Ukraine Endgame

The rats are leaving the sinking ship [The Rude Awakening] September 22, 2023 [WEBSITE]( | [UNSUBSCRIBE]( Ukraine Endgame - Poland threatens to stop sending arms to Ukraine. - The US public is tired of spending treasure on a country it can’t locate. - Russia, playing hardball with the grain, is splitting the EU. [$32.8 Billion PER DAY!]( [James Altucher]( Forget AI, cryptocurrency or anything else – [THIS]( is the biggest profit opportunity of your lifetime. It’s an obscure corner of the market… one which is quietly creating an average of $32.8 BILLION in new wealth PER DAY. [That’s $1.2 trillion per year…]( And if you act fast, you have the chance to get in on the action starting right away. [Click here now for details](. [Click Here To Learn More]( [Sean Ring] SEAN RING Dear Reader, Happy Friday! Oh, coffee tastes better on a Friday, doesn’t it? It’s full-on autumn here in Northern Italy. The leaves are turning red, orange, and yellow. It’s a remarkable sight. Come October, I’ll be writing about truffles. But in the meantime, the West's united front is crumbling for Ukraine. The actual costs are becoming apparent, and no one wants to pay. We knew this was coming. We called it. Okay, we were a year early with this. But this is happening right now. Here’s [what I wrote last November]( The Friendly Jock Saves the Nerd Isn’t it the sweetest tale? The big, bad Bully pushes around the four-eyed nerd. The Nerd is at his wits’ end, as he has no friends. It’s 3 p.m., and the crowd gathers around for the beating. The Nerd’s brow is covered in sweat. The Bully clenches his fists and starts the verbal intimidation. And then… suddenly… The Jock has had enough of this abuse. The Jock beats the crap out of the bully. The Nerd can’t believe his luck! The Jock extends his hand and says, “Are you alright?” The Nerd cries, “I am, thanks to you!” The Jock replies, “My name is Dirk Strongbow. How about we get a milkshake?” The quivering Nerd excitedly replies, “Sure! My name is Val Orvacant.” They go off for their milkshake as the Bully flees home. It’s sweet, isn’t it? Except in our tale, the Jock moves to another city next summer, and the Bully resumes beating the crap out of the Nerd. This is why Ukraine has my sympathy. They’re the Nerd. They were told America - the Jock - would always be there for them. And Europe - so vocal yet insignificant - doesn’t even get a part in the story. The Bully - Russia - just has to wait it out. As I wrote yesterday, the Western Alliance is already fraying at the edges. America will leave, sooner or later, just like it did in Afghanistan. It will do a cost-benefit analysis at some point, and then the USG will realize what’s in the neocon’s best interest is not necessarily in America’s best interest. Europe arrives at that conclusion presently. Let’s catch up with what’s happening. 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Poland suspended weapons shipments to Ukraine yesterday amid a dispute between the two countries over a temporary ban on Ukrainian grain imports. Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said that Poland is "no longer transferring weapons to Ukraine because we are now arming Poland with the most modern weapons." But really, the suspension of weapons shipments is a way for Poland to pressure Ukraine to stop sending grain through the EU. That’s happening because Russia has blocked the Black Sea route to Africa and Asia. Poland, Hungary, and Slovakia have all imposed bans on Ukrainian grain imports, citing concerns about a glut of Ukrainian grain in their markets, crushing prices and hurting their farmers. Ukraine has responded with a complaint to the World Trade Organization against all three countries. The suspension of weapons shipments is a major blow to Ukraine, as Poland has been one of its staunchest backers since the start of the war with Russia. Poland has provided Ukraine with billions of dollars in military aid, including tanks, fighter jets, and other heavy weapons. It’s unclear how long Poland will suspend weapons shipments to Ukraine. According to [The Times of London]( Piotr Mueller, a Polish government spokesman, said that existing military contracts for arms and ammunition would be honored. He appeared to confirm a link between the end of weapons transfer to Kyiv and the grain dispute, referring to “a series of absolutely unacceptable statements and diplomatic gestures . . . on the Ukrainian side.” And Poland isn’t the only place where Zelensky is meeting resistance. American Resolve is Starting to Crumble [Zero Hedge]( noted the following: - Zelensky fired at least 6 top-ranking defense officials over corruption, after recently firing longtime Defense Minister Oleksii Reznikov amid a graft probe. - American transgender spokesperson for Ukraine's Territorial Defense Forces, Sarah Ashton-Cirillo, was suspended indefinitely