Lemurs Are Having a Mysterious ‘Baby Boom’ in Madagascar. Here’s Why That Might Not Be a Good Thing Smithsonian Magazine
Man takes Hamilton city bus on a joy ride — making stops to let passengers on and off, say police CBC
Woman accused of leading authorities on 173-mile SoCal pursuit before escaping into Mexico is arrested Los Angeles Times
Waymo robotaxis are now giving rides on freeways in LA, San Francisco, and Phoenix TechCrunch
Climate/Environment
Analysis: Fossil-fuel CO2 emissions to set new record in 2025, as land sink ‘recovers’ Carbon Brief
‘Little to No Measurable Progress’ on Climate as World on Track for 2.6°C: Report Common Dreams
Assume the worst LRB
A New Unifying Issue: Just About Everyone Hates Data Centers Inside Climate News
Ecosocialism and degrowth in the Anthropocene Climate & Capitalism
Pandemics
Enduring Outcomes of COVID-19 Work Absences on the US Labor Market JAMA Network Open
Brain fog and other long COVID problems in the workplace Law360 Canada
Water
No deal on the Colorado River despite Trump administration deadline Cal Matters
Water on the Brain The Baffler
Africa
African health body says continent ‘facing worst outbreak of cholera’ in 25 years Anadolu Agency
Blood and business: The Israel-UAE nexus fuelling Sudan’s war The New Arab
Japan
Takaichi: the Honeymooner Julian Macfarlane
India
China made quiet border advances as ties warmed, Indian critics warn WaPo
China?
Exclusive: Nexperia customers in talks over workaround to skirt Europe-China chip feud, sources say Reuters
‘I’d do it all again,’ says Dutch minister at heart of car chip standoff with China The Guardian
Taiwanese lawmaker ‘wanted’ by China speaks at Berlin parliamentary hearing Focus Taiwan
China Widens Tech & Education Gap with Outlaw US Empire Karl Sanchez
The Myth of China’s “AI Talent Pipeline” ChinaTalk
Syraqistan
Scoop: Israel seeks 20-year military aid deal with U.S. with “America First” tweaks Axios
More than a dozen Israeli soldiers spoke to ITV for their new documentary Breaking Ranks: Inside Israel’s War, about how their army’s two-year campaign in Gaza involved shooting unarmed Palestinians en masse, using teenagers as human shields, and flattening entire neighborhoods… pic.twitter.com/QiljtBxl3D
— Drop Site (@DropSiteNews) November 12, 2025
The Cost of Aid: When Humanitarian Data Collection Becomes a Method of Warfare OpinioJuris
U.S. and Saudi Arabia working to finalize defense pact before MBS meets Trump Axios
European Disunion
Old Blighty
Labour government proposes three year real terms pay cut for teachers in England WSWS
Crisis Report: 300,000 face extreme homelessness as budgets falter The Canary
New Not-So-Cold War
UK and Canada may provide their own “reparations loans” to Ukraine – EU commissioner Ukrainska Pravda
Germany Ends Special Refugee Status for Ukrainians Greek City Times
Russia’s refineries are leveraging spare capacity to blunt Ukrainian drone damage Meduza
Bulgarian president vetoes law on seizure of Lukoil assets Intellinews
Censored Lavrov interview with Italian media (FULL TEXT) RT
The Cold War never ended Thomas Fazi
South of the Border
In Chile’s Presidential Race, Communist Party Candidate Faces the Son of a Nazi Truthout
The top US military contractors cashing in on Caribbean operations Responsible Statecraft
Top officials present Trump with military options for Venezuela in the coming days CBS News
Justice Department Office Which Justified Torture Now Argues For Killing Moon of Alabama
Colombia to maintain US intelligence-sharing to fight drug trafficking Al Jazeera
Ecuador May Host Two U.S. Bases Pending Referendum on Foreign Military Presence Telesur
U.S. Congress Intensifies Pressure on Mexico Over Energy Policy Telesur
The Great Game
Kazakhstan, Russia Sign Landmark Comprehensive Alliance Declaration Astana Times
L’affaire Epstein
‘Epstein Hoax’ Got Legs? Mark Wauck
Sometimes The Media Ignoring A Major Story Becomes The Story—And Other Notes Caitlin Johnstone
Trump 2.0
Trump Escalates War on Leftists With Antifa Foreign Terror Label Ken Klippenstein
Trump Administration Expected to Drastically Cut Housing Grants New York Times. “…could quickly place as many as 170,000 formerly homeless people at risk of returning to the streets.”
How Multilevel Marketing Explains Trump’s Corruption The Economic Populist
Eric Trump: “You can send $500 million worth of bitcoin on a Sunday night at 11pm while having a glass of wine with your wife for virtually zero fees.” pic.twitter.com/KU4PvccN98
— Aaron Rupar (@atrupar) November 13, 2025
The Uniparty
Where Is the Opposition to an Attack on Venezuela? Daniel Larison
Police State Watch
Google Has Chosen a Side in Trump’s Mass Deportation Effort 404 Media
Feds deployed tear gas on the Far Southeast Side even after cops told them they had no gas masks, sources say Chicago Sun-Times
Mamdani
Mamdani’s First Budget Phenomenal World
Lina Khan’s populist plan for New York: Cheaper hot dogs (and other things) Semafor
Upper East Side Moms Are Melting Down Over Mamdani New York Magazine. “A 35,000-person Facebook group devolved into panic and infighting after the mayoral election.”
If Capital Strikes Against Mamdani, Organized Worker Power Can Strike Back Truthout
Our Famously Free Press
BBC news has a long record of disinformation. But this time it chose the wrong target Jonathan Cook
Groups demand Israeli influencers register as foreign agents Responsible Statecraft
Healthcare?
The ‘Worst Test in Medicine’ is Driving America’s High C-Section Rate New York Times
Did the “Solution” Solve the Problem, Or Did It Just Make Somebody Rich? Charles Hugh Smith
AI
Happy holidays: AI-enabled toys teach kids how to play with fire, sharp objects The Register
How Much AI Will Audiences Accept in Music and Movies? Quantifying Where Consumers Draw the Line on AI Art Stat Significant
Vast collection of historic American music released via UCSB Library partnership with Dust-to-Digital Foundation UC Santa Barbara The Current
Imperial Collapse Watch
The F-35 Stealth Fighter Haunts The U.S. Air Force National Security Journal
DOGE veteran could bring much-needed change to Navy research, observers say Defense One
A MAGA Senator Promised Hope for a Dying Ohio Mill. Then Reality Set In. New York Times
For some, ‘the new American dream is to leave’ Straits Times
MAHA
America’s legacy of eugenics is alive and well in Trump’s White House Prism
From COVID Cheerleaders to Grocery Gestapo Pandemic Accountability Index
Class Warfare
The Eviction Kings The Nation
Can School Parking Lots Become Havens for Homeless Families? Governing
Antidote du jour (via):
See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.
“UK and Canada may provide their own “reparations loans” to Ukraine – EU commissioner’
If I were the UK or Canada, I would be praying for a quick Russian win before these reparations loans actually kick off. Once those loans are paid, then they are on the UK and Canada’s books and there is zero chance that the Russians will end up paying those loans back for them in the form of reparations. Those loans will have to be paid back including any interest. There seems to be this manic desire in most EU nations to keep this war going on for several years more. Trouble is, they can print up money but they can’t print up Ukrainian soldiers which are coming up short.
