It is an American trait to root for the underdog in any contest that pits David vs. Goliath. Therefore, it is understandable that most Americans (except for extreme MAGA types) are thrilled that Ukrainian forces have pushed the brutal, but hapless, Russian military away from Ukraine’s two largest cities and are gamely taking the fight to a force multiple times as big and strong (on paper).
As should be clear by now, Francis Fukuyama’s declaration in The End of History: The Last Man (1992) that we had arrived at “the end of history” did not mean that classical liberalism, or laissez-faire economics, had emerged victorious over communism and fascism, or that the final ideological hegemony signaled the end of socialism. In fact, for Fukuyama, the terminus of history was always democratic socialism or social democracy. As Hans-Hermann Hoppe noted in Democracy: The God That Failed, “the Last Man” standing was not a capitalist homo economicus but rather a “homo socio-democraticus” (222). The end of history, with all its Hegelian pretenses, did not entail the defeat of socialism-communism but rather of classical liberalism. Evidently, the big state and big capital were supposed to have reached an inevitable and final détente. The Great Reset is the consummation of this final détente.
What Russia’s War Means for Armenia and Azerbaijan
As the ripples of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine pulse outward, they have left one region especially volatile: the South Caucasus. The Ukrainian conflict has paradoxically raised the likelihood of both further fighting and a negotiated peace in this area between the Caspian and Black Seas. The region was the site of a brutal war in 2020 between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh—an Armenian-populated enclave within Azerbaijan—and adjacent regions. The 44-day war left around 7,000 people dead and saw Azerbaijan inflict a crushing defeat on Armenia, reversing territorial losses it had suffered in fighting during the 1990s. The war also left unresolved questions, lingering disputes, and simmering tensions. In March, just as Ukraine used Turkish-made Bayraktar drones to repulse Russian forces, Azerbaijan used the same type of drones to strike Armenian troops in Karabakh.
Knocking ‘Em Out of the Sky Since ’78
I don’t usually like to start my pieces with a video, but I’ll make an exception in this case. The video below is too awesome not to include right away. It shows a Stinger missile doing what Stingers do best; blowing stuff out of the sky. In this instance, a Russian helicopter (which looks to me like a Mi-28 Havoc) was downed over the Ukrainian countryside last March. It had what you call a “good effect on target.”
It was understandable why, on 29 November, 1947, the United Nations (UN) passed Resolution 181, partitioning Palestine and creating a Jewish state. In the wake of the Holocaust, there was a widespread sentiment that there should be some form of recompense to the Jews, even if it came at the expense of those who had nothing to do with the Holocaust.
US President Joe Biden and Speaker of House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi say the Ukraine war will continue “until victory is achieved”, but neither of them has said what might constitute victory.
Which brings us to what the Florentine clerk advised 500 years ago: “Never wound a deadly foe and let him live. Either kill him or turn him into a friend.”
There is a replacement of civilization and the media is not even covering it.
“By 2050, 50 percent of the French population will be mixed.” — Jean-Luc Mélenchon, Radio Classique, May 17, 2021.
“The mayor of Grenoble adopts the arguments and rhetorical formulas of the Muslim Brotherhood: talking about freedom to impose sexism”. — Céline Pina, Le Figaro, May 4, 2022.
Measles is so contagious that a single case in close living conditions like refugee camps can activate an outbreak response. That’s expected to happen more often than usual this year.
The World Health Organization (WHO) found that there were 23 million more babies under one year old who missed their routine vaccinations in 2020 than in 2019—including the first of two measles vaccine doses that are recommended for children by the WHO. That number hasn’t been this high since 2009 and is thought to have contributed to the current massive spike in cases worldwide.
Former US Secretary of State Henry Kissinger said that Ukraine should give up territory to seal an end to the Russo-Ukrainian war in an address to Western leaders. Ukrainian leader then gave a “polite” response to the former secretary, declining his suggestion.
Since early May, Iran has been rocked by protests over a precipitous rise in food prices, triggered by the government’s decision to cut existing subsidies on food products. Since then, prices have gone up dramatically, with staples such as imported wheat increasing by up to 300 percent and cooking oil by close to 400 percent.