Saturday, October 17, 2020
The BIDEN CRIME FAMILY'S Payoff Scheme | Rudy Giuliani's EXCLUSIVE Reaction
The BIDEN CRIME FAMILY'S Payoff Scheme | Rudy Giuliani's EXCLUSIVE Reaction
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZasrHQeKiY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RZasrHQeKiY
This is insane. Please watch starting at 5:30 seconds. Emails from hunter Biden to Naomi Biden documenting how Joe made Hunter give him half of everything he got from Burisma
Thursday, October 15, 2020
Why Did He Receive Millions? Hunter Biden Linked to Burisma, Russian Oligarch, and China Businessman
Why Did He Receive Millions?
Hunter Biden Linked to Burisma, Russian Oligarch, and China Businessman
Wednesday, September 30, 2020
Screen Shot 2020-09-30 at 20.22.56
By Bethany Blankley | The Center Square
(The Center Square) – The U.S. Senate Committee on Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs and the U.S. Committee on Finance Majority Staff released its finding from a year-long investigation into Hunter Biden, the second son of Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden.
The investigation was launched after Finance Committee Chairman Charles Grassley, R-Iowa, publicly raised conflict-of-interest concerns about the sale of a U.S. company to a Chinese firm linked to Hunter Biden one month before Congress was notified about a whistleblower complaint that House Democrats used to impeach President Donald Trump. The Republican-controlled Senate acquitted Trump.
While Democrats were pushing to impeach Trump, Grassley raised concerns about corruption linking Hunter Biden to millions of dollars in transactions taking place between the Ukrainian gas company Burisma Holdings, Russian oligarch Yelena Baturina, and Chinese businessmen with ties to Beijing's communist government.
Since 2014, government officials had flagged concerns about possible criminal activity linked to Burisma, according to the 87-page report.
Sen. Ron Johnson, R-Wisconsin, said the committees’ investigation “found millions of dollars in questionable financial transactions between Hunter Biden and his associates and foreign individuals, including the wife of the former mayor of Moscow.”
The U.S. Treasury Department flagged payments collected overseas by Hunter Biden and his business partner, Devon Archer, for possible illicit activities, the report found.
"The Treasury records acquired by the Chairmen show potential criminal activity relating to transactions among and between Hunter Biden, his family, and his associates with Ukrainian, Russian, Kazakh and Chinese nationals," the report states.
The report also raises concerns linking Hunter Biden to sex and human trafficking: "Hunter Biden paid nonresident women who were nationals of Russia or other Eastern European countries and who appear to be linked to an Eastern European prostitution or human trafficking ring.”
In footnotes, the report adds, "There is extensive public reporting concerning Hunter Biden's alleged involvement with prostitution services. Records on file with the Committees do not directly confirm or refute these individual reports," investigators wrote. "However, they do confirm that Hunter Biden sent thousands of dollars to individuals who have either: 1) been involved in transactions consistent with possible human trafficking; 2) an association with the adult entertainment industry; or 3) potential association with prostitution. Some recipients of those funds are Ukrainian and Russian citizens.
"The records note that it is a documented fact that Hunter Biden has sent funds to nonresident alien women in the United States who are citizens of Russia and Ukraine and who have subsequently wired funds they have received from Hunter Biden to individuals located in Russia and Ukraine. The records also note that some of these transactions are linked to what appears to be an Eastern European prostitution or human trafficking ring.”
Johnson told Just the News, “The report raises serious questions that former Vice President Biden needs to answer. There are simply too many potential conflict of interest, counterintelligence and extortion threats to ignore.”
The report highlights testimony given by two U.S. State Department officials, former Acting Deputy Chief of Mission at the U.S. Embassy in Kyiv, Ukraine, George Kent, and key impeachment witness against Trump and State Department energy adviser Amos Hochstein. They both testified to the committees about concerns they raised about Hunter Biden's role with Burisma.
Kent canceled a State Department partnership with Burisma, reported an alleged $7 million Burisma bribe to the Justice Department, and tried to communicate his concerns to former Vice President Biden, who brushed him off, according to his testimony. Hochstein also raised concerns about conflicts of interest and potential criminal activity related to Joe and Hunter Biden, records show.
Kent testified that the Bursima bribe occurred in December 2014, seven months after Hunter Biden joined its board. After learning about it, Kent and the State Department’s Resident Legal Advisor reported the allegation to the FBI.
The report cites testimony and U.S. government records to support its claims.
Section V of the report also mentions that former Secretary of State John Kerry was aware of Hunter Biden’s Burisma-related activities, contrary to his claims. When asked about them at a town hall event in Nashua, New Hampshire, on Dec. 8, 2019, Kerry said, “I had no knowledge about any of that. None. No.”
The investigation concludes that the Obama administration “knew that Hunter Biden’s position on Burisma’s board was problematic and did interfere in the efficient execution of policy with respect to Ukraine.
"Moreover, this investigation has illustrated the extent to which officials within the Obama administration ignored the glaring warning signs when the vice president's son joined the board of a company owned by a corrupt Ukrainian oligarch,” it adds.
The report lists the amount of money Hunter Biden and his partner, Archer, received from Burisma and other foreign entities.
Biden and Archer received more than $4 million from Burisma while the company aggressively lobbied the State Department to make the corruption allegations against it disappear.
“Hunter Biden, his family, and Archer received millions of dollars from foreign nationals with questionable backgrounds," the report adds, including:
On the same day that Vice President Joe Biden appeared with Ukrainian Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk and addressed Ukrainian legislators in Kyiv about Russia's actions in Crimea, Archer received $142,300 from Kenges Rakishev of Kazakhstan, reportedly for a car.
Elena Baturina, the former mayor of Moscow, and Russia's only female oligarch, wired Hunter Biden $3.5 million.
Chinese national Gongwen Dong opened a bank account with Hunter Biden to fund a $100,000 global shopping spree for the Biden family.
Ye Jianming, Gongwen, and other Chinese nationals linked to the communist government and the People's Liberation Army, had business associations with Hunter Biden, which “resulted in millions of dollars in cash flow," according to the report.
The report does not accuse Joe or Hunter Biden of a specific crime, and both Bidens deny any wrongdoing.
Hunter Biden did not leave Burisma until 2019.
The report also states that investigations are ongoing because of a lack of cooperation from the FBI and other agencies.
