Ilan Pappe on Israel: "We are witnessing the beginning of the end"

Xeenophile · 2023-12-08T07:28:51+00:00

SO. What began (at least outwardly) as a nationalist project - i.e. based on the notion that a society can only be cohesive if everyone in it shares certain common (mostly) superficial traits - specifically by a "nation" that had just endured an event so terrible that many were driven to the conclusion that they could only function among themselves, is now dying of lack of social cohesion. How ironic.

Xeenophile · 2023-11-24T16:32:12+00:00

No, this just means they're not liberal.

There's no reason on god's green Earth to even accord them that label; Team-Achenar stopped liking that label themselves decades ago, in a sort of awkward tacit accord with Rush Limbaugh.

Xeenophile · 2023-10-04T06:07:53+00:00

It could be an innocent coincidence; police chiefs make the personal life-choice to move from landlocked desert-states to tropical islands all the time...it is also entirely possible that if I bet every penny to my name on a single roulette-spin, I'll win, so it's totally a reasonable course of action to consider.

Xeenophile · 2023-09-29T00:07:43+00:00

OOOOOOOOHHHH, Nature magazine used the J-word...!

Xeenophile · 2023-09-29T00:04:31+00:00

Reported for robosexuophobia; c'mon, let people love whomwhat they love, it's not 3003 anymore!

Xeenophile · 2023-09-28T23:48:54+00:00

They really have it out for Russel; this is nuts.

Why him? Why now?

Xeenophile · 2023-09-28T21:04:57+00:00

When other men went limp, Bob Dole had what it took to stand tall!

Xeenophile · 2023-09-28T07:10:49+00:00

Who the Ungefährlich-Dinge is still listening to Nate Silver?!?

Xeenophile · 2023-09-28T07:05:40+00:00

When VeryChillGuy@1VeryChillDude is accusing almost the entire federal government of treason, why, you know it's serious.

Xeenophile · 2023-09-28T07:02:49+00:00

This is getting weird - by which I mean, in its own right, even in a vacuum of everything else.

Xeenophile · 2023-09-26T16:52:07+00:00

This asshole's organization has been lying, stealing and killing for its entire existence. The CIA is nothing in comparison.

This is...true. * Shudder *

As long as we're talking about comeuppances and reckonings, even ALL OF THIS may only be the beginning.

Speaking of "the tea-leaves", I've wondered for a while now whether the "Know-Nothing" Party is due for a comeback in one form or another.

Xeenophile · 2023-09-26T11:02:00+00:00

...Then the Body-Snatchers came, hollowed them out, and replaced them with Zelenskyy and Obama.

The resemblance is kind of alarming (X's chinbutt notwithstanding).

Xeenophile · 2023-09-23T01:15:43+00:00

r/ChoosingBeggars

Xeenophile · 2023-09-15T20:52:15+00:00

Given how often they do use that kind of trick in domestic policy to make insults and scams look like miracles, the fact they're not doing that tells us...well, something. I'm not sure what.

Xeenophile · 2023-09-15T20:48:52+00:00

Somebody needs to just start following him around playing 'Yackety Sax' already.

Xeenophile · 2023-09-15T20:47:36+00:00

I was going to say, "biggest grift in history"???

I'm picturing a line of fish being eaten by progressively larger ones - nearer the end would include (among others) Big Oil, Big Pharma, Big Finance, the arms industry, and the Catholic Church....

Xeenophile · 2023-09-15T20:34:39+00:00

Why the committment to nonviolence? Think of the violence they've done to all of us; it's only the enormous scale of the thing that separates it from a situation that would, if condensed into a handful of individuals, be blazingly obvious grounds for justifiable homicide.

They believe they are superior to us, that they are entitled to preferential treatment and totally different standards; I understand logistical problems, but by insisting on nonviolence right out the gate, don't we just ratify that conceit?

Xeenophile · 2023-09-15T20:27:53+00:00

The great strength of the totalitarian state is that it forces those who fear it to imitate it.

