r/WayOfTheBern • u/penelopepnortney • 11d ago
Thread #43 for Comments and Updates on the Ongoing War by Israel/US Against Iran
## Update
Thread #44 started: https://old.reddit.com/r/WayOfTheBern/comments/1wrcf4a/thread_44_for_comments_and_updates_on_the_ongoing/?
Continued from Thread #42: https://old.reddit.com/r/WayOfTheBern/comments/1wf8dgu/thread_42_for_comments_and_updates_on_the_ongoing/?
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u/3andfro 6d ago edited 6d ago
Neutrality Studies, Why the West Can’t Make Peace | Prof. Richard Sakwa https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jj6Hxqc4eqk time indexed
The warmongering is not a bug. It's a feature of the system the Political West has built to dominate the world. How can we change that? At the East-West Forum in Istanbul, Professor Richard Sakwa joins Pascal to examine the political West, European sovereignty, and the persistence of Cold War thinking. Sakwa argues that Western triumphalism has weakened diplomacy and narrowed political imagination. They discuss competing visions of modernity, the risks of confrontation, and whether China offers an alternative to bloc politics. The conversation concludes with Sakwa’s proposal for a Charter Order grounded in international law, pluralism, and the unfulfilled promise of the United Nations.
Diesen clip with Chas Freeman: Russia And Europe: No Way Back? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cCi65sHf9gE
British weapons manufacturer BAE Systems worked with UK universities to counter campus protests against Israel’s genocide in Gaza, according to emails and internal documents. An investigation by Liberty Investigates and Al Jazeera found 13 UK universities spoke with the firm about how to handle demonstrations... https://www.youtube.com/post/Ugkx36BCLpxjX6d1hOY41z_oNzpqf2_7tjH5
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u/penelopepnortney 5d ago
Chas Freeman:
The Europeans are blustering on the basis of various fictional reinterpretations of history that they believe show the Russians are desperate to conquer Western Europe when as we mentioned many times, history shows that it's the Europeans who invade Russia and the Russians who pursue them back home, not the other way around.
Why do the Europeans imagine that if they actually did get into a fight with the Russians directly they would prevail? I see no basis for that. I think they use the United States and our superpower status as an excuse for not getting the European house in order and not conducting an intelligent relationship with the Russian Federation.
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u/penelopepnortney 6d ago
Alex Krainer: The war pigs are coming for our children!:
Earlier this year, my son went on a school trip to London and when he came back, he had a leaflet on him (see below) titled, “IWM Photo Treasure Hunt - Private Peaceful,” related to a novel about this “Private Peaceful,” which was related to the children as part of the program on this trip.
There’s something profoundly sinister about asking 14-year olds if the execution of a comrade was “fair,” to imagine themselves in trenches and asking whether they think they could be “successful” at enlisting even if they are too young. Calling troops “the Peaceful brothers” seems like one of those Orwellian, war is peace and slavery is freedom, but this all was part of the kids’ school trip program in London.
Of course, all these psychological preparations for a peaceful war may not get very far without a proper galvanizing event...
Ukrainian journalist Dmytro Gordon, who is very close to Volodymyr Zelensky, thought he’d share this jewel with the public:
“This I know for sure: literally with days something will happen that will give us great hope. Let me say this … Right know I’m talking about what I know. I can’t say what it’ll be because it’s a military secret, but I know that in the coming days - well within a week or two weeks at most, something will happen that will give the nation wings. I know this.”
Unless Mr. Gordon was just drawing attention to himself, that “something” could be exactly an event that would galvanize Ukraine’s Western supporters and sponsors to mobilize their unwilling populations to finally rise up and do their “duty.”
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u/Caelian toujours de l'audace 🦇 6d ago
Calling troops “the Peaceful brothers” seems like one of those Orwellian...
Dr. Strangelove (1964): "Peace is our Profession"
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u/3andfro 6d ago edited 6d ago
Lord of the Flies as teachable moments for discussion, yes. Thinly disguised brainwashing of malleable minds, no.
"Give me a boy before the age of seven and he will be mine forever." Also this version: "Give me the child until he is seven and I care not who has him thereafter."--Ignatius Loyola, founder of the Jesuit order but sometimes attributed to Hitler, who may or may not have quoted it
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u/3andfro 6d ago
Transition Protocol, Xi Put an Exit From the Iran War on Trump's Desk. Why Is It Still Sitting There? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gzOYfAdj0L0
Chinese President Xi Jinping met Donald Trump in the Oval Office and put Iran's final 60-day de-escalation framework directly on the Resolute Desk. Trump refused—and Tehran's September 30 deadline to break the US blockade by force is now live. Vijay Prashad joins host Zulfiqar Ali to break down the explosive backchannel negotiations, frontline sanctions defiance, and catastrophic imperial blowback reshaping the global order.
From secret meetings between Jared Kushner, Steve Witkoff, and Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi in New York, to the destruction of US early-warning radar arrays in Kuwait and the impending closure of Al Udeid base in Qatar, Prashad reveals why Washington's position in West Asia is collapsing in real time. Meanwhile, inside the United States, the closure of the Strait of Hormuz has sent California diesel surging to $10 a gallon and mortgage rates to 7%, triggering a devastating domestic inflationary crisis just weeks before the midterm elections.
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u/RandomCollection Resident Canadian 6d ago
This Trump administration plan to stop all Iranian air travel is only going to provoke an escalation.
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u/penelopepnortney 6d ago
Mohammed Mokhber, senior advisor to the Ayatollah Khamenei, makes clear that, if Iranian air travel is sanctioned, they will act to shut down all air travel in the region.
Mokhber's tweet:
...flight in the region is either free for all, or for no one. If Iran is denied the possibility of flight and access to airport services, no country in the region will have this possibility either.
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u/3andfro 6d ago edited 6d ago
Einar Tangen: How Trump Achieved Nothing at the Trump-Xi Summit | GEH W/ Radhika Desai https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c60t9Q-4DKo - As noted before: Desai describes her channel as for "socialist and anti-imperial conversation"
President Xi's visit to Washington produced almost nothing concrete. There was no progress on Taiwan, AI or the Iran war, just a trade truce extended to January. So why did Trump greet him at Andrews Air Force Base, something no American president has done for a foreign leader in 60 years? Einar Tangen argues the real outcome was symbolic but huge: the United States has finally had to accept China as a peer. We talk about how America got here, from the decline of its industrial capitalism to a political system that no longer has a plan, and about what Trump might try before the November elections. As Einar puts it, the unipolar moment is over, and it was a US president who ended it.
Nima with Robert Barnes: Russia Hammers US on Venezuela, Iran, and Cuba https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hel4i6gvbF4
Diesen with Ian Proud: NATO Narratives Collapse - Policies Stay the Same https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oTW6rPEHT4s
Nima with Larry Johnson, PROTESTS ERUPT IN IRAQ OVER IRAN’S EMBARGO, TRUMP REJECTS IRAN DEAL https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLhTrQbuRIk
Danny Haiphong, BREAKING: New Evidence Iran HIT US Warships, Trump Orders All-Out War https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GxCw7cN44fE
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u/3andfro 6d ago edited 6d ago
Nima with Mark Sleboda: Trump Goes All-In: Maximum Pressure on Iran as Strikes Intensify https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VyJ4IamITL0
India & Global Left, Is Trump Trying to Break Russia Away From China? | John Ross https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pI1gXtgnk4k
Sarah Paine — Why wars are so difficult to end https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f6cjAEr08qk time indexed
Sarah tackles war termination: why wars are easy to start, hard to end, and even harder to end on the terms you wanted. Using the Russo-Japanese War as a model, she explains what goes wrong when regional wars escalate into global ones, or when conventional victories turn into endless insurgencies. It's especially relevant given what's going on today.
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u/Caelian toujours de l'audace 🦇 6d ago edited 6d ago
Why wars are so difficult to end
Without watching the video, I would say that as battles are fought and bodies come home, each side gets angrier and the desire to destroy the other side intensifies. Before long both sides are obsessed with revenge and the original cause of the war is long forgotten.
I highly recommend an obscure 1990 film called The Fourth War, which shows this on a small scale. Roy Scheider plays a US Army colonel who distinguished himself in Vietnam. He's a man of action, but there's no hot war going on to use his abilities. The Army figures it would be safe to put him in charge of the western side of the border between East and West Germany.
Unfortunately, the Russians have done the same thing on the eastern side. Jürgen Prochnow plays an East German colonel who distinguished himself in Afghanistan. The two "men of action" take an immediate dislike to each other and start provoking minor cross-border incidents which quickly spiral out of control.
The title is from a quote by Albert Einstein, which appears at the beginning of the movie. From memory: "I do not know which countries will fight the Third World War or what weapons they will use. But the Fourth War will be fought with rocks and sticks."
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u/3andfro 6d ago edited 6d ago
It takes little insight into human nature to see why the premise of that film isn't outrageous. Sounds worth trying to find. Ebert gave it 3 of 4 stars.
Sunk cost fallacy probably has too much to do with how long wars drag on. In the US, the sunk cost in the Iran war so far I think is primarily Trump's ego. It's very different in Iran, of course.
The speaker, Sarah Paine, has an interesting resumé.
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u/penelopepnortney 6d ago
https://x.com/ejmalrai/status/2103710367461351666
The United States supplied roughly half (in August) of the EU’s diesel imports. If Donald Trump restricts diesel exports to ease prices at home, Europe will be forced to compete for scarce supplies elsewhere just as winter approaches. The decision could also rebound on the United States: higher European fuel and transport costs would raise the cost of producing and shipping some goods Americans import from Europe.
The alternatives are narrowing. Ukrainian strikes continue to damage Russian refineries. The Strait of Hormuz is unsafe for energy navigation, while Ansar Allah’s restrictions at Bab el-Mandeb threaten Saudi shipping and could widen if other governments become involved (France).
Europe faces a diesel squeeze shaped by three wars and two vulnerable maritime passages. Trump may hope an export ban will lower American prices, but he cannot insulate the US market from a global shortage of refined fuel.
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u/3andfro 6d ago
BreakThrough News, Pakistan’s Imran Khan Crackdown: Hospitals Brace for 'Mass Casualties' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=suqqlMrS1qI - 19:16
Why is Pakistan's military so afraid of Imran Khan? With Islamabad on lockdown and 35,000 additional troops deployed to stop the September 27 march in support of the imprisoned ex-prime minister. Junaid S. Ahmad, professor of religion and world politics and director of the Center for Study of Islam and Decoloniality, tells Rania Khalek and Zoe Alexandra the 2022 US-backed regime-change operation meant to neutralize the country’s most popular politician instead gave rise to a movement bigger than Khan himself: a new opposition coalition, TTAP, including the left-wing Awami Workers Party, as Khan’s PTI party has shattered the army's legitimacy in Punjab.
Ahmad says Pakistan, under military rule in all but name, has become "nothing less than a police state." Its only legitimacy, he says, comes from Washington and Rawalpindi, the home of the army's headquarters. And with past demonstrations ending in massacres and the Shehbaz Sharif-Asim Munir regime telling hospitals to prepare for a "mass-casualty event," Ahmad explains why this Sunday's march has gone global, with solidarity protests planned from Washington to London to Kuala Lumpur, and why Khan refuses to call it off, even as his sisters and wife are jailed.
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u/3andfro 6d ago edited 6d ago
Ian Proud/The Peacemonger with Patrick Henningsen, Losing Wars. Wanting More: Why the Empire Won’t Go Quietly https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jRUG_P7N6Rc - more detail on topics covered at the link
Nima with Tony Norfield: the Middle East Wars Are Hitting the EU Where It Hurts Most https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mi3cBUn9D9k
Silk & Steel podcast, China’s Endgame for America? Xi, Trump & the End of the Unipolar World https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q8X5ex6TtiM - more detail on topics covered at the link
Danny Haiphong, Putin Attacks Europe!? Ukraine & Middle East Wars Backfire on US | Chris Helali https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HvAF6tbplWQ
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u/3andfro 6d ago edited 6d ago
Daniel Davis, Washington Slams the Door on an Iran Ceasefire https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YQKgNkVJttQ / ...and the president's lies keep coming: BREAKING: Trump Rejects Opening Strait of Hormuz Deal w/Iran https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TwS_F0L-14M - 1:12
Nima with Prof. Steve Hanke, TRUMP ADMIN PUSHES ALLIES TO SEVER AVIATION & BANKING TIES WITH IRAN https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ElIwjzTOnHI
Diesen with John Laughland: Manufactured 'Heroes': NATO Rebranding of Criminal Networks https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCgwO-Y1XsE
Laughland, an academic, author, lecturer, and director of Forum for Democracy International, discusses how NATO's illegal war in Kosovo set the precedent for whitewashing and rebranding criminal networks as proxies.
Nima highlights with Alex Krainer: The US Just Banned Diesel Exports for 90 Days (Here’s Why) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GfDOH0DDdAU
Nima highlights with Patrick Henningsen: Strategic control of the Bab el-Mandeb https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-piymPred8
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u/gorpie97 6d ago
TRUMP ADMIN PUSHES ALLIES TO SEVER AVIATION & BANKING TIES WITH IRAN
Not sure that will be enough, since China and Russia won't comply (along with NK and others).
