Two years ago, pro-life advocates made a horrific discovery when they opened boxes of medical waste from a late-term abortion facility in Washington, D.C.

Inside were the bodies of 115 aborted babies, including five who appeared to be nearly full term and possibly victims of illegal partial-birth abortions or infanticide.

However, D.C. officials seemingly have done nothing to investigate the horrific discovery despite repeated calls from U.S. Congressional leaders and pro-life advocates. Undercover investigations exposing other unethical and potentially illegal activity by abortionist Cesare Santangelo and his Washington Surgi-Clinic appear to have gone ignored as well.

Now, Pro-life groups are urging the House Judiciary Committee and pro-life Chairman Jim Jordan to hold a thorough hearing while continuing the fight for justice for the five babies. The babies are five children whose lives were reportedly brutally ended at the clinic of a notorious late-term abortionist in Washington D.C.

The letter appears below:

Dear Chairman Jordan,

We are grateful for the timely intervention of House Judiciary Subcommittee Chairmen Chip Roy and Andy Biggs on behalf of the D.C. Five this February. The D.C. Five—ngel, Christopher X, Harriet, Holly, and Phoenix—are five children whose lives were reportedly brutally ended at the clinic of notorious late-term abortionist Dr. Cesare Santangelo in Washington D.C. The Biden administration has so far refused to investigate the deaths of these children, despite evidence of potential federal crimes, and instead greenlit discarding their bodies. Dozens of members of Congress stepped in to block the D.C. Medical Examiner from disposing of their remains prematurely. We urge the House Judiciary Committee to investigate Cesare Santangelo’s practices and to demand justice for the Five.

The bodies of the D.C. Five were discovered by pro-life activists two years ago, on March 25, 2022, outside of the Washington Surgi-Clinic, only five blocks from the White House. The lives of these five children were ended late in pregnancy. Although the activists who found them asked the police to investigate, and despite repeated requests from members of Congress and the public, to date, no autopsies or investigations have occurred. In the meantime, several Ob-Gyns including former abortionists have reviewed many pictures of the remains and determined the likely gestational ages of these babies and the probable procedures used by which their lives were ended.

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While these experts believe ngel and Holly may have been killed via the tragically legal procedure of dismemberment abortion, several federal laws – including the Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act (18 USC § 1531) and/or the Born Alive Infants Protection Act (1 USC § 8)  allegedly may have been violated in conjunction with the deaths of the other three.[1] These are the estimated gestational ages of the babies who were potential victims of federal crimes:

• Harriet (possible partial-birth abortion): 28-29 weeks
• Christopher X (possibly born-alive): 32-33 weeks
• Phoenix (possibly born-alive): 25-26 weeks

Members of Congress and of the public have continued calling on the Department of Justice and the mayor of the District of Columbia to investigate Cesare Santangelo and the deaths of the Five. Nonetheless, no investigation has occurred, and there is evidence indicating they have no intention to investigate.

Instead of investigating Cesare Santangelo and his practice for these alleged federal crimes, the Biden administration submitted a budget that would fund abortion for any reason at any stage of development in D.C. They have turned a blind eye to these tragic deaths and alleged crimes and instead proposed sending more business to abortion clinics in the District—including the Washington Surgi-Clinic—with taxpayer dollars.

Because the District of Columbia falls under federal jurisdiction and federal crimes may have been committed by Cesare Santangelo, we urge the House Judiciary Committee to hold a thorough hearing into the D.C. Five. These five children should be toddlers now, but instead are lying in a morgue awaiting the justice that continues to be denied to them. Cesare Santangelo must be investigated. We demand Justice for the Five.

Sincerely,

Susan B. Anthony Pro-Life America                         Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising

Thomas More Society                                                Americans United for Life

American Association of Prolife Obstetricians          Concerned Women for America
and Gynecologists                                                      Legislative Action Committee

Family Policy Alliance                                               Family Research Council

March for Life Action                                                National Right to Life

Students for Life Action                                             The Abortion Survivors Network

Live Action                                                                 CatholicVote

Center for Family and Human Rights                        Eagle Forum

Ethics and Public Policy Center                                 The Center for Medical Progress

American Cornerstone Institute                                 The FAMiLY Leader

Choose-Life America                                                 Citizens for a Pro-Life Society

Coalition for Jewish Values                                        Good Counsel

Human Coalition Action                                            Human Life Alliance

Human Life of Washington                                        Kentucky Right to Life

Liberty Counsel                                                          Liberty Counsel Action

Life Issues Institute                                                    Life Legal Defense Foundation

Life Matters TV and Media, Inc.                                LifeNews.com

Louisiana Family Forum                                            NC Values Coalition

New Mexico Alliance for Life                                   Ohio Right to Life

Operation Rescue                                                       Priests for Life

Pro-Life Action League                                              Protect Life Michigan

Sanctuary Cities for the Unborn                                 Secular Pro-Life

South Dakota Right to Life                                        Speakhope.net

Stand True                                                                  The White Rose Resistance

Wisconsin Family Action                                           Wyoming Family Alliance

Images of the brutalized remains of these children have been circulated across the globe and appear to be evidence of federal crimes including violations of the Partial Birth Abortion Ban Act and the Born Alive Infant Protection Act.

Earlier this year, the Biden administration ordered destruction of the babies’ bodies — which could permanently destroy the criminal evidence. But pro-life attorneys were able to stop it.

Caroline Taylor Smith, Executive Director of PAAU, the Progressive Anti-Abortion Uprising, says this day has long been feared and she told LifeNews that destruction of their bodies could forever deny them justice.

