Thieves steal 8 objects from the Louvre in daring daytime heist France24
Cooperative meerkats, guide ants, and dining-room monitor hens: Animals can teach, too El Pais
Climate/Environment
World’s oceans losing their greenness through global heating, study finds The Guardian
Trump’s planned Fannie and Freddie IPO and the climate elephant in the room Moving Day
‘It’s effectively a bailout’: Edison benefits from fine print in Newsom’s last-minute utility legislation Los Angeles Times
Pandemics
As the Flu Surges in Asia, Could Getting Sick Year-Round Be the New Normal? TIME
Water
Water reveals superpowers hidden at the nanoscale University of Manchester
Water Level of Armenia’s Lake Sevan Falling Rapidly Threatening Economy and Population Window on Eurasia
China?
China’s emerging export control regime High Capacity
TACO, Nexperia, and what exactly does Europe want from China? China Translated
China Is Already Winning the Trade War America Wanted Bloomberg
Chinese tech giants pause stablecoin plans after Beijing steps in FT
Why Xi’s Military Purges Are Really Happening And Why They Always Happen This Way
What’s unfolding in China right now, the expulsion of top generals and a sweeping military purge is part of a recurring pattern in Chinese power politics, when the leadership feels internal… https://t.co/A2sGhQGETZ pic.twitter.com/pwHqdXLhRq
— EndGame Macro (@onechancefreedm) October 18, 2025
Support for government in China: is the data accurate? Jason Hickel
Pakistan-Afghanistan
Pakistan, Afghanistan agree to ‘immediate ceasefire’ in Qatar talks Channel News Asia
Friends Or Foes: The Conflict Of Interests Between Pakistan And The Taliban In Containing Tehrik-I-Taliban Pakistan (TTP) – Analysis Eurasia Review
Syraqistan
Israel heavily bombs Gaza in major ceasefire violation Middle East Eye
Soon after the explosion in Rafah, I’m told by a source familiar, the White House and Pentagon knew that the incident was caused by an Israeli settler bulldozer running over unexploded ordnance — contradicting Netanyahu’s claim that Hamas had popped up from tunnels.
After… https://t.co/Xwy63sEL3M
— Ryan Grim (@ryangrim) October 19, 2025
Israeli army says Gaza ceasefire back on after day of deadly attacks Al Jazeera
🚨Israel’s plan for Gaza: divide it with a Berlin-wall like deadly line; symbolic & limited PR “reconstruction” only in areas fully controlled by the IDF & run by criminal gangs & collaborators; rest of Gaza will be kept a wasteland regularly bombed by Israel & raided by gangs… pic.twitter.com/l8jzr8ZYWG
— Muhammad Shehada (@muhammadshehad2) October 17, 2025
***
October 19, 2025. On the first day of the olive harvest in Turmus’ayyer, the Israeli Defense Force leads a group of farmers directly into a brutal ambush by armed settlers. These people need to be in prison by tomorrow, and the people of this village, and all across Palestine,… https://t.co/i4PbG9jn4j pic.twitter.com/i67CjLB2gg
— jasper nathaniel (@infinite_jaz) October 19, 2025
Zionism’s Cultivation of a Closed Heart Countercurrents
***
LNG tanker on fire off Yemen coast after explosion Al Jazeera
***
US envoy says Syria ‘back to our side’ after joint raid with extremist-led govt forces The Cradle
***
Iran, China, Russia Declare UNSCR 2231 Expired Tasnim
‘Strategic regret’ about avoiding nukes puts top Khamenei aide in spotlight Amwaj
Old Blighty
UK calls up Armed Forces veterans for digital ID soft launch The Register
Boris Johnson confesses: He’s fallen for ChatGPT The Register
Labour is betting on bubble economics Counterfire
European Disunion
New EU members could join without full voting rights Politico
German Federal Office of Civil Protection publishes guide removing war as an ‘unlikely’ possibility Euronews
New Not-So-Cold War
Trump urged Zelenskyy to accept Putin’s terms or be ‘destroyed’ by Russia FT
Is Trump Attempting A Regime Change Op Against Putin? Mark Wauck
TPP STANDS FOR TRUMP-PUTIN PEACE AND THE PROOF OF THE PUDDING –ANTICIPATING THE MENU AT THE BUDAPEST SUMMIT John Helmer
The American superweapon that scared Putin so much he may make peace in Budapest Daily News Hungary. Lol.
***
Giant Russian Gas Plant Suspends Intake After Ukrainian Drone Strike Reuters
EU countries set to agree 2028 deadline for Russian gas ban Euractiv
EU Seeks Maritime Declaration To Inspect Russia’s ‘Shadow Fleet’ Reuters
China Joins Russia’s Shadow Fleet with First-Ever Dark LNG Ship-to-Ship Transfer gCaptain
“I did not blow up Nord Stream,” says suspect in first interview after extradition ruling Notes from Poland
The Caucasus
Analysis: Mehdiyev arrest points to lingering Azerbaijani-Russian tension Eurasianet
L’affaire Epstein
South of the Border
Exclusive: US returning Caribbean strike survivors to Colombia and Ecuador, Trump says Reuters. Wait, I thought these were dangerous narco-terrorists who required summary execution.
Rubio promised to betray U.S. informants to get Trump’s El Salvador prison deal WaPo
Trump Baselessly Calls Colombia’s Petro ‘Drug Dealer’ as US Bombs Another Boat Common Dreams
Rodrigo Paz to take power as Bolivia grapples with deep economic crisis Anadolu Agency
Trump 2.0
“No Kings” Protest (and Arrests) Have Begun Ken Klippenstein. “NSPM-7 is already being used to detain protesters over speech.”
A No Kings Related Note Karl Sanchez
Unfettered and Unaccountable: How Trump is Building a Violent, Shadowy Federal Police Force ProPublica
Trump isn’t sending troops to cities with highest crime rates, data shows Kansas Reflector
***
Secret Service finds hunting stand with line of sight to Trump’s Air Force One in Florida Axios
***
Federal agency overseeing US nuclear stockpile will furlough most of its workforce starting Monday CNN
Democrats en déshabillé
The Congressional Black Caucus’s Silent Partnership With AIPAC The Nation
Police State Watch
Exclusive: Report Finds Systemic Atrocities in Colorado Immigrant Jail Migrant Insider
Writer Who Survived ADX Supermax Prison Describes How It “Entombs” People Truthout
Imperial Collapse Watch
Hitlerism, Trumpism, Netanyahuism, Le Penism, Macronism Emmanuel Todd
Groves of Academe
Abbott: ‘Texas is targeting professors’ over ‘leftist ideologies’ The Hill
Antitrust
Monopoly Round-Up: Does the Left Have Trouble with Making Things in America? BIG by Matt Stoller
How I Became a Populist The New Republic
Healthcare?
Downcoding is Back From the Dead: Insurers Resurrected a Scheme to Pay Doctors Less That the Courts Banned HEALTH CARE un-covered
“Liberation Day”
The Auto Industry’s Bruising Year of Back-to-Back Supply-Chain Snafus WSJ
Crapification?
The Zipper Is Getting Its First Major Upgrade in 100 Years Wired
Qualcomm Buys Arduino, and the Open-Source Community Is SkepticalIEEE Spectrum
Tech Workers Versus Enshittification Communications of the ACM
Class Warfare
The AI revolution’s next casualty could be the gig economy Business Insider
New York City Nurses Confront an Austerity Avalanche Dollars & Sense
Dollar Store Workers Fight to Improve Jobs, Even Without a Union Capital & Main
Antidote du jour (via):
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
‘It’s effectively a bailout’: Edison benefits from fine print in Newsom’s last-minute utility legislation Los Angeles Times
I believe that Cali “enjoys” amongst the highest power electricity rates for households in the US. Now, add this, while sporting a “cut utility bills” slogan. Oh Newsom, Newsom. Is it true that AI Data Centers are the reasons behind higher bills in the US as most of the MSM claims?. California shows quite a different thing. You must know where Newsom interests reside.
Whether or not it is, all the AI regulation under consideration ultimately reduces to a pro-censorship, pro-war-sl*t position. Effective Altruists will give you free room and board for joining the “anti-“AI (actually pro-militarization) astroturf movement and spreading pro-regulation gospel. https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/fhiXNB4RS3h5BpQLF/pause-house-blackpool
Who knows what to make of Gavin, he’s been busy mocking the Donald-as his faithful sideclick online, but you get the idea it’s the 20 or 30 something year olds behind it, not dissimilar to Fetterman’s efforts.
Speaking anecdotally, after PGE tried to burn down half the state, Edison spent an enormous amount of effort to secure their foot hill transmission lines against fire initiation. This amounted to placing new poles between the existing poles to support heavily insulated wire and installing extensive equipment on the cross arms to handle lightening strikes and charge surges. At the time I was wondering who was going to pay for the upgrade. It certainly feels more secure but the main upshot has been the absence of frequent power outages due to lightening. That is my report from the Tule river drainage. Wukchumni will have to inform as to the Kaweah watershed.
“Who was going to pay for the upgrade”
Obviously all consumers in Edison’s grid. They pay for all of it plus a % profit for the company. Whether the company might have come with better and less expensive solutions is something I cannot argue about. They have incentives to do it in the most expensive ways —> more profits. Whether state regulators examine the projects and discuss the solutions proposed defending the interest of the consumers, who knows. Some call this “rewarding capital spending over performance”. This example of perverse incentive in Cal is “insulating utilities by allocating risks on consumers”
You have to remember California fires almost put PG&E out of business. Edison did not want to go down the same toilet. I have no love for either company. My three phase power used to be pretty cheap but Edison consolidated categories to charge add-ons and fees to pretend small users cost as much as large users to service. California is a pretty regulated state. That is why insurance companies are leaving the state after taking a big hit from the fires. This is not on Edison but is the work of the Public Utilities Commission. They are the ones looking out for the consumer and approving solutions. I’m sure it helps to have a lobby but it is in the end a balancing act. I would go solar but three phase inverters are pretty expensive.
