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April 3, 2024 - Ron Paul Liberty Report
29:14
Pentagon And Neocons Seek To 'Trump-Proof' Ukraine Military Aid

Pentagon and NATO officials are reportedly considering moving under NATO control a multi-national group that coordinates military aid to Ukraine. Control is currently in US hands, but the deep state fears a re-elected President Trump may attempt to stop their endless war machine. Also today: Biden's crocodile tears over Israel's slaughter of aid workers.

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Trump-Proofing Weapons for Ukraine 00:10:35
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.
Good morning, Dr. Paul.
How are you this morning?
Doing well.
Good.
You're doing okay?
Yes, absolutely.
Up and ready to go.
That's right.
Okay, we've got to stop some crazy ideas out there.
I hope we can.
That's if you just look at the news or if you look at anti-war, you have lots of things on our table to deal with.
Okay, the one that we're going to deal with is they're ganging up on Trump.
I know you can't believe this, but they think that Trump might even be serious about some of the things he says, even though we say, well, we'll wait and see exactly what he does and who he appoints.
But Trump has said some things about NATO, which is not flattering, and some people like all the power, and they see a guy like Trump might just take over.
So what's this whole idea now?
Trump-proofing weapons for Ukraine.
Allies consider moving arms group into NATO.
Oh, boy, then there's, hey, you know, that's not maybe there'll be competition between who's running the show.
But of course, we always run the show because we have the most money, we have the biggest military, and we've been fibbing so long that people just can't ever believe that our currency will fail or that we'll run out of bombs because nobody how many bombs we give away and provide for everybody, people, next day, more bombs.
We're in business.
That's our whole business.
But this whole thing of joining up is a little weird.
I keep thinking that having two groups, that seems like a concern for the establishment.
I just don't think that's going to happen because a lot of those companies that are already in there already have troops in these countries and they're already playing these games.
But I don't.
I just think that something bigger is going to happen than worrying exactly who's pulling the strings because we always have been pulling the strings.
Almost for World War I, not so much World War I, but World War II and the settlements and all the treaties that we've had.
We've been running the show, but we're also, you know, we're also responsible.
We also have a debt that we have to deal with by being king of the hill.
And that's what will finally slow this thing down.
But this whole thing of shifting all the weapons, you know, to something that Trump might not have, you know, what they're doing.
They're saying, I guess nobody even talks about what if it's Biden that's in.
They don't say, you know, if Biden doesn't win, we better be concerned.
You know, even the opposition, I think probably all the Democrats now are assuming that.
So anyway, we'll hear more about this, I'm sure.
Yeah, I mean, you say it's ganging up against Trump, which is only partly right because I think it really is ganging up against the American people.
It's ganging up against democracy.
It's ganging up against the voter.
I mean, it's a blatantly anti-democratic move.
They're taking an entity which provides weapons for Ukraine, and we are the majority funder of that entity, the U.S. taxpayer.
It's taking it out of the hands of the U.S. president.
It's taking foreign policy out of the hands of the U.S. President and putting it in an organization, you know, a multinational organization.
I mean, it basically says no matter who you vote for, you're going to get war, whether you like it or not.
And if there's a danger that Trump might come in and put an end to this war, well, we're going to take away his ability, taking away the American president's ability to conduct foreign policy.
Well, if it's all their fault and they're causing these problems, that relieves the American people and our Congress.
That's where the real responsibility is.
We put up with all this stuff, but this is a maneuver in the midst of all this mess.
And they will, you know, they'll do whatever they think is best in their interest.
But I also think that basically almost everything going on now, the insanities, whether it's all these court cases or whether, I think a prevailing attitude in this country today is pretty well split, probably less than 50%, and that is hate Trump.
Hate Trump.
So that's part of it, but you're also very right about this whole thing.
It's an attack on us.
Trump is our guy.
But his policies, we'd like him to pin it down a little bit more when he talks about what's best for America.
I can have a system of government which would be very constitutional, and it would be the very best thing for America.
Yeah.
Well, let's look at the article.
It's from Politico.
And we actually have two related articles, and they're both on the same theme.
Trump proofing weapons for Ukraine.
Allies consider moving arms group into NATO.
Go to the next one.
Here's what the article is all about.
The U.S. and other Western countries are considering transferring to NATO a U.S.-led multinational group that coordinates the shipments of weapons to Ukraine.
One of several new proposals, and I underline this, that could help maintain the flow of arms to Kiev under a second Donald Trump presidency.
