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Links 8/15/2024

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Brave Goat ‘Sneaks In’ to Livestock Guardian Dog Pack Like the Best Helper Parade Pets

Alaska Airlines flight diverts as red-faced pilot admits to passengers he’s ‘not qualified’ to land at mountain airport Daily Mail

Climate

Climate crisis activists halt traffic at major German airports Anadolu Agency

Antarctic is svelte from melt, but that’s not good Colorado Sun

Water

Startups Are Racing to Make Water Out of Thin Air Bloomberg

Pantanal waterway project would destroy a ‘paradise on Earth’, scientists warn Guardian

Syndemics

Doctors accused of spreading misinformation lose certifications WaPo

China

China industrial output grows at slowest rate in four months FT

China is on track to overtake France and the United States as the world’s leading source of atomic power BNE Intellinews. Musical interlude.

China to control exports of critical mineral antimony from next month South China Morning Post

* * *

No quick fix China Daily

Managing the Sino-American AI Race Project Syndicate

China Warily Observes Bangladesh Political Transition China Digital Times

Commentary: Beijing’s Baltic confession exposes undersea vulnerability Channel News Asia

India

Rural aspirations: Economic opportunities need to be spread across India Business Standard

Hindenburg Report: Silence from Government and Absurd Statements Further Erode India’s Credibility The Wire

Extrajudicial Killings May Be Frequent in India’s Most Populous State New Lines Magazine

India braces for indefinite nationwide port strike Splash 247

A new Kashmir rail bridge that could be a game-changer for India BBC

The fall of Bangladesh’s iron lady The New Arab

Africa

Laundering Carbon and the New Scramble for Africa Climate and Capitalism

The Great Game

Helsinki Commission: “Georgia’s ruling party is using black money” JAM News

Syraqistan

U.S. Navy Prepares For Protracted Middle East Conflict Naval News. Commentary:

US NSC to ‘Post’: Claims of sharing intel of Mossad agents with Tehran ‘Categorically false’ Jerusalem Post

Top Hamas official says group is losing faith in US as mediator in Israel-Gaza ceasefire talks The New Arab

Far-right Israeli minister sparks outrage by praying at flashpoint mosque Agence France Presse

Slogans and Lies John MacArthur, Harpers

European Disunion

The Strange Logic of Germany’s Antisemitism Bureaucrats Jewish Currents

Dear Old Blighty

Children to be taught how to spot extremist content and fake news online Guardian

Dreaming of Downfall New Left Review

We Are The Bad Guys Craig Murray

New Not-So-Cold War

A Drunken Evening, a Rented Yacht: The Real Story of the Nord Stream Pipeline Sabotage WSJ

The competing theories of the Nord Stream explosions FT

Germany issues arrest warrant for Ukrainian suspect over Nord Stream sabotage France24

Ukraine and Russia Plan to Keep Gas Flowing Amid Fighting Bloomberg

* * *

Deception and a Gamble: How Ukrainian Troops Invaded Russia NYT

Ukraine’s Ombudsman explains purpose of establishing military commandants’ offices in Russia’s Kursk Oblast Ukrainska Pravda

SITREP 8/14/24: Zelensky Doubles Down as His Front Collapses Simplicius, Simplicius the Thinker

* * *

French Fighters on Both Sides: ‘Normandie-Niemen’ Drone Squadron Helping Russia to Repel Ukraine’s Kursk Offensive Military Watch

Russians attack Odesa with ballistic missile, targeting port infrastructure Ukrainska Pravda

* * *

Ukraine and Russia begin talks on exchange of prisoners captured in Kursk FT

Putin the Resilient Foreign Affairs The deck: “Predicting the Collapse of His Regime Is Wishful Thinking.”

The Value of Trust in World Politics Valdai Discussion Club

Antitrust

What Should We Do About Google? Tim Wu, NYT

Spook Counry

It turns out that the Trump mess was no bug in the system Greg Gutfeld, FOX:

Two months ago, a man in shorts and a T-shirt walked through an open door in the [FBI] Miami field office and spent the night. First, he took a shower, then downloaded porn on a computer…. Next morning, he asked employees where he could get a cup of coffee, and they got him coffee. Hell, I don’t get treated that well at Starbucks and I own Starbucks. He was only caught when he entered a defensive tactics class, and someone finally asked who the hell he was… Now, look, no agency is perfect, but when some clown can wander into a classified facility, watch porn, wash up, spend the night, have breakfast, and then attend a tactical training session, is it any wonder a whack job can ride up on a bike and shoot Trump? Best Buy has better security…. So forget the conspiracy theories unless it’s a conspiracy of decline, and it’s everywhere.

The Final Frontier

BP to help Nasa establish base on the Moon Space,cpm

Ocean’s worth of water may be buried within Mars — but can we get to it? Space.com

NASA to decide on how to bring home stranded astronauts by end of the month Al Jazeera

Digital Watch

AI stole my job and my work, and the boss didn’t know – or care The Register

I Gazed Lovingly Into Strangers’ Eyes on ‘Eyechat’ 404 Media

Zeitgeist Watch

Diminishing returns:

Class Warfare

Grocery Teamster Gets Job Back, Prepares to Organize for More Labor Notes

Defending national sovereignty and delinking. A question of class struggle and rights Countercurrents

Proteomics identifies potential immunological drivers of postinfection brain atrophy and cognitive decline Nature. From the Abstract: “Infections have been associated with the incidence of Alzheimer disease and related dementias, but the mechanisms responsible for these associations remain unclear. Using a multicohort approach, we found that influenza, viral, respiratory, and skin and subcutaneous infections were associated with increased long-term dementia risk. These infections were also associated with region-specific brain volume loss, most commonly in the temporal lobe. … Our findings support the role of infections in dementia risk and identify molecular mediators by which infections may contribute to neurodegeneration.”

Rawls the redeemer Aeon

Antidote du jour (Nicor):

See yesterday’s Links and Antidote du Jour here.

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About Lambert Strether

Readers, I have had a correspondent characterize my views as realistic cynical. Let me briefly explain them. I believe in universal programs that provide concrete material benefits, especially to the working class. Medicare for All is the prime example, but tuition-free college and a Post Office Bank also fall under this heading. So do a Jobs Guarantee and a Debt Jubilee. Clearly, neither liberal Democrats nor conservative Republicans can deliver on such programs, because the two are different flavors of neoliberalism (“Because markets”). I don’t much care about the “ism” that delivers the benefits, although whichever one does have to put common humanity first, as opposed to markets. Could be a second FDR saving capitalism, democratic socialism leashing and collaring it, or communism razing it. I don’t much care, as long as the benefits are delivered. To me, the key issue — and this is why Medicare for All is always first with me — is the tens of thousands of excess “deaths from despair,” as described by the Case-Deaton study, and other recent studies. That enormous body count makes Medicare for All, at the very least, a moral and strategic imperative. And that level of suffering and organic damage makes the concerns of identity politics — even the worthy fight to help the refugees Bush, Obama, and Clinton’s wars created — bright shiny objects by comparison. Hence my frustration with the news flow — currently in my view the swirling intersection of two, separate Shock Doctrine campaigns, one by the Administration, and the other by out-of-power liberals and their allies in the State and in the press — a news flow that constantly forces me to focus on matters that I regard as of secondary importance to the excess deaths. What kind of political economy is it that halts or even reverses the increases in life expectancy that civilized societies have achieved? I am also very hopeful that the continuing destruction of both party establishments will open the space for voices supporting programs similar to those I have listed; let’s call such voices “the left.” Volatility creates opportunity, especially if the Democrat establishment, which puts markets first and opposes all such programs, isn’t allowed to get back into the saddle. Eyes on the prize! I love the tactical level, and secretly love even the horse race, since I’ve been blogging about it daily for fourteen years, but everything I write has this perspective at the back of it.

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232 comments

  1. Antifa

    METHANE THROUGH THE NORDSTREAM
    (melody borrowed from Say You Love Me  by Christie McVie as performed by Fleetwood Mac)

    (August 13, 2024—Germany issued an arrest warrant for one Volodomyr Z for his role in blowing up the Nordstream pipeline in 2022. If he didn’t do it, that leaves only the USA, which would mean one NATO member attacking another NATO member. No, no, no—it has to be Volodomyr Z, whoever he is, and wherever he might be.)

    They’re looking lately for one Vo-lo-do-myr Z.
    You know he blew up Nordstream deep beneath the Baltic Sea
    He did it with some friends our data shows
    From a rented yacht he laid the bombs down below

    Who’s seen Vo-lo-do-myr Z around?
    Diver dude who took the Nordstream down?
    Ya gotta give him a big thumbs up
    Ending methane through the Nordstream!

    Yes it sounds crazy—we’ve searched for him the whole world over
    The deed was ghastly, a bubbling bubbling gas gusher
    Without that methane Europe’s bound to freeze
    He’s been seen now and then but the Z man still runs free

    Who’s seen Vo-lo-do-myr Z around?
    Diver dude who took the Nordstream down?
    Ya gotta give him a big thumbs up
    Ending methane through the Nordstream!

    (musical interlude)

    Maybe maybe we can find this guy today
    He’s a real thrill seeker—does it for the pay
    What he did is so wrong it enrages me
    If you see Volodomyr here’s the number where I’ll be

    Who’s seen Vo-lo-do-myr Z around?
    Diver dude who took the Nordstream down?
    Ya gotta give him a big thumbs up
    Ending methane through the Nordstream!

    Who’s seen Vo-lo-do-myr Z around?
    Diver dude who took the Nordstream down?
    Ya gotta give him a big thumbs up
    Ending methane through the Nordstream!

    Methane through the Nordstream . . .
    Methane through the Nordstream . . .

    Stalling, stalling, stalling
    Stalling, stalling, stalling (yeah)
    Stalling, stalling, stalling
    Stalling, stalling, stalling
    Stalling, stalling, stalling
    Stalling, stalling, stalling

    2. lyman alpha blob

      RE: Germany issues arrest warrant for Ukrainian suspect over Nord Stream sabotage

      Another ‘how dumb do they think we are?’ piece. From the article –

      “Different German media outlets reported Wednesday that they had reached Volodymyr Z. and the woman in question, who both denied any involvement.”

