I am genuinely grateful to the owner of this website who
has shared this enormous paragraph at at this place.

What’s up colleagues, pleasant article and nice arguments commented at this place, I
am truly ebjoying by these.

It’s the “ well educated middle “ class who watch and believe CNN and the rest of the liberal propaganda channels.

They are the brainwashed morons who believe what they see on TV and in the
“Quality” press; NYTimes, The Nation Atlantic, New Republic etc.

If you want to know what the really intelligent Americans who know that all the quality press and CNN are just a lot of lying propaganda,think, keep hanging out in this site, Amren vdare and you will find dissident realistic truthful news.

Of course these sites are kept going by uneducated redneck hillbilly manual workers and other deplorable losers to immigrant workers at all levels from dishwasher to Dr.

The more educated an American is, the more he or she believes CNN and the rest of the lying press.

Are you the one who did borrow the bicycle?

Not everyone. I read about it for the first time in my life.

I read it in trolling comments a few times over years – for example, I guess some Ukrainian comments on YouTube.

Anon from TN
The majority of the populace in any country is quite dumb. No state propaganda (USSR, USA, UK, Germany, you name them, they are all the same) ever targets the smart fraction of the populace. It is crafted for the lowest common denominator, i.e., “an average Joe” with limited mental ability (ret*rded, using your term).

It never would occur to me to think about Zhirik’s sex life, but when I asked someone who usually knows about these things if it’s true about his homosexuality, I was told, “everyone knows that.”

Not everyone. I read about it for the first time in my life.

Good man.
He deserved his double digit result.

I have a lot of respect for Zhirinovsky, he’s played an important role in Russian politics for decades now. He’s entertaining, smart and generally calls it like he sees it. What he does in his private life is irrelevant to all this anyway.

But his career is probably in its twilight now, and his poor showing in the election is a symptom. This makes him vulnerable. The point wasn’t that the piderast journalist is telling the truth, but that he felt he could even make such an accusation publicly and that he chose now to do do. It never would occur to me to think about Zhirik’s sex life, but when I asked someone who usually knows about these things if it’s true about his homosexuality, I was told, “everyone knows that.”

OT

The Hungarian election seems difficult to predict because there is little openly available detailed precinct level data, and also because it’s difficult to measure second preferences and the likelihood of people voting for candidates other than that of their most preferred parties. It’s also difficult to predict turnout, and the Fidesz victory or its size greatly depends on turnout: basically, the lower the turnout, the higher the portion of the votes going to Fidesz. The most likely guess is still a Fidesz win without winning a supermajority, though there’s always the chance of a Fidesz supermajority and also of a Fidesz loss. The March 15 speech of Orbán threatening some unspecified people with retribution was unhelpful in that it could mobilize the opposition voters. The fact that now there seems to be a chance of beating him will probably also mobilize opposition voters.

I’m the last person to support Putin unless there is other worthy candidate. But dishonesty and idiocy of the claims against Russia often astonishes me.
Russian meddling in the US elections … Fake Russian Facebook Accounts Bought $100,000 in Political Ads
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/09/06/technology/facebook-russian-political-ads.html
Is this even for real? Clinton’s campaign cost 1.4 bln or 1,400,000,000.00 dollars. Even half a million would be a drop in a bucket.
But if someone isn’t completely ret*rded and thinks for a minute. Wouldn’t Russian intelligence services try to cover up the traces and use money stashed in foreign country or offshore zone?

No need to tell me))) Total agree with you!
But what amazes me that Western powers think (not without a reason) that their people are completely ret*rded to believe in blatant lies.
How ret*rded does one have to be to believe that Russian intelligence services or FSB would kill someone with Novichok? It doesn’t make sense. Wouldn’t they try to cover it up? Even a 4-year old tries to cover up his mischief from the parents. So, wouldn’t you expect intelligence services of Russia to be a little bit more intelligent than an average 4-year old boy?
At least British authorities haven’t found a postcard “From Russian FSB with love” near the body. Otherwise, it could have served as 100% evidence against Russia.

He’s married with a wife and grandkids. So while it’s not impossible that he is gay, there’s not exactly vast or overwhelming evidence that he is gay, on the basis that a Muslim liberal journalist, who lives in the West (i.e. everything that would want to take down Zhirinovsky), says he once touched his back during an interview ten years ago.

Why Did Grudinin Do Well in the East?

Meme candidates always do well in the Russian East, in every election. (Previously Zhirinovsky used to do well there, back when he was the memiest politician in Russia. He’s old and tired now, so Grudinin it is.)

Voice of an Israel-firster?
Was not Israel involved in nudging the US towards “humanitarian interventions” in seven countries, all according to the criminal Oded Yinon plan? https://consortiumnews.com/2018/03/22/how-many-millions-of-people-have-been-killed-in-americas-post-9-11-wars-part-one-iraq/
“…about 2.4 million people have probably been killed in Iraq as a result of the historic act of aggression committed by the U.S. and U.K. in 2003. …
The 2006 Lancet study estimated that about 601,000 Iraqis were killed in the first 39 months of war and occupation in Iraq, while the war had also caused about 54,000 non-violent deaths.
… at least 40,000 civilians were killed in the bombardment of Mosul alone. .. there were probably many more bodies buried in the rubble…
On the 15th anniversary of the illegal invasion of Iraq, the Center for Constitutional Rights in the U.S. renewed its call for the U.S. to pay war reparations to the people of Iraq. [You know — like Germany has been paying the reparations to Jews].
The world will never hold major American and British war criminals accountable for their crimes as long as the public does not understand the full scale and horror of what they have done. And the world will not know peace as long as the most powerful aggressors can count on impunity for “the supreme international crime.”Samar Hassan screamed after her parents were killed by U.S. soldiers in Iraq in 2005. Credit Chris Hondros/Getty Images.

