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Bulletins and News Discussion from March 18th to March 24th, 2024 - Ra Ra Rasputin - COTW: Russia

Image is of President Vladimir Putin, with his cook Prigozhin, though he is more famous for other things.

I'm assuming we all know what a "Russia" and a "Putin" is, so I'm skipping the background section.

On March 15th, Putin handily won the presidential election. This is perhaps one of the least surprising things to happen in the last couple years, and all claims and debates about electoral corruption are missing the point (in this particular election at least). The reason why Putin won is not fascist brainwashing or Putin having a high Persuasion/Intimidation DC, and it's not even really about the laws that make opposing the Ukraine War illegal. Wages are up significantly, unemployment is at record lows (for the post-USSR period, of course), as is poverty, and the ruble is about as stable as it could be given what the West has tried to do to it. The government has been forced to massively intervene in the economy to keep things afloat, buying up properties that have been ditched by foreign and domestic billionaires, though obviously Russia's wealthy are still plenty powerful. Inflation is up, but wages are comfortably outpacing it. And the Communist Party remains a relic of a bygone era, disconnected from the young people who might hypothetically propel a revolution.

Russia is still in the transition from switching to a Western-oriented export economy to an Eastern-oriented one. Nonetheless, Russia is now China's single largest oil supplier (unseating Saudi Arabia), delivering half of all their oil to China, and trade between the two countries has massively increased. Where Western brands have retreated from Russia (and not many actually have), more Russia-friendly corporations, and Russian businesses themselves, have filled the gaps.

By going through the news, I've seen a lot of economies that are not doing well at all. Most countries seem to be in that category. Either they have general growth but a deeply struggling populace, or the government is trying to keep the population afloat but running up huge debts in the process, or the government is failing on both counts. Russia is one of the few countries on the planet that I can confidently state is actually doing quite well objectively, which means it's doing extremely well relatively. Considering the Western economists regularly delivering portents of doom in early 2022, and salivating over how they were going to divide the country following the inevitable economic collapse, this is a hilarious state of affairs.

In the long term, their predictions may come true. It is entirely possible that a post-war Russia will slump, returning to neoliberal policies and continuing their nonsensical allergy to budget deficits. Russia might not be a mere gas station, but a substantial amount of the economy is made up of fossil fuel exports, which might be troublesome in a greener future, especially as China, their main oil market, is one of the few countries on the planet that seems serious about renewable/nuclear energy. And the limited labour force means that long-term growth is inherently limited without some creative measures, even with the potential influx of whatever remains of the population and territory that Russia seizes in Ukraine. Perhaps it is in this crucible of disillusionment and hardship, after seeing that good things are indeed possible if the government wishes them to be so, that a socialist Russia could rise again. But we aren't there yet, and the growth continues for now.

Much of this information is, again, from Michael Roberts. It seems like we're both doing the same strategy of hopping from election to election.

Apologies for the lack of updates (again!), I've been going through book titles again for the reading list (I've probably got a thousand or more to get through) and also trying to touch grass more. I'm not very good at balancing things out, I tend to do the hyperfocus-on-one-thing-until-it's-done approach.

The COTW (Country of the Week) label is designed to spur discussion and debate about a specific country every week in order to help the community gain greater understanding of the domestic situation of often-understudied nations. If you've wanted to talk about the country or share your experiences, but have never found a relevant place to do so, now is your chance! However, don't worry - this is still a general news megathread where you can post about ongoing events from any country.

The Country of the Week is Russia! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.

The bulletins site is here!
The RSS feed is here.
Last week's thread is here.

1.1K comments

  • TOPPLE. BEHEAD.

    Argentina's government rules out free dengue vaccine despite record deaths

    Presidential Spokesperson Maneul Adorni says there is no plan to make Dengue vaccine free and compulsory to citizens despite a record number of deaths this year.

    President Javier Milei’s government will not include a vaccine for Dengue fever in its national vaccination calendar. Speaking at a press conference in Buenos Aires on Monday, Presidential Spokesperson Manuel Adorni shot down suggestions that the state would make the jab free and compulsory to citizens despite a record number of deaths this year.

