[First a small announcement: I will contact the “Saker correspondents” over the week-end with details about how we will get organized and the kind of stuff we will do. Over 40 people have responded to my offer and I am happy to announce that we got all five continents covered. Another seven candidates have not answered my request to confirm their desire to participate: “fsd”, “cc”, “sl”, “y”, “aa”, “ov” and “fg”. If you are still interested, please email me over the week-end.]
Listening to Kerry today I went through a series of rather contradictory emotions. First, I felt disgusted, then my disgust turned to anger, then to outright amazement and, by the end, I actually felt rather happy. Let me explain why.
First, of course, my stomach turns every time I hear this prototypical representative of the 1%er plutocracy speaking to the world as if he was some kind of Emperor-schoolteacher scolding a class of rather dumb and unruly kids for their bad behavior and promising them a spanking. We all know that folks like Obama or Baby Bush are just puppets, a mostly empty shell shown to the zombified public as “The President and Commander in Chief” while in reality these guys are basically spokesmen. Not so Kerry. He is in the Dick Cheney or James Baker class, not quite at the top of the power pyramid, but much higher up. These are the folks who step in when the mindless puppet makes a mess and some brains are needed on the frontlines. I find these people profoundly repulsive (though I could not help admiring James Baker’s fantastic diplomatic skills).
My initial disgust turned into rage when I heard Kerry speak such lies that out to make even a politician feel ashamed of himself. Most of what Kerry said could quite literally be turned around by 180 degrees and become true. Even though I am now 50 years old and I have seen all sorts of lies, deceptions, betrayals and falsehoods over the years, I still have a naive voice in me screaming “how can he say that?”, “does he not feel horribly ashamed?”, “how can he live with himself?”. I know. I am naive and idealistic. I just cannot get used to it. Even after 50 years.
Eventually, my rage turned into outright amazement. At this point, I was beyond good and evil, I was marveling at the nerve it takes to go on world-wide TV and basically state that he earth is not round, but triangular, that 2+2=317 and that black is pink with green dots. He even added that it was impossible to turn black into grey, that black was just that, black. At this point I was awed.
And then, suddenly, it hit me. Kerry and the interests he represents are really terrified and frustrated. His statement is a desperate attempt to do what the lawyers call the “last resort rule“. It goes like this: “If you have the law, hammer the law. If you have the facts, hammer the facts. If you have neither the law nor the facts, hammer the table”. Kerry was hammering the table really very, very strongly and that, I realized, was an implicit admission that neither the (international) law nor the facts were on his side. Had the facts or the law been on his side, there would have been no need for table hammering, of course.
His panic and frustration also showed in his rather clumsy attack on the Russia Today TV channel. Here is what he said:
In fact, the propaganda bullhorn that is the state-sponsored Russia Today program, has been deployed to promote – actually, Russia Today network – has deployed to promote President Putin’s fantasy about what is playing out on the ground. They almost spend full time devoted to this effort to propagandize and to distort what is happening or not happening in Ukraine. Instead, in plain sight, Russia continues to fund, coordinate, and fuel a heavily armed separatist movement in Donetsk.
But think about it: Russia Today does not broadcast in Ukrainian or Russian. It broadcasts in English, Spanish and Arabic. The only thing RT does broadcast in Russian are its documentaries on its dedicated website: http://doc.rt.com/on-air/. This is a tiny fraction of what the channel really does and its audience in Russia or the Ukraine is minute compared to the one of the big Russian TV channels. So why did Kerry single our Russia Today? The answer is obvious, of course, it is because Russia Today is a very popular TV channel outside Russia or the Ukraine. According to Wikipedia,
The network’s signal is carried by 22 satellites and over 230 operators, which allows some 644 million people to watch the channel in more than 100 countries. RT America is available to 85 million people in the United States. In 2011 it was the second most-watched foreign news channel in the U.S. after BBC World News, and the number one foreign station in five major U.S. urban areas in 2012. It is also very popular among younger American people, U.S. college students, and in U.S. inner city neighborhoods. In 2013 RT has become the first TV news channel in history to reach 1 billion views on YouTube. According to the Broadcasters’ Audience Research Board between 2.2–2.3 million Britons tuned their televisions to RT during the second half of 2012, making it the fourth-most watched rolling news channel in Britain, behind BBC News, Sky News and Al Jazeera English.
Remember the candid admission of Walter Isaacson, chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors, who openly declared that,
“We can’t allow ourselves to be out-communicated by our enemies, you’ve got Russia Today, Iran’s Press TV, Venezuela’s TeleSUR, and of course, China is launching an international broadcasting 24-hour news channel with correspondents around the world [and has] reportedly set aside $6 -10 billion dollars – we have to go to Capitol Hill with that number – to expand their overseas media operations.”
So there you have it. The problem is not that Russia Today is stirring up the people of eastern Ukraine, the problem is that thanks to Russia Today the people in the West are beginning to see through the official propaganda! That is the real reason for Kerry frustrated outburst.
So, to sum things up:
1) The law is not on Kerry’s side.
2) The facts are not on Kerry’s side.
3) The people in the West are beginning to see through the lies of the propaganda machine.
4) There is nothing the Empire can do about any of that.
If any confirmation of that was needed, it came today with the amazing performance of Mark Levine on today’s CrossTalk show. It’s not on YouTube yet, but you can watch it here: http://rt.com/shows/crosstalk/154788-ukraine-info-war-russia/. Levine turned CrossTalk into CrossShout, another clear case of “table hammering”. Why – for the same reasons as Kerry. Nothing else works for him anymore.
Ever since Putin came back to power, Russia is not playing by the same set of rules as the ones drafted by the Empire. Both in Syria and the Ukraine, Russia has been very carefully but steadily pushing back the international AngloZionist plutocracy and loosening its grip on the planet and this is directly reflected in the impotent rage of Kerry and his fellow 1%ers.
This, I think, is very good news indeed.
Cheers,
The Saker
a meme went around crimea at the time of the referendum, to try to scuttle the referendum using officers daughters….the ip addresses of these were found to be in US or Bahrain:
this is what this youtube commentator says :
‘Для тех, кто не понял прикола.
