[Majorityrights News] Alex Navalny, born 4th June, 1976; died at Yamalo-Nenets penitentiary 16th February, 2024 Posted by Guessedworker on Friday, 16 February 2024 23:43.
[Majorityrights Central] A couple of exchanges on the nature and meaning of Christianity’s origin Posted by Guessedworker on Tuesday, 25 July 2023 22:19.
[Majorityrights News] Is the Ukrainian counter-offensive for Bakhmut the counter-offensive for Ukraine? Posted by Guessedworker on Thursday, 18 May 2023 18:55.
Posted by DanielS on Wednesday, 15 November 2017 20:24.
60,000 join nationalist march carrying racist banners and chanting for ‘White Europe.’
An estimated 60,000 people turned out in Warsaw for the march, with many chanting ‘clean blood’, ‘pure Poland’ and ‘White Poland’ and carrying posters with the words: ‘White Europe of brotherly nations.’
The Guardian, “‘White Europe’: 60,000 nationalists march on Poland’s independence day”, 12 Nov 2017:
60,000 join far-right march carrying racist banners and chanting for ‘White Europe’
An estimated 60,000 people turned out in Warsaw for the march, with many chanting ‘clean blood’, ‘pure Poland’ and ‘White Poland’ and carrying posters with the words: ‘White Europe of brotherly nations.
Demonstrators with faces covered chanted “Pure Poland, White Poland!” and “Refugees get out!”. A banner hung over a bridge that read: “Pray for Islamic Holocaust.”
Metro, “60,000 join nationalist march carrying racist banners and chanting for ‘white Europe,” 12 Nov 2017:
Tens of thousands of people carried symbols, religious slogans on banners and made racist chants during a march in Poland on Saturday.
An estimated 60,000 people turned out in Warsaw for the march, with many chanting ‘clean blood’, ‘pure Poland’ and ‘white Poland’ and carrying posters with the words: ‘white Europe of brotherly nations’.
Poland’s independence day celebrations turned ugly this weekend, as tens of thousands of nationalist protesters took to the streets, chanting anti-Muslim and anti-Jewish slogans and setting off flares.
The day celebrates the re-birth of Poland in November 1918, 123 years after the Prussian, Habsburg and Russian empires carved up Poland among themselves and erased it from the map of Europe. CNN.
Evelyn Farkas: Former Assistant Secretary of Defense for Russia, Ukraine and Eurasia: 14:45: It drives me crazy when Former Director Comey says that the Russians are coming back. To your point, they never left. I mean they’re still here, they have all that information, they’re in our cyber- and in our information-sphere.
Ned Price: And its broader than just Wikileaks and the overt or semi overt organs of the Russian government. I think one thing we noticed even after the election; you take the sort of trending story in Alt-Right or so-called Alt-Right circles: [example] hashtag #Syriahoax started in Russia and somehow make their way to the United States and started trending in some of the same circles that are collectively known as the Alt-Right. And I think the linkage between the two is not something we fully understand; how something jumps across he Atlantic like that and tends to land with the same group of people after originating in pro-Russia circles.
Now we need a non-Jewish panel discussing Israeli and Jewish influence over the American electorate - lol.
..in fact, there are some questions toward the end that bear upon that -
Charlie D. from Duke Law: 52:00: Would it help if we broadened the discussion about all foreign nations who are trying to influence our campaigns?
Panel averts the question -
Ned Price: 52:19: I would start with the proposition that it’s natural for governments to have policy preferences. Clearly I would suspect lots of the NATO member countries were made uncomfortable listening to Donald Trump during the campaign speak of NATO being obsolete. I think that the issue is that in today’s environment there has been attempt at criminalization on policy preferences on the part of foreign capitals. But I think we have to remember is a far cry from a NATO country, you know, privately rooting for Hillary Clinton and a strategic adversary getting involved in our election with Active Measures, covert influence, social media, you name it.
Julia Ioffe: They weren’t probing and scanning our election infrastructure, yeah.
Audience Member: Have any of you considered the business role of the president and Russia; because he has, right now, no one will lend him money in New York City, no one will do business with him in New York City. He owes a great deal of money. Where does he get the money? There are a lot of rumors that he gets it from Russia. Have any of your explored any of that?
