The Edge of Extinction?

All week I've awoken wondering if nuclear war has broken out yet. Fortunately it hasn't, thanks to Iran's restraint. But it's not just humanity and the biota at risk of extinction, it is many things...the US empire and its U$D, the nations of Ukraine and Israel may not survive, NATO and the EU sit on the brink of extinction as do our civil liberties, especially freedom of speech. Let's dive into these stories and more below the fold...

The world awaits Iran's retribution. There was talk this week of a preemptive strike by Israel on Iran, but my understanding is Russia let Israel and the US know they had defensive troops manning air defenses in Iran and striking them would be a declaration of war...so perhaps jets have been cooled. Larry explains in this interview...

(48 min)

Tehran Professor Marandi has been hitting the talk shows trying to explain Iran's position and situation. He and Larry had an informative conversation involving the historical background to the current situation.
Iran and Israel on the Cusp of War w/ Mohammad Marandi (1.2 hours)
Tehran University professor Seyed Mohammad Marandi joins Counter Currents host Larry Johnson to discuss Western myths about Iran and the prospect of a Iran-Israel war in the Middle East.

He also appeared with the Duran also 1.2 hours.
Iran's Impending Retaliation - Seyed Mohammad Marandi, Alexander Mercouris & Glenn Diesen

Last week we discussed the assassinations of the Hamas and Hezbollah leaders as Israel (Bibi) tries to expand to a regional war involving the US. This was a provocation.
This week there was a good deal of conversation about other horrors being committed by Israel from condoning the rape of prisoners to the continued genocide. At the same time US subservience to Israel has been obvious for years. The US government is owned and controlled by AIPAC.

Prof. John Mearsheimer: The Israel Lobby - it's POWER

(1 hour)
His substack article: Deep Dive on the Israel Lobby

The Judge and Prof. John Mearsheimer : Will Russia and China Back Iran? (34 min)

The Judge and Max Blumenthal : Netanyahu At His Worst (28 min)

The Judge and Phil Giraldi : Israel’s Rule of Law

(26 min)

Here's a short 10 minute presentation by Phil about Israel.

CIA OFFICER’S RELENTLESS WARNING: “THEY’RE A THREAT!”
This clip is from the National Summit to Reassess the U.S.-Israel "Special Relationship" on March 7, 2014 at the National Press Club.

A few more from the Judge...
Amb. Charles Freeman: Ritter, Ukraine, and Israel (29 min)

Col. Lawrence Wilkerson: Israel vs. Iran (28 min)

Col. Douglas Macgregor : Is Israel On the Ropes?

(30 min) The Col does a good job talking about the interconnections of all the moving parts which was last weeks WW topic.

As war widens, US assets become easy targets

US economic and military interests across West Asia could come under direct fire as Israel's aggressions drag Washington into a region-wide escalation.

The Ukraine Proxy War

Zelensky & NATO gamble everything on Kursk Nuclear Power Plant (30 min)

Pentagon Refuses To Rule Out Strikes On Moscow
The Pentagon on Thursday was asked by a reporter during the daily briefing whether Ukraine forces’ use of American weapons in its ongoing Kursk incursion is “consistent” with US policy of what Ukraine can and cannot do with US weapons. It has become clear that Ukrainian troops are currently using American weapons to attack Russian territory, troops, civilians, and infrastructure. Spokeswoman Sabrina Singh answered without hesitation that “yes it is consistent with our policy” and explained that Washington has supported the need for “crossfire” from Ukraine back across the border onto Russian positions from which it is being attacked, even if that is on Russian territory. She framed what is happening in Russia’s Kursk oblast—an offensive which has entered day four—as ‘defensive’ in nature.
...
As of Friday, the fighting in Kursk is in its fourth day, which is unprecedented for a Ukrainian military incursion inside Russia. Ukraine has simultaneously stepped up its cross-border drone attacks, reportedly hitting an important military airfield in the Lepetsk region, impacting a facility where glide-bombs are stored. According to the latest: Ukrainian drones struck a key military airfield in Russia’s Lipetsk region, as Kyiv continues its largest offensive on Russian soil since the start of the war. Ukrainian forces targeted the airfield in Lipetsk — roughly 300 kilometers (186 miles) from the border with Ukraine — on Thursday night, hitting warehouses and a number of unspecified objects in the vicinity of the airport, Ukraine’s General Staff of Command said in a Google-translated Telegram post. Earlier in the week, the Ukrainian offensive led to the evacuation of thousands of people and a state of emergency being announced in Kursk.
The timing of this high-risk assault is interesting, happening at a time where Ukraine has been on a slow and steady retreat in the Donbass. Ukraine needed something ‘big’ to both distract Russia’s military command from front line operations and as a blow to Moscow’s morale. And now Kiev is pressing the Biden White House to let it use ATACMS long-range missiles to strike deeper into Russia. “This will give them the leverage they need for negotiations with Russia — this is what it’s all about,” Mikhail Podoliak, a senior advisor to President Zelensky, told The Washington Post.

