Puppet MastersS


Handcuffs

We're coming for you

James Howard Kunstler
Clusterfuck Nation
Fri, 14 Oct 2022 00:00 UTC
UnkSam
© Getty ImagesYou're Next!
Slip slidin' away... Slip slidin' away... You know the nearer your destination... The more you're slip slidin' away....
— Paul Simon
Have you noticed, as the election looms, the Party of Chaos trips deeper into its own self-created chaos? Turns out that the effort to make Ukraine the fifty-first state is not going over so well with the voters. Nor is the campaign to convince children to switch sexes. Or the crusade to sell ever more mRNA "vaccines" that the CDC knows good-and-goshdarn-well is killing and maiming credulous citizens by the millions. Or the program for importing limitless alien "vibrance" across the open border with Mexico.... As the venerable Rolling Stones sang more than a half century ago: "Rape... murder... it's just a shot away!" This is the kind of country that the Party of Chaos has been grooming you up for.

Comment: Make it so.

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Stop

Putin says no need for further massive air strikes on Ukraine, foresees end to mobilization


RFE/RL
Fri, 14 Oct 2022 00:00 UTC
VPutin
© public domainRussian President Vladimir Putin • Astana, Kazakhstan
Nearly eight months into his war against Ukraine, Russian President Vladimir Putin appears to be striking a softer tone, saying he sees no need for continued massive air strikes and that a mobilization of troops to support his military operation will end in two weeks.

Speaking to journalists in Kazakhstan's capital, Astana, on October 14, Putin said that Russia was willing to hold talks on ending the war, although they would need to be held with an international mediator if Ukraine comes to the table as well.

Putin -- who has said he would be ready to use nuclear weapons to defend Russia's "territorial integrity" -- also warned of a "global catastrophe" in the event of a direct clash between NATO troops and Russia. Still, he said he sees no need for talks with U.S. President Joe Biden at the present time.

There is "no need for massive strikes" now because most of the designated targets have been hit and "we have not set ourselves the task of destroying Ukraine," Putin said after attending a summit of leaders from the former Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) in the Kazakh capital.

Comment: Putin is pragmatic. It is fundamental to his nature and leadership. More from RT:
During a press conference in Astana, Kazakhstan, President Putin explained that the Russian military is now pursuing other objectives, as only seven of some 29 targets designated by Russia's Defense Ministry were not hit in a bombardment earlier this week. "But these objects are being finished off gradually."

On Wednesday, Ukraine's Energy Minister German Galushchenko revealed that about 30% of the country's energy facilities were damaged in two consecutive days of Russian strikes, according to CNN.

Putin said Moscow does not have the intention of destroying Ukraine as a country, and the current situation is a response to hostile actions taken by Kiev. He explained that if Ukraine had not blocked the water supply to the nearly two and a half million people living in Crimea, Russian forces would not have had to enter the country to open it back up.

"If they hadn't done this, there wouldn't have been other counteractions," the President noted, adding that the recent attack on the Crimea Bridge is now also forcing Moscow to "think ten times" about how important it is for Russia to establish a link with Crimea across Ukrainian territory.


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Oil Well

Saudis say US sought 1 month delay of OPEC+ production cuts

Jon Gambrell
AP
Fri, 14 Oct 2022 00:00 UTC
OPEC
© AP/Philipp-Moritz Jenne/FileOPEC • Vienna, Austria • October 5, 2022
Saudi Arabia said Thursday that the U.S. had urged it to postpone a decision by OPEC and its allies — including Russia — to cut oil production by a month. Such a delay could have helped reduce the risk of a spike in gas prices ahead of the U.S. midterm elections next month.

A statement issued by the Saudi Foreign Ministry didn't specifically mention the Nov. 8 elections in which U.S. President Joe Biden is trying to maintain his narrow Democratic majority in Congress. However, it stated that the U.S. "suggested" the cuts be delayed by a month. In the end, OPEC announced the cuts at its Oct. 5 meeting in Vienna.
Holding off on the cuts would have likely delayed any rise in gas prices until after the elections.

Rising oil prices — and by extension higher gasoline prices — have been a key driver of inflation in the U.S. and around the world, worsening global economic woes as Russia's months-long war on Ukraine also has disrupted global food supplies. For Biden, gasoline prices creeping up could affect voters. He and many lawmakers have warned that America's longtime security-based relationship with the kingdom could be reconsidered.

