Eugène Delacroix Les femmes d’Alger 1834
Palestina
https://twitter.com/i/status/1715813627708481568
Tucker Trump ad
This Trump Campaign Ad, narrated by Tucker Carlson, should be posted and reposted every hour of every day.
We desperately need Trump back in charge.
pic.twitter.com/qPBSmZvkf2— Juanita Broaddrick (@atensnut) October 20, 2023
Maher
https://twitter.com/i/status/1715728586928259078
Arnold
Wow. Wow. Wow.
Incredible powerful message (incredible speech writing)—to those who stumbled on the wrong path and may ruin their future for not knowing the past.
The weight of history pic.twitter.com/FPxBLF2QAW
— Josh Wolfe (@wolfejosh) October 21, 2023
Bibi’s main dilemma: Israel is much weaker than you think. Check also the Scott Ritter video. Israel would lose far too many troops if it enters Gaza.
• Netanyahoo’s Strategic Dilemma (MoA)
Israel is a colonial settler state in permanent conflict with the suppressed natives. It thought it could survive in that state, or even extend its settlements, by deterring opposing forces with its superior military. Hamas has breached that deterrence myth by inflicting, in one day, more casualties in Israel than it had experienced in any previous wars. Natanyahoo is under pressure to restore the deterrence, to again provide the Zionists with a feeling of superiority. He can not do that. Any land attack in Gaza means urban warfare in an already destroyed city with large underground facilities. During the taking of Bakhmut the Wagener forces had in total some 40,000 casualties (dead and wounded). The other side had more than 70,000. What price would the IDF have to pay to ‘destroy Hamas’?
The other factor is of course Hizbullah and other resistance groups, which may well attack Israel from the north and various other directions. Hizbullah has loudly said it would do so should the IDF enter Gaza. It has some 100,000 missiles – more than enough to exhaust Israel’s air defenses. Its longest reach missiles can attack any major city within Israel. There have already been daily fire exchanges at the norther border. The 2006 war in Lebanon has shown that Hizbullah is dug in and very able to defend itself. It has since gained more experience by fighting ISIS in Syria. Neither U.S. air force attacks nor a land force invasion can hinder Hizbullah from firing its missiles. (Syria, as well as Iran, will not intervene in the war unless they are directly attacked.) Netanyahoo must attack Gaza to restore deterrence. He can not attack Gaza because the urban warfare would cause large Israeli casualties. He can not attack Gaza because Hizbullah would then destroy the myth of the superior settler state even more than Hamas has done so far.
Israel, with the help of the U.S., has tried to push the population of Gaza into Egypt. From Egypt’s standpoint that would be a humanitarian solution, at least as long as others pay for it. But it would cause a serious strategic problem. Resistance by Hamas and others against Israel would continue indefinitely, but Egypt would be held responsible for it. It can not and will not take on that burden. Netanyahoo’s next idea was to starve Gaza. But the world will not let him do that. At least not beyond a certain point. Even the UN Secretary General has visited the Rafah crossing. Other global organizations, like the WHO and ASEAN, have spoken up. Pictures of starving people will make it impossible for the west to support that ‘solution’.
Meanwhile Hamas fighters will continue to sit in their tunnels, ready to defend their land, and likely with enough provisions to hold out for months. Israeli settlers, with the support of the IDF, are rampaging through the West Bank. They are killing more Palestinians and further enrage the global public against their deeds. This will escalate. Israel’s decision making is paralyzed. It will for now continue to talk of a ground invasion but will not launch one. It will also continue to starve Gaza. But something will soon break. At any minute there might be a new large atrocity in Gaza or a pogrom in the West Bank. Any miscalculation in the north could launch that front into a hot war. Hizbullah could start to ‘preemptively’ invade Israeli proper. But Israel’s Jewish public is still demanding a war of revenge. It still needs the restoration of its deterrence and superiority. But what if that turns out to be impossible to achieve? Well. Then something else must change.
Ritter
This is why they are trying to make America fight their war for them pic.twitter.com/GRAhLp7PNM
— Jake Shields (@jakeshieldsajj) October 21, 2023
This would hit Europeans much more than Americans. But prices would surge everywhere.
• Middle Eastern Officials Could Cut Off Oil Supplies – AP (RT)
Iraqi Prime Minister Mohammed Shia al-Sudani has reportedly warned that supplies of Middle East oil to international markets could be disrupted if the war between Israel and Hamas escalates to the point of involving other countries in the region. The conflict will “impact global security, escalate regional conflict, jeopardize energy supplies, exacerbate economic crises, and invite further conflicts,” the Associated Press quoted al-Sudani as saying on Saturday at a peace summit in Cairo. Al-Sudani called for an immediate cease-fire and a prisoner swap to bring an end to the bloodshed. He argued against bringing civilians out of the Gaza Strip amid Israeli bombing, saying, “the Palestinians have no other place but their land.”
