news

Won a local by-election that I've been doorknocking for recently

Won't say anymore as it'll definitely dox me but it's a score.

Thank you Reform for splitting the Tory vote.

An interesting piece that tries to answer the question: "Why does everybody in the West think that China's economy is doing very badly when it demonstrably isn't?" from a very capitalist Hong Kong research group thinktanky place:

At an investment conference in Kuala Lumpur recently, I caught up with an old friend and Gavekal client. Over coffee between sessions, we talked about one of the most visible changes of the last few years in Asia: the Chinese cars that have so quickly appeared on roads across the continent. This led us to the comments made in September by Ford chief executive officer Jim Farley. Freshly returned from a visit to China, Farley told The Wall Street Journal that the growth of the Chinese auto sector poses an existential threat to his company, and that “executing to a Chinese standard is now going to be the most important priority.” By any measure, this is an earth-shattering statement.

Making cars is complicated. Not as complicated as making airliners or nuclear power plants. But making cars is still the hallmark of an advanced industrial economy. So, the idea that China is suddenly setting the standards that others must now strive to meet is a sea-change compared with the world we lived in just five years ago.

This led my friend to question how Farley and other auto industry CEOs could have fallen quite so deeply asleep at the wheel. How could China so rapidly leapfrog established industries around the world without all those very well paid Western CEOs realizing what was happening until two minutes ago?

The rest of the piece continues in that more informal style, so I'll just summarize the rest of the article:

During the pandemic, and especially as the Ukraine War was causing chaos, nobody from the West really bothered to visit China, and so haven't seen how things have developed. This is in line with a Dengist strategy of keeping a low profile and not flaunting their capabilities, but it wasn't as if China was stopping them from visiting - CEOs just had other things to worry about with supply chain disruptions.

The author then basically says that China is doing capitalism better than the West, and now the West is (rather hilariously) backing away from jerking off the very concept of globalization and now think tariffs are awesome again.

Next, he talks about how the West has been pretty consistently racist against Asia throughout history, and these racist impulses still very much exist, so they would naturally underestimate China. There's also the fact that China is a communist state, and everybody in the West is brought up on anti-Soviet propaganda (the author doesn't use that word, unfortunately).

He moves on to explaining how the West is assuming that China = Japan 30 years ago, with inaccurate similarities drawn between their economic situations. The West is saying to itself that China will need to do massive fiscal stimulus to keep growing and get out of its "rut", but they don't seem to be considering if this rut is actually intentional, in order to bring down Chinese real estate and focus on more productive endeavors. This graph says it all:

There's no real conception that the collapse in real estate might actually be the policy and not the catastrophic consequence of like, communists not understanding Economics 101. The government explicitly said that this was the goal the entire time. Additionally, the property bust has hit the biggest cities the hardest, especially among millennials, but third and fourth tier cities are doing fairly well (the rural situation is complicated but dissatisfaction is concentrated in older people there). As the first and second tier cities are the most often visited by Westerners, their image of China is disproportionally negative. Meanwhile, in the third and fourth tier cities, there has been an industrial and transportation boom, which has gone almost unreported in the West.

Some more explanations for Western negativity include a general tendency to report bad news more than good news ("China is FIVE DAYS from TOTAL COLLAPSE!" gets more clicks than "Things are doing pretty good in China.") as well as China's lackluster stock market performance relative to its massive improvements, and Americans hyperfocus on stocks.

And, of course, the final contributing factor: that the US is pumping hundreds of millions of dollars to "...raise awareness of and increase transparency regarding the negative impact of activities related to the Belt and Road Initiative, associated initiatives, other economic initiatives with strategic or political purposes, and coercive economic practices.” via the Countering the PRC Malign Influence Fund Authorization Act.

Two unrelated thoughts:

1. Trump's batshit crazy cabinet actually proves that voting Trump was the correct accelerationist position. If you wanted to accelerate the downfall of American hegemony and the weakening of American institutions by appointing the biggest dumbasses on the planet, then you got your wish with this 2nd Trump admin. I sympathize with Americans comrades, but chickens come home to roost like the great martyr Malcolm X said.

