Egon Schiele Port of Trieste 1907
Nap/Crooke
Putin: When you look at bloodied children, dead children, how women, old people suffer, how doctors die, and fists clench, and tears well up in your eyes, you can’t say it any other way, but we shouldn’t, we don’t have the right to allow ourselves to be guided by emotions. We must clearly understand who is really behind the tragedy of the people of the Middle East and other regions of the world. Who organizes deadly chaos, who benefits from it. Today this has become obvious and clear to everyone, the customers act openly and brazenly – it is the ruling elites of the United States and their satellites that are the main beneficiaries of global instability.
Vladimir Putin:
▪️When you look at bloodied children, dead children, how women, old people suffer, how doctors die, and fists clench, and tears well up in your eyes, you can’t say it any other way, but we shouldn’t, we don’t have the right to allow ourselves to be guided by… pic.twitter.com/nVg7oqwK7X
— Sprinter (@Sprinter99800) October 30, 2023
Macgregor
Mearsheimer
Racist
This fact-based video on the history of oppression and racism against Palestinians by Israel was taken down on Instagram after getting 12 million views. Watch this.
Is Israel really the victim?pic.twitter.com/LKM5xumz3y
— Kim Dotcom (@KimDotcom) October 30, 2023
Israel set out in theory to destroy Hamas. It is now confronting an increasingly united Islamic world. For the first time in 1,000 years you have the Shiites and Sunnis who are united with one purpose, to STOP Israel.
Instead of responding to this the President as he always does is escalating. Netanyahu is betting on this very heavily and believes that Israel together with our military power can prevail. This is a big mistake.
Doug Macgregor
Hard to believe?!
• White House Seeks Funding For Israeli Plan To Ethnically Cleanse Gaza (Cradle)
The White House on October 20 released a $105 billion supplemental funding request for the Israel and Ukraine wars, which includes funds earmarked to help implement Israel’s plans to annex Gaza and forcibly expel its 2.3 million Palestinian residents to Egypt’s Sinai as part of the ongoing war with the Hamas-led Palestinian resistance. President Joe Biden announced the request during a televised speech from the Oval Office, expressing his hope that Congress will move urgently on the legislation. Biden’s national security adviser, Jake Sullivan, told reporters at the time that Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine and Hamas’ attack on Israel represent a “global inflection point.” This request would provide $5.7 billion for the Agency for International Development’s International Disaster Assistance account and $3.5 billion to the Migration and Refugee Assistance (MRA) account within the Department of State.
The funding anticipates that large number of Palestinians in Gaza will be forced abandon their homes in Gaza and flee to Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula in response to Israel’s ongoing siege and bombing of Gaza that has killed over 8,000 Palestinians, the majority women and children, in just three weeks. The White House stated that “These resources would support displaced and conflict affected civilians, including Palestinian refugees in Gaza and the West Bank, and to address potential needs of Gazans fleeing to neighboring countries.” “This would include food and nonfood items, healthcare, emergency shelter support, water and sanitation assistance, and emergency protection. This would also include potential critical humanitarian infrastructure costs needed for the refugee population to provide access to basic, life-sustaining support,” the statement adds.
The White House argues the support is necessary because, “This crisis could well result in displacement across border and higher regional humanitarian needs, and funding may be used to meet evolving programming requirements outside of Gaza.” The inclusion of funding to assist Gazans “fleeing to neighboring countries” is alarming due to the leak of a document issued on 20 October by Israel’s Ministry of Intelligence recommending the occupation of Gaza and total transfer of its 2.3 million inhabitants to Egypt’s Sinai Peninsula.
“you must put under curse of destruction,” and not “show them any pity.” As for their kings, “you will blot out their names under heaven.”
• Nakba 2.0 Revives the Neocon Wars (Pepe Escobar)
[..] the leaders of major oil producers – Russia, Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Kuwait – can cut off almost half of oil production in the world in one fell swoop, demolishing the entire economies of the EU and U.S. without firing a shot. Diplomatic sources assure this is being seriously considered. As an old school Deep State source, now in Europe, told me, serious players are actively involved in sending this message to the Beltway “to make the U.S. think twice about igniting a war that they cannot control. When they go to Wall St. to check out the derivative exposure they will already have had time to think it over as documents were sent to folks like Larry Fink at Blackrock and Michael Bloomberg.” In parallel, a serious discussion is evolving in intel circles across the “new axis of evil” (Russia-China-Iran) about the necessity of consolidating a unified Islamic pole. The prospects are not good – even if key poles such as Russia and China have clearly identified the common enemy of the whole Global South/Global Majority. Turkey under Erdogan is just posing. Saudi Arabia will not invest itself into defending/protecting Palestine no matter what. American client/minions in West Asia are just scared. That leaves only Iran and the Axis of Resistance.
