False Claims About Russia Continue To Cloud The 'West's' Vision
The pro-Ukrainian Spectator states correctly that the sanctions on Russia have failed. But its reasoning is dubious:
The West embarked on its sanctions war with an exaggerated sense of its own influence around the world. As we have discovered, non-western countries lack the will to impose sanctions on either Russia or on Russian oligarchs. The results of the miscalculation are there for all to see. In April last year, the IMF forecast that the Russian economy would contract by 8.5 per cent in 2022 and by a further 2.3 per cent this year. As it turned out, GDP fell by just 2.1 per cent last year, and this year the IMF is forecasting a small rise of 0.7 per cent. And that is all in spite of the war in Ukraine going much more badly than many imagined it would in February of last year. The Russian economy has not been destroyed; it has merely been reconfigured, reorientated to look eastwards and southwards rather than westwards.
Yes, the 'West' had an "exaggerated sense of its own influence around the world". But that is only a part of the problem. The 'West' still thinks it is superior to other countries even as at least some other countries have caught up with it and are, in parts, superior in the use of science and technology.
Moreover the 'West' thought that Russia was inferior to it. In 2015 the late Senator John McCain called it a "gas station masquerading as a country":
"Look, Russia is a gas station masquerading as a country," McCain said. "It's kleptocracy. It's corruption. It's a nation that's really only dependent upon oil and gas for their economy, and so economic sanctions are important."
In the early 1990s Russia surely was down. But it wasn't out. It had a heavy industry and everything it needed to feed it. It had well educated people and large scientific community. When McCain spoke, 25 years after Russia's downfall, the country was largely back in the upper league.
Its per head production of steel, cement, energy and food was and is higher than in most 'western' countries. Those are the basics numbers one needs to judge an industrial country and its capabilities, not some dubious number like the Gross Domestic Product which includes 'services' of dubious value. (For example the share of health expenditure in the quite high U.S. GDP is 16.8% with a worse outcome for the general population than in less spending European countries.)
As it has now become clear even to the Spectator that the sanctions on Russia have failed one would hope that the 'West' would come to a more realistic view of itself and of Russia economic capabilities. Unfortunately that is not yet the case.
Witness Florida's governor Ron DeSantis who in March 2023 basically repeated McCain's false claim:
... DeSantis said of Putin. "And so, he's basically a gas station with a bunch of nuclear weapons and one of the things we could be doing better is utilizing our own energy resources in the US."
The 'West' will continue to underestimate Russia's capability as long as such false claims are still believed. Only a realistic assessment and more respect for Russia's capabilities can correct the mistake of waging and losing a proxy war against it.
Posted by b on May 12, 2023 at 15:19 UTC | Permalink
next page »I posted this in the open thread. It fits here perfectly.
Thread on Russia's Central Bank report on the economy:
1/ Russia's Central Bank released a detailed analysis of the country's economy, with predictions up to 2024. Key point - the economy is proving a lot more stable than expected.... continues
https://threadreaderapp.com/thread/1656981767557873669.html
Posted by: too scents | May 12 2023 15:31 utc | 2
Thanks for the posting b
I want to make McCain's words be a more accurate reflection of the projection from behind the curtain
Look, America is a private bank cartel masquerading as a country," I said. "It's kleptocracy. It's corruption. It's a nation that's become dependent upon the FIRE sector for their economy, and so economic obfuscation is important."
Posted by: psychohistorian | May 12 2023 15:32 utc | 3
Dave ONeil @ 1
Thanks for that heads up.
I read into that ....
The UK can expect call-up any time now, conscription into the army, no choice.
. They'll chuck the British youth into the meat grinder next.
Why becouse the youth can't work and live on a minimum wage.
Cynical tory brutality.
Posted by: Mark2 | May 12 2023 15:33 utc | 4
John McCain was a piece of shit masquerading as a human!
Posted by: Firefly | May 12 2023 15:38 utc | 5
McCain was a complete screwup who only survived because of his Daddy. Married a mafia heiress after dumping his first wife, a good wife he did not deserve. Biggest activity in his later years was canoodling and carrying on with Lindsay Graham, another complete moron.
This is the sort of 'leader' America honors and respects. North Vietnam knew within minutes of his crash who and what he was and who his daddy was. America prioritizes ignorance.
Posted by: oldhippie | May 12 2023 15:41 utc | 6
I think of McCain like Reagan: an eternally undead albatross around all our necks, because of their usefulness to the aristocracy. Every President since Reagan has been...Reagan.
Kılıçdaroğlu, the main rival of incumbent President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, put up a scathing tweet on Thursday:
"Dear Russian friends. You are behind the doctored videos, fake content, and conspiracies that were made public. If you want to continue our friendship after May 15, refrain from interfering in the Turkish state. We are still in favor of cooperation and friendship,"
His tweet came on the same day when Muharrem Ince, another candidate, withdrew his candidacy, claiming a smear campaign perpetrated by supporters of the Gülenist Terror Group (FETÖ) endorsed by supporters of Kılıçdaroğlu.
Another fake claim and he doubles down on Friday by repeating his claims: "If we did not have concrete evidence, I wouldn't have tweeted," he told Reuters. No evidence was presented.
The Economist recently called on Turkish voters to support Kılıçdaroğlu. The cover with the title “The Most Important Election of 2023” was adorned with tags “Save Democracy” and “Erdoğan Must Go.”
Posted by: gary | May 12 2023 15:42 utc | 8
The West believes Consumption determines Production and forgets that Currency Values are not predicated on Consumer Demand but Elasticity of Supply
Posted by: Paul Greenwood | May 12 2023 15:59 utc | 9
If any political analysts offered a "realistic assessment "
Where would their career path lead?
Posted by: jpc | May 12 2023 16:02 utc | 10
Hi, I add more.
(THIS FOOD PRODUCT CONTAINS BIO-ENGINEERED INGREDIENTS) -yuck!
A for-profit capitalists model showing ugly face. Yes! How can humanity survive under this food destruction for money. Forcing genitic manipulation of food to produce more profit reducing flavour and nutrients creating poisen
Will hundred years they feed you dirt flavoured meal, add another hundred years they only feed you dirt. It can never get any better, only worse as profits shrink, so do quality and corruption increases.
Today, America food on self tastes like cardboard,
microwaved and bleached,
no flavour, usually shipped around world, stored years before eat.
Russia has special. Pure, clean food, With natural FlAvour. The food tastes like food, has clean aroma, the smell of real food products brings back memories of childhood. US overspices everything cause food here high in chemicals.
Non GMO needs a new name, the seed is pure not altered. Something wrong, if us takes RF, humans perish cause they will destroy last known food supply that not mass harvested and chemically treated bleached microwaved food for profit.
Posted by: Miguel | May 12 2023 16:09 utc | 11
Let's look at 'food inflation' across Europe ....
Food Inflation in European Union averaged 3.42 percent from 1997 until 2023, reaching an all time high of 19.17 percent in March of 2023 and a record low of -1.20 percent in June of 2014.
UK currently at just less than 20% [helping out The Spectator]
Russian Federation at less than 3%
Ukraine 22%
Poland 24%
Turkey at a whopping 54%
Estonia Latvia Lithuanian all over 20%
https://tradingeconomics.com/country-list/food-inflation?continent=europe
No comment.
Posted by: Don Firineach | May 12 2023 16:09 utc | 12
They don't understand money so they have no idea why it never worked.
But some of us do below
HREF= "https://new-wayland.com/blog/madness-of-clowns/"
Posted by: Derek Henry | May 12 2023 16:10 utc | 13
Tried 2 different ways still no idea how to post a link on this blog :(
Posted by: Derek Henry | May 12 2023 16:20 utc | 15
I love the UK SecDef: We can no longer sit by and watch Russia take the lives of Ukrainian civilians. Really? The Ukies do a great job of killing civilians and they did that for years in the ethnic Russian population which was met with total indifference by the UK SecDef. Even today the Ukies are attacking civilian targets all the time. Somebody needs to tell The West that their lies don't have any clothes.
Posted by: Jeff Harrison | May 12 2023 16:22 utc | 16
Farming contributes less gdp than money laundering in the city of London but guess which one, if withdrawn, will kill everyone? I think economists and the idiot politicians who listen to them, have mistaken their map for the territory. If you have gas plants, steel foundries and tank factories, you will win against a foe who measures wealth by how many slop-gobbling, slack-jawed, fat-arsed office sloths they have in ugly tall buildings made out glass.
I expect a flash of brilliant light from the direction of GCHQ any day soon, as Russia shows that it too has long-range missiles...
Posted by: Benn | May 12 2023 16:23 utc | 17
"Its per head production of steel, cement, energy and food was and is higher than in most 'western' countries."
That's very good, Russia is certainly not just a gas station. However two observations:
1. If this indeed is a 'civilizational war', per head means nothing. Only the totals of either side matter.
2. Soviet Union made huge amounts of concrete, steel, food etc. Not so many consumer goods or services. Didn't end well. Won't end well this time.
Posted by: Membrum Virile | May 12 2023 16:26 utc | 18
psychohistorian | May 12 2023 15:32 utc | 3--
Good description. I'd add Homeless Capital of the World and Creating More Poverty Than Russia & China Combined. Also, Incapable of Thinking for Itself.
If Russia is a "gas station masquerading as a country"
Then the US is an "Arms dealer masquerading as a country"
Posted by: Oldcutlas | May 12 2023 16:30 utc | 20
They are still scratching their heads Why the Russian Oil Price Cap Won't Work.Some of us knew from the very beginning why it would NEVER work.
https://new-wayland.com/blog/why-the-russian-oil-price-cap-wont-work/
" An individual company will want to export to make a monetary profit. However, the national economy only needs to export to the extent that it can obtain imports in exchange for them. Imports raise a nation’s standard of living. Exports are the cost of obtaining imports. Exporting in excess is, therefore, potentially a waste of national resources. Since Russia is barred from obtaining imports from the West, it has no national interest in exporting anything to the West.
