276 Comments

I suppose the irony is that America, a country founded by citizens with little tolerance for government, has mutated into a government that has little tolerance for its citizens.

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The mutation was baked into the cake when the Articles of Confederation were abandoned.

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Rabbit Hole Alert!

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I consider the Constitution to be the result of a bloodless coup.

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Interesting how the new government assumed the states' debts, and monetized it. And the new bondholders were a rich few in places like New York and Massachusetts. Guess it was Hamilton's idea...

Could be a rabbit hole, though, to explore that here!

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An important rabbit hole… The Broadway show “Hamilton” is only the latest and slickest whitewash…. (wow! a black man protraying a white man who monetized the whole country!… dumb woke ignorance)

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More post-modern crap…

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yes, and thats happened only because of the governments ability to counterfeit funds for everything it wants to do. iy cant even tax us enough for all the meddling it wants to achieve. we need to get the feds back in their lane.

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The 1st Amendment … so ironic that the first concern of americans at the outset is still the major concern… despite the amendment….

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U got it !

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My friend directly lost his job yesterday because of this. He writes for an independent heterodox online publication and was laid off yesterday. His boss said they were downgraded BY NEWSGUARD after they published COVID lab leak theory articles and they lost revenue and grants DIRECTLY due to this downgrade. EDIT: well he DID write for for the outlet...

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Would your friend talk to me?

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This is why I subscribe. Matt's articles on Loudoun County, Virginia ~2 years ago were classic investigative journalism. He listen's and reports.

And he's just getting better.

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Matt sealed the deal with his Loudoun County reporting with me also. Great piece of Journalism!

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Re Matt's; "...Newsguard’s customers include universities and libraries..."

Interesting T-rad's friend's company lost grants. It might be worth investigating if similar grants to libraries and universities are tied to using Newsguard or similar services. We only hear about tech platforms being censored but not much about universities.

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I just shot him a text. I'll let you know what he says.

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Too much litigation etc involved at the moment. Wish he was willing, but I can understand his reticence. Newsguard is the reason that was expressed to him, but as it isn't provable it could be awkward for him if that turns out not to be the case. Add to that the possible (?) threat of the feds and well...

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He, or his attorney, should reach out to FIRE.

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YES

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What that means, "I'd like to remain employable."

I understand that. I cover up my Trump sticker on my car to go to work for the liberal NGO.

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Btw- Crovitz is a former Wall Street Journal (Dow Jones guy). I am not surprised by this since the WSJ ran the government narrative all during COVID.

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That’s awful. I’m sorry.

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So, what’s the problem here? Newsguard is expressing its opinions about another media source’s accuracy and trustworthiness. Emphasis on the word “opinions.”

The suit Matt describes in this column is, at bottom, a defamation claim — News Consortium is claiming that Newsguard defamed News Consortium. More specifically, News Consortium is suing Newsguard for expressing an opinion.

You can read my full comment on this issue below. (roughly #269 in this comment section). But it concerns me to see a veteran journalist like Matt Taibbi reporting on this lawsuit without pausing to notice that “A” is suing “B” for “B’s” expression of opinion — the lawsuit itself might well be an attempt to censor “B.” Defamation claims have long been used as a tool of censorship — and of course Matt knows that.

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B is censoring on behalf of the fascist deep state. did you miss that part sparknuts?

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Having taxpayer dollars spent on suppressing the free speech of taxpayers is just beyond galling.

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We paid for the gain of function research.

We paid for the coverup of the gain of function research.

We paid for the masks and the lockdowns and the school closings.

To top it all off, we pay for the censorship, too!

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And we're still paying for the censorship, intellectually, politically, and financially.

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We also pay for the subsequent economic melt-down.

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And when you can no longer pay for your house, the bank will swoop in with newly printed cash to buy it for pennies on the dollar.

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The process is referred to as "reinvestment".

And oh, look. The Biden maladministration is beginning another round of "help the underrepresented minority homeowners". Because that worked so well the last time.

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And we paid for the vaccine research, the vaccines, the testing,…

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there is very little evil in the world that isnt touched and influenced to some degree by US taxpayers the USG'S ability to counterfeit trillions.

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TAXES DON'T FUND SPENDING AT THE FEDERAL LEVEL. Congress creates new money every time they pass an appropriations bill. I know that the phrase "taxpayers' dollars" catches everyone's attention, but the government can pay for what it wants without you.

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Well, true. But every trillion dollars created by the government reduces the value of my money. So it is taking from me even if it wasn't my taxes that paid all of for their spending.

