We are experiencing a very hot and dry summer. Some people quite like it and for our governments there is nothing wrong yet. But actually, we should sound a big alarm. According to experts, if we do not change course soon, we risk ending up in the ‘climate end game’. In the meantime, the orchestra on the Titanic is continuing to play.
The ubiquitous deployment of behavioural-science techniques – ‘nudges’ – to increase compliance with both covid-19 restrictions and the vaccine rollout has raised major ethical concerns. Particularly alarming has been the state’s strategic use of fear (or ‘affect’ in the language of behavioural science), shaming (‘ego’) and peer pressure (‘norms’). The tentacles of behavioural science have extended beyond the arena of pandemic management and into many other areas of day-to-day life, including debt collection and the green agenda. Given their widespread prevalence and the profound ethical questions associated with them, it is imperative that the Government’s deployment of these powerful techniques adheres to a robust and transparent ethical framework. Alarmingly, politicians and state-sponsored behavioural scientists have – to date – displayed a stubborn reluctance to discuss these issues.
Chairperson of the eKhenana commune of Abahlali baseMjondolo (AbM), who was out of prison on bail, was gunned down at his home two days before he was to appear in court. This is the third murder of AbM leaders in eKhenana commune in Cato Crest this year.
Lindokuhle Mnguni, chairperson of eKhenana commune of Abahlali baseMjondolo. Photo: Siya MbheleBy Eva Bartlett
[Source: Photo Courtesy of Eva Bartlett]Ukraine continues to fire internationally-banned anti-personnel mines on civilian areas of Donetsk and other cities in the Donetsk People’s Republic (DPR), in violation of international law and of the mine ban convention Ukraine signed in 1999 and ratified in 2005.
Staffed by NATO military officers and former government ministers and notorious for training the West’s top spies, the Department of War Studies at King’s College London is also providing the workforce for many of the largest social media companies. This includes Facebook, TikTok, Google, and Twitter.A MintPress study of professional databases and employment websites reveals a wide network of War Studies alumni holding many of the most influential jobs in media, constituting a silent army of individuals who influence what the world sees (and does not see) in its social media feeds.
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Alan Macleod’s latest investigation with MintPress delves into the relationship between Western intelligence agencies, the corporate social media giants, and the Department of War Studies at the King’s College of London
By Drago Bosnic
Close strategic partnership between Russia and China has been the mainstay of their relationship for decades. The US has been trying to disrupt this successful partnership ever since, especially as Russia started regaining its strength, but the incessant belligerent actions of the imperialist thalassocracy have pushed the two (Eur)Asian superpowers even closer. This cooperation is manifold, but its space component is particularly concerning for the US, as it has serious security implications. The Pentagon is worried that the US “might not be able to match the united financing and know-how” of Moscow and Beijing.
The Pentagon’s latest weapons package to Kiev may indicate a looming counteroffensive, the Washington Post suggests
The US may be helping Ukraine prepare for an impending counteroffensive against Russia, The Washington Post claimed, pointing to the type of weaponry making up the latest batch of military aid pledged to Kiev by the Pentagon.
Chairman of Turkey’s left-wing and nationalist Patriotic Party, Dogu Perincek is reportedly leading a delegation to Damascus (File photo)Yesterday, Russian President Vladimir Putin spoke with Uzbekistan President Shavkat Mirziyoyev regarding the forthcoming Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) summit in Samarkand on September 15-16. This must be the fourth or fifth time the two leaders confabulated over the upcoming event. One lost count!
Imran Khan, a former cricket star who went into politics and became Prime Minister of Pakistan, had been ousted by bribing and threatening politicians of his coalition to turn against him. Khan had developed good relations with China and Russia and was against allowing the U.S. military to use Pakistan as a base for attacks in Afghanistan.
There may be some duplication due to cross-posting and may be updated throughout the day, so please check back. If it gets updated, I usually insert the time on the line above. A lot of cross-posting usually indicates that the article is popular and some links may not work, depending on your location but I’ve kept them anyway, so at least the reader has some idea of the scale of censorship now operating in the ‘democratic’ West.
US Interests and Israeli Crimes
https://dissidentvoice.org/2022/08/us-interests-and-israeli-crimes/
How The “Four Island Chain” Members Became U.S. Client States
https://dissidentvoice.org/2022/08/how-the-four-island-chain-members-became-u-s-client-states/
Biden, Pelosi: Postmortem on Taiwan Trip
https://dissidentvoice.org/2022/08/biden-pelosi-postmortem-on-taiwan-trip/
On May 31, BBC Radio initiated an embarrassing imbroglio when it broadcast a factually challenged, overtly propagandistic documentary special called Ukraine: The Disinformation War.
There may be some duplication due to cross-posting and may be updated throughout the day, so please check back. If it gets updated, I usually insert the time on the line above. A lot of cross-posting usually indicates that the article is popular and some links may not work, depending on your location but I’ve kept them anyway, so at least the reader has some idea of the scale of censorship now operating in the ‘democratic’ West.
Brits will be paid to go without power-hungry appliances – media
https://www.rt.com/news/561341-uk-energy-saving-payments/
Establishment Republicans love to blame Donald Trump for their losses, but they are their own problem
https://www.rt.com/news/561159-liz-cheney-trump-republican/
Hard-partying Finnish PM’s drug test results revealed
https://www.rt.com/news/561339-marin-drug-test-results-finland/
By John Parker
[Source: forbes.com]Tory leadership candidate Rishi Sunak has launched a furious, misguided, attack on Good Law Project and its founder Jolyon Maugham QC for “wasting time and money” in the Courts. And he has threatened judges he calls “recidivist” – a word meaning the tendency of convicted criminals to continue to offend – with legislation to force them to act in accordance with his wishes.
The fact that NATO is stepping up its combat support for the Ukrainian military in Britain and on other member states’ territories is clear proof that the U.S.-led axis is at war with Russia. This is no longer a proxy war, but rather a full-scale multi-level war.
Declan Hayes
Before looking at Ukraine’s government warrants, which gives the game away to anyone with even a rudimentary financial or mathematical background, let’s just quickly survey Kiev’s empty coffers.
Because the changes needed to achieve sustainable well-being for everyone are so big, they require determined social movements with wide participation. But while history shows that inertia and defeatism can become self-fulfilling, it also shows that governments ultimately have to respond to popular pressure – or be replaced by it.
An UAV hit the roof of the headquarters of Russia’s Black Sea Fleet, Sevastopol, Crimea, August 20, 2022In military terms, the crude, locally assembled drone dropping a country-made bomb or two on unguarded sites in Crimea are at best pin pricks in the big picture of Russia’s special military operation in Ukraine. But it can be profoundly consequential in certain other ways.
By Glenn Diesen, Professor at the University of South-Eastern Norway and an editor at the Russia in Global Affairs journal.
The author and holocaust survivor, Victor Klemperer, identified two distinct styles of language that defined Hitler’s propaganda against the Jews: either “scornful derision” of the inferior race or “panic-stricken fear” of their threat to civilisation.
Anti-Russian propaganda over the past centuries has similarly produced two contradictory positions – disdain for Russians as an uncivilised and backward people, and simultaneously an immeasurable threat looming over Europe. A state of affairs described by one writer as “Russophrenia: the idea that Russia is simultaneously about to fall apart, and also take over the world.”
