An interesting article by Vladimir Terekhov at NEO. It ends thus:
“…..it must be said that the fears in the United States about China becoming a global power are rather bewildering, some may even argue completely irrational, as China is offering the world a wholly positive project. Surely these fears are all of the notorious Chinese leadership, which one could hardly call rational.
“Of course, everyone has the right to live in a their own fantasy world. However, it is not a good idea to allow myths and pseudo-scientific theories, perhaps about the Chinese leadership, to enter real life. Attempting to do so is counterproductive, which was very accurately illustrated by a truly reputable Hong Kong newspaper, the South China Morning Post.”
https://journal-neo.org/2020/08/24/no-sunny-weather-on-the-horizon-for-us-china-relations/

Posted by: bevin | Aug 24 2020 14:53 utc | 103

Here is the link to the SCMP article
https://www.scmp.com/comment/opinion/article/3097251/trumps-anti-china-policy-doomed-fail-his-covid-19-strategy-did

Posted by: bevin | Aug 24 2020 14:56 utc | 105

Colonel Cassad
apologies for length post y’all. Machine translation
1. In terms of numbers, the opposition counted from 100 to 250 thousand. The Ministry of Internal Affairs stated that 20 thousand. The truth is somewhere there … It seems that we can talk about several tens of thousands of people at the rally in Minsk. More accurately can be said by those who are counting on their heads by analyzing the pictures taken from above, which better than other allow checking the reliability of the statements of the authorities and the opposition.
Visually, the rally on August 23 seemed somewhat less ambitious than the rally on August 16, which remains the peak.
On the one hand, the past rally can be interpreted as a “trend fading”, but the total number is nevertheless quite enough to create the necessary picture of a mass protest. Accordingly, after the rallies next Sunday, it will be possible to build a curve and see whether the protests in Minsk will go downhill or the situation will develop in waves, as it was in the first months of the yellow vest protests, when protesters renewed their number records several times. especially after joining the protests of trade unions.
2. Lukashenka yesterday in every possible way demonstrated his readiness for forceful options and attempts to storm administrative buildings. The image of a man with a gun reminded me of Allende. This is a kind of reminder that Lukashenko is not going to leave Belarus anywhere and is ready to defend himself with arms in hand if there is an attempt to transfer the rallies from fermenting around the city to storming administrative buildings. Hence the snipers on the roofs, a large number of security forces, cordoning off at a number of key areas, paddy wagons and other special equipment scattered around the city. As Lukashenka himself said, since Monday “let them not be offended.” So far, this translates into broadcasting the image of a “man with a gun”, an order to stop the work of the striking enterprises, as well as today’s order to dismiss teachers from schools who do not share the state ideology.
3. All this clearly indicates that, combining the tactics of concessions and pressure, Lukashenka aims at the fact that in the medium term the protests will become less massive, and the KGB and other security structures will work hard on activists and disloyal ones. Along the way, all this will be accompanied by rallies in support of Lukashenka, which will be held on weekdays and affect not only large cities, as well as the work of an updated information policy (with the participation of Russian specialists) and a transition to more active action in Telegram, where channels like Yellow plums “, acting in line with the Maidan-Antimaydan discourse. In addition, Lukashenka actually has diplomatic support from Russia, which in a number of aspects actually duplicates Minsk’s statements about the Belomaidan threat or voices the danger of the “Reanimation Package of Reforms”, which the opposition is trying to disown, but which Lavrov spoke about quite clearly.
4. The West will naturally continue to put pressure on Lukashenka, but as it is already noticeable, they are afraid to “squeeze” and push Lukashenka even more into the arms of the Kremlin, whose help for Lukashenka has become critically important in the context of crumbling relations with Western countries and their puppets in Eastern Europe. Nevertheless, anti-Maidan and anti-NATO rhetoric will be in the mainstream of the Belarusian state propaganda in the coming months. And a further deterioration in relations with the West is inevitable, especially in light of the expected increase in pressure on the organizers of the protest in Belarus.
5. Regarding Lukashenka’s prospects, it seems that rallies and unrest in the streets will not lead to his overthrow. Attempts to seize power by force will also be stopped by loyal security officials. Options that could lead to Lukashenka’s departure: [and their evil g man stops..]

Posted by: Walter | Aug 24 2020 15:27 utc | 107

Snake@48
You myopically look at this as a battle between the cell and virus without consideration of the human immune system which is a product of evolution. Much of our DNA is made up of virus particles. Indeed the virus predated both the cell and the DNA. Our immune system is perfectly capable of dealing with viruses. Those who succumb to viruses have immature, dysfunctional or deficient immune systems due to age, chronic inflammation (from disease) or nutritional deficiency
There is no need for a vaccine, mask or any other intervention outside of hospital. The virus is not an external threat. Its part of the environment we must learn to coexist with . Man adopts to evolving viruses with continued evolution of its own immune system. Embrace the science of the immune system and evolution. by: Kay Fabe @ 52
<== Thank you for your comment but i do not myoptically look at anything I hope... According to https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Immune_response <=== An immune response is a reaction which occurs within an organism for the purpose of defending against foreign invaders. These invaders include a wide variety of different microorganisms including viruses, bacteria, parasites, and fungi ,..[1] There are two distinct aspects of the immune response, the innate and the adaptive, which work together to protect against pathogens. The innate branch—the body’s first reaction to an invader—is known to be a non-specific and quick response to any sort of pathogen immune response to infection before the cell is infected or any part of the body is infected.. ?
.the Immune Response is not a preventive to SARS CoVid 19 infection of a human cell..the immune response fights the challenges presented by the challenging virus . A defeatist might suggest humans must learn to co exist with pathogenic viri..? virons are external to the cell, hopefully the innate Immune response can keep it that way. Unless and until the virus successfully infects the cell, …. is exactly my point.. we humans need to find a way to stop the infection at the outer boundary of our cells when all defenses including the innate system fail.. the virus gains access into the living human cell.
virus challenge => interface <= innate defense fails<=>cell challenged
==========================>infection complete> adaptive system responds.
there are a few problems with this model. but for this discussion it might do.