2. Russians actually entered deep into Kupiansk, I can't believe my eyes. Actually insane development, I didn't expect this at all so quickly honestly. It says a lot about the state of Ukrainian defences at this point. The story of Kupiansk is very interesting and serves as a good blueprint of the future of how Ukrainian territories will be integrated into Russia. Russia took over Kupiansk without a fight in February 2022, because the mayor was an intelligent man who spared the city from unnecessary bloodshed by calling the Russian command and telling them that they're free to enter the city without needlessly destroying infrastructure and civilian life. Civilians stayed, got their wages from Moscow, repairs were done quickly, civilians didn't leave, schools switched to Russian which the population already spoke perfectly, and that angered western media so much. When the Ukrainians took back the city in September 2022, mass arrests took place and sob stories were planted in media. The city was turned into a military hellhole by the AFU and most civilians had to flee. Russia kinda stabbed those people in the back during that disastrous period, but that's another discussion.

these are the people that lecture you about anti-semitism and racism

Continuing their state-protected tour of violence, dozens of Israeli fans beat a french fan in the stands of the France v Israel match the other night. Some media has framed it as 'booing and clashes' but more and more videos from the game have been appearing since then.

Police and security did little to nothing to stop the violence as fans further down the stands looked on helplessly, but arrested French fans trying to get others out of the mob of Israeli hooligans. After the match an Israeli fan in an IDF tee shirt was interviewed by the French media grinning and saying the level of security was "wonderful, magnificent, maybe too much even" before pointing out that they had a "small incident in Block K" which they dealt with "directly". There's also video of French fans showing police and security, with video evidence on their phones, that the Israel fans were the aggressors. Of course they were ignored.

Macron and other French ministers were at the match to "show their support for fighting anti-semitism" after Amsterdam. They didn't mention or condemn the Israeli violence against French fans afterward from what I can see.

When the leaders of European states repeatedly and reflexively defend Israeli violence against and above their own citizens as victims - in countries that are already sliding ever-rightward - they're pouring fuel on the kindling of actual antisemitism. It's going to end very badly indeed.

Fantastic news everyone

Houthi rebels are brandishing increasingly sophisticated weapons, including missiles that "can do things that are just amazing," the Pentagon's chief weapons buyer said at an Axios event.

Lol. Lmao even. At this point, if I was the Pentagon I would simply hire Yemeni engineers

Under Secretary of Defense for Acquisition and Sustainment Bill LaPlante on Wednesday said the Houthis "are getting scary."

"I'm an engineer and a physicist, and I've been around missiles my whole career," he said at the Future of Defense summit in Washington, DC. "What I've seen of what the Houthis have done in the last six months is something that — I'm just shocked."

https://www.axios.com/2024/11/14/laplante-houthi-antiship-missiles-iran

The Haka in the NZ parliament video has been quite viral on Arab social media circles in the past two days, and it has generated some pretty interesting reactions that I will share here.

Reaction type number 1: why? The most common reaction is people being completely unaware of the history of Maori peoples in NZ, so they share or comment on the video in an attempt to understand the context of the video. Many comments ridiculing the thing, but most were just curious about who these people are.

Reaction type number 2: damn this is cool. Many thought it was cool and that it shows that Maoris are brave people that are not afraid to capture the white man's institution to do their dance and show their culture.

Reaction type number 3: this is a defeated people. This type of reaction was the most interesting in my opinion, because people made a lot of comparisons to Palestinians inside Israel who participate in elections and have representation in the Knesset. It was a lot of "is this really it?", this is a defeated people whose culture and way of life was mostly decimated by colonisers, and now they're standing in the white man's institutions wearing the white man's clothing and doing song and dance. I have to emphasise that most of these reactions actually came from a place of love for native people, but they saw the Haka in this particular context as a sign of humiliation, not strength. One guy wrote that Israel might let three Palestinians do a dabke in the Knesset in 2050 as they sign a law that deports all remaining Arabs in Greater Israel.

The NYT asks - Why Was There a Broad Drop-Off in Democratic Turnout in 2024? (archive)

Gaza - not mentioned, even though they talk about Harris getting fewer votes than Biden in Dearborn. Grocery prices - not mentioned. Are you better off than you were four years ago? Not mentioned.

Some analysts point out that Ms. Harris was simply the latest political casualty of a postpandemic global trend favoring challengers, no matter the incumbents’ politics, in places like Japan, South Africa, South Korea and Britain.

Mexico? Not mentioned, because then they'd have to point out that incumbent parties that have actually done something to help people out of poverty tend to win reelection.

Loser shit:
https://xcancel.com/QudsNen/status/1856249160623693844

A pro-Israel rally in Washington was expected to draw 40,000 people, but only about 200 attended, according to media reports.

too lazy to make a post but on amerikkkan celebrities, beacons of virtue.

Imagine donating to campaign to fight fascism (together with 700 mln dark money, but putting that aside), and they pay katy perry cool 1 million for appearance

Maduro declares himself a Marxist-Leninist. Says he believes in Marx, Engels, Lenin, Mao-Zedong, Fidel Castro, Bolivar and Chavez.

https://tankie.tube/w/4niduPYSN8w2j6DK7RZpow

EDIT: The quality of this is shit I'll reupload.