    Adorni, who also questioned the vaccine’s effectiveness, said talks over its inclusion on the national vaccination calendar are “not on the agenda,” though the decision could be revisited in the future. "Immunity is achieved over time, so vaccinating now would mean that immunity will be achieved in four months, where the mosquito is no longer a problem, even though its effectiveness has not been proven," said Adorni.

    Argentina has seen 79 deaths from dengue over the last eight months, 69 of which have been registered since the turn of the year. In the past week, 22 people have died after infection from the virus. Infection numbers are soaring. So far in 2024, more than 102,000 cases have been reported, which is 86 percent of the 120,000 cases registered in total, another record.

    Milei said in an interview last Sunday that the dengue crisis is "part of Kirchnerism's negligence" – a reference to the government which preceded his in office. He accused them of “not having run a good campaign a year ago.”

    For those seeking vaccination, the TAK-003 vaccine, also known as Qdengam, produced by the Japanese laboratory Takeda, is available in Argentina privately. Each dose against the virus, which is transmitted by the Aedes Aegypti mosquito, costs about 70,000 pesos (about US$80 at the official exchange rate), while the minimum wage is set at 202,800 pesos (USS$232).

    Eduardo López, an infectious disease doctor at the Buenos Aires Children's Hospital, contradicted Adorni’s remarks. "Studies show that vaccines are safe and effective," he told the C5N news channel.

    Andrea Gamarnik, a virologist, specialist in the dengue virus and researcher at the CONICET scientific research institute, denounced on the X social network that Argentina is "in the worst dengue epidemic in history" but that experts are not "allowed to work" because, she believes, the government is dismantling the scientific system.

    A month ago, tens of thousands of people around the world shared videos of mosquito swarms in Argentina. That particular one was an invasion of Aedes Albifasciatus, a species that grows especially after the rains and in open, grassy places, unlike Aegypti, which grows mainly in cities and spreads Zika and chikungunya as well as dengue.

    Both my mother and sister have dengue, both had serious fever but are now recovering. Hospitals wont give them tests, stating that "they don't have any" or are reserved for some special cases. "Come back tomorrow" they say. So far I've been able to avoid the disease, but I work in the streets so it's a matter of time one of these little fuckers bite me.

    Also, oncologic patients are getting their help completely shut down by the government, leaving them to fend off by themselves against predatory pharma practices. The state decided to fuck off and the market will never help, we're all being left alone.

    I try to mask it all off with some jokes and whatever, try to sound positive. But deep down I'm reaching a breaking point. Everywhere I look there's misery, hunger and desperation and it's all catching up to me.

  • I wanted to write a short primer on missile terminology at the start of the week, but my phone deleted most of it so I ran out of energy. Here it is again.

    #Aerodynamics: Hypersonic: Technically a buzzword, but is regarded at Mach 5 (aka 5x the speed of sound). In US Military terms, this refers to a weapon that can perform maneuvers at this speed above. Ballistic missiles travel at above hypersonic speeds or above by virtue of all their other properties, but don't fill the US military definition as they don't do maneuvers in response to incoming fire. Even the original V2 approached hypersonic speeds. This speed makes the weapon difficult to intercept, as there's less time to intercept and any change in direction is "larger" for the purposes of interception. However, most cruise missiles and anti-tank missiles are not hypersonic, and are even subsonic. Hypersonic velocities introduce some aerodynamic and physical/mechanical complications that slowly increase depending on the local air pressure and multiple of the speed of sound. As a counter-example, a Mach 10 projectile 60 km above the Earth's surface will not produce the same plasma envelope or heat as the same profile projectile 2 km above the Earth's surface. Be wary when seeing this term in the media, it sometimes refers to ballistic missiles, which is nothing special unless they can course correct.