Posted by: snake | Aug 24 2020 15:52 utc | 109

karlof1 | Aug 24 2020 16:04 utc | 111 Dude, It begins to look like a broad frontal attack in every “sphere” of modern war. See also my remarks and others, vk in particular, at MoA poisoning N thread…

Posted by: Walter | Aug 24 2020 16:10 utc | 111

The real situation shaping global order is the collapse of the US economy featuring:
>high unemployment
>quarter-mile food lines
>widespread eviction filing for nonpayment of rent, starting today (estimates of 30 million affected)
>wide disregard for COVID-19 preventive measures
>education programs without classroom attendance
>poor health and medical care
>the usual widespread corruption
>continued assassination of black men resulting in violent protests, etc.

Posted by: Don Bacon | Aug 24 2020 16:56 utc | 113

Cholinesterase inhibitors seem to be used against Altzheimers desease and dementia, but treating cocaine dependency, too.

Posted by: Pr | Aug 24 2020 17:00 utc | 115

How many barflies think we’re in the process of a “Fourth Turning”? That seems to be the focus of Max, Stacy and their guests on the last two Keiser Reports, where in this show it’s agreed that for the past 35 years the fundamental policy of the Federal Reserve Chairs is completely “fraudulent” and is the basis for today’s problem. Yes, it’s a huge problem, but if we can “fix the money” and “the politics” the commonfolk will have a better future once the crisis works itself out. Can it be done without a major war occurring is the hot question, and there’s some optimism that might be avoided provided Russia and China can convince the EU to cease following the Outlaw US Empire. The thought being if the coming Dollar Crisis can be contained to the USA and a new international trading/banking arrangement arrived at that avoids being centered on one nation’s fiat currency, then the harm will be limited. Now to watch the latest episode.

Posted by: karlof1 | Aug 24 2020 17:39 utc | 117

karlof1 @113: “…war needs solvent financing to feed it.”
Or imminent financial collapse. Use it or lose it.
Recall the real reason Iraq invaded Kuwait: The government had just concluded warfare with Iran with nothing to show for it. They had a million man army that had to be demobilized during economic hard times. What do you do with a million unemployed former soldiers? You lose a lot of sleep because they will find something to keep themselves busy. Something like regime change.
In other words, if you will soon no longer be able to pay for them, you are best off using your troops while they still follow orders. A desperation move, for sure, but the US government has been acting rather desperate lately.

Posted by: William Gruff | Aug 24 2020 18:30 utc | 119

i really need to use the preview option!! my spelling mistakes are atrocious!!

Posted by: james | Aug 24 2020 18:42 utc | 121

Saw this cancel culture on ZH today.
“US Bill Seeks To Ban Title “President” For China’s Xi Jinping”
While the country is overrun with covid, protests, unemployment, homelessness, food banks, etc., etc., these so called leaders are dealing in important matters like this.
Astonishing.

Posted by: arby | Aug 24 2020 19:22 utc | 123

vk, that was interesting about Germany, we here in Switz. see Germany as a monolithic block, and as ‘boss’ of the EU, which is one of the reasons that Switz. cannot ever join the EU.
If we consider differences, they are the usual ‘pol’ ones and don’t inform. (CDU vs. Sarah W, etc.) Italy (which suffers from the EU) is seen as a more legitimate, closer, more friendly or ‘potential’ partner, despite border squabbles, which are perpetual, a kind of excuse or justification for other fights…Plus the bad past. — Mussolini built a wall but it is now full of holes. Ppl (immigrants from the S) still cross and in winter they risk death ..
Term limits: Angel Merkel has been the Chancellor of Germany and the de facto EU boss since 2005. (Touting equal partnership with France, actually the ‘junior’, which France goes along with, particularly Macron. Sark the First was less keen, as an Atlanticist..)
No term limits 😉 … !
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alpine_Wall
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sahra_Wagenknecht

Posted by: Noirette | Aug 24 2020 19:36 utc | 125

Nobody reads old pages, so I’m replying here.
As this is an open thread, I hope my post is tolerable.
In the “U.S. Will Sanction Other Countries” thread…
@Kadath | Aug 22 2020 4:51 utc | 60
[US dumping the United Nations and forming its own parallel organization]
In an attempt to form a new alternative to the United Nations, the US could get little support and risks looking totally ridiculous.
Remember, the US lost overwhelmingly, 9-128, in the UN General Assembly on the question of recognizing Jerusalem as Israel’s capital (December 21, 2017). This despite Nikki Haley (remember her?) threatening to “take names”. Even the European countries voted against the US (although Poland may have chosen to abstain).
So there’s a very real risk that if the US huffs and puffs and threatens to blow the UN up, the rest of the world might refuse to join the proposed new organization. And the US would have to crawl back, very humiliatingly, to the United Nations.

