Tag Archives: Russia

The Differences Between the Lines

16 Thursday Jan 2020

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Post 3,001 … back on the sad state of world politics. But, this is a story about the stories. There’s a wide gulf of a difference between reporting around the world.

In the US, Drudge, CNN, etc. lamented the sad spectacle of the latest Democratic “debate.” Yeah, TrumpSlide. Elsewhere, the same sources provided lackluster commentary (OH WOW! WHAT?) on the Putin/Medvedev shakeup (again) in Russia. The dynamic duo certainly plots something. What? Other sources speculate in various ways.

RT has a humorous, it’ll-be-okay approach.

The Asia Times sees something familiar – a ploy to keep power for life.

Which is right? Who knows. The point is to get off the standard US right-left charade and make independent assessments. There, that wasn’t so painful, now was it?

The “Russia” Fixation

19 Saturday Oct 2019

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Hillary Clinton has “Russia, Russia, Russia” on the brain and it’s just not going away. Yes, we now know – thank you, Madam Secretary – that Tulsi Gabbard, like Donald Trump before her, is a Russian plant…

Hillary Clinton said that Rep. Tulsi Gabbard is being groomed by Moscow to run as a third-party spoiler candidate in 2020 to help President Trump win reelection.

The former secretary of state pushed the theory on Campaign HQ podcast hosted by David Plouffe, President Barack Obama’s campaign manager in 2008.

Plouffe and Clinton discussed hurdles the Democratic nominee would face and compared the 2020 race to Clinton’s loss to Trump in 2016. Plouffe asked Clinton about the part third-party candidates, such as Jill Stein of the Green Party, played in 2016, allowing Trump to secure key states.

“They are also going to do third party again,” Clinton, 71, said. “I’m not making any predictions, but I think they’ve got their eye on somebody who is currently in the Democratic primary and are grooming her to be the third-party candidate,” Clinton said, referring to Gabbard, without mentioning the Hawaii representative by name.

“She is a favorite of the Russians. They have a bunch of sites and bots and other ways of supporting her so far. That’s assuming Jill Stein will give it up, which she might not because she is also a Russian asset.

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Jill Stein too… How very sad. Mrs. Clinton has an illness. Maybe she thinks that will help her dark horse her way into 2020. Sad…

But, unlike conservatives, The very lovely Mrs. Gabbard is ready for a fight.

Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard fired back this afternoon at Hillary Clinton over comments she made suggesting the Hawaii congresswoman and 2020 candidate is being groomed by the Russians.

Clinton said in a recent interview, of the Russians, “I think they’ve got their eye somebody who’s currently in the Democratic primary and are grooming her to be the third-party candidate. She’s a favorite of the Russians.”

When asked by NBC News if this was a reference to Gabbard, a Clinton spokesperson responded, “If the nesting doll fits…”

Gabbard responded this afternoon, calling Clinton, “the queen of warmongers, embodiment of corruption, and personification of the rot that has sickened the Democratic Party for so long.”

Corruption? What corruption?

If it’s a straight fight between the Hottie and the Hag, my money’s on Surfer Girl!

Russian Interference

15 Saturday Jun 2019

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Found it! Well, there’s ample evidence of the Empire meddling in Russia, to be more specific. Attacking nuclear-armed Russia’s power grid. What could go wrong?

The United States is stepping up digital incursions into Russia’s electric power grid in a warning to President Vladimir V. Putin and a demonstration of how the Trump administration is using new authorities to deploy cybertools more aggressively, current and former government officials said.

In interviews over the past three months, the officials described the previously unreported deployment of American computer code inside Russia’s grid and other targets as a classified companion to more publicly discussed action directed at Moscow’s disinformation and hacking units around the 2018 midterm elections.

Advocates of the more aggressive strategy said it was long overdue, after years of public warnings from the Department of Homeland Security and the F.B.I. that Russia has inserted malware that could sabotage American power plants, oil and gas pipelines or water supplies in any future conflict with the United States.

But it also carries significant risk of escalating the daily digital Cold War between Washington and Moscow.

The administration declined to describe specific actions it was taking under the new authorities, which were granted separately by the White House and Congress last year to United States Cyber Command, the arm of the Pentagon that runs the military’s offensive and defensive operations in the online world.

But in a public appearance on Tuesday, President Trump’s national security adviser, John R. Bolton, said the United States was now taking a broader view of potential digital targets as part of an effort “to say to Russia, or anybody else that’s engaged in cyberoperations against us, ‘You will pay a price.’”

Power grids have been a low-intensity battleground for years.

Since at least 2012, current and former officials say, the United States has put reconnaissance probes into the control systems of the Russian electric grid.