The PM suggested that the current crisis could have been averted if UN Security Council resolutions against Israel’s settlement policies in Palestinian territory had been respected. However, Israel dismantled its settlements in the Gaza Strip in 2005. Hamas has controlled Gaza since 2006, and no new elections have been held in the territory since then. Al-Sudani’s warning comes amid concerns that Middle East countries could cut off oil exports to the West in response to a possible Israeli ground offensive in Gaza. Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian roiled energy markets on Wednesday, when he called for Muslim countries to impose an “immediate and complete” oil embargo on Israel. The 1973 Arab oil embargo against the US and other countries that supported Israel led to long lines at gasoline pumps and had a devastating economic impact. However, only about 12% of US crude imports came from the Middle East in 2022, down from around 85% in the 1970s.
International oil markets remain volatile, and the Israel-Hamas war could push prices higher, “which is definitely bad news for inflation,” International Energy Agency executive director Fatih Birol told the AP. Developing countries that rely on imported crude and oil products would be hurt the most, he said. Brent crude, a key international oil benchmark, is currently trading around $93 per barrel, up from $85 before Hamas militants killed hundreds of Israeli civilians and took hundreds of others as hostages on October 7. Hamas is backed by Iran, which ranks as the world’s eighth-largest oil producer. Even without support from other major exporters for an embargo, Tehran has the potential to significantly disrupt markets. About one-third of the world’s seaborne oil shipments pass through the Strait of Hormuz, which connects the Persian Gulf to the Gulf of Oman and the Arabian Sea.
“..the speech by the 80-year-old POTUS “infantilizes the American public..”
• Biden’s ‘Weak’ Speech Reflects ‘Bankrupt’ US Policy in Mideast (Sp.)
In his address to the American people, US President Joe Biden announced he would be sending a budget request to Congress to “fund America’s national security needs.” By that, POTUS meant dishing out further support to the ongoing NATO proxy war against Russia in Ukraine, and aiding Israel in its fight against Hamas. As a presidential address, Joe Biden’s speech tailored to garner support for supplementary funding of Israel and Ukraine was a “failure,” “illogical,” and “a sort of muddled vision of what he thought he was doing,” Professor Joe Siracusa, political scientist and dean of Global Futures, Curtin University, told Sputnik. “What he did in it was he conflated what’s going on in Gaza with what’s going on between Ukraine and Russia. They’re not comparable. So he conflated these two things, and then he asked for money to cover both of these in the House of Representatives, saying that both Hamas and Russia pose ‘existential threats’ to their neighbors.
That’s not true. Russia’s relationship with its neighbor is a long, complicated one, going back to czarist Russia, Soviet Russia, in the modern times, not the same kind of thing,” the pundit clarified. US President Joe Biden spoke to the nation on Thursday and announced he would be sending a budget request to Congress for funding for Israel and Ukraine. Support for the two countries was positioned as funding “America’s national security needs.” Aid to Ukraine was offered under the guise of a “smart investment,” sure to pay dividends for future generations. Earlier reports indicated that the funding request may include as much as $60 billion in aid to Ukraine. Furthermore, the speech by the 80-year-old POTUS “infantilizes the American public,” the political scientist believed.
“The American public doesn’t know that much about foreign policy… Biden speaks for the foreign policy elite. These are the people who got us [United States] bogged down in Vietnam, who lost Iran, they lost Iraq… lost Afghanistan, and so on and so on. The foreign policy public in America is very small. But the elites or the neocons kind of run the show for Biden in the background,” Professor Joe Siracusa underscored. Asking Congress for supplementary funding for Tel Aviv, along additional aid to the Kiev regime amid waning resolve among lawmakers, as well as the American public, to further bankroll NATO’s proxy war against Russia in Ukraine is a “tough sell” for Biden, Joe Siracusa assured. “I think Americans are just a little weary of this,” he pointed out.
“I reckon that the Russian-Ukraine conflict has come to about an end. Most Americans are done with it because they understand there’s an adjustment there. But in terms of bankrolling Israel, the United States is looking over its shoulder at increasing confrontation in the region or beyond. Those two aircraft carriers there are not to deter violence, because Joe Biden hasn’t deterred violence anywhere. I mean, it happens anyway. They are there to tell Israel’s enemies that an attack on Israel right now from either Iran or Hezbollah or other places will be met with American counteraction. And that’s the one thing you do not want to fool around with,” said the expert. sAs to the Palestine-Israel conflict, which accrued an even more horrifying death toll after the attack on a northern Gaza hospital, “this war… was a failure in intelligence,” said the pundit, offering the opinion that “a lot of people… were asleep at the switch.”
