Old Creepy Joe. Just getting it done
- Thread starter Bushay
- Start date
mr merlin
EOG Master
About as significant as me going out on my lawn and screaming about biden,
mr merlin
EOG Master
Apparently the indians are buying russian crude and reselling it to europe. The question is, is that hurting the russians or the europeans, or both? Certainly india is coming out ahead.
You might say, well, the russians are coming out behind, because they're selling their oil cheap/cheaper. BUT if there were no sanctions the worldwide price would be lower across the board, so therefore russia would be getting roughly the same price they are now, but europe is the one paying more for their own sanctions.
the indians are sharp. They do not need the oil. Maybe later in the year .
In Russia, Far-Right Nationalists Offer Rare Criticism of Kremlin’s War Effort
Nationalist figures and pro-war bloggers are among few critics of Russia’s poor battlefield performance in Ukraine
In Russia, nationalist figures and pro-war bloggers volley criticism at the Kremlin for failures and missteps by Russian forces in the war in Ukraine. Their narrative contradicts the version promulgated by the Kremlin, which otherwise has suppressed negative coverage of Russia’s performance.In Telegram channels, critics who generally support Russia’s campaign in Ukraine are faulting the government of Russian President Vladimir Putin for Russia’s inadequate preparation for the war, an unnecessarily high rate of casualties and the slow pace of Russia’s offensive.
“While the Kremlin continues to slowly chew the usual snot, our respected Ukrainian partners are matter-of-factly destroying everything they can reach,” wrote Igor Girkin, a far-right nationalist, after Ukrainian forces struck Russian targets with U.S.-supplied weapons in July. “The failure of the Russian military strategy in Ukraine is obvious,” he said earlier this month.
Mr. Girkin, who commanded pro-Russian separatist forces in 2014 seeking to break the Donbas region from Ukraine’s control, is among the most vocal critics of the Russian performance in the war.
Such voices—many urging the Kremlin to become more aggressive in Ukraine—could lay the groundwork for a military draft, which Mr. Putin so far has avoided, according to analysts.
“A lot of these commentators complain that the Russian government doesn’t go far enough,” said Rob Lee, a senior fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute. “If Putin decides to escalate the war, they will support it, they would be happy with that. In that regard, they would be useful to the government.”
“Putin probably realizes that there are big military failures you can’t deny,” Mr. Lee said. “There has to be an outlet for it. Maybe, as long as it’s directed at the military leadership, rather than political leadership, it’s fine.”
Mr. Putin held a closed-door meeting with military correspondents in June, according to Russian state media.
The Kremlin didn’t respond to a request for comment.
The pro-war critics don’t toe the official Kremlin line that the war is going according to plan. They call the conflict a “war,” rather than as a “special military operation,” as required by the Kremlin, and they mock some of the Russian Defense Ministry’s obfuscations.
Earlier this month, after explosions rocked an air base in Crimea—an area of Ukraine illegally annexed by Russia in 2014—the Russian Defense Ministry claimed that ammunition at the base detonated. The ministry also said that no aircraft were damaged and that there were no injuries on the Russian air base there.
“If this was a fire, then it was a very shameful fire. Jokes aside, I bet on a strike by cruise missiles,” wrote Roman Saponkov, a war correspondent embedded with Russian troops in Ukraine. Mr. Saponkov didn’t respond to a request for comment.
A popular pro-Russia Telegram channel called “Voennyi Osvedomitel,” or “War Informer,” posted a photo of a destroyed plane at the air base and reported on injuries and a death caused by the explosions, citing local officials.
Later, satellite images showed extensive damage to aircraft on the base.
The U.K. Defense Ministry said the explosions resulted in the loss of eight combat jets but said the original cause of the blasts wasn’t known.
Telegram is one of the few information spaces easily accessible to Russians that offer a variety of views on the war. In Russia, critical commentary by think tanks and universities is censored, according to Mr. Lee. State-backed media dominate Russian news outlets and only very rarely allow any acknowledgment of Russian weakness.
“In two days of fighting in the conditions of “open fields” I lost five [fighters] irretrievably, while seven were wounded. In terms of those killed, that’s a higher count than in the three months in the battles for Mariupol,” wrote veteran Donbas commander Alexander Khodakovsky on his Telegram channel earlier this month. The post received more than 2 million views.
Russia’s Ministry of Defense said in March that 1,351 Russian soldiers have been killed in the conflict, a figure it hasn’t since updated. The Pentagon thinks as many as 80,000 Russian service personnel have been wounded or killed.
Mr. Khodakovsky said that the high casualty rate is coming with modest results, blaming the Russia’s top-down military chain of command that has stalled decision-making and the delivery of needed weapons.
