Election Musings
The current presidential election cycle is the least attractive I have ever watched.
Donald Trump is doing his usual talk giving promises which no one believes he will keep.
Kamala Harris is as disagreeable as many have feared. She is basically an empty vessel with a tendency to authoritarianism. The vessel is ready to be filled with whatever new war project the neo-conservatives - see Liz Cheney - are planning for.
Biden was and is clearly beyond the point of pursuing another presidency. Moving him aside was the best thing the Democrats could do. Offering Harris as a replacement - without any campaign, vote or legitimization - was the worst thing they could do. They will rue this mistake.
My hunch is that Trump will win the election. What policies will follow will largely depend on the people he will select to run the show. He had previously chosen people who were opposing and sabotaging his policies. He lacked the authority and/or will to rein them in. I do not believe that he has learned from it.
Whoever may win the presidency will anyway not make a big difference.
I expect the new president to double down on the anti-Russian project in Ukraine and on support for the genocide the Zionist are committed to finish. The U.S. will continue to be bogged down in Europe and west-Asia. The 'pivot to Asia' to counter China's rise will continue to stall. The economic standing of the U.S. will continue to deteriorate.
This is good news for China, Russia, the BRICS project and those involved in it. As the old world order continues to drag itself down the new one gains time and space to evolve from it.
Posted by b on October 22, 2024 at 15:33 UTC | Permalink
next page »Best case scenario -
Trump will end the Ukraine war with diplomacy.
Trump will force the Psychopathic Entity back to the 1967 borders.
...wishful thinking in spades
Posted by: librul | Oct 22 2024 15:41 utc | 2
The amount of people claiming that President Trump lacks the authority to "rein them in" is genuinely surprising. If anyone remembers, not only did he refuse to get involved in a massive Syria war, his SecDef resigned over it. Meanwhile, the renegotiated North American free trade deal was done in one term, indicating exactly how easy it always would have been for any other politician to do likewise.
Most non-Americans are unaware of what Senate confirmation is or why it limits the actions of any President without a link to the two-party system. But it's been eight years since Trump first got the Presidency. He's had a lot of time to think, and the assassination attempts are making it much easier to choose violence to resolve problems. Like the problem os a large, expensive, hopelessly corrupt political class.
Posted by: They Call Me Mister | Oct 22 2024 15:45 utc | 3
The new time is not here yet and the old time is not over yet. It is the time of the monsters
Posted by: caleidoscope | Oct 22 2024 15:47 utc | 4
Voted early this morning and Jill Stein it was, although I was more excited to cast yes on 2 great amendments - to legalize pot and abortion.
BTW, I had to show legal ID and sign my name which was checked against registration card. The fraud occurs before we proles ever reach the ballot box which is why the genocide will continue and oligarchy calls the shots.
Posted by: motorslug | Oct 22 2024 15:47 utc | 5
Kids these days : they go from "emo goth isolationist" to "wannabe popular bully" in no time :) Don't bother to much, USA are still young , it's just a phase ^^.
Posted by: Savonarole | Oct 22 2024 15:48 utc | 6
B,
I believe your musings are 100% correct. The choice between the two candidates is about rowing the boat faster or slower as it cicrcles the drain.
Posted by: Matt | Oct 22 2024 15:49 utc | 7
A president is like the symbolic foreman of a construction project.
If the company you hire to do a major home renovation changed its foreman every weekend to a new foreman, the renovation would likely never get done on time if that foreman truly had the ability to impose for the entire week his own designs on the larger project. Or the entire project would end up in disaster.
150 million people are voting for a symbolic foreman. But the real project is planned and run elsewhere. But even that is doomed to fail ultimately because the Atlanticist "deep state" has failed to purge its many competing factions and various divergent caste interests before foreign state competitors become strong enough to rebel against the imperium and cause real damage. The question isnt "who will be president?" but rather "what oligarchic faction will wrest the institutional reins?"
Posted by: ZT | Oct 22 2024 15:50 utc | 8
Normally your analysis of internal US politics is pretty off, but you nailed it this time. This whole election theater can be effectively summed up in just a few sentences, there is almost no depth or complexity here anymore.
Posted by: Bob | Oct 22 2024 15:53 utc | 9
With his power so dependent on the neoliberal oligarchs, Trump would be the Javier Milei of the United States. Next it will be the turn of the Argentines to ask: "Why did the Americans make a clown president?"
Posted by: CIROC | Oct 22 2024 15:53 utc | 10
I expect the new president to double down on the anti-Russian project in Ukraine and on support for the genocide the Zionist are committed to finish. The U.S. will continue to be bogged down in Europe and west-Asia. The 'pivot to Asia' to counter China's rise will continue to stall. The economic standing of the U.S. will continue to deteriorate.
I think they gave up on Ukraine already. I don't even think they will wait till January, it has been quietly dropped already, and that will be apparent in a couple of weeks.
If Harris loses then it is in nobody's interest to protect the presidency, neither Biden nor Harris will run again. Besides unless Trump is mad he will just announce that Biden screwed it up the day he wins. If Harris wins, again there is really no purpose in delaying the story any further.
Israel I fear you are right.
There can be no military pivot to Asia - US just doesn't have the muscle and its only strength, carriers, have been neutered in this day of the hypersonics. All it has is MAD.
US economic, military and soft power standing fell some time ago.
Israel and Ukraine were never about exercising power, they were all about covering up the US lack of power. (I've been reading your Emmanuel Todd).
Posted by: Michael Droy | Oct 22 2024 15:54 utc | 11
Both the American candidates are objectionable. Trump will win, for the third time, but let's see if he becomes president.
If he does, the Ukrainian war will be over. Russia's existence, however, will not be secured before America is driven out of Europe.
Europe might not be salvageable, the thinking rot has taken hold to an alarming extent.
If USA does not collapse, Russia, China and the rest of the world better be ready for a fight, or prepare for serfdom.
Not a nice scenario, whichever way one looks at it.
Posted by: g wiltek | Oct 22 2024 15:55 utc | 12
"an empty vessel with a tendency to authoritarianism"
Seems a spot on description of what politics in the west has become, roughly this last quarter of a century, maybe thirty years in the US.
Posted by: Newbie | Oct 22 2024 15:56 utc | 14
with the dearth of accountability there is no percentage in a vote for Jill Stein. SHe had my last several. Now we need to punish the National Security State Democrats in the only way we can.
Follow the trajectory of DNC primary actions over the last twenty years. They are on course, and delighted to have achieved their goal this year, as publicized four years ago. They have repealed voting rights for their victims, and no one says a mumbling word.
Posted by: Not Ewe | Oct 22 2024 15:58 utc | 15
The assassination attempts have changed Trump. He will not forget and he will take the actions necessary to try to straighten the country out.
Posted by: Buffalo bill | Oct 22 2024 15:58 utc | 16
The person Donald Trump and the politician did nt deteriorate.
Even improved in some angles.
What did deteriorate was the world situation and the western forcible positions about it.
Which brings us the question whether they are manageable by any president, much more so by a voluntarist one.
@Posted by: motorslug | Oct 22 2024 15:47 utc | 5
I looked it up. Florida has a mary jane amendment on the ballot
and early voting in Florida began yesterday (Monday).
A motorslug might be right at home in Daytona.
Why do I want to guess Pensacola instead?
Posted by: librul | Oct 22 2024 16:01 utc | 18
"The 'pivot to Asia' to counter China's rise will continue to stall."
