Moon of Alabama Brecht quote
February 25, 2024

The MoA Week In Review - OT 2024-060

Last week's post on Moon of Alabama:

Ukraine:

Middle East:

Election:

---
Other issues:

Nordstream:

Syria:

Russia:

Health:

Boeing:

> Sir Tim Clark told the Financial Times he had seen a “progressive decline” in Boeing’s standards, which he put down to long-running management and governance mis-steps, including prioritising financial performance over engineering excellence. <

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

Posted by b on February 25, 2024 at 13:03 UTC | Permalink

Comments
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And some more to read, on the history of colonialism

https://www.wealthandpower.org

Posted by: Minaa | Feb 25 2024 13:28 utc | 1

Thanks Mina. That looks very interesting.

Posted by: bevin | Feb 25 2024 13:53 utc | 2

US commercial real estate market has simply melted away. For sure, EU is hit hard too.

Remember that construction sector is (was) a large chunk of the entire remaining 'productive' economy in the west. And the financialization built on top of commercial and residential real estate debt is another large chunk of the economy.

A historic building in Minneapolis just sold at a shocking 80%+ 'discount' - this is not a typo

The 164k sq ft building sold for $3.8 million or $23 per sq ft

What did the seller pay for it back in 2017? $19.2 million

What's concerning is that even at 70-80% 'discounts' there are few buyers at those prices for office buildings across the US...

This is not good for commercial real estate or the financial system.

For the latest updates on the commercial real estate meltdown just like this, make sure to follow
@TripleNetInvest

https://twitter.com/TripleNetInvest/status/1761737453629853806

Posted by: unimperator | Feb 25 2024 14:09 utc | 3

The collapse in commercial real estate values will wack regional banks big time. Regional and local banks tend to focus on real estate loans.

Another topic :

Question - any insights on the pace of de-dollarization ?

Posted by: Exile | Feb 25 2024 14:11 utc | 4

Broken link https://nordictimes.com/world/independent-investigator-elements-of-uk-government-behind-nord-stream-attacks/

---

If find it impossible to harmonize Hersh's story of Washington intrigue with an attack carried out from a British submarine.

How many hundred people can keep a secret?

Posted by: too scents | Feb 25 2024 14:16 utc | 5

"This is not good for commercial real estate or the financial system."

Posted by: unimperator | Feb 25 2024 14:09 utc | 3

---

Counterpoint: price discovery is good.

Posted by: too scents | Feb 25 2024 14:19 utc | 6

"US commercial real estate market has simply melted away. For sure, EU is hit hard too.

Remember that construction sector is (was) a large chunk of the entire remaining 'productive' economy in the west. And the financialization built on top of commercial and residential real estate debt is another large chunk of the economy.

A historic building in Minneapolis just sold at a shocking 80%+ 'discount' - this is not a typo
The 164k sq ft building sold for $3.8 million or $23 per sq ft

What did the seller pay for it back in 2017? $19.2 million

What's concerning is that even at 70-80% 'discounts' there are few buyers at those prices for office buildings across the US...

This is not good for commercial real estate or the financial system.

For the latest updates on the commercial real estate meltdown just like this, make sure to follow
@TripleNetInvest

https://twitter.com/TripleNetInvest/status/1761737453629853806"

Posted by: unimperator | Feb 25 2024 14:09 utc | 3

I have a colleague in the CRE business in Toronto and Ottawa. I naively asked him, "Why not renovate office buildings to residential stock-apartments or condos since we do not enough units at present?"

He replied-"That's a pipedream" . Going on to explain these buildings don't have kitchen or plumbing for individual units so you need to go reconfigure into individual units would be a nightmare in time and money.

He said, secondly: "The buildings usually have an inner courtyard-so what to do with all that space, you can't rent it out and to reconstruct into individual units it is another nightmare" He kept saying ,"nightmare", a lot.

The current US CRE will slap the economy with a crash greater than 2008; in my opinion.

Posted by: canuck | Feb 25 2024 14:25 utc | 7

Ah a new open thread I’m glad I checked before posting Sunday sermon. Be seated or dance or whatever.

I have over recent years finally realised that WE have always lived in a fascist Collective West. One that we have been deluded into believing is the highest human civilisation that has ever emerged ! That with our jet set , Hollywoodised lives and cultural hegemony, we are the wisest humans of all!

We are certainly the Smuggest.

Why the demented Russophobia , joining Sinophobia, Islamophobia joining the Xenophobia that we have been so accustomed to?

The endless ‘cunning stunt’ Plans by the Few who are best described by the spoonerism of that phrase.

The centuries long constant attempt at taking Russia has failed every time - with dire consequences as they retaliated by driving the invaders back to their own capital cities in Europe. London only surviving because of being an island!

So every attempt is moulded to keep the populations ‘on side’ as they are the ones called upon to make the ultimate sacrifices for our masters timeless avarice amongst other megalomaniac tendencies.

The RF forces were not thrown in human waves on the well prepared defences. They haven’t Over Extended in big arrows and left itself wide open to a simple stroll into Crimea and adverse world opinion.

How. Very. Dare. They??

‘Boo hoo the Putinistas stole our ball … sniffle, sniffle.
MORE sanctions, MORE Magick $ Billions, MORE unwilling Last of the Ukrainians. That Land is Our Land - look we have the signed contract from the snotty green goblin god itself! See?? It’s ours I tell you …’

So here we are. How did it happen and why does it not stop? How could Russia for a change be the invader instead of a defender?

The Russian of course were fully aware of all of the machinations throughout history. Hell! they were even called into meetings with their would be ‘partners’ who made demands of capitulation directly. what they wanted - for the Russian bear to roll over and cry uncle - or else!

Such not so secret meetings having long taken place. There are photos of Lavrov co with their opposite numbers from the White House , the young Psaki and Zhakarova even - as the Dance was prepared - ‘Partners’ - why do we suppose the phrase has been used so acidly by the Russians?

The constant repetitions over the years in the revealed wikileaks memoranda from ambassadors show ; reporting that the only way Russia would be pushed to do such an extraterritorial direct adventure would be to have an existential reason.

A real Red Line. That explains the whole ‘unprovoked invasion’ Narrative construct.

It also addresses the massed animus against Assange - as they know that other incendiary records exist which he has but hadn’t yet revealed. Hence his daily torture.

The Russians instead of blindly being provoked and be part of the greater salami sliced conquest of the World , instead made their own plans to help the Global South, the MENA and with their unprecedented, unimaginable alliance with China have forged the Multipolar World Order.

By fighting back across the Evil Empires 1000 fronts by Resistance and cuts in each one!

So when the Red Line crossing provocations, forced them to act as planned by their foes. They wouldn’t stand alone.
The survival from an unsurvivable predicament by not shunning the trap set but embracing it!
A master Judo Move.

Hence the outcomes hoped for by the collective west and its masters of money are turned to ashes on their lizatdy tongues - just when they thought it was finally a victory!

The victory that was to be heralded in by the New pseudo religions of Woke, Global Calamity and sacrifices demanded of the masses whilst the Few carry on as they have for centuries!

Their total control of Money, Media and Intellectual and Cultural Superiority would have finally achieved their homosuperior goals and they could plough on with the rest of the long planned management of humanity and the Earth!

The Golden Billion, the Useless Eaters dispensed, the Slaves and Servants who would own nothing and be Happy.
Hell they even had a song anthem saying that prepared and promoted!

There is only ever another Plan for the deluded minions to peddle for their Masters because they have No Reverse Gear. Not even a U-turn steer. Just double down on ever more useless sanctions, ever more money printing to pay even more mercenaries and proxies and threats with ever more lethal weapons!

That is Where we are and Why and How as simply as I can write it now.

It turns out we have always lived in a fascist collective waste that we have been deluded into believing is the highest human civilisation that has ever emerged !

Now to enjoy the fine reads offered by our host !

Posted by: DunGroanin | Feb 25 2024 14:36 utc | 8

V useful piece from IndianPunchline on Central Asia ...

Good relations all round - and important diplomatic wins for Russia.

Posted by: Don Firineach | Feb 25 2024 14:39 utc | 9

"Biden wants to put the US on permanent war footing - Responsible Statecraft, Feb 23 2024" ??????


No, this is called "crony capitalism" for the Military Industrial Complex. Remember, Biden sometimes had to borrow money to be able to attend congress when he was a simple member of Congress.

One Margaret Thatcher once said "the problem with socialism is that sooner or later one runs out of otherman's money".

Well, I have a similar statement about Capitalism: "The problem with capitalism is that sooner or later one runs out of other man's money"".

Posted by: WMG | Feb 25 2024 14:49 utc | 10

British journalist Max Hastings heard netanyahu saying something very disturbing:

https://twitter.com/DalrympleWill/status/1721163356051288412

Posted by: WMG | Feb 25 2024 14:51 utc | 11

Re: converting office building into residential

It’s a technical nightmare mostly having to do with the distributed systems ( ie HVAC ) as well as the vastly different floor to floor spacing.

Many have tried over the decades and mostly failed. However, one real estate developer famously made a success of converting a long dormant office tower at Columbus circle into a luxury residential tower and hotel …….donald Trump 🤪

Posted by: Exile | Feb 25 2024 14:53 utc | 12

In a nutshell.

This synopsis is only talking about the last 100 years or so but the basic concept is much older than that. Clearly other things have been going on too but this has always been the why and the what for.

For the last 100+ years but mostly after WWII the US and its allies, usually referred to as “The West” have been dominating the global extraction, production, and consumption of the worlds finite natural resources. This process, commonly referred to as the “resource curse” is well known. What is much less well known is the other side of this operation which is called “demand destruction” You see it was never enough to just take the resources, it is equally or more important to make sure other countries, whether they have resources or not, do not grow their economies using those resources whereby driving up the price and accelerating the depletion of those finite resources.

I won’t go into the details of all the myriad ways in which the west/US has accomplished this other than to say they have used every dirty trick in the book economically, financially, politically, militarily, covertly, and more all of which has the net effect of tens of millions dead, hundreds of millions wounded/disabled, and billions living lives of hopeless suffering.

The west, mostly the US, has succeeded in securing for themselves the lions share of what the world has to offer and enslaved a large part of the global population to produce much of what the west consumes.

Well this paradigm is ending. The global majority has tried to resist the west several times throughout history but have always been violently slapped down and set back decades in the process. This time the non-western global majority are better organized and have the backing and support of Russia and China who individually could most likely beat the west and together along with Iran, North Korea, and dozens of other smaller but determined countries could absolutely destroy the US and the west.

So far none of this is going to be easy for Americans or Europeans to swallow however none of it can be denied either. With reference to Overton I believe that the window has been cracked open and is being nudged further open every day.

This new paradigm is a done deal, nothing can stop it now…well except for several big mushroom clouds.

As heinous as it has been the thing is the west had to do it this way. I am not condoning it in any way but lets do a quick thought experiment that may help put things in perspective.

Lets say that things went differently after WWII. All of the legacy colonialist pulled out of their respective colonies. France, Italy, Spain, THE US, fully out of Asia, Indonesia, Africa, Middle East, Latin America, all of it. They allowed all of these regions to develop their economies, industries, extraction and value added production, trade amongst themselves, oh they would still be happy to trade with the west but only for the fair market price and only if the west has something they want. They would not allow western capital to buy their way into their economies and syphon off most of revenues and pay no taxes aka, Globalism.

A couple of things would have happened by now. First the US economy would not be half of what it is today nor would the other western nations. Next with 5 times the number of consumers as the west the worlds finite resources would all be well past peak and hitting a wall, there would certainly be nothing left for them to export. Also the environment would be a steaming pile of toxic shit (even more than it already is) and the CO2 would be twice what it is now triggering a couple dozen positive feedback mechanisms sending the planet into hot house earth at +10c where just about everything dies.

One of my favorite things to contemplate in this scenario is the FACT that we would have hundreds of thousands of absolutely brilliant people of every race and gender possibly free to develop a more positive and equatable future for mankind. I am certain that they could have done much better than the handful of conniving asswipes that have directed humanity to where we are now.

So here we are now at the brink of a new world paradigm where 5 or 6 billion people are free and motivated to make up for the last … forever and start building … everything! Ports, rail, factories, roads, bridges, electric power plants, cars, air-conditioners, and more, more than 3 or 4 times what we already have built.

Anyone really think that can happen?

Posted by: jef | Feb 25 2024 15:27 utc | 13

The Portsmouth Treaty concluding the Russo-Japanese War:


The signing of the treaty created three decades of peace between the two nations and confirmed Japan's emergence as the pre-eminent power in East Asia. Born from the Taft–Katsura agreement, the treaty gave consent to the Japanese colonization of Korea, and later resulted in the annexation of Korea to Japan in 1910.

The treaty also forced Russian Empire to abandon its expansionist policies in East Asia, but it was not well received by the Japanese people.[6] The Japanese public were aware of their country's unbroken string of military victories over the Russians but were less aware of the precarious overextension of military and economic power that the victories had required. News of the terms of the treaty appeared to show Japanese weakness in front of the European powers, and this frustration caused the Hibiya riots and the collapse of First Katsura Cabinet (first premiership of Katsura Tarō) on January 7, 1906.[2]

Because of the role played by Theodore Roosevelt, the United States became a significant force in world diplomacy. President Roosevelt was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1906 for his backchannel efforts before and during the peace negotiations even though he never actually went to Portsmouth.