Adolf Hitler

Xeenophile · 2023-09-15T20:07:05+00:00

This socialist model of corporate ownership is proving far more competitive, dynamic and innovative than the American plutocratic model, where blackrock and parasitical finance St. Capital controls everything about a company.

Some more about this would be good; if true, it's the first good news I've heard in some time, since I've been sweating most lately over the question of 'how do we save the world from global feudalism?!'

Xeenophile · 2023-09-15T19:48:27+00:00

Nice of him to hit the nail on the head, even from the wrong side, I suppose.

He's not wrong it's a 'place' issue; we live in a society, societies have values (to wish otherwise isn't wrong, it's just impossible, like asking for water without oxygen), and values inevitably means status disparity among individuals who fare better or worse at fulfilling those values.

I've been saying for years that the problem is, 'businessmen have forgotten their place'. They're not geniuses, they're not superior beings, they're bean-counters; macro-mediocrities.

It should go without saying, and it's flabbergasting that it doesn't, that the measure of a man cannot possibly be taken in dollars and cents.

You'd think it would be possible by now to develop software that obsoletizes anybody that stakes its worth on an MBA.

Xeenophile · 2023-09-06T17:32:06+00:00

"Complications with a new IT system" - I gotta ask: Did they even need it?

Are they certain there was something so wrong with their old one that risking something like this was a less-bad option than keeping things as they were???

I mean, certainly, it could go either way, but from what I've seen of "new IT systems", I see no reason to assume they're preferable to old ones anymore, au contraire.

Xeenophile · 2023-09-06T02:10:10+00:00

I...have never seen that before. I have to wonder if it's a fresh new psyop to break people apart - if it's not, it sure is ready-made to become one.

Xeenophile · 2023-09-02T04:55:18+00:00

Darnit, NOW how are we gonna televise The Revolution???

Xeenophile · 2023-09-02T02:57:00+00:00

...Thank Goodness???

Xeenophile · 2023-09-01T11:22:50+00:00

I almost hope that happens; the effects of TDS have been far-reaching and absolutely nightmarish, and those who wouldn't finally drop that in this scenario, would find themselves forcibly liberated from the Church Of Current Thing, at which point hopefully they'd finally get what we've been trying to tell them all along.

Xeenophile · 2023-09-01T11:14:42+00:00

On the bright side (but for all the wrong reasons, of course), MAYBE this'll mean we'll FINALLY see some backpedaling on all the '000s-era Francophobic propaganda?

There were some Polandball comics about that episode that were actually pretty awesome; France was a hero among nations back then.

Xeenophile · 2023-09-01T11:09:40+00:00

Don'tcha love it, though?!

Xeenophile · 2023-09-01T11:06:52+00:00

"You can fool some of the people all of the time, and all of the people some of the time, but you can not fool all of the people all of the time."

― Abraham Lincoln

Xeenophile · 2023-09-01T11:05:17+00:00

Speak of the devil, I just got this from Reporters Without Borders:

Dear Friends,

The situation of the media is very worrying in Niger, one month after the military coup there. Mobilised by Reporters Without Borders (RSF), African media professionals have issued a joint appeal to Niger’s military junta, the National Council for the Safeguard of the Homeland (CNSP), to respect press freedom.

Since 26 July, the date of the coup, local and international journalists have been physically attacked and harassed online and media have been suspended. Media freedom and pluralism are being directly targeted. The right to inform and be informed must not be called into question in Niger at a time of political turmoil.

Journalists and press freedom organisations across Africa, from Niamey to Djibouti and from N’Djamena to Antananarivo, came together to call on Niger’s junta to respect the fundamental right to reliable and pluralistic media reporting, and to not obstruct journalists’ work.

We need your support in order to be able to continue our fight, alongside independent journalists on the ground, to preserve the freedom to report the news in this crisis-torn region.

Thoughts?

Xeenophile · 2023-08-29T19:16:09+00:00

Must've been Parker Brothers; they were overdue for a new gimmick-theme-Clue set.