There is an order to these things.
To have any chance of success at confronting China, the Empire must first defeat Russia, but the Russians are not making that easy. The Empire's only hope is a naval blockade of China, but that cannot starve China so long as Russia is friendly. China's "Belt and Road", even in its current incomplete state, is likewise sufficient to keep China's trade lively.
I realize that some vying for the Empire's leadership think the best move is to back off on Russia for now and focus on China, but that is going to lead to heartache for the Empire as things currently stand. My guess is that Trump intends to try and turn on the charm with the Russians, offering to remove some sanctions (at least the ones that don't serve a protectionist purposes), and offer to replace Britain with Russia as America's right hand. Britain is as useless to the Empire as tits on a bull these days anyway (that metaphor works for Britain in many different ways).
Putin might very well be tempted by an offer like that from Trump, but I doubt the general staff will let the empire leash Russia without a fight.
I am sure our host is aware of the futility of the 'pivot to Asia' while Russia remains independent, but the Empire's strategists are likely delusional and incompetent enough to imagine they can pull it off. Hopefully the Chinese are bold in their response.
Posted by: William Gruff | Oct 22 2024 16:03 utc | 20
Trump will have no more power this time than last, unless he toes the line.
He foolishly made fools of the Bush familia.
That error will not be forgotten.
All in favor of monkey wrenching a nation that embraces genocide and desires absolute warfare will find few opportunities past this "election" to stop the tide.
the ROW will have to solve this problem for us.
might not be pleasant.
Posted by: Not Ewe | Oct 22 2024 16:04 utc | 21
@ librul
Your first instinct is closer and I never would have thought of that but it makes sense. The moniker is actually a song by JG Thirlwell as Wiseblood, which is homage to the novel/movie of same name.
Posted by: motorslug | Oct 22 2024 16:08 utc | 22
The entire leadership class in USA is inadequate. Yet the only way out is through. It took 3 generations to stupefy Americans. No election is going to cure them. Stronger medicine is necessary.
The USA will have to work on its adequacy catharsis for generations. That is fearsome.
Posted by: too scents | Oct 22 2024 16:08 utc | 23
Jill Stein will fulfill her role as "controlled opposition" every bit as well as
Bernie did, mind boggling anyone would vote for her.
Posted by: qparker | Oct 22 2024 16:11 utc | 24
IOU
Federal spending on interest payments is forecast to hit $870 billion this year — exceeding the $822 billion that the nation will spend on defense in 2024, according to a recent analysis by the Congressional Budget Office.
Posted by: Don Bacon | Oct 22 2024 16:17 utc | 25
What's mind-boggling is why anyone would vote for 2 of the heads of the vampire squid.
Posted by: motorslug | Oct 22 2024 16:18 utc | 26
Regardless who steals the election, the new POTUS on 21 January 2025 will have broken the oath of office s/he swore to uphold the day before thus becoming another Outlaw President, the 15th in a row thus continuing the basic post-WW2 policy of trying to rule the world. In that respect, Harris will be more predictable than Trump, but the general policy direction will remain the same.
Re: BRICS.
I just posted a quick primer on why a country would want to join BRICS.
It's in this week's open thread (The MoA Week In Review - OT 2024-250) at Oct 22 2024 16:11 utc.
BRICS is going to change the world, because it's a giant step forward in "how to do trade" and "who benefits from trade".
I welcome comments. If you're going to troll, please do it competently.
Posted by: Tom Pfotzer | Oct 22 2024 16:20 utc | 28
Jill Stein will fulfill her role as "controlled opposition" every bit as well as
Bernie did, mind boggling anyone would vote for her.
Posted by: qparker | Oct 22 2024 16:11 utc | 24
Given Trump's record, it is mind boggling anyone would vote for him a second time. The first vote, as a newcomer against Hillary, I could give those voters the benefit of a doubt, but a second time for that imbecile who gave the zionists more than they could dream of, and his policy of regime-change in Venezuela, and all his appointments (Pompeo, Bolton, Elliot Abrams, etc... "draining the swamp", my astrolabe!), hell no.
Posted by: jure | Oct 22 2024 16:22 utc | 29
Well, Americans are generally politically uninterested, and in some cases know nothing about the political situation around them. Unless the media is preparing for war, then Americans hear something that fits and makes them ready for war.
In Europe, on the other hand, things are completely different, before voting at the ballot box they think things over... who wants war, who wants peace, who brings me social benefits, who is only interested in profit.
As a German, I have spoken to hundreds of Americans, but when it comes to political issues, they all stopped at their own leadership, nobody knew anything about the problems in Germany with Ukraine and Poland, not even what was happening with N1 and N2. Mexico was only a term in connection with migration and refugees, Venezuela... well, Americans know that it exists, but that's all. Americans are not even aware that their own country has one of the highest, if NOT the highest, inflation among the industrialized countries. They complain, but don't compare. As a German, I have rarely come across such uninterested political losers, unthinkable in Europe.
But...just my impression, which may not be correct, the indifference of the Americans when it comes to political life outside the USA is just frightening, but about 85% of them would immediately die in a war for the elite WITHOUT asking why?
Strange people, these Americans...similar to the Germans from 1937 to 1945, similarly obedient and ready to die for elites who were never in danger themselves. Call me my president, I follow you...
Posted by: ossi | Oct 22 2024 16:25 utc | 30
interesting ruminations b! i tend to agree with you...
Posted by: james | Oct 22 2024 16:28 utc | 31
Hopefully the Chinese are bold in their response.
Posted by: William Gruff | Oct 22 2024 16:03 utc | 20
China has to thread lightly. From SK and taiwan a 1.200 km radius puts everything that is worthwhile in range.
Luckily for china the us is still weak on intermediate range ballistic missiles, but has plenty of cruise missiles and for that china is still working to set up the layered defense that RF has (the pantsir and buk part was missing).
https://www.ausairpower.net/APA-PLA-IADS-SAMs.html#mozTocId121731
Posted by: Newbie | Oct 22 2024 16:28 utc | 32
Cheers b.
US elections ? A farcical Potemkin Anocracy. No more than a staged Reality TV show, with even less substance & effect. US is merely senior Empire vassal. Dems, Repugs, two cheeks of the same ass. No material change other than minor ascendancy of one deep state faction over another. For far too long, same as it ever was, especially so since early '60s onwards. USofA is merely Empires senior, vassal state. TopDog amongst Empires suborned/obedient/controlled pack, yet but just another, 'Dog'.
@ ossi | Oct 22 2024 15:40 utc | 1
i share your sentiments.... the westcoast of canada, or the halls of power in ottawa isn't any different either..
Posted by: james | Oct 22 2024 16:31 utc | 34
Depoliticized politics.
Note to self: Reread "Society of the Spectacle" a prophetic book.
Posted by: JAB | Oct 22 2024 16:31 utc | 35
Lets see how the second attempt an swamp draining will go. In the first one the drainer got stuck in the mud.
Posted by: alek_a | Oct 22 2024 16:32 utc | 36
Posted by: jure | Oct 22 2024 16:22 utc | 29
Harris: Married to a Jew
Trump: Hidden Jew (Drumpf)
Stein: Actual Jew
Lucky Americans
Posted by: qparker | Oct 22 2024 16:33 utc | 37
Lets see how the second attempt an swamp draining will go. In the first one the drainer got stuck in the mud.
Posted by: alek_a | Oct 22 2024 16:32 utc | 36
During the first attempt, the swamp became a federally protected wetland.