Unsurprising that the Americans are behind even that unlikely colonial horror.

What modern act of colonialism is the USA *not* ultimately responsible for?

Posted by: Arch Bungle | Feb 25 2024 15:44 utc | 14

"...we have always lived in a fascist collective waste that we have been deluded into believing is the highest human civilisation that has ever emerged!"

Reality tends to be more complicated than such sweeping statements. For example, it would be plausible to argue that Switzerland has indeed been an exemplar of the highest human civilisation that has ever emerged. The Swiss constitution of 1848 was modeled after the American constitution. Among the larger countries, the US was arguably the freest and most prosperous nation that had ever existed, with the average household income of the poorest 20 percent of the population gradually improving to match what had been the overall median household income one generation earlier.

However, the US was drawn into both World Wars, created intelligence agencies, and when the World War II ended, the newly-created CIA became involved not only in foreign intrigue, but also in domestic affairs, infiltrating the media, and engaging in domestic spying and assassinations. A semi-fascist state was born.

Posted by: greg | Feb 25 2024 17:39 utc | 15

Zombified billion or palanquin bearing billion rather than golden? More appropriate

Posted by: Ordinarydude | Feb 25 2024 17:54 utc | 16

thanks b.. i enjoyed the lucy komisar article on navalny and will find some time for the baud article she links on the bottom of her article, also on the topic of navalny being a deep state asset…

Posted by: james | Feb 25 2024 18:10 utc | 17

Corrected link

https://nordictimes.com/world/independent-investigator-elements-of-uk-government-behind-nord-stream-attacks/

I’m on a phone so can’t format the link.

Posted by: jonku | Feb 25 2024 18:36 utc | 18

I had a one hour meeting/reunion with a former student--Mexican American-- who is now a state legislator in Illinois. I asked him about the border/immigration. He said it's causing lots of anger and conflict in the Chicago area. Most of his constituents are Mexican ranging from 4th generation to recent arrivals and have always endured the strains of helping to bring relatives up and then helping them integrate into their respective communities. It's always been hard. New arrivals seldom speak English and their English speaking cousins strain resources, take up room and sometimes cause embarrassment. Now it's worse.
New arrivals--according to him-- are not coming from Mexico. They have no extended family network but are receiving work permits, housing vouchers, food assistance and medical cards. Schools are enrolling large numbers K through 12. Middle and high school fights are up. Many Mexicans who came up as far back as 1990 still don't have legal residence and are very angry.

My sister-in-law teaches in a large school district and said they are receiving large numbers of Africans. Lots of gang fights in the high school. She said Blacks don't want to be called "African American" anymore partly because they do not want to identify with the new immigrants.

Both of the above people are Democrats and are involve in local and state issues. I assume they themselves will punch the blue team ticket but my guess is that many of the less affluent parents and voters will not. The immigration issue is definitely a "thing" in Illinois.

Posted by: migueljose | Feb 25 2024 18:48 utc | 19

Thank you, b - lots to read! I enjoyed the juxtaposition of the Tass article with your fine Kursk comparison. Nature has welcomed my youngest daughter's birthday with a big burst of juniper pollen -- fortunately there's wind forecast for tomorrow!

If anyone has allergies this spring, masks do help, and also small spoonfuls of honey work for me.

Posted by: juliania | Feb 25 2024 18:52 utc | 20

@ Posted by: greg | Feb 25 2024 17:39 utc | 16
“ For example, it would be plausible to argue that Switzerland has indeed been an exemplar of the highest human civilisation that has ever emerged”

That’s been addressed a long time ago fella.

“ In Switzerland, they had brotherly love, they had five hundred years of democracy and peace – and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock.”
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=cydkTy6GmFA

That’s when cinema was still able to produce art instead of fairy tale propaganda.

Fascism is what western civilisation since the Money Men took over the imperialist Mission.

Take another look at what you believe to be ‘history’.

Posted by: [email protected] | Feb 25 2024 19:58 utc | 21

migueljose

It’s my understanding that net Mexican immigration (both legal and not) has been a tiny bit negative since 2007-08.

Posted by: Exile | Feb 25 2024 20:25 utc | 22

The US continues to destroy countries to its south, such as the brutal sanctions on Venezuela and shipping gang members from the US to their "home" countries, and then complains about the resultant desperate people flowing north. Same with the Europeans complaining about all the refugees from their destruction of Libya (which also acted as block on refugees from further south), Syria, Lebanon and Iraq.

If the Republicans really wanted to solve the illegal immigrant problem they would remove all of their illegal sanctions and provide proper development support to Central America. The European (and the US) would need to accept Gaddafi's son as the only legitimate Libyan leader, Assad as the Syrian leader and get the hell out of Iraq. Then also put the employers of illegal immigrants in jail. But of course they wont, instead they will "build a wall". The Democrats wont because they can use woke bullshit to cover up their importation of illegals to help drive down wages.

And the average American / European has to deal with it. Same as the average Londoner who is now an ethnic minority in the city. Same happening very much also in Canada with massive legal immigration.

Posted by: Roger | Feb 25 2024 21:40 utc | 23

Posted by: Roger | Feb 25 2024 21:40 utc | 24

We are held hostage in our own countries by malicious jews.

Nobody wanted war in the middle east but somehow, in our name, our resources and men are used to fight in every country that borders isreal and the refugees are again sent by jews from the middle east into our nations.

There is not one country the White man can call his own, that he runs. Its all a nightmare, with race traitor politicians and HR women as the political politburo who will take your job away for wrongthink.

Even the politicians that promise to not go to war in the middle east do so anyway.

I take no blame for any of this.
I still don't want immigrants or refugees of any kind for any reason.

I just read that 1.5% of lawyers are Black women but somehow in the NY supreme court its 100% black female judges.

People need to wake up. Break the conditioning. What on earth do you mean "we" are responsible for any of this ?

We are completely occupied, savagely oppressed. And a key part of that oppression is the thought that we are free and have anything to do with the system. Voting doesn't matter. We are chattle slaves who think we are free.

I agree with a lot of what you say Roger but you do know its within the realm of possibility that Republicans say they want to solve illegal immigration but in reality they don't want to, right ?

The only thing that could or can be done is for people in the news, media, govt, armed forces, big globohomo corporations, they all have to stop cooperating or sabotage the work output.

Regular, reasonable White men in the USA have ZERO political power. That's all there is to it.

The only other option to remedy things is unspeakable and if most of polite society can't even suss out that they are g0yim slaves then I doubt they are ready to even discuss the unspeakable.

Posted by: ryanggg | Feb 25 2024 22:12 utc | 24

The Julian Assange hearings have concluded and in a few weeks there will be a ruling.

If extradited to the US he will arrive during a Presidential election and be a pawn in that.

Most are aware of the video taken by an Apache helicopter firing 30 millimeter rounds
and hellfire missiles, released to the public by Julian Assange and Wikileaks.

A lesser known release by Wikileaks is of a Pentagon memo. The memo confirms war crimes committed
by President Obama as well as confirms his cover up of those crimes. It also describes a scheme
to subvert the Constitution and bypass Congress. Obama and the Pentagon are also seen bribing
Yemen officials as reward for their participation in the cover up.

https://search.wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/10SANAA4_a.html

Posted by: librul | Feb 25 2024 22:15 utc | 25

@Posted by: Exile | Feb 25 2024 20:25 utc | 23

It’s my understanding that net Mexican immigration (both legal and not) has been a tiny bit negative since 2007-08.

From a recent Pew Research Report:

Here are key findings about how the [approx. 4.5 million] U.S. unauthorized immigrant population changed from 2017 to 2021:

The most common country of birth for unauthorized immigrants is Mexico. However, the population of unauthorized immigrants from Mexico dropped by 900,000 from 2017 to 2021, to 4.1 million.

There were increases in unauthorized immigrants from nearly every other region of the world – Central America, the Caribbean, South America, Asia, Europe and sub-Saharan Africa.

Among U.S. states, only Florida and Washington saw increases to their unauthorized immigrant populations, while California and Nevada saw decreases. In all other states, unauthorized immigrant populations were unchanged.

4.6% of U.S. workers in 2021 were unauthorized immigrants, virtually identical to the share in 2017.

So the flow of illegals is equalling those illegals who become legal or leave, and the Mexican share is radically down.

Meanwhile, the lawful immigrant population grew by more than 8 million, a 29% increase, and the number of naturalized U.S. citizens grew by 49%. In 2021, naturalized citizens accounted for about half (49%) of all immigrants in the country.

i.e. lawful immigration (and also permanent residents) are a much larger factor than illegals. Nearly a million legal immigrants were allowed in in 2022.

The decrease in unauthorized immigrants from Mexico reflects several factors:

- A broader decline in migration from Mexico to the U.S.

- Mexican immigrants to the U.S. continuing to return to Mexico

- Expanded opportunities for lawful immigration from Mexico and other countries, especially for temporary agricultural workers.

After Mexico, the countries of origin with the largest unauthorized immigrant populations in the U.S. in 2021 were:

- El Salvador (800,000)
- India (725,000)
- Guatemala (700,000)
- Honduras (525,000)

The Northern Triangle

Three Central American countries – El Salvador, Honduras and Guatemala – together represented 2.0 million unauthorized immigrants in the U.S. in 2021, or almost 20% of the total. The unauthorized immigrant population from the Northern Triangle grew by about 250,000 from 2017 and about 700,000 from 2007.

Other origin countries

Venezuela was the country of birth for 190,000 U.S. unauthorized immigrants in 2021. This population saw particularly fast growth, from 130,000 in 2017 and 55,000 in 2007.

Among countries with the largest numbers of U.S. unauthorized immigrants, India, Brazil, Canada and former Soviet Union countries all experienced growth from 2017 to 2021.

Some origin countries with significant unauthorized immigrant populations showed no change, notably China (375,000) and the Dominican Republic (230,000).

The six states with the largest unauthorized immigrant populations in 2021 were:

- California (1.9 million)
- Texas (1.6 million)
- Florida (900,000)
- New York (600,000)
- New Jersey (450,000)
- Illinois (400,000)

https://www.pewresearch.org/short-reads/2023/11/16/what-we-know-about-unauthorized-immigrants-living-in-the-us/


Posted by: Roger | Feb 25 2024 22:17 utc | 26

Oh boy this is Brilliant !!!!

I laughed so hard I woke up the neighbours.

The right are having their get together at CPAC all the big names are there and all the right wing populists.

The El Salvador President Nayib Bukele is asked to give a speech and address the conference and then tells the truth.

18 and half mins in.

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=u0e_grWEcB0

This was long overdue and even know they all know it they still won't admit to the American people. They'll still.lie about it day and night.

The left haven't even got the courage to say it they keep the myth going.

I always thought it would be the left that would be the first to come out and say it. Nothing but a bunch of cowards and the right have beaten them to it. Not that it matters as voters are dumb anyway.

Posted by: Echo Chamber | Feb 25 2024 22:34 utc | 27

- The EU has already weakened the Ukraine more than A LOT OF people dare to think. From 2004 onwards the EU allowed people from EU member A to work in all the other EU countries. As a result of this A LOT OF men from Eastern Europe (+ the Balkan) moved to western Europe (e.g. Germany, Nethelands and the UK) to work over there. The british government estimated that about 50 thousand workers from the rest of the EU would move to the UK. Instead of 50 thousand some 500 thousand workers came to the UK.

As a result of that there were shortages of workers in e.g. Poland, Romania and Bulgaria. These countries decided to hire people from the Ukraine to aleviate these shortages in those countries. The ukrainian men and women who went to work in eastern Europe were all in the age brackets between say 20 and 40 years old. Precisely the group of people who are also very likely to be drawn i9nto the ukrainian army.

When the war in the Ukrain started A LOT OF people - predominantly from eastern Ukraine - fled to the EU, making the shortages of men of fighting age even larger. After february 2022 another 2 million (????) people left the Ukraine. No wonder the Ukraine has problems finding enough men for the army.

Posted by: WMG | Feb 25 2024 22:46 utc | 28

@Posted by: librul | Feb 25 2024 22:15 utc | 26

(@26 continued)

Even before the targets in Yemen had been "legally" designated as
a Foreign Terrorist Organization Obama used cluster bombs to shred
dozens of women and children in a failed attempt to hit members of
"al Qaida in Yemen (AQY)".

The war crime immediately became a dirty Obama secret, covered up
with the help of the MSM, in particular ABC.

An enthusiastic White House had leaked to their contacts at ABC that
Obama had escalated the War on Terror, taking it to another country,
Yemen. This was December 17, 2009 only days after Obama had returned
from his ceremony in Oslo where he proudly accepted the Nobel Peace
Prize.

ABC was thrilled with their scoop and in manly voices announced
the escalation in the War on Terror.

The very next day ABC went silent forever about it, joining the cover up
of a war crime.

Hillary Clinton, by the way, committed her own act of cover up.
Covering her butt by backdating a memo (fraud - Federal fraud).

The designation of a organization as a FTO (Foreign Terrorist Organization)
is not official nor legal until it is published in the Federal Register.
An oversight? Obama attacked Yemen before Secretary of State Hillary Clinton
had done the paperwork to make the killing legal?

The designation was not published until a month later, January 19, 2010.
Hillary Clinton back dated the memo she published in the Register with the date of
December 14, 2009, to somewhat cover her butt.

