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Debt Rattle July 10 2024

Jul 102024
 
 July 10, 2024  Posted by at 9:10 am Finance Tagged with: , , , , , , , ,  55 Responses »


Pablo Picasso Family of Saltimbanques 1905

 

• Trump Makes Biden Election Prediction (RT)
• A Second Spousal Regency Is Now Underway (Stockman)
• Paul Krugman Urges Biden To Drop Out (RT)
• Senile, Drooling, but Mostly Fabulous (Luongo)
• The Crowning of Kamala Harris? (Les Leopold)
• Orban: “China Has A Peace Plan, America Has A War Policy” (SCF)
• The Big Picture behind Viktor The Mediator’s Peace Shuttle (Pepe Escobar)
• EU Might ‘End’ Hungary’s Presidency – Politico (RT)
• Kremlin Responds To Kiev Hospital Attack Allegations (RT)
• NATO Should Not Be Party To Ukraine Conflict – Erdogan (TASS)
• Netanyahu Goes for Broke (Patrick Lawrence)
• Israeli Gaza Campaign May Kill 186,000 or More – 8% of Population (Juan Cole)
• UK Finances Worst Since 1945 – New Chancellor (RT)

 

 

 

 

 

 

Speaker Johnson

 

 

MEP
https://twitter.com/i/status/1810450168866635813

 

 

Rogan Dr. Phil

 

 

Orban Soros

 

 

Populists

 

 

 

 

“He has the delegates, he doesn’t have to get out. There’s nothing they can do to get him out.”

• Trump Makes Biden Election Prediction (RT)

US President Joe Biden “doesn’t want to quit” and “may very well stay” in the race for the White House, Republican rival Donald Trump has said. According to Trump, the Democratic Party will find it difficult to force Biden to quit. In the two weeks since he debated a visibly frail and confused Biden last month, Trump has stayed out of the public eye. Meanwhile, liberal media outlets have run articles questioning Biden’s mental health, as Democratic donors and lawmakers reportedly weigh their options for forcing the 81-year-old to suspend his reelection campaign. In a phone interview with Fox News host Sean Hannity on Monday night, Trump predicted that Biden will withstand the pressure to step down. “It looks to me like he may very well stay in,” Trump told Hannity.

“He’s got an ego and he doesn’t want to quit. This isn’t necessarily a very positive thing for our country, but I think he might very well stay in.” Biden himself has vowed to stay in the race, telling MSNBC on Monday that he is “not going anywhere.” In a letter to Democrats in Congress earlier that day, Biden insisted that he “wouldn’t be running again if I did not absolutely believe I was the best person to beat Donald Trump in 2024.” Biden won the support of nearly 99% of Democratic delegates during the party’s largely symbolic primary elections this year. This victory gives the president “a lot of power,” Trump told Hannity, adding that removing him from office via a constitutional amendment could be the only option available to the Democrats. “Unless they use the 25th Amendment… he has all the power,” Trump explained. “He has the delegates, he doesn’t have to get out. There’s nothing they can do to get him out.”

Should this come to pass, Trump said that he would expect to face Vice President Kamala Harris in November’s presidential election. “I think that [the Democrats] are very concerned about the vote if it’s not her,” he said. “They are gun-shy, they don’t want to do it any other way. It seems that if he gets out for whatever reason – and I don’t think he wants to get out – but if he gets out then it will be her.” Trump offered a cruder assessment of Biden’s chances in the days after the debate. In leaked footage filmed at one of his golf courses in late June, Trump could be heard telling a small group of supporters that Biden would surely be “quitting the race,” calling the president an “old, broken-down pile of crap.” Turning to Harris, Trump said that while she would be a better opponent, she is “so pathetic” and “so f**king bad.”

Trump on Biden

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“..why Kamala Harris and the timorous men and woman of the Biden cabinet have not activated the 25th Amendment: They are scared to death of Jill Giacoppo!”

• A Second Spousal Regency Is Now Underway (Stockman)

As it turned out, the immobilization of the presidency during the last 18 months of Wilson’s term was one of history’s great serendipity’s. Absent Wilson’s tireless promotion, the abominable League of Nations Treaty died aborning. America was thus given one more chance to return to its ways as a peaceful Republic untroubled by the petty intrigues of nations beyond the great Atlantic and Pacific Ocean moats. Needless to say, that reprieve has long since been kicked away. America is now a dangerous Empire and its president is virtually the helmsman of the planet. So the fact that Jill Biden has apparently read and copied the entirety of professor Markel’s account of America’s first Spousal Regency is troubling indeed. It was evident beyond a shadow of a doubt last Thursday night that a second Spousal Regency is now underway.