“We suspected that Biden’s DOJ would attempt to sweep this evidence under the rug. This is yet another step in the coordinated effort to protect Big Abortion and Caesare Santangelo’s horrific crimes. These children cry out for justice and we won’t stop fighting for them,” she told LifeNews.

In March 2022, Terrisa Bukovinac and Lauren Handy found the bodies of the five late-term aborted babies and more than 100 first-trimester aborted babies in boxes that they received from a truck driver who was collecting medical waste from Santangelo’s abortion facility.

Last year, dozens of U.S. Congressional leaders joined pro-life advocates in demanding a federal investigation into Santangelo’s practice. However, some expressed doubts that the U.S. Department of Justice will do anything because pro-abortion Democrat officials with the Biden administration lead the agency.

The post 50 Pro-Life Groups Call for Investigation of Five Babies Killed in Infanticides or Abortions appeared first on LifeNews.com.

We stand on the cusp of what might be termed Chaotic War. Not the formula used by Israel often in the past to intimidate adversaries; this is different.

Israeli reporter Eddie Cohen said, in the wake of the attack on the Iranian Consulate: “We are very clear that we want to start a war with Iran and Hezbollah. Do you still not understand?”

“Israel wants to drag Iran into a full-scale war in order to be able to strike at Iran’s nuclear facilities,” though these facilities are beyond American and Israeli reach, buried beneath mountains.

Cohen, and of course, Israel’s military leadership, will know that; but Israel nonetheless is locking itself into a logic that can only lead to defeat. Iran’s nuclear facilities are safe from Israeli assault. The destruction of civilian Iranian infrastructure, which is out in the open, may kill many, but will not, per se, collapse the Iranian state.

Trita Parsi places Israel’s objective in attacking the Iranian Consulate in Damascus in a different context:

An important aspect of Israel’s conduct – and Biden’s acquiescence to it – is that Israel is engaged in a deliberate and systematic effort to destroy existing laws and norms around warfare.

Even during wartime, embassies are off-limits [yet] Israel just bombed an Iranian diplomatic compound in Damascus.

Bombing hospitals is a war crime, [yet] Israel has bombed EVERY hospital in Gaza. It has even assassinated doctors and patients inside hospitals.

The ICJ obligated Israel to allow the delivery of humanitarian aid to Gaza. Israel actively prevents aid from coming in.

Starvation of civilians as a method of warfare is prohibited under international humanitarian law. Israel has deliberately created a famine in Gaza.

Indiscriminate bombings are illegal under international humanitarian law. Biden himself admits that Israel is bombing Gaza indiscriminately.

The list goes on and on … However, Israel’s breach of Vienna Convention immunity accorded to diplomatic premises – plus the stature of those killed – is highly significant. It is a major signal: Israel wants war – but with U.S. support, of course.

Israel’s aim, firstly, is to destroy the norms, conventions and laws of warfare; to create geo-political anarchy in which anything goes, and by which, with the White House frustrated, yet acquiescing to each norm of conduct obtrusively trodden underfoot, allows Netanyahu to grip the U.S. bridle and lead the White House horse to water – towards his regional End of Times “Great Victory”; a necessarily brutal war – beyond existing red lines and devoid of limits.

As symbolically significant as the Damascus attack is that the U.S., France and Britain – after a brief “hat tip” to the Vienna Convention – refused to condemn the levelling of the Iranian Consulate, thus placing the shadow of doubt over the Vienna Convention’s immunity for diplomatic premises.

Implicitly, this refusal to condemn will be widely understood as a soft condoning of Israel’s first tentative step towards war with Hizbullah and Iran.

This Israeli chaotic “Biblical” nihilism, however, bears no relationship in purely rational terms to Netanyahu’s aspiration for a “Great Victory.” The reality is that Israel has lost its deterrence. It won’t return; the deep anger across the Islamic world generated by Israel through its massacres in Gaza during the last six months precludes it.

Yet, there is a second, adjunct reason why Israel is set on deliberately flouting humanitarian law and norms: Israeli journalist, Yuval Abraham reports in +972 Magazine in great depth how Israel has developed a AI machine (called “Lavender”) to generate kill lists in Gaza – with almost no human verification; only a “rubber stamp” check of about “20 seconds” to make sure the AI target is male (as no females are known to belong to the Resistance’s military).

The blatant extra-legality behind the Gaza “kill list” methodology, as reported by Abraham’s various sources, can only be immunised and sheltered through normalising them as but one amongst a general pattern of illegalities – and in effect, claiming sovereign exceptionalism:

[T]he Israeli army systematically attacks the targeted individual whilst in their homes — usually at night whilst the whole family is present — rather than during the course of military activity … Additional automated systems, including one, [callously] called ‘Where’s Daddy?’ were used – specifically to track targets when they had entered their family’s residences… However, when a home was struck, usually at night, the individual target was sometimes not inside at all.

The result is that thousands of Palestinians — most of them women and children or people who were not involved in the fighting — were wiped out by Israeli airstrikes, especially during the first weeks of the war, because of the AI program’s decisions.

‘We were not interested in killing [Hamas] operatives when they were in a military building … or engaged in a military activity,” A., an intelligence officer, told +972 and Local Call. ‘On the contrary, the IDF bombed them in homes without hesitation – as a first option. It’s much easier to bomb a family’s home. The system is built to look for them in these situations.’

In addition … when it came to targeting alleged junior militants marked by Lavender, the army preferred to only use unguided missiles, commonly known as “dumb” bombs (in contrast to “smart” precision bombs) which can destroy entire buildings on top of their occupants and cause significant casualties. ‘You don’t want to waste expensive bombs on unimportant people — it’s very expensive for the country and there’s a shortage [of those bombs].’

