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NPC

Best of the Web: The Russians hacked our pizza! DHS warns of efforts to divide Americans over pineapple on pizza

Mike Levine
ABC News
Fri, 19 Jul 2019 17:25 UTC
dhs pizza
Department of Homeland Security issues a warning using pineapple pizza.
The U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is warning that Russian agents could seek to further divide Americans by exploiting U.S. passions over whether pineapple belongs on pizza.

It's a cheesy, playful warning -- but it's trying to deliver a serious message. Posted online Wednesday by the department's Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, the tongue-in-cheek warning aims to help Americans identify and protect against propaganda campaigns from Russia and other foreign adversaries.

After all, the DHS warning says, Russian agents are capable of simultaneously insisting online that "Being anti-pineapple is un-American!" while also pushing out posts saying "Millennials are ruining pizza!"

"Foreign influencers are constantly on the lookout for opportunities to inflame hot button issues in the United States," the new DHS warning says. "They don't do this to win arguments; they want to see us divided."
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Cupcake Pink

Best of the Web: Study: Democrats tend to be LESS tolerant of diversity than Republicans - And the more educated they are, the LESS tolerant they become

Arlie Hochschild
The Guardian
Sun, 21 Jul 2019 10:20 UTC
A new survey found Democrats live with less political diversity despite being more tolerant of it - with startling results
liberal bubble
© Elizabeth Brockway/The Daily Beast
In a surprising new national survey, members of each major American political party were asked what they imagined to be the beliefs held by members of the other. The survey asked Democrats: "How many Republicans believe that racism is still a problem in America today?" Democrats guessed 50%. It's actually 79%. The survey asked Republicans how many Democrats believe "most police are bad people". Republicans estimated half; it's really 15%.

The survey, published by the thinktank More in Common as part of its Hidden Tribes of America project, was based on a sample of more than 2,000 people. One of the study's findings: the wilder a person's guess as to what the other party is thinking, the more likely they are to also personally disparage members of the opposite party as mean, selfish or bad. Not only do the two parties diverge on a great many issues, they also disagree on what they disagree on.

Comment: Take stock of reality, in other words. But is that what happened after 2016? No, they crafted the most spectacularly unhinged political theater in known human history, blaming the leader of a foreign country for losing an election in their own.

The findings in this study probably replicate, to one extent or another, across the globalized 'Western' liberal-cosmopolitan island chain from NYC to London to Paris and beyond. It's not just that the West is divided into two camps, but that one of those camps is a clear minority, dominates the levers of power, and is rendering itself not only irrelevant but a danger to the continuation of human civilization.

Fair play to the Guardian for publishing these findings, which, of course, are devastating for most of its columnists' daily commentary...

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Bullseye

Best of the Web: Destabilizing Pakistan: Bookending Washington's China policy

Tony Cartalucci
New Eastern Outlook
Thu, 25 Jul 2019 12:00 UTC
Balochistan
Much is being said of US activities aimed at China. Recent protests in Hong Kong together with a US-led propaganda campaign aimed at Beijing's attempts to quell a growing terrorist threat in Xinjiang are aimed at pressuring the nation to fall back into line within Washington's enduring unipolar international order.

The latter of these two campaigns in particular - claims of Chinese authoritarianism as Beijing attempts to neutralize US-backed separatists and terrorists in Xinjiang - has also been spun as China "targeting Muslims."

This ignores the fact that one of China's closest and oldest allies in Eurasia is Pakistan - a Muslim-majority nation. It also ignores the fact that in Pakistan, the US is playing the same game aimed at cultivating violent extremism, separatism, violence, division, and even the dissolution of Pakistan's current borders.

Comment: See also:

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Sherlock

Best of the Web: The Jeffrey Epstein case: A rare opportunity to focus

Michael Krieger
Liberty Blitzkrieg
Tue, 23 Jul 2019 03:07 UTC
Epstein/Trivers/Summers
© Screen Shot/Rick Friedman/PolarisJeffrey Epstein with Robert Trivers, Alan Dershowitz, Larry Summers, Harvard 2004
Perhaps, at long last, a serial rapist and pedophile may be brought to justice, more than a dozen years after he was first charged with crimes that have brutalized countless girls and women. But what won't change is this: the cesspool of elites, many of them in New York, who allowed Jeffrey Epstein to flourish with impunity.

For decades, important, influential, "serious" people attended Epstein's dinner parties, rode his private jet, and furthered the fiction that he was some kind of genius hedge-fund billionaire. How do we explain why they looked the other way, or flattered Epstein, even as they must have noticed he was often in the company of a young harem? Easy: They got something in exchange from him, whether it was a free ride on that airborne "Lolita Express," some other form of monetary largesse, entrée into the extravagant celebrity soirées he hosted at his townhouse, or, possibly and harrowingly, a pound or two of female flesh.