Posted by CNBNewsnet on Wednesday, September 30, 2020 at 08:45 PM in CNB CRIME , Current Affairs, DELAWARE, General/Political News, MARYLAND, New Jersey , PHILLY & PA. NEWS | Permalink | Comments (0)
Joe Biden's son Hunter made money from Russia, China: Donald Trump
Joe Biden's son Hunter made money from Russia, China: Donald Trump
WASHINGTON: Democratic presidential candidate Joe Biden' s son Hunter received a large sum of money from Russia and China, US President Donald Trump has alleged and said that the mainstream media is "underplaying" the story and keeping quiet on it.
"It's hard to believe, when you see the kind of money that he ( Hunter) has made from China, from Russia, where the wife of the mayor of Moscow gives him three-and-a-half million dollars and nobody even has any question about it," Trump told reporters at a White House news conference on Sunday.
Synopsis "It's hard to believe, when you see the kind of money that he (Hunter) has made from China, from Russia, where the wife of the mayor of Moscow gives him three-and-a-half million dollars and nobody even has any question about it," Trump told reporters at a White House news conference.
According to a Senate Republican report released last week, during Biden' s tenure as vice president, Hunter, 50, received a USD 3.5 million wire transfer from Elena Baturina, the widow of Moscow's former mayor Yury Luzhkov.
The report further alleged that Chinese nationals lavished Hunter and other members of the Biden family with money, giving Hunter and Biden' s brother James credit cards for a USD 100,000 international shopping spree. Despite such a damaging report being published, the mainstream media is "underplaying the story and keeping quiet on it,"
Donald Trump said. "If we had a media that was fair -- even just reasonable -- this would be the biggest story for years and years and years. Then you'd really be entitled to real Pulitzer Prizes, not the fake committee that gives you these fake awards," he told reporters.
"Why did he ( Hunter) get three-and-a-half million dollars? I'll tell you why: Because Joe Biden was in on it...There's no way that he wasn't. And ( Hunter) uses Joe Biden' s plane -- Air Force Two. Uses Joe -- and they go to China, and then he comes back, and he never mentioned it to his father that he just got a billion and a half dollars?
"And now it's turning out that it's much more money than that...It's turned out to be much more money from China...a member of the Chinese Communist Party gave him a lot of money. And the press has no interest in these stories...It's very disheartening for the people of our country," Trump said. Meanwhile, in an interview to Fox News, Senator Ron Johnson said some of these payouts are "just stunning".
"I don't know what that was about, but let's go through the report and please go through the key findings. What struck you most in terms of the money that Hunter Biden accepted from these foreign countries and foreign companies while his father was vice president," he said.
According to the Senate Republican report, Hunter was serving on Burisma's board (supposedly consulting on corporate governance and transparency), when Burisma owner Mykola Zlochevsky allegedly paid a USD 7 million bribe to officials serving under Ukraine's prosecutor general, Vitaly Yarema, to "shut the case against Zlochevsky".
"George Kent testified that this bribe occurred in December 2014 (seven months after Hunter joined Burisma's board), and, after learning about it, he and the resident legal adviser reported this allegation to the FBI,” it said. Kent is serving as Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs since September 4, 2018. His early service has included assignments in the US diplomatic missions to Poland, Thailand and Uzbekistan.
“In addition to the over four million dollars paid by Burisma to Hunter Biden and his business partner, Devon Archer, for membership on the board, Hunter, his family, and Archer received millions of dollars from foreign nationals with questionable backgrounds,” the report said. " Hunter Biden had business associations with Ye Jianming, Gongwen Dong, and other Chinese nationals linked to the Communist government and People's Liberation Army. Those associations resulted in millions of dollars in questionable transactions," it alleged.
Joe Biden’s World Is Crashing Down
Joe Biden’s World Is Crashing Down
https://youtu.be/EB0gVgxTQOs
By Micha Gefen - October 15, 2020 1245 0
If Joe Biden loses the election to President Trump, Democrats will point to Hunter Biden as the former VP’s weak link. Hunter’s shady business deals and love of crack cocaine and prostitutes has now been published for the whole world to see with just under 3 weeks t go in the election. Welcome to the real October Surprise.
Donate Today And Promote This Video To Thousands
For the entirety of this campaign, Joe Biden has insisted that he had no connection to Hunter’s activities. Leaked emails now show that this narrative ahs been a lie. In fact, both Bidens are just plain shady and as Deep State as it gets.
The Burisma issue that showed up at Trump’s impeachment has now blown up with Joe Biden being the central player in that affair. Imagine, if another elected leader used his power to destroy or prevent money from reaching another ally in order to help a family member’s business dealings with said country. This of course was the reason Trump was impeached. Trump did nothing wrong, but now it is clear Biden did and has been lying about it ever since.
Things are about to get far crazier as the Democrats know that if Trump wins, he will put them in jail.
Smoking-gun email reveals how Hunter Biden introduced Ukrainian businessman to VP dad
NEWS EXCLUSIVE
Smoking-gun email reveals how Hunter Biden introduced Ukrainian businessman to VP dad
By Emma-Jo Morris and Gabrielle FonrougeOctober 14, 2020 | 5:00am | Updated
Hunter Biden introduced his father, then-Vice President Joe Biden, to a top executive at a Ukrainian energy firm less than a year before the elder Biden pressured government officials in Ukraine into firing a prosecutor who was investigating the company, according to emails obtained by The Post.
The never-before-revealed meeting is mentioned in a message of appreciation that Vadym Pozharskyi, an adviser to the board of Burisma, allegedly sent Hunter Biden on April 17, 2015, about a year after Hunter joined the Burisma board at a reported salary of up to $50,000 a month.
“Dear Hunter, thank you for inviting me to DC and giving an opportunity to meet your father and spent [sic] some time together. It’s realty [sic] an honor and pleasure,” the email reads.
An earlier email from May 2014 also shows Pozharskyi, reportedly Burisma’s No. 3 exec, asking Hunter for “advice on how you could use your influence” on the company’s behalf.
The blockbuster correspondence — which flies in the face of Joe Biden’s claim that he’s “never spoken to my son about his overseas business dealings” — is contained in a massive trove of data recovered from a laptop computer.