As I have often pointed out, Grudinin was easily the most pro-Ukrainian candidate – as in the least interested in supporting the Donbass – besides the liberals Sobchak and Yavlinsky.

“Pavel Grudinin, a presidential candidate from the Communist Party of the Russian Federation, said he was in favor of recognizing the independence of the People’s Republic of Donetsk and the People’s Republic of Lugansk, as well as the possibility of reuniting Donbass with Russia if the residents of the region wanted to do so.

Of course, the Minsk Agreements played an important role in ending the genocide of the population of these republics. But the fighting there continues, albeit not with so many casualties among civilians. Bandera-lovers daily shell the cities and villages of therepublics, as a result of which ordinary people suffer and die. The Minsk agreements have turned into a sort of screen for the preparation of a forceful solution to the “problem of Novorossia.”
https://www.fort-russ.com/2018/01/grudinin-kprf-presidential-candidate/

Anon from TN
If you mean May, Johnson, or Williamson, they are being slighted very reasonably. Britain never had such hopeless nonentities in leadership in my memory. Compared to these, John Major looks like a towering giant.

I voted for Zhirinovsky

Commenter 5371 (if I remember the digits correctly) recently stated in a different thread that Zhirinovsky is a homosexual. I found the assertion intriguing, as it was the first time I’d heard it. Well, lo and behold, as part of Russia’s current mini-Weinsteingate scandal, Zhirik is now being publicly accused of sexual harassment by an openly gay male journalist. How ironic that Russia’s nationalist champion is a homosexual Jewish lawyer, something akin to a Russian Roy Cohn.

We? Sounds like you’ll soon be rolling in Russian dough. Lucky you Sean, you might consider investing some of it in seeing a shrink.

Are people not entitled to a little indignation if they are unreasonably slighted?

They are going after high returns so they accept the risk, but it will turn out to be a much bigger risk than they realise. Russia needs technology transfer from the West, and that can easily be stopped.

Perhaps I must be more clear.

Nobody’s disputing the money angle, and it’s both direct and indirect. The direct MIC $$$ (campaign contributions) is miniscule compared to the indirect [jobs in defense industry in every congressional district]. The USA economy runs on blood. Bernie Sanders, the pseudo peacemaker, loves his F-35 in Vermont.

However, the heavy-duty lobbying is the demonization of Iran and the allegation that the Houthis are an Iranian proxy. This is a largely Zionist project, abetted now by KSA. The Israel Lobby, via the media, promotes fear and hatred of Iran, so the public then accepts the war policy.

Plus, the public barely knows about our wars and their consequences. The MIC, media, the Israel Lobby [the Deep State] has no interest in accurate exposure.

Anon from TN
Sorry to disappoint, but you are a bit too late. Just now Russia sold $4 billion worth of Eurobonds. British investors bought 39%, US investors – 25%. They obviously forgot to consult you. A pity.

Well, thanks for that first word, which was at least a reply to my question.

No, the UK is snow whit in all this. Nobody is listening to what Russian diplomats have to say any more. And the Western investment funds will stop investing in Russia because it will be too risky now there is talk of sequestrating Russian dirty money.

Our country, our rules, Russians can go back where they came from. If they don’t shut up, we’ll take their dirty money, because we can get at those offshore accounts, if we chose to.

How about proper investigation, fact checking, trying to be impartial for a sec in order to find the actual offender? Nah, too hard.

That is all fine and good provided there ever was an offender and there was in fact a crime committed. Perhaps, this was all staged; nobody was poisoned, or if there was, it happened with the full knowledge and approval of the appropriate UK authorities.

This seems to be the most logical explanation, and all this talk about “Novichok”, chemical weapons and such is just a smokescreen. The explanation that this was a false flag operation is the only one fully consistent with the behavior of the UK government. Even assuming the UK politicians are dumb, they can’t possibly be that dumb not to be able to predict the Russian reaction to an ultimatum. They’d only do that if they in fact didn’t want any information or cooperation but wanted to start a quarrel right away. A total absence of all Western ambassadors at the briefing by the Russian Foreign Ministry the other day confirms the theory.

The UK did everything possible to obfuscate the matter, so chances are we’ll never know what, if anything, really happened. Any information and/or samples coming now from the UK authorities is obviously suspect, since there is no way to know where in fact they are coming from. This is the same pattern used many a time before in Syria, in Litvinenko case, in the MH17 “investigation”, etc.

Anon from TN
As the American saying goes, follow the money. I have no doubt that the votes were motivated by $$$. However, this could have been direct (lobbying, which would be a criminal offence everywhere but remains perfectly legal in the US), or indirect, via jobs weapons manufacturers provide locally, etc.

Anon from TN
Well, it is Lügenpresse everywhere. It cannot be anything else when the same elites wholly own MSM and all branches of government. Founding Fathers must be turning in their graves.

Anon from TN
Good description how the propaganda works. The ways and mechanisms are exactly the same in the USA, UK, Germany, etc., as they were in the USSR.

Yesterday the US Senate voted to continue the genocide of Yemeni civilians.

