Last week’s talks produced “progress” according to all sides, with technical teams set to meet this week to work out the details. President Trump, however, suddenly announced that he was not happy with the talks because the Iranian side refused to say “the magic words” that they would not pursue nuclear weapons.

But Iran has been insisting for decades that they have no interest in producing a nuclear weapon and our own intelligence has confirmed that they are not doing so.

Shortly after President Trump’s announcement, the US and Israel launched their attack, killing Iran’s religious leader along with some 40 other political and military leaders in a “decapitation” strike.

It was supposed to be like the Venezuela operation. Quick and painless for the US. Kill the leadership and the long-suffering people would take to the streets and reclaim their country. It may make a good plot for a Hollywood movie, but in real life these regime change operations have never worked. Millions did take to the streets in Iran, but it was to mourn the slain Ayatollah and to reaffirm support for their government.

Just like we “rallied around the flag” after the attacks on 9/11.

Quickly, Iranian retaliation for the attacks began to take their toll on US assets and Israel. US soldiers have been killed and US fighter jets have been shot down. US bases in the region are either damaged or destroyed. Likewise, US embassies and consulates have come under attack, including by Iraqis likely still furious over the US destruction of their country 20 years ago.

And, with the Pentagon warning that the operation may go weeks instead of days, we are quickly running out of missiles.

Billions of dollars have already been spent on this unprovoked attack, and when the smoke clears – if it does – we may see hundreds of billions or maybe much more having been wasted on yet another Middle East war. Just what President Trump promised he would not do.

The neocon “cakewalk” crowd, including Lindsey Graham and others, have been proven wrong again. Tragically, more American servicemembers may die while the neocons blame someone else for the fiasco they helped launch.

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said of the US/Israeli attack that “this combination of forces enables us to do what I have longed to do for 40 years…”

But the purpose of the US military is not to fulfill the decades-old wishes of foreign leaders. There is a good reason we have a Constitution that says only Congress can declare war.

Launching a military strike during negotiations will have lasting negative effects for the United States. Who would ever trust US diplomacy again if talks are used as a distraction for pre-planned attacks?

The Administration is doing its best to spin this unfolding disaster as all going according to plan, but what is the plan? No one knows. Do they know?

Here’s a plan: End this today. Return the destroyed US bases to the countries where they are located. And just come home. That is what a real “America first” movement looks like.

Article posted with permission from Ron Paul

The post Stuck In Another Disastrous Middle East War appeared first on The Washington Standard.

The Epstein files support claims that Epstein worked with intelligence agencies, in particular Israel’s Mossad and the American CIA. Yet, the mainstream media and most politicians seem uninterested in whether Epstein used underage girls in a scheme to blackmail powerful individuals on behalf of intelligence agencies.

Fortunately, the alternative media is not afraid to discuss Epstein’s intelligence connections or any other matters related to Epstein, including suspicious circumstances surrounding his death.

The Epstein files and the Justice Department’s failure to let the people see the full files present an opportunity for libertarians. The belief that government agencies used the sexual abuse of children as a means of ensuring rich and powerful people did their bidding will increase distrust of government and the interests that profit from, and often control, the state. The Trump administration’s failure to release the files until forced to by Congress will further increase the distrust of government.

This distrust can lead to support for liberty if those of us who know the truth explain that the problem is a government that tries to run the economy, run the world, and run our lives. This type of government will inevitably attract unscrupulous individuals. Therefore, the solution is to limit the government’s power. The first step is to build a critical mass of people committed to restoring liberty and able to see through the propaganda used to convince us government is taking our liberty for our own good.

Following the Watergate scandal, Murray Rothbard wrote that, “[i]t is Watergate that gives us the greatest single hope for the short-run victory of liberty in America. For Watergate, as politicians have been warning us ever since, destroyed the public’s ‘faith in government’ — and it was high time, too.” Unfortunately, the people’s distrust in government did not last. However, Representative Thomas Massie, who is leading the fight to make the files public, has argued that abusing minors in order to blackmail wealthy and powerful individuals, along with the refusals to expose the full truth about these horrific crimes, is bigger than Watergate.

