PHILIP A. FARRUGGIO—e have a president who has taken the term ‘Low Base’ to a new level. When he did a ‘pass’ on the Charlottesville white supremacy, Neo Nazi march and street battles that ensued the next day, he gave indirect legitimacy to such a mindset. The ‘rot’ from such passive reaction (whether or not deliberate) continually trickles down throughout our citizenry. A few cases in point.
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Russia has successfully tested its most advanced air-defense system, the S-500 Prometey, in Syria, according to the Russian daily Izvestia. Citing sources in the Russian Ministry of Defense, the outlet reported on October 2 that the test included the “ most important elements of the S-500.”
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JIM MILES—Israel will continue to exist, most likely as an apartheid state. It is the major military power in the region with its not so secret nuclear arsenal and a highly militarized state apparatus. The two state solution is dead, and was never truly alive. A truly democratic state would provide equal rights in all areas for all inhabitants of the country, one factor that denies Israel the right to call itself a democracy just because it holds elections once in a while.
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MoA—The People’s Republic of China held a great parade (3h video, shorter version with comments) to celebrate the 70th anniversary of its founding. Some interesting new weapons were on display that are of strategic significance. China has, like Russia and Iran, used the decades the U.S. military wasted with counter insurgency in Iraq and Afghanistan to build strength where the U.S. military has weaknesses. Those weaknesses are most visible in the Navy.
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DMITRY ORLOV—While the Ukraine, as part of the Russian world, is important, an important requirement for being part of the Russian world is willingness to die for it. The people in Eastern Ukraine have demonstrated such valor, and so they are given humanitarian aid and other forms of assistance and are issued Russian passports soon after they ask for them (and submit all of the required paperwork). As far as the rest, they have demonstrated quite a bit of anti-Russian hostility and an overwhelming willingness to sit around and do nothing while their country is being looted and destroyed, and so they will get nothing.
