By Ron Paul
President Donald Trump and former Vice President Joe Biden spent most of last week’s first Presidential debate trading insults and interrupting each other. The result was a debate with very little discussion of actual issues or policies. In one of the evening’s few substantive exchanges, President Trump rightly criticized Vice President Biden for saying he would listen to the “scientists” in determining whether to lock down the country. President Trump also acknowledged that the lockdowns were a harmful over-reaction that needs to end. Unfortunately, President Trump once again pledged that Covid vaccines would soon be available. This raises the specter of a repeat of the swine flu debacle where a vaccine rushed into production for political purposes caused more deaths than the swine flu itself. President Trump also raised concerns about mandatory Covid vaccinations by suggesting the military would be in charge of vaccine distribution. Vice President Biden vehemently denied he was a socialist, while championing increased spending, taxes, regulations, expanded Obamacare, and a modified "Green New Deal." Biden may not consider himself a socialist, but if his economic plans were implemented it would take America further down the road to socialism — and serfdom. President Trump also denounced socialism, while bragging about his own big government policies such as tariffs, massive spending increases, and plans to maintain the “popular” provisions of Obamacare. One topic that did not come up was gun control. This may have been because both candidates support infringements on the Second Amendment. Joe Biden was chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee when it passed gun control measures like the assault weapons ban and the “Brady Bill.” President Trump has not only banned bump stocks by executive order, which President Obama refused to do because his Attorney General correctly determined that the President lacks the authority to do so, but has enthusiastically endorsed “red flag” laws. These laws allow law enforcement to, as President Trump put it, “take the guns first worry about due process later.” The Congressional Budget Office has projected that the federal debt will exceed the gross domestic product next year and reach 195 percent of GDP by 2050! This report was issued before this week’s revelation that the federal debt reached record levels of $27 trillion. This is the biggest threat to our national security, but it was unmentioned during the debate. This is not surprising since few in the political or media elite understand the debt crisis well enough to give it the attention it deserves. Although if Biden wins and Democrats seize control of the Senate, Republicans will likely remember they are supposed to be against big spending and debt. One critical area that could have led to an interesting exchange was monetary policy. Biden has called Trump’s tweets attacking the Fed as an assault on Fed’s independence, as if the Fed were ever free from political pressure. President Trump has gone from supporting a fed audit, criticizing low interest rates, and supporting the gold standard, to pushing the Fed to adopt the insane policy of zero interest rates The debate is the latest evidence the two major parties will not on their own restore our lost liberties. Those who want to roll back the welfare-warfare state should avoid focusing on political parties or personalities. Instead we must focus on spreading the ideas of liberty among our fellow citizens and building a liberty movement that puts principles of liberty above partisanship.
As Fauci warns Americans that they need to 'hunker down' again to avoid viruses, a group of top scientists and epidemiologists have released a detailed plan to get over the covid crisis while actually preserving lives. Also today: the economic costs of the shutdown continue to devastate and...victory in Michigan against a tyrant?
Get your copy of Ron Paul's new mini-book with a donation to the Ron Paul Institute. More information here: http://ronpaulinstitute.org/archives/peace-and-prosperity/2020/october/01/support-rpi-get-ron-pauls-new-mini-book/  By Jeff Deist Today's headlines announced Donald and Melania Trump "tested positive" for covid-19. Another claims nineteen thousand Amazon workers "got" covid-19 on the job. Both of these pseudostories are sure to ignite another absurd media frenzy. As always, the story keeps changing: Remember ventilators, flatten the curve, the next two weeks are crucial, etc.? Remember Nancy Pelosi in Chinatown back in February, urging everyone to visit? Remember Fauci dismissing masks as useless? Why should we believe anything the political/media complex tells us now? So what do these headlines really mean? What exactly is a covid "case"? Since the beginning of the coronavirus outbreak, most US media outlets have been exceedingly credulous and complicit in their reporting. Journalists almost uniformly promote what we can call the "prolockdown" narrative, which is to wildly exaggerate the risks from covid-19 to serve a political agenda. They may be motivated to hurt Trump politically, to promote a more socialist "new normal," or simply to drive more clicks and views. Bad news sells. But the bias is clear and undeniable. This explains why media outlets use the terms "case" and "infection" so loosely, to the point of actively misinforming the public. All of the endless talk about