Our Friday News Analysis | What the World Reads Now!

By Glenn Diesen
Substack.com
27 August 2024

Reason, individualism, and secularism are essential components of civilizational development, although they are not the only components. Therefore, the critical focus for discussions about civilizational development should be the limits of reason. Is pre-modern heavy luggage slowing development, or is it the foundational building block of civilization, as the primordial instincts of human nature cannot be transcended?

Between the modern and the pre-modern

The relationship between the modern and the pre-modern is the main issue when exploring the sustainable development of civilization. Does civilizational development entail the modern incrementally replacing the pre-modern, or must modernity be built on the solid foundation of the pre-modern?

In the premodern era, society was organized based on religion, culture, and tradition to sustain group identity and collective consciousness. In contrast, modernity is characterized primarily by reason and individualism, which arose with the Enlightenment, the Industrial Revolution, and liberal political revolutions.

Liberalism tends to consider civilizational development as the modern replacing the pre-modern. Reason replaces the instinctive, and individualism replaces the communitarian. John Stuart Mill cautioned against the “despotism of custom” as culture and traditions are an external authority that imposes constraints on the individual. Liberalism thus often scorns tradition as democracy for the dead as previous generations acquire intrusive influence over the present.

Yet, when building a society based on reason, it must be acknowledged that human beings are divided between reason and instinct, with the latter having evolved over tens of thousands of years and cannot be transcended. As Sigmund Freud acknowledged: “The primitive mind is, in the fullest sense of the word, imperishable.” The principal instinct in human nature is to organize in groups for security and meaning — a foundation for a thriving civilization. From this perspective, modernity can only exist and thrive if firmly rooted in the pre-modern.

Emilie Durkheim observed during the industrialization of France in the 19th century that growing prosperity correlated with the rise of suicides. Similarly, how can we explain that the most developed state in the world today, South Korea, has the world’s lowest birth rate and among the highest suicide rates, and the state attempts to combat loneliness and the crisis of loss of meaning in society? The modern has exhausted the pre-modern. Like a star, civilizations often shine the brightest when decadence has already commenced.

The Excesses of Liberalism

In the birthplace of European civilization and democracy, Plato and Socrates cautioned that free societies would become increasingly accessible. This was a warning as freedom entailed the individual gradually liberating himself from all external authority and the hierarchies that sustained society. Freedom in its purest form would collapse society and replace democracy with tyranny.

Alexis de Tocqueville referred to liberty and individualism as breaking the “chain” that connected all people in pre-modern society, as the individual sought to liberate himself from culture, family, and faith. Tocqueville argued that in the victory of liberty, the individual would “confine him entirely within the solitude of his own heart.” Yet, Tocqueville considered American democracy successful as the spirit of freedom coexisted with and was balanced by the spirit of religion. Nonetheless, Tocqueville believed that the balance between the pre-modern and the modern was fragile as liberty as a revolutionary ideology would, over time, free itself from the pre-modern, such as religion.

The success of the liberal nation-state reflects a similar balance between the pre-modern and the modern. The nation-state is primarily based on the legacy of the pre-modern as a political construct formed based on a shared kinship, history, culture, tradition, and faith. The nation-state became a robust and sturdy vessel for Western countries to develop liberal societies based on reason and individualism. This contrast or balance was the recipe for successful civilizational development. Although, as Plato and Tocqueville would have warned, over time, liberalism would gravitate towards victory by decoupling from the nation-state and thus destroy itself.

Liberalism is an ideology of liberation that thrives in opposition to outdated systems like the monarchy. Without opposition, liberalism can liberate society from the social structures upon which it rests. The political scientist John Herz wrote in 1950 that international idealism “Paradoxically, [has] its time of greatness when its ideals are unfulfilled when it is in opposition to outdated political systems and the tide of the times swells it toward victory. It degenerates as soon as it attains its final goal, and in victory, it dies”.

The contemporary divorce of liberalism from the nation-state represents the individual’s rejection of all imposition by external authority. Objective morality is replaced by moral relativism, the secular state transitions to radical secularism as Christianity is increasingly purged from society, unifying culture is replaced by multiculturalism, the family as an essential institution disintegrates, and the individual now even seeks to liberate itself from biological realities with the current gender ideology. As the individual increasingly identifies solely by itself, it produces a toxic combination of narcissism and nihilism that plagues social cohesion.

