Dec 232023
 
 December 23, 2023  Posted by at 9:00 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , ,  39 Responses »


Edward Hopper New York office 1962

 

The Supreme Court Sees the Politics – Jack Smith Denied Request (CTH)
A Rigged System From Top to Bottom (Donald Jeffries)
NYT Editor: Opponents to Trump’s Disqualification The New Confederates (Turley)
Slip, Sliding Towards Civil War as Trump Tossed From Colorado Ballot (Bridge)
Biden Emailed Son’s Business Associate 54 Times In 1 Year– Republicans (RT)
Ukraine Can’t Defeat Russia – Fico (RT)
‘Old Ukraine’ Is Dead – Arestovich (RT)
McGovern: Biden’s Proxy War in Ukraine Evokes Strong Memories of Vietnam Sp.)
Ukrainian Military Vows To Boost Numbers By Any Means (RT)
All Ukrainians Must Fight – Security Chief (RT)
Foreign Nations Should Sanction Ukrainian Draft Dodgers – Zelensky Aide (RT)
Germany Vows To Protect Ukrainian Men From Zelensky (RT)
Russia Warns Of ‘Complete Breakdown’ In Relations With US (RT)
Whatever It Takes Won’t Be Enough (Kunstler)
2023 Year in Review: Down Some Dark Rabbit Holes (Dave Collum)

 

 

 

 

Tucker Assange

 

 

 

 

Woody

 

 

Crooke

 

 

 

 

“For the Supreme Court to accept the request of Smith, would be for the Supreme Court to pretend the political motive was unknown..”

The Supreme Court Sees the Politics – Jack Smith Denied Request (CTH)

As we stated yesterday, following the Smith request, the Trump attorney response, and the Smith re-response, the transparency of the special counsel motive is obvious. For the Supreme Court to accept the request of Smith, would be for the Supreme Court to pretend the political motive was unknown. The Supreme Court did not pretend and was curt in their retort: “The petition for a writ of certiorari before judgment is denied.” Special Counsel Jack Smith argued in his petition to the court, the speedy resolution of Trump’s claim of presidential immunity is of an urgent national interest. The motive was/is a transparent speedy timeline effort to influence the 2024 GOP presidential primary race.

The court, heck, the entire world can see it. Arguments on the presidential immunity issue, within the DC Circuit Court of Appeals, are set for January 9, 2024. The decision of the 3-judge panel will come thereafter. Depending on the outcome, Donald Trump can then ask for a full panel appellate court review. If the Circuit Court appeal results in a non-favorable outcome, the next step is the Supreme Court. Meanwhile, the DC trial of Donald Trump is frozen awaiting a determination on the original issue of presidential immunity.

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“Peter Navarro was convicted for contempt of Congress, because he ignored a subpoena. You know, the same thing presidential offspring Hunter Biden just did this week. Former Attorney General Eric Holder did this as well. Some subpoenas are more equal than others.”

A Rigged System From Top to Bottom (Donald Jeffries)

Just the other day, New York Attorney General Letitia James issued a remarkable statement. “Before this trial even began, the judge ruled in our favor and found that Donald Trump did engage in years of significant financial fraud,” James boasted publicly. This is associated with just one of Donald Trump’s absurd legal cases. Let what this laughable, biased prosecutor said sink in for a moment. She admitted that the honorable judge had “ruled in our favor” before the case had gone to trial. Even for this collapsing Banana Republic, it’s a shocking precedent to openly brag about such a serious breach of basic legal protocol. James, whom Trump has called “racist,” recently stated, “The Donald Trump show is over.” James has referred to Trump as an “illegitimate president,” and said “his days are numbered.” She lashed out at Trump at many rallies, even declaring, “We’ll bring him down!”

Upon being elected in December 2018, James vowed, “We will use every area of the law to investigate President Trump and his business transactions and that of his family as well.” In this case, Trump is accused of exaggerating the value of his assets. Now, I’ve known a lot of people in my lifetime that exaggerated the value of whatever they had. Bullshitters, I believe they’re called. Or to be more polite, blowhards. Until now, being a bullshit artist wasn’t a criminal offense. The good judge in this case, Arthur Engoron, is about as biased as can be, a perfect example of the new judges who rule over the Orwellian courtrooms of America 2.0. Engoron slapped a gag order on the former president after he insulted his law clerk in a post on Truth Social. Some insults are more equal than others. Trump also received a gag order in his equally ridiculous trial for “conspiring to overthrow” the 2020 election, by complaining about the many obvious irregularities that smacked of fraud.

It’s hard to keep track of the players without a scorecard, but Jack Smith, the prosecutor in the case where Trump is being tried for alleging electoral fraud, something which Stacy Abrams continues to do in the same state, is in a category by himself. Smith has regularly taunted Trump on social media, at Trump’s own grade school level. It makes you proud to be an American to witness it. Judge Tanya Chutkan is almost identical to Engoron in her transparent bias against Trump. Trump has no chance in either case. Although a bit less classless than the TikTok judges Alex Jones has been tried by, they are similar in their disregard for traditional appearances of impartiality and the presumption of innocence, and their distaste for free speech.

Just as the lethargic American public permitted tyranny to be constructed all around them, without protesting or even noticing, they have allowed the implementation of a politicized justice system. The prosecutions of Roger Stone, Paul Manafort, Mike Flynn, Sydney Powell and other Trump associates were all politically motivated. Peter Navarro was convicted for contempt of Congress, because he ignored a subpoena. You know, the same thing presidential offspring Hunter Biden just did this week. Former Attorney General Eric Holder did this as well. Some subpoenas are more equal than others.

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“..it is up to society to protect citizens from the “nefarious” uses of free speech or free elections by cleansing ballots and social media.”

NYT Editor: Opponents to Trump’s Disqualification The New Confederates (Turley)

“Why are you standing with confederates who betrayed this country?” Those words from New York Times editorial board member Mara Gay on MSNBC captured the unhinged coverage of the Colorado Supreme Court’s disqualification of Donald Trump from the 2024 election. While the underlying theory under the 14th Amendment had been previously rejected by jurists in various states (including many Democrats), Gay had a simple take for viewers: anyone raising democratic or constitutional objections are modern day confederates. Gay was asked on MSNBC’s Morning Joe how she would respond to many of us who have questioned the constitutional basis for using the 14th Amendment to bar Trump from ballots.

Gay responded: “Why are you standing with confederates who betrayed this country? This is what they’re standing with. It’s the spirit of those confederates rather than the Americans who came together after a long and brutal Civil War that was fought to keep the Union together and clearly saw a threat in ex-confederates running for office. So much so they amended the Constitution to prevent those traitors from running for office.” It is that simple for the editors of the New York Times: either you support this previously rejected theory to prevent voters from casting their ballots for a candidate or you are a confederate. So those three Democratic appointees on the Colorado Supreme Court were just more confederate fellow travelers. Gay knows that other states and courts have rejected this theory. She knows that even the majority said that the precedent for the decision was “sparce” and that this was “uncharted territory.”

Yet, if you reach the opposing view of most judges who have looked at this question, you are standing not with the Constitution but the confederacy. The obvious attempt is to intimidate and ostracize those who may have qualms over barring citizens from voting for candidates. It is akin to being called a racist on campus if you oppose diversity policies or standards on academic grounds.

It is only the latest example of how the left is engaging in McCarthy-like tactics to portray advocates for free speech or other constitutional protections as enemies of the state. Back in the day, it was the Democrats who were denounced for raising such legal objections. Now, Democratic members and pundits attack witnesses as “Putin lovers” or supporters of “insurrectionists” in opposing censorship. Or confederates for objecting to ballot cleansing. Indeed the rhetoric used by Gay is strikingly familiar to the defense for censorship on the left. She added on MSNBC that the Colorado decision “should send a message that our electoral system can be used for nefarious purposes against democracy itself. It’s clear. It’s clear as day.” Thus, it is up to society to protect citizens from the “nefarious” uses of free speech or free elections by cleansing ballots and social media.

Of course, others simply used the opinion to vent on an almost schoolyard level. Rick Wilson of The Lincoln Project, taunted the former president and said that the court “called you out for what you are. You’re a filthy insurrectionist. You’re a losing loser who loses.” That is still weirdly preferable to labeling anyone raising constitutional concerns as standing with “confederate traitors.” Yet, it is remarkable how these critics who have long objected to Trump rhetoric have adopted the same personal and reckless rhetoric. Gay’s interview should be chilling for anyone who cares about both law and journalism. It shows the righteous rage that fuels the intolerance in our country. It also shows the potential for this insidious theory as more Democratic politicians, like those in California, who are calling for their own officials to find ways to block Trump from ballots.

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“..then it’s off to the races for something potentially unspeakable..”

Slip, Sliding Towards Civil War as Trump Tossed From Colorado Ballot (Bridge)

In an effort to ‘protect democracy,’ the Colorado Supreme Court declared Donald Trump “constitutionally ineligible” from running in the state’s 2024 primary in what appears to be the latest sign that America is heading for a calamitous train wreck. Was it any coincidence that on the very same day the Biden administration began the removal of the ‘Reconciliation Memorial,’ which was unveiled 109 years ago in Arlington National Cemetery in the aftermath of the Civil War as a symbol of America’s “national unity,” the state of Colorado denied thousands of its citizens the right to vote for – who else? In a 4-3 ruling, the Colorado Supreme Court ruled that former President Donald Trump lacked the legal credentials to participate in the state’s presidential primary because of the 14th Amendment’s “insurrectionist clause,” removing his name from the state’s 2024 ballot.

The 14th Amendment on insurrection states, Section 3. No person shall be a Senator or Representative in Congress, or elector of President and Vice President, or hold any office, civil or military, under the United States, or under any State, who, having previously taken an oath, as a member of Congress, or as an officer of the United States…shall have engaged in insurrection or rebellion against the same, or given aid or comfort to the enemies thereof. But Congress may, by a vote of two-thirds of each House, remove such disability. Colorado’s highest court overturned a ruling from a district court judge who ruled that Trump incited an insurrection on Jan. 6, 2021, but said he could not be removed from the ballot because it was unclear that the provision – written in the post-Civil War period – was intended to cover the presidency.

The obvious problem with the Colorado ruling is that Special Counsel Jack Smith did not charge Teflon Trump with an attempt to mount an insurrection on January 6, nor any other day. However, if by some chance the U.S. Supreme Court would affirm the Colorado ruling, leaving Trump disqualified not just in Colorado but in many other states, then it’s off to the races for something potentially unspeakable. Meanwhile, the cancel-culture commandos continue their attack on civil liberties in other ‘democratic’ venues as well. YouTube, for example, said it will remove videos that make false assertions that institutional fraud cost President Trump the 2020 election (suitcases filled with ballots magically appearing from under desks after the media have all called it a night is just a ‘conspiracy theory,’ right?). Since September, the company has sent to the memory hole over 8,000 channels for spreading “harmful and misleading” content.

To add to the Orwellian-ness of its draconian handiwork, the Google-owned monstrosity was creepily happy to inform in its blog page that “over 77% of those removed videos were taken down before they had 100 views.” If we were talking about the game ‘whack the mole,’ such swiftness might be something to brag about. But since we’re talking about severe violations of the First Amendment, the company should feel nothing but shame. Incidentally, speaking about violations of the 14th Amendment, how about the part at the end that speaks about giving “aid or comfort to the enemies thereof”? With an estimated 5,000 illegal immigrants swarming across the U.S.-Mexico border every day, some traveling as far away as the Middle East and China just for the privilege, couldn’t these mostly military-aged strangers be considered very real enemies? It certainly would seem that U.S. President Joe Biden, who has exposed the American people to every sort of danger, could be found guilty of ‘aiding and abetting’ a very real threat – an epidemic, if you will. Is there not one Republican-led high court in the land to take up the challenge?

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“..using aliases and private email addresses..”

Biden Emailed Son’s Business Associate 54 Times In 1 Year– Republicans (RT)

US President Joe Biden exchanged dozens of emails with his son Hunter’s business associate while he was vice president, according to a Republican-led committee investigating Biden’s alleged influence-peddling. Biden has denied any involvement in his son’s overseas dealings. Files released by the House Ways and Means Committee this week show Biden using aliases and private email addresses to communicate with Eric Schwerin, Hunter Biden’s accountant, 54 times. The bulk of these exchanges took place either side of Biden’s two 2014 trips to Ukraine, with Hunter Biden appointed to the board of Burisma, a Ukrainian energy firm, after the first trip. The committee did not publish the contents of the emails, only describing when they were sent.

Nevertheless, the messages “directly refute previous public statements the president has made that he had no knowledge of his son’s business dealings,” the committee said in a press release. Asked earlier this month whether he knew about or partook in Hunter’s business activities, Biden said “I did not, and it’s a bunch of lies.” Hunter Biden was lavishly compensated for his work with Burisma, earning around $1 million per year for as long as his father was in the White House. Hunter’s former business partner, Devon Archer, told the House Oversight Committee in July that Hunter was appointed solely to guarantee that the company would have influence over US policy, and that Joe Biden regularly called Hunter during meetings with Burisma clients.

Biden admitted in 2018 to using $1 billion in American aid money as leverage to have a Ukrainian prosecutor, Viktor Shokin, fired. According to the Oversight Committee, Hunter asked his father to ensure that Shokin was sacked while the two spoke by phone during a Burisma meeting. The House Ways and Means Committee, Oversight Committee, and Judiciary Committee are currently conducting an impeachment inquiry into Biden’s alleged corruption and influence-peddling. The House of Representatives voted along party lines to formalize this inquiry earlier this month, a move that grants greater subpoena power to the committees. However, Hunter Biden has defied a subpoena calling for him to give a closed-door deposition to the Oversight and Judiciary committees, stating that he would only answer questions in a public session.

Citing witness testimony and files retrieved from a laptop belonging to Hunter Biden, Republicans allege that the Biden family received around $24 million in payments through shell companies from business figures and politicians in China, Kazakhstan, Romania, Russia, and Ukraine while Biden was vice president. Some 150 of these transactions were flagged as “suspicious” by the US Treasury Department, according to the committees. The Ways and Means Committee describes Schwerin as “the architect of the Biden family’s shell companies,” which were allegedly used to conceal these payments. Democrats insist that Schwerin merely helped Joe Biden file his tax returns during his time as vice president.

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No Gaza or Red Sea today, but lots of Ukraine. Feels like things could change there, fast.

Ukraine Can’t Defeat Russia – Fico (RT)

No amount of Western weapons pumped into Ukraine will be enough to secure a victory over Russia, Slovak Prime Minister Robert Fico has said, adding that this means that the conflict has no military solution. In an interview with the local Pravda newspaper on Friday, Fico – a vocal critic of sending arms to Kiev – suggested that while the West was trying its best to use Ukraine to “destroy” Russia both economically and militarily, this approach was doomed from the very start. “This plan can never work, it is an absolute misunderstanding of reality and the real position of the Russian Federation,” he noted, recalling that Moscow has gained more territory than Ukraine this year, even despite the latter’s ill-fated counteroffensive.

According to Fico, while Western sanctions are certainly unpleasant for Moscow, it would be a mistake to think that “a Russian citizen is beating his head against the wall because he cannot buy an American phone” as he can simply buy a Chinese one. When it comes to the battlefield situation, the West should honestly admit that “Ukraine does not have enough forces to militarily reverse the situation,” according to the premier. We can pour all the weapons of the world, all the money there, and Russia will never be defeated militarily. It is the turn of 2023 and 2024, and you will see that Russia will begin to dictate the terms of settlement of this conflict. Meanwhile, Fico recalled that Ukraine had a chance to end the conflict in its early stages by signing an agreement with Russia but walked away from the negotiation process after receiving promises of support from the West.

This past June, Russian President Vladimir Putin said that in the spring of 2022 Moscow and Kiev drew up a peace treaty in which Ukraine had committed to a neutral status. David Arakhamia, a Ukrainian MP who led Kiev’s delegation at the talks, later confirmed that this was one of Russia’s key demands. He also said that Ukraine broke off the engagement after then-UK Prime Minister Boris Johnson dissuaded it from taking the deal. Several months after the talks collapsed, four former Ukrainian regions overwhelmingly voted to join Russia in public referendums, with President Vladimir Zelensky later barring negotiations with Moscow. Russia, however, maintains it is open to engagement with Kiev. As things currently stand, “only a naive person” could imagine that Russia would contemplate leaving its new territories, Fico concluded.

