Welcome to Saturday's Potluck - July 2, 2022

“Learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist.”
Pablo Picasso

Writing today's Open Thread was more challenging than normal this week. Should controversial topics be avoided. Stick to discussing food. Except this showed up Friday at The Guardian news .

The UN’s cultural body has added the cooking of Ukrainian borscht to its list of endangered cultural traditions, accepting Ukraine’s petition to fast-track its application following the invasion by neighbouring Russia.

Ukrainian borscht-making “was today inscribed on Unesco’s list of intangible cultural heritage in need of urgent safeguarding”, Unesco said in a statement on Friday.

Should linked sources be limited to those supporting the current Unites States narrative. I have never been comfortable to limiting myself to approved information sources. An early lesson in life was there are only a few times it is necessary to agree and repeat the opinion of someone else. Those times were generally related to passing a test for an educational course reach a goal.

Consider myself a life long student of many subjects not a teacher. While I may share my opinions and information sources it is not my intent to have everyone agree.

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Appears the potential world wide risk for nuclear war related to Ukrainian activities may have some twists and turns to the story.

Nuclear family: How Ukraine helped North Korea develop the world's deadliest weapons
Russia Times - July 1, 2022

How does a country which is effectively cut off from the rest of the world even achieve this level of technology? You might be surprised, but we must go to Ukraine for answers.
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“It wasn’t Ukraine sending their engines to North Korea – it was the work of North Korean scientific and technical intelligence in Ukraine that made it all happen. Apparently, the liquid-fuel rocket engines had been acquired there illegally even prior to 2014,” the expert concluded.
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In August 2017, The New York Times, citing Michael Elleman, a missile expert with the lobby group Institute of International Strategic Studies (IISS), reported that the DPRK had most likely used the RD-250 engines to design its own intercontinental ballistic missile.
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“It’s likely that these engines came from Ukraine – probably illicitly... The big question is how many they have and whether the Ukrainians are helping them now. I’m very worried,” Elleman said. The experts at the IISS, however, believed that the official authorities in Kiev were not involved in the smuggling operation.
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However, in a 2018 report by the 1718 Sanctions Committee (DPRK), the Ukrainian authorities admitted that, in all likelihood, the engine for North Korea’s ballistic missiles was created using components of the RD-250 engine produced by Yuzhmash. They added that, in their opinion, the deliveries must have been made through Russian territory. Of course, they would say this.
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In 1994, Kiev finally discarded the last of its remaining nuclear arsenal, of around 1,000 missiles it had retained after the collapse of the USSR. The plan was to pass half of them on to Russia and to destroy the rest – as part of the US-funded disarmament program.

But in 2005, ex-president of Ukraine Viktor Yushchenko confirmed that the previous administration had sold X-55 cruise missiles capable of carrying a nuclear warhead to Iran and China “through several figureheads,” as he put it. The range of these missiles is 2.5 thousand kilometers, so this scam practically meant an increased threat of nuclear attack for Israel and Japan.

Starting from the 1990s, representatives of North Korea were caught red-handed trying to get hold of Soviet nuclear missile technology on many occasions. Kashin believes Pyongyang has been conducting scientific and technical intelligence in Ukraine for quite a while now.
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Mikhail Khodarenok, a military analyst and retired colonel, reminded RT about the chaos and anarchy that reigned in post-Soviet Russia and Ukraine, affecting many areas of life in the 1990s.

“Back then, Ukraine saw much of its critically important technology leak out of the country. We can trace Ukrainian influence in both China’s and Iran’s strategic cruise missile arsenals. And it’s not surprising – everyone did their best to survive in those turbulent times. And many things may indeed have been done without the involvement of [the] Ukrainian leadership.”
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Another issue that has likely played into the hands of North Korean technology hunters is the ‘brain drain’ phenomenon, with dozens of Soviet engineers fleeing abroad after the Belovezh Accords were signed in 1991, disbanding the USSR.

The post-Soviet de-industrialization of Ukraine took stable income and career prospects away from dozens of professionals working at the Ukrainian aerospace manufacturer Yuzhmash. So these people were forced to look for other ways to make a living.