“We proceed from the fact that all people are equal, everyone has the same rights, the rights and freedoms of one country and one people end where the rights and freedoms of another person or of an entire state start. This is how a multipolar world should gradually be born,” Putin told the Chinese network.”
• US Will Build ‘New World Order’ – Biden (RT)
The current US-led world order has “sort of run out of steam,” but Washington will shape the system that replaces it, US President Joe Biden told supporters on Saturday. Leaders in Moscow and Beijing, however, have argued otherwise. Speaking at a campaign reception in Washington, Biden bragged about how he convinced Japan and South Korea to send financial aid to Ukraine, and how he signed a rail and ports deal with the EU, India, and Saudi Arabia at the G20 summit in New Delhi last month. “So, I think we have an opportunity to do things, if we’re bold enough and have enough confidence in ourselves, to unite the world in ways that it never has been,” Biden declared. “We were in a post-war period for 50 years where it worked pretty damn well, but that’s sort of run out of steam. Sort of run out of steam. We need a new, new world order in a sense,” he continued.
The world order that emerged following the Second World War was a bipolar one, with the US and USSR vying for influence and geopolitical supremacy. The collapse of the Soviet Union ushered in a unipolar world order, with the US the sole superpower. As the USSR disintegrated, then-US President George HW Bush proclaimed victory in the Cold War and the dawning of a “new world order” in his 1991 State of the Union address. Three decades later, and with Washington scrambling for funds to fight two foreign wars, American dominance is less assured. China’s economy was the world’s eleventh largest in 1991, but is now second to only the US’. With Beijing expanding its nuclear arsenal and modernizing its military, President Xi Jinping has referred to the US-led West as “declining” on multiple occasions, and hailed the emergence of a “multipolar world,” in which international relations are governed by laws and treaties, rather than US-enforced “rules.”
Russian President Vladimir Putin has also spoken at length about building a multipolar world, describing such an order as one in which individual “civilization-states” are free to pursue their own interests free from the dictates of a hegemonic power like the US. Russia, China, and their partners in the BRICS group and across the Global South all share this goal, Putin told China Central Television (CCTV) last week. “We proceed from the fact that all people are equal, everyone has the same rights, the rights and freedoms of one country and one people end where the rights and freedoms of another person or of an entire state start. This is how a multipolar world should gradually be born,” Putin told the Chinese network.
Yeah, sure..
• US and Israel Mulling Interim Government In Gaza (RT)
The US and Israel are mulling the creation of an interim administration in Gaza that would be backed by the UN and Arab governments, Bloomberg reported on Saturday, citing sources. According to people familiar with US government discussions, the plans are still at an early stage and depend on future developments, including on whether Israel’s ground operation against Hamas is a success. The idea, which would effectively see the Palestinian armed group removed from power, would also require the participation of regional Arab states, which could be tricky to secure, the report says. Commenting on the potential of getting Arab nations on board, William Usher, a former senior Middle East analyst at the CIA, told Bloomberg that it “would require a major shift in how Arab states accept risk and work with one another” as well as a “leap of trust” by Israel at a time when this “commodity [is] in short supply.”
After Hamas launched a surprise attack on Israel on October 7, leaving thousands of dead and injured, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu vowed to “crush and destroy” the Palestinian group.On Friday, Israeli Defense Minister Yoav Gallant outlined three phases of war with Hamas. The first would involve aerial bombardment and ground operations, followed by lower-intensity fighting to eliminate “pockets of resistance” in Gaza. The final stage would require “removal of Israel’s responsibility for life in the Gaza Strip and the establishment of a new security reality,” he said. At the same time, Israeli opposition leader Yair Lapid suggested on Thursday that the best solution for Gaza after the conflict is over would be to return it to the control of the West Bank-based Palestinian Authority, which was ousted by Hamas from the enclave in 2007.
Meanwhile, Bloomberg reported on Friday that the US and some of its European allies are pushing Israel to postpone its ground operation to win more time to secure the release of hostages held by Hamas, which has captured some 200 people since the violence began. The same day, US officials confirmed that the group had set free two American hostages. Washington has also reportedly exerted an unprecedented influence over the plan for the ground operation, fearing that an all-out attack on Gaza may trigger a broader conflict, drawing in Hezbollah, a Lebanon-based Islamist military group with close ties to Iran.
Say no more: “The AIM-9 Sidewinder is the grandfather of a weapons system that entered production in 1956..”
