Tag Archives: Europe

How The Shale Revolution Saved Europe from a Great Blackout, by Daniel Lacalle

Posted on January 23, 2022 | Leave a comment

American shale oil is filling in the European green energy gap. From Daniel Lacalle at dlacalle.com:

In October, the governments of Austria and The Netherlands warned of the risk of a “great blackout”. Soaring natural gas prices, lack of security of supply and a challenging outlook of pipeline deliveries from Russia made the governments exceedingly nervous about the chances of providing cheap and reliable energy for homes in winter.

However, an unexpected ally has prevented an energy crisis in Europe and, ironically, it is an ally that was banned in most European nations: Shale gas.

About half of the record U.S. Liquefied Natural Gas volumes shipped in December 2021 went to Europe, up from 37% earlier in 2021, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

While most European nations banned the exploration and development of domestic natural gas resources many years ago, the United States has plenty and competitive supplies thanks to the shale oil and gas revolution, which has made the country almost energy independent. Domestic natural gas production has exceeded U.S. demand by about 10%, according to Reuters.

There is a lesson for the U.S. here. Many European energy policies have been ideologically directed, and massive energy subsidies and political intervention have not strengthened the competitiveness of the economy, secured energy supply, or even reduced significantly carbon emissions.

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Europe’s Multicultural Volcano, by Giulio Meotti

Posted on January 16, 2022 | Leave a comment

Islam is changing the character of Europe and on present trend will dominate it in a few decades. From Giulio Meotti at gatestoneinstitute.org:

  • “[E]nclaves, mini-states and neighborhoods in large European cities will begin to appear. Yes, they will always be a minority. But they are more united and threaten violence. And the state will have to obey their instructions”. — Sergei Markov, Russian political scientist, interview in Lenta.ru, January 3, 2022.
  • Many of the migrants already live on the generosity of European welfare, even as the police, social workers and ambulances do not enter these areas or must be protected when they do.
  • In these lost areas, we are no longer in Europe.
  • On December 8, 2021, during the Feast of the Immaculate Conception, 30 of the Catholic faithful were attacked in the street and threatened with death. The attackers shouted, “kuffars” (“infidels”) and “it is not your home”, Le Figaro reported. “Wallah [I swear] on the Koran, we will cut your throat”, attackers told the priest who opened the procession. This took place not in Pakistan, but in Nanterre, France.
  • In Brussels, according to former Secretary of State Bianca Debaets, “there are too many areas where it is difficult for women and homosexuals to walk”.
  • Although women of foreign nationality are only one-sixth of all women of childbearing age in Belgium, half of all children in Belgium are now born to foreign women…. This is the picture that just emerged from the National Institute of Statistics.
  • One-third of Belgium’s population is of foreign origin; Belgians are already in the minority in Brussels….
  • But as everyone knows, the “Great Replacement” is just a far-right fantasy….
  • This multicultural volcano is not a threat only in the distant future of Europe; it is already in place. The big question is: why is it not stopped?
  • This transformation is the single most important event in Europe. That anyone who reports about it is accused of “racism” and “Islamophobia” suggests that it is a secret too huge and important to be freely discussed.
“We in the West are used to seeing women everywhere around us,” Ayaan Hirsi Ali (pictured) writes in her new book, Prey, before describing that in certain parts of Brussels, London, Paris and Stockholm, “you suddenly notice that only men are visible,” as women “erase themselves” from public spaces. (Photo by Jemal Countess/Getty Images)

“If Europe does not regain control, Islamized mini-states could soon appear”. The prediction comes from the Russian political scientist Sergei Markov. In an interview published by Lenta.ru, Markov notes that European institutions are adapting to the Islamic way of life, values ​​and traditions (the recent campaigns of the Council of Europe in favor of the Muslim veil is an example), and adds:

“Fully Islamized Islamic enclaves, mini-states and neighborhoods in large European cities will begin to appear. Yes, they will always be a minority. But they are more united and threaten violence. And the state will have to obey their instructions”.

