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March 21, 2023 - Ron Paul Liberty Report
31:30
Bungling Biden Pushes China Into Russia's Arms

Today's historic visit of China's newly-re-elected Premier, Xi Jinping, to Russia further solidifies what would have hardly been imaginable not long ago: A strong Russia/China alliance against the US and its satellites in the EU. How did Biden bungle this so badly? Also today: Another day, another hundred million for Ukraine. Finally: Iraq war 20 years later - Washington has learned nothing.

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Dollars, Oil, and Russian Maneuvers 00:15:16
Hello, everybody, and thank you for tuning in to the Liberty Report.
With us today, Daniel McAdams, our co-host.
Daniel, good to see you this morning.
Good morning, Dr. Paul.
How are you this morning?
Doing well, doing well.
There's still a couple problems we have to solve here.
We can't take a rest.
We'll get into it.
No rest.
And I think there's a lot of people who are very interested in solving problems, but very confused on what's going on.
One item in the news, which is big news, and it's gotten coverage both on social media as well as the real media, but it was a little bit of spinning.
And that has to do with what's going on with these Russians and the Chinese.
And I think most people in this country believe they're our enemy.
They're two enemies.
And what are they up to?
Are they going to gang up on us?
And some are saying, well, no, I think we've contained Russia.
We've spent a couple, you know, $100 and some billion dollars saving Ukraine.
So we're not worried about Russia at this moment, but we are very, very worried about the Chinese.
And there's a little bit of Chinese bashing going on.
But, you know, there goes those Chinese and the Russians just marching off on their own, not even checking with us.
And we didn't get invited.
And Biden didn't say a word.
But the Chinese and the Russians got together to talk about international events and how they can work together.
And who knows?
They might even think about how to spend the money they've accumulated.
You know, the Chinese are pretty good at it.
And who knows what the Russians saw the other day, though, the statistic that a lot of people forget about.
The country that has the most natural resources in the whole world is Russia.
And yet, sadly, they have gone through hundreds of years of never becoming libertarian in manufacturing.
In our country, at least we had a good start.
We had a good start with our Constitution, and there has been a lot of development, even though we fear the fact that that's going to be lost.
But we don't see any whole lot of benefit to us with what Russia and China is doing.
I mean, it may turn out badly.
It may be a benefit.
But our responsibility, as I see it, is to talk more about what does that mean for us?
Should we have been there?
Could we be there?
And how can we have better relationships?
Because right now, today, if a president is so bold to sit down and invite some of these people over here to have a conversation, they could be in big trouble.
We're not supposed to deal with them because they have been ruled out of order.
And yet today, there's something special going on because it's not exactly what they do on a routine basis.
Back in the 60s and the 70s, you know, the Russians and the Soviets and China worked together, but there was a split.
I remember the time back then when the split was the history.
But this is the opposite of that.
This is the coming together of a distance they held between each other.
So it'll be interesting to see what happens, significant, but we don't know exactly what it'll be like tomorrow, the next day.
Yeah, it's a big meeting.
I mean, it is a three-day meeting between Xi Jinping, who was just re-elected an unprecedented third time to be Premier of China.
He will have ran China.
The only person who ran China longer in the modern era was Mao Zedong.
So he's got an unprecedented level of power.
And he goes to Moscow for a full three-day summit.
Now, he and Putin on yesterday had an informal talk for four and a half hours.
I don't know how you do that.
And then he met earlier today with the prime minister of Russia.
And then they move into the formal section of their talk later on.
They're already doing that now, obviously, because they're ahead of time.
So it's a massive meeting, a three-day meeting again, as you say.
And the U.S. media, of course, is very centered on Ukraine.
And so they're saying that the whole thing is about Ukraine.
It's not.
This summit is about deepening ties between Russia and China.
Something, as you say, that would have been thought unprecedented back, especially in the Nixon era where Nixon had the intelligence to go over there and try to be friendly with China and open the door to China.
Well, of course, we've been doing the opposite since then.
And you can really contrast the diplomacy if you watch how it was when Xi arrived, how he was treated, how they've talked.