They started retaliating in 2012 for a problem that manifested in 2016 2018. For once the US government thinks forward. And, one could have guessed about Bolton’s involvement even without the reading. These fools may end up getting that war they’ve wanted for so long. Rest assured, you’ll get the (massive) tab.

Russia Extends the Olive Branch

15 Wednesday May 2019

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Now that the Russia, Russia, Russia! hoax has been exposed and laid to rest, the Russians would like to get back to “better.” Will Washington be wise enough to understand?

Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov told U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo on Tuesday it was time for Moscow and Washington to put aside years of mistrust and find a way to work together constructively.

One wonders if DC can do anything constructively anymore. Let’s hope so.

 

Stop. Mueller Time.

18 Thursday Apr 2019

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We anticipate the full partial redacted whatever portion on the Mueller Report a little later today. I’ll get that up, maybe with a little analysis – like there’s anything to analyze, at some point. Check Drudge, news junkies.

Anyway, I assume that tomorrow, Good Friday, we will start seeing the unsealing of all those secret military indictments. Let the treason trials (Nuremberg-style) commence. … I crack me up…

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First Venezuela, Now Syria. When, here, America?

17 Wednesday Apr 2019

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And, thank you, Christian Russia, for checking the insane plans of the Washington Neocons. Syria, parts of it, are becoming Christian (again).

A community of Syrians who converted to Christianity from Islam is growing in Kobani, a town besieged by Islamic State for months, and where the tide turned against the militants four years ago.

The converts say the experience of war and the onslaught of a group claiming to fight for Islam pushed them toward their new faith. After a number of families converted, the Syrian-Turkish border town’s first evangelical church opened last year.

Islamic State militants were beaten back by U.S. air strikes and Kurdish fighters [and Russia and the Regime] at Kobani in early 2015, in a reversal of fortune after taking over swaths of Iraq and Syria. After years of fighting, U.S.-backed forces fully ended the group’s control over populated territory last month.

Though Islamic State’s ultra-radical interpretation of Sunni Islam has been repudiated by the Islamic mainstream, the legacy of its violence has affected perceptions of faith.

Many in the mostly Kurdish areas of northern Syria, whose urban centers are often secular, say agnosticism has strengthened and in the case of Kobani, Christianity.

Christianity is one of the region’s minority faiths that was persecuted by Islamic State.

So, maybe all it takes is a depression and a civil war to reverse the curse in the United States of Babel. Or, do we have to wait until we’re the minority? We already have the persecution from our own brand of ultra-radicals.

Anyway, good for the people of Kobani. May the faith spread.

This reminded me of a plea from a Syrian Priest – against both the Islamists and the Neocon loons:

No, It Won’t Even Slow Him Down

25 Sunday Nov 2018

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One hopes so, regardless of what the fake Mueller “Russia, Russia, Russia” investigation reveals:

Alan Dershowitz, a frequent defender of President Donald Trump, said special counsel Robert Mueller’s report will be “devastating” for the president.

The Harvard Law professor emeritus told ABC News Chief Anchor George Stephanopoulos that he believes the president will have to navigate the political impact of a potentially damning final report from the special counsel.

“I think the report is going to be devastating to the president and I know that the president’s team is already working on a response to the report,” Dershowitz said on “This Week” Sunday.

Dershowitz added that he believes the report, although it will have a strong political impact, is unlikely to result in criminal charges.

In fact, the report, devastating or not, may be a good thing; it may provide a convenient list (should anyone in power want one) of enemy combatant candidates. It’ll probably make for some funny Tweets too. Bring it.

End of the Empire in Sight?

14 Wednesday Nov 2018

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This doesn’t look good. But it does look natural and excepted. US military advantage has eroded, study says:

“There is a strong fear of complacency, that people have become so used to the United States achieving what it wants in the world, to include militarily, that it isn’t heeding the warning signs,” said Kathleen Hicks, a former top Pentagon official during the Obama administration and one of the commissioners. “It’s the flashing red that we are trying to relay.”

The picture of the national security landscape that the 12-person commission sketched is a bleak one, in which an American military that has enjoyed undisputed dominance for decades is failing to receive the resources, innovation and prioritization its leaders need to outmuscle China and Russia in a race for military might reminiscent of the Cold War.

The military balance has shifted adversely for the United States in Europe, Asia and the Middle East, undermining the confidence of American allies and increasing the likelihood of military conflict, the commission found, after reviewing classified documents, receiving Pentagon briefings and interviewing top defense officials.

“The U.S. military could suffer unacceptably high casualties and loss of major capital assets in its next conflict. It might struggle to win, or perhaps lose, a war against China or Russia,” the report said. “The United States is particularly at risk of being overwhelmed should its military be forced to fight on two or more fronts simultaneously.”