In addition, Russia is banned from dealing in Western currencies, and the West has banned its populations from dealing in roubles. Paradoxically, that makes the exchange analysis very easy indeed: nobody in Russia needs Western currencies as there is nothing to buy them. However the energy sales to the West need to be exchanged, at least in part, for roubles as the Russian energy firms have bills and taxes to pay.
That imbalance should make it very difficult to get hold of roubles in exchange for Western currencies, and the exchange rate is only being prevented from ascending into the stratosphere by the intervention of the Russian banking system.
In effect, Western currencies are confetti from the Russian point of view - as useless as Reichsmarks. The exchange rate exists to prop up the energy firms in rouble terms, with the Russian Central Bank discounting FX settlement balances into roubles as required.
The Russian banking system ensures that the oil companies get enough Roubles to pay their staff, their suppliers and the government’s tax. This happens whatever the amount of Dollars/Euros/Pounds the energy firms get in the front door, whether that is one or one billion. The exchange rate will buffer the problem if the Russian banking system thinks it needs to.
Moreover, Putin’s government provisions its activities like all governments provision their activities - by commandeering the resources of the nation via votes in the legislature. The real tax point is when a government takes something for its use and deprives the private sector of access to it, not when money is handed over. Money is just a way of shifting the burden of that confiscation around the nation.
The government may give the people some roubles for the resources it commandeers so that they can transact with others. Those others then stand the loss instead when they settle their tax bill. This way of looking at things is not a new idea - Keynes laid it out in depth in How to Pay for the War in 1940.
All governments of sovereign nations settle payments in the same way - an interest-free overdraft at the central bank which is then partially eliminated as taxes are collected, leaving the balance as additional National Savings in the currency of issue. In all cases, the underlying asset the central bank discounts is the state’s power to tax. The ‘missing taxes’, that cause so much wailing and gnashing of teeth, will turn up, automatically, when the National Savings people hold are finally withdrawn and spent.
The ‘power to tax’ asset is disguised by the foreign and real assets the central bank chooses to take onto its books in exchange for issuing its liabilities, whether that is gold, foreign exchange, IMF claims, or anything else. An ‘anything else’ that could easily include barrels of oil.
These masking assets, detectable by not being denominated in the reporting currency, hide the ‘negative equity’, ‘government overdraft’, ‘ways and means provisions’ or other description of the balancing item that would otherwise show up on the balance sheet.1
Stripping away these distractions and looking at the underlying processes shows how things actually work. The Russian government can place orders for more missiles, pay for them in roubles, allow the tax system to place the burden of producing those missiles on the Russian people and, where people decide to save in roubles, mask some of those savings in the accounts via a notional tax on energy exports.
That process will continue whatever price the West tries to impose on oil exports and whether Russia decides to send any of its oil abroad or not. "
Posted by: Derek Henry | May 12 2023 16:32 utc | 21
The principle applies:
"If you know the enemy and know yourself, you need not fear the result of a hundred battles. If you know yourself but not the enemy, for every victory gained you will also suffer a defeat. If you know neither the enemy nor yourself, you will succumb in every battle.” (Sun Tzu)
Posted by: TMartin | May 12 2023 16:37 utc | 22
Don Firineach | May 12 2023 16:09 utc | 12
Yes but the wealth is also very high. Most of them don't care about a food price increase of 20%. So you can easily ignore any food or energy price increase of less than 3x-5x for those living in the Western parts. It's just a too small percentage of their monthly income. For the other EUs, like those in East using most of their monthly income only on food and utility bills, it does matter but they're just slaves, no one cares. "Eat less, what's the problem?"
Posted by: rk | May 12 2023 16:37 utc | 23
In Russia you see the return of the White Russians, which are the Russian Orthodox Christians. This is why they have been attacked, especially after they threw out Bill Browder.
Posted by: JackG | May 12 2023 16:39 utc | 24
Posted by: Derek Henry | May 12 2023 16:32 utc | 21
quoting from https://new-wayland.com/blog/why-the-russian-oil-price-cap-wont-work/
"In effect, Western currencies are confetti from the Russian point of view - as useless as Reichsmarks."
This might be the view from the ivory towers. However, on street level, literally, dollars and euros are VERY valued and the trade is brisk and rates are totally different from official quotes. Much like during soviet times. That is the course Russia has chosen. History will show the results.
Posted by: Membrum Virile | May 12 2023 16:43 utc | 25
...
The 'West' will continue to over-underestimate Russia's capability as long as such false claims are still believed. Only a realistic assessment and more respect for Russia's capabilities can correct the mistake of waging and losing a proxy war against it.
Posted by b at 15:19 UTC
There. Fixed it.
The 'West' has fallen so deeply in love with its own balderdash that it can no longer distinguish fact from fantasy. Luckily Russia is ready and willing to help them correct their self-deception addiction.
Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | May 12 2023 16:44 utc | 26
psychohistorian @3
oldhippie @6
D @7
Three concise knockouts; Bruce Lee would be impressed.
I tend to agree with the Saker's assertion that the US's and its various capos' approach toward Russia is based on racist supremacy; James Clapper (himself a criminal who should be in jail) said something along the lines of "Russians are predisposed to subterfuge, and dishonesty." Sounds pretty racist to me. Recall what happened when another bunch of racists put Russia's back against the wall; things will get uglier before they get better, I fear.
Thanks again, b.
Posted by: robjira | May 12 2023 16:48 utc | 27
Some of us were 6 months ahead of every one else on the planet with the facts of what was really happening. Compared with the nonsense on the zero hedge website.
>B>https://new-wayland.com/blog/how-russian-gas-is-paid-for/
The key point missed by everyone why the sanctions were never going to work is because that the Russian government’s demand that everything is paid in Roubles doesn’t actually alter anything because Gazprom is being paid in Roubles anyway. The gas buyer will still be paying with Euros, with the banks in between earning a fat fee for shuffling the paperwork. Those banks could be anywhere in the world free from the sanctions as shown below.
https://new-wayland.com/blog/rouble-gas-payments-false-flag/
MMT'rs because they ignore ideology and politics and concentrate on the actual balance sheets and the assets and liabilities in place. Worked it out months before anybody else. Who stupidly thought Russian exports funded Russia's ability to fight this war. The neoliberal globalist war mongering fools in the West still do.
Posted by: Derek Henry | May 12 2023 16:50 utc | 28
It's not just "false claims about Russia," it's also gross lies about the West's own condition that are made to enable the feasting of Neoliberal Parasites. One of the more important things said by Radhika Desai during her Geoeconomic Show with Hudson is that the Dollar System has always been unstable for a variety of reasons since it began after WW1, its faults being similar to that of the Sterling system leading to the conclusion that no national currency can provide a stable environment for international commerce and international development. Thus, there're many good reasons to end Dollar Hegemony as the situation also harms the USA's citizenry.
On the Turkish election front, Kemal Kiliçdaroğlu (rival to Erdoğan in the presidential election) may have shot himself in the foot, or perhaps put his foot in his mouth.
A third presidential candidate, Muharrem Ince, who was thought would take votes away from Kiliçdaroğlu in the first round, was apparently compromised by a sex Tape.
A previous CHP leader, Deniz Baykal, was also compromised in a similar way I believe, paving the way for Kiliçdaroğlu to take the leadership of the party. The Baykal tape was attributed to the Gülen group, then still working with Erdoğan, and the US. Thus this benefitted both Erdoğan and Kilçdaroğlu then.
Ince, a Kemalist, has claimed that the Ince Tape is a fake produced by the US through the Gülenists to smear him before the election. Ince withdrew from the race. This of course would benefit Kilçdaroğlu in the first round, so what does Kilçdarolğu do?
He blames Russia for creating the deep fake!! Straight out of Washington's anti-Russian neocon camp. I know at least a few people who now regard Kiliçdaroğlu as a compromised Washington puppet as result of this statement and will transfer their vote to Erdoğan. They reason what does Russia have to gain from increasing Kilçdaroğlu's vote over Erdoğan - nothing.
Why would Kiliçdaroğlu state this? Turks are not Americans. Even secular CHP voters are not reflexively anti-Russian. It merely demonstrates that Kilçdaroğlu is clearly beholden to the Washington camp, and is not his own man. Kiliçdaroğlu may still win the election, as it is quite close, and this stunt is a little late in the day, but he has already lost some votes, not because of the sex tape stunt, but because he did not have enough sense to not parrot his handlers ludicrous slander against the Russians.
Foot in mouth disease, indeed!
Posted by: Blue Dotterel | May 12 2023 16:53 utc | 30
Dollar System has always been unstable for a variety of reasons ...
Posted by: karlof1 | May 12 2023 16:52 utc | 30
---
All notional systems of credit are unstable. At question is "who shall bear the cost of returning the system to balance"?
Posted by: too scents | May 12 2023 17:00 utc | 31
Posted by: gary | May 12 2023 15:42 utc | 8
Sorry missed your post on the same Turkish topic. It is amazing how it jives with this continous and increasing obvious false claims against Russia.
Posted by: Blue Dotterel | May 12 2023 17:01 utc | 32
Blue Dotterel @ 31
Thanks for the update, and nice to read from you again! Seems this is shaping as quite the pivotal election cycle for Turkiye, and could prove to be a major inflection point in relations with the US.
Posted by: robjira | May 12 2023 17:03 utc | 33
" Since Russia is barred from obtaining imports from the West, it has no national interest in exporting anything to the West.
Posted by: Derek Henry | May 12 2023 16:32 utc | 21 "
However, Russia seems to import filthy Western music, tv shows, websites, and movies without issue.
Posted by: Deplorable Commissar | May 12 2023 17:04 utc | 34
Benn | May 12 2023 16:23 utc | 17
re...Farming contributes less GDP than money laundering in the city of London but guess which one, if withdrawn, will kill everyone? ...
