Irreversible Decline?

Did the U.S. and the Saudis Conspire to Push Down Oil Prices?

“Saudi oil policy… has been subject to a great deal of wild and inaccurate conjecture in recent weeks. We do not seek to politicize oil… For us it’s a question of supply and demand, it’s purely business.” – Ali al Naimi, Saudi Oil Minister

“There is no conspiracy, there is no targeting of anyone. This is a market and it goes up and down.” – Suhail Bin Mohammed al-Mazroui, United Arab Emirates’ petroleum minister

“We all see the lowering of oil prices. There’s lots of talk about what’s causing it. Could it be an agreement between the U.S. and Saudi Arabia to punish Iran and affect the economies of Russia and Venezuela? It could.” – Russian President Vladimir Putin

Are falling oil prices part of a US-Saudi plan to inflict economic damage on Russia, Iran and Venezuela?

Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro seems to think so. In a recent interview that appeared in Reuters, Maduro said he thought the United States and Saudi Arabia wanted to drive down oil prices “to harm Russia.”

Bolivian President Evo Morales agrees with Maduro and told journalists at RT that: “The reduction in oil prices was provoked by the US as an attack on the economies of Venezuela and Russia. In the face of such economic and political attacks, the nations must be united.”

Iranian President Hassan Rouhani said the same thing,with a slightly different twist: “The main reason for (the oil price plunge) is a political conspiracy by certain countries against the interests of the region and the Islamic world … Iran and people of the region will not forget such … treachery against the interests of the Muslim world.”

US-Saudi “treachery”? Is that what’s really driving down oil prices?

Not according to Saudi Arabia’s Petroleum Minister Ali al-Naimi. Al-Naimi has repeatedly denied claims that the kingdom is involved in a conspiracy. He says the tumbling prices are the result of “A lack of cooperation by non-OPEC production nations, along with the spread of misinformation and speculator’s greed.” In other words, everyone else is to blame except the country that has historically kept prices high by controlling output. That’s a bit of a stretch, don’t you think? Especially since–according to the Financial Times — OPEC’s de facto leader has abandoned the cartel’s “traditional strategy” and announced that it won’t cut production even if prices drop to $20 per barrel.

Why? Why would the Saudis suddenly abandon a strategy that allowed them to rake in twice as much dough as they are today? Don’t they like money anymore?

And why would al-Naimi be so eager to crash prices, send Middle East stock markets into freefall, increase the kingdom’s budget deficits to a record-high 5 percent of GDP, and create widespread financial instability? Is grabbing “market share” really that important or is there something else going on here below the surface?

The Guardian’s Larry Elliot thinks the US and Saudi Arabia are engaged a conspiracy to push down oil prices. He points to a September meeting between John Kerry and Saudi King Abdullah where a deal was made to boost production in order to hurt Iran and Russia. Here’s a clip from the article titled “Stakes are high as US plays the oil card against Iran and Russia”:

“…with the help of its Saudi ally, Washington is trying to drive down the oil price by flooding an already weak market with crude. As the Russians and the Iranians are heavily dependent on oil exports, the assumption is that they will become easier to deal with…

John Kerry, the US secretary of state, allegedly struck a deal with King Abdullah in September under which the Saudis would sell crude at below the prevailing market price. That would help explain why the price has been falling at a time when, given the turmoil in Iraq and Syria caused by Islamic State, it would normally have been rising.

The Saudis did something similar in the mid-1980s. Then, the geopolitical motivation for a move that sent the oil price to below $10 a barrel was to destabilize Saddam Hussein’s regime. This time, according to Middle East specialists, the Saudis want to put pressure on Iran and to force Moscow to weaken its support for the Assad regime in Syria… (Stakes are high as US plays the oil card against Iran and Russia, Guardian)

That’s the gist of Elliot’s theory, but is he right?

Vladimir Putin isn’t so sure. Unlike Morales, Maduro and Rouhani, the Russian president has been reluctant to blame falling prices on US-Saudi collusion. In an article in Itar-Tass, Putin opined:

“There’s a lot of talk around” in what concerns the causes for the slide of oil prices, he said at a major annual news conference. “Some people say there is conspiracy between Saudi Arabia and the US in order to punish Iran or to depress the Russian economy or to exert impact on Venezuela.”

“It might be really so or might be different, or there might be the struggle of traditional producers of crude oil and shale oil,” Putin said. “Given the current situation on the market the production of shale oil and gas has practically reached the level of zero operating costs.” (Putin says oil market price conspiracy between Saudi Arabia and US not ruled out, Itar-Tass)

As always, Putin takes the most moderate position, that is, that Washington and the Saudis may be in cahoots, but that droopy prices might simply be a sign of over-supply and weakening demand. In other words, there could be a plot, but then again, maybe not. Putin is a man who avoids passing judgment without sufficient evidence.

The same can’t be said of the Washington Post. In a recent article, WP journalist Chris Mooney dismisses anyone who thinks oil prices are the result of US-Saudi collaboration as “kooky conspiracy theorists”. According to Mooney:

“The reasons for the sudden (price) swing are not particularly glamorous: They involve factors like supply and demand, oil companies having invested heavily in exploration several years ago to produce a glut of oil that has now hit the market — and then, perhaps, the “lack of cohesion” among the diverse members of OPEC.” (Why there are so many kooky conspiracy theories about oil, Washington Post)

Oddly enough, Mooney disproves his own theory a few paragraphs later in the same piece when he says:

“Oil producers really do coordinate. And then, there’s OPEC, which is widely referred to in the press as a “cartel,” and which states up front that its mission is to “coordinate and unify the petroleum policies” of its 12 member countries…. Again, there’s that veneer of plausibility to the idea of some grand oil related strategy.” (WP)

Let me get this straight: One the one hand Mooney agrees that OPEC is a cartel that “coordinates and unify the petroleum policies”, then on the other, he says that market fundamentals are at work. Can you see the disconnect? Cartels obstruct normal supply-demand dynamics by fixing prices, which Mooney seems to breezily ignore.

Also, he scoffs at the idea of “some grand oil related strategy” as if these cartel nations were philanthropic organizations operating in the service of humanity. Right. Someone needs to clue Mooney in on the fact that OPEC is not the Peace Corps. They are monopolizing amalgam of cutthroat extortionists whose only interest is maximizing profits while increasing their own political power. Surely, we can all agree on that fact.

What’s really wrong with Mooney’s article, is that he misses the point entirely. The debate is NOT between so-called “conspiracy theorists” and those who think market forces alone explain the falling prices. It’s between the people who think that the Saudis decision to flood the market is driven by politics rather than a desire to grab “market share.” That’s where people disagree. No denies that there’s manipulation; they merely disagree about the motive. This glaring fact seems to escape Mooney who is on a mission to discredit conspiracy theorists at all cost. Here’s more:

(There’s) “a long tradition of conspiracy theorists who have surmised that the world’s great oil powers — whether countries or mega-corporations — are secretly pulling strings to shape world events.”…

“A lot of conspiracy theories take as their premise that there’s a small group of people who are plotting to control something, to control the government, the banking system, or the main energy source, and they are doing this to the disadvantage of everybody else,” says University of California-Davis historian Kathy Olmsted, author of “Real Enemies: Conspiracy Theories and American Democracy, World War I to 9/11″. (Washington Post)

Got that? Now find me one person who doesn’t think the world is run by a small group of rich, powerful people who operate in their own best interests? Here’s more from the same article:

(Oil) “It’s the perfect lever for shifting world events. If you were a mad secret society with world-dominating aspirations and lots of power, how would you tweak the world to create cascading outcomes that could topple governments and enrich some at the expense of others? It’s hard to see a better lever than the price of oil, given its integral role in the world economy.” (WP)

“A mad secret society”? Has Mooney noticed that — in the last decade and a half — the US has only invaded nations that have huge natural resources (mainly oil and natural gas) or the geography for critical pipeline routes? There’s nothing particularly secret about it, is there?