I mean, compare that and contrast that with modern American diplomacy, which ironically mirrors the old Soviet diplomacy toward its own satellites, which is, we say jump, you say how high.
You know, it was just a couple of weeks ago when the U.S. administration was shaking its finger at China saying, you better not give a single weapon to Russia.
Don't you sell a single thing.
And meanwhile, we've given hundreds of billions of dollars worth of weapons to Ukraine.
So the hypocrisy is out there in the open.
But this is a very, very important meeting because it signifies the deepening of a relationship between two extremely powerful nations.
As you point out, the one, Russia, which is gifted with unbelievable natural resources, and the other, China, which has been very successful in developing its economy, even though, as you also point out, not necessarily along a free market line, but probably more free market than we are these days.
But nevertheless, so the marriage of these two really should spell trouble to the U.S.
But the U.S. is, you know, oblivious to these, apparently oblivious to these fundamental changes in the world.
Well, I do think our foreign policy fundamentally has contributed to the need for these two countries to get together.
And you've mentioned a few of these things.
I mean, just the whole idea that we depend on sanctions, you know, do this, do that, or we'll put sanctions on you.
We do it wholesale with Russia and the Chinese.
But it's amazing that, you know, Russia got around all their sanctions against the oil.
The oil gets out.
And they're richer.
And they were able to sell more oil, and the oil shortages weren't nearly as bad as people expected.
But of course, our bombs are being used too readily.
Right now they're being used in Ukraine, but we used them around the world, in targeted killings that we've used.
And we throw our weight around.
From their viewpoint, we're a bunch of bullies.
And also, I think what's helping them feel motivated is who's going to pick up the pieces when our bankruptcy accelerates and when the dollar becomes less the universal currency, the reserve currency of the world.
And I think, you know, the way we bail out the banks and all and the deficit we have, they must sit or say, yeah, it's amazing.
They're pulling it together and people are still using the dollar.
But ultimately, we're going to prepare for this.
And I don't know, but my guess would be if they had any sense, if the Russians and the Chinese are talking, they would be talking about monetary policy as well.
Yeah.
And as you well point out, I mean, Russia is selling more oil, it's making more money, it's developing relationships with Saudi Arabia, it's trading with the Saudis in non-dollar denominations.
So breaking the dollar hegemony, you know, where the U.S. approach to foreign policy is, as you say, sanctions, pushing people apart.
But I would say one very early, huge success, and I don't know if it was planned.
If it wasn't planned, it's a pretty good win on the side of Russia and China, which is to wrongfoot the U.S. and to make the U.S. government look as if it does not want peace in Ukraine.
And they've put them on their back feet because, as you know, Dr. Paul, we talked about on the show, China put forth a position paper outlining kind of in general, broad terms, what a peace negotiation might start to look like in Ukraine.
And the U.S. rejected it immediately because it came from the Chinese.
And so now the two of them are meeting, and the U.S. can only respond by saying, we don't like this.
And actually, we have a clip.
And, of course, as usual, Tucker Carlson captures it perfectly.
Here's a short clip from his show last night explaining and showing John Kirby, the spokesman of the National Security Council, saying, you know, we don't like this.
We don't want the war to end.
If we can get that queued up, that'd be, I forget the first minute and 15 or whatever seconds of that video clip.
Here we go.
Let's full screen that.
Let's rewind that in full screen.
Yeah, there we go.
As predicted, the Biden administration's reckless interference in the war in Ukraine has pushed China together with Russia, thereby ending for all-time American global dominance.
And as if to rub it in our faces, the president of China, President Xi, met with Vladimir Putin in Moscow today.
He went there in part to broker a ceasefire in the conflict.
You can be opposed to Russia and China getting together, but if you care about Ukraine, you probably want this war to end.
But this administration wants to keep it going.
Here's spokes Flack, John Kirby, explaining.
If they call for a ceasefire, you believe Ukraine should and will reject that.
Yes, we do, and we would reject it as well.
We think that that's an unacceptable outcome right now.
Obviously, we want the fighting to stop.
We want the war to be over.