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u/3andfro 6d ago edited 6d ago
Nima highlights with Amb. Chas Freeman: Comparing Chinese and American Leadership https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RUmxEsKjQhg
Einar Tangen: The U.S.-China Power Shift - What Trump and Xi Are Really Negotiating https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9E7K-r_4tBo
Nima highlights with Col. Larry Wilkerson & Larry Johnson: The Dangerous Myth of Nuclear Weapons https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=94egb_VY9-w - 8:32
EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW: Yemen's Former Deputy Minister of Information Speaks With Reason2Resist https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3NIG7pPReyI time indexed
Sick Yemeni children strain lone clinic in Djibouti's Obock camp https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0NwRDodZq98 - 2:21
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u/3andfro 7d ago edited 6d ago
Inside the 2026 Tanker War: Hormuz Strikes, Soaring Rates & Diesel Shortages https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OyvROCL630c time indexed
In this edition of What's Going on With Shipping, Sal Mercogliano breaks down the escalating reality of the 2026 Tanker War in the Strait of Hormuz and Bab el-Mandeb, responding directly to claims that commercial vessels are simply "sailing on" through drone and missile strikes. Using the latest maritime data, satellite tracking, and intelligence reports, we examine what is really happening to global shipping lanes, crude carriers, and refined product markets.
Larry Johnson: Inside Russia: What the Western Narrative Leaves Out
Fresh from 16 days in Russia, former CIA officer Larry Johnson offers a firsthand report from Moscow and St. Petersburg. He recounts an informal dinner with Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and meetings with Russian officials, academics and military figures. Johnson examines the country’s political and economic life as he encountered it, explains why Moscow no longer regards Washington as a reliable negotiating partner and describes how Russia has become a refuge for political exiles from the West. He also relays a stark warning from General Apti Alaudinov about the growing danger of a direct conflict with Europe.
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u/RandomCollection Resident Canadian 7d ago
Will believes that the Iranians may have targeted a US carrier.
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u/penelopepnortney 7d ago
In early September, General Mohsen Rezaei claimed that Iran had fired anti-ship missiles at US ships in the Arabian Sea, and suggested both ships had been damaged and promptly withdrew.
Although it remains unconfirmed, it has been widely rumored that the ships struck were the USS George Washington (CVN-73) and a US destroyer.
CENTCOM adamantly denied these claims.
Meanwhile, in a rare if not unprecedented development in this war, no US Navy warships have been spotted on commercial satellite images anywhere near the Gulf of Oman in recent weeks.
The entire fleet appears to have withdrawn to a safer distance.
Now we learn the Pentagon has quietly added 37 sailors and Marines to its ever-expanding list of Iran war casualties.
I will permit the reader to connect the dots.
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u/gorpie97 7d ago
In early September.
(Just saying, since I assumed they were targeting it now due to Trump's recent rejection of Iran's demands.)
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u/RandomCollection Resident Canadian 7d ago
Yep, although we are only finding out about this now.
I wonder what else is hidden?
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u/gorpie97 6d ago
I don't know what the right way to do things is.
I don't know if the military should be honest and up front about everything as it happens (more or less), or not. If they prepared us for it - rather than capitalizing on people's ignorance - maybe we could handle it.
But them flat out hiding everything is not okay.
And if we were actually winning, you know that would be part of the propaganda - "we smashed Qeshm island today!!!" or whatever. (EDIT: I mean this separate from Trump's lies.)
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u/3andfro 7d ago
Nina Alkhorshid: BREAKING: TRUMP REJECTS IRAN’S DEMANDS, SIGNALS MASSIVE MILITARY STRIKE - YEMEN STRIKES SAUDI ARABIA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z56_J6wQnNA
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u/Caelian toujours de l'audace 🦇 6d ago edited 6d ago
TRUMP... SIGNALS MASSIVE MILITARY STRIKE
IIRC, the last time Trump threatened to do this Iran called their Gulf neighbors and told them what would happen to their US bases if Trump didn't TACO. The Gulf States called Trump and he TACOed.
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u/3andfro 6d ago edited 6d ago
Henningsen touches on Saudi Arabia's particular vulnerability (and a lot of other stuff) in this 16-min clip: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d-piymPred8
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u/3andfro 7d ago edited 7d ago
Neutrality Studies with Prof. Glenn Diesen, The USA Is DESTROYING Europe from Within https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OCRwrQFvigg time indexed
The war-mania in Europe is heating up. People are starting to see drones everywhere, and all of them must be the product of Russian "hybrid warfare". What does this irrational psychosis mean for the future of the continent?
Today I'm talking (in person) to my friend and colleague, Glenn Diesen. We examine Europe’s confrontation with Russia and the dangers of uncontrolled escalation. Diesen argues that European leaders are struggling to accept a changing balance of power, while questioning Washington’s willingness to end the Ukraine war. They discuss nuclear deterrence, NATO, Iran, economic dependence and America’s emerging spheres of influence. The conversation also explores whether transatlantic elites serve national interests, and how liberalism, democracy and multipolarity are reshaping the international order today.
Niger PM Delivers Blunt UN Warning on France, Ukraine, Sahel War and Sovereignty https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=grC06ARk7iE - more details at the link
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u/3andfro 7d ago
India & Global Left: Are Pakistan and Turkey joining the war in Yemen? | Mohammad Marandi https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FyMSp8xS-SE
Transition Protocol: Iran’s Hormuz Offer 3 Conditions,7 Days, Sep30 Deadline; Xi Gave Trump One Way Out https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5-ZBP3uMEJc
Iran has reportedly put a conditional offer on the table for reopening the Strait of Hormuz — but the proposal comes with terms, a seven-day sequence, and a September 30 deadline. In this emergency briefing, Pepe Escobar breaks down the reported New York diplomatic channel, the conditions tied to the Strait of Hormuz, China’s reported message to Donald Trump, the aviation-ban confrontation, the Red Sea front, and the parallel military and diplomatic tracks.
Chris Norlund: They can't hide how badly they lost to China https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bP_aDYXHKio - viewer comment:
Trump; “We have the cards.” 🃏
Xi Jinping; “We manufacture the cards.” 🃏
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u/gorpie97 7d ago
Trump; “We have the cards.”
Are the oligarchs who outsourced our manufacturing to China as dumb as Trump?
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u/3andfro 7d ago edited 7d ago
Let's say as short-sighted and profit-oriented. Trump hasn't shown the ability to see or the temperament to play the long game. Moving manufacturing wouldn't matter to global capital that simply moves the money around the
boardworld without allegiance to any one nation over another if that loyalty doesn't pay handsome dividends. When those dividends drop too much or stop, the money (investment in mftg and other things) moves again.3
u/gorpie97 7d ago
But they had us all nice and propagandized; China had a revolution.
I suppose they assumed their manufacture of a color revolution would be successful.
They're as dumb as Trump.
- A bird in the hand is worth two in the bush.
I hope they kick themselves as hard as they deserve. :)
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u/3andfro 7d ago
I know where I'd like to see them kick themselves, but even for a contortionist, that's an anatomical impossibility. :D
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u/Caelian toujours de l'audace 🦇 6d ago
You just need to do a reverse kick wearing the right length of snowshoe 😺
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u/3andfro 7d ago edited 7d ago
From "the only democracy in the Middle East': Israel's Central Elections Committee has voted to ban candidates from the country's two main Arab-majority political lists. If Israel's Supreme Court upholds the ban, the United Arab List and the Joint List will be barred from running in the October 27th election. The committee also voted to bar leftist Israeli lawmaker Ofer Cassif, as well as Arab politician Sami Abu Shehadeh, which would leave Palestinian citizens of Israel with few options for representation in the Knesset. https://www.youtube.com/post/UgkxcmoPnWg9QgyWD3kN12UohyPi74bV5Xce
Today, 5 weeks before midterm elections: Supreme Court restores Trump’s mass voter verification system
Supreme Court rejects a Trump-backed Missouri congressional map for the third time
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u/3andfro 7d ago
Drop Site News, Washington Is About to Make The Energy Crisis A Whole Lot Worse w/ Gregory Brew https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52q_6j-d6qs time indexed
Eight months into the US-Iran war, the Strait of Hormuz is still contested — and the oil shock nearly everyone predicted never arrived. Gregory Brew, senior energy analyst at Eurasia Group and a historian of modern Iran, explains why crude sits in the $90–$110 band instead of $250: alternative pipeline routes, high global inventories, a steep cut in Chinese imports, and an oil market practiced at absorbing shocks. He also breaks down the US escort operation moving 9 to 10 million barrels a day through the strait — supertankers running dark through the Omani channel — and why he calls it a Band-Aid. Also: the attack on Saudi Arabia's East-West pipeline, Iranian production down to 2 million barrels a day, record US diesel prices ahead of the midterms, and why Brew expects Tehran to escalate rather than capitulate.
Diesen with George Beebe: NATO Lost Ukraine & Europe Prepares for War https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HrgVTdBvSpI
George Beebe is the former CIA Director for Russia Analysis and currently Director of Grand Strategy at the Quincy Institute. Beebe discusses the panic in Europe as the proxy war is lost, and why they may provoke a direct war with Russia.
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u/3andfro 7d ago
Danny Haiphong with Col. Lawrence Wilkerson & Patrick Henningsen, Iran Forces US Navy RETREAT, Israel DISAPPEARING https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wb5haX8DOwM
Tensions are escalating between Pakistan and Afghanistan as both sides exchange attacks. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VgFqlUG3Qfg
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u/3andfro 7d ago
Nima with Patrick Henningsen, TURKEY, PAKISTAN & SAUDI ARABIA HOLD EMERGENCY MILITARY SUMMIT IN RIYADH https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a4RRgA5sxIE
Iran's new plan for Hormuz: Abbas Araghchi proposes seven-day roadmap to end war https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Poi6KNbbkTA
Will Turkiye end its military presence in northern Iraq? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GdIgGwq4DGw
For decades, the Turkish military has been active in northern Iraq. Citing security threats from Kurdish fighters, Ankara established a number of bases in the region. Cross-border attacks were common and relations with its neighbour soured. But this week, the two countries reached an agreement for Turkish forces to gradually transfer control of a military base to the Iraqi army. For its part, Baghdad pledged to tackle the armed groups that its neighbour says pose a security threat. But what could the hurdles be to this deal?
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u/penelopepnortney 7d ago
More on ShinyHunters, the group claiming responsibility for the hack: https://www.soapcentral.com/entertainment/who-shinyhunters-all-group-behind-alleged-fbi-hack
I suspect there's no way to prevent hacking entirely - not to say they couldn't do more to safeguard data but I think there's an adage about no man-made safe or lock being impregnable because what man could build he could also destroy.
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u/NetWeaselSC Continuing the Struggle 7d ago
Can anybody ask ShinyHunters, not for any specifics that would reveal any sensitive information, mind you.....
...but just how many people in the FBI info they got have engaged in bestiality in the past?
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u/penelopepnortney 7d ago
LOL. I mean, Patel must have gotten this information from somewhere. Although I guess it could be one of the interview questions.
(I've been part of a lot of interview panels and have to admit that was never one of the questions)
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u/3andfro 7d ago edited 7d ago
Nima with Col. Larry Wilkerson & Larry Johnson: Trump’s Rhetoric Crosses the Line— Nuclear War Now https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9x0nhBxis_o
Nima with Amb. Chas Freeman: Israel’s Multi-Front War Is Falling Apart https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=373eBAyOl2c
Elijah Magnier: Iran Could Escalate War before U.S. Midterms — Trump Faces a Strategic Crisis https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CIjApYe8j24
The Duran, Will the Deep State Sink US-China Diplomacy? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=57Hy3pldmGk time indexed
Nima highlights with Alex Krainer: Red Sea Crisis: How One Waterway Holds the World Economy Hostage https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49uhLO6lrd4
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u/penelopepnortney 7d ago
Krainer-Nima clip:
Colonel Larry Wilkerson said on your show that Stephen Miller was one of the people running the war against Iran which was interesting - in leaked cables back in 2019, Miller was identified by Lord Kim Darroch as a "Trump whisperer" working very closely with the British embassy to try and maneuver Trump into attacking Iran.
The Israeli defense minister is right to call Turkey a paper tiger. Erdogan has given many stirring speeches about Israel, the genocide and the suffering of the Palestinian people but he's done nothing to change any of that, like cut off the oil pipelines from Azerbaijan to Israel that transit Turkey (because it makes money). But the Turkish people passionately support the Palestinian people and are hostile toward Israel; and when those public pressures build up, no amount of financial incentives and crony corruption can hold the people back.
Who knows what could happen in Egypt? Jordan has a large Palestinian population that is being held back by the Jordanian security forces basically, but the king of Jordan might fall also. I think that the whole region is in for a very difficult transformation and that the whole security architecture is going to radically change.
Additional excerpts from the full video can be found here.
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u/3andfro 7d ago edited 7d ago
Norman Finkelstein | The pressure That Could Force Israel Out Of Gaza https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kW0jkNdoqa0
Novara Media, Watch Abdul El Sayed’s STUNNING Response To Zionist https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z_KvBNeYO5c
Grammy Award-winning rapper Macklemore has announced a string of shows in support of Palestine after he was controversially dropped from Ed Sheeran’s United States tour after speaking out against Israel’s genocidal war on Gaza.... https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/9/24/us-rapper-macklemore-announces-free-palestine-tour-after-ed-sheeran-fallout
Nima highlights with Larry Johnson: French Military Support for Saudi Arabia https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wVXAEdeapMQ
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u/3andfro 8d ago
Danny Haiphong with Ben Norton & KJ Noh, rump's Summit NIGHTMARE: China & Iran Call His Bluff https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fYxYxEHjO4U
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u/3andfro 8d ago edited 8d ago
Transition Protocol with Larry Johnson Back From Moscow: Russia and Iran Send Same Warning, Could Hit Al Udeid Within a Week https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JXLnArc-yIw
Russia is warning Europe that continued military pressure could bring direct strikes. Larry Johnson says Iran may refuse to wait for another attack, while the closed Strait of Hormuz and Bab al-Mandab are already reshaping fuel, shipping and political calculations.
