Universe Wars: Cultural Battles & Liberty for All

 Letter to the Editor NYT — On the U.S.-Venezuela Oil Deal To the Editor: Recent reporting on the U.S.-Venezuela oil pact, and on intermediary firms now surfacing around it, points to a troubling pattern: a historic chance for Venezuela's recovery is being negotiated in the dark. I write as someone with family ties to Venezuela's oil sector going back to the 1930s, and to Basque immigrants who found opportunity there. Venezuelans have endured nearly three decades of institutions captured by corrupt insiders. A 25-year deal covering 65 billion barrels, struck without competitive bidding or public disclosure of who stands to profit, risks repeating that pattern under a new flag. Transparency -- clear ownership, open bidding, public accounting of proceeds -- is not a technicality. It is the difference between rebuilding a free Venezuela and simply changing which insiders control its wealth. Mikel de Elguezabal Méndez, 73492846A Navarra, Spain

 Subject: Letter to the Editor — Transparency in the U.S.-Venezuela Oil Pact To the Editor: Your recent coverage of the 25-year U.S.-Venezuela oil agreement rightly raises alarms about secrecy and process, but a deeper danger deserves attention: the deal's opacity is a gift to precisely the actors it should exclude. Free markets flourish on clear title, enforceable contracts and competitive bidding -- the institutions that let capital find its best use. A pact negotiated in secret, without competitive tender, invites middlemen with murky ownership and offshore accounts to insert themselves between two nations' resources and their rightful beneficiaries. That is not capitalism; it is the mercantilism Adam Smith warned against two centuries ago. Venezuelans have spent 27 years watching their institutions hollowed out by cronyism dressed as socialism. Replacing one opaque arrangement with another, however well-intentioned, squanders a rare chance to rebuild the rule of law that pr...

LLAMADO ABIERTO A LA CIUDADANÍA Y PETICIÓN FORMAL TELEMÁTICA Libertad natural, límite fiscal y eficiencia del Estado : propuesta ciudadana de debate público sobre la presión fiscal acumulada, el crecimiento del gasto público y los límites de la extracción tributaria Promotor: Mikel de Elguezabal Méndez-Rodulfo DNI 73492846A Navarra, 2026 Este documento constituye un llamado abierto en internet y, al mismo tiempo, una petición formal que se registra por vía telemática ante el Congreso de los Diputados, el Senado, el Parlamento Foral de Navarra y la Cámara de Comptos de Navarra. Se presenta para su tramitación como petición ciudadana, iniciativa de debate parlamentario o solicitud de informe, conforme a los reglamentos y normativas de cada institución, incluyendo el derecho de petición y las competencias de las Comisiones de Peticiones. I. Objeto de la propuesta Se solicita la apertura de un debate público, parlamentario, económico, jurídico y técnico sobre una cuestión que afecta direct...

  No comprehensive city-by-town casualty table exists (or can be reliably calculated) for every locality in the USA, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, and other nations for WWI and WWII. Official records track national (and sometimes state/provincial or unit) military deaths, not exhaustive hometown tallies for thousands of cities and towns. Individual honor rolls, local memorials, and archives (e.g., U.S. National Archives WWII lists by state/county, Commonwealth War Graves Commission, Australian War Memorial) exist for some places, but compiling or inventing complete per-city figures for all locations would be inaccurate and incomplete. Your example numbers for NYC (2,308 WWI / 4,567 WWII) do not match available historical estimates. -------------- Approximate national military deaths (primarily or including European theaters; figures vary slightly by source due to definitions of battle vs. non-battle, missing, postwar, etc.)These are the best-attested totals from official/histor...

https://youtu.be/i-aU-RCkY1k?is=V653DMkGxiUpTpql Great speeches...