This can and will be used to shut down public debate in Australia because it prevents citizen journalism of any sort.
The Conservatives will pass it because the media will tell them its good for business.
The labor/ left will pass it because it shuts down debate on immigration.
The Greens will love it because it shuts down debate on climate change.
The tools:
content means content:
(a) whether in the form of text; or
(b) whether in the form of data; or
(c) whether in the form of speech, music or other sounds; or
(d) whether in the form of visual images (animated or
otherwise); or
(e) whether in any other form; or
(f) whether in any combination of forms.
13 Meanings of misinformation and disinformation
(1) For the purposes of this Schedule, dissemination of content using a
digital service is misinformation on the digital service if:
(a) the content contains information that is reasonably verifiable
as false, misleading or deceptive; and
(b) the content is provided on the digital service to one or more
end-users in Australia; and
(c) the provision of the content on the digital service is
reasonably likely to cause or contribute to serious harm; and
(d) the dissemination is not excluded dissemination.
(2) For the purposes of this Schedule, dissemination of content using a
digital service is disinformation on the digital service if:
(a) the content contains information that is reasonably verifiable
as false, misleading or deceptive; and
(b) the content is provided on the digital service to one or more
end-users in Australia; and
(c) the provision of the content on the digital service is
reasonably likely to cause or contribute to serious harm; and
(d) the dissemination is not excluded dissemination; and
(e) either:
(i) there are grounds to suspect that the person
disseminating, or causing the dissemination of, the
content intends that the content deceive another person;
or10
(ii) the dissemination involves inauthentic behaviour.
Note: Disinformation includes disinformation by or on behalf of a foreign
power.
(3) For the purposes of this Schedule, in determining whether the
provision of content on a digital service is reasonably likely to
cause or contribute to serious harm, regard must be had to the
following matters:
(a) the circumstances in which the content is disseminated;
(b) the subject matter of the information in the content that is
reasonably verifiable as false, misleading or deceptive;
(c) the potential reach and speed of the dissemination;
(d) the author of the information;
(e) the purpose of the dissemination;
(f) whether the information has been attributed to a source and,
if so, the authority of the source and whether the attribution is
correct;
(g) other related information disseminated that is reasonably
verifiable as false, misleading or deceptive;
(h) any matter determined by the Minister under subclause (4);
(i) any other relevant matter
Main amendments Schedule 1
No. , 2024 Communications Legislation Amendment (Combatting Misinformation
and Disinformation) Bill 2024
(vi) a program of audio, visual (animated or otherwise) or
audio-visual content designed to be distributed over the
internet; and
(b) is subject to any of the following:
(i) the rules of the Australian Press Council Standards of
Practice or the Independent Media Council Code of
Conduct;
(ii) the rules of the Commercial Television Industry Code of
Practice, the Commercial Radio Code of Practice or the
Subscription Broadcast Television Codes of Practice;
(iii) rules of a code of practice mentioned in
paragraph 8(1)(e) of the Australian Broadcasting
Corporation Act 1983 or paragraph 10(1)(j) of the
Special Broadcasting Service Act 1991;
(iv) rules or internal editorial standards that are analogous to
the rules mentioned in subparagraph (i), (ii) or (iii) of
this paragraph to the extent that they relate to the
provision of quality journalism;
(v) rules specified for the purposes of this paragraph in the
digital platform rules; and
(c) has editorial independence from the subjects of the person’s
news coverage.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
(3) For the purposes of this Schedule, news content is content that
reports, investigates or explains any of the following:
(a) issues or events that are relevant in engaging persons in
public debate and in informing democratic decision-making;
(b) current issues or events of public significance for persons at a
local, regional, national or international level;
(c) current issues or events of interest to persons!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<
This is probably irrelevant because according to Scott Ritter,, Russia is not bluffing about using nuclear weapons shortly. See his latest on YouTube. We aren’t going to make it to election day……..
Walrus, Scott Ritter may possibly be proved correct by events but I don’t pay him much attention any more because his celebrity and exposure have gone to his head in a big way. Did you see their (RF) Sarmat explosion the day before yesterday, leaving a gigantic cavern? That’s 3 out of 4 that have failed AFAIK. Stalin would have shot the entire Russian high command several years ago and only a fool would have blamed him. Take a look at Peter Zeihan’s 7 minute video about the drone-missile hybrid named Palyianitsa which I left on an earlier thread.
In that comment I focused on the weapon’s characteristics. I should have mentioned his remarks on the vulnerability of Russian rail systems on which their logistics depend. He conjectures that by seizing a rail hub in Kursk oblast the Ukrainians (NATO in reality, UK and US in fact) have been able to access and decipher large portions of the Russian rail schedule. That’s beyond my expertise to comment on.
Ukraine hits Russia where it Hurts. Peter Zeihan.
https://tinyurl.com/bdhwh2uk
F&L,
I do not trust Peter Zeihan as far as I can throw him.
James — if you’ve read my several comments about the man you know that neither do I care for him. However the Palyianitsas are as real as real can be and his info about the rail system seems to hold up. And the attacks on ammo depots and the numerous other highly destructive strikes? They are absolutely real. They’re discussed voluminously.and with exceeding bitterness on Ru Telegram. I’ll grant you that there are certainly other sumbags in the mix, but Putin appears to be an atrocious and totally incompetent commander.
Here’s 2 of today’s comments by Anatoly Nesmiyan. He is a severe critic of the Russian regime and is Russian by birth. He’s also one of the smartest people on the planet.
Pay attention: Limey motherfuc***s. The ruling elite of GB simply doesn’t change.
https://t.me/anatoly_nesmiyan/20684
Well, and as confirmation of British participation in planning the Russian-Ukrainian conflict – the statement of a British official that the conflict will continue after 2026. In a situation where there is no possibility to continue it today, such a statement best says that the British do not intend to miss such a chocolate opportunity to create colossal difficulties for continental Europe associated with the severance of ties with Russia. This was the basis of British policy for all previous centuries, and it would be strange if it suddenly changed right now.
https://t.me/anatoly_nesmiyan/20682
In fact, if we look at the military actions in February 2022, there was both military planning and a political goal , both current-operational and of a higher order. In the south, in just a few days, a land corridor to Crimea was created, the capture of Kharkov created an unacceptable threat to the Ukrainian Armed Forces group in the Luhansk and Donetsk regions, and the situation should have been fixed by the capture of Kiev and the signing of a peace treaty by Zelensky, in which Ukraine renounced not only Crimea, but also a number of its other territories (this is already according to current circumstances and appetites). Well, and then Lavrov would have repeated NATO’s ultimatum – to return to the 1997 borders.
Actually, it’s not rocket science – the actions of Russian forces had a completely legible planning, and political decisions were announced in advance.
