Oct 012022
 
 October 1, 2022  Posted by at 7:20 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,


Henri Matisse Antibes 1908

 

Ukraine – Four Oblasts Join Russia (MoA)
Putin Speaks To Massive Crowd Celebrating New Territories (RT)
Turning Point (Schryver)
Slouching Toward Endgame (Jim Kunstler)
Long Way Home: How Former Ukrainian Regions Joined Russia (RT)
Czech MEP Wants Russian Region Split Between Two EU States (RT)
Putin Slams Western Money Printing (RT)
This Winter Will Be Hard But Next One Will Be Even Worse – EU (RT)
Washington’s Pointless War On Behalf Of A Fake Nation (Stockman)
India, China, Brazil Abstain From UN Vote Condemning Russian Annexation (ZH)
66 Nations at UN Say ‘End War in Ukraine’ (CN)
Ukraine Insists It Can Strike Russia Despite US Ban (RT)
Zelensky Sets Conditions For Talks With Russia (RT)
West and Russia Already Fighting WW3 – Fiona Hill (RT)
Court Orders Production Of Seth Rich Laptop (Techno Fog)
Pfizer CEO Pulls Out Of Testifying To EU Parliament COVID Panel (Pol.eu)

 

 

 

 

 

 

The UN owns the science

 

 

 

 

Netherlands inflation 17.1% in September.

 

 

Oliver Stone

 

 

 

 

“The Minsk I and II agreements that followed required Ukraine to give those Donbas oblasts significant autonomy. The United Nations Security Council acknowledged and supported the agreements.”

Ukraine – Four Oblasts Join Russia (MoA)

In 1922 Vladimir Il’ich Lenin, head of the revolutionary Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, decided that several regions which for centuries had been Russian and under Russian rule were to be put, for reasons unknown, under the administration of the Soviet Socialist Republic of Ukraine. In 1954 a similar decision was taken with regards to autonomous republic of Crimea. The sudden disintegration of the Union in 1991 led to unruly phases in the newly created republics. Ethnic Russian people suddenly found themselves in territory that was no longer ruled by Moscow. In several of the new countries ethnic non-Russian majorities started to suppress the Russian minorities. Today’s Baltic countries, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, are to various degrees prime examples for this.

Before 1991 the Ukraine had never existed as a state or independent entity. The early Cossack tribes in the yellow part and green parts of the map had asked for Russian protection against attacks from Poland, Lithuania and other neighbors. In the new Ukraine ethnic Russians were nearly half of the population and the parties they supported managed to win several countrywide elections. Big voting differences were visible along regional/ethnic lines. The country had strong economic relations with Russia. Its industry depended on Russian gas while nearly all its machine and steel exports went to Russia. The U.S. did not like that. It wanted to control rule the Ukraine to be able to put pressure on Russia.

It twice, in 2004 and in 2014, organized ‘color revolutions’ to overthrow elected Ukrainian governments which, for mostly economic reasons, tended to favor relations with Russia. The 2014 color revolution was exceptionally brutal. The U.S. had organized extreme right wing groups to take the lead in violent protests. (The same groups were in the early 1940s allied with German Nazis and, between 1948 and 1952, were waging a CIA led guerrilla war against the Soviet Union.) The street fighting ended with an unconstitutional change of the government of Ukraine. The first law that the new coup government implemented was a rejection of Russian as one of Ukraine’s state languages. For some 50% of Ukrainians Russian is their daily language. Ukrainian itself is a Russian dialect. Nearly 100% of Ukrainians understand Russian.

The ethnic Russian people in Ukraine feared being canceled. Crimea, which in 1991 had voted for and declared its independence before the Ukraine did so, voted, under Russian protection, to join Russia. Moscow accepted the move. People in other former Russian parts of Ukraine protested and a some in the east took up arms. They twice defeated the Ukrainian army and volunteer formations sent against them. The Minsk I and II agreements that followed required Ukraine to give those Donbas oblasts significant autonomy. The United Nations Security Council acknowledged and supported the agreements. But any attempts to implement them were sabotaged by the U.S. via the armed right wing movements that had control over the government in Kiev.

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Done deal. Fait accompli.

Putin Speaks To Massive Crowd Celebrating New Territories (RT)

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Friday evening addressed thousands of people gathered on Moscow’s Red Square to celebrate the beginning of the process to incorporate four former Ukrainian regions that voted overwhelmingly to join Russia. Putin’s emotional speech came just hours after he signed treaties on the inclusion of the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics, as well as Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions, into the Russian Federation. The signing ceremony marked the start of the formal process of accession, which will entail the treaties being reviewed by the Constitutional Court and by both chambers of the parliament. Claiming it was Russia that originally “created modern Ukraine” by transferring Moscow’s “historical territories” to it, Putin said modern Russia had now given people in those regions “the right to choose.”

“People came to the referendum and made their choice: to be with their historical motherland, with Russia,” he said to applause from the crowd. For decades, Putin claimed, the Ukrainian authorities had unsuccessfully tried to eradicate people’s “historical identity,” to destroy their traditions and forbid them from speaking their native language. “These people carried love for their historical homeland in their hearts and passed it on to their children,” the president said, adding that Russia was not only opening its doors, but was “opening its heart” to them. “Welcome home,” he said, prompting chants of ‘Russia’ from the crowd. Putin also used the address to make several pledges: to improve security in the new territories, to revive their economies and to build schools and hospitals.

“We became stronger because we are together. The truth is behind us, and truth means strength, and thus victory. Victory will be ours,” Putin said in conclusion, before shaking hands with the heads of the regions, who joined him on the stage. Meanwhile, on Thursday, on the eve of what Putin described as a “historic day,” UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres called on the Kremlin “to step back from the brink” and to stop the “annexation” of the four Ukrainian regions. Guterres also warned Russia that neither the inclusion of new territories into Russia, nor the results of their referendums would be recognized as legal. Moscow, in turn, accused the secretary-general of abusing his power by making political statements on behalf of the UN.

Putin speech

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“..the Russian high command intentionally weakened their line in this particular area in order to entice the NATO commanders of this newly created army to attack precisely where they did..”

Turning Point (Schryver)

It is also indisputably established that the Russians had, in the weeks preceding the Ukrainian attack, significantly reduced the density of men and equipment in the geographic triangle formed by the Seversky Donets River running northwest to southeast, and the Oskol River running north to south. The confluence of these two rivers is immediately southeast of Izyum, with the transportation hub of Kupyansk straddling the Oskol to the north, and Andreevka on the left bank of the Seversky Donets to the northwest. The Russians had left small but satisfactorily supplied formations of Donbass militia and Rosgvardia (Russian National Guard), covered by relatively potent long-distance artillery fire, modest close air support, and occasional precision missile strikes against concentrations of Ukrainian forces.

[..] I remain persuaded the Russian high command intentionally weakened their line in this particular area in order to entice the NATO commanders of this newly created army to attack precisely where they did, and then to deliberately lead them into the triangular pocket defined by the two rivers, as described above. My argumentation supporting this view is as follows: First of all, it must be kept in mind that, from the very beginning of this now three-week-long battle, the Russian forces defending the area in question have been outnumbered at least 5:1 at almost every juncture. It is absurd to believe this disparity in force numbers was not anticipated by Russian commanders, and a battle plan conceived to exploit the geography and the inherent firepower superiority of the defending force so as to conduct a punishing tactical retreat.

And, in retrospect, it is now plainly evident that is precisely what they have done. Contrary to the ridiculously exaggerated tales of a disorderly Russian retreat – with a thousand destroyed/abandoned tanks and armored vehicles, thousands of casualties, and ten thousand captured (yes, numbers such as these were breathlessly reported by western “expert analysts” in the first week of the battle!) – the Russian forces conducted a remarkably disciplined fighting retreat, progressed through multiple prepared lines of defense, and exacted severe losses on Ukrainian men and equipment every step of the way, while suffering relatively modest losses themselves.

Yes, several towns and villages were briefly defended and then abandoned along the way. In each case, the Ukrainian propagandists and their western media allies trumpeted the glorious victories, but none of these stories of supposed martial brilliance bothered to mention the exorbitant price being paid for the modest pieces of real estate they claim to have “liberated”. Nor have the subsequent “filtration” purges of “Russian collaborators” in each of these towns and villages been reported in the completely one-sided western media accounts. Instead, western audiences were once again treated to evidence-free atrocity tales of barbaric Russian troops engaging in wanton rapes, murders, plunder, torture, indiscriminate massacres, and mass graves of innocent civilians.

Macgregor

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“..to maintain the flimsy pretense that NATO had any actual stake in whatever happens in Ukraine — as the result of the dumpster fire set there by America.”

Slouching Toward Endgame (Jim Kunstler)

Not many weeks ago German foreign minister Annalena Baerbock told the world that Germany would support Ukraine (and US-driven NATO policy) “no matter what German voters think.” That was all for show, you understand, to maintain the flimsy pretense that NATO had any actual stake in whatever happens in Ukraine — as the result of the dumpster fire set there by America. At the same time, that very same German foreign ministry was sneaking through back channels to feel out the Russian foreign ministry on ways Germany might get Russian natgas on the down-low, through third parties, say, Turkey, buying time until the glorious day those Nord Stream pipelines might re-open and the former normality of German economic life would resume?

“Joe Biden” slammed the door on that pretty conclusively Monday, blowing up the two pipelines, a premier act of insanity by a US government fueled at every level and in every direction by psychotic strategic thinking. For starters, consider that the Nord Stream sabotage amounts to the leading member of NATO committing an act-of-war against the rest of NATO. What else do you call depriving most of Europe the means to make a living — or merely to stay alive? As it happens, Germany is in no position to answer this casus belli by going to war against the USA. Germany has a Potemkin military — America has made sure of that since 1945, the last time these Teutons of northern forests went batshit crazy against Western Civ.

