Post ArBmteSCqElaATRR9k by ByronCinNZ@mastodon.nzoss.nz
(DIR) More posts by ByronCinNZ@mastodon.nzoss.nz
(DIR) Post #ArBhfzAeWKGUaxtZIW by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-02-16T20:55:14Z
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"Nate Silver recently likened Trump’s operational style to ...poker. The bluff is an inherent part of the process. The bluff is more formidable when Trump threatens to up the ante, because America has more reserves of economic and political power than any other country on the planet. Ask Colombia. That power imbalance makes it risky to call him out. And just as risky to provoke his ire by defending the principles under threat."#GordonCampbell, 2025https://www.scoop.co.nz/stories/HL2502/S00011/gordon-campbell-on-surviving-the-47th-us-president.htm(1/?)
(DIR) Post #ArBiBnMBynDvDoSd4C by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-02-16T21:01:00Z
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Looking in from the outside (far, far outside), it seems like Canada, Europe and others Global North countries are finally learning what Korea, Vietnam, Chile, Guatamala, Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, Syria and so many others have known for decades. That the US is a heavily-armed bully, that won't hesitate to use excessive force to ensure its dominance ("shock and awe").(2/?)
(DIR) Post #ArBiYfdaqVh3wPVY3c by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-02-16T21:05:08Z
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Now that the US has entered it's Brezhnev period, totally dominated by corporate stalinists, the rest of the world has to start planning for a post-US future.There are serious proposals floating around for dismantling the US as a single country, as was done with the USSR, and replacing it with an EU style federation. Where current US states can group themselves into internationally recognised states, within a voluntary-membership American union.This is worth serious consideration.(3/3)
(DIR) Post #ArBja0mZobEZlSuflQ by davemosk@mastodon.nz
2025-02-16T21:16:32Z
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@strypey But someone *is* going to call his bluff eventually, which could potentially have cataclysmic consequences with heavy collateral damage.
(DIR) Post #ArBmteSCqElaATRR9k by ByronCinNZ@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-02-16T21:53:38Z
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@strypey I saw this and didn't get the Colombia reference. In the showdown with Colombia over return of Colombian nationals illegally present in the US, it was Trump who backed down by all accounts other than than the mainstream US media. Or is Cambell referencing something else?Watching Trump, he seems to almost always folds when is bluff is called - as long as he can spin it as a victory to his supporters
(DIR) Post #ArBqmW1ICUl9ndhoZ6 by wolftune@social.coop
2025-02-16T22:37:12Z
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@strypey what the healthiest governing structure for any situation looks like is worth imagining, and it shouldn't take an extreme crisis to do that sort of thinking.In the current context, question is (A) envisioning realistic directives and (B) figuring out strategiesI fear the problem pattern of concerned people acting without following coherent effective strategies
(DIR) Post #ArBrfJNOuTskVvAw9A by nonlinear@social.praxis.nyc
2025-02-16T22:47:08Z
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@strypey only in American need Colombia is being perceived as losing negotiations. Colombia demanded something, trump threaten with tariffs, they got what they wanted with on tariffs on them. They won the bluff. Diversify your news sources.
(DIR) Post #ArBrhdlq3WzaLPiUEK by Crystal_Fish_Caves@mstdn.party
2025-02-16T22:47:29Z
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@strypey Cool. Coolcoolcool. Im in! I am already in the center of Ecotopia so lets do this!
(DIR) Post #ArBsHsyczrLnvlyvcu by camille@social.praxis.nyc
2025-02-16T22:54:05Z
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@strypeyInherently untrue. He told Gaza "high noon on Saturday". It is now Monday in Gaza. He just says shit and then spins it to make it *appear* he won.Same with him thinking he has all this leverage over Jordan and Egypt. Frankly, he doesn't. He is a person who OFTEN overplays his hand. However, there is no need to loudly call him out in order to achieve your aims. Most countries don't give a shit if he spins chickensalad out of chicken shit to his followers. Doesn't hurt them none.
(DIR) Post #ArCd9P6irX38ozE2Do by nonlinear@social.praxis.nyc
2025-02-16T23:01:01Z
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@camille @strypey Exactly. Even Colombia situation, they got what they wanted and the “moar tariffs” was an empty bluff. They just don’t care about optics that much. America will be like North Korea, with press praising supreme leader as infallible when rest of the world just routes around it. It will take a while. It will js painful. But it is happening already. Dude nuked americas soft power and intelligence.
(DIR) Post #ArCd9PyxbsR1XCbLlI by camille@social.praxis.nyc
2025-02-16T23:08:19Z
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@nonlinearYeah. He did a lot of dismantling in lightning fast time.Some of it will be painful; some might frankly be a big relief. America is so clearly not trying to be a moral leader anymore, and THANK GOD. They had no business in that role ever.@strypey
(DIR) Post #ArCd9QhcvoADljV1No by nonlinear@social.praxis.nyc
2025-02-16T23:30:39Z
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@camille @strypey Soft power is the cheapest power to maintain. Intelligence is costly but it pays of in a decade. Trump obliterated both all at once (no one would risk sharing info with US voluntarily and be caught in a leak), and America will never be what it was before. Which is bad for us Americans but frankly great for all rest of the world.
(DIR) Post #ArCd9RMOUEm1oAZZvU by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-02-17T07:39:10Z
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@nonlinear> no one would risk sharing info with US voluntarily and be caught in a leak... except for 5 Eyes partners like NZ. *sigh*@camille
(DIR) Post #ArCd9XD2jurJwuFCBU by nonlinear@social.praxis.nyc
2025-02-16T23:02:48Z
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@camille @strypey An entire nation as narcisistic supply 🤷🏽
(DIR) Post #ArCd9YMISzr5Vta6FM by nonlinear@social.praxis.nyc
2025-02-16T23:32:38Z
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@camille @strypey@nzoss.nz Trump will try to force his hands on some key players but American military kept losing occupations as it was, I can only imagine how a hollow clusterfuck it will be under these “efficient institutions” idiots. Military is wasteful, it needs redundancy, and tight information control. These idiots will try to “modernize” it and it will explode on their faces. It’s for the best, people.