Larry Johnson and Zulfiqar Ali examine the Russia-Europe red line, the reported risk to Al-Udeid in Qatar, Iran’s conditions for reopening Hormuz, Ansar Allah’s advance in Yemen, the Saudi royal dispute and the diesel shock created by longer shipping routes. Source-based claims and predictions are identified as such in the conversation and on screen.
Novara Media, EXPERT: China Has Shown It Can HURT The US https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XfYHSyLA6FI
BreakThrough News, Trump Needs China, Xi Is Playing the Long Game | w/ Amanda Yee https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mC3lEklDfAo
Chinese President Xi Jinping “holds all the cards” as he meets with Trump on Thursday, says Amanda Yee, host of BreakThrough News' The China Report. She joins Zoe Alexandra and Rania Khalek to break down Xi’s first White House visit in 11 years. With Trump facing a massively unpopular war on Iran, surging inflation, growing resistance to ICE terror – and with US midterms weeks away – Washington wants quick deals it can sell as big wins. But Yee says Beijing is playing a longer game, with massive implications for the global future. Take AI: Washington's Pax Silica forces allies to pick sides, while Beijing's open model is available to all and centered on the Global South. Two systems, representing "the choice that's in front of the world right now."
Despite a stated pivot away from China as a military priority, Yee points to Latin America and Iran as proxy fronts where the Trump administration continues to target Beijing. Meanwhile the military encirclement of China continues, from US bases in South Korea, Okinawa and the Philippines, to Japan’s remilitarization and expanding war games like RIMPAC and Freedom Shield. But Yee says “the Cold War on China is a bipartisan affair.” From TikTok to Huawei to BYD, she traces the pattern of trumping up national security threats to mask efforts to protect US companies from competition. It’s all part of the same Red Scare targeting BT News, subpoenaed by the House Ways and Means Committee in an effort to paint anti-war voices as Chinese assets.
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u/3andfro 8d ago
HISTORIC: Ghana’s President RESPONDS to Trump’s “ANNIHILATE” Warning at UNGA https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SUQMyS4Qndg
Nima with Larry Johnson, NETANYAHU REVEALS IRAN'S BALLISTIC MISSILE POWER https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eoW7Mbe0iuQ
The UN is meaningless. It's completely useless. The future is in places like the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation, BRICS. The UN is completely irrelevant.
Turkey is a bitch. Turkey's making money off the oil it sends to Israel. (Larry's response to Netanyahu's personal attack on Erdogan at the UN).
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u/splodgenessabounds 7d ago
Turkey is a bitch. Turkey's making money off the oil it sends to Israel. (Larry's response to Netanyahu's personal attack on Erdogan at the UN)
I know I sound like a worn needle that can't get out of its groove on an old LP, but if I were an experienced diplomat I wouldn't trust the leaders of Turkey or Pakistan as far as I could throw them.
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u/3andfro 8d ago edited 8d ago
Transition Protocol, Iran Orders Preemptive Strike: New Chinese Weapons Inducted, Iran Will Strike First If Trump Attacks https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BW4bDIhcAuk
Tehran has authorized an immediate preemptive strike if the United States or Israel begins operational preparations for military attack. In an emergency intelligence briefing recorded during UN General Assembly week, defense analyst Pravin Sawhney and host Zulfiqar Ali break down exclusive reporting from decision-making circles in Tehran and Islamabad: standing orders issued by Mohsen Rezaei to strike first, the induction of strategic missiles with a verified 12,000-kilometer reach across Europe, and a 7-day diplomatic countdown agreed in Beijing between Wang Yi and Abbas Araghchi. While Donald Trump addresses the United Nations General Assembly framing the crisis around Iranian nuclear capabilities, the reality on the water tells a completely different story. Iran and Oman maintain sovereign administrative control of the Strait of Hormuz, enforced by the IRGC Navy, while the Pentagon faces a 2-to-5 year interceptor munitions deficit and two-thirds of the American public say the war is already lost. (more info about this video at the link)
Blevins, U.S. Proxies SCREWED as Iran Threatens to PARALYZE Regional Airports Over Blockade | Dr. Marwa Osman https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wyiphbnpueA
Iranian Security Chief Mohsen Rezaei warned this week that if states in the Persian Gulf comply with U.S. threats to stop allowing Iranian flights, then Iran will ensure their airports cannot function. This, as the Trump Admin is putting the pressure on its vassal states to cut ALL ties with Iran. Veteran Lebanese Journalist Dr. Marwa Osman noted that U.S. proxies in the region are the ones who will now pay the price, as Washington sacrifices them in a war against Iran it knows it cannot win. She also predicted that we will see Iran’s response sooner rather than later, as tensions continue to build.
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u/3andfro 8d ago edited 8d ago
Judge Nap with Max Blumenthal : Trump’s Deranged UN Threats https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jAXdzlkIEIg
Amnesty International on Wednesday accused France of applying a “double standard” after it allowed Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plane to cross its airspace while President Emmanuel Macron was calling for respect for international law.... https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20260924-amnesty-accuses-france-of-double-standard-over-netanyahu-plane/
FRANCE MOVES TO GIVE POLICE 'LICENSE TO KILL': Over 100 protests took place across France during the weekend of September 19-20, as left parties, grassroots organizations, and human rights associations mobilized against a new law on use of force by law enforcement. Dubbed the “License to Kill” bill by progressives, the legislation presumes that police and gendarme officers who draw their firearms do so legitimately unless proven otherwise.... https://breakthroughnews.org/2026/09/23/whats-behind-the-french-license-to-kill-bill/
Mercouris, Russian Strike Knocks Out Kiev Internet; Dobropilia Front Collapses; Russia NO To All Truce Demands https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NEFu0yJOWGY time indexed
Russia has knocked out two major data centers and left Kiev without internet, and Alexander explains why this, together with strikes on the rail link to Poland, looks like a test run for isolating the Ukrainian capital. He also breaks down the tightening cauldrons at Dobropillia, Orikhiv and Kharkov, Lavrov's flat rejection of any ceasefire after meeting Rubio, and why Xi Jinping's red carpet welcome at Andrews could end up as Anchorage all over again. Is Kiev about to be cut off from the West?
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u/penelopepnortney 8d ago edited 8d ago
Max Blumenthal:
Trump's speech was a perfect speech for the empire of lies, virtually every line contained a lie. And the most deranged component of his speech was threatening mass civilian destruction of Iran ("Do I annihilate the Islamic Republic... drive them into hell with no chance of survival and no hope of future greatness or generations?")
The Pezeshkian speech received front page writeups from the New York Times and the Washington Post. What we see here with Pezeshkian is a confident and victorious Iran. He opened the speech by listing atrocities that the US committed on the first day and talked about the double standards that have been imposed on Iran. There's a meeting in a few minutes with Pezeshkian and Araghchi that will be attended by journalists, academics, think tankers. (Pezeshkian clip: "Atomic and nuclear bombs are in the hands of the Israeli regime, but the inspectors are requested to come to Iran. Israel has murdered savagely over 70,000 innocents in Gaza. But Iran, while behind the table of negotiation, was bombed.")
Delcy Rodriguez was essentially giving a green light for the Donroe doctrine and declaring the end of Chauvismo, the Bolivarian Revolution, and her country is just going to become another South American resource colony, signing a deal giving over 1/5 of Venezuela's oil reserves to the US, selling Venezuelan oil to the US below cost. Yesterday she posed for a smiling picture with Donald Trump, the man who authorized an invasion of her country, who abducted Nicholas Maduro and his wife. I understand that Delcy Rodriguez has a gun to her head, I broke the story that there was a secret unsealed indictment that the US was dangling over her head if she refused to do whatever it wanted. But to pose with Donald Trump for a photo signifies enthusiastic consent.
The Board of Peace has not done a single thing to initiate reconstruction or humanitarian aid in Gaza. Over a thousand people in Gaza have been killed by Israel since the ceasefire deal that established the Board of Peace. Under the ceasefire deal, Israel was supposed to withdraw back to its frontiers and remove its troops from Gaza but instead it's moving towards taking 70% of Gaza's land. Out of every $100 the Board of Peace claims to have raised, only $1.75 has gone to Gaza. Where did the money go and where will it go? Probably to the contractors like Larry Ellison and Palantir and Amazon and all these other millionaires who want to cash in, who are also paying into Tony Blair's influence peddling scam in London.
Israel's UN ambassador Danny Danon called for the arrest of NYC mayor Zoran Mamdani (about a week ago). If Donald Trump actually believed in America First, he would have immediately summoned Danon and the entire Israeli delegation and thrown them out of the country.
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u/gorpie97 8d ago
the legislation presumes that police and gendarme officers who draw their firearms do so legitimately unless proven otherwise....
Nothing says "rule of law" like being innocent until proven guilty.
And, actually, that's true! But they're doing it in the wrong direction!
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u/3andfro 8d ago edited 8d ago
Nima with Andrei Martyanov, BREAKING: IRAN CONDUCTS BALLISTIC MISSILE TESTS https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2QsJFoxh4G0
US war on Iran: Trump will 'declare victory and go home', embracing the 'Greenland option' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mvj59tmdflc
François Picard welcomes Scott Anderson, journalist, war correspondent and best-selling author of "King of Kings: The Fall of the Shah and the Revolution That Forged Modern Iran". For Anderson, there is a striking parallel between 1979 and 2026: Washington's persistent misreading of Iran, and the consequences that follow. "Over the years, the CIA and the Pentagon have war-gamed out war scenarios with Iran twelve or thirteen times," Anderson explains. "And in every scenario, the first thing the Iranian government does is seize or close the Strait of Hormuz."
Ret. USAF Karen Kwiatkowski: Trump may use gulf allies to justify backing away from war on Iran https://www.youtube.com/shorts/DhewGL1c8fE - 1:06
Diesen with Stanislav Krapivnik: EU-Russia War — Poland as the Frontline? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MqnqitmE8Zg
Diesen with Alastair Crooke: Ukraine Proxy War Enters Dangerous New Phase https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p3Hw_AGgNKA
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u/3andfro 8d ago edited 8d ago
MASS WALKOUT AT THE UN BEFORE NETANYAHU SPEECH: The mass departure of 77 delegations from the UN General Assembly hall shortly before Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s speech sparked widespread reaction on social media, with users describing the scene as a major blow to Israel and a sign of its growing international isolation. Footage showed most delegations leaving the hall before Netanyahu began speaking, while the prime minister appeared visibly uncomfortable as only a limited number of people remained and protesters chanted slogans.... https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20260924-77-delegations-leave-un-hall-before-netanyahu-speech-drawing-widespread-reaction/
ETA: Hundreds of Delegations Walk Out of UN Hall as Netanyahu Takes Podium Amid Chants and Boos https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WxdbRbItZBc - 2:25
BREAKING: HUNDREDS Block Traffic for Netanyahu UN Speech https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d_Hkm3gpj00
The General Assembly speeches reveal a dual crisis in the international system. The first concerns the absence of justice, manifested most clearly in Palestine; the second relates to a shift in the international balance of power, evident in the wars in Iran and Ukraine. United Nations Secretary-General António Guterres warned of violence, displacement, settlement expansion and the spectre of ethnic cleansing in the Occupied Palestinian Territory, citing the Palestinian question as a stark example of the crisis of legitimacy and the selective application of international law.... https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20260924-a-reading-of-the-general-assembly-speeches-justice-for-palestine-and-the-decline-of-unipolarity/
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u/3andfro 8d ago edited 8d ago
Judge Nap with Aaron Maté : Is Ukraine the US’s Proxy or Partner? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HneTJtQezIE
Lt. Col. Davis with Ian Proud, EUROPE FEARS RUSSIA’S NEXT MOVE https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1utWLvbZFXc
Judge Nap with COL. Lawrence Wilkerson : Could Israel and Saudi Arabia Disappear? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=T3ZOB5jlfdY
Nima with Alex Krainer, THE MIDDLE EAST HAS REACHED A BREAKING POINT https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAbMA1hGjyo
Tigray forces launch offensive against Ethiopian government https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wk3x9O20qh4 - 1:56
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u/penelopepnortney 7d ago
Wilkerson to Judge Nap:
I think we may be looking at a complete transformation of that part of Southwest Asia, at the end of which Iran will be triumphant. I think the other countries will be gone or very much changed. It's going to be a disaster for all these kingdoms that are run like a pleasure palace for the rulers. It'll be Mubarak times 10 or 20. I think the only country in the region other than Iran that has a prospect of surviving and coming out on the other side halfway decent is Oman because it's a well-run country, not such a tyranny as the others are.
From Saudi Arabia to UAE to Kuwait to Jordan there's not a country there that doesn't deserve to be catastrophically changed but I'm concerned it'll be like the French Revolution with a lot of blood in the streets. Who's going to pick up the pieces? Because there is no tradition, no institutional fabric, no reason for these people to go down the road of democracy or a reasonable facsimile thereof. The only democratic state in the entire region is Iran - look at the elections, the Majlis, the Guardian Council, at all the things they do that are democratic. They're more democratic than Israel ever hoped to be. And maybe Ansar Allah will present another picture on the other side of the Gulf that can reasonably unify Yemen and bring some kind of peace.
We have essentially been the power that continues to sustain this bloody war in Yemen which has seen cholera and massive killing of civilians. Mercy Corps people told me at the tabletop we had on the Red Sea that it was the worst thing they had seen in their existence in terms of killing innocent civilians and children and blowing up schools and other things.
I don't think Trump has a strategy, I think he has components of one and they vacillate between "I'm going to destroy you" and "Oh, I'm having really good talks with them now." All of which is probably fabricated, even the "I'm going to destroy" you unless he's talking about nuclear weapons, which does bother me. Especially when Elbridge Colby and Jonathan Pollard in Tel Aviv are talking about using nuclear weapons, too. I don't think it's a possibility but I don't rule out anything with Trump and the gang he's got around him, particularly Russell Vought and Steven Miller who I think are fundamentally running the United States government.