      There’s a warrant out for Mr. Z’s arrest, the media apparently know how to contact him, so presumably so do the German authorities. And yet Mr. Z has not been arrested yet. My guess is they will track down this mysterious Mr. Z sometime around never.

  3. The Rev Kev

    “Alaska Airlines flight diverts as red-faced pilot admits to passengers he’s ‘not qualified’ to land at mountain airport”

    Actually I have a lot of respect for that pilot. With all those people’s lives at risk if something went wrong, he decided not to box himself into a bad situation and diverted that plane instead. If I was a passenger on that plane I would have shaken that pilot’s hand but I will let Dirty Harry have the last word here-

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_VrFV5r8cs0 (10 secs)

    1. earthling

      Yes! Possible tragedy averted. We should all know our limitations and admit them if it means it will keep other people safe. Hope he comes out of this with career intact and not set back.

    2. jefemt

      Used to be a one-stop flight on Frontier from BZN to DEN, the one stop in Jackson. I love to fly, but one winter flight I was on made me second guess commercial aviation- I have never been in a plane that dropped, bottomless, at least four seconds to ‘grab air’…in white out vertiginous December conditions like a time landing in Jackson.
      Knowing the horst-graben fault- built Tetons were out there to the west was additionally un-nerving. Sometimes trust and faith in science is trumped by knowing the operators are humans and Nature bats last.

    3. XXYY

      I had the same reaction when I read this. The pilot must have felt tremendous pressure to just land anyway. All his passengers would be late, he would have to make an embarrassing revelation to his employer and the people on the plane, and he risked making his whole enterprise look comical and unserious.

      However, some combination of factors kept this from happening. Training, regulations, licensure, personal integrity, and the knowledge that at least some of his superiors would back him up in the decision seem to have tipped at the scale in the right direction.

      Definitely a case where the system worked against all odds .

  4. Terry Flynn

    re UK fake news spotting. For quite a while I, seeing that real productivity and what “we can actually do” meant a 4 day week was sufficient, have thought that the “fifth working day” should be a day when we ALL attend “continuing professional development” stuff.

    We should all be taught how to interpret stuff like sensitivity/specificity of tests that are thrown at us by medics; how to understand that those statistics on TV regarding the “new toothpaste” are garbage; how voting systems can be manipulated etc. All the “common sense” stuff that are routinely hijacked by Elon et al.

    I’m Gen X and don’t have a lot of time for younger people who present on YouTube but I’ve gotta give them something: there are quite a few of them who can present quite esoteric ideas in “YouTube shorts”. They should be given a platform to teach EVERYONE about things like fiat money, MMT, etc.

    1. .Tom

      I think the competition among youtoobers has really advanced the quality of some kinds of teaching. So much better than the rubbish we got at school back in the day (not all of it bad, just some).

      The flip side is that people are learning unorthodox beliefs. Back in the day all we had was TV and newspapers. Hence the big push against misinfo and hate speech and the big show of punishment. It’s already a horrible mess in the UK and going to get worse and people will suffer. But how do you get that genie back in the bottle? The harder you try the more obvious the game is. You can create a chilling effect that way but how many people must be punished to win the next election? Can that really work?

      And much to my surprise it’s being remarked on in the mainstream outside the UK. On a discussion forum I enjoy that focuses on technical stuff there’s an off topic thread where people share jokes. I’ve recently enjoyed several that take Starmer’s authoritarian clamp down as it’s theme and politics isn’t even a permitted topic on the site. One was a Monopoly board, UK Edition with a picture of Starmer in the middle and every single square on the board is “Go to Jail”. It’s a good one. Another was a meme about a SWAT team at the home of a kid that shared a meme.

      1. .Tom

        The Monopoly board image appears to be a rehash of an older one “The New Egypt Monopoly” from about 10 years back.

        1. The Rev Kev

          Well I don’t know about you guys but I for one am looking forward to the formation of Starmer’s Junior Spies-

          ‘Nearly all children nowadays were horrible. What was worst of all was that by means of such organizations as the Spies they were systematically turned into ungovernable little savages, and yet this produced in them no tendency whatever to rebel against the discipline of the Party. On the contrary, they adored the Party and everything connected with it… All their ferocity was turned outwards, against the enemies of the State, against foreigners, traitors, saboteurs, thought-criminals. It was almost normal for people over thirty to be frightened of their own children.’ ― George Orwell, 1984

          ‘Who has control of the children of today has control of the adults of tomorrow.’ ― Rev Kev, 2024

    3. Mikel

      I’ll believe all the interest in fighting “fake news” when they fight the plethora of fake financial news.

      1. ACPAL

        Pardon my scepticism but I can’t imagine the British government allowing anyone teaching the public, let alone children, how to tell when they, the government, are lying. Worse, giving the public the ability to spot all the lies that have led to wars, assassinations and torture, economic malfeasance, political graft, and etcetera could cause the government to collapse. Further, I can’t imagine the US allowing any western nation to teach this.

        1. Mikel

          Well, since your comment ended up here…I’ll answer:
          ” Further, I can’t imagine the US allowing any western nation to teach this.”

          It doesn’t matter if it’s taught or not. They don’t see any “public” holding them accountable for anything. Even the most obvious nonsense.

        2. .Tom

          I wouldn’t trust the British government to teach basic arithmetic but schools manage. I think it’s a great idea for schools to teach critical thinking. I propose they start with the Jimmy Dore mantra: The number one source of disinformation is the government; number two is the new media; randos on Twitter are a distant third.

          1. Terry Flynn

            I’m now probably on a list but the clue is “trusting the UK govt to teach us critical faculties”.

            Won’t happen. And is why in general election a few weeks ago I followed Jonathan Pie’s suggestion and drew a big spaffing cock on my ballot paper.

            In the UK the number of spoiled ballots is counted. I wish that my half-Aussie rules were followed in making voting compulsory. We can at least begin to learn if the non-voters are satisfied or utterly pissed off.

            1. Terry Flynn

              PS I talked to the local election official. She knew full well that I’d spoiled my ballot simply because NOBODY takes a couple of minutes to put the tick/cross in the ballot. She was absolutely professional about ensuring democracy but I knew she was disillusioned about the current UK.

              I really felt sorry for her and she admitted she was exhausted with life generally.

  5. The Rev Kev

    ‘Sal Mercogliano (WGOW Shipping) 🚢⚓🐪🚒🏴‍☠️
    @mercoglianos
    Just a reminder that the @USNavy
    does not have enough oilers and the ones we have are old and worn out.
    1/We only have two T-AOEs left in the fleet and both are on the US East Coast. Supply just returned from a record breaking deployment with USS Eisenhower.’

    Yeah. Unless your logistics are sorted, you will be left with Navy ships running out of fuel and no ammo to shoot. Washington is keen on staring a brawl with China but if China decides to go after oilers, cargo ships repair ships, etc. it would slowly cripple the fighting ships of the Navy and leave them hanging on the vine. The trouble here is that neocons understand nothing of such things and just expect those ships to just appear in the same way that artillery rounds were suppose to just appear for the war in the Ukraine. For them, ship availability is an esoteric subject just as industrial production is and not worth their while understanding.

    1. NotTimothyGeithner

      The 800 bases are meant to replace the old support fleet. The Chinese won’t be concerned with the tankers but the stationary targets. 2 tankers won’t support a sustained war effort.

      Local vendors who supply the bases may be fine accepting inflated payments when the threat is local thugs with AKs but against Chinese missiles keeping the bases isolated they will bail. This is why support fleets exist. The bases are too small to have credible integrated defenses at least for sustained periods.

      A record breaking deployment means the Houthis aren’t just blocking transit of the Suez but supply runs from bases and local vendors.

      This was all a known critique of Clinton’s scrapping of the support fleet back in the 90’s to look like money was being saved. Senator Jim Webb was really big on this as a problem, and interestingly, Shrub made noises about this before the crusade.

      1. Neutrino

        When will there be some terminations, resignations or even demotions at the Pentagon?

        Not in the near future. The third quarter is the time-honored scare the taxpayers and politicians quarter. That is the time to publicize the must-have items in the growing Defense budget. Without those items, politicians will be soft on Defense, and soft on defense. Nobody wants that in an election year.

        At least in the private sector, the third quarter on the calendar means a little more time to scare, or just to signal budget cuts. In government, on their October to September fiscal year, there is no slack.

        Don’t expect politicians to address oiler, support fleet or any other such problems. They might appoint a committee Committee, but not a Blue Ribbon Committee, where they just talk and posture and preen. Useless to the commonweal.

        1. Wukchumni

          If our various Generalissimos were coaches in the NFL, their 1 & 16 seasons would mean an automatic contract extension, go team.

      2. Aurelien

        Here is a list of USN facilities outside the US. It’s not very impressive and Bahrein–the closest–is directly in the line of fire anyway. Even if the ships could take on fuel and armaments at one of these bases–which might be questionable–you still have to get the supplies there in the first place. I’m afraid “800 bases” won’t help: most are small administrative units, and one on examination turned out to be a transit desk at Accra airport in Ghana. Accra is near the sea, but not that near.

    2. JTMcPhee

      Neoliberal-neocon “understanding of the world” seems delimited by “rules” learned by playing “Monopoly ™,” which was actually created to warn of the DANGERS of acquisitive renter capitalism, https://www.lolaapp.com/origin-of-monopoly/, and “The Game of RISK! ™,” played in a patently fairy-tale world space. “As the name suggests, the goal was world domination, and it had players waging war with Napoleonic armies and navies across the globe until only one remained.” https://www.thehistoryreader.com/cultural-history/risk/

      But no sense even trying to understand and comment on the trajectory we are forced onto by our “successful betters” and their minions. Find a small community with its own well, and settle in to maybe weather the descent or prolong the inevitable. “In the end, we are all dead.”

      2. communistmole

        Without going into the question of Strauss’ influence on the neocons: this is not what Strauss understands by an esoteric understanding of a text.

    4. nippersdad

      “The trouble here is that neocons understand nothing of such things”

      Which reminds me of this mornings insane op-ed of the day: Biden Has To Choose To Win World War III

      “Global war waits for no country. It finds democratic nations when it is least desired. For now, it has found Ukraine and Israel. And if Biden fails to let these allies win it, World War III will find the U.S. as well.”*

      That must be one very small and very tough bubble to have to live in.

