#is impossible to remove it from geopolitics etc
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I say all this but I still do take pride in my Islamic upbringing and have used many of its values to kind of inform how I approach people and the world. Which kind of makes this whole thing worse because!!! So many religions and governments fucking hates Muslims!!!! We even hate ourselves because we started forming sects!!! Literally one of the foremost forbidden things the Prophet and the first Caliphates said NOT to do after their death!! Yet we can't talk about dismantling religion without also including Judaism and Islam, two very persecuted religions, but in such a way as to not contribute to white supremacy and fascism or the half dozen other chud groups or ideologies or countries that want us dead.
Do you see my issue? I do genuinely believe we need to remove religion from the world but I don't know how to currently conceptualize religious-based persecution within that belief. So the belief in removing religion from the world gets pushed to wayside in favor of wanting to protect religious minorities.
#lunar lectures#Does anyone perhaps have some readings on this?#I'm literally so stuck and lost on this shit#i will admit tho#im not exactly convinced religious based persecution exists in a pure form#at least not in the current day#with how centralizing religion is#is impossible to remove it from geopolitics etc#therefore trying to conceptualize just religious based persecution is fruitless#cause your can always look at it another angle or maybe even more macro#that doesn't necessarily focus the differing religions
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Alternate History scenarios I want to see
I’m tired of the same two scenarios, the South wins the Civil War, Nazis win World War II. There’s no more blood to be pulled from those stones, they’re completely dry, completely played up. At best they’re just generic, at worst they’re conservative wish fulfillment. ¡No mas! For the love of God, just give us some scenarios we haven’t seen before, some scenarios that postulate a better world instead of a worse one.
If you have to do the Civil War, let Lincoln survive, let him oversee Reconstruction. Let the South remain under military occupation, get rid of the Compromise of 1877, get rid of Jim Crow laws, enforce the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments. The Civil Rights movement would have occurred fifty or sixty years earlier.
What if Archduke Franz Ferdinand was never assassinated? Tensions were boiling over in the Balkans, something was bound to happen eventually, his death was just the final straw; if he survived though, the resulting war wouldn’t be nearly as catastrophic, instead being tantamount to a Third Balkan War between Austria and Serbia. Germany and Russia and France probably wouldn’t even get involved, it would be contained to the peninsula and be over by Christmas 1914. The resulting post-war world would be so different from our own it would be near impossible to imagine; no carving up the Middle East, no rise of authoritarianism in Russia and Italy and Germany and China, no Holocaust, no Cold War, no baby boom, etc.
1939, Albert Einstein never signs the Szilard Letter to President Roosevelt, so the Manhattan project never gets off the ground. The Nazis were not developing atom bombs, the American nuclear program was predicated on a lie (as most of our foreign policy decisions are). If we never develop the bomb, there’s no arms race, no Cold War, no crimes against humanity by the US against Japan, no looming threat of nuclear war at all times. Maybe the Soviets would have developed the bomb eventually, but the US wouldn’t be the first, and we wouldn’t be as aggressive over out stockpile as we were through the 20th century.
The arrest and trial of Adolf Hitler; what if the Western Front had reached Berlin before the East? What if we’d been able to capture him alive and try him at Nuremberg with the rest of the Reich? He doesn’t get the satisfaction of a quick ending, his crimes are aired to the world, his few remaining supporters finally see him as a man instead of a god. He’d be hanged, cremated, and disposed of in the Pegnitz River. The Western allies would have been in a stronger position and could probably have maintained control of a united Germany rather than letting the East fall under Russia’s sphere of influence. That’d be a scenario in and of itself; what if Germany was never divided? No Berlin Wall, a smaller Iron Curtain, no far-right parties in the Bundestag, etc.
Lee Harvey Oswald is arrested for trying to assassinate Major General Edwin Walker in April 1963. He never assassinates John F. Kennedy, who wins re-election in 1964. He passes the Civil Rights Act (though it might be harder in this timeline because he’s a northerner; Johnson was able to pass it because he convinced his fellow southerners to stop filibustering it), he oversees and deescalates Vietnam, eases relations with the Soviet Union and China, advancing geopolitics by five or even ten years.
The impeachment of Richard Nixon; he resigned because he had lost all support, even from his own party (something that would never happen today). If he had tried to fight the charges instead, he would have been removed from office and subsequently tried in criminal court. Gerald Ford was chosen as Vice President in part because he was seen as an honest politician at the time, in comparison to the outgoing Agnew who was embroiled in his own scandal; when Ford pardoned Nixon, his credibility tanked. If Nixon was found guilty by Congress, I don’t think Ford would have pardoned him (well, he probably still would have because Republicans are the party of corruption, but a man can dream, can’t he?) This would have finally set the concrete precedent that the president is not above the law, that they can and will face consequences for their actions.
The assassination of Ronald Reagan; what if John Hinckley Jr. had succeeded in killing Reagan in March 1981? Full offense to any and all conservative pieces of shit reading this, but the world would be an infinitely better place. No Reagan means no Iran-Contra Affair and no Reaganomics (no trickle down), which means no tax cuts for the super-wealthy and no trillion dollar monopolies. There would still be a middle class, we’d have higher wages and more benefits, we’d have universal healthcare like every single other developed nation on the planet! In 1980, George H.W. Bush called Reagan’s policies “voodoo economics” because he knew they wouldn’t work; he only got on board after he started cashing his checks. If he became president in ‘81 rather than ‘89, he wouldn’t have continued those policies (he was more concerned with the foreign than the domestic agenda). No Reagan means no AIDS crisis, or at least a substantially reduced one. No Reagan means no Mujahideen in Afghanistan, so no Taliban, no al-Qaeda, no 9/11, no endless War on Terror in the Middle East, no PATRIOT Act, no Orwellian police state. THIS is the biggest change I can imagine in the last 50 years.
What if Glasnost and Perestroika has succeeded in the Soviet Union? What if the USSR had democratized under Gorbachev’s reforms? The Russia that came out of the collapse was corrupt to the core trying to fill the sudden power vacuum, which is how Putin rose to the top. If Gorbachev’s reforms had succeeded, if the Soviet Union had modernized, if a true multi-party democracy had been established, the world would be a better place. The Iron Curtain would still have fallen because Gorbachev got rid of the Brezhnev Doctrine, meaning Eastern Europe would be free of Soviet influence sooner, the Caucuses and Central Asian republics would have more say in how the country was run, and authoritarianism would be on the decline in Russia.
Al Gore wins the 2000 election; if he had become president, we would never have gone to war with Iraq. Hell, we may even have avoided war with Afghanistan; the Taliban claimed they were willing to extradite Osama bin Laden if we could prove his involvement in 9/11, and I think Gore would have taken them up on the offer. Now there’s no saying they actually would have followed through with it, but it’s always better to try diplomacy first. Even if we DID end up going to war with Afghanistan, it would be shorter and less deadly; fewer civilian casualties, an actual exit strategy, and no power vacuum because we’d never topple their government just to secure oil and military contracts. No Iraq War means no Syrian Civil War, which means no ISIS.
If you’re going through the trouble of researching and writing an alternate history scenario, why one Earth would you would you just fart out the same story we’ve heard a million times before? Give us some obscure changes, something small, something niche that would have a domino effect on World History. Like, what if Austria had won the Austro-Prussian war, and the German Empire didn’t exist? What if the Norman conquest had been repelled by the Celts? What if Margaret Thatcher slipped on wet concrete and bashed her head in on the way to Number 10? There are so many better possibilities to write about than Confederates and Nazis!
