~ Fake News. Final unraveling of the Russian Bounties “story.” As I said from the beginning, if you believe that the Taliban need Russian rubles to kill Americans, you’re either a neocon or a moron.
Glenn Greenwald on this topic.
~ Scott Alexander – Prospectus On Próspera. Think of the flies. (Or, why I’m not a fan of “solarpunk”).
FWIW, I think it’s a cool experiment, but I don’t think much will come out of it. It’s just downshifting on a very large & organized scale, but one that strips much of the benefits from it. Would you want to live in this ghastly modernist architectural ensemble, paying US-tier prices for property? What exactly is the point when you could go to, like, Puerto Rico – which I gather has become a playground for Bitcoin millionaires who don’t want to pay taxes? So Prospera will select for weird libertarian American ideologues, culturally insular ones at that (wanting to create their own bubble in the Third World) plus equally weird Hondurans with high % of confidence tricksters, etc. (more normal/talented ones can just go to the US). Doesn’t sound like a recipe for success.
~ Coinbase. Clown market values a CEX that’s 10x smaller and crappier than Binance at more than a third of that of the world computer (which I told you not to invest in). But imagine what happens when this boomer money goes into crypto directly.
~ Paul Robinson (RT) – Biden’s Russia policy ludicrous, unbelievable, contradictory & unprecedented: First offers Putin summit & then imposes sanctions
~ Moscow Procurator threatens to recognize Navalny’s organizations – the FBK, and the regional Navalny HQs – as extremist. Not illogical, it seems hardly wise to maintain a de facto network of soviets-in-waiting that answer to an increasingly hostile foreign Power.
~ Woke Spooks. I suppose it was the inevitable that the CIA would eventually drink its own Kool-Aid. This is good for the world.
~ Ukraine now says it believes Iran intentionally shot down Flight 752. What level of ass-kissing is this?
~ Guillaume Durocher – Bumbling Towards the Biosingularity. The contradictions of biopolitics: Leftoids often de facto pro-eugenic while decrying it, while populist rightoids de facto pro-dysgenic even while many of their brighter elements recognize its importance.
~ Twitter creates a #MilkTeaAlliance emoji. China is correct to block access to it as a tool of a foreign Power intent on its dissolution. Russia needs to follow suite.
Georgian: “You are worse than ISIS.”
Russian: “That is an interesting opinion, but I’m waiting for you to weigh the tomatoes.”
This is the current Open Thread, where anything goes – within reason.
If you are new to my work, start here.
Commenting rules. Please note that anonymous comments are not allowed.
Greenwald has some great content at Substack including this one:
https://greenwald.substack.com/p/cnns-new-reporter-natasha-bertrand
Can’t say the same for Clint Watts’ last piece:
https://clintwatts.substack.com/p/russias-disinformation-ecosystem
Rehashed BS that has been debunked on more than once occasion.
A worthy follow-up to a recent Robinson piece:
https://irrussianality.wordpress.com/2021/04/29/commemorating-the-russian-civil-war/#comments
Unfriendly Countries
Re: Re: https://theduran.com/russia-puts-together-10-unfriendly-countries-list/
The Saker of the “Anglo-Zionist” mindset (a misapplied IMO term) should’ve an interesting reply on why Israel isn’t included. Russian-Israeli relations are indicative of a healthy relationship, in the form of two countries finding areas of agreement, while not letting the disagreements get too out of hand. The same can be said of Russian-Turkish relations.
There’re individuals who contradict the above linked reactive list. Bob Hartley is the coach of the KHL champion Avangard Omsk team. He also coaches the Latvian national team. Dynamo Riga plays in the primarily Russian situated KHL. The KHL has North Americans playing in it. There’re ethnic Balts playing and coaching basketball in Russia. There’re the numerous Russian athletes proudly representing Russia at events like the Olympics and assorted world championships, in addition to participating for teams in North America and EU countries.
Likewise, I don’t see the harm of having Anglo-North Americans writing for the Strategic Culture Foundation. Joe Biden isn’t being so honest in saying that he wants to unite Americans.
More accurately put, he seems to want to unite Americans under one set of guidelines, that gives little if any respect towards some views which have a practical basis. Related:
https://home.treasury.gov/news/press-releases/jy0126
So there’s no misunderstanding, I’ve yet to appear in a venue, or see any set of individuals who agree 100% on everything. This point is made in response to those who hypocritically cherry pick.
The point is exit, which is something that all of us should want to seek, as that CIA video makes clear. Puerto Rico is a US satrapy, whereas Honduras, for all its many faults, is at least nominally sovereign.
As Nick Land once wrote, our present reality is one:
The same motivation underlies seasteading, which is much more difficult than setting up an enclave on a tropical island.
Ultimately, there’s nothing more valuable these days than sovereignty, and Prospera is an innovation in sovereignty — if a very small and protean one.
The CIA was woke even under Trump, there were active diversity quotas and PC being implemented by his own CIA pick Gina Haspell.
The process to diversify the CIA started even earlier, during Obama.
Generally speaking, non-military related intel agencies are more woke and there is trouble between the military run (aka white males) NSA and the civilian (aka women and minorities) CIA.
Came across this venue which appears to favor the likes of Galeotti, Jankowiz and Stoner:
https://www.slavxradio.com/
Starting in the 1980s, conservatives in Congress have succeeded in getting legislation passed that forced public education institutions to allow military recruiters.
One of the few levers of power than the US Right has to get cultural autonomy is a refusal to enlist by the rural conservative whites that disproportionately enlist in combat arms. For now this isn’t much supported by low-level conservative officials, but the law prevents us from simply banning recruiters in the institutions we do control.
In a society increasingly driven by a spoils system, “veteran” is largely the only A/A category that a white male can obtain.
