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November 5, 2023
The MoA Week In Review – OT 2023-260

Last week's post on Moon of Alabama:

Palestine:

> There will be efforts to devise arrangements, to be sure. But the most notable diplomatic fallout from the fighting might be that diplomacy becomes even more difficult. The coordination necessary to make any arrangements for governance functions may be extremely difficult to achieve.
…
Gazans will live in the surviving buildings and makeshift structures for a while. Any rebuilding will exclude significant portions of Gaza. Commerce, manufacturing, agriculture, and other businesses will be effectively destroyed, rendering Gazans completely dependent on humanitarian aid. Once a “besieged enclave,” Gaza will be reduced to a “supercamp” of internally displaced persons. <

—

Sam Heller | سام هيلر @AbuJamajem – 6:51 UTC · Nov 5, 2023
My (belated) takeaways from Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah's speech Friday, which I think mostly elaborated on what we've understood to be Hizb's posture and calculus since October 7 🧵: 1/8
…

Ukraine:

—
Other issues:

Russia:

Empire:

Germany:

—

Michael Tracey @mtracey – 2:47 UTC · Nov 2, 2023

The House just passed 354 – 53 a resolution that could be read as effectively authorizing war with Iran. "All means necessary" would have to include military means… correct?

Naturally, it also declares support for Israel waging war on Iran

The new Speaker is really on a roll!

Use as open (not Ukraine or Palestine related) thread …

Posted by b on November 5, 2023 at 13:03 UTC | Permalink
Comments

As it says above: “Use as open (not Ukraine or Palestine related) thread …”

Posted by: b | Nov 5 2023 13:56 utc | 1

As it says above: “Use as open (not Ukraine or Palestine related) thread …”

Posted by: b | Nov 5 2023 13:56 utc | 2

Thanks, b, for this lengthy Week in Review. I jumped right in at the NYT article about the German Greens. Maybe it’s just me, but I found some of the messages in there quite extraordinary.
“Today the Greens are widely viewed as a drag on the government of the Social Democratic chancellor, Olaf Scholz…” <— ! They draggin’ down Scholz! Who’s been treated purely like a disposable water boy by Biden himself and that German ambassador, I think? “The reversal of fortunes for the Greens is the story of a party that has long struggled to transcend its roots as a niche, environmentalist party to become a more pragmatic political force capable of broader appeal to lead the country.” … I’m sorry, but I only know a small amount about the history of Germany’s Green Party and I can’t believe they actually wrote that. “Struggled,” I suppose that’s one way of expressing it. “But in Mr. Scholz’s government, which also includes the pro-business Free Democrats, the Green presence has been weightier, and the party’s stumble raises questions about whether the German economy…” Wait — “the pro-business Free Democrats”… has Washington found itself a new horse to ride in on? “Experts said the law, which was passed in weakened form in September, has helped fuel the growing popularity of the far-right Alternative for Germany party, or AfD, which is polling at more than 20 percent, around the highest in its history.” Well if experts [from the State department?] say that about the heating law, or Heizungsgesetz, then it must be so. “ “The key thing is going to be — the challenging thing, but also the beautiful thing — is to convince people who don’t yet think the way we do,” said Katrin Göring-Eckardt, a longtime leader in the party from eastern Germany who is now a vice president of Parliament.” Maybe that came out wrong in translation but that sounds a bit far-right to me. “Bernd Ulrich, a journalist with the newspaper Die Zeit who is writing a book on green politics, said that Mr. Habeck, in particular, would be key to whether the party could restore its stature.” He has been portrayed as laughable in the Canadian media, and I can’t see past that. Apologies to Herr Ulrich.

Posted by: Bruised Northerner | Nov 5 2023 13:58 utc | 3

Thanks, b, for this lengthy Week in Review. I jumped right in at the NYT article about the German Greens. Maybe it’s just me, but I found some of the messages in there quite extraordinary.
“Today the Greens are widely viewed as a drag on the government of the Social Democratic chancellor, Olaf Scholz…” <— ! They draggin’ down Scholz! Who’s been treated purely like a disposable water boy by Biden himself and that German ambassador, I think? “The reversal of fortunes for the Greens is the story of a party that has long struggled to transcend its roots as a niche, environmentalist party to become a more pragmatic political force capable of broader appeal to lead the country.” … I’m sorry, but I only know a small amount about the history of Germany’s Green Party and I can’t believe they actually wrote that. “Struggled,” I suppose that’s one way of expressing it. “But in Mr. Scholz’s government, which also includes the pro-business Free Democrats, the Green presence has been weightier, and the party’s stumble raises questions about whether the German economy…” Wait — “the pro-business Free Democrats”… has Washington found itself a new horse to ride in on? “Experts said the law, which was passed in weakened form in September, has helped fuel the growing popularity of the far-right Alternative for Germany party, or AfD, which is polling at more than 20 percent, around the highest in its history.” Well if experts [from the State department?] say that about the heating law, or Heizungsgesetz, then it must be so. “ “The key thing is going to be — the challenging thing, but also the beautiful thing — is to convince people who don’t yet think the way we do,” said Katrin Göring-Eckardt, a longtime leader in the party from eastern Germany who is now a vice president of Parliament.” Maybe that came out wrong in translation but that sounds a bit far-right to me. “Bernd Ulrich, a journalist with the newspaper Die Zeit who is writing a book on green politics, said that Mr. Habeck, in particular, would be key to whether the party could restore its stature.” He has been portrayed as laughable in the Canadian media, and I can’t see past that. Apologies to Herr Ulrich.

Posted by: Bruised Northerner | Nov 5 2023 13:58 utc | 4

Thanks b, for all your work. The week review is a really good innovation of the last few years.

Posted by: Minaa | Nov 5 2023 14:42 utc | 5

Thanks b, for all your work. The week review is a really good innovation of the last few years.

Posted by: Minaa | Nov 5 2023 14:42 utc | 6

Russian historian Aleksandr Dyukov on the inflation of Ukrainian partisan numbers under Khrushchyov:

While the data on the number of partisans in the Belorussian SSR—374 thousand—is confirmed by documents, and each one has a registration card, the data on the number of partisans in the Ukrainian SSR—500 thousand—is a post-war invention ordered by Khrushchyov; the total number of partisans in the Ukrainian SSR was about 240 thousand.
The number of Ukrainian partisans, according to UShPD [Partisan Movement’s Ukrainian Headquarters — S] records, was about 220 thousand during the entire war. This figure was mentioned in 1949 by Colonel I. G. Starinov who was giving closed lectures at the Frunze Academy (he was deputy head of the UShPD during the war), this figure was initially given by Soviet historians. However, after Khrushchyov came to power, a decision has been made to increase the number of Ukrainian partisans. At first they attempted to do this by identifying undercounted partisans—but only 20 thousand were found. After that they stopped caring and proclaimed the figure of half a million partisans.
Can’t have fewer partisans in the Ukraine than in Belarus!

Posted by: S | Nov 5 2023 14:50 utc | 7

Russian historian Aleksandr Dyukov on the inflation of Ukrainian partisan numbers under Khrushchyov:

While the data on the number of partisans in the Belorussian SSR—374 thousand—is confirmed by documents, and each one has a registration card, the data on the number of partisans in the Ukrainian SSR—500 thousand—is a post-war invention ordered by Khrushchyov; the total number of partisans in the Ukrainian SSR was about 240 thousand.
The number of Ukrainian partisans, according to UShPD [Partisan Movement’s Ukrainian Headquarters — S] records, was about 220 thousand during the entire war. This figure was mentioned in 1949 by Colonel I. G. Starinov who was giving closed lectures at the Frunze Academy (he was deputy head of the UShPD during the war), this figure was initially given by Soviet historians. However, after Khrushchyov came to power, a decision has been made to increase the number of Ukrainian partisans. At first they attempted to do this by identifying undercounted partisans—but only 20 thousand were found. After that they stopped caring and proclaimed the figure of half a million partisans.
Can’t have fewer partisans in the Ukraine than in Belarus!

Posted by: S | Nov 5 2023 14:50 utc | 8

ahahahahaha. I’m dying, as the Z-ppl (not those Z-ppl, the other ones) say. The Price Cap Coalition is on the loose!
US Treasury Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC), 2 Nov
Russia-related Designations, Updates and Removal; Counter Terrorism Designation Update; Issuance of Russia-related General Licenses
rough count
individuals: CH (2), CY (2), IE (2), LT (2), SE (1), RU (33), TR (1)
companies: AE (13), CH (1), CN (5), CY (3), LU (1), MN (1), RU (154), SG (1), TR (10), UZ (1)
pna.gov.ph, EU plans to present 12th package of sanctions vs. Russia soon: EC, 5 Nov

The European Commission will soon publish the 12th package of European Union (EU) sanctions on Russia, which will include fresh import and export bans as well as an increase in the oil price ceiling [!], EC President Ursula von der Leyen said at a press conference in Kiev.
“We will soon propose a 12th package of sanctions, with new listings, new import and export bans, actions to tighten the oil price cap, and to further crack down on sanctions circumvention,” she wrote on X (formerly Twitter).

“dual-use things, “third-country” compliance “anti-coercion” measures!

According to Bloomberg sources, the new planned restrictions will affect exports of welding equipment, chemical products and other military-related technologies. The community is also considering banning software licenses and imports of some processed metals, aluminum and building items, transportation products, and gemstones. The latest EU sanctions list is expected to include more than 100 individuals and 40 business entities companies.
According to the agency’s sources, the EU seeks to persuade European corporations eNTiTIes to include restrictions in contracts with foreign nations prohibiting the transfer of equipment that can be used for military reasons to Russia.

Oorsula November 4 Declaration: Slava Big Israel!

Posted by: sln2002 | Nov 5 2023 15:06 utc | 9

ahahahahaha. I’m dying, as the Z-ppl (not those Z-ppl, the other ones) say. The Price Cap Coalition is on the loose!
US Treasury Office of Foreign Asset Control (OFAC), 2 Nov
Russia-related Designations, Updates and Removal; Counter Terrorism Designation Update; Issuance of Russia-related General Licenses
rough count
individuals: CH (2), CY (2), IE (2), LT (2), SE (1), RU (33), TR (1)
companies: AE (13), CH (1), CN (5), CY (3), LU (1), MN (1), RU (154), SG (1), TR (10), UZ (1)
pna.gov.ph, EU plans to present 12th package of sanctions vs. Russia soon: EC, 5 Nov

The European Commission will soon publish the 12th package of European Union (EU) sanctions on Russia, which will include fresh import and export bans as well as an increase in the oil price ceiling [!], EC President Ursula von der Leyen said at a press conference in Kiev.
“We will soon propose a 12th package of sanctions, with new listings, new import and export bans, actions to tighten the oil price cap, and to further crack down on sanctions circumvention,” she wrote on X (formerly Twitter).

“dual-use things, “third-country” compliance “anti-coercion” measures!

According to Bloomberg sources, the new planned restrictions will affect exports of welding equipment, chemical products and other military-related technologies. The community is also considering banning software licenses and imports of some processed metals, aluminum and building items, transportation products, and gemstones. The latest EU sanctions list is expected to include more than 100 individuals and 40 business entities companies.
According to the agency’s sources, the EU seeks to persuade European corporations eNTiTIes to include restrictions in contracts with foreign nations prohibiting the transfer of equipment that can be used for military reasons to Russia.

Oorsula November 4 Declaration: Slava Big Israel!