#alternate history#alternate history scenario#world war 1#world war 2#the great war#us civil war#2000 election#soviet union#ussr#impeachment#assassination#fuck reagan#fuck ronald reagan#fuck republicans#fuck conservatives#authoritarianism#world peace
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Worldbuilding, briefly
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about how I approach worldbuilding in my own work, and how worldbuilding appears in the media that I admire, and just want to share some thoughts
so, y’know how lot of writers admit that it feels like their characters end up writing themselves? hijacking the creators’ brains and acting out their own lives? I feel the same can be said for settings, if they’re given the chance to breathe freely
suffice to say, a setting should feel dynamic-- a living, changing thing that affects (and is affected by) characters/plot/etc., and has solid internal logic. I think the two central concepts which make for good worldbuilding, in this respect, are:
a sense of history
holistic integration with all other story elements
History
when a setting only exists in the present moment, it comes off flat and static-- merely a cardboard set-piece that could fall over at a gust of too-strong wind (or critical thought). settings need history to feel vibrant and alive, just as any individual character needs history to inform their actions and beliefs
essentially, good worldbuilding answers the question of, “How did we get here?”
in practice, having a sense of history helps a great deal in predicting and designing how a setting looks at the present. think of it like following branching pathways back to the source-- the main divergence(s) from real-life. as humans living on planet Earth in our particular sociocultural environments, whatever we create will automatically borrow from what we’re familiar with, so it helps to track down where we may be subconsciously starting at. once we find that initial divergence, it’s a simple matter of following logical stepping-stones from that source, up to the present point
thus, you can break the broad question of, “How did we get here?” down into smaller, more manageable chunks by carefully tracking along a path of history
some examples of what I’m talking about here:
need an explanation for the current geopolitical climate? trace back the basic history of all the countries in question, follow it back to basic sources (fighting over resources/territory, power/ideological struggles, etc.), to figure out why the geopolitical landscape looks as it does today. want to figure out how a particular culture came to their current beliefs/practices? look back to the history of their land-- what resources do they use, what ecological cycles impact them, how much cultural overlap do they have with their neighbors, and how does this impact what they most cherish in themselves and others? want to figure out how/why a creature exists in your world? map their evolutionary taxonomy and ecological relationships back to a point that connects to the other creatures on your planet-- where exactly did they “start” out and what pushed them to evolve the way the did?
most of these sub-questions will likely never be directly answered in your story, and you don’t even need to have detailed answers for most of them. but trust me when I say that YOU knowing the answers (even answers that you may consider broad and simple) will affect how you craft the present setting and its sense of history
of course, the level of divergence from real-life will impact how much reworking a given setting needs in order to feel self-sustaining and whole. a world where political history diverges from real-life only a few years previous is going to have different needs than a story whose very life-forms are built on different molecular structures than Earth life, for example. it can be intimidating in some cases, but if you’re willing to put in the work and research for it, you can make some pretty incredible discoveries
Holistic Integration
I’ll fully admit, Folding Ideas’ video on Ludonarrative Dissonance is what rly got me thinking abt this topic (and more deeply abt my own thoughts on stylistic/tonal consistency). his central idea about how we can approach story elements as separate or integrated rly clarified some of my vague opinions/feelings on certain media
essentially, worldbuilding shouldn’t be treated as separate from other story elements like plot and themes, if you want it to work holistically in your world. otherwise, your worldbuilding may start telling a different story from the plot/themes/etc. you’re consciously trying to craft. in fact, I’ll even argue that it’s impossible to treat worldbuilding separately, on a fundamental level
let me focus specifically on themes for a moment when I say, humans don’t create objectively. we don’t craft worlds or stories without automatically inserting our own beliefs and ideas into the settings. to say that a setting is free of theme in particular is highly arrogant, imo, and a sign that the creator likely thinks their own views are simply the “norm”. a magic system will reflect a creator’s views on souls and energy and existence; creature designs will reveal the aesthetic and types of animals a creator gravitates towards; various political systems will reflect a creator’s background and assumptions about the power/morality of said systems
in this way, I think it’s downright impossible to craft a world without themes in the first place. so it just makes sense to recognize and lean into that, while crafting the more deliberate themes of a story
but even if we do assume, for sake of argument, that worlds COULD be crafted objectively, I just don’t understand why they would? why/how a world functions the way it does will affect the ways characters move through that world, and how they experience their arcs and subsequent themes. like, it’s genuinely baffling for me to imagine crafting a story without every element organically weaving into and affecting one another, it just doesn’t feel like it would even work
because when an element of the story doesn’t exist in service of the other elements around it, that element becomes a useless distraction rather than an asset. folks complain all the time about useless characters-- people that take up precious screentime without moving any other element (plot, character arcs, tone, etc.) forward. yet the same can absolutely be said for settings-- settings which just exist as spaces to set characters while they experience a plot, separate from that given setting. when these settings don’t touch any other element of the story in any meaningful way (or vis-versa), they become distracting and useless, and ultimately destabilize/undermine the other elements
like, when we’re told a setting is rough and dangerous, but the characters that live there don’t act like it (no street smarts, no sense of caution towards their environment, no sense of where they are and how to get where they need to quickly--), it undermines the reliability of the characters’ personalities/arcs. when we’re told a setting is full of casual magic which affects everything, yet we’re shown a 1:1 picture of real life with no sign of how people using magic, how tech may integrate with magic, how magic affects aesthetic or history, it distracts from and undermines the fantasy/escapism. when we’re explicitly told that a story’s themes center around defying expectations/roles, yet the setting we’re supposed to root for only reinforces pre-defined roles and rules, it completely undermines any of the deliberate themes the creator intends. when we’re following a plot through various environments meant to showcase the variety of culture and aesthetic a world has cultivated, but we’re merely shown variations on a very similar theme, it’s distracting and boring
worldbuilding should not feel like a dissonant piece from other story elements. worldbuilding should harmonize with and enhance all other story elements, and those elements in turn should enhance the worldbuilding. while it absolutely is useful to tackle or talk about certain elements separately (I mean, I am taking a whole post to discuss worldbuilding, specifically), ultimately a good story is a whole whose parts can’t be fully removed from one another
Internal Logic
you may be wondering why I have yet to make any real mention of “logic” up to this point, since that’s how most folks analyze worldbuilding. hell, even I usually judge worlds based on how well they stick to their “internal logic”. but I think focusing on a vague sense of “logic” puts the cart before the horse, so to speak
if you don’t know the history of a particular setting, how can you track any cultural/political/etc. logic to its source? to say that logic “pre-establishes” certain rules is to admit that there is a sense of history there in the first place, thus specific events preceding the present text which explain why the present exists as it does. like, the big bang is a historical event that’s set up the logic of our entire universe, the same way a war sets up the political logic of a nation going forward. thus, history precedes logic
but before history can set precedents in worldbuilding, it’s really the other story elements which decide what history is important enough to establish in the first place. a story whose themes center around biological imperatives and ecology will need worldbuilding with a strong biological history; a story whose plot centers on political intrigue will need a world with a strong political history; a story with characters ranging across all different cultures will need to establish history for those cultures, etc. you aren’t obligated to establish the history of every single aspect of a setting, merely the parts that are actually relevant to the rest of the narrative in some way
this is how the internal logic of a story is established: by knowing exactly what history needs to be established to enhance the other story elements. logic should organically follow, once you have a strong grasp of history and holistic integration
-Mod Spiral
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#1yrago An incredibly important paper on whether data can ever be "anonymized" and how we should handle release of large data-sets

Even the most stringent privacy rules have massive loopholes: they all allow for free distribution of "de-identified" or "anonymized" data that is deemed to be harmless because it has been subjected to some process.