Meanwhile, the vengeful, narcissistic tribe of conquistadors, masters of political deception and moral exemption, is deep into consolidating its Nakba 2.0 – which doubles as the perfect solution to illegally gobble up all that gas offshore Gaza. The Israeli Ministry of Intelligence’s deportation directive affecting 2.3 million Palestinians is quite clear. It has been officially endorsed by the Ministry on October 13.It starts with expelling all Palestinians from northern Gaza, followed by serial “land operations”; leaving routes open across the Egyptian border in Rafah; and establishing “tent cities” in northern Sinai and later on even new cities to “resettle Palestinians” in Egypt. Humanitarian Law and Policy Consultant Itay Epshtain has noted, “I have not been able to detect, as of yet, an agenda item or government decision endorsing the directive of the Ministry. If it was indeed presented and approved it would not likely be in the public domain.”
Several of Tel Aviv’s own extremists are confirming it in their outbursts, anyway. As for the wider war, it has already been written. A long time ago. And they want to follow it to the letter, in tandem with American Christian Zio-cons. Everyone remembers Gen Wesley Clark going to the Pentagon two months after 9/11 and learning about the neocon/Christian Zio-con plan to target 7 countries in 5 years for destruction: Those were Iraq, Libya, Lebanon, Syria, Somalia, Sudan – and Iran. All of them were destabilized, destroyed or plunged into chaos. The last one on the list is Iran. Now go back to Deuteronomy 7:1-2, 24: “Yahweh told Israel that he has identified “SEVEN NATIONS GREATER AND STRONGER THAN YOURSELF” (caps mine), that “you must put under curse of destruction,” and not “show them any pity.” As for their kings, “you will blot out their names under heaven.”
“Call it the long war for short.”
• When The Devil Drives, What Needs Come First? (Helmer)
In the Gaza operations so far, and in the ideology which Israeli officials and journalists are repeating to the western media, the devil aims to drive every Palestinian, the born and the as yet unborn, to death. In such a war the first need for Hamas and the Arabs is to survive in order to keep fighting. Nothing is more sure than the “holy reasons” Shakespeare put into the mouth of Lavatch the Clown, that surviving to fight the long war will defeat this devil’s needs in the end. In practical politics, Israel and the US either win their genocidal war swiftly now, or else they will lose the long war. Russian military sources are reporting the US is resupplying the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) at a rate of two US Air Force (USAF) transports every hour, moving from the continental US through bases in the UK, Germany, Italy, Greece, and Cyprus.
US sources have acknowledged the logistical effort is too great to continue for long. Right now the US Navy and USAF cannot continue delivering on the promised resupply of the Ukrainian forces in their war against Russia, while at US bases in Syria and Iraq the Pentagon is privately evacuating troops while publicly striking at their Arab attackers. The Arab, Iranian, and Russian media are reporting that in response, Hamas and Hezbollah are maintaining a frequent rate of fire against IDF and Israeli territorial targets. They are not yet attacking Israel’s offshore gas production platforms, which provide most of the fuel for the country’s electricity generating plants. They are not yet disabling Israel’s ports and airfields. The Russian military assessment is that for the time being the Hamas and Hezbollah capacity remains intact and in reserve. The Arab side is exercising restraint.
What then are the needs which must now be addressed by the allies of the Palestinians, the Arab states, Iran, and then Russia? On Sunday, Russia officially called this war “the American project”. This followed the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) vote last Friday, October 27, when the US and Israel led a tiny minority in favour of their short war, including a half-dozen island states sinking slowly into the Pacific Ocean. A Moscow source confirms the US is the priority Russian target because the IDF cannot continue in Gaza as the US capabilities exhaust themselves. He believes that US over-exertion in the Middle East will accelerate the Russian military’s move on to the offensive on the Ukrainian battlefield, and shorten thereby that war. The public statements for mediation between the warring parties issued by Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov and his ministry are not the full Russian story, the source believes.