Norway and now UK and Canada?! And in the context of a thievery scandal so big it may finally shed light on how money sent to Kiev is being distributed. I don’t get it. Ukraine won’t pay back the loans so the guarantors will. Euroclear knows this, I assume, and stood firm. Norway, UK and Canada must know this too so what on earth are they talking about? Is it just a virtue signal knowing it won’t happen or is it sincere?
Exactly. I don’t know what the motivation is for this in the UK, but here in Canada this is explicitly connected to diaspora politics.
I’m sure this is true. Put simply, the longer Putin is spending resources and manpower fighting Ukraine, the safer the rest of Europe is from invasion.
You won’t ever hear any European politician saying this publicly, but I’m reasonably sure they have all quietly come to the same conclusion.
In effect, the Ukraine war is giving EU governments breathing room to rearm themselves to counter the inevitable future Russian threat.
The whole thing is making Russian “threat” to Europe inevitable. The bulk of the Russian army, with their best equipment, are not intended for Ukraine now. They are being deployed against Central Europe (Leningrad and Western Military Districts.) Europe just talks about rearming. Russia is rearming, under the premise that Europe is.
What, other than the belligerence toward Russia demonstrated by the European nations, makes you think that Russia is a threat to them? Is it possible that Russia had limited objectives when it invaded Ukraine and could have made peace shortly after the war began if it had not been for Boris Johnson?
Where can I find a crystal ball like yours?
Finland, Estonia, or perhaps Berlin chancellory? Or the 10 Downing St? Russia was not a threat to Europe a couple of years ago. I think Europe has ensured that Russia is a threat to them now. One might say that Russia was not a threat to France in 1811. It definitely was by middle of 1812, and the crystal ball then was in Napoleon’s pocket.
“inevitable future Russian threat”
I think you’re in the wrong blog. Any conclusions the current incompetent heads of European governments have reached regarding the Ukraine civil war are as delusional as thinking that Russia is a threat to any country that doesn’t actually menace its existence as a federation. That’s the only Russian threat they should be thinking about. It would require some reflection on what future they really want for their countries and not how they look among their peers.
Uh?
Many European politicians are saying this all the time. “Ukraine is our first line of defence” and all that crap. Are you paying any attention Ian?
Well yes, the governments are rearming themselves with arguments to later play the blaming game. If you are talking about weapons to defend European states (not goverments) that is not really happening to a significant degree. Except, may be, for infighting amongst European countries but not against the big bear.
If the EU politicians honestly thought Russia is planning to invade EU (for what?), they would have stopped sending their weapons and ammunition to Ukraine a long time ago. Russia is currently fighting with both hands behind it’s back, and yet Ukraine consumes more weapons and ammunition than NATO and the other usual suspects can produce together.
That, as a plan to prepare, is the worst. The way to buy time, if the really is a fear of an attack, is to dig up the proposals Russia sent in December 2021 and start “discussions” about the “European security arrangements”. And at the same time stop all help to Ukraine and start accumulating resources.
Nope. this is just a bunch of below average leaders unable to find the reverse gear. They have money left, they have no weapons left, and nobody want to fight their war in Ukraine. So all they have left is trying to scare EU citizens to cough up the money and not ask questions about this “newly discovered” corruption in Ukraine.
I am just confirming that you totally believe that Russia wants to invade all of Europe?
If only. It can be argued the last time it happened the whole world got a lot better for most of the people.
We can only hope.
There is a huge amount of money to be made from hand wringing about Russia coming for Paris!
Profit from the illusion of Slavic hordes and the illusion that German rearmament might be actually a defense…..
EU deluded in multiple planes.
The interesting questions are who will become President of the Russian Federation when President Putin fades into honourable retirement, and what stance and what action will his successor take to settle the European problem once and for all, assuming, of course, that Presiden Putin maintains his patience with Europe and merely gives Brussels and three or four of it’s leading seventh rate military powers a punishment beating or two for their involvement in Ukraine’s epic disaster?
And something really should be done about the grotesque silly-billies in the Baltic states if only to stop their agressive posturing and squealing and to ensure that Russian speakers in those countries enjoy full civil rights and a guaranteed minimum quota of Russian speakers in government ministries and their legislative bodies and cabinets.
Then it may be possible to return the gift of democracy and its fruits to the people from their present witless and undeserving political élites, most of whom deserve a quick trial and a long vacation enjoying the hospitality of publicly owned hotel facilities in, say, the Murmansk region, or somewhere similar, where they can spent long leisurely days redeeming themselves by digging for rare earths or working on the recovery of Russia’s black gold, and after thirty or forty years they can return to their enhanced democracies fully rehabilitated and in excellent shape, based on their low calory diet and hard physical work, and try their hand at local politics once more.
For those who believe Russophobic scare talk, it might help to read Richard Sakwa’s recent book, The Lost Peace.
I believe it to be a well documented and fair treatment of the West’s primary responsibility for Europe’s present nightmare.
To summarize, the present Russian ideology greatly frowns on the idea of “marching into Paris”, even if they had the capability to do so.
It’s not about the present Russian ideology. Russian have always frowned upon the idea of “marching into Paris”. Even when they were forced to do it, they did not stay there for long. After having a quick coffee at a bistro, the just left.
In Berlin they had to stay longer, in order to prevent the thing that happened right after they left.
re: alleged plagiarism case against German scholar Ulrike Guérot
important
Guérot´s publisher will go to court against the obviously politically charged verdict against her by the German higher court in the summer.
See yesterday´s press release:
– use yandex-translate which is bad though (Google didn´t work for whatever reason, I am not gonna speculate here why 🤔…) –
13.11.2025 – press RELEASE: Westend Verlag, in case Guérot for the freedom of Science
https://westendverlag.de/comment/detail/019a7cc29f2c73589108fcadf8903909
“In response, the “Causa Guérot has been included” as a case example, in a report of the Council of Europe. The Committee on Political Affairs and Democracy in Strasbourg, is currently preparing a study on the topic of `Strengthening freedom of expression: an imperative for the consolidation and development of democratic societies´ (AS/Pol (2025) 15, 19. May 2025), which will be published in December, 2025.”
Many of today’s links give a general sense of unreality which has me re-reading some fictional books as a sort of counterweight. I picked up Dickens “A Tale of Two Cities” and was dumbfounded as to the echoes of his character descriptions to characters in today”s current events. A good example, replace Monseigneur with Donnie. “Military officers destitute of military knowledge; naval officers with no idea of a ship; civil officers without a notion of affairs; brazen ecclesiastics, of the worst worldly, with sensual eyes, loose tongues, and looser lives; all totally unfit for their several callings, all lying horribly in pretending to belong to them, but all nearly or remotely of the order of Monseigneur, and therefore foisted on all public employments from which anything was to be got; these were to be told off by the score and the score. People not immediately connected with Monseigneur or the State, yet equally unconnected with anything that was real, were added to the heap as to the man whose riches, as mere riches, nothing counted. The leprosy of unreality disfigured every human creature in attendance upon Monseigneur.” Aye, the leprosy of unreality from plastic surgery to spray tans. Sigh.