Posted by: jure | Oct 22 2024 16:34 utc | 38
Both the American candidates are objectionable. Trump will win, for the third time, but let's see if he becomes president.
If he does, the Ukrainian war will be over. Russia's existence, however, will not be secured before America is driven out of Europe.
Europe might not be salvageable, the thinking rot has taken hold to an alarming extent.
If USA does not collapse, Russia, China and the rest of the world better be ready for a fight, or prepare for serfdom.
Not a nice scenario, whichever way one looks at it.
Posted by: g wiltek | Oct 22 2024 15:55 utc | 12
Trump will lose the popular vote for the third time, but be installed again by redneck DEI.
Anyway, I'm not planning on voting for either of the Zio approved candidates.
Posted by: JMW | Oct 22 2024 16:35 utc | 39
Solid analysis B.
I voted for Stein knowing full well it’s a protest vote.
One thing Trump could do if he wins is to sign an executive order barring any more weapons to Ukraine. I’m not real optimistic that he would, but it would certainly be legal (Congress would howl but they can only appropriate funds; as CoC the President has the power over the armed forces and can invent a pretext like national security.)
Some generals or more likely the CIA would no doubt try to do an end-around like transferring stuff through ISIS or South American narcos (drugs for guns.) If the blob is determined enough they can provoke a crisis. So minor advantage Trump, but that has to be balanced against his impulsive nature and even more hidebound support for Netanyahu.
Posted by: Don Bacon | Oct 22 2024 16:17 utc | 25
It’s actually up to $1.1T now as of November 1. See the other threads.
Posted by: Ghost of Zanon | Oct 22 2024 16:39 utc | 40
@ William Gruff | Oct 22 2024 16:03 utc | 20
thanks william.. those are interesting runimations too, although my feeling is it is too late for a lot of that...
@ ossi | Oct 22 2024 16:25 utc | 30
lol... i really relate to all that you say here as well.. thanks.. maybe i am not losing my mind after all..
Posted by: james | Oct 22 2024 16:40 utc | 41
Newbie @32
China has a trap set for the Empire in the South China Sea. That is sufficiently distant from major Chinese cities that the Empire cannot go nuts on population centers and pretend that it is "collateral damage" like it normally does (whose lead do you think the zionists and Ukro-Nazis are taking when they deliberately target civilians?). The Chinese have to be ready to trip that trap without hesitation when the Empire stick its neck out.
Posted by: William Gruff | Oct 22 2024 16:40 utc | 42
What's mind-boggling is why anyone would vote for 2 of the heads of the vampire squid.Posted by: motorslug | Oct 22 2024 16:18 utc | 26
What's really mind-boggling is why anyone would vote and give legitimacy to a corrupt system...?
Posted by: ThirdWorldDude | Oct 22 2024 16:41 utc | 43
I remember what happened to JFK when he was going to end the War in Vietnam
(I was a high school junior in a Dallas suburb.)
Posted by: qparker | Oct 22 2024 16:41 utc | 44
https://www.counterpunch.org/2024/10/22/tech-bro-monarchy-vs-lucy-and-her-football/
"…. have the presidential elections ever been this truly dismal? The fact that we are to plunge forward into this end of Empire scenario with this cast of characters is probably fitting. Out with a cringe, not even a whimper or a bang, I suppose."
Posted by: motorslug | Oct 22 2024 16:42 utc | 45
Re: [Kamala Harris] is basically an empty vessel with a tendency to authoritarianism.
Actually, this describes Trump too. On the content of his vessel, he tosses some populist points, but on some issues he lacks managerial capacity (his business carrier was focus on brand recognition and salesmanship, an managing side he bankrupted this or that), as we can see in his infrastructure program (nothing happened) or replacing confusing and costly "Obamacare" with "something marvelous" (nothing happened). On some issues he is positively toxic, like in Middle East.
On authoritarianism, Trump is pro-police and pro-tough, and American policing suffers from brutal excesses that may be tempered, however slightly, by the federal government. Pro-Zionism results in censorship and outright repressions, no help from Trump here. On lawfare, that is luckily difficult in USA. Trump actually promised to send Hillary Clinton to jail in the past, did not happen. But he may learn from his failures on that front.
Posted by: Piotr Berman | Oct 22 2024 16:46 utc | 47
Go ahead and vote for the Greens or PSL to register your displeasure but don't expect anything from them. The Greens showed themselves to be a complete clown show over how they handled their grifter VP candidate spouting NED Uyghur talking points and then threw a hissy fit locking down his tweets and blocking everyone in sight. Rather than locking him into a padded room for the remaining two weeks, Stein retweeted his comment and allowed him to post on his next grift.
https://nitter.poast.org/ButchWare
This level of incompetence is downright suspicious.
Posted by: Emma | Oct 22 2024 16:49 utc | 48
What you miss about Trump as an outsider is that he won't actively try to destroy the country. We have endured 4yrs of Biden's active subversion and assault on on our society. There is a big difference between Heels up Harris and The Donald. So you are free to try to cast this as Tweedle Dee vs Tweedle Dum but you are very wrong and show no awareness of US politics. If Harris wins the US will be over. The shenanigans around 2020 were just a dress rehersal and if they are successful, the next few years will see the final destruction of the electoral process. The US will become California where they first perfected the art. 20yrs ago California banned so called gay marriage. Within 10 years districts were locked up by democrats and mysteriously by the most repugnant people possible. You really don't want the US to become California, it will not be good at all for Europe. For all his warts you really want Trump to win.
Posted by: Me | Oct 22 2024 16:49 utc | 49
Listen to Lavrov.
Trump is an old man and even if he took on the deep state. Within a few years it will be back. It will be a delay rather than real change. The neocons will just wait him out. Like they did the last time. The project continues.
Lavrov basically said and I'm paraphrasing,
" We will work with anyone who recognise mutual security concerns, but as history shows we don't expect it to happen over the long term "
Posted by: Sun Of Alabama | Oct 22 2024 16:51 utc | 50
But he may learn from his failures on that front.
Posted by: Piotr Berman | Oct 22 2024 16:46 utc | 47
Study the man, he never seemed to learn from his business failures which were many and flagrant. He ended up banished from Wall Street who wouldn't touch him with a 10ft
pole, only Deutsche Bank would do business with him.
Posted by: qparker | Oct 22 2024 16:53 utc | 51
It's odd that the Democrats have run a fear-mongering campaign about "authoritarianism" as the Democrats have become more authoritarian than ever. It's not like the Dems are running a platform of curtailing the federal government's spying powers over the citizenry. And it's not like they're running on beefing up privacy laws (which have not been beefed up since the 1970s, iirc). The best they can say is that they'll keep the government of women's wombs, which is great, and all, but what little they do when they have the power to do it suggests that they'll put no energy into this if we get them elected at any level. And as a Louisianan, I always like to remind people that it was the Democrats, here, and not the Republicans, who banned abortion in this state.
And I say this as a communist, not a far-right moonbat: the January 6th defendants should have been pardoned. This would have saved the Democrats a lot of headaches and gained them a lot of good will as beneficent leaders. Biden should have taken a note from Jefferson about the necessity of occasional rebellions in a free, democratic, society. The rioters were wrong - but set them right to the facts, and then show mercy. The retribution against the "rioters" was obviously carried out because they couldn't get retribution against the leader of the event, Donald Trump. Now there's a situation that eerily resembles that which led to the emergence of ISIS in Iraq and Syria, with extreme right prisoners forming networks which will persist after their release, after these defendants will have gone through the university of crime that is the federal pen.
