Image is of a crowd protesting in Athens.
Last week, on Friday, hundreds of thousands of Greeks poured into the streets to strike and protest on the second anniversary of the deadliest train crash in Greek history, in which 57 people died when a passenger train collided with a freight train. On this February 28th, public transportation was virtually halted, with train drivers, air traffic controllers, and seafarers taking part in a 24 hour strike - alongside other professions like lawyers, teachers, and doctors.
The train crash is emblematic of the decay of state institutions brought about from austerity being forced on Greece in the aftermath of the 2008 Great Recession, in which the IMF and the EU (particularly Germany) plundered the country and forced privatization. While Greece has somewhat recovered from the dire straits it was in during the early 2010s, the consequences of neoliberalism are very clearly ongoing. Mitsotakis' right-wing government has still not even successfully implemented the necessary safety procedures two years on, and so far, nobody has been convicted nor punished for their role in the accident. The austerity measures were deeply unpopular inside Greece and yet the government did not respond to, or ignored, democratic outcry.
Last week's thread is here.
The Imperialism Reading Group is here.
Please check out the HexAtlas!
The bulletins site is here. Currently not used.
The RSS feed is here. Also currently not used.
Israel-Palestine Conflict
Sources on the fighting in Palestine against Israel. In general, CW for footage of battles, explosions, dead people, and so on:
UNRWA reports on Israel's destruction and siege of Gaza and the West Bank.
English-language Palestinian Marxist-Leninist twitter account. Alt here.
English-language twitter account that collates news.
Arab-language twitter account with videos and images of fighting.
English-language (with some Arab retweets) Twitter account based in Lebanon. - Telegram is @IbnRiad.
English-language Palestinian Twitter account which reports on news from the Resistance Axis. - Telegram is @EyesOnSouth.
English-language Twitter account in the same group as the previous two. - Telegram here.
English-language PalestineResist telegram channel.
More telegram channels here for those interested.
Russia-Ukraine Conflict
Examples of Ukrainian Nazis and fascists
Examples of racism/euro-centrism during the Russia-Ukraine conflict
Sources:
Defense Politics Asia's youtube channel and their map. Their youtube channel has substantially diminished in quality but the map is still useful.
Moon of Alabama, which tends to have interesting analysis. Avoid the comment section.
Understanding War and the Saker: reactionary sources that have occasional insights on the war.
Alexander Mercouris, who does daily videos on the conflict. While he is a reactionary and surrounds himself with likeminded people, his daily update videos are relatively brainworm-free and good if you don't want to follow Russian telegram channels to get news. He also co-hosts The Duran, which is more explicitly conservative, racist, sexist, transphobic, anti-communist, etc when guests are invited on, but is just about tolerable when it's just the two of them if you want a little more analysis.
Simplicius, who publishes on Substack. Like others, his political analysis should be soundly ignored, but his knowledge of weaponry and military strategy is generally quite good.
On the ground: Patrick Lancaster, an independent and very good journalist reporting in the warzone on the separatists' side.
Unedited videos of Russian/Ukrainian press conferences and speeches.
Pro-Russian Telegram Channels:
Again, CW for anti-LGBT and racist, sexist, etc speech, as well as combat footage.
https://t.me/aleksandr_skif ~ DPR's former Defense Minister and Colonel in the DPR's forces. Russian language.
https://t.me/Slavyangrad ~ A few different pro-Russian people gather frequent content for this channel (~100 posts per day), some socialist, but all socially reactionary. If you can only tolerate using one Russian telegram channel, I would recommend this one.
https://t.me/s/levigodman ~ Does daily update posts.
https://t.me/patricklancasternewstoday ~ Patrick Lancaster's telegram channel.
https://t.me/gonzowarr ~ A big Russian commentator.
https://t.me/rybar ~ One of, if not the, biggest Russian telegram channels focussing on the war out there. Actually quite balanced, maybe even pessimistic about Russia. Produces interesting and useful maps.
https://t.me/epoddubny ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/boris_rozhin ~ Russian language.
https://t.me/mod_russia_en ~ Russian Ministry of Defense. Does daily, if rather bland updates on the number of Ukrainians killed, etc. The figures appear to be approximately accurate; if you want, reduce all numbers by 25% as a 'propaganda tax', if you don't believe them. Does not cover everything, for obvious reasons, and virtually never details Russian losses.
https://t.me/UkraineHumanRightsAbuses ~ Pro-Russian, documents abuses that Ukraine commits.
Pro-Ukraine Telegram Channels:
Almost every Western media outlet.
https://discord.gg/projectowl ~ Pro-Ukrainian OSINT Discord.
https://t.me/ice_inii ~ Alleged Ukrainian account with a rather cynical take on the entire thing.
Russian Wage Growth Hits 16-Year Peak Amid Race to Find Workers
Running out of people to work in the economy.
Cant russia attract migrant workers from central asia?
Russia already has plenty of Central Asian workers and it is already causing social backlash with the usual problems associated with neoliberal policies re: importing low cost migrant workers e.g. anti-immigration sentiment, language barrier etc. All this taking place in the backdrop of a demographic crisis further amplifies the structural problems inherent within Russia’s economy.
Russia needs a full socialist economic transformation plan that reinforces self-sufficiency and abandons the neoliberal policies (in particular, the Central Bank control of monetary policy that disrupts any kind of fiscal spending and industrial policy set by the Cabinet of Ministers i.e. the Goverment), without which it cannot survive in the long run.
If China reconciles with the US in the near future, as I am predicting, Russia will be left behind economically.
I honestly can see the opposite happening, a reverse Sino - Soviet split, where the US throws some bones to Russia to break up the Russia - Iran - China - North Korea Axis.
And wasn't it trending towards an ageing population already. Welp
This is a good thing though just spun as negative. Full employment and high wage growth is objectively good for the people even if it’s bad for “tHe EcOnOmY” as understood by capitalists
It’s good for the workers but without an economic transformation plan, it will still stifle Russia’s economy in the long run (it is already suffering under the Central Bank’s high rate over the past three years).