The Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity
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Spending on Defense Is One Great Big Lie

Friday August 23, 2019

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Washington Post columnist Robert Samuelson is worried. He thinks that maybe — just maybe — the US government is not spending enough on defense. In a column entitled, “Here’s Why We Could Be Under-Spending on Defense,” Samuelson has come up with a complicated formula that has caused him to fear that China and Russia might actually be spending more money on their militaries than the United States. Bringing to mind the famous missile-gap controversy during the Cold War, Samuelson wrote, “Our reputed military superiority might be exaggerated or a statistical fiction.”
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US Ambassador Grenell’s Threat to Germany Has Backfired, Driving Germany Closer to Russia

Thursday August 22, 2019

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Last week, German lawmakers sent a stark message to Washington. The argument escalated following a series of flippant comments made by US ambassador Richard Grenell who had demanded Germany increase its defense spending, claiming it was “really insulting to expect the US taxpayer to keep paying for over 50,000 Americans” stationed in Germany, and that the US would do well to move all of its military assets from Germany, and relocate eastward to Poland. 

Lawmakers in Berlin reacted by welcoming a US withdrawal from German soil – and proceeded to tell the US it can take its nuclear weapons with them.

Dietmar Bartsch, chairman of the Left Party, said, “The US ambassador is right: US taxpayers should not have to pay for US troops in Germany … If the Americans pull out their soldiers, they also have to pull out their nuclear weapons.”
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Trump Fine-Tunes Peace Deal With Taliban

Thursday August 22, 2019

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The US President Donald Trump’s remarks at the Oval Office in the White House on August 20 regarding the Afghan peace talks and related issues exuded an overall sense of satisfaction that the “endless war” is finally ending —although issues still remain to be sorted out before the deal is closed.

This was also Trump’s first public assessment of the meeting he took last week with top officials, including the secretaries of state and defence, CIA director and US special representative on Afghanistan Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad who leads the American team of negotiators at the Doha talks with the Taliban.

Trump said more than once during his remarks to the media on Tuesday that the talks with the Taliban are going well, and he made it a point to acknowledge publicly that the Taliban genuinely want to stop fighting with the US troops. As he put it,
I will say this: The Taliban would like to stop fighting us.  They would like to stop fighting us.  They’ve lost a lot.
Trump threw light on what to expect.
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Lindsey Graham’s Blank Check. Why a Defense Agreement With Israel Would Be a Disaster for Americans

Thursday August 22, 2019

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Two world wars began because of unconditional pledges made by one country to come to assistance of another. On July 5, 1914, Kaiser Wilhelm II of Germany pledged his country’s complete support for whatever response Austria-Hungary would choose to make against Serbia after the June 28th assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand of Austria by a Serbian nationalist during an official visit to Sarajevo, Bosnia. This fatal error went down in history as Germany’s carte blanche or “blank check,” assurance to Austria that led directly to WW I.
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Joseph Mifsud, British Intel Asset, Not Russia's Boy

Wednesday August 21, 2019

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Joseph Mifsud, the Maltese Diplomat who reportedly told George Papadopoulos that Russia had Hillary's emails, was a British intelligence asset. But the Brits did not keep Mifsud for themselves. They offered him to the CIA and the FBI, and those two US agencies, in a coordinated effort, relied on Mifsud to entrap Papadopoulos and to manufacture a Russian collusion case against the Trump Campaign.
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End Foreign Aid to Israel and Everyone Else

Tuesday August 20, 2019

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Democratic Congresswomen Ilhan Omar and Rashida Tlaib are calling on the US Congress to reevaluate US foreign aid to the Israeli government. Their reason? Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, denied entry into Israel for the two of them, owing to their public support of the Boycott, Divestments, and Sanctions movement, a global protest against the Israeli government’s longtime mistreatment of Palestinians.

Omar stated:
We give Israel more than $3 [billion] in aid every year. This is predicated on them being an important ally in the region and the only democracy in the Middle East. But denying a visit to duly elected members of Congress is not consistent with being an ally, and denying millions of people freedom of movement or expression or self-determination is not consistent with being a democracy.
Unfortunately, however, Omar and Tlaib, like the rest of their Democratic counterparts, just don’t get it. In fact, neither does their nemesis, President Trump, and his Republican cohorts. Not only should the US government stop foreign aid to the Israeli regime, it should stop it for every other regime in the world.

For one thing, consider that the Trump administration is spending $1 trillion this year more than it is bringing in with taxes. The difference? He’s borrowing it, thereby adding another trillion dollars to the $22 trillion dollars in federal debt that is already hanging over American taxpayers.
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Trump Administration Wants Permanent Repeal of the 4th Amendment

Monday August 19, 2019

Departing Director of National Intelligence Dan Coats sent Congress a letter requesting that several features of the misnamed USA FREEDOM Act be made permanent, allowing the US government to spy in Americans in perpetuity. The Trump Administration wants to be able to intercept phone calls and text messages as well as snoop into business records and other violations of the Fourth Amendment. The FREEDOM Act was passed after Ed Snowden revealed that the NSA was illegally spying on American citizens. Falsely advertised as "reform," the replacement bill only made "legal" the illegality of the PATRIOT Act. Will Americans find the will to oppose this creeping tyranny? Tune in to today's Liberty Report...
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The Saudis Learn the Term 'Asymmetric Response'

Monday August 19, 2019

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The Saudis just learned that some moments in history show their significance as they unfold. Iran shooting down a US Global Hawk stealth drone and President Trump refusing his war-hawk cabinet in retaliating militarily is one of them.

I said then and still maintain that this was a turning point in the history of the world.
Any retaliation by the US would be catastrophic for the world economy. It would unleash a regional conflict on multiple fronts which would not be any kind of controlled theater…

… That for all the might of the US military and financial empire, its weaknesses are deep enough that even a relatively weak military and economy like Iran’s can stop it all dead cold because of basic things like geography, logistics and simple human resolve.
Many people misinterpreted these statements, and, indeed the entire article, to mean that Iran could stand up to the US in a direct military conflict and prevail. Nonsense.

War today isn’t just fought with soldiers, bombs, guns and drones. It’s fought in all theatres including the commodities futures and forex markets.
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Behind a Made-for-TV Hong Kong Protest Narrative, Washington is Backing Nativism and Mob Violence

Monday August 19, 2019

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President Donald Trump tweeted on August 13 that he “can’t imagine why” the United States has been blamed for the chaotic protests that have gripped Hong Kong. 

Trump’s befuddlement might be understandable considering the carefully managed narrative of the US government and its unofficial media apparatus, which have portrayed the protests as an organic “pro-democracy” expression of grassroots youth. However, a look beneath the surface of this oversimplified, made-for-television script reveals that the ferociously anti-Chinese network behind the demonstrations has been cultivated with the help of millions of dollars from the US government, as well as a Washington-linked local media tycoon. 

Since March, raucous protests have gripped Hong Kong. In July and August, these demonstrations transformed into ugly displays of xenophobia and mob violence. 

The protests ostensibly began in opposition to a proposed amendment to the extradition law between Hong Kong, Taiwan, mainland China, and Macau, which would have allowed Taiwanese authorities to prosecute a Hong Kong man for murdering his pregnant girlfriend and dumping her body in the bushes during a vacation to Taiwan.
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Are Recessions Inevitable?

Monday August 19, 2019

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Stocks fell last week following news that the yield curve on Treasury notes had inverted. This means that a short-term Treasury note was paying higher interest rates than long-term Treasury note. An inverted yield curve is widely seen as a sign of an impending recession.
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