Macron’s new ‘hate speech’ internet law turns France into authoritarian state

The Duran’s Alex Christoforou and Editor-in-Chief Alexander Mercouris discuss France’s Avia law, which is setting up a system of censorship where private companies will be obliged to act as thought police on behalf of the French state or face heavy fines.

The new law will use ‘hate’ as the pretext to systematically silence dissenting opinions, including those of Macron’s political opponents.

https://theduran.com/macrons-new-hate-speech-internet-law-turns-france-into-authoritarian-state-video/

Government Says Afghanistan Ceasefire Could Hold, Taliban in Kabul for Prisoner Release Talks

Small clash reported at northern checkpoint, but violence is still down

The three-day Afghanistan ceasefire for Eid al-Fitr came to an end on Thursday, with reports of a handful of skirmishes, including a Taliban attack on checkpoints in Parwan Province. Despite this, Afghan officials say violence is still down substantially, so in many ways the truce is still holding.

Hopes for more diplomacy seem to be alive as well, with the Taliban sending a negotiation team to Kabul to continue discussing prisoner releases. The Afghan government released a lot of prisoners during the ceasefire.

Making deals on prisoner release would be a huge goal for the Taliban, and with the Ghani government wanting to keep a truce roughly in place, this is a good chance for a mutually beneficial exchange.

The three-day ceasefire was a good step toward showing everyone in Afghanistan that a peace process was possible, and while the deadline expired, there is plenty of room to keep the making gains toward a peace deal.

https://news.antiwar.com/2020/05/28/government-says-afghanistan-ceasefire-could-hold-taliban-in-kabul-for-prisoner-release-talks/

Israeli Troops Reportedly Open Fire in Disputed Land on Border With Lebanon

The Israeli army opened fire with automatic weapons in a disputed territory of the Shebaa farms located on the border with Lebanon when a shepherd was grazing his flocks of sheep on the border zone, the state-run Lebanese NNA news agency reported on Friday.

An incident occurred this morning in the Jabal al-Shahel district on the outskirts of the Shebaa farms, the NNA news outlet reported, adding that no one was injured.

The Shebaa farms is disputed land between Lebanon, Israel and Syria. The Lebanese Hezbollah political movement, in turn, stated that this territory belongs to Beirut and that the Israeli military should withdraw from it.

Earlier in May, Sayyed Hashem Safieddine, the head of the movement's executive council, said in an interview with Al Mayadeen broadcaster that Hezbollah did not seek war with Israel but was preparing for any possible scenario.

https://sputniknews.com/middleeast/202005291079456234-israeli-troops-reportedly-open-fire-in-disputed-land-on-border-with-lebanon/

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey: 'Anger' Shown is Result of '400 Years' of Slavery And Racism

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey (D) on Thursday appeared to justify the riots in his city by claiming the anger shown was "not just because of five minutes of horror, but 400 years."

While making the statement, Frey also acted like he was crying:

From NBC News, "Minneapolis mayor says anger over George Floyd death 'not only understandable, it's right'":

Minneapolis Mayor Jacob Frey choked back tears on Thursday and told protesters who were decrying the police-involved death of George Floyd that their anger was "not only understandable, it's right."

The mayor's eyes appeared red from tears as, just a few miles away, firefighters were still dousing flames from protests that turned violent overnight, demonstrations that erupted after Floyd's death in police custody on Monday.

"What we've seen over the last two days … is the result of so much built-up anger and sadness," he told reporters. "Anger and sadness that has been ingrained in our black community, not just because of five minutes of horror, but 400 years."

I guess the big screen TVs we saw looted were a form of reparations?

https://www.informationliberation.com/?id=61482

Arizona Schools To Reopen In Fall, Gov. Ducey Says

Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey announced on Thursday that the state’s schools would resume in-person instruction in the fall.

“We’re planning ahead to get kids and teachers safely back in the classroom for the start of the fall school year,” Ducey said in a statement, adding that the reopening of Arizona was moving forward “with a calm and steady approach” that includes following public health guidance and tracking COVID-19 infection data.

The number of new daily cases of COVID-19 in the state has declined since hitting a May 15 peak of 565, according to the Arizona Department of Health Services. To date, Arizona has seen a total of 885 COVID-19 deaths, with the number of daily fatalities peaking at 26 on April 30, before gradually declining.

