Ford Madox Brown Finding of Don Juan by Haidee 1873
The MAGA people
WATCH: RFK Jr.'s running mate Nicole Shanahan just released another awesome video ENDING the media's lies about "The MAGA People." It shows how they have lied about Trump supporters and vilified them for years
"Contrary to what we have been told, we found the MAGA People to be… pic.twitter.com/rZyXxN6eJP
— George (@BehizyTweets) September 13, 2024
Jesse
NEW: Trump now seems open to another debate, after ruling it out. This after one of the ABC moderator’s “fact-checks” was proved wrong. The bias is so blatant that even Democrats are demanding a full investigation into the debate. pic.twitter.com/HUl8KZB7Ai
— Jesse Watters (@JesseBWatters) September 14, 2024
Ritter
https://twitter.com/i/status/1834688146778263579
Newest ad
https://twitter.com/i/status/1834653270385545249
NEW: The Trump campaign has shared Kamala Harris' entire interview that was released today, saying their "newest ad just dropped."
Brutal.
In the interview, Harris gave confusing answers to a variety of questions:
Gun Control: Harris says she *does* think America needs an… pic.twitter.com/f1jN2jiIFk
— Collin Rugg (@CollinRugg) September 14, 2024
Abdul
The dishonest, corrupt media in all of their glory.
"There is no Abdul. Trump made it up."
In 2021, before the botched withdrawal, Biden's CIA Director met with the same Abdul that they now claim doesn't exist.
Share this far and wide. Someone should get it to Trump. pic.twitter.com/TphmTO1fd4
— MAZE (@mazemoore) September 13, 2024
Vivek machine
The Supreme Court gave us the toolkit we need to dismantle the permanent bureaucracy. All we need is a president willing to pick up those tools & get to work. pic.twitter.com/krsts0sOxs
— Vivek Ramaswamy (@VivekGRamaswamy) September 14, 2024
Nevada
https://twitter.com/i/status/1834805819809948137
Real fact check
This is the greatest fact-check to ever exist. It will never get better than this. Savor it. pic.twitter.com/V6U6q4EF8t
— Bonchie (@bonchieredstate) September 14, 2024
Tucker
Tucker Carlson: "If they think that there's a chance that Trump could win decisively enough in November that they can't steal it, then I think their only option there is to in some way throw the society into chaos as they did during COVID which was the pretext for changing the… pic.twitter.com/e3mAkQPo8T
— Camus (@newstart_2024) September 14, 2024
Yeah..no. What few people realize, and the editors at Strategic Culture sure don’t, is the impact of Bobby Kennedy joining Trump’s campaign. Kennedy will certainly have demanded no wars. End Ukraine, end Gaza -one way or another-, and no new ones. And Trump okayed this.
• US Presidential Debate Delusion: 2 Candidates For 1 Party… The War Party (SCF)
Two events dominated international news this week: the TV debate between U.S. presidential candidates, Kamala Harris and Donald Trump; and reports that Washington and its NATO allies are gearing up to permit the Ukrainian regime to use their long-range missiles to hit deep into the territory of the Russian Federation. The latter move would be viewed in Moscow as a major escalation from a proxy war to a direct conflict between nuclear powers. The aforementioned events are tightly connected. The U.S. presidential election is less than two months away with Democrat Harris and Republican Trump vying in a hotly contested and divisive race for the White House. Harris, the incumbent vice president, performed best in the live TV debate, according to polls. Trump, however, with characteristic brashness, claimed that he had won the debate.
His subsequent refusal to engage in a follow-up second debate might infer that the Trump campaign fears that Harris was able to get the upper hand over her older opponent, who sounded hackneyed and incoherent. We are talking here about superficial style and not substance, which neither candidate has much of. Discernibly, the U.S. establishment favors Harris to win. Most of the American media are supportive of what would be the first woman to become president of the United States, and a woman of color too. That credential alone burnishes the image of the American republic as a supposed bastion of democracy and liberal values. More importantly for the American deep state – or ruling class – is that Harris is more aligned with its imperialist foreign policy. As with her current boss, President Joe Biden, Harris spoke belligerently about confronting Russia and unwavering support for the conflict in Ukraine.
The Washington establishment wants Harris to win on November 5 to ensure the continuation of the proxy war against Russia. The all-dominant military-industrial complex at the heart of U.S. capitalism wants the war racket to keep churning out mega profits. But also in the bigger geopolitical picture, the conflict with Russia is just one element in a wider policy of confrontation with other foreign powers, primarily China, or any other nation that challenges U.S. presumptions of hegemony. As we argued in our editorial last week, the United States is endeavoring to offset its failing global power by pursuing an intensified policy of aggression and bellicosity even if such a policy puts the entire planet at risk of catastrophic world war. The highly choreographed move this week by the United States and Britain to give the Ukrainian regime permission to use long-range missiles to strike deep into Russia is tightly correlated with the high-stakes presidential election.
Even Western media are reporting that the Ukrainian regime is in dire straits as Russian forces make significant gains in the Donbass region as well as pushing back the month-old Kursk offensive. A telling report by CNN seemed to catch up with the reality that many independent observers have already been pointing out, namely that Ukrainian defenses are collapsing. The Biden administration cannot afford an embarrassing defeat in Ukraine before the November election. Candidate Harris would be indelibly damaged by the loss of prestige especially given the huge political and financial capital invested to “defend Ukraine from Russian aggression”. Hence, giving the Kiev regime another lifeline of long-range weapons is aimed at making the floundering Zelensky junta hang on for another few weeks to get past the U.S. election.
