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fart simpson)
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Some Guy TT posted:maybe im just a tankie but the taliban making moves like this seems to suggest that the people so desperate to escape the country we keep hearing about may not have been innocent angels and this may have some bearing on why weve been dragging our feet on the whole refugee issue Or it could just be that we've been ramping up the paranoia and fear of a Taliban takeover to a fever pitch and everyone who even tangentially worked for or with the Americans is fearing for their lives enough to try and hug landing gear.
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Aug 16, 2021 18:33
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| # ? May 26, 2024 22:13 |
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Some Guy TT posted:maybe im just a tankie but the taliban making moves like this seems to suggest that the people so desperate to escape the country we keep hearing about may not have been innocent angels and this may have some bearing on why weve been dragging our feet on the whole refugee issue  
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Aug 16, 2021 18:56
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https://apnews.com/article/china-dubai-uyghurs-60d049c387b99b1238ebd5f1d3bb3330 Another great article..my favorite part is when the guards give her a phone and let her call her dissident fiance and pastor. You can really tell that they're not experienced running a black site. Also lol that she identified uyghers by how they look and their accent. I wish all the hundreds/ thousands of people america has held in black sites were treated this well and also let go after a few days
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Aug 16, 2021 19:02
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https://twitter.com/ajalali/status/1427291752612966408?s=20quote:There are rumors on social media that I have been appointed as the head of the interim government. This is false news. I have not been offered any, nor am I interested in doing so. Some counterfeiters publish lies on fake pages in my name and in my words. Do not believe uh nope
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Aug 16, 2021 19:07
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gradenko_2000 posted:hey BrutalistMcDonalds, I remember you had a take before about how the pull-out from Afghanistan wasn't actually all that much of a draw-down because all of the official troops were getting replaced with PMCs. https://twitter.com/indmilitarynews/status/1427205315682918403 the U.S. embassy was hiring three days ago though. anyone want to take the job? https://twitter.com/idreesali114/status/1426273114472726537 BrutalistMcDonalds has issued a correction as of 19:21 on Aug 16, 2021 |
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Aug 16, 2021 19:15
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i dont see any blue check mark so how do we know the second one isnt the news faker
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Aug 16, 2021 19:19
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Some Guy TT posted:i dont see any blue check mark so how do we know the second one isnt the news faker because its the less funny option
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Aug 16, 2021 19:21
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https://mobile.twitter.com/marcthiessen/status/1427229983089508358 lol that hes still doubling down on this not even literal tankies actually believe south koreans would just uncritically submit to the power of juche the minute the americans leave
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Aug 16, 2021 19:33
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BrutalistMcDonalds posted:the U.S. embassy was hiring three days ago though. anyone want to take the job? *sigh* none of these spoiled millennials want to work anymore.
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Aug 16, 2021 19:40
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China is already starting to take Afghanistan and how America treated their collaborators and work it into their propaganda:- https://twitter.com/globaltimesnews/status/1427267130467119104?s=21
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Aug 16, 2021 20:00
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https://mobile.twitter.com/laurnorman/status/1426937792567943168
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Aug 16, 2021 20:07
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Al-Saqr posted:China is already starting to take Afghanistan and how America treated their collaborators and work it into their propaganda:- Guess this is a takeaway from the other side https://twitter.com/PacStandardTW/status/1426003156127797259
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Aug 16, 2021 20:11
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Al-Saqr posted:China is already starting to take Afghanistan and how America treated their collaborators and work it into their propaganda:- The Taiwanese government is a lot more popular than Afghanistan's though. Is there a perception in China that they would be greeted as liberators if they invaded Taiwan?
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Aug 16, 2021 20:11
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The threat of war between China and Taiwan has existed for seventy years and at this point it's better to understand it as political football than something that anyone short of the highest levels of the governments themselves know how it would play out. It's good for diplomatic brinksmanship but the moment real war might happen then you're basically threatening to upset the entire political and economic order of the entire world. And China's really big on not upsetting existing orders, especially one that's currently shifted towards its favor.
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Aug 16, 2021 20:17
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https://mobile.twitter.com/ajwsmall/status/1427304325504774149 gonna lol if we become protaliban in exchange for their backing ughyur separatists
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Aug 16, 2021 20:23
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Some Guy TT posted:maybe im just a tankie but the taliban making moves like this seems to suggest that the people so desperate to escape the country we keep hearing about may not have been innocent angels and this may have some bearing on why weve been dragging our feet on the whole refugee issue i wouldnt doubt it
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Aug 16, 2021 20:37
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Gripweed posted:OK, nevermind, American troops need to be in Afghanistan as long as it takes to prevent obscenities like this
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Aug 16, 2021 20:40
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Flavahbeast posted:The Taiwanese government is a lot more popular than Afghanistan's though. Is there a perception in China that they would be greeted as liberators if they invaded Taiwan? I mean they consider Taiwan to be rightfully theirs and stolen land so I would assume so, yes.
