It’s The Climate, Dummy

Whitney Webb: Bankers Use Climate Scam in Latin America to Introduce Digital Currency Globally

The currency in Argentina has been devalued and people are being pushed into dollar-denominated stable coins like Tether that allows the FBI to spy on users. The goal is programmable currency, whether it is issued by central banks or private companies, that allows bankers to control the money and spending over all people.

Every capital city of latin America has eagerly signed on, unaware of the strings attached to the partnerships, paving the way for a sweeping surveillance apparatus tied to American intelligence under the guise of combating climate change.

.Latin America is quietly being forced into a carbon market scheme through regional contractual obligations – enforced by the satellites of a US intelligence-linked firm – which seeks to create an inter-continental “smart grid,” erode national and local sovereignty, and link carbon-based life to the debt-based monetary system via a Bitcoin sidechain.

Sweeping across the shores of Latin America comes a scheme from some of the most predatory figures in the venture capital ecosystem of the United States. It is a brazen attempt to assert foreign influence across Latin America and threatens to reshape the very fabric of the region and the day to day lives of its people. At its core is a serpentine set of contractual obligations, held at the municipal level, cast throughout Central and South America, upheld by an intelligence-linked satellite company, and controlled by a private se­ctor consortium of green-washed financiers aiming to turn the region’s forests into equity and carbon credits. At the same time, it obliges local governments to spend “conservation” funds on projects that further financialize nature and aid the construction of an inter-continental “smart” grid. One of its key ambitions appears to be further entrenching the debt load of the region through the multi-lateral development banks and the dollarization of the continent from the subnational level up through carbon markets upheld by a digital ledger. What seems like a technological marvel aimed at progress and connectivity harbors a darker agenda — one that intertwines planetary surveillance, financial predation, geopolitical maneuvering, and the domination of a resource-rich continent buried in debt.

This grand design, known by the acronym GREEN+ and conceived by stalwarts of the digital dollar and debt schemes of the private sector, has quietly taken root through a web of political entanglements at the local level. Even a key figure in the Drexel Burnham Lambert junk bond scandal plays a role. Astonishingly, every capital city of Latin America has eagerly signed on, apparently unaware of the strings attached to these seemingly benign partnerships, while a majority of municipalities in the region have also made commitments with these same groups that will push them to join GREEN+, potentially in a matter of weeks. The (hopefully) well-meaning regional governments have unwittingly paved the way for a sweeping surveillance apparatus tied to American intelligence that threatens to erode privacy and civil liberties under the guise of progress and combating the climate crisis.

Upon further observation, GREEN+’s connections reveal a disturbing narrative of financial interests melding with geopolitical ambitions. The backers of the satellite company share ties with former members of the highest offices of US financial policy and regulation alongside the key architects and profiteers of private capital creation, aiming to consolidate control over monetary flows in Latin America within the redistribution of distressed government debt from the public to the private sector. As this two-part series will show, this concerted effort is not merely about surveillance – it’s a calculated move towards further dollarization, tightening the grip of corporate and technological monopolies over the economic landscape of the Americas.

The scheme’s proponents also speak of how it will significantly advance the “economic” and “regional” integration of the Americas, invoking visions of unity while obscuring the true nature of their agenda for economic domination and stronger regional governance. Their model, eerily reminiscent of the EU’s transition from a free trade union to a bureaucratic behemoth yoked to the US through the Eurodollar, sets the stage for unelected entities to enforce policies through programmable money, enabled by smart contracts on blockchains and designed to benefit the few at the expense of the many. What materializes before us is not just a technological evolution but a quiet banker coup — one that lays the groundwork for land grabs and invasive surveillance under the guise of progress and conservation. It’s a narrative that echoes throughout history, where intelligence-linked figures and predatory financial interests converge to prey upon the Global South, leaving a trail of economic exploitation and geopolitical manipulation in their wake. What masquerades as progress for individuals and the environment at large may very well be the harbinger of a new era of subjugation and control.

THE GREEN+ PROGRAM

In 2022, several groups came together to launch the GREEN+ (Government Reduction of Emissions for Environmental Net + Gain) Jurisdictional Programme, the “first program that will monitor by satellite all subnational protected areas of the planet” and – through contracts with numerous local and state governments – propel and deepen the economic integration of the Americas through the quiet imposition of a continent-wide, blockchain-based carbon market.

GREEN+ has been piloted in a handful of Latin American cities since its founding and is due to launch globally in just a few weeks time. Most of the GREEN+ agreements with “subnational” governments have remained focused on Latin America. Per the program, the subnational agreements have established the “rules and requirements to enable accounting and crediting with GREEN+ policies and measures and/or nested projects, implemented as GHG mitigation activities,” with GREEN+ being described as “the planet’s new subnational government advisory mechanism.”

