New York Times reporter, social media censorship supporter, and First Amendment non-fan Steven Lee Myers’ “news analysis” led Thursday’s front page: “Voters Strain Under Deluge Of Untruths -- Disinformation Climbs to a Sordid New Peak.” And who’s responsible? The Russians, Donald Trump, Elon Musk, and Republicans in general. Myers noted false claims from Russia about Gov. Tim Walz being spread on social media by a Florida deputy sheriff, then transitioned smoothly to blame “the world’s richest man, Elon Musk” for helping spread it. (Musk is a billionaire that the Times feels free to criticize, unlike George Soros, who the paper shields by accusing conservative critics of anti-Semitism.) Smears, lies and dirty tricks -- what we call disinformation today -- have long been a feature of American presidential election campaigns. Two weeks before this year’s vote, however, the torrent of half-truths, lies and fabrications, both foreign and homegrown, has exceeded anything that came before, according to officials and researchers who document disinformation. The effect on the outcome on Nov. 5 remains to be seen, but it has already debased what passes for political debate about the two major party candidates, Mr. Trump and Vice President Kamala Harris. It has also corroded the foundations of the country’s democracy, undermining what was once a shared confidence that the country’s elections, regardless of who won, have been free and fair. As if the mainstream media hasn’t done that very thing itself with its own brand of election interference. And does a sweet image of a girl and a puppy really have a corrosive effect on democracy? If posted by a Republican, then yes, evidently. A fictitious image of a girl clutching a puppy in a life raft so moved Amy Kremer, the chairwoman in Georgia for the Republican National Committee who posted it this month, that she stood by it even after she learned it was not real. “Y’all, I don’t know where this photo came from and honestly, it doesn’t matter,” she wrote on X, where her initial post received more than 3 million views. “It is seared into my mind forever.” The Times is disappointed that conservatives have taken steps to neutralize Big Government censorship online. A concerted conservative legal and political campaign that went all the way to the Supreme Court has abetted the falsehoods about election fraud anyway. The project has undercut government agencies, universities and research organizations that once worked with the social media giants -- especially Facebook and Twitter -- to slow the spread of disinformation about voting. Myers circled back to the left’s current Public Enemy No. 2, space entrepreneur and X owner Elon Musk. Perhaps the single biggest factor in today’s disinformation landscape has been Mr. Musk’s ownership of Twitter, which he bought two years after the 2020 election and rebranded as X. And could this be the first mention in the Times of Meta chief Mark Zuckerberg’s “sorry, my bad” letter to Congress for interfering in the 2020 election process? In August, Mr. Zuckerberg wrote a mea culpa to Representative Jim Jordan of Ohio, the Republican chairman of the House Judiciary Committee, who has led the conservative charge against moderation by the major social media platforms. Mr. Zuckerberg said that, in hindsight, Facebook had wrongly restricted access to some content about the pandemic and the laptop belonging to Mr. Biden’s son, Hunter. “We’ve changed our policies and processes to make sure this doesn’t happen again -- for instance, we no longer temporarily demote things in the U.S. while waiting for fact-checkers,” he wrote. Perhaps the most galling part of the story was recruiting Democratic hack and PolitiFact founder Bill Adair onto Team Truth vs. Republicans: One of the trailblazers in fact-checking in the United States has been PolitiFact, which the journalist Bill Adair founded in 2007 to measure the claims politicians make on a scale from true to mostly true, mostly false to “pants on fire.”….While “all politicians lie” might be a common lament, Mr. Adair said that the blame has tilted significantly to the Republican Party. “You have a convergence of a politician and a party that believe they can benefit from lying,” he said.