“Joe Biden” would have received his gold watch from Washington’s grateful ruling apparatchiks long ago, save for the obvious fact that Jill Biden has said that absolutely “nyet means nyet”. At this point, of course, it would be helpful if Jill did speak a bit of Russian because the minions helping her conduct this unauthorized, unlawful and constitutionally- repugnant Regency have gotten her marooned in what amounts to an helacious Moscow Winter. Alas, however, it appears that her second language lies elsewhere. That is to say, Jill Jacobs Giacoppo’s tribal ferocity did not originate from the bucolic hills of Willow Grove Pennsylvania or the classrooms of Upper Moreland High School or even the instructors at Brandywine Junior College. Her father’s family had emigrated from the Sicilian village of Gesso, losing the “Giacoppo” part within days of passing Lady Liberty, but hanging on to the blood loyalty part even unto the present fraught hour.

That is to say, Edith Wilson Biden is a clear and present danger to the American Republic. She has spent the last 47 years marinating in the self-righteous hypocrisies, follies and evil-doings of the Washington ruling class—without ever once have been called to accountability by any kind of electorate at all. Like Edith Wilson, she was apparently an able spouse and hostess – who taught classes at Northern Virginia Community College on the side and was pleased to call herself “doctor” owing to a quasi-honorary degree from the Biden family’s political sinecure at the University of Delaware. And yet and yet. Jill Giacoppo is an utterly unqualified usurper, who has even less excuse for her blatant power grab than did Edith Wilson back in the day. At least in Edith’s time there was no 25th Amendment to regularize, organize and legitimize the transfer of power to the constitutionally prescribed role of Vice President.

To be specific, section 4 of the 25th Amendment addresses the precise case of a President unable to fulfill his constitutional role but who cannot or will not step aside. In that event, it provides both a decision-maker and a procedure. The deciding group is the Vice President and a majority of the Cabinet. If this group declares a President “unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office,” the Vice President immediately becomes Acting President; and he remains so unless a two-thirds majority of both chamber reinstate the former president. So why was “Joe Biden” still in the Oval Office last Thursday night making a spectacle of his very disabled self before a global audience of 51 million?

It’s plain as day that there is one reason and one reason alone as to why Kamala Harris and the timorous men and woman of the Biden cabinet have not activated the 25th Amendment: They are scared to death of Jill Giacoppo! Then again, this election is allegedly about saving constitutional democracy from the prospect of an illegal coup. And while the DNC and its megaphones in the MSM may resolutely deny it, that’s exactly what is now dangerously underway in their own backyard.

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Paul who?

• Paul Krugman Urges Biden To Drop Out (RT)

US President Joe Biden should “do the right thing” and drop out of the election race in favor of Vice President Kamala Harris, Nobel Prize winner and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman has said. Democrats and key party donors are growing increasingly concerned about their prospects for the vote in November after Biden’s disastrous performance in the June 27 debate against Republican rival Donald Trump. In a column on Monday, Krugman argued that Biden has been “ludicrously mistreated” by having his “every verbal or physical stumble” analyzed. Despite this, however, Krugman, the 2008 Nobel Prize winner in economics, said Biden should stand aside as his party’s candidate for president.

Harris should “probably” be the one to take his place, he added. The televised debate last month gave Biden a “golden opportunity” to “be calm and reassuring” in the face of Trump’s “bizarre and menacing” behavior, but he “utterly failed the test,” Krugman wrote. ‘During the CNN-hosted showdown, Biden appeared visibly confused, slurring his words and struggling to finish his sentences. While the White House blamed Biden’s poor performance on a cold and his busy travel schedule earlier in the month, some Democratic donors and liberal pundits have called on the 46th president to suspend his campaign. Some formerly friendly media outlets have also demanded that Biden step aside.

The 81-year-old has refused to withdraw from the race, admitting only that he does not debate “as well as [he] used to.” Speaking to MSNBC on Monday, Biden said he is “not going anywhere” and vowed to continue his reelection campaign, insisting he is “the best candidate to beat Donald Trump.” A survey conducted by CBS News/YouGov in the wake of the presidential debate found that 72% of registered voters do not believe that Biden has the “mental and cognitive health necessary to serve as president.”

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“..Doug Emhoff, you know the ‘second gentleman’ was at a debate watch party with Rob Reiner and Jane Fonda. What did he do to deserve that? Meathead and Hanoi Jane?”

• Senile, Drooling, but Mostly Fabulous (Luongo)

Well, here we are. It’s a full blown panic. It is now obvious that President Biden lacks the mental faculties to carry on the office of the presidency. And the nervous mice are starting to tiptoe out on the ice and do the ‘noticing in public’ they have avoided the last three and a half years. The Democrats are now dividing themselves between the culpable and those with culpable deniability. Who knew? Who could have known? It’s time to call a lid on the whole damn thing, Jack. Now Republicans don’t want to hear that, they want to keep Biden in the race, for obvious reasons. That’s easy to understand and if he was just running as a candidate and not for reelection, it wouldn’t be a big deal. But, there is a country to run, every single day. And we do not know who is running it. That is beyond politics. And beyond unacceptable.

