Listen to a reading of this article: ❖ Turkey's President Erdoğan has officially withdrawn Ankara's objection to the addition of Finland and Sweden to NATO membership, with the three countries signing a trilateral memorandum at a NATO summit in Madrid.
That is not solely Biden's mantra. Name me one President since Jimmy Carter that wasn't for war. I'm not so sure on Carter's stance, he just happened to be president while the USA was still licking its wounds from Vietnam.
It's like a collective madness has enveloped over Europe and these other countries that are supporting the US/NATO/UK.... support for Ukraine,and their hatred and willingness to destroy Russia! .............
Reminds me of one of those stupid SCI-FY/Horror movies,where Satan casts an evil spell over everybody,and they end up running round chopping people to death with meat axes or something! .......... Maybe someone has put something in all their drinking water........... I dont know.... but something strange is happening to their collective consciousness, and they are running round the world like a depraved psychopath wrecking the joint and spraying shit everywhere!
Reading news like that makes me positively thrilled about being old. Maybe I'm old enough to actually die of old age before this whole can of worms spills all over the world. If it starts before I'm gone, I'll be gone in a nanosecond. I won't wait for the hunger, the disease, the radiation poisoning's slow death, the misery of war. I feel sorry for the young ones, who may still think that the future is bright. It ain't bright, sweethearts. It's the nuclear explosions on the horizon.
The Baby Boomers had it pretty good compared to what is on the horizon. And it just seems impossible to stop it now - the repression, the failure of the US Constitution to even protect our most fundamental rights - the unabated economic slavery of ordinary Americans - and the ever increasing militarism and wars ...
I do wonder though, as I'm getting up there in age myself as well, if there is anything after we die? Or is it all just a random joke?
Connecting this news with other news this week, WW3 looms ever more ominously:
* NATO chief announced an increase of troops from 40k to 600k (650% increase)
* US Army announced it will no longer require high school diploma for enlistment
* US Congress moved to require women to register for the draft
Also, whatever concessions Turkey extracted from NATO in exchange for not vetoing Finland and Sweden's membership are unlikely to contribute to peace in Eurasia.
I wonder how the congress figures the women registering for the draft, AND now the abortion ban. Do they give us a choice of either enlisting, or producing more cannon fodder? Or they figure a pregnant ones can fight as well, because the pregnancy is their problem, not the Army's? Can they make us give it to them both ways? I refuse to give it to them in ANY way.
Yes, Putin does seem to be the only grownup on the political stage. Xi is probably there also. While they are authoritarians, the governments in Russia and China manage their Oligarchy. In the USA and the West, the Oligarchy manages the government.
The Swedish government played a crucial role in the empire's persecution of Assange.
Regarding Sweden, Caitlin.
Yes, it did and will be remembered for that dirty little piece of deviant behaviour for a long time to come. That was the beginning of lies, lies and more bloody lies from that once respected neutral. No one deserved to be treated that way and Julian Assange has paid the price with his time in incarceration. He also respected Sweden.
You won't easily dismiss those actions, Sweden. As much to blame as the arch criminal USA when it comes to that shameful episode. Fantasyland, a la Walt Disney.
It seems that even Sweden with its neutral stance in the past can be tempted to fall into line (that is , bed) with corrupt whores like the USA if the price is right. And it must have been right. Then, all of a sudden, it floated off the airwaves, all done, thanks. Purpose served.
No doubt the skilled research of Caitlin will source out the true story one day. There were so many people in Sweden involved in the dirty deed, the rubbish bin now cleared of statutory declarations, photos of the "ladies" involved, witness statements by the score, legal judgement by government mouthpieces and other associated groups and on and on. The Brothers Grimm couldn't have done a better job, had they been Swedish.
Seemed as though it could have been a possibility then, just for a month or two (as it was Sweden, a respected country in those days) but not now.....and never again. Now tarred with the same colours as the rest of the NATO bunch of US puppets.
Sweden is fully in line with the Great Reset agenda, surveillance capitalism, society controlled by Silicon Valley. E.g. subcutaneous microchips have long replaced actual credit cards, train tickets, and more recently vaccine passports in Sweden. That's why they were allowed some freedom with their Covid policies, because they already are on board and confirmed obedient poodles.
Me too. Everyday it seems the idiots--I mean, oligarchs--in power have more of a death wish. I just wish they'd leave the planet and leave the rest of us out of it. Maybe we can blast them off Earth in one of Bezos' giant phallic-symbol toys?