…

The Collapse of Liberal Democratic Values

What are the most sacred values of liberal democracies? Our societies are defined mainly by the secular morality of humanism, which is determined by human rights, free speech, democracy, and peace. However, how solid and durable are the sacred values under moral relativism?

In Germany, protesters are now beaten by the police for protesting against genocide as the protests are framed as being “anti-Semitic.” In France, the CEO of Telegram was arrested for refusing to abide by demands for censorship under the moral argument that “content moderation” is required to fight criminality. In Britain, the freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, and freedom to protest have been criminalized to fight “hate” without a clear definition or consistent implementation of the laws. NATO argues that weapons are the path to peace in Ukraine. At the same time, the EU openly punishes member states attempting to restore diplomacy and restart negotiations with Russia as this allegedly appeases and emboldens Russia.

Collective punishment is permitted under the vague assumption that the entire population contributes to some extent economically or culturally to “Putin’s war machine.” Germany thus makes a moral case for even seizing the private belongings of tourists due to their nationality. Unthinkable practices like legalizing the theft of a nation’s sovereign funds are permitted under the guise of helping the victim. In the US, the Democratic Party argues democracy can only be preserved by voting for their candidate and even sabotaging candidates from their party, as the new leaders should be selected by a well-intentioned elite and not elected by the uninformed public. In Germany, the political-media elites are openly discussing the need to ban the main opposition party altogether as it allegedly does not conform to liberal democratic values. Humanitarianism no longer constrains the use of force but is instead used to legitimize the use of force and exempt the West from abiding by international law.

The moral arguments made in society and by our political leaders need more solid grounding …

Continue Reading …

KURSK CHANGED THE WAR.

A discussion with Dmitry Polyanskiy - First Deputy Permanent Representative of the Russian Federation to the United Nations

Watch the video here (39 minutes, 1 second)

By Glenn Diesen
Substack.com
27 August 2024

We discussed the Russian perspective on the invasion of Kursk with Dmitry Polyanskiy, the First Deputy Permanent Representative of the Russian Federation to the United Nations.

Polyanskiy discussed why the Americans have been very silent about the invasion of Russian territory on the diplomatic front, the likely objectives of the invasions, Russia’s response, and the broader consequences.

My main concern is that a direct NATO-Russia war is only prevented by NATO pretending not to be attacking Russia and Russia pretending not to be attacked. With every new escalation, there is less ability and preparedness to pretend we are not in a war. It appears that the Americans are aware that the deep strikes into Russia, the attacks on nuclear power plants, and the invasion of Russian territory take us to the brink of nuclear war.

What is the Side of the Story that is Not Yet Decisive? Edited by Abraham A. van Kempen.

EDITORIAL … The Pendulum Swings and Planet Earth Continues to Spin

Everybody who’s anybody talks about democracy as though we don’t have enough democracies. Or, could it be that many democracies are lost in their ways? Professor Diesen asks the ‘obvious:’ Why are Our Liberal Democratic Values Collapsing?

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. (RFK Jr.), with Tucker Carlson, presses the panic button and laments his misgivings about the Democrats falling off the cliff. That’s why RFK Jr. claims he endorses former President Trump.

France arrested Russia’s boy wonder, Pavel Durov, for the same reason why he ‘escaped’ from St. Petersburg. Dutrov allegedly refuses to homogenize his Telegram platform to ‘world-democratic’ standards, including Russia’s. Has France forgotten why Durov badmouths his homeland? “Freedom is not Free,” writes French correspondent Rachel Marsden.

What’s going on? Matt Taibbi evokes, “As governments everywhere tighten their grip on the Internet, Meta's CEO blows a hole in years of official lies. How authorities brought this on themselves.” What is Matt saying? Democracies are not too different from totalitarian regimes in controlling social media content. RFK Jr told Tucker Carlson that the Democratic Party doesn’t trust the masses. They don’t want freedom of speech. The Democrats, of course, blame the Republicans.

Professor Ian Bremmer’s TED video, “Who Runs the World,” proclaims the answer in 14 minutes, 59 seconds. Though I question the basis of his analysis, I welcome his conclusion—sprinkled with characteristic Western paranoia—which explains the obsession for Western democracies to rein in the multi-billion-populated social media networks like their totalitarian comrades.