No Wars for GayPride
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Gum70pXwz8Y/YIhrs9DFrvI/AAAAAAAAHQU/P233JzxuOz8PZ4aIjRj9M1e1Sc05SgMhACLcBGAsYHQ/s16000/99w6d37fuu551.png
It smells like Deus Ex spirit….
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Ymu1VkhVi-M/YIhrs3FJhpI/AAAAAAAAHQQ/RCd2WY_HiH0ADhC3lGb1xmXKTcUp6WoigCLcBGAsYHQ/s16000/60883265203027672639ecf5.jpg
I hope he didn’t forget to turn on his anti-virus. Wouldn’t want him to download the corona virus by accident.
Cowards run for exit, when Khalsa enter.
Edc Blade went from 1ft to 3
https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/781981619073318943/836871675328987166/IMG_20210417_124924.jpg
Life problems from N to ੦
ਵਾਹਿਗੁਰੂਜੀਕਾਖਾਲਸਾਵਾਹਿਗੁਰੂਜੀਕੀਫਤਿਹ
Honduras IQ: 81
Puerto Rico IQ: 83
Puerto Ricans seem to show a remarkable level of dysfunction for their supposed DNA:
12% Native American
65% West Eurasian (Mediterranean, Northern European and/or Middle Eastern)
20% Sub-Saharan African DNA.
Especially when you consider that some of them are white.
I wonder if they have a lot of Berber DNA from the Canary islands or Arab slaves.
On the plus side, haven’t a lot of the young people left? Maybe, white Americans could take it over demographically and then agitate for independence.
Can Do Better Than Rojansky
Re: https://www.rt.com/russia/522447-washington-ignorance-pattern-diplomatic-relations/
From what I’ve seen, I generally like NB’s input. However, it’s quite wrong to suggest that Matthew Rojansky is some worthy substantive counter to Victoria Nuland. More accurately put and as previously noted by yours truly, Rojansky is perhaps a relative “moderate”, purely on the limits of what the US foreign policy establishment is willing to accept. Regarding Rojansky:
https://www.eurasiareview.com/07112016-realists-on-russia-analysis/
https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2019/04/24/gauging-ukraine-with-russia-and-belarus/
https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2019/08/21/getting-real-with-the-us-foreign-policy-establishment-realists/
Rojansky appears to have more in common with Nuland than a (dare I say) moderate pro-American/pro-Russian advocate. Somewhat reminded of when Strobe Talbott was considered too soft on Russia, when he was being considered for a Clinton admin appointment, at a time when US-Russian relations were better than the present. Among other examples, a panel discussion involving Talbott, Zbig Brzezinski, Sergey Rogov and Vladmir Lukhin, reveals Talbott to be an earlier variant of Rojansky.
Recent Al Jazeera Changes
Re: https://www.aljazeera.com/program/inside-story/2021/4/16/will-us-sanctions-work-against-russia & https://www.aljazeera.com/program/inside-story/2021/4/19/will-russia-attack-ukraine
In the first video, Glenn Carle carries on like a loud barking dog, who calms down after receiving a stern reply that his histrionics aren’t going to work. Carle participated in what can be reasonably described as a relatively well balanced panel.
In the second video, Al Jazeera does a reverse from its typical format of having two anti-Russian leaning guests going against one of the opposite. The two pro-Russian leaning guests Viktor Olevich and Glenn Diesen, were a bit too tame (to my liking) in some of their replies. A greater emphasis could’ve been given to the 2014 overthrow of Ukraine’s democratically elected president, leading to the immediate elevation of nationalist leaning anti-Russian elements, which in turn led to a counter-response in Crimea and Donbass.
The Al Jazeera host of these two shows, Sami Zeidan, was especially good, when compared to Western mass media types. He essentially got Mychailo Wynnyckyj to reveal a disdain for pro-Russian perspectives, as evidenced by the response the latter gave to the Kiev regime’s closing of media venues with views that aren’t anti-Russian along the lines of what Wynnycky prefers.
As a follow-up to what Wynnycky said about the closing of these outlets, there’s an understandable fear factor (having to do with among other things physical and verbal abuse) within Kiev regime controlled Ukraine, when it comes to demonstrating against nationalist anti-Russian leaning positions. Within reason, it has been observed that the veracity of the nationalist anti-Russian advocacy in Ukraine (which includes violent elements) has given it a greater influence from its actual number. In Kiev regime controlled Ukraine, anti-Russian opinions don’t face the same level of censorship and violence as pro-Russian ones.
Furthermore, pro-Russian perspectives in Ukraine aren’t exclusively relegated to people who classify themselves as ethnic Russian.
These articles serve as examples of what nationalist leaning anti-Russians (regardless of ethnicity) and the Biden administration (among some others) typically seek to de-emphasize:
https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2021/04/14/cnn-blatant-disinformation-about-russia-ukraine-activity/
https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2021/04/17/us-attaches-death-head-insult-fans-flames-threatening-world-war-ukraine/
Just released video with GG:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AXcjwX-JGA
You are a conservative in California. Do you:
a,) flee the state immediately
b.) wait for the recall election and vote for the Jenner Abomination, to try to destroy Republicans for all time.
It is my theory that the Western Church gave chickens that extra little something – that cherry on top to add to their pre-existing and already impressive viciousness. They bred them to lay more eggs over Lent (and consequently to have a greater appetite). And surely kudos also belongs to whoever previously bred them to fight.
But I must castigate the Eastern Orthodox for making no contribution to the project, as they do not eat eggs during Lent. To make up for this embarrassing deficit, I suggest that Slavs or Greeks give chickens cybernetic implants. Perhaps, laser-beams mounted on their beaks.