>>>Upper East Side [UES] Moms Are Melting Down Over Mamdani
IMO, this is more about the precariat state of the poseur professional class (yes, cue all the violins).
For half the salary, one can live a better lifestyle (in 95% of the country) than the stereotypical “posh” UES/UWS lifestyle, just without the Manhattan/center of the universe virtue signal. (NYC real estate has gotten insanely worse since my life there)
For them, yes….a 5 percentage point rise in NYC or NYS taxes would punch a hole in their budget. Having to choose between the nanny or trips to France—the horror!
‘Lovey, could you be a dear and pour me another glass of plonk and some cheddar on Ritz crackers, while I send half a billion to somebody on the internet?
By the way anyone who says money can’t buy happiness doesn’t know where to shop.’
This should be under Guillotine Watch.
Those guys really live in a different world.
In my social milieu, it is unheard of to have to fork off a fee to drink a wine of glass with one’s wife.
Not a corkage fee, nudge nudge wink wink, say no more.
This just in: Harrell concedes to Wilson in Seattle
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/11/14/katie-wilson-seattle-mayor-bruce-harrell/87258593007/
Where is she in relation to Sawant as far as positioning on the socialist spectrum?
Wilson is more about curbing the excesses of capitalism rather than curbing capitalism altogether. So that puts her in the democratic socialist camp, as opposed to the socialist one where Sawant stands.
I’m sure they see things that way, but if that 5% was used to provide better services, make the city more affordable, etc than they would be better off.
About that new AI generated song topping the country music charts, let me know when Breaking Rust” goes on tour.
I was listening to Eddie Trunk’s show (he is a talk radio guy who covers 80’s metal acts, along with some other nostalgic groups we all probably grew up with.) Apparently, the trend for some still-touring acts, many of whom are in their 70’s, is to not only lip-sync but basically have a CD play all the music while they just pantomime along.
To me, there is something unseemly for musicians approaching 80 to tour primarily on the songs of their youth. Many of those songs were great. Are still great. They were the product of youth and passion, and quite literally come from a different age. But now some musicians have been performing these same songs for 30, 40 or 50 years. And some apparently need some “assistance” in these performances. Milli Vanilli tried to make a career of this assisted live performance almost from their beginning, and when caught doing this due to a live technical glitch were widely ridiculed. I think there should be a new term for this kind of assisted live performance in the far tail end of a music career*, long after they should have retired. I am suggesting “Mail-in Van Halen” for that term.
*This is not a criticism of old musicians that have continued to grow and produce new material, but instead the ones who have not put out an album in decades, but continue to tour solely off their greatest hits. I’m looking at you, Journey.
I watched a masterful Earl Wild play the piano at the Hollywood Bowl when he was pushing 90, but I also endured one of the worst concerts of my life in seeing off an idol of mine.
This was about a dozen years ago and Gordon Lightfoot was playing at the Hanford Fox Theater in Godzone, one of those over the top 1920’s movie theaters that seats about 500 and has a balcony with a bar attached, oh happy day!
I’ve seen Bob Dylan, Robert Earl Keen, David Grisman and a bunch of other concerts there.
I guess i’d seen him play half a dozen times, with one incredibly memorable concert at the Greek Theater in LA circa 1982, and sad to say but his voice was utterly shot, gone.
Micky Mantle didn’t try to play for the Yankees in his late 70’s, you know.
Funner times:
Gordon @ his peak in an hour long BBC concert from 1972:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PEVQiUMbvHU&list=RDPEVQiUMbvHU
Yeah, I saw Gord in 2017 — the show was great, but his voice was a reedy shadow of its former self.
IMO, the other thing that is unseemly is the number of bands still touring with only one, or even zero original members.
These band names have become brands. People will pay money for a name, even if the only tie to the original band is a second drummer who came on board after the first one quit.
The big buzz Eddie Trunk was talking about this week on his show was the band Rush, who are going out on tour next year (they’re in their early 70’s, making them relatively youngsters) with a new drummer, despite having vowed not to do so after Neil Peart passed away back in 2020. The general sentiment seems to be that they should have called it “Lee-Lifeson” or something other than “Rush” but the promoters can’t resist all that money, and with fewer and fewer bands touring (Kiss, Whitesnake retired) the ticket prices have soared.
My brother-in-law played base for the Beach Boys for about a dozen years, with Mike Love being the only original band member, essentially a ‘ghost band’.
He loved the anonymity, and related that they would play a concert at a casino, and an hour later he’d play blackjack and nobody would know who he was.
Last time we saw the Beach Boys was at the Visalia Fox, and I searched mostly in vain for somebody under 30 in the audience.
That’s a particularly ludicrous case because the Beach Boys were at best only a garage band with one genius, Brian Wilson, attached.
Pet Sounds album, one for the R&R Hall of Fame. Many musical insights in the linked article.
Sonically amazing, innovative of course, and I really like the Beach Boys. My dad took us (I was 10 at the time) to see them in 1977 when Brian was touring again with them. Made a huge impression on me. BUT, I tend to side with some of the outlier opinions on Pet Sounds- there are some great songs, but there are some songs that are not very good, and then there are some outright duds. For me, while listening to Pet Sounds, there a quite a few skips. Sacrilege right?
I’m a heretic, but I agree regarding Pet Sounds. Some of the songs almost feel like an afterthought to the creation of them.
…how many geniuses is the standard component for a band?
Too many geniuses and you end up like the Yardbirds where the members just fly off in different directions.
“My brother-in-law played base…”
first, second or third?? did they have a bass player too?
My brother-in-law played a military base, and bombed the bass.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W6CJmJ5p3Ow
I’m definitely biased as a former drummer, but I don’t like the idea of the new Rush tour. You can’t just replace a guy like Neil Peart who was one of the best ever. I’ve seen some videos of the woman they have taking his place and she’s good, but not Neil Peart good.
On the other hand, always loved Steely Dan, who had a studio musician cottage industry going on the side.
You’d certainly notice Michael McDonald’s voice, but everybody else is largely anonymously good.
A fun young drummer on You Tube is Sina Doering. Many videos showing techniques, so a good way to show non-drummers a lot.
I’m not going to criticize somebody continuing to make a living doing something they are good at. Often if these groups come up with new music the old fans or critics don’t like it, so they get criticism either way.
But they have families, entourages, long-term employees they want to support, and people that want to hear them despite diminished vitality. I say let a thousand flowers bloom, everyone can smell the ones they prefer.
Daily Mail reports that David Coverdale of Whitesnake has retired – he stopped touring in 2022 due to illness, never recovered enough to hit the stage again. He was already singing a key or two lower, with vocal support, so it was time.
The Beatles at their peak and when they were still touring ended up mining their words when in big stadiums. Audiences at the time were just screaming and shouting continuously and the Beatles realized that nobody could actually hear them sing so they kinda gave up.
At a family get together, what was your first concert? came up, and my brother-in-law won in a romp, as he was an 18 year old usher @ the Indianapolis State Fair for the Beatles concert there in 1964.
He related that with every teenager girl screaming, crying or carrying on, you could barely hear anything.
