The majority of French people see France as heading towards collapse. Although a sizable percentage believe that climate change and overconsumption will be the main cause, the majority cause, totalling up the numbers, is through mass immigration and civil war, which are interrelated.
  https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/02/15/65-per-cent-of-french-believe-french-civilization-will-collapse/
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tldq-crFMsQ&list=PLC35FDJiECFT5EikwoZ9_F204U41L6LuM

“A survey released by polling firm Ifop has claimed that more than six in ten French people think that French civilisation as we know it will collapse. The survey noted that a third of the people who believed in the collapse think it will occur in a brutal fashion and put the time frame for the collapse within the next 20 year or so. One of the chief reasons stated by respondents as the prime cause of a potential collapse is climate change, with 27 per cent stating that climate factors and overconsumption will spell the end for French civilisation, French media outlet L’Aisne Nouvelle reports. Around 15 per cent of the respondents said that mass migration would be the cause of the collapse, while another 14 per cent stated that internal conflicts within French society, or even civil war, could precipitate it. Many have warned of a potential civil war in France, including leading radical Islam scholar Gilles Kepel, who stated in 2016 that the “Jihadi Generation” had a goal to destroy Europe in a civil war and rebuild an Islamic society in the aftermath. The following year, Belgian historian David Engels made a similar prediction saying that “in 20 to 30 years Europe will have become an authoritarian or imperial state, after a phase resembling civil war and decay.”

     The White House is highly suspicious about China’s official statistics on the number of people infected with coronavirus (Covid-19), indicating that China is lying, something that American Renaissance magazine should consider the significance of, given their East Asian superiority thesis. Anyway, Trumpery and co are likely to be right about this because Covid-19 is more infectious than has been previously thought:
  https://www.zerohedge.com/health/chinas-coronavirus-numbers-dont-add-and-white-house-doesnt-believe-them
  https://www.shtfplan.com/headline-news/trump-does-not-trust-the-coronavirus-numbers-that-are-coming-out-of-china_02172020
  https://www.naturalnews.com/2020-02-17-new-study-novel-coronavirus-r0-value-high.html

“Researchers from the Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico have pre-published a new study in the journal medRxiv (associated with the British Medical Journal) that says the actual basic reproductive number, or R0, for novel coronavirus is somewhere between 4.7 and 6.6, as opposed to the 2.2 to 2.7 range being claimed by government health authorities. While the study has not yet been peer-reviewed as of this writing, its abstract explains that “extensive individual case reports” on this constantly evolving global outbreak reveal that the R0 estimates put forth by those “in charge” are essentially flawed. After evaluating these case reports and assessing them alongside estimated key epidemiology parameters, including the virus’ incubation period – we now know the incubation period to be closer to a month as opposed to just two weeks – the team determined that each coronavirus-infected person can potentially infect nearly seven others with the disease. “Integrating these estimates and high-resolution real-time human travel and infection data with mathematical models, we estimated that the number of infected individuals during early epidemic double every 2.4 days, and the R0 value is likely to be between 4.7 and 6.6,” the paper explains.”

     These comments have been scattered across the internet, so it is convenient to present them here as well. In a recent speech given by Ernest Tigori, an Ivorian intellectual and political activist, exiled in France, and winner of the Nelson Mandela Prize for Literature in 2017, and author of the book L’Afrique à désintoxiquer (“Detoxifying Africa”), he explains why it is crucial to for Europe to escape eternal repentance for its alleged crimes in Africa, and lead Africa out of infantilization. Tigori is a sharp critic of the African ruling class, whose corruption is fuelling African migration. Oh, needless to say, Tigori is a Black intellectual …
  https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/im-saddened-by-the-white-mans-emasculation-an-african-sets-the-record-straight/
  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bzTmsmPyuGE