Depending on what size you’re talking about there lots of 3 phase inverters for both hybrid/, off grid and full grid tie without batteries.
They are not more expensive really than single phase, only that usually 3 phase is a larger watts so it’s bigger and therefore more expensive equipment
Size matters. Anything that will satisfy the horse power demands of a machine shop cost $10K and up.
Just a reminder: the Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) is about 35% cheaper than PG&E, and pays its C-suite a fraction of the privately-owned PG&E. Nevertheless, PG&E execs were worried about facing negligent homicide suits for their skimpy maintenance blowing up a gas pipeline in suburban San Bruno, and burning down the ironically-named town of “Paradise.”
I’d suggest Newsom is “foaming the runway” for the private utilities.
“Is Trump Attempting A Regime Change Op Against Putin?”
‘Putin offered to exchange Russian-controlled Kherson and Zaporozhye for Ukrainian-controlled Donetsk and Lugansk – The Washington Post’
Soon as I read that Putin wanted Ukrainian-controlled Donetsk and Lugansk I knew that it was bogus. Several weeks ago I heard that Russia already has all of Lugansk except for a few villages so no gain there. And Donetsk? The Russians have cauldrons up and down that front filled with trapped Ukrainian soldiers and Pokrovsk about to fall which is the big one where Zelensky is sending the best of the troops that he has left. As that all collapses, the Russians will just roll up the rest of Donetsk. So he is not going to trade that territory for Kherson and Zaporozhye and you can be sure that they are next up. Still, this is a story by the Washington Post and that is as good a coming from the CIA so just a psyops post.
IIRC the Zaporozhye Oblast includes the land connection to the Crimean peninsula. There’s no way Russia is trading that away.
Also, Donetsk, Kherson, Luhansk and Zaporizhzhia Oblasts all voted in September 2022 to join Russia, so I don’t think Putin can just wave that away. (You can question the votes, but it did happen. I remember Patrick Lancaster reporting from the locations.)
Both the Zaporozhye Oblast and Kherson Oblasts are included.
AS hde Rev Kev says, it was obviously false news.
Isn’t the Washington Post just the mouthpiece for idiots in the CIA? And the New York Times the mouthpiece for idiots in the State Department? Or have I got that backwards? Creating their own reality, a la Karl Rove…
“Thieves steal eight objects from Louvre in daring daytime heist”
There has been talk about how that jewelry may be disassembled and the gold melted down but I don’t believe that at all. What I suspect is that some billionaire saw that jewelry and wanted it for themselves. As they could not buy it, no matter how much money was offered, that through various criminal connections a professional team was recruited to do this snatch and grab. I know that it will shock some people that billionaires have contacts with criminal elements but that is the world that we live in. So some narcissist now has this jewelry. They can never show it but will take keen pleasure in knowing that it is theirs now and nobody else’s.
can you even be a billionnaire without being neck deep in organised crime?
Yes, after you’ve paid legislators to legalize all your crimes. Or packed the Supreme Court, depending on your circumstances.
He said *without* being neck deep. /s
Rev Kev: Likely.
There is a shadow world of the arts — Swiss warehouses with mysterious comings and goings, disappearances of pieces from Italy, art from looted archeological digs ending up discreetly sold and discreetly hidden.
Here, a current simmering scandal is the Agnelli family’s collection of paintings — 300 or 400 works by major artists that are somehow “lost.” There is the remarkable saga of a Monet that was sold at auction by the family, but that may now be a copy. Oh, and there is at least one more copy floating around, as well as the original, which may be in Portugal with an heir to the Glories of Exor and Stellantis.
https://www.open.online/2025/10/13/famiglia-agnelli-dipinto-monet-scomparso-indagine/
I reckon “loot” and “treasure” are bonded at the hip from a colonist’s viewpoint. To begin with, the emeralds, diamonds, silver, and gold used to fabricate the neckless were likely “appropriated”. From a western cultural perspective thieving treasure is ok. We are taught this from our leaders (Gaddafi’s gold, Venezuela’s oil) again and again.
And where would the “loot” be if it hadn’t been “appropriated”? Mostly underground, buried in rubble, or in some rich guy’s private home. More people from the colonies probably saw it in the Louvre or British Museum or the Met than would have if it had stayed where it came from.
Even for a troll comment, this is pretty desperate don’t you think?
My impression is that the people who do most of the big ticket art heists already have a buyer.
We discovered some untouched 3,500 year old tombs on the excavation I worked on, complete with painted sarcophagi and unbroken decorated pottery. There was nothing unique or spectacular – you could find similar examples in many museums across Crete. In fact, the museum basements were lousy with this stuff – there’s often a lot more in storage than what’s on display, and I realized that a lot of what we discovered would probably never be seen by anybody except for some future scholars working on a dissertation. But it’s still beautiful artwork that can be accurately sourced as thousands of years old.
There were also rumors that the head of the excavation had a higher standard of living than what you might expect for a professor with a social science degree, and the suggestion that perhaps he had a side hustle in antiquities dealing. I can attest that security at the excavation was light to non-existent.
In the 1980’s in Europe i’d buy 1700 to 1800 year old cheap Roman bronze coins by the hundreds that had sometimes come out of the ground a fortnight prior. They’d run $3 to $4 per. They apparently didn’t have banks or metal detectors way back when, so everybody buried their money somewhere.
It’d be the equivalent of burying a earthen vessel with a bunch of Lincoln Cents, not really of much collector value a few thousand years hence.
We’re only enthralled with King Tut because of his stuff.
Nobody’s gonna get all that excited when they unearth Zuckerburg’s tomb in Hawaii in early July 4257 and find a veritable shitlode of Charmin.
you don’t need to be a billionaire to accomplish that heist.
The perps did not use some “Mission Impossible” tactics and widgets.
Probably some drug or organized crime lord. Helped by incredibly complacent security
Pictures I saw of gotten gains were pretty fugly, but most older jewelry such as Napoleon’s goods, tend to be that way.
If you parted it out, all of the diamonds would have to be recut from miners cut to a modern cut, losing a little bit in the process, but you’d never know where they had come from prior.
The goods would be worth a ton less if you part them out, anything Napoleon is worth the big bickies,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napoleon%27s_penis
p.s.
I was quite impressed with the portrayal of glass merchants in the 2000 film Diamond Men.
Usually Hollywood can be counted on to butcher professions, such as the old hag of a coin dealer in 1989’s Johnny Handsome who gets robbed by Mickey Rourke.
That Napoleon story reminds me of the urban legend that circulated when I was a yout’, that Depression-era gangster John Dillinger was known to have had the world’s biggest penis, and that it was pickled in the secret “Freak Exhibit Room” in the basement of the Smithsonian.
Ah, children’s culture…
Regarding the Louvre heist, isn’t it plausible the thieves have private customers waiting in Dubai or some such place?
I would think the market is quite flaccid for such frivolous feets~
p.s.
So lets say you own Napoleon’s penis, how to best display the little fella’s little fella?
LOL! You’re right. Who steals gold from the Louvre to melt it down. There will at least be a temporary world manhunt for these perps. You’d have an easier time knocking off a few mom and pop jewelry stores and not getting caught if all you wanted to do was melt down the gold.
I’ll use that article to point out the ongoing deterioration of accuracy in anything we read online these days.
In the header of the article in bold we find –
“A four man “strike team” broke into the Louvre in the heart of Paris on Sunday and robbed eight objects from the Apollo Gallery, including historical jewellery, as the world-renowned museum closed for the day.”
Then in the 2nd paragraph of the article we find something different –
“A robbery took place this morning at the opening of the Louvre Museum,” French Culture Minister Rachida Dati on Sunday wrote on X. The Louvre said it was closing for the day “for exceptional reasons”.
My guess here is the header was written by AI, and it got confused by the fact that the museum closed for the day after the morning robbery. And the discrepancy isn’t all that relevant to the main point of the story. But you see this AI summary garbage on practically everything now, and not all the mistakes it makes will be so inconsequential. Not that that is going to stop anyone from cramming AI down our throats any time soon.
Honestly speaking, I kind of respect a good old fashioned heist in this day and age
I can’t wait for the movie about this one to come out.
I agree. SPECTRE has their fingerprints all over this. The jewels will probably adorn some megalomaniac’s underground lair while he holds the world to ransom with his space laser.
re: Russia – Gilbert Doctorow mini-debate
Doctorow caused some ruckus recently.
Even Andrei Martyanov cared to link a longer article on this “discussion”:
When an “Expert” Loses his Footing
Gilbert Doctorow—self-proclaimed Russia expert—is maneuvering himself into the sidelines with unsubstantiated and confused theories.
by Denis Dobrin / Peter Hanseler / Andreas Mylaeus
Sun 19 Oct 2025
https://forumgeopolitica.com/article/when-an-expert-loses-his-footing
Intro:
“(…)Gilbert Doctorow, who calls himself a “Sovietologist” and considers himself the only real Russia expert in the independent media, has been peddling theories for several days that leave even hardened political commentators speechless.
In an article published in his “Armageddon Newsletter” on Substack on October 1, 2025, he went so far as to claim that a palace revolution was imminent in the Kremlin in Moscow and that Russian society increasingly viewed Vladimir Putin as a hated Gorbachev 2.0. He also makes cheap suggestions for a successor to the Russian president, whose government ship has now accumulated too much barnacle growth and become too cumbersome.