How can the citizens of NATO countries do anything to prevent their governments and businesses from killing life on earth? If those countries were democratic, the answer would be obvious - through courts, protests, media work or strikes. Some people, including even myself, are still doing it. Are we very delusional? What kind of resistance is even possible in Orwellian military and financial autocracies?
Further to my comments, I'd add that as far as NATO is concerned, resistance is easy. Humanise the Russians. You do not have to agree with them, apologise for their government or justify the military action in the Donbass. Just offer an alternative to the racist and vile garbage that is being spewed at the Russians and Russophones.
With a name like Jacek, I assume you are Polish. There is nothing NATO wants more than to see people in or from east-central or eastern Europe stewing in hatred for Russia. Just being sane, fair and human about the Russians robs NATO of the anger and contrived hatred they seek.
NB I have family antecedents in the former Warsaw Pact (Czechia and Poland) and I can assure you that simply being balanced about Russia and respectful (not buying into the humbug and the vitriol) is resistance itself. My father was liberated by Marshal Konev's army as a boy and I deeply resent the way NATO supporters are carrying on. Regardless of ethnicity, language or religion the peoples across the region owe it to each other to refuse the invitation to mutual hatred and rivalry. Resist the banning of Russian athletes and artists, condemn those who tear down memorials and answer back at the propagandists for war. Those hyenas need to be identified for what they are. Even if all you do is read a Russian novel or listen to a Russian song, do it. It is the right thing to do.
You are on the right track and are a decent man. More power to you.
Great idea! I'm in an online group where we read modern literature online. We read an Afghan writer last time. I'll suggest a Russian one next time. Any tips? Ideally short stories, maybe about the West from the Russian point of view and available in English? I'll ask some Russian speakers I know too.
Recommendations? If by modern you mean 20th c, my all-time favourite would be IT'S ME, EDDIE by Edward Limonov or any of his other works set in America (HIS BUTLER'S STORY). Several have been translated into English. IT'S ME, EDDIE is very hard to get now (it was published in the 80s) and probably would not be available but if you ever find a copy, read it. It is a fictionalised autobiography about life in Manhattan in the 70s....absolutely nothing else remotely like it. It is an eye-opening take on America. There has been talk that it might be made into a movie.
Zakhar Prolepin's SIN is supposed to be very good. I have a copy, but have yet to get round to reading it (I have piles of books waiting).
Since your taste runs to exotic (Afghan) I'd recommend THE BLIND OWL by Sadegh Hedayat. He was Iranian, a student of Sartre. It is fairly short, but brilliant.
Don't ever get discouraged or think that you are not making a difference. They rely on this happening. Don't confuse mainstream media attention for making an impact.
Resistance cannot expect to work if it just follows an established, cliched, idea of protest or opposition. The system knows how to shut all this down or co-opt it very quickly. And the West is not autocratic: we have oligarchies with dispersed forms of power in which every institution is synchronised ideologically with every other institution. Disrupting this synchronisation is the key to resistance.
I suspect that grassroots organising should aim to create parallel structures of all kinds. These do not have to be resource intensive or formal. Alternate fora for disseminating news and opinions (Substack is a great example of this), associations that relieve the isolation and anomie so prevalent in our time, just about anything that brings people together in ways that do not support the regime; film groups, book clubs, study groups, clubs for hobbies can all be used to cultivate alternatives or build trust and cohesion (qualities that the regime fear when they are found amongst the ruled). Anything that does not default to promoting or legitimising regime propaganda. Experimentation always helps. Trust your own judgement and experience.
Full-out madness has come over the world, and Stoltenberg is just the figurehead. The gross insult is they want to kill us all - with this mediocrity as agent. Russia will take as dim a view of Finland/Sweden Nato membership as they did of Georgia's, and the possibility of Ukraine's. This is a poker game played by drunken sailors, misfits and the delusional, and the ante provided by the deep pockets of the taxpayer, for as long as it lasts. There are no winners here.
You are 100% right about the poker game played by "drunken sailors, misfits and the delusional".
Russia will be patient. She is clearly winning militarily and economically. The defeat of the Ukrainians in the Donbass is now very close. Once that happens things will develop very fast and we will see chaos across much of Ukraine. The humiliation in Washington will surpass the effect of the withdrawl from Kabul by an order of magnitude.
