Justice Clarence Thomas in Hospital with Infection

Justice Clarence Thomas in Hospital with Infection

Freedomist Editor March 21, 2022

Justice Clarence Thomas hospitalized with infection, Supreme Court says

From abcnews.go.com
2022-03-21 13:41:24

Excerpt:

Justice Clarence Thomas has been hospitalized with an infection, the Supreme Court announced in a statement.

Thomas was admitted to Sibley Memorial Hospital in Washington, D.C., on Friday evening after experiencing flu-like symptoms, Supreme Court spokesperson Patricia McCabe said in a statement.

He was diagnosed with an infection after undergoing tests and is being treated with intravenous antibiotics, McCabe said. She did not provide more details on the nature of the infection.

“His symptoms are abating, he is resting comfortably, and he expects to be released from the hospital in a day or two,” McCabe said. “Justice Thomas will participate in the consideration and discussion of any cases for which he is not present on the basis of the briefs, transcripts and audio of the oral arguments.”

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Is it Time to Ghost the Left?

Paul Collier March 21, 2022

Your news outlets are not in the business of making money. They’re mostly subsidized by the mega corp that owns them.

Megacorpos, whatever you want to call them, produce content marketing packaged as news.

These same megacorpos have more lately also been using entertainment production more for content marketing than seeking to make profitable products.

These megacorps have been subsidized, in essense, by foreign markets, with China being bigger than maybe all the others combined. China has become the de facto subsizer of content marketing in America for the past 5-8 years.

The number one content marketing producer, by far and away, with over 80 percent shares in almost every market, is the DNC and the coalition of hate and opportunism that supports this death machine.

The DNC has been using megacorps, and being used by them as well (these folks are all always only frenemies), to push narratives and create ‘realities’ that create support for destroying a Constitutional Republican America, by any means necessary, as this slows down the mega-powered minute few from being able to move as quickly at manipulating society to their advantage as the rest of the world can, especially their number one frenemy, China.

None of these nation-states have a people with such a sense of individual liberty entitlement, and the DNC and megacorp coalition want nothing more than to join the rest of the world at the expense of American individual rights.

None of the major social and cultural means of production owners (and there’s maybe 15 or 20 total companies that own 80 plus percent of most of our major markets) have any interest in restoring or preserving rights for individuals. Not a one.

They want to compete with Chinese billionaires, but they imagine they can keep their DNC dangerous dragon ally on a leash.

This is not about being pro or anti-monopolistic, this is about the values of the leaders of those monopolies becoming fundamentally revolutionary in nature, antithetical to an American Constitutional Republic with a Bill of Rights that emphasizes the rights of individuals to choose their own beliefs, not have them forced on them by the powerful minute few.
Americans have a right to bad beliefs. End stop. No one can be forced to like anyone or anything or any belief or any action they choose not to like. This is America, not Soviet DNC, not yet.

The DNC looks at the megacorp Citadelians in the same way as these elites view them, as a necessary dangerous dragon ally, but one they will ultimately control.

These alliance are all frenemy alliances. Everyone in this ‘cult of self over the masses’ cabal sees themselves as the final highlander, ready to kill their best friend when the time comes. In minecraft, of course….

Perhaps it is time for the rest of us to simply start ignoring them
Those of us not fooled by the hateful agit prop, those of us not choosing to be opportunists and take advantage of the passive aggressive unaccountable type of power the DNC narratives create, and those of us who are not simple cowards afraid to speak up, might want to simply start ignoring these people altogether.

Stop complaining about their wackadoodle bad art woketarian garbage content. Laugh at it, sure, but stop acting angry. Let these fools play out their melodramatic out-of-tune song, and laugh while they drunk post their own l’s on twitter. Or not.

Maybe not even laugh at them. Just. Ignore them. They’re boring. They have like five lines and 15 words they use, and that’s about it. They’re not even entertaining lolcows at this point. They’re not even cringe. They’re just…….boring.

All this to say, if you can, just turn them off, tune them out, and make your own content if you have to.

We who have not gone insane will find each other and be there for our former friends and family when they stumble out of the mist and ask themseles “What the heck was I thinking?”

Unlike the left, we have mercy, we have grace, so no one who wants back will be rejected. No one gets permabanned for their crappy beliefs alone.

So yeah, just tune out and create. That’s my take.

World Situation Report – March 18th, 2022

Michael Cessna March 18, 2022

Welcome to the World Situation Report For March 18th, 2022

The goal of this column is to present news from around the world that is not often – if ever – covered by more mainstream entities, using local sources wherever possible, but occasionally using news aggregators not used, again, by the mainstream media. Also, please note that we do use links to Wikipedia; while Wikipedia is well-known as a largely-useless site for any kind of serious research, it does serve as a launch-pad for further inquiry, in addition to being generally free of malicious ads. As with anything from Wikipedia, always verify their sources before making any conclusions based on their pages.

This column will cover the preceding week of news.

North America

Starting off in the United States, a wave of bomb threats were called in across the country, to everything from junior and high schools, to grocery stores, a YMCA, a comedy club and even to facilitate a back robbery. Just a short sample of stories are under the links below:

[Source 1] – [Source 2] – [Source 3] – [Source 4] – [Source 5] – [Source 6] – [Source 7]

Meanwhile, 21 year/old Elvin Hunter Bgorn Williams pleaded guilty to attempting to join the Islamic State in May of 2021. Williams was arrested by FBI agents as he attempted to board a flight bound for Cairo, Egypt. Williams had come to the attention of Federal law enforcement some five years ago, when he was reportedly kicked off of social media for expressing his opinion that the 2017 suicide attack on the Manchester, England Arena following a concert headlined by singer Ariana Grande was justified because of how she dressed on stage. The Seattle-area mosque Williams attended attempted to de-radicalize him, even obtaining a laptop and cellphone for him, to help him find a job; however, after finding him using the devices to view extremist content online, the mosque demanded the devices be returned and contacted the FBI. The mosque was not named in court documents. Williams was arrested after contacting what he believed to be Islamic State recruiters.

[Source 1] – [Source 2] – [Source 3]

Finally, the US Consulate in Nueva Laredo, in Mexico’s Tamaulipas State, announced that it will be temporarily closed to the public, after being hit by gunfire from suspected gangs on the night of March 13-14, following the arrest of Juan Gerardo Trevino, or “El Huevo,” the purported leader of the Cartel of the Northeast, a breakaway group that calved off of the Los Zetas criminal syndicate.

There was no word on when full operations at the consulate might resume.

[Source 1] – [Source 2]

Europe

Turning to Europe, in a disturbing possible expansion of the current war in the Ukraine, a pair of drone aircraft, reported to be a Tu-141 dating from the Soviet era, in current use by Ukrainian forces, crashed near the outskirts of the capital city of Zagreb, Croatia, while a current-model Orlan-10 scouting drone, believed to be in exclusive use by Russian forces, was discovered crashed in a field northern Romania, signalling a possible spill-over in the on-going fighting.

Both vehicles were reported to have contained traces of explosive material, although investigations by local authorities continue.

NATO officials confirmed that NATO air defense units had tracked the Tu-141 as it flew through the airspace of member-states Hungary and Croatia, but made no effort to intercept the drone. Croatia and Hungary have both raised protests with NATO, as well as launching investigations within their own air defense forces as to why the six-ton, forty-seven foot long was not intercepted before crashing near a large dormitory of an unnamed university, reportedly damaging some 40 vehicles.

The Tu-141 was long ago replaced in the Russian inventory by newer designs, but numerous examples are known to be operated by Ukraine, leading to speculation that some may have been armed by the Ukrainian Armed Forces as long-range strike weapons

Although the Orlan-10 is normally unarmed, the small Russian drones are known to be capable of carrying small ordnance of c.15lbs.