Posted by: sln2002 | Nov 5 2023 15:06 utc | 10

Finland’s president, the same satan-looking creep who illegally signed Finland up for the EU, the euro and Nato (and who officially has a 100% approval rating), signed Finland into the WHO agreement as well. The one that gives the bodily sovereignty of people away to the gay creep Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, a Bill Gates stooge.
According to the agreement, this gay without medical education can now, at Bill’s whim, announce an imaginary medical emergency that requires everyone to be vaccinated. By force if necessary. Just in time as the satan-looking Finnish president got all those US troops into Finland to help with the “forced” part. If necessary. Sounds like a double genocide threat together with the preparations for making Finland into the next Ukraine.
No discussion on the topic in Finland except three or four people grumbling on Telegram.

Posted by: Michael A | Nov 5 2023 15:24 utc | 11

Finland’s president, the same satan-looking creep who illegally signed Finland up for the EU, the euro and Nato (and who officially has a 100% approval rating), signed Finland into the WHO agreement as well. The one that gives the bodily sovereignty of people away to the gay creep Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, a Bill Gates stooge.
According to the agreement, this gay without medical education can now, at Bill’s whim, announce an imaginary medical emergency that requires everyone to be vaccinated. By force if necessary. Just in time as the satan-looking Finnish president got all those US troops into Finland to help with the “forced” part. If necessary. Sounds like a double genocide threat together with the preparations for making Finland into the next Ukraine.
No discussion on the topic in Finland except three or four people grumbling on Telegram.

Posted by: Michael A | Nov 5 2023 15:24 utc | 12

Lavrov was asked a curious question and provided one of his semi-cryptic answers on the weekly “Moscow. Kremlin. Putin” program:

Question: At a meeting on the events in Dagestan, which you also attended, President Vladimir Putin used the words “root of evil” for the first time in reference to the United States. Are they doing something with the root? Uprooted? What should be done with it?
Sergey Lavrov: There are other methods, including the use of chemicals, which do not have to be uprooted. President Vladimir Putin may have used this term for the first time, but he has repeatedly voiced the idea, conclusion and assessment that the United States is the main actor (as it is now fashionable to say) whose goal is to destabilise any region of the world.
Recently, I read analytical responses to what is happening. One of the politicians (not in Russia) said that when they discuss the foreign policy of the West and the United States, it is wrong to talk about double standards. They have the same standard: “We are in charge. We will return what we want. Where we can’t achieve any result, we will destabilize the situation and fish in troubled waters.”
If you look at all the foreign adventures of the United States over the past fifty years, starting with Vietnam, there is not a single story in which they have actually benefited the country and the region in whose affairs they intervened.
This only confirms the conclusion I have just voiced: it is in their interest to destabilise anything and everything. Then wait for their dollars (which they print in huge quantities) for someone to come in the expectation that the United States will “help” someone again. Those who count on such assistance should remember the sad experience of all the leaders of countries that relied on the United States. As soon as the situation changed, Washington shamelessly abandoned these leaders to their fate and began a new phase of its selfish policy.
Question: As for the root and the “chemicals” – will we not be accused of preparing and using chemical weapons? Now there are all sorts of fantasies.
Sergey Lavrov: This is an image. Let everyone draw conclusions to the best of their ability.

I would go further back in time than Lavrov to the period immediately after WW2 to the Outlaw US Empire’s actions in Central and South America as well as its saving many Nazis, but otherwise he’s correct. What Russia is trying to do is to get the Global Majority to awaken and review what has actually occurred since WW2, which is certainly 100% revisionist but isn’t aimed at altering those events but understanding them and the consequences they’ve had since, one of which is the genocide in Palestine.

Posted by: karlof1 | Nov 5 2023 15:27 utc | 13

Lavrov was asked a curious question and provided one of his semi-cryptic answers on the weekly “Moscow. Kremlin. Putin” program:

Question: At a meeting on the events in Dagestan, which you also attended, President Vladimir Putin used the words “root of evil” for the first time in reference to the United States. Are they doing something with the root? Uprooted? What should be done with it?
Sergey Lavrov: There are other methods, including the use of chemicals, which do not have to be uprooted. President Vladimir Putin may have used this term for the first time, but he has repeatedly voiced the idea, conclusion and assessment that the United States is the main actor (as it is now fashionable to say) whose goal is to destabilise any region of the world.
Recently, I read analytical responses to what is happening. One of the politicians (not in Russia) said that when they discuss the foreign policy of the West and the United States, it is wrong to talk about double standards. They have the same standard: “We are in charge. We will return what we want. Where we can’t achieve any result, we will destabilize the situation and fish in troubled waters.”
If you look at all the foreign adventures of the United States over the past fifty years, starting with Vietnam, there is not a single story in which they have actually benefited the country and the region in whose affairs they intervened.
This only confirms the conclusion I have just voiced: it is in their interest to destabilise anything and everything. Then wait for their dollars (which they print in huge quantities) for someone to come in the expectation that the United States will “help” someone again. Those who count on such assistance should remember the sad experience of all the leaders of countries that relied on the United States. As soon as the situation changed, Washington shamelessly abandoned these leaders to their fate and began a new phase of its selfish policy.
Question: As for the root and the “chemicals” – will we not be accused of preparing and using chemical weapons? Now there are all sorts of fantasies.
Sergey Lavrov: This is an image. Let everyone draw conclusions to the best of their ability.

I would go further back in time than Lavrov to the period immediately after WW2 to the Outlaw US Empire’s actions in Central and South America as well as its saving many Nazis, but otherwise he’s correct. What Russia is trying to do is to get the Global Majority to awaken and review what has actually occurred since WW2, which is certainly 100% revisionist but isn’t aimed at altering those events but understanding them and the consequences they’ve had since, one of which is the genocide in Palestine.

Posted by: karlof1 | Nov 5 2023 15:27 utc | 14

Sam Heller | سام هيلر @AbuJamajem – 6:51 UTC · Nov 5, 2023
My (belated) takeaways from Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah’s speech Friday, which I think mostly elaborated on what we’ve understood to be Hizb’s posture and calculus since October 7 🧵: 1/8

Could someone, please, post here the whole thread for those of us who do not have am X account and are not able to read anything at X any more, since Musk took over?
Thanks in advance

Posted by: Ghost of Mozgovoy | Nov 5 2023 15:44 utc | 15

Sam Heller | سام هيلر @AbuJamajem – 6:51 UTC · Nov 5, 2023
My (belated) takeaways from Hizbullah leader Hassan Nasrallah’s speech Friday, which I think mostly elaborated on what we’ve understood to be Hizb’s posture and calculus since October 7 🧵: 1/8

Could someone, please, post here the whole thread for those of us who do not have am X account and are not able to read anything at X any more, since Musk took over?
Thanks in advance

Posted by: Ghost of Mozgovoy | Nov 5 2023 15:44 utc | 16

Could someone, please, post here the whole thread for those of us who do not have am X account and are not able to read anything at X any more, since Musk took over?
Posted by: Ghost of Mozgovoy | Nov 5 2023 15:44 utc | 8
Here you go:
https://nitter.net/AbuJamajem/status/1721057530506248319

Posted by: Zet | Nov 5 2023 16:00 utc | 17

Could someone, please, post here the whole thread for those of us who do not have am X account and are not able to read anything at X any more, since Musk took over?
Posted by: Ghost of Mozgovoy | Nov 5 2023 15:44 utc | 8
Here you go:
https://nitter.net/AbuJamajem/status/1721057530506248319

Posted by: Zet | Nov 5 2023 16:00 utc | 18

“Dozens Arrested in Dagestan After Mob Storms Plane Arriving From Israel.”
This issue is interesting. I believe what appears to be the obvious explanation: SBU fomented the riot to undermine Russia as anti semitic, playing on the natural revulsion to the Zionazi’s mass slaughter of innocents in Gaza, particularly in regions with large Muslim populations.
However, I check the wsws.org periodically as they frequently have good coverage, despite their ridiculous line on Trump and then Russia since 2017.
Look how their “young guard” covered Dagastan:
“But political responsibility for the outburst of antisemitism also lies with the Kremlin and the Russian oligarchy as a whole. The Russian ruling elite has a sinister history of promoting antisemitism. This includes both the Jewish pogroms in Tsarist Russia and the antisemitic campaigns of the Stalinist bureaucracy, a central component of Stalinism’s nationalist reaction against the internationalist program of the October Revolution. The Russian oligarchy as it emerged out of the Soviet bureaucracy’s restoration of capitalism has revived all of these traditions in the vilest manner.”
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2023/11/04/gevb-n04.html
Ultimately, because anti semitism existed under the Tsar and Stalin, it’s assumed that the current Russian government is also antisemitic. This is not just unfair or specious reasoning, but a furtherance of the Ukronazis attempt to slander Russia to it’s own and US imperialism’s benefit.
When an imperialist country attacks a non imperialist country, the traditional marxist line is to defend the victim of imperialism and take a defeatist line on the aggressors. But this website consistently seems to equally denounce Russia and US imperialism ala Max Shachtman. It does so in a subtler way than obvious fake left whores of the empire like the DSA which makes it more insideous.
This comment is only for those that consider the marxist perspective valuable and include wsws.org in their reading.
I just wonder about wsws.org. Are they for real or is some element of the leadership a controlled opposition in the US?

Posted by: Ahenobarbus | Nov 5 2023 16:01 utc | 19

“Dozens Arrested in Dagestan After Mob Storms Plane Arriving From Israel.”
This issue is interesting. I believe what appears to be the obvious explanation: SBU fomented the riot to undermine Russia as anti semitic, playing on the natural revulsion to the Zionazi’s mass slaughter of innocents in Gaza, particularly in regions with large Muslim populations.
However, I check the wsws.org periodically as they frequently have good coverage, despite their ridiculous line on Trump and then Russia since 2017.
Look how their “young guard” covered Dagastan:
“But political responsibility for the outburst of antisemitism also lies with the Kremlin and the Russian oligarchy as a whole. The Russian ruling elite has a sinister history of promoting antisemitism. This includes both the Jewish pogroms in Tsarist Russia and the antisemitic campaigns of the Stalinist bureaucracy, a central component of Stalinism’s nationalist reaction against the internationalist program of the October Revolution. The Russian oligarchy as it emerged out of the Soviet bureaucracy’s restoration of capitalism has revived all of these traditions in the vilest manner.”
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2023/11/04/gevb-n04.html
Ultimately, because anti semitism existed under the Tsar and Stalin, it’s assumed that the current Russian government is also antisemitic. This is not just unfair or specious reasoning, but a furtherance of the Ukronazis attempt to slander Russia to it’s own and US imperialism’s benefit.
When an imperialist country attacks a non imperialist country, the traditional marxist line is to defend the victim of imperialism and take a defeatist line on the aggressors. But this website consistently seems to equally denounce Russia and US imperialism ala Max Shachtman. It does so in a subtler way than obvious fake left whores of the empire like the DSA which makes it more insideous.
This comment is only for those that consider the marxist perspective valuable and include wsws.org in their reading.
I just wonder about wsws.org. Are they for real or is some element of the leadership a controlled opposition in the US?

Posted by: Ahenobarbus | Nov 5 2023 16:01 utc | 20

Some links regarding war profiteering:
• Eyes on the Ties: Corporate Enablers of Israel’s War on Gaza
• Responsible Statecraft: Wall Street eyes big profits from Israel-Hamas war
• The Guardian: ‘Hamas has created additional demand’: Wall Street eyes big profits from war
• PressTV: War profiteering: US arms industry giants rejoice as Israel rains bombs on Gaza
Maybe some people should think twice on where they put their savings, especially US folks…

Posted by: Zet | Nov 5 2023 16:09 utc | 21

Some links regarding war profiteering:
• Eyes on the Ties: Corporate Enablers of Israel’s War on Gaza
• Responsible Statecraft: Wall Street eyes big profits from Israel-Hamas war
• The Guardian: ‘Hamas has created additional demand’: Wall Street eyes big profits from war
• PressTV: War profiteering: US arms industry giants rejoice as Israel rains bombs on Gaza
Maybe some people should think twice on where they put their savings, especially US folks…

Posted by: Zet | Nov 5 2023 16:09 utc | 22

Peskov to TASS:

“Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly stated that he is ready for any contacts […] . Curtailing of the basis of bilateral relations between Russia and the US was spearheaded by the Americans. This is why at least the head of the US will have to change his position at some point, taking a more constructive stand on bilateral relations, which will be followed by conditions for such a meeting growing ripe”.

