To all my current followers - here is a picture which demonstrates my opinions and preferences with respect to Russia. I have respect for the Tsarist era and its achievements but my preference is strongly for Soviet power. Continue to follow or unfollow as you prefer:

Sargon of Akkad is looking well.

You stood for nothing and now it might well be too late. But if you want to know who helped get us here, who helped make it acceptable, look in the mirror! It's you who helped put Alex Pretti in the ground. /END

When it suited you, you thought it was a minor thing, it could all be controlled. But now, now you're worried, but not out of any principle, or for the kind of free, open, happy, and contented society but because you smell a threat to what you think is your power. /11

If it was any of the litany of things you claim to deplore you would NEVER have for an INSTANT supported Ukraine. You would NEVER have tolerated the Holocaust apologia in the Baltic States and their monuments to collaborators and génocidaires. But you did /10

When all of the above happened you should have stood against it strongly. You did not, you enabled it or encouraged it. You weren't worried about authoritarianism or fascism. Putin annoyed you but NOT because he is authoritarian. It's something else /9

Now that there is something else out there you cannot control perfectly and does do what you want it to do, now, now, after cheering it elsewhere and refusing to call it what it was you are worried about fascism. I am sure you think Chrystia Freeland is just wonderful. /8

Then when the war started you embraced the "defenders of Azovstal" you overlooked and forgave everything and snarled at anyone doing otherwise as a Putin-bot. You never stood for democracy. You stood for using a tool to bash and kill that which annoyed you /7

When Azov penetrated into state structures you said it was being domesticated, rather than mainstreamed and applauded the 'weakness' of the armed and embraced Far Right. Or you kept criticism muted because 'Putin talking point.' Were you going to stand against fascism or not? /6

When Oles Buzina was murdered. When Party of Regions deputies were murdered you applauded Ukraine's advancement of democracy. When the Communist Party was banned, you celebrated as you did attacks on the judiciary through lustration /5

When 100 people were burned alive in Odessa on 2 May 2014 and you said "well they were agents provocateurs" or "the Ukrainians said those people were armed" "they burned themselves", or somehow it is Russia's fault, what did you think you were endorsing? Democracy? /4

When you screeched when the Berkut fought back but then applauded the "Anti-terrorist Operation" when you at best wrung your hands or made excuses for the armed natsbats, Azov, Aidar, Tornado, Donbas, Jaguar, what did you think would happen ? /3

When you supported the Maidan and made excuses for all the Red-over-black 'Blood and soil' UPA flags and said to give it time, and that it was edgy rebellion. What did you think would happen? When they set up torture chambers on the Maidan, you said nothing or worse /2

This in response to a post where he waxed indignant about rising authoritarianism if not fascism in the USA. That's all very well but he also supports Ukraine. This was his response when I pointed out that inconsistency. I've really had it with these so-called liberals. /1

Entre 1945 et 1955, la mortalité infantile a été divisée par trois en France. En plus de la politique nataliste mise en place à la Libération, c'est en partie dû à la Sécurité Sociale construite par les communistes français. Le communisme sauve des vies, depuis toujours :

https://t.co/yve3WiV3D3

Forget the OPCW. All you need is a map of Syria during Operation Damascus Steel. The Syrian Army is taking tons of ground til they finally get to Ghouta. They're on the verge of victory and we're supposed to believe they used WMDs on a target with no military value? What kind of

https://t.co/JmGvi4yfos

Ultimately, this should be the final nail in the coffin for PACE. It's not a human rights institution or a functional multilateral organ, it's all venal, sleazy, violent geopolitics by has-beens and wannabes, dragging down Europe's human rights infrastructure with it.

Sic transit gloria mundi...

The surviving prisoners of the Jewish ghetto in Vilijampolė tell the Soviet officers who liberated the city about the atrocities of the Nazis. Of the 37,000 Jews who lived in Kaunas before the war, only 3,000 managed to survive. Lithuanian SSR, August 1944