It’s been a not-so quiet week in Lake Wobegon

Lake Wobegon is a fictional small town in Minnesota created in the mind of one of the world’s greatest story-tellers, Garrison Keillor. Each episode of his long-running
radio show, A Prairie Home Companion, includes a story that begins with that famous line: “Well, it’s been a quiet week in Lake Wobegon.” That has become a code phrase in our family that we use either (1) when we are about to launch into a long and complicated narrative, (2) when, truly, nothing of importance is going on, or (3) we don’t know what else to say and feel that a meaningless statement is better than silence.

I am using a variation of that phrase here primarily for the third purpose. Obviously the world is in great turmoil, and there is much that could be said about every aspect of it, but this is not the place so, since it is hard to know what to say about any of this, I merely want to leave one thought with you.

If you notice, there are several themes that, like threads in a tapestry, appear, disappear, and reappear throughout the fabric of daily news. They are fraud, deceit, plunder, murder, and war.

There is nothing new about any of these, and it could be argued that they always have been with us and always will be, because they are rooted in human nature. I agree with that analysis but would like to shift the issue from IF such things are inevitable to THE DEGREE to which they are inevitable.

I believe that most humans have instincts and tendencies for both of what we call good and evil. That being the case, it makes a difference what kind of a culture we have. Some cultures are tolerant of fraud, deceit, plunder, murder, and war. In fact, some even consider these things to be necessary and praiseworthy. Others, of course, promote the values of honesty, private property, equality-under-law, and respect for individuals against the group.

The next time you read a news report about some horrendous assault against liberty, privacy, health, or even life, itself, think about the culture that permits these things to be done in the name of national security, morality, religion, or any other variant of the greater good for the greater number.

Bottom line: If the world understood the wisdom within the Creed of Freedom and built its laws and constitutions upon them, Lake Wobegon would be a lot quieter than it is today.

G. Edward Griffin
2016 February 12

THIS WEEK IN REVIEW

European finance ministers are calling on the European Central Bank to restrict the use of 500-euro notes. The official story is that this would hinder the financing of terrorism. [We note, however, that the international banking systems now are trying to phase out all paper currency as a means of establishing all-digital money, and this could merely be another step in that process. The reasons for that have nothing to do with terrorist funding but everything to do with increasing tax revenue, producing bank fees on every transaction, and monitoring everyone’s purchasing habits.] Euronews 2016 Feb 12 (Story)

Munich, Germany: US Secretary of State John Kerry announced that a dozen countries, including the US and Russia, have agreed to a “cessation of hostilities” in Syria one week from now. [We hope this is a real agreement and not just rhetoric as usual. The test will be to see what happens in the next week. If Russia succeeds in destroying the ISIS stronghold in the city of Allepo, the US, Turkey and the Saudis will have to abandon their long-term mission to topple the Syrian government – or break the agreement to cease hostilities. In that case, they will claim that they are merely reacting defensively against new aggression by Russia, Syria, and Iran. We shall see.] CNN 2016 Feb 11 (Story)

Cliven Bundy, the Nevada rancher who touched off an armed showdown with federal authorities in 2014 and who supported a similar confrontation in Oregon in 2016, was arrested at the Portland airport. He faces charges of conspiracy related to the standoff at his ranch. His sons face similar charges. The remaining four occupiers of the federal building in Oregon surrendered on Thursday. The mini revolt is over. Oregon Live 2016 Feb 11 (Story) (Cached)

A major prison riot in the city of Monterrey began as a clash between rival gangs. It has killed 52 prisoners and wounded 12 more. Family members are pleading at the gate to know who is dead and who is alive. Reuters 2016 Feb11 (Story)

The US Department of Justice is suing the city of Ferguson, Missouri, for misconduct and multiple violations of citizens’ rights. The DOJ is calling for major reform within the police department, but city council rejected the plan because it was too costly. ABC News 2016 Feb 11 (Story)

Bernie Sanders publicly chastised Hillary Clinton for taking foreign policy advice from former US Secretary of State, Henry Kissinger. He says that Kissinger is responsible for bombing Cambodia during the Vietnam-War era and clearing the way for Pol Pot, which launched one of greatest genocides in history. However, he did not say what his own foreign policy would be. Yahoo 2016 Feb 11 (Story)