Speaking at a press conference Thursday, Ducey said that youth summer leagues, summer schools, and day camps can also reopen, with some resuming operations as soon as next week.

Epoch Times Photo

Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey speaks at a COVID-19 briefing in Phoenix, Ariz., on May 28, 2020. (Screengrab via YouTube/Office of Gov. Doug Ducey)

State Superintendent Kathy Hoffman is expected to provide detailed information on how students, teachers, and parents can protect themselves as schools reopen, Ducey said at the presser.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/arizona-schools-to-reopen-in-fall-gov-ducey-says_3369622.html

Layoffs 2020: Delta, United Airlines Prepare For Massive Gutting Following Coronavirus Outbreak

Delta and United are expected to begin firing thousands of employees after Sept. 30

The protection from layoffs enshrined in the CARES Act ends on this date

Both companies have made public their plans to go small

Delta Air Lines and United Airlines, the world’s second and third largest airlines in terms of fleet size, are about to lay off tens of thousands of employees starting this year as COVID-19 continues to slow down passenger air travel to a painful crawl.

Delta employs close to 90,000 people worldwide while United has 96,000 employees. Both companies announced their intent to go small but aren't revealing how many people they plan to fire. Analysts said the numbers they have in mind might be close to or in excess of the 30% layoffs announced by American Airlines.

Delta and United won't be able to fire people until Oct. 1, however. The limitation on firing employees as a condition for the $58 billion bailout by the United States government's CARES Act expires Sept. 30. Half of this amount consisted of grant aid that covered airline payrolls and prevented layoffs through Sept. 30. Delta and United were among the airlines that took the money.

Delta is now laying the groundwork for what airline sources suspect will be massive layoffs. On Thursday, Delta said in a memo to its staff a "smaller Delta unfortunately means fewer people will be required." This means the obvious: layoffs or voluntary retirement.

The company is dangling two voluntary exit programs before the employees: one is a retirement package for employees that have worked at Delta for more than 25 years; the other is a buyout covering most of its workforce.

“While we never dreamed just a few months ago that we would be talking about a smaller Delta this was expected to be a year of growth, after all this is the reality we’re facing," wrote CEO Ed Bastian in the memo to employees. “Every voluntary departure helps to protect the jobs of those who most need them.”

United has been preparing its employees for the day of culling since late March. United Airlines CEO Oscar Munoz and president Scott Kirby on March 27 sent a letter to all employees stating in stark terms layoff are in the company's future as no immediate relief can be expected from the dreadful plunge in passenger numbers.

https://www.ibtimes.com/layoffs-2020-delta-united-airlines-prepare-massive-gutting-following-coronavirus-2984584

Renault To Cut 15,000 Jobs As Part Of Global Restructuring, While Awaiting French Government Emergency Loan

Renault has about 179,000 workers across the world

Renault plans to slash its global production capacity to 3.3 million vehicles from 4 million by 2024

Renault hopes to save $2.2 billion through these measures over the next three years

Two days after the French government unveiled an $8.8 billion stimulus package to save its ailing auto industry, carmaker Renault said it will cut 15,000 jobs as part of a major global restructuring.

Of those job losses, 4,600 will occur in France itself. That will likely lead to several plant closures, although Renault has not identified them yet.

Renault has about 179,000 workers across the world.

Renault, which is 15% owned by the French government, also said it will reduce the number of its subcontractors in engineering, cut the number of components it uses, and suspend expansion plans in Romania and Morocco.

The company also plans to slash its global production capacity to 3.3 million vehicles from 4 million by 2024, while focusing more on small vans or electric cars. (Under former chairman Carlos Ghosn, Renault had sought to reach 5 million unit sales annually by 2022)

Renault said it hopes to save €2 billion ($2.2 billion) through these measures over the next three years.

Renault’s partner Nissan of Japan announced similar cost-cutting measures on Thursday.

"This plan is essential," said Renault’s interim CEO Clotilde Delbos. "We have to change our mindset. We're not looking to be on top of the world, what we want is a sustainable and profitable company… We [previously] thought too big in terms of sales.”

Delbos also said Renault will review each of its geographical regions to decide exactly where job cuts will occur.

