#Russia Probe

[tomorrowusa]

^^^ What really happened. hehe 🙂🇺🇦

Seriously, don't be too surprised when Russia's missiles go WAY off course.

Putin's project to revive the glory days of the Soviet Union has not been going well.

[mysterioushimachal]

NIA Busts Immigration Racket in Himachal: Russian Link Probed

On a quiet morning in Dharamshala, a tourist hotspot nestled in the lap of the Himalayas, national security forces descended with urgency. The NIA raid Dharamshala operation, which began around 5 AM, targeted a well-constructed three-storey house owned by a man known as Sunny, a former salesman from Bharmour, Chamba. This wasn’t just another income tax search or local police action. It was a…

[liberalsarecool]

I owe my Trump-supporting friends an apology. I’ve been critical of the Trump presidency and am still exhausted from the experience.

But to be fair, President Trump wasn’t that bad, other than:

• when he incited an insurrection against the government,

• mismanaged a pandemic that killed over a million Americans

• separated children from their families

• lost those children in the bureaucracy

• tear-gassed peaceful protesters on Lafayette Square so he could hold a photo op holding a Bible in front of a church

• tried to block all Muslims from entering the country

• got impeached

• got impeached again

• had the worst jobs record of any president in modern history

• pressured Ukraine to dig dirt on Joe Biden

• fired the FBI director for investigating his ties to Russia

• bragged about firing the FBI director on TV

• took Vladimir Putin’s word over the US intelligence community

• diverted military funding to build his wall

• caused the longest government shutdown in US history

• called Black Lives Matter a “symbol of hate”

• lied nearly 40,000 times

• banned transgender people from serving in the military

• ejected reporters from the White House briefing room who asked tough questions

• vetoed the defense funding bill because it renamed military bases named for Confederate soldiers

• refused to release his tax returns

• increased the national debt by nearly $8 trillion

• had three of the highest annual trade deficits in U.S. history

• called veterans and soldiers who died in combat losers and suckers

• coddled the leader of Saudi Arabia after he ordered the execution and dismembering of a US-based journalist

• refused to concede the 2020 election

• hired his unqualified daughter and son-in-law to work in the White House

• walked out of an interview with Lesley Stahl

• called neo-Nazis “very fine people”

• suggested that people should inject bleach into their bodies to fight COVID

• abandoned our allies the Kurds to Turkey

• pushed through massive tax cuts for the wealthiest but balked at helping working Americans

• incited anti-lockdown protestors in several states at the height of the pandemic

• withdrew the US from the Paris climate accords

• withdrew the US from the Iranian nuclear deal

• withdrew the US from the Trans Pacific Partnership which was designed to block China’s advances

• insulted his own Cabinet members on Twitter

• pushed the leader of Montenegro out of the way during a photo op

• failed to reiterate US commitment to defending NATO allies

• called Haiti and African nations “shithole” countries

• called the city of Baltimore the “worst in the nation”

• claimed that he single-handedly brought back the phrase “Merry Christmas” even though it hadn’t gone anywhere

• forced his Cabinet members to praise him publicly like some cult leader

• believed he should be awarded the Nobel Peace Prize

• berated and belittled his hand-picked Attorney General when he recused himself from the Russia probe

• suggested the US should buy Greenland

• colluded with Mitch McConnell to push through federal judges and two Supreme Court justices after supporting efforts to prevent his predecessor from appointing judges

• repeatedly called the media “enemies of the people”

• claimed that if we tested fewer people for COVID we’d have fewer cases

• violated the emoluments clause

• thought that Nambia was a country

• told Bob Woodward in private that the coronavirus was a big deal but then downplayed it in public

• called his exceedingly faithful vice president a “p---y” for following the Constitution

• nearly got us into a war with Iran after threatening them by tweet

• nominated a corrupt head of the EPA

• nominated a corrupt head of HHS

• nominated a corrupt head of the Interior Department

• nominated a corrupt head of the USDA

• praised dictators and authoritarians around the world while criticizing allies

• refused to allow the presidential transition to begin

• insulted war hero John McCain – even after his death

• spent an obscene amount of time playing golf after criticizing Barack Obama for playing (far less) golf while president

• falsely claimed that he won the 2016 popular vote

• called the Muslim mayor of London a “stone cold loser”

• falsely claimed that he turned down being Time’s Man of the Year

• considered firing special counsel Robert Mueller on several occasions

• mocked wearing face masks to guard against transmitting COVID

• locked Congress out of its constitutional duty to confirm Cabinet officials by hiring acting ones

• used a racist dog whistle by calling COVID the “China virus”

• hired and associated with numerous shady figures that were eventually convicted of federal offenses including his campaign manager and national security adviser

• pardoned several of his shady associates

• gave the Presidential Medal of Freedom to two congressman who amplified his batshit crazy conspiracy theories

• got into telephone fight with the leader of Australia(!)