Seems to me that either Chancellor Olaf Scholz acknowledges this deadly affront to Germany and negates further participation in the NATO Ukraine idiocy, OR, within a few months he will face violent political uprising from his own people and his government will fall — and not necessarily within the framework of any orderly parliamentary procedure. More like mobs in the streets… chaos… government buildings torched… officials strung-up — real insurrection, not the fake kind we hear about endlessly from the American Party of Chaos. How, exactly, do any of the major NATO countries continue to regard the USA as any kind of ally? They won’t and they can’t.

Anyway, and despite the recent panicked expansion of NATO, member countries of the adjoining scaffold known as the European Union are peeling off one-by-one. Georgia Meloni, soon to be Prime Minister of Italy, couldn’t have put it more plainly when her coalition won last week’s election: she and they oppose in the strongest terms all the Woke nonsense that the World Economic Forum has programmed into the EU. She and they are against the cancellation of individual liberties and tyrannical affronts to due process of law; are against the degenerate campaign to undermine family, church, and national sovereignty; and are unwilling to act as a dumping ground for anymore Third World hordes the EU stupidly induces to come to Europe’s shores.

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“..Kiev refused to meet its responsibilities, particularly on the question of federalization, unless its troops were given control of the Donbass regions’ borders with Russia. This ran contrary to the terms of the Minsk agreements.”

Long Way Home: How Former Ukrainian Regions Joined Russia (RT)

Maidan In late 2013, a wave of street protest began in Kiev, ostensibly sparked by the government of Viktor Yanukovich shunning an economic agreement with the EU – a deal sold to Ukrainians as a harbinger of immediate social and economic benefits. As weeks of determined protest stretched into months, the so-called Maidan demonstrations were hijacked by radical nationalists, resulting in violent clashes with security forces in which dozens died. International politicians lent their support to the protests, with senior US diplomats famously handing out cookies in central Kiev. The emboldened movement gathered momentum and, despite a power-sharing deal mediated in February 2014 by Russia, Germany, France and Poland, escalating violence forced then-President Viktor Yanukovich to flee. The US-backed coup in the capital rallied the radical forces, who resorted to openly threatening the pro-Russian population in Ukraine with violence if they dared oppose the newly-installed authorities in Kiev.


Minsk agreements The Crimean Peninsula had strong historic ties with Russia, having been transferred to Kiev’s control only in 1954 under Soviet leader Nikita Krushchev. The region is essential for Russia’s national security as its deep harbours host the Black Sea naval Fleet. In a daring operation that was thought to have eventually prevented significant bloodshed, Moscow deployed special forces across the peninsula, and local authorities held a referendum on breaking with Ukraine and joining Russia. Moscow formally accepted Crimea’s bid in March 2014. The situation with two Donbass regions developed differently. In mid-April 2014, Kiev sent the military to quash protests in Donetsk and Lugansk. Protesters responded by forming militias and fighting back, militarising an already inflamed conflict.

The following month, the two regions held referendums on declaring their independence. The conflict in eastern Ukraine sank into a stalemate after the Ukrainian military suffered serious losses to what Kiev claimed were Russian troops secretly fighting in Donbass. The warring parties agreed to a ceasefire and a reconciliation roadmap, formalized in two agreements signed in Minsk in 2014 and 2015 respectively, was agreed to. The peace plan never fully worked. While hostilities in Donbass dwindled, Kiev refused to meet its responsibilities, particularly on the question of federalization, unless its troops were given control of the Donbass regions’ borders with Russia. This ran contrary to the terms of the Minsk agreements. Former Ukrainian President Pyotr Poroshenko acknowledged in June that he agreed to the ceasefire only to win time to rebuild the Ukrainian military.


NATO encroachment The tension over Ukraine escalated in 2021, after Russia accused NATO of expanding into the country without formally admitting Kiev into the alliance. Moscow had for decades made clear that Ukraine’s would-be membership in the US-led bloc would be crossing Russia’s security red line. Moscow sought guarantees from Washington that would have addressed its concerns. However, US officials declared that NATO’s “open door” policy meant that Ukraine was free to defend itself as it wished. Kiev enshrined the goal of becoming a member of the military bloc in its constitution in 2019. Since then NATO members have intensively trained Ukrainian troops, providing Kiev with weapons and otherwise helping to field a more capable army. Over the same period, Ukrainian neo-Nazi groups became embedded into military structures, gaining political power well beyond their levels public support, given the results of elections held in 2019 and 2020.

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This Czech sees a cheap opportunity. One problem: “The distance between Prague and the city of Kaliningrad is around 660km.”

Czech MEP Wants Russian Region Split Between Two EU States (RT)

A long-time European Parliament member from the Czech Republic, Tomas Zdechovsky, has supported an idea posted by a blogger of separating the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad from Moscow and splitting it between Prague and Warsaw. On Thursday, Zdechovsky shared a tweet from a Polish blogger showing a map of Russia’s westernmost Kaliningrad Region being split between Poland and the Czech Republic. The caption to the image read: “It’s time to divide Kaliningrad, so that our Czech brothers finally have access to the sea.” The Czech politician, who has been an MEP since 2014, even suggested a plan for how to have the region removed from Russia. “We will hold a referendum to make Kaliningrad Czech-Polish,” he wrote, adding that “instructions” on organizing a vote could be taken from Crimea.


The peninsula decided to become part of Russia in the wake of a 2014 referendum following the US-backed overthrow of the democratically-elected government of Viktor Yanukovich in Kiev. On Tuesday, referendums on whether to join Russia concluded in Zaporozhye and Kherson Regions, which declared independence from Ukraine, and the Lugansk and Donetsk People’s Republics in Donbass. The residents in all of the territories overwhelmingly supported joining Russia. On Friday, Russian President Vladimir Putin is expected to sign treaties on incorporating the four new constituent members into the Russian state. The treaties have yet to be approved by the parliament. Kaliningrad is sandwiched between Poland and Lithuania and the Baltic Sea and doesn’t share a border with the Czech Republic. The distance between Prague and the city of Kaliningrad is around 660km.

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“..you can’t feed anyone with paper, you need food.”

Putin Slams Western Money Printing (RT)

Paper money printed up by Western nations will not heat homes or feed anyone in the world, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Friday. “People cannot be fed with printed dollars and euros, they cannot be fed with these pieces of paper,” Putin said during the ceremony for the accession of the two Donbass republics and the Kherson and Zaporozhye regions into Russia. “All this is important, what I’m talking about, but what was just said is no less important – you can’t feed anyone with paper, you need food.” The president noted that EU politicians have been trying to convince people to eat less, wash up less, and dress warmer in their homes to conserve energy.


“And those who start asking fair questions on why this is so are immediately declared enemies, extremists, and radicals,” he said. Putin also reiterated his criticism of the Ukrainian grain deal mediated by the UN and Türkiye, which allows Kiev to export food via the Black Sea, saying it is not working as intended, as the shipments do little to alleviate food shortages in needy nations. “They are now exporting bread from Ukraine… under the pretext of ensuring food security for the poorest countries in the world. Where does it go? … everything goes to the same European countries, with only 5% sent to the poorest countries in the world. Again, another swindle and outright deception

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The EU won’t exist in its present form by next winter.

This Winter Will Be Hard But Next One Will Be Even Worse – EU (RT)

EU energy officials are concerned about the effects the ongoing energy crisis in Europe will have on the continent once cold weather sets in, Commissioner Kadri Simson told journalists on Friday. “Ministers were concerned, as am I, that this will not be an easy winter for us, and the next winter will be even more difficult,” said Simson during a press conference after an extraordinary meeting of EU energy ministers. The meeting was meant to address the skyrocketing gas prices in Europe and to develop a package of emergency measures aimed at assisting European households and businesses amid the crisis.

The agreed-upon steps include placing a cap on energy company revenues and distributing excess profits back to consumers. The plan also prescribes mandatory energy savings, requiring EU members to cut energy demand during peak hours by 5% and suggesting a 10% reduction in overall electricity use. The ministers failed, however, to agree on a price cap on wholesale natural gas, which was one of the key demands issued to the European Commission by a group of 15 EU member states ahead of the meeting. In a joint letter, the group argued that a price cap was the one measure that could help the bloc “mitigate the inflationary pressure, manage expectations and provide a framework in case of potential supply disruptions.”

While the European Commission has not completely ruled out the possibility of a price cap on natural gas, it has warned that such a move would weaken the bloc’s ability to secure gas supplies in the global market. The issue will reportedly be discussed at a later date, according to Lithuanian Energy Minister Dainius Kreivys. As Russian gas deliveries to the EU have declined by as much as 48% this year, according to Gazprom, inflation in the Eurozone has since hit double digits for the first time in recent history. It’s feared the situation will further deteriorate after the Russian Nord Stream pipelines suffered damage in a suspected act of sabotage earlier this week, which will severely limit potential gas deliveries to the bloc in the near future.

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“..all trapped in a newly declared country in which they didn’t especially wish to reside.”

Washington’s Pointless War On Behalf Of A Fake Nation (Stockman)

During the next 250 years the expansionist Czars annexed more and more of the adjacent territory, designating the eastern and southern regions as “Novorussiya” (New Russia), which territories included Catherine the Great’s purchase of Crimea from the Ottomans in 1783. That is to say, at the time of America’s own independence the heart of today’s Ukraine was ruled by the long arm of Czarist autocracy. After the Bolshevik revolution, of course, the map changed radically. In 1919 Lenin created the socialist state of Ukraine on part of the territory of the former Russian Empire. Ukraine officially became the Ukrainian People’s Republic with the capital of Kharkov in 1922 (moved to Kiev in 1934).

Accordingly, the new communist state swallowed up Novorussiya per the eastern and southern portions of the green area in the map below, including Donetsk, and Lugansk regions, as well as the Kherson and Zaporizhzhia regions bordering the Sea of Azov and the Black Sea that are the sites of today’s Russia-sponsored succession referendums. Then in 1939, as a result of the infamous Nazi-Soviet Pact, Stalin annexed the eastern territories of Poland, as designated by the yellow areas of the map. Thus, the historic territory of Galicia and the Polish city of Lvov were incorporated into Ukraine by the joint decree of Stalin and Hitler. In June of 1940, Stalin next annexed Northern Bukovina (brown area) from Romania. And then at the Yalta conference in 1945, upon Stalin’s insistence to Churchill and Roosevelt, the Hungarian Carpathian Ruthenia was incorporated into the Soviet Union and added to Ukraine.