• Ukraine to Receive ‘Frankenstein’ Air Defenses From US
The Ukrainian military is experiencing a serious shortage of anti-aircraft defenses. This is because of the Russian forces’ use of long-range Lancet kamikaze drones, and the Russian Aerospace Forces deployment of precision-guided glide bombs, which have greatly thinned the ranks of the Ukrainian Armed Forces’ frontline air defenses. To protect infantry and equipment, Kiev has been forced to move its air defense systems closer to the front, where they can fall prey to cheap Russian FPV drones.Consequently, Kiev’s requests for advanced air defenses from its Western patrons have become increasingly urgent. The armed conflict that has broken out in the Middle East has exacerbated the problem. Israel asked for help from the US on the first day of hostilities.
The Pentagon is on the horns of a dilemma – whether Israel or Ukraine is more deserving of its support. The latest rhetoric would suggest that Washington is more inclined to help Tel Aviv, with Ukraine left scrambling for whatever scraps are left. Step forward the FrankenSAM (a portmanteau word of “Frankenstein” and “SAM” [surface-to-air missile]) program. The plan involves the development and production of improvised air defense systems using components and materials from Ukrainian, US and allied stockpiles. Old decommissioned anti-aircraft missiles will be repurposed as ammunition for these “chimeras”. According to one major international news agency, the US Department of Defense believes this approach will quickly provide the Ukrainian Armed Forces with some much-needed air defense capabilities. This, in turn, will prepare the Ukrainian army for the winter campaign.
In this way, Washington hopes to achieve three goals at once: it will load its defense industry up with orders for “FrankenSAMs”, get rid of obsolete explosives, and demonstrate “support for its ally” to the world. According to the media, the Pentagon is working on three projects as part of the FrankenSAM program. The first is almost finished: Ukraine will initially receive a ground-based short-range air defense system with AIM-9M Sidewinder missiles, according to the news agency’s source. Without going into detail, the source explained that the chassis, launchers, radar and other equipment for the system will be provided by the US and its allies. This, the media outlet noted, will help “meet Kiev’s vital air defense needs” and tackle related issues.
Washington announced the delivery of Sidewinder missiles in August, after the release of what was then its latest military aid package. This raised many questions, as the missile is of the air-to-air variety. Ukrainian fighter jets still in service are not capable of firing it without significant modifications to their on-board electronic systems, and the first F-16s for the Ukrainian armed forces are not expected until next spring at the earliest. In addition, the Sidewinder is only effective at short range, whereas Russian pilots prefer long-range engagements. The news about the modification of these missiles for ground use clarifies the situation. The AIM-9 Sidewinder is the grandfather of a weapons system that entered production in 1956 and has undergone several upgrades over the years.
The forthcoming short-range air defense version of the system will be equipped with the 9M variant, introduced in 1983 and actively used during Operation Desert Storm. The period of most extensive production coincided with the years of this conflict. In the early 2000s, this modification was replaced by the more advanced AIM-9X, with the Reagan-era AIM-9M variants stored away. It’s unknown how effective these 30-year-old missiles will be against modern Russian aircraft, but the fact is that the US has enough of these munitions to supply Ukraine for months.
“We observe the death of diplomacy unfolding in front of our eyes and we do not see any expression or action being taken rooted in the values on which the EU was built.”
• EU Staff Members Express Fury Over Von Der Leyen Stance On Gaza Conflict (IT)
Staff members of EU institutions have written to European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen expressing fury over her stance on the Israel-Hamas conflict, in a letter that accumulated 842 signatures. The letter, which has been seen by The Irish Times, accuses the commission of giving “a free hand to the acceleration and the legitimacy of a war crime in the Gaza Strip”. It begins by condemning the Hamas attack on Israel before continuing: “We equally strongly condemn the disproportionate reaction by the Israeli government against 2.3 million Palestinian civilians trapped in the Gaza Strip”. “We hardly recognise the values of the EU in the seeming indifference demonstrated over the past few days by our Institution toward the ongoing massacre of civilians in the Gaza Strip,” it continues.
The letter warns that the EU is “losing all credibility and the position as a fair, equitable and humanist broker” and damaging its international relations as well as risking the safety of EU staff. “We are saddened by the patent show of double-standards which considers the blockade (water and fuel) operated by Russia on the Ukrainian people as an act of terror whilst the identical act by Israel against the Gazan people is completely ignored,” the letter reads. The signatories are from a wide range of EU countries including Ireland. “We cannot remain silent observers when the Institution you represent as President not only has been unable to halt the Palestinian tragedy unfolding for decades in full impunity, but by its recent unfortunate actions or positions seem to give a free hand to the acceleration and the legitimacy of a war crime in the Gaza Strip,” they write.