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Posted in Civil Liberties, Collapse, Geopolitics, Governments, History, Immigration, Law, Politics, race relations, Religion

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The Not-Ultimatum, by Observer R

Posted on January 15, 2022 | Leave a comment

The U.S. no longer has the economic or military power to maintain itself as the dominant global power, but the U.S. power structure is not ready to accept that truth. From Observer R at thesaker.is:

The documents issued by Russia in December 2021 (the so-called “Not-Ultimatum), concerning modifications to the security architecture in Europe, have created a considerable sensation in the diplomatic and military worlds. Russia politely requested that NATO confine its activities to its location as of 1997, and keep out of the former Warsaw Pact territory. This was to abide by the promises that the United States made to the Soviet Union at the time that the Soviets agreed to disband the Warsaw Pact. Both the United States and NATO responded negatively to the initiative, but agreed to hold negotiations with Russia during the week of January 11-14, 2022.

During the negotiation period many commentators have opined that the intellectual quality of the US official statements and the US think-tank products could be improved. Perhaps all is not lost, however, as at least some US officials have grasped the changes in Russian weapons and the Russian economy that make it necessary to sit down and do serious talking. For example, the top US general has announced that the world has moved from a unipolar setup to a multipolar one, and that the US is now only one of the poles, the others being China and Russia. The US general has engaged in “deconfliction” talks with the top generals of China and Russia—presumably to try and ward off any mistakes that could wind up frying the world to a crisp. In addition, the head of the CIA has allowed the CIA Fact Book to be published publicly showing that China and Russia are much higher-ranked in GDP than most politicians and pundits in the US give them credit for. China is significantly out in front, and Russia is sixth and closing in on fifth place. Finally, a former First Lady and Secretary of State has written that the massive US aircraft carriers are to a large extent obsolete and that the F-35 fighter jet does not live up to expectations. There is a widespread feeling that the US is behind the Russians in hypersonic weapons, air defense, and probably electronic warfare also.

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Posted in Economics, Economy, Eurasian Axis, Foreign Policy, Geopolitics, Governments, History, Military

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Why Russia Is Ready to Check-Mate the U.S. and Its Western Empire, by Finian Cunningham

Posted on January 12, 2022 | Leave a comment

Russia is not going to allow the U.S. and Great Britain to realize their long-held ambition and dominate Eurasia. Russia is strong enough to prevent it, and teamed with China is strong enough to prevent them from exercising much influence at all. From Finian Cunningham at strategic-culture.org:

The Western empire-builders are weakened and exposed in the eyes of their own populations and thus are disarmed politically to pursue confrontation.

Author and commentator Alex Krainer explains in the following interview why Russia is now strong enough to take a definitive stand against the United States and its Western empire-builders. This is the wider historical context for high-level negotiations being conducted this week between Russia and the U.S. and NATO in which Moscow has asserted red lines for its national security.

Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the U.S.-led Western powers became deluded with arrogant entitlement. As Krainer points out, the Western empire-builders presumed to have the right to wage wars and flout international law. For much of the past three-decade period, Russia was too weak economically and politically to challenge this reckless aggression. But now it has grown strong enough to “check-mate the empire’s global ambitions”. This is why war or regime change in Russia has become an obsessive goal for the U.S. and Western partners. It accounts for the relentless sanctions, Russophobia and surge in tensions over Ukraine and more recently Kazakhstan.

Russia is perceived as an obstacle to Western control over the strategically vital Eurasian continent. The prize of Eurasia has long been coveted by Western imperialists, from the British Empire’s Sir Halford Mackinder to the U.S. strategist Zbigniew Brzezinski. As Krainer notes, it was this imperial calculation by the Anglo-American capitalists that led to the building up of Nazi Germany as a bludgeon to destroy the Soviet Union and purportedly to give the empire-builders global hegemony. This imperial machination led to World War II and the greatest conflagration in human history with as many as 85 million dead. The Soviet Union and China accounted for more than half of the death toll.

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Putin Stamps Out the Fire in Kazakhstan and Ukraine, by Tom Luongo

Posted on January 8, 2022 | Leave a comment

As is usually the case, Putin has anticipated the U.S. and European’s next move and has effectively countered it. From Tom Luongo at tomluongo.me:

This week’s events in Kazakhstan are not surprising.

Less than one week before a major summit between the United states NATO and Russia over the security architecture of Eastern Europe, we’re treated to another failed color revolution in the most strategically important place along Russia’s southern border.

There was looting, horrific violence and former government buildings, the ultimate symbols of power, set on fire.

What may have been surprising was how quickly Russia and Kazakh’s President, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev invoked the CSTO to come in and stop the nonsense.   But, if it didn’t happen this way the consequences for Russia and the rest of Asia would have been catastrophic.

