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Nothing ever happens gang

So now that the Assad government is gone do we all become Rojava guys? Is it time to send anarkiddies some flowers to let the tankies into the Abdullah Ocalan stan community?

On a serious note I've been peering though some portuguese language Rojava twitter accounts and they seem very scared of HTS, they're not buying into the reformed jihadist idea at all and seem to be expecting the rebel government to strike the kurds at the behest of turkey, also they've been reporting abuses of minorities in rebel territory.

Long standing ovation and cheer for "Palestine will win!" at the congress of the portuguese communist party this week

Elizabeth Warren introduces Senate bill to hold capitalism ‘accountable’

FINALLY! Why don’t someone do this before?!

Also at least 2 Syrian scientists have been assasinated in the last 48 hours and I can’t tell if it’s Israel or HTS

Me generally

As some people are looking for a bigger picture I want to once again bring the real left wing struggle in Brazil right now. In general I suggest only mild/low expectations for BRICS in SA.

1- First as a reminder the analysis that Trump's election is a serious bad result for South America/Brazil still holds. Not only the USDBRL reached historic high $6,00 mark as a result of Haddad's plan. The market as expected wanted more and did not enjoy the smoke screen.

Yet on rather on another historical front the Mercosur-EU trade deal finaly happened after 25 years of negotiations. Yes almost before og BRICS was even a thing! Hilarious irony. Brazil seems to be hedging its bets, or at least accepting this geopolitical play from the EU side, I'd argue the BRICS Venezuela issue was the first sign of this hedge.

As Nakedcapitalism recently put it EU Nears Finish Line on Trade Deal With South American Bloc in an Effort to Deal Blow to China

On the South American side, there are strong reasons to believe that the deal will lead to the following:

More fires and deforestation in the Amazon. Escalation of invasion of indigenous territories, land-grabbing and violent attacks. A disruption of local food production. Increased use of dangerous pesticides.

Why Does the EU Ruling Class Want the Deal?

While agriculture products are the largest slice of the Mercosur exports to the EU (32.4 percent), mineral products are second at 29.6 percent. The South American countries have plenty of what the EU is looking for, including lithium, graphite, nickel, manganese, and rare earth elements. The EU is currently almost completely reliant on China for minerals needed for EV batteries, solar panels, wind energy, and green hydrogen — all part of the bloc’s flailing green transition.

Even if the EU is able to secure more critical minerals from Mercosur with this trade deal, who will do the processing? There’s still no clear answer. Von der Leyen likes to tout her tools like the bloc’s Net-Zero Industry Act (NZIA), which aims for the EU to process 40 percent of the strategic raw materials it uses by 2030. The NZIA allows projects to bypass many environmental and social impact reviews, but there’s no budget, and the policies do nothing to change Europe’s disadvantages, which include a lack of subsidies compared to the US and China and much higher energy costs thanks to their “de-risking” away from Russian energy.

Yet the “de-risking” — code for the EU’s eager role as a US proxy in the fight against Russia and China — continues.

Thus far, it’s mostly been a disaster on every level — strategically, economically, and environmentally.

My wholesome BRICS leader can't possibly be signing a relic of the 2000's Free Trade Agreement that only causes environmental damage and favors the landowner class that violently opposes him and the left no way!

Though the other BRICS leader can just happily smile away as these dangerous initiatives fail anyway. Is this what a win-win/mutually beneficial deal looks like?

2- I need to remind people Lula's government went from a mostly mixed to good first half to a terrible neoliberal boot on the working class second half.

The Maduro spout was not a coincidence. Lula wants to pander to many sectors including the religious fundamentalist evengelicals that demonize the Cuban/Venezuelan revolutions.

The current Haddad(Finance Minister) despite the smoke screen(some tax exemption for poor) the focus remains, cut one of the biggest Brazilian welfare programs the BPC i.e retirement and social welfare money for people who can't retire due to illness etc.

Right now we have Federal Council of Social Services (CFESS)(1) making a public announcement against it I quote below.

Among the main points, the PL imposes technological barriers to access and permanence of the benefit - such as biometric registration and registration updating, without investment to make it viable. Furthermore, it limits the real increase in the minimum wage and, consequently, the value of the BPC, putting at risk the income of the beneficiary to meet their basic needs. Another point of setback is the reduction of elderly people and people with disabilities to the category of “infra-citizens”, by changing the concept of “family” without legal, social and scientific support.

