The All Things Political Topic - new edition

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

4 hours ago, Lexx said:

Apparently Tucker Klansman gets a new show on... Twitter. Would like to say I'm surprised, but considering the mask-off fascism / right-wing grifting from Musk lately, I'm really not at all.

Wow, that'll really convince the fleeing advertisers to come back. What a great use of $44000000000.

[Gfted1]

SEE! He could have given every single man, woman and child in the US ~$131.00 instead of pissing it away. smh.

[Katphood]

On 5/10/2023 at 1:13 PM, BruceVC said:

I only read this post now and its very informative 

Firstly Im glad the Iranian government  arent trying to enforce the hijab wearing anymore. Thats a huge victory and it was what  started the initial protests and it matters

But what do you mean by " They still use nerve agents on our schools(women) to test it out for Russians. Can you believe this? 'Here is a school full of beautiful 16 year old Iranian school girls...let's use them as guinea pigs for our Russian overlords!!! "

What is going on at the schools and what do you mean by "use them as guinea pigs " , is this for language or wearing the hijab?

 

 

Thanks Brucie. Pretty much this:

They try to retaliate when they see women not wearing hijab in every way they can. If they can't arrest you, they will find another way to make their presence(IRGC and religious nutjobs) felt.

[HoonDing]

https://www.theguardian.com/law/2023/may/11/abu-zubaydah-drawings-guantanamo-bay-us-torture-policy

rules-based order

[BruceVC]

12 hours ago, HoonDing said:

https://www.theguardian.com/law/2023/may/11/abu-zubaydah-drawings-guantanamo-bay-us-torture-policy

rules-based order

But but ...what about the invasion of Ukraine and the killing and tortue of Ukrainians by Russia 

Damn I love this whataboutism, thanks to everyone who taught me it. Its such a good way to handwave these developments  

 

[Malcador]

Turkish elections look close.

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/turkey-votes-pivotal-elections-that-could-end-erdogans-20-year-rule-2023-05-13/

I guess if Erdogan does lose, Turkey's going to fall in line with US wishes at least NATO wise ?

[Elerond]

1 hour ago, Malcador said:

Turkish elections look close.

https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/turkey-votes-pivotal-elections-that-could-end-erdogans-20-year-rule-2023-05-13/

I guess if Erdogan does lose, Turkey's going to fall in line with US wishes at least NATO wise ?

Difficult to say as Erdogan has ruled Turkey for 20 years, so it is difficult to predict what opposition will do in case they get in power.

 

But currently it looks like that Erdogan predictably will get keep his power and predictably all polls that before election said that opposition has lead were wrong. So it seems that Turkey continues to do what it has done past 20 years

[Zoraptor]

Ironically, most of the 'just Turkey things' done before Erdogan were done under CHP rule. The start of the war with the Kurds, invading Cyprus etc. You only really get degrees of nationalism with Turkish political parties*, and CHP wouldn't tear up Montreux or start arming the Kurds against Assad (more likely the reverse) no matter how Not Erdogan they are. Nor will they buy Patriots if they're going to be stung for missiles at $10m USD a pop like Saudi.

*not necessarily Turkish nationalism, given the HDP exists.

[HoonDing]

Good that the western shill is losing.

[Zoraptor]

The funniest thing is all those Turks living in the west, yet voting for Erdogan.

Quote

Sunday's vote was not only for the presidency but for the 600 seats in parliament too. And here too the Erdogan party had a good night, heading for a majority of about 317 seats.

Sheesh BBC, couldn't you have checked your own graphic, in the same article? AKP lost 28 seats, to 267. Still the largest party, but not a majority.

[HoonDing]

Well, Turks in the west have firsthand experience of what they don't want their motherland to become.

 

[BruceVC]

https://www.aol.com/china-imposes-2m-fine-stand-211033488.html

CCP has fined a Chinese comedian $2m for cracking a joke about the Chinese military

In the new BRICS\Chinese led world order its going to be more  free and multipolar world ...except you cant tell jokes 

[Lexx]

I'm a big fan of that. Let them believe their own propaganda about how strong their military is. They'll run into the same trap that russia made itself when disallowing any criticism. Some day this will backfire hard.

[Chilloutman]

17 hours ago, Lexx said:

I'm a big fan of that. Let them believe their own propaganda about how strong their military is. They'll run into the same trap that russia made itself when disallowing any criticism. Some day this will backfire hard.

Well I think those dead people in Ukraine would probably prefer if Russia still thought they are too weak

[Gromnir]

am reading the durham report and it is a bit o' a slog. is only 200 pages, but am not recalling each and every fed statute referenced so we need review 'em all. furthermore, am needing check durham narrative for accuracy regarding persons and dates.  exhausting.

will give full thoughts once am done. we reread the ig report from 2019 as it covered much o' the same territory and were lambasted by durham when horowitz released his findings. we never did read the full 1000 page bipartisan senate report concerning the same 2016 issues in part 'cause the senate report reached no conclusions... and also 'cause it were 1000 pages. regardless, the 200 page durham report is requiring far more than 200 pages worth o' material review.

given the increasing temporal remoteness o' the events, is worth restating a bit o' history which is relevant.

2014

feds begin an investigation into paul manafort 

"Among the more striking sections of the report is the committee’s description of the professional relationship between former Trump campaign chairman Paul Manafort and Konstantin Kilimnik, whom the committee describes as a Russian intelligence officer.

"“Taken as a whole, Manafort’s high-level access and willingness to share information with individuals closely affiliated with the Russian intelligence services, particularly Kilimnik, represented a grave counterintelligence threat,” the report says.