Taken together, these Stalinist seizures are now known as Western Ukraine, the peoples of which understandably do not cotton to things Russian. At the same time, the 85% Russian-speaking population inhabiting the purple area (Crimea) was gifted to Ukraine by Khrushchev in 1954 for the very reason of extending his own accession to the communist dictatorship. Nevertheless, after the disintegration of the Soviet Union, Ukraine inherited these communist-confected borders within which there were upwards of 40 millions Russians, Poles, Hungarians, Romanians, Tartars and countless lesser nationalities—all trapped in a newly declared country in which they didn’t especially wish to reside.

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“..you are intentionally pushing us to use the right of the veto in order to then wax lyrical about the fact that Russia abuses this right..”

India, China, Brazil Abstain From UN Vote Condemning Russian Annexation (ZH)

Russia on Friday vetoed a Western bid to condemn its annexations of four occupied Ukrainian regions following controversial referendums – and while this move was expected from the Kremlin, China, India, Brazil and Gabon abstained.Russia’s veto came after the United States and Ukraine co-sponsored the resolution hours after Russian President Vladimir Putin announced that Moscow would take over areas of Ukraine seized during the invasion following referendums organized by the Kremlin.


“This is exactly what the Security Council was made to do. Defend sovereignty, protect territorial integrity, promote peace and security,” said US ambassador to the United Nations, Linda Thomas-Greenfield, adding “The United Nations was built on an idea that never again would one country be allowed to take another’s territory by force.” Russian ambassador Vassily Nebenzia said that it was unprecedented to try and condemn a permanent member of the Security Council. “Do you seriously expect Russia to consider and support such a draft? And if not, then it turns out that you are intentionally pushing us to use the right of the veto in order to then wax lyrical about the fact that Russia abuses this right,” he said.

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They don’t care about condemning an annexation. This is what UN nations really want.

66 Nations at UN Say ‘End War in Ukraine’ (CN)

We have spent the past week reading and listening to speeches by world leaders at the U.N. General Assembly in New York. Most of them condemned Russia’s invasion of Ukraine as a violation of the U.N. Charter and a serious setback for the peaceful world order that is the U.N.’s founding and defining principle. But what has not been reported in the United States is that leaders from 66 countries, mainly from the Global South, also used their General Assembly speeches to call urgently for diplomacy to end the war in Ukraine through peaceful negotiations, as the U.N. Charter requires. We have compiled excerpts from the speeches of all 66 countries to show the breadth and depth of their appeals, and we highlight a few of them here.

African leaders echoed one of the first speakers, Macky Sall, the president of Senegal, who also spoke in his capacity as the current chairman of the African Union when he said, “We call for de-escalation and a cessation of hostilities in Ukraine, as well as for a negotiated solution, to avoid the catastrophic risk of a potentially global conflict.” The 66 nations that called for peace in Ukraine make up more than a third of the countries in the world, and they represent most of the Earth’s population, including India,China, Indonesia, Bangladesh, Brazil and Mexico. While NATO and E.U. countries have rejected peace negotiations, and U.S. and U.K. leaders have actively undermined them, five European countries — Hungary, Malta, Portugal, San Marino and the Vatican — joined the calls for peace at the General Assembly.

The peace caucus also includes many of the small countries that have the most to lose from the failure of the U.N. system revealed by recent wars in Ukraine and the Greater Middle East, and who have the most to gain by strengthening the U.N. and enforcing the U.N. Charter to protect the weak and restrain the powerful. Philip Pierre, the prime minister of Saint Lucia, a small island state in the Caribbean, told the General Assembly, “Articles 2 and 33 of the U.N. Charter are unambiguous in binding Member States to refrain from the threat or use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state and to negotiate and settle all international disputes by peaceful means. …We therefore call upon all parties involved to immediately end the conflict in Ukraine, by undertaking immediate negotiations to permanently settle all disputes in accordance with the principles of the United Nations.”

Global South leaders lamented the breakdown of the U.N. system, not just in the war in Ukraine but throughout decades of war and economic coercion by the United States and its allies. President Jose Ramos-Horta of Timor-Leste directly challenged the West’s double standards, telling Western countries, “They should pause for a moment to reflect on the glaring contrast in their response to the wars elsewhere where women and children have died by the thousands from wars and starvation. The response to our beloved secretary-general’s cries for help in these situations have not met with equal compassion. As countries in the Global South, we see double standards. Our public opinion does not see the Ukraine war the same way it is seen in the North.”

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“Kremlin press secretary Dmitry Peskov reiterated on Friday that Moscow would from now on treat any attack on those territories as an attack against Russia itself.”

Ukraine Insists It Can Strike Russia Despite US Ban (RT)

The US only forbids Kiev’s forces from attacking Russian territory with HIMARS (High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems), not all American weapons, Ukrainian ambassador to Washington Oksana Markarova has said on Thursday. The US has been Kiev’s main backer during the conflict with Moscow, providing Ukrainian forces with billions of dollars worth of military aid, including sophisticated hardware such as HIMARS multiple rocket launchers, M777 howitzers, and combat drones. Last month, Ukrainian Defense Minister Aleksey Reznikov said that Kiev had “agreements with the US that we will not use weapons provided to us by the US and partners on the territory of Russia”due to Washington’s concern that it could escalate the fighting even further.

During her interview with Ukrainska Pravda, Markarova was asked if the US ban covered all weapons sent by Washington to Kiev. The ambassador responded by clarifying that “this applies specifically to HIMARS,” but not other American hardware. She also insisted that HIMARS could still be used by Kiev against Crimea as “it was, is and will be Ukraine.” The peninsula overwhelmingly voted to become part of Russia in a referendum in 2014, with Ukrainian leadership vowing to reclaim control on numerous occasions. Crimea has been targeted with drone attacks during the ongoing conflict and several explosions at military facilities on the peninsula have been attributed to Ukrainian saboteurs. On Friday, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed treaties on accepting the two Donbass republics, as well as Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions, which declared independence from Ukraine, into the Russian state.

Residents of those territories voted in referendums, which concluded on Monday, to join Russia. The treaties now await their ratification by the parliament. US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken said earlier this week that Washington “will never recognize the annexation of Ukrainian territory by Russia” and therefore would have no objections to Ukraine using American weapons in Donbass, Kherson and Zaporozhye Regions though Kiev’s attacks on the regions have regularly resulted in civilian deaths. Kremlin press secretary Dmitry Peskov reiterated on Friday that Moscow would from now on treat any attack on those territories as an attack against Russia itself. Moscow has long criticized the deliveries of weapons to Ukraine by the US and its allies, arguing that it only escalates the fighting and increases the risk of a direct confrontation between Russia and NATO.

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Zelensky ignored the Minsk agreements. That’s all.

Zelensky Sets Conditions For Talks With Russia (RT)

Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has refused to negotiate a peace settlement as long as Vladimir Putin remains president of Russia, issuing a regime change demand via his official Telegram channel on Friday. Claiming he had “always offered Russia coexistence on equal, honest, dignified and fair terms,” Zelensky blamed Russia for the failure of negotiations, insisting that it was “obvious this is impossible with this Russian president.” “We are ready for a dialogue with Russia, but … with another president of Russia,” he wrote. Unlike the majority of his Telegram posts, this one was written only in Ukrainian, without an accompanying English translation. Zelensky has repeatedly rejected overtures of peace from Moscow, most recently turning down Putin’s offer on Friday to resume negotiations.

What made the offer a non-starter for Kiev is that Putin refused to relinquish the regions that voted this week to join Russia. “Only the path of strengthening Ukraine and expelling the occupiers from our entire territory will restore peace,”Zelensky declared in his address. Zelensky also confirmed that Ukraine had submitted an accelerated application to join NATO on Friday, something he previously admitted was probably never going to happen. While the Western media described the move as “more symbolic than practical,” the Ukrainian president seemed quite serious, arguing that Sweden and Finland were able to apply on an accelerated basis even without a Membership Action Plan and it was thus only “fair” that Ukraine do the same.

“De facto, we have already completed our path to NATO,” he said in another Telegram post. “De facto, we have already proven interoperability with the Alliance’s standards … We trust each other, we help each other and we protect each other.” Zelensky has previously acknowledged Ukraine might struggle to secure the consent of all 30 NATO member nations, pushing instead for the so-called Kiev Security Compact, which would oblige NATO’s core members to defend Ukraine “in case of aggression” while codifying the provision of bottomless military and financial aid as a stopgap measure.

Admitting Ukraine would draw NATO into immediate confrontation with Russia, under the Article 5 mutual defense provision. While the US is committed to the ‘open door’ policy when it comes to NATO, now is the wrong time to consider Ukraine’s membership application, President Joe Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, said on Friday. The move would also make peace with Moscow impossible, as Putin has made it clear since before the military operation began in February that Ukraine must remain a neutral country under all circumstances.

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“If the goal is to avoid a conflict in which we are already fighting, then does the rest of Washington’s approach to Russian aggression need to be reconsidered?”

West and Russia Already Fighting WW3 – Fiona Hill (RT)

The West has been fighting World War III against Russia “for a long time” without being aware of it, former White House advisor Fiona Hill told the New Yorker magazine on Thursday. Moscow, however, is aware, with President Vladimir Putin accusing the collective West of waging “hybrid war” on Russia. “We’ve been in this for a long time, and we’ve failed to recognize it,” said Hill, who served in Donald Trump’s national security council before testifying against him during the 2019 impeachment inquiry. With the US backing a coup in Kiev in 2014 and supplying military aid to Ukraine while it waged war against the Donetsk and Lugansk People’s Republics in the eight years since, Hill suggested that Washington could reevaluate its stated policy of supporting Ukraine without becoming a direct party to the conflict.

