Sunday, 06 August

05:52

Lessons from the Korean War "IndyWatch Feed War"

JULY 30, 2023 BY M. K. BHADRAKUMAR

Lessons from the Korean War

The Los Angeles-class fast-attack submarine USS Springfield in Busan for a port visit, South Korea, July 22, 2023

The psychology of forgetting and why memory fails is a tantalising topic in the life of individuals or nations. Cognitive psychology spawned many theories about it. The main theory, the motivated forgetting theory, is the most charming as it is easy to relate to it: people forget things in the pitiless flow of life because they either do not want to remember, and painful and disturbing memories are, thus, made unconscious and very difficult to retrieve, albeit they still remain in storage in the attic of the mind.

The United States and the Korean War (25 June 1950 27 July 1953) is a case in point. Succinctly put, the war ended at a juncture when a stalemate prevailed, which in...

02:58

EU state will order Russians to leave "IndyWatch Feed War"

RT | August 4, 2023

The government in Riga will send official notices next month to almost 6,000 Russian nationals, informing them they have 90 days to leave the country, a Latvian parliamentarian confirmed on Friday.

There are 5,000 to 6,000 of them. These are people who have not shown any desire, either to take the exam or to obtain a temporary residence permit. They are silent, Ingmars Lidaka, head of the parliamentary committee on citizenship and migration, told the Lithuanian state broadcaster LRT.

The Latvian Interior Ministry confirmed that the notices are currently being prepared, and will be sent out in September to around 6,000 recipients, according to the news agency Elta.

Last year, after the hostilities in Ukraine escalated, Riga imposed a requirement for Russian nationals who wish to reside in Latvia to take and pass a Latvian language test. Ethnic Russians make up about a quarter of the Baltic states 1.8 million residents, and have been denied Latvian citizenship since Riga declared independence from the Soviet Union in 1991.

Then-president Egils Levits argued last August that ethnic Russians suspected of disloyalty to Latvia should be isolated from society, citing the Ukraine conflict. However, back in 2021, Levits openly spoke of a plan to promote Latvianism in language and culture in order to make it dominant by 2030.

Last September, around 100 activists in Riga protested the upcoming education law which would eliminate Russian from all schools as a language genocide.

In January, Latvian authorities arrested Marat Kasem, editor-in-chief of Sputnik Lithuania, who had returned to visit his dying grandmother. Though a Latvian national, Kasem had been deported to Russia in 2019 because of his association with Sputnik.

Riga charged Kasem with espionage and held him imprisoned for four months, eventually agreeing to reduce the charges and impose a fine of 15,500 ($17,000). After the new Latvian president, Edgars Rinkevics, complained about the prosecutors leniency, the journalist left the country once again.

01:45

Ex-Pakistani PM Imran Khan jailed for three years "IndyWatch Feed War"

RT | August 5, 2023

Former Pakistani prime minister Imran Khan was issued with a three-year jail sentence by an Islamabad court on Saturday after he was found guilty on corruption charges. The verdict means that Khan, who claims the prosecution was politically motivated, will not be able to contest elections later this year.

In a pre-recorded statement released on X (formerly Twitter), Khan told his supporters: I have only one appeal, dont sit at home silently.

Judge Humayun Dilawar declared in court that Khan, 70, had deliberately submitted fake details after he was accused of illegally profiting from the sale of gifts he received while serving as Pakistans head of state between 2018 and 2022. After issuing the three-year custodial term, the judge also ordered Khan to be banned from politics for a period of five years.

Following the verdict, Khan, who was not in court, was arrested at his home in Lahore and taken into police custody. The claims against the former prime minister are a case of political victimization, according to his lawyer Intezar Hussain Panjutha.

Khan was not given an opportunity to defend himself and say his side of the story, he said after the verdict. We wanted to provide witnesses in his favor but he was not allowed this opportunity. Khan was not given a fair trial.

Khans barrister, Gohar Khan, added in comments to The Dawn newspaper that the courts verdict had been a murder of justice.

However, opponents of the former politician appeared to celebrate the courts judgment outside the building, with some chanting: Imran Khan is a thief.

More than 150 cases have been brought against Khan, the former sports star turned populist political figure, since he was ousted from office last April following a no-confidence vote. He has denied all wrongdoing.

Barring a successful appeal, Khans conviction means he will be prohibited from standing in Pakistans general elections, which are expected to take place in October or November. Khan, who had unsuccessfully called for early elections to take place, has previously stated his belief that Pakistans military authorities have attempted to obstruct his Tehreek-e-Insaf party from regaining political power.