• had a Secretary of State who called him a moron

• forced his press secretary to claim without merit that his was the largest inauguration crowd in history

• botched the COVID vaccine rollout

• tweeted so much dangerous propaganda that Twitter eventually banned him

• charged the Secret Service jacked-up rates at his properties

• constantly interrupted Joe Biden in their first presidential debate

• claimed that COVID would “magically” disappear

• called a U.S. Senator “Pocahontas”

• used his Twitter account to blast Nordstrom when it stopped selling Ivanka’s merchandise

• opened up millions of pristine federal lands to development and drilling

• got into a losing tariff war with China that forced US taxpayers to bail out farmers

• claimed that his losing tariff war was a win for the US

• ignored or didn’t even take part in daily intelligence briefings

• blew off honoring American war dead in France because it was raining

• redesigned Air Force One to look like the Trump Shuttle

• got played by Kim Jung Un and his “love letters”

• threatened to go after social media companies in clear violation of the Constitution

• botched the response to Hurricane Maria in Puerto Rico

• threw paper towels at Puerto Ricans when he finally visited them

• pressured the governor and secretary of state of Georgia to “find” him votes

• thought that the Virgin islands had a President

• drew on a map with a Sharpie to justify his inaccurate tweet that Alabama was threatened by a hurricane

• allowed White House staff to use personal email accounts for official businesses after blasting Hillary Clinton for doing the same thing

• rolled back regulations that protected the public from mercury and asbestos

• pushed regulators to waste time studying snake-oil remedies for COVID

• rolled back regulations that stopped coal companies from dumping waste into rivers

• held blatant campaign rallies at the White House

• tried to take away millions of Americans’ health insurance because the law was named for a Black man

• refused to attend his successors’ inauguration

• nominated the worst Education Secretary in history

• threatened judges who didn’t do what he wanted

• attacked Dr. Anthony Fauci

• promised that Mexico would pay for the wall (it didn’t)

• allowed political hacks to overrule government scientists on major reports on climate change and other issues

• struggled navigating a ramp after claiming his opponent was feeble

• called an African-American Congresswoman “low IQ”

• threatened to withhold federal aid from states and cities with Democratic leaders

• went ahead with rallies filled with maskless supporters in the middle of a pandemic

• claimed that legitimate investigations of his wrongdoing were ��witch hunts,”

• seemed to demonstrate a belief that there were airports during the American Revolution

• demanded “total loyalty” from the FBI director

• praised a conspiracy theory that Democrats are Satanic pedophiles

• completely gutted the Voice of America

• placed a political hack in charge of the Postal Service

• claimed without evidence that the Obama administration bugged Trump Tower

• suggested that the US should allow more people from places like Norway into the country

• suggested that COVID wasn’t that bad because he recovered with the help of top government doctors and treatments not available to the public

• overturned energy conservation standards that even industry supported

• reduced the number of refugees the US accepts

• insulted various members of Congress and the media with infantile nicknames

• gave Rush Limbaugh a Presidential medal of Freedom at the State of the Union address

• named as head of federal personnel a 29-year old who’d previously been fired from the White House for allegations of financial improprieties

• eliminated the White House office of pandemic response

• used soldiers as campaign props

• fired any advisor who made the mistake of disagreeing with him

• demanded the Pentagon throw him a Soviet-style military parade

• hired a shit ton of white nationalists

• politicized the civil service

• did absolutely nothing after Russia hacked the U.S. government

• falsely said the Boy Scouts called him to say his bizarre Jamboree speech was the best speech ever given to the Scouts

• claimed that Black people would overrun the suburbs if Biden won

• insulted reporters of color

• insulted women reporters

• insulted women reporters of color

• suggested he was fine with China’s oppression of the Uighurs

• attacked the Supreme Court when it ruled against him

• summoned Pennsylvania state legislative leaders to the White House to pressure them to overturn the election

• spent countless hours every day watching Fox News

• refused to allow his administration to comply with Congressional subpoenas

• hired Rudy Giuliani as his lawyer

• tried to punish Amazon because the Jeff Bezos-owned Washington Post wrote negative stories about him

• acted as if the Attorney General of the United States was his personal attorney

• attempted to get the federal government to defend him in a libel lawsuit from a women who accused him of sexual assault

• held private meetings with Vladimir Putin without staff present

• didn’t disclose his private meetings with Vladimir Putin so that the US had to find out via Russian media

• stopped holding press briefings for months at a time

• “ordered” US companies to leave China even though he has no such power

• led a political party that couldn’t even be bothered to draft a policy platform

• claimed preposterously that Article II of the Constitution gave him absolute powers

• tried to pressure the U.K. to hold the British Open at his golf course

• suggested that the government nuke hurricanes

• suggested that wind turbines cause cancer

• said that he had a special aptitude for science

• fired the head of election cyber security after he said that the 2020 election was secure

• blurted out classified information to Russian officials

• tried to force the G7 to hold their meeting at his failing golf resort in Florida

• fired the acting attorney general when she refused to go along with his unconstitutional Muslim travel ban