Obama's acceptance speech in Oslo for the Nobel Peace Prize was December 10th.

Yemen leaders agreed to participate in Obama's coverup saying it was their
own Yemen forces that had accidentally shredded dozens of women and children.

Obama was grateful to the Yemen leaders. The Yemen leaders were not
honored in Oslo. But, ironically, Obama ended his speech honoring women
and children, days before he ordered their slaughter.

How can one not be cynical.

"Hope and Change" Obama in Oslo, accepted his Nobel Peace Prize.
Reading between the lines, Obama described
"Hope" as a Child's Dream.

Reading between the lines, the real world, according to Obama's speech is
'a cruel world' with 'punishing poverty',
a world where 'oppression will always be with us',
'deprivation is intractable',
'clear-eyed we can understand that there will be war',
but there is 'still a place for that child's dreams'.

One week after his Nobel Peace Prize speech
Mr Hope and Change shredded dozens of women and children in Yemen
and covered it up.

Obama in Oslo, December 10, 2009:


"Somewhere today, a mother facing punishing poverty
still takes the time to teach her child, scrapes together what
few coins she has to send that child to school -- because she
believes that a cruel world still has a place for that child's
dreams.

Let us live by their example. We can acknowledge that oppression will
always be with us, and still strive for justice. We can admit the
intractability of deprivation, and still strive for dignity. Clear-eyed,
we can understand that there will be war, and still strive for peace.
We can do that -- for that is the story of human progress; that's the

hope

of all the world; and at this moment of challenge,
that must be our work here on Earth.

Thank you very much.
(Applause.)

One week later Obama shredded dozens of women and children in Yemen
and covered it up.

Here is ABC's Brian Ross using his most masculine voice to boast about Obama's attack:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bHcg3TNSRPs

Wikileaks cable corroborates evidence of US airstrikes in Yemen (Amnesty Intl)
https://www.amnesty.org/en/press-releases/2010/12/wikileaks-cable-corroborates-evidence-us-airstrikes-yemen/

Actual cable at Wikileaks:
https://search.wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/10SANAA4_a.html

Posted by: librul | Feb 25 2024 22:52 utc | 29

@Posted by: librul | Feb 25 2024 22:52 utc | 30

(@26 and @30 continued)

The cable summing up a meeting between General Petraeus and President Saleh of Yemen
discusses laundering weapons to get around the 'American "bureaucracy"'. (Congress and the Constitution)
We sell weapons to Saudi Arabia and they
transfer them to President Saleh of Yemen to use against the Houthis.

https://search.wikileaks.org/plusd/cables/10SANAA4_a.html

"The U.S. could convince Saudi Arabia and the UAE to supply six
helicopters each if the American "bureaucracy" prevented
quick approval, Saleh suggested. The General responded that
he had already considered the ROYG's request for helicopters
and was in discussions with Saudi Arabia on the matter. "We
won't use the helicopters in Sa'ada, I promise. Only against
al-Qaeda," Saleh told General Petraeus."

Saleh *'promised'* to use the helicopters only in war #1 and not war #2.

In the same meeting the Yemeni made a joke about lying to their own Parliament.

""We'll continue saying the
bombs are ours, not yours," Saleh said, prompting Deputy
Prime Minister Alimi to joke that he had just "lied" by
telling Parliament that the bombs in Arhab, Abyan, and Shebwa
were American-made but deployed by the ROYG."

This was the cover up. Obama had ordered the attack even though
the target, AQAP, was not legal. The lie was well appreciated by the American side who gifted the Yemeni
with an increase in U.S. security assistance.

---

Have to include this too. General Petraeus demonstrates intimate familial knowledge
of the women and children he slaughtered, else complete shamelessness:

"4. (S/NF) Saleh praised the December 17 and 24 strikes
against AQAP but said that "mistakes were made" in the
killing of civilians in Abyan. The General responded that
the only civilians killed were the wife and two children of
an AQAP operative at the site,"

According to Amnesty International the December 17th attack alone was devastating:
"A Yemeni parliamentary inquiry found that 41 local residents, including 14 women and 21 children, and 14 alleged al-Qa’ida members were killed in the attack."

Posted by: librul | Feb 25 2024 23:00 utc | 30

El Salvador President Nayib Bukele address to the CPAC. The major right wing conference of the world.


" Bukele's actual words beginning at 18:55, were "(Federal) taxes are not funding your government...Your government is financed by US Treasury bonds. Who buys the bonds? Mostly the Fed." (The Fed buys Treasury securities that do not get sold on the market.) "How does the Fed buy them? By printing money. What backing does the Fed have for that printed money? The Treasury bonds themselves. So you finance the US government by printing money out of thin air. Why then do you pay federal taxes? To uphold the illusion that you are funding the US government, which you are not. The US government is funded by money-printing. Paper backed by paper."

Ha, ha, ha, ha, ha...

Who's been exposing that in great detail on moon of Alabama for months now ? Who has been telling the actual "truth" all along ?

Can somebody send the CPAC video to the chuckle brothers at the Duran please, Scott Ritter and Col McGregor and that complete and utter idiot Kim.com.

Gonzalo Lira also fell for the lie. With a catch phrase " know what's going on " is quite ironic.

They all know the truth and are treating voters like idiots. Which they are. The Duran boys, Ritter, McGregor and Kim.com, George Galloway all each to man. Spread the tax payer money myth like confetti.

I pulled them up about it constantly. They were lying to their followers pure and simple. Embracing the framing and the narratives of the war mongers they detest. They just couldn't see it entrapped by GROUPTHINK !

What's the right wing ideologues going to say now lol. How are they going to immediately head bin this one, as it is completely against everything they believe in and every confirmation bias they have.

Hilarious man absolutely hilarious !!!!

Posted by: Echo Chamber | Feb 25 2024 23:02 utc | 31

Since no one asked ..., Navalny beat Magitsky's record for Legislated Outrage in the US Congress.

Genocide Joe's sanctimonious

Remarks at the National Governors Association Winter Meeting
official | broadcast A/V, run time 19:09

BIDEN [@ 03:46-04:29]: ...Failure to support Ukraine in this critical moment will never be forgotten in history. It will be measured and will have impact for decades to come. I want to thank all you governors here for—and I heard you if you agree with me as many of you do—to urge your congressional representatives to force this bill to be brought up. American can hav—to prove American can be relied on. America stands up for freedom. We never bother anyone particularly Putin. Look, folks, now another important work we're doing—I want to thank you all for delivering historic results for the American people. We've been incredible partners....
official Statement Ahead of the Two-Year Anniversary of Russia's Brutal Assault Against Ukraine
... These sanctions will target individuals connected to Navalny's imprisonment as well as Russia's financial sector, defense industrial base, procurement networks, and sanctions evaders across multiple continents....
official Treasury.gov notice, On Second Anniversary of Russia's Further Invasion of Ukraine and Following the Death of Aleksey Navalny, Treasury Sanctions Hundreds of Targets in Russia and Globally
[...]
In addition to individuals and eNTiTies located in Russia, OFAC [the US Office of Foreign Asset Control] continues to target persons outside of Russia who facilitate, orchestrate, engage in, and otherwise support the transfer of critical technology and equipment to Russia's military-industrial base. OFAC also will continue to impose sanctions on persons, wherever located, that allow Russia to reconnect to global financial markets using illicit channels. Targeting third-country facilitators is also a focus of our international partners, who also continue to sanction persons outside of Russia whose actions enable Russia to maintain, sustain, and rebuild its war machine. Our international coalition is sending a clear message to would-be evaders and circumventers [sic] that such actions have and will continue to have consequences.

Today's OFAC targets are located across the world and include third-country exporters and transhippers of technology, equipment, and parts to Russia, a freight forwarder involved in weapons shipments to Russia, and a transnational money laundering network facilitating the illicit movement of Russian-origin precious metals. In all, OFAC today targeted 26 third-country eNTiTies and individuals in 11 countries, including the People's Republic of China, Serbia, the United Arab Emirates, and Liechtenstein.
[...]

and the G7 Leaders' Statement (24.02.24) to which Biden referred the US governors—a litany of organized crimes under color of law
[...]
We will continue to apply significant pressure [sic] on Russian revenues from energy and other commodities. We will continue to take steps to tighten [sic] compliance and enforcement of the oil price cap.
[...]
We will continue to impede [sic] Russia's development of future energy projects and disrupt its development of alternatives for energy shipping and other services. We will continue efforts to reduce Russia's revenues from metals.

We will continue to take action against third-country actors who materially support Russia's war including by imposing additional measures on eNtiTIes, where appropriate, in third countries. We call on financial institutions to refrain from supporting Russia's war machine and we will take appropriate steps, consistent with our legal systems, to deter this behaviour [UK-Eng. ALERT].
[...]
We welcome the adoption of the EU legal acts concerning extraordinary revenues of central securities depositories gained from Russia's immobilised [sic] sovereign assets and encourage further steps to enable their use, consistent with applicable contractual obligations and in accordance with applicable laws. We ask our ministers [UK-Eng. ALERT] to continue their work and update ahead of the [G7 Italia] Apulia Summit [13-15 June 2024] on all possible avenues by which immobilized Russian sovereign assets could be made use of to support Ukraine, consistent with our respective legal systems and international law.
[...]

reference US criminal code
racketeering, restraint of trade, color of law, deprivation of rights under color of law

Posted by: sln2002 | Feb 25 2024 23:02 utc | 32

@Posted by: ryanggg | Feb 25 2024 22:12 utc | 25

Utter delusional anti-semitic racist homophobic bigotry, and so easy to disprove!

The Supreme Court of New York State actually consists of 62 courts - one for each county, and the judges are of very diverse ethnic backgrounds and of both sexes. Here's the details for New York County - https://ballotpedia.org/New_York_County,_New_York_(Judicial)

The highest court in New York state is actually the appellate court, one black woman among seven justices.
https://www.nycourts.gov/ctapps/

Now be gone with your BS.

Posted by: Roger | Feb 25 2024 23:06 utc | 33

If the Republicans really wanted to solve the illegal immigrant problem they would remove all of their illegal sanctions and provide proper development support to Central America.

Posted by: Roger | Feb 25 2024 21:40 utc | 24

____

So how are the Dims any better?

Posted by: malenkov | Feb 25 2024 23:29 utc | 34

@Posted by: Echo Chamber | Feb 25 2024 22:34 utc | 28

Bukele is the classic ruling class "strong man" who whitewashes the history of the ruling class's horrific war against the people of El Salvador in the 1970s and 1980s with their death squads and horrific levels of death - resulting in the complete destruction of the left-wing forces pushing for real change. Fully backed by the US.

He will also keep the deep roots between the gangs and the ruling class quiet. He will stabilize the country, while keeping the country dominated by a tiny elite and the people will blindly vote for him just to have peace (as the Afghans embraced the Taliban after the CIA-backed warlords destroyed the Afghan left). He uses the rhetoric of Trump to hide his rule for the benefit of the Salvadorian oligarchs.

The appeal will fade and then he will align with the military, just like Somoza did.

Posted by: Roger | Feb 25 2024 23:30 utc | 35

Lithuanian foreign minister Landsbergis waiting for the 'wests Pearl Harbor moment'. Sounds a bit ominous 'innit.

https://www.lrt.lt/en/news-in-english/19/2136313/west-waiting-for-pearl-harbor-moment-in-russia-s-war-in-ukraine-says-lithuanian-fm

Posted by: unimperator | Feb 25 2024 23:33 utc | 36

I bet The El Salvador President Nayib Bukele after he finished his speech at CPAC. Got taken through the back and was dragged over the coals.

World leaders can get assassinated by telling the truth like that in public. Regime changed for less lol.

Hilarious !

Posted by: Echo Chamber | Feb 25 2024 23:41 utc | 37

In1965 in Melbourne Australia a ufo landed in westall high school grounds in the morning. It stayed for about 10 minutes the took off, met up with 1or2 others and flew east. Teachers and about 200 kids saw it. In the afternoon Govt officials turned up and threatened one teacher that he would be classed as an alcoholic and never teach again,then,get this told the kids not to tell anyone, seriously?Clearly the Govt was aware of them, so given this was 60years ago, who has the technology?It would seem that given all the conflicts, some group or entity is holding back. Are we all being played, supporting one side or the other when someone is orchestrating the whole show?

Posted by: Q-lander | Feb 25 2024 23:41 utc | 38

reference US criminal code cont'd.
extortion, coercion, Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO)

(30.12.22) OFAC Preliminary Guidance on Implementation of the Price Cap Policy
(30.03.23) EU "anti-coercion instrument"

(19.05.23) G7 Leaders’ Statement on Ukraine

(02.06.23) EU raises bar for punishing countries

(21.07.23) 11th package of sanctions, enforcement, and penalties

(04.10.13) EU 'united' against economic blackmail [sic]

[...]
The new anti-coercion instrument was adopted with an unusually large majority of 578 votes, from the far-left to the far-right. Only 24 MEPs voted against the new instrument, while 19 abstained.

Economic coercion refers to attempts to influence the internal decisions of the EU or one of its member states by means of certain trade policy measures, such as tariffs[ and export] or export restrictions.

"This instrument enables rapid reaction against coercive measures, against pressure from other countries," Bernd Lange (S&D), head of the Parliament's committee for international trade and chief negotiator for the instrument, said after the vote. "While this anti-coercion tool should act as a deterrent, we will also be able to take action if necessary to defend the European Union's sovereignty," he added.
[...]
However, while the EU sees itself as the righteous defender of its sovereignty against foreign coercion, its own environmental trade policies can make the EU itself appear as an economic "coercer with kid gloves".