Excellent argument. I wiil only expand it:
FOOD [incl Air and water] is the prime necessity for survival, whether life on Earth sprung from a lightning strike on a rock, simple transfer to a galactic concentration camp, or whatever.
D. Graeber/M. Hudson's "Credit and debt existed before money" is an explosive fact in the universe of myths that formed our schooling...because the corollary is FOOD farming/agriculture, as a tool of the creditor to pry any wealth items from its owners, such as tenured land holders since 5,000 years ago, or family members' labor/services as a form of slavery via debt bondage, etc.
In terms of a more workable theory, perhaps the origin of the class called "creditors" is the parasitic lender who realized that "lending" as prime occupation is the way out of having to do stoop-labor. I.e., "Eureka! I can escape a lifetime of hard labor" anchored to a tiny plot. And that still rings true in present time. Ask any living-high banker.
The Creditor Debtor game is the winning tech used to game mankind's cruel systems of survival. The Debtor is made subservient to the Creditor. Debtors are the underclass, AKA untermenchen. The Creditor Debtor Game inherently is legal because it includes Creditor gaming of the justice system and all other manmade systems. Adding the use of Creditor "muscle" to overcome any resistant "obstacles" is, well...assassination inclusive.
On origin of "money":
Early coinage did not come from a single individual, like a King. It came from a large group under/around the King's entourage or court, etc. who are necessary for any money-system, from concept thru coin production to distribution and accounting. That means any money-system is WIDE-OPEN to infiltration/outside influence and corruption [other intentions]. I.e., gaming by the creditor-class. Thus the debacle of prixate-banking under winner-loser mentality typical of Capitalism or any system tolerating unlimited accumulation of wealth.
By the way, any kind of money has no value unless FOOD is available [to purchase] for consumption before death by starvation. Agriculture, anyone?
Gaming our supply of FOOD is surely a target of the creditor-class.
Posted by: chu teh | May 12 2023 17:11 utc | 35
Membrum Virile @ 26
" This might be the view from the ivory towers. However, on street level, literally, dollars and euros are VERY valued and the trade is brisk and rates are totally different from official quotes. Much like during soviet times. That is the course Russia has chosen. History will show the results. "
Firstly.....
Both dollars and Euro's are NOT valued on the Russian street level. You now can't buy anything with them due to the sanctions. More importantly you can't pay your taxes with them as in Russia you are taxes in roubles.
Secondly.....
Nothing like Soviet times today as Then it was the gold standard and fixed exchange rates. Russia has learned a lot from that HUGE mistake. They learned everything they needed to learn on August 17, 1998 below
>B>https://moslereconomics.com/wpcontent/uploads/2007/12/Exchange-Rate-Policy-and-Full-Employment.html
" Let me address some accounting fundamentals of fixed and floating foreign exchange regimes using the pre August 17, 1998 Russian ruble as an example.
The marginal holder of ANY ruble bank deposit, at any Russian bank, had a choice of three options before the close of business each day.
(I will assume all rubles are in the banking system. Actual cash is unnecessary for the point I am making in this example.)
The three choices are:
· Hold rubles in a clearing account at the Central Bank
· Exchange ruble clearing balances for something else at the CB.
· Buy a Russian GKO (tsy sec), which is an interest bearing account at the CB
· b. Exchange rubles for $ at the official rate at the CB
For all practical purposes, 2a and 2b competed with each other. Russia had to offer high enough rates on its GKOs to compete with option 2b. In that sense interest rates were endogenous. Any attempt by the Russian Central Bank to lower rates, such as open market operations, would result in an outflow of $US reserves. The conditions for a stable ruble could not coexist. The net desire to save rubles was probably negative, the failure to enforce tax liabilities resulted in deficit spending even as the government tried to reduce spending, and the higher interest rate on GKO’s increased government spending even more.
At the time GKO rates were around 150% annually, and the interest payments themselves constituted at least the entire ruble budget deficit. It seemed to me that higher rates of interest were the driving factor behind the excess ruble spending which led to the loss of $US reserves.
With the $ in high demand due to a variety of factors, such as domestic taxed advantaged $US savings plans, insurance reserves, pension funds, and the like, and, exacerbating the situation, what could be called overly tight US fiscal policy, there was, for all practical purposes, no GKO interest rate that could stem the outflow of $US reserves.
The main source of $ reserves was, of course, $ loans from both the international private sector and international agencies such as the IMF. The ruble was overvalued as evidenced by the fact that $ reserves went out nearly as fast as they became available. The Russian Treasury responded by offering higher and higher rates on its GKO securities to compete with option 2b, without success. This inability to compete with option 2b is what finally leads to devaluation under a fixed exchange rate regime.
Floating the ruble
On August 17th it was announced that option 2b, for all practical purposes, was no longer available. This meant the ruble was now a floating currency. Option 2a now competed only with option 1, so the interest rate was suddenly exogenous. It would be and could only be whatever the government determined to pay when it offered its GKO’s for sale. It could, for an extreme example, decide to pay 0%, and the excess clearing balances would have no choice but to remain as excess balances and earn no interest. That would make the interbank rate 0 bid between credit worthy counterparties.
Previously, with option 2b open, the penalty for excess government spending was higher rates on GKO’s and loss of $US reserves. With a floating exchange rate the penalty for excess spending is the exchange rate of the ruble. "
Posted by: Derek Henry | May 12 2023 17:12 utc | 36
Errata in my post #36, above...
Sjould read "When the Debtor is made subservient to the Creditor, Debtors are the underclass, AKA untermenchen.
Posted by: chu teh | May 12 2023 17:17 utc | 37
I find it literally incredible that Western elites do not see what b has so clearly written out.
As in: I don't believe it. They may say such things for public consumption but they cannot possibly believe them themselves.
I smell a rat!
@Dave Oneil | May 12 2023 15:25 utc | 1
Russians are grown-ups; or at least, some of them are. The Brits should have been dealt with very, very harshly when they shipped uranium ammo to Ukraine--if not long before then. Don't talk to me about nukes in Belarus which are tactical, shorter-range weapons which are not targeted at the UK, and anyway aren't going to be used anytime soon.
If Russia does nothing then the signal is that they don't care that much, and will probably put up with more where that came from. At this stage, nobody should be surprised when the Empire does absolutely everything it can get away with. With clear preparations underway to have at least the option of a nuclear provocation, that is a disturbing thought.
Posted by: Ma Laoshi | May 12 2023 17:24 utc | 39
Membrum Virile
90% of the people on the planet who were brainwashed as children from the age of 5 in government education camps across the Western hemisphere and rest of the world still don't get it. The very important lesson Russia learned on August 17, 1998.
They still apply gold standard, fixed exchange analysis to floating rates.
It's even got a name and is called "monetary silencing" performed by Western governments and universities. Monetary silencing is about excluding people from knowledge of monetary institutions and turning them into mere money users and consumers–people whose knowledge doesn’t go beyond using a credit card, depositing a check, or knowing where to get money from a pay-day lender. It’s about silencing anything that comes close to a structural vision.
https://moneyontheleft.org/2019/09/13/money-politics-before-the-new-deal-with-jakob-feinig/
Posted by: Derek Henry | May 12 2023 17:26 utc | 40
Posted by: Derek Henry | May 12 2023 17:12 utc | 37
“Both dollars and Euro's are NOT valued on the Russian street level. You now can't buy anything with them due to the sanctions. More importantly you can't pay your taxes with them as in Russia you are taxes in roubles.“
I call bullshit! Go to any street corner, hotel lobby etc. in a major Russian city today, looking like a westerner. You will very soon get somebody asking you for USD, euros, maybe even pounds. And they offer you rates way beyond official rates. And probably stiff you when counting the bills, but that can happen in street deals everywhere.
Yes, people need to have rubles for taxes, daily groceries etc. But savings are mostly not kept on banks, and those cash savings are not in rubles.
Posted by: Membrum Virile | May 12 2023 17:36 utc | 41
Go to any street corner, hotel lobby etc.
Posted by: Membrum Virile | May 12 2023 17:36 utc | 42
---
Hello Sailor!
Posted by: too scents | May 12 2023 17:40 utc | 42
Posted by: Derek Henry | May 12 2023 17:26 utc | 41
“’90% of the people on the planet who were brainwashed as children from the age of 5 in government education camps across the Western hemisphere and rest of the world still don't get it. The very important lesson Russia learned on August 17, 1998.”
I actually remember that quite well. Don’t know exactly what lesson Russia learned, but maybe every problem is not a nail?
Posted by: Membrum Virile | May 12 2023 17:41 utc | 43
Membrum Virile
Just look at how far Russia has come since August 17, 1998.
The Russian Rouble Get Out Clause
https://new-wayland.com/blog/rouble-get-out-clause/
And...
The Russian Fiscal Toketa
https://new-wayland.com/blog/the-russian-fiscal-toketa/
Doing the right thing by floating the currency in 1998 taught them how things really work.
Posted by: Derek Henry | May 12 2023 17:42 utc | 44
The people of Russia are responding to the need to defend mother Russia and that is causing the economy to boom. Their resolve will carry them to nuclear war and beyond if that's what it takes.
Fortunately for the rest of the world, all indications are that Russia is not anywhere near being threatened to the point of needing to flex its nuclear muscle!
Posted by: Up North | May 12 2023 17:42 utc | 45
“Posted by: too scents | May 12 2023 17:40 utc | 43”
“Hello Sailor!”
Takes one to know one, eh? LOL
Posted by: Membrum Virile | May 12 2023 17:42 utc | 46
Long time lurker, first time poster. The notorious quote from the late Senator Juan McStain has inspired a number of retorts, including several good ones above. The best retort I've run across is that 'Murika is just a trailer park owned by a payday loan racket pretending pretending to be a country'. Western economic figures are complete nonsense as they reckon usury-racketeering proceeds as prosperity, which is basically claiming that the product of slaves is prosperity. While here I thought I'd post the collection of Joe Tzu quotes from The Art of Bore which have been compiled from the barflies here. Feel free to add to those I've missed...