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A reminder conflict in the South China Seas would not simply disappear if Peoples Republic of China would abandon its claims of sea territory related t0 the Nine--dashed Line. Republic of China (Taiwan) has its own claims disputes.

Taipei Dismisses Manila’s Protest Over Drills Off Disputed South China Sea Island Sputnik News - June 29, 2022

The quarrel centers around Taiping Island, the largest of the South China Sea’s Spratly Islands. The island, which the Philippines calls Ligaw, also has several other claimants, but has been under Taipei’s control since 1956.
Taiwan’s foreign ministry has dismissed the Philippines’ objections to its drills off Taiping Island, saying it has a “right” to the live-fire exercises after Manila issued its “strong objection.”
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The disputed island is situated in the middle of the Spratly Islands archipelago – a large group of islands, islets, cays and reefs sprinkled across an area of 425,000 square kilometers, and contested by Brunei, China, Malaysia, the Philippines, Taiwan and Vietnam.
Taiwan and the Philippines have no formal diplomatic relations, instead maintaining ties with the People’s Republic of China, but do enjoy strong economic links. They have repeatedly clashed over the Spratlys, as well as the Scarborough Shoal and the Batanes archipelagic province of the Philippines.
The dispute over control of the South China Sea and its island territories has been turned into a major potential geopolitical and military flashpoint between claimants, as well as the United States, which has no claims to the area, but has classified it as a “matter of US national interest.”

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The Associated Press site apnews conveniently presents a summary of news for the past two days under various headings. I often use to spot a subject not included in local or state newspaper sites. Such as this find today.

Experts: US Court fractures decades of Native American law The Associated Press - July 1, 2022

A U.S. Supreme Court ruling expanding state authority to prosecute some crimes on Native American land is fracturing decades of law built around the hard-fought principle that tribes have the right to govern themselves on their own territory, legal experts say.

The Wednesday ruling is a marked departure from federal Indian law and veers from the push to increase tribes’ ability to prosecute all crimes on reservations — regardless of who is involved. It also cast tribes as part of states, rather than the sovereign nations they are, infuriating many across Indian Country.
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Criminal justice on tribal lands already is a tangled web, and the ruling likely will present new thorny questions about jurisdiction, possible triple jeopardy and how to tackle complicated crimes in remote areas where resources are stretched thin. States had power to prosecute crimes involving only non-Natives on reservations before this week’s ruling.

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What is on your mind today?

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Lookout's picture

Why would anyone believe anything the US "guarantees"? We're proven untrustworthy again and again.

We're off to B'ham today to see my Mom and eat BBQ. She's 90 and just trying to see her a bit more often these days while I can. It's a 2 hour drive each way, but we filled up yesterday for $3.80/gallon and felt like that was a bargain. Interesting how quickly our perspective changes.

Well, have a good week on the homestead, and we'll try to do the same. Thanks for the OT.

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“Until justice rolls down like water and righteousness like a mighty stream.”

studentofearth's picture

@Lookout and the fortune to still be able to visit Mom.

My bargain gas this week was $5.59, still substantially cheaper than other stations. It is creating less congestion on the roadways and in the store aisles.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

Creosote.'s picture

@studentofearth

I'm near a major arterial for a neighborhood with less access than was expected in early 1900s when the bridges to it were put in. Arterial traffic (single cars) about a block away starts one by one around 4-5 am, then is heavy til about 7 in the evening - after that very quiet. Fewer houses/apartments have evening iights on now, gas is $5.69; and it's nothing iike previous before-the-Fourths.

Very struck too by how few birds I see or hear. Only four on a long afternoon crosstown trip Friday under many trees near or arching over the roadway.

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caught this little ditty, thought it was funny ..

"Ukraine is the “new Iraq wrapped up with a pretty little NATO bow, with a nuclear present inside,”

and

“The American people do not want war with Russia, but NATO & our own foolish leaders are dragging us into one. We should pull out of NATO.”

