The “spectacle” of Adbusters
Adbusters is a glossy, freewheeling leftie magazine that publishes images that are normally both fun and disturbing and often thought-provoking.
Bruce’s Contradicciones Newsletter
Politics, history
Latest episodes
Israeli election coming up, war on Gaza continues
With Israeli parliamentary elections coming up on October 27, it’s important to keep in mind that Benjamin Netanyahu’s policies toward the Palestinians are, unfortunately, very popular among his target constituencies: “Jewish Israelis are united in their support for perennial war, which effectively means charting an increasingly solitary regional and global path,” writes Ori Goldberg.
Navigating today’s neo-McCarthyism in politics
I’m hesitant to even mention this for several reasons.
“Hybrid” threats and a mystery drone at the Leipzig Airport
One of the recent events that at least looks like a Russian provocation was the appearance of a drone loaded with explosives at the Leipzig, Germany airport.
Ukraine and European diplomacy
Bloomberg has reported, “Former senior officials from the UK, France, Germany and Russia met in Vienna last month to explore potential conditions for peace talks to end Moscow’s war on Ukraine, according to people familiar with the matter.”
More on the Ceuta incident and its international context
Dahlia Scheindlin, an Israeli political scientist and author of The Crooked Timber of Democracy in Israel: Promise Unfulfilled (2023), commented on the idea that Israel may have encouraged last week’s incident in Ceuta, in which 72 thousand people starting on Thursday crossed the border from Morocco to Spain, causing a flap among some panicky EU politicians - though most of them had returned to…
What’s up with the US’ new partner (?!) Venezuela?
A new editorial in El País takes a quick look at the status of governance in Venezuela after the early 2026 US intervention in which the President, Nicolás Maduro, and his wife were kidnapped and sent to the US, where they are still awaiting trial on drug trafficking charges.
Ceuta immigration incident, five days on
Politico reports on Tuesday a number of 72 thousand for the number of immigrants/refugees who arrived in the Spanish city of Ceuta from Morocco, most of which apparently came on this past Thursday.
The recent refugee flow from Morocco to Spain and … Israeli involvement??
I have my reservations these days about the reporting from The Young Turks, especially from their two leading reporters, Cenk Uygur and Ana Kasparian.
Refugee influx from Morocco into Spain
Judith Kohlenberger of the Wirtschaftsuniversität Wien has become a prominent commentator on immigration issues in the EU.
AOC on The Majority Report
It is no surprise for anyone following American politics that Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez is a successful politician with an outstanding talent for her chosen field.
War from Poland (?) to Yemen
A reminder that long wars bring lots of problems.
Current state of the Russia-Ukraine forever war
In recent interviews, Sir Bill Browder and Rhode Island Sen.
Iran War punditry: A coincidental encounter with Bobo and Ruth on PBS
David Brooks and Jonathan Capehart are the two regulars on the PBS Newshour’s weekly wrap-up discussion of the news.
Christian Right Trumpism
The Southern Baptist Convention (SBC), still the largest Protestant denomination in the US, is apparently going through yet another way of “conservative takeover.” And after decades of conservative takeovers, that’s an impressive accomplishment!
The implications of mass acceptance of vigilante murder – with the example of the Azaria Affair in Israel
Joshua Leifer writes in Haaretz about an incident of an Israeli soldier murdering a wounded man in 2016 wound up becoming a celebrated act and how the trend in that direction has intensified in the ensuing decades:
Saving liberal democracy without going all-in on compulsive centrism
“I am … simply unprepared for a world in which [Bill] Kristol sounds way more radical than Ezra Klein,” says Dan Drezner in a footnote to a recent Substack.
“Anti-Communism” in the Trump 2.0 era politics
Trump’s use of “communism” to describe all Democrats is an indication that he intends to use the politics of “anti-Communism” extensively in his authoritarian, anti-democracy project this year.
Iran’s Revolutionary Guard
Following the current US-Israel War on Iran is like some kind of bad dream in which you work to solve a problem and are relieved you finally figured it out, but then the same problem keeps popping up over and over again.
The Iran War disaster, authored by the US and Israel, proceeds
The US and Israel began the current war against Iran on February 28.