For example, measures such as its new carbon tariff (CBAM) and its anti-deforestation law are seen by other countries as interference with their own sovereignty, as they impose rules defined by the EU on other countries and punish them in case of non-compliance through tariffs[ and export] or import restrictions.
[...]
Thus, while the EU is building [NATO] muscles with a new tool against coercion by others, it will have to work hard at convincing third countries that it is not a "coercer" itself.

Posted by: sln2002 | Feb 25 2024 23:42 utc | 39

S&P Global, EU Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism to raise $80B per year by 2040 (24.02.23)

[...]
The EU has agreed to implement a new Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) as a long-term alternative to the issuance of EU Emissions Trading System free allocations to covered EntITiEs. Europe's aim is to prompt its industries to decarbonize without being undercut by imports facing no carbon cost.
[...]
Refined products, such as petroleum products and LNG, were considered but were not covered within the initial scope of the CBAM. CBAM before the end of 2027, allowing for possible further sectoral scope expansion in the future.

The methodology of the EU CBAM will categorize products into "simple goods," meaning goods produced by materials and fuels that have zero embedded emissions, and "complex goods," meaning goods other than simple goods, where embedded emissions in materials and fuels used in production will also be covered by the CBAM. To calculate embedded emissions (within selected goods), the EU describes a specific embedded emissions methodology in the legislation, with the final details expected to be released following approval of the measure by the European Council and European Parliament in the coming months. To determine CO2 emissions from electricity, a CO2 emissions factor will be determined using CO2 emissions data from the electricity sector, divided by the gross electricity generation based on fossil fuels in the relevant geographic area. Where actual emissions cannot be adequately determined by the authorized CBAM declarant, default values shall be used, set at the average emission intensity of the exporting country increased by a "proportionately designed mark up."
[...]

Reuters, India plans to protest EU's carbon tax at WTO meeting (07.02.24)

Posted by: sln2002 | Feb 26 2024 0:12 utc | 40

Clinical issues: Meloni blames Russia for Gaza war

Moscow bears responsibility for the conflict between Israel and Hamas militants in Gaza, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni claimed in an interview with il Giornale newspaper published on Saturday [24 Feb 2024]. It was Russia’s military campaign against Ukraine that supposedly encouraged Hamas to launch a massive attack against Israel on October 7, 2023, she stated.

The Italian leader maintained that a military operation launched by a permanent UN Security Council member against its neighbor violated international law and shook the entire global security system. She said such a move would have inevitably “have a cascading effect on the other regions… of the world, from the Middle East to the Balkans, to Africa.”

“If Russia had not invaded Ukraine, in all likelihood, Hamas would not have launched such an attack against Israel,” she claimed.

Posted by: sln2002 | Feb 26 2024 0:23 utc | 41

"It turns out we have always lived in a fascist collective waste that we have been deluded into believing is the highest human civilisation that has ever emerged !

Now to enjoy the fine reads offered by our host !"

Posted by: DunGroanin | Feb 25 2024 14:36 utc | 8

I live in western Canada and in 62 years old. In my youth we always referred to our culture as a police state. A democracy but tightly controlled by the police. A problematic legal system. But comedians have always been a source of Truth. Jimmy Dore is a good example. It was Cheech and Chong who did a small skit where the punchline was "These guys are fascist man!"

So knowing this was a reference to Hitler and Mussolini we were all laughing our heads off. Because in order to be a good joke it has to be grounded in truth. Often the surprise of speaking hidden truth.
Realizing that we lived in a country like that, the futility of voting, and the attack upon labor and The Working Man taking place throughout my lifetime...

We checked out, tuned up, and did the best we could to just get by in life. I've forgotten the term but it's something along the lines of learned futility. They try to teach you that resistance is futile. It's a borg kind of view. It's fairly efficient though. It's not bad as far as fascist tactics go.

In recent years I've really been getting a strong theme coming out where Western people over 50 are just praying they can manage to live their lives out before their World falls apart.

It seems to me that it's the same mentality carried forward decades later. It was always a serious mistake, and I do Place some of the blame for the current state of the world on my generation.

In simple terms we refuse to listen to the folks that appear in these comments. We didn't want to know. Most of the people out there still don't want to know. I certainly agree with that quote that you get the government you deserve.

I don't know. Maybe it's my white guilt leaking a bit around the edges.

Posted by: David G Horsman | Feb 26 2024 0:29 utc | 42

From quote sln2002 | Feb 25 2024 23:42 utc | 40 "EU Emissions Trading System'

The utter effing bullshit of these schemes. Here in oz there is what is called carbon offsets that can be bought and sold. Basically it means paying someone else to put dead dinosaurs into the surface carbon cycle. Absolute effin rort. virtually zero dinosaurs get locked back in the ground.
Generally trees are bought and sold as carbon offsets. Trees are very close to net zero when it comes to permanently locking carbon back into the ground.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Feb 26 2024 0:49 utc | 43

@ sln2002 | Feb 26 2024 0:23 utc | 42 with the confirmation of the domino theory of geopolitics by the Italian PM...thanks

That quote from her below is precious
"
“If Russia had not invaded Ukraine, in all likelihood, Hamas would not have launched such an attack against Israel,” she claimed.
"

Its called civilization war

Posted by: psychohistorian | Feb 26 2024 0:50 utc | 44

Re: echo chamber and fed monetary policy

I don't understand exactly what your point is. I think most people know that the fed prints money far beyond what it collects in taxes. Everyone knows that the U.S. dollar is tops and reserve currency that it has carte blanche.

But it is disengenuous to say that taxation does not matter and is in fact not the life blood and insurance of the U.S. state. Taxpayer funds are the only real insurance policy that the Federal gov't has against the rising tide of dollar-averse nations.

When the greenback falls, not if, it will be the gov't come crawling back to the taxpayer where it will not be able to survive without catastrophic restructuring and a gutting that has been incoming since the north beat the south in the civil war. Bring it on.

Posted by: NemesisCalling | Feb 26 2024 0:57 utc | 45

As I am surfing the net I catch the posting title below

Trump predicts ‘losing World War III’ if he is not elected in 2024

What is Trump going to say when WWIII is lost before the US (s)election?

We are watching the best shit show money can buy.

Posted by: psychohistorian | Feb 26 2024 0:58 utc | 46

We are watching the best shit show money can buy.
Posted by: psychohistorian | Feb 26 2024 0:58 utc | 47

A ticking bomb for sure.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Feb 26 2024 1:05 utc | 47

Peter AU1 | Feb 26 2024 1:05 utc | 48

How's the study going Pete?

In case you missed my posts, I added several really good sites to read up on.
https://www.moonofalabama.org/2024/02/open-neither-ukraine-nor-palestine-thread-2024-055/comments/page/3/#comments

Posted by: Lavrov's Dog | Feb 26 2024 1:44 utc | 48

Finally, some political common sense on X:
https://twitter.com/oldbooksguy/status/1760375938016038956

Jash Dholani
@oldbooksguy
9 reasons why aristocracy beats democracy

1. The Pyramid Problem. Will Durant said there are grand tasks “requiring generations” of coordination and democracy is utterly incapable of them. A democratically elected leader can never build a Pyramid.

2. The Freedom Paradox. Durant writes that while aristocracies do limit “political freedom,” democracies are no freer as they crush individuality with the “fanatic pressure of dull majorities.” Better a rule by minorities trained from the “outset” in the rigors of an aristocratic upbringing.

3. Pedigree v/s Pocketbooks: Durant writes that “rule by pedigree is the only alternative to rule by pocketbooks.” Rich oligarchs always subject nations to the “ideals of the stock exchange, the marketplace, and the factory” unless aristocrats stop them.

4. Elections are Lotteries: Aristocracies free leaders from the “lottery of elections.” French philosopher Renan predicted that elections will be the triumph of “mediocrity” as they’ll put “knaves and quacks upon the throne.”

5. The Case of England: “England’s leaders were trained for public place from their boyhood; first at home, then at Eton or Harrow, then at Oxford or Cambridge, and then by appointment to arduous minor offices. It was these men who lifted little England to the top of the world.”

6. Slow Is fast: Will Durant writes that societies cannot change too quickly because “large bodies must move slowly.” But what about science progressing rapidly? The analogy breaks down when you understand that “society is not a laboratory, and men do not submit to vivisection.” Science thrives on trial and error; doing trial and error in political affairs racks up the body count in millions. Ask Chairman Mao.

7. Traditions as Memory. Will Durant: “The sanity of the individual lies in the continuity of his memory; the sanity of a group lies in the continuity of its traditions.” Progressives are strangely proud of their amnesia.

8. Aristocracy of the soul. Durant defines the “aristocracy of soul”: “A vigor and yet ease of carriage, a sureness of touch in judgment and taste, a readiness of wit, an unassuming dignity and an unfailing generosity.”

9. The Aristocratic Peace. Durant writes that equality is the breeding ground of violence: “Peace is between unequals; the pretense of equality brings a perennial tug of war.” Only by accepting the “natural inequality of men in intellect and will” can we realize the “hypocrisy of egalitarian institutions.” Aristocratic peace demands that we do not lie.

The arc of history is long, but it bends towards the return of aristocracy...

Share this to Durant-Pill your timeline.

Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 26 2024 3:20 utc | 49

Its called civilization war
Posted by: psychohistorian | Feb 26 2024 0:50 utc | 45

ummmm no. Meloni, for one, is afflicted by multiple psychopathic disorders.

Posted by: sln2002 | Feb 26 2024 3:57 utc | 50

Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 26 2024 3:20 utc | 50

Tell us again. Why did you immigrated from Britain?

Posted by: sln2002 | Feb 26 2024 4:11 utc | 51

I can't stop laughing. This episode of Price Cap Coalition's exit plan is too ridiculous. After two years moribund "debt-raising" for Ukraine, a year of ECB and IMF disapproval, suicidal ideation sprayed over Euroclear by continental parliamentarians, and two full-months of back-to-back uhh free investment advice from Thomson Reuters employees, the banksters—The Canuck City!—have cold feet.

Banks Urge UK to Tighten Laws Around "Seizing" [immobilised, frozen, embezzeled, confiscated, impounded] Russian Assets

International banks have warned the UK government that it must establish legal principles before it presses the button on the seizure of billions of pounds of Russian assets, otherwise it risks potential shocks to the global financial system and EXPOSING institutions to legal action fees.
[...]
That caution is echoed by some in the finance industry who told Bloomberg that they want the mounting political rhetoric to be translated into internationally coordinated measures to ensure that any seizures are fencing their ill-gotten gains is lawful. Some bankers and lawyers in the UK warn that high-profile confiscations of assets account holders' property risk damaging London’s LOL! reputation as an international financial center and could spark questions about the rule of law.
[...]
A priority for the banks is some form of legal protection, ["bail-in"] or indemnity, against any future action criminal complaints brought by Russia against individual financial institutions involved in the confiscation of assets theft of account holders' property, people familiar with the matter said. They declined to be identified discussing [public-]private conversations conspiracy to commit a crime.
[...]
"Everyone has said they want to punish Putin for Navalny's murder, with actions such as 500 new sanctions in the US. That isn't going to change Putin's mind," said Bill Browder [LOL!], the former investor in Russia turned Kremlin critic Magnitsky Act shill. "Confiscating Embezzling $300 billion of Russian money cash and cash equivalents and calling it the Navalny Act [!] would send a message that he understands."
[...]
Bank run bail-out demanded!
Financial institutions have told MPs and civil servants that any move to seize the money liquidate accounts would require a clear LOL! audit trail to show the funds were going to Ukraine and make the process robust and transparent. They have also urged the government to take account of any pressure there could be on bank liquidity statutory reserves and credit rating due to both sudden demands for the cash to be handed over or if other foreign investors—anxious about the seizure embezzelment of assets—decide to pull their own funds, the people added.
[...]

Posted by: sln2002 | Feb 26 2024 5:09 utc | 52

The role of the Elites in causing the current Meta Crisis and what to do about it.

There are the four warning signs of an imminent societal collapse or revolution:
1 ) declining living standards for the general population. The technical term is Immiseration, or Economic Impoverishment.
2) even more important is Elite Overproduction
3) the State Weakness financially and institutions is the third one and
4) depending on how large and powerful the country is External Influences can also play a role

All right so this Elite concentrate four sources of Social Power which is: coercive economic, political, or administrative, and ideological power. Don't forget ideological is very important soft but very powerful kind of power. We need the elites but somehow you have to constrain them to act for the benefit of all. And in the past that has been done successfully and societies have thrived.

Still, we need the elites, the well educated skillful and capable. We need managers, we need intelligent and wise thought leaders. We need all those people who are good at organizing things and who can occupy the important positions of power and influence. But we need and want Pro-Social leaders who are working for the benefit of the whole of the population rather than for the narrow benefit of the ruling class only!

We need to worry about the health of societies and how do we get better health or societies? By getting much better science.

Understanding Societal Collapse Historically - with Complexity Scientist Peter Turchin

What leads to political turbulence and social breakdown? Is there any way to stop history repeating itself today? Peter Turchin has mined 10,000 years of data to find the answer.