The first need in Lavrov’s mediation, he says, is between the General Staff and the Kremlin. The second priority is to let the Americans demonstrate their weakness across the region by conserving the Palestinians in place, deterring Egyptian and Jordanian concessions, and preventing a direct attack on Iran. “The real Russian position , not the public statements , ultimately comes down to what level of military cooperation the Ministry of Defense has with Teheran. The Syrian and Ukrainian wars have made this very deep. I expect the Foreign Ministry’s public line will change when the Palestinian casualties reach 20,000. As the official Israeli statements against the Russian government already make clear, they know what is going on behind the scenes. It’s not just the Caucasian Muslims now but most Russians feel there’s been enough crying support for Israel. Lavrov will catch up.” “I would say the real work now in Moscow is on ensuring the Americans do not directly attack Iran. The rest is going to play out according to the General Staff’s road map Lavrov could and should have in front of him. Call it the long war for short.”
“Americans, British, and Europeans need to confront the fact that propaganda from Zionists, a minority of Jews, has turned them into monsters demanding Palestinian blood.”
• NOT IN OUR NAME Declare Jewish Peace Organizations (Paul Craig Roberts)
Organizations of the Zionist Lobby, such as ADL and AIPAC, and Netanyahu have created more anti-semitism than have all of those slandered by them as anti-semites. The open and brutally insulting way in which AIPAC and Netanyahu flaunt their domination over the US Government offends many Americans, and ADL’s defamation of people who criticize aspects of Israeli policy, such as President Jimmy Carter, have alienated many more. Many wonder why a person can criticize US, Russian, Chinese, and every other country’s policies without being slandered as anti-American, anti-Russian, anti-Chinese, but can only genuflect to Israel. Zionists are clever propagandists. They have succeeded in convincing Americans that they speak for all Israelis and all Jews. Such is far from the case. There is strong opposition to Zionism among Israeli Jews. Many oppose the treatment of the Palestinians.
There are Israeli Jewish organizations that oppose the theft of Palestinian land in the West Bank and the demolition of Palestinian homes in order to construct apartment buildings for “settlers.” Many Israeli Jews oppose the current bombing of Gaza. Netanyahu has minority support. He is in office only because he was able to put together a coalition of hard rightwing parties. It is the mistaken belief that Zionists speak for Israel and all Jews that causes Republicans such as Lindsay Graham, Mike Johnson, Donald Trump and Ron DeSantis to be such strong supporters of the current Israeli indiscriminate bombing of Gaza. Many American Jews are up in arms about the massacre of Palestinians currently underway. A few days ago two Jewish peace organizations–Jewish Voice for Peace and IfNotNow–marched on the US Capitol and staged a sit-in inside. “Not in our name,” they proclaimed and demanded an immediate ceasefire and justice for the Palestinians.
I have had Israeli house guest who came to convince Protestant denominations to disinvest from Israel until the Israeli government reflected the empathy that Americans show Israelis in Israeli government empathy to Palestinians. Unfortunately for the Palestinians, the Christians were too much under the thumb of Zionist propaganda to have any Christian charity for the Palestinians. According to reports, 1.4 million Gazans–more than half of the population–have already been displaced by Israel dropping US-supplied bombs on Palestinian civilians. Rabbi Alissa Wise told CNN that “it’s wretched. I wake up every single morning with tears in my eyes, rage in my heart, and I channel it into action.” Her latest was to occupy the US Capitol and urge a ceasefire, which is far more than than any Christian church leader, member of the House or Senate or Biden regime are doing.
Note that it is Jews who are leading the demand for a ceasefire. CNN published photos of the Jewish peace rally on Capitol Hill. The Jews are holding signs: Zionism = Fascism, Stop Genocide in Gaza, Jews Say Ceasefire Now, No To War And Apartheid, Not In Our Name, and other trenchant statements. Americans, British, and Europeans need to confront the fact that propaganda from Zionists, a minority of Jews, has turned them into monsters demanding Palestinian blood. The demand for blood might well end in nuclear Armageddon.
“This perhaps is the final tragic irony. Those who were once in need of protection from genocide now commit it.”
• Exterminate All the Brutes (Chris Hedges)
Israel’s bombing campaign, one of the heaviest of the 21st century, has killed more than 7,300 Palestinians, nearly half of them children, along with 26 journalists, medical workers, teachers and United Nations staff. Some 1.4 million Palestinians in Gaza have been displaced and an estimated 600,000 are homeless. Mosques, 120 health facilities, ambulances, schools, apartment blocks, supermarkets, water and sewage treatment plants and power plants have been blasted into rubble. Hospitals and clinics, lacking fuel, medicine and electricity, have been bombed or are shutting down. Clean water is running out. Gaza, by the end of Israel’s scorched earth campaign, will be uninhabitable, a tactic the Nazis regularly employed when facing armed resistance, including in the Warsaw Ghetto and later Warsaw itself. By the time Israel is done, Gaza, or at least Gaza as we knew it, will not exist.