As I keep repeating, there is not a “West” vs. “Global South” struggle right now. There is a “West” (Anglosphere and EU and someone else), an “East” (Russia, China and a bunch of satellites), and a “Global South” (the rest).
The strategic goal of the East is to make European Countries switch allegiance and build an Eurasian community. After that, the Anglosphere will have no other choice than joining this community of peers. That will mark the end of the Unipolar struggle without a shot fired (well, almost…).
The strategic goal of the USA is to raise again an iron curtain between the East and the West to protect its economy from a total failure. US real economy, which was prominent for a few decades after WWII, lost its competitiveness on a global scale already in the ’80s, at least, hence the bullying on its allies to stay afloat (e.g. the Plaza Accord that maimed the Japanese economy). However in the ’90s, after the fall of the USSR, the US elite pushed for a globalist agenda, an economic system where they could not compete and could not bully: that was a total strategic failure. Now they are backtracking, but it is probably too late.

Posted by: SG | Nov 5 2023 16:28 utc | 23

Peskov to TASS:

“Russian President Vladimir Putin has repeatedly stated that he is ready for any contacts […] . Curtailing of the basis of bilateral relations between Russia and the US was spearheaded by the Americans. This is why at least the head of the US will have to change his position at some point, taking a more constructive stand on bilateral relations, which will be followed by conditions for such a meeting growing ripe”.

As I keep repeating, there is not a “West” vs. “Global South” struggle right now. There is a “West” (Anglosphere and EU and someone else), an “East” (Russia, China and a bunch of satellites), and a “Global South” (the rest).
The strategic goal of the East is to make European Countries switch allegiance and build an Eurasian community. After that, the Anglosphere will have no other choice than joining this community of peers. That will mark the end of the Unipolar struggle without a shot fired (well, almost…).
The strategic goal of the USA is to raise again an iron curtain between the East and the West to protect its economy from a total failure. US real economy, which was prominent for a few decades after WWII, lost its competitiveness on a global scale already in the ’80s, at least, hence the bullying on its allies to stay afloat (e.g. the Plaza Accord that maimed the Japanese economy). However in the ’90s, after the fall of the USSR, the US elite pushed for a globalist agenda, an economic system where they could not compete and could not bully: that was a total strategic failure. Now they are backtracking, but it is probably too late.

Posted by: SG | Nov 5 2023 16:28 utc | 24

On the Guardian this morning…
“Zelenskiy says cost of no more US aid is Russian war against Nato as he invites Trump to Ukraine.”
Pretty desperate…courting assassination…

Posted by: Ahenobarbus | Nov 5 2023 16:31 utc | 25

On the Guardian this morning…
“Zelenskiy says cost of no more US aid is Russian war against Nato as he invites Trump to Ukraine.”
Pretty desperate…courting assassination…

Posted by: Ahenobarbus | Nov 5 2023 16:31 utc | 26

Slowly but surely de-dollarization is progressing:

Latest data from the SWIFT system showed that yuan’s share of international payments hit a record high of 3.71 percent in September, and the currency retained its position as the fifth most active for global payments, while total payments in yuan increased by 2.77 percent in terms of value compared with August.
From January to September in 2023, the volume of cross-border yuan settlement hit 38.9 trillion yuan ($5.32 trillion), up 24 percent year-on-year, according to statistics released by People’s Bank of China, the central bank, on Friday.
Since the beginning of the year, there have been notable developments in the yuan’s internationalization, such as surpassing the euro to become the second-largest currency in Brazil’s foreign exchange reserves, Argentina’s first-ever use of yuan to repay its foreign debts, and Pakistan’s inaugural payment of Russian crude oil expenses in yuan.

https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202310/1300726.shtml

Posted by: Zet | Nov 5 2023 16:46 utc | 27

Slowly but surely de-dollarization is progressing:

Latest data from the SWIFT system showed that yuan’s share of international payments hit a record high of 3.71 percent in September, and the currency retained its position as the fifth most active for global payments, while total payments in yuan increased by 2.77 percent in terms of value compared with August.
From January to September in 2023, the volume of cross-border yuan settlement hit 38.9 trillion yuan ($5.32 trillion), up 24 percent year-on-year, according to statistics released by People’s Bank of China, the central bank, on Friday.
Since the beginning of the year, there have been notable developments in the yuan’s internationalization, such as surpassing the euro to become the second-largest currency in Brazil’s foreign exchange reserves, Argentina’s first-ever use of yuan to repay its foreign debts, and Pakistan’s inaugural payment of Russian crude oil expenses in yuan.

https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202310/1300726.shtml

Posted by: Zet | Nov 5 2023 16:46 utc | 28

@Bruised Northerner | Nov 5 2023 13:58 utc | 2
Habeck held a speech two days ago – read from a teleprompter – where he basically declares his undying loyalty to Israel and demands every German does that as well, uncaringly even throwing German Muslims and critics of Israel under the bus. He even threatened immigrants with expulsion, if they “hate” on Israel too much! The Greens, who were shuttling in every single guy from all over the world into Germany now threaten Muslim immigrants with expulsion.
And the United Media Front in Germany has been gushing over his speech, how great it is supposed to be. Recently Habeck was regularly critizised for his incompetence as the minister of economy. But as the Greens are now the party most heavily infested by transatlantic establishment stooges, they are also the most heavily defended by large parts of the media. Quelle surprise. They all have no morals, it really is absurd.

Posted by: Roland | Nov 5 2023 16:53 utc | 29

@Bruised Northerner | Nov 5 2023 13:58 utc | 2
Habeck held a speech two days ago – read from a teleprompter – where he basically declares his undying loyalty to Israel and demands every German does that as well, uncaringly even throwing German Muslims and critics of Israel under the bus. He even threatened immigrants with expulsion, if they “hate” on Israel too much! The Greens, who were shuttling in every single guy from all over the world into Germany now threaten Muslim immigrants with expulsion.
And the United Media Front in Germany has been gushing over his speech, how great it is supposed to be. Recently Habeck was regularly critizised for his incompetence as the minister of economy. But as the Greens are now the party most heavily infested by transatlantic establishment stooges, they are also the most heavily defended by large parts of the media. Quelle surprise. They all have no morals, it really is absurd.

Posted by: Roland | Nov 5 2023 16:53 utc | 30

I’m thinking, someone’s got jet lag, narcolepsy, a closed head injury, or something.

12:04pm: Blinken tells Abbas [?!] Gazans must not be ‘forcibly displaced’
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas on Sunday that Palestinians in Gaza “must not be forcibly displaced”, a State Department spokesman said.
Blinken met with Abbas in Ramallah as he made a surprise high-security visit to the West Bank as violence surges in the occupied territory in tandem with the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.
State Department spokesman Matthew Miller [!] said the pair also discussed “the need to stop extremist violence against Palestinians” in the West Bank.

• Secretary Antony J. Blinken, Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry, and Jordanian Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi At a Joint Press Availability, 4 Nov

…We’re all deeply concerned about escalating extremist violence against Palestinian civilians in the West Bank. This has been a serious problem that’s only worsened since the conflict. I updated ministers today on my discussions with- throughout the Israeli Government yesterday, where I underscored that incitement and extremist violence must be stopped—and perpetrators must be held accountable….

• Secretary Blinken’s Meeting with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, 5 Nov

Posted by: sln2002 | Nov 5 2023 17:14 utc | 31

I’m thinking, someone’s got jet lag, narcolepsy, a closed head injury, or something.

12:04pm: Blinken tells Abbas [?!] Gazans must not be ‘forcibly displaced’
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken told Palestinian Authority leader Mahmoud Abbas on Sunday that Palestinians in Gaza “must not be forcibly displaced”, a State Department spokesman said.
Blinken met with Abbas in Ramallah as he made a surprise high-security visit to the West Bank as violence surges in the occupied territory in tandem with the Israel-Hamas war in Gaza.
State Department spokesman Matthew Miller [!] said the pair also discussed “the need to stop extremist violence against Palestinians” in the West Bank.

• Secretary Antony J. Blinken, Egyptian Foreign Minister Sameh Shoukry, and Jordanian Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Ayman Safadi At a Joint Press Availability, 4 Nov

…We’re all deeply concerned about escalating extremist violence against Palestinian civilians in the West Bank. This has been a serious problem that’s only worsened since the conflict. I updated ministers today on my discussions with- throughout the Israeli Government yesterday, where I underscored that incitement and extremist violence must be stopped—and perpetrators must be held accountable….

• Secretary Blinken’s Meeting with Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas, 5 Nov

Posted by: sln2002 | Nov 5 2023 17:14 utc | 32

thanks b… ditto minaas comment to you…
@ Ahenobarbus | Nov 5 2023 16:01 utc | 10
thanks.. interesting and relevant question on wsws… perhaps bevin will chime in?
————–
i wish i could read the nyt articles.. oh well.. i refuse to sign up.. i don’t care that much..

Posted by: james | Nov 5 2023 17:19 utc | 33

thanks b… ditto minaas comment to you…
@ Ahenobarbus | Nov 5 2023 16:01 utc | 10
thanks.. interesting and relevant question on wsws… perhaps bevin will chime in?
————–
i wish i could read the nyt articles.. oh well.. i refuse to sign up.. i don’t care that much..

Posted by: james | Nov 5 2023 17:19 utc | 34

Posted by: james | Nov 5 2023 17:19 utc | 17
NY Yella Cake? You’re not missing anything except serial over-writes. But if you must abuse yourself, copy & paste the story’s URL into an archive.* or waybackmachine search field.

Posted by: sln2002 | Nov 5 2023 17:24 utc | 35

Posted by: james | Nov 5 2023 17:19 utc | 17
NY Yella Cake? You’re not missing anything except serial over-writes. But if you must abuse yourself, copy & paste the story’s URL into an archive.* or waybackmachine search field.

Posted by: sln2002 | Nov 5 2023 17:24 utc | 36

Hello, unappreciated blog! Thanks for reminding me: Stereotype is the mind killer.

Posted by: sln2002 | Nov 5 2023 17:39 utc | 37

Hello, unappreciated blog! Thanks for reminding me: Stereotype is the mind killer.

Posted by: sln2002 | Nov 5 2023 17:39 utc | 38

@ sln2002 | Nov 5 2023 17:24 utc | 18
thanks and thanks for the link @ 19 and your posts more generally!

Posted by: james | Nov 5 2023 17:48 utc | 39

@ sln2002 | Nov 5 2023 17:24 utc | 18
thanks and thanks for the link @ 19 and your posts more generally!

Posted by: james | Nov 5 2023 17:48 utc | 40

Habeck held a speech two days ago – read from a teleprompter – where he basically declares his undying loyalty to Israel and demands every German does that as well, uncaringly even throwing German Muslims and critics of Israel under the bus.
Posted by: Roland | Nov 5 2023 16:53 utc | 15
Full ack! The only positive thing about his speech was that it was translated into various languages incl. Arabic so Muslims all over the world can see his racist remarks.