      * https://thehill.com/opinion/national-security/4827915-biden-world-war-iii/

      1. The Rev Kev

        Those people are literally insane. They actually want not only a NATO/Russia war in eastern Europe but a general all-out war involving the entire Middle East. And certainly China would be dragged in as well which also means an all-out war in the Pacific as well. Nobody wins a WW3 which is why we never had one. Nuclear winters are for keeps.

      2. ilsm

        They are not crazy their reality differs from yours.

        We are far down the rabbit hole and wandering.

        Next they will deny you your reality.

    5. ilsm

      I recall a quote from some highly placed American admiral early in WW II: “Logistics, i would like some of it”.

      US Navy is pretty good at refueling ay sea, if they have the tankers ship.

      Re-arming under weigh is a problem!

      Twenty trillion run through the pentagon the past several decades and no one thought we really might have to use the stuff……

      My last experience with US logistics was desert shield. We took 6 months!

      1. The Rev Kev

        ‘Re-arming under weigh is a problem!’

        If I recall correctly, when those US Navy ships have to load up more missiles when they go Winchester, they cannot do it at sea and must return to a port to do so. That seems to be a big limitation that.

      2. LawnDart

        Desert Shield almost killed me in so many ways. In July of ’90, as I was a loadmaster on C5s, I was a fighting 205-lbs, but by March/April I was down to mid/upper 130s– even though I often ate 4-5 MREs a day! On one stop back at Travis, I vaguely recall speaking a mix of Tagalog, Korean, Japanese and Pidgin English, accompanied by minicry and lots of gestures as I was trying to direct the loading crew– yeah, they were bewildered.

        Our aircraft were all kinds of f-ed up– red x’s throughout the maintenance log– under normal conditions this meant the aircraft was not allowed to fly, however… kinda surprised more of them didn’t crash.

        On the home-front, all boyfriend/girlfriend relationships that crewmembers had ended, and at our squadron was experiencing over 50% divorce-rate even before the start of Desert Storm.

        Longer-term, I went several years without a bug-bite, but I also came down with pnemonia 2-3 times a year…

        Yeah, we were logistics and six-months was wearing enough: I don’t see how we could have maintained that pace for a year.

        1. ilsm

          I was in C-141 outfit, supply.

          In 1973 when our aircraft stopped the channels to Southeast Asia we grounded most for backlog write ups.

          Late Fall 72 was all out, as was Oct 1973 to Israel.

          In summer 1990 I was staff in DC.

    7. Mikel

      Israel “defending itself” with a US show of force.

      At any rate, they’ll go into big war ill-prepared. It’s been done before.
      And besides, they can make all the mistakes they want because who is going to hold them accountable?
      The people in charge of making the bad decisions aren’t going to be the ones dying.

    8. scott s.

      Not sure of the reasoning why not building any more T-AOE. May be that when the CLF was all USN it made sense but under MSC not so much. So instead of T-AOE we have T-AO and T-AKE. That actually isn’t all that much different from my 70s-90s experience with AOs and AEs.

      What I see as the bigger issue now with Red Hill shut down is the handful of tankers DLA-E has to refill the T-AOs.

      As far as “800 bases” that doesn’t do much for logistics. In my day in PAC we had Guam, Yoko, and Subic for ships. After Subic closed most support got contracted out of Singapore (think Fat Leonard). But the Brit DGar (Diego Garcia) then became the hub for the North Arabian Sea / Gulf.

      There’s something called Fleet Readiness Center Western Pacific which handles contracted aircraft/GSE maintenance for Atsugi and Iwakuni plus deployers.

    10. XXYY

      … it would quickly cripple the fighting ships of the Navy…

      Fixed it for ya.

      Remember all the anti-ship missles!

  6. VTDigger

    I scoff at the article about turning something as nebulous and self centered as “Liberalism” into a church but then I remember Scientology exists…the human creature is malleable indeed!

  7. Balan Aroxdale

    Slogans and Lies John MacArthur, Harpers

    The accusation of apartheid is also distorted. With two million Arab citizens, the Israeli state is not comparable to pre-1991 South Africa. There is a strong tendency in Israel to keep Arabs and Jews segregated, as well as an informal discrimination toward Arabs. But the political system is not legally based on a separation of the races or of religions, notwithstanding Israel’s excessive requirement that all citizens swear loyalty “to the state of Israel, as a Jewish and democratic state.”

    Is there a term for this kind of tired intellectual, who can barely muster the energy to trot out cliches that any Tiki-Toking 12 year old can now see right through and moreover layout the nature and practice of apartheid in the West Bank? I’m imagining an older type who goes to more dinner parties than conferences and who rarely uses a smartphone or social media. If this letter wasn’t a laughing stock when first printed in French, then the Parisian intelligentsia must not be reading Harpers or LeDevoir anymore.

    1. Vicky Cookies

      The term is just ‘intellectual’. The priestly class will serve the power which enables it not to work with its hands, in most cases.

      The passage you quoted is shocking, though, in that it seems to me to scream the facts which disagree with it. “What about on the stolen and occupied land?” Is a thought I hope our 12 year old tik tok-ers are having as well.

      1. Lefty Godot

        After reading The Cultural Cold War (Frances Stonor Saunders), which describes how 1950s “Non-Communist Left” intellectuals were turned into barking seals for the CIA, I’m convinced that state-sponsored (or foundation-sponsored/corporate-sponsored) intellectuals are just another species of prostitute. It certainly pays off for them, career-wise, and they mostly pretend that their hands are clean. (Many of the ones in that book end up, not accidentally, as the nucleus for the current neocon mandarins.)

      2. .Tom

        They think we don’t notice when intellectuals show off their skills of twisting themselves into pretzels.

    2. Neutrino

      Magazines can become caricatures of themselves. When people tell you that they read only the factoid page in Harpers, or only the cartoons in The New Yorker, believe them. Add you own favorite has-been magazines, and newspapers.
      Rolling Stone, check.
      Certainly not worth the subscription prices.

    3. pjay

      From the opening paragraph:

      “The history-trained journalist in me can’t help but feel upset upon hearing phrases like, “Zionism is racism,” “Israel is an apartheid state,” “Israel is engaged in a genocide in Gaza,” or “Israel is colonialist.”

      Yes. What is the purpose of this essay? Here is a “liberal” intellectual who purports to be opposed to the current Gaza carnage but is “upset” when protesters use words like “racism,” “apartheid,” “genocide,” or “colonialist” and jumps through some ridiculous rhetorical hoops to make his point as if this somehow brings greater clarity for us poor dolts who are not linguistically precise! For whom is such a piece written, and why?

          1. Rolf

            In this era where the young have been trained to see microagressions as tantamount to real harm, the bar is likely to be set very low by historical standards.

            Here.

      2. 123

        Mr. MacArthur, ‘the history-trained journalist,’ obviously believes in the philosophical and logical truth, That if it looks like a duck, and swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck,’ then it ain’t a duck.

      3. ChrisRUEcon

        “history-trained journalist”

        What is that quote attributed to Napoleon again?

        History is written by the victors.

        Unfortunately the truth is near always better found in the tales of the oppressed.

        Family blogging liars … family blog them and their family blogging feelings.

    4. DJG, Reality Czar

      Thanks, Balan Aroxdale. I also read Slogans and Lies, which didn’t sit well with me during my afternoon walk.

      Aside from his moral slovenliness in dealing with segregation and discrimination against the Palestinians, he later in the article turns out to be an apologist for a kind of thinking that is reminiscent of Old Adolf (whom I hesitate to name):

      However, neither the current massacre nor an eventual expulsion constitutes genocide. As far as I know, there are no Jewish ideologues who want an Arab purge for pseudo-scientific reasons, like the Nazis wanted for the Jews. Frankly, project “Eretz Yisrael” is not so different, in principle, from the “manifest destiny” America inflicted on the country’s Indigenous population. Even if mass expulsion were to ensue, there is no Israeli plan to eliminate the Arabs.

      No, the reasons aren’t pseudo-scientific. They are bloody religious vengeance. And Manifest Destiny involved genocide: See Trail(s) of Tears.

      MacArthur wants to define genocide in such a way that there was only one in “recent history.” Yet Hitler noted that no one remembered the Armenians. Nor does MacArthur. But then, the official Turkish line is that the government didn’t truly advocate removing them. The government didn’t truly control the eastern provinces, so it left the massacres up to Kurdish militias. Another case of one oppressed people helpfully killing off another oppressed people. And the forcible conversions of Armenians: Heaven forfend.

      Yet I guarantee that the moral obtuseness on display in MacArthur’s essay is flourishing in the Biden administration, in university administrations across the U S of A, and even in the oh-so-righteous U.S. churches. And as always, they will not bear the consequences of their horrible actions and hellish opinions.

      1. ChrisRUEcon

        DJG, Reality Czar:

        > MacArthur wants to define genocide in such a way that there was only one in “recent history.”

        Exactly this … the only one that mattered was the one where the oppressor was the oppressed! Every oppressor (or their lackeys in journalism) wants to be able to effectively “Pontius Pilate” themselves away from the horrors they have inflicted, are about to inflict or are currently inflicting. And yes, what an awful miss with the comparison to the native American genocide! There’s a reason Harper’s circulation (via harpers.org) is hovering around 100K print and they largely depend on the coasts for their circulation – it’s palliative drivel for aging imperialists.

      2. ChrisRUEcon

        #Bonus

        > Yet I guarantee that the moral obtuseness on display in MacArthur’s essay is flourishing in the Biden administration

        Oh yes, it’s flourishing … (via Black Agenda Report)

      3. lyman alpha blob

        One wonders, for it to count as a genocide, do the aggressors have to kill ’em all?!!?? Because if so, then even Adolf’s efforts fell short.

        Not sure it really matters whether we call it a genocide, ethnic cleansing, or just good ol’ mass murder. It’s still an abomination done in our name.

      4. Balan Aroxdale

        That paragraph also made my eyes boggle. Especially since I’ve recently discovered David Sheens videos categorizing Israeli politics. He make it clear that Israel has become increasingly extremist over the last 30-40 years and that there are indeed “Jewish ideologues who want an Arab purge for pseudo-scientific reasons”, and religious reasons besides.