Donald Trump would benefit greatly from the debacle of defeat in Ukraine. The former Republican president is pitching his bid to return to the White House on pushing a peace deal in Ukraine and “preventing World War Three”. Trump’s maverick disparagement of the NATO alliance and European allies is partly why the U.S. establishment does not favor him. By comparison, Harris is a more pliable tool for American warmongering, especially regarding confrontation with Russia. Trump’s talk about negotiating a resolution in Ukraine is problematic for the militaristic deep state. However, it is important to disabuse the notion that Trump is a peace candidate. He may have an inchoate inclination to scale back the U.S. aggression against Russia, but the Republican contender is more belligerent than his Democrat rival toward China and Iran. Trump is fully supportive of Israel’s genocide in Palestine.
It is fair to say that if Trump were president again, the U.S. foreign policy of warmongering would merely shift to some other region of the world. Trump’s talk about stopping World War Three is not credible. When he was president (2016-2020), he stoked the NeoNazi Ukrainian regime to wage its genocidal war against ethnic Russians in the Donbass, which led to Russia’s military intervention in February 2022. He was also gung-ho about cutting Europe off from Russian gas and putting pressure on Germany to cancel the Nord Stream project. Biden later ordered the blowing up of the undersea Baltic pipeline in September 2022. Pitching himself as a peacemaker in Ukraine is Trump’s cynical attempt to tap votes among many Americans who are rightly alarmed by the reckless proxy war against Russia. It boils down to rhetorical posturing.
“..a vote for comrade Kamala Harris is a vote for war with Russia.”
• Harris Wants War With Russia – Trump (RT)
Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump has asserted that an election victory for his rival, Vice President Kamala Harris, would ultimately lead to war with Russia, warning of an impending “nuclear Holocaust.” During a campaign rally in Las Vegas, Nevada, on Friday, Trump expressed concern about a potential nuclear conflict due to the “incompetent people” in Washington, claiming he is the only one capable of preventing a global war. “You’re going to end up in World War III. You’re going to have a nuclear Holocaust if we’re not careful. These people have no idea what they’re doing,” he warned supporters, promising to keep Americans “out of World War III.” “I will end the chaos in the Middle East, and I will settle the war in Ukraine… I will resolve that as president-elect,” he continued, arguing that “a vote for comrade Kamala Harris is a vote for war with Russia.”
Trump claimed that Harris aims to reinstate military conscription to “draft your child and put them in a war that should never have happened.” The former US president insists that the conflict in Ukraine would not have escalated if he had been in office at the time. Throughout his reelection campaign, he has repeatedly claimed he could stop the fighting “in 24 hours,” though he has not specified how. Earlier this week, Trump’s running mate, Ohio Senator J.D. Vance, shed light on a possible peace proposal, suggesting it would likely involve creating a demilitarized zone around the current line of contact and guaranteeing Ukraine’s neutrality to Moscow, which aligns with one of Russia’s main objectives. Harris, however, contends that Trump would abandon Ukraine, asserting that her efforts, along with the supply of ammunition, have ensured the country remains “independent and free” to this day.
Putin speaks through his alter ego.
• Russia Had Reason To Use Nukes, But Showed Restraint – Medvedev (RT)
Throughout the Ukraine conflict, Russia has had ample reason to use nuclear weapons, but has so far exercised restraint, the deputy chair of Russia’s Security Council, Dmitry Medvedev, has said. He warned, however, that Moscow’s patience is not limitless, suggesting that Russia could respond harshly if Western nations allow Kiev to use the missiles they have provided to strike targets deep inside Russian territory. Kiev has been demanding that these limitations be lifted since at least May. Several media outlets have recently alleged that Washington and London will soon do so, or secretly have already.
In a post on his Telegram channel on Saturday, Medvedev wrote that Western leaders have lulled themselves into a false sense of security, thinking that Moscow is bluffing when it warns of dire consequences for allowing long-range missile strikes. The official, who was also the Russian president from 2008 to 2012, said Russia is fully aware that conducting a nuclear strike would be a momentous decision. “It is precisely because of this that a decision to use nuclear weapons… has not been made so far,” Medvedev stressed. He added that the “formal prerequisites for this, which are understandable to the entire global community and that are stipulated by our nuclear containment doctrine, are in place.” He cited the Ukrainian offensive in Kursk Region as one example.
“Russia is showing patience,” he said, while warning that “there is always a limit to patience.” Medvedev went on to suggest that Russia could also respond to Western escalation with some sort of new weaponry – not necessarily nuclear, but still devastating. Speaking on Thursday, Russian President Vladimir Putin argued that the Ukrainian military is not capable of operating Western long-range systems on its own, but needs intelligence from NATO satellites and Western military personnel. For this reason, if the West allows Kiev to hit targets deep inside Russia, “this will mean that NATO countries, the US, European countries are fighting against Russia,” Putin said.
“..Americans will not be able to sit it out behind the waters of this ocean..”
• US Can’t Hide From Nuclear War – Moscow (RT)
Washington will be unable to hide from a nuclear conflict if it starts across the ocean, Russian Ambassador to the US Anatoly Antonov has said. Fears of a potential escalation between Russia and NATO over Ukraine have been intensifying in recent days, as Western powers reportedly mull the possibility of allowing Kiev to conduct missile strikes deep in Russian territory. Speaking with Rossiya 24 channel on Friday, Ambassador Antonov said that he is surprised at the “illusion” that “if there is a conflict, it will not spread to the territory of the United States of America.” “I am constantly trying to convey to them one thesis that the Americans will not be able to sit it out behind the waters of this ocean. This war will affect everyone, so we constantly say – do not play with this rhetoric,” Antonov stated.
