Llewellyn H. Rockwell Jr.'s Blog, page 2275

FISA Madness

For the past few days, the nation’s media and political class have been fixated on the firing of the No. 2 person in the FBI, Deputy Director Andrew McCabe. McCabe became embroiled in the investigation of President Donald Trump because of his alleged approval of the use of a political dossier, written about Trump and paid for by the Democrats and not entirely substantiated, as a basis to secure a search warrant for surveillance of a former Trump campaign adviser who once boasted that he worke...

Russiagate Comes to England

I don’t know what happened in Salisbury England on March 4th, but it appears that the British government doesn’t know either. Prime Minister Theresa May’s speech before Parliament last Monday was essentially political, reflecting demands that she should “do something” in response to the mounting hysteria over the poisoning of former Russian double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter Yulia. After May’s presentation there were demands from Parliamentarians for harsh measures against Russia, r...

Deja Vu All Over Again

Everything is great. We’re riding high. The stock market is up. Employment is up. Analysts and pundits see nothing but smooth sailing ahead.

It sounds an awful lot like 2007.

It’s like deja vu all over again.

As an article published at The Conversation pointed out, there were two key problems lurking below the surface in the mid-2000s that few people paid any attention two. Those same two factors exist today. And once again, few people are paying much attention.

Excessive household debt A ho...

YouTube Cracks Down

YouTube started out awesome. You could post videos of anything you wanted, pretty much. Then, over time, they realized that if they paid content creators, those creators could churn out better content. It was pretty cool. People could make a living entertaining folks or teaching them cool stuff.

However, YouTube soon started to turn left politically. They started demonetizing content they disagreed with while turning a blind eye to content they did. This forced content creators–people who oft...

Swamp Psychopath

What prompted former CIA Director John Brennan on Saturday to accuse President Donald Trump of “moral turpitude” and to predict, with an alliterative flourish, that Trump will end up “as a disgraced demagogue in the dustbin of history”? The answer shines through the next sentence in Brennan’s threatening tweet: “You may scapegoat Andy McCabe [former FBI Deputy Director fired Friday night] but you will not destroy America…America will triumph over you.”

It is easy to see why Brennan lost it. T...

Revival of Free Speech at Speakers’ Corner

I have never visited Speakers’ Corner in Hyde Park, London. I first heard about it during English lessons in school while growing up in Germany. Learning at the age of about 13 of this unique and idiosyncratic institution of individual freedom, this outward sign of a truly tolerant society, added to my sense of pride in my English heritage, my mother being a daughter of the island nation. I was also intrigued; it chimed with my budding interest in politics. However, for some reason, even afte...

How Did They Get So Filthy Rich?

This was my most anticipated book of the year, so I bought the audio version at the earliest possible moment and listened to it eagerly. It completely delivers on its promise, exposing potential new political self-dealing scandals.

Previously, Schweizer’s “Clinton Cash” book contributed to Hillary Clinton’s election loss. This new book could be the death knell for Joe Biden’s presidential hopes, as it reveals how his son, Hunter Biden, benefited from the former Vice President’s dealings with...

World War Might Sound Crazy

Though some have been warning about the catastrophic potential for a third global conflict for years, it wasn’t until recently that these warnings became more mainstream. The calamitous nature of the violence in Syria — which has one nuclear power defending a government that has been the target of a regime change operation led by the world’s superpower — combined with 2017’s threats of “fire and fury” against another state intently pursuing a nuclear weapons supply of its own, has pushed the ...

Did Putin Order the Salisbury Hit?

Britain has yet to identify the assassin who tried to murder the double agent Sergei Skripal and his daughter, Yulia, in Salisbury, England.

But Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson knows who ordered the hit.

“We think it overwhelmingly likely that it was (Russian President Vladimir Putin’s) decision to direct the use of a nerve agent on the streets of the U.K.”

“Unforgivable,” says Putin spokesman Dmitry Peskov of the charge, which also defies “common sense.” On Sunday, Putin echoed Peskov: “It i...

National Liberation Is Libertarian

The recent rioting and virtual civil war in Northern Ireland points out, both for libertarians and for the world at large, the vital importance of pushing for and attaining the goal of national liberation for all oppressed people. Aside from being a necessary condition to the achievement of justice, national liberation is the only solution to the great world problems of territorial disputes and oppressive national rule. Yet, all too many anarchists and libertarians mistakenly scorn the idea o...