В марте, еще до крымского референдума, на многих интернет-ресурсах появлялись вбросы в стиле “Я – жена/дочь/сестра офицера, живу в Крыму/Севастополе 10/15/50 лет. Поверьте, здесь всё не так однозначно…” и дальше шел текст типа “на самом деле тут кроме горстки путлерюгенда не хочет в Россию, слава Украине и т.д.”
Когда такие посты от “родственниц офицеров” стали появляться десятками в день, народ на про-российских форумах уже ржал с них в голос, особенно когда обнаруживалось, что посты писались с американских, бахрейнских и других иностранных IP. не имеющих ни к России ни к Украине никакого отношения.
Вбросы продолжались где-то до начала апреля, сейчас их почти нет
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YCBV7lzr1XY
Walter Isaacson is no longer (for over two years) chairman of the Broadcasting Board of Governors.
Where-Wolf said…
“The article by Vltchek reinforces my conviction that the dam has broken.”
I’ve come to the same conclusion and have since been trying to understand what it means for the rest of us and what the best course of action is. How is IT going to affect us in Canada in regards to our savings, pensions, employment and social securities? We’ve seen the global financial elite’s grand rehearsal (bail-ins, capital controls, etc.) in Cyprus. A global crack down on Occupy movement was another rehearsal of coordinated actions by governments’ enforcement arms in developed countries. They are getting ready for the final showdown with their populations in an anticipation of a massive event. The question is how close we are to the “moment of truth”?
Я
Great analysis from G.Duff: Ukrainian Underbelly, the Hidden Combatant
…On April 17, 2014, the New York Times published a story on the de-escalation settlement. The Times is, ostensibly, a bastion of the “liberal press” but, along with CNN, the Washington Post, Daily Beast/Newsweek, Wall Street Journal and other “institutions,” is largely controlled by the Israel lobby in the US and Israeli intelligence.
All Murdoch media operations are entirely operated as Israeli intelligence fronts.
As with the Israeli operations inside Syria, the ability to control media can be and is a vital defense function. No intelligence professional expects a “free press.” In fact, without “ham handed” bumbling on the part of spy/reporters, intelligence agencies would have to actually work.
In this case, the New York Times virtually leaked vital intelligence through its poor quality disinformation tactics.
The Times story by Michael Gordon begins quoting Secretary of State Kerry as characterizing the agreement as a “first step to avert ‘a complete and total implosion’ in eastern Ukraine.” However, within a paragraph, the “Imagineering” begins.
“The agreement, described in a joint statement, does not specifically require Russia to remove the approximately 40,000 troops it has on Ukraine’s border, as Mr. Obama has demanded.”
However, after careful examination of Obama’s statements, nothing even comes close to a “demand,” a term whose diplomatic equivalent is “ultimatum.”
Such terms are not used without care and, in this case, are attributable to systematic misdirection by the New York Times. They weren’t done there, not by a long shot. They immediately hit with another fictional “demand:”
“Nor does it commit Russia to holding direct talks with the interim Ukrainian government, which has been another American demand.”
This is followed by something that leads us further, a trail to Tel Aviv:
“It calls on all sides in Ukraine to refrain from violence or provocative behavior and rejects all forms of intolerance, including anti-Semitism, which Mr. Kerry said had emerged as a worry in eastern Ukraine.”
Least of all, Secretary of State Kerry has never made mention of “anti-Semitism” as a threat in Eastern Ukraine. However, the danger of “anti-Semitism” has been a major concern of both the White House and State Department but not in Eastern Ukraine but in western Ukraine.
The original intercepted communication with Undersecretary of State Victoria Nuland (Nuland and her husband, John Kagan hold Israeli citizenship) outlined specifically how neo-Nazi “anti-Semitic” forces were to be pushed out of the government… –ProPeace
In other words, you have the right to be “secure in your person” except when you are hit by a missile by your own government. The right to be secure only applies if the government seizes you or searches you “unreasonably”. But if it “just” kills you, that’s totally okay.
==================================
In fact, the right to be secure does not apply also if the government seizes you or searches you “unreasonably”.
In fact, no personal right applies against US government.
In fact, the US Constitution has been replaced entirely by a single amendment: “Boys, the government does as he like, whenever, whatever, wherever. That’s all!”.
In fact, a case could be made stating that also no foreign jurisdictions apply against US government.
A few weeks ago the FBI have been able to seize an Ukrainian citizen in Austria for an alleged crime committed in India.
While a US pilot in force to one of the 106 US Military Bases in Italy killed 17 people some years ago, joking with his fighter-toy and cutting the cables of a ropeway, and Italian jurisdiction DID NOT APPLY to him.
You know, they hate them for their freedom and their values…..
@clint 25.4., 21.24
try http://www.chartophylakeion.de/blog/ !
K
Now the Ukrainians say Russia did not violate their air space.
“The Ukrainian coup-imposed acting defense minister, Mikhail Koval, on Saturday told journalists that no violations of state borders by the Russian aircraft or troops have been recorded.”
“Four [Russian] transport airplanes Il-76 were flying along our state border but they did not cross the borderline,” Koval was quoted as saying by Interfax-Ukraine. thus contradicting Washington. They say they Russians stayed on their side of the border.
http://rt.com/news/155084-russia-planes-ukraine-airspace/
Zero Hedge called it right yesterday:
If the following news had been “sourced” by Ukraine news agencies, we would caveat it by saying it is almost certainly propaganda. However, since the source for this AP story appears to be “US officials”, we will only assign a 98% probability to it being propaganda. Hot on the heels of our report that the Russian “Doomsday Plane” had been seen in the vicinity of the Baltic states, we learn of more Russian airborne acrobatics, this time involving Russian fighter jets which flew into Ukrainian airspace a “handful of times over the last 24 hours, in what one called a continued provocation of the heightened tensions in the region.” One, of course, being a “US source” – the kind that was behind the original armed coup in the first place, so one should take this “news” on a somewhat salty basis too.
http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-04-25/russian-warplanes-repeatedly-enter-ukraine-airspace-helicopter-buildup-latvia-surges
And I would be grateful if you let me manage this blog the way I see fit. What you call “religious proselytizers” are already persecuted enough and sneered at in this confused and dysfunctional society without you coming here telling them to go away. I tell them to please come here, Muslim, Hindu, Christian, Jew, Buddhist, Shinto or any other and speak freely without having to worry about some religion-hating bigot condescendingly telling them to shut up. I welcome and encourage an open and free discussion of religious issues and I welcome and encourage the discussion of non-religious issues from a religious point of view.”