But as we know, even the most ideal plan never survives a collision with reality. The key problem of any crisis is always time. And even here everything was quite competent: having understood that the initial plans would have to be adjusted, and quite significantly, two weeks later ceasefire negotiations began, which were supposed to record the current state of affairs. The Russian army faced what was not foreseen in the plans: on the “other side” were, in fact, the same people – stubborn and angry. And trained, having gone through combat operations in the ATO zone. And near Kiev, and in Kharkov, and in the south, territorial defense became the force that stopped the regular army of Russia, including its most combat-ready units.
But time was lost. British Prime Minister Johnson got involved in the events, and he created a situation that finally deprived the Kremlin of subjectivity. One can even say exactly when the Kremlin completely lost control over the events and began to play not the first, as at the beginning, but the second number – this was Bucha. The professional special operation of the British with the creation of an unacceptable situation was not the first – the mythical genocide in Srebrenica was also organized, where the bodies of soldiers of the 28th Bosnian division killed in combat were presented as killed civilians. The Serbs initially tried to deny the presented version of the execution of civilians, but then accepted it as one of the conditions of the West. The West is generally very good at managing conflicts of savages. Experience is a great thing. In March 2022, it worked again.
Johnson did not try to persuade Zelensky to continue the war, he made it impossible for him to sign and implement the terms of the ceasefire. Direct personalized control in its purest form. Zelensky as a politician turned out to be a nobody, so there was simply no point in wasting time on persuading him and bargaining with him.
The Russian mantras of “everything is going according to plan” after Bucha are already phantom pains of something that will never happen. No planning envisaged two and a half years of conflict, and in the most exhausting version of attrition. And with the prospect of its further continuation for an indefinite time.
Today, none of the direct parties to this conflict have a question of winning, today there is a question of minimizing the damage, and colossal damage, from the entire event, since no acquisitions will pay off in any way. But here too, the people who pull the strings on which Putin hangs, among others (and, of course, Zelensky) understand perfectly well that they have nowhere to go, since the first condition for this is the admission of their catastrophic mistakes. To come out and say “I screwed up” – it is clear that no one will ever hear this from Putin. The code of the boy will not allow it. Zelensky also cannot say these words, since he will have to answer why he continued to fight after March 2022, although he had every opportunity to end the conflict, albeit in defeat, but not at such a high price as today. So here, too, personalized management is in full swing.
In general, if we are to talk about plans, then for more than two and a half years now we can only discuss one plan – the British (and then the American), which today determines the entire course of this conflict.
F&L,
And I cannot help but think that the UK’s ruling class is salivating at the prospects of one million hot Ukrainian devushkas moving to London.
James –
Of course. And all the wealth of Russia is sitting in London banks for years now helping to keep the UK economy afloat. That percentage, that is, that hasn’t been laundered offshore by those vampires for the upkeep of their own estates etc. Putin’s job has been to do precisely that — keep his “respected partners” fat and happy. The term is “comprador elite.”
” He conjectures that by seizing a rail hub in Kursk oblast the Ukrainians (NATO in reality, UK and US in fact) have been able to access and decipher large portions of the Russian rail schedule.”
Riiiiiiight. And if this had occurred to Zeihan then it would have certainly have occurred to the Russians.
The idea that they are unable to lockout a “rail hub” computer in Kursk is….. ludicrous. They would certainly be able to do it at the router end of things if such a computer was compromised by a virus.
That is a given.
Yet Zeihan thinks that if the Ukrainians were able to take physical control over that same computer then the Russians would be helpless to do anything to lock it out.
Like so many of the things that Zeihan says it is nonsensical.
Here’s the main problem I have with Peter Zeihan’s videos: he simply assumes that his flights of fancy must be true because they are consistent with the figures.
He never considers that there might be other explanations that are equally – if not more – consistent with those same figures i.e. he is dogmatic about his opinions.
Take the video you refer to, where he states (probably correctly) that the drone did the damage that it did because a great deal of munitions were sitting out in the open.
His assumption is that this happened because the Russians are hopeless jokes who don’t know how ammo dumps work. Obviously.
OK. That’s one option. The other is that the ammo is sitting in the open because Russian ammo production has now reached such gigantic levels that all the bunkers were full and therefore there was nowhere else to put the ammo but in the open.
An assumption that is equally compatible with the observable results BUT ALSO consistent with the know fact that Russian ammo production has expanded to a level unattainable in the west.
Of course, if Zeihan’s prejudice turns out to be wrong then his conclusion will be erroneous: this strike at this ammo dump is unlikely to make the slightest difference at the front lines because new ammo is flowing through the system in numbers so great that no amount of ammo-dump-go-boom! is going to make any difference.
As for his discussion of the “vulnerability of Russian rail systems” is just a Gish-Gallop of assumptions: Russian logistics relies on rail, and rail is electric, and the electrical grid is very vulnerable, so Ukraine can’t possibly lose.
Hello. How does Ukraine take out the electricity grid of a country as huge as Russia?
Answer: it can’t.
Yeah, Right,
I also take Zeihan’s pronunciations with a grain of salt. He doesn’t mention that this supposedly modern, very well protected ammo storage site which fell prey to the graft and corruption of modern Russia. What was constructed was a Potemkin village of an ammo storage site and obviously not well protected. Every storage site I’ve ever seen on every military post I’ve visited consisted of heavily constructed concrete and earthen bunkers built to withstand a massive explosion in any one bunker. They would also withstand a drone or missile attack that happens to hit any one bunker squarely. This main Russian storage site obviously did not meet this standard.
Your assumption that the site was so overflowing with ammunition due to Russian overproduction flies in the face of the reality on the front. Russian ammo expenditure, although still impressive, is a fraction of what it once was. Why would such an excess of artillery ammo no make its way to the front?
I do agree that it is highly unlikely that Ukraine’s insight into the Russian rail traffic control lasted very long when the rail traffic control hub was seized at Sudzha. It would have only been a momentary view into the inner workings of the Russian rail system. However, even open source analysis has done a good job of mapping vulnerabilities of the Russian rail system. Some of these analysts have argued that Ukraine should target electric substations serving the rail system. Will that knock out Russia’s electrical grid? Of course not, but it can stop train traffic within say 100 miles of the front. Russian replacement troops will still be able to force march to the front, but ammo and other necessary supplies will slow to a trickle. That doesn’t mean that Ukraine can’t possibly lose, but it does mean Russia can’t possibly win.
TTG: “What was constructed was a Potemkin village of an ammo storage site and obviously not well protected.”
What’s “obvious” about your statement, TTG?
The depot was in two parts: a Soviet-era portion of haphazard layout, and a much newer section of geometrically-placed bunkers.
I assume you are talking about the latter.
There hasn’t been any convincing satellite info that shows that latter section post-strike, so claiming that this section blew up is pure speculation.
TTG: “Russian ammo expenditure, although still impressive, is a fraction of what it once was.”
The Russians are still pumping over 10,000 shells a day into the Ukrainian lines. I’ve not seen a single Ukrainian front-line soldier claim that there has been a noticeable slackening of that onslaught, nor have I seen a single Russian soldier claim that ammo is now in short supply.