The decision by the Saudi Foreign Ministry to release a rare, lengthy statement showed how tense relations between the two countries have become.

Comment: Surely SA is sweating bullets!

See also:

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Arrow Down

US should abandon 'outdated Cold War mentality' - China


RT
Fri, 14 Oct 2022 16:36 UTC
Mao Ning
© AP/Liu ZhengChinese Foreign MInistry spokeswoman Mao Ning
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Mao Ning on Thursday accused President Joe Biden's administration of clinging to an "outdated Cold War mentality" instead of pursuing "win-win cooperation" with Beijing. Discussing the new US national strategy at a regular press briefing, Mao said that her country sees no benefit "in any rhetoric or act that plays up geographical conflict or major power competition."

"We oppose the outdated Cold War mentality and zero-sum mindset," she emphasized, referring to the way China is described in the new US strategy.

According to the document released by the White House on Wednesday, Washington views Beijing as "the only competitor with both the intent to reshape the international order and, increasingly, the economic, diplomatic, military, and technological power to do it." Responding to this claim, Mao noted:
"China's development is fundamentally about the happiness of the people and rejuvenation of the nation. The US needs to follow principles of mutual respect, peaceful coexistence and 'win-win cooperation,' especially now, when the world is undergoing changes unseen in a century.

"As the biggest developing and developed country, China and the US have a responsibility of defending world peace and stability and promoting economic prosperity and development."
Confrontation will not benefit either Washington or Beijing, the ministry spokeswoman said, urging the US to bring its relations with China "back onto the track of sound and steady development."

Comment: Wise words fall on deaf ears. Locked on target, the US trajectory has no intention of changing course.

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USA

Westerners live in denial, convinced they're the good guys

Jonathan Cook
Middle East Eye
Fri, 14 Oct 2022 00:00 UTC
Stamp/woman
© ReutersWoman poses for photos of postage stamp image depicting the Crimean Kerch Bridge on fire.
No one took responsibility for the explosion over the weekend that ripped through a section of the Kerch Bridge that links Russia to Crimea and was built by Moscow after it annexed the peninsula back in 2014.

But it was not just Kyiv's gleeful celebrations that indicated the main suspect. Within hours, the Ukrainian authorities had released a set of commemorative stamps depicting the destruction.

Russian President Vladimir Putin was under no illusions either. On Monday, he struck out with a torrent of missiles that hit major Ukrainian cities such as Kyiv and Lviv. It was a pale, Slavic echo of Israel's intermittent bombardments of Gaza, which are expressly intended to send the Palestinian enclave "back to the Stone Age".

If the scenes looked familiar - an attack by one party, followed by a massive retaliatory strike from the other - the mood and language that greeted the Ukrainian attack and the Russian counter-attack felt noticeably different from what passes for normal western commentary about Israel and Palestine.

The blast on the Kerch Bridge was welcomed with barely concealed excitement from western journalists, politicians and analysts, while Moscow's strikes on Kyiv were uniformly denounced as Russian brutality and state terrorism.

That is not the way things work when Israel and Palestinian factions engage in their own rounds of fighting.
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Putin

Putin addresses Russian Energy Week International Forum - Speaks on sabotage, economics and geopolitics


Kremlin.ru
Wed, 12 Oct 2022 14:15 UTC
Russian Energy Week International Forum plenary session
Vladimir Putin spoke at the plenary session of the Russian Energy Week International Forum. The topic of the panel discussion is Global Energy in a Multipolar World.

President of Russia Vladimir Putin: Good afternoon, friends, ladies and gentlemen.

I would like to welcome all the participants and guests of Russian Energy Week, a respected and recognised platform for dialogue on key global energy topics.

Such direct and transparent communication is essential now, when the global economy in general, the fuel and energy sector are in the middle of, let me be direct, an acute crisis due to unstable price dynamics of energy resources, an imbalance in supply and demand, and the overtly subversive actions of individual market participants, who are guided solely by their own geopolitical ambitions, resort to outright discrimination in the market, and if that does not work, they simply destroy the infrastructure of their competitors.


Comment: Numerous world leaders give loads of lip service about helping their citizens - Putin and his team actually do it; and by extension help lift up those who are smart enough to work with him.

