Happy Father’s Day to all. My concern with nuclear weapons is that will this administration take us to that moment of using them. Many of us will not survive. But they may since they will know when those missiles are on the way. So they’ll get the hell outta Dodge and leave the rest of us flapping in the wind like sitting ducks. That’s why in my book they are all no good.

Posted by: Jose Garcia | Jun 18 2023 14:03 utc | 1

Thanks for another week at the bar b

I don't worry about nukes but I do worry about bio-chemical warfare. I want to read Putin saying that Russia will nuke empire if they try and kill big chunks of humanity with biological warfare.....where is the MAD here?

Posted by: psychohistorian | Jun 18 2023 14:20 utc | 2

A savvy political move for Donald Trump to make right about now would be to take up the cause of freeing Julian Assange, who is charged with violating the 1917 Espionage Act, the same law Trump has been charged with violating. Trump would turn the tables on Biden with this move and give the Democratic National Committee a brain freeze. It would help Assange immensely too. By defending Assange, Trump would be defending himself. By visiting Assange personally at Belmarsh Prison, Trump would create a sensation that would force the media to break their silent treatment for Assange. If Trump promised to pardon Assange if elected that would make Assange and the Espionage Act a major issue in the 2024 campaign in a way that could help Trump win his own espionage case, and the election.

Posted by: Chas | Jun 18 2023 14:26 utc | 3

thanks b!

i like the quotes from ellsberg and putin.. thanks for highlighting the issue of nukes brought up by karaganov this week.. i am glad to see putin addressed it in his typically logical and incisive manner.. as i have said repeatedly - russia is not dealing with a logical player on the other end of this conflict.. i pray this conflict goes away sooner then later.. thanks for the various links.. i am most interested in the mint press article, so i am going to go read it..

@ psychohistorian | Jun 18 2023 14:20 utc | 2

the bio-chemical weapons is an ongoing concern.. and of course the whole covid thing remains an open question as to what exactly it was too.. was that some accidental bio-chemical experiment on the planet?

Posted by: james | Jun 18 2023 14:38 utc | 4

@ Chas | Jun 18 2023 14:26 utc | 3

it is too bad trump didn't figure that out when he was in a position of power to do something... unfortunately the image of him being a self serving grifter has been cemented into many people's minds at this point.. if he was to do it now - it would be seen as totally self serving grifter action..

Posted by: james | Jun 18 2023 14:40 utc | 5

"Popular" is a pretty poor traslation. Putin use a 'folk' idiom.

Also, being a civilized guy, he didn't say "fuck them" (хуй с ним) but the more polite version, ("хрен им") which would be almost exactly identical in usage to "screw them".

Posted by: ДжММ | Jun 18 2023 14:44 utc | 6

Re: The Karaganov Nuke controversy here @ MoA...

Early in Episode 2 of Oliver Stone's 4 part doco The Putin Interviews, Stone persuades Putin and other officials to watch the movie Doctor Strangelove, (supplied by Stone).

During the post-movie chat session, Stone remarks sombrely "Hot war? Who will survive?" To which Putin replies, equally sombrely "No-one will survive."

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Jun 18 2023 14:51 utc | 7

My analysis of the Latin American Southern Cone countries - The West vs. The Rest, The Current State of Play; Latin America Pt 1.

A place where the landed aristocracy and financial and extractive (lighter skinned) elites, allied with foreign capital, always seem to be able to defeat any attempt at even a bourgeois progressive revolution and industrialization. They never give up and use whatever means necessary. Even in places like Bolivia, victories for the indigenous and working people are always open to an elite challenge that never rests. More trade and FDI with China may actually be leading to continued deindustrialization and a focus on exports of food and raw materials, returning nations back to the early twentieth century.

Nations may be able to take a somewhat more independent stance, but they are just too close to the US and too far away from China.

Posted by: Roger | Jun 18 2023 15:02 utc | 8

Posted by: Roger | Jun 18 2023 15:02 utc | 10

Thank you for writing that.

Posted by: TM | Jun 18 2023 15:28 utc | 9

TM @ 14

Actually I saw a silent teardrop shaped black craft with a canopy flying when I was in the miltary in the 70's. I was so close I saw the pilot and he was in US gear.
I am sure they were testing some sort of new platform and it might not have worked out or they have it on the shelf.

We can believe what we want but I am telling you the truth.

Posted by: circumspect | Jun 18 2023 15:52 utc | 10

team10tim @ 14

Failed systems are a money maker for the MIC. Stuff that works well and does not break is a loser. High maintenace systems are a big money maker as well and they are the contractors that fix them. I suspect the ET tech is not quite ready. Judging from I was last year they are getting close.

Posted by: circumspect | Jun 18 2023 15:47 utc | 15

Yeah, nobody wants to fix things these days, they all want regular income so you need "checkups" and "updates" and "patches" and so on.

Posted by: Bemildred | Jun 18 2023 15:53 utc | 11

Wow, my posts were elimintated and the thread was renumbered. Was it really that bad? Did B do that?

Posted by: circumspect | Jun 18 2023 15:55 utc | 12

The Ellsberg article was quite good. Sort of like RFK Jr. running for president. It brings back memories of the era I lived through.

Posted by: circumspect | Jun 18 2023 16:29 utc | 13

Yesterday alone I read about a Harvard guy selling body parts, a professor caught having sex with his dog, and a thirteen year old girl who had a double mastectomy done to her because she was gender confused.

We have reached Sodom and Gomorrah levels of degeneracy in this country. We are a blight, a twisted sickness on the soul of this world. America is the heart of the beast. You might think I'm some kind of religious fanatic to write in such terms, but you would be wrong. It is only in these terms that I can accurately describe these abominations of our collective soul.

Posted by: JustAMaverick | Jun 18 2023 16:47 utc | 14

circumspect 13

I too have had legitimate posts censored here. Don't know why but I will say that I run into such things everywhere now, even in places that claim to be defenders of free speech. The worst of them is Sheerpost.

Posted by: JustAMaverick | Jun 18 2023 16:51 utc | 15

JustAMaverick | Jun 18 2023 16:47 utc | 14

That's not degeneracy. In fact it's the highest, most generated state of capitalism, where Mises' Law of Price has proceeded almost to completion.

Posted by: Concerned Citizen | Jun 18 2023 16:56 utc | 16

JustAMaverick @ 15

I have seen B remove posts and renumber threads. He used to say that in a short post when he took that action. The god of the blog is in control. Such is life. Ones and zeros are in control.

The Ellsburg article mentioned what we were posting about so it was not off topic. We must have drilled without an anesthetic.

Posted by: circumspect | Jun 18 2023 17:15 utc | 17

Bah, posted on UA thread by mistake .....

On Karaganov, Karlof1, on a previous thread, suggested that he was possibly a neoliberal shill, publishing his nuke escalation thesis in the Russian sphere, that matches neither Russia’s doctrine not interests, but might be very useful for western propagandists to incorporate into their own anti-Russian narratives. “Look at what Russian’s themselves are saying”, that sort of thing.

Assuming I read Karlof1 correctly.

Posted by: anon2020 | Jun 18 2023 17:51 utc | 18

Gilbert Doctorow article is a wonderful take down of the karaganov and hersh articles.. i recommend it for anyone going deeper into the topic that karaganov's earlier article aroused here and elsewhere.. or you could just skip it all and read what b highlighted from putins speech.. i actually think doctorow's article is very good and gives more insight into this, then putins short and succinct response..

Posted by: james | Jun 18 2023 18:40 utc | 19

“The worst of them is Sheerpost.

Posted by: JustAMaverick | Jun 18 2023 16:51 utc | 15”

I’m guessing you’ve never been to the Common Dreams site.

Posted by: malenkov | Jun 18 2023 19:04 utc | 20

Posted by: Jose Garcia | Jun 18 2023 14:03 utc | 1

Once again I am struck by the exceptionalism of well meaning people. Fathers Day in Australia is in September. "What, people do things differently in other parts of the world???" I hear Americans say. The innocent imperial certainty of even the nicest and kindest Romans Americans appears in the way their vernacular is taken for the vernacular of mankind in general. The surest way to know you're living in the province of an empire is that you have to explain why your customs deviate from the 'norm'.

So, in short Jose, don't 'Happy Fathers Day' me because it ain't Fathers Day. In Sydney at any rate it's just another manic Monday (Jose: "what, isn't it 5pm everywhere in the world? USA! USA! ...)

Posted by: Patroklos | Jun 18 2023 19:25 utc | 21

Let me guess, Patroklod: Maybe I shouldn’t wish you a happy Juneteenth?

(*giggles*) (*ducks*)

Posted by: malenkov | Jun 18 2023 19:32 utc | 22

*Patroklos (apologies for bad cell phone typing)

Posted by: malenkov | Jun 18 2023 19:33 utc | 23

@18 "On Karaganov, Karlof1, on a previous thread, suggested that he was possibly a neoliberal shill,..."

Remember, Krishna and Arjuna destroyed the whole kingdom at the battle of Kurukshetra; the corruption was too widespread and purging was necessary. Karagonov's logic I can understand. I don't like it, but if the black knight keeps crawling after me, biting me and my children, don't I have to cut off the head too? I don't see any hope of the West - in any form or group - changing its ways for the better, but rather getting increasingly demonic. Was it the czech Prime Minister recently advocating prison camps for all Russians outside Mother Russia - like US did to Japanese in WW2?