[Source 1] – [Source 2]

In the southern port city of Marseilles, France, meanwhile one police officer was hospitalized and two others injured after a man attacked the officers with a knife, according to reports, on March 12. The reason for the attack remains unclear. The perpetrator, who apparently was unknown to police for any prior offenses, was killed by other offices after “warning shots” were fired. An investigation is underway in an attempt to determine if the attack has any terrorist connections.

[Source 1] – [Source 2]

Africa

Turning to Africa, Moroccan police arrested five suspects on the 16th, on suspicion of being affiliated with the Islamic State, and plotting attacks throughout Morocco.

[Source 1] – [Source 2]

Further south, the West Africa region, thirteen gendarmes were killed by unidentified gunmen in the northern region of Burkina Faso.

In northwestern Nigeria, meanwhile, a wave of kidnappings is sparking fears of a return to “forced recruitment” by terror groups such as Boko Haram, although the kidnappings could be related to “forced labor human-trafficking groups” (i.e., slavers).

In Central Africa, the so-called “Allied Democratic Forces”, an Islamist terror group operating in Uganda and the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC) with ties to ISCAP, continued their offensive in the northeastern DRC province of Ituri, killing as many as fifty-two civilians in attacks on four villages. This comes as one of the ADF’s main leaders, Kabanda Abdulla Musa, was arrested by Ugandan authorities following a series of surprise raids in that country’s border region with the DRC.

In the nation of Sudan, at least 133 pro-democracy demonstrators were injured in crackdowns against protests against the October 25, 2021 coup d’état in the African nation that placed General Abdel Fattah al-Burhan at the head of a military junta.

[Source 1] – [Source 2] – [Source 3] – [Source 4] – [Source 5] – [Source 6] – [Source 7] – [Source 8] – [Source 9]

Arabia

Moving to the Arabian Peninsula, the war in Yemen grinds on, with near-continuous air strikes by Saudi-led coalition jets being countered by Houthi strikes against oil refineries by bomb-carrying drones attacking the vulnerable facilities. The confusing, multi-sided conflict – part of the 40+ year-old Saudi-Iranian Proxy War – is now in its seventh year, with no end in sight.

[Source 1] – [Source 2] – [Source 3] – [Source 4] – [Source 5] – [Source 6]

Middle East

In the Middle East, proper, Israeli government websites were targeted in a large-scale cyber attack on the 14th, as Palestinian confrontations with Israeli security forces in the West Bank killed two, with three more being arrested.

Throughout Iraq and Syria, sporadic, low-level fighting continues, including attacks on US logistics convoys rolling north into Iraq from Kuwait, as well as attacks on Iraqi Army commanders by numerous groups.

This comes as Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) fired a series of twelve ballistic missiles into the Kurdish city of Erbil on the 13th. The IRGC claimed the attacks were in response to purported attacks on an Iranian drone factory by Israel’s Mossad intelligence service, in February and March of this year.

[Source 1] – [Source 2] – [Source 3] – [Source 4] – [Source 5] – [Source 6] -[Source 7] – [Source 8] – [Source 9] – [Source 10]

South Asia

In South Asia, Pakistani security forces reportedly killed one of the architects of the March 4th attack on a Peshawar mosque that killed 64 and wounded 190.

To the south, in Balochistan, 4 gendarmes of the Frontier Corps (FC) were killed and eight wounded in an IED attack on an FC convoy on the 15th. Elsewhere, in North Waziristan, security forces killed four suspected terrorists in a pair of gun battles, after acting on tips.

[Source 1] – [Source 2] – [Source 3]

Turning to India, Indian security forces have reportedly killed 39 terrorists in Jammu & Kashmir, so far this year, although continual skirmishing with Islamic terror groups continues.

Meanwhile, four terrorists from Bangladesh, from the Jamaat-ul-Mujahideen Bangladesh (JMB) group, were captured in the northern city of Bhopal, along with laptops and explosives.

Finally, in Central India’s “Red Corridor”, several Communist guerilla’s were killed in encounters with various security forces, while others planted a crude IED at a train station in the northern city of Bihar. The device was discovered and disarmed by police, disrupting rail operations for over three hours.

[Source 1] – [Source 2] – [Source 3] – [Source 4] – [Source 5] – [Source 6] – [Source 7] – [Source 8] – [Source 9]

How The US Could Counter Putin

Bill Collier March 13, 2022

William Collier- Regardless of HOW and WHY we, the US, got to this place of Russian revanchism, which was certainly goaded on by the would-be globalist hegemonic ruling class of the West, the situation now is that Russsia has become a hazard to our country and its allies. We can leave for future articles how we the freedom-loving masses ought to deal with our own corrupt ruling class who are to blame for this and focus for now on how we, as the US, might contend with the Putinistas, basically Putin and the oligarchs who support him.

We can start with the premise that Putin’s strength comes from a 60% to 70% approval among the Russian people because, basically, although it’s never quite as simple as this, he is viewed as a strong man and Russians, in the main, but not all Russians, adore the strong and despise the weak. There may be many reasons for this, but in general, when a leader is seen as strong they enjoy support, even if in character and in how they treat the Russian people, they are corrupt and evil.

This may SOMEWHAT be shifting as more and more Russians do not cotton to such thinking, but among most, among at least 60% if polling is accurate, it still holds that “strong is good and weak is bad.”

Keep this in mind.

Next, let’s consider three other factors: Russia has a basically under-developed and corrupt economic system, Russia is essentially a gas station, and the only real power Russia has is their nuclear arms.

So now we have four key things: Russians support the strong and hate the weak, Russia has an underdeveloped economy due to massive corruption, Russia’s only economic asset is gas and oil, and the only real military strength they have is nuclear arms.

The Putinistas are authoritarian and corrupt. While they cater to the Russian nationalist sentiment and some rightly see them as a counter to the West’s vision of a globalist corporate-government hegemony that is directly against nationalist sovereignty, the Putinistas are mostly for themselves first. Perhaps in Putin’s mind he and his cronies ARE the living embodiment of Russia, but the net effect is all wealth and power centers on Moscow and to hell with everyone else.

Add to all this that we, as in the US, have other fish to fry, as it were. We face threats in many quartets.

Internally we have this corporate-led assault on our history and way of life through the cancel-culture wokatariate and their rather intolerant behavior toward anyone who refuses to ditch their Judeo-Christian values for the new alt-gendered fantasy they call progress. On the other hand we have a reactionary core who, in response to this, are embracing things like identitarianism and either racial separatism or racial supremacism, and this could grow.

But externally we have threats coming from places like Iran and China, North Korea, Pakistan, Cuba, and Venezuela, among others.

Thankfully, at this time, our internal and external threats haven’t unified. The true powers, as in the actual shot-callers behind each of these threats, are as much against each other as they may be a threat to the people of the United States of America.

With all this in mind, how do we, as in the US, counter Putin and his cronies?

At the basic level we have to seek ways, in every possible arena, to make him and his cronies look weak and powerless. His chosen arena is Ukraine and while countering him there may be important, as we analyze all the arenas Russia must operate in we will find many opportunities to out Putin on his back foot.

First, there is the more obvious fact Russia depends on energy exportation. Second, there are Russian goals in Syria whose regime Putin props up. Third, there is the Russian defense industry which exports weapons all over the world. Fourth, there are Russian territories claimed by Japan and China. Fifth, there are Russian economic and investment schemes in Africa.

All these vulnerabilities present opportunities to bring pain to bear and make Putin look weak.

In Syria, for instance, and with Iran as her ally, Russia has severe disadvantages if we care to exploit them. The US can shut Iran off from all exports and imports via the sea. The US can arm anti-Assad forces in Syria while Russia cannot bring seaborn reinforcements as long as the war in Ukraine is happening. These moves would potentially force the Russians out of Syria and would demonstrate how Russia could do nothing to help their ally Iran.

