". . .They are running the Accords logic to its conclusion: every adversary becomes a counterparty, every conflict becomes a deal, every closed economy becomes an investable market." —Patrick Wood
Meanwhile in the background as everyone is distracted, the real agenda is unfolding at breakneck pace:
"…and this is why today I am announcing this government will make a new, free-of-charge, Digital ID mandatory for the right to work, by the end of this parliament. Let me spell that out: you will not be able to work in the United Kingdom, if you do not have Digital ID. It’s a simple as that."
—Current British Prime Minister Keir Starmer
They will never be satisfied until this is your life:
----
Want to drive your car today? I’m sorry you said something the government didn’t like and your social credit score is no longer high enough, your air conditioner was running during the hottest part of the day and now your carbon footprint has exceeded your daily limit, you missed your last mandatory doctor’s appointment and your vaccination status is not up to date, and you live in a 15 minute city so you can walk anyway. 50 credits have been deducted from your CBDC wallet for attempting to access your rented vehicle while failing to meet these criteria.
—deducts credits—
Your bank account is now negative. 50 additional credits have been deducted for your overdraft and your social credit score has been lowered by 100 points for failing to keep a positive net balance.
---
Under no circumstance should anyone ever comply with getting the ID Digital. It will become your panopticonic slave collar if you put this 'one-ring" of power on your finger.
You are so correct, the very smart Vernon Coleman has been warning people of years and it's taken him from being a recognized and revered authority to squashed under the heel of the black boot. Yet, even at an advanced age where he should retire, he keeps sending out the warnings.
Well I was kind of half-serious about the comment, Lugh, but only half. Therefore, love can exist in the half I was not serious about. :D
Sheesh. You're getting kind of mushy these days, no?, or is my memory a bit selective? <3
Give me a hug, I'm pinkish-beige... well, a bit less so at this time of year, what with my being in the sun. Be brownish-beige with subtle salmon undertones I suppose soon enough.
(As if a kissing gourami, Strange Bedfellow extends his lips toward Lugh.)
A true globalist, trying to make his nation fail, so that transnational entities, typically associated with banking, will be in the wings. I don’t know who funds them, but they would be a good bet.
Didn't take long for them to get rolling, did it? As the globalist ship sinks, the strategy must be to ring-fence the Crown holdings and as much of Europe as possible. Then, they'll . . . what? Do they even know?
It's almost like there is a God, and that thumbing your nose at Him for centuries is not all that adaptive.
Sir Keir was ready to step down but his wife won't let him. She knows it's now or never. Break the filthy peasants before they revolt. The Orcs are in the shires. They will be armed and used as reserve troops if necessary.
06/22/26: “There’s evidence that the over-full storage capacity for their oil has already caused damage to their oil wells — because shutting down wells degrades the geology of the underlying oil-bearing rock.”
We heard this every 15 minutes in the days of March and April and then --- inexplicable radio silence until James mentioned it today. Which is much appreciated.
--- A tad less than “two years”: “Keir Starmer … as Prime Minister [held] the position from July 5, 2024 [until] ... He announced his resignation on June 22, 2026, and is remaining in a caretaker role…”
At this point, contestants have been Jeopardy! Champions for longer stints than UK prime ministers…
--- Tell IT! Perfectly summed up: “[T]he feckless Merz in Germany, the wobbling Macron in France, the commie PM Pedro Sánchez in Spain, and Giorgia Meloni in Italy, who double-crossed her voters on ending illegal immigration.”
Nevertheless, the UK’s next four PMs should be Merz, Macron, Sanchez and Meloni.
Each one is Churchill, compared to what’s left on the shelf in London.
Trump made a remark in one of his off-the-cuff spoutings to the effect that "we are taking a lot of oil out of Iran." Made me wonder, rather than getting the tankers moving, if he agreed to take the oil "overflow" to prevent ruining Iran's oil wells. That would be a small cost toward recovery whereas losing their wells would be devastating. At this point, no one could effectively stop the US doing that. Just saying.
06/23/26: Your scenario would hinge on the Iranians realizing that this would bail their asses out. Overall, the ratio of talk-to-known-results right now is so ridiculous, I'm waiting for enough time to pass so that we'll eventually find out what's going on. Vance facing the Iranians must think that he's back in the Ozarks listening to a hog-calling contest.
The increasing contrast between South America and Europe is getting more obvious every day. Our closest neighbors are rapidly shedding the shackles of ultra-leftism and jumping on the conservative bandwagon.
Meanwhile, Europe is doing everything it can to protect the dream of totalitarianism and the push for WW3.
Let's hope they don't bring us all down with them as they have tried multiple times in the last century.
Answer be a question. Why the EU insistence on driving Europe to Islam? Britain, just like portions of the US rust belt, is being destroyed by the socialism inherent to Islam. Why? Is this a verification of Lugh’s opinion that crony capitalism drives humanity towards government control? Towards socialism and eventually Marxism. Was Marx right? Is this the natural order?
Your last sentence. Has the USA pouring trillions of dollars into Europe since WW2 been a way of countering the movement toward European socialism, the USSR until 1991, and that what we are witnessing in the USA right now is a counter movement by European socialists against the US.
It goes back to the origins of the NWO and who is involved - rich elitists. Bankers. People who's names are never mentioned. Echoes all the way back to the French Revolution - did they ever go away? Or did they go underground (secret cabals?) until they could force a different kind of slavery on the masses? The populist intellectuals think socialism will save them. We know how that ends. Revolution? Hard to do without guns because what do elitists have to fear from a populist uprising? People tried it with rivers of pig shit. We saw how that ended. Van der Leyen is still plotting. What else have they got? If a tanker full of small arms were distributed to the patriots in any country, would they actually DO anything? Or does 2000 years of subservience make the population unable to act in defense of their own survival? They did it twice before, but where is that drive now? (LOL Asking for a friend. )
Would love to see that tried in Iran to overthrow the mad mullahs.
80 billion in weapons dumped into Iran instead of the other Islamic cesspool, Afghanistan, might have made a difference since Iran has a mostly educated populace.
The regime has started again to execute dissidents. I do not understand Trump right now. The target was and should be the elimination of the theocracy in Iran. Until it is gone, there is no progress. If we can airlift out Maduro, why can’t we go get Khameini and all the rest of the Iranian mob?
The reports coming out of the “peace talks” are ludicrous. What are we doing? Is Trump’s deal making ego overtaking his common sense? Trump says that the regime is going to allow the removal of the uranium, the regime says, “no way.” Who is talking to whom, this really sounds like a gigantic clusterfuck.
The world would be a much better place if the USA simply followed Founding Fathers George Washington and John Quincy Adams’ sage wisdom: Befriend all nations, trade with all nations, eschew becoming entangled in foreign alliances and conflicts and do not seek monsters abroad to destroy.
"All we are saying is give minding your own beeswax a chance."
Mind your own beeswax, John. This is not your world to keep fudging up. Easy, peazey, lemon-squeezey.
My sense is that Europe is more afflicted with devoted Marxists and progressives than South America. The warning example of Cuba, and the counter example of the US, is also stronger in this hemisphere.
Crony capitalism? You mean like Government and Industry working together? As if the contrary is even possible? As Marx said, Capital centralizes. Fewer and fewer own more and more. But their credo remains personal profit, so they are not fit to rule. Thus the Government must remain on top since personal profit cannot run a society.
Here we go again. Government is the solution to the avarice of people.
Government is a focus amplification of the greed of people. Government hates people. Government wants power period. Government is the target evil of the Revelation, “Babylon”. Lugh, your treatise about government is so false. Competition dilutes economic power, period. The progression of capitalism to cronyism to socialism to either fascism or Marxism is the decline of competition.
The main cause of the movement to corporate or other cronyism is government interference with the free market. That makes people nervous and they turn to guess who, the government. The cause d’etre of the problem.
In this incisive talk, Michael Parenti exposes the "rag-to-riches" mythologies and the "prosperity gospel" of modern corporate capitalism.
He argues that no ruling class rules nakedly; they instead adorn their power with symbols and myths to justify their privileged positions at the apex of the social pyramid.
Why the claims that capitalism creates general prosperity and bolsters democracy are historically inaccurate.
Why the ruling class is the least "self-reliant" group, benefiting from billions in government subsidies, bailouts, and land giveaways.
Capitalist Corporations have given us wonderful things ~ wonderful for them!
@Ben What about the socialism Israel enjoys on our behalf? The billions in welfare we give them each year, with no conditions. I trust you support an end to all forms of socialism, and this is a huge one.
I don't know about Ben but I certainly do . Like food aid to Africa , they just breed more and then you have more of them to feed . Its unnatural and it creates unnatural outcomes .
I'll take the sparsely populated mountains of Utah. Big cities are disgusting. The ever present smell of puke, urine and garbage permeates everything. Not to mention the public defecation, homelessness and crime.
Hopefully Putin will torch all 27 EU Capitals, Amsterdam, Athens, Berlin, Bratislava, Brussels, Bucharest, Budapest, Copenhagen, Dublin, Helsinki, Lisbon, Ljubljana, Luxembourg, Madrid, Nicosia, Paris, Prague, Riga, Rome, Sofia, Stockholm, Tallinn, Valletta, Vienna, Vilnius, Warsaw, and Zagreb, not necessarily in alphabetical order, but a combination of Kinzhals, Zircons, and Oreshniks, should do the trick.
Glassing all the "decision centers", where the "deciders" are, should suffice. Same as the US. The majority of Europeans can take care of business, once out from under the yoke of the deciders. Same as the US. For the umpteenth time, same as every civilization, every day we have two choices; protect our way of life or lose it. We're losing - soon to have lost - our way of life.
Hope they find a way to target the globalist “deciders” while still preserving the European art and architecture. Glass parking lots are aesthetically unappealing.
Agreed completely. Unfortunately, destroying one's own art and architecture is part and parcel of destroying one's own cultural identity - the mission of the Eurotrash Marxist deciders. They have brought in millions to assist in the demolition. Orban was the last holdout - they finally got him.
In downtown St. Augustine, a 140-year-old obelisk that stood in the town square, the Plaza de la Constitucion, was removed as the City Commission knelt to and appeased BLM in 2020. I imagine some culturally important items were removed from Atlanta also. I can assure you, this is not tolerated in Red Square, where cultural identity is sacrosanct.
The EU Marxists are no different than our homegrown variety - out to erase history, so they can tell the children, this is how it's always been. Muslim men have always gang-raped White Christian girls in the UK, get over it. Right after Starmer cleans out his desk, he should be marched to the gallows and hung. Head of the line of all the British MP's.
Unfortunately, I'm embarrassed to admit that have some extended family of that ilk. Suicidal empathy - the new phrasing goes. Another verbal workaround for mental illness.
Don't watch any TeeVee, but from what I hear, the scenery of the show was magnificent. From personal experience, I find Montana & Wyoming hard to beat. The Tetons are in a class of their own. Breathtaking in person.
The whole underlying theme of the show was all about the Dutton family protecting their way of life from those who wanted to take it from them by hook or by crook , or trying to halt the inevitable march of so called " progress" as defined by mostly big moneyed interests coming in and trying to turn Montana into a theme park essentially and driving out the traditional cattle ranchers and so on . Its " progress " so they say , and it may be inevitable but for me it ultimately trends dystopian followed out to its logical conclusions just like revelations in the Bible . Somebody was smart enough to conclude that man, on his own , without a reverence for the transcendent , will end up ultimately screwing himself by going too far .
The Corporations are just acting as they were designed to act: Make money for shareholders. There's no money in traditional cattle ranchers. I guess you forgot about the competition, the law of the jungle stuff. It's right there in Adam Smith.