Know-how of the city of Khabarovsk: elderly people receive a package of chicken eggs for vaccination against coronavirus
https://d.radikal.ru/d12/2105/a8/f775b1be8cf8.png
An additional benefit of this type of vaccines is that it might greatly reduce the burden on the pension system.
They do not eat eggs during Lent (or any fast days). They eat them all after. The more the better.
Anyone know any good books about the Nigerian civil war? (especially the byzantine, pardon the term, entanglements of the foreign supporters of Nigeria and Biafra).
Currently reading There was a Country by Chinua Achebe. It’s okay-ish but is really more about the author than about the war. He’s very much a Biafra-apologist and was directly involved on their side (which is okay, since he’s open about it) but he’s also a novelist (which is much worse and leads him to gay-tangents about the role of the artist in war time, etc.).
You should try firearms. Or if thats too expensive at a minimum just get the bullets and build a single-shot pipe gun.
https://2rdrtx4bt29lo91s31mjhkji-wpengine.netdna-ssl.com/wp-content/uploads/2020/04/Screen-Shot-2020-09-18-at-10.36.26-AM-1024×581.png
Its 2021 bruh…. There is VIOLENCE and then there is playing around…..
https://i.imgur.com/UDPsSGd.jpg
From this point of view, the pension fund should pay anti-vaccinators
It’s ੨੦੭੮ or 2078.
Compare ੬th with guns vs ੨੬th with both.
Shastar & Astra, melee & missile.
Go take painkillers, leaf.
https://twitter.com/ChinaEmbSL/status/1388172594642231298?cn=ZmxleGlibGVfcmVjcw%3D%3D&refsrc=email
Putin should stand on an apple box (or a potato sack?) when he is with Lukashenko.
What’s with the Tajikistan-Kyrgyzstan clashes?
I was a bit disappointed that China decided to put their space station on an inclination which was not easily reachable for Russian launches.
https://twitter.com/CarlZha/status/1388528147516116994
In all seriousness, I do think Orthodox fasting is impressive.
Honestly, on the Catholic side it seems to have gotten pretty weak. Only Fridays during Lent (not like in it used to be: everyday). If you are an Irish Catholic, you will often get a pass to eat Corned Beef and Cabbage on St. Patrick’s Day, if it is on a Friday – and to think, there was a time when the average laborer in Ireland practically only ate meat on two days of the year, Easter and Christmas.
https://twitter.com/travisakers/status/1388485151018061827
His was proposintion for more civilised age. Sadly we are now living in an age of rust.
Today is not a good day to be Putin or Xi Jinping. They must be shitting in their pants. It’s so true that I will have to press the agree button for my own comment.
An interesting spectacle. A small pro-Navalny protest was broken up in Kiev by far-right activists (at 4:34) chanting “Putin Khuilo Navalny khuilo Slava Ukraini..” Their point is that as a Russian, Navalny is just bad and therefore no Ukrainian should support him. Despite this approach, everyone speaks and swears in Russian until some reporter interviews them, at which point they effortlessly switch to Ukrainian. Such is Kiev.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lb6EOlgf_10
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-vho6cCT1L0
The interesting part is that the Uzbek get to play the “elder brother ” role by talking to both the Tadjik and the Kirghiz. Uzbekistan might eventually evolve into the regional power broker. Russian action is conspicuously absent, like in the early stages of the recent conflict in Karabakh.
Cool, they could do an amazing Village People karaoke…
I guess we will have a new theme song for Top Gun 3..
https://youtu.be/l5aZJBLAu1E
A lot of people in the world would find it very satisfying to see CIA committing suicide. The earlier it started, the further it advanced, the better it is for the world.
Seems to have happened back in January. I wish both Ukrainian nationalists and Ukrainian Navalnyists the very best in their war against each other.
https://twitter.com/akarlin88/status/1353004312188870656
I never would have guessed just from looking at them.
And what the hell are they wearing on their heads?
Chinese have launched a 22 ton space station part.
https://spacenews.com/china-launches-tianhe-space-station-core-module-into-orbit/
Meanwhile, Russians are building their own space station called Ross, that will go on Sun synchronous orbit. All those polar orbits are getting increasingly crowded, despite their higher launch costs. Either Great Penguin Empire is rising again in the Antarctica, or space militarization is accelerating and people need more spy hardware up there.
https://m.tvzvezda.ru/news/2021424355-VmQur.html
Also, Russians, like DOGE coin, are going to the Moon in October.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VgLkASCeaGI
Russians are going to the South Pole and digging for water. What is interesting is they are looking for something I mentioned earlier – that scientst is talking about primordial water perhaps even going back to molecular cloud remnants that made our solar system, and organic impurities. I’m not the only one thinking life on Earth may be older than Earth lol.
Russians are also packing real drills, similar to Kazachok/ExoMars I believe, which should have better chances of success than self hammering nail Americans sent.
https://mashable.com/article/mars-mole-robot/
It will be interesting to see what proper drills turn up. Surface science on both Moon and Mars is better done with robots and remote control. However, if we need to dig deep, and look for unexpected, humans will be required there a lot sooner than expected – communications will not work well underground.
Meanwhile, NASA is being a tease with SpaceX on a $3 billion contract. But it’s no big deal since there is absolutely no way Starship will get human rating by 2024, nevermind Moon landing human rating.
https://www.theverge.com/platform/amp/2021/4/30/22412771/nasa-spacex-hls-moon-lander-blue-origin-protest
And of course, some paramilitary types (radio frequency recon) are developing tech for orbital construction. Space industry is going to be happening.
https://spacenews.com/kleos-in-space-manufacturing/
Gay flags on American embassies might be the best thing to come out of this administration.
