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Links 8/30/2025

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Christopher, the Dog-Headed Saint JSTOR (Micael T)

Astronomer: Sun is now storing up energy for a powerful flare Vzglyad via machine translation (Micael T)

Starlink Puts the Last Nail in Burning Man’s Coffin Gizmodo (Kevin W)

#COVID-19/Pandemics

CVS Holds Off on Offering Covid Vaccines in 16 States New York Times

Climate/Environment

Warning of ‘horrendous’ rat infestations after summer heatwaves Independent

EU’s record wildfire emissions highlight threat to forest carbon sinks Climate Change News

Türkiye’s wildfires leave lasting scars on marine life, scientist says Daily Sabah

Iraq’s Water Reserves Hit 80-Year Low, Sparking National Emergency Kurdistan24

China?

Why China Builds Faster Than the Rest of the World Wired (resilc)

Chinese banks face profit squeeze as loan growth falters Reuters

Japan has lodged a protest accusing China of carrying out the “unilateral development” of gas fields in disputed waters in the East China Sea Aljazeera

India

‘In a nightmare’: India braces for big layoffs as Trump’s tariffs bite Aljazeera

India warns Pakistan to expect flooding after opening major dams near the border Independent

Bangladesh’s Garment Boom, Workers Still in Chains CADTM (Micael T)

Africa

There will be no economic takeoff in Africa without lots of large (private sector) firms Ken Opalo

Africa Is Buying a Record Number of Chinese Solar Panels Wired (resilc)

Somalia, UAE hold talks as tensions simmer over Puntland, Somaliland Al-Monitor

South of the Border

Thirsty data centres boom in drought-hit Mexico BBC

European Disunion

Inept Leaders’ Tunnel Vision Drives Europe into Turmoil Simplicius. Neoliberalism makes you stupid.

Who will be most vulnerable as Europe’s energy crunch deepens? Moodys

Macron’s stunned troops see no good way out of France’s impasse Politico

The time is ripe for another widespread protest in France Connexion France

‘Turning point’: German weapons firm opens Europe’s largest munitions plant France24

Wary of Russia, Germany tiptoes toward compulsory military service Washington Post

German government: Corruption and involvement in Nord Stream explosion have no impact on aid to Ukraine Nachdenkseiten via machine translation< Migrant riots have come to Switzerland Spectator

Old Blighty

British farmers brace for a second year of poor harvests Financial Times

Sky-high electricity costs hinder Britain’s net zero mission Reuters

People, ideas machines XIII: The origins and evolution of the Cabinet Office, the heart of darkness in the permanent government Dominic Cummings. Colonel Smithers:

Cummings has teamed up with Farage, but stays in the background. The Heritage Foundation and he are drafting the company’s manifesto for the 2029 election.

Reform is a company owned by Farage and Mohammed Zia Uddin Yusuf, better known as Zia Yusuf. Yusuf hopes to set up a DOGE in Whitehall.

Israel v. the Resistance

Bezalel Smotrich presents plan to end Gaza war by 2026 Jerusalem Post

Gaza: US Forces Can Be Liable for Assisting Israeli War Crimes Human Rights Watch (resilc)

[BREAKING SPECIAL] : Rubio’s Shameful and Illegal Interference With the UN. w/ Prof. Jeffrey Sachs Judge Napolitano, YouTube

Israel’s Worsening PR Problem and Its Failure to Defeat Hamas Larry Johnson

Lindsey Graham Calls for Sanctions on Norway After Major BDS Move New Republic

* * *

* * *

Russia, China, reject attempt of E3 to Reimpose Sanctions on Iran over Nuclear Program Juan Cole

Iran plunged into new crisis as currency drops to near-record low of 0.000001% on Dollar Daily Express

New Not-So-Cold War

Ukrainian Cities Are Again Under Destructive Strikes💥🏙️ Military Summary And Analysis For 2025.08.30 Military Summary, YouTube

The US announced the transfer of weapons to the Ukrainian Armed Forces that can strike “deeper” into Russian territory Vzgylad via machine translation. (Micael T)

Why 3,350 New Bombs For Ukraine Will Not Make A Difference Moon of Alabama (Kevin W)

Germany completes construction of railway network for possible troop transfer to Ukraine Top War (Micael T)

The ghost in the Kremlin’s corridors: Yevgeny Primakov’s lasting power Brian McDonald (Colonel Smithers). Important

Austria’s loss of neutrality requires moving IAEA, UN, OPEC offices from Vienna — Medvedev TASS

US extends loophole to keep banned Russian diamonds coming RT (Micael T)

Imperial Collapse Watch

THE WAR-WARRING IDIOSYNCRASY OF CAPITALISM (V -AND FINAL-) Andres Piqueras via machine translation (Micael T)

Amtrak’s New Acela Trains Are Here. They’re Moving Slower Than the Old Ones Wall Street Journal (resilc)

Trump 2.0

Trump’s approval rating plummets to record second term low, new poll says Independent

Republican Storms Out of Back Door After Being Laughed at During Town Hall DNYUZ (resilc). For defending Trump. Video here. This in the beating heart of red America.

* * *

The White House’s Bizarre Defense of Chinese Foreign Students American Conservative

RFK Jr continues to make dubious health claims as CDC roils under his leadership Guardian (Kevin W)

President Trump revokes Kamala Harris’s Secret Service protection The Hill

Transportation Dept. Cancels $679 Million for Offshore Wind Projects New York Times (Kevin W)

DoD asks civilian employees to volunteer for ICE, CBP supporting roles Federal News Network

Tariffs

Most of Trump’s tariffs are illegal, federal court rules Guardian (Kevin W)

Fedwatch

Trump’s attack on the Fed threatens US credibility Financial Times

Immigration

Neil Young confronts Donald Trump in new song Big Crime: ‘Don’t want soldiers on the streets’ Guardian (resilc)

Big if true. Means being a person of color = presumed Hispanic = suspected “illegal”:

Washington Governor Criticizes Border Patrol Arrests at Wildfire Site New York Times

Democrats en déshabillé

>Is Cory Booker For Real? We Asked His (Fake) Political Consultant Zeteo. Trust me, watch this.

0% of Democrats Happy with State of the US Right Now Newsweek

Former AIPAC Democrats Sign On to Block Arms Sales to Israel Intercept.

Mr. Market is Moody

For bruised bond markets, turbulence persists as debt sales ramp up again Reuters

AI

OpenAI Says It’s Scanning Users’ ChatGPT Conversations and Reporting Content to the Police Futurism (Micael T). STOP USING AI!!!

Power Distortions Are More Common Near Data Centers Barry Ritholtz (resilc)

The Bezzle

Before You Pump Gas, Look For These Signs Of A Card Skimmer Jalopnik. A must read if you drive an ICE in the US

Antidote du jour (via):

And a bonus (guurst):

Amd a second (Chuck L). There is some skepticism in comments, but no one suggests AI, more that the clips may have been stitched:

A third:

See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.

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177 comments

  1. Geo

    Not the most important thing considering all the harrowing articles in links today but symbolically it speaks volumes about the values and intentions of our current government:

    “The Pentagon is restoring a portrait of Gen. Robert E. Lee, which includes a slave guiding the Confederate general’s horse in the background, to the West Point library three years after a congressionally mandated commission ordered it removed, officials said.”

    https://www.nytimes.com/2025/08/28/us/politics/pentagon-trump-confederate-lee-west-point.html

    Reply ↓
    1. The Rev Kev

      Lots of figures in the Trump regime like the Confederacy and are having bases, that had their names changed from Confederate officers under Biden to different names, having them revert back to those original Confederate names again. You wonder how far it will go. During Trump’s military parade they had soldiers dressed in the outfits from previous eras such as WW2 ‘dog-faces’ to Union troops to Revolutionary troops. So what happens when they hold a military parade like that again, that along side Union soldiers you will have soldiers dressed in Confederate uniforms marching as well. Under Trump, it could happen.

      Reply ↓
      1. QABubba

        Arlington National Cemetery was built on Robert E. Lee’s former plantation. Outside his home, in the ’60’s, they had alternating Confederate and American flags. Now just American.
        As an aside, despite what Robert McNamara and Dick Cheney told you, there are no rows and rows of white crosses. Makes you wonder if they ever visited.

        Reply ↓
        2. scott s.

          While it could be nominally called “Lee’s Plantation” Arlington is probably most connected to George Washington Parke Custis.

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      2. Carolinian

        A couple or more decades back there was a fad in my region for Civil War battle re-enactments with whole troops of enthusiasts in Confederate uniforms. Trump had nothing to do with this and few eyebrows were raised.

        Here’s suggesting that for most of the Northerners fighting back then the war was not about slavery but about saving the Union and that’s why they were so willing to bring the South back in afterwards, if on dubious terms. The people who are changing history are those who ignore the reality that racism didn’t just exist in the South. Reconstruction was not so much a surrender to “fascism” as the goal of the war from the beginning.

        As for now, perhaps they should rename those forts Fort Westmoreland or LeMay. The line between good wars and bad ones can be very fuzzy indeed and forts are about wars. IMO the R2P people are mostly hypocrites.

        Reply ↓
        1. Swamp Yankee

          Carolinian,

          Northern public opinion shifted over time. You suggest above that “for most of the Northerners fighting back then the war was not about slavery but about saving the Union[.]”