Democrats are nervous about Kamala. Who cares? She is the Vice President of the United States of America and her job is to step into the vacuum at moments like this. There will be plenty of time for a post-mortem later, but there can be no pretending that Biden is capable of finishing out his term. It’s nonsense and everyone knows it. But the Democrats have never met a rule or standard that they weren’t willing to politicize, and relativize, to their own ends. They can always screw over President Harris at the convention in six weeks, and give the nomination to someone else. They can fight the ballot issues at the state level. But I bet she winds up with the Senile Ice Cream Man’s superdelegates, so maybe everyone should stop worrying and learn to love the Kam…ala. How did we get here? According to some, it was because the right wing crankosphere has been too mean.

Calling out the obvious denied the establishment press their ability to do their jobs. They had to spend all their time doing counter-narrative against internet meanies, otherwise they would have noticed the president is unfit for office. Well, we’ve been calling him the Senile Ice Cream Man™ for over three years over here, so it must be our fault. We are deeply sorry about that. Sorry about being able to perceive reality. Meanwhile, the press is still getting their heads around the possibility of consequences. Give credit to the New York Times for being able to sniff a change in the zeitgeist and move quickly towards it. Even as they deserve heaps of scorn for carrying on the farce for so long, they’ve quickly put on their big girl pants and are out doing the journalism thing. It’s been cringeworthy to watch. So the press is doing the careful lane change. But we still have to watch all the Democrats pretend they didn’t know.

“Whip smart” Joe Biden is the best he’s ever been! That’s what they said on Morning Joe! You know the show where marriages, and credibility, goes to die. But, it wasn’t a lie, exactly. In some ways, Biden hasn’t changed at all. He was always an egotistical prick who said dumb stuff. Joe has always made up thinly believable lies based on his patronizing view of the world. He’s always been awkwardly sniffing people. Even if you believe “Corn Pop was a bad dude,” do you not remember Biden was the life insurance policy for the first black president? Obama thought “…I sure don’t want to get shot, who could I pick for VP that would make even an assassin think twice? Oh, I know, Joe Biden. No one wants that dumbass in charge!” Supposedly, poor Doug Emhoff, you know the ‘second gentleman’ was at a debate watch party with Rob Reiner and Jane Fonda. What did he do to deserve that? Meathead and Hanoi Jane?

In any case, five minutes in Reiner reportedly started screaming while Jane was crying. Awkward. Not as bad as listening to Kamala practice a speech, but pretty bad. Then you have the Hollywood elites, with their fake surprise and lamentations of betrayal. I can think of a lot of off-color compound words people might use to describe Ari Emmanuel. Dumbfuck is not on that list. He was so surprised to see Biden’s performance, shocked I tell you. Bitch, please.

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Dems are trying to turn disaster into a demonstration of democracy.

• The Crowning of Kamala Harris? (Les Leopold)

While we await President Biden’s talk with the Lord Almighty, the Democratic Party lords are planning the coronation of Vice President Kamala Harris. Is she the best Democratic Party nominee? Many party leaders are eager to shut down that discussion. For them, it’s game over. They say that Harris should be the nominee and anyone who opposes her will greatly offend key Democratic constituencies, starting with the Black women who have been the backbone of the party in key states. How would it look, for example, if a white woman like Governor Gretchen Whitmore, were chosen instead? After all, Harris is literally “next in line.” Picking anyone else, therefore, would be like cutting ahead of the line. Not fair and an insult to people of color. But that argument is a stretch. It’s not automatic that vice presidents get a free ride to the nomination. Sometimes they have to fight for it, as Hubert Humphrey did in 1968.

And Biden himself, of course, was pushed aside for Hillary Clinton in 2016, even after serving two terms as Obama’s VP. Party elites also point to the fact that Harris is well known and therefore has a big edge over newer candidates who have not yet been vetted through the national political grinder. But that also cuts the other way. While Harris is well known, that’s not necessarily a plus. As of July 5, 51.2 percent disapprove of the job the Veep is doing, with only 37.1 percent approving, according to ABC News’ 538 poll averages. And currently, she is trailing Trump in the latest poll, 47 to 42 percent. Her supporters will correctly point out, however, that the other, lesser-known Democratic hopefuls are currently polling even more poorly against Trump. Harris also has a stellar electoral record to be considered in California, where she served as Attorney General and then U.S. Senator. And, of course, she won the vice presidency in 2020, but that vote was largely about Biden and Trump.

As a national candidate for president in 2020, however, she did not do well. After one good debate in June 2020, her campaign faltered, as her poll numbers crashed from 15 percent to 3 percent in December. She then withdrew even before the primaries began. Some will write that off as old news that doesn’t tell us much about the current situation, but really, why exactly doesn’t that history matter? What concrete evidence do we have that she would do better now as a presidential candidate? What counts most today is who the Democratic rank-and-file really want as their presidential candidate when Biden has his come-to-Jesus moment and stands down. The party’s candidate this year needs to inspire and draw the broadest possible turnout to defeat Donald Trump in the battleground states.