You're borrowing from our other conversation in which if you go back and reread it , I made a point of not delving into the moral aspects of the a-moral functions of capitalism for the sake of staying on topic . I have already acknowledged that I believe that morality is central to honoring a kind of "good ,true and beautiful " philosophy of human interaction . The point you are still missing I think is that you suppose that those centrally controlling rulers , removed from the necessity to adhere to natural market principles are going to be somehow less capricious or self serving then those who must by neccesity head those natural market forces , while I believe the opposite to be true . Bottom line , cattle ranching is a chosen way of life for people who own their own way of life outright . Forced hostile takeover of their property is by definition immoral , no matter the reason ( progress ) you feel entitled to do it , You must have missed the bill of rights . Another thing to consider is why exactly small family cattle ranching and small farms have become so difficult to sustain as a way of life . The answer , as usual leads back to the government either doing something that was not in its original charter or failing to do something that it should have done , like ensuring corporations don't become too powerful ( which also alludes back to your would 'rulers ' being corrupted by moneyed influence . I also already said all of this was inevitable because man fails to maintain his connection with the transcendent reality ( the very author/ Creator of our morality that works in harmony with the physical laws of our reality . Yeah I know , I went to far down the rabbit hole . In reality ranch and farm life connect people to the earth and forge the kind of character traits that rising cultures embody , whereas the rise of corporate vulturism marks the period dissolution of great cultures, or the decline of culture . I am not an anarchist ,I'm a small government conservative .
Not to worry. Americans will show the Eurotrash how totalitarianism is really done.
Notice that we Americans never seem to celebrate our freedoms more than when we're looking outward.
Turns out our "more perfect union", is nothing more than a federal bureaucracy that enjoys total control over every one of us:
Absolute power, a federal system that can make you disappear, with no semblance of due process. A system that assures that you and I commit, as Harvey Silvergate calls it, 3 felonies a day, just by participating in society.
In the event the bureaucracy decides (and yes, its up to them) to subject you its trial court system, you become a hapless player in a legal theater performance that assures the state will prevail. If the federal system decides to encumber your freedom, except in very rare cases, nobody can save you.
Consider as well, the absolute power by design, of never accountable local district attorneys. They can fabricate whole cloth criminal cases against any one of us. And through commission of false testimony, and omission of truth, send any one of us to a lifetime of prison.
These same district attorneys enjoy iron-fisted control over the application or non application, of criminal laws passed by our elected legislatures. The will of the people is short circuited by the political whim of a few system officials. As a result, America's cities are burning.
And in the rare, extraordinary event that this flawed, even criminal miscarriage of justice is exposed, we're often told by these same DA's that a victim's vindication demonstrates that the system does work...Systemic arrogance. Tyranny is seldom humble.
Nothing personal, but a US citizen, pointing out another nation's lack of freedoms, is like a prisoner bragging that his shackle chains are longer.
Just a question, could it be that the EU, the Europe consortium is playing a game with America? Are they countering the anti-socialistic folks in the US? Does Trump see this and is trying to isolate America from Europe? Is it the reason why he wants to isolate the Western hemisphere?
On our 250 birthday, is it time that the American people realize the Declaration of Independence was America telling Europe to take their monarchies and socialism and shove them where the sun does not shine?
Short answer: Unless of course, there's a buck to be made.
The notion that our government’s international policies are based on political ideology rather than globalist corporate interests, oil and gas, military industrial complex, (surveillance) technology is just precious...
"Let's hope they don't bring us all down with them as they have tried multiple times in the last century."
In the last century + one decade (stretching the period to include the Great War) the European states couldn't bring us down with them. The US had too many natural advantages: prairies and farms rather than blood-soaked fields; ocean-flanked borders instead of creaky gates and Maginot Lines to be bypassed; factories no bombs could reach.
On the surface it looks like we still hold those cards, but it's mostly an illusion -- one that could prove dangerous. Already has been so proven. The world has changed so much, especially in technology. Instant communications and jet travel have condensed time and space to bring us ever closer to One World (but not in the way Utopians of previous generations imagined).
The isolationists between the world wars understood we didn't have to be a party to Europe's Götterdämmerung. Fortunately or unfortunately -- both, really -- Woody Wilson and FDR were sure we had a moral obligation, plus a financial incentive, to intervene.
Following a decisive win in WWII, that has been the accepted and rarely questioned attitude. Well, we should start questioning it again. Certainly the US must assert its interests in a worldwide economy. But faced with a minefield of invading and occupying and nation building, we need to learn to pronounce the words, "No thank you. Good luck, everybody."
Our forefathers were right to greatly fear democracy. Seems great of be able to vote yourself free stuff, and this largely accounts for the popularity of it. Election procedures in the Constitution have been eroded in modern times. Correct me if I'm wrong, but a 100% tax rate may be legal and constitutional provided one could successfully argue that 'just compensation' was received. Doesn't seem likely, but neither does the belief that a man can become a woman. A 100% rate means they could take all your stuff and 'justly compensate' you whatever they deem as 'just'.
JohnAZ is a one trick pony. He needs to shove his anti-socialism male bovine excrement up his ass! Does he even know how many Americans live off Social Security? Is he going to send back his Social Security checks? Yeah right!
I betcha he never even took the time to watch my Michael Parenti link above. His mind is made up. Not only on religion. LOL
Inconvenient fact: As democracy has spread ~ poverty has increased.
DM! I miss your opinions and view points, even the ones I don't agree with :)
I blocked JohnAZ a few weeks back. I couldn't take his rhetoric anymore and the idiot responds to everybody's comments clogging up the thread. Once I got him off my screen the comments section became much easier to filter and read.
The founding fathers knew the failure that is democracy and created a Republic that has also, for all intents and purpose, been a dismal failure. The Constitution has failed to keep government power in check and keep government the purview of the creators.
What do you think the best form of government would be? A benevolent king/queen?
I read once that anarchy, often given a very bad name as it is associated with chaos, could be a higher form of living in that everyone just lives, leaves their neighbors alone, with no government at all. We obviously are too corrupt as a people to live in this manner. One thing that is clear to me is raw capitalism isn't the way. Democracy isn't the way. A Republic doesn't work. Socialism won't work due to corruption of the elites.
Well ultimately its obvious that you want to be nothing more than to be kept by the state . Sucks to be you , there is no spark of liberty in you ." Good times make weak men " .
Meloni is particularly disappointing. Thought she would put Cursula von der Lying in the toaster. Nope, she caved. Trump saw it & Meloni is now just another EU shrew to be thrown from office.
I don't know, Matt. Much of what you are accusing has not been substantiated, though there is audio of him talking about grabbing pussies which I found really bizarre. As a red blooded American male who is very attracted to beautiful women, never have I had any inclination to brag to my buddies that I often grab women by their genitalia nor have I ever attempted such a thing. If Trump shits in his pants, well, that's something I don't want to know about. If he's a child rapist then I hope he rots in hell.
Given that I don't know for sure about the pants shitting and child raping accusations, Donald Trump is the most popular human being on the planet today. He's probably more famous than Jesus Christ who is largely unknown in many eastern countries. If given the opportunity for a picture with the most famous and well known human being on the planet.....I'd probably take it.
Honestly, I don't care about Meloni or Italy for that matter. Though I did suspect that all of her conservatism would vanish once she entered political office. Women in politics are weak and unable to lead. Too emotional and too illogical.
It looks like the European peasantry has had enough. The modern day Braveheart in Scotland taking a blade to random people in a Muslim neighborhood the other day is just the beginning. Starmer's fall is based on the revelation that while he was Home Secretary or whatever they call his previous post, the government sent over 12,500 "stern letters" telling accused rapists that raping English children is not considered good form and if it isn't too much trouble, try not doing that. As author Ralph Peters has said, Europe will eventually revert to form and drive out or massacre these interlopers. This summer, this Fourth Turning is lighting off its afterburners.
Similar things are occurring in Ireland according to a long interview Felix Rex conducted with a particular Northern Ireland man about what is happening unreported behind the scenes in the wake of recent events like the attempted beheading of a disabled Irishman by a mooslime immigrant . The people are seething pissed and tired of waiting for redress from a government that seems intent upon eliminating its native citizenry , and so have taken matters into their own hands on evicting these savages from their communities . Who would have thought , the Irish , snapping ? sarcasm ( I am part Irish, don't get my Ire up either )
Our man Jim continues to see the world through the Israeli lens, as if Israel is righteous and rational, and the rest of the world is insane. Week after week we are told that Iran’s leaders are maniacs and that their only prudent course of action is to let the US and Israel decide what sort of country they should be.
The future is not the failing West. It will be the BRICS nations and the Global South, and the world they create is unlikely to be much like ours, and certainly not Israel’s. We may not like it much, and they won’t care.
Among a number of contentions in Friday’s post that should be addressed, this one stands out:
“Mr. Trump managed to marshal the help of all those Persian Gulf nations in the Iran op so as to end the nuclear threat, and the constant chaos in the region. Who would have imagined that a year ago? Everybody in the region is on the same page now.”
If everybody in the region was capable of unity for any purpose, Israel would have ceased to exist decades ago. The sad fact is that the Arab world is so chronically preoccupied with internal differences that it has never been able to band together for long, even to counter existential threats.
The second dubious implication is that the US can now count on this ephemeral unity to assure us of the region’s long-term gratitude and good will. We have never had the benefit of either from the Gulf States. They regard us with contempt, and have only suffered our building military bases on their territory because that was supposed to assure their security. Turns out, it doesn’t. Those bases simply became prime targets, which Iran has been canny enough to render useless. In doing so, Iran has exposed us as being unable to protect them.
As nations the Gulf States are, of course, largely as artificial as indoor snow skiing in Dubai. During the twentieth century certain Arab tribes were favored as newly-minted ruling elites, enabling them to live lives of indolent decadence that most Americans might only dream of. If it turns out that their best hope of sustaining that enviable lifestyle is the Shia Persians, rather than the infidels of America, they will readily adapt to that new reality.
Like a lie-of-omission, omitting Israel's transgressions from one's narrative, rather than denouncing them, while 'trashing' Iran, still seems to say something, not that I'm necessarily suggesting that of you, since I've not read everything you've written. You tell us.
But sniping as you do here, and then running away-- you know, minus some back-and-forth engagement?-- does give one pause and, in my eyes and perhaps others', might risk cheapening your 'product' (Maybe that's the idea to make a point that I've previously made.) and, metaphorically, taking it into a kind of cheapened landscape of suburban clusterfuckery, in-line with the more concrete that you've lamented.
It is also imagined that it might inspire someone to swap out the H in your middle name for a C, which you wouldn't like, would you?
If you can't adequately/courageously engage with your commenters or critique Israel, as you lean on your censor crutch to boot, should you be sniping some comments, trashing Iran or even your so-called Democrats, as if you're any better?
Or even continuing to publish/sell some kinds of books/paintings with a straight face?
He claims not to be a Zionist, yet his positions are indistinguishable from Zionists. He also claims never to have heard of the idea of Greater Israel, which is disingenuous, to say the least.
The Talmud writers had no clue about the bizarre incarnation that is USrael. It needs a new edition. Or if it has some sort of clue I'm unware-- and perhaps many Israelis are unaware-- it's not worth toilet paper.
Argue that if you wish, put me in my place. I don't care. I suppose what I'm saying is that the Talmud is damned if it does and damned if it doesn't.
Israel should walk off-stage, go to the rehearsal room, re-rehearse Israel, and then when it's properly ready, walk back onstage and do it right. If it's not already too late and the audience has all got up and left. Maybe in another 3000 years.
Whether he realizes it or not, what Jim actually wants is a small tribe or village, not a nation-state like America.
You can't have a nation-state for too long anyway. It's just too big. That's why we get civ decline and/or collapse historically.
Jim's anti-Democrat, (anti-etcetera) stances, for one, simply don't fit the bill, don't fit the nation-state mold. But that is not just a problem for/with Jim. It's a problem for anyone where a too-big/non-human-scale culture tries to get different people to live together as if they are similar enough in taste, style, ideas, and practices, etc.. It's unworkable, an imposition, a coercion.
So Jim can write about it anyway, but it's kind of pointless in a way. It's writing about something that's not only fundamentally-unworkable but also fundamentally unethical because it's coercive. You cannot get 'New Urbanism' from coercing taxes from people to pay for it. You just get pissed off people and the negative drag-effect-like results from that.