In its list of 32 recommendations, the commission urged the Pentagon to explain more clearly how it intends to defeat major-power rivals in competition and war. It assailed the strategy for relying at times on “questionable assumptions and weak analysis” and leaving “unanswered critical questions.”

Economic depression, this foreign defeat, and 2033. Are you a prepper??

On a not unrelated note, given the expected “unacceptably high casualties,” maybe we could use a little of the overseas adventurism budget to shore up some of these 1-star VA zombie factories.

I read somewhere – somewhere stupid like Facebook maybe – a while back about some fantasy scenario which pitted the mighty US military against the entire world. In the fantasy, the US won, cakewalk style, in about a day. Questionable assumptions and weak analysis, there. A touch of insanity too. This is going to be hard to accept if or when it happens. 460 AD. Rome.

Civilization and Savagery

17 Monday Sep 2018

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Russians, long oppressed by communism, seek a return to an honest and gentlemanly tradition: dueling:

The Russian Liberal Democratic party has drafted a bill allowing for official duels and detailing rules for such combat. The move comes after the head of the National Guard challenged an opposition figure to a fight over slander.

The motion, prepared and drafted by MP Sergey Ivanov states that a duel between Russian citizens should be possible – although it should by no means be deemed a normal way of settling scores.

“In recent times there is a tendency among civil servants to challenge citizens who express opinions that differ from the official point of view to duels. In order to systemize the main reasons of such challenges and the rules of actual duels we propose this bill,” the lawmaker wrote in the note attached with the draft.

The Russians are a different breed. I’m astounded that it’s the officials seeking to challenge the people. But it could easily go the other way – there. Here, there’s a reason our “leaders” are scared to death of such a prospect. It’s why they have routinely denied citizens the right to trial by combat. No, they’re headed in the opposite direction and taking us with them. Here’s a preview, from Venezuela, of what the future in America, with socialism for all and a “living wage,” will look like:

Nearly 40 percent of all Venezuelan stores have closed —some of them perhaps permanently —after the government of President Nicolas Maduro increased the minimum salary by nearly 3,500 percent in one fell swoop, according the National Council of Commerce and Services of Venezuela.

Many of the companies, which had been barely surviving the gradual collapse of the economy, saw the salary increase and other changes announced last month as the fatal blow in a series of policies that have been gradually strangling their businesses.

“These decisions are leading many business people to say, ‘No, I can’t do it any more,'” said Maria Carolina Uzcategui, president of the council.

The problem is that Venezuelan companies are being forced to sell at prices far below cost just as employee salaries are increasing 60 times, Uzcategui said.

What’s more, the regime has banned stores from increasing their prices to cover the salary increases, arguing that it is not necessary.

That’s literally a page from Atlas Shrugged. And it’s a page, a popular one, in the American socialist playbook.

If you’re young and love the West, consider the East.

Kekkōdesu, Mr. Roboto

21 Tuesday Aug 2018

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Not to sound all Al Gore, but we only have a few years to head off the robot apocalypse.

The Russian news (all fake, huh?) gave us the “creepy” droid seen stalking around a parking lot.

A video has emerged on Twitter showing a faceless yet worryingly realistic humanoid robot walking in what looks like a perfectly mundane courtyard. The trip down the uncanny valley caused some to proclaim an impending apocalypse.

The clip shows the stoop-backed robot making its way past the cameraman, with ominous music playing in the background. Its black and orange limbs, hi-tech-looking protrusions along its spine, and its hollowed out head all lend to the realism, bringing to mind Boston Dynamics’ latest scary creations. But then the camera zooms in on its face plate, and that’s where you might feel a slight urge to scream and run, because set in the near-featureless white mask are two moving, human-like eyes.

Naturally, some users’ reaction was “WE ARE ALL GOING TO DIE.”

Yeah, probably, but not from that goofy-looking thing. Death is more likely from this one (also from Putin Landia):

Russia has unveiled a terrifying 4.5-tonne bulletproof robot that can walk and hold weapons in its giant claws – and looks straight out of sci-fi films like Avatar and Robocop.

The Avatar-style ‘bot was revealed by Kalashnikov at the Army 2018 Fair just outside Moscow, as a ‘demonstration of what is to come.’

The robot can walk and has space in a cabin for people to sit and operate the robot from inside and can hold and move objects with its claws, including weapons.

The pilots are protected from bullets, debris and any other dangerous object behind the armoured glass and metal encasement.

The gold robot, which has been called Igorek, is still under construction and the creators do not wish to reveal all its characteristics until they have finished.

I’m good with the current reveal. 4.5 tons, claws, weapons, made by Kalashnikov, bulletproof … that’s more than enough. Any engineers reading this, feel free to leave comments about possible soft points on this monster. What minimum caliber do we need? (I’m thinking concentrated fire on the windshield or just fire [napalm] on the whole body).

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Coming to a future near you. Mirror.