The controversy over the Epstein files comes at a time when the US is on the verge of an economic crisis. This crisis is rooted in President Nixon’s 1971 abandonment of the last link between the dollar and gold, giving the United States a purely fiat currency. This fiat money system, combined with the dollar’s reserve currency status, made it possible for the government to run up huge debts. Today, the federal debt is almost 39 trillion dollars and is increasing quickly. This exploding debt, along with resentment of America’s hyper-interventionist foreign policy, is leading to increased international support for abandoning the dollar. These factors all suggest that the next crash could end the welfare-warfare-fiat currency system.

If those of us who know the truth can take advantage of the growing distrust of government to further spread the ideas of liberty, the next crisis may lead to a return to limited constitutional government, liberty, and peace.

Article posted with permission from Ron Paul

The post Epstein Files: An Opportunity For Those Who Love Liberty appeared first on The Washington Standard.

As I have often said, while there are many evil things out there on the Internet, at the same time, we have the tools to communicate the unfiltered message of freedom like never before.

Even though Tucker Carlson’s show on Fox News was enormously popular – number one in the nation – the network still yanked the show from underneath him because they didn’t like some of the things he was saying.

Now, Tucker and other independent media figures answer not to studio executives with their own agendas, but rather they answer directly to the American people in the marketplace of ideas. Carlson’s reach as an independent is arguably greater than when he was on Fox.

And there are many more like him with large – and not so large – audiences who are appealing directly to the “consumer,” without the middleman to tell them what they can and cannot say. Admittedly, sometimes what people say is ugly, but we do not have free speech to only talk about the weather.

Bigi media and big government are in bed together and they hate the fact that we can communicate with each other without their filters and influence. They long for the days when they could shovel down our throats just what they wanted us to hear and believe.

While we may be winning this battle for free expression, we must not fool ourselves into thinking that we have won the war. We must remember, just a few years ago, during COVID, all it took to have your platform wiped off the face of the earth was to dare question the “wisdom” of Anthony Fauci.

Even today, there are forces seeking to use the power of the state to silence opinions they disagree with.

In Europe, free speech is under attack by totalitarian measures like the Digital Services Act, which creates a police state in the name of “protecting” citizens from “disinformation.” Of course, “disinformation” is simply information that governments or elites don’t want to get out. You can go to jail for an X post in Europe, while violent criminals are set free.

Make no mistake – many in the US would love to have such a system in place to protect speech they like and punish speech they don’t like. We have already seen attempts to intimidate – or even deport – people who have protested the recent mass killings in Gaza, for example. And the US government’s forced sale of TikTok was not a victory for free speech.

The truth is, “cancel culture” exists in both the left and the right and everywhere in-between. If we want to maintain and expand our ability to communicate freely and grow our voice in the independent media sphere, we cannot let our guard down. “Free speech for me but not for thee” – using government force to shut down unwanted voices – will result in free speech for no one. And once it is gone, it will not be easy to get back.

Article posted with permission from Ron Paul

The post Media Freedom…If We Can Keep it! appeared first on The Washington Standard.

In March, President Trump signed an executive order calling for eliminating the Department of Education. Since then, Education Secretary Linda McMahon has worked on transferring some Education Department activities to other agencies. For example, it has been announced that some activities of the Office of Elementary and Secondary Education, which is involved in federal K-12 education programs, will be moved to the Labor Department. While these changes can reduce the power and reach of the Education Department, they do not ensure a reduction of the federal government’s role in education.

The appropriations bill that President Trump signed into law last week indicates he has given up on ending the Department of Education. The bill, which was first approved by the Republican-majority House and Senate, contains a provision requiring the Education Department to “support staffing levels necessary to fulfill its statutory responsibilities, including carrying out programs, projects, and activities.” Another provision prohibits the Education Department from transferring funds to other government agencies.

The bill also increases the Education Department’s budget. Increasing the budget of an unconstitutional Cabinet department is never a good idea, but it is especially bad when the federal debt is increasing by trillions of dollars a year. If President Trump and the other Republicans who have said they want the Education Department shut down are not going to even attempt to shut it down, they could at least reduce its funding.

