Open Thread 2021-85
I was asked to remind people to keep their comments reasonably short. This is no place to post long essays or text that can be found elsewhere on the internet. Link to that text and maybe post an excerpt but not the full piece.
News & views ...
One Day - Three Biden Failures
The three issues below are unrelated to each other except that they convey the rapid failure of the Biden administration.
There were state governor elections in Virginia and New Jersey and they results do not look good for the Democrats:
Tuesday’s elections left the Democratic Party reeling after one Republican won the governor’s race in Virginia and another posed an unexpectedly strong challenge to New Jersey’s incumbent governor, with the race still too close to call.
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A year after Mr. Biden won Virginia by 10 percentage points, former Gov. Terry McAuliffe, a Democrat, failed in his quest to win back his old office, losing to the Republican candidate, Glenn Youngkin, in a contest that was closely watched for what it could signal about voters’ satisfaction or lack thereof with the incumbent president and his party. Mr. McAuliffe conceded to Mr. Youngkin on Wednesday morning.
Atrios explains best why the Dems are again losing:
[T]he story of every Dem election win is they promise lefty stuff, fail to deliver, then they lose subsequent elections and then tell themselves that doing all the lefty stuff they didn't do was the cause. They lose power, eventually go back to running on lefty stuff, win, and then again fail to deliver.
The failure to deliver is a indeed a constant. But there is a reason behind that. The U.S. election system is basically based on bribery and thus incapable to deliver the policies most people want.
The system has little to do with real democracy. It is a sham. People around the world know this. People in the U.S. know it too and want it changed:
In the Global Attitudes Survey this spring, Pew asked 18,850 adults in 17 advanced economies, including the United States, about their views of American society and politics. Countries surveyed included Britain, Canada, Australia, France, Germany and South Korea.
“Very few in any public surveyed think American democracy is a good example for other countries to follow,” Pew’s report said. ...
Over the last days there has been a conference of the parties of the UN climate convention. U.S. President Biden had planned to 'lead' it.
Cont. reading: One Day - Three Biden Failures
When Russian Troops Training In Russia Are 'Raising Concerns' Its Propaganda
Yesterday the Washington Post as well as Politico were again engaging in warmongering disinformation.
Both claimed that Russian troops are amassing at the Ukrainian border.
The Post wrote:
A renewed buildup of Russian troops near the Ukrainian border has raised concern among some officials in the United States and Europe who are tracking what they consider irregular movements of equipment and personnel on Russia’s western flank.
Politico headlined:
Satellite images show new Russian military buildup near Ukraine
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But while the headline of the piece say "near Ukraine" the text actually places the pictured troops "near the Russian town of Yelnya close to the border of Belarus."
Cont. reading: When Russian Troops Training In Russia Are 'Raising Concerns' Its Propaganda
The U.S. Supply Chain Crisis Will Get Worse - As Will Inflation
By now it is obvious to everyone that the U.S. has a supply chain problem.
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The highly optimized 'lean' transport chain from producers to consumers has clogged up.
This is a consequence of the two shocks the pandemic has caused in consumption patterns. Orders dropped hard at the start on the pandemic when people went into lockdown. A second shock came when consumption recovered to a higher than ever levels.
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The higher consumption was not for services as restaurants were often still closed. Instead the money went into buying things. Things that are produced elsewhere.