And as I said, it could end today if Mr. Putin would do the right thing.
But to call for a ceasefire right now basically ratifies what they've been able to grab inside Ukraine and gives them time and space to prepare for future operations.
And that's just not going to be acceptable.
Right.
So this is the second time the Biden administration has stopped any attempt to end the war, negotiated and not immediate frozen in place, but trying to end it.
The second point there, here you have John Kirby, spokesman of the National Security Council, saying it's not the time to call for a ceasefire.
Well, he's not in the trenches bleeding and dying right now, and it's pretty cynical to suggest that.
You know, what is strange about Biden being so bold with his statement?
No, we're not ready for this.
We don't want to even talk about it.
Traditionally, two countries who are in a bitter struggle are always wanting to be seen as the peacemaker.
That's still considered a more decent image and saying, no, I don't want to have anything to do with this.
Keep the war going.
So that to me is a change.
But the whole thing is, though, that people realize that now more than ever that we're not in the business of peace.
We're in the business of war.
But that reflects the fact that we have an empire attitude and we want to maintain it.
We do want the dollar to be the strongest.
We do want to remain the strongest military.
And in doing that, you have to pretend that you're the most decent country in the world, always working for peace.
And now they've thrown that aside.
And it really, I think, you know, in the long term, which might be weeks or months, I think our image is going to be further diminished.
Yeah, I think so too.
Well, let's put on this next clip because it's from Real Clear Politics.
It's just an example because Blinken also has said, quote, this is our Secretary of State Blinken, the world should not be fooled by any tactical move or ceasefire proposal by Russia supported by China.
So again, it's almost smacks of desperation, Dr. Paul, where the U.S. says, don't be fooled by them.
Don't be fooled by them.
Don't believe us.
But this is the second time, at least, that we know that the U.S. and its allies have stepped in and prevented a ceasefire.
And we know this from Naftali Bennett, the former Israeli prime minister, who said, Hey, I was working toward peace.
We had a deal on the table.
It looked like they were going to sign it.
This was back in last April, almost a year ago.
And the U.S. and the U.K. jumped in and said, no, you can't do that.
So the second time they've got in the way of peace.
And in the meantime, even though Zelensky likes to talk a tough game, well, he's also seeing a bigger picture and seeing the fact that his country is being ripped apart.
Put on this next one because here is Zelensky's response to the Chinese proposal to begin peace.
He said, Zelensky wants Xi Jinping meeting following China's peace plan.
And that was last month.
And then here's from Politico, I think it is today, if we can put this next one up.
Call me anytime.
Zelensky plays the long game with Xi Jinping.
He's basically sitting around saying, please give me a call.
I want to talk to you.
We're waiting for you.
And she hasn't called yet.
And do the next one if you can, because this is now this is Kirby again.
He called the Russia-China relations a marriage of convenience, not affection.
It's a weird way of talking about this.
He's almost like a jealous, scorned courtier, you know, saying that he doesn't really love Putin.
It's just a marriage of convenience.
It just all smacks of desperation.
To me, it'll be interesting to see what happens with a Biden administration.
Who knows how it would change with Trump in?
But Biden's administration is saying, no, no, we wouldn't want any part of it, which suggests what in the world is he doing?
You're supposed to at least pretend.
But, you know, our whole arrival on the international front, I think, occurred in 1917 when we Wilson weaseled our way into the war was over.
He wanted to just deal up the pieces.
He wanted to help write the peace treaty.
But here, we're rejecting that.
And I don't believe for a minute that they think that they're going to divide up the world and set the stage here without the United States doing something, or at least somebody's going to be motivated because there's still a lot of hawks in there.
And there's a combination of the neocon Republicans and the progressive sellouts.
They're working together.
That's why we've heard more criticism of Biden by the progressive.
But I think there's going to be this so-called pragmatic demand that we participate.
How can we do this?
We did it in World War I.
We grabbed hold of things and participated.
But look at what we were able to do after World War II.
We helped divide up the world and we decided the reserve currency of the world would be the dollar because we had already taken all the gold.