Step One is: Stop the Wealth Pump
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XGhBTKzrJEY

An excellent talk and Q&A

Posted by: Lavrov's Dog | Feb 26 2024 6:53 utc | 53

International banks have warned the UK government that it must establish legal principles before it presses the button on the seizure of billions of pounds of Russian assets

sln2002 | Feb 26 2024 5:09 utc | 53

---

The banks want indemnity for secularizing the frozen assets and selling that security on, to bagholders like pension funds, in the eventuality that the frozen assets thaw rendering the collateralize obligation valueless.

Posted by: too scents | Feb 26 2024 7:24 utc | 54

collateralize obligation valueless.

Posted by: too scents | February 26, 2024 at 07:24

Posted by: too scents | Feb 26 2024 7:25 utc | 55

collateralize obligation valueless.

Posted by: too scents | February 26, 2024 at 07:24

---

collateralized obligation.

The intent is to package the frozen Russian assets as a CDO.

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

laptop keys are sticky this morning.

Posted by: too scents | Feb 26 2024 7:28 utc | 56

Posted by: NemesisCalling | Feb 26 2024 0:57 utc | 46

Never said that taxes don't matter and in fact for months now point out what they are REALLY for - shredding machine. Also used to move skills and real resources around the economy.

They are NEVER used as revenue to fund the government.

You are wrong at least 80% of the world's population think they are used as revenue to fund the government. Voters are stupid.

A British election was won on a meme of " theirs no money left" Labour are now saying they can't do a green transition as "there is not enough money". EVERY politician stands up there and says tax payers money apart from this guy from El Salvador who told the truth.

There's no such thing as tax payer funds. Read what's written on the currency in your pocket. That's who's money it is.

" When the $ falls they'll come crawling back to the tax payer"

No They won't. What on earth for ?

You get the $'s from them to pay your taxes. If you don't you go to jail. There's no such thing as tax payer funds the $ is nothing more than a tax credit. Every $ you have will eventually be shredded. As every $ you have will eventually be spent. If not by you then by your children.

They don't go anywhere apart from the shredding machine.

If you give somebody £100, they spend it which is taxed at 20%, leaving the next person with £80 as income. They then spend that £80 which is taxed at 20%, leaving the next person with £64 as income. And so on until the entire £100 disappears and creates £100 of extra tax. All without changing the tax rate one single percent

The result is lots of extra sales and income for people down the spending chain they wouldn't otherwise have received. It's a straightforward geometric progression.

A 100 is issued from thin air and a 100 is shredded at the end of the process.

Why Tax Matches Spending

https://new-wayland.com/blog/why-tax-matches-spending/

You hold the currency for a while then you die. There's a huge possibility dedollarisation will make the $ stronger.

Here:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=tlNHoVYIfRY

Posted by: Echo Chamber | Feb 26 2024 8:54 utc | 57

In your pocket you have tools that used to be the privilege of government ministers and large multinational companies.

If you look at a map of submarine cables used to connect the internet, it's hard to imagine the early submarine cables were used to connect the British Empire. In the imperial days, the government held the monopoly of long-distance communications - the old Cable and Wireless. The result was that the British Empire could pick off their adversaries one by one, at their leisure.

These days have now gone.

Posted by: Passerby | Feb 26 2024 9:07 utc | 58

In the imperial days, the government held the monopoly of long-distance communications

Posted by: Passerby | Feb 26 2024 9:07 utc | 59

---

Now the monopoly is on cryptographic infrastructure, the trust given to shared keys and the choices excerpted over algorithms and protocols.

Consider the data available to SpaceX as it routes Starlink messages.

It is reasonable to assume that Apple assisted an unknown party to backdoor the iPhone.

https://thehackernews.com/2023/12/most-sophisticated-iphone-hack-ever.html

China restricted iPhone use months before the vulnerability became public.

https://archive.ph/SmWfi

Posted by: too scents | Feb 26 2024 9:37 utc | 59

Re: enemy assets confiscation

Serious discussion of confiscation of Russian private or government assets will ripple throughout the global financial markets.

Its one thing to freeze enemy assets during war time, it’s quite another to confiscate these assets. its absolutely unheard of to confiscate the assets of private foreign citizens without due process Its a sign of a utterly lawless and barbaric regime.

Ripple effects will be accelerating de-dollarization. Which Brazilian, Indian, or Chinese company will keep investment assets in any NATOland financial institution ? These enterprises are surely stealth exiting any and all NATOland Banks. Quietly exiting a big financial position takes a long time ; a few years.

We starting the 3rd year of 5-7 year process. De-dollarization results in higher interest on Federal Debt. and that brings peace

Posted by: Exile | Feb 26 2024 9:55 utc | 60

Climate change? What drives that? Temperature change. Temperature if climate is viewed as a pyramid sits at the top of the pyramid. It determines what life forms can exist and reproduce. it determines weather patterns ect.

Atmosphere regulates what radiation from the sun reaches the surface and what is radiated back out into space.

As always, understanding the past is critical to understanding the future.
This idiot term 'climate change' to replace temperature change when it comes to greenhouse emissions....

It was when looking into human history back into the last ice age and through the younger dryas that I looked at ice core charts and other aspects temperature related.

Talk about the 'tower of babel'...

With this very large rise in greenhouse emissions it is critical to know the driver of major temperature changes is the past. Again the 'tower of babel'.

Like with Trump derangement syndrome, covid derangement syndrome, with industrial age emissions, there are religious extremists at both ends of the spectrum. Even a stray dog that tries to hump my leg. Not to mention bankers in ivory towers.

From the ice core charts, it becomes a near certainty that prior to industrial emissions. From the way the findings are presented - CO@ in relation to temperature, it becomes a certainty that in the past, Greenhouse gasses rather than being a driver of temperature change, have simply reacted to temperature change.
That the reason Jones and Corbyn and the likes develop excellent reputations for long term forecasting.
In looking into the planetary cycles which determine how much radiation from the sun earth receives, and comparing it to the beginning of an interglacial, it becomes clear that although that is a major factor, there is another as yet unknown factor involved.

Idiot greens want to dig holes and use heaps of energy to reduce emissions. Carbon credits... bullshit to feed the mushrooms. Baerbock bulldozing windmills and declaring coal green. Black is white. White is black...

Trying to determine percentage of CO2 greenhouse effect - again the tower of babel.

What triggered the holocene. Why did CO2 rise in relation to temperature after the 8200 year cold event. What caused the holocene? When will the next glacial/ice age begin? According to the last three interglacials it is due now. Stretch that back to the fourth glacial and it could be some time. But we don't know what triggered the holocene.

So will emissions save us from the next ice age, or assuming the holocene continue infinitely, cause us to burn in the fires of CO2?

Unless we know the past, we cannot plan the future.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Feb 26 2024 9:57 utc | 61

Posted by: [email protected] | Feb 25 2024 19:58 utc | 22

“In Switzerland, they had brotherly love, they had five hundred years of democracy and peace – and what did that produce? The cuckoo clock.”

You do realize that the character uttering these words is the villain of "The Third Man"?

Posted by: Cherrycoke | Feb 26 2024 10:05 utc | 62

How does Musk's Tesla turn a proffit? Easy peasy.


https://carboncredits.com/tesla-regulatory-carbon-credit-sales-jumps-116/
Tesla beat 1st quarter income expectations with more than double previous quarters’ carbon credit sales.

Tesla has been criticized for its previous years’ earnings being dependent on the sales of its carbon credits. These credit sales have been a major driver of Tesla’s profits over the years.

Posted by: Peter AU1 | Feb 26 2024 10:05 utc | 63

Its one thing to freeze enemy assets during war time, it’s quite another to confiscate these

Posted by: Exile | Feb 26 2024 9:55 utc | 61

---

Russia's frozen assets will not be confiscated. They will be used as collateral to confiscate a 3rd party's assets, probably pension funds, in a not so sophisticated game of bait and switch. See what I posted @55 & @57 about CDOs.

The bagholders bags are probably already filled.

Posted by: too scents | Feb 26 2024 10:25 utc | 64

Posted by: too scents | Feb 26 2024 10:25 utc | 65…

Thanks for reminding me, clever thieves they are. Brilliant scheme to pillage on both ends.

Makes me think of that hilarious video from 2009:

Quantitative Easing Explained
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=PTUY16CkS-k&pp=ygUecXVhbnRpdGF0aXZlIGVhc2luZyBleHBsYWluZWQg

Posted by: Exile | Feb 26 2024 11:06 utc | 65

Dramatic video

🇫🇷🇧🇪 Farmer riots in Europe are gaining momentum.

French and Belgian farmers ram tractors into police barriers. This looks more like a civil war rather than a strike.

https://t.me/intelslava/55480

Posted by: Norwegian | Feb 26 2024 11:16 utc | 66

@ Posted by: NemesisCalling | Feb 26 2024 0:57 utc | 46

Your failure to understand is understandable but it’s because you don’t want to understand because that scares you or you are a narrative manager to keep that misunderstanding going.

“Only poor people pay taxes” said who?

What EchoChamber is giddy about is that the truth about what Money is can no longer be concealed and misrepresented to the masses.

‘Err … they scratch their head ….how is it possible to have a debt bigger than all the money? ‘

Because poor deluded fools debt IS money.
Bankers are villains.

‘But …but ..taxes! My money that I MADE ‘

No fools ! YOU don’t MAKE it, you EARN it as wages or profits. Taxes just makes your money worth something instead of just being some kind of Monopoly game money .

That is the TL;DR version for these who can’t get their heads around the fact that everything they believe about the nature of Money is a lie.

That some fairytales are actually the truth.

Read on Nemesis and others - if you dare - beware the truth may make you insaner!
Or it will set you and the world free finally.

Ready? Let’s go for a stroll down the yellow bricked road !

It is the truth that taxation by collection of these taxes , in the currency of the state demanding taxes is the ONLY thing that gives that currency ANY value.

It has always been so since Taxes were collected in currency instead of as ‘tribute’ of actual THINGS and LABOUR . Which are actual representation of Wealth.

Like when farmers had to supply a certain amount of what they grew to the local taxman.
Or they had to go and fight a war somewhere their masters wanted.

The proof of this is - if you still don’t believe it - try and go down to your tax office and pay them in the stuff you grow, or furniture you make , or with your labour or some thing you own. What would happen?

It used to be possible long long time ago , and sophisticated even, the tax office would require that you even store the items safely until they sent someone for it ! Through keeping a tally.

Just think it through step by step.

What everyone considers to be the fruit of their labour as them ‘making money’ is a lie.
Most don’t ‘make’ money they ‘earn’ it! Even the ‘owners’ of businesses.

Money is ‘made’ elsewhere by a very few select people. Just two types.

First by the state that issues the money and pays for goods and services with it and gives it its perceived value by demanding taxation from these earnings and goods it buys as direct and indirect tax.

Second the entities that the state gives a licence to also issue that currency - the Financiers , Banks, Credit card companies, Mortgage and credit issuers. They have a licence to print money! Just like the state. Unlike the state They get to charge interest on that magic money and keep the profit.

That’s why being a banker is the height of power. That is why the same old banking dynasties exist in every country. They demand a license from every nations government to issue that countries currency- and that’s how they get to own most of the actual Wealth created by the Peoples of these countries.

That has been happening for centuries ever since they dreamed up Money and Banks as the secret weapon of Power.

There was a time, not at all long ago, when there were many banks , mutual societies of sorts, based around towns, in counties, which would issue their own currencies for the locals to trade with. But they weren’t part of the Banking intranational Giants who had created the system - they were the Jacks who had got some magic beans that allowed Jack to climb into the Giants home high above the peasants and steal that giants magic money trick!

All of these little Jack bankers are destroyed now , all their currencies became worthless one after the other , as soon as the government refused to accept it as a valid currency that the taxes they demanded be paid in!

See? It’s not ‘your money’ it’s Theirs and they can cancel it at anytime. In recent years that has been tried in different countries when the government suddenly announces the cancellation of some note denomination or other and everyone has to go to a bank and convert it to the new note before it becomes worthless !

That’s just a minor experiment with cash under your mattress - what happens when they cancel all holdings , the digital numbers in some electronic ledger and replace it with another? When the value of how many new currency numbers you need to buy your loaf of bread with changes?

In 2000 it happened across Europe as the Euro was introduced. One Euro equalled so many old francs , or peso or lira or marks. The U.K. sterling was never going to be part of that whilst having the European Bank being built and based in the City!

What happened was inflation. A reduction of the buying power in terms of old money. It was easier for these of us who traveled regularly to such countries to note how many £’s it cost to buy a bottle of wine or a pack of cigarettes in €’s and how the relative values changed.

We had it good for a few years as we got more for our buck! Until the exchange rate between the £ and € was allowed to move towards parity. It has led to chaos amongst many who lived abroad but relied on their pensions from the U.K.

That is why countries that refuse to be part of the scam are destroyed , their leaders murdered ,and wars of destruction inflicted upon them with maximum brutality, as an example to anyone else who might say ‘hang on a minute - how can you make magic money that I have to slave my life to earn ?’

The Magic Money Tree ! The Goose that lays the golden egg ! That’s how.

There was a recorded statement by one of the Yankee oligarchs matriarchs from a century ago which was judged as amusing and drunken looneyness of the rich aristo class of Yankees ( yes you have always had them too and the Class system) :

“ Only the poor people pay taxes” she revealed.