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“People of cultures other than Ukrainian, be they Russian or something else, do not want to fight for a monoethnic Ukraine because Kiev discriminates against them..”

‘Old Ukraine’ Is Dead – Arestovich (RT)

Ukraine cannot exist as a monoethnic and monocultural state in its 1991 borders, which is the essence of what the government of President Vladimir Zelenksy seeks in the conflict with Russia, his former aide Aleksey Arestovich said in an interview on Friday. Speaking to journalist Yulia Latynina, the ex-official declared the nationalist Ukrainian project “dead,” stating that Kiev is unable to find people willing to fight for it. He claimed that 30% to 70% of troops on the front line refuse to go into combat and seek opportunities to desert. According to Arestovich, the refuseniks “have passed a sentence on this system, they have sealed its end.” Zelensky’s statement that the Ukrainian military leadership wants to mobilize up to 500,000 people for the war effort appears to be a form “trolling” by the commanders, Arestovich said.

The target is absolutely unrealistic, he claimed. With Kiev ramping up the pressure on draft dodgers, they will soon stop running from conscription teams and start shooting at them, the ex-official predicted. People of cultures other than Ukrainian, be they Russian or something else, do not want to fight for a monoethnic Ukraine because Kiev discriminates against them, the commentator noted. The same is true for people who live in territories under Russian control, which Kiev wants to take back by force. Ukraine “has nothing to offer to the residents of Donbass and Crimea, except for a second-rate citizen status,” he said. Meanwhile, Ukrainians who support the monoethnic project may have other issues with the government, be it a grudge over an unfair economic system or lack of political liberties.

“We live in a country of prohibitions, a country where freedoms are suppressed… where you are caught and forced into the army. Who would want to fight for such a nation?” Arestovich asked. He claimed that only by radically reforging itself as a multiethnic and multicultural nation, as befits its democratic composition, and putting its national interest first can Ukraine have a future. Such a Ukraine could convince people to live and die for it, rather than seek opportunities to flee. That kind of Ukraine could also reach a deal with Russia and the West on a viable European security architecture, thus eliminating the cause of the current conflict, he argued.

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“..the more ludicrous Team Biden’s idea about Russia’s threat to Europe gets, the more desperately they stick to it. “I saw this happen before,” McGovern said..”

McGovern: Biden’s Proxy War in Ukraine Evokes Strong Memories of Vietnam Sp.)

Joe Biden claimed earlier this month that the US can’t let Russian President Vladimir Putin win in Ukraine since “he won’t stop there. “[If] Putin attacks a NATO ally — if he keeps going and then he attacks a NATO ally — we’re committed as a NATO member to defend every inch of NATO territory, and we’ll have something that we don’t seek and that we don’t have today,” the US president stated on December 6.In response, Russian President Putin called Biden’s claim “complete nonsense”, adding that he believes that his American counterpart understands that. “Russia has no reason, no interest — no geopolitical interest, neither economic, political nor military — to fight with NATO countries,” Putin emphasized on December 17.

“The more I hear Biden and his advisers, the more I think they actually believe that the Russians are out to take over Europe like us,” Ray McGovern, a former CIA officer who prepared the president’s daily brief during the Ronald Reagan administration, told Sputnik. “It reminds me of back in the sixties when I was working on Russian policy toward Vietnam and Southeast Asia. The domino theory or the Russians theory, the Russians were trying to take over the whole world, especially Southeast Asia. Not only that, but Indonesia, the whole world just better go down the drain if the Russians prevail in Vietnam. “The “domino theory” meant that “when one nation falls to communism the impact is such as to weaken the resistance of other countries and facilitate, if not cause, their fall to communism,” as per a 1964 memo from the Board of National Estimates to the director of central intelligence. The US used the now-discredited theory to justify its involvement in the Vietnam War years after its unfortunate military campaign in Korea.

Eventually, the US got bogged down in Vietnam, with its leadership continuing to stick to the false narrative. The same is happening now in Ukraine, according to the CIA veteran: the more ludicrous Team Biden’s idea about Russia’s threat to Europe gets, the more desperately they stick to it. “I saw this happen before,” McGovern said. “There was a false narrative. We were winning in Vietnam and our forces were just about to complete the victory, except General Westmoreland was saying, and this is late 1967, ‘We just need 208 more troops because we’ve got to go into Vietnam, right up to the Chinese border, and then we’ll win for sure’. Now, that was delusional. That was crazy. And, you know, those of us who have been around a while knew what happened last time we went up to the Chinese border in Korea. Right?”

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“..221,571 Ukrainian men have arrived in Germany since then and 189,484 remained in the country..”

Ukrainian Military Vows To Boost Numbers By Any Means (RT)

Ukraine will boost the size of its army one way or another, a Defense Ministry spokesman said on Friday as cited by local media, adding that citizens should not delude themselves into thinking that only volunteers will have to fight. President Vladimir Zelensky previously stated that the Ukrainian military was looking to enroll between 450,000 and 500,000 people into the armed forces. Illarion Pavlyuk, the ministry spokesman, said on national television that the enlistment goals will be achieved through a combination of volunteer recruitment and mandatory conscription.“We urge people to join the armed forces voluntarily, without waiting for a mobilization summons, and offer them the chance to choose their specialty,” he said. “But it does not mean that only those who want to serve will do, or that one can pick from only non-combat jobs.”

The official said the military would prefer to see more volunteers but that it will make up the difference through mobilization. Zelensky reported the target draft number during a press conference on Tuesday. He implied that he had reservations about some of the ideas being floated by the military leadership, such as mobilizing women, and claimed that the plan would come at a price tag of $13.4 billion for Ukraine.German media reported this week that Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov wanted male citizens aged between 25 and 60 who reside in foreign nations to report for mobilization or face sanctions and dishonor.Kiev shut its border for men of conscription age after the hostilities with Russia erupted in February last year, banning anyone without a special waiver from leaving. However, the tabloid Bild reported that 221,571 Ukrainian men have arrived in Germany since then and 189,484 remained in the country.

In comments to Ukrainian media on Wednesday, Pavlyuk claimed that German journalists had “shifted the emphasis” of the minister’s remarks. He clarified that at this time no legal mechanisms to pressure or punish those dodging the draft on foreign soil are being considered.Meanwhile, Mikhail Podoliak, a senior aide to Zelensky, suggested on Friday that Kiev could convince host nations to strip social benefits and residency permits of draft-dodgers in order to coerce them to return.On Tuesday, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu estimated Ukrainian losses since the start of the conflict at over 383,000, with roughly half of the casualties sustained during the so-called summer counteroffensive, which Kiev launched in early June.

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“..Kirill Budanov, the chief of Ukrainian intelligence, said last week that forcing people without motivation into service would not make the army stronger..”

All Ukrainians Must Fight – Security Chief (RT)

Every Ukrainian citizen, and not only the members of the military, must serve their country during its conflict with Russia, Aleksey Danilov, the Secretary of the Ukrainian National Security and Defense Council, has said. In an interview with local media on Thursday, the security chief signaled that the era when some Ukrainians could turn a blind eye to the fighting was over. “This kind of calm, when… it was believed that the war was purely a matter for the military, and the rest of the country could live its own life… has passed, it must end, it doesn’t work that way,” he insisted. “Everyone should take part in this war, and not selectively: while someone is fighting, others are throwing chips in the casino. This is not fair,” the official said. At the same time, Danilov noted that Kiev’s planned mobilization drive would not last only one day or one month, but that the whole process could take at least a year.

His comments come after Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky revealed earlier this week that the military had proposed calling up an additional 450-500 thousand people, and that the government wanted to allocate an additional 500 billion hryvnias ($13.3 billion) to the effort. He also stressed that Ukrainian authorities must prioritize “justice” when replenishing the military’s ranks. Meanwhile, on Thursday, Ukrainian Defense Minister Rustem Umerov said all Ukrainian men who had left the country since start of the conflict would be invited to report to recruitment centers, warning that those who fail to comply could face sanctions. However, Kirill Budanov, the chief of Ukrainian intelligence, said last week that forcing people without motivation into service would not make the army stronger.

Ukraine announced a general mobilization shortly after the start of the conflict with Russia in February 2022, barring most men aged between 18 and 60 from leaving the country. The campaign, however, has been marred by widespread draft dodging and corruption. Ukrainian officials have repeatedly signaled plans to recruit more soldiers amid Kiev’s faltering counteroffensive which has been underway since early summer but failed to gain any substantial ground. Moscow has described Ukraine’s losses during the push as catastrophic, estimating them at about 160,000 casualties.

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“..the German constitution forbids forcing any German national to serve in the military with arms in their hands and he “cannot imagine” Berlin “forcing people from other countries to do so.”

Foreign Nations Should Sanction Ukrainian Draft Dodgers – Zelensky Aide (RT)

Ukrainian men of fighting age who fled the country amid the conflict with Russia should be forced to return, Mikhail Podoliak, a senior aide to President Vladimir Zelensky, has said. A set of restrictions that would limit their access to aid and services in their places of stay is required to achieve this goal, he told Ukraine’s Channel 24 in an interview published on Friday. Podoliak’s words support comments made by Defense Minister Rustem Umerov, who told Germany’s Bild tabloid earlier in December that all Ukrainian men of military age living abroad were to be summoned to recruitment centers. The minister also warned that those who fail to comply could face sanctions.The Ukrainian Defense Ministry then clarified his statements by saying that a mobilization mechanism for Ukrainians living abroad was “not on the agenda.”

In his interview on Friday, Podoliak said that Umerov had “a right idea.” According to the Zelensky aide, no one should be allowed to just “sit out” the conflict and shed responsibility for their nation. “They should be equal,” Podoliak said, referring to Ukrainians living abroad and those who stayed and are now being mobilized. “Those should be the consultations with the governments of foreign nations where our men are residing,” he said, adding that the talks should be focused on “whether they [the Ukrainians] can further get temporary residence permit, have certain preferential treatment, get aid” there. Podoliak also said that Umerov was “probably” already considering a set of measures that would “give our guys abroad an opportunity to make a choice: either to get drafted or… lose certain opportunities granted to people that temporarily left Ukraine.”

His words came amid reports that Ukraine is struggling to refill the ranks of its army and is taking additional measures to enhance border controls amid daily attempts by men desperate to illegally flee the country. In December, Zelensky said that the nation’s military had proposed calling up an additional 450,000-500,000 people, and that the government wanted to allocate an additional 500 billion hryvnia ($13.3 billion) to the effort.

Earlier this week, Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu estimated that Ukraine had lost over 383,000 soldiers since the start of the conflict, adding that roughly half of the casualties were sustained during its much-hyped summer counteroffensive. Some of Ukraine’s Western backers have already expressed their opposition to plans to force Ukrainian refugees to go back and fight. “It will not be the case that we are now forcing people to get drafted or [join] the military service against their will,” German Justice Minister Marco Buschmann told journalists on Friday. The minister said that the German constitution forbids forcing any German national to serve in the military with arms in their hands and he “cannot imagine” Berlin “forcing people from other countries to do so.”

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“..Berlin would not “force people to do compulsory military service or military service against their will.”

Germany Vows To Protect Ukrainian Men From Zelensky (RT)

Ukraine’s new mobilization drive will have no practical consequences for Ukrainians living in Germany, the country’s Justice Minister Marco Buschmann told the German Press Agency (DPA) on Friday. Kiev’s Defense Minister Rustem Umerov had told German newspaper Bild on Thursday that calls for people to report to recruitment centers would be sent out to all citizens of military age – including Ukrainians living abroad. He also warned that anyone who ignores the “invitations” would face sanctions, although he did not discuss the potential penalties. “It’s not a punishment to defend and serve your country. It’s an honor,” he stated. It comes after Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky revealed earlier this week that the military had proposed drafting an additional 450,000 to 500,000 people, and planned to allocate a further 500 billion hryvnias ($13.3 billion) towards the effort.

Bushmann said Berlin would not “force people to do compulsory military service or military service against their will.” He explained that it was a positive thing that war refugees had been accepted into Germany via a simplified procedure and given the opportunity to work.“I cannot imagine, as our constitution stipulates that German citizens do not have to serve in the armed forces against their will, that we can force people from other countries to do so,” he concluded. More than 221,000 Ukrainian men arrived in Germany after the conflict broke out, with almost 190,000 of them still in the country, according to German authorities.

Ukraine announced a general mobilization shortly after the beginning of the conflict with Russia in February 2022, prohibiting most men aged between 18 to 60 from leaving the country. Kiev has signaled plans to expand recruitment drives for more soldiers amid its stalled counteroffensive, which has failed to show any substantial results since its start in early summer.Moscow’s Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu, speaking at a ministerial meeting on Tuesday, estimated Kiev’s losses during the push at 159,000 killed and wounded, and the total casualties sustained by the Armed Forces of Ukraine at 383,000.

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“..it is extremely difficult for the US ruling circles to accept the changing world order. Many of them are simply organically incapable of moving away from thinking in terms of their own superiority..”

Russia Warns Of ‘Complete Breakdown’ In Relations With US (RT)

Russia-US relations could sink to a new low if Washington makes more “reckless” decisions regarding the Ukraine conflict, Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov has warned. In an interview with Interfax published on Friday, the Russian official accused the US of pursuing a “misguided” and “dangerous” policy aimed at inflicting a “strategic defeat” on Moscow. These actions have left bilateral relations in a “comatose state,” Ryabkov said. “I can’t rule out that at some point in the future… Washington won’t go below this near-zero level that our relations are currently at, if there is no brightening when it comes to… views on what is happening [regarding] Russia and Ukraine,” he stated.

A “complete breakdown” in ties is even possible, Ryabkov added, suggesting this would mean a dramatic reduction in the respective diplomatic presence in the two countries. Even though the US is wary of completely dismantling relations, it is “not ready to find common ground… even in theory,” the diplomat further claimed.According to Ryabkov, while the two powers continue dialogue in several narrow areas, this “equilibrium could collapse at any moment due to Washington’s recklessness.” The seizure of Russian assets or military escalation could be among the triggers for a further deterioration, he said. Ryabkov stressed that Russia is not seeking to sever ties, but cautioned that “the diplomatic relations in themselves are not a totem to be worshipped, or a sacred cow to be protected.” “We are ready for any scenario,” he emphasized.

Russia and the US could potentially restore relations, although this will be hard, Ryabkov acknowledged. “The problem is that it is extremely difficult for the US ruling circles to accept the changing world order. Many of them are simply organically incapable of moving away from thinking in terms of their own superiority,” he explained. Ryabkov’s comments come after the New York Times reported on Thursday that the White House had intensified talks to seize $300 billion in Russian assets blocked in the West, which could be used to help Ukraine. Moscow has repeatedly denounced the freezing of its funds as “theft,” warning of retaliation if the West goes ahead with the confiscation of the assets.

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“..to brand someone a criminal, there must be a record of indictment and conviction for a particular crime, and that, in the case of Mr. Trump, a politically-motived fairy tale about an “insurrection” doesn’t cut it.”

Whatever It Takes Won’t Be Enough (Kunstler)

And just like that — snap ! — the news about the Colorado Supreme Court’s droll action against candidate DJ Trump vanished from the front page (or top screens) of The New York Times. Do you know why? I’ll tell you: Because the political Left has finally managed to embarrass itself with a “lawfare” gambit so nakedly fatuous that it exposes the faction’s drive to destroy the election process, and with it our country. This is what you get from a regime that faked its way to power and now must strain to cover up its long train of crimes, abuses, and effronteries to common sense, while running out of tricks to keep fooling even its own deranged followers. Somehow, the act of kicking a leading candidate off the ballot has finally registered as inconsistent with “defending our democracy.”

Of course, the reckless abuse of law — “lawfare” — proceeds from the Left’s disrespect for boundaries and limits, which is exactly what law in principle concerns itself with. And from there it’s a quick leap into totalizing bad faith, the operating system for government under an imposter president, “Joe Biden.” Suddenly, mere days before Christmas, when the people want to be preoccupied with things other than politics, events merge explosively to shape the fate of the nation. In a sane world, the US Supreme Court would not just summarily strike down the Colorado ruling, but would issue a career-ending rebuke to the brain-damaged state justices who managed to not learn a basic principle of due process: innocent until proven guilty — that to brand someone a criminal, there must be a record of indictment and conviction for a particular crime, and that, in the case of Mr. Trump, a politically-motived fairy tale about an “insurrection” doesn’t cut it.