He also mentioned that while Western countries accuse Russia of “sabre-rattling,” the US wants to investigate the consequences a nuclear strike would have for Eastern Europe. Antonov was apparently referring to a study ordered by the US Defense Department to simulate the impact of a nuclear conflict on global agriculture. According to a solicitation notice posted on a government procurement platform, the study will focus on regions “beyond Eastern Europe and Western Russia,” which in the simulation is the epicenter of the hypothetical nuclear attack. On Thursday, Russian President Vladimir Putin warned that removing restrictions on Ukraine’s use of Western weapons would directly involve the US and its allies in the conflict with Russia and would be met with an appropriate response. Russia’s envoy to the UN, Vassily Nebenzia, later reiterated that granting Kiev permission to use Western-supplied long-range weapons would constitute direct involvement in the conflict by NATO.
“We’ve been broadcasting straight out of the KGB headquarters all this time..”
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken has accused RT and its parent company of acting as an extension of Russian intelligence and attempting to undermine democracy around the world. Speaking at a State Department press conference on Friday, Blinken announced sanctions designations against RT parent companies Rossiya Segodnya and TV-Novosti, accusing “individuals affiliated” and “elements within” them of allegedly attempting to interfere in the Moldovan elections. The State Department has also sanctioned Dmitry Kiselev, Rossiya Segodnya’s director-general. TV-Novosti was also accused of “being responsible for or complicit in, or having directly or indirectly engaged or attempted to engage in, interference” in US or other foreign elections “for or on behalf of, or for the benefit of, directly or indirectly,” the Russian government.
RT is “engaged in covert influence activities… functioning as a de facto arm of [Russian] intelligence,” Blinken told reporters. Blinken revealed that the US, UK, and Canada plan to launch a global effort to treat RT’s activities as espionage, and hope to attract all of their “allies and partners” to the endeavor. James O’Brien, assistant secretary of state for European and Eurasian affairs, called RT a “threat to democracy and accurate information.” According to the State Department, RT has “moved beyond being simply a media outlet and has been an entity with cyber capabilities,” which is “also engaged in information operations, covert influence, and military procurement.” The US government claimed that “an entity with cyber operational capabilities and ties to Russian intelligence” has been embedded within RT since the spring of 2023 and that RT editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan and her deputy Anton Anisimov had “direct, witting knowledge of this enterprise.”
Another accusation leveled against RT was that Anisimov has operated a crowdfunding platform “providing material support and weaponry to Russia’s military units in Ukraine.” The State Department claimed that RT has funded “proxy outlets” that engaged in “covert influence activity” around the world, alleging that this has happened in Africa, Germany, France, and Argentina. The head of the State Department’s Global Engagement Center (GEC), James Rubin, told reporters on Friday that the “broad scope and reach” of RT was one of the reasons many countries around the world did not support Ukraine. The GEC has funded propaganda games aimed at children and forced Twitter to censor pro-Russian content. Rubin admitted last year that he wanted to use the GEC to shut down Russian media outlets around the world.
“We are going to be talking… in Latin America, Africa and Asia… to try to show all of those countries that right now broadcast – with no restrictions or control – RT and allow them free access to their countries,” Rubin said, arguing that RT’s presence has “had a deleterious effect on the views of the rest of the world about a war that should be an open and shut case.” The State Department’s announcement was leaked to CNN earlier in the day. When reached for comment by the US outlet, RT’s press office sarcastically replied: “We’ve been broadcasting straight out of the KGB headquarters all this time,” adding, “We’re running out of popcorn to sit and watch what the US government will come up with next about us.”
RT is one of the reasons the world has been not fully supportive of Ukraine – State Dept pic.twitter.com/PhvJYKwE87
— RT (@RT_com) September 13, 2024
“..if the media community does not unite now, if every media corporation head does not understand this, tomorrow… it will be too late..”
• US Has Declared Information War On Russian Media – Zakharova (RT)
The new round of US sanctions against Russian media outlets amounts to a declaration of an “information war,” Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova told RT. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken unveiled new restrictions on Friday targeting RT parent companies Rossiya Segodnya and TV-Novosti. He accused the network of being “engaged in covert influence activities… and functioning as a de facto arm of [Russian] intelligence.” “The degree of aggression with which all of this was expressed is off the scale. I think this is definitely a declaration of information war. It went on behind the scenes through the sanctions policy, but there was no declaration that the Russian media would now be openly attacked,” Zakharova stated.
The renewed attack on Russian media was prompted solely by “jealousy” in the West “because they could not compete” with it fairly, the Foreign Ministry spokeswoman said. Washington has provided no actual evidence to back up its allegations against the outlets, she added. “When they say that’s because RT is doing something wrong in the US, if it violated at least one American law, if at least one fake was a sign of some kind of global information campaign that RT is conducting on the territory of the US, if even one RT correspondent had engaged in illegal activities, and an American court of some state or maybe even a Pan-American court would have conducted some kind of investigation long ago, a verdict would have been carried out. But there’s nothing to show.”
This new development should be a wake-up call for media outlets worldwide, Zakharova said, warning that any broadcaster could become the next target. “This suggests that journalists all over the world should now understand that tomorrow this will be done to them. Therefore, if the media community does not unite now, if every media corporation head does not understand this, tomorrow… it will be too late,” the spokeswoman warned.