… The army also decided during the first weeks of the war that, for every junior Hamas operative that Lavender marked, it was permissible to kill up to 15 or 20 civilians … in the event that the target was a senior Hamas official with the rank of battalion or brigade commander – the army on several occasions authorized the killing of more than 100 civilians in the assassination of a single commander.

Lavender — which was developed to create human targets in the current war — has marked some 37,000 Palestinians as suspected ‘Hamas militants,’ most of them junior, for assassination (the IDF Spokesperson denied the existence of such a kill list in a statement to +972 and Local Call).

So, there it is – no wonder Israel might seek to camouflage the details within a normalised general array of transgressions against humanitarian law: “They wanted to allow us to attack [the junior operatives] automatically. That’s the Holy Grail. Once you go automatic, target generation goes crazy.”

It is not difficult to speculate what the ICJ might determine …

Does anyone imagine that this flawed Lavender AI machine would not be asked to churn out its kill lists, were Israel to decide to surge into Lebanon? (Another reason for normalising the procedures first in Gaza).

The key point made in the +972 Magazine report (with multiple sourcing) is that the IDF were not focused on pin-point elimination of Hamas’ Qassam Brigades (as claimed):

‘It was very surprising for me that we were asked to bomb a house to kill a ground soldier, whose importance in the fighting was so low,’ said one source about the use of AI to mark alleged low-ranking militants:

‘I nicknamed those targets “garbage targets.” Still, I found them more ethical than the targets that we bombed just for “deterrence” — high-rises that are evacuated and toppled just to cause destruction.’

This report makes clear nonsense of Israel’s claims to have dismantled 19 out of 24 Hamas Battalions: One source, critical of Lavender’s inaccuracy, points out the obvious flaw: “It’s a vague boundary”; How to tell a Hamas fighter from any other Gazan civilian male?

‘At its peak, the system managed to generate 37,000 people as potential human targets,’ said B. ‘But the numbers changed all the time, because it depends on where you set the bar of what a Hamas operative is. There were times when a Hamas operative was defined more broadly, and then the machine started bringing us all kinds of civil defence personnel, police officers, on whom it would be a shame to waste bombs.’

Just last week, War Cabinet member and Minister Ron Dermer, was delegated to travel to Washington to plead that the IDF success in dismantling 19 Hamas battalions justified an incursion into Rafah to dismantle the 4 to 5 battalions that Israel claims still remain in Rafah.

What is clear is that AI was a key Israeli tool to its Gaza “Victory.” Israel was going to sell a “smoke and mirrors story” based on “Lavender.”

By contrast, Palestinians, who are aware of their quantitative inferiority, have a very different outlook: they switched to a new way of thinking that gives the simple act of resisting a civilisational meaning – a path to metaphysical victory (and quite possibly a kind of military victory), if not in their lifetimes, then for the Palestinian People, thereafter. This constitutes the asymmetrical nature of the conflict that Israel has never managed to understand.

Israel wants to be feared, believing this will restore its deterrence. Amira Hass writes that regardless of any revulsion for this government and its members: “The vast majority [of Israelis] still believe that war is the solution.” And Mairav Zonszein writing in Foreign Policy, notes that “The Problem Isn’t Just Netanyahu, It’s Israeli Society”:

The focus on Netanyahu is a convenient distraction from the fact that the war in Gaza is not Netanyahu’s war, it is Israel’s war—and the problem isn’t only Netanyahu; it’s the Israeli electorate … A large majority—88 percent—of Jewish Israelis polled in January believe the astounding number of Palestinian deaths, which had surpassed 25,000 at the time, is justified. A large majority of the Jewish public also thinks that the [IDF] is using adequate or even too little force in Gaza … Putting all the blame on the prime minister misses the point. It disregards the fact that Israelis have long advanced, enabled, or come to terms with their country’s system of military occupation and dehumanization of Palestinians.

Yet neither Israel, nor the U.S., has a comprehensive strategy for this mooted war. Israel’s approach is all tactical – claiming to have degraded Hamas; turning Gaza into a humanitarian hellscape and setting the scene for the “decisive plan” devised by Bezalel Smotrich for the Palestinians. Amira Hass again:

Either agree to an inferior status, emigrate and be uprooted ostensibly voluntarily, or face defeat and death in a war. This is the plan now being carried out in Gaza and the West Bank – with most Israelis serving as active and enthusiastic accomplices, or passively acquiescing in its realisation.

The U.S. “vision” is also tactical (and far removed from reality) – Imagining the transformation of Gaza into a “Vichy collaborator” statelet; imagining that political pressure by the French in Lebanon will force Hizbullah’s retreat from its ancestral lands in south Lebanon; and imagining that the Biden White House is able to achieve politically through pressure what Israel cannot do militarily.

The paradox is that, with Israel and the U.S. being dependent on an “image” that has been confused with reality, this too works to Iran’s and the Resistance Front’s advantage. (As the old adage goes, “do not disturb an adversary who is making mistakes”).

Reprinted with permission from Strategic Culture Foundation.

“Nobody can stop” Israel from going after Hamas, the prime minister has declared 

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has insisted his country will conduct a military operation in the city of Rafah in Gaza, despite concerns over the civilian death toll it could cause. 

An estimated 1.3 million people, most of them displaced from parts of the Palestinian enclave, are crammed into the settlement on the border with Egypt. Netanyahu is under pressure from a government coalition partner to attack the city.  

“We will complete the elimination of the Hamas battalions, including in Rafah. No force in the world will stop us. Many forces are trying to do this, but it will not help because this enemy, after what he has done, will not do it again,” the prime minister declared on Tuesday during a visit to the Tel HaShomer military base. 