BEATLES * [RARE] LIVE ! @ The INDIANA STATE FAIR INDIANAPOLIS, INDIANA [w/ NEWS FOOTAGE] 1964
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_sGVVfhCW9o
I came in second though, my first concert was Queen at the Fabulous Forum in late 1977…
Queen – Live in Inglewood, CA (22nd December 1977)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2plqqFXtStM&list=RD2plqqFXtStM
I saw the Beatles twice in L.A., in 1965 and 1966, in two different venues (Hollywood Bowl & Dodger Stadium). Except for a moment in ’66 when the breeze shifted and a few seconds of “Paperback Writer” became audible in the stands, I heard nary a note I can recall.
Lovely story Jonathan.
Thank you
It can be painful when some of your favorite artists show up, but check out The Wings of Pegasus YouTube channel where he has the receipts regarding artists and their performances. Many or miming or being crazily tuned. Sad really.
When you play an AI country song backwards, you get your job back…
This is quality Wuk content – 4.5 doubloons out of 5.
….that’s 36 Escudos for those of you playing along at home
For the Neoliberal minded out there, that is 20 Quatloos.
…is that almost equal to a Full Shaft?
https://www.ngccoin.com/price-guide/world/purple-shaftieuland-shaft-x-m5-1970-cuid-1105057-duid-1554972
My question is, who gets the gold?
my uncle grabbed the gold,
then we high tailed it down down to mexico…
of course
On the other hand, you become an atheist and no longer love your mother
But you also get paroled!
you can create your own AI songs on suno dot com. the kids love it; and the content is no worse than any random B-side from your favorite artist.
Let’s be honest, even your favorite singer had generic, forgettable songs—AI (rather sophisticated “Mad Libs” maker) is at that level
You might also like Compressorhead.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3RBSkq-_St8
“Germany to introduce voluntary military service”
Wait — huh? If voluntary service is somehow new, what do they call the current arrangement?
William Lyon Mackenzie King is no doubt having chuckle from beyond the grave watching the Germans fumble for his old dodge: “conscription if necessary, but not necessarily conscription” …
In criss-crossing Canada in the early 1970’s, Barry Broadfoot came up with amazing oral history tales of a number of periods including the Great Depression and WW2.
Think Studs Terkel, but richer stories
In Six War Years, there was a lot of resentment towards French Canadian soldiers from English speakers, who for some reason didn’t have to serve overseas in the military-only domestically, and were known as Zombies.
Oooh, this one’s complicated, but I come down on the side of the Québécois conscripts. The original deal was that conscription was only for home defense and one had to volunteer to go overseas. Then that rule was changed mid-stream, and the resentment from the betrayal, of the French Canadian conscripts being forced to fight in Britain’s war for a foreign monarch that they felt no allegiance to, was perfectly justified.
My guess is that young Germans might join to defend the country and to be part of a deterrent force. But what they won’t do is be in a position where Merz wants to send them on safari against the Russians. Too many German families have photo albums showing young men in uniform in WW2 that went to Russia – and never came back. I saw one once and it showed me the Hollywood Germans was – and still is – just trash propaganda.
As unemployment rises, and particularly young male unemployment, these 2.600€ offered to play soldier will be seen as an attractive offer. This inasmuch as it is perceived as a game. So here we see the roadmap.
Step1: Conditions for job insecurity are settled. Houses extremely expensive to rent or buy.
Step2: Offer paid voluntary military service. Playing with weapons! Free lodging and meals plus 2.600€ and you can get out of the hell your parents house has become for you! Yes! Just what i was wanting!
Step3: Sorry, this was not a game. Now take the duffle bag with the extra uniform and enter the train to Lvov. I said right Now!
Does this mean that groups of young drunken guys will stop wandering German cities, blowing air horns and laughing to announce to world + dog that their year in the Bundeswehr has ended?
Regarding “Bulgarian president vetoes law on seizure of Lukoil assets”, Germany finds itself in a similar quandery regarding the Rosneft assets.
As I explained in the past, Rosneft has participations in three German refineries, holding a majority in one — the infamous PCK in Schwendt. This refinery experienced many tribulations linked to the stoppage of oil deliveries by pipeline from Russia. It is finally managing to work at 80% capacity (in a very dirty way) through a combination of crude imported via Rostock, Gdansk, and from Kazakhstan via the Druzhba pipeline (1/6 of the total input, planned to be increased to over 1/5).
Faced with the most recent sanctions edicted by the USA against Russian firms, the Germans must somehow evict Rosneft from its ownership of PCK, just like the Bulgarians must somehow evict Lukoil from its ownership of the Burgas refinery.
Contrarily to Bulgaria though, Germany has been granted a “general license” from OFAC that suspends sanctions against the German subsidiaries of Rosneft — till the 29th April 2026. It is unclear whether this waiver can be extended further.
So there is still enough time to figure out how to change the ownership structure of PCK, right?
No, because just like for Bulgaria, from the 21st November 2025 onwards sales of Rosneft assets will require the explicit approval of the USA…
There had already been discussions to sell the Rosneft share in PCK to the Qatar Investment Authority, but they all floundered because of the question of the price. The unremitting loss of degrees of freedom for Germany because of the restrictions imposed by the USA is bound to push the price down further.
The alternative is to turn the fiduciary administration by the Bundesnetzagentur (which has been extended every six months since it was put in place in 2022) into an outright nationalization. However, Russia would certainly make a countermove, either legally by disputing the expropriation in international courts, or practically by blocking the transit of Kazakh oil via the Druzhba pipeline.
Meanwhile, projects to revive the fortunes of the PCK refinery are either in limbo (such as laying a new, higher capacity pipeline from Rostock to Schwendt replacing the almost 60 years old relied upon so far) or have been quietly abandoned (such as turning PCK into a plant for hydrogen production).
I do not know what happened, but it is Schwedt, not Schwendt.
Švejk?
A late Halloween antidote? “The Vampire Cat.”
I’ve seen that face somewhere, before…
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bat_Boy_%28character%29
Can anything halt the decline of German industry? — FT
Is this a violation of Betteridge’s Law? German industry was humming along well enough until 2022. The article discusses Trump’s tariffs and Chinese competition, but carefully avoids any mention of RU sanctions and Nordstream. It’s not easy to write a long article about the problems of German industry without once mentioning the cut-off of cheap reliable gas from its main supplier, but the FT is up to the task!
I think the answer to the headline’s question is a qualified ‘Yes’; qualified, because it would require Germany to abandon its present foreign policy trajectory and replace it with the sort of independent-minded Ostpolitik that served it so well in the past. Which is not likely to happen under its current government.
The FT comments section under the article is worth skimming, if for no other reason than to serve as a reminder of the excellence of NC’s comment section.
“[…] the problems of German industry without once mentioning the cut-off of cheap reliable gas from its main supplier […]”
I would restate this as: “cheap, reliable, plentiful gas”.
I do not know whether a new version of the Ostpolitik would suffice. After all, affordable Russian gas and oil came to Germany via pipelines, and these have to cross countries (most notably Ukraine and Poland) that are unabashedly hostile to any kind of deep relation with Russia. Germany could get Russian gas and oil via tankers — but then it would not be cheap.
For a century, Germany relied upon abundant coal to sustain its industrial might, from two sources: the Ruhr and Silesia. At the conclusion of WWII, Germany abruptly lost its Silesian supplies, and its coal mines in the Ruhr started getting depleted.