Cont. reading: The U.S. Supply Chain Crisis Will Get Worse - As Will Inflation
The MoA Week In Review - OT 2021-084
Last week's posts at Moon of Alabama:
- Oct 25 - Microsoft Blames Russia For Failure To Enforce Its Vendors Account Security
Related:
- Nation-State Attacker of Telecommunications Networks - Bruce Schneider
- Traffic Camera Mistakes Woman for Car, Issues Ticket to Car Owner - Petapixel
- Windows 10, Linux, iOS, Chrome and Many Others at Hacked Tianfu Cup 2021 - Hackernews
- Oct 26 - On The Delusion In U.S. Foreign Policy And What Might Change It
Related:
- The United States Needs to Get Serious - Stephen Walt / Foreign Policy
- Why Did They Even Bother Ousting Trump Just to Continue His Foreign Policy? - Tim Kirby / SCF
- “The Spoils of War”: How Profits Rather Than Empire Define Success for the Pentagon - Intercept
- Oct 27 - Pentagon Generals, News Writers Abuse Chinese Test Flight To Argue For More Weapons
Related:
- Opinion: It’s not a ‘Sputnik moment’ and we should not feed Cold War paranoia - Zakaria / Washington Post
- Taiwan Defense Minister Says Island Should Rely on Itself for Defense - Antiwar
- Taiwan Trouble feat Peter Lee - Around the Empire
- Oct 29 - How Poland Tried To Win But Lost The Gas Game
Related:
- Russia’s Gazprom to cover third of global gas consumption growth in 2021 - RT
- Russia's Gazprom strikes gas supply deal with crisis-hit Moldova on ‘mutually beneficial terms,’ averting energy emergency - RT
- Russian natural gas price for Moldova may reach $500-600 per 1,000 cubic meters - source - TASS
- Oct 30 - Biden Rejects Claims That He Wants To Return To The Nuclear Deal With Iran
Related:
- Iran says Israel, U.S. likely behind cyberattack on gas stations - Reuters
- US flies bomber over Middle East in show of force to Iran - AFP
- Biden offers to lift sanctions if Iran 'changes course' - LA Times
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Other issues:
Cont. reading: The MoA Week In Review - OT 2021-084
Biden Rejects Claims That He Wants To Return To The Nuclear Deal With Iran
The Biden administration is not willing to return to the original nuclear deal with Iran. It wants a much different deal that it can then use to further pressure Iran into more, unrelated concessions. That strategy will fail.
Iran knows that the U.S. is not serious about returning to the JCPOA.
These few headlines are sufficient to explain that:
- Sep 24 - US implores Iran to return to nuke talks without delay - AP
- Oct 7 - US Calls for Iran to Make ‘Imminent’ Return to Nuclear Deal Talks - Antiwar
- Oct 27 - Iran says it's returning to nuclear deal talks after stalling for months - Yahoo
- Oct 27 - As Iran agrees to return to nuclear talks, US urges it to show ‘good faith’ - AFP
Urges to show 'good faith' ...
> The United States on Friday hit Iran with a fresh set of sanctions as President Joe Biden prepares for a key weekend meeting with European leaders to discuss the possible resumption of nuclear talks with the Islamic Republic.The Treasury Department announced the new penalties against two senior members of Iran’s Revolutionary Guard Corps and two affiliated companies for supplying lethal drones and related material to insurgent groups in Iraq, Lebanon and Yemen and to Ethiopia, which has been fighting rival Tigray forces for almost a year.
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Friday's sanctions block any assets that those targeted may have in U.S. jurisdictions, bar Americans from transactions with them and, perhaps more importantly, also subject foreign people and firms that do business with them to potential penalties.
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The two firms, the Kimia Part Sivan Co. and the Oje Parvaz Mado Nafar Co., along with the latter's managing director, were sanctioned for supplying engines and technical assistance to the drone programs, Treasury said. <
The new sanctions will of course make the negotiations even more difficult if not impossible. It is hard to avoid the conclusion that the Biden administration is not really interested in closing a deal. It has however no alternative if it wants to at least somewhat limit Iran's nuclear program. A war against Iran would end with a defeat of the U.S. and its allies in the Middle East.
How Poland Tried To Win But Lost The Gas Game
Energy supplies from Russia to western Europe have always been on long term contracts with mostly fixed pricing. These constructs allowed Russia to make the large invest in the necessary infrastructure while the buyers gained energy security. The European Union, under U.S. influence, has tried to destroy that model. But its attempts to 'open the energy markets' has led to insecure supplies and extreme prices.
Poland's current situation can be seen as an example for the 'success' of such policies.
In 1992 Russia, Belarus, Poland and Germany agreed to build the Yamal-Europe pipeline to bring natural gas from new gas fields in Russia to Poland, Germany and beyond.
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The pipeline has a capacity of some 33 billion cubic meter (1.2 trillion cubic feet) per year. In 1996 Poland and Gazprom of Russia agreed on a contract that would deliver up to a third of the pipeline's capacity to Poland for 25 years. The price was, as usual at that time, bound to the oil price with a defined delay in rising and lowering the gas price but in principle following the movement of the global oil markets. Gazprom, which had to invest billion to develop the Yamal fields and pipelines, insisted on a 85% minimum (‘take-or-pay’) amount of gas that Poland would have to pay for independent of its actual demand for it.