Not only are the tactics the same, but so is the rhetoric. Palestinians are referred to as animals, beasts and Nazis. They have no right to exist. Their children have no right to exist. They must be cleansed from the earth. The extermination of those whose land we steal, whose resources we plunder and whose labor we exploit is coded within our DNA. Ask Native Americans. Ask Indians. Ask the Congolese. Ask the Kikuyu in Kenya. Ask the Herero in Namibia who, like Palestinians in Gaza, were gunned down and driven into desert concentration camps where they died of starvation and disease. Eighty thousand of them. Ask Iraqis. Ask Afghans. Ask Syrians. Ask Kurds. Ask Libyans. Ask indigenous peoples across the globe. They know who we are.
Israel’s distorted, settler colonial visage is our own. We pretend otherwise. We ascribe to ourselves virtues and civilizing qualities that are, as in Israel, flimsy justifications for stripping an occupied and besieged people of their rights, seizing their land and using prolonged imprisonment, torture, humiliation, enforced poverty and murder to keep them subjugated. Our past, including our recent past in the Middle East, is built on the idea of subduing or wiping out the “inferior” races of the earth. We give these “inferior” races names that embody evil. ISIS. Al Qaeda. Hezbollah. Hamas. We use racist slurs to dehumanize them. “Haji” “Sand Nigger” “Camel Jockey” “Ali Baba” “Dung Shoveler” And then, because they embody evil, because they are less than human, we feel licensed, as Nissim Vaturi, a member of the Israeli parliament for the ruling Likud party said, to erase “the Gaza Strip from the face of the earth.”
Naftali Bennett, Israel’s former Prime Minister, in an interview on Sky News on Oct. 12 said, “We’re fighting Nazis,” in other words, absolute evil. Not to be outdone, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu described Hamas in a press conference with the German chancellor, Olaf Scholz, as “the new Nazis”. Think about that. A people, imprisoned in the world’s largest concentration camp for sixteen years, denied food, water, fuel and medicine, lacking an army, air force, navy, mechanized units, artillery, command and control and missile batteries, is being butchered and starved by one of the most advanced militaries on the planet, and they are the Nazis?
[..] Maybe we are fooled by our own lies, but most of the world sees us, and Israel, clearly. They understand our genocidal proclivities, rank hypocrisy and self-righteousness. They see that Palestinians, largely friendless, without power, forced to live in squalid refugee camps or the diaspora, denied their homeland and eternally persecuted, suffer the kind of fate once reserved for Jews. This perhaps is the final tragic irony. Those who were once in need of protection from genocide now commit it.
Lebanon, Turkey house large amounts of refugees.
• Tucker And Farage: Why Aren’t Muslim Countries Taking Muslim Refugees? (ZH)
Tucker Carlson sat down with former UK politician Nigel Farage to discuss where refugees from current conflicts in the Middle East should go, considering that there will be “hundreds of thousands, possibly millions” of them in the coming weeks, months and years. Carlson posited a scenario in which Israel is asked to take in refugees who hate them. “So if you were to suggest ‘well why isn’t Israel take them in, it’s their War’, the response you would get would be… ‘that’s insane these people are dangerous.'” Likewise, a country with Christian roots such as the United States – which feels it should try to help people, should remember that “the duty of any government its primary duty is the Integrity of its own country and its citizens,” Carlson continued.
Carlson then observes that there’s a distinct lack of voices calling for countries with booming economies, such as China, to bear the refugee load. Why instead are Christian countries, historically bastions of refuge, the only ones saddled with this “obligation”? “It’s interesting that no one ever says well China’s got the fastest-growing economy in the world they have an obligation to take in millions of refugees,” he said. Farage noted the UK’s “great history in the UK of taking refugees,” noting that “they did very, very well in Commerce, Finance, the military in our country,” in terms of persecuted groups that the country has taken in throughout history. But juxtapose this with the recent waves of refugees, and a disturbing pattern emerges. A significant number of these refugees, especially from regions like Gaza, are potential sympathizers of extremist groups like Hamas.
