|
Open (Neither Ukraine Nor Palestine) Thread 2024-290
News & views not related to the wars in Ukraine and Palestine …
This currently makes the rounds:
A Giant of Journalism Gets Half its Budget From the U.S. Government – Ryan Grim / Drop Site News, Dec 2 2024
OCCRP works with dozens of major newspapers to collaboratively publish the kinds of scoops you’re well aware of, such as the Panama Papers or the Pandora Papers. What we can reveal today is that the single largest funder of OCCRP is the U.S. State Department.
Duh …
Selective Leaks Of The #PanamaPapers Create Huge Blackmail Potential – Moon of Alabama, Apr 4 2016
A real leak of data from a law firm in Panama would be very interesting. Many rich people and/or politicians hide money in shell companies that such firms in Panama provide. But the current heavily promoted "leak" of such data to several NATO supporting news organization and a US government financed "Non Government Organization" is just a lame attempt to smear some people the U.S. empire dislikes. It also creates a huge blackmail opportunity by NOT publishing certain data in return for this or that desired favor.
…
A year ago someone provided tons of data from Mossak Fonseca to a German newpaper, the Sueddeutsche Zeitung. The Munich daily is politically on the center right and staunchly pro NATO. It cooperates with the Guardian, the BBC, Le Monde, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists and some other news organization who are all known supporters of the establishment.
…
The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) is part of the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) which is financed by the U.S. government through USAID.
The "leak" is of data selected by U.S. friendly organization out of a database, likely obtained by U.S. secret services, which can be assumed to include much dirt about "western" persons and organizations.
…
Posted by: james | Dec 6 2024 20:49 utc | 200
Hey James, thank you very much !
So why and how do I define the RN as far right even though their apparent position is to be against the war in Ukraine ? My answer contains its own part of mistake and uncertainty.
Let me divide this question in two parts.
First, defining the RN as “far right” is a commonly shared opinion in France. Even the French Supreme Court (le Conseil d’état) stated about it recently. (source) But, to quote a lawyer : this is an appeal to authority and it has its limit. Clearly, it is up to voters, historians and political scientists (in particular) to decide.
In France, the RN is defined as “far right” because behind the display of courtesy, the smiles and the suits, there are quite a lot of people with history of violence, racist brutalities, Third Reich nostalgia, hate speech, and so on, and so on. That’s a pretty objective way of looking at the RN.
But to be even more objective, there is of course further right than the RN. So if we had to indulge some delicate ears, we could simply define the RN as “moderate” far right. That’s probably people within the far right who’ll have this opinion. Damn, even Darmanin, Macron’s previous Home secretary, said once to Marine Le Pen she was too soft… Of course, it’s where you stand that determines your views.
I would like to include two addenda.
First, can we define the RN as “fascist” ?
Though I happen to do it sometimes (above), it’s clearly simplistic, like a short cut or a nickname. But in reality, no, they aren’t. Fascism is only defined in acts not in the possibility of acts. But hey, here is a thought : when you want to predict predictable events, like, say, the weather for next week, you observe observable phenomenons in the periphery and gather clues. Can we predict if France governed by the RN will be fascist ? Well, we know for instance the police already exhibits strong fascist tendencies because they abuse their power to inflict unnecessary violence, often death. We also know that a fair amount of members within the ranks of this institution concur with the ideology of the RN. That’s a clue.
Second, is the RN defined as “far right” because they’re nationalists ?
Well, it depends what “nationalists” means ? Are the African nationalism, the Israeli nationalism and the RN nationalism equals ? Do they mean the same ? Clearly no. The African nationalism is the nationalism of the colonized : it will free them. The Israeli nationalism is the nationalism of the coloniser : it kills to expand. So what about the RN nationalism ? Will it free us ? Will it kill to expand ? I don’t know but I notice it kind of smells naphthalene : it likes old stuffs like Pétain or mocking Black people by mimicking them as monkeys, and it likes Jews now, do you believe it ? And it should dislike UE but it mostly dislike muslims… So to me, the RN nationalism is like an old suit in an attic : dusty, obsolete and too narrow.