The United States is not a “mad secret society with world-dominating aspirations”. It’s a empire with blatantly obvious “world-dominating aspirations” run by political puppets who do the work of wealthy elites and corporations. Any sentient being who’s bright enough to browse the daily headlines can figure that one out.

Mooney’s grand finale:

“So in sum, with a surprising and dramatic event like this year’s oil price decline, it would be shocking if it did not generate conspiracy theories. Humans believe them all too easily. And they’re a lot more colorful than a more technical (and accurate) story about supply and demand.” (WP)

Ah, yes. Now I see. Those darn “humans”. They’re so weak-minded they’ll believe anything you tell them, which is why they need someone as smart as Mooney tell them how the world really works.

Have you ever read such nonsense in your life? On top of that, he gets the whole story wrong. This isn’t about market fundamentals. It’s about manipulation. Are the Saudis manipulating supply to grab market share or for political reasons? THAT’S THE QUESTION. The fact that they ARE manipulating supply is not challenged by anyone including the uber-conservative Financial Times that deliberately pointed out that the Saudis had abandoned their traditional role of cutting supply to support prices. That’s what a “swing state” does; it manipulates supply keep prices higher than they would be if market forces were allowed to operate unimpeded.

So what is the motive driving the policy; that’s what we want to know?

Certainly there’s a strong case to be made for market share. No one denies that. If the Saudis keep prices at rock bottom for a prolonged period of time, then a high percentage of the producers (that can’t survive at prices below $70 per barrel) will default leaving OPEC with greater market share and more control over pricing.

So market share is certainly a factor. But is it the only factor?

Is it so far fetched to think that the United States–which in the last year has imposed harsh economic sanctions on Russia, made every effort to sabotage the South Stream pipeline, and toppled the government in Kiev so it could control the flow of Russian gas to countries in the EU–would coerce the Saudis into flooding the market with oil in order to decimate the Russian economy, savage the ruble, and create favorable conditions for regime change in Moscow? Is that so hard to believe?

Apparently New York Times columnist Thomas Freidman doesn’t think so. Here’s how he summed it up in a piece last month: “Is it just my imagination or is there a global oil war underway pitting the United States and Saudi Arabia on one side against Russia and Iran on the other?”

It sounds like Freidman has joined the conspiracy throng, doesn’t it? And he’s not alone either. This is from Alex Lantier at the World Socialist Web Site:

“While there are a host of global economic factors underlying the fall in oil prices, it is unquestionable that a major role in the commodity’s staggering plunge is Washington’s collaboration with OPEC and the Saudi monarchs in Riyadh to boost production and increase the glut on world oil markets.

As Obama traveled to Saudi Arabia after the outbreak of the Ukraine crisis last March, the Guardian wrote, “Angered by the Soviet invasion of Afghanistan in 1979, the Saudis turned on the oil taps, driving down the global price of crude until it reached $20 a barrel (in today’s prices) in the mid-1980s… [Today] the Saudis might be up for such a move—which would also boost global growth—in order to punish Putin over his support for the Assad regime in Syria. Has Washington floated this idea with Riyadh? It would be a surprise if it hasn’t.” (Alex Lantier,Imperialism and the ruble crisis, World Socialist Web Site)

And here’s an intriguing clip from an article at Reuters that suggests the Obama administration is behind the present Saudi policy:

“U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry sidestepped the issue (of a US-Saudi plot) after a trip to Saudi Arabia in September. Asked if past discussions with Riyadh had touched on Russia’s need for oil above $100 to balance its budget, he smiled and said: “They (Saudis) are very, very well aware of their ability to have an impact on global oil prices.” (Saudi oil policy uncertainty unleashes the conspiracy theorists, Reuters)

Wink, wink.

Of course, they’re in bed together. Saudi Arabia is a US client. It’s not autonomous or sovereign in any meaningful way. It’s a US protectorate, a satellite, a colony. They do what they’re told. Period. True, the relationship is complex, but let’s not be ridiculous. The Saudis are not calling the shots. The idea is absurd. Do you really think that Washington would let Riyadh fiddle prices in a way that destroyed critical US domestic energy industries, ravaged the junk bond market, and generated widespread financial instability without uttering a peep of protest on the matter?

Dream on! If the US was unhappy with the Saudis, we’d all know about it in short-order because it would be raining Daisy Cutters from the Persian Gulf to the Red Sea, which is the way that Washington normally expresses its displeasure on such matters. The fact that Obama has not even alluded to the shocking plunge in prices just proves that the policy coincides with Washington’s broader geopolitical strategy.

And let’s not forget that the Saudis have used oil as a political weapon before, many times before. Indeed, wreaking havoc is nothing new for our good buddies the Saudis. Check this out from Oil Price website:

“In 1973, Egyptian President Anwar Sadat convinced Saudi King Faisal to cut production and raise prices, then to go as far as embargoing oil exports, all with the goal of punishing the United States for supporting Israel against the Arab states. It worked. The “oil price shock” quadrupled prices.

It happened again in 1986, when Saudi Arabia-led OPEC allowed prices to drop precipitously, and then in 1990, when the Saudis sent prices plummeting as a way of taking out Russia, which was seen as a threat to their oil supremacy. In 1998, they succeeded. When the oil price was halved from $25 to $12, Russia defaulted on its debt.

The Saudis and other OPEC members have, of course, used the oil price for the obverse effect, that is, suppressing production to keep prices artificially high and member states swimming in “petrodollars”. In 2008, oil peaked at $147 a barrel.” (Did The Saudis And The US Collude In Dropping Oil Prices?, Oil Price)

1973, 1986, 1990, 1998 and 2008.

So, according to the author, the Saudis have manipulated oil prices at least five times in the past to achieve their foreign policy objectives. But, if that’s the case, then why does the media ridicule people who think the Saudis might be engaged in a similar strategy today?

Could it be that the media is trying to shape public opinion on the issue and, by doing so, actually contribute to the plunge in oil prices?

Bingo. Alert readers have probably noticed that the oil story has been splashed across the headlines for weeks even though the basic facts have not changed in the least. It’s all a rehash of the same tedious story reprinted over and over again. But, why? Why does the public need to have the same “Saudis refuse to cut production” story driven into their consciousness day after day like they’re part of some great collective brainwashing experiment? Could it be that every time the message is repeated, oil sells off, and prices go down? Is that it?

Precisely. For example, last week a refinery was attacked in Libya which pushed oil prices up almost immediately. Just hours later, however, another “Saudis refuse to cut production” story conveniently popped up in all the major US media which pushed prices in the direction the USG wants them to go, er, I mean, back down again.

This is how the media helps to reinforce government policy, by crafting a message that helps to push down prices and, thus, hurt “evil” Putin. (This is called “jawboning”) Keep in mind, that OPEC doesn’t meet again until June, 2015, so there’s nothing new to report on production levels. But that doesn’t mean we’re not going to get regular updates on the “Saudis refuse to cut production” story. Oh, no. The media is going to keep beating that drum until Putin cries “Uncle” and submits to US directives. Either that, or the bond market is going to blow up and take the whole damn global financial system along with it. One way or another, something’s got to give.

Bottom line: Falling oil prices and the plunging ruble are not some kind of free market accident brought on by oversupply and weak demand. That’s baloney. They’re part of a broader geopolitical strategy to strangle the Russian economy, topple Putin, and establish US hegemony across the Asian landmass. It’s all part of Washington’s plan to maintain its top-spot as the world’s only superpower even though its economy is in irreversible decline.