          First, I’m not sure how you divine that aspect of northern public opinion. There were no polls, and the best we can do is look to the letters of the troops, public debates, electoral returns, and similar secondary measurements. But while in the beginning years of the war, prior to Antietam and the Emancipation Proclamation, slavery may not have been an overriding concern for some northerners, by 1863, and especially 1864 and 1865, it became central, as recognition dawned on both the Lincoln Administration and the general public that the war could not be won without destroying the slave system that undergirded the economic power of the planter class which ran the Confederacy (despite the yeomen and the poor doing most of the fighting).

          How can we test this? By looking at the electoral results in 1864. McClellan, who was the Democratic nominee, took the position that he wished to save the Union and continue the prosecution of the war (contra various “Peace” Democrats and outright Copperheads like Vallandingham of Ohio), while leading a Party that was profoundly opposed to the Lincoln Administration’s moves on things like emancipation.

          Lincoln, on the other hand, ran on his record, including Emancipation, and of course, continuing the war to victory.

          Lincoln, of course, won, carrying every state not in active secession except New Jersey (McClellan’s home state), neighboring Delaware, and Kentucky. The final electoral count in 1864 — decisively in favor of Lincoln and his policy of emancipation — cuts against your suggestion above that the Northern public didn’t really care about slavery.

          No serious historian suggests that racism only existed in the South (Leon Litwack’s _North of Slavery_ is over six decades old). I also don’t know what you mean by “dubious terms” for Southern readmission. If anything, northern terms were generous.

          To the direct point — the war was, at its most profound level, a contest between two social-economic systems, between slavery and free labor. The free labor parts of the South, the uplands, themselves often rose in rebellion against the planter class (e.g., West Virginia). Robert E. Lee was of the planter class which rebelled against a democratic government so it could continue keeping human beings as chattel. He was a good general, but so was Frederick the Great, and neither should be on the wall at West Point.

          Reply ↓
          1. scott s.

            Might be worth checking out “What This Cruel War Was Over” by Manning.

            Her technique was to use letters from private soldiers to develop a narrative of sentiment regarding the war and its aims. In her view, opinion was largely directed in the north to maintaining the union. She ascribed this as a result of the second great awakening, especially in New England, which she describes as leading to a concept of American Exceptionalism — the idea that American government was uniquely established by God. As such, an attempt to sever that union was an attack on God’s plan.

            She argues that as northern armies moved into the south, direct contact of troops with the southern slave-based society produced a change in attitudes. The point wasn’t so much that troops became abolitionist, but that they saw slavery as destructive to the common white southern population.

            In her view as troops communicated their views that slavery was destructive to whites back home, the idea became widespread and elites in the north were gradually pulled into the idea resulting in the preliminary EP.

            Reply ↓
            1. Swamp Yankee

              Scott S., you’re right, Manning’s book sounds worth checking out, thank you. It seems consistent with the generally accepted idea that Northern opinion shifts over the course of the war, growing increasingly anti-slavery (whether for abolitionist humanitarian reasons or for concerns about what it did in terms of social and economic stagnation to white Southerners.)

              Reply ↓
          2. JBird4049

            I would look at the results of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, enhanced the conflict over slavery and solidified the positions of both sides. Probably most Northerners were racist and would not have have blacks either as relatives or neighbors, but the country was highly religious with the slave raids into the North from the South often for free born blacks forced Northerners into an ethical quandary: all men are equal before God and certainly all men are human, not things, in God’s eyes; if this is true, what does this say about slavery and what does this mean for a country that accepts slavery? And what does this say about a part of the country that embraces it?

            The more the South tried to expand and protect slavery, the more its actions forced the Northern public to think about slavery and its moral implications as well as the political corruption and the violence created by the Southerners protecting the “peculiar institution.” The racism remained, but the antipathy towards slavery increased.

            And the more the North criticized slavery, the greater the slavocracy overreacted, which increased the criticism from the North, which…

            Reply ↓
          3. QABubba

            If I remember correctly, parts of DC were enslaved until about 1863. Congress appropriated money to buy the slaves in DC and free them. But until then, Congressman could go to dinner over at the other slave holding Congressman’s house, with them as servants. You could literally walk back and forth across a street from free to enslaved and back.

            Reply ↓
            1. Carolinian

              The Emancipation Proclamation only freed the slaves or “contraband” belonging to participants in the rebellion. This was both a tactic to weaken the Southern home front and a bid to get England off the fence and to stop offering help to the South (which it did).

              One should bear in mind that slavery was a threat to free labor and this probably had a lot more to do with Northern public opposition than moral considerations. The planters were living in the middle ages while the North was joining the rest of the 19th century world. Hence the “house divided.”

              Reply ↓
              1. QABubba

                One must always remember the South was ‘King Cotton,’ which was the wealth creator of its time (extremely slave labor intensive). The cotton went to the textile mills in England (stolen from the Irish and the Indians). Hence British support for the South. The North wanted that cotton. They wanted to build textile mills of their own, which they did.
                As an aside, the Blacks loading the cotton bales on ships on the Mississippi River were given a quota of cocaine per day for efficiency’s sake. If I remember right, it was about 9 grams per day per slave. A nickel weighs 5 grams, for comparison.

                Reply ↓
          4. Carolinian

            My point is not whether most people in the North approved or disapproved of slavery but whether most soldiers saw themselves putting their lives on the line for the issue and and i’m suggesting–obviously no clairvoyant powers–that they did not and the re-acceptance of the South, warts and all, makes my point. It took another one hundred years for blacks to see a movement toward equality and I could cite endless instances of racism and yes even lynching above the Mason-Dixon. The patronizing treatment of black people in movie world including the famous and successul Gone With the Wind also makes my point.

            Of course for the Southern planters the war was absolutely about slavery and no slavery no war.

            History is history. We should not pretend it was something it was not. Nor do I condemn those Civil War re-enactors although that trend seems to have faded.

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      3. jax

        I was raised in south Jersey. About ten years ago my older sister sent me pictures of ‘Celebrate Vineland Day.’ Lots of pioneer dressing and pioneer food but my jaw dropped open when I saw people taking pictures in front of a huge Confederate flag. Plenty of cognitive dissonance for me, but when I asked about it I was told “it’s all part of our history.”

        Um. No, it is not. New Jersey fought for the Union. I’ve come to understand that the Confederate flag no longer has much to do with America’s civil war. It’s now a MAGA brand seen nationwide. Just kill me now.

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        1. hk

          The weird 20th century development is that Confederacy became the “thing” in places where the real Confederacy was not exactly popular.

          Today, West Virginia is about the most “Confederate” state today. Well, West Virginia came into existence by seceding from the Confederacy. Generally speaking, the idea of secession was not something that poor Southerners were fundamentally thrilled about: they weren’t invested in slavery, abstract notions of states’ rights, or whatever. (Ironically, one place where nothing seems to have since 1861 is Arizona–little known fact: Southern half of the then-Territory of New Mexico seceded, becoming, at least, according to the Confederacy, the Confederate Territory of Arizona (There is plaque in downtown Tucson where the secession convention was held). Their beef? Border with Mexico not being properly controlled by the feds.)

          Reply ↓
    1. divadab

      My wife rescued a fledgling crow from the road and put it in a tree. Later a crow came into our backyard and it certainly appeared it was thanking her. It certainly recognized her.

      Birds have been around a lot longer than we have…..their intelligence is something I’m not sure materialistic, reductionist science has a handle on.

      Reply ↓
  3. LawnDart

    Col., thank you for that: The ghost in the Kremlin’s corridors…

    “…better to court many princes than bend the knee to one.”

    Immediately this brought me to the workplace, and then I realized that this applies to many situations in life: it’s about relinquishing one’s agency.

    Reply ↓
  4. Neutrino

    Jalopnik, a new website to explore for memories, fun and laughs. Start with the skimmer article and drive on through. There were some really awful car designs over the years. The pieces on the Oz gearheads were refreshing.

    Reply ↓
  5. YuShan

    “OpenAI Says It’s Scanning Users’ ChatGPT Conversations and Reporting Content to the Police”

    Another reason why in the future people are going to run local models on their own computer. You need a powerful PC to have things run smoothly, but out of curiosity I have installed a free model on my own ancient PC (Ivy Bridge 2012 system) and while slow and hallucinating a lot, it does functionally work, without sending any communications with the outside world. It’s remarkably good for a size of only 4GB. I can see where this is going.

    Reply ↓
    1. Jason Boxman

      There’s so much investment in transforms/LLMs, I don’t think any of this is going away, but I do think small models are probably the future. As you said, they can be run completely locally, and trained to purpose. If you have Apple Silicon, and ~ 32GB of RAM, you can already run models that are functional and possibly even useful, depending on their size. No dedicated GPU necessary on Apple. With inference dedicated chips, you could do this on Wintel as well; I don’t know if that’s in the pipeline, I don’t follow PC architecture much for decades now. I know hyperscalers have been working on their own inference-only GPUs/CPUs for a number of years now.

      Reply ↓
      1. NotThePilot

        No dedicated GPU necessary on Apple.

        Not only. Even some of the ARM single-board CPUs (Raspberry Pi, Libre Computer, etc.) have chips with some AI cores now. They’re not beefy devices & I haven’t played with that feature at all (yet) so I don’t know how good it really is. But the hardware is there in the specs.

        Reply ↓
        1. Glen

          The AMD AI CPUs designed for laptops have been generating quite a buzz in some circles. The highest end version of these can be configured to run stand alone LLMs. Here’s Wendell on Level1Linux going over the Framework Desktop using the AMD AI Max+ 395:

          Linux on the New Framework Desktop PC! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ziZDzrDI7AM

          I am not an advocate of AI, and never used it in any professional situation although I did work with some engineers that had used it on other projects (and after discussing the technology with them, saw absolutely no reason to use it ever). But if you’re interested, and have the money to spend, you can now run your own LLM at home.

