Bulletins and News Discussion from January 6th to January 12th, 2025 - The Fall of Trudeau - COTW: Canada
Image is of Trudeau and Trump together at Mar-a-Lago in November 2024. Source is here.
The Liberals, headed by Trudeau, have not been doing so hot lately. Polls have been rather poor, showing the party far behind the Conservatives, and the Deputy Prime Minister Chrystia Freeland (an outspoken apologist for Ukrainian Nazis) resigned recently, with more MPs following her lead. Trump's return to power has shaken the Canadian establishment due to his threats to impose massive tariffs on Mexico and Canada, which will have substantial economic consequences given that Canada sends most of its exports to the US, compounding the economic malaise that has affected most of the world over the last few years.
With all this bad news, there are rumors and reports that Trudeau will soon resign, ending his nine years of rule. His fall would be yet another casualty in the wave of incumbent parties falling across the imperial core, only to be replaced by more conservative parties that have very similar policies but wish to cast all blame and hardship onto minorities.
Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful. Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section. Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war. Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis. Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists' side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language. https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one. https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts. https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel. https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator. https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps. https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language. https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language. https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses. https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
The president of Bolivia, Luis Arce, said this Saturday that his government will not change the economic model based on social organizations, despite criticism from the opposition and analysts for the economic situation in the country, and also announced that it will defend and improve the economic stability of Bolivians.
“That is the basis of our economic model that we are not going to change (…) we will improve it for the benefit of the Bolivian people, with you we will do it,” said the president in his speech during the anniversary of the Women’s Federation “Bartolina Sisa” in the eastern region of Santa Cruz. Arce recalled that this social organization, like others, founded the Movement to Socialism (MAS), an official party based on “rebuilding the country and recovering natural resources” for the benefit of the population.
The Bolivian president stated in his speech that his government is committed to ensuring the economic stability necessary for the country, highlighting the achievements made in this area and reiterating that it will continue working to maintain such stability. According to official data, the Bolivian model achieved growth indicators despite opposition sectors claiming that the economic model is exhausted, but without proposing alternatives that would privilege the interests of the population.
The total aggregate budget amounts to 369,341 million bolivianos (official currency of Bolivia), while the consolidated budget totals 296,566 million bs, that is, they are increased by 8.5% and 11.7%, respectively, compared with EGP 2024. Of the consolidated expenditure budget, of Bs 296,566 million, 58.8% (Bs 174,235 million) is current expenditure, 17.2% (Bs 51,046 million) capital expenditure and 24.0% (Bs 71,285 million) use funds.
For the subsidy on fuels, inputs and additives, it allocates BRL 15,156 million, and for the subsidy on food a total of BRL 750 million (wheat, BRL 383 million; maize, BRL 268 million and rice, BRL 99 million).