*The journey of 1000 gaffes begins with a single misstep.
*A journey greater than ten thousand miles begins by stepping off a cliff.
*Never trust a piano player who uses both hands to wave at the audience.
*You can always find a plan if you use a good teleprompter.
*To dismount with dignity. First take your foot out of the stirrup.
*When your enemy approaches, unexpectedly fall from your mount; and in the following confusion, boldly crawl away!
*Planning is a form of laziness.
*You cannot go to a 7-11 or Dunkin Donuts without having a slight Indian accent. I kid you not.
*I don’t shake hands with the air, the air shakes my hands.
*So the best way to get something done…If you ..If you hold near and dear to you that you.. uh… like to be able to uh…….. anyway.
*Know your enemy as I do, you will stumble, lose many midterms, shake many invisible hands.
*Become your own best enemy.
*Shake hands with the air! Your opponent will wonder at what person he’s not seeing!
*Always speak in garbled tongues. It is better to walk it back than to stride forward.
*Always greet effusively people who don’t exist. Your enemies will understand this as a sign of perspicacity: You see things that others do not.
*We planned and run the war, but Ze didn’t tell us that we fucked up. Shame on him!
*By doing almost everything, nothing is achieved.
*If your strategy is seen as failing against a first enemy, apply it against a stronger enemy to confirm it doesn’t work.
*Though a warrior may gain victory over a thousand Corn Pops, still greater is victory over thyself.
*Fervently believe your own disinformation.
*When climbing stairs, better to fall repeatedly and make yourself look weak. That way, people will never be able to tell how weak you actually are.
*If one can defeat himself he need not be defeated by another.
*When there is nothing left to do, you can cross your arms. There is no need to do it running.
*When you don’t know what you’re doing, neither does your enemy.
*Never look a gift horse in the mouth; sniffing the nether regions is my way or the high way. To Hunter go the spoils.
*When you have failed as a general, boldly become a ‘woman.’ Wars are won in the concubine’s bedchamber.
*I’ve said it before: self defeat can be defeated. But you have to defeat it yourself.
*The supreme art of war is to fight without winning.
*A great democratic leader delivers everything to his people but no less than 10% to the big guy.
*The government is 70 percent right 30 percent of the time.
*If you can't grope and sniff young girls, you must lick the world.
Posted by: Exalted Cyclops | May 12 2023 17:44 utc | 47
Posted by: Derek Henry | May 12 2023 17:42 utc | 45
“Doing the right thing by floating the currency in 1998 taught them how things really work”
Ok, now we are maybe talking past each other. I’m certainly not advocating that all currencies should ‘float freely’. But not doing that can lead to different valuations on the street. Especially during times of crisis. And that is what is happening now, on the streets.
Posted by: Membrum Virile | May 12 2023 17:48 utc | 48
Tried 2 different ways still no idea how to post a link on this blog :(
Posted by: Derek Henry | May 12 2023 16:20 utc | 15
Took me a while too because I use a small screen. You have to use the entire section starting with the first <+A and ending with the last A+>:
<+A+HREF="https://www.wikileaks.org/">Link to Wikileaks<+/+A>
(I added + signs in a few places otherwise it all gets subsumed into a link and disappears.)
You put your link in between the " " ("your link here") just like shown above (do not delete the ""s). Then you put the reference text where it says 'Link to Wikileaks' so that is what you will read and that is what the link between " and " is attached to. At first I was missing the initial <+A because it is always on a higher line on my screen and also I found the repetition of 'Link to Wikileaks' confusing.
< +A+HREF="https://www.moonofalabama.org/">Link to MoA<+/+A+ >
which without all the pluses will look like:
Posted by: Membrum Virile | May 12 2023 17:36 utc | 42
This may have nothing to do with your point, but here in Mexico the only way I can change USD (apart from a very few banks which have monthly limitations and need to photograph your passport and visa etc.) is via narcos with a 10-15%+ haircut. This is the first place in my life that $100 USD bills are almost useless. Maybe it's because Mexico is so close and there are border issues etc. so it's not a meaningful thing but...
The MSM is painting the russkies as exhausted and the leadership fragmented and out of touch.
The only meaning of the Russian incursion on its own terms is to push out and hold the western front. The current wave of propaganda makes it look like they've gone about as far as they can go.
Ukraine's destruction is openly represented as investment opportunity by its president, so they've already sacrificed their heartland for future growth.
The SMO had to be war of attrition according to its original vague objectives. As US has shown over history, there's no "victory" in such operations. The fact that USA's military capability outmatches its adversaries in every theater has never led to military victory: you can destroy a place but never gain a victory.
NATO knows this: USA has never fought for national defense, it fights to make hay. Look from SE Asian, through Central America, Middle East, etc. The process must have a life of its own, such as shaping geo-politics, "opening markets", re-factoring policy, creating business opportunities, maybe blow up a pipeline, etc.
So you just pick opportune points to declare victory "Mission Accomplished" and get back to business. Russian claim to victory was the only thing missing from their Victory Day celebration.
Russia has been on the back foot for a generation and the decade of meddling in Ukraine by State Dept seems to have paid off: they over-committed to territory without commensurate productive gains. A purely nationalist fight means nothing for the future: the material dynamics of life are not powered by curating a heritage, or protecting an ethnic group or heritage: those are purely cultural side-effects of the fight. USA has seen over and again that utterly outmatched scrappy guerrillas can hang on and mutate through storms of Empire. Ukraine has NATO behind it!
Russia is fighting the USA and Europe just for a border. The "might" of the US which is 10x the Russians can't even manage its own southern border against the wandering hoards created by its War on Drugs. What chance does Russia have against the enormity of its western front?
The key point of the SMO was a reaction to nuclear encroachment on the west. That's the geopolitical essence of the tension: a missile crisis used as an enormous long term project to place pressure on Russia's western borders. The project is succeeding, because its planners have estimated its just a matter of time which they can afford to wait.
A language of war spoken in nuclear terms is anathema to everyone: it's actually mute. So Russia was finally provoked into a proper quagmire with an Empire behind the scrappy rebels. George Lucas never dreamed of such things.
Ukraine has been sacrificed. The Uke west chose to split from Russia after the collapse of the Soviets. The east were torn asunder. Russian ethnic history was amputated and claimed by another state. That's history. Just as there's no political future of Dixie in the remains of the US Confederate South. Ethnic color and culture is what emerges from survival, it's not the means of survival.
China and the rest of BRICS are a red-herring. They're all post colonial. They try to fabricate a cultural identity that seems to pre-excuse their occupation, but they have only the language of the occupier to do so. The world already transformed under their feet. There's no old world any more.
Maybe Russia can be seen as a last hold-out: having only been usurped to western commodities, but never truly colonized. There's maybe a latent hope among this spectariat that Russia embodies some noble resistance of a nationalist values to the total commodification of society. But even if Russia truly is an island unto itself, it can't escape the churn of the world.
Posted by: Arrnon | May 12 2023 18:20 utc | 51
Posted by: Scorpion | May 12 2023 17:55 utc | 51
Yeah, not directly related, but thanks for the info. I find these kinds of things fascinating. Of course there is a danger of giving too much meaning to it, but still:
Dollar is clearly on the slide, even though reasons may vary. Sounds like in the case of Mexico it is very much the fault of US overreach. As in, dollar would be good, but the restrictions imposed on banking etc. by the US make it less desirable than it used to be.
And secondly, I of course have read about the narcos' immense power, but money changing in the capital? Not good!
But again, sincerely, thanks for the info.
Posted by: Membrum Virile | May 12 2023 18:35 utc | 52
@Arrnon | May 12 2023 18:20 utc | 52
Adorno's despair, while understandable, has no future.
The 'total' commodification of society was close to completion recently ....
... until it wasn't.
The future, thankfully, remains open.
Posted by: Don Firineach | May 12 2023 18:43 utc | 53
ZH has a posting up with the title
US Attorney General Approves Transfer Of Seized Assets From Russia Oligarch To Ukraine
The West continues to project its Might-Makes-Right Rules based order while it is having its ass handed to it by Russia in the proxy war of Ukraine.
When the SMO is over, is turnabout fair play? Maybe even hit up Pope Frank and King Chuck for a tithe from their history of ill gotten gains
Posted by: psychohistorian | May 12 2023 18:50 utc | 54
Posted by: Arrnon | May 12 2023 18:20 utc
NATO knows this: USA has never fought for national defense, it fights to make hay. Look from SE Asian, through Central America, Middle East, etc. The process must have a life of its own, such as shaping geo-politics, "opening markets", re-factoring policy, creating business opportunities, maybe blow up a pipeline, etc.
In a very real sense, America is fighting for national defense in that Russia, China, Brics is a challenge to America's global domination. This war is America's final effort against Russia which could play a part in American empire's fall.
Losing the war against Russia is not an acceptable option. And of course the Russian people's resolve has failed to crumble under the empire's threat and it only gets stronger.
America is going to further risk nuclear war because there is no other option! Defeat for America would or will be the final defeat, just as surely as it would/will be the final defeat for Russia. read: (Russia, China, the Brics)
Posted by: Up North | May 12 2023 18:53 utc | 55
"Whether it’s the seizure of Crimea in 2014, involvement in the Syrian war that preserved the Assad regime, the hacking of the U.S. election in 2016 or the recent cyberattack of U.S. government agencies and private businesses, Russia has shown itself capable and willing of employing multiple strategies over many years to advance its strategic interests abroad."
the West being packed with the worst filth in human history has nothing to do with anything, does it?
maybe Russia is responsible for looming debt default? if they wouldn't upset the global order, the West wouldn't be forced to spend so much on the military.
btw, heroic truth teller and history's greatest martyr, Tuck 'er and run Carlson, he called it: Beijing is the enemy, and the conquest of China begins in the halls of Montezuma. so get ready for the war on the border. and south of the border. if the US can't defeat Russia, maybe they can defeat dehydrated Mexicans who marched from Venezuela and El Salvador to escape sanctions, death squads and the drug war. if not, the prison and police state will thrive the while.