The Jewish state says it is trying to obliterate the Palestinian militant group Hamas, which launched a deadly incursion into Israel last October, triggering the current round of violence.  

Netanyahu said in a video statement on Monday that a date had already been set for an operation in Rafah, but declined to name it. His message followed an ultimatum by National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir, who threatened that Netanyahu would lose his mandate if he failed to end the war in Gaza “without a broad attack on Rafah.” Ben-Gvir heads the far-right Otzma Yehudit party, and is part of the coalition government led by Netanyahu’s Likud political force.  

The Israeli leader is also under pressure to change tactics in Gaza from key ally the US, whose arms supplies are crucial for the war effort. President Joe Biden last week demanded “specific, concrete, and measurable steps to address civilian harm, humanitarian suffering, and the safety of aid workers,” warning that the US could reconsider its support. 

The change of tune in Washington followed the killing last week of six aid workers from the World Central Kitchen humanitarian organization. The Israel Defense Forces (IDF) targeted the group’s convoy in what it claimed to be a tragic mistake, despite the food supply mission being closely coordinated with the military. Chef Jose Andres, who leads the relief organization, is a prominent public figure in Washington. 

A woman has been arrested in Poland for attacking her partner during a political argument, according to local media

A woman in Poland has been taken into police custody for hitting her partner with a bone taken from soup that was cooking, after the two had a drunken disagreement over politics, PAP news agency reported on Tuesday.

The domestic argument had to do with a local election in Bartoszyce, a city in the country’s north, according to the report. The 44-year-old suspect was cooking at the time, so she used the bone as an improvised weapon to hit her opponent on the head. The man was taken to hospital, where he received stitches for his injury.

Both sides confirmed the circumstances of the altercation to the police, who said they have yet to inspect the scene of the alleged crime, where they will likely confiscate the weapon.

“We don’t have it yet, so it’s hard to say which bone the couple is talking about,” a local officer was quoted by the agency as saying.

READ MORE: French mayor arrested after 70kg of cannabis found at her home – media

The spokesman remarked that the row over the runoff ballot was influenced by alcohol that both participants had apparently been consuming at the time.

The woman has a criminal record and, if convicted of the assault, is facing up to seven years and six months behind bars, according to the report. PAP described the woman as “sobering up in a police detention center.”

The Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith (DDF) released on Monday a new document addressing human dignity, reaffirming the traditional teaching of the Church that not only condemns abortion, sex-change surgery, gender ideology and surrogate maternity as contrary to human dignity, but also adds social justice issues to the list of “equally important” themes for Catholic doctrine.

The declaration Dignitas Infinita on Human Dignity (DI) commemorates the 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and reaffirms “the indispensability of the concept of dignity of the human person within Christian anthropology.”

The document clearly restates Catholic doctrine opposing abortion and euthanasia.

It explains that surrogacy “violates the dignity of the woman, whether she is coerced into it or chooses to subject herself to it freely.”

Regarding euthanasia and assisted suicide, it reiterates that “suffering does not cause the sick to lose their dignity, which is intrinsically and inalienably their own.”

DI also addresses gender theory and criticizes how it “intends to deny the greatest possible difference that exists between living beings: sexual difference.”

“This foundational difference is not only the greatest imaginable difference but is also the most beautiful and most powerful of them. In the male-female couple, this difference achieves the most marvelous of reciprocities,” the document continues.

“Only by acknowledging and accepting this difference in reciprocity can each person fully discover themselves, their dignity, and their identity.”

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In its discussion of sex changes, DI states: “it is in the body that each person recognizes himself or herself as generated by others, and it is through their bodies that men and women can establish a loving relationship capable of generating other persons.”

According to the document, this is why Pope Francis has affirmed that “creation is prior to us and must be received as a gift.

“At the same time, we are called to protect our humanity, and this means, in the first place, accepting it and respecting it as it was created,” DI adds.

Except for the opening proposal, which embraces the approach that issues of different moral gravity are still “interconnected,” there are no doctrinal novelties.

Every controversial issue is addressed with quotes from the magisterium.

The Prefect of the DDF, Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández, agreed with one of the journalists during the press conference that the text is mostly a “collection of quotes.”

In the introduction, DI justifies its publication by explaining the need to reassert the Catholic teaching regarding human dignity, since “history illustrates how individuals—when exercising their freedom against the law of love revealed by the Gospel—can commit inestimably profound acts of evil against others.”

The introduction is followed by four parts:

1. “A Growing Awareness of the Centrality of Human Dignity” makes the theological case that “dignity is intrinsic to the person” and that “all human beings possess this same intrinsic dignity, regardless of whether or not they can express it in a suitable manner.”

2. “The Church Proclaims, Promotes, and Guarantees Human Dignity” argues how, according to Catholic tradition and theology, “faith plays a decisive role in helping reason perceive human dignity and in accepting, consolidating, and clarifying its essential features.”

3. “Dignity, the Foundation of Human Rights and Duties” explains that although there is significant advancement in human rights issues in the world, “the arduous journey of advancing human dignity remains far from completion.”

4. “Some Grave Violations of Human Dignity” is the longest part of the document and attempts “an updated list” of issues that affect human dignity.

“While not claiming to be exhaustive,” the document warns, “the following paragraphs draw attention to some grave violations of human dignity that are particularly relevant.”

The issues to which a paragraph is dedicated are these, in the order they are presented:

• The Drama of Poverty
• War
• The Travail of Migrants
• Human Trafficking
• Sexual Abuse
• Violence Against Women
• Abortion
• Surrogacy
• Euthanasia and Assisted Suicide
• The Marginalization of People with Disabilities
• Gender Theory
• Sex Change
• Digital Violence

In all these issues, Catholic doctrine is reaffirmed with quotations mostly from Pope Francis’ magisterium.