I would have liked to see a joint Chinese-Russian station, just to send a sign to the US, but it seems to not be in the cards.
Jason Riley wrote his op-ed column in the Wall Street Journal a few months ago regarding payment to the vaccine-reluctant. He cited an economist who placed the necessary figure at $1,000 per person. One wag replied: A vaccine so safe that you have to pay people $1,000 to get it, to protect them against a disease so deadly that you need a test to know if you have it.
This may influence the decision:
https://twitter.com/disclosetv/status/1388636694254166020
Former US Senate majority leader Harry Reid (the closest thing the country has got to a government-official-ufo-expert) is telling the press that the Russians are behind UFO’s buzzing American Navy ships.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9528793/UFOs-buzzing-warships-sent-PUTIN-former-senator-claims.html
https://encrypted-tbn0.gstatic.com/images?q=tbn:ANd9GcQFa4Mk6mkOUms0b6HJVVQ7nUOe_40MzoI7vA&usqp.jpg
Russia’s little green men at it again!
Navalny-supporter Anatoly Zak blames China
https://twitter.com/RussianSpaceWeb/status/1387743915277791232
What is that fourth-world shithole illiteracy you’re typing?
Well I was gonna suggest this cleverly disguised weapon:
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-B2M2utF984s/YI5_BoW44dI/AAAAAAAAHQs/0TXiAd4b5c0KRlalU8iVQkuTEpvqpyYJACLcBGAsYHQ/s16000/m16.JPG
But if you insist on being a target for bullets (or meat shield for the uninitiated) this might be more within your budget:
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-ova9x_abw5Y/YI5_BvDwRyI/AAAAAAAAHQo/8BsIFk0pW883kXlHQVjWDWD_EXZtmJjAwCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/knife1.JPG
One minute you are enjoying a bowl of curry and rice, and the next you are fighting off attackers with this deadly and disguised weapon.
https://1.bp.blogspot.com/-qALjMzFVa5E/YI5_GebHWQI/AAAAAAAAHQw/uF6Px8pFOqg0NPZ85Is9ltLho_pkCIzrwCLcBGAsYHQ/s0/knife2.JPG
Another great essay by Asia Time’s Spengler (David P. Goldman):
https://asiatimes.com/2021/05/americas-gender-warriors-in-a-deal-with-the-devil/
I believe this will contribute greatly to the dépopulation of the developed countries, leading to the demise of what is left of the Western civilization and its replacement by something more compatible with the biological survival of our species.
The “details” then lead to a seven year old article. So sources are “trust me, bro!”
Russia and China are cooperating on the Moon base.
https://spacenews.com/china-russia-open-moon-base-project-to-international-partners-early-details-emerge/
As for space station in Earth orbit, Russia is going for the military applications directly, where China is more of a civilian project, so their goals don’t quite align.
New Zealand and Scotland are building spaceports, and its not because they are some great space-faring powers with heavy launch capability. Space war over Arctic is heating up, and it’s more of a Russian thing than Chinese.
That’s interesting – I wasn’t thinking that the rumor was possibly connected to Navalny’s people.
It’s a bit hard to analyze, but I’m not even sure how significant it is. Probably they could reach the inclination, if they were given overflight rights over China. Though, I’m not sure how amendable the Chinese would be to this, even on a per-mission basis.
https://www.iflr.com/article/b1rcp6dz98ch05/fatf-and-the-future-of-decentralised-finance
Supposedly China requested Russia to halt weapons sales to India during the Himalayan crisis, which Russia refused to do.
Christ is risen bros
Regardless, today is the anniversary of the Odessa tradehouse burning. Its largely this event that sparked my great Ukrainophobia (my time working them was just kindling to the flame). Hohols burned several people alive and then they cheered this on. Although genetically Ukrainians might be Slavic his event and the attitudes to it showed me that culturally Ukrainians are closer to the Turks and Caucasians they cheer on and bow to like mankurts than their “Brother Slavs”. Its part of why I never got the whole Russian triunism thing; why would anybody want to live in the same country as those creatures chimping out in the name of the nezalezhna, and why I can only giggle at the irony of seeing them complain about all their fallen in the war.
D E U S E X!
A Windows PC game that has never been approached, much less equaled. I still play it every couple of years – dated graphics and sound, but excellent story and branching choices.
Deus Ex is like the South Park of PC games – there’s so much in there that turned out to be prescient, even prophetic.
They got the timeline wrong, but the Deus Ex designers saw the global trends in the year 2000 and extrapolated them – and got a lot of things right, it turns out.
Glad to know someone else here appreciates that game.
Don’t worry, the majority of Russians do not want to live in the same country with them. As you might remember, among other things, Ukies claimed that they are not brothers to Russians. Now Russians commenters often joke “thank goodness we are not brothers, we’d be ashamed to have brothers like that”.
You’re literally a Canadian, stfu.
That’s roughly where we are. But I have given up on the corona fanatics – mostly scared elderly boomers, but also a surprising number of younger morons. It is conformism with a touch of hypochondria.
About 5-10 years ago Western pharma companies in Eastern Europe were paying 50 Euros to people to take a test “flu vaccine”. Maybe the same miracle vaccine. For anyone under 60 the official vaccine side effects are higher then corona mortality – both are statistically insignificant, but why go through it?
If the elderly want to pay the young to take the vaccine they should pay a lot more. A 35-year old has 50 years of potential risk, that has to be compensated. A 80-year old has nothing to lose. The argument that the young should do it for the community is beyond indecent – what have the elderly boomers done for the next generations?