It follows stiff criticism of president von der Leyen in the European Parliament and among EU national diplomats for her expression of unqualified support for Israel’s response to the Hamas attack in a trip to Israel, while opting not to make a call for the respect of international law as member states had done. The letter was circulated internally among staff of the European Commission and other institutions, with supporters invited to sign the letter on an online page which reached 842 signatures before the appeal closed. Messages left by EU staff reflect deep anger and disillusionment, including among longstanding EU diplomatic staff and specialists in foreign affairs. “As an EU diplomat I feel embarrassed by the stand taken by the institution in external communications since the start of the crisis,” one wrote. “We observe the death of diplomacy unfolding in front of our eyes and we do not see any expression or action being taken rooted in the values on which the EU was built.” Another commented that the EU had “destroyed all the good work done in the recent decades with the Palestinian authorities and people”.
“This woman is a crazed warmonger..” “Don’t let the sweet Southern accent fool you. She’d have us in every war she could find.”
• US Needs ‘Department of Offense, Not Defense’ –Nikki Haley (RT)
Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley has called for instilling fear in Washington’s foreign enemies by transforming the US Department of Defense into the “Department of Offense.” Speaking at a campaign event on Friday in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, Haley demanded that the US respond to the Israel-Hamas war by providing the Israeli government and military with “whatever they need whenever they need it.” She added that Washington’s goal must be to “eliminate Hamas, not weaken them,” and she called for cutting off government funding to colleges whose students or employees hold protests in support of the Palestinians. Haley, the former South Carolina governor who served as US ambassador to the United Nations under then-President Donald Trump, suggested that President Joe Biden’s administration must not be fooled by Friday’s release of two American hostages by Hamas.
“They are doing this to earn favor with America because they want to try and look good in the eyes of America,” she said. “Don’t fall for it.” Having a stronger military and strong leadership in the White House could have prevented the war in Israel, as well as the Russia-Ukraine conflict, Haley argued. Biden’s botched withdrawal of US forces from Afghanistan in 2021 and his administration’s recent prisoner-swap agreement with Iran emboldened America’s enemies, she claimed, adding that only a stronger military can restore US credibility. “We’ve got to be smart, and we’ve got to be ready,” Haley said. “I’m tired of talking about a ‘department of defense’. I want a ‘department of offense’. Every enemy needs to fear us.”
Haley is calling for a bigger and apparently more aggressive military despite the fact that the Pentagon already boasts annual spending of nearly $832 billion – exceeding the world’s nine next largest defense budgets combined. The US has about 750 bases in 80 countries, and it has a long history of regime-change programs and military interventions around the world. “This woman is a crazed warmonger,” US podcast host Joey Mannarino said in an X (formerly Twitter) post. “Don’t let the sweet Southern accent fool you. She’d have us in every war she could find.”
Haley has reportedly been enriched by the US military industrial complex since resigning as Trump’s UN ambassador in October 2018. She was hired as a board member with US defense contractor Boeing in 2019. Although she left the company the following year, she still owned as much as $250,000 in Boeing stock as of a financial disclosure filing in May. Haley has earned six-figure fees for speaking engagements, including over $230,000 from the Center for Israel and Jewish Affairs, and she was paid $127,500 for her work as a consultant to an advocacy group called United Against a Nuclear Iran, which has lobbied for military strikes against Tehran. She also netted more than $708,000 in consulting fees from Prism Global Management LLC, an investment fund, and her husband holds stakes in two firms with ties to the defense industry.
“Who are the victims on one side and on the other? Poor people who lose their children.”
• Ukraine’s Leaders Are Controlled By US – German ex-Chancellor (RT)
Former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder has argued in a newspaper interview that the US government didn’t “allow” any compromises that could have brought an end to the Russia-Ukraine conflict just weeks after Moscow’s military offensive began in February 2022. Speaking in an interview published by Germany’s Berliner Zeitung newspaper on Friday, Schroeder said he was asked to help mediate the March 2022 peace negotiations between Ukrainian and Russian officials in Istanbul. He said that although representatives of Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky were open to making concessions on such key issues as renouncing efforts to join NATO, “the Ukrainians did not agree to peace because they were not allowed to. They first had to ask the Americans about everything they discussed.”
Russian officials have repeatedly claimed that the US and other Western backers of Ukraine discouraged Zelensky’s government from agreeing to a peace settlement. Schroeder, who has defended his continuing friendship with Russian President Vladimir Putin, essentially confirmed that allegation in the Berliner Zeitung interview. “My impression: Nothing could happen because everything else was decided in Washington,” he said. The ex-chancellor described Washington’s strategy as “fatal,” saying it resulted in closer ties between Russia and China. “The Americans believe they can keep the Russians down,” Schroeder said. “Now, it is the case that two actors, China and Russia, who are limited by the USA, are joining forces. Americans believe they are strong enough to keep both sides in check. In my humble opinion, this is a mistake. Just look how torn the American side is now. Look at the chaos in Congress.”
