#Political Analyst & Commentator

[everythingne]

marketing ploy — LN4 / ch. 1

Everyone can see the growing tensions between Red Bull and McLaren as Lando gears up to be the next best driver under Max. The publicity of it all causes a slight issue… the people want more drama. They need more drama.

So, McLaren and Red Bull make a deal—a plan to get them both the publicity (and some extra cash).

The plan?

Olivia Piastri (yes, Piastri), the head analyst of Red Bull, has to pretend to date her brother’s teammate. And she can’t tell anyone—not even Oscar, it’s not a real relationship.

piastri!oc x lando norris

warnings/notes: sort of financial abuse, manipulation from higher authorities, fake dating AND brothers best friend trope (guys let me cook!!)

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05 MARCH 2023 -- INSTAGRAM.

OLIVIAPIASTRI MADE A NEW POST ↴

liked by landonorris, oscarpiastri, redbullracing, and 689k more…

oliviapiastri: never a dull day here in RB. so glad to have gotten to celebrate three podiums!! shout out to max, nori, and ossi here in bahrain!! 🧡❤️

bakerpiastri: the siblings ever 🧡

papayababy: so are we gonna talk ab her calling lando NORI??

⤷ rb.fancams: NO FR??

verstaphin: ok but since when has olivia posted so much mclaren??

oscarpiastri: oh so i can't see the film photos but u can post them?

⤷ oliviapiastri: this is what u get for biting me while drunk.

landonorris: thanks oli 🧡

lando.wc: olivia posting the prettiest photo of lando ever is so...

⤷ piastrycounter: NO FR??? what if. like.

⤷ lando.wc: @.piastrycountry our brainwaves are connected.

addiees: LANDOS COMMENT?

22 FEBRUARY 2023 - SAKHIR, BAHRAIN.

“Piastri incoming!”

Stepping into Christian’s office in my tall white heels, I give him a fist bump at his soft shake of the head and his laugh. It’s extremely weird to have been called to his office at this time, but the man had been serious when we’d spoken about it earlier. I'm still wearing the dress I'd worn to dinner with Oscar and our parents, a little orange sundress my mother had bought me when Oscar first signed with McLaren, paired with a little white sweater and my heels. A loose gold dangle earring catches on a curl, and my bracelets and rings clink as I raise my hand to slip the perfectly done curl off the earring before it ruins it.

"Thank you again, Miss Piastri, for coming on such a short notice." Christian says as I look into the room and my head tilts up slightly as I take in the room in front of me. Three men in different stages of formal dress with their backs to me, a man I don't know sits on one side of the desk with Alice, Red Bull's Chief Communications Officer. And a third woman sits on the other side of the desk with my brothers manager. As I speak, they all turn around, and I notice its both Zak and Andrea from McLaren, and...

"Sorry, am I interrupting something?" I ask, staring down none other than Oscar's current best friend, Lando Norris.

Now, I didn't quite... like Lando Norris. It wasn't that he was an asshole or anything, in fact, he was quite polite. And I didn't not like him either. I just didn't really know him. When you only really see a guy in work mode, asleep, hungover when your brother lets him spend the night after they party, or drunk off his ass at a club. Well. It's kinda hard to genuinely like spending time with him. But, he and Oscar got on better than a house of fire, so ultimately I had learned overtime to just deal with his antics. It was usually fun to watch, and I was usually too busy with Red Bull work to even be paying attention.

"Not at all, actually we were waiting for you to get started." Christian places a hand on my shoulder and smiles, motioning for the chair next to Lando that--conveniently, had been left open. I pop down next to him and offer him a soft smile which he returns. Ah yes, civility. I can work with the bare minimum, it's the usual amount of respect I get here.

"My Mom had to get a picture of Oscar and I in the new paddocks here, thats what took so long." I laugh, settling down in the seat and looking over at the women I dont know, offering them soft smiles as I turn back to Christian, "Sorry if I was a bit late."

"Right on time, actually," Christian nods, "As punctual as usual."

"Lets get right to business, we need Lando to be in top shape for tomorrows race. Can't keep him out too late." Zak easily jokes, bringing the attention of the room to him. Christian laughs softly, taking a seat at his desk and flicking open his laptop. The confusion radiating off of me slowly melts into curiosity, leaning back in my chair as well as I plop my little orange Coach purse on my lap.

"Ah, it's all too much for little Lando Norris, right?" I ask, kicking Lando's chair and he crosses his arms as he looks over at me--eyes meeting mine with a bit of playful anger.

"Little Lando Norris?" He pouts and I kick his chair again with a shrug, making him start laughing as he leans back and swats at my foot. His nails scratch along my ankle and I shiver from the feeling, pulling my ankle to the side of my leg.

"Well, this might work better than expected." Andrea comments with a soft grin on his lips, "they already get along well, and have some sort of chemistry."

"Huh?"

"What?"

Lando and I both turn to look at Andrea, then we both turn our attention to Zak and then Christian in order. The three men laugh along to Andrea, nodding in agreement as the two women jot down some notes, the third woman by Lando huffing with a soft smile on her lips. I point to Ada Luanne, my brothers manager and speak softly.

"Wait, so why are we here?" I finally ask and Christian looks to Zak, holding a hand out for the man to explain. He does, standing as he motions around the room, introducing everyone to each other, thankfully.

There's me and Lando settled in two leather chairs that uncomfortably stuck to my thighs. Christian sat his desk with Zak and Andrea standing between him and Lando and my chairs. Alice, Red Bull's Chief Communications Officer sits next to Steve Atkins, who is McLarens Chief Communications Officer. Then, on the other side of the desk is a woman named Astrid Marina, who is Lando's manager, and then my brothers manager Ada Luanne who is here to represent me.

"And, we are all here for the two of you." Zak nods, and Lando sends me a sharp look that says nothing but 'what the hell did you do?' which I counter with my best 'I didn't do shit, what did you do?' look.

"You see, tensions between Red Bull and McLaren's racing teams are at an all time high due to how close Lando has been racing with Max." Zak continues after a moment, "and the fans have been eating up the rivalry. It's truly been one of the most intense spikes in merch sales and social media trends we've seen in years on both sides. And, Miss Piastri, that is where you come into the picture."

"Okay? What does this have to do with me, if you don't mind my asking?" I lean forward slightly, eyes glancing up at Zak, then to Andrea, then Christian, then back to Zak's smug smile.

"We need to keep the rivalry alive between us and Red Bull, yeah? And, over the past few weeks when you've been on radio with Max, the fans have noticed the two of you seem to be quite close. And considering you are Oscar's sister..." Zak waves a hand as he comes to take one of mine, squeezing it as he leans down to be my eye level, "we have quite an opportunity."

"I'm not following." I glance to Lando, who sends me a helpless shrug of confusion.

"Well, Miss Piastri." Christian taps his desk and Zak moves to sit down again. I watch as both Alice and Steven whisper to each other as the Astrid and Ada nod to Christian, and he speaks words I never thought I'd hear.

"To keep up with publicity, we would like for you and Lando to pretend to date. Just for a season or two."

I can't even bring words to my mouth. The room feels so crowded, multiple sets of eyes watching me as I sputter to try and come up with some sort of answer. Luckily, Lando does that for me.

"I'm sorry?" He spits, a sort of anger in his tone, "what are you on about?"

"Olivia, you will start to spend more time with McLaren." Alice starts to explain, and everyone looks to her, "post more McLaren, wear more McLaren, start to cause a stir. Once we see that stir, we will take photos of you wearing Lando's number and post those. This should start a dating rumor through Australia to Miami."

My jaw is open, completely catching flies at the moment.

