Walter Langley Never morning wore to evening but some heart did break 1894
Mr. Fish
Nap/Crooke
All made up – Larry Johnson
Nap/Ritter: Nukes
Ritter: Israel will not exist
Macgregor – Ukraine is defeated | A disaster for Israel
“It speaks of Palestinians as a dehumanized mass. There are no mothers, fathers, children, teachers, doctors, lawyers, cooks, poets, taxi drivers or shopkeepers. Palestinians, in the Israeli lexicon, are a single contagion that must be eradicated.”
• Israel’s War on Hospitals (Chris Hedges)
Israel is not attacking hospitals in Gaza because they are “Hamas command centers.” Israel is systematically and deliberately destroying Gaza’s medical infrastructure as part of a scorched earth campaign to make Gaza uninhabitable and escalate a humanitarian crisis. It intends to force 2.3 million Palestinians over the border into Egypt where they will never return. Israel has destroyed and nearly emptied the Al Shifa Hospital in Gaza City. The Indonesian Hospital in Beit Lahia is next. Israel is deploying tanks and armored personnel carriers around the hospital and has fired rounds into the building, killing twelve people. The playbook is familiar. Flyers are dropped by Israel over a hospital telling people to leave because the hospital is a base for “Hamas terrorist activities.”
Tanks and artillery shells rip away parts of the hospital walls. Ambulances are blown up by Israeli missiles. Power and water is cut. Medical supplies are blocked. There are no painkillers, antibiotics and oxygen. The most vulnerable, premature babies in incubators and the gravely ill, die. Israeli soldiers raid the hospital and force everyone out at gunpoint. This is what happened at Al Shifa hospital. This is what happened at Al Rantisi Children’s Hospital. This is what happened at Gaza’s main psychiatric hospital. This is what happened at Nasser Hospital. This is what happened at the other hospitals that Israel has destroyed. And this is what will happen at the few hospitals that remain. Israel has shut down 21 of Gaza’s 35 hospitals, including Gaza’s only cancer hospital. The hospitals still operating have severe shortages of basic medicine and supplies. One by one the hospitals are being picked off. Soon there will be no health facilities left. This is by design.
Tens of thousands of terrified Palestinians, forced to evacuate by Israel, their homes blasted into rubble, seek refuge from the relentless bombing by camping out in and around Gaza’s hospitals. They hope the medical centers will not be targeted by Israel. If Israel abided by the Geneva Conventions they would be correct. But Israel is not carrying out a war. It is carrying out a genocide. And in a genocide, a population, and all that sustains a population, is obliterated. In an ominous sign that Israel will turn on the Palestinians in the West Bank once it is done flattening Gaza, armored vehicles have surrounded at least four West Bank hospitals. The Ibn Sina Hospital has been raided by Israeli soldiers along with the East Jerusalem Hospital.
Israel’s settler colonial state was founded on lies. It is sustained by lies. And now, when it is grimly determined to carry out the worst slaughter and ethnic cleansing of Palestinians since the 1948 Nakba, or “catastrophe,” that saw 750,000 Palestinians ethnically cleansed and some 50 massacres by Jewish militias, it spits out one grotesque absurdity after another. It speaks of Palestinians as a dehumanized mass. There are no mothers, fathers, children, teachers, doctors, lawyers, cooks, poets, taxi drivers or shopkeepers. Palestinians, in the Israeli lexicon, are a single contagion that must be eradicated.
“Christian” Evangelical ministers claim that with genocide of the Palestinians, Israel is only taking what God gave them..”
• The Campaign for the Destruction of the West Has Succeeded (Paul Craig Roberts)
Over the course of my life I have watched the American people, indeed, the peoples of the West, abandon civilization and civilized behavior. Today nothing is important throughout the Western World except money. Even people with money don’t care what they look like. People dress like slobs. They behave worse. Four-letter words are common parlance in conversations between men and women. There is no longer such a thing as “polite society.” Feminism taught women to throw away chastity and to be promiscuous, and with chastity went female modesty. When I walk on the beach, females from young girls to grandmothers are sporting the stripper’s G-String, Their entire buttocks are displayed. The tiny patch in front gets smaller and smaller. Not long ago I saw a young women without a top. She had two strips of tape across her nipples.
It wasn’t that long ago that feminists were claiming the men had turned women into sex objects. What nonsense. What man wants his 14,15,16, 17, 18 year old daughter or his wife displaying their nakedness to the public? Not long ago there was a news report that a young woman had offered her virginity for sale on the Internet. I have been trying to imagine what my mother and my aunts’ reaction would have been to such a report. It is now common for attractive young women in naked provocative poses to advertise online: “I am selling my pussy.” Is this a prostitute soliciting customers? What has become of women? How did American girls get turned into harlots?