David Swanson gives a good account of how it went down, but IMO his attribution to $$$ is overly simplistic. There’s also their brains washed with “evil Iran” propaganda.
http://davidswanson.org/why-55-u-s-senators-voted-for-genocide-in-yemen/
Why 55 U.S. Senators Voted for Genocide in Yemen

The dismemberment of the Russian empire would have occurred anyway, and would have been even greater and faster without Bolshevism. 1991 would have been anticipated for 1918-9, without Lenin and Trtosky. Without communist ideology, there would be nothing to unite people without a common culture.
As for economic development, it is unlikely that it would benefit from a survival of tsarist incompetence. And in the case of an anti-Bolshevik victory, progress would be seriously retarded. Koltchak’s troops massacred workers because they saw them as a threat. the white regime would certainly deindustrialize the country to curb the ‘red danger’, as did the Argentine military during its last period in power.

Jobbik has drifted to the left. It’s now probably to the left of Fidesz, or at least not significantly to the right. Its relations with any of the leftist parties are better than Fidesz. By the way, Orbán tried to make it impossible for them to campaign. So they also hate Orbán now. And they are definitely not less handshakeworthy than Fidesz. They already engaged in talks to the leftist parties. The “new leftist” parties (untainted with governing 2002-10) actually probably like Jobbik more than the socialists or DK (a spinoff party of the socialists with their least popular politicians, somehow still hanging in the National Assembly).

on the assumption that people MUST vote against Orban whoever is available

That has happened in all of the by-elections since 2014. Fidesz lost each of them. I’m not saying it will happen everywhere, but if Fidesz loses over half the districts…

Let me repeat: I still think Fidesz will win this one. But unless they change significantly (and I’m not sure they are capable of that), they will lose badly in 2022. Probably already during the European elections. Even the municipal elections (I think in 2019). It’s possible that they won’t be able to hold onto power until 2022. (And there’s now some chance of them losing already on April 8.)

They have less than half of the voters, and anyone who is not explicitly their voter hates them. Not a good situation, even if you’re the biggest party in the land…

Dishonesty, hysteria and russophobia of the West helps to propel Putin’s support among Russians during elections. If it hadn’t been for the West Putin support might have sunk long ago. What do we have as a result? Even if the elections were rigged a bit the second and the third candidate with the most voter support are definitively not pro-Western.
Here’s piece of news about Russia https://www.mercurynews.com/2018/03/21/us-russian-crew-blasts-of-for-the-iss-from-kazakhstan/ If Russians are so evil why do we collaborate with them? Why do we use their help to send astronauts to space? But most mainstream media doesn’t report news like this. Instead we get constant bashing of Russia in the media, Russian collusion, Russian meddling in the US elections, chemical attack in Syria, Russians intelligence services (or whoever) killing people in London etc.
How about proper investigation, fact checking, trying to be impartial for a sec in order to find the actual offender? Nah, too hard. Let’s just show some photos of children in Syria and bomb the sh*t out of Assad. Or declare murder in London as Russian attack on UK sovereignty and expel all Russian diplomats.

Agree. It looks like Gorbo-Yeltsyn betrayal was a culmination of Russia misplaced desire to join to be like the West. I also wondered about difference in national psych. When the West liked something it just wanted to take It, not to be like it and Russia instead of wanting to take over what she liked wanted to be like it. It led to self betrayal and catastrophe. Russia did have 2 chances to take over Europe in 1813-1814 and in 1945.

I have suspected for a long time that Israel Shamir is an Israeli intelligence asset. This piece shows him very skilfully and maybe without uttering an outright falsehood but with selective truths undermining the legitimacy of Putin.

that’s on the assumption that people MUST vote against Orban whoever is available. As far as I can tell, that’s not automatically the case. Voter apathy might prevail as well, in which case Orban profits, or Jobbik, which is unhandshakeworthy more from the left than from the right anyways and just effectively block any coalition.

Did the lefties in Hungary adapt anti-immigrationism yet? In Slovakia, the whole country is basically united in this case so it is not really a voter issue.

What I see is extraordinary. People of all sorts sit n eat n stare with goggle eyes clearly sinking into an hypnotic state. Some stare with their mouths open. Some even forget to eat. Many become agitated n after leaving rush back to view the screen a second time. The shop employees are obsessed with it n often run to the screen to turn up the volume as if some great world crisis were erupting. Others swear n curse. This goes on for hours. Professional types, middle class people, even bums pause from their prohibited panhandling all stop n stare n absorb n clearly believe whatever the heck the screen is saying. None ever read books, they just sit n stare n react.

Yup.
People who at least try to think are squeezed between those you described and sociopaths/psychopats in power.

I, personally, actually don’t still know who to blame for that predicament and, more importantly, is there is a point anyway.

Most like, it is just what it is, like sky is blue etc.

I truly believe that all that would work just fine save that Oppenheimer’s invention ’45.
That…thing….created the problem.
The “mind” you described above having thermonuclear weapons. Just…..not…….good.

In my opinion, if any political leader is not a puppet, it is Putin.

What surprised me most in the USA was, when staying at the homes of USA friends with good, even university education, was their ignorance.
A former university history professor talked to me about the USA Civil War, he was flabbergasted when I showed little interest, stating that in Europe we had had wars all the time.
A more or less well known USA writer, of non fiction, I saw reading the Readers Digest.
A high school teacher just watched CNN.
On the other hand, in e mail discussions with USA veterans, Korea and Vietnam, they knew quite well how they had been fooled, even, Vietnam, how the USA had committed war crimes.
But who in the USA understands that FDR wanted war since he was brought into politics, 1932, ad deliberately provoked Pearl Harbour ?
Yet the books explaining this, written by USA historians, or for example in the diaries of Lindbergh, exist.
Who read the diaries of Harold L Ickes, where one can find that Britain had to pay the price of the Balfour Declaration, in order to be saved from capitulation in November 1917 ?
But let me admit, before retirement gave me the opportunity to read widely, I also did not doubt what quality media told us.
I now see our media as the Germans see theirs, Lügenpresse, literally ‘lies press’.
In reaction the EU has begun censoring internet, fake news.