Washington’s allies in Western Europe “failed” to seize the opportunity to push for peace in March 2022, Schroeder said. At the time, he added, Zelensky was open to compromise on Crimea and breakaway territories in the Donbass region. Since that time, hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian troops have been killed as Western military aid prolongs the conflict. Putin estimated earlier this month that Kiev lost over 90,000 soldiers in the failed counteroffensive that began in June. “The arms deliveries are not a solution for eternity, but no one wants to talk,” Schroeder said. “Everyone is sitting in trenches. How many more people have to die? It’s a bit like the Middle East. Who are the victims on one side and on the other? Poor people who lose their children.”
Schroeder argued that only French President Emmanuel Macron and German Chancellor Olaf Scholz can revive peace talks in Eastern Europe. “Scholz and Macron should actually support a peace process in Ukraine because it’s not just an American matter, but above all a European matter.” He added, “Why did Scholz and Macron not combine the arms deliveries with an offer to talk? Macron and Scholz are the only ones who can talk to Putin.” Russian leaders were threatened by the US push to bring NATO to Moscow’s western border by adding Ukraine to the Western military alliance, Schroeder said. However, he claimed that one of the justifications for arming Ukraine – alleged Russian expansionism – had no basis in reality.
“This fear of the Russians coming is absurd,” Schroeder said. “How are they supposed to defeat NATO, let alone occupy Western Europe?” He added, “That is why no one in Poland, the Baltics and certainly not in Germany – all NATO members, by the way – has to believe they are in danger.” On the other hand, Schroeder insisted, Western leaders must understand that no matter who is in power in Moscow, Russia won’t allow either Ukraine or Georgia to be absorbed by NATO. “This threat analysis may be emotional, but it is real in Russia,” he said. “The West must understand this and accept compromises accordingly. Otherwise, peace will be difficult to achieve.”
“..take action to get rid of the Covid-era mail-in ballot trickery that the blob cooked up to keep itself in power.”
• Step It Up and Go (Kunstler)
When you read of “Joe Biden’s” 37 percent favorable rating in some poll, do you wonder how it can be that high? Hard evidence of his high crimes of bribery has been plain to see for many months. We await a brisk House inquiry to put all that evidence in order, in a simple bill that even The New York Times won’t be able to ignore. Let Mr. Schumer’s tiny Senate majority try to decline an impeachment trial. Between that and “Joe Biden’s obvious incapacity, he’ll have to resign. And then let the Party of Chaos try to pretend that Kamala Harris can be in charge of anything. We’ll see soon enough who’s pulling the strings in the White House. The House should simultaneously form committees to impeach the faithless and incompetent agency heads below “JB” starting with Merrick Garland, specifically for criminally violating the rights of the many J-6 defendants falsely charged, denied speedy trials, and abused in the federal jails while awaiting those unjustly delayed trials. Also, tack on multiple counts of perjury for the many times he lied under oath before Congress.
Next, Alejandro Mayorkas, for allowing a virtual invasion of our country and his gross, willful failure to enforce the laws that regulate entry across our borders. As with Mr. Garland, include counts of perjury, lying to Congress. After him, Xavier Becerra, Secretary of Health and Human Services, for presiding over the vaccination debacle and all the lying about it perpetrated under his supervision by the CDC, the FDA, and many other public health agencies. FBI Director Christopher Wray is not subject to impeachment, so the House should defund the agency until he and the rest of the seventh floor C-suite gang, led by Deputy AG Lisa Monaco, resign. That would be good start for breaking up the blob so that the public does not have to wait for a 2024 election that shows no signs of being cleaned up procedurally to ensure fair and truthful results — though momentous impeachment moves against the figures truly responsible for wrecking the country might prompt some states to take action to get rid of the Covid-era mail-in ballot trickery that the blob cooked up to keep itself in power.
All of the blob’s projects are coming to grief now in the worst way possible. Ukraine was a foolish venture starting in 2014 when the US tried to shanghai it into NATO over a red line explicitly declared by Russia. We didn’t believe they meant it, apparently. What part of sphere of influence don’t we understand? How did the CIA do sizing that up? Or sussing out the October 7 Hamas massacre in Israel? Do they have no assets in Gaza? How’s America’s prestige in the world doing, and the dollar that represents it, vis-à-vis the new BRIC alliance that was allowed to come together largely because of the “Joe Biden” regime’s foreign policy blunders scaring so many previously neutral nations?
How are the blob’s domestic projects doing? It’s managed to destroy the credibility of medicine, the honor of higher education, and the authority of the news media — with plenty of help from the blobistas embedded in all those institutions. How is it possible that the majority of doctors still don’t know that Covid vaccines are unsafe and ineffective, and that they have been systematically lied to by the CDC from the get-go on this? How is it possible that presidents of the most distinguished universities go along with the suppression of free inquiry and speech, as if these were not the foundation of learning? How is it possible that the editors of The New York Times and The Washington Post lie continually and knowingly about events and persons, unless they are getting paid by, and have become defacto arms of, the blob itself, to cover-up the discovery of its crimes?