(…)”
Interesting comments section where Doctorow himself, Dmitry Orlov and other bloggers also comment, along several German readers in German. So they are actually bi-lingual
(Originally a German-Swiss site as far as I understand I didn’t know this blog.)
Doctorow wrote again here, today:
Does the Vladimir Solovyov talk show speak for President Putin?
20 October 2025
https://gilbertdoctorow.com/2025/10/20/does-the-vladimir-solovyov-talk-show-speak-for-president-putin/
On the one hand we need discussion as much as clean air. On the other I welcomed John Helmer´s reminder that we, the sane, who want a decent world and end to this war, Russophobia and those endless lies, are few in numbers in the West. Therefore we better avoid infighting.
This Gilbert Doctorow always seemed to me to be a very careful man. I don’t quite understand why he’s being attacked like this right now…
Ego, maybe resentment?
Thanks for the links, AG– the stories were worth the comments as well.
Seemed to me to be a little too taken by the chattering classes. Research did not appear to be one of strong points. I really liked his travelogues. Maybe he could skip the criticism about his presumed baseless opinions and have a bit of success if he simply wrote about his travels around Russia.
Exactly. I enjoyed his articles about his stays at his place in St. Petersburg, and his conversations with friends there, but stopped listening to him when he decided to become a pundit. He listens to Russian TV talk shows. End of. He himself is/was(?) a wholesale liquor salesman who lives in Brussels.
I don’t quite understand why he’s being attacked like this right now…
Because he’s not agreeing with the prevailing narrative?
“Gilbert Doctorow, who calls himself a “Sovietologist”
He is an expert on some aspects of Russian culture and life. He has a PH.D in Russian Studies from back when Russian Studies in US universities meant something and was a friend and colleague of Steven Cohen.
He has, from what I can figure out, probably 45 or so years of business experience in the USSR and the Russian Federation. He seems to have had some fairly close associations with the USSR/RU arts scene. He has published on Russian and US affairs.
Oh, and yes, he has a Russian wife and seems to alternate between residencies in Brussels and St. Petersburg. I believe he and his wife sold their dacha in the Leningrad Oblast a year or two ago.
Looking at the author blurbs on the “hit piece” article I really do not see anything that qualifies the authors as experts any more (well possibly less) than Doctorow.
One German lawyer (Mylaeus), one Swiss lawyer (Hanseler) though both with Russian experience and one Russian classically trained pianist with experience in real estate management (Dobrin). BTW, neither Dobrin nor Hanseler are old enough to really remember the USSR.
I suspect Doctorow very likely is wrong but I have to admire the level of invective and ire he has aroused.
His late father in law was a Soviet admiral, I think. So he has come across some military matters indirectly besides his background in history and obvious insights into “Kremlinology.”
Having said that, he struck me as 1) someone who loves being a contrarian just for sake of being contrary at times; 2) make assertions based on hunches rather than careful dissection of the evidence; 3) who seems to think more highly of his insights than might be justified. All three suggest his conclusions should be viewes with plenty of salt, but I do think he has a lot of insights even when you fon’t think they add up to what he thinks.
Honestly, I think that at this point all the “kremlinoligist” I tend to follow at least with one eye seem to be caught in this trap where The West (in panic) makes a flood of statements all over the place and often contradicting each other while Russia and Kreml merely keep the course steadily and restating the same comments over and over again – and yet one is supposed to have something new to day every week about the Kreml’s short and long term plans and what’s going inside Putin’s head.
Under the pressure to comment they all tend to over-analyze seemingly random tidbits or possible new trends they think are emerging in the (ever grinding) boredom that is the Russian official stance.
It just is not that exiting to state week after week that Russia is still aiming to reinstate the Ukrainian constitution of 1996, while Ukraine is still stubbornly holding on to constitution of 2014/2019 . That won’t get you the readers or listeners.
No. Trump went too far with Tomahawks. The mood in Moscow has changed a lot. It is necessary to understand the limits of permissible blackmail.
Because he’s not agreeing with the prevailing narrative?
What is this prevailing point of view and what does he disagree with? I live in Moscow and it seemed to me that his text is quite close to what is happening.
Thanks Wall. I agree. I watched Doctorow and Glenn Deisen and Doctorow was very cautious. It is interesting that Ritter, Martyanov, Sleboda, and Orlov are all attacking Doctorow the man, not his ideas. The 4 mentioned could be called Russian propagandists for their behavior as they are all reacting the same way with the same message. Too bad the 4 mentioned propagandists have never watched sports – sports fans debate replacing a coach all the time.
As far as watching TV for analysis, I am listening to The Duran talk about some news article.
Doctorow absolutely correctly watches Russian television and understands who exactly needs to be watched and what to listen to. He conveys the meaning of what he has heard quite accurately and correctly evaluates the nature of these statements.
This morning’s Meaning In History link covers this territory pretty well.
Some nonsense, I’m sorry. The Washington Post simply distorted Putin’s demands. They’re always confusing things there- it doesn’t matter. They spelled the word Russia correctly, and I can thank this newspaper for that. Gilbert Doctorow wrote more or less close to reality, even if some bloggers don’t like it, especially Martianov.
re: UK´s slide to authoritarianism
Much more important than Doctorow´s case is this piece by Craig Murray:
36 Minute Trials and No Jury – Starmer’s Fascist Mass Courts
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2025/10/36-minute-trials-and-no-jury-starmers-fascist-mass-courts/
“Those charged with terrorism for supporting Palestine Action will have no jury in trials limited to 36 minutes each, with prison sentences up to six months. These are the plans for Starmer Courts for mass trials of anti-Genocide protestors.”
Also: Murray has set up a donation fund to support the cause of Palestine Action and making a legal case against the government´s abuse of power.
“I have started legal action in Scotland against the UK government over the proscription of Palestine Action, in coordination with Huda Ammori and her team in England. The petition has been accepted by the Court and served on the Solicitor General. They now have 16 remaining days to respond.”
https://www.craigmurray.org.uk/archives/2025/10/fight-the-proscription-of-palestine-action/
Like the Floridian rocket dockets for foreclosures during the 2008 financial crisis where they had too many cases, so they just sped up the judicial process with less need for the pesky required documentation of nonpayment or ownership?
Kansas Reflector does an excellent job in its article on “Trump isn’t sending troops to cities with highest crime rates.”
The issue is crime rates. The issue is crime rates over time. The issue is crime as propaganda for the “law ‘n’ order” crowd, and propaganda about crime in the US of A always has racial undertones.
As the Reflector points out: “The cities with populations of 250,000 or more with the highest violent crime rates were, in order: Memphis, Oakland, Detroit, Baltimore, Cleveland, Kansas City, Milwaukee, St. Louis, Albuquerque and Minneapolis, according to Stateline’s analysis of FBI data.”
Hmmm. So why are Portland and Chicago being targeted? Does Trump have a grudge against Portlandia? The episodes shot at the feminist bookstore?
Did Trump have too much “Chicago-style pizza,” which is a very dubious comestible indeed? (I won’t eat it.)
The question to discuss is this: What is Trump (plus Miller, Vought, Noem, and Vance) trying to prove? Why would Trump choose Chicago, a city occupied more than once by federal troops and a history of resistance to said occupations? See: the Pullman Strike of 1894. And then the Republic Steel Strike and the 1937 Memorial Day Massacre.
Likewise, Portland isn’t a “natural” target for crime-fighters like Trump and Kristi “Pooch Magnet” Noem.
Shouldn’t any discussion center on the questions: The Department of Homeland Security, as we all knew, is now Frankenstein’s monster. ICE is engaged in raids that remind me of U.S. history and slave catchers. TSA has always been a mess, and the FBI is an even older stinking mess. Isn’t it time to rein in these entities? Or would that require more political will than MAGA, BlueMaga, and liberals can ever muster up?
I think that that Reflector article also nips some of the skirmishes here about gross numbers and rates.
For those still unable to understand rates: In 2021, Japan had 263 murders. Dallas, Texas, had 212 murders. Obviously, Dallas is safer than Japan.
> “Chicago-style pizza,” which is a very dubious comestible indeed?
Wow, Uno‘s catchin’ strays…
I remember dining out at Old Chicago Pizza back in the mid eighties. The draw was an extensive list of beer on tap. The pizza, despite being baked on a cast iron skillet, was of the white bread variety and mediocre at best.
Not the same thing at all. First is the quality of the ingredients, the fennel in the sausage, the quantity of cheese, the browning running the full side of the deep skillet and the slight blackening of the cheese on top. Like French pastries, the continuous temperature of the ovens is critical.
We can’t help when a matter of Cultural Heritage is misappropriated, and much ‘chicago style’ pizza in strip malls is undercooked and overdoughed. Can’t be helped if someone got given a Coors Light for their first taste of ‘beer’. But the comment refers to Chicago, and the honour of the City must be defended. The simulacra is not the thing.
Zachary’s Chicago style spinach and mushroom stuffed pizza in the Bay Area, essentially an employee coop, cannot be beat. My wife had a hankering for it while pregnant. Quite spendy tho.
Amen. The tourist pizza (Uno, Gino’s East, Malnatti’s) should not be confused with the neighborhood or suburban gems. Cornmeal in the crust, for one thing. Not that the originals aren’t good, but the franchising leaves much to be desired, excepting Giordano’s.
I’ll happily yield.
Sounds absolutely delicious.
Why Chicago? Trump is getting his revenge on all who may have once called him a “short fingered vulgarian.” So there’s Obama, who made fun of him at that correspondent’s dinner, and Pritzker, who made fun of him at the ’24 Dem convention. America is now Trump’s psychodrama. We are just living in it.