So again, bypassing the U.S. president and getting the aid to Ukraine without regard to what that president wants.
Now go to the next one.
And this is Jim Townsend, a former Pentagon and NATO official.
He says, there is a feeling among not the whole group, but a part of the NATO group that thinks it's better to institutionalize the process just in case of Trump's re-election.
Now imagine being an American government official and wanting to bypass your own president in favor of a multinational organization like NATO.
Here's what he also said.
Putting this under NATO kind of isolates it from a Trump presidency or even from a U.S. that might get distracted by China and can't keep it going or get its own funding together.
So basically no matter what happens, if we get distracted by China, whatever, we're going to be on the hook to pay and to continue sending weapons.
You know, if the numbers are powerful enough where they can say, well, we'll vote on this, it might be a place where we point out the shortcomings of democracy, you know, because the numbers of their, if they can vote that in and change all that, the reason why I don't think it's going to happen like that so quickly is they're still dependent on our money.
Even if it's running out of value, it's still, it's going to be hard to, you know, get us out of the way.
But there are signs that things are fading right now in the financial markets and us losing the fact that they bring us up.
That's probably pretty significant by itself, you know, and getting a little bit disgusted with the United States.
And the other thing that they did is they want to move all the control over the money and weapons to Ukraine away from a future President Trump.
But if you put the next one up, this is from the same article.
Late last year, lawmakers approved a law that would require congressional approval if a future president tried to pull out of NATO.
They're considering further protection measures.
They're trying to not only Trump-proof the weapons to Ukraine, Trump-proof us doing anything to get out of NATO, making it impossible for the president to do so.
I mean, this is an incredibly anti-democratic move.
And that's what they're all for, true democracy.
Well, let's move to the next one because it's a similar situation, if you can put that one up.
NATO chief floats establishing $100 billion fund for Ukraine.
That's a shock.
I can't even breathe.
Yeah, that's a lot of money.
$100 billion.
NATO Secretary General Jen Stoltenberg will propose establishing a $100 billion five-year fund for Ukraine when the alliance's foreign ministers meet on Wednesday.
The idea is to lock in long-term support for Ukraine amid uncertainty around U.S. aid to Ukraine.
So they're afraid, again, that the money won't be there.
So they want to get it now while it's there and put it in a fund that's outside the control of the president.
When I think of all the pros and cons and the odds of this stuff working as they're proposing, I think, you know, I think they're dreaming, you know, but something bad will come of it because maybe they'll put that fund together and decide, well, the enemy is really, you know, this is to go only to killing Russians or something.
Yeah, it's dangerous.
I mean, it's taking foreign policy, U.S. foreign policy away from the U.S. You know, it doesn't matter who you vote for.
This is going to be the policy.
And that's, remember, that's why Trump was impeached in the first place.
He didn't want to release that military aid to Ukraine way back when.
And they said, well, you have to do it.
It's the interagency consensus.
We have to support Ukraine.
And he says, well, I'm a little skeptical about that.
Okay, you're impeached.
I mean, that's what they did.
So it's a tyrannical time.
Here's from the article again.
Go to the next and politico reported, the one idea would be to involve 32 members of the alliance contributing the $100 billion fund at the same rate they contribute to the alliance's budget.
And I underline this.
That would put most of the burden on the U.S. since Washington pays about two-thirds of NATO's budget.
So they want all of our money, but they want us to shut up while they spend it.
Well, it's coming to light, but I sort of think that's been going on a while.
And I think there's a big shift, though, in our ability to continue to finance everything and send all these weapons at the same time.
In a way, I keep thinking, maybe Trump will serve a benefit that is sort of not talked about, that he is antagonistic and he wants to rock the boat and that they will start putting pressure on the whole thing about why we should run the show.
Because would there have been a coup in 2014, do you think, without the United States?
Biden Rebukes Israel's Gaza Policy 00:06:37
I think we were 90% of that.
Absolutely, absolutely.
I guess what the one silver lining might be, if Trump sees all of this, it might make him irritated.
It might have the opposite effect.
He might say, oh, yeah, well, I'm going to really come get you.
There's been that going on.
Oh, we'll impeach him.
Yeah.
That'll destroy his reputation six months later, or I don't know, stronger.
Well, we need to do that again.
And it didn't work.
And we will say nastier things about him.
It's so crazy.
It is.
