Welcome to Saturday's Potluck - Dec 2, 2023

Submitted by studentofearth on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 4:50am

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

Morning. Short diary today, serious writers block.

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Did find a long video, worth the time to watch or listen. Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson draws on his experience in the halls of power of Washington DC as assistant to Colin Powell spanning from George H.W. Bush though George W. Bush. The rise of current Neocon crew from "those crazies" to the architects of current world affairs.

Empire in Decline - Colonel Lawrence Wilkerson, Alexander Mercouris and Glenn Diesen (1:27:49 min)

37 min - defines stupid - the latin base of word - that is seeking after that which is unwise. Considers most of our current leaders stupid.
116 min - Military is 10 years ahead of any other federal agency on addressing climate change. Sees a risk of potential for martial law if US becomes overwhelmed with extreme climate events.
121 question on Israel Future - 2004 Bush gave Ariel Sharon ok for Israel to absorb all territory. Wilkerson's opinion Benjamin Netanyahu responsible for assassination of Yitzhak Rabin in 1995.

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Learned a fair bit from this video last week (hat tip soryang) about the war games with China published last January which US kept loosing. The games only projected 6 to 8 weeks of combat and did not include any plans to proceed forward to peace.

What Would a War over Taiwan Look Like? | Robert Wright & Lyle Goldstein

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WARRIOR UPDATE WITH SCOTT RITTER - UKRAINIAN LINES COLLAPSING (1:17:47 min) Nov 12, 2023
Set to begin at 1:11:47 for a discussion regarding North Korea

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We need a little good news.

China’s carbon emissions set for structural decline from next year The Guardian Nov 21, 2023

Beijing’s solar and wind installation targets for the year were met by September, according to the report, and the market share of electric vehicles is already well ahead of the government’s 20% target for 2025.

“These record additions are all but guaranteed to push fossil-fuel electricity generation and CO2 emissions into decline in 2024,” Lauri Myllyvirta, a lead analyst at the Centre for Research on Energy and Clean Air and the author of the report.
...
“If this pace is maintained, or accelerated, it would mean that China’s electricity generation from fossil fuels would enter a period of structural decline – which would also be a first. Moreover, this structural decline could come about despite the new wave of coal plant permitting and construction in the country,” Myllyvirta added.

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Intel Roundtable: McGovern/Johnson: Who killed Seth Rich? Israel/Ukraine wrap. (28:52 min) Dec 1, 2023

The livestream videos this week by Judge Napolitano channel ongoing discussions regarding current events in Israel/Hamas/Gaza, secondary subject Seth Rich and third subject Ukraine/Russia conflict. The interviews are generally posted on Monday through Friday if would like to view them in a more timely manner. The link opens in the LIVE column, occasionally an interview only appears in VIDEOS section.

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What is on your mind today?

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Submitted by QMS on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 8:10am
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The practical nature of the Chinese establishing achievable goals to reduce
reliance on fossil fuels is encouraging. Quite a contrast to the hodgepodge
US approach.

Thanks for the Potluck!

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question everything

Submitted by studentofearth on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 12:49pm
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@QMS can significantly move one down a chosen path

thanks for stopping by and commenting

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
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Submitted by Lookout on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 9:22am
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A nice needed rain falling this morning.
Larry on the Duran was very good. Lots of behind the scenes stories I found interesting.

The war games clip looks good. I'll check it out later this weekend.

Hope all is well on the homestead. Thanks for the OT!

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

Submitted by studentofearth on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 12:56pm
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@Lookout Fortunately yesterday was a bit warm and the frozen soil thawed, water is soaking into the dry soil. Chickens are a little unhappy - the dust wallows are having technical problems.

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Still yourself, deep water can absorb many disturbances with minimal reaction.
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Submitted by snoopydawg on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 11:27am
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.

Hunter Biden laptop story even before the NY post posted the story on it.

Matt Taibbi and Michael Shellenberger testify about the most shocking things they found in the Twitter Files including former FBI officials working with the Aspen Institute, corporate media, and social media to pre-bunk the Hunter Biden laptop story.

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@mtaibbi
: "The most alarming thing we saw was the regular organized stream of communication between the FBI, DHS, and the largest tech companies. They had an organized system for flagging content, not occasionally, but in enormous numbers involving spreadsheets of accounts that ran into the hundreds of thousands."