Given the spate of extremist-driven incidents in the West, particularly in the UK, one can’t help but wonder: are Western countries knowingly or unknowingly sowing the seeds of their own societal unrest? “So if you take any significant number from Gaza into our country, you will have a significant percentage of Hamas sympathizers and supporters among them,” said Carlson. To which Farage replied: “And if anyone should take them Tucker, shouldn’t it be the Egyptians? Shouldn’t it be the Saudis? Shouldn’t it be their co-religionists in that part of the world? And how interesting that Saudi Arabia didn’t take a single person from Syria because they were worried of the impact it would have on Saudi Society. Right. And the same goes for Egypt.”
According to Farage, “We have allowed the virus of Marxism to take hold in our countries,” noting how Britain and the United States are being indoctrinated with a toxic blend of guilt over their colonial pasts, allegations of institutional racism, and a host of other divisive narratives. All the while, conservative voices, which could counter this downward spiral, remain silenced by a spineless media establishment. “Conservative cowardice through politics and media has led to so very much of this,” he continued.
Ep. 35 Start another war, send millions more anti-Western refugees to the West. Starting to notice a pattern? pic.twitter.com/93dQaVfbNF
— Tucker Carlson (@TuckerCarlson) October 30, 2023
“..Nebenzya pointed out high losses among UN staffers in the conflict..”
• Biblical-Scale Catastrophe Unfolding In Gaza Strip – Russia’s UN Envoy (TASS)
A humanitarian catastrophe on a biblical scale is unfolding in the Gaza Strip, Russia’s Permanent Representative to the UN Vasily Nebenzya said at a session of the UN Security Council. “It’s time to call it what it is: a humanitarian catastrophe on a biblical scale is unfolding on occupied Palestinian territory, in the West Bank of the Jordan River and in the Gaza Strip,” he said. “According to information received, the number of fatalities in the enclave has surpassed 8,000 people, half of whom are women and children,” the envoy pointed out.
Over 2,000 people remain under the rubble, more than 21,000 sustained wounds while internally displaced people are numbering 1.6 mln, he noted. Additionally, Nebenzya pointed out high losses among UN staffers in the conflict zone. “These horrible figures are increasing hourly. We are thankful to all the humanitarian workers on site who are working at the end of their tether under the conditions of a catastrophic lack of basic goods, including medical ones, as well as with high risks for their lives,” the diplomat said.
“..the EU has brought itself to the brink of “complete degeneration” by deciding to become Russia’s enemy at the instigation of Washington.”
• EU Is Russia’s Enemy – Medvedev (RT)
Russia and the European Union are now “true enemies” rather than neighbors, according to former Russian President Dmitry Medvedev. Writing on social media on Sunday, Medvedev, who serves as deputy chairman of the Russian Security Council, claimed that Brussels has become obsessed with building “crazy conspiracy theories” and raving about the “complete unpredictability of Russia.” As a result, the bloc has spent “astronomical sums to maintain its security” but has “lost Russia as a long-term strategic partner. We are not happy about this, but it is a fact,” the former president added. Medvedev accused the EU of meekly complying with the whims of the US, meaning it has lost the ability to act independently not only globally but even in Europe.
“Almost all EU countries stood at attention in front of the United States and Britain and obediently began to carry out their instructions to support the Nazi Kiev regime. And now any instructions in general,” Medvedev wrote. He claimed that the EU has brought itself to the brink of “complete degeneration” by deciding to become Russia’s enemy at the instigation of Washington. At the same time, the former president insisted that the world’s great powers will sooner or later agree on how to coexist in the new geopolitical conditions, and that Washington will have no choice but to deal with Russia, China, and the Global South. Europe, however, will “soon be gone,” Medvedev predicted, comparing the EU to a “sweet little old woman.”
“She was mercilessly limited in her rights by a fat-faced overseas relative, whom she trusted unreservedly. First he cynically robbed the wealthy old woman, depriving her of many sources of livelihood and sending her millions of poor relatives. Soon, he will simply throw the old woman, who has fallen into insanity, out onto the cold street, mercilessly slamming the door behind her in her own house.” One of Russia’s closest allies, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, stated last week at a meeting with Hungarian Foreign Minister Peter Szijjarto that he wholeheartedly supports the existence and preservation of the EU, and wants it to be “strong, resilient, sovereign, and independent.” Lukashenko explained that his support did not stem from any particular love for the EU, but because it is one of the pillars, along with Russia, China, the US, and India, that hold up the planet and whose downfall would be “bad for everyone.”