Xeenophile · 2023-08-26T05:00:42+00:00

The obligatory Chocolate Rain

Xeenophile · 2023-08-25T19:42:21+00:00

Give me the skinny: What is it trying to imply about Prigozhin here?

Xeenophile · 2023-08-25T17:41:15+00:00

Oooh, I hope it's Albert Speer (such a dreamboat)...!

Xeenophile · 2023-08-24T16:34:23+00:00

Oh noes, he had to end his vacation to go to Hawai'i!!!

Xeenophile · 2023-08-24T00:02:25+00:00

Hence this man remains my hero.

Xeenophile · 2023-08-23T23:59:25+00:00

They're Azov moles deliberately trying to promote a new wave of global Judenhass.

That must be it.

Xeenophile · 2023-08-23T23:51:35+00:00

On the bright side, an event like this is what led to "American Pie", so the Russian Century's already on-track to have its own tearfully-nostalgic generation-defining ballad!

Xeenophile · 2023-08-23T23:49:12+00:00

I guess if you were really drunk, "Prigozhin" might come out sounding like "Paul Wellstone"....

Xeenophile · 2023-08-23T23:47:43+00:00

...Or tax-purposes, always a pan-galactic favorite.

Xeenophile · 2023-08-23T23:40:42+00:00

Well, that's what "capitalism" always was, now wasn't it? I've grown convinced that Marx and Engels actually really screwed things up for the Enlightenment; all they really did was try to make a "science" out of a field that has no business being one, and impose a confusing and divisive new lexicon over ideas that the likes of Thomas Paine, Voltaire, and James Madison had already done an ingenious job with.

It's feudalism versus democracy. Always was. Same struggle since 1776.

Xeenophile · 2023-08-23T23:29:12+00:00

...an American non-sexual lump screams Russians are inhuman.

No, worse: Not people.

It is long-past time we decoupled "person" from "human" - and this recent sub-cult of "human being this, human being that" is downright devolutionary.

Of course I recognize the dangers of this, hence it needs to be a slow, pragmatic process rather than a radical one (which would require knowing precisely the correct end-point, which itself is the notorious fatal conceit of many a radical movement), but I've always believed "the human condition" is a thing in need of a cure anyways, not some endless ~~PostModernist~~NeoMedievalist bukakke-circle.

Xeenophile · 2023-08-23T16:53:28+00:00

I'm strongly inclined to agree with top-comment:

I don't want to throw cold water on a good news story, but there too few verifiable details in this article to make it credible. There is no reason to withhold most of the facts in the case, and I can find no news or government sources that confirm the events that are asserted. If there were police involved there would be a report. If it "happens all the time" there would be numerous reports. I'm not suggesting that child trafficking doesn't happen frequently, but this smells like a QAnon scam. You owe it to your readers to check sources and confirm your information.

"Saving Kids From Pedophiles^TM" does seem to have evolved into the Sirrus-base's complement to Achenar's "Allyship^TM" - and some of the imagery in that story is just too reminiscent of any number of '80s movies. We've got the old Manichean terror-zeitgeist fighting the new one, and like all true fundies, they cannot recognize themselves in each other.

Those of us who've been burned by Team-Achenar have really had to reassess our relationship with Team-Sirrus's base, and it's easy in such a state to fall too far to the other side. We MUST retain our critical standards against all comers - after all, was not the reason we "walked away" because we'd long had good and well-articulated reason to hate Sirrus, and were floored when Achenar started manifesting those same qualities (including the most telling of all: responding to criticism with ad-hominem STFUisms)?

Sometimes I agree with Jordan Peterson, sometimes I don't, but in addition to his 12 Rules being generally good, "Remember Why You Started" is especially priceless.

Xeenophile · 2023-08-23T16:31:37+00:00

But what if it's a gender non-conforming truck driver?

Xeenophile · 2023-08-23T00:01:34+00:00

Some way to coordinate mass-noncompliance sounds really good (and should've been worked on in the interim anyways).