As for Ukraine itself, efforts to continue to supply Ukraine with anti-air and anti-armor weapons and munitions should continue apace, albeit through many points and not via massive convoys the Russians can bomb. The erosion of Russian military might in Ukraine plays into a narrative that Putin is weak.

Now let’s consider all the places where Russia is vulnerable internally and use our covert means to foment trouble on every periphery. Russia has a substantial and growing, and disaffected, Muslim minority, some of whom may feel strongly that Russia is their foe. Russia has cordial relations with the Central Asian countries, this is something we ought to be undermining.

We can support the opposition in Belarus and Khazajstan, for instance, and foment unrest at a time when Russia cannot spare forces to put them down.

Instead of thinking holistically about a global response on Russia’s periphery, the present US administration, whose policies in line with past Presidents have goaded the Russians into attacking Ukraine, are thinking in a very limited and one-dimensional way. They are actually perpetuating the mythos of Putin as a strong man who they are powerless to stop because it might “escalate” things. Having goaded the Russians we are now saying we don’t want to escalate things further with them lest they unleash nuclear holocaust.

It would have been better to counsel the Ukrainians to pursue strong neutrality, to cool their ambitions to join the EU and NATO, and to actually invest in a credible air defense, which they neglected up until now. As for whether or not the US actually operates or funds biolabs and whether or not they are former Soviet labs or present-day bioweapons programs, the activities of the US, under Fauci’s management, in these things remains suspect.

But, be that as it may, the mythos of Russia as being 10 feet tall and Putin being beyond our reach stems from the fact we are playing in his sandbox and on his terms instead of taking a holistic approach. Goading the Russians into a war that is spiraling out of control was bad policy, but now that we have, the question is, “should we retreat and let Putin be the strong man or should we take the battle into arenas where he is helpless?”

Undermining Putin’s standing as a strong man is the easiest way to depict him as weak and undermine his support among his people but, most importantly, his fellow oligarchs.

The fact the US is not taking a holistic view of limiting Putin’s power and is not encouraging peace in Ukraine based on neutrality may prove that the people pulling the levers of power in Washington today aren’t really doing so in the interest of the American people.

Use Gold to End Inflation Without Recession

Ralph Benko March 11, 2022

By Ralph J. Benko

Donald Trump, inadvertently, certainly, and unnoticed, virtually, has put his successor Joe Biden in the hot seat. How so?

As Nobel economics laureate Milton Friedman famously declared and later distinguished economists confirmed it takes up to two years before the Fed’s overenthusiastic gunning of the money supply shows up in consumer prices.

Called: “inflation.” Let’s rewind.

But first… inflation is a misnomer. Rising prices are just a symptom of the real problem: a sinking dollar.

Donald Trump spent a lot of time pounding the table for a weaker dollar going on two years ago:

Bloomberg, March 3, 2019: Trump Says Dollar Too Strong in Renewed Criticism of Powell;
- Reuters, June 25, 2019: Trump thinks dollar is too strong, blames Fed policy;
- Reuters, November 18, 2019: Trump says he told Fed’s Powell US interest rates are too high.

Trump, a very “in the moment” guy, surely had no idea that a weak dollar would cause inflation later. But … you get the drift.

Fed chairman Jay Powell discretely accommodated Trump’s incessant demands. Now Trump’s inflation chickens are coming home to roost … in the Biden henhouse.

A president, after a lag, always gets the dollar – weak or strong – he wants. This is an open secret. As I wrote at Forbes back in 2014:

As journalist Steven Solomon wrote in his indispensable exploration of the Fed, The Confidence Game: How Unelected Central Bankers Are Governing the Changed World Economy (Simon & Schuster, 1995):

“Although they strained to portray themselves as nonthreatening, nonpartisan technician-managers of the status quo, central bankers, like proverbial Supreme Court justices reading election returns, used their acute political antennae to intuit how far they could lean against the popular democratic winds. ‘Chairmen of the Federal Reserve,’ observes ex-Citibank Chairman Walter Wriston, ‘have traditionally been the best politicians in Washington. The Fed serves a wonderful function. They get beat up on by the Congress and the administration. Everyone knows the game and everyone plays it. But no one wants their responsibility.’”

True news.

Yet old news.

What’s weird and unsettling is that virtually nobody in Washington is pinning the blame where it obviously belongs, on Donald Trump’s weak dollar demands. The Pachyderms, who know better, or should, blame inflation on the big Democratic Party-led spending.

Balderdash! Yet it’s understandable that Pachyderms would wish to avoid placing blame on their former titular leader, the punitive Trump. Truth be told, the GOP spent at least as drunkenly as the Dems. But it’s plain dopey to pin a monetary disorder, inflation, on fiscal policy.

So, what’s up with the Donks? Instead of sticking their archnemesis Trump with the blame that belongs to him they are making absurd claims that Greedy Big Business is at fault for rising prices. Preposterous.

We have known at least as far back as Adam Smith that businessmen will always conspire to raise prices. Smith, who practically invented capitalism, called out the greed of businessmen explicitly in capitalism’s bible, Wealth of Nations.

It’s not munificence or counsels of civic virtue that constrains businesspeople from raising prices. It’s competition.

Big Businesswomen (and men!) are no greedier now than they were before inflation kicked up. Profit maximization is a constant among the merchant class.

So, by blaming Big Business, Biden and the Bidenistas are making a transparently absurd argument. Nobody to the right of Bernie Sanders – meaning, most Americans – buys this lame story.

This is doubly weird because the midterm elections are coming up. These will be a referendum on the government’s pandemic response … and inflation.

This farce would be funny if the joke weren’t on us. With both the Republicans and Democrats getting the cause of inflation badly wrong we are likely to get continuing inflation… followed by a cure as bad as, or worse: recession.

As the Wall Street Journal recently observed, “Historically, the Fed hasn’t been able to push down inflation without a recession.” This, sadly, is true enough. Yet a recession really isn’t required to cure inflation.

H.L. Mencken once wrote that “Democracy is the theory that the common people know what they want, and deserve to get it good and hard.” So long as the Republicans and the Democrats are engaging exclusively in blame-shifting, rather than restoring the proven-effective supply-side policies of stabilizing the dollar and keeping tax rates reasonably low, we common people are going to get it good and hard.

That said, nobody I know of in power in America is looking at the real, historically proven, Constitutional solution. That would be making the dollar legally convertible into gold at a fixed price, say $2,000/oz.

After a short adjustment period gold convertibility would end inflation while creating a wonderful climate of equitable prosperity and job creation. The gold standard worked extraordinarily well for almost 200 years!

Gold is out of fashion with the smart set, such as PhD economists who haven’t delivered anything nearly as good. Nothing else has worked nearly as well as gold.

And so here we are, facing the worst inflation in 40 years. Our politicians giving us a Hobson’s Choice between seeing our savings and salaries shrink in buying power, by inflation, or seeing our neighbors, or even ourselves, thrown out of work by a completely unnecessary recession.

Yikes! Money printer go brrr?

It falls to us—including you, dear reader—to contact our Representatives by their websites, emails, phone calls and even good old-fashioned letters. Guide their footsteps back onto the Paths of Righteousness. Tell them:

“You shall not press down upon the brow of labor this crown of thorns; you shall not crucify mankind upon a cross of federal reserve notes!”

Onward to a golden age.

#

© 2022 by Ralph J. Benko, co-author of The Capitalist Manifesto and chairman and co-founder of “The Capitalist League,” is the founder of The Prosperity Caucus and is an original Kemp-era member of the Supply-Side revolution that propelled the Dow from 814 to its current heights, doubled American real per capita GDP, and world GDP from $11T to $94T.