Here’s an assessment of the Toropets (Tver) dump damage done from 19 September satellite imagery:
The first clear satellite images from the ammunition depot of Toropets have been released by Radio Svoboda. My assessment is not yet final because smoke clouds are still blocking partially the view at some areas. Nevertheless, what can be seen is already devastating. Here are my numbers:
The newly built portion of the base:
– All 23 buildings have been destroyed
– Out of 42 storage bunker at least 15 have been destroyed, 10 more cannot be assessed but are most likely destroyed, due to their proximity to the major bomb crater
– the remaining 17 bunkers show various signs of damages but it is hard to assess the impact of it
– 5 major bombs craters can be seen (yellow)
Damage rate approximately: over 80%
The old part of the base:
– at least 17 buildings have been destroyed
– at least 2 open air logistics fields are smoldering, probably more in the northwestern portion of the base
– area market in violet cannot be entirely assessed but especially the northern portion seems to be totally gone
– 2 major bomb crater can be seen
Damage rate approximately: 70%-90%
Given that the damage by excessive heat and kinetic damage caused by shockwaves and shrapnel lead to material deterioration beyond usage, especially missiles and other complex weapon systems, I would call this virtually a total loss of all material on the base, where at best only 10%-20% can be salvaged.
Russian ammo expenditure dropped by 75% by early 2023 from the highest level. That’s a DOD assessment. Ukrainians have also noticed the drop. Perhaps the loss of artillery pieces or worn out barrels have a lot to do with this drop. Might also be a reticence to use North Korean ammo since it of crappy and sometimes fatal quality.
Estonian Foreign Intelligence Service and Bain & Company both estimate the Russians will produce 4.5 million artillery shells in 2024.
Which… [tap][tap][tap]… equates to over 12,000 artillery shells per day.
If I am right and the Russians are firing around 10,000 artillery shells per day at the front lines then that makes perfect sense: production exceeds demand by a noticeable but not obscene amount, so the ammo depots don’t deplete and also don’t overflow with stuff they can’t store.
If you are right and the Russians on the front line are being starved of shells then….. well, gosh, the Russians have a problem in that every day 12,000 shells leave the factories and they have nowhere to put them.
Because to my mind that’s the problem: the numbers have to add up across the board, and not just looked at in isolation.
If the Russians are pumping out 12,000 artillery shells A DAY (and nobody in officialdom appears to be disputing this) then it seems to me the only logical conclusion is that something approaching that is being fired at the Ukrainians each and every day.
Otherwise you have to explain where the Russians are putting all those shells, if they aren’t putting them down-range and into Ukrainian trenches.
[NOTE ALSO that if 12,000 artillery shells are leaving the factory each and every day then these drone strikes on Russian ammo depots isn’t going to have the flow-on effect that pundits claim, because the Russians can bypass the middleman by shipping from the factory directly to the consumer. Not as easy, obviously, but doable]
TTG: “Russian ammo expenditure dropped by 75% by early 2023 from the highest level”
by. early. 2023.
That was then, TTG, and this is now. And not two days ago our very good friends at the ISW stated that Russia was firing 10,000 artillery shells per day.
TTG: ” That’s a DOD assessment.”
… from “early 2023”. Which is a year and a half ago.
TTG: “Ukrainians have also noticed the drop. ”
I will note the use of the present-tense “have” rather than the past-tense “had”, which is odd, since you are referring to something from “early 2023”.
Yeah, Right,
Russia expended some 25,000 to 30,000 shells a day in 2022. So today’s 10,000 shells is quite a drop.
TTG: “So today’s 10,000 shells is quite a drop.”
The Russian military has these funny ideas regarding sustainability of combat operations.
As in, they work out the logistic requirements first, and then their ability to sustain those logistics, and only then do they decide on a go/no-go on a military operation.
Odd, heh? Even odder when every man and his Zeihan state categorically that the Russians don’t understand logistics.
As I said, the latest western estimates of Russian shell production is a touch over 12,000 shells a day. So it is no stretch to reach the conclusion that the Russian military take the view that they can fire 10,000 shells a day …. indefinitely.
So that’s what they do.
That’s well over five times what the Ukrainians can pump back at ’em, and even that is rapidly denuding “the West” of its ammo stockpiles.
Which would make the Kremlin smile inside.
TTG: “Russia expended some 25,000 to 30,000 shells a day in 2022.”
Over what time period “in 2022”, and under what circumstances?
By anyone’s calculations 25,000 shells per day over an entire year would be a totally unsustainable rate of fire. It would probably exceed the entire planetary output of artillery shells “in 2022” if it were sustained over an entire year.
I know it, you know it, the Ukrainians would know it and so would the Russians.
Clearly worth doing in the early stages of the invasion when the Russians sent 150,000-200,000 men against a Ukrainian Army that was many times larger.
But “in 2022” the Russians were still working on a Plan A that involved a swift advance to the outskirts of Kiev to spook Zelensky into a negotiated solution.
Which would have succeeded if not for Bonkers Boris Johnson, and that necessitated a move to Plan B: a bigger Russian army to grind down of the Ukrainian army through time.
The number of soldiers were adjusted up, and the expenditure of ammo was dialed back down, and both to ensure that Plan B could be sustained indefinitely.
Because that’s how Plan B is supposed to work.
All part of the calculation, TTG, because logistics rule.
The Russians are quite good at such things even if both Peter Zeihan and you mock them.
And yet, Budanov knew to launch drone attacks on Toropets, Tikhoretsk & Oktyabrzski ammo depots when ammo trains were there loading or unloading and plenty of ordnance was in the open. Maybe he could have gotten that from IMINT, but that intel would take time. So maybe he got access to Russian Railway dispatcher network and had access to schedule and composition of ammo deliveries. Or perhaps the Sudzha hub gave him the frequencies and locations of switching signals or other safety signals that are automatically tripped by a moving train?
Leith, it is only speculation that there was an ammo train when the drone attack struck.
There is a degree of sloppiness involved in reporting/analysis of these drone strikes: speculation is reported as self-evident truths, damage estimates are treated as gospel, and claims of the total destruction of the sites are accepted even before the smoke clears.
What is known is that the Torpets depot was constructed in two parts: the larger part was constructed by the Soviets, and a newer part is mid-2010s.
The older section presumably holds Soviet-era ammo, the newer section would presumably contain newer munitions.
Did both sections go up in a big Boom? Did only the Soviet-era section go up? Or was it predominantly out-in-the-open ammo that went kerblowie?
I haven’t seen evidence to support any over the others, yet I’ve seen the ISW claim “as fact” that month’s worth of ammo was destroyed based on what appears to me to be wishful thinking.
As for the intel for the attacks, if ammo is stored in the open then that would be visible in commercial satellite imagery. You don’t need any more skullduggery than that.