Of course it’s your blog and you can do what you want with it. But since in the first place it takes half an hour to find anything, and in the second place you haven’t written anything of factual utility since your last sitrep, don’t expect me to recommend you, Mr “20,000 readers a day.” By the way, doesn’t orthodox christianity frown on lying?
An excellent blog post by Ilargi at The Automatic Earth:
http://www.theautomaticearth.com/debt-rattle-apr-25-2014-is-america-preparing-for-the-wrong-war/
Я
Unknown gunmen land from helicopters, attack checkpoint near Soledar, Donetsk region – militia
http://rt.com/news/155104-soledar-ukraine-military-attack/
“Unknown assailants landed in helicopters and attacked a checkpoint in Soledar city in eastern Ukraine’s Donetsk region, a militia source told RIA Novosti adding that there is a fight going on.
There is no information on the number of casualties.
Soledar is located about 30 kilometers south east of Slavyansk.
The people’s governor of Donbass region Denis Pushilin confirmed to RT that there is fighting in Soledar.
As the unknown men attacked the checkpoint, the militia was forced to retreat, the source told RIA.
The second checkpoint is preparing for attack he said, adding that there are about 50 activists, many without weapons.
“We cannot send reinforcements from Slavyansk as all [forces] are defending the city,” the source stressed.
The militia has blocked the entrances to warehouses storing arms to prevent the National guard forces from confiscationg the weapons, a militia source told RIA.
He added that the warehouses were left over from Soviet times and have in storage only outdated weaponry, such as Mauser, Colts, Degtyarev machine guns, submachine PCA guns but in great amounts.
“Armed men attacked our warehouses storing weapons, we are repelling the attack, there is fighting,” Interfax cites a militia in the people’s self-defense HQ as saying.”
Hi,
can somebody (someone who understands polish and german) please confirm that this article:
http://www.expresszeitung.ch/redaktion/geopolitik/europa/ukraine-polen-hatte-die-putschisten-zwei-monate-vorher-ausgebildet
correctly transports the contents of this article:
http://nie.com.pl/13-2014/tajemnica-stanu-tajemnica-majdanu
?
I can only read the german article and it states, the polands goverment was involved in training maidan-“activists” before the coup and that there are photos to prove this. The german article lacks though more information about further evidence.
Thanks
Paul Craig Roberts in his article today says:
“Unwilling to listen to any more of Washington’s senseless threats, Moscow no longer accepts telephone calls from Obama and US top officials.”
http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2014/04/26/moving-closer-war-paul-craig-roberts/
If this is true, it sounds serious.
Bail in for Ukrainians
http://www.silverdoctors.com/ukraine-proposes-depositor-bail-in-on-deposits-over-100000-hryvnia/
@semper fi 05:30
My reference to your handle did not pre-suppose your being a marine. In fact the quotes come from T-shirts, posters, &c which were popular in the 1970’s and 80’s among disenchanted young men very few of which were ex-marines. The handful of veteran American servicemen I have known well groan at that sort of juvenile chauvinism.
If I was mistaken in supposing that you have lost all hope or trust in the other and that it is naive to trust any leaders, please pardon my error, as I will pardon yours in presuming anyone here wants Russians to harm their brothers. For the most part we recognize that US policy makers are angling for a Fort Sumter or an Alamo to to get the peaceloving cattle lowing for war.
That your “handle is a simple decoy” suggests you have misunderstood our host’s intent and wish to undermine it. I was endeared to Saker and his blog after reading and sharing his fears that the unthinkable from the Russian constitutional crisis of 1993 might be repeated. With few exceptions the denizens of the Vineyard share the belief that geo-politics need not be a zero sum game and that cooperative solutions between the greater and lesser powers are a preferred outcome to the disastrous collapse of the petro-dollar.
You and I could agree to disagree or even each reflect on the other’s position though your decoy approach makes this improbable. That we may part on the best of terms I leave you this:
Εἰρήνην ἀφίημι ὑμῖν, εἰρήνην τὴν ἐμὴν δίδωμι ὑμῖν· οὐ καθὼς ὁ κόσμος δίδωσιν ἐγὼ δίδωμι ὑμῖν. μὴ ταρασσέσθω ὑμῶν ἡ καρδία μηδὲ δειλιάτω.
Brian
is this blog finished now?
A bit off topic but I can’t resist wanting to share this with all of you- I crack up when I watch it
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XHwyF6d7qck
anoyn. said–“In my view it will be difficult since apart from Russia and China all the rest are mainly Western colonial legacies and not true sovereign countries.”
I agree.
India has unelected Pm mm singh because he is a sikh traitor and american agent.
china has imposed president who ows post to machinations of the british who ousted Bo-his rival.
Russia annoyed her allies like iran and syria.
so today Russia has to do it alone-but if it humbles anglos west-then Russia will have hundred of nations willing to be her partner again.
@Where-Wolf: Check this pic of a Tu-95 Bear from the BBC: http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-27157504 . Someone has painted ‘BBC RUSSIA’ on the tail.
The BBC is not written in Latin letter, but in cyrillic. They are actually the Russian equivalents of VVS or “Russian Air Force”
@Rowan Berkeley: don’t expect me to recommend you, Mr “20,000 readers a day.” By the way, doesn’t orthodox christianity frown on lying?