Kazakhstan is simply too big and too important for Russia to even consider allowing to fall back into the hands of someone like Nursultan Nasarbaev, a true post-Soviet meglomaniac, Russophobe and self-interested jackass whose double dealings with the West are just shy of those by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan.

This article by Fyodor Lukyanov, brings up a lot of good points about what this intervention means for the future and I highly recommend it. But what’s most important now is that this was a stiff message to Washington, London and Brussels.

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Russia is Done Playing Politics Over Ukraine, by Tom Luongo

Posted on January 7, 2022 | Leave a comment

Vladimir Putin is telling Europe as much as the U.S. that it’s time to fish or cut bait. From Tom Luongo at tomluongo.me:

MOSCOW, RUSSIA – DECEMBER 1, 2021: Russia’s Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Maria Zakharova gives a weekly press briefing. Russian Foreign Ministry/TASS

As we approach next week’s big summit between the U.S./NATO and Russia over tensions in Ukraine it’s important to understand just where things between everyone stands. Russia’s Foreign Ministry, normally the soul of understatement and infuriating politeness, has been ratcheting up the blunt over the past couple of months.

Nothing else seems to get the attention of U.S. and European so-called diplomats and decision-makers.

These are people who arrogantly believe it is their right and privilege to demean everyone else they don’t respect or agree with. They sincerely don’t like it when it comes back at them.

To that point, the recent dustup between Russian Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Maria Zakharova and the EU’s top diplomat Josep Borrell was outstanding. Zakharova is thorough, eloquent, and nearly always correct.  She accomplishes these things because she has the truth on her side.

Borrell published an interview with the German propaganda rag, Die Welt, which read like an application for his long-term commitment to Arkham Asylum for solipsism bordering on insanity in which he complained Russia had no right to make demands of the EU or NATO.

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The Year of the New Normal Fascist, by C.J. Hopkins

Posted on December 17, 2021 | Leave a comment

It’s no exaggeration to say that what’s gone on inparts of Europe, Australia and New Zealand, and parts of the U.S. qualifies as fascism. From C.J. Hopkins at consentfactory.org:

And so, as 2021 goose-steps toward its fanatical finish, it is time for my traditional year-end wrap-up. It’s “The Year of the Ox” in the Chinese zodiac, but I’m christening it “The Year of the New Normal Fascist.”

And what a phenomenally fascist year it has been!

I’m not talking amateur fascism. I am talking professional Class-A fascism. Government and corporate sanctified fascism. Bug-eyed, spittle-flecked, hate-drunk fascism. I’m talking mobs of New Normal fascists shrieking hatred and threats at “the Unvaccinated” as they are dragged off “Vaccinated Only” trains, painting Nazi-era messages on their windows of their stores, leaders of government fomenting mass hatred, TV commentators literally quoting sadistic Nazi SS doctors, leftists going full-fascist on Facebook, concentration camps, Goebbelsian propaganda, censorship of dissent … the whole nine yards.

Here in Europe, things are particularly fascist. One by one, New Normal countries are rolling out social-segregation systems, ordering “lockdowns” of “the Unvaccinated,” and otherwise persecuting those who refuse to conform to official New Normal ideology. Austria has made “vaccinations” mandatory. Germany is about to follow suit. “Covid passes” have been approved in the UK. Greece is fining “Unvaccinated” pensioners by reducing the amount of their state-pension payments. Swedes are “chipping” themselves. And so on.

In New Normal Germany, “the Unvaccinated” are under de facto house arrest. We are banned from society. We are banned from traveling. We are banned from protesting. Our writings are censored. We’re demonized and dehumanized by the New Normal government, the state and corporate media, and the New Normal masses on a daily basis. New Normal goon squads roam the streets, brutalizing pensioners, raiding barber shops, checking “papers,” measuring social distances, literally, as in with measuring sticks. The Gestapo even arrested Santa Claus for not wearing a mask at a Christmas market. In the schools, fascist New Normal teachers ritually humiliate “Unvaccinated” children, forcing them to stand in front of the class and justify their “Unvaccinated” status, while the “Vaccinated” children and their parents are applauded, like some New Normal version of the Hitler Youth. When New Normal Germany’s new Chancellor, Olaf Scholz, announced that, “for my government there are no more red lines as far as doing what needs to be done,” apparently he wasn’t joking. It’s only a matter of time until he orders New Normal Propaganda Minister Karl Lauterbach to make his big Sportpalast speech, where he will ask the New Normals if they want “total war” … and I think you know the rest of this story.