“If the goal is to avoid a conflict in which we are already fighting, then does the rest of Washington’s approach to Russian aggression need to be reconsidered?” the New Yorker paraphrased her argument. While Hill did not directly call for the US to enter open war with Russia, other US lawmakers and former officials have. Shortly after Russian troops rolled into Ukraine in February, a group of these national security experts called on President Joe Biden to enforce a “no-fly zone” over Ukraine. Such a measure would see the US and any willing NATO allies commit to shooting down Russian aircraft, something Moscow has explicitly said it would perceive as an act of war.

Russia already considers itself at war with NATO in Ukraine, and Putin has vowed to use “all available means” to defend its own territory, including four former Ukrainian regions set to join the Russian Federation in the coming days. In a speech on Friday after signing accession treaties for these four regions, Putin accused the West of waging a “hybrid war” against Russia to prevent the development of a “multipolar world.”

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“In the first lawsuit, the FBI produced no responsive documents. The parties knew the FBI had something, and so this sparked a second lawsuit – where the FBI somehow found 20,000 pages of potentially responsive documents.”

Court Orders Production Of Seth Rich Laptop (Techno Fog)

Today, a federal judge ordered the FBI to “produce the information it possesses related to Seth Rich’s laptop.” This case involves a multi-year fight by attorney Ty Clevenger to obtain records relating to the FBI/DOJ investigation of Seth Rich, particularly whether Rich was involved in the hack of the DNC or had communicated with Wikileaks. This fight dates back to 2017 and includes two FOIA lawsuit. In the first lawsuit, the FBI produced no responsive documents. The parties knew the FBI had something, and so this sparked a second lawsuit – where the FBI somehow found 20,000 pages of potentially responsive documents. The court explains:

Of those 20,000 pages, the government found 1,596 pages of responsive documents, of which the government withheld 1,469 pages under various FOIA exemptions (privacy, law enforcement exemption, etc.). The FBI also withheld the contents of Seth Rich’s personal laptop, which it possesses, in its entirety, alleging the privacy of Rich’s family in “preventing the public release of this information” outweighs the public interest in disclosure. The court rejected that argument, stating “the FBI has not satisfied its burden of showing more than a de minimis privacy interest that would justify withholding information from Seth Rich’s laptop.” What will the laptop reveal? Time will tell. (Time is especially relevant becausethe DOJ will appeal and drag this out.)


What might be more interesting is the FBI’s complete records on Seth Rich. The FBI has fought production of those records – first by failing to “find” its own documents, and now by alleging documents must be withheld due to “national security grounds” and the “basis that disclosure of the information would threaten intelligence-gathering efforts.” The information in the FBI’s possession includes that which was “provided by foreign government agency authorities under an implied assurance of confidentiality.” It also may – or may not – include whether the FBI used a “code name” associated with Seth Rich. And, if FBI representations are to be believed, it also includes “details of intelligence activities, sources, and methods related to national security.”

Read more …

1/ Tell him if he doesn’t show up, the deal is off.
2/ Tell Von der Leyen the same thing.

Pfizer CEO Pulls Out Of Testifying To EU Parliament COVID Panel (Pol.eu)

Pfizer Chief Executive Albert Bourla has pulled out of an appointment to testify before the European Parliament’s special committee on COVID-19, at which he was expected to face tough questions on how secretive vaccine deals were struck. The decision follows an audit report into the EU’s vaccine procurement strategy published earlier in the month that raised new questions about contact between Bourla and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen that preceded a multibillion-euro vaccine contract. The head of the U.S. pharmaceutical giant, the largest supplier of COVID-19 vaccines to the EU, was scheduled to appear before the panel on October 10. The committee is meeting with key officials involved in the EU’s vaccine procurement process to draw lessons on how to respond to future pandemics.

Other pharmaceutical executives have addressed the committee, including the CEO of Moderna and senior officials from AstraZeneca and Sanofi. The committee’s chair, Belgian MEP Kathleen Van Brempt, told POLITICO she “deeply regrets” the decision taken by Pfizer. After a visit to BioNTech’s headquarters last week, Van Brempt had said in a written statement that she looked forward to discussions “with other CEOs” including “Mr. Albert Bourla, the CEO of Pfizer” on October 10. The report, by the European Court of Auditors, found that von der Leyen had been directly involved in preliminary negotiations for the EU’s biggest vaccine contract, for up to 1.8 billion doses of the BioNTech/Pfizer vaccine, which was concluded in May 2021. This was a departure from the negotiating procedure followed with other contracts, where a joint negotiating team made up of officials from the Commission and member countries conducted exploratory talks.

The EU watchdog also noted that the Commission refused to provide records of the discussions with Pfizer, either in the form of minutes, names of experts consulted, agreed terms, or other evidence. Already in 2021, the New York Times reported on the seemingly-cozy relationship between Bourla and von der Leyen, with the two exchanging text messages in the run-up to the deal. Contacted by POLITICO, a spokesperson for Pfizer said the company’s president of international development markets, Janine Small, would attend the committee hearing. “She has been identified as best placed to support the committee in meeting their objectives,” the spokesperson said.

Read more …

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

there’s some debate about what time signature it’s actually in. Musicologists say that riff is in 13/8 time, effectively switching from 3/4 to 4/4 for every fourth bar. Depending on who you talk to, the rest of the song is in 3/4 or 12/8, with that 13/8 weaving in and out.
https://twitter.com/i/status/1575560807278313472

 

 

 

 

 

 

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Home Forums Debt Rattle October 1 2022

Viewing 40 posts - 1 through 40 (of 69 total)
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  • #117402

    Henri Matisse Antibes 1908   • Ukraine – Four Oblasts Join Russia (MoA) • Putin Speaks To Massive Crowd Celebrating New Territories (RT) • Turnin
    [See the full post at: Debt Rattle October 1 2022]

    #117404
    Afewknowthetruth
    Participant

    Fuck off WEF, Davos mobsters, Bilderbergers or whatever you are. No one owns science.

    The utter bollocks you churn out and call science and try to ram down our throats is so distorted, so Orwellian, I am almost lost for words.

    “If God took so much trouble to give me a mind, I’m sure he wanted me to use it.”

    ‘Ignorance is strength’ doesn’t work on me. And thankfully, I am not alone!

    #117405
    Afewknowthetruth
    Participant

    Pardon me for posting this again. It’s too important to get lost in yesterday’s thread.

    #117406
    Afewknowthetruth
    Participant

    When two tribes go to war [ a point is all that you can score ]

    #117407
    chris_gee
    Participant

    Link to Putin’s latest speech, His coherence contrasts with that of many other leaders, http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/69465

    #117408
    anticlimactic
    Participant

    I live in the UK and am concerned about a Labour government. The party has recently declared that its primary aim is to fight Climate Change. They are also promising to nationalise all the energy companies.

    While voters may think energy will become cheaper and plentiful it is more likely that power plants will be closed and energy will become more expensive and scarce.

    #117409
    Dr. D
    Participant

    Turns out my guess was right, it was about $1B gas in the pipe. Those Kooky Russkies! Blowing up their own $1B! Who can explain their slanty-eyed ways?

    And of course, NATO just released more methane than 100 years of Dutch farmers. ‘Cuz Environment! Pure Love. Global Warming! ‘Lectric carz! Amirite? Ugh.

    We are coming in on Ten THOUSAND points lower in the Dow. Doesn’t seem it when it’s so high and we’re squeaking 29k, but 10,000 points down since Jan 6, 2021. “Faith and confidence.” Letting us know who’s winning the war. In other news, the Ruble remains the top currency worldwide. But you can’t have it, only Sachs and Morgan have access and can make money, not take money. So what is the 28th? Slow train comin’.

    Ah NATO, Must. Start. WWIII. Like ‘99, market crashing. Fists of Fury. Must. Blame. Someone.

    Anyway, yuppers, WWIII. It’s the End of the World as Germany knows it, and I here in America feel fine. Thanks Germany! You’re a pal. Thanks Poland, who L I T E R A L L Y has a generational “Sampson” type plan to self-immolate the ENTIRE nation if only it can kill a few Russkies on our behalf. Ah, racism at its finest!

    But: Ukie joins NATO. Um…how? Rules are 1) Can’t have disputed borders 2) Can’t be in an active war 3) Have to have unanimous agreement. And 4) Why the heck would anyone do that? Ukraine isn’t helping NATO, or a single NATO country in any possible way. Nothing. They haven’t even got a nickel. They are solely and exclusively AT war, are LOSING the war, and now want somebody ELSE to fight the planet-ending war for them: YOU.

    It will kill me and everyone I know? Shut up and take my money!!! You had me at “Kills everyone I know.”

    Uh-huh. I have the suspicion Turkey is not going to sign up. The U.S. is calling muster on NATO so they can expel the naughty Nellies. Italy? Ha ha. Denmark, surely you want to lose every adult male (remaining) and for Danes to cease to exist so Zelensky can get a second Miami beach house, nej?

    I have to support this run-down if you didn’t click on it yesterday: https://market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=247072
    Similar here: https://www.zerohedge.com/geopolitical/stockman-slams-washingtons-pointless-war-behalf-fake-nation

    Joe will DIE to protect any Soviet border. Stalin to the end!!! Must. Support. Joint. Agreement. Of Hitler. On behalf of…Nazis. We MUST deny Kherson a legitimate government to support our illegitimate government. …Of 2014 coup. Ah, there’s nothing you can say to break the spell. Not even death will cure it.

    Polish thinker points out Article 5 is s—t. Will America trade Poznan for Boston? That would be insane, both for personal reasons, for military reasons, or for human reasons: Poznan may have 500k people, while Boston and NY have + millions. And critical military infrastructure. So as has happened so far with the U.S. providing exactly nothing except extra money-laundering circling back the midterms, the U.S. will CLAIM to help, get Poland in the line of fire, then change their minds and not back the war, or not fully. You know, the old London/Anglo plan: “this is a battle for somebody else.” Coolies, Pakis, Aussis, don’t care. So long as it’s not us. Once Poland and Germany cease to exist, our factories will be humming as the only town left.