Also, in a sane world interested in truth and justice, the Republican-majority Congress would have months ago convened new hearings about the Jan 6/21 Capitol riot to undo the manifold perfidious frauds instigated by the previous Democrat-majority committee under Chairman Bennie Thompson. By now, testimony should have been compelled from Nancy Pelosi, the then Capitol Police Chief Steven Sund, and former Defense Secretary Chris Miller about Ms. Pelosi’s refusal to call in national guard troops to reinforce security around the building, and to answer for the odd behavior of the Capitol Police, such as opening doors for the mob and then serving as ushers to show off the place. It seems obvious that many elected Republicans also have an interest in supporting the Jan 6/21 “insurrection” fairy tale. Do you still wonder why the evil entity infesting Washington is called “the blob”?

The Substack blogger who styles himself as El Gato Malo offers the alluring theory that a SCOTUS ruling on whether the 14th Amendment clauses that were applied to the presidency in the Colorado case, could enable Special Counsel Jack Smith to slip-in a superseding indictment (replacing the original indictment) in his DC Jan 6 case against Mr. Trump with new insurrection / rebellion charges, thus setting-up a fortified argument for states to chuck Mr. Trump off any ballot. More “lawfare,” you see. Whatever it takes. . .!

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If you have absolutely nothing to do this Christmas…

2023 Year in Review: Down Some Dark Rabbit Holes (Dave Collum)

What keeps me writing? Narcissism. I love the hugs. Catherine Austin Fitts put my entire writeup on the coming pension crisis in her Solari Reports noting, “I loved reading your year-end War and Peace.” Larry Summers told me “you have no filter.” My first Covid writeup in 2020 was said to be in the hands of Steve Scalise’s staff for uploading to the Congressional record. (I have no idea if it made it.) As outlined below, I have wonderful chats with brilliant people on the podcast circuit.

There are the Joe Sixpacks who have no voice and reach out in comments sections or by emails thanking me for voicing their concerns. So many people just want a voice. Tweeters with 20 followers are thrilled when they get a response because somebody heard them. These are the guys who listened to Oliver Anthony’s Richmen North of Richmond and were brought to tears.3 The media tried to tell us Oliver wrote an anthem for angry white guys, but montages of black guys rockin’ to his lyrics proliferated on social media. When Elon Musk publicly told Disney’s Bob Iger to “Go fuck yourself” for trying to blackmail him by pulling ad revenues, that was the fuckoff heard ‘round the world. I don’t know if Elon is a good person—probably not—but he is playing one on the internet, and he is very special in his own way.

Good writing on important subjects does not go out of date. If something is not important a month or even a year later, it was not important the day it was written. I try to touch third rails. If a 68-year-old tenured professor can’t speak up, then who can? It gets me in trouble occasionally. I got canceled pretty seriously in 2020, sleeping with a shotgun fully committed to taking at least one of those death-threatening neo-Stalinist Antifa curb stompers to the light with me if they had showed up at my house. Regular readers certainly have detected elevated anger as I witness the world’s events unfold in ways that were unimaginable a few years back. I have no intention of pussy footing around my foes. I would love to see that mass-murdering Tony Fauci fed to the spirit cookers.

If you came out of the Covid pandemic and not figured out that the entire narrative was an exercise in authoritarianism and possibly a largely peaceful depopulation, I think you are pretty lame. If, however, you grasp the Covid story, you probably have also figured out that the CIA whacked Kennedy, 911 was an inside job, and every war in at least a century was started with one or more false flag events. If so, Pat yourself on the back for grasping many big issues. Robbie Parker understands…

Maybe the Covid scam and all the associated lies proffered by credentialed experts have you wondering if the credentialed climate experts are lying too. Climate change, in my opinion, is the biggest scam in history. If, by contrast, you are supergluing yourself to roads during rush hour and throwing tomato soup onto masterpieces to save humanity, you suffer Munchausen by progressive and are a member of the biggest cult in history. Please—I beg you—when Reverend Jones gives you the nod, drink. (I have returned to climate change again this year, just to top off previous thoughts with some fresh ones and to piss of The Cult.)

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1234
https://twitter.com/i/status/1738224915193770168

 

 

Gatorboy
https://twitter.com/i/status/1738066350851903941

 

 

Owls
https://twitter.com/i/status/1738258097842294885

 

 


Sarcosuchus is an extinct genus of crocodyliform that lived during the Early Cretaceous, 133 to 112 million years ago. The largest specimen reached 9–9.5 meters (29.5–31.2 ft) long. This is a comparison between its skull a nile crocodile’s.

 

 

Gershwin

Frank
https://twitter.com/i/status/1738278116135514383

 

 

Support the Automatic Earth in wartime with Paypal, Bitcoin and Patreon.

 

 

 

 

 

Oct 142023
 


Pablo Picasso Self portrait 1907

 

Middle East On Brink Of Full-Scale War – Russian Envoy To UN (TASS)
Gaza War as Indicator of West’s Crumbling Dominance (Sp.)
US Diplomats Told To Avoid Calls For Gaza ‘Ceasefire’ (RT)
Netanyahu Describes Actions In Gaza As ‘Just The Beginning’ (TASS)
Israel Lost My Sympathy – Croatian President (RT)
Russia is Ready to Mediate in Palestinian-Israeli Settlement – Putin (Sp.)
Israel Targets Hamas’s Labyrinth Of Tunnels Under Gaza (BBC)
Don’t Read American Media – Putin (RT)
Putin Comments On Ukrainian Weapons In Hamas Hands (RT)
Israel’s Intel Failure Is ‘Bad For Business’ (Klarenberg)
All This and World War, Too (Kunstler)
Trump’s Unflattering Story About Netanyahu Elicits Outrage (ZH)
‘Hundreds of Thousands’ Dodging Draft In Ukraine – Minister (RT)
Judge In Trump Classified Documents Case Rebukes Prosecutors (G.)

 

 

 

 

Macgregor

 

 

 

 

Al-Aqsa

 

 

 

 

If we have Kennedy (independent), Biden (democrat), Trump (republican) running and no one of them are able to reach 270 electoral votes, this is what happens next:

Article II, Section 1, US Constitution:
“The Person having the greatest Number of Votes shall be the President, if such Number be a Majority of the whole Number of Electors appointed; and if there be more than one who have such Majority, and have an equal Number of Votes, then the House of Representatives shall immediately chuse by Ballot one of them for President; and if no Person have a Majority, then from the five highest on the List the said House shall in like Manner chuse the President.”

In this event, the House of Representatives will decide the next president from among the FIVE top candidates. Kennedy running as an independent has changed everything. For better or for worse. Assuming he makes it to the finish line.

 

 

 

 

Netanyahu’s been waiting for this all his life. And he doesn’t see, just like the US doesn’t, that it’s too late now. They’ll be up against the entire Arab world, and that they can’t win. The world has changed a lot in the last 20-30 years.

Middle East On Brink Of Full-Scale War – Russian Envoy To UN (TASS)

The Middle East is on the brink of a full-scale war, Russian Permanent Representative to the United Nations Vasily Nebenzya warned. “The region is on the brink of a full scale war and an unprecedented humanitarian catastrophe,” he told reporters following a closed-door UN Security Council meeting on the current escalation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. “Let me be clear: the responsibility for the looming war in the Middle East, to a large extent, lies on the United States,” he told reporters following a closed-door UN Security Council meeting on the current escalation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. According to Nebenzya, “it is Washington that recklessly and selfishly blocked the work of the Middle East Quartet of international mediators in an effort to monopolize the peace process and limit it to imposing an economic peace with Israel on the Palestinians and other Arab countries without solving the Palestinian question.”

“We consistently warned against this, saying it will backfire one day, and so it did,” the Russian envoy stressed. Nebenzya added that “for years, the US blocked any reaction, any signal from the UN Security Council, <...> claiming that its quiet regional diplomacy is more effective.” “We shouldn’t ignore that the current flare-up of violence happens against the background with real systematic violations of the decisions of the UN Security Council and the General Assembly, including the illegal expansion of settlements, which is regularly condemned by the vast majority of UN member states,” he said. Nebenzya added that Russia unequivocally condemned “extreme brutality, killings and the horrifying scale of violence.” “Any killings and violence against peaceful civilians, both Israeli and Palestinian citizens, is inadmissible,” the Russian envoy stressed.

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“The Americans did a lot of things to prevent pacification in this area, not to mention the implementation of the 1947 UN Security Council decision on the creation of an Arab state in Palestine.”

Gaza War as Indicator of West’s Crumbling Dominance (Sp.)

The Gaza crisis serves as a reflection of the crumbling unipolar rules as the world is embracing multipolarity and seeking new approaches to simmering conflicts. Neither Israeli nor American intelligence seemed to be aware about the preparations for Hamas’ surprise assault on Israel last Saturday. “The Middle East region is quieter today than it has been in two decades,” US National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan claimed at the Atlantic Festival on September 29, suggesting that Washington could now shift its focus on the Ukraine conflict and containing China’s rise in the Asia Pacific. As it turned out later, the night before the Hamas attack the Israeli intelligence agencies spotted signs of irregular militant activity in Gaza but IDF and Shin Bet’s top brass decided not to put the Israeli military patrolling the border on high alert, according to the US press. Apparently, the Israeli security leadership also believed that the situation was largely under control.

The Hamas brutal rocket strike and sudden infiltration of Hamas militants in Israel’s territories where the group met little if any resistance became a wake-up call for both Washington and Tel Aviv. However, the erupted conflict is the result of a string of mistakes made by the international community and the US, in particular, during its unipolar moment, according to Alexander Asafov, political scientist, member of the Russian Association of Political Consultants. “It was [the US] who sowed the seeds of these mistakes, which have led to these smoldering conflicts,” Asafov told Sputnik. “And, of course, we see a clear manifestation. [The current crisis] in the Middle East, this is the result of just such a conflict. After all, it was [US President Donald] Trump who moved the US Embassy to Jerusalem. The Americans did a lot of things to prevent pacification in this area, not to mention the implementation of the 1947 UN Security Council decision on the creation of an Arab state in Palestine.

Therefore, of course, this is a clear manifestation of the fact that there is no longer any Pax Americana, no unipolar world. And now the world is entering a new transition period, towards multipolarity, including through pain, blood and awakening conflicts.” According to Asafov, the US and its Western allies did not seek ways to resolve the contradictions once and for all: they capitalized on festering wounds of local crises in the Middle East, Africa, Central Asia and elsewhere. “The world’s hegemon [the US] has kept many conflicts smoldering through manipulation, forceful pressure and various other tools that they call ‘soft’ or ‘smart’ power,” the political scientist continued. “And [Washington] did this deliberately, because it helped both earn money and, among other things, ensure a certain influence and control through dormant conflicts.”

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“..US press materials should steer clear of phrases such as “restoring calm,” “end to violence/bloodshed,” or “de-escalation/ceasefire..”

US Diplomats Told To Avoid Calls For Gaza ‘Ceasefire’ (RT)

The US State Department has advised diplomats to avoid calling for “de-escalation” or a “ceasefire” in Gaza amid continued fighting between Israel and Palestinian militants, multiple media outlets reported. US officials have voiced loud support for the Jewish state’s right to “self-defense” in the wake of a deadly Hamas raid last week. In an email addressed to a small group of officials on Friday, the State Department said US press materials should steer clear of phrases such as “restoring calm,” “end to violence/bloodshed,” or “de-escalation/ceasefire,” unnamed administration officials told NBC News and other outlets. The Huffington Post, which obtained a copy of the email, called the missive a “stunning signal” and an indication of the White House’s “reluctance to push for Israeli restraint.”

The email was sent amid a new round of airstrikes on Gaza in response to a Hamas-led terrorist attack last Saturday. Asked about the directive, an unnamed State Department official told HuffPo that they would not comment on internal communications. Despite the discussions behind the scenes, at a press event in Qatar later on Friday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken told reporters that Washington had stressed to Israel the “importance of taking every possible precaution to avoid harming civilians” in Gaza. He added “We recognize that many Palestinian families in Gaza are suffering through no fault of their own and that Palestinian civilians have lost their lives.”

President Joe Biden has described last weekend’s Hamas attack as “pure evil” and insisted that Israel had a right to respond. However, in some recent remarks he claimed that Washington and its allies “uphold the laws of war,” and reportedly asked his Israeli counterpart, Benjamin Netanyahu, to minimize civilian casualties in Gaza during private discussions, according to NBC. US Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin relayed a similar message to IDF officials during meetings in Israel on Friday, the outlet added, noting that he urged them to “observe international rules of warfare.”

Since last Saturday, at least 1,300 Israelis and nearly 1,900 Palestinians have been killed in hostilities, with thousands more injured on both sides, according to local officials. IDF bombing raids have continued into Saturday morning, leveling whole apartment blocks in some strikes, while Israeli ground troops have begun their initial thrust into Gaza. The Israeli government has ordered more than 1 million residents in northern Gaza to evacuate the area for their own safety, though the United Nations and other rights groups have slammed the directive, saying it was impossible to accomplish without a massive humanitarian toll. Asked about the policy on Friday, White House spokesman John Kirby declined to endorse or condemn it, merely calling it “a tall order.”

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Israel must get rid of Bibi.. His time is up.

Netanyahu Describes Actions In Gaza As ‘Just The Beginning’ (TASS)

The Israeli army’ strikes on Hamas targets in the Gaza Strip are “just the beginning,” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said. “We are responding to our enemies with great force, with unprecedented force. I would like to point out that it’s just the beginning. Our enemies have just begun to pay. I will not go into detail of what will come next, but I will say that it is just the beginning,” Netanyahu said in a televised address to the nation. The Israeli prime minister stressed that in conversations with US President Joe Biden and other world leaders, he was trying to ensure “significant international support” for Tel Aviv. Netanyahu reiterated his confidence that Israel would have total victory over Hamas.

Tensions in the Middle East flared up again after Hamas militants infiltrated Israel from the Gaza Strip on October 7. The Palestinian movement described its attack as a response to the actions of Israeli authorities against the Al-Aqsa Mosque on Jerusalem’s Temple Mount. Israel announced a total blockade of Gaza and started carrying out strikes on the Palestinian enclave, as well as on certain areas in Lebanon and Syria. Clashes are also taking place in the West Bank. Over 1,900 Palestinians have been killed and about 7,700 have suffered wounds; in Israel, the death toll stands at about 1,500 and nearly 4,000 people have been wounded.

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“I think it was an idiotic move, for all my sympathies for Israel – which they unfortunately wasted after 15 minutes..”

He’s not the only one thinking along such lines. He’s merely the only/first western leader to say it out loud.

Israel Lost My Sympathy – Croatian President (RT)

Having the Croatian Foreign Ministry fly an Israeli flag was “idiotic” and inappropriate, President Zoran Milanovic said Friday, noting that the deplorable atrocities by Hamas did not give Israel the right to bomb civilians for revenge. “I think it was an idiotic move, for all my sympathies for Israel – which they unfortunately wasted after 15 minutes – after the horrors and massacres by Hamas,” Milanovic told reporters who asked him about the flag incident. “I condemned the killings [by Hamas], and expressed my horror and revulsion, but the right to self-defense does not include vengeance and killing civilians,” he added.

Hamas launched a surprise attack on Israeli bases and settlements near Gaza on Saturday, killing over 1,300 Israeli citizens, according to the latest figures from West Jerusalem. Israel has declared war on the Palestinian group and bombed Gaza with artillery and aircraft, vowing to “dismantle” the Hamas leadership. At least 1,900 Palestinians, including 614 children and 370 women, have been killed in Gaza over the past week, according to the latest figures from the Palestinian Health Ministry. Some 7,696 were injured, the ministry added.

Milanovic, a Social Democrat, has often clashed with the Croatian cabinet, which is led by the nationalist HDZ. He explained his objection to the flag gesture by citing protocol. “Other flags have no place in Croatia, unless in strictly regulated circumstances,” the president said. He added that he would lower the banners of NATO and the EU – which Croatia joined in 2009 and 2013, respectively – “slightly” below the national flag in his office, “just to show that the Croatian flag is a step above them.”

The former foreign minister, who assumed the presidential post in 2020, has gained notoriety in both the EU and NATO by going against conventional wisdom on many issues. In June, he said the “Glory to Ukraine” slogan repeated by many Western officials was no different than that of the WWII Croatian allies of the Nazis, which he denounced as harmful for Croatia’s image. Earlier this year, Milanovic insisted Croatia was not at war with Russia and criticized the German decision to send tanks to Ukraine. He also criticized the EU’s treatment of member states like Poland and Hungary, and accused Brussels of treating Croatia like a “retarded” child.