No.
We yesterday had our municipal elections, and our last referendum, the law that makes referenda possible has been abolished.
For ‘good’ reason, any time we can vote in a referendum we vote against government policy, without any effect.
2005 we voted against the EU, two years ago against the EU Ukraine association treaty, this, the last time, against the law that makes it possible for our secret services to spy legally on anyone.
The result of ignoring us was clear yesterday, the big losers were the national governing parties, the winners local parties.
Like Germany and Belgium, it becomes more and more difficult to govern our country.
In all three countries it took more than half a year to form a stable government, in our case, as with the two previous Rutte governments, with a parliamentary majority of one seat.
Next year we have our provincial elections, in fact elections for the higher, and smaller second parliament.
I expect that will be the end of Rutte, what then will emerge; no idea.

I spend hours each day in a lunch spot that blares CNN. I always turn my back to the screen n put on headphones since I don’t have time to re-verify simple facts like the sky is blue, facts which PravdCNN constantly seeks to bring into doubt.

From my backward seat I get to observe the lunchgoers as they consume CNN-fare along with their lunch-fare, without myself having the misfortune of having to hear CNN or see the screen.

What I see is extraordinary. People of all sorts sit n eat n stare with goggle eyes clearly sinking into an hypnotic state. Some stare with their mouths open. Some even forget to eat. Many become agitated n after leaving rush back to view the screen a second time. The shop employees are obsessed with it n often run to the screen to turn up the volume as if some great world crisis were erupting. Others swear n curse. This goes on for hours. Professional types, middle class people, even bums pause from their prohibited panhandling all stop n stare n absorb n clearly believe whatever the heck the screen is saying. None ever read books, they just sit n stare n react.

On those rare occasions when I waste a moment by turning to look at the screen to verify that WW3 has truly broken out, all I ever see is Wolf Blitzer holding sheets of paper n the word Trump inching across the screen. I always regret wasting the moment turning to look when I could have read a few more words in my book.

Indoctrination via habituation n hypnosis seems to be the chief message of CNN. When I check genuine news sources later on I always find that WW3 did not break out, that Trump is still the President, that the sky is actually blue n not green or red or polka dot n has not magically transformed itself into cloud images of the Martyr Hillary in Gaea sympathy with PC Cultists’ lamentations.

I am sure that Putin would win election in every country in the world for even much less , what he did in Russia…He is the only one. No competition . I repeat , no competition for Putin.
And they not only voted for him but they got already plenty of improvement back.
More that they dreamed.. First normal ruler and excellent one.
Russia is now a showcase of democracy.
If Xenia have a nice looking mother , everything is possible …
/Even good treatment, in the cruel election fights/.
Swamp is now dried in Moscow…

I find it rather interesting that none of the comments address the last part of Shamir’s article. If it’s correct, the Brits made a very nasty error that shows the true nature of their establishment.

When you state that an idea crossed your mind, how on earth do you measure a time span of such a super short duration? Is it a nano second or one and a half?

Very funny.

What’s stopping you?

Jilles, maybe your American friends are simply ignorant and easily fooled. That is the type of people who make CNN their sole source of news. This doesn’t make them average Americans, just CNN fans.

If I came to visit a friend in Holland, and based my opinion of all Nederlanders on that friend and three others like him that I met while there, would you agree with me if I said that the average person in the Netherlands thought like my friend and his three friends?

No, Robin, I’m not delusional. CNN is the news source of choice for libtards, and I do not consider libtards “average Americans”.

Please seek help with your anger issues. Everyone who disagrees with your views isn’t delusional, and you don’t know everything about everything. You can go take your pill now.

80 US Senators have been in office for at least 20 years. Hillary Clinton routinely boasted of 40+ years in politics. Perhaps the desire for change is smothered in the USA too.

Anon from TN
IQ in my comments is just a shorthand for intellectual ability. It does not mean that I believe in it. I was on the admissions committee of our umbrella graduate program long enough to know that IQ, GRE, or SAT scores mean exactly nothing. At best, they reflect the effort people put into preparation to these tests, but have no predictive value whatsoever.

Even better from a long term perspective, polling by age group from 2016 shows progressively larger margins of support for Fidesz (and for Jobbik) among younger groups.

I don’t think it’s true of Fidesz, they are weaker among the young. I think it might be true of Jobbik to an extent, but also of the new leftist parties, especially the otherwise very small Momentum, probably also LMP.

Methodological note: The Hungarian pollsters generally release separate data about the support of political parties among all eligible voters (which tends to include a high percentage for “don’t know/no preference”), and about the support of political parties among “active” or “certain” voters. The table below refers to the latter data.[a]

It’s a near certainty that the “don’t know” voters will mostly vote for an opposition party. There’s more of them than usual, especially this close to the election (when normally voters already know for sure if they were going to vote, and for whom).

Orbán is good (he seems to have gotten more and more based over the years), but his corruption and his tendency to surround himself with incompetent hacks and sycophants will be his undoing. As I wrote, I still expect him to win this time, but he will no longer get a supermajority.

Regarding immigration, if Jobbik becomes a part of the coalition, then I wouldn’t expect big changes. Even half of leftist voters are against third world immigration. But I’m not sure if the enthusiasm will stay.

Also Orbán is overusing the migration topic in his election campaign, especially whenever his corruption comes up. It only discredits the topic, which I don’t like.