    Supersonic: An actual technical term that means above the speed of sound in a given context. You know this. At sea level (and for many military applications), this is roughly 340 meters a second (1200 kmph or 760 mph). There are a bunch of aerodynamic qualities that change around this speed. I say around as air flowing past a bit sticking out (say, a wing, or radio antenna etc) will cause air to flow faster than the speed of sound, creating lateral forces that affect the vehicle (vehicle: plane, missile, bullet etc). Those lateral forces mean a vehicle will want to be solidly above or below the supersonic threshold. The lower the air pressure (usually, the further up) reduces the speed of sound, but also reduces the supersonic effects (to zero, as you slowly go up into the stratosphere). For long ranged air-lining, a higher altitude where your jet engines still run is better, but for other purposes it varies a lot.

    Subsonic: Slower than the speed of sound. You are this, probably.

    Missile Types: Ballistic Missile: A vehicle (plane, missile, or bullet) that follows approximately a ballistic trajectory. Usually, such a vehicle will expend all of its fuel on the way up (at most), and rely on orbital mechanics to maintain its speed on the way down. Longer ranged ones will avoid the Earth's atmosphere for a lot of the journey. This means that such a vehicle will be very speed<->weight/fuel efficient. If it isn't striking a moving target, it also needs the least amount of redirection by weight. Its main disadvantages are that its very easy to detect by RADAR, since it by definition goes over the horizon very far away, and that it can get difficult to course correct for many reasons. As the air pressure goes down due to altitude, your aerodynamic surfaces matter less. As the pressure and speed increase, both heat and RADAR are less effective on the way down. Nonetheless, they are very hard to shoot down. Famous examples: V2 Rocket, Iskander, Kinzhal, and ATACMs. They're also cheaper per range/weight.

    Cruise Missile: A missile that follows the curvature of the Earth (instead of ballistic trajectory), usually powered by a jet Engine and are usually subsonic. Compared to Ballistic missiles, they're easier to guide and harder to detect by RADAR. However, once they are detected, they are easier to shoot down. They can even be chased and engaged with fighter aircraft. Some of them have a lower powered RADAR that lets them follow terrain up and down, making their visibility extremely low when going cross-country. Cruise missiles have an ascending, descending, and a cruise trajectory, and generally behave like a plane (indeed, the original Kamikazes planes were called early cruise missiles, but the V1 is closer to what we'd call a cruise missile). They have similar vulnerabilities to planes. Various methods of making them harder to shoot down, coating them in RADAR absorbing paint, making them faster during one stage (often descent, for things like the Zircon), RADAR following terrain, Jinking maneuvers on descent, hardened noses etc. Famous examples include the V1 Buzz-bomb, Tomahawk Missile, Zircon... Anti-ship missiles are often a variation of this, flying lower and with less range but otherwise performing the same function.

    Missile: Much talk of missiles, traditionally it means something that isn't powered in flight (e.g. an arrow, rock, bullet etc), but nowadays means an unmanned powered flight weapon (e.g. a cruise missile, ballistic missile etc). Nonetheless, it is always separated from the operator and firing mechanism, as is tradition.

    Anti-Aircraft Missile: The Ballistic and Cruise Missiles usually go to destroy battlefield assets of one sort or another. AA missiles specifically destroy missiles and aircraft. They tend to be the fastest rocket powered missiles for their size. Things like the Patriot or the S-500 are AA missiles, and are capable of catching up to and destroying other missiles even if the other missile has passed the launch point. The tend to fly in a straight-ish line, always heading for the predicted trajectory of the target.

    Drone: Often powered by an electric motor, subsonic, and intended to loiter in the battle space until needed, as opposed to launched for mission. Blurry term.

    Motors:

    Rockets: Rockets are high power per weight, high power per time, and extremely cheap. Their disadvantages are running time and they are less able to be controlled (there are fuel rockets, but that's generally outside the scope of a military context). They are mostly used on Ballistic and AA missiles, and the final portion of some cruise missiles. The smallest missiles (MANPADS, MANPAT?, etc) also tend to use rockets for their simplicity, tolerance to size, and cheapness.