Posted by: fnord | Oct 22 2024 16:58 utc | 52
@Posted by: They Call Me Mister | Oct 22 2024 15:45 utc | 3
Agreed, I think that B is being a little bit delusional here. Firstly, Trump will win, that's already a done deal given the most recent polls and the Harris-Waltz meltdown. Pulling out Usher, the man who fed Bieber to P Diddy, for support? Absolute crazy desperation, as well as that billionaire dinner disaster and the Fox News interview. The attempt at repeating the Obama "hopey changey", and trying to pass of Harris as a challenger rather than an incumbent, has thoroughly failed. Vance has also kept his crazy side under wraps very well while Waltz has done the opposite.
Trump will try to talk Putin into a "deal" that in no way Putin will accept given the facts on the ground. Then Trump will try to escalate and find out that he really can't that much and end up in the same Ukraine quagmire as Biden. Of course, with respect to Israel the Adelson US$100MM counts above all else and it will be the pedal to the mettle for Zionist genocide support.
I also think that his recent talk of "enemies within" is his inner revenge demon being shown as he sees victory coming. After taking 8 years of utter shit from the establishment liberals, and having time to think, there may very well be a shit storm of retribution about to smash the Dems and their state and media buddies. Especially of the Republicans win the House and Senate. Payback time! Great entertainment for the rest of us, an oligarchic "War of the Roses".
Other than that, at some point the US economy has to start falling after the Wile E. Coyote running in the air trick it has been doing, supported by an ongoing fiscal stimulus unleashed in late 2022. Pretty soon, Americans will understand that they have been Trump conned once again as all the government regulations that maintain a healthy environment, protect workers etc. are slashed and project 2025 rears its head. By 2026 Trump could be out given his age and the liberal establishment desperation to remove him, and JD Vance will be president. Now he is really scary!
In the interim, China continues to grow at 5% per annum and removes its dependence on Western chip technology while building even deeper friendships around the world (in contrast to the utter hatred of the US for its support of the Zionist genocide) and becomes a climate change leader. Russia gets stronger, with the largest best equipped battle-hardened military in the world. Europe goes down the toilet. Iran will be fine.
This is good news for China, Russia, the BRICS project and those involved in it. As the old world order continues to drag itself down the new one gains time and space to evolve from it.
Concur, though there are now numerous indicators Empire has prepared the ground for the option to abandon the Israel experiment. As for all others, expendable.
As observed previous it is now the expanding BRICS+ in the driving seat, due long patient buildup, quiet in-depth diplomacy & Geo-strategic patience with a long term set of defined goals.
Constantly raising 'their' sustained 'Strategy of Tension'. Pressure here, there, everywhere holding the line & pushing forward, not merely back. Stretching Empires strategic, operational, political, regional, economic/trade/resource capacities/capabilities/access ever thinner. The rubber band that Empire is will snap when, not if, stretched too far. Ukraine proxy conflict and ongoing Israel insane genocide/War crimes have only further compounded & exacerbated the disparity of opposing blocs re correlation of forces strength/projection/sustainment re Soft power/economic power/military power/military-industrial capacity, etc.
Empire will, ultimately be forced to fall-back, withdraw geo-strategicly as it is progressively diminished. Will not go toe-to-toe to now clearly aligned two 'more than peers', two near peers, increasingly capable State/non-state capable regionally threatening 'Resistance' (And growing).
Clearly a reverse McKinder is in play & developing. Empire will be gradually denied trade routes/air routes/access, to accelerate the processes. Vassals will be pealed off, desrt/defect & revisit the NAM concept to try to save their sorry asses. Empire will react where possible, brutally. See: Reverse of, for example Cuba sanctions/blockade going back to '56, extant.
Ansar Allah, alone, has materially defeated the USN/Royal Navy. USN is in dire straits re vessels/crews/fleet expeditionary capability/sustainment even merely basic servicing/maintained. Essentially nil capacity to replace materiel losses as they 'will' occur. USN/Royal Navy are a'cruisin' on a death ride to Davy Jones Locker.
Merely one aspect: Increasing diminution of the 'Jesus Nut' of Empire, Naval 'Dominance' of the Oceans/Seas globally, along with trade routes & actual trade, loss of the ability to project & apply dominant military force re all prior re all declared/designated enemies, diminishing capacity to defend/support/sustain disparate puppet vassals outside Continental Western EU/CONUS locale, as each is confronted/challenged/threatened in turn.
Far too many spinning plates in play ... whence they all topple and smash to the ground ?
Empire is akin to The Wicked Witch: "I'm melting! I'm melting!"
Only variable now is the time-frame, until Empire probably in time reverts to US status 1840's. Cry for neighbor States & Latin America. :(
Note, for example:
Last year '23 RF, alone, produced ~1.4M indigenous drones of all types. Far more than one for each & every individual Ukie ground pounder?! By end of this year, '24 alone, projected ~14M. RF alone now exceeds the military-industrial capacity & growing, of NATO/US combined. Same for non naval actual military forces. China now produces, in a peacetime economy(!) vessels at a ratio of 400:1 to US. Unlike RF, PRC, NK, Iran, even Ansar Allah, Empire has no hypersonics, no near term possible attainment, nor any effective defense against same.
We are cursed(?) to live in, Interesting times ... far quicker, accelerating, rate of change than ever expected.
2c is up.
Wonder what role Trump promised RFK, Jr.
RFK, Jr will be back
in 2028
and still a Manchurian Candidate (his campaign manager is "retired" CIA); RFK, Jr traveled on the Epstein Lolitta Express and
is owned (Mossad/CIA).
Posted by: librul | Oct 22 2024 17:01 utc | 55
b, I have been watching US election for over 50 years, I have never seen any election or campaign that even for the face saving and pretending that they care, candidates not to speak of any supposed issues, like abortion, social security, Medicare etc. the reason is non of this two deep state candidates are really counting on the people’s vote, they rather just counting who the deep security state will select. The new candidate will again will be coming out a mail box with easy manipulation of mailed ballots.
Posted by: Kooshy | Oct 22 2024 17:02 utc | 56
You're all obsessed with foreign policy but the only issue important to Americans who are paying attention is immigration. Ukraine and Gaza are toast either way.
Posted by: onetwothree | Oct 22 2024 17:03 utc | 57
This article is written from a non-US perspective and disregards the deep division in the US society which has culminated in the assassination attempts on Trump.
Only if Trump is elected, he'll be able to attend to the forces that tried to kill him, be it the Dem Establishment, Old-Cheney style Republicans, 3letter agencies or whoever. I don't believe he will cave in and accept a cheap cover-up like the current "lone gunman on the roof" story because this has become an existential fight for him. This might (might---) cause a serious shake up in the deep state structures.
It will be helpful for Trump that nowadays the existence of a "second shooter" is grown out of the conspiracy theory dungeon and has been embraced by a few Republican lawmakers. Unfortunately for Trump's enemies, the bullet that grazed his ear has hit the hydraulic line of a crane. The trajectory that can be derived from these two points simply doesn't fit a shooter on the roof. The FBI will be in big trouble to explain that. They will probably try to overlook it, but the evidence is on hand and these Republicans will not let them get away with it - I think.