YR –
There is high resolution imagery by MAXAR of the results of the Toropets attack. The photos show trains with many railcars visibly destroyed next to revetments and/or bunkers or warehouses where stored ammo had been blown to hell. Many of the other still-standing railcars appear damaged by fire.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GYLhknmWUAASTL8?format=jpg&name=large
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/GYLhetwXsAAN1zL?format=jpg&name=large
AFAIK there is not “yet” high resolution imagery available for Oktyabrzski and Tikhoretsk ammo depots. However Ukraine HUR claims an ammo train was unloading North Korean missiles at Tikhoretsk when the UAVs attacked. You probably do not believe that, but you should not completely disregard it at least until some high res imagery is published. And one OSINT analyst using lower res images claims that at Tikhoretsk 75 railcars were destroyed (some totally obliterated), or heavily damaged. That makes sense if a trainload of North Korean KN-23 SRBMs with 500 kg warheads was unloading.
Walrus –
Scott Ridder is a convicted pedophile. As for Putin using nuclear weapons, he fears doing that, remember his 20-meter long table? He knows he’d be the first one to be taken out, if not by the West, then by his own siloviki, or by Xi who has already warned him not to use nukes. Plus the most recent of four failed tests of the RS-28 Sarmat ICBM has also cast doubt on his ability to use nukes. That explosion at Plesetsk Cosmodrome just three days ago turned the Sarmat silo into a huge crater.
https://www.reuters.com/business/aerospace-defense/russian-missile-failed-during-test-researchers-imagery-indicate-2024-09-23/
Instead of using nuclear weapons directly, Putin is more likely to strike Ukrainian nuclear power plants this winter, and then using his vast propaganda machine to blame it on Ukrainians. That is more his style as a former KGB operative. He is still trying to divert attention from his own attacks on the Zaporizhzhia NPP by alleging a fictitious Ukrainian threat to the Kursk NPP. Even if he does not directly attack Ukrainian nuclear reactors, he can still provoke a radiation catastrophe like Chernobyl by attacking peripheral infrastructure such as NPP switchgear and transmission substations. According to Ukraine’s Energoatom, Russian UAVs constantly fly over or near Khmelnytsky NPP. That’s in western Ukraine not far from the Polish border.
Walrus — can you at least Freeze Peach in Australia?
More seriously it’s dreadful news but I’m not surprised. Why? I lived in England as a child. I saw where Orwell got his ideas for 1984 right before my eyes. He and others believe and attest that no, he drew his inspiration from his experience in Spain and Stalin’s suppressions there and domestically. As usual that’s only partially true and his inspiration derives from his childhood, as some profound psychological studies of Orwell deduce.
I’ve never seen such outright tyranny and abuse of children. And Australia is an extension of that dreadful place, possibly much worse because it was founded by their rejects and criminals, similar to the USA in it’s southern provinces particularly. One needn’t look far to comprehend the whys and ways of US criminal insanity.
So what conclusion derives from your detailed exposition? That you can be arrested and taken away for nearly anything down under — in other words an Australian is about as safe from imprisonment as any of hundreds of thousands of victims of the sleazy informants in the USSR of the 1930s.
Are Australian children being massacred while attending school? Evidently not. The bloody Limeys at least got that right.
Meanwhile it only gets better and better in the land of the free.
Chicago gangbangers rage against newly arrived Venezuelan migrants as Tren de Aragua moves in: ‘City is going to go up in flames’.
https://nypost.com/2024/09/22/us-news/chicago-gangbangers-face-off-against-venezuelans/
This situation is equivalent to granting Adolph Hitler his most feverishly desired wish in 1942.
Black gangs fighting criminal cartel illegal immigrants in America’s 2nd largest city. (They’re fighting people who used to murder children by ripping out their hearts on altars atop pyramids to boil their remains with peppers and tomatoes in a cannibal stew only a measly few hundred years ago). Thanks Joe Biden, thanks Kamala. And because it’s America, of course, the other candidate is likely much worse.
And btw, guess what it says to someone such as Vladimir Putin or a nationalist Russian leader who seizes power? It says — go ahead and nuke our cities, because we don’t give a damn about them. (New Orleans 2005 was another example). That is our “missile defense.”
F&L – I thought Orwell got his ideas from working as a police officer in the Indian (ie British) Imperial Police force in Burma.
Walrus – some of us lefties still believe in free speech! Any lefty who does not believe in free speech is an idiot.
James — indeed that’s true and his guilt feelings about working for a murderous imperial power drove him to writing. He also fought in Spain and hoboed through Europe interwar. His book on being.down and out in Paris is replete with marvelous and stunningly insightful anecdotes. I greatly admire George Orwell btw. A giant.
“Any lefty who does not believe in free speech is an idiot.”
Unfortunately, a lot of leftists are trying to limit free speech.
Some examples:
https://jonathanturley.org/2024/09/18/a-better-deterrence-hillary-clinton-calls-for-the-arrest-of-americans-spreading-disinformation/
https://jonathanturley.org/2024/07/12/the-first-amendment-is-out-of-control-academic-and-entertainment-figures-rally-in-the-fight-against-free-speech/
https://jonathanturley.org/2023/07/27/pew-seventy-percent-of-democrats-and-democratic-leaning-independents-support-speech-limits/
“the emergence of the Democratic Party as a virulent anti-free speech party.”
Turley has LOTS of posts on this subject, see:
https://jonathanturley.org/category/free-speech/
Keith Harbaugh
Wanna know why? It’s because the Jewish owners of America are furious that criticism of Israel has morphed fairly quickly into old fashioned 3rd Reich style antisemitism. Some of stuff on X now is almost if not more extreme as Goebbels’s rags and movies. The Jews couldn’t care two bits about free speech. They just don’t want to revisit the gas chamber. But if they commit genocide? Fine and dandy in genocide Joe’s and Gigglin Kamala’s America — directed by Blackrock and JP Morgan Chase Bank. Iran has done nothing – no mystery. They would be vaporized if they had a capable offensive attack on Israel. All the BS about how Iran is so advanced and large and dangerous? Pure Zionist propaganda purposed to get religious maniacs like Christian Zionist Speaker of the Louse Mike Johnson to send more weapons to those mass murdering terrorists.
Changing title to “freeze peach”.unbuckled a chuckle.wrote this after Clinton’s “deplorable” remark
You got the right kind of rage
I see you’ve come of age
You’re a burning hot keyboard warrior
Oh the horror,the horror
Twitter is your battle ground
What’s that hashtag you’ve found
Pulled it out the gutter
A machine gun putter
You fire those tweets off all day
When the deplored come out to play
But you better watch out
This is no party boy scout
Gonna take your toys away
Then what will you say
My freedom of speech
Eaten like a peach.
mcohen,
Good one. Resonates.
Look for it to be put forward in our Congress.
Freedom of speech is already limited in the US. Multiple US states have made it illegal for peoples and companies to do business with them if they advocate sanctions against Israel. BDS.