“It saddens me to see the white man too emasculated to put up any resistance
Regarding Europe, Tigori warns that uncontrolled migration from the South to the North shore of the Mediterranean may destabilize it beyond repair and that ethnic wars could well be looming on the horizon. “It saddens me”, he says,” to see the white man beating his breast over and over, too emasculated to put up any resistance to people who’ve come to threaten him on his own doorstep”. He believes that a toxic mix of guilt, “human rightsism”, political naivety and crass ignorance of History have a debilitating effect on Europeans’ capacity to fight the invasion. He accuses the corrupt African leaders of destroying the lives of hundreds of millions of human beings in all impunity but is equally critical of the ideologues who are paving the way for them. They should stop blaming it all – slavery, the slave trade, colonialism, neocolonialism, and racism – on a forever repentant Europe, which now has to carry the burden of this mass immigration to atone for its supposed sins against Africa. Tigori explains how the History of black Africa from the 15th to the 20th centuries has intentionally been falsified in the 1940s by Stalinist strategists and their Communist followers, whose covert aim it was to tarnish the image of Western European nations, in order to drive them out of their colonial possessions and take their place. Up until now, that is 30 years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, the lies have stuck. He has harsh words, too, for fake humanists and do-gooders, wolves in sheep’s clothing who jump on the humanitarian bandwagon to better conceal their motives. These predators are deft at playing gullible public opinion like a fiddle, while reaping juicy profits in their smuggling rings and transnational underground networks. The myth the author debunks is twofold. No, Europe is not responsible for the practice of slavery in black Africa, nor is it guilty of colonial crimes. And, no, Africans did not allow themselves to be enslaved or colonized as “poor hapless victims”. He goes on to explain how the myth of Europe’s debt towards Africa is perpetuated by certain powers that have a stake in keeping it alive. This myth, born out of Cold War Soviet anti-Western propaganda, is now serving another variety of the same agenda.

     For a wide-eyed fanatic such as myself, I look daily for the signs of end times, as told in the last book of the Bible. I am not an expert about this, or anything else, but like you, have my opinion, which I hold regardless of evidence. For example, I believe in climate change, but not global warming, but global cooling, namely a new ice age. I am also concerned about the various plagues threatening the earth, including locusts, which is something out of the Bible, I think. Just read the following and tell me there is not a theological meaning behind all of this:
  https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/10-plagues-are-hitting-our-planet-simultaneously

“#1 Armies Of Locusts – As I detailed the other day, swarms of locusts the size of major cities have been devouring entire farms in Africa in as little as 30 seconds.  These swarms have also been spreading throughout the Middle East, and now we have learned that they have even reached China… A gigantic swarm of locusts that belong to a plague that has ravaged millions of acres of crops across east Africa has been spotted reaching the Chinese border. Billions of the insects have destroyed food supplies across Kenya, Somalia and Ethiopia in what has been described as the worst plague for decades. #2 Extremely Bizarre Weather Patterns – It is almost as if virtually all of the old rules have suddenly been thrown out the window.  An all-time record 209 mph wind gust just hit Calfiornia, and absolutely crazy storms are happening all over the planet.  For example, just check out what just took place in Australia… Sydney has been thrown into chaos by a devastating storm that saw two months of rainfall in just two days – forcing mass evacuations, leaving 150,000 homes without power, and prompted warnings not to drive to work. The storm dumped 400mm of rain on the city over the weekend, causing mayhem for commuters on Monday morning with roads blocked, ferries cancelled and trains suffering major delays across the network. #3 Unprecedented Flooding – We are seeing unusual flooding all over the world right now, and the flooding that is devastating the southern U.S. at this moment is being called “unprecedented”… In Jackson, Mississippi, hundreds of residents either watched their homes flood over the weekend or worried their residence would soon be drenched as the Pearl River crested Monday at 36.8 feet, its third-highest level ever recorded – behind only 1979 and 1983.

     Billionaire Michael Bloomberg is racing up the charts of popularity, using his billions to buy the presidency. Some notable things are that there was mention of Hillary Clinton as a running mate, which sunk as fast as it was raised, but, who knows. Given that this would put gun banning on the front agenda, maybe the old girl is just lying, which would not surprise me.
  https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/02/15/drudge-michael-bloomberg-considering-hillary-clinton-running-mate/
  https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/02/18/hillary-clinton-shuts-down-rumors-of-being-bloombergs-running-mate-oh-no/
  https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/02/15/bloomberg-clinton-ticket-means-california-style-gun-control-for-everyone/
  https://www.zerohedge.com/political/bloomberg-frames-farmers-primitive-idiots-demeaning-diatribe

     There is speculation that Bloomberg could beat Trump, which if true will test the thesis of accelerationism, since Bloomberg will definitely implement gun banning, open borders immigration, and the entire house of horrors, but so will all of the others, so nothing will prevent civil war 2.0, at least in principle.
  https://www.zerohedge.com/political/while-sanders-lead-pack-primary-polls-oddsmaker-has-bloomberg-beating-trump-general
  https://www.zerohedge.com/political/bloomberg-using-fortune-fundamentally-alter-manipulate-us-politics
  https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/02/bloombergs_money_sowing_the_seeds_of_destruction_of_the_democrat_party.html
  https://www.amren.com/commentary/2019/12/camp-of-the-saints-eco-fascism-and-liberal-consternation/