Posted by: rjb1.5 | May 12 2023 18:55 utc | 56
Thanks b for this reflective posting on the current western state of mind. This kind of sizing up the status quo is laying the fertile ground for meaningful discussions at an excellent geopolitical blog such as MOA.
Yes, the 'West' had an "exaggerated sense of its own influence around the world". But that is only a part of the problem. The 'West' still thinks it is superior to other countries even as at least some other countries have caught up with it and are, in parts, superior in the use of science and technology.
This assessment is largely true of the population at large in the West, both Americas and western Europe, perhaps including Japan/Korea/ASEAN/Australia too. At their leadership level, the bragging we hear may just be jesters voicing what they think their audiences like to hear. However, a substantial portion of the Western leadership is indeed so stupid, ignorant, and brash as to be truly blaring their idiocy for all to hear. In any case, this results in the following statement you concluded with:
The 'West' will continue to underestimate Russia's capability as long as such false claims are still believed. Only a realistic assessment and more respect for Russia's capabilities can correct the mistake of waging and losing a proxy war against it.
This false claim may be a good thing! If the popular western mentality believes they have lost!!!, the desperation may lead to extremism and heighten the risk of WWIII. Under a false claim as you have described, the western population at large may choose to wait out the inevitable collapse of them Russkies instead of pressing the button for the new Kingdom Come! I hope the west goes down in slow motion as the obnoxious British Empire did since the Suez Canal incident of the 50's, then the sterling devaluation of the 60's, then the demise of their auto industry of the 70's and 80's, then the kissing of American asses of the 80's, 90's, through the turn of the century, then as today biting the dusts, too afraid to press the button as a last hurray, because now in their mind they don't even know if that button works!.
Yup! A slower western decline is a more benign western decline. Let them dream a little longer, until they come to realize a nuke war may be won by the other side.
Posted by: Oriental Voice | May 12 2023 18:58 utc | 57
Russias economy is good and the west actually knows and covets it. They'll be lining up to buy it for pennies on the dollar if russia loses in ukraine and submits to weimarian reparations.
Posted by: Neofeudalfuture | May 12 2023 19:14 utc | 58
And secondly, I of course have read about the narcos' immense power, but money changing in the capital? Not good!
But again, sincerely, thanks for the info.
Posted by: Membrum Virile | May 12 2023 18:35 utc | 53
Well, just for clarity: I was in a small town with a high number of US expats but even there only 2 banks would change dollars, maximum $4000 per month. I was buying a car and needed more so a taxista hooked me up with a local money-changer (whom he said was narco-connected). In many towns there is only 1 bank (Banco Azteca - which is set up to receive funds from Mexicans working in the States sending money back home and usually has a whole load of plasticky motorbikes and washing machines to purchase with monthly payments in front of the tellers in back, to which there are nearly always extremely long lines).
And I was in Germany three or so years ago and wanted to buy my eldest grandson a piano and the same $4,000 limit was in effect (for cash, not if wired, same as in Mexico) but also my son had to wait 3 weeks after the cash deposit for the bank to honor the funds, so that was surprising as well. I lived in Germany many years ago and $100 USD was instantly transactionable in any bank, but also some shops. No more.
Well, we all know that cash is on the way out. And the retail banking sector in the West has been increasingly difficult since 9/11 and then 2008. Terrible industry.
I pray that the West continues to live in its bubble and illusion of superiority, so a more benign and
peaceful civilization can emerge. The Western reign of terror needs to end.
Posted by: Steve | May 12 2023 19:16 utc | 60
Posted by: Up North | May 12 2023 18:53 utc | 56:
In a very real sense, America is fighting for national defense in that Russia, China, Brics is a challenge to America's global domination. This war is America's final effort against Russia which could play a part in American empire's fall.
Of course Russia, China, BRICS, are challengers to America's global domination. They said so in no uncertain terms--Multipolarity VS Unipolarity. The issue is whether war is the only (or rather, the rational) response to such a challenge. There are alternatives: 1) fix your own potholes that caused you to stumble; 2) kiss asses to incite opponents' vanities and buy you time to catch up; 3) if you can't beat them, join them; 4) pray harder to your God to become stronger/smarter; .......
I can go on. But it seems the only f**king option western minds can think of is to fight and let's ALL GO DOWN TOGETHER! Is this conclusion incidental or genetic???
Posted by: Oriental Voice | May 12 2023 19:17 utc | 61
Spectator: "As we have discovered, non-western countries lack the will to impose sanctions on either Russia or on Russian oligarchs."
This is a rhetorical gem, "lack the will to". A less erudite person would write "have no interest in imposing sanctions", or more specifically, "oppose sanctions". One could imagine discovery process of Western diplomats explaining the importance of sanctions and solidarity, only to get replies like "too busy right now", "too tired", "may be later", "too difficult".
Solidarity with Western sanctions may be difficult indeed. For example, Bangladesh, strangely enough, produces most of electricity using imported fuel oil, and in the spirit of anti-authoritarian solidarity, it should be checking where it comes from and how is it made -- perchance, from Russian crude. Even Europeans have big problems checking that, like noticing huge ship-to-ship activity near Greek islands.
A related trope is to blame non-Western attitude on "Russian disinformation". Feeble minded non-Westerners are sadly susceptible.
Posted by: Piotr Berman | May 12 2023 19:17 utc | 62
Posted by: Scorpion | May 12 2023 19:15 utc | 60
Yeah, realised myself after posting that Mexico doesn’t equal Mexico city :(
But more good info. I thought the limit was 10 000 usd. But I really have tried to avoid dealing with banks in cash.
But I do have one sort of funny anecdote relating to it. I had to deposit a fairly small amount of cash, maybe 300 usd, to a friends company account. The teller asked me where the money was from? I was dumbfounded, but then answered, honestly, that I withdrew them from the ATM next door. And that was good enough :)
Posted by: Membrum Virile | May 12 2023 19:28 utc | 63
The US is a death cult. Masquerading as a country. It keeps its citizens like mushrooms and feeds them meth
Posted by: Tannenhouser | May 12 2023 19:32 utc | 64
Soviet Union made huge amounts of concrete, steel, food etc. Not so many consumer goods or services. Didn't end well. Won't end well this time.
Posted by: Membrum Virile | May 12 2023 16:26 utc | 18
Food is not a consumer good? What is? Gucci bags?
Posted by: Gene Poole | May 12 2023 19:49 utc | 66
I think 10,000 USD is the per transaction limit over which tax forms have to be filled out by the recipient bank and submitted to IRS. $4,000 is the monthly allowance per person for converting USD cash to pesos. And apparently similar limits exist now in Germany so perhaps this is a banking cartel network policy all over?
Meanwhile, a died-in-the-wool pro-Trump website - The Gateway Pundit - has a long interview the last part of which goes into an in-depth discussion of Jim Hoft's excellent interview with RFK Jr last week. (They know each other well and are in a joint lawsuit against Big Pharma or some such.) The two podcasters are really excited by that interview and towards the 1 hr mark are saying that if DJT gets knocked out for any reason then RFKj will be their man in a heartbeat.
This is not surprising given what RFKj says - he is far more detailed and punches the Deep State aspects far harder than Trump who deals more in emotive inuendo. If enough people get to hear him and absorb the implications of what he is (truth)telling, it will have an effect on the American electorate (though not who is running the voting machines!).
For example, he spells out how Avril H, the ex Deputy CIA Director and now Biden's DNI chief ran the pre-covid drill with Gates and, among others, the Chinese head of their CDC equivalent including among which drills were tactics to counter 'it came from a lab' narratives. Of course he also tells how the gain of function work outlawed in the US was simply transferred to Wuhan and other labs. So the CIA was all over the pandemic thing from beginning to end, including overseeing the famous 'warp speed' operation even though in theory that should have been done only by Medical Agencies and private pharmaceutical companies.
Trump never spells things out that way (the main reason I could never really warm to him although I do think he was unfairly treated to the disgrace of all who did so) but RFK Jr does. If only his voice were not so wracked with trauma.....
In any case, it shows that the right-left divide is not nearly as great as most imagine. The real fault lines in the US are pro status quo versus anti status quo. Both Parties, of course, being different shades of Pro Status Quo. I suspect the clear majority of American people want substantive reform but UniParty rule effectively guarantees that they cannot elect a true reform administration with support in both Judiciary and Legislature. In any case, RFK Jr is probably going to have a big effect.
If for no other reason than that he is American Royalty and though most Americans like to poo-poo the notion, it has existed since forever and exists still in this still fledgling Republic albeit no longer in a monarchic container.
@Posted by: Oriental Voice | May 12 2023 19:17 utc | 62
The west knows that it cannot compete with China directly. The western populations are simply too low quality. Their only chance is trying to leverage their quickly fading military and economic might to strangle China in its crib before it grows too large to handle.
Posted by: FVK | May 12 2023 19:59 utc | 68
Posted by: D | May 12 2023 15:41 utc | 7
Right on: well said.
Posted by: Patroklos | May 12 2023 20:00 utc | 69
@FVK, #69:
Thanks for your discussion. If what you said is true, then the west is guilty of ignorance of the status quo. China is not crawling in its crib anymore. It's sailing the seven seas and flying to the moon. What would trigger the west to realize that China
has grown too large to handle?
Posted by: Oriental Voice | May 12 2023 20:18 utc | 70
@18 membrum virile
Yes, service industries are the major employer in most developed economies.
But note Vladimir Putin's assessment of the impact of sanctions on the service sector:
It is not turning out as you might expect...
Posted by: Powerandpeople | May 12 2023 20:23 utc | 71
The empire came to the correct conclusion that it had no choice but to challenge Russia on account of the Brics alliance that was surely coming.