Germany replaced coal with abundant gas to ensure the continued existence and the development of its industry, from two sources: Russia and the North Sea. With the war in Ukraine, Germany abruptly lost its Russian gas supplies, just as the fields in the North Sea are getting rapidly depleted.
I do not see any short to medium-term replacement for gas, which, one should always remember, is not just a source of energy, but also a raw material for various important industrial processes (just like coal).
and that oil and gas is now / will be with Power of Siberia 2 under contract for buyers to the east and south. Russia strongly emphasizes long-term contracts, as they provide stable, long-term cost estimates for effective business planning. In contrast, the EU believes these are inefficient, which makes business planning nearly impossible.
Indeed. I had the pink paper in my hot little hands a couple days ago and turned to this full page article. So, I go, lets give it a quick scan for key words…’Nordstream, cheap Russian gas, sanctions on Gazprom’…not a peep. So, I tune in Mercouris and he reads the entire piece for me. He wonders, “Where are the discussions of cheap Russian gas and the destruction of Nordstream?” Astonishing how the Euro-elite are presenting a united front in assisted suicide while dragging the lumpen along with them. Resistance is not only futile it will get you banished.
It seems to me as if we’re hurtling towards a last speech by Ceaușescu moment, the loathing is piling up and things aren’t going well for Joe Sixpack & his better half Jane Chardonnay.
40% of US women age 15-44 want to leave the US permanently.
https://news.gallup.com/poll/697382/record-numbers-younger-women-leave.aspx
I looked at their methodology. They interviewed 1000 by phone. No breakdown by age. No question list. Meh.
But where can they/we go? Most Americans don’t have a lot of savings that would let them uproot themselves and start over, and many are not proficient in any language but English (and some barely qualify for that). The places like Russia that have lots of opportunities for work are conservative (by the standards of young Americans) and feature multiple languages that you might have to learn depending on where in the country you found employment. Meanwhile the UK is a mess and getting worse, and things aren’t looking so hot in Canada, Australia and New Zealand if you’re coming in short on do-re-mi.
“Happy holidays: AI-enabled toys teach kids how to play with fire, sharp objects”
Jesus H. Christ. Some of the stuff that those AIs are telling little kids is just nightmare fuel for a parent. If an adult was telling them that stuff you would have them immediately arrested. Imagine a kid talking to an AI about the pet dog and then the kid goes up to the mother and ask her what ‘bestiality’ is. I’m sure that Kumma AI would come up with something like that. As the author of this article suggested, get your kids a new LEGO kit instead.
Years ago I listened to a comedy skit where the comedienne said that all through childhood her mother kept telling her “Don’t do it.” After her marriage ceremony her mother said “Go ahead and do it.” She replied “But mom, you never told me what it was.”
I grew up in the 50’s and early 60’s, some times in the city and sometimes on the farm. We learned about breeding, burning the brush pile and garbage barrel, driving tractors, using sharp objects like nails and knives, and so forth. By the time I was 18 I could take care of myself without getting hurt. I often wonder how those kids who grow up over-protected survive when they hit 18.
When I was in high school it was not unusual for someone to keep their hunting rifle in their locker so they could go hunting right after school. These were kids who learned the proper way to use guns from their parents at a young age. Now days most 18 yr olds would be a danger to themselves and everyone else the first time they touch a gun because their parents kept guns away from them.
IMHO parents should welcome AI to bring up subjects so the parents can spend time with their kids showing them how to do those things safely rather than endlessly saying “Don’t do it.”
You make the foolish assumption that the kids are going to tell the parents what idiotic notion the AI has given them (including possibly that they should never tell anyone, let alone their parents) BEFORE acting upon it.
This reminds me of the early days of television and the parents who thought it a good idea to put their kids in front of the “boob tube” and let it raise them. Now we have parents giving their kids an IT toy to raise them. Before TV many parents sent their kids out to be raised by other kids, which was analogous to the IT toy except that it was much more tactile. After all, who wants to spend time raising their kids?
I count this article as an antidote.
Only because it happened in Canada. And I really liked the part about the hijacker refusing to let a rider with an expired bus pass get on!
If that bus were in the US, cops would have turned the driver into swiss cheese.
Like this?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DZzNBvmM_J4
Putin weaponizes unused refining capacity and rapid repairing.
Yes, because it is “hybrid warfare”.
For proper “hybrid warfare”, one needs to put a heavy machine gun on a Prius.
That Epstein’ reach extended to the highest levels of various levels of the ruling class, to which I add academia, foreign affairs, Israel/Russia to the article’s author’s list. Whitney Webb has claimed that Epstein’s sex stuff is less important that his white-collar crimes. She asserts that he is part of the WW II, now continuing collaboration between intel and organized crime. The sex stuff brought Epstein down. Is he unique or are there other Epstein’s navigating the ruling class?
It’s Epsteins all the way down.
I think you mean it’s Epsteins all the way up?
It didn’t shake me, but it made me sad, to hear that Chomsky took Epstein’s money.
Chomsky did not take Epstein money. His wife, Carol had recently died. She had an account that Naom did not know how to transfer it. Epstein was at MIT and a coworker told Chomsky that Epstein could help. Outside of his academic skills, he lacked some basic functional skill as told by his assistant Beverly.
“African health body says continent ‘facing worst outbreak of cholera’ in 25 years”
This is one of the things that I miss about the 20th century. The international authorities would look at a debilitating disease and would decide to go wipe it out. They would actually do that. They got rid of smallpox through this attitude. So I think that the fact that you have cholera still circulating is a lack of political will and international bodies not stepping up to the plate. There are several centers for cholera such as Zambia, Nigeria, India and the Congo but take India as an example-
‘The city of Kolkata, India, in the state of West Bengal in the Ganges delta, has been described as the “homeland of cholera”, with regular outbreaks and pronounced seasonality. In India, where the disease is endemic, cholera outbreaks occur every year between dry seasons and rainy seasons. India is also characterized by high population density, unsafe drinking water, open drains, and poor sanitation, which provide an optimal niche for survival, sustenance, and transmission of Vibrio cholerae.’
I know it sounds unfair but if that situation was true of Shanghai in China, anybody think that the Chinese would just tolerate it or do an all hands on deck effort to wipe it out once and for all?
In the diary of the Gold Rush by William Swain, he’s from upstate NY and falls in with a competent group of Michigander 49’ers, 65 of them, and within a month of leaving for Cali, 5 of them were dead from Cholera, as sanitary measures were few and far between and there was only 1 ‘trail’ if you will and every horse, mule and oxen shitting as they go.
Imagine going into a venture where almost 10% of the participants would die?
This was a common rate of death by Cholera among all 49’ers.
They were armed to the teeth against Indian attacks, but the latter wanted no part of them and their killing disease.
Read all about it in:
The World Rushed In: The California Gold Rush Experience
Swain was an eloquent writer and observer of goings on, highly recommended.
