(Zero Hedge)—Trump’s recent announcement that he will be rescinding federal government approval of the NYC congestion toll program has Democrats up in arms. NY Governor Kathy Hochul has vowed to go to war with Trump in the courts in order to keep the program in place. She claims that federal law prevents the White House from unilaterally halting the program and that the toll is necessary to maintain infrastructure in Manhattan while making residents safer.
Congestion pricing was enacted in January and charges drivers $9 each time they enter the Central Business District below 60th Street in Manhattan. It has three stated goals: to reduce traffic, lower carbon emissions and raise revenue for mass transit.
However, congestion pricing is actually rooted in an issue which Governor Hochul tends to gloss over: Carbon taxation. Road pricing is a key element of the notorious 15 Minute City concept often put forward by the World Economic Forum (of which Kathy Hochul is an adherent), and it is specifically justified by proponents as a method for reducing carbon emissions. In other words, road pricing or the “congestion toll” is a way to apply direct carbon taxation on the general public.
The 15 Minute City concept is built around the fallacy that travel reduction is necessary to “save the planet” from global warming. The idea is relatively simple – Create artificial obstacles through law to reduce or remove individual travel. The WEF refers to this as “sustainable and inclusive mobility”. The Davos crowd presents sustainable mobility as a quest for “convenience” to encourage people to stop using private transportation, but nothing is as convenient as having your own vehicle.
The globalists know this, so, in order to create convenience for the public they have to make private transport very inconvenient. Hence, charging multiple tolls per day for accessing certain roads, or all roads, with your own car. The more carbon taxes you pay for simply driving the less you will want to drive and the more convenient “green transportation” options will seem.
Congestion tolls are a negative incentive to keep lower and middle class people from using personal transportation, keeping them trapped within small areas where they can walk (in 15 minutes) or take public transport, but rarely leave.
The ultimate purpose of 15 Minute Cities is to centralize populations into tiny areas, completely eliminate private transportation and control all citizen mobility. The idea received increased attention from the WEF and the establishment media during the covid lockdowns, when it was suggested that covid travel mandates should be kept in place in order to mitigate climate change.
As many critics have noted in the past, there is zero scientific evidence of causation between carbon emissions and higher temperatures. The Earth has had numerous warming periods over its long history, most of them occurring long before human industry existed.
Not only that, but historic carbon trends show no match between rising carbon levels and higher temperatures. That is to say, the entire climate science industry is built on a hoax that falsely connects human activity to climate change.
Road pricing appears to be an attempt to enforce carbon taxation by another name, and initiate the beginning stages of 15 Minute Cities though “sustainable mobility”.
Beyond the hysteria and fraud surrounding climate change, another factor that must be considered is mass surveillance. The spread of thousands of traffic cameras using AI to identify and track drivers in real time is not just a problem in terms of squeezing taxpayers for more money on roads they already paid for. There’s also the question of whether or not these cameras will only be used for collecting license plate numbers.
Independent Journalism Is Dying
Ever since President Trump’s miraculous victory, we’ve heard an incessant drumbeat about how legacy media is dying. This is true. The people have awakened to the reality that they’re being lied to by the self-proclaimed “Arbiters of Truth” for the sake of political expediency, corporate self-protection, and globalist ambitions.
But even as independent journalism rises to fill the void left by legacy media, there is still a huge challenge. Those at the top of independent media like Joe Rogan, Dan Bongino, and Tucker Carlson are thriving and rightly so. They have earned their audience and the financial rewards that come from it. They’ve taken risks and worked hard to get to where they are.
For “the rest of us,” legacy media and their proxies are making it exceptionally difficult to survive, let alone thrive. They still have a stranglehold over the “fact checkers” who have a dramatic impact on readership and viewership. YouTube, Facebook, and Google still stifle us. The freer speech platforms like Rumble and 𝕏 can only reward so many of their popular content creators. For independent journalists on the outside looking in, our only recourse is to rely on affiliates and sponsors.
But even as it seems nearly impossible to make a living, there are blessings that should not be disregarded. By highlighting strong sponsors who share our America First worldview, we have been able to make lifelong connections and even a bit of revenue to help us along. This is why we enjoy symbiotic relationships with companies like MyPillow, Jase Medical, and Promised Grounds. We help them with our recommendations and they reward us with money when our audience buys from them.
The same can be said about our preparedness sponsor, Prepper All-Naturals. Their long-term storage beef has a 25-year shelf life and is made with one ingredient: All-American Beef.
Even our faith-driven precious metals sponsor helps us tremendously while also helping Americans protect their life’s savings. We are blessed to work with them.
Independent media is the future. In many ways, that future is already here. While the phrase, “the more the merrier,” does not apply to this business because there are still some bad actors in the independent media field, there are many great ones that do not get nearly enough attention. We hope to change that one content creator at a time.
Thank you and God Bless,
JD Rucker