EDIT2: Reup https://streamable.com/cijwwe

are you client maxxxing rn, hexbears? I'm my kitty's client

disgusting husks of human beings, absolutely perversion from top to bottom in that department of anything resembling morality

Twitch declares that “Zionist” is a slur, will issue bans for criticizing “individuals” based on their “religious beliefs or background” (genocide, settler colonialism)

https://archive.ph/qwX4r

Direct implications for leftist anti-genocide influencers like Hasan and his platform, also possibly setting precedents for mass censorship and removal of other Palestinian and anti-genocide organizing on major social media networks.

[Post: https://hexbear.net/post/3904798]

As expected, the transphobic Moon of Alabama is the first 'right wing but anti war' website to make the beautiful argument that just because Trump is gonna appoint even bigger warmongerers and neocons than last time, that doesn't mean he'll listen to them. Looking forward to even more copium along the way.

Elon Musk, Ramaswamy land Trump admin roles

Trump announced Tuesday that Musk and Ramaswamy would lead his “Department of Government Efficiency” (DOGE), an initiative meant to “slash excess regulations, cut wasteful expenditures” and restructure federal agencies.

Real government hours

Listen folks, I'm going to make Elon Musk, very handsome patrician, I'm going to make him the doge of Venice and it's going to be great. There's so much waste, the failing Castellani faction and sleepy Marino Faliero—they’ve wasted trillions of ducats, folks. Trillions! And they’ve been giving your tax ducats to illegal immigrants from the Papal States ro come here and make our canals unsafe at night. The crooked Castellanis even tried to frame me and send the Lords of the Night after me, even though I didn't do anything wrong.

We’re going to make Venice great again with Elon! He’s amazing—the most divorced man in Venice, his kids won't talk to him, very sad, but don’t be fooled. He’ll board the Bucentaur in full regalia, throw that golden ring into the sea every year—the best ring toss ever—marrying our serene republic to the sea. More efficient, more patriotic, better than anyone has ever tossed a ring.

It’s going to make life better for every Venetian. They told me, “Donald, you can’t do it! You can't make Elon the doge!” but I'm doing it folks, I'm doing it. He's going to be so great, like when he took over the town criers and put an X on their uniforms, even though all the haters and losers wanted to keep the silly bird. And now it is a huge success, folks. And that’s what he’ll do for Venice

༼ つ ◕_◕ ༽つlinky

European Liberals realising that American social media is designed for political interference is so funny.

the worm has some good ideas

Nah man, this cabinet is actually insane.

Biden Allows Ukraine to Strike Russia With Long-Range U.S. Missiles

Big development. Russia previously drew a very clear red line about this.

Speaking in St Petersburg, President Putin sent a clear warning to the West: don’t allow Ukraine to use your long-range missiles to strike Russian territory.

Moscow, he said, would view that as the “direct participation” of Nato countries in the war in Ukraine.

“It would substantially change the very essence, the nature of the conflict,” the Kremlin leader continued.

“This will mean that Nato countries, the USA and European states, are fighting with Russia.”

He claimed that, for missile launches into Russia, Ukraine would require data from Western satellites and that only servicemen from Nato member states would be able to “input flight missions into these missile systems”.

Trump won Deerborn, Michigan, libs on Twitter are already calling for pogroms.

it is november 13 and stalin saved the world from fascism

Politico: "Donald Trump Jr. taunts Zelenskyy about ‘losing your allowance’".

Russians have entered the central districts of Kupiansk, Chasiv Yar and Kurakhove, all within 3-4 days. Insane pace compared to just a few months ago. All three advances will completely reshape the upcoming year of the war in Ukraine. Taking eastern Kupiansk will collapse the north Oskol front for Ukraine and force a withdrawal from a significant chunk of land. The fall of Kurakhove will force a withdrawal from south Donetsk into less fortified regions, which will most likely mean that Russia enters Dnipro Oblast for the first time in early 2025. And the fall of Chasiv Yar means that Russia will control the highest points in the whole Donetsk region and will open up an opportunity to basically roll down from the hills of Chasiv Yar into the Kramatorsk - Konstantinivka line. We're firmly in the opening stages of a complete collapse of the AFU now, the way that the Kupiansk offensive has happened was unthinkable a few months ago. Russians just drove like 5km deep into Ukrainian lines with basically no resistance and could then reinforce that opening quite easily. All that is happening while Russia have seized border villages with no resistance in Chernihiv and Kharkov Oblasts, and have also started a new offensive in Zaporozhye/Donetsk close to the strong fortified towns of Velika Novosilka, Gulaypole and Orikhiv. Disastrous situation for the AFU.

