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When 'Mental Health' Is Used to Empower the State

Wednesday March 21, 2018

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Cries for gun control have reached deafening levels since the Stoneman Douglas High School shooting in Parkland, Florida on February 14th, 2018.

Exploiting the tragedy that left 17 people dead, gun control advocates are using every means possible to ram gun control measures across legislatures nationwide.

One avenue that gun control proponents have pursued is the advancement of legislation containing mental health restrictions. Consequently, legislators at both the federal and state level have recently proposed extensive background checks and mental health screening processes to ensure that guns don’t fall into the hands of the mentally unstable.

For many gun control proponents, the current National Instant Criminal Background Check System (NICS) is simply not enough and must be vastly expanded.

Even if we took these assumptions at face value, one must first ask the following question:

Are the mentally ill actually more prone to committing acts of violence?
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Unhappy Anniversary: Iraq War At 15

Tuesday March 20, 2018



Fifteen years ago today the "shock and awe" of an unjust and illegal US war on Iraq began. A million people may have died. Trillions wasted. The neocons told lie after lie, which the mainstream media repeated unquestioningly. Dutifully. Today Iraq remains a devastated, divided country. The war to, as then-President Bush promised, "bring the Iraqi people freedom" has only brought them death and misery. Yet the same neocons continue pushing war propaganda with impunity. Always another monster to slay. We look back at this "unhappy anniversary" in today's Liberty Report.
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Russiagate Comes to England

Tuesday March 20, 2018

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I don’t know what happened in Salisbury England on March 4th, but it appears that the British government doesn’t know either. Prime Minister Theresa May’s speech before Parliament last Monday was essentially political, reflecting demands that she should “do something” in response to the mounting hysteria over the poisoning of former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia. After May’s presentation there were demands from Parliamentarians for harsh measures against Russia, reminiscent of the calls for action emanating from the U.S. Congress over the allegations relating to what has been called Russiagate.
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The Most Important Hearings Of The Young Century

Monday March 19, 2018

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On MSNBC’s “All In” on March 13, I discussed how the removal of Rex Tillerson from the position of secretary of state was the final triumph of largely Republican efforts—but with complicit Democrats as well—to consolidate the making of foreign and security policy exclusively in the White House. Since the 1947 National Security Act, there has been institutional momentum for this shift. It is important to be aware of this institutional momentum because to reverse the shift will require much more than just a new president and administration. It will take statutory change by the Congress. Such change must be highly deliberative and thus will take time. Immediately, however, the damage to US foreign and security policy—and the country in turn—could be so immense that temporary, non-statutory actions are essential.

Having Mike Pompeo at State, Gina Haspel at the CIA, Nikki Haley at the United Nations, and three military professionals closely advising a grossly inexperienced and narcissistic president is sufficient to give pause to anyone interested in arresting the significant deterioration of our democracy. But putting all control over the main instrument of national power that this team is most apt to use—the military—in the hands of one man, Donald Trump, makes President Xi Jinping’s move in China following the Nineteenth Party Congress pale in comparison. First, Xi is not a warmonger, and, second, Trump has become one. If Americans believe that 17 straight years of war is enough, they need to stand by: another 17 or more is in the offing. Blood and treasure will be the payment for years to come.

Iran and North Korea—the latter despite the “historic” opening of talks—are merely the leading possibilities. Russia and China loom in the foreground, not the background. Conservation of enemies is not a principle of this White House team. Rather, it wants to make as many enemies as possible, at the same time as it destroys traditional alliances and dismays and distances US friends.
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Russian Double Agent Poisoned: Who Did It...And Why?

Monday March 19, 2018



Former Russian spy-turned-UK-spy Sergei Skripal was apparently poisoned earlier this month in the UK. British Prime Minister Theresa May wasted no time in blaming the Russian government and its president, Vladimir Putin personally. Although signatories of the Chemical Weapons Convention must provide samples and evidence when requesting clarification on such matters -- and are given ten days to do so -- Prime Minister May demanded that Russia prove itself not guilty under a 24 hour deadline and refused to hand over any evidence. Why not follow the rules? Is this a false flag to feed the Russiphobia that is rampant? Tune in to today's Liberty Report.
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Ron Paul and Jacob Hornberger to Speak at Foreign Policy Conference in Charleston, South Carolina

Monday March 19, 2018

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Ron Paul and Jocob G. Hornberger — two of the premier voices for peace in America — will speak at a foreign policy conference next month hosted jointly by Paul and Hornberger’s respective educational organizations — the Ron Paul Institute for Peace and Prosperity (RPI) and the Future of Freedom Foundation (FFF). The Sunday, April 29 conference titled “Non-intervention: America’s Original Foreign Policy” will take place from 1:00pm to 5:00pm in Charleston, South Carolina.
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Russia Claims US Deploys Warships For Imminent Attack On Syria, Trains Militants For False Flag Attack

Saturday March 17, 2018

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Last April, in one of the Trump administration's first "diplomatic" ventures, the US fired 59 Tomahawk missiles on Syria, in stated retaliation for the latest alleged chemical attack by the Assad regime, the same "false flag" excuse which was used by the US to officially enter the conflict back in 2013 when military tensions between the US and Russia nearly resulted in a regional war.
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Syria: It Would All be Over by Now Without the ‘Regime-Changers’

Saturday March 17, 2018

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It was seven years ago this week that the conflict in Syria began. How might it have developed without the negative role played by Western powers and their regional allies?

Beware the Ides of March, the old saying goes. The 15th of March down the ages has seen not only the assassination of Julius Caesar and the Nazi invasion of Czechoslovakia; it was also the day, in 2011, that the conflict in Syria began.

According to the standard narrative, it was the intransigence and brutality of the Assad government (always referred to as a ‘regime’) that plunged Syria into chaos. But while it’s true that there was genuine discontent with the government for a number of valid reasons seven years ago, the divisions within Syria could have been overcome without much bloodshed, had certain countries not worked to sabotage any peaceful solutions to the crisis.

Faced with a direct threat to its rule, the Assad government showed it was willing to make compromises. As early as March 26, 2011, the BBC was reporting that the government had released more than 200 political prisoners. There were also amnesties announced in May and June.

Not only that but important political changes were introduced as Assad acknowledged in a televised address that demands for reform were legitimate.
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Time for the US to End Democracy Promotion Flim-Flams

Saturday March 17, 2018

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Democracy promotion has long been one of the U.S. government’s favorite foreign charades. The Trump administration’s proposal to slash funding for democratic evangelism is being denounced as if it were the dawn of a new Dark Age. But this is a welcome step to draining a noxious swath of the Washington swamp.

Nineteenth century humorist Josh Billings quipped, “A fanatic is someonewho does what the Lord would do if He knew the facts of the matter.” Similarly, the U.S. government intervenes to rig elections in case foreign voters don’t know the facts of the matter. The U.S. has interfered — usually covertly — in more than 80 foreign elections since World War Two to boost its preferred candidates.

Former CIA chief James Woolsey was asked last month on Fox News whether the U.S. government was continuing to meddle and “mess around in other people's elections?" Woolsey replied with a smile and said: "Only for a very good cause. In the interests of democracy." Obviously, democracy is ill-served if any U.S.-preferred candidate lose.

Nowadays, the National Endowment for Democracy (NED) is the flagship for U.S. political meddling abroad, and Trump proposes to slash its budget by 60 percent, from $170 million to $67 million. When Congress created the agency in 1983, it prohibited NED and its grantees from directly aiding foreign political candidates. But that law restrains NED as effectively as the Fourth Amendment’s restriction on warrantless searches leashes the National Security Agency.
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