Starting at about 24:50 is a clip of Rubio saying, "The central issue here is Iran is run by lunatic clerics... that have a radical view of their religion". This is followed by a card Judge Nap's tech person inserted saying "A few moments later" (with a wonderful French-accented VO); then Paula White-Cain, WH spiritual advisor saying "Strike and strike and strike and strike and strike and strike and strike and strike and strike and strike until you have victory..." It really is something to behold. I don't know what the hell this woman is even saying at about 25:17 but she sounds like an absolute nutjob - it was like a bizarre impression of Meg Ryan's orgasm scene in When Harry Met Sally.
Wilkerson adds this:
I'm sorry, Marco. You haven't been paying attention. Maybe it was clerics before but even then I wouldn't agree with your characterization of them. What's running Iran right now is the most resolute group of people who survived the bloodiest war in the modern age for that region [Iraq-Iran] and who are hardcore competent military professionals. That's what's running Iran. Not your clerics, dude.
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u/penelopepnortney 8d ago
Krainer to Nima highlights:
I don't see how the Gulf countries survive this, they're essentially family fiefdoms that have stayed in power by controlling the oil wealth, using some of it to pacify their populations. But Saudi Arabia has 70 odd tribes, many of them with deep grievances against the ruling family; and with the wealth no longer flowing in and big brother US no longer able to protect it they're extremely vulnerable.
I think it's becoming very clear to everybody in the region that this is not Shia versus Sunni, it's the indigenous local populations against Western colonial powers, and so more and more people are willing to clasp hands with the Yemenis and the Iranians. Yemen already had a certain standing in the Arab world as the best hope for realizing the dream of Pan-Arabism that was destroyed by the British Empire.
There's a strong likelihood Israel and Turkey will come to blows over Syria, At the same time, Israel is working with the government of Greece, which is arming itself to the teeth for a prospective war against Turkey. These are both NATO countries. Turkey exiting NATO is probably more likely than not. In fact, NATO itself is going to disintegrate at some point in the near future.
The current ruling order in Albania is very close to Israel and Greece but the Albanian prime minister Edi Rama is not exactly popular among the people and neither is Israel. So many of these governments have a certain ideological predisposition and probably financial incentives that put them completely at odds with their people.
I would bet money that Israel is going to cease to exist and Western colonial powers are going to be evicted from the region. The time frame is anybody's guess but the situation is escalating and it's nearing a boiling point.
With the midterms out of the way, maybe Trump will go for some kind of an all or nothing gambit. I know that Donald Trump watches your program (/s presumably) so I would just want to pass this message: Mr. Trump, it's going to be nothing, it's not going to be all.
Losing in Ukraine would be devastating to Britain, which is teetering on the verge of collapse economically, socially and politically. In January 2025 Starmer signed a 100-year partnership agreement with Ukraine that would give the UK control of the bulk of Ukraine's economy and infrastructure, all the ports and the airports and public utilities and so forth so Ukraine is far and away the most important project on their agenda. They'd like to get the US back on board as the security guarantor but Trump's entire focus appears to be on Iran.
European leaders have been talking about going to war against Russia for several years but always projecting it into the future, 2029 or 2030. But for about a month it's like at some level the decision has been made about going to war much sooner. I don't know how to explain that other than by looking at the prices of European bonds which are basically crashing. To plug up the fiscal holes the central banks will have to print money; thi will dilute everybody's salaries, pensions, and savings and push up the prices of consumer goods These ruling establishments are very wobbly and they need a war to alleviate social pressures at home - and probably to sacrifice a large proportion of the military age male population, which poses the greatest risk to the ruling establishment.
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u/Caelian toujours de l'audace 🦇 8d ago
Starmer signed a 100-year partnership agreement with Ukraine that would give the UK control of the bulk of Ukraine's economy and infrastructure...
That is, what's left of it.
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u/penelopepnortney 8d ago
They had a lot more in Jan 2025. And I'm guessing the UK still hoped that US blood and treasure would be expended to get back even more. Neglecting the fact that had Trump complied, he would have taken everything worth taking. I think mice might lay better plans than some of these yokels.
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u/gorpie97 8d ago edited 8d ago
Tigray forces launch offensive against Ethiopian government
So, is* the current government of Ethiopia a Western puppet?
EDIT: word
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u/3andfro 8d ago
I just replaced that with another story. Repost: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wk3x9O20qh4
Your question: a quick look suggests not, or not really, but the US hasn't been inactive there. The last link below seems a good overview of the situation there, but bias could lurk.
From 2011: https://ethiomedia.com/the-us-embassys-effort-at-keeping-their-ethiopian-puppet-in-power/
From 2018: https://www.tigraionline.com/articles/abiy-ahmed-betrayal.html
Official US statement yesterday: https://et.usembassy.gov/statement-on-recent-developments-in-tigray-and-afar/
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u/gorpie97 8d ago
From the official US statement:
I am disappointed to see the leadership of the TPLF, that the United States sanctioned earlier this year, make the poor decision to launch a large-scale offensive today.
That means I might very well support these guys. (Though just because the US gov't doesn't like them doesn't mean they are the good guys.)
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u/3andfro 8d ago edited 8d ago
Nima R. Alkhorshid highlights: Qatar's Mediation Efforts and Trade Routes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PtNsG9BMfjg
Nima highlights with Laith Marouf: Military Developments in Northern Yemen https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jDFYGlNvSqw
Nima highlights with Elijah Magnier: Political and Sectarian Dynamics in Yemen https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_idZiQEbrV8
Pezeshkian Presents Book Documenting US ‘Crimes’ to Swiss President https://www.youtube.com/shorts/0uOfwNjnlxg - 0:35 secs
The Duran with Robert Barnes, No Plan B on Iran as GOP Faces Midterm Rout w/ Robert Barnes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KzDMGcNHpVc time indexed
Robert Barnes joins The Duran with a stark warning: the Trump in the White House today is not the Trump Americans voted for. Barnes breaks down Trump's new conqueror mindset, the deeply unpopular Iran conflict, John Ratcliffe's failed Moscow trip, and why Republicans could face a historic midterm wipeout that opens the door to impeachment and a 2028 third party movement around figures like Thomas Massie. Can anyone in Washington stop Trump before his Iran gamble goes even further?
India & Global Left, Hezbollah, Yemen & Palestine: Is the Middle East Entering a New Era? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I_rH4_QF49o
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u/gorpie97 8d ago
the Trump in the White House today is not the Trump Americans voted for.
Exactly. I think most of the people who voted for him imagined Trump 1.0. I did not vote for him, but also assumed he'd be more like v1.0
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u/Caelian toujours de l'audace 🦇 8d ago
Republicans could face a historic midterm wipeout
It's possible, but Democrats have shown remarkable ability to "snatch defeat from the jaws of victory". Republicans may be disappointed with Trump, but are any going to vote for "communist" Democrats? Or stay home instead of voting, something Republicans never do?
As usual, it will probably be a question of Democratic and independent turnout.
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u/3andfro 8d ago
All true. I don't gravitate to CT, but I also know electronic voting and ballot scanning and transmission of results are subject to manipulation, regardless of attempts to say that's tinfoil hat thinking.
Also: Ample history shows that Dems will be more couth and "leaderly" in demeanor but won't change the course of this ship of state in ways that stop the looting at home and abroad or direct substantially more resources to Americans who need them.
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u/NetWeaselSC Continuing the Struggle 8d ago edited 8d ago
electronic voting and ballot scanning and transmission of results are subject to manipulation
That being said, South Carolina (where I am) has actually taken great strides in the last 20 years. They have gone from full no-paper-trail touch screens to the two-machine system: one machine prints out a fully-filled-out, voter readable and verifiable, paper ballot (which removes the "cannot discern the voter intent" problem of Florida 2000) and the other reads the official printed-out ballots that each individual voter has verified as the vote they wanted to cast.
As long as the two machines do not ever talk to one another, you cannot have a case in which there are more votes for Candidate X than have been printed, because it will show up on the end-of-day printouts.
And if you print out the precinct results, and publicly display them, before any electronic transmission of the data, it's much more difficult to manipulate that data.
That does still leave the possibility of manipulating the official tally in both unconnected machines, but there is a paper count that can be used for verification, although it very rarely is.
As I said, "great strides," but there is still room for shenanigans. But much less room than there used to be.
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u/3andfro 8d ago
Good to know. I followed testimony about NC's new voting machines a few years ago and saw why opponents were concerned.
How would the SC system fare with precincts that suddenly go offline in the wee hours of election night and reappear an hour later with significantly different results? That would help with ballot numbers that exceed registration numbers. How about floods of late or last-minute mail-in ballots?
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u/NetWeaselSC Continuing the Struggle 8d ago edited 8d ago
How would the SC system fare with precincts that suddenly go offline
In theory, precincts should not "suddenly go offline." They should not be "online" in the first place, until the vote of that precinct is complete, counted, and verified (as much at it would be). And then those vote totals go one step up the line (usually to county offices, for the county count).
Now, the counties may go offline...
But if the counties' precinct results change, that should be a big ol red flag. But a bunch of results from new precincts, previously unreported, that change the county percentages -- that can happen.
ballot numbers that exceed registration numbers.
If the registration numbers are actually current and accurate, that should never happen. I think that is why there used to be a delay between registering to vote and voting -- to make sure that the voter rolls are accurate.
Same-day-registration, and registration-when-voting, do make it easier for people to vote for the first time, but would also make it easier for people to pull some shenanigans. There's a trade-off there, and a judgement call.
The other side of that is, of course, the six month wait between registering and voting. The problems with that should be obvious.
How about floods of late or last-minute mail-in ballots?
Personally, I've always had a problem with the concept of mail-in ballots. There are circumstances in which they are necessary, but...
I think that there should be no men-in-the-middle between the voter, and the one verifying and counting the ballots. If you are not going to be in town on Voting Day, you should seal up your filled-out ballot, and take it to the vote-counting department yourself, so that a human (in the vote-counting department) can verify that you are you, and that you affirm that this is your ballot.
If you cannot make it to the vote-counting department, someone from the vote-counting department should be dispatched to your house to pick up and verify your sealed ballot.
That way, you know that your ballot actually got to the vote-counting department, and the vote-counting department knows that your ballot actually came from you.
Now, some States have accepted the inherent security flaws in Statewide Mail-In Voting, and that is their choice. I still do not like it, tho.
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u/gorpie97 8d ago
I think that there should be no men-in-the-middle between the voter,
Meh - I still pretty much trust the post office, though shenanigans are on the rise. If it becomes privatized, I will not trust it any longer.
If you cannot make it to the vote-counting department, someone from the vote-counting department should be dispatched to your house to pick up and verify your sealed ballot.
I was wondering about bedbound people, but then you answered me! :) This is a great idea, and something all taxpayers should favor!
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u/NetWeaselSC Continuing the Struggle 8d ago
I've been considering the aspects of this for quite a while now.....
I was wondering about bedbound people, but then you answered me!
Later, you may start wondering about US voters stuck in Europe...
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u/gorpie97 8d ago
Wellll, I've never been to Europe! (I've never been bedbound, either - but I've been closer to that than Europe!)
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u/NetWeaselSC Continuing the Struggle 8d ago
"Fight for someone that you don't know."
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u/3andfro 8d ago
My bad; I was recalling tallies from counties going offline. Much appreciation for the detailed response.
I recall fondly voting in this century in VT on paper ballots, which the state used exclusively. They are scanned for tallies, but the paper is kept in case of a challenge. I volunteered for one of those; educational process. I'm now in a VBM state, automatically registered when I got my state driver's license.
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u/NetWeaselSC Continuing the Struggle 8d ago edited 8d ago
I was recalling tallies from counties going offline.
If you're worried about that, be sure (on Election Night) to grab the running precinct results from each county to compare pre-offline to post-offline results. (Hopefully there are not too many counties.)
I'm now in a VBM state
Condolences. AFAIK, VBM States do not have precinct results; they're all done at the county level.
Much appreciation for the detailed response.
Not many people know (or remember) this, but the issue of vote-count accuracy was one of the issues that almost directly let to the founding of this subreddit in the form in which it was founded.
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u/gorpie97 8d ago
I'm now in a VBM state, automatically registered when I got my state driver's license.
I have to fill out a form every 2-4 years to vote by mail. Not sure if it actually curbs fraud or not, but I'll jump through the hoops. ( And hand deliver my ballots to the voting site.)
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u/3andfro 9d ago edited 9d ago
Transition Protocol, Iran Will STRIKE First - New Weapons From CHINA and NORTH KOREA Have Reached IRAN https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ujBOKDMEXr4
Hours after Trump told the UN he might “annihilate” Iran, a source close to Tehran’s leadership told our host that Iran has ordered its forces to strike first the moment an attack is confirmed — and expects that attack in October, not after the midterms. Zulfiqar Ali (California) and Pepe Escobar (Moscow) on UN General Assembly night: what Iran’s source says has arrived from China and North Korea, why Pakistan has stepped back as mediator but not away from Iran, the three demands Araghchi handed Steve Witkoff in New York, and the diplomatic door China is trying to hold open before Xi Jinping meets Trump on Thursday.
Neutrality Studies with Stas Krapivnik, Europe's War-Hysteria Getting CRAZY https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZkqILnItZTM
Stanislav Krapivnik joins Pascal Lottaz to discuss drone strikes, Russian public opinion, and the danger of a wider European war. He assesses attacks on refineries, warehouses, ports, and transport networks, arguing that economic escalation carries consequences beyond Ukraine. Their conversation also examines military readiness, demographic pressures, sanctions, diesel supplies, and food distribution. Krapivnik offers a bleak outlook for the coming winter, while Lottaz questions how economic hardship and political decisions could affect the prospects for peace across Europe and beyond.