But the reality of "re-identification" attacks tells a different story: again and again and again and again and again, datasets are released on the promise that they have been de-identified, only to be rapidly (and often trivially) re-identified, putting privacy, financial security, lives and even geopolitical stability at risk.
The problems of good anonymization are myriad: one is that re-identification risk increases over time: a database of taxi-trips, say, might be re-identifiable later when a database of user accounts, or home addresses, or specific voyages taken by one person, leaks. Releasing a database of logins and their corresponding real names might allow a database of logins without real names to be mass re-identified with little effort.
Anonymization suffers from the "wanting it badly is enough" problem: industry and regulators would benefit immensely if there was such a thing as reliable de-identification, and the fact that it would be useful to have this creates the certainty that it's possible to have this (see also: crypto backdoors, DRM, no-fly lists, etc).
Regulators, wary of being overly proscriptive, often use "industry best practices" as a benchmark for whether anonymization has taken place. But this only works if the public rewards companies that practice good anonymization, meaning that companies will compete with one another to find effective anonymization techniques. Since it's impossible for a prospective customer to evaluate which anonymization techniques work until after there has been a breach, markets don't reward companies that spend their resources perfecting anonymization, meaning that industries race to the bottom to effect the cheapest methods without regard to whether they work, and this becomes "best practice."
You can see this in other sectors: UK anti-money laundering rules require that banks identify their customers' home addresses using "industry best practices." Bank customers don't care if their bank is complicit in money-laundering, so they don't preferentially choose banks with good anti-money-laundering practices, which means that all the UK banks converged on using laserprinted, easily forged gas-bills as proof of address, despite the fact that these offer nothing in the fight against money-laundering. It's enough they they're cheap to process and can be waved around when a bank is caught in a money-laundering prosecution.
A Precautionary Approach to Big Data Privacy, a 2015 paper by Princeton computer scientists Arvind Narayanan (previously), Joanna Huey and Edward Felten (previously), is the best look at this subject I've yet read, and should be required reading.
The authors point out that the traditional -- and controversial security methodology of "penetrate and patch" (where bugs are identified after the product is rolled out and then fixed) -- is totally unsuited to the problem of data-anonymization. That's because once an "anonymized" database is distributed, it's impossible to patch the copies floating around in the wild (you can't recall the data and remove problematic identifiers), and partner organizations that you've given the data to have no incentive to "patch" it by taking away identifiers that they might be using or find useful in the future.
Instead of "ad-hoc" de-identification methods, the authors recommend a wonkish, exciting idea called "differential privacy," in which precise amounts of noise is added to the data-set before it is released, allowing the publisher to quantify exactly how likely a future re-identification attack is, balancing the benefits of release with the potential costs to the people implicated in it.
Differential privacy is hard to do right, though: famously Apple flubbed one of the first wide-use applications for it.
The authors set out a set of clear guidelines for how to turn their recommendations into policy, and give examples of how existing data-releases could integrate these principles.
We're living in a moment of unprecedented data-gathering and intentional release, but the entire policy framework for those releases is based on a kind of expedient shrug: "We're not sure if this'll work, but it needs doing, so..." This paper -- written in admirably clear, non-technical language -- establishes a sound policy/computer science basis for undertaking these activities, and not a moment too soon.https://boingboing.net/2018/02/01/high-dimensional-data.html
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Dumb pipeline conversation

We’re Energy Independent - Yeah! It’s now time to get out of the U.N.
If Canada wants oil to get to Mexico, then USA can benefit.
Canada will do it with or without our putting people back to work
Yes, there will be spills to clean up
Don't you just love logic?
Let's praise Pres. Trump for turning it around for us

Is energy independence important to you? It means low gas prices at the pump.
To be truly energy independent, the United States would need to produce enough energy to sustain the entirety of its population and industry. Such independence seemed like a far off goal not too long ago. However, innovations in sustainable energy and the recent shale gas boom have made the idea of an energy independent future seem more attainable.
As it seems more and more possible for the United States to achieve energy independence in the not-so-distant future, it’s important to remember that this process is complicated. Though it can be achieved in different ways to different effects, energy independence will require the US to radically re-envision the way it supplies and uses energy.
Energy independence also boasts possible geopolitical benefits. The United States imports most of its energy from countries where political tensions run high. Saudi Arabia, Iraq, China and Russia are all huge exporters of energy, and this has put the United States in more than one awkward position over the years.
In addition to the amount of defense money spent protecting US oil interests abroad, relying on foreign oil has prevented the US and other countries from intervening in conflicts around the world. Europe’s lack of intervention when Russia annexed Crimea is just one example of energy stability influencing foreign policy decisions for the worse.

Energy independence could free the United States from fear of trade retaliation when making foreign policy decisions. This would make it easier for the US and other energy independent countries to boycott or otherwise intervene in unjust systems and governments. It would also give other oil producers more claim over their own energy.
as of 2018, October - the USA has become energy independent - Hurrray! Thank you Pres. Trump
What comes next? Before this resource is depleted, we must retire the notion of fossil fuels and move toward wind, solar, or hydro. I prefer hydro; it has the least bad side effects.
DEMS would eliminate nearly all fossil fuels from the electric grid and force everyone in the country to buy from power companies selling only renewable energy.
Without government subsidies, renewable energy costs significantly more than many forms of traditional energy generation.
Electricity prices are, on average, increasing by 50 percent faster in those states that have created renewable power mandates compared to those that have rejected these economically destructive policies. This is especially troubling news for working-class and lower-income Americans, who spend much larger shares of their income on energy than wealthier families.

Not only are DEMs proposing to eliminate the hundreds of thousands of jobs in the fossil fuel industry in the United States, even though America recently became a net-energy exporter, they are demanding this transition occur in just 10 years, from 2020 to 2030. This mandate would be virtually impossible to achieve because wind and solar energy sources still rely on back-up generation from fossil-fuel-powered energy when the wind isn’t blowing and the sun isn’t shining.
DEMs also propose “eliminating greenhouse gas emissions from the manufacturing, agricultural and other industries, including by investing in local-scale agriculture in communities across the country,” as well as “eliminating greenhouse gas emissions from, repairing and improving transportation and other infrastructure, and upgrading water infrastructure to ensure universal access to clean water.” It’s not clear whether this would eventually mean the elimination of all gasoline-powered cars, but even if we assume private ownership of these vehicles would be permitted, the removal of affordable fossil fuels, including natural gas, from all industry would increase the cost of developing, manufacturing, and delivering all goods and services in the country. It would force companies to spend, at the very least, hundreds of billions of additional dollars more than they do now — expenses that would inevitably be passed along to consumers by raising taxes, printing money, and creating new publicly owned banks.
Please send an email to your Senator and to your House rep ASAP! You can cut/paste the VOTE NO message into your email. You may also phone the United States Capitol switchboard at (202) 224-3121 - plz be nice to the volunteer. Also send this message to Pres. Trump.
VOTE NO on Green Deal. The biggest reason I can think of - WE ALREADY have the Climate Change Law. Thanks to Pres. Trump
and YES on getting out of the UN.
Congressional Republicans want to defund the U.N., a 193-nation boondoggle for which the United States alone pays well over a quarter of the freight — about 22 percent of the regular operating budget, and close to 30 percent of the much larger peacekeeping budget (for which we get more scandal than peace).
At best, denying our annual $3 billion payment would accomplish nothing. Defunding measures are called for periodically, whenever the U.N. induces a congressional tantrum over one or another of its obscenities. Even as one lawmaker fumes about shutting off the spigot, another is already saying, “Well, we don’t need to defund everything — after all, the U.N. does a lot of good.”