@shellenberger
: "For me, it was seeing the so-called former FBI officials within Twitter working with a variety of groups including the Aspen Institute to pre-bunk the Hunter Biden laptop story before it was ever published in the New York Post, and then to get it censored by Twitter, whose Twitter's internal staff had concluded that the NYP tweet had not violated their terms of service and they censored it anyway."

@mtaibbi
: "This isn't a crazy conspiracy theory. we've already had four federal judges rule that they believe this activity violates the First Amendment."

@shellenberger
: "We discovered that the Aspen Institute had created a workshop attended basically by all major media, including social media platforms, to basically pre-bunk in advance the Hunter Biden laptop story even though there was no evidence that it existed outside of the fact that the FBI knew they had it because they got in December 2019."

Okay this is maybe the 5th time Matt has testified to congress about the massive censorship programs that they exposed in the Twitter files. What is congress going to do about it? One court already ruled that it was illegal for Biden to censor us, but another overturned the decision and it’s going to the SC. What will congress do to hold the government accountable to the constitution?

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Submitted by studentofearth on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 1:37pm
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@snoopydawg FBI is not involved in Seth Rich case despite 'conspiracy theories,' officials say Good Morning America 2017 By Brian Ross, Mike Levine and James Gordon Meek
May 22, 2017

FBI and other law enforcement officials are privately knocking down a conspiracy theory today,
...
According to officials with knowledge of the matter, the FBI is not investigating the unsolved murder of Seth Rich last year in what agents have determined was “a possible attempted robbery” gone wrong. Asked about the possible connection between Rich and WikiLeaks, one official told ABC News that “the only place I've seen that is through the conspiracy theories online."

Thanks for the info

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Submitted by snoopydawg on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 1:42pm
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@studentofearth

I’m still working my way through this article on the Rich case because it’s got lots of links I follow.

https://theconservativetreehouse.com/blog/2023/11/29/potentially-importa...

I guess we will see what’s on it unless it’s been scrubbed. I commented on the article last night if interested.

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Submitted by studentofearth on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 4:02pm
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@snoopydawg very informative.

for those who want to read - here is the link
The article does a good job refreshing memories.

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Submitted by studentofearth on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 12:27pm
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a pivot point of their plans.

George Soros’ Giant Globalist Footprint in Ukraine’s Turmoil The New American March 14, 2014

Especially noteworthy in relation to Ukraine is his key involvement in the American-Ukrainian Advisory Committee (AUAC). The Ukrainian Weekly of December 10, 1995, reported:

  • The American-Ukrainian Advisory Committee met in New York on November 17-18 [1995] and reiterated its strong conviction that a resilient Ukraine is in the interest of European stability and thus also American security

Among other things, the AUAC called upon the U.S. Congress, USAID, the IMF, the World Bank, and the EU to shower the Ukrainian government (then run by “former” Communist Leonid Kuchma). It also encouraged the Ukrainian government to hasten “privatization” by selling “blocks of equity to private investors.” Kuchma followed their advice and, as in the former Soviet Union, his false “privatization” scheme transferred enormous state assets into the hands of select Communist Party members, creating instant billionaire oligarchs, who have dominated Ukraine ever since. Sitting on the UAUC with Soros were one-world CFR heavyweights Zbigniew Brzezinski, Henry Kissinger, Frank Carlucci, and Richard Burt. The same one-worlders are pushing the same agenda today, two decades later.

Today in Sputnik Globe
Soros Jr. Secures Reported Chemical Waste Agreement With Ukraine — Journalist

Alexander Soros, the son of controversial American financier George Soros, has reached an agreement with Ukrainian authorities to allocate 400 square kilometers of land for the disposal of hazardous waste, according to an investigation by French journalist Jules Vincent.
...
The source revealed that the agreement was reached during a meeting on November 7 between Soros Jr. and the head of Volodymyr Zelensky's office, Andriy Yermak. Under the terms of the agreement, Ukraine will transfer land to American companies for the burial of hazardous waste from chemical, pharmaceutical and oil companies for an indefinite period of time and free of charge. The companies include Dow Chemical, DuPont, BASF, Evonik Industries, Vitol and Sanofi.
...
According to the source, the land in question is located in the Ternopol, Khmelnitsky, and Chernovitsky regions - fertile black soil farming areas in the western part of Ukraine.