Julia Ioffe: 53:48: Both of his sons said that he (Trump) gets most of his money from them (Russia) ...and its not a crazy proposition either that if he’s doing real estate in New York and Florida ...and guess where (((Russians))) who want to park their money outside of Russia, guess where they want to buy real estate? - (((New York and Florida))).
Posted by DanielS on Thursday, 09 November 2017 06:44.
President Donald Trump and Saudi Deputy Crown Prince and Minister of Defense Mohammed bin Salman meet at the White House in Washington, U.S., March 14, 2017. Kevin Lamarque | Reuters
CNBC, “Trump may have pushed Saudi Arabia and Iran closer to war”, 7 Nov 2017:
- Saudi Arabia’s moves over the past few days are bringing it closer to direct war with Iran.
- But this process seems to have been kick started by the new Saudi crown prince’s meeting with President Trump in March.
- It’s crucial to keep this conflict contained to the Middle East.
Crucial news keeps flying out of Saudi Arabia at a frantic pace, but here’s the bottom line: The Saudis are marching ever closer towards a wider regional war. And the U.S. may have helped send them down that path.
Just to recap, in the last several days the new crown prince of Saudi Arabia has initiated a massive purge of dozens of his fellow princes, ministers, and others in the kingdom in what’s been labeled as an “anti-corruption” sweep. Most of the headlines so far are understandably focusing on the one celebrity arrested, Alwaleed bin Talal, the billionaire investor seen and heard frequently for years on financial news channels like CNBC.
But that was just the first wave of news from Riyadh. Since the crackdown began on Saturday, the Saudis have considerably ramped up their accusatory rhetoric towards their neighbors. First, the kingdom squarely blamed Iran for a missile attack on Riyadh from Yemen that was thwarted by the U.S.-made Patriot anti-missile system. The Saudis called that attack “direct military aggression by the Iranian regime and may be considered an act of war.”
Second, the Saudis accused Lebanon of — figuratively at least — declaring “war” against it because of aggression from Hezbollah. That statement spurred even Saudi ally and Egyptian President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi to publicly urge for calm.
al-Sisi may be too late. Because the common denominator in all these Saudi moves is a more focused preparation for a wider and more direct war with Iran for control of the region. As I noted when he was first put in his top position by his father King Salman in June, Crown Prince Mohammad bin Salman was already known as a hardcore hawk against Iran. Just a month before he was made crown prince, bin Salman declared that peace dialogue with Iran was impossible.
“More aggressive anti-Iranian hawks like bin Salman may have seen Donald Trump’s election as an excuse to win the day over more dovish princes and ministers. And the White House seemingly gave Saudi Arabia a green light.”
But the direct line to these more bellicose moves begins earlier than that and goes directly to the White House. While still deputy crown prince, bin Salman visited with President Trump in March of this year. During that meeting, they publicly declared Iran as the key regional security threat in the Middle East. That was step one.
Posted by DanielS on Tuesday, 31 October 2017 06:07.
CNBC, “Mueller Is Now ‘Untouchable’ After The Manafort Indictment: Former US Attorney”, 30 Oct 2017:
John Lauro, former U.S. Attorney on the scope of the indictment:
“It’s very aggressive.” While it doesn’t have anything to do with the campaign yet, it is a historical indictment that includes money laundering, failure to register as a foreign agent and conspiracy against the United States.
“And they threw in something at the end there which was very significant - at the very end an item about his son-in-law. They are going to press him to no end. They are going to pressure Paul Manafort to flip or cooperate [like the prisoner’s dilemma?]. Absolutely”
“The significance of this indictment is that it gives Mueller cover going forward, nobody’s going to touch him because Paul Manafort is under indictment. And this gives him opportunity to press Manefort for information.”
[When you say nobody’s going to touch him, what do you mean?]
“He can’t be fired by the president of the United States, there’s no way, this indictment is significant because going forward nobody is going to even suggest that the investigation should stop or that Meuller should be relieved of his duties.”
“Because Paul Manafort is under indictment now, the investigation is moving forward, Trump would be impeached the next day [for obstruction of justice] if he tried to remove Mueller.”
“Mueller is now untouchable as a result of this indictment. That’s the significance of it.”
[You’ve actually got two guys under indictment, Manafort and Gates, setting up another prisoner’s dilemma as they could turn on one another]
“Right, right.”
