Llewellyn H. Rockwell Jr.'s Blog, page 2403

JFK, Trump, and Camelot

If Trump was ever sincere, his election has proven that one person simply cannot fight this corrupt system, this horrid swamp. Trump the reformer, the unlikeliest of knights in shining armor, is gone. The renegade billionaire striking fear into the heart of the establishment lasted a brief shining moment, like Camelot. — Donald Jeffries

These are the concluding words of an article listing Donald Trump’s sellouts since January 20, 2017. There have been a lot of them.

I think he is correct abou...

Vietnam Déjà Vu

Much of America, including yours truly, has been watching the Public Broadcasting Service (PBS) series, ‘Vietnam.’  Instead of clarifying that confusing conflict, the series has ignited fiery controversy and a lot of long-repressed anger by soft-soaping Washington’s motives.

This march to folly in Vietnam is particularly painful for me since I enlisted in the US army at the height of the war.  Gripped by youthful patriotism, I strongly supported the war.  In fact, the TV series even showed a...

Chemtrails and Geoengineering

We’ve probably all glanced up at airliners and jets flying up high in the sky at some point or another. While common sense tells us that the white lines coming out of planes are contrails and that they’re completely normal and harmless, the subject of chemtrails (which many people believe them to be) has been fiercely debated in recent times.

And it’s easy to see why, when repeated isolated cases seem to suggest that “something” has altered certain environments. Such conspiracy theories have...

The FBI Just Stopped Publishing Data

According to the latest FBI data, drug arrests in the United States increased from 2015 to 2016. Though the federal agency used to provide breakdowns on the details of these arrests in its annual “Crime in the United States” report — including which drugs were in question and whether the arrests were made over possession or sale — in its latest report, the FBI is withholding specifics.

On Monday, Tom Angell, a contributor at Forbes, wrote about the increase in drug arrests across the country,...

Judge Moore

When elected chief justice of the Alabama Supreme Court in 2000, Judge Roy Moore installed in his courthouse a monument with the Ten Commandments that Moses brought down from Mount Sinai carved into it.

Told by a federal court his monument violated the separation of church and state, Moore refused to remove it and was suspended — to become famous as “The Ten Commandments Judge.”

Roy Moore is now the Republican candidate for the Senate from Alabama, having routed Sen. Luther Strange, whom Pres...

Don’t Fall for Tax Reform

Please don’t fall for tax reform.

It’s a con, and a shell game. It’s a promise every presidential candidate makes, including Trump. But we ought to be suspicious of grandiose talk about Congress reforming anything. Tax reform proposals always evade and obscure the real issue, which is the total cost– financial, compliance, and human– taxes impose on society. The fundamental questions about war and entitlements and state power go unasked. We never consider whether Congress really needs to spen...

A Constitutional Anniversary

Misguided Enthusiasm

While not a jubilee year, last week marked the 230th anniversary of the US Constitution. Naturally, most of its devotees enthusiastically praised the document which by now is seen on a par with Holy Writ itself.

The constitutional convention in Philadelphia, anno 1787. Things have gone downhill ever since. Many – though not all – of those taking part in the convention were members of the moneyed elite, the land speculators who had instigated the war of independence when K...

California Mulling

I expected it to happen, but not this quickly.

California officials are, apparently, “mulling” a ban on cars with internal combustion engines, according to an article in the industry trade publication, Automotive News. If they more than mull and pass a ban, CA would be the first American state to do so – following the example set by several European states, including most recently the UK.

Part of the reason it is happening so quickly is because of amen-corner support from American publication...

America in the Middle East

America’s Great Game: The CIA’s Secret Arabists and the Shaping of the Modern Middle East, by Hugh Wilford

Wilford continues the story with the Americans moving into Cairo; there was a need to coordinate Lend-Lease activities in the region.  It turns out that Lend-Lease was useful for purposes other than sending Jeeps to Europe.  From the time of his transfer from the State Department to the OSS in April 1944…

…Kim [Roosevelt] was a key player in Project SOPHIA, a secret program for spreading...

A Two-Edged Sword

I sometimes wonder if America’s greatest threat is the population’s hyper-patriotism. The bulk of the population is now at work shutting down the NFL players’ First Amendment rights, and none of the incensed censors are capable of understanding that it is they, and not the NFL players, who are attacking the U.S. Constitution. We have been through all this flag business before, and federal courts have ruled for the protesters who burnt flags, wore them on their clothes, whatever. Yet, here we...