(Those days when you can a piece because the very last source you check for linking completely debunks your arguments …)
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December 20, 2016
Open Thread 2016-43
Comments
@ juliania who thanked me for reading the 3-part commencement speech
It was a bit fiddly to read all three parts but I try to respect others opinions and learn from them.
I see Xtian religions as enablers of my/our social cancer of private finance and fault them for that. I have also experienced too much hypocrisy (and bullying) from those who profess faith but don’t live it.
I think it is in our nature to seek community and historically religions have provided that, albeit with way too much non-evolving structure. When I worked with people studying the future 40+ years ago I was was incensed at the religious position on birth control for example. The ongoing religious patriarchal control over women’s bodies and the shaming of sexual pleasure except for procreation are other facets of the inability to evolve/get beyond the Enlightenment period where it was proven that religions don’t have all the answers.
Why can’t we celebrate cultural diversity instead of trying to eliminate it? I and others benefit from Chinese herbal medicine because the Chinese didn’t burn their “witches” like the white men did…..writes a white man….grin
Posted by: psychohistorian | Dec 24 2016 22:08 utc | 201
Trump says will dissolve his foundation before assuming office
The foundation, which reported having assets of $1,115,991 in 2015, is currently under investigation by the New York State Attorney General’s office over several accusations.
It also donated $10,000 to an illegal Israeli settlement in the occupied West Bank.
The money was transferred by the foundation through an American NGO raising funds for the illegal Beit El settlement.
From the Ha’aretz link above …
Yaakov (“Ketsale”) Katz, one of the founders of Beit El, said in the interview that the donation was made in honor of Trump’s lawyer and friend David Friedman, whom he has since chosen as the next U.S. ambassador to Israel. Friedman serves as president of the American Friends of Beit El Institutions, which raises about $2 million a year for projects and institutions in the settlement.
“If I would have known he would be elected president, I would have saved the check,” said Katz.
… the new engineer of the genocide express.
Posted by: jfl | Dec 24 2016 22:41 utc | 202
Israel to reassess UN ties following UNSC resolution: Netanyahu
“I instructed the foreign ministry to complete within a month a re-evaluation of all our contacts with the United Nations, including the Israeli funding of UN institutions and the presence of UN representatives in Israel,” said Netanyahu on Saturday.
The UN needs to push through Palestinian membership following UNSC 2334.
Posted by: jfl | Dec 24 2016 22:44 utc | 203
@ jfl and others
I just read this link on ZH and encourage you and others to read it as well.
ZH posting title: Former CIA Spy Has A Christmas Message For Trump
There is hope where there is the will to speak truth to power.
Truth is treason in an empire of lies…….George Orwell
Posted by: psychohistorian | Dec 25 2016 1:31 utc | 204
@jfl | Dec 24, 2016 6:07:51 Interesting facts about the Milan area:
Aangirfan: BERLIN MARKET ATTACK – FALSE FLAG INSIDE JOB.
“Ariel” is a VERY RARE name for a Polish person…
Posted by: ProPeace | Dec 25 2016 6:37 utc | 205
Posted by: jfl | Dec 24, 2016 6:07:51 AM | 201
I think it is more complicated than that.
Because Germany’s public left or right wing is very anti war, Germany’s participation in the “yougoslav wars”, “the war on terror” and the “new cold war” has been by stealth, trying to help by intelligence, playing the nice constructive, nation building and sometimes the mediating part. Also of course because the “new cold war” runs through Germany and its special relationship with Russia.
So when Obama tried to extricate the US from the Middle East by a “muslim brotherhood strategy”, Germany helped with seminars for the Syrian opposition on how to run an administration, and developed a special relationship with Tunisia and the Ennahda Party.
The above has not been advertised much but is official news, anybody who is interested can find it on the internet. Same as Merkel’s recent refusal to recognize the Syrian President never mind the outcome in Syria.
What has not been publicly announced nor was discussed is the way a radical Islamic scene was allowed to grow under the eyes of German security services, observed recruiting militants for Syria but not stopped nor closed down. Nor did the German state react to frightened Muslim parents worried about their kids. Instead politicians concentrated on headscarves.
Estimates are that 7-800 Germans have been fighting in Syria – some of them with German army training.
If I assume that the people behind the Berlin attack knew what they were doing, then “the West” has lost control of the Jihadi networks under their noses.
Posted by: somebody | Dec 25 2016 11:16 utc | 206
@210 sb,
And if the people behind the German ‘security services’ were watching the people behind the Berlin attack, then “the West” has lost control of the Jihadi networks under their noses to the far-right wing within their own ‘security services’.
The attack works against Merkel in the next election and helps pave the way for AfD. Coming this far in advance, I would expect more between now and the election.
They seem pretty determined to prevail. I certainly hope they are exposed before they do take over.
Posted by: jfl | Dec 25 2016 14:59 utc | 207
“Suspicious” Fire Burns Down Hamburg Refugee Center. Could the BND or whoever be playing both sides of the ‘battle’?
Posted by: jfl | Dec 25 2016 15:09 utc | 208
Posted by: jfl | Dec 25, 2016 9:59:19 AM | 211
I don’t think the Berlin attack was a German idea.
Posted by: somebody | Dec 25 2016 15:33 utc | 209
@105 Piotr. It very well could be but if you put aside Dzerzhinsky’s role and focus on Russia’s trajectory for the last 20 years, you’d still agree with the premise, (a return towards a sovereign christian nation) wouldnt you?
Posted by: Lozion | Dec 22, 2016 3:56:27 PM | 161
Sure, but this is a “no brainer option” that does not require any organizational continuity. Whatever novelties you want to introduce as a politician, ideologically you have to link to the past of your nation, and given collapse (incomplete, in terms of popularity) of Communism and a more complete collapse of “Zapadnik” tendency (pro-Western, Zapad = West), what else was there?
I have this quote ringing in my ear from a book for teens translated from Russian into my mother tongue “Listen dear folks how we lived in Askold time” (a story teller addressing poor folks, Askold and Dir being the first Varangian princes of Kiev, something like Hengist and Horsa for the English). Good if vague link to the past always helps.
Posted by: Piotr Berman | Dec 25 2016 15:44 utc | 210
Russian jets carry out airstrikes to aid Turkish Army in Aleppo’s Al-Bab
According to a military source at the Kuweires Airport, a group of Russian Su-24 and Su-34 fighters jets carried out airstrikes over Al-Bab in east Aleppo, resulting in the destruction of several mechanisms that belonged to the so-called “Islamic State of Iraq and Al-Sham” (ISIS).
Despite Russian air assistance on Sunday, the Turkish Army was unable to maintain control over the Al-Farouq Hospital and Jabal Al-Aqil after the Islamic State terrorists scored a direct hit with their VBIED (vehicle borne improvised explosive device).
Does this mean that Erdogan has accepted a Turkish no-fly zone in Syria?
Does this mean the Russians have accepted Turkish control of Northern Syria?
Was Syria even consulted in any of this?
Posted by: jfmxl | Dec 26 2016 6:42 utc | 211