https://corbettreport.substack.com/p/what-is-programmable-money
What Is Programmable Money?
There are 3 types of people in this world.
There are those who read that SWIFT has "solve[d] the significant challenge of interoperability in cross-border transactions by bridging between different distributed ledger technology (DLT) networks and existing payment systems" and
get a chill down their spine
rub their hands in glee
ask what SWIFT is, get bored halfway through the answer, and go back to checking their TikTok feed
Now, given that you're reading this editorial, you're probably in the first category of people. (And if you're in the second category, all I can say is GET OFF OF MY LAWN YA DAMN GLOBALIST BANKSTER, YOU!)
But I guarantee most of your friends, family, co-workers, neighbours and acquaintances are in the third category. And who can blame them? Financial mumbo jumbo is designed to be as eye-wateringly boring and unsexy as possible.
But here's the rub: while the public focuses on distractions and entertainment, the global banking cabal is hard at work engineering a new form of money that will serve as the backbone of the most sophisticated system of financial surveillance and control the world has ever seen. It is not hyperbole to say that the very fate of the human species hangs in the balance.
So, are you at a loss to explain to your normie friends why the coming central bank digital currency (CBDC) paradigm is so important and why it should be a primary concern for all of humanity?
Well, then, today is your lucky day. This editorial is for you . . . and them!
WHAT IS PROGRAMMABLE MONEY?
Let's start today's exploration with a simple question: what is central bank digital currency?
Here's the not-so-simple answer: central bank digital currency is an electronic token of a nation's official currency issued by that nation's monetary authority, often (but not exclusively) using distributed ledger technology.
Still unclear? Don't worry, that's to be expected. Specialist language is often used to dissuade the public from becoming engaged in important topics, and the world of currency creation is certainly no exception to that rule. From the IMF's SDRs to SWIFT and CIPS, from DLTs to CBDCs, from the petroyuan to the digital yuan, those seeking a deeper understanding of monetary matters quickly find themselves drowning in a sea of impenetrable acronyms and complicated jargon.
So let's get back to basics: what is money?
Although it's a simple question, the answer to that question largely depends on whom you ask.
If you ask a member of the Sound Money Defense League, you'll get an earful about the history of precious metals.
If you ask John Titus, you'll get a half-hour presentation featuring coloured marbles and Kool Kats and Jolly Jesters. (Seriously, watch the video. It's good.)
If you ask me, you'll get a documentary on the Federal Reserve or a radio program on monetary reform or an hour-long podcast on Survival Currency.
But if you ask our friends (<-SARCASM!) over at the Bank for International Settlements, you'll get a Jackson Pollack-inspired work of visual diarrhoea that looks like this:
(Seriously, whoever is making these infographics for the BIS and the WHO and the other members of the globalist alphabet mafia needs to be fired.)
But, as ridiculous as this kaleidoscopic Venn diagram of nonsense may seem at first glance, the "money flower" does tell us something important about what we think of as "money" in the current economy: it can take many forms.
From peer-to-peer, non-electronic money (e.g., local currency) to universally accessible, electronic, non-central-bank-issued money (e.g., bank deposits) to electronic, central bank-issued, non-peer-to-peer, non-universally accessible money (e.g., central bank reserves), "money" (or at least what most people think of as money in their day-to-day lives) comes in an assortment of flavours.
And then there's CBDC.
As you'll note, central bank-issued electronic "money" comes in different flavours—from "central bank digital currency" to "central bank-issued cryptocurrency (retail)" to "central bank-issued cryptocurrency (wholesale)"—and occupies multiple spots on the BIS' chart.
Is CBDC universally accessible? Possibly. Is it peer-to-peer? It depends. Both universally accessible and peer-to-peer? Well, it could be.
You see, CBDCs are not a singular, rigidly defined thing. From the underlying technology used to issue, track and record these digital tokens to the network upon which they flow to the protocol that network follows, every part of a central bank digital currency is customizable.
On the surface, this might seem like a trivial point. After all, why should Joe Blow or Jane Soccermom care what type of distributed ledger technology (DLT) a CBDC operates on or even whether it uses DLT at all? You scan your device, you hear a beep, your account is debited by a certain amount and you walk out of the store with your newly purchased pack of gum. What's the big deal?