          Reply ↓
      2. scott s.

        NVidia hardware with CUDA and at least 12Gb of VRAM helps in running some of the Python-based code. Something like an RTX 5070.

        Reply ↓
  6. QABubba

    Re: Simplicius
    The problem is globalism/neoliberalism. The ability for corporations and billionaires to hide their money off shore, move it around the world, means it becomes tax free. Therefore wealth inequality skyrockets. No nation gets to tax it.
    Therefore the individual governments go bankrupt (including the US). This is not the Westphalian model.

    Reply ↓
    1. Bugs

      It’s funny how the West can sanction and debank assorted enemies of the moment but can’t do a darned thing about tax exiles.

      Reply ↓
      1. QABubba

        It goes back to neoliberalism. Russia’s oligarchs moved their money around the world and avoided taxes. Then they were sanctioned and Russia was kicked out of SWIFT. Suddenly, they couldn’t do this anymore, and had to reinvest their money in the Russian economy and pay taxes. This was the greatest gift of the morons to the Russian government. The Russian economy is now thriving, and the current debt level is 19% of GDP, up from 15%, but they’re spending on the war.
        This is absolute proof positive of why the neoliberalism model, which allows the free flow of money around the world to avoid taxes, is destroying the Westphalian model nation state. All the West had to do was impose currency controls on Russia, and Russia thrived. And their tax revenue thrived.

        Reply ↓
        1. The Rev Kev

          You know, what you said could be done as a comedy routine. And yet everything that you said is entirely true fro start to finish and is exactly what happened. Now I am wondering if there has been a similar effect in Iran the past few decades. At the least they have a solid engineering sector which could be the result of internal investments.

          Reply ↓
  7. LawnDart

    The dog (Chihuahua/Corgi) has mostly abandoned the first two floors of the townhouse where we reside: bats have figured out how to enter in the evening, both tiny and rather large ones. The tiny ones are black, fast and frenetic, and the large one is pretty chill, a reddish-brown in color; he takes his time to wonder around and to see what there is to see.

    At first the Princess simply wandered to her kennel (enclosed cage) and lay down with paws crossed to watch the show, but a recent morning addition has proven too much for her. You see, to get the hyper little black bastards out, I’d leave a door open… Mr. Grey Squirrel started showing up in the living room every morning, and a chunker is he.

    Now the Princess will chase cats, deer, and even bear (honestly, it’s hillarious– Chihuahua chasing/treeing Black bear) , but apparently not this invader of our household– a fat squirrel. Mr. Squirrel doesn’t give a damn about the dog, but she doesn’t care for his company, so she’ll whine a little and leave. Personally, I have no problem eating the son-of-a-bitch (squirrel, not dog… maybe) along with a few of his friends, and I think he knows this so he scampers off whenever I show up…

    Reply ↓
    1. mrsyk

      You might try placing a realistic looking stuffed cat on a chair and putting it just inside the door so the silhouette is visible from outside. I’ve had some success doing this.

      Reply ↓
      1. LawnDart

        That’s an idea.

        We do have ferral cats around here, but they seem to mostly stick near the farms: too many hungry foxes, wolves, coywolves, eagles and hawks I suppose, but if I could get my hands on one for a few days that’d probably do the trick. Maybe it could teach the dog to fight as well… or eat it.

        The dog actually belonged to my father and step-mother: I am not a small dog person. They had Jack Russells before her, and each of them were mean and yappy, but not the Princess– if anything she’s too friendly, energetic and happy; she’s got zero mean in her, unlike their other dogs. Maybe she’s got doggie autisim, because she did not pick up on or take up the darker side of my elders personalities, ’cause those folks could be nasty, especially once their dementias started to set in.

        I had no plans on being a dog owner as it really isn’t compatable with my lifestyle, but it seems to have happened. She’s come a long ways from where she was at when I inherited her– an unhousebroken, skittish, pugly mess– and I am kind of proud of her, of how far she’s come. Now if she had been one of those Jack Russells she’d be filling a shallow hole in the woods– if I’d even bother to bury the damn thing.

        Reply ↓
  8. Wukchumni

    Starlink Puts the Last Nail in Burning Man’s Coffin Gizmodo
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    Funny article, Starlink has been at Burning Man for many years now, it didn’t show up all of the sudden this Burn~

    My first Burning Man was in 2003 and it felt similar to a backpacking trip where there was no outside information, and you had to live in the present. It was most evoking in 2005 when Katrina was happening during the event, and we had campmates from Metarie, La. who would drive to Gerlach Nv just outside of the event to figure out what’s going on.

    They left Wednesday and hightailed it back home, where their house was a bit of a shambles from the hurricane.

    There is a great emphasis in the media that its all Illionaires and their ilk that rule to roost. If anything its more like a chance for them to be normal people in that everybody gets around on bicycle while festooned with goggles and a mask if duststorms are threatening.

    Much was made of the Orgy Dome being ripped apart by 50 mph winds, and there is a swinger element to BM, but its pretty much for those that indulge in such activities on a normal basis.

    I’m no prude, but i’d never do that, nor have any of my campmates ever partaken, that i’m aware of, and that’s around 200 people over 20 years.

    Last year the only public sex I saw was a couple making it on an art installment, that’s it.

    That said, Burning Man might be dying out, the last 3 years tickets with a face value of $550 have been available for a few hundred bucks leading up to the event, to me that speaks volumes~

    A couple of mudfests in the last few years doesn’t help things, although the silver lining to it all, is after it rains there is no dust as the alkali turned into hard caked dry mud.

    Reply ↓
  9. The Rev Kev

    “Macron’s stunned troops see no good way out of France’s impasse”

    ‘It was, after all, the surprise snap vote following European elections last summer that shunted France into its current deadlock and irrevocably damaged Macron’s reputation.’

    Politico is mistaken here. Actually they are wrong. They want to blame voters but in the last elections the votes were heading to the left but what happened was that the French political establishment rigged it so that the right and the center-right continued in power in defiance of election results. They want a new PM now but the guy that they have in mind is center-right too. They refuse to change and they refuse to reform. So the present PM is still playing games by trying to set up inter-generational warfare when he said on French TV-

    ‘The primary victims of the government debt will be the “youngest French people,” Bayrou said in an interview with French broadcaster TF1 on Wednesday.

    “They’re the victims; they’re the ones who will have to pay the debt for the rest of their lives,” he said, adding that Paris is trying to convince them that more borrowing is needed.
    French debt ballooning by €5,000 a second – PM READ MORE: French debt ballooning by €5,000 a second – PM

    “All this for the comfort of certain political parties and for the comfort of the so-called boomers.” ‘

    https://www.rt.com/news/623694-french-pm-debt-devastate-generation/

    No. It is still actually class. If they really wanted a solution they could reign in military spending and taxing wealthy people and corporations but they refuse to go there and instead try to get young and old people fighting each other instead of muppets like Macron and the people responsible for him. So all the present PM can suggest is things like scrapping public holidays, slashing public sector jobs, as well as welfare and pensions cuts. Pretty soon in France they will be saying

    ‘Help us, IMF. You’re our only hope.’

    Reply ↓
    1. YuShan

      “The primary victims of the government debt will be the “youngest French people,” Bayrou said in an interview with French broadcaster TF1 on Wednesday. “They’re the victims; they’re the ones who will have to pay the debt for the rest of their lives,” he said, adding that Paris is trying to convince them that more borrowing is needed”

      Has anybody considered that these young folks are simply going to default on that debt? That sucks for the holders of that debt (pension funds etc) but young folks know they won’t get pensions themselves, so why would they pay for it? If I were young (which unfortunately I’m not), I would rather default/ reset and start with a clean slate. When younger generations get more political power, they will be inclined not to pay for legacy debt.

      Reply ↓
    2. mrsyk

      Where we fight our parents out in the streets to find out who is right and who is wrong.
      B Taupin

      Stoking this fire is insanity. The young will be/are looking for someone to blame for their (each day more) stark and hopeless reality.

      Reply ↓
      1. ambrit

        Macron is too young to remember France in 1968. Maybe his Dom is, I don’t know.
        The big worry I anticipate is that the reactionary politicos will figure out a way to focus all of this resentment and anger on the “Others.” Make it an internal race war. Unfortunately, that strategy is feasible. It works all the time world-wide.

        Reply ↓
    3. Aurelien

      No. You may want to glance at the figures for the 2024 elections. The clear winners of the popular vote were the Rassemblement national, with 37% followed by the Nouveau Front Populaire (sic) with 27%, just ahead of Macron’s coalition with 25%. Through a series of sordid (but not illegal) deals between the first and second rounds, the RN’s political enemies united to reduce the number of seats it gained to 143, whilst inflating the NFP’s seats to 193. However, the RN would not have been capable of forming a government (and did not want to) even if it had found coalition partners. And no-one would go into a coalition with the NFP, which in any case was riven with too many bitter internal disputes to form an effective government. (Though many people, including me, think that Macron missed an opportunity to destroy the NFP by asking them to form a government and watching them fall apart. But then he’s not a good politician.) So the relative majority that could be obtained from Macron’s troops, the centre-Right and independents was just about the only option.

      The situation in the National Assembly reflects the situation in the country, and new elections (which Macron has ruled out) would just produce another inconclusive result.

