Serbia's PM: Puppet and Lackey

It didn't take very long for the terrorist rampage at the offices of Charlie Hebdo - a pretty obvious case of blowback from Western-promoted jihadism - to be re-framed by the Powers That Be as an issue of free speech. To believe that, however, one would have to purge all memory of the past several years of a West gone mad, in which free speech and those who accidentally practiced it were repeatedly burned at the stake of political correctness and "social justice" (e.g. "Shirtgate"). And they'd have gotten away with it, if not for us folks who notice and remember things.

This came to mind as I was reading reports from Serbia that the Prime Minister had thrown a tantrum over allegations made by an Imperial propaganda outfit. Apparently, BIRN had run a story last Thursday - overshadowed by the events in France - alleging that the government in Belgrade had acted "wastefully" by giving the contract to dredge a flooded mine to an "inexperienced" company. The PM responded by whining that the "EU paid BIRN to print lies" and that the contract was given to a lower domestic bidder because Serbia can't afford a 23-million-euro price tag from an EU conglomerate.

Trigger warning: Noticing and Remembering ahead. Also logic.


Here's the thing. The EU isn't paying BIRN: the Empire is. As their website helpfully explains, BIRN "emerged from the Balkan programme of the London-based Institute for War & Peace Reporting, IWPR, in 2005." And though the website claims this operation is local and "sustainable," this is pure nonsense. IWPR's Balkans program was funded directly by the U.S. Department of State, UK's Foreign Office, and George Soros (through his "Open Society" and other foundations). The Balkans countries afflicted by these "benefactors" are hardly able to feed themselves these days, let alone support a plague of parasitic propagandists.

Aleksandar Vučić (Olyksandr Vuchych), puppet PM of Serbia

I've actually written a lot about IWPR (and its BIRN spin-off) over the years, both here and at Antiwar.com. For all their talk of teaching and practicing respectable journalism, this is an outfit that first censored (and re-wrote) an article critical of the Hague Inquisition, then sacked the writer after a few months. His crime? Telling the truth, that plea-bargains suborning perjury were a rotten way to pursue justice for Balkans atrocities. So when someone - even the pathetic Serbian PM - claims that BIRN is a propaganda outfit, I yawn. That's really not news.

What is, news, however, is that the very same PM, in the course of his extended groveling pseudo-protest to the EU officials in Brussels, actually admitted to being their "errand-boy and lackey".

In the statement, carried by all the major media in Serbia (see here, for example), Aleksandar Vučić said (translation mine, emphasis added):

"By the way, if I personally represent an obstacle because I don't want to be your puppet on a leash, but only a servant of the citizens of Serbia, let me know this clearly and worry not, I will get out of your way, I know there are many eager to take over the role of your errand-boy and lackey immediately."

It's a passage both absurd and revealing at the same time. It is entirely possible it was actually written in (what someone thought was) English, hence the absurd phrase "puppet on a leash" (Serbian: лутка на повоцу), instead of the obviously intended "puppet on a string" (Serbian: марионета). But Vučić can't possibly be serious when he says he doesn't want to be a puppet, but rather serve the citizens of Serbia. For the past two and a half years he's been in power, he has done nothing to serve Serbia, and everything to serve Brussels - and Washington.

Only if "citizens of Serbia" is understood as those in Serbia who consider themselves "citizens" and loathe the actual Serbs - i.e. the quisling cargo cult of "pro-Western democrats and reformers" - would that phrase make even a modicum of sense.

But also note that Vučić never offers to "get out of the way" of the people (or "citizens") he supposedly serves, instead telling the EU not to worry, he would immediately step aside if they but command him to do so "clearly." The only thing clear here is who his real masters are.

That, by the way, he goes on to confirm in the very last sentence: "I know there are many eager to take over the role of your errand-boy and lackey immediately."

Rest assured this is a faithful translation of what he actually wrote, and that in both the Serbian original and this translation, the phrase "role of your errand-boy and lackey" can be swapped with "job of Prime Minister" without altering the meaning of the sentence in the slightest. What he is very clearly saying here is that the job of Serbia's PM is to be Empire's "errand boy and lackey"; that he is precisely such a person; and that the job is his, his own, his preciousss.

Somehow I doubt that this "confession" is the first step on the road to repentance. In the Serbian version of that famous adage about leopards and spots, it's the wolf who can "change his pelt, but never his nature". The PM's name just happens to translate as "Wolf Cub".