Now statues across the world could see the same fate - with London’s monument to Lord Nelson which towers over Trafalgar Square being the latest to face calls for the chop. But the demands have provoked a furious response from politicians who claim the removal would be ‘un-British’. In an opinion piece on the Guardian website, columnist Afua Hirsch argued it “is figures like Nelson who immediately sing to mind” when hearing the latest about the 700-odd confederate statues which have been pulled down in the US.

She wrote that while the reaction in Britain to the Charlottesville incident is “almost entirely condemnatory of neo-Nazis in the US”, the “colonial and pro-slavery titans of British history are still memorialised” in the UK. Highlighting monuments such as Lord Nelson’s tower, along with one celebrating notorious slaver Edward Colston in Bristol, she suggested the angry tone seems to disappear. Ms Hirsch wrote: “We have ‘moved on’ from this era no more than the US has from its slavery and segregationist past. The difference is that America is now in the midst of frenzied debate on what to do about it, whereas Britain – in our inertia, arrogance and intellectual laziness – is not.”

The article sparked outrage among some Britons, with former Ukip leader Nigel Farage tweeting: “Shocking that The Guardian are encouraging this. The left really do hate Britain.” Hordes of other people have reacted with horror over the article, with one social media user sharing a photo comparing the “alt-left” to members of Islamic State (ISIS) - who tore up huge swathes of land in Palmyra which was covered in historic statues.

One Twitter user said: “Miss Hirsch doesn’t realise how multicultural Nelson’s navy was and how it saved us from invasion from a dictator.”

“White people, if you don’t have any descendants, will your property to a black or brown family. Preferably one that lives in generational poverty,” Helm writes in an article titled “White people, here are 10 requests from a Black Lives Matter leader.” White people are asked, “Give up the home you own to a black or brown family,” pass on any inherited property “to a black or brown family,” or “re-budget your monthly so you can donate to black funds for land purchasing.”

White women, especially, are urged to “get a racist fired” or “get your boss fired cause they racist too,” Helms writes. She concludes, “Commit to two things: Fighting white supremacy where and how you can (this doesn’t mean taking up knitting, unless you’re making scarves for black and brown kids in need), and funding black and brown people and their work.”

During a press conference in New York City last Tuesday, President Donald Trump condemned the neo-Nazis and white nationalist protesters in Charlottesville. “I’ve condemned neo-Nazis. I’ve condemned many different groups,” Trump said before calling the man who rammed a car into counter-protesters and killed a woman a “disgrace” and a horrible “murderer.”

Maduro has faced months of deadly mass protests by opponents who blame him for an economic crisis and are demanding elections to replace him. International pressure has also grown, with US President Donald Trump even saying this month that the United States reserved the option of military intervention in the Venezuela crisis. Maduro pointedly highlighted his alliance with Russia, which had rejected Trump's recent threat as "unacceptable."

The Venezuelan leader said he wanted to "keep strengthening the military cooperation agreement" between the two countries "for the sovereign defense of Venezuela." Russia recently sold fighter jets and ground to air missiles to Venezuela. "Venezuela has the full and absolute support of Russia," he said, adding that he would soon go to Moscow to meet with Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Of course, the real question that needs to be asked here is simple: “If Assad is killing his own people, why are Syrians running back to him in droves?” Why would people who were being slaughtered by their own government rush back to it at the earliest possible opportunity? Perhaps because they actually prefer to live in Syria than some other country.

Perhaps their government isn’t killing them like Americans are being told they are. It is also important to point out that the rate of return for Syrian refugees has increased directly with the amount of territory liberated by the Syrian government. In other words, as the Syrian government liberates more territory, more Syrians return to their homes in government-controlled territory.

Obviously, if Syrian refugees were fleeing Assad, we would be seeing an increase in refugees. Regardless, it is clear to all who are not being paid to see otherwise that Syrians are returning home because America’s terrorists are losing territory and, thus, they now have the ability to return to their homes under government control.

While alternative media researchers have been pointing this out since the beginning of the conflict, mainstream media now has no choice but to admit that Syrians are willingly returning to the country run by the man these same outlets have attempted to demonize and destroy for six years. Slowly but surely, the mainstream media’s narrative surrounding Syria is unraveling in front of everyone’s eyes.

After enduring the worst natural disaster in American history, New Orleans was given billions of dollars to fix their flood control infrastructure, yet the city government has utterly failed to follow through. And let’s not forget what happened after Katrina. Multiple investigations found that the levees failed due to things like poor design, improper materials, and a lack of maintenance. And everyone knew for decades that one day those levees would fail, yet they kept kicking the can down the road. They’re still kicking the can.

So what really causes a natural disaster? Is it really an act of God, or are people to blame? There’s nothing “natural” about corruption and mismanagement. That’s what’s really responsible for most disasters, and that’s what really caused the flooding in New Orleans in 2005, and in 2017. And it’s not just New Orleans that we see human weakness written all over a natural disaster with massive casualties. Pretty much every time there is an earthquake, a fire, or a storm that kills hundreds or thousands of people, you’ll find that people failed to prevent the preventable. They built unstable buildings and failed to maintain levees.