The Democrat mantra is that “democracy is on the line” this fall. That same concern should guide their candidate selection process. Are they willing to open it up, so the base of the party has a say in who is nominated? If so, then the Democrats should seriously consider a reasonable process outlined by Jonathan Alter in the New York Times:

• Only those with a certain threshold of support in polls may take part in Democratic debates scheduled before the convention.
• Each qualifying candidate will be granted a half-hour address on the opening night of the convention, with the winner expanding on it in his or her acceptance speech.
• Delegates should take into consideration—though not be bound by—state and national polls showing the relative strengths of the candidates.
• The candidates should identify possible running mates.

Representative James Clyburn (D-S.C.), a Biden campaign co-chair no less, is suggesting a mini-primary before the August nominating convention. And James Carville argues for holding four regional town halls for new candidates selected by Bill Clinton and Barack Obama, who also would chair the meetings. It’s possible that Kamala Harris would come out of this process as the strongest contender, igniting and mobilizing many of the key Democratic Party constituencies. But it would be a grave error to use that untested assumption to eliminate rank-and-file Democrats from having a real say in the process.

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“China has a peace plan. America has a war policy. And Europe, instead of having its own strategic approach, is simply copying the American position..”

• Orban: “China Has A Peace Plan, America Has A War Policy” (SCF)

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán continued his peace mission with a trip to China before moving on to the United States on Monday, July 8th. After visiting Kyiv and Moscow last week, he headed to the capitals of the two global powers, who—in the prime minister’s words—have the ability to influence the outcome of the Russo-Ukrainian war. Hungary assumed the rotating Presidency of the Council of the European Union on July 1st, and Orbán is using this role to promote his “peace mission,” an attempt to bring the war in Ukraine to an end. Though the prime minister made it clear that he is not mandated to hold talks on behalf of the other EU member states, he said he would like to find out how far Ukraine and Russia were willing to go—and update fellow EU member states on his findings.

Since the start of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, Hungary has been the only EU member state to call for a ceasefire and peace talks instead of prolonging the war by sending weapons to Ukraine. As we recently reported, Orbán visited both Kyiv and Moscow last week in an attempt to talk to both participants in the war that has now raged for almost two-and-a-half years. He was criticised by EU leaders for talking to Russian President Vladimir Putin, with European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen stating that “appeasement will not stop Putin.” However, Balázs Orbán, the prime minister’s political advisor (not related to Viktor Orbán) said in an interview on Sunday that Hungary’s EU presidency provides a good opportunity to open the communication channels between the parties of the war. Unveiling the agenda of the presidency in June, Hungarian EU Affairs Minister János Bóka said “the EU has to guarantee the security and peace of Europe, and every one of our priorities will be interpreted within this framework.”

In a short video uploaded to his X account after his meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping in Beijing, the prime minister said: “Of course, the warring parties have the last word in the war, but three world powers have a decisive influence: China, the United States and the European Union. They also influence when this war will end.” In Beijing, Orbán said he had discussed with Xi the Chinese peace plan, saying “China is the only world power that has been clearly committed to peace from the beginning.” China’s and Brazil’s road map states that “dialogue and negotiation are the only viable way out of the crisis.” China did not attend a Western-backed peace summit held in Switzerland last month, saying it is meaningless to hold such a conference without the participation of one of the warring factions, Russia. According to AP reporting, Xi followed his meeting with Orbán by calling on Russia and Ukraine to stop the fighting—and on other major powers to create an environment conducive to talks.

“China has a peace plan. America has a war policy. And Europe, instead of having its own strategic approach, is simply copying the American position,” Viktor Orbán told German daily Die Welt in an interview shortly before his trip to Beijing. After visiting Beijing, Orbán flew straight to Washington, D.C., where he is set to attend the summit of NATO leaders, which begins on Tuesday. Member states plan to pledge to keep pouring arms and ammunition into Ukraine at current levels for at least another year. NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said the alliance’s 32 member countries have been spending around €40 billion each year on military equipment for Ukraine since the war began and that this should be “a minimum baseline” going forward.

Before the summit, it was rumoured Orbán would meet former President Donald Trump who has claimed he could end the war within 24 hours of moving back into the White House. Orbán openly supports Trump’s presidential candidacy, and has stated that the former president would bring back peace to Ukraine. “Prime Minister Orbán, like my father, wants to see PEACE brought back to the world. Enough of the constant wars and the endless sums of money to fund them. … Peace must be the ultimate goal,” Donald Trump Jr.—Trump’s son, who recently visited Budapest—posted on X.

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“All negotiations with him, he is always in a good mood – this is the first thing. Secondly, he is more than 100% rational. When he negotiates, when he begins to explain, when he makes an offer, saying yes or no, he is super, super rational..”