Ouch! That hurts, but what can I do? Ok. I admit. I lied about the 20’000 a day, the real figures are something like 2-3 per day, including you. As for my Christianity it is, as with all religious people, purely a show. In reality, all religious people are all hypocrites and we fully deserve the loathing of the honest atheists out there. But, please, *PLEASE!!* – I beg you – do not stop recommending my blog or I will even lose the few readers I have. Without your precious recommendation, I am finished. So I appeal to your atheistic sense of justice and compassion and I beg you to give another chance. If you do, I will immediately post one article by Dawkins and I will call you “Sir”. Is that a deal?
@foka:is this blog finished now? LOL! You wish :-)
EVERYBODY: A few rumors I want to dispel.
a) water in Crimea. The problem is irrigation, not drinking. Besides, it hurts the Ukies more, since Crimea was willing to pay for it. Not a big problem
b) Putin weak and Russian military inferior. Don’t worry about Putin, he is not the one sweating right now. He is the one not returning calls. As for the Russian military – you cannot just compare numbers of this and that. The evaluation of a force is totally scenario dependent. Does Russia have what it takes to occupy all of western Europe? No. All of the Ukraine? Yes. Can the US/NATO stop Russia? No. The rest is just feel-good nonsense.
Other than that, I am busy preparing a working plan for the correspondents and, frankly, taking a few hours off to watch the grass grow. Expect a Ukie SITREP by Monday morning at the latest.
Kind regards to all,
The Saker
@Nora
In reply to-
.” You might try it some time, especially before blindly attacking people who do dig beneath the surface and find things you disagree with or are too blinded by hate to see. If you really read the posts and comments on this blog — open your eyes, heart and mind and actually take in what people write and try to understand what they mean”
You expect me to consider your position objectively and without emotion, even though your answer to my position is to call me names and pretend I’m some outlier from a bygone age who’s kind have been long extinct. I might be one of the few voices on here who contradicts your popular perspective. A different perspective from the closed echo chamber you’ve been accustomed to. You could trumpet your anti-American views with all the venom you saw fit back when your audience were just a handful, but you’re on a bigger stage now and shouldn’t be surprised to learn that not everyone shares your views. You can adjust accordingly and mask your venom in the interest of reaching folks like me, and in return receive some semblance of cordiality and dialogue from my end. Or you can keep yelling at me and calling me names and learn the hard way that our differences are real. Did you really expect me to respond with kindness to the lopsided vitriol that passes for a balanced intellectual conversation on here? I’ve been called everything from a baboon, to an “americunt”, by your highly educated cohorts, even saker got in on the act, for just for expressing a contrarian perspective from your orthodoxy. Why should I think you my betters again? I’ve already excused your insults as a deficiency in vocabulary that limits your ability to fully express your emotions so offense taken. A lot of people subscribe to your views including Americans of all stripes, I understand that and I accept it, but just look at the composition of the US military, immigrants of every stripe, hard-bitten survivors who have overcome incredible odds just to bleed for their American dream. You still think men that determined need brainwashing to tear apart America’s enemies, take a careful look. And that doesn’t include the millions outside our military struggling to build their dreams from the bottom up. They arrive on our shores with nothing in their bellies but the desire to overcome. What may seem like a deteriorating country to you, is in actuality a million miles from the squalor of an existence we came from, this is change the American way, study our history. To us this is paradise. And we aim to leave an even stronger America for our posterity. You see Nora, we too are a rising tide, (and you’ll have to learn to live with that too),a tide so strong, even some Americans whose forebears once felt the hunger but are no longer hungry themselves look upon us with derision. We are a nation of about 350million, even if only a quarter feel as I do, you’ve still got a problem. Let’s find common ground for the betterment of our common heritage, or you can keep coming at me with your aggressive tone and get nothing but aggression in return.
Attacks on several block-posts. Prisoners, dead. M-16 found on site. Tactic was the same in all attacks – armed men deploying from helicopters.
http://www.odnako.org/blogs/grazhdanskaya-voyna-v-10-km-ot-slavyanska-nachalsya-boy-opolchencev-protiv-neizvestnih-s-vertolyotov/
grunt,
What exactly are you trying to accomplish here? Not only do I know a LOT more of our history than you’ll ever hope to — and you can take that to the bank — but also, more to the point, I see right through you. Don’t bother me again; you’re not worth my time.
Putting American troops in Eastern Europe was a clumsy move. Today the soldiers are directed at Russia. Tomorrow they may point their weapons at Germany.
Germany will move into the Russian camp.
Saker, you could resolve a lot of the trolling and ethnic slurs tarnishing your blog by simply forbidding any comment on another comment (or commenter), deleting ipso facto any comments that violate this rule. Comments should be for rationally discussing the pros and cons of your articles, not for quarreling and slandering other commenters.
Winter comes again suddenly for Russia’s Urals – http://rt.com/news/155064-april-snowstorm-russia-urals/
No coincidence – Looks like the US cabal has cranked up the HAARP apparatus.
Do they really think the Russians will be concerned by some cold weather???
@Mikhail:you could resolve a lot of the trolling and ethnic slurs tarnishing your blog by simply forbidding any comment on another comment (or commenter), deleting ipso facto any comments that violate this rule. Comments should be for rationally discussing the pros and cons of your articles, not for quarreling and slandering other commenters.
I understand your purpose, but this would also immediately reduce the ability of commentators to speak to each other and that is something I find very important. This blog is not about me delivering lectures from a podium – its about creating a space for intelligent and free discussion which can even take place without my intervention at all. Also, I rather UNDER-moderate than OVER-moderate. And if that means to have to put up with the inevitable imbecile, so what? There are always morons around, no matter where you go, and morons, being morons, don’t have very many argument to present, especially to educated and smart people, so the lash out with personal attacks. So what, let them. The French say “the dogs bark, the caravan passes”. Same here, let them bark, but we can continue going forward.
Does that strike you as a very misguided approach? Am I too naive or to permissive?