Argentina: A report from an organization called Physicians in Crop-Sprayed Towns has challenged the theory that the Zika virus epidemic in Brazil is the cause of the increase in microcephaly among newborns. The doctors discovered that most of the sick people live in areas where a chemical called Pyriproxyfen is added to the water to eliminate mosquitoes. It does this by producing malformations in developing mosquitoes, and the doctors say it also produces the malformation called microcephaly in human embryos. The chemical was introduced to the water supply in 2014, and the malformations began to appear in that area shortly thereafter. Pyriproxyfen is manufactured by Sumitomo Chemical, a Japanese ‘strategic partner’ of Monsanto. GM Watch 2016 Feb 10 (Story) (Cached)

The US Supreme Court, in a surprise decision, halted Obama’s climate-change regulation against coal plants until all legal challenges have been heard in court. This delay could undermine Obama’s commitment to the Paris Agreement to cut emissions by 26% or more by 2025. A final ruling on this matter likely will not be made until June, 2017. NY Times 2016 Feb 10 (Story) (Cached)

Hawaii’s Big Island has declared a state of emergency over an outbreak of dengue fever. 250 cases of the mosquito-borne illness have been confirmed. PBS Newshour 2016 Feb 10 (Story)

Ohio Governor John Kasich, a current presidential candidate, is expected to sign a bill blocking state and federal funds for groups that perform or promote abortions. Kasich is accused of supporting the bill for political gain, because Ohio law already prohibits state funds from being used for abortions. However, state funds are now used by Planned Parenthood to provide other procedures, and this indirectly releases funds for abortions. Reuters 2016 Feb 10 (Story) (Cached)

Monsanto agreed to pay the government $80 million in fines for presenting false accounting information to its shareholders. It failed to list expenses for a costly rebate program to bolster sales for its RoundUp Ready pesticide. Sales plummeted when RoundUp’s patent expired and cheaper brands appeared on the market. Monsanto’s CEO Hugh Grant will voluntarily return $3,165,852 to the company that he received in cash bonuses and stock awards. He will be able to recover this quickly, because his base annual pay was increased to $1.6 million plus a new $1.9 million bonus plus nearly $10 million in “long-term incentives”, which, typically are in the form of stock options at prices below market value. Washington Post 2016 Feb 10 (Story) (Cached)

US: Winners of the New Hampshire primaries were announced. On the Republican side, Donald Trump took 34% of the vote followed by John Kasich with 16%, Ted Cruz with 12%, and Jeb Bush with 11%. On the Democrat side, Bernie Sanders won 59% of the vote and Hillary followed with 38%. The National 2016 Feb 9 (Story)

Bernie Sanders trounced Hillary Clinton in the New Hampshire Democrat Primary, with 151,584 votes over Clinton’s 95,252, yet Hillary is in the lead for delegates. She has 431 while Sanders has only 52. Truth In Media 2016 Feb 10 (Story) (Cached)

Unknown hackers broke into FBI computers and posted online the identities, job titles, emails, and phone numbers of 20,000 FBI employees. The identities of 9,000 Department of Homeland Security employees also were posted. The Secretary of Defense quickly responded by asking for a $7 billion budget increase to improve cybersecurity. [Get it? Unknown hackers post information publicly available from government departmental directories, the press plays it up as a cyberattack, and the Pentagon tells Congress it needs another $7 billion to improve cybersecurity. Is it possible that some of this money will be used to pay the people set up the whole thing in the first place? Just asking.] PressTV 2016 Feb 9 (Story)

CNN reports that Saudi Arabia is preparing to send 150,000 troops to invade Syria, by way of Turkey, in March. Many observers believe [as we do] that this has nothing to do with fighting ISIS but is solely to topple the Syrian government. InfoWars 2016 Feb 8 (Story) (Cached)

Syria: The city of Aleppo is on the verge of being liberated from rebel control by Russian and Iranian forces, which would result in Assad resuming power over the region. This may be the real reason the Saudis are planning to send 150,000 troops to Syria, not to fight terrorist rebels, which now are all but defeated, but to battle against Russia, Syria, and Iran. [World wars are started by situations like this.] ZeroHedge 2016 Feb 7 (Story) (Cached)

New York: Ground water at the Indian Point nuclear power plant has had a 65,000 percent increase in radioactive tritium, and the source of the leak is unknown. Officials at the power plant say that the contamination has not spread off-site and that there is no health danger. New York Governor Cuomo has been trying to close the plant for years because of its proximity to twenty million residents in the nation’s largest city. RT 2016 Feb 7 (Story) (Cached)

During a Republican debate in New Hampshire, Donald Trump said that he supports waterboarding to combat terrorism. USA Today 2016 Feb 7 (Story) (Cached)

