“Negative Hallucination” hypnosis experiment – MUST SEE via YouTube, August 23, 2017
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3UCB1rUcjGE&feature=youtu.be
According to the blurb beneath the video,
Here’s how the mainstream media puts America under the SPELL of mass hypnosis, using a psychological phenomenon known as “negative hallucination.”
James Comey started drafting statement exonerating Hillary Clinton before FBI interviewed her, aides, Washinton Examiner, Melissa Quinn, August 31, 2017
(Comey — I mean Alice — in Wonderland. Sentence first, verdict later. — DM)
Former FBI Director James Comey started to draft a statement exonerating Hillary Clinton in the bureau’s investigation into her use of a private email server before the FBI interviewed her or her key witnesses. (Graeme Jennings/Washington Examiner)
Former FBI Director James Comey started to draft a statement exonerating Hillary Clinton in the bureau’s investigation into her use of a private email server before the FBI interviewed her or her key witnesses, the Senate Judiciary Committee said Thursday.
“Conclusion first, fact-gathering second — that’s no way to run an investigation. The FBI should be held to a higher standard than that, especially in a matter of such great public interest and controversy,” Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, and Judiciary Subcommittee Chairman Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., said in a letter to the FBI.
The Judiciary Committee reviewed transcripts, which were heavily redacted, indicating Comey began drafting the exoneration statement in April or May 2016, before the FBI interviewed up to 17 key witnesses, including Clinton and some of her close aides.
Comey’s work on the statement also came before the Justice Department entered into immunity agreements with Cheryl Mills, Clinton’s chief of staff while she was Secretary of State, and Heather Samuelson, who served as the State Department’s White House liaison.
Comey announced in July 2016 the FBI wouldn’t recommend criminal charges against Clinton.
Democrats in Congress alleged last fall that Comey’s actions in the FBI’s investigation into Clinton’s email use violated the Hatch Act, which caused the Office of Special Counsel to launch an investigation.
During its investigation, the Office of Special Counsel interviewed James Rybicki, Comey’s chief of staff, and Trisha Anderson, the principal deputy general counsel of national security and cyberlaw, who were close to Comey at the FBI.
The Office of Special Counsel shared those interview transcripts at Grassley’s urging after Comey was fired.
In their letter to the FBI, Grassley and Graham requested drafts of Comey’s statement closing the Clinton email investigation, including his initial draft from April or May and his final statement. The senators also asked for all records related to communications from FBI officials related to Comey’s draft statement, and records provided to the Office of Special Counsel.
US orders Russia to close three diplomatic offices after Putin orders cuts to American staff, Washinton Examiner, Melissa Quinn, August 31, 2017
The State Department has ordered Russia to close three of its U.S. facilities by Saturday after Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the U.S. to reduce its diplomatic staff in Russia by 755 employees.
The Trump administration said the decision was made “in the spirit of parity invoked by the Russians,” and gave the Kremlin until Sept. 2 to close its Consulate General in San Francisco, a chancery annex in Washington, D.C., and consular annex in New York City.
“With this action, both countries will remain with three consulates each,” State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert said in a statement. “While there will continue to be a disparity in the number of diplomatic and consular annexes, we have chosen to allow the Russian government to maintain some of its annexes in an effort to arrest the downward spiral of our relationship.
“The United States hopes that, having moved toward the Russian Federation’s desire for parity, we can avoid further retaliatory actions by both sides and move forward to achieve the stated down of both of our presidents: improved relations between our two countries and increased cooperation on areas of mutual concern. The United States is prepared to take further action as necessary and as warranted.”
The State Department also said it has “fully implemented” Putin’s order for the U.S. to cut its diplomatic staff in Russia, but voiced its opposition to the move.
“We believe this action was unwarranted and detrimental to the overall relationship between our countries,” Nauert said.
Putin said last month the U.S. had to reduce its staff in Russia by 755 employees after President Trump signed a bill imposing new sanctions on Russia.
With the cuts, staff levels at U.S. diplomatic missions in Russia were brought to 455.
Justice Department Forces Christian Pastor to Testify on Islam Views, PJ Media, J. Christian Adams, August 31, 2017
(What does Attorney General Sessions have to say about this outrage? He probably does not even know about it. — DM)
Next week, senators have a chance to ask about whether it is a good use of resources to subpoena Christian pastors to ask them about their views on Islam when in a case where the primary parties have already settled.