Stefan, In Florida you’re allowed to run over protesters with your vehicle. Maybe that’s been modified I don’t know.
F&L,
That does not mean you can leave your house to find a protest and run people over. But it would be fun to see that in court.
A people should know when they are conquered. Don’t worry about the Russians. Your own government is nuking you. The Russians don’t need to worry about you
@walrus
You should rejoice that this confirms your dictum about government action achieving the exact opposite of it’s intended goal. 🙂
We are headed for “interesting times” where the very meanings of true and false will just evaporate, and not only in Australia.
Take solace in the Tao.
Thanks for link.interesting stuff
No later than Covid, it was obvious that any Orwellian experiment but by tried on Canada and/or Australia. Sad for it, beautiful countries, but seems they have no substantial agency over many things (e.g. from the submarines purchases by Australia, to the Covid dictatorship, to the unconstitutional freezing of bank assets of Canadian truckers).
Wow, the Anglosphere is finished. England long gone, Ireland, Canada, Australia gone too (ditto Scotland, Wales, NZ, Hong Kong). USA finished too unless Trump wins and crushes the educational establishment (which he is probably too lazy to do).
“educational establishment”?
Now that’s interesting.
Walrusk
That is bad news.not content with the content.
Did you know that Winnie Mandela once said that the ANC will free South Africa with a box of matches.
And afterwards someone wrote graffiti on a wall in Hillbrow stating “stompie kan nie winnie”
Boknaai ouboet.Empire strikes a match
We were in a unipolar moment after the collapse of the USSR. Now we are in the outworking of the American liberal economic policy. If China does what America says, China will rule the world (until India catches up). The American regime can’t stand this. Hence wars. And Russia! Russia is the little boy we can beat rather than the bully on the block we can’t do anything about. But what if Russia gives the us American boys a bloody nose?
Lots of reports that the 101 st Airborne Infantry are deploying to Israel and Cypress. Another aircraft carrier left Norfolk today for the ME. If Bibi can get some United States servicemen and servicewomen killed before the election Trump wins. A genocidal criminal dictator’s dream. I wonder if he jerks off thinking about it. It’s a feature of sadism in some cases.
You’re talking about Bibi, not Trump?
I take it you mean Cyprus, probably the British sovereign bases there. At least 2 LPDs have docked in Cyprus in recent months and there has been a military exercise or two involving Greece France US Greek Cyprus. The Greek Cypriot president claimed they have no part in hostilities but they plainly have been moving closer to the USA in the last year or so and have signed a military cooperation agreement just a few weeks ago. Historically they have never been this pro-US or pro-Israel.
https://cyprus-mail.com/2024/09/15/our-view-president-should-be-congratulated-for-improving-us-ties/
When growing up in Cyprus in the late 1960s, we used to drive through the Akrotiri airbase on the way to Nicosia from Paphos, and sometimes the missile launchers visible from the road near the village of Episkopi were fully armed and pointing upwards. My father used to say “The brits are keeping an eye over Nasser just in case.”
Tbe one guy who didn’t sell out to guess who. Not only does he say it’s certainly terrorism but that it heralds a truly horrific future that is definitely on its way. That’s obvious.to anyone with an intellect superior to a pinecone but in this rotten place it is the exception rather than the rule to state the obvious.
FORMER CIA DIRECTOR LEON PANETTA SAYS PAGER ATTACK IS TERRORISM.
https://tinyurl.com/mryh422z
F&L,
You’re quite the fair weather chameleon, aren’t you?
CIA bad, no wait CIA good, now bad again, now good because some of them agree with you.
Trump bad. Dick Cheney, Big Neocon, bad, Dick Cheney endorses Harris, but Harris good and Trump still bad.
Eric: “CIA bad, no wait CIA good, now bad again, now good because some of them agree with you.”
I would like to make two observations about that sentence:
1) F&L is not saying that the “CIA now good” merely because Leon Panetta told the truth to a disbelieving reporter. He is saying that Leon Panetta told the truth.
It happens, I suppose.
2) Where you would write “some of them agree with you” I would write “some of them have just told the truth”.
Which can happen, I suppose.
Maybe Ol’ Leon owns shares in pager companies. Or perhaps he has a fiduciary interest in walkie-talkie manufacturing.
I don’t know, and I am not the least bit interested in reaching out to ask him.
But it may well be that The Pan-Man is taking a wider-view of this, and doesn’t really like the idea of wide-eyed nutters weaseling their way into supply chains to plant Things That Go Boom into stuff that you or I or other people might previously have bought.
China looks a much more attractive source of electronic goods today. Much more so than last week.
Taiwan much less so. Hungary? Nope. Indeed, anywhere in the West, to be honest.
The Eyebrows That Talk might be alarmed at that development, especially when he has no tribal affiliation with the perpetrators of this attack.
Eric at the time I wrote that it was overcast and drizzling rain here.
Alastair Crooke’s take.
“The notion that Hizbullah’s communications are crippled is wishful thinking that fails to distinguish between what may be called civil-society Hizbullah, and its military arm.
Hizbullah is a civil movement, as well as a military power. It is the Authority over a significant slice of Beirut and a country – a responsibility that requires the Movement to provide civil order and security. The pagers and radios were used primarily by its civil security forces (effectively a civil police managing security and order in Hizbullah-controlled parts of Lebanon), as well as used by its logistics and support branches. Since these personnel are not combat forces, they were not seen to require truly secure communications.
Even before the 2006 war, Hizbullah ended all cellphone and landline communications in favour of their own dedicated optic cable system and hand-courier messaging for the military cadres. In short, Hizbullah’s communications at the civil level took a major hit, but this will not unduly impact upon its military forces. For years, the Movement has operated on the basis that units could continue with combat, even in the event of a complete rupture of optic communications, or the loss of a HQ.”
https://strategic-culture.su/news/2024/09/23/will-israel-recklessly-seize-day-have-doors-war-without-limits-been-opened/
TonyL,
That’s a good take. And it makes sense.
I find it quite astonishing that you think that Alastair Crooke “makes sense” in his observation that most of those killed and injured in this Israeli pager attack were “not combat forces”. Indeed, Crooke claims that those pagers were “primarily” used by “its civil security forces”
There is a very long thread where I argued exactly the same point to you, and you were having none of it.
Yeah, Right,
Yes, that still makes them Hezbollah security forces. More than 60 countries have designated Hezbollah to be a terrorist organization, even though it is an integral part of the Lebanese government.
Most of the calls for calling this a war crime and terrorism are based on the bomb/pagers being booby traps that could indiscriminately kill or injure civilians. I still maintain these pager attacks were far more targeted than any of the bombs dropped on Gazans and Lebanese civilians.
TTG: “Yes, that still makes them Hezbollah security forces.”
A civil police force is not a legitimate military target, TTG.
New York cops are not legitimate military targets EVEN IF the USA is at war with another country.
London Bobbies are not legitimate military targets no matter who the UK military is exchanging fire with.