(DIR) Post #ArCe48ZN1Shm2Ig4em by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-02-17T07:49:31Z
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@wolftune > I fear the problem pattern of concerned people acting without following coherent effective strategies100%. It worries me even more that some people I talk to here seem so lost in their moralising ideological fantasyland, that they condemn thinking strategically, and seeking broad alliances, as compromising with 'the enemy'. Which if you read Umberto Eco carefully, is a sign of what he calls "ur-fascism" (basically proto-fascism).
(DIR) Post #ArCyRos7uIicyk1LJw by camille@social.praxis.nyc
2025-02-17T11:37:43Z
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@strypeyI'm curious what's going to happen to 5 Eyes in light of the "deep state purge" and US going it alone with Russia.Frankly, I'm content for 5 Eyes to finally blow up. Colonial surveillance that@nonlinear
(DIR) Post #ArDMIYU1rtHcRZrfPc by wolftune@social.coop
2025-02-17T16:04:52Z
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@strypey the way we got to the current catastrophe was almost entirely by un-reviewed, un-questioned, no-discussion emotional activism losing to careful strategizing by those who are undermining healthy societyAttuning to our feelings, our fears and concerns etc is a *separate* step from deciding carefully what actions to take. And it's not about ignoring feelings, it's the opposite. We need to notice *also* the appropriate fears we should have around taking counterproductive action.
(DIR) Post #ArDomDJTwLbCBprUrA by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-02-17T21:24:13Z
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@camille > I'm content for 5 Eyes to finally blow up. Colonial surveillance that100%. Ending NZ participation in US-dominated spy hijinks has long been one of my political goals. With abolishing the GCSB, or at least severely cutting its powers and funding, as stretch goals.I totally supported the Ploughshares action of the folks interviewed in the documentary The Fifth Eye;https://www.nzonscreen.com/title/the-5th-eye-2015Recent events only make it more urgent.(1/2)@nonlinear
(DIR) Post #ArDp1uIOPlrpqDprkG by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-02-17T21:27:03Z
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(2/2)About the kindness thing one could say about the 5 Eyes, while still being truthful, is that it's ..."... an alliance marred by mistrust, mistakes and misjudgments, one that likes to see itself as responsible for keeping its nations safe but has, at times, not only failed in that endeavour but has also contributed to global insecurity."#SteveBloomfield, 2022https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/oct/02/the-secret-history-of-the-five-eyes-untold-story-international-spy-network-by-richard-kerbaj-review#5Eyes #spying #surveillance
(DIR) Post #ArDq5ZVxiideVCUgam by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-02-17T21:38:19Z
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"It is so hard to imagine anything fundamentally different from what we have now. But without these alternate visions, we get stuck on dead center. And we’d better get ready. We need to know where we’d like to go."#ErnestCallenbach, 2008https://www.nytimes.com/2008/12/14/fashion/14ecotopia.html#UtopianFiction #SolarPunk #Ecotopia @Crystal_Fish_Caves
(DIR) Post #ArDqIiE4dtaXHjOPMO by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-02-17T21:41:20Z
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Thanks so much for the reference @Crystal_Fish_Caves, I can't believe I'd never heard of this! It reminds me of The Fifth Sacred Thing by Starhawk, which I've long wished someone would make into a TV series. They did it with The Handmaid's Tale, so why not?
(DIR) Post #ArEENF4kqd03Dzj6gq by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-02-18T02:11:03Z
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"After 300 plus pages of scandal, [Richard] Kerbaj blandly concludes: 'The alliance remains vital in attempting to foresee and combat future threats'. It is a bizarre end to an, at times, brilliant book."#SteveBloomfield, 2022https://www.theguardian.com/books/2022/oct/02/the-secret-history-of-the-five-eyes-untold-story-international-spy-network-by-richard-kerbaj-reviewThis is the realpolitik of the 5 Eyes and its member agencies. Even when allowed to tell some of the stories of how appallingly abusive and antidemocratic they are, you're still supposed to blandly endorse them.#surveillance #spying #5Eyes
(DIR) Post #ArFrKcjWWXYB6CUwsq by wolftune@social.coop
2025-02-17T16:06:07Z
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@strypey George Lakoff has been trying to get progressive politicians and activists to consciously consider communication for decades but few are willing to listenhttps://www.theframelab.org
(DIR) Post #ArFsGWUlsGrgY3CrJ2 by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-02-18T21:12:43Z
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@ByronCinNZ > Or is Cambell referencing something else?The reference to Colombia comes after he says;"America has more reserves of economic and political power than any other country on the planet."Could be a reference to Plan Colombia?https://web.archive.org/web/20160109132325/http://bailey83221.livejournal.com/54324.html
(DIR) Post #ArFsjg7ZAIaKneFr9M by strypey@mastodon.nzoss.nz
2025-02-18T21:18:00Z
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@davemosk > someone *is* going to call his bluff eventuallyAs @ByronCinNZ points out here, his bluff has already been called;https://mastodon.nzoss.nz/@ByronCinNZ/114015785360795325Each time it is, he collapses like a paper tiger. I'm much more worried about Drumpf's weakness being used by Melon Husk and the rest of the DataFarming oligarchs, to take control of the US federal state, and shred any part of it that serves the public interest.