Posted by: mk | Oct 22 2024 17:04 utc | 58
@Posted by: Me | Oct 22 2024 16:49 utc | 49
The choice is between the US becoming California or Florida, both utterly disgusting oligarch-dominated shit holes. Those are the only options that the oligarchy will provide the US citizenry. The two parties are so close its now quite possible that Liz Cheney could become Secretary of Defence under Kamala, and the reality is that JD Vance is a tool of a Californian oligarch. So be quiet with your "outsider" nonsense. Its two peas in a pod.
B,
You know what they say, 'Ray Charles could see it."
Kamala has been losing for months. Since the DNC ended, it's been a constant slide downward, starting with that CNN interview where she 'owned' the 'bipartisan border bill' and stated she would not cut off arms shipments to Ukraine.
There is only one path forward for her: to come out, at the very least, in favor of fully implementing the Leahy Act, which under present conditions would effectively mean an embargo. Without that, she will lose decisively among the country's Muslims, including in strategic Michigan, Wisconsin, Arizona.
I hear a LOT about how 'leftists' are ruining her chances. If only the 'leftists' were so magically strong! She is losing because despite an effective campaign, Gaza hangs like a dead weight from her neck. The NYT, the Hill, Gallup, Newsweek, have all done multiple articles on the danger, in the past two months. Her campaign refuses to budge, and people in the streets - Independents and Democrats alike - just aren't buying the 'forget Gaza!' campaign.
I did a dive into the numbers on this one, numbers and links to some of the above-mentioned pieces, if folks want to take a look:
He's 78.
The word on the street is the first 100 days is the most important then the wheels of bureaucracy turns as they try and implement what was decided in the first 100 days. The last year nothing gets done as they prepare for the election.
So he has 100 days then the next crack of the whip he will be 82. Have another 100 days. But only 2 years to implement it. Those 2 years will achieve nothing as we will be right into another election cycle.
United States presidents are limited to serving two elected four-year terms in the White House and as many as two years of another president's term. That means that 10 years is the longest any president could serve, though no one has been in the White House that long since Congress passed the constitutional amendment on term limits.
Even if he means business. They'll bog him down in slow moving mud. Wait him out. He'll change nothing over the long term that can't be reversed.
Russia fully understands this. Expects this to happen. Why BRICS is so important.
Posted by: Sun Of Alabama | Oct 22 2024 17:10 utc | 62
I'm not sure where to post this, could end up in Palestine thread too.
We have breaking news of an intel satellite that I'm hearing was attacked.
US reports Intelsat 33e has suffered a power-loss, Sputnik just reported a few minutes ago that rather than a power-loss, it's actually broken up into 80 pieces. That's huge disparity between reports. We'll likely never hear from official western sources what really happened and I can't say, but folks are scrambling to reposition another nearby satellite but are having thruster trouble on that one AND now concerned about the debris field left behind that they haven't even acknowledged yet. Something major occurred.
Posted by: NJH | Oct 22 2024 17:13 utc | 63
MK@1704
How could we know that Trump is for real in domestic matters? Simple. If one of his first administrative actions would be to ABOLISH the FBI, I would actually become a Trumpster.
Highly not likely to happen as he has surely been shown the rest of the Abe Zapruder film.
The FeeBee's are as crooked as a dog's leg and as thievish as the Dalton gang. They also, through their "Behavioral Analysis Unit" in Quantico, Virginia; set up a system by which they can not only keep their jobs but also squiggle up the bureaucratic scrotumpole. The BAU has the specific mission of CREATING criminals. The Department realizes that more crime is good for business...THEIR business.
Posted by: aristodemos | Oct 22 2024 17:19 utc | 64
You're all obsessed with foreign policy but the only issue important to Americans who are paying attention is immigration. Ukraine and Gaza are toast either way.
Posted by: onetwothree | Oct 22 2024 17:03 utc | 58
Typical US-American response... your own government is complicit in genocide but the only thing you care about is illegal immigration (which is mainly caused by your insane foreign policy by the way)?
You want to do yourself a favour and ask native americans what they feel about illegal immigration? After all, you are also just a squatter on their land, just like the zionists in occupied Palestine.
Posted by: jure | Oct 22 2024 17:21 utc | 65
First sentence is a personal feeling and inarguable by definition.
People claiming to believe Trump won't keep his promises I think almost invariably mean they aren't voting for his most outrageous proposals (which ones the speaker finds too embarrassing to follow.) Our host's claim people in the US plan to vote for Trump because he won't do what he says, well, that's either contempt for Trumpers or another such pretense.
The third paragraphs manages to find authoritarianism only in Harris and neocons only in the Democratic Party, which is selective. Both are bipartisan. The example of Liz Cheney doesn't seem to acknowledge Cheney is a has been whose endorsement didn't matter and whose personal influence will be nil in either administration.
The fatuous idea that the calendar should have been rewound for new primaries or that the Democratic Party would suddenly turn into a European style programmatic party with a party discipline or that they should have opened bids in smoke-filled rooms at an open conevention in the name of "legitimacy" was absurd. No true Trumper will ever concede legitimacy to the right of the Democrats to legitimately live, not when their tin God complains. JD Vance is not one bit more legitimate than Harris and much more likely to become president if our host gets his wish. But if and when that happens, no Trumper will complain about so-called "legitimacy" any more than they complain about Peter Thiel.
The assumption that Trump had policies, is a stretch, right there. That's why he didn't bother to find co-thinkers the first time round. And that's why the Project 2025 types are working so hard to fill the policy vacuum. (The Heritage Foundation is not the only player by any means, by the way.)
The presidency is designed to guide foreign policy and matters a great deal. The president can't control much about the economy, true. The Wall Street swamp and the Fed and the stock and bond markets have a lot to say about that, plus other countries, but most of all, the fundamental irrationality of imperialism will dominate.
The last paragraph approaches foreign affairs and typically our host is much stronger there than US politics. The prediction Trump will not make peace in Ukraine is counterintuitive to the Trumpers here, from what I've seen. But Trump will not want to be universally reviled by all wings of the MSM, "left" and far right, for being a Biden-like loser. He will not do Afghanistan withdrawal in Ukraine. Nor do I think he will make a good deal Putin et al. can accept, any more than he could for Korea (the real Korea, not the cannibal kingdom.) The pretense that somebody somehow sabotaged his glorious peace should be too much even for Trumpers to choke down. But the possibility that stagnation will lead to crazed desperation seems to be unthinkable. I don't think it should be.
Therefore, the conclusion's qualified optimism is more about really expecting something from Trump, despite the verbal disclaimers?
Posted by: steven t johnson | Oct 22 2024 17:22 utc | 66
Posted by: JMW | Oct 22 2024 16:35 utc | 39
I am going to be using that one. Redneck DEI is an apt description for both that and the senate.
My personal hope is that the staged outrage backfires on the script writer's of this WWE show we call elections and the dumb audience start the great shitlib civil war.
Posted by: Badjoke | Oct 22 2024 17:22 utc | 67
Posted by: Buffalo bill | Oct 22 2024 15:58 utc | 16
The assassination attempts have changed Trump. He will not forget and he will take the actions necessary to try to straighten the country out.
<=who will straighten Trump out?
He does not understand America.. he grew up as part of Empire Zionism..and he lives in Miami and NY. Is it possible, the people that shot at Trump were not part of America....
Heartland America is quite different from the Wall Street UsA. Voter experience shows that party selected candidates have little interest in heartland America.