It is clear that shutting down the Department of Education will require a sustained effort by Americans fed up with spending billions to produce a subpar educational system. Pressure needs to be put on lawmakers to restore control over education to states, local communities, and parents.

School choice week was the week before President Trump signed the bill providing funding to the Education Department. Programs giving parents control over their children’s education — such as Education Savings Accounts — continue to grow in popularity as do alternatives to public schools such as private schools and homeschooling.

Private schools and homeschooling received a boost from the “Big Beautiful Bill” providing tax credits for scholarships for private school tuition and home school expenses.

Parents looking for a homeschooling curriculum incorporating the ideas of liberty should consider my online curriculum. My curriculum provides students with a solid education in history, literature, mathematics, and the sciences. It also gives students the opportunity to create their own websites and internet-based businesses. This provides students with “real world” entrepreneurial experience that will be useful no matter what career paths they choose.

The curriculum is designed to be self-taught, with students helping, and learning from, each other via online forums. Starting in the fourth grade, students are required to write at least one essay a week. Students also take a course in public speaking.

The curriculum emphasizes the history, philosophy, and economics of liberty, but it never substitutes indoctrination for education. The goal is to produce students with superior critical thinking skills. If you think my curriculum may meet the needs of your child, please visit www.RonPaulCurriculum.com for more information.

Article posted with permission from Ron Paul

The post Republicans Save the Department of Education appeared first on The Washington Standard.

The Justice Department recently launched a criminal investigation into whether Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell lied to Congress about the costs of renovating the Federal Reserve’s offices.

Many believe this investigation was launched in order to support President Trump’s effort to replace Powell, who he nominated to be Fed chairman in 2017, with a Fed chairman who will accommodate President Trump’s demands for lower interest rates.

Almost all observers believe that President Trump’s desire to stack the Federal Reserve board with loyalists who will tailor monetary policy to his liking motivated the investigation of Federal Reserve Board Member Lisa Cook. President Trump is using allegations that Cook lied on a mortgage application as a justification to fire her.

At a Supreme Court hearing on Lisa Cook’s case, the majority of justices — including some who have been supportive of President Trump’s attempt to exercise greater authority over federal agencies — seemed to oppose his firing of Cook. One reason for this would be viewing the Fed as different from federal agencies like the Federal Trade Commission because private banks play a role in the Fed’s governance. This indicates the Fed is a public-private hybrid.

The criminal investigation into Chairman Powell and the attempt to fire Lisa Cook have caused investors, stock traders, and others to fear Trump is endangering the economy by compromising the Fed’s independence. This supposed threat to Fed autonomy has also caused some Republicans who are usually defenders of President Trump to criticize him.

There is a long history of presidential attempts to influence monetary policy. President Richard Nixon, for example, pressured Fed Chairman Arthur Burns to lower rates. Nixon and Burns were even recorded joking about Fed independence.

Fed Chairman William Martin may not have liked Ike, but he caved to President Eisenhower’s demands that the Fed increase the money supply. President Bill Clinton persuaded Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan to support Clinton’s economic plans. The most extreme case of presidential pressure (at least until the Justice Department launched its criminal probe into Powell) was when President Lyndon Johnson shoved the Fed chairman against a wall because the Fed raised interest rates, causing trouble for Johnson’s Great Society at home and Vietnam War abroad. President Trump is thus not different from his predecessors; he is just more transparent.

Opponents of Federal Reserve “independence” have a point. Allowing a secretive central bank to control interest rates and the money supply is the reason the purchasing power of the dollar has vastly declined since 1971, when President Nixon severed the last link between the dollar and gold. Fed-produced fiat currency is also the cause of rising economic inequality and instability. The beneficiaries of this system are the politicians and the corporatist interests living off the welfare-warfare state. On the other hand, President Trump’s critics are correct that giving politicians power to set interest rates would be a recipe for disaster. Instead of arguing over who should control the money supply and set rates, President Trump and Congress should work to audit and end the Fed.