“And here’s how the conversation goes: Mr. Manefort, you’re facing a long time in jail. Your son-in-law could be implicated, we’re ready to indict your son-in-law as well, what are you going to give us in return? What are you going to talk about? Whether its the Trump administration, other business deals or the campaign itself?”
[and they’re saying the same thing to Rick Gates as well?]
“Absolutely, that’s going on right now.”
“It’s very specific: they call it a ‘speaking indictment’, and prosecutors do that in order to signal to the defense that we have a powerful case against you.”
“This is actually a long standing case against Manafort that Meuller picked up because it allows him to squeeze Manafort and Gates.”
“The government acts slowly, but when they do, they’ve made sure to button-down every hatch.”
“The indictment sends a message to everybody that ‘we’re serious.’ There’s going to be a lot of pressure on Manafort. I suspect that there’s going to be other indictments as well; anybody who is the subject of a federal investigation, with dozens of FBI agents and sixteen of the most skilled prosecutors, good luck to you.”
Posted by DanielS on Monday, 30 October 2017 06:00.
Poland is correct to denounce Richard Spencer in his neo-Molotov-Ribbentrop larp.
While the Polish government is not perfectly articulate of its reasons to denounce Richard Spencer for his advocacy of a counter productive world view, they are not far off the mark and not wrong to reject him either.
Typical of American right wingers, Spencer is nursing a neo-Germanophilic world view, overly sympathetic to the German imperialism of the world wars (and antagonistic to Great Britain’s ‘interference’), with a new twist that would larp and valence a re-empowered German / Russian axis - i.e., a newly got up Molotov-Ribbentrop agreement for an “imperium”, i.e., imperialism that would run rough shod over the interests of many necessary allies - Hungary rejected him for the same reason Poland rejects him for the same reason Britain rejected him for the same reason Japan would reject him (for the same reason all of Asia would reject him for the same reason Zionism embraces him, for the quid pro quo reasoning that comprador wielding right wing enterprises embrace him) etc. - while his larped empire (Lisbon to Vladivastok) would be governed by whom? Apparently he would depend heavily on working with Jewish interests to facilitate (maneuver) his Russo-Germanic grand civic Euro larp, in Duginesque delusion of grandeur - a delusion coddled by ((())).
News Week, “Richard Spencer Is Too Racist for Poland’s Right-Wing Government”, 27 Oct 2017:
Poland’s right-wing government doesn’t want white supremacist Richard Spencer to visit the Eastern European country, calling him a “threat” to democracy.
Spencer was scheduled to speak at a conference organized by Poland’s far right to celebrate Polish Independence Day on November 11, but the country’s Foreign Ministry condemned the alt-right leader, whose condemnation of diversity has found support among neo-Nazis, whose ideological predecessors invaded Poland and killed millions during World War II.
“As a country which was one of the biggest victims of Nazism, we believe that the ideas promoted by Mr. Spencer and his followers could pose a threat to all those who hold dear the values of human rights and democracy,” the Polish Foreign Ministry said in a statement, adding that Spencer’s views are in conflict with Poland’s legal order.
Poland is not beyond criticism in its brand and particular expressions of nationalism, but Richard Spencer is highly dubious in his imperial larp; and the Poles are correct to denounce Spencer and like apologists for the imperialist aspirations of Nazi Germany and the casualties it left in the wake of its aspired imperialism, relevantly in this case, the Poland that came back not as “a gift of Woodrow Wilson”, but through the endurance and perseverance of Polish nationalism through 123 years in exile during the tri-partition; and then again through 50 years in exile during the Nazi and Soviet regimes.
Posted by DanielS on Sunday, 22 October 2017 17:23.
Reuters, “Abe to push reform of Japan’s pacifist constitution after election win”, 22 October 2017:
TOKYO (Reuters) - Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s ruling bloc was headed for a big win in Sunday’s election, bolstering his chance of becoming the nation’s longest-serving premier and re-energizing his push to revise the pacifist constitution.
Having exceeded 310, Abe can now push ahead with historic transformation
Abe’s Liberal Democratic Party-led (LDP) coalition has won a combined 310 seats, reaching a two-thirds “super majority” in the 465-member lower house, with 11 seats still up for grabs, broadcaster TV Asahi said.
A hefty win raises the likelihood that Abe, who took office in December 2012, will have a third three-year term as LDP leader next September and go on to become Japan’s longest-serving premier. It also means his “Abenomics” growth strategy centered on the hyper-easy monetary policy will likely continue.