During the Dark Ages there were towns that killed every single woman as a witch. Whatever were they thinking? [And what were the women that moved in thinking -but that's a different story...] If that's the way West goes after Russia - and it seems so - they may not have a lot of choice.

Posted by: oracle | Jun 18 2023 19:55 utc | 24

malenkov | Jun 18 2023 19:04 utc | 20

I never considered them as claiming to support free speech. I gave up on Common Dreams five years ago. In fact as far as Western media goes I am down to The Grayzone and Zero Hedge and that's pretty much it. It's that bad. Almost as bad is western independent media where I can only tolerate half a dozen sites like The Duran, Garland Nixon, Jimmy Dore, Moon of Alabama and a couple others. More and more I have to leave the west altogether to find anything like real news and information.

Posted by: JustAMaverick | Jun 18 2023 20:00 utc | 25

@Posted by: james | Jun 18 2023 18:40 utc | 19

Great Doctorow comment about "Dmitry Medvedev who was, let us be frank, a perfect patsy for the West during his presidency.", he was the idiot who approved the Libyan no-fly zone at the UNSC. Now he does act like a "super-hawk" to try to make up for it. The same with "In short, nothing that Karaganov says now should be taken at face value. He is trying to improve his image at home." exactly!

Posted by: Roger | Jun 18 2023 20:05 utc | 26

Military Summary channel now calling it a Russian Spring in his summary of the last two weeks of Ukrainian offensive.

Also the new Finnish government seems not to be following NATO orders, after getting rid of that woke neoliberal warmongering anti-Russian party-girl as their leader who is now getting a divorce (what a surprise!).

Posted by: Roger | Jun 18 2023 20:13 utc | 27

China retaliating for Taiwan incursions by US Navy by buying more Iranian oil: "Iran Oil Exports Hit Highest Record In Five Years"

Iran using funds to build a new hardened nuclear weapons capable facility: "Recent satellite pictures appear to confirm that Iran is building a nuclear facility in the Zagros mountains, near the existing Natanz enrichment site"

US realizes it has to reach a mini-deal with Iran to stop uranium enrichment from getting to weapons grade: "Report: Netanyahu says US and Iran in talks for a ‘mini-deal’ Israel can live with"

Posted by: stringmeteor | Jun 18 2023 20:30 utc | 28

anon2020 | Jun 18 2023 17:51 utc | 18--

Too funny!! I replied on the Ukie thread.

Posted by: karlof1 | Jun 18 2023 20:33 utc | 29

Let's cut to the bone.

The missing point is that those USians within or close to the system that know anything at all are more than well aware that if the threshold got lowered they wouldn't be facing nukes tomorrow but nukes right now.

They know they're far past any "lower threshold" because at least some of them believe or hope (!) they are currently right now as we speak in the later stages of a process of dismantling Russia.

In other words they already correctly know that Russia would presently be justified in launching all the nukes, not just one or two. Russia is also ready to do so but so far chooses not to.

Easy as that. Plain as day.

Posted by: Sunny Runny Burger | Jun 18 2023 20:34 utc | 30

Roger @ 26

Your substack looks interesting, I will have to spend some time there. Dmitry Medvedev seemed to me be sort of pro western some years back and then changed to what he is today. Guys like that I do not trust but he is near the top of the power structure, a power struture I know where near understand nor do I have the time and resources to try at this time.

Posted by: circumspect | Jun 18 2023 20:40 utc | 31

@ oracle | Jun 18 2023 19:55 utc | 24

that's my concern as well which the karaganov article sort of solicits..

@ Roger | Jun 18 2023 20:05 utc | 26

i think doctorow hit a home run with that line, but the whole article is worth others reading.. obviously you have!

Posted by: james | Jun 18 2023 20:41 utc | 32

Big difference between being "pro-western" (everyone is) and "being pro-the-west-making-war-on-you-or-otherwise-screwing-you-over" (nobody is, not even people in the west and yes we get screwed over constantly by "our" people).

For some reason the US powers abhor the idea of having real friendly relations, a strange thing considering it is how the world should feel about the US rather than the US about the world.

Posted by: Sunny Runny Burger | Jun 18 2023 20:52 utc | 33

Roger: your link to the Finnish story is missing its target url. It's not in the source code either so I guess you forgot to include it (I've done that before too, very easy to do).

Posted by: Sunny Runny Burger | Jun 18 2023 20:58 utc | 34

Roger | Jun 18 2023 20:05 utc | 26--

IMO, Medvedev was stabbed in the back. Russia's outlook toward the West at that time was still to tray and find accommodation not confrontation. Unfortunately for Ghaddafi and Libya, Russia learned a very important lesson which completely altered Russian perspective. Putin was PM at the time; is anyone calling him a patsy or worse over that?

JustAMaverick | Jun 18 2023 20:00 utc | 25--

I was banned from Common Dreams in 2016 for being Anti-Clinton, Anti-D Party, and for providing too many truths that showed the many op/ed writers they featured to be charlatans and liars. My screen name there was EnemyofWar. When I was banned, I downloaded all of my commentary which was rather massive and shut down the website for about 48 hours. I once touted it as a good info source, particularly when it had the section of links to international media prior to 2012 when it was discontinued. I put a few things together and determined CD's main source of funding was the D-Party. I used to look at its main page every so often but haven't visited at all this year. IMO, its demise is a good example of what's happened to info outlets since that time. What we see today is the result of the rallying cry that was made in 1999 in the run-up to the Battle-in-Seattle and the rise of Indymedia outlets that exhorted people to become the media. The problem then as now is to sift the junk from the genuine.

Posted by: karlof1 | Jun 18 2023 21:00 utc | 35

Wow, my posts were eliminated and the thread was renumbered. Was it really that bad? Did B do that?

Posted by: circumspect | Jun 18 2023 15:55 utc | 12

Yes, many of my posts are not appearing,
On one recent post the attempt to post was interrupted
with appearance of a cloudfare message, then on another during an attempt to connect to MoA cloudfare announced I was not authorized or something like that..
Something seems to be up,,

Posted by: snake | Jun 18 2023 21:03 utc | 36

People can wish me happy father's day every day of the year if they want to, not a problem. I don't mind. You be as nice as you can be :)

I don't have any kids though :D

Posted by: Sunny Runny Burger | Jun 18 2023 21:04 utc | 37

Forgot what I really wanted to comment on; the increased surveillance against any kind of criticism.

Look how scared they are. Such fragile flowers.

Yes this will be used against "nobodies" (such as me) but the real intended target is themselves; all the people working inside the system.

There's a reason all the yellow and blue flags and messages of support disappeared from most of the non-digital public space, sports events, etc.: a lot of people simply don't support it and the powers that be are vary of that. They pump as much of it as they can into controlled environments (anywhere they can remove voices or feel confident that most "agree") but not where people most of whom might be against it can speak to each other or make too much noise about it.

It's not just ordinary folks either, hence the drive for surveilling and removing criticism in order to catch "disloyal" servants/slaves.

Would be funny if they had the balls to go public when they catch generals disparaging each other :)

Posted by: Sunny Runny Burger | Jun 18 2023 21:34 utc | 38

Yikes Scott Horton really threw Ellsberg under the bus in that Politico interview:

Horton believes that Ellsberg, like other whistleblowers, occasionally sees conspiracy and government perfidy when the evidence is scant ... He’s really serious about conspiracy theories,” Horton says. “I would contrast what he did during the Vietnam era to some of the more recent things where he’s really not on the inside anymore and doesn’t have that access to information.”

These quotes gave the Politico author a perfect "in" to discredit Ellsberg's discussion of the US Empire, its role in creating the Ukraine crisis, and the MSMs role as purveyors of war propaganda.

Posted by: S.P. Korolev | Jun 18 2023 21:42 utc | 39

Posted by: Patroklos | Jun 18 2023 19:25 utc | 21

Are you telling me that it *isn't* beer-thirty where you are?

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Jun 18 2023 22:10 utc | 40

Posted by: snake | Jun 18 2023 21:03 utc | 36

I seem to be thrown under the bus at any mention of Bovid or Dovid

Posted by: SwissArmyMan | Jun 18 2023 22:15 utc | 41

@Posted by: Sunny Runny Burger | Jun 18 2023 20:58 utc | 34

Thanks, yeah the kludgy old platform doesn't help - with more recent ones you just insert a hyperlink to the text thats already there. Here it is, basically the woke lefties tend to lead to a right wing response so now Finland gets neoliberalism with social conservatism! Still interesting to see if they will do a Hungary as their conservatism is much closer to that of Russia than the EU and the US.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v2XleK8M1V8

Marin may have locked them into NATO, its a bit like Hotel California - you can check out but never leave once you are in.

Posted by: Roger | Jun 18 2023 22:19 utc | 42

I've had comments disappeared into the ether before they're ever visible on the page after a quick refresh of my browser here at MoA. Never had any comments show up and then disappear. Usually there is an offending hyperlink that must trigger some sort of censorship algorithm in the software in my experience.