“..it is a real challenge to negotiate with him and be prepared to match his intellectual and political level.”

• The Big Picture behind Viktor The Mediator’s Peace Shuttle (Pepe Escobar)

Viktor Orban is on a roll. And that has set out a riotous roller coaster. Everyone has been gripped by the extraordinary spectacle of pre-historic specimens wallowing in the Western geopolitical swamp reaching the depths of Hysteriastan at the sight of the Hungarian Prime Minister’s peace shuttle moving from Ukraine and Russia to China. And to do that on the eve of the 75th anniversary of warmongering Global Robocop NATO has got to be the ultimate affront. The 3-hour long Putin-Viktor The Mediator meeting in Moscow was quite something. These are arguably Putin’s three main points: 1.Kiev cannot allow the idea of a ceasefire because that would remove the pretext for extending martial law. 2.If Kiev ends martial law, it will need to hold presidential elections. The chances of the current Ukrainian authorities winning are close to zero. 3.There should not be a truce for additional Kiev weaponizing: Moscow wants a complete and final endgame.

By comparison, these are arguably Orban’s three main points: 1.The positions of Russia and Ukraine are very far from each other, much needs to be done. 2.The war in Ukraine has begun to have an impact on the European economy and its competitiveness (as much as the EU “leadership” may deny it). 3.“I heard what Putin thinks about the existing peace initiatives, the ceasefire and negotiations, and the vision of Europe after the war.” Orban also made a point of emphasizing the airtight pre-meeting secrecy, as “means of communication are under total surveillance by the Big Boys”. He described the search for a solution in Ukraine as his “Christian duty”. And he said he asked three direct questions to Putin: whether peace talks are possible; whether a ceasefire before they begin is realistic; and what Europe’s security architecture could look like.

Putin, said Orban, answered all three. The clincher – not for the warmongers, but for the Global Majority – was Orban’s description of Putin: “All negotiations with him, he is always in a good mood – this is the first thing. Secondly, he is more than 100% rational. When he negotiates, when he begins to explain, when he makes an offer, saying yes or no, he is super, super rational. How else can you say it in Hungarian? Cool headed, reserved, careful and punctual. He has discipline. So it is a real challenge to negotiate with him and be prepared to match his intellectual and political level.” All of the above ties up with the concept of a new Eurasia security system proposed last month by Putin – and a key theme of discussion at the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit in Astana last week. Putin has emphasized the central role of the SCO in the process, stating that a “decision was made to turn the SCO regional anti-terrorist structure into a universal center tasked with responding to the entire range of security threats.”

In a nutshell: the SCO will be arguably the key node in the new Eurasia-wide indivisibility of security arrangement. This is as huge as it gets. It all started with the concept of Greater Eurasian Partnership, proposed by Putin in 2015 and conceptualized by Sergey Karaganov in 2018. Putin took it to another level in his meeting with key Russian diplomats in June; it’s time to set up serious bilateral and multilateral guarantees for collective Eurasian security. That should be a security architecture, according to Putin, open to “all Eurasian countries that wish to participate,” including “European and NATO countries.” And it should lead to “gradually phasing out” the military presence of “external powers in Eurasia”, side by side with “establishing alternatives to Western-controlled economic mechanisms, expanding the use of national currencies in settlements, and establishing independent payment systems.” In a nutshell: a complete geopolitical and technical-military revamp, as well as geoeconomic (the importance of developing alternative international transport corridors such as the INSTC).

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“With such a meeting the presidency ends before it has really begun.”

• EU Might ‘End’ Hungary’s Presidency – Politico (RT)

The European Union could revoke Hungary’s presidency of the bloc over Prime Minister Viktor Orban’s trip to Moscow, Politico EU has reported, citing diplomatic sources. Orban went to Ukraine last week, upon assuming the European Council presidency and vowing to “Make Europe great again.” He then went to Russia, triggering howls of outrage in Kiev and Brussels alike. “Member states were already irritated by the ‘MEGA’ motto. But a meeting with [Russian President Vladimir] Putin will permanently overshadow the Hungarian presidency,” Politico reported on Monday evening, citing an unnamed EU diplomat. “With such a meeting the presidency ends before it has really begun.” Politico described Orban as having gone “rogue” and suggested the EU ambassadors “could move from public condemnations alone to concrete action to restrain” Budapest at their meeting on Wednesday.

There is “a very clear political disapproval” of Orban in Brussels, another anonymous diplomat said, adding that the ambassadors are “now discussing what exactly to do on Wednesday.” The bloc “can get rid of the Hungarian presidency within weeks,” argued Daniel Hegedus, a senior fellow at the German Marshall Fund think-tank. He laid out a series of steps by which Brussels could move the start of Poland’s presidency to September 1, cutting Hungary’s term short, so as to “attach negative consequences to Orban’s behavior.” This would require a four-fifths majority in the European Council.

