UK - The UK Government has admitted that it is unsure whether various safeguards it put in place in response to the Covid-19 outbreak - including the ‘travel traffic light system’, hotel quarantine measures or ordering people to isolate at home - actually worked. In a report published on Tuesday, the Public Accounts Committee has found that despite spending at least £486 million on implementing its traffic light system for international travel during the pandemic, the government “does not know whether the system worked or whether the cost was worth the disruption caused”.

HUNGARY - The Russia-Ukraine conflict could end the West’s dominance and shift the balance of power in the world, Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban has said. Russia launched a military campaign against the neighboring country in late February. Orban argued that the decision to impose sanctions on Moscow and supply Kiev with heavy weapons de facto turned the EU and NATO member states into participants in the conflict, but ultimately yielded no results. “Instead, today we are sitting inside a car with flat tires on all four wheels,” Orban said in a speech in the Romanian city of Baile Tusnad on Saturday. “The world is not only not with us, but it is demonstratively not with us,” the PM added, arguing that, instead of thinking about gaining the upper hand on the battlefield in Ukraine, the West should now focus on achieving peace through negotiations. Orban also warned that the conflict could easily put an end to Western supremacy and “create a multipolar world order.”

HUNGARY - Hungary's leader Viktor Orbán bashed Western Europeans for 'mixing with non-Europeans' and said Hungarians 'do not want to become a mixed race'. Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán said that his country's citizens have no interest in fraternizing with non-Europeans, according to Radio Free Europe. Orbán idealized an "unmixed Hungarian race" while speaking at Baile Tusnad Summer University located in central Romania on Saturday. He argued that Europeans should not mix with "non-Europeans." "We move, we work elsewhere, we mix within Europe," he said. "But we don't want to be a mixed race" or a "multiethnic" group, he added.

SWITZERLAND - The World Economic Forum (WEF) is promoting a plan to block the Sun using “space bubbles,” supposedly to combat “climate change.” Blocking the sun is a major globalist plot that Bill Gates has been involved in. If the globalists manage to block or dim the Sun’s rays, how will humanity be affected? This is the question that America’s empty-suit quisling political leaders do not seem to be asking with any kind of urgency. Meanwhile, Klaus Schwab’s WEF and other globalist entities seem determined to block the Sun, which cartoon villain Mr Burns unsuccessfully tried to do on The Simpsons. A disturbing video shared by WEF states that “MIT scientists say ‘space bubbles’ could help reverse climate change by reflecting the Sun’s heat away from Earth.” The video refers to this process as “geoengineering.” The video explains that “The bubbles would be manufactured in space by robots” and “They would form a ‘raft’ about the size of Brazil.” Really?

SWITZERLAND - Is your car really necessary? The World Economic Forum (WEF) doesn’t think so. It has published a paper that calls for an end to “wasteful” private car ownership in favor of communal sharing to lessen global demands for precious metals and fossil fuels. The unelected elites in Geneva, Switzerland, argue too many people own private vehicles for the planet’s good. Most are barely driven and a universal model that will take consumers “from owning to using” their cars is the way forward. “The average car or van in England is driven just 4% of the time,” the WEF paper sets out. Instead of having vehicles sit idle, sell your car and walk or share because “Car sharing platforms such as Getaround and BlueSG have already seized that opportunity to offer vehicles where you pay per hour used.”

USA - An out-of-control wildfire raging near Yosemite National Park has burgeoned into one of the biggest blazes this year, forcing thousands of Californians to flee their homes in remote mountain communities as the fire raged for a third straight day. Despite the efforts of more than 2,000 firefighters to contain the blaze, the fire, which began in the foothills of the Sierra Nevadas Friday, was zero percent contained Sunday, state fire officials conceded. Photos and video footage from the stricken region - a rural landscape home to nearly 18,000 - show the destruction left by the fast-moving inferno, which has spread east at a rapid rate, putting pressure on officials to contain the flames. At least 10 structures have been destroyed thus far, California fire officials said Sunday, and five heavily damaged - with another 2,000 still at risk.

USA - In Earth’s orbit itself, the US Space Surveillance Network is tracking more than 14,000 pieces of space junk that are larger than 10 cm (4 inches) across, such as defunct satellites and rocket stages. It’s estimated that there are millions of pieces smaller than that. Because of the high speeds at which objects move in Earth’s orbit, even little pieces of space debris can cause damage. Windows on the space shuttle often had to be replaced because of damage from collisions with debris smaller than a millimeter. (This is why the shuttle flew around the world tail-forward.) Even satellites have been destroyed by space debris.