“He deludes himself … We are not winning. But try telling him that..”
• Zelensky ‘Feels Betrayed’ by Western Partners – Time Magazine (Sp.)
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has become robotic after feeling betrayed by his Western backers, Time magazine reported, citing members of Zelensky’s inner circle. “Now he walks in, gets the updates, gives the orders, and walks out,” one of the sources said, with a second source adding that he feels betrayed by his Western allies. “He deludes himself … We are not winning. But try telling him that,” the source reportedly said.
Earlier on Monday, former Ukrainian Prime Minister Mykola Azarov said that the Ukrainian armed forces are experiencing a critical lack of quality medicines and medical equipment, as the number of injured soldiers has tripled amid the crumbling counteroffensive. Last week, UK media reported that medical staff of the Ukrainian armed forces are complaining about faulty medical equipment and the lack of supplies, leading to an increase in the death toll in the wake of Ukraine’s counteroffensive.Moreover, corruption is rampant among Ukrainian officials, a top advisor to Zelensky reportedly said. “People are stealing like there’s no tomorrow,” the advisor is quoted as saying. Zelensky acknowledged the problem of corruption in Ukraine, the report said. However, Zelensky also suggested that some foreign backers may be exaggerating the issue as an excuse to reduce support, the report said. The report comes as US lawmakers weigh a $106 billion supplemental funding request by the Biden administration, which includes money to support Ukraine and Israel. Some lawmakers have proposed considering aid for the two countries separately due to a potential lack of support for Ukraine among House Republicans.
There you go…
• New German Anti-War Party Already Neck and Neck With Scholz’s SPD (Sp.)
Despite the fact that Germany’s new political party conceived by lawmaker Sahra Wagenknecht has yet to become official, it has already overtaken a member of the ruling coalition government in a poll. Around 14 percent of Germans are ready to vote for the Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance – For Reason and Justice (BSW), according to a poll commissioned by Bild am Sonntag and cited in media reports. Two surveys were carried out, one specifically featuring the party that BSW is preparing to found officially next January, and another one omitting it to assess which of Germany’s political parties might hemorrhage support once this new rival enters the fray. German Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s Social Democratic Party is only one percentage point ahead of Wagenknecht’s brainchild, one of the polls showed, and two other members of the ruling coalition – the Green Party and the Free Democrats – lag behind at 12 percent and 5 percent, respectively.
As to which party is likely to lose the most voters to the new political alliance, the survey indicated it would be the right-wing Alternative for Germany Party (AfD). Although the poll omitting Wagenknecht’s alliance showed AfD garnering 21 percent of the votes, the poll that included BSW showed some 4 percent of German voters abandoning AfD, according to the survey. These figures place the “Alliance Sahra Wagenknecht–For Reason and Justice” in fourth place. Wagenknecht, known for her vociferous criticism of Germany’s military aid to the Kiev regime and sanctions targeting Russia, announced on 23 October, at the first press conference of the new political alliance, that she had abandoned The Left party and intended to found a new political party with several close associates that stands for “reason and justice”. The former parliamentary leader of The Left, Amira Mohamed Ali, was elected chairwoman of the new Sahra Wagenknecht Alliance – For Reason and Justice, which already has 10 lawmakers who also abandoned The Left.
Wagenknecht, who did not mince her words when she described Germany’s government as the “worst” in its history, emphasized that it “acted without a plan, is short-sighted and sometimes totally incompetent”. “We need to return to political sanity, and this applies first and foremost to our economic policy. Germany is a country that is poor in raw materials but rich in exports. A large part of our wellbeing depends on high industrial added value. But with the economic sanctions [against Russia] we have cut ourselves off from cheap energy resources without any viable alternatives,” Wagenknecht said.
Would the success of the new Anti-War Party have something to do with this?
• Germany ‘Must Be Prepared for War’ in Europe – Defense Minister (Sp.)
Germany must prepare itself for a European war, Defense Minister Boris Pistorius has announced. “We have to get used to the idea that there may be a threat of war in Europe,” the minister said in an interview with German media. “Germany must be able to defend itself. We must be prepared for war,” he said. Warning that the ongoing Ukrainian crisis and the latest explosion of violence in the Palestinian-Israeli crisis will have consequences for German society, Pistorius said that Germany must act defensively, and that this applies to both the Bundeswehr and society at large. Pistorius rejected allegations leveled by some of Germany’s political class that the government has been too slow in its ambitious rearmament plans, insisting that “it doesn’t get much faster than that,” and pointing out that the Bundeswehr is not only getting €100 billion in extra money, but also being reorganized.