“It’s very easy to promote freedom of speech and practice it when it’s only your speech that counts and no one else’s..”
• US Media And Intelligence Services Have Long Merged – RT Editor-in-Chief (RT)
Washington seeks to silence any dissenting voices, as its celebrated “freedom of speech” applies only to those who support the official narrative and obey instructions from US intelligence services, RT editor-in-chief Margarita Simonyan said following the latest crackdown on Russian media. Secretary of State Antony Blinken announced the latest round of sanctions against the news outlet on Friday, accusing it of engaging in “covert influence activities” and “functioning as a de facto arm of Russian intelligence.” Earlier in September, Washington imposed sanctions on Simonyan and three other senior RT employees over alleged attempts to influence the 2024 election. Simonyan asserted that this latest attack on Russian media is a clear effort to clamp down on the information space ahead of the elections.
“They need to silence everyone. This is the story of freedom and democracy in the so-called free West. It seems to me that only clinically insane people or those who are obviously biased can believe in it,” she stated. In practice, the US idea of a free press doesn’t extend to others, she added. It’s very easy to promote freedom of speech and practice it when it’s only your speech that counts and no one else’s. Simonyan argued that Washington’s claims about RT collaborating with Russian intelligence are a “classic case of projection.”
“The idea that you can’t achieve results without being part of the intelligence service has exposed them for what they are,” she said. She noted that the way US mainstream media publishes various intelligence “leaks” and insider information from unnamed security officials points to their close ties with American intelligence services. “If you look at who runs these foundations and often the media, they’re either families of intelligence employees, former intelligence officers, or future ones,” she added. They receive orders from intelligence services: write this, write that. They have long since merged with each other.
“Trial Judge Juan Merchan has delayed sentencing until Nov. 26, but he first must rule on whether to vacate the verdict..”
• Lawfare Collapsing Amidst Harris’ Vow To Prosecute Trump (Spivak)
Largely shedding Joe Biden’s canard that Trump must be defeated to save democracy, Kamala Harris’ conceit is that she prosecutes criminals and Donald Trump is one. “I know Donald Trump’s type,” she sneers. As San Francisco district attorney and then California attorney general, Harris supported jailing parents of truants, suppressed evidence, keeping an innocent man on death row, repeatedly covered up misconduct, leading to the dismissal of more than 600 cases, incarcerated prisoners beyond their sentences, violated Federal laws that protect donor privacy, and failed to disclose conflicts of interest arising from her personal relationships. Her record of abusing prosecutorial power fits perfectly with Democrat lawfare against Trump and his advisers. Now, following setbacks for prosecutors, Trump will have a reprieve in further substantive proceedings until after the election.
• Colorado, Maine, and Illinois declared Trump an “insurrectionist,” ineligible for the presidency under the 14th Up to 32 other states were considering doing the same. In Trump v. Anderson, the U.S. Supreme Court unanimously rejected this travesty. Among other failings, the states violated a requirement that Congress determine the process, and Trump has never been indicted for, let alone convicted of, insurrection.
• The left’s least favorite judge, U.S. District Court Judge Aileen Cannon, dismissed the Mar-a-Lago classified records case, holding that Jack Smith’s appointment as special prosecutor violated the Appointments Clause of the Constitution (Article II, § 2) and his use of a permanent indefinite appropriation violated the Appropriations Clause (Article I, § 9). The government refused a compromise that might have saved the case, and is appealing.
• In Trump v. United States, a 6-3 court held that a president is immune from prosecution for official acts, his motives cannot be questioned, and his official acts may not be used as evidence in a prosecution of his private acts. Smith has filed a superseding indictment that suffers many of the same defects as the initial indictment, including as to immunity, novel legal theories, and the First Amendment rights of free speech and petition. Despite U.S. District Court Judge Tanya Chutkin’s best efforts to move the case forward, she has bowed to reality and delayed the next hearing until after the election.
• In Fischer v. United States, the Supreme Court threw out federal prosecutors’ use of 18 U.S.C. § 1512(c)(2) to prosecute Jan. 6 defendants for interfering in congressional proceedings, holding that the statute is limited to tampering with, or destroying, official records. That ruling also will narrow Trump’s election fraud case.
• A Georgia appeals court agreed to hear a challenge to Fani Willis’ right to remain as prosecutor, scheduling arguments too late for a trial this year. Even if Willis prevails, the immunity decision, First Amendment, and misapplication of the Georgia RICO statute likely will doom her case.
• A Nevada court dismissed an indictment against six Republicans accused of submitting certificates to Congress falsely declaring Trump the winner of the state’s 2020 presidential election.The New York cases are more problematic abuses by prosecutors who ran on platforms of “getting” Trump:
• There are at least a dozen reasons Trump’s conviction in New York District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s business records case should be reversed. Trial Judge Juan Merchan has delayed sentencing until Nov. 26, but he first must rule on whether to vacate the verdict because he allowed testimony by federal officials (Hopes Hicks and Trump’s assistant) about Trump’s official acts as president, now prohibited by the Supreme Court’s immunity decision. More damaging, in Erlinger v. United States, the Supreme Court held that a unanimous jury verdict is required for any factual finding that increases a potential sentence. Merchan did not require unanimity to identify the so-called “other crime” used to convert an expired business records misdemeanor into 34 felonies.• Judge Arthur Engoron found Trump liable in New York Attorney General Letitia James’ so-called civil fraud case for misstating asset values in loan applications, though the banks testified they did not rely on the statements, lost no money, and would continue to do business with Trump. Engoron ordered Trump to pay $455 million and forfeit his New York businesses. The New York appeals court stayed most of Engoron’s ruling and allowed Trump to post a reduced bond of $175 million for his appeal. The finding of liability may survive, but the penalties should be vacated as excessive under the 8th Amendment and Article I §5 of the New York Constitution, among other flaws.
