Puppet MastersS


Bizarro Earth

Best of the Web: Slaying the dragon: The world stands on the brink of global war

crowd silhouette
© unknownSunrise Sunset
Alexander Dugin delves into the intricate dynamics of a rapidly evolving multipolar world as we step into 2024, highlighting the pivotal shifts and conflicts reshaping global geopolitics.

The main issue in 2024 remains the same fundamental problem as before: the confrontation between two waves — the waning wave of a unipolar world order with US hegemony and the collective West, and the rising wave of a multipolar world, embodied in BRICS-10.

This problem did not arise now, but as the West, having gained at one historical moment the appearance of sole planetary domination (after the collapse of the USSR), proved incapable of implementing its leadership in practice, new sovereign poles began to assert themselves — Russia and China. Other poles are on the approach — India, the Islamic civilisation, Africa, and Latin America. In total, seven power centres, including the West. Six of them have united in BRICS, beginning to build a multipolar order.

The West continues to cling to its hegemony and attacks the most dangerous opponents to its domination — Russia, China, and the Islamic world. This did not start today but at the very beginning of the 2000s. But the current contrast of the political world map was finally acquired in recent years — especially after the beginning of the Special Military Operation in Ukraine. The operation became the first hot war of the multipolar world against the unipolar one. Until then — especially during President Trump's first term and due to the rise of populism in Europe — it seemed that a direct clash could be avoided, that the West would peacefully accept multipolarity, trying to fight for a worthy place in the post-globalist world order. This is what Trump meant by calling to drain the globalist swamp in the US itself. But so far, the swamp managed to drain Trump himself and, during the most swampy administration under President Biden, to unleash a bloody conflict in Ukraine, throwing all the forces of the collective West against Russia, the most important pole of the multipolar world.

Comment: The global/anti-global rumble is underway...choosing sides, taking bets.


Heart - Black

Why the oligarchs LOVE democracy

ALexS
© telegra.phAlex Soros
It's the only system where one man can script decades of wars and millions of dead worldwide.

Last week, World Economic Forum held their annual Summit in Davos, Switzerland. What struck me in several discussions, is how deeply the Davos attendees care about democracy. Sure, they may be enormously privileged and powerful, but they seem awful keen that we, the deplorables have political power with an effective system of checks and balances. One such voice is the talented Mr. Alex Soros, son of his equally talented father, George.

In a display of veritable oratorical fireworks in this moving clip, young Mr. Soros drew attention to the clear and present danger to our precious democracy: Donald Trump. We should only hope that the good people at Davos can save democracy by somehow preventing the American people from voting wrong in November.

What if it's not really about democracy?

X

Trump won't change anything - Lavrov

SerLav
© File/Sputnik/Russian Foreign MinistryRussian FM Sergey Lavrov
US-Russia relations have deteriorated beyond the point of repair, even if the Republican frontrunner reaches the White House, the top diplomat has said...

Ties between Moscow and Washington are unlikely to improve, even if Donald Trump wins the upcoming 2024 US presidential election, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov told CBS in an interview that aired on Tuesday. The former US president had previously repeatedly boasted about his good relations with Vladimir Putin.

America's general approach towards Russia has not changed over the past decades, Lavrov said, adding that Washington itself had ruined its relations with Moscow by dismantling all the "confidence-building" mechanisms and eroding mutual trust.

The minister pointed in particular to the decision by former US President George W. Bush to withdraw from the Anti-Ballistic Missile Treaty (ABM Treaty) in 2002. The key arms control agreement signed by the US and the USSR in 1972 limited the number of ballistic missile defense systems each side could have and was designed to de-pressurize the arms race between the two Cold War rivals.

Comment: Traps for Trump are being set...second generation and counting.