To get an idea of what a Kunstler Village might look like, one may only need to read this blog and get its rules and what Jim does and says. His little hamlet. Would that hamlet be worth living in? For some, sure. But have you ever seen the comments on Jim's blog here or his previous one from those of the actual town he lives in? Greenwich? They weren't too happy with some of Jim's take on it when he first arrived. Unsure it's still there, but it underscores my point that if you want what you think are good things, many are not going to agree. Hamlet size, maybe-- but you'll have to abide, get along and compromise and it still won't be entirely to your liking. That's not how life works anyway. People will be run out of town.
Jim was married apparently, but got a divorce. So you see? It's even difficult to maintain a life with one person sometimes, never mind a relationship called, America.
As a confirmed misanthrope I even find Dunbar's number optimistic for a community, but it's certainly clear that the world is well post-nation state, which makes the pipedreams of the Globalists even more absurd.
I find the sort of communities Jim imagines in his World Made by Hand series quite plausible, and still regard his old corpus devoted to alerting the world about the eventuality of collapse as valuable. He writes now as if he no longer believes in collapse, perhaps because that scenario can't be squared with Israel's territory-snatching ambitions.
I don't gainsay either Kunstler's intelligence or his research skills, which makes his current iteration as a blogger mystifying. The only thing that makes sense is that he profits from promulgating Israeli propaganda. (I won't be so indelicate as to suggest how)
His dittoheads on this forum know nothing, but there isn't anything controversial about my post Monday. History indisputably shows that the Arab world has never been able to unite for any purpose, and It's common knowledge that the Gulf State elite regard us as scum. He doesn't refute it, because he can't. I guess that's what pisses him off.
Too many people seem all too happy to even die at the hands of their own ignorance. That's why there's no shortage of cannon-fodder for example. So be it.
Jim, you quietly avoided stating that Israel is occupying Lebanon. Bombing towns, killing innocent civilians. I know that being put in that situation, where I was not a "Hezbola" fighter in the past, I would join up after my family's town, infrastructure, churches had been destroyed. Each family they destroy, creates enemies. To label anyone wanting and fighting to get Israel out of Lebanon as "Hezbollah" is dissembling. https://homebrave.com/home-of-the-brave//from-lebanonhttps://www.instagram.com/courtneybonneauphotography/
Your post is rather 2023, actually. BRICS is not forging ahead, particularly as there appears to be quite the conversation between Trump, Putin and Xi. With regard to Israel, please be reminded that Israel responds, they do not attack first. If Hezbollah stops attacking, there is no need for a response. Obviously, despite the MOU, Iran has not told Hezbollah there is a cease fire.
A future alliance of the US with Russia and China is a pipe dream. We have tried to destroy China's North-South railway connection to Tehran, and we continue to permit our NATO puppet to wage war deep into Russia. They will continue to pretend that we are capable of reconciliation. In the meantime, China dumped another fifty billion in US Treasuries last week, because they see the writing on the wall. The composition of BRICS will continue to evolve, but it will happen, because China and Russia want it.
Thank you for the sane and accurate posts. I fear you are about to be banned from this Substack discussion... i.e. Kunstler's personal Room 101 of Zionist indoctrination.
The American empire has fallen into a fundamentalism of its own civic religion. They, and their European servants, have committed the classic blunder of coming to believe their own propaganda and allowing it to shape their world view. They truly believed it was wise to try to push a hostile military alliance to Russia's own border. They have continued to provoke Russia to the point of risking a nuclear response.
I have done so before. My spreadsheet has about fifty authoritative sources. You would do well to begin with Pepe Escobar, Douglas MacGregor, Alex Krainer (Jim hates him), Larry Johnson, and Charles Freeman. None of them, of course, write for any corporate media.
I think a future Russian American alliance is natural and a good fit . China on the other hand , Russia absolutely has no love for , only an alliance of pure convenience in the service of staunching the EU/ UK , sometimes US central bankster crews from moving in and liquidating the mother land( Russia ) for her resources . A Bridge across the Bering Strait with one of the Diomede islands as a mid support . Were getting the band back together man !!!!
Trump had a fine idea of us becoming friends with Russia when he first ran, in 2016. It can't happen because our government is still dominated by unreconstructed Cold Warriors.
NATO is lobbing missiles deep into Russia, including Moscow, daily. NATO is just a front for perpetual US military aggression. That's hardly a recipe for an alliance.
Cooperation with China is of huge benefit to Russia. With us, not so much.
Thank you for shining the light of reason on the real issues in the middle East and elsewhere. It is telling that we never see a rational response to your arguments---just emotional name-calling.
For decades, the deal has been straightforward. In 1973, after the post-war boom receded, the USA went from trade surplus to deficit and its hegemony was in danger. Kissinger went to the Gulf states and made this offer: The USA pledges to guarantee their defense. In exchange, the oil-rich nations will only sell oil for US dollars and will recycle those dollars in the US markets.
That arrangement held for five decades. Its ending was chimed earlier this year when Iran rained missiles on its Gulf neighbours and the USA was powerless to stop them. The Gulf countries now know full well the security they've been purchasing isn't real, so they will be looking for new arrangements. And the MOU makes it official: the USA will orchestrate a $300 billion rebuilding fund for Iran and hand over the Persian Gulf as its sphere of influence. Iran will now join the other Gulf countries, who have the $300 billion under their couch cushions, in a new security architecture.
Lindsey Graham and other national-security chowderheads will want to spin this as a victory for the USA, but it's a stunning defeat.
Yes that treaty exists but it was the result of talks between FDR and King Ibn-Saud in 1943. The Joint Chiefs told FDR that there was not enough domestic oil to fight a two theater war.
Well, I admit I wasn't careful and kinda wung that one without consulting any sources. I still think my assessment of the current situation holds up, however.
Trump visited the Gulf States in 2025 and they all agreed to invest Billions in to the US? So it's amazing that you ramble on seeming like Mr Smarty Pants! Lol....
The Israel haters cannot concede that Iran is an evil country, using Shia Islam as justification to control the Persian Gulf and the flow of global oil. Just another hyper-inflated bunch of religious assholes.
Israel committed the genocide, not Iran. You talk like supporters of Karmelo Anthony. As if he's the victim and not Austin Metcalf.
Stop twisting Christianity and maybe you can untangle your twisted mind. They killed Christ and revile Him to this day. The Muslims see Him as a great prophet.
5,000- 100,000 + Iranians no longer among the living would argue with you if they could Janos.
While independent human rights groups have not yet fully verified a death toll as high as 40,000, reputable international organizations and leaked internal documents confirm that Iranian security forces carried out a historic and unprecedented mass slaughter of civilian protesters during the January 2026 uprisings. -Forbes
Post-Revolution & The 1980s: Human rights groups like the Iran Human Rights Monitor estimate that up to 120,000 political dissidents and opposition members were executed during this decade, particularly following the 1988 prison massacres.
November 2019 Protests: Following nationwide fuel protests, Amnesty International documented the deaths of hundreds, while the U.S. State Department estimated over 1,000 deaths. -Iran primer
2022 "Woman, Life, Freedom" Uprising: A United Nations fact-finding mission confirmed at least 551 deaths during the crackdown on these protests -WSJ
Recent Crackdowns: Escalating civil unrest and wartime martial law led to a surge in both executions and protest-related deaths. Activist groups, such as the [Human Rights Activists in Iran (HRANA)](0.5.17, 0.5.18), reported thousands of additional fatalities during widespread crackdowns
.Because the Iranian government severely restricts foreign media and frequently implements internet blackouts, the true total of those killed by the regime remains a source of ongoing international investigation and documentation.
During a class on human motivation, while discussing power motivation, the instructor asked what power position is the most dangerous to humanity and the most power driven. Many diverse answers then he said, all wrong. The correct answer is religious leader, as he has God or gods to justify his declarations. Iran is just the latest. The FF knew this and tried to make the Constitution religion free.
They were not exactly popular to begin with and now despite decades of antIsrael propaganda the Arab states have seen the greater threat to regional sanity and stability involves disposing of the Shiite ruled theocracy in Iran. The biggest problem they only want to throw money at the problem and not their armies.
You’re covering a lot of ground today, JHK!👍 The Iranian situation is fascinating and I suspect several members of the current IRGC leadership will soon become familiar with Eddie Money’s hit song “Two Tickets to Paradise”. Kaboom 💥 Elsewhere over there, the European nations you’ve highlighted are all in various stages of capitulation to radical Islam. Perhaps they will learn a lesson or two from their more rational neighbors, such as Hungary, Poland or Sweden (with its recent adoption of “assimilate or be deported”). If not, they will all soon be joining their radical Islamist superiors praying to Allah five times a day. 🤷♂️🤷♂️
Israel has to get out of Lebanon, either willingly or by force. Then and only then can their be peace. Abraham accords? The Iranians are not Sons of Abraham. And even the Arabs should be clever enough not to fall for such bs.
Israel out of Lebanon won't stop Hezbollah from launching rockets at Israel. So Israel is to sit back and get repeatedly kicked in the shins while Iran chips away at them via proxies. Death by a thousand cuts or a nuclear conflagration is still death.
The only good thing that would come of this is that the world would be well and finally be rid of the cursed fake people called Palestinians.
I don’t see why it isn’t in Israel’s best interest for Iran to become a failed state. Their access to oil and natural gas does not depend on the Strait.
Congratulations JHK. You have now gone 100% certifiably insane. Everything you say is going on is 180 wrong. Everything you say is not going on is also 180 degrees backwards. Down is up; up is down. Good is evil; evil is good. Between you and Huckabee and Trumpenstein and Netanyahoo you haven't told the truth since February 28th. You are about to blow up the world. At least the two worst evil terrorist organizations USA and Zionist Israel will be gone forever. Then we can start over.
The fact that nobody on this thread truly knows the truth is pure truth in and of itself. We are all arguing points that cannot be verified outside of reading someone else's writings.
If you really want to understand what is actually going on geopolitically... Ukraine/Russia, US+Israel/Iran, US+Israel/Palestinian genocide, US+Taiwan/China, etc... you can check out Judge Napolitano's YouTube channel.
He interviews multiple subject matter experts daily. The likes of: Prof Jeffrey Sachs, Prof John Mearsheimer, Scott Ritter, Col Macgregor, Phil Giraldi, LtcCol Danny Davis, Prof Seyed Marandi, Ray McGovern, Larry Johnson, AMB Chas Freeman, Max Blumenthal, and several others.
When the MOU first came out I found and printed it, it's here on my desk. As I read it I had to chuckle because it reminded me of the "letter of intent" I saw so many of in my commercial real estate career. We called them "Swiss cheese agreements" for they were full of holes. I'm no international expert on politics but I've done business if a few foreign countries including the middle east and these people think very differently than us. I feel Trump knew full well this agreement would be violated almost immediately and that part of his plan. While the press thought it great, he was merely sitting back waiting for them to so violate it as that will give him power to act. Trump is always 8 steps ahead of everyone else with a clear view of the outcome he wants.
As to Starmer, a man who shouldn't have had that position ever, I spoke to a friend of mine who lives in the UK and he says most of the citizens there, or as he says at least the smart ones, are thrilled with him quitting. However, they also know the next one will be even further left than Starmer. Their joy may be short lived.
Starmer was 'lent' as PM by the Trilateral Commission, of which he was a member. He's a dedicated global technocrat and a Fabian. Burnham is the same. The globalists already supported devolution (Wales, Scotland and NI). Now they'll sell the 'democratic deficit' agenda because England doesn't have a separate devolved parliament. But what they're going to do is create English regions instead, with regional mayors (Burnham fashion). They are pushing 'citizens' assemblies', i.e. random 'representative' groups of people who will act as think tanks, but will be manipulated through the Delphi technique. There is to be no real democracy (not that there ever was). This agenda is the global gulag in operation, with pretend local 'democracy', but all directed from the centre.
I don't think sympathy for a 3-year-old Syrian boy is remotely out of place, no matter what his death was used for. The UK and US governments were complicit in creating the situation in Syria that led to the refugees leaving in the first place. It was not the fault of the Syrian refugees.