You might be a tad too harsh on them. Unlike “immunized” by propaganda older Eastern Europeans, younger Easterners, as well as American (and Western in general) public is only slowly coming to the realization that if you assume that everything MSM tells you is a lie, you’d be correct 99 times out of 100. In fact, the level of MSM control and the use of paid liars in today’s West was matched in human history only twice before: in Hitler’s Germany and Stalin’s USSR. Compared to current West, Brezhnev’s USSR had a remarkable freedom of the press.
The capsized migrant boat off San Diego brings this to mind. US Coast Guard cutter surface swimmer policy manual, section 2(j):
“The cutter swimmer will not swim into or under a capsized or submerged vessel, aircraft, or vehicle. If deployed next to a capsized object, the CSS is permitted to search visually and reach inside while maintaining a grasp on a reference point on the exterior of the object. If the CSS determines that a person is trapped under or in the object and cannot be reached from the reference point, the CSS must request alternate assistance.”
I predict an event will occur in which the USCG’s failure to swim under a capsized migrant boat will be depicted as heartless discrimination against migrants. But this is a standing rule that is uniform — no discretion.
There’s indeed a political programme in early Taoism! Look at this off-hand passage from Tao Te Ching:
So anarcho-primitivism lite for the historical Taoists. Now I’m cheering on the WEF for their sabotaging of modern liberal industrial capitalism, even if the system they’ll erect in place is despicable – only the ones fleeing from that will realize Lao Tzu’s vision.
It is indeed. Practically half of the year Orthodox do not eat meat, fish, dairy, eggs, oil and wine and abstain from sex. Nevertheless wine and oil are allowed on Saturdays and Sundays ‘for the hardness of the fast’ and allowances are made for sick people. Fast is not of course aiming to debilitate people, but as an exercise of the will. It is a time when people ”cast aside earthly cares” that impede concentration on the spiritual prayer.
Not necessairly. The CIA is one of the main drivers of US soft power through its various arms like “Radio Free Europe” or through Hollywood or even through the NGO’s that it runs and funds (like in Hong Kong). Together these lead to the spread of dubious ‘US values’ abroad. So the more the CIA spreads and gets aggressive, the worse for everyone.
The only way that the CIA can go down, is by ending the USD as fiat currency – end that and the US suddenly cannot support hundreds of overseas bases, there would be rapid inflation, and the military would have to be cut down (as would most military applications/spying organizations).
Question of the day: Just heard my parents spreading rumors about organ harvesting in China, particularly recent “cases” of several hundred undergrads gone missing in Wuhan. I know those are memes propagated by Epoch Times (Falun Gong) which has been strongly suppressed by the Party, but I actually wonder if those have a grain of truth in them (separately from the Uyghur issue in Xinjing), especially when the Epoch Times provides evidence (or are those like Uyghur “testimonies” or the general run of Holocaust “evidence”)?
(the Wuhan undergrads “case” is most likely urban legend and so unprovable)
Let me impart what I’ve learned living for 33 years in the USSR. If you assume that everything MSM tell you is a lie, you’d be correct 99 times out of 100. What’s more, compared to today’s Western media, Soviet “Pravda” in 1980s was a paragon of truthfulness.
I admit to being conflicted on Falun Gong.
On the one hand, they seem like a crazy cult, but, on the other hand, I have heard that they are racists, and if that is true, they can’t be 100% bad.
It takes two to lie. The willing morons in the West (and the east) are a big part of this. It is not that hard to figure out that what MSM is pushing is nonsense. That makes my evaluation of the people who willingly swallow it rather harsh. In a way, the willing morons are the problem and not the MSM propaganda that would be meaningless without a willing audience.
Yes, it takes a swindler and a sucker. From my perspective, swindler is guiltier (even though by definition suckers are more numerous). Swindler is a criminal, whereas sucker is just a fool.
It is slightly more complicated psychologically, but I agree. A fool, or a sucker, is someone who craves being lied to. A long-domesticated characters who can’t fathom not living in a lie, the constant directive lying gives them comfort.
In evolutionary terms I think that lying has its origins in unequal relationships: weaker men, women, children, slaves. The weaker side lies to get out of sticky situations, “yes sir, I cleaned the stables, twice…“…
The modern development of powerful elites choosing to lie is more dangerous. People with power lived (usually) by an honour code, lying was what slaves and women did. They used deception in fighting, but the massive lying to one own’s people is relatively recent phenomenon. It suggests that they see their own people as enemies, so any deception is ok. Or they are just weak.
Rulers always lied to the ruled. It is in recorded history. As early as 1258 BC, both Egyptian Pharaoh Ramses II and Hittite king Hattusili claimed to their subjects that they won the battle of Kadesh. Looking at their peace treaty even a child can figure out that both considered the result a draw.
That form of lying is an attempt to preserve honour, more like boastfulness, usually harmless. Middle East is also an old civilisation and some of the recent bad habits appeared there much earlier.
My frame of reference is more medieval and late medieval European society: people believed in all kinds of spiritual nonsense, but control was based on power and not on lying. As late as the beginning of WWI the mindless boasting was deceptive (“we will be in Paris, (Berlin, Vienna, St. Petersburg) by Christmas!“), but it differed from today’s comprehensive lying about everything. There was a kind of physical reality about world, today lots of stuff is purely invented, like ‘genders’, ‘who is oppressed’, etc…and of course there is still the traditional boasting about the enemy.
The micro-lying about totally insane details seems a modern phenomenon. Like Navalny with novitchok on a plane and nobody else gets sick. Anyone buying that nonsense is also responsible. They simply can’t be that stupid, they want the lies.
Contradictory, certainly. Ludicrous and unbelievable, I suppose so, for us outsiders anyway, “like a host spitting on the table when inviting a guest for dinner”. Unprecedented, not quite: they did a very similar thing in the case of the Anchorage summit with China, a month and a half ago. (The previous quote is a comment à propos by one Lü Xiang.) The US announced the ratcheting up of its economic warfare policies* vis-à-vis China merely a day ahead of the scheduled meeting in Alaska. Like in this latest case, it was the US who had initiated the dialogue and proposed the meeting in the first place!