testing, testing, testing served to obscure two important facts. First, the tests themselves are almost laughably unreliable in producing both false positives and negatives. And what is the point? Are we going to test people again and again, every time they go out to the grocery or bump into a neighbor? Second, detecting virus particles or droplets in a human's respiratory tract tells us very little. It certainly does not tell us they are sick, or transmitting sickness to anyone. Take a perfectly healthy person with no particular symptoms and swab the inside of their nose. If the culture shows the presence of staphylococcus aureus, do we insist they have a staph infection? When someone drives to work without incident or accident, do we create statistics about their exposure to traffic? —A virus is not a disease. Only a very small percentage of those exposed to the virus itself—SARS-CoV-2—show any kind of acute respiratory symptoms, or what we can call "coronavirus disease." The only meaningful statistics show the incidence of serious illness, hospitalizations, and deaths. The single most important statistic among these is the infection fatality rate (IFR). Data collected through July shows that the IFR for those under age forty-five is actually lower than that of the common flu. The covid-19 IFR rises for those over fifty, but it is hardly a death sentence. And the data does not segregate those with preexisting health issues caused by obesity, diabetes, and heart disease. If we could see data only for reasonably healthy people under fifty, the numbers would be even more reassuring. Mild or asymptomatic covid cases are effectively meaningless. The world is full of bacteria and viruses, and sometimes they make us a bit sick for a few days. There are millions of them in the world all around us, on our skin, in our nose and respiratory tract, in our organs. We are meant to live with them, which is why we all have immune systems designed to help us coexist and adapt to ever-changing organisms. We develop antibodies naturally, or we attempt to stimulate them through vaccines, but ultimately our own immune systems have to deal with covid-19. The virus will always be out there waiting, on the other side of any lockdown or mask—so we might as well get on with it. From day one the focus should have been on boosting immunity through exercise, fresh air, sunlight, proper dietary supplementation, and the promotion of general well-being. Instead our politicians, bureaucrats, and media insisted on business lockdowns, school closures, distancing, isolation, masks, and the mirage of a fast, effective vaccine. As with almost everything in life, state intervention made the situation worse. We can only hope many governors are removed from office, either by impeachment or at the next election. Several, including Andrew Cuomo in New York and Gretchen Whitmer in Michigan, should face criminal charges for their lawless edicts. There is no due process exception for "public health." Lockdowns were never justified, either in terms of the covid-19 risk or the staggering economic tradeoffs, which will be felt for decades. They certainly are not justified now, given seven months of additional data showing that the transmission and lethality of covid-19 are not particularly worse than previous SARS, swine flu, or Ebola pandemics. We still don't know how many of the reported two hundred thousand US covid-19 deaths were actually caused by the SARS-CoV-2 respiratory disease, or simply reflect people who died of other causes after exposure to covid-19. We do know that the harms caused by the lockdowns far outweigh the harms posed by the covid-19 virus. We have had nearly eight months of life and liberty stolen from us by politicians and their hysteria-promoting accomplices in media. How much more will we accept? This article was originally published at The Mises Institute. 
America, the federal republic & America, the global empire. Two distinct Americas. The first was marked by individual liberty, sound money, free markets and a foreign policy of non-intervention. The latter is marked by dependence on government, fiat money, dominance of government and politically-connected business, and endless war. Sound money fueled America's rise. Federal Reserve counterfeiting is hastening its decline.
The Centers for Disease Control have released a "helpful" set of guidelines for upcoming holidays. Celebrating Halloween or Thanksgiving as we did in the "old normal" is out of the question. Consider a "virtual" Thanksgiving, they recommend. Also today, CNN tells us there is NO RETURN to normal, and if you want to return you may be mentally ill.
Also - Why is CIA Director Haspel blocking declassification of documents critical to understanding "Russiagate"? Also, as discussed on today's program, get your copy of Dr. Paul's BRAND NEW mini-book, "The End of Unearned Opulence" with a $50 donation to the Ron Paul Institute. For a $100 donation, Dr. Paul will hand-sign it. This is a LIMITED TIME offer! Go to: http://www.RonPaulInstitute.org/support
Last night's presidential debate was more like a food fight than a serious discussion of policies. Moderator Chris Wallace lost control early on and seemed to bring his biases with him to the event. Underneath all the rudeness and screaming, however, a few important points and distinctions can be made. In today's Liberty Report we will do our best to bring those distinctions to light.