      Reply ↓
      1. The Rev Kev

        ‘which in any case was riven with too many bitter internal disputes to form an effective government’

        As compared to the current situation? All that is happening is that they are picking PM after PM in an effort to keep on kicking the can down the road. And how do you know that another election would be inconclusive. With France on the verge of having to go for an IMF loan, they might just be willing to give the le Penn’s party a go, especially after the extreme shenanigans that went on during the last election. At this point, Macron refusing new elections is just like Zelensky refusing new elections too and for the same reasons. Macron will eventually disappear into a nice new job with a bank or think tank somewhere but France does not have that luxury. And the clock is ticking.

        Reply ↓
    4. DJG, Reality Czar

      Rev Kev: What struck me in both articles is that they are written by the French equivalent of U.S. Republicans, that is, neoliberals. Both Saint Remy and Heffer are guilty of this, and I will quote Saint Remy:

      French politics will still be too internally riven to pass vital deficit-slashing reforms, despite Bayrou’s Cassandra-like warnings that France could be headed toward a Greek-style debt crisis if it sits on its hands and doesn’t implement an unpopular €43.8 billion budget squeeze.

      Then Heffer:

      Having written here recently about the problems that Prime Minister François Bayrou has in trying to secure €43billion of savings in a country addicted to state, and particularly to welfare, spending, the opposition is mobilising.

      With elites like these two, I’d be getting my gilet jaune out of the wardrobe, too.

      Vive la France.

      Reply ↓
    1. Polar Socialist

      No. Nope. Nyet.

      Today the EU foreign ministers will discuss, for the first time, officially about the possibility of using the frozen assets but as far as we know, most members oppose the move for financial and legal reasons.

      What Hungary sued EU over was that EU ignored Hungarian veto when it decided last year to use the interest from the frozen assets to support Ukraine. According to Hungary this violates the equality clauses of the EU member states and thus the EU law itself. It was filed in May and the European Court of Justice formally accepted it this Monday.

      Reply ↓
      1. The Rev Kev

        If they let the EU get away with this, then voting becomes de facto majority voting – which the EU has been pushing for some time. Maybe Slovakia will launch their own independent lawsuit later on to add further pressure on the EU.

        Reply ↓
        1. hk

          They scared Tywin, who was at least pretty smart, but not Cersei, the narcissistic idiot.

          Guess who is(are) running EU and EU states?

          Reply ↓
  11. AG

    re: 10 years German immigration “crisis”

    This might be mostly for Germans.

    BERLINER ZEITUNG contacted several German “celebrities” who had publicly supported the opening of borders by Merkel in 2015 for an answer how they saw the issue looking back today.

    (I btw agreed with that decision but of course as an isolated action it was idiotic. But the truth behind immigration has not been acknowledged since, lest solved, of course.)

    Anyhow, not a single of those people responded to the inquiry of BERLINER ZEITUNG.
    That´s hard. They ALL declined an answer.

    Such people as Claudia Roth (Green Party, then Vice President of the German Bundestag), Dieter Zetsche (then Chairman of the Board of Management of Daimler AG), Jan Böhmermann (TV Late Night Show host), or Reinhard Cardinal Marx (Catholic, then Chairman of the German Bishops’ Conference).

    10 years of “We can do it” – From loud commitment to big silence:

    The silenced

    Ten years ago, the German federal government opened its borders to illegal migration. This decision found many prominent advocates at the time. Do people still see it the same way?

    machine-translation:
    https://archive.is/2MCem

    Reply ↓
    1. Daniil Adamov

      It couldn’t be that hard to simply say they stand by their opinion of the time… Except that with the polarisation that seems to have vastly increased since then, perhaps they fear being pilloried by either side, whether they stand by it or admit to even the least bit of wavering?

      Reply ↓
      1. AG

        Of course fear is behind it, too.
        But then what are they worth?
        These individuals als rich, influential, safe.
        And of course it´s easy to boast without anyone contradicting.

        This is what GREENS actually complained about late 2021 – well before the disastrous fallout of 2022+ – it was hard to implement their environmental agenda if circumstances are counter to it. Well, that´s politics my dear children…

        Reply ↓
    2. flora

      From Bad Catittude about the latest news from Scotland. (And the pols and disconnected ‘elites’ wonder why regular citizens hate their open border policies? It’s almost like it was designed to destroy the white working class, the people who used to unionize for better wages. Nah, that can’t be what’s happening. )

      The Flower of Scotland.

      https://boriquagato.substack.com/p/the-flower-of-scotland

      Open borders is a WEF thing. Bernie called open borders the dream plan of the Koch Brothers. George S. wrote an open op-ed defining the program and insisting it would be implemented.

      Reply ↓
        1. JBird4049

          Perhaps, it is because I am an American, but I find it just bizarre that some commentators find it more objectionable that a 14 year old girl felt the need to carry a kitchen knife, of the same kind as I have in my kitchen, and a hatchet of a size that I had for decades for both camping and for the fireplace, to protect both herself and her 12 year old sister. You would have thought that she was carrying and preparing to use a fully loaded, fully automatic assault rifle for the fun of it, instead of being so scared that she felt compelled to carry two tools for a public walk in broad daylight where it appears that it is dangerous, partly because of ill policing and a strongly apathetic adult population unable or unwilling to protect children from harassment from sketchy strangers.

          There are a few places in the United States where it is reasonable to carry a gun, even if illegally, because it is so dangerous, but often critics will complain more about the gun owner, often casting aspersions about ghetto culture or about white trash, instead of looking at the political economy, which often includes corrupt and incompetent policing, that created an environment so dangerous that people feel compelled to arm themselves whether they want to or not. And it seems to me the same in the United Kingdom, where the mere display of a kitchen knife and a hatchet is of more outrage and concern than of the reality that created the fear, and probable danger, that made doing appear reasonable necessary.

          This kvetching about not the use, but the mere appearance, of weapons by people in dangerous situations not of their own creation, appears to be more about tribal signifiers as well as showing contempt for the lower classes forced into such a reality; it also shows unseemly, even cowardly, behavior by some towards their supposed lessers as if the value of a human being especially of the vulnerable depends on what class they are a part of.

          I get the dislike and fear of weapons, even of certain groups of people, but really, whom you direct your hate to, shows who are, especially when you ignore the whole situation and focus on the most obvious bits of it, making for quick, mentally untaxing, snap judgments.

          Reply ↓
          1. Revenant

            It is essentially illegal to carry a knife in public in the UK, covertly or openly.

            There is an exclusion for very small knives, I think (butter knife or paring knife) but penknives are a grey area (size, function, folding action). I think there is also a defence of having a good reason, e.g. a chef.

            Reply ↓
          2. Revenant

            Actual guidance here.
            https://www.gov.uk/buying-carrying-knives

            This reminds me, I bought a corkscrew earlier this month and the girl in John Lewis, the department store, would not let me carry it to the til, she had to take it and would only give it to me at the till. But the vegetable peeler and, weirdly, the scissors, were OK. The corkscrew appears to a “cyclone knife” (cool rebranding!) but scissors seem to be disregarded in that guidance….

            Reply ↓
          3. mrsyk

            If my memory serves me well, the Black Panthers advocated and practiced “open-carry” causing heads to explode with repeated bouts of hypocrisy and the Mulford Act.

            Reply ↓
        2. IM Doc

          I really wish I could find it now but I cannot.

          Earlier this week making the rounds online, there was a picture of this very same young Scottish girl rendered in stained glass, with her knives crossing her chest, halo over the head.

          I thought it was very fitting. There are more than a few ancient stories of young women who had very similar stories before they became martyred and saints of the church. The midwits in the Labour Government in the UK are really playing with fire. They seem to be completely oblivious and too stupid to realize what they are doing.

          Reply ↓
          1. flora

            Huh. Oh well then. MSM says no. Debunked by the police. There ya go. Who could possibly dispute the UK police story? / ;)

            Reply ↓
            1. JBird4049

              It says something about the police (and their own government) when the majority of the public are not inclined to believe them even if they are telling the truth. The police almost always are the ones who investigate themselves and find themselves innocent, and they almost always support whatever narrative makes the political leadership happy even when half of the time, when I do some digging, it’s complete baloney.

              It’s like crying wolf too often. What happens when you really are telling the truth?

              Reply ↓
            2. J.

              I mean, the police did have security cameras and a witness, if you read the fine article.

              I’d say a good reason to suspect this story is that Musk was amplifying it. His agenda is showing.

              Reply ↓
          2. flora

            also: are online bot names ever more than a single alpha-consonant like ‘t’ or ‘j’ and etc. Really. Inquiring minds want to know. As the old Paul Harvey podcast listener saying goes. / ;)

            Reply ↓
          3. thrombus

            You know something is true when it’s in Daly Mail, and when the police debunked it, and especially when comments are disabled. Sorry we are not currently accepting comments on this article, because it is true.

            Reply ↓
  12. Afro

    The White House’s Bizarre Defense of Chinese Foreign Students American Conservative

    *******

    Having taught at multiple American universities, I can confirm that foreign students are often among the best. They raise the standard. It’s also good to have American students exposed to students from other cultures.

    If I was a zillionaire, I’d set up something like the Rhodes scholarship, but instead of sending bright American youth to England, they’d go to China or Russia.

    Reply ↓
    2. hk

      In my experience, it’s been a mixed bag. Many foreign students come to US after being selected through competitive process and on national scholarships–they are invariably fantastic. Others are just good students who opted to come to US for school for various reasons (usually from rich families) and they tend to be pretty good on average, but not always. Then there are children of nouveux riches (or even not so nouveux ones) who come to US schools to party and think American colleges are a joke–I met a few of them, including Chinese, and my former institution wanted to actually solicit this subset–and these are execrable, the worst of the worst.

