the West, Britain has become practised in the arts of self-deception and subject avoidance. If a politician in France had been butchered by a Muslim of Somali descent, the French media and political class would have gone through a cycle of debate about the ideology that propelled the killer. Government and security sources would have talked about the networks surrounding the suspect. And the whole society would have learned a little more about what might have led to such an outrage.

In Britain the situation is otherwise. David Amess was stabbed to death in a church while holding a surgery for his constituents. The man apprehended for his killing is a 25-year-old of Somali descent named Ali Harbi Ali. In the days since then we have learned that the suspect had been referred to the government’s Prevent programme seven years ago while still a sixth-former at Riddlesdown Collegiate school in Purley. Yet the political classes have once again shown themselves incapable of even being able to speak about the most likely source of the problem.

From the immediate aftermath of the murder politicians talked of the killing almost as though Sir David had died of natural causes. Sadiq Khan, among other senior politicians, tweeted his sorrow that Sir David had ‘passed away’. When the Commons met on Monday to commemorate Sir David, it was once again as though a colleague had merely died uncommonly suddenly and unnaturally early.  (Douglas Murray, The Spectator, 10/23/2021)

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ASYLUM SEEEKERS

A second crisis in Britain is the arrival of boat people who cross the Channel from France trying to get into the UK.  These are mostly people from South Asia and Africa.   Up to 1000 a day arrive this way, all attracted by the “freebies” given by the British taxpayer.  From the moment of arrival, they are housed in four-star hotels and receive a generous allowance from the state.  This is in addition to free education and free healthcare.   The British are not allowed to turn them away as they are asylum seekers.  Why do they cross from France?   Because the “freebies” are more generous in the UK.   The solution here is to remove the freebies.    While they discuss that, they might want to also re-introduce conscription.  90% of the asylum seekers are young males.  Nothing is required of them.  They could certainly be enrolled in government programs that contribute something.   These do not necessarily have to be military.

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RUSSIA’S PRESIDENT ON CANCEL CULTURE

Russia’s president, Vladimir Putin, has commented on the Anglo-American rethink on Cancel culture.   This is the push in schools to “cancel” history, or rather to rewrite it in such a way that it totally destroys the culture, by upending the past.  When asked about it, Putin replied “Been there, done that”.    Russia was the first country to “cancel culture”, when the Bolsheviks took control of the country in 1917.   Suddenly, all history had to be condemned, a thousand years of tsars were all evil people and the church was persecuted.    Until 1991, when communism itself was overthrown and there was a revival of learning about the past.   Today, even the last czar, Nicholas II, has been rehabilitated with 36 busts and statues of him throughout Russia.   So, Russia has “been there, done that,” and it didn’t work.

However, this does not mean America could reverse “cancel culture” seventy years from now.   Demographic trends, encouraged by loose immigration “rules”, mean that the US will be a very different nation seventy years from now.   Russia can at least be thankful that at the fall of communism, the people were ethnically the same as those who were in at the beginning.

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AFTER THE QUEEN

A friend of mine in Australia believes that when the Queen dies, everything will fall apart.   This is a growing conviction of many.    Melanie Phillips, a conservative Jewish columnist who lives in the UK, wrote on this very subject this morning.

‘To widespread unease, if not outright concern, the Queen has been missing some public engagements recently due to unspecified health issues. On her doctors’ advice, she will not be attending the COP26 climate summit in Glasgow on Monday; she has been replacing public engagements where possible by Zoom encounters; and she has apparently been speaking to the prime minister by telephone instead of in their usual face-to-face weekly meetings.

‘. . . the Queen is an irreplaceable constant in the life of the British nation. Her public appearances aren’t just the exercise of her role as the symbol of the nation. As so many feel so viscerally, she is the nation.  People feel better just for seeing her out and about with her trademark smile, a few gracious words — and trailing a cloud of insoluble mystery. With her unrivalled sense of duty, her stoicism and her emotional restraint, many see in the Queen the embodiment of a Britain whose cultural identity is inexorably fraying. Many feel in their bones that when the Queen eventually passes, Britain will just not be the same. Despite the fact that the monarchy will continue, something of infinite value will have been lost.’  (Vivat Elizabeth, Melanie Phillips, 10/29/2021)

A scripture that comes to mind is Proverbs 14:34 – “Righteousness exalts a nation, but sin is a reproach to any people”.    In a world that is full of sin, the Queen is a righteous woman.  The nation benefits from this.   Many Americans think the queen doesn’t do anything (because she is not involved in politics).   Rather, the queen holds everything together.  With her passing, the future of the Commonwealth and of the UK itself will be uncertain.  They may not survive the transition.

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DECLINE OF THE BBC

A survey in the UK has shown that radio has been losing its audience.   This is not surprising.  I rarely listen anymore.   In a country where many radio stations are controlled by the BBC, debate has been ruled out on many issues, including climate change, evolution and gender issues.   Try to take a conservative stance on any of these and you will not be invited back.    I’m surprised anybody is still listening to talk radio, an area in which the BBC used to excel.

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CLIMATE CHANGE

What’s the point in the climate change conference in Glasgow when China does not cooperate?   They are the world’s biggest polluter.   Recent reports claim that China is opening 700 more coal mines.  So, how does this work?  We close one coal mine and they open 100?

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ISLAM

PERSECUTION OF CHRISTIANS CONTINUES

“[T]he humanitarian crisis that is developing as the Taliban returns to power is likely to become a genocide against Christians if the Biden Administration does not act….” (Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, American Center for Law and Justice, August 27, 2021)

“[T]he possibility of there being a genocide against Christians in the wake of this withdrawal is extremely high. Already, the Taliban is compiling lists of known Christians and their communities. They are going door to door searching Afghan homes for Bibles, even searching smartphones for Bible apps.” — Former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, American Center for Law and Justice, August 27, 2021.  (“The Basic Message is Hatred,” by Raymond Ibrahim, Gatestone, 10/24/2021)

What several international observers have for years characterized as a “pure genocide” of Christians in Nigeria has reached new levels.