Well, let's move on, I guess, to our next topic, which is a disgusting and disturbing topic.
But again, we're seeing that the U.S. mainstream media is trying to go to bat for Biden.
Let's put this up.
They're making it sound like Biden has been awfully tough against Israel.
This is from Politico.
Biden calls out Israel's humanitarian record after World Central Kitchen Strike.
And go to the next one.
how they worded it, Politico, which is always carrying water for Biden.
President Joe Biden offered a decidedly sharp rebuke of Israeli military operations on Tuesday following a deadly airstrike in Gaza that killed seven aid workers with the World Central Kitchen.
In a statement put out by the White House, Biden said he was outraged and heartbroken by the killings, demanding a swift investigation that would bring accountability.
The findings of the investigation must be made public.
I don't know.
Does that sound that awfully sharp to you?
But if they wanted to be more objective and spread the blame around, off a decided sharp rebuke of Israel's military pressure.
Well, if that's really the issue, would they ever consider with their close financial ally and weapons ally United States?
It's a game they play, and they play it to the media, and they've gotten away with this for a long time.
It just looks like it's not being sold, and I think that's what this election is all about right now.
People aren't rolling over.
There's groups in this country that traditionally have been 95% always going with the Democrat.
And right now, that seems to be breaking.
And it may be, it will snowball between now and the election too, because that can happen too.
Once everybody feels the momentum is this way, I'm not going to stick my neck out.
Yeah, and I just, I question whether what kind of a sharp, like you say, the sharp rebuke would be to say, no more weapons.
But in fact, I was tracking some planes this morning.
Two C-130s took off from Israel and they went to Cyprus, no doubt to pick up more American weapons.
And by the way, they did kill one American.
I think three British citizens were killed, an Australian and a poll.
They were cooking dinner for starving people.
That's what they were doing down there, and they were blown up.
But Israel said, well, it was just a mistake.
You know, no biggie.
Come on.
And this is a good, Sean McCarthy isn't a journalist.
And I think he actually summarized it very well.
If you put up that next tweet, if you have that next tweet.
Israel accidentally bombed a food convoy which shared their coordinates with the IDF in advance.
Then they accidentally bombed it again.
Then they accidentally bombed it a third time to finish off the survivors.
I think that captures pretty well what happened and the incredulousness, the inability to believe their explanation.
Aaron Mattei, a good friend of ours with the Gray Zone, he also has a good take on it if you put the next one up.
Biden not only let Israel block food into Gaza, but provided Israel with bombs that likely killed Western aid workers, including an American, trying to deliver food themselves.
So those bombs that killed that American and those Brits were either UK or U.S. bombs.
You know, they say this stuff, trying to make it sound reasonable.
But not to change anything, any thinking or policy, but we're doing this, but we want to justify it if we can only get them to do more to protect the victims.
I mean, we don't want to injure somebody that's providing aid.
And yet, what you just quoted raises a question, what is deliberate or an accident?
What a shared.
Yeah, and what happened, the result of bombing these humanitarian workers is that several of the other major nonprofits that were providing food to Gaza, they pulled out yesterday.
They said, we can't, this is too dangerous now.
We can't continue to provide.
So the end result of this is quicker starving of the people of Gaza now.
So in a way, if that was Israel's goal, a very cynical goal, then they certainly have achieved that mission.
You know, he says, the United States has repeatedly urged Israel to deconflict.
That's a neat term, deconflict their military operations against Hamas with humanitarian operation.
You know, that's going to take care of everything.
But they don't say, why don't we just have a ceasefire and take a breath before the killing goes on?
But no, they don't say that.
They want to deconflict.
So are you against this deconflict?
I guess we're supposed to be maybe for that and change the name.
Yeah.
Well, here's a proof in the pudding.
You know, the politico and the mainstream media wants to cover for Biden.
Well, he had a sharp rebuke of Netanyahu.
He had some tough words for him.
But then in the same breath, put up the next one.
Tough words for Netanyahu, yet as Bill Hartouing get repunciable.
Statecraft writes, Biden okays more arms to Israel, crushing the hope of a Gaza shift.
So on one hand, he's saying, gosh, you guys, you really should stop bombing.
By the way, want some more bombs?
You'd think that people would wake up when they see there's a hoax out there, but no, they march on.
And except for the fact that the division is like it's never been before, to think of, you know, what has happened in this country with the Palestinian Americans splitting with Israel.
I don't think that's happened quite that way.