USA - Thanks to the horrific drought which is absolutely devastating ranching in the Southwest, ranchers are now in “panic mode” and are selling off their cattle at an unprecedented rate. In fact, some are choosing to sell off their entire herds because they feel like they don’t have any other options. In recent days, seemingly endless lines of trailers waiting to drop off cattle for auction have gone viral all over social media. Everybody is talking about how they have never seen anything like this before, and if the drought in the Southwest persists the lines could soon get even longer. In the short-term, this is going to help to stabilize meat prices. But in the long-term the size of the US cattle herd will steadily become much smaller, and that has very serious implications for our ability to feed ourselves in 2023 and beyond.

EUROPE - Hungary has told the European Union that it must adopt “Christian roots and culture”, as well as rework the union’s “dead end” European parliament. Lawmakers in Hungary voted 130 to 50 in favour of a resolution that mandates the country’s government to push for a number of structural reforms at the EU level, including a rework of the union’s parliament, as well as to make the bloc adopt “Christian roots and culture”.

USA - Many books have been written over the centuries but some so accurately described events that would occur decades later, one would think those writers had a crystal ball that actually worked. We have heard that art imitates life, with some swearing life was truly imitating art. In reality some writers were just so in tune with the world, so observant of what was happening around them, that they were able to project a future, if the path continued in the direction they were observing it moving in.

UK - Neil Ferguson, through his institute at London’s Imperial College, can call the shots on a major percentage of the global population. He’s Mr Genius, when it comes to projecting computer models of epidemics. Fellow experts puff up his reputation. According to the Business Insider (4/25/2020), “Ferguson’s team warned Boris Johnson that the quest for ‘herd immunity’ [letting people live their lives out in the open in the UK] could cost 510,000 lives, prompting an abrupt U-turn [massive national lockdown in the UK]… His simulations have been influential in other countries as well, cited by authorities in the US, Germany, and France.” Not only cited, not only influential, but swallowed whole.

USA - Triple digit temperatures and a fickle monsoon season have combined with decades of persistent drought to put one of North America’s longest rivers in its most precarious situation yet. Islands of sand and gravel and patches of cracked mud are taking over where the Rio Grande once flowed. It’s a scene not unlike other hot, dry spots around the western US where rivers and reservoirs have been shrinking due to climate change and continued demand. Local and federal water managers on Thursday warned that more stretches of the beleaguered Rio Grande will be drying up in the coming days in the Albuquerque area leaving endangered silvery minnows stranded in whatever puddles remain. “This is almost the sole source of water in the central part of New Mexico and we’re not trying to save it just for the fish,” said Andy Dean, a federal biologist. “It’s our job as the Fish and Wildlife Service to prevent the extinction of this animal, but this water is also for everybody in the valley. We’re trying to save it for everybody and if the fish is that piece that helps us do that, then that’s what we have to use.”

JAPAN - Dozens of people were urged to evacuate their homes after a fiery volcanic eruption in southern Japan on Sunday as the national weather agency issued its top-level alert for the mountain. Television footage showed lava and dark plumes of ash exploding from Sakurajima in Kagoshima, which erupted just after 8 pm (11:00 GMT). The volcano frequently spits out smoke and ash, and is a major tourist attraction. Sunday's blast propelled large cinders about 2.5 kilometres (1.5 miles) from the crater, the Japan Meteorological Agency said in a statement. The agency raised its alert for Sakurajima to level five, the top level, which urges evacuations. Before the eruption it was at level three, which bans entry to the mountain.

CHINA - China’s National Energy Administration (NEA) said Thursday it approved a coal mine project worth 3.1 billion yuan ($458 million) in the country’s Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, Reuters reported. “The project has annual production capacity of 4 million tonnes a year, with phase one at 1.2 million tonnes and phase two at 2.8 million tonnes [sic],” Reuters quoted the NEA as saying on July 21. The administration said that one of its goals in approving a new mining site in Zhungeer was to help “ensure stable energy supply.” China’s state electric grid is primarily fueled by coal power.

USA - Water police comb through Southern California neighborhoods, searching for illegal lawn irrigation or residents washing their vehicles. Those disobeying the new water restrictions will be issued a warning, and repeat offenders will be slapped with hundreds of dollars in fines. Los Angeles Department of Water and Power (LADWP) has a team of water conservationist police patrolling city streets and sidewalks for water wasters. The 'water cops' also investigate hundreds of complaints by neighbors (or so-called 'Karens') who report one another about water wasting. AFP spoke with one water specialist, Damon Ayala, who rides around Los Angeles, writing down addresses of homes where he finds evidence of infringement of the strictest ever conservation rules that went into effect early last month.