So this will be, I don't think, I guess my point is I don't think that the United States will remain complacent and just go along with this, even, you know, because maybe they say, fine, you guys don't want to participate.
International Criminal Court Indictment 00:05:54
We don't even want to talk to you again.
But something is going to stir to put us involved in these negotiations one way or the other.
Who knows what they might try?
Yeah.
Well, another aspect of this visit that's interesting in the U.S. maneuvering, manipulating along with its allies, is this whole International Criminal Court indictment.
Remember that happened three days ago.
Putin was indicted for kidnapping kids.
The sole report that it was based on was funded by the State Department, and they did no investigation.
They only looked at Twitter for their evidence.
So very sketchy.
But, you know, the Xi Putin summit was known for quite some time.
So I don't believe it's any coincidence that the ICC arrest warned it came out just three days before.
And here's my exhibit A for that conspiracy theory.
Put this up.
This is the New York Times.
What they're saying, as she and Putin meet, U.S. assails diplomatic cover for crimes.
Just three days after the ICC accused Putin of war crimes, President Xi Jinping arrived in Moscow for a state visit.
So it makes both of them look bad, and she is coddling war criminals is what it says.
But if you dig a little deeper, Dr. Paul, and you don't have to spend a lot of time doing it, well, what's the ICC, as we talked about yesterday?
No one recognizes it.
We don't even recognize it, but we feed it information.
So how do they get funded?
Are they independent?
What's going on?
Well, I did like literally three seconds of digging.
And if you can put this up, this happened just a couple of days ago.
Millions in extra funding pledged for ICC work in Ukraine.
Oh, who's pledging it?
Let's do the next one.
The ICC is funded by justice ministers from over 40 countries met in London to pledge another $4.5 million to support the ICC in its investigations into alleged war crimes.
So breaking it down, Dr. Paul, the U.S., the UK, our European allies fund the ICC, and they tell the ICC who they need to indict.
And that's why they only indict the enemies of the so-called West.
So the whole thing smells a little fishy.
Maybe Biden was motivated a little bit because he's working on that contract he made with the military industrial complex.
Because, you know, they're getting ready.
It may be on its way.
No, 350, is that billion or million, I guess?
Only million.
That's Trump change.
So 350 million.
And that would be inconsistent if they say, oh, we're in part of a peace treaty.
Well, why are you sending more weapons to them?
And so maybe after the money gets there or the American people say, because there is a building resistance in the Congress not to keep sending money over there, and maybe the resistance will be there, then Biden will have to take another step or change his ways because they think that we're not going to have much to say about it under the circumstances working.
And that's fine.
That wouldn't be too bad, but I wish we just quit spending any money on it.
Spend the money at home by returning money to the taxpayer.
That's my idea.
You know, I watch a lot of things pro-Ukraine, pro-Russia.
I want to get a bigger picture.
I was watching a pro-Russia Telegram channel, and they talked about this.
As you say, we can even put that up.
Another $350 million for weapons for Ukraine.
And what they did is they just juxtaposed that with some video from one of the inner cities.
Maybe it was Chicago, who knows?
But it could be anywhere.
And it's just this person walking with a phone camera down the streets of this, and everyone is on drugs.
They do that thing where they're, I guess it's fentanyl or whatever that makes you lean over.
And dozens, hundreds of people just passed out on the street.
And it just, I mean, I think that's going to resonate with people.
Look, our cities are falling apart.
We are broke.
Our banks are failing.
Yet somehow, and we can put that next one up, in the middle of all of this collapse of our economy, actually go back one, or go forward one if you can.
There we go.
U.S. announces $350 million in weapons package for Ukraine, as you point out, Dr. Paul.
More weapons, more weapons.
But here's something else that Dave de Camp dug up in this piece, and it's kind of interesting.
If you put the next one on, go ahead.
From that piece, now here is a rare admission of truth, Dr. Paul.
Truth does get out.
He says the new package comes after a Pentagon official told the New York Times that upcoming ammunition shipments were part of a, quote, last-ditch effort to help Ukraine.
Now, we've been told for the past year that Ukraine is winning.
How does that square with this is a last, this is a Hail Mary pass for Ukraine?
