bannork

Isn't this story about India more than Thailand?

I liked John Bolton's recent remarks regarding NATO. He said the Europeans should ignore the Trump's admin badmouthing Europe, Trump will only be here 4 years max. In the meantime, although European leaders might feel like telling the US they don't need them so it's time to build a European force only, this will simply give Trump a good excuse to leave NATO, something he's been threatening to do for years. Bolton recommends European nations build up their military forces, and importantly, follow the advice of Jose Maria Aznar, the former Prime Minister of Spain, namely make NATO global: bring in Japan, Australia, Singapore, Israel. According to Bolton this could cause Donald to think twice about leaving NATO. Good idea, wot?

Absolutely. I'm glad some Palestinians have turned against Hamas. If only enough Israelis could turn against their own right wing zealots, then perhaps peace could follow, but so much brutality on both sides since Oct 7 will make that difficult.

Petition: Cancel Trump’s state visit – Stop Trump Coalition regards bannork

A More in Common poll last month ( January 2025) found that 59% had a negative view of Trump and just 24% had a positive one, giving him a lower approval rating than any UK politician. When voters were asked by YouGov in December why they were unhappy that Trump had won the presidential election, respondents most commonly cited his criminal record and misogynistic attitudes, but also used a range of unflattering adjectives including racist, crazy, authoritarian and dangerous. UK party leaders walk tightrope on Trump while voters want stricter stance | Foreign policy | The Guardian I would suggest since then his popularity has sunk even further after the abusive and condescending remarks about Europe and its militaries from his sidekicks.

The rise of China and alliances like BRICS are building alternative financial ecosystems. More countries are ditching the dollar in trade - think Brazil and China settling in yuan, or India buying oil from Russia using rupees. Systems like China’s CIPS or India’s RuPay, and big experiments with digital currencies (like the mBridge project), are being designed to cut the dollar out of the loop entirely. Many countries, tired of being at the mercy of Washington’s decisions, are looking to reclaim control to focus more on productive investment than speculative gains. National reserves are being diversified, central banks, especially in China and Russia, are holding fewer dollars and more gold, euros, and yuan. Countries are signing currency swap deals - India with Malaysia, China with Saudi Arabia, Russia with Turkey. Payment systems like Russia’s SPFS are being built to bypass SWIFT, the messaging backbone of dollar transactions.. From cryptocurrencies to gold-backed payment tools, there’s a growing demand for reserves of value outside the dollar. It’s a systemic shift. A move away from speculative finance, and toward a more multipolar world where countries can control their destinies. Will the world move away from the US dollar?

A dog would leave him.

The Atlantic's Jeffrey Goldberg had advance notice of a recent United States military strike against Houthi rebels in Yemen because he was sent plans for the strike in a message from Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth. On March 11th he received a connection request on encrypted messaging app signal from Mike Waltz, President Donald Trump's national security adviser. After accepting the request, Goldberg was then invited to join a messaging channel called "Houthi PC small group" that appeared to show administration officials coordinating plans to attack the Houthis. Goldberg thought it could be a set up but his doubts faded when a user identified as Hegseth sent highly detailed plans for a strike in Yemen, and then bombs began to fall on the country a few hours later. Goldberg left the Signal group and then sent questions to Trump officials asking them why they had given him access to top-secret war plans. Journalist stunned as Pete Hegseth inadvertently sends him top-secret war plans

My favourite dream VID-20250324-WA0000.mp4

The man is a real estate investor. Zero experience in geo politics as shown by his ignorant remarks.

Indeed, he looks far better there than now. Nowadays he is truly the ugliest American in every sense of the word.

Thousands of people gathered in front of Tesla's showroom in Manhattan. The event was organised by the "Tesla Takedown" movement, the organisers want people to sell their Teslas and give up their purchased shares. Similar gatherings took place in dozens of other locations in the USA. In Berlin last week, several Tesla cars were burned in one night. After Musk's attempts to interfere in the German elections, the drop in Tesla car sales in Germany exceeded 70%. Some contrite owners are defending themselves with stickers in various languages. The Polish version runs, ''I bought this before Musk went crazy". New York rallies spark backlash against Musk and Tesla

Agree, and we grew up with such wonderful music too.

The politicians are astute, they won't cancel the visit but they know full well Trump is reviled throughout the Western world beyond the red states of USA, so the trip might get postponed indefinitely or on the grounds of demonstrations making the visit impractical.

Megan is American, you've gotta let her in. Oh! Wait a minute, maybe not. You might deport her to some Central America republic without due process of law.

We're with Europe again, plus Canada, Australia, Japan, S. Korea, etc. You've Donald no mates Trump USA. On yer own

The admiration goes back a long way

On Friday, CNN fact-checker Daniel Dale Dale wrote, Trump made no fewer than nine false claims while speaking to reporters. 1.Trump used inaccurate figures for the number of votes he received in the 2024 presidential election (77 million, not 'much more than 80 million'). 2. Amount of US aid to Ukraine 3. The number of migrants who entered the US during the Biden administration 4. The US trade deficit with China 5. US trade deficit with Canada ( vastly overstated, ) 6. Annual US fentanyl deaths ( overstated US deaths per year sixfold) 7.. He wrongly declared, again, that Honda announced it is building a new factory in Indiana. 8.. He repeated his years-old baseless claim that NATO would no longer have existed if not for his first presidency. 9. He told his familiar unsubstantiated story about large numbers of migrants having come from jails in 'the Congo' and elsewhere'. 'Baseless': CNN fact-checker wrecks Trump's fabrication-riddled Oval Office remarks

According to a report from Politico's Amy Mackinnon, Elon Musk and DOGE staffers having a free hand in firing has had the end effect of putting "hundreds of intelligence and national security officials who had access to reams of classified information" on the street. Ex-CIA officer James Lawler remarked, "What we have done is we have created a ripe set of targets for our adversaries." Kevin Carroll, a former CIA case officer, agreed and added “You’re absolutely creating a counterintelligence risk,” he said. “Not by letting people go, but the manner in which you’re letting people go.” Hundreds of officials with access to highly sensitive information have been fired or placed on administrative leave across the federal government. The Pentagon announced Tuesday that it was forging ahead with plans to cut some 50,000 to 60,000 civilian jobs. A slate of top national security officials at the FBI and Department of Justice have also been removed from their posts. 'A ripe set of targets': Intel experts sound alarm that fired spies could turn on U.S.

Hey, we weren't stupid enough to elect a serial orange liar as a president. Back to this idiot. It's one thing to get scammed so easily and foolishly, it's another thing to go to the media and stand there like a lemon pointing at the 200 baht item he paid 20,000 baht for. He's screaming, look how stupid I am!

Tsikhanouskaya said, "This constant repression that we have been going through for four, almost five years, already hasn't made people forgive or forget, or to deny their pro-European perspectives. This visible quietness of the country doesn't mean that people gave up. It means that people are preparing and they will be ready when there will be the possibility." According to the Belarusian human rights center Vyasna, over 50,000 people have been detained on political grounds after mass protests broke out following Lukashenko's 2020 presidential election win and at least 5,472 people have been convicted in politically-motivated criminal cases. The United Nations estimates that around 300,000 Belarusians have left the country since then, with most going to Poland and Lithuania. Belarus' opposition leader Tsikhanouskaya says regime change just a matter of time