The defense minister went on to blame the current government’s predecessors going back to the 1990s for the military’s shoddy state. “Everything that has been messed up and fallen into disrepair over 30 years cannot be corrected in 19 months,” he insisted. But by the end of the current decade Germany will find itself in a completely different position, he promised. Germany’s rearmament is on track to becoming the largest of its kind since the Second World War, with spending continually ticking upward for more than 60 years, with the exception of a brief drop in spending in the 1990s after the end of the Cold War. But the outlays have not coincided with visible improvements in the European nation’s military capabilities, with the Bundeswehr regularly complaining of shortages of military equipment and parts, and limitations to training stemming from restrictions on the use of fuel and ammunition during drills.
Despite these problems, Berlin has been highly generous in supporting the US-led proxy war against Russia in Ukraine, committing over €17.1 billion in military assistance to Kiev since 2022 – more than any other country apart from the United States itself. Major equipment deliveries have included Leopard 1 and Leopard 2 tanks, Gepard self-propelled anti-aircraft guns, Panzerhaubitze 2000 self-propelled howitzers, Marder infantry fighting vehicles, and Panzerfaust RPGs.
From insurancenewsnet. They notice something, but can’t name it. Not a word about vaccines.
“Younger adult death rate up 20% in 2023.”
• ‘Excess Mortality’ Continuing Surge Causes Concerns (INN)
“There’s no standard way to measure excess mortality,” said Josh Stirling, founder of the Insurance Collaboration to Save Lives, a non-profit organization that seeks mitigate mortality losses by providing life insurers with tests to screen policyholders for health problems. “But if you use the data that seems most reliable it looks like, generally, we’re at 13.9 deaths per 100,000, which is up perhaps 7% from where it should have been. Is that catastrophic? Maybe not, but it should be lower.” The Society of Actuaries polls of its members found that in August of last year 85% thought excess morality rates would continue to 2025. Two months ago, the same poll found that 79% believed excess mortality rates will continue through 2026.
The issue is clouded because figures vary widely depending on how the data is cut and adjusted for the time period, age, specific pathologies, and many other factors. Some executives think the current numbers are temporary or seasonal and don’t require the industry to react.“We believe that insured population will continue to see declining excess deaths over the next several years reaching about 0% excess deaths by 2030,” said Fred Tavan, chief pricing officer at Legal & General America, a Maryland-based insurer and major provider of term life insurance in the U.S. “This is one of the reasons there haven’t seen any significant changes in insurance premiums during COVID or even after. A scan of insurance premiums across the industry from different carriers proves this out.”
Others aren’t so sanguine and point to statistics from the U.S. Center of Disease Control that show mortality rates alarmingly rising for different categories. For example, younger adult mortality rates are up more than 20% in 2023, the CDC said. Cause of death data show increased cardiac mortality in all ages. And even as COVID-related causes declined in 2022, others rose, particularly stroke, diabetes, kidney and liver diseases. “Consider the ripples of COVID-19 and its varying impacts, leading to higher rates of depression, suicide, and increased substance abuse,” said Samantha Chow, global leader for Life, Annuity and Benefits Sector at Capgemini, the giant multinational Paris-based consulting company. “This has set off a domino effect. From a life insurer’s standpoint, and those dealing in retirement and long-term care solutions, there’s a larger conversation at hand.
Can the industry handle a sudden spike in claims? The surge in excess deaths caught carriers off guard, and our aging population is becoming more susceptible to illnesses or passing due to natural causes.” Chow said there’s a real question of whether the insurance industry can sustain the enormous payouts the excess mortality rates will dictate. “The real concern for life insurers lies in preparing for an unexpected wave of death claims and the impact on their assets under management,” she said. “Do they have enough reserves to weather these outflows, given the excess deaths? It’s not just about death or health. It is about the industry’s ability and readiness to manage this monumental outflow.”
Full EV
This is the most coherent explanation on why going “fully EV” makes no sense (for now).
Get this man in charge of an energy committee. pic.twitter.com/DhtYoxdP52
— Brandon Beylo (@marketplunger1) October 30, 2023
Crocodile, cayman, alligator. Which is which?
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