This is the first part of a three-part investigation into the United Nations' origins and plans for the future of the world. The United Nations has become a target of increased scrutiny in recent years. As the United Nations announces more and more plans for humanity's future, it seems like we should ask ourselves where the United Nations came from and where it thinks humanity is going. Most inquiries about the United Nations end up explaining its functions, but the question of its long-term goals is harder to answer. It is necessary to explore the origins of the United Nations and the key figures behind this shady international organization. The United Nations “came into existence” on October 24, 1945. However, if we want to understand its full purpose, this is not the beginning of the story. One place to start is the founding of another organization called the Lucis Trust. Alice and Foster Bailey founded the Lucis Trust in New Jersey on April 5, 1922. It was started as a “vehicle to foster recognition of the universal spiritual principles at the heart of all work to build right relations.” Alice and Foster Bailey were members of the Theosophical Society. Isobel Blackthorn, who has a Ph.D. in Western esotericism, characterizes the beliefs of theosophy: “Central to Theosophy are: a belief in the existence of the soul, reincarnation and the interconnectedness of all existence; an epochal view of evolution that includes consciousness; the transmission of an Ageless Wisdom from master to disciple; and a commitment to humanitarianism.” Lucifer as philosopher A view of the recently enlarged and remodeled Meditation Room at United Nations headquarters. Image courtesy of the UN More practically, the Lucis Trust was founded to house a publishing company, originally called “Lucifer Publishing Company,” established a month later in May 1922. For some reason, most people had a problem with this name: “It soon became clear to the Baileys that some Christian groups have traditionally mistakenly identified Lucifer with Satan.” For this reason, the Lucifer Publishing Company was changed to the Lucis Publishing Company sometime in the mid-1920s. A discrepancy on the Lucis Trust website makes it unclear whether the publishing company's name was changed in 1924 or 1925, but it was undoubtedly changed by 1925. A common misunderstanding surrounding this organization is that the Lucis Trust was ever called the Lucifer Trust. Only the publishing company was ever named “Lucifer” for a short period of its history. The organization maintains, however, that these two words bear roughly the same meaning, with one simply being more palatable: “Both ‘Lucifer' and ‘Lucis’ come from the same word root, lucis being the Latin [genitive] case meaning of light.” Theosophists claim that Lucifer is important to their belief, not as the figure of Satan but as a Promethean figure who brought knowledge to man: “[Theosophy] views Lucifer as one of the solar Angels, those advanced Beings Who Theosophy says descended (thus “the fall”) from Venus to our planet eons ago to bring the principle of mind to what was then animal-man.” It is left to the reader to determine whether this is a convincing argument for the difference between the two figures. Aside from the publishing company, the Lucis Trust also established the Arcane School (1923), Triangles (1937), and World Goodwill (1932). The Arcane School “trains people in meditation and service to develop their spiritual potential.” It seeks to “help students understand and accept discipleship responsibility and to recognize the part that they can play in the evolution of consciousness by serving humanity.” Triangles is “a service activity, using the power of thought and of prayer to uplift and transform consciousness.” The Arcane School and Triangles are educational activities people can engage in and learn from. These descriptions, while vague, start to make a little more sense in light of the larger project and belief system of the Lucis Trust and the United Nations. World Goodwill, however, has a closer institutional relationship with the United Nations, so this is where we should focus for the time being. To begin with, the Lucis Trust is listed as an NGO by the U.N. and “has Consultative Status with the Economic and Social Council of the United Nations (ECOSOC).” World Goodwill is also an NGO, separate from the Lucis Trust. The Lucis Trust and World Goodwill can actively participate in U.N. oral arguments, meet representatives, and recommend policy. There are over 4,800 NGOs that enjoy this status, according to the U.N. website. The same page says, “Millions have already engaged with, and will own, this 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development with its 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).” Interestingly, World Goodwill is particularly focused on promoting the Sustainable Development Goals and has been “historically recognized by the UN.” Together, these organizations push for greater recognition of the U.N. and its objectives: “Since their