Enlarge ImageHunter Biden email
The computer was dropped off at a repair shop in Biden’s home state of Delaware in April 2019, according to the store’s owner.
Other material extracted from the computer includes a raunchy, 12-minute video that appears to show Hunter, who’s admitted struggling with addiction problems, smoking crack while engaged in a sex act with an unidentified woman, as well as numerous other sexually explicit images.
The customer who brought in the water-damaged MacBook Pro for repair never paid for the service or retrieved it or a hard drive on which its contents were stored, according to the shop owner, who said he tried repeatedly to contact the client.
The shop owner couldn’t positively identify the customer as Hunter Biden, but said the laptop bore a sticker from the Beau Biden Foundation, named after Hunter’s late brother and former Delaware attorney general.
Photos of a Delaware federal subpoena given to The Post show that both the computer and hard drive were seized by the FBI in December, after the shop’s owner says he alerted the feds to their existence.
HUNTER BIDEN DOCUMENTS
13
A federal subpoena showing the computer and hard drive were seized by the FBI
But before turning over the gear, the shop owner says, he made a copy of the hard drive and later gave it to former Mayor Rudy Giuliani’s lawyer, Robert Costello.
Steve Bannon, former adviser to President Trump, told The Post about the existence of the hard drive in late September and Giuliani provided The Post with a copy of it on Sunday.
Less than eight months after Pozharskyi thanked Hunter Biden for the introduction to his dad, the then-vice president admittedly pressured Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko and Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk into getting rid of Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin by threatening to withhold a $1 billion US loan guarantee during a December 2015 trip to Kiev.
“I looked at them and said: I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money,” Biden infamously bragged to the Council on Foreign Relations in 2018.
“Well, son of a bitch. He got fired.”
Shokin has said that at the time of his firing, in March 2016, he’d made “specific plans” to investigate Burisma that “included interrogations and other crime-investigation procedures into all members of the executive board, including Hunter Biden.”
Joe Biden has insisted that the US wanted Shokin removed over corruption concerns, which were shared by the European Union.
Meanwhile, an email dated May 12, 2014 — shortly after Hunter Biden joined the Burisma board — shows Pozharskyi attempting to get him to use his political leverage to help the company.
The message had the subject line “urgent issue” and was also sent to Hunter Biden’s business partner, Devon Archer, who also sat on the Burisma board at the time.
Pozharskyi said that “the representatives of new authorities in power tend to quite aggressively approach N. Z. unofficially with the aim to obtain cash from him.”
N.Z. isn’t identified in the email but appears to be a reference to Burisma founder Mykola Zlochevsky, whose first name is a Ukrainian version of “Nicholas.”
When the alleged shakedown failed, “they proceeded with concrete actions” in the form of “one or more pretrial proceedings,” Pozharskyi wrote.
“We urgently need your advice on how you could use your influence to convey a message / signal, etc .to stop what we consider to be politically motivated actions,” he added.
Enlarge ImagePozharskyi and Hunter Biden
Vadym Pozharskyi and Hunter BidenYalta European Strategy / Getty Images
Hunter Biden responded by saying he was with Archer in Doha, Qatar, and asked for more information about “the formal (if any) accusations being made against Burisma.”
“Who is ultimately behind these attacks on the company? Who in the current interim government could put an end to such attacks?” he added.
The exchange came the same day that Burisma announced it had expanded its board of directors by adding Hunter Biden, who was put in charge of its “legal unit and will provide support for the Company among international organizations,” according to a news release that’s since been scrubbed from Burisma’s website.
Hunter Biden actually joined the board in April 2014, according to multiple reports.
His lawyer said last year that Hunter was “not a member of the management team,” adding, “At no time was Hunter in charge of the company’s legal affairs.”
About four months after Hunter Biden’s correspondence with Pozharskyi, Archer forwarded Hunter Biden an email chain with the subject line “tax raise impact on Burisma production,” which included Pozharskyi saying that the Ukrainian cabinet had submitted new tax legislation to the country’s parliament.
hunter-biden-1
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Photos from Hunter Biden's hard drive
“If enacted, this law would kill the entire private gas production sector in the bud,” Pozharskyi wrote.
In the Sept. 24, 2014, email, Pozharskyi also said he was “going to share this information with the US embassy here in Kyiv, as well as the office of Mr Amos Hochstein in the States.”
At the time, Hochstein was the State Department’s newly appointed special envoy and coordinator for international energy affairs.
Enlarge ImageDevon Archer
Devon ArcherPatrick McMullan via Getty Image
In December 2017, the Naftogaz Group, Ukraine’s state-owned energy company, announced that Hochstein had joined the company as an independent director, but on Monday he announced his resignation.
“The company has been forced to spend endless amounts of time combating political pressure and efforts by oligarchs to enrich themselves through questionable transactions,” Hochstein wrote in an op-ed published by the Kyiv Post.
In addition to denying that’s he’s spoken to Hunter Biden about his overseas business dealings, Joe Biden has repeatedly denied any conflict of interest or wrongdoing by either of them involving Burisma.
Last February, he got testy during an appearance on NBC’s “Today” show when co-host Savannah Guthrie questioned whether it was “wrong for [Hunter] to take that position, knowing that it was really because that company wanted access to you.”
“Well, that’s not true. You’re saying things you do not know what you’re talking about,” the elder Biden responded.
hunter-biden-7
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Photos from Hunter Biden's hard drive
Last December, Joe Biden also lashed out during a Democratic primary town hall event in Iowa, where a man accused him of sending Hunter to Ukraine “to get a job and work for a gas company, he had no experience with gas or nothing, in order to get access to . . . the president.”
“You’re a damn liar, man. That’s not true and no one has ever said that,” Biden fumed.
Biden then continued berating the man as he stepped forward, called the man “fat” and challenged him to “do push-ups together, man.”
The FBI referred questions about its seizure of the laptop and hard drive to the Delaware US Attorney’s Office, where a spokesperson said, “My office can neither confirm nor deny the existence of an investigation.”
Hunter Biden’s lawyer refused to comment on the specifics but instead attacked Giuliani.
“He has been pushing widely discredited conspiracy theories about the Biden family, openly relying on actors tied to Russian intelligence,” the lawyer, George R. Mesires, said of Giuliani.
Pozharskyi and the Joe Biden campaign did not return requests for comment. Hochstein could not be reached.