The big deal, of course, is that CBDCs are not like cash or bank deposits or the other forms of payment that we use in our everyday transactions. Instead, they are programmable.
Just like a piece of software running on your computer or an app on your stupidphone, CBDCs can be programmed to act in certain ways. Conditions can be set on their use. They can be created or deleted, frozen, devalued or inflated with the click of a button. And, like any piece of software, they can be updated—with or without your knowledge—to provide new functionality at any time.
So here is the next question we must tackle in this exploration: What can CBDCs be programmed to do?
HOW WILL THIS BE USED AGAINST US?
Let's turn back to our Joe Blow example above. He goes to the store as usual, picks up a pack of gum, takes it to the register, scans his device and waits for the beep. But this time the beep doesn't come.
"What's going on here? I have enough funds in my account to buy a pack of gum!"
"I'm sorry, sir, but it says here that you participated in the Freedom Protest last Sunday. The central bank has deemed you a domestic terrorist and frozen access to your wallet. You'll have to report to the nearest Re-education Centre for a full indoctrination course before you can make purchases again."
Just a few years ago this scenario might have seemed like far-fetched science fiction. But, given what we've experienced in recent months—from Canada's crackdown on the Freedom Convoy supporters to the latest PayPal censorship scandal—who can deny we're on the cusp of this scenario becoming a daily occurrence in the dawning digital dystopia?
This is the danger of programmable money.
I'm glad more and more people have seen the now-infamous clip of Agustin Carstens—the rotund general manager of the Bank for International Settlements—explaining the appeal of CBDCs to his banking cabal buddies. There, smack dab in the middle of an IMF livestream on cross-border payments, Carstens admits plain as day that CBDCs will enable the creation of a financial surveillance and control grid that dictators of the past could only dream of:
We don't know who's using a $100 bill today and we don't know who's using a 1,000 peso bill today. The key difference with the CBDC is the central bank will have absolute control on the rules and regulations that will determine the use of that expression of central bank liability, and also we will have the technology to enforce that.
As I've noted a number of times now, the entire CBDC agenda is laid bare by Carstens in those two chilling sentences. It is not just about the complete surveillance of all transactions that CBDCs will enable—knowing "who's using a $100 bill today"—it's about the banks' ability to "determine the use of that expression of central bank liability" and "the technology to enforce that."
"Determine the use of that expression of central bank liability"? This is more financial gobbledygook designed to hide the true horror of a chilling proposal. What does that actually mean in plain English? It means that CBDCs could be programmed so that they are only spendable if the holder of those funds meets certain requirements.
Do you remember that parking ticket you forgot to pay last month? Well, your central bank-issued CBDC wallet remembers, and it will just subtract those funds (plus a late-payment fee) from your account when you're not looking. Got caught supporting the wrong fundraiser or the wrong political cause? Don't worry, in a world of CBDC transactions, you wouldn't have been allowed to donate to that cause in the first place, because your wallet wouldn't let you!
Following this line of thought, programmable money could also be used to perfect a system of carbon credits and individualized ESG scores. In today's world, it would be incredibly difficult for the government to implement a scheme where every store has to check your carbon allowance before allowing your next purchase. Sure, EBT cards can be programmed to disallow purchases from liquor stores, casinos or other naughty businesses, but stopping people from spending their own bank deposits (or cash) is much trickier.
In the CBDC world of the future, however, such restrictions could be programmed into the ledger itself. If your carbon credit or your ESG score is below a certain amount, no soup for you! (. . . Unless you're going to throw that soup on a painting to protest climate change, of course. That'll be allowed.)
These concerns are not merely theoretical, nor are they the ravings of wide-eyed conspiraloonies. A director of the Bank of England came out last year to highlight these very features of digital currency, declaring that there could be "some socially beneficial outcomes" to stopping people from buying what they want, such as "preventing activity which is seen to be socially harmful in some way."
What's more, we know that the idea of a social credit system being used to allow or disallow purchases is not just some Black Mirror-esque sci-fi fantasy but a lived reality in China. It requires absolutely no imagination whatsoever to understand how programmable money could be used to restrict our purchases based on our social credit ratings, carbon allowances, ESG scores, allegiance to political causes or absolutely any other arbitrary criteria.
