Bulletins and News Discussion from November 20th to November 26th, 2023 - Let Sleeping Dogs Milei - COTW: Argentina
Bulletins and News Discussion from November 20th to November 26th, 2023 - Let Sleeping Dogs Milei - COTW: Argentina
Image: the last sight of many a commie.
Please pronounce his name wrong to make the title pun work better.
Anyway - Javier Milei, a caricature of a libertarian invented deep in the Hexbear Bit Factory, has won the Argentinian general election; and with a 12 point lead over Massa, it wasn't even particularly close. There are several analogies for this situation - Trump beating Hillary, Bolsonaro winning in 2018, or the alternate universe where Le Pen beat Macron. Massa is not a great guy. The last couple years have been difficult for Argentina, facing massive inflation and the same general economic downturns that are happening everywhere.
Milei is an... interesting person. To name just a couple things going on in his deeply bizarre life, he has a very special relationship with his sister, and an even more special relationship with his mastiff, Conan. When Conan died in 2017, he was so utterly distraught that he had him cloned into four new dogs, named Murray, Milton, Robert, and Lucas, for his economist idols. And he uses mediums to speak to his dead dog. This is probably the closest we're ever going to get to having a dog be president of a country.
Milei wants to essentially collapse the economy even harder. Playing off the general public sentiment of "dollar = good, peso = bad", he has vowed to make the national currency of Argentina the US dollar, thus eagerly giving a massive amount of control over the Argentinian economy directly to America. He wants to take a chainsaw to the status quo, cut off trade with communist countries like China, and demolish the Central Bank. Will Argentinian capitalists and the Senate let him do this? Probably not. What happens with their membership in BRICS+? Who knows. Where does Peronism go from here? Who can say.
But he still won, and will now be president. I suppose that every dog has its day.
Friendly reminder: when commenting about a news event, especially something that just happened, please provide a source of some kind. While ideally this would be on nitter or archived, any source is preferable to none at all given.
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA daily-ish reports on Israel's destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news (and has automated posting when the person running it goes to sleep).
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
Various sources that are covering the Ukraine conflict are also covering the one in Palestine, like Rybar.
The Country of the Week is Argentina! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.
Here is the map of the Ukraine conflict, courtesy of Wikipedia.
Links and Stuff
The bulletins site is down.
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Add to the above list if you can.
Resources For Understanding The War
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.
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.
Telegram Channels
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
Pro-Russian
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.
Pro-Ukraine
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
Last week's discussion post.
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I think there is more than a little opportunism here though. I think it's easy for republican politicians to be against the war in Ukraine because it's "Biden's War" and anything he does is a commie globalist conspiracy. They were pissed at Biden for cutting our losses in Afghanistan too, because he was the one doing it, doesn't matter that it was also a colossal drain on our resources. I personally know conservatives who consider themselves anti war because they oppose the war in Ukraine but are vehemently opposed to any reluctance to give Israel more weapons.
If it were a war they started or that was being overseen by their candidate I'm not convinced chuds would care at all.
I think there is more than a little opportunism here though. I think it's easy for republican politicians to be against the war in Ukraine because it's "Biden's War" and anything he does is a commie globalist conspiracy.
Why is it "opportunist" though unless being anti-Ukraine is legitimately popular? That's the point. My point isn't that Republicans are good wholesome people who we should support, drop you moralism. My point is an analytical one, that being anti-Ukraine War is a popular stance that people care about, hence why Republicans chose this issue to grandstand on and not a different one. It just so happens to be the correct stance as well, so there should be no excuses about it the path ahead is clear.
Think about it, why wouldn't they pick an easy winner among the GOP base like "more money to the southern border to stop migrants and muslamic style individuals"? It's safer for them, doesn't upset anyone in the MIC and they still get to opportunistically grandstand and shut down the government and all that fun stuff. They stuck their neck out to oppose Ukrainian War funding because there's a lot of people who it's important to
I think people who are motivated by Ukraine are often doing so as an expression of their partisan identity (evil ruzzians colluding in our elections/sleepy joe turning us communist), not as a consistent position you could leverage into a long running project. I might be wrong about that but no conservative I've heard on this topic has a position that makes sense outside of partisan teamsmanship. Except maybe like Mearshimer, but he's not representative of the base or a popular upswell in sensible realpolitik calculation among suburban white people.
If the issue is popular among right wingers because they want to lurch further right I'm not sure how you coopt that. You could coopt genuine antiwar sentiment. Can you do the same for "NATO is (((the globalists))) trying to weaken us so the Chinese can take over"?