Wherever you look, all standards have come down. It wasn’t that long ago that American women would not appear in pubic or in a department store without being in a suit or a dress with stockings and high heels. Now you can’t tell by looking the rich from the poor. Sin spreads like contagion when sexual perversion is normalized and when the accumulation of money is the social goal, no matter how it is acquired. The result is that the social resistance to sin and depravity weakens. Today the governments of the Western World cheer on Israel’s genocide of the Palestinians. “Christian” Evangelical ministers claim that with genocide of the Palestinians, Israel is only taking what God gave them. The fact that God dispelled the Jews for their wickedness is left out of the discussion.
This is so sick that it shows that Christianity is no longer a force for moral, humane behavior. If Israel can exterminate Palestine, anything goes. For decades the main function of education in the West has been to demonize the West and to present the West as an exploiter of the non-white world. This long-established campaign against the West was intended to destroy the West, not to reform it. The gentile agnostic liberals and the Zionists led the campaign to discredit and undermine the West. The campaign for the destruction of Western Civilization has succeeded. Will the neoconservative delusion that Washington is independent of reality and can purchase US hegemony while showing itself to the world as the enabler of Palestine genocide come crashing down?
“..control of the full extent of territory ruled by the Biblical Israelites, which would include portions of modern-day Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia..”
• US May Want ‘Wider War’ in Middle East to ‘Take Out Iran’ (Sp.)
The United States may be hoping for a broader conflict to break out amidst Israel’s military campaign in Gaza in order to damage Iran and other foes, according to author Jeremy Kuzmarov.The claim was made on Sputnik’s Political Misfits on Monday as Kuzmarov discussed the geopolitical situation in the Middle East with hosts John Kiriakou and Michelle Witte.“The leadership in the United States and Israel are hardline neoconservatives,” said Kuzmarov, who also serves as the managing editor of CovertAction Magazine.“I think they have their own desires in the Middle East,” he added. “They may want to draw in other countries and have a wider war so they can finally take out Iran.”While Kuzmarov suggested US President Joe Biden may be slightly less hawkish than politicians such as former US Vice President Dick Cheney, he insisted the US commander-in-chief should still be considered a “neoconservative,” a political movement traditionally associated with an interventionist foreign policy.
Kuzmarov said the Israeli government also favors an aggressive military stance in the region. “Israel wants to control southern Lebanon,” he said. “I think they have plans for ‘greater Israel,’” the military analyst added, referring to the belief by some in the country that Israeli land should extend into Gaza and the West Bank. Some Israelis use the term to advocate for control of the full extent of territory ruled by the Biblical Israelites, which would include portions of modern-day Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Lebanon, Iraq, and Saudi Arabia. Israel currently occupies a portion of Western Syria known as the Golan Heights and frequently engages in bombing campaigns in the country. The Middle Eastern nation has been involved in periodic wars with its neighbors since its founding in 1948.“I think they [Israel] feel emboldened that the US is behind them and they can go forward with their plan until the Palestinians are crushed,” said Kuzmarov.
“I think they’re excited, this is their moment they’ve been waiting for for years, to crush the Palestinians and take over everything. And that’s what they’ve always wanted, certainly the Likud Party.” “They have plans for how they can transform the whole area economically,” Kuzmarov added. “And I think they’re pursuing those goals.” Biden also spoke of “a better future for the Middle East” during his recent Oval Office address, referring to a US-led plan to build a rail corridor through the region. Some analysts have suggested Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu would like to formally annex Gaza in order to ensure control over natural gas discovered off the coast of the disputed territory, which would be transported via a new pipeline. Access to the deposits would increase exports to the United States and other allies, where energy costs have soared due to sanctions on Russia and Venezuela.
“The Iranians in my view have played this whole thing over the last six weeks perfectly,” said Kiriakou, noting the country’s restraint after the Israeli prime minister called for an attack on their historic foe in the hours after Hamas’ October 7 operation. Kiriakou also praised China’s attempts to broker a ceasefire between Israel and Hamas, claiming the Asian superpower is “serious about being the peacemakers in the Middle East.” “The likes of Egypt, Saudi Arabia and Jordan appreciate that, with the US… not seen as an honest broker in the region,” he added. Kuzmarov agreed that China is “starting to build its stature in the world arena” by attempting to navigate tensions between world powers, such as when they negotiated an historic agreement between Iran and Saudi Arabia earlier this year.
“The hardline opinion in the US is that the militant groups attacking the US forces are acting at Iran’s behest. This allegation is an old US-Israeli bogey..”
• US Embarks On Proxy War Against Iran (Bhadrakumar)
A massive US naval deployment in a wide arc of the so-called Greater Middle East is under way — stretching from Crete in the Eastern Mediterranean, into the Red Sea and the Bab el Mandeb and into the Gulf of Aden and all the way into the Gulf of Oman. This deterrent display may transform as large scale offensive operations and aims to rework the geopolitical alignments and bring them back to the traditional grooves of intra-regional rivalries in the Gulf region. Ship spotters first said that as of Thursday, the aircraft carrier USS Dwight D. Eisenhower and its escorts were sailing just outside the Strait of Hormuz in the Gulf of Oman, and were approaching the Persian Gulf. A Pentagon official confirmed the location but would not say whether the carrier will enter the Persian Gulf passing through the Strait of Hormuz.