Let's quit playing defense, and aim higher and harder:

Now at long last is the time to reclaim our dignity at the airports! THE SHOES STAY ON!

Xeenophile · 2023-08-18T23:29:30+00:00

Daleks.

We are ruled by Daleks, but without the proficiency in mathematics.

Xeenophile · 2023-08-17T23:54:24+00:00

Reminds me of the "Advertising Lullaby":

Xeenophile · 2023-08-15T20:40:07+00:00

Any links to the non-YouTube story they're citing - i.e. same important information without the video-banter that some find annoying and unhelpful?

Xeenophile · 2023-08-15T20:34:37+00:00

That's why it's worth asking if it's been compromised, isn't it?

Xeenophile · 2023-08-03T01:32:03+00:00

3:59 - 4:16: I find this very hard to believe.

In fact, as someone who lives much nearer this border than most and hasn't heard dick about any of this, I have to be very skeptical in general of any "crisis at the border" talk.

Admittedly, it's a long border and a huge planet full of countless different worlds, all of them real; maybe it's all true.

I'll say this much: I know I've heard a lot to like about President Obrador, and this is all supposedly happening on his turf. What's HE got to say about all this?

By this point, why even try to get into America - "a burning house", like King warned Belafonte - when you could settle down in Mexico?

Finally: A wall? Really? Dare I ask what his plans are for the border with Canada?

Xeenophile · 2023-08-02T21:46:00+00:00

Half an hour?

I don't suppose anyone else would be willing to share a "Cliff's Notes" version?

Xeenophile · 2023-07-28T22:35:45+00:00

It has caused permanent changes in my body, my voice will forever be deeper, my jawline sharper, my nose longer...

Lady Elaine Fairchilde: Transsexual Icon.

Xeenophile · 2023-07-28T00:05:09+00:00

More like:

Xeenophile · 2023-07-28T00:02:08+00:00

....The Aristocrats.

Xeenophile · 2023-07-27T21:18:50+00:00

We might've started a long, monstrous war for less than absolutely nothing!!! Oh wait....

Xeenophile · 2023-07-27T12:14:08+00:00

Evidently, "Noreika" is a Lithuanian surname. How does one go about persecuting Lithuanians? That would be new.

Xeenophile · 2023-07-27T08:52:45+00:00

Where to begin??? Weird Al Yankovic's too easy (as is anything else that would ever have been featured on The Dr. Demento Show), but seeing as this thread is already working its way toward a comprehensive Marx-Brothers discography, let's go wth the obvious: https://youtu.be/n4zRe_wvJw8

I'd be remiss not to contribute to the Python compendium, too: https://youtu.be/bABELUm8BR0

The "années folles" of the '90s were a little different: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DjoNucs20Vw

Even the '000s (pronounced "OOZE!") had its moments: https://youtu.be/lrzKT-dFUjE

A good drama can use comic relief...: https://youtu.be/9BnxwP8vLRg

...or is it cosmic relief?: https://youtu.be/MjsIp-gbKXg

What can I possibly say about this one? BRING IT ON HOME: https://youtu.be/qLrnkK2YEcE

Xeenophile · 2023-07-26T15:35:05+00:00

What makes a zone turn Neutral? Lust for gold? Power...?

Xeenophile · 2023-07-21T18:22:10+00:00

A few extra pairs of shoes is what he should've brought. https://youtu.be/_4rYWc4o-eY

Xeenophile · 2023-07-21T17:55:44+00:00

My thoughts exactly; I actually feel incredibly sorry for him.

He tried to do the right thing, starting out...but the first thing that happened when he entered office is the Ukonazis had A Little Chat with him, and now he's in a totally hopeless situation.

He's Hamlet, Shylock, and MacBeth all rolled into one.

Xeenophile · 2023-07-21T17:51:38+00:00

Looks good to me!

Grover Cleveland

Xeenophile · 2023-07-21T17:49:48+00:00

The Vice-President Palin we never had.

