Tag: conservatism
South Korea presidential ouster part of Chinese strategy to ‘expand its regional influence,’ expert says
In a week that saw French right-wing leader Marine Le Pen banned from running for office, the South Korean Constitutional Court’s ouster of President Yoon Suk Yeol from office on Friday has critics looking towards Beijing’s hand in efforts to remove the leader from power.
“Yoon’s foreign and security policies stand in stark contrast to the pro-China figures long supported and controlled by the [Chinese Communist Party (CCP)],” Anna Mahjar-Barducci, Middle East Media Research Institute (MEMRI) project director, told Fox News Digital. She explained that those policies “posed a threat to Beijing’s long-term strategy of cultivating a pro-China faction in South Korea,”
Mahjar-Barducci claimed the CCP has used “overt economic cooperation, political donations, covert benefit transfers and even illegal sexual bribery” to cultivate “certain South Korean political figures over time, aiming to undermine the U.S.-South Korea alliance, weaken South Korea’s strategic independence and expand its regional influence at the expense of the U.S.”
Trump signs ‘Executive Order to begin eliminating the federal Department of Education once and for all’
Vice President JD Vance Delivers Remarks at the American Dynamism Summit
I posted this video this morning (several posts below) along with an essay on the dangers of an advanced AI surveillance state. I commented on that essay before watching the video because a totalitarian surveillance state is a very real and dangerous possibility and many of us are talking about it. Now that I have watched Vance’s talk, I am posting it alone. In my view it’s a good talk and I agree with the policy directives Vance outlines. As a Buddhist, I am fundamentally an optimist and do not worry too much about things I have no control over. In many comments I have said our best defense against totalitarianism is free speech and platforms that host thriving free speech. Free speech can be thought of as a kind of biological technology that always sifts through the data and eventually finds the best stuff. This process must needs always be ongoing because everything is always changing. ABN
Maine Court Says Doctor Who Injected 5-Year-Old with COVID-19 Vaccine Without Parental Consent Has Immunity
The young Maine child who was given a controversial and experimental Pfizer-BioNTech mRNA injection at a public school without his parents consent may not have immunity from Covid-19. But the doctor who delivered the non-consensual shot and the powerful hospital system that supplied it do. Legal immunity, that is.
The Maine Supreme Judicial Court decided on March 4 in Hogan v. Lincoln Medical Partners that the hospital system and its affiliates are fully immune from legal liability after administering an experimental mRNA injection to a five-year-old child without parental consent.
The ruling, issued March 4, affirms a lower court decision that dismissed the case brought by parents Jeremiah Hogan and Siara Jean Harrington, whose child was injected with the Pfizer-BioNTech COVID-19 shot at a school clinic in November 2021. The couple had sued the healthcare provider, its parent company MaineHealth, and the physician who administered the shot, alleging a litany of offenses, including medical malpractice, battery, false imprisonment, and intentional infliction of emotional distress.
MaineHealth is the largest hospital operator in the state of Maine and employs more than 24,000 workers, including Dora Mills, the sister of Gov. Janet Mills, who serves as the “Chief Health Improvement Officer.”
Though it was clear at the time the vax was not safe, since then it has been proved the vax is dangerous. The state should never have the right to overrule parents or do medical procedure without their consent. This is basic to USA legal rights and freedoms. In retrospect, the Constitution was right and the doctors and the hospitals and the state and federal governments were wrong. Right there is why you do not interfere with parents rights or anyone’s right to refuse medical treatment, nor do you restrict their freedom to speak about what is going on. The conspiracy theorists were way more right about everything covid while the government and the, now dead, legacy media were way more wrong about everything. This is an example none of us who lived through it should ever forget. Covid illustrates from many angles the fundamental, inalienable importance of individual rights as spelled out in the US Constitution. All culture needs some bedrock upon which to found itself. USA’s is our magnificent Constitution. ABN
Disappointing anyone would have supported the nonsense, but this is the breakdown