Ukraine Hopes Home Drone Defense Can Defeat Russia

Mark Clouse March 10, 2022

Ukrainian drone owners are using their drones in a range of ways to resist the Russian army. There is a great risk involved if your drone is from China, as it has a special feature that allows the operator of the drone to be easily located. However, there are workarounds that all but eliminate the problem. The drones have been used for a variety of missions, including being used as drone suicide bombers.
The pattern is emerging for how retail drones come into play in any conflict, starting with earnestness in Syria and reaching new strategic expressions over the skies of Livya, where Turkey emerged as a drone superpower, along with China. Today, Turkey is arming the Ukrainian military with the now legendary Bayraktar,
The future of war is drones. The future of self-defense is drones. The future of associative defense is drones. The Ukraine War is becoming an inexact proving ground for the ability of drones to either defend or propel offenses in a modern conventional war. My supposition is that drones are leveling the playing field for the smaller, defensive, or insurgent powers, which could be a great opportunity for liberty to emerge, or great risk for any short-term return to stability.

Ukraine Drone Enthusiasts Form Flying Fury Force To Thwart Russian Forces

From amp.hothardware.com
2022-03-07 20:34:59

Excerpt:

Drone enthusiasts in Ukraine have volunteered to use their flying skills in an attempt to combat Russians forces. This is a major shift from flying their drones as a hobby, to flying them to save potentially save lives. One retail store in the capital city of Kyiv has emptied its stock, as it has given out some 300 DJI drones for the purpose of war related missions. Others throughout Ukraine are attempting to get their hands on more drones from friends and colleagues in Poland and other places throughout Europe.

“Why are we doing this? We have no other choice. This is our land, our home,” stated Denys Sushko, head of operations at Kyiv-based industrial drone technology company DroneUA. Before the war, the company sold mainly to farmers and energy companies.

Read Full Article

Report Connects Amazon to Uyghur Forced Labor Camps

Mark Clouse March 10, 2022

Amazon has been caught, again, and again and again, doing business in China with firms that do business with Chinese Forced Labor Camps. Some of these Forced Labor Camps are Uyghur labor camps. In addition to Amazon, Apple also was found to have ties to many of these same labor-camp-powered Chinese manufacturing firms. The report comes from the Tech Transparency Project.

According to Tech Transparency Project, two of these companies were Luxshare Precision Industry and AcBel Polytech, who also do business with Apple. Both Apple and Amazon have fully embraced the woketarian corporatism also reflected politically in the DNC, yet while they preach moral supremacism at home, equality, social justice, they make products for the world from the labor of political prisoners and victims of genocide.

In response to the report, Amazon Inc issued this vague statement, “Amazon complies with the laws and regulations in all jurisdictions in which it operates, and expects suppliers to adhere to our Supply Chain Standards. We take allegations of human rights abuses seriously, including those related to the use or export of forced labor. Whenever we find or receive proof of forced labor, we take action…”

Amazon suppliers reportedly have ties to forced labor camps in China

From www.yahoo.com
2022-03-08 00:28:09

Excerpt:

A number of Amazon’s Chinese suppliers are linked to from China’s Xinjiang region, according to a new from the Tech Transparency Project. The organization found that five of Amazon’s suppliers have been directly accused by watchdog groups and journalists of relying on workers from China’s many , which it uses to detain Uyghur Muslims, Kazakhs and other ethnic minorities. The suppliers produce Amazon devices and Amazon-branded products, such as the line of home goods and tech accessories.

“The findings raise questions about Amazon’s exposure to China’s repression of minority Uyghurs in Xinjiang—and the extent to which the e-commerce giant is adequately vetting its supplier relationships,” wrote the authors of the report. “Amazon says that its suppliers ‘must not use forced labor’ and that it ‘does not tolerate suppliers that traffic workers or in any other way exploit workers by means of threat, force, coercion, abduction, or fraud.’ But its supplier list tells a…

Read Full Article

Like the DNC, China Wants to Censor Internet Misinformation

Paul Collier March 10, 2022

A high-level member of the political advisory board of the Chinese Communist Party has been telegraphing the next move by Chairman Xi’s party to assure that any dissent that might grow is nipped in the bud before it ever blooms. To that end, the high-ranking member of the prestigious political advisory board, Jia Qungguo, has been complaining about the proliferation of ‘misinformation’ on the Chinese Communist Party controlled internet.

Jia said, “….there are often people online who, for some purpose, package a foreigner’s vicious remarks against China as the view of everyone in that country towards China in order to incite the Chinese people’s dissatisfaction and hostility towards said country and its people,”

You see, friends, if we can’t all reflect the world policies of the state, how can we be trusted, how can we be safe as a people? In the name of protecting citizens from dangerous thoughts that could lead others to make bad decisions, the DNC pushes for hate speech laws and more social media censorship, following, it would seem, this model that has been used for centuries in China, the Chinese Communist Party method of controlling and eliminating potential competition, dissent.

Chinese government adviser calls for law to ban ‘fake news’ | China

From www.theguardian.com
2022-03-08 12:29:00

Excerpt:

An adviser to the Chinese government has called for new laws to ban “fabricating and disseminating fake information online”, blaming the rampant disinformation on the internet for polarising Chinese public opinion.

Jia Qingguo, a member of China’s highest political advisory body, said he also believed the proliferation of misinformation online had fuelled tensions between China and foreign countries.

“For example, there are often people online who, for some purpose, package a foreigner’s vicious remarks against China as the view of everyone in that country towards China in order to incite the Chinese people’s dissatisfaction and hostility towards said country and its people,” Jia said in an interview on Saturday with online news portal The Cover, which is affiliated with the state-owned Sichuan Daily.

The former dean of the prestigious Peking University’s School of International Studies added that the spread of fake news could harm national interests, and lead to public confusion and social division. He called on Beijing to introduce specific measures to “severely punish” those who create false information to “cause serious harm to society”.

Read Full Article

World Situation Report — March 10th, 2022

Michael Cessna March 9, 2022

Welcome to the World Situation Report For March 10th, 2022

This is a new column for the Freedomist. I am delighted to be able to join the Freedomist team, and to once again work with William Collier, my long-time friend and editor. For those who may have followed my work at the Military Gazette, this column is a version of MilitaryGazette’s “World SITREP” column. The goal of this column is to present news from around the world that is not often – if ever – covered by more mainstream entities, using local sources wherever possible, but occasionally using news aggregators not used, again, by the mainstream media. Also, please note that I do use links to Wikipedia; while Wikipedia is well-known as a largely-useless site for any kind of serious research, it does serve as an introductory launch-pad for further study, in addition to being free of malicious ads. As with anything from Wikipedia, always verify their sources before making any conclusions based on their pages.

This column will cover the preceding week of news.

That said, let’s move on to the news…

Japan Moves Ahead with Plans to Deploy Automated Cargo Vessels

Japan has decided to proceed with automating sea-going cargo vessels, as falling numbers of skilled crews and the dream of increased profits tempt executives to give automation a chance.

The falling numbers of people willing to take the very real risks of a life working the sea is real. Despite the comparatively low crew requirements of modern ships, compared to older vessels, increasing traffic from more and more hulls in the water have balanced out the numbers. However, for some decades, fewer and fewer people sign up with merchant shipping academies, making qualified crew hires a priority. In such an environment, the allure of a completely automated cargo vessel, requiring no crew to pay or insure, is very real.