I still hope he’ll manage to change. As you wrote, he is probably the most based white leader of any country.

We’ll see.

I hope you’re wrong.

From a distance, Viktor Orban looks like the world’s greatest statesman.

On the big, long term issues his platform is perfect:

Immigration restriction
Non-interventionist foreign policy
Christian social conservatism
Understands the importance of a replacement level birthrate
Pragmatic populist economics
National pride and sovereignty
Relatively friendly towards Russia, could conceivable be the mediator who prevents WW3
Foreign aid focused on helping the most vulnerable people, Middle Eastern Christians, survive in their own homeland
Above all, the public face and brains of the V4 group, and the established ally of the national conservatives currently taking control of Austria, Italy and hopefully soon other Western European countries.

For the first time since John Hunyadi, the #1 defender of European Christian civilization is a Hungarian.

The poll results on Wikipedia look promising for Fidesz:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Opinion_polling_for_the_Hungarian_parliamentary_election,_2018

The 30 day average gives Fidesz 50% + support, compared to 45% in 2014.

It looks as though Fidesz has stolen a large chunk of Jobbik’s 2014 supporters, and the combined nationalist percentage (Fidesz + Jobbik) has slightly increased at the expense of the left.

Even better from a long term perspective, polling by age group from 2016 shows progressively larger margins of support for Fidesz (and for Jobbik) among younger groups.

Again, with the IQ – university trope? It’s largely irrelevant.

You are in a tiny bubble, and just because your small, smart sample seems “woke,” don’t imagine IQ is any barometer for resistance to group-think and propaganda.

Furthermore, don’t assume that humans, high IQ or otherwise, are capable of extrapolation. My lunch group was composed of Christian activists who have [each] spent decades advocating for Palestinians. They are intimately aware of how propaganda has biased Americans for Israel. They have seen the film, Occupation of the American Mind. They know that only by persistent clever marketing, the Zionists sold the fraudulent “noble little Israel” myth.

And yet, they accept unquestioningly the MSM fake news about ANY OTHER SUBJECT. I find this particularly galling, but I believe it’s a form of denial they use because the cognitive dissonance would be just too much to bear.

You have to remember he started out as a young, fresh leader. (The name Fidesz originally comes from an abbreviation FIDESZ, which stood for Young Democrats’ Alliance. It was a liberal party in the early 1990s, and until 1992 no new member could be accepted above the age 35…)

His entourage changed a lot since he came to power in 2010. It moved a bit in the alt-right direction, which is to say, it got crankier. Many of his more normal conservative allies left him over the years or started keeping a low profile, while he started to employ stupid lieutenants. Since 2010, but especially since 2014 he really became a Führer of his party, and most people around him were sycophants. He seems to have believed by 2014 that he was an infallible genius, and that it was no longer possible for anyone in Hungary to beat him.

His lieutenants are now either stupid or corrupt or both. He himself is not above all this: his son-in-law started a corrupt scheme in 2010, and was already considered a shady scandal-ridden figure before 2014, but recently new details emerged. It’s possible Hungary will have to pay back some money to the EU (I mean, stealing EU monies when you’re trying to take a stand against them must be stupid…) because of these shady deals. The mayor of his native village became one of the richest people in the country over the past 8 years (he’s a simple gas fitter), and many people now suspect that his wealth actually belongs to Orbán personally. To be honest, it’s not implausible.

First of all it is not me that is interfering in anything in Russia. But Israel, what is he, Israeli, Swede, Russian, something else? Anybody know? He seems to try to influence much more. But that’s OK with you as he is Communist, yes?

He is journalist/columnist that writes around monthly for Komsomolskaya Pravda in Russia. I was surprised he answers questions here. As for his name – he is actually anti-Israel, ironically.

Orbán probably didn’t understand the possibilities of the internet.

One of the most common characteristics of conservatives – ie. the moderate right we’ve depended on to fight the left over the last half century – throughout the West is that they are really slow learners. Alt Righters always talk about conservative cowardice and treachery, which are also common, but the inability of conservative people in general to even notice new situations/threats etc is even more frustrating and demoralising. I guess it’s more to do with endemic provincialism rather than outright stupidity but who knows.

Anon from TN
You may be right, all 27 years in the US I communicated with the smartest people in the country, at Universities, research institutes, and scientific meetings. I only encounter hoi polloi when I drive through the middle of nowhere, like Arkansas, Kansas, Oklahoma, Kentucky, Tennessee, or Indiana, and only briefly at gas stations or in roadside eateries. It is usually pretty bad, “a bunch of imbeciles”, using your expression. I have a feeling that a representative sample of common people I encountered in school in what now is Lugansk Republic was smarter. But I might be wrong, that was so long ago.

Well one thing is certainly clear, the poison didn’t act like a fourth generation military grade chemical weapon should act, especially if super-evil Putin-assassin-bots actually planned this shit. I mean a failure rate of 1 out of 2, hit me, maybe they like to sail close to the wind with dosage, but both?!

Trump does make it easy for them.

Is it possible you just communicate with the top 5% USA people with regard to IQ ?
Or even a lower % ?
One of the shocking events of my life was when I was summoned for being tested for compulsory military service, it was in 1961, if I remember correctly.
The group that was there was, I suppose a representative sample of the Dutch.
My idea ‘a bunch of imbeciles’.
Just having had contact with gymnasium and university people, my idea of the average Dutch clearly was all wrong.
I must have forgotten by then primary school, where it was about the same.
I met people with the same shock.