If the empire steps back now, it knows that it won't get another equal opportunity.
And so the empire has no choice but to gamble on nuclear war!
In the meantime the make-believe war with it's mutually agreed upon limitations can go on, until all the limitations and politeness are withdrawn, one by one.
Posted by: Up North | May 12 2023 20:50 utc | 72
In a recent post by Simplicius it was stated that the U.S., when calculating GDP, adds up all of the homeowners in the country, calculates what they would otherwise be paying in rent, were they were home renters, sums that figure up and pastes it onto the GDP. To be sure, I am not qualified to verify the veracity of this claim but it seems plenty feasible, considering what I know of the US of BS.
Posted by: nwwoods | May 12 2023 20:56 utc | 73
thanks b...
let me flip mccain's words around..
""Look, USA is a Hollywood- Disney type theme park, with Wall St type Casinos masquerading as a country," McCain said. "It's kleptocracy. It's corruption. It's a nation that's really only dependent upon banking and arm sales for their economy, and so a reality check is important."
Posted by: james | May 12 2023 21:30 utc | 75
This is for the audience. And it's important to emphasize and repeat this statements, over and over.
The propaganda relied on pretty much the same slogans, all over Europe (but maybe this is due to the internet, too). So, wherever *you* are, you probably heard this one: Putin only respects the strong.
Somehow, the propaganda seems to reflect it's inventors. Like when Biden called Putin cold blooded, without heart and without soul" - think that's a pretty good description of the people who decide to turn another country like Iraq to rubble, just like that. But we know - Iraq would have never been bombed, if they had S-400s. It's "us" only respecting the strong.
And honestly - if you don't expect to feel consequences personally, even if you don't like things, you'll more likely to give a fuck. And why should we, Russia is just a big gas station made of junk. Never the'll dare to go against NATO. Ho ho ho ...
The people are told Putin was afraid of US nukes, so he would NEVER use some himself... meanwhile - according to our narrative, although never said in particular - we expect him toe will just accept to die and Russia to disintegrate, like whatever, like why not; not just Putin but his people too.
USA is advantaged here. It's a rather small circle controlling Europe, and with some exceptions, they have them in pocket - EU already said to "never leave UA", they're shielded from reality and stepping back would mean losing face: The narratives even move further from reality.
But they have one big advantage. How do you fight a nuclear war...? Until now, this was impossible.
They already had there anti-missile shield long before: this was Germany. If Warsaw Pact would reach the river Rhine, they would even drop the bombs themselves.
But now, they have another country they can use for ATTACK too. The junta in control is too brainwwashed to see consequences - they already tried to pull NATO in this, a few times already.
I'm trying to be optimistic, but sadly ... i think that's what we're heading to. Not even on purpose, but due to human issues like vanity or unwillingness to admit a lie. And because the ones in control have a safe place, they'll delude to survive some strikes w/o problem.
But at first, it's not them who'll burn - it's us, in Europe.
So if we don't get our asses up, WE are doomed.
Posted by: nobody | May 12 2023 21:40 utc | 76
thanks for the info b.
and to all, with the cool posts.
mccain when a prisoner
made anti-us propaganda
recordings. he couldn’t take the pain.
no honor in his character
only petty avarice
Posted by: Dingo | May 12 2023 21:44 utc | 77
Controlling the narrative ... h/t nakedcapitalism today
V useful graphic - and useful read
Report on the Censorship-Industrial Complex: The Top 50 Organizations to Know
The citizen's starter kit to understanding the new global information cartel
SUSAN SCHMIDT, ANDREW LOWENTHAL, TOM WYATT, TECHNO FOG, AND 4 OTHERS
10 MAY 2023
https://www.racket.news/p/report-on-the-censorship-industrial-74b
Posted by: Don Firineach | May 12 2023 22:29 utc | 78
@23,TMartin, "If you know yourself and your neighbors wife, wait until her husband goes to work", Joe Tzu. And yes, I've read Sun Tzu. Have the book.
Some good comments today. The US doesn't produce much that anyone wants. Neither weapons, food or anything else. How the mighty have fallen.
Posted by: Immaculate deception | May 12 2023 23:33 utc | 79
#3 #19 & #20
Thanks and insightful comments.
I add one more--prison/incarceration capital of the world, more both % of population and absolute numbers than any country on the plant ever, including N Korea and Stalinist Russia.
Posted by: Battenmountain | May 13 2023 0:51 utc | 80
Thank you b. A welcome oasis of sanity.
I am having a few days of sitting back. The end game is inevitably going to play out. I am sorry to see so much destruction and death. I watch as the ‘West’ makes our final moves this century.
As the proxie natzos make their genius D-Day move!
It seems to be to accept the inevitable defeat, but leave a fairy tale of ‘evil Russia’ and all things Russian. Including actual Russian language. Along with all Russian Culture!
A supposed only a ‘gas station’ etc bs,(how fucking racist is that?).
I mean Russian people have as much land as they need. They don’t need any more. Not Ukraine. And least of all decrepit Europe.
Unfortunately for Europe, our move was not dictated by our actual best interests, but by those few, the cowardly few, the ones who have Owned and Rule us, but aren’t us. They have for generations wanted to own Russian lands. They fail, again. They look like they want to throw us under the bus as they scream in their failure. They want us to die to the last European as they shape shift away from that devastation.
As a comfortably of 60 year old in the U.K. am learning Russian and telling the youngsters, debt laden, forsaken , to do the same, and Chinese, and any number of African languages, starting with Swahili!
To travel while young to Russia. To Syria, Iran, Venezuela .. anywhere they are supposedly not supposed to. It will be cheap. People will love them. They will see the world as it is and not be scared as they are told to be if of these places and peoples.
The ‘West’ is a Waste. Collectively.
Posted by: DunGroanin | May 13 2023 1:04 utc | 81
The reality of Rasputin and the slander and defamation of him by western press and communist outlets is a very good example of how long this viciousness has been going in. The guy was basically a pacifist, opposed ww1 and who tended to be a calming influence on a hemophiliac sufferer Alexei Romanov. That's about it. But if you read the journalism he was a Sexual Predatory Demon who plunged Russia into a war and then into godless revolution.
The Western agent Prince Yusopov, in cahoots with the Brit MI6 pointman in St Petersburg murdered Rasputin because he opposed the war, then the commies dug up his Christian grave after their Communist coup and destroyed the body. He hadn't done anything to harm anyone. The disinformation about the place is off the hook.
Posted by: Wokechoke | May 13 2023 1:13 utc | 82
Zelenskyy's demand to address the Eurovision Song Contest has been rejected by the organisers on the basis that it breaches the "Equality of Contestants" principle. Boris and Rishi don't like it, but nobody else cares what BJ & RS are thinking, or pretending to think...
Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | May 13 2023 2:19 utc | 83
Posted by: Exalted Cyclops | May 12 2023 17:44 utc | 48
Made my day. Still giggling.
Posted by: Patroklos | May 13 2023 2:46 utc | 84
64, Membrum Virile, you should have said that it was honest hit money. Hahaha. Dinero de los drogos
Posted by: Immaculate deception | May 13 2023 3:11 utc | 85
@ nobody | May 12 2023 21:40 utc | 77
Back to the ultimate topic of nuclear war. Of course, the US elite issues pollyannish statements about how there is no danger, how Russia would never use its nuclear weapons and especially never launch a total attack against the US, how the US could win a nuclear war, etc. All whistling in the dark.
The facts are simple, yet people don't dwell on them, because nuclear war is so "unthinkable." And the fact is, all my life, more than 70 years, I have lived like every other man, woman, and child in the US under the threat of apocalyptic nuclear annihilation falling on us out of the sky anytime, any day or night. And when you live under that threat continuously, apart from it being unpalatable and thus something you usually want to avoid thinking about, even if you do think about it, it recedes into the background and becomes nothing, because it is always there but it hasn't happened. And this is even though everyone knows it can happen. And there is no defense against hundreds of missiles shot off at once, and especially not now.
The aftermath of nuclear war has been deeply studied, but there are quite a few disputed points, such as the extent of a possible nuclear winter. However, even if one only considers what is fairly certain, the disaster would be unbearable, first, deaths and injuries caused by the blasts, second, more deaths and injuries caused by the radiation, whose effects were once overestimated but still would be major, third, the destruction of the infrastructure including all the supply chains, and fourth mass death for nearly everybody in the attacked countries from the famine that would result from the collapse of agribusiness even with no nuclear winter. This would also affect people in countries not attacked. Famine would occur everywhere, but those best placed to survive would be in poor countries where subsistence farming was still practiced. Three quarters of the world's population would perish, including nearly everyone in the warring countries.
As for the survival of the elite, some of the national security apparatus might have hideouts deep under mountains and so on, but there would be several problems with their survival. There would be no country or government apparatus anymore, so they would not have the power to command anything. There own supplies would run out eventually, even if they had enough for say two years, and those two years themselves would be pretty miserable, but nothing compared to what would ensue when they had to go forage. Would they think they would get to be like medieval knights plundering the peasants? Too bad, because there would be no peasants and no crops. The downfall of survivalism is that it mostly focuses on immediate, not long term survival, and in a world with nothing, the long term would be really hard to succeed at.
For the US elite, the main source of their inveterate hatred for Russia is that Russia has parity in nuclear weapons, nothing else. This is just intolerable to the nobility of the exceptional nation, so it makes them want to jump up and down screaming like a herd of baboons (Sorry, no offense meant to the actual baboons). All they can do is ignore the nuclear parity, like they even did during Yeltsin's presidency, when Russia was prostrate. During that time they exploited Russia all they could, they helped to disarm it from conventional weapons, but did they even once mention the nuclear weapons? No, they didn't, except to help Russia evacuate those weapons from Ukraine, Belarus, and Kazakhstan back to Russia. So why didn't they try to get rid of Russia's nuclear arsenal when Russia had a somewhat pliable president and was prostrate, the only chance they would ever get to end Russia's nuclear parity?