The US naval build-up in the region consists of another carrier strike group as well — USS Ford and its escorts — which last week moved away from Israeli coast and is now re-positioned to the south of Crete, according to ship spotters, apparently beyond the missile reach of Lebanon’s Hezbollah. Apart from the two carrier strike groups, the US deployment also includes a three-ship Bataan Amphibious Ready Group with the 26th Marine Expeditionary Unit and several guided-missile destroyers — USS Bataan and USS Carter Hall operating in the northern portion of the Red Sea, and USS Mesa Verde in the Eastern Mediterranean along with the command ship USS Mount Whitney. Additionally, there are some number of US attack submarines in the region, but the Pentagon does not typically disclose their locations — except for a rare disclosure recently by the US Central Command of the transit on November 5 of nuclear guided-missile submarine USS Florida to the east of Suez.
The most obvious explanation for such a formidable naval buildup is that it is part of the US effort to keep the current conflict in southern Israel and Gaza contained. Hezbollah continues to fire rockets and anti-tank missiles into Israel from Lebanon; Iran-backed Shia militant groups are attacking US bases in Iraq and Syria; and Houthi rebels in Yemen are firing missiles towards Israel. During the period since October 17, there have been at least 58 attacks on US bases, mostly in Iraq. The hardline opinion in the US is that the militant groups attacking the US forces are acting at Iran’s behest. This allegation is an old US-Israeli bogey and keeps surging whenever Iran is in the crosshairs and/or there is requirement of a blame game. Expert opinion, including in the US, has always been wary of it.
Longtime observers estimate that while Tehran is openly helping the various resistance groups operating in the Middle East to push back the US and Israel, that does not exactly make these groups “Iranian proxies”. Thus, it transpired that Iran was taken by surprise by the Hamas attack against Israel on October 7. According to Reuters, at a recent meeting in Tehran with Ismail Haniyeh, the chairman of the group’s political bureau, Iran’s supreme leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei brought this up. At any rate, it is a known fact that the US establishment is well aware of the ground realities of its state of play with Iran and has not hesitated to use back channels to lean on Tehran to use its good offices with the Shia militant groups operating in Iraq to exercise restraint. But the bottom line is that Iran too has its limitations in such extraordinary times such as today when hatred and anger towards the US and Israel has risen to a crescendo in the Muslim countries.
“..due to the approach adopted by the US and Israel in the region, if the crimes against the people of Gaza and the West Bank are not stopped, any possibility could be considered, and a wider conflict could prove inevitable.”
• ‘Russia Should Be More Active In Palestine Peace Efforts:’ Iranian FM (Cradle)
Iranian Foreign Minister Hossein Amir-Abdollahian held a phone call with his Russian counterpart, Sergei Lavrov, on 19 November to discuss regional developments and attempts to end the war in Gaza. Amir-Abdollahian stressed that significant efforts are needed to stop the violent displacement and killing of Palestinians in Gaza and the West Bank and voiced his wish for Moscow to play a more active role in trying to bring an end to Israel’s ethnic cleansing campaign. “Resistance will determine the final outcome,” Amir-Abollahian noted. The two foreign ministers also spoke about the US role in the war, saying that Washington was planning on extending theviolence rather than taking action to bring it to an end.
“The [US] claims to be seeking an end to the war, but in practice, it escalates the intensity and spreads the sphere of the [US]-Zionist war,” Amir-Abdollahian said. For his part, Lavrov expressed that he was disappointed with Israel’s refusal to stop the attacks on Gaza and made note of the need to continue discussions set to put an end to the war and free captives. “The schedule of upcoming contacts and a number of other topical issues on the bilateral and international agenda of mutual interest were also touched upon,” the Russian foreign ministry media brief said, noting that the Iranian side that initiated the call. The two nations have been prominent in their attempts to bring the war between Palestinian factions and Israel to an end.
Amir-Abdollahian previously revealed that Iran has been holding back-channel communications with the US to bring peace to the region. “We said that Iran does not want the war to spread,” Amir-Abdollahian said in an interview with the Financial Times on 16 November. “But due to the approach adopted by the US and Israel in the region, if the crimes against the people of Gaza and the West Bank are not stopped, any possibility could be considered, and a wider conflict could prove inevitable.” On 15 November, Lavrov said Russia told Israel: “You cannot buy security, which we are convinced you need, by delaying the creation [of a] Palestinian state, and by [criminally] reducing the territory which was designed for the Palestinian state by the United Nations.”
“..female surveillance troops said months before the incursion that something unusual was about to happen..”