"This will help us come back to our ideal size," she said.

https://www.ibtimes.com/renault-cut-15000-jobs-part-global-restructuring-while-awaiting-french-government-2984758

Bill Gates running deadly global “vaccine empire” that can only exist through extreme censorship of real science and intelligent questions about vaccine safety

The reason why Microsoft co-founder and billionaire eugenicist Bill Gates is being given so much airtime amid the Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) crisis is because Gates is currently the world’s largest manufacturer of vaccines, as well as the money behind the mass vaccination agenda.

Gates is also the single-largest donor to both the World Health Organization (WHO), which is currently under investigation by the United States for its handling of the Wuhan coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, and the CDC Foundation, both of which act as marketing arms for his global vaccine empire.

There is no doubt that Gates lives to vaccinate, his number-one goal being to jab every single person on the planet with his many vaccines. Gates actually stated about a year-and-a-half ago that “vaccine hesitancy” is a top “global health threat” that must be dealt with if the world is going to “progress” in the direction he wants.

Other recipients of moneys from Gates include Adam Schiff’s Intelligence Committee Chair PAC (political action committee), to which Gates has maxed out his legal contributions. Schiff, as you may recall, called on Facebook, Google, and Amazon back in early 2019 to censor all “vaccine misinformation” from their platforms.

“Vaccines are both effective and safe,” Schiff wrote in a letter to these tech giants. “There is no evidence to suggest that vaccines cause life-threatening or disabling disease.”

These obvious Gates-inspired talking points were accompanied by Schiff pushing a bill one year prior that would have increased the kangaroo “Vaccine Court” budget by another $11,200,000. This fund has already paid out some $4 billion to families of children who suffered disability and/or death due to vaccination, but it requires even more to handle a growing vaccine injury backlog.

https://www.dcclothesline.com/2020/05/29/bill-gates-running-deadly-global-vaccine-empire-that-can-only-exist-through-extreme-censorship-of-real-science-and-intelligent-questions-about-vaccine-safety/

Virus Is a War on Christians

Abortion clinic and strip parlors stay open while churches are shuttered. The Covid Hoax must be seen in the context of an ongoing Cabalist (Satanist) war against Christianity.

Interestingly I am not the only assimilated Jew who takes the side of Christianity. David Horowitz sounded the alarm in 2019, before the Covid Hoax hit.

David Horowitz- "I am a Jew, but I know these are especially dangerous times for Christians. The war on the virus has become a war on Christians.

Let me explain. The draconian powers of government have been deployed against Christians, their churches, and their faithful during this pandemic.

It is nothing less than a dry run of government-controlled persecution of Christians. And the little pushback these people faced as they trampled over constitutional freedoms is a dangerous omen.

by Bill Muehlenberg

(abridged by henrymakow.com)

Back in the late 60s while still in my days of rage and rebellion, I religiously read underground newspapers and hard left magazines. Ramparts was one of those, edited by David Horowitz, a key figure in the New Left.

https://www.henrymakow.com/2020/05/david-horowitz-war-on-christians.html

A Chronicle of a Lost Decade Foretold

Foretold

May 27, 2020

Yanis Varoufakis

Many on the left still cling to the hope that the COVID-19 crisis will translate into the use of state power on behalf of the powerless. But those in authority have never hesitated to harness government intervention to the preservation of oligarchy, and a pandemic alone won't change that.

ATHENS – To exorcise my worst fears about the coming decade, I chose to write a bleak chronicle of it. If, by December 2030, developments have invalidated it, I hope such dreary prognoses will have played a part by spurring us to appropriate action.

