Merkel interrupted her summer holiday in order to hold the press conference and used the media-fomented hysteria following recent attacks in Germany to announce a law-and-order programme. Although the police investigation is still underway, Merkel spoke of “Islamic terrorism”, and described the attacks in Würzburg and Ansbach as a “breach of civilised taboos”. Those pulling the strings, she threatened, would feel the “full force of the law”.

In one breath, Merkel spoke of the attacks in Würzburg and Ansbach, about the “terrible terrorist attacks” in Nice in France, of the attack in Orlando, USA and the murder of a French priest. The aim of the terrorists was to “destroy our way of life”, she said. They were sowing hatred and fear between cultures, and were sowing hatred and fear between religions, the Chancellor said.

On the morning before Merkel’s government statement, the Bavarian state administration, which was holding a cabinet meeting at Tegernsee, announced its own “extensive security package”. It includes more posts and improved technical resources for the police, more staff at the prosecutor’s offices and courts and an expansion of video surveillance in public places and roads, at railway stations and on trains.

In addition, the retention of internet data would be expanded. As well as telephone companies, those providing email services and social media will also be required to store traffic data. Moreover, the 10-week time limit for storing data will be “significantly” increased. Penalties for resisting police officers will be raised from six months up to five years’ imprisonment.

When asked about the Bavarian security package, Merkel told the press conference: “In these matters, we have much common ground.”

More than 5,000 protested in Berlin and thousands more throughout Germany over the 'open-door' policy that many have blamed for four brutal terrorist attacks that left 13 dead over the last month. The Chancellor faced a fresh wave of fury after it emerged that two recent terror attacks and a third killing were carried out by men who entered the country as refugees.

Despite the massive waves of criticism, Merkel defended her policy this week, dramatically proclaiming 'we can do it' as she pledged not to let the violent acts guide political decisions. But now her key ally in Bavaria - which bore the brunt of the attacks - has launched a fresh attack on her leadership, distancing his party from Merkel and straining the coalition that keeps her in power.

Now, however, that sense of unity across Europe and North America against Russian aggression is flailing, as NATO does drastic amounts of self-harm. "Putin has the luck of the devil," Mark Galeotti, a visiting fellow at the European Council on Foreign Relations, told Bloomberg about the fraying nature of NATO. "He can just sit back and watch this richer, more powerful and legitimate values-based bloc tear itself apart."

The lack of commitment to upholding NATO's cornerstone of collective defense from a US presidential candidate undermines the alliance as a whole, experts said, and could cause considerable anxiety among NATO allies — particularly in the Baltic States and Eastern Europe. The failed coup in Turkey has also deeply shaken the military alliance. Turkey has the second-largest military in NATO and provides vital security to the alliance's eastern and southern flanks. However, since the failed putsch, Turkey is rapidly moving away from NATO, the US, and the West as a whole.

"Anti-American sentiment is rising in the Turkish government and on the Turkish street," Aaron Stein, a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council, told Bloomberg. "The Obama administration is at its wit’s end about the Turkey issue."

In fact, it would be very difficult to understate just how obsessed many members of the global elite are with population control. So just who are these people among the global elite who believe so fervently in population control? Some of the names you are about to read below might totally shock you. Many of them are some of the biggest names in the world.

For example, Prince Charles gave a major speech just the other day in which he bemoaned the rapidly expanding world population:

“I could have chosen Mumbai, Cairo or Mexico City; wherever you look, the world’s population is increasing fast. It goes up by the equivalent of the entire population of the United Kingdom every year. Which means that this poor planet of ours, which already struggles to sustain 6.8 billion people, will somehow have to support over 9 billion people within 50 years.”

Many among the global elite believe that the growing world population is the number one problem facing the world.

US Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg… “Frankly I had thought that at the time Roe was decided, there was concern about population growth and particularly growth in populations that we don’t want to have too many of.”

Jacques Cousteau… “In order to stabilize world population, we must eliminate 350,000 people per day.”

CNN Founder Ted Turner… “A total population of 250-300 million people, a 95% decline from present levels, would be ideal.”

Prince Phillip, the Duke of Edinburgh… “If I were reincarnated I would wish to be returned to earth as a killer virus to lower human population levels.”

Planned Parenthood Founder Margaret Sanger… “The most merciful thing that a family does to one of its infant members is to kill it.”