      Reply ↓
    4. divadab

      Not so at Canadian Universities, which have flooded themselves with foreign, mostly Asian students, as a source of funding in the face of government cutbacks (universities in Canada are all government institutions). The english language skills are very low; copying and cheating are rampant; and much remedial work is required. It’s a prime example of short-term gain (continued funding and employment for staff) creating long-term pain (degrading the universities service to citizens by degrading their education).

      Not to mention that foreign “students” are mostly employed – it’s a very effective end-run around the immigration system. Again, to the detriment of Canadian young people. Youth unemployment is over 14.6% – this summer students found it very difficult to get summer jobs as many many low wage positions were filled by foreign “students”. Yet another Emperor Justin shitshow.

      Reply ↓
  13. moog

    Migrant riots have come to Switzerland Spectator

    It could very well have been a suburb of Paris or Lyon, but this was Lausanne, just along the lake from Geneva, in supposedly calm and orderly Switzerland.

    LOL, I love the comparison. Paris has become a benchmark for chaos. How do you say shithole in French? Le merde-something-something?

    Reply ↓
    2. valdo

      The incident has been tied to police responses like heavy handed interventions over acts of juvenile delinquency. Eerily, last month a teenage girl died exactly the same way here in Lausanne, while being chased by police and losing control of her scooter.
      Grievances expressed by rioters concern police response and not the sort of sort of societal dynamics implied in the article, which frankly paint a picture I don’t recognize on the ground.

      Reply ↓
  14. The Rev Kev

    ‘Ibrahim Majed
    @ibrahimtmajed
    Aug 27
    Operation Hammer of God:
    U.S. and Israel Plan to Destroy Hezbollah Leaked Documents Reveal Blueprint for Lebanon Invasion’

    Yeah, nah! This sounds like a bs psyops story to put pressure on Lebanon to buckle under to Israeli/US demands – or else. But what is proposed here is a full scale invasion of the entirety of Lebanon. And if that happened, then Hezbollah would fire off every missile and drone against Israel they have under the use-it-or-lose-it principal this turning Israel into downtown Gaza city. Anyway, if the Israelis still haven’t broken Hamas, how will they defeat Hezbollah. Every time the IDF gets into a fair fight with an opponent, they get their clock cleaned and commenters like Douglas Macgregor have spoken disparagingly of the IDF’s quality.

    Reply ↓
    1. Mikel

      Lebanon has one main thing to do: avoid civil war again. That’s the best defense they could have at the moment.

      Reply ↓
      1. The Rev Kev

        The US and Israel have the same aim – to push Lebanon into a new civil war. Then they can do to them whatever they want like they do in Syria.

        Reply ↓
  15. Munchausen

    Lindsey Graham Calls for Sanctions on Norway After Major BDS Move New Republic

    He should demand bombing of The Norwegian Nobel Committee. :)

    Reply ↓
    1. mrsyk

      Sanctions! Sanctions!
      Read all about it
      Spin ball Wizard’s got a miracle cure
      Sanctions! Sanctions!
      Read all about it
      Sanctions!

      Good morning Campers!

      I’m your Uncle Lindsey
      And I’ll welcome you to Bibi’s Holiday Camp
      The camp with no conscience
      Nevermind the murder
      When you come to Tommy’s
      You’re iron-clad forever…., ha ha!

      Welcome…

      Music and cadence stolen from the Who’s rock opera “Tommy”.

      Reply ↓
    2. The Rev Kev

      Hey, if Trump is not nominated for a Nobel Peace Prize the next time they meet, will he sanction the members of that committee?

      Reply ↓
  16. Wukchumni

    Warning of ‘horrendous’ rat infestations after summer heatwaves Independent
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

    We’ve had few heat waves in the Central Valley, but a rat infestation in the almond orchards like you wouldn’t believe.

    Central Valley almond farmers are losing the battle to a widespread rodent infestation that’s caused hundreds of millions of dollars of damage to crops throughout the region, impacting the entire industry.

    More than 100,000 acres of almond groves in Merced, Fresno, Kings and Kern counties have been affected by hungry roof rats that are gnawing on almond trees and destroying pricey irrigation equipment, according to a report by the Almond Board of California earlier this month. Preventing the invasion has been an ongoing effort since at least last year. In total, the financial toll to replace damaged crops and repair equipment is estimated to be as high as $310 million.

    https://www.sfgate.com/food/article/california-almond-farms-rat-infestation-20814345.php

    Reply ↓
    1. The Beeman

      this part of the story makes me smile.

      “In the hours before their arrival, the eldest brother, Ewan, uploaded a video calling the marina ahead of their approach.
      “Do you have pizza and beer? I repeat, do you have pizza and beer? Over.”“

      Reply ↓
    2. Mass Driver

      Jamie, Ewan and Lachlan Maclean completed the journey in 139 days,…
      The previous record for the fastest full, unassisted, nonstop Pacific row was 160 days, set by Russian solo rower Fyodor Konyukhov in 2014.

      What kind of competition is this, when a team goes against an individual? Next ones should send a galley, and shave an additional few percent off, and claim the record.

      Reply ↓
  18. lyman alpha blob

    RE: The White House’s Bizarre Defense of Chinese Foreign Students

    They really do think we’re stupid. From the article –

    “The cabinet secretary offered a curious defense of the proposal: It’s necessary to save American universities. “Well, the president’s point of view is that what would happen if you didn’t have those 600,000 students is that you’d empty them from the top, all the students would go up to better schools, and the bottom 15 percent of universities and colleges would go out of business in America,” Lutnick replied. “So, his view is he’s taking a rational economic view, which is classic Donald Trump.” ”

    I don’t have numbers at my fingertips, but my understanding is that most Chinese students going to elite US universities are paying full tuition, essentially subsidizing USian students. And there are a lot of them. My kid is looking to go to college in Boston and we’ve visited a few times in recent months. A person dropped down from the sky by the banks of the river Charles might be excused for thinking they’d landed in Beijing rather than Boston. Even the pre-college summer program at a Boston school that my kid attended had a lot of Chinese nationals checking the place out. The kids who attend the lower tier US colleges which tend to be much less expensive are not suddenly going to be going to Harvard and paying full freight. It’s the top tier colleges which will suffer, with their endowments likely taking a hit. Or – the horror, the horror – administrative bloat might be cut to compensate for the lost revenue. This is all about elite rice bowls being smashed, not lesser known universities going belly up. Chinese nationals want to go to Stanford and Harvard, not University of Maine Machias in the middle of nowhere. The lead article in the local paper puts the lie to Lutnick’s claims –

    https://www.pressherald.com/2025/08/29/as-international-student-arrival-drops-nationally-maine-colleges-see-little-change/

    Reply ↓
  19. IM Doc

    0% of Democrats Happy with State of the US Right Now

    A few words from a bewildered former Democrat, now Independent, and that would be me.

    In the past, my wife and I have given generously ( very likely a bit too generously ) to various Dem campaigns and places like the DCCC and DNC. We stopped giving gradually as we noticed the Democratic Party and most recently the Biden Administration were turning the country into a Maoist struggle session. Watching how all of those initiatives have really taken a toll on my own profession of medicine has been an eye opener. Starting right around COVID, we just completely quit donating and soon thereafter quit voting for them. We have instead begun donating all of our money to local charities that are helping causes to support the less-fortunate in our community. I doubt we will ever go back to any political contributions. Giving money to the Dems at this point is like giving it to a black hole. We are bombarded weekly with emails and personal letters crying for cash – and according to the New York Times this week, most of any donations are going to pay off Kamala Harris’ huge deficit. I do not know about you, but I would much rather be giving money to local orphanages and homeless shelters rather than Megan Thee Stallion and Oprah Winfrey. The entire thing has really become a disgrace. I think this is a large part of the big ZERO as demonstrated in the link above.

    The Dem Party has really turned to cope. The past two weeks I have seen all kinds of missives about the imminent death of Trump. This has been even asked on our COVID email group right here. I just shake my head. If this is all they have, they are in serious trouble. You can go into any group of 70 or 80 somethings in this country ( I see this all day and every day) and see exactly the same hand and feet issues that the Dem operatives are spewing about Donald Trump. Every day. All day long. These things are part of being 70 something. That being said, as I tell every patient, the warranty expires at age 70. Any one over that age can drop at any moment from something, and organ systems can fail. It is part of being a human being. Our culture has completely lost sight of death and dying and doing so gracefully. We are all going to die. And there are possible consequences to electing anyone over that age to be President. I just cannot believe what I am seeing as the cope. It is truly something to behold.

    Each day he does not die, with the kind of suggestions these Rachel viewers are being drowned in, is even more days that the zero is going to become more agitated.

    My part of the zero percent is just the behavior of the Dems over the past 10 years or so. Literally everything is a lie, a distortion, a bamboozlement, a virtue-signalling performance. They are doing nothing, absolutely nothing, for the working class of this country.

    How many times did I personally witness a felony before the age of 21? ZERO. How many times have my children been visiting big blue cities and witnessed felonies? We are now up to 5. And yet we are told that any suggestion of a crime problem in those cities is just a huge exaggeration. This is the complete disconnect from reality. And this is just one example of many.

    Meanwhile, the other side is really getting sucked up into unwarranted triumphalism. Furthermore, it appears we are going to lower interest rates into an oncoming economic implosion…..what could possibly go wrong?