Before our pandemic-induced lockdowns, politics seemed to be a game. Political parties behaved like sports teams having good or bad days, scoring points that propelled them up a league table that, at season’s end, determined who would form a government and then do next to nothing.Then, the COVID-19 pandemic stripped away the veneer of indifference to reveal the political reality: some people do have the power to tell the rest of us what to do. Lenin’s description of politics as “who does what to whom” seemed more apt than ever.By June 2020, as lockdowns began to ease, left-wing optimism that the pandemic would revive state power on behalf of the powerless remained, leading friends to fantasize about a renaissance of the commons and a capacious definition of public goods. Margaret Thatcher, I would remind them, left the British state larger, more powerful, and more concentrated than she had found it. An authoritarian state was necessary to support markets controlled by corporations and banks. Those in authority have never hesitated to harness massive government intervention to the preservation of oligarchic power. Why should a pandemic change that?As a result of COVID-19, the grim reaper almost claimed both the British prime minister and the Prince of Wales, and even Hollywood’s nicest star. But it was the poorer and the browner that the reaper actually did claim. They were easy pickings.It’s not hard to understand why. Disempowerment breeds poverty, which ages people faster and, ultimately, readies them for the cull. In the shadow of falling prices, wages, and interest rates, it was never likely that the spirit of solidarity, which soothed our souls during lockdowns, would translate into the use of state power to strengthen the weak and vulnerable.

https://www.project-syndicate.org/commentary/bleak-preliminary-history-of-2020s-by-yanis-varoufakis-2020-05?mod=article_inline

USA plan: militarized control of population

The Rockefeller Foundation, which has historical ties to the US federal government, has presented a national plan to control the coronavirus epidemic. It aims to test 30 million people a day at state expense and to subject US citizens to strict military control.

The Rockefeller Foundation has presented the "National Covid-19 Testing Action Plan", indicating the "pragmatic steps to reopen our workplaces and our communities". However, it is not simply a matter of health measures as it appears from the title.

The Plan - that some of the most prestigious universities have contributed to (Harvard, Yale, Johns Hopkins and others) - prefigures a real hierarchical and militarized social model.

At the top, the "Pandemic Testing Board (PTB), akin to the War Production Board that the United States created in World War II". The Pandemic Testing Board would “consist of leaders from business, government and academia” (government representatives would not in the first row, but finance and economic representatives being listed in order of importance).

This Supreme Council would have the power to decide productions and services with an authority similar to that conferred to the President of the United States in wartime by the Defense Production Act.

The plan calls for 3 million US citizens to be Covid-19 tested weekly, and the number should be raised to 30 million per week within six months. The goal is to achieve the ability to Covid-19 test 30 million people a day, which is to be realized within a year.

For each test, "a fair market reimbursement (e.g. $100) for all Covid-19 assays” is expected. Thus, billions of dollars a month of public money will be needed.

The Rockefeller Foundation and its financial partners will help create a network for the provision of credit guarantees and the signing of contracts with suppliers, that is large companies that manufacture drugs and medical equipment.

According to the Plan, the "Pandemic Control Council" is also authorized to create a "Pandemic Response Corps": a special force (not surprisingly called "Corps" like the Marine Corps) with a staff of 100 to 300 thousand components.

They would be recruited among Peace Corps and Americorps volunteers (officially created by the US government to "help developing countries") and among National Guard military personnel. The members of the "Pandemic Response Corps" would receive an average gross wage of $40,000 per year, a State expenditure of $4-12 billion a year is expected for it.

The "pandemic response body" would above all have the task of controlling the population with military-like techniques, through digital tracking and identification systems, in work and study places, in residential areas, in public places and when travelling. Systems of this type - the Rockefeller Foundation recalls - are made by Apple, Google and Facebook.

https://www.voltairenet.org/article210000.html

Cruz Asks For Criminal Probe Into Twitter Over Alleged Violations Of Iranian Sanctions

Senator Ted Cruz, R-TX, penned a letter Friday to Attorney General William Barr and Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin urging them to pursue a probe against Twitter “for possible criminal violations of the International Emergency Economic Powers Act (IEEPA) (50 U.S.C. §§ 1701 et seq.) and sanctionable activities prohibited by Executive Order 13876 (E.O. 13876).”

In his letter, Cruz referred the officials back to his February 6th letter to Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey “informing him that Twitter and its principals face criminal liability and sanctions exposure for providing social media accounts to Iranian persons designated as Specially Designated Nationals (SDNs) by the Department of the Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC) pursuant to E.O. 13876. You were copied on that letter, as were President Trump and the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of California Anderson.”

Twitter, however, still allows officials such as Ali Khamenei (@khamenei_ir), the Supreme Leader of the Islamic Republic, and Javad Zarif (@JZarif), the Iranian Foreign Minister to hold accounts. Cruz added that that action is a direct violation of “IEEPA to issue E.O. 13876, which prohibits ‘the making of any contribution or provision of… goods[] or services’ to persons designated pursuant to that order” and called on Dorsey to remove them from the platform. Violating the IEEPA could result in the payment of $1 million in fines and up to 20 years in prison.