The first of the “new 10 commandments” on the Georgia Guide stones… “Maintain humanity under 500,000,000 in perpetual balance with nature.”

Thomas Ferguson, former official in the US State Department Office of Population Affairs… “There is a single theme behind all our work – we must reduce population levels. Either governments do it our way, through nice clean methods, or they will get the kinds of mess that we have in El Salvador, or in Iran or in Beirut. Population is a political problem. Once population is out of control, it requires authoritarian government, even fascism, to reduce it….”

Princeton philosopher Peter Singer… “So why don’t we make ourselves the last generation on earth? If we would all agree to have ourselves sterilized then no sacrifices would be required — we could party our way into extinction!”

As the next century approaches, the natural forces that are pushing the world towards economic integration will offer governments a broad choice. They can go with the flow, or they can build barricades. Preparing the way for the phoenix will mean fewer pretended agreements on policy and more real ones. It will mean allowing and then actively promoting the private-sector use of an international money alongside existing national monies.

That would let people vote with their wallets for the eventual move to full currency union. The phoenix would probably start as a cocktail of national currencies, just as the Special Drawing Right is today. In time, though, its value against national currencies would cease to matter, because people would choose it for its convenience and the stability of its purchasing power.

The alternative – to preserve policymaking autonomy - would involve a new proliferation of truly draconian controls on trade and capital flows. This course offers governments a splendid time. They could manage exchange-rate movements, deploy monetary and fiscal policy without inhibition, and tackle the resulting bursts of inflation with prices and income polices. It is a growth-crippling prospect. Pencil in the phoenix for around 2018, and welcome it when it comes.

Swiss gold exports to the United States are normally less than 0.5 metric ton a month. And for many months there weren’t any gold exports. However, something big changed in May as Swiss gold exports surged to 20.7 metric tons (665.500 oz).

So what’s going on here? Why the declining US gold exports or surging gold imports from Switzerland? Are foreign countries demanding less gold?? I doubt it. Or how about the massive increase in supposed gold flows into the Global Gold ETFs & Funds?? While there is no way of knowing how much gold these Gold ETFs & Funds hold, something seriously changed in May as the Swiss exported more gold to the US in one month than they have every year for several decades.

Are wealthy Americans finally acquiring a lot more gold? It will be interesting to see that data for the next few months when the USGS releases their Gold Mineral Industry Surveys.

According to LifeSiteNews, the Kenya Catholic Doctors Association say that doctors have uncovered evidence of a mass sterilisation program sponsored by the Kenyan government and funded by Bill Gates. The Kenyan government denies there is anything wrong with the vaccine, and says it is perfectly safe.

The Kenya Catholic Doctors Association, however, saw evidence to the contrary, and had six different samples of the tetanus vaccine from various locations around Kenya sent to an independent laboratory in South Africa for testing.

The results confirmed their worst fears: all six samples tested positive for the HCG antigen. The HCG antigen is used in anti-fertility vaccines, but was found present in tetanus vaccines targeted to young girls and women of childbearing age.

Dr Ngare, spokesman for the Kenya Catholic Doctors Association, stated in a bulletin released November 4:

“This proved right our worst fears; that this WHO campaign is not about eradicating neonatal tetanus but a well-coordinated forceful population control mass sterilization exercise using a proven fertility regulating vaccine. This evidence was presented to the Ministry of Health before the third round of immunization but was ignored.”

At least in Kenya, Catholic doctors are acting and taking a stand against what they see as an involuntary mass sterilization campaign designed to control the population of Africans.

The aircraft will be flown from Ellsworth Air Force Base in South Dakota next month, and the air wing will be accompanied by 300 airmen. "The B-1 units bring a unique perspective and years of repeated combat and operational experience from the Central Command theater to the Pacific," reads a statement from the US Air Force.

"They will provide a significant rapid global strike capability that enables our readiness and commitment to deterrence, offers assurance to our allies, and strengthens regional security and stability in the Indo-Asia-Pacific region." The B-1s will replace B-52 bombers currently stationed in Guam.