And we haven't even gotten to the economic ramifications of programmable money. The infinite malleability of CBDCs is a wet dream to the technocratic tyrants who wish to manipulate the financial system to their benefit.
Consider this: CBDCs are not fungible. Each digital token in your CBDC wallet is individually identifiable, sequesterable and programmable. So let's imagine the central banksters, in their infinite wisdom, decide that people aren't spending enough. They could build demurrage into the network protocols; the longer a CBDC sits unspent in your wallet, the less it's worth.
Again, this is no hypothetical concern or flight of fancy. Even the UK government committee that made headlines for "condemning" the plan to create a new UK digital currency as a "solution in search of a problem" listed the fact that "a digital pound could be set to be spent by a deadline or on particular products or services" as one of the potential advantages of a Bank of England-issued CBDC.
Or take the problem of bank runs. If and when digital currency becomes predominant, the threat of bank runs becomes non-existent. If CBDCs are designed—as they certainly could be—so that they are not interchangeable with bank deposits or cash or other forms of central bank liability, then there's no withdrawing them from the bank and stuffing them under your mattress. Bank bail-ins? Negative interest rates? Hyperinflation? Whatever happens, you're in for the ride.
Yes, even a moment's thought reveals that as bad as things are right now—with governments freezing the bank accounts of protesters and payment processors threatening to fine users for spreading "disinformation" and banks cutting off business with those who commit wrongthink—it will be much, much worse in a world of programmable money.
WHAT CAN WE DO ABOUT IT?
As I stressed above, CBDCs are not a singular thing. They can take different forms, they can be rolled out in different ways, and there is no international standard for their implementation among the various national central banks (yet). Indeed, it's even possible that any given country might reject the use of CBDCs altogether.
Given this state of affairs, it's tempting to think that a respite from the CBDC nightmare will be found in this or that corner of the globe. Maybe this country won't implement the social credit control grid. Maybe that country is too undeveloped to roll out a proper digital surveillance grid. Maybe some freedom-respecting, sovereignty-loving nation will stand up to the globalists and reject digital currencies altogether!
It's a nice thought, but—as my regular readers know by now—CBDCs are already being used, trialed or studied in almost every nation on earth. In fact, far from technological backwardness shielding populations from the digital currency agenda, CBDCs seem to be rolling out fastest in some of the lesser-developed nations. And as for freedom-respecting nations resisting the push for programmable money, the very BRICS members that some still (falsely) believe to be standing up to the globalist mafia are not just embracing the digital currency agenda, they are—in the case of the explicitly globalist, Agenda 2030-promoting Chinese and Russian governments—leading the race to implement CBDCs of their own.
No, the hope of avoiding this CBDC calamity does not lie in the hands of some mythical group of crusading white hats on the global(ist) stage, as the hopium addicts contest. There is no cabal of ruling oligarchs anywhere on the planet who would reject a technology that could help them to better control the cattle that populate their tax plantation.
On the contrary. Like so many other aspects of the globalist agenda, we soon discover that the power to end this madness is ours and ours alone. The key to the digital prison is right here in our hands.
The future depends on us.
It depends on us finding others who understand the gravity of the situation and building community with them. It depends on us developing survival currencies to see us through the coming storm. It depends on us finding and supporting our local producers. It depends on us boycotting the bad and buycotting the good. It depends on us embracing Cash Fridays and Black Market Friday and then realizing that these things don't have to happen only on Friday. It depends on us doing the million things that we can do to beat the banksters at their own game and win the war on cash.
Of course, it won't be easy. It's not supposed to be. The path of convenience leads to the world of total surveillance and control. If we want to avoid that path, we're going to have to get used to taking the path less travelled.
But in the end, it's our choice to make.
For the time being, we decide who we transact with and in what form. We decide whether we buy this item or that item. We decide whether we buy from this business or that business. We decide whether we shop at the supermarket or the farmer's market. We decide whether we pay with cash or credit or Apple Pay or seashells or playing cards or anything else. We decide whether we pay over the table or under the table, whether we barter or trade or provide service in kind or whether we just walk away and buy nothing at all.
The choice is ours to make, and we're making it thousands of times each and every day, whether we know it or not.