    Melissa Fleming. They certainly “Own the Science.” They should: they paid enough for it.

    Core CPI: backward-looking, oft delayed 30 days. It’s probably twice that (as seen in Holland’s chart). Certainly here in America prices have now passed through and food has doubled. Paychecks have not. That follows fuel, taxes, healthcare, credit card rates, and last few years, rent.

    “Before 1991 the Ukraine had never existed as a state or independent entity.”

    And they don’t exist now. They’re the government of an open, illegal, 2014 coup. That is UN illegal. One that then broke all UN human rights by outlawing language, culture, and non-stop genocide of their people. Guess which side the U.S. funds and supports.

    ““This is exactly what the Security Council was made to do. Defend sovereignty, protect territorial integrity, promote peace and security,” said US ambassador to the United Nations,”

    Exactly what we DIDN’T do. In 2004, in 2014. In Libya, Syria, Iraq. Heck, we don’t support peace in New Jersey or Missouri but fund “far right” candidates and informants who create riots.

    “Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has refused to negotiate a peace settlement as long as Vladimir Putin remains president of Russia,”

    This was hilarious. I guess Ukraine runs Russia now? They’re the new U.S. capital and therefore topple governments and leaders at will, I guess? What is it? 199 Democracies toppled since James Monroe? RussiaRussiaRussia.

    “Have you ever wondered…Are we the Baddies?”

    “we have already proven interoperability with the Alliance’s standards”

    This was also ASTOUNDINGLY false. One of the key problems is that Ukraine has, and it trained only with Soviet-standard hardware, and nearly nothing from NATO. They have perfect IN-operability, which will take decades to change. Luckily, every plane and rocket is blown up, so they can start fresh with NATO gear today. …Gear that, now proven, does not work. Planes that don’t fly, guns that don’t shoot…and cost 100x more. What’s not to like? Amirite Britain? With an un-working aircraft carrier, no planes, and a failing National Health?

    New territories “Done deal. Fait accompli.”

    Not exactly. They don’t own the territory, NATO just tried Sec. 5, and that would make the NEXT 100 miles to the Dnieper the shelling zone that needs to be controlled. It won’t stop until the Nazis are removed. …From D.C. We are trying our best, and certainly pinning Joe between two fronts, thus the “Red Wedding” speech.

    “Turning Point (Schryver)”

    As has been discussed, Russia seems to have traded a bunch of empty territory for the erasure of a whole summer’s worth of NATO-trained men. The territory you can get back; the men you can’t. The men take 25 years of careful growing with full mothers and happy homes. Land wars in Asia.

    “Putin Slams Western Money Printing (RT)”

    In the “Never left the mental ward” thinking of our leaders, UK, having no gas, because prices are high, are going to print MONEY, not gas, to make the price HIGHER. And not notice. Nor will the people. They will cheer, just as they did under the Covid checks that are now biting.

    “The EU won’t exist in its present form by next winter.”

    Thanks to the end of NS2, this is now past-tense. Not JUST “Get through the winter” – a low bar for ultra-modern nation like Germany – but NO Fertilizer. That means no planting. No gas. That means no manufacturing. At all. That means no jobs. No BMWs, no plastics, no machine parts. No airplanes. No bombs. Germans, living in Viking longhouses, wearing skins.

    That’s not Winter 2023…it’s 2023, 2024, 2025… It’s not fixed until energy appears again.

    Yet markets still think Germany is awesome. Bouncing back! DeutscheBank is top-notch, no defaults here! Literal NPR MoneyMatters article yesterday: “Economists haven’t he faintest idea what’s going on! Here, let’s quote them for 5 straight minutes! “Yes, Bob, it’s true. I’m an economist and I have no idea what is going on. The market not collapsing, and people still spending is completely inexplicable to me. Back to you, Kevin.”

    “In the first lawsuit, the FBI produced no responsive documents. The parties knew the FBI had something, and so this sparked a second lawsuit – where the FBI somehow found 20,000 pages of potentially responsive documents.”

    …And nobody goes to jail. This is a crime to refuse, a crime to mishandle, and civil rights to deny. That has often led to multi-million dollar settlements. Nope. Suck it peasant: we do what we want.

    I’ve got a cure: Defund, then erase the FBI in its entirety. Maybe then, after we *might* create a new one some distant day, we can hire people who do not live, breathe, and die for the end of human rights. “FBI: Killing all Human Rights since 1959” (Or before)

    “Pfizer CEO Pulls Out of Testifying to EU Parliament COVID Panel (Pol.eu)”

    Yeah, that’s what I told my judge when he subpoena’d me too. I’ve got golf that day.

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

    #117410
    Dr. D
    Participant

    Not that it isn’t a significant storm, but: https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/armstrongeconomics101/opinion/hello-from-florida-fake-news/

    What good is news or weather if all the reporting is false? They need to accurately report what roads are open, which are not. When. If the governor reverses the evacuation, how busy the roads are and if you have gas to get back from your hotel house party in Alabama. (This is a southern tradition now).

    It’s hard to follow the weather since it’s wrong ALL THE TIME, even when they’re not being sensationalist. Like the ‘20s, but unlike a modest period from 1970-2000, it’s more accurate to look out the window and smell the air. Even the radars are worthless since they swapped. As usual, doppler, etc appears to see too much and a lot of what isn’t relevant. That is, too much data, too confused.

    Repeating the usual for effect: universally when this happens, the reporters cruise up and down the coast looking for that one abandoned house whose shore was washed away 30 years ago and it about to fall in. Then they all set up cameras on it, or some fool’s yacht he didn’t know how to tie up, and was trying to sink for insurance. (Disposal costs on dead boats is astronomical)

    Point being: lying by context. This has nothing to do with reality. I’m quite sure the Cat 5 leveled everything it hit. But that’s a tiny area. What did it do 5, 10, 20 miles away? How about critical transmission lines? Major highways? People are used to this stuff (shockingly) and clean it all up in no time. For why I have no idea, I’d move to a much lighter, more mobile plan.

    One tree that breaks your roof is a crisis to YOU. That’s not wrong. It must be fixed, you can’t stay in Philly while your winter house is rotting. But that can happen from a T-storm in Ohio too.

    Well, there’s only one cure for a tree falling on your house: get vaccinated.

    #117411
    John Day
    Participant

    Last night Aspnaz wrote:
    “If this is WW3 then you would have to assume that someone outside the west is coordinating this attack on western energy, the aim being to destroy the west. I very much doubt that scenario, I suspect that it is a group within the west that have gone rogue and believe they can win something better by destroying the west. I do not consider this to be WW3, it is more like a sick civil war where the perpetrators have already taken over the governments and are using that power to sabotage the west.”

    We just have different concepts of “World War”.
    My concept is that world-war resets the prevailing international economic arrangements, and that all of the slaughter is a means to that end.
    This time the owner class (world wars ARE also class wars) does not want to nuke everything they own, but still needs to terrorize the people into sudden changes, to benefit the-owners.
    There are different groups of owners, variously cooperating and competing.
    None of the groups of owners is truly dependible, especially to working-class people, but some are really worse than others.

    VP Gary offered “Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick” by Ian Dury and The Blockeads, a song I sang a snippet of to somebody last week, and which can cycle through my head when I ride my bicycle.

    Pomp and Circumstance, and the subordination of native peoples to the service of empire were also thoughtfully explored… (The Polynesian Expansion across the Pacific was one of the great human migrations, and unique. Polynesians eat people who won’t become slaves. Waste-not, want-not…)

    #117413
    chooch
    Participant

    If true, would this make Lyman the first Russian city returned back to Ukrainian control?

    This minor victory/retreat/repositioning of Russian troops probably won’t help with the optics within Russia. Here is Solovyov lamenting a few days ago.

    And this was certainly classic.

    #117414
    aspnaz
    Participant

    anticlimactic said

    I live in the UK and am concerned about a Labour government. The party has recently declared that its primary aim is to fight Climate Change. They are also promising to nationalise all the energy companies.

    Socialise the losses, bail out the owners with cash of temporary value. Keir Starmer was Jimmy Saville’s protector while he was head of the CPS, he is as dirty a politician as you can get: bent as a bureaucrat, bent as an MP, how else did he become leader of Labour.

    #117415
    zerosum
    Participant

    ‘Tackling Disinformation’ – ‘double standards’

    1. Shut off all unapproved communication channel
    2. Don’t say anything
    3. Arrest/punish opposition
    4. Don’t tell the truth
    5. immediately declared enemies, extremists, and radicals
    6. Re define meaning of words/ (lawyer up)
    7. Invoke God/good/evil/
    8. Deny responsibility (not me)
    9. Assign responsibility to others (It’s their fault)
    ———
    Don’t tell
    The Ruble remains the top currency worldwide
    ———
    Racism at its finest!
    (pot calling the kettle black)

    It’s not us, It’s the enemy who are racist.
    ———–
    What is WW3 – battle grounds

    1. opioid killing consumers
    2. mind control – lies/truth/facts
    3. energy control/distribution
    4. food scarcity/distribution/control
    5. Immune system – health/medical/chemical distribution
    6. resource control/distribution
    7. Extreme weather
    8. Immigration
    9. Democracy/liberty/freedom

    #117416
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    “some older hipster in a flannel shirt”

    (ahem) That is a bathrobe, and I am not old, I am ancient beyond reckoning.

    ***

    “Sometimes I post, and it goes through. Other times, a robot says I’m spam. It asks me to add two numbers together, but stumps me by showing me only one.”

    Log out and log back in. Save a copy of your post, add some additional text, preferably nonsensical so it isn’t confused with your intended message, past it in the comment window after logging back in, and submit.That usually works.