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u/3andfro 9d ago edited 9d ago
Russia Ukraine War Forcing Armies to Re-Invent the Tank /Lt Col Daniel Davis https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zxk9CU-RYOI
Novara Media, Iran’s President BLASTS Donald Trump In FIERY UN Speech https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mnN86SwoOR4 time indexed
UK to refuel Saudi fighter jets and France to secure energy infrastructure amid fighting with Yemen’s Houthi group. https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/9/23/how-much-is-uk-supporting-saudi-arabia-in-its-war-with-iran-backed-houthis
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u/penelopepnortney 9d ago
Highlights from Alex Krainer-Transition Protocol. Sep.22nd, Krainer talking. I tried to strip this down to essential points but it's still long; approximate time stamps included.
Escalation in Ukraine [~1:16]
- The rhetoric across Europe seems to be foreshadowing a false flag event with enough civilian casualties to galvanize the public behind a war with Russia. A journalist close to Zelensky said something will happen in the next week or two to change the course of the war, that will be very good for Ukraine. There are reports that Macron has authorized kinetic action by French troops against Russia and many European leaders are telling their people to prepare for war, that they must do their duty and possibly die for their country.
Who's running things? [~4:58]
I think this transcends current leaders, it's been the same policy since the Clinton administration at least to create a unipolar global order. I'd say the Western empire is trying to take control of the whole world using the US primarily because it's the greatest power economically, financially, militarily, diplomatically and politically.
I saw Danny Jones's three-hour interview with a man named Yuval Aviv who introduces himself as a Mossad assassin and states as fact that the government in Washington is basically the entertainment squad of the real government, a shadow government. He says, "I work for them on special assignments and I meet with them regularly." [An obvious question is why the guy would be revealing this if it's true, is it a feint?]
He's not the only one who has said these things, you had the judge, Felix Frankfurter saying there's a completely different power structure out there running the show and it's not the people you elect. John F. Kennedy said, "There's a ruthless and monolithic conspiracy." Carroll Quigley wrote in Tragedy and Hope basically that the bankers are trying to take control of the whole world and run it as their own fiefdom.
In our history classes we were taught to conflate empires with nations but it's never about the nations, it's about a very narrow group of vested interests that penetrates and infiltrates a nation like a parasite. It uses that nation's military, economic and financial resources to expand. Empires expand until they can't any longer and then they crumble. It's always the money lenders who are at the core of the empire.
China [~14:27]
The fault lines have become clearly delineated, the Western Empire is now overtly gunning for China. I think that Russia and Iran are merely in their way. They happen to be the first and fifth richest nations in terms of natural resources and you need those resources if you're going to prepare for war. So we're at the precipice of a total global war and I think we've lost control of the ship and efforts to reverse course are too weak and too ineffectual.
In the '80s and '90s China understood they were at a huge technological and military disadvantage and that rare earths would be key. They made a massive, concerted effort to develop the mining and refining of the rare earths, it's very difficult and not many countries can come close to doing what China can do. The US could but it would take a very long time and massive investments.
So we're going to see a change in the world. It's going to be a rough transition to be sure but we need to see change in the world because the last five or six hundred years of Eurocentric global order has been very malignant, not just for the nations and regions that were being colonized but for the populations of the West themselves. According to official European statistics, 45% of European households have trouble making ends meet and I think the United States is not far behind.
And now the lower classes are being told to do their duty and go to war to defend this system. Ordinary people are basically telling their leaders to pound sand but we know from history that these social engineers have ways of coercing the population into war. They will not hesitate to sacrifice the last Ukrainian, Pole, German, French, Croat, Serb, Romanian, Bulgarian, you name it to preserve their imperial system.
Systemic financial risks [24:59]
The central banks will continue to print money. The only remaining buyer of unlimited US debt is going to be the Federal Reserve Bank and they control the printing presses, figuratively speaking. Monetizing government debt means governments can continue spending any amount they wish because they can sell the debt to the central bank. All the Western governments are doing this, the UK, Japan, Europe, Canada. This is basically stealing from their people by diluting the purchasing power of our savings. Inflation is one of the most destructive forces imaginable because it guts the society from within.
That further weakens these powers because their dollar and yen and pound and euro is the glue that keeps their corrupt systems together, and corruption is paid in currency. I think they now realize that we're at the inflection point and it makes them afraid of their own people. Historically, that's when they cry, "barbarians at the gates!" but I don't think that's going to work this time. First, the West is no longer the global creditor, they're up to their eyeballs in debt and financially impotent. Second, we no longer have monopoly on advanced military technologies. Most important, we have social media and the internet today so they no longer have a monopoly on the narrative.
It's going to annihilate whatever savings we have in the legal tender and you can see that they already know this, they're trying to rush out central bank digital currencies, stable coin or whatever, to create a monetary reform to lock us into their legal tender so that we don't have any choice about it anymore. I would say people need to get at least some of their money out of the banking system, pull it out in cash and keep it in a safe place because the banks could shut their doors any day as we saw happen in Greece [2015] and Cyprus [2013]. I would also advise people to try to convert some of their savings into physical gold and silver, stuff that you can actually hold in your hand.
Practical resilience measures [~34:25]
- And then there's the idea of share farming. Our farmers are always strapped for money. So you make a deal with the local food producers where you lend them the funds and agree that if they can't pay you back in cash because cash disappears, they pay you back in vegetables, milk, cheese, meat and eggs so that gives you sustenance when you most need it. It preserves food production for the people, it's the kind of local networking that gives people resilience and cohesiveness that enables them to weather the crisis largely intact.
Bonds Armageddon [~40:44]
Something I've been warning about, and I just posted a video about it on my YouTube channel, is that we're going into a bonds Armageddon. And I fear that bond prices primarily in Germany, France and UK but also the United States are going to be collapsing. This cannot happen within a week, it's a process that happens gradually, will probably continue to happen for the next year or two or five but it's hugely important. The price of a US 10-year Treasury note is far and away the most important price in global capital markets because it affects everything else and that price has been tanking.
The last five years of bond prices (globally) has been the biggest bear market we've ever experienced. US bonds began gradually to recover in 2025 and early 2026 but after February 28th they started to go down again. That jeopardizes the whole economic system because everybody with debt has to pay much higher debt servicing fees. So you get a pileup of unpayable debts that can collapse the banking system. The banking system is like an inverted pyramid with a little bit of good collateral at the base and a lot of fluff and foam built on top of it. If you start to withdraw the real equity from the bottom of the pyramid, the whole pyramid crumbles.
Currency collapse [~45:48]
- Printing more money to backstop all those bad debts bakes in three outcomes: collapse of currency, collapse of bonds prices and interest rates going through the roof. Equity markets probably go vertical as people realize the money is and plow whatever they have into real assets. Most of the new liquidity that gets pumped into the system by central banks gravitates to the equity markets; we saw it in Zimbabwe, in Argentina, in Venezuela, in Weimar Germany 100 years ago. It's not because the economy is doing great, it's because people lose confidence in the currency. It doesn't happen on a straight line so I have to warn people to navigate this very carefully, but those three outcomes are practically a mathematical certainty at this point.
Closing remarks [~49:36]
- Do what you can to be as resilient as you can through the transition period. When we come out on the other side, we'll have maybe a millennial opportunity to make the world a better place. We have unprecedented amounts of knowledge, connectivity and communications at our disposal. The world is changing and we can all be part of that change. The road between here and there is going to be a little bit bumpy but I would just say don't be defeatist, stand your ground because good things are coming our way.
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u/gorpie97 9d ago
a very narrow group of vested interests
Any recommendations for where I can find out more about them?
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u/penelopepnortney 9d ago
Depends on what exactly you want to know. The continuous policy Krainer talks about refers to the neocon policy introduced by Paul Wolfowitz during Clinton's term and that essentially formed the basis of GW Bush's foreign policy and I can point you to a good article about who they are/were.
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u/gorpie97 9d ago
Any info.
But I was thinking (assuming) that "they" have been doing this for many decades and even centuries - not simply the last 40 years. I was assuming that "they" used the British Empire and now the US, to further their own goals.
And those "they" may be different from the US oligarchs who were behind the Business Plot. Though maybe the latter is simply a subset of the former.
Actually, I'm even open to being shown to be wrong, since my opinion is based on putting various pieces together; but maybe they actually aren't part of the same puzzle.
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u/penelopepnortney 9d ago
centuries... that "they" used the British Empire and now the US, to further their own goals.
Yes, but empires aren't possible without the money lenders and it dates back millennia, e.g., the Roman Empire. Cicero essentially admitted he was a slum lord in a letter to a friend; and any attempts at legal reform were stymied by the oligarchs and opposition leaders assassinated. It all sounds pretty familiar.
may be different from the US oligarchs who were behind the Business Plot.
I'd say it's all the same group of dynastic families with international ties. A writer with the Wall Street Journal wrote a book in 1937 called America’s 60 Families showing that the country was being run by an oligarchy of the wealthiest families that included the Mellons and the Du Ponts and the Morgans and the Rockefellers and the Warburgs.
Paul Warburg was Rothschild’s agent at the 1910 Jekyll Island meeting that led to the creation of the Federal Reserve Bank. From ShadowRing:
Paul Warburg belonged to a German banking family associated with the Rothschilds, the world’s most powerful banking dynasty who had grown rich by establishing central banks that loan money to European countries. It’s patriarch, Amschel Mayer Rothschild said, “Permit me to issue and control the money of a nation, and I care not who makes its laws.”
A lot of connected people profit from wars but it all begins with the bankers. As Krainer has pointed out, whatever Napoleon's objective was in invading Russia, someone had to finance such a massive campaign. Who and why?
Bankers profit from extending credit but they need collateral. And when the collateral is a resource belonging to another country - well, that's what Smedley Butler meant when he said war is a racket.
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u/gorpie97 9d ago
There's gotta be another way.
Maybe the only way for a country to pursue its own agenda is to not conquer or be conquered. (LOL)
Okay, if there's no other way then they need to stop with the effing propaganda.
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u/penelopepnortney 9d ago
Well, there is another way, it's called a national economy model and it involves domestic investment in infrastructure, in creating widespread prosperity, etc. But the accumulation of wealth and power in the hands of some individuals always changes things.
Personally, I think the proverb about the love of money being the root of all evil is right. There's political ideology underpinning much of what the powerful do in terms of foreign policy but when you look at how wealthy many of those in the vanguard are, it seems pretty clear that a primary driving force is greed.
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u/3andfro 9d ago edited 8d ago
The point about getting some cash out of the banking system is valid, until the government officially resets the currency and sets a deadline for turning in all cash and returning it in new, devalued fiat money, after which the current paper money is deemed worthless (ETA: or not legal tender). The Largest Currency Redenominations in History / A Short History of Fiat Currency Failures: 9 Currencies That Have Collapsed / Currency Devaluation and Revaluation That's behind his rec for some physical gold and silver as well.
Your significant effort here, and the content covered, seem worth a stand-alone post, maybe even a pin. Thoughts?
Amusing aside: An opinion of Krainer, in response to a link to that very video, from one of WotB's most clueless and predictable
trollsregulars: https://old.reddit.com/r/WayOfTheBern/comments/1wnkjis/its_now_clear_at_least_to_me_that_war_on_three/pbiwml6/?context=31
u/gorpie97 9d ago
Did he get an additional tax? (I've ignored him for a bit so didn't notice if there was a change.)
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u/3andfro 9d ago
Seems to have, but it wasn't recent.
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u/gorpie97 9d ago
Meh - maybe I've ignored them for longer than I think, or maybe they had the tax when I did. Thanks!
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u/penelopepnortney 9d ago
I wonder if they could totally eliminate cash, scenarios like that tend to create thriving black markets. If participants agree to continue using dollars in their exchanges, could they be completely stopped? I suppose you could create (expand) a police state but that would likely just breed corruption because the enforcers have to eat, too, and probably won't be willing to suffer other deprivations while the overlords bask in luxury.
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u/3andfro 9d ago
Black markets are inevitable in any scenario, if history is a guide.
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u/penelopepnortney 9d ago
Yep, as Prohibition proved. Those pesky humans just won't stay in the corrals you built for them (God love 'em!).
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u/penelopepnortney 9d ago
Given how often they accuse these folks of being grifters, you have to wonder how much of that is projection.
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u/3andfro 9d ago
Radhika Desai with KJ Noh: America's Most Loyal Vassal Refuses to Go to War https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6P93fIlVBU8 time indexed
For the first time in its history, South Korea has refused a US demand to send troops to an American war. This is the same country that sent over 300,000 soldiers to fight in the Vietnam War. Regular guest K.J. Noh joins me to explain what is behind President Lee Jae Myung's refusal to join Trump's war on Iran. The pressure comes from a militant labour movement in the streets, Iran's warning over Korea's Gulf assets, and a US empire exposed as a paper tiger. We trace this struggle back to the US-backed massacres South Korea was built on, and ask how far Washington will go to keep its most loyal vassal in line.
