Bulletins and News Discussion from October 28th to November 3rd, 2024 - LDP Falls Flat / Yet Neoliberalism / Rampages Onward - COTW: Japan
Bulletins and News Discussion from October 28th to November 3rd, 2024 - LDP Falls Flat / Yet Neoliberalism / Rampages Onward - COTW: Japan
Image is from this SCMP article.
Much of the analysis below is sourced from Michael Roberts' great website.
Japan's ruling parliamentary coalition, consisting of the LDP (purple) and it's junior coalition partner Komeito (in light pink) have lost their ruling majority. They have ruled post-war Japan for almost its entire history. The LDP is currently led by Shigeru Ishiba after Kishida stood down due to a corruption scandal, and ties to the Unification Church.
While geopolitical factors (over the cold war between the US and China, etc) may have played a role, by far the biggest reason for this result in the poor economic conditions over the past few years. Inflation has risen and real wages have fallen, with little relief for the working class via things like tax reductions. While inequality in Japan is not as extreme as in America, it is still profound, with the top 10% possessing 60% of the wealth, while the bottom 50% possess just 5%.
Shinzo Abe previously tried to boost economic performance through monetary easing and fiscal deficits, while Kishida ran on a "new capitalism" which rejected Abe's neoliberalism and promised to reduce inequality. Nothing substantial has resulted from all this, however, other than increasing corporate wealth. Innovation continues to fall, and domestic profitability is low, resulting in decreasing investment at home by Japanese corporations. Labour productivity growth has only slightly picked up since the mid-2000s and is falling again. The rate of profit has fallen by half since the 1960s, and Japan has been in a manufacturing recession - or very close to it - since late 2022. In essence: there is no choice but between stagnation or decline.
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Israel-Palestine Conflict
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA reports on Israel's destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news.
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists' side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
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so is there any evidence that DPRK has troops in the Ukraine war area? All the news from my understanding is just from the CIA and if they told me that sky was blue I'd have to check if it turned green.
IMO its all but officialy confirmed now.
"Our traditional, historically friendly relations, which have travelled the tested path of history, today ... are rising to a new level of relations of invincible military comradeship," she told Lavrov, praising the role played in this by North Korean leader Kim Jong Un and Russian President Vladimir Putin. She said Pyongyang had no doubt that under Putin's "wise leadership" the Russian army and people would "achieve a great victory in their sacred struggle to protect the sovereign rights and security interests of their state."
"And we also assure that until the day of victory we will firmly stand alongside our Russian comrades," she said.
Choi Song-hee DPRK Foreign Minister right now in a meeting with Lavrov.
If you expect some PR photo of DPRK soldiers with a flag all saying fuck Ukraine/US geolocated in Kursk then that will take a while. But maybe front line reports as soon as they're deployed.
The Russians only officially deflected and the DPRK doesn't actually give a fuck whether you believe them or not.
Meeanwhile this is what the Russians are saying at the UN https://t.me/Slavyangrad/111977
Even if we imagine that everything our Western colleagues claim about military cooperation between Russia and the DPRK suddenly turns out to be true, why are the United States and its allies trying to impose on the whole world the rotten logic that they have the right to help the Zelensky regime, mobilizing all their military and intelligence potential for this, while Russia's allies do not have the right to do this? — said Vasily Nebenzya.
From denial to compromise? If our enemies can have unofficial allies so can we.
People are expecting "evidence" but Russia/DPRK got nothing to gain by announcing all of this in advance, its literaly the opposite of what you should do. Let the west struggle with whether Ukraine is lying again while they get everything ready.
The real concerning events are regarding what SK is willing to do in response. Again as before there was no reason for SK to suddenly join this war if it triggers DPRK to do the same.
In fact I don't think the US got anything to gain. Look Biden now saying he'll authorize deep strikes into Russia or something like that. You see the issue was never the "excuse"(US doesn't need excuses, look at Gaza) but the facts regarding US weapons productions and the simple fear of Russian retaliation. If they stop fearing Russian retaliation then this is escalation. The bigger picture is to ask why create more dangerous escalation with Russia/DPRK now when Israel is willing to go to war with Iran?.
The answer imo should be the simplest explanation. DPRK signed an alliance with Russia. Russia is willing to go to WW3 in East Asia and in exchange Russia suggested DPRK help in Ukraine for both sides benefit(more rear troops for one, more training for the other), meanwhile both sides get useful economic and military cooperation. We'll see what is the US response, most likely nothing, but SK may get aggressive.
Good analysis.
What would it matter, materially? Hypothetically, US special forces could be "discovered" to be operating in Ukraine or Israel tomorrow. What would that even mean?
Putin didn’t deny it but his answer did seem trolling.
I’ve seen milbloggers speculate that if it’s true they probably go into action this weekend in Kursk.
so what would be the point of the lie? to get south korean troops into ukraine? or are they going to try to start some shit in korea? real dying empire hours
The RoK didn't send much support to Ukraine. So the ukrainians are trying to use this to get them to send weapons and supplies.
I think the RoK hawks actually started the rumor. They want the west to think of DPRK as the next war after isisrael.
Uncritical support for the DPRK in their heroic struggle to free Korea from the genocidal American Empire
I don’t think it’s a lie. It seems plausible enough to me that DPRK would send troops to fight inside Russia.
I don’t really see it as confirmed yet but if it wasn’t true I would have expected a denial by now and there hasn’t been one.
No. Western media would have no reason to hold back on releasing easily obtainable photographic proof if they were present.
DPRK special advisors and missile experts have likely been in the war area for a while now, as Russia has been using North Korean ballistic missiles in certain attacks from the beginning of this year, as evidenced by photographs of missile debris. As for infantry, all the evidence is of them in the far East of Russia, but they could be deployed to the frontlines soon.
no