        Sheen has recently had to add a 5th category of “Messianists/Kahanists” to his list who are even more extreme and are explicitly all in on genocide as opposed to just ethnic cleansing. Videos are worth a watch.

      5. NN Cassandra

        I think it must be some sort of subversive parody. I mean, who does, in the course of arguing that what Israel is doing in Gaza isn’t genocide, brings up the fate of Indians in America and after equating it with what is done to Palestinians, concludes THAT means Israel isn’t doing genocide? I’m surprised he didn’t proudly announce that when Israel finishes its work in Gaza, it will give the remaining thousand or so Gazans some random desolate piece of land in Negev and maybe even let them run tax-extempt casinos there.

    5. Carolinian

      Agree that it is an astonishingly poor article from the long time Harper’s chief. The “no comparison to the Nazis” statement ignores the fact that the Nazis were enthusiastic Zionists. MacArthur seems to know nothing about the true origins of Zionism and uses that as a defense.

        1. barefoot charley

          John MacArthur is the son of John T and Margaret X MacA, whose foundation pays for all things true and beautiful including NPR, despite John himself having been a right-wing bottom-feeding insurance flogger in the Depression. His son’s apostate meanderings got into Harper’s because he bought it. I believe that’s how he got Lapham back in the saddle in the 80s–he funded him. So little John never came up against exigent editorial standards, and it always showed.

      2. artemis

        The Publisher’s Notes don’t appear in the print magazine. I’m a subscriber, and didn’t see it. I also get one or two of their email newsletters, and didn’t see it there. Finding it on the website is tricky, it’s buried.

    6. vao

      There is a strong tendency in Israel to keep Arabs and Jews segregated, as well as an informal discrimination toward Arabs. But the political system is not legally based on a separation of the races or of religions

      Israel’s citizenship law prohibits spouses of Israeli citizens from obtaining a residence permit in Israel proper or naturalization as Israeli national when they are residents of the occupied territories — or of other countries deemed as “enemy states” (Syria, Lebanon, Iran…). Except if the spouse in question is a Jew. Thus, an Israeli Palestinian cannot bring a Palestinian spouse from the West Bank to live in Israel, whereas a Jewish Israeli can marry and bring a Jewish settler from the West Bank to live in Israel.

      There you go: not informal, but formal discrimination based on “race or religion”.

      That article is obviously an example of ignorance or bad faith.

    7. Kouros

      Religious intermarriage is exceedingly rare among Jews in Israel. Only about 2% of Jews who are married or living with a romantic partner say they have a spouse or partner who belongs to a non-Jewish faith or is religiously unaffiliated.

      Religious intermarriages are not conducted in Israel, but marriages between members of different faiths conducted in other countries are recognized in Israel.

      https://www.pewresearch.org/religion/2016/03/08/intergroup-marriage-and-friendship/

      The bold was mine, and I think it implies the fact that intermarriages are in fact not allowed… Not apartheid…

  8. Watt4Bob

    …but if China decides to go after oilers, cargo ships repair ships, etc. it would slowly cripple the fighting ships of the Navy and leave them hanging on the vine.

    IIRC, recent war-gaming of US/China naval confrontation in the South China Sea resulted in China victory in less than an hour.

    When your aircraft carrier sinks, it no longer needs fuel or armaments.

    Recent experience with Iran’s tactics indicate swarms are really difficult, maybe impossible to defeat.

    1. Antifa

      A swarm of drones against a carrier?
      One or a few will get past your barrier
      Blow holes in the deck
      And your ship is a wreck
      Tow her back home and bury her

        1. Antifa

          Captain O has a verb that’s apter and subtle
          Ships are not buried—the right word is scuttle
          They aren’t towed to some pier
          To end their career
          They go down in that big salty puddle

  9. DJG, Reality Czar

    The German justice system and Nordstream.

    Why now? To what end? The bevy of articles in the Links makes me wonder what “message” we are meant to receive from the Powerful about Nordstream.

    From the France 24 article: “The Ukrainian suspects are accused of transporting the explosives used in the attack in a sailing yacht called the Andromeda, according to the German media reports. According to reports at the time, a team of five men and one woman chartered the yacht from Rostock port to carry out the operation.”

    The Andromeda is a single-masted yacht.

    Several commenters here with experience as divers and in explosives pointed out how much special equipment would have been required as well as how sizable the four charges on the gas pipes would have to have been.

    All mysteriously delivered to a single-masted yacht.

    So we’re still getting the story that Ginger, the Professor, Thurston Howell III, and Volodymyr Zhuravlov set off from the port of Rostock with hundreds of kilos of equipment and explosives, unbeknown to anyone.

    Zhurovlev then supposedly lived in a village in Poland unnoticed until his recent retreat to Ukraine. (Like U.S. killers, “He was a quiet man…”)

    What is the purpose of this denial of facts about how such an operation has to be carried out? Is this another instance of Our Betters thinking that no one knows anything about logistics? Is someone trying to pin the Nordstream mess on Zelensky as he slides into oblivion?

    Meanwhile, Fatto Quotidiano today ends its coverage of The Mystery with a quote from German government spokes-hole Wolfgang Büchner, “Our support for Ukraine will not change, regardless of the results of the investigation.”

    Oh.

    I will await further information from our German correspondents.

    1. JohnA

      The story has as many impossible to believe holes as the Skripal novichok saga. But the media will continue to unquestionably push it, if told to by the PTB.

    2. brian wilder

      I read through the Wall St Journal account.

      It is like the scenario for a straight-to-Netflix thriller.

      Just one niggling thought: where on that 50-ft sailing boat was the decompression chamber? Who rented that? Where is it now?

      I honestly know nothing about deep-sea diving, never having been below 30 feet. But, I have seen compression chambers and they didn’t look like something you could just pick up at Wal-Mart or stick in the back of a Toyota on your way to the Marina.

      So, I put it as a question to better informed commenters: is this a potential hole in the story? Or, should I just put it aside as I do most such McGuffin’s used to jumpstart conspiracy theories on X?

            1. t

              The almost are weird. That link is mostly, when I clicked, historic pix.

              There is a market for yacht decompression chambers but they’re sold for emergency use. They fit in a trunk.

      2. carycat

        They borrowed the TARDIS that MI6 keeps in their basement when they are not lending it out to the BBC

      3. Grebo

        Inflatable decompression chambers exist and are presumably lighter and pack up small.

        But you wouldn’t really need one unless something went wrong. A dive like that would have to employ mixed gas (ie. no nitrogen) rebreathers. They would decompress at depth, possibly with some stashed tanks on a rope.

        Still an implausibly difficult endeavour, and they would need the latest US military kit. My bet is Hersh had it more or less right.

        1. Captain Obvious

          Deep sea diving uses big sumbersible chambers. Getting up to high pressure (and down from it) takes a lot of time, and that does not leave much to do actual work down there. For serious business, divers are brought to high pressure inside the chamber on the ship itself, and then submersed with it. They get out in the depths, do the work, and get in, and get lifted. They can stay under pressure for days. Once the job is done they decompress.

    3. Mikel

      “Now, for the first time, the outlines of the real story can be told. The Ukrainian operation cost around $300,000, according to people who participated in it. It involved a small rented yacht with a six-member crew, including trained civilian divers. One was a woman, whose presence helped create the illusion they were a group of friends on a pleasure cruise.”

      Well, people here at NC joked about it, but the Gilligan’s Island-like narrative is their story and they are sticking to it.
      So where is this SS Minnow?

      1. pjay

        Well, we now know that the CIA couldn’t have been involved, because they *tried* to warn everyone of the Gilligan’s Island plot in the summer of 2022. But as usual, no one would listen to the wise and prescient warnings by the CIA. We never learn. If only we would have heeded their advice then the five men (and a woman) in a boat would not have been able to carry out such a stunt in one of the most monitored stretches of water in the world.

        2. Skip Intro

          The brilliant part is how all the not so veiled threats from Biden down against the Nordstream pipeline over the years gave this logistically brilliant Polish driver the cover he needed to pull of his dastardly scheme!

      2. NN Cassandra

        Yeah, clickbait headline. I followed it just to read how they are going to present “the other” theory. Well, they solved that problem by not mentioning it at all!

    5. Sean Gorman.

      Re new nordstream story
      Are they finally looking at endgame? When the shooting stops, assuming we are still here, legal begins

    6. .Tom

      The absence of any need for a new cover story is the interesting part. Why Germany? and why now?

      Sometimes I can believe that the fatuous cover stories are a flex: make the media report them seriously to show off how powerful you are. Other times they are demanded by the public or the media. Other times they are needed for bureaucratic reasons, e.g. CYA. In this case, I really can’t imagine. Just ignoring who did it seemed to be working.

  11. The Rev Kev

    “NASA to decide on how to bring home stranded astronauts by end of the month”

    It would be hilarious if Putin announced that astronauts Barry Wilmore and Sunita Williams could come home aboard the Russian Progress MS-28 cargo ship that is due to dock at the ISS in a day or to. Then you would see the Biden White House having to explain why that would be totally unacceptable and why. But I’ve got an idea. Maybe when SpaceX sends its Crew-9 mission to the ISS next month, they could send along Felix Baumgartner and two spare suits. It’ll be great and maybe Red Bull can sponsor it to cut costs-

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FHtvDA0W34I (1:30 mins)

    1. .Tom

      I often think about Barry and Sunita and the conversations they have between themselves up there about how to get down from there. They know Russia could help but that Biden wouldn’t allow it so they’d have to stow away. I think that would make a cool movie plot. Then back on the planet surface they get stuck in prisoner exchange negotiations.

    2. Wukchumni

      ‘Lost In Space’ TV show pitch:

      Z. Smith… head engineer, sneaks tweaks on board the Starliner, er the ‘Miss Family Robinson’.

      Smith is revealed to be a saboteur working on behalf of an unnamed nation or organization that is obviously happy utilizing the lowest bidder and the highest paid executives.

      1. Neutrino

        App pitch.
        Plot out airline travel using non-Boeing planes.

        Case study pitch.
        Review impacts of the Welch-era GE execs who got passed over for Immelt, then left for browner pastures.