Orban has dismissed criticism that he does not have a mandate to represent the EU by saying that his peace missions are not classical negotiations and therefore do not require one. Bigger powers might be able to end the conflict, but Hungary can be “a good tool in the hands of God” to promote peace, the Hungarian leader said last Friday on national radio. Hungary has long been one of the few EU members critical of the bloc’s unqualified support for Ukraine, urging Brussels instead to push for peace. Budapest has blocked plans to finance Kiev’s weapons purchases, declined to participate in the program of training Ukrainian troops, and refused passage of weapons and equipment to Ukraine via its territory.

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“..used by the Ukrainian authorities to ensure continued funding and the continuation of the conflict.”

• Kremlin Responds To Kiev Hospital Attack Allegations (RT)

Moscow has vehemently denied responsibility for the tragedy at the Okhmatdet children’s hospital in Kiev, after a missile hit the facility on Monday. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov has insisted that the incident was caused by a Ukrainian air defense missile. Speaking to reporters on Tuesday, Peskov stressed that Russia “does not strike civilian targets” and that all strikes carried out by the Russian military are exclusively aimed at “critical infrastructure facilities and military targets that are somehow related to the regime’s military potential.” Regarding Ukraine’s accusations that Moscow intentionally hit the hospital in Kiev, Peskov pointed to the official statement by the Russian Defense Ministry, which “absolutely rules out that there were strikes on any civilian targets. It states that we are talking about the fall of an anti-missile.”

The Russian Defense Ministry reported on Monday that it had conducted a large-scale attack using long-range high-precision weapons to strike Ukrainian military industry facilities and aviation bases. The attack was said to be in response to Kiev’s continued attempts to cause damage to Russian energy and economic facilities. The ministry stated that all the intended targets were hit and rejected Kiev’s claims of Russian missiles striking civilian facilities as “absolutely untrue.” “Numerous published photos and video footage from Kiev clearly confirm the fact of destruction due to the fall of a Ukrainian air defense missile launched from an anti-aircraft missile system within the city,” the ministry said. It also accused Kiev of attempting similar “hysterics” in the past, especially before large international summits, such as the NATO gathering in Washington that kicked off on Tuesday. The Russian Defense Ministry suggested that the incident at Okhmatdet is being used by the Ukrainian authorities to ensure continued funding and the continuation of the conflict.

Russia’s ambassador to the US, Anatoly Antonov, has also suggested that the hospital tragedy is seen by Kiev’s Western backers as a “perfect gift” to justify further escalation of the conflict and the continuation of hostilities. The Western press is “whipping up hysterics” and hiding relevant facts about the tragedy, Antonov claimed, including Moscow’s assessment that the incident was caused by a Ukrainian air defense missile. Pro-Kiev media outlets have claimed that the weapon that struck the hospital was a Russian air-launched Kh-101 cruise missile. However, others have argued that the projectile, which can apparently be seen in a video filmed from a distance by a witness, was probably an AIM120 fired by a NASAM missile system or an interceptor fired by the MIM-104 Patriot missile system. Western donors have provided Ukraine with this type of US-developed weapon.

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“They do not want to hear anything..”

• West Doesn’t Want To Listen – Kremlin (RT)

Russia will continue to “speak the truth” to the world, despite Western governments and media refusing to allow their citizens to hear what Moscow has to say, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov stated on Tuesday. Peskov was asked by the VGTRK broadcaster about Ukraine’s claims that Russia struck a children’s hospital in Kiev. Moscow has insisted that its forces targeted a nearby missile plant and that the hospital was actually hit by a stray Ukrainian air defense missile. Ukraine’s version of events was quickly backed by its Western supporters. Moscow and Kiev further traded accusations during an emergency UN Security Council meeting on Tuesday. “It is very difficult to get our point across to the Western world right now. They do not want to hear anything,” Peskov said. “We see the hysteria in [Western] newspapers, TV channels,” the Kremlin spokesman added. “This is likely due to the monopolistic dominance of Anglo-Saxon media there.”

Nevertheless, Moscow will continue to “tell the truth about what has happened, both domestically and in countries where the audience is ready to hear us and where we have technical means to reach them,” Peskov stressed. Since 2022, the EU has banned several Russian news broadcasters, including RT, citing “systematic information manipulation and disinformation.” YouTube similarly began to crack down on Russian-linked content, removing more than 70,000 videos and 9,000 channels related to the Ukraine conflict, according to The Guardian. Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova has branded the sanctions “political censorship and a campaign to completely wipe out alternative viewpoints.”

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“..every day that weapons are being used [in Ukraine] confirms the rightness of Turkey’s position” on the issue..”