'They' are Syrian now? Burning innocent people out of their homes because of something someone else did is an outrage and a heinous crime. Note also that your government and mine put the current ISIS/Al Qaeda head chopper in power in Syria, so there may be more refugees, including your Syrian Christian brothers and sisters.
They're invaders foisted on us by our traitor governments. Grow up or go work on a solar power farm. Back to the land! Women shouldn't be voting so it's good you ruined your ballot.
Don't worry: They're mostly Catholics and Orthodox so no Christians at all by your low Church standard.
The Alawite Shiites are or were at least, very tolerant. Mr Assad and his wife used to visit big churches on Christmas Eve to wish his constituents a Merry Christmas.
Let's get real- no way could Queer Kier survive the Pakistani Rape Gang Investigation Report.
That being said- how is it that they (the Lib Commies) are just going to put in a carbon copy of Starmer and totally ignore the millions of Brits who support Tommy Robinson, Rupert Lowe and Nigel Farage's efforts to unite the Kingdom?
How is it? Didn’t Burnham just get a lot of votes ? Who “ voted” for him? What does the population of greater Manchester look like? Where are those millions when it comes time to vote?
Seems rather obvious the EU and Britain are increasing their push for war with Russia due to pure hatred of, and desire to take over their resource riches. Their disdain and even deranged hatred for Trump adds more fuel to the fire. Of course the ongoing assault on their citizens in favor of the illegal invading hordes makes a threat of civil war another reason to start WWIII. Even Spain, under the communist Premier, is facing a potential rehash of the Spanish Civil War as he moves to grant citizenship to over one million illegal invaders, the Spanish people's opposition be damned. The brutal treatment of native citizens by every EU member and the British Commonwealth nations makes insurrections and even civil wars more likely as invaders are granted more rights and powers. The leftist loons will do anything to retain and consolidate power, including murdering many millions in their planned war against Russia. Without the war, they will simply continue imprisoning protesters and opponents and driving their societies closer to revolt.
Without the U.S. to pull their irons out of the fire, Europe is toast. The native Europeans do not deserve what is coming, but the corrupt politicians and useful idiot supporters most certainly do. Hopefully, they will not be engaged in a war with Russia, the worst of bad choices, but face insurrections and even civil war to stop the rot. Our very own seditionists, even traitors, the Demoncraps, have been fomenting and planning insurrections and even civil war here if they cannot steal or bribe their way to power. Gonna be a hot time all around the world.
Wow. I've heard of moving the goalposts, but Mister Social Critic has devised an all-new strategy to secure, protect and defend his delusions: swap the goalposts. Don't want to admit that Iran scored a touchdown against the USA? Easy: redefine the game. When the other team carries the ball past the goalposts behind you, that means you scored a point. It's genius!
That squawking you hear is Iran getting dragged kicking and screaming into getting everything it's asking for. Because in February, the USA tried and failed to impose its will on them by force, there is no military solution, and Trump's only option if he wants to avoid a Great Depression is to accord the existing Iranian regime its sphere of influence over the Persian Gulf and hand it the Gulf's security architecture, leaving Israel in the cold.
Donald Trump's problem now isn't getting the Iranians to gracefully submit to him giving them a hummer. It's getting Congress and the national security state to do so. This is how empires fall: not just with humiliating defeat, but with humiliating delusion.
I've tried several times over the years to imagine what the final fall would look like, but now that it's actually happening I have to admit that never in my wildest imagination could I have come up with all this. Reality exceeding fiction once again!
I guess we can live with the fantasy that Trump making the only sane choice he has left is proof of his genius. It is no surprise that one of his staunchest believers not in his administration, should paint it such. We might nominate JHK for first place in the “shadow cabinet”, iPhone on speed dial. No matter.
An end to this war is worth listening to a bit of nonsense. Like the conclusion that the poor IDF wasn’t really attempting to take out a Hezbollah position in southern Lebanon bringing on the shelling but it was the reverse. The Queen believes “six impossible things before breakfast” we hear. No matter. Trump either brings Israel around kicking and screaming or is forced to cut them off from certain military aid. The Curtis LeMay doctrine is toast and he knows it.
Though I share his opinion of the current state of the Democratic Party his opprobrium is better served directed at AIPAC payroll masquerading as patriots in the GOP, at FOX News and elsewhere.
Yes, Iran didn't like Trump's subtle diplomacy of not only threatening to bomb the shit out of Iran but that they the diplomats wouldn't make it back to Iran either. The fucking savage.
Cut off "our greatest ally" of the billions in no-strings-attached welfare we give them each year, and get their lobbying group out of our politics. Maybe then they will have to learn how to get along with their neighbors. We pay for their healthcare and free university, while many in the US can't afford rent and our cities are dystopian nightmares. Will we be able to vote on this, will it be on the ballot in the next elections? Ahh, we can dream...
"The Trump administration temporarily lifted oil sanctions against Iran on Monday ..."
[Similar to what the Obama administration did in 2016 to reach the JCPOA deal with Iran]
".. and announced that Tehran had agreed to invite United Nations inspectors back to Iran’s nuclear sites ..."
[Similar to what was already in place before Trump tore up the JCPOA agreement in 2018]
"Upon the signing of this MOU, the Islamic Republic of Iran will make arrangements using its best efforts for the safe passage of commercial vessels with no charge, for 60 days only, from the Persian Gulf to the Sea of Oman and vice versa."
[Traffic will again be allowed to move freely through the Straight of Hormuz -- similar to how it was before Trump & Israel started their attacks in February/March. But, this time, no guarantee beyond 60 days.]
The authoritarian leadership controlling Iran has not appreciably changed. Different people, but arguably a more repressive regime than ever.
[i.e., no improvement over what it was before Trump & Israel started their attacks in February/March]
Yeah, I guess it was cool to see all of that expensive military stuff getting blown up in Iran for a couple of weeks (although -- so sorry about the 100 schoolkids! Whoops!). Iran is definitely a bad actor, and any reduction in its military power can only be a good thing for the Middle East. I'll agree with that part.
But ... Iran still has control over the Straight of Hormuz. And our country is now an additional $150 billion in debt from this war alone (while our federal debt hole has grown $2.3 trillion bigger just since Trump re-assumed the presidency in Jan 2025 -- so much for DOGE "solutions". At least the Tech Bro Boys were able to download all kinds of our previously private information from the government databases, though -- so I'm sure that will someday work to our collective advantage).
And, finally, the 'nuclear material agreement' can has simply been kicked down the road for .... um, at least another 60 days. (Although if you think it will actually be resolved in 60 days, well I have an algae-infested Reflecting Pool in D.C. to sell you ...)
All this winning!
Trump should have just kept the JCPOA in place eight years ago and declared victory. But he was too mad at that Black Guy to let that laboriously-negotiated agreement stand.
Trump could have won a lot of hearts and minds by pointing at the JCPOA and saying "This stinks!" but then leaving it in place and beginning a campaign for a better agreement. There was no upside to tearing it up...other than the tingle it created in Trump's pants.
One thing though, and I know I'm preaching to the choir on this one, I'm not sure Trump could actually articulate what a better agreement was other than to say "One not signed by Obama".
I sure wish what I was saying was complete and utter BS...but it's not.
Meanwhile in the background as everyone is distracted, the real agenda is unfolding at breakneck pace:
"…and this is why today I am announcing this government will make a new, free-of-charge, Digital ID mandatory for the right to work, by the end of this parliament. Let me spell that out: you will not be able to work in the United Kingdom, if you do not have Digital ID. It’s a simple as that."
—Current British Prime Minister Keir Starmer
They will never be satisfied until this is your life:
----
Want to drive your car today? I’m sorry you said something the government didn’t like and your social credit score is no longer high enough, your air conditioner was running during the hottest part of the day and now your carbon footprint has exceeded your daily limit, you missed your last mandatory doctor’s appointment and your vaccination status is not up to date, and you live in a 15 minute city so you can walk anyway. 50 credits have been deducted from your CBDC wallet for attempting to access your rented vehicle while failing to meet these criteria.
—deducts credits—
Your bank account is now negative. 50 additional credits have been deducted for your overdraft and your social credit score has been lowered by 100 points for failing to keep a positive net balance.
---
Under no circumstance should anyone ever comply with getting the ID Digital. It will become your panopticonic slave collar if you put this 'one-ring" of power on your finger.
An appropriate warming for all western nations.
You are so correct, the very smart Vernon Coleman has been warning people of years and it's taken him from being a recognized and revered authority to squashed under the heel of the black boot. Yet, even at an advanced age where he should retire, he keeps sending out the warnings.
Dr. Coleman knows this axiom well:
“Silence in the face of evil itself evil. God will not hold us guitless.
Not to speak is to speak.
Not to act is to act. “ —Dietrich Bonhoeffer
Yes, he certainly does. I have read many of his books and am never disappointed. he, and apparently you, have great insight.
Panopticon
by Killing Joke
https://youtu.be/H7KlZJ21bt0?si=xaE9M12UBIq9Lro1
----
"Self censorship, self policing
Shaping human behaviour
Computer games, low attention span
Distractions for the servile brain
Inside the, Panopticon
You don’t have to have your phone on
All behaviour calibrated, from bulk metadata
--
Weishaupt comes alive
The all seeing eye
--
All your habits, all your movements
All your sexual preferences
All your colleagues, all your friendships
How often you take a shit
All your debts, all your bets
All your hopes and fears are known
Consolidation in every nation
The great work is nearly done
--
Weishaupt comes alive
The all seeing eye
--
Retaining bulk metadata to be held against you
The elitist leanings of man appealed to by corporations
Diminishing expectations can be seen in every nation
Many tongues, one voice
The great work of age has come
--
Weishaupt comes alive
The all seeing eye
--
Everything is known, health and your loans
All privacy gone, in the Panopticon
Everything is known, health and your loans
All privacy gone, in the Panopticon"
...And Whitey's on da moon....
Whitey needs to come back down to Earth, stop fooling himself that he's All That and More.
In other words, stop loving himself (as other groups naturally do) and thus lose in the competition for survival?
~ Salmon Undertones ~
Well I was kind of half-serious about the comment, Lugh, but only half. Therefore, love can exist in the half I was not serious about. :D
Sheesh. You're getting kind of mushy these days, no?, or is my memory a bit selective? <3
Give me a hug, I'm pinkish-beige... well, a bit less so at this time of year, what with my being in the sun. Be brownish-beige with subtle salmon undertones I suppose soon enough.
(As if a kissing gourami, Strange Bedfellow extends his lips toward Lugh.)
https://youtube.com/shorts/sDmUpwC2LUk?si=hHZ6FwUg1x_EF-q5
A true globalist, trying to make his nation fail, so that transnational entities, typically associated with banking, will be in the wings. I don’t know who funds them, but they would be a good bet.
Didn't take long for them to get rolling, did it? As the globalist ship sinks, the strategy must be to ring-fence the Crown holdings and as much of Europe as possible. Then, they'll . . . what? Do they even know?
It's almost like there is a God, and that thumbing your nose at Him for centuries is not all that adaptive.
Sir Keir was ready to step down but his wife won't let him. She knows it's now or never. Break the filthy peasants before they revolt. The Orcs are in the shires. They will be armed and used as reserve troops if necessary.
Well said, TT.
06/22/26: “There’s evidence that the over-full storage capacity for their oil has already caused damage to their oil wells — because shutting down wells degrades the geology of the underlying oil-bearing rock.”
We heard this every 15 minutes in the days of March and April and then --- inexplicable radio silence until James mentioned it today. Which is much appreciated.
--- A tad less than “two years”: “Keir Starmer … as Prime Minister [held] the position from July 5, 2024 [until] ... He announced his resignation on June 22, 2026, and is remaining in a caretaker role…”
At this point, contestants have been Jeopardy! Champions for longer stints than UK prime ministers…
--- Tell IT! Perfectly summed up: “[T]he feckless Merz in Germany, the wobbling Macron in France, the commie PM Pedro Sánchez in Spain, and Giorgia Meloni in Italy, who double-crossed her voters on ending illegal immigration.”