US: Conflicts-of-interest continue to be exposed at the EPA. The EPA routinely appoints those who benefit from federal research grants to peer-review their own work. Members of the EPA’s Clean Air Scientific Advisory Committee have received millions in funding by the EPA itself. Six of the seven members of that committee have received a total of $119,217,008 in EPA grants. [In other words, corruption-as-usual.] Truth in Media posted 2016 Feb 6 (Story) (Cached)

California: High levels of Uranium-238 and radon are spewing out of a methane leak and hovering over north Los Angeles. Resident complaints of feeling ill, nausea, and vomiting have been chalked off by officials as the result of breathing the natural gas and not related to radiation poisoning. SHTFplan posted 2016 Feb 6 (Story) (Cached)

The Chinese are expanding their U.S. holdings, already valued at $72 billion, to now include the Chicago Stock Exchange. InfoWars posted 2016 Feb 6 (Story)

US: Catholic Charities and a few other organizations that thrive on federal funds are welcoming refugees to 180 cities across the US. The official line is that 10,000 ‘Syrian refugees’ will be brought in by the federal government. In truth, however, most of these will be neither Syrian nor refugees. Furthermore, 10,000 is a misleading number, because it excludes an additional eight people that each ‘refugee’ is allowed to bring. The real number could be 90,000. Constitution posted 2016 Feb 6 (Story) (Cached)

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ANALYSIS

News and commentaries that reveal historical facts and trends that place current events into perspective and make it possible to anticipate future events.

 

US Intelligence chief James Clapper has acknowledged for the first time that government agencies might use the new generation of ‘smart’ household devices spy on you. Devices such as electric meters, gas meters, thermostats, washing machines, TV sets, refrigerators, and automobiles are being equipped with digital components to monitor your every move. Next News Network 2016 Feb 11 (Story)

James Clapper, the US Director of National Intelligence, has placed the process of gene editing on the list of weapons of mass destruction. Gene editing refers to altering the DNA of living cells. Clapper says gene splicing can be weaponized if it is used to alter life forms to turn them into disease carriers or cause them to inbreed with natural life forms to produce defective offspring. That includes humans. MIT Technology Review 2016 Feb 9 (Story) (Cached)

US: A group called the Preventive Services Task Force has recommended mandatory depression screening for all Americans. The cost would be covered by health insurance which, in turn, is subsidized by taxes. [In our view, this is a scheme to label just about everyone as mentally depressed or disturbed, which will lead to mandatory medication with mind-destroying psychotropic drugs and to denial of the right to own firearms.] Ron Paul 2016 Feb 7 (Story) (Cached)

The family of a Florida defense contractor who was killed in a November terror attack in Jordan is suing Twitter. The family contends the social networking service knowingly allowed groups such as ISIS to use Twitter to spread propaganda, recruit followers, and raise money. Twitter announced that it has shut down 125,000 accounts since mid-2015 for promoting terrorism. [It is comforting to see an attempt to prevent the recruiting of terrorists, but it is chilling to think of how this could evolve into censorship of political dissent merely by calling it domestic terrorism.] CBS News 2016 Feb 6 (Story)

The World Health Organization has declared that spread of the Zika virus is a global health emergency, but it failed to provide any details on the disease. [We think that is because there is no serious evidence that the virus causes a brain disease as widely reported in the media. If there is no science behind this, it’s better to let the media carry the load of convincing the public that there is a medical emergency. That, likely, would lead to the introduction of a new vaccine to save everyone – with billions in sales to the drug companies. The Zika virus was engineered in the laboratory, and the patent is held by the Rockefeller Foundation. Anyone can buy it for 599 euros.] Global Research posted 2016 Feb 6 (Story) (Cached)

James Corbett presents more evidence that the Zika virus is not causing the high rate of microcephaly in Brazil. Data on more than 100,000 babies since 2012 shows that the population in north-eastern Brazil already had a high rate of microcephaly prior to any concerns over the virus. Nevertheless, the UN’s World Health Organization is using the Zika virus to fabricate a viral epidemic. Obama has asked for $1.8 billion in funding to fast-track a new anti-Zika vaccine. Corbett Report 2016 Feb 10 (Story)

Argentina: A report from an organization called Physicians in Crop-Sprayed Towns has challenged the theory that the Zika virus epidemic in Brazil is the cause of the increase in microcephaly among newborns. The doctors discovered that most of the sick people live in areas where a chemical called Pyriproxyfen is added to the water to eliminate mosquitoes. It does this by producing malformations in developing mosquitoes, and the doctors say it also produces the malformation called microcephaly in human embryos. The chemical was introduced to the water supply in 2014, and the malformations began to appear in that area shortly thereafter. Pyriproxyfen is manufactured by Sumitomo Chemical, a Japanese ‘strategic partner’ of Monsanto. GM Watch 2016 Feb 10 (Story) (Cached)

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HUMOR

Need to Know is as serious as it gets, but laughter is good for the soul and helps to keep our equilibrium amid the chaos. So, here are quips, gags, and images to put a smile on your face. If you have some you would like to share, please send them here.