Kind regards,
The Saker
PS: also consider this: what have the trolls achieved so far? They have ridiculed themselves. So they deposit their droppings here, and then they have to leave anyway because their credibility is road kill. One even had to come back to post as “anonymous”. So they come, and get beat. And they come again, and get beat again. Eventually they get it. They too shall pass :-)
Sacker, you said, “My initial disgust turned into rage when I heard Kerry speak such lies that ought to make even a politician feel ashamed of himself. . . . Even though I am now 50 years old and I have seen all sorts of lies, deceptions, betrayals and falsehoods over the years, I still have a naive voice in me screaming “how can he say that?”, “does he not feel horribly ashamed?”, “how can he live with himself?”. I know. I am naive and idealistic. I just cannot get used to it. Even after 50 years.”
Saker, I’m about 25 years older than you, retired lawyer and economist–retired out of disgust. Trust me, you can eventually get used to it!
On your recommendation I watched Kerry’s speech (his spectacle) and was completely unmoved by it. I had expected nothing from it and got one hundred percent of my expectation fulfilled. These are not men (or women) in the governments of the west, they are gerbils.
The lies are endless, as is the depravity of spirit. I expect that’s why Putin has stopped taking calls from Obama: Who wants to hear nothing but heavy breathing on the other end of the line?
For a while I’m sure Putin asked Obama the age-old question, “Will you respect me in the morning.” Now that he knows the answer to that question, I’m sure Obama has been removed from his speed dial.
Good piece up at Voltaire.net on NATO’s Incremental Absorption of Ukraine
http://www.voltairenet.org/article183470.html
If Lavrov gets the same propaganda lines on the phone from Kerry/Obama that they feed us through the MSM, then how depressing that must be for the Russians if they are trying to hold a real discussion with the USA.
That would explain the story that the Russians are no longer wasting their time taking US calls.
*
It is also likely that the US is wary of talking on the phone after Russia has released key wiretapped chats by US state dept. officials.
I think even the unwashed masses are starting to “get it”. Not all of them. Not by a long shot, but I find that when I get into chats with average Joes we are of like minds about what it happening to this country.
Saker, your insights are golden in these poisonous times. Here is a rant from George Carlin, a man far ahead of his time:
“There’s a reason for this, there’s a reason education sucks, and it’s the same reason it will never ever ever be fixed. It’s never going to get any better. Don’t look for it. Be happy with what you’ve got… because the owners of this country don’t want that. I’m talking about the real owners now… the real owners. The big wealthy business interests that control things and make all the important decisions. Forget the politicians. The politicians are put there to give you the idea that you have freedom of choice. You don’t. You have no choice. You have owners. They own you. They own everything. They own all the important land. They own and control the corporations. They’ve long since bought and paid for the Senate, the Congress, the state houses, the city halls. They got the judges in their back pockets and they own all the big media companies, so they control just about all of the news and information you get to hear. They got you by the balls. They spend billions of dollars every year lobbying. Lobbying to get what they want. Well, we know what they want. They want more for themselves and less for everybody else, but I’ll tell you what they don’t want. They don’t want a population of citizens capable of critical thinking. They don’t want well-informed, well-educated people capable of critical thinking. They’re not interested in that. That doesn’t help them. That’s against their interests. That’s right.
They don’t want people who are smart enough to sit around a kitchen table and think about how badly they’re getting fucked by a system that threw them overboard 30 fuckin’ years ago. They don’t want that. You know what they want? They want obedient workers. Obedient workers, people who are just smart enough to run the machines and do the paperwork. And just dumb enough to passively accept all these increasingly shittier jobs with the lower pay, the longer hours, the reduced benefits, the end of overtime and vanishing pension that disappears the minute you go to collect it. And now they’re coming for your Social Security money. They want your fuckin’ retirement money. They want it back so they can give it to their criminal friends on Wall Street. And you know something? They’ll get it. They’ll get it all from you sooner or later ’cause they own this fuckin’ place. It’s a big club and you ain’t in it. You and I are not in the big club.
The table is tilted, folks. The game is rigged and nobody seems to notice. Nobody seems to care. Good, honest, hard-working people: white collar, blue collar, it doesn’t matter what color shirt you have on. Good, honest, hard-working people continue — these are people of modest means — continue to elect these rich cocksuckers who don’t give a fuck about them. They don’t give a fuck about you. They don’t give a fuck about you. They don’t care about you at all! At all! At all! And nobody seems to notice. Nobody seems to care. That’s what the owners count on. The fact that Americans will probably remain willfully ignorant of the big red, white and blue dick that’s being jammed up their assholes every day, because the owners of this country know the truth. It’s called the American Dream, ’cause you have to be asleep to believe it.”
Amen, George! R.I.P.
Saker – I am sure that you are very busy, but you must know that the continued success of a blog is dependent on frequent updates.
People come here daily to read your thoughts and analyis in your Sit-Rep.
It is oxygen for people who are suffocating on lies and un-inspired state propaganda.
@Anonymous: I am sure that you are very busy, but you must know that the continued success of a blog is dependent on frequent updates.
Anybody unhappy with the frequency of update here is welcome to look for a better blog elsewhere. I am just one 50 year old guy, and even I need to take a break sometimes. Today I took my FIRST break (just a few hours) in several months and I immediately get a complaint. There was nothing much happening in the Ukraine and I needed to take a few hours for myself, must I apologize for that?
Sometimes I really don’t understand my fellow human beings…
The Saker (now going to sleep, if I may)
What you must remember is that Kerry is a social psychopath he really believes what he says. In conversation with a psychopath if you endeavour to refute what they say they start to shout you down and get angry. In such a situation best to walk away and probe from a distance as you do with your blog.
@what have the trolls achieved so far? They have ridiculed themselves. So they deposit their droppings here, and then they have to leave anyway because their credibility is road kill.
This is the best course of action. It is important to be always aware of what these people think. They reveal the real intentions of their manipulators.