    3. Captain Obvious

      Since Progress is designed to burn up in the atmosphere, it would make more sense for Medvedev to make that offer. He could add that they would suffer less than burning up in Boeing spaceship.

    4. Useless Eater

      Roy Scheider and Helen Mirren sorted this out 40 years ago, but they had better AI…. the HAL 9000

    1. The Rev Kev

      You think that when Russia eventually takes over the Ukraine, they could make a deal with those corporations and bondholders? That they will honour the debts to those corporations – like BlackRock – in exchange for getting their $300 billion back? Sure Russia would be getting much more back but unlike corporations like BlackRock, they don’t have angry shareholders riding their case. :)

        1. John k

          Imo the logical consequence of that is russia stops exchanging real goods such as titanium for western paper. Perhaps the war and the need for such things as car parts has delayed the cutting of all trade between russia and the west, but my guess is that will progress with growing speed. And if physical trade stops why honor west patents/copyrights?
          China finds it difficult to shift from massive exports to the west to more internal consumption, but the west looks to push harder regardless of who wins the presidency. The west seems to want to stop trade with the east, imo an own goal. Meanwhile more countries seem to find BRICS and the east tempting, turkey’s west ties look increasingly unstable. Russia defeating nato might convince some fence sitters.
          West looking more and more to me as a failed neo-lib backwater. Is Israel stable long term? As cheap missiles/drones improve the resistance becomes more effective. It’s a very small country with huge vulnerabilities that continuously leads with its chin.

          1. Yves Smith

            Russia is still selling a lot of oil to the West. Even with the Russian intent to divorce the West as a result of the sanctions, there’s still some dependence.

            1. Terry Flynn

              NC has made me more aware of sources that detail these “secondary markets”. I’ve been darkly amused by how Russia has kept running all the western airplanes it “stole” after Ukraine sanctions took hold.

              Don’t get me wrong – issues are arising regarding maintenance. But in the “waiting game” Russia seems to be holding all the good cards.

              1. The Rev Kev

                If Russia and the west ever swap the aircraft that they have for each, will those planes be allowed to fly that come back to the west? Sure they will come back with up to date maintenance logs of all the work done on those planes and parts replaced but will those airlines get the nod from the insurers to fly them again – because all that work was done in a place which is now no longer recognized by so many official bodies. Will those airlines be able to get those planes certified again without a complete tear-down and inspection?

                1. Terry Flynn

                  Those points were EXACTLY the ones raised by the aviation YouTubers I follow (those that are not clickbait rubbish).

                  We will NEVER be sure that any “currently Russia owned” airplane can satisfy insurance criteria as dictated by the West. Maybe those planes were safely maintained (via Iran etc) but the authorities here will NOT acknowledge this when the alternative is a shedload of cash from USA/UK/AUS.

                  1. Polar Socialist

                    As far as I know the maintenance is done by companies approved by Russian Federal Air Transport Agency and using either “parallel imported” or domestically manufactured parts, also approved by the said Agency, all following the ICAO standards.

                    Since there have been no accidents, and the Russian airlines are reporting less issues (per flight hour) with western aircraft than before, we can assume the maintenance is not done by Mr. Turgʻunboyev using hammer and duct tape behind the hangars of Islam Karimov Tashkent International Airport.

                    That doesn’t mean your wrong, and the western insurance companies are quite likely to reject these planes as non-airworthy wrecks.

                    1. Joker

                      Western insurance companies are quite likely to reject these planes as non-airworthy wrecks, unlike brand new Boeings that fall appart in flight.

  13. chuk jones

    Harper’s Slogans and Lies. The author is saying what Israel cannot be: “Zionism is racism,” “Israel is an apartheid state,” “Israel is engaged in a genocide in Gaza,” or “Israel is colonialist.” Then seems to invalidate the idea with this statement: ‘Frankly, project “Eretz Yisrael” is not so different, in principle, from the “manifest destiny” America inflicted on the country’s Indigenous population.’
    Really? I wouldn’t go there, as I don’t see any native American’s here and this was Creek land before Europeans got here. I stopped reading there. Life is too short.

    1. pjay

      Yes, that was puzzling. Given the author’s argument, I thought his “manifest destiny” analogy was rather disingenuous. It’s hard to find better examples of racist, genocidal, colonialist apartheid than that of the American “colonists” toward native Americans.

  14. .Tom

    Murray’s recent We Are The Bad Guys blog post was discussed in comments a bit yesterday. It’s a good read and concise summary of a few things but more than that it has the power of personal testimony of an intellectual and moral revelation. In his career Murray was a high level servant of the British state and now he says “It is a hard thing to lose the entire belief system in which you were brought up.” That’s strikingly similar to my own wording.

    Anyway, I was thinking yesterday of the moment in the Fight Club movie when Jack finds out the truth: “We have lost cabin pressure.” The collapsing feeling of discovering the worst possible thing did happen and you did it. I watched the clip and there’s another analogy in it that I wasn’t aware of before. It seems like a story about human psychology and satire on consumer obedience but it can also be seen at the level of societies, states, and proxies, with Tyler as the rampaging hoard and Jack the fragile veneer of freedom, democracy and human rights. I’ll let you search YouTube for it on your own if you want. First hit on “fight club cabin pressure”. Not safe for work.

    1. GramSci

      I lost my entire belief system in 1965 with the onset of the Vietnam War. It continues to depress me how little shame white people have.

        2. flora

          There’s a reasonable case to be made that the Vietnam war from the West’s point of view was (unsaid in public) as much about the offshore oil resources as about political or “spreading democracy” reasons.

            1. Wukchumni

              Since Black Friday in 1983, Venezuela has been the basket case of basket cases financially, kind of similar to Mexico where the Peso was worth 1/264th of its previous value after hyperinflation. While not as dramatic as Weimarzuela, imagine your savings being worth about 1/3rd of a Cent on the $, versus previous value?

                1. Wukchumni

                  We destroyed the middle class in each country by destroying their sovereign currencies.

                  We need Venezuela for the oil, thus the Guaidó & Au appropriation games, and need Mexico for the cheap labor force.

        3. hemeantwell

          “Is race the issue? Or is imperialism the issue?”
          Always the question to ask. Adolph Reed, Barbara Fields and others on the left have made it clear that the delights of racism are grease for systems of economic exploitation. Their ridicule of the idea that the plantation system was an embodiment of a racial superiority project, instead of a colonial extraction project, is conclusive.

          1. CA

            “Adolph Reed, Barbara Fields and others on the left have made it clear that the delights of racism are grease for systems of economic exploitation. Their ridicule of the idea that the plantation system was an embodiment of a racial superiority project, instead of a colonial extraction project, is conclusive…”

            Notably as well, Lerone Bennett Jr. and Edward Baptist. This is important.

          2. CA

            https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/04/books/the-half-has-never-been-told-follows-the-money-of-slavery.html

            October 3, 2014

            Harvesting Cotton-Field Capitalism
            Edward Baptist’s New Book Follows the Money on Slavery
            By FELICIA R. LEE

            “Have you been happier in slavery or free?” a young Works Project Administration interviewer in 1937 asked Lorenzo Ivy, a former slave, in Danville, Va. Ivy responded with a memory of seeing chained African-Americans marching farther South to be sold.

            “Truly, son, the half has never been told,” he said.

            This anecdote is how Edward E. Baptist opens “The Half Has Never Been Told: Slavery and the Making of American Capitalism,” an examination of both the economic innovations that grew out of the ever-shifting institution of slavery and the suffering of generations of people who were bought and sold.

            Mr. Baptist, a history professor at Cornell, said in an interview that his book represented his decade-long effort to blend these two aspects. Published in September, “The Half” joins a new wave of scholarship about the centrality of slavery — and the cotton picked by slaves — to the country’s economic development…

        5. GramSci

          It’s actually about technology. “White people” happened to be the first to build transoceanic ships with cannon, not to mention aeroplanes with bombs. These made it irresistibly easy to subjugate Untermenschen. Had black or yellow or brown people gotten the technology first, they might have been the Imperialists of the Millenium and wanted evermore oil.

          That still doesn’t excuse white people’s lack of shame.

  15. eg

    The author of “Rawls the redeemer” won’t like it, but the liberalism he’s describing is a religion (even if, like romanticism, it’s a “spilled religion”), a crusading religion no less, and he one of its “priests.”

    A little more self-awareness, please …

  16. Wukchumni

    Goooooooood Mooooorning Fiatnam!

    It’s 0520 hours. From the delta factor of reserve banking, to the DMZ (demonetized zone) of crypto, back to Bitcoin all in one byte. Today’s forecast calls for a hundred percent chance of clout crowding the market in the cloud, not that any of it exists except in fertile mind fields we’ve carefully laid utilizing furrowed brows pecking away furiously.

    It was the best of times to panic-while it was the worst of times to panic, everybody was in agreement while transferring funds from Plan A to Plan B on QWERTY using light digital pressure on the very ends on their arms to move alms.

    You couldn’t really call it panicking if all you were doing was losing faith in various banking establishments and parking the money in Treasuries, essentially putting all your faith in Federal fiat.

    Here’s a song coming your way right now. “Nowhere To Run To” by Martha and the Vandellas. Yes! Hey, you know what I mean! Too much?

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQRIOKvR2WM

  17. LawnDart

    Re; Syraqistan

    Iran feeding the tension as Israel waits in anticipation:

    Explainer: What are the scenarios and potential targets of retaliatory strike on Haifa?

    While Tel Aviv has been identified as one of the possible targets of the planned retaliatory operation, other potential targets are located in Haifa, a strategic city in the north of the occupied Palestinian territories.

    https://www.presstv.ir/Detail/2024/08/15/731412/Israel-Haifa-Iran-retaliation

    Tel Aviv was the subject of this feature a few days ago, and I would not be surprised if this weekend the Iranians highlight potential targets in Jerusalem as well.

    It seems that this time the Iranian response is not only intended to “send a message” to Israel’s government and military, but to the general public as well (“your political leaders are threats to your safety”).