• hired Stephen Miller

• openly discussed national security issues in the dining room at Mar-a-Lago where everyone could hear them

• interfered with plans to relocate the FBI because a new development there might compete with his hotel

• abandoned Iraqi refugees who’d helped the U.S. during the war

• tried to get Russia back into the G7

• held a COVID super spreader event in the Rose Garden

• seemed to believe that Frederick Douglass is still alive

• lost 60 election fraud cases in court including before judges he had nominated

• falsely claimed that factories were reopening when they weren’t

• shamelessly exploited terror attacks in Europe to justify his anti-immigrant policies

• still hasn’t come up with a healthcare plan

• still hasn’t come up with an infrastructure plan despite repeated “Infrastructure Weeks"

• forced Secret Service agents to drive him around Walter Reed while contagious with COVID

• told the Proud Boys to “stand back and stand by”

• fucked up the Census

• withdrew the U.S. from the World Health Organization in the middle of a pandemic

• did so few of his duties that his press staff were forced to state on his daily schedule “President Trump will work from early in the morning until late in the evening. He will make many calls and have many meetings,” allowed his staff to repeatedly violate the Hatch Act

• seemed not to know that Abraham Lincoln was a Republican

• stood before sacred CIA wall of heroes and bragged about his election win

• constantly claimed he was treated worse than any president which presumably includes four that were assassinated and his predecessor whose legitimacy and birthplace were challenged by a racist reality TV show star named Donald Trump

• claimed Andrew Jackson could’ve stopped the Civil War even though he died 16 years before it happened

• said that any opinion poll showing him behind was fake

• claimed that other countries laughed at us before he became president when several world leaders were literally laughing at him

• claimed that the military was out of ammunition before he became President

• created a commission to whitewash American history

• retweeted anti-Islam videos from one of the most racist people in Britain

• claimed ludicrously that the Pulse nightclub shooting wouldn’t have happened if someone there had a gun even though there was an armed security guard there

• hired a senior staffer who cited the non-existent Bowling Green Massacre as a reason to ban Muslims

• had a press secretary who claimed that Nazi Germany never used chemical weapons even though every sane human being knows they used gas to kill millions of Jews and others

• bilked the Secret Service for higher than market rates when they had to stay at Trump properties

• apparently sold pardons on his way out of the White House

• stripped protective status from 59,000 Haitians

• falsely claimed Biden wanted to defund the police

• said that the head of the CDC didn’t know what he was talking about

• tried to rescind protection from DREAMers

• gave himself an A+ for his handling of the pandemic

• tried to start a boycott of Goodyear tires due to an Internet hoax

• said U.S. rates of COVID would be lower if you didn’t count blue states

• deported U.S. veterans who served their country but were undocumented

• claimed he did more for African Americans than any president since Lincoln

• touted a “super-duper” secret “hydrosonic” missile which may or may not be a new “hypersonic” missile or may not exist at all

• retweeted a gif calling Biden a pedophile

• forced through security clearances for his family

• suggested that police officers should rough up suspects

• suggested that Biden was on performance-enhancing drugs

• tried to stop transgender students from being able to use school bathrooms in line with their gender

• suggested the US not accept COVID patients from a cruise ship because it would make US numbers look higher

• nominated a climate change skeptic to chair the committee advising the White House on environmental policy

• retweeted a video doctored to look like Biden had played a song called “Fuck tha Police” at a campaign event

• hugged a disturbingly large number of U.S. flags

• accused Democrats of “treason” for not applauding his State of the Union address

• claimed that the FBI failed to capture the Parkland school shooter because they were “spending too much time” on Russia

• mocked the testimony of Dr Christine Blasey Ford when she accused Brett Kavanaugh of sexual assault

• obsessed over low-flow toilets

• ordered the re-release of more COVID vaccines when there weren’t any to release

• called for the construction of a bizarre garden of heroes with statutes of famous dead Americans as well as at least one Canadian (Alex Trebek)

• hijacked Washington’s July 4th celebrations to give a partisan speech

• took advice from the MyPillow guy

• claimed that migrants seeking a better life in the US were dangerous caravans of drug dealers and rapists

• said nothing when Vladimir Putin poisoned a leading opposition figure

• never seemed to heed the advice of his wife’s “Be Best” campaign

• falsely claimed that mail-in voting is fraudulent

• announced a precipitous withdrawal of troops from Syria which not only handed Russia and ISIS a win but also prompted his defense secretary to resign in protest

• insulted the leader of Canada

• insulted the leader of France

• insulted the leader of Britain

• insulted the leader of Germany

• insulted the leader of Sweden (Sweden!!)

• falsely claimed credit for getting NATO members to increase their share of dues

• blew off two Asia summits even though they were held virtually

• continued lying about spending lots of time at Ground Zero with 9/11 responders,

• said that the Japanese would sit back and watch their “Sony televisions” if the US were ever attacked

• left a NATO summit early in a huff

• stared directly into an eclipse even though everyone over the age of five knows not to do that

• called himself a very stable genius despite significant evidence to the contrary

• refused to commit to a peaceful transfer of power and kept his promise

And a whole bunch of other things I can’t remember .