That has always been the truth. Because the poor are the ones who have to work and produce actual things that even the rich can’t do without - like food.

And if you aren’t born into that dynastic world families you ARE the poor. No matter how much money you earn in your lifetime and have in the bank. You will NEVER be as rich as them. Ever . Because they can just Magik more into their own accounts - abracadabra! just like that a press of a button on some keyboard and it’s done. Voila.

The Banking class and the Ruling class that provides the licence to print money , never have to lift a finger all their lives. That’s why all politicians are bought, that’s why the aristo class they aspire to end up in careers and positions where they manage the golden egg laying geese and the magic money tree farms for the actual Giants the creators of Money as a thing -which allows them through their international networks to control their Empires and start wars between nations they control and destroy these they don’t yet.

Oh and you might say ‘but.. but they too have all their money in the same currency that you say is Magic and worthless as mine - so it can’t be true!’

Ah I say they have already used their oodles of magic money to buy up all your wealth! The land that you farm , The furniture you made , the houses and offices you built , the infrastructure that was public but now is privately owned by them. The great Art and the shares in all the businesses that own anything of value.
They don’t care about the currency in their name because they have already got their names on all the REAL wealth - they do it periodically by Great Recession , it’s due now,, asset prices collapse they hoover it up with their magic money and then let the currency collapse ! Then come up with some nonsense about New Deal’s and Welfare.

Then the Merry-go-Round begins again ! The poor left to start building some wealth for themselves again after bankruptcy and the kingly class and their Money overlords enjoy the the poore servitude and impoverishment.

It’s called a Rinse And Repeat.

‘But .. but .. but who ARE they and why can’t I become one of them?’

Ah that’s the rub, no matter how good or clever you are and how much better at everything then them - they’ll make you their top house boy , butler, ceo , educator , general , politician , politician , president and king , a multimillionaire and even a billionaire and let you sit at the Top Table with others who they elevate , but there will always another table which only they sit at.

In their Olympian halls where they are beyond mere billionaires , where their wealth is judged in how many kings, how much land, how many slaves, how much art and jewellery. A life of a God.

They may not all look the same because they shapeshift through the ages. Now they look like bit Spanish, Now Italian, Now Dutch, Now British, Now American, now Russian , Now Chinese and yes Now African - a bit but not totally , because you see , you have to be of the blood of the ancient kings , the khazar kings… those who invented Money and it’s magic trees through banks.

See ?

The Only thing they fear is being disobeyed and the threat of an end to their dynastic lineage!

Now if only there were some peoples, somewhere that could resist the Bankers combined might, know who the Bankers were , where they lived and where their secret top table and castles in the sky were, where they grew their magic money trees - AND could destroy all of that with a super force before the Bankers could destroy us - then we could finally rebuild a world without their Money Power forever keeping the Multipolarity of humanity down and their unipolar world order on top…

If only such free peoples free of the Old Bankers existed …. Right in-front of your eyes?

See?

Posted by: DunGroanin | Feb 26 2024 12:00 utc | 67

Posted by: too scents | Feb 25 2024 14:16 utc | 5
"I find it impossible to harmonize Hersh's story of Washington intrigue with an attack carried out from a British submarine.

How many hundred people can keep a secret?"

Its not a secret. I know about it, you know about it, that man in Norway knows about it but it will only attract official attention if it appears in the MSM. Until then it remains officially a secret even if the dogs in the street know about it. And anyway does everybody on board a submarine know everything that's going on?

Posted by: Johnny Conspiranoid | Feb 26 2024 12:35 utc | 68

Peter AU1 | Feb 26 2024 9:57 utc | 62

Your post sounded like the Tower of Babel. No sense making at all. You may as well double down now. Remain permanently cantankerous and blame the world instead.

Posted by: Lavrov's Dog | Feb 26 2024 13:18 utc | 69

World war 3 has already been lost. In hindsight (h/t karlofi) it was one long war from 1914, and it was about who'd get to rule the world, as someone else here on MoA said most pointedly.

Even a few years back China's accelerating economic momentum was sure to overtake the west, and now they have forged a quasi-alliance with Russia and Iran.

Nato is bleeding itself white at the Ostfront. There are no credible military ressources left that could turn this around, this was analyzed here well over time (e.g. the F-16s), and RAND had stated as much even before the war began. I believe they were betting on a guerilla war, as evidenced by the Nato training of Ukrainian officers (small wars only) and the open boxes with guns that were set up on street corners early in 2022. That, and the sanctions which backfired.

A general weakening of Russia also didn't occur, so the NS2 sabotage was repurposed and now the conflict is kept going to siffon off european (german) industrial manufacturing into the USA. "Sorry we can't deliver the promised LNG!" I heard them saying recently, while european gas consumption is down by 20% which should be mostly via demand destruction through closing of factories.

In that sense, the USA is anticipating their loss already; this looks to me a retreat from confrontation with the eurasian block.

What other means have they left? After the double Trident ICBM failure last week, I can't see them standing up to russian strategic armament built up over the past 20 years systematically - I always thought this a very commited, sober and patient policy of the Putin team. It's paying off now (still please spare a thought on the TU-160M "[kinzhal?] missile carrier" production line).

What else is there? Space Aliens, of course. Unforeseen events, which I also can't foresee. The hand of god? Well, he's on our side I believe. That leaves only bio-terrorism in my book. I can't say much about this, other than that I suspect it won't be able to really turn the tides for them either - because how should that look like? <-- Please jump at this if you will, MoA.

Okay, and how about a long game? No chance in hell there, brother. The world is waking up to the machinations in Gaza, and it is a rude awakening. I sat with a ukraininan jew and a few others for dinner recently, we spoke about Israel and his identity. It was open, though not candid, not sure if everyone at the table got the subtext between him and me, but it is now almost ready for polite conversation.

It is our duty to keep furthering the transformation, we're dedicated, and we're good at it here at MoA.

Salut!

Posted by: persiflo | Feb 26 2024 14:21 utc | 70

@Johnny Conspiranoid | Feb 26 2024 12:35 utc | 69

Its not a secret. I know about it, you know about it, that man in Norway knows about it but it will only attract official attention if it appears in the MSM.
This is how evidence-free rumors are distributed.

Posted by: Norwegian | Feb 26 2024 14:24 utc | 71

In case you missed my posts, I added several really good sites to read up on.


https://www.moonofalabama.org/2024/02/open-neither-ukraine-nor-palestine-thread-2024-055/comments/page/3/#comments

Posted by: Lavrov's Dog | Feb 26 2024 1:44 utc | 49

FYI new people, if you long press on the digits 49 in the comment you can copy a direct link to it. However that conversation thread has many links and that may be why lavrov, or his dog, linked to the page 3.

Posted by: David G Horsman | Feb 26 2024 15:18 utc | 72

https://brownstone.org/articles/repeal-the-17th-amendment-yesterday/

Goes over a little why the Senate as first created was replaced by a Bankster-friendly replacement undermining the original Federalist structure.

A similar process is underway globally, though I confess to not being able to see the sides clearly, but one thrust is to dissolve nation state jurisdictions in the same way that the 17th Amendment undermined the States in the US context. This initiative is sometimes called 'globalism'. If this is a bona fide movement (versus an urban myth etc.) then the likelihood of significant World War is low because the globalists are within all major nations and what they are orchestrating is various regime-and-jurisdiction changes, mainly via subversion from within not kinetic force from without.

To me a big question is: are Russia and China opposed to this globalist thrust? Sometimes it seems like they are, at other times it seems they are at its forefront.

Either way, it seems the ill-advised experiment with 'democracies' is about to draw to a close and something quite different will soon be replacing it. Something secular. Something systems and science-based, thus materialist. And therefore something quite questionable.

Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 26 2024 15:58 utc | 73

"- Biden wants to put the US on permanent war footing - Responsible Statecraft, Feb 23 2024"

The US has been on a permanent war footing since about 1950.

Posted by: lester | Feb 26 2024 16:04 utc | 74

From Canadian news, on organized crime —

16 charged, 18 arrested in major operation targeting organized crime in Quebec
https://globalnews.ca/news/10315499/arrests-organized-crime-hells-angels-street-gangs-drug-war/

The leader of the street gang they targets has fled - to Europe, they suspect.

Mexican church officials have helped arrange a truce between 2 warring drug cartels

https://www.ctvnews.ca/world/mexican-church-officials-have-helped-arrange-a-truce-between-2-warring-drug-cartels-1.6783741

Trudeau is in Poland, defends Canada’s current level of defence spending

https://www.lapresse.ca/actualites/politique/2024-02-26/visite-en-pologne/justin-trudeau-defend-les-niveaux-de-depenses-du-canada-en-defense.php

Posted by: Bruised Northerner | Feb 26 2024 16:11 utc | 75

Posted by: too scents | Feb 26 2024 7:28 utc | 57

Good work! Every fence supplies a market—primary, secondary, derivative, undsoweiter. A good copper is at least one or two steps ahead of a criminal suspect to set the trap.

Let's recap "securities".
What is a guarantee? Who is a guarantor?

opportunity
(13.09.22) Rassmussen and Yermak, "The Kyiv Security Compact International Guarantees for Ukrain"

[...]
• The security [!] guarantees will be positive; they lay out a range of commitments made by a group of guarantors, together with Ukraine. They need to be binding based on bilateral agreements, but brought together under a joint strategic partnership document - called the Kyiv Security Compact.
• The Compact will bring a core group of allied countries together with Ukraine. This could include the US, UK, Canada, Poland, Italy, Germany, France, Australia, Turkey, and Nordic, Baltic, Central and Eastern European countries.

A broader group of international partners including Japan , South Korea, among others, should also support a set of non-military guarantees based on sanctions. It would include snapback sanctions LOL!, which are automatically re-applied in case of further Russian aggression. A legal framework should be developed which will allow authorities to seize the property of the aggressor, its sovereign funds and reserves, and the assets of its citizens and entities on the sanctions list. The funds raised should be directed to repair the war damage inflicted on Ukraine.
[...]
• Provide financial aid and direct investments, including through future reconstruction instruments, to support the national defence budget, as well as ensuring financial assistance (including non-repayable grants FACEPALM! to restore the infrastructure of Ukraine, which was destroyed or damaged by military actions.
• Allocate reconstruction funds, including non-repayable LOL! financial assistance, towards supporting and building Ukraine's new national defence industrial base.
[...]

means
(21.04.22) Task Force KleptoCapture and the Kleptocracy Asset Recovery Rewards Program

(25.05.23) cap gains embezzlement

(10.01.24) Rebuilding Economic Prosperity and Opportunity (REPO) for Ukraine Act

(15.01.24) discounted "Reparation Bonds"

(17.01.24) G7 covered bonds

(22.01.24) cap gains sales tax

(05.02.24) ECB purchase program

motive?
I leave this unneccessary spiritual speculation to uhh polyglot capital co-religionists on board the money train.

Posted by: sln2002 | Feb 26 2024 16:32 utc | 76

La Stampa carries the worst pro-Empire narratives but this is absurd even by that low bar.

https://www.lastampa.it/esteri/2024/02/26/news/il_15_febbraio_cera_laccordo_per_scambiare_navalny_piu_due_americani_tra_cui_evan_gershkovich_con_lassassino_russo_kras-14100595/

On February 15, there was an agreement to trade Navalny plus two Americans (including Evan Gershkovich) for the Russian assassin Krasikov. Abramovich mediated, the day after Putin decided to liquidate him The story of the director of the Navalny team Maria Pevchikh: 'The next day she had Alexey murdered'

The news, communicated by the director of Team Navalny, is disruptive: on February 15 morning an agreement was in fact reached to exchange Alexey Navalny, plus two American citizens, with Vadim Krasikov, a Russian Fsb spy who Putin considers 'a patriot' and who is actually the murderer of a Chechen-Georgian rebel in the Tiergarten in Berlin.

Maria Pevchikh says that Navalny's partners had now made sure of the decision to exchange Alexey for Krasikov, who is serving a life sentence for murder in Germany. The negotiations lasted two years, maybe it would have taken much less, but that's how it went, Pevchik says, and on the 15th morning the team received confirmation of the exchange. On February 16, Navalny died. Murdered.

The proposal to exchange Navalny had been delivered to Putin by the oligarch Roman Abramovich. And here we get into the disturbing story of Navalny's murder. 'Putin was told clearly,' Pevchik explains. "The only way to get Krasikov is to trade him for Navalny. “Oh, yes, Putin must have thought. I will not tolerate Navalny free. And since they are ready to change Krasikov in principle, we simply need to eliminate the issue of bargaining.” In essence, Putin strongly wanted Krasikov, he had made it known to the Americans for months, but Washington in principle, explains a Western intelligence source, worked at least at the beginning to get Gershkovich back, the Wall Street Journal journalist arrested by Putin with invented accusations of espionage. Also because Navalny was Russian, and the Americans were not entitled to negotiate for the release of a Russian citizen. In fact – the idea came to Christo Grozev – there is a law that allows political prisoners to be exchanged for spies of foreign services (in this case Russians).

Gershkovich had been arrested in the city of Yekaterinburg, about 1,600 km east of Moscow, while reporting on the war in Ukraine on March 29, 2023. Moscow has never forgiven him for writing one of the most beautiful and informed pieces on the ground about the disaster of the Russian economy. The other American (Russian-American) citizen who according to La Stampa sources could have entered the exchange was probably Alsu Kurmasheva, editor of the Tatar-Bashkiro service of Radio Free Europe-Radio Liberty (RFE-RL), also arrested for making articles about Russia (the formal accusation: violating the Foreign Agents Act).