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It will have to be China and Russia to make peace. Putin’s in Beijing next week.

Russia is Ready to Mediate in Palestinian-Israeli Settlement – Putin (Sp.)

Russian President Vladimir Putin said at a meeting of the CIS Council of Heads of State that Moscow is ready to mediate in the Palestinian-Israeli settlement. Commenting on the current situation in the region, the president said that civilian casualties in the conflict will be completely unacceptable. “Well, the most important thing is that civilian casualties will be absolutely unacceptable … The main thing now is to stop the bloodshed,” Putin said. The United States attempted to solve the political Palestinian-Israeli problem with the help of certain economic incentive measures, [..] Putin said. The aggravation of the situation in the Middle East is the result of the failed policy of the United States, which was not concerned with finding a compromise in the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the Russian leader said.

“The Middle East Quartet of international mediators was not used. Under far-fetched pretexts, the United States actually blocked this format, which was unique and, by the way, had a mandate approved by the relevant UN resolution. An attempt was made, with the help of certain economic incentive measures, to solve a political problem, an underlying problem, and namely the creation of an independent Palestinian state,” Putin said at a meeting of the CIS Council of Heads of State in a narrow format. The Russian Foreign Ministry earlier called on the sides to cease hostilities. Moscow noted that a settlement of the crisis is possible only on the basis of the “two-state” formula endorsed by the UN Security Council, which provides for the establishment of an independent Palestinian state within the 1967 borders with East Jerusalem as its capital.

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“..Hamas meanwhile claimed that its tunnels stretched 500km and that only 5% were hit. To put those figures into perspective, the London Underground is 400km long and is mostly above ground..”

Israel Targets Hamas’s Labyrinth Of Tunnels Under Gaza (BBC)

Israel says it is striking parts of a secret labyrinth of tunnels built underneath the Gaza Strip by Hamas, as it continues to retaliate for the Palestinian Islamist militant group’s unprecedented cross-border attack on Saturday. “Think of the Gaza Strip as one layer for civilians and then another layer for Hamas. We are trying to get to that second layer that Hamas has built,” an Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesperson said in a video on Thursday. “These aren’t bunkers for Gazan civilians. It’s only for Hamas and other terrorists so that they can continue to fire rockets at Israel, to plan operations, to launch terrorists into Israel,” they claimed. It is very difficult to assess the size of the network, which Israel has dubbed the “Gaza Metro” because it is believed to stretch beneath a territory that is only 41km (25 miles) long and 10km wide.

Following a conflict in 2021, the IDF said it had destroyed more than 100km of tunnels in air strikes. Hamas meanwhile claimed that its tunnels stretched 500km and that only 5% were hit. To put those figures into perspective, the London Underground is 400km long and is mostly above ground. Tunnel construction began in Gaza before Israel withdrew its troops and settlers in 2005. But it was ramped up after Hamas took control of the Strip two years later, which prompted Israel and Egypt to begin restricting the movement of goods and people in and out for security reasons. At its peak, almost 2,500 tunnels running underneath the Egyptian border were used to smuggle in commercial goods, fuel and weapons by Hamas and other militant groups. The smuggling became less important to Gaza after 2010, when Israel began allowing more goods to be imported through its crossings. Egypt later shut the smuggling down by flooding or destroying the tunnels.

Hamas and other factions also started digging tunnels to attack Israeli forces. In 2006, militants used one underneath the border with Israel to kill two Israeli soldiers and seize a third, Gilad Shalit, who they held captive for five years. In 2013, the IDF discovered a 1.6km-long, 18m-deep tunnel lined with a concrete roof and walls leading from the Strip to land near an Israeli kibbutz after residents heard strange sounds. The following year, Israel cited the need to eradicate the threat of attacks by militants using such “terror tunnels” under the frontier for a major air and ground offensive in Gaza. The IDF said its forces destroyed more than 30 tunnels during the war. But a group of militants were also able to use one to mount an attack in which four Israeli soldiers were killed.

“The cross-border tunnels tend to be rudimentary, meaning they have barely any fortification. They are dug for a one-time purpose – invading Israeli territory,” says Dr Daphné Richemond-Barak, an expert on underground warfare who teaches at Reichman University in Israel. “The tunnels inside Gaza are different because Hamas is using them on a regular basis. They are probably more comfortable to be in for longer periods of time. They are definitely equipped for a longer, sustained presence.” “The leaders are hiding there, they have command-and-control centres, they use them for transport and lines of communication. They are equipped with electricity, lighting and rail tracks. You can move around more and stand.”

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“..just listen to the former president of the United States. Listen to him, he will give you a good description of the current level of development of the American media..”

Don’t Read American Media – Putin (RT)

Russian President Vladimir Putin has encouraged reporters to read the American media less. The remark came during a press conference in the Kyrgyz capital of Bishkek in response to a question about reports that the Russian Kant air base in Kyrgyzstan had been abandoned due to the conflict in Ukraine.“American media outlets are saying that all the equipment is in Ukraine, and that the [Kant] base is deserted,” claimed an Izvestia journalist at the press conference. He did not specify which US outlets had made such claims. “You are reading the American media in vain,” Putin told the reporter who had asked the question. “First, they very often distort reality – just listen to the former president of the United States.

Listen to him, he will give you a good description of the current level of development of the American media,” the president said, apparently referring to Donald Trump and adding that American media will “teach you bad things.” Putin insisted that the Kant military base remains active and continues to act as a “deterrent factor for various extremists.” He added that there is also an active aviation unit there which includes combat aircraft and helicopters. “They are at Kant, on combat duty and service,” Putin said.

On Thursday, the Russian leader, together with his Kyrgyz counterpart Sadyr Japarov, took part in a ceremony dedicated to the 20th anniversary of the opening of the Kant base. During the ceremony, Putin declared that Russia will continue to provide the base with the most modern weapons and promised to solve all the issues that the military personnel serving at the base may have. The Russian president’s visit to Kyrgyzstan marks the first time he has traveled abroad since the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for him earlier this year. Next week, Putin is expected to travel to China to meet with President Xi Jinping during the international Belt and Road forum.

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“..they even sell [weapons] to Russia, and if they can sell them to Russia, nothing surprises me anymore..”

Putin Comments On Ukrainian Weapons In Hamas Hands (RT)

That some of the weapons sent to Ukraine ended up in the hands of Hamas militants probably has more to do with corruption than deliberate deliveries, Russian President Vladimir Putin said on Friday. “I doubt that there were deliveries of weapons from Ukraine, but I have no doubt there were leaks of weapons from Ukraine,” Putin explained at a press conference in the Kyrgyz capital of Bishkek. “We know the level of corruption in Ukraine is very high. The black market arises when there are many who want to buy, and in Ukraine there are many who want to sell,” he added, noting that Ukrainians were “definitely selling” weapons on the international market through countries in Africa and the Middle East.

“Why, they even sell [weapons] to Russia, and if they can sell them to Russia, nothing surprises me anymore,” the Russian president said. The issue of Hamas using weapons the US and its allies had sent to Ukraine was first raised by former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev, who claimed such equipment was “being actively used in Israel.” Kiev’s military intelligence responded by accusing Russia of sending Western weapons captured in Ukraine to Hamas in a “false flag” operation designed to make Kiev look bad to its backers. Israel has neither confirmed nor denied Medvedev’s weapons claim, but rejected the Ukrainian insinuations of Russian involvement in the Hamas attack as “complete nonsense.”

Hamas militants fired hundreds of rockets into Israel on Saturday, followed by raids into nearby Israeli settlements, villages, and towns. Israeli authorities said more than 1,300 people died in the surprise attack. West Jerusalem has responded by declaring a “war” against Gaza. Speaking about the escalating conflict, Putin noted that Israel is facing an unprecedented attack but that its response has been “quite brutal.” He also offered Russian mediation, given that Moscow had “very good relations” with Israel, as well as traditional ties with the Palestinians, “so no one can suspect that we want to play some kind of games.”

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Pegasus.

Israel’s Intel Failure Is ‘Bad For Business’ (Klarenberg)

Last year, the Times of Israel reported that in 2021, the country’s overall cybersecurity exports were estimated at $11 billion. In addition, 33 percent of cyber unicorn companies operate from Israel, and a whopping 40 percent of global private cyber investments have been funneled into the country, according to the Israeli government. From Tel Aviv’s perspective, the exposure of their electronic surveillance and warfare systems as ineffective and vulnerable to guerrilla attacks is a serious blow to Israel’s “Startup Nation” brand, which relies heavily on its multi-billion-dollar tech sector – with cybersecurity at its core. Just a few years back, in 2018, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu had boasted:

“Cybersecurity grows through cooperation, and cybersecurity as a business is tremendous…We spent an enormous amount on our military intelligence and Mossad and Shin Bet. An enormous amount. An enormous part of that is being diverted to cybersecurity…We think there is a tremendous business opportunity in the neverending quest of security.” The push for cybersecurity supremacy permeates almost every area of Israeli society. Universities hone innovative new technologies and train future generations of cyber spies and security operatives, to be employed upon graduation by the welter of firms locally and abroad founded by veterans of Tel Aviv’s infamous cyber intelligence agencies, such as Unit 8200, which act as effective arm’s length divisions of the Israeli state.

Graphic videos showcasing Israel’s “surgical strikes” on Palestinian civilians and infrastructure are used as a marketing tool to promote their weaponry to foreign clients, while practical demonstrations of invasive surveillance tools like the notorious Pegasus have gained notoriety. Pegasus infects target smartphones, enabling the real-time harvesting of vast amounts of sensitive user data. In recent years, revelations of foreign governments and security agencies being implicated in scandals due to their covert use of Pegasus have become disturbingly routine. This invasive tool was developed by the NSO Group, founded by a former Mossad operative. A 2021 Carnegie Endowment investigation revealed that 56 different states had procured this technology, as well as other spyware and “digital forensics” innovations from Israeli competitors like Candiru, Cellebrite, and Cytrox.

As Jeff Halper, director of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions, documented in his 2015 book War Against The People, Tel Aviv hawking wares such as Pegasus to overseas customers generates an enormous amount of diplomatic goodwill, which is highly effective in stifling international criticism of Zionist barbarism towards Palestinians. After all, that barbarism’s brutal efficacy has perversely become a unique selling point for Israeli killing apparatuses, surveillance “solutions,” and battle tactics worldwide. Mere days before Operation al-Aqsa Flood commenced, Israeli media reported on a “record-breaking spike” in countries buying Israeli cyber warfare and intelligence systems from 67 to 83 over 2022, and marketing licenses for these wares granted to 126 countries.

This followed a “dramatic decline” in 2021, precipitated by the exposure of widespread use of Pegasus by repressive governments, and NSO and Candiru being blacklisted by Washington. It seems likely the events of recent days will also lead to a significant decline in the fortunes of Israel’s cybersecurity sector. Gaza is, by design, an open-air concentration camp, and in theory, nothing and no one gets in or out without Tel Aviv’s authorization and knowledge. However, this time, the supposed internal surveillance system failed catastrophically.

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“..well before the 2024 election, America will have a new chief executive and that it won’t be Kamala Harris. It could be someone in a uniform, though.”

All This and World War, Too (Kunstler)

One naturally wonders what role the shadowy Globalists have played in the build-up to all this, and how things will go with them. I can imagine Europe plunged into political chaos that would lead to scenes like a mob riding Klaus Schwab out of his Swiss redoubt on a rail, and the German government falling, and Paris on fire, and street-fighting in Stockholm. Chaos is as chaos wantsto do. One thing seems certain: it’ll be a cold winter there for most everybody. It’s probably safe to say that Mr. Zelensky will not be getting additional bowls of gruel out of Uncle Sam. No one is paying attention to Ukraine now, and that sudden neglect by the once-solicitous NATO alliance could go on indefinitely with wider conflict breaking out elsewhere — meaning that Russia will be left to methodically restore the status quo ante that allowed Ukraine to be a quiet backwater in Russia’s sphere of influence since the end of the previous world war, until our wicked and reckless neocons moved to wreck the joint.

China is the joker in the deck now. There’s plenty of chatter that China’s banking system is toast, with its new and large middle class left holding a giant bag of worthless securities and unsellable real estate, and that when they are sufficiently pissed-off that will be the last round-up for Uncle Xi and his CCP. But then, you can also easily imagine that gang thinking now is the optimum moment to try and grab Taiwan and its riches, with Western Civ all tied up elsewhere. I remind you of China’s “Four Wars” doctrine for bringing us down. There’s Ukraine, now Israel, there’s the internal war of Left versus Right throughout the West, and there’s the massive invasion of Europe and the USA of uninvited mutts. Four wars. The breaking point.

Yet to play out is America’s crisis of leadership. As supply lines break, and the flash mobs loot the luxury shops, and the illegal aliens stream in, and the price of everything goes up-up-up, and the truth about the Covid vaccines is finally grokked, even the dazed-and-confused American public might notice that the White House has become a zombie palace. Politics hates a vacuum and “Joe Biden” begins to look like a black hole that will suck the execrable deep state blob that surrounds him across the event horizon that opens to oblivion. I’d go so far to predict that well before the 2024 election, America will have a new chief executive and that it won’t be Kamala Harris. It could be someone in a uniform, though. Just sayin’. Everything is in flux.

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“Every US President has hated Netanyahu, regarding him as a conniving fanatic. But only Trump said out loud what Obama was overheard saying on a hot mic and Clinton said in private.”

Trump’s Unflattering Story About Netanyahu Elicits Outrage (ZH)

Republican rivals of former President Donald Trump have lashed out at the GOP front-runner for telling a story about Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu which put him in a negative light and suggested he’s ‘weak’ at a sensitive moment. It happened Wednesday night at a campaign rally. Trump was recounting the events and hours leading up to his decision to kill top Iranian general Qassem Soleimani in a 2020 drone strike outside the Baghdad airport. Trump told a cheering crowd that the Israeli prime minister “let us down” by backing out of participation in the covert operation at the last minute. Watch: Trump also controversially said this week Israeli leaders need to “step up their game” as Netanyahu “was not prepared” for the deadly Saturday raid into southern Israel.

He further called Hezbollah “very smart” while generally urging Israel to be more prepared and efficient. He had at one point called Israel’s Defense Minister Yoav Gallant a “jerk”. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, chief among Trump’s 2024 rivals for the Republican presidential nomination, blasted the somewhat impulsive words, saying “Now is not the time to be attacking our ally,” – especially as the Israeli bodies and missing are still being counted. DeSantis also admitted that while “there’s a lot of people that generally like Trump’s policies,” they are not “big fans” of his behavior, in a swipe at the story about Soleimani’s death. But it was Chris Christie, also in the 2024 race, who went even more on the attack, calling Trump “a fool”.

“Only a fool would make those kinds of comments. Only a fool would give comments that give aid and comfort to Israel’s adversary in this situation, and he always places it in the context of himself,” the former New Jersey governor said. “This is someone who cares not about the American people, not about the people of Israel, but he cares about one person and one person only: The person he sees in the mirror when he wakes up in the morning,” Christie continued. “As a Republican Party, we cannot once again nominate a fool like this to be our nominee and get him anywhere near the presidency of the United States.”

Jewish groups also weren’t happy: Ari Fleischer, the former White House press secretary who serves on the board of the Republican Jewish Coalition, said he wished Trump would “let his personal grievances with Bibi, whatever they are, slide for now.” [..] Journalist Max Blumenthal offered his opinion on Trump’s words, saying “Every US President has hated Netanyahu, regarding him as a conniving fanatic. But only Trump said out loud what Obama was overheard saying on a hot mic and Clinton said in private.”

Read more …

They’re just waiting for Zelensky to go.

‘Hundreds of Thousands’ Dodging Draft In Ukraine – Minister (RT)

Hundreds of thousands of Ukrainian men are dodging the draft at present, amid the ongoing mobilization, Deputy Defense Minister Natalya Kalmykova has said. She added that the authorities are working on legislation that will “help settle this issue.” Speaking to Ukraine’s Rada TV on Friday, Kalmykova said that “unfortunately, we see a lot of situations… when people don’t want and plan to avoid mobilization somehow, the need to defend their country.” She claimed that the number of draft dodgers amounts to “tens, hundreds of thousands of people.” Speaking to Ukrainskaya Pravda last week, Interior Minister Igor Klimenko warned that the Ukrainian government is looking at ways to punish those who have fled the country to avoid military service.