Phyllis Diller says:
Housework can’t kill you, but why take a chance?

Cleaning your house while your kids are still growing up is like shoveling the sidewalk before it stops snowing.

The reason women don’t play football is because 11 of them would never wear the same outfit in public.

Best way to get rid of kitchen odors: Eat out.

A bachelor is a guy who never made the same mistake once.

I want my children to have all the things I couldn’t afford. Then I want to move in with them.

Most children threaten at times to run away from home. This is the only thing that keeps some parents going.

Any time three New Yorkers get into a cab without an argument, a bank has just been robbed.

We spend the first twelve months of our children’s lives teaching them to walk and talk and the next twelve years telling them to sit down and be quiet.

cameraicon_1GREAT PHOTOS

Some things just have to be shared. If you know of some, please send them here.

Looking good.

moo-4

READERS’ FORUM

Comments under 300 words, please. We cannot engage in correspondence but do appreciate your contribution. We do not publish insults or attacks against other readers. Points should stand on their own merits. You are welcome to express your religious views but not to criticize the views of others. Our mission is to unify our readers, not divide them. Send comments here.

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WHY I AM RUNNING FOR CONGRESS
2016 Feb 12 from Patrea Patrick
I have accepted the Freedom Force call to action. We all need to step up to the plate and run for office if we want to really make a difference in our government. It is our right and our duty. So I am running for Congress in the 30th District, San Fernando Valley, California. To make this happen, I need a campaign manager and anyone else who wants to help me in this campaign. My priority issues are to secure our freedom, harden the power grid against cyber hackers, terrorists, and EMP strikes. and get politics out of money and banking. Please join with me at http://www.patreapatrick.com.

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THE OTHER KIND OF REVOLUTION
2016 Jan 31 from Wil Barkley
Dear Mr. Griffin, You are “right on” with this issue regarding “The other kind of revolution”. This is why I wrote the ebook “Why?…So Our Children May Know Freedom”. Without basic education in the principles of freedom, freedom dies, or is devoured by the beast of suppression and control. These principles have to be marketed to enough people to effect a long term return to a free society.

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WAR IN MIDDLE EAST PROVES THE MASSES CAN WIN?
2016 Jan 31 from Ken Bradley.
Ed, you wrote: “It is now possible for an oligarchy of less than one percent of the population, wielding such weapons, to easily defeat any mass uprising.”

I don’t think so. Look at the middle east, Iraq and Afghanistan. In a shooting war, the enemy advances, we retreat, the enemy camps, we harass, the enemy tires, we attack, the enemy retreats, we pursue.

In the infowar, which is mostly bloodless, the enemy advances, we attack, the enemy camps, we harass, the enemy tires, we attack, the enemy retreats, we pursue. All wars are wars of attrition.

The hearts and minds of the American people are in the right place. You and Alex and others are winning the infowar. Let’s hope it never turns into a shooting war but if it does, the right leadership will win there too.

REPLY FROM GEG:
Hello Ken. The wars in Iraq and Iran cannot be compared to a war of a government against an enemy or against its own population. In the Middle East, the insurgents and terrorists are the product of funding and support from the US. In other words, the enemy is controlled opposition.

The Council on Foreign Relations crowd needs a credible and thriving enemy to justify their military presence. Victory over these forces would be easy if there were a will for victory. But prolonged conflict is the goal, not victory or conquest. The effectiveness of Russia’s military action is mute testimony of that fact – and even they have not employed any of the weapons of mass destruction and control that now are available. All wars are not wars of attrition – unless the contestants want them that way for purposes other than military conquest.

I agree when you say that the hearts and minds of the American people are in the right place, but my point is that millions of hearts and minds now can be incinerated in an instant by a few trained, technicians at the controls of high-tech weaponry previously unknown in history.5

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Being informed is not enough. Knowledge, by itself, is not power, but it holds the potential for power if we use it as a guide for action. Truth always will be defeated by tyranny unless we are willing to step forward and enter the battle. The future belongs, not to ideas, but to people who act on those ideas. If you truly want to make a difference in the world, Freedom Force International awaits you.

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Patrick Henry
American attorney, planter, and politician noted for his oratory on behalf of independence from Great Britain , 1736 – 1799

“Nothing will preserve [liberty] but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are inevitably ruined.“

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