From Rania Khalek’s twitter:

Lebanon needs air defenses and the fact that no country has even pretended to offer that shows what a cowardly world we live in.

Palestine also needs air defenses.

Israel is dropping bombs on residential buildings every day and massacring entire families. We’re all just helplessly watching bc this world is pathetic.

The only country that can do that is Russia and they’re being stretched to the limit by endless waves of Ukrainian drones and the occasional yet unpredictable long range missile strikes supplied by Western countries. All of their air defense systems are already fully occupied and new production (which is being churned out slowly) obviously goes to the Ukrainian front.

The West kept Ukraine fighting for a reason.

President-elect Donald Trump, addressing House Republican leaders at a Washington hotel on Wednesday, quipped that he "can't get rid of" Elon Musk, perhaps his most influential advisor during the presidential campaign.

"Elon won't go home. I can't get rid of him—at least until I don't like him," Trump joked, acknowledging Musk's growing presence in his inner circle. "He's behaving as if he's a co-president and making sure everyone knows it," one of the sources told NBC News.

german parliament enacts "anti-antisemitism" law effectively banning pro-palestinian speech

i know this is a somewhat older article but the ramifications for german anti-zionism are terrifying and should be brought to international attention.

Julie Alli (host speaker of Salaamedia) now openly refers to it as "Nazi israel" in addition to the "Zionist Apartheid entity" and she even doubled down since this morning while interviewing the coordinator for the Palestine Solidarity Committe Prof. Usuf Chikte. He also on live radio stated that if Zionists don't want to be called Nazis, then they should not be Nazis.

I should start putting these interviews on TankieTube

LMAO, wtf?

BREAKING: Trump names Fox News host Pete Hegseth as Secretary of Defense

I'm guessing this guy is a demonic genocidal freak like the rest of them?

seems like government of lebanon will sign something

yesterday un voted again milei simping aside

Sucks to suck:
https://westafricaweekly.com/shares-of-australian-mining-company-fall-32-after-mali-detains-ceo-and-two-executives-on-corruption-charges/

Police suppress pro-Palestine protest against Hillary Clinton in Belfast

Irish police pushed back pro-Palestine students and academics who held a protest inside the campus of Queen’s University in Belfast, denouncing the visit of former US presidential candidate Hillary Clinton.

Palestine supporters protested Clinton’s visit, accusing her of supporting the Israeli war on Gaza and Lebanon. The protest, which featured Palestinian flags and people drenched in fake blood, was met by police.

Police arrested several protesters leading dozens to demonstrate in Belfast for their release. The former US secretary of state’s visit to Belfast was to participate in the Global Innovation Summit.

Video https://xcancel.com/CYMBelfast/status/1857404826193154327

As stated in my post in selfcrit, I'm staying on the site to host the news megathreads and will keep posting as normal.

I already completely made up my mind. My post there wasn't to try and get people to beg for me to return, it was just to be transparent about why I felt like I was a subpar moderator in light of recent events and therefore why I left. I'm the only mod on self_improvement so I can't just leave (literally, the site UI doesn't allow zero moderators AFAIK) so once we've sorted that out, I will no longer be a part of the mod team and I've already left the mod chat.

Thank the lordt

ACLU cheers house vote blocking 9495

WASHINGTON — The House of Representatives blocked H.R. 9495, the Stop Terror-Financing and Tax Penalties on American Hostages Act, 256-145. Because the House of Representatives was attempting to move the bill on suspension it required a two-thirds majority in order to pass. This legislation would have granted the Secretary of Treasury the unilateral power to investigate and effectively shut down any tax-exempt organization — including news outlets, universities, and civil society groups — by stripping them of their tax-exempt status based on an unilateral accusation of wrongdoing.

Testimony of a British surgeon who spent time in Gaza where he talks about quadcopters coming down after airstrikes and shooting civilians: https://old.reddit.com/r/Global_News_Hub/comments/1gps2bv/british_surgeon_nizam_mamode_testifies_to_the_uk/

Do we know what quadcopter this might be? I have never seen footage of a quadcopter with a gun used in combat yet the claim here is that this was happening day after day? The operational way they're using this must either be really sneaky or so fast in and out that they're never around long enough to be filmed.

So, the Brazilian terrorist (the Liberal Joker lol) was a locksmith and a landlord. Most of his money came from renting out a building to various people. It seems he was married to a random woman, who is also a far-right Bolsonaro supporter, and she confirmed that she saw him googling things about bombs and terrorism, and also confirmed that the couple (before divorcing in 2023) went to protests in 2022/2023, where they begged the Army, the US, aliens and God (that's not a joke, by the way) for a coup.

