Ex-official predicts protests likely ‘to accelerate Putin’s desire to do something’ in Ukraine, but lawmaker says Moscow lacks ‘the capability of handling 2 crises simultaneously’

By NOMAAN MERCHANT, TOI      Today, 12:54 am

 
In this handout photo released by Russian Defense Ministry Press Service, Belarusian peacekeepers leave a Russian military plane at an airfield in Kazakhstan, January 8, 2022. (Russian Defense Ministry Press Service via AP)

WASHINGTON (AP) — Russia’s decision to send paratroopers into Kazakhstan, where a crackdown on violent anti-government protests has left dozens dead, injects additional uncertainty into upcoming talks over a possible Russian invasion of Ukraine.

The question is whether the unrest in Kazakhstan has changed the calculations of Russian President Vladimir Putin as he weighs his options in Ukraine. Some say Putin may not want to engage in two conflicts at the same time, while others say Russia has the military capacity to do both and he will decide separately on whether to attack Ukraine. The instability in Kazakhstan may even add new urgency to Putin’s desire to shore up Russia’s power in the region.

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By Judah Rose, AM THINKER

The COVID vaccines are experimental drugs.  Even if the FDA were still functioning as intended and serving a productive role in protecting the public from dangerous products, these drugs are not approved.  It is true that the FDA, after putting aside its normal procedures intended to better ensure safety, has approved a version of the vaccines known as COMIRNATY.  But as all public health authorities admit, COMIRNATY is not available anywhere.

The drug companies cannot accept any liability for the damages their products are causing, because they know full well they would be bankrupted.  A fully approved drug would not have the complete liability protection that a drug under Emergency Use Authorization has.  That there is an approved version means that under the law, the EUA must be pulled.  This is just another law not being followed due to this “emergency.”  Without the protection of the EUA, there would be no liability protection for the manufacturers.  The upshot is that there are no available fully approved COVID vaccines.
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By Robert W Malone MD, MS     Jan 6/22

So, not that what happens to me is so special – but last night Linkedin decided I was not a fit human to be on their platform. In another blink of an eye of big tech, Linkin flushed my 30,000 connections and platformed me. No explanations, no warnings were given. I can say that I rarely post anything on Link-in that is controversial anymore, since they de-platformed me and then apologized for it last summer. This was not a surprise – just more of the same censorship that is happening everywhere.

All I can do at this point is laugh about it. This is about resiliency: like water off a duck’s back.

In two weeks since Twitter de-platformed me, my GETTR account has gone over 212,000 followers. Other social media venues are doing well also. My Substack is over 100,000 people. My Gab account is 88,000 strong. My fan run telegram account also has 189,000 subscribers. I am recording 8-10 podcasts and TV interviews a day. If  I could clone me, I could do five times that number. I will not let my voice be silenced, because the cause is too great.

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by Victor Davis Hanson,   ZERO HEDGE         January 6, 2022:

Recently, Democrats have been despondent over President Joe Biden’s sinking poll numbers. His policies on the economy, energy, foreign policy, the border, and COVID-19 all have lost majority support.

As a result, the left now variously alleges that either in 2022, when they expect to lose the Congress, or in 2024, when they fear losing the presidency, Republicans will “destroy democracy” or stage a coup.

A cynic might suggest that they praise democracy when they get elected, only to claim it is broken when they lose.

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Russian President Vladimir Putin, Chinese Leader Xi Jinping, and then-Iranian President Hassan Rouhani at the Shanghai Cooperation Summit on June 14, 2019 in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan.  (Mikhail Svetlov/Getty Images)

While much attention in global capitals is being paid to Russian troops amassing on Ukraine’s border, Lithuania is the ‘canary in the coal mine’ of global order, argue Hudson Senior Fellows Tod Lindberg and Peter Rough in The Wall Street Journal. NATO member Lithuania faces a united front of Sino-Russian pressure designed to test U.S. and European commitment to their democratic partners. If the U.S. and NATO allies fail to support Lithuania, the impact of Sino-Russian cooperation will be felt far beyond Vilnius. See below for further analysis, and join us next week for a discussion on China’s economic slowdown and the implications for its political stability.