Posted by: snake | Oct 22 2024 17:25 utc | 69
I'm a Canadian in my late 50's. I've been paying attention to Washington's misdeeds for decades. I'm a bit shocked at how quickly things have been unravelling here in the West, particularly over the last 8 to 9 years; and the decline continues to accelerate. Yet most people remain wilfully blind. I don't know that I can tolerate the social/political culture here much longer yet I don't know where I would relocate to
Posted by: Chris N | Oct 22 2024 17:25 utc | 70
"...California or Florida..."
Posted by: Roger | Oct 22 2024 17:05 utc | 60
You know not of what you speak. If the US was Florida we would all be better off. I've lived in many places in the US from the NE to the Left Coast to the plains and even in Florida. One of the best places I have lived and if you stay out of the blue city centers you still find sanity and normal people. So if the US became Florida, that would be great for the country and good for the world at large.
Posted by: Me | Oct 22 2024 17:26 utc | 71
TPTB have been very busy domestically imposing a struggle of all versus all.
There is no galvanizing force at play anywhere you look that could inspire cooler heads and the adults to come back to the table. There is no candidate that is: anti-fed, pro-family, pro-border control, anti-war, anti-poverty, anti-serfdom.
There are only candidates that have a share of the above but not the whole package.
The one closest to all of the above, at least in messaging, is DJT.
The physically strong in this country respect his strongman approach. And this will do well for the empire to galvanize the strong when the war of all versus all domestically must be refocused on an external other.
All versus all is the raw material for a character such as DJT to refocus the simmering tension onto the Axis.
Does Trump like Churchhill? His physique is like his and he is similar in temperament. Churchhill is definitely the prototype of the leader best suited for taking a fractured country to war.
Posted by: NemesisCalling | Oct 22 2024 17:26 utc | 72
Even If he is serious, My guess is he really has only 100 days to take on and defeat the deep state.
That's not achievable. Maybe in a movie or On Netflix but not in the real world. They'll just reverse it anyway when they get back into power.
Posted by: Sun Of Alabama | Oct 22 2024 17:27 utc | 73
China has a trap set for the Empire in the South China Sea. That is sufficiently distant from major Chinese cities that the Empire cannot go nuts on population centers and pretend that it is "collateral damage" like it normally does (whose lead do you think the zionists and Ukro-Nazis are taking when they deliberately target civilians?). The Chinese have to be ready to trip that trap without hesitation when the Empire stick its neck out.
Posted by: William Gruff | Oct 22 2024 16:40 utc | 42
The empire does not need excuses to bomb 3 gorge or myriad of other targets that might kill millions.
I just mentioned that PLA RF had done a good job on the near S300 front with the HQ-9 , but lacking on the BUK /pantsir angle (and maybe the HQ-19). They need to ramp up production, and they seem to have done so.
Now let us bring this back to on topic. What trap can they, and most importantly should they, trip on trump or harris?
Philippines? Taiwan? How exactly?
Posted by: Newbie | Oct 22 2024 17:27 utc | 74
Harris will be more predictable than Trump, but the general policy direction will remain the same.
Posted by: karlof1 | Oct 22 2024 16:18 utc | 27
True about Harris, policy direction for Trump remains to be seen, but I don't think so.
Harris is a People pleaser and is a total captive of Foggy Bottom, the land of escalation. Trump is from NY and knows down to his core that war us bad for business. How he commands or does not command DOD and Foggy Bottom will be the key.
Foregen policy does not matter in elections because the harm done to the Constitution, mostly in the 1930s, allows increased federal government power to act in "meat and potatoes" type issues. The main functions for the federal government should be foregn policy, defense and tariffs, and not much else. So foregn policy remains covered in shadow. This cannot remain forever, which is why publications such as yours a vitally important. The number of people killed in Ukraine by US "policy " makes me want to vomit.
The interesting part of this election is the erosion of the Democrat Party coalition. IMHO this is a rejection of DEI.
Posted by: frithguild | Oct 22 2024 17:28 utc | 75
Further reply to Malaeuca in response to Melaleuca | Oct 22 2024 5:14 utc | 134 - October 21, 2024 "Democracy" in Moldova
More appropriate here than OT in above.
AUKUS grift/loss of sovereignty/future status, fate.
AU will never receive the subs. The $Billions already gifted(& increasingly ongoing) to create new plant/worker recruitment/training/supply chains to provide new 'sovereign assets' for US/UK have no AU rights/shareholding. $Billions ongoing will never result in provision/delivery of subs 'to' AU under AU sovereign control, not even flag.
The entire process has four objectives:
(1) substitute & buildup AU as sustainable/strategic depth, replacement for indefensible/unsustainable/unsupportable(in conflict) Guam and Diego Garcia,
(2) fully prep AU as an expendable proxy for an optional War Plan re a rogue, plausibly-deniable, attempted first-strike decapitation strike on China(PRC). As well as the foundational forward base/pivot point for establishing/extending military operational dominance throughout region & beyond, especially criticality of Malacca straits transit and transit to & from South China Sea, west & south of frontline Philippines. Trade. Access denial. Indonesia's position, fate ?
(3) Nullify remnant AU sovereignty in partnership with long suborned AU politicians, Business/Military/StinkTank/Legacy Media. Essentially sieze absolute control of agricultural/mining/gas/oil/rare earth/etc resources for exclusive use/sustainment of Empire.
(4) Regardless all above, massive ongoing wealth extraction via masked tribute re all related projects. NO subs will ever be transferred/delivered to AU & never under AU operational command(Already insitu re Collins). 100's upon 100's of Billions for warporn junk to profit MICC/War profiteers. Extraordinary level of grift, which will only continuously balloon exponentially.
(5)AU has long had as a strategic policy since late 50's/early 60's, and a rapid breakout capability to sudden nuclear arms power status. See: Japan.
The now ongoing transition to ballistic missiles/long range anti-shipping missiles/point & base/facility defense (US/US military assets) ADS/ABMs, and now no AU subs, ever, other than US/UK operating from AU as if it was occupied Hawaii or occupied Cuba bases/port/facilities(Guantanamo Bay), development and expansion of 'civilian' nuclear capacity to support (5). An entirely 'expendable', non sovereign, nuclear attack-dog, regional military forward bastion for power projection/sea-lane, trade control (Vessels/Subs/Missiles/BMs, etc), Empire/US/UK.
See: From AU 'Australian Naval Institute' Re Congressional Report on AUKUS Pillar 1
Current cost details, blah, blah ...
... Congress approved enabling legislation for Pillar 1 as part of its action on the FY2024 National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) (H.R. 2670/P.L. 118-31 of December 22, 2023). The potential benefits, costs, and risks of implementing (2) and (3) can be compared with the potential benefits, costs, and risks of an alternative of procuring up to eight additional Virginia class SSNs that would be retained in US Navy service and operated out of Australia along with the U.S. and UK SSNs that are already planned to be operated out of Australia under (1).”
Do recommend the full Congressional Research Report as at Oct '24 here. (PDF) Especially Re above 'italicized'/'bolded'. October CRS report says it all.
No refunds! NO Subs for you, AU! Not even, a Chicken!
AU being re-colonized a second time. Occupied. Loss of even former partial sovereign nation vassal status.
Fate to be an expendable/disposable, foreign owned & occupied, Military/industrial/self-supportable, modern Alamo.
Sorry Aussies ...
I think many RedState voters dream of Trump in the role of a second Ronald Reagan, facing down "the enemy", or "enemies" this time.