“And so our offensive is thwarted, and so our defense is broken. It’s not a subjective factor, it’s how the system is set up,” Mr. Khodakovsky wrote. “It is obvious to everyone that we were less prepared for the operation than we would have liked,” he wrote in July.
Mr. Khodakovsky couldn’t be reached for comment.
Criticism by pro-war and pro-Russian commentators intensified last month, after a Russian offensive in the eastern Ukrainian region of Donbas slowed to a crawl.
The pro-war voices also expressed outrage that Ukraine began using U.S.-supplied multiple-launch Himars rocket systems and other precision weapons to hit Russian ammunition depots and command centers.
Western artillery systems unpleasantly surprised us with their range, accuracy, and variety of modern ammunition,” Aleksandr Sladkov, a correspondent for Russian state television channels, who has close to 900,000 followers on Telegram, wrote in a post on Aug. 2. In the post, he compared pros and cons of Russian and Ukrainian weapons systems.
Mr. Sladkov declined to comment.
Mr. Girkin, who has faulted the Kremlin for what he says was a lack of support for his Donbas initiative in 2014, is especially critical.
Mr. Girkin called for severe punishment of Russia’s top military command, including the Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, in response to the Himars strikes by Ukrainian forces. If Mr. Girkin were in Mr. Putin’s shoes, “most likely they would not have gotten away with just a firing squad,” Mr. Girkin said in a video posted on his Telegram channel last month. He has also criticized Mr. Putin directly, a potentially dangerous gamble in Russia.
Mr. Girkin says he feels compelled to continue speaking out to help Russia achieve its goals.
Mr. Girkin, along with three others, has been charged in a Dutch court in connection with the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight MH17 over eastern Ukraine in 2014 and the murder of 298 people on board. He has denied the charges.
Mr. Girkin has built his Telegram audience to more than 430,000 followers from around 15,000 before the war, according to Telemetrio, an analytics service for Telegram channels. He is a former reserve officer of Russia’s Federal Security Service with monarchist and imperialist views, and a leader of a Russian nationalist organization called Novorossiya Movement, or New Russia Movement, that advocated for Russia’s expansion in Donbas and other areas uniting what he refers to as Russian people, according to Mihai Varga, a lecturer and researcher at the Institute for East-European Studies at Freie Universität Berlin, where he studies right-wing movements.
Mr. Girkin has also condemned the Russian military for indiscriminate civilian attacks in Ukraine.
The pro-war voices provide valuable information on the war’s progress for Western analysts.
“We monitor them not only because they provide a different perspective than what we see from the Russian Defense Ministry. They also provide us with on-the-ground footage,” said Kateryna Stepanenko, a Russia researcher at the Washington, D.C.-based Institute for the Study of War, a research organization. Sometimes “reading Girkin feels like I’m reading my own assessments,” she added.
The military bloggers also serve as a voice for fighters on the front who might feel that their commanders aren’t responsive to their needs, said Frederick W. Kagan, director of the Critical Threats Project at the American Enterprise Institute, a conservative think tank.
Telegram blog Rybar posted a letter on Aug. 15 that it said came from a Russian soldier fighting in Ukraine, who complained about the lack of modern equipment. The soldier wrote that most units have old armored vehicles that are of poor quality and break down.
The only criticism the Russian government appears to tolerate comes from the band of pro-war bloggers, analysts say. So far Mr. Girkin and other military bloggers haven’t been censored, despite a new law that bans discrediting the Russian armed forces. Mr. Putin’s government has opened thousands of criminal cases against critics of the war.
wsj
boston massacre
EOG Master
Treason In The White House !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
How Much Of The U.S. Has China Already Infiltrated Right Under Our Noses?
Through land grabs, media partners, and spies, the Chinese assault is less of a swift invasion and more of an endless infiltration.
Numerous pieces have been published discussing the inexorable rise of China, and the likelihood of the Chinese economy overtaking the United States’ economy. More concerning, though, is the fact that Chinese companies closely aligned with Beijing are directly influencing operations in the United States. They are buying up land, influencing news and media networks, and shaping the narratives on college campuses. The Chinese assault is less of a swift invasion and more of an endless infiltration.
Land Grabs
Fufeng Group, a company with close ties to the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), recently acquired 300 acres of prime farmland in North Dakota for $2.6 million. China now owns well over 192,000 agricultural acres in the United States.On July 25, obviously concerned by Fufeng’s purchase, Doug Burgum, the governor of North Dakota asked the U.S. Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen and U.S. Defense Secretary Lloyd Austin to “provide clarity on whether this land purchase has national security implications.”