There will be no northern front against NATO, unless NATO provokes one (always a possibility). By Christmas the sanctions will have Europe in turmoil. Johnson and Schulz will most likely be gone and Macron will be overwhelmed by a renewed wave of popular unrest.
The foolishness and ineptitude of the Empire's managers never cease to amaze. It's not at all clear that they have figured out that Russia's military capacity far exceeds that of the West and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. Maybe being blind to reality is a prerequisite for the job.
Please consider that while many of our "leaders" (Blinken for example) are stupid, there is a reason they were put into place under the leadership of a demented fool.
If the Oligarchy didn't want this war, it wouldn't be happening.
I'm going to mention again, the first inscription on the Georgia Guidestones installed by some "anonymous" group. It wasn't put there by any religious organization or civic group. It may have been a small group, but they are very rich. They see the coming climate catastrophe.
I don’t disagree that oligarchs are in control, but they are not omniscient or incapable of error. In provoking a war with Russia, they almost certainly expected a different result—militarily, economically and geopolitically. The balance of power is now tipping towards Russia, China and the Global South, and a multipolar world is taking shape. Perhaps, in the end, a different set of oligarchs will grab the reins of power, but that will not have been part of the original plan.
A large degree of confusion over what is happening is inevitable. We are never given the truth about what is happening.
My guess is that the present oligarchy is making a mess, but elements of the oligarchy expect to cash in on the dysfunction that they have seen coming. They are sharks in a feeding frenzy and they are always happy to chew off each others' fins, given the opportunity.
Supporting radical Ukrainian nationalism and undermining the Minsk Accords was a mistake, just as trusting to the reliability of strategic advice from a compliant and hollowed out Pentagon (compromised by generations of prioritising conformism over competence) was a mistake. Turning a country the size of the Ukraine into another Kossovo or Afghanistan was insane, while posting NATO officers and NCOs to the Ukraine and encouraging the use of heavy artillery against Russian communities in Donetsk and Lughansk was the very definition of recklessness and criminality and was obviously designed to create an impression of weakness on the part of Putin, leading to his overthrow.
What is unclear is why Washington did not back down when they realised that Putin was getting serious. Why did they persist with the artillery assault on the Russians seeking autonomy within the Ukraine? My guess is that Washington wants the ethnic Russians out of the region very badly, so as to place NATO bases there. The co-location of hydrocarbon resources (needed to repay the loans to Ukraine by the West) is a factor too, as is a desire to leverage as much advantage from NATO's remaining strength as fast as possible.
They (Washington, Brussels, London) have been bluffing about their strengths for a long-time and have become stupid enough to fall for their own humbug. The diplomacy over the Ukrainian crisis has been so inept that you get the impression Washington is no longer capable of coherent policy-making. It is all reptile-brain geopolitics. The West is weakening, not just economically but in terms of ability at the top as well.
I agree with most of what you say. But I’m sure some members of the Oligarchy actively engineered this crisis in order to kill off large portions of humanity.
I understand you probably won’t go that far. Thing is my perspective (to me) makes a response more urgent. Time to get James Bond to hunt down Spectre.
For certain there are some elements within the oligarchy who are actively and virulently malicious, even to the point of consciously supporting what you might call a form of constructed mass homicide via economic restructuring. Russia during the Yeltsin era experienced this directly and the Ukraine appears to have also become a deindustrialised dystopia with Malthusian touches.
The trends in the mortality rates in the Rust Belt in the US are sinister. They are also potentially predictive of what is in store for many of us: shortened life-spans with increasing frequencies of chronic illness. The majority of the oligarchy are cheerfully indifferent and find any number of ways to ignore or dismiss the implications of the crypto-Malthusian element in their assumptions.
My concern is that we need to be cautious how we frame things. I have met phenomenal resistance from friends, acquaintances, colleagues etc whenever I have broached anything connected to these subjects. Even 'progressives' do not want to acknowledge the implications of what is happening, while the right wingers rave on in ways that are outrageous and potentially incendiary (Alex Jones is the most well known, but there are even worse out there). Getting the balance right is difficult. I tend to think focusing on the hard evidence helps, but am unsure how much notice many people pay to this.
Being cautious reminds me of the saying about nothing in the middle of the road but dead armadillos.
How do you get people to pay attention?
Have you noticed that no one cares about Ukraine any longer? This is especially disturbing given that it is Ukraine that is the source of our inflation.