If Trump is elected, he can order that the federal prosecutions against him end, or pardon himself, and the state cases likely will be delayed until he leaves office. If Harris wins, the Democrats can be expected to press forward. Though Trump’s legal team has carved back most of the cases and will continue to do so, a conviction still could mean jail time. Democrats are doing better in their lawfare against Trump’s advisers, who have limited immunity defenses. Several are defendants in Georgia, Arizona, and Michigan. Rudy Guliani and John Eastman are being disbarred, and at least eight other Trump lawyers face disciplinary proceedings. Peter Navarro and Steve Bannon were jailed for refusing to testify to the Jan. 6 Committee. The last time a recalcitrant congressional witness was jailed appears to be 1948.
But for Trump’s wealth and perseverance, he might now be in jail. Democrats financially destroyed or jailed his closest political advisers and are broadly threatening Republican party lawyers. Usually, Harris talks about the criminal justice system from the far left. But, like other progressives, when she is in pursuit mode, the Constitution, equal justice, and fundamental principles are mere affect.
“..the Ukrainian operation has turned into the bloody waste it was destined to be..”
• The West Is Ensuring Kiev’s Demise On Purpose (Amar)
The predictable and predicted is happening again. Despite the coyly teasing dance of seven veils performed by, mostly, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, to those who ignored the noise and focused on the signal, it’s always been clear that Washington and London would decide to – officially and openly – allow and help Ukraine to use their missiles for attacks even deeper into Russia than before. And of course, it’s been obvious to Moscow as well, as Dmitry Peskov, President Vladimir Putin’s spokesman, made clear as early as September 11. That the West is escalating is no surprise. It has a well-established pattern of continually ratcheting-up the stakes in its proxy war – including (but not restricted to) the supply of intelligence, mercenaries, ‘advisors’, various tanks, armored vehicles, missile systems, and recently F-16 fighter planes. Now it’s time to fully unleash Storm Shadow and then, if perhaps a little later, long-range ATACMS missiles.
What we can safely disregard is the pretext of Iran allegedly shipping short-range ballistic missiles to Russia. It’s either simply untrue or irrelevant. Tehran denies the American claim. Those ready to scoff at that should recall that the West has a rock-solid record of making things up, from Iraqi WMDs to Israel’s legally strictly non-existing ‘right’ to defend itself against those it occupies and genocides. And even if Iran has handed over missiles – as, by the way, it would have an actual right to do as a sovereign state – that is not why this specific Western escalation is occurring now. The real reason why the restrictions on the use of Western missiles are coming off at this point in the war is that Kiev is even more desperate than usual. With Russia first containing Kiev’s Kursk Kamikaze incursion and now launching devastating counter-attacks, the Ukrainian operation has turned into the bloody waste it was destined to be, while Moscow’s forces are accelerating their advances elsewhere, as even the stalwartly pro-Kiev New York Times is admitting.
Not that adding deeper missile strikes will save the Zelensky regime from defeat and probably collapse. For one thing, Ukraine does not have a large supply of these weapons, and given Western politics and lack of production capacities, it never will. Kiev may get lucky and do some limited damage, but – as with earlier silver bullets – the missiles cannot change the course of the war. Russian countermeasures will greatly blunt their impact in any case. But the Zelensky regime has a habit of clinging to one straw after the other. And, in addition, Zelensky’s team is pursuing its usual double strategy of seeking spectacular attacks that can feed propaganda at home and abroad, as well as perhaps finally escalate the war into an open regional, that is European, or even global conflict. For that apocalyptic escalation is Kiev’s last – if insane and suicidal – chance of staving off defeat.
Leave nothing for the Russian victors, not even people.
• Is the West Attempting to Destroy Kiev Demographically? (Miles)
Millions of Ukrainian citizens speak Russian and maintain political sympathies towards Moscow. Is the West working to prevent them from becoming reintegrated with their historical motherland? Russia’s proposed European security agreement in December 2021, bombastically referred to by Western sources as an “ultimatum,” represented one final good faith attempt on the part of Moscow to foreclose the possibility of war with Ukraine. The Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs published two draft treaties seeking to halt NATO’s steady march eastward. The military alliance has provoked concern in Moscow since its establishment in 1949 and especially since the ascension of West Germany to the bloc in 1955, which spurred the creation of the Warsaw Pact. The Warsaw Pact was famously dissolved as the Cold War drew to a close in 1991 but NATO – anchored by the reunified German state responsible for the 20th century murder of 27 million Soviet citizens – lives on, expanding its influence and territorial reach every few years.
“I would really like to see some documents from that [June 2021] summit in Geneva between Putin and Biden, because I think something happened there to trigger the Russian action towards proposing that security agreement in December of 2021 and preparing for the possibility of an armed conflict,” said Serbian-American journalist and translator Nebojsa Malic. The analyst joined Sputnik’s The Final Countdown program Thursday to share a provocative theory about the US-backed Ukraine proxy war on Russia. “Something was said at that summit that nobody’s talking about, but I’m very, very curious,” said Malic, referring to the final meeting between the Russian and American heads of state before the outbreak of the proxy conflict. “Why are they doing this? I had a somewhat off-the-wall theory a couple of days ago that it all goes back to the [hypothesis] of [former US National Security Advisor] Zbigniew Brzezinski and his whole theory that without Ukraine, Russia can’t be an empire.”