• NATO Should Not Be Party To Ukraine Conflict – Erdogan (TASS)

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said that during his participation in the NATO summit in the United States he intends to bring up the issues of counterterrorism, Gaza, and Ukraine, especially the fact that the alliance should not become a party to the conflict. “We expect an outcome from this summit that takes into account our national security interests and strengthens solidarity within the alliance. During our meetings [in Washington], we will draw attention to the growing threat of terrorism in the world and emphasize the need to intensify NATO’s efforts here. We maintain a principled position on the conflict in Ukraine. We support its territorial integrity and consider it unacceptable for NATO to become a party to the war in Ukraine,” Erdogan told reporters before departing for the United States, according to his administration’s X page.

He added that “every day that weapons are being used [in Ukraine] confirms the rightness of Turkey’s position” on the issue. Erdogan also said that he intends to “put Israel’s ongoing massacre against the Palestinian people on the agenda” at the summit. “We have not been able to achieve what we wanted from NATO regarding Israel and Palestine. The efforts of the international community are not yet enough to stop Israel. We will put these issues back on the agenda of our meetings in the US and expect to obtain the results we hope for. Serious talks were held in Doha. The head of Mossad also visited Qatar. Certain steps have been taken, but they have not been finalized yet,” the Turkish leader pointed out.

He also recalled that Turkey “is among five NATO countries that make up the backbone of the organization,” which other alliance members agree with. He said he will have a meeting with new NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte during the summit. The new NATO summit, timed to coincide with the 75th anniversary of the organization, will be held in the US capital on July 9-11.

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Delusional.

• Netanyahu Goes for Broke (Patrick Lawrence)

It is a matter of record that the Zionist project has had extensive territorial designs on the lands known as Palestine since at least the early 20th century. As others have argued, the Israelis’ openly racist assault on the Palestinians of Gaza is to be understood not as a sudden eruption of violence, a departure, but as an especially savage continuation of Zionist conduct for more than a century. When history is brought to bear in this fashion, it becomes increasingly apparent that the invasion of Gaza since the events of last Oct. 7 ought not be seen in isolation. The more pathologically disturbed members of Benjamin Netanyahu’s freak-show regime — notably, but not only, Bezalel Smotrich and Itamar Ben–Givr, the finance and national security ministers — have never been shy on this point. They are entirely dedicated to the restoration of Eretz Yisrael, the mystical Land of Israel, which, variously interpreted through the ages, could extend at the extreme from the Red Sea all the way to the Euphrates Valley.

But the crazed ultras to whom Netanyahu owes his political survival have not yet got far enough to turn their visions into articulated policy. Is this changing? This is our question, along with another: Is the Biden regime — or at this point its successor — prepared to “stand with Israel,” as American leaders like to put it, if extremist dreams of violent conquest turn into real, live political and military plans?I have been convinced for some time, as I gather that many Palestinians are, that when the Israel Occupation Forces are done in Gaza they will next turn to the West Bank. On this point I now correct myself: In my interpretation the IOF, in close collaboration with brutish Israeli settlers, has already begun its assault in the West Bank. Of late the Israelis have also been openly threatening to launch a full-scale attack on Hezbollah, the political and military movement that controls southern Lebanon. This, too, bears interpretation.

Douglas Macgregor, the retired colonel and now an energetic commentator on politico- military affairs, has no trouble putting together the 2–and–2 of this moment. Here he is last week on “Judging Freedom,” Andrew Napolitano’s webcast program: “Whatever happened on the 7th of October, and I’m still not convinced that was not allowed to happen, … the decision then to attack had very little to do with what happened on the 7th of October and everything to do with a long-term strategic plan to begin the process of ethnically cleansing, expelling, or murdering, whatever you want to call it, the Arabs in Gaza and, ultimately, the Arabs on the West Bank.” This seems right but short of the emerging reality. A few minutes later in his exchange with Macgregor, Napolitano played a clip of Netanyahu addressing a table of officials, at least some of whom are American, last Friday:

“Iran is fighting us on a seven-front war. Obviously, Hamas and Hezbollah. The Houthis, militias in Iraq and Syria. Judea and Samaria on the West Bank. Iran itself. They’d like to topple Jordan. Their goal is to have a combined ground offensive from their various fronts, coupled with combined missile bombardments. We’ve been given the opportunity to scuttle it. And we will. The first requirement is to cut that hand [he gestures as if to cut through his right forearm], Hamas. People who do these things to us are not going to be there. We will have a long battle, I don’t think it’s that long, but we’ll get rid of them. We also have to deter the other elements of the Iran terror axis. We have to deal with the axis. The axis doesn’t threaten only us. It threatens you. It’s on the march to conquer the Middle East — conquer the Middle East — conquer. That means conquer Saudi Arabia, conquer the Arabian Peninsula, it’s just a question of time. And what’s standing in their way is a small Satan, that’s us, on the road to the middle-sized Satan, that’s the Europeans — they’re always offended when I tell them that — ‘You’re the great Satan!’ And we have to stop that.”

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“9 out of 10 children under 5 in Gaza are suffering from one or more infectious diseases. Levels of acute watery diarrhea are 20 times higher than typical.”

