Author: Henry Barnard

I am a voracious reader and also enjoy writing. I often have a very different point of view than the popular one. I do see value in debate, and thought it might add to the public debate on controversial issues if I were to express my contrarian opinions. I also started keeping my poems recently (I've written little pieces my whole adult life but never kept any); and I've been a photographer now for over 25 years. So I will be adding an occasional poem and hopefully interesting photograph to the blog along the way, just to spice things up.

48-Hour Fast

I want to do one 48-hour fast per month to get the benefit of increased autophagy, but I’ve had difficulty doing this. I stay busy with exercise (swimming) the full day that I can’t eat anything, but end up caving and eating just a few hours before going to bed, which would otherwise mean success if I didn’t cave. So I almost get there. Frustrating.

I got this idea from listening to a Youtuber about how to extend a fast a little longer. The idea was to use very high-fat and low-carb foods that won’t spike one’s insulin levels, so they won’t bring down the active ketosis. So I thought I might try this the next time I reach that impasse at a few hours from bedtime.

I’ve chosen two foods to eat: pecans (20 half shells) and one whole avocado. I put these two foods into cronometer, and they do provide an enormous amount of fact and very little carbohydrates. The issue is whether that much fat will satisfy my food craving and get me to bedtime without an insulin spike. We’ll see how this goes.

Intermittent Fasting

Where Are the Peacekeepers?

What one should be asking oneself about the conflict in Ukraine is where are the peacekeepers? It is obvious that a settlement of the dispute would be very beneficial to all the parties — Europe, Russia, and most of all Ukraine itself, for, if this war in Ukraine continues and no doubt escalates, the entire country will be ravaged.

But where are the third-party peacekeepers who might aid in brokering an agreement between Russia and Ukraine? No one seems to be stepping up to this task despite the clear benefits for all.

The areas of Ukraine that the Russian military has taken over have a majority of ethnic-Russians in their populations, so it isn’t unrealistic for these areas to be incorporated into Russia — that’s called democracy or rule by the majority. The deal would include the guaranteeing of the new borders of Ukraine against any further incursion by Russia, along with the compromise that Ukraine remains unaligned with NATO. Those are the obvious parameters of such an agreement.

Why would Ukraine entertain such an agreement with loss of territory? Because they are facing devastation to the middle and western parts of their country — currently relatively unscathed — as well as the loss of the entire coastline, including Odessa, so that Ukraine would become completely landlocked, and so no longer benefit as a lucrative transit point for the eastern trade route.

But instead of stepping up to encourage such an agreement, the West has elected instead to open the floodgates of military aid to Ukraine. Clearly, the West, egged on by the US, doesn’t want peace, but is willing to sacrifice Ukraine in order to debilitate Russia. That’s why there are no peacekeepers. The West is using Ukraine to wage covert war against Russia.

This will not end well for the West, certainly not for Ukraine.

Waging war, even indirectly, is an unpredictable animal. The current generation of would-be diplomats in the West seems to have forgotten this fact. And Kennedy’s sword-of-Damocles remark relative to the threat of nuclear war is still very pertinent today — perhaps more pertinent than ever.

Outbreak of War

What the events that led to the outbreak of World War 1 in 1914 tell us is that diplomats can lose control of situations, which can escalate quickly and snowball out of anyone’s control.

World War 1 was a war that no one wanted, with the possible exception of Kaiser William II who had off-the-wall fantasies of glory in combat. Because of entangling alliances, once the dominoes started to fall, it was inevitable that the world was faced with not a local war but a world war.

It is a lesson that perhaps has been lost on today’s generation of diplomats that seem to be acting as if the nuclear threat were merely an innocuous abstraction that could never happen. But it can happen, and if certain events are set in motion mindlessly, it will happen of its own accord.

And so we will have another world war that no one wanted, but this time it will be the war that does end all war — and civilization as we know it.

Finland

The path to nuclear war…happening before our eyes.

Finland’s Foreign Minister

Finland

If NATO entertains admitting Finland, we are facing nuclear war with Russia dead on — and I do mean “dead”.

Lunatics in Charge

Finally Some Sanity

Finally, an American politician — Rand Paul — stands up to the Russia-haters, and adds some sanity to American policy in regard to the Ukraine situation, which clearly has been caused by US/NATO-promoted NATO expansion, not by Russia.

Rand Paul

Lunatics in Charge

The anti-Russia politicians in Washington are the lunatics in charge of our foreign policy with regard to the Ukraine war.

US has gone off the rails. This will not end well.

Lying

Don’t See Irony

The woke liberals in the US don’t see irony in their supporting a Nazi regime in Ukraine.

Lying

The lying in the Ukraine war is on the Ukrainian side, and it is encouraged by the Western press, which has an unbalanced view toward Russia.

Liberators

The Russian military are considered to be liberators in areas of Ukraine where ethnic Russians are the majority. You don’t get this story told by the Western press.

The ethnic Russians in Ukraine have been discriminated against for years, and they are afraid of the Ukrainian hit squads sent out to eradicate dissent.

Ukrainians — NATO’s Pawns