Ukraine Is A Long-Term Affair

In Ukraine the United States presented Russia with its most serious challenge in the last quarter-century. Russia has not responded to that challenge in a timely manner. She proved unable to anticipate and then counter the Maidan scenario last winter, even though the grand rehearsal was presented with the “Orange Revolution” ten years ago. Now Russia’s relations with her strategically essential neighbor – Ukraine – are on the brink of rupture, or a painful restructuring for decades to come.

Normal US-Russian relations would require the recognition that Russia has legitimate interests in her near abroad. To understand the Washingtonian mindset, however, we need to recall a quote from President Obama’s graduation address at West Point in May 2014: “The values of our founding inspire leaders in parliaments and new movements in public squares around the globe.” Evidently he was alluding to the Maidan.

The Founding Fathers would turn in their graves to learn that, according to the president of the United States, their values have inspired Messrs. Tyahnibok, Yarosh, and other blood-soaked heirs of Stepan Bandera who now sit in the Parliament of Ukraine. The mindset is hardly new. In 1999 Senator Joseph Lieberman declared, “The United States of America and the Kosovo Liberation Army stand for the same values and principles. Fighting for the KLA is fighting for human rights and American values.”

“The United States is and remains the one indispensable nation,” Obama says. “That has been true for the century past, and it will be true for the century to come.” In reality it has never been true, it is not true now, and it never will be true. Madeleine Albright’s famous claim along those lines back in the 1990’s was a sign of her mental instability. It was reiterated in Bill Clinton’s 1996 speech on Bosnia. That Obama has chosen to recycle such inanities is a sign of intellectual and moral bankruptcy, not only his own but also that of a sizeable segment of the American foreign policy establishment. But the march goes on. If some country dares resist the will of the “indispensable nation,” then it is necessarily evil. Susan Rice thus condemned China and Russia at the UN for vetoing the U.S.-supported UN Security Council resolution to bomb Syria as “disgusting,” “shameful” and “unforgivable.” It’s psychotic.

A state’s political, military, economic, and moral resources are conventionally used in a balanced way to protect or enhance its security. The U.S. is practicing a different brand of diplomacy, which is in ample evidence in Ukraine. And Russia, in responding to the initial Maidan crisis, has made a severe miscalculation.

This error now needs to be corrected as part of Russia’s long-term strategy aimed at regime change in Kiev. Let us be clear: Moscow will never obtain Western recognition of its legitimate interests in the near abroad. Moscow should therefore defend its national interests as it deems fit. It should be understood that the sanctions and demonization of Russia’s and Putin personally, of diplomatic abuse and military pressure, will continue regardless of what Russia does. If Russia does not act to prevent the transformation of Ukraine into a Russophobic “Banderistan”, then the return of the Crimea will prove to be scant compensation for the overall weakening of Russia’s geopolitical position. To avoid this, Russia needs to do several things.

First of all, it should fight the regime in Kiev on all fronts – openly and secretly, diplomatically and undiplomatically. No handshakes with Poroshenko. Join the already raging information war. Moscow should constantly remind the world of the false-flag stunt with the Malaysian Boeing in the sky above Ukraine, and insist on a full disclosure of all facts which are still concealed. It should demand an investigation of the massacres in Odessa on May 2 and on May 9 in Mariupol, and an internationally supervised trial. Finally it should tell the world about the ongoing mass murder of ordinary people in southeastern Ukraine, where a ceasefire is supposed to be in operation.

It is necessary to take TV documentaries and feature films revealing these and other Western myths. It is necessary to politically support the Novorussian de facto independence. The Kiev regime has already lost the right to Novorossia, so now it is necessary to support the irreversible changes to ensure its viability. Using the U.S. terminology, Russia has the “Responsibility to Protect.” In my opinion, Kiev should be forced to abandon all hope for the resumption of military operations.

Third, you need to provide political and financial support to the opposition in Ukraine, to the non-Banderist civic groups. These groups are small, but given the fact that Ukraine is facing inevitable economic collapse, there exists a favorable and growing environment for Russia’s use of “soft power.” It is necessary to tighten the screws in economic relations with Ukraine, based on an understanding that there will be no security, no stability, for as long as Kiev is controlled by the current regime. It needs to be discredited, starting with the coup February 21, 2014.

Regime change in Kiev and Ukraine’s de-nazification are a matter of life and death for Russia. Ukraine’s partition is a poor alternative. Even if Novorossiya were to include Kharkov and Mariupol, the Banderist remnant will become even more Russophobic – and it will still include most of Ukraine, on both sides of the Dnieper. That would poison Russian-Ukrainian relations for a very long time. It makes more sense to preserve the unity of Ukraine, but to create conditions for its denazification.

Don’t expect any readiness for compromise from the U.S. They will continue to bait their protégés in Kiev to continue military operations in the east. Not right now, of course, but in the spring of 2015, when NATO rearms Ukraine’s military forces. The chaos in Ukraine is a long-term condition, and this is only one part of the global strategy of the United States based on the notions of global dominance and exceptionality. Instead of calming the situation in the South China Sea, Washington will continue to encourage its Asian satellites Japan, South Korea to be tough with China. But as Obama said two years ago, the national security strategy is to retain full-spectrum dominance, to maintain the ability to counter threats worldwide, and to “confront and defeat aggression anywhere in the world.”

Meanwhile, the Hudson Institute claims that the situation in Kyrgyzstan is critical to U.S. national security, and Senator Richard Lugar of Indiana, ranking Republican on the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, says that the U.S. commitment to Moldova’s territorial integrity is essential if America is not to surrender its position in a key region to U.S. foreign policy.

So there. Ukraine, Syria, gays, lesbians, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova – all of them are among the vital interests of the one indispensable nation. Not one, not even the smallest such “interest” can ever be dropped, for – as Obama said at West Point – “that’s not leadership; that’s retreat. That’s not strength; that’s weakness.”

American Exceptionalism and American Torture

In 1964, the Brazilian military, in a US-designed coup, overthrew a liberal (not more to the left than that) government and proceeded to rule with an iron fist for the next 21 years. In 1979 the military regime passed an amnesty law blocking the prosecution of its members for torture and other crimes. The amnesty still holds.

That’s how they handle such matters in what used to be called The Third World. In the First World, however, they have no need for such legal niceties. In the United States, military torturers and their political godfathers are granted amnesty automatically, simply for being American, solely for belonging to the “Good Guys Club”.

So now, with the release of the Senate Intelligence Committee report on CIA torture, we have further depressing revelations about US foreign policy. But do Americans and the world need yet another reminder that the United States is a leading practitioner of torture? Yes. The message can not be broadcast too often because the indoctrination of the American people and Americophiles all around the world is so deeply embedded that it takes repeated shocks to the system to dislodge it. No one does brainwashing like the good ol’ Yankee inventors of advertising and public relations. And there is always a new generation just coming of age with stars (and stripes) in their eyes.

The public also has to be reminded yet again that – contrary to what most of the media and Mr. Obama would have us all believe – the president has never actually banned torture per se, despite saying recently that he had “unequivocally banned torture” after taking office.

Shortly after Obama’s first inauguration, both he and Leon Panetta, the new Director of the CIA, explicitly stated that “rendition” was not being ended. As the Los Angeles Times reported at the time: “Under executive orders issued by Obama recently, the CIA still has authority to carry out what are known as renditions, secret abductions and transfers of prisoners to countries that cooperate with the United States.”

The English translation of “cooperate” is “torture”. Rendition is simply outsourcing torture. There was no other reason to take prisoners to Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Egypt, Jordan, Kenya, Somalia, Kosovo, or the Indian Ocean island of Diego Garcia, amongst other torture centers employed by the United States. Kosovo and Diego Garcia – both of which house large and very secretive American military bases – if not some of the other locations, may well still be open for torture business, as is the Guantánamo Base in Cuba.