Of course part of the problem is that his targets are themselves often less than admirable but Trump as a stable non genius is indifferent to the collateral damage, whether it’s blowing up boats or abusing foreigners trying to live. His lack of anything resembling a conscience is probably why the Israelis have the goods on him.
Dunno about “Chicago-style” pizza, but in Chicago you can find some of the best pizza to be found in this world, refined by decades of incredibly ruthless competition.
During my college years, I managed and tended bar at the BC Tap, which was just up the street from Calo Ristorante; was, until Brendan (shot-caller) got into a pissing-match with Mayor Daley (jr) who eventually chased him out of town. Calo’s had/has some of the best stuffed pizza imaginable, in addition to damn good Italian cusine. I’m not really a pan-pizza guy, and for thin-crust, nothing has ever come close to challenging sadly departed Papa Tonelli’s absolutely legendary, almost magical thin-crust pizza.
If you people-watch, you can also occasionally catch sight of some colorful individuals at Calo’s, though they tend to keep very low-key– totally unlike Sabitino’s back in the day, which was loud, over-the-top and flamboyant, where being seen was often the point. Calo’s is relaxed and chill, but don’t step on any toes if you know what I mean; there’ve been many “come to Jesus” moments in that back-alley off of Clark Street.
I’ve travelled coast-to-coast and all in-between, and pizza’s often been part of the journey. West Coast “pizza” is usually glorified flatbreads with ecclectic toppings, and on the East Coast, man, they’re just plain lazy– no quality, no sense of pride in their creations. Strangely, one of the best not-Chicago pizzas I’ve had came out of an Arab-run GAS STATION just outside of Detroit–the guy working the pizza oven was a man on a mission, shooting for the big-time, and maybe he’ll make it, because his pies were damn good.
So, if I gotta spell it out for you, DLG, don’t you ever, ever, conflate “Chicago-style” pizza for Chicago pizza, or you and me are gonna have problems, capisce?
LawnDart: I used to live — for about twenty years, till the move to the Undisclosed Region — about five blocks from Calo’s. I was west of Ashland.
Your golden memories of classy Italian cookery and olympian pizzas are, errrr, nostalgic.
Now, if you were talking about the kids at Munno, I’d take you seriously. (Clark and Leland.)
PS: And, no, I don’t want to hear about the imaginary “No Ketchup on Hotdogs” rule, either.
Nostalgia is about all I have these days, tucked deep in the Northwoods and farm country– a long ways from anything that could be appropriately be called “pizza.” But I did have some bear-meat last night and it was quite delish, so there’s that…
It is an interesting exercise to review Trump internal policies in the context of today’s excellent “Hitlerism, Trumpism, Netanyahuism, Le Penism, Macronism” by E. Todd. Here he shakes the political box with an “expressionistic approach”.
I agree and with the discussion of Todd below–just getting around to reading this. While I obviously know little about Europe (except from movies!) I think his view of the situation here is dead on target. My neighbors in their Ford 150s are not going to revolt and in my opinion the country has changed and dropped much of the ethnic and racial hatred so common in the 20th. Now, with the white poor falling into the underclass, they are seeing more solidarity with their former victims, not less. And contrary to those German Lutherans the business Baptists do let everyone into Heaven as long as they get properly dunked behind the altar. When we did have a Civil War it was in fact a rich man’s war even as some wealthy in North and South managed to draft dodge just like Trump.
Trump won’t last but he may wreck the economy not to mention the environment. What comes after that is a fog.
Trump apparently holds similar grudges to the ones that Biden had – https://www.racket.news/p/exclusive-fema-workers-improperly
When this story first came out, it was downplayed. Taibbi notes how one woman was made the scapegoat at the time and blamed for the whole episode. When she claimed to the media that she was given orders by her superiors, she wasn’t believed and the story went nowhere. Now it seems she was in the right.
It shouldn’t make any difference that the person who was scapegoated was a black woman, but given the current political climate, I think it does.
Here’s hoping for a new D-R variant of covid that only takes out elected members of both major political parties and spares the rest of us from their vindictive games.
Hmm, I thought you were native Chicagoan, notwithstanding your current residence in Italy? I, personally, always enjoyed annual ritual (so to speak) dinner at Giordano’s at our annual conference when I was still in academia…perhaps it doesn’t compare to the Italian Italian fare, though?
interesting articles on the Russia-Ukraine ceasefire offers. I tend to lean towards Wauck’s assessment about these being unrealistic and not in Russia’s interest, but Helmer, who has a lot of credibility in my view, gives the talks more weight. It may be that Russian plans are to draw talks out while changing reality on the battlefield. With winter imminent, it could be a costly strategic blunder to let the enemy rearm and take pressure off their energy grid, despite the hardships to Russia’s own troops if the objectives of the SMO are not achieved.
why have talks? (rhetorical Q) Russia’s/the Kremlin’s political demands have been in the public seemingly forever
you only negotiate if you have something to trade (or delay if it’s politics)
I deleted it from my original paragraph, but I wrote about how Russia may just want to stall the talks out in order to delay any decision on Tomahawks or stealing assets long enough to prepare for them. Engaging in talks may be a signal to the US (and BRICS) that Russia is not intransigent in its demands. The pressure on oil exports, both over land via sanctions and by sea via piracy of its shadow fleet, are real.
Helmer’s credibility becomes incredible when he extensively quotes the Financial Times. Moreover, this is a piece written by several of the western worlds greatest print prevaricators…Max Seddon, Henry Foy and Christopher Miller. As I am fond of saying about Max, “Everything he says is a lie including ‘and’ and ‘the’.” (h/t Mary McCarthy) Read it and weep.
> Water reveals superpowers hidden at the nanoscale University of Manchester
>> The discovery required the team to develop ultrasensitive measurement techniques capable of probing water layers much thinner than the skin of a virus and track their electrical response across frequencies from kilohertz to gigahertz—spanning six orders of magnitude.
In his work on exclusion-zone water, Gerald Pollack gives great credit to Gilbert Ling for the microprobe he developed. The perceptual advance allowed observations which expanded theoretical possibilities.
From the underlying paper:
> For quasi-2D water, in which the water becomes layered across its entire thickness (h ⪝ 2 nm), we observe a pronounced extra peak in conductivity.
Pollack’s work involves charge difference perpendicular to the layered planes of the liquid crystal. The conductivities in this work are equal to or greater than layers provoked by the nafion that Pollack works with.
The underlying mystery that structured water tantalizes is that a charge separation can be leveraged for life to piggyback on, a large mystery indeed. This work hints at something like superconductivity parallel to the layer planes. A vast increase in evolutionary potential space.
Yes, water is amazing. Water also has memory and can accept, store and transmit information. Here’s a couple of short videos regarding water’s power: (Water) Influenced With Sounds & Intent!
And my favorite studies on water’s memory were done by Japanese scientist Dr. Emoto. Here’s a short video (the music is overly dramatic, but muting helps)
Water Has Memory! Dr. Masaru Emoto’s Water Experiment!
Have a sip :-)
“Windows 11’s October update just broke the Windows Recovery Environment — USB keyboards and mice unusable in Windows RE after latest bug hits”
How can Microsoft screw up so bad repeatedly? And on core elements of the operating system as well? As far as I am concerned, I wouldn’t touch Windows 11 with a 10 foot barge pole.
This after breaking localhost in “normal” Windows 11:
Windows 11 update breaks localhost, prompting mass uninstall workaround
https://www.theregister.com/2025/10/16/windows_11_update_localhost/
That’s pretty impressive!
Maybe it’s a stealth sales campaign for Windows 10? (Look ma, no updates to break stuff! What a cool feature!)
Or maybe this is just AI replacing human software testers? (Hey, who needs keyboards or mice anymore, just tell the AI to fake typing all day, and we’ll go to a long lunch!)
Or maybe this is just AI replacing human software testers?
I am not a betting lady but Github Copilot is a Microsoft product and AI pull request review and apply suggested changes is a feature
Are there ever any real penalties for any of these large software, database and cloud vendors when they screw up and make your device unusable or allow your personal and confidential information to be spread all over the internet? The worst that might happen is a class action suit where some lawyers get a nice payout and you get a buck or two. It’s no wonder there is no security, no guarantee your device won’t be bricked, no privacy…consequences are only for little people like you, not for any of the important people and their companies.
That’s a very valid point. Market share on OSes has been such a hornswoggle for like forever. It’s pretty much Windoze or Mac and then you’re in the weeds.
But I will throw this out there as a one time inducement. I’m using Linux at home and see ZERO ads. I mean ZERO. None on web pages (Sorry Yves, but I did make sure I donated to the Tip Jar), none on Youtube (well, they occasionally manage to slip a static one in when I start the web page), none pretty much anywhere. Plus no AI, no Clippy, no Copilot, nothing in the cloud. So if that’s what you want, it takes a little work, but not much (actually I now find it easier to install Linux that Windows.)
Reading that post made it less likely that I would soon regret my decision to switch to Mac after getting the “bad” news that my Windows 10 desktop could not upgrade to Windows 11.
re: European Disunion
2x German BERLINER ZEITUNG
use google-translate
1) (also see NC ´s POLITICO link above which is the original source)
For Ukraine’s accession: EU forges plans to restrict voting rights of new members
The EU is planning new accession rules. Future members are to start without veto rights. But one country continues to block Ukraine’s enlargement.
https://www.berliner-zeitung.de/news/fuer-ukraine-beitritt-eu-schmiedet-plaene-stimmrecht-neuer-mitglieder-zu-beschraenken-li.10001626
Mainly quoting German Green bigwig and major idiot, Anton Hofreiter (originally a decent and peaceful Bavarian farmer and biologist turned clueless warmonger and propaganda puppet). Those EU nomenklatura supporting this (French, Dutch seem to oppose) trying to play off smaller countries like Montenegro against Hungary.