“A lot of good,” by the way, is an exaggeration. Sure, some U.N. officials are just as well-meaning as any other preening progressive. But the institution stinks, even in its humanitarian aid work. As Heritage’s Brett D. Schaefer notes, citing a 2012 academic study on best and worst practices among aid agencies, U.N. agencies consistently rank “among the worst and least effective performers.”

More important, if $3 billion seems like chump change to you in an age of unfathomable $20 trillion national debt, that’s the way Turtle Bay’s grubby globalists see it, too. They continue to plot international tax schemes (on carbon emissions, financial transactions, etc.), as well as the lucrative skim from redistributionist rackets like the “Green Climate Fund” and the new “Sustainable Development Goals.” The real goal, naturally, is a sustainable fund for the U.N., relieving it of reliance on finicky donors.
The GOP Congress’s focus on the U.S. contribution is understandable. The American taxpayer’s U.N. tab far exceeds the combined $2.5 billion ponied up by the other four permanent Security Council members (China, Russia, Britain, and France). In fact, it exceeds the contributions of 185 countries combined (about three dozen of which pay under $30K in dues – far less than what their diplomats rack up in unpaid Manhattan parking tickets).
Yet the money is not the real problem, and cutting it off for a time won’t pack much political punch.

The Left loves the U.N. It will never seriously address the institution’s thoroughgoing anti-Americanism, anti-Westernism, anti-Semitism, anti-nationalism, anti-capitalism, and anti-rectitude. Instead the media-Democrat complex – with a big assist, starting in two weeks, from the most publicly active former president in American history – would portray an aspirational U.N. valiantly fighting to save the planet from war, poverty and CO2. Duly abominated for slashing funds, the GOP would take a political hit but achieve nothing: The U.N. would find other ways to raise the dough, and Republicans – after watering the defund effort down to feckless foot-stomping – would be goaded into paying any withheld dues, with interest, probably during the next lame-duck session.
The better move is: Just leave. Withdrawal from the U.N. would make transnational progressives go ballistic, but it would hearten millions – the kind of patriotic, self-determining citizens whose fury at statism’s transition into globalism catalyzed Trump’s candidacy (and, in Britain, spurred Brexit).
Put the politics aside, though. Leaving would be the right thing to do.
The U.N. is Ground Zero of the totalitarian Islamist-Leftist quest to eviscerate Western principles and individual liberty – and, while they’re at it, the Jewish state.
You think I’m exaggerating? The U.N. is the Islamist-Leftist vehicle for nullifying American constitutionalism – its guaranteed freedoms and the very premise that the People are sovereign. In just the last few years of Obama’s eager collaborations, the U.N. has produced resolutions that erode First Amendment liberties, calling on member states to outlaw negative criticism of Islam. It has overridden the Constitution’s protections against treaties that harm American interests, endorsing the Iran nuclear deal to give it the imprimatur of international law even though it is unsigned, unratified, and would not have had a prayer of attaining the required two-thirds supermajority Senate approval.
The U.N. is the Islamist-Leftist vehicle for nullifying American constitutionalism – its guaranteed freedoms and the very premise that the People are sovereign.
And more is on the way. The Obama administration signed a U.N. arms-trade treaty that would undermine Second Amendment rights — again, under the vaporous guise of “international law.” On Obama’s watch, the U.S. has also signed the U.N.’s onerous Paris climate agreement, which international bureaucrats tell us has “entered into force” despite — again — the lack of Senate approval required for ratification under our law.
Think no ratification means no problem? You’re not getting how the U.N.’s international-law game works.
Once American presidents sign agreements, globalists insist that we’re bound by them. How can that be, since a presidential signature is insufficient under the Constitution? Because in 1970, President Nixon signed another beauty, the Vienna Convention on the Law of Treaties. Its Article 18 states that once a nation signs a treaty — or merely does something that could be interpreted as “express[ing] its consent to be bound by the treaty” — that nation is “obliged to refrain from acts which would defeat the object and purpose of the treaty.” You’ll be shocked, I’m sure, to hear that the Senate has never approved this treaty on treaties, either. No matter: The State Department (who else?) advises us that, notwithstanding the lack of ratification under our Constitution, “many” of the treaty’s provisions are binding as — you guessed it — “customary international law.”

American government participation in the U.N.’s shenanigans is stripping away our rights and our capacity to govern ourselves. Just as bad, it is sullying us.
Logically, it has to be that way. When not bowing before foreign despots, Obama practically genuflects at mentions of the “international community.” But the international community is awful. It consists of a few good countries swimming in a shark-infested sea. When good seeks consensus with evil, the result cannot be good — just as when you insist, as our government does, on being an impartial “honest broker” between Israel, our democratic ally, and the Palestinian terror state-in-waiting, that is a boon for the jihadists, not the democrats. When you pretend that all states are equal, that there is no difference between the good guys and the bad guys, that is always a coup for the bad guys.
And that’s what the U.N. is: a coup for the bad guys.
Think about it: We are voluntarily entered into an arrangement in which actions affecting American national security and prosperity are subject to the Security Council veto power of Vladimir Putin and the Communist Party of China – the principal patrons of the “Death to America” regime in Iran, the world’s leading sponsor of anti-American terrorism.
We are voluntarily underwriting an institution that — with Obama having formally boarded the anti-Israel train — is joining the anti-Israel Boycott, Divestment, and Sanctions movement. The General Assembly, which is steered by the sharia-supremacist Organization of Islamic Cooperation, has just created a BDS database to target companies that do business with Israeli settlements in what the U.N. has declared is “Palestinian territory.”
WE NEED TO GET OUT of UN . . . NOW!
Please send an email to your Senator and to your House rep ASAP! You can cut/paste the VOTE NO message into your email. You may also phone the United States Capitol switchboard at (202) 224-3121 - plz be nice to the volunteer. Also send this message to Pres. Trump.
It would depend on the terms under which the U.S. left .If we completely withdrew all at once, our resources, our capital, our troops, and the UN’s right to even meet in the U.S., then either China or Russia would most likely maneuver to have the entity relocated for the publicity and influence.They would not be one iota as generous as the U.S. with resources or manpower. Within five years the U.N. would crumble much as the League of Nations did.Without the U.S. bankrolling the operation and actually doing the things it wants done, the U.N. would be even less than a paper tiger. It would be couple of paragraphs in a high school history book.
Any vengeance toward Israel or elsewhere could easily be handled with various independent coalitions.
Also, as a result from our recent election fiasco . . .
In each state, we must come together and demand clean elections.
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Ben Ful Links - February 22/2021

Weekly Geo-Political News and Analysis
Benjamin Fulford. February 22, 2021
Massive March Campaign Planned Against Global Idiocracy
Source: benjaminfulford.net
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Ben Ful Links - February 22/2021:
For example, the peer-reviewed scientific report sent to us by British and French intelligence says:
“According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) on August 23, 2020, ‘For 6% of the deaths, COVID-19 was the only cause mentioned. For deaths with conditions or causes in addition to COVID-19, on average, there were 2.6 additional conditions or causes per death.’”