Additional reporting by Ebony Bowden
FILED UNDER COMPUTERS , EMAILS , ENERGY , HUNTER BIDEN , JOE BIDEN , NATURAL GAS , RUDY GIULIANI , STEVE BANNON , UKRAINE , 10/14/20
READ NEXT Hunter Biden emails show leveraging links with dad to boos...
Smoking-gun email reveals how Hunter Biden introduced Ukrainian businessman to VP dad
Senate committee investigating alleged Hunter Biden drive, smoking-gun email
Senate committee investigating alleged Hunter Biden drive, smoking-gun email
By Steven NelsonOctober 14, 2020 | 10:46am | Updated
Smoking-gun email reveals how Hunter Biden introduced Ukrainian businessman to VP dad
HUNTER BIDEN
Trump on Post’s Hunter Biden exposé: China will 'own' the US if Joe Biden wins
Cruz slams 'unbelievable' Twitter censorship of another Hunter Biden story
Trump camp's Twitter locked in new fallout from Post’s Biden bombshell
WH press secretary: Twitter has me 'at gunpoint' over Post's Hunter Biden story
WASHINGTON — A Senate committee is investigating a bombshell cache of documents about Hunter Biden’s foreign dealings that was acquired by a Delaware computer repairman and exposed Wednesday by The Post.
The Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee confirmed it is working with the repairman, whose identity was confirmed by The Post, to verify documents from the hard drive.
“There are so many red flags about the Biden family trying to cash in on the Vice President’s position that it can be hard to keep them straight,” Committee Chairman Ron Johnson (R-Wis.) told The Post.
“Today’s report raises more questions that must be resolved,” Johnson said.
“What we know for a fact is that Hunter Biden took millions of dollars from foreign nationals including, the wife of the former Mayor of Moscow, people tied to the Chinese Communist Party and other unsavory characters. Joe Biden needs to finally come clean and tell the truth to the American people about all of these issues, and he needs to do it now.”
An email from the cache indicates Joe Biden, the Democratic presidential candidate, met with Vadym Pozharskyi, an adviser to the board of Ukrainian energy company Burisma, while it employed his son. At the time, Biden led the Obama administration’s Ukraine policy.
Biden said last year, “I have never spoken to my son about his overseas business dealings,” including his reported $83,000 monthly pay on Burisma’s board.
House Democrats impeached President Trump in December for asking Ukraine to investigate Hunter Biden’s employment.
The repairman contacted Johnson’s committee in late September — one day after it released a report on Joe Biden’s apparent conflicts of interest in his son’s international business dealings, including a claim he received $3.5 million from the wife of Moscow’s former mayor.
The repairman provided correspondence to The Post documenting his outreach to the committee.
Enlarge ImageJoe Biden (right) speaks as his son, Hunter Biden, looks on
Joe Biden (right) speaks as his son, Hunter Biden, looks on.Getty Images
He spoke on Oct. 5 with three members of the committee’s staff.
SEE ALSO
Voters have right to know what Joe Biden did for son Hunter: Devine
A spokesman for the committee confirmed to The Post that it’s investigating.
“We regularly speak with individuals who email the committee’s whistleblower account to determine whether we can validate their claims,” the spokesman said.
“Although we consider those communications to be confidential, because the individual in this instance spoke with the media about his contact with the committee, we can confirm receipt of his email complaint. We have been in contact with the whistleblower and are in the process of attempting to validate the information he provided.”
FILED UNDER 2020 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION , HUNTER BIDEN , JOE BIDEN , 10/14/20
Trump slams censorship of The Post in first comment on Hunter Biden exposé
Trump slams censorship of The Post in first comment on Hunter Biden exposé
By Steven NelsonOctober 14, 2020 | 6:41pm | Updated
Enlarge Image
trump
SAUL LOEB/AFP via Getty Images
MORE ON:
HUNTER BIDEN
Ted Cruz slams 'unbelievable' Twitter censorship of another Hunter Biden story
Trump camp's Twitter locked in new fallout from Post’s Biden bombshell
WH press secretary: Twitter has me 'at gunpoint' over Post's Hunter Biden story
Emails reveal how Hunter Biden tried to cash in big on behalf of family with Chinese firm
President Trump on Wednesday slammed the “terrible” censorship of The Post’s bombshell exposé on Hunter Biden’s hard drive and an alleged email linking Joe Biden to his son’s job at a Ukrainian energy company.
“So terrible that Facebook and Twitter took down the story of ‘Smoking Gun’ emails related to Sleepy Joe Biden and his son, Hunter, in the @NYPost,” Trump tweeted from Air Force One en route to a campaign rally in Iowa.
“It is only the beginning for them. There is nothing worse than a corrupt politician. REPEAL SECTION 230!!!
Twitter blocked users from sharing The Post’s link to the story, which describes an alleged 2015 email from Burisma energy executive Vadym Pozharskyi thanking Hunter Biden for “giving an opportunity to meet your father.”
Biden, who led the Obama administration Ukraine policy, said last year, “I have never spoken to my son about his overseas business dealings,” including his reported $83,000 monthly pay on Burisma’s board.
SEE ALSO
House Republicans evade Twitter censors to share Post's Hunter Biden story
Twitter said Wednesday it prevented users from tweeting or direct-messaging a link to the article because it violated a ban on distributing hacked material.
The contents of the hard drive allegedly belonging to Hunter Biden were passed on to The Post by former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, a personal attorney to Trump, after he received it from a Delaware computer repairman.
The repairman says he legally accessed the content under an abandonment contract clause when Hunter Biden did not collect a damaged laptop within 90 days. He also turned over the laptop to the FBI.
Facebook, meanwhile, said it was taking unspecified steps to limit distribution of The Post’s article pending “fact-checking.”
Republican lawmakers on Wednesday cited the article censorship by Twitter and Facebook in calls for reform Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, a foundational internet liability shield for sites that host third-party content. Sen. Josh Hawley (R-Mo.) separately requested a Federal Election Commission investigation.
Supporters of reforming Section 230 say tech giants should lose protections if they operate as a publisher, rather than as a neutral platform.
“Condemnation is not enough. It’s time to reform Section 230,” wrote Rep. Ken Buck (R-Colo.), a Republican on the House Judiciary Committee.