No, the headlong rush toward CBDCs and digital control will not be stopped just because we join hands and sing kumbaya. Every country around the world will try pushing digital currency on their populations at some point in the coming years. But it's not set in stone that this push will succeed.
Programmable "money" is only money if we submit to using it.
....
https://scheerpost.com/2022/10/13/scott-ritter-pipelines-v-usa/
Pipelines v. USA
Intent, motive and means: People serving life sentences in U.S. prisons have been convicted on weaker grounds than the circumstantial evidence against Washington for the attack on the Nord Stream pipelines.
Circumstantial evidence, just like direct proof, can be used to prove the elements of a crime, the existence or completion of certain acts and the intent or mental state of a defendant. Generally speaking, a prosecutor, to obtain a conviction, needs to show beyond a reasonable doubt that a defendant committed a certain act and that the defendant acted with specific intent.
Nord Stream 1 is a multi-national project operated by Swiss-based Nord Stream AG intended to supply some 55 billion cubic meters (bcm) of Russian natural gas annually to Europe by directly transporting it from Russia, through twin 1,224 kilometer-long pipelines laid beneath the Baltic Sea, to a German hub, from which the gas would be distributed to other European consumers.
The first of the twin pipelines was completed in June 2011 and began supplying gas in November 2011. The second was completed in April 2012 and began supplying gas in October 2012. Gazprom, the Russian gas giant, owns 51 percent interest in the Nord Stream 1 pipeline project.
Nord Stream 2 is a near clone of the Nord Stream 1 project, consisting of twin 1,220-kilometer pipelines laid beneath the Baltic Sea connecting Russia to Germany. Started in 2018, it was completed in September 2021. Like Nord Stream 1, the Nord Stream 2 is designed to deliver approximately 55 bcm of natural gas from Russia to Europe through Germany. Nord Stream 2, like Nord Stream 1, is operated by a multinational company in which Gazprom has 51 percent ownership.
Unlike Nord Stream 1, Nord Stream 2 was never allowed to begin supplying gas.
The Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines are anathema to U.S. national security policy, which for decades has been sour on the degree to which Russian natural gas dominates the European energy market. This animus was perhaps best captured by a column published in the German newspaper DieWelt in July 2019.
The piece, co-authored by Richard Grenell, Carla Sands, Gordon Sondland (respectively, the U.S. ambassadors to Germany, Denmark and the European Union), was entitled “Europe must retain control of its energy security” and made the argument that the “Nord Stream 2 pipeline will drastically increase Russia’s energy leverage over the EU,” noting that “[s]uch a scenario is dangerous for the bloc and the West as a whole.”
Observing that “a dozen European countries rely on Russia for more than 75 percent of their natural gas needs,” the ambassadors concluded “This makes United States allies and partners vulnerable to having their gas shut off at Moscow’s whim.”
Moreover, the ambassadors claimed,
“European Union reliance on Russian gas presents risks for Europe and the West as a whole and makes U.S. allies less secure. The Nord Stream 2 pipeline will heighten Europe’s susceptibility to Russia’s energy blackmail tactics. Europe must retain control of its energy security.”
The ambassadors also wove in some critical geopolitical context as well, declaring
“Make no mistake: Nord Stream 2 will bring more than just Russian gas. Russian leverage and influence will also flow under the Baltic Sea and into Europe, and the pipeline will enable Moscow to further undermine Ukrainian sovereignty and stability.”
Russia’s “weaponization” of energy against Europe was the topic of a “debate” that Gary Peach and I carried out in December 2018 on the pages of Energy Intelligence, which monitors issues pertaining to global energy security. Gary, one of EI’s senior writers, covers Russian energy.
I argued that “Russia has never sought to use its status as a major supplier of energy to Europe as a vehicle of policy influence,” noting that:
“[t]he weaponization of Russian energy comes in the form of sanctions imposed against Moscow and the pursuit of policies designed to curtail development of Russia’s energy sector. It is far easier to make a case that the U.S. and Europe pose a threat to Russian energy security rather than vice versa.”
Gary, on the other hand, noted that
“Gazprom’s supply contracts exhibit the underlying economic threat from Moscow: The pricing formula is roughly the same for all countries, but those countries in Russia’s good graces receive an arbitrary ‘discount.’” He concluded that “when Gazprom is the only conceivable gas supplier, it has shamelessly abused the monopoly.”