To The Australian        Contrary to misrepresentations, British culture does indeed constitute Australia's core national identity ("Not British to the core any more", 20/2). That culture has given us our sacred tradition (Christianity), our language, our constitution, our parliamentary and judicial tradition and our free way of life. It is British culture which has made Australia a magnet for immigrants from nations all around the world. The claim that this central aspect of our identity is redundant is nonsense. We do not need to be decolonised, since we are already an independent nation. Nor is there any "inherent sovereignty" of the Aboriginal peoples. They lost control of this continent long ago and have no right whatever to take it back. There is a war to wrongfully delegitimise our nation. We Australians must defend our wonderful heritage and defeat this incipient revolution.
  Nigel Jackson, Belgrave, Vic

     Scotland had begun an experiment with a universal income scheme; here are the details:
  https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/home-news/universal-basic-income-scotland-week-cash-payment-life-nicola-sturgeon-first-minister-snp-a7934131.html

“Scotland may adopt a universal basic income scheme that would guarantee a cash payment of up to £150 a week to its citizens for the rest of their lives, Nicola Sturgeon has said. The First Minister said she would fund research into the proposal that would “inform parliament’s thinking for the future”. The system has been championed as a method to do away with the UK’s welfare system, but critics complain that it is complicated and pointed out that many of the handouts overlap. It would see benefits payments such as the dole and housing all rolled into one lump sum. It would not be means-tested and would be given out whether the recipient has a job or not. Advocates say it frees up State workers from assessing individual cases for benefits - such as housing payments and the dole - and that it also eliminates poverty. But critics complain it pushes social policy “in the wrong direction” and the payments encourage people to work less and therefore contribute less in taxes to fund the scheme.”

     The Democrats want to empty the jails, take away guns, primarily from white Americans, and open the already porous borders. So, where will this lead? Harmony and peaceful co-existence, or survival of the fittest?
  https://www.foxnews.com/us/inmates-rearrested-rape-california-jail-ice

“U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) reported on Wednesday that hundreds of Orange County Jail inmates on whom the agency had active detainers were re-arrested over the past two years on charges including rape, assault with a deadly weapon and child sex offenses -- after local authorities released them without notifying ICE. According to county data, officials at the Southern California jail didn't notify ICE when it released 2,121 inmates with detainers on them over 2018 and 2019. Over that same period, another 1,315 were released "to ICE upon completion of their local sentences in accordance with" California's sanctuary regulations laid out in Senate Bill 54, an ICE press release said. According to ICE, 411 of the released inmates have been rearrested and booked into the Orange County Jail on additional charges, which also include domestic violence, identity theft, and driving under the influence. The agency's statement noted that number does "not account for individuals who may have been released and committed crimes in other jurisdictions." Senate Bill [SB] 54, which became law in 2017, prohibits state and local law enforcement agencies from detaining illegal immigrants for violating immigration laws except in cases where they have been convicted of serious or violent felonies. Orange County Sheriff-Coroner Don Barnes has called the policy a "social science experiment" undertaken by lawmakers in Sacramento.”

     This is where diversity, open borders immigration and politically correct judges lead, a dangerous brew indeed, coming from the degenerate U-deKay, once known as “Great Britain,” today, generally far-from-great, Britain:
  https://www.breitbart.com/europe/2020/02/14/farce-judges-block-deportation-of-criminals-including-knife-killer-and-rapist-at-last-minute/

“Dozens of Jamaican criminals whose deportation was blocked by judges at the last minute included a knife killer and a rapist, prompting anger from government figures tired of the “farce” of judicial review. There was something of a controversy surrounding the charter flight, which originally involved up to fifty serious criminals, because the migrants involved came to Britain in their youth — although the general public seemed markedly less concerned about it than left-liberal politicians and members of the establishment media. In the end, only 17 criminals were successfully deported, after the Court of Appeal decided that a three-day mobile phone mast outage meant that another 25 did not have adequate access to legal advice on their cases. The 25 rescued criminals, who may now have to be released on bail while the Government seeks to rectify the situation, included Fitzroy Daley, who stabbed a man to death outside a pub in London, and Fabian Henry, who “raped a teenage girl in Bristol and groomed and abducted another”, according to The Times.