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Sheriff

Russian troops from joint military force to arrive in Belarus in response to military activity of Poland & Baltic states near border


TASS
Fri, 14 Oct 2022 21:52 UTC
Belarusian Defense Minister Viktor Khrenin
FILE PHOTO: Belarusian Defense Minister Viktor Khrenin. Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Belarusian Armed Forces Colonel Viktor Tumar specified that the joint military force was created to fortify the defense of the Belarusian border and reduce military activity in border areas.
The Russian troops that are part of a regional group of forces formed by Minsk and Moscow will start arriving in Belarus in the next few days, Deputy Chief of the General Staff of the Belarusian Armed Forces Colonel Viktor Tumar said on Friday.

"I believe it's necessary to point out that Russian troops from the joint military force will start arriving in the Republic of Belarus in the coming days," he said, as cited by the Belarusian Defense Ministry's press service.

Tumar specified that the joint military force was created to fortify the defense of the Belarusian border and reduce military activity in border areas. The deputy general staff chief added that a peacetime corps of the Belarusian forces would form the backbone of the group, which would also include some autonomous Russian units.

Comment: This appears to be related to a statement made earlier this month by the Belarus Defense Minister who warned that NATO is preparing for war.



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Arrow Down

How low can you go? NYC congressional candidate Mike Itkis stars in porn to show 'sex positive' agenda

Zach Williams and Natalie O'Neill
New York Post
Fri, 14 Oct 2022 15:46 UTC
mike itkis porn
The “Bucket List Bonanza” video is part of his “sex positive” platform.
His campaign's off with a bang!

A Manhattan congressional candidate has released an online porn video starring himself in a bid to highlight his "sex positive" political platform.

Long-odds, third-party hopeful Mike Itkis — who's expected to lose to Democratic Rep. Jerry Nadler in New York's 12th District — posted the steamy, 13-minute sex tape with adult movie star Nicole Sage.

Comment: It's likely that this has nothing to do with any "issues" Itkis wants highlighted and has everything to do with contriving a shocking political stunt to save a failing campaign. It's gross, but gross may actually play well in New York.

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NPC

Virginia state lawmaker to introduce bill making it a crime for parents not to affirm their LGBT child

Paul Best
Fox News
Sat, 15 Oct 2022 09:24 UTC
Elizabeth Guzman
© Jahi Chikwendiu/The Washington Post via Getty ImagesElizabeth Guzman running for election for the Virginia House of Delegates in the 31st District.
Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin introduced updated 'model policies' on transgender students last month.

As the battle over parental rights and protections for LGBT students heats up in Virginia, one state delegate said she will introduce a bill in the legislature's next session that would make it a crime for a parent or guardian not to affirm their child's sexual orientation or gender identity.

The move is in response to Republican Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin's updated "model policies" on transgender students, which require students to use bathrooms and join sports teams based on their sex at birth, as opposed to their gender identity.

Comment: See also:

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Brick Wall

'We should be aiming for zero infections': New chancellor Jeremy Hunt's woeful record on lockdowns

Will Jones
The Daily Sceptic
Fri, 14 Oct 2022 18:37 UTC
Chancellor Jeremy Hunt
The new Chancellor Jeremy Hunt has in recent months been rebranding himself as a lockdown sceptic, winning Esther McVey's support in the leadership contest and pledging, according to McVey, never to impose "full lockdowns or damaging restrictions" again. However, prior to the post-Omicron political wind-change, Hunt was an eager supporter of the extreme Zero Covid position, advocating elimination of the disease, criticising the lifting of restrictions, voting for vaccine passports and praising the Chinese example of police-enforced quarantine.

In May, the Spectator collected together some of Hunt's most pro-lockdown quotes. Such as the time, in July 2020, when he spoke to the pro-restriction group Independent SAGE and pledged his allegiance to the Zero Covid creed:
I very much agree... that we should be aiming for zero infection and elimination of the disease because that is basically the approach taken in countries which have a SARS strategy as opposed to a flu strategy and those are the countries that have overwhelmingly been the most successful in tackling coronavirus. My sister lives in Beijing and she flew back to Beijing in the middle of lockdown. Just to give you an idea of the contrast, she was escorted from the airport in Beijing to her home by Ministry of Health officials and then put into her home for two weeks' quarantine. The door was sealed and she had a police car sitting outside her house periodically. Now I'm not saying that we go that far in this country but I just think it's an indication of how serious they are, in the countries that have had to deal with SARS, about stopping, at the route, every possible source of infection.
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