Article posted with permission from Ron Paul

The post Trump’s Latest Regime Change Target appeared first on The Washington Standard.

The US President is making it clear he is not giving up on “regime change” for Iran. Late last week the world held its breath, expecting a US missile strike on Iran after Trump promised “help is on the way” to the US-backed insurrectionists. President Trump claimed that he called off the strikes at the last minute when he was told that Iran would hold off on executing the ringleaders of the revolt.

Ironically, Trump himself has ordered the execution of more than 100 individuals on boats in the Caribbean and Pacific Ocean without charges, trials, or convictions.

The renewed military threats on Iran come after the unprecedented fifth visit to DC this year by Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu, who was said to be arriving with a renewed demand for US military action against Iran. Add to this the recent US military operation to kidnap the President and first lady of Venezuela and take the country’s oil, as well as President Trump’s increasing demands for control over Greenland, and the aggressive militarism of this Administration is about the polar opposite of what was promised by Candidate Trump.

And the American people are taking notice.

Three recently released polls could spell disaster for Trump’s second term – and for Republicans in this year’s midterm elections.

According to a Quinnipiac University Poll released last week, seven in ten Americans oppose the US use of force against Iran, including a solid majority of Republican voters. Eighty percent of the very important independent voters oppose any US attack on Iran.

On President Trump’s renewed demand for control of Greenland – control he claimed he would get “the easy way or the hard way” – that same Quinnipiac poll shows that 86 percent of Americans surveyed oppose taking the territory by force. A majority of 55 percent of Americans polled do not even want President Trump to purchase the massive island.

An AP/NORC poll also released last week showed President Trump’s approval rating on foreign policy has shrunk to a new low in his presidency. According to the poll, “Forty-five percent of adults want the US to take a less active role in global affairs, up from 33 percent in September 2025.”

Americans are clearly more interested in getting our problems solved at home than acting as policeman for the world.

Perhaps even worse for President Trump and the Republicans, according to a newly-released Real Clear Politics poll, President Trump’s approval rating hits a new second-term low of 42.1 percent.

Whatever praise President Trump may be receiving from his inner circle – which is increasingly neocon – and a small group of MAGA supporters, such aggressive operations overseas are rapidly losing him the support of the rest of the American people. And that includes Republicans.

Trump ran on “no new wars” and “no more regime change overseas.” These are very popular positions. Abandoning these positions has cost Trump dearly. We can hope that in the remaining three years, President Trump will rediscover Candidate Trump’s positions and show his neocon advisors the door.

Article posted with permission from Ron Paul

The post President Trump: Peace Is Popular appeared first on The Washington Standard.

About a week after the invasion, President Trump had a meeting with executives from American oil companies to discuss plans for Venezuela. Some of the companies’ executives at the meeting were less than enthusiastic about developing Venezuelan oil. One reason for this is that, since the Venezuelan government nationalized oil activities twenty years ago, fracking has made the US the world’s leading producer of oil and natural gas. Rebuilding the oil industry in Venezuela could cost as much as a billion dollars for an uncertain payoff. Among the complications, Venezuelan oil does not easily flow though pipelines unless it is cut with solvents, making it more expensive to transport.

In his first press conference after the Venezuelan first couple was seized, President Trump said: “We are going to run the country until such time as we can do a safe, proper, and judicious transition.” He later stated that Maduro’s successor Vice President Delcy Rodriguez would “pay a very big price, probably bigger than Maduro,” if she does not adequately fulfill the US government’s demands.

Following the invasion of Venezuela, there have been suggestions that President Trump will direct the US military to invade other countries as well. For example, Secretary of State and National Security Advisor Marco Rubio said, “if I lived in Havana and I was in the government, I’d be concerned.”

To no one’ s surprise, Senator Lindsey Graham was delighted by the possibility that Venezuela was just the first of many regime change wars President Trump will wage. Senator Graham even got President Trump to autograph a Make Iran Great Again hat. Many Iranian victims of the Shah of Iran’s secret police might disagree with Senator Graham on whether having the CIA install another puppet government in Iran will make that country great.