The problems, of course, are legion: many ports have strict rules concerning pilots coming aboard to conn ships, not least because channel conditions change, sometimes frequently; ships also require underway maintenance – engines are reliable, but issues frequently occur. The number of things that can go wrong on any seagoing ship are too numerous to go into in any detail here, but having crew aboard to address the problem as it occurs is a problem Japan will need to address, before most ports – and shipping companies – are going to accept completely robotic cargo ships…

…And that’s before we address pirates, and hacking.

TFI Global – Japan moving ahead with automating cargo vessels:

Source 1

Source 2

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Merchant Ships Attacked In Ukrainian Waters, France Seizes Russian Freighter

As the war in Ukraine intensifies, cargo vessels are suddenly finding themselves in the midst of a deadly crossfire. As of 2/26/2022, the Moldovan-flagged chemical tanker “Millennial Spirit”, carrying 600 tonnes of diesel fuel (with a Russian crew), was apparently shelled by a Russian warship, seriously injuring two of the crew; the Turkish owned “Yasa Jupiter” was struck by a bomb (with no reported casualties, thankfully), and is limping towards Romanian waters; and the Panamanian-flagged bulk freighter “Namura Queen”, loaded with wheat, was struck by a rocket on her stern; she is currently underway, making for a safe port near Istanbul, Turkey.

A large number of non-combatant vessels remain tied to docks in harbors and estuaries as fighting continues to rage around them. These vessels will be hard-pressed to leave on their own, as Ukrainian harbor pilots are obviously occupied elsewhere.

Meanwhile, France has seized the Russian-owned vessel “Baltic Leader” in the English Channel, on suspicion of being on the list of sanctioned Russian companies black-listed by the European Union (EU), NATO and the United States.

Contrary to popular belief, wars are not “good” for business – preparing for war is good for business, not actually fighting it. With the world logistics system still reeling from Covid-related delays and the Ever Given accident that blocked the Suez Canal for almost a full week, delaying schedules and causing knock-on effects throughout the fragile global logistics network, it is hard to detail specifically what effects Putin’s War will have on the global shipping industry, but it is unlikely to be good.

Source 1

Source 2

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5KFPAOgCfGM

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Turning to US national news…..

Bomb Threat Disrupts Ferry Operation

A bomb threat against the Bainbridge Island – Bremerton disrupted ferry service on March 6th. Police explosive-sniffing K-9’s cleared the ferry “Tacoma” to return to service by 1pmPST…

[Source]

Also on the 6th, two persons attempted to rush the main gate at Joint Base Andrews (JBA) – home of the Presidential transport squadrons – at approximately 9pm, but were stopped by alert guards and automated barricades. One of the individuals (a 17-year old male) was captured, and the other is being sought. Although reports remain foggy, at least one of the persons (the individual captured by security) was armed. No shots were fired, despite initial reports of an “active shooter”.

As of this writing, the other individual remains at large. No information has been released on either individual involved in the incident, although the 316th Security Forces Group and local authorities have stated that the at-large individual is not on the base.

Vice President Harris and various other members of the cabinet had been aboard JBS earlier in the evening, boarding a flight to Selma, Alabama, but were not present at the time of the incident.

[Source 1]

[Source 2]

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While, in international news….

Europe & Australia

Proving that some people just want to act out, thus making martyrs where they don’t need to, a makeshift “bomb” was thrown onto the ground of the Russian diplomatic mission to The Hague, in the Netherlands, while an envelop containing an unspecified “white powder” was mailed to the Russian embassy in Canberra, the Australian capitol, this week….

[Source 1]

[Source 2]

In Sweden, meanwhile, it seems that the so-called “Islamic State” – still extant – will take anyone, as a 49-year old woman was convicted of not preventing her then 12-year old son from being recruited to fight for the terror group in 2013. The child, along with his father and an older brother, were all subsequently killed fighting for the IS. The mother denied any wrongdoing, saying that she had been “lured” to Syria in 2013 by her husband…no word on what she thought was happening in Syria at that time.

[Source]

In Turkey, riot police celebrated International Women’s Day by firing tear gas at demonstrators attempting to join a women’s march. The demonstrators are engaged in protests against the Erdogan government’s withdrawal from a European treaty on combating violence against women last year.

[Source]

Meanwhile, Turkey has also arrested or is seeking to arrest over one hundred individuals that the government claims were involved in the attempted coups-de-tat against the Erdogan government in July of 2016.

[Source]

Turning to Africa…

Major fighting continues in the West African nations of Mali, Niger and Nigeria, as local security forces battle on against the Boko Haram, the “Islamic State in the Greater Sahara” and the “Islamic State/West Africa Province (ISWAP)” terror groups.

Malian Army (FAMa) forces beat back an attack by ISWAP on an outpost in Mondoro, in the central part of the country, on March 4th, reportedly killing at least 70 terrorists, while suffering at least 27 troops dead, 33 injured, and 7 missing. The attack was described as “complex”, and involved the use of “vehicle bombs”.

To understand the scale of this fighting, the numbers being reported by FAMa are essentially two full platoons of infantry, or about two-fifths of an infantry company (generally, about 180 personnel). And this is not the first action of its kind, in this country of barely 20million people; actions on this scale have happened more than a few times. This kind of loss rate in action is rather rare, these days; to give an idea of scale, the United States lost a total of 258 personnel in the Gulf War of 1990-1991, and in the entirety of what is known as the “War on Terror“, from 2001 to today (March, 2022), the US has lost a total of 7,074 dead.

[Source]

In neighboring Niger’s southwestern Torodi region, five soldiers were killed and three more were wounded on March 6th, when their vehicle rolled over an “improvised explosive device” (IED) laid by the “Islamic State in the Greater Sahara”. Niger has approximately 12,000 troops deployed full-time in its interior, trying to fend off terror groups that have been operating in earnest in the region since early 2017.

Niger was also the scene of the October, 2017 ambush of a US Army Special Forces team and their Niger partner-forces at the village of Tongo-Tongo which killed four of the ten-man US team, and four Niger troops.

[Source]

In Nigeria’s far-northeastern region, Boko Haram terrorists attacked a Nigerian Army Forward Operating Base (FOB) near the town of Damasak, and were repelled with the loss of seventeen dead and three captured, along with several vehicles and weapons.

Boko Haram made its name when it appeared several years ago, by kidnapping hundreds of elementary- and middle-school children to use as either child-soldier “recruits” (for the boys) or as “wives” (for the girls) for their “troops”.

[Source]

Meanwhile, Nigeria’s “Department of State Services” (DSS) security service has reported that the “Islamic State/West Africa Province (ISWAP)” has been training suicide-bombers in the northeast of the country, as well.

[Source]

In the Middle East…

The “Middle East” remains unstable in the extreme. A small sample of the past week:

*The so-called Islamic State claimed responsibility for a suicide-bomb attack in Pakistan, that killed five security force troops when the attacker detonated their vest as a convoy rolled past in the Pakistani state of Baluchistan. This comes on the heels of the suicide attack on March 4th, in Peshawar that killed 63 and wounded nearly 200.

[Source]

*In Syria, Russian air force planes launched a series of attacks on March 4 and 5, targeting Islamic State forces in the central Resafa region of Syria’s Raqqa Governate, scene of the Islamic State’s Pyrrhic defeat and loss of their “capital” in October of 2017. While cheered at the time as signalling the “end of ISIS”, intense fighting has continued in Syria ever since, with Russian air forces launching over 900 sorties in February, alone.

[Source]

*Elsewhere in Syria, 13 Syrian Army troops were killed and 18 wounded, when the bus they were traveling in was ambushed near the ancient city of Palmyra on March 6th.

[Source]

India, for a change, was largely quiet this week. Aside from security forces being on “high alert” following the Peshawar attack, police in Assam arrested five people linked to Al-Qaeda in the Indian Subcontinent (AQIS), while arresting a Maoist leader in the city of Gaya, in the northern state of Bihar, the country was largely quiet, this week. Given the normal news cycle in India, this is a welcome change.