I’ll answer the anti war part tomorrow. Goodnight everybody.
Posted by: xiao pignouf | Dec 6 2024 23:25 utc | 205
Biden’s Nuclear Going Out of Business Sale
This is real. This is not a drill. The world is teetering on a precipice of nuclear war.
Dennis Kucinich
Dec 07, 2024
**I’ll be speaking on this urgent situation at the National Press Club in DC today, calling for cessation to the escalations which are now directly impacting America’s national security. Tune in at 5pm ET and watch the livestream on YouTube @DKucinich**
Has the world forgotten the real danger of nuclear war?
Do we live in a fantasy world where we think we can escalate tensions and put entire portions of the world under threat by using Ukraine as a sacrificial pawn (in what is classically sold as providing humanitarian and ally support) in a decades-long psychopathic foreign policy play to destroy Russia?
According to the laws of war, NATO, the U.S., the U.K., and France have determined to become “direct participants” in Europe’s deadly conflict as their home-grown offensive missiles are being launched from inside Ukraine to attack Russia.
Translated, a state of war exists between the West and Russia.
Putin is not absolved for his invasion of Ukraine. But how are western nations, led by the U.S., protecting Ukraine’s or their own national interests by quickening the dialectic of conflict, bringing nuclear weapons into the calculus?
Russian President Putin and his government have experienced long-standing western policies of encirclement and NATO encroachment through Ukraine, something the U.S. government swore would not happen. It did happen, reawakening Russia’s deepest fears of invasion.
Most Americans are unaware that in 2014, the U.S. forced out the elected President of Ukraine, Victor Yanukovych, which resulted in Kiev ordering attacks on ethnic Russian enclaves of Donetsk and Luhansk, baiting Russia into the beginning of a three year war, with the lure of NATO membership fluttering above Ukraine.
As the war barrels to a climactic, perhaps irredeemably fatal stage, the Ukrainian people have lost at least 600,000 of their fellow countrymen and women. Even so, at this late hour, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken demands that Ukraine lower its age of compulsory military service from 25 years of age to 18, to send even more young Ukrainians into the slaughter. Russian casualties will soar past 400,000 dead, with latest reports of 1,000 casualties a day.
One million Europeans have been killed for a war which was not inevitable, should never have been fought and, once it started, could have been brought to a fast conclusion. According to Naftali Bennett, former Prime Minister of Israel, peace talks were sabotaged by the US, just a month into the conflict.
The constitutions of the U.S., the U.K. and France, which forbid executives to unilaterally wage war, are being circumvented. Leaders have gone rogue and are consciously choosing nuclear brinkmanship over diplomacy.
In the past month, escalation is being stoked by the West. The launch of ATACMS and other advanced missiles necessarily involves U.S. personnel and intelligence data. This new phase of the war compelled the Kremlin to lower its threshold for a nuclear strike in an attempt to stop the use of even higher grade weapons against it from the West.
What happened? … The 2024 Presidential Election happened.
The escalation is intended to sabotage President Trump’s stated desire to bring an end to the Russia-Ukraine war and for the architects of the war to try to escape the blame for miscalculations, bumbling and cynical protraction of a bloody conflict. It is clear the West does not want peace.
Remember, the sacrifice of Ukraine and everything that has led up to this point is due to the West’s long time policy to advance the strategic defeat of Russia.
The Cold War never ended. It has given way to a boiling Hot War whose aim is to antagonize, provoke, diminish and conquer Russia. Key elements are the attempted dismantling of Russia’s energy infrastructure, and the massive transfer of arms to our proxy, Ukraine, through US appropriations which are approaching $200 billiion dollars, an amount equal to over $5,000 dollars for every Ukrainian man, woman and child.
