Dr. Gonzo

I think I must have remembered the story wrong, apologies - I can't find anything that he got human rights workers killed either. I did find this though: https://nymag.com/intelligencer/2016/07/why-did-wikileaks-help-dox-most-of-turkeys-adult-female-population.html which is a pretty shitty thing for Wikileaks to have done. It included whether the women were AKP members, which could be pretty deadly for them in all honesty. But I guess we won't know if that got any of them killed or not.

If Assange wanted to truly use the "I'm a journalist" defense, he probably should have done things that journalists do like scrub names of people in the documents he was releasing so he wouldn't be putting people in harms way. Instead he just released documents without a care in the world for the people that were named in those documents, and many - like the human rights workers in Turkey that were listed - ended up getting killed. His part in helping Chelsea Manning be a whistleblower is commendable, but a lot of the other stuff he did while in charge of Wikileaks was dangerously reckless at best. Do I think he should be charged for espionage? Probably not, based off what little I know about him and Wikileaks... but I do think he's an arsehole that got people killed, so I do think he's getting a bit of karma coming back to bite him on the arse.

I wonder what would happen if a nation like Pakistan, Iran, or any of the many countries that doesn't recognise Israel changed their stance and said "okay we recognise Israel" but then added "as an apartheid state" - it seems that would be a halfway point between fully normalised relations and simply not recognising. It'd certainly make the impasse with the Iran nuclear talks a bit more interesting. According to Iran, the US rejected a deal Iran proposed that kept the IRGC on the sanctions list (which we have been told for months now, has been a red line for Iran considering the way the IRGC is meshed with so much of every day life in Iran)... but this time was rejected because the US insisted Iran recognise Israel. If that's true, I wonder what would happen if Iran said "we recognise Israel as an apartheid state." It's still a middle finger to Israel, but it's obviously a big step from suggesting they don't have the right to exist and that they are not recognised as a real country. And it sets a pathway for countries to actually have normalised relations should theoretically benefit everyone involved - particularly Palestinians and Israelis.

Israel's coalition has fallen apart - Knesset to disband & more elections coming soon. Could be Netanyahu's pathway back to power there, sadly.

Russian lawmakers have been saying increasingly insane shit over the past few months. Part of me thinks they feel compelled to sound as rabidly insane as they can because otherwise Putin might think they're disloyal and think they're good targets for purging. Part of me thinks it's because they'll show clips of it on their state media and get to pat themselves on the back for "showing Russian strength." And part of me thinks their politicians are insane arseholes who genuinely believe the stupid shit they say. So I really have no idea what to make of any statement coming from any Russian politician at the moment.

Yeah if I were you, I wouldn't watch it. It's just the tale of an egotistical man-child showing United (and now the world) how much of an irritating twat he really is. It's insane if he thinks it makes him look any better PR-wise. It makes Mourinho look completely vindicated - it's like he is on a mission to prove Mourinho was absolutely right about him. Also the complete lack of respect it shows towards your club and your fans is kind of mental considering he's made millions off the back of not even coming close to performing near expectation for years. And then the club makes him a massive offer despite him looking like dogshit for years... and he turns it down as a "nothing" offer. He was lucky the club was entertaining keeping him beyond his contract in the first place... let alone offering him that insane amount. You can tell he's a dumb cunt without even watching it though. He named it Pogmentary instead of Pogumentary. Smh. At least as a fan of a club that isn't United (and in fact, a massive rival of yours)... there's some entertainment value in watching this overrated dickhead act like the overrated dickhead he is. But if I were you watching it, I'd probably just be furious the whole time. He's probably made you angry enough, no use wasting that energy mate - it's not worth your time. Just know that it makes him look terrible. It is genuinely awful PR, I am legitimately surprised it's something he's actually put out there. If I'm Juve, or any club that's considering making him an offer, I'd have changed my mind just based off the show.

And Russia furious about it, saying it's illegal for Lithuania to act as though they're a sovereign country.

I think it's wrong to look at racism as a left wing v. right wing thing, tbh. I know it's easy to do that when some politicians are much more openly saying racist or xenophobic stuff than others... but it's not really accurate. There's a lot of immigrant communities that are probably a lot more conservative leaning than we'd probably first think & there's a lot of racist/xenophobic/bigoted views that are weirdly common among large swaths of the population regardless of anyone's political leanings.

Tbf what you said was funny

It’s incredible, he comes off as even more of dickhead than I could have imagined. United are so lucky he turned down that £300k a week contract he called a “nothing offer.”

My favourite bit of Man Utd news was the guy saying “I promise the leaks from the club have stopped.” In suppose the guys he told trusted him as he was actively leaking information to the club to them.

Big talk from Mr. “But does he improve them”

He doesn’t have to donate as much as he’s done though

How many shit "evolution" and "natural selection" jokes will commentators be making at the start of the season because we've signed Darwin? I've already seen 2 since he joined us - one on the BBC website.