In our Monday Edition on 26 August 2024, we published the complete transcript of RFK Jr.’s speech, detailing his reasons for endorsing former President Donald J. Trump.

I was moved. RFK Jr.’s speech was about ‘Helping to Heal a Broken Democracy.’

Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. means what he says. The words ring genuine whether you listen to his crackling voice or read his speech. They come from the heart. RFK Jr. is neither Democrat nor Republican. He shares his thoughts and hopes to transform America as an Independent.

It’s about time.

A democracy where two parties are pitted against each other stirs chokepoints at best and gridlock at worst. Ironically, things get done if one party takes control of the Presidency, Congress, and the Supreme Court. But one party at the helm is less of a democracy for the other party.

For this reason alone, RFK Jr.’s speech is a breath of fresh air.

_________________________

THE NEXT GLOBAL SUPERPOWER ISN'T WHO YOU THINK | IAN BREMMER | TED

Who runs the world? Political scientist Ian Bremmer argues it's more complex than it used to be. 

Watch the video here (14 minutes, 58 seconds)

Presented by: Ian Bremmer, Political Scientist
TED
14 June 2024

With some eye-opening questions about the nature of leadership, he asks us to consider the impact of the evolving global order and our choices as participants in the future of democracy.

Read the full transcript here. 

TOP EU DIPLOMAT SAYS HE'S CONSULTING MEMBER STATES ON SANCTIONS AGAINST ISRAELI MINISTERS FOR ADVOCATING WAR CRIMES AGAINST PALESTINIANS.

Borrell – “There are Israeli ministers who incite against Palestinians and raise ideas that invite the commission of war crimes."

European Union Foreign Minister Josep Borrell, Credit Haaretz Israel

By Amir Tibon

Haaretz Israel
29 August 2024

European Union Foreign Minister Josep Borrell said that the EU has officially asked other member states to impose sanctions on "some Israeli ministers."

Borell requested a meeting of EU foreign ministers in Brussels, which is scheduled to discuss the war in Ukraine and the situation in Gaza.

He added that there are Israeli ministers who incite against Palestinians and "raise ideas that invite the commission of war crimes." The proposed sanctions could include freezing assets in the EU and a ban on entering EU member states.

On Tuesday, Borrell announced that he intends to ask the countries to make a joint decision on imposing sanctions against Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich and National Security Itamar Ben Gvir.

Since his request requires the approval of all 27 European Union member states, the chance they will support it could be higher.

However, the very discussion sets a new standard on the issue of international sanctions imposed on extreme right-wing individuals and entities in Israel.

Even if the request is only approved by some EU countries, some countries may choose to advance the sanctions individually.

TUCKER CARLSON INTERVIEWS RFK JR.

Transcript: Teaming up With Trump, Pavel Durov’s Arrest, CIA, and the Fall of the Democrat Party

Presented by Robert W Malone, Md, Ms
Substack.com
27 August 2024

(0:42) RFK Jr. Endorsing Donald Trump

(11:26) Censorship and Pavel Durov’s Arrest
(34:56) America’s Health Crisis
(42:20) RFK Meeting with Trump
(46:48) Kamala Harris Refusing to Meet with RFK.
(53:36) Why Did They Withdraw Secret Service?
(1:01:48) Would RFK Accept a Position as CIA Director?
(1:05:39) Why Is the Democratic Party Suing RFK?
(1:16:00) Real Environmentalism
(1:26:10) RFK's Plan to Get Trump Elected

Tucker Carlson (00:00:00):
(00:00:30):

So people were shocked. I know a lot of people. Well, we were amazed when you endorsed Trump. I was not surprised because, for all the areas where you disagree on specific issues, there's a consistent theme that I've noticed in both of your lives, which is you've both spent the majority of your life, well, in your case, your whole life in [00:01:00] the American ruling class. Both of you decided that it was corrupt and that you would say so out loud at great risk. At significant risk to both of you. And so it was a matter of time before you aligned somehow. Is that how you see it?

Robert F Kennedy Jr. (00:01:16):

Yeah. There have been many political realignments, about four or five, throughout American history. We're going through one right now with the Democratic Party, and both political parties are changing in this theatrical way.