“We reject the American regime. Why not treat the Russian regime equally?”
— And why “we” should treat them equally? The American “regime” has been thoroughly zionized so that an expression of patriotism by the US brass is looked upon as a great courage: http://turcopolier.typepad.com/sic_semper_tyrannis/2018/03/votel-mattis-and-dunford-must-be-on-the-same-page.html
Comment section: “…all these statements by Votel are true and it took a good deal of courage to make them in public.” — Get it? Just stating truthfully that Syria has won a civil war is an anathema to the Lobby and it takes a great personal courage by a four-star general in the United States Army who has been commander of United States Central Command to testify the truth for the US Congress.
Russain Federation is an independent state. The US is ZUSA – Ziocon United States of America. Ukraine has become the Kaganat of Nuland, and the UK has become a personal estate of the Friends of Israel. For example, Boris Johnson proclaimed himself a committed Zionist: http://jewishnews.timesofisrael.com/boris-johnson-zionist/
Boris Johnson, Theresa May, and Gavin Williamson are not working for the UK citizens — they are working for the Lobby (The Friends of Israel), which explains their indecency re Skripal affair. They are defaming the United Kingdom with their behavior: https://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2018/03/21/uk-ambassador-craig-murray-asks-aware-fact/

What do you mean when you say the elections have been fixed for years, the truth is they have been fixed for generations going clear back to Washington, but its way more fun to point fingers at some other person or some other country and cry corruption ,after all its the American way….

He’s jew born in Russia.
His parents went to Israel, what then was his age I do not know.

The whining is coming for the land of Bush the lesser, Cheney five deferments, Rice mushroom cloud, Chicago-style elections, and the Lobby strict censorship over the US Congress (only Israel-firsters are allowed). Wouldn’t it be great if the US first punish her own criminals, including banksters and dual-citizenship spies? Four million civilians — including a multitude of children — were slaughtered in the Middle East since 1999 to satisfy the desires of Israel-firsters, MIC, and oilmen. And yet, the major war criminals who pushed for the wars of aggression (a supreme crime) are wondering free: from Bush and Kristol to Clinton and Powers

Russia has yet to untangle some several hundred years of central authority style leadership and taking on democratic principle is just not as breezy as assumed.

This is such a cliche phrase. Could you specify where exactly do you see stellar examples of “democratic principles” ? In the UK with its unelected upper chamber of the parliament and the Prime Minister, also not elected directly by the citizens? In the US, with its two-party system in indirect elections? In Australis, with its compulsory voting?

Today’s Russia is as democratic as any Western country, more so than some. Whatever peculiarities our political system has is due to our history, the same as in any other country. The same as in the UK, with their “constitutional” monarchy in the absence of actual constitution. The same as in the US, with their voting system designed by Founding Fathers. Russia is large and divers; some centralized authority is needed to keep it together structurally and mentally, that is all.

So parties could run separately and then after the first round of voting they could form an alliance.

The second round had the three best performing candidates, and it wasn’t necessary to get the majority in the second round. Therefore, cooperation between at least the two largest opposition parties (with some candidates, usually, but not always, the weakest ones, withdrawing from the race) was still needed. But they didn’t have to do it until after the first round.

Also recently websites have popped up showing the most viable (popular) opposition candidates in most districts, so now voters already have the information. Orbán probably didn’t understand the possibilities of the internet.

A number of scandals rocked his party (some corruption scandals involving his close family members, but not all scandals were corruption related), but the most important thing is that already in 2014 he didn’t have a majority of the votes.

The Hungarian election system since 2014 is a mix of first past the post and (to a smaller extent) proportional representation. (Even the latter favors the winner.) Before Orbán changed it, it had a similar system, but one where the MP districts had a second round, unless someone received the majority of the votes. So parties could run separately and then after the first round of voting they could form an alliance.

Orbán changed the system because he understood that for the opposition (which was divided, even without Jobbik) would need to form an alliance in order to be competitive. However, some of the leftist parties were discredited in the eyes of the majority of the electorate (and the voters of Jobbik and the leftists were often incompatible), and so an alliance would have destroyed a large portion of the appeal of the other leftist parties (not to mention Jobbik).

However, that seems to have changed recently. Moreover, there has been open talk of “cross-voting” even with Jobbik, so in many places the parties won’t even have to form an alliance (which, less than three weeks before the election, they have still failed to do anyway), their voters in each district will be voting for the most popular opposition candidate (and now this seems to include Jobbik), and they are encouraging their voters to do so.

It’s a question how many of the voters will actually do so, but I think the floodgates have opened to some extent already. It’s not exactly encouraging that since 2014 Fidesz has lost all by-elections. They were usually explained away as products of unusual local circumstances, but it’s getting increasingly likely that it will happen in a lot of places.

I still expect Fidesz to win, but not by a large margin.

As such Russia still gravitates towards “a strong man” style of leadership.

Ironically it was the US and its ((advisers)) that first handed all of the Russian wealth over to the ((oligarchs)), and then, later, supported Yeltsin when he illegally dissolved the Rada and arrested their leaders (generally known as the 1993 Russian constitutional crisis) (they had also supported him earlier, back when he was only President of the Russian Soviet Socialist Republic and Gorbachev was head honcho, when Yeltsin sent tanks to bomb the Rada/Parliament, during the so-called “August coup”). As a result, so that “their man” had all the authority he needed to crush any dissent, the US and “West” fully supported the “authoritarian” Constitution adopted later that year to cement Yeltsin’s powers.

But of course now they blame Putin and the “Russian character” for it. Because, you know, that is how the “West” rolls.

taking on democratic principle is just not as breezy as assumed

Yes and that is why there is not one country, aside perhaps from Switzerland, that is even remotely democratic. The US is an utter oligarchic tyranny. Some other countries in Europe may have some minimal claim at a semblance of democracy but it all collapses under closer scrutiny. Heck many European countries still have their monarchies, including, probably in the most extreme form, the UK.