President Trump’s newfound love of regime change wars may be one reason why he is seeking to increase the military budget to 1.5 trillion dollars. President Trump claims that tariff revenue can fund the increase, but that is simply not possible. The majority of the increase in spending would come from other taxes, including the Federal Reserve’s regressive and hidden inflation tax.

A recent poll by the Pew Research Center found that there is much less support for an “activist” US foreign policy among Americans under 50 than among older Americans. This is the case among both Democrats and Republicans. In fact, the differing view on foreign policy among younger people was a major factor behind President Trump’s support from younger people in 2024. Continued betrayal by President Trump of his no more regime change wars pledge will cause the president and the Republicans to lose support among younger voters.

Article posted with permission from Ron Paul

The post Making Imperialism Great Again? appeared first on The Washington Standard.

This was not a war, we were told. It was just a surgical operation to remove a criminal dictator and restore democracy to the country. American oil companies would soon get even richer exploiting the country’s vast oil reserves. This time it will be different!

If all of this sounds familiar, that’s because it is the same narrative used each time the US has launched a “regime change” operation this century.

The Iraq war would be a “cake walk,” they swore. Skeptics were ridiculed. The staged demolition of the Saddam Hussein statue in Baghdad marked the triumph of that short US military operation.

The “liberation” of Iraq was to be the first domino in the coming revolution throughout the Middle East, we were promised. Just weeks into the operation, then-President George W. Bush landed on an aircraft carrier with a huge “Mission Accomplished” banner behind him.

Then everything fell apart. The US could not “run” Iraq. It could only use brutal force – and torture – to give the impression that we would soon turn the corner. Victory was at hand. Just send more troops and spend a little more money.

But none of it did the trick. None of it worked.

In the end, the US sank trillions into the failed “nation-building” operation in Iraq and upwards of a million people died, including thousands of US troops.

And here we go again.

Despite being elected on promises of “no new wars” and “no nation-building,” President Trump used military force against Venezuela, kidnapped the country’s president, and declared that “we” would be running the country from now on.

After the operation in Venezuela, President Trump took a “Mission Accomplished” victory lap of his own in a press conference where he declared that US oil companies would return to Venezuela under US protection and that we would “run” Venezuela for the time being.

“The oil companies are going to spend money… we are going to get reimbursed,” he said.

But there’s more to come.

President Trump’s Venezuela raid and kidnapping occurred just as Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu was departing the country. According to press reports, Netanyahu was in town to persuade President Trump to send the US military back into Iran. Israeli officials have openly stated that the US operation in Venezuela is the warm-up for the next round of US “regime change” – in Iran.

Warmongering US Senator Lindsey Graham has taken to the television news programs to urge President Trump to continue on to Cuba and then Iran. President Trump seemed to agree, stating that, “we have to do it again. We can do it again, too. Nobody can stop us.”

Venezuela was just another neocon operation. First comes propaganda demonizing the country and its leadership. Then comes saber-rattling and threats of war. The operation is launched and the “objectives” are quickly reached. Or so they claim. But then it all falls apart. We become poorer as the special interests get richer. And those we claim to be liberating suffer worse than under the previous regime.

Will we ever learn?

Article posted with permission from Ron Paul

The post Regime Change & Nation-Building Are Back! appeared first on The Washington Standard.

Reclassifying marijuana does not repeal federal laws criminalizing its use. The reclassifying does, though, facilitate research into marijuana’s medical benefits. It also enables marijuana businesses that are legal under state laws to take ordinary deductions on their taxes. While President Trump’s executive order is a step forward, those who support advancing liberty must continue to press for repeal of all federal drug laws.

The Constitution does not give the federal government any authority to outlaw marijuana or any other “illicit” substance. At least supporters of alcohol prohibition understood that a constitutional amendment was needed to impose a national ban on alcohol. The war on drugs has been a primary excuse for violations of liberties, including unconstitutional searches and seizures, “no-knock raids,” bank reports to the federal government on those making large cash deposits, and draconian mandatory minimum sentences. The drug war has also been used to justify foreign interventions — such as President Trump’s current actions against Venezuela.