Posted by: Zet | Nov 5 2023 18:15 utc | 41

Habeck held a speech two days ago – read from a teleprompter – where he basically declares his undying loyalty to Israel and demands every German does that as well, uncaringly even throwing German Muslims and critics of Israel under the bus.
Posted by: Roland | Nov 5 2023 16:53 utc | 15
Full ack! The only positive thing about his speech was that it was translated into various languages incl. Arabic so Muslims all over the world can see his racist remarks.

Posted by: Zet | Nov 5 2023 18:15 utc | 42

“… just wonder about wsws.org. Are they for real or is some element of the leadership a controlled opposition in the US?” Ahenobarbus@10
They aren’t ‘controlled opposition.’ But they do share a broad range of propaganda objectives with the ruling class.
One has to bear in mind that every time an Anne Applebaum or a Robert Conquest pops up with more ‘documentation’ of Stalin’s crimes of hundreds of millions starved to death or even Mao’s plot to kill off everyone except his immediate family (and the girl he fancied two doors down), the WSWS and many other organs of the various groups which claim to be bearing the mantle of Trotsky fall over themselves to ‘second that motion.’
And that incidentally, is true of the charges of anti-semitism against Stalin who was guilty of much but nothing of the sort.
The truth and this is a long, sad story, is that Trotsky’s memory has been hi-jacked by anti communists since his death. Even during his lifetime the old fellow had to fight off the friendship of the Un-American Activities Committee and its ilk- after his death the floodgates opened and- I speak as a man whose entire adult life has been spent in the halls of Trotskyist analyses- since the early 1950s when hundreds of ex-Trotskyists (including NATO’s first Secretary General) rallied to the imperialist side of the Cold War (many of chanting the Stalin=Hitler idiocy, most of them wallowing in new found wealth).
Hence, in the not very long run, the NeoCons who hated ‘Stalinism’ so much that they applauded the end of the USSR and had so deluded themselves that the Imperialists were the ‘good guys’ in the Cold War that they slipped very easily into becoming unashamed partisans of the Hegemonic Empire.
Most Trotskyists did not go so far, many, indeed, like the faction around the WSWS merely displayed a weakness for personality cults of the kind that would have embarassed Stalin- hence the long list of “theoreticians’ and despots-over-a-dozen-or-two who have helped fuck up the working class movement, turning it into a network of fan clubs edging closer and closer (as the Ukraine crisis has demonstrated) to the neo-con position.
As I say its a long story: james, “don’t get me started…” Really all we have yto do is repeat Wren’s epitaph- ” If you would see Trotsky’s monument, look around you!”
The founder of the Red Army deserved better but the more one studies the course of the Central Committee of the CPPP the clearer it becomes that all those involved were flawed, while the task before them was impossible.
That the USSR defeated the Wehrmacht, and all of Europe behind it, is enough. And so it should be.
Let me just add, after reviewing the above quickly, that one other consequence of the wholesale desertion of US left-communists to the imperialist cause is the genocide in Gaza. Just take a look at the front row of the cheering section.

Posted by: bevin | Nov 5 2023 18:18 utc | 43

“… just wonder about wsws.org. Are they for real or is some element of the leadership a controlled opposition in the US?” Ahenobarbus@10
They aren’t ‘controlled opposition.’ But they do share a broad range of propaganda objectives with the ruling class.
One has to bear in mind that every time an Anne Applebaum or a Robert Conquest pops up with more ‘documentation’ of Stalin’s crimes of hundreds of millions starved to death or even Mao’s plot to kill off everyone except his immediate family (and the girl he fancied two doors down), the WSWS and many other organs of the various groups which claim to be bearing the mantle of Trotsky fall over themselves to ‘second that motion.’
And that incidentally, is true of the charges of anti-semitism against Stalin who was guilty of much but nothing of the sort.
The truth and this is a long, sad story, is that Trotsky’s memory has been hi-jacked by anti communists since his death. Even during his lifetime the old fellow had to fight off the friendship of the Un-American Activities Committee and its ilk- after his death the floodgates opened and- I speak as a man whose entire adult life has been spent in the halls of Trotskyist analyses- since the early 1950s when hundreds of ex-Trotskyists (including NATO’s first Secretary General) rallied to the imperialist side of the Cold War (many of chanting the Stalin=Hitler idiocy, most of them wallowing in new found wealth).
Hence, in the not very long run, the NeoCons who hated ‘Stalinism’ so much that they applauded the end of the USSR and had so deluded themselves that the Imperialists were the ‘good guys’ in the Cold War that they slipped very easily into becoming unashamed partisans of the Hegemonic Empire.
Most Trotskyists did not go so far, many, indeed, like the faction around the WSWS merely displayed a weakness for personality cults of the kind that would have embarassed Stalin- hence the long list of “theoreticians’ and despots-over-a-dozen-or-two who have helped fuck up the working class movement, turning it into a network of fan clubs edging closer and closer (as the Ukraine crisis has demonstrated) to the neo-con position.
As I say its a long story: james, “don’t get me started…” Really all we have yto do is repeat Wren’s epitaph- ” If you would see Trotsky’s monument, look around you!”
The founder of the Red Army deserved better but the more one studies the course of the Central Committee of the CPPP the clearer it becomes that all those involved were flawed, while the task before them was impossible.
That the USSR defeated the Wehrmacht, and all of Europe behind it, is enough. And so it should be.
Let me just add, after reviewing the above quickly, that one other consequence of the wholesale desertion of US left-communists to the imperialist cause is the genocide in Gaza. Just take a look at the front row of the cheering section.

Posted by: bevin | Nov 5 2023 18:18 utc | 44

i wish i could read the nyt articles.. oh well.. i refuse to sign up.. i don’t care that much..
Posted by: james | Nov 5 2023 17:19 utc | 17
If you’re on a Mac or iOS device then you can use the following shortcut to open any pay-walled page on archive.ph via the share sheet, doesn’t get simpler than that:
https://www.icloud.com/shortcuts/eed044b9a72448afb56d6985f504005b

Posted by: Zet | Nov 5 2023 18:23 utc | 45

i wish i could read the nyt articles.. oh well.. i refuse to sign up.. i don’t care that much..
Posted by: james | Nov 5 2023 17:19 utc | 17
If you’re on a Mac or iOS device then you can use the following shortcut to open any pay-walled page on archive.ph via the share sheet, doesn’t get simpler than that:
https://www.icloud.com/shortcuts/eed044b9a72448afb56d6985f504005b

Posted by: Zet | Nov 5 2023 18:23 utc | 46

From the NYTimes, today: US banks are now forthrightly”>https://archive.ph/V7hGz”>forthrightly criminal confiscation of customer accounts based solely on the recommendation of AI computer evaluations that seek to identify fraud and other illegal activity.

But a New York Times examination of over 500 cases of this dropping of customers by their banks — and interviews with more than a dozen current and former bank industry insiders — illustrates the chaos and confusion that ensue when banks decide on their own to cut people off.
Individuals can’t pay their bills on time. Banks often take weeks to send them their balances. When the institutions close their credit cards, their credit scores can suffer.
Upon cancellation, small businesses often struggle to make payroll — and must explain to vendors and partners that they don’t have a bank account for the time being.
As if the lack of explanation and recourse were not enough, once customers have moved on, they don’t know whether there is a black mark somewhere on their permanent records that will cause a repeat episode at another bank. If the bank has filed a SAR, it isn’t legally allowed to tell you, and the federal government prosecutes only a small fraction of the people whom the banks document in their SARs.

The NYTimes does inform us that the banks do “offer a modicum of sympathy”, though.

Posted by: Pacifica Advocate | Nov 5 2023 18:24 utc | 47

From the NYTimes, today: US banks are now forthrightly”>https://archive.ph/V7hGz”>forthrightly criminal confiscation of customer accounts based solely on the recommendation of AI computer evaluations that seek to identify fraud and other illegal activity.

But a New York Times examination of over 500 cases of this dropping of customers by their banks — and interviews with more than a dozen current and former bank industry insiders — illustrates the chaos and confusion that ensue when banks decide on their own to cut people off.
Individuals can’t pay their bills on time. Banks often take weeks to send them their balances. When the institutions close their credit cards, their credit scores can suffer.
Upon cancellation, small businesses often struggle to make payroll — and must explain to vendors and partners that they don’t have a bank account for the time being.
As if the lack of explanation and recourse were not enough, once customers have moved on, they don’t know whether there is a black mark somewhere on their permanent records that will cause a repeat episode at another bank. If the bank has filed a SAR, it isn’t legally allowed to tell you, and the federal government prosecutes only a small fraction of the people whom the banks document in their SARs.

The NYTimes does inform us that the banks do “offer a modicum of sympathy”, though.

Posted by: Pacifica Advocate | Nov 5 2023 18:24 utc | 48

Posted by: SG | Nov 5 2023 16:28 utc | 12
The strategic goal of the USA is to raise again an iron curtain between the East and the West to protect its economy from a total failure. US real economy, which was prominent for a few decades after WWII, lost its competitiveness on a global scale already in the ’80s, at least, hence the bullying on its allies to stay afloat (e.g. the Plaza Accord that maimed the Japanese economy). However in the ’90s, after the fall of the USSR, the US elite pushed for a globalist agenda, an economic system where they could not compete and could not bully: that was a total strategic failure. Now they are backtracking, but it is probably too late.

I agreed with most of your post – esp. dividing blocs into West, East and Global South vs West vs RoW, and that the East hopes that Europe will join Eurasia (which it really should). I believe either Putin or Lavrov suggested that (again) only last week.
However, I have emboldened your last sentences because I don’t understand them. Assuming the ‘they’ refers to the US elites, I don’t know what you mean by ‘where they could not compete and could not bully’. Could you kindly clarify?

Posted by: Scorpion | Nov 5 2023 18:38 utc | 49

Posted by: SG | Nov 5 2023 16:28 utc | 12
The strategic goal of the USA is to raise again an iron curtain between the East and the West to protect its economy from a total failure. US real economy, which was prominent for a few decades after WWII, lost its competitiveness on a global scale already in the ’80s, at least, hence the bullying on its allies to stay afloat (e.g. the Plaza Accord that maimed the Japanese economy). However in the ’90s, after the fall of the USSR, the US elite pushed for a globalist agenda, an economic system where they could not compete and could not bully: that was a total strategic failure. Now they are backtracking, but it is probably too late.

I agreed with most of your post – esp. dividing blocs into West, East and Global South vs West vs RoW, and that the East hopes that Europe will join Eurasia (which it really should). I believe either Putin or Lavrov suggested that (again) only last week.
However, I have emboldened your last sentences because I don’t understand them. Assuming the ‘they’ refers to the US elites, I don’t know what you mean by ‘where they could not compete and could not bully’. Could you kindly clarify?

Posted by: Scorpion | Nov 5 2023 18:38 utc | 50

Posted by: Zet | Nov 5 2023 18:23 utc | 23
i wish i could read the nyt articles.. oh well.. i refuse to sign up.. i don’t care that much..
==============================================
I use Brave Browser (chrome family) with an extension called Archive Page. All the mainstream press tends to open immediately (because someone else already processed it) but if not it doesn’t take long for them to create a new archive link. It is offered on Firefox as well.

Posted by: Scorpion | Nov 5 2023 18:42 utc | 51

Posted by: Zet | Nov 5 2023 18:23 utc | 23
i wish i could read the nyt articles.. oh well.. i refuse to sign up.. i don’t care that much..
==============================================
I use Brave Browser (chrome family) with an extension called Archive Page. All the mainstream press tends to open immediately (because someone else already processed it) but if not it doesn’t take long for them to create a new archive link. It is offered on Firefox as well.