On a similar note, I maintain a couple of fake Facebook accounts to keep in touch with some friends and family and to troll various other people and pages. Over the past week, I've been involved in a three-way chat using FB Messenger. It's a private, 3 person conversation not visible to anyone else at all. Every single day I am temporarily banned or blocked from sending messages at some point in the conversation. There is no recourse. Whereas if you have a post removed from your page, you can appeal it via a somewhat byzantine process, but not with Messenger. It is AI managed because I know that neither of the other 2 people reported me.

This is a big deal because a lot of people use FB Messenger as their primary messaging app on their phones, my wife and the female members of her family included. I use Signal or the default Android SMS app for most messaging and occasionally WhatsApp for some groups I'm part of like a fantasy sports league or two.

Facebook is using Artificial "Intelligence" to censor people from being able to communicate in one-, two-, three- and probably as many ways a conversation can go - in real time. So if I'm trying to have an emergency conversation with someone who only uses FB Messenger, and it flags something I've said, then (temporarily, usually) bans me, I'm SOL. How long before other messaging platforms - including Apple or Android - begin to do this? And we have zero recourse. In the US I'm pretty sure the FCC doesn't regulate text messaging in the same way as they do the 'airwaves' or voice comms over the publicly leased spectra. Not sure about the EU.

I went out and tried doing some research using various search engines, including using the trick of adding '+reddit' to Google searches to filter out the copious annoying fucking ads that always appear first due to their hideous SEO practices. I found one subreddit from 2022 consisting of about 20-30 replies, but nothing else. How could this not be a huge deal? It's a dangerous precedent in so many ways that I don't even have to enumerate them, but the most dangerous being that you can be arbitrarily and capriciously prevented from communicating about ongoing emergent situations in real-time.

As I mentioned to start, I personally only have fake FB accounts (went so far as to purchase a set of very realistic fake IDs from a dude online using Bitcoin in order to activate one of them, that's how serious I am about my trolling, LOL) and I would never use FB Messenger as a primary or even secondary means of communication, but for those who do, Big Brother literally is watching and acting any time you're using the platform, even in private conversations.

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Jun 18 2023 22:22 utc | 43

Wall Street On Parade has news of JP Morgan forking out at least $290 million compensation to Epstein's trafficked spy team.

I guess that successfully prevents any release of documents and even further enquiry as to the destiny of any recordings of the dalliances. Yet another USA clever Cone of Silence. It seems to me that JPMC needs to be destroyed. Fat Chance.

This past Monday, McCawley’s law partner, David Boies, announced that the two sides had agreed to settle the case for $290 million. The exact terms of the settlement have yet to be filed with the court but Judge Jed Rakoff, who is assigned to the case, approved it as a Class Action on Monday, meaning multiple Epstein victims may be able to receive monetary relief under the settlement.

McCawley is known to go for the jugular during depositions and to be in full command of the documents obtained during discovery – if she is given access to those documents. On Friday, June 9, just 72 hours before the case was abruptly announced as reaching a settlement, McCawley had filed a breathtaking and scathing letter with the court regarding the stonewalling behavior of JPMorgan with discovery materials.

Plenty more at the link.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Jun 18 2023 22:23 utc | 44

@Posted by: karlof1 | Jun 18 2023 21:00 utc | 35

Roger | Jun 18 2023 20:05 utc | 26--

IMO, Medvedev was stabbed in the back. Russia's outlook toward the West at that time was still to tray and find accommodation not confrontation. Unfortunately for Ghaddafi and Libya, Russia learned a very important lesson which completely altered Russian perspective. Putin was PM at the time; is anyone calling him a patsy or worse over that?

I remember at the time that this caused a bit of a rift between him and Putin, seems he did act quite independently. I can't see Putin being that naive, especially after the 2008 speech. Medvedev was seen as very liberal at the time. Of course, the Chinese were also taken for a ride, they learnt never to trust the West again.

Posted by: Roger | Jun 18 2023 22:24 utc | 45

@ Tom_Q_Collins | Jun 18 2023 22:22 utc | 43

I can’t say I’ve made an exhaustive comparative study of messaging apps, but I’m reasonably happy with Line. WhatsApp was okay but I deleted it when Zuck bought it, so it’s probably as bad as the FB product now.

Posted by: malenkov | Jun 18 2023 22:31 utc | 46

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Jun 18 2023 22:23 utc | 44

Not sure if the same one, but I think I saw that article at WSoP on Thursday or Friday. My thoughts also went to "So they don't have to actually admit to wrongdoing or let out any documents" as well. I also thought to myself "How much of that money is really going to the victims vs. the lawyers?"

The whole system is rigged for the rich and prestige social classes (corporate lawyers, banksters) from top to bottom.

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Jun 18 2023 22:34 utc | 47

Some moron wrote:

A savvy political move for Donald Trump to make right about now would be to take up the cause of freeing Julian Assange, who is charged with violating the 1917 Espionage Act, the same law Trump has been charged with violating.
____________________________________________

Ha ha ha
If Trump wanted Assange out of prison all he had to do was not press charges against Assange and not request extradition on those charges.
Trump is the only reason Assange is in jail.

Posted by: jinn | Jun 18 2023 22:35 utc | 48

Posted by: Chas | Jun 18 2023 14:26 utc | 3

Is this some kind of joke? Obama and his Justice Department refused to indict Assange although it is known that they considered it. Not only was it Trump and his JD that actually indicted Assange, they plotted literal assassination attempts and illegally spied on him in the Ecuadorian Embassy for years. Patrick Lawrence attended many if not all of the days of Assange's first trial in the UK and it was stated under oath in court that Trump took a personal interest in indicting him; it wasn't some rogue "deep state" or "swamp creature" actor beyond his purview or control.

It is offensive to the intelligence of anyone who has actually followed the Assange affair to propose that Donald J. Trump, Assange's actual persecutor, would step into the process on Julian's behalf. And as much as I loathe the Espionage Act (of 1917 IIRC) I happen to find it somewhat pleasantly ironic in a poetic justice sort of way that Trump finds himself charged under the exact same ridiculous law that he used to effectively end Julian Assange's life. F*ck Trump.

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Jun 18 2023 22:44 utc | 49

China continues to develop peace and self determination for Palestine. A Jimmy Dore report of eight minutes.

I guess this and the Cuba developments are a tangible sign of China's commitment to the global south and nothing could be clearer.

I find it amusing that the Blinken is given permission to enter China at the same time :))
What China does next following his exit will be equally interesting. Chinese are masters of trolling.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Jun 18 2023 22:47 utc | 50

Errata? In my post above ^^^ I said it was Patrick Lawrence who attended Assange's trial. I may have been thinking of Craig Murray and will have to look it up when I get a chance. Either way, in the loose transcription that one of them did in the courtroom where Assange was initially tried, it was stated that Donald Trump had full knowledge of and gave full support to the indictment.

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Jun 18 2023 22:50 utc | 51

Trump is the only reason Assange is in jail.

Posted by: jinn | Jun 18 2023 22:35 utc | 48

Trump is not the *only* reason Assange is in jail. In fact, applying the logic used by the "moron" as you described him, it is Joe Biden that could easily end this farce right now, immediately. Yet he doesn't. Recall how when Trump took office it was one of his underlying goals to reverse as many Obama policies as he could. Mostly out of pure spite. Why didn't Biden quickly act to undo what Trump did to Assange? Blaming Trump at this point might be partially accurate, but it's not the whole story, by a long shot.

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Jun 18 2023 22:52 utc | 52

jinn # 22:35 utc | 48

"Trump is the only reason Assange is in jail."

Exactly, and any person expecting that loser Trump to do anything compassionate or ethical at any time is truly deluded.

A Presidential Pardon would have solved the issue but Trump was and is gutless.

He even abandoned the entire January 6 deluded and entrapped supporters. The Trump being has no ethics and no shame.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Jun 18 2023 22:53 utc | 53

Started looking around for articles about Trump and Assange and stumbled on this one by Ron Paul from 2020. It speaks - presciently - to the poetic justice that Trump now faces himself after he turned away from Assange and Wikileaks and used the "deep state" to persecute him.

https://mises.org/wire/trumps-betrayal-julian-assange

Today, Monday the 24th of February, Assange faces an extradition hearing in a UK courthouse. The Trump administration—led by a man who praised Assange’s work—seeks a show trial of Assange worthy of the worst of the Soviet era. The US is seeking a 175-year prison sentence.

The Trump administration argues that the Australian Assange should be tried and convicted of espionage against a country of which he is not a citizen. At the same time the Trump administration argues that the First Amendment does not apply to Assange because he is not an American citizen! So Assange is subject to US law when it comes to publishing information embarrassing to the US deep state, but he is not subject to the law of the land—the US Constitution—which protects all journalists and is the backbone of our system of government.

It is ironic that a president who has been the victim of so much deep state meddling has done the deep state’s bidding when it comes to Assange and Wikileaks. President Trump should preempt the inevitable US show trial of Assange by granting the journalist a blanket pardon under the First Amendment of the United States Constitution.

The deep state that Trump is serving by persecuting Assange is the same deep state that continues to plot his own ouster. Free Assange!

Senile Uncle Brandon needs to free Assange, NOW.