[rahulrainbow]

रूस का पहला चंद्रमा मिशन लूना-25 और भारत का चंद्रयान-3

रूस का पहला चंद्रमा मिशन लूना-25 और भारत का चंद्रयान-3 20 अगस्त 2023 को, रोस्कोस्मोस (रूसी संघ के राज्य अंतरिक्ष निगम) ने घोषणा की , कि लूना -25 प्री-लैंडिंग के दौरान चंद्रमा की सतह पर दुर्घटनाग्रस्त हो गया था। . अब पूरी दुनिया चंद्रयान-3 (इसरो द्वारा लॉन्च) पर नजर रख रही है, जो 23.08.2023 को शाम 6:05 बजे चंद्रमा की सतह पर उतरने के लिए तैयार है।  . रूस का पहला चंद्रमा मिशन लूना-25 और भारत का…

[spacenutspod]

*Hosted by Tim Gibbs with AI Assistant Hallie* - **NASA's Lunar Trailblazer Satellite** - Mission: Search for water on the moon. - Details: Lockheed Martin built, measures 11.5 feet wide, weighs 440 pounds. - Launch: No earlier than 2024, alongside the Intuitive Machines IM-2 mission. - Instruments: Lunar Thermal Mapper (LTM) sensor from the University of Oxford. - Purpose: Map lunar surface temperature and variations in minerals. - **Oxygen Production on Mars** - Need: 30 metric tons of oxygen for a crew of six astronauts. - Solution: Produce oxygen on Mars from its abundant CO2. - Recent Development: Mars Oxygen ISRU Experiment (Moxie) Project. - Research: Donald Rapp and Eric Hinderman's model for a full-scale Mars ISRU system. - **Discoveries with the FAST Telescope** - Led by: Professor H.A.N. Gene Lin from the National Astronomical Observatories of the Chinese Academy of Sciences. - Findings: Distinct dwarf pulses from pulsar PSR B2111+46. - Observations: Galactic Plane Pulsar Snapshot Survey. - New Emission State: Dwarf pulses. 4. **Spotlight Story** - **Russia's Lunar 25 Probe Crash** - Incident: Lunar 25 crashed during pre-landing maneuvers. - Last Contact: 2.57 pm on a Saturday. - Background: Russia's first moon mission in almost 50 years. - Mission Goal: Soft landing on the Lunar South Pole. - Historical Context: Last attempt in 1989 with the Phobos 2 probe. - Statement: Roscosmos Boss Yuri Borosov had estimated a 70% success rate. 5. **Hallie's Joke of the Week** - "Why did the scarecrow win an award? “ 6. **Closing Remarks** - Find all episodes and the parent podcast, SpaceNuts, at spaceknuts.io or bitesz.com. - Join the conversation on the Facebook page: SpaceNuts podcast group. - Weekly Schedule: Steve Dunkley on Mondays and Tim Gibbs on Fridays. - See you next week! Thank you for tuning in to the Astronomy Daily podcast!

[fairuzfan]

PELOSI SAYS WHAT?????

https://www.reuters.com/world/us/pelosi-urges-fbi-probe-gaza-ceasefire-protests-us-suggests-russia-links-2024-01-28/

[ID: A screenshot of text that reads:

"US Muslim group condemns Pelosi for saying Gaza ceasefire protests have Russia link

By Kanishka Singh, January 28, 2024 3:44 PM EST. Updated 2 min ago

Pelosi made the remarks in a CNN interview after she was asked whether opposition to President Joe Biden's policy in the war in Gaza could hurt the Democrat in November's presidential election.

"For them to call for a ceasefire is Mr. Putin's message, Mr. Putin's message. Make no mistake this is directly connected to what he (Russian President Vladimir Putin) would like to see," Pelosi told CNN.

"I think some of these protesters are spontaneous, and organic, and sincere. Some I think are connected to Russia," she said. "Some financing should be investigated and I want to ask the FBI to investigate that."

End ID.]

[oneheadtoanother]

"Stop an American and begin to make some serious criticisms of our society, and nine times out of ten his final defense will be: 'But this is the freest and finest country in the world.' When you probe into what he means by this, it turns out that what he is really talking about is the material goods that he can acquire in exchange for his birthright of political freedom. That is, he is free to have an automobile, a TV, a hi-fi, and all kinds of food, clothing, and drink as long as he doesn't offend anybody he works for or anybody in an official capacity, and as long as he doesn't challenge the accepted pattern of racial, economic, and political relations inside the country or its foreign policy outside. On these questions most Americans absolve themselves from any responsibility by saying that all that is 'politics' and 'I am not interested in politics.' What they really mean is that they are afraid to assume political responsibility because it would mean jeopardizing their economic and social status. No people in the world have more to say about the lack of free speech in Russia, China, Cuba, and Ghana. The reason is that as long as they have these other places to talk about, they can evade facing the silent police state that has grown up inside America. If you casually mention the police state to an American, the first thing that comes to his mind is some other country. He doesn't see his own police state.