Posted by: Scorpion | Nov 5 2023 18:42 utc | 52

@ Zet | Nov 5 2023 18:23 utc | 23 // @ Scorpion | Nov 5 2023 18:42 utc | 26
thanks guys.. i am on linux ( not apple ) – ubuntu, with brave browser.. i will try the archive feature… that is also what @ sln2002 | Nov 5 2023 17:24 utc | 18 recommended.. i am a bit of a luddite on ubuntu, lol..

Posted by: james | Nov 5 2023 19:00 utc | 53

@ Zet | Nov 5 2023 18:23 utc | 23 // @ Scorpion | Nov 5 2023 18:42 utc | 26
thanks guys.. i am on linux ( not apple ) – ubuntu, with brave browser.. i will try the archive feature… that is also what @ sln2002 | Nov 5 2023 17:24 utc | 18 recommended.. i am a bit of a luddite on ubuntu, lol..

Posted by: james | Nov 5 2023 19:00 utc | 54

Het land weet dat er kwaad is gedaan / En dat van die zon en
die maan / Al Dat rokende van het land / Van de verbijstering
van de beesten / Van het lichten van het land / En de zon en
de maan / Van de angst van de beesten
Nu moet ik gaan: de bloemen sterven / En het donkert al
als ik jou weer ontmoeten zal / Zal ik mijn naam in jouw huid kerven. Dan zal ik zingen van een zwarte dag / En van de schaduw die wij moesten delen / En van de vloek die sprong in onze kelen
en van het mes dat in jouw handen lag.
Langzaam, van ver gevolgd door de hond van de hof
Ben ik de oude wegen zwijgend ingeslagen
Een bleke herfst verbloedt achter de zwarte hagen;
Vrouwen gaan einderlangs, rouwend, in donkere stof
Al grauwer wordt het veld
De lucht koelt af, de nevel welt
Wat staat gij zo en kijkt verbaasd en staart?
Wat is het dat u in de schemering zo ontstelde?
(De Kift)

Posted by: Minaa | Nov 5 2023 19:32 utc | 55

Het land weet dat er kwaad is gedaan / En dat van die zon en
die maan / Al Dat rokende van het land / Van de verbijstering
van de beesten / Van het lichten van het land / En de zon en
de maan / Van de angst van de beesten
Nu moet ik gaan: de bloemen sterven / En het donkert al
als ik jou weer ontmoeten zal / Zal ik mijn naam in jouw huid kerven. Dan zal ik zingen van een zwarte dag / En van de schaduw die wij moesten delen / En van de vloek die sprong in onze kelen
en van het mes dat in jouw handen lag.
Langzaam, van ver gevolgd door de hond van de hof
Ben ik de oude wegen zwijgend ingeslagen
Een bleke herfst verbloedt achter de zwarte hagen;
Vrouwen gaan einderlangs, rouwend, in donkere stof
Al grauwer wordt het veld
De lucht koelt af, de nevel welt
Wat staat gij zo en kijkt verbaasd en staart?
Wat is het dat u in de schemering zo ontstelde?
(De Kift)

Posted by: Minaa | Nov 5 2023 19:32 utc | 56

Eagelton’s piece in NLR suffers from the usual academic bubble interpretation of US geopolitical actions (and escaping that bubble has shaped the latter part of my academic career…)—namely, that it assumes US policy is determined and executed by something akin to an university sub-committee, well-meaning and intelligent people who end up trying to crack a nut with a sledgehammer. Nowhere is the scourge of neoliberal managerialism discussed and this is the elephant in the room: a dysfunctional latter-day bureaucracy that elevates self-promoting narcissists and sociopaths who get ahead by applying a brutal calculus concocted from the worst excesses of corporate capitalism, shameless entrepreneurialism and inflexible bureaucratic hierarchies. The characters that populate his op-ed (Biden et al.) are, frankly, crooks who preside over a system of plunder. That the Israelis are saying the quiet part out loud by ethnic-cleansing and land-grabbing in plain sight with the blessing of the ‘civilized world’ only serves to highlight the fact that the last 200 years of Western hegemony has been so many versions of Kurtz’s imperative to ‘exterminate all the brutes’. Let’s not put lipstick on ‘imperial designs’ as though there is a rational system of governance at work. The Jake Sullivans of this world are not Buckley Jr or Gore Vidal; they’re pimply middle managers who put no height limit to the pile of bodies they will climb to fill their accounts and dominate others.

Posted by: Patroklos | Nov 5 2023 19:32 utc | 57

Eagelton’s piece in NLR suffers from the usual academic bubble interpretation of US geopolitical actions (and escaping that bubble has shaped the latter part of my academic career…)—namely, that it assumes US policy is determined and executed by something akin to an university sub-committee, well-meaning and intelligent people who end up trying to crack a nut with a sledgehammer. Nowhere is the scourge of neoliberal managerialism discussed and this is the elephant in the room: a dysfunctional latter-day bureaucracy that elevates self-promoting narcissists and sociopaths who get ahead by applying a brutal calculus concocted from the worst excesses of corporate capitalism, shameless entrepreneurialism and inflexible bureaucratic hierarchies. The characters that populate his op-ed (Biden et al.) are, frankly, crooks who preside over a system of plunder. That the Israelis are saying the quiet part out loud by ethnic-cleansing and land-grabbing in plain sight with the blessing of the ‘civilized world’ only serves to highlight the fact that the last 200 years of Western hegemony has been so many versions of Kurtz’s imperative to ‘exterminate all the brutes’. Let’s not put lipstick on ‘imperial designs’ as though there is a rational system of governance at work. The Jake Sullivans of this world are not Buckley Jr or Gore Vidal; they’re pimply middle managers who put no height limit to the pile of bodies they will climb to fill their accounts and dominate others.

Posted by: Patroklos | Nov 5 2023 19:32 utc | 58

I agree 100% with Paroklos. His description applies not only to politicians and the media “people” but to most universities in Western Europe nowadays.
With regard to Kurtz, isn’t it odd that no one in the Western governements seems to have seen Apocalypse Now and how their own elements might turn rogue.

Posted by: Tom3 | Nov 5 2023 19:42 utc | 59

I agree 100% with Paroklos. His description applies not only to politicians and the media “people” but to most universities in Western Europe nowadays.
With regard to Kurtz, isn’t it odd that no one in the Western governements seems to have seen Apocalypse Now and how their own elements might turn rogue.

Posted by: Tom3 | Nov 5 2023 19:42 utc | 60

Posted by: Tom3 | Nov 5 2023 19:42 utc | 30
Absolutely right: Conrad’s novella and Coppola’s film are about as timely as it gets.

Posted by: Patroklos | Nov 5 2023 19:53 utc | 61

Posted by: Tom3 | Nov 5 2023 19:42 utc | 30
Absolutely right: Conrad’s novella and Coppola’s film are about as timely as it gets.

Posted by: Patroklos | Nov 5 2023 19:53 utc | 62

Posted by: Patroklos | Nov 5 2023 19:32 utc | 29
Nowhere is the scourge of neoliberal managerialism discussed and this is the elephant in the room: a dysfunctional latter-day bureaucracy that elevates self-promoting narcissists and sociopaths who get ahead by applying a brutal calculus concocted from the worst excesses of corporate capitalism, shameless entrepreneurialism and inflexible bureaucratic hierarchies.

Good insights, but I feel you are blending primary colours overmuch in that there is a significant difference between yellow, blue and red. Managerialism is indeed a widespread, serious and generally overlooked problem, but I don’t believe that it alone creates the rapacious greed of Hegemonic Empire. Rather, I suspect that in order to milk populations of their wealth and agency, organized elites systematically put up buffer zones of baffling bureaucracy to camouflage their policies and networks. Those at the managerial level are mainly well-meaning but are systematically dumbed down by operating a machine designed and fueled by the deception involved with making sure they don’t know the elites whose purposes they ultimately serve. Deception by definition involves hiding, obfuscating which by definition engender ignorance. Ignorance is the opposite of being awake, knowledgeable, on the ball. Hence the sclerotic, paralyzing nature of rampant managerialism – as well as its seemingly occluded, untouchable nature.
Those are two sides – managerialism vs elites. No doubt there are several others. For example the Zionist project, though only of interest to a tiny segment of the West’s population, has an over-sized influence on no end of domestic and foreign policy. Doubtless there are other powerful elements as well.
The point being that it’s not just one amorphous managerialist blob. There are various and differing skeins in the overall tartan.

Posted by: Scorpion | Nov 5 2023 19:59 utc | 63

Posted by: Patroklos | Nov 5 2023 19:32 utc | 29
Nowhere is the scourge of neoliberal managerialism discussed and this is the elephant in the room: a dysfunctional latter-day bureaucracy that elevates self-promoting narcissists and sociopaths who get ahead by applying a brutal calculus concocted from the worst excesses of corporate capitalism, shameless entrepreneurialism and inflexible bureaucratic hierarchies.

Good insights, but I feel you are blending primary colours overmuch in that there is a significant difference between yellow, blue and red. Managerialism is indeed a widespread, serious and generally overlooked problem, but I don’t believe that it alone creates the rapacious greed of Hegemonic Empire. Rather, I suspect that in order to milk populations of their wealth and agency, organized elites systematically put up buffer zones of baffling bureaucracy to camouflage their policies and networks. Those at the managerial level are mainly well-meaning but are systematically dumbed down by operating a machine designed and fueled by the deception involved with making sure they don’t know the elites whose purposes they ultimately serve. Deception by definition involves hiding, obfuscating which by definition engender ignorance. Ignorance is the opposite of being awake, knowledgeable, on the ball. Hence the sclerotic, paralyzing nature of rampant managerialism – as well as its seemingly occluded, untouchable nature.
Those are two sides – managerialism vs elites. No doubt there are several others. For example the Zionist project, though only of interest to a tiny segment of the West’s population, has an over-sized influence on no end of domestic and foreign policy. Doubtless there are other powerful elements as well.
The point being that it’s not just one amorphous managerialist blob. There are various and differing skeins in the overall tartan.

Posted by: Scorpion | Nov 5 2023 19:59 utc | 64

I very significant event’s been taking place in Moscow over the weekend that I just was made aware of: “the marathon of the Znanie society as part of the Russia exhibition-forum, which opened at VDNKh,” via this TASS report in Russian on Patrushev’s remarks made yesterday. Curiosity aroused, I went to Znanie Society’s website to see if I could find his complete remarks and those of other participants. Wow! What an event. For those who don’t know, Znanie is Russian for knowledge, and the society integrates Russian leaders from all sectors with the overall educational system. (I’ve reported on this organization and its work at my substack and VK sites.) What follows are the core of Patrushev’s remarks as provided by TASS, but not all by far:

People’s Unity and Overcoming the Time of Troubles
National Unity Day symbolizes the overcoming of internal and external threats by the people of Russia through unity and cohesion.
During the Time of Troubles, Russia was on the verge of losing its sovereignty, but its people “united, defended their native land and statehood,” got rid of interventionists and traitors, restored a strong government, and embarked on the path of independent development.
This was facilitated by the enormous spiritual upsurge of the multinational people of the country, “whose statehood has always been based on three pillars – national unity, faith and a strong vertical of power.”
An Age-Old Confrontation
Europe has long sought to destroy the Russian state, as it could not tolerate the rise of the Third Rome – Moscow, this was regularly manifested in attempts at “political intrigues, economic enslavement and direct aggression.”
From the German knights to the Nazis in the 20th century, almost all of Europe participated in the aggression against Russia.
Historically, Russia has always been a “bone in the throat of the West,” hindering the implementation of its hegemonic plans, and representing a powerful civilizational alternative.
Western Russophobic ideologues have come up with entire theories on how to achieve the collapse of Russia, which formed the basis of the Western strategy to destroy our country.
The 1990s as a New Time of Troubles
The dramatic 1990s became a “new Time of Troubles” in which the existence of the Russian state was once again threatened.
The collapse of the Soviet Union gave wings to the rulers of the United States and other Westerners, who believed that by dividing Russia, they could achieve its destruction.
Western advisers flooded Russia in the 1990s, seeking to create chaos in the country, “encouraging separatism, imposing debt fetters and onerous international obligations.” The West relied on stimulating chaos and introducing external control of the country.
The West also used additional levers of pressure in the form of NATO’s aggressive eastward expansion, support for extremism and radical religious groups, inspired a “wave of defamation of the Russian Orthodox Church and traditional Islam,” and propagandized all sorts of vices.
As a result of the radical reforms imposed by the West, the standard of living in the country declined, unemployment grew, industry, agriculture, transport, and the financial system were destroyed, and the military-industrial complex actually ceased to perform its main function – to provide the armed forces with modern weapons.
International terrorism in the 1990sposed a serious threat to Russia’s sovereignty, with Western countries hypocritically calling the terrorists “fighters for freedom and democracy.”