Moreover, the key Executive Order referred to, number 13491, issued January 22, 2009, “Ensuring Lawful Interrogations”, leaves a major loophole. It states repeatedly that humane treatment, including the absence of torture, is applicable only to prisoners detained in an “armed conflict”. Thus, torture by Americans outside an environment of “armed conflict” is not explicitly prohibited. But what about torture within an environment of “counter-terrorism”?

The Executive Order required the CIA to use only the interrogation methods outlined in a revised Army Field Manual. However, using the Army Field Manual as a guide to prisoner treatment and interrogation still allows solitary confinement, perceptual or sensory deprivation, sensory overload, sleep deprivation, the induction of fear and hopelessness, mind-altering drugs, environmental manipulation such as temperature and noise, and stress positions, amongst other charming examples of American Exceptionalism.

After Panetta was questioned by a Senate panel, the New York Times wrote that he had “left open the possibility that the agency could seek permission to use interrogation methods more aggressive than the limited menu that President Obama authorized under new rules … Mr. Panetta also said the agency would continue the Bush administration practice of ‘rendition’ … But he said the agency would refuse to deliver a suspect into the hands of a country known for torture or other actions ‘that violate our human values’.”

The last sentence is of course childishly absurd. The countries chosen to receive rendition prisoners were chosen precisely and solely because they were willing and able to torture them.

Four months after Obama and Panetta took office, the New York Times could report that renditions had reached new heights.

The present news reports indicate that Washington’s obsession with torture stems from 9/11, to prevent a repetition. The president speaks of “the fearful excesses of the post-9/11 era”. There’s something to that idea, but not a great deal. Torture in America is actually as old as the country. What government has been intimately involved with that horror more than the United States? Teaching it, supplying the manuals, supplying the equipment, creation of international torture centers, kidnaping people to these places, solitary confinement, forced feeding, Guantánamo, Abu Ghraib, Bagram, Chile, Brazil, Argentina, Chicago … Lord forgive us!

In 2011, Brazil instituted a National Truth Commission to officially investigate the crimes of the military government, which came to an end in 1985. But Mr. Obama has in fact rejected calls for a truth commission concerning CIA torture. On June 17 of this year, however, when Vice President Joseph Biden was in Brazil, he gave the Truth Commission 43 State Department cables and reports concerning the Brazilian military regime, including one entitled “Widespread Arrests and Psychophysical Interrogation of Suspected Subversives.”

Thus it is that once again the United States of America will not be subjected to any accountability for having broken US laws, international laws, and the fundamental laws of human decency. Obama can expect the same kindness from his successor as he has extended to George W.

“One of the strengths that makes America exceptional is our willingness to openly confront our past, face our imperfections, make changes and do better.” – Barack Obama, written statement issued moments after the Senate report was made public.

And if that pile of hypocrisy is not big enough or smelly enough, try adding to it Bidens’ remark re his visit to Brazil: “I hope that in taking steps to come to grips with our past we can find a way to focus on the immense promise of the future.”

If the torturers of the Bush and Obama administrations are not held accountable in the United States they must be pursued internationally under the principles of universal jurisdiction.

In 1984, an historic step was taken by the United Nations with the drafting of the “Convention Against Torture and Other Cruel, Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment” (came into force in 1987, ratified by the United States in 1994). Article 2, section 2 of the Convention states: “No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture.”

Such marvelously clear, unequivocal, and principled language, to set a single standard for a world that makes it increasingly difficult for one to feel proud of humanity. We cannot slide back. If today it’s deemed acceptable to torture the person who supposedly has the vital “ticking-bomb” information needed to save lives, tomorrow it will be acceptable to torture him to learn the identities of his alleged co-conspirators. Would we allow slavery to resume for just a short while to serve some “national emergency” or some other “higher purpose”?

If you open the window of torture, even just a crack, the cold air of the Dark Ages will fill the whole room.

Cuba … at long, long last … maybe …

Hopefully, it’s what it appears to be. Cuba will now be treated by the United States as a country worthy of at least as much respect as Washington offers to its highly oppressive, murdering, torturing allies in Saudi Arabia, Egypt, Honduras, Israel, Pakistan, Afghanistan, and elsewhere.

It’s a tough decision to normalize relations with a country whose police force murders its own innocent civilians on almost a daily basis, and even more abroad, but Cuba needs to do it. Maybe the Cubans can civilize the Americans a bit.

Let’s hope that America’s terrible economic embargo against the island will go the way of the dinosaurs, and Cuba will be able to demonstrate more than ever what a rational, democratic, socialist society can create. But they must not open the economy for the Yankee blood-suckers to play with as they have all over the world.

And I’ll be able to go to Cuba not as a thief in the night covering my tracks and risking a huge fine.

But with the Republicans taking over Congress next month, all of this may be just a pipe dream.

Barack Obama could have done this six years ago when he took office; or five years ago when American Alan Gross was first arrested and imprisoned in Cuba. It would have been even easier back then, with Obama’s popularity at its height and Congress not as captured by the Know-Nothings as now.

So, Cuba outlasted all the punishment, all the lies, all the insults, all the deprivations, all the murderous sabotage, all the assassination attempts against Fidel, all the policies to isolate the country. But for many years now, it’s the United States that has been isolated in the Western Hemisphere.

Reason Number 13,336 why capitalism will be the death of us.

Antibiotic-resistant bacteria – the “superbugs” – if left unchecked, could result in 10 million deaths a year by 2050. New drugs to fight the superbugs are desperately needed. But a panel advising President Obama warned in September that “there isn’t a sufficiently robust pipeline of new drugs to replace the ones rendered ineffective by antibiotic resistance.”

The problem, it appears, is that “Antibiotics generally provide low returns on investment, so they are not a highly attractive area for research and development.”

Aha! “Low returns on investment”! What could be simpler to understand? Is it not a concept worth killing and dying for? Just as millions of Americans died in the 20th century so corporations could optimize profits by not protecting the public from tobacco, lead, and asbestos.

Corporations are programmed to optimize profits without regard for the society in which they operate, in much the same way that cancer cells are programmed to proliferate without regard for the health of their host.

Happy New Year. Here’s what you have to look forward to in 2015.

• January 25: 467 people reported missing from a university in Mexico. US State Department blames Russia.
• February 1: Military junta overthrows President Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela. Washington decries the loss of democracy.
• February 2: US recognizes the new Venezuelan military junta, offers it 50 jet fighters and tanks.
• February 3: Revolution breaks out in Venezuela endangering the military junta; 40,000 American marines land in Caracas to quell the uprising.
• February 16: White police officer in Chicago fatally shoots a 6-year old black boy holding a toy gun.
• March 6: Congress passes a new law which states that to become president of the United States a person must have the surname Bush or Clinton.
• April 30: The Department of Homeland Security announces plan to record the DNA at birth of every child born in the United States.
• May 19: The Supreme Court rules that police may search anyone if they have reasonable grounds for believing that the person has pockets.
• May 27: The Transportation Security Administration declares that all airline passengers must strip completely nude at check-in and remain thus until arriving at their destination.
• June 6: White police officer in Oklahoma City tasers a 7-month-old black child, claiming the child was holding a gun; the gun turns out to be a rattle.
• July 19: Two subway trains collide in Manhattan. The United States demands that Moscow explain why there was a Russian citizen in each of the trains.
• September 5: The Democratic Party changes its name to the Republican Lite Party, and announces the opening of a joint bank account with the Republican Party so that corporate lobbyists need make out only one check.
• September 12: White police officer in Alabama shoots black newborn, confusing the umbilical cord for a noose.
• November 16: President Obama announces that Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, North Korea, Sudan, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Bolivia and Cuba all possess weapons of mass destruction; have close ties to the Islamic State, al Qaeda, and the Taliban; are aiding pro-Russian rebels in Ukraine; were involved in 9-11; played a role in the assassination of John F. Kennedy and the attack on Pearl Harbor; are an imminent threat to the United States and all that is decent and holy; and are all “really bad guys”, who even (choke, gasp) use torture!
• November 21: The United States invades Iran, Syria, Lebanon, Palestine, North Korea, Sudan, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Bolivia and Cuba.
• December 10: Barack Obama is awarded his second Nobel Peace Prize
• December 11: To celebrate his new peace prize, Obama sends out drones to assassinate wrong-thinking individuals in Somalia, Afghanistan and Yemen.
• December 13: Members of Ukraine’s neo-Nazi parties, which hold several high positions in the US-supported government, goose-step through the center of Kiev in full German Storm Trooper uniforms, carrying giant swastika flags, shouting “Heil Hitler”, and singing the Horst Wessel song. Not a word of this appears in any American mainstream media.
• December 15: US Secretary of State warns Russia to stop meddling in Ukraine, accusing Moscow of wanting to re-create the Soviet Union.
• December 16: White police officer shoots a black 98-year-old man sitting in a wheel chair, claiming the man pointed a rifle at him. The rifle turns out to be a cane.
• December 28: The Washington Redskins football team finish their season in last place. The White House blames Vladimir Putin.