2) EU takes action: Hungary and Slovakia should no longer receive Russian gas (POLITICO again)
The EU wants to completely stop Russian gas by 2027. Hungary calls it an attack on its energy supply. Gas prices could rise by up to ten percent.
https://www.berliner-zeitung.de/wirtschaft-verantwortung/eu-greift-durch-ungarn-und-slowakei-sollen-kein-russisches-gas-mehr-bekommen-li.10001622
“(…)
The European Union is close to deciding to completely ban Russian gas from the internal market – for the first time without unanimity among member states. According to information from the US magazine Politico, energy ministers are expected to approve a new law in Luxembourg on Monday that will gradually phase out Russian gas imports by 2027
(…)
Until now, sanctions in the energy sector had to be passed unanimously. This time, Brussels is resorting to a different legal instrument: the gas ban is to be implemented as a trade measure
(…)”.
“Boris Johnson confesses: He’s fallen for ChatGPT”
A libertine narcissist matched up with an erotic ChatGPT telling them everything that they want to hear? Sounds like a match made in heaven to me.
Boris: “Drinking heavily. I lost the election again. Where is the nearest bridge higher than 30 meters?”
ChatGPT: “Sorry to hear of your loss. There are no bridges of that height in Oxfordshire, but may I suggest the splendid Queensferry Crossing whose deck is 60 meters above the river?”
Boris: People laugh at me because I can’t be bothered to groom myself, other than by having kids out of wedlock.
ChatGPT: Sorry to hear that, but anybody can comb their hair, You’re a maverick in that regard and I find it quite appealing.
Turns out the exaggerated sycophancy of chat bots that most people find repulsive is what Boris is in love with. They do seem well matched.
“Trump urged Zelenskyy to accept Putin’s terms or be ‘destroyed’ by Russia”
Putin’s talking points, Putin’s talking points, Putin’s rhetoric, Putin’s arguments. Ye gods the mindless repetition … 🙄
No difference to the incessant fixation on whatever verbal nonsense Trump spews out at random instead of focusing on what is playing out behind the scenes where it matters. The media has turned the ‘news’ into a soap opera where only the main character has lines, and they’ve been following that playbook for so long its all they know how to do.
“China Is Already Winning the Trade War America Wanted”
Hal Brands might benefit from a little reflection upon what 300+ years of interaction with “the West” has taught China.
“No Kings” Protest (and Arrests) Have Begun”
Can’t say that I was impressed with this and to tell you the truth, the whole thing sounds like an establishment psyops set up by billionaires and the Democrats. Consider. What does the slogan ‘No Kings ‘even mean? It’s like saying ‘Bleh!’. It’s just a backhanded way of saying ‘I Hate Trump.’ Trump let his own feelings be known here-
https://x.com/LauraLoomer/status/1979754846090834014 (19 secs)
So the net effect is that the protestors had no focus and Trump proved once more that he has no gravitas. So here is the thing. Supposing, just supposing, that all those people were instead demanding healthcare for all and it was not a one off thing but a continuous rolling affair? Anybody remember when that healthcare for all was a thing a coupla years ago – but that nobody talks about it anymore. Strange that. So instead of getting people out onto the street for real issues that effect people’s lives, instead they have been funneled into what amounts to performative theater.
A lot of ‘see me-dig me’ going on as of late…
Wasn’t surprised to see the performance theater going on in Portland, as proportionately, I think more Portlanders go to Burning Man than any other big city, and there’s a fair bit of performance theater going on at the burn, i’ll tell you what.
I attended a Black Rock City high pressure time-share presentation once, oh and the way it got twisted around was magical.
They tried No Karens but that killed attendance. ;)
No Kings? The US already did that 250 years ago. (Maybe they could take the protests to England or one of the Commonwealth countries.) / ;)
Nice weather for a big outdoor party, though.
I’m shocked at the scorn for No Kings on NC. For heaven’s sake, it was 7 million people getting off their butts to gather and say ‘No, this wrecking of America and drive toward fascism is not ok’. That’s a damn good thing.
No, it is not a solution in itself, but it’s better than hopeless passivity, simply doomscrolling and saying ‘did you hear what insane stuff happened today?’.
it was not 7 million.
and the disdain for /”No Kings” is that it is an astroturfed, narrowly (as in demographics) mobilized movement funded by one set of billionaires in their culture war versus a different set of oligarchs.
I didn’t see protest signs saying “No Oligarchs”. Probably just an oversight. / ;)
Well … “kings” is plural, after all…. ;-)
Prince Regent Baron would like a word…
Thank you for very succinctly saying all that. Saved me a much longer and less direct comment.
I was hoping the protest in my area might at least delay my drive across town – it couldn’t even do that. Everyone then dutifully packed up and went on with their day at the pre-arranged end time for the protest.
Wake me up when the Black Panthers show up. They were at least organized, had demands, and posed a threat.
Me, I would have spiced it up somewhat along the protest route by buying a whole mess of TACO sized corn tortillas-which trust me, are Mother Nature’s frisbee, capable of going 100-200 feet with a deft toss, and not putting the hurt on anybody.
200 frisbees is something like $6
I bet that you could get tens of millions of Americans getting off their butts to demand healthcare for all. Just make sure that the Democrats are shut out of any such movement. Trump is gone in three years, unless he chokes on a burger first, but Americans will still not have healthcare for all when that time comes. Trump is not the problem. He is merely the sickly sweet smell emanating from the gangrene on the American political body.
You must mean ‘Gang Green’…
>You must mean ‘Gang Green’…
The NY Jets? Their determined commitment to losing, often through their own terrible choices (eg $20m/year for a QB who cannot throw straight) makes them a natural metaphor for the Dems.
Yes! Where are (were) the Dems when “Medicare for All” was on the table? That’s a clear slogan everyone can understand. Large protests in the USA only come about after lots of funding. Are the Dems gonna fund a “Medicare for All” rally in all major cities? Hold your sign but don’t hold your breath.
I dunno, a massed gathering of people worried about inflation, losing their livelihoods, concerned about the country and what direction it is headed, reduced to a 2 word statement in regards to possible royalty to come in a little over 3 years time… not all that different than in the aftermath of a terrorist killing 60 and wounding 600, that ‘Vegas Strong’ was where it was at.
I recommend the How I Became a Populist above in links.
As to no kings its the same old but trump from a privileged class that refuses to look in the mirror.
Also in links: Monopoly Round-Up: Does the Left Have Trouble with Making Things in America? – BIG by Matt Stoller
The article raises other huge questions that also need to be addressed.
Ok, you’re convincing me to go back and finish it. I like Stoller and agree with his anti-monopoly take. But the way he twists himself into knots to try to give the Democrat party credit for doing something, anything beneficial is very off-putting. As is his well known anti-China bias. I think he’s way off base trying to frame rare earths as some sort of Chinese monopoly. If the US hadn’t said “Take all of our industry, please!” that would be one thing, but they did in fact say just that. By my definition of monopoly, if you gladly give away your ability to manufacture something, you have no business trying to claim those you gave it to are monopolists.
He’s more addressing the hostility to doing anything about manufacturing.
Granted, this administration is not the one to address it, but the overarching question is about the challenges to get to a place to address economic deficiencies.
The article is not only about blaming China. That’s a misrepresentation.
It includes a scathing indictment of the Democratic party about a particular point.
Thanks. I did finish it now and agree with his point about the Democrats and their aversion to onshoring. Also appreciated his point that we used to be able to have high wages and products cheap enough to export.
This TINA narrative needs to be countered at every opportunity. For example, the entire state of California used to be able to provide free college education. We also used to do agriculture without having to import massive amounts of labor. I thought this video that a commenter posted last week was very good on that last point – https://www.youtube.com/live/zdWrHb8b-c0
NC commented not long ago on the real motivation behind the ICE raids. And the lady in the video makes the same point.
Bedoya’s article reminds me a little of Taibbi’s “The Divide: American Injustice in the Age of the Wealth Gap”.
It accomplished exactly nothing. In a few days nobody will even remember that it happened.
And in case you did not notice: the USA has been a wreck for a very long time (unless you are in the top 1 to 10%).
Good grief. it wasn’t about health care. It was about the heavy hand of the Trump administration. It was especially notable in the places Trump (Miller) has sent in the thugee to punish the libs. The protests featured sarcasm not fire arms. The Kristi Noam intent is to provoke violent resistance to justify a violent response. That did not happen.
Unsupported claims are being made here. How do you know it was not 7 million? Where is the evidence that G. Soros bought all those frog costumes? And where were you? Banking your energy for the real protest or just going to vote for the next “no choice”.
Comments sections any time, anywhere, tend to overlook the benefits of community.
I’d also wager monied interests were watching, and wondering if Miller and Vought should stop saying the quiet parts outloud and come up with better cover stories.
i have been worn down by attending too many unserious protests, especially in college, run by people who want to protest against something, anything. my opinion is generally that protests are nice social events where you can meet new people and feel the joy of chanting in unison. socially, they are a nice thing, and are a decent intro to effective action. but i always ask: what are the material changes resulting from the protest? so often nothing materially changes.
i view the no kings protests as baby’s first foray into protesting. they might be the beginning of some sort of escalation (who knows!) but for now they are a bit goofy to me. the type of protest where someone brings out bongo drums and i get hit with a feeling of unreality. i don’t think they are bad, but i do not think they will bring about material changes yet.
Yeah, we’re way rusty not having seriously protested since the 70’s man, er 1770’s that is.