All was well up until November 2014 when Poland's gas operator PGNIG suddenly found that it paid a too high price for the gas coming from Russia. (It is not just a coincidence that this came a few months after the U.S. arranged coup in the Ukraine and the return of Crimea to Russia.)
In March 2015 Poland sued Gazprom to gain lower gas prices:
Cont. reading: How Poland Tried To Win But Lost The Gas Game
Open Thread 2021-83
News & views ...
Pentagon Generals, News Writers Abuse Chinese Test Flight To Argue For More Weapons
The generals in the Pentagon want to get rich. Most strive to take this or that board position at one of the large weapon manufacturers after they retire. But to get there requires that the generals, while still in the military, promote more weapons sales.
Big newspapers are another party with interests in promoting weapon manufacturers and wars. They pay for quite a lot of advertisement. News of weapons and wars also nice clickbait which brings more paying subscribers and again additional advertisement.
These two forces collaborate in their weapon and war promoting efforts which in the best case result in the plundering of the common people. In the worst case the end result is the slaughter of many innocent humans for no sensible cause or reason.
Here is a recent example by the well known warmongers David E. Sanger and William J. Broad of the New York Times:
China’s Weapon Test Close to a ‘Sputnik Moment,’ U.S. General Says
A Chinese test of a hypersonic missile designed to evade American nuclear defenses was “very close” to a “Sputnik moment” for the United States, Gen. Mark A. Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said on Wednesday, the first official confirmation of how Beijing’s demonstration of its capabilities took American officials by surprise.
The authors, as well as Milley, are of course wrong.
Cont. reading: Pentagon Generals, News Writers Abuse Chinese Test Flight To Argue For More Weapons
On The Delusion In U.S. Foreign Policy And What Might Change It
The current U.S. foreign policy is delusional. Its attempts to command the world are getting laughed at. How did this happen and what might change it?
Here are excerpts from two smart essays which discuss the theme.
Alastair Crooke asks why somehow nothing seems to be working within Joe Biden's United States. He then observes of its global policies:
At the international geo-political plane, things don’t seem to be working either. Team Biden says it wants a ‘managed competition’ with China, but why then send Wendy Sherman (who is not noted for her diplomatic skills) to China as Biden’s envoy? Why has there been this continuous chip-chipping away at the 1972 ‘One China’ policy with a series of small, seemingly innocuous moves on Taiwan if Team Biden wants contained competition (what he said he wants in a recent call with President Xi), but falters, time after time, to instigate a serious relationship?
Does the Team not understand that it is not ‘containing’ competition, but rather playing-with-fire, through its’ opaque hints that the U.S. might support Taiwan independence?
And then, why of all people, dispatch Victoria Nuland to Moscow, if the competition with Moscow was to be quietly ‘balanced out’ as Biden’s face-to-face with Putin in Geneva seemed to signal? Like Sherman, Nuland was not received at a senior level, and her ‘Maidan arsonist’ reputation of course preceded her in Moscow. And why decimate Russia’s diplomatic representation at NATO HQ, and why have Secretary Austin talk in Georgia and Ukraine of NATO’s ‘open door’?
Is there some hidden logic to this, or were these envoys intentionally sent as some kind of ‘kick-ass’ provocative gesture to underline who’s boss (i.e. America is Back!)? This is known in Washington as ‘capitulation diplomacy’ – competitors are presented with only the terms of their capitulation. If so, it didn’t work. Both envoys effectively were sent packing, and Washington’s relations with these key states are degraded to near zero.
The Russia-China axis have come to the conclusion that polite diplomatic discourse with Washington is like water off a duck’s back. The U.S. and its European protégés simply do not hear what Moscow or Beijing says to them – so what is the point to talking to ‘tin-eared’ Americans? Answer: None.
Prof. Michael Brenner recently sent a longer diagnose of the U.S. political sphere to his mailing list. He sees the same foreign policy problems as Crooke does and tries to answer some of the questions Crooke is asking:
Cont. reading: On The Delusion In U.S. Foreign Policy And What Might Change It