In an April 3rd response to Cruz, Twitter argued that it would violate the platform’s policy saying “to deny our service to [Iran’s] leaders at a time like this would be antithetical to the purpose of our company.” Moreover, they stated that it’s Twitter’s “goal is to elevate and amplify authoritative health information as far as possible.”

“The position cannot be aligned with Iranian policy as it actually exists or with how designated Iranian officials use Twitter,” Cruz said in his Friday letter. “Iranian officials ban Iranian citizens from accessing Twitter. In early April, Khamenei and Zarif used their Twitter accounts to post anti-American disinformation and conspiracy theories, not authoritative health information. They use their accounts provided by Twitter to threaten and taunt their enemies real and imagined. In any event, Twitter’s corporate values and grave misapprehension of the threat that Khamenei and Zarif pose are irrelevant. An American person’s disagreement with IEEPA or E.O. 13876 is no excuse for noncompliance.”

Still, Twitter maintains that they’re not violating IEEPA saying “[m]aking the Twitter platform available for use . . . as a tool of communication[] is broadly exempted from OFAC prohibitions.” According to Cruz, Twitter’s justification is baseless according to “The General License D-1 (GL D-1) to which Twitter implicitly refers creates an exception for services and software incident to Internet-based communication.” adding that “it expressly ‘does not authorize’ the services ‘to any person whose property and interests in property are blocked pursuant to any part of 31 C.F.R. chapter V, other than persons whose property and interests in property are blocked solely pursuant to Executive Order 13599 as the Government of Iran[.]’

Cruz continued, “Khamenei and Zarif are designated pursuant to E.O. 13876 and so the exception does not apply” adding that “E.O. 13876 authorizes sanctions against ‘any person’ who is determined to have ‘provided technological support for, or goods or services to’ such designated persons.”

Copied on the letter are President Donald Trump, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, FBI Director Christopher Wray, U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of California David L. Anderson, and District Attorney of New York County, New York Cyrus R. Vance Jr.

https://saraacarter.com/cruz-asks-for-criminal-probe-into-twitter-over-alleged-violations-of-iranian-sanctions/

German Official Invites Twitter To Move HQ To Germany

A German official has invited Twitter to move their headquarters to Germany where “you are free to criticize the government as well as to fight fake news.”

Thomas Jarzombek, who charges tech affairs for Germany’s Economic Affairs Ministry, added, “We have a great startup and tech ecosystem, your company would be a perfect fit and I will open any doors for you! @realDonaldTrump.”

President Donald Trump has been engaged in a back and forth with Twitter over the platform’s random fact-checking notices issued on some of his Tweets. For example, Twitter issued a warning to the President’s tweet late Thursday about destructive riots in Minneapolis in response to the death of George Floyd.

President Trump signed an Executive Order to put those social media companies “in check,” as Sara A. Carter wrote in a recent column.

“This order may one day allow federal regulators to fine Facebook, Google, Twitter and other social media platforms that operate more like publishers than platforms for free speech,” Carter wrote. “At question is Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act, which was enacted in 1996 and signed into legislation by then President Bill Clinton.”

“It was enacted to regulate pornography, as well as offensive communication content. Even though, it was seen as unconstitutional it was never abandoned but instead, adopted by “interactive computer service” that gives immunity from most lawsuits to tech companies from information posted on their platforms.

https://saraacarter.com/german-official-invites-twitter-to-move-hq-to-germany/

ISIS Releases Summary Of Its Recent ‘Battle Of Attrition’

On May 28, ISIS’ al-Naba newspaper released an infographic summarizing the results of the terrorist group’s recent “Battle of Attrition 3.” The infographic piece claimed that ISIS carried out 228 operations in twelve different regions across the world. The operations included 82 attacks with improvised explosive devices (IEDs), 45 raids, 30 assassinations and 24 sniper attacks.