    Jet Engines: Jet Engines offer very high power to weight ratio, weight to range, and medium efficiency. They're usually found on cruise missiles and aircraft. Some cruise missiles final stage may seem like they attain rocket-like velocities, but in-fact use scramjets to attain this velocity. They tend to be very high cost for all dimensions (range, efficiency, volume etc), but fulfill a niche in between traditional combustion engines and rockets.

    Piston Engines: Outside the scope of missiles and aircraft nowadays, though they used to be used in aircraft. They are cheap, have high tolerances and fuel efficiency, and can adjust their power for a purpose very well. They tend to be quite heavy for their power output though. Poor torque at low RPS compared to all other engine types. We don't see these on missiles or aircraft atm and I don't see it except in some extremely niche cases.

    Electric Motors: These tend to be somewhere around Jets and Pistons, though they tend to have quite high weights to volume and power. They offer very high torque at low RPS compared to jets and lots of power variability, and much lower mechanical complexity compared to equivalent Jet and Piston designs. As the line between missile and drone gets blurred, I imagine we'll see this blurred. However, for the time being, if something is electrically powered and seems like a missile, it is a "drone".

    Motor vs Engine: Motor provides motive force generally, engine provides motive force with internal combustion. Colloquially, these are pretty interchangeable. However, if you need to... Steam Engine, Jet Engine, Electric Motor, Pressure Motor. Usually, this is rotary. Rocket engines, despite being a combustion system, often get called motors.

    Guidance systems:

    RADAR: The standard method of tracking aerial targets and sea targets. Metal reflects Radio very well compared to air or water, or even soil, so this can be tracked very easily. Sometimes, especially for smaller projectiles (e.g. AA guns), the RADAR is on the ground and the projectiles pull into the reflection from the target until they are close enough. Missiles can also track into such a reflection; Semi-homing RADAR (Fox-1). For larger systems, a RADAR array can be mounted on the projectile (active homing RADAR, Fox 3). This is used in civil and military aviation constantly, but can also be used for reversing your car, speed detectors etc. Can be jammed, but not as easily as you'd think.

    Infrared/thermal/heat-seeking: (Fox 2) The main method other than RADAR for tracking aerial targets. Aircraft tend to run hot. Thus, an infrared camera can track a projectile into a target for much cheaper. Most military aircraft carry flares to guide heat-seeking projectiles away, to varying degrees of success. This also tends to be pretty short ranged; infra-red gets soaked up by the atmosphere pretty quickly. Also, for faster missiles, the nose cone gets hotter as the velocity increases, which reduces the ability of thermal optics to see any target.

    Manual or external guidance: Receiving data from somewhere else to guide the missile. Wire-guiding on anti-tank weapons is a classic method of this, however the modern Dong Feng uses transmissions from an AWACS to guide to target. These tend to vary quite wildly and their counter-systems also.

    Aerodynamic Control: Uses fins and wings to control the direction of movement. Only applicable for low altitude missiles, and less applicable for supersonic vehicles (but not inapplicable, you just have to design around it)

    Gyroscopic Control: Stabilisation control that allows you to adjust heading based on previous velocity. Used in conjuction with other controls.

    Vectored Thrust Control: Uses thrust from the Motors to control the direction of movement. The only valid method of control when outside the atmosphere.

  • I’ve seen a lot of takes lately about ISIS being essentially a US asset at this point. Tracks with what I know of US methods historically, but wondering if anybody has anything substantive or specific on this.

  • "The Attackers on "Crocus" did not intend to become suicide bombers: the criminals were caught attempting to flee to Ukraine

    FSB head Bortnikov reported to President Putin on the detention of 11 individuals, among whom are all four terrorists directly involved in the attack on "Crocus". The effort to identify the remaining accomplices continues, but conclusions about the situation are forthcoming, and they are disheartening for Ukraine.

    The perpetrators of the attack did not intend to become "martyrs." They wanted to live long and happily after their horrific crime. That’s exactly why they quickly retreated, not waiting for the assault to begin and did not try to take hostages. This does not resemble the typical actions of Islamist terrorists, but rather resembles the actions of mercenaries from sabotage groups, who were promised cover, escape, and a generous reward. None of the scoundrels intended to die for ideas or anything similar — it was purely cold calculation.