…

Robert F Kennedy Jr. (00:34:55):

No, I've never done any of that. But anyway, so it became clear to me that if Kamala got elected, the issues that I cared about, which is ending the foreign wars, the unjust wars, immoral wars, the wars of choice like Ukraine, stopping the censorship, which I think is existential for our democracy, and then protecting children from this extraordinary, exploding chronic disease epidemic. Those are the three reasons that got me into the campaign. That's why I ran for president. Those three reasons that if she got elected, I'm 70 years old, that eight years from now, our kids are going to be lost. And if she's present for eight years, my chance to do anything about it would be gone. And then I got a contact from Kelly means, who you know. Well, you've made one of these. One of the best shows ever put on TV was your interview with Callie and his wife, Casey and Callie. For those of you who haven't seen the show, his show is an expert, a genius, brilliant, articulate, eloquent, and an incredibly comprehensive knowledge of the food system and what is corrupting it.

(00:36:19):

What is causing the corruption at the FDA, at USDA, the capture of those agencies by the processed food industry, the chemical industry, and the pharmaceutical industry that profit from sick children? One of the things that Cali says is that there is nothing more profitable in our society today than a sick child because all of these entities are making money on them. The insurance companies, hospitals, medical cartels, and pharmaceutical companies have lifetime annuities. Any child that, and the earlier that kid is sick, they don't want to kill them. They want them to be ill for the rest of their lives. And we have now a whole generation. When my uncle was present, 6% of Americans had chronic disease. Today is 60%. When my uncle was president, did you know about this country's annual cause of chronic disease treatment? Zero. There weren't even any drugs invented for it. Zero. It's about $4.3 trillion today; none of it is necessary.

Continue reading the complete transcript …

HONG KONG EDITORS CONVICTED OF SEDITION IN BLOW TO PRESS FREEDOM

The editors said they published stories in the public interest, but a judge ruled they were guilty of a crime against national security.

Patrick Lam left, and Chung Pui-Kuen of Stand News left the court in Hong Kong last year. Credit...Louise Delmotte/Associated Press

By Tiffany May

Reporting from Hong Kong
New York Times
29 August 2024

The two veterans of Hong Kong’s long boisterous news media scene didn’t shy away from publishing pro-democracy voices on their Stand News site, even as China cranked up its national security clampdown to silence critics in the city.

Then the police came knocking, and more than two and a half years later, a judge Thursday convicted the two journalists — the former editor-in-chief of Stand News, Chung Pui-Kuen, and his successor, Patrick Lam — of conspiring to publish seditious materials on the now-defunct liberal news outlet. Both face potential prison sentences.

The landmark ruling highlighted how far press freedom has shrunk in the city. Local news outlets have already self-censored to survive, and some foreign news organizations have left or moved out staff amid increasing scrutiny from the authorities.

During the trial, prosecutors characterized news articles and opinion pieces published by the two as biased against the government and a threat to national security.

Continue Reading …

WHAT THEY TALK ABOUT WHEN THEY TALK ABOUT WAR

How reporting and the way the US government speaks about the wars it sponsors has changed between the Bush and Biden administrations.

Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, President George W. Bush, and Vice President Dick Cheney at the Armed Forces Farewell Tribute to Rumsfeld at the Pentagon December 15, 2006 in Arlington, Virginia.

By Seymour Hersh

Substack.com
27 August 2024

The last week of August is usually a slow one in my business. As an investigative reporter at the New York Times or the New Yorker, I stayed away from late August. It’s the worst time to drop a good story because few people pay attention.

I did the same last August, while on vacation with my family when I republished one of my old stories in this space. I am doing so again today. Below is a long dispatch from 2006 about the war raging between Israel and Hezbollah. It shows, in troubling detail, the vast difference between today, with the Democratic Party in power, and 2006, when Vice President Dick Cheney dominated foreign policy.

The story linked below is replete with seven sources from here and abroad cited by name and ten more unnamed sources in Israel and Washington, whose job descriptions are made as explicitly as possible. All sources agreed to talk to a New Yorker fact checker to verify their quotes when on or off the record. Those who would not agree to confirm their words with me were not published.

A critical element in the 2006 article is the extent to which those at the top of the Bush administration had no qualms about discussing America’s role in supplying and working with the Israeli military as it engaged Hezbollah. It was clear that we were all in.