When I guess Biden was having his fundraiser, they said, well, there's going to be a lot of people up there raising cane.
Minimum Wage Mandate Consequences 00:06:04
I went, what was that?
Oh, it's the Palestinians.
They didn't have any, I don't know whether they did.
They probably tried to get a few people out for Biden.
But this was more spontaneous.
It involves what we are talking about, but not exactly for the same arguments and the reasons.
Yeah.
Well, I guess we'll move on to, do you want to continue with this some more?
I'm finished on this one.
We'll go and talk about franchises.
Our good friend Norman Singleton sent this over this morning.
He pulled our chestnuts out of the fire, and we were wondering what to talk about.
California, as you may have heard, Dr. Paul, they have just, they're going to make everyone rich.
They just raised the minimum age to 20 bucks an hour.
It doesn't matter what you do, bike messenger, whatever, minimum wage, $20 an hour.
Everyone's going to get a living wage.
Well, unfortunately, it doesn't quite work that way, as you know better than anyone else.
It causes the prices to go up.
Boy, that's for sure.
And they ignore some fundamental principles in economics.
And this is bred into the system because even the businessman answers these questions in a sort of a pragmatic way, not on a philosophic way, of government shouldn't be in the business.
Why should government be involved in setting wages?
All activity in a free society should be voluntary.
But no, who's going to direct it?
Isn't it amazing how quickly they passed that law?
I think the governor suggested it, and they passed that law in no time.
So I wonder if they had that around.
But that is really, really dumb.
And the record will be that there's going to be, well, it's not going to work.
Some people will be fired.
The companies are going to make less money.
And companies are going to go bankrupt.
And costs are going to go up.
So the consumer and even the worker is not going to benefit other than for a week or two.
Because it does push all prices up, too.
So that won't be a solution.
But they start with the principle: well, you have to have good management.
You have to find out what 51% want.
You have to have the majority tell us what to do.
And all of a sudden, we have this mess out there.
And then they say, well, there's a miss.
And that's what's wrong with free enterprise.
Look at what it's given us.
Yeah, yeah.
Well, they're going to, you know, what's going to happen is that you've got to pay the burger flipper 20 bucks an hour.
Well, that means the burger is going to start costing 20 bucks.
And then what's Newsom going to do?
He's going to say, you are gouging people with these high prices.
We're going to force you to lower the prices.
And the franchise owners are going to say, okay, we'll go belly up.
We'll just close the whole thing down.
Yeah, boy, there's one out there that owns a lot of these franchises.
Just think, how many people have been very happy with him, or he wouldn't have grown that?
He grew because he provided the service and the price was right.
Now they want to come in, they won't be able to provide the service, and the prices are going to go up.
And the other people, somebody was describing the average person working in these fast food places.
And they're usually young people.
It's a second job, and they're in college and work on their way through.
And a lot of them are going to suffer the consequences.
Sounds good.
Oh, $20 an hour.
When the minimum wage used to be $5 or $6, they would promote, well, we have to raise, that'd be a big argument.
We have to raise it about $1.50.
That's what we think they should have.
And some of us would argue, well, if it's so good, why don't you make it $15?
It would be so absurd.
Oh, okay.
Then before you knew it, that's what they were doing.
Now it's $20 an hour.
Oh, somebody is, one of the congresswomen suggested $50.
Yeah, yeah, yeah, $50.
Yeah, that's what we need.
That was so outrageous.
They said, oh, no, we want sanity in what we're doing.
Well, you know, it's not only kids that are working in these places, but a lot of retirees.
You know, that's tough to live on that Social Security.
If you're able to do it, and I think they also like it for a little bit of the social aspect as well.
You know, it helps keep the mind moving and a little bit of money coming in.
They're going to be gone.
You know, there are statistics now showing that measuring the employment, the number of people employed, it's 800,000 overstated.
Because let's say you have somebody working in there, he's on Social Security, and he goes back and works 15, 20 hours a week.
Ah, new job.
You know, he's desperate to survive.
And he has a new job, and they put him down on the list.
They found out that there's very few new jobs that are productive jobs.
In the old days, it was an industry that was developing and the computer industry and what?
New people, they had jobs that they were producing stuff or services.
But so often now it's a gimmickery.
So this, you can hardly say, oh, this is a solid job.
Maybe I can get rid of one of my jobs.
$20 an hour.
And I'll take all the overtime.
And yet, what happened?
He goes from eight hours down to four hours a day or something.