"Once the rumor really starts, you will both do a 'soft launch' of the other--basically, faceless photos. You'll be caught by paparazzi on a date, you'll be seen together in the paddocks, and such. We'll bring this rumor up and up until about midway through the season when, during a pole position celebration, Lando will go to you for a celebratory kiss--which will cement your relationship." Alice continues, and then Steven takes over,

"We'll run the relationship probably through next season, maybe a little longer, and then you'll both have a peaceful split off and remain friends. No harm done."

I stare blankly, finally closing my jaw to take a slow breath to calm my racing heart. I look to Lando, who looks equally as shocked if not more shocked than I am about this.

"You're reading me a film script, not the next twenty months of my life." I snap, standing up, and Lando follows my lead as I point to Christian, "I'm an engineer, not some--actress you can throw around for publicity points!"

"Olivia, please." Christian stands, holding a hand out like you would to a scared dog, "it's something temporary, and it's no strings attached! There's a pretty big... financial bonus as well."

"You both will get twenty-five percent of all revenue make off this stunt. Depending on how well you sell this... that could triple or even times both of your salaries by ten." Alice crosses her arms, "and, the deal will be kept to people in this office. Only we will know why this is being done. To everyone else, even Oscar and Max, this relationship is genuine."

There's a long pause, and part of me feels trapped. The amount of money I could make for putting up with a guy I already put up with his obviously extremely appealing. I make a good chunk of change already, but just doubling that would make me set for a while. I could finally start spending my money the way I wanted to.

Hell, I could pay off all my student loans at once with that absolute chunk of change.

"Fuck it." Lando says under his breath, so low only I hear the slight scratch of his voice as he sighs and then looks up at Christian, "where do I sign?"

"Norris?!" I shout as my disbelief hits an alltime high, He had made that decision easily. Lando's right hands takes a pen from Christian's left one as he turns back to me, running a hand through his frizzy curls.

"We fake date for a year, and then we go off and do whatever we want after with a large paycheck for something no one knows is fake. How is this a bad deal, Olivia? I already spend almost every weekend with you and Oscar anyway, it'll hardly be different." He says, and a paper is pushed his way, he looks back at me once more in that loose, half buttoned white tee and black dress shorts. His necklaces dangle off his neck as he scribbles down his name without any hesitance, clicking the pen shut and holding it out to me.

"Plus, if we're pretending to be a real couple, you'll be losing out on nothing because I will be buying you pretty much everything for the next twelve months."

Fuck. That's a good point. I could kinda manipulate this to benefit me if all goes to shit. The black pen taunts me, and the way he grins and wiggles it in the air towards my hesitantly lifting hand is no different.

Yeah, so much for being shy, Lando.

"Is there a way out of this after I sign?" I ask and Christian nods. Relief I didn't know I needed floods my body immediately after and I feel like a man in a confessional being absolved of his sins. Complete and utter relief.

"If you want to leave, talk with me, and I'll sort it out." He says, "it's really no strings attached."

So, there was a way to back out. Easily too. Christian had taken me under his wing with Red Bull when I was quite young. The man was basically my second father by now, so I could tell him anything, and knowing that all I had to do was ask him if I wanted to leave?

It felt a lot less heavy to look at the pen now. But I find my gaze drifts upwards and I look at Lando. That tiny gap in his front teeth, the freckle that rests on his cheek right by his nose, the way his eyes crinkle as his smile widens.

Oh, I'm so fucked when Oscar finds out I'm 'dating' Lando.

I groan, snatching the pen from his hand and leaning down to also sign the contract as I mutter.

"You're lucky I'm a money hungry bitch."

And, we begin.

[probablyasocialecologist]

In most Israeli media coverage, “it is as if [Palestinian civilians] don’t exist,” Gideon Levy, a reporter for the left-leaning Israeli daily Haaretz, which has covered the plight of Palestinians in Gaza, told the progressive American news program Democracy Now!. On international news networks, “you see Gaza. You see children dying on the dirty floors of the hospitals, bleeding to death. You see the uprooted people, you see the destruction, you see the suffering . . . and the starvation,” Levy said. “In Israel you see only the soldiers, only the hostages.” Some media analysts have warned that this absence is shaping Israeli public opinion. A poll released by Tel Aviv University’s Peace Index and the Israel Democracy Institute in mid-November showed that a majority of Israeli Jews—57.5%—believed Israeli forces were using insufficient firepower in Gaza, while another 36.6% thought the military was using the correct amount of force, and just 1.8% thought it was using too much. A poll by Tel Aviv University’s Peace Index from mid-January showed that these numbers have held stable, even as the death toll in Gaza has continued to climb, prompting more international calls for Israeli restraint. “I assume that if the media were showing stories about what is happening beyond the border, it would force [the Israeli public] to deal with another aspect of reality,” said Oren Persico, a staff writer at the Israeli media watchdog The Seventh Eye. Rami Younis, a Palestinian filmmaker and journalist, similarly perceived a far-reaching effect. “The entire Israeli population has moved more to the right [since October 7th], and that is mainly because of the media,” he said. “The louder you shout that Gaza must be obliterated, the more likely it is that you’ll get featured on TV panels.” But to some close observers of the Israeli political landscape, the question of whether the media is molding public opinion or simply reflecting it is not straightforward. “The media is making a choice, but so are Israelis,” said Raviv Drucker, an Israeli political commentator and investigative reporter. “People don’t want to see [Gazans’ suffering] and the media doesn’t want to show it.” This does not necessarily reflect a lack of knowledge about what is happening in Gaza. “This is a state in post-trauma,” he said. “If you stop an Israeli on the street, they know that thousands of children are dying in Gaza. It’s not a lack of understanding; it’s a lack of empathy. An unwillingness to participate in their pain.”

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Mary L. Trump at The Good in Us Substack:

Normally, my issue with the corporate media is their failure to shine a light on stories that matter. But in this case, it seems some segments of the corporate media, primarily Fox, is hellbent on helping Donald interfere with his trial through jury intimidation. It’s a disturbing reality that we must confront. Last night, Donald Trump posted the following on social media: “They are catching undercover liberal activists lying to the judge,” Jesse Watters.

Lawyers and legal analysts like Ryan Goodman and Andrew Weissman made it clear that this was a serious breach, the most serious to date, of Judge Merchan’s gag order – one that should be dressed immediately.  The fact that Donald was quoting somebody else is irrelevant. This seemed to be a blatant case of jury tampering, especially since, at the time of this was posted, five jurors and all six alternates remained to be chosen. I fully expected today’s proceedings to begin with the judge announcing that the so-called Sandoval hearing, which he originally scheduled, would be held today before any other court business. This seemed to be a reasonable assumption considering the purpose of that hearing was so the judge can rule on the prosecution’s contention that Donald should be held in contempt and sanctioned accordingly.

Juror Number 2 dismissed

It’s not uncommon for a juror to be chosen and subsequently let go during the selection process. That was the case with Juror Four after the prosecution discovered the man may have been untruthful in some of his answers. Juror Two’s circumstances were different. She was excused after telling the court that she’d become concerned that her identity might be discovered after her family and  friends questioned her about her possible involvement in the trial following media coverage. The fact that the judge felt the need to keep the identities of jurors anonymous is a damning indictment of the criminal defendant. And clearly the jurors understand the inherent danger of being seated on this jury. 

To put this in perspective, my friend and former U.S. Attorney, Joyce White Vance explained, “Typically, you would only see that happen in a case involving violent organized crime.” Following the juror’s feedback, Judge Merchan reprimanded the press for reporting far too much information about the jurors. [Out of an abundance of caution, I deleted the section about the jurors from last night’s post.]

[...] In a disturbing display of media influence, Fox host Jesse Watters went through the list of jurors, with identifying characteristics like employment, gender, place of residence, and commented on each one. 

