Bulletins and News Discussion from October 14th to October 20th, 2024 - Paper Tigers
Image is a frame taken from this video of Iranian missiles raining down on Israel without interception due to a weak and depleted air defense system after a year of war and genocide.
Mao, 1956:
Now U.S. imperialism is quite powerful, but in reality it isn't. It is very weak politically because it is divorced from the masses of the people and is disliked by everybody and by the American people too. In appearance it is very powerful but in reality it is nothing to be afraid of, it is a paper tiger. Outwardly a tiger, it is made of paper, unable to withstand the wind and the rain. I believe the United States is nothing but a paper tiger.
When we say U.S. imperialism is a paper tiger, we are speaking in terms of strategy. Regarding it as a whole, we must despise it. But regarding each part, we must take it seriously. It has claws and fangs. We have to destroy it piecemeal. For instance, if it has ten fangs, knock off one the first time, and there will be nine left, knock off another, and there will be eight left. When all the fangs are gone, it will still have claws. If we deal with it step by step and in earnest, we will certainly succeed in the end.
Strategically, we must utterly despise U.S. imperialism. Tactically, we must take it seriously. In struggling against it, we must take each battle, each encounter, seriously. At present, the United States is powerful, but when looked at in a broader perspective, as a whole and from a long-term viewpoint, it has no popular support, its policies are disliked by the people, because it oppresses and exploits them. For this reason, the tiger is doomed. Therefore, it is nothing to be afraid of and can be despised. But today the United States still has strength, turning out more than 100 million tons of steel a year and hitting out everywhere. That is why we must continue to wage struggles against it, fight it with all our might and wrest one position after another from it. And that takes time.
Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful. Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section. Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war. Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis. Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists' side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language. https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one. https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts. https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel. https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator. https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps. https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language. https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language. https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses. https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
This news is already a few months old, but it's still very funny to see how stupid Milei is. Last year, or earlier this year, Milei visited Brazil to meet Bolsonaro and receive a medal that basically said he was very sexy, cool and impossible to kill (it's much worse than that, actually). And so far he hasn't met with Lula da Silva, the president of Argentina's most important regional ally and trading partner.
So, since Milei hasn't met with Lula da Silva, what was Brazil's plan? I remember reading in some media that Brazil had three plans: the first was for Milei to basically become Macri 2.0 (normal, boring neoliberal) and be respectful of Brazil and China. The second was that Milei would continue to be an idiot, but would beg for money and help behind the scenes, and the third was that Brazil and China would not talk to Milei at all and would instead talk to the Argentine congress and governors.
Lula decided to go for the third option, invited Axel Kicillof (a left-wing Peronist, former Minister of the Economy and currently Governor of Buenos Aires, and probably a much better candidate than Sergio Massa) to the Presidential Palace and gave him the treatment of a foreign head of state (which Macron also did with Lula da Silva when Lula was running for president in 2022. Macron hates Bolsonaro very much because Bolsonaro said Macron's wife was ugly and old, and France has interests in Brazil and especially in the sale of nuclear material and arms to Brazil). Kicillof basically did what Milei had to do, meanwhile Milei was calling the wife of Spain's prime minister a criminal to own the Zurdos on Instagram and posting AI generating lions while screaming "Libertad Carajo!!"
Bolsonaro also is a pedophile though, he decided to brag about having sexual relations with some random Venezuelan girls 5 days before the 2022 elections, which didn't help him win against Lula da Silva.
Also, it turn out he was lying, the two teenager girls didn't have relations with him because they weren't even sex workers (he said they were for no reason), they were literally some random 14 year olds who were going to school and Bolsonaro decided to take a picture with them.
Tbh, Bolsonaro is the same guy who said on TV that he was proud that he had sexual relations with animals. I think Trump also did say Jeb Bush's wife was ugly, I think Bolsonaro thought this would impress his supporters.