    1. The Rev Kev

      All those oil and fuel storage depots that Israel has would make a great target, especially if they wait for that ship carrying all that jet fuel to arrive and offload its cargo. They are definitely a military target and their destruction would throw a massive spanner into the IDF’s mobility, including it’s air force. And even though there is more and more support in Israel for an invasion of Lebanon, without fuel they would have to hoof it. Come to think of it, Israel might have to agree to a ceasefire if they do not have the fuel to carry on their war. Sure they could drain the fuel out of 80% of their armoured vehicles to keep the other 20% going but that is only a temporary fix.

      1. Martin Oline

        I have seen many a refinery in Ukraine blow up. What a show the huge explosions would make on the nightly news. The loss of the fuel would be deadly to the continued viability of Israel as a state and result in a mass migration of Zionists.

        1. John k

          What’s not to like?
          If I was Hezbollah I’d do it and say any attack on Beirut would result in an equivalent attack on Tel Aviv.

      1. The Rev Kev

        Probably because for the Democrats the election is getting closer & closer and they want the whole war to go away so it does not become a political issue. And that can’t happen until it ends.

    3. Grebo

      I would think Iran is going to keep it proportional rather than escalate. So they are choosing which Israeli to hit. It can’t be Netanyahu or any of his henchmen. One of their favourite extremist rabbis would be a good choice, along with the red heiffers as someone drolly suggested the other day.

  18. ChatET

    Isn’t the timing of the charges for the Nordstream diving suspect interesting. Didn’t insurers win a court case recently refusing payment claiming that it was state action that destroyed the pipeline? If the Germans can prove it was not state actors but rogue elements they might be able to get that decision thrown out.

    1. Tom Doak

      I don’t think this is about insurance money. I think it’s about giving the Germans a popular excuse to abandon project Ukraine if events require it.

  19. ChrisFromGA

    Re: Gaza ceasefire talks

    These phony talks have become a lot like Zelensky’s “Peace Summit” in Switzerland, as only one side of the two parties in conflict is actually present at the table:

    https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c0e8gzyp8e2o

    The media are doing their best to spin and claim that Hamas can be briefed afterwards, but essentially Israel is negotiating against itself.

    The plan cited in the July 2 speech by Biden turned out to be fraudulent. Blinken lifted an old Israeli proposal that had not been approved, being the equivalent of a musical out-take never meant for making the final album cut. Of course, Israel was furious, and ever since they’ve been figuring out various games to make it look like they’re negotiating, when they really aren’t.

    So, Hamas has every right to just stay away as both Israel and the US are negotiating in bad faith.

  20. eg

    What is the point of John MacArthur’s “Slogans and Lies”? That there are bad people on “both sides”?

    His elision of relative power at work here is profoundly mendacious.

  21. deedee

    Re: Gutfeld

    The “weird” frame is sticky because it’s just … true.
    Hard to explain exactly how or why but I find right-wingers to be inherently creepy.
    I try to expose myself to thoughtful folks on the right. I particularly have a good deal of time for libertarian critics especially on issues such as war and peace, the police state, legalization of drugs but they just can’t not be creepy and weird.
    Gutfeld makes some excellent points but he’s not funny and his demeanor impacts me on a cellular level.
    Sh*tlibs just piss me off but they don’t creep me out.
    Maybe this has something to do with the tribal nature of politics in America circa right now.

        1. The Rev Kev

          I think that I find the word “shot” to be a micro-aggression. :)

          All I can say is that the present Democrats would be comfortable among Reagan’s right-wingers from the 80s.

          2. deedee

            Haha re microagression. I will police myself accordingly but maybe that metaphor needs to be defunded.

            Agreed r.e. the ratchet effect on Democrats.
            https://stopmebeforeivoteagain.org/stopme/chapter02.html

            Today’s Democrats and their supporters are clearly Bush’s Republicans. In many cases they are literally the same people.

            The other part of that effect is that the right gets further and further to the right.

            And creepier …

          2. Grebo

            Weird: adj. — Something or someone your gut tells you not to consider eating, shagging, or employing.

      2. Alice X

        right-winger

        1) One with the gold who wants it only for themselves.

        2) One without the gold (except for maybe a penny here or there), but somehow has been manipulated into believing that is ok, as long some other(s) have less of it (ie Afros or migrants), and can keep their guns to make sure of it.

        I’ll punt on the D’rats for the moment. My 1/2¢

        1. Wukchumni

          3) One who is armed to the teeth against a formidable foe. Did you know that sinister is Latin for left, say no more.

    2. NotTimothyGeithner

      Especially with libertarians and their focus on their embrace of a philosophy, it’s not hard to reason out what they might embrace next.

      Conversely free school lunch programs don’t turn into kids working in mines or worse.

      The Blue MAGA types may assume “The Handmaid’s Tale” was written about their own feelings when Mother lost, but it was penned in 1985 about now “reasonable Republicans.” As a practical matter, abortion has been banned in over half the country.

    4. t

      I’ve had astounding conversations with right wingers in which their utter disregard for people who are not them because of where they were born, or their parents, is creepy. Chilling even. In all seriousness, the way some racists go on is far less respectful than they way people talk about animals they raise for food. The well-funded staff of Pragur U, for instance, have zero qualms about crafting deliberate lies and being proactively belligerent about anyone who would fact check.

      Serious folks on the leftward side of things judge people by their actions.

      Their are creepy weirdos everywhere – which isn’t news to anyone whose been female in modern America. That’s like saying their are drunks on the left and the right, just a product of people. Nothing to do with the projects.

      1. pjay

        “… have zero qualms about crafting deliberate lies and being proactively belligerent about anyone who would fact check.”

        Well, I am forced to point out that this describes a lot of people today who consider themselves “on the leftward side of things.” Of course then we would have to debate the meaning of “leftward,” and we’re back to the beginning.

        I do know that Adam Schiff is one of the “weirdest” political figures I’m familiar with. For me he is quite “creepy, chilling even,” not to mention despicable and dangerous. Is he a right-winger? Hard to say.

    5. Katniss Everdeen

      Glad you brought this up. I’ve been wanting to ask the “weird” (and “creepy”) crowd, “Weird how?”

      And just to speed things up, here’s the definition of the word “how”:

      how
      /hou/
      adverb

      1. In what manner or way; by what means.
      How does this machine work?

      2. In what state or condition.
      How is she today?

      3. To what extent, amount, or degree.
      How bad was it?

      I’d say #1 is the definition that fits my question most closely.

      1. deedee

        How are they weird/creepy?

        Painting with a very broad brush but I find right-wingers to be all too often lacking in human empathy for starters. Proclivity towards being and/or supporting bullies. All too often emotionally fixated on damage to personal property and immigration as violating their space on an almost cellular level. All too often patriarchal windbags who have terrible taste in music, art, humor etc. And yeah, scratch a little deeper and you often find racism/sexism. The attack on woke is just an excuse to make fun of transgender people.

        And FWIW if it’s easier for others to peg me as Blue MAGA that’s fine.

        I’ve got no particular love for any political spectrum, left, right, authoritarian or even anti-authoritarian and as I’ve said I’ve found plenty to despise among folks who identify as “left” whatever that means in 2024. All too often they are sanctimonious hypocrites and blowhards. But despite their terrible beliefs, as people I’d rather hang out with at a potluck dinner over a bunch of right wing creeps any day of the week.

        My observation is based on my own subjective feelings. And yes it’s probably intensely tribalistic. I am a human-being, at least I think I am.

        1. Yves Smith

          You come off as a bigot. I lived in Alabama for a while. The right wingers I encountered there almost never fit your stereotype. Many were well read. In the gym, a prof at the local uni would often discuss politics with some of the hard core right winger and they’d have civilized informational exchanges even if the right wingers usually were not persuaded. They didn’t get upset and considered his views and gave real arguments back, not soundbites. Similarly, I regularly sported a Bernie sweatshirt and a mask and was not harassed or given a dirty look for either.

          One I know, a woman, is extremely well traveled, is an opera, classical music, theater, and art buff (I have done museum tours with her overseas and she has recognized particular paintings that were traveling and name the museum in which they normally lived). She even argues, to the consternation of her liberal friends, that they ought to be paying $10 for their pint of berries, that its cheap price is due only to it being picked by immigrant labor.

      2. Stephanie

        As someone who has used the word ‘creepy’ recently in the comments, I define it as people who don’t follow social norms in a way that feels aggressive or predatory: people who show up to kids’ events who don’t seem to know any other adults and aren’t cheering for any of the kids; the middle-aged dudes who hung out at the college bars my friends and I frequented when we were in college; the dude who takes a seat right behind you on a bus or in a theater that’s otherwise nearly empty.

        ‘Weird’ people, on the other hand, don’t follow social norms in a way that feels entitled or oblivious: The woman who used to march right up to the front of the queue at the coffee shop where I worked and place her order – and was surprised when I told her she would have to move to the back of the line- she was weird. Ditto the guy who used to pray out loud over his coffee right up there at the counter every time I handed it to him, regardless of the people waiting behind him. The machine operator I worked with who we used to call “The Close Stander” was weird – always very polite, but also completely unaware that both men and women were trying to physically distance themselves from him when he spoke to them.

        When I describe someone I’ve only seen on screen as creepy or weird it is because something in their mannerisms reminds me of a real-life interaction that was uncomfortable or awkward. When Walz talks about Trump being weird that rings true for me. I’ve worked for a number of small-business owners with Trump-sized egos who were socially clueless and occasionally incredibly difficult to be around if you’re the sort of person who suffers from second-hand embarrassment, and that is pretty much how I imagine Trump to be. Yes that’s an unfair judgement to make of someone I’ve never met, and probably many politicians fit that definition of weird (*cough*Mark Dayton*cough*), including Harris and her inappropriate giggles and Dean and his primal yawp, but it stuck for Trump and Dean in a way it hasn’t for Harris.

        1. Wukchumni

          I’ve only known a couple of blatant space invaders and they both happened to be French-Canadians, if I’m allowed to stereotype.

          I’m talking major creepy, they’d violate the usual 2 foot barrier with impunity, inching in closer to 6 inches away from your grill in conversation and not allow you to really get away, eww I get the shivers just thinking about it.

        2. Gumbo

          Second cousin, county farm bureau president, talking to the president from the next county who had been in a meeting with several others and Trump: “Is he like that in person?”. “No, completely normal in person, Jekyll and Hyde”.

          Cousin is an Obama/Trump/No more Trump voter.