Posted by: Cyril | Aug 24 2020 19:48 utc | 127

@vk 129
wow they have no shame at all.
interestingly the accompanying policy goal in that slide, “providing school choice”, goes to your thesis. That phrase is a euphemism for defunding public schools, with a combination of private and religious schools taking their place — and receiving the funding taken away from the public schools in a per-student transfer scheme, which will of course increase as public schools outside of wealthy enclaves get neglected even more.

Posted by: ptb | Aug 24 2020 20:12 utc | 129

Cholinesterasa inhibitors were involved in the famous and terrible case of mass poisoning so called “Toxic Syndrome” in Spain in the 80s, adjudiced to Colza Oil, but that trail debunked by investigative journalist Andreas Faber-Kaiser…
The Russians were not…A pesticide also used as a military grade agent produced by a well known German chemical giant was discovered as the cause by some medical especialists who then were silenced, some died, originated in a tomatoes harvest in southern Spain delivered throughout the country…
That investigation costed Andreas Faber Kaiser his life…He died of VIH infection…before he left, he stated never knew where he could catch it…
https://andreas.faber.cat/articulos/denuncia/sindrome-toxico/
Reasearch by military doctor, Liutenant Coronel Luis Sánchez-Monge Montero, could help treating Navalny…May be the Russians could get to his research, and offer it to Navalny´s wife…

Posted by: H.Schmatz | Aug 24 2020 20:26 utc | 131

Yes it does apply very much to me, james @ 121, thanks so much for your lengthy reply! I agree, as I said in my earlier post, Lossky is very difficult for me also — it isn’t necessary at all to follow what he is saying, as my point to Kay Fabe was that there is a different Christianity which is the one that Putin practises, and it has existed as early as has Catholicism, has the same roots.
Thanks so much for looking at the link – it says what Eastern Christianity is about, and you got the gist of it, that’s good enough! I didn’t have all this ‘larnin’ when I joined the little church of my closest friends, just got absorbed into the music, the visuals, the friendship of it, and only very gradually have learned a bit more, but not nearly on the level that Lossky speaks about it here. I did think it might be easier to follow than the fusion of oral and written I did earlier – he’s basically about the contrast with western Christianity here, and really has only for his whole lifetime written one book, which the link is the foreword to. He worked on it literally his whole life as he died only a week or so after it was published.
I presented it because it is a very concise summary of the difference between east and west, which I think is important in light of vk’s insistence that Trump’s ‘American exceptionalism’ is the oncoming Christian apocalypse. It isn’t! There is no such thing! And it was nice of Kay Fabe to demonstrate that even in western Christianity the basic message, (your do unto others one,) has till now prevailed as the Christian message.
At the Last Supper, Jesus says a version of it several times to his disciples: “A new commandment I give to you: Love one another as I have loved you.” That one is very neat as it fuses the two he has previously given: “Love God with all your heart, mind, strength; and your neighbor as yourself.” If you are not a believer, the first one isn’t possible; but even so you could follow that new commandment and love people the way someone you love loves you, (a parent for instance).
Or so it seems to me.

Posted by: juliania | Aug 24 2020 20:40 utc | 133

Germany is living proof there’s no natural or artificial nation-State, only economic prosperous ones and in economic crisis ones.
Modern Germany is actually the amalgamation of two kingdoms: Prussia and the Holy Roman Empire. The Holy Roman Empire was the remains of the Roman Empire in the West, while Prussia was a kingdom which managed to prosper and expand eastwards (until connecting to the Russian Empire, in modern Poland) during the Modern Age. There was born Germany’s “bipolarity”, with two dominant classes fusing together, initially under Prussian hegemony (Weimar Republic to the Third Reich).
During the Cold War, Germany (Third Reich) as partitioned again, in four parts: an American, French, British and Soviet parts. The first three ended up fusing together to form the Federal Republic of Germany (aka “West Germany”, acronym FDR) and the latter became the Democratic Republic of Germany (aka “East Germany”, acronym, in German, DDR). The DDR occupied Berlin (Brandenburg), thus most of historical Prussia (Prussia’s capital, Königsberg, is still in Russian hands). But most of the Prussian elite must’ve fled to the Western half during the ending of WWII.
Since the DDR wasn’t capitalist, the entire German capitalist class ended up in the Western half. During these decades, they probably ended up absorbing Western (Western European + American) values and doctrines (Atlanticism). The DDR lost the war and was gobbled up by the FDR, hence today’s German elite is essentially the FDR elite with the ingredient that they now have the EU and a free hand in the East. It is not that farfetched to claim the old Prussian ambitions of old Germany haven’t fade away, as the Cold War only lasted a few decades. It’s also logical, from the point of view of a central European capitalist power to expand to both sides – the Eastern side being the most delicious, since it still is a Lebensraum to be exploited and because the Eastern European economies are complementary to Germany’s (commodities exporters vs manufacturing superpower). If they lost their Prussian instincts, the German elite must’ve certainly regained them after the collapse of the USSR (the EU’s foundation happened roughly at the same time, so that may have been a concerted operation).
But the EU – the sword Germany uses against the East – has its roots in the Benelux (Belgium, the Netherlands and Luxembourg), and the Rotterdam port (Netherlands) still is Germany’s via to its mammoth exports. It was only with the consolidation of the West that modern Germany was able to expand to the East – hence many economists calling the creation of the EU as Germany’s delayed conquest of Europe (minus Russia).