(*) When done by sovereign states (specially unilaterally, as is common) against sovereign states (specially unaligned ones), “sanction” is a propagandistic buzzword purporting to imply that the (fully self-interested) agent is in a position of impartial arbiter and adjudicator.
How to explain this behaviour? What could be the goal?
At the time, Global Times had offered that it’s a pressuring tactic (by a side that engages “from a position of strength”, that is, one that presupposes its dominance), alternatively that it’s a signal of lack of internal consensus among US decision makers. Robinson suggests possible LDPR de-escalation while maintaining a hardened stance against their perceived “enemy”, and carrot (or olive branch) & stick.
I observe that, of those, only the “internal dissension” theory seems compatible with genuine desire to seek productive dialogue and diplomacy. The alternatives would require an additional hypothesis of either madness, schizophrenia, or passive-aggressive disorder in order to explain the apparent self-sabotage, which is not a serious proposition, however much we might joke and/or despair about the West’s condition. But with the circumstance now repeated the likelihood of the theory is diminished: the hypothetical internal disagreement is supposed to be transitory, and one would expect that they would more or less get themselves sorted after ~3 months.
So if the USG isn’t really that interested in diplomacy, what motivates it to go through the motions?
Maybe the point is to avoid a meeting but reserve the chance to claim that they actually wanted it and it was the other side that rejected it, conveniently ignoring the contradictory behaviour (after all, “that’s just, like, your opinion, man”, i.e., a simple matter of “narrative”). In other words, theatre for domestic consumption. In this regard, we can note that in this case the “stick” came right after the “olive branch”: 2 days, April 13 to April 15. That was quicker than in the Anchorage case: 6 days, March 11 to March 17. In that case the “stick” came so late that, I guess, by then some members of the Chinese delegation and media may have been already on Alaskan soil. Washington had even clarified that, actually, it was “not expecting specific negotiated deliverables from the meeting”. Still Peking decided to go ahead with the meeting, but did not ignore the discourtesy and publicly and sternly denounced it. Was this shorter “turnaround” a deliberate attempt to prevent the same outcome? Or was it perhaps a signal of the USG discontent with the results of Biden’s phone call with Putin?
An additional consideration: I remember that around the time of the Anchorage summit they went on stressing how “USA was back”, implicitly hitting at Trump, who one is supposed to believe had caused a “departure”, I guess, from the world’s centre stage. Could it be that they believe this nonsense themselves? Perhaps what looks like passive-aggressiveness was meant to serve as a show of self-assurance and dominance. Maybe they are feeling a little bit insecure and this is meant to assuage their own anxieties. Or, more likely, it is a display meant for uneasy vassals and prospective subjects looking for a new master (or considering a re-shuffle of their allegiances).
Alternatively, the strategy is to try and create distraction and confusion with deliberately erratic behaviour: “I’ve got it, you guys! Just act really fucking crazy, it will totally throw those easterners off!”
Juneteenth is now recognized in 49 states. I propose to combine it with MLK Day, then move it to February 6th, which is the day the first settlers left NYC for Liberia, and rename it “Liberia Day.”
On this day, we will honor the most-deserving blacks by giving them free one-way tickets to Liberia.
Altan:
https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/832383014557712437/839284227610902568/E0lKqBdXIAQhcE3.png?width=733&height=598
https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/832383014557712437/839284323932831744/E0lJ2PtWEAclAb5.png?width=552&height=598
Rest:
https://www.patreon.com/posts/purpose-of-dasam-23957882
Well Buddha Gautama is a Man of warrior caste and a Mahapurusa, a Great Being, thus He is depicted with hair in top knot or Ushnisha. Weapons He does not need, for there is no power which can resist Him or do Him harm.
For us Buddhist laypeople weapons are just tools, to be used in the time of danger. I do personally believe that gun is better than sword, or would you have brought a stick to a battle five hundred years ago?
https://har-assets.s3.amazonaws.com/item-images-resized/2000px/5/9/8/59809.jpg
https://har-assets.s3.amazonaws.com/item-images-resized/2000px/8/1/5/81582.jpg
The Bodhisattva of Wisdom, Manjushri, one of the most beloved figures of Mahayana Buddhism, is often depicted wielding a sword symbolizing wisdom that cuts down delusions and ignorance.
https://i1.wp.com/blyzhchedoboga.com.ua/wp-content/uploads/2011/11/Arkhystratuh_Mikhail1.jpg
https://twitter.com/Ukraine/status/1389526712560635906
The only thing stopping Pakistan from trolling India like this (after all, India is named after the River Indus which is mostly located in Pakistan) is their obsession with Islamism and wanting to be associated with Arabs and Turks instead of acknowledging their rich indigenous Dharmic heritage.
The picture I posted was of Archangel Michael.
The Enclave Nuclear Powered Oil Rig from Fallout 2 is entering design phase, right on schedule.
https://world-nuclear-news.org/Articles/US-State-Department-launches-SMR-support-programme
Annexing Canada will be neat.
Watched the sequel to Train to Busan, Peninsula (2020).
A lot of people didn’t like it, but I liked it. Some qualifications: stodgy CGI again, some plot holes (but they are pretty much inherent to zombie movies.) I don’t think it is thematically as well-developed on a horror level, but is more of an action movie, with the zombies being more disposable. The vehicle and gun scenes get a bit ridiculous, and if you can’t ignore the lack of realism, you won’t like it.