“Twitter is attempting to meddle in the election with anti-conservative bias. @jack is acting like a publisher, making the case yet again to reform Section 230,” Buck wrote.
Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio), the panel’s top Republican, wrote, “Big Tech claims they aren’t biased against Conservatives. So why are they suppressing speech to help the Democrats? Section 230!”
FILED UNDER 2020 PRESIDENTIAL ELECTION , DONALD TRUMP , HUNTER BIDEN , JOE BIDEN , UKRAINE , 10/14/20
READ NEXT House Republicans evade Twitter censors to share Post's Hu...
Watch: CIA whistleblower implicates Obama, Hillary, Biden - US & Canada - Israel National News
http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/289085
https://nypost.com/2020/10/14/email-reveals-how-hunter-biden-introduced-ukrainian-biz-man-to-dad/?utm_source=maropost&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nypdaily&utm_content=20201014&tpcc=morning_report&mpweb=755-9124220-720431335
Wednesday, October 14, 2020
Thursday, September 3, 2020
"Do not punish the masses for the sins of the few"
"Do not punish the masses for the sins of the
few"
This
applies to any and all rights and privileges stated in the Constitution of the
For example “The Right to Bear and Keep Arms”. The
Second Amendment to the Constitution of the
Nowhere
does the Constitution give the President or the Congress the power to
federalize state crimes or enact gun control legislation -- not even in a
national emergency. One reads the Constitution in vain for such a delegation of
authority by "We, the People" through the several states. Very
instructive on this point are the Kentucky Resolutions of 1798 which were
written by Thomas Jefferson.
The federal government in 1798
enacted a law making it illegal to criticize a federal official (the Sedition
Act).
These are among the arguments
that Jefferson made in the
...whensoever’s the general
government assumes un-delegated powers, its acts are un-authoritative, void,
and of no force: ...that the government created by this compact was not made
the exclusive or final judge of the extent of the powers delegated to
itself;...each party has an equal right to judge for itself, as well of
infractions as of the mode and measure of redress.
Jefferson went on to spell out that the only powers to punish crime delegated
to the federal government were 1) treason, 2) counterfeiting the securities and
current coin of the United States, 3) piracies and 4) offenses against the law
of nations. In this context,
Anyone
who has observed children will recognize that, ironically, they often
demonstrate a more stringent and uncompromising sense of justice than the
adults around them. A small child who must divide a piece of cake, for example,
will be excruciatingly precise in cutting it lest the "chooser" glom
on to a larger slice. Whether the issue is whose turn it is to clear the
dishes, take out the trash, or who broke that lamp, young people appeal to an
almost innate sense of propriety in demanding they be treated fairly and
equitably.
This
tendency to rigor is perhaps even more evident when parents must mete out
punishments and rewards. To be falsely penalized for something they did not do
will stir up the loudest and shrillest of complaints among the innocent
offspring.
Too
many adults, unfortunately, mildly, meekly, and silently accept such
collectivist justice when dealing with social and political issues.
The
essence of a moral view of justice entails a recognition that only individuals
can be held accountable for the right and wrong they do. Because each of us
possesses free will and, thus, the capacity to make choices among alternatives,
when we act upon our best (or sometimes worst) judgment, we and we alone are who
should reap the benefits of selecting wisely and appropriately...and we and we
alone should be the ones to suffer the negative consequences of picking
hastily, foolishly, or ignorantly.
If
good and evil are to mean anything, our moral autonomy as beings with the
capacity for rational behavior must be acknowledged and accepted. Any other
basis for determining who is responsible for destructive or constructive
outcomes leads to the kind of schizophrenic legal and political realm nipping
at our heels today.
This
individualistic conception of justice did not always hold sway. Indeed,
collectivistic guilt has a long history. In Christian theology, we are all
guilty of sin because of the behavior of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.
Throughout the past, whole families -- sometimes entire cities -- were held
responsible for what fathers or kings might have done. The average citizen of
ancient
Our
Founding Fathers recognized the inherent injustice in accepting the doctrine of
collective guilt, i.e., visiting unto the sons the sins of the father. Article
III of the Constitution says that "no Attainder of Treason shall work
Corruption of Blood." In other words, the family of a traitor cannot be
punished simply because the members are related to the perpetrator.
The
bulk of the legal code under which we labor today, however, is rife with
violations of this principle. The general collectivization of our culture in
the Twentieth Century permeates every crack and crevice of our relationship
with the law. Incoherently, our politicians hold individual citizens blameless
for many of the negative conditions in their lives (e.g., being poor, homeless,
addicted to drugs, sexual promiscuous, or abysmally ignorant) while pointing a
narrow finger at us all. "Society" does not provide enough resources
(i.e., money) or understanding or opportunities.
But
"society" is only an abstraction, a way of describing the
relationships, the actions, the beliefs of individuals. Despite what every
dictator or tyrant or statist has proclaimed, society as a separate entity does
not literally exist apart from and above the separate and distinct individuals
who comprise it. Just as the ideas of "right" and "left"
have no meaning when divorced from the people involved, so too,
"society" loses its coherence when reified (and too often, deified).
In
addition to supplying a (poor) rationale for the plethora of social programs
dragging us down -- from Social Security and Medicare to business subsidies and
disaster relief -- the notion of collective responsibility, obligation, or
guilt obliterates proper understanding and application of justice and equity by
punishing the innocent majority for the transgressions of the criminal few.
Most
regulations, laws, and prohibitions are propounded by pointing out that certain
abuses have occurred in the past. Thus, because certain people have engaged in
improper behavior, everyone must be presumed to be a potential criminal and
have his choices and actions inspected, constrained, or curtailed. Such legal
machinations act as a kind of prior restraint. They sanction the notion that
the agents of the government must, in essence, punish citizens -- for potential
improprieties -- beforehand by means of dictates, fees, or restrictions on what
they do and/or how they do it.
But
an implicit assumption of guilt -- before you have even acted -- violates the
constitutionally recognized principle that you can only be punished after you
have actually done something wrong. Even then, the legal system must assume the
innocence of the accused. The courts must prove you are guilty. To make you
prove you are innocent -- as most regulations on business and individuals do --
is rank injustice. To add insult to the injury, many of the laws strangling us
today are based on some group's notion of morality regardless of whether or not
you have actually violated anyone's rights (for example, with consensual
"crimes" such as prostitution, drug use, and gambling).