It is difficult to discuss the oligarchy and at the same time make clear they are not monolithic. You’re a foolish oligarchs just as they are foolish people. Some of the Oligarchs got played. Just like Lehman Brothers.
The war is an opportunity for profit. It enables the US and European arms industries to secure guaranteed profits, as well as economies of scale for sales that will fund the development of the next generation of weaponry.
The sanctions will cut Europe off from Russia. This sends the price of energy through the roof, ,making European industry uncompetitive and kills off the threat of Europe being integrated with Russia and China. The euro is guaranteed to remain no threat to a petrodollar under growing pressure. Deindustrialisation kills off the European social model that the US has never liked (the demonstration effect of a functioning welfare state and socialised medicine etc).
Perhaps you should look into "de-dollarization" . Michael Hudson has been talking about it for over a decade and it is now here with groups of nations around the world proposing their own currencies.
IOW, I'm not saying that there's no profit, but I am saying that it will be only the Oligarchy that survives the hyperinflation that is coming.
The USA has already been deindustrialize. Russia has shot off more cruise missiles in 4 months than the USA can produce in a year. And 500 people were just hired for that Russian factory.
Michael Hudson is essential reading. No one understands or explains it better. He is an invaluable asset for anyone trying to figure things out. His videos are brilliant too.
Hyperinflation is the oligarchs' comfort zone. The hyperinflation in Germany in the 20s allowed the giant German industrial firms to pay off vast debts accrued during WW1, when they borrowed to expand production in the expectation of gaining new markets through military victory.
Steady high inflation in the US will enable the US governments to reduce the burden of their debts. Cashed up oligarchs will buy assets from people under economic stress. The bankruptcy of small and medium firms will allow the further consolidation of monopolies and oligopolies.
The oligarchs do not want us dead...only poor and insecure. They'd rather rule over a pauperised North America and Europe than compromise over power or inequality. Deindustrialisation has created the economic insecurity need to break the back of the middle and working classes.
The coming food crisis was engineered to eliminate many of the "extras". Take Afghanistan for example, no food, the Taliban loses control, the "fighters" move out of the country (Syria for instance where the USA pays them to attack Assad) those that are left die, and wow, all that vast mineral wealth is there for the taking.
After all, how many people does it take to staff a mansion? With robotics, how many to staff the factory?
They don't want us "all dead", but they do talk a lot about "useless eaters" -- like retirees on Social Security which is why it has to be privatized.
This is the new Holocaust. It is happening slowly, gradually so we don't see it happening. The "war" between the Boomers and the Millennials then gets manufactured out of thin air to divert attentions. The higher incidence in death among those just now retiring and the fact that their single source of income, a social security check, is confiscated to house them in a single room of a ancient hotel that has no good heat is no longer talked about.
C'mon Caitlin, You know you want Australia to join NATO too! It doesn't matter that you're not anywhwere near the North Atlantic. Oh, and please bring Japan and South Korea with you and those namby pambies in New Zealand and most certainly the Republic of China (in Taiwan) and all those silly litte island nations in the South Pacific too! How else are we going to beat the (fake) Commies unless we have a World War? OCEANIA FOREVER!
This phenomenon (the US/NATO alliance against an alleged "evil empire") is sometimes referred to as "shared psychosis" or "folie à millions" (madness by the millions) among followers, a phenomenon well documented by renowned mental health experts such as Carl Jung and Erich Fromm. The power of the US corporate media to persuade Europeans to join us in this insanity is at once both surprising and very disappointing. As Noam Chomsky stated, whatever else happens in Russia/Ukraine, the US has already conquered the EU. This is a huge victory for US weapons manufacturers and US Big Oil, and a huge defeat for world peace and the possibility of life on earth ending at any moment.
The United States is suffering. Biden: "Let's stay in war forever!" Tone deaf as always.
That is not solely Biden's mantra. Name me one President since Jimmy Carter that wasn't for war. I'm not so sure on Carter's stance, he just happened to be president while the USA was still licking its wounds from Vietnam.
It's like a collective madness has enveloped over Europe and these other countries that are supporting the US/NATO/UK.... support for Ukraine,and their hatred and willingness to destroy Russia! .............
Reminds me of one of those stupid SCI-FY/Horror movies,where Satan casts an evil spell over everybody,and they end up running round chopping people to death with meat axes or something! .......... Maybe someone has put something in all their drinking water........... I dont know.... but something strange is happening to their collective consciousness, and they are running round the world like a depraved psychopath wrecking the joint and spraying shit everywhere!