"The report notes how Manafort shared internal Trump campaign polling data with Kilimnik and says there is “some evidence” Kilimnik may have been connected to Russia’s effort to hack and leak Democratic emails, though that information is redacted. The report also says “two pieces of information” raise the possibility of Manafort’s potential connection to those operations, but what follows is again blacked out." -- from the pbs link re: senate report

march 29, 2016

manafort joins the trump campaign.

july 27, 2016

 july 28, 2016

the feds get a call from alexander downer

downer, an australian diplomat, met a trump campaign advisor in london to have drinks in may o' 2016. at some point during the eve, the trump campaign guy shared info that the russians had "dirt" on hilary clinton by way o' thousands o' emails.  

not surprising, downer thought the conversation with papadopoulos were relevant in the wake o' the trump announcement.

july 31, 2016

the crossfire hurricane investigation begins

fast forward to 2019, post mueller investigation which determines crossfire hurrican's legit predicate were the call from downer, and barr appoints durham to investigate the origins o' crossfire hurricane.

...

again, we wanna read the full report before reaching conclusions, but am having noticed in stories recent released contemporaneous with the durham report, the history is already having been forgotten. 

HA! Good Fun!

Edited May 19, 2023 by Gromnir

[Zoraptor]

In the latest round of incredibly badly researched propaganda from supposedly reputable sources:

China's Loans Pushing World's Poorest Countries to Brink of Collapse. Which then forms the basis for a lot of other people not checking the actual facts, including those who at least supposedly are actual financial journalists.

But let's see what the statistics actually say, shall we? On average for the poorest/ most debt laden 3 times as much debt is held by western private institutions than China, and they charge more than twice the interest rate. But you say, surely the nice western institutions offer debt relief? Uh, yeah, nah. They want China to forgive their debt so that they get paid back and China doesn't based on... their debt being more expensive and thus more important to pay off. Actually dropping their interest rate though so their debt isn't oppressive... yeah, nah again. Far cheaper to feed ludicrous bollocks to inept- being generous- journos.

But you say, surely you've got those figures from a Chinese source which is biased, or they're cunningly hidden away in some dusty tome. Well no, they're from the World Bank, and cunningly hidden on the, uh, internet. You'd think financial journalists at least might have heard of it.

And as always, classic cite: The IMF's Role in Zaire's Decline

[Malcador]

https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/2023/05/18/pentagon-drone-strike-syria-civilian-al-qaeda/

Cut a cheque, shrug and go on, I guess.

[teknoman2]

Today was election day in Greece and i lost all faith in humanity. The current government has committed so many crimes that you could build a space elevator with the list. If this were any other EU country, every single member of this government would be in jail but not only they get a free pass, they even won the elections with 41% of the votes.

Illegal surveillance or political opponents, kangaroo courts, criminal mismanagement of the pandemic, covering for corporate crimes, promoting profiteering, causing several businesses to go bankrupt by needlessly getting involved in the Russia-Ukraine war, causing the civil war in Sudan, making the country the laughingstock of the planet, getting the country fined 5 times by the EU and 2 by the UN, breaking a massive deal with Italy, Egypt and Israel because Biden said so and the list goes on and on.

Unless there was election fraud, there is no hope for this country if people are still willing to vote for criminals to rule. But then again, the government did gift almost 200 million euros to the media besides repealing the law that forced them to pay their very long overdue taxes so anyone listening to the mainstream media would only ever hear how great everything is.

[PK htiw klaw eriF]

https://www.texastribune.org/2023/05/23/dade-phelan-ken-paxton-resign-intoxication/

Lmao, let them fight 

[Gorth]

Background, 95 old woman waved a steak knife at the police (she was using a walking frame, so it's not like she was going to run after the cop with the knife). While he didn't shoot to kill, he tasered her. Now she's dead. She collapsed and hit her head on the way down. A bad case of "overkill" (poor choice of words, I know).

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-australia-65696475

For me, an obvious case of using the wrong tool for the job, as is often the case where police is the "default" go to solution whenever somebody somewhere has a problem. Same thing when dealing with people with mental issues. Police are often a blunt tool applied to a fragile object (the few specialists working for the force not withstanding).

[Zoraptor]

Meh, don't employ sociopaths and give them a feeling of impunity, simple enough.

And strangely enough, not talking about the guy who pulled the trigger, but the head cop. Yeah, I'll spare a thought for the poor police force in their hour of tragedy and how terrible it's been for them her dying.

[Gfted1]

Another example where a net firing drone would have diffused the situation. When will we learn?

[Gorth]

I'm genuinely curious, is it as bad as it seems from the outside?

https://www.bbc.com/culture/article/20230525-how-book-banning-escalated-in-the-us

It's very hard not to draw parallels to another time and another place. You guys who live there would know better (I hope), so is it just DeSantis working on spreading his vision of a new American "Paradise" to a federal level, or is it just a small group of very vocal regressive forces in the country, stirring up things

 

Edit: I.e. is it a problem or just a few shrill voices making enough noise that international media uses it for click bait and site hits

[Hurlshort]

Desantis doesn't exactly have stormtroopers at his disposal. He's got quite a cult of personality going on in Florida, but he's facing off against both Trump and Mickey Mouse, and my guess is Disney will win out in the end.

Book banning (and book burning) is also not a new thing in the US, but it's always been limited in scale. Getting anything like that done on a Federal level is a lot more complicated. There are always outlier states. Florida and Texas seem like crazy places to me, but they say the same thing about California. 

 

[Lexx]

So is America gonna default on their dept or nah? Would be nice to know if a global economics crisis is incoming soon or if we still have some years.

Edited May 26, 2023 by Lexx