She said she knew her ex-husband was going to kill Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes and called the judge an animal that deserved to be killed, she said that to the Federal Police investigators. And to make things even funnier, this couple also stole money from the government's social programs by falsifying documents, which makes things funny because in the Liberal Joker's manifesto he said he was angry about Lula's Tax Reform because it would target the rich and take money from them to give to useless people who didn't deserve it (he's talking about poor people).

Death to America

The Biden administration will continue to provide military support to Israel despite its failure to meet a U.S. deadline for increasing humanitarian aid to Gaza. A report from humanitarian organizations indicated that Israel did not fulfill most of the U.S. demands.

The U.S. State Department stated it has not found evidence of Israel violating U.S. law, despite reports of ongoing humanitarian crises in Gaza. Humanitarian groups criticized the U.S. decision, highlighting severe shortages of aid and ongoing violence against civilians.

The situation in Gaza remains dire, with reports of high malnutrition rates and limited access to medical care. As the deadline passed, Israeli airstrikes continued, resulting in civilian casualties and further displacement.

https://theintercept.com/2024/11/12/israel-aid-block-gaza-biden/

Malcolm X’s family sues FBI, CIA and NYPD for $100m over his murder

Lawsuit alleges law enforcement agencies knew of plot to kill civil rights leader but did not act to stop it Marina Dunbar and agency Fri 15 Nov 2024 19.42 GMT

The family of Malcolm X, the militant civil rights leader who was assassinated almost 60 years ago, filed a $100m federal lawsuit on Friday that accuses the FBI, the CIA and the New York police department (NYPD) of allowing his murder.

The lawsuit, brought by Malcolm X’s daughter Ilyasah Shabazz and other family members, alleges the law enforcement agencies concealed evidence they knew of the plot to kill him but did not act to stop it.

“We believe that they all conspired to assassinate Malcolm X, one of the greatest thought leaders of the 20th century,” Ben Crump, a civil rights attorney who is representing the family, said at a press conference. US-crime-ASSASSINATION-MALCOMXOrganization of African American Unity member Mustafa Hassan (C), with Civil Rights Attorney Ben Crump (3rd L) and Ilyasah Shabazz (2nd L), speaks at a press conference in New York on July 25, 2023, to discuss developments in the murder of her father, civil rights leader Malcolm X. (Photo by Ed JONES / AFP) (Photo by ED JONES/AFP via Getty Images) Witness claims police said ‘Is he one of us?’ as they restrained Malcolm X killer Read more

The wrongful death lawsuit was announced at a memorial center on the site in New York City where Malcolm X was killed in 1965. It seeks to answer questions surrounding the assassination, and paint an accurate history of the events, Crump said.

It is also intended to bring reparations to the family. There was no comment from the FBI, the CIA or the NYPD by Friday afternoon.

“This cover up spanned decades, blocking the Shabazz family’s access to the truth and their right to pursue justice,” said Crump in a statement. “We are making history by standing here to confront those wrongs and seeking accountability in the courts.”

Malcolm X became prominent as the national spokesperson of the Nation of Islam, an African American Muslim group that espoused Black separatism.

After more than a decade with the group, he publicly broke with it in 1964. He moderated some of his earlier views on racial separation, angering some Nation of Islam members and drawing death threats.

Talmadge Hayer, then a member of the Nation of Islam, confessed in court to being one of the three assassins. But speculation that the government may have been aware of the assassination plan and allowed it to happen has persisted for decades.

Shabazz was two on 21 February 1965, when she, her mother and her siblings witnessed her father being shot and killed while preparing to speak at New York’s Audubon Ballroom in the Washington Heights neighborhood of Manhattan. From theguardian

https://search.app?link=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.thenationalliteracyinstitute.com%2Fpost%2Fliteracy-statistics-2022-2023&utm_campaign=aga&utm_source=agsadl1%2Csh%2Fx%2Fgs%2Fm2%2F4

Illiteracy has become such a serious problem in our country that 130 million adults are now unable to read a simple story to their children

21% of adults in the US are illiterate in 2022

54% of adults have a literacy below 6th grade level

45 million are functionally illiterate and read below a 5th grade level

44% of the American adults do not read a book in a year

The Top 3 states for highest child literacy rates were Massachusetts, Maryland, and New Hampshire, in that order (highest to lowest).

The Bottom 3 states for child literacy rates were Louisiana, Mississippi, and New Mexico, (highest to lowest).

Any American here that could tell me if it's legit. It's shockingly low.