    ***

    Re: WW3 definitions: let’s split hairs over what is or isn’t a world war, shall we? The entire planet is reeling from the economic shock waves of this conflict( global inflation)

    Actual military conflict is currently limited to Ukraine (and the usual colonial flash-points). I doubt very much that it will remain confined to Ukraine. But have no fear: proving, in fora like TAE, that one is right and the other is wrong will save us from the outcomes of wars and such.

    ***

    Meanwhile, perching on a ledge high above the “peanut gallery” while tossing one’s very own private reserve meshuganuts on said gallery far far far below one’s personal sphere of immaculately conceived self-worship is obviously not an expression of personal vainglorious egocentricity. Oh no. Placing oneself above others is certainly not an expression of personal ego. It is obviously just a manifestation of one’s impeccable humility, not a self-protecting delusion based on personal insecurity relative to others.

    Optical Illusions of the Wounded Ego

    I wouldn’t mind it except that, along with being annoyingly hostile and blatantly false, it is goddam.fucking.boring. I know that such activity indicates deep suffering by the actor, but as is so often the case, the actor would rather settle for an illusion of superiority than ask to be loved and embraced as a soul in need. Typically, they don’t feel deserving of help and project that feeling of unworthiness onto others.

    What can you do? It’s 5am, a woman in my apartment complex has been battered but won’t accept my offer of refuge because a stranger can’t possibly want to help a 40-something broad clean from meth for 45 days. (Probably has underlying menial health issues; I’d guess mild paraschizophrenia?) She’ll probably be using before the day is over, I’m thinking but what do I know. I ask God what to do and I always get the same answer: “Do your best.”

    “That’s not very good,” I reply.

    “Tell me something I don’t know?” God replies. “But it’s all you’ve got.”

    Maybe I Think Too Much

    #117418
    John Day
    Participant

    “Think Too Much”, or maybe keep thinking, instead of doing something useful, when there is not enough good information to reach any conclusion…
    (Bathrobe, Got it, Sorry…)

    #117419
    John Day
    Participant

    “World War Three Almost Announced” , with picture in kitchen, almost ready for winter
    https://drjohnsblog.substack.com/p/world-war-three-almost-announced

    I was going to write an explanatory essay about this moment in history, but after excerpting Putin’s speech from yesterday, the wind has gone out of my sails.

    Vladimir Putin addressed Russians and the world yesterday, the last day of September, in quite a different setting from Joe Biden’s address to Americans and the world on the first day of September.
    Excerpts:
    ​ “​Kiev threatened millions of people who came to express their will with repression. But the people of Donbass, Zaporozhye and Kherson weren’t broken, and they had their say.
    ​ ​I want the Kiev authorities and their true handlers in the West to hear me now, and I want everyone to remember this: the people living in Lugansk and Donetsk, in Kherson and Zaporozhye have become our citizens, forever. (Applause.)
    ​ ​We call on the Kiev regime to immediately cease fire and all hostilities; to end the war it unleashed back in 2014 and return to the negotiating table.​” …
    ​..”T​he West continued and continues looking for another chance to strike a blow at us, to weaken and break up Russia, which they have always dreamed about, to divide our state and set our peoples against each other, and to condemn them to poverty and extinction. They cannot rest easy knowing that there is such a great country with this huge territory in the world, with its natural wealth, resources and people who cannot and will not do someone else’s bidding.
    ​ ​The West is ready to cross every line to preserve the neo-colonial system which allows it to live off the world, to plunder it thanks to the domination of the dollar and technology, to collect an actual tribute from humanity, to extract its primary source of unearned prosperity, the rent paid to the hegemon. The preservation of this annuity is their main, real and absolutely self-serving motivation.​” …
    ..”They do not want us to be free; they want us to be a colony. They do not want equal cooperation; they want to loot. They do not want to see us a free society, but a mass of soulless slaves.”​ …
    ..”While we – we are proud that in the 20th century our country led the anti-colonial movement, which opened up opportunities for many peoples around the world to make progress, reduce poverty and inequality, and defeat hunger and disease.”​ [Hi Africans​. Hi Indians​.]​ …
    ..”Recall that during WWII the United States and Britain reduced Dresden, Hamburg, Cologne and many other German cities to rubble, without the least military necessity. It was done ostentatiously and, to repeat, without any military necessity. They had only one goal, as with the nuclear bombing of Japanese cities: to intimidate our country and the rest of the world.
    ​ ​The United States left a deep scar in the memory of the people of Korea and Vietnam with their carpet bombings and use of napalm and chemical weapons.
    ​ ​It actually continues to occupy Germany, Japan, the Republic of Korea and other countries, which they cynically refer to as equals and allies.”​ …
    ..”In effect, the American elite is using the tragedy of these people to weaken its rivals, to destroy nation states. This goes for Europe and for the identities of France, Italy, Spain and other countries with centuries-long histories.”​ …
    ..”These European elites understand everything – they do, but they prefer to serve the interests of others. This is no longer servility but direct betrayal of their own peoples. God bless, it is up to them.
    ​ ​But the Anglo-Saxons believe sanctions are no longer enough and now they have turned to subversion. It seems incredible but it is a fact – by causing explosions on Nord Stream’s international gas pipelines passing along the bottom of the Baltic Sea, they have actually embarked on the destruction of Europe’s entire energy infrastructure. It is clear to everyone who stands to gain. Those who benefit are responsible, of course.​” …
    ..”Everything I am saying is important. And what I just said is no less so: you can’t feed anyone with paper – you need food; and you can’t heat anyone’s home with these inflated capitalisations – you need energy.”​ …
    ..” it is important to recall that the West bailed itself​ ​ ​[Bankers] ​out of its early 20th century challenges with World War I. Profits from World War II helped the United States finally overcome the Great Depression and become the largest economy in the world, and to impose on the planet the power of the dollar as a global reserve currency. And the 1980s crisis – things came to a head in the 1980s again – the West emerged from it unscathed largely by appropriating the inheritance and resources of the collapsed and defunct Soviet Union. That’s a fact.
    ​Now, in order to free itself from the latest web of challenges, they need to dismantle Russia as well as other states that choose a sovereign path of development, at all costs, to be able to further plunder other nations’ wealth and use it to patch their own holes.​” …
    ..”The current neocolonial model is ultimately doomed; this much is obvious. But I repeat that its real masters will cling to it to the end.”​ …
    ..”Let me repeat that the dictatorship of the Western elites targets all societies, including the citizens of Western countries themselves. This is a challenge to all. This complete renunciation of what it means to be human, the overthrow of faith and traditional values, and the suppression of freedom are coming to resemble a “religion in reverse” – pure Satanism.”​ [Vlad watched Joe’s speech on September 1?]
    “Exposing false messiahs, Jesus Christ said in the Sermon on the Mount: “By their fruits ye shall know them.”’​ …
    ..”As I have already said, we have many like-minded people in Europe and the United States, and we feel and see their support. An essentially emancipatory, anti-colonial movement against unipolar hegemony is taking shape in the most diverse countries and societies.”​ …
    ..”Friends,
    ​ ​Today, we are fighting for a just and free path, first of all for ourselves, for Russia, in order to leave dictate and despotism in the past. I am convinced that countries and peoples understand that a policy based on the exceptionalism of whoever it may be and the suppression of other cultures and peoples is inherently criminal, and that we must close this shameful chapter. The ongoing collapse of Western hegemony is irreversible.”
    ​http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/69465

    ​The Battle of Evermore: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=88b0OYxdtyM

    #117421
    John Day
    Participant

    Aww, rejecting links again, will insert spaces…

    ​ ​Ukraine will not negotiate with Moscow until Putin is replaced as president, Zelensky and his cabinet said
    https://www.rt. com/russia/563840-zelensky-negotiations-putin-russia/

    ​Moon of Alabama (German) ​Ukraine – Four Oblasts Join Russia
    https://www.moonofalabama.org/2022/09/ukraine-four-oblasts-join-russia.html#more

    Big Serge analyzes the current battlefield and looks at paths of escalation in the next phase of war. Well worth reading. (Russia can sabotage western finance.)
    The War Has Just Begun
    ​ ​”Many western nations have advised their citizens to leave Russia immediately, suggesting they are worried about escalation (this coincides with Ukraine’s unhinged claim that Russia may be about to use nuclear weapons). For the time being, I expect Russian escalation to remain confined to Ukraine itself, likely coinciding with the deployment of additional Russian ground forces. If Russia feels compelled to undertake an out of theater escalation, targeting American satellites, digital infrastructure, or forces in Syria remain the most likely option.”
    https://bigserge.substack.com/p/the-war-has-just-begun

    ​ ​Turning Point​ ​A different kind of war is about to begin.
    ​ ​As I write, the Ukrainians have finally achieved a near-total encirclement of the Russian forces in Liman. Their only remaining avenue of supply and escape is a single narrow corridor that is largely covered by Ukrainian artillery. It remains to be seen whether they will make a last stand in the city, or attempt a costly withdrawal through the fire zone…​
    ..For several weeks now, seemingly endless trains of Russian military equipment have been flowing from Russia into Ukraine. The video evidence of this unprecedented buildup is abundant, and has increased notably over the past two weeks, and particularly in recent days.
    ​ ​Make no mistake, these are not columns of rusty, antiquated Khrushchev-era tanks and vehicles, as the clueless empire propagandists would have you believe. From what I have seen, it is mostly pristine stuff – hundreds of top-shelf tanks, self-propelled artillery, infantry fighting vehicles, hundreds of rocket artillery launchers, impressive numbers of various air-defense systems, and uncounted seemingly brand-new support vehicles of all types.
    ​ ​Yes, much to the chagrin of the many Russian-friendly analysts I follow, it appears virtually none of this huge buildup of military strength has been promptly distributed to the front lines. The valiant forces who have fought at Kupyansk, Liman, and other places for the past several weeks have apparently been adequately supplied, but not substantially reinforced. The ongoing buildup is clearly being reserved for “something big” that is yet to come.
    https://imetatronink.substack.com/p/turning-point