Powerful stuff. I’ll agree with the analogy of the 1990s being a new Time of Troubles. All too often I fail to check the Russian TASS page. I’ll compile some of these “lectures’ into a review and post them to my substack. I’ll post a notification when that’s completed.

Posted by: karlof1 | Nov 5 2023 20:04 utc | 65

I very significant event’s been taking place in Moscow over the weekend that I just was made aware of: “the marathon of the Znanie society as part of the Russia exhibition-forum, which opened at VDNKh,” via this TASS report in Russian on Patrushev’s remarks made yesterday. Curiosity aroused, I went to Znanie Society’s website to see if I could find his complete remarks and those of other participants. Wow! What an event. For those who don’t know, Znanie is Russian for knowledge, and the society integrates Russian leaders from all sectors with the overall educational system. (I’ve reported on this organization and its work at my substack and VK sites.) What follows are the core of Patrushev’s remarks as provided by TASS, but not all by far:

People’s Unity and Overcoming the Time of Troubles
National Unity Day symbolizes the overcoming of internal and external threats by the people of Russia through unity and cohesion.
During the Time of Troubles, Russia was on the verge of losing its sovereignty, but its people “united, defended their native land and statehood,” got rid of interventionists and traitors, restored a strong government, and embarked on the path of independent development.
This was facilitated by the enormous spiritual upsurge of the multinational people of the country, “whose statehood has always been based on three pillars – national unity, faith and a strong vertical of power.”
An Age-Old Confrontation
Europe has long sought to destroy the Russian state, as it could not tolerate the rise of the Third Rome – Moscow, this was regularly manifested in attempts at “political intrigues, economic enslavement and direct aggression.”
From the German knights to the Nazis in the 20th century, almost all of Europe participated in the aggression against Russia.
Historically, Russia has always been a “bone in the throat of the West,” hindering the implementation of its hegemonic plans, and representing a powerful civilizational alternative.
Western Russophobic ideologues have come up with entire theories on how to achieve the collapse of Russia, which formed the basis of the Western strategy to destroy our country.
The 1990s as a New Time of Troubles
The dramatic 1990s became a “new Time of Troubles” in which the existence of the Russian state was once again threatened.
The collapse of the Soviet Union gave wings to the rulers of the United States and other Westerners, who believed that by dividing Russia, they could achieve its destruction.
Western advisers flooded Russia in the 1990s, seeking to create chaos in the country, “encouraging separatism, imposing debt fetters and onerous international obligations.” The West relied on stimulating chaos and introducing external control of the country.
The West also used additional levers of pressure in the form of NATO’s aggressive eastward expansion, support for extremism and radical religious groups, inspired a “wave of defamation of the Russian Orthodox Church and traditional Islam,” and propagandized all sorts of vices.
As a result of the radical reforms imposed by the West, the standard of living in the country declined, unemployment grew, industry, agriculture, transport, and the financial system were destroyed, and the military-industrial complex actually ceased to perform its main function – to provide the armed forces with modern weapons.
International terrorism in the 1990sposed a serious threat to Russia’s sovereignty, with Western countries hypocritically calling the terrorists “fighters for freedom and democracy.”

Powerful stuff. I’ll agree with the analogy of the 1990s being a new Time of Troubles. All too often I fail to check the Russian TASS page. I’ll compile some of these “lectures’ into a review and post them to my substack. I’ll post a notification when that’s completed.

Posted by: karlof1 | Nov 5 2023 20:04 utc | 66

Someone, maybe the author, linked this piece in comments at the Kit Klarenberg Substack article:
https://ourimperialpress.substack.com/p/how-the-fk-are-these-the-good-guys
RE: NATO
“It is easily one of the biggest- and ugliest- lies to be spun as a byproduct [of] this conflict. Not that the Western mass media has ever tired of polishing the (should have long since been flushed) turd that is the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
NATO is unequivocally the most offensive, in several meanings of the word, defensive organization in history. It has no record of ever “defending” anything. Instead it has been, repeatedly, a truly brutal aggressor that has abused and crushed weaker nations.
A supposed force of righteousness and peace promotion, deterring wars and violations of national sovereignty with its steely, restrained resolve, it instead has been an initiator of numerous wars and a serial violator of national sovereignty, often pursued with a vicious, hateful enthusiasm. Sold as a vehicle to deter military actions and prevent political unrest, it is a repeated wrecker of stability, leaving nations and entire regions in chaos after disastrous, consistently failed, interventions.”

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Nov 5 2023 20:11 utc | 67

Someone, maybe the author, linked this piece in comments at the Kit Klarenberg Substack article:
https://ourimperialpress.substack.com/p/how-the-fk-are-these-the-good-guys
RE: NATO
“It is easily one of the biggest- and ugliest- lies to be spun as a byproduct [of] this conflict. Not that the Western mass media has ever tired of polishing the (should have long since been flushed) turd that is the North Atlantic Treaty Organization.
NATO is unequivocally the most offensive, in several meanings of the word, defensive organization in history. It has no record of ever “defending” anything. Instead it has been, repeatedly, a truly brutal aggressor that has abused and crushed weaker nations.
A supposed force of righteousness and peace promotion, deterring wars and violations of national sovereignty with its steely, restrained resolve, it instead has been an initiator of numerous wars and a serial violator of national sovereignty, often pursued with a vicious, hateful enthusiasm. Sold as a vehicle to deter military actions and prevent political unrest, it is a repeated wrecker of stability, leaving nations and entire regions in chaos after disastrous, consistently failed, interventions.”

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Nov 5 2023 20:11 utc | 68

Posted by: james | Nov 5 2023 17:19 utc | 17
Not sure why nobody has suggested this yet, but it works for all NYT and other typical paywalled MSM articles (not Substack or sports sites requiring membership).
https://archive.is/
Example: https://archive.ph/2S0sE
There is also a browser plugin available for Chrome (yeah, fuck Google) and others.

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Nov 5 2023 20:18 utc | 69

Posted by: james | Nov 5 2023 17:19 utc | 17
Not sure why nobody has suggested this yet, but it works for all NYT and other typical paywalled MSM articles (not Substack or sports sites requiring membership).
https://archive.is/
Example: https://archive.ph/2S0sE
There is also a browser plugin available for Chrome (yeah, fuck Google) and others.

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Nov 5 2023 20:18 utc | 70

Posted by: bevin | Nov 5 2023 18:18 utc | 22
Excellent comment…which pretty much goes for most of your contributions here, so doesn’t bear mention (by me) but for the fact that you’re a minority preaching against a great headwind. Even here.
At the same time, you have me wondering – how many of the original “neocons” were ex-Trotskyists or at least ex-Troskyite (if there’s a difference)? My understanding was that many if not most of them at the minimum claimed to be or were said to have lingered in the same circles during university and such.
And I wonder if you could elaborate on the influence of Zionism in the early days of the “neocon” movement – as many of them, again as far as my limited knowledge goes, were very much pro-Israel (which for many years following its founding was essentially a socialist country)?
Could you recommend any books on this, by the way?

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Nov 5 2023 20:23 utc | 71

Posted by: bevin | Nov 5 2023 18:18 utc | 22
Excellent comment…which pretty much goes for most of your contributions here, so doesn’t bear mention (by me) but for the fact that you’re a minority preaching against a great headwind. Even here.
At the same time, you have me wondering – how many of the original “neocons” were ex-Trotskyists or at least ex-Troskyite (if there’s a difference)? My understanding was that many if not most of them at the minimum claimed to be or were said to have lingered in the same circles during university and such.
And I wonder if you could elaborate on the influence of Zionism in the early days of the “neocon” movement – as many of them, again as far as my limited knowledge goes, were very much pro-Israel (which for many years following its founding was essentially a socialist country)?
Could you recommend any books on this, by the way?

Posted by: Tom_Q_Collins | Nov 5 2023 20:23 utc | 72

Is Life tracking Scripture or does Scripture track Life?
Here ’tis Sunday, Ed; and my Orthodox Old Calendar readings, at any rate are right on track. The Epistle extract is a bright one from the end of Corinthians II that neither circumcision nor noncircumcision ‘counts for anything’, but a ‘new creation’ is where is at, and that, friends is the ‘Israel of God’. (More on that anon.)
Then, the Gospel Reading comes from Saint Luke and is the story Of the rich man (whose name we are not told) and the poor man, Lazarus, lying at the rich man’s gate. We all know that they both die and go opposite places; what is interesting is the conversation between Abraham and the rich man, [who wishes not to be where he is, but it is apparently too late.]
So, says the rich man, please send Lazarus to my five brothers ‘so that he may warn them’. Abraham says, “They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.” And he said, “No, father Abraham; but if someone goes to him from the dead [as Lazarus now is] they will repent.” He [Abraham] said to him, “If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.”
Of course, this is Jesus telling this story to a crowd of people, and one would point out that this is the first of those who might rightfully be called ‘a Christian’, so although the participants in the story seem all to be very much Jews, one can say this is the Christian slant to it all.
On the other hand, Paul, who is writing to the Corinthians [Greeks] is very much a Jew, moreso for having severely persecuted Christians, and yet he’s the one with a positive message here, as far as providing an ‘out’ at the end of it – ‘a new creation’.
Back in the day, in my little church, we never had our priest expounding on the texts immediately after the readings – the service would continue its usual course to the end. Conversations ensued during the coffee hour [or hours] back at the house. So, I will leave it at that. Enjoy your Sundays, everyone!

Posted by: juliania | Nov 5 2023 20:25 utc | 73

Is Life tracking Scripture or does Scripture track Life?
Here ’tis Sunday, Ed; and my Orthodox Old Calendar readings, at any rate are right on track. The Epistle extract is a bright one from the end of Corinthians II that neither circumcision nor noncircumcision ‘counts for anything’, but a ‘new creation’ is where is at, and that, friends is the ‘Israel of God’. (More on that anon.)
Then, the Gospel Reading comes from Saint Luke and is the story Of the rich man (whose name we are not told) and the poor man, Lazarus, lying at the rich man’s gate. We all know that they both die and go opposite places; what is interesting is the conversation between Abraham and the rich man, [who wishes not to be where he is, but it is apparently too late.]
So, says the rich man, please send Lazarus to my five brothers ‘so that he may warn them’. Abraham says, “They have Moses and the prophets; let them hear them.” And he said, “No, father Abraham; but if someone goes to him from the dead [as Lazarus now is] they will repent.” He [Abraham] said to him, “If they do not hear Moses and the prophets, neither will they be convinced if someone should rise from the dead.”
Of course, this is Jesus telling this story to a crowd of people, and one would point out that this is the first of those who might rightfully be called ‘a Christian’, so although the participants in the story seem all to be very much Jews, one can say this is the Christian slant to it all.
On the other hand, Paul, who is writing to the Corinthians [Greeks] is very much a Jew, moreso for having severely persecuted Christians, and yet he’s the one with a positive message here, as far as providing an ‘out’ at the end of it – ‘a new creation’.
Back in the day, in my little church, we never had our priest expounding on the texts immediately after the readings – the service would continue its usual course to the end. Conversations ensued during the coffee hour [or hours] back at the house. So, I will leave it at that. Enjoy your Sundays, everyone!