My father lived through the REAL inflation in Germany in 1923. The U.S. dollar went from 2 marks in 1920 to 5 billion marks in November 1923. People would get paid in cash and right away spend all of it as it would be worth nothing in a day (except to burn to heat the house).

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right, the government takes what it cant through taxes, by inflation.

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The tail is wagging the dog. Thanks for doing what you can to keep these wolves in check Matt.

"But, Jefferson worried that the people - and the argument goes back to Thucydides and Aristotle - are easily misled. He also stressed, passionately and repeatedly, that it was essential for the people to understand the risks and benefits of government, to educate themselves, and to involve themselves in the political process. Without that, he said, the wolves will take over." —Carl Sagan, The Demon-Haunted World

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So, how many of the people working at “Newsguard” are former CIA, DIA, FBI, NSA, etc. employees?

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You bet!!

My suspicion has long been that the D.C. grant/award system is another tax dollar guzzling industry inhabited by sycophants and hustlers who turn on a dime to line their pockets and parrot the "party line". The joined at the hip corporate/surveillance bureaucratic monstrosity, (citizen tax dollars in the front door earmarked and dispersed to special interest insiders out the back) appears to be a major weapon of what is obviously a war on American values and the middle class. Like all grifters, the perps have to threaten and silence legitimate truth and inquiry. In this case "we the people". Hence Billy Gates, Klaus Schwab, the Davos crowd and the international war on free speech. It's a purely criminal enterprise.

The journalist Chris Hedges has been the only Substack leader I've seen to platform the UBS whistle blower Stephanie Gibaud. Central bankers and criminal financiers are/were/have always been the enemy of freedom. A few years back the Taibbi report that HSBC, BOA and other financial grifters were busted knowingly laundering cartel drug money and walked was no surprise. The 2008 looting and gutting of American industry and economic base? Ukraine was/is a poster child for money laundering and the numbered Swiss account. Sleepy Joe B., obviously not the only D.C. grifter, was neck deep. Would a perp willing to sell the White House be willing to sell out "we the people"? A look through any windshield affirms the Hedges observation that "capital" has abandoned America.

Stay pumped!!

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The grift has been going on for over half-a-century. Whitney Webb has two neurotically dense books "One Nation Under Blackmail" volumes 1 and 2.

She gives names, dates, places, motives, connections, and suspicions at a frenetic pace, so much that it's actually difficult to consume without corkboard, pins, and red string, but if you're a fairly old codger (or codgeress), these names pop out of your memory like pin worms.

I tell you, it is utterly amazing. I don't know her. I don't have anything to do with her. Her books are amazing.

Sold at fine bookstores near you... hopefully, but if not... then, well, you know:

https://www.amazon.com/One-Nation-Under-Blackmail-Intelligence/dp/1634243013/ref=pd_bxgy_sccl_1/131-6279743-3264851?content-id=amzn1.sym.43d28dfc-aa4f-4ef6-b591-5ab7095e137f&pd_rd_i=1634243013&psc=1

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You're correct--It all ain't lost at all but it is all in all hard to see what it all is but I'm pretty sure it ain't human. It's a delusional corporate fascist vision of some chemically castrated heavily medicated dormitory born and bred cyber wired Big Foot creature that subsists on crickets and lives inside a hologram with no sense of time and no connection to history who willingly spends ten hours a day performing repetitive tasks in a suicide netted factory for arcade tokens and the right to patriotically die in state owned euthanasia center. (Sorry!! The "..pops out of your memory like pin worms.." phrase triggered my neurosis.)

Thank you for the heads up. I'll check out Ms. Webb's "..Under Blackmail...."

Let me return the favor. At the end of his life C.G. Jung wrote a book called AION. It is as you say "dense". But the psychologist Edward F. Edinger wrote a short accompanying commentary that can be either be read alone or used as a guide when reading Jung's work. My "...A-Bomb 20th Century retro/pathology not politics/brand new age/salvation in the Constitution.." rant is based in a large part on the insights in those books. Likewise, for fun, if you still possess a healthy sense of paranoia and wonder Cormac McCarthy's double volume THE PASSENGER/STELLA MARIS might be the subtle brutality you're looking for.

Stay strong. Stay clear and keep on rockin'!!

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Lot's to reply to... I'll be brief. As for "it" not being human, I think C.G. Jung would align them more with a very particular subset of human... anti-human maybe... but point taken... when squinting at what they're saying they want... humanity doesn't immediately come to mind.