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Aug 16, 2021 20:41
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Maximo Roboto posted:The threat of war between China and Taiwan has existed for seventy years and at this point it's better to understand it as political football than something that anyone short of the highest levels of the governments themselves know how it would play out. It's good for diplomatic brinksmanship but the moment real war might happen then you're basically threatening to upset the entire political and economic order of the entire world. And China's really big on not upsetting existing orders, especially one that's currently shifted towards its favor. The same goes the other way though. China is more capable than ever before of invading and occupying Taiwan, which means the Taiwanese government also can't push the boundaries too much knowing that there's a red line to cross.
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Aug 16, 2021 20:45
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Pener Kropoopkin posted:The same goes the other way though. China is more capable than ever before of invading and occupying Taiwan, which means the Taiwanese government also can't push the boundaries too much knowing that there's a red line to cross. Agreed, but despite imbecilic speculation, the DPP is not going to actually declare independence because they know they are bound by the three no's or whatever. So right now that front is waged by "ROC government might back some measure to consider changing the country's name in some international sports league" or something non-political like that. Even the whole Chinese Taipei thing went unchallenged except to people drooling over it on Twitter. And China's whole thing has been penalizing businesses that refer to the island as Taiwan (airlines, John Cena) but that's pretty much the extent of it. Both parties continue to stick to previously agreed boundaries.
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Aug 16, 2021 20:57
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https://mobile.twitter.com/SethGJones/status/1427227304380534792
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Aug 16, 2021 21:08
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https://mobile.twitter.com/fred035schultz/status/1427250830315597825 someone plz show this to the chinese so they can go wait your trains are only as fast as dogs
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Aug 16, 2021 21:14
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Grapplejack posted:I mean they consider Taiwan to be rightfully theirs and stolen land so I would assume so, yes. I doubt the PRC leadership thinks the population of Taiwan would welcome them as liberators, but they probably assume whatever discontent that arose from it could be managed as in Hong Kong.
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Aug 16, 2021 21:48
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https://twitter.com/nightposting/status/1427404730389643265?s=19
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Aug 17, 2021 00:13
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https://twitter.com/ABC/status/1427387458791125002?s=20
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Aug 17, 2021 00:21
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How common is it for I guess Demi-official Chinese media (I don’t actually know how directly controlled by the CPC the they are?) like the Global Times to print media where it so starkly lays out how Taiwan is functionally independent. Somehow I thought they danced around it more or tried harder to maintain the premise that it’s still directly part of China. Or do they pick and choose.
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Aug 17, 2021 00:24
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remember when the US aided in the destruction of women's social standing in afghanistan in the 80s oops
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Aug 17, 2021 00:43
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Hey we never gave money directly to the Taliban! Only indirectly! We were giving our money to *squints* Gulbeddin Hekmetyar. Well whoever that is I'm sure he wasn't as misogynistic as the Taliban.
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Aug 17, 2021 01:03
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https://twitter.com/ShakiraSecurity/status/1427393308167491593?s=20
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Aug 17, 2021 02:14
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lol, can't believe i saw this like a day ago: crepeface posted:this is what i found last time i looked into it:
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Aug 17, 2021 02:36
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sorry youre antisemitic now for suggesting that george soros uses his limitless wealth for bad things
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Aug 17, 2021 02:59
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soros was famous for funding anti communist movements everywhere, its weird as hell that he became the boogeyman for reactionaries after all he's done for them
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Aug 17, 2021 03:07