I know many friends and colleagues who are now participating in protests for the first time. Standing up to those in power and taking protest baby steps are good things for democracy. Only time will tell if these protests have legs.
> protests are nice social events where you can meet new people
That was Howard S. Becker’s perspective. That something is going on even when nothing is going on. One he studied was an event with simulated casualties for community emergency response. The altruistic aspect helps grease the interactions. Meeting like-minded people is important for both strong and weak social ties, and a larger event has enough variance to keep things fluid.
Because a lot of NC has such disdain for the Democrats and their “fighting for” rhetoric, that they are tired of Lucy pulling away the football. This event was your typical Democrat operation, lots of noise but no results.
To paraphrase Stalin, “How many divisions does the No Kings rally have?”
+1
“EU Seeks Maritime Declaration To Inspect Russia’s ‘Shadow Fleet’ EU Seeks Maritime Declaration To Inspect Russia’s ‘Shadow Fleet’”
Pretty sure that any “mandate” by the EU does not extend to international waters. For that they would have to go to the United Nations but know that the UN would never go for that. And it should be mentioned that ‘inspection’ is only one step away from ‘confiscation’. The Russians could take this to the UN as out and out piracy but I believe that they are already escorting those tankers through the Baltics as they know that the countries bordering this sea are reckless enough to try something stupid. And it would be tough if any troops that try to board that ship are met by a squad of Russian Marines fresh from the Ukrainian front. Those other countries may issue orders for those Russian ships to leave international waters and sail into their own waters but they are already ignoring such orders as it is.
This marine side of the war has an uncomfortably inevitable feel to it. This, and the potential destruction of Turkstream.
If one may add a couple of links–Hedges’ speech in Australia.
https://consortiumnews.com/2025/10/18/watch-chris-hedges-2025-edward-said-lecture/
And Patrick Lawrence on a similar theme.
https://scheerpost.com/2025/10/17/patrick-lawrence-against-chutzpah/
Both suggest the Israelis are not going to be deterred from their long term goal of making the propaganda claim “a land without people” into a “fact on the ground.”
Which is at least one difference from the American version of settler colonialism where indigenous culture and lore have been assimilated into our schoolbook history.
eg: Hal Brands might benefit from a little reflection upon what 300+ years of interaction with “the West” has taught China.
In the brief scope of a piece of opinion journalism done for an apex MSM outlet like Bloomberg?
In that context and at that length, it was quite intelligent and truthful. Intelligent enough that Brands likely has thought about that 300+ history, but decided there’s no point writing something that the copy desk and editors will certainly rewrite out.
Conor knows how that works.
The comment above was meant in response to eg’s further up. For the sake of comparison with the Brands piece, though, and to underline my point, get a load of this—
Putin Is Out of Options
https://archive.ph/wgwbw
‘…the Kremlin has no credible path to victory. Although Russia’s leadership seems utterly oblivious to this reality, the conclusion is inescapable….
‘European political support for Ukraine is robust…Moreover, a proposal to extend Ukraine a €140 billion loan backed by frozen Russian assets held in Belgium could shore up Ukraine’s economy and defense production … pulling it off is eminently achievable with sufficient political will….’
And so on. The author is Carl Bildt, former prime minister and foreign minister of Sweden, if you wanted more evidence for how the West — with leaders of such incompetence and stupidity, and ‘we create our own reality’ attitudes — has come to the pass it has.
My mother told me it was very unkind to mock the mentally impaired. Shame on you, Michaelmas! Shame on you!!.
So Trump’s continued liberal Democrats “state of exception”, as I think Lambert put it, but in this case it’s the Marxists and wokeness, that are destroying America and threatening democracy, instead of Trump. (And there’s no Marxism in evidence, but conservatives love to equate liberals with actual Leftism and beyond.)
At every step of the way, liberal Democrats made Trump inevitable, from Obama’s failed two terms, to Democrat persecution of Trump as a state of exception, to Biden’s failed Pandemic response, to endless condescension. Talk about blowback.
Please name a president who’s term or terms were not failed.
The Olympic World Championship in artistic gymnasts is this week in Jakarta, Indonesia. Israeli athletes denied visas to participate. From BBC.
https://www.bbc.com/sport/gymnastics/articles/c1m30mj59yko
Current scores from the competition.
https://www.olympics.com/en/news/gymnastics-2025-world-championships-full-schedule-all-results-scores-medals-complete-list
On the funny side of life, the Maccabis were banned by a club in the UK because of their notorious violence and racism. Starmer went on a rant how you can’t do that because it is antisemitic or whatever. News has just come out now that the Tel Aviv police have also banned a match that included Maccabi after ‘after rioting and “risks to human life”.’ So, does that make the Tel Aviv Police force antisemitic too?
https://www.theguardian.com/football/2025/oct/19/tel-aviv-football-derby-between-hapoel-and-maccabi-called-off-after-rioting
Was treated to ‘Stand Up To Jewish Hate’ tv commercials when watching some NFL yesterday, and not a word in regards to Zionist Jewish Hate for people in Gaza.
EndGame Macro:
“When defense procurement stalls or funds disappear, Beijing reads it not as simple mismanagement but as a national security risk. Xi’s recent ouster of generals linked to the Rocket Force and defense logistics suggests he’s cleaning the chain of command ahead of potential crises in Taiwan, the South China Sea, or confrontation with the West.”
So where is Xi wrong here? How much better off would the US be if Generals didn’t retire into procurement sinecure pork? And the inevitable, if China is doing it it must prove weakness closer:
“The irony is that the more the regime tightens, the more brittle it may become. Xi is trading technical competence for personal loyalty, the same trade off that weakened the late Soviet Union. Yet for now, the logic makes sense from his perspective because a fragmented or corrupted PLA is a far greater risk than an obedient but less dynamic one. In Beijing’s calculus, purity beats performance when the stakes are existential and Xi’s actions suggest he believes that moment is close.”
Or maybe not, the US has entered every major war with incompetent generals and the last one we won (WW2) is no exception: FDRs willingness to promote those who were effective matched Lincoln’s promotion of that drunkard Grant. It’s “leadership” here, “a sign of weakness” there. I hope the morons running things don’t bet the house on Chinese weakness like they got the EU to do on Russian weakness in Europe.
There is actually an argument to be made that the US didn’t even win WWII. Our bankers may have caused it, but Russia beat the Germans and Russia and China beat the Japanese before the Americans showed up. If anything, the more we learn, the more it looks like the US went to Europe to stop the Russians from liberating Europe.
“The American ‘superweapon’ that frightened Putin so much he may seek peace in Budapest”
So what is this superweapon? Ah, Tomahawks. OK. Thing is that there have been so many superweapons over the past few years that you can lose track – Javelins, HIMARS, M777 Howitzers, ATTACAMS, F-16s and the list goes on. The Tomahawks won’t make any difference either. A coupla years ago the US shot off about 100 of them at Syria and even their second grade equipment shot down the bulk majority of them before they reached their targets.
With talk like that Rev Kev, you’re going to give the MIC a complex.
p.s. I expect old fashioned tomahawks will make an appearance in WW4.
I wouldn’t be so cavalier about the Tomahawks not making a difference…. in that they are potentially nuke armed, so the defence has to treat them as nukes, which means nukes flying in the opposite direction. I heard London and Berlin *were* nice cities to visit….
Would Trump trade Chicago for Berlin?
Maybe?
No, he has property there.
The writer over states the potential of the tomahawk in the vicinity of Moscow..
What is also relevant: there are very few mobile launchers that have US missions.
Also, Japan has decided to go offensive with their missile destroyers, modifying their missile defense destroyers to carry tomahawks just like US’ Arleigh Burke/Aegis destroyers! Japan want 400 missiles, and will eventually modify all its missile destroyers to fire tomahawks.
I wonder if Japan’s “need” for tomahawks is coincidental to let Trump off hook to Zelensky and the neocons?
This while US Navy has Aegis destroyers providing defenses for Japan!
As Trump said there are needs for tomahawks.
re: Tomahawk´s destructive power and Western ADs destroyed
Just 2 hints to what Tomahawks actually mean and do not mean:
Mike Mihajlovic in comments to his recent Tomahawk piece:
“(…)Russians possess both the means to intercept these missiles and the capability to locate and destroy any potential launcher. In reality, the Tomahawk is about 80% marketing and only 20% actual value(…)”
And Andrei Martyanov:
Reminding how many conventionally armed Tomahawks you would need to do real harm to RU industrial facilities to actually achieve something militarily.
“(…)
how many TLAMs would be required to put just a single refinery of TANECO size out of business for, say, a year
(…)
even without AD, with TLAMs ALL of them being leakers it will require at least 100 (one hundred)
(…)”
Here is the wrinkle, ie leakers
“(…)
when operating within the environment such as Russian Air Defense, in order for them to provide 100 leakers, they will need something on the order of couple of thousands of TLAMs
(…)”
Which explains the number of how many missiles of this calibre RU used in the SMO so far:
“(…)
26,400 High Precision stand-off weapons Russia used so far on targets
(…)”
According to another RU source the US has around 3,800 Tomahawks truly available.
https://t.me/pozivnoy_kazman/14217
“(…)
Total inventory, excluding those decommissioned, disposed of, or issued during military operations or exercises, is approximately 3,800 cruise missiles.
(…)”
A military TG channel on destroyed AD by RU during SMO so far:
https://t.me/CyberspecNews/93338
“(…)
— 27 x S-300 batteries/divisions,
— 29 x Patriot systems,
— 9 x IRIS-T systems,
14 Buk, 2 Tor, 6 NASAMS, 1 Aspide 2000, 3 Hawk, 1 Supacat, 1 RIM-7, 1 S-125, 4 Gepard, 3 Tunguska air defense systems
(…)”
Value of PATRIOTS destroyed approaches $120 billion.