    ​ ​KRASNYI LYMAN IS BALANCING ON EDGE WHILE RUSSIA PREPARES FOR WAR WITHOUT GIVEAWAYS​
    ​Meanwhile, the New York Times reported citing own sources that the Pentagon is setting up to officially create a command center to control and manage ‘assistance to Ukraine’ in Germany. The center will be led by the US side and involve at least 300 personnel. While the fact that Kiev’s military operations against Russia are almost fully controlled and managed by NATO (mostly the US) is an open secret, the official opening of such center in Germany will become the formal recognition that the conflict in Ukraine is the conflict between NATO and Russia. In these conditions, the Kiev regime is just brushwood in the fire of this conflict.
    https://southfront. org/krasnyi-lyman-is-balancing-on-edge-while-russia-prepares-for-war-without-giveaways/

    #117422
    John Day
    Participant

    This war is against people, working-class people.​
    This winter will be hard but next one will be even worse – EU
    https://www.azerbaycan24.com/en/this-winter-will-be-hard-but-next-one-will-be-even-worse-eu/

    ​ ​Russia on Friday vetoed a Western bid to condemn its annexations of four occupied Ukrainian regions following controversial referendums – and while this move was expected from the Kremlin, China, India, Brazil and Gabon abstained.
    https://www.zerohedge.com/political/russia-vetoes-un-resolution-ukraine-annexation-india-china-brazil-and-gabon-abstain

    ​ ​66 Nations at UN Say ‘End War in Ukraine’
    ​ “What has not been reported in the United States is that leaders from 66 countries, [representing the majority of humans] mainly from the Global South, also used their General Assembly speeches to call urgently for diplomacy to end the war in Ukraine through peaceful negotiations, as the U.N. Charter requires…
    ​ ​African leaders echoed one of the first speakers, Macky Sall, the president of Senegal, who also spoke in his capacity as the current chairman of the African Union when he said, “We call for de-escalation and a cessation of hostilities in Ukraine, as well as for a negotiated solution, to avoid the catastrophic risk of a potentially global conflict.”

    66 Nations at UN Say ‘End War in Ukraine’

    ​ Ok, so let’s just go ahead and announce it and start nuking people, right? Somebody was “aware of it”.
    ​ The West has been fighting World War III against Russia “for a long time” without being aware of it, former White House advisor Fiona Hill told the New Yorker magazine on Thursday. Moscow, however, is aware, with President Vladimir Putin accusing the collective West of waging “hybrid war” on Russia.
    https://www.azerbaycan24.com/en/west-and-russia-already-fighting-ww3-former-us-advisor/

    #117423
    D Benton Smith
    Participant

    To be chipped into yesterday’s brief discussion of ego:

    And what is the EGO? Is it the soul? Or is it the bagged up collection of mostly fetid garbage that the soul drags along like some homeless “bag person” wandering the desolation of Los Angeles? I suppose the soul does this for lack of anything else that it can point to proudly and say, “That’s me! That’s all my STUFF. Pretty impressive, huh?”

    #117424
    Germ
    Participant

    ER Physician Dr. Joseph Fraiman Finds COVID Vaccines Have 1-in-800 Risk of Serious Adverse Events

    https://rumble.com/v1m74r6-er-physician-dr.-joseph-fraiman-finds-covid-vaccines-have-1-in-800-risk-of-.html

    ☠️☠️☠️

    #117425
    Noirette
    Participant

    Interesting quote:

    COVID-19 was the test of social responsibility – A huge number of unimaginable restrictions for public health were adopted by billions of citizens across the world. There were numerous examples globally of maintaining social distancing, wearing masks, mass vaccinations and acceptance of contact-tracing applications for public health, which demonstrated the core of individual social responsibility.

    > end quote. bold is in the original.

    From the World Economic Forum:

    https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2022/09/my-carbon-an-approach-for-inclusive-and-sustainable-cities/

    ‘Was the test..’ not ‘Was a test..’ heh.. how much hinges on an definite / indef. article?

    Who is fighting whom? The elites are trying to kill off the plebs, useless eaters, old ppl, some argue (yes, imho.) At the same time old-style national rivalry apparently flourishes as that gets ppl to accept sacrifice or go on the barricades, not that they are sent to fight on the ground.. Sovereignity is the a clarion call, but if one can’t import cheap products from China (as seen from the EU) it is a calamity! Corps and the MIC garner huge contracts but only of course for some time, in some conditions.

    #117426
    zerosum
    Participant

    I’m not spoon feeding you
    Read em and learn

    https://www.moonofalabama.org/2022/10/putins-remarks-on-europe.html#comments
    Putin’s Remarks On Europe
    http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/69465
    Signing of treaties on accession of Donetsk and Lugansk people’s republics and Zaporozhye and Kherson regions to Russia

    #117427
    Bishko
    Participant

    Regarding the doubling of CO2 levels. If all the increase of CO2 in the atmosphere can be attributed to man’s burning of fossil fuels and we have recently just passed the half way point of fossil fuel depletion then the future increase in CO2 would be from the burning of the remaining fossil fuels. Preindustrial CO2 levels were 280 PPMv , current CO2 levels are 413 PPMv, so all of the previous burning of fossil fuels has increased the atmospheric CO2 by 413-280 = 136 PPMv.

    Burning the remaining half of the fossil fuels will add another 136 PPMv to the atmosphere bringing the level to 413 + 136 = 549 PPMv.

    The v at the end of PPMv is for “volume” as opposed to “weight” or “Molar” This is the chemist in me.

    The second half of the fossil fuel inventory will never be completely burned. The last 20 to 30% will be economically impossible to extract except for high end feed stock, not fuel. So this 549 PPMv number will most assuredly be lower unless there are natural CO2 emission processes in action that are actually driving the number as well.

    In addition, it has been known for decades that there is a steady loss of CO2 from the equation. We know the volume of the atmosphere, we know how much fossil fuel is burned and we know the carbon content of all these fuels. But there is a constant shortfall in the CO2 increase. It is generally believed (not by everyone) that the loss is due to dissolution into the waters of the world. This makes sense and research can be performed. But agendized research would return bogus data and analysis like we are seeing in almost all published AGW research. The WEF needs this Hobgoblin and is pushing it hard and funding any “scientist” that will support their contention even if the data and the analysis is completely bogus. We saw this with the Covid lies as well.

    I realize that for people who have a belief in Human caused Climate Change, there is little hope that true facts will alter their outlook. Facts lead to Opinions, Opinions lead to Beliefs and Belief lead to Religion. If your mind is closed, facts do not matter. It’s like trying to convince a Catholic that god doesn’t exist. “Don’t confuse me with the Facts!”

    #117428
    zerosum
    Participant

    Winners and losers
    https://www.un.org/en/black-sea-grain-initiative/vessel-movements

    As of 30 September 2022, 241 voyages from Ukrainian ports have carried 5,471,144 metric tons of grains and other foodstuffs.
    Bolded vessel names indicate those chartered by the World Food Programme.
    Latest summary of shipments, as of 29-Sep-2022:
    ————————————–

    ________TONNAGE_ _PERCENT_
    OECD,EU:_3,770,145 __69.5%
    NATO: _3,465,664 __63.9%
    Turkey: ___815,737 __15.0%
    Other: _1,363,438 __25.1%
    POOR: ___292,370 ___5.4%

    TOTAL: _5.425,953 _100.0%
    ——–

    #117429
    Figmund Sreud
    Participant

    Luongo yesterday: The Curious Whodunit of Nordstreams 1 and 2

    … suggesting unthinkable – other than himself.

    The Curious Whodunit of Nordstreams 1 and 2

    … fwiw,

    F.S.

    #117430
    D Benton Smith
    Participant

    The Western Empire’s “money magic” has lost it’s mojo. It was doing its damnedest to apply the lessons contained in that hundred year old best selling re-hash of much older ideas, “The Richest Man In Babylon,” only to discover too late that the BIGGEST lesson in the book is NOT the idea of “making your gold work for you”. Nope. Gold does no work (duh!). The biggest lesson from “The Richest Man In Babylon,” is that by “making their money work for them” Babylon wiped itself from the face of the earth and today exists only in near myth as a fragment of people’s dimmest memory. I mean to say, Babylon is, indeed, “Gone, baby, gone!”

    The so-called “magic” in “The Richest Man In Babylon” was based on the truly insane notion that it is possible to make a thing called “financial profit” by moving around an idea called “money” in clever interest-returning ways, and that by acquiring a lot of “money” in this “profitable” way a person could acquire STACKS of “money” and thereby have the “power” to tell everybody else what to do (regardless of what everybody else WANTED to do). This delusory (suicidal!) goal is called “Becoming Rich and Powerful”, and it was pumped and touted throughout the entire civilization as the best idea since sliced bread.

    Well, step aside Babylon, because there is a new suicide-by-money-magic dead empire on its way to your corner of Hell. It has gone by many names, down through the ages, with a few of the most recent labels being The United States Government, and The British Crown, or the nasty “partnership” of its World Economic Forum. Names don’t matter. It is knowable by what it DOES. I call it “The Cabal” , others call it Globalist, whatever, but what it DOES is try by fair means and foul is to try to get something for nothing. It’s most recent manifestation, at any rate, along with its bastard offspring (US, UK, Aus/NZ/Oceania, etc.) is on it’s way to oblivion, so scootch over, Babylon and make a little room.

    NOTE:
    I’m not so naive as to think it isn’t going to start all over and happen again, starting now. After all, freebies and something-for-nothin and windfall profit are such TEMPTING LIES to believe in. No doubt we will err again, but this time PLEASE can’t we all try not to do anything QUITE that awful this time? Meanwhile, there’s a lot of real and actual WORK to do if we ever again want to have enough necessary and valuable products to go around, so that’s what I intend to concentrate on hence forward.

    #117431
    oldandtired
    Participant

    They lie every time.

    They lie to you to manipulate you.

    They manipulate you to humiliate you.

    They humiliate you to hurt you.

    Hurt you personally? Good.

    Hurt you, your family and friends? Better

    Hurt you, your family, friends and your country? Best!