Posted by: vk | Aug 24 2020 21:09 utc | 135

@ 136, in response to @ Posted by: Noirette | Aug 24 2020 19:36 utc | 126

Posted by: vk | Aug 24 2020 21:10 utc | 137

karlof1 @ 111 – it’s no longer morning, as I garden mornings, and coming here late was reading from the end, so nah! to Crooke’s second part — sounds like a crazy scheme to me, something like what India tried to do (I don’t know how that turned out, but this is not India.) We are supposed to have more faith in the internet and digital currency than we do in banks???
Well, I suppose if they can trash post office sorting machines, they can do anything.
Lauarel & Hardy: “This is a nice mess you’ve gotten me into, Stan.” Ya think?
Maybe instead of Swift’s war between the books, we could have a war between banks and silicon valley types, on the vast plains of Southern Utah. (No fires there yet.)

Posted by: juliania | Aug 24 2020 21:46 utc | 139

An overview and large excerpt from the new book by A.B. Abrams, Power and Primacy: A History of Western Intervention in the Asia-Pacific, is given space at The Saker’s blog with Abrams writing the narrative. What he exposes I knew some about but not to the degree he illuminates and his concern about what Asian policy will have toward the West now that it’s finally breaking free from its hegemonic grip.
What’s revealed is sordid to the nth degree and reveals a depth of racism toward Asians and brutalism that goes well beyond the pale:
“Occupation forces could loot and rape as they pleased and were effectively above the law.
“An example of such an incident was in April 1946, when approximately U.S. personnel in three trucks attacked the Nakamura Hospital in Omori district. The soldiers raped over 40 patients and 37 female staff. One woman who had given birth just two days prior had her child thrown on the floor and killed, and she was then raped as well. Male patients trying to protect the women were also killed. The following week several dozen U.S. military personnel cut the phone lines to a housing block in Nagoya and raped all the women they could capture there – including girls as young as ten years old and women as old as fifty-five.”
Both Trump and Pompeo, and most of those preceding them, remind me of creatures capable of such criminality, which is emblematic of Epstein and his ilk. The Feudal Outlook by those wielding power still exists. All those GIs returned home and probably generated similar trauma within their households in ways many of us yet recognize.

Posted by: karlof1 | Aug 24 2020 22:19 utc | 141

karlof1 | Aug 24 2020 22:19 utc | 142
Back about 1975 working in a foundry one of my colleagues who had been in the occupation as am MP told me a story along those lines.
The way he put it was that the prisoners he guarded were insane from combat in the island campaign. But yeah, story dovetails. That’s what they had been caught doing. Basically just put on ice to quiet down. Politically trials were not going to happen.
After the war most US combat vets had problems of one sort or another, and they drank a lot. I remember. Fights, broken windows, some target shooting out the back door…sometimes at flies on the ceiling, acting out I guess. In time that quieted down too. Now they’re most all gone.
But more immediately, Brother Marandi says @ tweeter “Seyed Mohammad Marandi @s_m_marandi
Aug 23
When the time comes, his murderers will be dealt with.”
Revenge served cold seems to be part of the agenda.
Could happen. Trouble with violence and lies is that one loses control of the outcome and, quite often, hands control to the opponent.
But I didn’t go to westpoint, so whaddai know?

Posted by: Walter | Aug 24 2020 22:57 utc | 143

Iran’s Drug Control Chief: US Aircraft Smuggling Narcotics Out of Afghanistan

“In the year 2000, the total production of narcotics in Afghanistan stood at about 200 tons, which rose to over 9,000 tons in 2017, an increase of about 50 times,” Momeni said during a Monday video conference with national anti-drug coordination councils, ISNA reported.
“Based on reliable information, planes operated by NATO and the United States transport these illicit drugs in our neighboring country,” he added.

But please, far-righters, keep blaming Chinese fentanyl and Mexican cocaine for the drug addiction crisis in America.
–//–
Doctors from Omsk are calling the Germans’ bluff:
‘We found no cholinesterase inhibitors in Navalny’s blood’: Omsk’s chief toxicologist comments on statement from Berlin’s Charite

“When Alexey Navalny was admitted to the in-patient clinic, he was examined for a wide range of narcotics, synthetic substances, psychedelic drugs and medical substances, including cholinesterase inhibitors. The result was negative,” said Sabayev, chief of the acute poisoning unit at the Omsk emergency care hospital where Navalny was treated before being airlifted to Germany.
“Besides, he did not have a clinical picture, specific for poisoning with substances from the group of cholinesterase inhibitors,” Sabayev, who is also the top toxicologist in the Omsk Region and the Siberian Federal District, added. “As was already said earlier, we are ready to share with our German colleagues samples of Alexey Navalny’s biomaterial for their comprehensive study.”

Posted by: vk | Aug 24 2020 23:14 utc | 145

Walter @144–
Thanks for your reply! The Missus a few years back wanted to learn more about ‘Nam since her dad was a tanker during his tour there well before she was born and as many was plagued by PTSD. The story’s convoluted and complicated, but the simple truth is her family was affected by the trauma ‘Nam–and Army life–induced that continues to live on. Lots of that trauma isn’t visible as it exists in mental and physical birth defects that invade for life, damage genes and can be transmitted to your own children as is her case. It’s really rather grave and shocking when an inventory’s taken. I discussed this issue with a lifelong social worker and educator–the man I learned the Franklin Reality Model from–and its impact on sociocultural functionality and as it relates to our collective morality–a quotient when looked at honestly has never been very good. I’d sure like to see/learn of some reason for optimism aside from the demise of the Outlaw US Empire. Perhaps humans are still too primitive or I expect too much. And meanwhile, time goes too fast, or maybe not fast enough.