Because they couldn't. First, if they said to Russia, "Let's get rid of your nuclear weapons," Russia would have just replied, "Oh, yes, we would just love to get rid of our nuclear weapons, and we will be happy to do so, just as soon as you get rid of yours!" So, checkmate! The imperialists were paralyzed by that, since the very discussion would have focused attention on the US arsenal and brought a storm of popular pressure for the US to disarm too, so they didn't even want to breathe it. Second, the providers and maintainers of US nuclear weapons and militarism wouldn't have wanted Russia to disarm anyway, because they would have been out of business. So, despite all, the nuclear parity remained, and the nuclear sword of Damocles remains suspended over all our heads.
The bigger danger now is that the disintegration of US power might cause the US elite to blow up the world with nuclear weapons out of spite when confronted with their own downfall. It is so bad that one of the congressmen even threatened to nuke the US population if it revolted. It is true that nuking the world would be suicidal and irrational, but when one reflects on the march of folly recorded in history, one cannot feel confidently secure.
Posted by: Cabe | May 13 2023 3:23 utc | 86
B, did you really think an article that mentions Russia "hacking US presidential elections" has any credibility? Yeah, I agree with that article's main thesis - one should never underestimate your geopolitical opponents - but the article itself is a joke.
Seriously, if anyone here believes Russia """hacked""" or was even able to significantly interfere with the 2016 presidential election then I have a bridge to sell you, LMAO.
Posted by: Lev Obolenskiy | May 13 2023 3:38 utc | 87
Posted by: chu teh | May 12 2023 17:11 utc | 36Oy vey, what an anti-semitic post, goy!
Posted by: Ma Laoshi | May 12 2023 17:24 utc | 40What do you propose the Russians could have done "to deal" with the Brits? Forget DU ammo - Brits have given Ukrops cruise missiles with 300km range that were used today to hit a target deep inside Luhansk.
There's nothing for Russia to do, unfortunately.
Posted by: Lev Obolenskiy | May 13 2023 3:47 utc | 88
Lev Obolenskiy #3:38 utc | 88
B, did you really think an article that mentions Russia "hacking US presidential elections" has any credibility? Yeah, I agree with that article's main thesis - one should never underestimate your geopolitical opponents - but the article itself is a joke.Seriously, if anyone here believes Russia """hacked""" or was even able to significantly interfere with the 2016 presidential election then I have a bridge to sell you, LMAO.
Perhaps B was having a 'naked capitalism' moment.
Why would Russia even bother to hack a USA election. There is likely a gridlock at the door/port from all the USA hackers just dying to get in there and make chaos/fun of their pathetic electoral process.
The real point about USA elections is that the outcome will be ridiculous because the process is contemptible.
Posted by: uncle tungsten | May 13 2023 5:19 utc | 89
Posted by: rk | May 12 2023 16:37 utc | 24
What a stupid comment that the people in the west are so rich it doesn't matter if food goes up 20% What planet do you live on . I know plenty of people in the west who are working poor who have full time jobs but can't make ends meet. What a stupid person you are are you so rich you move in the circles of the billionaires. Pensioners on fixed income are another example you think we all have a full bank account with millions of pounds to throw away
Posted by: Les-1946 | May 13 2023 6:21 utc | 90
@karlof1 | May 12 2023 16:52 utc | 30
One of the many, many things Marx got right. The "laws of motion” of the capitalistic mode of production reflect its inherently unstable crisis driven nature, which tends to oscillate between repeated breakdowns and collapses, with an overarching long term tendency for surplus value to fall, underconsumption due to overexploitation limiting realization of surplus value, overproduction and impoverishment of the proletariat amd petite bourgeoisie collapsing purchasing power.
To this I would add sanctions and the current interest rate driven instability driving soaring stagflation. The system stops working once the rentier seeking bourgeoisie own all the productive assets worth stealing, having acquired them with money given to them to alleviate stress, only they used it to purchase the world on their own account at negative real interest rates. As interest rates rise, they have to put up the price of everything to pay it, which removes all the liquidity from the economy, collapsing recirculation and the velocity of money. It swiftly reached the point where nobody but the plutocrats can afford anything, and then the rentiers collapse because there is nobody left to loot.
And to Western economists who have never read Marx, and have forgotten Keynes if they ever learned about him, it is an insurmountable mystery and they burble on and on about inflation (which is not happening to any significant extent) and corrections which they cannot explain or predict.
Meanwhile automation, robotics and AI collapse employment (also as predicted by Marx) which will result in the predicted "revolutions", but the results are likely to be astonishingly suboptimal unless hardship and death on a heroic scale appeal to you, because far too few people understand the risks of cascade failures in organically developed systems without breakers, fall-backs or restarts, where their predecessor systems are long disassembled and forgotten.
Posted by: Hermit | May 13 2023 6:27 utc | 91
@Cabe | May 13 2023 3:23 utc | 87
Only a total idiot would imagine that the "extent" of a decadal nuclear winter would be anything but catastrophic extinction for most extant life forms, plants and animals.
The experiment has already been performed about 252 MYBP in the Permian–Triassic extinction event where 57% of biological families, 83% of genera, 81% of marine species and 70% of terrestrial vertebrate species were lost.
See my A HREF="http://bit.ly/WarsOfDepopulation">Wars of Depopulation and appendices.
Posted by: Hermit | May 13 2023 6:42 utc | 92
@ Hermit | May 13 2023 6:42 utc | 93
So what if Homo Sapiens is a dead end. Life will prevail.
https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/article/120221-oldest-seeds-regenerated-plants-science
Posted by: too scents | May 13 2023 6:54 utc | 93
@Membrum Virile | May 12 2023 16:26 utc | 18
Then why did the CIA assess that Russians ate better and more calories than the West, and a faster growing economy from the 1920s to the 1970s?
As for it not ending well, the last time the USA's undeclared economic and insurrectionist wars were successful, but since then capitalism has collapsed harder, at far greater cost than the disassembly of the USSR. So what makes you imagine that the failed USA could defeat the allies.
Posted by: Hermit | May 13 2023 6:56 utc | 94
chu teh # 17:11 utc | 36
Gaming our supply of FOOD is surely a target of the creditor-class.
Thank you and IMO pottery was transformative as those that could make it or had an abundance of surplus to trade for it, immediately became a bank through their food store. I guess it was a personal bank in the beginning and later a community bank. Those that observed other mammals or developed the link between certain herbs and insect repellent/food preservation were likely highly regarded and rewarded such that knowledge of the techniques of extended food storage conferred 'priesthood' status perhaps.
Posted by: uncle tungsten | May 13 2023 7:05 utc | 95
@ uncle tungsten | May 13 2023 7:05 utc | 96
---
Ever wonder if the hormones they give cattle and fowl to produce more milk and lay more eggs is in any way connected with today's spreading LGBT+ phenomena?
Posted by: too scents | May 13 2023 7:11 utc | 96
Latest Russian inflation figures from TASS; sure doesn’t look like ‘economic damage’ to me.
https://tass.com/economy/1616907
MOSCOW, May 13. /TASS/. Inflation in Russia from May 3 to May 10, 2023, was zero after 0.19% inflation a week earlier, according to the Russian State Statistics Service (Rosstat) data.Consumer prices in the country have risen by 0.05% since the beginning of May, and by 2.11% since the beginning of the year. In annual terms, inflation was 2.24% as of May 10, 2023 (based on calculations utilizing average daily data from this and previous years on similar dates).
Prices for mutton increased by 1.8%, chicken meat - by 1.1%, granulated sugar - by 0.8%, vermicelli - by 0.5%, semi-smoked and boiled-smoked sausages - by 0.3%, boiled sausages, butter, and pasta made from premium wheat flour - by 0.2%, beef, sausages, canned meat and dry milk formulas for baby food - by 0.2%, cottage cheese, wheat flour, rye bread, rice - by 0.1%.
At the same period, prices for chicken eggs fell by 1.7%, buckwheat - by 0.9%, canned fruits and berries for baby food - by 0.3%, sterilized milk and sour cream - by 0.2%, and pork, margarine, black tea, and millet - by 0.1%.
Prices for fruits and vegetables fell by an average of 1.2%, with cucumbers falling by 10.4%, tomatoes - by 5.2%, and bananas - by 1.1%. White cabbage prices climbed by 18%, carrots - by 5.6%, onions - by 5.5%, table beets and apples - by 1.1%, and potatoes - by 0.4%.
Prices for smartphones and cigarettes grew by 0.2%, while prices for motor gasoline remained virtually unchanged and diesel fuel prices fell by 0.1%.
Posted by: West of England Andy | May 13 2023 7:27 utc | 97
chu teh | May 12 2023 17:11 utc | 36
You say:
"In terms of a more workable theory, perhaps the origin of the class called "creditors" is the parasitic lender who realized that "lending" as prime occupation is the way out of having to do stoop-labor. I.e., "Eureka! I can escape a lifetime of hard labor" anchored to a tiny plot. And that still rings true in present time. Ask any living-high banker.
The Creditor Debtor game is the winning tech used to game mankind's cruel systems of survival. The Debtor is made subservient to the Creditor. Debtors are the underclass, AKA untermenchen. The Creditor Debtor Game inherently is legal because it includes Creditor gaming of the justice system and all other manmade systems. Adding the use of Creditor "muscle" to overcome any resistant "obstacles" is, well...assassination inclusive"
Arguably the Creditor Debtor game has been criminalised by collusion between Western governments and the Rothschilds' Central Banking system using their fraudulent innovation called the "fractional reserve system". That system MAGICALLY reversed the creditor/debtor relationship with active connivance by governments and judiciaries.
Covert controllers of corporate governments and corporate banks secretly control Western nations. The control mechanism controlling governments and everyone, is counterfeit, i.e. pretend, money created out of thin air by corporate banks.