The bill also backslides in the defense of human rights and reveals its ableist nature by resuming the concept of “person with disabilities” as someone who is “incapable of independent living and working,” violating international treaties and disregarding the Brazilian Inclusion Law (LBI) itself.

The bill also jeopardizes the survival chances of families with multiple members living in poverty, as it revokes the rule that income from a BPC already granted and other social security benefits is not taken into account for the eligibility of another member for the BPC. The bill is racist, ableist, misogynistic, patriarchal, and ageist, and it undermines the Brazilian welfare state and could lead to hunger, putting the lives of the population at risk.

Therefore, we demand the withdrawal of Bill 4614/2024 from the Chamber of Deputies, we say no to fiscal adjustment, and we invite social workers to send emails and messages on the social networks of the deputies, showing that the Social Service repudiates this bill!

Among the left political opposition only mainly PSOL have managed to oppose this monstrous neoliberal attack. In his vote he says

Congressman Chico Alencar (PSOL-RJ) told Brasil de Fato that the PSOL bench will analyze the proposals sent by the government, but added that the party's parliamentarians will reject any type of favoritism towards the financial market, while workers foot the bill.
“Our overall position is against this package. We are not interested in calming the market; what we are interested in is starting to reduce social inequalities in Brazil and calming the tensions arising from these contradictions in society,” he said.

Yet this whole initiative has been the Lula's government own decision, the bill came from the government and not the opposition!

*Earlier this year Brazil already made a historical decision to increase tax on cheap(<USD$50) foreign imports, almost entirely from China e.g clothing, phone casings, every sort of cheap electronic etc. Basically Brazilians buy a lot of much cheaper clothing and stuff from China. Global south deindustrialization goes brrrrr!!!!

The local retail chain capitalists don't like this as they also only import from China and sell for a profit while Brazilians could just buy from Aliexpress for far cheaper. Yes another instance of inter-BRICS fighting where imperialist capitalists won.

3- The best for last, as a final warning don't listen to just Worker Party/PT Lula fans online.

Jones Manoel's Video because fuck twitter Here is Andre Esteves, Chairman of BTG Pactual, the biggest investment bank in Latin America, bragging about how the market managed to privatize several Brazilian utility companies and the left didn't do anything.

In the last three years, we privatized three of the six largest companies under state control. This year, Sabesp is the largest sanitation company in Brazil. Last year, Copel, which is the largest company, was the largest state-controlled energy company. The year before, it was privatized.

Privatizing Eletrobras, something that 10 years ago most of us here would have thought impossible to happen.* And to remember, Eletrobras was privatized 3 months before the election. We had the privilege of coordinating the three privatizations of Copel and Eletrobras. Because it is a huge privilege and a huge responsibility. For us at BTG, now three months before the election, we are privatizing the third largest state-owned company in Brazil.

And there was no text. No one showed up at the BTG headquarters with a cardboard sign saying I am against, right? Most of us here are from a generation that saw the privatizations there in the late 90s, right? That happened in Rio de Janeiro in Praça 15, which turned into a war zone, tear gas, investors, raising of blows, union confusion, you didn't know why it was happening, right? This time we privatized Eletrobras three months before the election and no one showed up with a cardboard sign to say I'm against it, so Brazilian society has changed.

Imagine having a banker tell it to you with a straight face lol.

I said before and I maintain the warning: Lula will not be re-elected unless there is a massive course correction. Be extremely careful with thinking state level business deals between countries, which IMO is realy the maximum extent of Chinese/dengist anti-imperialism so far, actualy reflects in our day to day struggles and the political situation at the ground level.

1:

https://www.cnn.com/2024/12/11/us/unitedhealthcare-ceo-brian-thompson-shooter-wednesday/index.html

Mangione knew UnitedHealthcare was holding an investors’ conference around the time Thompson was shot and killed — and the suspect mentioned in writings he would be going to the conference site, the NYPD’s Kenny told Fox News on Tuesday.

In the notebook passage, Mangione concludes using a bomb against his intended victim “could kill innocents” and shooting would be more targeted, musing what could be better than “to kill the CEO at his own bean counting conference,” a law enforcement official briefed on the matter told CNN.