Camcorder

Watchlisted: You're probably already on a government extremism list

surveillance
© investigative academy.com
"In a closed society where everybody's guilty, the only crime is getting caught."
— Hunter S. Thompson
According to the FBI, you may be an anti-government extremist if you've:
a) purchased a Bible or other religious materials,
b) used terms like "MAGA" and "Trump,"
c) shopped at Dick's Sporting Goods, Cabela's, or Bass Pro Shops,
d) purchased tickets to travel by bus, cars, or plane;
e) all of the above.
In fact, if you selected any of those options in recent years, you're probably already on a government watchlist. That's how broadly the government's net is being cast in its pursuit of domestic extremists. We're all fair game now, easy targets for inclusion on some FBI watch list or another.

When the FBI is asking banks and other financial institutions to carry out dragnet searches of customer transactions — warrantlessly and without probable cause — for "extremism" indicators broadly based on where you shop, what you read, and how you travel, we're all in trouble.

Clearly, you don't have to do anything illegal.
You don't even have to challenge the government's authority.
Frankly, you don't even have to care about politics or know anything about your rights.

All you really need to do in order to be tagged as a suspicious character, flagged for surveillance, and eventually placed on a government watch list is live in the United States.

Comment: The tendency is to be complacent, to trust, hence the jabbing reminders 'all is not as it seems'.


Light Saber

Trump steamrolls Nikki Haley in New Hampshire GOP primary: Second show of 2024 dominance

trump new hamshire primary 2024
© Timothy A. Clary/AFP via Getty ImagesRepublican presidential hopeful and former US President Donald Trump gestures during an Election Night Party in Nashua, New Hampshire, on January 23, 2024.
Former President Donald Trump won the New Hampshire primary Tuesday night, defeating former U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley and effectively marching his way into the GOP presidential nomination.

The Associated Press called Trump the winner just after polls closed at 8 p.m. With 95% of the vote counted, Trump led with 54% to Haley's 43%.

Trump held multiple late-night rallies in the Granite State as he sought a shock-and-awe campaign to block Haley from a much-needed win. His final rallies featured key endorsements from South Carolina elected officials, including Sen. Tim Scott (R-SC), whom Haley appointed to the Senate, in a bid to detract attention away from Haley, a two-term South Carolina governor.

Comment: Haley is such a repellent warmonger, Republican Rand Paul actually founded a movement called 'Never Nikki'




Magnify

"The myth of the Russian threat": What is behind the plans of Lithuania and Poland to hold military exercises in the Suwalki corridor

Lithuanian military personnel on exercises
© Alfredas Pliadis / XinhuaLithuanian military personnel on exercises
Lithuania and Poland plan to hold exercises in the Suwalki corridor on the border of the two countries in April, Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda said. In turn, Polish Leader Andrzej Duda noted the importance of the Suwalki corridor for European security. In his opinion, this region requires increased attention. Earlier, the West has repeatedly expressed concern that Russia may take control of the Suwalki corridor and thereby cut off the Baltic States from the rest of the EU. According to analysts, Moscow has never had such plans.

Vilnius and Warsaw plan to hold exercises in the Suwalki corridor on the border of the two countries in April. This was announced by Lithuanian President Gitanas Nauseda in an interview with Delfi.

"I am glad that the President of Poland really responded vividly to the desire to conduct joint exercises on this piece of land called the Suwalki corridor," Nauseda said. — We are already talking about very specific dates, perhaps it could happen in April."

Comment: So really much ado about nothing, but NATO has to find excuses for its existence and thus keeps making provocative exercises, costing tax payers billions and lining the industrial military complex.


Black Magic

The four horsemen of Gaza's apocalypse

The Four Horsemen of Gaza’s Apocalypse
Joe Biden relies on advisors who view the world through the prism of the West's civilizing mission to the "lesser breeds" of the earth to formulate his policies towards Israel and the Middle East.

Joe Biden's inner circle of strategists for the Middle East — Antony Blinken, Jake Sullivan and Brett McGurk — have little understanding of the Muslim world and a deep animus towards Islamic resistance movements. They see Europe, the United States and Israel as involved in a clash of civilizations between the enlightened West and a barbaric Middle East. They believe that violence can bend Palestinians and other Arabs to their will. They champion the overwhelming firepower of the U.S. and Israeli military as the key to regional stability — an illusion that fuels the flames of regional war and perpetuates the genocide in Gaza.