He told the newspaper that they will likely face administrative fines, adding, however, that those who have used fake papers or illegally secured documents to allow them to leave Ukraine could end up in prison. In recent months, the Ukrainian authorities have reportedly been exploring the possibility of getting men of military age who have fled the country to return. In late August, a senior lawmaker from President Vladimir Zelensky’s ruling party, David Arakhamia, said Kiev could seek the extradition of draft dodgers from the EU. Multiple EU states, including Germany, Austria, Hungary, and the Czech Republic, have already made it clear they will not round up draft dodgers and send them back to Ukraine. Total mobilization has been repeatedly prolonged in Ukraine ever since Russia launched its military operation in the country in February 2022.

Recruitment officers regularly conduct raids in public spaces, cafes, and on the streets. Local media outlets have reported on cases in which officials have used force to detain those who refuse to join the army. Zelensky has publicly acknowledged that Ukraine’s counteroffensive, which was launched in early June, has run into difficulties. Last month, he attributed the slow pace of the operation to Russian air superiority, as well as the failure of Kiev’s Western backers to send the necessary weapons. Western military officials have also stated that Russian defenses have proven more resilient than expected. Last week, Russian President Vladimir Putin put the number of Ukrainian casualties since the start of the counteroffensive at 90,000, estimating that nearly 1,900 armored vehicles and 557 tanks have been destroyed as well.

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“..rebuked prosecutors for “wasting the court’s time” on Thursday with their sudden request to partly restrict the lawyer for one of Trump’s co-defendants..”

Judge In Trump Classified Documents Case Rebukes Prosecutors (G.)

The federal judge in the criminal case about Donald Trump’s retention of classified documents rebuked prosecutors for “wasting the court’s time” on Thursday with their sudden request to partly restrict the lawyer for one of Trump’s co-defendants. US district judge Aileen Cannon abruptly postponed the hearing after getting the request – which came after prosecutors had first said they would not seek disqualification. “I do want to admonish the government for frankly wasting the court’s time,” Cannon said. She added she was “disappointed” that David Harbach, one of the prosecutors, had raised the request without warning, and without citing supporting cases from the southern district of Florida.

The hearing was the second in a pair of proceedings scheduled so Trump’s co-defendants, Walt Nauta and Carlos De Oliveira, could be told of their lawyers’ prior representation of witnesses during the grand jury investigation who could testify against them at trial. Trump and Nauta were charged in an indictment alleging the illegal retention of national defense documents at Trump’s Mar-a-Lago resort and obstruction of justice. With De Oliveira they were charged on additional obstruction counts in a superseding indictment unsealed in July. The prosecutors in the office of special counsel Jack Smith had asked for conflict-of-interest hearings for Nauta’s lawyer Stanley Woodward and De Oliveira’s lawyer John Irving, due to the fact they might be constrained at trial because of divided loyalties to their current and former clients.

The complication emerged at the hearing for Nauta, when prosecutors said they could not be sure how Woodward might cross-examine “Trump Employee 4”, identified by the Guardian as the IT director of Mar-a-Lago, Yuscil Taveras. Taveras is of special interest because Woodward initially represented him during the grand jury investigation. When prosecutors told him he was a target for charges, Taveras retained a new lawyer – not paid by Trump’s PAC – and changed his sworn testimony. The prosecutors revealed at the hearing that they now intended to call Taveras as a witness, and told the judge they believed Woodward should be precluded from engaging in cross-examination, or be allowed to call into question his credibility during closing arguments to the jury. The cross-examination concern had been previously raised in court filings. But asking to preclude Woodward from doing closing arguments was a new request, and it seemed to irritate Cannon, who pressed Harbach on why it was being raised for the first time at the hearing.

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Horsepower
https://twitter.com/i/status/1712760084051140885

 

 

Ears

 

 

Alpaca

 

 

Ears

 

 

 

 

Support the Automatic Earth in wartime with Paypal, Bitcoin and Patreon.

 

 

 

 

 

Sep 142023
 
 September 14, 2023  Posted by at 8:52 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , ,  39 Responses »


Claude Monet The Wooden Bridge 1872

 

White House Tells Media How To Cover Biden Impeachment (RT)
White House Tells Media To “Ramp Up Scrutiny” of Impeachment Inquiry (Turley)
Hunter Biden Sues Former Trump Aide Who Published Laptop Materials (Sp.)
RFK Jr. Telegraphs Threat to Vacate Democrat Party (PJM)
Does Putin Realize The Danger In Projecting The Image Of A Weak Russia? (PCR)
EU States Tell Zelensky They Won’t Hand Over Draft Dodgers (RT)
China And India Have ‘Low Intellectual Potential’ – Zelensky Aide (RT)
Russia’s Pivot To The East Is ‘Irreversible’ (RT)
The South China Sea’s Resource Wars (Frank)
Musk Gave Control Of Starlink To Pentagon – Biographer (RT)
‘Weaponized Govt Agencies’ “Don’t Wish Good Things For Me” – Elon Musk (ZH)
Great Reset Visionaries Stumble Upon An Unexpected Roadblock (Schlevogt)
Was There A “War On Terror” Or A War On The American People? (PCR)

 

 

Biden map
https://twitter.com/i/status/1702117416313208863

 

 

War Games in the Black Sea – Now What? w/ Col Doug Macgregor

 

 

Hunter

 

 

Emmer

 

 

 

 

These are the same people who impeached Trump based on lies invented from whole cloth by the Hillary Clinton campaign. Who made sure the FBI sat on the laptop for 4-5 years. Who had 51 intel guys and gals declare all its contents Russian disinformation. Those same people.

White House Tells Media How To Cover Biden Impeachment (RT)

White House lawyers have reportedly written a letter directing CNN, the New York Times and other US media outlets to scrutinize Republican lawmakers more aggressively as they try to impeach US President Joe Biden. CNN and other recipients of the letter acknowledged getting the missive on Wednesday. “It’s time for the media to ramp up its scrutiny of House Republicans for opening an impeachment inquiry based on lies,” Ian Sams, a spokesman for the White House Counsel’s Office, wrote in the letter. He added that the impeachment efforts should “set off alarm bells for news organizations.” US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-California) launched the impeachment effort on Tuesday, directing committees of the Republican-controlled House of Representatives to open a formal inquiry.

He said allegations of influence-peddling and solicitation of bribes by the Biden family “paint a picture of a culture of corruption.” Even before receiving any guidance from the White House, some US media outlets already appeared to be trying to protect the president. CNN and Associated Press, for instance, suggested that Republicans were trying to prosecute Biden without having evidence to justify their investigation. Those outlets apparently ignored such evidence as the sworn testimony of IRS whistleblowers and the records of bank transfers that lawmakers have already revealed. By launching impeachment proceedings, congressional committees will gain more power to subpoena documents that could help prove or debunk the allegations.

Veteran US journalist Matthew Keys, who has worked for such outlets as Reuters and Fox News, said the White House directive on impeachment coverage was “not OK.” He added, “The White House should not be encouraging, influencing or interfering in the editorial strategies of America’s newsrooms, including CNN and the New York Times.” The letter could backfire, Keys said, because “any time the media does try to hold Republicans to account, those lawmakers can simply counter by questioning whether it’s actual journalism or something encouraged by the Biden administration.” Legal scholar Jonathan Turley, a professor at George Washington University, said the directive “has an uncomfortable feeling of marching orders to the media.”

By trying to influence coverage of the impeachment inquiry, he argued, the administration “removes any pretense of separation between the Biden personal legal team and the White House Counsel’s Office.” Sams, who also serves as a senior adviser to Biden, claimed that Republicans had failed in nearly nine months of investigation to “turn up any evidence of the president doing anything wrong.” He added that impeachment is “grave, rare and historic,” and the press must treat the claims of Republicans with “appropriate scrutiny.” The White House official attached a 14-page appendix to his memo providing talking points to address Republican “lies.” Democrats previously controlled the House and twice impeached then-President Donald Trump.

Read more …

Turley’s take: “..the White House is now calling for the media to again form the wagons around the President and attack the impeachment effort as it did the laptop and the corruption investigation.”

White House Tells Media To “Ramp Up Scrutiny” of Impeachment Inquiry (Turley)

[..] a system by consent rather than coercion. Given that long concern, a letter drafted by the Biden White House Legal Counsel’s Office was striking in a call for major media to “ramp up their scrutiny” of House Republicans “for opening an impeachment inquiry based on lies.” The message is curious and concerning, particularly in the aggressive role being played by the White House Counsel’s office under Stuart Frank Delery. First, as I have previously noted, the White House is now actively involved in pushing narratives and denying factual allegations linked to the Biden corruption scandal. That could create Nixonian-type allegations of the abuse of office in the use of federal employees to counter impeachment efforts. Second, the letter was drafted by Ian Sams, a spokesperson for the White House Counsel’s Office.

So White House lawyers are now enlisting the media in a counter media campaign against impeachment? The letter removes any pretense of separation between the Biden personal legal team and the White House Counsel’s office. Sams has been the most aggressive White House official in actively swatting down allegations of corruption as well as the President’s documents investigation. Third, the letter calls for the media to actively support the White House account. The draft of the letter is a call for what I have previously criticized as “advocacy journalism” where reporters frame stories to advance their own viewpoints or values. Sam wrote “[c]overing impeachment as a process story – Republicans say X, but the White House says Y – is a disservice to the American public who relies on the independent press to hold those in power accountable.”

In other words, media should (and it has for years) refuse to give equal attention to allegations agains the Bidens and instead tell the public what the truth is. It is a call for media to tailor the coverage to push the position of the White House against this effort to ramp up the investigation into corruption. It is an approach that is already embraced by many in the media. [..] The letter has an uncomfortable feeling of marching orders to the media. This is a media that followed the lead of Biden associates in spreading the false story that the Hunter laptop was Russian disinformation. This is the media that refused to acknowledge the authenticity of the laptop until only recently — long after the presidential election. This was the media that only recently admitted that President Biden has been lying about denials related to his son’s influence peddling. Yet, the White House is now calling for the media to again form the wagons around the President and attack the impeachment effort as it did the laptop and the corruption investigation.

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“..the suit against Ziegler does not admit the laptop belonged to Hunter Biden but does assert the data belongs to him..”

Hunter Biden Sues Former Trump Aide Who Published Laptop Materials (Sp.)

Attorneys for Hunter Biden have filed a suit against Garrett Ziegler, who has been publishing emails and photos allegedly from Hunter Biden’s now infamous laptop, alleging that he violated California state and federal computer fraud laws in doing so. The suit, filed in California, specifically accuses Ziegler and a non-profit organization he runs called Marco Polo, of violating the California Computer Data Access and Fraud Act and the federal Computer Fraud and Abuse Act. On the Marco Polo website, Ziegler published tens of thousands of emails, photos and videos purportedly from the laptop. Similar to Hunter Biden’s lawsuit against laptop repair shop owner John Paul Mac Isaac, the suit against Ziegler does not admit the laptop belonged to Hunter Biden but does assert the data belongs to him.

The lawsuit also accuses Ziegler of hacking an encrypted backup of Hunter Biden’s iPhone that was on the laptop, something he seemingly admitted to doing during a December 2022 interview. Mac Isaac, who says he first gave the laptop to the FBI and later to former President Donald Trump’s lawyer Rudy Giuliani, has also sued Hunter Biden, Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) and two US media outlets for defamation and civil conspiracy. Both lawsuits are pending. Ziegler is a former Trump aide who worked under trade adviser Peter Navarro. The lawsuit describes him as “a zealot who has waged a sustained, unhinged and obsessed campaign against [Hunter Biden] and the entire Biden family for more than two years.”

[..] The California Comprehensive Computer Data Access and Fraud Act (CCCDAFA) is designed to prosecute hackers. It forbids individuals that “accesses and without permission takes, copies, or makes use of any data from a computer, computer system, or computer network, or takes or copies any supporting documentation, whether existing or residing internal or external to a computer, computer system, or computer network,” with the intent to defraud, cause harm, or commit a crime. However, the law is not clear on who owns the data contained within the laptop. According to Delaware law, where the laptop was reportedly left, abandoned property belongs to the individual tasked with caring for it after reasonable attempts to contact the original owner have been made. But the law is less clear if that would limit ownership to the laptop itself, or if it would include the data contained within.

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“RFK Jr. abandoning the Democrats would all but ensure a defeat of the Brandon entity — and a brutal, landslide one at that..”

RFK Jr. Telegraphs Threat to Vacate Democrat Party (PJM)

The Democrat Party has a latent disaster on its hand vis a vis one RFK Jr. On the one hand, they are fully dedicated to sabotaging his campaign. Under no circumstances whatsoever will he be permitted to win the nomination. Even if he had 80%+ support from the electorate, the sick truth is that party leadership (influenced by the consultant and donor classes) would rather lose with Brandon than win with RFK Jr. because of what he’s liable to do to the Deep State and D.C. largesse were he ever to assume office. It would be a proverbial bloodbath for the administrative state and all of the grifters who feed on it. On the other hand, they need to keep RFK Jr. within the Democrat Party fold because if he were to go rogue and run third party — which he, frankly, should have been doing all along — it would be a veritable death knell for the Brandon entity’s prospects in 2024, which are wafer-thin as it is.

Whatever perceived threat Cornel West poses to Brandon’s re-election with his Green Party run, magnify that threat by 10x, 100x and you’re in the ballpark of what RFK Jr. would do to the party. It’s not outlandish to speculate that a strong third-party run by RFK Jr. might literally break the Democrat Party for years or possibly forever. That’s how sick of the party’s BS its own members, not to mention independents and non-voters (the largest, unserviced voting bloc in the country), are. RFK Jr. has already proven himself nearly bulletproof from relentless Democrat Party and corporate state media attacks — arguably on the same level in this regard as “Teflon” Don.

Here is RFK Jr., in an interview with Forbes, explaining what elaborate lengths the Democrat Party has gone to to rig the primary against him, outright threatening that he might drop his intra-party bid and turn his campaign into a third-party run:

“If the DNC is gonna make it, is gonna rig it so that it is simply impossible for anybody to challenge President Biden, and you know I need to look at other alternatives. Because I can’t go back to the people who support me, to my donors, and say you know, I’m just going to, I’m just in this to make a point, I need to show them a road to victory.” What is for now a threat — albeit apparently a sincere and credible threat — needs to be encouraged by everyone to evolve into reality. RFK Jr. abandoning the Democrats would all but ensure a defeat of the Brandon entity — and a brutal, landslide one at that — in 2024, which can be nothing but good news for all Americans, even delusional, loyal Democrats who don’t understand their own self-interest.

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Paul Craig Roberts: ” If Putin really wants to save lives, he should hurry up and win the war.”

Does Putin Realize The Danger In Projecting The Image Of A Weak Russia? (PCR)

Militarily and diplomatically weak EU countries, not one of which is capable of going to war, are stealing the cars, cell phones, and even soap of Russians who enter Europe as tourists. Why Russians want to be tourists in the EU that is aligned with the US and Ukraine against Russia is a mystery. Although Germany, for example, would be instantly defeated in a war with Russia, the German government feels secure in robbing Russians who come to Germany as tourists. How is it that such a weak country as Germany can feel secure robbing Russian citizens? Perhaps the answer is that by permitting a conflict to continue for 17 months against an impotent Ukraine, Putin has convinced Europe and the US that Russia is too weak to risk Western ire by winning in Ukraine.

Clearly the West believes this as we can see from humiliation after humiliation delivered to Putin and to Russia. Putin could not even attend the meeting of BRICS, his own creation, in South Africa without being arrested and turned over to the International Criminal Court. Clearly, no one is afraid of Putin and Russia. When you have enemies who do not fear you and even mock you, you can expect provocations to rise in intensity. You can also expect to demoralize your own people and your own army, thus encouraging your opponent to be more aggressive. This has been my concern since February 2022, not because I am on Russia’s side but because I believe the provocations will result in a wider, likely nuclear, war. Col. Douglas Macgregor has come to share my concern.