inception Lucis Trust and World Goodwill have given their support through meditation, educational materials and seminars, by highlighting the importance of the UN's goals and activities as they represent the voice of the peoples and nations of the world.” A New World Order religion JIM WATSON/Getty Images If this isn’t enough to establish the close relationship between the ideas of the Lucis Trust, Alice Bailey, theosophy, and the United Nations, the Lucis Trust encourages people who “value the power of thought ... to support the United Nations through meditation, invocation and prayer” and to visit the U.N. meditation room, which was constructed shortly after the United Nations came into existence. Dag Hammerskjöld, the second secretary-general of the United Nations, who personally oversaw the creation of this room, describes one of the aspects of the room: “People of many faiths will meet here, and for that reason, none of the symbols to which we are accustomed in our meditation could be used.” More on this later. This article does not suggest that Alice Bailey was a founder of a global religion or that the United Nations is some sort of “church” following in lockstep. It also does not suggest a coordinated, unitary vision of spirituality within the United Nations. Consider why George Soros and China had a falling out in the '80s: China saw a concrete vision for the future that could not be strayed from, while Soros imagined an indeterminate “Open Society.” For present purposes, the United Nations and its spiritual vision are more similar to Soros’ approach to society than China’s. Going forward, however, it is essential to understand that Bailey’s influence can be found within the United Nations. Moreover, the spiritual dimension of the United Nations needs to be recognized. Bailey’s theosophical teachings have created a spiritual impulse that is felt in its members from the U.N.’s inception to this day. Even the likes of Eleanor Roosevelt have publicly participated in these spiritual practices, reciting Alice Bailey’s Great Invocation in 1952 from the United Nations headquarters in New York. Part of the Invocation reads, “Let Christ return to Earth,” but interestingly, there is a footnote mark next to the word “Christ,” which reads: “Many religions believe in a World Teacher, a 'Coming One,' knowing him under such names as the Lord Maitreya, the Imam Mahdi, the Kalki Avatar and the Bodhisattva. These terms are sometimes used in versions of the Great Invocation for people of specific faiths.” Suffice it to say that they do not clarify this when praying before a largely Western audience. This sleight of hand appears in much of the U.N.'s thought, and people should be aware that this is what the invocation means when it refers to Christ. One important figure “closely associated” with Alice Bailey was Robert Muller, who “served in the U.N. for forty years and was assistant to three Secretary-Generals. Muller devised the World Core Curriculum for which he was awarded the UNESCO Peace Education Prize of 1989, a curriculum loosely based on Alice Bailey’s 'Education in the New Age.' He contributed to Alice Bailey’s magazine, The Beacon, and addressed Arcane School conferences.” Robert Muller was an influential figure in the United Nations for most of its history. His story is told in part two.

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The prominent neoconservative Robert Kagan has resigned his position as an editor at large at the Washington Post due to the paper’s Friday decision not to endorse a candidate for president.  Subscribe…

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The prominent neoconservative Robert Kagan has resigned his position as an editor at large at the Washington Post due to the paper’s Friday decision not to endorse a candidate for president.  Kagan has had a long career within neoconservative politics, founding with William Kristol of the Project for a New American Century. Both Kagan and Kristol advocating for regime-change in Iraq long-before the Iraq war, including in a New York Times op-ed in 1998. Throughout the conflict, Kagan repeatedly praised the Iraq War, declaring victory multiple times, praising the “surge,” and claiming after the invasion that Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction were merely yet to be found. More recently, Kagan has served as a senior fellow at the Brookings Institution.  Kagan, much like Kristol, has emerged since 2016 as an opponent of Donald Trump. He endorsed Hillary Clinton in the 2016 election, and more recently has recently written articles in the Washington Post decrying a hypothetical “Trump dictatorship.” He has confirmed both his resignation and its cause.  Kagan is married to Victoria Nuland, a State Department official best known for her hawkish and anti-Russian views, including for her role in Ukraine’s 2014 “Maidan” Color Revolution, and her promotion of the Russiagate hoax.  The post Neocon Grandee Kagan Resigns Over Post Non-Endorsement appeared first on The American Conservative.