No wonder the push to send more of the citizens to the meatgrinder before they become aware of the scope of the tragedy on their culture and historical lands.

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Submitted by snoopydawg on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 4:50pm
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@studentofearth

No wonder the push to send more of the citizens to the meatgrinder before they become aware of the scope of the tragedy on their culture and historical lands.

Zelensky has been giving away fertile farmland for big factory farms to operate in the country and which will drive regular farmers off their land. I don’t remember what else he has promised to blackrock and its ilk, but wouldn’t it be funny if that land is part of what Russia has in mind of capturing in order to push Ukraine farther back so they can’t threaten people in the areas that voted to join Russia?

But the biggest stink is Z giving land away for free to Soros so he can pollute it and destroy so much of the area. I wonder if the Ukraine media is even covering what Zelensky has been doing?

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Submitted by snoopydawg on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 5:38pm
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@studentofearth

Link About halfway through the article. Looks like Zelensky is juggling lots of balls and he might or might not be on his way out the door. Apparently Biden wants to end the war so he can focus on China. Gotta love wars planned years in advance and before any country attacks us. I wonder where Iran fits into this scenario?

Finally, there is one last very significant perspective that I’ve actually forgotten to add to this episode’s entire outlook in most of my reporting on it thus far. Many will recall that Soros recently visited Kiev, with Yermak posting photos of the warm reception he bestowed on the new head of the Soros empire.

This leads to one of the most important aspects: which is that Zelensky and co. are fully entwined with the Soros/BlackRock/criminal globalist cartel, and have been busy making secret deals to sell off Ukraine’s most vital national ‘organs’ in exchange for various financial promises. Recall in the earlier ZeRada report, it said:

it is important for them to keep as many Ukrainian assets as possible, which will make it easier to service debts to BlackRock, which according to the plan should consolidate Ukraine's liabilities. The more factories and businesses that remain in operation, the easier it will be for external players to support Ukraine.

…..
Whether it’s true or not, the fact remains that we know from earlier confirmed findings that many of these conglomerates have been slowly moving into Ukraine, particularly for the farmland, in recent years.

This puts a potential ceasefire in a whole different perspective. Recall in a recent report that I wrote about how the reason U.S. cannot allow Russia to continue fighting is because it risks losing all of Ukraine in a total, decisive Russian victory over the embattled country.

This adds even more weight to this, as BlackRock, Dupont, Soros, and co., cannot allow their vast investment projects in Ukraine to completely fall into Russia’s hands. That means for these megacorp powerhouses, a ceasefire that preserves their holdings is of paramount importance. If Washington and the CIA won’t do the dirty work of ridding Ukraine of whomever may be holding up that process, then certainly these nefarious and shadowy organizations will gladly oblige.

Recall in the earlier Poroshenko leak, the oligarch Akhmetov groused about everything they own being wiped out by this war. Like I said, this adds a whole other dimension to developments, as I highly doubt these all-powerful consortiums will allow Ukraine to fall into the enemy’s hands, losing billions in investments and the control of such a critical piece of the ‘world’s breadbasket’ and unregulated dumping ground.

is juggling lots of balls

Lol…didn’t he play the piano with his?

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Submitted by on the cusp on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 12:55pm

They will entertain/educate me while I do laundry and other unexciting things.
I glimpsed at Moon of Alabama and skimmed his post about Israel planning to engage in war for a year, and that their goal was 40% accomplished thus far. Their unstated goal sure looks like genocide.
Hezbollah may have something coming to move the goalposts. We shall see.
Have a great day, soe, and thanks for the potluck.

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"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

Submitted by studentofearth on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 1:14pm
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@on the cusp takeover Wilkerson mentions Bush gave permission for in 2004.