 By Chris Rossini Human life, which consists of 7+ billion individually conscious 'I's,' can be described with the words 'radical decentralization.' Human life is radically decentralized. First, there are no carbon copies of the 7+ billion of us. No copies with anyone who lives now, who has lived in the past, or who will show up after us in the future. Even identical twins are one-of-a-kind individuals. We each perceive, interpret, and uniquely explain the world to ourselves. We each choose what to believe, what we desire, and how to act to achieve those desires. Radical decentralization. We're also equipped with boundless imaginations. We can imagine whatever we want. It can be fact or fiction, true or false, practical or impossible, logical or illogical. But while we have this liberty of thought, there is only one universal government that the whole world lives under. This government cannot be "regime changed." There can be no coup, overthrow, or abdication. It has the characteristics that man-made governments want, but can never have. This universal government is simply known as the truth. We can imagine that which is not true. We can even believe that which is not true. But we cannot create, bring about, or turn into reality that which is not true. So if a person (or group of people) imagine that they can take the radical decentralization of human life, and centralize it under their own command, they are imagining something that isn't true or achievable. They can act on their imagination. They can plan and build "structures." They can add to the "structures" of those who went before them. They can take 100 years, 1,000 years, or even 1,000,000 years to try to erect their centralized control, but it still wouldn't be true or achievable. Human life is radically decentralized. Centralizers can create the deadliest weapons that can blow the planet to smithereens, and human life is still radically decentralized. They can stick a camera and microphone on every square inch of the Earth, and human life is still radically decentralized. They can censor, and censor, and censor, and the truth still stands and is communicated between us. We're unique individuals, responsible for ourselves. That's a huge job and it lasts a lifetime. In your private home, you're responsible for the affairs of yourself and your family. It would be quite odd, if someone told you, that in addition to that, you're now responsible for what goes on in your neighbor's house, as well as the house two doors away, and three doors away....and so on. That's an impossible task. You cannot assume such a responsibility and succeed. You've got your own stream of problems and challenges to face and deal with. When an event occurs at your neighbor's house, it is for the people who live there, and who are directly experiencing the event, to deal with it. Sure, you can voluntarily offer assistance, and your neighbor can either accept or reject your assistance. But it's impossible for you to be responsible for the affairs that take place there. This is so easy for most people to understand. However... Bring in politics, and the opening to be a busybody in the lives of others, and this understanding of reality is thrown directly out the window. The illusion and fantasy of centralized power captivates even the most brilliant, rational and logical individuals. It seduces those who are otherwise geniuses in their own fields of specialization. This mentality snowballs into the dumpster fire that we call American politics today. Yet, it wasn't always this way. Those who formed the original American colonies and United States started off really well. Not perfect, of course, but really well. They acknowledge the radical decentralization of human life. They acknowledged the right to one's own life, to one's individual liberty, to one's own property, to the pursuit of one's own happiness, and to the fruits of one's own labor. The federal government was a weak sideshow. Local affairs were to be solved locally. The federal government wasn't there to abridge our liberty (see the Bill of Rights). It wasn't there to centralize all power to itself. Even America's foreign policy was something to be greatly admired. George Washington said to “steer clear of permanent alliance with any portion of the foreign world." Thomas Jefferson said the foreign policy of America was "peace, commerce, and honest friendship with all nations—entangling alliances with none." Boy, was the wrong road taken after this, or what? Everything changed at the start of the 1900's. In 1898, the U.S. conquered foreign nations and inherited 11 million new inhabitants. The taste of empire, and being a global busybody was now in its early stages. The next major thrust would come with Woodrow Wilson's foolish entry into the European War (World War I). The American empire would expand again after World War II. It would expand again during, and especially after, the Cold War. And today, in 2020, the United States claims that the entire Earth is its sphere of influence. The entire Earth!!! Anyone who watched the Presidential debate last night saw that the chaos is not only the foreign policy of empire that has bankrupted the country, but local centralization of power as well. Nothing is off limits to the federal government. It touches every aspect of the lives of 300+ million American people. The president is supposed to have a position on a virus, on the weather, on healthcare, on the economy, on education, on every U.S. state's affairs, on medicine, on vaccines, on the stock market, on riots, on policing ... The centralization now encompasses every square inch, and the chaos of this centralized power couldn't be more obvious. No one is happy, yet everyone seems to be looking to centralized power as the fix! No! Centralized power is the problem! The rejection of individual liberty is the problem! This is a world of radical decentralization. Centralized power can do nothing but turn every aspect of life upside-down. Yet no one wants to admit that the jig is up. It's as if everyone is curious and wants to see what the next level down into the abyss looks like. Why? It's going to be worse than even this! The first step in fixing this problem is admitting it. May Americans get there sooner rather than later. But there's no time to wait around for everyone else. Let us each individually accept the radical decentralization of human life and live by it. Let's each refuse to be a busybody that sticks his or her nose into everyone else's business. Let's each keep our own houses in order to the best of our abilities. Our own unique life is sufficient enough. 