“Even today, in the face of so many violations of human dignity that seriously threaten the future of the human family, the Church encourages the promotion of the dignity of every human person, regardless of their physical, mental, cultural, social, and religious characteristics,” DI states in its short conclusion.

LifeNews Note: Joshua Mercer writes for CatholicVote, where this column originally appeared.

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Berlin has deployed the first soldiers from a promised 4,800-strong force to Lithuania  

Germany has sent an advance military team to Lithuania as part of plans for a full-strength armor brigade permanently stationed in the Baltic state, which borders Russia. Moscow has described the mission as a threat that requires “special measures” in response. 

German Defense Minister Boris Pistorius was among those to see off 21 military service members and civilian employees who departed on Monday from Berlin to Vilnius. The minister praised the Bundeswehr deployment as “a clear signal of solidarity” with Germany’s fellow NATO member. 

The Lithuanian Brigade, or Panzerbrigade 45, is set to include some 4,800 soldiers and 200 civilian employees by the time it becomes fully operational in 2027. It will be hosted at the Rudninkai training ground in the southeast of the country as well as near the town of Rukla. Some German troops will be located just 20km from the border with Belarus, a key Russian ally. Lithuania also borders the Russian enclave of Kaliningrad.

Lithuania, which has for years been upgrading the infrastructure needed to house foreign troops, has described the German deployment as historic. The arrival of the advance team four months after the roadmap for the permanent mission was signed heralds “a new page of a deeper Lithuanian-German partnership,” Defense Minister Laurynas Kasciunas declared as he welcomed the troops.

Vilnius has touted the German force as a deterrent against Russia, although Moscow perceives it as yet more evidence that NATO is encroaching on its borders. 

“This continues an escalation of tension, the creation of hotspots of threats to us at our borders, which will certainly require special measures to ensure our security,” Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said. 

Moscow has accused Washington of ignoring its concerns over NATO enlargement in Europe, which was done in breach of promises made to the Soviet leadership when it agreed to German unification in the early 1990s. 

The current hostilities between Moscow and Kiev, which the US-led military bloc claims requires an increased presence in Eastern Europe and the Baltics, was triggered by NATO’s creeping expansion into Ukraine, according to Russian officials. 

READ MORE: Finland sees no chance for peace in Ukraine

Since 2017, German troops have been part of the so-called ‘enhanced Forward Presence Battlegroup Lithuania’, a multinational 1,700-strong force stationed in Rukla. 

It is a good and comprehensive moral document. It is very strong and unambiguous, odd for Pope Francis, in many places especially at it concerns what God has defined a the crown of His creation being humanity, created in His image and likeness, male and female he created them. 

While some areas could have been tweaked better for clarity, there isn’t much to complain about. For Pope Francis, we dodged a bullet of grotesque ambiguity. That’s a miracle!

HERE’S MY EXCEPTION:

I think the document speaks about sin only twice. That’s the fly in the ointment for me. Let me explain.

I understand that this document is aimed not only at Catholics but to a worldwide audience of believers and nonbelievers. Thus it is an apologetic for the Church’s teaching on the dignity of life trying to convince the skeptical in worldly terms and appealing to the moral good in people often tainted by politics, polls, and how people feel about this, that or the other. In other words, there are for many Catholics and for most non-believers no moral imperatives set in stone that can’t change with the times and people’s opinions. 

While I understand this approach and appreciate it to a certain extent, I think the Magisterium of the Church has to declare moral teachings that affect the world not only in the here and now, but as a preparation for heaven or, failing to follow the narrow road of God’s salvation, affecting people not only here but in the afterlife in terms of either damnation or salvation. 

Yes, the Kingdom of God is here but not yet. That’s the irony of salvation. And yes, in this life, we must be workers for Christ in bringing heaven to earth as a sign of the salvation that awaits us.

There is no warning to the world, the flesh and the devil, that failing to promote the dignity of life in all its aspects not only damages the world in which we live bringing death and destruction to those who are defenseless, but will affect the final destination of the choices they make that harm the common good and the most innocent but also the guilty, and that destination is damnation or the fires of hell.

There is no “soteriology” in this document as I understand the study of salvation apart from trying to make life better in the here and now. 

And to that end, post-Catholics like our current President Biden, are idealists too, in terms of the political ideologies which become like a fake religion in the moral realm. All that they promote that is opposed to this document, DI, they think too they are improving the world, by allowing a woman to kill her baby up to the end of her pregnancy and even afterward. They think it will create a better world to euthanize those who are compromised in any way to include assisted suicide. They think that a non-binary approach to huaman sexuality and making the choice of being sexually what ever someone feels they are is for the common good.

They are wrong, dead wrong. And for a Catholic president and any Catholic who buys into the political agenda of certain political parties throughout the world who promote these post-Christian evils, eternal damnation awaits.

There needs to be a better call to eternal salvation in Jesus Christ in this document and it is lacking. It reads like just one more political statement in a world of multiple moral, immoral or amoral political ideologies. 

Ivermectin Emerges as a Significant Aid in Cancer Treatment

Paul Craig Roberts

Roman Balmakov of EpochTV is the best news presenter in the business. In this 13 minute video Balmakov reports successes from the use of Ivermectin in cancer treatment. https://www.theepochtimes.com/epochtv/ivermectin-as-a-powerful-drug-for-fighting-cancer-a-look-at-the-evidence-facts-matter-5622050?utm_source=Enews&utm_campaign=etv1-2024-04-05&utm_medium=email&utm_content=upvideo&est=AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAceE5JjMFys3H%2BbdAvWpUcQzPZ0WlGLZbDFlFfmdQNQ%3D%3D

As I reported during the 3 years of orchestrated Covid hysteria, both HCQ and Ivermectin are preventers and cures of Covid. The medical authorities knew this, but they suppressed it,
because if they acknowledged that a cure existed, the Covid “vaccine” could not be released under emergency authorization.