Xeenophile · 2023-07-14T18:56:06+00:00

The KING! The King! The King...!

Xeenophile · 2023-07-13T00:52:06+00:00

Poor Harrison Ford; poor Spielberg, for that matter (I'd even say 'poor Lucas', but he really should've known better than to sell it all to RatCorp).

What a Hindenbergian way to end a legend.

On the upside (or a reasonable facsimile thereof), there was a period there where I was not sure the "Get Woke, Go Broke" prophecy would actually pan out as much more than embittered wishful thinking; sure looks like it's happening now, though!

Xeenophile · 2023-07-13T00:29:16+00:00

It is TOTALLY racist; it always was. They're everything they claim to oppose. That was pretty clear almost from Day 1.

Xeenophile · 2023-07-13T00:26:38+00:00

Watch it! Saying bad things about Mussolini is trains-phobic!

Xeenophile · 2023-07-13T00:22:50+00:00

In fairness, a connection between renewed societal interest in fitness/self-defense and fascism is not a new idea by any means. There is biological logic to it (FEAR!), and you could see it in the uptick in same in the '80s and '90s. More recently, I had noticed (from a distance) that "fitness culture" seems to have polarized into 'trad-fascist' in the form of CrossFit, and 'alt-fascist' apparently embodied by Planet Fitness.

Is that why I don't exercise more? Because I'm a self-hating Jew???

I don't know, maybe I'm just taking into account the bigger picture: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K-cIxPHmCBg

Xeenophile · 2023-07-12T23:52:09+00:00

Well, we lost Ustinov a long time ago, I wonder if Shatner would be up to endorse "Billy Bud"?

Xeenophile · 2023-07-12T23:44:26+00:00

They're going to have to compete the Chinese American Citizens Alliance (which is real, and otherwise a good organization): http://www.cacanational.org/

Xeenophile · 2023-07-12T23:39:04+00:00

Poor bastard.

Xeenophile · 2023-07-12T23:34:35+00:00

Notice how tiny, poor countries are somehow LEADING THE WAY with this - could there be a deader give-away about both the quality of and intent behind this product?

Xeenophile · 2023-07-12T23:13:33+00:00

"You Were Never Anything But a Useful Idiot, Charlie Brown"

Xeenophile · 2023-07-12T23:08:24+00:00

"The Tell-Tale Country"

Xeenophile · 2023-07-12T23:07:06+00:00

In this case, I'm really not sure...maybe "Freudian slip" has just become a new excuse for daring to tell the truth!

Xeenophile · 2023-07-12T22:53:58+00:00

Interesting tactic, actually: Try to reason with President Nudnik by sounding like his mother.

Xeenophile · 2023-07-12T02:25:21+00:00

I literally LOL'd from that snippet alone. DAVE BARRY FTW.

Xeenophile · 2023-07-12T02:23:48+00:00

How about an ad that offers me a rational, factual reason that their product is worth buying?

Xeenophile · 2023-07-12T02:19:45+00:00

He took the words right out of my mouth.

Xeenophile · 2023-07-11T12:00:54+00:00

~~Stockholm~~D.C. Syndrome

Xeenophile · 2023-07-08T02:51:43+00:00

Really? It falls to -me- to post the obvious correct reply? (yes, you gotta go to YouTube to watch it - still worth it):

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yWhpk-8QLFQ&embeds_referring_euri=https%3A%2F%2Fduckduckgo.com%2F

Xeenophile · 2023-07-07T23:55:03+00:00

"Hello, Dana Carvey? Yeah, we've actually got some work for you, and you're not gonna believe whom they want to cast you as....!"

Xeenophile · 2023-07-07T23:52:20+00:00

I agree that's become an incredible new-favorite crutch, but only a Sith deals in absolutes.

Xeenophile · 2023-07-04T23:49:49+00:00

IT CAN'T HAPPEN HERE (unless the almighty-limitlessly-devious-evil-god-king-worthless-secretly-insolvent-small-handed-buffoon-who-destroys-everything-he-touches somehow does it)!