    As for who sponsored them — this can be understood by the direction of their escape. " - Readovka

    Edit: to clarify this is the telegram interpretation of what happened. What is known for now is that 11 ppl were arrested, the terrorists were heading towards ukraine and "they had approppriate contacts there", whatever that means.

    Edit 2: anyway it does look a lot more like ukraine had to do something with this. Whether it was official or some mercenaries told to go rogue is not at all clear yet.

    Edit 3: BBC reporting curiously omitting the part of the FSB statement about where they were captured, where they headed and who they had contacts with.

  • US Navy aircraft carrier faces relentless battle against Houthi attacks (BBC, 18 Mar 2024)

    [...] Captain Wroe says the Houthis have posed the greatest challenge to the US Navy in recent history.

    "This is the most since World War Two," he says. That was the last time the US operated in an area where they could be fired upon every day.

    The tempo of operations on the aircraft carrier itself has also been unrelenting - with dozens of sorties being flown round the clock. [...].

    Up in the carrier's flight control tower, Commander George Zintac, known as the Air Boss, is having to choreograph their movements - with a jet either launching or landing in just over a minute.

    He's been in the US Navy for more than 30 years, but says "this is probably the most flying I've done on a deployment - everyday we're flying a tonne".[...]

    Unlike the Houthis, they're away from home with few creature comforts. Every meal on board is literally feeding the five thousand. The food bill on the carrier alone is $2m (£1.6m) a month.

    Captain Chris Hill, the commanding officer of Ike, says "people need breaks, they need to go home".

    But he says they don't yet have dates for when that'll happen. So one of his tasks is to maintain the crews morale and resilience.[...]

    Captain Hill says: "It's difficult to define winning and losing in this kind of conflict."

  • American politics be like; "America is going to commit genocide, bucko. So you need to decide which geno-side you're on!"

    The Democrats campaign promise is "Our genocide will not effect people you care about"

    And the GOP's promise is "our genocide will effect people you hate"

    This is a bad and everything sucks. The political class now has the thumbs up to openly, explicitly use genocide as a policy tool to whip the voting masses. We've gone from "They'll take your guns/abortions!" to "Vote for us or we will let them kill your family. Hell we'll fucking help them do it".

  • From Reuters

    White House spokesman John Kirby said there was "no indication at this time that Ukraine, or Ukrainians were involved in the shooting." Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova questioned how the U.S. knew this and said Washington should immediately pass any information it had to Moscow, or stop making such statements. "On what basis do officials in Washington draw any conclusions in the midst of a tragedy about someone's innocence?" Zakharova said.

  • Being a rather frequent flyer from Boston, I want to talk about the Biden administration's vendetta against JetBlue. JetBlue is a airline carrier operating in the US.

    The US airline market is made up of the Big 4 (United, American, Delta, Southwest) followed by regional (Alaska, Air Canada), low cost (JetBlue), and ultra-low-cost (Frontier, Spirit) carriers. The Big 4 dominate passenger volumes (160M+/year), while the others sit in the 40M/year range.

    JetBlue is an airline carrier that's primarily focused on the Northeast (New York, Boston, etc.). Spirit and AA have more national networks, which crucially means more slots for flights. AA also has a robust international network.

    Naturally, you might think that having more competitors for the Big 4 would be something desirable for the Biden administration... And yet?

    JetBlue and American Airlines had signed an agreement termed the Northeast Alliance. This agreement allowed JetBlue passengers onto AA flights (and vice versa) and route coordination along with various status recognition and loyalty program integration benefits. In 2022, the DOJ began a trial claiming JetBlue and American Airlines were being "anticompetitive" in their operations in the Northeast. In 2023, the ruling forced the Northeast Alliance to disband within 30 days. The core elements of the Northeast Alliance were designed to help JetBlue and AA compete with Delta and United in the New York and Boston markets. This, naturally, fell through.