In December 2019 the administration of President Donald Trump imposed sanctions in a desperate last-second bid to prevent the Nord Stream 2 pipeline from being completed.
These sanctions were waived by the administration of President Joe Biden in May 2021 in an effort to be seen as repairing relations with Germany that had been severely frayed during the Trump administration. However, upon completion, Nord Stream 2 was prevented from operating by objections raised by German regulators regarding licensing issues, which were not expected to be resolved until mid-2022.
In the lead up to the Russian invasion of Ukraine, the Biden administration devised a plan to punish Russia by imposing severe economic sanctions which would target the Russian energy sector, including measures designed to halt the delivery of gas from Russia to Germany via the Nord Stream pipelines.
One of the issues confronting U.S. policy makers was finding the right mix of sanctions that would succeed in harming Russia without destroying the European economy in the process. Policy makers on both sides of the Atlantic, however, recognized that meaningful sanctions which targeted Russian energy contained collateral risk to the European economy which could not be avoided.
One of the mechanisms that U.S. and E.U. policy makers were hoping would alleviate the economic consequences of sanctioning Russian energy was to increase the supply of U.S. liquified natural gas (LNG) to Europe. Since 2016 the amount of LNG supplied by the U.S. to Europe has increased, with more than 21 bcm delivered in 2021.
But 21 bcm couldn’t begin to offset the quantity of natural gas being shipped by Russia to Europe in case of any large-scale disruption of Russian energy supplies brought on by the imposition of economic sanctions that targeted the Russian energy sector.
After the Russian invasion of Ukraine — and the realization that the energy disruption to Europe was going to be far greater than had been anticipated — Biden made good on his promise to increase the supply of U.S. LNG to Europe. But the quantities still fell far short of demand, and at prices that were, literally, bankrupting all of Europe.
The Victims
With Germany blocking the operation of Nord Stream 2 and sanctions precluding the repair of the Nord Stream 1, the German population began bearing the brunt of the sanctions on Russian energy.
Despite their government’s insistence that it would remain resolute in confronting what it perceived as Russian aggression against Ukraine, the German people had other plans. By Sept. 26 they began taking to the streets in large numbers to demand that their government open the Nord Stream 2 pipeline and provide the German people and economy with the energy needed to survive.
The Crime
On Sept. 26, the Nord Stream 2 pipeline reported a massive drop in pressure. The next day, the Nord Stream 1 pipeline reported the same. A Danish fighter jet, flying over the pipeline route, reported seeing a one-kilometer diameter disturbance in the water off the island of Bornholm, directly over the Nord Stream 2 pipeline, created by the massive release of natural gas underwater. (Danish authorities have estimated that between the two pipelines the total amount of methane released into the atmosphere was around 500,000 metric tons.)
The incident took place in the exclusive economic zone of Sweden, and the Swedish Security Service took the lead in investigating what had happened. (Curiously, Russia was not invited to participate, despite having a vested economic and security interest in the matter.)
“After completing the crime scene investigation,” the Swedes reported, “the Swedish Security Service can conclude that there have been detonations at Nord Stream 1 and 2 in the Swedish economic zone,” noting that the blasts had caused “extensive damage” to the lines.
The Swedes also declared that they had retrieved some materials from the incident site, which were being analyzed to determine who was responsible. This evidence, the Swedes stated, “strengthened the suspicions of gross sabotage.”
While all parties involved with the Nord Stream pipeline “sabotage” concur that the cause was manmade, no nation outside Russia has named a suspect. (Russian President Vladimir Putin has attributed the attack, which Russia has labeled an act of “international terrorism,” on the “Anglo-Saxons” — the British and Americans.)
Biden dismissed the Russian claims. The pipeline attack “was a deliberate act of sabotage and the Russians are pumping out disinformation and lies,” the U.S. president said. “At the appropriate moment, when things calm down, we’re going to be sending divers down to find out exactly what happened. We don’t know that yet exactly.”
But we do know. Biden told us himself. So did Secretary of State Antony Blinken. So did the U.S. Navy. Between the three, we have incontrovertible evidence of intent, motive and means — more than enough needed to prove guilt beyond any reasonable doubt in a court of law.
