When hardline leftists (fascists, communists, et al) are successful in advancing their political ideology, we always reach a point where all opposition must be silenced.  Dissent is a risk to the totalitarian state; that’s also why communists always ban religion.

Totalitarianism needs total control.  Free speech is antithetical to that control.  The natural evolution of any totalitarian state is to use the justification of security as a method for that control; hence, the U.S. received The Patriot Act, and all of the longer-term slippery slope consequences that are never fully discussed at the outset.  I digress.

So, here we are today – facing a U.S. Dept of Homeland Security (DHS), under the current control of the far left, stating that free speech is now the biggest domestic threat for terrorism.  Whereby the voices to target are those voices who might: “sow discord and undermine public trust in government institutions to encourage unrest, which could potentially inspire acts of violence.”

Undermine trust in government, as defined by anyone who does not blindly trust the policies from Biden administration, and you are now subject to be labeled a terrorist.

DHS Alert (Feb 7, 2022) – The United States remains in a heightened threat environment fueled by several factors, including an online environment filled with false or misleading narratives and conspiracy theories, and other forms of mis- dis- and mal-information (MDM) introduced and/or amplified by foreign and domestic threat actors.

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Good grief, when the leftist government in Canada gets pushback, they really don’t know how to handle it.  Earlier today, the Canadian government expressed extreme anger toward any American citizen who may have made a financial contribution to the Freedom Protest. {CTV}

Reading from a prepared statement, Justin Trudeau’s Public Safety Minister Marco Mendicino stated the Canadian government intends to target any American who may have donated to the Freedom Convoy protest effort.  Apparently, the Canadian government wants to scare Americans away from donating to support the Freedom Protest in Ottawa.  [Full Presser Video Here]

Minister Mendicino identified the Ottawa protest group as a “violent”, “hate” group.  The Ottawa truck drivers were described as an “angry, loud, intolerant and violent crowd,” who “threaten the national security of Canada.”

Following his outline of the violent mob, Minister Mendicino switched his targeting to the donors who have supported the Freedom Protest, saying that Canada has a “robust” intelligence community that will flag for the Trudeau administration all concerns of national security, as well as a separate branch within the RCMP that looks into these types of issues.

“That’s why I’m certainly confident that wherever there’s foul play of the sort, that we’ll be in a position to act appropriately,” said Mendicino.  “If, for example, someone was contributing with the intent of either causing public harm or trying to undermine public safety, that would be something that would be against the law, and there would be appropriate sanctions for that, if proven in the court of law,” he said.

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People are starting to catch on.  First, how it is surfacing:

(Zero Hedge) ...”traders are paying bumper premiums for immediate supply” … “Commodities are severely undersupplied” … “The shortage of, well, everything has translated into record price of virtually all commodities: the Bloomberg Commodity Spot Index, which tracks 23 energy, metals and crop futures, has touched a record this year. That has been driven in part by surging oil prices, which have hit their highest level since 2014.” (read more)

CTH readers are specifically well positioned to understand what is happening in the background we have discussed two specific issues:

(1) In any era of hyper-inflation, we always see the advanced purchasing of inventory for profit.  Meaning, when prices are quickly rising multinationals use their size and power over commodity goods to store, physically or through contracted future purchases, goods that are held until a specific target price is reached and then sold for a bigger profit.  In 2022 the “supply chain disruption” is being used as a cover.

(2) In the modern era, the major multinationals control the supply of originating products.  There’s no such thing as a free market. In the modern era it is a controlled market.

Long before the word “inflation” hit the 2021 headlines, April/May of last year, CTH specifically identified where we are right now.

In the background right now, the multinationals are exploiting the two issues above.  The Zero Hedge article “Shortages of Everything” is discussing the surfacing symptom, i.e. goods traders willing to pay premium prices to secure inventories, not necessarily the root cause.

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Gasoline prices have risen, on average, 40% in the past 11 months.  This leads to higher consumer costs across the board.  Oil, currently $90/barrel, is going to go even higher as a merge of Biden economic, regulatory, energy and foreign policies are going to make things worse.

As the Obama-Biden administration previously said when they achieved their last historic increase in gas prices, “U.S. energy prices will necessarily skyrocket“, in order to achieve their ideological climate change objectives.