    JetBlue and Spirit Airlines had signed an agreement aiming to merge. The DOJ also claimed that this merger was "anticompetitive" as it would remove ultra low cost carrier seats from the industry. This merger was also terminated by the DOJ.

    In this context, it's important to note a couple of things:

    Spirit Airlines is not doing well. Domestic leisure travel demand has not rebounded as they'd hoped and their planes are not in the best shape. They're worth a fifth of what JetBlue was offering to purchase them.

    JetBlue is not doing well. They're running losses and had hinges the entire company on one of the two partnership deals going through. Now, with both deals blocked and losses racking up, they're forced to cut service and cut routes while raising fees. As a result of this, JetBlue is currently paying pilots to not fly.

    American is the straggler of the Big 3 (Delta, United, American) traditional carriers. Their profit margins are lower than the competition post-COVID.

    This is to say, while Delta and United have been doing great throughout this entire ordeal, JetBlue is fucked, Spirit is fucked, and American is slightly fucked. This is the type of competition that the Biden administration encourages: one where the entrenched players aren't touched and smaller/less successful players can go fuck themselves.

  • Lol if you type anything about someone being a supporter of genocide into a youtube comment it gets shadow removed by an automated system.

  • Everybody huge news has dropped that nobody has really metabolized yet, although I'm skeptical as I'm not seeing any mainstream news reporting on it yet. It's possible these two just look very very similar. For one thing, Chechnya is nowhere close to Tajikistan so I'm not sure how it would be reported that he's Tajik if he was Chechnyan/Ukrainian.

    Edit: upon further review, the terrorist is speaking Tajik in an interrogation video released of him so it’s unlikely to be a known Chechen criminal. I’m gonna say this is deboonked.

    This is the arrested leader of the attack on Crocus:

    His name is Rustam Azhyiev, he's a Chechen.

    According to this article from August 2023, Rustam is a veteran of Syria (fought for jihadists against Russia) who then went to Ukraine in 2022 and gained citizenship there to continue fighting Russians. The leader of the attack is a Ukrainian citizen, a terrorist from Syria and jihadist. He was likely the one that recruited the other Tajik nationals to join in the Ukrainian plan, and the Ukrainians obviously hoped they could blame ISIS and Tajiks/Chechens instead of themselves being implicated.

    The mission was for Rustam to get across the border back to Ukraine, where FSB states Ukrainian intel had contacts awaiting them. Rustam then would get squirreled away to safety and the other Tajiks would be blamed. These are professional mercenaries, not ideological martyrs, because they work for money and flee for their own safety.

  • I feel like I need to further explain the electoral college to the non-yanks here. Most are, of course, already aware that it's completely fucked up. But most of even these people are under the impression that state "points" are awarded to whoever wins the popular vote in each state. This is not true. In fact, ordinary American citizens have no right at all to vote for a presidential candidate. This is not an exaggeration, it's not a joke. The president is installed by the electors, who are under no obligation to honor the vote in their state. They are the only ones with the powers to cast votes for presidential candidates, and who they decide to vote for is at their sole discretion. It has happened before where an elector ignores the vote in their state. Again, the electors are not required in any way to agree with the vote in their state.

    When you fill in the circle next to "Genocide Joe", you aren't voting for him, you're voting for the people who pinky promise to do so on your behalf, but who will face no consequences if they don't.

    Strictly speaking, this means that the votes for each candidate are essentially a non-binding poll that may or may not be honored.

  • Random facts that I learned today:

    In 2008, Ukraine held a television polled called the “Greatest Ukrainians” and Yaroslav the Wise came first with an astounding 40% of the votes.