To The Australian         Two different responses to the High Court decision in Love and Thoms are provided (21/2) by Henry Ergas ("Foolish ruling widens indigenous gap into a chasm") and Shireen Morris ("A voice for First Nations should be beyond the reach of the judiciary"). Only that by Ergas is likely to have the approval of the majority of Australians. He recommends that we "erase all racial references from Australia's constitution." This approach would treat all Australian citizens, no matter what their ethnicity, on an equal footing. It would thus be fundamentally unifying and would enhance internal stability and external security. Norris cleverly tries to turn the similar approach of the Institute of Public Affairs on its head; but the mere inclusion in her title of the contentious term "First Nations" shows that she wants us to play with loaded dice. So does her assertion that "we must also heed how indigenous people want to be recognised." That is the way of division and, if taken far enough, constitutional separatism. Australians are not lemmings. They won't buy it.
  Nigel Jackson, Belgrave, Vic

     Last I heard, the  South African government was going slow on taking land from Whites and giving it to Blacks, when President Trump tweeted about the need for the US to investigate this. But, things are now full speed ahead:
  https://www.biznews.com/undictated/2020/01/27/clarification-bank-loans-expropriation-daily-friend

“The Institute of Race Relations launched an open-letter campaign last week asking prominent banks in South Africa to clarify the implications of expropriation without compensation. What the IRR wants to know is; who would pay off bonds of property that gets expropriated, the banks or the mortgage holder? With the debt-to asset ratio in the agricultural sector being particularly high; it could prove to be a tricky situation if the state decides to expropriate farms. Farmers will not be able to service the loans they take out and for the banks there would be nothing to repossess as the property is now owned by the state. The Department of Agriculture, Land Reform and Rural Development recently revealed it had no discussions with the country’s banks about being compensated for loans against property that is expropriated with Agriculture Minister Thoko Didiza indicating that she was waiting for the bill to be finalised. Nicholas Babaya writes in the Daily Friend that CEOs should be more vocal “in their opposition to the constitutional amendment which is proposed” and is accusing the banks of “playing along” to avoid being in the firing line. – Linda van Tilburg

     This is good to see, when so much hype is being sprayed about an alleged climate crisis, that at least some bodies of scientists are standing up and saying: No! And, they are standing up to the tyrannical UN:
  https://www.aei.org/carpe-diem/there-is-no-climate-emergency-say-500-experts-in-letter-to-the-united-nations/

“On the same day last week that Greta Thunberg made an impassioned speech to the United Nations about her fears of a climate emergency, a group of 500 prominent scientists and professionals, led by the CLINTEL co-founder Guus Berkhout, sent this registered letter to the United Nations Secretary-General stating that there is no climate emergency and climate policies should be designed to benefit the lives of people. Here’s the press release, here’ the list of 500 signees, and here’s the opening of the letter:

     When you read the list below, it brings home just how much we have lost. How much longer will we tolerate what governments of both persuasions have delivered? They certainly are not reflecting our wishes.
In more robust times, the voters would be assembled at their MP’s office demanding he/she vote for certain things OR face being turfed out at the next poll.  Now we just meekly argue that we better maintain our voting pattern because we don’t want those other b’s getting elected.  Realistically we can see it matters little which party is in power!  Neither are looking after us!  They all parrot the tune orchestrated by globalists around the world. This message below makes it clear that we will certainly have more of the same UNLESS we do something about it.  We owe it to our kids and their kids.  How will we answer them one day when they ask Grandpa, “What did you do to change the disastrous course?” Start tomorrow  -  no that is too late.  Start today and contact your Federal MP (and Senators) irrespective of their party alliance.  Show him/her the message below and politely tell him/her that they will definitely not be getting your vote next election until he/she reverses the present disastrous policies destroying our sovereignty. Gary Matthews who has written the message is unknown to me but he has done us a big favour.  Reward him by taking action.