“We have never seen an evil government in this country like the one of today. The government is fully in support of the bloodshed in Nigeria. We are being killed just because we are not Muslims. These evil Fulani jihadists are enjoying the backing of the government to go about killing people, destroying their houses and farmlands, yet when we try to defend ourselves, the government will go about arresting our people. What kind of justice is this?” — Rev. Jacob Kwashi, Anglican bishop, during a funeral for 17 murdered Christians, Morning Star News, August 30, 2021.

“[T]here is an ongoing genocide in Southern Kaduna targeted at the indigenous Christians population . . . Not a single church or school is left standing. Not a single herdsman has been apprehended all these years. It is unfortunate that . . . the western media do not believe that our lives are worth any news.” (Jonathan Asake, a former member of Nigeria’s House of Representatives, The Epoch Times, August 4, 2021)

The Turkish government stepped back from a threat to expel ten Western ambassadors, including the one from Germany. As President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan noted, the ambassadors have vowed to comply with the Vienna Convention on Diplomatic Relations, and to “cease interference in Turkey’s domestic affairs.” Earlier, an appeal for the immediate release the jailed businessman and foundation activist Osman Kavala by the ten ambassadors had sparked a diplomatic crisis. Kavala has obviously been imprisoned on political grounds. Thus, his case offers western states an occasion to politically intervene with Ankara – in other words, to do something, they, themselves, would not tolerate, as, for example, in the case of jailed WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. Germany, in particular, is striving to mitigate conflicts with Turkey – for strategic reasons. Experts, however, expect disputes with Ankara to continue because it clearly perceives the West’s decline and, has begun to reorient itself toward Asia. (German Foreign Policy, 10/27/2021)

WIFE BEATING OK

Egyptian Islamic scholar Dr. Yosry Gabr explained the conditions for wife beating, saying the practice is intended to instill discipline, and not “to cause pain.” He spoke in a video that was posted on his YouTube channel on August 5, 2021. Dr. Gabr said that it is forbidden for a husband to beat his wife in public, to cause her pain, or to leave a mark on her body, and that anyone who does so is a criminal. He went on to explain that if the wife is disobedient, meaning that she is condescending towards her husband, then he must admonish her or give her a gift, so that she will “obey him out of love.”  Dr. Gabr said that this is because women are controlled by their emotions and not by reason, and that this is what makes them “sweet.” He further said that if this does not work, the husband must “forsake” her in bed, and if she is a “nasty person and does not want to understand,” he should beat her. Dr. Gabr explained that the beating must only be done to instill discipline in the wife and not to cause her pain.   (MEMRI, 10/10/2021)

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TO THE POINT

• 1981 – US national debt hits $1 trillion – In September 2021, the public debt of the United States was around 28.43 trillion U.S. dollars, around 1.5 trillion more than a year earlier, when it was around 26.95 trillion U.S. dollars. (https://www.statista.com/statistics/273294/public-debt-of-the-united-states-by-month/)

• Why Kenyan churches are banning politicians from pulpits
  by Emmanuel Onyango * BBC News, Nairobi * 24 October 2021 Leaders of the established churches have had enough. They have banned politicians from the pulpit, accusing them of making “divisive and unedifying” remarks that “desecrate the church.”  https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-58666703

• A British trawler has been seized by France and another fined as tensions escalate over post-Brexit fishing rights.  The ships were cautioned during “classic checks” yesterday off Le Havre, a port in the Normandy region, France’s Maritime Minister Annick Girardin announced in a tweet. This is “not a war but this is combat,” she told French media. The crackdown came as Paris “pledged to ban all British seafood imports from next week in retaliation for the government’s decision not to grant more fishing licenses to French trawlers in British waters,” The Times reported.   (The Week, 10/28/2021)

• Brazil’s Senate is calling for the prosecution of President Jair Bolsonaro on charges including crimes against humanity over his handling of the Covid-19 pandemic.  Lawmakers have voted to approve a report by an opposition-controlled committee that recommended pursuing a total of nine criminal charges against Bolsonaro for a response that has left Brazil with the world’s second-highest coronavirus death toll.  (10/28/2021)

BIDEN AND JOHNSON MEET AT G7

As Joe Biden and Boris Johnson prepare to meet in person for the first time ahead of this week’s G7 summit in Cornwall, the question preoccupying many political pundits is whether the duo will become friends.

The White House says the meeting on Thursday will “affirm the enduring strength of the special relationship” between the two countries, which may have been feeling less special to Johnson since Biden spoke out against Brexit before his presidential election victory last year.

Indeed, Johnson’s spokesperson emphasized yesterday that the prime minister “prefers not to use” the S-word, The Guardian reports. “But that in no way detracts from the importance with which we regard our relationship with the US, our closest ally,” the spokesperson added.  (The Week, 5/8/2021)

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The leaders of the UK, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan and the US are hoping to thrash out agreements on how to tackle a range of global issues at a key meeting in Cornwall this week.

With Britain holding the presidency of the G7 group of wealthy nations this year, the summit provides Boris Johnson with the opportunity to play a central role on the world stage. But the prime minister will be contending with some thorny issues, both on the official agenda and behind the scenes, when the three-day meeting in the coastal resort of Carbis Bay kicks off on Friday.  (The Week, 5/9/2021)

G7 leaders will be discussing the three C’s – Covid, Climate Change and China.   (Sky News 6/9/2021)

G7 TO BECOME G10?

“The British government has been shrewd in addressing America’s concerns in the east by pushing for a ‘Democratic 10’ — consisting of the US, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, India, Australia and South Korea — to replace the ‘Group of 7’ and form a grander alliance against China expanding its power and reach.” (Freddy May, Spectator, 6/12/2021)

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FIVE TO FOUR

The Five Eyes alliance is an intelligence-sharing arrangement between five English-speaking democracies: the US, UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. It evolved during the Cold War as a mechanism for monitoring the Soviet Union and sharing classified intelligence. It is often described as the world’s most successful intelligence alliance. But recently it has suffered an embarrassing setback.

Four of the members have jointly condemned China’s treatment of its Uyghur population in Xinjiang province. They have also expressed concern over China’s de facto military takeover of the South China Sea, its suppression of democracy in Hong Kong and its threatening moves towards Taiwan, which China has vowed to “take back” by 2049. One country, though, has opted out of confronting China: New Zealand.