by the Ukrainian military in an [embarrassing debacle](. - The New York Times ran an article that said a missile fired by Ukraine - [not Russia]( - struck a busy civilian market ...marking an unexpected establishment media about-face. - Biden has yet to pledge any new weapons for Ukraine as Zelensky is in the US, and there are reports that ATACMS long-range missiles [will not be approved](. Yikes. That’s not good at all. This is made all the worse by House Republicans, who can’t seem to get the defense bill through Congress. I’m not saying that’s necessarily bad for America… but it’s definitely bad for Ukraine. From [Politico]( Speaker Kevin McCarthy suffered yet another stinging defeat Thursday, as a handful of conservatives tanked a key vote that was supposed to signal the way out of days of intraparty bickering. Instead, GOP hardliners again blockaded the floor for the second time in three days — leaving McCarthy unable to call the party’s own defense spending bill to the floor. This time, though, it came as a shock to many GOP leaders, who believed they won over enough holdouts to finally bring up the Pentagon funding bill. Perhaps more ominously, the ultraconservatives’ gambit proved what many in the GOP had already suspected: That McCarthy is essentially powerless to avert a government closure that could begin Oct. 1. Zelensky is so worried about the USG’s position that he’s hit up the likes of Ken Griffin and Bill Ackman for cash… in exchange for juicy contracts to rebuild Ukraine once this mess is over. From [Fox Business]( Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy on Wednesday is scheduled to meet in New York City with a who's who of the nation's top finance people, business leaders, diplomats, and even a chef to discuss how private sector money can be used to help rebuild his war-torn country, FOX Business has learned. The meeting was put together by JPMorgan, the big bank serving as Zelenskyy’s financial adviser to attract private capital for a new investment fund to rebuild Ukraine’s infrastructure destroyed in its war with Russia, according to people with knowledge of the matter. Earlier in the afternoon, Zelenskyy met privately with BlackRock CEO Larry Fink, the sources say. BlackRock is the world’s largest asset manager and has also been advising Zelenskyy on how to attract U.S. private sector money for the rebuilding effort. The list of invitees, according to sources, includes William Ackman, the head of hedge fund Pershing Square Capital; Ken Griffin of the Citadel investment empire; Jonathan Gray, president and chief operating officer of private equity powerhouse Blackstone; Philipp Hildebrand, a vice chairman at BlackRock; Michael Bloomberg, former New York City mayor and founder of Bloomberg LP; and Eric Schmidt, the former CEO of Google and now head of the Schmidt Futures, a philanthropic organization. But perhaps all isn’t lost. …But the Pentagon Exempts Ukraine Spending from Shutdown. Who needs Congress when you’ve got the Penta-neocon on your side? From [ChéNN]( The Pentagon has determined that the training and support of Ukrainian forces is exempt from a potential government shutdown, according to the Defense Department, and will continue even in the increasingly likely event that Congress fails to pass a spending bill in the coming days. The determination allows critical elements of American support for Kyiv, such as the training of Ukrainian forces and the ongoing transfer of weapons to Ukraine, to proceed in the midst of an ongoing counteroffensive. “Operation Atlantic Resolve is an excepted activity under a government lapse in appropriations,” said Defense Department spokesman Chris Sherwood. Operation Atlantic Resolve refers to the US effort to support Ukraine and to bolster NATO’s eastern flank. It was established in 2014 following the Russian invasion of Crimea. Democracy: one for you and two for us! Wrap Up The rules are… there are no rules. After much to-ing and fro-ing, Zelensky will get his American armaments, while Maui and East Palestine get “gots.” Kevin McCarthy is about as useful as a solar-powered flashlight. Poland will honor its existing contracts… and probably be strong-armed into writing new ones. But Western sympathy, cash, and weaponry are running out. When this circus ends, no one knows. Have a great weekend! All the best, [Sean Ring] Sean Ring Editor, Rude Awakening X (formerly Twitter): [@seaniechaos]( In Case You Missed It… Do You Have the Right to Feel Safe? [Sean Ring] SEAN RING Greetings from lovely Northern Italy. I hope all’s well. Thank you for last week's fantastic stories and feedback about the IRS piece. I may publish that part of the mailbag later. But right now, I’m unsure if any readers who wrote in would want me to divulge their cases. Again, thanks for writing (and the kind words as well)! Today, I'll talk about the citizenry rather