• Sexism Thwarted Prevention Of Hamas Attack – Haaretz (RT)
The deadly Hamas attack on Israel could have been prevented if an Israel Defense Forces (IDF) unit made up of women and tasked with monitoring Gaza had been listened to, an unnamed soldier told the newspaper Haaretz, citing sexism as the reason for the lack of attention paid to their reports. In an article published on Friday, the women, speaking on condition of anonymity, said they had repeatedly reported recent activity by the Palestinian militant group. According to the outlet, female surveillance troops said months before the incursion that something unusual was about to happen. They reportedly saw militants briefing near the border fence, training to hit tanks and disable cameras, and increased drone activity in the area.
“It’s a unit made up entirely of young girls and young female commanders,” one interviewed soldier told the outlet. “There is no doubt that if there were men sitting at those screens, things would look different.” The women said that on the day of the Hamas raid, “no one told us there was such a high level of vigilance,” referring to claims by senior security officials that they had warned of possible infiltration into border communities. According to one soldier, three or even two hours would have allowed them to prepare. “The IDF left us like sitting ducks” she said, noting that combat troops “at least had weapons and were killed like heroes” while the female observers “were abandoned by the army and simply slaughtered without having any chance to defend themselves.”
In late October, the office of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu posted on X (formerly Twitter) that he had been warned of Hamas’ intentions “under no circumstances and at no stage.” He apologized and deleted the statement shortly after a wave of criticism from Israeli officials and politicians. The New York Times has reported that both Netanyahu and top Israeli security officials underestimated the threat from Hamas and did not devote the resources necessary to counter it, in the belief that Iran and the Lebanese militant group Hezbollah posed a greater danger. Hamas attacked Israel on October 7, killing some 1,200 and taking about 240 people hostage, according to Israeli officials. In response, Netanyahu declared the country to be at war, and the IDF launched massive air strikes and a ground operation in Gaza. Palestinian officials say the death toll on their side has exceed 13,000, with most casualties being children and women.
“..Ukraine needs more Western funding and support to restore its 1991 borders and become an economic powerhouse once more..”
• Ukraine ‘Concerned’ About Western Push For Russia Talks – Security Chief (RT)
The government in Kiev is worried that its Western backers are calling for peace out of an irrational fear of Russia, Aleksey Danilov, the head of Ukraine’s National Security and Defense Council, said on Monday. Danilov spoke via video link to the annual conference of the Halifax International Security Forum, a Washington, DC-based NGO funded in part by the Canadian government. “Ukraine is concerned by the fact that discussions among certain partners have intensified regarding the need for negotiations, consultations, meetings with the Russians to discuss the issues of the war in Ukraine, a ceasefire, etc,” Danilov said, according to a transcript posted by his office. He attributed this to a “rudimentary fear” of Russia and argued that the West should follow Ukraine’s example instead, as Moscow “only understands the language of force.”
According to Danilov, the current conflict is “a struggle between democracy and tyranny,” with the West and Ukraine on one side, and Russia, China, Iran and North Korea on the other. If Russia is not defeated, the world should expect a new “axis of evil” within 15-20 years that would include “some European countries” as well, he insisted. “Ukraine and the Ukrainian people will fight to the end. We are sure of our victory.” President Vladimir Zelensky’s top security official described Ukraine’s ideal of victory as “controlled decomposition of Russia into several parts” leading not just to “regime change” in Moscow but the “de-sovereignization… denuclearization and demilitarization” of the neighboring country. Meanwhile, he said, Ukraine needs more Western funding and support to restore its 1991 borders and become an economic powerhouse once more.
“Ukraine has every chance to become a strategic project of the West, which will demonstrate the full power of the vitality of democracy and the defense of universal values,” Danilov insisted. “The West must confirm that it is and remains the First, and a victorious Ukraine will serve as a convincing narrative in the modern confrontation between slavery and freedom!” Earlier on Monday, US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin arrived in Kiev to offer moral support for Ukraine, but had no new military assistance to announce. Meanwhile, Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen told the outlet CNBC that Ukraine is “utterly dependent” on US funding to keep paying the salaries of government workers, calling the continued funding of Kiev a “critical priority” for US national security. Washington has blown through most of the congressionally approved funding for Ukraine and the White House has been trying to pressure Congress to pass more, so far with no effect.
“..the Kiev regime is drafting people over 40 years old, as the Ukrainian youth has already been “successfully” sacrificed for the NATO interests..”
• US Media Acknowledges True Situation in Ukraine Special Op Zone (Sp.)
Russia will liberate about 20 percent of the current Ukrainian territory, approaching Kiev, Peter Van Buren, editor at The American Conservative, wrote on Monday. More and more Western media outlets have acknowledged the true situation on the ground in the special operation zone, realizing the scale of Western propaganda, which has managed to cover it up for almost two years. “Amidst a flood of propaganda, the story was always the same: Ukraine was pushing back the Russians with weapons provided by a broad range of agreeable NATO benefactors. Between Ukrainian jet fighter aces with improbable kill ratios to patriotic female sniper teams with improbable hair and makeup, Russia was losing,” the journalist clarifies. It is all the more surprising to see common sense coming from an article in a US media outlet which points out that the conflict itself could have been avoided had it not been for US meddling.