    6. mrsyk

      Re: Gutfeld
      A reminder that “Shimmer” is both a floor wax and a delicious dessert topping. To wit, just because the FBI has been shown to have had lapses in service performance in the past does not disprove an institutional plot to assassinate the former president. So no, I’m not going to “forget the conspiracy theories unless it’s a theory of decline”, thank you.

    8. Daniil Adamov

      There may be something to this, as I remember a cross-cultural example: an ex-liberal in Russia writing about how he might despise his fellow liberals for the evil liars that they are, yet they still don’t make him as instinctively nauseous as those damned dirty communists. This even though cerebrally, he was probably equidistant from both. Old “tribal” emotions die slowly and aren’t necessarily tied to any consciously held views.

  22. eg

    Armas’ “This sceptered isle” is amusing if you enjoy watching the lickspittles of empire at work, romanticizing an England that never was.

    Some of us less favourably disposed to “the auld enemy” are rather enjoying the long, miserable decline that’s been playing itself out since the end of “imperial preference” — the lamentations of Armas and his ilk only making the experience all the more satisfying.

  24. The Rev Kev

    ‘Daily Loud
    @DailyLoud
    BREAKING: Oreo and Coca-Cola are teaming up to launch an Oreo-flavored Coke Zero and a Coke-flavored Oreo.’

    Oreo and Coca-Cola both giving people something that they never asked for. So what is next?

    The year 2027 – ‘BREAKING: Oreo and Coca-Cola are teaming up to launch a new product that combines both Coke and Oreos that will be dubbed OroeOk or perhaps Cokeo which will be a wonder synergy between the two products. Critics claim that it has the texture of brown sludge but Oreo and Coca-Cola claim that people will just have to get used to it. And soon they will be adding electrolytes!’

  25. Wukchumni

    I can’t quit you Bibi
    So I’m gonna put you down for awhile
    I said I can’t quit you Bibi
    I guess I gotta put you down for awhile
    Said you messed up my happy home
    Made me mistreat my unfortunate child
    Yes sir you did

    Said you know I love you Bibi
    My love for you I could never hide
    Oh, you know I love you Bibi
    My love for you I could never hide
    Oh when I feel you near me
    I know you are my one desire

    When you hear me moaning and groaning, Bibi
    You know it hurts me deep down inside
    When you hear me moaning and groaning, Bibi
    You know it hurts me deep down inside
    Oh, when you hear me saying we’re ironclad, Bibi
    You know you’re my one desire
    Yes, you are

    I Can’t Quit You Babe, performed by Led Zeppelin

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4_n33954kGk

    1. mrsyk

      The other side of that Zepplin coin, Bibi, Bibi, Bibi, Bibi, Bibi, Bibi, Bibi, I’m a gonna leave you…

  26. Martin Oline

    I have seen reports that RFK Jr. has been talking with both the Trump and Harris campaigns. It seems he has offered (viz The Washington Post) to endorse the Harris campaign in exchange for a cabinet position. Poor Robert, he doesn’t understand that he helps the Harris campaign if he runs as an independent. He is not on many of the Blue state ballots so he will only damage Trump in the Red states.

    1. The Rev Kev

      Maybe Bernie should have demanded a Cabinet position when he folded his campaign into the Democrats in 2019 or maybe 2015. They would have hated him for doing so but they would also have begrudgingly respected him for it.

      1. Wukchumni

        Maybe Bernie should have demanded a Cabinet position when he folded his campaign into the Democrats in 2019 or maybe 2015.

        …don’t they already have an ottoman?

    2. flora

      He’s being kept off the ballot as an independent in NY even though his team collected more than the required number of signatures. The NY courts have denied his suit. (This is NY after all.) He’s trying again

      The WaPo sounds a little fishy to me. Is WaPo running their own trial balloon for some reason? Or trying to throw another lead weight onto RFK jr’s campaign boat? / my 2 cents.

      1. Martin Oline

        Tin foil hat time. Conservative Tree House believes it to be a CIA plot, as in Robert is an asset. A quote “RFK Jr. is trying to present a pressure point to entice President Trump to pull him closer. In other words, the CIA is concerned that Trump did not initially take the RFK Jr. bait, and now they are going to run a public campaign to position their candidate.”

        2. Martin Oline

          Oh my Flying Spaghetti Monster, now he’s denying it! The outreach to Kamala, not the glowing. He confirmed it yesterday and denies it today? If you run hot and cold does that mean you are lukewarm or just wishy-washy?

        3. cfraenkel

          ‘RFK Jr. as a CIA asset’ – words fail. Stupidest timeline indeed. Clearly people are just bullshitting whatever out of column A mixed with something from column B to fit today’s talking point. I wasn’t alive in 1968 so nothing back then matters?

  27. TomW

    “U.S. officials have said that Ukraine’s cross-border offensive didn’t violate that policy. “They are taking actions to protect themselves from attacks,””

    The US asked for one single thing from Ukraine. For billions of dollars in financial aid. As well as enormous amounts of satellite data. “Don’t use our weapons inside Russia.”

    Zelensky will now do anything to drag the US into a direct fight with Russia. He is now the major risk in the area. The Kursk raid followed by his attack on Zaporizhzhia Nuclear Power Plant was intended to provide Zelensky with a nuclear ‘bargaining chip’.

    Ukraine is now an enemy of the US. Officials, reacting to the popularity of this in the US, are afraid to publicly criticize this action directly. The NYT stated that this has ‘created a change in US policy.’ There is no terrorist act that Zelensky seems to be willing to forego.

    From an earlier news article:

    “Moscow on Sunday accused the United States of bankrolling Ukrainian attempts on the life of Russian President Vladmir Putin, hours after former US president Donald Trump was injured in an assassination attempt.

    The charges from Moscow came after Ukrainian spy chief Kyrylo Budanov revealed his country’s failed assassination attempts on Saturday in an interview.”

    Time to deal with Zelensky as the dangerous element he has become.

  28. Mikel

    AI stole my job and my work, and the boss didn’t know – or care – The Register

    Time to get a library card?

  29. Captain Obvious

    Startups Are Racing to Make Water Out of Thin Air Bloomberg

    LOLZ. These startups had a late start. Many years late. There is already a whole Internet saga about “Fontus – The Self Filling Water Bottles”.

    Spoiler: It’s a dehumidifier.

  30. Mikel

    Top Hamas official says group is losing faith in US as mediator in Israel-Gaza ceasefire talks – The New Arab

    Wait…Hamas had faith in the US as mediator in this situation? They went for a meeting with BIden one weekend and saw what???

    1. hardscrabble

      Lambert linked 2 articles from New Arab today. Haven’t noticed this site before; but from these two quick reads and the side-linked stories, it looks like western media narratives aimed at uninformed Arab diaspora? Anybody here have more past experience with this site?

  33. Wukchumni

    Devil’s Own Advocate…

    I get the feeling that a role reversal is in order and we Golden Billionaires are gonna be pauperazzi soon. I see our new role as a human export gig like say Filipinos ending up working elsewhere as the pay at home won’t cut it.

    But where do we end up going, certainly not to ex-Golden Billionaire haunts?

  34. Mikel

    Managing the Sino-American AI Race – Project Syndicate

    I’d like to see Ed Zitron’s views on this subject.

  36. Wukchumni

    Justice Minister Paul Goldsmith has signed Kim Dotcom’s extradition order, meaning New Zealand will almost certainly deport him to the United States.

    German-born Dotcom moved to New Zealand in 2010. He has been facing potential extradition since 2012 when he was arrested as part of a global sting. The US Justice Department pressed charges against Dotcom, including criminal copyright infringement, money laundering, racketeering and wire fraud.

    Dotcom made his fortune from Megaupload, a file-sharing website often used to share pirated movies and music. He was pursued by US authorities who argued that the company profited from the intellectual property of others, which was uploaded to the site.

    https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/politics/justice-minister-signs-kim-dotcoms-extradition-order/ZIO7RHMUS5B3NCKUEW4QH5C4V4/

    1. playon

      mega.nz is a very useful site, I use it to upload things I want to share (not copyrighted stuff, mostly my own audio files etc to exchange with other musicians) and have used it for some years now. I wasn’t aware that Dotcom was the owner. Not to come on like a shill for mega.nz, but the site gives you 50 GB of encrypted storage for FREE. I’m guessing the encrypted storage pisses off US intelligence agencies.

  37. .Tom

    Riots in England and Northern Ireland

    I’ve been trying to get some kind of an overall picture of what’s happening but it’s difficult. Been hard to synthesize a bigger picture by combining the state and commercial news, politician’s statements, and the independent, online and fringe media, including conversations here.

    So what do you think of today’s linked article?

    > Dreaming of Downfall New Left Review

    It presents an overall picture that seems to make sense. Does it? It’s opinionated and doesn’t hide it but it might be right.

    1. Ben Panga

      My 2c: there’s a lot that’s fairly convincing and a few major flaws. My major criticism is downplaying the economic aspects and the absence of any analysis of how immigration may have affected native communities.

      I have a big issue with “Meanwhile those drawn to this ethnonationalist politics steadfastly refuse to be particularly poor or marginalized”.

      I can’t find a source right now, but watching reports of various riot-related convictions there actually seems to be a strong skew to the very poor. A lot of the accused are of “no fixed abode” i.e. homeless or itinerant.

      Overall it reads like it was written by someone who lives in the “progressive left” bubble. See also Ash Sakar’s stuff.

      2. .Tom

        Thank you, Ben.

        There are a few questions that interest me. One as you mentioned is economics. Another is size and concentrations of immigrant communities, which may help explain why Scotland has not see trouble. Third is non-competitive local politics, e.g. if a Labour stronghold is safe then that can lead to unaccountable admin.

      3. .Tom

        Richard Seymour last two paragraphs are disappointing. He ridicules liberals distracting us by blaming Russia and Brexit, which is fair. Then goes on to ridicule what he calls the “left” idea of material interests being at root. This, however, is in fact the real liberal theoretical shortfall. Liberalism would have us believe that, given sufficient commitment to human rights and giving them the nod when they come into conflict with property rights, we can all get along. This seems perhaps plausible if and only if the rising tide is indeed lifting all boats and people believe these tidal conditions will hold. Since those conditions are now clearly gone in the UK and seem unlikely to return, we should not expect to all get along. That, it seems to me, is the “convection cells of the storm that have been gathering in plain sight.” That is the big question anyone seriously discussing British politics needs to include.