(Science, Public Health Policy and the Law Volume 2:4 October 12,2020) https://jdfor2020.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/adf864_165a103206974fdbb14ada6bf8af1541.pdf
Here, for example, is a link to a scientific report admitting CRISPR is used in “Covid-19” vaccines. https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7469881/
The Cabal’s state actors are now under increasing attack for their criminal activities. Florida Governor Ron DeSantis told puppet President Biden off last Wednesday after China Joe instructed him to shut down the state because of the fake Pandemic. Speaking to vaccine czar Dr. Anthony Faustus DeSantis asked, “How much do you stand to earn from these vaccines, Dr. Fauci?” He then added, “And, Joe, if you continue with this course of action, I will authorize the state National Guard to protect the movement of Floridians.” When Biden replied, “Address me as Mr. President or President Biden,” DeSantis replied “I will not, and you can go fuck yourself,” before hanging up. https://realrawnews.com/2021/02/gov-desantis-tells-biden-go-fuck-yourself/
The situation on the ground is now so dire that, in just one example, a new survey by the NYC Hospitality Alliance reveals that 92 percent of New York restaurants couldn’t afford to pay December rent. https://thenycalliance.org/information/december-2020-rent-report
Also even to corporate propaganda media is starting to revolt against their fake narratives. For example, in an appearance on MSNBC, White House COVID adviser Andy Slavitt said the fact that Covid infection patterns were identical in no lockdown Florida and hyper-lockdown California was “a little bit beyond our explanation.” https://www.zerohedge.com/covid-19/watch-biden-adviser-struggles-explain-similar-covid-numbers-ca-fl-despite-opposite
The Cabal is now desperately dialing down the fake pandemic as reality becomes impossible for them to deny any longer. That is why they are reporting a huge drop in “Covid” cases and propaganda news articles are now saying the entire “pandemic” could be over by April. http://www.battleforworld.com/2020/08/01/covid-19-where-does-it-end/#CovidCasesDrop
https://www.statista.com/chart/22067/daily-new-cases-by-world-region/
Of course, we must never underestimate these criminals because they have literally thousands of years of experience in herding humans as if they were livestock. The attack on Texas -which involved deliberately shutting down their power grid in the middle of a cold snap- is one example. This came after Texas Congressman Ron Wright “died of Covid-19,” and as an election for his replacement looms, the corporate propaganda media is full of articles criticizing the Texas establishment for “mishandling,” its energy grid. https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2021/02/17/texas-shows-that-when-you-cannot-govern-you-lie-lot/
Now, NSA sources are telling us the next thing the criminal regime is planning is food shortages. The NSA notes:
1) Small farms shutting down world-wide.
2) Over 1,000 ships off our coast with food as the FDA keeps them out at sea; allowing the food to rot,
3) China is outbidding everyone for food worldwide as their crops fail,
4) This NASA-created freeze is not allowing food shipments across the nations; USA, Europe, etc.
Furthermore, the NSA notes railroads are sitting idle so trucks must pick up the slack meaning shipping costs went from $1,000 per container to $10,000 per container from Seattle to Chicago. They note the same trouble in Japan as ports need constant upgrades due to shaking. To top things off, they say “Biden is shipping USA Grain Reserves to China again.” https://news.yahoo.com/world-pay-more-meat-food-050000496.html
https://www.zerohedge.com/commodities/amid-soaring-food-prices-kraft-heinz-conagra-brands-set-raise-prices
The cabal has also been tearing down power substations in the U.S. for years “so a 3-hour power outage becomes a 3-week power outage,” the sources note. They say what happened in Texas was “just a foretaste.” https://www.revolver.news/2021/02/texass-power-grid-disaster-is-only-the-beginning/
In addition to economic sabotage, the Cabal is now promoting multiple space missions to gather money. https://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-9273375/Seven-minutes-terror-NASAs-Perseverance-land-Mars-TODAY.html
https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/worldnews/14089099/russia-china-sign-historic-deal-build-first-moon-base/
Now let us look at a recent snapshot of some of the moronic policies the Cabal is trying to impose on the world. For one thing, they are still harping endlessly about Iran and its so-called “nuclear bomb.” Here for example is a Mossad linked Debka comment saying “the blank wall reached by President Joe Biden’s policy for re-engaging Iran in nuclear diplomacy is that his advisers could not get together on a strategy for stalling its progress towards a bomb.” This is the same BS they have been repeated endlessly for over 30 years. https://www.debka.com/are-bidens-moves-for-nuclear-diplomacy-with-iran-stuck-in-the-sand/
Of course, if you take a look at Iranian leaders wearing their sheep masks, you can tell Iran is also just a cabal colony playing their role in trying to get us all to kill each other in WWIII. https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/white-house-signals-iran-its-ready-eu-sponsored-talks-major-nuke-deal-breakthrough
In Israel meanwhile, the sheeple there are now being given the mark of the beast vaccination certificates that allow them to go shopping, etc. https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/israel-re-opens-further-with-green-pass-for-vaccinated/ar-BB1dSlf1
And then we have German Chancellor Angela Hitler saying, “the pandemic is not over until all people in the world have been vaccinated.” https://www.reuters.com/article/us-germany-politics-g7-merkel-idUSKBN2AJ1WG
Of course, any nations opposed to this are “rogue nations,” opposed to a “rules-based world order,” which is why NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said, “China and Russia are trying to re-write the rules of the road to benefit their own interests.” https://www.reuters.com/article/us-germany-security-nato-idUSKBN2AJ24G
The Pentagon is on board with the plan to occupy Israel and so are the Russians. “Russia is the last island of freedom,” State Duma speaker Vyacheslav Volodin said recently adding, “Do you see what’s happening in the United States of America? The country is dying, everything has been canceled out.” https://www.themoscowtimes.com/2021/02/17/russia-is-the-worlds-last-island-of-freedom-parliament-speaker-says-a72995
Several targets have been outlined for the spring offensive against the cabal. In addition to Israel, any world leader pushing for Covid-19 vaccines has to be removed ASAP. These include Boris Johnson of the UK, Justin Castro of Canada, Angela Hitler of Germany, Joe CG Biden of the U.S. etc.
Removing Justin Castro in Canada is a high priority because it will allow Canadian troops to join their compatriots in states like Texas and Florida to fight against the Khazarian mafia strongholds like California and New York. https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/14-5m-canadians-to-be-immunized-by-june-updated-vaccination-timeline-shows-1.5314048
Also, Google and Facebook were created with taxpayer money and then given to private individuals. They are now taking over power from elected governments and must be nationalized. “Freedom of speech is not something that anonymous moderators working for private companies should decide,” Deputy Polish Justice Minister Sebastian Kaleta said recently. “Instead, that is for the national body; duly elected officials,” he added. https://www.foxnews.com/world/poland-fights-big-tech-push-block-social-media-censorship?utm_campaign=later-linkinbio-foxnews&utm_content=later-14580965&utm_medium=social&utm_source=instagram
https://www.zerohedge.com/political/biden-admin-working-directly-big-tech-crush-vaccine-dissent
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Is the US in Bible Prophecy?
: By Pete Garcia Published on:October 18, 2017
There has been much discussion as of late on whether or not the United States is found in Bible prophecy. How does the world’s most powerful, Christian, and Israel-friendly nation not warrant a mention as a key player in the last days? If the US is in Bible prophecy, what role does she play? If she is not, then why not? What happens to her vast natural resources, advanced technology, military arsenal, and able-bodied citizens? Considering these questions, there are biblically sound and astute teachers on both sides of the issue who either believe that the US is Mystery Babylon, or that we are not in the picture at all.
Those in the camp of us being Babylon (mystery or otherwise), seem to make good points for that case (see here). Probably the strongest reason why we could be is that the Jew’s are told to come out of her. As of 2017, the largest concentration of Jewish people outside of Israel is in the United States. While at the same time, there are practically no Jews in what was traditional Babylon (Iraq) thanks to the likes of Al Qaeda, ISIS, and other militant Islamic groups. So how could they come out of her (Babylon), if they are not in there, to begin with?