• Israeli Gaza Campaign May Kill 186,000 or More – 8% of Population (Juan Cole)

Rasha Khatib, Martin McKee and Salim Yusuf, The Lancet calculate that 186,000 or more people may be killed* by the Israeli total war on Gaza, about 8% of the population. If you do not see this study reported on your cable “news” channel, you may conclude that the corporation that owns it is complicit in genocide. One of the paper’s authors, Martin McKee, “is a member of the editorial board of the Israel Journal of Health Policy Research and of the International Advisory Committee of the Israel National Institute for Health Policy Research.” Although McKee says he is writing solely in a personal capacity, I think we may conclude that some members of the professional Israeli public health community have their hair on fire about the prosecution of the Gaza War. The Gaza Ministry of Health now says that over 38,000 Palestinians have been killed by the Israelis. As The Lancet notes, the World Health Organization and even the Israeli intelligence services accept these figures.

Since the Israeli Air Force has dropped as many as five hundred two-thousand-pound bombs and by now has destroyed or damaged a majority of the buildings in the Gaza Strip, it is likely that at least 10,000 uncounted dead are under the rubble. The 38,000 dead are the result of what is called direct gathering of the figures. Initially the dead were identified and reported by hospitals. As Israel has reduced the ability of hospitals to function by its attacks on them, this direct reporting has continued, but hospitals began being unable in some cases to send along identification, though they could confirm the reception of the corpses. Some dishonest observers suggested that this inability to know the names of the dead somehow made the numbers less reliable, but the World Health Organization refuted this allegation. The dead are in makeshift morgues still gradually being identified.

Indirect counting of the dead attempts to calculate the missing people using statistical methods. Sometimes public health experts have attempted to interview people to collect data on dead family members and friends, and then projected totals based on these surveys. That method is not available in Gaza, where the Israeli authorities will not permit journalists and other observers, and where it is dangerous to be because there are no real safe zones, with those regions declared safe zones often having been bombed. Muhammad Jawad et al., in a survey of 118 unique armed conflicts affecting 102 countries from 1990 to 2017 found that they produced an average of 19.2 battle-related deaths per 100,000 population (54.7 for those in war as opposed to minor conflict). There were in addition an average of 311 excess deaths per 100,000 population from causes other than being immediately killed by a bomb or bullet. So, 16 civilians died of starvation, communicable, maternal, neonatal, and nutritional diseases and injuries, for every direct death in combat.

And this seems important, in the Jawad et al. study: “Effect estimates were disproportionately larger for children aged under 5 years, regardless of the cause of death. Gaza had some 350,000 children under 5. UNICEF reported in May, “9 out of 10 children under 5 in Gaza are suffering from one or more infectious diseases. Levels of acute watery diarrhea are 20 times higher than typical.” Already last March, 1 in 3 children under 2 were acutely malnourished, a condition that produces permanent cognitive and emotional damage. The Lancet authors used a much smaller multiplier, of four indirect deaths for each direct death. Based on the death toll known when the paper was written, they arrived at 186,000 dead for this war over the coming months. They admit that the estimate of four indirect deaths for every direct one is conservative, so the number could be substantially greater.

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“We face the legacy of 14 years of chaos and economic irresponsibility..”

• UK Finances Worst Since 1945 – New Chancellor (RT)

The UK’s new Labour government has inherited the worst economy since the Second World War, the newly appointed chancellor of the exchequer, Rachel Reeves, has said. Reeves took charge of the country’s finances after Labour won 412 of the 650 seats in the House of Commons in last week’s general election, ending 14 years of Conservative Party rule. “I have repeatedly warned that whoever won the general election would inherit the worst set of circumstances since the Second World War,” Reeves said in a speech at the Treasury on Monday. “We face the legacy of 14 years of chaos and economic irresponsibility,” she added, accusing her Tory predecessors of acting out of “political self-interest” as part of a “government that put party first, country second.”

“New Treasury analysis that I requested over the weekend shows that, had the UK economy grown at the average rate of other OECD [Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development] economies this last 13 years, our economy would have been over £140 billion [$179 billion] larger,” Reeves said. She claimed that Tory policies effectively cost the UK budget £58 billion ($74 billion) in lost tax revenue in 2023 alone. “That’s money that could have revitalized our schools, our hospitals, and other public services,” the new chancellor said. “Growth requires difficult choices – choices that previous governments have shied away from.”

Reeves vowed to end “political timidity” in the UK’s “antiquated planning system,” and promised reform while staying committed not to “no increases in National Insurance, and the basic, higher, or additional rates of Income Tax, or VAT.” According to The Guardian, the UK’s deficit has reached the highest level since the 1960s under more than a decade of Conservative governments, while the country was badly affected by “shocks including Brexit, the Covid pandemic and the cost of living crisis.” The International Monetary Fund projected in early July that the UK’s GDP will grow by 0.5% this year.

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