Thank you for the AION pick, I'll rush to get it. I bought 2 Jung books last week, so I'm prepped.

Also... The Passenger... I read it over a month ago. Somehow his best book (not thought possible) and ranking in my top 1 or so all-time best books (Blood Meridian does not like being crowded up there, but both climbed in my mind, due to its limited space, no choice I'm afraid). My one contest to Passenger's relevance in this discussion is that, when he broaches our particular arena of conversation, he bows out by saying something like "You know what that sounds like."... i.e. sounds like a conspiracy theory... i.e. crazy... without elaborating his position. But we're looking more living Alicia's life every day.

Looking forward to AION. Thanks again.

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Edinger (now at light speed) left some YouTube vids you might like. Always good to bump into a McCarthy fan. Thanks.

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Many, I would imagine. It would make sense that it's a similar deal to the high-dollar jobs that SEC and Treasury people get when they are done making government work for Wall Street. While Newsguard salaries likely can't touch Goldman Sachs, they're certainly better than government salaries.

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Grifters, all.

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Many commenters here at Racket News are Newsguard employees.

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“Former”

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If they have a DoD contract, you can bet they will hire more military, NSA, CIA people in order to expand their reach into the federal fisc and expand their censorship offerings.

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Another revolving door.

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Excellent. Thanks for that. Ironically, Carl was government funded. I wonder if Thucydides and Aristotle were as well.

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I would like all voters to have mandatory civics exams before voting . Just like a drivers license a voters license has responsibilities. Many people don’t understand how the government works. The history of Jefferson and Ben Franklin’s disagreements should be known to all.

Getting back to misinformation- Animal farm has a scene where the pigs rewrite the rules to favor the pigs over the others . “Some Animals are more equal than others . “

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Careful that you don't suggest yourself out of the electoral process.

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I shouldn’t vote if I can’t pass the civics test . There would be classes and a test and makeup tests. It is our greatest right and should be treated as such .

I watched how a bill becomes a law 😂 and that’s a good place to start. I have a well educated friend who thought she had to fill out the whole ballot . She didn’t understand the amendments but thought she had to vote on everything. There r more people who don’t even understand the basics. Sheriff is non partisan but if a party is listed people vote along the party line. We almost had a felon become sheriff because he listed democrat.

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A well-informed citizen. Bravo!

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Great quote.

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Next it is time to see how Wikipedia's rating system of "reliable sources" also suppresses speech.

Wikipedia rates Consortium News as UNRELIABLE.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Reliable_sources/Perennial_sources

CONSORTIUM NEWS cannot be a citation for Wikipedia.

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“The Wikimedia Foundation has pulled in millions of dollars, even as the cost of web hosting (about $2.5 million/year) has remained constant. As it turns out, less than half of the Wikimedia budget has anything to do with running Wikipedia. With the rest of the money, the Foundation have vastly expanded their staff; the organisation now employs 400 people and by the end of 2021 they had accumulated over $230 million in assets. Because they now have vastly more money and more people than they need to run a crowd-sourced encyclopedia, they have become a grant-making institution.”

https://www.eugyppius.com/p/the-managerial-menace?

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That's a really good eugyppius article.

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Who reads/uses Wikipedia?

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And this is exactly why I would never listen to any news or opinion type show on PBS… someone should also call them out…

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"Name and shame." Thank you for doing that here, Matt, with the co-CEOs of this POS company. We need thousands of these lawsuits out there. There is a legal phrase I misremember, penned by SCOTUS in one of their pro first amendment rulings, regarding disallowing censorship by the government by proxy and threat. Freedom of speech includes the freedom to hear it, to consume it. This, and this alone, is the meaningful battle of our time. All the rest is window dressing. We are with you.

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Well said. Agreed. It's concerning when I hear/read people complain that Matt is beating a dead horse, so to speak. There is no issue more paramount than our ability to share and receive information. Particularly that which concerns the government and its actions.

It's hard to fathom with all that is going on the past 20, 10, 7, and even 3 years (consecutively more and more obvious and pointed) to not conjure the slightest amount of foresight necessary to see where this all goes.

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When there is no accountability for misdeeds those who perform them are emboldened.

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Please follow up with examples of MainStream media stories that are flat out wrong but not flagged and ’conspiracy stories’ flagged as wrong that turned out to be totally correct.

The money is one issue, but corruption in their judgement will exoose their charade.

They must be stopped.

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It must atrophy. Actively stopping it would be a snake eating its own tail.

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Expose the corruption If their own charade. Bring it all to light

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The Hamilton 68 stories were flagged as true, but were a hoax.