Intent
Speaking to reporters on Feb. 7, Biden declared “If Russia invades, that means tanks or troops crossing the border of Ukraine again, there will no longer be a Nord Stream 2. We will bring an end to it.”
When a journalist asked how Biden could do such a thing, given that Germany was in control of the project, Biden retorted: “I promise you: We will be able to do it.”
No prosecutor has ever had a more concise statement of intent — a veritable confession before the event — than this. Joe Biden should be taken at his word.
Motive
When asked by reporters on Oct. 3 to comment on the Nord Stream pipeline attacks, Blinken responded in part by noting that the attack was “a tremendous opportunity to once and for all remove the dependence on Russian energy and thus to take away from Vladimir Putin the weaponization of energy as a means of advancing his imperial designs.”
Blinken further declared that the U.S. would work to alleviate the “consequences” of the pipeline attack on Europe, alluding to the provision of U.S. LNG at exorbitant profit margins for U.S. suppliers — another “opportunity.”
Prosecutors often speak of cui bono, a Latin phrase that means “who benefits,” when seeking to import motive for a crime committed, under the presumption that there is a high probability that those responsible for a specific crime are the ones who stand to gain from it.
Blinken. Tremendous opportunity.
Cui Bono.
Means
In early June, in support of a major NATO exercise known as BALTOPS (Baltic Operations) 2022, the U.S. Navy employed the latest advancements in unmanned underwater vehicle, or UUV, mine hunting technology to be tested in operational scenarios.
According to the U.S. Navy, it was able to evaluate “emerging mine hunting UUV technology,” focusing on “UUV navigation, teaming operations, and improvements in acoustic communications all while collecting critical environmental data sets to advance the automatic target recognition algorithms for mine detection.”
One of the UUV’s used by the U.S. Navy is the Seafox.
In September, specialized U.S. Navy helicopters — the MH-60R, capable of employing the Seafox UUV — were tracked flying off the Danish island of Bornholm, directly over the segments of the Nordstream 1 and 2 pipelines that were later damaged in the sabotage incidents.
“On November 6, 2015, the NATO Seafox mine disposal unmanned underwater vehicle was found during the scheduled visual inspection of the Nord Stream 1 gas pipeline. It lay in space between gas pipelines, clearly near one of strings. NATO said the underwater mine disposal vehicle was lost during exercises. Such NATO exercises when the combat explosive device turned out to be exactly under our gas pipeline. The explosive device was deactivated by Swedish Armed Forces at that time.”
Guilty Beyond Reasonable Doubt
The burden that exists to prove guilt beyond a reasonable doubt “is fully satisfied and entirely convinced to a moral certainty that the evidence presented proves the guilt of the defendant.” In the matter of the Nord Stream 1 and 2 attacks, this burden has been met when it comes to assigning blame to the United States.
Biden all but confessed the crime beforehand, and his secretary of state, Blinken, crowed about the “tremendous opportunity” that was created by the attack. Not only did the U.S. Navy actively rehearse the crime in June 2022, using the same weapon that had been previously discovered next to the pipeline, but employed the very means needed to use this weapon on the day of the attack, at the location of the attack.
Guilty as Charged
The problem is, outside of Russia, no one is charging the United States. Journalists run away from the evidence, citing “uncertainty.” Europe, afraid to wake up to the reality that its most important “ally” has committed an act of war against its critical energy infrastructure, condemning millions of Europeans to suffer the depravations of cold, hunger and unemployment —all the while gouging Europe with profit margins from the sale of LNG that redefine the notion of “windfall” — remains silent.
There is no doubt in any thinking person’s brain as to who is responsible for the attacks on the Nord Stream 1 and 2 pipelines. The circumstantial case is overwhelming and fully capable of winning a conviction in any U.S. court of law.
But no one will bring the case, at least not at this moment.
Shame on American journalism for ignoring this flagrant attack on Europe.
Shame on Europe for not having the courage to publicly name their attacker.
But most of all, shame on the administration of Joe Biden, who has lowered the U.S. to the same standard of those it hunted down and killed for so many years — a simple international terrorist, and a state sponsor of terrorism.
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