Surprisingly, perhaps, for a nation that prides itself on respect for human rights, New Zealand’s Foreign Minister Nanaia Mahuta declined to join in this Western condemnation of Beijing, saying “it felt uncomfortable” with expanding the alliance’s role by putting pressure on China in this way. Although New Zealand’s Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern admitted on Monday that its differences with China are becoming “harder to reconcile”, the country still prefers to pursue its own bilateral relations with Beijing.   (BBC 5/4/2021)

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HOW THE QUEEN GOT CANCELLED

“Oxford students cancel our Queen!” screamed the Daily Express splash this morning following a vote at Magdalen College to remove a portrait of Her Majesty from a common room.

First reported by right-wing news site Guido Fawkes, the graduate students agreed to take down the print of a 1952 photograph of Elizabeth II on the grounds that “depictions of the monarch and the British monarchy represent recent colonial history.” The decision was made by members of Magdalen College’s Middle Common Room (MCR), of whom ten voted in favor of removing the portrait, two against and five abstained, according to the BBC.

The print was bought by students in 2013 to decorate their common room but will now be replaced by “art by or of other influential and inspirational people,” the MCR have agreed. And any future depictions of Royal Family members “will now be subject to a committee vote,” Guido Fawkes reports. (The Week, 5/9/2021)

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EUROPE  MOVES TO ASIA 

The EU should significantly extend its foreign and military policy activities in the Asia Pacific region, EU Foreign Affairs Commissioner Josep Borrell demanded on his return from a visit of several days to Indonesia. In Jakarta, Borrell discussed prospects for intensifying cooperation with the country and with the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and announced: “We are exploring options to enhance EU’s maritime presence in the vast Indo-Pacific space.” This is necessary because, through China’s rise, the world’s center of gravity is increasingly shifting away from the Atlantic to the Pacific. ”The history of mankind of the 21st century will be written in the Indo-Pacific area.” Just a few days earlier, German Defense Minister Annegret Kramp-Karrenbauer became the first member of a German government to ever visit the Pacific Island of Guam, where the German frigate Bayern will dock during its Asia tour in the fall. Guam hosts major US military bases and is seen as a possible battlefield in a war between the USA and China.  (German Foreign Policy, 6/8/2021)

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DIVERSITY DOESN’T WORK

Muslim family attack ‘premeditated’
Police in Canada say four members of a Muslim family have been killed in a “premeditated” vehicle attack. The assault took place on Sunday in the city of London in Ontario province. A boy aged nine, the family’s only survivor, is in hospital with serious injuries. A 20-year-old Canadian man has been charged with four counts of murder and one count of attempted murder. Police said “it is believed that these victims were targeted because they were Muslim.”  (The Week, 6/8/2021)

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FINAL THOUGHT

In an article in The Economist (May 22^nd), the magazine reveals the results of a survey done by Cornell University that “found that 27% of adult Americans are estranged from a close family member.”  “Karl Pillemer, a professor of sociology who led the research and wrote a book about its findings called “Fault Lines,” says that because people often feel shame, the real figure is likely to be higher.   The relationship most commonly severed is that between parent and adult child, and in most cases it is the child who wields the knife.”  (“Laters, Maybe,” page 25).

The US leads the world in this social phenomenon.   In other words, your family is more likely to break up in the US that anywhere else. 

II Timothy 3:1-5 describes too many people today when it says:  “But mark this: There will be terrible times in the last days. People will be lovers of themselves, lovers of money, boastful, proud, abusive, disobedient to their parents, ungrateful, unholy, without love, unforgiving, slanderous, without self-control, brutal, not lovers of the good, treacherous, rash, conceited, lovers of pleasure rather than lovers of God—having a form of godliness but denying its power. Have nothing to do with such people.”

Divorcing your parents requires a certain amount of self-centeredness.  Such people are lacking in natural affection.   It goes against nature to be so selfish.   Sometimes, the parent is to blame.   If your adult child takes on different beliefs and values from your own, this should not be the end of the relationship.   It would need to change to one based on mutual respect.

The same Apostle who wrote the above, also wrote:  “Love never fails” (I Corinthians 13:8).  Put another way, if all else fails, try love!   Whatever your differences, an extra dose of love will go a long way in saving a relationship.  Better that than never seeing your son, daughter or parent again!

DEMS OPPOSED TO VOTING MACHINES

“He said, she said.

“It turns out that your opinion about Dominion Voting Systems depends not only on who you are but when you’re asked.  If you zip way back to December 2019, then, if you are Democratic Senators Elizabeth Warren, Ron Wyden, or Amy Klobucher, you are very worried about their security.

“Back then, these high-minded public servants wrote letters warning that these widely used voting systems were “prone to security problems.”  “We are particularly concerned,” they wrote, that “voting machines and other election administration equipment, ‘have long skimped on security in favor of convenience’.”

“That was in December of last year – the good old days when NBC, for example, warned about “Chinese parts” and “hidden ownership” of the machines.

“Chinese manufacturers,” they noted, “can be forced to cooperate with requests from Chinese intelligence officials to share any information about the technology and therefore pose a risk for US companies,” not to mention “the concern of machines shipped with undetected vulnerabilities or back doors that could allow tampering.”

“As I say, that was a year ago.

“Today, post Nov 3, 2020, you don’t hear the Democrats worrying out loud about the security of the machines that counted (not to say manufactured) the votes that led to Joe Biden’s apparent victory.

“On the contrary, to raise questions now about Dominion Voting Systems and the software that powers them, as Sidney Powell, Lin Wood, and others have done, is to obstruct “democracy” and promulgate “conspiracy theories.”

“Zip back to 2006, and you find CNN running stories about how vulnerable electronic voting systems are to interference and hacking.  Back then, the watchword was “Democracy for sale.”

“It was all especially worrisome since the machines are used in some 2000 counties across 30 states.”  (“Recounts needed to settle Dominion’s Role, and the Election.” Roger Kimball, The Epoch Times, 11/25/2020).

The 2020 presidential election is unlike any before and requires unprecedented measures to protect it, our republic, and our future.

The degree and scale of voter fraud was unprecedented. In swing states, President Donald Trump had large leads on election night.  Then, late at night counting was stopped while election observers were ushered out.  And then, huge, statistically impossible vote dumps occurred, giving Joe Biden the lead.