(VIA CNBC) Gas prices rose to the highest level in more than seven years Friday, on the heels of the U.S. oil benchmark topping $90 per barrel for the first time since 2014. 

The national average for a gallon of gas stood at $3.423 on Friday, according to AAA, slightly surpassing the prior high-water mark of $3.422 from Nov. 8.  Friday’s price means consumers are now paying the most at the pump since Sept. 10, 2014, AAA data shows.

The national average stood at $2.44 a year ago.  The rapid rise in prices is contributing to inflationary fears across the economy and is creating a headache for the Biden administration. (read more)

Yes, a president can and does control the price of gasoline.  What can a U.S. President and administration specifically do?  We have abundant U.S. energy resources.  Quite literally the strongest in the entire world.

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If you watch anything today, this is it.  AP Journalist Matt Lee has been around for a long time. He’s the consistent person in the State Department briefing room who understands the deep state institutional games, and he knows how to spot narrative engineering.

Earlier today State Department Spokesman Ned Price said, “The United States has information that Russia is planning to stage fabricated attacks by Ukrainian military or intelligence forces as a pretext for a further invasion of Ukraine.”

Journalist Matt Lee then asked Ned Price what the declassified evidence was that the state dept was referring to.  Price responded that he just gave it to the audience; meaning his word was the evidence.  Matt Lee calls bullshit on Price, and things got really interesting. WATCH:

Folks, the intelligence state, the Fourth Branch of Government, is making it all up.  Everything about this Russian looming attack narrative has been manufactured out of whole cloth by the Intelligence Community and Biden administration.

The statements and position by Ned Price are transparently absurd.  Ridiculously so.  Matt Lee calling the bluff on the U.S. State Department, and comparing them to Alex Jones conspiracy theorists, is peak insanity.  No one trusts the U.S. government institutions any longer.  Everyone knows the “intelligence state” makes stuff up to steer and control events.  It’s a joke.

Russia is likely not doing anything, likely doesn’t even have a threatening posture, but yet, inside the DC bubble we are on the precipice of a thermonuclear war. We have passed through the looking glass, and now we are in bizarro world.

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Senator Ray Lujan from New Mexico suffered a stroke recently.  Thankfully, despite the seriousness of his medical situation, he is expected to make a recovery.  However, he will likely miss all U.S. Senate work for at least a month.  Lujan’s absence creates a significant issue for Senate Democrats in an upper chamber with a 50/50 split.

Lujan suffered the stroke last Thursday, on the same day Joe Biden announced the retirement of Supreme Court Justice Stephen Breyer.  The news of Senator Lujan’s major medical condition has been essentially quiet.

With Joe Biden expecting to nominate a Supreme Court justice very soon, the senator’s absence could be problematic.

However, not to worry, creepy Joe’s recent praise of Mitch McConnell and Lindsey Graham will likely assist.

WASHINGTON DC – […] While the 49-year-old New Mexico Democrat is expected to make a full recovery, no one knew when he would return to the evenly divided Senate, or what it means for the immediate agenda.

Luján’s unexpected medical condition comes at a moment when Senate Democrats simply don’t have any votes to spare to pass party priorities, including reviving their social spending bill and now confirming a Supreme Court justice. The latest news could leave Democrats reliant on Republican votes to move forward on nominees and other priorities.

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According to the White House, 50 special forces operators attacked the leadership compound of Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi, the ISIS replacement head for Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi who was killed in 2019.  According to the White House occupant, after a lengthy engagement with U.S. forces, al-Qurayshi killed himself the same way al-Baghdadi did, by exploding a bomb.  There were no U.S. casualties.

(Via ABC) First responders reported that 13 people had been killed, including six children and four women. White House press secretary Jen Psaki said U.S. officials believe al-Qurayshi’s explosive killed himself, his wife, and three children. She added that U.S. officials were conducting an assessment to determine whether American action resulted in any civilian deaths. (more)

The White House background briefing on the strike IS HERE.  The remarks by Joe Biden ARE HERE.

Sending 50 special operators for one building engagement is a little heavy; however, obviously the White House was petrified that something would go wrong, and the last thing Ron Klain wants would be another boondoggle to add to the pile of disasters this administration has created.