I think the proper course of action to respond to the Trump administration’s actions is to double down our efforts in posting in online comment sections. They’ll never know what is happening to them.
Yes!andtomakeitharderontheadministrationmakesuretoleavenospacesbetweenwords.
Good idea of course. However, I don’t remember the specifics, but there is software that web hosters (Gaggle, F’book, etc.) use that records everything you type, even if you hit delete before you send/post your comment. Everything on the ‘net is forever, especially if one has time or money to keep track of it. A great quote from Jaron Lanier: “He (or she) who has the biggest server, wins!”
I have half a mind to do just that.
I winder if it ever crossed Trump’s mind that picking up the phone and ending the genocide in Gaza might improve his chances of winning the “Peace Prize”…or that ending the futile war on Russia might do the same.
I don’t think Trump’s mind works that way, he doesn’t seem to make connections like that.
To be fair to Trump, his administration has helped negotiate agreements to end some minor conflicts. But sadly, the major ones in the eyes of the west has eluded any peaceful agreement.
The Todd article is fantastic!
The linkage between Protestantism (as the dominant mass religion, not so much the particulars of faith by individuals) and Catholicism vis a vis modern political movements is worth some extra thought. It certainly helps explain some curious oddities about Italian and German fascist movements in 1920s and 30s vis a vis cultural and ethnic minorities.
Mussolini’s “minority policy” in 1920s and early 1930s was surprisingly “tolerant,” in a peculiar way. The important thing was that Jews and Muslisms (Libyans) were welcomed into the Fascist (capitalized since I am referring to the party rather than the ideological movement) ranks as long as they embraced the “proper Italian” ways (i.e. fascism–whatever that really meant). This did not work so well with the Libyans–they were, after all, colonial subjects to whom “Italian” things were alien, but worked suprisingly well with the Italian Jews, who contributed a rather large number of Italian fascists. Much is made of how Italo Balbo brought his friend, the mayor of Ferrara, as his personal guest as a sign of protest to a state dinner honoring Hitler (I think it was in 1938?) but the mayor was also a long time fascist activist well known to the fascist leadership. Things were such that the Merchant of Venice could be set in 1944, with Shylock as a Jewish Fascist who still harbors delusion that Mussolini, as the leader of the Salo Republic, still has any sway in how things are done under German occupation.
In Todd’s argument,, Italian fascist movement was an heir to the Cathoic mindset, assimilative and integrationist even while it was repressive, while the German, emerging from the Protestant, was exclusivist and exclusionist (It does beg the question about individual Nazi leaders, I suppose–likes of Hitler and Goering did come from Catholic regions of “Germany” writ large. It would, then, make sense that the Italian fascists should seek to make fascists out of the minorities while the Nazis woiuld remove them from the society that they controlled. Of course, this is also something we see when we contrast the Spanish Empire in the New World vs its English counterpart as well.
Time is scarce but since you recommend, I’ll try to read.
Thanks.
I found specially interesting the part titled “Psychiatry of the upper middle classes” where Todd explains the most important difference between current “far-right populism” and fascist movements in the 30s. The latter were rooted in middle classes and were supported mainly by the upper middle classes in the fear for socialism and communism, while the current populists are rooted mostly on the working class and part of the lower middle class. He calls it “popular conservatism”. He states that the upper middle classes, which got mad during the 30s, have now run crazy. The globalists are irredeemably Russo-phobic, militaristic and paranoid (restricting liberties) very much like the Nazis in their days. Macronism he calls it. Months ago i remember calling these “extreme centrists” but Todd frames them as the real far-right.
Sorry for another reply but I cannot help myself. Today I was reading (after Todd’s) an article by El Pais running commentaries by PMC globalists Mateo Renzi and Josep Borrell that the very same outlet has organized in Barcelona to join there all kind of crazed European globalists. To the question of What is the most relevant challenge Europe is facing?, no doubts: becoming irrelevant. These people can only talk about “global challenges” and forget absolutely about, let’s say, the European polulaces. Internal politics are only mentioned only “to face the far-right populism”. And here you note they enter crazy territory: “the problem is not the far-right itself but “the bureaucratization of Europe” says Renzi. So, the malcontent of large swathes of the population with the “centrists” is because bureaucratization? Gimme a break, please, Mr. Renzi. In which planet do you reside? And the solution? Competitiveness of course. Ahh the globalists…
His European contextualizing is really strong, I thought it was a great article too.
For the US and Trumpism, while I agree about Trumpism being the driving force behind Netanyahuism, there’s a deeper American substrate that leads through Calhounism, in my view the foundation stone of proto-fascism, to the “Lost Cause” myth by which Reconstruction was overthrown and Type 2 Calhounism was established with Jim Crow.
In this view the Oligarchs are re-fighting the American Civil war from the Jefferson Davis perspective along Mackinder’s arc from the Levant to the Baltic to preserve the Globalist vision of a purely monetary empire under their control, and lapsing into the “Lost Cause” default narrative as their efforts fail. This points to the next phase, assuming they don’t go nuclear on the way down, which is a Ukrainian KKK type resistance in the EU and recrudescence of the original in the US.
I’m curious what you mean by “Calhounism”?
Calhoun was a curious, schizophrenic (at least in terms of his political orientation), and paradoxical political thinker. While the general “Lost Cause” mythology can be traced back to him, he also drew strongly on both founding American republicanism AND oligarchic repressive Sullaism. I suppose there is somewhat of a version of “Calhounism” as a caricature of Southern justification of oligarchy steeped in racism shielded from the federal power (which has a large measure of truth), but I get the sense that you mean something much broader than this.
First, I’m no expert, I got sucked into reading Congressional Record after reading Spaulding’s “History of the Legal Tender Paper Money” about the Greenback in the Civil War.
Calhoun was the Ur-States Rights guy, when the Southern States were, essentially, a propertied oligarchy amongst whom’s most valuable and highly traded, leveraged, and arbitraged property was other people. Mere threats to which property was viewed as a “Constitutional” casus belli, precipitating secession.
He was classically educated and, and a great orator. The contradictions you observe are defined posthumously, they were common in his time and before: Hamilton was both progressive and a ruthless authoritarian: slaver Jefferson waxed about all men being created equal; etc. The propertarian ethos of a Constitutional Government of the propertied class, which property included other people, is from todays perspective either an absurdity, or an aspiration, depending, in Todd’s terms, on how frail one’s superego has become!
And Todd’s marshaling the superego to this moment, strikes me as brilliant: we have President id. In fact, the id is bipartisan.
WRT Calhoun, I’d strongly recommend reading this:
https://www.amazon.com/Majority-Rule-versus-Consensus-Political/dp/0700616357?th=1&psc=1
James Read is little known outside a very limited political theorists’ circle, but he’s a fantastic scholar.
He also has a great book on the Founders’ political philosophy:
https://www.amazon.com/Power-versus-Liberty-Hamilton-Jefferson-ebook/dp/B00AMQFA0W?th=1&psc=1
Thank you!
Calhoun was a sore loser who was butthurt he couldn’t win the Presidency so he pushed for Civil War for like 20 years before it happened.
That’s why I’m glad Trump won. If he had lost, then he would have gotten his followers to do some crazy stuff.
That was a good one. A minor quibble, and paraphrasing the Big Lebowski on nihilism – say what you will about the tenets of national socialism, but at least it’s an ethos. I’m not sure that “Trumpism” is that. In fact, Todd nails it a little later – “Perversity reigns. Trumpism reigns.” If there is any coherent strategy for Trump and his appointees beyond “owning the libs”, I’m not seeing it. Now for the neocons and technocrats lurking in the shadows of the Trump administration, that’s a different story, but the article didn’t really get into that aspect.
Todd also notes –
“This is the real mystery of the National Rally: xenophobic, it was born in Catholic territory.”
Depending on how you look at history, this isn’t so odd. Eric Hobsbawn discussed the religiosity of the revolutionary period and notes that those opposed to the revolutionary ideals of the French sought refuge in Catholicism at the time. They were the conservatives who wanted the monarchy reestablished.
One could say much the same thing about the Italian Fascists: they wanted to make Italy great again, literally (with Rome as old Italy) but had little or no ideology beyond that other than pwning their enemies and doing what they did, when they cared, to appeal to diverse populations in different ways (the latter, in many ways, more important than their non-ideology for the “success” of their rule–they have to be given credit for ruling Italy for some 20 years, from March on Rome to Italian entry into WW2, without messing up too badly.)
Ow, they’re the BRICS house
Awful mighty-mighty, just lettin’ it all hang out
They’re the BRICS house
That larders stacked and that’s a fact
Ain’t holding nothing back
Ow, they’re the BRICS house
Recently put-together, everybody knows
This is how the story goes
They know they got everything
That a new hegemon needs to take over from the man, yeah, yeah
How can they lose with the stuff they produce
Twenty-four/Seven manufacturing base oh what a winning hand
Ow, they’re the BRICS house
Awful mighty-mighty, just lettin’ it all hang out
They’re the BRICS house
That larders stacked and that’s a fact
Ain’t holding nothing back
Ow, they’re the BRICS house
Yeah, they’re the one, the only one, that includes the Amazon
The clothes she weaves, her innovative ways
Make an old Uncle Sam wish for younger days, yeah, yeah
She knows she’s built out and knows how to please
Sure enough to knock a formerly strong economy to its knees
Ow, they’re the BRICS house
Awful mighty-mighty, just lettin’ it all hang out
They’re the BRICS house
That larders stacked and that’s a fact
Ain’t holding nothing back
Shake it down, shake it down now
Shake it down, shake it down now
Shake it down, shake it down now
Shake it down, shake it down now
Shake it down, shake it down now
Shake it down, shake it down now
Shake it down, shake it down now
Shake it down, shake it down now
Brick House, by The Commodores
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RYWOk-E4REE&list=RDRYWOk-E4REE
MAGA on the March
Lower-Income Americans Are Missing Car Payments (NY Times, paywalled)
Oops
But soon the stock market will be back to ATH, so it’s all good!