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Jun 18 2023 23:00 utc | 54

Regarding Karaganov's article, I think his main point is being overlooked. And regarding Doctorow's commentary, I'm disappointed to find that the bulk of it disparages the author and not his idea.

~~

I thought when I read Karaganov's proposal that his main contention was to restore the level of fear that held MAD in place for so long. And I thought that this was such a powerful plea that all the other details and proposals in his piece were quite secondary. I still think that.

I just read the Doctorow commentary on the article and its author. Remarkably, for his subsequent dismissal of Karaganov, Doctorow actually quotes the key passage from Karaganov's article that struck me:

The creation of nuclear weapons was the result of divine intervention. Horrified to see that people, Europeans and the Japanese who had joined them, had unleashed two world wars within the life-span of one generation, sacrificing tens of millions of lives, God handed a weapon of Armageddon to humanity to remind those who had lost the fear of hell that it existed. It was this fear that ensured relative peace for the last three quarters of a century. That fear is gone now. What is happening now is unthinkable in accordance with previous ideas about nuclear deterrence: in a fit of desperate rage, the ruling circles of a group of countries have unleashed a full-scale war in the underbelly of a nuclear superpower.

That fear needs to be revived. Otherwise, humanity is doomed.

Karaganov did precede that with the disclaimer that his theory of nuclear peace was "not quite scientific." But whatever his spiritual belief, his sheer scale of thinking strikes me as matching the apocalyptic nature of his observation, and his plea.

He is, perhaps, appalled by his own suggestion, knowing perhaps that any messenger of such an appalling message might be crushed by the stir it may cause. Nonetheless, he sees the appalling moment we are in (of no fear), and therefore makes what can only be an appalling proposal - to return to fear.

As I've characterized this piece all along, Karaganov was pleading for the west to be returned to its earlier fear of nuclear war: only MAD can prevent the destruction of the world, he is saying. I think it's an eminently reasonable plea.

If it truly has inspired alarm in the west, then good. The west needs much more alarm at the prospect of nuclear war. Something has to scare those maniacs straight. It is now simply a question of: what?

~~

As for Doctorow, I don't find his analysis at all useful here. I read him frequently, but many times his terrible attitude of superiority clouds his analytical judgment - something clouds it, at least, and I find his attitude hard to take even when I agree with his point.

He goes full-on ad hominem with Karaganov, and spends almost no time with the idea itself, which is a shame. He forgets that people change, that they are never one monolithic label - not Dugin, not Medvedev, whom he also slights in passing - that their prose is imperfect, and that a new idea may be expressed poorly in its initial birth.

Doctorow's answer to such a clarion call as Karaganov attempts to issue is reduced to one facile line: "In short, nothing that Karaganov says now should be taken at face value."

Not helpful.

Posted by: Grieved | Jun 18 2023 23:36 utc | 55

Thanks, b, for posting another Week in Review.., and also for composing posts that follow some sort of traditional structure for journalistic prose, as opposed to those first three articles that seem (to me) to talk about things using words like Ukraine and war, etc. This is so bad, I think it can’t be steno from the CIA — this must be Chat GPT, I wonder?

Russia is adapting. That’s the one unifying message I could discern throughout, and “Vietnam-style spider holes” caught my attention from that first New York Times article. Adapting… like running a little propaganda interference campaign? That’s speculative. I don’t know if the owners of this would even notice if they were.

Random other thoughts:
I think the Pentagon expects the Canadian government to buy this f***ing thing. … The Pentagon is a very special place, I would wager.

https://www.ctvnews.ca/canada/u-s-deploys-high-tech-pentagon-program-to-help-canada-detect-suppress-new-wildfires-1.6445304

Max Verstappen won the Canadian Grand Prix. Congrats team Red Bull! The Beaverton ran a really funny article on the French Canadian keyboard.
https://twitter.com/TheBeaverton/status/1669756452133646352

Posted by: Bruised Northerner | Jun 19 2023 0:09 utc | 56

I cannot make any comprehensive assessment of the Doctorow article b has linked above, only to say that the author's statement that 'Serge Schmemann hates Russia' seems a personal assessment of a relationship perhaps, but cannot be the entire truth, since Schmemann's book "Echoes of a Native Land" is a part of my own library that I value for its poetic retelling of family experiences stretching back into tsarist times and forward into post Communist beginnings. I quote from the last pages:

"... I was amused that Steshin still held to the old Communist stereotype [in fall of 1996] of Americans as people with millions stashed in their top hats. Of course I would have liked to emulate my ancestor and shout, "I buy it!" and thus give this story a neat conclusion. I loved the beauty of the place and had reveled in its echoes, and, like Alexandra Nikitchna, I hoped it would end up in good hands. But even if I had a million, my life was elsewhere.

On January 27,1997, I went to Russia on a brief assignment, to cover Natan Sharansky's first visit to Moscow since his expulsion. I was struck by the changes that had taken place in Moscow: the rebuilt Church of Christ the Savior rivaled the Kremlin in majesty, the old center was brilliantly illuminated through the long winter night, glittering shops offered every conceivable ware. But the politics were still chaotic, and the economy was running on its own underground rules, which for most people meant paying protection money to racketeers and avoiding taxes...."

I can't believe that this writer, with family history going back centuries, hates Russia.

Posted by: juliania | Jun 19 2023 0:27 utc | 57

Tom_Q_Collins @ 54

I think you all are missing the point. The same entities that persucute Assange are the same entities that damaged Trumps first election campaing, his attempt to make peace in Korea, and his right to be president whether we like it or not, are prosecuting him now.

How can that be OK? You can love one and hate the other or love both but how can it be rationally be OK to see both destroyed by the same entities?

Trump pardoning Assange was a longshot. Reading the Hersh article above about Daniel Ellsberg shows how much has changed between Vietnam and Ukraine. There used to be some stand up people that opposed Vietnam from deep withing the monster. Some did not like it but went along as it was their job. Others just resigned and moved on. Now all we get is bullshit releases coordinated by the monster. All are onboard with the Ukraine.

Vietnam dried the US's appetite for war for quite a while. Not so with Ukraine. They want more with no end in site. As I age I see the past, I see the present, and I do not like what I see in the future.

Anyway, I am out for the week so don't bother replying. Just venting in amazement.

Posted by: circumspect | Jun 19 2023 0:55 utc | 58

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Jun 18 2023 22:52 utc | 52

Why didn't Biden quickly act to undo what Trump did to Assange?
__________________________________________________

Don't hold your breath but Biden letting Assange go seems a pretty likely outcome to me. Its either that or the death of Assange.

It seems unlikely to me that the US establishment will ever want to allow this case to go to trial.
A trial of Assange would mean a careful examination of the facts that show that all Assange did was reveal the criminal acts of the US govt.

We are just the observers of the choreography and we can only guess who they hired as choreographer...

Posted by: jinn | Jun 19 2023 0:59 utc | 59

@ jinn | Jun 19 2023 0:59 utc | 59

In the unlikely event there is a trial — the wheels of “justice” grind slowly in the Land of the Free, as any Gitmo detainee can attest — the proceedings will be held in secret and most of the trial details will be suppressed. National security, dontcha know.

That, or he’ll be Epsteined.

Posted by: malenkov | Jun 19 2023 1:13 utc | 60

@ Tom_Q_Collins | Jun 18 2023 22:44 utc | 49 / 51

fully agree with you tom and it was craig murray who sat thru all those proceedings regarding assange..

@ Grieved | Jun 18 2023 23:36 utc | 55

thanks grieved... i knew there was something about that karaganov article that required a bigger conversation.. i liked the doctorow article, but upon reading your review of it, i do see why you'd say all that and perhaps it is some type of superiority complex that casts a shadow over his article.. that said, i am been wanting to talk about this article because it seems to me that we are not dealing with logical rational actors with regard to nato and the west here.. they are doing shit that is clearly unhinged and claiming they are still not a party to the conflict.. that is complete bullshit.. nato is into this deep... they are directly their puppet leadership in ukraine on all aspects of war and destruction and of course are almost 100% for sure behind nordstream and the dam destruction.. these are terrorist actions... so, what is to stop them for continuing to ramp up? i can't see it..

so yeah - a return to fear... what about having some fear for the outcomes nato and friends have put in motion here? how do they get that?? in that regard karaganovs article is very relevant.. thanks for saying all that my friend..

Posted by: james | Jun 19 2023 1:17 utc | 61

From the Ukie thread: AG | Jun 18 2023 23:12 utc | 131--

You asked:

Why would the EU zone be a dead zone. Merely for rising energy prices?
I do not know how much of the de-industrialization claims/fear will materialize e.g.

And added a number of ancillary issues, but the above is paramount.

Again, here's the RT report I cited two days ago:

"Germany cannot afford to pay more money into the EU budget, Finance Minister Christian Lindner told the Die Welt newspaper on Friday. Although Germany is the bloc’s largest contributor, it has been forced to make cutbacks as its economy contracts.

"In view of the necessary cuts in our national budget, we are currently unable to make any additional contributions to the budget of the European Union," Linder told reporters in Brussels, adding that other member states have come to the same realization.