Posted by: karlof1 | Aug 24 2020 23:32 utc | 147

karlof1 | Aug 24 2020 23:05 utc | 145 The financial fubar on the horizon. Of course there is nothing beyond boyscout preparedness to be done. I have the idea that most of the dying will be on the Eastern portions, and, given the objective reality, most dying will happen near the start of the fighting…ammo shortages and food choking off the cities worst, some.
Do not imagine that we here @ Anoxia are unaware of the tidal wave.
We selected this locus with such a tragic possibility in mind. Actually our expectations were informed by Quakerness and my Marxist parents.
War and trauma makes damage that, for lack of a better rule, lasts seven generations, I think.
I must thank you for Franklin. How the Fascist Won aligns with stories my mother told me about the betrayal of the Soviet Allies by Truman et al. I remember her voting for Wallace.
Next time I sally out I expect I better get some fishing line and so forth…it’s only a click to the water.
And yeah, people even @ MoA seem to generally ignore the looming sociofinacialfubar. It doesn’t matter, does it? We bought the tickets and have to go for the ride (mangling Hunter Thompson)
Later Dude.

Posted by: Walter | Aug 25 2020 0:22 utc | 149

@karlof1
I’m not gonna lie— I look at who’s posting and then read my favorites. Don’t get a big head but you’re one of them, among many others at the bar (julianna James, PeterAu1, Walter….).
I’m not that smart. I read the Alastair crooke piece and understood a thimble full of what he said.
Can you chunk it down and do a “dummies” version for us lower functioning plebes?
thanks.

Posted by: migueljose | Aug 25 2020 0:52 utc | 151

Thank you b for that second link to OCCRP.
That reinforces my belief in thoroughly reforming the maritime Mafia industry and its adamant opposition to OBOR and the Eurasian land transport infrastructure.
The permanent global disability resulting from a totally opaque criminality in maritime transport will lead us to war in their interests.
The merchants of Venice work us over 500 years later.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Aug 25 2020 0:57 utc | 153

Regarding Vietnam and soldier conduct, it’s important to know that disgruntled soldiers were a primary reason for the US pullout from the Republic of Vietnam, a fake puppet country created by the US inside Vietnam. The young draftees of the time, reacting to stupid fatal missions, refused to go on missions and conducted ‘fragging’ of unit NCOs — rolling a live grenade under their cots. It was a ‘broken army’ unable to fight, thanks for the conduct of these young men.
Young men? Many of them were drafted as teenagers.
That system obviously had to come to an end, therefore the 26th Amendment to the Constitution, because ‘men old enough to fight (18yo) were old enough to vote.’ That allowed the end of the draft and enlistment activities inside high schools to continue to fill the ranks with teenagers in order to ‘protect our freedom.’
Sure, they are gullible. Scientists have found that the average human brain (varying perhaps with experience) doesn’t mature until age thirty (explains some of our behavior!). Anyhow, a big shoutout to those who acted in Vietnam fifty years ago, young as they were.

Posted by: Don Bacon | Aug 25 2020 1:25 utc | 155

Cop in Kenosha Wisconsin shoots an unarmed black man seven times in the back because he didn’t stop when the cop said “stop or I’ll shoot”. This looks like straight-up second degree murder. I dunno, are cops in the U.S. allowed to shoot you if you’re not acting belligerent in any way but simply refuse to obey an order?

Posted by: krypton | Aug 25 2020 2:03 utc | 157

The new scientist is sounding like the sorcerer’s apprentice and the USA is BAD, SAD and Demented.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Aug 25 2020 2:27 utc | 159

A week ago I posted an opinion on Australian rare earth companies impending skyrocketing share prices on account of China’s dominance of the mining and processing operations. One Barfly rubbished the idea suggesting rare earths were not so rare. Since then a number of Australian companies have had specular price rises. The Australian and US governments have both fast tracked a joint Critical Minerals Taskforce. China is also the largest consumer.
https://thewest.com.au/business/public-companies/ato-settles-northern-banks-10m-and-wipes-off-9m-debt-c-1262028
A number of companies have made breakthrough processing technologies and discoveries including Australian Strategic Materials, ASX code, ASM, this company has shot up way over 100% in less than a week, have a look at the charts. Barflies were given the tip. Some are dual listed like lithium miner and processor Lynas Corp, now building an additional plant in Texas.
A number of Australian miners and processors of crucial battery making minerals including cobalt, graphite, copper, nickel and particularly lithium have performed beyond belief. Even traditional iron ore and gold producers are way up. There is a renascence in Australian mining. Forget oil, the green revolution and new disruptive technology is now mainstream. I reported the ASX as a teenager I have never seen anything like this.

