RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.wsj.com/articles/soviet-politics-american-style-11608658685?mod=opinion_lead_pos5

On Christmas Day 1991, Mikhail Gorbachev, president of the Soviet Union, gave his farewell speech and more than seven decades of Russian revolutionary socialism came to an end. A generation later, the spirit of the Soviet Union has re-emerged with mass support in the U.S.

When I arrived in Moscow in 1976 to begin a six-year stint as a correspondent, I was struck by the red flags flying from government buildings and the somber streets devoid of advertising except for garish posters showing workers with clenched fists demanding an end to the arms race.

When the Soviet Union fell, it seemed the Soviet attempt to impose a deluded version of reality had died with it. Francis Fukuyama, in his 1989 essay “The End of History,” said that Marxism-Leninism was doomed as an alternative to liberal democracy. I argued at the time that the drive to make a religion out of politics had not disappeared.

For the past four years, potted histories have warned about the rise of fascism in the U.S. But the real danger is the transformation of “tolerance” into an ideology with its own courts, informers and punishments, all of them reminiscent of the Soviet Union.

One of the pillars of the Soviet Union was a controlled press in which all coverage was organized to confirm a mendacious ideology.

https://www.zerohedge.com/political/pork-city-here-are-most-ridiculous-pet-projects-900-billion-spending-package

As Congress prepares to pass a $900 billion COVID-19 stimulus bill rolled into a consolidated appropriations package – with funding for assistance for households and businesses, along with vaccine distribution and other pandemic-related measures, the bill also includes a ton of pork per usual.We already know about the $600 checks for each adult and dependent. This time, however, ‘mixed-status’ households where eligible citizens live with illegal immigrants, will not only receive payments – they can retroactively claim benefits after being left out of the last round.

The bill also includes $300 per week in enhanced unemployment benefits, and would extend unemployment to 50 weeks for both state and federal programs, vs. the standard 26 weeks.

And now, on to the pork… which includes billions to foreign countries, US military weapons purchases which go above and beyond their budgets, $40 million for the Kennedy Center, and nearly $200 million so that federal HIV/AIDS workers overseas can buy cars and car insurance, among other things.

FOREIGN HANDOUTS:

A minimum of $3.3 billion in grants to Israel.Also included is $453 million to Ukraine, on top of the $400 million Trump eventually released. No word on how much of that goes to the ‘big guy.’$10 million for “gender programs” in Pakistan. $1.3 billion to Egypt, and $700 million to Sudan. $135 million to Burma, $85.5 million to Cambodia, $1.4 billion for an “Asia Reassurance Initiative Act,” and $130 million to Nepal.

https://issuesinsights.com/2020/12/23/trump-should-veto-the-2-3-tril-5593-page-covid-19-stimulus-2020s-biggest-fraud-of-all/

Passage of the enormous COVID-19 “stimulus” bill is being hailed as a landmark effort to help average Americans heal from the economic ravages of the Chinese virus. It is nothing of the sort. Passed in the dead of night, it’s a pork-filled nightmare that will lead to more debt, bigger government and a dimmer future for all Americans.

The redoubtable Stephen Green did the basic math. Based on a U.S. population of roughly 330 million, the $900 billion stimulus amounts to $2,727 in spending per person.

OK, but how much of that goes into people’s pockets? A pittance: $600.

Yet, Democratic House Speaker Nancy Pelosi committed the unforgivable sin of holding up those $600 checks for struggling American families in order to hurt President Donald Trump’s reelection chances. This is politics at its most cynical and is a prime example why average Americans today hold politicians in such low esteem.

All told, the bill for this sprawling legislation comes to $2.3 trillion — yes, that’s trillion with a “t”. Add that into Green’s earlier calculation, and the amount spent per household grows to $6,969.

Sure, but all that is going to COVID-19 relief for individuals and small businesses, right? No, not even close – $1.4 trillion from the Consolidated Appropriations Act is dedicated to the federal government’s fiscal 2021 budget.

It was all cobbled together in the last hours of closed-doornegotiations, focused on getting massive servings of pork spending and new, useless government programs added, not on COVID-19 relief. That was just the selling point to all us rubes.