Van Buren cites former German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, who outright stated the simple fact that: “The only people who could resolve the war over Ukraine are the Americans. During the peace talks in March 2022 in Istanbul, Ukrainians did not agree to peace because they were not allowed to. They had to coordinate everything they talked about with the Americans first. However, nothing eventually happened. My impression is that nothing could happen because everything was decided in Washington.” Now, after almost two years of bragging about the constant supply of “almighty” Western weapons to Ukraine, it is becoming a new trend among US and European journalists to talk about a stalemate in the conflict and peace negotiations. It took only about two months for the NBC News to come from “Ukrainian counteroffensive is making ‘tangible progress’ against Russia, Blinken tells NBC News,” to “U.S., European officials broach topic of peace negotiations with Ukraine, sources say,” underscoring a significant change in public opinion on the crisis.
At the same time, the situation in Ukraine is getting worse, regardless of Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky’s dreams. Time reports that the Kiev regime is drafting people over 40 years old, as the Ukrainian youth has already been “successfully” sacrificed for the NATO interests. Van Buren emphasizes the “manpower gap” as the main issue hindering Ukrainian success. The editor is both surprised that the Russian military has been destroying the “all-powerful” NATO equipment and unwilling to believe it, putting it down to the poor training of the Ukrainian soldiers. “It didn’t hurt that Russia’s capability versus NATO equipment was surprisingly good, or perhaps the Ukrainians’ handling of sophisticated Western arms was surprisingly bad,” the article says. Unfortunately for the US government, as the Palestine-Israel conflict rages on, Americans have been losing interest in the Ukraine crisis, which has become “boring,” Van Buren argues.
Americans like simple pictures: the good guy vs the bad guy, just like in a comic book. The events should take place far away, as usual for the US, just so there is no danger for the spectator; however, footage should be top-notch, and the map should be easy to follow, as simple as possible, just like in American football, the article clarifies. “Americans, both the people and their government, distracted by the greatest propaganda tools ever imagined (the media), seem capable of focusing on only one bright shiny object at a time. In the case of wars, a new bright shiny object must include two clear sides, one good and one pure evil, with one preferably an underdog, daily combat footage which can be obtained without too much danger, and a football game-like progression across a map that is easy to follow. It should not be boring,” the newspaper clarified.
“..the media he now owns remains the most powerful source of information for Republicans,” a majority of whom have recently become highly skeptical on continuing to fund the Ukrainian military..”
• Why Murdoch Rushed to Meet Zelensky in Kiev (Sp.)
Lachlan Murdoch, who took the reins of Fox Corp. and News Corp. last week, met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky in Kiev over the weekend. So what exactly prompted this trip? Lachlan, 52, is the eldest son of now-retired Rupert Murdoch, an Australian-born American media mogul, who announced his retirement in September. Last week, Lachlan Murdoch officially became the sole chair of News Corp and the executive chair and chief executive of Fox. Remarkably, the first foreign leader the new head of the media empire hastened to meet was none other than Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky. According to Axios, Lachlan Murdoch traveled to the Ukrainian capital over the weekend, accompanied by two reporters – Benjamin Hall from Fox News and Jerome Starkey from the Sun.
Hall conducted an interview with Zelensky that is expected to be aired on Tuesday night’s episode of “Special Report with Bret Baier,” according to the media outlet. The report suggested that Lachlan Murdoch’s visit with Zelensky is of importance given that the media he now owns remains “the most powerful source of information for Republicans,” a majority of whom have recently become highly skeptical on continuing to fund the Ukrainian military. Indeed, a new survey by Gallup has indicated that 62% of Republicans believe that the US is “doing too much” to help Kiev, a surge from 50% in June. Likewise, the Ukraine aid issue is losing GOP support in the US Congress.
The trend is apparently driven by Ukraine fatigue, Kiev’s failure to succeed in its counteroffensive attempt, and, most notably, Israel’s war against Hamas, declared by Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the wake of the Islamist surprise attack on October 7. Zelensky mentioned his meeting with Lachlan Murdoch in a Facebook* post on Monday, while the newly appointed media chairman declined to comment on his Kiev tour via his spokesperson, as per Axios. Meanwhile, it is known that Lachlan used to talk to Zelensky previously. According to the US mainstream press, media mogul Rupert Murdoch and his son reportedly held a telephone conversation with the Ukrainian president in March, weeks before they ousted Tucker Carlson, the American political commentator and writer who hosted the eponymous nightly talk show “Tucker Carlson Tonight” on Fox from 2016 to 2023.
“The situation on the front and in the Ukrainian state institutions is on the verge of complete collapse..”