In al-Naba’s infographic, the operations were distributed as follows:

Iraq: 132 operations, 225 people were killed or injured;

Syria: 51 operations, 92 people were killed or injured;

Western Africa: 15 operations, 60 people were killed or injured;

Egypt: 9 operations, 22 people were killed or injured;

Central Africa: 6 operations, 54 people were killed or injured;

Libya: 4 operations, 2 people were killed or injured;

Somalia: 3 operations, 11 people were killed or injured;

Yemen: 3 operations, 9 people were killed or injured;

Afghanistan: 2 operations, 8 people were killed or injured;

Eastern Asia: 1 operation, no casualties reported;

Pakistan: 1 operation, 2 people were killed or injured;

India: 1 operation, no casualties reported;

For the last three years, ISIS cells carried out coordinated operations in the Spring with the aim of draining their foes, especially in the Middle East.

As the infographic indicates, Iraq and Syria were the main points of ISIS’ so-called Battle of Attrition 3. While a good chunk of the claims in the infographic are mere propaganda, there is no secret that the terrorist group is still highly-active in the two countries.

https://southfront.org/isis-releases-summary-of-its-recent-battle-of-attrition/

German Official Leaks Report Denouncing Corona as ‘A Global False Alarm’

Germany’s federal government and mainstream media are engaged in damage control after a report that challenges the established Corona narrative leaked from the interior ministry.

Some of the report key passages are:

The dangerousness of Covid-19 was overestimated: probably at no point did the danger posed by the new virus go beyond the normal level.

The people who die from Corona are essentially those who would statistically die this year, because they have reached the end of their lives and their weakened bodies can no longer cope with any random everyday stress (including the approximately 150 viruses currently in circulation).

Worldwide, within a quarter of a year, there has been no more than 250,000 deaths from Covid-19, compared to 1.5 million deaths [25,100 in Germany] during the influenza wave 2017/18.

The danger is obviously no greater than that of many other viruses. There is no evidence that this was more than a false alarm.

A reproach could go along these lines: During the Corona crisis the State has proved itself as one of the biggest producers of Fake News.

So far, so bad. But it gets worse.

The report focuses on the “manifold and heavy consequences of the Corona measures” and warns that these are “grave”.

More people are dying because of state-imposed Corona-measures than they are being killed by the virus.

The reason is a scandal in the making:

A Corona-focused German healthcare system is postponing life-saving surgery and delaying or reducing treatment for non-Corona patients.

Initially, the government tried to dismiss the report as “the work of one employee”, and its contents as “his own opinion” – while the journalists closed ranks, no questions asked, with the politicians.

But the 93-pages report titled “Analysis of the Crisis Management” has been drafted by a scientific panel appointed by the interior ministry and composed by external medical experts from several German universities.

The report was the initiative of a department of the interior ministry called Unit KM4 and in charge with the “Protection of critical infrastructures”.

This is also where the German official turned whistleblower, Stephen Kohn, work(ed), and from where he leaked it to the media.

The authors of the report issued a joint press release already on Mai 11th, berating the government for ignoring expert advise, and asking for the interior minister to officially comment upon the experts joint statement:

“Therapeutic and preventive measures should never bring more harm than the illness itself. Their aim should be to protect the risk groups, without endegearing the availibilty of medical care and the health of the whole population, as it is unfortunately occurring”

“We in the scientific and medical praxis are experiencing the secondary damages of the Corona-measures on our patients on a dialy basis.”

“We therefore ask the Federal Ministry of the Interior, to comment upon our press release, and we hope for a pertinent discussion regarding the [Corona] measures, one that leads to the best possible solution for the whole population”

At the time of writing, the German government had yet to react.

But the facts are – sadly – vindicating the medical experts’ worries.

On Mai 23 the German newspaper Das Bild titled: “Dramatic consequences of the Corona-Measures: 52,000 Cancer Ops delayed.”

Inside, a aeading medical doctor warns that “we will feel the side-effects of the Corona crisis for years”.

More

https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2020/05/29/german-official-leaks-report-denouncing-corona-as-global-false-alarm/

Turkish Multiple Rocket Launcher Spotted In Libya

The Turkish military has deployed at least one T-122 Sakarya multiple launch rocket system (MLRS) in Libya to support forces loyal to the Government of National Accord (GNA).

On May 28, Libyan and Turkish activists shared a photo of the MRLS on a highway near the town of Misrata in northern Libya. The rocket launcher will likely be operated directly by Turkish troops.