I think where it really shines is just in comparison to most Hollywood zombie movies, which often signal diversity, go overboard on gore, or seem like a colossal waste of money, even if they make a huge profit. IMO, the film, like the first one, had a subtle natalist message – that you won’t find in Hollywood, where the babies will turn into zombies when they are born. And I think there were very subtle nationalist undertones.
What I would like to see in the future is a kind of Korean-Swiss Family Robinson zombie movie. That is, not a tropical island shipwreck but something that amplifies the family message and shows a Korean family with seven kids fighting zombies. Throw in a few collateral relatives (like uncles) that sacrifice themselves, so that a part of them will survive in their nephews and nieces.
https://asiatimes.com/2021/05/chinas-hydrogen-dream-takes-shape-in-shandong/
There’s a bit of truth, but not a lot.
China used to harvest organs from executed prisoners – which almost never political prisoners, but the more usual people seen by the government as “worthless scum”, especially members of the drug trade. It was also seen as the appropriate “transformation” of someone worthless to have his organs given to someone more worthy of life.
That turned into a black legend of sorts from there but execution of political prisoners for organs either never happened, or happened in extraordinarily rare cases during the heyday of corruption(and before).
A zombie movie might be a good way to address the world’s most important graph. Set it in an Arab country. Figure once black Africans go into zombie mode, they have no trouble crossing the Sahara.
Starship landed successfully, nice!
https://www.foxnews.com/science/spacex-starship-landing-whats-next.amp
Reaching orbit by the end of the year is a bit optimistic I think, for that they need to build an actual orbital rocket and not just a flying grain silo with three engines.
But by 2025, in just 4 years, I can see them successfully refueling in orbit. Large scale material transfers in space is absolutely key technology, and it’s not trivial.
I have like 2,600 hours in Kerbal Space Program and good 25% of that was spent on orbital refueling in various places lol. Musk will be bringing KSP to life.
Anyway, if refueling works (and it most likely will), I’d recommend Russia and China to just copy Starship tech for automated missions in Low Earth Orbit, such as cargo delivery. Human rating is still far away I think, 2030 or so.
Part of the limitation is the private property nearby. You put 28 raptors into the thing, and it will be pretty loud. Heck of a kaboom, if it blows too.
It has always amazed me from what little amount of land SpaceX has conducted their hops. I know people who own more land, and I bet a lot of people do.
I don’t see how they can try it without the county using eminent domain first, unless they launch from Canaveral or one of those oil platforms. But I think they want to use Boca Chica. It will be interesting to see how it develops, what public use case they make, and what they offer the homeowners, county, or state. But I think the legal wrangling needs to be figured into the timeline. Many don’t want to sell, though I guess Musk ultimately has a lot more bargaining power than a guy like Disney had. Maybe, the smart thing to do is to hold out until he offers a car and a free ride into space (transferable) into the bargain.
Most people are not morons. The problem with democracy is that it’s based on the assumption that ordinary people can have intelligent opinions on foreign policy, economic policy, trade policy and social policy.
This is simply not possible. You cannot have an intelligent opinion on something like the Middle East or the Ukraine or North Korea or Taiwan unless you have a pretty thorough knowledge of the histories of those places going back at least a century and a pretty thorough knowledge of the internal politics of those places. Ordinary people cannot possibly have the required knowledge.
You cannot have an intelligent opinion on economic issues unless you know what the hell Modern Monetary Theory is all about and why it leads to different conclusions from older approaches like Keynesianism. Ordinary people cannot possibly have the required knowledge.
You cannot have an intelligent opinion on medical issues like COVID unless you’re a specialist in the field. Ordinary people cannot possibly have the required knowledge.
You cannot have an intelligent opinion on complex social issues such as arguments for and against drug legalisation unless you know a fair bit about the history of government policies on drugs for the past century or so. Ordinary people cannot possibly have the required knowledge.
But despite the fact that ordinary people have neither the time nor the inclination nor the specialised background to understand such issues we still expect them to make informed decisions on these issues.
Yea, it will eminent domain. The Atlantic did a pretty good article about it a while back.
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2020/02/space-x-texas-village-boca-chica/606382/
SpaceX bought out a bunch of people and those who stayed are at their own risk. Texas will argue Spacebase is critical infrastructure for state development and will boot out the holdouts.
What you say is true. But I think the key problem of the US today is not democracy: we have too little of that left to make it a problem. As far as I can tell, the major problem is that people who make government decisions (ostensibly on our behalf) either do not have knowledge to do the right thing or do not have the US interests in mind (possibly both). The elites who run the US and their government servants are too often clueless and make decisions accordingly. Current US foreign policy might have been OK many years ago, but in today’s world it amounts to insane blundering that speeds up the decline of the US. E.g., only a total moron could have simultaneously antagonized Russia and China, and we have the third administration in a row doing exactly that. Current domestic policies are even worse: no US enemy could have undermined the country as thoroughly as the US elites. I can go on for a long time, but let’s just summarize. I saw one empire dying (I came to the US from the USSR in 1991) and I hate seeing clear signs of gross deterioration and imminent death of another one.
Can any of your Russians advise me on how to get Russia-Latin labeled keys for a mechanical keyboard?
I’ve got stickers put on my Red Dragon mechanical keyboard right now, but they are not staying put well with all the typing I do.
I am thinking I will pop the keys off, cut out the Cyrillic letter shape with a rotary tool, and then fill the void with clear resin of some sort to allow the back light through. However, maybe I can get already-labeled backlight keys I can snap on with both Roman and Russian letters.
What do Russians do for mechanical keyboards?
Even assuming the average voter is intelligent. His personal interest may not align with the long term especially very long term well being of his own country/civilization.