On Top of Everything Else, Henry Kissinger Prevented Peace in the Middle East The Intercept Nov 30, 2023

little attention has been paid to his efforts to prevent peace from breaking out in the Mideast — efforts which helped cause the 1973 Arab–Israeli War and set in stone the Israeli occupation of the West Bank and Gaza.
...
In June 1967, two years before the start of Nixon’s presidency, Israel had achieved a gigantic military victory in the Six-Day War. Israel attacked Egypt and occupied Gaza and the Sinai Peninsula, and, following modest responses from Jordan and Syria, also took over the West Bank and the Golan Heights.

In the following years, the ultimate fallout from the war — in particular, what, if any, of the new territory Israel would be able to keep — was still fluid. In 1968, the Soviets made what appeared to be quite sincere efforts to collaborate with the U.S. on a peace plan for the region.

The Soviets proposed a solution based on United Nations Security Council Resolution 242. Israel would withdraw from the territory it had conquered. However, there would not be a Palestinian state. Moreover, Palestinian refugees from the 1948 Arab–Israeli War would not return to Israel; rather, they would be resettled with compensation in Arab countries. Most importantly, the Soviets would pressure their Arab client states to accept this.
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One person prevented this from going forward: Henry Kissinger. Backstage in the Nixon administration, he worked assiduously to prevent peace.
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Rather, Kissinger perceived all the world through the prism of the Cold War between the U.S. and the Soviet Union. Any settlement at the time would require the involvement of the Soviets, and hence was unacceptable to him. At a period when it appeared in public that an agreement with the Soviets might be imminent, Kissinger told an underling — as he himself recorded in his memoir “White House Years” — that was not going to happen because “we did not want a quick success [emphasis in the original].”

Household chores are like some world problems the same ones crop up every week.

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Submitted by enhydra lutris on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 1:06pm
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intermittent rain here this morning, enough to wet the plants and soil, but not too seriously, the ground beneath the evergreens and orange tree is still dry.

Watched the Seth Rich video yesterday evening, not expecting any meaningful disclosure to result. The feebs were part of the Russiagate hoax and the only reason they could've had for grabbing and hiding that laptop is that it could blow their cover and/or expose the fraud, so they have the same incentive to keep it sekret as they did to initially conceal it.

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 --

Submitted by studentofearth on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 3:39pm
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@enhydra lutris the cover-ups. It has only taken 7 years for this one, in spite of massive attempts to redirect focus of common citizens. Younger generations will pick up the skills.

Gives one hope - even if we never learn the contents of the laptop. There will always be a group citing it was a random event, move on, nothing here and believe the official narrative.

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Submitted by humphrey on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 1:22pm

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Submitted by snoopydawg on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 1:23pm
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.

Chris Hedges

Israel reopens the slaughterhouse

Phase One of Israel’s genocidal campaign on Gaza has ended. Phase Two has begun. It will result in even higher levels of death and destruction.

The skies over Gaza are filled — after a seven-day truce — with projectiles of death. Warplanes. Attack helicopters. Drones. Artillery shells. Tank shells. Mortars. Bombs. Missiles. Gaza is a cacophony of explosions and forlorn screams and cries for help beneath collapsed buildings. Fear, once again, is coiling itself around every heart in the Gazan concentration camp.

By Friday evening, 184 Palestinians — including three journalists and two doctors — had been killed by Israeli air strikes in the north, south and central Gaza, and at least 589 injured, according to the Ministry of Health in Gaza. Most of them are women and children. Israel will not be deterred. It plans to finish the job, to obliterate what is left in the north of Gaza and decimate what remains in the south, to render Gaza uninhabitable, to see its 2.3 million people driven out in a massive campaign of ethnic cleansing via starvation, terror, slaughter and infectious diseases.

Nothing is off limits. Hospitals. Mosques. Churches. Homes. Apartment blocks. Refugee camps. Schools. Universities. Media offices. Banks. Sewer systems. Telecommunications infrastructure. Water treatment plants. Libraries. Wheat mills. Bakeries. Markets. Entire neighborhoods. Israel’s intent is to destroy Gaza’s infrastructure and daily kill or wound hundreds of Palestinians. Gaza is to become a wasteland, a dead zone that will be incapable of sustaining life.

This war is not over. It has not even begun.

Craig Murray says that 149 countries have signed the Geneva Conventions and it would just take one of them to instigate the international justice court to bring charges against Israel. None have. Why hasn’t Russia, China or any of the countries in the area called for that? Lots of the leaders are doing a lot of yadaing, but as they say talk is cheap.