In short, these four men are grossly incompetent. They join the club of other clueless leaders, such as those who waltzed into the suicidal slaughter of World War One, waded into the quagmire of Vietnam or who orchestrated the series of recent military debacles in Iraq, Libya, Syria and Ukraine. They are endowed with the presumptive power vested in the Executive Branch to bypass Congress, to provide weapons to Israel and carry out military strikes in Yemen and Iraq. This inner circle of true believers dismiss the more nuanced and informed counsels in the State Department and the intelligence communities, who view the refusal of the Biden administration to pressure Israel to halt the ongoing genocide as ill-advised and dangerous.

Pistol

SOTT Focus: BBC documentary on Western Death Squad in Yemen: Israeli Security Firm Hired by UAE Paid American Mercenaries to Carry Out Political Assassinations

Yemeni human rights laywer Huda al-Sarari
© Jack Garland/BBCThe son of Yemeni human rights laywer Huda al-Sarari was fatally shot in 2019
The United Arab Emirates (UAE) has funded politically motivated assassinations in Yemen, a BBC investigation has found.

Training provided by American mercenaries - hired by the UAE in 2015 - has then been used by Emiratis to instruct locals, sparking a surge in targeted killings, a whistleblower says.

The findings come as conflict in Yemen has returned to the international spotlight following attacks on ships in the Red Sea.

The UAE government has denied the allegations in our investigation - that it had assassinated those without links to terrorism - saying they were "false and without merit".

The killing spree in Yemen - more than 100 assassinations in a three-year period - is just one element of an ongoing bitter internecine conflict pitting several international powers against each other in the Middle East's poorest country.


Comment: So, as in Iraq, Libya, Syria and Afghanistan, the West - working closely with Israelis - have been running a death squad in Yemen. What the above text description doesn't mention, but which is clear from the above BBC documentary video, is that these assassinations were reported in Western media as having been done by 'ISIS'. And so, once again, we see that 'ISIS', like 'al-Qaeda' before it, is Western-Israeli military-intelligence assassinating political figures it believes pose a challenge to their influence over the 'management' of global energy supplies coming from the Middle East.
Yemen has the misfortune to inhabit strategic real estate. Lying at the southern end of the Arabian peninsula, Yemen is bordered by Saudi Arabia to the north, the Red Sea down to the Bab el-Mandeb strait to its west, the Gulf of Aden to the south and Oman to its east. Its territory also includes islands in the Red Sea and around the Bab el-Mandeb strait. The strait, an 18-mile gap between the east coast of Africa and the Arabian peninsula, is a potential chokepoint for the heavily-used shipping route from the Suez Canal and the Red Sea to the Gulf of Aden and Indian Ocean.
The crux of the matter is: who controls Yemen, controls vital shipping lanes. And, to the consternation of all, it turns out to be the Houthis, who have exercised this ability to attempt to force Israel to cease its genocide in Gaza. So now the Western Powers are back to outright bombing Yemen...


Stop

DeSantis kills bill helping Trump day after endorsing former rival

ron desantis
Gov. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) quashed hope for a bill introduced in the Florida legislature that would allow taxpayer funds to pay for former President Donald Trump's legal expenses.

Republican Trump endorser state Sen. Ileana Garcia introduced the bill, "Grants for Victims of Political Discrimination," which would authorize up to $5 million to be granted to a qualified person.

However, DeSantis responded to a report on the bill on Monday that detailed that "some Florida Republicans want taxpayers to pay Trump's legal bills."

Comment: See also:


Jet1

Suspected Jordanian air strikes in southern Syria kill 10 - activists

air strikes arman
© Suweida Fire BrigadeSuweida Fire Brigade posted photos showing crews searching for a person presumed dead after the strikes in Arman.
At least 10 people, including children, have been killed in suspected Jordanian air strikes in south-western Syria, local activists and media say.

Several homes were reportedly destroyed in Arman, a town in Suweida province about 20km (12 miles) from the border.

There was no immediate comment from authorities in Jordan.

Comment: See also: Jordan asks US to deploy Patriot systems citing 'ballistic' threat