Georgia Representative Marjorie Taylor Greene (R)

Thanks for the Potluck!

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studentofearth's picture

@QMS

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

enhydra lutris's picture

and morning is now well over with, even here, but what, pray tell, is Ukrainian Borscht? Do they use only white beets, or what?

Also, why the hell should anybody believe any of this?

In 1994, Kiev finally discarded the last of its remaining nuclear arsenal, of around 1,000 missiles it had retained after the collapse of the USSR. The plan was to pass half of them on to Russia and to destroy the rest – as part of the US-funded disarmament program.

Ukraine splits with a bunch of Rooshean nukes and hardware and then "discards" it even though they had promised to return all of it to Rooshea? Pursuant to a US funded plan no less?

As for the supremes they just made yet more defacto treaty violations de jure, merely icing on the cake of betrayal as it were.

be well and have a good one

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That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --

CB's picture

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CB's picture

@CB

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studentofearth's picture

@CB of events the past couple of days and potential long term considerations.

I am not much of a video watcher and appreciate them being prescreened for quality.

Enjoyed the posting of this one in another thread yesterday. It brought up a few points about India I had not considered.

[video:https://youtu.be/4sko0oEKoHk]

This was an interesting article form late May in Taipei Times.

India’s stance on Tibet, Dalai Lama

In the past few years, whenever the Dalai Lama spoke about visiting Taiwan, the media here only reported that he would like to visit.

However, Indian reporting says that the Dalai Lama has a precondition for visiting Taiwan, namely that he first wants to meet Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) in Beijing.

In other words, he would visit Taiwan under the premise of “one China,” but India would never agree to that.

The strategy of India’s foreign affairs departments regarding the Dalai Lama is to prevent him from visiting either side of the Taiwan Strait. They would prefer that he stayed in India, so they often refuse to grant him visas.

When dealing with the Tibetan issue, Taiwan, the US and Japan have to consider the role India plays.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
--When the opening appears release yourself.

CB's picture

the children can play and laugh again without fear.

13-Year-Old Girl Added to Ukrainian Hit List
Jun 30

Child-writer doxed online after appealing to UN on behalf of Donbas children

“War is air raids, the rumble of artillery and tanks, the cannonade of gunfire… It has many sounds and many faces. It sneaks up and falls on you with all its force when you least expect it. And as you hide, you count the bursts. One. Two. Three… God, thanks for passing. And then the guns go silent. And in that silence, you hear a baby crying. Quiet sobs, like a kitten’s meow. And then the shelling begins again, drowning out everything… That is why war children are quiet. They know their cries will go unheard.”
— Faina Savenkova, “Children’s Cry of Victory.” Written in 2020 at age 11

She had been surrounded by it most of her life. Among her earliest memories is a tableau of explosions, air raids, crying, death and dying.

In her home city of Lugansk, she has known little else but war for eight long years, since the Maidan coup and overthrow of Ukrainian President Viktor Yanukovich, when the bombs started falling on the Russian-speaking residents of the Donbas region. The war has been going on since she learned to walk.

“Now I am 11 years old,” she wrote in an essay titled “Children’s Laughter of Victory,” in 2020. “Half of my life is war. I don’t know how children like me felt in that difficult and terrible year of 1941, but it seems to me that it is similar to everything that children in Lugansk and Donetsk are experiencing now.”
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She began co-authoring with an adult writer and successful novelist, Aleksandr Kontorovich, who has been trying to tell people in the western hemisphere about the ongoing shelling of civilians in Donbas and the threat to children in the region. Their first collaboration was titled “The World That Doesn’t Exist,” followed by a novel about the children of Donbas titled “Those who stand behind your shoulder.”

But it wasn’t her fiction which got Faina’s name published on Mirotvorets, a notorious Ukrainian website which lists the names and personal information of people deemed “enemies of Ukraine.”

It was her truth.

Faina’s writing is immensely popular in Russia and other former Soviet countries, especially among young readers. As she grew more confident in her writing, she began to take a public stand for the children of war-torn Donbas. She contacted various international organizations and, at the age of 13, she sent a video-letter to the United Nations, calling for an end to the genocide of children in her part of the world. The video was aired during a Security Council meeting.