This pattern, which occurred only in the states where Biden had to reverse the results, and hadn’t occurred in previous elections, points to a coordinated effort to steal the election.   (The Epoch Times, 12/14/2020)

“Who was not stunned to learn that as Trump seemed to be pulling ahead in the voting count on Nov. 3, suddenly, around midnight, the vote counting appeared to stop in the crucial swing states, and we were told it would begin again early the next morning? Why the halt?”  (Pat Buchanan, 12/11/2020)

“Can a nation so distracted, so divided, so at war with itself continue to meet all of the duties, obligations and commitments that are ours as the self-proclaimed ‘leader of the free world’?”  (Pat Buchanan, 12/15/2020)

The federal government’s distribution of COVID relief funds over the past year has been disastrous. As Bloomberg reported in October, the Small Business Administration (SBA) “gave out $10,000 grants to almost anyone who asked.”  From fraudulent applications to identity theft, billions of dollars are believed to have been stolen.  However, criminals were not the only ones to benefit from governmental incompetence; federal COVID relief has also helped prop up extremist organizations with long-held ties to violence. The amounts may be small, but the examples are shocking.   (MEF, 12/7/2020)

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BENEFITS OF FURTHER MIDEAST PEACE – Jared Kushner scores late-term wins for Israel, upending expectations.

President’s son-in-law was widely mocked in the US but made historic breakthroughs in the Middle East, with four Arab countries recognizing the Jewish state within months
by Shaun Tandon and Francesco Fontemaggi, 13 Dec 2020, Times of Israel

WASHINGTON (AFP) — The United Arab Emirates is getting top-of-the-line fighter jets. Morocco is winning recognition for decades-old territorial claims. And Sudan is coming off the US terrorism blacklist. The Arab nations are suddenly achieving long-sought goals after agreeing to normalize ties with Israel, in a last-minute triumph for the unorthodox diplomacy of outgoing US President Donald Trump’s son-in-law, Jared Kushner.

Widely mocked for more than three years as a boyish lightweight, who was best known for his famous wife, troubled property deals and his father’s stint in prison, Kushner is scoring historic breakthroughs lauded by Trump’s base with four Arab nations since.

. . . Veterans of Middle East diplomacy agree that Kushner moved nimbly after the United Arab Emirates first signaled its willingness to recognize Israel. “He had the authority; he was smart enough to develop personalized relations. I think he clearly deserves some credit for taking advantage of what the landscape showed was possible,” said Dennis Ross, who served as Bill Clinton’s Middle East envoy. (MORE — https://www.timesofisrael.com/jared-kushner-scores-late-term-wins-for-israel-upending-expections)

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POTENTIAL SECURITY SCANDAL INVOLVING US CONGRESSMAN ERIC SWALWELL

This scandal involves a Chinese spy named Fang Fang (aka Christine Fang) who posed as a student in the San Francisco area and raised money for Swalwell’s first campaign for Congress, was placed as an intern in his Washington office and had a personal, possibly romantic, relationship with him. 

The FBI became so concerned about Swalwell’s ties to Fang that they gave him a “defensive briefing” on her in 2015. Shortly thereafter, Fang fled the U.S. for China after she learned she was being investigated by the FBI. 

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Swalwell have tried to downplay this story.  Swalwell says it happened many years ago and he severed all ties to Fang in 2015 after the FBI briefing.   (Fred Fleitz, Foxnews, 12/14/2020)  (See article “Afterthought” at end of blog.)

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BREXIT END GAME

“As an uncompromising Brexiteer, I believed from the very start that the only true Brexit was a no-deal Brexit.

That’s because iron logic always meant that any deal the UK might strike with the EU would keep the UK tied to it in some way. 

The reason for that is the premise upon which the EU is based. In essence, it is a protectionist bloc which, acting as a European super-state subsuming its 27 member countries, will resist anything that puts it at an economic disadvantage. 

It is therefore particularly sensitive to competition, particularly since it is itself so vulnerable. That’s because it’s trapped by its regulations, laws and bureaucratic rigidity into a permanent state of economic sclerosis and inability to respond flexibly to any shocks to the system — of which there are plenty. Its internal economic pressures are therefore dire and its long-term future unsustainable. In short, it’s an economic basket-case.

By contrast, the UK is innately nimble and flexible. It has the ability to adjust its financial and monetary levers to respond to shocks to the system. Its deep commitment to true liberty, so poorly understood in continental Europe, means it is far less regulated and therefore more entrepreneurial and potentially dynamic. And it commands the supreme global advantages of the English language, and in the City of London the world’s pre-eminent financial hub. 

Without minimizing the UK’s undoubted weaknesses, all these advantages mean that, unshackled from the EU, it stands poised to become a supreme competitive threat to its neighbors just across the English Channel — a threat that the EU has explicitly recognized and sworn to negate.

As indeed it must. That’s why it was always the case that the EU would never make any concessions to the UK that would place the EU at a disadvantage. That’s why it was always the case that the terms of any such deal would always be to the UK’s disadvantage. 

And that’s why the words that must strike deep dread into the heart of every true Brexiteer are “A deal now looks more likely . . . ”   (“The Brexit end-game,” Melanie Philips, 12/11/2020)

Scotland can’t afford to remain part of the Union from The Spectator magazine UK:  21 Nov 2020 by Andrew Wilson:  a former SNP MSP & author of the party’s recent ‘Growth Report’

Tony Blair’s biggest achievement was delivering a referendum that unified Scotland behind devolution and gave all parties a stake in its success. Boris Johnson is wrong to say it was ‘a disaster,’ but in being wrong is helping precipitate the logical next step: independence. The opinion polls that show a growing majority for Scottish independence will mystify those who believe the lazy, metropolitan idea that independence is an emotional fantasy — all Braveheart, Bannockburn and bagpipes. How, they ask, could a band of Caledonian romantics ever convince the canny Scots to opt for such a thing?

But what if the case for independence was a highly sophisticated position advocated by one of the most popular political leaders in the world? It is now supported by 64 per cent of those aged under 65, according to one of the latest polls. The Spectator, while founded by a Scot, has never supported the idea of his homeland’s independence. But its readers rightly pride themselves on reading different points of view. I seek not your support but your understanding as I try to explain what is really going on here.