Posted by: juliania | Nov 5 2023 20:25 utc | 74

@ Tom_Q_Collins | Nov 5 2023 20:18 utc | 35
thanks tom! dang, but that first link works like a hot dam! thanks..

Posted by: james | Nov 5 2023 20:33 utc | 75

@ Tom_Q_Collins | Nov 5 2023 20:18 utc | 35
thanks tom! dang, but that first link works like a hot dam! thanks..

Posted by: james | Nov 5 2023 20:33 utc | 76

Managerialism [sic] is indeed a widespread, serious and generally overlooked problem
Posted by: Scorpion | Nov 5 2023 19:59 utc | 32
Have a peek into this grande bourgeoisie (FKA βουλή) handbook: Mortality, Immortality, and Other Life Strategies by Zygmunt Bauman.

Posted by: sln2002 | Nov 5 2023 20:34 utc | 77

Managerialism [sic] is indeed a widespread, serious and generally overlooked problem
Posted by: Scorpion | Nov 5 2023 19:59 utc | 32
Have a peek into this grande bourgeoisie (FKA βουλή) handbook: Mortality, Immortality, and Other Life Strategies by Zygmunt Bauman.

Posted by: sln2002 | Nov 5 2023 20:34 utc | 78

@ Zet | Nov 5 2023 18:23 utc | 23 // @ Scorpion | Nov 5 2023 18:42 utc | 26
thanks guys.. i am on linux ( not apple ) – ubuntu, with brave browser.. i will try the archive feature… that is also what @ sln2002 | Nov 5 2023 17:24 utc | 18 recommended.. i am a bit of a luddite on ubuntu, lol..
Posted by: james | Nov 5 2023 19:00 utc | 27

Search for “Best Web Archives” and you’ll find quite a few sites that almost fully archive the entire NYTimes/WaPo/Atlantic/Grauniad daily front-pagers, among many, many others. I use Archive Today, which masqs itself under several different (and shifting) dot-affixes. Find the best one for you.
To use these services simply copy the URL of the page you want to view and then—this is sometimes (but not always) imperative—delete all the Cooke-generating tracker garbage that follows the root-URL.
A few tries and you’ll easily get the hang of it all, but a quick overview follows:
Enter the root URL into the “search” function on Archive Today and I have only found, as a guesstimate, around 0.5% of articles as “unsaved”. And in the few instances where I go back and check a few days later, those “lost pages” are almost always recorded.
The tools are out there. They are being provided and served up by the genuinely “Anonymous” (which doesn’t stupidly advertise itself) of the “Global Others as conceived by the Collective West” (GlOCCoW, maybe?): the Global South, Africa, BRICS, the SCO, OBOH/BRI, the Global left, etc: these are all combining information resources that will inevitably overwhelm all efforts by US/uk and their subsidiaries, Fr/ISI/Germ, to “control THE NARRATIVE”.
Let us not kid ourselves: what is meant by the phrase “control of the narrative” is “control of the basic facts upon which future histories will be established”.
Anyone who uses the phrase “the narrative” has (perhaps passively) assumed the social role of someone who is presuming to fight for the basic facts that will be included as “history”, from today on into the future.
Historically, any purely rhetorical fight for “history” is a battle that is only determined by combatants on a battlefield. Thus: Sargon, Babylon, Ramses, and Sumer were all established.
Thus, also, Napoleon, Churchill, and Stalin were defeated.
Yet, by extension, so also has the US been defeated in, quite literally, all of its wars since WWII—let’s emphasize WWII because the US was allied with both Britain and Russia, which in FDR’s vision would have served as a useful, cooperative counterpoint to The Vaunted British Empire (an Empire most current Media Brits strive to ignore—what with the USSR)
The USSR was such an indubitably valuable ally during WWII—and yse, all of the wars fought by the US have been in opposition NOT to “Soviet encroachment” but rather against “anti-colonial insurgencies”, against which the VAUNTED US MILITARY has ALWAYS LOST—except where the F/uk/US coalition in Africahas utilized genocide, as has been proven in Rwanda, during the Clinton era of the Neocons.
This whole presumption of dictating an “end to history” has always been just damnably stupid—Godel proved why, mathematicaly, in our modern era. But Religion was created synchronously with Mathematics—not “logick”— each in contrast to one another (and Gematria along with literal timelines of the Bible, in contrast).
Meanwhile Science (old “Mathematics”) and Humanism (as, now, ”Religion”, as argued by Nietzsche, the Existentialists, and the Communist Philosophers most cogently) are in a confused admixture that confuses each, and drives many people into often fruitless investigations of the past

Posted by: Pacifica Advocate | Nov 5 2023 20:57 utc | 79

@ Zet | Nov 5 2023 18:23 utc | 23 // @ Scorpion | Nov 5 2023 18:42 utc | 26
thanks guys.. i am on linux ( not apple ) – ubuntu, with brave browser.. i will try the archive feature… that is also what @ sln2002 | Nov 5 2023 17:24 utc | 18 recommended.. i am a bit of a luddite on ubuntu, lol..
Posted by: james | Nov 5 2023 19:00 utc | 27

Search for “Best Web Archives” and you’ll find quite a few sites that almost fully archive the entire NYTimes/WaPo/Atlantic/Grauniad daily front-pagers, among many, many others. I use Archive Today, which masqs itself under several different (and shifting) dot-affixes. Find the best one for you.
To use these services simply copy the URL of the page you want to view and then—this is sometimes (but not always) imperative—delete all the Cooke-generating tracker garbage that follows the root-URL.
A few tries and you’ll easily get the hang of it all, but a quick overview follows:
Enter the root URL into the “search” function on Archive Today and I have only found, as a guesstimate, around 0.5% of articles as “unsaved”. And in the few instances where I go back and check a few days later, those “lost pages” are almost always recorded.
The tools are out there. They are being provided and served up by the genuinely “Anonymous” (which doesn’t stupidly advertise itself) of the “Global Others as conceived by the Collective West” (GlOCCoW, maybe?): the Global South, Africa, BRICS, the SCO, OBOH/BRI, the Global left, etc: these are all combining information resources that will inevitably overwhelm all efforts by US/uk and their subsidiaries, Fr/ISI/Germ, to “control THE NARRATIVE”.
Let us not kid ourselves: what is meant by the phrase “control of the narrative” is “control of the basic facts upon which future histories will be established”.
Anyone who uses the phrase “the narrative” has (perhaps passively) assumed the social role of someone who is presuming to fight for the basic facts that will be included as “history”, from today on into the future.
Historically, any purely rhetorical fight for “history” is a battle that is only determined by combatants on a battlefield. Thus: Sargon, Babylon, Ramses, and Sumer were all established.
Thus, also, Napoleon, Churchill, and Stalin were defeated.
Yet, by extension, so also has the US been defeated in, quite literally, all of its wars since WWII—let’s emphasize WWII because the US was allied with both Britain and Russia, which in FDR’s vision would have served as a useful, cooperative counterpoint to The Vaunted British Empire (an Empire most current Media Brits strive to ignore—what with the USSR)
The USSR was such an indubitably valuable ally during WWII—and yse, all of the wars fought by the US have been in opposition NOT to “Soviet encroachment” but rather against “anti-colonial insurgencies”, against which the VAUNTED US MILITARY has ALWAYS LOST—except where the F/uk/US coalition in Africahas utilized genocide, as has been proven in Rwanda, during the Clinton era of the Neocons.
This whole presumption of dictating an “end to history” has always been just damnably stupid—Godel proved why, mathematicaly, in our modern era. But Religion was created synchronously with Mathematics—not “logick”— each in contrast to one another (and Gematria along with literal timelines of the Bible, in contrast).
Meanwhile Science (old “Mathematics”) and Humanism (as, now, ”Religion”, as argued by Nietzsche, the Existentialists, and the Communist Philosophers most cogently) are in a confused admixture that confuses each, and drives many people into often fruitless investigations of the past

Posted by: Pacifica Advocate | Nov 5 2023 20:57 utc | 80

“…fruitless investigations of the past”==demonstrably ahistorical religious Evangelical bullshit such as is puked out upon people who can neither smell nor taste the moral rot and spoilage in men like John Hagee, or Joel Osteen.

Posted by: Pacifica Advocate | Nov 5 2023 21:06 utc | 81

“…fruitless investigations of the past”==demonstrably ahistorical religious Evangelical bullshit such as is puked out upon people who can neither smell nor taste the moral rot and spoilage in men like John Hagee, or Joel Osteen.

Posted by: Pacifica Advocate | Nov 5 2023 21:06 utc | 82

Posted by: bevin | Nov 5 2023 18:18 utc | 22
———————————————————–
That was a very interesting account of you own history bevin, and pretty good breakdown concerning Trotsky and his followers after his death. I moved over to the CPUSA from the very conservative Socialist Labor Party (SLP) which was Marxist, but anti-Leninists’, Stalinist, and Trotskyists. I came to DeLeon’s SLP in my mid-twenties through my ex-father-in-law, a retired salty Merchant Marine and a firm socialist, and a hell of a nice guy. I respected him a lot, but Marxism without Lenin just didn’t seem complete. So, in my early thirties I moved over to the CP, but not without doing some research. Early on I was confused by the division between the various Marxist groupings (or should I say cults?) as it did begin to look like to me at the time.
My reading of Trotsky’s early works seemed quite reasonable, even as my association with the CP which eventually ended my interest in the works of Trotskyist didn’t completely tarnish my view of Trotsky, including the idea of the “Permanent Revolution (PR)” which at one time did seem to make sense to me.
Some time back, here on MoA, you explained why Stalin could not abide by Trotsky’s idea of the PR, and it was very similar to the many discussions I had with CP fellow travelers (I will not go into it here) and I assumed you were a fellow traveler as well.
I was living in Boston when the CP split into factions (one faction led by Angela Davis) in some part over Stalinism. This faction became the left arm of the Democratic Party and ceased to be communist as far as I can tell, not even with a little “c”.
I keep close contact with many of my CP comrades, including the head of the Houston Party, and there has not been, as you said a “wholesale desertion of the US left-communists to the imperialist cause is the genocide in Gaza” by the CP. There are differences over the PLO and Hamas, which go back to 2006. But even the CP accepts that the present leadership of the PLO are nearly worthless. At least that is my reading of the situation.

Posted by: Ed | Nov 5 2023 21:48 utc | 83

Posted by: bevin | Nov 5 2023 18:18 utc | 22
———————————————————–
That was a very interesting account of you own history bevin, and pretty good breakdown concerning Trotsky and his followers after his death. I moved over to the CPUSA from the very conservative Socialist Labor Party (SLP) which was Marxist, but anti-Leninists’, Stalinist, and Trotskyists. I came to DeLeon’s SLP in my mid-twenties through my ex-father-in-law, a retired salty Merchant Marine and a firm socialist, and a hell of a nice guy. I respected him a lot, but Marxism without Lenin just didn’t seem complete. So, in my early thirties I moved over to the CP, but not without doing some research. Early on I was confused by the division between the various Marxist groupings (or should I say cults?) as it did begin to look like to me at the time.
My reading of Trotsky’s early works seemed quite reasonable, even as my association with the CP which eventually ended my interest in the works of Trotskyist didn’t completely tarnish my view of Trotsky, including the idea of the “Permanent Revolution (PR)” which at one time did seem to make sense to me.
Some time back, here on MoA, you explained why Stalin could not abide by Trotsky’s idea of the PR, and it was very similar to the many discussions I had with CP fellow travelers (I will not go into it here) and I assumed you were a fellow traveler as well.
I was living in Boston when the CP split into factions (one faction led by Angela Davis) in some part over Stalinism. This faction became the left arm of the Democratic Party and ceased to be communist as far as I can tell, not even with a little “c”.
I keep close contact with many of my CP comrades, including the head of the Houston Party, and there has not been, as you said a “wholesale desertion of the US left-communists to the imperialist cause is the genocide in Gaza” by the CP. There are differences over the PLO and Hamas, which go back to 2006. But even the CP accepts that the present leadership of the PLO are nearly worthless. At least that is my reading of the situation.