Well, one of the arguments that's going to come up in a way it has already to a slight degree, and that is we need more help here, we need help at the borders, and there are no policemen around.
You know, Black Lives Matter and Tifa, they run the show and they don't get arrested or charged or whatever.
But now there's excitement up in New York because Trump has to march in and people are anticipating that we're going to see him put handcuffs on Trump.
You know, that sort of thing.
And so they say New York's advertising for some policemen.
They all left.
I mean, a lot of them left because they were sick and tired of the harassment and the defunding of the police and blaming the police for all of this.
And the forced shots, the forced jabs, too, remember?
Yeah, oh, that's right.
Of course, that even goes over into, they haven't settled that in the military yet.
That's still a tragic circumstance.
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Sponsor Thanks & Police Issues 00:04:05
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Well, the last thing we want to talk about today, Dr. Paul, is an unhappy anniversary.
And that is 20 years ago this week, despite all of the efforts by you, Dennis Kucinich, and a handful of great people on Capitol Hill, did not stop the Iraq war, and it broke out 20 years ago.
It was a date you would probably remember even for other reasons.
It's about that time or shortly before that.
You arrived in the nick of time.
You were just coming on the staff there and you saw us through that thing and we worked hard because it lingered.
I don't know whether, well, they had to deal with somebody else, but they were still building up the case to go into Iraq.
And they did this, but it took them a long time.
9-11 was September, a year and a half before, and they didn't go into Iraq until 2003.
So that makes a 20-year anniversary.
But there was a lot of ups and downs, but most of them were downs and a lot of death and destruction.
And guess what we achieved, though?
We brought the world together.
We made sure that Iraq, who were, believe it or not, reasonable people compared to what we're dealing with now.
And All of a sudden, they were able to, our policies were able to drive them to become good friends of the Iranians, who are our arch enemies now, and probably into that camp of Russia and China.
So, you know, we talk about backfiring and having things happen this way.
It's not a surprise that things are much worse.
But anyway, it was 20 years, and unfortunately, a wasted, a wasted 20 years.
I remember when it was starting, Pearl came on before our committee, and he was promoting the war.
And I said, how long will it be?
How many people have to die?
Because they were on the verge of the war story.
How many times will have to die before you'll change your tune?
And if you recall, Daniel, he didn't give me much of an answer.
No, he brushed you off.
It's forever.
Forever.
But nobody knows who Richard Pearl is today, and a lot of people know who Ron Paul is.
So that's the best revenge, is that people listen to what you say.
Nobody listens to Pearl.
Yeah, it's kind of funny.
I first wanted to go work for you in a way when I saw the U.S. indiscriminately bombing Yugoslavia in 1999.
And I was fortunate enough to be working for you when the U.S. also indiscriminately bombed Baghdad.
And I remember watching those bombs hit, and I really, I may have actually started crying, but I certainly felt like it, seeing that city blown up and those bombs, just hundreds and hundreds of them.
You know, when we criticize Russia, and, you know, rightly so, they're blowing up a lot of stuff over there.
But I tell you what, when we hit Baghdad and we flattened these places, Fallujah flattened these places, it was just completely, completely awful.
And I don't know if, oh, go ahead, I'm sorry.
Bombs Over Baghdad 00:04:02
Well, what I was going to say, policy has not changed.
We're still working with the same policy and all the problems we have and all the spending.
But I've argued the case, and in time, I will believe it will come to pass, that we're going to run out of weapons and money and stamina and support from the American people, and we'll stop the nonsense.
Yeah.
And, you know, remember that Saddam was the next Hitler and everything.
And I forget what article it was.
I've been reading a lot about the 20 year anniversary, but someone pointed out that in reality, Saddam was semi-retired.
He was writing a romance novel at the time.
He was bombed, and he just couldn't believe the U.S. would attack him.
He literally, he didn't believe when they said, you're going to get hit.
You're going to get hit.
No, I'm not.
They're not going to do that.
And there they go.
Well, he had reason to because when the Iranians were fighting the Iraqis, he was on our side.
We were on his side.