Big error! Demonizing works very well. Just look at how Trump is portrayed by the media, academia, entertainment and a large part of the GOP.

Anon from TN
There is one little problem with your claim: in China, people are not allowed to choose national leaders, even via fake vote. Another is that Putin enjoys much greater genuine support in Russia than Trump in the US, Merkel in Germany, or Macron in France, not to mention pathetic lame duck May in the UK. I don’t know how widespread is the support of Xi in China, but it can’t be lower that that of Trump, Merkel, or May in their countries. Personally, I am no fan of Putin, but I admire his ability to win kudos for Russia with a fairly weak hand (Xi also tends to win kudos for his country, but his cards are much stronger). This most likely explains Western hysteria.

ad hominen detected. Israel really knows as well as I do what is going on here.

So if he is living in Jaffa, Stockholm and Moscow (in which order?), how does he find so much time to spend in Yakut and get the pulse of the place? Russia is a big place to travel around, with many different languages, cultures, etc. And many people have many opinions. Spare us the “I know Russia” crap. All you have is your opinion.

But let us (Russians) to decide how we’ll build our future.

First of all it is not me that is interfering in anything in Russia. But Israel, what is he, Israeli, Swede, Russian, something else? Anybody know? He seems to try to influence much more. But that’s OK with you as he is Communist, yes?

All the problems arise from attempts of the West to transfer its f#cken “values” around the world.

Even if that were true, “Communism” is most definitely a “Western value”. Or didn’t they teach you that in your grade school?

Anon from TN
For the sake of the majority of readers who don’t speak Russian Mr. Shamir should have translated the poster shown in the picture. It says on one side “March 18, 2018”, and on the other “Strong president – strong Russia!” Without Western meddling in Syria and Ukraine this slogan would have been useless. The effect of Western propaganda is clearly reflected in the fact that more than 84% of voters residing outside Russia chose Putin, much more than those residing in the country (less than 77%). Mr. Shamir also should have mentioned that March 18 was not just a random date: it was the fourth anniversary of Crimea rejoining Russia. As could be expected, in Crimea and the city of Sevastopol, the fraction of Putin vote was even greater than in the rest of Russia, more than 90%. The people there remember who they should thank for their escape from the Ukrainian madhouse. All these little tricks certainly helped Putin, but this help was predicated on an insane anti-Putin propaganda campaign in the West. I am saying insane for a reason. Russian people have learned their lesson: there will never be another Yeltsin or Gorbachev in Russia. In fact, the West will rue the day Putin is gone.

Aside from the obvious legalized bribery (Citizens United), the absolute control of the corrupt 2-party system, the oligarchic and utterly undemocratic mass media, etc., we also had the case in 2000 that a bunch of unelected dictators-for-life “decided” the US election, clearly unlawfully. Bush vs. Gore.

Yes, US is in no position to be lecturing anybody about “democracy”. But US is not short on chutzpah in any political realm.

Or it could be that a nation such as Russia has yet to untangle some several hundred years of central authority style leadership and taking on democratic principle is just not as breezy as assumed.

As such Russia still gravitates towards “a strong man” style of leadership. And Pres Putin is a reasonable, seasoned, astute strong leader, who doesn’t fold in the face of adversity.

Putin and Trump are controversial puppets that serve respective national interests. Trump puppet is a return to the swagger of the ugly American. Putin is composed and ruthless because people end up dead after a button is pushed or something every American remembers from grade school propaganda. Both puppets have fan bases around the world and in each of their countries. Each country tries to show its own citizens and the rest of the world how honest and true their fake money drenched voting frauds are. The most Democratic and free countries where the sheep have a vote are incidentally the world’s leading weapons manufacturers: US, Russia and China.

If elections resulted in real change, the Russians and Yankees wouldn’t have them. All theater for the zombies, aka the voting class. Only zombies would argue over the merits of the candidates. The US needs very little from its citizens. These includes obedience, widespread ignorance and the unquestioned belief they live in a Democracy because voting happens.

The best slaves are the ones that lack the intelligence to recognize their own slavery. The happiest slaves know that voting is a rigged sham but don’t care because the right master leads them.

Though I still expect Orbán to win in April, his odds have considerably worsened in recent weeks. There is now a serious chance of Fidesz not getting a majority.

Any particular reason for his worsening chances?

Anon from TN
As the Romans used to say (sometimes this phrase is claimed to belong to Prometheus), “Iuppiter iratus ergo nefas” (Jupiter, you are angry, therefore you are wrong).

Anon from TN
Now, that I believe. Due to dismal school system (purely parochial, no national standards, local boards full of ignoramuses decide what kids are taught in school) too many Americans sincerely believe that the world consists of three roughly equal parts: Main street, out-of-town, and overseas. I guess the election results in the last few decades show this clearly.

Don’t know Shamir’s background. I am familiar with wikipedia – Judaized/Zionized deception and lies especially against someone who has written like Israel Shamir. FLOWERS OF GALILEE highly recommended. Wikipedia NOT.

Alas, I stayed with USA friends, well educated middle class, where CNN was the only ‘news’ source.
Three other USA acquaintances I visited in their homes, cannot remember having seen a newspaper other than a local one about marriages and funerals.
The USA reminded me of the Peking court, that, when British warships were reported on the coast, responded with ‘there had been so many pirates already’.
In the Badlands, in a very small café, I identified myself as Dutch, from Holland, Netherlands.
When all this did not ring bell I mentioned Europe, the first time in my life.
This was understood.