Posted by: Paul | Aug 25 2020 3:13 utc | 161

@ 163 “War is a criminal enterprise”
. . .”War is a racket. . .the only one in which the profits are reckoned in dollars and the losses in lives.” — MajGen Smedley D. Butler, USMC, double recipient of the Congressional Medal of Honor, 1935

Posted by: Don Bacon | Aug 25 2020 3:30 utc | 163

Posted by: Don Bacon | Aug 25 2020 1:25 utc | 156 Anyhow, a big shoutout to those who acted in Vietnam fifty years ago, young as they were.
I was there. In the US Army from March, 1967 to March, 1970. In Vietnam from August, 1967 to August 1968, stationed in Cam Ranh Bay for the first 9 months, then three months at Vung Ro Bay, 16 miles south of Tuy Hoa.
I almost went off at Cam Ranh. One guy did go off, got an M-16, loaded up and started shooting people until he was killed by the Military Police. While up at Vung Ro, we had this fat black guy as our platoon sergeant. He carried a .25 semi-auto on him at all times because he was afraid some of us would hit him with a board when he came back drunk from the enlisted men’s club, which was pretty much every night. Down in Cam Ranh, one First Sergeant did have a grenade rolled into his hooch one night. Up at Vung Ro, after we were attacked in June, 1968, the Colonel in charge was fired on by a guard one night on the cargo pier. Another time someone “accidentally” tried to run him down with a two-and-a-half-ton truck.
My platoon was pulling guard duty down around the pump station we were responsible for which pumped fuel from Shell Oil tankers in the bay up to the airfield at Tuy Hoa. Standard procedure at that time was to obtain permission before firing on any suspicious individuals seen. The guy operating the M-60 machine gun at our position said, after the Lieutenant on duty left our position, “If that guy tries to prevent me from firing on anything I see, I’m gonna deck him.” LOL
Good times…not. 🙂

Posted by: Richard Steven Hack | Aug 25 2020 3:34 utc | 165

i forgot to thank karlof1 for sharing the crooke article which i also read… thanks karlof1…

Posted by: james | Aug 25 2020 4:25 utc | 167

Below is an amazing posting at Xinhuanet that refutes Pompeo’s recent speech at the Richard Nixon Presidential Library
Fact check: Pompeo’s fact-twisting China speech versus the truth
I am only part way thru it and am impressed at the sledgehammer they bring to the refutation. The posting refutes 26 points that Pompeo made and I am still reading number 3…..

Posted by: psychohistorian | Aug 25 2020 5:15 utc | 169

Let me just quote one of the shorter ones from my link above.
”
16.Mike Pompeo: Chinese companies do not answer to independent boards, and many of them are state-owned and have no need to pursue profits. A good example is Huawei.
False.
Fact check: The fourth national economic census of China’s National Bureau of Statistics (NBS) indicated that by the end of 2018, there were 15.61 million private companies in the country, up 178.6 percent from the end of 2013, and 84.1 percent of total enterprises were private ones, up 68.3 percent. The number of state-controlled enterprises were about 242,000, accounting for only 1.3 percent of total enterprises.
— Creating wealth and profits are the natural pursuit and the most important functions of businesses. NBS statistics revealed the following profits made by China’s major industrial enterprises (with an annual business turnover of at least 20 million yuan each) in 2019: 1.64 trillion yuan by state-controlled enterprises, 4.53 trillion yuan by joint-equity enterprises, 1.56 trillion yuan by foreign as well as Hong Kong-, Macao- and Taiwan-invested enterprises, and 1.82 trillion yuan by private enterprises.
— In China’s economic system, the private sector contributes to over 50 percent of tax revenue, over 60 percent of GDP, over 70 percent of technological innovation, and over 80 percent of urban employment, and accounts for over 90 percent of the number of enterprises.
— Huawei is a leading private enterprise, and 100 percent employee-owned. The Chinese government has no shares in Huawei, which adopts an employee shareholding scheme involving 104,572 people through its trade union. Only Huawei employees are eligible to participate, and no government departments or organizations have any shares in Huawei.
”
This is especially important to me since various barflies continue to spout either/or socialism/capitalism BS about China.

Posted by: psychohistorian | Aug 25 2020 5:46 utc | 171

Tuyzentfloot
In several comments you have mentioned the genuine problems of protesters.
Some protesters do have genuine rather than propaganda issues.
https://tass.com/world/1193353
“Protests continue despite curfew in Wisconsin where police shoot black man”

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Aug 25 2020 7:11 utc | 173

A Covid reinfection case after 4 and a half months. https://www.statnews.com/2020/08/24/first-covid-19-reinfection-documented-in-hong-kong-researchers-say/
4 months has been named as how long antibody protection was likely to last.