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How? "Must be stopped"

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they must be made to fear for life and limb. the gentle among us need to acknowlege this.

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This feels like small potatoes to me. Very small.

When Jeff Bezos contracts with the CIA and other government "intelligence" agencies and bureaucracies to do their cloud computing for 10s of billions of dollars on one hand, then continues to canonize them with the other (WaPo), why is no one asking about THAT government influence and censorship? And we know he's not alone. CEO Crovitz is philosophically correct in that the government has its tentacles in so many private pies, that it can - and far too often does - influence and "control" private enterprise from anyone who receives government funding (or over priced business contracts), from Covid relief to education to culture makers (advertising, entertainment and other media) to spying.

The practice is pernicious to say the least, and a free press, while critical to our society, is only one of many private enterprises doing the government's bidding.

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This Cloud Computing is as bad as AI—recent computers don’t even have USB ports anymore, implying that EVERYTHING that goes in and out of your computer, including storage, will be on the Cloud. Talk about making it easy for the government to control everything; obviously the Tech companies are colluding with the government.

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I couldn't agree more. The new flow of and storage of information is so insidious. We've all seen revisionism right before our eyes. When AOC called Trump's detention centers on the border "concentration camps" the online dictionary definitions of concentration camps wasn't changed overnight to agree with her, it was changed online within minutes. A terrifying trend and reality. Keep paper everything, then, if possible use and old computer USB ports to save the rest.

It's positively surreal

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I still run into people who think this is “progress.”

Things like movies are rapidly becoming available through streaming only. I imagine shows like “Life of Brian” will disappear completely…

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That's why I still insist on actual books.

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D’accord!

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Why am I blocked from liking your comment? Is it something I said?

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I've got a "way back" folder on my laptop, my personal in-home cloud device, and another more remote cloud device that have about 1T of on-line history on them.

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I purchased World History and US History - hard copy . It’s in a shelf in my art room . It’s safe . I also bought the Roald Dahl collection before they were cleansed . We have to go back to paper . Wish AOC would leave the US .

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I have a whole wall of books, no one has modified them (yet). One of the defects of e-books, especially the Kindle and Nook varieties: they can be changed at will when your reader is connected to the internet.

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We have several hundred books, including many Library of America volumes of writing in the 18th, 19th and 20th centuries. We do not read much online.

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People like you and me may end up being the only place one can get certain books in the near future. Kind of rings true of the samizdat system they had (maybe reverted to) in Russia.

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AOC, a plant, obviously.

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Yes, and she was installed by the government to boot!

:-)

...sorry, I fell for my own impulsivity. Really, I think my plants behave more rationally and honestly than Sandy Cortez (aka "AOC": I am disinclined to dignify her with an acronym).

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Installed by the government? I thought every new Representative has their own Netflix special!?!

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an insult to horticulture!

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Touché! Hahaha!

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If de-Googled phones are hitting the market (about 4 that I know of), then only buying a laptop if it has ports on it could resist the tide.

BTW - Major swaths (if not all) of the U.S. government is now requiring Microsoft products for means of communication (Teams, Outlook, their product suit). I wonder who made that deal.

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FOIA opportunity...

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🪒🛎️

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It may be "small", but this monster must be confronted anywhere it can be. Hopefully, CN will win the case (it is hard to see this in any way than arbitrary censorship) and based on that precedent bigger push back can be attempted.

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Depends entirely on what judge is presiding. To have any chance of winning it will need to end up at the Supreme Court.

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With a defunct Congress only concerned with spending more, and a compromised executive branch, the courts are going to bear the burden.

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Hopefully CN wont settle when the DOD offers to dump a dump truck full of cash onto their driveway.

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Or invade a small country for them, for free.

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No one gets to be a billionaire in this country without being vetted.

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Well, what about Musk? I do think he's a thorn in their side.

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"CEO Crovitz is philosophically correct in that the government has its tentacles in so many private pies, that it can - and far too often does - influence and "control" private enterprise"

Look into In-Q-Tel. It isn't just that the .gov has their tentacles in a lot of private pies, it's that they started a lot of them. It is highly likely the CIA started Walmart, Google, Amazon, Facebook, and many others.

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Well, the cia was created in 1947 and Walmart in 1950, so it's improbable that they started them. The point of your suggestion however, is well taken, and possible, though imo, not plausible. That isn't to say ALL of them haven't been well financed and advantaged by the cia and other govt agencies and courts.

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Walmart was started in 1962 and incorporated in 1969

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