Posted by: Ed | Nov 5 2023 21:48 utc | 84

@Scorpion | Nov 5 2023 18:38 utc | 25

However, I have emboldened your last sentences because I don’t understand them.

Sorry, I tried to be too concise, because the issue is quite complex. What I meant is the fact that the US economy reached a dominant position (between the ’40s and ’50s) due to a number of contingent reasons, i.e. being the only advanced economy left untouched by the war, being gifted loads of British technology etc.
In the American propaganda, however, all these contingent reasons were dismissed as to give the impression that the dominance of the US economy was the result of some kind of exceptionalism, of some inherent quality. To say the truth, the opposite was actually true: the extreme US capitalism is a hindrance for a real economy. However, and that is a problem of propaganda, new generations of Americans were raised with the belief in American exceptionalism, even in the economic sphere. That is the reason why the US elite could not foresee that their real economy was ill prepared to compete on a global scale, once the iron curtain was brought down.
As long as there was a Cold War and an iron curtain, Americans could keep afloat their aging real economy through a number of bullying measures: some harsh, like the aforementioned Plaza Accord, others somewhat softer, like leveraging their huge internal market for anti-competitive practices. With the end of the Cold War, new markets opened up for Western companies and the Western market opened up to Eastern companies. This fact had some big consequences: the relative importance of the US market for Western (European, Japanese) companies shrinked, becaused those companies have now more big markets to exploit, so the USA cannot leverage their own market to impose their will as before; some new big markets, e.g. China, are impervious to US political pressure, so, there, American companies have not some of the advantages they enjoy(ed) in Western markets; Eastern companies were actually more competitive and independent than what the Americans thought.
The result is that Boeing was still dominating the aerospace market in the ’80s, it was challenged by Airbus in the ’90s and it was surpassed during the 2000s. American carmakers were historically the biggest in the world, and they were outcompeted by Japanese, European and Korean automakers in the 2000s. US machine tool industry was quite important, but it is now declining steadily.

Posted by: SG | Nov 5 2023 21:49 utc | 85

@Scorpion | Nov 5 2023 18:38 utc | 25

However, I have emboldened your last sentences because I don’t understand them.

Sorry, I tried to be too concise, because the issue is quite complex. What I meant is the fact that the US economy reached a dominant position (between the ’40s and ’50s) due to a number of contingent reasons, i.e. being the only advanced economy left untouched by the war, being gifted loads of British technology etc.
In the American propaganda, however, all these contingent reasons were dismissed as to give the impression that the dominance of the US economy was the result of some kind of exceptionalism, of some inherent quality. To say the truth, the opposite was actually true: the extreme US capitalism is a hindrance for a real economy. However, and that is a problem of propaganda, new generations of Americans were raised with the belief in American exceptionalism, even in the economic sphere. That is the reason why the US elite could not foresee that their real economy was ill prepared to compete on a global scale, once the iron curtain was brought down.
As long as there was a Cold War and an iron curtain, Americans could keep afloat their aging real economy through a number of bullying measures: some harsh, like the aforementioned Plaza Accord, others somewhat softer, like leveraging their huge internal market for anti-competitive practices. With the end of the Cold War, new markets opened up for Western companies and the Western market opened up to Eastern companies. This fact had some big consequences: the relative importance of the US market for Western (European, Japanese) companies shrinked, becaused those companies have now more big markets to exploit, so the USA cannot leverage their own market to impose their will as before; some new big markets, e.g. China, are impervious to US political pressure, so, there, American companies have not some of the advantages they enjoy(ed) in Western markets; Eastern companies were actually more competitive and independent than what the Americans thought.
The result is that Boeing was still dominating the aerospace market in the ’80s, it was challenged by Airbus in the ’90s and it was surpassed during the 2000s. American carmakers were historically the biggest in the world, and they were outcompeted by Japanese, European and Korean automakers in the 2000s. US machine tool industry was quite important, but it is now declining steadily.

Posted by: SG | Nov 5 2023 21:49 utc | 86

@ Posted by: karlof1 | Nov 5 2023 20:04 utc | 33
That’s what I have been trying to articulate!
I have been having to figure it out by my own research , but there it is! In black and white.
It’s our West against their East. We have been the villains for centuries in our avarice and attempt at hegemony over not just them but the whole world. Or our lords and masters have. No matter what fairytales were sold of our ‘Rights’ as individuals and pantomime ‘democracy’, ‘one man one vote’ …lies all lies.
For our grandkids sake – they must know the truth – we must question all our beliefs.
Thank you again for your great work , along with b and others to make this site so crucial in understanding just wtf is going on!

Posted by: DunGroanin | Nov 5 2023 22:01 utc | 87

@ Posted by: karlof1 | Nov 5 2023 20:04 utc | 33
That’s what I have been trying to articulate!
I have been having to figure it out by my own research , but there it is! In black and white.
It’s our West against their East. We have been the villains for centuries in our avarice and attempt at hegemony over not just them but the whole world. Or our lords and masters have. No matter what fairytales were sold of our ‘Rights’ as individuals and pantomime ‘democracy’, ‘one man one vote’ …lies all lies.
For our grandkids sake – they must know the truth – we must question all our beliefs.
Thank you again for your great work , along with b and others to make this site so crucial in understanding just wtf is going on!

Posted by: DunGroanin | Nov 5 2023 22:01 utc | 88

“…Stalin were defeated.”
Posted by: Pacifica Advocate | Nov 5 2023 20:57 utc | 40
—————————————————————————–
Stalin, and the Russian people won the fucking WWII in Europe. Are you arguing differently? Then please explain?

Posted by: Ed | Nov 5 2023 22:03 utc | 89

“…Stalin were defeated.”
Posted by: Pacifica Advocate | Nov 5 2023 20:57 utc | 40
—————————————————————————–
Stalin, and the Russian people won the fucking WWII in Europe. Are you arguing differently? Then please explain?

Posted by: Ed | Nov 5 2023 22:03 utc | 90

No matter what fairytales were sold of our ‘Rights’ as individuals and pantomime ‘democracy’, ‘one man one vote’ …lies all lies.
Posted by: DunGroanin | Nov 5 2023 22:01 utc | 44
——————————————————————–
Voting, even one man (person) one vote, does not a democracy make. It is who and what you are voting for. Our “Democratic Republican” form of government ensures that we always elect a majority of candidates that represent a minorty class of wealthy doners. Whatever was promised during the campaigns is null and void as soon as the first session of the newly elected candidates are gaveled into office. You would think that the American and Europeans would get the message.

Posted by: Ed | Nov 5 2023 22:15 utc | 91

No matter what fairytales were sold of our ‘Rights’ as individuals and pantomime ‘democracy’, ‘one man one vote’ …lies all lies.
Posted by: DunGroanin | Nov 5 2023 22:01 utc | 44
——————————————————————–
Voting, even one man (person) one vote, does not a democracy make. It is who and what you are voting for. Our “Democratic Republican” form of government ensures that we always elect a majority of candidates that represent a minorty class of wealthy doners. Whatever was promised during the campaigns is null and void as soon as the first session of the newly elected candidates are gaveled into office. You would think that the American and Europeans would get the message.

Posted by: Ed | Nov 5 2023 22:15 utc | 92

So, here we are. A total clusterfuck. And, for you sensitive ones, b used that in an article years ago. I was wondering if any of you have seen the photographs of Soliemani and General Patreus together?

Posted by: Immaculate deception | Nov 5 2023 22:18 utc | 93

So, here we are. A total clusterfuck. And, for you sensitive ones, b used that in an article years ago. I was wondering if any of you have seen the photographs of Soliemani and General Patreus together?

Posted by: Immaculate deception | Nov 5 2023 22:18 utc | 94

This article Western Left and the US-China Contradiction sums up the problem with the Western Trotskyist Left (e.g. World Socialist Web Site or Novara Media) so well:

Their position amounts in effect to saying: I have my notion of how a socialist society should behave (which is an idealised notion), and if China’s behaviour in some respects differs from my notion, then ipso facto China cannot be socialist and hence must be capitalist.

A bunch of mostly upper middle class intellectual masturbators imagining what a “perfect” socialism would be and rejecting any actual existing socialism because it does not meet their ridiculous standard. The enemies of real change.

One may critique many aspects of Chinese economy and society, but calling it “capitalist” and hence engaged in imperialist activities on a par with western metropolitan economies, is a travesty. It is not only analytically wrong but leads to praxis that is palpably against the interests of both the working classes in the metropolis and the working people in the global south.

Posted by: Roger | Nov 5 2023 22:24 utc | 95

This article Western Left and the US-China Contradiction sums up the problem with the Western Trotskyist Left (e.g. World Socialist Web Site or Novara Media) so well:

Their position amounts in effect to saying: I have my notion of how a socialist society should behave (which is an idealised notion), and if China’s behaviour in some respects differs from my notion, then ipso facto China cannot be socialist and hence must be capitalist.

A bunch of mostly upper middle class intellectual masturbators imagining what a “perfect” socialism would be and rejecting any actual existing socialism because it does not meet their ridiculous standard. The enemies of real change.

One may critique many aspects of Chinese economy and society, but calling it “capitalist” and hence engaged in imperialist activities on a par with western metropolitan economies, is a travesty. It is not only analytically wrong but leads to praxis that is palpably against the interests of both the working classes in the metropolis and the working people in the global south.

Posted by: Roger | Nov 5 2023 22:24 utc | 96

DunGroanin | Nov 5 2023 22:01 utc | 44 “For our grandkids sake – they must know the truth – we must question all our beliefs.”
As Patrick Armstrong wrote, the point at which we realize everything we have been told were lies.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Nov 5 2023 22:26 utc | 97

DunGroanin | Nov 5 2023 22:01 utc | 44 “For our grandkids sake – they must know the truth – we must question all our beliefs.”
As Patrick Armstrong wrote, the point at which we realize everything we have been told were lies.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Nov 5 2023 22:26 utc | 98

Re bypassing paywalls or subscription walls. At most sites, once the page has opened it takes a second or a few for the blocker to appear. Hit the readerview icon during that short window. Full article comes up in the reader view format. Sometimes photos ect are missing but the written article is always complete.
Reader view icon on the three browsers I use is always (on the three browsers I use) innermost icon in the address bar. It generally appears only when the page opens so best to be aware of its exact location and have the pointer there ready to click on it the moment it appears.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Nov 5 2023 22:40 utc | 99

Re bypassing paywalls or subscription walls. At most sites, once the page has opened it takes a second or a few for the blocker to appear. Hit the readerview icon during that short window. Full article comes up in the reader view format. Sometimes photos ect are missing but the written article is always complete.
Reader view icon on the three browsers I use is always (on the three browsers I use) innermost icon in the address bar. It generally appears only when the page opens so best to be aware of its exact location and have the pointer there ready to click on it the moment it appears.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Nov 5 2023 22:40 utc | 100

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