Trade War Game On!

“Things sure are getting exciting again, ain’t they?”  The remark was made by a colleague on Tuesday morning, as we stepped off the elevator to grab a cup of coffee.

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“I’ll tell you one thing.  President Trump’s trade war with China won’t end well.  I mean, come on.  China’s outplayed the U.S. at this game for over a quarter century.  They have the upper hand.

Why Turkey Wants to Invade the Greek Islands

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has said that Turkey “gave away” Greek islands that “used to be ours” and are “within shouting distance”. “There are still our mosques, our shrines there,” he said, referring to the Ottoman occupation of the islands. (Photo by Carsten Koall/Getty Images)

 

• Turkish propagandists also have been twisting facts to try to portray Greece as the aggressor.
• Although Turkey knows that the islands are legally and historically Greek, Turkish authorities want to occupy and Turkify them, presumably to further the campaign of annihilating the Greeks, as they did in Anatolia from 1914 to 1923 and after.
• Any attack against Greece should be treated as an attack against the West.

There is one issue on which Turkey’s ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) and its main opposition, the Republican People’s Party (CHP), are in complete agreement: The conviction that the Greek islands are occupied Turkish territory and must be reconquered. So strong is this determination that the leaders of both parties have openly threatened to invade the Aegean.

Turkey Converts Hagia Sophia to Mosque

The Hagia Sophia in Istanbul was the grandest cathedral in the Christian world, until it was captured and converted to a mosque by the Muslim Ottoman Turks in 1453. The Turkish Republic converted the Hagia Sophia to a museum in 1935, and Turkey’s current Islamist government is now converting it into a mosque. (Image source: Antoine Taveneaux/Wikimedia Commons)

 

 

• This is how the minds of Islamic supremacists seem to work: If you want churches to remain churches, it means you are “disturbed by the Koran or Islamic prayers,” and you disrespect or “insult” Islam. According to Islamic scriptures, those who “insult” Islam or its prophet Muhammad are to be executed.
• So if one wants to survive under Islamic rule, one has to submit to Islam and accept one’s own inferior status. There is apparently no place for diversity or civilized, equal coexistence of Muslims and non-Muslims in Islamic nations.
• “I can only think of one reason [to turn Hagia Sophia into a mosque]. As a shout of Islamic triumphalism. What a mistake that would be. Christians would rightly consider it an intentional insult. The international community would see it as an open rejection of its diversity agenda. Moreover, I think that a relatively secular Turkey acting so radically would demonstrate to the world that despite moderate Muslims’ many assurances to the contrary, contemporary Islam is intolerant in outlook, belligerent toward non-believers, and dangerously hegemonist in its intentions.” — Wesley J. Smith, author.
• The West did not protect Anatolian Christians during the 1914-1923 genocide. It does not seem as if the West will protect Europe against what seems to be the current bloodless Muslim invasion, either.

The process of converting the historic Hagia Sophia church-then-museum in Istanbul into a mosque, in the works for the past three years, now seems to have been finalized.

Pope Calls for New World Government

Never has a declaration from the pope been more hotly anticipated. The leaking of an early draft of Pope Francis’s latest encyclical—an official addition to Catholic doctrine—certainly helped. The fact that it deals with global warming means that it has been discussed across many media outlets that rarely pay close attention to papal pronouncements. Britain’s left-wing Guardian newspaper even published whole sections of it and live-blogged its release.

This suits the pope’s purpose for the document perfectly. In his introduction he makes clear that, unlike his last encyclical, he is not just writing to members of the Catholic Church. Instead, he writes, “I would like to enter into dialogue with all people.” The Guardian called it “the most astonishing and perhaps the most ambitious papal document of the past 100 years.”

What Happens Next In Russia – A 6-Step Recipe For Western Disaster

Even though two of the most bloodiest wars in modern history resulted from pacts between Europe and Russia, the Europeans have always accepted that risk and usually chose Russia as a partner over the United States. This needs to be remembered when considering what direction Europe is going today. History does in fact repeat itself.

 

Recent events, such as the overthrow of the government in Ukraine, the secession of Crimea and its decision to join the Russian Federation, the subsequent military campaign against civilians in Eastern Ukraine, western sanctions against Russia, and, most recently, the attack on the ruble, have caused a certain phase transition to occur within Russian society, which, I believe, is very poorly, if at all, understood in the west. This lack of understanding puts Europe at a significant disadvantage in being able to negotiate an end to this crisis.

Whereas prior to these events the Russians were rather content to consider themselves “just another European country,” they have now remembered that they are a distinct civilization, with different civilizational roots (Byzantium rather than Rome)—one that has been subject to concerted western efforts to destroy it once or twice a century, be it by Sweden, Poland, France, Germany, or some combination of the above. This has conditioned the Russian character in a specific set of ways which, if not adequately understood, is likely to lead to disaster for Europe and the world.