Reading news like that makes me positively thrilled about being old. Maybe I'm old enough to actually die of old age before this whole can of worms spills all over the world. If it starts before I'm gone, I'll be gone in a nanosecond. I won't wait for the hunger, the disease, the radiation poisoning's slow death, the misery of war. I feel sorry for the young ones, who may still think that the future is bright. It ain't bright, sweethearts. It's the nuclear explosions on the horizon.
The Baby Boomers had it pretty good compared to what is on the horizon. And it just seems impossible to stop it now - the repression, the failure of the US Constitution to even protect our most fundamental rights - the unabated economic slavery of ordinary Americans - and the ever increasing militarism and wars ...
I do wonder though, as I'm getting up there in age myself as well, if there is anything after we die? Or is it all just a random joke?
After we die, whatever there is, it won't concern us. We will be GONE forever. I am not afraid of death. I am terrified of pain.
I love life, and the more I love life, the more sad it makes me that death might bring an end to it forever. Who can blame me?
Connecting this news with other news this week, WW3 looms ever more ominously:
* NATO chief announced an increase of troops from 40k to 600k (650% increase)
* US Army announced it will no longer require high school diploma for enlistment
* US Congress moved to require women to register for the draft
Also, whatever concessions Turkey extracted from NATO in exchange for not vetoing Finland and Sweden's membership are unlikely to contribute to peace in Eurasia.
I wonder how the congress figures the women registering for the draft, AND now the abortion ban. Do they give us a choice of either enlisting, or producing more cannon fodder? Or they figure a pregnant ones can fight as well, because the pregnancy is their problem, not the Army's? Can they make us give it to them both ways? I refuse to give it to them in ANY way.
Army hospitals are Federal territory, they don't have to follow state laws.
Other than Putin who shows measured Russian response
Seems one must be the
Mad insane sort to be in power
Yes, Putin does seem to be the only grownup on the political stage. Xi is probably there also. While they are authoritarians, the governments in Russia and China manage their Oligarchy. In the USA and the West, the Oligarchy manages the government.
Folks might want to read the first inscription of the Georgia Guidestones. This chaos is happening on purpose.
But we should all cheer up, the supreme court has upheld our second amendment rights. Just hope folks will have a clue about where to aim.
"How do we convince people in power to preserve that future?"
Wish I knew the answer to that question.
The Swedish government played a crucial role in the empire's persecution of Assange.
Regarding Sweden, Caitlin.
Yes, it did and will be remembered for that dirty little piece of deviant behaviour for a long time to come. That was the beginning of lies, lies and more bloody lies from that once respected neutral. No one deserved to be treated that way and Julian Assange has paid the price with his time in incarceration. He also respected Sweden.
You won't easily dismiss those actions, Sweden. As much to blame as the arch criminal USA when it comes to that shameful episode. Fantasyland, a la Walt Disney.
It seems that even Sweden with its neutral stance in the past can be tempted to fall into line (that is , bed) with corrupt whores like the USA if the price is right. And it must have been right. Then, all of a sudden, it floated off the airwaves, all done, thanks. Purpose served.
No doubt the skilled research of Caitlin will source out the true story one day. There were so many people in Sweden involved in the dirty deed, the rubbish bin now cleared of statutory declarations, photos of the "ladies" involved, witness statements by the score, legal judgement by government mouthpieces and other associated groups and on and on. The Brothers Grimm couldn't have done a better job, had they been Swedish.
Seemed as though it could have been a possibility then, just for a month or two (as it was Sweden, a respected country in those days) but not now.....and never again. Now tarred with the same colours as the rest of the NATO bunch of US puppets.
Sweden is fully in line with the Great Reset agenda, surveillance capitalism, society controlled by Silicon Valley. E.g. subcutaneous microchips have long replaced actual credit cards, train tickets, and more recently vaccine passports in Sweden. That's why they were allowed some freedom with their Covid policies, because they already are on board and confirmed obedient poodles.
Me too. Everyday it seems the idiots--I mean, oligarchs--in power have more of a death wish. I just wish they'd leave the planet and leave the rest of us out of it. Maybe we can blast them off Earth in one of Bezos' giant phallic-symbol toys?
Not a death wish for themselves. Only for us.
If only.... Short of that maybe we could agree on some nice
island somewhere, far away from us and let them rule themselves and create NWO. We could even provide them with more than
essentials to get them started.