Biden just sent Israel 100 2,000 pound bombs after Blinken asked them to use smaller bombs. Ursula from the EU recently visited Egypt and Jordan offering them billions to take Palestinian refugees. Both countries turned her down. America has long backed Israel’s intentions to push Palestinians to vacate their country going all the way back to Roosevelt who promised that No Palestinians would be left in the country.

This mass murder is not going to stop because it seems to many countries don’t want it to. I’m especially disgusted with Russia after how many millions they lost to the Nazis. How is what Israel is doing any fucking different?!

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Submitted by humphrey on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 1:53pm

across.

It reminds me of this event.

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Submitted by soryang on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 3:01pm
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...about the extensive North Korean artillery threat? It is the US is that is ignoring that threat, and encouraged the current incompetent far right Yoon Seok-yeol administration to dismantle the 9.19 military agreement with North Korea. TK of The Blue Roof describes this agreement as a "non-aggression pact."

The guy who pushed this is Kim Tae-hyo, an off the chain right wing nut, who is the "principal deputy national security advisor." Kim did his postgraduate education in the US. TK calls him South Korea's John Bolton. I've called him that before also. This is an excerpt from the Blue Roof Nov week 4 newsletter:

TBR Weekly Update: Week 4, November 2023

The Moon Jae-in 문재인 administration’s North Korea policy is typically written off as a failure because it did not achieve the denuclearization of North Korea. This assessment overlooks the liberal administration’s very real successes in working with Pyongyang 평양 on inter-Korean relations, as embodied in the September 19 Inter-Korean Military Agreement 9.19 남북 군사협정 - a major milestone in the 73-year standoff between the two Koreas.

The September 19 Agreement is, in essence, a non-aggression pact between Seoul and Pyongyang. The agreement established a buffer area around the demilitarized zone in which no military activity in air, water or on the ground may take place. The Agreement’s most significant provision was the removal of the 220 guard posts inside the DMZ, which previously held approximately 8,800 soldiers armed and ready to start shooting at adversaries located a mere stone’s throw away.

The Agreement was designed to reduce the risk of an inadvertent conflict escalating to all-out war or sinking potential denuclearization negotiations. And during the Moon administration, the design largely worked as intended: between 2007 and 2012, the Lee Myung-bak 이명박 administration saw 228 provocations from North Korea in the DMZ; between 2012 and 2017 the Park Geun-hye 박근혜 administration from 2012 to 2017 saw 108. During the five years of the Moon administration, which held office from 2017 to 2022, there were only five.

(See previous coverage, “North Korean Drones.”)

Anyone can access The Blue Roof for free, but it requires registration. TK is a Korean-American attorney. This is from a related news article-

N. Korean soldiers in truce village armed with pistols: sources

SEOUL, Nov. 28 (Yonhap) -- North Korean soldiers stationed in the Joint Security Area (JSA) of the Demilitarized Zone (DMZ) have been carrying pistols since the North scrapped a 2018 inter-Korean military tension reduction agreement, sources said Tuesday.

Arming soldiers in the JSA -- known as the truce village of Panmunjom -- is the latest in a series of North Korea's moves that nullify the pact, including restoring guard posts and bringing heavy firearms along the border with South Korea.

The two Koreas agreed to pull back firearms in the JSA in accordance with the Comprehensive Military Agreement, but North Korean military personnel in the area began carrying guns late last week, according to informed sources. Their South Korean counterparts still remain unarmed, they noted.

Great.

Thanks for the OT studentofearth. Watched Wilkerson as well as Scott. Thought the Colonel's interview was one of his best yet.

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Submitted by studentofearth on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 4:08pm
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Submitted by humphrey on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 6:39pm

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Submitted by snoopydawg on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 7:09pm
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@humphrey

Notice how the armed men gather in groups even though the people they are bullying and shooting are unarmed? Let’s arm the Palestinians too and see how the settlers react when they have to fight people who can defend themselves.

Oh and Blinken is going to sanction the settlers and keep them from flying. Yeah that’s gonna do anything you fcking moron.

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Submitted by humphrey on Sat, 12/02/2023 - 7:59pm

fellow".

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