Anon from TN
Maybe I overestimate American citizens (I work at a top-rate University and communicate mostly with faculty and grad students), but I’d like to come to their defense. CNN (as well as FOX news, NYT, and other MSM) represent the views of the lower half of US citizens by IQ. As far as I can tell, blatant lies of Western propaganda achieved among the people with brains the same result as the Soviet propaganda: even if they state something truthful for a change, people would doubt that.

Anon from TN
Fact is, Western stupidity and grotesque lies of Western propaganda did more for Putin’s electoral success that pro-Putin propaganda. Speak of unintended consequences. In 2013 Putin’s approval hovered at ~45%. Nazi coup in Ukraine and reunification with Crimea increased it to 65-70%. Recent British hysterics, where the versions change every day, each new one more fantastic than the preceding ones, with more gaping holes in it, added another 5% at least. Officially, Putin got more than 76% of the vote with participation of more than 67% of eligible voters. This time around he did not need any underhanded tricks. Thus, more than 51% of eligible voters supported him. This is the level Western politicians can’t even dream of: Trump was elected by 26% of eligible voters, Merkel’s party got even less. Even if Mr. Shamir’s numbers are correct, Putin got higher fraction of the votes than any Western politician in living memory. Putin should thank Trump, May, Merkel, Macron, and others for his resounding electoral success.
As to Mr. Karlin, who pretends to be a pro-Russian blogger, he was wrong, as usual. Nothing new there.

Were the results falsified? Probably, up to a point,

What an idiotic habit of saying thing when you have no evidence whatsoever to back them up. As they say, put up or shut up.

Based on everything I know the elections were as clean as any elections could ever be. My personal sampling, however limited, also tells me that people went not just to vote, but to vote for Putin. The recent activity of our friends in West succeeded in mobilizing specifically Putin’s electorate.

And sociologist prognoses are of little value nowadays: they are tools of psychological warfare against the voter.

Of course not – particularly, if you don’t like the results.

In the far-away Yakut province, with its mind-boggling frost of minus 35 ° below zero, the Communist contender has got almost 30% of the vote. …On the other side, in the notoriously dishonest and despotic Muslim republic of Chechnya the contender was given less than 5%.

Yes, Chechnya is notoriously dishonest and despotic, but Yakutya is a paragon of democracy. Really, Mr. Shamir? It’s amazing how indulgence in wishful thinking can easily destroy even decent analytic abilities.

You’re truly delusional if you think CNN does NOT represent average American thinking, at least a large paart of it. Last week I suffered through a luncheon of 5 mature adults extolling Rachel Maddow. Sickening.

“I watch CNN in order to know what the average USA citizens thinks.”

Unless that was meant as sarcasm, you’re doing yourself a disservice. CNN is no more a credible source for what the average American thinks than the Soviet-era Pravda was.

those who identified themselves as Jewish left for Israel. There they learned that the Jews do not consider them being members of the Chosen People, and many of them trekked back to Russia, cured of their illusions.

Mr. Shamir – I am hoping that you could clarify just how large the Russian/Ukrainian Jewish immigration is in Israel? A Greek friend of mine is under the impression that it’s quite large, and that many of these non ‘Chosen people’ have become Orthodox Christians. He also feels that Putin, as the new ‘Protector of Orthodoxy’ has much influence over these Jews in the Holyland? Any figures, any thoughts?…

The idea that Putin staged the British attack so as to generate a nationalist backlash in the election had crossed my mind. It probably had some effect and that led to the overkill the author is referring to. The fact that Both Putin’s and Grudinin’s results were significantly out of line with the polls suggests rigging on behalf of both of them, all the more so as the results obtained by the other candidates were essentially what the polls predicted. More importantly, though, Putin has (once again!) shot himself in the foot. Nobody really beleives the official results, including the voter turnout, but even if you take the official numbers, the election has been pretty much a disaster for him. Only about half the electorate voted for him, with about one third refusing to vote at all, in spite of inducements and pressures, with about 17% voting for the various other candidates. From now on, therefore, claims by Putin’s American supporters that he enjoys massive popular support will be laughed out of court. Roughly one Russian in two wants to see the last of him! Some of that is due to his hanging on too long. He has now been in effective power for 19 years and people are just bored with him. That happened to Thatcher after 11 years. Merkel is more or less finished after 13 years and even his most loyal supporters were glad to see François Mitterrand go after 14 years. Desire for change is part of human nature. For that very reason, I don’t see Putin staying until 2024.

, pro tip: nowadays nobody falls for the trick of putting unsupported assertions in the predicate of the sentence. That doesn’t actually make it more convincing. It might work at a site that’s not run by a physicist for people with a proper liberal education. But here, not so much.

Another pro tip: demonizing the leader is kind of trite, having been tried with mixed success on Saddam, Kim, Qaddafy, Arafat, Khomeni, Khameni, Amedinejad, Amejinedinejinejanejad and so on. All the foreign devils just blur into one another and our eyes glaze over. It also sounds as if you never heard of СБРФ. That is who’s eating your lunch. In fact you can’t talk sense without considering the state as a whole.

To that end, here are some documented facts about the Russian state.

http://www.ohchr.org/EN/countries/ENACARegion/Pages/RUIndex.aspx

In these documents, prepared by civil society and international experts acting in their personal capacity, you will find actual issues worth thinking about. Not Putin is short, or he rides a horse. You can readily compare those issues to America’s, or Israel’s, or Ukraine’s, to understand just where Russia fits in terms of all the legal duties the state bears.