Or they built homes where they should have never been built. A stone marker in Japan reads, “High dwellings are the peace and harmony of our descendants. Remember the calamity of the great tsunamis. Do not build any homes below this point.”

The marker was placed near Fukushima, and there are hundreds of them all over Japan that were built by tsunami survivors centuries ago. They’re a warning to future generations, not to build their homes too close to the coastline. The village that resides above this marker was untouched by the Tohoku tsunami that devastated Japan in 2011. The people who lived below it were not so lucky.

In reality, natural disasters are rare. The kinds of disasters that are completely unexpected and kill lots of people who didn’t know they were in danger, only strike once in a blue moon. But man-made disasters, the kinds that are caused by a lack of preparedness, willful ignorance, corruption, and normalcy bias, are very common. They happen every day.

At Monday night's board meeting, the teacher at the center of the controversy spoke out. With emotions high, she addressed a packed house. "I'm so proud of my students, it was never my intent to harm any students but to help them through a difficult situation," she said. The teacher defended her actions to read two children's books about transgenderism including one titled "I am Jazz." She says the books were given to her by a transgender child going through a transition.

"The kindergartners came home very confused, about whether or not you can pick your gender, whether or not they really were a boy or a girl," said England. Parents say besides the books, the transgender student at some point during class also changed clothes and was revealed as her true gender.

And many parents say they feel betrayed and blindsided. "I want her to hear from me as a parent what her gender identity means to her and our family, not from a book that may be controversial," a parent said. "My daughter came home crying and shaking so afraid she could turn into a boy," another parent said.

Soros, a Hungarian-born Jew who has spent a large part of his fortune funding pro-democracy and human rights groups, has repeatedly been targeted by Hungary's right-wing government, in particular over his support for more open immigration. In the latest case, Prime Minister Viktor Orban has backed a campaign in which Soros is singled out as an enemy of the state. "Let's not allow Soros to have the last laugh" say billboards next to a picture of the 86-year-old investor, a campaign that Jewish groups and others say foments anti-Semitism.

Soros, who rarely addresses personal attacks against him, has not commented on the billboards. But Hungarian Jewish groups and Human Rights Watch, an organization partly funded by Soros, have condemned the campaign, saying it "evokes memories of the Nazi posters during the Second World War". Many posters have been defaced with anti-Semitic graffiti, including the words "stinking Jew" written in magic marker.

Knowing there were problems ahead for the Jews, Soros’ father, who was a successful lawyer, bribed a government official to take 14 year old George Soros in and say he was his Christian godson. While hundreds of thousands of Hungarian Jews were being shipped off to the death camps, George Soros accompanied his appointed “godfather” around confiscating property from Jews. George admitted it wasn’t difficult at all to take part in taking property from the Jews.

Kroft asked Soros if it bothered him?

Soros: It created no problem at all.

Kroft: No feeling of guilt?

Soros: No.

Why should Israel tread lightly when it comes to this monster who had no feelings of guilt about taking property from fellow Jews during the Holocaust?

According to the NukeMap website, the dropping of the B-83, the largest bomb in the current US arsenal, would kill 1.4 million people in the first 24 hours. A further 3.7 million people would be injured, as the thermal radiation radius reached 13 km. 

Likewise, the "Tsar Bomba" is the largest USSR bomb tested. If this bomb was dropped on New York, it is estimated that it could kill 7.6 million people and injure 4.2 million more. The nuclear fallout could reach an approximate area of 7,880 km on a 15 mph wind, impacting millions more people. 

Both America and Russia's arsenals are regulated by several treaties that place limits on the numbers and kinds of warheads and delivery systems they have.  If either country were to expand their nuclear capacity even further, as Trump and Putin have hinted at, it could shatter these agreements and plunge the world into a new Cold War.

Our figures on nuclear weapons, based on statistics from the Arms Control Association, are mainly estimates because of the secretive nature with which most governments treat information about their arsenals. 

That failed narrative has now been replaced with a new mass hysteria: "a new cultural Civil War is inevitable." In this narrative, America has succumbed to us-versus-them divisions divided by all-or-nothing ideological bright lines. Snap out of it, America: you're being played, just as you were played by the absurd "Russia hacked the election" mania.

The core strategy here is the destruction of any common ground: once the delusion that there is no common ground left has been cemented by relentless mainstream and social media hysteria/propaganda, the populace fragments into echo-chamber fiefdoms of ideological conformity that are easily manipulated by the political-financial power structure.

Once the populace has been fragmented into ideologically divisive camps, controlling the resulting mass of warring mobs is easy. Rather than recognize the commonality of their powerlessness and impoverishment, the fragmented fiefdoms are easily turned on each other: From the point of view of each fragmented fiefdom, the problem isn't structural ie the dominance of extreme concentrations of wealth and power; the "problem" is the other cultural-ideological fiefdoms.

Once the masses accept this false division and the destruction of common ground, their power to reverse the extreme concentrations of wealth and power is shattered. The play is as old as civilization itself: conjure up extremists (paying them when necessary), goad the formation of opposing extremists, then convince the populace that these extremists have been normalized ie your friends and neighbors already belong to one or the other.

This normalization then sets up the relentless demands to choose a side - the classic techniques of misdirection and false choice.