[There’s LOTS to enjoy in Skye’s Links today, starting with a long-awaited announcement.]
At long last, the Turtle is stepping down, though not immediately:
[This Archive was originally published on May 12, 2005. It's been nearly 19 years, but Putin and his cronies still think the same way. Understanding how their definition of peace differs from ours is crucial to understanding their propaganda.]
TTP, April 28, 2005
When you were a kid, do you remember reading the great epic of Greek mythology called Jason and the Argonauts? Sent on a mission he is not expected to survive by the man who has usurped his throne, Jason assembles a crew of heroes, including Hercules, Orpheus, Castor and Pollux, and sails in the great ship Argo across the Euxine Sea to the distant land of Colchis to capture the legendary Golden Fleece.
It's a marvelous adventure story which the ancient Greeks believed was not myth but true. And sure enough - it turns out that Colchis was a real place and there really was a Golden Fleece. At the east end of the Black Sea (the Greeks called it the Euxine), there is a range of huge mountains called the Caucasus. The mountain streams that poured down the Caucasus and into the Euxine carried so many particles of gold that the folks who lived there - the Colchians - would peg sheep skins in the streams to trap the gold particles in the wool.
Colchis is one of the most ancient lands in the world. It's where the original Caucasians came from. Today it is called Georgia. This week, George Bush sailed in Air Force One to modern Colchis to be wildly welcomed by hundreds of thousands of Georgian Argonauts thanking him for rescuing the Georgian Golden Fleece from its former conqueror, Russia.
The people of Georgia recognize George Bush as the savior and protector of freedom that he is. Why can't the Russians? Churchill said Russia was an enigma wrapped in a riddle inside a puzzle. Why can't they live in peace with their neighbors instead of always wanting a piece of their neighbors? Part of the answer must lie in there being no word for 'peace' in the Russian language.
Argentina’s Javier Milei is racking up some solid wins, with the fiscal basket case seeing its first monthly budget surplus in 12 years.
Apparently, it took Milei just nine and a half weeks to balance a budget that was projected at 5% of GDP under the previous government. In US terms, he turned a 1.2 trillion-dollar annual deficit into a 400 billion surplus. In 9 and a half weeks.
How did he do it? Easy: he cut a host of central government agency budgets by 50% while slashing crony contracts and activist handouts.
For perspective, if you cut the entirety of Washington's budget by 50%, you'd save a fast 3 trillion dollars and start paying off the national debt.
It turns out it can be done, and the world doesn't collapse into chaos.
[Alexei Navalny gave this speech in a courtroom in 2014. Konstantin Kisin translated it into English because it is so powerful and important for us all, not only the Russians.]
How many times can a man who isn’t breaking the law give his last words? Zero. If he’s really unlucky, once. But over the last two years, I’ve been asked if I have any last words six, seven, maybe ten times.
I’ve heard this phrase many times now: “Mr. Navalny, do you have any last words?” I get the sense that my last words mark the last days for me, for someone, for everyone. I keep being asked for my last words and when I give them, I notice that these last days don’t seem to come.
[Speaking to the judges] If I took a photo of the three of you, or better still, a photo of you together with the counsel for the so-called victims in this case, you are the people with whom I have spent my recent days. I call you “people who look the other way.”1
Do you even notice that you are constantly looking down? You’re looking the other way. I am talking to you but you’re looking down all the time. None of you have anything to say.
[Speaking to the presiding judge] Elena Sergeevna, what is the phrase you keep repeating to me? All of the people I deal with—investigators, prosecutors, prison wardens, civil and criminal judges—you all keep saying the same thing to me: “Alexei, you understand the situation.” It’s true: I understand the situation, but what I don’t understand is why do you keep looking the other way?
President Joe Biden is failing, flailing, and falling. He's clearly cognitively disabled, as even the special counsel noted when refusing to charge him with crimes over mishandling classified documents. The southern border is a wide-open and deadly mess. And though the economy never went into full recession, it sure doesn't feel like it's growing. Bidenomics means wages haven't kept up with 18% cumulative inflation since Biden took office.