Its the second time in recent months that Khan has been arrested. Around 100 paramilitary troops were involved in his detention last May in connection with one of the numerous cases against him. Khan has alleged that Pakistans military is responsible for attempts to subdue his political influence. He has also claimed that the United States has conspired with Pakistans government to prevent him from returning to political power.

01:28

RFK Jr. Sues YouTube and Google, Alleges Misinformation Policies Violated His First Amendment Rights "IndyWatch Feed War"

By Brenda Baletti, Ph.D. | The Defender | August 4, 2023

Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Childrens Health Defense founder and chairman on leave, this week filed a lawsuit against YouTube and its parent company, Google, alleging the social media giant violated his First Amendment rights.

According to Kennedy, who is running for the Democratic nomination for president of the U.S., YouTube engaged in a censorship campaign that included removing videos of his speech at Saint Anselm College in New Hampshire and interviews he did with clinical psychologist Jordan Peterson and podcaster Joe Rogan.

The complaint, filed Aug. 2 in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California, alleges the U.S. government has taken extraordinary steps under Joe Bidens leadership to silence people it does not want Americans to hear, including himself and many others.

That censorship makes it difficult for Kennedy to reach millions of voters and also for his supporters to amplify his message, the complaint says.

The lawsuit predicts the censorship will continue throughout Kennedys campaign, intensifying as the primaries approach.

Mr. Kennedy often speaks at length about topics people would like to ignore, including the negative health effects of toxic chemicals and potential safety concerns about the COVID-19 shots, the complaint reads. Then YouTube uses its medical misinformation policies developed in partnership with federal government agencies and the Biden administration to justify removing his videos.

In doing so, the platform censored not only Kennedys comments on medical issues, but the entire content of his speeches and interviews, according to the suit.

Although YouTube is a private company, it is not simply a publisher, the complaint alleges it has become an important platform for political discourse in America, a digital town square that voters trust as a place to get news and opinions about the issues of the day.

According to the complaint:

YouTube operates as a public forum, the digital equivalent of a town square. As such, it cannot remove protected speech, especially political speech, based on its viewpoint.

There is a sufficiently close nexus between YouTube and the federal government such that YouTubes actions may be fairly treated as that of the government itself.

Although YouTube cited its own COVID-19 vaccine misinformation policies to censor Kennedy, those policies rely entirely on government officials to decide what information gets censored, according to the lawsuit.

For example, the suit says YouTube doesnt allow content that contradicts local health authorities (LHA) or the World Health Organizations (WHO) medical information about COVID-19, and the guidance on those policies only changes based on government decisions.

Kennedy also called YouTubes medical misinformation policies unconstitutional because they are vague and overbroad and because they give unnamed government officials, who the policies depend entirely on, the unfettered discretion to decide what information gets removed from YouTube.

Kennedy is seeking injunctive relief to prohibit YouTube from further censoring his speech, and the restoration of any videos of his political speech removed during the campaign.

Kennedy also seeks a declaration that Google and YouTube violated his First Amendment rights and that its medical disinformation policies are unconstitutional.

Brenda Baletti Ph.D. is a reporter for The Defender. She wrote and taught about capitalism and politics for 10 years in the...

Saturday, 05 August

13:16

Understanding REAL AI "IndyWatch Feed World"

QUESTION: Mr. Armstrong, I attended your 2011 conference in Philadelphia. A friend of mine insisted and paid for the ticket, telling me your computer has been incredible on forecasting long-term that nobody can come close. I confess I thought your forecasts at the event were out there. You put up the war cycle and said it would all begin in 2014. That was three years in advance. There were cameramen there filming what later became the film The Forecaster. I hear they are doing a sequel to show all the forecasts you made ten years ago have come true. I also hear they are doing a Holywood film on you, like the Big Short.

You have accomplished what nobody else has done, and you are even a legend in markets and were even a speaker at the American Hackers convention in computers. With all the craziness going on about Artificial Intelligence, some people call it a threat to humanity, and others seem to be hinting that AI might take over everything. So there is no better person to speak about this than you. Are we at risk from AI, or is the hype some excuse claiming AI starts the war, not the people, as a cover-up?