        He ends with blaming defective psychology and thought. Maybe. If so, how to fix that? Or is the article really about striking moral and intellectual poses?

    2. Anonymous 2

      I agree with Ben Panga that there is a lot there that is right. It is however a very complex area and people will approach the subject with their own preconceptions as to what the problems are and their causes. Links have been made with English Nationalism, the legacy of football hooliganism, manipulation by malevolent actors in the background, perhaps including foreign powers, criminal motives (there seems to have been looting and a lot of the rioters seem already to have had criminal records) and, of course, just plain racism. There is probably a grain of truth in many of the explanations that have been put forward. Societies are complex organisms. Simple explanations rarely capture everything that bears on developments.

      The truth is, though, that the UK has been struggling ever since the Crash in 2008. Living standards have been stagnant, even falling. Austerity, Brexit and Covid have all damaged the economy and society further. In a society where discontent has been held at bay by raising living standards, this is dangerous.

      As for immigration, I am at a loss to understand what is going on. The Brexit vote put governments on notice that immigration was an issue (it did not help that the Coalition Government of 2010-15 cut financial support for areas experiencing pressures o/a immigration). But the Tories then introduced a regime which meant that immigration soared. Why?

      It is all very worrying. This is the sort of situation which empowers fascists. The idea that the UK could not possibly go down that route is, to my mind, unconvincing. The new Labour government has been bequeathed an awful mess by the Tories. There is a very real possibility that they will be unable to turn matters around sufficiently by 2029, in which case the UK could pivot far Right. This is probably what some of the puppet-masters behind the scenes are wanting.

      1. .Tom

        > In a society where discontent has been held at bay by raising living standards, this is dangerous.

        Agree. See my comment above about tides.

        > But the Tories then introduced a regime which meant that immigration soared. Why?

        To lower labor costs. And I’d expect similar employer-friendly policies from Labour (sic).

        As for fascism, idk. But the reflexes of Starmer are authoritarian. And Yvette Cooper sounds like an old-school, hard-line right wing Tory from pre-Thatcher days.

  38. Ben Panga

    How pro-Israel groups shape global media coverage of Palestine (Declassified UK)
    “Should journalists go on propagandistic tours to Israel?”

    “Western journalists are accepting trips to the Middle East organised by pro-Israel advocacy groups, it has emerged.

    Reporters from the Spectator and Newsweek magazines and a Sunday Express correspondent were among “top flight journalists from across Europe” who the groups helped to visit Israel in June.

    The five-day itinerary, seen by Declassified, promised briefings with a former Mossad chief, Israel’s state-owned arms company and soldiers serving in Gaza.

    A government lawyer who defended Israel at the Hague and a minister from Benjamin Netanyahu’s hardline Likud Party were also on the line up.

    It was organised by the Europe Israel Press Association (EIPA) in tandem with the America Middle East Press Association….”

    Lots of detail here. Seems not dissimilar to the Labour Friends of Israel junkets, if more right-wing.

    My favourite nugget: “The Express journalist used the trip to generate another article headlined Keir Starmer as PM ‘would spell open season for anti-semitism’ warns Israeli minister.

    Giannangeli was quoting Amichai Chikli, who is Netanyahu’s minister for diaspora affairs and combating antisemitism, and an admirer of Tommy Robinson.

    The Likud minister said of Starmer’s Labour Party: “Their policy is pro-Islamist. It’s the green and red alliance – green for Islam, red for communism”.” After all he’s done for them!

    Declassified is an oasis of sanity in the madness of UK media.

    1. Polar Socialist

      Let’s just say that they should probably register register as foreign agents to avoid Ritter’s faith.

      Just kidding, it’s a rules based world, so no worries. They’ll probably get promoted to “experts” instead.

  39. pjay

    This is a useful contribution to the “debate” on the Venezuelan election. In particular, it explains why that pseudo-scientific “statistical analysis” laundered through some Columbia U. website a few weeks ago was farcical. When I saw it I didn’t really take it seriously since the fallacies seemed obvious. But it was naturally presented as objective scientific evidence by CNN and others. So however futile, I’ll pass this on.

    https://dissidentvoice.org/2024/08/cnns-fraudulent-analysis-of-fraud-in-the-venezuelan-presidential-election/

    1. MikeH

      In their post, Miller and Harris miss the point in the post from Columbia University.

      The issue pointed out in the Columbia post is that if you compute the percentages from the given values of the votes and the total votes, the resulting percentages are numerically extremely close to the percentages as reported to 1 decimal place. Using Python, I get these values in 64-bit precision:

      Maduro 5150092.0 * 100.0 / 10058774.0 = 51.19999713682801
      Gonzales 4445978.0 * 100.0 / 10058774.0 = 44.1999989263105
      Other 462704.0 * 100.0 / 10058774.0 = 4.600003936861491

      In fact, the values are such that they are the closest possible floating point representations to the reported values. For example, this can be seen for Maduro as follows:

      5150091.0 / 10058774.0 = 0.5119998719525859 (e = 1.2804741411631682e-07)
      5150092.0 / 10058774.0 = 0.51199997136828 (e = 2.863171999489822e-08)
      5150093.0 / 10058774.0 = 0.5120000707839742 (e = -7.078397423754268e-08)

      Even for one candidate, this is extremely unlikely to occur by chance, though in the Columbia post no-one was able to come up with a good numeric value for the probability. For all three candidates, the probability becomes vanishingly small.

      However, if the reported vote totals were computed by multiplying the respective percentage (divided by 100) by the reported total and rounding to the nearest integer, the resulting votes for each candidate would be exactly as reported.

      As a further illustration, let’s add 5000 to Maduro, subtract 4000 from Gonzales and 1000 from Others (so the total remains the same) and compute the percentages from the vote total:

      5155092.0 / 10058774.0 = 0.5124970498392747
      4441978.0 / 10058774.0 = 0.44160232648630937
      461704.0 / 10058774.0 = 0.04590062367441599

      These values would not have excited any suspicions.

      Whether the reported results are an indication of fraud is a quite different question.

  40. Wukchumni

    Foetuses can be called ‘unborn humans’ for Arizona abortion vote (BBC)
    ~~~~~~~~~~~~

    Hey, fetus! Oh, fetus!
    Hey, fetus! Oh, fetus!

    Fetus, if you will
    Please send a little girl for me to thrill
    A girl who wants my kisses and my arms
    A girl with all the charms of you

    Fetus, make her fair
    A lovely girl with sunlight in her hair
    And take the brightest stars up in the skies
    And place them in her eyes for me

    Fetus, unborn human that you are
    Surely the things I ask
    Can’t be too great a task

    Fetus, if we decide against you
    I promise that I always will be true
    I’ll give her all the love I have to give
    As long as we both shall live

    Hey, fetus! Oh, fetus!
    Make my dreams come true

    Hey, fetus! Oh, fetus!

    Venus, by Frankie Avalon

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_mA1k-b9UNw

  41. Eclair

    RE: Simplicius’ 8/14/24 SITREP. Can’t believe I am reading sitreps, but …..
    “Replacing Zelensky, according to the United States, will allow the West to better prepare for negotiations with Russia on a settlement. Former Ukrainian Interior Minister Arsen Avakov is currently being considered as a suitable candidate. The Americans consider Avakov’s strengths to be his continuing contacts with the leaders of European countries. The US has already been instructed to work out a scenario for Avakov’s rise to power in Kiev; the issue is being discussed with Tymoshenko, Poroshenko and the Servant of the People deputies.” (from the Press Bureau of the Russian Foreign Intelligence Service.)

    Assuming there is even some truthiness in the above statement, how can US/EU officials ever refer again, with a straight face, to Ukraine as a ‘Democratic’ state? We have seemingly become Humpty Dumpty, in ‘Through the Looking Glass:’ when we use a word, it means just what we chose it to mean – neither more nor less.

    And, even though we now have a presidential candidate, complete with folksy sidekick, who never received a vote, but was essentially elevated by the acclaim of the MSM, suspiciously and immediately orchestrated into a Hallelujah Chorus of delirious praise, as befits the Second Coming, do we still have a ‘Democracy’ in the US?

    ‘Democracy.’ ‘Dictatorship.’ ‘Authoritarian.’ Have they become mere labels, that mean just what we want them to mean when we use them to praise or demonize a nation?

    1. Maxwell Johnston

      That small mention by Simplicius caught my eye too. Arsen Avakov is a real piece of work; even by the standards of UKR corruption, he’s in a league of his own. Zelensky got rid of him in 2021, but it seems he’s still in the game and plotting his return (or revenge). I recall that odd helicopter crash near Kiev in January 2023 that killed most of UKR’s top cops in one go (including Avakov’s successor). I never saw the final crash report, but I’ve always suspected that it was no accident.

  42. cfraenkel

    Seems like you answered your own question. And that’s without even bringing AIPAC, Bezos, “carried interest” or Justice Thomas into the argument (to just pick the first examples that come to mind….)

  43. playon

    “Doctors accused of spreading misinformation lose certifications”

    On the other hand the CDC has also spread misinformation, a lot of it, and it’s been much more damaging to the population than these two Doctors ever were. Neither of them has killed anyone which is more than you can say for Biden and the CDC.

    1. RookieEMT

      I wish we talked about this more. I followed their guidelines and so far haven’t suffered from long covid despite two infections to date. It’s fine to debate their treatments, but to strip them of certifications is do damn creepy.

      I’ll never forget the weird things the CDC and press did. Their extreme criminal negligence, the apathy. How the press were viscous vultures ready to tear apart any dissidents.

      Their collective body-count is probably around 1,000,000 Americans. They got away with it big time.

      1. rowlf

        We were supposed to forget about Anthony Fauci’s performance with AIDS, forget that there was never any success with past coronavirus vaccines in people and animals, and forget that MRNA technology never made it past safety and performance testing.

        I think we are seeing the same marketing and media efforts applied to the Democratic Party’s Presidential campaign.

        Also, since summer 2021 Kory recommended getting vaccinated. What a weird and vindictive government.

Comments are closed.