     What can I say?
  http://timesofsweden.com/2020/02/02/sweden-sentences-19-year-old-man-to-75-hours-community-service-for-sex-crime-against-13-year-old-girl/

“A 19 year old man has been convicted by the Swedish court of appeals for “sexually taking advantage” of a 13 year old girl. The prosecutor was looking to get him convicted of rape against a minor, but the Swedish court decided to only convict him of “taking advantage” of the young girl reports Swedish news site Samnytt. The man, who is a citizen of Somalia, had been messaging the girl on Snapchat where he said he wanted to have intercourse with her, despite the girl telling him her age. He had asked to meet up with the girl, and after meeting at a shop they went home to his apartment where he locked the door and proceeded to have intercourse. He had both anal and vaginal intercourse, and according to the girl, she was “biting her tongue” during this because of the pain. She “couldn’t sit down for two days” afterwards and she got anxiety and had trouble sleeping. According to the court, the girl sustained injuries from the intercourse. The age of consent in Sweden is 15. Despite this, the court did not convict 19 year old Hussein of rape against the 13 year old girl, but instead he was convicted of “sexually taking advantage” of her. The man received residence permit in Sweden by the migration authorities on the 13th of April 2016. On the 9th of March 2019 he was arrested by police. On the 6th of May 2019 Mora District court sentenced the man to a suspended sentence, 75 hours community service and ordered to pay SEK 15 000 ($1 579) damages to the girl. On the 6th of December 2019 Svea Appeals court upheld the sentence, but increased the damages to be paid to SEK 25 000 ($2 632). Here is an excerpt of the court ruling translated into English. The prosecutor urged that the court of appeals should convict Hussein for rape against a minor instead of sexually taking advantage of a minor, and for the sentence to be prison. Regarding damages for pain, the court of appeals does not question that the plaintiff has suffered mentally after the event and that it has affected her school work. However the presented evidence is, with taking into account what the plaintiff and her mother has told about her wellbeing before the event in this case, not such that other factors than Husseins can be ruled out to have affected her wellbeing. The court of appeals changes the district court ruling only such that the damages that [name redacted] should pay to NN3 is set to SEK 25 000 and rent as stated by the district court ruling.”

     This is an incredible story from Ireland that readers may not know about, that Ireland, of all places, is set to ban the sale of petrol ands diesel cars by 2030:
  https://www.technocracy.news/ireland-set-to-ban-sale-of-petrol-and-diesel-cars-by-2030/
  https://www.rte.ie/news/2019/1229/1103466-electric-car/

“The Government is drafting new laws that would ban new petrol and diesel car registrations by 2030, as part of a strategy to protect the environment. The aim is to ensure that one third of vehicles on the roads are electric in ten years' time. The Sunday Independent reported that Minister for Communications, Climate Action and Environment Richard Bruton is planning to publish the law early in the new year. The new measures will be included in the Climate Action Amendment Bill 2019. It is understood that the bill will be developed further in conjunction with other departments. The Government's Climate Action Plan aims to reduce emissions and be carbon neutral by 2050. Transport emissions accounted for over 20% of Ireland's emissions in 2018. The Government is planning to have 936,000 electric vehicles on the roads by 2030, including battery operated and hybrid vehicles. It has promised to double the amount of home chargers installed and further roll-out the nationwide network of on street charging points.”

     The sheer beauty of law suits and litigation has always made my pulse rate increase, and put a smile on my face, however cloudy the day, because in suing, things get decided, and there is certainty in an uncertain, nay, chaotic world. Politics goes around in a circle, but law is constrained by economic necessity and the unending desire to allow the smooth flow of commerce through the alimentary canal and bowels of society. Let’s consider the coming battle between women born with vaginas and other female parts, including genetics, versus transgendered people, as an example of the music of law in action:
  https://apnews.com/8fd300537131153cc44e0cf2ade3244b

“The families of three female high school runners filed a federal lawsuit Wednesday seeking to block transgender athletes in Connecticut from participating in girl’s sports. Selina Soule, a senior at Glastonbury High School, Chelsea Mitchell, a senior at Canton High School and Alanna Smith, a sophomore at Danbury High School are represented by the conservative nonprofit organization Alliance Defending Freedom. They argue that allowing athletes with male anatomy to compete has deprived them of track titles and scholarship opportunities. “Mentally and physically, we know the outcome before the race even starts,” said Smith, who is the daughter of former Major League pitcher Lee Smith. “That biological unfairness doesn’t go away because of what someone believes about gender identity. All girls deserve the chance to compete on a level playing field.” The lawsuit was filed against the Connecticut Association of Schools-Connecticut Interscholastic Athletic Conference and the boards of education in Bloomfield, Cromwell, Glastonbury, Canton and Danbury. “Forcing girls to be spectators in their own sports is completely at odds with Title IX, a federal law designed to create equal opportunities for women in education and athletics,” attorney Christiana Holcomb said. “Connecticut’s policy violates that law and reverses nearly 50 years of advances for women.”