Burgum’s fears are most definitely warranted. Over the last decade, Chinese ownership of farmland in the United States has increased dramatically. To compound matters, only a handful of states ban foreign ownership of farmland. Since 2016, a mysterious billionaire by the name of Sun Guangxinhas spent tens of millions of dollars buying land in Texas. Sun’s ties to the CCP are well known.
In truth, Chinese ownership of American farmland is just one part of the disturbing equation. Residential real estate is the second part. China now accounts for roughly a quarter of total foreign investment, in U.S. residential real estate, according to Market Watch. The Chinese are now the largest foreign buyers of U.S. homes and this has been the case for close to a decade.
Chinese Media Partners
The next step in Chinese infiltration involves corporate media. Take CNN, for example. It’s owned by CNN Global, which is part of Warner Bros. Discovery. This multinational mass media and entertainment conglomerate has close ties to China.Three other highly influential networks, NBC News, CNBC, and MSNBC, are owned by Comcast. As Harold L. Vogel, a former professor of finance and economics at Columbia, wrote last year, Comcast’s reliance on the Chinese market cannot be emphasized enough. From “major feature film releases to a theme park, and to NBA basketball games,” Comcast is beholden to the CCP.
Furthermore, Comcast owns Universal Pictures. In 2016, Universal announced that it was partnering with Perfect World, a Chinese entertainment company. It has co-financed dozens of movies with Universal, including “Jason Bourne” and “The Northman“, one of the biggest movies of 2022. The Chinese connection runs even deeper. Last year, Universal Studios opened a theme park in China’s capital, Beijing.
Then, there’s ABC News, owned by The Walt Disney Company. The American multinational may very well be headquartered in Burbank, California, but it can currently be found residing in China’s pocket.
Spies on College Campuses
Ownership comes in many forms. It’s not just farmland, real estate, media empires, but also ownership of minds. This is where Confucius Institutes come into play. These public educational and cultural promotion programs are funded and arranged currently by the Chinese International Education Foundation, a shady organization affiliated with the CCP.During his time in office, Donald Trump made a genuine effort to close as many of these institutes as possible. However, despite warnings from numerous Republican lawmakers, the Biden administration undid some of Trump’s work. According to a recent piece published by Voice of America (VOA), at least 28 institutes that were previously closed have recently reopened under new names.
As the VOA piece notes, On July 1 of last year, “one day after its Confucius Institute closed, the College of William and Mary established the W&M-BNU Collaborative Partnership with Beijing Normal University.” The Chinese university, we’re told, “was the American school’s former Confucius Institute partner.” Nothing, it seems, has changed but the name. New face, same dangerous ideas and philosophies.
The Daily Signal recently reported the CCP-backed institutes have simply rebranded themselves. They have “retained their function of promoting the interests of the Chinese Communist Party in the United States.” These institutes are synonymous with espionage. According to Christopher Wray, the 8th and current director of the FBI, Chinese spying in the U.S. has become so problematic that the FBI now launches at least two counterintelligence investigations every day in an effort to nullify the threat from Beijing.
How did we get here? How did we get to a place where a country that never tires of threatening the United States now molds the minds of students across the country, shapes the narratives dished out by major media outlets, and owns huge amounts of American farmland and real estate?
Would the CCP allow the United States to influence China in a similar manner? No, of course not. A lethal mixture of inattention, nonchalance, and poor policies has landed us in the hottest of waters. Cutting the Gordian knot won’t be easy. In fact, it might prove to be impossible.
kane
EOG master
Georgia GOP senatorial candidate and former Georgia Bulldogs star running back Herschel Walker has a history of verbal gaffes, nonsensical language, factual inaccuracies, and a blatant disregard for the truth. And Walker was at it again with a combination of all of those on Saturday.
Walker recently declined an invitation to participate in a debate on Oct. 13 in Macon against Georgia Senator Raphael Warnock. His reason for declining is puzzling, to say the least.
Here's the reason why he's backing out of the debate, see if it makes sense to anyone:
“I’m not going to respond to anything because you know that’s not a debate, and you know that,” Walker told 13WMAZ. “You’ve got people that are contributors to his campaign and it’s in this room that only two people gonna see it on a Sunday night, I think. NFL Football, I am giving you an opportunity to be statewide so everybody can see what it is, see the contrast between the two of us. I don’t know how you can ask for anything better.”
Walker recently declined an invitation to participate in a debate on Oct. 13 in Macon against Georgia Senator Raphael Warnock. His reason for declining is puzzling, to say the least.