Key to the program are the services provided by GREEN+ founding member Satellogic, an Argentina-founded company closely aligned with Peter Thiel’s Palantir and Elon Musk’s SpaceX that specializes in sub-meter resolution satellite surveillance. Satellogic, a contractor to the US government and whose founders were also previously contactors for the US’ DHS, NSA and DARPA, will provide surveillance data of the entire world’s “protected areas” to GREEN+’s governing coalition, composed of the NGOs CC35, the Global Footprint Network, The Energy Coalition and other “respected stakeholders.”

According to the press release that details Satellogic’s alliance with GREEN+, the satellite surveillance data “will enable individuals, organizations, and global markets to accurately monitor the compliance of signatory jurisdictions to avoid deforestation.” However, other information in the press release reveals that forests will actually be monitored for the purpose of generating “credible” carbon credits to be traded on exchanges by GREEN+ on behalf of subnational governments. The press release also states that the GREEN+ alliance with Satellogic will “advance the future measurement of energy emissions in the most populated areas of the planet,” i.e. the surveillance of carbon emissions from space. Satellogic launched some GREEN+-affiliated satellites in 2022 as part of its pilot and is due to launch the remainder this April during Miami Climate Week. Satellogic’s past and upcoming launches of GREEN+ satellites were/will be conducted in collaboration with Elon Musk’s SpaceX, also a contractor to the US military and US intelligence agencies.

Though framed as a way to develop economic incentives to mitigate climate change, the program is based on California’s controversial and grift-prone cap and trade program and has been created (and is being implemented by) individuals and companies that are seeking to covertly dollarize Latin America and/or have deep ties to US intelligence. Its ultimate ambitions go far beyond carbon markets and seek to use satellite surveillance to enforce carbon emission levels in both urban and rural areas. It also seeks to impose a new financial system centered around energy, commodity, and natural resource “credits” that are underpinned by extensive and invasive surveillance, underscored by the motto: “Earth observation is preservation.”

The alliance that created GREEN+ includes the NGOs CC35, the Global Footprint Network (GFN), Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Catalytic Finance Foundation (CFF, formerly R20) and The Energy Coalition (TEC); the Gibraltar-based law firm Isolas; the global insurance giant Lockton; the satellite company Satellogic; the “green” blockchain company EcoRegistry; the dominant carbon credit certifier in Latin America, Cercarbono; and Rootstock (RSK), the bitcoin side-chain protocol responsible for “smart BTC.” Several members of the alliance, though how many is unclear, now operate as part of a consortium linked to a company called Global Carbon Parks, which is discussed in greater detail later in this article and now manages major aspects of GREEN+. The NGOs (i.e. CC35, GFN, CFF and TEC) involved in founding GREEN+ are those who actually govern the GREEN+ program from California.

As previously mentioned, the program takes carbon in “effectively conserved protected areas of a sub-national jurisdiction”, i.e. a city, county, province, or state/region, and converts them into carbon credits. Per the program, “these credits are traded on the [carbon] offset market, and income is deposited in a trust fund” that is controlled by GREEN+ and is known as the GREEN+ Trust. That trust is run by unspecified individuals who work for Lockton, Isolas and Rootstock. Alejandro Guerrero, head of Lockton’s Argentina & Uruguay branch, is the only publicly acknowledged member of the trust.

Another website tied to the GREEN+ initiative describes the initial process as follows:

  1. Public and private agreements between [a subnational] government and custodians are signed with zero upfront cost.
  2. Custodians trade the carbon units that are produced by the subnational governments (the public sector) signing contracts with the private sector in voluntary carbon markets.
  3. Those contracts signed by the subnational governments become smart contracts and carbon credits are then tokenized for traceability.
  4. The GREEN+ Trust holds government funds in escrow.

Subsequently, “a partial release of trust funds is made periodically during the crediting period of the jurisdictional initiative.” From this “partial release,” “a percentage operational fee” is deducted (the percentage is undisclosed in the program’s documents) and paid to the GREEN+ program while a separate (and also undisclosed) fee is also deducted “for the operation of the GREEN+ Trust.” Disbursements of what remains are made annually over a ten year period and, per graphs produced by GREEN+, those payments remain the same, fixed value even if the value of the carbon credits of the protected areas grows.