When asked recently in an interview to assess Putin as a war leader, Macgregor said that Putin is overly cautious and that there is concern in the Russian military that by allowing the conflict to drag on, Putin gives credibility to the propaganda that Russia is weak and this encourages more Western intervention. Prigozhin, the Wagner Group commander, had this opinion, and when he tried to get Putin’s attention he was falsely accused of attempting a coup and treason. It seems the Russian government and media invents false narratives just as does the West. Col. Macgregor says, “I am worried — if you don’t act quickly to end it, at some point, you’re in trouble — and he’s in trouble, his country is. So, I think there has to be an end to this — but you can’t end it at the negotiating table. If you march to the Dnieper River and send your tank columns into Kiev, then you have a shot at ending it. But if he sits where he is, I don’t know . . .”

Neither does Putin, but he continues to sit there all the while convincing the neoconservatives that Russia lacks the strength to launch an offensive even against a defeated Ukrainian army. Does Putin really want to convince the West that Russia is too weak to really fight or that he is too much of a goody two shoes compassionate liberal to be a war leader? It would be irresponsible to lead the West to such a dangerous conclusion. If Putin really wants to save lives, he should hurry up and win the war.

Read more …

Except for Poland.

EU States Tell Zelensky They Won’t Hand Over Draft Dodgers (RT)

The Czech Republic announced on Wednesday that it would not send military-age men who came as refugees back to Ukraine to be conscripted. Germany, Austria and Hungary have already made similar declarations. European conventions exclude extradition for things such as desertion or draft evasion, Justice Ministry spokesman Vladimir Repka told the outlet iDnes. However, he added that if Ukraine files individual extradition requests citing a specific criminal act they may have committed, Prague may give them consideration. Hungary has ruled out any extraditions outright. “We are not investigating any Ukrainian refugees to determine if they have been called up for military service. Hungary will not extradite them to Ukraine,” Deputy Prime Minister Zsolt Semjén told the outlet ATV on Wednesday.

“All refugees from Ukraine are safe in Hungary.” German officials who spoke to Deutsche Welle earlier this week said that Berlin did not intend to send draft-eligible refugees back, since desertion and draft evasion are not crimes under German law. There are over 123,000 Ukrainian men of military age who are in Germany as refugees, according to official estimates. Vienna was the first to refuse extradition of military-age men. There are about 14,000 potential draftees among the 101,000 Ukrainian refugees in Austria. “That would be a massive encroachment on our statehood, we would never do that,” a spokesman for the Interior Ministry told the outlet Exxpress on September 7.

On the other hand, Poland has already begun sending some Ukrainian men back, according to Hungarian media reports. A senior lawmaker from President Vladimir Zelensky’s ruling party said in late August that Ukraine might seek extradition of draft-dodgers from the EU. The government in Kiev recently announced another round of mobilization in order to make up battlefield losses, which Russian President Vladimir Putin estimated at over 70,000 in the past three months of heavy fighting. Zelensky fired all draft commissioners last month and ordered a review of all medical exemptions from military service, citing widespread corruption. New rules were adopted allowing for the conscription of people with mental disorders, chronic diseases, tuberculosis and HIV.

Read more …

How to make friends when you need them most.

China And India Have ‘Low Intellectual Potential’ – Zelensky Aide (RT)

The people leading India and China lack the ability to predict the long-term consequences of their policies, a senior aide to Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has claimed. Mikhail Podoliak pointed to what he called “the problem of the modern world,” singling out India and China, in an interview with Ukrainian media on Tuesday. “The problem with these countries is that they do not analyze the consequences of their own moves. These countries, unfortunately, have low intellectual potential,” he said. Podoliak suggested that even though India has a lunar exploration program, it “does not mean that this nation understands what the modern world precisely is.”

The dismissive remarks were in the context of Beijing and New Delhi’s refusal to support Kiev in its conflict with Moscow. Podoliak complained that India, China and Türkiye were “profiting” from the war by maintaining trade with Russia. “Technically, it is in their national interests,” he acknowledged, before presenting his view of what would benefit China in the long-run. “China should be interested in Russia disappearing, because it is an archaic nation that drags China into unnecessary conflicts,” he claimed. “It would be in their interest now to distance themselves from Russia as far as possible, take all the resources it has, and take part of the Russian territory under their legal control. In fact, they will do that,” he added.

Following the interview, the Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman urged Podoliak to clarify his remarks, when asked about them during a media briefing on Wednesday. Podoliak has a record of lashing out at nations, organizations and public figures seen as not sufficiently supportive of Kiev. Among his latest targets was Pope Francis, whom he had branded an “instrument of Russian propaganda” who “continues to reduce the influence of Catholicism in the word to zero.” The pontiff had encouraged Russian Catholics to cherish their nation’s historic legacy. The Ukrainian official also recently hit out at Elon Musk, who Podoliak claimed “enabled evil” by refusing Kiev’s request to use his Starlink communications system to launch drone attacks against the Russian Black Sea Fleet.

Read more …

“Even if we imagine that we will once again be friends with the West, that they will lift their sanctions, our businesses will not return to the West..”

Russia’s Pivot To The East Is ‘Irreversible’ (RT)

Russia is steadily reorienting trade and business cooperation toward Asia and away from the “static” West, Presidential Business Rights Commissioner Boris Titov told RIA Novosti on Wednesday. Speaking on the sidelines of the Eastern Economic Forum in Vladivostok, Titov stated that while the process initially started as a political response to Western sanctions against Moscow, it has since evolved and is now based entirely on economics. “Until recently, the process of Russia’s turn to the East was largely due to political reasons, but today everything has changed dramatically… Now we can say with certainty that this turn is irreversible, and it is based not on political, but primarily economic reasons,” the ombudsman said.

Titov claimed that while the Western economy is well-developed, it is already “too heavily invested and sluggish.” “In the East, on the other hand, everything is booming, moving forward rapidly, developing rapidly. And this applies not only to China, India, and Indonesia, but also to many other countries. They are the center of development today, not Europe, our main consumers of energy are there, finally,” the Russian official added. According to Titov, Russian entrepreneurs have already realized that doing business in the East is more lucrative.

“Even if we imagine that we will once again be friends with the West, that they will lift their sanctions, our businesses will not return to the West… It is much more interesting to enter the developing markets of the East and grow together than to remain static in the West,” Titov concluded. Russia has steadily developed ties with countries in the Global East and South in recent years, although the process has greatly accelerated due to the conflict in Ukraine and the ensuing Western sanctions against Moscow. In recent months, Russia has become the top supplier of oil to both China and India, as well as the largest European exporter to China overall.According to a recent survey by the state-owned Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VTsIOM), 67% of Russians approve of the eastward pivot, with only 11% against it.

Read more …

“By some estimates, that seabed may contain 1,000 times more rare earth elements than those below dry ground..”

The South China Sea’s Resource Wars (Frank)

You could call it a race to the bottom, with China leading the charge. In December 2022, that country unveiled its Ocean Drilling Ship, a deep sea mining (DSM) vessel the size of a battle cruiser set to be operational by 2024. Instead of weaponry, however, the ship is equipped with advanced excavation equipment capable of drilling at depths of 32,000 feet. On land, the Chinese already hold a virtual monopoly on metals considered vital to “green” energy development, including cobalt, copper, and lithium. Currently, the Chinese control 60% of the world’s supply of such “green” metals and are now eyeing the abundant resources that exist beneath the ocean’s floor as well. By some estimates, that seabed may contain 1,000 times more rare earth elements than those below dry ground.

It’s difficult to believe that devastating the ocean’s depths in search of minerals for electric batteries and other technologies could offer a sustainable way to fend off climate change. In the process, after all, such undersea mining is likely to have a catastrophic impact, including destroying biodiversity. Right now, it’s impossible to gauge just what sort of damage will be inflicted by such operations, since deep-sea mining is exempt from environmental impact assessments. (How convenient for those who will argue about how crucial they will be to producing a greener, more sustainable future.)

The U.N.’s High Seas Treaty, ratified in March 2023, failed to include environmental rules regulating such practices after China blocked any discussion of a possible moratorium on seabed harvesting. As of 2022, China holds five exploration contracts issued by the U.N.’s International Seabed Authority (ISA), allowing the Chinese to conduct tests and sample contents on the ocean floor. While that U.N. body can divvy up such contracts, they have no power to regulate the industry itself, nor the personnel to do so. This has scientists worried that unfettered deep-sea mining could cause irreparable damage, including killing sea creatures and destroying delicate habitats.

“We’ve only scratched the surface of understanding the deep ocean,” said Dr. Andrew Chin, a scientific adviser to the Australian-based Save Our Seas Foundation. “Science is just starting to appreciate that the deep sea is not an empty void but is brimming with wonderful and unique life forms. Deep sea ecosystems form an interconnected realm with mid and surface waters through the movement of species, energy flows, and currents. Not only will the nodule mining result in the loss of these species and damage deep sea beds for thousands of years, it will potentially result in negative consequences for the rest of the ocean and the people who depend on its health.”

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The biographer didn’t understand everything Musk told him. That leads to strange confusion.

Musk Gave Control Of Starlink To Pentagon – Biographer (RT)

Elon Musk gave the US military full control over a “certain amount of Starlink equipment” and can no longer influence how the system is being used to aid Kiev’s war effort, his biographer has unveiled, claiming the tech mogul wished to end his involvement in a scheme that could “cause a nuclear war.” Speaking to the Washington Post’s David Ignatius for an interview published on Wednesday, Musk biographer Walter Isaacson was asked about the billionaire’s decisions regarding Starlink, a constellation of satellites designed to provide global internet access and phone service which has also been used by the Ukrainian military.

Musk was initially “critically supportive” of Kiev and allowed near-full access to the Starlink system, according to Ignatius, who wondered why the entrepreneur eventually became “very nervous” and began restricting the range of the satellites, including in sensitive regions such as Crimea. “I’ve talked to him during this whole thing, and there was late one night, he said, ‘Why am I in this war?’ He said, ‘I, you know, created Starlink so people could chill and watch Netflix movies and play video games. I did not mean to create something that might cause a nuclear war,’” Isaacson replied. The author went on to say that Musk “decided to sell and give total control over a certain amount of Starlink equipment, Starlink services to the US military so that he no longer controls the geofencing,” adding that the SpaceX CEO “no longer controls the terms of use” for the satellites.

Isaacson said Musk had also developed a “military version of the Starlink” dubbed “Starshield,” suggesting that he hoped to pass off the project to the military. “I think that was his way of saying, ‘I got to get out of this. Even I don’t believe I should have this much power,’” the biographer continued. Musk has come under fire over his refusal to help Ukrainian forces attack Moscow’s Black Sea fleet in the Crimean port of Sevastopol – a revelation which only came to light in an excerpt from Isaacson’s biography published last week. The tech billionaire reportedly opted to prevent Kiev from using Starlink to guide naval drone strikes on Russian ships, fearing Russia might use nuclear weapons in retaliation to what he called a “mini-Pearl Harbor.”

While Ukrainian Digital Transformation Minister Mikhail Fedorov purportedly demanded that Musk turn the system back on, he was refused, with Musk explaining that Kiev “is now going too far and inviting strategic defeat” by attacking Crimea. The SpaceX CEO later claimed their services in the region around Crimea were not turned on at the time because his company was not allowed to provide coverage there due to US sanctions against Russia.

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“..the reason it was turned off was because the United States has sanctions against Russia, which includes Crimea, and we are not allowed to turn on connectivity to a sanctioned country without explicit permission..”

Note that Musk calls Crimea Russian…

‘Weaponized Govt Agencies’ “Don’t Wish Good Things For Me” – Elon Musk (ZH)

“I don’t know really what their issue is.” That’s how the world’s richest man describes the apparent ‘beef’ that the Biden administration has with him (apart from him calling them on their bullshit and enabling a free-speech platform for others to discuss non-approved narratives). Specifically, Elon Musk told the panel on the ‘All-In’ Podcast Summit yesterday: “…there does seem to be some significant increase in the weaponization of government and really sort of misuse of prosecutorial discretion in many areas… I think this is really a dangerous thing for there to be partisan politics with government agencies.” “Elon, does the Biden administration have it out for you, and why?” All-In host entrepreneur David Sacks asked Musk. “Ha. What ever gave you that idea?” Musk joked.

“I don’t think the whole administration has it out for me,” he added. “But I think there’s probably aspects of the administration… or aspects of interests aligned with President Biden who probably do not wish good things for me.” As a reminder, DOJ and SEC are currently investigating Tesla for allegedly allocating funds to a secret project to build Musk a house – which Musk has denied (and Walter Isaacson’s biography also confirms has been dropped). Additionally SpaceX is being investigated by DOJ for not hiring illegal immigrants (no, seriously). Then there’s the FAA nitpicking over SpaceX approval: “The only thing holding back the second planned Starship at this point is regulatory approval,” signifying that they are only waiting for FAA for their next launch.

Regarding Tesla, Musk focused on the company’s operations in China. He expressed concerns about China’s military capabilities, noting, “there will come a point in the not too distant future where China’s military strength in that region far exceeds America’s.” This point underlined the broader geopolitical considerations he takes into account in his business ventures, which brings us back to Starlink and the recent controversy over Ukraine demanding him enable the satellite web service for an attack on Crimea. Musk made it clear that Walter Isaacson – his biographer – had misunderstood the situation and that the initial decision to not allow access to Starlink around the Crimean border was due to sanctions from the Biden administration.

“Starlink have provided connectivity to Ukraine since the beginning of the war and as the Ukrainian government has said, Starlink was instrumental in the defense of Ukraine – although the media forgets to mention that.” Musk explains that “at the time [the attack] happened, the region around Crimea was turned off… and the reason it was turned off was because the United States has sanctions against Russia, which includes Crimea, and we are not allowed to turn on connectivity to a sanctioned country without explicit permission – which we did not have from the US government.”

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Work from home.

Great Reset Visionaries Stumble Upon An Unexpected Roadblock (Schlevogt)

The Center for the History of the Russian Diplomatic Service, a Moscow-based museum, proudly guards a mysterious gift that then Secretary of State of the United States Hillary Clinton handed over to her Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, during a meeting in Geneva in 2009: a button to be pressed symbolically to reboot the relationship between the two countries. However, the gadget carried the Russian imprint peregruzka The Center for the History of the Russian Diplomatic Service, a Moscow-based museum, proudly guards a mysterious gift that then Secretary of State of the United States Hillary Clinton handed over to her Russian counterpart, Sergey Lavrov, during a meeting in Geneva in 2009: a button to be pressed symbolically to reboot the relationship between the two countries.

However, the gadget carried the Russian imprint peregruzka, meaning “overload,” instead of the deceptively similar word perezagruzka, which is the correct translation of “reset.” Likewise, recent transformative changes to the post-pandemic workplace around the globe seem to indicate that the much-touted Great Reset of capitalism increasingly is viewed as a burden too heavy to bear for humankind and an idea soon to be shelved in a virtual cabinet of curiosities. In June 2020, only months after the outbreak of the global COVID-19 pandemic, the World Economic Forum (WEF), in cooperation with the Prince of Wales, started the Great Reset Initiative. Its basic idea was to leverage the fluidity of the dramatic global health crisis to push through lasting fundamental changes to capitalism on a world-wide scale and thus avoid a rerun of the Great Depression.

Thinking about the aftermath of the pandemic, Klaus Schwab, the chief executive officer of the WEF, rejected incremental, ad hoc and stop-gap measures. Instead, he envisioned a systemic revolution, encompassing radical transformations in every country, every aspect of society and economy, and every industry. The seemingly all-inclusive Great Reset Transformation Map, which features several overlapping categories, shows that the vision also includes one aspect of the future of work, that is, redesigning jobs.

To achieve his lofty aspirations, which he described as “unprecedented,” Schwab promulgated the following three broad priorities of a Great Reset agenda, which partially builds on ideas that he had already suggested prior to the pandemic: (1) interventions to achieve fairer market outcomes, (2) investments to reach shared goals such as equality and sustainability, and (3) leveraging the “Fourth Industrial Revolution” for the public good, especially in health care and the social sphere. In a Foreign Affairs article published in 2015, Schwab conceptualized the Fourth Industrial Revolution as a set of radical breakthroughs benefiting humankind, achieved by a convergence of emerging technologies in the physical, digital and biological domains. It follows the preceding three industrial revolutions, which were triggered by mechanical, electrical and digital inventions and innovations respectively.

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“The “Muslim threat” was played to such an extent that the Attorney General said, “we need every tool available to us,” by which he meant getting rid of the US Constitution.”