As the “vaccine” had not gone through the required testing, it could not be released for use under normal conditions. Therefore, it was a known risk, and the emergency use authorization protected the pharmaceutical companies from liability.

As the “medical authorities” –FDA, CDC, NIH, WHO–are all shills for the profits of Big Pharma and exist in a revolving door relationship with Big Pharma–Fauci himself shared patent ownership with Big Pharma–an untested vaccine was falsely and illegally released under false pretenses. Big Pharma made billions of dollars, and millions of “vaccinated” victims died or had health injuries. This is an established fact, not a “conspiracy theory” as Big Pharma’s “fact checkers” proclaim. It is an established scientific fact totally ignored by the whore media, medical boards, and the Big Pharma operatives that constitute the “medical regulatory authorities.”

As a consequence of legislation lobbied to passage by Big Pharma and insurance companies, fewer and fewer doctors are in private practice. Instead they are employees, which means they are accountable to their employer, some HMO, and not to their patients. Medical insurance has not adjusted to this fact.

I have a friend who is a doctor employed by a HMO. Observing the failure of ventilators and the non-treatment process for Covid, he cured patients with Ivermectin. Three times he was called in by his employer and ordered to stop treatment with Ivermectin. He ignored the orders on the grounds that they were an illegitimate interference in the doctor-patient relationship and an interference in his obligation to his patients and the Hippocratic Oath. Understanding that a fourth reprimand was a firing, leaving his patients unprotected, he diagnosed Covid infected patients with lupus and other health problems traditionally treated with Ivermectin or HCQ.

In other words, in the “free” United States of America, now seen worldwide as “a shithole country,” the only way a conscientious medical doctor should serve the health of his patients was through subterfuge.

Recently, as I reported, a federal court ordered the Big Pharma marketing agent, the FDA, to remove its online warnings against the use of Ivermectin, a long approved drug for general use based solely on the doctor’s opinion. All of the totally corrupt federal agencies–FDA, NIH, CDC, along with Bill Gates’ WHO–declared Ivermectin, long a preventer in Africa of River Blindness, to be a “horse medicine.”

No one in Africa taking Ivermectin as “the Sunday medicine” to prevent river blindness got Covid.

No one in Africa taking HCQ as “the Sunday medicine” to prevent malaria got Covid.

Four states in India successfully used Ivermectin to prevent Covid, did not use the “vaccine” and experienced little, if any, Covid. The same in parts of Brazil.

Today it is the Covid-Vaccinated countries where athletes in their prime are dropping dead on the playing field, where entertainers are dropping dead during performances, where airlines are running out of pilots due to the airline vaccine mandates, where babies and kids are dying from heart attacks, where never before seen turbo cancers are appearing among children and adults, where male and female fertility are declining, where miscarriages are rising.

The question before us is: Will the scientific information reported by Balmakov advance the use of Ivermectin in the cure and prevention of cancer, or will Ivermectin, a very inexpensive medicine, be seen as a threat to the existing institutionalized profitable treatment of cancer, which basically destroys a person’s immunize system so cancer can win.

Americans being naive souls trusting authority are perfect victims for the likely renewed demonization of Ivermectin.

Indeed, we have a forerunner from federal “medical authorities” who have set their sights on banning NAC, a long-used supplement that greatly improves human health.

The last thing Big Pharma wants is a healthy population. Big Pharma needs a sick population for its profitability. Indeed, Big Pharma creates vaccines and “medicines” that make us sicker so we need more medication.

Insouciant Americans don’t understand that Big Pharma controls medical research and increasingly the curriculums of medical schools. Not long ago when the editors of the two most prestigious medical research publications resigned, the New England Journal of Medicine and The Lancet, both said that they had no confidence in the articles that their journals published, because 70% of the articles were written with Big Pharma grants.

In the world today, American youth are the most medicated, vaccinated kids in the world, and hardly any of them are healthy.

The question before us is: How did a people intended by their founders to be the most free in human history end up subservient to official narratives that destroy their freedom, their health, their independence?

Why is the American population content with its impotence and loyal to a government that is unaccountable to the people?

The only answer is that the insouciant American population has zero awareness of their situation. When people don’t understand that they are threatened, how can they resist a threat of which they are unaware?

It is not Putin, XI, Iran, who are overthrowing America. America has been overthrown by the insouciance of the population.

Nuclear Armageddon Is Not the Only Extermination Threat We Face

The famous Belgian medical scientist, Geert Vanden Bossche, who warned us against mass vaccination in the teeth of a pandemic, says a second Sword of Damocles hangs over our heads–an outbreak of a new Covid virus strain from mutation within the bodies of the Covid vaccinated. James Howard Kunstler explains:

https://kunstler.com/clusterfuck-nation/this-is-not-an-april-fools-gag/

If you can’t make your mortgage or rental payment, your car payment, your credit card payment, your student loan payment, or your child support payment, you can thank Joe Biden and the Democrats’ open border policy.

Lew Rockwell explains: https://www.lewrockwell.com/2024/04/lew-rockwell/invasion-alert/

Kiev’s duty-free access to bloc’s market will be extended but caps will be placed on items such as honey, eggs, sugar and poultry

EU lawmakers have reached an agreement to extend Kiev’s duty-free access to member states’ market but have decided to also introduce caps on a number of Ukrainian farm imports, the European Council announced on Monday.