What about America’s role in the current Israeli war with Hezbollah? Are our generals providing intelligence and other forms of help, including additional weaponry, to Israel? If so, was it a policy decision made by President Joe Biden with the advice and counsel of Vice President Kamala Harris, the vice president, now facing Donald Trump in this fall’s election? She said as much in her acceptance speech at the Democratic convention last week when she declared that she would never deny Israel the means to defend itself.

Has the vice president been in the loop all along in terms of America’s support for Israel in Gaza and America’s support to Ukraine Prime Minister Volodymyr Zelensky in the current war with Russia, which she defended so vigorously in her acceptance speech last week? It is known that Cheney was an active participant in war planning for Afghanistan, just as Vice President Biden was in the killing of Osama Bin Laden during the Obama administration. Has Harris been equally involved in such life-and-death decisions in her years as vice president?

Is Harris, once elected and in office, committed to Biden’s disastrous support of what is an unwinnable war against Russia in the Ukraine? Is she also committed to spending billions of American dollars on munitions and other aid to Israel? At the same time, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu avoids a ceasefire in Gaza and pursues a war against Hamas that is less and less winnable while killing and maiming tens of thousands of Gazans.

Is Biden’s foreign policy going to be hers? She seemed to uphold it in her acceptance speech at last week’s Democratic Convention.

If so, is it also fair to ask when she learned that President Biden was beginning to fail or, at the least, having moments of minimal lucidity? As a Washington journalist, I was told long ago by others that there were moments when the president blanked out during an interview and needed his wife to finish sentences for him.

Biden’s bad day at the office in June, his disastrous debate with Donald Trump, did not happen suddenly but revealed a condition that had been apparent to many for months at least. The press is not asking many complex questions about when Vice President Harris and the White House staff who still support her knew the truth about Biden’s impairment. It was an internal secret. How long did it last? More than one year?

There is a lot of explaining for the Democrats between now and the election in November. I also think it’s fair to ask if the White House is as involved in the planning and execution of the current Israeli war with Hezbollah as it was during the Bush administration. It is our bombs and other munitions that are being fired.

_________________________

Annals of National Security

WATCHING LEBANON

Washington’s interests in Israel’s war

AUGUST 21, 2006—In the days after Hezbollah crossed from Lebanon into Israel on July 12th to kidnap two soldiers, triggering an Israeli air attack on Lebanon and a full-scale war, the Bush Administration seemed strangely passive. “It’s a moment of clarification,” President George W. Bush said at the G-8 summit in St. Petersburg on July 16th. “It’s now become clear why we don’t have peace in the Middle East.” He described the relationship between Hezbollah and its supporters in Iran and Syria as one of the “root causes of instability.” Subsequently, he said it was up to those countries to end the crisis. Two days later, despite calls from several governments for the United States to take the lead in negotiations to end the fighting, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice said that a ceasefire should be put off until “the conditions are conducive.”

Continue reading …

ZUCKERBERG DEFIES THE BORG

As governments everywhere tighten their grip on the Internet, Meta's CEO blows a hole in years of official lies. How authorities brought this on themselves

By Matt Taibbi
Substack.com
27 August 2024

On April 9th, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan sent a letter to Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg reminding him of a subpoena seeking communications between Meta, the FBI, and “alleged foreign influence on election integrity.” Jordan’s office subsequently released a “Facebook Files” series, revealing documents showing Meta executives worrying about “continued pressure… including from the White House” to remove content.

Zuckerberg yesterday sent a letter that in a country with a functioning news media would have significant ramifications. Not in direct response to Jordan’s April query, it appears to have been sent at Zuckerberg’s own volition and is filled with passages deeply embarrassing to authorities. The first is about pressure to “censor” — specifically “censor,” not “moderate” or “exercise oversight”:

               In 2021, senior officials from the Biden administration, including the White House, repeatedly pressured our teams for months to censor certain COVID-19 content, including humor and satire, and expressed frustration with our teams when we disagreed… I believe the government was wrong, and I regret that we were not more outspoken about it…

Another was about Meta’s blocking of Miranda Devine’s 2020 New York Post Hunter Biden after being warned by the FBI:

               The FBI warned us about a potential Russian disinformation operation about the Biden family and Burisma in the lead-up to the 2020 election.