ANSWER: ChatGPT has dazzled the world and led everybody to think that AI will be something like the movie Terminator or The Matrix. I will dig out the old program I wrote in the early 1980s for my children. It was a simple program where I taught the computer to have a conversation. I would ask a question like Do you have a dog? My daughter would reply yes. Of what is their name? She would then say the name. It stored all that info so the next time she went to the computer; it would ask: How is your dog Buttons? One day she came home from school and saw I had the computer apart, and she started crying, saying I killed it.

Back then, I worked with Dragon Systems. They produced hardware that you plugged in a board in the slot of an old IBM XT, and the computer would speak. She would bring over her girlfriends to prove to them her computer talked to her.

The point is that such a program is not really AI in the sense that it is self-aware to the point it will take over the world. With the in...

06:32

Market Talk August 4, 2023 "IndyWatch Feed World"

ASIA:

Singapores economy grew by 0.7% year-on-year and 0.3% quarter-on-quarter in the second quarter, avoiding a technical recession. This growth exceeded the expectations of economists, who had predicted a 0.6% year-on-year and 0.3% quarter-on-quarter growth. In the previous quarter, the economy had contracted by 0.4% quarter-on-quarter but saw marginal growth of 0.4% year-on-year. Despite the positive data, the Monetary Authority of Singapore had warned of an uncertain growth outlook. Following the release of the GDP data, the Singapore dollar slightly strengthened against the U.S. dollar and traded at $1.321.

The major Asian stock markets had a mixed day today:

NIKKEI 225 increased 33.47 points or 0.10% to 32,192.75
Shanghai increased 7.62 points or 0.23% to 3,288.08
Hang Seng increased 118.59 points or 0.61% to 19,539.46
ASX 200 increased 13.60 points or 0.19% to 7,325.30
Kospi decreased 2.59 points or -0.10% to 2,602.80
SENSEX increased 480.57 points or 0.74% to 65,721.25
Nifty50 increased 135.35 points or 0.70% to 19,517.00

The major Asian currency markets had a mixed day today:

AUDUSD increased 0.00539 or 0.82% to 0.66059
NZDUSD increased 0.00507 or 0.83% to 0.61277
USDJPY decreased 0.702 or -0.49% to 141.838
USDCNY decreased 0.0043 or -0.06% to 7.17700

Precious Metals:

Gold increased 8.29 USD/t oz. or 0.43% to 1,942.03
Silver increased 0.098 USD/t. oz or 0.41% to 23.653

No economic news from last night:

Some economic news from today:

India:

FX Reserves, USD decreased from 607.04B to 603.87B

EUROPE/EMEA:

The Bank of England has raised its key interest rate to a 15-year high of 5.25 percent to address soaring inflation rates. The bank intends to keep the rate at this level for a while to tackle the cost-of-living crisis. This is the 14th consecutive interest rate hike by the central bank. The policymakers will closely monitor inflationary pressures. The decision was made in response to British annual inflation, which is currently close to eight percent, significantly higher than in the eurozone and the U.S. There were concerns that the increase would be more significant, but the rate hike was only a quarter-point due to a drop in inflation to 7.9 percent, although the bank aims to bring it down further to around two percent.

The major Europe stock markets had a green day today:

CAC 40 increased 54.54 points or 0.75% to 7,315.07
FTSE 100 increased 35.21 points or 0.47% to 7,564.37
DAX 30 increased 58.48 points or 0.37% to 15,951.86

The major Europe currency markets had a mixed day today:

EURUSD increased 0.00945 or 0.86% to 1.10385
GBPUSD increased 0.00683 or 0.54% to 1.27813
USDCHF decreased 0.00327 or -0.37% to 0.87083

Some economic news from Europe today:

Germany:

German Factory Orders (MoM) (Jun) increased from 6.2% to 7.0%

UK:

S&P Global / CIPS UK Construction PMI (Jul) increased from 48.9 to 51.7

US/AMERICAS:

The US job market expanded by 187,000 in July, with the health industry leading the way after adding 87,100 positions. Both construction and financial services added 19,000 new positions, with wholesale incorporating an additional 17,900 jobs. Leisure and hospitality added 17,000 positions, government grew by 15,000, and retail added 8,500 jobs. Information services took a nota...

