by Michael Lesher

In one sense, I don’t have much to say about the newest chapter in the eight-year-old American war against the people of Ukraine – nothing that you can’t learn from an array of sources as politically diverse as George Galloway and Peter Hitchens, Tariq Ali and John Mearsheimer.

After all, the facts really aren’t complicated. Russia’s recent invasion, far from being “unprovoked” (as shamelessly claimed in mainstream media), follows eight years of the US-backed Ukrainian regime’s deadly shelling of ethnic Russians near the border of Russia itself, in fighting that has killed more than 13,000 civilians in territory Vladimir Putin’s administration pledged to protect long ago.

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The real target is us. And whatever news we see from Ukraine in the mainstream press – now, tomorrow, a month from now, whenever – that’s one point we mustn’t forget.

Remember the rapid erosion of free speech throughout the West as the COVID coup started to intensify? Well, that was just a foretaste of the censorship we can expect to see on social media as our opinion-makers shift to a Cold War footing. Remember the marginalization of news sources whose information about SARS-CoV-2 didn’t square with the Official Message?

The senseless banning of RT in many “free” countries since Russia’s invasion suggests how that trend will proceed. Remember the way accurate public comment about Anthony Fauci or Bill Gates became an act of sedition as of 2020?

Today, arbitrary government crackdowns (no warning, no trial, no proof of illegal acts) are already getting worse; war hysteria will further aggravate them.

As for the economy, Reuters is reporting “wild swings in the prices of oil, metals and other raw materials” – surely a harbinger of worse things to come.

In fact, rising consumer prices, shortages, fiscal contraction, increased unemployment – all products of lockdowns – are already showing signs of spiraling out of control as the super-rich fatten off war profiteering and the rest of us are lectured about the “sacrifices” expected of us in the fight against the Russian Beelzebub.

https://off-guardian.org/2022/04/09/ukraine-a-new-battle-in-the-old-war-of-the-new-normal/