The West has built itself an economy based on services and speculation. Meaning it's backed by nothing, other than imaginary concepts. So when the prices of tangible goods go down, the few EU/US/UK industries that use/produce them suddenly have to lower prices as they can't compete. If they lower prices, their stock goes down. If their stock goes down, then the whole speculation sector deflates in value. If the speculation sector loses value, the western economies collapse.

There's a similar worry with the price of steel (which is also "overproduced" by China after diminishing its construction sector), and don't forget the recent tarrifs imposed on EVs and renewable resources exported by China as well.

There's wider implications on the West caused by price cuts:

• less profits for the capitalist class

• line doesn't go up exponentially any more

• the global south suddenly has viable alternatives to importing high-tech and manufactured goods

• the financial instruments used to keep the global south down are no longer effective

And imagine the hubris of said war criminals not attending, because their other war criminal buddies were not invited.

Zelensky this last week started saying that Ukraine will start negotiating by the end of the year.

The recent "peace summit" in Switzerland was a failure, but immediately afterwards we saw a bunch of Western nations ramping up the aid and committing to deploying support personell for the rear (mostly medics and engineers they say). Probably Zelensky promised there will be one last counteroffensive. If some success, he's probably thinking he will convince the Russians to accept less concessions.

He announced this week that Russia must accept:

• Ukraine joining NATO (no chance)

• Ukraine joining the EU (maybe feasible, as Putin's last terms did not prohibit this)

• Russia to pay Ukraine monetary concessions for the war and lost territorry (significant that the Ukrainians are backpedalling on 1991 borders; maybe Russia will actually pay as a negotiating chip for further Ukrainian concessions)

He did not talk about:

• demilitarization (which will definitely be a Russian term)

• denazification (which Russia will likely accept symbolically, in favour of other concessions)

• commitment to neutrality (which Russia will definitely demand)

And he still wants to treat Russia through a third party (likely the US/UK, possibly China) which Russia will not accept.

The Biden-Trump debate, as well as the French election results have shown that the West is unlikely to continue supporting Ukraine for long. That Zelensky is willing to negotiate by the end of the year probably has something to do with Biden's likely exit from the White House in January.

Furthermore, the current situation on the ground could not be more starkingly obvious:

• Russians are sweeping Ukrainian defenses and making massive gains in significant areas.

• The recent mobilization in Ukraine was a massive failure. Newly mobilized troops are either surrendering en masse AND giving up information to the Russians (which has led to an increase in precision strikes on Ukrainian HQs, ammo depots, vehicle depots and areas of troop concentration), or refusing to attack or take up positions for defense, or dying in large numbers due to poor training.

• Ukrainian manpower is completely depleted and Ukrainian losses are climbing to record numbers.

• Lack of defensive works that outlines the massive corruption regarding Western aid

• Removal of commanding officers (like the general that Azov wanted removed) and disagreements between general staff and Zelensky (Zelensky and Syrsky are not getting along - it is likely that Syrsky refused to carry out a counteroffensive - also the aforementioned removed general was Syrsky's friend/supporter/ally).

It is no wonder that Western media will start actually telling some truth about Project Ukraine. They need to prepare the people for the inevitable defeat of the West in Ukraine.

I'm sure the two things are totally unrelated!

Translation: It's ok to be killing civilians when they have passports from countries we don't like! These are excellent news! And even better, we get to hear Russia whining like a little baby about its dead people! Man, what a great chance this event has been to show off my moral superiority on the internet!

could very well revive Western pressure for negotiations that would obviously favor Russia, leaving the Kremlin free to revive the conflict at a future time of its choosing.

The last time there was a negotiated agreement, Russia retreated from Kiev and a bunch of land as a show of good will. Then Ukraine went back on the signed peace deal and decided to continue the war at the behest of its masters.

The time before that, Merkel admitted that it was only done so Ukraine could buy time so the West could arm it for this war. Which by the way, Ukraine started by intensifying its bombardments of civilian centers in Donetsk and Luhansk, after every Russian warning, declaring its willingness to acquire nuclear weapons, and courting NATO.

They were also scathing about Western foot-dragging, saying supplies and weapons systems came too late and in insufficient numbers to make the difference they otherwise could have

Why would they expect anything different? What made them think that the West is a reliable ally? Unfortunately after the collapse of the USSR, through a mixture of propaganda and cynicism, there's a lot of non-Western people who romanticize the West as "better than us", in a twisted global form of Stockholm Syndrome.

Just look at who gains and loses from this:

Russia gains:

• Mostly settle a personal score
• Eliminate the minor political threat that Navalny poses while in prison
• Make sure he never plays any part in Russian politics again, in the very slim chance he escapes prison, or is the same person 30 years later (when his imprisonment would end).

West gains:

• The few Russians who supported Navalny might now increase in numbers due to perceived martyrdom
• Nazi and defeatist voices become more prominent in Russian discourse for the coming month, as the discussion turns to Navalny's death
• Rallying cry against Putin
• Make Putin look like a dictator
• Revitalize anti-Russian sentiment and fearmongering (excuse diplomatic actions, military funding, and mishandling of other national affairs)
• Can constantly talk about this in the news for the next 1-2 years
• Revitalize support for Ukraine, which was dangerously waning (with a US election coming up in a few months, and the current president being criticized from everywhere that he spent too much on Ukraine and Israel)
• Turn attention away from condemnation of Israel as a genocide perpetrator by the ICJ (Honestly, this alone is reason enough for Israel to have done it)
• Strengthen NATO by herding more potential members forward

What that says in reality is: "I'd rather burn the world in nuclear fire than lose the elections to Trump"

They are taking the line from Israel. The Israeli defense minister also called them animals upon declaring they'll cut off their electricity and water.

You are mistaken. The US is in NATO. Unless you mean to tell me their 1000 military bases encircling Russia and China are somehow not a provocation?

What is the fascination with historically illiterate liberals trying to equate everything they don't like to Hitler?

Putin invaded Ukraine, because he doesn't want nukes 800 km from Moscow. If you don't understand this, you don't understand what is happening here.

I consider this to be a bad development. I could see Facebook/Meta aggressively growing to become the "default" server, then squashing everybody else. Not to mention all the US intelligence fuckery that will be potentially happening.

We laugh at this now, but in a few months we might have server admins enforcing Meta TOS on their users for fear of being cut out from the biggest part of the Fediverse.

I'd propose that right from the get-go, a bunch of instances should band together and defederate from Threads.