Posted by: Tuyzentfloot | Aug 25 2020 8:06 utc | 175

Coupla papers which could interest those who can be bothered with such things.
The first A randomised controlled study of the effect of cholinesterase inhibition on colon function in patients with diabetes mellitus and constipation details the efficacy of some cholinesterase inhibitors in the treatment of diabetics, particularly those whose guts have frozen, so require a ‘kick along’ to get ’em moving again. The second Cholinesterase inhibitors in patients with diabetes mellitus and dementia: an open-cohort study of ~23 000 patients from the Swedish Dementia Registry recounts how specialists in gerontic care held off prescribing Cholinesterase inhibitors for patients with diabetes suffering from dementia, but the studies authors demonstrated that not only were Cholinesterase inhibitors effective for treating diabetics, reduction in diabetes-related mortality was associated with cholinesterase inhibitor use.
So what? Well if Navalny presented as a patient in a diabetic coma at Omsk, prescription of a cholinesterase inhibitor is a proven remedy.
AS for so much of this thread – why? It is no secret that most leaders lie to their citizens, or that established publishers are the primary delivery mechanisms for leaders’ lies.
That sad fact applies across the board for all leaders, what I do not understand is why so many appear surprised by the deceit, or that some imagine that the nonsense pushed out by some leaders is any way different in its deceits than some other nation’s bulldust. They all do it, we all know it, so why waste time & energy trying to establish which is the most truthful when none of them are the least bit truthful?
Lastly it always saddens me when the superstitious try to hold sway with nonsense which was considered dodgy a coupla thousand years back. Nothing which has happened since has made these irrational beliefs any more correct then they were back then – the reverse in fact.
The roman emperors grabbed ahold of xtianity & in the process built the catholic church for one reason only – they had been losing their battles & many citizens attributed that to ‘the gods’ having deserted Rome.
So these greedy power lovers took a punt on a new religion, but as it always does, xtianity let the people down. Wars continued and the roman empire continued to implode.
However although the empire was on the way down, the church being newer and all, hung in there pushing the new tosh so that as the empire died, church leaders could sidle up to the new power and do a deal; “Our big boss (the pope) will back you oh mighty but cruel & oppressive one, if you back our church to your subjects”. ie you scratch our backs, we’ll scratch yours.
That is what happened and it had the usual outcome of such deals – eventually the power junkies fell out over division of the spoils or somesuch, so the pope would harass some king for marrying the wrong woman( eg someone who the church had no hold over) so the church & the king would both reound up innocents press gang them into one side or the other then this meat would kill or be killed allegedly in the name of god but really just to advance the interests of their generals or priest-generals.
We may sometimes like to put about that their hasn’t been a time in the last 250 years when the US government hasn’t been killing some group of innocents.
Sadly the catholic church has an even worse record, that since the romans decided to give it a burl, there hasn’t been a time when the church hasn’t been cranking up at least one side of a war, sometimes both sides.
The classic example being the crusades when Roman catholics sieged & sacked Constantinople who were also xtian because the pope in rome wanted to establish himself above the same sort of bloke in Constantinople.
Yet we shouldn’t be surprised, how is it that two thousand years back when people thought the earth was flat, the sun orbited earth & no one had a clue about gravity, a few tatty scrolls written in an obscure language that had a tiny vocabulary fully of regional colloquialisms & shitty grammar could be anything other than a mixture of gossip and superstition. The small vocab full of regional variation plus the lax grammar is great for holy rollers as it leaves so much room for ‘reinterpretation’. Every week in amerika some greedy exploiter cranks out a new take on the old tosh, then hooks in a few more idjits stupid enough to sling 10% to the conman while they whinge about paying taxes to build roads schools & hospitals, plus of course wage war on innocents portrayed as heretics/infidels/unbelievers, but that is one use of taxes these mugs rarely complain about.
It is pointless to discuss any of this with Xtians catholics in particular as in the end however rational you may try to keep the discussion the xtian will fall back on irrational statements about faith etc.
There is no point, from then on, irrationality – dearth of logic is always the last refuge of those hoodwinked by superstitious piffle.
The biggest drag about it is that they are never going to know, when they kark it, the lights have gone out so they will never have the conscious realisation they’ve been sold a crock, because they will be dead incapable of thought at all. That of course is the beauty of the scam they bought into. The bosses out looting & raping their parishioners can never get arrested for the frauds they commit every day because the complainants who know, are brown bread, so can’t tell their families that they all bought into a load of old codswallop.
The bit I most loath about catholicism is when some idjit tries to claim it is ‘beautiful’ that all the great western music & art is devoted to ‘their’ church.
Total tosh, as few ever bother to mention that for more than a thousand years any person who was great at expressing themselves musically or could paint a picture which conveyed genuine emotion, they had no choice but to make some xtian myth the focus of all their work – not just some of it – all of it. If an artist tried to paint or compose on any other subject, the best they could hope for was quick torture, 2 or 3 days on the rack, followed by being burnt at a stake.
I have no doubt that on many occasions an artist’s mind was probably thinking about the bonk they had the night before, yet forced that down & knocked out another cartoon of a bunch of sad misfits eating dinner.

Posted by: Debsisdead | Aug 25 2020 9:06 utc | 177

Tuyzentfloot
Plenty of places have genuine stuff to protest about, no matter US or France or some of the countries US has attacked.
Needs to be a bit more detailed than your vague latte sipper philosophies.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Aug 25 2020 10:48 utc | 179

Re: Psychohistorian @ 172 thank you for your post..
Hitler was forced into WWII, but before Hitler was Kaiser Wilhelm II, I have a personally signed edition of Wilhelm’s memoirs published in 1922, Wilhelm was related to the Queen in England and the Czar in Russia, all of the Czars came from Prussia as did Wilhelm and Hitler. A very able man, thought deeply about nearly everything and everyone one. Propaganda was the tool that forced the humanity of the world to fight each other in British, USA, and French bankers’ Lion filled Stadium; they wanted Germany destroyed and Germany stopped from producing the Ottoman Empire oil.
Germany was too successful, it had become in the eye of the banking empire, a nation state to be made evil by propaganda. Fact=>everywhere Germany was out performing Russia, France, Holland, Switzerland, and Japan Germany was growing its colonies (which was the way of the time) and its at home production so robust it left most Western Europe out in the cold.
Acquiring ownership of all oil beneath the Ottoman Empire was the real goal of WWI. Germany was already deeply involved in producing the Ottoman oil. German economic performance strong and dependent on the oil industry it had developed underneath the Ottoman Empire that the bankers decided in 1876 the German competition was a risk to their global power. In 1897 at the 1st Russian Congress in Switzerland 1897, Russia signed a treaty with France to get Germany, the next year, France, England and the United States signed a secret pact to get Germany. From 1898 forward, the secret services of these banker owned treaty bound nation states, made sure German negotiations in any diplomatic effort (in non German space) would be engineered to fail. basically, the Bankers wanted the nation state that hosted them, to sanction Germany into submission, but the nation state power to sanction was weak, so sanction took much longer and was not as efficient as it is today.
A person named Schiff in the USA funded the Japan-Russian war in 1905, and spent $20 million financing the 274 NY city persons in helping Lenin and Trotsky overthrow the Russian Government after the Czar and Czarist in 1919 Stepped down. 70% of the Bolshevik Revolution officials in Russia, 274 of them to be exact, were from NYC.
China has become pre war Germany, the western bankers have raised the war flag, and global armed competition for economic superiority is about to begin. Billions of humans will be destroyed in the process unless humanity unites beneath the nation state control system and closes down the nation state owned war arena.