than the government screwing things up. The rich citizenry. Louis CK is a comedian, but I’ve never watched his stuff. He became famous from 2000-2018 when I didn’t care much about America besides its movies. When I settled in the Philippines in 2019 and bought a TV with YouTube automatically uploaded, I caught up on much of American culture of the past two decades. I learned about Louis CK and Joe Rogan, whom I had never heard of. I saw why people thought Tom Brady was better than Joe Montana. LeBron, Sidney Crosby, Alex Ovechkin…. I had lots of catching up to do. I also saw [when Louis CK was caught with his pants down]( (really) and was canceled. By then, most people with a modicum of gray matter knew what a degenerate hive Hollywood was. So, it surprised no one. Whatever. But about seven months ago, Louis CK was on the Joe Rogan Experience. I missed it because I have no idea how anyone has two hours a day to listen to podcasts. Yesterday, writer Ryan James Girdusky, author of the [National Populist Newsletter]( and [They're Not Listening: How The Elites Created the National Populist Revolution]( posted this on X.com, which I retweeted with a comment: Credit and follow me at [@seaniechaos]( [Exposed: Biden’s 2022 mistake to cost him election?]( [James Altucher]( Will this ugly scandal doom Biden in 2024? In February 2022, [Joe Biden made the most dangerous mistake]( any President has made in the past 150 years. If it all plays out like Jim Rickards is predicting… Biden’s blunder will soon cost good Americans EVERYTHING. There’s still time to protect your money. But you can’t wait. [>>See Biden’s terrible mistake here<<]( [Click Here To Learn More]( Welp, I’ve given my opinion away. But to be fair, here is the transcript of the drivel Louis CK spouted: I think that the most, I don't know, there's a form of life. It's a weird thing because you're not supposed to be happy, and you're not supposed to be safe. I think that that's the problem is that people expect that, and it's not a good way to… you're not happy when you're safe. You're not happy when you're happy. When you're secure. …I was really listening to something about the border, these people just trying to come into America, and some people are like, “Well, if we let just a few in, it's a mess.” There's no good answer. What if we just let the ones in who are really upset? Yeah, but we can't let 'em all in. When liberals try to say, it's like the dumbest position they get into, it's like, “Well, we can, no, we can't keep let 'em in here. Got to keep 'em out. But we really like 'em and it's great that they're brown and sorry, but there's an impossible…” And then the right takes over, and they sound racist. And then the left takes over. They just sound stupid. But my feeling is they should open it, the border. And just let 'em pour in, let everybody pour in. And then the answer, which is, “Well, then there'll be all these problems.” Yes, there should be. It shouldn't be so great here. It shouldn't be so great here is what I'm saying. In America, it shouldn't be. It's a weird thing to sequester a certain group of people and try to keep upping their lifespan and their lifestyle and just keep trying to increase that for this group of people and then this pressure of people trying to come in so they can enjoy it. There's something wrong with that. That's not a system that's working, and it forces people to do cruel things to other people. There are a lot of people that die so Americans can be safe. They're just dying… Weddings that are drone bombed in Yemen because the guy said something that might have resulted in American insecurity. Not even definite American deaths, but just so we can breathe a little easier. Folks die, and folks do labor in unsafe places so that we can keep the prices where we like 'em. There's so much about American life that other people pay for it. That's part of it. But also it's not good for us either. It's not a good way to live in a gated community. If you let folks pour in any other wave, it'll kind of slosh, and then just things will be different. I don't know what'll really happen. A bunch of people will they just come with knives and start killing everybody? I don't think so. I don't know what'll happen, but it's just weird to me. I mean, I lived in Mexico when I was a kid. My dad's Mexican and I remember my first cogent thoughts were in Mexico, and then I came to America. I mean it was Mexico City. It was beautiful. Also, it was a city before America had anything. It's this very old European kind of place. Mexico, it's a beautiful country, and it's got a lot more depth to it than anybody knows here. And we're not really sharing with them because they're kind of like the other guys because we're afraid of how many of them are dying to come here to work for us for very little. Like this thing. I don't know. I don't know. This is