Those in the camp who believe we are not in the prophetic picture at all (see here) believe so for a variety of reasons. The most obvious reason for saying the US is not in Bible prophecy is that there is no explicit mention of any nation (in the geopolitical sense) that matches our description in the prophetic texts concerning the last days. While a number of doomsday scenarios could pose an existential threat to the United States, none (in my opinion) threaten to so suddenly upend the traditional global order as the Rapture of the Church. The threat has been gravely underestimated in books like the “Left Behind” series and other popular eschatological material.
Underestimated not because of the percentage of how many American’s are raptured up, but by what immediately follows.
Assessment
Speculation abounds as to what the percentage will be for those believers who will be caught up. Some think as low as one percent while others think as high as twenty-five percent. The percentage then has become sort of a measuring stick by which we could determine whether or not the US survives the Rapture event and go on to play a major role in the 70th Week of Daniel. I tend to think around ten percent of the US population will be raptured, but even then that means around thirty million Americans (by current population standards) would instantaneously disappear. But regardless, the how is less important than the why in regards to our potential role in the Tribulation.
What is of utmost importance is realizing that once the Rapture does occur, the restraining ministry of the Holy Spirit is also removed (2 Thess. 2:6-8).
This does not mean that the Holy Spirit disappears from the earth altogether. The Holy Spirit is omnipresent and cannot, not be everywhere. The Holy Spirit was on the earth prior to the day of Pentecost and He will be here after the Rapture event. What it means is that the mystery of iniquity (or lawlessness) that is active in the world today, is at the same time actively being hindered by God’s power through His people. We are salt and light to a world that will quickly be engulfed in darkness once the Rapture occurs. But after the Rapture, lawlessness will no longer be hindered. Lawlessness will go unchecked and the world will quickly move in one accord under the direction of Satan who will rapidly form that final world system.
Then the devil, taking Him up on a high mountain, showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. And the devil said to Him, “All this authority I will give You, and their glory; for this has been delivered to me, and I give it to whomever I wish. Therefore, if You will worship before me, all will be Yours.” Luke 4:5-7
The idea that the world first experiences the Rapture then sees the unleashing of the four horsemen matches perfectly with what Paul is shown concerning the order of events. The man of sin cannot be revealed until we (the body of Christ) is removed. This is why we see John record the Revelation in the manner which he does (Rev. 1:19):
The vision-the things John has seen
The seven letters to the seven churches-the things which are in John’s day until now
The heavenly throne room and subsequent events-the things after this (after the churches)
Now I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals; and I heard one of the four living creatures saying with a voice like thunder, “Come and see.” And I looked, and behold, a white horse. He who sat on it had a bow; and a crown was given to him, and he went out conquering and to conquer. Revelation 6:1-2
The first horse out of the gate is the man of sin riding the white horse. He seemingly takes advantage of a crisis already in progress. How long the crisis lasts between the Rapture and his arrival is unknown. We know that the actual 70th Week does not start at the Rapture, but with a covenant that is signed between Israel and the nations (Dan. 9:27) which he will ultimately violate halfway through. The man of sin will then become the son of perdition once Satan physically possesses him at the midway point. At present time, it is impossible for us to know who this man will be. We only know what the Bible says about him. However, his arrival likely comes at a point of great turmoil. So if the world’s agenda is currently being hindered by God the Holy Spirit through the body of Christ on the earth, what does our removal then signify?
A total lack of restraint. Unchecked restraint will result in turmoil and conflict and crisis.
It should mean that the floodgates of hell are opened and there will be a short period of chaos immediately following the removal of the body of Christ (the Church) from the earth. This will force the power structures of the former world-order (pre-rapture) to realign themselves post-rapture. The old saying is that nature abhors a vacuum, and will fill itself with anything to avoid a vacuum. If the church’s removal provides this vacuum, you can guarantee that something will fill this void. This is where I believe the spirit of antichrist becomes the strong delusion that sweeps over the world.
Logically what comes with turmoil and change, is conflict. If we look back at World War 1 or World War 2, we see that the geopolitical realities changed significantly before and after each of these events. After the Rapture will be no different. The world will be forced to realign itself. IF the US is not impacted at all by the Rapture, then the current power structure (or the world order) will not need to change. But we do see great change coming because the next horse unleashed is the rider on the red horse.
When He opened the second seal, I heard the second living creature saying, “Come and see.” Another horse, fiery red, went out. And it was granted to the one who sat on it to take peace from the earth, and that people should kill one another; and there was given to him a great sword. Rev. 6:3-4
As I’ve stated in a previous brief’s, that any belief system outside of true, orthodox Christianity, is from Satan. While the varying religions and worldviews may have different angles, forms of worship, terminology, etc., they are all varying corruptions of the truth. The reality then is that there is only one God, who is expressed in three Persons, who are all of the same divine essence and being, co-equal in power, and willingly submitting to each other to eternally be in one accord, according to Scripture. Anything that deviates from that is from Satan.
In other words, it could have just as easily been Hinduism or Shintoism that was violently rampaging across the Middle East and Europe as it is Islam. Any view that is not true biblical Christianity, is fiercely (when confronted) opposed to the truth because of what it reveals about its corrupted nature. Without the Holy Spirit to keep the world at bay, the world will tear itself apart trying to establish a new dominant religious position.
When He opened the third seal, I heard the third living creature say, “Come and see.” So I looked, and behold, a black horse, and he who sat on it had a pair of scales in his hand. And I heard a voice in the midst of the four living creatures saying, “A quart of wheat for a denarius, and three quarts of barley for a denarius; and do not harm the oil and the wine. Rev. 6:5-6
When peace is taken from the earth, what naturally follows is economic disparity and starvation. The rich and powerful have the means to keep their wealth and sustenance, while the rest do not. With starvation comes death and pestilence.
When He opened the fourth seal, I heard the voice of the fourth living creature saying, “Come and see.” So I looked, and behold, a pale horse. And the name of him who sat on it was Death, and Hades followed with him. And power was given to them over a fourth of the earth, to kill with sword, with hunger, with death, and by the beasts of the earth. Rev. 6:7-8
The world population is currently at 7.5 billion people. While we can’t know the percentage of those taken up at the Rapture of the Church, we can know (roughly) how many perish during the first four Seal judgments. A fourth of that is around 1.875B people. This is an unprecedented number and aside from the Noahic flood, we don’t have anything else that can really compare to a number that large perishing in such a short period of time. That number alone will force major geopolitical alignments that will bring about the final world system headed by the Antichrist.
Conclusion
I think that the biblically reasonable answer to the question of whether the United States is in Bible prophecy is that we are, but not in the way we hoped or expected. Although we are not Mystery Babylon, we will be essential to its creation. Every gentile power that has come about ultimately befriends and then betrays either the nation of Israel (and Judah) or the Jewish people. The nations will have to answer for this as well (Matt. 25:31-46). After the Rapture, the US will cease to look or be anything of like what it is today. I expect the US to become exceedingly anti-Semitic much the same way Europe rapidly became anti-Semitic in the early 20th century.
The Jews will have to flee the United States back to Israel just as they did Europe between WWI and WWII. This is because the antichrist spirit will feed that supernatural hatred to a people who have been given over to a strong delusion. Satan’s intent then is to gather the Jews into one place so to set a snare for destruction (Matt. 24:15-21, 2 Thess. 2:3-4). If Satan can destroy Israel, Jerusalem, the temple, and kill the Jews, then God’s prophetic word will fail thus nullifying God’s plan for Satan. At least, that is his plan it seems.