The fact is that the exchange proposal for Navalny, which came to Putin by Abramovich, created a kind of short circuit: Putin could not say no, but he did NOT want to leave Navalny on the loose. The only solution – not very problematic for a man who 'killed tens of thousands of people,' explains Pevchik – was at that point to assassinate Navalny.

In the famous “interview” with the pro-Trump and pro-Putin American propagandist, Tucker Carlson, Putin had already explained – to a precise question about Gershkovich – how he considered Krasikov. 'It makes no sense to keep in prison – claimed the Russian dictator – a person who, out of a sense of homeland, has killed a bandit in one of the European capitals.' Then he added, disturbing and sibylline: 'Whether he did it of his own will or not, it is another matter' (moreo denying that the Berlin murder had been ordered by Moscow). Krasikov, it is worth repeating it for those who do not remember the story, is actually not a “patriot”, he is the murderer of the Russian services who in August 2019 shot dead in the Tiergarten of Berlin the Georgian exile Zelimkhan Khangoshvili, who had fought alongside the Chechen rebels.

Posted by: anon2020 | Feb 26 2024 16:38 utc | 77

Evan Gershkovich Is most likely still a Russian citizen

Posted by: Exile | Feb 26 2024 16:42 utc | 78

https://www.unz.com/proberts/the-rapidly-emerging-rule-of-tyranny-in-the-west/

How can a people as indoctrinated and brainwashed as Americans possibly avoid the tyranny that is rapidly descending on them? Many Americans have difficulty being realistic about government. They think government is there to serve them. It is not. Many decades ago Albert Jay Nock made that clear in the classic book, Our Enemy, The State.

The trust that Americans place in official narratives is extraordinary. Americans fell for 9/11, for Saddam Hussein’s weapons of mass destruction, for the “Covid Pandemic” hoax and the mRNA deadly vaccine. Our government wouldn’t lie to us, many say as they sit in front of CNN, Fox News, listen to NPR, read the New York Times and program themselves into mindlessness.


I recently read a letter from a US Senator to a federal agency demanding to know why the agency was financing research in Wuhan, China, focused on weaponizing bird flu. She hasn’t had a reply. Are the elite going to release weaponized bird flu on us in 2025? By then will it be a criminal offense to refuse the vaccine?

Bill Gates has made it clear that the elite’s agenda is to kill off most of the world population. Mike Benz recently explained to Tucker Carlson the controls being put in place to prevent one word of truth being spoken in resistance to the tyranny that is prepared for us. https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2024/02/19/2024-is-the-last-year-of-free-speech-and-democracy-in-the-western-world/

The official narrative is that people are killing the planet by causing global warming. To save the planet people have to be eliminated. Here we face not Israel’s genocide of a couple of million Palestinians, but the elite’s genocide of 7.5 billion people. Those advocating the genocide of humanity are not held accountable. Instead, they are respectable leaders of mankind.

Also:
https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2024/02/19/2024-is-the-last-year-of-free-speech-and-democracy-in-the-western-world/

On February 16, Tucker Carlson interviewed Mike Benz, the world’s leading expert on the censorship industry. Here you have a complete and accurate explanation of who rules us–and No it is not the Rothschilds and the Bilderbergs–and why the US government has decided to deep-six the First Amendment...

Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 26 2024 16:54 utc | 79

@58 echo chamber

What you say is true in a closed system, but in a system threatened by the rising tide of spirit to undo the excesses of an unstable empire, the role of the taxpayer again comes to the front.

It is not true that taxpayer money is shredded. It is zeroed out. But this is only a very tentative situation, a confidence game, whose wager is nothing but its very existence.

I am, of course, speaking of empire, for which there is no proper school of economics to educate oneself on. You expounding on the various reasonable choices the masters have at their disposal to steer the economy is an incredibly foolish, not to mention moot, errand.

But perhaps we are talking past each other. The role of the taxpayer is currently in a homeostasis suspension, but given the right opportunity in the near future, the productive capital of the citizen will again be paramount when the behemoth of our federal gov't is taken down a peg or two.

Posted by: NemesisCalling | Feb 26 2024 17:18 utc | 80

https://dailycaller.com/2024/02/26/palestinian-government-prime-minister-mohammad-shtayyeh-resign/

Palestinian Government Resigns As Israel-Hamas War Rages On

Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 26 2024 17:30 utc | 81

@too_cents

why not link to the real hackernews?

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=38783112

pro tip: you can search hn via algolia here: https://hn.algolia.com

Posted by: sunof27 | Feb 26 2024 17:46 utc | 82

@Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 26 2024 15:58 utc | 73

Oh yeah, the Brownstain Institute a true lover of oligarchical rule. The 17th amendment actually made the US MORE democratic, as Senators would now be elected directly by the people rather than indirectly chosen by the state legislatures. Such indirect selection is exactly the problem with the EU, removing accountability from the people.

The real coup was the "Framer's Coup" that produced a US Constitution (written by the power elite of their day secretly out of sight of any public gaze) which replaced the Articles of Confederation that distributed power to the states linked to a weak central government, with a highly centralized powerful central government. Here the Brownstone Institute is lying through its face about US history. It's the Federalists who supported and still support rule by oligarchy, Hamilton actually wanted a President for life and utterly hated and despised the not rich.

The quote from the article you referenced below shows the absolute hatred of the Brownstone Institute for democracy, "the tyranny of the majority". It accurately states that the Framers hated democracy.

Democracy is unaccountable tyranny of the majority. It’s coercion. It’s two wolves and a sheep voting about what’s for dinner. It was not what our Framers intended. It was, quite literally, the diametric opposite of the Framers’ intention and their genius.

At the end of the piece, the author disingenuously states "And this is power that We the People must take back for ourselves." What he really means by "We the People" is "We the oligarchs and rightful rulers", its a word game that such oligarch-loving sites regularly play. The authors name is actually a pseudonym to hide the real author, i.e. most probably an oligarch or courtier wanting to hide his/her self-interested agenda.

The Institute is funded through elite-serving charitable organizations set up to specifically hide the names of the donors, so much for the US "free market of ideas". Just another member of the Mainstream Alternative Media, wrapping elite-serving anti-democratic neoliberalism with some facts and large dollops of right wing culture war BS. Just as the MSM does with "left" wing culture war BS.

They also hate the fact that the US government, through the New Deal, actually took some actions to offset the huge inequities in power, wealth and income in the US (called the Great Divergence, ended by neoliberalism in the 1970s). They also hated the income tax of 1913 that only fell on the rich, since the 1970s the oligarch-class have been very good at removing their own taxation while dumping it on the rest of society. As Leona Helmsley so notoriously stated "only the little people pay taxes".

Posted by: Roger | Feb 26 2024 18:07 utc | 83

This comment from hn lays out the extent of the infiltration | collaboration:

"That's pretty astonishing. The MMIO abuse implies either the attackers have truly phenomenal research capabilities, and/or that they hacked Apple and obtained internal hardware documentation (more likely).

I was willing to believe that maybe it was just a massive NSA-scale research team up until the part with a custom hash function sbox. Apple appears to have known that the feature in question was dangerous and deliberately both hidden it, whatever it is, and then gone further and protected it with a sort of (fairly weak) digital signing feature.

As the blog post points out, there's no obvious way you could find the right magic knock to operate this feature short of doing a full silicon teardown and reverse engineering (impractical at these nodes). That leaves hacking the developers to steal their internal documentation.
The way it uses a long chain of high effort zero days only to launch an invisible Safari that then starts from scratch, loading a web page that uses a completely different chain of exploits to re-hack the device, also is indicative of a massive organization with truly abysmal levels of internal siloing.

Given that the researchers in question are Russians at Kaspersky, this pretty much has to be the work of the NSA or maybe GCHQ.

Edit: misc other interesting bits from the talk: the malware can enable ad tracking, and also can detect cloud iPhone service hosting that's often used by security researchers. The iOS/macOS malware platform seems to have been in development for over a decade and actually does ML on the device to do object recognition and OCR on photos on-device, to avoid uploading image bytes: they only upload ML generated labels. They truly went to a lot of effort, but all that was no match for a bunch of smart Russian students.

I'm not sure I agree with the speaker that security through obscurity doesn't work, however. This platform has been in the wild for ten years and nobody knows how long they've been exploiting this hidden hardware "feature". If the hardware feature was openly documented it'd have been found much, much sooner."

-- end quote

the video he mentions: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7VWNUUldBEE

Posted by: sunof27 | Feb 26 2024 18:15 utc | 84

@Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 26 2024 16:54 utc | 79

The great blind-spot of ignorance of libertarians is that they think a society with an extremely limited state will somehow be some bucolic wonderful place. Of course, there are also those that intentionally lie because they understand the reality. A country with an extremely limited state is one run by the oligarchs, with the rest of the population at the mercy of those oligarchs.

Now of course in many nations the oligarchs have taken control of the state, as with the US, to use it as an extra tool, and a more efficient tool, of subjugation. That is why revolutionaries must take control of the state, to use the power of the state to destroy the power of the oligarchs. As they have done in China, Cuba, Nicaragua, Iran and to some degree in Venezuela and Bolivia - that's why the US ruling elite want to destroy these countries at all costs. It was the same with Libya. They also turned on Putin when he strengthened the state and reduced the power of the oligarchs (now further reduced under the sanctions regime and the exigency of war).

Libertarianism is a call for oligarchic rule, a self-defeating ideology for the people. Trotskyists and other anarcho/libertarian socialists also serve up the same self-defeating nonsense when they decry taking control of the state and the need for a strong state leadership to crush oligarchical power. Very much fulfilling the role of a controlled opposition, sheep dogging the people into self-defeating avenues of action.

Posted by: Roger | Feb 26 2024 18:20 utc | 85

[The world wars were] about who'd get to rule the world, as someone else here on MoA said most pointedly.

...

Salut!

Posted by: persiflo | Feb 26 2024 14:21 utc | 71

Salaam!

That would be me in a retired handle. The importance of the psychological aspect of establishing an overt global government was also stressed in related comments. The psychological aspect of humanity includes, naturally, the numinous content that we can categorize under magical, meta-physical, occult, spiritual, and religious. (Certain approaches to philosophy also require components of revential attitudes as a consolation to the God-less soul.)

There is no question in my mind that the psychological levers of power far outstrip any other means available to those who desire lordship over mankind. The psychological control of man affords long term, generational, stable, and self-affecting means of controlling masses. In fact, we are living in such times. After all two skysrapers turned to dust in front of our eyes and yet here we are, discussing fine points of international law, finanance, empire, ideololgies, etc.

The entire global elite went along with 9/11's insulting, beyond patronizing, beyond show boating. It was asserting, demonstrating, announcing.

wa Salaam!

Posted by: sunof27 | Feb 26 2024 18:54 utc | 86

@Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 26 2024 16:54 utc | 79

Tucker and his guest push the false narrative that at some bucolic time (the 1950s?) the people of the US had freedom of speech and conscience and its the nasty "globalists", "leftists", "communists", "liberals" that have come together to take these rights away. That is complete history-defying bullshit.

In the 1950s we had a little thing called McCarthyism and an FBI run by the the 1984-style discipline imposer Hoover and his COINTELPRO. The CIA also spent large amounts of money manipulating academia and the press. The hearings on this in 1970s, even though significantly limited by the security state, have many shocking examples of the lack of rights people have in the US if they err too far away from the accepted beliefs. From 1917-1920 Wilson implemented what can only be called a fascist state. In between there were still very significant limits of free speech and acceptable beliefs.

The modern version is simply a return to the 1950s with significantly different technologies (e.g. the internet) that need to be controlled during a time of oligarchic response to working class threats (e.g. OWS) and intra-oligarchic conflict. The West is also at war, and just as in WW1, WW2 and even the US-Spanish War, the media will be very fully and tightly controlled. Nothing new, just the same old same, but if Tucker and his guest accepted that then they would have to accept that the US has always been ruled by an oligarch ruling class and that there has never been something called "freedom of speech".

Just more Mainstream Alternative Media wrapping their propaganda within layers of actual facts. Trying to tell you that there is some independent "US government" when its all bought and paid for by the oligarchs.

Posted by: Roger | Feb 26 2024 19:45 utc | 87

POLYCENTRIC !

Here we go. Not even the westernised label that allows ‘unicentric’ as a viable word, never mind a viable concept. First time I heard that phrase. Love it.


🇷🇺🇨🇳 On February 26, Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov received Deputy Foreign Minister of the People’s Republic of China Sun Weidong, who is in Moscow on a working visit.

The Sides praised the current state of Russian-Chinese relations, which have reached an unprecedented level and continue to develop dynamically in line with the agreements between the two countries’ leaders.

Mutual intention was expressed to increase coordination in key international organisations and dialogue mechanisms in the interests of creating a more just and sustainable polycentric world order. The desire to increase bilateral cooperation in #BRICS, considering Russia’s chairmanship this year, was reaffirmed.

🌐 A confidential discussion was held on ensuring security in the Eurasian space, as well as in the Asia-Pacific region, given the active attempts by the West to create small-bloc military-political associations in the region. Several important issues were discussed, including the Ukraine crisis and the situation on the Korean peninsula.