Yeah.
Well, let's put it up.
This is from the New York Post, but it's all around.
And as you point out, this is about a person who has several McDonald's franchises.
Put that, go back one, please.
There we go.
McDonald's franchisee raises prices after California minimum wage law, but he won't charge 20 bucks for a happy meal.
And interesting, I like the article underneath it: Panera Bread has been exempted from the $20 minimum wage requirement after the donor, the owner, donated to California governor.
How about corruption in California?
So here's the franchise owner.
Let's go to the next clip.
And as you say, Dr. Paul, very successful man.
Unintended Consequences 00:05:10
He owns a bunch of franchises, but he makes a very good and simple point.
As a business owner, when you're dealing with this kind of extraordinary overnight change, you know, a 25% increase in wages.
No stone has to remain unturned, Roderick told CNN.
And go to the next one now.
Here's some more unintended consequences.
There we go.
The new law also forced Roderick to rethink large capital expenses.
He will postpone renovating the dining room and hold off on plans to buy new grills and rooftop air conditioning machines.
So that's economics.
That's just basic stuff, right?
He doesn't want to fire people, and so he's going to have to hold off on renovations and things to make it better.
You know, people who want special interests and special power and unearned income, they have to believe in that system.
Because the other one, you have to have some talent, and you have to be a manager.
People don't want to recognize that.
So if the manager has all his, what right does he have to have all those franchises?
Well, who voted him to do that?
Well, the good democracy is when the consumer is the voter.
And if they come to his store and supports him, that is a real vote for liberty and personal choices.
But that's not when they do this.
This is the elimination of the benefits coming from personal choices.
But they do it in everything.
They do it in foreign policy.
They do it in economic policy.
And they do it in all social events.
Thinking that, oh, well, we have to do this because they're doing something we don't like.
And so they regulate everything.
So that's why I think keep it simple, and that is everything should be voluntary.
And have one rule.
You have to have one rule, which would be more powerful because it's a moral rule.
And as you can't hurt other people, you can't steal.
Simple.
Oh, boy, that's brilliant.
You'll put the government out of business.
That's what they do.
That's it.
All right.
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Over to you, Dr. Paul.
Very good.
You know, the silliness of the minimum wage law is what we just discussed, how foolish it is.
It doesn't work.
And the big problem, it's a violation of liberty.
It violates the basic principle that you have.
Contracts should be very, very important in a free society.
But also the exchange, whether it's an employer, an employee, or customer and a businessman, as long as things are voluntary, boy, there'd be nothing for the warriors to do because things would go so much smoother.
And we've had examples of this in the country.
It's never perfect for sure.
But we've had a lot more of voluntarism.
And I can't understand the tremendous benefit from this and the attractiveness of saying, oh, you mean you can do anything you want?
Yeah, I wouldn't even have an income tax.
It's your money.
Spend it the way you want.
But you can't defraud people.
You can't hurt people.
You can't rob.
But just think of all the things going on.
Look at what we've had now with this socialized democracy where people gang up and you have enough special interest that you can demand, oh, okay, yeah, the businessman doesn't deserve any protection.
We're going to gouge him personally by saying he has to pay his employees $20 an hour, $30 an hour, and everybody knows it won't work.
Yet politically, they think they can gain it.
But what we hope for is that the average individual will get an education outside the government schools.
Because the government schools I've educated, most of the people that I knew in Congress, they didn't study Austrian economics.
They didn't understand sound money.
But they went along with this.
And yet, it isn't a complex formula that you have to understand to bring about good results.
You have to just say, do you like volunteerism and do you like nonviolence?
And really, you don't have to go a whole lot further.
Because if you say, well, yeah, but we have to have more protection to protect the value of our money, you know, and our Constitution said we will, but we'll let the government, you know, set the interest rates and increase the money supply every time the special interest demands something.
Well, it doesn't work because that's based on theft.
And I think you have to remember one thing, and that is that where they trick us into accepting this is Bastiat made the point so clearly.
They said, Bastiat made the point that if you want something, your neighbor is rich and has something, you don't have the right to go in and steal it.
Governments Obey Expected Rules 00:00:27
Most people even understand that.
No, that'd be theft.
But you can send your politician in there and we'll reward him by sending him donations and get him re-elected so he keeps doing all dirty work for us.
So that means governments should obey what we are all expected to obey in a free society based on non-intervention.
I want to thank everybody for tuning in today to the Liberty Report.
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