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eyy an actual good and informative article on belarus: https://newleftreview.org/sidecar/posts/the-opposition-businessquote:For the first three years after the fall of the Soviet Union, the rapid marketization of the economy caused social collapse and mass discontent. Lukashenko presented himself as the solution to these ailments. He slowed the pace of privatization, partially reinstated price controls and restored elements of central planning. He established economic ties with Russia and brought back some of the social guarantees from the Soviet era. Manufacturing remained under government control, deindustrialization was halted. quote:Despite its resistance to shock therapy, Belarus had steadily been integrating into global markets. Throughout the 90s and 2000s, Minsk was critically reliant on energy supplies from Russia, whose oligarchs were eager to gain approval for the privatization of Belarusian gas transportation and oil refining industries. These negotiations led to rising tensions with Moscow, which in turn pushed the republic toward dependence on Western imports (hence its current vulnerability to sanctions). During the 2010s, falling demand in the world market and protectionist measures adopted by Western governments finally sapped the dynamism of the Belarusian economy. To make its manufacturing output more competitive, the government devalued the national currency twice. Real incomes fell, and Lukashenko expanded the public sector to prevent mass unemployment. Soon there was not enough money left in the budget for social services. Austerity and incremental privatization followed; the pension age was increased and labour rights were eroded. In an attempt to restock the state coffers and eradicate the grey economy, the government introduced a highly unpopular ‘freeloader’ law which required all those who are not officially employed to pay the government a fixed fine. quote:Having created one of the most successful IT-clusters in the world, employing over 100,000 people and attracting significant foreign investment, Belarus’s tech workers turned against the government after 2010. This section of the population was embedded in the global economy, favoured market-friendly reforms and saw the sluggish Belarusian ‘social state’ as a socialist hangover. They demanded regime change and a complete repudiation of this legacy. ‘We now have the bourgeois, rich people, IT people’, complained Lukashenko, ‘whom I created…providing them with conditions that would be impossible elsewhere. And now they want power quote:Bat’ka took a nationalist, pro-Western turn, hoping to outflank the opposition on cultural issues and strengthen the regime’s legitimacy. He refused to accept the annexation of Crimea by Russia in 2014, stopped delivering his presidential speeches in Russian, and increased the hours dedicated to Belarusian language in schools. At a press-conference in 2014, Lukashenko declared that Smolensk, Bryansk and Pskov rightfully belonged to Belarus: an overture to far-right nationalists who see the country as an heir to the medieval Great Duchy of Lithuania. He proposed a tactical union with the opposition against Russian revanchism and entered further into NATO’s orbit. As recently as 2017, the president referred to himself as an ally of the EU. quote:But liberal-nationalist leaders squandered their popular support by failing to put forward a compelling economic programme. Eager to dismantle the remnants of socialism, they offered no vision for Belarus beyond unpopular market reforms. This gradually alienated workers and the unemployed, most of whom have now either split off from the protest movement, or made clear that their discontent with the government does not equate to support for the opposition
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Aug 17, 2021 03:45
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also some of these people look like security contractors. although more of the base-patrol security guard duty than erik prince mercs https://twitter.com/vcdgf555/status/1427359848987971600
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Aug 17, 2021 04:01
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on a lighthearted note this was a really fun read. it turns out when you can't let go out of anti-communism and liberalism fails to work you get ten thousand political parties of rear end showing incoherent five star movements of hope and change everywhere: https://newleftreview.org/sidecar/posts/leftovers The 11 July snap election in Bulgaria may ultimately be remembered for its turnout rate, which fell to an all-time low of 42%. Much of the post-election debate revolved around the reasons for this figure. Some blamed the new electronic-voting machines, which supposedly scared off the elderly and less educated; others claimed that people were unwilling to vote during the summer vacation, especially since the outcome was entirely predictable. Only a few observers on the left suggested that the country’s consistently dwindling voter participation might have something to do with the lack of alternatives on the ballot. [...] Today, the nominally social-democratic BSP is facing a crisis similar to that of centre-left parties in the rest of Europe. Voters resent it for the right-wing measures enacted in the late 2000s, including the introduction of a 10% flat tax. They were also repelled by its decision to appoint the media tycoon Delyan Peevski as head of the National Security Agency in 2013. Since its return to opposition, the BSP has failed to highlight the contiguity between neoliberal reforms and rampant corruption. Instead, it has opted for handwringing over the loss of the ‘traditional Bulgarian family’, quixotic denunciations of ‘genderism’, and support for GERB’s nationalist campaign against Northern Macedonia. As a result, the BSP’s voter base has abandoned it in droves. Its working-class support fell to just 44% in the last election, compared to over 65% for all other parliamentary parties. [...] Amid the terminal decline of Bulgarian socialism, the country’s politics are now defined by the fault line between ‘protest parties’ and ‘the establishment’, pitting new and not-so-new smaller parties against the bloc composed of GERB, the BSP and the DPS (which claims to represent Bulgaria’s Muslim minority). Given Bulgaria’s status as the poorest, most unequal country in the EU – with swathes of its population lost to outward migration – one might assume that the field would be wide open for a left-leaning social-democratic opposition. But this prospect has largely been eclipsed by the dominance of ‘anti-corruption’ discourse, which overrides all other concerns. [...] Izpravi se, Mutri Vun (‘Stand Up, Thugs Out!’), a centre-left grouping led by the charismatic former