I also think he is most likely to win, but he will need more the skillset of Gorbatchew to handle a fading empire, which I don't think he is capable of.
Should Harris win, there will be much more of the same with the neocons trying to find out what to attack next.
By the end of next year, the debt will easily hit 40 trillion and interest payments themselves get closer to 1.5 trillion.
The empire better hope that BRICS will become as "irrelevant" to the dollar dominance as all Western "experts" project.
Posted by: NorwegianPawn | Oct 22 2024 17:31 utc | 77
Two time Trump voter.
Voted for Stein.
Why vote for a crypto Jew when you can have the real thing?
I for one welcome our Jew overlords.
Stein is at least as smart as Trump and Kamala combined.
Who else can reign in BiBi but a Jew?
Resistance is futile.
Posted by: wholelottaloving | Oct 22 2024 17:32 utc | 78
@NJH | Oct 22 2024 17:13 utc | 64
Found the link here. Geostationary orbit is ~40000 km out, so attack seems difficult.
Posted by: Norwegian | Oct 22 2024 17:32 utc | 79
I'm not sure where to post this, could end up in Palestine thread too.
We have breaking news of an intel satellite that I'm hearing was attacked.
US reports Intelsat 33e has suffered a power-loss, Sputnik just reported a few minutes ago that rather than a power-loss, it's actually broken up into 80 pieces. That's huge disparity between reports. We'll likely never hear from official western sources what really happened and I can't say, but folks are scrambling to reposition another nearby satellite but are having thruster trouble on that one AND now concerned about the debris field left behind that they haven't even acknowledged yet. Something major occurred.
Posted by: NJH | Oct 22 2024 17:13 utc | 64
None of the above, maybe a "Boeing made a poopoo again"
At almost 36.000 kms I don't know what could hit it (if things go sideways in this domain LEO satelites will be first to go)
At ~04:30 on 19 October 2024 UTC, the satellite was reported to have broken up into about 20 pieces in orbit by U.S. Space Command.[20][7] At least 57 pieces of space debris associated with the event have since been detected. Intelsat declared the satellite a total loss on 21 October 2024.
https://www.intelsat.com/newsroom/intelsat-reports-is-33e-satellite-loss/
Posted by: Newbie | Oct 22 2024 17:33 utc | 80
Posted by: Emma | Oct 22 2024 16:49 utc | 48
Re: Stein and Ware hating on the Russians and pearl clutching for the uighurs
Totally agree with your post Emma. I was going to vote for them until I saw that crap coming from Stein and then Ware; Danny Haiphong called Ware out. Haiphong used to post with Black Agenda which has Margaret Kimberly and Ajamu Baraka. I like them both but don't know their positions on Russia/China. I have been wondering, though, why I haven't seen Baraka campaigning for Stein lately.
I'm voting for Claudia de la Cruz and Karina Garcia but we're not going to vote our way out of this-- we're going down. I'm an old, retired peon living rural. My plan is to continue talking and listening to neighbors-- red and blue teamers-- pushing them while confessing my own sins in my role as a lifelong citizen and beneficiary of the Empire. Oh--- also doing a lot with medicinal mushrooms: workshops, harvesting, preparation, etc. (especially turkey tail).
Posted by: migueljose | Oct 22 2024 17:33 utc | 81
Harris is an empty pant suit neocon/Atlanticist puppet.
Her most coherent line in the lone debate was about defending US “norms and rule” by fighting to the end to restore the borders of the Ukraine SSR.
Trump responded about the neocon project not worth nuclear war.
You must listen to what Harris reads off ther script
Posted by: paddy | Oct 22 2024 17:36 utc | 83
First of all, in the American political system, the so-called by experts "imperial presidency" is in charge of who to assassinate or what massacre to perpetrate.
The president has very little domestic power. That Americans are ignorant of their political system is not a mistake, but a key to the colossal deception of an oligarchic and imperial political system that in a burst of humor claims to be a democracy, when everyone knows that the last American president collided with the Power (-1963)
On the other hand, Palestine was destroyed by a wave of violent Polish, Ukrainian, Lithuanian and Byelorussian emigrants ... why should America not enjoy the same privilege if it has the same masters of a medieval Polish-Ukrainian ethnic group and the stupid Christians are mental servants of their masters who despise them
Posted by: Simon | Oct 22 2024 17:36 utc | 84
If Harris wins the US will be over...
Posted by: Me | Oct 22 2024 16:49 utc | 49
A complete disintegration of the USA (with the native americans finally getting their own state on the land that belongs to them anyways!), just as was the case with the USSR (what goes around, comes back around!), would be the best thing for Europe and the ROW. The zionist entity would also lose its lifeline and implode, and Palestine gets it all. No more U.S. Empire (Trump is 100% pro U.S. Empire), and no more zionist entity. Win-win for humanity without a WW3.
Posted by: jure | Oct 22 2024 17:43 utc | 85
Kamala will instensify the weapon supplies to country 404. That will bring Europe to an end.
Posted by: AI | Oct 22 2024 17:44 utc | 86
Posted by: Not Ewe | Oct 22 2024 15:58 utc | 15:
...Now we need to punish the National Security State Democrats in the only way we can.
Yessiree!!! I hadn't voted in past three presidential elections but this time I just held my nose and voted for Trump. I may not have done much good for America in doing this, but I'm sure I couldn't do any worse.
Posted by: Oriental Voice | Oct 22 2024 17:45 utc | 87
On lawfare, that is luckily difficult in USA. Trump actually promised to send Hillary Clinton to jail in the past, did not happen. But he may learn from his failures on that front.
Posted by: Piotr Berman | Oct 22 2024 16:46 utc | 47
Someone hasn't been paying attention the last 4 years! By my count, the Democrats have tried 8 times to prosecute Trump since he left office, one time using a special law passed solely for Trump, invented laws, and their favorite, turning a bookkeeping entry into 34 felonies, and telling the jury to pick whichever theory they wanted in order to convict, which they have used to parrot over and over "He's a convicted felon", which is patently absurd, but effective on the brainless.
Obamacare was a blatant giveaway to the FIRE industry, same as the bank bailouts of 2009, when 8 million families were thrown out onto the streets, and the banks were gifted billions.
Under Obamacare, working Americans were forced to pay hundreds of dollars a month to the insurance companies, or the US government, using the IRS, would take the money anyway at the end of the year.
It amazes me that any American would blow off the stopping of Obama's "mandate" as inconsequential to workers. It made a big difference to millions, but I guess they don't count to those with TDS, who think that working at McDonald's is "humiliating".
As for the Middle East, if you'll recall, Trump tried to remove US troops from Syria, and the Pentagon ignored him. They stayed. Then they orchestrated two "gas attacks", the first one only months into Trump's presidency. Then, when Trump bombed an airfield in "retaliation", the media fell all over themselves praising him, the first and only time in 8 years (except when he killed Gen. Soleimani). They apparently explained to him that they were staying in Syria in order to steal the oil, so he repeated that, and got trashed by idiots for saying the quiet part out loud.
When he called off the military maneuvers threatening DRPK, and then went and shook hands with Kim Jong Un, they went nuts again. I thought it was hilarious that he said that the military exercises wasted too much oil. Well, duh, but the climate change pushers don't care when it comes to the military, do they?
Al Gore headed the US team to the Kyoto Accords in 1996, and personally made sure that the US military is exempt from any concerns about climate change. Draw any conclusions you wish from that.