“Everybody assumed that this meant territory,” the journalist continued. “But what if Washington has actually realized that Ukraine can’t possibly win this and never could and are basically trying to deny Russia Ukraine as a resource – both land, oil riches, resources, whatever – but most importantly people.” “What if the actual endgame is making sure that Ukraine is wiped out demographically?” The true number of Ukrainian troops lost over 30 months of fighting has remained obscured in mainstream media as Kiev wages a propaganda war to attempt to maintain the support of the Western public. But analysis earlier this year placed Kiev’s casualties at close to half a million, a number that has only grown since Russian Defense Ministry Sergei Shoigu expounded on the subject in April. Observers say the war is possibly the bloodiest the world has seen in decades as Western countries continue to fund the anti-Russia crusade.
Meanwhile, Ukrainian civilians have suffered an epidemic of drowning deaths as citizens attempt to escape the draft by swimming to freedom across the country’s border with Romania and Hungary. Malic suggested the elimination of an entire generation of Ukrainians is not a tragic but unavoidable consequence of the war for Western military planners, but rather the point of the war, with the protracted conflict robbing Moscow of the human capital otherwise gained by its liberation of eastern regions. “This is an incredibly cynical and sinister perspective,” Malic conceded. “But… when you eliminate the impossible, anything else, no matter how improbable, must be the truth. Because that’s the only explanation that comes to my mind at this stage, because they are either complete imbeciles and are literally fighting a completely unwinnable war, or they figure out the war has been unwinnable and their objective is to actually have no more Ukrainians at maximum and bleed the Russians.”
“..a “common and indivisible architecture of strategic security and a fair polycentric world order.”
• BRICS, The Rise Of China And The Concept Of “Security” (Pepe Escobar)
The first meeting of security experts/National Security Advisors under the expanded BRICS+ format at the Konstantinovsky Palace in St. Petersburg unveiled quite a few nuggets. Let’s start with China. Foreign Minister Wang Yi proposed four BRICS-centric security initiatives. Essentially, BRICS+ – and beyond, considering further expansion – should aim at peaceful coexistence; independence; autonomy; and true multilateralism, which implies a rejection of Exceptionalism. At the BRICS table, the overarching theme was how member-nations should support each other despite so many challenges – mostly unleashed by you-know-who. On India, Secretary of the Russian Security Council Sergei Shoigu, meeting with Indian National Security Adviser Ajit Doval, stressed the strength of the alliance, “confidently standing the test of time”.
The larger context was in fact offered in parallel, in Switzerland, at the Geneva Center for Security Policy, by the always delightful Foreign Minister S.Jaishankar: “There was a club called G7, but you wouldn’t let anybody else into it – so we said, we’d go and form our own club (…) It’s actually a very interesting group because if you look at it, typically any club or any group has either a geographical contiguity or some common historical experience or a very strong economic connect.” But with BRICS what stands out is “big countries rising in the international system.” Cut to Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Sergey Ryabkov, stressing how Russia and Brazil “have similar approaches to key international issues”, emphasizing how Moscow cherishes the current “bilateral mutual understanding and interaction, including in the light of the simultaneous presidencies of BRICS and G20 this year.”
In 2024, Russia presides over BRICS while Brazil presides over the G20. President Putin, apart from addressing the meeting, had bilaterals with all the top players. Putin noted how 34 nations “have already expressed their desire to join the activities of our association in one form or another.” Meeting with Wang Yi, Putin stressed that the Russia-China strategic partnership is in favor of a just world order, a principle supported by the Global South. Wang Yi confirmed President Xi Jinping has already accepted the official Russian invitation for the BRICS summit next month in Kazan. Putin also met with the Secretary of Iran’s Supreme National Security Council, Ali Ahmadian.
Putin confirmed he is expecting Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian for another visit to Russia, apart from the BRICS summit, to sign their new strategic partnership agreement. Geoeconomics is key. The development of the International North South Transportation Corridor (INSTC) was confirmed as a top Russia-Iran priority. Shoigu for his part confirmed, “We are ready to expand cooperation between our security councils.” The deal will be signed by both Presidents soon. Moreover, Shoigu added that Iran’s entry into BRICS advances cooperation among members to form a “common and indivisible architecture of strategic security and a fair polycentric world order.”
“Discrediting official, immutable narratives, such as the one about 11 September, remains the ultimate taboo. But a false narrative construct cannot hold out forever..”
• The Fake ‘War On Terror’ Collapses (Pepe Escobar)
The events of 11 September 2001 were intended to impose and enshrine a new Exceptionalist paradigm on the young 21st century. History, though, ruled otherwise. Cast as an attack on the US Homeland, 11 September 2001, immediately generated the Global War on Terror (GWOT), launched at 11 pm on the same day. Initially christened “The Long War” by the Pentagon, the term was later sanitized by the administration of Barack Obama as “Overseas Contingency Operations (OCO).” The US-manufactured War on Terror spent a notoriously un-trackable eight trillion dollars defeating a phantom enemy, killed over half a million people – overwhelmingly Muslims – and branched out into illegal wars against seven Muslim-majority states. All of this was relentlessly justified on “humanitarian grounds” and allegedly supported by the “international community” – before that term, too, was renamed as the “rules-based international order.”