Kiev Regime’s Terrorism Shows Russia Must Go All The Way
Ultimately, the war in Ukraine is not just against a psychopathic NATO proxy. It is against the Western system of global domination and its NATO war machine. History shows that a negotiated detente is only a stepping stone for more aggression further up the road. The Western powers incubated the Nazi virus and unleashed its mutated strain in Ukraine. Not only does the Kiev Nazi virus have to be eradicated. So too ultimately must the Western imperialist disease that is the progenitor. Russia’s territory is the site of a historic, world-changing confrontation. That confrontation goes all the way back to the heroic battles of the Donbass, Crimea and Kursk against the Wehrmacht in 1943-44 culminating in the present against NATO. After this climactic battle is finally won by Russia, there should be never any repetition. That entails a definitive defeat of the Western imperialism that earlier spawned Nazi Germany and today’s U.S.-led NATO.

Ukraine Losing Battle to Recruit New ‘Cannon Fodder’ For NATO Proxy War (Sp.)
A drastic shortage of manpower in the Ukrainian Army has hounded the Kiev regime to such an extent that it has not only tightened its mobilization rules, but shown willingness to recruit deserters and convicted felons. The Kiev regime’s huge combat losses go hand in hand with its losing battle to recruit new “cannon fodder.” Conscription is becoming increasingly tough, despite assurances to the contrary spouted by official spokesmen for Ukraine’s military, The Wall Street Journal admitted. While troops at the front in eastern Ukraine are reportedly desperately short of men, draft dodgers are tirelessly devising strategies to avoid enlistment.

The Forever Wars go full War OF Terror (Pepe Escobar)
Exhibit A ...Essentially, Russian intel discovered that Kiev intel was setting up the joint assassination of President Putin and Defense Minister Belousov during the Navy Day parade late last month in St. Petersburg. Ryabkov was very cautious – as this is a matter of national security, involving several top agencies. When asked directly whether “an action was being prepared at the Main Naval Parade” against Putin, Ryabkov was not explicit: he only acknowledged the presence of “a certain connection with this kind of event” – according to the Russian Foreign Ministry.
...
Belousov himself called the head of the Pentagon, weapons peddler Lloyd “Raytheon” Austin, and told him in no uncertain terms to tighten the leash on the Kiev goons – or else. Now imagine how the transcript of the blunt Russian message would read. As Andrei Martyanov remarked, Belousov must have detailed how Kiev would simply cease to exist – and in due time, “so would D.C.” if the Americans decided to authorize the hit.