Friday, 04 August

23:55

12 missing after flash flood triggered landslide in Uttarakhand, India "IndyWatch Feed World"

At least 12 people have gone missing after a flash flood triggering landslide hit India's northern state of Uttarakhand, officials said Friday. According to officials, several shops were swept away on Thursday night near Gaurikund in Rudraprayag district, about 245 km northeast of Dehradun, the capital city of Uttarakhand. "Last night we got information that three shops were affected because of falling rocks and heavy rainfall near Gaurikund. Our teams immediately reached the spot to carry out rescue efforts despite facing several difficulties," Dalip Singh Rajwar, a disaster management officer, said. "We were unable to locate anyone, and it is said that around 12 people were there but so far they have not been traced."

11:04

Indian Defense Minister says New Delhi is ready to 'liberate' Pakistan-administered Kashmir "IndyWatch Feed Nthamerica"

Indian Defense Minister Rajnath Singh has said India is ready to cross the Line of Control (LoC) to maintain its honor and dignity. The LoC is currently the demarcation line between Indian- and Pakistani-administered Kashmir. "We can go to any extreme to maintain the honor and dignity of the country... if that includes crossing the LoC."

Wednesday, 02 August

05:15

Even the Aliens Are Boring "IndyWatch Feed Economics"

Everything is boring, even the aliens.

Sometimes truth is best revealed tongue-in-cheek, that is, in semi-serious banter rather than supposedly serious analysis.

Consider the recent flood-tide of "news" about extraterrestrial vehicles, a.k.a. UFOs and UAPs--(formerly Unidentified Aerial Phenomena, now Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena, to include underwater phenomena.

Prolific podcaster (1,314 podcasts and counting) Tommy Corrigan and I tackled the UAP mystery--why are UAPs now an officially sanctioned "thing"?--in a free-form conversation, Aliens Are Boring (1:08 hrs).

As you can tell from the title of our podcast, the truth is the Powers That Be have managed to make the aliens boring. Rather than the "revelations" being "stunning" or "shocking," the entire exercise was as boring as everything else the PTB manage.

Transforming what could be the biggest story in history into a boring committee meeting devoid of any real evidence is quite an accomplishment. As Tommy opined, what would qualify as "interesting" would be Presidents Xi, Putin and Biden appearing on stage together to announce a global consortium to deal with the alien presence, and video of recovered alien bodies and spacecraft wreckage.

Instead, we got a boring committee meeting with sworn testimony, i.e. a nothing-burger of rehashed pilot accounts from the New York Time's 2017 report. 2 Navy Airmen and an Object That 'Accelerated Like Nothing I've Ever Seen'

In a word, boring. Tic-Tacs, saucers, hovering lights, blah-blah-blah.

The only interesting aspect of the the whole charade is the question, why now? The question, cui bono, to whose benefit?, remains unanswered. Who benefits from the distraction or the narrative?

OK, we get the PR cover story. The American public deserves to know,, National Security is at stake, and so on. But what's the real motivation? Who benefits from this stage-managed emergence of weird stuff that's been ridiculed and dismissed by the Powers That Be for 75 years?

The most likely answer to many is this is just a larger-scale rollout of the usual False Flag template: a threat has emerged which we must counter. The template is worn at the edges because it's been used so many times. For example, North Vietnamese gunboats fired on US Navy vessels, so we really had no choice but to launch a multi-year bombing campaign involving thousands of aircraft and military personnel that cost many their lives and squandered countless billions of dollars.

Never mind the "attack" was fabricated for PR purposes. It worked great, as it always does. The public rallies around vastly increased "defense" spending and skeptical inquiries are derided as "unpatriotic" / dangerous to National Security.

Due to its over-use, the public is finally wise to the template, and so how much traction this rollout of the alien threat to National Security will have is not yet visible.

Until the public gets to see the alien corpses on ice and the shattered spacecraft bits, it's a non-starter.

Further down the "truthiness" chain, we ask: why are the aliens as boring as everything else? Tommy and I discuss the possibility--again, tongue-in-cheek--that the Powers That Be are themselves so bored by their control of all the machinery of the modern world that they decided to unleash the alien wild-card as a rare "what the heck" moment of freedom from the demands of controlling everything, just to see where it goes.

Humans habituate rather quickly to ceaseless hysterical crises. The crises pile up and we tune out. Those generating the crises for the benefit of various players start realizing the endless crises are slipping inexorably into the same boring trough as entertainment, "news", AI (LLMs, blah-blah-blah), economics, politics and the rest of the tightly controlled narratives.

Where's the outrage"? It burned out long ago. There's nothing left but the mind-dulling, hyper-boring derangement of channel-surfing and the social-media / TikTok / Only Fans scroll of repetitive rubbish....