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France has been forced to withdraw its troops from Mali, Niger and Burkina Faso. All three countries have forged closer ties with Moscow.

It was only a matter of time I suppose but the IMF is now focusing its nonsensical ‘growth friendly austerity’ mantra on Japan. In a recent interview, the former Portuguese Finance Minister now in charge of the IMF’s so-called ‘Fiscal Affairs Department’, Vitor Gaspar claimed that Japan is now in a precarious position and must…

Source - Patreon

Source - Patreon

Source - Patreon

He’s very desperate right now Trump issued that call for his cult to protest at the courthouse last night. It’s not surprising. They haven’t shown up to protest for him on the courthouse steps or anywhere else. This was from day 1. There weren’t any more today after he made that call. So he lied: He’s only been able to get a ragtag handful of weirdos to show up at the courthouse and it’s freaking him out. His rallies aren’t drawing like they used to but it’s early in the campaign. The people who come to them at the moment are hard core cultists who love the ritual the same way Grateful dead fans used to follow them all over the world. I know people who follow Bruce Springsteen the same way. But there are no crowds coming to his trial and I would guess it’s because the rallies are a very specific kind of fun get together for the true believers. This isn’t that.

A new report by the Public Accounts Committee found that a lack of government oversight of the system is leaving it open to significant amounts of fraud

He wasn’t the only one, although he appears to have been the only one who was directly conspiring with Trump. Rick Perlstein wrote about the tabloid support for Trump at the time. So did I, writing about the Drudge effect: Some years back, Washington Post reporters Mark Halperin (currently of Bloomberg News and MSNBC) and John Harris (now editor in chief of Politico) wrote a book about political journalism called “The Way to Win: Clinton, Bush, Rove and How to Take the White House in 2008.” In it, they made a famous admission about how Beltway journalism works in the digital age: Matt Drudge rules our world … With the exception of the Associated Press, there is no outlet other than the Drudge Report whose dispatches instantly can command the attention and energies of the most established newspapers and television newscasts. So many media elites check the Drudge Report consistently that a reporter is aware his bosses, his competitors, his sources, his friends on Wall Street, lobbyists, White House officials, congressional aides, cousins, and everyone who is anyone has seen it, too.

When Speaker of the House Mike Johnson pushed through aid to Ukraine this week, it...

In entertainment news, the baby who was this week booted out of comedian Arj Barker’s Melbourne International Comedy Festival show has been signed by agent to the stars Max Markson and announced as a contestant on Channel 7’s Dancing With... Read More ›

The White House brushes off accusations of hypocrisy, courting TikTok while seeking to ban it.

The post As Biden Cheers TikTok Ban, White House Embraces TikTok Influencers appeared first on The Intercept.

The defense will try to say that Trump was just trying to keep these allegedly false accusations about his womanizing from Melania. Please. She knew who she was married to. He’s on record saying he’d be dating Ivanka if she wasn’t his daughter. He once said when asked if he would stay with Melania if she was disfigured in a car crash: “How do the breasts look?” He very famously once said: “You know, it doesn’t really matter what [the media] writes as long as you’ve got a young and beautiful piece of ass.”  She herself went on Howard Stern and said that she and Donald “have incredible sex once a day, sometimes even more.” She had no trouble defending his grotesque Access Hollywood comments: So no, Trump wasn’t worried about Melania. She had a pre-nup.

Supporters worry Khan’s life is in danger and with good reason: The military has a long history of killing deposed leaders.

The post Chuck Schumer Privately Warns Pakistan: Don’t Kill Imran Khan in Prison appeared first on The Intercept.

From his popular podcast, to his travels with Will and Jada Smith, to GAP ads...

The surprising relationship between age and success in rebellions.

The post The Age of Rebellion appeared first on Nautilus.

I’m not so sure Robert Kutner thinks JD Vance is the only guy who can keep the MAGA/corporate coalition going after Trump. He writes: WITH THE PUBLICATION IN 2016 of his best-selling book Hillbilly Elegy, Vance marketed himself as a self-made man who had risen above his troubled origins. For Vance, poverty was all about self-defeating values. In my review of his book in the Prospect, I described Vance as Charles Murray with a shit-eating grin. As I wrote: Hillbilly Elegy turns out to be a very sly piece of work that professes to express great nostalgia and compassion for the hillbilly way of life. (“Americans call them hillbillies, rednecks, or white trash. I call them neighbors, friends, and family.”) But Vance is on the trail of a bait and switch. Despite the down-home charm, he ends up sounding condescending to his neighbors and kin. Vance not only excelled at Yale Law; he is now at a Silicon Valley hedge fund. And, according to Vance, you could be, too—if you weren’t so gol-durned lazy. If you weren’t selling your food stamps, blowing off jobs, deserting your kids, and getting stoned on Oxycontin.

One wonders how the Australian mainstream media will react to the news that India, the so-called biggest democracy in the world, has thrown out ABC correspondent Avani Dias from the country. Dias was denied a visa after her program Sikhs, Spies and Murder: Investigating India’s alleged hit on foreign soil was aired on the ABC Continue reading »