Affirmative
action policies punish those who were never racist for the sins of those long
dead, an indirect "corruption of blood." Business regulations assume
that only state scrutiny prevents all entrepreneurs from being polluters,
swindlers, and cheaters. Sexual harassment and anti-discrimination laws
(whether for sex, race, ethnic background, age, or disability) squeeze us all
into narrow-minded compartments of barely suppressed bigotry held in check only
by the good graces of the bureaucrats.
Tens
of thousands of gun (i.e., people) control laws treat peaceful,
rights-respecting individuals as criminals held at bay only because they must
jump through arbitrary, unconstitutional hoops that disarm and endanger
millions while leaving the field unchallenged to the
rapists, robbers, and burglars.
The "rule
of law" has morphed into the "rule of men." Politicians,
regulators, and law enforcement agents see us today as blank, faceless, and
interchangeable segments of whatever particular group they have focused upon.
No longer are we treated as distinct individuals. Instead we are lumped
together, punished for no sin of our own, treated not as innocent individuals,
but as untrustworthy villains-by-proxy.
The Constitution has been turned
on its head. Instead of the individual at the pinnacle of the pyramid, today he
is crushed by the weight of the masses who take precedence in their anonymity
over his unique and individual life and personality. Instead of the individual
being able to do anything not prohibited and the state only that which is
permitted, in modern society, the abstract (and literally nonexistent) state
has virtually carte blanche to chase after every whim. The true, fundamental
component of our culture -- a single, real, breathing person -- is bound and
chained, able to choose only from a narrower and narrower range of what is
allowed him as a privilege, not a right.
As mentioned, the very notion of
"rights" has itself been both bloated and choked. On the one hand, "rights"
to health care, housing, food, education and on and on are manufactured out of
thin air. On the other hand, property rights -- the foundation for implementing
the right to your own existence -- is suppressed by the rampant moral inflation
of bogus rights. Coupled with both malign neglect and direct attacks upon
property, we drift without legal anchor or direction.
To restore freedom, we must
reclaim the moral initiative. We must re-consecrate respect for justice as a
trait of the individual, not the collective. We must hold as sacrosanct our
right to earn and hold property, to direct its use, and to wield it as a shield
against malefactors. We must proclaim our right as free, autonomous, and
sovereign individuals to do what we want, say what we will, and build our lives
without the permission, sanction, or approval of any group. As long as we
respect the same rights of all others, we should and must never be punished for
the transgressions of the few.
Compiled by YJ Draiman
Tuesday, July 28, 2020
‘The most terrible camp’: After 80 years, cruelty of SS site on UK soil revealed
‘The most terrible camp’: After 80 years, cruelty of SS site on UK soil revealed
INTERVIEW INMATES WERE MOSTLY EAST EUROPEANS, WITH MANY FRENCH JEWS
Archaeologists publish in-depth survey highlighting the historical importance of the oft-overlooked Lager Sylt, as well as the physical and psychological torture of its inmates
LONDON — British archaeologist Caroline Sturdy Colls compares her work on the sites of Nazi atrocities to a police inquiry.
“This is an investigation into historic crime, but crime that still has relevance for people today,” explains the Staffordshire University professor. “You wouldn’t conduct a police investigation only looking at witness testimony.”
For Sturdy Colls, who has worked on Holocaust and genocide sites throughout Europe, including Treblinka, it is the bringing together of physical evidence and witness testimony which offers the opportunity to find “new evidence and new perspectives on the nature of these crimes.”
Alderney is in one of the small clusters of islands — an archipelago which includes Jersey, Guernsey, and Sark — which lie in the English Channel off the coast of Normandy. Semi-independent, they were nonetheless the only part of the British isles to be occupied by Germany during World War II.Alongside a team from the university’s Center of Archaeology, Sturdy Colls has just completed a decade-long investigation into one of the least-studied scenes of Nazi barbarism: Lager Sylt, a slave labor and concentration camp on the island of Alderney.
Illustrative: Caroline Sturdy Colls, a renowned forensic archaeologist, in the 2019 documentary, ‘Adolf Island.’ (Snap TV via JTA)
The result of the Staffordshire University team’s research is published in April’s edition of the academic journal Antiquity. It brings together declassified aerial photographs, archival accounts, and a range of other non-invasive techniques — such as ground-penetrating radar, and light detection and ranging surveys (LiDAR) — to produce the first investigation of Sylt since a British government inspection in 1945. It is also the first to use archaeological methods.
‘The most terrible camp’
Sylt is near-unique. It is one of only two concentration camps to have been sited on British soil. The other — Lager Norderney (not to be confused with the island of Norderney off Germany’s northern coast) — was one of four forced labor camps constructed on Alderney after the island was occupied in June 1940.
Built in 1942, Sylt was originally one of the smaller camps. But a year later, Sylt, together with Norderney, was taken over by the SS Death’s Head Unit. It became a satellite of Neuengamme, expanded rapidly in size, and was turned into a concentration camp. Sylt swiftly earned a well-deserved reputation as “the most terrible camp,” as a former Alderney prisoner later testified.
The French prisoners dubbed Alderney “le rocher maudit” — the accursed rock
Its inmates were mostly East Europeans, although there was also a large contingent of French Jews. The French prisoners dubbed Alderney “le rocher maudit” — the accursed rock — underlining the brutality of the wind-swept, sea-beaten and remote island. Its prewar civilian population of 1,400 people had been evacuated by Britain when, deeming them too difficult to defend, it pulled out of the Channel Islands after the fall of France in June 1940.
For Hitler, these solitary prized British possessions were — as Nazi propaganda would have it — the “last stepping stone before the conquest of mainland Britain.” But Alderney also had an important strategic value. As part of the “Atlantic Wall” fortifications, it was intended to protect the sea channels around Cherbourg, provide the Luftwaffe with anti-aircraft cover, and deny the Allies a potentially useful staging post for the opening of the feared Western Front.
From early 1942, Alderney thus became the scene of massive construction — of tunnels and bunkers, gun emplacements and artillery batteries, roads and a railway line — which would leave it the most fortified of the Channel Islands. Sylt’s slave laborers, together with those of Alderney’s other camps, were put to work on this massive construction effort.