I think it was perhaps about a few months or a year or so when Jayant Bhandari’s article about India was linked to in Naked Capitalism. I always thought the article might be exaggerating things a lot in India but then you see those articles about cholera in India and it really makes you think. Maybe unhinged neoliberalism is not a solution
https://www.amren.com/features/2024/12/india-its-worse-than-you-think/
While many aspects of Indian society described by the author may well be true, he severely lacks the socio-historical perspective on them:
“The institutions left behind by the British have been hollowed out, becoming purely predatory and sadistic. This occurred because, in post-British India, those in power prize expediency and acquiring wealth as life’s sole purposes.
[…]
The British were a godsend. Without them, the situation has continued to worsen. India will eventually nullify all the benefits it got from the West and revert to its pre-colonial ways. It will fall apart, and I wouldn’t be surprised if much of its population falls prey to war and famine and declines to the level it was before the arrival of Europeans.”
Briefly:
1) India was under colonial exploitation. In particular, the East India Company was well known to be particularly “predatory and sadistic”, with most of its officials and owners “prizing expediency and acquiring wealth as life’s sole purposes”.
2) Those wonderful institutions set up by the British were designed primarily to control and exploit the country and its population — as was the case in every colonial endeavour (from laws to railways).
3) Historical studies have shown that devastating, large-scale famine was actually a consequence of the British rule, and that it did not exist to such an extent before the colonization.
It is not uncommon for émigrés to have a very disparaging, utterly negative appraisal of their country of origin, and a romanticized view of their new environment.
Indeed. No doubt there were wooden headed scions of the fallen Protestant landed gentry who felt the same about Ireland.
Re Venezuela, I suspect any US military action would limit itself to some bombing/missile strikes and seizing and holding the Orinoco lake region only so as to deprive the country and government of any revenues from their oil, while at the same time promoting terror gangs to unleash chaos in the region, with a view to causing eventual civil unrest and regime change. It would be more or less a copy-paste job from the Syria playbook, with the same long term goal, albeit without the benefit of a friendly demographic/region in which to base out of (ala Kurdish separatist region), so could be more of a challenge to execute. Do recall that the ‘War on Drugs’ predated the ‘War on Terror’ by some distance. Al-Qaeda and ISIS are as much creations of the USA as the ‘carteles’, and serve the same purpose as far as USA policy is concerned, to excuse and justify intervention in pursuit of geopolitical goals and/or resource acquisition.
“Sometimes The Media Ignoring A Major Story Becomes The Story—And Other Notes”
Caitlin writes a whole section on this story-
‘A lady on TikTok has made headlines with a social experiment where she calls up churches in the United States pretending to be a mother desperately seeking a can of formula for her hungry baby and documents which ones are helpful and which are not. The overwhelming majority of the places of worship she contacted have been unwilling to help a mother in need, including Joel Olsteen’s multimillion-dollar megachurch.’
But some good news comes from this-
‘And for the churches that are offering to help, there has been a significant positive response.
A post on X from the account @lydiakauppi, which has been viewed 1.6 million times, detailed that one of the churches that offered to help Monroe has been flooded with donations.
“Heritage Hope Church of God has since received over $75,000 to their food pantry. The congregation says he’s been crying all week,” Kauppi’s post read.’
The whole original article is worth reading-
https://www.newsweek.com/nikalie-monroe-church-call-experiment-starving-child-poverty-snap-benefits-11022815
🤡
Ukraine’s EW System Beats Back Russia’s Kinzhal Missiles, Playing “Our Father Is Bandera” Through the Static
https://united24media.com/latest-news/ukraines-ew-system-beats-back-russias-kinzhal-missiles-playing-our-father-is-bandera-through-the-static-13378
Gonna have my say some tomorrow
Gonna give away my secrets
I’d take you along with me
But you would not go so far
Don’t disregard what Donald does not want you to see
You’ll hear a dead man say
Won’t be what I want to be
I continue in my way
Don’t you see, see, see where I’m goin’
Don’t you see, see, see where I’m goin’
Don’t you see, see, see where I’m goin’ to
I don’t want to
Every day I see the mornin’ in purgatory
Come on in the same old way
I tell myself tomorrow brings me
Payback I would not dream today
Gonna have my say some tomorrow
Gonna give away my secrets
I’d take you along with me
But you would not go so far
Don’t disregard what Donald does not want you to see
You’ll hear a dead man say
Won’t be what I want to be
I continue in my way
Don’t you see, see, see where I’m goin’
Don’t you see, see, see where I’m goin’
Don’t you see, see, see where I’m goin’ to
I don’t want to
A Song for Jeffrey, by Jethro Tull
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=din0-BRBBpg&list=RDdin0-BRBBpg
Taco quest continues
The affordability crisis is forcing Trump to radically reshape his economic plan on the fly (CNN)
and
Trump makes an attempt to decelerate controlled fight into terrain, is it enough?
Hoi Polloi just aren’t buying the idea that running the country into the ditch, is tantamount to winning the Indianapolis 500
Well, the Democrats are doing what they can to foam the runway for him.
Johnstone reports on a study being done where a researcher calls American churches and tries to get a donation of formula for her starving baby. She is almost always turned away, contrary to what Jesus would presumably have done if he got the same call.
Reminiscent of one of Lambert’s rules, for sure.
I would note that locking up someone in jail costs about $80,000 a year per prisoner. That would pay for a lot of baby formula, but we nevertheless have infinite money for the prison system and less and less for food. Present day Western society seems astonishingly cruel and vicious.
With many of the dogma trysts, every sperm is sacred up to a point and then you’re on your own, bub.
That $80,000 looks like a cost to you.
It’s an income CoreCivic and GEO Group.
If you just gave that money to the poor, we’d have to extend thoughts and prayers to the shareholders.
It’s long been clear that Jesus wouldn’t recognize most so-called Christians among the elite.
Oh, he would recognize them all right — as the whited sepulchres that they are.
The confusingly named “Myth of China AI pipeline” is an article about the social costs of the pipeline – not its existence (and I doubt there are any myths that the social costs are negligible – just that the need to develop to deter the threatened US-China war (which would kill tens of millions of Chinese, or the entire planet) was worth the cost. The article asks whether, now that China has caught up and has an effective deterrence, can it take the pressure down a notch?
Out of curiosity, I googled to see if death by overwork also occurs in China. Answer: yes, and easy to find.
https://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2016-12/11/content_27635578.htm
A quick survey did not reveal the same level of problem in Vietnam or Thailand (Today’s links arleady included info on the famous Japanese overwork)
I didn’t finish reading Semifor’s hit piece on Lena Khan because sign up. Maybe someone can provide the conclusion. Don’t know anything about Semifor’s slant but found this paragraph illuminating:
People familiar with the transition, and her thinking, have an answer: Khan has been scouring city and state laws — some overlooked by past mayors and some too new to have been tested yet — for legal footing for Mamdani’s priorities. It’s a skill set the Yale-trained lawyer wielded while running the FTC, where she dusted off laws, some dating from the early 20th century, and sued companies under novel theories of harm. “Excavating and enforcing the law” is how one transition adviser put it.
How can a mainstream source print this without acknowledge the present administration’s extensive use of laws dating to the 19th century and stretched interpretations to pursue adversaries?
Well, Semifor CEO Justin B. Smith learned how to B.S. at Georgetown University School of Foreign Services after which he earned his foreign servicing cred by leading corporate strategy for The Economist Group. Can’t see any axes to grind coming from there…
“Enter Semafor. The world’s first news platform designed to meet the moment we are in. Providing audiences with an unparalleled level of journalistic transparency through innovative new forms, cutting through the noise of the news cycle with smart, distilled views and exploring competing perspectives across borders for a curious, new global audience.”