    But I just laugh out loud at all the Democratic handwringing – if this was all so important, why did the party nominate an obvious, severe dementia patient – and then follow that up with a dry ( or not so dry) drunk?

    Again, there are multiple reasons for the zero. Not the least of which is the complete failure of the Democratic Party. My wife and I as well as multiple other friends and family members have just decided to ride it out. No cash to politicos. Ever again. We are going to do what we can to improve conditions in our own little world. Make changes in the issues that are happening right in front of our eyes in our own community. And almost assuredly never vote for another Dem again until vast changes and accountability have occurred.

    Reply ↓
    1. anahuna

      Doc, there’s much to agree with in your post and your recommendations for local activity. Still, this paragraph seems to apply equally to Trump and the Republicans:

      “My part of the zero percent is just the behavior of the Dems over the past 10 years or so. Literally everything is a lie, a distortion, a bamboozlement, a virtue-signalling performance. They are doing nothing, absolutely nothing, for the working class of this country.”

      Reply ↓
    2. samm

      0% of Democrats Happy with State of the US Right Now

      Yes, but it’s nothing to worry about because “Abundance” is just around the corner. /s

      Reply ↓
    4. Pat

      Maybe it was from being in a Democratic majority state and city, but I got there before you and your wife. It was years of promises with little success but lots of cuts and losses. Then there were the Obama years. The atrocity that is ACA* and the not so good flim flam that got us that along with HAMP and the lack of bank break ups and prosecutions was as Lambert would say “illuminating”. I still appreciated individual Democrats and Independents who managed small wins here and there, but no longer bought the “act”. Legal corruption is and has been the norm for awhile. And politicians of both parties don’t just answer to the big money donors, they aspire to being the same kind of power players. They are as much narcissists as the current President. And as such the people and wellbeing of most of this country are pawns to be played, discarded and crushed.

      The only bright spots I have seen are the growing rejection of Israel and its propaganda, and that more and more people recognize how much of what our political class says is not in any way backed up by their actions.
      While I may choose at some point to support an individual politician, and that is more likely to happen locally, the “party” can pound sand.

      *As I was writing that a St Jude’s commercial came on. Nothing says healthcare “reform” was bull manure quite like still needing charities to provide medical care for seriously ill children a decade and half after it was enacted.

      Reply ↓
    1. Jason Boxman

      “But we’ve all heard for the past few weeks either anecdotes of people who’ve been ill, or people in our community, or just specific communities who are having increasing numbers of COVID as well. I think this is one good example of that.”

      Heh.

      A quick look at “North Carolina Respiratory Virus Summary Dashboard“. ED visits are trending up. Surprise. But only for “COVID-like”, whatever that is. Why not, you know, test for COVID?

      Reply ↓
    2. curlydan

      I visited a physician’s assistant yesterday in KC with a mask on. She asked me why the mask, and I said partly because a school shut down for a week in Kansas City, KS (the one mentioned in the story).

      I do some volunteer work in KCK public schools starting next week, and I think I’ll mask up there as well.

      Reply ↓
  21. Trees&Trunks

    Ooooo here is a goodie from the lovely country of Sweden

    I nominate Zelenskyy – deserves the Peace Prize
    The debater: The Ukrainian president is a true representative of peace

    Nothing says Nobel Peace Prize as 1.7 million dead of your own people.

    https://www-aftonbladet-se.translate.goog/debatt/a/Xjr3qn/jag-nominerar-zelenskyj-fortjanar-fa-fredspriset?_x_tr_sl=auto&_x_tr_tl=en&_x_tr_hl=de&_x_tr_pto=wapp

    Maybe the next fool will suggest Netanyahu?

    Reply ↓
    1. Carolinian

      Well Trump has suggested himself and that’s equivalent to suggesting Bibi since he indulges Netanyahu’s every whim.

      Reply ↓
    2. trombus

      This isn’t even an official nomination. Sweden is slacking. Or maybe, it’s just afraid of Trump’s sanctions for suggesting someone that is not him.

      Reply ↓
    2. flora

      It’s hilarious, sort of, that the AI data scraping training-sets have no idea how much of the data they’re scraping is absolutely false, complete garbage answers entered to online questionnaires for example that are deliberately false. Messing with the online questionnaire data has been a thing for a long time. Hey, this is America, we love messing with data-bots. / ;)

      Reply ↓
    3. IM Doc

      At least you are just talking about tacos.

      My favorite AI story of the week comes from DFW……

      https://www.wfaa.com/video/news/crime/bounty-hunters-detain-wrong-man-after-using-ai-facial-recognition-software/

      Amazingly, a couple of Dog the Bounty Hunters in a Dallas suburb somehow were “using AI” for facial recognition of criminal suspects – and located their perpetrator. They stormed the private residence and “flash-banged” the man – only to discover the AI had really screwed up and it was not the perp after all – he was an innocent and completely uninvolved man giving someone a hair cut in his garage barber shop. Oh well, at least there were not tasers or guns involved – but what if there had been?

      Those bounty hunters AND the AI company executives definitely need to be doing some real time. In a real world, there should be zero tolerance of this kind of stuff.

      Reply ↓
      1. JBird4049

        >>>Those bounty hunters AND the AI company executives definitely need to be doing some real time. In a real world, there should be zero tolerance of this kind of stuff.

        The police have been using software, databases of photos, and cctv to find suspects who have been arrested, and very occasionally convicted, for about a decade, even when they were wrongly identified. IIRC, one case was in Louisiana about a decade ago where police arrested a man for a crime that happened at the same time he was making a speech because the computer made a match. Despite a roomful of witnesses, he was arrested and convicted. He was eventually released. Plenty of people have been arrested and been in jail for however many days or even months before the mistake is noted. But the police never have to pay for their mistakes. And since it is usually the poor or working classes with the occasional middle class person, the news rarely covers the incidents, nor much political pressure to correct this. It is much like civil asset forfeiture.

        Hey, since much of civil asset forfeitures are based on police “experience” and “training” often done without criminal charges or even actual evidence, what is to prevent the use of AI in civil asset forfeitures?

        Reply ↓
    4. Martin Oline

      That AI thing is everywhere now. I hear that Old MacDonald’s farm is now using AI to streamline their business. Now the refrain is AI AI too.

      Reply ↓
  23. XXYY

    Israel’s Worsening PR Problem and Its Failure to Defeat Hamas, Larry C. Johnson

    I love Johnson, but I wish he and everyone else would stop saying things like this:

    I don’t think [Netanyahu] spinning on social media will salvage Israel’s well-earned reputation as a terrorist state that gleefully murders women and children.

    This is the kind of thing that people have been saying since the beginning of time, but I think we need to retire the idea that somehow men are expendable, either in time of war or for that matter during any other time when humans are being killed in vast numbers.

    Obviously our leaders love this formulation, since they greatly favor activities where they don’t need to worry about the lives or livelihood of the male gender: wars, dangerous workplaces, toxic industrial activities, or any other profitable elite pastimes that require large numbers of humans to be fed into the chopper. If they can tell themselves and everyone else that because only men are being killed, then their operation is somehow virtuous, this obviously lets them off the hook to a great degree.

    I like to think that in today’s world, most people would reject this premise if they had to say it outright, but it still seems to be lingering around in the backs of our brains and in certain patterns of speech and antiquated thinking.

    Let us henceforth reject the “gleeful murder” of people of any gender.

    Reply ↓
    1. Goingnowhereslowly

      I was once a child and am now a woman and I completely agree!

      While very different from the situation in Gaza, I have also shed a few tears for the (mostly) men lost to the horrible meat grinder that is the war in Ukraine. And I will never forgive my country’s political elite for their complicity in fomenting and prolonging that conflict.

      Men and soldiers are just as human as I am.

      Reply ↓
      1. JBird4049

        While it is true that men’s deaths have been considered less important than women and children for thousands of years, even if women were often considered less than men, the reason why was not because men were disposable or even unimportant. It is because we are actually more expendable than women and often children.

        Culturally, historically, and biologically, it is our job to put our bodies and lives between them and danger be it the local bears and lions or the local enemies’ warriors. We are, after all, physically stronger, shorter lived, and can father children with multiple wives. Biologically, it’s how we are built and used for. And a society, nation, or country can take a greater loss in men than women, recovering for more quickly than if it was a greater loss in women or even children.

        So, yes, while I agree that intrinsically men, such as myself, are just as worthy as any woman in the practical and often harsh reality of life, we are more expendable and perhaps our deaths are potentially less damaging and tragic than then of women and children.

        Reply ↓
        1. XXYY

          I remember a scene in Game of Thrones where a castle is being attacked by a horrific onslaught of vicious invaders. The proper setup for this situation, which was expected to result in the death of everyone defending the castle, was for women and children to go into some kind of underground shelter and block all the doors, while the men took up station outside and prepared to die.

          There was one man who snuck himself into the basement with the women during this. He was meant to be a figure of cowardice and unmanly virtues. (There was a similar scene in Titanic where a man gets onto a lifeboat filled with women and children and hunkers down in shame.)

          Our culture is apparently that women should do their utmost to preserve their own lives in times of danger or distress, while men should cheerfully prepare themselves for death.

          This seems to me to be a very strange message to pass on to our progeny. Certainly not very woke.

          Reply ↓
  24. The Rev Kev

    “Israel’s Worsening PR Problem and Its Failure to Defeat Hamas”

    That Zeitoun battalion sounds a bit like the Persian Immortals, Every time somebody got killed, a replacement would be sent up so that formation would stay intact. Sounds too like that it is not so much a battalion as a large number of hunter-killer teams hiding out in the rubble that the Israelis themselves have created. Mind you, I don’t expect in 50 years time to see an IDF-Zeitoun Battalion Reunion Event.