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The United State Department of Justice has issued subpoenas to force a Christian pastor in Virginia to disclose under oath his views on Islam.
Pastor Steve Harrelson of the Mt. Lebanon Baptist Church in Boston, Virginia, has been served with a wide-ranging subpoena by lawyers for the DOJ’s Civil Rights Division. The subpoena demands his presence to testify under oath in response to questions from Justice Department lawyers about his views on Islam as well as several other issues:
Harrelson is not a party to any lawsuit or other action brought by the Justice Department. He is a private citizen. The Justice Department subpoena also demands that the pastor bring any papers or documents that he has to his deposition with government lawyers that relate to or mention Islam and turn them over to the government.
Pastor Steven Harrelson
In addition to Harrelson, other Christian third-party private citizens have also been subpoenaed to reveal under oath their views on Islam and to deliver any documents they possess related to Islam to federal attorneys.
The Justice Department case alleges that Culpeper County refused to grant a permit to allow the Islamic Center of Culpeper to pump and haul away sewage. The case was brought under the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act. The mosque purchased land that was unsuitable for a septic system at the time of purchase.
The United States Department of Justice is pursuing the case against Culpeper County and forcing a Christian pastor and other Christians to testify under oath about their views on Islam even though the mosque itself has already settled all claims with the county. (Full settlement here).
The fact that the mosque settled with the county led one federal judge to call into question the Justice Department’s zeal to continue to pursue the case even though the purported victim is satisfied and will be building a mosque:
At a federal court hearing Friday at which the county argued to dismiss the suit for a second time, Judge Moon sided with Culpeper in providing his take on the sustained complaint, saying the continued litigation still puts the Islamic Center at odds with the county.
“It’s an artificial division of a settlement agreement. They tried to come together, said they would try to live together peaceably, now it seems you are putting a wedge between the county and the Islamic Center of Culpeper,” he told the federal attorney arguing against dismissing the case. The Justice Dept.’s continued pursuit of the lawsuit does not help the Islamic Center, Moon added.
The underlying action is a controversial civil court case alleging that Culpeper County discriminated in zoning decisions regarding an application to build a mosque. The case was filed a month after President Trump was elected but before the inauguration by Acting Assistant Attorney General Vanita Gupta. It has continued with unbroken zeal.
Federal law prohibits discrimination in zoning practices against religions. During the Obama administration, a radical new argument was pressed by DOJ lawyers: that zoning boards can be saddled with any “naked animus or resistance from the community.” In other words, if some people don’t want a mosque in the community, then any zoning decision against the mosque must be because of citizen opposition. It’s the everyone-is-racist if anyone-is-racist theory advanced by academia and others.
The lawyers on the subpoena documents are listed as Onjil McEachin and Sameena Shina Majeed.
Onjil McEachin came to the Justice Department in the last couple of years from the Department of Housing and Urban Development, where McEachin’s office was deeply involved in advancing disparate impact legal theories to prove racial discrimination.
Sameena Majeed was formerly a lawyer with the Legal Aid Society of the District of Columbia and won the Steere Prize in Women’s Studies at Yale for her work entitled “Feminist Voices: An Ethnographic Examination of Feminist Consciousness in Urban Pakistani Women.”
The case was brought by the Civil Rights Division’s Housing and Civil Enforcement Section. The hiring practices of the Civil Rights Division under President Obama has been the feature of PJ Media’s Every Single One series and an inspector general Report of the Department of Justice. (The lawyers featured in the Every Single One Series from that section can be viewed here.) After obtaining resumes of lawyer hires after PJ Media was forced to file a lawsuit against the DOJ, the series revealed that under President Obama, every single one of the lawyers hired was a partisan or ideological leftist. This led the inspector general to recommend that the department end certain hiring criteria that have led to the perception that only lawyers of a certain leftist ideological perspective are hired.
Assistant Attorney General Tom Perez refused to implement the recommendations of the inspector general.
The Washington Post obtained and reported information in a story about the controversial case that the Culpeper sheriff had conducted seminars on jihadi networks in the United States — a fact the Washington Post found to be relevant to the zoning dispute.
The county sheriff has previously come under fire for hosting a seminar on “Jihadi Networks in America” led by a former FBI agent who claims terrorists control most leading American Muslim groups.
Since President Trump’s inauguration, the notorious Civil Rights Division has been run by caretakers without a Senate-confirmed political appointee head. President Trump has appointed Eric Dreiband to head the Civil Rights Division.