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This is the approximate proportion, including Republicans, of our population who are fundamentally totalitarian in their thinking. Totalitarianism shows most when we are under pressure, when people are afraid, when real courage is tested. Independents usually lie somewhere between Dems and GOPs, though they tend to be more supportive of individual freedoms and rights. Not a pretty picture however you look at it. The covid years should always be remembered and often recalled. Vast numbers of people in USA and globally completely caved to mind-control so serious they injected extremely dubious gene therapy even into their children. At the same time, dissenting ‘conspiracy theorists’ were right about almost everything, thus proving yet again that freedom of speech is our most important right. ABN
Rubio cancelling 83% of USAID programs
A British and European assessment of Trump
Education Department Launches ‘End DEI’ Website to Solicit Complaints About Schools
The U.S. Department of Education is asking the public to report practices of diversity, equity, and inclusion in public schools, the Trump administration’s latest move to go after schools for what it calls “divisive ideologies” and “indoctrination.”
The agency on Thursday launched a public portal—EndDEI.Ed.Gov—for parents, students, teachers, and the broader community to report practices of discrimination based on race or sex in publicly-funded K-12 schools.
This new effort comes just before the Feb. 28 deadline that the Trump administration set for K-12 schools and universities to end DEI practices or risk losing federal funding.

‘Let’s have free expression all over the Western World. That is the path to strong alliances in Europe’ — JD Vance
This is the exact right move because it creates a strong alliance among we the people of the West. It’s a game theory move in that Vance draws a line which all but forces people to choose sides. It is a direct assertion of fundamental American values, calling for ‘free expression’ through reason and peace. To disagree is to marginalize yourself. Free speech is also a European value but it has been codified and emphasized less than in USA. Vance is proposing a very large win-win deal with the entire Western world. He is not wielding a military club, but a thoughtful one that aligns our populations at an elemental level. ABN
There Is No Such Thing as Democracy without Free Speech. Period.
Kevin O’Leary on DOGE — ‘Cut more, they’re not cutting enough. Cut everything…’
‘Insulting someone is not a crime’ — JD Vance

Vance is referring to the video above. Hate is generally not advisable from a Buddhist point of view, but it is not a crime in USA and should not be a crime anywhere. ‘Hate speech laws’ are a sloppy form of censorship. I like seeing Vance and Trump strongly assert free speech, our most important inalienable right. ABN
Louisiana Dept Of Health ‘Will No Longer Promote Mass Vaccination’
Following Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s confirmation as the secretary of Health and Human Services (HHS), the Louisiana Department of Health (LDH) confirmed that it “will no longer promote mass vaccination.”
The announcement by the LDH was sent out as an internal memo — ordering staff to end all media campaigns and promotions to encourage vaccinations.
“The State of Louisiana and LDH have historically promoted vaccines for vaccine preventable illnesses through our parish health units, community health fairs, partnerships and media campaigns,” wrote Louisiana’s Surgeon General Ralph Abraham.
“While we encourage each patient to discuss the risks and benefits of vaccination with their provider, LDH will no longer promote mass vaccination,” the memo continued.
The LDH also released a public statement, vowing to restore the public’s trust in the healthcare system following the previous COVID-19 mandates and lockdowns.
“For much of the last century, public health has taken it upon itself to fill the gaps in our broken healthcare system – providing guidance, information, and health recommendations. But when we get it wrong and overreach, the harm is often irreparable. Trust is built over years and lost in seconds, and we’re still rebuilding from the COVID missteps,” the announcement read.
Very good news. Covid proved we the people are smarter than government bureaucrats and that free speech is better than government restricted speech. I hope everyone who lived through that era will always remember how much free speech and free choice in medicine matters. ABN
DOGE Descends On IRS As Musk Prepares To Audit Agency
A top staffer of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) arrived at IRS headquarters on Thursday ahead of a planned audit announced by President Donald Trump.
Elojn Musk aide Kavin Kliger visited the DC offices of the IRS to examine its systems, according to the Wall Street Journal, which noted that Kliger has been working at the Office of Personnel Management.
Later in the day, Trump announced that DOGE would audit the nation’s tax collection agency.
“The Internal Revenue Service will be looked at like everybody else,” Trump told reporters during a White House press briefing.
“They’re doing a hell of a job. It’s an amazing job they’re doing,” Trump said of Musk and DOGE. “I call it the force of super-geniuses, but it’s building, and you know they go up, and they talk to some of the people about certain deals, and they get all tongue-tied because these people get it. They’re very smart people. We need smart people.”
Trump was responding to a question about Kliger’s visit to the IRS and whether the administration wants to close the agency – to which Trump said he did not expect that to be the case.