In less words, a propaganda rag.
“innovative new forms”
there’s that word again
Catch phrase salad
No deal on the Colorado River despite Trump administration deadline Cal Matters
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Nobody wants to admit how over-allocated the H20 is from the Colorado River, being the crux of the issue aside from iffy winters that brought us to this juncture.
Water related… Just saw this article in the sfgate about Yosemite “banning” this guys book.
https://www.sfgate.com/national-parks/article/bay-area-writer-book-banned-yosemite-21171556.php
I’m hoping the two links under MAHA are given as an exercise in critical thinking. The arguments are so awful, just reading them gives readers an example of how not to think.
So, MAHA policy isn’t eugenicist?
And Conservatives don’t blame the poor?
So, there is a MAHA policy?
Yes, snake oil sales.
Who Pays When A.I. Is Wrong? (NY Times via archive.ph)
And with Google having a search monopoly, it ain’t their problem. So naturally you’re stuck suing. So much for organizing the world’s information, lol.
Wowzers
But no satisfaction, it seems
“Where Is the Opposition to an Attack on Venezuela?”
Maybe the New Realism has set in. Did opposition to the war in Vietnam stop the war? Only in part, with the major reasons for ending the war being the frightening collapse of military discipliner in the conscripted group and the money sink that the war had turned into. Did opposition to the Iraq war stop it? No. Did Occupy accomplish anything? No. Has protest in this century accomplished anything other than stoking PMC nostalgia vibes? Everyone at this point recognizes that the PTB don’t care what the mass of people want or what they’re opposed to. And the government has shown multiple times that it’s willing to use extreme violence (up to the point of murder, as at Kent State) against mostly peaceful protesters, usually relying on police provocateurs to stir things up if an excuse is needed. So while people may not want the latest outrage to be perpetrated by the US government, “learned helplessness” has set in. We’re no longer a functioning democracy and the Congress, Supreme Court, and Executive Branch just do whatever they and their paymasters want, people be damned.
The ‘see me-dig me’ component of protest marches as we know it is quite something, and the idea of pending royalty* is the last of my worries-a cross to bear after January 20, 2029, not sooner.
Could an organic peaceful uprising against the ‘man that caused things to change take place under current auspices, me no think so.
* if we get there, we’ll need reminder courses on curtsying & bowing protocol when presented to the King and King in training Baron.
Protests, not so much. Strikes? Oh hell yes, and the more “general” the better.
Trump’s economy continues to show arrhythmia
Fewer burritos, more bargains: Consumers flash holiday warning signs (CNBC)
If they do it will likely be because of accounting shenanigans. The fact that every major retailer has been in Black Friday mode for two weeks or more does not indicate confidence that the consumers are coming. There may be some last minute holiday surges, but I doubt it. What with the shut down, tariffs, rising food costs and astronomical premium increases (not to mention what is looking to be the coldest winter in a while for a few regions) the funds might not be there for more than socks and an orange in the stockings for a growing percentage of consumers.
Trump potentially gave Clinton the presidential treatment based on latest Epstein emails?
Assuming Bubba is Clinton and not referring to the racist prison partner term
https://x.com/wallyrashid/status/1989040065407004945
“‘I’d do it all again,’ says Dutch minister at heart of car chip standoff with China”
Arrogant, hubristic and not only has he learnt nothing but he is trying to make himself the hero by warning against the big bad Chinese. He caused economic damage around the world and yet he still gets to keep his job. And his insistence that the Trump regime had nothing to do with his choice of attacking Nexperia has a smack of he doth protest too much about it. He admits in the article that they were trying to take over that Chinese based company and when they reasonably shifted some operations back to China because of it, just swiped the whole company. The guy is an idjut.
Trump continues to self-immolate over Epstein.
Per Guardian
Speaking to reporters on Air Force One on Friday night, Trump was asked: “Have you ruled out a pardon for Ghislaine Maxwell?”
“I haven’t even thought about it,” Trump replied. “I mean, I haven’t thought about it for months. Maybe I haven’t thought about it at all, you’re just asking me a question.”
“Why can’t you rule it out?” the reporter followed up.
“I don’t talk about that. I don’t rule it in or out, I don’t even think about it,” Trump answered.
In 2020, when Maxwell was arrested, Trump was asked whether he expected her to “turn in powerful men” during a White House briefing.
“I don’t know, I really haven’t been following it too much. I just wish her well,” the president said. “I’ve met her numerous times over the years, especially since I lived in Palm Beach and I guess they lived in Palm Beach. But I wish her well.”
Going to bat a convicted sex-trafficker and center of a web of shadiness is not gonna win back any supporters. The hummus-eaters (h/t Tucker Carlson) must really have some good stuff on him OR he’s actually losing touch entirely.
This is big, US justice department investigates Epstein’s alleged ties to Clinton and banks after Trump request, BBC.
The US justice department has confirmed it will investigate paedophile financier Jeffrey Epstein’s alleged links to major banks and several prominent Democrats, including former President Bill Clinton.
The Clintons and their friends don’t play.
I’m so cynical at this point I assume it’ll just be something noisy to appear to be doing something without actually doing anything .
And as others have said here often, the real (or other) story that’s being covered-up is Epstein’s role as a geopolitical fixer. Continues to be ignored by the media. In this BBC article he’s “a financier”.
That “fixer” part is what’s got me wondering. Bill Clinton is big game. The Epstein affairs are well populated with names from the Iran Contra affair. I would call them “the security state”, but now I’m not so sure.
The prosecution, if it happens, of the former president will make for some juicy discovery. Stock up on popcorn.
US military planning for divided Gaza with ‘green zone’ secured by international and Israeli troops (Guardian)
Subhead: Almost all Palestinians have been displaced to ‘red zone’ where no reconstruction is planned
The US is planning for the long-term division of Gaza into a “green zone” under Israeli and international military control, where reconstruction would start, and a “red zone” to be left in ruins.
Foreign forces will initially deploy alongside Israeli soldiers in the east of Gaza, leaving the devastated strip divided by the current Israeli-controlled “yellow line”, according to US military planning documents seen by the Guardian and sources briefed on American plans.
After weeks in which the US promoted reconstruction in the form of fenced-in camps for small groups of Palestinians, referred to as “alternative safe communities” (ASC) [BP: concentration camps] those plans were dropped this week, the US official said.
Trump has ruled out putting any US soldiers on the ground to pave the way for an Israeli withdrawal, or funding reconstruction. “The US has been very clear they want to set the vision and not pay for it,” said one diplomatic source
Earlier this month, the US military regional Centcom command drew up plans to put European forces – including hundreds of British, French and German soldiers – at the core of the ISF…
They include up to 1,500 infantry soldiers from the UK, with expertise including bomb disposal and military medics, and up to 1,000 French troops to cover road clearance and security.
The US also wanted troops from Germany, the Netherlands and Nordic countries to handle field hospitals, logistics and intelligence…
Another document lays out plans for foreign soldiers to man crossings along the line of control after “integrating” with Israeli forces stationed along it…
The Israeli military will “consider conditions for withdrawing” at a later stage when international security is in place, the plan states, without setting out any timeline….
