Retep The Observer

Chicago, Oakland, Montana, Tralfamadore 🏀the future you fear is already here, now what? 🤡🌎🔥😈

[Arnaud Bertrand @RnaudBertrand]

I'm typically not one to toot my own horn but I think I may have written the single best article on Xinjiang this past decade.

Never has writing an article taken me so much time: almost two months.

It involved, as amply documented on this platform, a six-week RV roadtrip through Xinjiang during which I posted so relentlessly that I suspect several of you muted me somewhere around day six, and are only reading this now because someone told you the ordeal was finally over 😅

More seriously, I did what unfortunately all too few writers do these days when writing about a topic: I genuinely went deep.

Not only did I travel almost everywhere in Xinjiang and spoke with hundreds of people in the process, but I also spent a further 10 days afterwards in Urumqi - the province's capital - to engage with the local intelligentsia (journalists, university professors, public servants both junior and senior, XPCC/Bingtuan executives, businessmen, etc.) to get as accurate a read on the place as I could.

Meanwhile, when back in Urumqi after our roadtrip, I placed my 2 daughters in a holiday camp with local Uyghur kids - learning as a result something no discussion with an adult could ever tell me: what life is actually like for Uyghur kids in today's China.

On top of all this, I read widely and voraciously. The academic historians - Brophy, Gladney, Rudelson. The UN reports. But also books like Li Juan's wonderful Winter Pasture, a Chinese writer's account of living through a winter with Kazakh nomads in the Altay region.

The end result is an 8,000-word article that, I hope you'll agree, does something no article on Xinjiang has done in a very long time: treats the place and its people with the depth they deserve.

Maybe uncharacteristic for me, I don't shy away from the uncomfortable parts - on either side. I write about the omnipresent police checkpoints and the institutional paranoia as candidly as I write about the breathtaking shallowness and lies of the Western discourse on the topic.

If you're looking for propaganda - whether pro or anti-China - you'll be disappointed. If you're looking for honesty and nuance, however, I think you'll like it.

Enjoy the read here: https://t.co/K39WByvjvG

[SlavicPatriot @infantserbian]

American YouTubers are flooding Cuba right now. Filming the poverty. Shocked by the conditions. No electricity. Empty shelves. Crumbling buildings.

And every single one blames the Cuban government.

Not one mentions the US embargo. 64 years. Since 1962.

Let me explain what that means in simple terms.

Cuba can't trade with the US. Can't buy American goods. Can't sell to American markets. That's expected.

But here's the real damage: any company that does business with Cuba gets sanctioned by the US. Any bank that processes Cuban transactions gets cut off from the American financial system. Any ship that docks in Cuba can't enter a US port for 6 months.

The US didn't just embargo Cuba. They forced the entire world to embargo Cuba.

For 64 years.

No access to international banking. Can't import medical equipment. Can't buy spare parts for machinery. Can't trade freely with 90% of the global economy.

I watched sanctions destroy Serbia in the 90s. We got 8 years of full economic isolation. Cancer patients died waiting for medicine we couldn't import. Inflation hit 300 million percent. Our economy collapsed.

That was 8 years. Cuba has endured 64.

And now American YouTubers show up, film the poverty their own government created, and blame the victims.

Why am I bringing this up now? Because the media campaign is starting. Marco Rubio just said "all options are on the table" for Cuba. American influencers are suddenly very interested in Cuban suffering.

This is the setup. Film the crisis. Blame the government. Build public support. Then invade.

I've seen this playbook before. Serbia. Iraq. Libya. Venezuela last week.

Watch. Cuba is next.

Cuba is poor because America strangled them for 64 years and won't let anyone else help. That's the answer. Everything else is propaganda.

[Retep The Observer @contango29]

@BrettErickson28 Because the average US citizen is dumb enough to believe almost anything so naturally these clowns assume everyone is just as dumb. But anyone that’s travelled outside the US for more than cheap service at a cozy resort would understand that we’re not fooling anyone but ourselves

[Alec Karakatsanis @equalityAlec]

Thread: This the story of one of the most remarkable cases in U.S. history, and you’ve probably never heard of it. The story of what the U.S. government did to Ezell Gilbert is important because it explains how our legal system works as well as any case I have ever seen. (1)

[Retep The Observer @contango29]

@DrJStrategy 🤡

[Johnny Akzam @JohnnyAkzam]

It’s time to turn the page 📄

[Big Buddha Palmz @XanKaiDesigns]

@TheJFreakinC

[ReportingForDuty @_Koko_Reed]

“Kavanaugh stops” is what they are called and made legal by Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh when he concurred with a September 2025 decision in Noem v. Vazquez Perdomo that allowed ICE agents to resume certain investigative stops for detentions factoring in appearance or location.

https://t.co/0s5QM5vBu6

[Retep The Observer @contango29]

@XonnyyOP @XQuantumTraderX @johnarnold 🎯🎯🎯

[Retep The Observer @contango29]

🎯🎯🎯

[China view @Chinaview0022]

欧美西方国家为什么恨中国？被一个英国学者说透了

英国学者杰森·希克尔说了句大实话：西方恨中国，不是因为民主人权，是因为中国砸了他们500年的饭碗。

一带一路让非洲、拉美、东南亚国家终于能不用看IMF脸色搞基建了。中国给技术、给贷款、不附政治条件。这动了谁的奶酪？

希克尔算过一笔账：西方每年从全球南方榨走2.2万亿美元，够消灭极端贫困15次。这不是援助能补回来的——援助一年才1500亿，左手给右手抢。

500年前呢？中国GDP占世界三分之一，万国来朝，不靠抢。西方的"文明秩序"才是历史的异常。

八国联军抢了150万件圆明园文物、北京城掠走1.3亿两白银的时候，他们讲人权了吗？

中国做衬衫的时候他们笑，中国做芯片的时候他们急。不是中国变了，是他们割不到韭菜了。

资本是吸血鬼，战争是它的餐具。什么时候这套秩序碎了，什么时候世界才真和平。

[Retep The Observer @contango29]

@Bigsteppergv @BRICSinfo I guess you missed the hack in 2010 that exposed western intelligence assets all over the globe …
🤡

[Retep The Observer @contango29]

@SantiagoAuFund More 🤡💩

[Dr. CBS @drcbs_]

One of the most compelling pieces of propaganda produced by the US state was the “totalitarian” and “authoritarian” discourse that conflated communism and fascism, starting in the late 1930s. Its purpose was to construe anything other than Western “democracy” as dangerous and in need of eradication.

[Retep The Observer @contango29]

@king_of_bob @DanMKervick 💯

[Benn Jordan @bennjordan]

Flock takes their privacy very seriously.

But the ethical gray area in surveillance technology works both ways.

Under no circumstances should elected officials or public servants enjoy an expectation of privacy when spending tax dollars to attend a surveillance lobbying event.

[Retep The Observer @contango29]

@mcsquared34 Yes

[Retep The Observer @contango29]

@AAlex18494 @serish 🎯🎯🎯

[Oakenblunts @Oakenblunt]

@ricwe123 @liamcunningham1 Not only is he an incompetent, his department is also a mess, with a wave of resignations fleeing the sinking ship that is the US Treasury.

Everything this man does turns to utter shit. A true King Midas in reverse.

https://t.co/6pd63qobn4

[Retep The Observer @contango29]

@VinnysCorner1 Bill Melton

[Israel Exposed @xIsraelExposedx]

We're stepping out of the shadows and onto the screen.