I apologise for the comment in advance, but the absolute political shitshow we have witnessed in Europe over the past few years has given me a weird appreciation of Angela Merkel.

She managed to keep US influence relatively at bay, maintained good economic relations with Russia and China, knew how to throw a bone to the various anti-EU factions within Europe to keep them from gaining influence, annoyed the Brits to the point they left the union and obviously maintained the EU's imperialist projects while keeping their image and her legacy clean. Compared to her the Macron-Scholz-von der Leyen trio look like dumb, dumber, and the the dumbest. IMO she beats Obama for most competent imperialist of the past few decades.

Israel union calls for general strike as protestors across country demand Gaza hostage deal - BBC

Trump was always against abortion ban because he knew how much it will help drive Dem turnout

Trump calls DeSantis abortion ban ‘a terrible mistake,’ sparking anger from some key Republicans - September 19, 2023

Trump privately called a Roe v. Wade reversal ‘bad’ for his party - June 24, 2022

Hypothetically if there were two identical candidates with their only difference being that candidate #1 will enact abortion rights, I think voting for them is a valid form of harm reduction.

However just look at the track record of Kamala and the Dems. Just this campaign they have been willing to fund genocide, imprison immigrants, increase police funding and completely ignore climate change. They have no moral compass, the only guiding principle for them is whatever will earn them more money or votes. And abortion rights happens to earn them both a lot of donation money AND a lot of voters. They have no incentive to ever fight for it in the same way they will never fight for M4A or free college education. It is simply another tool to force large part of the working class to forever vote for them.

I personally won't label anyone who votes for her thinking they are fighting for abortion rights as an evil person, but for me it's just a completely useless act. Even if dems do act to protect them, they will 100% do it in a way that Republicans can easily re-ban next election.

I agree with that. He was going for a repeat of the presidential election, but miscalculated the left.

France has a two-round system, so even if the far-right won the first round he just needed to keep second place and the left would be forced to back him up in the second round giving him an easy win. But with the left overperforming, now his voters are the ones forced to do the whole "lesser evil" dance in a lot of districts. It will be interesting to see in which direction they are going to break.

elections are happening today. Does anyone have some knowledge how things are looking?

• As far as I see the far-right are winning the election, but not with enough votes to gain a majority so they will need to form a coalition with someone else.
• The leftist big tent party are polling as solid second. Mélenchon is cool and based, but I'm wondering how many positions did he have to concede to form the party?
• Macron's party is eating shit lol Why would you call snap elections at your party's weakest point in history??? Probably the biggest unforced error in politics since Biden agreeing to a live debate (so since yesterday I guess? God liberals are dumb)

Fellas, what the fuck is happening on TERF island?

Biden administration signals it will support push to hit ICC with sanctions

Okay this is getting ridiculous lol. I understand the geopolitical reason the US supports Isreal is that it needs a vassal state to exert military influence on the Middle East / North Africa and prevent any attempts of decolonisation. But at this point maintain the state of Israel is costing them the entirety of their soft power in every other region in the world.

Let's not forget that a massive chunk of America's power(especially in Europe and East Asia) comes from people liking them. Otherwise no one will agree to hosting tens of thousands of their troops in their own country. This is also why the US invests such a large amount on cultural exports like Hollywood movies.

So I missing something in my analysis? Surely the Middle East can't be more important than Europe and Asia? Or is the American political class so demented they can no longer make rational decisions even in the interests of the bourgeoise?

Biden calls ICC decision 'outrageous'

Critical support to Isnreal for destroying decades of Western "rules-based order" propaganda in a matter of weeks

ICC prosecutor seeks arrest warrants for Netanyahu and Hamas leaders

I wouldn't put the cold war with China on Trump. I think the period of his presidency coincided with the Chinese government finally getting more independent on the geopolitical scene and also transitioning to high-tech manufacturing competing with the West (Huawei, BYD, Tiktok, etc...). Once the US government realized they are no longer dealing with just an obedient manufacturing hub, they launched the trader war. I think the policy would have been the same no matter if Trump/Clinton/Biden is in charge. Literally yesterday Biden announced even more tariffs on green energy products.

The war in Ukraine is kind of the same. The only reasons Republicans became pro-Russian is because the Democrats were anti-Russian and the parties are obliged to always disagree. If Russia invaded Ukraine under Trump they would just make up a different excuse to support them. "Evil Putin is restoring the Soivent Union. We must stop the commies!!"

Majority of ASEAN people favor China over U.S., survey finds

According to the State of Southeast Asia 2024 survey, compiled by the ISEAS-Yusof Ishak Institute, 50.5% of respondents opted for China and 49.5% preferred the U.S. if ASEAN had to pick sides -- the first time Beijing edged past Washington since the annual survey started asking the question in 2020. Last year's survey showed 38.9% preferred China and 61.1% chose the U.S.

Other findings of the survey include that 59.5% of the respondents see China as the most influential economic power in Southeast Asia, far ahead of the U.S. at 14.3%. Meanwhile, 43.9% said China is the most influential political power in the region, versus America's 25.8%.

Philippines and Vietnam are being a bit cringe, but all others look good