Nevertheless, the UK’s next four PMs should be Merz, Macron, Sanchez and Meloni.
Each one is Churchill, compared to what’s left on the shelf in London.
Trump made a remark in one of his off-the-cuff spoutings to the effect that "we are taking a lot of oil out of Iran." Made me wonder, rather than getting the tankers moving, if he agreed to take the oil "overflow" to prevent ruining Iran's oil wells. That would be a small cost toward recovery whereas losing their wells would be devastating. At this point, no one could effectively stop the US doing that. Just saying.
06/23/26: Your scenario would hinge on the Iranians realizing that this would bail their asses out. Overall, the ratio of talk-to-known-results right now is so ridiculous, I'm waiting for enough time to pass so that we'll eventually find out what's going on. Vance facing the Iranians must think that he's back in the Ozarks listening to a hog-calling contest.
The increasing contrast between South America and Europe is getting more obvious every day. Our closest neighbors are rapidly shedding the shackles of ultra-leftism and jumping on the conservative bandwagon.
Meanwhile, Europe is doing everything it can to protect the dream of totalitarianism and the push for WW3.
Let's hope they don't bring us all down with them as they have tried multiple times in the last century.
The difference is that if you don't earn in South America, you starve.
They all tried Socialism and ran out of other people's money.
The more Socialism one gets, the worse life becomes.
Europe is still sponging off big daddy Uncle SAM.
Answer be a question. Why the EU insistence on driving Europe to Islam? Britain, just like portions of the US rust belt, is being destroyed by the socialism inherent to Islam. Why? Is this a verification of Lugh’s opinion that crony capitalism drives humanity towards government control? Towards socialism and eventually Marxism. Was Marx right? Is this the natural order?
Your last sentence. Has the USA pouring trillions of dollars into Europe since WW2 been a way of countering the movement toward European socialism, the USSR until 1991, and that what we are witnessing in the USA right now is a counter movement by European socialists against the US.
It goes back to the origins of the NWO and who is involved - rich elitists. Bankers. People who's names are never mentioned. Echoes all the way back to the French Revolution - did they ever go away? Or did they go underground (secret cabals?) until they could force a different kind of slavery on the masses? The populist intellectuals think socialism will save them. We know how that ends. Revolution? Hard to do without guns because what do elitists have to fear from a populist uprising? People tried it with rivers of pig shit. We saw how that ended. Van der Leyen is still plotting. What else have they got? If a tanker full of small arms were distributed to the patriots in any country, would they actually DO anything? Or does 2000 years of subservience make the population unable to act in defense of their own survival? They did it twice before, but where is that drive now? (LOL Asking for a friend. )
Would love to see that tried in Iran to overthrow the mad mullahs.
80 billion in weapons dumped into Iran instead of the other Islamic cesspool, Afghanistan, might have made a difference since Iran has a mostly educated populace.
Afghanistan, not so much.
The regime has started again to execute dissidents. I do not understand Trump right now. The target was and should be the elimination of the theocracy in Iran. Until it is gone, there is no progress. If we can airlift out Maduro, why can’t we go get Khameini and all the rest of the Iranian mob?
The reports coming out of the “peace talks” are ludicrous. What are we doing? Is Trump’s deal making ego overtaking his common sense? Trump says that the regime is going to allow the removal of the uranium, the regime says, “no way.” Who is talking to whom, this really sounds like a gigantic clusterfuck.
The world would be a much better place if the USA simply followed Founding Fathers George Washington and John Quincy Adams’ sage wisdom: Befriend all nations, trade with all nations, eschew becoming entangled in foreign alliances and conflicts and do not seek monsters abroad to destroy.
"All we are saying is give minding your own beeswax a chance."
Mind your own beeswax, John. This is not your world to keep fudging up. Easy, peazey, lemon-squeezey.
Years of terrible press are taking a toll.
It doesn't matter what he does, 25%-30% of this country and most of the press will have something stupid and shabby to say.
My sense is that Europe is more afflicted with devoted Marxists and progressives than South America. The warning example of Cuba, and the counter example of the US, is also stronger in this hemisphere.
Crony capitalism? You mean like Government and Industry working together? As if the contrary is even possible? As Marx said, Capital centralizes. Fewer and fewer own more and more. But their credo remains personal profit, so they are not fit to rule. Thus the Government must remain on top since personal profit cannot run a society.
Here we go again. Government is the solution to the avarice of people.
Government is a focus amplification of the greed of people. Government hates people. Government wants power period. Government is the target evil of the Revelation, “Babylon”. Lugh, your treatise about government is so false. Competition dilutes economic power, period. The progression of capitalism to cronyism to socialism to either fascism or Marxism is the decline of competition.
The main cause of the movement to corporate or other cronyism is government interference with the free market. That makes people nervous and they turn to guess who, the government. The cause d’etre of the problem.
You still have not come up with a single socialist win.
They never will.
Instead, we get I know you are, but what am I?
The Fake Philosophy Behind Capitalism | Michael Parenti
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NA8mBCl7Y2U
In this incisive talk, Michael Parenti exposes the "rag-to-riches" mythologies and the "prosperity gospel" of modern corporate capitalism.
He argues that no ruling class rules nakedly; they instead adorn their power with symbols and myths to justify their privileged positions at the apex of the social pyramid.
Why the claims that capitalism creates general prosperity and bolsters democracy are historically inaccurate.
Why the ruling class is the least "self-reliant" group, benefiting from billions in government subsidies, bailouts, and land giveaways.
Capitalist Corporations have given us wonderful things ~ wonderful for them!
No, competition results in winners and losers. The losers get eaten and absorbed. Grow up and see what's in front of you.
Socialism is inherent failure, Lugh, you need to work on something else to solve problems as the basis of the failures is ALWAYS government.
@Ben What about the socialism Israel enjoys on our behalf? The billions in welfare we give them each year, with no conditions. I trust you support an end to all forms of socialism, and this is a huge one.
I don't know about Ben but I certainly do . Like food aid to Africa , they just breed more and then you have more of them to feed . Its unnatural and it creates unnatural outcomes .
What do we get for our dollar?
What a dumb question!
So dumb you and the other guy can't answer it.
South America becoming what Europe was. Europe becoming what South America was. I'll take Buenos Aires over Paris at this point in history.
Not me, both are big cities!
Give me Ushuaia over either of them.
I'll take the sparsely populated mountains of Utah. Big cities are disgusting. The ever present smell of puke, urine and garbage permeates everything. Not to mention the public defecation, homelessness and crime.
SEE MY REPLY DOWN IN "HIDDEN REPLIES" BELOW.
THE SUBSTACK CENSORS ARE HARD AT IT TODAY.
So get the fuck out of here and go.
What a spoiled beta bitch
With the exception of It-Lee, I'll take Greater Buenos Aires over Euro cities anytime!
It-Lee now hates Trump, have you heard lol
Hopefully Putin will torch all 27 EU Capitals, Amsterdam, Athens, Berlin, Bratislava, Brussels, Bucharest, Budapest, Copenhagen, Dublin, Helsinki, Lisbon, Ljubljana, Luxembourg, Madrid, Nicosia, Paris, Prague, Riga, Rome, Sofia, Stockholm, Tallinn, Valletta, Vienna, Vilnius, Warsaw, and Zagreb, not necessarily in alphabetical order, but a combination of Kinzhals, Zircons, and Oreshniks, should do the trick.
Glassing all the "decision centers", where the "deciders" are, should suffice. Same as the US. The majority of Europeans can take care of business, once out from under the yoke of the deciders. Same as the US. For the umpteenth time, same as every civilization, every day we have two choices; protect our way of life or lose it. We're losing - soon to have lost - our way of life.
Hope they find a way to target the globalist “deciders” while still preserving the European art and architecture. Glass parking lots are aesthetically unappealing.
Agreed completely. Unfortunately, destroying one's own art and architecture is part and parcel of destroying one's own cultural identity - the mission of the Eurotrash Marxist deciders. They have brought in millions to assist in the demolition. Orban was the last holdout - they finally got him.
In downtown St. Augustine, a 140-year-old obelisk that stood in the town square, the Plaza de la Constitucion, was removed as the City Commission knelt to and appeased BLM in 2020. I imagine some culturally important items were removed from Atlanta also. I can assure you, this is not tolerated in Red Square, where cultural identity is sacrosanct.
The EU Marxists are no different than our homegrown variety - out to erase history, so they can tell the children, this is how it's always been. Muslim men have always gang-raped White Christian girls in the UK, get over it. Right after Starmer cleans out his desk, he should be marched to the gallows and hung. Head of the line of all the British MP's.
Sickening to see Western culture/ freedom/ capitalism destroyed. Even more sickening to see Europeans and Americans aiding the demise. Useful idiots.
Unfortunately, I'm embarrassed to admit that have some extended family of that ilk. Suicidal empathy - the new phrasing goes. Another verbal workaround for mental illness.
We see it all over this message board.
I have them too. I will never understand it.
Maybe you've been watching one too many episodes of Yellowstone ? Lol, just kidding .
Don't watch any TeeVee, but from what I hear, the scenery of the show was magnificent. From personal experience, I find Montana & Wyoming hard to beat. The Tetons are in a class of their own. Breathtaking in person.
The whole underlying theme of the show was all about the Dutton family protecting their way of life from those who wanted to take it from them by hook or by crook , or trying to halt the inevitable march of so called " progress" as defined by mostly big moneyed interests coming in and trying to turn Montana into a theme park essentially and driving out the traditional cattle ranchers and so on . Its " progress " so they say , and it may be inevitable but for me it ultimately trends dystopian followed out to its logical conclusions just like revelations in the Bible . Somebody was smart enough to conclude that man, on his own , without a reverence for the transcendent , will end up ultimately screwing himself by going too far .
The Corporations are just acting as they were designed to act: Make money for shareholders. There's no money in traditional cattle ranchers. I guess you forgot about the competition, the law of the jungle stuff. It's right there in Adam Smith.
You're borrowing from our other conversation in which if you go back and reread it , I made a point of not delving into the moral aspects of the a-moral functions of capitalism for the sake of staying on topic . I have already acknowledged that I believe that morality is central to honoring a kind of "good ,true and beautiful " philosophy of human interaction . The point you are still missing I think is that you suppose that those centrally controlling rulers , removed from the necessity to adhere to natural market principles are going to be somehow less capricious or self serving then those who must by neccesity head those natural market forces , while I believe the opposite to be true . Bottom line , cattle ranching is a chosen way of life for people who own their own way of life outright . Forced hostile takeover of their property is by definition immoral , no matter the reason ( progress ) you feel entitled to do it , You must have missed the bill of rights . Another thing to consider is why exactly small family cattle ranching and small farms have become so difficult to sustain as a way of life . The answer , as usual leads back to the government either doing something that was not in its original charter or failing to do something that it should have done , like ensuring corporations don't become too powerful ( which also alludes back to your would 'rulers ' being corrupted by moneyed influence . I also already said all of this was inevitable because man fails to maintain his connection with the transcendent reality ( the very author/ Creator of our morality that works in harmony with the physical laws of our reality . Yeah I know , I went to far down the rabbit hole . In reality ranch and farm life connect people to the earth and forge the kind of character traits that rising cultures embody , whereas the rise of corporate vulturism marks the period dissolution of great cultures, or the decline of culture . I am not an anarchist ,I'm a small government conservative .
Again, could it be that Europe is behind the socialist movement here! Is Trump reacting?
Again, the idiocy. Communism is an offensive arm of Capitalism.
And your opinion on government shows total ignorance.
Not as much as it shows your ignorance, my friend!
You and Ben need to put yourself on READ ONLY mode.
Good grief, Dennis, follow your own advice.
You have zero value to say on this or anything else.
Pretty well laid out at the center of much of this is England.
EU too.
Trump shouts it to their faces and they hate him for it.
Not to worry. Americans will show the Eurotrash how totalitarianism is really done.