    Reply ↓
  25. The Rev Kev

    “People, ideas machines XIII”

    Considering that this is Dominic Cummings writing this, I think that the whole thing is suspect. All a Cabinet is is a sort of executive committee but obviously politicians do love their games. But he seems to want to do away with permanent public officials, even though many of them are already being replaced with ‘consultants’. As Cummings is also an admirer of Musk’s DOGE, I could see him trying to get the UK to have their own version of DOGE to clear the way of public servants in favour of those that would have financial interest’s at heart to have yet even more say in the UK government.

    Reply ↓
    1. nyleta

      I don’t know the legalities in the UK, they don’t have a written constitution but in Australia the office of Prime Minister and the Cabinet are not mentioned in the Constitution. They could be cancelled any afternoon with a vote in the Lower House.

      The Federal Executive Council is the one mentioned, that is why Hurley and Morrison were playing games with it during COVID. The Governor General in Council could in theory rule by decree and the membership of the council is only has to have been a Minister of the Crown at some stage, not even Australian, our version of the Privy Council. No numbers are set. No doubt there would be problems in real life but we might be glad of the set up if we provoke Chinese ire at the behest of the US to an extreme.

      Reply ↓
      1. The Rev Kev

        If I recall correctly, not only too are political parties not mentioned but neither is the actual Australian people. An odd omission that – or maybe telling.

        Reply ↓
  26. DJG, Reality Czar

    The Venezuela situation: I have been thinking of Venezuela and the gunboats. I am having a vu jà dé.

    It seems to me that the demonization of the presidents of a country with many natural resources, much like Russia’s mineral wealth (and Venezuela’s outsized petroleum reserves), and the invention of pretexts to confront such resource-rich country, and the search for pretexts to provoke a war, why, I’d say that the Ukraine Adventure is a thoroughly dysfunctional rehearsal for Venezuela.

    What could possibly go wrong?

    Although the U S of A better get to work and find some nice khaki sweatshirts for Juan Guaidó.

    I’m sure Nancy Pelosi can be enlisted in a wildly witty Xitter meme campaign. Snake Island Venezuela!

    Stay tuned.

    Nancy and Juan, plotting revolution, with Juan who “we consider to be the president”:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DRh2JeliY2w

    Reply ↓
    1. DJG, Reality Czar

      Further on the glories of U.S. foreign policy and negotiations with a resource-rich country:

      Hillary Clinton, snivelling about man-spreading.

      https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/hillary-clinton-putin-manspreading-sexist-b2105339.html

      Unfortunately, in the past six or eight years, this article, and Clinton’s attitudes, hasn’t changed much.

      Obviously, man-spreading is a good reason to move masses of long-range missiles into Ukraine.

      Hillary Clinton, the mind boggles. Even Samuel Beckett wouldn’t have put her and her compulsive babbling in Waiting for Godot.

      Reply ↓
  27. Tom Stone

    I finally caught Covid @ 5 weeks ago, now confirmed with a test, A “Mild Case” of razorblade Covid with symptoms that lasted a day.
    Since then I have experienced four minor cardiac events that involved shortness of breath, night sweats, swollen ankles and angina,which responded to Nitro.
    I’ll be getting an echo cardiogram on the 5th which will hopefully provide more information.
    It’s been a heck of a ride, I plan to enjoy the beauty each day brings me and leave with a laugh.

    Reply ↓
    1. Jason Boxman

      I’m sorry to hear that; hit my dad a month ago, despite masking, and only a few quick trips that week to like Lowes and the grocery store. How is a mystery. Was bad enough swallowing treatment wasn’t possible without a liquid steroid.

      I wish you a speedy recovery!

      Reply ↓
      1. Tom Stone

        Thanks, I have consistently used either a properly fitted N95 or P100 since December 2019 when I started isolating in preparation for Chemo.
        I undoubtedly picked it up outside while passing an individual or small group since I have limited my time indoors to the extent I could by shopping during off hours or shortly after stores open.
        I recently turned 72 and I have multiple serious health issues.
        Every day is a gift and I make an effort to be aware of and grateful for each moment.
        With limited success…I am very human.

        Reply ↓
        2. kareninca

          I hope very much that you quickly get a handle on the cardiac issues. My 82 y.o. mom caught it two weeks ago for the third time, and although the acute phase wasn’t bad now she has serious fatigue.

          Reply ↓
    2. ambrit

      Do let us know the results. I’m pushing into your age cohort and am beginning to notice the signs of impending physical dissolution.
      I was thinking that the medical wealth extraction “infection” could possibly respond to a course of treatment with Nitro Express.
      Hang in there. The young’ns will need all the functional elders they can get to navigate their way through the coming “Time of Troubles.”
      “All that was old is new again.”
      Stay safe.

      Reply ↓
    4. The Rev Kev

      Jee-zuz. Looks like you will have to take even better care of yourself than you normally do. I guess that you will have to mask up more so that you don’t get another hit from Covid.

      Reply ↓
  28. NotTimothyGeithner

    It’s Lee Corso’s last College Game Day. I walked by him once in Tallahassee. He was perfect.

    Me: (As I walked by a gentleman in a Holiday Inn Suites in Tallahassee; Gameday was in town; I was helping my sister move) You are Lee Corso!

    Corso: (I had spun around, but he had clearly turned at a normal pace) I sure am.

    Reply ↓
    1. Norton

      There was a Lee Corso tribute Not So Fast, My Friend on ESPN last week and maybe it is still available on demand. Well worth the search.

      I met him in a hotel elevator just before he was going to speak at an event.

      Reply ↓
  29. Jason Boxman

    Hilarious.

    The Nobel Prize and a Testy Phone Call: How the Trump-Modi Relationship Unraveled (NY Times via archive.ph)

    Prime Minister Narendra Modi of India was losing patience with President Trump.

    Mr. Trump had been saying — repeatedly, publicly, exuberantly — that he had “solved” the military conflict between India and Pakistan, a dispute that dates back more than 75 years and is far deeper and more complicated than Mr. Trump was making it out to be.

    Trump truly is a selfish gasbag.

    And NY Times always has its eye on the ball, eh

    The dispute has played out against the backdrop of trade talks of immense importance to India and the United States, and the fallout risks pushing India closer to American adversaries in Beijing and Moscow. Mr. Modi is expected to travel to China this weekend, where he will meet with President Xi Jinping and President Vladimir V. Putin of Russia.

    (bold mine)

    Reply ↓
    3. Ben Panga

      I read that this morning in Dehli with some amusement. There’s no 3d-chess here, just an old narcissist desperate to get the same badge the gave Obama.

      Watching Trump, I wonder if he’s getting more Trumpy. From working a lot with seniors, I have come to believe that as people’s minds and bodies fade, their idiosyncrasies (or if you prefer personality disorders) became stronger. This would mean the irrational narcissism becoming more dominant, and the decisions getting more counter-productive. And it will accelerate.

      Reply ↓
  30. Tom Stone

    The Trump administration is continuing to escalate its war on the American People and I predict that at some point the resistance will become violent.
    When that happens I expect the Trump Administration to go totally berserk, No limits, no boundaries.
    Which is the usual result of abandoning the Rule of Law, there’s nothing left but force.
    When the only tool you have is a hammer you are likely to end up with a very sore thumb.

    Reply ↓
  31. Jason Boxman

    Targeting Iran’s Leaders, Israel Found a Weak Link: Their Bodyguards (NY Times via archive.ph)

    Israel was able to track the movements of key Iranian figures and assassinate them during the 12-day war this spring by following the cellphones carried by members of their security forces.

    It’s been clear for 20 years that cell phone usage is a liability; And Israel hasn’t been shy about conducting assassinations in Iran. I think sheer convenience frequently overrides security and privacy considerations.

    The meeting was so secret that only the attendees, a handful of top Iranian government officials and military commanders, knew the time and location.

    It was June 16, the fourth day of Iran’s war with Israel, and Iran’s Supreme National Security Council gathered for an emergency meeting in a bunker 100 feet below a mountain slope in the western part of Tehran. For days, a relentless Israeli bombing campaign had destroyed military, government and nuclear sites around Iran, and had decimated the top echelon of Iran’s military commanders and nuclear scientists.

    The officials, who included President Masoud Pezeshkian, the heads of the judiciary and the intelligence ministry and senior military commanders, arrived in separate cars. None of them carried mobile phones, knowing that Israeli intelligence could track them.

    (bold mine)

    Not immediately called out, but obvious, is that Israel tried to assassinate the president of Iran. The goal was/is clearly regime change.

    According to Iranian and Israeli officials, Iranian security guards’ careless use of mobile phones over several years — including posting on social media — played a central role in allowing Israeli military intelligence to hunt Iranian nuclear scientists and military commanders and the Israeli Air Force to swoop in and kill them with missiles and bombs during the first week of the June war.

    Convenience.

    Reply ↓
    1. Polar Socialist

      Also many of the “assassinated” key figures appeared in public after the war. So, not the success it’s made up to be, especially considering that Israel ended up getting it’s arse handed to it.

      Reply ↓
    1. amfortas

      my doctor friend, now blissfully retired…stopped taking new medicaid patients about 10 years ago…this sounds a lot like that.
      its a method of passively destroying the system.
      then they can point to it and say, “see? gubmint healthcare dont work!”.
      same thing they did to the Post Office.
      and to the Disability System…and to the IRS, now that i think about it.