Notes

1. Associated Press, December 11, 2014
2. New York Times, December 11, 2014
3. Los Angeles Times, February 1, 2009
4. New York Times, February 6, 2009
5. New York Times, May 24, 2009
6. Washington Post, December 11, 2014
7. National Security Archive’s Brazil Documentation Project
8. Washington Post, December 10, 2014
9. See note 7
10. Washington Post, December 13, 2014

Russia’s Sergey Lavrov “Clash of Civilizations”

Since the Western Press has directed their wrath at Vladimir Putin as their latest villain, while his approval rate soars to 88% in Russia, most Americans are not familiar with Foreign Minister of Russia Sergey Lavrov, much less know his public statements. Lavrov is a thoughtful contrast to the rigid and contemptuous foreign policy spokesmen’s from the Soviet era. It is well worth the time to investigate the actual sentiments that Lavrov has expressed throughout his diplomatic career. An insight of the mindset that underpins his thinking is revealed over two years ago, in the Voltaire Network, which published Sergey Lavrov’s account, On the Right Side of History and provided the following assessment.

“Western propaganda continues to distort Russia’s position in respect of the Syrian crisis. It accuses Moscow of supporting Damascus for profit motives, or even criminal solidarity. In this piece, Sergey Lavrov does not expound on his country’s strategic choices, but rather on the principles that underpin his diplomacy. He responds imperturbably to the inanities spouted by Western media, underscoring Moscow’s commitment to international law and its pledge to support people. Lavrov counterpoints the massive popular support enjoyed by President al-Assad and the illegitimacy of the sectarian armed opposition, sponsored from abroad.”

Quoting from the Lavrov test:

“Back in the 1990s in his book The Clash of Civilisations, Samuel Huntington outlined the trend of the increasing importance of identity based on civilisation and religion in the age of globalization; he also convincingly demonstrated the relative reduction in the abilities of the historic West to spread its influence. It would definitely be an overstatement if we tried to build a model of the modern international relations solely on the basis of such assumptions. However, today it is impossible to ignore such a trend. It is caused by an array of different factors, including more transparent national borders, the information revolution which has highlighted blatant socio-economic inequality, and the growing desire of people to preserve their identity in such circumstances and to avoid falling into the endangered species list of history.”

From the official site of THE MINISTRY OF FOREIGN AFFAIRS OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION, read the entire remarks by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov at the latest Council on Foreign and Defense Policy meeting. The information contained in these annotations requires a serious evaluation.

Watch the video, that supplements the text account. Interrupting the significance of this presentation, the blog – The Vineyard of the Saker writes an account of the Remarks by Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov at the XXII Assembly of the Council on Foreign and Defense Policy, Moscow, 22 November 2014.

I have bolded out what I consider to be the most important statements made by Lavrov that day.  I would just like to add the following:

1)  Lavrov is considered very much a “moderate” and his language has always been strictly diplomatic.  So when you read Lavrov, just imagine what folks in other Russian ministries are thinking.

2) Lavrov makes no secret of his view of the USA and of his plans for the future of our planet.  When you read his words, try to imagine what a US Neocon feels and thinks and you will immediately see why the US elites both hate and fear Russia.

3) Finally, Lavrov openly admits that Russia and China have forged a long-term strategic alliance (proving all the nay-sayers who predicted that China would backtstab Russian wrong).  This is, I would argue, the single most important strategic development in the past decade.

4)  Finally, notice the clear contempt which Lavrov has for a pseudo-Christian “West” which dares not speak in defense of persecuted Christians, denies its own roots, and does not even respect its own traditions.

Complimenting this viewpoint is the YouTube, . If Lavrov is correct that the NeoCon American foreign policy after the collapse of the Soviet empire has positioned itself to become the single dominating armed force on the planet, what other results but an unending warfare environment can one expect? Longing for an enemy to keep the military machine in high gear certainly is perceived by the rest of the world as threatening.

Blogger Nick Freiling presents an assessment in, What the others are saying, of the following Lavrov quotation.

“In attempting to establish their pre-eminence at a time when new economic, financial and political power centres are emerging, the Americans provoke counteraction in keeping with Newton’s third law and contribute to the emergence of structures, mechanisms, and movements that seek alternatives to the American recipes for solving the pressing problems. I am not referring to anti-Americanism, still less about forming coalitions spearheaded against the United States, but only about the natural wish of a growing number of countries to secure their vital interests and do it the way they think right, and not what they are told “from across the pond.”

Mr. Freiling writes his own comments.

“It’s worth noting that perspectives like these aren’t totally absent from mainstream punditry in the U.S. Libertarians, for one, have long warned about the dangers of stretching American resources too thin in pursuit of foreign policy initiatives that don’t have immediate national security implications. Politicians like Rand Paul have even brought hints of such sentiments into the mainstream.

But this is still a far cry from what most Americans consider an “orthodox” perspective on U.S. foreign policy, even if most people agree we’re overextended in many world arenas.”

The fourth point that the Vineyard of the Saker makes, is expanded upon in the Radical Reactionary essay, Western Secularism vs. Russian Christian Revival where the background and recent direction in Russia is traced.

If you expand your analysis beyond mere political and economic context, the Lavrov foreign policy initiative has a component of emphasizing a traditional and historic cultural motivation. While a religious factor may not have anything to do with forging a new Russia and China alliance, dismissing a spiritual and inward revival in Russia would be a profound error.

Radio Free Europe in the article, Orthodox Churches Fight Back As Eastern Europe Pushes To Modernize, Secularize, makes the case and linkage in Tradition of Religious Nationalism parallels Lavrov’s cultural autonomy.

“Geraldine Fagan, a Moscow-based correspondent for the religion-focused news agency Forum 18 and author of the new book “Believing in Russia: Religious Policy After Communism,” says that religious nationalism, although condemned as heresy in the 19th century, is a profound tradition in Orthodox cultures.

“In many cases, Orthodox churches were ministering to a single ethnic group, and this gave rise to nation-states,” Fagan told RFE/RL in an e-mail. “And there is a lingering sense in places across the Orthodox world that national security depends in a profound — even mystical – way on the nation remaining Orthodox.”

The difference of a nation state from an empire is crucial for comprehending the nature of a legitimate government. The fall of the Soviet empire was inevitable. The notion that an American empire will avoid the same fate is absurd.

This “Clash of Civilizations” is understandable not because either empire rode the high moral road, but because both abandoned the fundamental principles that create a viable society and nation.