The preliminary decision has been approved by EU ambassadors. The agreement will enter into force after it is approved by a European Parliament committee, which is set to meet on Tuesday.

According to the latest arrangement, the exemptions on tariffs initially granted to Kiev in 2022 after the launch of Russia’s military operation in Ukraine will be extended for another year, until June 2025.

However, Brussels has also decided to “reinforce the protection of sensitive agricultural products” and has introduced “automatic safeguards” for oats, corn/maize, and groats, as well as produce like honey, eggs, poultry and sugar, to prevent cheap imports from flooding the EU market. 

Specifically, tariffs would be applied to the listed produce if imports of it exceed average levels of past years. The European Commission has also proposed extending this reference period to the second half of 2021, the year before the conflict broke out.

Previously, it was estimated that these new safeguards could potentially reduce Kiev’s earnings by some €240 million ($260 million) per year.

The decision to limit Ukrainian imports comes as farmers across Europe have been protesting for several months against the EU’s policies, which, agricultural workers say, are threatening their livelihoods.

After the launch of Russia’s military operation in Ukraine, the European Commission lifted all duties and quotas on Ukrainian goods for a period of one year to allow its agricultural products to be shipped to global markets. However, these imports ended up flooding Eastern European countries, destabilizing markets

European farmers have complained that they simply cannot compete with cheap Ukrainian imports that are not subject to the same tariffs and regulations as EU-produced goods.

A coalition partner has threatened to pull support from the prime minister should he fail to attack the Palestinian city

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu says his government has set a date for a major ground operation in Rafah, the last remaining Palestinian shelter in Gaza.

The Israeli leader is under pressure both from close ally the US, which sees the promised offensive as a major threat to civilians, and from members of his own coalition, who demand military action. Some 1.3 million people, most of them displaced from other parts of the Palestinian enclave, are estimated to be crammed into the city, which is located at Gaza’s border with Egypt.

In a short video statement on Monday night, the prime minister said that achieving a victory over the militant group Hamas “requires entry into Rafah and the elimination of the terrorist battalions there. It will happen – there is a date.”

Earlier in the day, Israel’s National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir issued an ultimatum to Netanyahu, stating that if he “decides to end the war without a broad attack on Rafah in order to defeat Hamas, he will not have a mandate to continue serving as prime minister.”

West Jerusalem has declared the elimination of Hamas, which organized a deadly incursion into southern Israel last October, as its primary goal. Netanyahu has previously claimed that the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) “had eliminated 19 out of 24 of the Hamas battalions”.

Last Sunday, the IDF announced that it was pulling most of its ground forces from the southern part of Gaza. The move will give soldiers rest, in preparation for a future mission in the Rafah area, Defence Minister Yoav Gallant said.

Critics of the Israeli tactics say it is a far cry from the precision-targeting of Hamas militants, which is how West Jerusalem portrays it. Over 33,000 Palestinians have been killed in more than six months of hostilities, compared to some 1,200 Israelis killed in the initial Hamas massacre.

Last week, Israel targeted a convoy of the humanitarian group World Central Kitchen in a series of drone strikes, which killed seven aid workers. The attack, which the IDF described as a tragic mistake, was ordered despite the group having closely coordinated its mission with the military.

READ MORE: Most Hamas battalions in Gaza eliminated – Netanyahu

US President Joe Biden threatened last Thursday to reconsider Washington’s support for Israel unless it changes its approach. Israel has since reopened a border crossing to allow more aid into Gaza and reported a surge in the number of trucks loaded with crucial supplies entering the blockaded territory, after claiming for months that it was not preventing the flow of aid.

In the most recent report from FINRA, margin debt levels have surged as bullish investors leverage their bets in the equity market. The increase in leverage is not surprising, as it represents increased risk-taking by investors in the stock market.

We previously discussed that valuations, in the short term, reflect investor optimism. In other words, as prices increase, investors rationalize why paying more for current earnings is rational.

“Valuation metrics are just that – a measure of current valuation. More importantly, when valuation metrics are excessive, it is a better measure of ‘investor psychology’ and the manifestation of the ‘greater fool theory.’ As shown, there is a high correlation between our composite consumer confidence index and trailing 1-year S&P 500 valuations.”

The same holds for margin debt. Unsurprisingly, as consumer confidence improves, so does the speculative demand for equities. As stock markets improve, the “fear of missing out” becomes more prevalent. Such boosts demand for equities, and as prices rise, investors take on more risk by adding leverage.

Adding to that exuberance is the increased demand for share repurchases, which has been a primary source of “buying” since 2000. As CEO confidence improves, a byproduct of increased consumer confidence, they increase the demand for share repurchases. As buybacks boost asset prices, investors take on more leverage and increase exposure as a virtual spiral develops.

However, should investors be afraid of rising margin debt?

A Byproduct Of Exuberance

Before we dig further into what margin debt tells us, let’s begin with where we are currently. There is clear evidence that investors are once again highly exuberant. The “Fear Greed” index below differs from the CNN measure in that our model measures positioning in the market by how much professional and retail investors are exposed to equity risk. Currently, that exposure is at levels associated with investors being “all in” the equity “pool.”

As Howard Marks noted in a December 2020 Bloomberg interview:

“Fear of missing out has taken over from the fear of losing money. If people are risk-tolerant and afraid of being out of the market, they buy aggressively, in which case you can’t find any bargains. That’s where we are now. That’s what the Fed engineered by putting rates at zero…we are back to where we were a year ago—uncertainty, prospective returns that are even lower than they were a year ago, and higher asset prices than a year ago. People are back to having to take on more risk to get return. At Oaktree, we are back to a cautious approach. This is not the kind of environment in which you would be buying with both hands.