    They are not elite. They are not the Swamp. They are not leaders. They are not the Cabal. They are right in front of you. On TV. The internet. They are people in control, who suffer from Severe Mental Illness.

    They only want to hurt you. Every single time. Just like the little toy you wound up and sent across the floor when you were a kid. That is what the toy does. Every single time. It does just the one thing. Same with these people suffering from SMI. They hurt you. Every. Single. Time. It is what they do. It is the only thing they do.

    Their actions are irrational to most of us. Because we are rational. We are not Severely Mentally Ill. We try to explain their irrational behavior-rationally.
    It cannot be explained rationally. They want to hurt you every single time.

    Best of the best kind of hurt? Kill you.

    500,000 civilians killed, mostly women and children, during the Gulf War.
    Secretary Albright when asked about it, responded that it was “Acceptable.”

    A sitting President of a country assassinated, and his country plunged into civil war and anarchy? Secretary Clinton when asked about it, stated, “We came, we saw, he died.”

    Doctor Fauci: “Ladies! Hold my beer!”

    They want to hurt you. Every single time.

    #117432
    anticlimactic
    Participant

    There is a fascinating chart on TAE [July 7th] showing CO2 levels through the ages. It was FOURTEEN times higher in the Cambrian era!

    It fell over 75% in the Carboniferous era for an interesting reason. Trees invented a new material : lignin. It took over 60 million years for nature to come up with something to recycle it. Trees grew and died but did not rot and ended up forming coal deposits.

    The chart shows that at the moment we have the lowest of CO2 ever. Plants grown in atmosphere of 800 ppm CO2 are HUGE. If CO2 levels doubled there would be much more vegetation, more food, more life.

    The seas will NOT become acidic. They are extremely alkaline and additional CO2 will reduce the alkalinity slightly. Above a certain level CO2 reacts directly with seawater to form insoluble carbonates – it will become a carbon sink.

    Doubling CO2 would literally mean the greening of the Earth.

    #117433
    D Benton Smith
    Participant

    (A quiet offer made recently to British Prime Minister Liz Truss and her trusty side kick “money genius”, Kwasi Kwarteng )

    Hey there Liz, Kwasi. How’s it goin,? Say, how would you like to be rich, powerful and famous? Want to become millionaires and hold high political office? Yeah? Good choice! Here’s the deal. All ya gotta do to get all that wealth, power and fame is to hold this bag of English money (Pound Stirling, gilts, etc.) for a minute . . . . and I’ll get right back to you in a day or two with all the rewards. “

    #117434
    D Benton Smith
    Participant

    Remarkable!

    People are just beginning to understand that there are no leaders this side of Russia except the official gaggle of elected/appointed ones now so exclusively intent upon their personal murder/suicide pact with the Devil in exchange for wealth, power and the immorality of the grave.

    There is no cavalry about to save us, or perhaps I should more accurately say that WE are the only cavalry and practically NOBODY wants to admit it..

    Anyone around here looking for a field promotion in the cavalry?

    #117435
    Afewknowthetruth
    Participant

    Bishko said

    ‘But there is a constant shortfall in the CO2 increase. It is generally believed (not by everyone) that the loss is due to dissolution into the waters of the world.’

    This has been well documented and accounts for the falling pH of the oceans, otherwise known as ocean acidification.

    The people who ‘don’t believe’ are either non-scientists or liars.

    The most pertinent aspect of all this is that chemical processes that operate on very long timescales have been completely overwhelmed by the sudden surge in both atmospheric carbon dioxide and oceanic carbon dioxide that has occurred since the commencement of the burning of large quantities of coal to release the chemical energy in the coal, i.e. the middle of the nineteenth century.

    For example CaSiO3 + CO2 goes to CaCO3 + SiO2.

    Also CaH2(CO3)2 + CO2 goes to CaCO3 + H2O

    A clever trick many professional liars employ is to talk only about anthropogenic CO2 emissions and take the numbers completely out of context of the entire carbon balance. They say things like; “The amount of CO2 humans emit is miniscule compared to what plants emit at nighttime.”

    Yep.

    But their false models are akin to operating a bank account and only ever looking at the interest without looking at the depletion of capital.

    It is a perfectly logical mind exercise to note the quantity of coal that was underground 200 years ago thta is now in the atmosphere and oceans as CO2 or [in simple terms] H2CO3 because H2O + CO2 goes to H2CO3

    It gets really interesting is when the oceans become sufficiently saturated with CO2 for the rate of absorption to significantly decline. Or heaven forbid, the oceans become net sources of CO2 because their temperature has risen above that at which absorption is maintained.

    I saw a report a few years ago that indicated some regions of the oceans had become net releasers of CO2 but have seen nothing on the matter recently, partly because I no longer take as much interest in such matters when everything around me is turning to shit, and the governments of NATOstan nations are pushing for nuclear war.

    Of course non-scientists will quickly skip over actual science and generate completely fake narratives because none of the ‘climate change denial’ we witness is about science at all, but is about refuting science in order to justify the defence of Industrial Civilisation.

    Needless to say, all official responses to the CO2 emergency are completely bogus and increase the magnitude of our collective predicament. We [those of us who are awake] have come expect nothing other than false narratives from politicians, economists and bureaucrats, etc. who are more than happy to destroy their own progeny’s futures, or in the case of younger politicians, economists and bureaucrats -i.e. under the age of seventy- are quite comfortable with destroying their own futures in defence of the short-term agendas of The Empire of Lies

    #117436
    D Benton Smith
    Participant

    If I was exceptionally skilled at skullduggery (which I’m NOT) I think the way I would go about it is to look around for some fool who wanted to be “Boss” and then become that narcissistic idiot’s indispensable paymaster and adviser. I think the job is called “fall guy”, and although the pay and perks are awesome, the “fall” part of the job description can REALLY suck.

    #117437
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    Only for you, mein herrs:
    It amuses me that we periodically go through sociomoral reformation campaigns to make TAE more “civil”. Oh, it’s good of itself, I suppose. All good clean well-intentioned fun. But part of what holds the TAE talk tribe together is the evolved pairs of mutually contemptuous personalities.

    This is a good thing. Such loyal oppositions are a driving force of survival competition within a tribe. Not so much in who wins or loses those contests: they are not necessarily about winning or losing any more than post-modern partisan politics are necessarily about winning or losing; they are for taking turns at good cop/bad cop dynamics and for a) bonding people together through juicy gossip camps and mutual enhancement groups (good old boy clubs), and b) if a tribe is lucky, bringing out of the background some quiet Big Man who’s had enough and busts both their chops to kingdom come.

    If the Big Man has a Conscience as big as the rest of him, and enough genius to strategically succeed, this is good for the tribe. If he’s just Big, or Big with a Conscience but poor strategy, it tends to be bad for the tribe.

    Seems that, the bigger the tribe (say, for funzies, gauged by orders of magnitude beyond the Dunbar Number: 150, 1,500, 15,000, 150,000…), the more likely it is that it will be the latter: Big psychopath or Big but too nice as in those guys who tend to finish last.
    We await our Messiah with barbed critiques, earnest entreaties, lusting contempt and kind devotion.

    Meanwhile, the times being what they are, we shoot up our medicines, oral being way too soft for hardcore medical security junkies like today’s pomo 21st century omnischizoid metaneurotics. And, a far cry from clunky brittle 78rpms on windup Victrolae, we snort a line of nanochips for our weekly music “feed”.

    O de times dem is a-changin:

    Oy:

    #117438
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    A bit of Golden Modern Era American exceptionalist melting pot ‘vital american’ American history

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

    And two songs from that apogee of our culture, when the American Dream wasn’t just a drugged video hallucination:

    #117439
    boscohorowitz
    Participant

    P.S. Dmitry Orlov says we need to watch this:

    I agree but I’ve also come to enjoy throwing fresh chum into the Who Is Most Right shark tank.

    #117440
    Afewknowthetruth
    Participant

    In the aftermath of the storm comes the unprecedented cost of repair and replacement.

    “Worst case scenario,”

    #117441
    Afewknowthetruth
    Participant

    The “fold like a bag of chips” moment is coming fast.

    #117442
    Figmund Sreud
    Participant

    Helmer:

    AFTERSHOCK OF NORD STREAM EXPLOSIONS RUMBLES WARSAW — POLISH POLITICIANS GO “NUTTERS”

    The Polish government in Warsaw, facing re-election in less than a year, wants all the credit from Washington for their joint operation to sabotage the Nord Stream gas pipelines on the Baltic seabed.

    It also wants to intimidate the German chancellor in Berlin, and deter both American and German officials from plotting a takeover by the Polish opposition party, Civic Platform, next year.

    Blaming the Russians for the attack is their cover story. Attacking anyone who doesn’t believe it, including Poles and Germans, Warsaw officials and their supporting media claim they are dupes or agents of Russian disinformation. […]

    AFTERSHOCK OF NORD STREAM EXPLOSIONS RUMBLES WARSAW — POLISH POLITICIANS GO “NUTTERS”

    F.S.

    #117443
    John Day
    Participant

    @Boscohorowitz: IT CAN’T HAPPEN HERE!

    #117444
    Afewknowthetruth
    Participant

    I should have included this important equation

    CaCO3 (insoluble) + H2CO3 [from CO2 + H2O] goes to CaH2(CO3)2 (soluble)

    In other words, high CO2 in the atmosphere leads to high CO2 in the oceans which promotes the dissolving of the shells of shellfish (more properly, prevents their formation).

    High atmospheric CO2 also promotes the dissolving of limestone that so many notable buildings are constructed of

    And high atmospheric CO2 promotes the dissolving of concrete.

    But since we are well on the way to worldwide starvation, declining energy availability, mass species extinction, and probably nuclear war, none of those slowish chemical processes are likely to matter.

    By the way, most wars since the seventeenth century have been chemical wars.

    #117445
    John Day
    Participant

    Thanks FS for the Dances With Bears. Helmer has no scoop today, but the poles should be thinking of 1938-1939 these days. The Anglos set them up that time.

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