Next week, senators have a chance to ask about whether it is a good use of resources to subpoena Christian pastors to ask them about their views on Islam when in a case where the primary parties have already settled.
Published time: 31 Aug, 2017 01:40
Sixty-one neighborhoods throughout the country were identified in the latest Swedish police report as vulnerable areas, with 23 being categorized as particularly vulnerable, up from 15 last year. These hotspots are “characterized by a low socio-economic status where criminals have an impact on the local community,” according to the police definition.
An estimated 5,000 criminals are operating in these areas, making up around 200 criminal networks in total, according to the report. Witnesses are sometimes afraid to talk to police, and the presence of criminal gangs and the high levels of poverty and marginalization makes it harder for officers to do their job.
“If you run a company in this area, insurance companies do not want to insure you,” Salam Kurda, a local Kurdish shopkeeper and chairman of the corporate association in Husby, Stockholm, told RT. “One of the basic requirements for being a successful entrepreneur is safety, but the risk is quite big today.”
“If your life is at risk, money does not help,” he added. “There has been quite a lot of shooting, very brutal mistreatment of our entrepreneurs, a lot of robbery, so the entrepreneurs have decided to change jobs or move to another area.”
“These people have not been taken care of by society. Society needs to keep the youth busy, make it difficult for them to end up in trouble. They are being used by adults. They sell drugs openly. They carry weapons,” Kurda said.
These deprived neighborhoods have largely immigrant or foreign-born populations, with a higher unemployment rate compared to native Swedes. These neighborhoods also serve as a breeding ground for radicalization and Islamist extremism. According to the Swedish Defense University, 70 percent of jihadi fighters that left Sweden to join Islamic State (IS, formerly ISIS/ISIL) terrorists came from these “vulnerable areas.”
“The problem is the cultural difference and that these immigrants that come to Sweden do not want to integrate, or some of them do not want to integrate. We see this especially in many of the European countries where they have taken a lot of immigrants,” Danish TV editor and host Jonas Christensen told RT.
“We don’t see it in, for example, Poland or Hungary. But in Germany, or in the country where I live, in Denmark, we also have no-go zones, in Copenhagen for example; and Sweden also, especially in places where they have taken in a lot of immigrants,” he explained.
“We see these problems also in France and Belgium. And in Sweden, government people, they don’t want to admit that this is actually a problem so they don’t want to mention these no-go zones as no-go zones.”
Successive waves of refugees and migrants have come to Sweden for decades, first escaping war zones in the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s, and now from Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan and Somalia. Fully integrating these arrivals, who often come from conservative Muslim societies, into liberal cosmopolitan Sweden, has proved to be a challenge. In late 2015, Sweden finally tightened up its generous entry policy, cutting welfare payments and insisting that new immigrants present valid ID documents.
The term ‘no-go zone’ was originally coined by Swedish journalist Per Gudmundson in a 2014 editorial for the newspaper SvD, shortly after the publication of a police report that originally identified 55 vulnerable areas.
“The police does not use the term ‘no go-zones.’ It is originally military slang for areas under rebel control. But the question is if there are any clearer description of locations were ‘the public in many cases experience it as if it is the criminals that rule the areas’ and where ‘police have not been able to fulfill their tasks,’” Gudmundson wrote.
Over the past few years there have been numerous notorious incidents connected to these areas, including: a spate of car burnings and gang-related shootings; a car bombing which killed four people, including a 4 year-old girl; a grenade attack which killed an 8 year-old boy; and even a riot that broke out mere days after US President Donald Trump rather preemptively made a speech about what happened “last night in Sweden.”
Although the list of vulnerable areas in Sweden has grown, this allegedly has more to do with the police reclassifying certain areas based on better intelligence rather than an actual deterioration in the neighborhoods themselves. Statistically, Sweden remains one of the world’s most developed, wealthy and low-crime countries.
Nevertheless, police certainly face difficulties maintaining law-and-order in these areas. In 2014, the police station in the Stockholm suburb of Rinkeby, also known as Little Mogadishu, had to be abandoned after it was firebombed.
“We need to make a clear shift in direction, we cannot continue in this direction ten more years,” Dan Eliasson, Swedish National Police Commissioner, said in June. “Society needs to do more, we need to do more.”