Unlimited Hangout article:        https://unlimitedhangout.com/2024/04/investigative-reports/debt-from-above-the-carbon-credit-coup/

from:    https://needtoknow.news/2024/05/whitney-webb-bankers-use-climate-scam-in-latin-america-to-introduce-digital-currency-globally/

We Know Who you Are, Where You Live, and NOW We Can Control What You Buy

CBDCs As A Weapon To Debank The Banked

If implemented as planned, CBDCs will end federalism, crush the U.S. Constitution, destroy the existing banking/financial system and slam dunk Technocracy into place. You don’t want to go along with this? You will be debanked, defunded and thrown out of economic life until you decide to comply. It’s a roundabout way to say “inclusive”. ⁃ TN Editor

In March 2022, President Biden signed an Executive Order directing government agencies to urgently research and develop a potential US central bank digital currency (CBDC) “in a manner that protects Americans’ interests.” It also encouraged the Federal Reserve Bank to continue doing so. And it isn’t just the Biden Administration in the United States working in such a direction.

As of the time of writing, CBDCTracker.org lists three countries or regions with retail CBDCs already “launched” (Bahamas, Jamaica and Nigeria), another five in “pilot” stage, and another twenty in “proof of concept” stage. Many more have at least researched wholesale CBDCs. (“Wholesale” CBDCs are intended for commercial and central bank use and the like, while “retail” CBDCs are intended for the rest of us). A report by the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) released just this month summarizes the results of a survey of 86 central banks and concludes that “there could be 15 retail and nine wholesale CBDCs publicly circulating in 2030.”

When you read statements from high-level officials of the BIS, central banks, and governments, you get the impression that CBDCs are an exciting development in the evolution of money. The BIS, for example, calls them “a new tool in the financial inclusion toolkit.” An op-ed co-authored by BIS General Manager Agustín Carstens and Queen Máxima of the Netherlands frames them in the title as “CBDCs for the people.” An IMF working paper asserts that CBDCs can “bank large unbanked populations” in developing countries.

Unpopular and risky

But when a CBDC was thrust upon the Nigerian people, adoption rates were abysmal at best (below 0.5 percent even a year after its launch), and Nigerians took to the streets to demand access to cash. CBDCs are widely unpopular in the United States as well. A CATO Institute national survey published just in May found that only 16 percent of Americans support the idea, and over twice as many (34 percent) oppose it. 78 percent responded that if a CBDC were offered, they would be unlikely to use it altogether. As for partisanship, while Democrats were twice as likely to support a CBDC than Republicans (22 percent for Democrats, 11 percent for Republicans), just as many Democrats oppose it, and the remaining 56 percent respond that they “don’t know.”

Risks CBDCs present include the loss of settlement finality that comes with physical cash (as abandoning cash accompanies the push for CBDCs), loss of financial privacy, easy seizure of assets, loss of the ability to resolve problems at a local level with a commercial bank (as it would be doubtful that a central bank would come to be known for its customer service), outright prohibition on spending or purchase limits with certain merchants or on certain products, and (perhaps most importantly) the paradigm shift from money as an exercise of economic freedom to one of social engineering by central banks and their respective governments. The latter could manifest itself in various ways, including (to name just a few) negative interest rates (essentially a confiscation of one’s savings), the expiry of one’s money (with a date determined by the issuing central bank or its government) — or even discouraging the consumption of products like gasoline, plane tickets or red meat in order to enforce a climate agenda.

Another CATO resource dedicated to identifying the risks of CBDCs rightly points out that a CBDC could reduce credit availability, disintermediate banks, and challenge the rise of cryptocurrencies. And all this is to say nothing of how businesses operating legally under state law would be treated by central banks when those very same economic activities are illegal under federal law. Even at present (with no CBDC yet launched in the United States), businesses working in the cannabis industry struggle to obtain and maintain bank accounts as many of the commercial banks are federally regulated. Are we really supposed to believe that the Federal Reserve would be more accommodating for cannabis businesses? It is difficult to imagine how CBDCs would not radically undermine federalism.

Finally, the increased surveillance also has a chilling effect on the public – even for legal activities. Enjoy vice (gambling, pornography)? Want to buy a gun? Now maybe you avoid living your life as you presently do.

Hardly inclusive

A quick trip down memory lane demonstrates how the debanking of legally-operating banked businesses in action has historically manifested. An Obama-era Justice Department operation called ‘Operation Choke Point’ targeted gun retailers, payday lenders, and the like beginning in 2013 not by charging the employees or owners of those businesses with actual crimes, but by upping the cost for banks to provide banking services to them, reminding those banks of their obligations under the Bank Secrecy Act and anti-money laundering (BSA/AML) regulations and the penalties for non-compliance. The result was (not surprisingly) the debanking of banked people and companies.

More recently, crypto has entered into the crosshairs, with regulators shutting down commercial banks that provide financial services to crypto companies. This latter operation was appropriately coined ‘Operation Choke Point 2.0’ by Nic Carter who draws parallels to the first operation.

The timing of a global CBDC initiative is also suspicious given the present cultural and political climate of “canceling” people with dissenting opinions and of Big Tech’s alignment with government to orchestrate something that resembles more of a PsyOp than “public health” as we have traditionally known it (as evidence from a FOIA request revealed).