Biden needs a reset and fast. What better time to blame-shift than leading up to his March 7 State of the Union Address?
The Left has created new rules for national politics.
Here are 20 some precedents they now have established for America in the future:
1) When in control of the Senate, demand the end of the filibuster; when not, don’t.
2) Call for the end of the Electoral College–but only if it appears to recently favor the candidate of the opposition.
3) In an election year, change any state balloting laws deemed unhelpful through administrative fiat or court order to favor your political candidate.
4) Seek to flip electors from voting in accordance with the popular vote count in their states; indict as an insurrectionist any of the opposition who dare do the same.
5) Raid the home of any opposition ex-president who removed classified files; exempt any sitting president of your party who did the same.
Eighteen years ago, October 9, 2003, I had the privilege to meet and have an unforgettable conversation with His Holiness the Dalai Lama. It was at a luncheon hosted by India’s Ambassador to the US at his residence in Washington. His Holiness loved my telling him how I had passed out over a thousand pictures of him during my three overland expeditions crisscrossing Tibet. “Illegally, yes?” he asked, as the Chinese make this a crime. “Oh, very illegally!” I answered as we both chuckled.
The Ambassador asked where he was born. His answer, “very remote village in far northern Tibet.” He was startled when I interjected, “Yes, I know, I’ve been there – I even bought a doonchen (telescoping 15 foot-long Tibetan prayer horn) in your village.” “A doonchen?” he exclaimed. “You mean…?” and put his hands to his lips to make this really loud WHOOOH like the horn makes. I nodded and did the same, WHOOOH. We belly laughed, while all the diplomats and Congressmen did not know what was going on.
Then he wrapped his hands around mine and I felt an electric energy run through my body. It was his blessing. I will treasure it all my life. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #60 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
A cliff-top fishing village on the Italian Riviera? Nope, Azenhas (ah-zhane-yas) do Mar – Watermills of the Sea – is on the Portuguese Riviera. This is a magic place of fairy tale castles, thousand year-old fortresses, luxury boutique hotels, fabulous food, great wine, gorgeous beaches, and postcard-perfect scenery everywhere.
The Portuguese people are among the kindest in Europe, while Portugal is one of the safest countries in the world. Of all the planet’s First World countries, it’s hard to find one more calm and serene than here.
If you’d like a personal experience of the best of Portugal, Wheeler Expeditions can arrange it for you. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #87 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)
They look real, don’t they? Ready to defend their Christian land with their lives. We are in the Palace Armory Museum of Malta, where you realize there is no nation on earth more proud of their Christian heritage. It was on Malta in 1565 that a few thousand Christian Knights led by 70 year-old Jean de Vallette defeated in utter humiliation a massive horde of Moslem Ottomans led by Suleiman the Magnificent.
In seeking to use Malta as his launchpad to conquer all of Christian Europe, Suleiman was bitter in defeat: “This cursed island is like a barrier interposed between us and our possessions,” believing that Allah ordained all Christian lands need be taken for Islam by the sword.
Vallette knew what he and his Knights faced: “It is the great battle of the Cross and the Koran which is now to be fought. A formidable army of infidels is at the point of invading our island.”
The incredibly heroic saga of the Knights’ victory is told in The Siege of Malta, on TTP since 2009. What’s critical to understand now is that, after 5½ centuries, the Maltese people are just as proud of their history and Christian heritage as ever. So here’s the question:
What would it mean for you to come to Malta and meet such people yourself? How uplifting and spiritually thrilling would it be for you to take a break from the mental illness of the Woke Anti-Christian culture you’re surrounded by, and immerse yourself in the absolute antithesis of it?