No, those are only sub-orbital toys. Musk's launchers could carry them one-way all the way to Venus, the real-life Hell they deserve.
How can the citizens of NATO countries do anything to prevent their governments and businesses from killing life on earth? If those countries were democratic, the answer would be obvious - through courts, protests, media work or strikes. Some people, including even myself, are still doing it. Are we very delusional? What kind of resistance is even possible in Orwellian military and financial autocracies?
Further to my comments, I'd add that as far as NATO is concerned, resistance is easy. Humanise the Russians. You do not have to agree with them, apologise for their government or justify the military action in the Donbass. Just offer an alternative to the racist and vile garbage that is being spewed at the Russians and Russophones.
With a name like Jacek, I assume you are Polish. There is nothing NATO wants more than to see people in or from east-central or eastern Europe stewing in hatred for Russia. Just being sane, fair and human about the Russians robs NATO of the anger and contrived hatred they seek.
NB I have family antecedents in the former Warsaw Pact (Czechia and Poland) and I can assure you that simply being balanced about Russia and respectful (not buying into the humbug and the vitriol) is resistance itself. My father was liberated by Marshal Konev's army as a boy and I deeply resent the way NATO supporters are carrying on. Regardless of ethnicity, language or religion the peoples across the region owe it to each other to refuse the invitation to mutual hatred and rivalry. Resist the banning of Russian athletes and artists, condemn those who tear down memorials and answer back at the propagandists for war. Those hyenas need to be identified for what they are. Even if all you do is read a Russian novel or listen to a Russian song, do it. It is the right thing to do.
You are on the right track and are a decent man. More power to you.
Great idea! I'm in an online group where we read modern literature online. We read an Afghan writer last time. I'll suggest a Russian one next time. Any tips? Ideally short stories, maybe about the West from the Russian point of view and available in English? I'll ask some Russian speakers I know too.
Recommendations? If by modern you mean 20th c, my all-time favourite would be IT'S ME, EDDIE by Edward Limonov or any of his other works set in America (HIS BUTLER'S STORY). Several have been translated into English. IT'S ME, EDDIE is very hard to get now (it was published in the 80s) and probably would not be available but if you ever find a copy, read it. It is a fictionalised autobiography about life in Manhattan in the 70s....absolutely nothing else remotely like it. It is an eye-opening take on America. There has been talk that it might be made into a movie.
Zakhar Prolepin's SIN is supposed to be very good. I have a copy, but have yet to get round to reading it (I have piles of books waiting).
Since your taste runs to exotic (Afghan) I'd recommend THE BLIND OWL by Sadegh Hedayat. He was Iranian, a student of Sartre. It is fairly short, but brilliant.
Don't ever get discouraged or think that you are not making a difference. They rely on this happening. Don't confuse mainstream media attention for making an impact.
Resistance cannot expect to work if it just follows an established, cliched, idea of protest or opposition. The system knows how to shut all this down or co-opt it very quickly. And the West is not autocratic: we have oligarchies with dispersed forms of power in which every institution is synchronised ideologically with every other institution. Disrupting this synchronisation is the key to resistance.
I suspect that grassroots organising should aim to create parallel structures of all kinds. These do not have to be resource intensive or formal. Alternate fora for disseminating news and opinions (Substack is a great example of this), associations that relieve the isolation and anomie so prevalent in our time, just about anything that brings people together in ways that do not support the regime; film groups, book clubs, study groups, clubs for hobbies can all be used to cultivate alternatives or build trust and cohesion (qualities that the regime fear when they are found amongst the ruled). Anything that does not default to promoting or legitimising regime propaganda. Experimentation always helps. Trust your own judgement and experience.
Full-out madness has come over the world, and Stoltenberg is just the figurehead. The gross insult is they want to kill us all - with this mediocrity as agent. Russia will take as dim a view of Finland/Sweden Nato membership as they did of Georgia's, and the possibility of Ukraine's. This is a poker game played by drunken sailors, misfits and the delusional, and the ante provided by the deep pockets of the taxpayer, for as long as it lasts. There are no winners here.
You are 100% right about the poker game played by "drunken sailors, misfits and the delusional".
Russia will be patient. She is clearly winning militarily and economically. The defeat of the Ukrainians in the Donbass is now very close. Once that happens things will develop very fast and we will see chaos across much of Ukraine. The humiliation in Washington will surpass the effect of the withdrawl from Kabul by an order of magnitude.