Civilization is fragile and requires a deep commitment to institutions that practice and administer legal justice, traditional social values and high moral standards. Maintaining governments that earn the rightful consent of its citizens is difficult and usually breaks down over time.

International affairs are even more delicate than internal equilibrium. Countries do not have permanent allies, they only have interests. Russia has a litany of problems and is no more a friend than any other regime that is exerting its own national self-interest.

The intrepid Brother Nathanael Kapner points the finger at THE ZIONIST HATE CAMPAIGN AGAINST RUSSIA, for an explanation why the pressitute media wants to suppress Russian nationalism. The orthodox cleric is echoing Sergey Lavrov when he cites “For it is NATO that Moscow is opposing owing to its creeping encroachment upon Russia’s borders.”

Americans need to oppose foreign policy adventures and certainly one that risks a global holocaust. Ready for World War III with China?, essay is just as valid when Russia is substituted. What effect would a Russian and Chinese strategic alliance have as the NWO juggernaut continues on it current path to destruction?

Transnational Opposition to Russian Sanctions illustrates why Western countries are playing a dangerous game.  Lavrov’s latest address provides a road map for what Russia is embarking on and what the international community should do to lower the tensions and restore constructive economic and political stability.

It is not too far fetch to imagine a current day, Western version for pounding of shoes, with the message “” reverberating from the halls of the UN. If this seems ridiculous, ask why pushing a Clash of Civilizations is any different?

Talking Turkey

Putin Gobsmacks Obama and Euro-Leaders with Surprise Gas Deal…

On Monday, Russian President Vladimir Putin clinched a groundbreaking deal with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan that will strengthen economic ties between the two nations and make Turkey the major hub for Russian gas in the region. Under the terms of the agreement, Russia will pump additional natural gas to locations in central Turkey and to a “hub at the Turkish-Greek border” which will eventually provide Putin with backdoor access to the lucrative EU market, although Turkey will serve as the critical intermediary. The move creates a de facto Russo-Turkey alliance that could shift the regional balance of power decisively in Moscow’s favor, thus creating another formidable hurtle for Washington’s “pivot to Asia” strategy.  While the media is characterizing the change in plans (Putin has abandoned the South Stream pipeline project that would have transported gas to southern Europe) as a “diplomatic defeat” for Russia, the opposite appears to be the case.  Putin has once again outmaneuvered the US on both the energy and geopolitical fronts adding to his long list of policy triumphs. Here’s a brief summary from Andrew Korybko at Sputnik News:

“Russia has abandoned the troubled South Stream project and will now be building its replacement with Turkey. This monumental decision signals that Ankara has made its choice to reject Euro-Atlanticsm and embrace Eurasian integration.

In what may possibly be the biggest move towards multipolarity thus far,..Turkey, has done away with its former Euro-Atlantic ambitions. A year ago, none of this would have been foreseeable, but the absolute failure of the US’ Mideast policy and the EU’s energy one made this stunning reversal possible in under a year. Turkey is still anticipated to have some privileged relations with the West, but the entire nature of the relationship has forever changed as the country officially engages in pragmatic multipolarity.

Turkey’s leadership made a major move by sealing such a colossal deal with Russia in such a sensitive political environment, and the old friendship can never be restored…The reverberations are truly global.”  (“Cold Turkey: Ankara Buckles Against Western Pressure, Turns to Russia”, Sputnik News)

Korybko seems to be alone in grasping the magnitude of what happened in Ankara on Monday, although –judging by the Obama administration’s silence on the topic–the gravity of the transaction is beginning to sink in.  Grandmaster Vlad’s latest move has caught US powerbrokers flat-footed and left them speechless. This is a scenario that no one had anticipated and, if it’s not handled correctly, could turn out to be a real nightmare. Here’s more on Monday’s press conference from Russia Today:

“Putin said that Russia is ready to build a new pipeline to meet Turkey’s growing gas demand, which may include a special hub on the Turkish-Greek border for customers in southern Europe.

For now, the supply of Russian gas to Turkey will be raised by 3 billion cubic meters via the already operating Blue Stream pipeline…Moscow will also reduce the gas price for Turkish customers by 6 percent from January 1, 2015, Putin said.

“We are ready to further reduce gas prices along with the implementation of our joint large-scale projects,” he added.”  (“Putin: Russia forced to withdraw from S. Stream project due to EU stance”, RT)

How can this happen? How can Putin waltz into Ankara, scribble his name on a few sheets of paper, and abscond with a key US ally right under Washington’s nose?  Isn’t there anyone at the White House who’s smart enough to anticipate a scenario like this or have they all been replaced with warmongering ding-dongs like Susan Rice and Samantha Powers?

The Obama administration has been doing everything in its power to control the flow of gas from east to west and to undermine Russian-EU economic integration. Now it looks like the nimble Putin has found a way to avoid the economic sanctions, (Turkey rejected sanctions on Russia)  avoid US coercion and blackmail (which was used on Bulgaria, Hungary, and Serbia), and avoid Washington’s endless belligerence and hostility, and achieve his objectives at the same time.   But– then again– isn’t that what you’d expect from a level-headed martial arts pro like Putin?

“I won’t beat you,” says Bad Vlad.  “I’ll let you to beat yourself.”

And, so he has. Just ask the befuddled Obama who has yet to prevail in any of his encounters with Putin.

But why the silence? Why hasn’t the White House issued a statement about the big Russian-Turkey gas deal that everyone’s talking about?

I’ll tell you why. It’s because they don’t know what the hell just hit them, that’s why. They were completely blindsided by the announcement and can’t quite figure out what it means for the issues that are on the very top of their foreign policy agenda, like the pivot to Asia, or the wars in Syria and Ukraine, or the much-ballyhooed gas pipeline from Qatar to the EU, that was supposed to transit– you guessed it– Turkey.  Is that plan still in the works or has the Putin-Erdogan alliance put the kibosh on that gem too?   Let’s face it, Putin has really knocked it out of the park this time. Team Obama is clearly out of its league and has no idea of what’s going on. If Turkey turns eastward and joins the growing Russian bloc, US policymakers are going to have to scrap the better part of their strategic plans for the coming century and go back to Square 1. What a headache.

There’s a good article in Wednesday’s New York Times that summarizes Washington’s ambivalence towards South Stream perfectly. Here’s an excerpt:

“Moscow has long presented the project, proposed in 2007, as making good business sense because it would provide a new route for Russian gas to reach Europe. Washington and Brussels have opposed the project on the grounds that it was a vehicle for cementing Russian influence over southern Europe and for bypassing Ukraine, whose price disputes with Gazprom twice interrupted supplies to Europe in recent years.”

Putin’s Surprise Call to Scrap South Stream Gas Pipeline Leaves Europe Reeling”, New York Times)

This has been the argument from the get-go, that selling gas to people in the EU somehow strengthens Putin’s maniacal grip on the continent. What a joke. Would you, dear reader, be willing turn off the heat, tear up your energy bill, and freeze to death in the dark to prove to your gas company that you’re not willing to capitulate to their tyrannical rule?

Of course not, because the idea is ridiculous. Just like blocking South Stream is ridiculous. Putin is selling gas, not tyranny.  He doesn’t want people clicking their heels and goosestepping to work. That’s just propaganda from the people in the oil industry who lost the competition for supplying fuel to the EU. Call it sour grapes if you want, because that’s what it is. Their pipeline failed, (Nabucco) and Putin’s won. End of story. It’s called capitalism. Deal with it.

And here’s another thing: The countries that South Stream would have served, do not have a back-up supplier to meet their growing gas needs. So by following Washington’s lead, they’ve basically shot themselves in the foot. Analysts figure that any replacement for Russian gas will probably be 30 percent more expensive then they would have paid Gazprom.