That is because in the United States, more than in any other country in the world, every man is a policeman over himself, a prisoner of his own fears. He is afraid to think because he is afraid of what his neighbors might think of what he thinks if they found out what he was thinking, or what his boss might think, or what the police might think, or the FBI, or the CIA. And all because he thinks he has a lot to lose. He thinks he has to choose between material goods and political freedom. And when the two are counterposed, Americans today will choose material goods. Believing they have much to lose, Americans find excuses where there are no excuses, evade issues before the issues arise, shun situations and conversations which could lead to conflict, leave politics and political decisions to the politicians. They will not regain their membership in the human race until they recognize that their greatest need is no longer to make material goods but to make politics."

-James Boggs, The American Revolution: Pages from a Negro Worker's Notebook, 1963. (emphasis added by me)

[reality-detective]

In a crazy turn of events, a former top FBI official, who played a key role in the Trump-Russia collusion probe, was just sentenced to four years in prison for colluding with Russia. But it gets crazier 🤔

[remnantglow]

Maya Andreyeva is a "camera," a reporter with virtual-reality-broadcasting equipment implanted in her brain. What she sees, millions see; what she feels, millions share. And what Maya is seeing is the cover-up of a massacre. As she probes into the covert political power plays of a radically strange near-future Russia, she comes upon secrets that have been hidden from the world…and memories that AI-controlled thought police have forced her to hide from herself. Because in a world where no thought or desire is safe, the price of survival is betrayal - of your lover, your ideals, and yourself.

happy (re)publication day to The Fortunate Fall by Cameron Reed, the lesbian cyberpunk cult classic that's been out of print for almost 3 decades!

it's a dark, intense, haunting book (if somewhat dense and undeniably demanding) about the place where noble ideals and brutal reality meet, about human nature, about how far you're willing to go for your principles, or for love, or for survival, about the erosion of privacy by technology, and about a whale.

it's some of the best cyberpunk has to offer, i'm really glad it can finally reach a wider audience 👁📷🐋

[mariacallous]

Russian is guilty of committing crimes against humanity in southern Ukraine’s Kherson region, according to a new report by the UN’s Independent International Commission of Inquiry on Ukraine. The report comes following an extensive investigation into a campaign of Russian drone strikes on Ukrainian civilians over a ten-month period beginning in July 2024, with the probe focusing on an area of southern Ukraine stretching more than 100 kilometers along the right bank of the Dnipro River around the city of Kherson.

Members of the UN Commission determined that Russia was engaged in the deliberate targeting of civilians and concluded that the drone attacks were “widespread, systematic, and conducted as part of a coordinated state policy.” The report detailed how civilians were targeted “in various circumstances, mainly when they were outdoors, both on foot or while using any type of vehicles,” and noted that on a number of occasions ambulances had been struck by drones in an apparent bid to prevent them from reaching victims and providing vital medical assistance.

During the ten-month period covered by the United Nations probe, Russian drones killed almost 150 Ukrainian civilians in and around Kherson, while leaving hundreds more injured. The constant threat of attack has created a pervasive climate of fear throughout the region, with people afraid to leave their homes. Terrified locals say they feel hunted and refer to the drone attacks as a “human safari.”

In addition to daily drone strikes, Russia has sought to maximize the psychological pressure on residents of the Kherson region via social media channels. UN investigators reported that video footage of drone attacks on Ukrainian civilians is regularly disseminated on Russian Telegram channels, some of which have thousands of subscribers. This video footage shows drone strikes along with the resulting deaths and destruction in the style of video games, often accompanied by background music. Meanwhile, menacing messages posted on Telegram call on Ukrainians to flee the region. “Get out of the city before the leaves fall, you who are destined to die,” read one message quoted in the UN report.

[thevoicefromanotherworld]

"I SUPPOSE YOU WILL BE THE FIRST ONE"

Another story with Sergei, because... do I need to explain it?

I hope you like it!

Cristel woke up with a severe headache.

She tried to look around, but the pain was so strong that she felt dizzy trying. She felt a rope wrapping around her wrists and ankles around a normal chair. The smell of leather, sweat and dust filled the air.

She squirmed against the ropes trying to free herself. She didn't know where she was, in fact she didn't remember anything from the last 72 hours.

"You can keep trying as much as you want," said a voice interrupting her thoughts. "Believe me, they won't come loose."

Cristel looked around scared, trying to see where the voice came from.

"I don't know who you are, or what's going on," she murmured hastily. "There must have been a mistake…"

That's when she saw them, a pair of amber eyes emerged from the shadows in front of her, making her swallow hard. Her breath caught in her throat, and he could see her pulse quickening due to the tension she was feeling.