Was There A “War On Terror” Or A War On The American People? (PCR)

In response to 9/11, Republican Attorney General John Ashcroft told an obedient Congress on a Wednesday to have a sweeping expansion of executive power and dramatic curtailment of American’s civil rights ready in bill form by the end of the week. As Matt Taibbi reminds us, “Congress quickly delivered with ‘roving’ wiretaps, warrantless searches, ‘trap and trace’ searches, law enforcement and intelligence access to grand jury information, use of FISA monitoring for non-foreign situations, reduction or elimination of predicate requirements for FBI investigations, and elimination of judicial review for most of these activities, among many other things in the USA PATRIOT Act. It all passed on October 26th.”

These measures had nothing whatsoever to do with fighting Muslim terror. To the contrary, these measures gave the government the power to terrorize Americans. Try to name Muslim terror attacks on America other than, if you believe the official narrative, 9/11. You can’t, because there aren’t any. Terror attacks on America were so non-existent that the FBI had to search for confused people and groups, convince them, enhanced with monetary bribes, to adopt a FBI prepared terror attack, and then arrest them before the attack could be attempted. The FBI always explained that “the public was never in danger” as control of the operation was in FBI’s hands. But the public is very much in danger from the police state measures that Taibbi lists. “Muslim terror” was so conspicuous by its absence that Homeland Security Director Janet Napolitano announced that Homeland Security was being refocused on domestic American “extremists,” which has come to mean Trump supporters against whom the US government is deploying the police state measures.

The first part of the “war on terror” was against Americans’ civil liberties. The second part of the war was on Israel’s opponents in the Middle East. In the case of Iraq and Libya entire countries were destroyed, millions killed and maimed, and displaced to Europe and the US with the strange result of importing Muslims who were said to be terrorists into the Homeland. Ask yourself how Americans managed to fall for the propaganda that the US was under widespread attack from Muslims. The “Muslim threat” was played to such an extent that the Attorney General said, “we need every tool available to us,” by which he meant getting rid of the US Constitution.

The foundation of the American police state was established on the basis of only one attack, 9/11, falsely attributed to Muslims. If the Muslims were really capable of outwitting the entirety of the US national security apparatus, why did they stop with the WTC? With such glorious success, why did they not continue? Why instead did the FBI have to create fake terror events in order to keep the public believing we were under attack? Notice how we are always “under attack.” If it is not Muslims, it is Covid, or Donald Trump.

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Problem
https://twitter.com/i/status/1702054366390235603

 

 

 

 

 

 

Support the Automatic Earth in wartime with Paypal, Bitcoin and Patreon.

 

 

 

 

 

Aug 232023
 
 August 23, 2023  Posted by at 8:54 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , , ,  59 Responses »


Jessie Willcox Smith From The Princess and the Goblin by George MacDonald 1920

 

Trump to Miss Debate as There’s ‘Less to Lose by Not Showing Up’ (Sp.)
A Letter To Our Betters (Lundrum)
Biden’s Personal Interest in Firing Ukraine Prosecutor Targeting Burisma (Sp.)
McCarthy Threatens Impeachment Inquiry, Again (Manley)
The EU Doesn’t Know How To Not Be A Vassal Of The US Anymore (Blankenship)
West ‘Perplexed’ By Ukraine’s Strategy – NYT (RT)
Ukrainian Draft Dodgers Aggravating Troop Shortages – BBC (RT)
F-16’s For Ukraine Can’t Carry Storm Shadows (Sp.)
Putin: Russia Among World’s Top Five Economies, Overtakes Germany (Sp.)
De-Dollarization Is Irreversible – Putin (RT)
Fukushima Water Discharge ‘Irresponsible’ – China (RT)

 

 

 

 

Brink of War
https://twitter.com/i/status/1694143915602182430

 

 

Macgregor

 

 

 

 

Myocarditis
https://twitter.com/i/status/1693744128314458248

 

 

Biological warfare
https://twitter.com/i/status/1693957169786294424

 

 

Escobar BRICS

 

 

 

 

If Trump is not there, nobody watches. If he IS there, nobody pays attention to the others. They can’t win.

No-one will watch a debate with Nikki Haley and Chris Christie. At the same time, Trump is on Tucker. A few hours later, he’s in Georgia.

Trump to Miss Debate as There’s ‘Less to Lose by Not Showing Up’ (Sp.)

Former US President Donald Trump had already planned to miss the first Republican primary debate since he is unquestionably the leading GOP candidate, but his impending arrest in Georgia the following day adds a new layer of volatility to the already-fragile state of US politics, a prominent commentator told Sputnik. The first Republican presidential primary debate for the 2024 US election race is set to air on Wednesday evening on Fox networks. Eight candidates are expected to attend the Milwaukee, Wisconsin, event, but missing will be the clear pack leader, former US President Donald Trump. The candidates expected to appear are Florida Governor Ron DeSantis; North Dakota Governor Dough Burgum; former US ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley; former US Vice President Mike Pence; former New Jersey Governor Chris Christie; former Arkansas Governor Asa Hutchinson; US Sen. Tim Scott of South Carolina; and New York-based entrepreneur Vivek Ramaswamy.

Just hours after the debate, Trump is set to surrender himself to authorities in Fulton County, Georgia, in connection with federal charges that he illegally sought to overturn his loss in the Peach State in the 2020 election. Ajamu Baraka, international human rights activist, organizer, political analyst, and the national organizer for the Black Alliance for Peace, told Radio Sputnik on Tuesday that Trump’s absence could potentially be read as good or bad by his supporters, but that it was certainly bad for the legitimacy of the US political system for Trump to be facing such transparently political charges designed to stop his participation in politics. “There could be a backlash from either supporters of Trump if they believe this represents a certain kind of arrogance or it could be the opposite, that people believe that what the Republican candidates should do is to rally around the presumptive nominee of their party,” Baraka said.

“For Trump and his campaign, it’s understandable that he would not want to subject himself to the possibility of having to deal with some aggressive responses or comments coming from some of his opponents,” he noted. “There’s really a lot to lose in doing that and so they may have calculated that there’s less to lose by not even showing up.” Baraka said it was clearly “the predominant thinking within the Republican Party” that the nomination was Trump’s to refuse at this point, leaving little room for the other candidates to make a separate name for themselves at the Wednesday night debate. Indeed, the Iowa Poll, widely seen as the most reliable early poll for the primary race, found that Trump has by far the most solid support of any candidate: 68% said they won’t vote for anyone else.“What the Democrats seem not to understand is – the perception is that these prosecutions are politicized,” he explained.

“This is an attempt on the part of Democrats and Democratically-connected institutions and structures to undermine the ability of Donald Trump to run again. “I think that narrative is extending beyond the hardcore Trump supporters. People are raising questions around what appears to be a sort of piling-on, and indictments that have such a political character to them. We know they’re being framed as just some objective legal issues. And we know that the judge in Georgia, for example, claimed that she’s going to try this case without the politics. But very few people are in fact buying that. And it’s really a very dangerous situation because that perception is really helping to continue to undermine the legitimacy of US institutions.” “It’s a very dangerous strategy, but one in which Democrats believe that, in some kind of way, they’re going to create a condition or situation where someone, one of the Republican candidates, will then break from the pack,” he said. “That seems to be the thinking of many of the Democratic Party strategists.”

Baraka said that the Democratic officials in Georgia had displayed a “political inclination to make” Trump’s prosecution “into a spectacle” by treating him as if he is a flight risk and imposing limitations on his speech. “The main thing is: they want to degrade” Trump, he said. “They want those pictures, for example,” of Trump surrendering to authorities. “They have this belief that this is going to somehow undermine Trump. I think it’s going to have the opposite effect,” Baraka asserted. He accused them of having a kind of one-sided moral “blindness” that would inevitably lead to “political errors” on par with the second attempt to impeach Trump following the January 6, 2021, insurrection by his supporters at the US Capitol. “It’s all part of the process of the degeneration of politics in the US. It is incredibly dangerous because of the deepening economic crisis that we are facing. When you have the delegitimization of all of the US institutions then there’s no telling what may happen in terms of the politics here in this country. It’s very, very dangerous.”

Trump racism

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“President Trump’s only crime was to humiliate the lot of you, at every level and in both parties.”

A Letter To Our Betters (Lundrum)

To those who rule over us, though not by our own choice; To those who could not care less about this nation we call our home, but instead only care for their own power, glory, and enrichment; To those who consider themselves better than us, and view us with nothing but the utmost contempt: We know exactly who you are. Now, more than ever before, We The People have had the wool pulled from our eyes, due in large part to your own arrogance. You have ended up as our ruling class, through manipulation rather than merit, through deception rather than democracy, and through favoritism rather than free elections. And we know all this through the efforts of one man: The man that you are now attempting to sentence to hundreds of years in one of your gulags, all for the crime of exposing your treachery at the highest levels.

Most simply, Donald J. Trump committed a sin that, in your eyes, is far more egregious than such trivial crimes as bribery, sexual impropriety, abuse of power, or even outright treason. President Trump’s only crime was to humiliate the lot of you, at every level and in both parties. The damage to your ego is a far greater offense than any actual criminal wrongdoing committed by many career politicians of days gone by.That is why you now hunt the man with all the relentlessness of Ahab pursuing his White Whale. And that is why we are now more resolved than ever before to stop you. Quite simply, the fight to save Donald Trump is the fight to save America: His struggle now is unlike any smear, intimidation, and character assassination campaign faced by any other political figure in American history. And it is only so because you have made it so. The more viscerally you react to him, and the more deranged your attacks against him, the more determined his supporters become to stand by him through it all.

But this all goes far beyond President Trump. You dictate to us from your halls of marble, built ages ago by far greater men than you will ever be, and in so doing desecrate the memory of those who came before us. If our Founding Fathers could see the state of their nation today, they would either believe that the Revolution had failed; or, perhaps, they would even regret the Revolution altogether if this was the ultimate end result. You have actively led a widespread and systematic effort to erase our nation’s history, from the legacy of those very Founders to the statues and other monuments meant to stand through all of time as a tribute to their greatness. Whether by mobs of roaming thugs or by official decree, you have sought to tear down the very memory of those who built the nation that you now run.

You speak down to us from your houses of glass, eternally – and perhaps deliberately – oblivious to the two-tiered society you have created for your own benefit and at our expense. You claim to fight for “democracy,” and yet actively obstruct the will of we, the 63 million, from the moment our chosen leader laid his hand on the Bible. Your bureaucrats determined that an archaic “interagency consensus” should override the desires of the American people and their elected commander-in-chief. When he called out the corruption of one of your leading political puppets, and suggested that such corruption should be investigated, you responded by putting him through a nakedly political impeachment trial. You made a crime out of noticing a crime, even after the former Vice President quite literally confessed to committing the corrupt act to which President Trump was referring.

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Where does this leave Obama?

Biden’s Personal Interest in Firing Ukraine Prosecutor Targeting Burisma (Sp.)

New memos indicate that then-Vice President Joe Biden did not act in concert with the US government when he threatened to withhold $1 billion in Ukraine aid unless the Poroshenko government fired the prosecutor general who targeted Hunter Biden’s Ukrainian employer at that time. Joe Biden and Democrats have repeatedly stressed that his insistence on firing Ukrainian then-Prosecutor General Viktor Shokhin back in December 2015 was consistent with the US policy of stamping out corruption in Ukraine. At the time, then-Vice President Joe Biden even went so far as to threaten then-Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko that Washington would deprive Ukraine of a much-needed $1 billion loan guarantee in case the latter did not fire Shokhin. The conversation reportedly occurred in December 2015.

Biden openly bragged about the incident to the Council on Foreign Relations gathering in January 2018: “I said, ‘You’re not getting the billion.’ I’m going to be leaving here in, I think it was about six hours. I looked at them and said: ‘I’m leaving in six hours. If the prosecutor is not fired, you’re not getting the money.’ Well, son of a bitch, he got fired. And they put in place someone who was solid at the time.” However, memos by Treasury and Justice Department officials obtained by Just the News, an independent US media outlet founded by award-winning investigative journalist John Solomon, indicate that the US government held Shokhin in high regard at the time and concluded that Ukraine had made progress in fighting endemic corruption, thus deserving the loan guarantee.

“Ukraine has made sufficient progress on its reform agenda to justify a third guarantee,” read an October 1, 2015, memo by the Interagency Policy Committee (IPC), a Barack Obama task force. Moreover, Senior State Department officials sent Shokhin a personal note saying they were “impressed” with his office’s work and invited him and his staff to Washington for a January 2016 strategy session prior to his sacking. Remarkably, an audio tape from March 2016 which appeared to record Biden and Poroshenko’s conversation showed that the Ukrainian president pointed out that there was no evidence that Shokhin and his office were anyhow mired in corruption: “Despite the fact that we didn’t have any corruption charges, we don’t have any information about him doing something wrong, I especially asked him … No, it was the day before yesterday. I especially asked him to resign,” Poroshenko allegedly told Biden in a tape released in 2020 by then-parliamentarian Andrii Derkach.

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McCarthy is the GOP. Trump is not.

McCarthy Threatens Impeachment Inquiry, Again (Manley)

House Republicans have been calling for impeachment proceedings against US President Joe Biden for months over allegations of financial misconduct during the Obama years. While initial calls were dulled, new reports suggest the initiative may be picked up once Congress comes back in session. US House Speaker Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) threatened, yet again, on Tuesday to launch an impeachment inquiry in September if the Biden administration fails to turn over documents said to be tied to an alleged bribery scheme involving the Biden family. It’s not clear, however, which documents McCarthy is seeking, nor from whom. Additionally, reports have suggested the so-called ‘missing’ files were not exactly requested by lawmakers. “The thing that holds up whether we do impeachment inquiry, provide us the documents we’re asking,” McCarthy said in an interview with Larry Kudlow. “The whole determination here is how the Bidens handled this.”

“If they provide us the documents, there wouldn’t be a need for impeachment inquiry. But if they withhold the documents and fight like they have now to not provide to the American public what they deserve to know, we will move forward with impeachment inquiry when we come back into session,” he added. The House speaker did clarify that they were looking for bank statements, as well as credit card statements. “The bank statements, the credit card statements and others. Show us where the money went, show us were you taking money from outside sources? And that would clear most of this up, but they seem to fight it every step of the way,” he added. Republicans have for months been making calls for an impeachment inquiry against US President Joe Biden over a pay-to-play scheme that is alleged to have taken place when the commander-in-chief served as vice president under the Obama White House. It’s alleged Hunter Biden used his father’s role as a means to get kickbacks at the time.

When asked about the impeachment inquiry into the president, McCarthy reportedly raised several allegations about Biden’s involvement in his son’s business dealings. In addition, he also criticized the decision to appoint a special counsel to oversee the ongoing probe into Hunter Biden. Attorney for the District of Delaware, David Weiss, was earlier appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland to oversee the Hunter Biden case, a move that has prompted GOP attacks against Weiss as a result. McCarthy is presently claiming that the US House could also push forward an impeachment inquiry into Biden should Weiss refuse to hand over certain information to Congress. It’s worth noting that prior to the appointment announcement, reports indicated that Weiss had initially been blocked from the post.

“If they use this special counsel to say that they can’t provide us the information, then it just shows more politics. And it will not stop us. Then we would move to impeachment inquiry and we would be able to still get the documents that we need as we move forward,” McCarthy explained. McCarthy first floated the idea of an impeachment inquiry against Biden in July, explaining then that the motive was rooted over allegations that the US president was a willing participant in financial misconduct. However, the early summer initiative only came after the House speaker initially opted to shut down earlier impeachment calls that were being encouraged by the hard-right Republicans of the House Freedom caucus.

CNN DOJ Biden

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“In 2008, the EU’s economy was somewhat larger than America’s: $16.2tn versus $14.7tn. By 2022, the US economy had grown to $25tn, whereas the EU and the UK together had only reached $19.8tn.”

The EU Doesn’t Know How To Not Be A Vassal Of The US Anymore (Blankenship)

In terms of hard numbers, Jeremy Shapiro and Jana Puglierin of the European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) think tank have stated: “In 2008, the EU’s economy was somewhat larger than America’s: $16.2tn versus $14.7tn. By 2022, the US economy had grown to $25tn, whereas the EU and the UK together had only reached $19.8tn. America’s economy is now nearly one-third bigger. It is more than 50 per cent larger than the EU without the UK.” The article goes on to describe a European Union that is dragging far behind the US and China in terms of quality universities, a less-than-pristine start-up environment, and lacking key benefits from its transatlantic peer – namely cheap energy. The Ukraine conflict has impacted the latter to the point that EU companies are paying three or four times what their American competitors are, with Washington being energy-independent and enjoying great domestic supplies. Meanwhile, energy from Russia is waning, European factories are closing in droves, and industry leaders are worried about the region’s future competitiveness.