"Lindner explained that the EU has maxed out its long-term budget through 2027, largely as a result of the bloc’s lavish aid packages to Ukraine. According to the latest figures from Brussels, the EU has given Kiev €72 billion ($79 billion) in economic, military, and humanitarian aid since Russia’s military operation in Ukraine began last February.

"Despite this unprecedented outflow draining its coffers, the European Commission is reportedly readying an additional €72 billion financial aid package to keep the Ukrainian economy limping along to 2027. According to Lindner, the commission will release a report next week asking member states for more money to cover the bill."

This paragraph provides the meat of the matter:

"Once regarded as Europe’s industrial powerhouse and the EU’s most resilient economy, Germany is currently experiencing deindustrialization as a consequence of its decision to cut itself off from cheap Russian gas and transition to more expensive green energy. The German economy fell into recession in the first three months of this year, and Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s government is planning to reveal around €20 billion ($21.8 billion) in budget cuts later this month."

It's not the price of energy that's at issue, although that's important. Rather, it's the available supply. Prices are high because supply is very short. Many businesses cannot afford to operate in such conditions thus deindustrialization. With that comes massively rising unemployment AND rapidly falling tax revenues. The latter is why Germany must cut its budget and can't send the EU any money. And this is but one of many such cuts to come. Germany was the EU's economic engine; no other nation had the ability to produce and to provide like Germany had. Many nationals went to Germany to find employment because their nations had already been deindustrialized via Neoliberalism. Almost all of those nations were given monies from the EU to stabilize their national budgets. Remember what happened to Greece? A close look at the EU Balance Sheet shows big time problems. Billions of euros have been wasted on Ukraine that will never be recouped, and billions of euros in lost business with Russia have also been lost forever. All of that were potential revenues enabling the EU/EC/NATO to function. Those revenue sources no longer exist, and the demand for additional support is increasing. Germany itself will soon be begging. All of this was foreseen when the Sanctions from Hell were levied in 2022. As Alastair Crooke said, "they didn't think this through." And of course, even more sanctions were levied. And then Nord Stream was destroyed. A handful of nations still get Russian gas via Turk Stream, and they form the nexus of a new Bloc that's emerging. But it will take years for them to replace a significant fraction of what Germany provided.

Bickering over allocations of money from the EU to members was already ongoing well before 2022, the feud between Poland and EU/EC perhaps the best known, but there're others. The Baltics are all economic basket cases. Norway is strong because of its hydrocarbons but has no real industrial economy to support EU. The years of Neoliberal parasitism have done their damage just as they have within the Outlaw US Empire. The goal behind the Empire's drive to pauperize the EU is to make it economically dependent. But in the EU's very damaged condition, the Empire isn't going to gain very much and will probably lose. NATO nations will find it very hard to contribute anything as they'll face massive social unrest and resulting political turmoil if not revolt. When the sanctions were laid in 2022, I wrote that we'll see the revolutions of 1848 all over again.

There is a solution for Europe: It must break with NATO/EU/EC and push away the Outlaw US Empire as far as possible while mending fences with Russia. That solution is anathema to the current bunch of European misleaders who must be ousted for the solution to be implemented. Russia has lots of gas, and transit routes across what was once Ukraine can be reestablished and new ones built. Turk Stream can be expanded. Qatar and Iran would greatly enjoy shipping their gas to Europe. BUT, the political situation must drastically change. How long that will take is unknown.

Putin and his team have made it clear that a solution can be arrived at with the new set of political leaders who base their policies on their nation's interests. Putin just reiterated that at SPIEF. That would include a new security framework for Europe along the lines of Xi's Global Security Initiative. NATO would disappear and governments would be able to allocate more monies to development and citizen support. The Outlaw US Empire would be left to its own designs along with the UK and Canada. The Multipolar Bloc would expand to include almost the entire world. But before all that can occur, the Ukraine conflict must be solved and vast political change must occur Europewide.

Posted by: karlof1 | Jun 19 2023 1:46 utc | 62

Anon2020 @ 18:

According to his Wikipedia entry, Sergei Karaganov is, among other things, dean of the Faculty of World Economy and International Affairs at Moscow's Higher School of Economics and is a current member of the Trilateral Commission. He has also served on the International Advisory Board of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Read the rest of his Wikipedia entry, especially the Political Thought section, and the expression "snake in the grass" comes to mind. Underlying his so-called political thought seems to be a belief that Russia believes itself an exceptional nation governed by a determinist "might is right" set of values. It has not occurred to him that at every opportunity leading up to the Special Military Operation in February 2022, Moscow tried to reason with the West, with diplomacy, and it was the West that refused any and all initiatives leading to reduced tensions and a stable peace.

Talk about sucking up to his superiors with pronouncements that he knows they want to hear.

Karlof1 is right.

Posted by: Refinnejenna | Jun 19 2023 2:00 utc | 63

Grieved # 23:36 utc | 55

On fear and Karaganov's intention.

Of all the nations that one might expect to be vehement in articulating fear of nuclear weapons, Japan stands out. That nation was subjected to the immediate and generations long consequences of these weapons being in the hands of a murderous psychopath.

They are still in those same hands.

Yet Japan has a leadership cult that has been carefully crafted by the murderous psychopath to the extent that it plays no role in demanding continuing and accountable nuclear disarmament. It is a coward cowed nation, incapable of stepping up to the leadership task that the vast majority of humanity expects.

So much has Japan's people and leadership forgotten the evil of nuclear weapons and devices and so much in subservience to the USA that it purchased the GE nuclear reactors, accepted their flawed and risky installation plans, and now it discharges radioactive waste water into the Pacific Ocean.

Such is forgetfulness.

I call it callous, psychopathic disregard for humanity and all oceanic life forms.

Other Pacific Nations share in the shame of their silence but this is not forgetfulness: this is cowed and subjugated silence.

I don't read Doctorow these days for the reasons you stated.

Karaganov and Doctorow could do us a favour and call out the criminal behavior of the perpetrator and its vassals - lay the blame where it belongs. The USA is pumping the right to use a nuke NOT Russia who consistently rejects that madness.

Doctorow gives comfort to the perpetrator and misleads us from the focus of responsibility. He continues with the wife bashing when the victim crawls back home. I don't like his prose.

So here is a platform for a leading nation to stand up to the hegemon on an extraordinary secure platform and set out the roadmap for a global disarmament and nuclear management destination. All the nuclear powers need to give a lot to gain the world. It is the very least that humanity should demant.

Posted by: uncle tungsten | Jun 19 2023 2:41 utc | 64

Germany has been by far the largest source of donations to the EU, with Poland the largest recipient. That goes back a few years, because the EU has not reported donors/recipients recently. It's a secret according to the outlaw European Union.

Posted by: Don Bacon | Jun 19 2023 3:01 utc | 65

@ uncle tungsten | Jun 19 2023 2:41 utc | 64
re: [Japan] is a coward cowed nation, incapable of stepping up to the leadership task that the vast majority of humanity expects.
Japan is a nation hated throughout Asia, especially in China, but it owes the US for its security and for the islands which were a gift of the US, much to China's chagrin.

Posted by: Don Bacon | Jun 19 2023 3:23 utc | 66

Boston, chicago, kansas, asia, america

Any others?

Posted by: UWDude | Jun 19 2023 4:20 utc | 67

@justamaverick

I dont believe in satan, but the great satan is real.

Posted by: UWDude | Jun 19 2023 4:23 utc | 68

I dont believe in satan, but the great satan is real.

Posted by: UWDude | Jun 19 2023 4:23 utc | 68

Or....Isreal?

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Jun 19 2023 5:17 utc | 69

Posted by: circumspect | Jun 19 2023 0:55 utc | 58

Sorry but you don't get off that easy with a juvenile don't even reply cuz I wont read it!!! I used to say that to ex-girlfriends when I was a pussy all those years ago. Even jinn has it right. Let me spell it out for you in no uncertain terms, since it almost seems like you're a Trump fanboi pretending not to be.

IT. WAS. TRUMP. WHO. INDICTED. ASSANGE. WHEN. NOT. EVEN. OBOMBER. WOULD.

Hope that helps.

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Jun 19 2023 5:19 utc | 70

a bad penny

what really happened
trailing fabulous filaments of floss & gloss
threadbare new york times prestidigitation
naked costumes flapped before our eyes today as never before
fancy dancing to rival snoopy's suppertime dance
merely to block the slightest whiff
of what really happened
until high-test production values crack a bit
then, every once in a while, you sense it rattling through the grate
like a bad penny
something you hadn't realized before
not just your folks today, but in days of yore
long before your own brief tenure here
slaveholders totally won the civil war
just like nazis prevailed in world war two
as it happens

6.XIX.2023

Posted by: Aleph_Null | Jun 19 2023 7:22 utc | 71

Germany has been by far the largest source of donations to the EU, with Poland the largest recipient. That goes back a few years, because the EU has not reported donors/recipients recently. It's a secret according to the outlaw European Union.

Posted by: Don Bacon | Jun 19 2023 3:01 utc | 65

This is explosive situation. Polish "populist" government (often called right wing, but the practice is very different from USA or UK) is increasingly erratic, but one aspect is constantly recalculating reparations that they want from Germany. The budget stays within EU guidelines of moderate deficit through smoke and mirrors, while "judicial reform" brought sanctions from EU, the subsidies were cut.