That said, rather than debate the mission, I would draw attention to the location and bigger picture.  Northern Syria is part of the Muslim Brotherhood territory under the influence of Turkish President Recep Erdogan.  ISIS, al-Qaeda, al-Nusra, and all extremist Islamic factions therein are all just various shades of authentic Islam as promoted by The Muslim Brotherhood.

Turkey is a member of NATO.  Abu Ibrahim al-Hashimi al-Qurayshi and all of the various offshoots of ISIS could not operate in Northern Syria without the assistance of Turkey.  But we are not allowed to talk about that.  Notice how none of the media ask the White House or Pentagon if we discussed the attack with Turkey in advance?

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At this point in our nation’s history, certain acceptances are needed in order to accurately identify the current status of our situation.

• • The Legislative Branch (SSCI) created the Intelligence State, the Fourth Branch of superseding government.
  • The Executive Branch (FBI, DOJ, NSA) control the Fourth Branch of superseding government.
  • The Judicial Branch (FISA Court) is the facilitating approval apparatus for the Fourth Branch.

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With that empirical and well documented reality in place, all three branches of U.S. government work in unison.  Who or what can intervene to stop the Fourth Branch of government from operating unilaterally?

This is the serious question that no one ever discusses.

The FISA Court is the private, secret, unchecked judicial system authorizing the power for the Intelligence State.

As a result, we continue to see NSA reports showing the unconstitutional surveillance of the American people continuing without consequence [NSA Release Here].

This is the 5th straight year where the National Security Agency (NSA) produces a document admitting their metadata capturing system, the system that captures all electronic communication of every single American and puts it into a stored database, is continually used as a research library for unnamed federal agents to scour (without search warrants) for the private documents of American citizens.

At this point, the NSA admission without consequence is simply just another Tuesday, it literally doesn’t even make the headlines anymore.

The executive summary does, however, include the NSA introducing the latest admissions about violating the 4th amendment right of Americans, while bragging about how their diversity hiring efforts have paid off.

So, there’s that.

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An interesting study from Johns Hopkins University [DATA HERE] shows the 2021 government lockdown did virtually nothing to stem death from the pandemic, but likely created more adverse “social ills” and long-term negative health outcomes.

WASHINGTON – […] The lockdowns during the early phase of the pandemic in 2020 reduced COVID-19 mortality by about 0.2%, said the broad review of multiple scientific studies.

“We find no evidence that lockdowns, school closures, border closures, and limiting gatherings have had a noticeable effect on COVID-19 mortality,” the researchers wrote. But the research paper said lockdowns did have “devastating effects” on the economy and contributed to numerous social ills.

“They have contributed to reducing economic activity, raising unemployment, reducing schooling, causing political unrest, contributing to domestic violence, and undermining liberal democracy,” the report said.

“Such a standard benefit-cost calculation leads to a strong conclusion: lockdowns should be rejected out of hand as a pandemic policy instrument,” the paper concluded. (read more)

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The latest BLS Job Openings and Labor Turnover (JOLT) report [DATA HERE] reflects a headline of 4.3 million U.S. workers quitting in December.  However, that number is 161,000 fewer quits than November. The job openings are starting to fill up.

While there is evidence the mandatory vaccine requirements are still working through the job market, we are still about another month away before the fog clears from the private sector employment data.

This Friday we will see the unemployment data from December, but in the interim this JOLT’s report is tracking with CTH expectations.

The primary driver of the quits rate has been inflation.  Workers seeking higher wages in an effort to deal with inflation can get faster paycheck results by switching jobs rather than asking current employers for more money.

We have been watching this trend for several months.  However, the rate of job-jumping is slowing down as the available jobs to jump into are fewer, and the vaccine mandate impact is settling down.

Despite the number of job openings, blue collar workers are starting to see job vacancies decreasing.  The service industries around accommodation, food services and basic dirty fingernail positions still have many vacancies; this is the epicenter of where the job jumping takes place. Employment in durable goods manufacturing is at that phase where things are about to get sketchy for tradespeople and union workers.

The white collar jobs are static and/or slightly downsizing.  The total number of hires was 6.3 million for December, a drop of 333,000 from prior month.  The number of people hired in professional and business services dropped by 159,000.

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