~ From the New York Magazine article: Who Was Jeffrey Epstein Calling?
An honest assessment of the current state of American politics and society in general leaves little room for optimism regarding the public's ability to accurately diagnose, much less tackle, our fundamental issues at a root level. A primary reason for this state of affairs boils down to the ease with which the American public is divided against itself and conquered.

Though there are certain issues pretty much everyone can agree on, we simply aren't focusing our collective energy on them or creating the mass movements necessary to address them. Things such as systemic bipartisan corruption, the institutionalization of a two-tier justice system in which the wealthy and powerful are above the law, a broken economy that requires both parents to work and still barely make ends meet, and a military-industrial complex consumed with profits and imperial aggression not national defense. These are just a few of the many issues that should easily unite us against an entrenched power structure, but it is not happening. At least not yet.

Comment: See also:

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Black Magic

Best of the Web: The Leftist lens: Words are 'violence,' and violence is 'justice'

James Lindsay
Quillette
Mon, 22 Jul 2019 01:15 UTC
painting stone thrower
Featured image: "Stones" (2003), by Joy Garnett (oil on canvas).
Responding to news that journalist Andy Ngo had been beaten by antifa protestors in Portland last month, a woman named Charlotte Clymer tweeted that "Ngo intentionally provokes people on the left to drive his content. Being attacked today on video taken by an actual journalist (because Ngo is definitely not) is the greatest thing that could have happened to his career. You know it. I know it. He knows it. We all know it. Violence is completely wrong, and I find it sad and weak to allow a sniveling weasel like Andy Ngo to get under one's skin like this, but I'm also not going to pretend this wasn't Ngo's goal from the start. I mean, let's cut the shit here. This is what they do."

Who is Charlotte Clymer? She is an activist who works at the Human Rights Campaign, America's "largest LGBTQ civil rights organization," which supposedly "envision[s] a world where LGBTQ people are ensured equality at home, at work [and] in every community." Andy Ngo, who has written for Quillette, the Wall Street Journal, the New York Post and other publications, happens to be gay. So this is where we are right now: A staffer for a human-rights organization dedicated to helping gay people is publicly cheering the beating of a gay man. This should raise an eyebrow.

Comment:

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Caesar

Best of the Web: Oliver Stone interviews Putin on War & Peace, why 'the Ukraine' is actually Russia, and the '2 percent factor'


Kremlin.ru
Fri, 19 Jul 2019 11:44 UTC
putin oliver stone
Vladimir Putin answered questions from American film director, screenwriter and producer Oliver Stone, parts of which were included in his new documentary, Revealing Ukraine. The interview was recorded on June 19, 2019 in the Kremlin. Here is the complete transcript...

Oliver Stone: So, I interviewed Mr Medvedchuk [leader of a Ukrainian opposition party]. It was in Monte Carlo. He gave us a very interesting interview. He gave us his view of the Ukraine. I gather that you're close with him.

President of Russia Vladimir Putin: I would not say that we are very close but we know each other well. He was President Kuchma's Chief of Staff, and it was in this capacity at the time that he asked me to take part in the christening of his daughter. According to Russian Orthodox tradition, you can't refuse such a request.

Oliver Stone: Oh, you cannot refuse it?

I thought it was a big honour for you to be the godfather of his daughter.

Vladimir Putin: It is always a great honour to be a godfather.

Oliver Stone: Well, how many children are you godfather to?

Vladimir Putin: I will not give a number but several people.

Oliver Stone: Wow. Is it like a hundred or three hundred?
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Play

Best of the Web: Oliver Stone's interviews with Russian and Italian media on new documentary 'Revealing Ukraine' (banned in Ukraine)


Vesti News
Sat, 13 Jul 2019 11:18 UTC
oliver stone revealing ukraine
Putting an end to the war in Donbass and telling the truth about the events of 2014 in Ukraine. These were Oliver Stone's goals when he was making his new film. The movie was recently presented at a film festival in Italy, where it won an award. In an interview with Eugeny Popov of Russia 1 earlier this month, Oliver Stone shared the issues he reveals through the prism of the Ukrainian crisis.


Comment: As far as we know, Revealing Ukraine has since been aired on Russian TV channel Russia 1. When it becomes available for general release, we'll publish it on Sott.net.

Here's the official trailer:

And a link to its official website.

Stone is not actually the director of this documentary, though he managed the interviews. The director is a Ukrainian man, but that didn't stop the Ukies from firing a grenade launcher at the Ukrainian TV station that had been scheduled to air the documentary first. The station shelved its plan to air it, and that'll probably be the last it's heard of in Ukraine.

Such is the applicability of Western 'democracy' in that country.

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Newspaper

Best of the Web: What makes Iran strong enough to stand against a superpower like the USA?