Exhibit B ...the two most extreme members of the Netanyahu cabinet follow the same rabbi who wants to blow up Al-Aqsa mosque to rebuild the Jewish Temple, expel or kill all Palestinians, and prevail in a coming Armageddon.
Ya’alon then delivers the clincher: “This concept rests on Jewish supremacy: Mein Kampf in reverse”. In this case, “a war of Gog and Magog”. Ya’alon adds: “This is what goes into the decision-making process in the Israeli government”. The lowdown: an escathological, ultra-rabid cult is dictating policy in Tel Aviv, the HQ of a genocidal, settler-colonial construct – complete with a massive vigilante militia, or interlocking militias, of hundreds of thousands of settlers, armed to their teeth, uncontrollable, and ready to do anything, even attacking the military and the Israeli state itself. There’s absolutely no way to talk or to reason with this fanatic mob.

We are caught in a web of war of our own creation.

Freedom of Speech, is it already extinct?
The FBI is at it again, this time targeting Scott Ritter. His wrong speech has TPTB upset. Just like the time he insisted Iran did NOT have WMD's. It is obvious this is an attempt to intimidate Scott.
US Hypocrisy on Full Display as Gov Makes 'Dubious' FARA Claims Against Scott Ritter
Under the orders of the US Justice Department, the home of former UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter was raided this week under allegations of violating the Foreign Agents Registration Act. More than two dozen boxes were pulled from his home, including an archive that backed Ritter's allegations that there were never any WMDs in Iraq in 2003.
The US' latest effort to target Scott Ritter have fully put on display the government's hypocrisy as it picks and chooses when to stay its hand and when to weaponize the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) against Americans, US attorney John Jackman told Sputnik.

Washington Further Escalates Its War On Dissent
The US has been getting increasingly aggressive in using FARA to suppress political speech that is critical of US foreign policy, with dissident voices being increasingly targeted by the Department of Justice on accusation of circulating unauthorized ideas in collaboration with governments like China and Russia.
This coincides with a report from Ken Klippenstein about a letter sent to the White House by 22 members of Congress demanding that protesters against the US-backed genocide in Gaza be investigated for any unauthorized affiliation with foreign governments, and severely penalized if any ties are found to “the Iranian regime”.
...
The US empire has been doing everything it can to restrict the flow of inconvenient information as public opposition to its criminality swells at home and abroad. Propaganda, censorship, the war on the press, banning TikTok, consolidating the collaboration of Silicon Valley with US government agencies, police crackdowns on campus demonstrators, and quashing political dissent are all outward manifestations of the agenda to manipulate the way the public thinks about what’s happening in the world.
The leaders of the US-centralized empire understand that real power lies in the ability to control not just what happens in the world but what people think about what happens, because doing so allows them to act however they want to act without the risk of revolution.

Last week we learned Tulsi is also being targeted...
Federal Air Marshal Whistleblowers Report Tulsi Gabbard Actively Under Surveillance via Quiet Skies Program
...Gabbard’s enrollment in Quiet Skies is likely politically motivated. Air Marshals were first assigned to Gabbard on Jul. 23, a day after she criticized Kamala Harris, Biden, and the National Security State in an interview with Laura Ingraham. FAMs were mobilized on Jul. 24 and assigned to their first flight with her on Jul. 25.

More wrong speech...
Free Speech Is An Illusion In The US’ – Tara Reade (RT)
You’re only free to speak your mind in the US if you are saying what the authorities want you to say, RT contributor and former aide to Joe Biden, Tara Reade, has claimed. Reade appeared live on RT on Thursday to comment on the search carried out by federal agents and state police at the home of former US Marine and UN weapons inspector Scott Ritter in New York state on Wednesday. She and Ritter, who is now a journalist, had both been invited to speak at the 27th St. Petersburg International Economic Forum (SPIEF) in June, but “unfortunately the federal agents took him off the plane and confiscated his passport,” Reade recalled. She said Ritter’s passport was never returned to him by the US authorities. “Usually, that indicates that someone is under investigation because they take away your passport,” she said.
The government in Washington has been “going after Scott Ritter for years” since “he spoke out against the war in Iraq and revealed that… the US government lied about the weapons of mass destruction,” the former Biden aide claimed. The persecution of the journalist and commentator – whose views on the conflict between Russia and Ukraine, as well as Israel’s war in Gaza, contrast sharply with those of the White House – is “just a pattern of what you are seeing in the US, which is the surveillance state and authoritative government,” she argued. “We have the illusion of free speech. We have that illusion of a right to travel. But in reality, it is only allowed if we say what the US wants people to say, otherwise you are at risk,” Reade said. She also suggested that, since Kamala Harris replaced Joe Biden as the Democratic presidential candidate last month, the party is “going back to the old Russiagate hysteria.”

