George Soros is rightly regarded as one of the most consequential advocates of freedom in Central and Eastern Europe. Years before the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Hungarian-born financier began investing his fortune in democratic dissidents. Once the Berlin Wall fell, his Open Society Foundations rapidly opened offices across the region, providing crucial support to independent journalists, civil-society activists and liberal-minded politicians.

It is this steadfast support for democracy that makes Soros’s latest gambit so confusing. The liberal philanthropist has joined forces with fellow billionaire Charles Koch in founding a foreign policy think tank, the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft. Disparaging “the foreign policy community in Washington” for having "succumbed to intellectual lethargy and dysfunction,” the institute will advocate “a new foreign policy centered on diplomatic engagement and military restraint.” On most issues, the liberal Soros and the libertarian Koch exist on opposite ends of the political spectrum. That they are collaborating on foreign policy may be a harbinger of a new left-right consensus favoring isolationism.

....

In a recent podcast, Koch explained the purpose of the institute, inaccurately quoting its namesake. “We go not abroad in search of monsters to destroy, we’re the friends of all nations, and allies of none.” John Quincy Adams did indeed utter the first part of that phrase, beloved by noninterventionists. But he said nothing of the sort about America not having allies.

That Koch would impute a distaste for alliances to Adams is revealing. Alliances have been the mainstay of U.S. foreign policy since the end of World War II, ensuring more than seven decades of unprecedented peace and prosperity. The alliance structures and partnerships the United States has forged, embodied by institutions such as NATO and bilateral agreements with nations including Australia, Colombia, Japan and India, ensure global order, freedom of commerce, and human rights. Koch also complained about our “over 800 bases around the world,” as if these were agents of aggression and not projections of stability.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2019/08/27/why-are-george-soros-charles-koch-collaborating-us-bashing-think-tank/

You know who loves Western non-interventionism? Vladimir Putin, which is why it's the cornerstone of Russian propaganda efforts.

Fucking around with insurance, mfa, single payer will never address the underlying problems with cost.

ETA- this is a great example where the capitalistic model doesn't work. Ask yourself why there is such a huge range in pricing.

Arbel Kynan, a top Israeli fashion model, wrote in an Instagram post on Tuesday that a Lebanese designer refused to have her take part in his runway show at the Haute Couture Week in Paris, which starts on January 20, because of her nationality.

“Truthfully... it’s still hard for me to digest....” Kynan wrote. She then told of how she arrived in Paris a few days ago to be photographed by a “very respectable fashion company,” and was told she would also walk the runway in next week’s show, which is a coveted job in the modeling industry.

“Many times, people ask us where we are from, and on the day of the shoot they asked me where I am from and, of course, I answered with a big smile that I am from Tel Aviv.” The shoot continued as usual, Kynan said, and they finished early. According to Kynan, a few days passed, and then on Tuesday, she says, “I received an email from my agency stating that the client is Lebanese and he does not want me to take part in the show, because I live in Tel Aviv, Israel – this is the content of the email I received.”

https://m.jpost.com/J-Spot/Israeli-model-says-Lebanese-designer-banned-her-from-show-614234

Protesters gathered on the streets of Iran Sunday for a second day of demonstrations against the regime, prompted by the Iranian leadership’s belated admission that it accidentally downed a Ukrainian airliner last week, killing all 176 people on board.

Hundreds of protesters rallied at various locations around the country, including outside a university in Tehran, social media posts showed.

Video also showed a crowd of several hundred at the university refusing to trample on large US and Israeli flags that had been laid down in the path of the march. Those that did walk on the flags were chastised by other protesters, the Haaretz daily newspaper reported. The video did not identify which university was involved.

“They are lying that our enemy is America; our enemy is right here,” chanted some protesters in Tehran, according to a report from the Reuters new agency.

https://www.timesofisrael.com/as-protests-restart-in-iran-demonstrators-refuse-to-trample-us-israeli-flags/

We have complained about linking to these websites for YEARS.