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Posted in Civil Liberties, Collapse, Government, Law, Medicine, Politics, Propaganda, Science, Tyranny

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The EU’s Strategic Balance Sheet – Well, Good Luck With That…, by Alastair Crooke

Posted on December 6, 2021 | Leave a comment

Heavily indebted and socialistic Europe in not in a strong position, and has been relegated by the US to a pawn in its machinations against Russia and China. From Alastair Crooke at strategic-culture.org:

How on earth did the EU get into such a strategic mess? The frank answer is by being unreflective, Atlanticist ‘bots’, Alastair Crooke writes.

“The United States will be hosting the online Summit for Democracy on 9 and 10th December, 2021, empowering itself to define who is to attend the event and who is not, who is a ‘democratic country’ and who is not … this will stoke up ideological confrontation and rift in the world, creating new ‘dividing lines’”: So write (jointly) the Ambassadors of Russia and China accredited to Washington.

“China and Russia firmly reject this move … [they] call on countries: to stop using ‘value-based diplomacy’ to provoke division and confrontation”, the Ambassadors warn.

Yet, this is clearly what Biden intends (strategic polarisation). Team Biden is aiming to build a strategic pro-U.S. bloc to pull in more states as adherents, so to isolate Russia and China. Taiwan is being instrumentalised against China (and to Beijing’s fury, has become an invitee to the conference), and Ukraine is being weaponised against Russia. Both are explosive issues. But of the two, it is Ukraine that is the most volatile.

We should not forget however, that America was dabbling with General Chiang Kai-shek from as long ago as 1925. (During WW2, there about one thousand U.S. military advisers in Chiang’s army). And after the war, the U.S. handed Taiwan over to the Kuomintang (Chiang’s political movement), as the platform for instigating insurrection against ‘the communist danger’ in mainland China.

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The NATOstan Clown Show, by Pepe Escobar

Posted on November 29, 2021 | Leave a comment

NATO should have ended when the Soviet Union did. Bereft of a mission, NATO has been making trouble ever since. From Pepe Escobar at strategic-culture.org:

The charade has come to a point that – diplomatically – is quite unprecedented: Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov lost his Taoist patience.

American hysteria over the “imminent” Russian invasion of Ukraine has exploded every geopolitical Stupid-o-Meter in sight – and that’s quite an accomplishment.

What a mess. Sections of the U.S. Deep State are in open revolt against the combo that remote controls Crash Test Dummy, who impersonates POTUS. The neocon-neoliberal axis is itching for a war – but has no idea how to sell it to an immensely fractured public opinion.

UKUS, which de facto controls the Five Eyes spy scam, excels only in propaganda. So in the end it’s up to the CIA/MI6 intel axis and their vast network of media chihuahuas to accelerate Fear and Loathing ad infinitum.

Russophobic U.S. Think Tankland would very much cherish a Russian “invasion”, out of the blue, and could not give a damn about the inevitable trouncing of Ukraine. The problem is the White House – and the Pentagon – must “intervene”, forcefully; otherwise that will represent a catastrophic loss of “credibility” for the Empire.

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Vaccinated, Cured Or Dead, by Raul Ilargi Meijer

Posted on November 23, 2021 | Leave a comment

Some political figures in Europe are peddling rhetoric of the “get vaccinated or die” variety. The question is: will those who die of Covid or at the hands of the authorities for resisting vaccination? Unfortunately, this is not a facetious question. From Raul Ilargi Meijer at theautomaticearth.com:

Europe is panicking over Covid. The more vaccinations there are, the more positive PCR tests. What no-one in Europe is yet ready to acknowledge is that 1/ more vaccinations may be the very cause of more positive tests, and 2/ the vaccinations are a dead-end street to begin with. The present vaccines will not get rid of Covid. Indeed, they may well make the problem – a lot- worse.

No politician or health expert wants to face even the possibility that this is so, because they’re all in a pact-with-the-devil with Pfizer. They must keep using the mRNA vaccines, and more all the time, boosters 3,4,5 etc., and they’re banned from using any other – pharmaceutical- approach.

It is kind of amusing to watch this utter failure go down, but only if you ignore the deaths and misery that have resulted from it, and will in the future. Hey, the official take remains that the vaccines saved millions of lives. Politics, media, industry, it’s a pretty much closed circle presenting the narrative to the public.

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