shit I don't know about. But the feeling I get is that the more American security, this feeling of more oxygen in the air. It's not good in the end for everybody. I could write a book unpacking this nonsensical crap. Instead, I’ll pick apart the stuff I bolded above. “…you're not happy when you're safe. You're not happy when you're happy. When you're secure.” I genuinely believe people feel this way, and it’s part of the reason they move to big cities. I loved the dangerous grittiness of London… in my 20s. I proudly showed off my scar from that barroom brawl that left a titanium plate in my head. But as a father and husband? I wouldn’t move to London right now for all the tea in China. It’s just too dangerous. “It shouldn't be so great here is what I'm saying. In America, it shouldn't be.” When you have no conception of history, of what the men and women who first settled in America went through, it’s easy not to understand what made America great. And that’s a massive part of the problem. You live in the “city on the hill.” And you have no idea why it became that way. As libertarian economist Per Bylund once brilliantly tweeted: Too many Americans don’t have a damn clue because they’ve been riding on the economic momentum better men and women created. “It's a weird thing to sequester a certain group of people and try to keep upping their lifespan and their lifestyle and just keep trying to increase that for this group of people…” What if we called this group of people “family?” Is it weird to keep your family in your house as healthy, safe, and long-lived as possible? And let’s extend this to like-minded people who traveled across the world with you and settled in this magnificent new country. And what about the descendants of those settlers who love their country, inherited their ancestors’ property, and want to enjoy and improve it as much as possible? If you think about it, Louis CK’s statement is an indictment of private property. The most important thing you own is yourself. And if like-minded people enter into voluntary contracts with each other to do such nefarious things as “upping their lifespan and their lifestyle,” then it’s no one else’s business. “That's not a system that's working, and it forces people to do cruel things to other people.” Yes, Louis CK, the system is working. And no, keeping out those who don’t share the same values isn’t cruel. It’s the right of those owners (citizens). “There's so much about American life that other people pay for it. That's part of it. But also it's not good for us either. It's not a good way to live in a gated community.” Then why do all of your LA friends live in a gated community? As for countries that act like gated communities, I give you Singapore, the UAE, and Monaco. All of those places are fabulous, rich, and safe. “A bunch of people will they just come with knives and start killing everybody? I don't think so. I don't know what'll happen, but it's just weird to me.” No, Louis CK. Of course, a “bunch of people” aren’t going to come with knives and start killing everybody. This is called the fallacy of composition. Just because most people aren’t killers doesn’t mean they’re all not killers. The question is, “How many of those would you tolerate to let the ‘good people’ in?” “Mexico, it's a beautiful country, and it's got a lot more depth to it than anybody knows here. And we're not really sharing with them because they're kind of like the other guys because we're afraid of how many of them are dying to come here to work for us for very little.” For one, you can go back there. I thought Italy would be better for my family and me than America. There’s no shame in upping sticks and moving. Second, we’re under zero obligation to “share” with anyone. How about sharing with those Americans who live below the poverty line? Third, mass immigration kills wage growth. So, the “very little” part is accidentally poor salesmanship. Does Switzerland let in people who’ll do work for nothing? Of course not. That’s part of the reason their country looks like heaven. Wrap Up I know I’m not an American citizen anymore, and I haven’t lived there for nearly a quarter century. But my goodness, has the collective IQ of America dropped that much since I left? Do people inside the country want to sabotage the place? I hope not. The British think the US is the last, best hope for the world. I’m not sure about that. But I certainly don’t want America to sink because of its citizens’ staggering ignorance. All the best, [Sean Ring] Sean Ring Editor, Rude Awakening Twitter: [@seaniechaos]( [Paradigm]( ☰ ⊗ [ARCHIVE]( [ABOUT]( [Contact Us]( © 2023 Paradigm Press, LLC. 808 Saint Paul Street, Baltimore MD 21202. By submitting your email address, you consent to Paradigm Press, LLC. delivering daily email issues and advertisements. 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