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There was an election in the DPRK for provincial, city and county people’s assemblies. The candidates had already been nominated and approved by the people beforehand. Turnout was 99.63% due to people working abroad as well as like one person who didn't vote. Approval was almost unanimous. Contrary to popular belief, the DPRK has four political parties and independent politicians, making it more diverse than the very boring US political scene.

https://nitter.net/NatalieRevolts/status/1729356888687485166

If anyone has more information about how candidates are chosen and discussed, as well as the efforts during election day that allow for such a high turnout (mandatory voting in liberal countries yields results that are a bit lower) then please chime in.

Banging my fists on the table and chanting "Viet Nam! Viet Nam!" over and over

Freighter headed to Italy with 21,000 tons of wheat gets stuck in Detroit River

officially declared

https://www.reuters.com/world/americas/argentinas-milei-says-shutting-central-bank-non-negotiable-2023-11-24/

The mayor has blamed the budget cuts on federal COVID aid ending, and the cost of the migrant crisis in the city.

Seeing this is being reported uncritically on a few other websites and on TV news as well.

The language surrounding the migrant situation is becoming more and more dangerous. It was only a month or two ago that Top Cop Adams said that the migrant "crisis" would destroy the city. Now we have the media running around putting the blame for budget cuts on migrants.

Here's a NYT article that goes into more detail on the recent budget cuts: https://web.archive.org/web/20231116210120/https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/16/nyregion/nyc-budget-cuts-schools-police-trash.html

Image is of General Abdourahamane Tiani, leader of Niger (left) and Ibrahim Traoré, leader of Burkina Faso (right).

The Alliance of Sahel States (ASS) formed on September 16th in the wake of the coup in Niger in late July, in which Niger, Mali, and Burkina Faso created a military and increasingly economic alliance in which attacking one would result in the other two joining. This was initially most relevant militarily, as ECOWAS was threatening an invasion of Niger if they did not restore civilian rule. Nonetheless, due to a mixture of a lack of real strength in ECOWAS due to Nigeria's internal problems, and the influence of Algeria, a very strong regional military power who negotiated against a war which could further destabilise an already destabilised region, and the vague promises of future civilian rule, the external military threat seems to have mostly dissipated.

However, internal threats remain. Burkina Faso is fighting against ISIS and al-Qaeda, which commit regular massacres of civilians; the government controls only 60% of the country. In Mali, the government is fighting against similar groups as well as the Tuareg, which inhabit the more sparsely populated north of the country - the government is in the process of kicking out the UN mission to Mali, and in the process retaking rebel stronghold cities like Kidal, which is raising some eyebrows as to what exactly the UN was doing all this time; and Niger is fighting against similar Islamic groups too, and is kicking out the French for being exploitative motherfuckers. Combine this with the sanctions against Niger which are crippling the country, disease outbreaks in Burkina Faso, and just the general shitty state of the world economy, and the situation is not looking very good currently.

That all being said, economy and trade ministers from all three countries have met this past weekend in Bamako, the capital of Mali. There, they recommended that the countries: improve the free movement of people inside the ASS (don't laugh!); construct and strengthen infrastructure like dams and roads; construct a food safety system; establish a stabilization fund and investment bank; and even create a common airline. This is all attracting foreign attention too - Russia has signed a deal to build Africa's largest gold refinery in Mali, and China is the second largest investor into Niger after France, ploughing money into the gold and uranium industries there. And, of course, the Wagner group is in the region - though I'm unsure if they're having a major or minor impact on events there.

The weekly update is here on the website.

Your Monday Briefing is here in the comments and here on the website.
Your Tuesday Briefing is here in the comments and here on the website.
Your Wednesday Briefing is here in the comments and here on the website.
Your Thursday Briefing is here in the comments and here on the website.

The Country of the Week is Burkina Faso! Feel free to chime in with books, essays, longform articles, even stories and anecdotes or rants. More detail here.

The bulletins site is... up!

RSS feed here.

Last week's thread is here.

The Chinese military on Saturday said it expelled U.S. guided-missile destroyer USS Hopper after it illegally trespassed into Chinese territorial waters off the Xisha Islands in the South China Sea.

The People's Liberation Army (PLA) Southern Theater Command has deployed its naval and air forces to "track, monitor and warn away" the vessel, said Senior Colonel Tian Junli, the spokesperson of the theater command, in a statement.

According to Tian, the U.S. has "severely jeopardized China's sovereignty and security," and the illegal entry serves as "ironclad evidence" of Washington's pursuit of "navigation hegemony" and "militarization of the South China Sea."

The spokesperson added that the theater command will maintain a high alert status and take all necessary measures to resolutely safeguard national sovereignty, security, and the peace and stability of the region.

Archived link: https://archive.is/20231124125749/https://www.wsj.com/finance/human-kidney-organs-selling-ae22a73d

https://archive.is/9z8Sj

"They all act like they are on ivory towers with white pointy hats and they're untouchable," he added. "Within the ranks of the United States Congress there's felons galore, there's people with all sorts of sheisty* backgrounds."

*I initially removed this because it sounds like an old time slur the editor missed. It actually comes from a word meaning unruly combined with a word meaning worthless

I'm not running for reelection because I don't want to work with a bunch of hypocrites. It's gross," he continued. "I have colleagues who are more worried about getting drunk every night with the next lobbyists they're going to screw and pretend like none of us know what's going on and sell off the American people. Not show up to vote because they're too hung over or whatever the reason is, or not show up to vote at all and just give their card out like f---ing candy for someone else to vote for them. This s--- happens every single week... These members behave abominably."

King shit, Santos for president

The embattled Congressman said Guest "should be a man and stop being a p---y and call the damn motion."

Expell me coward, you expell but a grifter who already has his health insurance

Archived link: https://archive.is/20231125210636/https://www.nytimes.com/2023/11/25/world/middleeast/israel-gaza-death-toll.html