On the other side of Oder, ruling coalition in Germany is vehemently opposed to national pride (perhaps OK) and national economic interest (hardly ever a good thing), and in polls, it looses support, however slowly. What is a bit faster is the shift outside the ruling coalition from CDU+CSU toward AfD. AfD has some cooky ideas (who does not), but is for the pride and national interest, so in the latest poll got 2nd largest support, CDU+CSU 25%, AfD 20%, left Linke 5%. Next government without CDU+CSU is impossible (mind you, the total of parties support is 92%), and what movers and shakers of CDU+CSU think is a mystery to me... perhaps they spend more time shaking than moving, but they are aware where and how they are using support, so recent Austrian model, right plus "far right", is possible.

Even if there will be some "grand coalition", the demands to cut subsidies to eastern ingrates has to be increasing. That would mean austerity in the eastern flank of EU, the pressure in EU boiler is rising. Normally, the situation would be controllable for at least one more election cycle, but the problems are present in more countries. My prediction is that subsidies to "ingrates and profligates" will be cut, populism on the rise, with an increasing dose of anti-war populism.

From that point of view, "slow war" of Russia, perhaps simply opportunistic (who can actually wage a "fast war"? Reality does not seem to support it), may have WWO type of effect, erosion of the support of government with eventual collapse in many places with results that elites did not expect at all.

Posted by: Piotr Berman | Jun 19 2023 7:47 utc | 72

sorry for abbreviating WWI with WWO

Posted by: Piotr Berman | Jun 19 2023 7:57 utc | 73

However poetic it is to indict Trump using Espionage Act (EA below), I guess defending Trump on that point is moral and practical.

EA is absurdly expansive, and Trump's indictment, while perhaps legal, became EXHIBIT 1 of that absurdity. From what I have read, this act is DESIGNED for dictatorial type of use, it was created to repress anti-elite anarchists, socialists and pacifists, at the time overlapping categories. To the silent majority, this is OK, keeping marginal riffraff in check has its good side. But with the rise of centrist extremism, nobody is safe. Center-left while in power can imprison center-right and vice versa. (Read on Marius and Sulla.)

We got a fight inside Overton window that can benefit folks outside like us, and more tangibly, Assange. Trump is a criminal (in moral sense) with worst crimes aligned with Deep State, but prosecuted with tools normally reserved for genuine non-conformists.

Posted by: Piotr Berman | Jun 19 2023 8:18 utc | 74

Vietnam dried the US's appetite for war for quite a while.

—————-

Recall that the anti-war movement only really gained traction once college draft deferments were ended.

Posted by: Exile | Jun 19 2023 9:11 utc | 75

Vietnam dried the US's appetite for war for quite a while.

Posted by: Exile | Jun 19 2023 9:11 utc | 75

That's a myth.

End of war against Vietnam 1975 to Gulf War in 1990 = 15 years
I wouldn't call 15 years 'quite a while'.

And that's even discounting:
- A pretty big hand in the Iraq/Iran war in 1980s
- A pretty big hand in Afghanistan in 1980s
- Intervention in Lebanon 1982
- Invasion of Grenada 1983
- Bombing in Libya 1986
- Invasion of Panama 1988

Their appetite for war has never dried in almost 250 years.
War is what they do!

Posted by: waynorinorway | Jun 19 2023 10:38 utc | 76

6.XIX.2023

Posted by: Aleph_Null | Jun 19 2023 7:22 utc | 71

I had trouble figuring out what that was all about until I realized that there are not
19 months in a year and you were using that ridiculous American custom of
putting the month number before the day of the month number. But all is good
Aleph, I figured it out in less than an hour. :)

And hey, thanks a lot for the content, btw.
Even Patroklos should approve.

Posted by: waynorinorway | Jun 19 2023 10:54 utc | 77

I just wanted to quickly chime in on Karaganov’s article. “That fear needs to be revived. Otherwise humanity is doomed.” (says what, or whom, AI?) In general, my inclination would be to discard an argument that builds itself on that foundation. This makes the author appear to me like a product of the very manufacturing facility he is assessing.

I would refer Karaganov to Berman’s comment @72. On a point of logic, I don’t think an enemy needs to feel fear in order to experience losing. (Does Sun-tzu weigh in on that?) They can ride in a lavish triumphant parade of victory right up to the end of it.

Further to my post up thread, if the problem is the Pentagon (“the Pentagon”) and Team Red Bull (“Team Red Bull”), then why does any entire nation need to be destroyed by a nuclear weapon? Because a failure to actualize the utopian dreams of said folk equals doom? The AI crowd is a very narrow segment of the population.

Posted by: Bruised Northerner | Jun 19 2023 12:37 utc | 78

Further to my @78, after a quick glance at the headlines TASS — are we upset about Belarus having tactical nuclear weapons?? This is a Russian world thing, is it, a little elite-on-elite conflict?

In the Anglo world, historically, the British are very effective at dismantling any unwanted elite apparatus/infrastructure. If the Russian elite is too divided to take on the monstrosity of whatever the USA has become, I’m sure the UK can gather up a few associates and take care of that.

Posted by: Bruised Northerner | Jun 19 2023 12:46 utc | 79

Tom_Q_Collins @43: "I found one subreddit from 2022 consisting of about 20-30 replies, but nothing else. How could this not be a huge deal?"

Because "it" (silencing uncomfortable discourse from outside their delusion bubble) is seen as a good thing by the emotional/cognitive six-year-olds who inhabit reddit. There is no bigger proponent of censorship than the reddit community. It is a huge hive of personalized echo chambers with the stipulation that certain specific discourse is banned from all of those echo chambers.

As a student of linguistics (yeah, I am not just a math guy, but never finished my doctorate because the university environment became too toxic and poisoned with "wokeness"), I have been fascinated with how whole coded vocabularies have spontaneously developed in the West to discuss such taboo subjects as the fraudulent 2020 US elections, the culture of violence within certain demographics, or the gender-affirming care spaying/neutering and genital mutilation of children that is all the rage these days. The Establishment and their loyal tools among the Professional-Managerial class are really pulling out all of the stops to control discourse and close the Overton Window, but the more they try to control, the more they destroy their own credibility.

Once you get over being depressed over it being western culture itself that is self-destructing here, this process is actually entertaining to observe. When western culture has finished imploding upon itself like a black hole, some of that culture's better aspects will be freed from its lunatic exceptionalist baggage and become possessions of humanity in general. Now that's a good thing.

Posted by: William Gruff | Jun 19 2023 13:02 utc | 80

Bruised Northerner @79

While you in the West have been brainwashed and programmed to hate by the "elites", and thus the fascism and Russophobia is their fault and not yours, the fact remains the poison is in your head. Dealing with that poison, and with your own domestic "elites", is your responsibility. American (and Canadian) populations are so far failing in that responsibility. Karaganov’s argument is simply that a good hard punch in the mouth might help western populations develop a better sense of perspective and thus get their shit together to deal with their own "elites". I happen to think he has a point.

And yes, for MAD to work, people have to fear it. The threat posed by MAD must be taken deadly serious by both parties or it cannot serve as a deterrent.

Posted by: William Gruff | Jun 19 2023 13:17 utc | 81

Some folks took note of a damning critique I gave on Martin Heidegger here a while back. Here are three brief quotes to back up the case (which I saw on facebook, of all places):

”Martin Heidegger's philosophy is extremely obscure and highly eccentric in its terminology. One cannot help suspecting that language is here running riot. An interesting point in his speculations is the insistence that nothingness is something positive. As with much else in Existentialism, this is a psychological observation made to pass for logic.”
— Bertrand Russell, Wisdom of the West: A Historical Survey of Western Philosophy (1959), Ch: XI, Epilogue, p. 303

[note: I think Heidegger terminology is his one strong point - "ein besserer Poet", as I put it once. The observation on nothingness, however, is spot on]

”I appeal to the philosophers of all countries to unite and never again mention Heidegger or talk to another philosopher who defends Heidegger. This man was a devil. I mean, he behaved like a devil to his beloved teacher [i.e., Husserl ], and he has a devilish influence on Germany. … One has to read Heidegger in the original to see what a swindler he was.”
— Karl Popper, as quoted in "At 90, and Still Dynamic : Revisiting Sir Karl Popper and Attending His Birthday Party" by Eugene Yue-Ching Ho, in Intellectus 23 (Jul-Sep 1992)

”Heidegger lies notoriously always and everywhere, and whenever he can.”
— Hannah Arendt , as quoted in Hannah Arendt/Martin Heidegger, by Elżbieta Ettinger, Yale University Press (1997), p. 28

Posted by: persiflo | Jun 19 2023 13:30 utc | 82

I struggled with the Politico "last interview". It seemed that the writer was more interested in throwing shade on Ellsberg than anything else.

Posted by: farm ecologist | Jun 19 2023 13:46 utc | 83

Okay Gruff @ 81. It’s hard for me to tell sometimes which the elites like more: connecting their downfall with the fall of all humanity (as if it’s something other than parasite/host), or blaming the masses who had no power at all to prevent their establishment for the fact that they are established.

Poison in the mind. Whatever. Let’s make it an abstract discussion.