Uyghur's in Syria found missiles and warn china that they're coming for them.

The sooner we find out what the new regime intends to with these guys the better, they gotta be crazy to let syria be a launching pad for terrorism into china. I don't even know if china would invade to stop it, this whole syria thing has probably further convinced china that foreign intervention is a grift. Probably would just try to get some UN resolutions passed to resolve the issue, it'd be interesting to see if the US would veto it.

Obviously these fellas can't launch these at china from syria but they could smuggle them out.

Does the apartheid regime just get their buffer zones on Google maps now?

One aspect of the Israeli invasion thats under estimated is the geography

Unlike with Hamas or Hezbollah there are no massive underground tunnel system in southern Syria, it's flat volcanic plains peppered with small to medium sized towns, no mountains, no built up urban sprawl from which to launch ambushes

It's a location where the US and Israeli air forces can leverage their full capability, the second a jihadist convoy or captured SAA tank gets within a 100km of an Israeli tank is the second an American bunker buster is dropped on top of them

Saw this on twitter and I think it's an interesting point: "Arab states should carefully consider that the area is now defined by three main power brokers: Israel, Turkey, and what remains of the Iranian power, and none of them are Arab.

Feels like "the arab world" has been mostly successfully israelized, Egypt is totally dormant due to state repression and the most the saudi's have done to assert themselves was normalizing with Iran through China.

Also, good short article on NLR about Syria

Former officers and soldiers of the SAA 25th Special Mission Forces Division (Tiger Forces) have gathered themselves in mountainous areas near the Lebanese border, vowing to keep fighting

They say they have fought against terrorists for years, and will continue to do so, despite the 'betrayal' of the SAA high command. They will start fighting as resistance groups to the incoming HTS / SNA government.

The commander in the video says they are ready to sacrifice themselves, he even says they have suicide bombers among them and that his pistol's last bullet will be for his head (he won't let himself be captured).

They have also replaced their chant. Instead of saying: 'Our souls, our blood, we sacrifice for Bashar', they now say 'our souls, our blood, we sacrifice for Syria'.

I guess if the new goverment becomes hostile to Iran and Russia, these guys will become the rebels that Russia and Iran will suport?

meta comment but I think with such a huge influx of new users from bluesky it might be a good idea to have a pinned comment talking about what the news mega is for a little while

Red media

This morning, the Israeli army reached Qatana, about 20 kilometers from Damascus. Israel is advancing into Syrian territory to fulfill Netanyahu's vision of a “Greater Israel.” Last night, Israel claimed to have conducted its biggest air operation in history against Syria.

: Oi you, tell us the number of nukes you have, yeah.

: No

https://archive.is/20241208110113/https://inews.co.uk/news/politics/china-secret-nuclear-stockpile-what-uk-must-do-new-3418651

edit: these are Khamenei's words and from a speech today btw, I feel like my screenshot was bad and confused people

I still can't believe that the shooting happened right as I started a playthrough of Luigi's Mansion. This is so surreal.

Watch me start a playthrough of New Vegas and another CEO gets dunked on by someone called The Courier

seized from here

Brief summary of today's Syria news.

Turkish-backed “SNA” fighters captured the northern city of Manbij and the surrounding countryside from Washington’s Kurdish-dominated “SDF” proxies.

The fascist Tel Aviv regime continues attacking Syria all over the country (even brazenly striking army bases in and near Latakia, an arms depot near Izra (in Daraa province), Damascus’ Barza neighborhood, Homs, an airbase in Qamishli, and many other locations). The Zionist invaders now illegally occupy the southern Syrian settlements of Quneitra, Madinat al-Baath, and Hader; and an army base on Mount Hermon. So far, the Salafist armed groups have not offered any serious resistance to the Zionist invasion. Egypt, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Iraq, and Iran condemned the invasion.

Ali Larijani reportedly offered him pre-set conditions 2 weeks ago in Damascus. Bashar didn’t agree with them and even refused to meet with Larijani—Iran’s special envoy—when he returned to Damascus Friday Dec 6. Bashar Assad refused to open the Golan front, despite being asked to by the resistance groups. The Assad government, after becoming too close with the Gulf Arabs, had put a lot of restrictions on IRGCQF, this sparkled dissatisfaction.