               That fall, when we saw a New York Post story reporting corruption allegations involving then-Democratic presidential nominee Joe Biden’s family, we sent that story to fact-checkers for review and temporarily demoted it while waiting for a reply.

               It’s since been made clear that the reporting was not Russian disinformation, and in retrospect, we should not have demoted the story.

Zuckerberg’s letter is a stiff poke in the eye to authorities, who brought this on themselves:

While Jordan has been applying steady pressure to Meta and other platforms for years, pro-censorship authorities have recently cracked the whip on firms like Zuckerberg’s with increased ferocity. This past weekend, Telegram founder Pavel Durov was arrested in France for failing to roll over with sufficiently canine enthusiasm for European authorities.

Durov has things in common with Zuckerberg. He was known originally for founding V Kontakte, a Russian version of Facebook. His arrest was based on a new enforcement principle implicit in U.S. government dealings with firms like Meta. If agencies like the FBI were once understood to have the responsibility for rooting out and stopping crimes like drug dealing and human trafficking, a new approach forces CEOs like Durov and Zuckerberg to police their platforms as governments want or assume criminal responsibility for their customers' behavior or disfavored speech.

               Involuntary deputization is a bitter pill for any industry leader to swallow.

Like other tech CEOs, Zuckerberg finds himself between a rock and a hard place. From one side, he sees subpoenas and investigations of censorship. On the other, he faces strident demands on content from authorities whose idea of “accountability” has gone beyond crippling penalties to detention. This is not just coming from Europeans.

Former National Security Council and White House official Alexander Vindman reacted to the Durov news by referencing a “growing intolerance for platforming disinfo” and a “growing appetite for accountability.” His specific threat was to Elon Musk:

Rumble chief Chris Pavlovski waited to comment on the Durov news until he’d “safely departed from Europe”:

This is a classic Hobson’s choice. Between complying with an investigation into government overreach and having to bend over forever for rapacious authorities who are also bone-stupid groupthinkers who’d surely destroy firms like Facebook and Rumble if left to their devices (hint: customers won’t knowingly rush to sign up to be spied on and fed political propaganda), any CEO with an instinct for self-preservation will take the first door every time.

Zuckerberg could keep rolling over, ceding more and more control of Meta to government goons, or he could try to convince officials to back off by handing out sample doses of pain. In that context, the letter makes sense. Officials surely know the Meta CEO has bloodier material to release if he wants. Might this sneak peek incentivize them to at least let Meta sit out the coming election cycle? It’s not an accident that Zuckerberg closed his letter to Jordan with a simple message, which read like it was written for another audience:

               “My goal is to be neutral and not play a role one way or another — or even appear to be playing a role.”

The letter has potent warnings, the most obvious being the “reporting was not Russian disinformation” portion. On August 6, 2020, the FBI briefed Senators Ron Johnson and Chuck Grassley, warning both that by investigating the Hunter Biden/Burisma story, they were advancing a “Russian disinformation” campaign. Worse, government sources subsequently leaked news of that briefing to the Washington Post, reporting that the Republican Senators had been given a “defensive briefing” by the FBI to see “how they respond” to being informed their investigation was seen advancing Russian interests.

               “They’re now on notice,” is how former FBI official-turned-media-sleazeball Frank Figliuzzi put it.

Zuckerberg’s letter touches on this larger story. The FBI involved itself in electoral politics by lying to business leaders and Congress about the origin of the Burisma tale. Senators Johnson and Grassley were bluntly threatened, informed that the FBI considered their investigation to be in service of a Russian plot and put “on notice” that their behavior going forward would be monitored.

               Was Facebook similarly “warned”? What would that record look like? What would Zuckerberg say about it if he could give a frank and extended interview?

As for the “censor” portion, here’s a short list of news organizations that spent years scoffing at the idea that Facebook/Meta “censored” figures like Robert F. Kennedy, Jr.