Even if you think that a CBDC is a good idea, consider that its power may be turned against you when the political pendulum shifts in your direction and your views or activities are suddenly considered taboo or illegal by those in power. Real financial inclusion requires an economic system where financial censorship is harder to accomplish in the first place. (Paper cash and Bitcoin help here).

Oh, and by the way, the BIS itself calls physical cash “the most inclusive form of money we currently have.” With all the talk of financial inclusion, the global push to phase it out is, well, ironic. SEC Chair Gary Gensler was right when he declared that “we already have digital currency. It’s called the US dollar.” We can address the many shortcomings of the traditional financial system without introducing another digital dollar in the form of a CBDC.

The vast power that a CBDC would place in the hands of a nation state or its central bank points in the direction of an unprecedented level of financial surveillance, censorship, and potentially debanking the banked whenever it may serve certain political objectives. Thus, it is hardly an understatement to say that we are at a crossroads for civilization.

We would also be wise to consider the words of FA Hayek, from The Road to Serfdom:

Economic control is not merely control of a sector of human life which can be separated from the rest; it is the control of the means for all our ends. And whoever has sole control of the means must also determine which ends are to be served, which values are to be rated higher and which lower—in short, what men should believe and strive for.

Read full story here…

from:    https://www.technocracy.news/cbdcs-as-a-weapon-to-debank-the-banked/

“You Will Own Nothing”. And Be Happy???

G. Edward Griffin Warns Against a Cashless System and Says Our Lives Are at Stake

“The world is now in the hands of the banking institutions,” says G. Edward Griffin, author of Creature from Jekyll Island and founder of the Red Pill University. He says that large banks have become so powerful that they are now “regulating the governments.” He concludes that investors will eventually lose their freedom of choice in the market because we’re moving towards a cashless society. He compared the new system that is planned to a military system where necessities are provided, not owned, and are awarded according to compliance with the system and rank.In the second video, Griffin said, “We will not survive the system by figuring out how to hide from it,”  and added, “Our lives and our freedom are at stake here.” He also believes the banking crisis is not a surprise since it allows for the transition toward  “a cashless society” with fewer banks. “Cash gives people autonomy. It allows them to be independent of others,” he argues. Finally, he claims that de-dollarization is inevitable because the national debt can never be repaid, and it may happen soon.

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from:    https://needtoknow.news/2023/06/g-edward-griffin-warns-against-a-cashless-system-and-says-our-lives-are-at-stake/

Digital (Control) Money Being Tested

New York Fed announces test of digital dollar with major banks

The Federal Reserve Bank of New York and major banks will launch a three-month test of a digital dollar in hopes of studying its feasibility.

The initiative was announced by the regional Federal Reserve bank and nearly a dozen financial institutions on Tuesday. A news release referred to the experiment as a “proof-of-concept project” in which the banks will work with the Fed’s New York Innovation Center to simulate digital money representing the deposits of their own customers and settle them through simulated Fed reserves on a distributed ledger.

“The [project] will also test the feasibility of a programmable digital money design that is potentially extensible to other digital assets, as well as the viability of the proposed system within existing laws and regulations,” according to the news release.

The news comes as cryptocurrency and blockchain technology have exploded to prominence in the mainstream financial world. While the flagship cryptocurrency bitcoin peaked a year ago and has since been in precipitous decline, the technology behind such tokens has attracted interest from not only private financial institutions but also central banks across the globe.

FED’S POWELL SAYS HE IS ‘LEGITIMATELY UNDECIDED’ ON CENTRAL BANK DIGITAL CURRENCY

In January, the Fed took a first step toward weighing the use of a central bank digital currency when it released its much-anticipated discussion paper and opened a four-month public comment period to receive input.

The paper said that a CBDC could streamline cross-border payments and could further enshrine and preserve the dominance of the dollar’s international role, including as the world’s reserve currency.

The findings of the new pilot project will be released after the 12-week test concludes, and the Fed has stressed that the experiment is not intended to advance any specific policy outcome or hint that the Fed is planning to make any big decisions about a central bank digital currency in the near future.

CLICK HERE TO READ MORE FROM THE WASHINGTON EXAMINER

Still, the project is sure to excite proponents of a digital dollar because it at least shows that the central bank is engaged with the concept enough to partner with private banks and run tests about its feasibility. Still, critics have warned that a digital currency maintained by the government could lead to a loss of privacy.

“The NYIC looks forward to collaborating with members of the banking community to advance research on asset tokenization and the future of financial market infrastructures in the U.S. as money and banking evolve,” said Per von Zelowitz, director of the New York Innovation Center.

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/economy/fed-banks-digital-dollar-test