{"id":314966,"date":"2025-09-09T06:25:24","date_gmt":"2025-09-09T06:25:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=314966"},"modified":"2025-09-11T07:24:17","modified_gmt":"2025-09-11T07:24:17","slug":"this-week-in-the-new-normal-105","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/?p=314966","title":{"rendered":"This Week in the New Normal #105"},"content":{"rendered":"<h1 style=\"text-align: center;\"><strong>Off-Guardian \u2013 Sept 8, 2025<\/strong><\/h1>\n<h5>Our successor to <em>This Week in the Guardian<\/em>, <em><a href=\"https:\/\/off-guardian.org\/category\/this-week-in-the-new-normal\/\">This Week in the New Normal<\/a><\/em> is our weekly chart of the progress of autocracy, authoritarianism and economic restructuring around the world.<\/h5>\n<h2><strong>1. \u201cID Cards will be great if our side does them\u201d<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>As the resistance to Starmer\u2019s Digital ID plan foments around the country, Conservative agitator Isabel Oakeshott has taken to her <a href=\"https:\/\/archive.is\/LYnP3#selection-2163.4-2163.73\">column in the Telegraph<\/a> to\u2026defend them:<\/p>\n<p style=\"padding-left: 40px;\">ID cards can create a culture of trust, but not under this Government<\/p>\n<p>Digital IDs work; they create high-trust societies where people don\u2019t lock their doors. We all carry cell phones and passports anyway, so why complain?<\/p>\n<p>Maybe it\u2019s sub-optimal, but we have a real problem with illegal immigrants and this will probably help.<\/p>\n<p>You see Digital IDs aren\u2019t inherently a bad; it\u2019s just we can\u2019t trust Labour to use them right.<\/p>\n<p>Transparent stuff.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>2. On the nature of rights<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>A video clip was doing the rounds this week, showing a debate between Tim Kaine and Ted Cruz in the Senate.<\/p>\n<div align=\"center\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-media-max-width=\"560\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Our rights don\u2019t come from government or the DNC.<\/p>\n<p>They come from God. <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/timkaine?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">@timkaine<\/a>, I suggest the Dems go back and read the words of our Founding Fathers. <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/QRmhTcbbOH\">pic.twitter.com\/QRmhTcbbOH<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Ted Cruz (@tedcruz) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/tedcruz\/status\/1963299914034663825?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">September 3, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>This will be the first time OFFG has ever agreed with Ted Cruz.<\/p>\n<p>Rights DO \u201ccome from God\u201d \u2013 or, \u201cour creator\u201d as described in the US Constitution. This is a philosophical statement, not a religious one. Meaning that rights are innate, they belong to all people inherently and not in the gift any individual or institution.<\/p>\n<p>The reverse position, as Kaine states, that rights originate from laws or the government, inverts the citizen\u2019s relationship with the state. Essentially, it immediately degrades them from \u201crights\u201d to \u201cprivileges\u201d. That idea is very dangerous.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>3. At least they\u2019re honest<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>In his latest attempt to troll the liberal coastal populations of the US, Donald Trump has announced he\u2019s re-branding the <a href=\"https:\/\/news.sky.com\/story\/president-trump-signs-order-rebranding-pentagon-as-the-department-of-war-13425876\">\u201cDepartment of Defence\u201d the \u201cDepartment of War\u201d<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>This undoes the previous change, <em>from<\/em> \u201cwar\u201d <em>to<\/em> \u201cdefence\u201d, following World War II.<\/p>\n<p>The media was quickly flooded with images and videos of signs being changed. Defense Secretary Pete Hesageth is gleefully revelling in being Secretary of War. It\u2019s all very performative.<\/p>\n<p>The name the Department of Defense was always a propagandist lie anyway. An Orwellian <em>mendaconym<\/em>. A phrase I\u2019m coining right now for a name which intentionally conveys the complete opposite of the truth (patent pending).<\/p>\n<p>It was never about defence, and always about war. But the fact that they\u2019re finally \u201cadmitting\u201d that is very interesting.<\/p>\n<h2><strong>It\u2019s not all bad\u2026<\/strong><\/h2>\n<p>Good Morning Britain ran a twitter poll to judge support for the planned Digital ID scheme. Here are the results:<\/p>\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"wpa-warning wpa-image-missing-alt aligncenter size-full wp-image-314967\" src=\"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/gmb-poll-results-id-cards.png\" alt=\"\" width=\"660\" height=\"254\" data-warning=\"Missing alt text\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/gmb-poll-results-id-cards.png 660w, https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/09\/gmb-poll-results-id-cards-480x185.png 480w\" sizes=\"(min-width: 0px) and (max-width: 480px) 480px, (min-width: 481px) 660px, 100vw\" \/><\/div>\n<p>I know, I know, you can\u2019t trust polls. But still\u2026I liked seeing it.<\/p>\n<p>Also, here\u2019s a little girl reading to her cat:<\/p>\n<div align=\"center\">\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\">\n<p dir=\"ltr\" lang=\"en\">Never gets old seeing this \uf979\uf496 <a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/0uAwoDqcKD\">pic.twitter.com\/0uAwoDqcKD<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Antidepressant Content (@depressionlesss) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/depressionlesss\/status\/1964242361720181111?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">September 6, 2025<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p><script async src=\"https:\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019m a simple man.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">*<\/p>\n<p>All told a pretty hectic week for the new normal crowd, and we didn\u2019t even mention <a href=\"https:\/\/www.independent.co.uk\/news\/world\/americas\/texas-lab-grown-meat-ban-b2819360.html\">Texas (temporarily) banning lab-grown meat<\/a> the or ludicrously theatrical <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.co.uk\/news\/articles\/c5yvpgyjed8o\">Epstein press conference<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: center;\">There\u2019s a lot of change in the air, a lot of agendas in the works, if you see a headline, article, post or interview you think is a sign of the times, post it in the comments, <a href=\"https:\/\/off-guardian.org\/submissions\/\">email us<\/a> or share it on social media and we will add it to the next edition.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Support Off-Guardian:<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/ko-fi.com\/offguardian\">Ko-fi<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.subscribestar.com\/offguardian\">Subscribestar<\/a><\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.paypal.com\/donate\/?hosted_button_id=CKFB3MH8CGB9U\">Paypal<\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/off-guardian.org\/2025\/09\/08\/this-week-in-the-new-normal-105\/\">Source\u00a0<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A regular look at the progress of autocracy, authoritarianism and economic restructuring around the world<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":39262,"featured_media":280317,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_et_pb_use_builder":"","_et_pb_old_content":"","_et_gb_content_width":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[61,58],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-314966","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-Commentary","category-Current_Affairs"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314966","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/39262"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=314966"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314966\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":314968,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/314966\/revisions\/314968"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/280317"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=314966"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=314966"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.thetruthseeker.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=314966"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}