    However, it was later revealed that the voting had been manipulated because Stepan Bandera was the one having a huge lead in the poll:

    The Chief of Great Ukrainians project, journalist Vakhtang Kipiani, informed the public in his blog, that the voting system had been manipulated by unknown persons. He stated that a couple of days prior to publishing the results he was aware of a possible win for Yaroslav the Wise. Prior to that, with a huge lead in first place was the controversial Stepan Bandera. For example, the winner, Yaroslav I, received 60,000 votes in one month and almost 550,000 in just one day. Mykola Amosov, who took second place, received almost 150,000 votes in just one day. Kipiani said that if these manipulation hadn't taken place Yaroslav would not have won.

    Interestingly, in the same year, Russia also held a television poll called the “Name of Russia” and Alexander Nevsky came first place as the most influential Russian.

    However, it was also disputed in that the voting had been manipulated as Josef Stalin was the clear winner in the poll:

    Stalin had led the poll early on and narrowly missed the top spot.

    The dictator took 519,071 votes compared to Nevsky's 524,575.

    Communists said the vote had been "cunningly" manipulated to prevent Stalin or first Soviet leader Lenin (who came sixth) winning because the Kremlin was embarrassed at their popularity.

    In a statement, the Communist party said it had "no faith in the organisers of the voting project", who had decided Stalin and Lenin were "bad lads" who should not win. The results prompted the "same level of trust as in the central electoral commission", it said, in reference to Kremlin rigging of the presidential election in Russia earlier this year.

  • Reddit IPO began today. Was pumped by private investors and is now declining now that retail investors have been let in.

    Surprisingly porn has not been banned on reddit, nor has any amateur content been forced into age verification.

    When the dust settles and some data on major shareholders emerges it will be interesting to see what funds are the biggest shareholders. Most of the big ones have a Vice Clause that forbids them investing in things like porn. Will be quite fun showing them loli content and asking why they're investing in child pornography.

  • DROP OUT BIDEN! DROP OUT YOU FUCKING SACK OF SHIT OLD GENOCIDAL FUCK

    DROP OUT AND NOMINATE HILLARY AS THE CANDIDATE. COME ON, I NEED TO SEE HER LOSE AGAIN

    (It's her turn)

  • I think it's a good reminder that back when people were floating Budanov as the new leader of the war effort, everyone expected him to do a shitty job as army chief but for there to be an uptick of intelligence ops. So it's no wonder the 'ISIS' gunmen tried to flee to Ukraine.

  • The obvious instigator of the Moscow terrorist attack is the evil empire or one of it's proxies. The question is what they were counting on achieving. A callous desire to inflict harm on random "enemy" civilians probably had something to do with it but it seems like a really lazy explanation.

    The attack has no military purpose. Maybe the plotters are hoping to demoralise the Russian public, thereby hurting the war effort and making the people demand an end to the war. But things rarely works like that and spectacular terrorist attacks like this are much likelier to increase public support for punishing those responsible.

    The only motive that kind of makes sense is that the attack was plotted in order to increase morale in Ukraine. The Kiev regime has been putting hundreds of thousands of their people into the meat grinder and they have no military results to show for it. A large attack like this can feel like a win in Ukraine and motivate the military to keep fighting.

  • NSFW: SA and violence.

    Brutal attack on rights activist rocks Argentina on eve of coup anniversary ::: spoiler spoiler

    H.I.J.O.S. human rights activist and daughter of dictatorship disappeared brutally assaulted and sexually abused at home by assailants who threatened her and identified themselves by using slogan linked to President Javier Milei.

    Argentina’s increasingly tense social climate and the dangers of President Javier Milei’s aggressive rhetoric have been thrust into the spotlight after it emerged that a human rights activist had been the victim of a brutal sexual assault.

    The victim, the daughter of a disappeared abductee during the 1976-1983 dictatorship and a member of the H.I.J.O.S human rights group, was brutally assaulted at her home in La Plata, Buenos Aires Province, by assailants earlier this month who identified themselves by using the slogan of President Javier Milei, according to reports. The news emerged Thursday, on the eve of the annual march commemorating the coup that brought the military junta to power some 48 years ago.

    Rights groups and politicians expressed horror at the news, which H.I.J.O.S described as a targeted “political attack.”