WizOz
+Espina says
Saker
You’re doing a fantastic job in enlightening us all. Keep on keeping on.
regards Espina
Dear Saker,
Of late I’ve wondered what went on in the mind of Vladimir Vladimirovich through February. Snubbed by many Western leaders and on high alert to terror attacks he nevertheless played the good host at Sochi all the while knowing Russia was under attack. To be honest I watched the athletics intently (especially hockey and aerials) and paid little attention to what I thought was just Orange II. Putin is a big boy and I need not feel sorry for him but what sh*ts the US was to pull this stunt when they thought he was distracted.
This morning while rooting around official news sources in E. Asia I found some items on the Xinhua news service from February that helped to answer my question.
SOCHI, Feb. 7 (Xinhua) — The 22nd Winter Olympic Games opened on Friday night in a spectacular ceremony which was attended by Chinese President Xi Jinping at the invitation of his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin.
…
Russia, for the second time, was President Xi’s first foreign destination of a year. In March 2013, Xi took a state visit to Russia a few days after he took office as Chinese President.
Xi’s appearance at the Sochi Olympic opening ceremony was the first attendance by a Chinese president at a major overseas sports event, signaling China’s strong support for the Olympics and Russia’s efforts to host the Games.
On Thursday, Xi met Putin for talks on bilateral relations as the two leaders reviewed the achievements in the China-Russia ties in the past year, made strategic plans for the bilateral cooperation in the new year and reached important consensuses on the strategic coordination on major international and regional issues.
http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/cnleaders/xjp201402/index.htm
Also this
Interview: Xi’s Sochi visit shows reinforcement of Sino-Russian ties: experts
http://news.xinhuanet.com/english/indepth/2014-02/07/c_133098342.htm
Zbigniew Brzezinski groaned, “You assclowns, when I said to isolate Russia I mean Great Game not playground antics-Russia is not Iraq or C.A.R.”
Saker, I haven’t used email for the last year so I haven’t yet contacted you regarding contributing as a correspondent but I’ll set up an email tomorrow.
By the way, if the half century you’ve mentioned is a recent thing I offer a toast for the occasion: To another half century!!! Mine was a couple years ago and I’ve already noticed that once one gets to be fifty history soon becomes a little less daunting – a century does not seem such a long time anymore. The veterans of the Great War pt I who were present at 11/11 ceremonies when I was a small child still made a striking presence shattered as they were by “the war to end all wars”
Brian
Sometimes I really don’t understand my fellow human beings…
The Saker (now going to sleep, if I may)
==================================
Be merciful, Saker, it’s called “addiction”….
:-)
About Germany coming to the Russian side, well, it would be already great if they finally come to their own side.
This article is spot on:
http://www.veteranstoday.com/2014/04/26/national-referendums-the-more-the-merrier/
I wish also to spend a few words about our tolerant, oh-so-tolerant, atheists.
Today is the Thomas Sunday.
(John 20, 19-31)
I remember once reading Dawkins proposal to take St. Thomas as the patron of scientists, because he asked for evidences to believe.
Poor Richard, however, did forget to mention that St. Thomas not only asked for evidences, HE ALSO DID GET THEM PLENTY!
Not only, after he did not discard them saying that to be a true scientist you need to eliminate God and supernatural from the discourse, as spectacular idiots as Richard Dawkins do claim (thus eliminating Newton, Galilei and almost every great scientist since the beginning of the times from the number of true scientists).
Atheist are logical, oh-so-logical, people. They are the people who walking near the Milan Dome have no doubt that such a mirable construct has to be the work of intelligent being, but facing something a billion time more complicated, as a single living cell, they pretend it to be the accidental result of casual hits of particles, particles coming out from nothing following a wave of cosmic probability (whatever that means).
They will deny the privilege of existence to anything which cannot be established by scientifical process, so denying their own existence (try to demonstrate scientifically, i.e. TO REPLICATE, a human being).
Atheists are rational, oh-so-rational, people. As in a novel by De Sade, they will lecture superstitious people like us about all the irrationality and barbaric features of Christianity, all of this while eating shit!
Exactly so, in that novel they were eating the excrements of the poor soul they were going to abuse, calling at the same all Christian retrograde idiots.
As Chesterton said, when you stop to believe in God, you do not believe in nothing, you start to believe in anything!
Of course, what did you expect denying the Logos?
(cfr. the exceptional work of Jonas E. Alexis: http://www.veteranstoday.com/author/alexis/)
Atheists are also very, very tolerant, I’ve already said that.
Theirs is the same tolerance of the homo-gang, the famous tolerance of Sodom (also known as the inverted tolerance): Either you join the orgy or you get raped.
Atheists are very, very pious people. Their faith is unshakable, completely allergic to any doubt and immune to any fact, a faith so granitic to put ours to shame.
The faith in the Nothing, this bizzarre divinity refuted by her own name.
Atheists will now tell you that life is a language, but nobody invented it (a logical non-sequitur: http://houseofmaedhros.wordpress.com/2014/01/28/the-problem-of-information/).
We superstitious people always have stated that life is a Language, the Word of God!
(John 1, 1-3)
Make your (educated) choice!
Saker says
I watched the Sochi Olympics with trepidation, my gut was telling me something traumatic was going to happen, some staged horrific event, and just like when Putin attended the Beijing Olympics……it did, South Osettia. Bear Baiting seems to be in vogue amongst the western securicrats, i believe they’re going to get a big fright soon. The vast majority of western populations, i think, stay quiet as deep down they worry they’ll be on the wrong side if they espouse what they really feel individually or collectively, they fear being exposed in the event of a western triumph over Russia and Putin. This will change dramatically when the Bear has had enough of being baited and with lightning speed lashes out, fear will then crystallise in europe when faced between a rock and a hard place.My point is that unless or until the western populations minds are focussed on just exactly what the consequences of their lapdog leaders actions are, they’ll keep their heads under their blankets. I live in hope that human consciousness is only in a temporary lull.
Espina Scotland
@ Я and Rowan Berkeley
I agree with the both of you and will refrain from religious comments, unless something needs clarification. This isn’t the place for it and I felt bad immediately after posting the religious comment.
@ Nora and Saker
Thank you for your kindness, much appreciated. I will try and stick to the topic at hand.