The prospective returns are low on everything.”

Of course, in 2021, that market continued its low volatility grind higher as investors took on increasing margin debt levels to chase higher equities. However, this is the crucial point about margin debt.

Margin debt is not a technical indicator for trading markets. What it represents is the amount of speculation occurring in the market. In other words, margin debt is the “gasoline,” which drives markets higher as the leverage provides for the additional purchasing power of assets. However, leverage also works in reverse, as it supplies the accelerant for more significant declines as lenders “force” the sale of assets to cover credit lines without regard to the borrower’s position.

The last sentence is the most important. The issue with margin debt is that the unwinding of leverage is NOT at the investor’s discretion. That process is at the discretion of the broker-dealers that extended that leverage in the first place. (In other words, if you don’t sell to cover, the broker-dealer will do it for you.) When lenders fear they may not recoup their credit lines, they force the borrower to put in more cash or sell assets to cover the debt. The problem is that “margin calls” generally happen simultaneously, as falling asset prices impact all lenders simultaneously.

Margin debt is NOT an issue – until it is.

As shown, Howard was eventually right. In 2022, the decline wiped out all of the previous year’s gains and then some.

So, where are we currently?

Margin Debt Confirms The Exuberance

As noted, margin debt supports the advance when markets are rising and investors are taking on additional leverage to increase buying power. Therefore, the recent rise in margin debt is unsurprising as investor exuberance climbs. The chart shows the relationship between cash balances and the market. I have inverted free cash balances, so the relationship between increases in margin debt and the market is better represented. (Free cash balances are the difference between margin balances less cash and credit balances in margin accounts.)

Note that during the 1987 correction, the 2015-2016 “Brexit/Taper Tantrum,” the 2018 “Rate Hike Mistake,” and the “COVID Dip,” the market never broke its uptrend, AND cash balances never turned positive. Both a break of the rising bullish trend and positive free cash balances were the 2000 and 2008 bear market hallmarks. With negative cash balances shy of another all-time high, the next downturn could be another “correction.” However, if, or when, the long-term bullish trend is broken, the unwinding of margin debt will add “fuel to the fire.”

While the immediate response to this analysis will be, “But Lance, margin debt isn’t as high as it was previously,” there are many differences between today and 2021. The lack of stimulus payments, zero interest rates, and $120 billion in monthly “Quantitative Easing” are just a few. However, some glaring similarities exist, including the surge in negative cash balances and extreme deviations from long-term means.

In the short term, exuberance is infectious. The more the market rallies, the more risk investors want to take on. The issue with margin debt is that when an event eventually occurs, it creates a rush to liquidate holdings. Since margin debt is a function of the value of the underlying “collateral,” the forced sale of assets will reduce the value of the collateral. The decline in value then triggers further margin calls, triggering more selling, forcing more margin calls, and so forth.

Margin debt levels, like valuations, are not useful as a market-timing device. However, they are a valuable indicator of market exuberance.

While it may “feel” like the market “just won’t go down,” it is worth remembering Warren Buffett’s sage words.

“The market is a lot like sex, it feels best at the end.”

The post Margin Debt Surges As Bulls Leverage Bets appeared first on RIA.

Naturally the piece I recently wrote for Crisis, “Modern Catholic Recovery Conference,” provoked wildly different responses. Some who fully endorsed my expressions of distress at so many lamentable elements in the modern church were almost giddy with delight at my humorous proposals. Others misconstrued my purpose and thought I was mocking the TradRecovery conference in spite of the fact that I…

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“These are my people,” I thought to myself as I listened to the panel of speakers. Or at least as much as people I had never met could be. And I never did meet any of those speakers as it turns out. It was the last day of the “Symbolic World Summit,” in Tarpon Springs, Florida, held from February 29 to March 2. One of the panelists, a poet and raconteur named Martin Shaw, gave us all homework…

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Washington wants to ensure that Novatek’s Arctic LNG 2 project is “dead in the water,” the State Department has said  

The US is aiming to halt the development of the Russian energy sector, including a major new LNG project in the Arctic, senior State Department official Geoffrey Pyatt has said.   

Speaking at a Financial Times summit on Monday, Pyatt stated that the US is specifically targeting the Arctic LNG 2 project in Russia’s northern Yamal Region, which is being developed by private energy giant Novatek. 

“Our goal is to ensure that Arctic LNG 2 is dead in the water,” Pyatt, who serves as assistant secretary of state for energy resources, was quoted as saying by the British newspaper. “We’re very focused on ensuring that Russia is not able to develop new projects in order to [redirect] the gas that it had previously sent into Europe.” 

The US has imposed several rounds of economic restrictions on Arctic LNG 2, the most recent of which was announced in November 2023. 

Cutting Europe off from cheap Russian pipeline gas has been a key component of Western retaliation since Moscow launched its military operation in Ukraine in 2022. While American LNG producers have seized a large share of the market, Russian gas continues to flow to some EU member states. 

According to a Reuters estimate, the EU boosted purchases of Russian LNG in 2023 to compensate for the loss of pipeline gas. LNG currently holds a 15% share of the market, up from roughly 8% before 2022. The share of the Russian pipeline gas was previously 37%. 

READ MORE: EU boosts gas purchases from Russia – Reuters

Moscow considers the Ukraine conflict to be part of a US-led proxy war against Russia, one of the goals of which is to quash economic competition. The wellbeing of Europeans has been sacrificed by Washington in the process, Russian officials have argued. 

The loss of the European market has prompted Moscow to refocus on pipelines linking major gas fields with customers in Asia, primarily China.