Watters then singled out any jurors who didn’t align with his idea of what a juror should be (pro-Donald) and cast doubt on their ability to be fair and impartial. This is not just unethical, it’s dangerous. Fox, on Donald’s behalf, is actively helping Donald create an atmosphere of fear among the jurors. In a just world, Watters would be fired for his irresponsible behavior, but Fox has no interest in justice. Consider what Josh Kovensky of Talking Points Memo, pointed out: “Instead of operating within the process of jury selection, which assumes that people are capable of setting aside whatever political beliefs or biases they may have in order to render a good faith judgment on the evidence, it casts the assumptions underlying that process as Trump’s enemy to be defeated, implying that the jurors themselves are incapable of both being impartial in their judgment of him and participating in a political system in which he is a main actor.”

[...]

Donald amplifies Fox, scares a juror, and breaks his gag order

So far, here’s the pattern: A Fox personality attacks the judge or jury, and then Donald shares it on Truth Social as a way to give himself plausible deniability: He can distance himself from the quote by saying it doesn’t represent what he actually believes. This is exactly what he did last night when he quoted Jesse Watters. Regardless of Donald’s attempts to pretend otherwise, this is a clear violation of his gag order and shows a blatant disregard for the legal process. He needs to be punished or this will spiral out of control quickly. We’re already seeing that his disrespectful behavior in the courtroom and flouting of norms — like refusing to stand when the prospective jurors enter the room or using his phone when nobody else is —has already gone too far. The gag order was imposed to prevent Donald from publicly speaking about witnesses, jurors, court staff and their families outside of the courtroom. Donald has run out of chances and his downfall will be of his own making.

[...]

Judge Merchan must lay the smackdown on Donald

Prosecutors have accused Donald of violating the court-imposed gag order SEVEN times since the commencement of the trial. And they will have a chance to make the case for Donald to be held accountable during a hearing next week. They have pointed to public statements and social media posts made by Donald over the past few days as evidence of these violations. They have described the situation as “ridiculous” and have called for it to stop, expressing frustration over Donald’s repeated breaches of the order. Former federal prosecutor Shannon Wu has now called on Merchan to strengthen the gag order to any communication about the trial beyond Donald saying he’s innocent and plans to defend himself. At the very least, Judge Merchan needs to be unequivocal in telling Donald and defense counsel that enough is enough. The repeated violations of the gag order and Donald’s attempts to interfere with the trial warrant serious repercussions. He cannot keep getting away with it.

Mary L. Trump writes in her Substack on how right-wing media outlets (esp. Fox's Jesse Watters) and Donald Trump are conducting witness tampering on the jury for the Trump falsification of business records trial. Trump Trial

[ridenwithbiden]

Joe Biden had some good news on Tuesday as polling showed him gaining on Donald Trump in 6 battleground states, 7 months before the presidential election. In response, one leading Democratic strategist said the “Biden bump is real”.

According to Bloomberg News and Morning Consult, Biden now leads Trump by 1 point in Wisconsin, having trailed by 4 last month, and is tied in Pennsylvania, where Trump had a 6 point lead last month. The two candidates were also tied in Michigan.

In other states likely to decide the presidential election in November, Trump was ahead in Arizona, Georgia, Nevada and North Carolina. Only Georgia, however, showed an increased lead for the presumptive Republican nominee.

Biden was due to campaign in North Carolina on Tuesday.

Trailing Biden in fundraising, Trump had no campaign events scheduled.

On Monday, a Biden campaign spokesperson called Trump “weak and desperate – both as a man and a candidate”, adding: “His campaign can’t raise money, he is uninterested in campaigning outside his country club, and every time he opens his mouth, he pushes moderate and suburban voters away with his dangerous agenda.”

Encouraging signs for the president included emerging positivity on economic conditions and many voters saying they had recently seen more positive news about Biden, particularly after his combative State of the Union address.

Simon Rosenberg, a Democratic strategist and commentator, said: “[The] election is clearly changing now, moving towards Biden: 10 recent national polls show Biden leading, he’s up 1 now in [the] Economist poll average, Harris this week finds Biden gaining 4, this new Bloomberg/MC polling also finds significant movement towards Biden.

“Biden bump is real.”

In the Bloomberg/Morning Consult poll, around half of Biden voters said they were determined to stop Trump.

Eli Yokley, US politics analyst for Morning Consult, told Bloomberg: “Negative energy motivates people. And the people who are supporting Joe Biden today are much more likely to express that negative energy that energised his 2020 campaign.”

[mydaddywiki]

Bob Beckel

Physique: Husky Build Height: 5'10“ (1.78 m)

Robert Gilliland Beckel (November 15, 1948 – February 20, 2022) was an American political analyst and pundit, and political operative. He had been a commentator on Fox News and was an original co-host of The Five until he was released in 2015 after being absent for several months recovering from back surgery. After departing Fox News, Beckel became a commentator for CNN, but returned to Fox News two years later as co-host of The Five. Later, Fox News announced Beckel had been fired again after he was accused of making a racist remark to a Fox News employee. Beckel died on February 20, 2022, at the age of 73.

Beckel had a penchant for alcohol, cocaine and getting oral from hookers before being saved later in life, in accordance with Christian doctrine. So there was a time where maybe after a few drinks and some lines, he wouldn’t mine a blow-job from an adoring male fan. Though he probably won’t reciprocate since he once choked on a large shrimp during a Fox party. So obviously he’s going to choke on my deal, but I’d still make the offer.

Of course he was straight, having been married with two children before getting divorced in 2002. He was the older brother of L.A. Confidential and Pearl Harbor actor Graham Beckel. I don’t really know anything else about him, other than I wanted to fuck him and his brother Graham.

[snoddie]

Normally I don't discuss big drama topics like this on my quirky little Tumblr blog, but there's something about the whole HBomberGuy plagiarism video that truly fascinates me.

It's the way Internet Historian fans reacted to it.

Illuminaughtii fans were pissed at what she did and viewers were calling her out for years, especially after what she did to her former colleagues. AVGN fans have been dissatisfied with the state of his content for a while now, James Somerton practically betrayed his audience and Filip Miucin is so beloathed that I deadass forgot his name while writing this and thought his name was Patrick.

Basically everyone saw what these creators did and we're collectively either unsurprised or disappointed to say the least. Internet Historian fans however, they were probably the most vitriolic community during this entire event. They were quick to either label the video a hit piece, claim Bomberman was slandering IH, discredited the video because of Bomberman's political views and friendship with HassanAbi (despite a majority of the video going after a left leaning LGBT analyst..) and in general, just kinda meat riding IH.

I don't think Bomberman went about the IH stuff perfectly, I definitely believe he had some hang ups with him due to IH's more...let's just say 'Chud' style of humor and the audience he cultivated. But to say the entire segment or even the whole video was a Historian hit piece is misguided at best and dishonest at worst. Historian might be reserved, but there's no denying that his silence regarding the plagiarism allegations kinda did lead to a snowball effect, people are too familiar with false copyright claims and some were a bit..too eager to bring the Jews into this. Yes he did resolve a lot of this, but there's a level of distrust I feel now, like how I feel with the other examples Bomberman used, if they were willing to do it once, what's stopping them from doing it again just with an even more obscure source? Historian and some of the others don't even have the algorithm breathing down their necks because they upload as frequently as Deltrarune chapters come out, so why not take time to come up with your own shit?

This is why I found the sudden nosedive into politics so...bizarre, because I didn't see this with the other supporters, not even Somerton and he's arguably the most political creator of the group.