Predictably, Maduro Charges Political Opponents With Treason, Hot Air, Jazz Shaw, August 31, 2017
Maduro is expanding his militias and consolidating his power. Soon, the remaining leaders of the old government who are willing to speak out against these atrocities will be imprisoned as traitors, no doubt send a chill down the spines of anyone else who was thinking of speaking up. Short of an armed revolt by the starving civilian population, it looks increasingly as if Venezuela is a lost cause.
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The dictator of Venezuela, Nicolas Maduro, continues to follow the basic instructions left by previous tyrants. Having dispatched with any semblance of representative government, there are still a large number of political opponents out there who remain vocal critics of the new order. How to deal with them?
Maduro is opting for a rather direct “solution” to the problem. He’s reportedly going to bring them up on charges of treason, followed by some sort of kangaroo court show trial and almost certainly terminal imprisonment if not outright execution. (Vice News)
Venezuela’s embattled government lurched closer toward dictatorship Tuesday as the country’s new national assembly voted to hold trials of opposition leaders for treason.
Hours after the vote, the United Nations issued a report condemning President Nicolas Maduro’s use of violence and torture against his opponents.
Venezuela’s national assembly, stacked with allies of President Nicolas Maduro, unanimously approved a decree instructing the country’s chief prosecutor’s office to immediately begin investigating “traitors” from the opposition accused of supporting U.S. sanctions against Venezuela.
At first glance you might think that the opposition leaders would at least be able to stay alive because Venezuela abolished the death penalty by constitutional decree more than 150 years ago. But the new national assembly is currently rewriting all the rules as they go, taking their instructions directly from Maduro. (They’re also on track to rewrite the constitution anyway, but that’s really a technicality at this point.) All they’ll need to do is issue a new order allowing the murder of “traitors” for “crimes against the state” and that will likely be that.
Can anything be done about this? Unlikely. At the same time that all of this was going on, the United Nations issued a condemnation of the Maduro regime for what amounts to crimes against humanity. (Reuters)
The United Nations on Wednesday said Venezuela’s security forces had committed extensive and apparently deliberate human rights violations in crushing anti-government protests.
The actions indicated “a policy to repress political dissent and instil fear”, the U.N. human rights office said in a report that called for further investigation.
It called on the government of President Nicolas Maduro to release arbitrarily detained demonstrators and to halt the unlawful use of military courts to try civilians.
Raise your hands if you think that Maduro will give one flying fig about any condemnation from the United Nations. He’s got China as an ally at this point, making sure that cash is still flowing into his coffers and they’re not going to go along with any additional sanctions against him. I had hoped for a brief time that the military might rise up in disgust and put him out of office, but there are no signs of that thus far beyond a single incident of a few dozen people raiding an arms depot.
Maduro is expanding his militias and consolidating his power. Soon, the remaining leaders of the old government who are willing to speak out against these atrocities will be imprisoned as traitors, no doubt send a chill down the spines of anyone else who was thinking of speaking up. Short of an armed revolt by the starving civilian population, it looks increasingly as if Venezuela is a lost cause.
By Pamela Geller – on August 31, 2017
Source: “Reform Muslim” Maajid Nawaz’s Suit Against SPLC Is Meritless – Geller Report
Nawaz always gets the last laugh, exploiting the kuffar’s desperation for a true Muslim reformer. A true Muslim reformer is ….an apostate.
Nawaz is a carny barker. Don’t buy the snake oil he’s selling.
Maajid Nawaz was furious to have been included on the SPLC’s hit list along with the likes of…me. He raged: “I’m listed there with people such as Pam Geller? It’s unbelievable.” So he can say that about me but the SPLC can’t say that about him? His suit, if it ever materializes at all, is meritless.
He wrote in the Daily Beast:
And setting aside my disdain for naming any individuals on lists, to include me alongside Pam Geller is patently absurd. Pam Geller furiously opposed the Park51 Manhattan mosque project. I supported it. Pam Geller supported the anti-Islam British protest group EDL. By facilitating the resignation of its founder Tommy Robinson, I helped to render it leaderless till it practically fizzled out. Pam Geller has “expressed skepticism” about the existence of Serbian concentration camps. I have repeatedly referred to the genocide in Bosnia as having been a primary factor in my own anger and radicalisation as a youth. Pam Geller has called for Islam itself to be designated a “political system”, and to lose its constitutional rights as merely a religion. I am a Muslim who set up an organisation that campaigns to maintain a separation between Islam, and the theocratic Islamists who seek to hijack my religion. Need I go on?