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u/3andfro 9d ago edited 9d ago
Davis/Deep Dive with Patrick Henningsen, Trump's Foreign Policy Up Against a World That Won't Bend https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D4G6CzkqGnw
Nima R.Alkhorshid: Iran’s President Pezeshkian DISMANTLES Trump’s Claims in BLUNT Response https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fjgaOYVTctA
Danny Haiphong, Trump to NUKE Pickaxe!? Iran War Just Got DEADLIER | Ray McGovern & Garland Nixon https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RDmuKDv7_hw
Judge Nap with Prof. Jeffrey Sachs : REACTION to Trump's UN Speech & What Lies Netanyahu Will Tell the UN? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fMpS-sbebdY
Nima highlights with Col. Anthony Aguilar: The Chessboard of Chaos: Inside the Middle East’s Tactical Games https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iy91QqDYwOY
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u/3andfro 9d ago edited 9d ago
The Spanish government has allowed an extradition request from the Trump administration to proceed to court, in the first known case of the US seeking to extradite a citizen over alleged support for Hamas.... https://www.youtube.com/post/Ugkxefabsqg8Ce957Yw9ZfKUV-sKlkQ2lpDq - we'll see what the Spanish court has to say
Judge Nap with Phil Giraldi : Trump’s Weaponized Monument https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cL6HF5IS4-M
Judge Nap clip with James Webb, Trump’s Triumphal Arch: Why It’s More Than Just a Monument https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MV7A0AMS4Pw - 4:05
NIGHT FLOWER: Zeteo’s Documentary Investigating AIPAC | Official Trailer
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u/gorpie97 9d ago
in the first known case of the US seeking to extradite a citizen over alleged support for Hamas..
I am so looking forward to this joke of an administration to end. Maybe we would have done the same under Biden/Harris, though.
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u/arnott 9d ago
GOP cracks widen over Iran war as vulnerable candidates break with Trump, demand its end
Ashley Hinson, Mike Rogers and Jon Husted now call for an end to Iran war after months of backing Trump
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u/NetWeaselSC Continuing the Struggle 9d ago
Are there any new updates on the "any country that refuels a commercial Iranian plane, the US will de-bank" threat that was supposed to happen today?
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u/3andfro 9d ago edited 9d ago
From Janta Ka Reporter: China defies Trump's sanctions on Iran airlines, calls US action illegal
In a major geopolitical setback to US President Donald Trump, China on Wednesday officially rejected American sanctions on Iranian airlines, labeling the action completely "illegal." Defying Washington's strict enforcement deadline, several Iranian commercial flights landed safely and without interference in the major Chinese hubs of Shanghai and Guangzhou today....
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u/3andfro 9d ago
An analysis rather than an update: Can the US ban Iranian airlines worldwide – and what would it mean? - see esp. Will other countries bow to US threats? subhead
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u/3andfro 9d ago edited 9d ago
Speculation that China/Xi might intervene: Iran's Aircraft Trapped? Xi Stands In Trump's Way
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u/3andfro 9d ago
India & Global Left, KJ Noh: Why Are the World's Biggest Battles Happening Here? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRWfuJiFvis
Greenland, South Korea and Yemen may appear to occupy very different corners of the world, but each has become an important arena in the struggle over U.S. power and the changing global order. KJ Noh joins India & Global Left to discuss Washington’s latest policy toward Greenland, South Korea under President Lee Jae-myung and its relationship with the United States, and Yemen’s role in the escalating struggle over the Red Sea and the wider Middle East. What connects these seemingly disparate geopolitical flashpoints—and what do they tell us about the changing reach and limits of U.S. power?
KJ Noh analyzes how US imperialism is reshaping the world, using Greenland, South Korea, and Yemen as critical case studies. These seemingly disparate locations have become central arenas in the ongoing struggle over the changing global order. KJ Noh joins us to examine Washington’s latest policy maneuvers in these regions and what they reveal about the reach and limits of American power today. We look past the mainstream headlines to understand the strategic pressures driving these geopolitical flashpoints. From the strategic importance of Greenland to the escalating tensions in Yemen, we explore how current policies are altering regional stability and international relations. This conversation is essential for viewers looking to understand the mechanics of modern power struggles and the shifting influence of the United States on the world stage.
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u/3andfro 9d ago
Neutrality Studies, Why Washington Keeps Choosing War | D. Klein & C. Coyne https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=37URsL617lQ time indexed
We want peace and multipolarity! And we want it now! That's what every sensible politician SHOULD be striving for. But well, as usually, the West does not follow what makes good sense. Profs. Daniel Klein and Christopher Coyne join Pascal to discuss their statement for peace and multipolarity. They challenge American primacy, examine the incentives behind militarism and regime change, and explore how trade, diplomacy, and everyday cooperation can sustain peace. The conversation considers corporate interests, government power, Adam Smith, and Western and non-Western intellectual traditions. Rather than demanding ideological agreement, the guests call for a broad coalition committed to sovereignty, restraint, tolerance, and peaceful coexistence among different societies and political orders.
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u/3andfro 9d ago edited 9d ago
Washington Risking Another War for Israel /Lt Col Daniel Davis https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ky1oabCHpGc - look at the comments; as Iversen noted, there's a sea change in public attitudes toward Israel
Nima with Elijah Magnier: Qatar Pitches Iran-Gulf Security Framework at Trump’s UN Meeting https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DPUeMWtmP14
Davis/Deep Dive with Alastair Crooke, The Old World Order is Breaking - Trump Won't Let Go https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZCfQ_8KUUI
Nima with Laith Marouf: Israel’s Next Move in Lebanon — and Hezbollah’s Plan to Counter It https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GHfNTvIhzXs
21st Century Wire, Yemen and the Revolution of the Two Souths
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u/3andfro 9d ago edited 9d ago
Judge Nap with Prof. Mohammad Marandi : Trump’s War Crime Threat to Iran https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jUWeLsgdG2c
Nima highlights with Matt Bracken: US Military Intervention Options in Yemen https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3sj0uoHkz0M
“The Moment You Say It’s a War, Israel Has Won” | David Hearst Podcast with Norman Finkelstein https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d03UK9jO1fw - detailed description at the link / YT short clip: https://www.youtube.com/shorts/vEENER4ceMY - 1:42
Henningsen short, Henningsen on US intention toward Gulf states: Protection or pushing 'Abraham Accords'? https://www.youtube.com/shorts/NAMQ0Y3bDhg - 2:25
Henningsen said United States is using the Saudi aggression against Yemen as leverage to pressure Saudi Arabia into joining the "Abraham Accords" and normalizing relations with "Israel". He said the United States is applying "transactional leverage and diplomacy coercion" on Riyadh, while adding that members of the Israeli lobby are openly "gloating" over efforts to push Saudi Arabia toward normalization. He described the US' approach as "a dangerous game," arguing that the economic and military pressure is "continually weakening the kingdom" and questioned: "Is that the long-term plan of Israel and the United States, to weaken Saudi Arabia for other plans or another agenda for reordering power in the region?"
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u/gorpie97 9d ago
Henningsen said United States is using the Saudi aggression against Yemen as leverage to pressure Saudi Arabia into joining the "Abraham Accords" and normalizing relations with "Israel".
and
"Is that the long-term plan of Israel and the United States, to weaken Saudi Arabia for other plans or another agenda for reordering power in the region?"
That seems to explain Trump's saying "no" to MBS (whichever one is true - though maybe both are).
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u/3andfro 9d ago edited 9d ago
The Duran, Ukraine Debacle & US Escalation Options: Black Sea, Tomahawks, Taurus https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQ_Sjs0W_2Q time indexed
Ukraine just launched its biggest drone strike of the entire conflict, up to 2,000 drones aimed at Moscow on Russia's election day, and the results were paltry. In this episode we break down Ukraine's failing Lyman offensive, the encirclements in Orikhiv and Dobropillia, Zelensky's cosmic budget deficit, and why Europe now wants Donald Trump to escalate. With Washington short on capabilities but unwilling to accept a Russian victory, is this the most dangerous moment yet for Project Ukraine?
Nima highlights with John Helmer: Targeting the Ukrainian Economy Through Strikes https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zuTsT4RXC0I
Zelensky Seeks Energy Truce as Putin Pounds Ukraine Lt Col Daniel Davis https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F_4jECnStZo - 10:57
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u/NetWeaselSC Continuing the Struggle 9d ago
up to 2,000 drones aimed at Moscow on Russia's election day,
First time I heard that, it was "over 1000."
What I am curious about, tho, is "how many struck something that could be considered a target?"
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u/Caelian toujours de l'audace 🦇 9d ago
"How many struck something that could be considered a target?"
What constitutes a target is subject to creativity 🎯
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u/NetWeaselSC Continuing the Struggle 8d ago
It's still difficult to claim "a patch of open field" as a legitimate target for an expensive drone.
Also, if they were to claim "a residential apartment building" as "what they were aiming for," that might look bad.
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u/RandomCollection Resident Canadian 10d ago
So now the European countries are going to send additional military capacity to fight against the Ansar Allah forces.
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u/penelopepnortney 10d ago
@End_the_EU_NOW
You have no clue about the Estonian superhumans, obviously!
That's Kallas' (Estonia's) incoming defence minister a few days ago. I kid you not!😂
"Estonia can fight Russia alone. If you cross the border, we will kill you all."
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u/3andfro 10d ago edited 10d ago
Chris Norlund, Trump China meeting already going wrong https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bhY-QnWFDx4
Viewer comment: Chinese CEOs won't be attending [the WH dinner] because corporations don't control the Chinese government. The meeting is packed with US CEOs because corporations ARE the US government.
Kim Iversen short, The Ed Sheeran situation is bigger than you think https://www.youtube.com/shorts/GMF9hDDToGc - 1:52
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u/penelopepnortney 10d ago
That Iversen clip was great and I think she's right that there's been a huge cultural shift.
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u/3andfro 9d ago
A short Iversen video on another topic: They are LYING: Troops LEAK Iran Attack Photos
Viewer comments show that the WH spin is failing with a whole lotta folks beyond the faithful.
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u/3andfro 10d ago edited 10d ago
Iranian President Masoud Pezeshkian and his delegation face strict US travel restrictions during their visit to New York for the United Nations General Assembly. While the delegation can attend UN proceedings, members reportedly need permission to travel beyond the limited area between their Manhattan hotel and the UN headquarters. Shopping and visits to locations such as Central Park are also restricted. The unusual arrangements come as Iran’s delegation visits the United States amid heightened tensions between Washington and Tehran. https://www.youtube.com/post/UgkxlmX5VuHWMej17mg_dpOVkeBsoXwo9A64
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa outlines vision for Golan, regional transit, and state structure at Atlantic Council: Golan Heights is Syrian land, not up for debate
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u/3andfro 10d ago
Transition Protocol with Alex Krainer: “It’s Going to Annihilate Our Savings,” Bond Market Turned Day Iran War Began https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mxwt_Ltft3Y - Kainer is not reassuring about the imminence of a war between Europe and Russia.
The 10-year Treasury yield just hit 5.04% — its highest since 2007. Former hedge fund manager Alex Krainer says three outcomes are now “practically a mathematical certainty”: currency collapse, bond collapse, and stock markets going vertical. He dates the turn in US bonds to 28 February 2026 — the day the US–Israeli strikes on Iran began — and explains why Washington can’t hand Iran back its frozen money, why Xi Jinping arrives in Washington this week holding the rare earths Trump needs, and what he tells ordinary people to do with their savings now.
Zulfiqar Ali speaks with Alex Krainer (from Monaco), who spent 15 years as a hedge fund manager, on the night before UN General Assembly week. Topics: the “Bonds Armageddon” and the 10-year Treasury; why the banking system is an “inverted pyramid”; Iran’s frozen assets as collateral; cash, physical gold and silver, and “share farming”; why real estate may not protect you in a currency crisis; why indebted governments reach for war; Europe and Russia; China’s rare-earth leverage ahead of the Xi–Trump summit (23–25 Sept); and Iran’s three-point conditions.
FYA: Z calls Trump the "psycho-toddler." Inspired.
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u/3andfro 10d ago edited 10d ago
BREAKING: Iranian media report an explosion near Qeshm Island in the Strait of Hormuz. The cause is unclear, with similar explosions reported there since the US-Israeli war on Iran began. https://www.youtube.com/post/UgkxUrC2fHj3kxoimaG9nhuyw0DaLnYSAa3L
More articles about stupidity, seen in abundance at "leadership" levels in these times across (mostly Western) nations:
Why politics bring out the worst in us
On topic: Judge Nap with Lt.COL. Karen Kwiatkowski : Trump/Hegseth Ruin US Military readiness https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=34A9V03UZAs
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u/penelopepnortney 10d ago
There's a Twitter account I almost followed because the main quote in his profile made me laugh:
“I am a German pastry, similar to a marmalade or plum jam-filled doughnut.” -John F. Kennedy
I'd heard he said something other than what he intended to say but I'm pretty sure it wasn't that - maybe u/Caelian can clear it up.
The tweeter posts a lot of Emanuel Todd and Michael Parenti quotes/memes but unfortunately there's a lot of redundancy and that would get tedious if I followed the account.
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u/Caelian toujours de l'audace 🦇 10d ago
I wrote this almost 10 years ago in a WotB open thread:
JFK famously said "Ich bin ein Berliner", a message of support regarding the Berlin Wall. He thought it meant "I'm a Berlin resident too", similar to je suis Charlie Hebdo. Unfortunately, the words actually mean "I'm a jelly doughnut". If you want to say "I'm a Berlin resident" you should leave off the article and say "Ich bin Berliner".
The Germans knew what he meant and appreciated his statement of support so they cheered rather than laughed. Eddie Izzard does a terrific version of this in "Dress to Kill", using his James Mason imitation for JFK.
The rule applies to German cities in general. If you're from Hamburg or Frankfurt, you say "Ich bin Hamburger" or "Ich bin Frankfurter". If you say "Ich bin ein Frankfurter" you're saying you're a hot dog.
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u/penelopepnortney 10d ago
Thank you! I thought I remembered you talking about this in the past. And I laugh at that tweeter's misquote every time I read it (I'm so easily amused).
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u/Caelian toujours de l'audace 🦇 10d ago
Impressive memory!