The problem for Scotland is that it cannot afford to remain on the UK’s glide path. Staying in the Union is riskier than independence. Voters can see that.

In his outstanding book The Levelling:  What’s Next After Globalisation, the Irish author Michael O’Sullivan points out that in 1924 Argentina was three times wealthier than Japan but is today half as rich. His point is that countries can make colossal strategic errors. The UK has been in a slow descent for some time now. It used to be the richest country on Earth, but currently sits in 21st position in the IMF rankings, and Brexit is hastening the drop. Why should Scotland now buckle in and continue to not enjoy the ride?   (“Scotland can’t afford to remain part of the Union,” Andrew Wilson, a former SNP MSP, The Spectator, 11/21/2020)

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FIGHT AGAINST ISLAMIC SEPARATISM

On October 2, President Emmanuel Macron delivered a “Fight Against Separatism” speech to the French parliament, announcing stricter measures to crack down on the growing influence of what he called “radical Islamism” among France’s Muslim minority, proportionally the largest in Western Europe. This ideology, he said, has “a proclaimed, publicized desire, a systematic way of organizing things to contravene the Republic’s laws and create a parallel order, establish other values, develop another way of organizing society which is initially separatist, but whose ultimate goal is to take over [the Republic] completely.”

Macron’s proposals include abolishing home-schooling, closing down independent schools, devoting more resources to policing and courts, bringing community language teaching under the control of the state, restoring policing in Muslim-majority zones, which he acknowledges has been let slide, reversing ghetto­ization, preventing radical takeovers of Muslim organizations, and rolling back sharia creep, such as the public cafeterias which now offer only halal-compliant menus, and the separation of sexes in public swimming pools.

(Mark Durie is a Fellow at the Middle East Forum, founding director of the Institute for Spiritual Awareness, and a senior research fellow of the Arthur Jeffery Centre for the Study of Islam)

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CHINA ASSERTING ITSELF IN CARIBBEAN

• China also seems to have a military agenda in the Caribbean region . . .  Chinese Defense Minister Wei Fenghe already is on record expressing China’s willingness to deepen military cooperation with Caribbean countries. Of more concern to US security interests is the ongoing seaport expansion project in the already commercially important port at Kingston, Jamaica, as well as the port at Freeport, Bahamas, China’s possible new base of operations 90 miles off the US coast.

• China is clearly not a government that honors its agreements . . .  The US can ill afford any Chinese drive to place under threat any Western Hemisphere country, much less the United States.

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SWAZI LEADER DIES OF COVID

Ambrose Dlamini:  Eswatini’s (Swaziland) PM dies after testing positive for Covid-19

The government of Eswatini says Prime Minister Ambrose Dlamini has died, four weeks after he tested positive for coronavirus.  A government statement said Dlamini, 52, died on Sunday afternoon in hospital in South Africa.  No cause of death was mentioned, but Dlamini had recently been receiving treatment for Covid-19 in South Africa.  Dlamini had been prime minister of Eswatini, formerly known as Swaziland, since October 2018.  The tiny landlocked country in southern Africa is one of the last absolute monarchies in the world.

With a population of about one million, the country has recorded 6,768 coronavirus infections and 127 deaths linked to the pandemic, according to the health ministry.  Dlamini announced he had tested positive for coronavirus on 16 November. At the time, he said he was asymptomatic and was feeling well.  A few weeks later, on 1 December, the Eswatini government said Dlamini had been moved to a hospital in South Africa, with the aim of fast-tracking his recovery.  But on Sunday the government said Dlamini died “while under medical care in a hospital in South Africa,” without giving more details. “Government in collaboration with the family will keep the nation informed of subsequent arrangements,” Deputy Prime Minister Themba Masuku said in the statement. (https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-africa-55297472)  

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SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT

ELECTION 2016

In their infinite wisdom, the United States’ Founders created the Electoral College to ensure the STATES were fairly represented.  Why should one or two densely populated areas speak for the whole of the nation?  The following list of statistics has been making the rounds on the Internet.  It should finally put an end to the argument as to why the Electoral College makes sense. 

Do share this.  It needs to be widely known and understood. 

• There are 3,141 counties in the United States. 
• Trump won 3,084 of them. 
• Clinton won 57. 
• There are 62 counties in New York State. 
• Trump won 46 of them. 
• Clinton won 16. 
• Clinton won the popular vote by approx. 1.5 million votes. 
• In the 5 counties that encompass NYC, (Bronx, Brooklyn, Manhattan, Richmond & Queens) Clinton received well over 2 million more votes than Trump.  (Clinton won 4 of these counties; Trump won Richmond) 
• Therefore these 5 counties alone, more than accounted for Clinton winning the popular vote of the entire country. These 5 counties comprise 319 square miles. The United States is comprised of 3,797,000 square miles.  When you have a country that encompasses almost 4 million square miles of territory, it would be ludicrous to even suggest that the vote of those who inhabit a mere 319 square miles should dictate the outcome of a national election. 
• Large, densely populated Democrat cities (NYC, Chicago, LA, etc.) DO NOT and SHOULD NOT speak for the rest of our country! 
• And . . . it’s been verified and documented that those aforementioned 319 square miles are where the majority of our nation’s problems foment. 

PILGRIMS NO FUN

“James I had thrown his weight behind Anglicanism, which in tone, vestment, and ritual was modeled closely on Rome. Down at the other end of the Protestant spectrum lay the gloomy Puritans, straitlaced and austere, rabidly opposed to any form of religious ostentation, convinced that pleasure was the invention of the Devil.   Fun-loving James despised them and would, he gloated, harry them out of the land.  Many, most notably the Pilgrims Fathers, took him at his word and abandoned England to settle in the New World.”   (“Great Feuds in history,” Colin Evans, 2001, page 29.)