@Nora in answer to your questions
Sunni power in Iraq is older than the Ottomans. It was there during the Ummayads and the Abbasids but was crushed by the Mongols under Halaku Khan. He stuffed the last caliph in a donkey hide and ran horses over him. He reportedly killed so many in Iraq (may the eternal blue sky bless his soul) that no major industrial work was under taken for 150 years.
Except for the Bouyads no early age ruling class or clan was Shia. There were sporadic revolts by Mukhtar Al-Thakafi and Zaid ibn Ali but they fettered out. These revolts were not always for power but a reaction to repression. It is only latter that Iranian dynasties such as the Safavids and the Mongol Ilkhans that were Shia came to power. The Ilkhans were originally Pagan/Buddhist then Sunni, but Oltaiju Khan was very impressed by Allama Hilli and converted to Shiasm. The mother of Halaku Khan (spelling is different on wiki) was reported to be a Nestorian Christian, he was Buddhist or shamanistic. He was the last Mongol ruler to have a pagan burial.
Before the Ummayads the struggle was between the ancestors of Mohammad (sawa) for the custodionship of the Kaba. Between the Bani Hashim and the Bani Ummayah. Both from the same tribe of Quraish. It later came to fore during Muhammad’s lifetime and immediately after his death. After the first two caliphs the third promoted his relations, the Umayyads, to such an extent that it cemented their gradual rise to authority.
The demographic shift in favour of the shias has been more gradual.
For names it’s to do with historic figures. The Shia don’t name their children after the bani Umayyah or those companions they despise. Names such as Ayesha, Omar, Walid, Khalid to a lesser degree and Abdur Rehman, Marwan, and Yazid to a greater degree are avoided. Names closer to the family of the prophet are considered better. The best names according to Imam Reza (as) are supposed to be those that show humility to the creator such as Abdullah (slave of God). But this is just their belief.
mindfriedo
Saker and all:
I found this post by Nora a worthwhile read: NATO’s Incremental Absorption of Ukraine
“Ukraine is and for decades has been seen as the decisive linchpin in plans by the U.S. and its NATO allies to effect a military cordon sanitaire severing Russia from Europe.”
http://www.voltairenet.org/article183470.html
Thanks Nora,
T1
@Maedhros
All right, all right, may be it is just that atheists are not as clever as you when it comes to choosing the “Right” God?
So how did you choose?
@hardcore: choosing the “Right” God? So how did you choose?
That is an EXTREMELY important topic, I would say THE most important one of all, and it is also one in which I strongly believe people get confused for the wrong reasons. To give you a half-way decent answer would take at the very least a full post and not the 4025 characters allowed by the comments section. However, I am reluctant to make a full post as the atheists would go bananas with rage again. So here is what I will do here: I will give you some pointers and if you and a few other atheists/scekptics/agnostics are interested, let me know, and I will give a more substantiated answer. Fair enough? Ok – so here are my pointers:
a) there can be only one God, one Creator. (that is axiomatic, but can be logically demonstrated)
b) one cannot “chose a God” but, instead, one has to find out more about Him and His Will.
c) God being Creator He is by definition outside of creation, thus we cannot “study” Him by studying creation or by making logical inferences. However, we can make the assumption that He wants us to know some things about Him. The process by which the “extra-creational” God communicates with his creatures inside creation is called “revelation”.
d) the task at hand therefore is to seek out and analyze God’s messages to us, i.e. to find out and explore His “revelations”.
e) God created us free (again, axiomatic but can be logically demonstrated). He therefore will allow us to accept or reject Him. Since he is hyper-real (having created creation) and omnipotent (by definition), nobody would reject Him if he was aware of His reality. Nobody rejects the existence of the earth or the moon. It would be even more impossible to reject a full manifested God. Thus God gave us the freedom to believe in His existence or not.
f) His revelation to us has to therefore be presented to us in a way which makes it sill possible to reject it. Nonetheless, it is there. Hence the “let he who has ears hear, and he who has eyes see”.
g) His revelation is made to specific individuals called prophets who then pass it on to the rest of us either orally, or in writing, or both. The tasks at hand is then to chose with prophets to believe.
The choices are well-known: the Old Testament prophets of the Septuagint, the Prophet Mohammad and his rendition of what the Old Testament prophets really said, the Rishis from the Veda, the authors of the Upanishads, the Brahma Sutras and the Bhagavad Gita, the Old Testament authors as edited and “corrected” by the Masoretes (basically the Pharisees), Zoroaster, etc.
By the way. To reject them *all* is illogical as that precludes revelation which, in turn, means that God, if He exists, would not make Himself or His will known to us at all. That would make all of theology futile. But the notion of a Creator Who created creation and then simply “left” is logically absurd (that can also be demonstrated).
So here is the interesting question: assuming there is a God, and assuming that He would want to reveal something to us, what characteristics would His revelation have? Just in theory. As a thought experiment. Would it be a one-time thing? Would it be a consistent or a changing message? Could that message be corrupted by humans, whether deliberately or by mistake (that is one of my favorite ones and a REALLY crucial one – think about it carefully)? What would God do about the pesky problem of human mis-interpretation of His revelation?
Ok, I will stop here. If all that is boring gobbledygook, we can stop here. If your interest is piqued by these issues, let me know. If enough skeptics/atheists/agnostics want it, I will be glad to go into more details.
Kind regards,
The Saker
Ian Welsh weighs in:
http://www.ianwelsh.net/if-i-were-a-russian-strategist-id-say-invade-the-ukraine/
Oh! Well…
I am afraid we are not going to go anywhere in a debate of atheism vs religious types: HOW MANY TIMES HAS THIS BEEN PLAYED TO NO AVAIL?
(and well before the Internet for sure :-) )
Since you “politely” presented your arguments I will give you mine which probably roughly match thoses of every atheist who ever been.
First, all your points “beg the question”, they ALL presuppose the existence of God.
Thus there is no point debating the “qualities” or “will” of God before having some plausible reason(s) to suppose its existence.
And for any “true atheist” (not agnostic) there is absolutely NO reason to postulate any “God” because THIS IS NOT AN EXPLANATION OF ANYTHING, it’s plainly devoid of meaning!