There will be no northern front against NATO, unless NATO provokes one (always a possibility). By Christmas the sanctions will have Europe in turmoil. Johnson and Schulz will most likely be gone and Macron will be overwhelmed by a renewed wave of popular unrest.
Baskin Robbins announces their newest flavor: Nato, sold in a self-licking ice cream cone.
Good. Fuck Russia.
The foolishness and ineptitude of the Empire's managers never cease to amaze. It's not at all clear that they have figured out that Russia's military capacity far exceeds that of the West and will continue to do so for the foreseeable future. Maybe being blind to reality is a prerequisite for the job.
Please consider that while many of our "leaders" (Blinken for example) are stupid, there is a reason they were put into place under the leadership of a demented fool.
If the Oligarchy didn't want this war, it wouldn't be happening.
I'm going to mention again, the first inscription on the Georgia Guidestones installed by some "anonymous" group. It wasn't put there by any religious organization or civic group. It may have been a small group, but they are very rich. They see the coming climate catastrophe.
I don’t disagree that oligarchs are in control, but they are not omniscient or incapable of error. In provoking a war with Russia, they almost certainly expected a different result—militarily, economically and geopolitically. The balance of power is now tipping towards Russia, China and the Global South, and a multipolar world is taking shape. Perhaps, in the end, a different set of oligarchs will grab the reins of power, but that will not have been part of the original plan.
A large degree of confusion over what is happening is inevitable. We are never given the truth about what is happening.
My guess is that the present oligarchy is making a mess, but elements of the oligarchy expect to cash in on the dysfunction that they have seen coming. They are sharks in a feeding frenzy and they are always happy to chew off each others' fins, given the opportunity.
Supporting radical Ukrainian nationalism and undermining the Minsk Accords was a mistake, just as trusting to the reliability of strategic advice from a compliant and hollowed out Pentagon (compromised by generations of prioritising conformism over competence) was a mistake. Turning a country the size of the Ukraine into another Kossovo or Afghanistan was insane, while posting NATO officers and NCOs to the Ukraine and encouraging the use of heavy artillery against Russian communities in Donetsk and Lughansk was the very definition of recklessness and criminality and was obviously designed to create an impression of weakness on the part of Putin, leading to his overthrow.
What is unclear is why Washington did not back down when they realised that Putin was getting serious. Why did they persist with the artillery assault on the Russians seeking autonomy within the Ukraine? My guess is that Washington wants the ethnic Russians out of the region very badly, so as to place NATO bases there. The co-location of hydrocarbon resources (needed to repay the loans to Ukraine by the West) is a factor too, as is a desire to leverage as much advantage from NATO's remaining strength as fast as possible.
They (Washington, Brussels, London) have been bluffing about their strengths for a long-time and have become stupid enough to fall for their own humbug. The diplomacy over the Ukrainian crisis has been so inept that you get the impression Washington is no longer capable of coherent policy-making. It is all reptile-brain geopolitics. The West is weakening, not just economically but in terms of ability at the top as well.
I agree with most of what you say. But I’m sure some members of the Oligarchy actively engineered this crisis in order to kill off large portions of humanity.
I understand you probably won’t go that far. Thing is my perspective (to me) makes a response more urgent. Time to get James Bond to hunt down Spectre.
For certain there are some elements within the oligarchy who are actively and virulently malicious, even to the point of consciously supporting what you might call a form of constructed mass homicide via economic restructuring. Russia during the Yeltsin era experienced this directly and the Ukraine appears to have also become a deindustrialised dystopia with Malthusian touches.
The trends in the mortality rates in the Rust Belt in the US are sinister. They are also potentially predictive of what is in store for many of us: shortened life-spans with increasing frequencies of chronic illness. The majority of the oligarchy are cheerfully indifferent and find any number of ways to ignore or dismiss the implications of the crypto-Malthusian element in their assumptions.
My concern is that we need to be cautious how we frame things. I have met phenomenal resistance from friends, acquaintances, colleagues etc whenever I have broached anything connected to these subjects. Even 'progressives' do not want to acknowledge the implications of what is happening, while the right wingers rave on in ways that are outrageous and potentially incendiary (Alex Jones is the most well known, but there are even worse out there). Getting the balance right is difficult. I tend to think focusing on the hard evidence helps, but am unsure how much notice many people pay to this.