A Moscow police officer is no more a legitimate military target than is a Kiev member of the constabulary.
There are “combatants”, and there are “protected persons”, and the former are legitimate military targets and the latter are not.
Police are police are police are police, and they are all in the category labelled “protected persons”.
That’s precisely why the “Gendarmerie” and the “Carabinieri” are distinctly different from “Police” in their characterization under international law.
TTG: “More than 60 countries have designated Hezbollah to be a terrorist organization, even though it is an integral part of the Lebanese government.”
So a Beirut dog-catcher or a Tyre garbage-collector are legitimate military targets BECAUSE they pull their pay-cheque from Hezbollah?
What about a Bint Jbeil midwife? Or a Beit Lif ambulance driver?
All legitimate military targets in your book if the services they provide are provided under the auspices of Hezbollah?
Yeah, Right,
Since when are dog catchers, garbage collectors, midwives or ambulance drivers members of the Hezbollah paramilitary? Being paid or getting social services from Hezbollah does not make one a member of Hezbollah. Perhaps those doctors in Beirut who were told to discard their pagers were Hezbollah members. They would still be protected persons. Was it Israel who told these doctors to discard their pagers because of their protected status? They didn’t warn the Iranian Ambassador to Lebanon. He should be an internationally protected person. Nor did they warn the well over a hundred IRGC members in the Deir Ezzor region of Syria who were wounded in the pager attack.
As I said before, this pager attack was far more protective of civilians and civilian infrastructure than any of Israel’s aerial bombardments or missile attacks. Children were killed and wounded in the pager attack. That is probably a war crime as is the wounding of the Iranian Ambassador, but I doubt it was an intentional war crime. The argument that this was a use of booby traps is a far stronger argument that this was a war crime than your argument that the Hezbollah and IRGC members killed and wounded are protected persons.
TTG,
I think you are losing this argument. “Civil security forces” are not combatants.
Suppose we are at war with Mexico, and they planted a bomb that goes off at Los Angeles Police department. I’m sure we’d say “Yup, that’s terrorism”. OTOH, if a bomb goes off at Camp Pendleton, we’d chalk it up as an attack on our Marine base.
TTG,
According to this page:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_designated_terrorist_groups
This is the list of countries that have designated Hezbollah as a terrorist organization:
Argentina
Australia
Bahrain
Canada
Colombia
Germany
Honduras
Israel
Malaysia
Paraguay
Saudi Arabia
United Arab Emirates
United Kingdom
United States
I count 14 countries.
James,
The list of 60 countries and organizations was current in 2022.The EU declared Hezbollah a terrorist organization. That’s quite a few countries not on that Wikipedia list. Both the GCC and Arab League declared Hezbollah a terrorist organization in 2016. But in June 2024 the Arab League withdrew the declaration. Surely that’s a reaction to Israel’s destruction of Gaza and the Gazan people. That removes 22 countries from the list.
TTG: “Since when are dog catchers, garbage collectors, midwives or ambulance drivers members of the Hezbollah paramilitary?”
That is an argument predicated upon the concept that Hezbollah is ONLY a paramilitary organization.
If you would actually read the Alistair Crooke article that you were praising you would see that this is an incorrect assumption.
TTG: “Being paid or getting social services from Hezbollah does not make one a member of Hezbollah. ”
No, but getting paid BY Hezbollah to PROVIDE that service makes you an employee of Hezbollah.
So while you are a Hezbollah employee, you are not a legitimate military target, precisely because you are a dog-catcher, a traffic cop, a garbage collector.
Read Crooke’s article. He knows what he is talking about.
Yeah, Right,
I’m not sure Crooke knows what he’s talking about concerning who was using the pagers. He based his statement on his assumption that Hezbollah “ended all cellphone and landline communications in favour of their own dedicated optic cable system and hand-courier messaging for the military cadres.” And that this happened even before the 2006 war. However, Nasrallah directed his fighters to ditch their cell phones only last February in a televised address, about the same time the pagers were coming in. The pagers were also in use by IRGC fighters in Deir Ezzor province and by the Iranian Ambassador to Lebanon. I doubt any of those people are dog catchers and garbage collectors.
Crooke definitely knows what he is talking about.
As for your link to Nasrallah’s February warning, here is the transcript from a site that is NOT friendly towards Hezbollah: “You have a tapping device in your pocket, and in the pockets of your son, daughter, and wife. You have it with you at home, at work, and in the car. Through this cell phone, they can hear what you say. They download everything you have on your cell phone – the conversations, the messages, and the images, and they can pinpoint your location. They can tell in which room you are, and if you are in your car, they can tell if you are in the front or the back, left or right. Do the Israelis need anything else? We are providing all this for them. Therefore, we have asked – and I am asking now again – that our brothers in the villages at the border, at the front, and maybe even throughout southern Lebanon, at this point in time… Especially the fighters and their families should refrain from using cell phones. Disable it, bury it, lock it in a metal box. Keep it there for a week, two weeks, a month… God knows how long this will last. Do this in order to protect the people’s security, lives, and honor. These are the collaborators. You’re asking where the collaborators are? The cell phones you, your wife, and your children hold are the collaborators. The cell phone is a lethal collaborator”
It is clear from the transcript that he is referring to PERSONAL mobile phones PERSONAL Web cams, PERSONAL Internet accounts.
He isn’t claiming that these are Hezbollah-supplied services, merely that the use of such PERSONAL devices invariably compromises security.
I mean, get real: Israel has been running that bogus pager-manufacturing front company for FIFTEEN YEARS which – gosh, who woulda’ thunk it – means that Israel was aware of Hezbollah’s ditching of mobile comms in the post-2006 war review.
TTG:” However, Nasrallah directed his fighters to ditch their cell phones only last February in a televised address, ”
Here is the money-shot from that speech
Nasrallah: “Therefore, we have asked – and I am asking now again – that our brothers in the villages at the border, at the front, and maybe even throughout southern Lebanon, at this point in time… Especially the fighters and their families should refrain from using cell phones”
Note the “again”, everyone.
TTG is factually incorrect to claim that Nasrahhah only decided in February 2024 that mobile phones are dangerous.
Untrue: Nasrallah explicitly says that this is not the first time that he has warned about the dangers of mobile phones.
He ALSO explicitly stated that he isn’t referring to mobile phones used as a battlefield comms system, unless we want to claim that a Hezbollah militant takes his wife and children with him when he goes out to do battle with the IDF.
Maybe that is your claim,I don’t know. After all,nothing appears to be too ludicrous in an attempt to defend the indefensible.
Yeah, Right,
Establishing and using a secure landline does not mean Hezbollah fighter stopped using their cell phones. Measures were taken after numerous attacks on Hezbollah leaders since last November. The pager/bombs were acquired and distributed to Hezbollah fighters to replace cell phones
https://www.reuters.com/world/middle-east/pagers-drones-how-hezbollah-aims-counter-israels-high-tech-surveillance-2024-07-09/
TTG: “I’m not sure Crooke knows what he’s talking about”
I’m quite certain he does, and I’m not alone in that.