    The activist – who is not ready to reveal her identity – "was tied up, beaten and sexually abused" by two armed men who forced their way into her home in a "political attack motivated by her human rights and feminist militancy," denounced the organisation that seeks to recover the identity of babies appropriated during the dictatorship.

    The victim was attacked upon entry into her home after returning from work. The assailants were waiting for her and sexually abused and threatened her with death before leaving the message: "We did not come to rob you but to kill you, we’ve been paid to do that." Before leaving, they scrawled on a wall: “VLLC” – a reference to “Viva la libertad, carajo,” Milei’s trademark political slogan.

    "We know you work in human rights and we want you to shut up, next time we're going to kill you," the attackers allegedly said, according to H.I.J.O.S. member Diego López Torres. Owing to the repercussions of this case, Presidential Spokesperson Manuel Adorni was asked on Thursday morning about the attack and the government’s reaction to it. “We expect the courts to advance with the clarification so that those responsible pay for their actions,” he said.

    ‘Legion of trolls’

    President Milei had not commented on the incident at press time, though many of his supporters online sought to cast doubt over the attack and question its veracity. The ‘@TraductorTeAma’ account on the X social network, one of Milei’s most vocal supporters online, claimed the incident was a Kirchnerite invention, writing: “We don’t believe them at all.” The Unión Cívica Radical were among the political parties to condemn the attack, expressing solidarity with the victim in a statement on X and calling for “the punishment of those responsible.”

    News of the incident comes just two days after the Marea Editorial publishing house, which specialises in human rights, denounced a digital campaign by “a legion of trolls” who defended the dictatorship in response to a publication about the Abuelas de Plaza de Mayo. "The ideological tension that today characterises the political climate in Argentina escalates in all spheres and Marea's networks were no exception," the publishing house said in a statement.

    The shocking attack comes amid a politically tense climate because of the government's position on the dictatorship, which human rights organisations and parties from the centre-left consider "denialist." Both Milei and his vice-president, Victoria Villarruel – who is close to the military and has relations with a number of jailed dictatorship-era criminals – question the number of disappeared agreed upon by human rights organisations (30,000) and claim that the real figure is far less (around 8,700).

    Unconfirmed reports this week claimed that the government intends to announce a decree on Monday ordering that all military personnel convicted of crimes during the dictatorship and who are aged over 70 will be entitled to serve out the rest of their sentence under house arrest. Defence Minister Luis Petri denied those reports in a press conference on Thursday.

    According to reports on Thursday, the government is making a video to mark March 24 that will outline the Milei administration's position. It is expected to include a call for a "complete memory" of the era – a remark linked to the two demons theory that downplays state terrorism and has been voiced regularly by Villarruel. Since 2020, 77 attacks related to dictatorship denialism have been registered, six of which occurred so far this year, according to the Registro de Ataques de Derechas Argentinas Radicalizadas (RA-DAR) (“Registry of Attacks by Radicalised Argentine Right-wingers”). :::

    I've said this some time ago when I described to people who was milei and who were the people surrounding him. Despite all the economic madness, the inflation, devaluation and so on, the most macabre part will forever remain his attitude towards the Military Junta that ruled Argentina from 1976 to 1983 and especially, it's 30,000 victims. And I've said, about this specific topic, they're not coming back just to do some revisionism and denialism, because that's what they've been doing for decades now. No, they're also back with revanchism. The attack on HIJOS' militant is something different, it's just not a couple of trolls saying "It wasn't 30,000" on social media, this is different, this is emulating how the military and the police acted in the 70s and 80s, direct and planned attacks towards identified victims that includes sexual violence. They're sending a message to all of us.

    Tomorrow, 24th of March, marks another anniversary in which the Military Coup of 1976 is remembered. Each year, Human Rights activists summon people to gather in the main plazas to commemorate the victims and the Desaparecidos from that period. But tomorrow's 24th is special, because it's not only there to remember those who we lost, it is there to prepare us for what's to come.

    If the president himself continues to "like" tweets from straight up genocide denalists, then we're getting in trouble. If we continue down this road, things will get really bad.

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