1949 LETTER FROM ALDOUS HUXLEY TO GEORGE ORWELL

“Whether in actual fact the policy of the boot-on-the-face can go on indefinitely seems doubtful.  My own belief is that the ruling oligarchy will find less arduous and wasteful ways of governing and of satisfying its lust for power, and these ways will resemble those which I described in Brave New World.  Within the next generation I believe that the world’s rulers will discover that infant conditioning and narco-hypnosis are more efficient, as instruments of government, than clubs and prisons, and that the lust for power can be just as completely satisfied by suggesting people into loving their servitude as by flogging and kicking them into obedience.”  (Letter from Aldous Huxley to George Orwell – 1949)

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TO THE POINT

• Eton College teacher loses dismissal appeal — An appeal panel has ruled that Eton College’s dismissal of a teacher was justified. The headmaster of the institution said that there are “limits to the freedoms that teachers have.” Will Knowland, an English teacher at the prestigious school, was sacked earlier this year for gross misconduct after recording a lecture in which he questioned “current radical feminist orthodoxy”.  (The Week, 12/15/2020)
• Campaigners call for reusable face-masks – Calls are rising for a switch to reusable face coverings after it emerged that more than 100 million disposable masks are binned in the UK every week. Research for the North London Waste Authority found that nearly 70% of those who wear disposable masks are unaware they are single-use plastic. “Whether they are binned or littered they will damage the environment,” a spokesperson for the NLWA said.  (The Week, 12/15/2020)

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LESSON FOR THE US FROM A CENTURY AGO

1936 was a long time ago.       

Before the American president became the “leader of the free world”, the King of England held the most important position on the planet.    The British Empire was at the height of is territory and the king was Head of State.

It had been almost a thousand years since England had three kings in one year, yet it happened in 1936.   “The year of the three kings” began with King George V on the throne.  His death at the end of January saw his son David become king as “Edward VIII”.   Before the year was out David would abdicate in favor of his brother, George VI, father of Queen Elizabeth II.

Abdication is such a rare event that many books have been written on the abdication.    The circumstances made if quite different from the last time there were three kings in one year (1066).  This is because the abdication was about a woman, an American divorcee (twice) from Baltimore.  Her name was Wallis Warfield Simpson.   The king is Head of the Church of England.  At the time, the church did not allow divorce.

In hindsight, a lot more is known.   Mrs. Simpson was having an affair even when dating the king, which might have compromised national security.  But, worse still, the king had definite Nazi sympathies, and would likely have compromised the nation’s security at a time when Germany posed a major threat to the United Kingdom.

The famous entertainer Noel Coward suggested at the time of the abdication that “a statue should be erected to Mrs. Simpson in every town in England for the blessing she has bestowed upon the country” (Great Feuds in History, Colin Evans, page 146). 

As I said, the abdication was a very long time ago.  But there’s a serious lesson here for Americans.  Just as England had a king who was a Nazi sympathizer, is it possible that the US could have a president working for communist China? 

Joe Biden seems to have extensive ties with the Chinese.  His son Hunter has been involved in questionable business activities with the Chinese and other foreign powers.  Certainly, on his salary of the last 50 years (he entered Congress in 1972), he could not afford the 10,000 square foot house he lives in.   

As it says in I Timothy 6:10, “For the love of money is a root of all kinds of evils. It is through this craving that some have wandered away from the faith and pierced themselves with many pangs.”   He would not, of course, be the only member of Congress tempted by money.

Betrayal at the highest level is not inconceivable.

MEDIA BIAS GREATER THAN EVER

NPR’S REFUSAL TO BROADCAST BAD NEWS ON BIDEN

(https://americantruthtoday.com/politics/2020/10/23/taxpayer-funded-npr-refuses-to-report-on-growing-biden-scandal-we-don-t-want-to-waste-listeners-time/?utm_source=sprklst&utm_campaign=allamerican-tax-10_23-pm)

A tweet from the National Public Radio (NPR) Public Editor on Thursday — on the day of the presidential debate — explained why the taxpayer-funded news outlet has been ignoring the growing scandal surrounding former Vice President Joe Biden, his son Hunter Biden, and the family’s business dealings in China.

“Why haven’t you seen any stories from NPR about the NY Post’s Hunter Biden story,” the tweet said. “We don’t want to waste our time on stories that are not really stories, and we don’t want to waste listeners’ and readers’ time on that stories that are just pure distractions.”

“Major media are either denouncing the allegations as unproven or ignoring the story, the motive for which is apparent. Journalistic duty be damned. We have to get rid of Trump. And anything that jeopardizes that highest of goals should be buried until after Election Day.”  (Pat Buchanan, 10/27/2020)

Texas prepares to send 1,000 troops to five major cities, DC boards up its stores and Washington state puts the National Guard on alert as the US braces for post-election violence.  (Daily Mail, 10/26/2020)

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One view on a Biden win:

If Joe Biden defeats Donald Trump next week, he will take office during a global pandemic and America’s most serious economic crisis for a century. And when he’s dealt with those, he will still have to rebuild US relationships abroad, grapple with the nation’s increasingly dysfunctional democratic institutions – and face the existential threat of climate change.  (The Guardian 10/28/2020)

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INTERNATIONAL AGREEMENT ASSERTING RIGHT TO LIFE

On Thursday, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and Secretary of Health & Human Services Alex Azar co-hosted the virtual signing of the Geneva Consensus Declaration along with the governments of Brazil, Egypt, Hungary, Indonesia, and Uganda.

The declaration serves as a rebuke to the pro-abortion rights U.N. and World Health Organization (WHO).

It states the nations join to promote women’s health as well as the “strength of the family and of a successful and flourishing society.”   The governments also affirm “the essential priority of protecting the right to life.”

The nations that signed onto the declaration, which represent 1.6 billion people, also “reaffirm ‘all are equal before the law,’” and that “human rights of women are an inalienable, integral, and indivisible part of all human rights and fundamental freedoms.”

The governments declare “the inherent ‘dignity and worth of the human person,’ that ‘every human being has the inherent right to life,’ and the commitment ‘to enable women to go safely through pregnancy and childbirth and provide couples with the best chance of having a healthy infant.’”