[Source 1]

[Source 2]

Finally, the South Korean Navy fired warning shots to ward off a North Korean patrol boat that strayed too close to Baekryeong Island, near the Northern Limit Line on the 8th. The North Korean craft was chasing an unarmed North Korean vessel, whose crew is being questioned by South Korean authorities.

[Source]

Cancel Russia- The Economic Hot War of Ukraine

Paul Collier March 8, 2022

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7gdxv37E3Qc

President Joe Biden officially announced the White House’s intentions to ban Russian oil and gas from being imported into the United States. This latest economic war action against Russia follows a list of sanctions and cancellations from American corporations, European states, and European corporations.

The move raises the stakes on Russia needing to secure a victory to secure a safe home for Putin, whose individual personality is the driving force in the decision-making process of the entire Russian state.

Rather than ending the war in the Ukraine, it might well be that the draconian moves to cut Russia off from the ‘Western’ world are pushing the world towards a type of war that will fundamentally end all that we have today, nuclear war.

The United States and Europe seem prudently willing to avoid having nuclear-powered nations’ troops clash in armed conflict, but have they considered that an economic war aimed at crippling, even destroying the Russian state could produce the same type of potential existential response?

The efforts by corporations to aggressively sanction a state far above and beyond what their own states asked of them could be the moment the cancel culture method of governance becomes cemented in the hearts and minds of the casuals, or it could be the peak of a power that is soon to be destroyed. The prospect of the former leaves me hesitant to cheer on the massive cancellation of an entire state.

Russia will not sit still, and the entire world is not cut off from Russia. The moves we are making right now are driving India into the Russia orbit, which means, given Russia and China’s increasing growing needs for one another, that India and China might soon have to mostly make nice, at least for the cameras. As usual, alliances are filled with contradictions and conflict, and this alliance will be no less contradictory or conflict-filled.

The American media, the DNC media de facto, is vilifying Russia every day in every way they can. Anti-Russianism is becoming a social pressure, and it looks more and more openly racist and bigoted every day. There is little time that anyone pauses to say, “By Russia, I mean the government, not the people.” In these hate diatribes, the Russian people are explicitly the targets of hate.

They are being sjw’d before our very eyes, and the right is cheering it on, for some reason.

Russia is run by a totalitarian killer who, to serve his own interest, invaded a nation of 40 million and proceeded to bomb their cities, their homes, even their schools. Russia, though, is doing what many of these same self-righteous nations have been doing themselves, with America being one of the clearest examples.

The actors on this stage are all ruthlessly serving their own interests, and yours aren’t theirs. Right now, they need to move to hurt Russians, to hurt Americans, to hurt Ukrainians, etc., to settle which of the concentrations of power in the world have the advantage going into the next few decades, nothing more.

Ukraine could have been a neutral buffer, but the West, with America in the lead, pushed it to be a threat to Russia. Russia could have been content with what she had, but seeing the West gain power in Ukraine prompted them to want to take it for themselves.

What follows is how the media is covering this economic war, with headers added to help you better understand the patterns that are emerging in this war. It starts with the first announcement of the US’s intention to block Russian oil and gas and ends with an analysis of what the new normal post-cancel-Russia looks like in trade.

Russia Gets Cancel Cultured for Invading the Wrong State

Biden Blocks Russian Oil, Gas

US To Block Russian Oil As Millions Flee Putin’s Invasion

From talkingpointsmemo.com
2022-03-08 15:22:41
Matt Shuham
Excerpt:

It’s thirteen days since Putin invaded Ukraine, meeting a level of resistance that’s shocked the world while isolating Russia and its people from much of the global economy.

The consequences — and battles — are continuing to play out. President Biden is expected to announce on Tuesday that the U.S. will ban imports of Russian oil and liquefied natural gas; the EU is expected to announce a plan to reduce its reliance on Russian gas.

It’s a strike at the hydrocarbon core of Russia’s economy, but one that is limited by its nature. The Europeans remain reliant on Russian oil and gas for energy, and Russia on them for foreign currency….

Read Full Article

EU Follows Biden’s Lead

EU to phase out Russian gas, oil, coal imports

From uk.investing.com
2022-03-07 18:45:00

Excerpt:

BRUSSELS (Reuters) – European Union leaders will agree at a summit this week to phase out the EU’s dependency on imports of Russian gas, oil and coal, a draft statement showed, marking a turning point in its policy towards Moscow prompted by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.

EU leaders will meet in Versailles on Thursday and Friday to discuss boosting their joint defence capability and Ukraine’s bid to become a member of the 27-nation bloc. [L8N2V445U]

Burned by the experience of supply shortages in microchips and pharmaceuticals during the COVID-19 pandemic, the leaders will also discuss how to make the EU more strategically independent of global suppliers in these sectors and food.

Read Full Article

Immediate Costs

Analysts say alternative supplies wouldn’t be able to fully replace Russian oil

From www.cnbc.com
2022-03-08 07:47:00

Excerpt:

While there are alternatives to Russian oil, they would be insufficient or difficult logistically if the U.S. and its allies were to ban Russian energy imports, analysts said Tuesday.

“There’s just no way even OPEC+ and even combined Iran and Venezuela could make up for it,” Vandana Hari, founder of energy intelligence firm Vanda Insights, told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Asia.”

Russia’s war in Ukraine shows no sign of abating as the U.S. and its allies weigh banning Russian oil and natural gas imports. Oil prices spiked to highs not seen since 2008, though later pared those gains. There was also concern that Russia could retaliate by cutting natural gas supplies to Europe.

To be sure, some Russian capacity could be replaced, Hari said.

Russia exports about 5 million barrels of crude oil per day, according to the International Energy Agency. Of that, Hari said about 2 million could be replaced if OPEC members Saudi Arabia, Iraq, Kuwait and the United Arab Emirates “were able to simultaneously…

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Domestic Oil Opportunities?

Gov. Cox urges President Biden to eliminate barriers to increasing U.S. domestic oil and gas production

From governor.utah.gov
2022-03-08 02:31:46

Excerpt:

SALT LAKE CITY (March 7, 2022) — Gov. Spencer Cox sent a letter to President Joe Biden today encouraging him to eliminate any barriers to increasing U.S. domestic oil and gas production. Read the letter in its entirety below.

Dear Mr. President,

I appreciate many of the actions you’ve taken over the past two weeks to isolate Russia and provide support to Ukraine, and I encourage you to consider additional measures, including eliminating any barriers to increasing U.S. domestic oil and gas production. This request won’t surprise you. I have consistently urged your administration, including long before this current crisis, to end your battle against developing American energy on public lands. It is more important now than ever that the United States and our allies produce the resources that will allow the world to move away from…

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Buying Oil from Other Authoritarian States?

Biden turns to countries he once sought to avoid to find help shutting off Russia’s oil money

From localnews8.com
2022-03-08 13:14:13

Excerpt:

President Joe Biden’s urgent global search for help shutting off Russia’s oil revenues is leading, in some instances, to regimes he once sought to isolate or avoid.

Biden administration officials traveled to Venezuela over the weekend for talks on potentially allowing the country to sell its oil on the international market, helping to replace Russian fuel. Biden may travel to Saudi Arabia as the US works to convince the kingdom to increase its production. And a looming nuclear deal could bring significant volumes of Iranian oil back to the market.

Caracas, Riyadh and Tehran would have been unlikely sources of relief for a Biden-led Western alliance before the start of the war in Ukraine. But Russia’s invasion has upended international relations, forcing the US and other nations to seek out solutions in places they’d previously shunned.