That’s the way fellow TTPers felt when they experienced The Magic of Malta with me in October of last year. And we hope you could join us when we plan to do this again very soon. Trust me, you owe this to yourself. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #264 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
There is a series of stepping-stone lakes in a hidden valley in Tajikistan known as The Seven Pearls of Shing. This is the fourth, taken at dawn’s early light with the lake a mirror reflecting the sky and surrounding mountains. Each Pearl are of different colors, each of uniquely mesmerizing allure. It is one of the many wonders – natural, cultural, historical – we’ll experience this again soon in our exploration of all Five Stans of Hidden Central Asia. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #52 Photo ©Jack Wheeler)
Between Sicily and Tunisia in the Mediterranean lies a secret hideaway of Europe’s rich and famous – the small Italian island of Pantelleria. Peaceful and quiet, the opposite of glitzy places like Ibiza, wealthy elite retreat here in luxurious yet very understated villas to get away from it all. It helps that the shoreline is all volcanic rock cliffs, which dissuades hordes of African “migrants” attempted to claim “asylum” in the EU welfare state by landing here.
The most beautiful spot on Pantelleria is this volcano crater lake known as “The Mirror of Venus” – of such magic color that, the legend goes, the goddess Venus would admire herself in its reflection. Come here for a tranquil escape of your own. (Glimpses of Our Breathtaking World #164 photo ©Jack Wheeler)
World War II and the Cold War it created are finally ending on Ukraine's battlefields. The war went kinetic two years ago yesterday when Russia invaded Ukraine. However, the Ukraine War first went kinetic in 2014 with the invasion of Putin's little green men, leading to the loss of Crimea. The inter-invasion period was filled with a massive propaganda campaign claiming that Ukraine was really part of Russia and that the locals loved Stalin so dang much that they wanted to be repressed again.
Putin's propaganda effort was mostly domestic as he worked to expand his power by creating a new Russian historical narrative intended to fill the gap left by the USSR. He relit the passion for Orthodoxy as a state religion. He reinstated blasphemy laws as he positioned the narrative of Russia as a moral crusader.
The Russian propaganda was merely reactionary to the rotting social trends in the West. When a drugged-up transvestite shot up an American school, Putin responded by publicly arresting and imprisoning deviant Russians. The timing and coordination between Western deviant events and Putin's reactions made everyone wonder how Putin seemed to be able to predict each Western LGBT+ crisis event. It was as if the Western news media was staffed full of Russian apologists and profiteers.
Yes, one wonders….
The latest in 'Crat lawfare:
Trump Must Pay Half a Billion Dollars Before He Can Appeal New York Decision
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78% of likely 'Crat voters are fascists who want Trump's name removed from the ballot. That does not suggest a peaceful future if Trump is able to beat cheat-by-mail. Then again, it almost guarantees a non-peaceful future if Trump doesn’t beat cheat-by-mail…
Nolte: 78% of Fascist Democrats Want Trump Removed from Ballot
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How barbarically evil is this? Almost unimaginably so – and on February 22, the day Putin invaded Ukraine two years ago today:
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Lots more, welcome aboard!
[This Monday’s Archive is what TTP posts at this time of year to dispel leftist treachery regarding America’s celebration of its greatest hero.]
This Thursday, February 22, is the 292nd anniversary of the birth of America’s founder, the equal in nobility, heroism, and virtue of any human being who ever lived — George Washington.
What it is not, nor is any day such as today (Monday 2/19), is the phony holiday called “Presidents Day.” Let’s be quite clear on this. There is no such holiday. It exists only in the minds of furniture dealers, car salesmen, and Hate-America leftists. Read on to understand why…
![. Konstantin Kisin translated it into English because it is so powerful and important for us all, not only the Russians.]](https://substackcdn.com/image/fetch/f_auto,q_auto:good,fl_progressive:steep/https%3A%2F%2Fsubstack-post-media.s3.amazonaws.com%2Fpublic%2Fimages%2F34c4fe54-1141-4e7a-bbfa-4c9f7e89bc3f_1336x24.png){kind=link}