Notice that we Americans never seem to celebrate our freedoms more than when we're looking outward.
Turns out our "more perfect union", is nothing more than a federal bureaucracy that enjoys total control over every one of us:
Absolute power, a federal system that can make you disappear, with no semblance of due process. A system that assures that you and I commit, as Harvey Silvergate calls it, 3 felonies a day, just by participating in society.
In the event the bureaucracy decides (and yes, its up to them) to subject you its trial court system, you become a hapless player in a legal theater performance that assures the state will prevail. If the federal system decides to encumber your freedom, except in very rare cases, nobody can save you.
Consider as well, the absolute power by design, of never accountable local district attorneys. They can fabricate whole cloth criminal cases against any one of us. And through commission of false testimony, and omission of truth, send any one of us to a lifetime of prison.
These same district attorneys enjoy iron-fisted control over the application or non application, of criminal laws passed by our elected legislatures. The will of the people is short circuited by the political whim of a few system officials. As a result, America's cities are burning.
And in the rare, extraordinary event that this flawed, even criminal miscarriage of justice is exposed, we're often told by these same DA's that a victim's vindication demonstrates that the system does work...Systemic arrogance. Tyranny is seldom humble.
Nothing personal, but a US citizen, pointing out another nation's lack of freedoms, is like a prisoner bragging that his shackle chains are longer.
Do your handlers pay well?
Asking for a friend.
Just a question, could it be that the EU, the Europe consortium is playing a game with America? Are they countering the anti-socialistic folks in the US? Does Trump see this and is trying to isolate America from Europe? Is it the reason why he wants to isolate the Western hemisphere?
On our 250 birthday, is it time that the American people realize the Declaration of Independence was America telling Europe to take their monarchies and socialism and shove them where the sun does not shine?
Short answer: Unless of course, there's a buck to be made.
The notion that our government’s international policies are based on political ideology rather than globalist corporate interests, oil and gas, military industrial complex, (surveillance) technology is just precious...
"Let's hope they don't bring us all down with them as they have tried multiple times in the last century."
In the last century + one decade (stretching the period to include the Great War) the European states couldn't bring us down with them. The US had too many natural advantages: prairies and farms rather than blood-soaked fields; ocean-flanked borders instead of creaky gates and Maginot Lines to be bypassed; factories no bombs could reach.
On the surface it looks like we still hold those cards, but it's mostly an illusion -- one that could prove dangerous. Already has been so proven. The world has changed so much, especially in technology. Instant communications and jet travel have condensed time and space to bring us ever closer to One World (but not in the way Utopians of previous generations imagined).
The isolationists between the world wars understood we didn't have to be a party to Europe's Götterdämmerung. Fortunately or unfortunately -- both, really -- Woody Wilson and FDR were sure we had a moral obligation, plus a financial incentive, to intervene.
Following a decisive win in WWII, that has been the accepted and rarely questioned attitude. Well, we should start questioning it again. Certainly the US must assert its interests in a worldwide economy. But faced with a minefield of invading and occupying and nation building, we need to learn to pronounce the words, "No thank you. Good luck, everybody."
Our forefathers were right to greatly fear democracy. Seems great of be able to vote yourself free stuff, and this largely accounts for the popularity of it. Election procedures in the Constitution have been eroded in modern times. Correct me if I'm wrong, but a 100% tax rate may be legal and constitutional provided one could successfully argue that 'just compensation' was received. Doesn't seem likely, but neither does the belief that a man can become a woman. A 100% rate means they could take all your stuff and 'justly compensate' you whatever they deem as 'just'.
Pure democracy is mob rule. Period. One of the worst and most failed models of government ever known to man.
You nailed it, my friend CP.
Mob rule by the corrupt 1%
JohnAZ is a one trick pony. He needs to shove his anti-socialism male bovine excrement up his ass! Does he even know how many Americans live off Social Security? Is he going to send back his Social Security checks? Yeah right!
I betcha he never even took the time to watch my Michael Parenti link above. His mind is made up. Not only on religion. LOL
Inconvenient fact: As democracy has spread ~ poverty has increased.
DM! I miss your opinions and view points, even the ones I don't agree with :)
I blocked JohnAZ a few weeks back. I couldn't take his rhetoric anymore and the idiot responds to everybody's comments clogging up the thread. Once I got him off my screen the comments section became much easier to filter and read.
The founding fathers knew the failure that is democracy and created a Republic that has also, for all intents and purpose, been a dismal failure. The Constitution has failed to keep government power in check and keep government the purview of the creators.
What do you think the best form of government would be? A benevolent king/queen?
I read once that anarchy, often given a very bad name as it is associated with chaos, could be a higher form of living in that everyone just lives, leaves their neighbors alone, with no government at all. We obviously are too corrupt as a people to live in this manner. One thing that is clear to me is raw capitalism isn't the way. Democracy isn't the way. A Republic doesn't work. Socialism won't work due to corruption of the elites.
What an absolute joke this post is.
You pretend that poverty does not exist in Socialist states.
All of South America is socialist, with extreme poverty and a tiny super-wealthy elite ruling class.
There is no way to climb the ladder out of the abyss in most of those countries, which is why they all flood into my country.
It would help if you had ever traveled anywhere outside of 'murica and kiwiland.
Well ultimately its obvious that you want to be nothing more than to be kept by the state . Sucks to be you , there is no spark of liberty in you ." Good times make weak men " .
Dennis is old and dying of cancer, which has affected what little brain he has.
Meloni is particularly disappointing. Thought she would put Cursula von der Lying in the toaster. Nope, she caved. Trump saw it & Meloni is now just another EU shrew to be thrown from office.
What do you expect from an emotional menstruating woman?
The occasional sammich ?
Now that is damned funny! 🤣
At least she isn’t a fame whore 🤭
What do you expect when Trump lies and says she was desperate for a picture with him lol
Who would want a picture with a pants shitting pussy grabbing child rapist?
I don't know, Matt. Much of what you are accusing has not been substantiated, though there is audio of him talking about grabbing pussies which I found really bizarre. As a red blooded American male who is very attracted to beautiful women, never have I had any inclination to brag to my buddies that I often grab women by their genitalia nor have I ever attempted such a thing. If Trump shits in his pants, well, that's something I don't want to know about. If he's a child rapist then I hope he rots in hell.
Given that I don't know for sure about the pants shitting and child raping accusations, Donald Trump is the most popular human being on the planet today. He's probably more famous than Jesus Christ who is largely unknown in many eastern countries. If given the opportunity for a picture with the most famous and well known human being on the planet.....I'd probably take it.
You’re more of a whore than Meloni, is all I’m saying.
I’m glad you find it reprehensible that he brags about grabbing pussies though…
That was a stupid response. Comparing me to a prominent political leader.
Thanks for the enlightening written words, though. I'll log it away in my journal of epic CFN conversations.
Now you’re acting like an emotional menstruating woman lol
A fame whore and a sensitive bitch?
Don’t go grabbing any pussies now ya hear
CFN beta boy 👋
You’re disappointed Trump destroyed our alliance with Italy?
So is Meloni
Honestly, I don't care about Meloni or Italy for that matter. Though I did suspect that all of her conservatism would vanish once she entered political office. Women in politics are weak and unable to lead. Too emotional and too illogical.
Says the emotional fame whore lol
Yep you’re definitely menstrual.
Maybe a picture with a pants shitter will cheer you up Lol
‘Shit licking moron’
Says the pants shitting worshipper lol
Trump can’t even get along with a fellow fascist because he hates the EU so much lol
This is what Democracy will deliver, either thru human stupidity or bureaucratic finagling.
When are we getting Democracy? I can’t wait lol
It looks like the European peasantry has had enough. The modern day Braveheart in Scotland taking a blade to random people in a Muslim neighborhood the other day is just the beginning. Starmer's fall is based on the revelation that while he was Home Secretary or whatever they call his previous post, the government sent over 12,500 "stern letters" telling accused rapists that raping English children is not considered good form and if it isn't too much trouble, try not doing that. As author Ralph Peters has said, Europe will eventually revert to form and drive out or massacre these interlopers. This summer, this Fourth Turning is lighting off its afterburners.
Similar things are occurring in Ireland according to a long interview Felix Rex conducted with a particular Northern Ireland man about what is happening unreported behind the scenes in the wake of recent events like the attempted beheading of a disabled Irishman by a mooslime immigrant . The people are seething pissed and tired of waiting for redress from a government that seems intent upon eliminating its native citizenry , and so have taken matters into their own hands on evicting these savages from their communities . Who would have thought , the Irish , snapping ? sarcasm ( I am part Irish, don't get my Ire up either )
If so, who voted for Burnham?
Our man Jim continues to see the world through the Israeli lens, as if Israel is righteous and rational, and the rest of the world is insane. Week after week we are told that Iran’s leaders are maniacs and that their only prudent course of action is to let the US and Israel decide what sort of country they should be.
The future is not the failing West. It will be the BRICS nations and the Global South, and the world they create is unlikely to be much like ours, and certainly not Israel’s. We may not like it much, and they won’t care.
Among a number of contentions in Friday’s post that should be addressed, this one stands out:
“Mr. Trump managed to marshal the help of all those Persian Gulf nations in the Iran op so as to end the nuclear threat, and the constant chaos in the region. Who would have imagined that a year ago? Everybody in the region is on the same page now.”
If everybody in the region was capable of unity for any purpose, Israel would have ceased to exist decades ago. The sad fact is that the Arab world is so chronically preoccupied with internal differences that it has never been able to band together for long, even to counter existential threats.
The second dubious implication is that the US can now count on this ephemeral unity to assure us of the region’s long-term gratitude and good will. We have never had the benefit of either from the Gulf States. They regard us with contempt, and have only suffered our building military bases on their territory because that was supposed to assure their security. Turns out, it doesn’t. Those bases simply became prime targets, which Iran has been canny enough to render useless. In doing so, Iran has exposed us as being unable to protect them.
As nations the Gulf States are, of course, largely as artificial as indoor snow skiing in Dubai. During the twentieth century certain Arab tribes were favored as newly-minted ruling elites, enabling them to live lives of indolent decadence that most Americans might only dream of. If it turns out that their best hope of sustaining that enviable lifestyle is the Shia Persians, rather than the infidels of America, they will readily adapt to that new reality.
Skillington — if you think I'm shilling for Israel today then you show no reading comprehension ability. I'm getting sick of your bumptious bullshit.
Calling it bullshit falls well short of cogent refutation.
https://www.kunstler.com/p/slouching-toward-peace/comment/281847659
Your fealty to a pack of decrepit narratives is doing you no credit, Mr. Kunstler. You should have stuck to urbanism.
Advice from someone who puts pineapple on pizza.
I've been informed that chocolate-covered bees are served and enjoyed at movie theaters in South America. Takes all kinds.
Note the shapeshift from column subject to free market questions. These guys are advanced degree evaders.
Two laughable attempts at narrative management for the price of one! Make a comment worth the time and I'll give you a straightforward answer.
^ Oh look, yet another logical fallacy. Yawn.
~ Kunstler's Pissing Into The Wind ~
Like a lie-of-omission, omitting Israel's transgressions from one's narrative, rather than denouncing them, while 'trashing' Iran, still seems to say something, not that I'm necessarily suggesting that of you, since I've not read everything you've written. You tell us.
But sniping as you do here, and then running away-- you know, minus some back-and-forth engagement?-- does give one pause and, in my eyes and perhaps others', might risk cheapening your 'product' (Maybe that's the idea to make a point that I've previously made.) and, metaphorically, taking it into a kind of cheapened landscape of suburban clusterfuckery, in-line with the more concrete that you've lamented.
It is also imagined that it might inspire someone to swap out the H in your middle name for a C, which you wouldn't like, would you?
If you can't adequately/courageously engage with your commenters or critique Israel, as you lean on your censor crutch to boot, should you be sniping some comments, trashing Iran or even your so-called Democrats, as if you're any better?
Or even continuing to publish/sell some kinds of books/paintings with a straight face?
Tee-hee.