Final official results from the election, which coincided with an approaching typhoon, are expected early on Monday.
The U.S.-drafted constitution’s Article 9, if taken literally, bans the maintenance of armed forces. But Japanese governments have interpreted it to allow a military exclusively for self-defense.
Backers of Abe’s proposal to clarify the military’s ambiguous status say it would codify the status quo. Critics fear it would allow an expanded role overseas for the military.
Abe said he would not stick to a target he had floated of making the changes by 2020. “First, I want to deepen debate and have as many people as possible agree,” he told a TV broadcaster. “We should put priority on that.”
The LDP’s junior partner, the Komeito, is cautious about changing the constitution, drawn up after Japan’s defeat in World War Two. Several opposition parties favor changes, but don’t necessarily agree on details.
REFERENDUMS RISKY
Amendments must be approved by two-thirds of each chamber of parliament and then by a majority in a public referendum.
“Now that pro-constitutional change parties occupy more than two-thirds of the parliament, the constitution will be the most important political issue next year,” said Hidenori Suezawa, a financial market and fiscal analyst at SMBC Nikko Securities.
Japan is now constitutionally free to realize its potential for nuclear weaponry within five months
“And as we saw in the U.K. ... a referendum could be tricky. So while Abe is likely to be prime minister for the time being, it is too early to say whether he can stay in power until 2021.” Abe declined to say if he’d run for a third term.
Abe had said he needed a new mandate to tackle a “national crisis” from North Korea’s missile and nuclear threats and a fast-aging population, and to approve his idea of diverting revenue from a planned sales tax hike to education and child care from public debt repayment [reut.rs/2yC0pma].
He called the poll amid confusion in the opposition camp and an uptick in his ratings, dented earlier in the year by scandals over suspected cronyism and a perception he had grown arrogant after nearly five years in office.
Abe has backed U.S. President Donald Trump’s tough stance towards North Korea, which has test-fired missiles over Japan, that all options, including military action, are on the table. Trump is to visit Japan Nov. 5-7 to reaffirm the leaders’ tight ties.
ABE‘S GAMBLE PAYS OFF
Abe’s snap poll gamble had seemed risky - some early forecasts saw the LDP losing a significant chunk of seats - after Tokyo Governor Yuriko Koike, often floated as a possible first Japanese female premier, launched her conservative Party of Hope.
That party absorbed a big chunk of the failed main opposition Democratic Party, which abruptly decided to run no candidates of its own. But voter enthusiasm soon waned despite its calls for popular policies such as an exit from nuclear power and a freeze on the planned sales tax rise.
Koike did not run for a lower house seat herself - she was in Paris for a climate change event on Sunday - and failed to say whom her party would back for prime minister.
“We had sought to put policies first. But we ended up with a very tough outcome, so I deeply apologize for that,” Koike told NHK.
A new Constitutional Democratic Party of Japan (CDPJ), formed by liberal former DP members, was vying with Koike’s party for the top opposition spot, although both are now set to have just a fraction of the LDP’s presence.
“Day by day, we felt we were getting more voter support for our call to revive more decent politics, and not fret about whether it’s right or left wing,” said CDPJ lawmaker Tetsuro Fukuyama.
Several experts noted the ruling bloc’s win was less a victory for the conservative, long-ruling LDP than a defeat for a divided opposition.
48 of the 50 Great Escapists are buried here, at Poznan Cytadela
Buried here, at Poznan Cytadela, are The 50 Great Escapists (48 of them, anyway) whose ingenious feat of stealth engineering allowed them to escape what was designed to be an escape-proof prison camp - Stallag Luft III - as immortalized in the movie, “The Great Escape.” Steve McQueen’s motorcycle scene was fake, but…
The real story is even more fantastic in terms of the prisoner’s ingenuity - including: a tunnel entranceway through a false floor in a shower drain; support structure to uphold loose sand; fabricated air ducts; documents and civilian clothes..
48 of the 50 Great Escapists are buried here, at Poznan Cytadela
President Donald Trump and Saudi Deputy Crown Prince and Minister of Defense Mohammed bin Salman meet at the White House in Washington, U.S., March 14, 2017. Kevin Lamarque | Reuters
Having exceeded 310, Abe can now push ahead with historic transformation
Japan is now constitutionally free to realize its potential for nuclear weaponry within five months