Ex-IRGCQF officer claimed Iran intel knew since 2 months ago that rebel groups in Idlib were up to something. He claims Iranians shared their worries with Turkey, but “Turks deceived them and assured Iranians there’s nothing to be afraid of—Should not have trusted the Turks. The situation in Syria has not ended and it’s going spark unrest. Especially between Kurdish SDF vs Turkish-backed rebel groups (e.g. HTS) AND inner fights among rebel groups.

It's now widely known that Iran, Hezbollah and other Shia factions asked Assad for permission to open a front in the Golan Heights after October 7th to support the resistance in Gaza & Lebanon. However, Assad refused, reportedly saying he did not want to drag Syria into a possible open confrontation with Israel & he did not want to risk jeopardizing his normalization progress with the Gulf States. Yemen's Ansarullah reveals more about Assad: 'He closed our embassy in Damascus, in exchange for Saudi Arabia letting him open a Saudi embassy there'

From Telegram

Girl what the heck are you doing over there you are literally OLDER than the battle of the bulge

Ain't no way a Mcdonalds employee snitched on the Adjuster 💀

Some pretty credible reports in Iraqi media about Ayatollah Sayyid Ali Al Sistani's health rapidly deteriorating. He's considered the Grand Marja of the Shia Muslim faith, which makes him pretty much the Shia Pope. Shia Marja politics are incredibly interesting, and his death might actually trigger a pretty massive upheaval in the upper echelons of the political side of Shia Islam. This might be the topic of my next effortpost, something about the evolution of the Shia Marja since colonialism and then Sistani's interpretation of the role which made him the modern Marja (but actually not, more on that later). The fight about succession will be interesting with many clashing dynamics (Persian vs Arab, Qom vs Najaf, Sistani family vs Islamic Republic of Iran, Political vs Apolitical, Old vs Young), and the looming Sadrist cult threat is even more interesting.

Turkey cement/construction stocks surge after fall of Syria's Assad government: Cimbeton, Nuh Cimento, Oyak Cimento, Afyon Cimento, Cimsa, Konya Cimento, Akcansa

Did anyone here invest in turkish cement and get the bag? Really we should've seen this coming.

Israeli bombings are still ongoing in Syria. They're apparently targeting the facilities of what were radar battalions in Damascus, scientific research facilities in Hama, and missile bases built into the Qalamoun mountain range. Remember that video taken by rebels a few days moaning about how Assad and Hezbollah built those underground missile bases into the mountains? Well I guess they can stop moaning now, Israel is currently attempting to destroy those facilities, either with bunker busters dropped from planes, or Israeli special forces units planting explosives within them.

⚠️ Warning – Graphic

Videos have emerged from across Syria showing extremist opposition elements, some of them wearing ISIS patches, carrying out sectarian field executions and revenge killings of supporters of Assad's government, former Syrian Arab Army officers, and Alawite civilians.

https://x.com/TheCradleMedia/status/1866594679963152513

Oh shit, has The Adjuster got got?

https://wjactv.com/news/local/reports-altoona-man-held-questioning-killing-unitedhealthcare-ceo-nypd-pennsylvania-new-york-brian-thompson

Big article on updates to the Colorado River water rights negotiation. Written strangely from a pro-Californian perspective, because there's no mention of how much water Californian farming corporations waste.

TLDR: Big rift between the lower and upper states on who should cut. No progress, and the negotiators are having petty fights blaming each other for the lack of progress. Trump will be taking over the negotiations. Realistically he won't have a proposal all states are okay with, so it'll become a legal battle at the end of 2026, probably going to the Supreme Court.

This is important because the Colorado River supports 40 million people, an enormous amount of hydroelectricity including the Hoover Dam, 15% of US agriculture, and 90% of winter vegetables. Asking states to cut water usage will force farmers to change crops, or go out of business. But allowing the reservoirs to dry would make a bunch of states and tribal lands uninhabitable, create enormous electricity shortages, and destroy a bunch of ecosystems

https://www.latimes.com/environment/story/2024-12-10/colorado-river-divisions

‘Zero progress’: Western states at impasse in talks on Colorado River water shortages

stuff in his reading list about dealing with back pain from surgery (including stuff about depression), maybe has been out of contact with his friends and family for months (if twitter screenshots are to be believed), was in NY sometimes around the shooting, had a manifesto and a gun with a suppressor on it when he was arrested (although could always be bs fed by the cops ig?), i think they got him, i think anyone saying otherwise is coping tbh. as for why he was so sloppy like this after seemingly planning this (relatively) cleanly at first? well, i think he saw how ecstatic the internet has been over it and wanted the recognition for it (and also, maybe he thinks he can get off scot free because of it?)