“They need to find levers to keep earnings from falling further and to free up money for provisions as more loans go bad..”
• Big US Banks Quietly Cutting 1000s Of Employees, More Layoffs Coming (Az.)
The largest American banks have been quietly laying off workers all year — and some of the deepest cuts are yet to come, Report informs via CNBC. Even as the economy has surprised forecasters with its resilience, lenders have cut headcount or announced plans to do so, with the key exception being JPMorgan Chase, the biggest and most profitable US bank. Pressured by the impact of higher interest rates on the mortgage business, Wall Street deal-making and funding costs, the next five largest US banks have cut a combined 20,000 positions so far this year, according to company filings. The moves come after a two-year hiring boom during the Covid pandemic, fueled by a surge in Wall Street activity. That subsided after the Federal Reserve began raising interest rates last year to cool an overheated economy, and banks found themselves suddenly overstaffed for an environment in which fewer consumers sought out mortgages and fewer corporations issued debt or bought competitors.
“Banks are cutting costs where they can because things are really uncertain next year,” Chris Marinac, research director at Janney Montgomery Scott, said in a phone interview. Job losses in the financial industry could pressure the broader US labor market in 2024. Faced with rising defaults on corporate and consumer loans, lenders are poised to make deeper cuts next year, said Marinac. “They need to find levers to keep earnings from falling further and to free up money for provisions as more loans go bad,” he said. “By the time we roll into January, you’ll hear a lot of companies talking about this.” Banks disclose total headcount numbers every quarter. The deepest reductions have been at Wells Fargo and Goldman Sachs, institutions that are wrestling with revenue declines in key businesses. They each have cut roughly 5% of their workforce so far this year.
I’m sure the Chinese would be happy to step in. How dumb would you like it? .
• Lithuania Wants To Ban Selling Needles And Nails To Russia (RT)
Lithuania has suggested including exports of buttons, nails, and sewing appliances in a 12th round of sanctions on Russia, EUobserver reported on Friday. According to the proposal, prohibiting the items is intended to “degrade Russian industrial capacities.” The list, among other things, is also said to include non-electric radiators for central heating and spare parts for them. The EU has been crafting its next set of Ukraine-related sanctions for weeks. While the package is expected to concentrate on further hindering Russia’s capacity to circumvent previously imposed restrictions, a number of new large-scale measures are also on the table. For instance, several member states have reportedly called for a ban on new deals with Russian nuclear giant Rosatom, as well as halting purchases of Russian uranium, liquified natural gas (LNG) and steel.
Estonia has reportedly demanded a full trade embargo on Russia to stop sanctions evasion. Other proposals include blocking IT services for Russian firms and stopping exports of laser technology. The Russian diamond industry is also in the crosshairs. The G7 has been working with Belgium, which hosts the world’s biggest diamond-trading hub in Antwerp, on traceability protocols which would be able to identify gems of Russian origin on retail markets. EUobserver cites an unnamed EU diplomat as saying the system is nearly ready and that Western states are set to impose a ban on Russian diamonds “in the very coming days.” In addition, the EU Council has reportedly stepped up work on the potential use of frozen Russian assets to aid Ukraine. Belgium earlier this month announced it would send tax revenue generated from Russian money kept it its Euroclear clearing house to Kiev, and proposed that other EU countries follow its lead.
According to EUObserver, the European Commission will start behind-closed-doors discussions on new sanctions with individual EU members this weekend or early next week. However, analysts note the process could take weeks to finalize, given the number of proposals and the fact that all member-states must agree on the measures to be included. Hungary, for instance, has adamantly opposed sanctioning the Russian nuclear industry due to its contracts with Rosatom for the construction of two new reactors at its Paks-2 nuclear power plant. Since the start of Moscow’s military operation in Ukraine in February 2022, the EU has implemented 11 sets of sanctions on Russia, targeting various sectors of the economy, the country’s financial institutions and trade, and blacklisting several hundred Russian individuals and businesses. The Kremlin has repeatedly labeled the sanctions illegal and warned they pose a threat to the world’s economic and trade relations.
“..claiming the investigation into Hunter Biden has been “slow-walked,” claiming Weiss had purposefully delayed the trial in order to favor Hunter Biden. Weiss has denied the claim..”
Slow walked? It’s only been 5 years…
• Hunter Biden Special Counsel To Meet With Republican House Judiciary Panel (Sp.)