It was the number of sites connected to the occupation on the small island — which is a mere three miles long and half a mile wide — which, in part, sparked Sturdy Colls’s interest.
Plans showing: A) the function of each structure; and B) remnants recorded during archaeological
investigations. (Centre of Archaeology, Staffordshire University/ via Antiquity Publications)
investigations. (Centre of Archaeology, Staffordshire University/ via Antiquity Publications)
“There are publications about this and there have been a lot of testimonies since the war but a lot of them don’t cover the forced and slave labor perspective and, apart from investigations in the immediate aftermath of the war, nobody has focused on the physical traces of these sites,” she tells The Times of Israel.
At Sylt her team used a series of non-invasive techniques which she has developed and deployed at other sites in Europe, particularly those connected to the Holocaust.
“What this means, in a broad sense, is that we can investigate the landscape — everything from the entire landscape at a macro level of Alderney down to very minute in-field objects and items — without disturbing the ground in any way,” she says.
“The crucial thing,” Sturdy Colls says, “is really using those techniques in combination and then bringing all of that data together with aerial photographs, witness testimony, maps, [and] plans, and essentially layering them to be able to try and determine what some of these surface and buried features might be.”
A taboo subject
But the work has taken place against a complex backdrop. In a bid to disguise their crimes, the SS demolished much of the camp in 1944. That effort, combined with the fact that, for many years, the presence of concentration camps on British soil was something of a taboo subject, meant that Sylt was often dismissed as having been “destroyed” or “dismantled.”
When the island’s parliament, the States of Alderney, debated whether to include Sylt in its register of historic buildings and monuments in 2015, for instance, one committee member suggested: “If there were buildings or something there worth conserving, I might have a different opinion; but there is nothing, apart from a broken old wash trough […] and a load of brambles.”
Photo of Sylt Concentration Camp on the island of Alderney, after Nazi surrender, May 1945. (Courtesy of the
Trustees of the Royal Air Force Museum/ via Antiquity Publications)
Trustees of the Royal Air Force Museum/ via Antiquity Publications)
One of the study’s most important findings, the Antiquity paper notes, was to demonstrate that “considerable traces of the camp survive, both above and below ground,” thus “challenging the notion that there is nothing ‘worth’ conserving.”
That view is endorsed by Gillian Carr, an archaeologist at the University of Cambridge who specializes in the occupation of the Channel Island.
“In my opinion, the paper will be useful in helping the island of Alderney to see the extent of traces of Lager Sylt left in the landscape and therefore to think again about how the camp might be used in the island’s heritage strategy in the future,” says Carr, who is also the Channel Islands’ International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance (IHRA) representative.
She is currently leading an IHRA project which aims to create a set of guidelines to protect Holocaust sites.
In 2017, Sylt was designated a conservation site by Alderney, although, the Antiquity paper claims, its “physical condition remains unchanged in 2019.”
The debate about the condition of the site and the continuing desire on the part of some islanders not to dwell too closely on the horrors perpetrated there are closely interlinked, believes Sturdy Colls.
The old gate posts to Lager Sylt on the island of Alderney, 2012. (CC BY-SA 2.0/ John Rostron)
“That has been fairly central to some of the arguments around the importance of the site,” she says. “It’s made it in some ways easier for people to ignore the history of what happened at Sylt because if you can’t see the site and if there’s nothing there to see, obviously that makes it easier to ignore its history.”
There is, the archaeologist says, “a long legacy” which goes back to immediately after the war when the British government was “not necessarily keen to even acknowledge that these camps existed on British soil.” That legacy also meant that a lot of archive material remained classified for many years.
As more and more evidence comes to light it becomes more painful
Sturdy Colls accepts that the subject is a difficult one for many islanders. “As more and more evidence comes to light it becomes more painful for some people to keep having this period of history dug up over and over again metaphorically,” she says.
She also recognizes there has been an effort on the part of some journalists and writers to “sensationalize the history of what happened on Alderney.”
“Part of the reason I started the project in the first place was because I wanted to go back and review all of the archival materials and then look at the physical evidence to try and cut through some of the myth and conjecture that had built up,” the archaeologist says.
Bunker on Alderney, likely built by slave labor from Sylt and the other camps. (Andree Stephan/ CC BY 3.0/ via Antiquity Publications)
Sturdy Colls is careful not to suggest her team’s latest research is full of revelations. “I’m not saying that everything in the paper has never been written anywhere before,” she says. “Clearly, a lot of people gave testimony about this, but I really hope that the archaeology validates those testimonies in many ways and it also fills in some of the gaps, because there are some things that people didn’t say in the testimonies either because they were never asked or they didn’t think it was important.”
In all, the archaeological team recorded 32 surface features at Sylt, including four boundaries, five structures within the SS sections, two in the camp commandant’s section, and 21 in the prisoners’ sections.
“Notable structures hidden under vegetation in the prisoner area include the toilet block and bathhouse, stables, and a kitchen with an accompanying subterranean cellar,” the paper says. “Remains of the SS canteen, workshops and guardroom were revealed in the SS area. Sentry posts, gateposts and the remnants of the camp fences also survive. The lidar and geophysical survey data reveal extensive evidence surviving beneath the ground’s surface, including the foundations of prisoner and SS barracks, the sickbay and construction office.”
Using aerial photography and geophysical data, the research also tracks how Sylt evolved in a short period from a small forced labor prison into a much larger concentration camp. That development is illustrated in the research by 3D reconstructions.
Drone shot of the remains of Sylt; Inset: memorial plaque at the site. (Centre of Archaeology; Staffordshire University; FlyThru/ Courtesy Antiquity Publications)
The human story
But it is the prisoners’ story — one of “hard labor, poor rations and harsh punishments,” as the paper puts it — that Sturdy Colls wanted to lay at the heart of the research.
“I was really trying to convey the human story,” she says. “A lot of my work, particularly as an archaeologist, has to be very scientific, but what I was trying to do with this really — and I try and do with all the work that I do in relationship to the Holocaust and genocide — is to show that we’re not just talking about bricks and mortar, we’re not just talking about numbers here. We’re talking about real people, and the way that those buildings were constructed, it made such a difference to people’s lives.”
That desire to weave together the relationship between the architecture of Sylt, the unforgiving landscape, and the terrible experience of the inmates is evident throughout the research.