     I think it was Bobby Hawke who wanted Australia to be the nuclear waste dump of the world. Well, I guess the gear has to go somewhere and Australians are ants on the world stage, so what does it matter if we get irradiated? One past proposal had it that there would be a waste dump in South Australia, left uncovered until enough dough was saved up to properly cover it. By that time all the glowing goodies would have blown over to multicult New South Walers, radiationally enriching it with diverse radiation. Anyway, onto today’s main presentation:
  https://www.adelaidenow.com.au/news/south-australia/kimba-welcomes-nuclear-dump-announcement/news-story/53531d82101ae5dd558c6a564de8b938?type=curated&position=1&overallPos=1&utm_source=AdelaideNow&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=editorial

“It is an expanse of paddocks as far as the eye can see but this stretch of brown dirt represents a new hope for a tiny Eyre Peninsula town. The Napandee farming property, on Kimba’s northwestern outskirts, is earmarked as the location for Australia’s newest nuclear waste site, 465km from Adelaide. Yesterday’s contentious announcement, made after nearly five years of consultation, reviews, protests and angst, has also sparked a new wave of optimism for the Eyre Peninsula town of just 629 people. Against the backdrop of declining population growth, farming challenges and a severe drought, supporters say the Federal Government’s decision gives the town a real chance to succeed and stave off extinction. However, several hundred opponents protested on Sunday and vowed the fight would continue. Locals in favour of the radioactive storage facility hope it will generate a multimillion-dollar economic boon, together with a much-needed cash injection into health services, education and infrastructure. Grandfather Jeff Baldock, 62, who operates a 7500 ha cereal and sheep farm with his three children, told the Sunday Mail the facility would help secure the area’s future. “Imagine the money that will flow through the wider Eyre Peninsula community,” he said. “It will be hundreds of millions of dollars. It is a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for a supply of jobs bringing more money that we can use to create other industries. “This is good for the future of Kimba. We are absolutely thrilled for the community. It provides another industry in town that doesn’t rely on farming, which is huge.” His sons, father of four Andrew, 37, and father of two Mark, 35, said the risks were minimal compared with the rewards. “If small towns don’t think outside the box and diversify their economy, they will continue to decline,” said Andrew, a former carpenter who returned to the family farm from Adelaide, where he met his wife Dale, 33. “We are doing this so our kids and their kids and then their kids can have a future. “I can’t think of another industry that will be guaranteed for 100 years. “The future now looks bright for Kimba in the long term. And we just want a sustainable future for our community.”

     This is a little story from America, the land of the free - HA! – which illustrates the lack of freedom of speech on campuses. Thus, a pretty right-wing girl, who champions gun rights, gets attacked by crazed left-wingers, while she is trying to give a talk. Examine this closely, because the same could happen here in Australia, only we don’t have gun rights, freedom of speech, or anything else much, in a moth-eaten country:
  https://www.breitbart.com/politics/2020/02/18/kent-state-gun-girl-kaitlin-bennett-confronted-by-protest-mob-at-ohio-university/

“Kent State “gun girl” Kaitlin Bennett was confronted by a mob of protesters during her visit to Ohio University on Monday. According to the university, “She drew a large crowd of people, many with opposing viewpoints, who also chose to exercise their first amendment rights.” According to a report by USA Today, conservative activist Kaitlin Bennett was mobbed by a group of students during a visit this week to Ohio Univerity. Bennett is perhaps best known for posing with a gun for graduation photos in 2018. Since then, Bennett has traveled to campuses around the country to discuss hot-button issues with progressive college students. Bennett posted a video of her encounter with the Ohio University mob to her Twitter account on Monday. In the video, hundreds of students circle around Bennett as she tries to make her way through campus in a car driven by a black student. At one point, the video shows a member of the mob splashing the vehicle’s occupants with liquid. At one point during her visit, Bennett announced that she would encourage President Trump to strip federal funding from universities that don’t protect students from outrage mobs. “This is what happens when a Trump supporter goes to a college campus,” Bennett said during the video. “I think @realDonaldTrump should strip funding from universities like this that harbor terrorists.”

