Even the need for transition – just to be clear – has only just begun to be recognised in the U.S. For the European leadership however, and for the beneficiaries of financialisation who haughtily lament Trump’s ‘storm’ unwisely unleashed on the world, his base economic theses are ridiculed as bizarre notions completely divorced from economic ‘reality’.
The diplomatic tempo of the Ukrainian Conflict is picking up as all relevant parties begin talking more about reaching an agreement to end it.
SAADA, northwest Yemen – It’s 2 pm on Wednesday, March 26, and I am standing in a deserted boulevard in Saada during Ramadan, in silence, surrounded by mountains, and watching a road sign telling me the Saudi border is only a two-hour drive away.
Bosnia and Serbia are back in the news.
Defence Secretary Hegseth at the Munich Security Conference gave us four ‘noes’: No to Ukraine in NATO; No to a return to pre-2014 borders; No to ‘Article 5’ peacekeeper backstops, and ‘No’ to U.S. troops in Ukraine. And in a final flourish, he added that U.S. troops in Europe are not ‘forever’ – and even placed a question mark over the continuity of NATO.
From Renaissance Florence, one of the – few – peaks of humanity, now living in memory, tread carefully across this flame-filled 2025.
The election has occurred; Trump will take office in January; many of the existing Party Nomenklatura will be replaced; different policies will be announced – but actually taking power (rather than just sitting in the White House) will be more complex. The U.S. has devolved into many disparate fiefdoms – almost princedoms – from the CIA to the Justice Department. And regulatory ‘agencies’ too, have been implanted to preserve Nomenklatura hold on the System’s lifeblood.
Israel is entering the next phase of its war on Palestine by completing its takeover of the Gaza Strip – from the northern border to the Netzarim corridor. It is likely that they intend for this area to then gradually be made available for Jewish settlement and annexation to Israel.
We can be sure: one day not too far in the future, psychologists and psychiatrists will recognize a social pathology that has afflicted the governments of western countries in the period 2022 – year 20xx, a disease whose symptoms are madness, senseless actions, masochism and a euphoric exaltation of self-harm. This disease will be remembered as the ‘sanctions disease’, a fad that has normalized an unprecedentedly unhealthy lifestyle and policy.
In the West, there are both excellent right-wing and very respectable left-wing figures. For instance, the AfD (Alternative for Germany) is a remarkable right-wing movement, and Sahra Wagenknecht is an outstanding leftist. In the United States, there are right-wing figures like Trump and Vance, but also leftists like Tulsi Gabbard and Kennedy. This pattern exists everywhere.
©2024