In deciding the next steps, Biden administration officials are weighing a host of factors. Russia’s invasion of its neighbor, which has left scores of civilians dead, has generated immense pressure on Western nations to cut their energy ties to Moscow, including from both Democrats and Republicans in Congress. In a videoconference call with American lawmakers Saturday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky pleaded for a ban on Russian energy.

US imports from Russia make up a small slice of the energy universe — roughly 8% in 2021, of which only about 3% was crude oil. White House economic officials have been engaged for more than a week in how to manage any decision to cut off those imports, officials say.

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Russia, Ukraine Key Semiconductor Resource Providers

Will the Russia/Ukraine crisis impact semiconductor recovery?

From capital.com
2022-03-08 02:02:17

Excerpt:

The semiconductor industry is among sectors that said it will ban all sales to Moscow. The decision may impact the industry’s recovery. Ninety percent (90%) of US semiconductor grade neon supplies come from Ukraine and chipmakers are sourcing at least 35% of palladium, which is used in semiconductors, from Russia, MarketBeat reported.

There has been a shortage of semiconductors since 2020 that has had a knock-on effect on the automobile and technology industries. Both use semiconductors to manufacture their products.

So how will the conflict impact the semiconductor industry? Experts believe that the industry’s recovery may be somewhat stunted due to the conflict in Ukraine.

“The main issue here is that Russia and Ukraine are major suppliers of palladium and neon respectively which are vital commodities for the chip industry….

Read Full Article

Biden Piles on Russia

US Government Further Restricts Transactions and Trade with Russia, Belarus, as Russian Countermeasures Grow | Venable LLP

From www.jdsupra.com
2022-03-07 16:46:42

Excerpt:

The United States, in coordination with global allies, continues to introduce sanctions and trade restrictions targeting the Russian government and its allies for their aggression in Ukraine. With these new measures and related guidance, the U.S. government is expanding its efforts to isolate Russia from the global financial system, cut off its defense and technology capabilities, and penalize President Putin and his inner circle.

The latest moves by the U.S. government include the following:

Cutting Off the Central Bank of Russia, the National Wealth Fund of Russia, and the Ministry of Finance. Directive 4 Under EO 14024 (Russia-related Sovereign Transactions Directive), effective February 28, 2022, prohibits U.S. persons from all direct or indirect transactions involving the Central Bank of…

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Shipping Russia banned goods may lead to blacklisting, U.S. warns companies | The Mighty 790 KFGO

From kfgo.com
2022-03-07 20:15:03

Excerpt:

By Karen Freifeld and Alexandra Alper

NEW YORK/WASHINGTON (Reuters) – The Biden administration is threatening to add companies to a trade blacklist if they skirt new export curbs against Russia, as it ramps up efforts to keep a vast array of technology out of the country after it invaded Ukraine last month.

The U.S. Department of Commerce, which oversees export controls, is mobilizing staff around the globe to halt illicit shipments of computers, aircraft parts, marine equipment and other technology to Russia, partnering with allied countries and U.S. law enforcement agencies like the FBI and the Department of Homeland Security to crack down on the newly illegal trade, according to U.S. officials.

The goal is to enforce sweeping new restrictions on shipments to Russia of both U.S. and foreign commodities, technology and software, if produced with U.S. equipment, technology or software. The restrictions also apply to Belarus.

Matthew Axelrod, the Commerce Department’s Assistant Secretary for Export Enforcement, told Reuters in a statement on Monday the United States will “bring the full force of the law to hold accountable those that knowingly violate the new rules, including by placing additional parties on the Entity List,” a U.S. trade blacklist.

Already some of the biggest names in tech, like Microsoft Corp and Intel Corp, have announced they will halt shipments to Russia.

U.S. exports to Russia were under $5 billion in 2020, according to the Commerce Department but, a senior official has said, multilateral cooperation means more than $50 billion in key inputs to Russia may be curbed.

Axelrod said the Commerce Department has begun “robust engagement with U.S. exporters and other partners to ensure they understand the new rules,” which aim to keep chips and other items made at home and abroad from Russia.

He also noted that 91 parties in 10 countries were added to the Commerce Department’s Entity List last week for supporting Russian military,…

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Russia Severs Citizens from Digital Outside World

Russia, Blocked From the Global Internet, Plunges Into Digital Isolation

From www.nytimes.com
2022-03-07 19:48:17
Adam Satariano and Valerie Hopkins
Excerpt:

“For the moment I do plan to work in Russia,” he said. “How this may change in the future, especially if YouTube will be blocked, I don’t know.”

Unlike China, where domestic internet companies have grown into behemoths over more than a decade, Russia does not have a similarly vibrant domestic internet or tech industry.

Protests in Russia. Amid antiwar rallies across Russia, the police said more than 3,000 people were arrested Sunday, the highest nationwide total in any single day of protest in recent memory. An activist group that tracks arrests reported detentions in 49 different Russian cities.

So as it is cordoned off into its own digital ecosystem, the fallout may be severe. In addition to access to independent information, the future reliability of internet and telecommunications networks, as well as the availability of basic software and services used by businesses and government, is at risk.

Already, Russian telecom…

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Twitch streamers in Russia lose livelihoods as sanctions hit home

From www.washingtonpost.com
2022-03-07 19:49:54
Nathan Grayson
Excerpt:

Twitch informed affected Russian streamers of its plans via email. (Twitch is owned by Amazon, whose founder, Jeff Bezos, owns The Washington Post.)

“Payouts to the financial institution associated with your Twitch account have been blocked as a result of sanctions,” read the email. “Twitch complies with economic sanctions imposed by the United States and other governments, and is complying with those imposed in response to the situation in Ukraine. These sanctions may limit or impact your access to payouts, ability to monetize your stream, and/or financially support other creators.”

The email from Twitch went on to add that “we appreciate how frustrating and difficult this is and would like to reassure you that if you can’t provide an alternative financial institution, we will do our best to pay

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Cancel Culture American Corps Cancel Russia

Yale professor lists companies not boycotting Russia: McDonald’s, Starbucks and Coca-Cola

From www.washingtonpost.com
2022-03-08 14:16:00

Excerpt:

Sonnenfeld, who founded the nonprofit Chief Executive Leadership Institute, said he has fielded calls from CEOs asking “why we didn’t have them on the right list, and what they needed to do to either clarify or actually take a more strong stance.”

On top of skyrocketing inflation and a plummeting ruble, Russians have been left with a dwindling marketplace: Prada stores have shuttered, TikTok has suspended operations in their country, and car companies including Rolls-Royce, Toyota and Volkswagen have stopped shipping vehicles to Russia. Even WWE, the wrestling entertainment company, said it would halt operations there.

The gutting of the Russian economy has shattered the image that President Vladimir Putin had created, portraying himself as an all-powerful leader with things under control, Sonnenfeld said in a phone interview Monday with The Washington Post.

And with Russian state media echoing Putin’s framing of the war as a “special…

Read Full Article

Amazon sells clothes with Russian military ‘Z’ symbol | News

From www.thetimes.co.uk
2022-03-08 15:45:00

Excerpt:

Amazon has been selling clothing and other merchandise marked with a “Z” that supports Russia’s war in Ukraine, The Times has found.

The symbol, used by the Russian army in Ukraine to avoid friendly-fire incidents, has gone viral in Russia and among the country’s supporters around the world.

T-shirts, sweaters and phone accessories with the symbol “Z” and explicitly advertised as “RUSSIAN Z SYMBOL MILITARY ARMED FORCES TANKS” were for sale on the tech giant’s site today. The description of items said they were sold and dispatched by Amazon.