Nawaz doesn’t realize that no one is exempt. He can insist it’s a religion of peace all you want, but the Left/Islamic propaganda machine will still call you an “anti-Muslim extremist” if you say the slightest critical word about Islam. And Nawaz’s attacks on me inevitably reinforce the attacks on him.
Nawaz’s Quilliam Foundation, supposedly a “moderate” organization, “came out in favor of the ‘Palestinian’ jihad against Israel and the ending of Israeli defensive operations. Also, when the Quilliam Foundation began, its founder Ed Husain attacked Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Ibn Warraq and others who speak honestly about the jihad threat — would a real opponent of jihad and Islamic supremacism do that? It has also been noted then that Husain ‘wrote disingenuously about Islamic teaching on apostasy and other matters, and ignored the deep scriptural, theological and legal foundations of Islamic violence and supremacism. Hardly a promising performance for a genuine reformer.’”
Nawaz’s Quilliam Foundation was founded by former members of the Islamic supremacist group Hizb ut-Tahrir, which calls for a worldwide caliphate. The Quilliam founders say they’ve rejected all that and are “moderates” now, but there are warning signs that they aren’t. The Quilliam Foundation is named after a 19th-century British convert to Islam, Abdullah (formerly William) Quilliam, who was hardly a “moderate.” In warning Muslims not to aid a British expedition into Sudan in 1896, he wrote: “For any True Believer to take up arms and fight against another Muslim is contrary to the Shariat, and against the law of God and his holy prophet. I warn every True-Believer that if he gives the slightest assistance in this projected expedition against the Muslims of the Soudan, even to the extent of carrying a parcel, or giving a bite of bread to eat or a drink of water to any person taking part in the expedition against these Muslims that he thereby helps the Giaour [Infidels] against the Muslim, and his name will be unworthy to be continued upon the roll of the faithful.” (Source)
“Reform Muslim Launches Crowdfunding Campaign to Sue SPLC for Defamation,” by Daniel Nussbaum, Breitbart, June 26, 2017:
Maajid Nawaz, a former Islamic extremist-turned-reformist who now runs a counter-extremism think tank, will sue the Southern Poverty Law Center for including him on a list of anti-Muslim extremists, he announced on Bill Maher’s HBO show Friday night.
Nawaz, who is also an author and ran for office in Britain in 2015, runs the Quilliam Foundation, which describes itself as “the world’s first counter-extremism organization,” dedicated to promoting pluralism within Islam and other religions. In October, the Southern Poverty Law Center — a left-wing “anti-hate” nonprofit that frequently targets conservative advocacy groups — listed Nawaz among 15 “anti-Muslim extremists,” including Ayaan Hirsi Ali, Pamela Geller, Brigitte Gabriel, David Horowitz and others.
“I’ve memorized half of the Koran. I’m a Muslim. I’m born and raised Muslim to a Muslim. I’ve learned classical Arabic and spent time in prison as a political prisoner for what I then thought was my religion,” Nawaz told Maher on Friday night’s episode of Real Time. “I’ve changed my views as to the interpretation of my religion, and along come these people…and decide that I don’t have the right to speak about my own heritage and critique it from within.”
Nawaz said he would be taking the SPLC to court for defamation and using crowdfunding to pay for the legal fees.
“These are the same guys who arrogate themselves the right to speak out against the Bible Belt. The SPLC is quite vocal against family planning, the anti-abortion movement, quite vocal against Christian fundamentalists; in fact, they’ve listed some Christian conservative groups on their hate lists as well,” Nawaz continued. “So they arrogate to themselves the right to criticize their own Bible Belt, but don’t want me to criticize our own Quran Belt, within my own community. And it’s this hypocrisy which I call the bigotry of low expectations.”
In October, Nawaz told The Atlantic that the SPLC had put a “target” on his head by including him on their list….
Source: Catalan Bid for Independence Seen in Broader Context of European Disintegration
Catalonia’s secession movement has been growing in Spain for decades. The region has its own language and culture. On August 28, two pro-independence parties in Catalonia, the Junts Pel Sí («Together For Yes») coalition and the radical-left Popular Unity Candidacy (CUP), submitted a bill to the regional parliament, which outlines the legal framework for the transition to independence. The two parties currently hold the balance of power in the assembly and, therefore, control the regional government.