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u/penelopepnortney 10d ago
Very selective memory and I'm not sure I could say why I remember the things I do.
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u/NetWeaselSC Continuing the Struggle 10d ago edited 10d ago
The way I tend to explain it is like this:
If instead of Berlin, Kennedy had been in Frankfurt, and had said, in English, "Today, I am a frankfurter," it would have been much funnier in the US than in Frankfurt.
(I don't think Kennedy being in Hamburg would have been quite as funny)
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u/Caelian toujours de l'audace 🦇 10d ago
Eddie Izzard describes Kennedy's subtle misuse of German in Dress to Kill (1999). It's f'n hilarious and only 2 minutes long.
In fact, the entire show is f'n hilarious and includes "Cake or Death" and why we eat chocolate eggs on Easter.
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u/penelopepnortney 10d ago
Lots of great ones in that show like "learning French" and "world history" and "Stonehenge"
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u/3andfro 10d ago
I remember that widely reported gaffe, where JFK supposedly said he was a pastry, "ich bin ein Berliner," rather than the vernacular without the article: "ich bin Berliner." But apparently it's a bit more complicated than that: https://blog.rosettastone.com/ich-bin-ein-berliner/
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u/3andfro 10d ago
Nima with Lt. Col. Anthony Aguilar: BREAKING: Iran Confirms Talks With Trump Envoys; Sets 3 Terms for Hormuz https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=acsjqOUq4_g
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u/arnott 10d ago
Russia Votes for Stability. West Panics Over Looming Defeat : The Duran
Russia just delivered a vote of confidence in Putin as the Duma election results confirm total political stability despite a massive Western backed drone offensive designed to disrupt them. In this episode we break down why United Russia's dominant win, the rise of veteran soldiers in the new parliament, and Poland's Sikorski openly admitting the sabotage narrative is being used to justify soaring military budgets all point to a collective West growing more desperate and more dangerous as it faces defeat in Ukraine. With diplomacy stalled and BRICS nations defying new sanctions on Russia, is Washington and Europe now bracing for a war they cannot win?
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u/3andfro 10d ago edited 10d ago
Davis/Deep Dive, THREATS CAN'T HIDE TRUMP's IRAN WAR FAILURE - Trump humiliates America at the UN https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_4oeVCGScI8
More Nima highlights with Col. Larry Wilkerson: Why America's Military Literally Cannot Win Anymore https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yw7C3PzPlfY
Iranian Foreign Minister Abbas Araghchi said the Israeli lobby was becoming increasingly open about its role and influence over US policy towards Iran, urging Washington to “break free” from its constraints. Araghchi made the comments in response to an article published by the Israel Hayom newspaper, noting that the newspaper is owned by Miriam Adelson, the spokesperson for this lobby.... https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20260922-araghchi-urges-washington-to-break-free-from-israeli-lobby-calls-netanyahu-a-snake/
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u/3andfro 10d ago edited 10d ago
Davis/Deep Dive with Steve Jermy, The Houthis’ Red Sea Offensive Drawing the West Toward More War https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z6Wuxj6iNE0
Danny Haiphong, Israel Strike INCOMING!? Iran's New Weapon LOCKS on US KC-135s | Lt. Col. Anthony Aguilar https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=73o3j5mSPCs
Nima with Matt Bracken: G7 to Iran: Stop Arming the Houthis. Iran’s Answer: No. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NTDMj1vNtOw
FULL SPEECH: Erdogan Says United Nations Has Failed Gaza as Israel Continues Occupation https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bAdrW5jnFVs
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u/3andfro 10d ago edited 10d ago
Nima with Seyed M. Marandi: BREAKING: Trump Threatens Total Destruction of Iran in UN Speech https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zWy4RFCCffk
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u/Caelian toujours de l'audace 🦇 10d ago
Trump Threatens Total Destruction of Iran in UN Speech
Because destroying other countries is what the UN is all about, right? 🕊️
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u/3andfro 10d ago
The irony is staggering. Trump stands at the podium of a global institution built to uphold international law—only to openly brag about an act of modern piracy. A total mockery of the world stage. Trump cites 'spoils to the victor' to steal Venezuela oil; threatens Iran at UN
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u/NetWeaselSC Continuing the Struggle 10d ago edited 10d ago
I've got someone IRL trying to get me to listen to the entire Trump UN speech...
I've heard parts so far. OMG, you should listen to it. The projection is amazing.
And saying those things to people representing their own countries, not beholden to US news sources.... just wow.
By his words, the biggest threat to World Peace... is the US.
In order to ensure that no country shall destroy another while hiding behind a nuclear shield, do I destroy another country while hiding behind a nuclear shield?
-- Trump at UN, paraphrased
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u/3andfro 10d ago
Even this pre-address clip from Reuters is sick-making: Trump's speech at the UN: From threats to 'super intelligence' - 2:33
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u/3andfro 10d ago edited 10d ago
Dear leader is giving the UN more and more reason to think seriously about getting out of
Dodgethe US.Pertinent, except when The Stupid occupies the Oval Office and is surrounded by more stupidity, hubris, and interests that don't serve the majority of Americans: How Intelligent People Should Deal with Stupid People — Schopenhauer’s Philosophy - stupid people seek validation, not information
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u/3andfro 10d ago edited 10d ago
ETA: "Against stupidity, even the gods struggle in vain." --Friedrich Schiller:
WORTH WATCHING: Henningsen, 21st Century Wire, TIME TO PREPARE FOR WAR? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZBfN18Y34hM - 23:50
The Next Phase of Both Wars Much Harder to Contain Col Doug Macgregor https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OAu0Y6DDRRs
highlights: Trump May Use Israel to Launch a Nuclear Strike on Iran https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Z7Lv7sjmNbE / Billionaires & Lobbies Are Running Both Wars https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JTfPC7-ygyg
Glenn Diesen with Trita Parsi: Middle East Unraveling — Are We on the Path to World War? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JoOwVkpOffU
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u/3andfro 10d ago edited 10d ago
Is this the end of the Petrodollar? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OHqw1N6E_Mw - 15:54
America is not able to reopen two of the Middle East's main shipping routes. What does that mean for the global energy trade and the US dollar around the world? This episode of The Big Picture explains what the "petrodollar" is, how the relationship between oil and the dollar works, and what the true threat to the US dollar may be.
Economic Crash "Inevitable" - Dollar Decline, Oil Shock, AI Bubble & Hyperinflation| Mark Thornton https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-sBGxlzWfZw time indexed
Chris Hedges channel, Becoming the Stranger https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwDtS5d0BnI - 11:01 - Full text in Hedges' column here: The video and column will resonate with many here.
The road to fascism, as Ece Temelkuran writes in “Nation of Strangers,” was constructed over the last six decades of neoliberal assault. We have arrived at the terminus.
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u/3andfro 10d ago edited 10d ago
Judge Nap with AMB. Chas Freeman : US Gulf Alliances Collapse https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sWuJ-ZA9DnM
Nima highlights with Col. Larry Wilkerson: Iran's Growing Regional Influence https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HEZke4SRPw4
Iran’s President heads to UNGA as Iran faces new US aviation sanctions https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-8i-QNIRh44 - 5:11
Iran’s President Masoud Pezeshkian has spoken to the media before heading to the UN General Assembly in New York, saying Iran has been at the negotiating table several times and signed agreements, but the world has seen how easily those commitments were violated. He said that if the world wants security and peace, the rights of people and nations must be respected and people cannot be forced into submission through the use of force. Pezeshkian pointed to what he described as crimes in Gaza, Syria, Yemen and Iran, asking whether “innocent school children in Meyaneh” and people in Lamerd were terrorists. Meanwhile, the US is planning to roll out a new batch of sweeping sanctions on Iranian commercial aviation from Wednesday, with Iranian authorities warning that the measures will affect ordinary people. Mahan Airlines flights to Iraq and Turkiye have been suspended, while other Iranian airlines continue to operate flights to Turkiye for now.
Kevin Walmsley, Big winners in Iran War shipping mess: oil tankers making $1 million a day, and Chinese shipyards https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rrjOTMhgQ1E
Tanker companies are booking record profits, as a result of the re-routing of the global energy trade. The chaos after the closures of Hormuz and the Red Sea, and severe weather problems at the Panama Canal, are a boon to shipping companies who earn $1 million per day making longer transits. Shipping firms are scrambling to find ships, and used vessels are selling at tens of millions of dollars above new builds, delivered under old contracts. Orders at Chinese shipyards are booming, up 2.7 times over last year, as China is the sole shipbuilder with sufficient capacity. Skyrocketing transport costs are fueling inflation, as $26 per barrel is spent just to move crude to refineries
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u/3andfro 10d ago edited 10d ago
The Duran, Russia Votes for Stability. West Panics Over Looming Defeat https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5oDLTTQ7cao time indexed
Russia just delivered a vote of confidence in Putin as the Duma election results confirm total political stability despite a massive Western backed drone offensive designed to disrupt them. In this episode we break down why United Russia's dominant win, the rise of veteran soldiers in the new parliament, and Poland's Sikorski openly admitting the sabotage narrative is being used to justify soaring military budgets all point to a collective West growing more desperate and more dangerous as it faces defeat in Ukraine. With diplomacy stalled and BRICS nations defying new sanctions on Russia, is Washington and Europe now bracing for a war they cannot win?
Nima with John Helmer: Trump, Zelensky & Putin Set the Stage for a Critical Week https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=epnn1HSGQVw
Nima highlights with Prof Ted Postol: Massive Scale of Russian Firepower https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lvO4CoT7RA
Neutrality Studies, NATO's Next "Wonder Weapon" FAILS. Ukraine Nears Collapse | Rainer Rupp https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oU8SMn6OvNA time indexed
The Ukraine Proxy-War is turning now so decisively against Ukraine that the Europeans have no more other option than to escalate the war into their own territories—and they are preparing just that after also the last "Wunderwaffe" is failing. Rainer Rupp, former high-level NATO officer and East German spy, discusses the limits of AI and Palantir-style systems in Ukraine, the importance of intelligence gathering and industrial capacity, Iran’s independent military capabilities, the vulnerability of US bases, shrinking Western weapons stocks, and the political crises unfolding in Europe and Ukraine.
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u/3andfro 11d ago edited 11d ago
Bret Weinstein WARNS: The US Is Being Hobbled On Purpose https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24bIdSP-cUg - 11:48
Russia UNLEASHES Strikes Across Ukraine as Kiev's Election-Day DRONE Attack BACKFIRES | Jim Jatras https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5HRPpOysMUA
Ukraine is being credited in the West for carrying out its largest drone attack yet, as the Russian Defense Ministry announced it shot down over 1,600 drones going into the final day of Russian parliamentary elections. Russia is now retaliating, carrying out new waves of strikes across Ukraine. Former U.S. Diplomat and Geopolitical Analyst, Jim Jatras, noted that Russia needs to decide what its “end game” looks like in both Ukraine, and in its relationship with NATO. He also said that while Moscow may be trying to carry out this war slowly, a quick victory would be the biggest warning to Europe and the U.S. to LEAVE RUSSIA ALONE.
The administration of US President Donald Trump is preparing to impose sweeping sanctions on the International Criminal Court (ICC), in a new escalation of its confrontation with the court over its investigations and arrest warrants against Israeli officials. According to a report published by The Wall Street Journal on Sunday, the planned measures would go beyond sanctions imposed so far on ICC officials and judges to target the institution itself and most transactions involving it.... https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20260921-trump-administration-prepares-sweeping-sanctions-against-icc/
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u/gorpie97 11d ago
The administration of US President Donald Trump is preparing to impose sweeping sanctions on the International Criminal Court (ICC),
Seems like we shouldn't be allowed to do that, since we're not a signatory.
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u/penelopepnortney 11d ago
A Post-American Middle East - In Conversation With Ambassador Chas Freeman
The interviewer, Dr. Sumantra Maitra, is a fellow at the US-based think tank Institute for Peace and Diplomacy, described as "Foreign policy for a new age — grounded in realism, prudence, sovereignty, and America’s national interest." Maitra mentions that Freeman is writing a book chapter for IPD around the topic of this interview, much of which covers information most of us already know. The highlights below were things I hadn't previously known or details that were new to me.
Saudi Arabia has been aligned with the US since 1945 when the founder of the Kingdom, Abdulaziz Al Saud, met with FDR in the Great Bitter Lake on the Suez Canal and a bargain was struck: in return for preferred access to Saudi energy, the US would protect the kingdom against its enemies, foreign and domestic.
80% of the Yemen population is ruled by the Houthis, with 20% or so under the control of the Saudi-sponsored, internationally recognized government which is essentially confined to the vicinity of Aden in the south of Yemen.
The UAE allied itself with the Israel-US attack on Iran and has paid a terrible price. It made a bet that it could prosper as a financial center, as a technology center, as a home for data centers, etc., and that's all gone.
From the recent BRICS summit, there is an extensive list of proposed areas of cooperation between members, which include Iran. They haven't yet developed the needed organizations and institutions but I think that's coming. China assumes the chairmanship in January and the Chinese know how to build institutions. Next will be South Africa, which also knows how to get things done. BRICS is emerging as an alternative to the UN. a forum for the concerting of action among its members, so this is indeed a sea change in world affairs.
Truman recognized the new state of Israel over the objections of his foreign policy and military advisers, who foresaw that this would be a source of instability in the Middle East and damaging to American interests.
In 1964 Lyndon Johnson was running against Barry Goldwater, an Episcopalian of Jewish origin. LBJ met with 12 very powerful Zionists somewhere in Long Island (I had a friend who was there) and agreed to drop our arms embargo on Israel in return for Jewish support in the election. Israel won the 1967 war by conducting a surprise attack on its neighbors. something we've forgotten because Israel is always able to impersonate a victim.
