25 Oct, 2023 12:06

Kiev slams Musk over calls to end Ukrainian conflict

The billionaire has urged the US to find a peaceful solution to the hostilities and restore relations with Russia to avoid WWIII

Mikhail Podolyak, a senior aide to Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky, described Elon Musk’s calls for an urgent ceasefire in the Ukraine conflict to avoid a larger conflict as a “catastrophic mistake” with far-reaching consequences in a Telegram post on Tuesday.

On his channel, Podolyak called Musk’s recent proposal equivalent to surrendering Ukraine to “mandatory large-scale genocide” from Russia and suggested that refusing to support Ukraine would “inevitably lead to a sharp increase in conflicts around the world, the end of the era of international law, the collapse of the international economy, and the triumph of the forces of evil.”(These people are insane!)

The advisor’s comments came after Musk stated in a conversation on X (formerly Twitter) Spaces on Tuesday that the US was “sleepwalking” into World War III by antagonizing countries like Russia, Iran, and China.

Musk said he believed that “civilization itself may be at stake” and stressed that the US must work to prevent a global conflict. To that end, he called on the US to “resume normal relations with Russia” and “figure out” a way to establish peace in Ukraine, labeling the war a hopeless situation.

The billionaire noted that it made no sense that soldiers from Russia and Ukraine should die every day and stressed that a ceasefire was the only way out of the conflict for the Ukrainian people since Russia would never give up its lands – apparently referring to Crimea, Kherson, Zaporozhye, and the Donbass republics – and Ukraine would never be able to take over these territories with its smaller army.

Musk suggested that the current line of control could be a suitable permanent border between Russia and Ukraine since, according to him, there is no significant anti-Russian insurgency in the “Russian-speaking areas of Ukraine”and, therefore, there is little point in forcing areas that want to be part of Russia to be part of Ukraine.

Meanwhile, Ukrainian President Vladimir Zelensky has recently urged his forces to take at least 500 meters of territory from Russian positions daily. That’s despite the Ukrainian military having suffered tens of thousands of casualties during this summer’s counteroffensive, which ultimately failed to achieve any significant territorial gains.

Earlier this month, Russian President Vladimir Putin described Kiev’s counteroffensive as having “failed completely.” He stated that Ukraine had lost over 90,000 soldiers, 557 tanks, and 1,900 since the start of the operation in June.

At the same time, Russian forces have been ensuring that the Ukrainian military has “increasingly fewer capabilities,” according to Russian Defense Minister Sergey Shoigu, who stated on Wednesday thatnew weapon systems deployed by Russian forces have taken down 24 Ukrainian planesin just the past five days.

https://www.rt.com/russia/585767-kiev-musk-peaceful-solution/

25 Oct, 2023 09:53

Ukrainian military getting weaker – Shoigu

Russian forces downed two dozen Ukrainian planes in just five days, the defense minister has claimed

Russian Defense Minister Shoigu said on Tuesday that the current situation in the combat zone suggests that the Armed Forces of Ukraine are losing strength and “panicking.” He cited a substantial take down of aviation potential to back up his assertion.

Shoigu claimed that his forces downed 24 Ukrainian military planes in just five days, crediting “new weapons systems” for the achievement.

He also pointed to manpower losses reducing Kiev's offensive potential. “Today's situation shows that the enemy has fewer and fewer capabilities. And there are fewer of their soldiers thanks exclusively to your combat work,” he told servicemen from the Vostok Group.

“They are in panic, we know their tactics, we know their offensive and retreat plans,” he added.

Shoigu added that in the last three to four weeks many Ukrainians have been captured or have voluntarily surrendered. According to him, they speak about thepoor psychological condition of their colleagues.

“We now have weapons systems which have taken down 24 planes in five days,” the minister was quoted as saying in a press release.

Footage of the discussion published by the military did not include the comments about the new weapons, while Shoigu did not detail the time frame in which the strikes on Ukrainian aircraft were conducted.

The Defense Ministry regularly reports successful engagements of Ukrainian military aircraft by fighter jets and air defense units. Briefings from last Friday to Tuesday claimed that 18 planes had been destroyed in total.

The list included 14 MiG-29s, two Su-24s, one Su-25, and one L-39. The latter is a Czech-produced trainer-fighter plane, rather than a more capable fighter or ground attack plane like the others. A single Mi-8 helicopter was taken down in the same period, according to the ministry.

The ministry’s briefing on Friday noted that in the week starting October 14, Russian forces took out 12 Ukrainian planes, including ten MiG-29s and two Su-25s. Seven of the MiGs were destroyed in a 24-hour period, the report said.