It records, for instance, the manner in which, while the number of prisoner barracks doubled during this time, the camp population quintupled from 100-200 to over 1,000 inmates. Today, the wooden barracks are long gone, but traces survive as shallow depressions, with buried concrete foundations and stairs leading down from ground level.
The prisoner kitchen cellar at the Sylt concentration camp on the island of Alderney. (Centre of Archaeology, Staffordshire University/ via Antiquity Publications)
Mapping out the barracks — which were exposed to the coast’s windy weather — graphically corroborates witness testimony of acute overcrowding. Each barrack, which housed roughly 150 men, allowed for less than 1.5 square meters (4 feet by 4 feet) for each person.
The size of the foundation of the prisoners’ kitchen — less than 20 meters by 6.03 meters (65 feet by 20 feet) — tells a story which, again, confirms later accounts of pitiful rations and lack of food. As Sturdy Colls says: “Obviously, they never really intended to feed them properly, otherwise they would have built a bigger kitchen.” The toilet block, which was uncovered in 2013, was also undersized and basic, as was the simple wooden building which housed the sickbay.
The archaeological survey draws out the contrast between the prisoners’ facilities and the comfort enjoyed by their SS guards. Many SS structures, for instance, were constructed from reinforced concrete. To protect them from the island’s harsh weather, and possible air raids, SS buildings were surrounded by stone walling and had foundations dug below ground level. The SS also put their horses in stables — whose foundations and a concrete trough survive in good condition — which were better constructed than the prisoner buildings.
Stable block at the Sylt concentration camp on the island of Alderney. (Centre of Archaeology, Staffordshire University/ via Antiquity Publications)
The archaeologists also investigated a tunnel which traveled from inside a prisoner bathhouse to just behind the commandant’s Tyrolean-style villa outside the camp walls. Electric lighting in the tunnel, whose existence has long been documented, indicates that it was well-used, but its purpose remains a mystery. Speculation has ranged from suggestions that it was a bomb shelter to the idea it was a space through which women could be taken into a brothel within the villa.
There is, says Sturdy Colls, a “weird contrast” between the the fact that the camp was so heavily guarded and this apparent weak spot where there is seemingly access between the commandant’s house and the prisoner area at the camp.
The researchers also explored the “heightened security measures” which were constructed — including barbed wire fences and watchtowers — as Sylt was transformed into a concentration camp.
The tunnel which connected the Sylt concentration camp commandant’s house to the camp proper. (Centre of Archaeology, Staffordshire University/ via Antiquity Publications)
“The nature of the security of this camp was incredibly strong in terms of the number of guards, but also in terms of the way that the camp was built given that there was nowhere to go when the prisoners escaped,” says Sturdy Colls.
Indeed, the fact that any escaped prisoner would encounter minefields, steep cliff edges and the sea makes clear that the security was, in part, intended to exact a psychological toll on those incarcerated behind it.
The nature of the security of this camp was incredibly strong given that there was nowhere to go when the prisoners escaped
As the archaeologist says: “The architecture of the camp and the number of guards was a way of making very clear to those prisoners that the SS was in control of every moment of their daily lives.”
The SS also used the security fences to taunt the prisoners — encouraging them to attempt to escape through them, and then shooting them when they did — and to inflict brutal punishments upon them.
Illustrative: Archeologist Caroline Sturdy Colls oversees excavations conducted at the mass graves area of Treblinka, the former Nazi death camp in eastern Poland. (Courtesy)
“I hope one of the key things about the article is that it shows that these weren’t just fence lines, these weren’t just buildings and wood and bricks and mortar,” says Sturdy Colls. “These were places where obviously the prisoners really did experience terrible atrocities, and a lot of that was connected to the way in which the camp was built and the way in which they were guarded within the camp.”
The scale of the horror perpetrated on Alderney is hotly debated. Official accounts after the war figured that less than 400 of the slave laborers died on the island. Seventy years on, though, some historians and military experts suggest the workforce and the death toll have been grossly underestimated.
Colonel Richard Kemp, Britain’s former commander in Afghanistan who has carried out detailed research into the Nazis’ reign of terror on the island, has, for instance, suggested the number of slave laborers who perished on Alderney is at least 40,000.
Illustrative; German WWII bunker ‘The Odeon’ in Alderney. The bunker is about three to four stories high and has an anti-aircraft emplacement at the back. Alderney is said to have been the most heavily fortified of the Channel Islands. (CC-SA-Tim Brighton)
Sturdy Colls says that coming to an official figure for the death-toll on Alderney is “very difficult.” She believes at least 700 slave laborers died, while labeling the figure a “very conservative estimate.” However, she continues, there is “no evidence that I’ve found in 10 years of archive research to suggest that numbers in the tens of thousands of deaths are in any way credible whatsoever. There is no evidence to suggest that that many people were even sent to Alderney.”
Her next project is a book on Alderney in which she is attempting to trace the stories of those who lived — and died — under the occupation.
“I think it’s very important to not only investigate that physical evidence and the source material,” Sturdy Colls says, “but to make sure in doing so we’re able to say something about those individuals to remind people that this isn’t something that just happened to collective groups of people.”
“Every one of those victims,” she says, “had their own stories to tell.”
Comments:
Comments:
Inka Dupont
My parents, my relatives, and most of the friends they had, all where P.O.W. in Japanese concentration camps in Indonesia. That was also not very well known to people but it happened. This story reminds me of that.
I think it's appalling what people can do to other people. And history doesn't record it.
I think it's appalling what people can do to other people. And history doesn't record it.
Roger Eden
There is no European country that did not have willing and enthusiastic participants in the Holocaust. They weren't Nazis, many were anti-German. Even UK citizens. On Jersey, prior to the arrival of the invading Nazis, the British Governor, sent British Policemen to round up the few Jews, writing an obsequious letter (still on the archives) that "he had the honor to inform the incoming General that he has collected the Jews...). They were murdered. He thought he was currying Nazi favors. Didn't help. The Governor was knighted at the end of the War.
Chandramouli Donti
The British and other Europeans invaded so many countries all over the world and destroyed the local cultures, economy and looted them. In no way they are better than German devils. All are same. Shame on humanity.
Miche Norman
Not true - the British had concentration camps all over the UK in the first and second world wars - some of them run on lines very similar to those that Dachau was run under complete with kapos.
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