It is what Wittgenstein referred to as a private language.
The really wild thing is going to be a bunch of “Why are the Radical Socialist Dems trying to cancel nuclear bombs?” takes on Fox. Are nuclear bombs really that bad? Or is this attack on nuclear weapons part of a Globalist plot to destroy your way of life? Makes you think!
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Both extreme ends feed on being contrarian, no matter the issue. They have to be opposite the “mainstream.”
They would rather be wrong than agree with CNN, NYT or serious outlets.
Far left is against consensus that’s for sure given we live in a capitalist society by and large but they aren’t some contrarian trigger da libs trolls. At least speaking for the ones I know.
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I think for normal people this is true, not sure it is of the type who makes a living off of political content on patreon, substack etc. That’s who I’m referring to.
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I think trolly pointed it out well when they said it was ‘normcore’ position that Russia bad, Ukraine good. That’s a big part of it. You don’t read the Jacobin or follow MTG without some major contrarian tendencies.
There’s also something to the idea that MTG/Trump hates Biden and is getting Russian money. Also the tankies at Jacobin are reflexively anti-anything west too. There’s a couple ways to get to that position.
That seems super far away, and do they expect to get free access to the Black Sea?
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Maybe they’re landing at Omaha beach.
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They think that Biden, and Democrats in general, are the worst and can’t be allowed to be the good guys in any dispute. These are the people who would rather vote third party or sit out an election rather than help any Democrat win against even the worst Republican.
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Teddy KGB “You can’t believe what fell.”
A great read.
I can’t even get close to imagining what it’s like to be in Kyiv, or similar, at the moment and these stories of how people just do stuff is inspiring.
The world has got to change.
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well this escalated quickly
https://mobile.twitter.com/michaelshchur/status/1504421083071590402
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because when you’re completely full of shit all the time and pounded the narrative that current leaders (in this case dems and reps) are always bad into your listeners brains, you have to side with everyone who is against them and can’t get off it.
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I think I get the just, but what was with calling grandpa Russia at the end?
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Cliffs: US surveillance drones and aircraft flying at the borders are gathering intelligence but real-time data is not shared. Plus a cite of that yahoo CIA article.
That’s what I’d leak too.
I am wondering if the whole “they’re using public cell phones” will end up being this wars “the English have good vision because of carrots” to cover up the radar
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There may be some things like this, but we can be pretty certain that the Russian forces are, to a certain extent, using unsecured communications, because those communications are on the internet. If the US had cracked comm lines that the Russians thought were secured, there is absolutely zero chance we hear those recordings. Even if the parties on both ends of the communication were killed, there’s still zero chance they’d be made public, because it’s basically certain that someone in Russia’s military command would know that there’s no chance Ivan and Gregor (or whoever) would be talking as they were on unsecured communications if secured communications were available so therefore the secured comm lines have been compromised. The only way we’re getting secured Russian communications on the internet is if plucky internet randos can crack Russian security on their communications, and if that’s the case, they might as well be unsecured.
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Fascinating article from someone who watches every minute of news on Channel 1 - on recent shifts in Putin’s message.
2. Putin’s top advisers have vanished.
Most nights, Putin is shown conferring with his advisers, who appear on a bank of TV monitors in front of him, with no advisers present. But on Tuesday, for instance, not a single member of Russia’s National Security Council was shown on the bank of TV monitors in whatever bunker Putin is holed up in. All of them seem to have either taken impromptu vacations — or simply been banished. The last time there was any fresh footage of Putin’s Cabinet ministers was last Saturday.
This includes Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu, who previously had been prominently featured on state TV. Shoigu, who has always come across as very level-headed, has been absent for days. This may suggest that he is being set up to be a scapegoat, if and when Putin needs one.
6. Putin is shifting the goal posts.
For the last few days there has been a gradual shift of emphasis away from Kyiv and the Ukrainian government — in fact, Kyiv is now rarely mentioned much if at all. During his Wednesday speech, Putin pointedly claimed that Russia never had a plan to capture the Ukrainian capital, Kyiv, even though at the start of the invasion he made clear that he was seeking to control all of the country and Russian artillery has been relentlessly shelling residential areas of the capital for days.
Instead, there has been a renewed emphasis on the necessity of “liberating” the coal mining area broadly known as the Donbas and protecting annexed Crimea and allowing Russian speakers there to freely speak Russian. On Thursday, Putin made an address from an unknown location dwelling at length on Crimea, promising the annexed region social support and road construction. Why the Kremlin chief would suddenly focus on Crimea is strange, since it supposedly is a solidly Russian area whose annexation, at least inside Russia, isn’t in question.
He has several times also mentioned the importance of “neutrality” for Ukraine. Taken together, these shifts may be a signal that Putin is no longer seeking to control all of Ukraine and could accept a settlement of the conflict that instead focuses on the status of Crimea and the separatist regions in eastern Ukraine. The fact that the broadcasts tend to mention ongoing peace discussions between Russian and Ukrainian officials also suggests that Putin hasn’t entirely given up on diplomacy.
Putin watchers seem to think he has very few real advisors. Like 2 or 3. The security council is just for show, and the show is on hiatus. The scary thing is Putin is supposed to be the moderating voice among the actual deciders.