“I want the United Nations not to forget that we, the children of Donbas, also have the right to childhood and a peaceful life… I want you to remember the smiles of your children. We, too, want to smile, we want to be happy, we want to choose our future and we just want to live,” Faina said.

Two months later, Mirotvorets, which means “Peacemaker” in Ukrainian, added her name as an “enemy of Ukraine.”
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Myrotvorets
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Overview

The site reflects the work of NGO "Myrotvorets centre", led by a person only known with the alias "Roman Zaitsev",[12] former employee of Luhansk Security Service of Ukraine office.[13] The website is allegedly curated by the government law-enforcement and intelligence agency Security Service of Ukraine (SBU)[14] and was promoted by Advisor to the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Ukraine Anton Gerashchenko.[15] The identity of the staff is secret, and a hidden panel sifts through information, often collated from Open-source intelligence,[12] as wll as information provided by individuals on a confidential basis.
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People included to the list

According to the head of the centre, 4.5 thousand people were in the file cabinet in October 2014; 16 December 2015 – 7.5 thousand; January 2015 – 9000; 13 April 2015 – 30 thousand. In October 2015 – 45 thousand people; by 21 March 2016 – 57,775 people;[40] by 27 January 2017 - more than 102 thousand,[41] on the 23rd of August 2019 - 187 thousand.[42] The most complete database contains residents of the Crimea.[13]
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CB's picture

@CB
while doing a little research on Faina Savenkova:

Why a Child’s laughter is Victory
11700 Views May 09, 2020

Faina Savenkova is 11 years old and in the 6th grade. She lives in Lugansk, LNR (Lugansk People’s Republic). Faina has lived more than half of her life during a war, half of her life hoping for peace. She wants the children of Donbass to be heard by adults.

Her essay is important and the parallels she draws to the Second World War are both poignant and real.

War is air raids, the roar of artillery and tanks, the cannonade of shots … It has many sounds and many faces. She sneaks up and falls upon you with all her strength when you least expect her. And hiding you count the gaps between the shells. One. Two. Three … Lord, thanks for passing by. And then the guns fall silent. And in this silence, the crying of a child can be heard. Silent sobs, similar to a kitten’s plaintive meow.And then the shelling begins again, drowning everything … This is why the children of the war are quiet. They know their crying will remain unheard.

The summer of 1941 was very hot. Under the scorching sun, fields burned out and small rivers drying up, the nights were still cold and dark. The country was alive. No one expected trouble to knock on the door. People, of course, understood that war could soon begin, but they tried to believe in the best, in good. Just the same as we did in 2014.

Vasily, one of my great-grandfathers turned 41 in the year 1941. He was going to go to college and dedicated to himself a year toward study, he submitted the documents. But his dreams were not destined to come true. War had come. Then, there was no going to the institute.
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I am now 11 years old. I live in Lugansk and I know what shelling or an airstrike is. Half of my life is war. I don’t know what children like me felt in that difficult and terrible 41st year (when the 3rd Reich occupied), but it seems to me that this is like everything the children of Lugansk and Donetsk are experiencing now.
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And I know for sure, like them, that the war will end sooner or later, and we will create a new future. We will have the memory of the sorrows of war, but also with faith in the world. A future, in the quietness of which, the children’s prayers for peace as well as their laughter will be heard. Because when a child laughs, the war recedes.

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lotlizard's picture

… or draw any conclusions from it, they take umpteen years to bring the atrocity to trial, give it the minimum of publicity, treat it as an occasion for emotion-laden, fact-poor “human interest” stories, and play up how survivors have supposedly “moved on.”

I’m talking about the French and E.U. elite establishment’s response to the 2015 Bataclan attacks, for which trials have only now just ended.

https://www.qwant.com/?q=bataclan+victims+survivors+trials=web

Some atrocities are immediately exploited to take an entire bloc of nations into a series of endless wars. Others are swept under the rug, with survivors left having to fight a lonely battle for justice.

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