• US Offers ‘Sedative Pill’ To Collapsing Ukraine – Moscow (RT)
Washington has announced yet another military aid package for Ukraine worth some $100 million, after the Pentagon warned earlier this month that it was running critically low on funds allocated for Kiev and will be forced to begin reducing the tranches. The latest package, announced on Monday, will include one High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) with additional ammunition, as well as Stinger anti-aircraft missiles and an unknown number of 155mm and 105mm artillery rounds. On top of that, the US military will supply Kiev’s forces with cold weather gear, TOW missiles and small arms ammunition. US Secretary of Defense Lloyd Austin paid an unannounced visit to Kiev on Monday, during which he had held talks with Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky and once again promised “the United States’ steadfast support for Ukraine.”
Russian officials called Austin’s visit a “mission of moral support,” while Moscow’s ambassador to Washington Anatoly Antonov said that the newly-announced “deadly gift” is designed to convince Ukrainian offficials that “they are still in the game and masters count on them.”“The message about another American arms supply to the regime is nothing more but a sedative pill prepared by overseas ‘benefactors’ for Zelensky. The situation on the front and in the Ukrainian state institutions is on the verge of complete collapse,” Antonov noted.
Ukraine is completely reliant on US aid for the functioning of both its military and civil society, US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen admitted on Monday, claiming that military aid to Ukraine was a “critical priority” for US national security. However, the Pentagon has already spent most of more than $60 billion allocated funding for Kiev, with only around $1 billion dollars left. “We have had to meter out our support for Ukraine,” Department of Defense deputy spokeswoman Sabrina Singh told reporters earlier this month, adding that, although the Pentagon will continue sending military aid packages, they are “getting smaller.” Both the Pentagon and the White House urged Congress to pass a new spending bill on Ukrainian aid so supplies can continue, but no such legislation has been adopted so far.
“The debt goes up, the interest on the debt goes up and that raises the debt even further, and you just spiral out of control. We are there right now.”
• US Financial Death Spiral – John Rubino (USAW)
Analyst and financial writer John Rubino has a new warning about being fooled into thinking the economy is improving because inflation and interest rates have fallen some recently. Rubino says, “If the U.S. government is running crisis level deficits, which it is right now, borrowing money and paying interest on it means we are in a financial death spiral. The debt goes up, the interest on the debt goes up and that raises the debt even further, and you just spiral out of control. We are there right now. The official U.S. debt is $33.5 trillion. It’s growing by $1.7 trillion a year, and $1 trillion of that is interest costs. Interest costs are rising as the overall debt goes up. Then throw in this incredibly reckless military spending in the guise of foreign aid, and you get a society that has completely lost control.
That’s where we are now. We are in the blowoff stage of a 70-year credit super-cycle. Those things do not end with a whimper, and they certainly do not end with a soft landing. They end with a bang, and the bang is going to be centered on the currency. People are going to look at this and say, ‘Do I really want to hold the currency or bonds of a country that is destroying its finances at this trajectory and this scale?’ The answer will be ‘No.’ At that point, it is game over for a deeply indebted economy. We are headed that way fast, and these wars are taking us that way even faster.” If the Fed keeps raising interest rates, the economy tanks, but you protect the dollar. If you cut interest rates, you spike inflation even more, and the U.S. dollar tanks.
Rubino says in the end, we get a “massive reset,” and the everything bubble explodes. Rubino says the dollar is going to decline and, at some point, it starts to go into freefall in terms of buying power. Rubino explains, “If a currency starts to decline in a disorderly way, then you have a massive financial crisis on your hands. That is definitely where Japan is right now. The U.S. is headed that way fast. So, once we reach that point, there is no fix. Then it is only a matter of time that everybody realizes that there is no fix, and they just bail on the whole experiment, and that’s where we are headed.” Rubino talks about plunging home prices, more trouble coming in the commercial real estate market and why you need gold and silver as core assets during a currency reset.
“Literally everyone is talking about it, even amongst donors. But the response is always: ‘What are you going to do?’”
• Biden Donors, Advisers Struggling Over How to Address President’s Age (Sp.)
Advisers to Joe Biden are reportedly considering a number of strategies to address concerns about the American president’s advanced age.“The one number in the polling that was concerning… had to do with age, and that is one thing you can’t reverse no matter how effective Joe Biden is behind the scenes,” said Democratic adviser David Axelrod, referring to polling showing the majority of Americans believe Biden is too old to serve another term as president.“In front of the camera, what he’s projecting is causing people concerns, and that is worrisome,” said Axelrod. Biden’s advisers have reportedly acknowledged the president sometimes appears frail in public appearances. They’ve responded to the issue by considering minimizing the distances the president walks on camera and having him wear more comfortable shoes.
Advisers are also attempting to prevent the president from climbing stairs when possible. Biden generated attention early in his term when he was filmed stumbling while ascending the stairs to Air Force One; the octogenarian president has slipped while walking up the steps to the presidential plane as recently as September. Biden also attracted attention last year when he fell from his bicycle while exercising in his home state of Delaware, turning an attempt to demonstrate the president’s physical fitness into another gaffe. While Biden allies admit he occasionally appears physically weak, they insist he’s still mentally capable of fulfilling responsibilities. But the president has been widely known for being gaffe-prone throughout his career. Some worry his propensity towards verbal flubs is only exacerbating worries over this age.