Funniest thing that could happen:

1. Trump becomes President, decides to stick it to Mexico. Breaks off all diplomatic relations.

2. Mexico stops doing trade or anything else with the United States.

3. The next day, the Adjuster livestreams himself from a beach in Mexico, proves that he's the Adjuster, and says his real name. Mexico won't extradite him.

First Year of Javier Milei’s Economic “Miracle”: Plunging Inflation, Surging Poverty, Rising Inequality and Slumping Industry

A nice summary of all the horrors Milei has inflicted on the Argentinian people.

IT BEGINS

A bunch of towers in my city have festive red, green, and white lights up in high windows. In my head canon it’s all Italian solidarity for Luigi

At least three Israeli soldiers were killed in the minefield explosion in 'Ras al-Naqoura' in Lebanon earlier today.

Lol

Erdogan: 'Besides Putin, I am the only real leader left in the entire world'

????

Israel orders closure of Dublin embassy, blaming 'extreme anti-Israel policy of Irish government' - Sky News

The decision comes after the Irish government said it would ask the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to broaden its definition of genocide - claiming Israel has engaged in the "collective punishment" of people in Gaza. Israel's foreign minister has ordered the closure of the country's embassy in Dublin, citing the Irish government's "extreme anti-Israel policy". Gideon Sa'ar said "Ireland has crossed every red line in its relations with Israel".

"The actions and antisemitic rhetoric used by Ireland against Israel are rooted in the delegitimisation and demonisation of the Jewish state, along with double standards," he said in a statement. The minister pointed to Ireland's decision earlier this year to recognise a Palestinian state, for which Israel recalled its ambassador from Dublin.

The move also comes after the Irish government said it would ask the International Court of Justice (ICJ) to broaden its definition of genocide - claiming Israel has engaged in the "collective punishment" of people in Gaza. Ireland's taoiseach (prime minister) said in a statement that the decision is "deeply regrettable", and that "keeping channels open has never been more important so that we can better understand each other's positions, even when we disagree".

Simon Harris added: "I utterly reject the assertion that Ireland is anti-Israel. Ireland is pro-peace, pro-human rights and pro-international law. Israel will instead "adjust our diplomatic network of missions" to strengthen ties with countries that want to do the same with Israel, but do not yet have an embassy.

For that reason, Mr Sa'ar said Israel will open an embassy in Moldova, and has instructed officials to find a suitable building and initiate the process of appointing an ambassador.

The guy who sang God Syria Bashar switched sides it’s so fucking over

Tiktok is telling me that the adjuster's family wealth was from a network of nursing homes. They were generally of very poor quality to say the least (I'm fucking disgusted, but that's US healthcare/elder care for you, nothing too new), and his LinkedIn shows that he volunteered at these homes.

It's likely that his experiences witnessing industrialized elder abuse had a strong effect on his views.

@tiffanycianci is the creator who pulled the research into a video if you want to look it up. Someone should grab it and post to tankietube or something.

there's no way this Luigi guy is the shooter. the eyebrows just do not match with the CCTV of the shooting. I feel like some kinda tinfoil hat mfer just saying that lmao, but yeah I do not buy this

Ex-defense chief suspected of plotting war with North Korea to justify martial law

Kim Yong-hyun is said to have called for strikes on sites from which North Korea was launching trash balloons and sending drones over Pyongyang

Photos of thousands of Syrian refugees returning from Turkey.

The guy on the latest radio war nerd said that in Turkey, much like everywhere else these days, there's been a rise in anti-immigrant sentiment, which syrians have been a primary victim of and having them return on their own without even having to deport them is a huge politican win for erdogan (though elections aren't until 2028 so I don't know if he'll remain popular by then)

Ford is threatening to end energy exports to the US if Trump goes ahead with the tariffs. Electricity from Ontario powers about 1.5 million houses in the US.

https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/doug-ford-tariff-threat-energy-exports-1.7408644

""That's okay if he does that. That's fine," Trump told a CNBC reporter."