Being cautious reminds me of the saying about nothing in the middle of the road but dead armadillos.
How do you get people to pay attention?
Have you noticed that no one cares about Ukraine any longer? This is especially disturbing given that it is Ukraine that is the source of our inflation.
Call me Cassandra
It is difficult to discuss the oligarchy and at the same time make clear they are not monolithic. You’re a foolish oligarchs just as they are foolish people. Some of the Oligarchs got played. Just like Lehman Brothers.
The war is an opportunity for profit. It enables the US and European arms industries to secure guaranteed profits, as well as economies of scale for sales that will fund the development of the next generation of weaponry.
The sanctions will cut Europe off from Russia. This sends the price of energy through the roof, ,making European industry uncompetitive and kills off the threat of Europe being integrated with Russia and China. The euro is guaranteed to remain no threat to a petrodollar under growing pressure. Deindustrialisation kills off the European social model that the US has never liked (the demonstration effect of a functioning welfare state and socialised medicine etc).
Perhaps you should look into "de-dollarization" . Michael Hudson has been talking about it for over a decade and it is now here with groups of nations around the world proposing their own currencies.
IOW, I'm not saying that there's no profit, but I am saying that it will be only the Oligarchy that survives the hyperinflation that is coming.
The USA has already been deindustrialize. Russia has shot off more cruise missiles in 4 months than the USA can produce in a year. And 500 people were just hired for that Russian factory.
The Oligarchy wants to kill us.
Michael Hudson is essential reading. No one understands or explains it better. He is an invaluable asset for anyone trying to figure things out. His videos are brilliant too.
Hyperinflation is the oligarchs' comfort zone. The hyperinflation in Germany in the 20s allowed the giant German industrial firms to pay off vast debts accrued during WW1, when they borrowed to expand production in the expectation of gaining new markets through military victory.
Steady high inflation in the US will enable the US governments to reduce the burden of their debts. Cashed up oligarchs will buy assets from people under economic stress. The bankruptcy of small and medium firms will allow the further consolidation of monopolies and oligopolies.
The oligarchs do not want us dead...only poor and insecure. They'd rather rule over a pauperised North America and Europe than compromise over power or inequality. Deindustrialisation has created the economic insecurity need to break the back of the middle and working classes.
"Poor and insecure" absolutely.
But that hardly means they don't want us dead.
The coming food crisis was engineered to eliminate many of the "extras". Take Afghanistan for example, no food, the Taliban loses control, the "fighters" move out of the country (Syria for instance where the USA pays them to attack Assad) those that are left die, and wow, all that vast mineral wealth is there for the taking.
After all, how many people does it take to staff a mansion? With robotics, how many to staff the factory?
They don't want us "all dead", but they do talk a lot about "useless eaters" -- like retirees on Social Security which is why it has to be privatized.
This is the new Holocaust. It is happening slowly, gradually so we don't see it happening. The "war" between the Boomers and the Millennials then gets manufactured out of thin air to divert attentions. The higher incidence in death among those just now retiring and the fact that their single source of income, a social security check, is confiscated to house them in a single room of a ancient hotel that has no good heat is no longer talked about.
The Oligarchy wants us dead.
Russia has a huge stock of Soviet-era anti-ship missiles that they are primarily using.
With every NATO expansion the West gets smaller and smaller.
Imagining possibilities too awful to say. Hope I might be wrong. Best I say nothing more.
C'mon Caitlin, You know you want Australia to join NATO too! It doesn't matter that you're not anywhwere near the North Atlantic. Oh, and please bring Japan and South Korea with you and those namby pambies in New Zealand and most certainly the Republic of China (in Taiwan) and all those silly litte island nations in the South Pacific too! How else are we going to beat the (fake) Commies unless we have a World War? OCEANIA FOREVER!
You're being sarcastic aren't you?
This phenomenon (the US/NATO alliance against an alleged "evil empire") is sometimes referred to as "shared psychosis" or "folie à millions" (madness by the millions) among followers, a phenomenon well documented by renowned mental health experts such as Carl Jung and Erich Fromm. The power of the US corporate media to persuade Europeans to join us in this insanity is at once both surprising and very disappointing. As Noam Chomsky stated, whatever else happens in Russia/Ukraine, the US has already conquered the EU. This is a huge victory for US weapons manufacturers and US Big Oil, and a huge defeat for world peace and the possibility of life on earth ending at any moment.