Some Stuff I Think You Might Like #1

A weekly roundup of all the best articles, videos, and podcasts from independent content creators that probably didn’t make your news feed.

It was the morning that news of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine first appeared on the world’s tv screens – the day, quite coincidentally, which marked the unofficial end of state-sanctioned Covid hysteria – when I awoke feeling shitty. Not tank-the-economy shitty, not facilitate-the-biggest-wealth-transfer-in-human-history shitty, and certainly not psychologically-stunt-our-children shitty. But nonetheless, pretty goddamned shitty.

In truth, I don’t know whether the affliction that recently gripped the McAuley household was the much-hyped Chy-na virus, and frankly, there’s no way in hell I’m letting any alleged medical professional stick anything anywhere to find out. What I do know, however, is that even after the coughs and chills have abated, I continue to be visited by a thick, syrupy brain fog which, while still some way shy of Biden-esque, has made it difficult to pull together everything I’d like with this week’s feature article. Under the working title of Propaganda, Ukraine, and the Power of Conscious Unknowing, the piece is proving one of the most challenging in a while, and so, until I’m able to knead this into something worthy of your time, I thought you might appreciate the work of a few other independent content creators whose perspectives have mitigated, at least somewhat, the mental inertia of my week:

1. Ukraine on Fire

Despite being released in 2016, there have been, in the days since Russia’s invasion, a sudden slew of hit pieces aimed at the Oliver Stone documentary, Ukraine on Fire. Of course, given these generally originate from the same genocidal PR-machine which spent the last two years feeding us wall-to-wall vaccine propaganda, I found myself rather inclined to give it a shot.

Directed by Igor Lopatonok, the film charts how the 2014 overthrow of Kremlin-friendly president Viktor Yanukovych was not the popular, people-lead uprising Western media portrayed it, but rather a coup d'état orchestrated by the U.S. State Department in conjunction with some legitimately unsavory nationalist groups. I’ve linked the YouTube version above because that’s the only format that Substack will embed, but the movie can also be found on more Free Speech-minded platforms such as Bitchute, Odysee, and Rumble.

2. How Ukraine’s Jewish President Zelensky made peace with neo-Nazi paramilitaries on front lines of war with Russia - The Grayzone

One of the most difficult aspects of the Ukrainian conflict for outsiders to reconcile is how Volodymyr Zelensky, the Jewish president of the troubled Eastern European nation, could possibly have ascended to commander-in-chief of an army suffused with bona fide neo-Nazis. Indeed, Zelensky’s heritage is often touted by Western media as means of downplaying the ultra-nationalistic presence within Ukraine’s armed forces, and yet, in this article from The Grayzone – a pointedly left-wing publication – authors Alexander Rubinstein and Max Blumenthal document the intricate series of events which gave rise to this strangest of allegiances.

“Besides authorizing the release of hardcore criminals to join the battle against Russia, Zelensky has ordered all males of fighting age to remain in the country. Azov militants have proceeded to enforce the policy by brutalizing civilians attempting to flee from the fighting around Mariupol.  

According to one Greek resident in Mariupol recently interviewed by a Greek news station, ‘When you try to leave you run the risk of running into a patrol of the Ukrainian fascists, the Azov Battalion,’ he said, adding ‘they would kill me and are responsible for everything.’”

3. Ukraine Is A Sacrificial Pawn On The Imperial Chessboard - Caitlin Johnstone

One of the most disquieting truths about the situation in Ukraine is that, for all the west’s condemnation of Putin, it is only they who would really benefit from a long, drawn-out war in Eastern Europe. Aside from isolating Russia on the world stage and hamstringing its leadership regionally, such a humanitarian catastrophe could easily be repackaged, after five years of rekindled Cold War paranoia, into justification for further political persecution back home. It doesn’t matter how baseless any of the claims of election interference proved to be. It doesn’t matter what John Durham uncovers. Among a largely passive public, the appropriate level of Russia-associated apprehension has already been achieved, Pelosi, Schumer, Schiff, and Harris assuredly giddy with the possibilities.

“All these hysterical anti-Russia narratives were shoved in everyone's face day after day, year after year, with nothing really uniting them apart from the fact that they drove up general anxiety about Russia and that they were initiated by the US intelligence cartel. Even the empty Ukrainegate scandal which led to Trump's unsuccessful impeachment was initiated by a CIA officer who just happened to be in the right place at the right time.'“

And while all those shrill narratives about a Putin puppet serving as America's commander-in-chief were being aggressively hammered into public consciousness, Trump's actual policies toward Moscow were extremely hawkish and aggressive. Beneath the narratives about Kremlin servitude, a new cold war was being dangerously escalated.

4. By using Ukraine to fight Russia, the US provoked Putin's war - Aaron Maté

Aaron Maté is unquestionably one of the best writers on Substack, and as always, he does a stellar job blowing holes in current state-approved reality. Here, he takes a magnifying glass to the ugly reality of American-backed regime change, illustrating that, while Putin may very well be the thuggish dictator the MSM claim him to be, the image he presents to his people is no more distorted and self-serving than that which our leaders present to us.

“ The coup government's anti-Russian sentiment culminated in a gruesome massacre in the city of Odessa. On May 2nd, a right-wing mob assaulted an anti-Maidan emplacement there, forcing the protesters into a nearby trade union building. Trapped inside, the anti-Maidan protesters were burned alive. Those trying to escape the flames were brutally assaulted. The official state toll is 48 dead, but the actual number may be far higher. No credible investigation has ever been conducted.”

5. Russia Ukraine War & Global Macro Impacts w/ Luke Gromen.

If you’ve got an hour to spare, you might consider checking out Preston Pysh and Luke’s Gromen conversation about the new look geopolitical landscape following Putin’s westward march. This is some seriously big picture stuff, diving into the hidden motivations of all the big players, the inevitability of tough times ahead, as well as exploring what we might do to cushion the blow. 

6. Ukraine’s Deadly Gamble - Tablet

Excellent article on how, for nigh on twenty years, the US has cynically and shortsightedly used Ukraine as a means of destabilizing Eastern Europe, thus Putin’s reputation domestically. Such strategies have long been recognized as a bedrock of US foreign policy and yet, what the author argues here, is that any such acknowledgment in regard to Ukraine is practically unthinkable, given how thoroughly such a revelation would eviscerate a Russian collusion narrative which, among the vast swathes of the politically disengaged, still clouds Donald Trump’s 2016 election campaign.

“By tying itself to an American administration that had shown itself to be reckless and dangerous, the Ukrainians made a geopolitical blunder that statesmen will study for years to come: A buffer state had staked its future on a distant power that had simply seen it as an instrument to annoy its powerful neighbor with no attachment to any larger strategic concept that it was willing to support.”