HOW it’s done:
A Central Bank is established with connivance of the government which then enables the Central bank to dictate interest rates. At the same time government Treasuries deliberately fail to issue money and currency needed to facilitate societal interactions and the exchange of goods a services, AND instead they licence private banking corporations to pretend to issue it.
Those banks then illegally and unlawfully pretend to create money out of thin air, deceptively calling the process “the fractional reserve system”. The banks do that by getting “borrowers” to pledge their credit to the bank by signing a falsely labelled loan contract which is really a promissory note. Then the bank types the amount specified in the contract into the creditor’s bank account calling the resulting digital debt tokens, 'money'. The bank then pretends that the creditor is the debtor and requires the creditor to “repay” with his/her real effort and labour, PLUS interest, the debt token amount called money which the bank has placed in his/her account.
That is fraud. The result is poverty, scarcity and want for creditors and untold riches for banks and especially for their owners and controllers.
Professor Richard Werner explains how the banks do this. See eg: ‘The Secret Power of Banks - Richard Werner - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=llb58LePo1I
Werner doesn't take his work to its logical conclusion in that although he proves that banks are not "transactional" i.e they do not LEND any money let alone the money they acquire as unsecured loans from people (falsely called "depositors") BUT rather they create money they ostensibly loan to borrowers at interest, OUT OF THIN AIR, and fraudulently pretend that it is real. The money that people are led to believe they are "depositing" in banks for safekeeping is in fact provided to banks as unsecured loans to the bank; thus the bank can use (BAIL IN) that money if its commercial "bets" ‘go South’. Money lent to banks that they BAIL IN to cover losses become formally converted to unsecured shares in the banking corporation. That means they rank BELOW all secured loans in the event of liquidation.
Werner appears to misdirect himself on the issue of the future need for banks to exist, presumably because he doesn’t seem to admit the full extent of banking fraud involved. If he did he would have to acknowledge that the banking system as we know it must cease to exist because each nation’s Treasury should issue all the nations’ money and currency, asset backed and interest free. At most that would leave minor money redistribution and safekeeping services for banks to fulfill. Such services could be done by Post Offices for minimal service fees.
Currently, over 97% of "money" in circulation isn't money, it's NOTHING - digits in the ether put there by corporate banks (which are also fictions, the money doesn't exist except on paper) which corporate governments (that are also fictions) fraudulently FORCE everyone to "repay" with real production of goods and services.
The scam is set up by governments granting free licences to private corporations to pretend to create currency out of thin air by typing numbers into borrowers' accounts, pretending that those digits are money.
That's far worse than usury. It is highway robbery, authorised and abetted by governments granting free licences to private banks to pretend to lend unlimited sums of currency instead of having government Treasuries emit real money ie. money backed by assets and the full faith and credit of the nation, on an interest free basis.
The complicity of governments generally in this gigantic fraud that impoverishes and enslaves populations is explicit in that governments, via Central Banks, purports to issue FREE licences to private corporate banks, authorising them to place digital debt token amounts they label as currency, in borrowers’ bank accounts, AND to pretend to lend those tokens as money when all the banks do is type those digits into borrowers’ accounts.
Arguably the process is worse than counterfeiting because banks demand that borrowers repay their 'fiat debt token' mythical money 'loans' (knowing that the amounts specified in those specious loan documents are actually the borrowers’ CREDIT which means the banks are responsible for the debt) with the actual fruits of the borrower’s real efforts and labour, PLUS additional payments to cover the “interest” CHARGED by the banks. At least other counterfeiters don't levy an annual compounding interest surcharge on the pretend money they issue.
That additional fraud is needed to enable the banks to repackage and on-sell their fraudulent loan agreements thereby earning even greater profits while also claiming the loan amount from appropriate national Treasuries under the Strawman mechanism.
The joke is especially hilarious for the banksters ever since 1666, See eg: ‘Democracy, Deception, Deceit - they're all the same’: https://english.pravda.ru/opinion/126430-democracy_deception_deceit/
the British; (and since 1933, USans) See: An Investigative Report From the desk of Barton Albert Buhtz: https://famguardian.org/Subjects/MoneyBanking/UCC/InvestigativeReportUCC.pdf
Moreover, as the Australian and many other peoples governments also implemented the Strawman mechanism during the Great Depression with the result that every time a living man or woman creates CREDIT by, for instance, taking out a mortgage or loan, the money/currency specified in the contract is simply a draw-down on his/her Cestui Que vie trust account with the relevant Treasury.
The biggest joke being that not only do “borrowers” not owe banks any interest, they don’t owe the principal either! All interest and principal paid to banks should be paid back to the “borrower” as the beneficiary of the relevant trust.
Apart from its complicity in licensing this banking fraud governments are complicit in that they DICTATE that real flesh and blood men and women must pay to private banks what are really unlawful TAXES.
As governments don’t issue asset backed money they are dictating that all members of society must use the banks’ fraudulently issued electronic fiat debt tokens if they wish to have the right and ability to participate in society i.e. in order for them to live and be able to legally trade and/or exchange goods and services.
Governments enforce this criminal system upon entire populations by unlawfully using their claimed exclusive Policing and judicial control of FORCE and VIOLENCE. They do that by mandating that anyone attempting to use commercial bartering or their own form(s) of asset backed money or currency will be prosecuted, fined and even imprisoned.
This gigantic scam is made possible by national governments and the MSM mind controlling whole populations from cradle to grave to accept this nonsense and to fear that governments will use their monopoly on use of force and violence to make them accept the situation. The same mechanism was used to create the Munchhausen by Proxy COVID-19 mass formation psychosis.
Governments mandating that bank issued digital currency must be used constitutes the protection racket aspect of the system. Why? Because governments DICTATE and enforces that “borrowers”must pay banks the nominal principal and interest (unlawful private TAXES) levied by private corporate banks in order for the economy to operate AT ALL! Why? Because governments only emit less than 3% of the money (in coins and notes) needed to enable the economy to function.
Because governments (that allegedly represent the community) fail to issue the necessary money supply, which is their primary task, private banks issue and CONTROL that supply and by alternatively pretending to issue excessive quantities of currency (as occurred during the COVID-19 scamdemic) and then restricting the money supply and increasing interest rates (as they have been doing this year) they create BOOMS and BUSTS in which they squeeze the population and extract even more profits by foreclosing on mortgages and loans, thus obtaining collateral properties for pennies on the dollar.
IN FACT, when foreclosing on properties banks SHOULD repay to the “borrower” ALL of the monies/currency paid to them on the relevant loan AND return the title to the property while not interfering with the “borrower’s” quiet possession of the property.
Incidentally, “inflation” is really a deceptive term for the devaluation of the currency due to banks causing excessive amounts of digital debt tokens to flood the economy. It isn’t caused by excessive wage demands and goods and services price increases. It actually represents the DEVALUATION of the currency (it’s reduced purchasing power) due to the banks’ having to place ever-increasing amounts of debt tokens in “borrowers” loan accounts BECAUSE they never purport to create or loan ANY debt repayment token currency with their “loans”. That means there is NEVER enough currency in circulation to enable “borrowers” to pay to the banks the principal AND interest they demand. That requires the banks to always create ever-larger face value loans to enable the system to continue. Accordingly these systems only last about 50-55 years before collapsing. The current global monetary system started in 1971.
To compound the felony the global banking system is currently squeezing the life out of most nations using unlawful and fraudulent interest rate increases. The criminal mechanism being used and actively condoned by governments and commentators alike, is unilateral bank increases in interest rates applicable to new and so-called variable interest loans. Apart from all other unlawful aspects of banking, any contract that purports to enable one party to unilaterally alter a material term of the contract makes the contract null and void ab initio because of uncertainty. The fact that governments and judiciaries pretend that this practice is legal underpins the need to remove them (along with commercial banking) and replace them with lawful natural law arrangements.
The CON is simple and audacious, and sooo huge that people refuse to believe it.
Ron
***********
Posted by: Ron Chapman | May 13 2023 7:30 utc | 98
too scents #7:11 utc | 97
There are so many chemical interferences facing us daily. AFAIK some endocrine disrupters are considered a major threat to wellbeing.
Feeding livestock production boosters is what gave cattle and us mad cow disease.
Posted by: uncle tungsten | May 13 2023 7:32 utc | 99
Gazprombank is the only Russian bank easily able to transact in Euros due to its strategic exemption from European sanctions. Gazprom will now only accept payment for gas into its RUB account, no doubt at Gazprombank.
Therefore EU buyers will have to send EUR to Gazprombank who will then credit Gazprom with the appropriate amount of RUB.
In other words banks will have to open a correspondent account with Gazprombank rather than whoever they were using as correspondent previously in Russia.
What Gazprom was doing internally (moving Euros into Roubles within Gazprombank), now everybody has to do. No doubt Gazprombank will make a tidy turn on each of those transactions.
Just as before the Europeans will pay for their gas in Euros, and Russia will receive payment in Roubles.
Due to sanctions in all directions, it’s likely that the only reasonable quote for EUR/RUB available will be from Gazprombank at whatever exchange rate they decide or are instructed to offer.
The sanctions are transitive which means that synthetic EUR/RUB quotes via third currencies won’t offer the usual alternative. It was possibly the best April Fools joke ever and the West continue to think Russian exports fund the Russian Treasury.. As ignorant as the tax payer money myth.
https://new-wayland.com/blog/rouble-rumble-continues/
Posted by: Derek Henry | May 13 2023 7:33 utc | 100
The comments to this entry are closed.
United Kingdom will turn up the heat.
UK Defense Secretary sending Long Range missiles to Ukraine
“ We will no longer stand by and watch Russia take the lives of Ukrainian civilians”
Video here https://twitter.com/AbrahamStein8/status/1657044081573339144?s=20
Posted by: Dave Oneil | May 12 2023 15:25 utc | 1