It's amazing how hard you westoids squirm to avoid being anti-war. The correct communist stance is anti-Ukraine War funds. It's that simple. It's a failure of the western left that they don't have this stance, both a failure of revolutionary duty AND a strategic blunder. They will not face success until they fix the internal issues of chauvinism that led them here as they will just be incorrect again on the next major issue.
No I agree, funding the war in Ukraine is pointlessly killing thousands of people over US geopolitical interests that are bad for the world. I personally oppose that.
I just am not sure I could get anywhere with Gaetz trying to argue that we share a political program and leveraging that into ending the war. Or convincing people who like Gaetz that they could meet their goals better through collective class struggle. I'm not sure these people are actually anti war. I think they're against Joe's war.
I just am not sure I could get anywhere with Gaetz trying to argue that we share a political program and leveraging that into ending the war.
Literally nobody said that was what we should do. I brought up the GOP as one example of many populist parties that oppose the war sweeping into victory across the western world. The left populists like Slovakia have the correct idea
I see. I guess it just feels hopeless in the US context, we have so little leverage on the left. I admire your optimism comrade. I hope the war ends soon.
Unless you have actually lived here, you have zero conception of what it is like to live in the U.S. nor the absolutely overwhelming social and psychological pressure that is involved. We are absolutely buried under propoganda 24/7, and it is also considered a virtue for the most credulous people on earth to assert their opinions constantly at meetings.
You could try to organize on an anti-war front here as it would be the right thing to do, but you would instantly lose all the libs because 'Ukriane is wholesome 100% uwu', and then you would lose the conservatives because 'taxation should be illegal and the roads should be privatized the way God intended.'
The distinct distance of the average American from reality is staggering if you haven't lived among it for years.
Lots of words to be defeatist and oppose anti-war duties, lots of tailist rhetoric
Hell yeah sink into your meaningless jargon like a good leftist, I'm sure that will work wonders. Lots of telling people what to do in a circumstance you aren't even close to aware of. Deal with your own shit, and I'll deal with mine. I'll do what I can.
Calling me 'tailist' while following the lead of the GOP is a good bit though. You should keep it up.
I’m not following the lead of the GOP, I’m doing my revolutionary defeatist duty to oppose my empire, it’s the correct revolutionary stance to oppose the war. It is you who is being tailist by abandoning the correct revolutionary stance to appeal to “normal democrats” who are actually social fascists.
I brought up the GOP and Orban and Slovakia only to demonstrate to you that your pathetic chauvinist westoid ass is getting outflanked. It’s a sign of your failure and instead of correcting you double down.
Chauvinists and reformists always talk like you do here btw, you always sound exactly the same. It’s not jargon, I’m explaining to your Marxist principles that are proven through history and practice and you reject it because you want to continue being a comfortable liberal. Anyone who dismisses revolutionary proven theory for vague platitudes is doing liberalism. Anyone who values “optics” over correct stances is doing Liberalism. Anyone who follows polls of popular positions among Liberals to decide their platform is doing Liberalism.
I am not abandoning it. I am fully on board with the anti-war effort and active within it, which is what I have been indicating to you, but trying to organize it as a coherent political front nearly impossible. I couldn't give a fuck about the Democrats.
I'm telling you that trying to get people into the anti-war movement is difficult and attempting to appeal to the same people that Matthew Gaetz and company are appealing to is a really hard sell, because they oppose empire's expansion for completely different reasons than we are and that attempting to use them as a 'bell-weather' indicator for popularity is not useful.
If you aren't worried about the popularity of a position, then quit talking about Gaetz or the GOP at all. If it's irrelevant then don't bring it up. Your messaging is complete shit.
You aren't explaining my Marxist principles to me at all 'one true leftist', you are lecturing me on realities that for some idealist reason you are not aware of and I am, while bringing up completely irrelevant issues and praising the oppositions opportunist political opposition.
We're not 'getting outflanked politically', that is an idealist analysis. We are getting outflanked materially. We have no popular media platform, we have no money, and our organizations are completely limited to the largest cities of which we are a tiny, tiny minority, and constantly having to work tirelessly for even basic political education.
Literally, who is being chauvinist here? You, who naively thinks that we are even close to being on the same playing field as someone like Gaetz who has the backing of billionaires and it is just a matter of 'correct messaging', or me, who it telling you what the literal material reality on the ground here is.