Here's the reason why he's backing out of the debate, see if it makes sense to anyone:
“I’m not going to respond to anything because you know that’s not a debate, and you know that,” Walker told 13WMAZ. “You’ve got people that are contributors to his campaign and it’s in this room that only two people gonna see it on a Sunday night, I think. NFL Football, I am giving you an opportunity to be statewide so everybody can see what it is, see the contrast between the two of us. I don’t know how you can ask for anything better.”
ZzyzxRoad
EOG Dedicated
mr merlin
EOG Master
No, sanctions were a choice, they didn't have to enact them and could reverse them at any time.
Sanctions cant possibly work if you cant get enough nations to go along and enforce them. 85% of the world rejects sanctions, so they failed, period.
The US cant push nations around anymore, the days of threatening more sanctions against anyone who disagrees with us are over.
We now have sanctions on russia and iran, how did that work out? there's talk of sanctioning china because of potential trade with russia and taiwan threats, india because of trade with russia, turkey because they wont hop to our tune. The list goes on and on.
No nation needs to trade with us anymore because we're not dominant in any area except the military anymore. Threatening sanctions implies they're losing something important, no nation believes that, they dont need our money or our trade, and they certainly dont need our lectures.
russia broke international law. Russia signed an agreement and did not honor what they signed. They are no different than the people that rob 7-11 and want free candy
mr merlin
EOG Master
ridiculous, did we break international law when we invaded dozens of countries?
mr merlin
EOG Master
How about the minsk accords?
russia had no business attacking ukrane.. now both sides spending billions. The side that runs out of money/ men loses
mr merlin
EOG Master
Russia is right, we are wrong, russia represents good, we represent evil.
There's no discussion, no debate, these are simple facts.
Russia will not run out of men when they are taking few losses, likewise they wont run out of money because they are not buying weapons, they are making them.
mr merlin
EOG Master
Russia is a united nation like they haven't been since the 2nd world war, meanwhile we are more divided than ever. We stand no chance backing Ukraine, none.
boston massacre
EOG Master
How's That Drug Addict Scumbag Doing, That You Voted For, For Governor Of Florida ?
DeSantis Beat That Drug Addict POS, That You Voted For.
Best Governor In America.
You Vote For Slime Ball Sewer Rats.
Go Join Them.
Florida Would Have Been A Disaster With That Piece OF Slime In Office.
mr merlin
EOG Master
Dugin is the former chief editor of the pro-Putin Tsargrad TV network, and has been often portrayed in Western media as being a 'mastermind' of the Ukraine invasion, as well as an intellectual / philosopher who's had a large influence in Russia's post-Soviet nationalism.
Alexander Dugin and Darya Dugin, via Telegram
In an Instagram post, Denis Pushilin, head of the Donetsk People's Republic in eastern Ukraine, called it an 'attack' by 'vile villains,' adding "The terrorists of the Ukrainian regime, trying to eliminate Alexander Dugin, blew up his daughter... In a car. Blessed memory of Daria, she is a real Russian girl!"
"The tenacity of these Ukro-Reich morons is amazing. Everyone, if possible, needs to be home in the next hour," he added.
An alleged photo of the scene was posted to Telegram by "MOW!" Moscow News, with the caption (translated): "All that remains of the blown up car of the daughter of the famous public figure Alexander Dugin on the Mozhaisk highway in the Moscow region. The SUV of Darya Dugina detonated while driving, after which it caught fire."
Check back for updates...
Alexander Dugin and Darya Dugin, via TelegramIn an Instagram post, Denis Pushilin, head of the Donetsk People's Republic in eastern Ukraine, called it an 'attack' by 'vile villains,' adding "The terrorists of the Ukrainian regime, trying to eliminate Alexander Dugin, blew up his daughter... In a car. Blessed memory of Daria, she is a real Russian girl!"
"The tenacity of these Ukro-Reich morons is amazing. Everyone, if possible, needs to be home in the next hour," he added.
An alleged photo of the scene was posted to Telegram by "MOW!" Moscow News, with the caption (translated): "All that remains of the blown up car of the daughter of the famous public figure Alexander Dugin on the Mozhaisk highway in the Moscow region. The SUV of Darya Dugina detonated while driving, after which it caught fire."
Check back for updates...
mr merlin
EOG Master
This will become commonplace theis fall.
[ Photo ]
The owner of a small tomato paste business in Italy received an electricity bill eight times higher than last year, almost one million euros (2022 on the left, 2021 on the right). It plans to close in September.
Sanctions are working
[ Photo ]
The owner of a small tomato paste business in Italy received an electricity bill eight times higher than last year, almost one million euros (2022 on the left, 2021 on the right). It plans to close in September.Sanctions are working
mr merlin
EOG Master
It's always good to see the enemy surrender en masse.