More than a month into the ceasefire, Israel continues to limit aid shipments into Gaza, including barring basic items, such as tent poles, that it classifies as “dual use” because it says they have the potential to be used for military purposes.
Nearly 1.5 million Palestinians are waiting for emergency shelter items and hundreds of thousands more are living in tents without access to basic services such as clean water. Almost all the population – more than 2 million people – are crowded into the red zone, a strip along the coast that covers less than half of Gaza’s surface area.
Losing the Republican Base, Israel Pours Millions to Target Evangelicals and Churchgoers (Haaretz via archive.ph)
[Excerpts:]
The Israeli government has signed contracts worth millions of dollars in recent months to rehabilitate Israel’s standing in American public opinion, both online and offline. Amid a sharp drop in support from the conservative right, Israel has hired firms to conduct not just “hasbara [public diplomacy] campaigns” but also campaigns targeting millions of Christian churchgoers, bot networks to amplify pro-Israel messages online, and efforts to influence both search results and the responses given by popular AI services like ChatGPT.
The largest of the new hasbara contracts was signed in August with a firm called Clock Tower X, owned by Brad Parscale, who played a lead role in Trump’s digital campaigns in 2016 and 2020.
According to the filing, Parscale’s company will produce “at least 100 core pieces of content per month” – including videos, audio, podcasts, graphics and text – and “5,000 derivative versions” monthly, aiming for 50 million impressions a month. Eighty percent of the content will target young Americans on TikTok, Instagram and YouTube.
Another Israeli campaign, commissioned for the Foreign Ministry, was proposed by Show Faith by Works, owned by Republican consultant Chad Schnitger, an evangelical operative connected to the Christian right. The campaign’s budget exceeds $3 million, one-tenth of which has already been paid via Havas, though a final contract has yet to be signed. Filings submitted in September describe a focus on “churches and Christian organizations in the western United States”
The filings for the proposed campaign explain that the messages will reach their audience through “the largest geofencing campaign in U.S. history” – a pitch to map the physical perimeters of every major church and Christian college in California, Arizona, Nevada, and Colorado during worship hours; identifying attendees using commercial data, tracking them, and continuing to target them with relevant ads. The estimated audience for the suggested project: eight million churchgoers and four million Christian students.
A draft proposal attached to the filings lists potential celebrity participants, including “Guardians of the Galaxy” actor Chris Pratt, Jon Voight (Angelina Jolie’s father), football player Tim Tebow, and NBA star Stephen Curry, though it’s unclear if any were contacted. The campaign also includes a touring installation called “The October 7 Experience,” designed by “Hollywood set builders” with immersive virtual reality screens.
Another Israeli campaign disclosed in the Foreign Agents Registration Act filings was signed with SKDKnickerbocker, also via Havas for the Foreign Ministry, worth roughly 2.5 million shekels. Under the contract, the firm – actually considered close to the Democratic party – will develop a “bot-based program on various social media channels that `floods the zone` with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ pro-Israel message.”
The campaign is titled “Esther Project.” It’s unclear whether it relates to the Heritage Foundation’s “Project Esther,” a blueprint for tackling antisemitism from the conservative think tank behind the controversial plans to reshape the federal government under Trump’s second term. “Project Esther” is presented as a national strategy for combating antisemitism and protecting Jewish communities – but critics, including Jewish and progressive groups, said its real goal was to criminalize pro-Palestinian activism.
A section about halfway down the latest post by Simplicius (where he quotes Russian correspondent Kharchenko) raises an interesting point that echoes, to a degree, Haig’s post earlier in the week.
https://simplicius76.substack.com/p/chorus-of-corruption-as-movement
The description of the battle makes it sound like the “tooth to tail” ratio, so to speak, in Ukraine is downright ludicrous. Russia may or may not have upwards of a million troops in or near theater, but the actual “fighting” troops might be limited to mere thousands of elite special forces, basically, across the entire front, with the rest playing essentially the role of “support” troops. This is, in some ways, continuation of an ongoing trend, I suppose–people have pointed out that, of the many hundreds of thousands of US troops who went through VN, only a handful actually engaged in combat–but the handful who did see combat saw a lot larger share of combat than their counterparts during World War 2, for example.
I’m back in Europe for a while for work and on the flight over I watched Civil War for the first time. Here’s the trailer.
While flawed (it seems like there was a struggle between a tighter, more focused storyline on the actual events vs vignettes and the latter won maybe because during production or editing the decision was made not to overtly ‘take sides’ given current events in the US) and gimmicky (the story is told through the lens, pun intended, of war photographers, and that one of them would be using film exclusively – including b&w development on the road – in an environment where the dollar has collapsed relative to the loonie and cell reception and power isn’t reliable is sort of unbelievable, I say this as a woman with 15 rolls of 35mm and two cameras with their accessories in a bag next to me, this is just not the sort of thing that would be available especially the chemistry in conditions that are depicted in the film), I am still thinking about a few of the scenes and a lot of the world building details. For example:
– Lots of strong Costa-Gavras (Z), early Oliver Stone (Salvador) and Pontecorvo (Battle of Algiers) influence, I think this may be where the weird inclusion of film photography is coming from.
– The finished film doesn’t focus on the conditions that led up to the war or get deep into the politics. It’s sort of in the background and taken as a given that the existing government are the bad guys; there is very little exposition on how things got to the current point, and I think that was actually a great decision on the part of the director because it removes any issues with suspension of disbelief because of the scenario (before it came out there was a lot of dismissive commentary online that no way would Texas and California align against a sitting government in a secession situation). The closest explicit rationale for why the fighting comes when one character says simply “They’re trying to kill us, so we are killing them”.
– The inner city conflict sequences look quaint, post-Gaza. Conversely, a lot of the film takes place in semi-rural/exurban areas with ‘normal Americans’ in paramilitary roles and these feel shockingly realistic. There is a scene at a gas station involving captured looters that is masterful at depicting how ‘normal’ people forced into terrible circumstances will quickly devolve into war criminality when journalistic attention is shown to them.
– The strongest scene in the film (the “What kind of American are you?” scene) feels like it was edited down from a longer sequence because at the time the film was made it probably seemed too unrealistic. In the militarized ICE world we live in now, though, it feels very, very possible. The guy who plays the main villain in that scene deserves an award for the menacing way he handled his gun, that scene was so stressful I had to turn the film off for a while and think about what I’d just seen before continuing!
– The final scenes where they enter DC and the White House are full of great background details that did immense heavy lifting to make the premise believable. Again, no exposition, I found myself pausing and just looking at the background details to take it all in. In the film the military surrenders before the government does, so the secessionist forces are battling the die hards/dead enders. Lots of details from other junta/regime endings transposed on the US situation that, again, before this year would have been completely ridiculous but now feel terrifyingly possible.
All in all, not a movie I will rewatch probably (although I might revisit a few scenes again) and like I said, kind of gimmicky, but really worth watching at least once if you’re American.
Pick a picture of peccadilloes perhaps, precisely prickly.
Meanwhile:
House Republican warns of potential sabotage tactics by Maduro in Venezuela
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/foreign-policy/3888566/house-republican-potential-sabotage-tactics-maduro/