Posted by: snake | Aug 25 2020 11:56 utc | 181

Debsisdead @178
It is true that the Abrahamic religions are at their core irrational. Unlike science, they have no mechanism to correct themselves either. On the contrary, those religious faiths reward irrationality. Even worse, irrational beliefs that cannot be falsified in any way are required prerequisites for membership in those cults. This craziness is embraced and redefined as a moral good among the adherents.
But artists require benefactors, or the art must be a hobby or a side effect of the productive process, like brackets in machinery or structures being filigreed for instance. Sadly, such worker artistry cannot persist in any but the most romanticized form of capitalism because it redirects labor resources from profits, so art itself must be commoditized.
Except for primitive communism (pre-agricultural hunter-gatherer societies) artists have required patrons, and during the Dark Ages the principal patron of the arts in Europe was the Catholic Church. While there is room for some subversion, most artists end up building their art around the interests of the ruling elites of the period when they exist because they need food and shelter like any other people.
How to escape this? It may not be what those brainwashed to think bad thoughts of it want to hear, but socialism is the only way to free the arts. Vestiges of socialism in Britain, for instance, enabled J.K. Rowling’s creative productivity. While providing the population with a no-strings-attached bare subsistence income frees artists from the requirement of patronage, it has the effect of driving up the price of the commodity that capitalists most require, which is labor. When the price of commodities no longer free float on the open market then those markets become distorted, informed capital investment fails, and capitalism breaks down. Really, how many pro-capitalist types would support anyone who wanted it to just sit at home and scribble in notebooks for years with nothing to show for it?

Posted by: William Gruff | Aug 25 2020 13:31 utc | 183

Awesome rant Debs.
!!

Posted by: Jackrabbit | Aug 25 2020 14:16 utc | 185

Follow up to MoA week in review of 8-16. In which B posted notices of the new quicker covid tests. My comment was it will at best be months before we see them. Looking at this morning’s mainstream reports it is clear they will never be allowed. Just never. Story after story about how the quick tests are plain evil. Reminiscent of how HCQ was destroyed. RussiaRussiaRussiaRussia. Orange man bad. Anything that interferes with the primary narrative is not a thinkable thought.

Posted by: oldhippie | Aug 25 2020 15:51 utc | 187

@ 178 debs.. nice to see you back! knocking down strawmen looked like it was fun for you…it totally escaped you what me, juliania and kay fabe were talking about, but i am glad you got a chance to rant over something i agree with too, lol…. you can thank us for that!

Posted by: james | Aug 25 2020 16:07 utc | 189

Reuters
“The president of the U.N. Security Council, Indonesia, said on Tuesday it was “not in the position to take further action” on a U.S. bid to trigger a return of all U.N. sanctions on Iran because there is no consensus in the 15-member body.”
“Indonesia’s U.N. Ambassador Dian Triansyah Djani, council president for August, was responding to a question from Russia and China on the issue during a meeting on the Middle East.
U.S. Ambassador Kelly Craft hit back after Djani spoke.
“Let me just make it really, really clear: the Trump administration has no fear in standing in limited company on this matter,” she told the council. “I only regret that other members of this council have lost their way and now find themselves standing in the company of terrorists.””
…………..
Nigeria takes the presidency shortly…

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Aug 25 2020 16:40 utc | 191

Peter AU 1 @192–
Nice of Ms. Craft to remind us that whenever in the presence of any Outlaw US Empire official that person’s in the presence of a member of the world’s #1 Terrorist Organization, easily proven given its behavior over the past 75 years. I for one am sick and tired of the lack of pushback against such agents of the Outlaw US Empire.

Posted by: karlof1 | Aug 25 2020 16:56 utc | 193

karlof1
It would be good to see some pushback. EU – Opposed to US on Iran and somewhat so on China, but taking the lead on Belarus. Makes me wonder if Merkel and Macron are trying to position Europe for the multi-polar world – Erdogan lite type thing?

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Aug 25 2020 17:10 utc | 195

karlof1
Thanks for Europe – Eurasia vs US trade. It is something I have never looked up.
Its an oddball world. Government to government, Russia and China are close, but what I see in the average person, the Russians like Australians fear the ‘Asian hordes’. I don’t think that is as prevalent in Europe.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Aug 25 2020 18:19 utc | 197

karlof1 199
Fiat money. Debt.. IOU’s? Barter is ok for some small village transactions, but currency is required for the current connected world. this fiat money dispersal with inflation. Basically an IOU that can become virtually worthless. It seems that these IOU’s that are called currency need to be tied to a certain amount of goods.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Aug 25 2020 18:54 utc | 199