____
Dragnets Drag
https://youtu.be/HK_gM0WFAeU?si=VdihIAxDIKtrjPgn
"Whirlpools whirl
Dragnets drag
Hell is not the fire
Hell is your belief
In yourself as the higher..."
He claims not to be a Zionist, yet his positions are indistinguishable from Zionists. He also claims never to have heard of the idea of Greater Israel, which is disingenuous, to say the least.
Israel, as it is, is just about completely antithetical to what the Jew is supposed to be.
If you don't get that, you can still write about nothing on your blog. That's what many do.
Worse than a clown world.
Kunstler could send himself, along with Kushner and Witkoff, over to Palestine to consult on its 'New Urbanism'.
There an adult in the house?
You haven't studied the Talmud. Go to Amazon and order, "The King's Torah".
Life's too short, Lugh.
The Talmud writers had no clue about the bizarre incarnation that is USrael. It needs a new edition. Or if it has some sort of clue I'm unware-- and perhaps many Israelis are unaware-- it's not worth toilet paper.
Argue that if you wish, put me in my place. I don't care. I suppose what I'm saying is that the Talmud is damned if it does and damned if it doesn't.
Israel should walk off-stage, go to the rehearsal room, re-rehearse Israel, and then when it's properly ready, walk back onstage and do it right. If it's not already too late and the audience has all got up and left. Maybe in another 3000 years.
Whether he realizes it or not, what Jim actually wants is a small tribe or village, not a nation-state like America.
You can't have a nation-state for too long anyway. It's just too big. That's why we get civ decline and/or collapse historically.
Jim's anti-Democrat, (anti-etcetera) stances, for one, simply don't fit the bill, don't fit the nation-state mold. But that is not just a problem for/with Jim. It's a problem for anyone where a too-big/non-human-scale culture tries to get different people to live together as if they are similar enough in taste, style, ideas, and practices, etc.. It's unworkable, an imposition, a coercion.
So Jim can write about it anyway, but it's kind of pointless in a way. It's writing about something that's not only fundamentally-unworkable but also fundamentally unethical because it's coercive. You cannot get 'New Urbanism' from coercing taxes from people to pay for it. You just get pissed off people and the negative drag-effect-like results from that.
To get an idea of what a Kunstler Village might look like, one may only need to read this blog and get its rules and what Jim does and says. His little hamlet. Would that hamlet be worth living in? For some, sure. But have you ever seen the comments on Jim's blog here or his previous one from those of the actual town he lives in? Greenwich? They weren't too happy with some of Jim's take on it when he first arrived. Unsure it's still there, but it underscores my point that if you want what you think are good things, many are not going to agree. Hamlet size, maybe-- but you'll have to abide, get along and compromise and it still won't be entirely to your liking. That's not how life works anyway. People will be run out of town.
Jim was married apparently, but got a divorce. So you see? It's even difficult to maintain a life with one person sometimes, never mind a relationship called, America.
As a confirmed misanthrope I even find Dunbar's number optimistic for a community, but it's certainly clear that the world is well post-nation state, which makes the pipedreams of the Globalists even more absurd.
I find the sort of communities Jim imagines in his World Made by Hand series quite plausible, and still regard his old corpus devoted to alerting the world about the eventuality of collapse as valuable. He writes now as if he no longer believes in collapse, perhaps because that scenario can't be squared with Israel's territory-snatching ambitions.
I don't gainsay either Kunstler's intelligence or his research skills, which makes his current iteration as a blogger mystifying. The only thing that makes sense is that he profits from promulgating Israeli propaganda. (I won't be so indelicate as to suggest how)
His dittoheads on this forum know nothing, but there isn't anything controversial about my post Monday. History indisputably shows that the Arab world has never been able to unite for any purpose, and It's common knowledge that the Gulf State elite regard us as scum. He doesn't refute it, because he can't. I guess that's what pisses him off.
Too many people seem all too happy to even die at the hands of their own ignorance. That's why there's no shortage of cannon-fodder for example. So be it.
Jim, you quietly avoided stating that Israel is occupying Lebanon. Bombing towns, killing innocent civilians. I know that being put in that situation, where I was not a "Hezbola" fighter in the past, I would join up after my family's town, infrastructure, churches had been destroyed. Each family they destroy, creates enemies. To label anyone wanting and fighting to get Israel out of Lebanon as "Hezbollah" is dissembling. https://homebrave.com/home-of-the-brave//from-lebanonhttps://www.instagram.com/courtneybonneauphotography/
https://www.instagram.com/p/DZxAYrRo_w7/
Your post is rather 2023, actually. BRICS is not forging ahead, particularly as there appears to be quite the conversation between Trump, Putin and Xi. With regard to Israel, please be reminded that Israel responds, they do not attack first. If Hezbollah stops attacking, there is no need for a response. Obviously, despite the MOU, Iran has not told Hezbollah there is a cease fire.
A future alliance of the US with Russia and China is a pipe dream. We have tried to destroy China's North-South railway connection to Tehran, and we continue to permit our NATO puppet to wage war deep into Russia. They will continue to pretend that we are capable of reconciliation. In the meantime, China dumped another fifty billion in US Treasuries last week, because they see the writing on the wall. The composition of BRICS will continue to evolve, but it will happen, because China and Russia want it.
Thank you for the sane and accurate posts. I fear you are about to be banned from this Substack discussion... i.e. Kunstler's personal Room 101 of Zionist indoctrination.
Do you even know what the definition of Zionism actually is??
Does it include a Palestinian genocide?
There is no Palestinian genocide. Stop subscribing to propaganda and do a bit of research.
Well, I suspect I know what it looks like;
https://imgflip.com/i/auxgdd
I suspect you’re pretty much of an asshole.
The American empire has fallen into a fundamentalism of its own civic religion. They, and their European servants, have committed the classic blunder of coming to believe their own propaganda and allowing it to shape their world view. They truly believed it was wise to try to push a hostile military alliance to Russia's own border. They have continued to provoke Russia to the point of risking a nuclear response.
https://dgap.org/en/research/publications/russias-nuclear-signaling-2026-and-implications-european-security
And if they do, they'll consider themselves the injured parties. Diplomacy is dead.
I suggest you continue to watch CNN, or whatever leftist media you currently get your information from.
You have no clue of my sources, obviously.
Then be brave and cite them, so others can gain your insight and wisdom.
I have done so before. My spreadsheet has about fifty authoritative sources. You would do well to begin with Pepe Escobar, Douglas MacGregor, Alex Krainer (Jim hates him), Larry Johnson, and Charles Freeman. None of them, of course, write for any corporate media.
You have no clue of mine...
Why would I care?
I think a future Russian American alliance is natural and a good fit . China on the other hand , Russia absolutely has no love for , only an alliance of pure convenience in the service of staunching the EU/ UK , sometimes US central bankster crews from moving in and liquidating the mother land( Russia ) for her resources . A Bridge across the Bering Strait with one of the Diomede islands as a mid support . Were getting the band back together man !!!!
Trump had a fine idea of us becoming friends with Russia when he first ran, in 2016. It can't happen because our government is still dominated by unreconstructed Cold Warriors.
NATO is lobbing missiles deep into Russia, including Moscow, daily. NATO is just a front for perpetual US military aggression. That's hardly a recipe for an alliance.
Cooperation with China is of huge benefit to Russia. With us, not so much.
Thank you for shining the light of reason on the real issues in the middle East and elsewhere. It is telling that we never see a rational response to your arguments---just emotional name-calling.
Would Sunni Saudi Arabia tolerate a Nuclear armed Shia Iran?
Maybe you can read up on that Sinni/Shia fault. It might be enlightening.
Yes, the Shia are much more peaceful than the Sunnis. Of course we're allied with the Jihadis. Of course!
Duh. Jim claimed fifteen weeks ago that Saudi Arabia would be instrumental in defeating Iran. Didn't happen, did it?
Yes, and remember we are committed to defend Saudi Arabia by treaty.
Iran has united the gulf states? I guess you missed that!
For decades, the deal has been straightforward. In 1973, after the post-war boom receded, the USA went from trade surplus to deficit and its hegemony was in danger. Kissinger went to the Gulf states and made this offer: The USA pledges to guarantee their defense. In exchange, the oil-rich nations will only sell oil for US dollars and will recycle those dollars in the US markets.
That arrangement held for five decades. Its ending was chimed earlier this year when Iran rained missiles on its Gulf neighbours and the USA was powerless to stop them. The Gulf countries now know full well the security they've been purchasing isn't real, so they will be looking for new arrangements. And the MOU makes it official: the USA will orchestrate a $300 billion rebuilding fund for Iran and hand over the Persian Gulf as its sphere of influence. Iran will now join the other Gulf countries, who have the $300 billion under their couch cushions, in a new security architecture.
Lindsey Graham and other national-security chowderheads will want to spin this as a victory for the USA, but it's a stunning defeat.
Yes that treaty exists but it was the result of talks between FDR and King Ibn-Saud in 1943. The Joint Chiefs told FDR that there was not enough domestic oil to fight a two theater war.
Well, I admit I wasn't careful and kinda wung that one without consulting any sources. I still think my assessment of the current situation holds up, however.
Trump visited the Gulf States in 2025 and they all agreed to invest Billions in to the US? So it's amazing that you ramble on seeming like Mr Smarty Pants! Lol....
You are a careless reader. I explicitly pointed out that they are not capable of being united.
I imagine the Gulf States have been united as Iran was consistently bombing them…
The Israel haters cannot concede that Iran is an evil country, using Shia Islam as justification to control the Persian Gulf and the flow of global oil. Just another hyper-inflated bunch of religious assholes.
Israel committed the genocide, not Iran. You talk like supporters of Karmelo Anthony. As if he's the victim and not Austin Metcalf.
Stop twisting Christianity and maybe you can untangle your twisted mind. They killed Christ and revile Him to this day. The Muslims see Him as a great prophet.
5,000- 100,000 + Iranians no longer among the living would argue with you if they could Janos.
While independent human rights groups have not yet fully verified a death toll as high as 40,000, reputable international organizations and leaked internal documents confirm that Iranian security forces carried out a historic and unprecedented mass slaughter of civilian protesters during the January 2026 uprisings. -Forbes
Post-Revolution & The 1980s: Human rights groups like the Iran Human Rights Monitor estimate that up to 120,000 political dissidents and opposition members were executed during this decade, particularly following the 1988 prison massacres.
November 2019 Protests: Following nationwide fuel protests, Amnesty International documented the deaths of hundreds, while the U.S. State Department estimated over 1,000 deaths. -Iran primer
2022 "Woman, Life, Freedom" Uprising: A United Nations fact-finding mission confirmed at least 551 deaths during the crackdown on these protests -WSJ
Recent Crackdowns: Escalating civil unrest and wartime martial law led to a surge in both executions and protest-related deaths. Activist groups, such as the [Human Rights Activists in Iran (HRANA)](0.5.17, 0.5.18), reported thousands of additional fatalities during widespread crackdowns
.Because the Iranian government severely restricts foreign media and frequently implements internet blackouts, the true total of those killed by the regime remains a source of ongoing international investigation and documentation.
During a class on human motivation, while discussing power motivation, the instructor asked what power position is the most dangerous to humanity and the most power driven. Many diverse answers then he said, all wrong. The correct answer is religious leader, as he has God or gods to justify his declarations. Iran is just the latest. The FF knew this and tried to make the Constitution religion free.
They were not exactly popular to begin with and now despite decades of antIsrael propaganda the Arab states have seen the greater threat to regional sanity and stability involves disposing of the Shiite ruled theocracy in Iran. The biggest problem they only want to throw money at the problem and not their armies.
You’re covering a lot of ground today, JHK!👍 The Iranian situation is fascinating and I suspect several members of the current IRGC leadership will soon become familiar with Eddie Money’s hit song “Two Tickets to Paradise”. Kaboom 💥 Elsewhere over there, the European nations you’ve highlighted are all in various stages of capitulation to radical Islam. Perhaps they will learn a lesson or two from their more rational neighbors, such as Hungary, Poland or Sweden (with its recent adoption of “assimilate or be deported”). If not, they will all soon be joining their radical Islamist superiors praying to Allah five times a day. 🤷♂️🤷♂️
Israel has to get out of Lebanon, either willingly or by force. Then and only then can their be peace. Abraham accords? The Iranians are not Sons of Abraham. And even the Arabs should be clever enough not to fall for such bs.