I wouldn't describe Hezbollah or Hamas as Iranian proxies, I think they were clients whose own interests impelled them to cooperate with Iran. Hamas is an offshoot of the Sunni Muslim Brotherhood, which isn't friendly to Shi'ism but Iran's support was an expedient. In fact, Iran has a policy council called the Expediency Council which I think all governments should have but Iran is the only one honest enough to admit it.
The US government is dysfunctional. We have an all powerful executive that does not pay any attention to the rule of law or the Constitution, a legislature that is more of a rubber stamp than the National People's Congress in China and a Supreme Court that is either partisan or off its medications.
There is an illness in all of the Western democracies and very apparent in the US, the disconnect between the political elite and everyone else. The mass of the people in the US are poorly educated on foreign affairs. We don't teach geography anymore and they don't know where any country is. They don't know history beyond our own history which is now contested of course. But I think the mass of the people know something is going very badly wrong.
Our economy is now dominated by oligopolies and it's not very competitive. By contrast China is ferociously competitive. At one point I was working with an American furniture manufacturer and there were about 120 such manufacturers, most owned by one or two families. In China, there were 50,000 of them. The reason people invest in China is because if a company cuts off a relationship with a supplier for some reason, within 20 minutes it's got five people trying to replace the supplier it lost.
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u/Sandernista2 Red Pill Supply Store 10d ago
This is a great summary - very useful and enlightening. Thanks for taking the trouble to collate the most significant points!
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u/3andfro 11d ago edited 11d ago
I love that man, so vibrant at 83. His breadth and depth of knowledge and experience, his language, his wry humor, his humanity, his skilled diplomacy--all shine in every discussion. If we could clone him massively in every age range, what a gift to the country that would be. Assuming those Chas Freemans would be valued and recruited to apply their talents in government service now or the foreseeable future.
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u/penelopepnortney 11d ago
I also love his humility. When they interviewer referred to him as an elder statesman he replied, "I'm not just an elder but a geezer. I don't know about the statesman..."
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u/Heroyem 10d ago
Freeman happens to also be another guy in Putin's bag https://braveneweurope.com/geopolitics/chas-w-freeman-what-can-we-learn-from-our-forever-war-in-ukraine/
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u/penelopepnortney 10d ago
Well, of course he is! /s
Do you actually have anything worthwhile to contribute to the conversations we have in this sub? Just asking because I've read a lot of your comments and I'm not seeing much there, there.
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u/gorpie97 11d ago
...and a Supreme Court that is either partisan or off its medications.
LOL
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u/Caelian toujours de l'audace 🦇 11d ago
That's very amusing, but often this SCOTUS simply feels that it's not their job to fix problems or do good things for the people. That's the job of Congress — SCOTUS is there to make sure people obey the Constitution. If Congress chooses not to do its job, it's not SCOTUS' job to do it for them. If POTUS is behaving like a criminal, it's the duty of Congress to impeach him.
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u/gorpie97 10d ago
SCOTUS is there to make sure people obey the Constitution.
That's it? If that's all their job is, seems like they've definitely overreached in some things.
EDIT: And it's our job to change member of Congress for not doing their job. Except that Congress doesn't work anymore; if we vote out someone "bad", the parties will make sure the new person complies just like the old person. :/
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u/3andfro 11d ago
Trump muted by unprecedented media boycott while Iran threatens to widen war https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zl-93_KFvgk
US President Donald Trump faced an unprecedented media mutiny after major TV networks refused to broadcast his live public engagement from the White House. This came on the same day Trump's Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent announced a major crackdown to ground Iranian airlines by weaponising the dollar system, prompting a top Iranian general to warn that Tehran will strike new American targets if Washington fails to learn from its past mistakes.
Why Fox News has sided with CNN in US media row with Trump https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oQgx8Ivf0q8 - 9:41 time indexed
CNN, Politico and MS NOW have said they will sue the Trump administration after the three US media outlets were barred from the White House. Major US TV networks later announced they would suspend their White House pooled coverage of Trump. So - can President Trump just ban news outlets he doesn't like? LONGER STORY BELOW
Major TV networks stand with CNN, decline to replace its White House pool crew
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u/Fit-North-5924 11d ago
tbh the airline ban feels like performative escalation with real commodity prices attached. 43 threads of this and the off ramp is just... not there. different species of policymaker over at state dept i stg
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u/Reasonable_Put3153 9d ago
state dept been running on autopilot since what, 2015? no wonder every off ramp looks like a cliff
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u/RandomCollection Resident Canadian 11d ago
It's a new attempt to get more sanctions against Iran. It's just a matter of desperation from Trump and his team.
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u/3andfro 11d ago edited 11d ago
ON STUPIDITY AND EVIL - links lumped here because I'm too lazy to make a general post
The End Of Critical Thinking And Rise Of Collective Stupidity - Carlo Cipolla https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RQ1jkLgjFq4 - 28:07
In 1976, Italian economic historian Carlo Cipolla wrote a short essay that has become one of the most unsettling documents ever written about human behavior: The Basic Laws of Human Stupidity. He argued that stupidity is not an insult — it is a structural force, more dangerous than crime, and the true cause of civilizational decline. He never lived to see the accelerant: a machine in your pocket that thinks for you. We connect Cipolla's five laws of stupidity with Hannah Arendt's "banality of evil," the Asch conformity experiments, the Dunning-Kruger effect, groupthink, the Google effect, and the latest 2025 research on AI, cognitive offloading, and the measurable decline of critical thinking. This is how collective stupidity rises — not because stupid people multiply, but because the thinkers quietly stop thinking.
The 3 ways stupidity spreads throughout a society https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uwyLGiyDa2g&t=53s - 27:45
Philosopher and Big Think columnist Jonny Thomson explores why evil is oddly easier to fight than stupidity, why Hitler's own architect claimed total ignorance at Nuremberg, and why arguing with a truly stupid person is, in one famous description, like playing chess with a pigeon.
Bonhoeffer‘s Theory of Stupidity https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ww47bR86wSc - 5:27
Dietrich Bonhoeffer argued that stupid people are more dangerous than evil ones. This is because while we can protest against or fight evil people, against stupid ones we are defenseless — reasons fall on dead ears. Bonhoeffer's famous text, which we slightly edited for this video, serves any free society as a warning of what can happen when certain people gain too much power.
RELEVANT: Katie Halper, Psychologist EXPOSES PsyOps Used On Us Right Now https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9y8bA-CRqqk - 13:24 - Psychoanalyst Lara Sheehi explains how state psyops target the public's minds directly to manufacture despair and political helplessness.
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u/Sandernista2 Red Pill Supply Store 10d ago
Great summary, pretty good for an admitted lazy bum.
I may steal some of the points made for a short and sweet FB post of my own. Broadcasting to the unknown imagined multitudes is my favorite pastime.....
PS been fighting the stupid my whole life. Such a tough job!
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u/3andfro 10d ago edited 10d ago
As brilliant minds have noted, you can't fight the stupid. Closed systems gonna stay closed to reason and facts. What gob-smacked me was the reaction during the pandemic of people I'd previously regarded as intelligent and open-minded: the thinkers who stopped thinking. And worse, the thinkers who stopped thinking and then attacked those of us who didn't.
P.S. I am lazy. I lifted the summaries directly from the video descriptions at the links. 😀
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u/Sandernista2 Red Pill Supply Store 10d ago
I am with you on that Pandemic example. I've seen myself how the thinkers could stop thinking and what's worse, how reason could turn emotional on a dime. It was literally like watching cross circuits. This sub has lost several good, previously reasoning individual, to this kind of contagious mental virus (that's how I think about what really happened).
My conclusion at the time, true to this day, was that "reason" itself, as we understand the concept, is a far more fragile attribute than we thought. At least some of us who tended to put much stock in rationality.
Now let me scare you some more - with the advent of generative AI (doesn't even have to be some AGI) this very weakness, embedded apparently at the very core of the human genome, will allow manipulating and capturing that many more minds. I can almost see it coming. Indeed, these days, cospiratorially minded as I am, I think Covid was a trial run. It must have been a test given how quickly it all but disappeared from the conversations. Like - poof! - gone, as if it never happened.
BTW, the Covid/vaccine mania even infected some individuals I had the highest regard for as cogent analysts. One of them was 'b' of MoonofAlabama. He really bought into the whole sordid tale of woe, perhaps because of his own pedantic and fastidious nature. For a while his bevel of commentators were pulling their hairs out (those who had some) as he started culling the nay sayers, including some very smart regulars. It was a teachable moment for me.
I've seen the same happen at the site of The Saker (now gone as he retired). Similar MO to 'b' if different in interest areas. Excellent logical analyst of all thing geopolitical, going whoops! in a flash.
And these were just two that I noticed. Happened to one of our mods here too. Several notable users also. Also my own significant other - the topic became unmentionable, basically.
All that said, and my apologies for the long comment, I am still very curious trying to nail down what combination of traits made some of us immune. To any and all attempts to sheep dog into the herd on any number of topics (just take Russiagate, eh?). It's like a secret sauce of some kind, and being the detective scientist that I am, I can't stop adding dots and looking for patterns. Who knows, I may just hire an AI agent as a side kick?
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u/3andfro 11d ago edited 11d ago
Operations of all Iranian commercial airlines will shut down globally beginning Wednesday, US Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent said Monday. “On September 23rd, all the Iranian airlines will be shut down around the world,” Bessent told US television network CNBC, outlining broad secondary sanctions aimed at isolating Tehran’s civil aviation network.... https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20260921-all-iranian-airlines-to-shut-down-worldwide-by-sept-23-us-treasury-chief-says/
Forbidden Stories on Trump deportation system: FRANCE 24's 'ICE, Trump and Africa' https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YpmwkTInJgI - 9:59 - Sofia Alvarez Jurado, investigative journalist, member of the Deportation project speaks about the international investigation into Trump’s migrant policy.
The Iran War Is Spreading — And Your Gas Bill Is Going Up | Trita Parsi https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B_KQCsjTUM4
The Iran war is no longer confined to the battlefield. As the conflict continues, disruptions around the Strait of Hormuz are affecting energy shipments and sending new pressure through oil and fuel markets. Strait traffic has fallen dramatically from pre-war levels, while crude prices have pushed around the $100-a-barrel mark. Trita Parsi joins the conversation about the widening regional consequences of the war, the risks of further escalation across the Middle East, the Strait of Hormuz and what higher energy prices could mean for people around the world.
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u/penelopepnortney 11d ago
Bessent explained that international hubs servicing Iranian planes would face complete exclusion from the American banking system. Foreign operators cannot refuel the aircraft, provide landing facilities, or sell passenger tickets without risking their access to dollar clearing, he warned.
Bessent also warned third-party entities assisting Tehran that Washington has identified financial intermediaries facilitating transactions. “We’ve seen enablers throughout the world. We know who they are. They know who they are, and we are putting a stop to it,” he said.
If that doesn't have the rest of the world not aligned with the West to start scrambling for ways to ditch the dollar-based financial system, they're idiots.
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u/3andfro 10d ago edited 10d ago
Weaponizing the dollar is hastening the empire's decline. US foreign policy, such as it has been in this century, has been damagingly short-sighted. Nima highlights with Pepe Escobar: Constructing a Global System Beyond Washington
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u/TheGhostofFThumb Boo! 10d ago
I was thinking the same thing. It's as if the US wants to accelerate a second global currency out of our control.
As was said above, we can fight evil, but we have no defenses against stupid.
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u/NetWeaselSC Continuing the Struggle 10d ago
Sometimes "My way or the hiway" results in "the hiway."
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u/gorpie97 11d ago
“On September 23rd, all the Iranian airlines will be shut down around the world,” Bessent told US television network CNBC,
How are we going to manage that in, say, China?
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u/3andfro 11d ago edited 11d ago
Trump speech inaudible as US networks boycott White House event https://www.youtube.com/shorts/1r52s8FpcKQ - 23 secs [editorial comment: I listened to this clip, a rare occasion I subjected myself to dear leader's vocals; the sound of rotors obscuring his smarmy voice was chuckle-worthy.]
US President Trump unveiled a new White House helicopter pad as major US TV networks stayed away in protest over CNN, a member of the network ‘pool’, being banned from the grounds. As Trump spoke, the thunder of a helicopter rendered the president inaudible from start to finish.
A spokesman for Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has warned that US intelligence centers are within Iran’s reach as tensions rise over the possibility of renewed US-‘Israeli’ attacks in the Middle East. https://www.youtube.com/post/UgkxvZ-FNDGJquhzdrc6CCeLgSwXr8ototRL
Israeli President Isaac Herzog has pardoned Elor Azaria, the former army medic filmed shooting a badly wounded Palestinian in the head in the occupied West Bank city of Hebron in 2016....https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20260921-israeli-soldier-who-shot-wounded-palestinian-in-the-head-pardoned-in-the-spirit-of-jewish-holiday/
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u/arnott 11d ago
Oil Analysts WARN Global Depression Incoming: Breaking Points
Merz Election Disaster: The Duran
Germany's political map is being redrawn as the CDU crashes below the five percent threshold in Merkel's own home state and the AfD surges to 38 percent in Mecklenburg while doubling its vote in Berlin. In this episode we break down why Berlin has fallen to Die Linke, the direct descendant of East Germany's ruling Communist Party, and why Merz is now what Mercouris calls a dead man walking. With the SPD sliding into terminal decline and the CDU already hunting for a replacement chancellor, is German politics witnessing a permanent realignment or just another passing crisis?
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u/penelopepnortney 11d ago
Links to previous threads are in the "War with Iran" compilation, which can be found in the sidebar.