Xeenophile · 2023-07-04T23:47:06+00:00

So where can I get a "Coalition of the Distrustful" T-shirt?

Xeenophile · 2023-07-04T23:41:00+00:00

Halfway down:

"Formerly".

You idiot POS.

Xeenophile · 2023-06-30T00:52:34+00:00

My thought after actually reading the piece:

Morgoth is a cancer on the world, but especially America; curing cancer is possible, but GOOD LORD, the process sucks.

Xeenophile · 2023-06-30T00:46:55+00:00

What else do you expect when any time the Sec. of State goes anywhere, people say, "Look! America's Blinken!"

Xeenophile · 2023-06-24T00:55:24+00:00

What never made sense, though, is how can THAT be true at the same time as they've been weaving and enacting a scheme to rewind not just the hard-earned miracles and revelations of the last 100 years, but the past ~400, that's literally taken generations to come to fruition? I could be overlooking something, but this much doesn't add up.

Xeenophile · 2023-06-24T00:51:21+00:00

Which speech is being referred to here, and where can I see JUST the speech sans commentary. I'm not up for a 2-hour video.

Xeenophile · 2023-06-23T04:44:09+00:00

So...what IS this?

That seems like a weirdly militaristic set of credos on the back wall for a wildlife-rescue outfit....

Xeenophile · 2023-06-23T00:39:46+00:00

I think you're being oversimplistic in your use of that term.

I'm all in favor of it, always have been - but the problem now is that it's the latest thing to be co-opted by humans with a terminal case of Not Getting It, to the point of stealing it right out from underneath those few who do (kind of an eerie reflection of how Ray Crock wound up crushing the original McDonald brothers to the point they could no longer even use their own name for their burger-shacks).

That's another big problem with all this; this stuff is really for outlier-individuals, and consumerism is now trying to assimilate it into something mass-marketable, and can be done on a low-effort assembly-line basis, like McDonald's, Pokemon, those dreadful iPhone games, etc.

Transhumanist values and consumerist values, simply put, are anathema - and there's also the looming issue of unknown-unknowns regarding the differences between us (e.g. some of us are very Cartesian, others very holistic; what if those different self-images actually reflect some real and deeper difference that nobody yet understands?).

Whatever happened to "different strokes for different folks"? They're an impediment to optimum profit, that's what - hence corporatist "inclusion" is imperialism, and "diversity" becomes conformity. Corporatists have learned nothing from the hard-learned lessons of the 20th Century, because those lessons spell out their death-warrant.

Xeenophile · 2023-06-23T00:27:37+00:00

First sentence of last line: "It's just a science thing, just like with global warming."

Wait, what is he trying to say here?

Tying this together with global warming strikes me as the dumbest move he could possibly make (and a very bad way to end an otherwise impressive read).

Xeenophile · 2023-06-23T00:17:18+00:00

"S.T.E.V.E" - well there's a new one for me.

Xeenophile · 2023-06-23T00:12:32+00:00

They seem to have used a Ship-of-Theseus process to induce (as I've called it before) the political/cognitive equivalent of prolapse.

Suddenly, "AXALT" is somehow NOT the quintessence of bigotry - in fact, you're a bigot if you DON'T think that way!

If only people knew what I learned as a basic principle of psychology and scientific reasoning in my first year of college (if not before!) - that THE DIFFERENCES WITHIN GROUPS OUTWEIGH THE DIFFERENCES BETWEEN GROUPS - this shit could never have gotten off the ground.

Xeenophile · 2023-06-23T00:05:24+00:00

What on god's green acres is this about...?

Xeenophile · 2023-06-16T00:02:17+00:00

One could point the finger at Jon Stewart as the herald and midwife of this transition - but of course he would never have needed to hit the map in the first place if "serious" media weren't ALREADY shot to hell.

Xeenophile · 2023-06-15T23:59:14+00:00

You did good, John.

Xeenophile