timelets

Hegel calls language the Daesin of spirit.

Language is the being there of spirit. It’s the way in which it's the medium through which a community passes itself on, recognizes itself, talks to itself, so embeds itself.

https://bernsteintapes.com/lectures/Hegel/01IntroA.mp3

In the past 72 hours, Donald Trump has dropped all pretense, torched a couple decades of American policy, and undermined 18 months of his own diplomacy. He lifted sanctions on the import of Russian diesel fuel, in violation of the letter and spirit of laws that he himself signed. He has threatened to stop sharing intelligence with Ukraine, unless Ukraine agrees not to target Russian refineries, thus demanding that Kyiv give up its most effective weapon while asking nothing from Russia in exchange. He has not criticized Russian attacks on Ukrainian power plants or factories, even those owned by American companies. He has offered no condolences for the recent deaths of Ukrainian children in Russian bombing raids.

He has lied repeatedly. He declared that Ukraine and Russia had agreed to an “energy cease-fire,” an announcement that surprised the Ukrainians and that in any case the Russians immediately broke, hitting a power plant in Kharkiv only hours later. He accused Ukraine of blocking negotiations, when in reality the Ukrainians have repeatedly proposed cease-fires and Russia has never agreed to a cease-fire or any meaningful negotiation at all.

This looks, instead, like something very different: an abrupt, Hail Mary attempt to force Ukraine to surrender and to save the Russian economy, perhaps in order to finally complete the multiple business deals that the Russians are known to have discussed with American negotiators and others in Trump’s orbit.

https://www.theatlantic.com/ideas/2026/10/trump-ukraine-putin-fuel/688974/?gift=hVZeG3M9DnxL4CekrWGK372rbdCi0mU0IdJSunXI0Sk

“...your Russki is insecure, wants to be respected, to be feared like the old Soviet Union. They need recognition, and they hate their second-tier status in the superpower stakes. That’s why Putin’s putting together USSR 2.0, and no one is going to stand in his way.

...as the chain-wrapped corpse of the Soviet was exhumed, hauled dripping out of the swamp, and its heart was started again, and the old prisons were filled anew..."

Red Sparrow, by Jason Matthews.

The president later Tuesday signed an executive order requiring federal agencies to refer to the technology as “super intelligence,” an effort to counter the increasingly negative public perceptions of AI.

https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-09-29/trump-set-to-host-nvidia-anthropic-ceos-to-discuss-ai-risks