Consumers overall = wealthy spenders
US economy holding up = AI capex spend
A glorious house of cards!
Leavitt to Believer
In this week’s episode, when asked who picked Hungary for the Trump-Putin talks, Karoline practically screamed June Cleaver-leaving no doubt who was in charge, golden cross dangling from her pretty little neck.
Food for thought dept:
Maybe the thing I feared most in the first Cold War was the idea that we’d all be eating Russian food if we nabbed the silver medal in the intermural games, and you may have noticed that Russian restaurants are few and far between in these not so united states, whereas Chinese restaurants are everywhere.
I’m a-ok with China taking over in Cold War part deux, Kung Pao me!
I’d guestimate that most every mens 14k wedding band has $400 to $600 worth of metal @ current rates-and similar to catalytic converters, might be a tempting target for those with a Sawzall.
There are so many excellent arguments/points in the Emmanuel Todd essay. Overall, a quite outside the box analysis that doesn’t fit comfortably with any of the dominant political, economic or cultural narratives predominant in the West.
His critique of what he calls the psychopathology of Western middle and upper middle classes is quite concise and controversial:
” I am convinced that the disappearance of collective beliefs–religious beliefs and ideological beliefs…has led to the collapse of the human super-ego…I do not define the super-ego as solely or even primarily repressive…the superego is the ideal of the ego anchoring positive moral and social values in the individual…The notions of honor, justice, courage, honesty… have their origins in the strength of the superego–if it weakens, they weaken, if it disappears they disappear… In the end, therefore, humanity has not been liberated by the end of religions and ideologies but rather diminished…It is the highly educated man and woman morally and intellectually stunted by the absence of religion who are the conveyers of Russophobic pathology.”
He believes the leadership classes of the West are today exhibiting both collective madness and collective hallucinations that increase the likelihood of nuclear war.
Considering the unfortunate attitudes toward women historically and currently promulgated by the Abrahamic faith communities, I always cringe when someone argues that human moral standards are diminished by lack of religion. Women always have and always will sacrifice ourselves for our children with or without some religious authority that obliges us to do so. Maybe some men need a coercive male divinity to oblige them to behave like civilized members of a community, but I question if this is the case for women globally or men outside of the Abrahamic world.
“Rubio promised to betray U.S. informants to get Trump’s El Salvador prison deal”
What a great idea! Every informant, snitch, or defecting spy will find this heartwarming.
An FBI or CIA officer will be able to promise, “Don’t worry the US protection plan is outstanding. You will be perfectly safe, at least until the Secretary of State decides to sell you out.
As the Russians apparently say “недоговороспособный (not agreement capable).
The Biggest Threat to Mamdani’s Agenda Isn’t Hochul or Trump — It’s Wall Street
The Sheerpost blog has a history of New York City’s financial troubles in the ’70s. Wall Street’s refusal to market or buy its municipal bonds sunk many of the admirable programs it offered, including free college tuition at NYU. It’s another case of the perverse “golden rule.” (Whoever has the gold makes the rules.)
The city also appealed to the federal government to give them bridge loans until they could finance their debt, The Ford administration refused (headline: “Ford to City: Drop Dead”).
…Yet another reminder that public financing and public banking is an absolute necessity, otherwise, even noble efforts like Mamdani’s agenda will be impossible to implement. This impossibility would make progressive candidates into liars unless they construct a workaround like public banking.
And with culture hijacked by related fintech mavens, this time, we probably won’t even get the creative underground music scenes with a projected collapse in NY.
It’s amazing that for a military that gets something like $1 trillion a year, we see this happening:
Artillery misfire over I-5 during Marine celebration hits VP Vance security detail
https://timesofsandiego.com/military/2025/10/19/live-fire-blast-over-i-5-during-marine-corps-celebration-damages-chp-vehicle/
I’m pretty sure giving even MORE money is not the proper solution at this point unless even more complete failure in the MIC is the point. (What is Russia spending on it’s military as it beats US/NATO? Something like maybe $100 million a year? Insane.)
I seem to recall that at the end of a press conference Putin was questioned about this discrepancy in military spending, where Russia somehow fields a more effective fighting force for a fraction of what the US pays for junk that breaks down. He quipped that Russia doesn’t have the corruption overhead that planners in the US are obliged to pay.
At a company I know, the annual “wellness benefit” is going away, wherein the company kicked back some money that it saved from the insurer to buy down the employee cost of health insurance. Supposedly canceled due to “low participation”, which seems suspect, since it was basically free money, provided an employee spent 10 minutes going through the health insurer’s wellness questionnaire once a year. More over, rates are going up again this year.
America is going great!
Chess grandmaster and popular chess YouTuber Daniel Naroditsky has unexpectedly died at age 29. Lots of tributes on chess forums but not much detail available at the moment. RIP.
My first thought: Danya was a long-time victim of sustained (and ludicrous) accusations of cheating from deranged ex-World Champion Kramnik. Danya spoke a lot about how much this affected him. I watched his streams from time to time and always found him sweet and sensitive.
re: intercity bus robbed in Germany Bavaria
I used to ignore such news but after now Ukraine War and the other spots of Western heroism with consequences there and here I expect such fallout to actually become a real thing:
An intercity bus was stopped on the Autobahn in the middle of the night and the passengers were robbed by armed folks.
The stupid thing about this – when you travel on that line at that time of day you really don’t have the money. Which is why most likely this news will be ignored.
Even though it tells you more about the true problems awaiting us than some individuals using knives in public (which has always existed.)
In Germany public transport has not been subject to this sort of thing.
If at all, my late grandmother told such stories in poor and abandoned Eastern Hungary some 15 years ago where public trains were hijacked which led to a serious decline in passenger numbers which again led to less investment into rail systems there…an area where some villages having serious Communist traditions oppose Orbán. Without any leverage. Dumb.
Still better than stabbings.
NEW LEFT REVIEW
quick piece
Contra Arendt
On civil society.
by Dylan Riley
https://newleftreview.org/sidecar/posts/contra-arendt
last paragraph:
“(…)
herein lies an irony of which the Trumpists seem blissfully unaware. For, far from exercising great cultural influence as the right claims, leftist and progressive intellectuals in the US have for decades been cordoned off as a privileged but largely irrelevant clerisy within the university-NGO complex. Here they have formed what Gramsci would have called a traditional intelligentsia, speaking to itself in its own arcane language and leaving the left at a severe disadvantage. It is not outside the realm of possibility that the Trump administration’s attempted destruction of this cordon sanitaire might create the conditions for left intellectuals to establish a more intimate link to the political and social forces of the day from which they are presently cut off. If so, Trump would have had a hand in the creation of a new modern prince adapted to the age of social media, virality and artificial intelligence, in addition to the ubiquitous culture industry. MAGA would be midwife of the very thing it most fears.
(…)”
Possible, but seems improbable. The problem is not just failure to communicate or even differences in ideology or values, but a fundamental unawareness of the problems.
I think, as the existing elites fail to understand the problems afflicting the main street, so to speak, an opportunity will open up for a good and effective communicator to reach the masses. The left seems to forget that they already had this chance, though, in Obama, and squandered it. GOP and Trump are clearly wasting MAGA, precisely because they can’t or won’t deliver the goods. But that’s not new and I don’t see the left being given a second chance just because.
The awakening of a liberal– too good to miss!
How I Became a Populist
My time at the Federal Trade Commission—before Donald Trump fired me—totally changed the way I see our political divide…
I came into office an unabashed advocate for immigrants. I left office the same way. But while that hasn’t changed, after three years as a commissioner, the way I look at the world has. I used to think that the defining fight for our country was between the left and the right. Now, I am much more worried about the money at the top crushing everyone underneath.
Good god, man– where have you been? Glad to see you all the same.
Facts bro
It seems like we all have to go through this political evolution of being a libtard or conservacon.
May all who attended No Kings be awakened!
Where most of the educated middle and upper middle class has been, in a bubble. Sure there were probably times when the rapacious corporate culture of America inconvenienced them, but it was only an instance, an anomaly. This coupled with long and carefully nurtured belief in capitalism blinded so many to the fact that the system is rigged and not just against the lazy. That a small portion of the world’s population sees the rest of us as serfs whose every cent, advantage, even our children is really theirs to do with what they will, including break and destroy.
The sad thing is that Trump will be blamed as more and more fall deeper into the wood chipper. Some won’t be distracted enough to miss the real villains, but most will. They will remain as blind to the cause as those who blame the massive immigration rather than those driving it.
TASS on Oct. 20th, afternoon:
The Russian Foreign Minister and the US Secretary of State discussed possible concrete steps “in the interests of implementing the understandings that were reached during the telephone talks between Russian President Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin and US President Donald Trump on October 16.”
https://tass.ru/politika/25399317
At least 135 mutilated bodies of Palestinians had been held at notorious Israeli jail, say Gaza officials
Returned bodies from Sde Teiman. Long piece with graphic stuff which I won’t excerpt, except for:
the bodies carried “no names but just codes” is some dark dark irony.
It’s not dark dark irony but dehumanization, which is part of all supremacist ideologies. Those things never change.
America finally broke
What’s happening to end the government shutdown? Nothing
That’s a sick country. People can’t afford to eat. Capitalism!