Most intelligent people over 60 in places like Germany know their guaranteed inflation indexed pensions are unsustainable and very harmful for their countries and specially their grand children. How many of these do you know who actively campaign to reduce such pension payouts ?
One man one vote democracy is a theoretically flawed concept whose imminent global failure is now fairly obvious.
Here is one possible solution. I don’t use Russified keyboard, but use this site
https://russian.typeit.org/
where you can select Russian letters with you mouse. You can copy-paste the text into Word document, if you need.
Not even sure Boca Chica is big enough to hit a high cadence that would probably be needed for refueling. I think a lot of the land is a wildlife reserve. Even with taking the cottages, their coastal footprint would be limited.
I just use the Latin layout with Cyrillic phonetic transpositions.
Well, squirrels are free to file a complaint with BLM (Bureau of Land Management) if their forest preserve burns down when Starship misfires. Good luck with that.
I think that location is ideal – Florida is too touristy and that makes industrial infrastructure development difficult. When you start in the middle of nowhere you are free to create anything you wish, especially if you have unlimited money.
I agree: pretty interesting location. Just North of Mexico – can’t help but feel that HBD plays a bit of role on some level. Like, maybe, it would be possible to put in Mexico, the land cheaper, but it would be harder politically to carry the idea of it benefiting the local area, and nobody wants to pay Baikonur-level rent. (like $115 million annually, though to be fair Baikonur is pretty big)
Right now, doesn’t seem like environmentalists are hyper-charged against rocket launches, but wouldn’t surprise me if that changed if Musk’s plans work out and it number of launches increase radically. I’d say it is a good opportunity to build out, with less opposition than will probably come later.
It’s actually kind of surprising that with all the space optimism that existed in the ’50s, that the government didn’t lay aside any Canaveral-like area on the coast of Texas. Though I guess floating platform launches on the Equator are an interesting future possibility, if the rockets can fly there. Russia should be studying the possibility.
Boca Chika will have military payloads, so Mexico is probably a no go. Like Russia has Plesetsk spaceport for military launches, they prefer not to go to Baikonur with those. And Plesetsk is better for polar orbits.
Boca Chika is closer to equator to take advantage of Earth rotation and maximize payloads. Interestingly, US military is constructing Plesetsk equivalent in UK and New Zealand, but not in Canada, as far as I know. If you are rich and purchased a New Zealand bunker to hide out during WW3, I recommend selling if it is near that spaceport.
Environmentalists can be rather selective. Fairly sure that white steam you see coming off the rocket is methane venting to the atmosphere to cool the pipes and condensing air moisture. You can also see that vent line burning after latest landing. It is fine and perfectly safe (unless your tanks are cracked), no different from a kitchen stove. But that’s a lot of methane they are going to dump into the air. And methane is more active greenhouse gas compared to CO2. So Swedish scary child Greta and polar bears may complain about that at some point.
It will be a lot of refueling and a lot of venting prior to landing because the last thing you want is for your propellants to hit warm pipes, vaporize, and cavitate those turbopumps a few seconds prior to impact.
And Russia does have equatorial spaceport as well, sort of, though Europeans run it – Kourou in French Guiana. A good number of Soyuz launches take place there.
I think it would be helpful if people accepted the reality that elections are meaningless. If you want to put pressure on the crazies who are running things you’re never ever going to do it through the ballot box.
At this point I’ll add the usual disclaimer – I am not advocating violence, which would be catastrophic and futile and evil.
But people do need to understand that turning up on election day to vote is not being politically active. It’s being a passive victim.
Agree 100%. Elections are a ruse for the gullible. Those who did not get that after 2020 “presidential elections” are hopeless. Unfortunately, there are lots of hopeless suckers eagerly gobbling up official lies.
With Guyana, I’m not sure that they allow Russian payloads.
Not sure what the attitude of Europeans is, but I understand that the US can often be quite antagonistic even on what seems to be matters of purely scientific cooperation.
“At this point I’ll add the usual disclaimer – I am not advocating violence, which would be catastrophic and futile and evil.”
Agreed. Evil, etc. Plus, solitary confinement sucks, just ask a non-violent Jan. 6 misdemeanor trespasser who finds himself a political prisoner. The question is, what SHOULD one advocate? Civil disobedience, like the civil-rights movement? Suppose Garland tells DeSantis: Nice try on local control of police and criminal justice, son, but the feds are asserting control. Does DeSantis say “you got it, coach” or does he peacefully resist? Scary times. After Trump vs. Hawaii, Korematu (group internment) is still the law of the land; Roberts refused to legally overrule it. Well, maybe the re-education camp will have a snack bar.
RUSSIA’S BURNING
Has anyone picked up on the huge forest fire centred around Omsk? It is planetary in scope.
There is also a considerable group of smaller fires in Saratov province.
Finally someone decided to do something about the cold.
The solution (or part of the solution) to warming up Russia is damming the Med. But then people might think about draining it, or shooting the water off into space, and, I believe that would make it colder? Or would it? Anyway, connecting Europe to Africa is not to be contemplated.
It may be better to use giant space mirrors to warm up Russia, or to attempt to use the greenhouse effect. Or to de-extinct ice age megafauna (I am not very hopeful on the progress here) to warm the land, by trampling the snow.
Personally, I have advocated that Russians build underground cities in Siberia, complete with public parks – it would be good to learn how to design these type of cities for Mars. I have also floated the idea of transgenically altering Russians and their pets to be better adapted to the cold. The lynx should be domesticated and Russians should be made frostbite-resistant – it is doable.
Modern democracy is designed as a charade, especially after Bernays.
Blood-letting isn’t something that can be avoided. If you stay pacifist, you bleed. Either your own blood or theirs. Or maybe you should quit the system, go off grid entirely, if you want peaceful existence just for yourself.