Posted by: Bruised Northerner | Jun 19 2023 14:11 utc | 84

@ persiflo | Jun 19 2023 13:30 utc | 82

Three of my own most beloved philosophers, impressively cited in your case against Heidegger, thanks. I dearly love Popper's work on distinguishing subjectivity from objectivity in particular, knowing little of his political thinking. I've never before encountered such an angry Popper. Arendt / Heidegger -- those were the days when philosophers were passionate about real points they were trying to make, as opposed to boring everyone to death (on purpose) with post-structural nihilism.

These are the days when it's practically impossible to engage anyone on the level of philosophical dispute. Look at the advocates of Simplicius versus those of Martynov in the Ukraine thread: there are good reasons to avoid ad hominem attacks, especially to the exclusion of what was in dispute in the first place. Your citations against Heidegger seem like personal takedowns (especially that old rascal calling Heidegger a "devil"!) That's okay, I guess, but it seems a bit like 20th century forerunners of our eternally annoying internet flamewars.

Posted by: Aleph_Null | Jun 19 2023 14:17 utc | 85

I am tempted to believe the desire to pivot the discussion to, “aren’t all humans just inherently bad inside?”, “all humans can die in a nuclear war” as verification that the offices of the UK and associates are more than capable of deconstructing the power structure of the USA. No wonder Blinken went to China.

Posted by: Bruised Northerner | Jun 19 2023 14:19 utc | 86

@ waynorinorway | Jun 19 2023 10:54 utc | 77

The date notation is a hat-tip to Gary Snyder, of Turtle Island --

XIX seems appropriate for our most farcical new holiday, celebrating that good news for some poor folks didn't arrive even later (if ever). We call it Juneteenth. Ideographically, the Roman numerals resemble two guards escorting a prisoner.

Posted by: Aleph_Null | Jun 19 2023 14:24 utc | 87

Follow-up article from Unz re WW II revisionism. Starts off with long section on Suvorov.
https://www.unz.com/runz/more-falsehoods-of-world-war-ii/

from the intro:

Although the Second World War ended more than three generations ago, I had argued that it still retained enormous present-day relevance and he appropriately selected one of my sentences as a framing quote for the entire interview:

Much of the current political legitimacy of today’s American government and its various European vassal-states is founded upon a particular narrative history of World War II, and challenging that account might have dire political consequences.

My reconstruction of the true wartime history was exceptionally provocative and controversial, as indicated by my closing paragraphs:

In the wake of the 9/11 Attacks, the Jewish Neocons stampeded America towards the disastrous Iraq War and the resulting destruction of the Middle East, with the talking heads on our television sets endlessly claiming that “Saddam Hussein is another Hitler.” Since then, we have regularly heard the same tag-line repeated in various modified versions, being told that “Muammar Gaddafi is another Hitler” or “Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is another Hitler” or “Vladimir Putin is another Hitler” or even “Hugo Chavez is another Hitler.” For the last couple of years, our American media has been relentlessly filled with the claim that “Donald Trump is another Hitler.”

During the early 2000s, I obviously recognized that Iraq’s ruler was a harsh tyrant, but snickered at the absurd media propaganda, knowing perfectly well that Saddam Hussein was no Adolf Hitler. But with the steady growth of the Internet and the availability of the millions of pages of periodicals provided by my digitization project, I’ve been quite surprised to gradually also discover that Adolf Hitler was no Adolf Hitler.

It might not be entirely correct to claim that the story of World War II was that Franklin Roosevelt sought to escape his domestic difficulties by orchestrating a major European war against the prosperous, peace-loving Nazi Germany of Adolf Hitler. But I do think that picture is probably somewhat closer to the actual historical reality than the inverted image more commonly found in our textbooks.

I had thought that this long piece would do well, but it easily exceeded all my expectations, with the early traffic being far greater than anything I’d published in many years. Within the first six days, the interview had attracted more readership than any other article on our website had accumulated over the previous six months. And although my long piece seemed to boldly cross every forbidden red line in mainstream history, the reaction was also surprisingly favorable, including far less angry criticism than I had expected to encounter.

Indeed, some of the responses were remarkably heartening. For example, I received a plaintive and sympathetic note from an eminent international academic scholar, an elderly, fully mainstream figure who had specialized in human rights issues and was the author of many excellent books, several of which I had read.

He explained that during 1972-1975 he had done extensive archival research on the war and had also interviewed dozens of the key surviving figures on both sides, including many of the highest rank, discovering that the official story we had all been taught was merely a pack of lies. But

“…never published my research, because it is useless in a world that wants to be lied to. Mainstream history is a disgrace — contrary to the testimony of eye witnesses, contrary to the documents in the archives…”

and:

“I feel like you do there is not only fake news but fake history fake law fake diplomacy and fake democracy…the level of falsification of history is appalling”

My presentation of the true history of World War II was organized by the eight separate interview questions and can be explored in that way:

Question 1: Hitler
Question 2: The London “Blitz”
Question 3: The Purge of Antiwar Intellectuals
Question 4: Postwar Germany
Question 5: The Pearl Harbor Attack
Question 6: Operation Pike
Question 7: The Holocaust
Question 8: Our Understanding of the War
Or the entire article can be read as a whole:

Why Everything You Know About World War II Is Wrong
Mike Whitney Interview with Ron Unz
Ron Unz and Mike Whitney • The Unz Review • June 12, 2023 • 12,600 Words
But although my responses ran a very long 12,000 words, even that was insufficient to include several of the most important “hidden histories” of the Second World War. Therefore, I’m now providing these in this follow-up piece.

The Suvorov Hypothesis ......

Posted by: Scorpion | Jun 19 2023 14:26 utc | 88

Posted by: Aleph_Null | Jun 19 2023 14:24 utc | 87

Gary Snyder - Now there's someone who needs to be cited more often. I used to meet him occasionally years ago when I lived in
Grass Valley. Not too familiar with Juneteenth but I guess it's true that some slaves were not aware that they were free even a year
or more after the Civil War ended, and like you mention, still don't have the reality. Jimmy Dore and that inarticulate idiot
side-kick (Curt ?) tried to do a show on it but they botched it badly.
You're up early. Carpe diem, eh?

Posted by: waynorinorway | Jun 19 2023 15:01 utc | 89

gary snyder was friends with wendell berry.. i believe they wrote a book together, but i haven't read it.. both poets..

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gary_Snyder

here they are in a conversation with each other..

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yjB6UqLVrwU

Posted by: james | Jun 19 2023 15:06 utc | 90

@ Roger 26
Great Doctorow comment about "Dmitry Medvedev who was, let us be frank, a perfect patsy for the West during his presidency.", he was the idiot who approved the Libyan no-fly zone at the UNSC. Now he does act like a "super-hawk" to try to make up for it.

I think Medvedev's role should be understood as maskirovka, and the man is happy to no longer have to play the patsy.

The 1990's taught Russians a very hard and shocking lesson about the West. The 21st Century has been more of the same. I believe conclusions were made around 1999, that the Kremlin had to rebuild Russian power. Importantly, that decision must have included the need to prevent the West from making a preemptive strike. The destruction of Libya in 2011 was a great tragedy, for all of Africa almost as much as for the people of Libya. But the hard question must be asked with 20-20 hindsight: "What would have happened if Russia had come to the support of the Libyans at that time?" Would that have changed the outcome in Libya, and would that have set the West upon a far more aggressive and faster schedule ? Without the example of Libya, perhaps people in Syria would not have been so opposed to Western meddling. Now the psychosis of the Western MSM is more fully exposed, it seems that if Russia had moved faster, it would have been slandered as an aggressor. Going slow, it's more clear that the only aggression comes from the West.

Obviously a great price has been paid for Russia appearing slow to respond, but the most important question is whether this slowness was necessary. At the time, I sure as hell didn't think it was, but looking back over the last 12 years, it's clear to me at least, that Russia had no other choice. YMMV.

Posted by: JessDTruth | Jun 19 2023 15:13 utc | 91

Another good piece on Unz.

“Today, there is an understanding that growth processes need to be regionalized and this vision prevails,” Lavrov said. “All the countries of this vast continent should use their God- and nature-given advantages to develop mutually beneficial logistic, financial, and transport chains.”

The foreign minister added that Russia would “leave all doors open” for partnership with European countries who realize that their interests are better served by cooperation with Russia rather than by playing Washington’s “ideological and geopolitical games.”

“The world will be different,” Russia’s top diplomat concluded. “And the processes we see unfolding today were whipped up by the West’s response to Russia’s Special Military Operation, when we accepted the challenge that they flung at us. These processes clearly show that autonomy and independence of any structures on the global arena that are related to the West are becoming the main trend today.”

https://www.unz.com/aanglin/lavrov-when-the-ukraine-conflict-ends-globalism-will-end/

Also, one lamenting anti-Jewish commentary on that site:
https://www.unz.com/article/an-appeal-to-readers-stop-the-obsession-with-jews/

Posted by: Scorpion | Jun 19 2023 15:35 utc | 92

Smoke anxiety terrorism from deliberate set forest fires in democrat governor states combined with large doses of caffeine moderated by golbalists causes erratic decision-making and reduction of life is a direct attack psychologically and physically causing harm and suffering to millions everyday deliberately with political intent is criminal murder

Posted by: Merlin | Jun 19 2023 16:01 utc | 93

DW News is nattering about Germany's brand spanking new National Security Strategy.

Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Jun 19 2023 16:18 utc | 94

Dedollarization:

June 14: Sberbank, the largest bank in Russia, has announced that individuals can now open accounts in rupees. (source)

June 16: Japanese shareholders of Russia’s Sakhalin-1 and Sakhalin-2 oil & gas projects are now receiving dividend payments in yuan. (source)

Posted by: S | Jun 19 2023 17:20 utc | 95

European Parliament MP accuses Baltic countries of linguistic genocide (EurAsia Daily, June 18, 2023 — in Russian)

European Parliament MP from Latvia, Tatyana Zhdanok, reminded her Brussels colleagues about political prisoners in the Baltic countries, Andrejs Pagors, an anti-fascist from Jelgava, wrote on social media today, on June 18.

At a parliamentary meeting, Zhdanok asked if multinational EU member states should be mononational, with one official language, one religion and a common understanding of history?

“Or is adherence to the motto ‘united in diversity’ more valuable for the European Union?” the parliamentarian noted.

If diversity is more valuable, as Brussels likes to argue, then Latvia, along with other Baltic countries, is practicing linguistic genocide and persecuting people for dissent, Zhdanok believes.

“There are more and more political prisoners. Their only fault is having a different opinion about the events of recent history. I will name just three: Algirdas Paleckis in Lithuania, Tatyana Andriets in Latvia, Sergey Seredenko in Estonia,” said the MEP from Latvia.

According to Zhdanok, the path that the Balts have chosen is not the one that Europe should follow.

Posted by: S | Jun 19 2023 17:32 utc | 96

@ Refinnejenna | Jun 19 2023 2:00 utc | 63

I agree with you; I am not sure if you mean the author of the Wikipedia article about Karaganov talks about the Russian nations' "Sendung's Bewusstsein" ("special", or charismatic self understanding) - or if this is what Karaganov is, in subtext, offering?

Those thoughts about the special role in the world are somewhat similar to the American (USA) self understanding, calling itself the "shining city on the hill" - but there is a big difference, because the Russian idea of "being special" is anchored more in the religious Orthodox Christianity, and not in secular realm. German nations also had ideas of 'being special' ("an Deutschem Wesen soll die Welt genesen.."). But let me stop here, because this train of thought leads into ethnic problems, which some prominent bloggers in this forum do not like to discuss.

Posted by: fanto | Jun 19 2023 17:35 utc | 97

Bruised Northerner @86: "aren’t all humans just inherently bad inside?"

Are potatoes inherently bad inside? Only if they are grown in toxic soil.

North America is a very bad environment for minds to develop in, so the default there is poisoned minds. It is possible for some of that poison to be purged, but it takes ongoing, deliberate, painful effort that results in one developing a worldview that is incompatible with that of one's friends and family. After all, their minds are still poisoned, and they are probably unwilling to go through the mental detox effort just because you want them to. In fact, many people are aware at one level or another that their minds are warped by warped culture, but the cost of un-warping their minds in the distance it will create between them and their social support group is too great.

There are actually lots of people fighting against this mind-warp, but there are also many others trying hard to keep the mental poison concentrations high (social media trolls, mass media presstitutes and entertainers, most of academia). The people fighting the poison are making progress, but it is slow and questionable if an un-poisoned critical mass can be achieved before they simply die off from old age or the Thucydides Trap reaches its climactic scene.

Posted by: William Gruff | Jun 19 2023 17:37 utc | 98

@ 98, you make a good point, but I think it is a lot to ask the Rest of the World, or even the Rest of the West, or even the Rest of the Anglo World, or even the Rest of North America, to wait patiently while the USA organically, without help from outsiders, deals with its elites, many of whom are global not domestic, right? Especially post-9/11 (and for a glimpse of that I recommend a CBC Documentary that came out for the one-year anniversary that shows Canada’s role in what happened, specifically the Chrétien government. I did a quick search but couldn’t find it.)

I can’t find an argument against the British possessing particular competency in de-throning entire elite classes, especially in Anglo-land, like it or not (this is the Saker’s old Anglo guard, I presume?) What happens next is another question, but the potentiality seems to be there presently for others, such as them, to remove the offenders from power in Washington and wherever else they may have pitched their tents.

On a bright note: Lavrov assures us that a new Eurasian world is in the works, concretely (love him using that term).

https://tass.com/politics/1635017

Posted by: Bruised Northerner | Jun 19 2023 18:13 utc | 99

Unz's article is just one more in a series designed to obscure the historical reality that the underlying cause of the Second World War was anti-communism.
Which, not coincidentally, has also been the dominant ideology of imperialism since the war ended.

By 1940 it was quite obvious that Hitler's success was entirely attributable to the tacit support he received from the ruling class of the imperialist countries.
What was called appeasement might equally well have been called 'strengthening'- the means whereby Hitler's sympathisers in, for example, the French and British governments assisted in the re-militarisation of Germany and improving its strategic position.

Munich was not about protecting the rights of German speakers living in the Sudetenland but destroying the critical military capacity of the Czech state and its important armaments industries. The Czechs, with the Soviet assistance offered them, could easily have resisted Hitler's forces. And the Anglo French governments knew this.
The Czechs, like the Austrians, were sacrificed because the French and British wanted Hitler to attack the Soviet Union. They made no bones about it. The thirty million plus who died when he did were the fruit of Chamberlain and Laval's politics.

During the 1930s one of the most consistent features on the political landscape was the Soviet campaign for collective security, either through the League or through bi-lateral agreements. The Litvinov policy was one of constantly seeking to implement what the Anglo French pretended that they wanted but constantly avoided- an agreement that any attack by Germany on its neighbours, any move to implement the dreams outlined, for all to see, in Mein Kampf, would be resisted by France, Britain and the Soviet Union.

Time after time Litvinov pursued the Soviet aim of preventing war, always aware that, as everyone in Moscow was aware, very powerful interests in France and Britain were intent on promoting war against the Soviet Union, which represented, in their eyes, a real threat both to their imperial possessions and the metropoles.

They wanted the Soviet Union smashed and, in Hitler, they thought that they had found the one force capable of doing it. They knew that their own populations were dead set against war- which was a factor in the difficulties that they had in avoiding Moscow's friendly embrace.
And, to repeat myself, this was because their governments were addicted to anti-communism.

During the war none of this was doubted, the truth emerged: Chamberlain and Baldwin were completely discredited in their own country. The Conservatives, the party of appeasement and anti-communism, were taken over by Churchill's 'patriotic' supporters and the place of the Tory anti-communists was supplied, in government, by coalition with Labour and the inclusion of the Trade Unions in decision making.
In France, the appeasers prevailed and France became part of the Third Reich, an important source of manpower and production for the Nazi war machine, govefned by appeasers who had become willing acconplices in the fascist enterprise: Laval, Daladier and Petain represented the Establishment. De Gaulle was a junior maverick, an obscure and unrepresentative figure.

The case of Poland is by way of being the exception proving the rule: the Polish government was fascist and rabidly anti-Soviet. It refused numerous attempts by Moscow to enter into a defensive agreement, based on the extremely unfavourable (to the USSR) borders of the status quo. But the Poles wanted war- they joined in the dismembering of Czechoslovakia as German allies. Polish policy then, one might almost say as it is now, was characterised by hatred of Russia and an overestimation of the value of their allies.

Unz's views are those of the extreme right in the United States, a desperate attempt to cobble together a justification of the anti-communist policy which is their religion and has guided them, and willy nilly the world they have dominated, since Truman brought his gang to power in Washington. Their anti-communism did not begin in 1945, it was already operative in 1919.

It was they who had rebuilt German industry and the industrialists who sponsored Hitler in the Weimar years and after.
In denying the lessons generally learned during the war: that the Soviet Union was a power for peace, that the capitalist ruling class tended to fascism, that the victory against fascism was that of workers and peasants around the world- in Korea, Vietnam, India, Indonesia as well as in the factories of north America and the British isles, Unz and the anti-communists are asserting that the Appeasers were right. That the USSR not the Nazis were the most dangerous enemy.

Naturally this leads to the historical nonsense that the USSR was about to attack Germany and the Germans merely pre-empted aggression in Operation Barbarossa.

This is a lie. And a flagrant lie- a blood libel of the very worst kind whose purpose is to justify the crimes of the Nazis. Were it merely the raving of a loud mouthed dilettante it would be insignificant.

Unfortunately it is something much more: it comes at a time when in the re-commitment of NATO to the objectives of Barbarossa, the celebration of the SS and Bandera, the state sponsored recreation of the Nazi project in Ukraine and eastern Europe, the general movement in the 'west' to recreate the censorship and criminalisation of dissent, including the banning of public protests, the criminalisation of opposition to the war on Russia and the dedication of the media and academy to imperialist objectives, Unz, while pretending to be in dissent, is telling us exactly what the ruling class wants us to believe.
Which, very simply, is that equality and social justice are the enemy. And that Fascism is preferable to, indeed necessitated by the threat of, socialism.

Mike Whitney ought to be ashamed of lending himself to this disgraceful apologia for fascism.

Posted by: bevin | Jun 19 2023 18:31 utc | 100