The declaration emphasizes that “in no case should abortion be promoted as a method of family planning,” and that “the family is the natural and fundamental group unit of society and is entitled to protection by society and the State.”  (Dr. Susan Berry, Breitbart, 10/23/2020)

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THE US – AN INSPIRATIONAL LEADER IN MID EAST

• By taking a robust approach to some of the region’s more intractable issues… such as relocating the American embassy to Jerusalem, the US has produced a number of profound changes to the regional landscape, the consequences of which are likely to be felt for many years to come.
• The breakthrough in the peace process, moreover, has resulted in the region being clearly divided between moderate, peace-loving countries that are prepared to engage in the peace process, and rejectionist regimes, such as Turkey and Iran, that are only interested in causing further bloodshed.
• It is these countries, as well as China, Russia, North Korea, Cuba and Venezuela that have most to fear in next month’s presidential election if a strong and successful America returns again.  (Con Coughlin, Gatestone, 10/24/2020)

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THE END OF AMERICAN ILLUSION

Since the end of the Cold War, most U.S. policymakers have been beguiled by a set of illusions about the world order.  On critical issues, they have seen the world as they wish it were and not how it really is. President Donald Trump, who is not a product of the American foreign policy community, does not labor under these illusions.  Trump has been a disrupter, and his policies, informed by his heterodox perspective, have set in motion a series of long-overdue corrections.  Many of these necessary adjustments have been misrepresented or misunderstood in today’s vitriolic, partisan debates.  But the changes Trump has initiated will help ensure that the international order remains favorable to U.S. interests and values and to those of other free and open societies.   (Nadia Schladlow, Sept-Oct issue, Foreign Affairs)

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THE US NAVY IS SHORT ALMOST 100 FIGHTER PILOTS

The US Navy is battling to get its fighter pilot training program back on track. by David B Larter, Sept 17,2020

The Navy has seen a slew of issues, including problems with the oxygen flow to the pilots causing negative and unsafe physiological responses in pilots and trainees, as well as readiness and engine trouble with aircraft. All of this has extended the time it takes to create a fighter pilot from three to four years, and the issues have created a gap in the number of pilots in the fleet, naval air training chief Rear Adm. Robert Westendorff said at a virtual Tailhook symposium on Saturday. “We can’t just snap our fingers and produce those immediately. The time to train of a strike fighter pilot is about three years; due to the bottlenecks we’ve had, its getting closer to four years,” Westendorff said.

(https://www.defensenews.com/naval/2020/09/17/the-us-navy-is-short-almost-100-fighter-pilots/)

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US & CHINA – INCREASED TENSIONS:  Tang Hong, a Chinese expert for Middle Eastern affairs, said in a September 3, 2020 interview on CGTN Arabic TV (China) that tensions are increasing between China and the United States because some American politicians still hold on to a Cold War ideology and believe that America can be the only superpower in the world. He said that U.S. and China can either cooperate or engage in competition that may involve armed conflict, and he criticized the U.S. for choosing the “wrong” path. Hong said that today’s China is not the China of the past, that it has a clear position regarding how it would respond to any military provocations and that it does not fear escalation. 

Tang Hong:  “In my view, the main reason for the escalating tensions between [the U.S. and China] is that some American politicians hold on to the ideology of the Cold War.  They delude themselves that they can maintain the status of being the single superpower in the world.  They believe that competition is the only way to resolve this problem and to preserve their status as the world’s only superpower.  But the truth is that they were wrong in thinking this.   (MEMRI, 9/16/2020)

Official Chinese TV Criticizes U.S. Capitalism, Trump’s Economic Policies: The Government Should Redistribute Wealth; Fundamental Reforms Are The Only Solution; Trump Does Not Care About Making America Great Again   (MEMRI 10/26/2020)

As Europe locks down again, there’s only one major country in the world that will fully recover from the pandemic. In his cover story, Rana Mitter looks at China’s incredible escape act and how the virus has reordered the world to Xi Jinping’s benefit.  (The Spectator, 10/22/2020)

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SOUTH ASIAN MUSLIM EXPERIENCE

The presence of South Asian Muslims in America began with a “trickle” of immigration in the early 1900s, but the “real flow” started after the independence of Pakistan and India in the 1940s. The South Asian Muslim diaspora grew rapidly in the U.S. during the 1970s and 1980s, when the U.S. sought to alleviate a shortage of doctors at home by opening its doors to foreigners with a medical degree. Attracted by the opportunity for greater income and freedom in America, these immigrants agreed to be placed in rural communities. Today there are some 52,800 American physicians from India and Pakistan, and 98% of the Pakistani doctors are Muslim.  (“South Asian Muslims and the American Experience,” Marilyn Stern, MEF, 10/26/2020)

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59% of American women with college degrees are trending toward Biden.   (CBS Face the Nation, 10/25/2020)

“Record high campaign contributions from women helped Democrats take the House in 2016, and now women have their sights set on the Senate.  In the 15 most competitive Senate races, an average 43% of the large dollar donors to Democratic candidates are women, compared to 28% of donors to Republicans.”  (USA Today, 10/26/2020)

Rep. Ilhan Omar (D-Minn.) told Axios in an interview that aired Monday that she expects a liberal turn if Democratic nominee Joe Biden is elected president, adding that she wants all Cabinet positions filled with progressives.

Biden’s transition team has reportedly vetted a handful of Republicans for potential Cabinet positions. While this may reinforce Biden’s image as a unity candidate, it has fueled a backlash among the Democratic Party’s leftmost wing.

“I would say all of the Cabinet positions should be filled by progressive Democrats,” Omar told Axios. “We know that the policies we advocate for are most popular with the American people,” she added.  (Tom Ozimek, Epoch Times, 10/27/2020)

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GERMANY / EU

We are facing very, very difficult months ahead.”
Chancellor Angela Merkel says German’s should brace themselves after a sharp spike in coronavirus cases. The country recorded its 10,000th Covid death on Saturday.  (The Week, 10/26/2020)

Germany tries to forge a deal on who can play ball in Europe Defense News, 21 Sept 2020 

COLOGNE, Germany — Time is ticking for Germany to find a compromise on letting American, British and other non-European Union countries tap into the bloc’s emerging defense cooperation scheme.  The government of Chancellor Angela Merkel has taken on the task of sorting out the issue by the end of the year, when Germany’s six-month term at the helm of the European Council concludes.  “It is an important issue to solve, particularly for close NATO partners,” Karl-Heinz Kamp, special envoy of the political director at the German Ministry of Defence, said during a panel discussion at the annual Defense News Conference this month.  The challenge is to find common ground between two camps within the EU: member states seeking ties with outsiders, and those countries who prefer treating the nascent defense agenda as a members-only affair.  Poland, Sweden and the Netherlands are leading a group of nations advocating for openness. But France, for example, is pursuing a more restrictive stance, especially toward Turkey and the United States.



