Agnostic Pessimist
scandired.bsky.social
Agnostic Pessimist
@scandired.bsky.social
Northern European with a recreational obsession with geopolitics. Esp. Oman/GCC/Arab Gulf/Yemen, Palestine-Israel, MENA, European rightward lurch, imperialism old and new, racism at home and abroad, in that order.

Medical student on the side.
How quickly investigations are opened across Europe vs. US is notable, and looks to me like an indictment of significant parts of the US justice system.
European media: Jeffrey Epstein once spent 6 hours in Brussels and met a retired former deputy minister - WE NEED ANSWERS. FRONT PAGE NEWS.

American media: Jeffrey Epstein partied for years with Trump, Lutnick, Clinton, Chomsky. Read a bit more, bottom of page 16.
February 6, 2026 at 12:31 PM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
An Israeli surveillance drone was seen hovering over mourners in a Kfar Kila graveyard, southern Lebanon, as they paid their respects. Israel has escalated its use of drones as psychological warfare, often broadcasting military messages to intimidate locals.
February 5, 2026 at 11:43 AM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
NBC News's Tom Llamas did an hour-long interview with Trump filled with softballs & filled with Trump lies that he didn't challenge.

Worst of all, he did not ask 1 single question to Trump about the Epstein files & the 38,000 references to Trump.

Our mainstream media is broken. Subscribe to Zeteo.
Read the extended transcript: President Donald Trump interviewed by 'NBC Nightly News' anchor Tom Llamas
Trump spoke about immigration, the Fed, artificial intelligence, the economy and more in the February 2026 interview.
www.nbcnews.com
February 5, 2026 at 7:17 AM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
Once you see it you can't unsee it, the theory of change for these people is as follows

1. Cripple a nation's economy via collective punishment. 2. (Hopefully) induce protests about the economy as a result. 3 Take these protests as a casus belli to topple the regime. 4. Cripple it more if 2 fails.
It's worth talking about how these people, nominally Democrats, repeatedly reaffirm that the point of the sanctions ie collective punishment which in turn will hopefully induce internal regime change. It's outright stated here that even if Iran did zero enrichment sanctions should not be lifted.
February 2, 2026 at 3:28 PM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
Something not really discussed on here (for whatever reason) is that Israel was genuinely hit quite hard by the ballistic missile barrages last year and this is the central reason why the US now demands that Iran, on top of accepting zero enrichment, also curtail its missile stockpile
January 31, 2026 at 5:28 PM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
Here is a good opinion:
January 25, 2026 at 5:24 AM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
*sigh*
January 24, 2026 at 12:02 AM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
Getting "Used" to the Israeli Drone in Lebanon
It ain't normal
www.hauntologies.net
January 21, 2026 at 9:17 AM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
This account from the Financial Times about Iran's protests has been making the rounds since it is one of the few in a major Western news outlet to suggest that "armed agitators" participated in the demos. Here's a link archive.is/202601220210...
January 23, 2026 at 4:47 AM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
"on what basis do you claim the right to speak for christians in the holy land?"

"um. we are those christians?"
January 22, 2026 at 11:59 PM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
O death, where is thy sting? O grave, where is thy victory?

No, seriously, though, where? Will they be here soon? Because the fucking country is sliding into moronofascism.
The president is now demanding the investigation of a member of Congress for “Political Crimes”
January 22, 2026 at 11:17 PM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
JD #Vance talking about the Titanic not to be turned around over night is the most accurate description of the current state of America. We all just watch it stearing right towards the iceberg (somewhere south of Greenland) - an noone feels ready to get the captain off the bridge and turn the wheel.
Vance on the economy:

"You don't turn the Titanic around overnight"
January 22, 2026 at 6:50 PM
I'd love to know:
1) What operations Scandinavian SOF commands are hypothesizing these days.
2) What DGSE is up to in Mexico, Panama, Ecuador, Colombia and Venezuela to make a potential US quagmire more quagmire-y.
January 21, 2026 at 3:29 PM
I hear pundits claim US will take Greenland and Europe will do nothing. If so, the embarrasment of our current leaders would & should linger for decades, and a competent European far right party could build a strong "stab in the back" accusation against current goverments on the back of it.
Think the Americans in general and the Trump administration in particular has savagely misjudged how Europeans feel about territorial sovereignty. It’s on an entirely different level of importance from economic security and there is almost no chance Greenland will be surrendered without bloodshed.
January 21, 2026 at 2:11 PM
Naomi Klein: "Gaza has blown a hole in our moral universe!".
Watch how European stances shift when comparing the oppression of women in Iran vs. Palestine. Why the loud condemnation for one and silence for the other?

Let us know your thoughts in the comments ⬇️
January 21, 2026 at 1:48 PM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
If we want to survive in this world, we need to be ready to just do things. It'll be imperfect and some people will inevitably lose out but if we cannot find the strength to agree to a trade deal that has been negotiated for more than 25 years (!) at a moment like this, we will get destroyed
🚨 BREAKING: In a vote that could delay the EU’s trade deal with Mercosur by up to two years, the European Parliament has sent the Latin American accord for a judicial review.

Read the story: politico.eu/article/eu-m...
January 21, 2026 at 12:37 PM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
“The IPS men dragged me to a place where it was hard to breathe. I was so exhausted that I threw myself face down on the floor, and they started beating me again. One of them sat on my back, another trod on my head, and the third tried to push something hard into my anus. I tried to clench my...
January 21, 2026 at 6:22 AM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
He might die tomorrow or moderate Dem senator Jeff Cornsteelmidwest might win a majority in 2028 and appoint a Supreme Court justice or two, but I don’t see how you can continue to ally yourself with a country with millions of voters who support this and no institutions that are able to reign it in.
Trump amplifies post that says NATO — not China or Russia — is part of the “real threat” to America.
January 20, 2026 at 4:55 PM
Obv. Too early to do anything but speculate but I feel like this has echoes of US' behaviour in cold war Latin America. Struggling to recall other examples of domestic violence being fuelled to this extent.
THREAD: Iranian authorities released new footage this weekend that appears to show armed men among protesters across multiple Iranian cities carrying out attacks during recent demonstrations, including shooting police officers at close range and beating people until they were left unconscious...
January 20, 2026 at 9:41 AM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
"Israeli agricultural exports face looming ‘collapse’ as world rejects products over Gaza genocide"
mondoweiss.net/2026/01/isra...
Israeli agricultural exports face looming ‘collapse’ as world rejects products over Gaza genocide
Israeli farmers warn the country’s agricultural export industry is facing a looming “collapse” due to international opposition to the Gaza genocide. Recent reports show the impact of boycotting Israel...
mondoweiss.net
January 19, 2026 at 9:09 PM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
And once that's done, make the price of military action astronomically high. Is it insane to deploy a tripwire force of European soldiers to force Trump to kill Danes and Germans and Brits if he wants to conquer Greenland? Yes, it's completely insane but that should be our policy
January 19, 2026 at 10:24 AM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
This is a red line. If we let the United States force Denmark to give up territory by threatening an invasion, we're done. There are no good options here, but we have to stand with Denmark
January 19, 2026 at 9:41 AM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
*Whereas all the rest of the world considers that the peace is about to be broken by Germany, that it is Germany that is threatening to attack Poland over Danzig, here in Germany, in the world the local newspapers create, the very reverse is being maintained." Shirer, Berlin Diary, Aug 1939
January 19, 2026 at 12:13 PM
Reposted by Agnostic Pessimist
Secretary General of the Council of Europe says “International law is either universal or meaningless. Greenland will show which one we choose.” Yes, well. Did Gaza show which one we choose?

www.nytimes.com/2026/01/19/o...
Opinion | I’m the Secretary General of the Council of Europe. This Is Something I Thought I’d Never Have to Write.
www.nytimes.com
January 19, 2026 at 10:22 AM