Likewise, if the US ceases to be the world superpower, some other nation(s) will rise up to fill that void such as the revived Roman Empire. What’s left of the US will be incorporated into that final world system. Without the constraints of the Judeo-Christian constitution, the US will dissolve relatively quickly. It would seem that either some catastrophic event occurs before Gog and Magog (Ezekiel 38-39), or after the Rapture, the US sees no intrinsic need to come to the aid of Israel. Either way, we are not willing to come to her aid.
The antichrist and the false prophet simply do not have enough time left to build the world forces it needs to dominate the planet in only seven years. They will have to rely on taking from what’s left of the major world powers through some advanced digital system (AI perhaps) to impose its iron-fisted will over the entire planet. Granted, even that time will be very brief as the forces from the east will eventually rise up to challenge his (antichrist’s) authority (Rev. 16:12).
Unfortunately, the US will be amongst the nations who finally assemble at the Valley of Megiddo and try to challenge the physical return of Jesus to the earth (Zech. 12:3). They nations armies are quickly and effortlessly destroyed as Jesus brings His armies from heaven to watch Him single-handedly destroy the world’s system (Dan. 2:44-45). Unlike earthly empires and kingdoms, Jesus does not have any weaknesses. He is the infinite source of all wealth, all power, and does not rely on consensus to conduct His will, because He and the Father, and the Spirit are One in purpose. To this, Revelation 19:15-16 states-
Now out of His mouth goes a sharp sword, that with it He should strike the nations. And He Himself will rule them with a rod of iron. He Himself treads the winepress of the fierceness and wrath of Almighty God. And He has on His robe and on His thigh a name written:
KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS.
Even so, Maranatha!
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Follow-up to Judicial Watch Deep State Panel
The Open Government Partnership (OGP) empowered the deep state. The OGP is primarily funded by Omidyar (Civil Society) and Soros (Open Society – CS and OS are the same thing, and there's a ton of overlap in what they fund.) The OGP has grown rapidly since its inception in 2011 and has 70 member countries. Each country has a National Plan, co-governed and implemented by CS and external stakeholders (in theory, the public – most of whom have never heard of the OGP. Hmmm….)
The OGPs multilateral partners include the World Bank, Bank of Asia, InterAmerica Development Bank, the UN and USAid.
The OGP allows globalists to infiltrate governments from the inside. One of the first things they address in a National Plan is FOIA processes, so they can control the flow of information. Another primary focus is the Extractives Initiative (EITI,) whereby they gain control of resources. www.doi.gov/sites/doi.gov/files/migrated/eiti/FACA/upload/CommunicationsPlanVer15.pdf They are in every agency, controlling procurement, contracting, and digital infrastructure. .
After thousands of research hours, it's impossible to see the OGP as anything other than a transition tool to one-world governance.
Here's an interesting 2011 Dept. of State Background Briefing on the OGP. The "two Senior Administration officials" were literally HIDDEN from view and referred to only as "Senior Administration Official One" and "Senior Administration Official Two." Why so much secrecy? One attendee wondered the same thing:
"QUESTION: (Inaudible) why – has it struck anyone as odd to a briefing about open government and transparency on background? Why is that necessary?
MODERATOR: There will be another briefing at – are you doing another briefing afterwards that’s on the record? I think you are. No? No. I think not.
QUESTION: Just so you understand this, we have to explain why officials are speaking anonymously. And if anyone is going to write – at least I do, and I think others do as well. But to write a story talking about U.S. officials anonymously plugging an Obama initiative for open government just – it makes – I’m sorry. It just makes —
MODERATOR: Because the event is happening tomorrow. The President will be on the record with his counterparts tomorrow. This is a preview, and it’s a preview by senior Administration officials below the level of the President. So the President will speak on the record tomorrow, but this is a preview.
QUESTION: But how does that advance the very goals you’re discussing, which are transparency and accountability. The two people who have spoken to us are not identified, so there’s no transparency about who they are. And because they speak under a cloak of anonymity, there is no particular accountability of what they’ve said. I mean, I cannot believe that you – this didn’t occur to anybody, and I don’t think the fact that the President’s going to announce it tomorrow is a very persuasive argument for not disclosing who you are." www.doi.gov/sites/doi.gov/files/migrated/eiti/FACA/upload/CommunicationsPlanVer15.pdf
Hopefully, that astute attendee is alive and well. If you read the full DoS OGP Briefing, you'll notice they focus on "the public" as "stakeholders." In reality, the stakeholders are corporations/investors who use the OGP to drive policy, regulations and/or legislation. This gives them a "leg up" on their competition, mitigates their risk, and increases their profits and control. Definitely NOT a free market system.
The OGP is also a useful framework for understanding the geopolitical landscape. Putin refuses to join the OGP. Same with Assad. Same with Maduro. Same with Erdogan. Orban withdrew Hungary from the OGP last December – in part because he did not want to release all government data to CS. Now, Hungary is being accosted for clamping down on NGOs that spew CS/OS rhetoric and a Soros-funded university. Are we seeing a pattern here?
Another example: The globalists wanted Ukraine's democratically-elected president, Yanukovych, (who Manafort advised – a position that conceivably makes him a globalist target, along with Presidents Trump and Putin) to join NATO, the EU and to cease friendly relations with Russia. They activated a a plethora of Soros/Omidyar-funded NGO's that manipulated Ukrainian citizens to rise against Yanukovych. Russia offered to aid Ukraine, and, concerned that Yanukovych might accept, the globalists brought in USAid (Omidyar-funded) and replaced Yanukovych with one of their own. They are trying the same thing in Venezuela.
Why is NO ONE talking about the OGP? My biggest fear is that it's an effort to make us think "all is okay" if Soros, DWS, the Clintons, etc. are removed from the equation. That is NOT the case. Even now, there's state, local and federal pending legislation that's very beneficial to their goals. We need to be on top of that and let our "representatives" know they WILL be voted out of office if they don't start representing US. BTW, the same people behind all of the above also "own" our elections – www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/6od9g5 /why_trumps_election_integrity_commission_is/. )
President Trump has "tabled" the OGP assessment process which suggests he's aware of its inherent problems. Shining a light on the OGP and its "little brothers," The Council of State Governments and The National League of Cities, helps to determine "who's who." For example, Judicial Watch recently published an article about College Park, MD City Council allowing non-citizens to vote. Relevant? See for yourself. www.collegeparkmd.gov/search.php?as_filetype=pdf&q=council+of+state+governments&Submit=Search&sitesearch=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.collegeparkmd.gov
Between the NGOs, the media, and a network that spans the globe, these people have a machine. We are being WAY too complacent. If you've read this far, THANK YOU! People like you will reverse the trajectory of our country.
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An incredibly important paper on whether data can ever be "anonymized" and how we should handle release of large data-sets

Even the most stringent privacy rules have massive loopholes: they all allow for free distribution of "de-identified" or "anonymized" data that is deemed to be harmless because it has been subjected to some process.
But the reality of "re-identification" attacks tells a different story: again and again and again and again and again, datasets are released on the promise that they have been de-identified, only to be rapidly (and often trivially) re-identified, putting privacy, financial security, lives and even geopolitical stability at risk.
The problems of good anonymization are myriad: one is that re-identification risk increases over time: a database of taxi-trips, say, might be re-identifiable later when a database of user accounts, or home addresses, or specific voyages taken by one person, leaks. Releasing a database of logins and their corresponding real names might allow a database of logins without real names to be mass re-identified with little effort.
Anonymization suffers from the "wanting it badly is enough" problem: industry and regulators would benefit immensely if there was such a thing as reliable de-identification, and the fact that it would be useful to have this creates the certainty that it's possible to have this (see also: crypto backdoors, DRM, no-fly lists, etc).