Members of the House Judiciary Committee will grill Special Counsel David Weiss over alleged favoritism in a criminal trial against the US president’s son. Special Counsel David Weiss is scheduled to meet with members of the House Judiciary Committee next month as Republicans continue to probe the handling of Hunter Biden’s criminal case. The private meeting will take place November 7 after prodding from House Judiciary Committee chair Jim Jordan (R-OH) who has alleged favoritism in the handling of charges against US President Joe Biden’s son. Jordan has long been a critic of the handling of the case, criticizing the role of Attorney General Merrick Garland, among others.
Two IRS workers claiming to be whistleblowers have come forward in recent months claiming the investigation into Hunter Biden has been “slow-walked,” claiming Weiss had purposefully delayed the trial in order to favor Hunter Biden. Weiss has denied the claim. Hunter Biden was previously set to accept a plea deal in the case, pleading guilty to willfully failing to pay taxes, but the deal fell apart amidst questions over to what degree the deal would shield the president’s son from future charges. Critics have alleged the deal was designed in an overly-favorable way to protect Hunter Biden from prosecution over several crimes. Weiss has indicated charges may be filed against Hunter Biden in Washington, DC or California where the IRS workers say there is more evidence of tax crimes.
Sounds juicy, but: the book deal.
• Joe Biden Paid Nearly $2.75million CASH for Rehoboth Beach house (DM)
It’s Joe Biden’s favorite place – his summer home in Delaware where he has decamped dozens of times during his 1,000 days as Commander-in-Chief. As DailyMail.com revealed on Tuesday he has spent at least 300 of those days either in the country’s second smallest state or on vacation. He bought the home at a time that it appeared his political career was over – five months after his Vice-Presidency had ended he was well into his 70s and after all he had decided to forgo a 2016 run for the top job. But now that house in the tiny town of Rehoboth Beach could turn out to be a major embarrassment as Republicans continue their push to find business links between the 46th president and his son Hunter. DailyMail.com has discovered that then-private-citizen Biden, who had spent virtually all his adult life in public service, bought the home for slightly under $2.75million – in cash.
And making the transaction even stranger it was within weeks of a highly questionable text that Hunter had sent to Runlong ‘Raymond’ Zhao, an associate at Chinese oil giant CEFC asking to seal a deal worth $10 million a year. ‘I am sitting here with my father and we would like to understand why the commitment made has not been fulfilled,’ Hunter wrote Zhao on WhatsApp on July 30, 2017. He then appears to threaten Zhao – who he calls Z. ‘Tell the director that I would like to resolve this now before it gets out of hand,’ he writes at 9.45 am. ‘And now means tonight,’ he adds, apparently referring to time in Beijing, which is 12 hours ahead. ‘And Z if I get a call or text from anyone involved in this other than you, Zhang or the chairman I will make certain that between the man sitting next to me and every person he knows and my ability to forever hold a grudge that you will regret not following my direction.
He signs off emphasizing: ‘Ok my friend – I am sitting here waiting for the call with my father. I sure hope whatever it is you are doing is very, very, very important.’ There is no proof that Joe Biden actually was sitting with his son, but metadata from photos obtained by DailyMail.com from Hunter’s infamous abandoned laptop show he was at his father’s main house, his Wilmington mansion, the day the text was sent. James Comer, chairman of the House Oversight Committee and one of the key figures leading calls for Biden’s impeachment, said the all-cash house purchase is suspicious. ‘The fact that Joe Biden purchased a luxurious beach house around the same time his family was receiving millions from a CCP-linked company raises many questions that need to be answered,’ Comer told DailyMail.com. ‘The House Oversight Committee will continue to follow the money trail to determine the extent of President Biden’s involvement in his family’s influence-peddling schemes and its impact on our national security,’ Comer added.
[..] His tax records from the time show he was beginning to make much more money than while he was Vice President, mostly from sales of his memoi, Promise Me, Dad, and lucrative speaking engagements by him and First Lady Jill Biden. In 2017, the first year Joe was out of office after 36 years in the Senate and eight more as vice president, the couple declared an income of $11 million, and a further $4.58 million in 2018. At the time of Joe’s Rehoboth house purchase, local news site Delaware Online reported that it had been bought ‘using part of their advance from a multi-book deal’. But even if the money for the home came from the $11 million he and Jill earned that year according to their tax filings, there are still large discrepancies in the President’s financial disclosures that remain unexplained. An analysis published last year by DailyMail.com shows a $5.2 million discrepancy between his IRS filings and his Office of Government Ethics disclosures for the same period.
Comer
https://twitter.com/i/status/1715437026160382022
Platypus
https://twitter.com/i/status/1715624902361747637
Snow leopard
Snow leopard mom pretending to be scared when her cub sneaks up on her to encourage them to keep practicing their stalking skills.. pic.twitter.com/lwguZ56hMd
— Buitengebieden (@buitengebieden) October 21, 2023
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Home › Forums › Debt Rattle October 22 2023