Developed by Turkey’s ROKETSAN, the T-122 MRLS consists of two pods of 122 mm launch tubes. The launcher is equipped with an advanced fire control system which calculates firing data automatically for rockets with different warheads and is capable of storing up to 20 target coordinates.

Turkey boosted its support for the GNA in the last few weeks. This enabled pro-GNA forces to make several significant achievements in western Libya, including the capture of al-Watyah Air Base from the Libya National Army (LNA).

The deployment of heavy weapons such as the T-122 MRLS indicates that Turkey is going on with its plans to support GNA forces. Ankara is not only shipping weapons to Libya, but also more Syrian militants.

https://southfront.org/turkish-multiple-rocket-launcher-spotted-in-libya-photos/

Our Grim Future: Restored Neoliberalism or Hybrid Neofascism?

With the specter of a New Great Depression hovering over most of the planet, realpolitik perspectives for a radical change of the political economy framework we live in are not exactly encouraging.

Western ruling elites will be deploying myriad tactics to perpetuate the passivity of populations barely emerging from de facto house arrest, including a massive disciplinary – in a Foucault sense – drive by states and business/finance circles.

In his latest book, La Desaparicion de los Rituales, Byung-Chul Han shows how total communication, especially in a time of pandemic, now coincides with total vigilance: “Domination impersonates freedom. Big Data generates a domineering knowledge that allows the possibility of intervening in the human psyche, and manipulating it. Considering it this way, the data-ist imperative of transparency is not a continuation of the Enlightenment, but its ending.”

This revamping of Foucault’s Discipline and Punish coincides with reports about the demise of the neoliberal era being vastly overstated. Instead of a simplistic plunge into populist nationalism, what is on the horizon points mostly to a Neoliberalism Restoration – massively spun as a novelty, and incorporating some Keynesian elements: after all, in the post-Lockdown era, to “save” the markets and private initiative the state must not only intervene but also facilitate a possible ecological transition.

The bottom line: we may be facing a mere cosmetic approach, in which the deep structural crisis of zombie capitalism – barely moving under unpopular “reforms” and infinite debt – still is not addressed.

Meanwhile, what is going to happen to assorted fascisms? Eric Hobsbawm showed us in Age of Extremes how the key to the fascist right was always mass mobilization: “Fascists were the revolutionaries of the counter-revolution”.

We may be heading further than mere, crude neofascism. Call it Hybrid Neofascism. Their political stars bow to global market imperatives while switching political competition to the cultural arena.

That’s what true “illiberalism” is all about: the mix between neoliberalism – unrestricted capital mobility, Central Bank diktats – and political authoritarianism. Here’s where we find Trump, Modi and Bolsonaro.

From Anthropocene to Capitalocene

To counterpunch zombie neoliberalism, those believing another world is possible dream of a social-democratic revival; wealth redistribution; or at least neoliberalism with a human face.

That’s where eco-socialism jumps in: a radical rupture with the diktats of the Goddess of the Market, the product of a healthy rebellion against ultra-authoritarian neoliberalism and illiberalism.

In sum, that could be seen as a soft adaptation of Thomas Piketty’s analyses: to break the domination of capital by economic democracy, in the spirit of mid-19th century social democracy.

It’s quite interesting, in this aspect, to consider Fully Automated Luxury Communism, by Aaron Bastani, a refreshing utopian manifesto where we see that once society is stripped off everything superfluous linked to alienation, it’s still possible for everyone to find all the necessary technical means to live “in luxury” without recourse to infinity growth imposed by Capital.

And that brings us to the direct link between the Anthropocene and what has been conceptualized by French economist Benjamin Coriat as the Capitalocene.

Capitalocene means that our current state of appalling planetary degradation should not be linked to an undefined “humanity” but “to a very defined humanity organized by a predatory economic system.”

The state of the planet under the Anthropocene must be imperatively linked to the hegemonic economic system of the past two centuries: the way we developed our system of production and legitimized indiscriminate predatory practices.

https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2020/05/29/our-grim-future-restored-neoliberalism-or-hybrid-neofascism/

https://twitter.com/Khamenei_tv/status/1265677848142123010

>>9364365

repost next clown baker Doc is a gatekeeper