Terra Incognita

My favorite poster under that article by leaps and bounds, no contest, is Mindi, the one who wrote this:

Russia does not want Ukraine. It became a looted, debt enslaved, ultra-nationalist degenerated, failed state after the 2014 coup. Rationally, it had nothing to offer but a financial & security drain. Unfortunately, Ukraine thought it was special- as if the US/NATO would not use it and lead it into destruction like every other puppet state. Fact: The Russian military would not have crossed that boarder had not the US filled Ukraine with bioweapons labs, military hardware, military provocations; empowered & enabled ukronazis to infiltrate the military, police forces, and government, becoming so emboldened as to assassinate political officials insufficiently belligerent, and enabled the slaughter & ethnic cleansing of Donbass. Jacobin really ought to be ashamed of itself.

I think Mindi deserves a typing thread all her own.

This was just highly recommended by a friend on fb.

With respect, that's a straw man view. Russia had to attack Ukraine bc the US and Nato, with their long histories of using bioweapons on foreign people. caused Russia to intervene?

The alternative view is that Ukraine is western at heart, has always been western at heart, and allowed itself to be fortified with armaments. Against whom? The potential of their neighbor, Russia, who suuplies weapons to support the Ukrainian separatist in the East. At some point it becomes chicken/egg, but we can safely assume Ukraine isn't the chicken.

Why do people think Ukraine is Russian territory? Why are so many Ukrainian ppl (men:18 to 60) reacting against this?

As we say in The States, it's settled law. (but we haven't civil warred in 150 years, our shit has become that old now)

This popped up from seven years ago. First thing I've seen about the Ukrainian far right from liberal media.

Jonathan wrote: ↑Mon Mar 21, 2022 7:10 pm With respect, that's a straw man view.

The NPR one? I thought you'd like it because you knew Teri Gross was my better half of Masha Gessen.

(jk. Haven't heard it yet).

Good on Konstantin.

I saw this, with commentary by and under poster SFDPSFDP Vincent.

Roshan wrote: ↑Tue Apr 12, 2022 11:04 am I saw this, with commentary by and under poster SFDPSFDP Vincent.

Thanks for the link Roshan. Both the video and the commentary are pretty good.
I'm a bit too tired right now to make a detailled reply and explain what i think they are missing but i'll download the video, watch it again at work and write something down tomorrow.

tbcd.

Okay so...

#About the implosion of the Parti Socialiste :
He is absolutely right about how bad it is, but it actually started in 2017 already. That's how Macron's party became a prominent force in french politics to begin with : by killing the main left wing party. Hidalgo's score in this election is pretty much a nail in that coffin.

#About Zemmour :
He is definitely right that Zemmour is a media creature who was launched to help Macron. But he is wrong about why.
Zemmour might be "hard right", loosely speaking, but this hard right is not quite the same as Le Pen's one. Zemmour voters are more educated, older, comes Vincent from urban centers. They are people who are both culturally conservatives AND economically conservatives, who used to vote for Sarkozy, might have voted for Pecresse if she wasn't that weak and that unlikely to win, and who are afraid of Le Pen views on economics and social policy. Quite a few of them are disgruntled deltas who would never vote Le Pen anyway.
So it's pretty unlikely that the plan was to help Pecresse and weaken Le Pen. Especially since there would be no reason for Macron to even want that. A duel with Pecresse would actually be harder for him, because then the whole left would stay home instead of forcing themselves to vote for him to "resist fascism".
It's way more likely that the plan was to kill the "traditional right" just like Macron already killed the "traditional left", and if that's the case, then this plan worked pretty well. Pecresse will have a very hard time recovering from that election, and it will have dire consequence (and very expensive ones) for her party in the next (local) elections.

#About Melenchon voters :
He is right that Melenchon did way better than expected, but he doesn't seem to get why.
If Melenchon did that good it's largely because a lot of people on the Left, who would normally never vote for him did it in hope he would beat Le Pen and push her out of the run off. Those votes are not so much "melenchon's votes",they are "anti-fascist votes".
A lot of those votes came very late, right before the election, because the polls were suggesting that it was actually possible that Melenchon would get the run off.
I actually saw quite a few die hard anarchists who hadn't voted in decades who actively campaigned for Melenchon during the last two weeks, for that very reason.

Some of Melenchon voters, especially among the working class and people from rural areas, will vote Le Pen. Others will stay home. Most probably will vote Macron. In any case, i doubt that they are actually the ones who will make or break this election.

I think the deciding factor this time will be the (many) people on both sides of the spectrum who stayed home because they (correctly) predicted the duel months ago and who are very tired of the "Me or Hitler" blackmail. If they keep thinking "why bother ?", Macron will indeed have a harder time beating Le Pen.
But i still think he will.

#About Melenchon and Le Pen points of convergences and the "long shadow of History"
He is very very right about this.
The thing is anti-globalism would be our main political force by far if it wasn't divided between a left and a right wing that fight each other as if it was still the Commune de Paris in 1871 or Spain in 1936.

#About Macron and Le Pen's stances on Russia and Ukraine.
As much as i agree with him about Macron's arrogant ineptitude, i don't think that's actually what the average french voter will see and remember about this. They will mostly remember that Macron somehow managed to be all over the place, as a World Leader, at the table of the Big Boyz. And that's it.
And i have very little doubt that Le Pen "pro-putin" stance will play against her rather than for her in the current context.

#About the similarity between this duel and Giscard - Mitterrand in 1981
I don't really see it.
I think it's largely a myth that Mitterrand only won because Chirac didn't explicitly call his voters to vote Giscard.
I think demographics ultimately decided this one and that the generations of the Baby Boom gave the Left the chance it never had since 1936. People, especially young ones, wanted a feast and they got 2 years of it.

There is no feast in sight this time, only a general collapse with Macron as the "last standing man" and Le Pen as the Bogey Woman.
Completely different story.
Only way for Macron to lose would be that people really got too tired of it.