If I were to armchair psychology my way into some kinda explanation, I'd probably have one of two reasons:

Internet Historian is a beloved creator who many people consider a trustworthy and extremely creative individual, and hearing him be accused of something scummy can have the most loyal fans feeling a bit wounded and defensive. I was definitely a huge fan of his work before the Bomberman video hit, I probably watched The Fall of 76 ...76 times? So learning it was made by someone willing to pull from someone else's work and pass it off as his own, it kinda stung.

The second (and let's be honest more likely) possibility is that there's political motivation behind it. No one can deny that Historian has appealed to more 'Anti SJW' crowds before, those people tend to be either more right leaning, center leaning or left leaning but don't like the way extremists behave. If you watched any video about Tumblr IH has made, it's quite clear whether intentionally or not what kinda audience he appeals to. Likewise, when the one person IH's audience despises the most (a leftist commentator, male feminist and someone actively criticizing IH) shows up, their instinctual reaction is to cry 'woke libtard getting mad at gigachad meme man'.

The reason all of this frustrates me, and why I even crawled out of my comfort zone of posting random crap and gay Homestuck drawings, is because it's a genuine example of political brainrot and creator dickriding muddying the waters of the discussion being had. Like Bomberman or not (I like his shit but don't always agree with his takes) you have to admit his video opened the floodgates for people actually kinda giving more of a shit about plagiarism online than before, highlighting how easy it is to get away, how there's almost nothing you can do about it law wise unless you're REALLY lucky and how much it can hurt genuinely talented or marginalized people.

And I'd hate for us to just ignore that conversation because you don't wanna admit your favorite funny internet guy might not be the best person.

Here's an unrelated picture of Wurmple eating soup.

[beardedmrbean]

Maria Kalesnikava became a symbol of defiance in Belarus when President Alexander Lukashenko used the full force of his security apparatus to smash mass pro-democracy demonstrations in 2020.

Now she's starving in prison and being held incommunicado in a tiny, stinking cell where the toilet is a hole in the floor, according to her sister, Tatsiana Khomich.

Her weight has dropped to just 99 pounds though she's five foot nine, Khomich said, putting her life at risk.

The Belarus interior ministry did not respond to a request for comment on her conditions.

"During the last year and a half, my sister Maria is isolated. She’s kept incommunicado - there are no calls, there are no letters, no visits of relatives or lawyers. And I just must maybe remind that Maria had surgery at the end of 2022 on a perforated ulcer. So she needs now special diet, special food which she cannot receive actually and we know that she cannot eat much from the prison menu."

Kalesnikava gained further renown when masked officers snatched her from the street to deport her to Ukraine.

She tore her passport into tiny pieces at the border so they couldn't.

At her trial, she smiled and danced in a courtroom cage.

She was sentenced to 11 years on charges including conspiracy to seize power.

Lukashenko, a close ally of Russian President Vladimir Putin, denied this week that there are political prisoners in Belarus.

Since early July, he has released 78 people convicted for protest activity, out of around 1,400 designated by human rights groups as political prisoners.

But all the leading pro-democracy figures, like Kalesnikava, languish behind bars and Lukashenko's critics say they see no real change.

Khomich said Kalesnikava was last allowed to write to her family in February last year.

"She also asked about letters and packages, the answer she got was, like, ‘Everyone has forgotten about you’. We know that also that some women saw that the administration brought her some letters from outside but they didn’t give it to her, they just tore it up in front of Maria."

"They torture her, basically. It's psychological, but also physical torture as well."

For Lukashenko the mass demonstrations of 2020, triggered by an election that the opposition and the West accused him of stealing, marked a watershed in three decades of authoritarian rule.

Some analysts believe that by crushing them, he burned bridges with the West and became beholden to Putin – a dependence they say could be making him uneasy, and prompting the so-far limited prisoner releases.

[mariacallous]

Ten years ago today, news of the crash of Malaysian Airlines flight MH-17 in eastern Ukraine shocked the world. All 298 passengers on board the Boeing 777, including 80 children, perished. This tragic event was just one of the many shocks coming out of Ukraine that year, as the largest European war after 1945 unfolded in southern and eastern Ukraine.

The war began in February 2014 with the occupation of Crimea by regular Russian troops, followed by Moscow’s illegal annexation of the peninsula in March. Russian irregular troops then entered Donbas in April 2014—ostensibly to “protect” Russian-speaking Ukrainians. Later on, more Russian armed groups, including Wagner mercenaries and small regular army units, poured into Ukraine. They brought with them heavy equipment, including anti-aircraft missile launchers used to shoot down MH-17, a commercial flight on its way from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur, as well as Ukrainian fighter planes and transport aircraft bringing troops and supplies. After Ukrainian defenders began to push back the Russians—at that time still mostly irregulars—large numbers of regular Russian troops started invading eastern Ukraine in mid-August.

Over the course of six months in 2014, there was a manifest, expanding Russian military aggression in the heart of Europe. Yet the West reacted barely at all—with meek diplomatic statements and a few minor sanctions. Besides their limited scope, the sanctions were initially focused narrowly on the annexation of Crimea. The first larger sectoral sanctions followed the shooting of MH-17, which killed dozens of EU citizens. Never were the sanctions a coherent response to the most significant attack on a European country since 1945. During the years that followed, even as fighting continued, little additional action was taken. The West continued business as usual with Russia or even upgraded relations, like Germany’s push to build the Nord Stream 2 gas pipeline.

How could it be that it took the West until Feb. 24, 2022—when Moscow expanded the war it launched in 2014 to a full-scale invasion—to wake up to the reality that Russia is a revisionist state seeking to impose, by any means necessary, its own version of European security order?

Between 2014 and 2022, Western politicians, commentators, and journalists, with few exceptions, continued to believe that Russia’s aims were limited—and that the war simmering in eastern Ukraine was a Ukrainian civil conflict taking place in isolation from Russia’s much larger revisionist aims. Not only did Western efforts to resolve the conflict fail. Since the West continued with business as usual, it also inspired Moscow to press on and paved the way for the 2022 invasion.

Why did the West fail to properly diagnose Russia’s war in Ukraine for eight long years? What lessons from this failure are important today?

One reason was the lack of Western expertise on Ukraine and Russia’s tactics there. Moscow’s interference in Ukrainian affairs since the country’s independence in 1991 had largely escaped Western journalists, political analysts, and international relations scholars. When some Western journalists arrived to cover the events, the situation on the ground was chaotic and its interpretation a challenge for newly minted Ukraine experts. Russian narratives of intra-Ukrainian conflict and regional escalation were simple, understandable, and made sense to many observers—not the least those who had previously worked in Moscow. Many media also relied on their Moscow correspondents, with their skewed, Russia-centric lens, to report on events in Ukraine.

There was also a glaring lack of awareness of Russian hybrid methods. Ten years ago, few Western observers understood the Russian way of war, for which Ukraine was a testing ground. Attempts by Ukrainians, other East Europeans, and Western area experts to explain Russia’s strategy were usually met with skepticism. To outside observers, these descriptions of the Kremlin’s methods, where the intelligence services play a central role, often sounded like speculative assessments or outright conspiracy theories.

The parachute reporters arriving in eastern Ukraine in 2014 witnessed pro-Russian protests and listened to pro-Russian Ukrainian citizens. Some foreign observers could not even tell the difference between Ukrainian residents of Donbas and people from neighboring Russian oblasts who crossed as adventurers or were bussed into Ukraine to participate in the supposedly indigenous separatist movement.

Pro-Ukrainian journalists and other anti-separatist local voices in Donbas, in contrast, faced threats, physical violence, and worse. These Ukrainians feared the consequences of expressing themselves publicly and often remained invisible to visiting reporters. A number of eastern Ukrainians resisting the Russian takeover were threatened, attacked, abducted, severely injured, or secretly killed by Russian irregulars or their local collaborators. Most of these collaborators were encouraged, financed, delegated, or otherwise coordinated by Moscow. This suppression of local opposition laid the groundwork for Russia’s eventual annexation of the Donetsk and Luhansk oblasts.