The bill is set to be passed before the next referendum on secession will take place on October 1, fulfilling a pledge made by a majority of Catalan MPs. According to opinion polls, a majority of Catalans favor holding a referendum on their status.
While Catalonia has been steadfast in its determination to hold a separation vote, the idea of referendum has been firmly opposed by the central government in Madrid. Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy’s conservative government is attempting to use the courts to prevent it from happening. Spain’s Constitutional Court has previously quashed Catalonia’s resolution to hold a referendum.
The court and Spanish government have also warned Catalonian officials that they could face legal repercussions and sanctions if they help organize the vote. The war of words between Catalonia and the central government has escalated recently. The recent terrorist attack in Barcelona has failed to bring unity against a common foe. The Catalans are reluctant to comply with Spanish courts’ rulings and the use of force by the central government is hardly an option.
Catalonia, a prosperous region in northeast Spain, which generates a fifth of Spain’s GDP and already has wide sovereignty, managing its own education system and police forces. But it lacks the privilege the Basque Country enjoys, running its own taxes.
Over 70% of Catalans back the referendum, but a “yes” vote is far from being a slam dunk decision. In an opinion poll taken before the recent terrorist attack, 41 percent of respondents said they want Catalonia to be independent, while about 49 percent said they do not. Similar polling information following the attacks is not available. If people say yes, independence will be declared in 48 hours and a new parliamentary election will be held in six months to be followed by a vote on new constitution. Catalonia will form its own military, a supreme court and a central bank.
Catalonia is not the only such place one in Europe. More and more regions in Europe demand independence, greater autonomy and sovereignty. There is increased momentum for regionalism. The dream of independence never abandoned the Basque region, which is mainly located in Spain, but extends into France. In Germany, Bavarians wish for greater autonomy or, even, independence. The calls for secession get louder there as immigrants’ flows hit the region.
Republika Srpska (RS) in Bosnia Herzegovina mulls secession. Brexit would likely trigger a second referendum on Scottish independence. Two of Italy’s wealthiest regions, Lombardy and Veneto, have announced plans for referendums in late October aimed at obtaining greater independence.
There is also a secessionist movement in Italy’s South Tyrol. A pro-independence movement is strong in Flanders, the northern region of Belgium. There are also other, more marginal separatist movements in Europe, including Wales, Cornwall, Northern Ireland (the United Kingdom), Galicia, Aragon (Spain), Silesia (Poland), Frisia (the Netherlands, Germany), Sardinia (Italy), Brittany, Occitania, Alsace, Savoy (France), the Aaland Islands (Finland), the Faroe Islands in Denmark, as well as other small parts of Italy, Spain and Monaco.
The more integrated Europe becomes, the more secessionist movements appear on the continent. And the secessionist movements within national states are not the only thing to divide Europe.
A deeper look shows that the much vaunted European unity is a myth. Europe is getting increasingly divided between political alliances. Southern European countries tend to integration. The Visegrad Group, made up of Poland, Hungary, the Czech Republic and Slovakia (the V4), is a bloc within the EU. In its turn, the European Union is on the verge of being divided into a «two speed» or «multi-speed» Europe. The idea of a «Federal Union» has been floated. It is expected that the final decision on the future functioning of the community will be made in December. The coming months are likely to see further turbulence. Germany holds legislative elections in September.
Multi-speed Europe would create rival blocs and perpetuate divisions, with France and Germany setting the rules and others left to catch-up. Countries outside the core will be marginalized being kept outside of the decision-making process. The EU is to become a loose alliance, a patchwork of blocs within blocks.
Actually, Europe has never seen such hard times in its history. The process of disintegration has started and is unstoppable. Today, the continent is divided into clubs, at times overlapping mini-coalitions based on shared geography or interests. «The purpose, even existence, of our Union is being questioned», EU foreign policy chief Federica Mogherini wrote in the foreword to the EU Global Strategy on Foreign and Security Policy – the document that emerged a year ago.
The Brexit-started domino effect is continuing the chain reaction across Europe. Crises abound, and all of them boil down to people ultimately prizing their national and regional identities over state or supranational projects. The upcoming changes may make the West as we know it fade away, with new groups of states or national identities emerging. Russia, an island of stability on the tumultuous continent, will see the divisive issues aggravating its relations with the EU simply vanish as time goes by. Moscow will have to deal with something new to take the place of the disintegrating Europe.
WarSclerotic 
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