Shoigu attended the award ceremony after visiting one of the headquarters involved in the Ukrainian campaign. It was held in a tent in which weapons trophies appeared to be on display alongside portraits of Russian military commanders and Orthodox icons.

https://www.rt.com/russia/585749-shoigu-ukrainian-planes-downed/

Special Counsel Jack Smith Continues Lawfare Operation With More Leaks to ABC, This Time Claiming Mark Meadows Warned Trump About 2020 Election Result Being Accurate

October 24, 2023 | Sundance |

Too many people continue falling for this Lawfare nonsense. CTH has been outlining what Lawfare operations are all about since we deconstructed the Trayvon Martin narrative. Perhaps a reminder is useful.

Lawfare, in its most obvious construct, is not a legal approach per se’, it is the intentional manipulation of the legal system to create the optics around information that is intended to be used by media to influence public opinion. {link}

That’s what Lawfare is all about, manipulating public opinion through leaks to the media. The leaks do not need to be truthful, accurate or directly in line with the prosecution of the case; they are intended exclusively to manipulate public opinion.

Remember, on August 21st, in another ridiculous Lawfare operation, Special Counsel Jack Smith told ABC that Mark Meadows testified that President Trump never attempted to declassify any information {Go Deep}. That report was transparently false, yet the media ran with it and multiple alternative media promoted it. Pure nonsense.

In this latest Lawfare effort, again from Special Counsel Jack Smith, again to ABC news, again about former Trump Chief of Staff Mark Meadows, the claim is the Special Counsel granted Meadows immunity (that’s the hook), and that Meadows told President Trump the 2020 election was not rigged or stolen.

Now remember, Mark Meadows wrote about the rigged and stolen 2020 election in his book, so why would he undermine his own story by saying something completely the opposite to Jack Smith that is only coming out now? TheOccam’s razor answer is, he didn’t. This lawfare story is all made up, fictitious, anonymous sources, manufactured to create a public impression.

Bolstering the likelihood that Meadows gave no such testimony, Meadows lawyers, when contacted by media, said the story is fake news. Yet again, everyone falls for it.This is how Lawfare succeeds, and this is how Trayvon Martin’s fake and fabricated ear-witness girlfriend becomes the key witness and embarrasses the prosecution on the stand.

(Via ABC) – Former President Donald Trump’s final chief of staff in the White House, Mark Meadows, has spoken with special counsel Jack Smith’s team at least three times this year, including once before a federal grand jury, which came only after Smith granted Meadows immunity to testify under oath, according to sources familiar with the matter.

See how the Lawfare operation works?

Jack Smith is not prosecuting a case; he’s trying to manipulate public opinion.

(When PDJT is no longer President, etc. The media will crash and burn for all the lies they’ve told)

https://theconservativetreehouse.com/blog/2023/10/24/special-counsel-jack-smith-continues-lawfare-operation-with-more-leaks-to-abc-this-time-claiming-mark-meadows-warned-trump-about-2020-election-result-being-accurate/

Former NYT Reporter: Americans Seeing Trump Was Right, Coming Out of ‘Woke Slumber’

by Randy DeSoto, The Western Journal Oct. 24, 2023 6:01 pm

Former New York Times reporter Bari Weiss sees a “political awakening” happening in the United States, contending that the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks in Israel have spurred the change.

Weiss made the argument in a Monday piece that she co-wrote with Oliver Wiseman for The Free Press.

“Here’s an example of what we mean: a friend, appalled at the equivocation and apologia in the West after the brutal Hamas killings, told one of us that he used to consider himself a ‘conscientious objector’ in the culture wars. ‘Not anymore,’ he said. October 7 changed that,” the commentators wrote.

“Liberal friends were suddenly talking about buying guns. Progressive friends were texting about topics like border security and immigration. In a whisper, one even admitted to watching Fox News,” Weiss and Wiseman added.

They cited comments billionaire venture capitalist Chamath Palihapitiya made last week on the “All In” he co-hosts during which he asserted that seeing all thechaos in the country and the world convinced him former President Donald Trump was right about many things.

Palihapitiya noted he voted for Democrat Hillary Clinton in 2016 and Joe Biden in 2020.

“As a Democrat who has been left homeless, who is now definitely in the center but probably leaning increasingly right, I am left yet again with an appreciation, despite the messenger, of the message ofthe Trump administration because what those guys did was pretty incredible in hindsight,” he said.

Do you think America is waking up from wokeness? He pointed to the Abraham Accords between Israel and the Persian Gulf states of the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain as an example.

Palihapitiya continued saying, “So much of the work that happened in that administration turns out to have been right. And that’s what is so frustrating for me. The work on the border wall?We didn’t like the messenger, so we killed the message. Turned out it was right.”

“Issuing long-term debt to refinance when rates were at zero? We didn’t like the messenger, so we killed the message. A structural peace in the Middle East? We didn’t like the messenger, so we killed the message,” the podcast host said.

“When are we gonna stop shooting ourselves in the foot? And when are we going to actually see and take the time tolook past who is saying things and actually listen to them word for word?”Palihapitiya asked.

Weiss and Wiseman also cited Konstantin Kisin in a column he wrote for The Free Press, titled “The Day the Delusions Died” regarding the Oct. 7 Hamas attacks.