Regulators, wary of being overly proscriptive, often use "industry best practices" as a benchmark for whether anonymization has taken place. But this only works if the public rewards companies that practice good anonymization, meaning that companies will compete with one another to find effective anonymization techniques. Since it's impossible for a prospective customer to evaluate which anonymization techniques work until after there has been a breach, markets don't reward companies that spend their resources perfecting anonymization, meaning that industries race to the bottom to effect the cheapest methods without regard to whether they work, and this becomes "best practice."
You can see this in other sectors: UK anti-money laundering rules require that banks identify their customers' home addresses using "industry best practices." Bank customers don't care if their bank is complicit in money-laundering, so they don't preferentially choose banks with good anti-money-laundering practices, which means that all the UK banks converged on using laserprinted, easily forged gas-bills as proof of address, despite the fact that these offer nothing in the fight against money-laundering. It's enough they they're cheap to process and can be waved around when a bank is caught in a money-laundering prosecution.
A Precautionary Approach to Big Data Privacy, a 2015 paper by Princeton computer scientists Arvind Narayanan (previously, Joanna Huey and Edward Felten (previoulsy), is the best look at this subject I've yet read, and should be required reading.
The authors point out that the traditional -- and controversial security methodology of "penetrate and patch" (where bugs are identified after the product is rolled out and then fixed) -- is totally unsuited to the problem of data-anonymization. That's because once an "anonymized" database is distributed, it's impossible to patch the copies floating around in the wild (you can't recall the data and remove problematic identifiers), and partner organizations that you've given the data to have no incentive to "patch" it by taking away identifiers that they might be using or find useful in the future.
Instead of "ad-hoc" de-identification methods, the authors recommend a wonkish, exciting idea called "differential privacy," in which precise amounts of noise is added to the data-set before it is released, allowing the publisher to quantify exactly how likely a future re-identification attack is, balancing the benefits of release with the potential costs to the people implicated in it.
Differential privacy is hard to do right, though: famously Apple flubbed one of the first wide-use applications for it.
The authors set out a set of clear guidelines for how to turn their recommendations into policy, and give examples of how existing data-releases could integrate these principles.
We're living in a moment of unprecedented data-gathering and intentional release, but the entire policy framework for those releases is based on a kind of expedient shrug: "We're not sure if this'll work, but it needs doing, so..." This paper -- written in admirably clear, non-technical language -- establishes a sound policy/computer science basis for undertaking these activities, and not a moment too soon.
https://boingboing.net/2018/02/01/high-dimensional-data.html
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Follow-up to Judicial Watch Deep State Panel
The Open Government Partnership (OGP) empowered the deep state. The OGP is primarily funded by Omidyar (Civil Society) and Soros (Open Society – CS and OS are the same thing, and there's a ton of overlap in what they fund.) The OGP has grown rapidly since its inception in 2011 and has 70 member countries. Each country has a National Plan, co-governed and implemented by CS and external stakeholders (in theory, the public – most of whom have never heard of the OGP. Hmmm….)
The OGPs multilateral partners include the World Bank, Bank of Asia, InterAmerica Development Bank, the UN and USAid.
The OGP allows globalists to infiltrate governments from the inside. One of the first things they address in a National Plan is FOIA processes, so they can control the flow of information. Another primary focus is the Extractives Initiative (EITI,) whereby they gain control of resources. www.doi.gov/sites/doi.gov/files/migrated/eiti/FACA/upload/CommunicationsPlanVer15.pdf They are in every agency, controlling procurement, contracting, and digital infrastructure. .
After thousands of research hours, it's impossible to see the OGP as anything other than a transition tool to one-world governance.
Here's an interesting 2011 Dept. of State Background Briefing on the OGP. The "two Senior Administration officials" were literally HIDDEN from view and referred to only as "Senior Administration Official One" and "Senior Administration Official Two." Why so much secrecy? One attendee wondered the same thing:
"QUESTION: (Inaudible) why – has it struck anyone as odd to a briefing about open government and transparency on background? Why is that necessary?
MODERATOR: There will be another briefing at – are you doing another briefing afterwards that’s on the record? I think you are. No? No. I think not.
QUESTION: Just so you understand this, we have to explain why officials are speaking anonymously. And if anyone is going to write – at least I do, and I think others do as well. But to write a story talking about U.S. officials anonymously plugging an Obama initiative for open government just – it makes – I’m sorry. It just makes —
MODERATOR: Because the event is happening tomorrow. The President will be on the record with his counterparts tomorrow. This is a preview, and it’s a preview by senior Administration officials below the level of the President. So the President will speak on the record tomorrow, but this is a preview.
QUESTION: But how does that advance the very goals you’re discussing, which are transparency and accountability. The two people who have spoken to us are not identified, so there’s no transparency about who they are. And because they speak under a cloak of anonymity, there is no particular accountability of what they’ve said. I mean, I cannot believe that you – this didn’t occur to anybody, and I don’t think the fact that the President’s going to announce it tomorrow is a very persuasive argument for not disclosing who you are." www.doi.gov/sites/doi.gov/files/migrated/eiti/FACA/upload/CommunicationsPlanVer15.pdf
Hopefully, that astute attendee is alive and well. If you read the full DoS OGP Briefing, you'll notice they focus on "the public" as "stakeholders." In reality, the stakeholders are corporations/investors who use the OGP to drive policy, regulations and/or legislation. This gives them a "leg up" on their competition, mitigates their risk, and increases their profits and control. Definitely NOT a free market system.
The OGP is also a useful framework for understanding the geopolitical landscape. Putin refuses to join the OGP. Same with Assad. Same with Maduro. Same with Erdogan. Orban withdrew Hungary from the OGP last December – in part because he did not want to release all government data to CS. Now, Hungary is being accosted for clamping down on NGOs that spew CS/OS rhetoric and a Soros-funded university. Are we seeing a pattern here?
Another example: The globalists wanted Ukraine's democratically-elected president, Yanukovych, (who Manafort advised – a position that conceivably makes him a globalist target, along with Presidents Trump and Putin) to join NATO, the EU and to cease friendly relations with Russia. They activated a a plethora of Soros/Omidyar-funded NGO's that manipulated Ukrainian citizens to rise against Yanukovych. Russia offered to aid Ukraine, and, concerned that Yanukovych might accept, the globalists brought in USAid (Omidyar-funded) and replaced Yanukovych with one of their own. They are trying the same thing in Venezuela.
Why is NO ONE talking about the OGP? My biggest fear is that it's an effort to make us think "all is okay" if Soros, DWS, the Clintons, etc. are removed from the equation. That is NOT the case. Even now, there's state, local and federal pending legislation that's very beneficial to their goals. We need to be on top of that and let our "representatives" know they WILL be voted out of office if they don't start representing US. BTW, the same people behind all of the above also "own" our elections – www.reddit.com/r/The_Donald/comments/6od9g5 /why_trumps_election_integrity_commission_is/. )
President Trump has "tabled" the OGP assessment process which suggests he's aware of its inherent problems. Shining a light on the OGP and its "little brothers," The Council of State Governments and The National League of Cities, helps to determine "who's who." For example, Judicial Watch recently published an article about College Park, MD City Council allowing non-citizens to vote. Relevant? See for yourself. www.collegeparkmd.gov/search.php?as_filetype=pdf&q=council+of+state+governments&Submit=Search&sitesearch=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.collegeparkmd.gov
Between the NGOs, the media, and a network that spans the globe, these people have a machine. We are being WAY too complacent. If you've read this far, THANK YOU! People like you will reverse the trajectory of our country.
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