Donors are advising Biden’s team to “lean in” on the issue, portraying the president’s age as a source of wisdom and encouraging them to portray him as an affable “Grandpa Joe” in contrast to his likely rival, former US President Donald Trump. “I think the strategy is not to even address it, to consider questions like that stupid or silly,” said one anonymous donor who took issue with the campaign’s strategy thus far. “Literally everyone is talking about it, even amongst donors. But the response is always: ‘What are you going to do?’” One political operative worried the campaign has become defensive over the issue, claiming, “They bristle in ways that aren’t helpful.”
“No one in America would have known that President Biden has lied, that they did receive money from China…that he did get involved in the business dealings..”
• McCarthy: GOP ‘Even Closer’ to Biden Impeachment (Sp.)
Former House Speaker Kevin McCarthy recently offered an update on Republicans’ impeachment inquiry against US President Joe Biden, revealing officials were inching ever close to a potential presidential ouster.“We have systematically followed every place the facts have taken us each and every day,” McCarthy said in a Sunday interview with US media. “And now it’s moved even closer because now we’ve got the subpoenas going in to get the bank statements.” McCarthy claimed a number of alleged revelations stemming from Republicans’ investigation. “No one in America would have known that President Biden has lied, that they did receive money from China…that he did get involved in the business dealings,” said McCarthy, referring to long-running claims of the US president’s involvement in his son Hunter Biden’s controversial business dealings in foreign countries.
Biden has denied the accusations, saying he lacked knowledge of his son’s business ventures – a claim seemingly contradicted by recent evidence. Hunter Biden is currently being tried on federal weapons charges.“We found all of this, the shell companies no one knew about prior,” added McCarthy. “This is important.” Biden has criticized House Republicans’ efforts, which in recent days led to the issuing of subpoenas to the president’s friends and family members. Special counsel Richard Sauber responded in a letter obtained Friday, calling the subpoenas “harassment to the president to score political points.”
“You appear so determined to impeach the president that you have misrepresented the facts, ignored the overwhelming evidence disproving your claims, and repeatedly shifted the rationale for your ‘inquiry,’” wrote Sauber to House Oversight Chair James Comer (R-KY) and House Judiciary Chair Jim Jordan (R-OH). Sauber claimed House Republicans’ efforts lack “constitutional legitimacy” because the inquiry was launched without a full vote of House members. Comer responded to the letter also claiming Republicans’ investigation “has unearthed new facts that contradict the White House’s and President Biden’s personal attorney’s narrative of the events.”
“Perhaps they’ll be drawn to the church basements in town. That might be us next year.”
• The Blob and Its Mobs (Kunstler)
Perhaps the anxious gloom pervading this year’s Thanksgiving is due to the dread of what comes next. No one in the public arena says that 2024 will be anything but much worse than what we’ve already lived through in this ongoing crackup of our country, and their expressed utterances are probably not as dark as their private, inner thoughts. The gang behind “Joe Biden” has successfully jacked our country into chaos. Something similar has got Europe and the rest of the Anglosphere in its thrall. Half of the public is grossly misinformed by The News, and swallows every proffered lie. The other half can’t get traction to storm this slippery slope of blob despotism.
So, the table is set. You have probably commenced the preparations for the ritual meal. We started with the cranberries last night, since the condiment has only two ingredients and would store well for four days. It came out badly. There was some rot in the berries that we couldn’t detect just by looking and sorting out some obviously bad ones. I hear a lot of chatter that the fresh food supply chain in America is broken. The bad link in the chain is apparently the trucking system. The truck lines can’t get enough workers to load the refrigerator trailers, so the fruits and vegetables spend too much time sitting on the loading dock, where they start to . . . turn. You have to wonder if this is a harbinger of greater disruptions to come, maybe widespread hunger, and you know what that leads to.
We’re going all out for the Thanksgiving feast here, a big fresh turkey, of course, and way more side-dishes than necessary for a dozen friends at the table. I live in a relatively poor county in deep upstate New York and I have to wonder how many people around here will go without a Thanksgiving feast this year, how many are suddenly mired in misfortune, default on a home mortgage, car sliding into the re-po zone, no job, no prospects, in despair, hungry. Perhaps they’ll be drawn to the church basements in town. That might be us next year.
Those of us outside the blob and their mobs know that our country has to be rebuilt somehow, and that rebuilding it must include assurances of personal liberty. I’m grateful and thankful this year that there are enough of us who understand what’s at stake and are prepared to fight against slithering tyranny. Do you see where things stand this Thanksgiving? It feels like the edge of something because it is the edge of something.
Picked the wrong target.