Western media only started to have a substantial presence in Ukraine in December 2021, on the eve of the full-scale invasion. Before that, much of the reporting was done by correspondents based in Moscow, who usually spoke only Russian and were heavily exposed to Russian narratives.

The Washington Post did not open a Kyiv bureau until May 2022—and sent its former Moscow correspondent to report on Ukraine. Similarly, the New York Times only opened an office in Ukraine in July 2022, headed by the paper’s veteran Moscow correspondent, Andrew Kramer, whose coverage of the war since 2014 had outraged Ukrainians. The newspaper’s reference to Russia’s hybrid attack as a “civil war” (later corrected) and Kramer referring to Russian-occupied territories as “separatist zones” echoed Kremlin language, reminding some Ukrainians of the Times’ sordid history of misreporting genocides and Soviet atrocities. Another widespread adoption of Kremlin talking points on Ukraine was the Western media’s myopic fixation on right-wing extremism that was supposedly out of control in Ukraine—a claim that has been solidly debunked but that would be used by Russian President Vladimir Putin to justify his full-scale attack in 2022.

Many journalists eventually learned to be more critical of Russian narratives. But there remains what behavioral psychologists call an anchoring bias: When people learn about something for the first time, they remember their initial interpretations. These take concerted effort to unlearn and can still be exploited by Russian propaganda.

There were multiple signs of direct Russian involvement in the events in the Donbas in 2014. Most Ukrainians understood intuitively, from the early days of the alleged rebellion, that the unrest and unfolding war were initiated, directed, and funded by Russia. In contrast, it took Western observers time to establish, specify, and verify the facts—and to distinguish them from the many lies.

A circumspect approach to information and conflicting claims from war zones is, in principle, good practice to avoid misinformation. In 2014, however, this overabundance of caution often turned into laziness—a cover not to do the hard work of digging deeper to establish the facts on the ground. With many Western governments and media commentators invested in the idea of a “thaw” with Moscow at the time, there was also an incentive not to look too closely at Russia’s involvement.

The inability, for many years, to define 2014 as a first Russian invasion also underlines the inability of Western observers, including the media, to cope with the sophisticated tactics of hybrid, grey-zone war. As long as the Russian irregulars and mercenaries did not wear official Russian army insignia—and as long as the Kremlin issued a stream of denials that the Russians in eastern Ukraine were anything more than “tourists”—media editors and fact checkers could take refuge behind a false equivalence of opposing claims and perpetuate the notion that the war was an intra-Ukrainian conflict. The media’s difficulties in properly framing a war if it’s waged beneath the threshold of an openly declared one continues to be an issue today.

Western willful ignorance was particularly evident concerning the so-called Donetsk People’s Republic and Lugansk People’s Republic. From their creation in 2014 to their end in September 2022, these were Russian proxy regimes. Yet many in the West—including governments, diplomats, academics, and journalists—treated them as statelets set up by supposed eastern Ukrainian “insurgents.” Only in January 2023 did the European Court on Human Rights put an official end to this pretense, establishing that Russia had effective control over these fake republics since the day they were created.

Regardless of motivation, the West’s slow public reaction to the unfolding events in 2014 left space for Moscow to fill with disinformation, half-truths, and propaganda narratives. Many of them, even after having long been debunked, still circulate today.

The West’s widespread cognition problem between 2014 and 2022 was also a result of a fundamental gap between Western strategic culture and Moscow’s sophisticated hybrid and grey-zone tactics. Initially, foreign observers were often reluctant to acknowledge that the war in the Donbas was part of the same operation as Russia’s more straightforward occupation of Crimea. There remained a naïve belief that the Donbas war was a separate case—an unfortunate conflict between equally legitimate interests to be resolved through joint negotiation, deliberation, and mediation.

Pursuing tactics known as “reflexive control” or “escalation control” that were first developed by the Soviet Union, the Kremlin used aggression via proxies to impose its will on Ukraine and its Western partners. From 2014 to 2022, aggressive behavior alternated with feigned concessions and apparent de-escalation to deceive Western politicians and negotiators into thinking that a peaceful resolution remained possible even as Moscow tightened its grip and prepared for an eventual full-scale conquest.

Throughout the talks that eventually produced the Minsk accords, Moscow used purposeful escalation by its proxy and regular forces to exert maximum pressure on Western and Ukrainian negotiators—but stayed short of an open and massive Russian military attack that could trigger a Western response. Moscow’s zigzag between escalation, apparently conciliatory moves, and stalling tactics managed to deceive many Western observers, who continued to believe that the West was in control of escalation, mistaking Russia staying below the threshold of full-scale war for a sign of moderation. This mistake proved deadly for Ukrainians, allowing the conflict to fester and grew.

On Feb. 24, 2022, the West finally woke up to reality, imposed substantial sanctions on Russia, rushed defensive weapons to Ukraine, and later followed up by delivering heavy weapons. Had there not been so many Western misconceptions about Russia’s first invasion in 2014, those weapons might already have been delivered then. And today’s much larger, much more brutal war might have been avoided.

[dreaminginthedeepsouth]

Billboard project

* * * * *

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

September 6, 2024

Heather Cox Richardson

Sep 07, 2024

One of the things that came to light on Wednesday, in the paperwork the Justice Department unveiled to explain its seizure of 32 internet domains being used by Russian agents in foreign malign influence campaigns, was that the six right-wing U.S. influencers mentioned in the indictments of the Russian operatives are only the tip of the iceberg. 

Since at least 2022, three Russian companies working with the Kremlin have been trying to change foreign politics in a campaign they called “Doppelganger,” covertly spreading Russian government propaganda. “[F]irst and foremost,” notes from a meeting with Russian officials about targeting Germany read, “we need to discredit the USA, Great Britain, and NATO.” Through fake social media profiles, their operatives posed as Americans or other non-Russians, seeding public conversations with Russian propaganda.

In August 2023 they launched the “Good Old USA Project” to target swing-state residents, online gamers, American Jews, and “US citizens of Hispanic descent” to reelect Donald Trump. ​​"They are afraid of losing the American way of life and the ‘American dream,’” one of the propagandists wrote. “It is these sentiments that should be exploited in the course of an information campaign in/for the United States.” Using targeted ads on Facebook, they could see how their material was landing and use bots and trolls to push their narrative in comment sections. 

“In order for this work to be effective, you need to use a minimum of fake news and a maximum of realistic information,” the propagandists told their staff. “At the same time, you should continuously repeat that this is what is really happening, but the official media will never tell you about it or show it to you.”

According to the documents, one of the three companies, Social Design Agency (SDA), monitors and collects information about media organizations and social media influencers. It collected a list of 1,900 “anti-influencers,” whose accounts posted material SDA workers thought operated against Russian interests. About 26% of those accounts were based in the U.S. 

SDA also identified as pro-Russian influencers more than 2,800 people in 81 countries operating on various social media platforms like X, Facebook, and Telegram. Those influencers included “television and radio hosts, politicians, bloggers, journalists, businessmen, professors, think-tank analysts, veterans, professors, and comedians.” About 21% of those influencers were in the U.S. 

YouTube took down the Tenet Media Channels associated with the Justice Department’s indictments, and last night, Tenet Media abruptly shut down. In The Bulwark, Jonathan V. Last noted that the Tenet influencers maintain they were dupes, although they must have been aware that their paychecks were crazy high for the numbers of viewers they had. He asks if, knowing now that their gains are ill-gotten, they are going to give them to charity. 