Read the Op-Ed

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By Jonathan Turley,     January 7, 2022

In the day long events commemorating January 6th, Speaker Nancy Pelosi made a telling statement to her fellow members and the public at large. Pelosi declared “It is essential that we preserve the narrative of January 6th.” Part of that narrative is that this was not a riot but an “insurrection,” an actual “rebellion” against our country. Pelosi’s concern over the viability of that narrative is well-based as shown by a recent CBS News poll. The majority of the public does not believe that this was an “insurrection” despite the mantra-like repetition of members of Congress and the media. The public saw that terrible day unfold a year ago and saw it for what it was: a protest that became a riot. (For full disclosure, I previously worked as a legal analyst for CBS News).

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NY SUN: https://www.nysun.com/foreign/biden-getting-set-to-accept-irans-status-as/91881/

By Majid Rafizadeh, GATESTONE INSTITUTE  •  January 8, 2022

• • No amount of appeasement and no deal is going to change the core pillars of the Iranian mullahs’ revolutionary principles, which include anti-Americanism, antisemitism, supporting terror groups, and brutally repressing their own population. The theocratic establishment uses international and regional agreements, such as its election last April to the UN Commission on the Status of Women, to advance its revolutionary ideals.
  • The Biden administration might begin to understand, nearly four decades after the establishment of the mullahs’ regime, that, as Henry Kissinger remarked, “The exercise of diplomacy without the threat of force is without effect.”

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Russia is sending troops to Kazakhstan to support the government, which has been facing days of angry protests. For Moscow, there is more at stake than cementing its influence in a neighboring country shaken by unrest.

   DW

Kazkh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev (left) enjoys close ties with Russia’s Putin

There’s one statistic that underlines just how important Kazakhstan is for Russia — the two former Soviet republics share one of the world’s largest national borders at 7,600 kilometers (4,722 miles).

But it’s not just the length of the common frontier that matters. The neighboring regions have been militarily significant since the Soviet era. Important sites include the Kapustin Yar missile test firing range, which is partly located in Kazakhstan, and the many weapons factories in and near the Ural mountain range. Geopolitically, Russia considers Kazakhstan, and indeed much of the entire region, as its backyard.

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T. Belman. I don’t agree with Kelly’s characterization of Jan 6 as a riot. She also said many cops were hurt and she cast aspersions on claims of voter fraud. I disagree. There is no comparison between this event and the riots lead by Antifa and BLM where many cops were killed. On Jan 6 the people who entered the Capital were invited in by police to begin with. The Democrats and their enforcers encouraged everything to happen and even appointed provocateurs. This was a staged event rather than a riot.

I posted this video because I respected Megyn Kelly. She is a former prosecutor and understands what it takes to make a case. She has a reputation to protect. So I trust her investigation and conclusions.

by Jeff Miller, REPUBLICAN BRIEF

On Friday, conservative justices questioned President Joe Biden’s vaccine requirement for businesses, as the Court heard arguments from Republican officials and businesses who want to block the policy.

Justices John Roberts and Neil Gorsuch have said that states and Congress should lead the effort to combat the pandemic, rather than a federal agency.

Amy Coney Barrett, a conservative justice, argued the workplace policy was too broad, affecting more than 80 million Americans.

GOP-led states and business leaders brought a lawsuit against the mandate for companies with 100 or more employees as an example of federal overreach.

It appears that the liberal justices sided with the Biden administration’s position that vaccinations and mandates were the best way to curb the pandemic.

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Envoy to Beirut says Riyadh ‘hopes political parties will end Hezbollah’s terrorist hegemony over every aspect of the state’

By AGENCIES    Today,

RIYADH — Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to Beirut said Thursday that Hezbollah was a threat to Arab security after the leader of the Iran-backed Lebanese movement branded King Salman a “terrorist.”

The latest exchange of insults follows a crisis between Lebanon and Gulf Arab states over the war in Yemen, and Saudi accusations that Hezbollah was meddling in the conflict.

