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International thread 2


Ser Scot A Ellison

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On 3/10/2019 at 9:34 PM, Conflicting Thought said:

They where not clear opportunities cuz until 2013 Chavez was alive and had a lot of support in and out of Venezuela, there wasnt enough of a crisis for the US to take advantage of. That changed with Maduro. 

And i bring the attempted coup as an example of very recent US intervention in Venezuela. 

So the two-day failed coup in 2003 counts as an opportunity but none of the elections Chavez won do?  That's absurdly poor operationalization, might as well just call the measure selection bias.

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2 hours ago, DMC said:

So the two-day failed coup in 2003 counts as an opportunity but none of the elections Chavez won do?  That's absurdly poor operationalization, might as well just call the measure selection bias.

Just think of the CIA as omnipotent bumblefucks as all becomes clear.

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Well shit! I'm assuming this is going to hit the international news soon if not already. The news has pushed Brexit off the number 1 news story on BBC. Mass shootings at 2 mosques in Christchurch today. Up to 9 dead and 50 injured. Maybe more.

Ugh. We've had mass shootings very occasionally in the past, but not directed at a religious group.

And the Bangladesh cricket team was at the mosque when the shooting started. For those perhaps unaware of time zone, it's Friday here, so the shooting was planned for Friday prayers.

Shooter not been caught or identified yet. Short, blonde dude wearing bullet proof vest and helmet.

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21 minutes ago, The Anti-Targ said:

Well shit! I'm assuming this is going to hit the international news soon if not already. The news has pushed Brexit off the number 1 news story on BBC. Mass shootings at 2 mosques in Christchurch today. Up to 9 dead and 50 injured. Maybe more.

Ugh. We've had mass shootings very occasionally in the past, but not directed at a religious group.

And the Bangladesh cricket team was at the mosque when the shooting started. For those perhaps unaware of time zone, it's Friday here, so the shooting was planned for Friday prayers.

Shooter not been caught or identified yet. Short, blonde dude wearing bullet proof vest and helmet.

Past mass-shootings here were one-off nutters (Stanley Graham and David Gray). This is something else.

We've only ever had two terrorist attacks before (the 1984 Auckland Trades Hall bombing, and the Rainbow Warrior. This is the third one).

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19 minutes ago, The Marquis de Leech said:

Further update on the shootings:

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=12213039&fbclid=IwAR3RX551O_ImOl8tT9OL0wPA-Q9OwyG3UxWcF-XU30nmJfYB8WNh3LHNrMU

The guy's Australian, and planned this as a terrorist attack, complete with manifesto.

I hate that this makes me feel slightly less bad, but I am glad it wasn't a Kiwi who did this. But there is a white nationalist movement in NZ, so it's not like he didn't have a community here.

Also Rainbow Warrior was a terrorist act by a foreign nation, which is a different sort of evil.

Police rang a mosque in Porirua to see if they were safe. Sounds kinda dumb at first thought, but probably a good idea to make sure there was no nationally coordinated attack going on.

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Looks like French protesters have not been fully mollified by the actions of the government:

Quote

Paris (AFP) - Rioters looted and torched shops and businesses on the famed Champs-Elysees avenue in Paris on Saturday, on the 18th weekend of French "yellow vest" protests, characterised by a sharp increase in violence after weeks of dwindling turnout.

President Emmanuel Macron cut short a skiing trip in the Pyrenees to return to Paris for a crisis meeting, as hooded protesters went on the rampage in Paris, leaving a trail of destruction in the touristic heart of the city.

...

The police appeared overrun as protesters swarmed the Champs-Elysees, vandalising and later setting fire to Fouquet's brasserie, a favourite hangout of the rich and famous for the past century -- as well as luxury handbag store Longchamp, a bank, another restaurant and several news stands.

The rioters also looted several clothing stores and set fire to barricades in scenes reminiscent of the worst yellow-vest riots in Paris in December.

Did something new happen to provoke them? Or maybe it's just that the weather is getting warmer...

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9 minutes ago, Altherion said:

Looks like French protesters have not been fully mollified by the actions of the government:

Did something new happen to provoke them? Or maybe it's just that the weather is getting warmer...

Probably the weather/climate. Yet, it should be said that the French Parliament just voted the "Pact Law" (Loi Pacte) privatizing the Paris Airports (and the FDJ, the French Lotery) despite heavy criticism and no apparent reason to do so, save for an ideological belief in the inherent goodness of privatization. And such privatizations are hated by many on *both* the French right and left.

Also, it should be said that encouraging the use of police violence in previous demonstrations (which was denounced by several international organizations like Amnesty International or the UN) has led to a radicalization of the movement. Many "yellow vests" who started out as peaceful protesters are now radicals who want to see the neo-liberal government and the oligarchy it represents fall.
It's all ideological. The government chose to play hardball to decredibilize the movement, and the protesters are responding in kind.

It should also be pointed out that there was a march for the climate last saturday as well. It wasn't violent, but it attracted hundreds of thousands throughout the country (as many as 350,000 apparently). And people in France tend to see political incompetence and the defense of the oligarchy as responsible for climate change... In a nutshell, there's a lot of talk of "convergence" between the two movements. It might seem paradoxical since the yellow vests started as a protest against a "green" tax, but in an old socialist country it really isn't: people want the rich and the powerful to pay and act, rather than put financial pressure on the individual citizen.

I've said it before, and I'll say it again: this could be the beginning of something far larger, because the government has plans to tackle pensions in 2019 - in a neo-liberal way of course. If the government is foolish enough to actually go through with this, the yellow vest movement will swell to dramatic proportions and become nigh unstoppable.
French governments have fallen for less than what Macron is trying to pull off. And let's remember that he only got 24% of votes in the first round of the 2017 presidential election... His legitimacy is fragile, his arrogance breathtaking.

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  • 2 weeks later...

https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/russia-is-making-the-us-look-weak-in-venezuela

Interesting. I remember a common expressed worry many right-wingers, and centrists  supposedly had of Hillary’s stance on Syria being her militancy in regards to it will certainly lead to WW3 due to confrontation with Russia. 

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