They don’t seem close to a cease fire at all. Russia is demanding Ukraine recognise new breakaway regions, Ukraine is demanding that Russia finally fuck off out of Crimea. In the context of this conflict, that’s probably about as far as the 2 sides can be from an agreement.

Seems unlikely considering the two sides haven't had talks in a while.

I doubt it, I think the real reason is rooted in something a bit more obvious about Britain and discrimination...

This looks pretty damning. I think Congressman Loudermilk is probably shitting himself right now.

Prague Spring & the other "Revolutions of 1989" , al-Fateh revolution (Libya), Carnation revolution (which turned Portugal into a democracy), People Power Revolution (bringing democracy back to the Philipines), Mongolian revolution of 1990. You could argue UK's Operation Boot in Iran, taking democracy away from Iran and putting the Shah in power, was a bloodless revolution too. The Shah loved to claim that - but he did have a ton of National Front executed in the immediate aftermath of his coup at the behest of his masters in the UK and US.

You know there've been bloodless coups in the past? Of course it's been politicised... the entire thing was fucking political

Yeah I'm not surprised even these knuckle dragging morons are even more reasonable than incel teens though, are you? Bringing firearms to a federal building is a good way to get shot on sight, which I think they were very clearly trying to avoid. Even so, they still managed to kill and injure people who were trying to protect the integrity of the election.

They tried to stop election results, threatened to hang Mike Pence. That there weren't more dead really just shows the restraint the police at the capital building really had. 6 capital police officers died though. I honestly think America's response to what happened is pretty pathetic. A bunch of idiots get charged but the people who organised it appear to get away scot free. But just because it was a pathetic coup attempt done by a bunch of morons, doesn't mean it wasn't a coup attempt. And there's no real need to speculate on who was pushing this and who wasn't with so much of that info now public.

I don't think the next Fallout is going to be in the UK. I don't think they'll do any that aren't in the US - they may do a bit with some China as a sidequest... but the whole theme of the series is focused around 50s Americana in an alternate universe where microtechnology never caught on before the "Great War" and how the relics of that alternate Americana have been interpreted by the survivors of the Wasteland. And that's been thematic of Fallouts since before Bethesda bought the IP. In any case, the next Fallout isn't coming out for a while. Todd Howard confirmed today it's the next game coming out for Bethesda... after Elders Scrolls 6 comes out. And that's next in the pipeline after Starfield. Considering Fallout 4 was basically just Skyrim with guns though... I don't have all that much hope for it being as good as Fallout 3 or New Vegas (although now that Bethesda and Obsidian are both owned by Microsoft, my hope for a New Vegas 2 is still strong)... Bethesda saw commercial success like they'd never achieved with Skyrim, so I think chances are more of their RPGs will be similarly watered down like Skyrim was Oblivion with better graphics but a more of a watered down RPG experience. I will say the Far Harbor DLC for Fallout 4 though definitely felt more like a traditional fallout... so perhaps they have learned from their mistakes a bit.

The Flight Attendant on HBO Max

I don't think it's that tough of a position for the DOJ. I think for far too long the DOJ has just acted as part of the executive and often makes decisions in line with "what gives the executive branch... the president... the most amount of power?" If there is a serious risk of civil war, that's why the US has it's national guard part of the military - isn't it? Part of the biggest issue with January 6th is while there was plenty of evidence of the risk of what happened, it seemed like there wasn't really adequate planning in the face of that known risk. At this point with January 6th they don't just have evidence against the political figures that played their part in coordinating what happened, they've got evidence against leaders of these militia groups - charge and arrest them in conjunction with any political figures implicated in January 6th & have the appropriate officials in every state ready to respond to potential threats of violence from these militias. These people are still a fringe minority and many people would be less likely to join people like this if they know there will be serious consequences to their actions. I think it's a much tougher decision for the DOJ to not prosecute. It shows that people connected with the rich and powerful can get away with anything, even attempts to overturn elections. I think for a lot of the country, it would just underscore the fact that the justice system in the country is a joke and that the ultra-wealthy and well-connected. And it should not be a partisan issue. The DOJ holding that a sitting president is within his rights to overturn the will of the voters is an awful precedent to set - regardless of whatever political affiliations anyone might have. It should scare republicans as much as it scares democrats that the department of justice could turn a blind eye to abuses of the president that degrade democracy - because the precedent set isn't one that would just apply to republicans. Republicans should be wanting the DOJ to do something because theoretically it gives Biden (and any other democrats) carte blanche to do the same thing Trump did. And with the midterm elections coming up, perhaps telling them the DOJ could give Biden the power to try to overturn the results in November might light a fire under their arses to actually look out for their country instead of being afraid of how their voters might feel for a few months.