Amazon was selling T-shirts with a Russian military Z today

Russians around the world have been daubing the white letter on black backgrounds to denote support for their army fighting in Ukraine. The adoption of the “Z” as a symbolic expression of support is viewed

Read Full Article

Netflix Stops Streaming In Russia As Companies Flee The Country

From www.entrepreneur.com
2022-03-07 17:14:00

Excerpt:

Netflix Inc (NASDAQ:NFLX) has decided to suspend its streaming services in Russia over the country’s war with Ukraine. The move comes almost a week after the entertainment giant refused to air state TV channels and comply with a propaganda mandate on large streamers.

As reported by The Verge, Netflix cited the war as a reason behind the decision, with spokesperson Emily Feingold saying in a statement: “Given the circumstances on the ground, we have decided to suspend our service in Russia.”

Netflix has stopped its streaming services after refusing a Russian mandate to air state TV channels such as Channel One and NTV last week. The government had ordered the airing of 20 state-backed channels displaying war propaganda.

The company has around 1 million subscribers in Russia, and also announced it would…

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Apple ‘blocks today’s huge iPhone event livestream in Russia over Ukraine invasion’

From www.the-sun.com
2022-03-08 15:41:00

Excerpt:

APPLE fans in Russia will have a hard time watching the firm’s latest iPhone launch when it kicks off later today.

According to MacRumors‘ Sami Fathi, the tech titan has blocked its live stream of the event on the Russian versions of YouTube and Apple.com.

2

The online broadcast is blocked on the Russian version of YouTube

It comes days after Apple announced that it was halting sales of iPhones and other products in the country in response to the invasion of Ukraine.

The firm is expected to unveil new models of the iPhone SE and iPad Air at its March 8 event, which it has titled “Peek Performance”.

As with previous product launches, Apple is live streaming the showcase to fans across the globe.

Broadcasts are already live on the firm’s website and YouTube channel, showing a dark screen before things kick off in earnest at 6 p.m. UK time (1 p.m. EST).

However, it appears Russians won’t have the option to watch through official means as new gadgets and software are announced.

“Apple…

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Rockwell Automation Suspends Business in Russia

From www.businesswireindia.com
2022-03-08 07:30:50

Excerpt:

Rockwell Automation, Inc. (NYSE: ROK) announced today that the company is suspending operations and sales in Russia and Belarus, effective immediately.

“Rockwell joins the U.S. government and the global community in condemning Russia’s attack on Ukraine and its citizens,” said Blake Moret, Chairman & CEO of Rockwell Automation, emphasizing that the company supports all U.S. sanctions.

Rockwell has made a financial contribution to Project HOPE to provide humanitarian relief to refugees in Ukraine and neighboring countries and is encouraging employees to help in a variety of ways. Rockwell will match employee donations made to Project HOPE and is offering paid time off to support local volunteer efforts.

Sales to Russia and Belarus represent less than 0.5% of Rockwell’s total revenue. The company will continue to pay salaries and…

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The West Joins in the Cancel Culture Cancelling of Russia

France’s L’Oreal to close stores, e-commerce sites in Russia

From www.reuters.com
2022-03-08 16:17:00

Excerpt:

PARIS, March 8 (Reuters) – L’Oreal, the world’s largest cosmetics group, said on Tuesday it would temporarily close its own stores, its directly operated counters in department stores and its e-commerce sites in Russia, in reaction to Moscow’s invasion of its neighbour Ukraine.

The French company, which strongly condemns Russia’s military action, also said it would also suspend all industrial and national media investments in Russia.

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EY Joins Other Big Accounting Firms Exiting Russia

From www.nytimes.com
2022-03-07 16:03:54

Excerpt:

EY, one of the world’s largest accounting firms, announced on Monday that it would pull out of Russia. It is the third of the so-called Big Four firms to exit Russia after the invasion of Ukraine: KPMG International and PricewaterhouseCoopers said on Sunday that they would quit the country. The other firm is Deloitte, which could come under pressure to do the same.

These groups are structured as partnerships of local firms, so the businesses in Russia can continue to operate, the three accounting firms said, but will no longer be a part of their umbrella networks.

“The EY global organization will no longer serve Russian government clients, state-owned enterprises or sanctioned entities or individuals anywhere in the world,” EY said in a statement. It has more than 4,700 workers in its network in Russia, it said. KPMG said it had more than 4,500 people working in Russia and Belarus, while PwC said it had 3,700 workers in Russia.

The moves by the accounting firms are the latest of…

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How Russian Institutions are Buckling

Explained: How sanctions by the West have impacted Russia’s aviation industry

From indianexpress.com
2022-03-08 12:09:04

Excerpt:

Effective Tuesday, Russia’s flag-carrier Aeroflot is cancelling all international flights — except to Minsk — given the restrictions by Europe and the United States on the country, which includes constraints on use of airspace and economic sanctions. However, the decision to ground international flights is layered — both in terms of the causes and effects.

Since the beginning of Russia’s military operations in Ukraine, western countries including EU member states, the UK, the US and Canada have imposed severe economic sanctions on Russia. This includes preventing companies from doing business in Russia and restricting use of airspace for Russian aircraft. While the airspace restrictions, which were also reciprocated by Russia, translated into more arduous flight durations, the economic sanctions led to…

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Russia’s AI industry faces collapse- POLITICO

From www.politico.com
2022-03-08 15:00:00

Excerpt:

“If that includes third-party sales, even that door is closed,” Rasser said.

— Draining (human) capital: Konaev said the broader exodus of tech firms from Russia will leave any company pursuing advanced AI research high and dry when it comes to financing. “It’s impossible to overstate how much they’re going to lose in terms of access to the investment you need to advance technological innovation,” she said.

That will likely lead to an outflow of human capital from Russia, too. Crushing sanctions and tightening authoritarianism are likely to lead Russian mathematicians and programmers to emigrate in the coming weeks and months (provided the Kremlin lets them leave).

“The opportunities are going to be outside of Russia,” said Lewis. “And that’s going to limit them on technology across the board — except in cybercrime.”

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Russia Begins to Adapt

Russian banks to use UnionPay after US providers exit · TechNode

From technode.com
2022-03-08 09:47:30
Ward Zhou
Excerpt:

Several Russian banks are planning to use China’s bank card service UnionPay as US services Visa and Mastercard suspend services in Russia, according to Reuters. Russia-issued credit cards using the Visa and Mastercard systems will stop functioning after March 9, part of a broader global economic backlash over the ongoing Russia-Ukraine war.

Why it matters: China could face more geopolitical pressure from the US. The country has toed a diplomatic line since the conflict began in late February, advocating for peaceful resolutions (in Chinese).

US card operators Visa and Mastercard handle 90% of all debit and credit card payments outside China. Another US operator American Express said on March 6 that it will stop services for internationally-issued cards in Russia.
Founded in 2002, UnionPay now has more than 1 billion users serving 180 countries and regions, providing cross-border payment services to cardholders and merchants.
Some Russian banks have already <a…

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The Potential Lasting Fallout

How Russia’s Invasion of Ukraine Could Reshape Trade, Starting With Cars

From www.nytimes.com
2022-03-07 19:15:01

Excerpt:

The auto assembly lines going quiet in Germany, Britain and Austria are more than just another example of how fragile supply chains have become. The shutdowns may foreshadow a fundamental reordering of the global economy that Russia’s invasion of Ukraine will accelerate.

The conflict has underlined the risks of doing business in authoritarian countries — not just Russia but also China — raising questions about the growing dependence of the automobile industry on the Chinese market.

China’s support for Russia has further strained relations between Beijing and the United States and Europe, which were already at loggerheads over trade. In Berlin, the conflict has strengthened members of the new coalition government who argue that Europe — especially Germany and its car industry — has become overly dependent on trade with China.

Automakers, with their global reach, complex supply chains and millions of employees, are a prime example of how the war in Ukraine could reshape…

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