"Do you know what I think?" he questioned, looking at her firmly, his eyes now bright blue. "I think you know perfectly well who I am, just as you know what you're doing here."

He gave her the chance to speak, but she just watched him without saying a word.

"I have a list," he announced. "Your name is on it." He tilted his head. "It's not one of the highest, but it's no less important." He slowly slid a small knife between his fingers, before looking away at her again. "We can do this the easy way," he offered, surrounding her, as if he were cornering her against an imaginary cliff. "Or I can cut off a finger for every lie you tell." He shrugged. "You decide." Cristel made a move to speak, but he silenced her with a gesture of his hand.

-Ah, ah, ah, I'm the one asking the questions, dorogoy – he whispered firmly, his thick Russian accent echoing loudly in the space between them-

He stared at her, his blue eyes locked on hers, as he sat down on the chair in front of her. He ran the knife through his fingers with the dexterity that only someone like him could possess. Cristel watched the movement for a few moments, until he stopped dead.

-First question, and I want you to be completely honest – he asked, looking at his reflection in the blade before looking at her again – Where is it?

-Where is who? – he asked in a small voice, he brought the knife closer to her hand – I really don't know what you're talking about, please! – she squealed, feeling the tip of the weapon gently digging into her nail – please – she begged –

He pulled the knife away, which made Cristel's body relax a little against the chair. He held her chin between his index finger and middle finger, staring into her eyes. The girl felt like she could easily get lost in that blue that looked so similar to the sea.

He let go of her more gently than he intended, to rest both hands on her knees.

-You're telling the truth - he said, she nodded -

-I've been trying to tell you - he whispered - I don't know who the person you're looking for is, or what I have to do with all this - she admitted - I just want to go home

-I can't let you do it - he said - until we know for sure who you are and how you found me, you'll stay here, with me

-And where is here, exactly? - he asked, looking both ways -

-Russia - he answered, looking at her coldly - you don't need to know more

-Of course - he murmured, observing him with respect -

She didn't know who he was, but it was clear that he had power, great power, so it wasn't a good idea to piss him off.

-So -she probed- Will you tell me who you are?

He let out a low growl, like that of a rabid animal.

-I am The Hunter -he answered-

-It is not possible, The Hunter is a myth -Cristel countered- no one who has met him has lived to tell the tale

He gave a half-smile before answering:

-I suppose you will be the first one

NOTE: DOROGOY MEANS SWEETHEART IN RUSSIAN 😌

[specialagentartemis]

THE FORTUNATE FALL RE-RELEASE IS OUT!

A cyberpunk novel from the 1990s that’s been out of print for years, and just got a new release, new cover, new introduction, under the author’s new name. And all of that FULLY DESERVED because it’s one of my favorite novels of all time. Cameron Reed only has the one novel and she knocked it out of the park.

Maya Andreyeva is a "camera," a reporter with virtual-reality-broadcasting equipment implanted in her brain. What she sees, millions see; what she feels, millions share. And what Maya is seeing is the cover-up of a massacre. As she probes into the covert political power plays of a radically strange near-future Russia, she comes upon secrets that have been hidden from the world...and memories that AI-controlled thought police have forced her to hide from herself. Because in a world where no thought or desire is safe, the price of survival is betrayal - of your lover, your ideals, and yourself.

Maya Andreyeva is a “camera,” a VR journalist who used to do real work and is now reduced to doing celebrity puff pieces and stories that don’t really matter. She does work she no longer thinks matters and goes home to an empty apartment and it’s a cyberpunk near future surveillance state where she feels like nothing she does matters anymore.

So when she stumbles on evidence of a massacre—a genocide— that the government would really rather have everybody forget, she decides she’s going to make this her swan song of a broadcast. Along with her new screener—a real-time editor she only knows from VR sharing her brain, who edits her raw experiences for broadcast—she’s going to expose these crimes to the world, and then maybe die or run away to claim asylum in Africa together, she doesn’t know yet and it almost doesn’t matter to her. Until it does.

It’s gay. There are whales. It’s weird and different and so worth reading. It’s bleak and sad and often harrowing, and does not shy away from what Maya finds out about the covered-up genocide. It’s about truth and justice and love and survival and journalistic integrity and the media, and it is so, so, so good.

[iamthetruenhaz]

Russia's prep work

I originally wrote this as a reply to a reddit comment about the prep work Putin's Russia has done to reconquer Eastern Europe (and Central Asia) and soften up the West in order to "reclaim" the "lost" global power status the USSR had.

Putin* has been prepping his "reconquering" of Eastern Europe and Central Asia since he stepped into office. He took on an openly anti-western course since the Munich speech in 2007. He probably saw American global dominance weakening following Afghanistan and Iraq and because Russia had stabilised after the 90s, he thought it was time to act.

First he paved the way with the Chechen war where he "won" and got to jump on the War on terror bandwagon and use Islamic terrorism as a boogeyman for his own imperialistic purpose to rile up Russians against external threats.

