Mike Robinson, Patrick Henningsen and Vanessa Beeley with today’s UK Column News.
G20, COP27, information war
00:20 Bali: G20 statement calls for vaccine passports, more CBDC development, carbon pricing and more mRNA vaccine technology transfer
British version of this digital-ID-to-travel: NHS Covid Pass
Economic Times (India): Bank of England considering CBDC
UK Column archive: Iain Davis analyses carbon trading
03:06 G20 statement also calls for commodity data
NHS England already loosening who can handle patient data digitally
Tom Forbes reports that Infosys has leaked over a year's worth of data keys from leading US hospital Johns Hopkins
Indian Express: Co-founder of Infosys is Rishi Sunak's father-in-law
UK Column was reporting Common Purpose and Indian data linkages a full decade ago
05:38 G20 statement heavy on the fight against "disinformation"
07:55 EU's de-facto embassy to the UK publishes Ukraine war "disinformation and manipulation" lessons learned
Vanessa Beeley commentary: This is part of an EU External Action Service partnership with Britain on information management
To no-one's surprise, the Foreign Office's Andy Pryce is involved
The Grayzone's archive on Pryce: a close chum of Paul Mason
EU has a 2022 Code of Practice on Disinformation that includes cutting off funds from wrongthinkers ("demonetisation"), "empowering fact-checking", and a "transparency centre"
11:27 COP27 also had a statement on "misinformation"
The new anti-Semitism: "Right-wing extremism"
16:09 Dutch protesters face being labelled as terrorists if they mistrust the World Economic forum or mention élites
The CounterSignal: Dutch counter-terrorism report finds that over half of the Netherlands' population does not trust government, courts, media or health experts
Tweet by Sander_2021 translates highlights of report
Vanessa Beeley analysis: Western intelligence is learning from the Ukrainian SBU's tarring methods
19:25 Yahoo! News: Elon Musk trying to get Twitter back on track after sacking recalcitrant staff
Patrick Henningsen commentary: New era at Twitter; current court cases will flush out recent efforts by social media to manage the information space
Clip: The free-for-all that used to be Twitter HQ — "Day in my life at the Twitter office" — @RachelKuruvila
Ukraine
28:10 Zelensky almost backtracks on World War Three-worthy claims regarding missile crash over Polish border
Clip: Sajid Javid said on 14 March 2022 that "not a single Russian toecap" must enter
31:47 US News: Polish President Duda was meeting CIA director in Warsaw as the missile hit Przewodów
Washington Post: CIA was meeting Zelensky in Kiev as the missile hit Przewodów
Patrick Henningsen analysis: Whoever was responsible, the strike on Polish soil provides opportunity for a pivot to negotiations
Clip: Just before Przewodów, Zelensky was getting away with comparing the retaking of Kherson with D–Day
On-screen graphic: Zelensky's ten peace proposals are "dead on arrival"—Ukraine is in no position to demand most of these points
RT: RIA Novosti says Russia believes Ukraine is making a mockery of peace talks by demanding that TV cameras be rolling
Patrick Henningsen commentary: This Ukrainian peace offer is designed to fail and appeals to Western petition-signers
Comedy clips: Dutch Prime Minister Rutte makes a great show of placing a phone call to Zelensky, as do Trudeau and Sunak jointly from Bali
Caption competition: Trudeau, Sunak and Schwab posing in batik shirts in Bali
(N.B.: one Telegram channel ran this competition as "Name the boy band")
43:36 Clip: Schwab in Bali at B20—"Deep, systemic restructuring will take some time and the world will look different afterwards"
Patrick Henningsen analysis: WEF frustrated that the new world structure is taking longer than bargained for
46:48 Vanessa Beeley commentary on appalling Western reporting of Ukraine war
Vanessa recommends Andrei Martyanov's latest episode, Goebbels Factory and Media War Crimes
Martyanov's books: Disintegration: Indicators of the Coming American Collapse and The (Real) Revolution in Military Affairs
Martyanov's latest blog: A No-Brainer, Really—analysing the situation in Kherson as a "trap for the Ukrainian Armed Forces"
Unexpected journalistic independence from the Financial Times (also carried by the Daily Express): NATO row breaks out as Zelensky savaged for "destructive lies" over Poland missile
FT reports, "Zelensky would not budge on the issue"; one NATO diplomat in Kiev quoted as saying the Ukrainians are "openly lying"
Clip: Military author Col. Douglas A. Macgregor interviewed by Polish Votum FM on Ukraine in regional context; also has his own YouTube channel
Vanessa's final analytical recommendation: Big Serge Thoughts on Substack, particularly his latest blog on Kherson, Surovikin's Difficult Choice—which considers and rejects the most pro-Russian explanation of the withdrawal from the city and concludes that the Russian Armed Forces faced an embarrassing overstretch
Economy
58:05 Parliament yesterday: Chancellor's Autumn Statement
On-screen graphics:
- The economy has entered a recession that has lasted just over a year
- High inflation results in falling living standards
- Consumer Price Index inflation peaks at a 40-year high
Energy Price Cap (Liz Truss' idea) to rise on 1 April 2023 (start of new financial year) from £2,500 to £3,000—but taxpayer still on the hook for all the thousands of pounds payable per household above the cap
1:00:14 Cost of Living support factsheet issued by UK Government: obligations upon people to work full-time while in receipt of paltry benefits, even those on Universal Basic Income in some cases
Patrick Henningsen commentary: You can't keep writing blank cheques for ever; time for some reversals of bad policy
1:02:49 FTX scandal grows: contagion spreads
Patrick Henningsen analysis: The big hitters like BlackRock were loath to see problems where their money was invested
Tweet by Rep. Madison Cawthorn (R–NC) draws attention to year-long Ukrainian funnelling of US tax dollars into FTX
Tweet by entrepreneur Kim Dotcom suggests President Biden was taking a hefty cut
Graphics by Patrick Henningsen: "This looks like a controlled demolition of the cryptospace ... you see how incestuous this gets ... remarkable post-midterms timing"
With uncanny synchronism—CoinTelegraph: NY Fed launches 12-week CBDC pilot program with major banks
Patrick Henningsen commentary: A key plank of the Federal Reserve is setting the framework for the use of approved cryptos just as another cryptocurrency has (been?) exploded, "almost as if scripted"
Savage poultry cull
1:10:42 Distressing footage from egg farmer in Yorkshire: Before and after culling shots of turkeys and laying hens that had tested positive for avian flu (H5N1)
Footage was played by a government veterinary surgeon in a webinar
Farmer suspects attack on food supply, as most of the fowl were evidently healthy in the pre-cull footage
This was happening two decades ago with beef herds: Slaughtered On Suspicion
1:15:55 Midterms aftermath: Trump announces his candidature for November 2024
As predicted by Patrick Henningsen, the Republicans have an eight-seat majority in the House of Representatives
As also predicted by Patrick, the new House majority focuses attention on past dealings of Biden—father and son
Litany of bad things now being released with the elections behind us, including rationale behind Trump home raid in Florida