Defenders of the drug war say it is necessary because the drug trade is controlled by violent criminals — even though this is the inevitable result of outlawing a product people wish to consume. The most important reason to end the drug war is that government has no moral right to stop adults from engaging in a peaceful (even if unwise) behavior like smoking marijuana. Laws prohibiting drug use have no place in a free society. These laws are rooted in the idea that our rights are merely gifts from the government conditioned on our “good “behavior. A government that can stop people from smoking marijuana is a government that can also mandate what vaccines we receive and how our children are educated.

Of course, in a free society, an individual who uses drugs would be responsible for the consequences of his choices, and those who oppose drug use could exercise their right to try to persuade others to abstain from drug use.

When I campaigned to return to Congress in 1996, both Republicans (in the primary) and Democrats (in the general election) focused on attacking my position on drugs. In response, I explained that the federal government has no authority to outlaw drugs and that the police state being built to stop drug use threatens all our liberty. The responsibility for combatting drug use belongs elsewhere, such as with churches and family members. I summed up my position as not pro-drug, but pro-liberty. In the end, I won that race. The people have been ahead of politicians in understanding the folly of the drug war.

All of us who value liberty must oppose the drug war. We should speak out for replacing various mandates and punishments of the drug war with increased respect for individual rights. We should also be steadfast that the end goal be a complete ending of the federal government’s drug prohibition.

Article posted with permission from Ron Paul

The post Did Trump Take A Step Toward Liberty? appeared first on The Washington Standard.

To paraphrase the famous 1953 President Eisenhower speech, “The Chance for Peace,” each of these dollars spent on military offense and the maintenance of the US global empire rather than on defense of our own nation, is taken from the mouths of the hungry and off the backs of hardworking American families.

Congress is so addicted to military spending that it appropriated even more money than President Trump requested, including an unconscionable $800 million for thoroughly corrupt Ukraine. Will Washington ever be called to answer for why Americans, who are seeing their standard of living eaten away by inflation and a declining economy, should continue to subsidize a criminal regime overseas whose ruling class enjoys the comfort of golden toilets?

The Ukraine money also undermines President Trump’s claim to be a neutral mediator in the conflict. How can you be a peacemaker when you are sending nearly a billion dollars in weapons to one side to help kill the other side? It makes no sense.

Congress even included measures in the bill that would prevent President Trump from bringing any US troops home from real “forever wars” in Korea and Europe. For how many more decades must the American worker continue to subsidize a US military presence in countries completely unrelated to our own security? World War II ended 80 years ago and the Korean War some ten years later. Yet, the American military empire remains, at an incalculable cost to Americans.

Some fellow critics will say this is all about welfare for rich countries overseas, and that’s partly right. But more than that, it is welfare for the politically-connected US military-industrial complex at home. Imagine how many retired US military officers and former US officials-turned-lobbyists might be financially inconvenienced if we finally “just marched home”?

This week, Western Christians will celebrate the coming of the Prince of Peace, with the Orthodox celebrating a few days later. It is disheartening that so many Americans who call themselves Christians also hold fast to a view that we must bankrupt our country and impoverish our people by playing policeman to the world and arbiter of whose regime must be changed by Washington.

Christians are among the biggest victims in these overseas operations, including in Syria, Lebanon, and Gaza. Yet many American Christians turn a blind eye to the suffering and misery produced by neocon-led militarism overseas. They don’t care that unquestioning support for Israel, for example, has nearly erased Christianity from where it was born.

Imagine if Jesus were born in the Holy Land today.

“Blessed are the peacemakers: for they shall be called the children of God.” That is the message of the Savior whose birth we Christians celebrate this week. Continuing to bankrupt our country and export misery overseas in the futile pursuit of a global military empire places us in opposition to this worthwhile advice. Let us all join together and work for a real peace in the New Year!

Article posted with permission from Ron Paul

The post A Christmas Gift To The War Machine appeared first on The Washington Standard.