Cui Bono? (who stands to gain) remains the paramount question related to all matters related to 11 September 2001. A tight network of fervently Israel-first neocons strategically positioned across the defense and national security establishments by Vice President Dick Cheney – who had served as secretary of defense in the administration of George W Bush’s father – sprang into action to impose the long-planned agenda of the Project for the New American Century (PNAC). That far-reaching agenda had waited in the wings for the right trigger – a “new Pearl Harbor” – to justify a slew of regime-change operations and wars across much of West Asia and other Muslim states, reshaping global geopolitics for the benefit of Israel.
US General Wesley Clark’s notorious revelation of a secret Cheney regime plot to destroy seven major Islamic countries over five years, from Iraq, Syria, and Libya all the way to Iran, showed us that the planning had already been done in advance. These targeted nations had one thing in common: they were resolute enemies of the occupation state and firm supporters of Palestinian rights. The sweet deal, from Tel Aviv’s perspective, was that the War on Terror would have the US and its western allies fighting all these serial Israeli-profiting wars on behalf of “civilization” and against the “barbarians.” The Israelis couldn’t have been more happy or smug about the direction this was going. It’s no wonder that 7 October 2023 is a mirror image of 11 September 2001. The occupation state itself advertised this as Israel’s own “11 September.” Parallels abound in more ways than one, but certainly not in the way Israel-firsters and the cabal of extremists leading Tel Aviv expected.
[..] The western Hegemon excels in constructing narratives and is currently wallowing in the Russophobia, Iranophobia, and Sinophobia swamps of its own creation. Discrediting official, immutable narratives, such as the one about 11 September, remains the ultimate taboo. But a false narrative construct cannot hold out forever. Three years ago, on the 20th anniversary of the Twin Towers collapsing and the onset of the War on Terror, we witnessed a great unraveling in the intersection of Central and South Asia: the Taliban were back in power, celebrating their victory over the Hegemon in a discombobulated Forever War. By then, the “seven countries in five years” obsession – aiming to forge a “New Middle East” – was being derailed across the spectrum. Syria was the turning point, though some would argue that the tea leaves were already cast when the Lebanese resistance defeated Israel in 2000, then again in 2006. But smashing independent Syria would have paved the way for the Hegemon – and Israel’s – Holy Grail: regime change in Iran.
“Without those resources they’re going to be in really, really big trouble.”
• Israel Exists to Help West Loot, Dominate Middle East (Miles)
Although modern defenders of Israel justify its existence under the pretense of “Jewish self-determination” or “decolonization,” the state’s ideological forebears clearly articulated Zionism as a colonial project. Issued by the British government in 1917, the Balfour Declaration is often considered to mark the beginning of Western support for the establishment of the modern state of Israel. The pronouncement, notorious among Palestinians and their supporters, committed the United Kingdom to the establishment of a “national home for the Jewish people” in the Levant. Some Zionists viewed the creation of Israel as a progressive act necessary to combat rising prejudice in Europe, but historians have pointed out the nakedly antisemitic motivations of Foreign Secretary Arthur Balfour, who sought to appease a British public wary of rising Jewish immigration to the UK.
Although the West has cloaked its support for Israel in the decades since in the language of liberal antiracism its motivations are far from altruistic, argues political activist Joti Brar. The vice chair of the Communist Party of Great Britain, Marxist Leninist joined Sputnik’s The Critical Hour program Thursday to discuss the United States’ ironclad backing of the country as it continues its deadly military operation in the besieged Gaza Strip. “We see the desperation, despite the fact that this genocide is going on in the full glare of public scrutiny,” said Brar. “The balance of power has totally shifted away from them… And therefore, if they want to survive, they’ve got to find another way forward.” “But the truth is, another way forward can’t be found because as far as the truth about Israel is concerned, Israel is an outpost of Anglo-American imperialism in the Middle East to control the region’s resources,” she continued. “They need that there. It’s their armed base in the middle of the Arab world to control the Arab world and to be able to keep the loot flowing.”
Although modern defenders of Israel justify its existence under the pretense of “Jewish self-determination” or “decolonization,” the state’s ideological forebears clearly articulated Zionism as a colonial project. “You are being invited to help make history,” wrote the ideology’s founder Theodor Herzl in a 1902 letter to Cecil Rhodes, the notorious namesake of the white supremacist African republic of Rhodesia. “It doesn’t involve Africa, but a piece of Asia Minor; not Englishmen but Jews… How, then, do I happen to turn to you since this is an out-of-the-way matter for you? How indeed? Because it is something colonial.” Jewish migration to Palestine rose sharply after the Balfour Declaration was issued, with violent paramilitary gangs arising from within the transplanted population. Terrorist groups such as Lehi and Irgun attacked the country’s indigenous Palestinian population, forming the basis of the Israel Defense [sic]
Forces after the establishment of the ethno-supremacist state in 1948. Israel has pushed the territory’s non-Jewish inhabitants to the margins since then, presiding over what numerous international organizations have classified as an apartheid state. “Oil remains the single most important commodity in the world today,” noted Brar. “It is the most important source of energy for the world, for industry and for war and it is the most geopolitically significant asset for that reason. And without controlling the oil and being able to loot it at rock bottom prices in the way that they do because of their colonial position in the region, then imperialism would be in massive trouble. What’s left of their economies would be collapsing.”
“And so you see this really existential identification of Western imperialism with Israel, which to a lot of people seems to make no sense. They can’t see why they don’t just let Israel fight its own battles and fight and die or live and die according to its own abilities. Why are they all jumping in? Why is Zionism so important to the West?” “The reason is it’s their tool for controlling the region and the region’s resources,” Brar explained. “Without those resources they’re going to be in really, really big trouble.”
“The abortion issue was created by a liberal US Supreme Court that declared a right that does not exist in the US Constitution..”