“Riyadh hopes that the political parties will give priority to the supreme interest of Lebanon… and end Hezbollah’s terrorist hegemony over every aspect of the state,” ambassador Waleed Bukhari said in a statement to AFP.

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While Israeli Prime Minister Naftali Bennett can effectively hold off formal negotiations, his left-wing colleagues are laying the groundwork for a return to the two-state follies of previous left-wing governments.  Op-ed.

By Alex Traiman, INN 

(JNS) Israel may have a right-wing prime minister, but Naftali Bennett is not positioning Israel’s diplomatic priorities. That portfolio rests with Foreign Minister and Alternate Prime Minister Yair Lapid, who is scheduled to take over the premiership as part of a rotation arrangement with Bennett in August 2023.

Bennett is busy micromanaging Israel’s COVID response, which includes constantly changing regulations and border closures.

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By Monica Showalter, AM THINKER

Congressional Democrats and their allies have been blowing a lot of hot air about the Jan. 6 “insurrection,” a pathetic crowd-control failure brought on by Capitol Police incompetence, crossed wires among those charged with security, and quite likely some FBI pot-stirring through agents provocateurs.  It’s bee ess.  The whole show is about discrediting President Trump to keep him from running for office in 2024, because, well, they know he won the 2020 election, and a lot of voters would like to get their votes’ worth in 2024.  But that’s precisely why they keep blowing the incident up into an “insurrection.”

According to leftist Rep. Hakeem Jeffries, who’s been tipped to lead the Democrats once House speaker Nancy Pelosi leaves the scene, via PBS:

It’s a day like Pearl Harbor and like Bloody Sunday down in Selma, Alabama, and like September 11 that should live in infamy here in America and throughout the world.

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by Daniel Pipes, The National Interest
September 19, 2021

Ex-Muslims are publicly flaunting their rejection of Islam as never before: a steamy tell-all memoir that tops the country’s best-seller lists; one video (with 1.5 million views) showing a copy of the Koran ripped into pieces; another video with a woman in a bikini cooking and eating bacon; and blasphemous cartoons of Muhammad.

Beyond such provocations, ex-Muslims work to change the image of Islam. Wafa Sultan went on Al Jazeera television to excoriate Islam in an exalted Arabic and over 30 million viewers watched the video. Ayaan Hirsi Ali wrote a powerful autobiography about growing up female in Somalia and went on to author high-profile books criticizing Islam. Ibn Warraq wrote or edited a small library of influential books on his former religion, including Why I am Not a Muslim (1995) and Leaving Islam: Apostates Speak Out (2003).

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By Nan Jacques Zilberdik, PALESTIAN MEDIA WATCH | Jan 6, 2022

Fatah anniversary messages:
·         Abbas honors “brave” terrorist prisoner “heroes,” their “struggles are lofty medals of honor”
·         Fatah hasn’t abandoned terror
·         Abbas implies PA/Fatah are prepared to use terror to get rid of Israel – “regardless of the sacrifices”
·         Terrorist murderer Dalal Mughrabi, who led killing of 37, among them 12 children, paraded as role model at anniversary procession
·         Arch-terrorist Abu Jihad, who was responsible for the murder of 125, stars in anniversary music video
·         “O God take [the Jews] to hell… grant victory to the Muslims… and expel the despicable ones from my land and liberate it from the Jews” – student recites at PA school ceremony
·         Fatah’s vision for the future remains a world with no Israel: Maps of “Palestine” erase all of Israel
Songs broadcast by PA TV for Fatah anniversary:
·         “Wave the rifle… we won’t cast our weapons from our hands,”
·         “We waved the [machine gun] and the RPG“
·         “My machine gun and my bullets are the path to salvation”

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HOW MANY PEOPLE ACTUALLY ATTACKED COPS ON JAN 6?

Tonight at midnight, just hours from now, we will begin the first of many annual remembrances of January 6th. pic.twitter.com/EZkV7LfpHQ

— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) January 6, 2022