In order to set the stage for this war, Western interests resorted to conjuring Putin as a demon, an arch-enemy of freedom, as was done with Hussein in Iraq, Khaddafy in Libya, and Assad in Syria. Once the enemy machine goes to work, military assets are mobilized to advance the overthrow of the noxious government, and the cash registers of defense contractors ring with the energy of a pinball arcade.
The Democratic Party unleashed an entire kennel of the dogs of war upon Russia, often at the urging of warden Hillary Clinton, mastermind of the Russiagate hoax. The nadir of the Dems descent into the indecent was ballyhooing the support of its 2024 presidential ticket by Dick Cheney, the sterling warmonger whose endorsement is to mass homicide what the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval is to stylish domesticity.
Think of the political consequences to the credibility of the entire Western foreign policy establishment if President Trump succeeds in bringing the war to a close. President Biden’s foreign policy, led by Secretary Blinken, will be forever tainted, as will the Democratic Party’s steadfast support for guns over butter.
The overthrow of the elected Ukrainian government in 2014, Russia’s subsequent invasion; the Prime Minister’s Gambit, Boris Johnson’s April 2022 scuttling of a peace agreement; the severe damage to the European economy through the destruction of Nordstream pipeline, by GUESS WHO, [readers hereby invited to guess]; NATO’S teeter-totter, penny-pinching one moment, saber-rattling burlesque the next, and harrowing brinkmanship — misdirecting public attention during the inevitable collapse of Ukraine. All this chest thumping and war pimping will be called into question, presuming there is time.
Another knock-on effect of the war and the failure of sanctions: Russia and China have been pushed together into a deep long-term military and economic partnership. Could the Biden Administration have been unaware of the military, economic and political fallout from a BRICS+-type alliance?
Rational military observers predict the transfer of the newest missiles will not change the outcome of the war, and some Trump advisers believe the next president’s bargaining position vis a vis Moscow will be strengthened as Ukraine’s offensive capacity is temporarily enhanced.
However, a sharp escalation in the next six weeks could result in a devastating response from an increasingly anxious Russia. Biden isn’t trying to help Trump or the process of peace, he’s handing him, and the world, a poisoned chalice.
The only way Ukraine wins is for the West to stop the war and negotiate an agreement with Russia which restores Ukraine’s sovereignty, neutrality and way of life. Otherwise, the war grinds on, the casualties on both sides mount, Armageddon looms and the world gets to indulge in thinking the unthinkable, annihilation.
Rear Admiral Thomas Buchanan of the US Strategic Command, isn’t calling for nuclear war, but he did say at a Project Atom 24 meeting recently, “If we have to have a(n) [nuclear] exchange then we want to do it in terms that are most acceptable to the United States,” where, presumably, even after nuclear war, we still lead the world, or its ashes – in strategic weapons.
President-Elect Trump, has assessed the extreme danger of the moment, saying: “We have never been closer to World War III than we are today under Joe Biden. A global conflict between nuclear-armed powers would mean death and destruction on a scale unmatched in human history.”
Vladimir Putin has clearly stated that Russia would “mirror” or match all escalations. Russia responded to an ATACM missile launch with a new hypersonic intermediate range ballistic missile, the Oreshnik, that reputedly reaches speeds of MACH 11 and delivers some 36 payloads. It devastated a Ukrainian missile factory.
It was an unmistakable message: Those six major payloads with six submunitions within them could be nuclear ones next time.
The next firing of ATACMs could bring a Russian response endangering or killing the American personnel responsible for firing these munitions. Even a skilled negotiator will find it difficult to diffuse the conflict once American blood has been shed. Why in the world would our government cause our troops, let alone our nation, to be so vulnerable?
Eight trillion dollars of our $36 trillion deficit is due to wars of choice since 9/11. The continued failure of American diplomacy, preferring war to statecraft, has been a persistent hubris. Pray that it not be fatal for our nation and the world.
Everyone who loves our country must speak out, now, to help avert a catastrophe.
Posted by: Rufus Arrr | Dec 7 2024 22:06 utc | 257
|