There’s Poynter/Politifact, NPR (which rolled its eyes at “the idea that fact-checking… amounts to censorship”), Politico (“there is no government censorship… the government neither coerces nor threatens private citizens or businesses”), BBC(censorship claims are among “examples of Mr Kennedy spreading conspiracy theories”), the New Yorker, and countless others. Here’s Dana Bash staring into the camera and saying, “Biden didn’t set out to censor” Kennedy’s speech:

               My old editor from Rolling Stone, John Hendrickson, has built a cottage industry writing RFK Jr. hit pieces in The Atlantic. Days ago, he published “Why RFK Jr. Endorsed Trump,” saying a “conspiratorial” Kennedy “sounded like a jilted lover,” for claiming exactly what Zuckerberg just confirmed:

               The Democratic establishment, he claimed, had weaponized government agencies against him and his campaign. He accused Biden of colluding with media companies to “censor” him…

I asked John if Zuck’s letter, in conjunction with the infamous email from Biden Administration Clarke Humphrey asking that a Kennedy post be taken down “ASAP,” might get him to at least stop scoffing at the word “censor.”

He hasn’t replied—no one will. Because reporting is done in herds, no one wildebeest can break formation without screwing things up for the others. So, they’ll all hold the line until they all stop holding the line. This is why a multi-billionaire like Zuckerberg, a human supertanker whose tiniest move causes market-disrupting fluctuations in his company’s share price, can correct himself faster than mere line reporters for media companies.

Governments can’t allow the public to have a debate about whether or not they are “censoring” people, which is why everyone who’s made claims in that direction, from Durov to Elon Musk to Glenn Greenwald to Max Blumenthal to me, has been tarred with the Hitler-of-the-month treatment in the press and dismissed as quacks, Trump supporters, or both.

Zuckerberg is putting “censor” in writing forces the Dana Bashes of the world to start adding the Meta CEO to their already bloated list of Putin-loving right-wing fabulists. This technique is already stretched beyond the limits of plausibility, and a total defection from the Bullshit Cartel of Zuckerberg — whose internal analysts indeed have a more accurate read on the population’s leanings than any poll agency — would make continued dismissals of censorship claims all but impossible. If he gave full evidence to someone like Jordan, it would make the Twitter Files look like a mild appetizer.

Some involved with the Murthy v. Missouri Supreme Court case on digital censorship are a bit upset today, irritated that Zuckerberg’s admissions came too late to help make their public case. As someone who dealt with frustration trying to roll the same story uphill and whose articles are frequently vaporized on Meta without explanation, I understand but choose to look on the bright side. Zuckerberg’s letter can only be good news. Our idiot ruling junta finally pushed too far, and a man moved to offer authorities a taste of embarrassment can indeed be convinced to serve the whole meal.

Mr. Zuckerberg, can we hear the rest?

FYODOR LUKYANOV: THE ARREST OF TELEGRAM’S BILLIONAIRE BOSS SHOWS THAT BIG CHANGES ARE COMING

Significant changes are coming to the global information sphere, and the Telegram founder’s standing is a canary in the coal mine.

Telegram CEO Pavel Durov at the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Spain, February 23, 2016. © Getty Images / Getty Images

By Fyodor Lukyanov

HomeWorld News
27 August 2024

Fyodor Lukyanov is the editor-in-chief of Russia in Global Affairs, chairman of the Presidium of the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, and research director of the Valdai International Discussion Club.

The arrest of Telegram founder Pavel Durov when he decided to take a little trip to Paris has caused a stir in various spheres—from the business and tech world to media and politics. We will focus on the latter, especially as the incident is becoming another milestone in a broader political reorganization.

Durov comes from a niche that claims transnational status above all else. Information and communication technologies have turned the world into a shared space and abolished sovereign jurisdiction. The enormous influence that the IT giants have acquired has been converted into gigantic amounts of money, which has, in turn, increased their influence further. Transnational corporations have always existed in mining, engineering, and finance areas. However, despite their international character, they were still tied to particular states and interests. The global communications industry and its innovation sector have dared to break that link.

The period of globalization that lasted from the late 1980s to the late 2010s favored this sort of attitude. It encouraged the creation of a level playing field on which the most developed countries had a clear advantage. They benefited the most. The costs associated with the techno giants’ growing ability to manipulate societies—including their own in the West—were not seen as critical.

The crisis of liberal globalization has led to a change in the international reality (you could also invert that statement and say the reverse without changing the essence). Thus, the willingness to play by standard rules has rapidly and universally diminished. What is fundamental is that this applies even where these laws were originally written in the leading states of the Western community.

Read more
Telegram founder finds out that ‘freedom’ isn’t free.