Earlier this week, former Fox News Channel personality Tucker Carlson hosted Holocaust denier Darryl Cooper on his X show, where Cooper not only suggested that the death of more than six million Jews was an accidental result of poor planning, but also argued that British prime minister Winston Churchill, who stood firm against the expansion of fascist Germany in World War II, was the true villain of the war.

Cooper’s argument puts him squarely on the side of Russian president Vladimir Putin and Hungarian prime minister Viktor Orbán, who insist that democracy undermines society. During the recent summer Olympics, Cooper posted on social media an image of Hitler in Paris alongside another of drag queens representing Greek gods at the Olympic opening ceremonies, an image some on the right thought made fun of the Last Supper of Jesus and his disciples. “This may be putting it too crudely for some,” Cooper wrote, “but the picture [of Hitler in Paris] was infinitely preferable in virtually every way than the one on the right.” 

The idea that Churchill, not Hitler, is the villain of World War II means denying the fact of the Holocaust and defending the Nazis. It lands Carlson and Cooper in the same camp as those autocrats journalist Anne Applebaum notes are “making common cause with MAGA Republicans to discredit liberalism and freedom around the world.” Elon Musk promoted the interview, saying it was “very interesting,” and “worth watching,” before the backlash made him delete his post. The video has been viewed nearly 30 million times. 

Carlson told Lauren Irwin of The Hill that the Biden administration is made up of “warmonger freaks” who have “used the Churchill myth to bring our country closer to nuclear war than at any moment in history.” Carlson is on a 16-day speaking tour, on which he will interview Trump allies, including Republican vice presidential nominee J.D. Vance and Donald Trump Jr. 

Trump today continued his effort to undermine the democratic American legal system in a “news conference” of more than 45 minutes, in which he took no questions. Although Judge Juan Merchan, who oversaw the election interference case in which a jury found Trump guilty on 34 counts, decided today to delay sentencing until November 26 to avoid any appearance that the court was trying to affect the 2024 election, Trump nonetheless launched an attack on the U.S. legal system and suggested the lawsuits against him were election interference. 

He spoke after he and his legal team were in court today to try to overturn a jury’s conclusion that he had sexually assaulted writer E. Jean Carroll, a decision that brought his judgments in the two cases she brought to around $90 million. He began with an attack on what he said was a new “Russia, Russia, Russia” hoax, and promised he had not “spoken to anybody from Russia in years.”

Aaron Rupar of Public Notice recorded what amounted to close to an hour of attacks on the American Justice Department and the laws of the country, and also on American women (he not only attacked Carroll, he brought up others of the roughly two dozen women who have accused him of sexual assault). He attempted to retry the Carroll case in the media, refuting the evidence the jury considered and suggesting that the photo of him and Carroll together was generated by AI, although it was published in 2019.

Attacking women was an interesting decision in light of the fact that he will need the votes of suburban women if he is to make up the ground he has lost to Democratic presidential nominee Vice President Kamala Harris and vice presidential nominee Tim Walz.

For her part, former representative Liz Cheney (R-WY) appears to see this moment for what it is. Although a staunch Republican herself, she is urging conservative women to admit they’ve had enough. Referring to both Trump and Vance in a conversation sponsored by the Texas Tribune, she said: “This is my diplomatic way of saying it: They’re misogynistic pigs.” She assured listeners, quite accurately, that Trump “is not a conservative.” “Women around this country…we’ve had enough.” “These are not people that we can entrust with power again.” 

Her father, former vice president Dick Cheney, agreed that Trump “can never be trusted with power again” and announced today that he will be voting for Harris. “As citizens, we each have a duty to put country above partisanship to defend our Constitution. That is why I will be casting my vote for Vice President Kamala Harris,” he said. Eighty-eight business leaders also endorsed Harris today, including James Murdoch, an heir to the Murdoch family media empire. Citing Harris’s “policies that support the rule of law, stability, and a sound business environment,” they said in a public letter, “the best way to support the continued strength, security, and reliability of our democracy and economy” is by electing Harris president.​​

Meanwhile, at his event with Sean Hannity of the Fox News Channel yesterday, Trump embraced the key element of Project 2025 that calls for a dictatorial leader to take over the U.S. That document maintains that “personnel is policy” and that the way to achieve all that the Christian nationalists want is to fire the nonpartisan civil servants currently in place and put their own people into office. Trump has tried hard to distance himself from Project 2025, but last night he said the way to run the government is to “get the right people. You put the right person and the right group of people at the heads of these massive agencies, you’re going to have tremendous success, and I know now the people, and I know them better than anybody would know them.”       

One of those people appears to be X owner Elon Musk, whom Trump has promised to put at the head of an “efficiency” commission to audit the U.S. government. 

In 1858, Abraham Lincoln, then a candidate for the Senate, warned that the arguments against democracy and in favor of a few people dominating the rest were always the same. In his era, it was enslavers saying some people were better than others. But, he said, those were the same arguments “that kings have made for enslaving the people in all ages of the world…. Turn in whatever way you will—whether it come from the mouth of a King, an excuse for enslaving the people of his country, or from the mouth of men of one race as a reason for enslaving the men of another race, it is all the same old serpent.” 

In our era, Indiana Jones said it best in The Last Crusade: “Nazis. I hate these guys.” 

LETTERS FROM AN AMERICAN

HEATHER COX RICHARDSON

[zvaigzdelasas]

Finland's economy minister, Vilhelm Junnila, has resigned his post after sustained allegations of ties to right-wing extremists as well as a series of distasteful Nazi jokes. Junnila is a member of the anti-immigrant Finns Party, which is part of Finland's new four-party center-right ruling coalition. Though he survived a vote of no-confidence called by opposition politicians in Finland's Parliament on June 28, Junnila announced he was stepping down Friday, saying, "For the continuation of the government and the reputation of Finland, I see that it is impossible for me to continue as a minister in a satisfactory way." Junnila had come under fire for, among other things, a public speech that he had given in 2019 related to a far-right memorial in the western Finnish town of Turku. He was also criticized for repeated Nazi jokes.

The populist apparently joked with a fellow Finns Party politician in a campaign speech on March 10, calling his candidate number — 88 — a good omen. "First of all, congratulations for the excellent candidate number. I know it's a winning card. Obviously, this '88' refers to two H letters which we won't say more about."[...]

The bloc, which holds 108 of parliament's 200 seats, took power on June 20. Though it seems likely Junnila will quickly be replaced, some observers have raised questions as to the coalition's viability. Junnila's resignation makes him the shortest-serving minister in Finnish politics. That distinction had previously been held by Karl Lennart Oesch, a military general who served as Finland's interior minister for 12 days in 1932.

30 Jun 23

The Finns Party said in a statement that Wille Rydman, 37, was chosen “unanimously” for the post. [...]

In early January, however, Rydman joined the nationalist Finns Party after he was ousted from the NCP last year because of allegations of harassment and improper relationships with young women and teenage girls. The case led to a police investigation, and he was later cleared of suspicion of misconduct.[...]

President Sauli Niinistö will formally appoint Rydman on Thursday.[...] Orpo’s four-party coalition government, described by political analysts as Finland’s most conservative Cabinet since World War II, was sworn in on June 20.

5 Jul 23

[militantinremission]

The 2024 Presidential Debate: Time for New Blood?

In a word, The 1st Presidential Debate of 2024 was BRUTAL! Both Candidates took personal shots at each other; but Joe Biden- to his Credit, offered more Substance than Donald Trump. Trump avoided questions on rising Child Care Costs, Drug Overdoses, & Israel's 'War On Gaza' to name a few, but Biden wasn't able to capitalize on his lack of Policy Measures. Joe Biden came across as 'Too Old for Primetime', & appeared to be regurgitating Talking Points more than confidently articulating his Agenda for the next 4 Years. Donald Trump rambled on & embellished the truth for most of The Debate, instead of answering questions directly. BOTH had moments where they were less than honest. Trump focused on Biden's Job Performance more than articulating his Own Agenda for the next 4 Years. Joe Biden seemed more cognizant AFTER The Debate, than during it.