      Reply ↓
  33. DJG, Reality Czar

    Relic Watch! The Shroud of the Chocolate City. Fraud, ambition, mayhem.

    Just when you were thinking, Oh, no!, is it possible that Bill & Hill are frauds? Now the shroud.

    I backed into this, and the detective work is a heck of a lot more interesting than Sweatily Ambitious Tom Cotton and Sweatily Ambitious Pete Buttigieg put together:

    Even in the 1300s, after this particular shroud showed up (along with several others, and who knew?), it had a whiff of fraud. Long article with wonderful details. I note that in 1453 the Savoys, who are wilier than the Windsors, got their hands on it, and the rest is the history of the Chocolate City.

    https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/03044181.2025.2546884#inline_frontnotes

    Summary news article of the above journal article.
    https://www.medievalists.net/2025/08/medieval-scholar-shroud-of-turin-fake/

    Italian video by a historian, with a mess o’ comments of all kinds:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T4oLWyKcj9E

    More on Nicole Oresme, who was one of those wonderful, wild medieval/renaissance figures who got into everything. Note that he invented mathematical graphs for speed / velocity, well before the Cartesian business.
    https://www.dam.brown.edu/people/mumford/beyond/coursenotes/2006PartIb.pdf

    Reply ↓
    1. gk

      You in the Chocolate City should appreciate the Grauniad’s error correction.

      This article was amended on 27 August 2025 because an earlier version wrongly referred to the dip bagna càuda as being Sicilian, when it originates from a different region in Italy, Piedmont.

      Reply ↓
    3. Ellery O'Farrell

      As for the Shroud, the cited article doesn’t reference anything after the 14th century, except for the carbon-dating (which has been thoroughly debunked, as its samples were from a contaminated or restored area; later datings have established a range from 1 BCE-2 CE or so).

      That excludes, first, the problem of why the negative of the photographic image yielded a positive image, just as if the centuries-old image were only a photographic negative—a result no one expected.

      Second, after the examination of the Shroud by a team of scientists and experts, many of whom weren’t religious or were even Jewish, there’s more than substantial evidence that this is a piece of cloth dating to roughly the first century and originating from the locality of Jerusalem (Near Eastern pollen, Jerusalem limestone dust, Roman flagellation and crucifixion practices, not to mention a reasonable provenance of the relic dating back to the first or second century, as well as explanations of how one died by crucifixion, especially in connection with the particular brutality this particular victim endured, and more). And no explanation at all of how the image could have been formed.

      Third, there’s the face itself: strong, even noble, tranquil and yet sorrowful, even after torture and death—the only face I’ve ever seen that I’ve loved on sight, that let me understand how very ordinary people could leave all they had and follow him just because he said so.

      See generally the voluminous resources on shroud.com, including many books with forensic, medical, and other details as well as current articles. The cited article will probably be addressed shortly.

      Reply ↓
  34. MicaT

    Solar/china/africa
    Not just solar panels but everything else too. Inverters, batteries, wire, meters, racks, controllers, breakers etc.

    I take offense at the term cheap.
    15 years ago maybe, now it’s solid good to great quality. Inexpensive for sure, but not cheap.

    Reply ↓
  35. Tom Stone

    So CPB is rounding up Lakota…they prolly intend to deport them to New Mexico because they are Red (Redskins, that is).
    That’s the Trump administration in a nutshell and I do mean nuts.

    Reply ↓
  36. OIFVet

    Andriy Parubiy has been assassinated in Lvov. It could be the Russians but as Mark Ames points out, it is quite likely to be the result of internal struggles and score-settling. Regardless, the outpouring of homages and mourning from senior EUrocrats is very telling, particularly when they refer to him as a “Symbol of the Maidan.”

    Reply ↓
    1. divadab

      My thoughts exactly – during wartime, many private scores are settled with violence. Add to that the wheels coming off the Zelenskyy’s ultra-nationalist regime as they slowly lose the war they picked with Russia, and it seems to me more of this kind of thing will happen as parties jockey for power and retribution.

      Reply ↓
    2. jo6pac

      I doubt it was the Russians also. He was shot 7 or eight times. Russian hit person would have only wasted one bullet on him.

      Reply ↓
    4. The Rev Kev

      Andriy Parubiy, sadly missed – by nobody. The guy was a Nazi who once said ‘the greatest man who practiced direct democracy was A* H* in the 1930s. Also once said-

      ‘“During the cabinet of ministers meetings, [at] which I was present, Parubiy directly ordered the mass shellings of the people of Donbass,” Telizhenko told RT on Saturday.

      “He said, ‘We do not care who those people are. Russians, they’re Moscali [a Ukrainian slur for Russians], we should kill them,’” the former diplomat, who was an adviser to Ukraine’s prosecutor general at the time, said.’

      https://www.rt.com/russia/623715-assassinated-mp-ordered-donbass-shellings/

      Reply ↓
  37. .Tom

    > The ghost in the Kremlin’s corridors: Yevgeny Primakov’s lasting power Brian McDonald (Colonel Smithers). Important

    McDonald sets it out in his 2nd paragraph. “The current talks with the United States won’t lead to Obama-era resets or Reagan-esque grand bargains. What Moscow wants is simpler: a) time, b) leverage, and c) a spread of options.” And the greatest of these is time. McDonald said that Moscow only has to wait for political change on France, Germany, and UK but I think Russia can wait for other trends to work in their favor too. Thanks to NC we can see the rough shape of the economic trends. The social trends are already visible, especially in UK, Germany and USA but these will also follow the economics. And Israel will drag its allies and supporters down to its level in international standing.

    Reply ↓
  39. NotThePilot

    Russia, China, reject attempt of E3 to Reimpose Sanctions on Iran over Nuclear Program Juan Cole

    It’s a good article by Cole, and the main point isn’t surprising. It’s very in-character that the Europeans think a clearly bad-faith measure will change any minds because it technically follows procedure if you ignore any history or context.

    I’m not sure one thing he mentions is correct though, and the oversight is probably very relevant to Iranian grand strategy:

    There actually is no use at all for uranium enriched to 60% — it is just radioactive rocks.

    My understanding is that 60% enriched uranium is sort of a sweet spot for naval reactors, and therefore a first-tier, blue-water navy. I think there are designs (French export models?) that run on leaner fuel, but I don’t think they made that design trade-off to maximize simplicity & mission capabilities.

    I’ve always found it interesting that neither Iranian nor Western statements mention it, like both sides want to deflect from the military implications for their own political reasons.

    Reply ↓
    1. Polar Socialist

      …because it technically follows procedure…

      In this case it doesn’t even follow the procedure. Paragraph 11 of the Resolution 2231 requires complaints to go trough “dispute resolution” in the Joint Commission. The E3 claims were originally made in January 2020, but they have not been brought to the dispute resolution, so technically they can’t lead to the snapback before an attempt has been made to resolve the dispute.

      Also the E3 have provably violated the JCPOA by joining the sanctions set by USA so they really can’t make the claim that Iran should be punished after E3 themselves disrupted the implementation of the agreement.

      That is the stance Russia and China are taking.

      Reply ↓
      1. hk

        One should never try to out outlawyer the Russians. That was true when Alexader I was the czar, Gorchakov was the foreign minister, Stalin was the general secretary, and still true with Putin at the helm…

        Reply ↓
      2. Yves Smith Post author

        This was a point that Alastair Crooke made: to go through the proper procedure, the snapback would have to be triggered by the end of June to allow Iran for its permitted rebuttal process.

        Reply ↓
  40. Mikel

    Germany completes construction of railway network for possible troop transfer to Ukraine – Top War

    Except the article doesn’t say that anything is “completed”.
    Jeez…

    Reply ↓
      1. Mikel

        But these types of tactics predate him. They may be especially on display now, but the factions that help him maintain the spotlight could be there long after.

        Reply ↓
  43. AG

    re: international law dispute

    Looks very promising:

    NEW LEFT REVIEW new issue

    Martti Koskenniemi – The Laws That Rule Us

    In an expansive response to Perry Anderson’s critique of international law in NLR 143, Martti Koskenniemi counterposes to headline rulings on crimes against humanity the opaque, pervasive network of techniques that constitutes the legal infrastructure of global capitalism, shaping our unequal world-social relations and how we imagine them.
    https://newleftreview.org/issues/ii154/articles/the-laws-that-rule-us

    Perry Anderson´s original piece from 2023:

    Perry Anderson
    The Standard of Civilization
    https://archive.is/FjSUA

    Reply ↓
  44. juno mas

    RE: Africa buying Chinese solar panels

    I’ve made the observation some months ago (in a response to the esteemed ‘Thuto’)
    that the fear of Chinese over-production of solar panels is a non-issue. China can afford to give panels away; because any micro-grid or home system still requires high value added Inverters and control systems to monitor panel output and, if necessary, battery back-up. Products that China also sells.

    A quote in the article, “the calculus is simple: cheap energy is good energy.” is not a balanced equation unless the cheap energy is from solar. As we’ve all seen cheap gas, coal, and oil is a climate disaster.

    Reply ↓
  45. Adam Eran

    Inept Leaders’ Tunnel Vision Drives Europe into Turmoil Simplicius. Neoliberalism makes you stupid.

    …I’d say there was a deliberate movement to delegitimize any authority not connected to the MIC or PMC. Why else would we be getting these incompetents, alcoholics, and dementia patients? Government! It can never be any good! (It’s a self-fulfilling prophesy!)

    Reply ↓

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