TTG: “He based his statement on his assumption that Hezbollah “ended all cellphone and landline communications in favour of their own dedicated optic cable system and hand-courier messaging for the military cadres.””
The Age in Australia was reporting on this as far back as 2008
https://www.theage.com.au/world/hezbollah-phone-system-sparks-unrest-20080511-ge72a6.html
“A private telephone network built by the Shi’ite Hezbollah organisation is at the centre of a political storm that has brought Lebanon perilously close to a new civil war.”
“The landline network, which Telecommunications Minister Marwan Hamadeh said was installed with the help of Hezbollah’s patron Iran, was crucial to Hezbollah thwarting a massive Israeli assault in a ferocious war two years ago”
So Hezbollah had definitely ditched all commercial landlines and all cell phone use prior to the 2006 war, and that fact was being widely reported as long ago as 2008.
Here’s another one:
https://www.csmonitor.com/World/Middle-East/2008/0509/p05s01-wome.html
“It has been known for some time that Hezbollah has installed a private non-commercial fiber-optic land-line telephone network to provide secure communications between its leaders and the cadres.”
Just face facts, TTG: Israel booby-trapped comms devices that Hezbollah DOES NOT USE for its military wing. It is used by its civilian wing.
And…. Israel launched a terrorist bombing campaign against those non-military people.
Deliberately.
Knowingly.
That’s “terrorism”, plain and simple.
Indeed, it’s so blatantly an act of terrorism that even good ol’ deep-state Leon Panetta had no trouble recognizing it for what it was.
TonyL,
“Hizbullah is a civil movement, as well as a military power.”
Colonel Lang pointed that out here years ago. Israel was interested in damaging Hizbullah as a movement. Their actions have the unintended consequence that they have garnered global support while Israel loses both. Israel was stopped by Hizbullah at the Litani in 2006. Israel’s infantry hasn’t gotten any better since then.
Fl.i once smoked a pinecone and it set me tree.
Chicago with Terry kath
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Lba2g_u1Ckg
mcohen you’re old enough to remember Chicago? Boy this takes me back. Driving with Steve Schollnick down Monroe avenue going to Smitty’s Soul Food restaurant at one am riding in my little sisters jacked up and bored out 425 cu in Mustang with drag racing slicks and a turbocharger sticking up through the hood. Magneto, white ball Hurst 4 on the floor shifter. Did anyone try to drag race us? Yes, the joke was on them though. I’ve never felt such power. The high point was Smitty’s deep fried chicken with impossibly hot sauce. As a chaser they served cups of chilled macaroni salad and buckets full of ice-water. I actually had a close friend who could eat an entire chicken with plenty of sauce and never take a sip of water. Only items on order: the chicken and macaroni salad.
Jimi Hendrix reportedly said Terry Kath was a better guitar player than he was.
The Mustang was green
@mcohen
Some strange similarity with Kath.
https://x.com/artyshowboy/status/1835694106757976438
This is one of the most profound exegeses of the spiritual depravity of western religious thought I have ever encountered. It’s not perfect but it’s flabbergastingly brilliant and on point. The man is an American, born and bred, and a Muslim. He occasionally uses the Islamic term for Satan – Sheitan.
The West is Stuck in Pandora’s Box.
https://tinyurl.com/mses2y2e
Walrus, the first 4 minutes of Craig Murray’s response here tells everything anyone needs to know about free speech in the Cannibal empire run by the ruling class of Britain for centuries on end. How can you be surprised at the new regulations in Australia?
1) They never had a first amendment. Ever.
2) Their libel and slander laws are severely punitive and costly to defend against. By design — you cannot even think of possibly besmirching the “good name” of an earl, duke, lord or baron. Children were hung till dead for stealing a crust of bread in this nation not many years ago. Charles Dickens.
Ambassador Craig Murray; The UK, Free Speech and Genocide | Judge Napolitano
https://tinyurl.com/529uhn7w
walrus, Jonathan Turley has written about the law you cite:
“Australia Moves Toward Draconian Anti-Free Speech Law”
https://jonathanturley.org/2024/09/14/australia-moves-toward-draconian-anti-free-speech-law/
“The new bill, the Australian Communications and Media Authority (ACMA),
will radically expand the powers of the government
to crack down on social platforms and citizens
accused of ill-defined misinformation and disinformation.”
What about poetry,easy there an exemption?
I went to see the Rav
The high
In places I myself cannot imagine
My sun he greeted me
The star I replied
The one who shines brightest
Whose light comes across time
I ask for illumination
Why is it
That nothing good comes from squeezing the tip
That also applies to the lower lip
And what is not batting an eye
Especially by those who arfully lie
Should we just pretend
When coming around the bend
That what we see
Is all that will ever be
Well gentleman of the committee
I am playing my last card this week,and if it comes to nothing,then I am throwing in the hankie.finished and klaar
mcohen, the dealer is dealing seconds and from the bottom. He mastered the Charlier pass as a boy during a misspent youth while watching 25 cent movies, while his friends were sharpening their switchblades in the alley. So you can’t win. When you cut the cards he puts them back in their original order faster than the human eye can see. Not only that the pretty girl across the table will be dealt all the winning hands.
All the hostages must be released.That is the only card on the table.
You are not keeping mcohen. UK PM Keir Starmer said the other day that “the sausages must be released.”
Does the term “delusions of grandeur” mean anything to you? You appear to be greatly in the grip of such a mental malady. You may even achieve “omnipotence of thought” as have many of your confreres. According to professionals its.the most profoundly psychotic state achievable. But I’m not a shrink by trade and can’t diagnose.you from a distance. Either way you’re one wacko son of a gun.
Leith: “Scott Ridder (sic) is a convicted pedophile.” It’s “Ritter’ not “Ridder” and in any case, your comment is inane and possibly malicious. the Colonels primary teaching is to separate the two issues of reliability and accuracy when assessing any information and you have deliberately tried to throw people off the scent with your opening observation.
For the record, it matters not whether he has a conviction for anything unless it is related to truthfulness, what matters is whether or not his opinion is grounded in fact and personal experience of the subject matter – both of which Ritter has in far larger quantities than you.
Sophocles knew this about 400 BC when he wrote in the Theban Plays: ” Just because a fool says the sun is shining doesn’t make it dark outside”.
Since we are talking about nuclear war and annihilation, I would have thought you might approach the subject more seriously considering that if you and your fellow idiots are wrong about Russian intentions, there will be no one left alive to hold you to account.
I, for one, don’t think Putin is bluffing and i am not willing to risk the survival of a billion people on a wild assed guess. Ukraine is all our own work and the future of our society is in the hands of a senile idiot.
Even if I survive a nuclear exchange, my wife and I wil perish quickly once our medications run out.