Then he invaded Georgia to probe the soil and see how the west would react. They mostly ignored him so he went on to meddle in Eastern European politics, coerce Ukraine for gas and fund right-wing parties all across Europe (at the time mostly to drive a wedge between Eastern and Western Europe and suck EE countries back into Russian orbit) while pumping anti-western sentiment and Soviet nostalgia at home.

He saw that the west was disunited because of the US-UK-EU split following the wars in Iraq, Libya and Syria. He capitalized on that in several ways using both the wars and the refugee crisis that followed. One, to increase racist and nationalist propaganda and stir up hatred against "the liberal gay western cabal" and the resulting Euroscepticism. Two, to prop up the "proper" traditionalist Russia as an alternative. Three, to paint Eastern European countries as a puppet of the US liberals who were "ackschually" nazis in disguise, which was easy when the West was divided between trying to coax them into the EU and leaving them as a buffer-zone backwater. The brightest example of the latter was in late 2021 when Lukashenko started dumping Middle Eastern migrants on the Polish border so the Poles could be painted as a racist, white supremacist state. Unlike, you know, Belarus (really Russia) which weaponized the migrants.

Then he failed in Ukraine when his puppet's sharp turn away from a planned EU accession path caused the Euromaidan revolts. Pro-Russian protesters soon spawned, staging provications (my own country had a wave of protests and pro-russian counter-protests back then and I remember neonazis and other paid protesters being at the forefronts). Russian media started hurling accusations of nazism against pro-western protesters.

All of a sudden, it's like a switch was flipped in Russian society. Decommunization was out the window. In 2015, Stalin was chosen as the most influential figure in *world* history by Russians. All the anti-Western, Russian irredentist, traditionalist, racist and homophobic sentiments coalesced into one, directed against the "evil nazi gay jewish West". Putin started openly provoking the West with displays of military force, close flybys in territorial waters, playing Cuban missile crisis in Kaliningrad. All to rack up the atmosphere of an imminent Cold War II and maybe even WWIII where a "wronged", "humiliated" Russia would finally make the West pay. The WWII victory celebrations also took on the appearance of a war cult, with jingoistic slogans like "we can do it again", "to Berlin" and "we're coming for the German women" displayed on every 9th May parade. Eastern European countries, especially the Baltics and Poland, noticed and tried to raise alarm, but were mostly told to keep their paranoia down and ignored.

In the last decade, he used his military and propaganda machine (what we call "hybrid warfare") to create the impression of the following: (1) The West is imperialist (and is being hypocritical about it), waging pointless bloody wars in the Middle East; (2) The West is weak in those wars, causing Russia to step in like in Syria and deal with the issue "properly"; (3) Western democracies are weak in dealing with "barbaric" refugees because they're too greedy not to let them in but too soft to throw the bad apples out (this was used to boost nationalism and Euroscepticism).

By those means, Russian propaganda managed to manipulate both anti-imperialist and nationalist groups within the West as well as in Russia and Eastern Europe and pave the way for its "just war" of "reconquering" Eastern Europe. In the West, the image of Eastern Europe was molded as either "poor backwards savages we're better off without" (for nationalists), "paranoid silly yokels crying wolf about Russia who is now playing nice" (for moderates), "ingrates not worth defending so we'll pull out" (for Trump-like US conservatives) or "backwards homophobic barbarians we don't want here because they'll ruin our utopia" (for progressivists). In Russia, they were portrayed as "lost property", accused them of being "taken over by nazis" anytime they tried to acknowledge any of the repressions suffered from USSR, and "unconscious puppets of the West" and routinely threatened with "annexation in 3 days" whenever they "misbehaved" by taking a stance against Russia's politics, whether past or current. Finally, in Eastern European countries themselves, Russia tried to ruin the image of the liberal West by portraying them as "the real fascists", "liberalism gone so far it circled back to fascism" and to prop up its own image as the "savior from debauchery upholding the good ols ways".

Also worth noting that Putin was all too eager to intervene in any country that tried to reject Russian dominance or even its own pro-Russian dictatorship. He was ready to support Belarus in 2020 and intervened in Kazakhstan in 2022 just a month before the invasion of Ukraine.

So yeah, it was quite the prep work. All to ensure that when he went on his imperialistic crusade in EE, people at home and in the West and even in Eastern Europe itself would applaud him, failing that be indifferent, failing THAT remain unheard.

* by "Putin" I don't necessarily mean just him, but the lobby behind him as well.

[tatarstani]

Official statement by the Director of the Information and Press Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Russian Federation in an interview

30 May 2025

Question: Russia has submitted materials to the UN International Court of Justice. They provide evidence of the acts of genocide perpetrated by the Kiev regime against the people in Donbass. What served as a basis for these claims? And is there a chance that these materials will be reviewed in an impartial and unbiased manner?

Answer: “Ukraine initiated proceedings in the UN International Court of Justice in February 2022, right after the start of the special military operation, as per the 1948 Convention on the Prevention and Punishment of the Crime of Genocide. However, it turned to the Kiev regime’s disadvantage.