From the beginning, the Trump administration has eyed the EU’s creation of a defense cooperation mechanism, dubbed PESCO, and the proposed multibillion-dollar European Defence Fund with a degree of mistrust. The efforts run the risk of undermining NATO if America and its powerful defense companies are kept out, Washington claims.  The tone has softened more recently, however, as officials on both sides of the Atlantic try to broker a compromise.  “One of the things that COVID-19 has really brought into sharp focus is the significance of our integrated defense industrial base,” said Gregory Kausner, executive director for international cooperation, who works in the Pentagon for acquisition chief Ellen Lord.  (Defense News, 9/21/2020)

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Hungary’s PM Orbán:  George Soros wants to create mixed-ethnic societies, dismantle nationalism, and hand power to the global elite  (9/22/2020)

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ISLAM

DOUBLE STANDARD IN ISLAM

France recalled its ambassador to Turkey after Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said French President Emmanuel Macron needed a mental health evaluation amid a government crackdown on Islamic extremism.

“What is the problem of this person called Macron with Islam and Muslims?”  Erdogan asked rhetorically during his Justice and Development Party meeting in the central Anatolian city of Kayseri.

“Macron needs treatment on a mental level,” he added, according to the BBC.  “What else can be said to a head of state who does not understand freedom of belief and who behaves in this way to millions of people living in his country who are members of a different faith?”

The French crackdown comes in response to the beheading of a history teacher near Paris by an alleged extremist.  (Danielle Wallace, Fox News 10/25/2020)

Grand Mufti Of Egypt Shawki Allam:  According To Our Research, 50% Of Second- And Third-Generation Muslims In Europe Support ISIS  (MEMRI, 10/25/2020)

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AUSTRALIA

QUEEN INNOCENT OVER DISMISSAL, KERR MISLED PALACE:  KEATING

The architect of Australia’s push for a republic, Paul Keating, repudiates as “tilting at shadows” the revisionist history that claims the Queen was implicated in the 1975 dismissal of the Whitlam government.

Rejecting conspiracy theories about the Queen’s complicity that have attracted support in recent years, the former prime minister said the Queen had “never contrived, on this occasion or others, over the long course of her reign, to undermine governments.”

Mr. Keating said claims that she engaged with governor-general John Kerr to terminate the Whitlam government were “given the lie” by his own knowledge of the Queen, notably her immediate acceptance of his advice as prime minister that Australia should become a republic, delivered in 1993 during their meeting at Balmoral.

He said it was the governor-general who misled Buckingham Palace in 1975. “Kerr usurped the kingly powers reserved to a monarch, unused for centuries, and made the palace hostage to his plans,” Mr. Keating said.

While he is a committed republican, Mr. Keating made clear his respect for the Queen, saying she sought always to do her duty by Australia. He warned republicans that accusing the Queen of complicity in Whitlam’s dismissal would only undermine their cause.   (The Australian, 10/26/2020)

AUSTRALIAN PROBLEM WITH JIHADISTS

In 2013, MEMRI reported on the activity at the Al-Risalah Islamic bookstore in Sydney, Australia, which also served as a community center for local Muslims. The report showed that the bookstore, located in the Bankstown area of West Sydney, was a hub from which radical Islamists spread extremist and militant Islamic views. The center was owned by Australian preacher and community leader Wissam Haddad, and many of the individuals who operated and preached there later joined Al-Qaeda (AQ) or the Islamic State (ISIS), or were involved terror activity inside Australia. Haddad closed the Al-Risalah center in September 2014 after media reports about the activity there aroused public outrage.

The present report, based on research conducted in 2019-2020, shows that, eight years later, despite arrests and the banning of their activity, Haddad and other members of the Bankstown jihadi network are still preaching extremist views and possibly also recruiting for terror organizations.  (MEMRI 9/24/2020)

COULD JOHNSON MAKE UP WITH A PRESIDENT BIDEN?

As the self-styled “Mr. Brexit”, Donald Trump’s residence in the White House seemed perfectly aligned with Boris Johnson’s aims of striking a lucrative US trade deal as Britain quits the EU.

But Trump’s opponent in the imminent US presidential election is a different prospect entirely. Having vocally opposed the Brexit project, Joe Biden may prove less eager to strengthen ties with Downing Street if he secures the White House.

And with polls pointing towards victory at the polls for the Democrat, concerns are growing inside Downing Street about a changing of the guard in Washington that could “leave Johnson scrambling to rebuild the ‘special relationship,’” according to the Financial Times.    (The Week, 10/26/2020)

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TO THE POINT

• BRITS FORCED TO PAY £4BILLION FOR IMMIGRANT 5-STAR HOTELS        (BNP newsletter, 10/23/2020)
• Pope Francis will elevate Washington DC archbishop Wilton Gregory to cardinal making him the first black prelate in the US to hold the rank.  (Daily Mail, 10/25/2020)
• ARRESTS AFTER SPECIAL FORCES END SUSPECTED TANKER HIJACKING — Seven stowaways have been arrested after the Special Boat Service stormed a tanker off the Isle of Wight.  About 16 commandos boarded the Nave Andromeda last night, following a suspected hijacking. Two Royal Navy Merlin helicopters were involved, along with two Royal Navy Wildcat helicopters. “Initial reports confirm the crew are safe and well,” the Ministry of Defence said in a statement.  (The Week, 10/26/2020)
• The Economist provided sympathetic coverage of a Chinese tech giant widely considered a national security risk without disclosing the publication’s lucrative business relationship with the firm that spanned nearly a decade.  (Washington Free Beacon, 10/26/2020)
• While critics of President Trump’s redeployment of U.S. troops in Europe continue to bash the moves, Poland is showing how a real ally behaves. While already fulfilling its NATO required 2% of GDP for defense spending, it has now also agreed to pay the majority of costs associated with stationing 5,500 U.S. troops at bases in Poland.  (American Defense News, 10/25/2020) 
• “The problem with socialism is that eventually you run out of other people’s money,” Margaret Thatcher.

Keep in mind on election day Daniel 2:21 — “And he changes the times and the seasons: he removes kings and sets up kings.”