The American Police State Has Murdered the Constitution (Paul Craig Roberts)
An American, even a former US Marine and UN weapons inspector, who takes issue with official explanations dear to Washington’s heart, will be accused, as Scott Ritter is, of manipulating the American public “on behalf of the Russian government.” In other words free speech, especially if it is true, is now effectively criminalized despite its Constitutional protection. For many years it has been impossible for many truths to be stated in the print and TV media. The official stories of 9/11, “Covid pandemic,” “Covid vaccine,” Washington’s invasions of Afghanistan and the Middle East, immigration, Israel’s takeover of Palestine, the conflict in Ukraine and others are off limits to skepticism. The alternative Internet media is the only source of information, and now it is being closed down by police state intimidation of Tulsi Gabbard and Scott Ritter and by the destruction of the website Vdare.
The assaults on Donald Trump shows us that not even a President in office is secure from fantastic police state charges. Try to imagine what it means that a New York state judge has set a September date for sentencing the Republican nominee for President seven weeks before the election. Here is real election interference, whereas Trump is being sentenced for interfering in an election by allegedly misreporting a business expense. That such total nonsense can occur in an American court with complicity of an American jury proves that the rule of law is dead and buried in America. Now it has gone beyond the law. It is the Constitution itself that is brushed aside in Washington’s fanatical determination to protect its lies. I have already noticed that alternative news websites are pulling in their horns. Soon we will know nothing.

Decay, Decrepitude, Deceit in Journalism (Ray McGovern)
Mainstream journalism has successfully buried parts of the Russiagate story, including the role played by former President Barack Obama. Was Obama aware of the “Russian hack” chicanery? There’s ample evidence he was “all in.” More than a month before the 2016 election, while the F.B.I. was still waiting for the findings of cyber-firm CrowdStrike, which the Democratic Party had hired in place of the F.B.I. to find out who had breached their servers, Obama told Clapper and Dept. of Homeland Security head Jeh Johnson not to wait. So with the election looming, the two dutifully published a Joint Statement on Oct. 7, 2016: “The U.S. Intelligence Community (USIC) is confident that the Russian Government directed the recent compromises of e-mails from US persons and institutions, including from US political organizations. The recent disclosures of alleged hacked e-mails on sites like DCLeaks.com and WikiLeaks and by the Guccifer 2.0 online persona are consistent with the methods and motivations of Russian-directed efforts. These thefts and disclosures are intended to interfere with the US election process. … “

This is not unique to the US. All of NATOstan is in on the game of suppressing wrong thought.
No one exemplifies the loss of free speech more than Julian. Fortunately he is now out of the hell hole prison and with his family.

At least some cheerful news!

The UK is now arresting people for X posts they don't like.

The first person arrested was Bernie Spofforth from Cheshire. This 55-year-old woman made posts aimed at inciting racial hatred and spreading fake data about the identity of the suspect

No wonder there's chaos in the streets.

UK riots: Just ignore the real problem and blame it all on the ‘far right’

A couple of good commentaries on the situation in the UK

Tony Norfield: UK Crisis - the EU’s Confusing Policies - Gaza and Ukraine Getting Worse? (48 min)

George can deliver a righteous rant...

It’s Britain’s Kristallnacht (19 min)

I wonder if the deep state isn't behind these riots (as I suspect they ere involved in the BLM and Jan 6 events) in order to prepare more control and create a bigger censorship highway.

Let's move across the Atlantic and look at America's decline...