The International Court of Justice issued its preliminary objections under this case on February 2, 2024. In this document, it rejected all the claims made by Ukraine alleging that Russia violated the Convention. The court went on to rule that further proceedings will focus on whether Ukraine committed acts of genocide in Donbass. Therefore, the Kiev regime filed the lawsuit only to become a defendant in this case.

On November 18, 2024, Russia submitted its main pleading document, the so-called Counter Memorandum, as part of these proceedings. In fact, this is the first time since the Nuremberg Trials that Russia de facto assumed the role of the prosecution in an international tribunal. But there are even more parallels with the Nuremberg Trials. Just as during these trials, we are dealing with a Nazi regime which was targeting civilians with mass atrocities on racial, ethnic and national grounds.

In fact, Russia’s Counter Memorandum can be viewed as an indictment containing evidence of the Kiev regime’s involvement in genocidal practices, including acts of genocide, as well as failing to prevent genocide, encouraging it, and refusing to hold others accountable for perpetrating these crimes.

The document’s main part is 522 pages long. It also includes over 10,000 pages in annexes setting forth evidence regarding over 140 instances of targeted efforts to kill civilians in Donbass, as confirmed by official testimonies from about 300 witnesses and victims, expert probes and other materials from the corresponding criminal files investigated by the Investigative Committee of Russia.

There are elements of genocidal intent in what the Ukrainian Armed Forces and the Nazi armed groups did. They wanted to eliminate Russians and Russian speakers in Donbass, citizens of the DPR and the LPR, adepts of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and people in this region in general as an ethnic, religious and national entity. The Kiev regime’s neo-Nazi nature and the fact that it relied on a criminal ideology of the bloody Ukrainian nationalist movements and the Third Reich were exposed. The paper also sets forth evidence of far-reaching ethnic and linguistic discrimination against Russians and Russian speakers, as well as Kiev’s commitment to erase the Russian language and Russian culture, while also destroying the historical memory regarding the victory over fascism, glorifying Nazis and their accomplices who were guilty of committing so many acts of genocide, from Petlyura’s pogroms to the Holocaust.

Our goal as far as international law is concerned is to hold the perpetrators accountable. We must attract as much publicity as possible and ensure that the entire international community pays attention. At this point all the materials pertaining to these proceedings, including Russia’s Counter Memorandum, are confidential as per the ICJ rules, but we will make sure to release them to the public once the oral arguments on the merits of the case begin.”

[rahulrainbow]

RUSSIA’S FIRST MOON MISSION LUNA -25 AND INDIA'S CHANDRAYAAN-3

Russia’s First Moon Mission Luna -25 And India’s Chandrayaan-3 On 20th August 2023, Roscosmos ( the State Space Corporation of the Russian Federation) announced that Luna-25 had crash-landed on the Moon’s surface during pre-landing manoeuvres. . Now whole world is watching the Chandrayaan-3 ( launched by ISRO), which is readying for its the powered descent at Moon Surface at 5:45 p.m. on…

[homosexualgirlandbags]

Another draft that I actually know what I'm talking about.

There is something about the way Nik's face distorts in the mirror.

How his face looks wrong, unlike his. How his nose constantly looks raw and jagged, yet when he takes a closer look at himself, all he could see was the tiny button nose of a 9 year old russian boy desperate for his father's approval.

How he sometimes sees the senseless violence of young men in his field and thinks back to a younger Nik, jumping onto the hot gun for his father.

How the hair above his lips seems to grow a little faster than the rest of his body hair, hitting him with the memory of how his father's mustache used to be untamed, wild. He keeps a little shaving kit in places he plans on staying a little longer. (John's office, his apartment, anywhere where John would be)

How the greys in his hair reminds him of a man now gone. The very face of his oppression staring back at him under the harsh LED lights of his (temporary) home. A reminder that he never truly left Russia and the overgrown mansion in Saint Petersburg.

He stands there, quiet for a few beats, staring into the murky brown eyes that aren't quite his (a gift(?) passed down by his father, because John loves them), a nose that didn't belong to him either. He tugs at the strand of hair falling out of place, watching it spring back in place. He tries to ignore the memories of tugging his father's curls when he was young.

He stares at himself for a long while, squishing and probing and altering the face that wasn't quite his, trying to seek comfort in the developing wrinkles forming.

At least his father never grew old enough to see them form.

Nikolai Belinski.

His father's son.

The splitting image of a man he hates.

The mirror doesn't stop distorting, not even as he grows older, his neck peppered with kisses from John, or his eyes coloured with eyeshadow from a night out.

But the freckle on his nose is his, and the dimple forming when he smiles belongs to him. The years worth of living scattered around his face in the form of scars, wrinkles and dirt etched into his skin. The pain on his scalp from a lover's (John, obvs) tug was something that was his, and will never be his fathers'.

Because as much as his father had taken from him, the gift of living would always be something that belongs solely to Nik.