Elijah J. Magnier
ejmagnier.com
Wed, 17 Jul 2019 00:00 UTC
khamenei khomeini
During the Iran-Iraq war in the 1980s the Islamic Republic of Iran deployed the slogan "Karbala, Karbala we are coming" ( كربلا كربلا ما دارييم مياييم) to "defend the value of Islam". In Syria the battle cry "Zeinab shall not be abducted twice" helped mobilise Shia allies and rally thousands of men to fight the Sunni Takfiri of al-Qaeda and the "Islamic State" (ISIS). Today, despite the existential battle between Iran and the US, the "Islamic Republic" no longer uses religious slogans, but is instead rallying support on a national basis. Even Iranians who disagree with the present regime are supporting their country in the face of the aggressive posture of the US. Iranian pragmatists were disappointed by the US's unlawful revocation of the JCPOA nuclear deal. Severe sanctions are being imposed on the Iranian people because Trump ditched the deal to please Netanyahu and to spite his predecessor Obama. In the face of these sanctions, the Islamic Republic refuses to bow to US dictates. Unlike other Middle Eastern countries who willingly submit to Trump's blackmail and bullying, Iran says "NO" to the superpower. Why? How can Iran do what Saudi Arabia and other regional powers could do but will not?

Iran manufactures its own tanks, missiles,submarines and is a member of the global club of nuclear science capable countries.


Comment: And almost certainly already has a nuclear weapon or two. Not that that is really the crux of the matter. What concerns the Pentagon and the Israelis is that Iran has general military capability to defend its skies and exert regional influence. Whether of not it has 'The Bomb' is just the narrative vehicle justifying its isolation by the empire.


Comment: The only thing bullies with big sticks understand is their targets defending themselves with big sticks. All the rest is prose signifying nothing.
Strength Respects Strength Kalam
© quotefancy
The likely reason the US is second-guessing the wisdom of striking Iran directly is because the Iranians are heavily-armed with Russian military tech. This is an itinerary of just the stuff we know about:

Russia reinforces Iranian air defense, mobilizes advisers for support

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TV

Best of the Web: In season 3, Stranger Things' celebration of '80s pop culture becomes a political ideology

Noah Berlatsky
The Verge
Mon, 08 Jul 2019 09:54 UTC
We're fighting the old wars again to see if they come out better this time
Stranger Things Russia
Stranger Things have happened. Millions of Americans today, for example, believe that their president is a Russian Manchurian candidate...

Warning: spoilers ahead for season 3 of Stranger Things

The third season of Stranger Things, like the first two seasons, revels in the fun, funny, nostalgic detritus of 1980s pop culture. Much of the series's action is set in a mall, the center of teen life before the advent of iPhones and Amazon. In the shopping emporium, the kids buy colorful '80s clothes and watch movies like Back to the Future and George Romero's Day of the Dead. Glimpses of classic Dungeons & Dragons manuals and period issues of Penthouse are scattered around the screen. Running jokes include references to '80s teen sex symbol Phoebe Cates and the bombastically maudlin theme song for The Neverending Story. Most horror stories surprise the audience with terrifying monsters that leap from the shadows. Stranger Things is more invested in surprising viewers with a wave of nostalgic touchstones.

Season 3 is different from its predecessors, though, in that its retro impulses extend not just to pop culture, but to geopolitics. The season's plot is steeped in Cold War paranoia. The nostalgia for a threatened Russian invasion is as comforting and cutesy in its own way as references to New Coke or the X-Men. But it's also an indication that the obsession with the past can indicate not just ongoing affection, but ongoing anxiety. Sometimes, art looks back to the '80s because people love the '80s. And sometimes it looks back there because the '80s, like Stranger Things' Mind Flayer, has its tendrils in the brain of American culture and won't let go.

Comment: They're certainly part of the drama, and their gaps in awareness feed 'the monster', but Trump and Trump supporters are not 'the monster'.

To 'kill the Mind Flayer now' would require seeing the source(s) of the cultural schizophrenia sweeping across the US, which mostly emanates from the intelligentsia and 'elites' of US society, who are in the throes of highly destructive ideological possession - the results of which are all projected onto Russia, which is anti-ideology.

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SOTT Logo

Best of the Web: Virtue-signaling gone mad: Apple comes out with 72 different emojis for multiple permutations 'intersectional diversity'

Igor Ogorodnev
RT
Thu, 18 Jul 2019 21:32 UTC
relationship emoji Apple
© AppleThe new relationship emoji being introduced by Apple for its iOS system.
If I wanted an emoji to look exactly like me, I'd just send a photograph. But then, unlike Apple and Google, I understand that they are a symbolic shorthand, not a racist tool of oppression that ignores my identity.

On Wednesday, World Emoji Day, the two California companies revealed their expanded repertoire of "newest designs that bring even more diversity to the keyboard."

Seventy-two new iOS emojis of couples holding hands, instead of a generic symbol. Thus, a blonde woman with a blond man, a blonde woman with a tan skinned man, a blonde woman with a light-skinned black man, a blonde woman with a dark-skinned black man, a dark-skinned black woman with a light-skinned black woman, a white man with a moustache with a white man without a moustache, and so on and on and on.
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