Hurrah for the US! Hurrah for stupidity!

The US has been determined to sabotage South Stream from the very beginning, mainly because Washington wants its corporations and banks to control the flow of gas to the EU market through privately-owned pipelines in Ukraine. That way they can rake in bigger profits for their moneybags shareholders. Without going into too much detail about the various methods the US has used to torpedo the project, there’s one story that’s worth a look. This is from Zero Hedge:

“…two months before the Ukraine government was overthrown the prime  minister of Bulgaria, Plamen Oresharski,  ordered a halt to work on the South Stream on the recommendation of the EU. The decision was announced after his talks with US senators.

“At this time there is a request from the European Commission, after which we’ve suspended the current works, I ordered it,” Oresharski told journalists after meeting with John McCain, Chris Murphy and Ron Johnson during their visit to Bulgaria on Sunday. “Further proceedings will be decided after additional consultations with Brussels.”

At the time McCain, commenting on the situation, said that “Bulgaria should solve the South Stream problems in collaboration with European colleagues,” adding that in the current situation they would want “less Russian involvement” in the project.

“America has decided that it wants to put itself in a position where it excludes anybody it doesn’t like from countries where it thinks it might have an interest, and there is no economic rationality in this at all,” (said)Ben Aris, editor of Business New Europe told RT.”  (“Europe Gives Bulgaria A Bank System Lifeline As Battle Over “South Stream” Pipeline Heats Up”, Zero Hedge)

Let me get this straight: Madman McCain strolls into town and immediately starts ordering people around telling them he wants  “less Russian involvement”, and that’s enough to bring South Stream to a screeching halt? Is that what you’re telling me?

Yep. Sure sounds like it.

Does that help you see what’s really going here? This isn’t about Putin. It’s about gas, and who’s going to profit from that gas, and in whose currency that gas will be denominated. That’s what it’s about. The rest of the nonsense about “Russian involvement” or terrorism or human rights or national sovereignty is just gibberish. The people who run this country (like McCain), don’t care about that kind of stuff.  What they care about is money; money and power. That’s it.

So what are they going to do now?  How are the big powerboys in Washington going to express their rage over this new threat created by Putin and Erdogan?

It doesn’t take a genius to figure that one out, after all, we’ve seen it a million times before.

They’re going to go after Erdogan hammer and tongs. That’s what they always do, isn’t it?

The only reason they haven’t started in already is because they’re getting their propaganda ducks in a row, which usually takes a day or two. But as soon as that’s taken care of, they’ll start dismantling old Recep one excruciating headline at a time. Erdogan is going to be the new Hitler and the greatest threat to humanity the world has ever seen.  You can bet on it.

Whistleblower Sibel Edmonds thinks that Washington has had-it-in for Erdogan a long time now, dating back to a  dust up he had with the CIA a few years back. In any event, she gives a pretty good account of what we can expect now that Erdogan is on Washington’s enemies list.  Here’s a clip from her post at Boiling Frogs:

“We all know what happens to those puppets when they end up in a rift with the CIA. Don’t we? The rift always brings expiration. Once a puppet is considered expired, then lo and behold, all of a sudden, the reversal branding and marketing begins: All old skeletons are dug out of the deep closets and leaked to the media. His previously overlooked human rights violations are looked at and scrutinized under a microscope. The terrorist card is brought into the equation. And the list goes on…

… All Empire-installed puppets and regimes must commit to the Empire’s commandments….Thou shall not violate the Imperial commandments. Because if you do, thou shall be disgraced, exposed, uninstalled, and may even be given death. All you have to do is look at the past century’s history. See what happens when an installed puppet gets too confident and inflicted with hubris, and ignores one or more commandments. This is when they are reborn as dictators, despots, torturers, and yes, terrorists. This is when their backyards get dug up to find a few grams of weapons of mass destruction.”…

No matter how we look at it Erdogan’s days are numbered … Anyone who ever dares to be this reckless will be punished and made an example for all other installed-puppets…”  (“Turkish PM Erdogan: The Speedy Transformation of an Imperial Puppet”, BFP)

So there it is. That’s what you can expect by the end of the week when the media starts their full-throttle demonizing of Erdogan, the man who dared to act independently and put the interests of his own people above those of the Washington mob bosses.  As anyone who’s followed US foreign policy for the last 60 years will tell you; that’s a big no-no.

Anti-Putin Propaganda Not Working

Anyone who follows the news regularly, knows that the media has done everything in its power to smear Vladimir Putin and to demonize him as a tyrant and a thug. Fortunately, most people aren’t buying it.
Yes, I’ve seen the polls that say that Putin and Russia are viewed “less favorably” than they were prior to the crisis in Ukraine. In fact, here’s a clip from a recent PEW survey which seems to prove that I’m wrong:

“Across the 44 countries surveyed, a median percentage of 43% have unfavorable opinions of Russia, compared with 34% who are positive.

Negative ratings of Russia have increased significantly since 2013 in 20 of the 36 countries surveyed…

Americans and Europeans in particular have soured on Russia over the past 12 months. More than six-in-ten in Poland, Germany, Italy, Spain, France, the U.S. and the UK have an unfavorable image of Russia. And in all but one of these countries negative reviews are up by double digits since last year, including by 29 percentage points in the U.S., 27 points in Poland, 24 points in the UK and 23 points in Spain.” (Russia’s Global Image Negative amid Crisis in Ukraine: Americans’ and Europeans’ Views Sour Dramatically, PEW Research)

These results strongly suggest that the public blames Moscow for the fighting in Ukraine and (presumably)agrees with the prevailing storyline that Putin is a vicious aggressor who seized Crimea in order to rebuild the Soviet Empire. The problem with the PEW survey is that the results are based random samples of nationwide face-to-face or telephone interviews.

Why is that a problem?

It’s a problem because the man-on-the-street hasn’t the foggiest idea of what’s going on in Ukraine. All he knows is what he’s heard on TV. So, naturally, when he’s asked to offer his opinion on the matter, he’s going to regurgitate some variation of the official version, which is that Putin is responsible.

But try asking someone who’s actually been following events in Ukraine that same question, and you’re going to get an entirely different answer. Among the people who follow the daily developments in Ukraine, roughly two out of three support the Russian position. This isn’t something you’re going to find in the survey data, but if you take the time to comb the comments lines in the international media, you’ll see what I’m saying is true.

I hadn’t figured this out until last week’s G-20 Summit in Brisbane when Canada’s PM Stephen Harper brusquely greeted Putin saying, “I guess I’ll shake your hand, but I only have one thing to say to you: you need to get out of Ukraine.”

The incident immediately became headline news around the world as journalists for all the major media heaped praise on Harper for courageously “shirt-fronting” the dastardly Putin. What was left out in the media’s account of the exchange, was Putin’s crisp retort, which was, “Unfortunately it is impossible, (for us to leave Ukraine) because we are not there.”

Touché. As you might expect, Putin’s response did not fit with the media’s narrative, so it was scrubbed from the coverage altogether.

The Harper incident was a particularly big deal in Canada where all the newspapers ran gushing articles lauding the prime minister for his righteousness and fortitude. Oddly enough, however, only a small percentage of the people who commented on the dust-up, saw Harper as the hero. Here’s a few samples of what ordinary people had to say. This is from BobsOpinion:

“Harper embarrasses Canadians again on the international stage. It will take years for Canadians to re-build our international relationships and to re-build our reputation.”

This comment is from redondex:

“Harper made a childish and baseless remark to Putin and walked off with a grin of a proud five year old spoilt kid. All Harper achieved was to ridicule himself in front of the rest of the world. That is our leaders usual behavior.”