Yeah, exactly.
Well, we should recommend if you put on that next clip, because there's a great piece, and we have it up on the Ron Paul Institute.
We've reprinted it, but this is from our good friend Peter Van Buren.
And he did something a couple of days ago.
Iraq was 20 years ago today.
That was on March 19th.
And he talks about his great book, Remember, We Meant Well.
And that was the book that we actually contacted him and said, hey, can you come in and talk to our Thursday lunch group?
Because he was there in the State Department in the second part after the initial invasion, the Reconstruction part.
And he looked at the stuff we were doing and the money we were throwing around.
He couldn't believe it.
So he kept notes and he kept his eyes open and his mouth shut.
And later on, he wrote this book and exposed all the insane things that we were doing.
And of course, he got kicked out of the State Department for doing that.
But it's a great article.
And in fact, a couple of things, if you can do the next one, a couple of things, this is a long clip, and I'm not going to read it, but if you can.
But he talks about how Washington would determine some broad theme of the month, such as women's empowerment, aimed at the domestic American audience.
And he said the theme would filter down to us at our level, and we were supposed to concoct some sort of progress, some sort of project on the ground that would follow the theme.
And so he says, it wasn't hard because corrupt organizations whose arose like flowers from the desert to take our money, they were usually run by Tony Soprano-type warlords.
The organization would morph in name a loan as needed from local activist groups to NGO to entrepreneur, et cetera, et cetera.
We give them full boxes of dollars.
And then this is the thing.
We funded bakeries on streets without water.
We paid for plays on getting along with neighbors and threw money at all this because no one could find a match to just set fire to it directly.
So he goes on and on.
And the book is a great read about how we approach these things.
But he did something in his book that I think is important and sometimes we forget because he emphasized, yes, after we do all this killing, and I had a habit of trying to point that out before they start dropping the bomb, don't worry about it.
We'll rebuild it.
And he points that out in Afghanistan, Iraq.
And now, what are we dealing with right now?
We're already talking seriously about how many dollars it's going to take to rebuild Ukraine.
You know, the insanity never ceases.
But the laws of economics will eventually have it stop because you just can't keep doing this.
It's amazing, though, that it has continued.
And I think that we can't give up on the belief in non-intervention because it is the right thing to do.
And we do see some incremental changes in numbers of people that join us.
And like you mentioned one time in our program today, that the truth went out and the truth was pointed out.
So yes, what else can we do?
Yeah.
Yeah, sometimes it feels like we're running uphill.
Allowing Tax on Hotel Meetings 00:01:57
But anyway, I'm just going to close up by thanking our viewers and reminding them, save the date.
We're going to have tickets on sale for our June 3rd Houston conference.
Same hotel, very nice hotel.
We had a great time last year.
I know, Dr. Paul, you enjoyed meeting with people.
I always enjoy meeting with people.
We'll get those tickets on sale, but mark June 3rd off in your calendar.
It's a Saturday for the next RPI conference.
And then I'll announce our summer conference within the next day or two.
Very good.
I'm going to close out by talking a little bit about the financing of these wars that are ridiculous and why do people go along with them?
How do they finance them?
Well, they tax some people, but there's not enough tax money out there to do it.
Well, we can borrow some money and people will loan the money to the government.
And that's still not enough.
But instrumentally, the thing that was absolutely necessary, and it was known as way back in 1913, but especially after World War II, that if you're going to continue to do this, you have to have a monetary system where the world trusts the currency for the time being.
And then the license to print money at will for secret use in foreign policy or monetary policy or welfare policy will be given.
And that's how it's paid for.
It's paid through inflation.
So the theory is, and the founders, I believe, understood this issue.
Don't allow a central bank.
Don't allow them to use anything other than gold and silver.
And it will be a significant policy that would help prevent these wars from being fought.
And yet we continue to do it.
But that is the end point.
And the end point, I think we saw a little bit of that end point barging through with bank failures.
But that's still very, very early on this.
It's a friable system.
And the whole world can't be financed by the Federal Reserve.
And right now we're seeing that, even that is cracking, as well as our foreign policy.
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