The ECFR issued its own report on the matter in April, which is far blunter in describing the situation as a kind of “vassalization.” The summary of that report notes that the Ukraine war has exposed the EU’s key dependencies on the US, that over the course of a decade, the bloc has fallen behind the US in virtually every key metric, that it is deadlocked in disagreement and is looking to Washington for leadership. The ECFR noted two causes for this situation. Firstly, despite the widely understood decline of the US compared to the rise of China, the transatlantic relationship has been unbalanced in Washington’s favor over the last 15 years since the 2008 financial crisis. The Biden administration is keen to exploit this and assert itself in the face of a disjointed Europe. Secondly, no one in the EU knows what greater strategic autonomy could look like – let alone agree on it if they did. There exists no process to decide the EU’s future in an autonomous way given the current status quo, which means US leadership is necessary.

This paints quite an interesting picture. Many commentators, including myself, have long documented the decline of the US and attributed it to a number of factors: less of an attractive environment for foreign direct investment (FDI), financial instability, corruption, and internal political turmoil. This is, of course, relativized to China, which has seen immense economic growth since the founding of the People’s Republic and particularly over the past four decades. But under the smoke screen of a fumbling America and a growing China, the EU has likewise fallen in stature. As for the two causes noted by the ECFR, they seem to be intertwined. Many of the key issues that have faced the EU, from migration to the banking crisis to Covid-19, have stemmed directly from the non-federal nature of the EU.

And the current political crises are a result of Euroskepticism, i.e. a backlash against what is perceived as an overreach from Brussels by some political organizations within the bloc. The EU is a complicated and sometimes cumbersome bureaucracy that is cherished by some, reviled by others, and, under these assumptions, is an impediment to strategic autonomy. The ECFR essentially argues for the EU and Western European capitals to lean into the transatlantic partnership, but on terms favorable to themselves. This includes creating an independent security architecture within and complimentary to NATO, creating an economic NATO of sorts and even pursuing a European nuclear weapons program. At least the former two are acceptable, as abandoning the US outright would be politically foolish for the EU at this juncture. It certainly needs to develop a transatlantic free-trade agreement that puts an end to American trade protectionism.

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“even the most experienced units have been reconstituted a number of times after taking heavy casualties.”

West ‘Perplexed’ By Ukraine’s Strategy – NYT (RT)

Ukraine’s counteroffensive is struggling because some of Kiev’s best troops are “in the wrong places,” the New York Times reported on Tuesday, citing senior US and UK officials speaking on condition of anonymity. The offensive’s main objective is to reach the Sea of Azov, cutting off Crimea from the Russian mainland, but Ukraine currently has more troops on the eastern front – facing Artyomovsk, also known as Bakhmut – than in the “far more strategically significant” south, according to the Times. “American planners have advised Ukraine to concentrate on the front driving toward Melitopol… and on punching through Russian minefields and other defenses, even if the Ukrainians lose more soldiers and equipment in the process,” the newspaper said.

The Russian Defense Ministry has estimated Ukraine had lost 45,000 dead and over 5,000 vehicles in the past two months of fighting, without going past the Russian screening line. “Only with a change of tactics and a dramatic move can the tempo of the counteroffensive change,” a US official told the newspaper, though others argued that even that may be too little, too late. Kiev’s insistence on keeping a large force in the east is particularly “perplexing” to American and British officials, as Western doctrine calls for commitment to a clear main effort. They argue that a smaller force could serve to pin down the Russian defenders, and while Ukraine theoretically has enough troops to retake Artyomovsk, doing so would “lead to large numbers of losses for little strategic gain.”

General Mark Milley, chairman of the US Joint Chiefs of Staff, his British counterpart Admiral Sir Tony Radakin, and NATO’s Supreme Allied Commander Europe Christopher Cavoli all urged Ukraine’s top general Valery Zaluzhny to focus on the southern front in the August 10 call, the Times said. Zaluzhny supposedly agreed. Just five days later, however, President Vladimir Zelensky was touring the “Soledar sector” near Artyomovsk, visiting the neo-Nazi ‘Azov’ unit and speaking about the importance of that front. According to the Times, Ukraine has started to redeploy some units to the south, but “even the most experienced units have been reconstituted a number of times after taking heavy casualties.”

Kiev is currently “tapping into its last strategic reserves,” and unnamed Western analysts worry that Ukrainian forces “may run out of steam” by mid-September, even before a change in weather turns the ground into impassable mud. The Times itself noted that US criticism comes from the perspective of officers “who have never experienced a war of this scale and intensity,” and that the US war doctrine “has never been tested in an environment like Ukraine’s, where Russian electronic warfare jams communications and GPS,” and there is no air superiority. Ukraine launched its much-hyped offensive in early June, but has so far failed to gain any significant ground, losing many Western-supplied tanks and armored vehicles in the process.

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“The groups exist throughout Ukraine and some have as many as 100,000 members..”

Ukrainian Draft Dodgers Aggravating Troop Shortages – BBC (RT)

Ukraine is struggling to reinforce its troop numbers due to “constant” heavy casualties suffered in the conflict with Russia and the population’s unwillingness to replace those no longer able to serve, the BBC reported on Tuesday. “The country constantly needs to replace the tens of thousands who’ve been killed or injured,” the British state broadcaster said, adding that many Ukrainian troops are exhausted following 18 months of hostilities with Moscow. According to the broadcaster, Ukrainians have formed mass chat groups on social media to share ways of dodging conscription, including providing tip-offs on Telegram of draft patrol officers’ routes. The groups exist throughout Ukraine and some have as many as 100,000 members, the BBC added.

Thousands have already fled Ukraine in an attempt to avoid the draft, while others are planning to do so, the BBC claimed. It said that those fleeing often bribe officials, including recruitment officers, to ensure safe passage abroad. Earlier this month, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky dismissed every single regional military official responsible for conscription following a series of corruption scandals. The Ukrainian authorities had previously opened 112 criminal cases against territorial draft center officials, Zelensky revealed at the time. Ukrainian defense officials have described the alleged offenses committed by those responsible for the draft campaign as “shameful and unacceptable.” Fired personnel will be replaced by combat veterans unfit for active duty, Zelensky said in early August, claiming that they had “no cynicism” and could be trusted.

According to the BBC, officers involved in the recruitment campaign stand accused of employing increasingly heavy-handed tactics. People have allegedly been summoned to recruitment centers for registration, often only to be seized on the spot and deprived of the chance to return home, the broadcaster claimed. Draft officials are also accused of using “harsh or intimidating tactics,” the British broadcaster said, while fresh recruits can reportedly find themselves on the front lines “with just a month of training.” The report comes as Kiev struggles with the much-hyped counteroffensive against Russian forces launched in early June. According to Moscow, Ukrainian troops have failed to make any significant progress, often only reaching the first line of Russian defenses.

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They find that out now?

F-16’s For Ukraine Can’t Carry Storm Shadows (Sp.)

According to reports in US media, the plan to supply Ukraine with US-made F-16 Falcon fighter jets has hit a snag, since the aircraft are not presently compatible with the British-made Storm Shadow cruise missiles previously given to Ukraine to enhance its long-range aerial strike capability. That has raised a new question among politicos: should the US send compatible cruise missiles to Kiev alongside the F-16, such as the AGM-158 Joint Air-to-Surface Standoff Missile (JASSM) with its 575-mile range? Alexander Mikhailov, head of the Bureau of Military-Political Analysis, told Sputnik on Tuesday that the situation exposes the unplanned and haphazard way in which NATO is scrambling to send Kiev any weapons they can find, but especially older ones.

“It seems to me that both the British and aviation armaments [industries] will find a technical opportunity to place their missiles on the F-16,” he said. “I think the issue here is quite technically solvable. It seems to me that, in general, we need to wait for the delivery of aircraft.” “We are again dealing with promises to assist in the supply of weapons, promises to establish training for pilots. But we don’t see specific products,” he said. “This story is very similar to the story of American tanks, which started in November of last year, when the Americans first promised their Abrams tanks and simultaneously dragged European partners into these promises, then they themselves stalled the supply of tanks, citing a lack of a structural base, a lack of a repair base, a shortage of all this in Poland or on the territory of Ukraine,” Mikhailov noted.

“And at this time, the German Leopard tanks were already burning and the image of the German defense industry was burning and a lot of other troubles that Europe received which, as it were, followed the lead of the Americans with their eternal divorce.” “Now it’s a very similar story. The Americans would very much like European planes to fly to Ukraine. Moreover, the same Germans have third-generation Tornado aircraft, Europeans have Typhoons, Mirages, Rafales, and Gripens. And in principle, there is plenty to choose from, especially if the Europeans are more loyal. But the Europeans are no longer fooled by these American promises. Because after the story with the Abrams, when even the Challenger tanks arrived in Ukraine and several Leopards were sent to Ukraine and even participated in the hostilities, the Abrams did not appear in Ukraine.”

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PPP.

Putin: Russia Among World’s Top Five Economies, Overtakes Germany (Sp.)

Despite pessimistic forecasts, Russia is among the five largest economies in the world and has overtaken the Federal Republic of Germany, Russian President Vladimir Putin said at the Council on Strategic Development and National Projects. According to the World Bank, the Russian Federation “has moved ahead of the Federal Republic of Germany in terms of purchasing power parity, in terms of the size of the economy,” Putin added. The president highlighted that this is one of the most important indicators. The president stressed that the growth rates are steady, including in industry, while the current budget situation is stable and risk-free. “The current budgetary situation is generally stable and does not carry risks for macroeconomic stability. In the second quarter, the federal budget deficit decreased almost eight times compared to the first quarter and totaled 264 billion rubles. In July, the budget balance was 458 billion rubles better than a year ago,” Putin clarified.

For July-September the budget will be reported with a surplus, and by the end of the year the excess of expenditures over revenues will amount to the planned 2% of GDP, Putin noted. According to the president, in a year and a half, the ruble’s share of payments for Russian exports has more than tripled, from 12% to 42%, and “if we count it together with the currencies of friendly countries, this share reaches 70%”. Domestic manufacturers are quickly filling the niches of foreign companies that have left, and Russia will continue to do the same, the president emphasized. On August 4, Sputnik calculated using data from the World Bank that Russia’s GDP by purchasing power parity (PPP) in 2022 for the first time ever exceeded $5 trillion, allowing the country to remain the world’s fifth-largest economy.

Earllier Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin said that the Russian economy had adapted to Western sanctions and was growing steadily, adding that, despite all attempts to cut it off from global production chains, logistics routes and financial systems, interest for the country’s economy was increasing. In early August, an American newspaper reported that the West’s strategy of imposing sanctions on Russian businessmen and their families proved to be ineffective. Russia’s ability to withstand the sanctions will be a subject for analysis in the future, according to the report.

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More PPP.

De-Dollarization Is Irreversible – Putin (RT)

The US dollar is losing its global role in an “objective and irreversible” process, the Russian president told participants at the BRICS Summit in South Africa on Tuesday. Vladimir Putin spoke by via videolink, after choosing not to attend the event in person.De-dollarization is “gaining momentum” he said, adding that members of the group of major emerging economies are seeking to reduce their reliance on the greenback in mutual transactions. The Russian leader said the five nations – Russia, China, India, Brazil and South Africa – are becoming the new world economic leaders, and that their cumulative share of global GDP has reached 26%. He noted that if measured by purchasing power parity, BRICS has already surpassed the Group of Seven leading industrialised nations – accounting for 31% of the global economy, compared to 30% for the G7.

Over the past 10 years, mutual investment between the BRICS member states has increased by six times. Their total investments in the world economy have doubled, while cumulative exports account for 20% of the global total, Putin said. Moscow is focusing on re-orienting its transport and logistics routes towards “reliable foreign partners,” including BRICS members, to ensure an uninterrupted supply of energy and food to the international market. Russia’s primary goals include developing the Northern Sea Route and the ‘North-South’ transport corridor, Putin stated. The first, passing through the Arctic Ocean, along Russia’s northern coastline, will ensure faster goods deliveries between Europe and the Far East. The second will connect Russia’s northern and Baltic ports to the Persian Gulf and the Indian Ocean, facilitating cargo movement between Eurasian and African nations.

“We are consistently increasing fuel, food and fertilizer supplies to the states of the Global South,” and actively contributing to global food and energy security, the Russian leader said. He blamed the current international food crisis on the West’s unilateral sanctions, describing them as “unlawful.” “Illegitimate sanctions… seriously weigh on the international economic situation,” and the “unlawful freezing of sovereign states’ assets” constitutes a violation of free trade and economic cooperation rules. The resource deficit and growing inequality worldwide are a “direct result” of such policies, the Russian president argued. He highlighted skyrocketing grain and food prices as the latest manifestation of this process, primarily affecting the most vulnerable nations.

Moscow is represented at the Johannesburg summit, which runs from August 22 to 24, by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. Putin opted not to attend the event after a decision by the International Criminal Court (ICC) to issue a warrant for his arrest in March. The court based the order on Ukraine’s allegation that the Russian evacuation of children from the conflict zone amid hostilities between the two nations amounted to “unlawful population transfers.”South Africa is a signatory of the Rome Statute of the ICC, and the US and its allies had pressured it to detain Putin should he travel to the country. Moscow has repeatedly denied the ICC’s allegations and stressed that it does not recognize the court’s authority, declaring the warrant legally null and void. Although South African President Cyril Ramaphosa repeatedly stated that he would not carry out the order, claiming it would amount to a “declaration of war,” Moscow ultimately decided to send Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov to the BRICS summit to represent Russia.

https://twitter.com/i/status/1694133636101001423

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“IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi recently claimed the wastewater was safe enough for drinking and swimming. He did not respond to Beijing’s request to drink it himself, however.”

“..if the [..] water is truly safe, Japan wouldn’t have to dump it into the sea—and certainly shouldn’t if it’s not..”

Fukushima Water Discharge ‘Irresponsible’ – China (RT)

The Japanese government’s plan to discharge water from the stricken Fukushima nuclear power plant into the ocean is “extremely selfish and irresponsible,” Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Wang Wenbin said on Tuesday. “The ocean sustains humanity. It is not a sewer for Japan’s nuclear-contaminated water,” Wang told reporters at the daily press briefing, calling the Japanese plan “unjustified, unreasonable and unnecessary.” “Japan is putting its selfish interests above the long-term wellbeing of the entire humanity,” the spokesman added. “China is gravely concerned and strongly opposed to this.” Beijing intends to take all the necessary steps to “protect the marine environment, ensure food safety and safeguard people’s life and health,” Wang added, without adding specifics.

Earlier on Tuesday, Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida announced that the dumping of waste water into the Pacific Ocean would begin on August 24, “weather conditions permitting.” For the past two years, the Tokyo Electric Power Company (TEPCO) has sought approval to start dumping the water from the Fukushima Dai-Ichi nuclear power plant, crippled by the 2011 earthquake and tsunami. The plant produces 100 cubic meters of radioactive water every day, to keep its reactors from melting down, and TEPCO is running out of storage on site. The company intends to release a total of one million metric tons of water, starting with around 7,800 cubic meters over 17 days.

Tokyo insists that the wastewater has been treated and poses no danger to humanity or marine life, but Japan’s neighbors disagree. The ocean dump proposal has been endorsed by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), which said its impact on the environment would be “negligible.” According to the UN nuclear watchdog, the wastewater contains about 190 becquerels of tritium per liter, well below the 10,000 becquerel limit set by the World Health Organization. IAEA Director General Rafael Grossi recently claimed the wastewater was safe enough for drinking and swimming. He did not respond to Beijing’s request to drink it himself, however.

“China and other stakeholders have pointed out on multiple occasions that if the Fukushima nuclear-contaminated water is truly safe, Japan wouldn’t have to dump it into the sea—and certainly shouldn’t if it’s not,” Wang told reporters on Tuesday. While Beijing did not specify measures it intends to undertake in response, China’s special administrative regions of Hong Kong and Macao have already said they would “immediately activate” import controls on Japanese seafood, covering live, frozen, refrigerated, and dried fish, as well as sea salt and seaweed.

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Mantis
https://twitter.com/i/status/1693928738835100023

 

 

Baby hippo

 

 

Monitor
https://twitter.com/i/status/1693897176311529493

 

 

Inca tern
https://twitter.com/i/status/1693973402183258421

 

 

 

 

Blue

 

 

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