Israel out of Lebanon won't stop Hezbollah from launching rockets at Israel. So Israel is to sit back and get repeatedly kicked in the shins while Iran chips away at them via proxies. Death by a thousand cuts or a nuclear conflagration is still death.
The only good thing that would come of this is that the world would be well and finally be rid of the cursed fake people called Palestinians.
Have they joined Iran and the rest of BRICS+ in an anti-American movement?
it is really a sad state of affairs. Stunning ignorance
I don’t see why it isn’t in Israel’s best interest for Iran to become a failed state. Their access to oil and natural gas does not depend on the Strait.
It's in the world's best interest if the current country called Iran fails completely.
Congratulations JHK. You have now gone 100% certifiably insane. Everything you say is going on is 180 wrong. Everything you say is not going on is also 180 degrees backwards. Down is up; up is down. Good is evil; evil is good. Between you and Huckabee and Trumpenstein and Netanyahoo you haven't told the truth since February 28th. You are about to blow up the world. At least the two worst evil terrorist organizations USA and Zionist Israel will be gone forever. Then we can start over.
Jeff...I wonder if JHK will respond?
"you haven't told the truth..."
Jeff,
The truth? I would not know the truth if I saw it...neither would you. Opposing viewpoints are not lies.
The fact that nobody on this thread truly knows the truth is pure truth in and of itself. We are all arguing points that cannot be verified outside of reading someone else's writings.
If you really want to understand what is actually going on geopolitically... Ukraine/Russia, US+Israel/Iran, US+Israel/Palestinian genocide, US+Taiwan/China, etc... you can check out Judge Napolitano's YouTube channel.
He interviews multiple subject matter experts daily. The likes of: Prof Jeffrey Sachs, Prof John Mearsheimer, Scott Ritter, Col Macgregor, Phil Giraldi, LtcCol Danny Davis, Prof Seyed Marandi, Ray McGovern, Larry Johnson, AMB Chas Freeman, Max Blumenthal, and several others.
Great post James, as always.
When the MOU first came out I found and printed it, it's here on my desk. As I read it I had to chuckle because it reminded me of the "letter of intent" I saw so many of in my commercial real estate career. We called them "Swiss cheese agreements" for they were full of holes. I'm no international expert on politics but I've done business if a few foreign countries including the middle east and these people think very differently than us. I feel Trump knew full well this agreement would be violated almost immediately and that part of his plan. While the press thought it great, he was merely sitting back waiting for them to so violate it as that will give him power to act. Trump is always 8 steps ahead of everyone else with a clear view of the outcome he wants.
As to Starmer, a man who shouldn't have had that position ever, I spoke to a friend of mine who lives in the UK and he says most of the citizens there, or as he says at least the smart ones, are thrilled with him quitting. However, they also know the next one will be even further left than Starmer. Their joy may be short lived.
Starmer was 'lent' as PM by the Trilateral Commission, of which he was a member. He's a dedicated global technocrat and a Fabian. Burnham is the same. The globalists already supported devolution (Wales, Scotland and NI). Now they'll sell the 'democratic deficit' agenda because England doesn't have a separate devolved parliament. But what they're going to do is create English regions instead, with regional mayors (Burnham fashion). They are pushing 'citizens' assemblies', i.e. random 'representative' groups of people who will act as think tanks, but will be manipulated through the Delphi technique. There is to be no real democracy (not that there ever was). This agenda is the global gulag in operation, with pretend local 'democracy', but all directed from the centre.
You've come so far. Remember when you were for "Syrian boy" and mass refugees? Now they are getting burned out of their homes and you say nothing.
I don't think sympathy for a 3-year-old Syrian boy is remotely out of place, no matter what his death was used for. The UK and US governments were complicit in creating the situation in Syria that led to the refugees leaving in the first place. It was not the fault of the Syrian refugees.
'They' are Syrian now? Burning innocent people out of their homes because of something someone else did is an outrage and a heinous crime. Note also that your government and mine put the current ISIS/Al Qaeda head chopper in power in Syria, so there may be more refugees, including your Syrian Christian brothers and sisters.
They're invaders foisted on us by our traitor governments. Grow up or go work on a solar power farm. Back to the land! Women shouldn't be voting so it's good you ruined your ballot.
How many immigrants' houses have you burned down so far?
So you wouldn't even give your Syrian Christian brothers refuge when fleeing the head chopper?
Don't worry: They're mostly Catholics and Orthodox so no Christians at all by your low Church standard.
The Alawite Shiites are or were at least, very tolerant. Mr Assad and his wife used to visit big churches on Christmas Eve to wish his constituents a Merry Christmas.
Let's get real- no way could Queer Kier survive the Pakistani Rape Gang Investigation Report.
That being said- how is it that they (the Lib Commies) are just going to put in a carbon copy of Starmer and totally ignore the millions of Brits who support Tommy Robinson, Rupert Lowe and Nigel Farage's efforts to unite the Kingdom?
It's the definition of insanity is it not? Refusal to accept reality is the hallmark of leftist parties.
How is it? Didn’t Burnham just get a lot of votes ? Who “ voted” for him? What does the population of greater Manchester look like? Where are those millions when it comes time to vote?
Exactly.
Seems rather obvious the EU and Britain are increasing their push for war with Russia due to pure hatred of, and desire to take over their resource riches. Their disdain and even deranged hatred for Trump adds more fuel to the fire. Of course the ongoing assault on their citizens in favor of the illegal invading hordes makes a threat of civil war another reason to start WWIII. Even Spain, under the communist Premier, is facing a potential rehash of the Spanish Civil War as he moves to grant citizenship to over one million illegal invaders, the Spanish people's opposition be damned. The brutal treatment of native citizens by every EU member and the British Commonwealth nations makes insurrections and even civil wars more likely as invaders are granted more rights and powers. The leftist loons will do anything to retain and consolidate power, including murdering many millions in their planned war against Russia. Without the war, they will simply continue imprisoning protesters and opponents and driving their societies closer to revolt.
"Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face." ~ "Iron Mike" Tyson
" It pains me to do it, but I'm going to have to punch all of Europe in the face." ~ Putin
Without the U.S. to pull their irons out of the fire, Europe is toast. The native Europeans do not deserve what is coming, but the corrupt politicians and useful idiot supporters most certainly do. Hopefully, they will not be engaged in a war with Russia, the worst of bad choices, but face insurrections and even civil war to stop the rot. Our very own seditionists, even traitors, the Demoncraps, have been fomenting and planning insurrections and even civil war here if they cannot steal or bribe their way to power. Gonna be a hot time all around the world.
Wow. I've heard of moving the goalposts, but Mister Social Critic has devised an all-new strategy to secure, protect and defend his delusions: swap the goalposts. Don't want to admit that Iran scored a touchdown against the USA? Easy: redefine the game. When the other team carries the ball past the goalposts behind you, that means you scored a point. It's genius!
That squawking you hear is Iran getting dragged kicking and screaming into getting everything it's asking for. Because in February, the USA tried and failed to impose its will on them by force, there is no military solution, and Trump's only option if he wants to avoid a Great Depression is to accord the existing Iranian regime its sphere of influence over the Persian Gulf and hand it the Gulf's security architecture, leaving Israel in the cold.
Donald Trump's problem now isn't getting the Iranians to gracefully submit to him giving them a hummer. It's getting Congress and the national security state to do so. This is how empires fall: not just with humiliating defeat, but with humiliating delusion.
I've tried several times over the years to imagine what the final fall would look like, but now that it's actually happening I have to admit that never in my wildest imagination could I have come up with all this. Reality exceeding fiction once again!
I guess we can live with the fantasy that Trump making the only sane choice he has left is proof of his genius. It is no surprise that one of his staunchest believers not in his administration, should paint it such. We might nominate JHK for first place in the “shadow cabinet”, iPhone on speed dial. No matter.
An end to this war is worth listening to a bit of nonsense. Like the conclusion that the poor IDF wasn’t really attempting to take out a Hezbollah position in southern Lebanon bringing on the shelling but it was the reverse. The Queen believes “six impossible things before breakfast” we hear. No matter. Trump either brings Israel around kicking and screaming or is forced to cut them off from certain military aid. The Curtis LeMay doctrine is toast and he knows it.
Though I share his opinion of the current state of the Democratic Party his opprobrium is better served directed at AIPAC payroll masquerading as patriots in the GOP, at FOX News and elsewhere.
Yes, Iran didn't like Trump's subtle diplomacy of not only threatening to bomb the shit out of Iran but that they the diplomats wouldn't make it back to Iran either. The fucking savage.
Cut off "our greatest ally" of the billions in no-strings-attached welfare we give them each year, and get their lobbying group out of our politics. Maybe then they will have to learn how to get along with their neighbors. We pay for their healthcare and free university, while many in the US can't afford rent and our cities are dystopian nightmares. Will we be able to vote on this, will it be on the ballot in the next elections? Ahh, we can dream...
This kabuki theater is getting long in the tooth. My predictions are predictably off mark, but it feels like the denouement is imminent.
Are Israeli troops fighting Hezbollah in Israel? Or in the territory of Lebanon? Asking for a friend.
"The Trump administration temporarily lifted oil sanctions against Iran on Monday ..."
[Similar to what the Obama administration did in 2016 to reach the JCPOA deal with Iran]
".. and announced that Tehran had agreed to invite United Nations inspectors back to Iran’s nuclear sites ..."
[Similar to what was already in place before Trump tore up the JCPOA agreement in 2018]
"Upon the signing of this MOU, the Islamic Republic of Iran will make arrangements using its best efforts for the safe passage of commercial vessels with no charge, for 60 days only, from the Persian Gulf to the Sea of Oman and vice versa."
[Traffic will again be allowed to move freely through the Straight of Hormuz -- similar to how it was before Trump & Israel started their attacks in February/March. But, this time, no guarantee beyond 60 days.]
The authoritarian leadership controlling Iran has not appreciably changed. Different people, but arguably a more repressive regime than ever.
[i.e., no improvement over what it was before Trump & Israel started their attacks in February/March]
Yeah, I guess it was cool to see all of that expensive military stuff getting blown up in Iran for a couple of weeks (although -- so sorry about the 100 schoolkids! Whoops!). Iran is definitely a bad actor, and any reduction in its military power can only be a good thing for the Middle East. I'll agree with that part.
But ... Iran still has control over the Straight of Hormuz. And our country is now an additional $150 billion in debt from this war alone (while our federal debt hole has grown $2.3 trillion bigger just since Trump re-assumed the presidency in Jan 2025 -- so much for DOGE "solutions". At least the Tech Bro Boys were able to download all kinds of our previously private information from the government databases, though -- so I'm sure that will someday work to our collective advantage).
And, finally, the 'nuclear material agreement' can has simply been kicked down the road for .... um, at least another 60 days. (Although if you think it will actually be resolved in 60 days, well I have an algae-infested Reflecting Pool in D.C. to sell you ...)
All this winning!
Trump should have just kept the JCPOA in place eight years ago and declared victory. But he was too mad at that Black Guy to let that laboriously-negotiated agreement stand.
Trump could have won a lot of hearts and minds by pointing at the JCPOA and saying "This stinks!" but then leaving it in place and beginning a campaign for a better agreement. There was no upside to tearing it up...other than the tingle it created in Trump's pants.
One thing though, and I know I'm preaching to the choir on this one, I'm not sure Trump could actually articulate what a better agreement was other than to say "One not signed by Obama".
I sure wish what I was saying was complete and utter BS...but it's not.
It does appear to be utter and complete BS.
If you live in this conspiracy theory cesspool...I'm guessing it probably does to you.
Complete and utter pants shitting child rapist beta.