• As Elon Promised, X Files Suit Against Media Matters (ZH)
Early Saturday morning, Elon Musk posted that his social media platform X will be “filing a thermonuclear lawsuit” against left-leaning non-profit Media Matters and “all those who colluded” for “completely misrepresenting” the real user experience on X. Musk added that X would file the lawsuit on Monday, which prompted even more malarkey on X as the day wore on with so many pro-censorship leftists clinging to the hope that Musk was not going to follow-through, with one CNBC reporter going so far as claiming “Musk may have been lying, like he has done before.” Well, he wasn’t lying, and time’s up for the Media Matters manipulators… The lawsuit, just filed in the U.S. District Court for the Northern District of Texas Fort Worth Division, alleges the organization’s tactics were manipulative and deceptive. The suit claims:
Media Matters has opted for new tactics in its campaign to drive advertisers from X. Media Matters has manipulated the algorithms governing the user experience on X to bypass safeguards and create images of X’s largest advertisers’ paid posts adjacent to racist, incendiary content, leaving the false impression that these pairings are anything but what they actually are: manufactured, inorganic, and extraordinarily rare. Media Matters executed this plot in multiple steps, as X’s internal investigations have revealed. First, Media Matters accessed accounts that had been active for at least 30 days, bypassing X’s ad filter for new users. Media Matters then exclusively followed a small subset of users consisting entirely of accounts in one of two categories: those known to produce extreme, fringe content, and accounts owned by X’s big-name advertisers. The end result was a feed precision-designed by Media Matters for a single purpose: to produce side-by-side ad/content placements that it could screenshot in an effort to alienate advertisers.
But this activity still was not enough to create the pairings of advertisements and content that Media Matters aimed to produce. Media Matters therefore resorted to endlessly scrolling and refreshing its unrepresentative, hand-selected feed, generating between 13 and 15 times more advertisements per hour than viewed by the average X user repeating this inauthentic activity until it finally received pages containing the result it wanted: controversial content next to X’s largest advertisers’ paid posts. Media Matters omitted mentioning any of this in a report published on November 16, 2023 that displayed instances Media Matters “found” on X of advertisers’ paid posts featured next to Neo-Nazi and white-nationalist content. Nor did Media Matters otherwise provide any context regarding the forced, inauthentic nature and extraordinary rarity of these pairings.
However, relying on the specious narrative propagated by Media Matters, the advertisers targeted took these pairings to be anything but rare and inorganic, with all but one of the companies featured in the Media Matters piece withdrawing all ads from X, including Apple, Comcast, NBCUniversal, and IBM—some of X’s largest advertisers. Indeed, in pulling all advertising from X in response to this intentionally deceptive report, IBM called the pairings an “entirely unacceptable situation.” Only Oracle did not withdraw its ads. The truth bore no resemblance to Media Matters’ narrative. In fact, IBM’s, Comcast’s, and Oracle’s paid posts appeared alongside the fringe content cited by Media Matters for only one viewer (out of more than 500 million) on all of X: Media Matters. Not a single authentic user of the X platform saw IBM ’s, Comcast’s, or Oracle’s ads next to that content, which Media Matters achieved only through its manipulation of X’s algorithms as described above. And in Apple’s case, only two out of more than 500 million active users saw its ad appear alongside the fringe content cited in the article—at least one of which was Media Matters.
[..] Texas AG Ken Paxton has officially opened an investigation into Media Matters for potential fraudulent activity: “The Office of the Attorney General (“OAG”) is opening an investigation into Media Matters for potential fraudulent activity. Under the Texas Business Organizations Code and the Deceptive Trade Practices Act, the OAG will vigorously enforce against nonprofits who commit fraudulent acts in or affecting the state of Texas. Attorney General Paxton was extremely troubled by the allegations that Media Matters, a radical anti-free speech organization, fraudulently manipulated data on X.com (formerly known as Twitter). “We are examining the issue closely to ensure that the public has not been deceived by the schemes of radical left-wing organizations who would like nothing more than to limit freedom by reducing participation in the public square,” said Attorney General Paxton.
Albanese
Under international law, Israel does NOT have a right to defend itself in the occupied territories of Palestine. In this case, only PALESTINIANS have the right to defend itself.
Explained by Francesca Albanese, UN Special Rapporteur for #Palestine…pic.twitter.com/dbd4Fn3D93
— Patrick Henningsen (@21WIRE) November 20, 2023
Just stop oil
https://twitter.com/i/status/1726482376187171116
Climate science
Reformed ex-climate alarmist: "There is no climate crisis… [There is] no consistent correlation between carbon dioxide and Earth's temperature—at times CO2 was 1300% of today, and we were stuck in very cold conditions… There is no foundation to the climate scare—it's all… pic.twitter.com/xoAt5ByX2u
— Wide Awake Media (@wideawake_media) November 20, 2023
WEF terrorism
A terrorist organisation is one that uses fear and intimidation to achieve their radical political objectives. The WEF is a terrorist organisation.
The WEF is a fanatical political organisation that uses fear and manipulation, like Covid hysteria, like the hoax of global… pic.twitter.com/ua2q3MW1e5
— Craig Kelly (@CKellyUAP) November 20, 2023
Fractals
https://twitter.com/i/status/1726574104739029119
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