It does not even take a nuclear exchange for this to happen, during the Covid orchestrated lunacy some of my own medications went missing for a few weeks.
Any trouble, say in the straight of Hormuz among many places, can bring this back.
Walrus it’s even worse than that. A huge number of delusional religious fanatics in the US are praying feverishly for a nuclear holocaust originating in the middle east so they can trigger the 2nd coming of Christ and be “RAPTURED” up to heaven to sit on the right hand side of Pager-exploding-device Yahweh and his son Transition-your-9year old-child-now-Jesus.
Sign on Sec Def Lloyd Austin’s office door:
If you are not a faggot, transexual or transitioned at public expense
convicted felon, please know that you are not wanted in this man’s army. So do not apply or enlist.
Joe Biden: I approved this message! And I love to sniff the hair of little kiddies!
Kamala Harris: And I will, if elected, continue the senile Biden crime family boss’s policies! And if you don’t vote for me guess what’s on offer — a notorious swindler and pussy grabber who is a convicted sex crime offender but who is additionally a billionaire so it’s ok for him to violate all our laws and required all the strength I could muster for me not to go down on my knees before him and ..
—————————
Please excuse my giddy foolishness, Walrus. We are living and many are dying, through an apocalyptic era. If Vladimir Putin nuked NYC and Washington DC especially, he’d be doing the human race a favor. But he won’t because these criminally insane idiots here control their own huge nuclear arsenals. Anyway Putin’s elites educate and house their families in London and other posh western cities including within the continental 48 states. They’ve probably paid significant bonuses to whoever is in the nuclear-launch command chain of the Russian Federation and covertly maintenan them on attractive salaries with the stipulation that they NOT launch under any circumstances. Or because Putin and his command are such corrupt thieves, people here believe that to be true even though it might not be.
F&l
“confreres” that is gold.I could work with that.I fits my poem which I will name
Confreres hombres
Delgado
Me and Ricardo
We were sailing from Cuba
To Key Largo
When we me met a senorita
Her name was Katrina
With long black hair
Eyes shining with lightning
She danced around and around
Come to New Orleans my friends
I will take you there
To see the Mardi Gras
Delgado
Me and Ricardo
From Cuba
With Katrina too
We sailed first to Bermuda
Then to New Orleans
“In the absence of truth,imagination will suffice”
Unit 812
Walrus –
I agree with you that Putin would like to nuke Kyiv and the West. If that happens I assume you’ll be fine down in the southern hemisphere, except of course for the meds. But answer me this: Why would Xi Jinping let Putin use nukes? China has a good trade thing going with the US and Europe, and even Chinese trade with Australia has started flourishing again after Beijing lifted its tariffs on Aussie imports. Putin depends heavily on the Chinese buying his oil and gas. Chinese cutouts are one of the major ways Moscow is getting electronics for missile guidance. Putin and Xi officially declared their relations “Not allies, but better than allies”. I don’t believe Putin will use nuke weapons because it would lose him that most important friend. And I don’t believe Putin is suicidal. The main danger to the West from Putin will not be nuclear-tipped ICBMs, it will be radiation from Ukrainian nuclear power plants that Moscow will target to cut off electricity for the winter – and he’ll have an already written propaganda meme that it was Ukraine that did it to itself.
As for the pedophile, my apologies for the dyslexic typo. But let us consider his so-called ‘reliability and accuracy’. He has routinely written articles for RT, Sputnik or spoken on Russian state media. And he often parrots Kremlin talking points on the war in Ukraine. For the last two and a half years Ritter has continuously predicted the “imminent collapse of Ukraine” and the “victory of Russia”. Ritter falsely accused Ukraine of the mass killings of Ukrainian citizens in Bucha. Ritter claimed that Poland “was trying to occupy the western regions of Ukraine”; and that Poland deliberately transfers defective planes to Ukraine’s Air Force and turns Ukrainian soldiers into easy targets.
And 25 years ago or so his former bosses at UNSCOM said that Ritter made factual errors, harmed UNSCOM’s mission in Iraq, and knew nothing of the considerations that go into decision making on the commission.
Ritter has no truthfulness at all. Believe him at your peril.
leith –
I wanted to argue with you but when I read your words ‘… for the last two and a half years Ritter has continuously predicted the “imminent collapse of Ukraine” and the “victory of Russia”’ I had to admit you are 100% right.
I was going to argue “Ritter is arguing in good faith” but then I reread your words and you never said he wasn’t. You just said he has been wrong – and he has most certainly been wrong about Russia’s imminent victory which never comes.
At this point I only trust TTG’s judgement on when the war in Ukraine will end. He and the Colonel have had the best track record on predictions in this matter and unfortunately the Colonel is not with us anymore.
James –
Well shucks, it’s always good for any of us to hear we were right!
But if you want, we can still have a discussion on the ‘good faith’ that you seem to attribute to Ritter. Or did I miread your post?
oops! “misread”
Walrus –
Just in from former RF Presidential.advisor and political scientist Sergei Markov. Translation below link.
—————————-
https://t.me/logikamarkova/14110
For understanding. Although it is very hard to believe, it is reality: Zelensky and his team would be happy with a nuclear strike on Ukraine.
Their logic is as follows: one or even several strikes of TNW on the Ukrainian Armed Forces will not be able to fundamentally change the military situation. But they will cause an explosion of indignation in the world and lead to real international isolation of Russia. Both China and the entire Global South will join the sanctions. As a result, the Russian economy will collapse and Russia will capitulate.
Therefore, Zelensky calls for provoking Russia as much as possible to use TNW. Convincing Western leaders that this is an effective way to defeat Russia. And the change in Russia’s nuclear doctrine, from Zelensky’s point of view, does not frighten, but pleases and means that Russia is already sticking its paw into the nuclear trap. And it needs to be pushed.
———————————–
Sergei Markov is an inveterate Putin propagandist but he is also a brilliant man and an insanely funny comedian when in the mood. He’s also presumably wired in to the thinking of important people over there. I haven’t had the time to check his opening assertion for accuracy above regarding the green drug addict’s desire for TNW strikes on his own country and people.
Actually they’re not his people. Zelensky is of the Jewish ethnicity and was inserted by the US and UK probably with the specific purpose in mind to find a pawn willing to send millions of Ukrainian men to a bloody death for the benefit of Blackrock and Chase Bank. Again this reaffirms my thesis that Blinken, Nuland, Zelensky and others in high positions who had Ukrainian Jewish roots are acting out subconscious fantasies
of revenge on the Ukrainians due to their well known antisemitic depredations including Babi Yar of WWII.
Whatever the case may be Zelensky’s comments as cited by Markov are the ravings of a homicidal, no – genocidal, madman, even crazier, if truth be known than those of Nero or Adolph Hitler at his worst. Both of those maniacal megalomaniacs brought utter and complete destruction to their nations, as did the religious madmen of the Jewish revolts of 70 AD and the later one in the early 1st century AD.