But if you have been listening to the endless parade of political speeches at the Democratic and Republican National conventions, you would be tempted to think that the greatest days for the United States are right around the corner. The politicians keep promising us that better times are coming if we will just make the “correct” choices on election day, but no matter who we send to Washington DC things just seem to keep getting worse and worse. Let’s take a look at just a few of the signs that indicate that our country is going in the wrong direction…

The rise in violent crime… Police officers are being shot at a staggering rate… The US economy continues to crumble… The US consumer appears to be increasingly tapped out as the middle class shrinks… Business is not booming… Our politicians just continue to go from bad to worse… Everywhere you look, evil is exploding…

Sadly, most Americans are way too addicted to entertainment to bother noticing that our nation is rapidly going down the toilet: In America today, millions of people would rather spend endless hours playing video games such as Pokemon Go on their phones rather than getting involved in their communities. And it is difficult to say that we even have “communities” anymore when most people spend far more time online than in face to face interaction with others. If you can believe it, one recent survey found that half the population of the United States and Canada uses Facebook at least once a day.

The average American spends more than five hours a day watching television, and the television is telling them that everything is going to be just wonderful and that they should go out and vote for Hillary Clinton because she would be the first woman president and that would make history.

Meanwhile, our society is falling apart in literally thousands of different ways, and most Americans know deep inside that our country is deeply, deeply broken. That is why more than two-thirds of us tell the pollsters that America is on the wrong track. Virtually all of us know that something is seriously wrong with the United States, even if we can’t always agree on what the solutions should be.

It’s not that no one writes about aspects of the arms trade. There are occasional pieces that, for example, take note of the impact of US weapons transfers, including cluster bombs, to Saudi Arabia, or of the disastrous dispensation of weaponry to US allies in Syria, or of foreign sales of the costly, controversial F-35 combat aircraft.

And once in a while, if a foreign leader meets with the president, US arms sales to his or her country might generate an article or two. But the sheer size of the American arms trade, the politics that drive it, the companies that profit from it, and its devastating global impacts are rarely discussed, much less analyzed in any depth.

The most damaging deals, if not the most lucrative, have been the sales of bombs and missiles to the Saudis for their brutal war in Yemen, where thousands of civilians have been killed and millions of people are going hungry.

There is, however, unlikely to be a genuine public debate about the value of the arms business and Washington’s place in it if it isn’t even considered a subject worthy of more than an occasional media story. In the meantime, the United States continues to hold onto the number one role in the global arms trade, the White House does its part, the Pentagon greases the wheels, and the dollars roll in to profit-hungry US weapons contractors.

If true, this would help explain the apparent ineptness of the coup forces. My first hypothesis explaining this ineptness plus other peculiarities of the coup was that the plotters were unwittingly working in a dark operation run by Turkish security forces, intended to make them fail while flushing them out and giving Erdogan a free hand. This possibility of Russian advance warning put together with Erdogan’s own belief that the coup originated in America should yield some serious geopolitical shifts in the region.

We could have an even stronger rapprochement between Turkey and Russia than was already underway, a rapprochement, by the way, which could well have helped tip the United States into giving a wink and a nod (and of course, as always, some cash) to Turkish rebel forces. But that would not be the only reason for America’s supporting a coup.

The truth is, from the American point of view, Erdogan’s erratic behavior – shooting down a Russian war plane, firing artillery into Syria at American Kurdish allies, blackmailing Europe over large numbers of refugees resident in Turkish camps, and still other matters – over the last few years has added uncertainty and potential instability to a strategically important region.

Even if the United States were not involved in the coup, although right now Turkey’s government appears to believe firmly that it was, Putin’s warning would add a powerful positive element to Russian-Turkish relations.

The vice chairman of Ms Merkel's CSU party, he criticised the Chancellor’s stance on migration which has seen millions flow across Germany’s borders. Mr Jahn blamed his government for the “nightmare” gripping locals in Bavaria, the largest state in Germany, which has been the location for three of the most recent attacks to rock the nation.

He said: “People in Bavaria and in the whole of Germany say that, of course, Ms Merkel has failed and, historically, the nation because she decided to ignore the German immigration law and she opened the borders of our country last year for two million immigrants from countries outside Europe. It’s really a nightmare [that] politicians brought to Germany and Bavaria, and people are very worried to be the next victims of terrorism in our country.”

It comes after Bavarian Governor Horst Seehofer announced that “Islamist terrorism has arrived in Germany”, as citizens faced “an entirely new dimension of terrorism – the Islamist-minded terrorism.” Also speaking after the trio of attacks to hit Wurzburg, Munich, and Ansbach, Bavaria’s interior minister, Joachim Hermann, proposed denying entry to any asylum seeker without a valid ID. He said: “Deportation into a war zone should not be taboo as well.”