Thrilla in Manila? Hardly. Tonight's presidential debate has many hanging at the edge of their seats, but it's not because they are interested in a serious philosophical discussion about the direction of the United States, a country clearly in crisis. Will Biden show up? Will Trump bring his bombast? How many punches will fly? But the debate will be marked more by what is NOT said by the candidates. Also today, Fauci and CDC Director Redfield declare war on Dr. Scott Atlas.
By Ron Paul
In the Soviet Union it was forbidden to dispute the wisdom of the “party line.” That’s because Marxian communism was viewed as the scientifically inevitable progression of mankind. For Marx and Lenin, the “science was settled.” Therefore anyone speaking out against “the science” of the Soviet system must be acting with malice; must actually want destruction; must want people to die. Anyone voicing opposition to the “settled science” of Marxism-Leninism soon found their voice silenced. Oftentimes permanently. Ironically, just 30 years after the “science” of Marxism-Leninism imploded for all the world to see, we are witnessing a resurgence here in the US of the idea that to question “the science” is not to seek truth or refine understanding of what appears to be conflicting evidence. No, it is to actually wish harm on one’s fellow Americans. And while we who question “the science” are not being physically carried off to the gulags for disputing the wisdom of our “betters” in the CDC or the World Health Organization, for example, we are finding that the outcome is the same. We are being silenced and accused of malicious intent. The Soviet Communists called dissidents like us “wreckers.” Last week on my daily news broadcast, the Ron Paul Liberty Report, we reported on two whistleblowers from inside the CDC and Big Pharma who raised serious and legitimate questions about the prevailing coronavirus narrative. The former Chief Science Officer for the pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, Dr. Mike Yeadon, has stated that from his experience he believes that nearly 90 percent of the current tests for Covid produce false positives. That means that this massive expansion in “cases,” used to justify continued attacks on our civil liberties, is simply phony. As Dr. Yeadon said in a recent interview about the Orwellian UK coronavirus lockdown, “we are basing a government policy, an economic policy, a civil liberties policy, in terms of limiting people to six people in a meeting...all based on, what may well be, completely fake data on this coronavirus?” Is Dr. Yeadon correct in claiming that based on his scientific observation there is no “second wave”? We don’t know. But we do know that his claims that the massive increase in “cases” in Europe used to justify new lockdowns are not in any way being matched with a similar increase in deaths. The EU’s own charts prove this. Deaths remain a flat line near zero while “cases” skyrocket to match the massive increase in testing. Yet when we reported on Dr. Yeadon’s findings on the Liberty Report last week we found that for the first time ever, our program was removed by YouTube. YouTube, owned by Google, which is firmly embedded into the deep state, was vague in explaining just where we violated their “community standards” by simply reporting on qualified scientists who happen to disagree with the mainstream coronavirus narrative. But they did offer this shocking explanation in an email sent to us at the Ron Paul Liberty Report: “YouTube does not allow content that explicitly disputes the efficacy of the World Health Organization.” Incredible! It’s not the science that is settled. What appears to be “settled is the impulse to silence anyone who asks “why”? The Centers for Disease Control have come out with a new estimate of the Covid infection fatality ratio and the numbers will shock you. No wonder the Florida governor has said "enough is enough" and decided to open his state up completely. We are told to trust the CDC, so why is the mainstream media ignoring this very important news? Is this still about a disease...or is it politics?
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