     Welcome to the new Cold War, with China now taking the place of the USSR:
  https://www.theaustralian.com.au/commentary/chinas-growth-marks-the-start-of-a-second-cold-war/news-story/3305a336c6d988db3a7ba2fb61790b41

“It’s the world’s second largest economy in nominal GDP and, with 1.4 billion people, the most populous nation. It boasts the world’s largest military force with 2.2 million active personnel and another 510,000 in reserve. It has financially colonised much of the South Pacific, central Asia and Africa. Now it is buying influence in Europe, with heavy investments in Greece, including ownership of the port of Piraeus. China is home to the world’s most extensive expressways and high-speed railways. There are 298 airlines and 235 airports. According to Credit Suisse, for the first time there are more rich people in China than in the US. Of the world’s wealthiest 10 per cent, 100 million are Chinese, 99 million are American. China is also home to 12 of the 100 largest companies in the world. Yet the UN still recognises China as a “developing” country. At the World Trade Organisation, it enjoys the same “special and differential treatment” as Zimbabwe and Haiti. Naturally, Beijing sees no reason to give up this self-declared status, claiming the preferential treatment it enjoys is a “fundamental right”. Commerce ministry spokesman Gao Feng recently -described China as the “largest developing country in the world”. That it certainly is. The WTO does not define a developed or developing country. Nor does it provide benchmarks or guidance. This is left entirely to the discretion of -individual members.

     One of the remarkable results of the saga regarding amending the property rights section of the Constitution is the relative silence coming from corporate top-brass at South Africa’s financial institutions. Banks and other financial institutions are – in the vast majority of cases – the way South Africans finance expensive property such as houses, agricultural land, vehicles, factories, and many other assets. Many have tried to frame the proposed constitutional amendment in terms of some kind of focus on agricultural land, but really when one understands this change in policy in light of the National Democratic Revolution of the governing African National Congress (ANC), it is clear that this is very much about property in general. The ANC’s policies have been progressively more and more about state control. Poor black South Africans living in RDP houses do not own the title deeds to the land on which they live. Failing state-owned enterprises are kept afloat by getting pumped full of taxpayers’ rands. In just over ten years, Eskom’s debt securities and borrowings have increased by over 1000%. Now Fikile Mbalula has announced the government is looking to establish another state-owned enterprise (SOE), this time a shipping carrier – largely for the purposes of transformation. Given the unmitigated failure to make a profit at so many other SOEs, this might seem insane, but it’s not insane if the purpose was never to make a profit in the first place. Fundamentally, the ANC believes in state intervention in the economy to drive social engineering – the dead loss is of no concern. I remember hearing Malusi Gigaba express these sentiments in a speech he gave at my alma mater Rhodes University last year. It was not that SAA was unsuccessful, we were just viewing “success” according to the imperialist Washington Consensus.

     When translating this view of “success” into the realm of property ownership, the implications of potential government expropriation of property should be making alarm bells go off  for financial institutions which grant loans against property as collateral. Should a person’s property be expropriated with compensation, is that person still liable to pay off their bond? It would be a bizarre situation in which people might default on their debt while having little to be repossessed by the bank. Nedbank CEO Mike Brown himself has stated that EWC could cause “a classical banking crisis.” So why then have CEOs of financial institutions not been more vocal in their opposition to the constitutional amendment which is proposed? Surely these intelligent CEOs and board members of banks must be aware of the serious consequences which expropriation of property without compensation will have on their clients? Unfortunately this fits in with a general trend of business cosying up to government in the hope that they might get a seat at the negotiating table. The agricultural community has perhaps already seen this, with Dan Kriek initially getting a seat at Cyril Ramaphosa’s 2018 Advisory Panel on Land Reform but later distancing himself from that panel’s recommendations for EWC. Kriek has since resigned (the official statement said it was “due to health and stress-related reasons”), and now farmers are facing terrible drought on one hand and government threatening to steal their property on the other. It is certainly understandable that big business in South Africa would want to have a good relationship with government. Government spending makes up a large proportion of GDP and the ANC is constantly finding new ways of involving itself in the economy, either through more failing SOEs or harsh regulatory environments – especially in the case of mining and infrastructure development, the latter of which consists of many government tenders. Perhaps big businesses in South Africa believe that by cosying up to the bureaucrats in Pretoria and “playing along” in the legislative process they may avoid being in the firing line. Take a look at this interview with Mike Brown from Nedbank, and how he gingerly mentions his opposition to EWC while still sounding supportive of “the process.”