“The events of the last week have shattered the illusion that wokeness is about protecting victims and standing up for persecuted minorities. This ideology is and has always been about the one thing many of us have told you it is about for years: power,” he argued.

“A friend of mine joked that shewoke up on October 7 as a liberal and went to bed that evening as a 65-year-old conservative. But it wasn’t really a joke and she wasn’t the only one,” Kisin added.

“Many people woke up on October 7 sympathetic to parts of woke ideology and went to bed that evening questioning how they had signed on to a worldview that had nothing to say about the mass rape and murder of innocent people by terrorists,” Kisin wrote.

Weiss founded The Free Press after famously resigning as a columnist from The New York Times in June 2020, citing an “illiberal” and “hostile” work environment.

“Part of me wishes I could say that my experience was unique. But the truth is that intellectual curiosity — let alone risk-taking — is now a liability at The Times,” she wrote in her resignation letter.

Weiss explained that self-censorship had become the norm among the writers, with job security only best guaranteed by publishing the “4000th op-ed arguing that Donald Trump is a unique danger to the country and the world.”

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2023/10/former-nyt-reporter-americans-seeing-trump-right-coming/

This is what the “Great Awakening” looks and sounds like. It’s almost time!

EXCLUSIVE from Rep. Keith Self: ‘How Was Jordan, Founder of House Freedom Caucus and the Nation’s Second Most Popular Conservative, Blocked by the Republican Party?’

By Guest Contributor Oct. 24, 2023 2:40 Guest post by Representative Keith Self (R-TX 3rd District)

A Movement of Hope

I have been reflecting on the defeat of Jim Jordan for Speaker of the House. How was Jordan, the founder of the House Freedom Caucus, and the second most popular conservative in the nation blocked by the Republican party?

I can tell you.

He was a threat to the Swamp. Yes, America lost to the swamp. Again. Hill reporters (who live and breathe on Washington speculation) quickly chalked up the defeat to differences and preferences within the Republican Conference. However, those in the grassroots realize that Jordan’s defeat represents something far greater – something that has been building for a long time.

Jordan was a threat to “the system.” Aka, the traditions, the hierarchy, and the old-guard beliefs engrained in Congress to protect the Washington elites who control money and power with no intention of relinquishing either. To “the system,” known to many as the Establishment, Jordan represented the thousands of Americans who lit up Washington’s phonelines last week demanding real change – perhaps the most frightening possibility to the Establishment.

While admittedly it was dismaying to witness the Republican conference block Jordan from becoming Speaker of the House, I looked at the situationfrom a wider lens and things appeared quite different. In fact, it was stunning to see just how far the conservative movement has come.

I can see how far it has come because I can still see myself standing at Preston Road in Plano, Texas, at one of the original Tea Party rallies in 2009. It was during this movement that Americans across the nation headed to the street corners to wave flags, gathered at rallies, and lit up the phones across Washington, DC demanding the need for our leaders to shed us of taxation without representation.

That same spark I saw in the Tea Party has burst into the flame I witnessed at beginning of the 118th Congress (my first term).

In January, a flare was sent up by a group I was part of. You may know them as “The Twenty.” A new era of conservatism had landed on the beaches of Capitol Hill, and frankly I’m not sure Washington was ready for us. We bandied together and succeeded in obtaining a strong Rules package with requirements like budget rules, single issue bills, and having 72-hours to review legislation – commonsense to us, inconvenient to Washington politicians.

This Rules package was the first step towards changing the trajectory of Washington– and by that I include the Establishment ways of thinking, tired strategies from the 90’s, and a strong aversion to out-of-the-box ideas. Again, Washington wasn’t ready for us.

Since January, a fierce boldness has spread in the House Republican Conference. The Establishment is starting to realize it cannot count on all of us to kiss the ring and vote. In May, 71 Republicans bucked House leadership and listened to the American people, voting against an unacceptable debt ceiling deal. In September, 90 Republicans again left the ranks and voted against the 45-day clean government funding bill. Bottom line, the two major bills that made it from the House to the Senate and ultimately were signed into law by Joe Biden, required Republicans to get Democrat votes.

This is not the PR the ruling class wants.Because of the conservative movement, that I believe is rising across America, more leaders are emboldened to ask the tough question – even of our own party. What have Republicans accomplished this year?

By asking the tough questions and bringing forward real debate, the Establishment is no longer able to operate in the shadows. Lines are emerging, and it’s becoming crystal clear to the American people who is working for them and who is out for themselves.

No one can promise that setbacks will not happen. Those who have long held power WILL fight back. But I and the small band of Republican conservatives remaining in the House will continue our efforts to move our nation forward.

I believe we are witnessing the emergence of a profound movement that crosses political lines.Rejoice in that hope! And fight on.

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2023/10/rep-keith-self-how-did-jordan-founder-house/