• The Abortion Issue (Paul Craig Roberts)
Perhaps nothing demonstrates the presstitutes’ idiocy, ignorance, and incompetence [more] than the media’s presentation of the abortion issue as a presidential issue with Kamala standing with women and Trump standing against women. The abortion issue has nothing whatsoever to do with the executive branch. The abortion issue was created by a liberal US Supreme Court that declared a right that does not exist in the US Constitution. A liberal Court ruled in favor of sexually promiscuous women who do not want the responsibility for their own sexual behavior, and gave them the right to terminate birth. A subsequent US Supreme Court repealed the previous Court’s decision for the reason that the creation of a right to abortion was a legislative act, not a judicial one. In overturning the previous Court’s finding of an abortion right, the subsequent Court said abortion was a legislative issue for state legislatures, a position with which Trump agrees, and that the judiciary has no Constitutional authority to legislate as the US Supreme Court had done in its abortion ruling.
What Trump is supporting is the separation of powers. If sexually promiscuous liberal and left-wing women who decry responsibility for their sexual behavior want the right to terminate the birth of a person, they will have to convince the legislators in the state governments. It is not a federal issue and in no way a presidential issue. Yet, the despicable whore American media featured it as a presidential issue in the “debate.” So why was it part of the media orchestrated “debate” between Trump and Kamala? The only answer is: to give the women’s vote to Kamala. The question that needs explaining is: Why is it that the presstitute media is given control over presidential “debates?” Especially “debates” held in controlled and sealed rooms devoid of an audience. A debate should be a public affair attended by the public and one that all media can cover if so inclined. How do we explain debates controlled by biased media assigned the task of protecting official explanations and never challenging them?
The answer is to keep Americans from understanding what has happened over the course of the life of their country to their country and to their Constitutional rights. The separation of powers that the Constitution prescribes endeavors to keep people, not government, in charge. What has happened over time, is the destruction of the peoples’ rights. It began with Lincoln destroying the 10th Amendment and states’ rights. Next came the expansion of the franchise to include non-property owners given the right to vote to themselves the property of others. Then Roosevelt’s New Deal turned Congress’ legislative authority over to executive branch regulatory agencies. Then with George W. Bush and Obama declaring their right based on suspicion alone of setting aside the Constitution’s prohibition against throwing people into dungeons without presentation of evidence to a court and conviction in a trial and the Constitution’s prohibition against execution of life without due process of law, the executive branch emerged more powerful than the US Constitution.
Everyone accepted these extraordinary violations of the US Constitution, including Congress, bar associations, the university law schools, and media.The American people themselves are so poorly educated, thanks to public schools that the insouciant fools support and money-driven universities that they have no realization of the Constitution’s burial along with American liberty, which, of course, means them. They sit there thinking they are a free people while a gulag is being prepared for them. As is evident, abortion is not the only issue about which Americans are hoodwinked. For most Americans, their existence is organized for them by controlled narratives. Following the media’s instruction, they regard those who tell them the truth as “conspiracy theorists.” The suppression of truth has always been easy in America, but in the 21st century it has become total. Today truth itself is being criminalized and so are those who express truth.
Today persons, such as Dimitri Simes, who give their honest opinions about events that are transpiring, as well as social media, such as Telegraph and X , are under attack for spreading harmful “false information.” Even the owners of social media companies where people express their opinions are being held accountable for the opinions expressed by the people and for the use of social media to “abet their crimes.” Pavel Durov, Telegram founder, has been detained in France on spurious charges that he is responsible for crimes committed by users of Telegram. Elon Musk is threatened both by the EU and the UK police commissioner with arrest if he fails to censor his interview on X with Donald Trump. If you look at this honestly, the Western world today compares unfavorably with Nazi Germany and Stalinist Russia. Today there is far more freedom of expression in Russia, China, and Iran than in the West.
Think about what this means. It is impossible to raise and discuss a serious issue such as Washington’s provocations of Russia, China, and Iran. How many Americans or any persons in the Western world are there who are not so stupid as to think that Ukraine’s totally artificial borders are worth a nuclear war? Is there anyone in the Western world who is not so utterly stupid and compromised as to think that Israel’s destruction of Palestine in the interest of Greater Israel is anything less than the worst war crime in human history? How do we explain Netanyahu, the genocider of Palestine, receiving 53 standing ovations from the US Congress? And it was Christian Evangelicals leading the applause. So, you see, it is not merely the abortion issue about which Americans are incapable of thought. They are incapable of though about any the the issues that are destroying them.
Dolphin
https://twitter.com/i/status/1834702397891060058
Skater
Cabbage (aka Bai Cai) is a white French Bulldog who has mesmerized the Internet by skating like an absolute pro.
No wonder that some are calling him “Tony Dawg”.
His owner, Zhao Chen, who is also a skater, began training him in 2020.pic.twitter.com/F1KtBKsbUm
— Massimo (@Rainmaker1973) September 14, 2024
No stick
“ No stick, no problem”
pic.twitter.com/s9I9OMlhSm— Science girl (@gunsnrosesgirl3) September 14, 2024
Rhino spot
https://twitter.com/i/status/1834938697327825390
Bartiromo
I think one of the hardest things in life is witnessing our parents get older.
Not only is @MariaBartiromo handling it beautifully, I think she’s an incredibly inspiring example of true love when it comes to caring for our parents. ❤️ #sagesteeleshow pic.twitter.com/cx51ycMDIz
— Sage Steele (@sagesteele) September 13, 2024
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