Donald Trump- to his Credit, was more reserved than he was in the 2020 Presidential Debates. Ironically, it was Joe Biden who initiated the insults, but Trump apparently didn't take The Bait. BOTH performances were subpar for a Presidential Candidate; I understand why Robert Kennedy Jr. was kept off that Debate Stage. NEITHER Candidate offered a Real Solution to Black Specific Issues. Instead, Both pivoted to the Reliable Standard of including 'Hispanics' & 'Minorities' into the Black American conversation. Donald Trump commented that Illegal Immigrants were stealing 'Black Jobs'. Mainstream Media & some Blackfolk were insulted by the statement, but Black Men have been literally pushed out of Union Jobs; particularly in the Field of Construction, in favor of Immigrants. People seem to forget that Black Men have traditionally been Blue Collar Workers. Trump is a virtual King of 'Off Color Comments', but many of Us understood what he was trying to say.

From a Black Perspective, the pivot away from Black Specific Issues speaks volumes about BOTH Party Agendas. Most Black Americans can't afford HBCU Tuitions, so funding them is a Moot Point to Us. Offering Black Students Free or Lower Tuition to State Universities would make more sense. Joe Biden offered a $10K Tax Credit to Black 1st Time Home Buyers, but didn't elaborate on it. He appeared strongest on the topic of Abortion, but allowed Trump to flummox him on the topic; particularly Late Term Abortions. Donald Trump appeared strongest on the issue of Immigration & put Biden on the spot several times, but didn't offer a Specific Agenda on how he will tackle it. Trump also lacked a Policy for lowering Inflation, other than extending his Tax Cuts to Corporations. Joe Biden's Economic Plan, is the continuation of 'Bidenomics'- A Plan that many are already concerned about.

Political Analysts & Pundits covering the Debate were quick to point out Joe Biden's performance. Most felt that he missed several opportunities to catch Donald Trump in blatant lies; they also questioned his Physical & Mental Fitness. He was supposed to reassure his Base that he had the Strength & Mental Competence to Serve another 4 Years, but critics are questioning his ability to finish the 1st Term of Office. Several Democratic Strategists called Biden "feeble & weak". Joy Reid said that Dems she spoke w/ are bordering on 'panic'. Rumors are spreading of a possible intervention asking him to step down, but it might be too late to change Candidates. CNN was accused of Stacking the Deck in favor of Joe Biden, but Trump appeared comfortable w/ the format. Both Moderators allowed Donald Trump to embellish w/o fact checking him; was that their job, or Biden's to do?

Democrats are calling Joe Biden's performance 'A Bad Night' (citing a Cold & scratchy throat), while the GOP applauds Donald Trump for 'Doing what he had to do'. I thought that BOTH Candidates were mediocre. Trump is being congratulated for Side Stepping questions & presenting a Vision of Smoke & Mirrors. Biden took a week off to prepare, but instead of repeating his State Of The Union Address performance, he stumbled through most of the Debate. Mainstream Media tried to predict This Debate would rival the Kennedy vs Nixon Debate of 1960, but it wasn't even close. The best dialogue between the Candidates, was about their Golfing Handicaps. America deserves a President that will move Us forward, but We have 2 'Old Dudes' caught up in their Own Egocentricity.

Donald Trump admitted that he's only running again, because he didn't see a GOP Candidate that could defeat Joe Biden. There are GOP Moderates out there that Republican Leadership & Voters could legitimately support. A few might even sway Independents, Libertarians, & disaffected Democrats; but grassroot support for the 'MAGA Agenda' has silenced most, out of fear of being labeled 'RINO'... I thought that This 'Pre Baby Boomer' Generation was willing to pass the baton when Barack Obama was Elected, but it seems like they've Doubled Down since he left Office. We currently have a Congress run by folks adamant about holding Power until it's pried from their Cold Dead Hands. The World Dynamic is changing & America needs to adapt. The Era of 'Neo Conservatives' & 'Neo Liberals' has run its Course- BOTH allowed the development of a Plutocratic Billionaire Class that has literally choked the Middle Class.

The Future Generations of American Society are NOT expected to outperform the previous Generations. Gen. Z in particular, is DROWNING before They can even Start; but Our 'Elder States[Wo]Men' don't seem fazed by This. They ALL seem content w/ taking The Country Down w/ them.

-It's TIME for New Blood!

[probablyasocialecologist]

We reject antisemitism in all its forms, including when it masquerades as criticism of Zionism or Israel’s policies. We also recognize that, as journalist Peter Beinart wrote in 2019, “Anti-Zionism is not inherently antisemitic—and claiming it is uses Jewish suffering to erase Palestinian experience.”  We find this rhetorical tactic antithetical to Jewish values, which teach us to repair the world, question authority, and champion the oppressed over the oppressor. It is precisely because of the painful history of antisemitism and lessons of Jewish texts that we advocate for the dignity and sovereignty of the Palestinian people. We refuse the false choice between Jewish safety and Palestinian freedom; between Jewish identity and ending the oppression of Palestinians. In fact, we believe the rights of Jews and Palestinians go hand-in-hand. The safety of each people depends on the other’s. We are certainly not the first to say so, and we admire those who have modeled this line of thinking in the wake of so much violence.  We understand how antisemitism and criticism of Israel or Zionism have been conflated. For years, dozens of countries have upheld the International Holocaust Remembrance Alliance’s working definition of antisemitism. Most of its eleven examples of antisemitism regard comments on the state of Israel, with some open to interpretation enough that they limit the scope of acceptable critique. What’s more, the Anti-Defamation League classifies Anti-Zionism as antisemitism, despite the misgivings of many of its own experts. These definitions have scaffolded the Israeli government’s deepening relationships with far-right, antisemitic political forces, from Hungary to Poland to the United States and beyond—endangering Jews in diaspora. To counter these sweeping definitions, a group of scholars of antisemitism published the Jerusalem Declaration in 2020, offering more specific guidelines for identifying antisemitism and distinguishing it from criticism and debate around Israel and Zionism.  Accusations of antisemitism at the slightest objection to Israeli policy have long allowed Israel to uphold a regime that human rights groups, scholars, legal analysts, and Palestinian and Israeli organizations have called apartheid. These accusations continue to cast a chilling effect across our politics. This has meant political suppression in Gaza and the West Bank, where the Israeli government conflates the very existence of Palestinian people with Jew hatred the world over. In propaganda aimed internally at its own citizens and externally toward the West, the Israeli government asserts that Palestinian grievance is not about land, mobility, rights, or freedom, but instead, antisemitism. In the last weeks, Israeli leaders have continued to instrumentalize the history of Jewish trauma to dehumanize Palestinians. Meanwhile, Israelis are arrested or suspended from their jobs for social media posts defending Gaza. Israeli journalists fear consequences for criticizing their government.

[justinspoliticalcorner]

Edward Helmore at The Guardian:

Pete Buttigieg, Joe Biden’s transport secretary, introduced himself to Democrats at their convention earlier last month in unusual fashion. “I’m Pete Buttigieg and you might recognize me from Fox News,” he told the crowd in Chicago.