I've long been hopeful the dollar would crash before we start WWIII. It looks like the race is on...
As stock market crashes, is US facing new financial crisis? Economist Michael Hudson explains
(1.25 hour) The stock market crashed on August 5, in a new "Black Monday". What caused it? Is the USA on the verge of a new financial crisis? Ben Norton is joined by economist Michael Hudson to discuss the extreme volatility, AI / Big Tech bubble, Japanese yen carry trade unwind, Chinese economy, and geopolitical dangers.

"Start PREPARING Yourself..." - Gerald Celente (13 min)

"You're gonna see a banking crisis the likes of which we've never seen before,” warns Gerald Celente, American trend forecaster and publisher of the Trends Journal. He also warns that banks are defaulting one after another, with insufficient coverage by mainstream media.

Is U.S. Dollar Becoming an ‘Unhinged Paper Currency’? ‘It’s Worst It’s Ever Been!’ – Art Laffer
(1.25 hours) Dr. Arthur Laffer, Founder & Chairman of Laffer Associates and Former Economic Advisor to President Reagan and President Trump. Laffer says the U.S. dollar is moving towards becoming an “unhinged paper currency.” He discusses de-dollarization, the implications of the weaponization of the U.S. dollar, and the competing global payment alternatives gaining traction, including Bitcoin and gold. He also shares his thoughts on Bidenomics and the failed policies of the current administration.
The first few minutes is worth you time.

De-dollarization accelerates as China's RMB soars past Euro, Yen; China builds new financial system

(11 min)
Worldwide adoption of China's currency, the renminbi (RMB), is gaining steam as the de-dollarization push takes hold across the non-G7 countries.
Two macro factors are accelerating the growth of the RMB in place of the US dollar as the preferred currency for trading and settlements. The economic sanctions against Russia, which froze and then seized billions of dollars of Russian USD reserves held in custody in Western banks, are forcing countries and companies to de-risk by moving their reserves from SWIFT-associated financial institutions. Another crucial factor is the high US interest rates, which are sucking in hundreds of billions of dollars from global accounts to feed huge and growing fiscal deficits.
High US government borrowing causes USD to be drained from the global system. Ironically, this causes USD to gain in value outside the US, while feeding inflation and reducing the dollar's strength inside the country.
Simply by moving its USD and Euro reserves from US and European banks to Chinese-based institutions, Chinese banks enjoy the best of all worlds: they receive billions of USD and Euro every day through trading surpluses, and can then lend those foreign currencies and create assets and economic activity on their own balance sheets. Analysis of Chinese banking and lending data confirm explosive growth in Chinese lending abroad, in both RMB and USD.

DITCH THE DOLLAR: China & Russia To Use Barter to Grow Bilateral Trade & Avoid Western Sanctions

(8 min) I suspect even more trade options will evolve. The Autumn BRICS+ meeting may hold some revelations.

Geopolitical and economic turmoil w/ Martin Armstrong (Live)
Follow Armstrong Economics: https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/
Interesting discussion of the interconnections of economics and politics.

Let me wrap it up with my favorite daily report, Alex Christoforou...from Saturday (36 min)

UK warns keyboard warriors. Pelosi, The Art of Power. Kursk operation stalled. US reinforces Cyprus
I like the way Alex covers the news with humor and in natural (or urban) beauty. Somehow it makes it all more palatable.

Will humans be added to the list of endangered species? If we continue like we're going it may be a moot question. The planet and universe have always evolved and changed. Extinction is one of the tools of evolution as species become less fit for survival. Perhaps we are at that point.
There were many stories I didn't cover this week...I skipped the election of Tweedledum and Tweedledumber (but there sure are some funny clips). I keep trying to get back to the garden and farming stories, but the news cycle is in such high gear I have not managed to do so (maybe next week?)...provided WWIII doesn't break out.
Never in my seven decades has the world been in such turmoil. So next week I'll awake again each day wondering if a nuclear war has begun.

Take care friends and have a lovely Sunday and a nice week. It is a pleasant 67F this morning at the height of summer. Please add any stories I missed which interest you, or any thing else you'd like to share.