French government in limbo after elections produce hung parliament
France's legislative elections have resulted in a hung parliament, with the National Assembly divided into three distinct blocs. Although the leftist coalition, the New Popular Front, came out on top with 182 seats, it does not have an absolute majority. While Macron has asked Prime Minister Gabriel Attal to remain in his post “for the time being”, the shape of the future government looks uncertain. FRANCE 24 takes a look at possible scenarios that could unfold.

With former secretary of the Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade Peter Varghese undertaking a review of taxpayer dollars spent on strategic policy work, Australia’s China hawks have argued a Canberra-based thinktank, the Australian Strategic Policy Institute (ASPI), cannot be touched.

Russia attacks in Toretsk, opening new front in Donbass. Surprise attack using a tunnel. Ukrainian conscripts abandon strategic fortified positions. Ukraine sends urgent reinforcements to halt and counterattack enemy gains. As of now, Russian forces have advanced 4 KMs and heavy fighting is taking place in the towns of Pivnichne and Niu-York.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VLuhProIGUY

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Record-breaking heat wave scorches millions across the US, fueling wildfires

A long-running heat wave is threatening roughly 130 million people across the US with record-breaking temperatures from coast to coast, setting the stage for more potential records in the coming days. The National Weather Service has extended excessive heat warnings, as cities like Ukiah, Livermore, Las Vegas, and Phoenix report dangerously high temperatures, and firefighters battle wildfires exacerbated by the extreme heat.

Roughly 130 million people were under threat over the weekend and into next week from a long-running heat wave that broke or tied records with dangerously high temperatures and is expected to shatter more from East Coast to West Coast, forecasters said.

During the ABC interview of the neoconservative President Biden on Friday night, July 5th, Biden said, “I’m running the world. Not — and that’s not hy — sounds like hyperbole; but, we are the essential nation of the world. Madeleine Albright was right.”

London’s support for Kiev during the conflict with Moscow will remain at the same level under his leadership, the new Prime Minister of Britain Keir Starmer has told Vladimir Zelensky.

Starmer replaced Rishi Sunak as the head of the UK government on Friday after the Labour Party he leads claimed a landslide victory in a general election, securing at least 412 of the 650 seats in parliament. One of his first phone calls in the new role was with Zelensky.

The Ukrainian leader wrote on X (formerly Twitter) on Friday that during their conversation he congratulated Starmer on becoming prime minister and “wished him success in fulfilling the British people’s expectations of the new government.”

DESPITE SOME HIGH DEGREES OF SOPHISTICATION, THE ANGLO/SAXON HEGEMONY IS STILL IN THE MONKEY STAGE OF HUMAN DEVELOPMENT... BY WISHING TO CONQUER THE WORLD BY WHATEVER MEANS, INCLUDING VIOLENCE AND DECEIT, THE AMERICANS AND THE ENGLISH HAVE FORGONE THEIR ESSENTIAL HUMANITY. IT IS HIGH TIME FOR THE WORLD TO SHIFT FROM ITS STILL INGRAINED PSEUDO-RELIGIOUS BELIEFS OF SUPERIORITY TO A PEACEFUL UNDERSTANDING OF THE ELEVATED HUMAN NATURE, WHICH IN TURN HAS TO UNDERSTAND THE MECHANISMS OF THE NATURAL PLANET...

The essential difference between Senator Fatima Payman and the rest of the federal Labor caucus – and the Coalition caucus as well – is that she opposes genocide and wants the federal parliament to take effective action against it. She is a minority of one in the federal Labor-Coalition political class.

Everything that has occurred in relation to her treatment by Labor-Coalition politicians and mass media hacks is a direct result of her daring to speak the truth about what is happening in Gaza, by stating on 14 May, in part:

Douglas Adams, author of The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, wrote “The President [of the Galaxy] in particular is very much a figurehead—he wields no real power whatsoever. […] His job is not to wield power but to draw attention away from it.”  This week, Rep. Daniel Goldman (D-NY) seemed to be taking the Hitchhiker’s Guide as a guide for government.

    by Jonathan Turley 

Berlin must not back any call for a truce that would see Kiev admit defeat, German Chancellor Olaf Scholz has said.

As Scholz took questions from members of the Bundestag on Wednesday, Left lawmaker Gesine Loetzsch asked about Germany’s involvement in the Russia-Ukraine conflict and the possibility of a ceasefire.

“In my view, a ceasefire that involves Ukraine’s capitulation is one that we as Germany must never support,” Scholz replied, according to the state broadcaster Deutsche Welle.

The German chancellor argued that Russian President Vladimir Putin’s truce terms amounted to Ukraine’s surrender, calling Moscow “cynical” and not interested in ending the conflict.

“Putin only talks about peace negotiations in order to continue the war. We will not allow this,”Scholz said.

US President Joe Biden has admitted he needs to get more sleep and work less, the New York Times reported on Thursday, citing two sources with direct knowledge of the remarks.

Biden reportedly made the statements during a gathering of Democratic governors on Wednesday. The event was organized to try and reassure key players within the party that the 81-year-old president is still fit for his job and vigorous enough to run a strong reelection campaign.

During the meeting, the president repeatedly told more than 20 Democratic governors that he would not be pushed out of the race and was “in it to win it,” according to reports by multiple media outlets.

In the 19th century, romantics talked a lot about nature, but ultimately did nothing for it. This is not the case of Pierre de Ronsard (1524-1585), the great literary figure of the La Pléiade group.

This author wrote the following powerful poem, and if it is so little known it is a pity: it is useful today for the liberation of the Earth. Ronsard in fact took up the defense of a forest located in what is today the Loir et Cher.

TRANSLATION BY JULES LETAMBOUR.

Ronsard speaks of the blood of the forest flowing, and describes the murder of the forest as a terrible crime. He does it in an elegiac but strong way, in a rebellious way and that's fascinating.

In this poem, which is called “Against the lumberjacks [LOGGERS] of the Gastine forest”, we can see his indignation…: 

There’s only one George Galloway. Six-term Parliamentarian, freedom fighter, man of the world. Writer, broadcaster, film-maker. Football and boxing enthusiast, movie-goer, box-set binger. Husband, father of five children, Scottish of Irish background, honorary Palestinian, Iraqi, Syrian, Egyptian… Friend of Fidel Castro, Hugo Chavez, Benazir Bhutto, Yasser Arafat, Tariq Aziz. Trembling with indignation at any injustice, anywhere.

https://www.georgegalloway.com/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FpwFW_HDW5A

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E_wsFWmS7yE

A week ahead of the NATO Summit in Washington, DC, US Secretary of State Antony Blinken turned spear again toward China, hyping that its "support" for Russia is fueling "the biggest security threat" in Europe, which experts said is an attempt to rope its European allies into playing along with Washington's geopolitical scheme, and incite chaos by inciting "another Ukraine crisis" in Asia.

One can be at a loss trying to explain why P&I published the rubbish by a former Australian “diplomat”, except to create ugly controversy when the facts are clearly in favour of John Pilger, Jeffrey Sachs, Paul Heywood-Smith and Keri McKern...

For Jon Richardson, former Australian diplomat who covered Eastern Europe from Moscow (in the USSR and later Russia), Belgrade, London and Canberra, Putin’s Russia is a Nazi/Fascist country because blah blah blah…