The previous era has not disappeared without a trace. The world has become fiercely competitive, but it remains closely interconnected.

Two things hold it together. The first is trade and production, the logistical chains created during the globalization boom. They have qualitatively transformed the economy and are extremely painful to break. The second is a unified information field, thanks to ‘nationally neutral’ communications giants.

But there is something strange that separates us. It is not a desire to grab more of the pie – in the sense of what Lenin called the expansionist “imperialist predators” – but rather a sense of internal vulnerability growing in various states.

Paradoxically, this is more of a factor in the more significant and critical countries because these powers are involved in the biggest game. This explains their impulse to minimize any factor that might affect internal stability. First and foremost, this pertains to the channels that serve as conduits for influence (read: manipulation), either from outside or specific internal forces.

Structures that operate transnationally – understandably – immediately look suspect. The view is that they should be ‘nationalized,’ not through ownership but by demonstrating loyalty to a particular state. This is a severe shift, and in the foreseeable future, this process could dramatically weaken the second pillar of the current global interconnectedness.

Durov, a committed cosmopolitan liberal, typically represents the ‘global society.’ He has had tensions with all the countries he has worked in, starting with his homeland and continuing throughout his recent travels. Of course, as a prominent businessman in a sensitive industry, he has been in dialectical interaction with the governments and intelligence services of different countries, which has required maneuvering and compromise. But the attitude of avoiding any national entrenchment persisted. Having passports for all occasions seemed to widen his scope for action and increase his confidence. At least for as long as this global society lived and breathed, calling itself the liberal world order. But it’s now coming to an end. This time, possessing French nationality, along with several other things, promises to exacerbate rather than alleviate the predicament of the accused.

The ‘transnational’ entities will increasingly be required to ‘ground’ themselves – to identify with a particular state. If they do not want to, they will be affixed to the ground by force and recognized as agents not of the global world but of specific hostile powers. This is happening now with Telegram, but it’s not the first and will not be the last such instance.

The struggle to subjugate the various actors in this sphere, thus fragmenting a previously unified field, will likely be a vital component of the following global political phase.

The tightening of control over everything related to data will inevitably increase the degree of repression in the information sphere, especially since blocking unwanted channels takes work in practice. But if relatively recently it seemed impossible to dig up the world’s information superhighway and make it unusable for travel, this no longer seems so far-fetched.

The most interesting question is how the likely shrinking of the global information realm will affect trade and economic connectivity, the remaining pillar of world unity. Judging by the pace of change, newsworthy developments will soon occur there, too.

BUILDING THE BRIDGE! | A WAY TO GET TO KNOW THE OTHER AND ONE ANOTHER

Making a Difference – The Means, Methods, and Mechanism for Many to Move Mountains

Photo Credit: Abraham A. van Kempen, our home away from home on the Dead Sea

By Abraham A. van Kempen

Senior Editor
Updated 19 January 2024

Those who commit to 'healing our broken humanity' build intercultural bridges to learn to know and understand one another and others. Readers who thumb through the Building the Bridge (BTB) pages are not mindless sheep following other mindless sheep. They THINK. They want to be at the forefront of making a difference. They're in search of the bigger picture to expand their horizons. They don't need BTB or anyone else to confirm their biases.

Making a Difference – The Means, Methods, and Mechanism for Many to Move Mountains

Accurate knowledge promotes understanding, dispels prejudice, and awakens the desire to learn more. Words have an extraordinary power to bring people together, divide them, forge bonds of friendship, or provoke hostility. Modern technology offers unprecedented possibilities for good, fostering harmony and reconciliation. Yet its misuse can do untold harm, leading to misunderstanding, prejudice, and conflict.

Continue reading

A Free Trial for Life – SUBSCRIBE NOW!

• It's quick and straightforward.

• We won’t ask for your credit card number.

• Just enter your e-mail address to receive your complimentary free-for-life subscription to our newsletter.

• Please include your First and Last Name.

• We won’t share or sell your e-mail address.

_________________________

Related Articles Recently Posted on www.buildingthebridgefoundation.com:

OUR FRIDAY NEWS ANALYSIS

OUR WEDNESDAY NEWS ANALYSIS

OUR MONDAY EDITION

________________________

The views expressed are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of the Building the Bridge Foundation