ombudswoman Maia Manolova, got just 5% of the vote, roughly the same as its share in April. Democratic Bulgaria (DB), the liberal–green coalition, won 13%: a slight increase from the last election. The outlook was somewhat better for the populist Ima Takuv Narod (‘There Is Such a People’, ITN), led by the popular folk-rock singer and TV talk-show host Slavi Trifonov, which rose to 24%. All three organisations came to prominence last spring through an effective PR campaign that sought to expose GERB as morally and institutionally corrupt. They organised live-streamed hearings in parliamentary committees to investigate accusations of graft by Borissov’s top officials. These weeks-long sessions, presided over by Manolova, made for highly entertaining primetime television, featuring testimonies of shady businessmen who claimed to have been extorted by government ministers. [...] Its membership includes former BSP activists and participants in the recent protests. Yet even Manolova tries to avoid the appearance of progressive politics, describing herself as ‘neither left nor right’. The DB’s Hristo Ivanov has also cultivated an apolitical vocabulary around state capture and judicial reform – issues thought to transcend traditional political divisions [...] Bulgaria’s most important political actor following the July ballot – catapulted into the strongest position to form a government – is ITN. Though the party ran in parliamentary elections for the first time in 2021, Slavi Trifonov has arguably been building up its base since the 1990s. His music group, The Ku-Ku Band, has been one of the most popular acts for the past thirty years. Their patriotic songs were the soundtrack to the anti-communist movements of early 90s, and their current popularity can partly be attributed to nostalgia for the optimism of that period. The Bulgarian diaspora, many of whom tune into Trifonov’s talk show and turn out to see The Ku-Ku Band on tour, voted for ITN in large numbers. The party won 45% of the vote in Germany, and over 50% in the UK and Spain. [...] ITN representatives embrace the ‘populist’ label, comparing themselves to Italy’s Five Star Movement, Ukraine’s Volodymyr Zelensky and even Trump. The leaders refuse to be referred to as ‘politicians’ and style themselves as ordinary workers employed by the people. Their party is not a ‘party’ but a ‘political project’. Like the Italian M5S, they promise to introduce direct democracy mechanisms including frequent referendums. They are heavily reliant on social media and private broadcasting channels, which allow them to skirt public scrutiny. [...] One of ITN’s few definitive political commitments is to reduce taxpayer subsidies for political parties: a reform which Trifonov tried to pass via a public referendum several years ago. Whether this would aid Bulgarian democracy is questionable, as subsidies are currently the only mechanism to transparently fund political activities given the parties’ low membership numbers. In general, ITN has maintained a remarkable silence on most major issues beyond electoral reform (again rejecting the left–right axis as outdated). It would not even offer an unqualified endorsement of the Covid-19 vaccine programme, asserting that the public should hear ‘all points of view’ on the question of vaccine safety. Despite its anti-elite posturing, the party is now proposing a government made up entirely of corporate-technocratic ‘experts’. The first nominee for Minister of Culture was Stanislava Artmutlieva, the owner of Bulgaria’s largest music distributor, famed for her passionate defence of copyright law. The Ministry of Energy is to be handed over to Krasimir Nenov, the director of a private coal thermal power plant. A Minister for the Environment has not yet been nominated. [...] ITN has forecast further public sector redundancies in the coming years under an obscure ‘digitalisation’ agenda. The party has also announced its intention to privatize major highways, along with the last publicly owned Bulgarian Development Bank [...] Given the continued dominance of the anti-corruption framework, the best shot for the country’s left is to shift the emphasis onto the structural reasons for widespread corruption – presenting itself as the solution to the causes rather than the symptoms. Otherwise, it risks disappearing off the radar of the popular classes, whose only options will be an ‘old politics’ or a ‘new populism’ with little to differentiate them. mila kunis has issued a correction as of 04:41 on Aug 17, 2021 |
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Aug 17, 2021 04:38
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my new project Onward Bulgaria!! is NOT a party, merely a political art collective that seeks to sweep aside the scourge of corrupt bus drivers stealing from the till. what are our other policies you ask? thank you and VOTE
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Aug 17, 2021 04:38
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Pasokification reigns
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Aug 17, 2021 04:44
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https://apnews.com/article/china-dubai-uyghurs-60d049c387b99b1238ebd5f1d3bb3330 quote:The AP was unable to confirm or disprove Wu’s account independently, and she could not pinpoint the exact location of the black site but we still published this nothingburger anyway because muh fact-based agenda for Afghanistan copium
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Aug 17, 2021 04:45
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https://twitter.com/ashoswai/status/1427297596100562948?s=19 lol
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Aug 17, 2021 05:07
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| # ? May 26, 2024 22:13 |
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What if it was Ashraf Gazi and they were doing #LandBack in a Black Hammer commune in Herat
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Aug 17, 2021 05:18
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