🤝 The conversation took place in a traditionally friendly and trusting atmosphere.

#RussiaChina

Amen.

Posted by: DunGroanin | Feb 26 2024 21:54 utc | 88

Posted by: Roger | Feb 26 2024 19:45 utc | 87


Thxs for your posts (and rebuttals!).

Brownstone Institute Mission:


OUR MISSION
The mission of Brownstone Institute is constructively to come to terms with what happened, understand why, and how to prevent such events from happening again. Lockdowns have set a precedent in the modern world and without accountability, social and economic institutions will be shattered once again.

An institution such as Brownstone Institute is essential in preventing the recurrence of lockdowns by holding decision makers intellectually to account.

In addition, Brownstone Institute hopes to shed light on a path to recovery from the devastating collateral damage, while providing a vision for a different way to think about freedom, security, and public life.

Brownstone Institute looks to influence a post-lockdown world by generating new ideas in public health, scientific discourse, economics, and social theory, to defend and promote the liberty that is critical for an enlightened society from which everyone benefits.

The purpose of Brownstone Institute is to point the way toward a better understanding of essential freedoms – including intellectual freedom and free speech – and the proper means to preserve essential rights even in times of crisis.

Could be as nefarious as you say, but since they were anti-lockdown and anti-vax etc. and people like that are subject to lawfare in today's America, hardly surprising they choose to be largely anonymous. But maybe you are right about them. I don't trust anything I read on the internet ever, but some of what they said about the Senate felt reasonable to me, someone who has felt that democracy is a con from the get-go. (Am also not libertarian, I don't think; never looked into it.) (More later, just got called away...)

Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 26 2024 22:07 utc | 89

"Europeans complaining about all the refugees "
Posted by: Roger | Feb 25 2024 21:40 utc | 24

Let us not forget how Europe's refugees have already floded the world, In my native Iowa, you won't meet many Iowa "Indians".

Posted by: lester | Feb 26 2024 22:28 utc | 90

"But maybe you are right about them. I don't trust anything I read on the internet ever, but some of what they said about the Senate felt reasonable to me, someone who has felt that democracy is a con from the get-go. (Am also not libertarian, I don't think; never looked into it.) (More later, just got called away...)"

Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 26 2024 22:07 utc | 89

Food for thought Scorpion definitely. As one cynic to another:

Sir your default assumption, ALWAYS, has to be that someone is talking to someone. The moment a group or individual has any "relevance", impact, etc. then some alphabet soup agency will infiltrate, so division, demonize and so on. You know that; It needs emphasis though.

Leaderless, or flat, organizations have the problem or organizing and cohesiveness, common goals. Kinda of that "drone proof" communications net I felt the most difficult problem to address was just that. I have an idea that would improve things at the tactical & strategic level and solve that problem. It's not a solution for those not fully committed to a cause.

It occurred to me yesterday that a cell phone battery, if deliberate, has the energy to destroy phone storage. It was so obvious and I never saw it for years. It's dual use and reuse (no phosphorous). Everyone loves features you know. Yikes.

You know it's a joke in my family.
It's a good one.
Now... if I thought of it?
Did someone else thought of it?
Well sure, I thought so.
But it exists!
That means it exists.
That's the point.
Which is a tad disturbing...
These nightmares that haunt my waking day?
What will they think of next? Shudder.

Posted by: David G Horsman | Feb 26 2024 23:00 utc | 91

Posted by: Roger | Feb 26 2024 19:45 utc | 87

Just more Mainstream Alternative Media wrapping their propaganda within layers of actual facts. Trying to tell you that there is some independent "US government" when its all bought and paid for by the oligarchs.

I generally agree with most of your post, esp. that the 'good old 1950's' weren't all they are nostalgically cracked up to be but that’s also true for Russia and China.

Viz the founding: weren't there various factions, some of whom were sincerely trying to set up a different sort of liberty-based republic and others a bankster colony?

In any case, in the Brownstone article I like the notion of strong States with a relatively simple Federal Government though don't believe it's viable: anything placed over the States, no matter how initially constrained, is bound to metastasize into the monster the system was designed, or as you argue pretending, to cage.

The only good State is strong and truly sovereign; when all is said and done, I am a European who prefers States with their own language, culture and class system, ideally with a bona fide sacred King at the top, not beholden to other nations or international cliques or ideologies as has been the case for centuries in the ruined West. And like Dugin, I am convinced that a secular, modernist, materialist model cannot create a good human society.

I roughly understand the underlying principles of the US setup, but clearly it is much too easy to subvert and should be rethunk; but the State is now captured, so rethunking is verboten. And here we are with a good old-fashioned kleptocratic plutocracy. I feel sorry for the American citizenry.

Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 26 2024 23:35 utc | 92

The infamous Tucker C, whom I love to suspect but who is having the best interviews of late, has a Chinese American guest on whose family left China soon after the Cultural Revolution which she witnessed unfolding in the streets every day because the Red Guard closed down the schools for two years, watching everything old being destroyed, 'Buddhist statues, Christian statues', everything old, including furniture, peoples photos, 'the goal is to get rid of the past to replace it with pure Maoism'.

Sounds lovely.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jIay3uL17Jg

Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 27 2024 0:12 utc | 93

@Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 26 2024 22:07 utc | 89

Could be as nefarious as you say, but since they were anti-lockdown and anti-vax etc. and people like that are subject to lawfare in today's America, hardly surprising they choose to be largely anonymous. But maybe you are right about them. I don't trust anything I read on the internet ever, but some of what they said about the Senate felt reasonable to me, someone who has felt that democracy is a con from the get-go. (Am also not libertarian, I don't think; never looked into it.) (More later, just got called away...)

I forget who the quote is from but supposedly some US oligarch at the beginning of the twentieth century stated that he could hire one half of the working class to fight the other. Well between the MSM and MSAM the oligarchs are getting the working class to fight each other very much on the cheap. One thing both the MSM and MSAM (and Dem/Repubs) share is neoliberalism, and both love using the state to discipline the working class. The Dems have to appear more caring and the Repubs more libertarian as cover for what they really want - rule by oligarch. If they can do that through manufacturing consent so good, if not coercion and violence will be used.

What currently complicates things is that there is an intra-ruling class fight and the gloves have completely come off in that fight, using the state against members and representatives of the ruling class in a way usually only reserved for the working class. For example, the McCarthy hearings quickly ended when McCarthy made the mistake of going after members of the establishment rather than the easy targets. Lawfare is usually only for labour unions, troublesome NGOs, journalists and socialists, whistle blowers, and foreign countries, not for people like Trump.

Posted by: Roger | Feb 27 2024 0:28 utc | 94

@Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 26 2024 23:35 utc | 92

Viz the founding: weren't there various factions, some of whom were sincerely trying to set up a different sort of liberty-based republic and others a bankster colony?

There's a great book "The Framers' Coup: The Making of the United States Constitution", by Micahel J. Klarman which covers this (very reasonably priced as an ebook). There were some people trying to do the right thing for the people, but they were completely overwhelmed by the selfish elites (who actually locked the doors of the building to stop anyone from getting wind of their nefarious creation). The whole ratification of the constitution was also a very unseemly thing as the majority of the population was against the taking of their democratic rights.

Also a huge smell around the use of the now strong Federal government to pay in full the war bonds of the individual states that had massively declined in value and were bought up by many speculators, a whole bunch of which had drafted the new constitution. And then to put down the working class/small holders revolt of the Whisky Rebellion. Hamilton nearly turned the US into a fascist state (along with the Aliens and Sedition Act) and his political grouping was only very narrowly defeated in the 1800 election ("the revolution of 1800") that brought in a Jefferson (after 36 ballots in the House!) that rolled back the politicization of the military and freed many of those jailed under the Aliens and Sedition Act (a forerunner of Wilson's fascist state and then the Homeland Security Act). He had written the preamble to the Declaration of Independence.

Jefferson was intentionally kept put of the drafting of the new constitution:

The Constitutional Convention took place from May 25th to September 17th, 1787, during which the text of the Constitution was debated, drafted, and ultimately decided upon by the delegates. On June 6th, Madison wrote a letter to Jefferson with a list of the individuals attending the Convention, but explained that he couldn’t reveal more about the substance of the ongoing debates because the delegates agreed that the proceedings should be kept secret.

On September 6th, Madison wrote a letter to Jefferson detailing some key provisions that were going to be included in the Constitution, as he reasoned that by the time the letter would arrive in France the details of the Constitution would be made public. Madison explained how state and federal governments were to be organized, and noted that some of the provisions may “surprise” Jefferson.

On December 20th, 1787, after the Constitutional Convention was over and while the ratification of the Constitution was being debated in state legislatures, Jefferson wrote a letter to Madison objecting to key parts of the Constitution. Among other things, Jefferson was concerned that the document lacked a Bill Of Rights and failed to establish term limits for federal officials. In earlier correspondences to other acquaintances, in 1786 Jefferson extolled government protection of civil liberties and wrote, for example, that “our liberty depends on the freedom of the press”. Jefferson also was a proponent of protections for religious liberty and wrote the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, which passed the Virginia General Assembly in 1786.

https://constitutioncenter.org/blog/a-quick-look-at-thomas-jeffersons-constitutional-legacy

The Bill of Rights, pushed forward by Madison and ratified in 1791 was an attempt to ameliorate some of the undemocratic focus of the constitution. Later, Jefferson and later presidents helped greatly expand the electorate. In 1800 it has been greatly limited by property, colour and sex requirements and only 76,000 people (out of a population of 3 million) had cast votes in 1800. Women only for the vote in 1920, and Blacks only truly enfranchised in the 1960s.

When Federalists go on and on about the US early democracy we should remember how incredibly limited it was.

Posted by: Roger | Feb 27 2024 1:00 utc | 95

@Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 27 2024 0:12 utc | 93

The Cultural revolution was substantially limited to the cities in a country with a very low level of urbanization. Within 2 years Mao had the Red Guards crushed as they got out of control and they were banished to the countryside. A major impact for the masses of the rural population due to both a rebalancing of education funds away from the cities and the millions of Red Guards sent into the countryside was a very rapid rise in literacy, which was one of the biggest factors that facilitated Deng's reforms.

As the son of a disgraced official, Xi Jinping was also banished to the countryside for years, an experience that seems to have been very formative upon the then teenager's worldview. His sister had committed suicide after a raid of the Red Guards upon the family home.

Deng's son was crippled after falling/being thrown out of a window during interrogation. Amazing how much these people endured before being rehabilitated by Mao.

Posted by: Roger | Feb 27 2024 1:07 utc | 96

Posted by: Roger | Feb 27 2024 0:28 utc | 94

What currently complicates things is that there is an intra-ruling class fight and the gloves have completely come off in that fight, using the state against members and representatives of the ruling class in a way usually only reserved for the working class. For example, the McCarthy hearings quickly ended when McCarthy made the mistake of going after members of the establishment rather than the easy targets. Lawfare is usually only for labour unions, troublesome NGOs, journalists and socialists, whistle blowers, and foreign countries, not for people like Trump.

Complicated indeed. The muckety-mucks are having internecine civil war fighting about how best to enslave everyone. The Chinese lady on TC's interview, when asked why they did what they did (the wicked CCP) said simply 'power'. And she said if people don't get involved and fight back, millions will probably die just as happened in her country.

Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 27 2024 1:09 utc | 97

Errata: in a post above I said 'her family' got out but it was just herself; she was an educated adult who landed a teaching position thanks to a sponsor teaching English whom she met in China. She led a quiet life as a grateful US citizen until the BLM riots in 2020 when she felt she had to speak up, because from her point of view, the country was looking more and more like CCP territory. Of course most in China will insist her view is wrong; fair enough, but it is her view.

She said she was grateful to have done three years, aged 16-19, in hard manual labour in the fields because she got to know the peasant class whom Mao had used to take over ('tyranny of the proletariat' indeed) but after the revolution they were worse off than before. That's why she maintains the whole thing is about power. I was never in China and know nothing, but my impression of marxism and communism is that they are a self-serving means to an end, a deliberate con for which far too many people susceptible to utopian snake oil salesmen fall. The idea of communism maybe pretty decent, and those who believe in it also decent, but the actual motive behind and execution of the implementation is power and control, same-old same-old.

I doubt things are that straightforward, that there is, as always, a mix of good and bad etc., but speaking as a first-hand witness moreover with conviction, hers is a voice worth hearing at least once.

Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 27 2024 1:13 utc | 98

This is how oligarchs engage directly with the education system to put their views and interests in the curricula ahead of those of the general populace. Koch Injected Nearly $500 Million into Hundreds of Colleges and Universities Between 2018 and 2022

He sees his "funding higher education as a means of educating young people on the benefits of free market capitalism" and "The policy papers produced by Koch-funded professors and researchers travel through the Koch network of think tanks and advocacy organizations, ultimately ending up in the hands of policymakers with the power to bring about the social change Koch favors".

Posted by: Roger | Feb 27 2024 1:16 utc | 99

@Posted by: Scorpion | Feb 27 2024 1:09 utc | 97

Millions did not die in the Cultural Revolution, and the economy was only affected in 1967 and 1968 before bouncing back to growth. There is much propagandist BS said about this period, including from those that fled from it. Generally, the 1960s and 1970s saw economic growth and improvements in living conditions that were much greater than those in India - even using the World Bank data.

Posted by: Roger | Feb 27 2024 1:21 utc | 100

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