The comment drew laughter, but beneath it was a certain truth: in the final two months of the 2024 election, politicians and campaign aides are less siloed in their ideologically aligned media bubbles in an effort to poach potentially persuadable voters. Buttigieg said he is proud to go on conservative outlets to speak on behalf of the Harris-Walz campaign because their arguments and facts might not otherwise be aired to that audience. So too have the Democratic governors Gavin Newsom, Josh Shapiro, Wes Moore and Gretchen Whitmer, and senators Amy Klobuchar, Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders, John Fetterman and Chris Coons also dropped in on the network. Meanwhile, Trump campaign adviser Corey Lewandowski has been on MSNBC’s The Beat with Ari Melber, and JD Vance on CNN. Presidential hopeful Kamala Harris told CNN she would find a place in her cabinet for a Republican if elected. In an election that is likely to turn on a small number of undecided voters in a handful of swing states, and considering that the Harris-Walz campaign has been on a bus tour of heavily Republican, mainly pro-Trump rural Georgia where there aren’t many votes to get, the cross-border forays into enemy TV territory makes sense.

“We have so many hyper-close elections in swing states that even if you only get a point or two that you take away from Republicans and put in your column can be the 10,000 votes that give you that swing state,” said the University of Virginia political analyst Larry Sabato. The same is true for going on a cable news station holding perceived political biases. When Buttigieg goes on Fox News, Sabato says, he is “not just addressing Republicans, but also getting Democrats indebted to him for the unpleasant task he’s performing”. But the media too likes to play the game – albeit for different reasons. The issue of the media, and its perceived political biases, has become a central campaign issue in the US and there is a deep public hostility to journalists. For the more partisan television networks like Fox and MSNBC, there is an advantage to having people from the other side on – as it may somewhat defuse accusations of one-sidedness.

The Guardian has a solid article on why Democrats appear on Fox “News” (and also why Republicans appear on CNN and MSNBC). Pete Buttigieg has become the king of Fox appearances for a Democrat for a reason.

[eretzyisrael]

MSNBC host Ali Velshi and Palestinian political analyst Nour Odeh attempted Saturday to shift blame onto Israel on after Hamas mercilessly attacked Israel.

Hamas, a Palestinian terrorist organization, launched a relentless attack on Israel at daybreak Saturday, firing rockets and invading on the ground. Gunmen streamed across the border and reportedly began brutally slaughtering Israelis and allegedly taking people hostage. Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu declared the country was “at war.”

But that didn’t stop MSNBC from blaming the Israelis.

“We have had a lot of statements from Americans, mostly Republicans this morning but some Democrats, it’s a boiler plate. ‘Israel is our greatest ally,’ ‘The only democracy in the Middle East,’ ‘Our strongest ally,’ ‘We must stand with Israel.’ There’s no nuance or recognition of anything that has been going on,” Velshi said. “Let alone, the only thing Americans are worried about these days are these so-called judicial reforms going on in Israel which has led to hundreds of thousands of people protesting on the streets, but lots of Palestinians have said to me, ‘Boy, they wish that those same Israelis who are out there protesting the so-called judicial reforms would be protesting Israel’s inhumane treatment of the Palestinians who live under Israeli occupation. But that’s just not something that’s happening. It’s not something we’re hearing from American politicians this morning. It’s not something we’re hearing from— I think the only comment I’ve heard is from the government of Qatar this morning about this.”

[sylvia-on-the-run]

"The Follow-up Committee of National and Islamic Forces condemn the policies pursued by the channels "Al-Arabiya" and "Al-Hadath," which have turned these channels into spokespeople for the zionist occupation. The Committee noted that these channels not only convey the zionist narrative and justify the occupation's crimes but also launch a media war against all resistance forces since the beginning of the war on Gaza. The zionist newspaper Haaretz has repeatedly commented on the "importance" of Al-Arabiya for the entity.

The Committee calls on all Palestinian and Arab viewers everywhere, as well as political figures, activists, journalists, and political analysts, to boycott these two channels, which are striving to distort the collective consciousness in the Arab world through psychological propaganda crafted by zionist hands.

The Committee also calls on all concerned parties in the Palestinian territories of the West Bank and Gaza Strip to revoke the work licenses of these channels and to halt their operations. The Committee urged the Bar Association to file lawsuits in the relevant courts against these channels, considering them as partners in the war of genocide against our people.

The Committee issued a special appeal to Saudi King Salman bin Abdulaziz to issue directives to review the policies of these channels, which are hostile not only to our Palestinian people and their cause but also to the sentiments of our Arab and Islamic nation."

These papers are *NOT* reliable sources

[infiniteglitterfall]

I just saw that Ahmed Alkhatib is speaking at a synagogue in Berkeley on Friday?! He's my fourth- or fifth-favorite Palestinian activist!! He's speaking with an expert on Palestinian trauma! I have zero idea what they're going to talk about beyond that!

This is what he says is his "platform," which is so long I'm gonna paste it into a reblog:

AND FOR THE CURIOUS, YOU CAN ZOOM IN AT 8 PM ON FRIDAY WITHOUT EVEN RSVPing: https://zoom.us/j/8781040

He has had a LOT of trouble connecting with the Pro-Palestine movement and finding people who'll listen to him, much less who will center and support his work as an activist from Gaza.

So share this with all your pro-Palestinian friends!

I WOULD just assume it's like... a general talk about All The Shit. But I heard this week that a coalition of Gazan activists has been working on a plan for self-rule in Gaza.

I don't know if he's involved in that; I'm behind on all this. They're not in the same activist circles, but that doesn't necessarily mean anything. But obviously it makes me curious about whether that will come up.

(OK, I know you want to know the top 5. It currently goes: Hamza Howidy at the top with a big gold star for pieces like this:

Then Bassem Eid; Moumen al-Natour; Mo Ghaoui; Ahmed Alkhatib. Those are all very close rankings that shift all the time. Even now, I'm mentally flipping 4 and 5 back and forth. And 2 and 3.

The Center for Peace Communications deserves a mention too. It's based in NYC, but it's devoted to giving the people of Gaza a way for their voices to safely be heard.)

This is what the synagogue event page says:

Potluck oneg after services, followed by HeartSpace at 8pm, featuring a discussion and Q+A with Palestinian political analyst Ahmed Alkhatib and Palestinian trauma expert Dr. Niveen Rizkalla.

As we approach the one-year anniversary of the deadly Hamas attacks on October 7 and grapple with the ongoing violence and devastation in Israel-Palestine, join us in our efforts to hold multiple perspectives with nuance and complexity, part of our ongoing HeartSpace series showcasing diverse voices from the region.

Ahmed Alkhatib is a nonresident senior fellow with the Scowcroft Middle East Security Initiative at the Atlantic Council’s Middle East Programs. He is also an American writer and analyst who grew up in Gaza City, having left in 2005 as a teenage exchange student to the United States.

He writes extensively on Gaza’s political and humanitarian affairs and has been an outspoken critic of Hamas and a promoter of coexistence and peace as the only path forward between Palestinians and Israelis.

Alkhatib has a bachelor’s degree in business administration and a master’s degree in intelligence and national security studies. His writing has been published in US and Israeli outlets, and his opinions and comments have been featured in international press. Click here for more information and to support Ahmed’s peacebuilding efforts"

Dr. Niveen Rizkalla is a postdoctoral research fellow at UC Berkeley’s Mack Center for Mental Health and Social Conflict. She specializes in research related to trauma, including PTSD, vicarious and secondary traumatization, victims of torture and war, and gender-based violence. She is also working on the mental health of Syrian refugees and the staff who assist them.

Her most recent project delves into the physical and mental health of aid workers who assist traumatized populations (refugees, conflict, and natural disasters) in Asia, Africa, Europe, Latin America and the Middle East.

ZOOM INFO

Join with video https://zoom.us/j/87810404956

Join by phone 1-669-900-6833, 1-346-248-7799, 1-253-215-8782

Meeting ID 878 1040 4956

Passcode 972073

Notice: Our Zoom recordings are for archival purposes only, and therefore are not available to the public.

DONATION INFO

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