Think about it: where does God comes from?
Another super God “created” this one?
Turtles all the way down (I suppose you know the joke).
So me/you/whomever being “too stupid” to understand the whole universe entails that “someone” more gifted “created” it?
See above for the circular argument!
It’s plainly good old paranoia known as hidden agency: if there is an “unexplained” rustle in the bush it could be a tiger or an enemy tribesman, better beware of any murky intent from uncertain “others”.
Ha! Voila! The Devil, but… we are not falling dead at every instant, there are good times too, soo…
There might be not-so-malevolent “others”, better find out and placate “them”…
Etc, etc, etc…
If you take any “sacred text” and go pronounce it unanounced at any psychiatric ward you’ll have no problem being admitted for delusional paranoia.
quote ” the western populations minds are focussed on just exactly what the consequences of their lapdog leaders actions are, they’ll keep their heads under their blankets.”
the same western population who eelcted the most vile war criminal tony blair 3 times and lair bush twice?
in iraq people are dying daily in a large number-who would be captured for this crime? why do the western population not capture those war criminals?
the only way that population will revolt agasint those crimnals is when west is shown to eb militarily-by whatver means-defeated. that is the need of the hour
Will abstain from this argument after this
These exchange took place in the 6th century. They were put forward by Jafar al Sadiq (as)
http://www.al-islam.org/tradition-myrobalan-fruit-hadith-al-halila-imam-jafar-al-sadiq/hadith
Easier and shorter reads are if one googles jafar sadiq atheist or Ali reza atheist.
mindfriedo
Hardcore, there is surely no reason to postulate God if you want to postulate Him with the different names of Chance or Necessity or String.
Only modernity has produced men with the impudence to criticize what they don’t know nor understand. I shall take into consideration this kind of men only when the book I did put on the floor ten years ago will return to its place on the library BY ITSELF!
(admittedly, a task several trillions times less complicated than the work of a single living cell)
For the time being, the book still lies helplessly on the floor….
Saker, I’m not a skeptics/atheists/agnostics, but I’m ready to beg you to write that full (and hopefully veeery long) post.
I guess that we can pretty well survive the (tolerant) rage of people not superstitious like us.
Take your time, but please write it. I’m new here, but I think we share a common background regarding Faith, and yet I’m not able to figure out where you are going from the few hints you gave.
Apart from that, I sense that it’s a topic exceptionally important, as I think that the real matrix of mankind history in the last two millennia is the good ol’ sanhedrin preparing the way for their own messiah, an earthly and worldly king, as the One sent by God did not fit in their delusion.
You may be inaccurate in your analysis of Kerry. He is living in his own “reality tunnel” [what we are SURE to be true, see the late R.A.Wilson’s “Prometheus Rising”] and coping with what inputs are given to him. Imagine a situation in which Kerry believes he is communicating sincerely. What would that imply about what is being fed to him, by Nuland, by the CIA, by Intelligence? About what’s actually going on? Remember that “vampires cannot see themselves in a mirror”. Given this presupposition, how will events progress and what will happen next?
You assume you know he’s lying, in your reality, and therefore he must be bluffing. What if this is not the case? What if he’s serious?
This is a classic example of “The Terrible Dances of Death and Power” as explained by Barry Oshry in “Seeing Systems”, a meta-analysis of how these encounters go down. Humans have been sleepwalk dancing the steps to war for eons, it’s all been done before. It’s as predictable as a Superbowl. Until you can break the rhythm and cause the hypnotized to wake up, the absurd drama is as fore-ordained as The Real Inspector Hound.
Can you please read “Prometheus Rising” and “Seeing Systems”, they are each relevant and worth the time?
Thank you very much for your work.
Although I’m not religious I have a healthy respect for belief and believers.
One of Dostoevsky’s most famous quotes goes as follows:
If God does not exist, everything is permitted,”
This seems to me to be one of the wisest statements ever made. If you do not believe in something bigger than yourself, then you are likely to believe that man can ultimately know the mind of God and is therefore justified in aspiring to God-hood.
This is the core materialistic belief of the scientific West. It is the key to understanding the tragic path of nihilism taken by our civilization. It also goes a long way to explaining the terrible excesses of the 20th and now 21st centuries.
It is also a debate that goes back thousands of years. Judaism is guided by the belief that God demands absolute obediance to His Law — even though we know this Law is written by men. This sets up man as God. Christ held the opposite view: that God is something beyond the Laws of man and therefore demands our faith.
This distinction perfectly encapsulates thousands of years of struggle for truth. It is the fundamental difference between how people think in Eastern vs. Western Christendom. The materialistic West has lifted Science to the status of a religion in the same way Judaism has lifted the Law. The more spiritual East has held on to the idea that man should aspire to goodness instead of God-hood.
I’m not feeling very eloquent today but I think this gets the basic idea across. I think this is the difference between Lucifer and God.
One thing to add:
In Greek Myth, Icarus flew too close to the sun, melting the wax that held his wings and causing him too fall to his death.
I believe this myth is an explanation of exactly this conflict — fly too high and you’re gonna get burnt.
And wouldn’t you know it, scientists say they’ve debunked this myth (ha ha).
Western hubris?
Researchers debunk the myth that Icarus ‘soared too high’
http://zeenews.india.com/news/world/researchers-debunk-the-myth-that-icarus-soared-too-high_926966.html
Where-Wolf, some years ago a Jewish grandee, Abraham Foxman if memory serves, declared that the Nazis, in seeking to exterminate the Jews, were guilty not of genocide, but of deicide, because the Jews are God. I have not been able to find this statement again since, so it may have been a fraud. My memory of it is rather clear, however, and it fits with various declarations of other Rabbinical figures that I have seen since. Naturally I know that many Jews, perhaps a large majority, do not concur with this view, or do so in some less malign form than many of the fundamentalist lunatics. However I do know that the extremists, and their more secular fascist colleagues, are in control in Israel, and in much of the diaspora, to all our great danger.