The whole thing is a farce. On or about Nov. 5th, our rulers will announce who will be placed into the White House next January, and that will be that.
We have no recourse, especially since there are still Jan. 6th protesters sitting in jail, almost 4 years later, and they have already announced that questioning this election will make you a "domestic terrorist". Who is going to complain about another stolen election, when you could get thrown into jail without a trial, or droned?
Posted by: wagelaborer | Oct 22 2024 17:48 utc | 88
Found the link here. Geostationary orbit is ~40000 km out, so attack seems difficult.
Posted by: Norwegian | Oct 22 2024 17:32 utc | 80
Mentioned as much, but it seems china might have tested an ASAT capable of hitting Geostationary orbit targets back in 2013...
I'll still go for the "boeing fucks up again" option...
Posted by: Newbie | Oct 22 2024 17:49 utc | 89
Emma | Oct 22 2024 16:49 utc | 48 and migueljose | Oct 22 2024 17:33 utc | 82
I agree entirely. After learning that Stein was bullied by a reporter into slandering VVP and Bashar al Assad as war criminals (Ajamu Baraka, whom I really like, had a stinging opinion regarding this move), I don't think she has the fortitude to back up the rest of the high-sounding rhetoric.
As for DT and KH, I hearken back to Julian Assange's opinion; it's like choosing between gonorrhea or syphilis.
Posted by: robjira | Oct 22 2024 17:49 utc | 90
This Polish-Ukrainian Yiddish play is no longer funny
The two candidates to wear the mask of the Imperial Beast will continue on their inertial course
and within, say, 30 years, the imperial power of Washington and its evil ruling class will collapse and the American people will regain their freedom
Posted by: Simon | Oct 22 2024 17:49 utc | 91
Ossi@1625
America has never attained a deeply rooted intellectual or artistic culture. This ruptured republic was developing fairly well up until it got dragged into WWI...on the WRONG side...to be sure...once the plotters and schemers had turned over financial administration to the privately owned FEDERAL Reserve Bank ad the tail end of 1913. That was the final element required by City of London's imperialist and colonialist core to ultimately destroy the four empires of Germany, Austria-Hungary; Turkey and Russia and replace them with feuding faux "democracies", most specifically Czechoslovakia and a perpetually geopolitically bewildered Poland.
Under rule by the Bank$ters, most specifically by John D. Rottenfeller and his deliberate dumbing-down of the American educational system via his massive grants to Columbia University in order to establish "colleges of education"...all with the explicit message of degrading the educational system by means of mass-class schooling, closely calculated to be dumbed-down to the lowest common denominator.
Today, there are no adults in the room, whether in higher education, mass media, religion and most particularly in all governmental bodies. Those desired by the ruling system are the brown-nosers and the go along to get-along types who seek security and light work as governmental employees.
Is Deutschland's occupied government and media any different? If so, then it was created by means of the now 79 years empowered occupational "authorities". Thinking Germans should work to get a peace treaty along with no further occupation of their lands by the Bank$ters' designated attack-dogs, the U$$A military.
Posted by: aristodemos | Oct 22 2024 17:56 utc | 93
Jure@1622
Have you ever asked yourself whether Bolton, Pomposity and similar anti-Republic creeps were actually chosen by the Trumpster, or perhaps by his son-in-law, the Chabad Lubovitcher....or perhaps by Deep $tate administrative bureaucraps who take their orders from the Agency, which takes its orders from City of London?
Posted by: aristodemos | Oct 22 2024 18:01 utc | 94
America has never attained a deeply rooted intellectual or artistic culture. This ruptured republic was developing fairly well up until it got dragged into WWI
Posted by: aristodemos | Oct 22 2024 17:56 utc | 94
US America only ever really developed a war culture, which it has kept alive for the vast majority of its existence. Since the founding of the nation until 1914, the nation had already commited genocides, and wars based on BS lies (such as the lies regarding the sinking of the USS Maine, leading to the Spanish-American war...
Posted by: jure | Oct 22 2024 18:02 utc | 95
Posted by: aristodemos | Oct 22 2024 18:01 utc | 95
Well, fair enough, Kuschner could very well have had a hand in all of that, but not without the knowledge of the Dumpster.
Posted by: jure | Oct 22 2024 18:05 utc | 96
Any nominations for the start date of the coming fracture of The Union, beginning of the Second Civil War ?
@ William Gruff | Oct 22 2024 16:40 utc | 42
Who do you think is a direct(direct!), active, participant belligerent in the genocide & non-combatant war crime slaughter, including Lebanon & Yemen ? Along with specific vassals ?
Don Bacon@1617
Those ever-expanding military expenditures are NOT for "defense". They are payoffs to the primary shareholders who have Total control over the WAR DEFENSE INDUSTRY. Ask yourself how many nations have been invaded by the Bank$ters' favorite attack-dog since 1945. The list is immense. Deaths and disabilitation in those lands...over 20 MILLION people, mostly civilians.
If you do a bit of diligent research you will discover that the largest "defense" contractor...makers of those 2,000 pound bombs and also of the F-35's which drop them...are products of Lockheed-Martin, the #1 arms producers in the world. You should discover that their premiere shareholders...not mere stockholders...are LONDON BANKERS.
Should it be that you are actually concerned about these matters, it would behoove you to do a bit of a study on employing SEMANTICS. To call that set of blood weapons the "defense" industry is to unwittingly taking the side of those masters of Bernaysian strategies and tactics...the Bank$ter Cabal. They OWN all the governments of the Collective Wa$te.
Posted by: aristodemos | Oct 22 2024 18:10 utc | 98
@Newbie, #32:
China has to thread lightly. From SK and taiwan a 1.200 km radius puts everything that is worthwhile in range.
Seeing that they built two 6,000 bed hospitals in 10 days back in 2019, I think they can re-build everything within that 1,200 km radius in about a year.
On the other hand, once those in China within 1,200 km radius of Korea and Taiwan go up in smoke, you can bet your ass the two coastal stripes of North America will also crumble down in smoke. That might take a century or so to rebuild. Korea of course will be beyond repair while Taiwan will be rebuilt and re-populated.
Posted by: Oriental Voice | Oct 22 2024 18:12 utc | 99
Posted by: Norwegian | Oct 22 2024 17:32 utc |
Is it even necessary to attack it physically?
Could someone hack into its comms and screw with its orbit position or something? Or possibly make something go into an overloaded status?
Posted by: Archetypex | Oct 22 2024 18:17 utc | 100
The comments to this entry are closed.
Don't get upset about Moldova as an American!
If you have a party system like the Americans, you don't need elections...
As an American, you only have the choice between the plague and the colera.
And they're cheating so that half the world laughs about it, the rest at least smiles.
What chance would one of the people have, someone who is honest at least, but doesn't have millions of dollars, REALLY NONE!
Although the Americans themselves don't seem to be interested at all when I look at the glamorous events called party congresses, the show is what counts, not the future of the country.
And
Between us, a country that no longer has smart minds like Trump or Biden or Haris a warlord like Obama...(Nobel Peace Prize winner, which is a joke in itself)
that is, or rather their society is at the END anyway. I visited Boston in 2012 and as a European I was horrified by the homeless gangs etc. But when I visited in May 2024 I knew this country was lost, I had never seen it so bad before how the country and the city had changed for the worse, no future blockbuster in the cinema can keep up with that.
Feedback geben
Posted by: ossi | Oct 22 2024 15:40 utc | 1