This is from Makman1:

“I was under the impression that a proper democracy would first use negotiating as a way to understand the divergent groups involved in the Ukrainian revolution and then apply a political solution, if possible. The present Ukrainian government immediately used force. PERIOD! The Harper government, instead of using its “influence” to attempt to defuse a complex situation blindly followed the actions of the USA. If Harper really cared at all he would ask his foreign minister to get directly involved with Russian and Ukrainian counterparts and help reach a compromise…. Hopefully, Harper is not supporting Ukrainian right wing fascists?”

This is from Jörð:

“It’s not wise for Harper to follow America’s lead on every foreign policy. The USA government has a terrible track record when it comes to getting things right in foreign lands. Also Putin was correct when he responded to Harper’s comment by saying “It’s impossible, we are not there.” Technically Russia is not “In” the Ukraine.”

This is Time4Change:

“This is another example of Harper BLUSTERING backed with NO SUBSTANCE! Why are there NO SANCTIONS on the Russian Energy Giants Rosneft and Rostec? Could it be the hundreds of billions of $s the Russians have invested in the tar sands have caused Harper to be the SOFTEST on ACTIONS while shouting the loudest.”

And this is from Mt Athabaska:

” …one day Harper will reach puberty on global affairs.”

It’s worth noting that these comments were lifted from article that was published by the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation. I was shocked at how harshly Harper was criticized by his own countrymen. I was also surprised that the author’s obvious anti-Putin bias had virtually no impact on the opinions of the people who commented on the incident. In fact, it appeared to make many of them mad.

I should also mention that I omitted all of the comments that lambasted Harper for hiding in a broom closet “while a gun battle ensued in a nearby hallway of the Parliament building in Ottawa” in early October. (See here: Needless to say, Harper’s comical performance at the G-20 hasn’t convinced anyone that he’s the courageous leader he imagines himself to be.)

The media is increasingly worried that it’s losing its ability to persuade people to support policies that only serve the interests of elites. The media has rolled out all the heavy artillery in its campaign to demonize Putin, but the strategy hasn’t worked. In fact, it’s backfired quite badly leading some publications to cancel their comments section altogether.

And the response from readers has been huge too, mainly because the standoff between two nuclear-armed adversaries has galvanized the publics’ attention. For example, in the CBC article I cited above, more than 2,500 comments have been posted already, while many of the other articles on Ukraine or Putin have exceeded 6,000 comments. This just shows how closely people are following events and how passionate they feel about the policy.

And, as we said earlier, this isn’t just a Canadian phenom either. For example, here are a few of the comments I picked up from an article in the conservative UK Telegraph in an article titled Global economy to suffer as Putin quits G20 early.

Zeug Gezeugt:

“The US supports the neo-Nazi ethnic cleansing campaign in east Ukraine, Russia supports the Russian speaking Ukrainian majority in the east against it. Pretty simple really, and the US enforced sanctions can only harm EU Russian relations, a win-win all round for the neoconservative hawks.”

Pamela Cohen:

“So, the media tells us in the Title that Putin is to blame when the Global economy suffers, because he left the G20 early. What stupidity. And what a statement in bringing warships as their targeted President attends yet another meeting. Good for Putin. Blame the US-backed coup and looting and 4000 deaths on Putin, and blame the Ukrainian plane that shot down a passenger flight on him, too. Then shun him at a world meeting, as if he doesn’t have the right and responsibility to defend his country’s borders, Naval base, pipeline and brothers in the Ukraine as they are shelled and killed by US manipulation.

Instead of shock and awe and intruding where they didn’t belong like the US in all the Mid-Eastern countries according to long-ago made plans, Putin sends humanitarian aid and the people vote in Donetsk and Luhansk.

Putin-not all Americans are stupid sheep. My apologies for the onslaught of ignorance and imperialism. You are standing up to bullies of the worst kind. The world needs peaceful solutions to restore the harm of NWO fanaticism and corrupt bankers. Hold the line.”

MP Jones: “The US never ended the cold war and the ‘useful idiots’ in this context are us in Europe and the UK.”

Richard N:

“Most British people are deeply unconvinced by the flood of US and EU propaganda over Ukraine, trying to cast Russia as the villain – when the civil war there was caused directly by the US and their EU side kicks backing a coup to overthrow the elected government of a sovereign country, Ukraine.”

timepass:

“With due respect to the author, you say that his (Putin’s) popularity will rise at home as a consequence of this. Please read the message boards North American and European, you will find his popularity seems to have increased everywhere.

Guess the Brains behind 5 eyes and snooping will now have to move into the new reality of the power of the internet to provide information which they would not like others to get. Just a question of time before they make their next move – Censorship!”

Busufi:

“If, the ‘Seven Dwarfs’ (US, UK, EU, Japan, Australia, Canada, and South Africa) like bullies, weren’t so obsessed with beating Russia or China into a corner, rather than bringing Russia or China into their corner; the world would be a better place. Co-operation works better than devastation.”

John Derbyshire :

“Why all this Anti Russian propaganda. The fools who run the West keep creating bogeymen Bin Laden, ISIS, oddly both had connections to Western Powers. So as we face an economic down in the world economy we need another bogeyman, and up pops Putin in the Capitalist controlled media!

People seem to have short memories of pre Putin era, when Yeltsin backed by the West led the country to economic meltdown. Maybe he has scant regard for democratic institutions, but do Western governments support the views of the people!

All of this came about when the United States pushed Nato’s borders eastward and involved themselves in the Ukraine, particularly Mr Kerry. Russia felt itself threatened not by demands of democracy a device used by the worlds superpower, but the growing influence of the United States in the region. The fact that the USA exploited ethnic tensions only shows what was their intention in the region.”

petergardener:

“If the objective is to make Mr Putin appear isolated on the world stage in order to make him less popular at home, it isn’t working and also shows a profound misunderstanding of the Russian mind-set. ‘

Our Western political leaders also have a profound misunderstanding of strategy. Just about everything they do in relation to Russia is wrong and gains the West nothing. But they do like willy waving. Just a pity they do so much damage while they are at it.”

RedBaron9495: “With the public, the effect is rebounding and probably starting to gain Putin more support and worldwide sympathy. This British news forum is good example of that. They made the mistake of going into overkill…..and the public are wising up to the propaganda. They seen this all before prior to Iraq 2003 invasion…and again with Gaddafi.”

Circle of DNA :

“Well, the lives of average folks in Russia has been drastically improved since Putin took the reins of power. He defends Russian interests, fights the empire of chaos, and is massively supported by his people. He is also well educated and a first class statesmen. What is there not to like about him?”

Alltaxationistheft: “The Russian people appreciate how lucky they’ve been for Vladimir Putin to be around at the right time to resist the Neocon supremacist Wolfowitz doctrine…

Since the 1990s , the war mongering maniacs in the West have been planning to asset strip, and plunder Russia via ”liberal democracy”, claiming its natural resources while funding serial inter-ethnic tribal wars via US allies Qatar and Saudi Arabia…

In the 1990s, Russian people were driven into starvation ,prostitution and suicide under pro American ”Liberal” US corporate puppet Yeltsin… but Putin kicked the CIA EU Mossad lunatics out and has been re-building a Russia into a world power ever since.”

anonymous:

“The classless western free (loading) world that produces very little except paper currency, lies and bullshit. I am surprised Mr. Putin came and surrounded himself with such low life scum.
When all the western oligarchs hate someone as much as they hate President Putin, you know he has to be doing something right.”

There’s no need to be selective. Curious readers should go to any editorial platform that covers the crisis in Ukraine and judge for themselves if what I’m saying is true or not. The comments above are in no way extraordinary. What they do show, however, is that the media is losing the propaganda war in pretty stunning fashion, and that’s a huge victory for ordinary people. It’s very difficult for elites to prosecute their criminal wars or implement their rip-off economic policies when people can clearly see what they’re up to.

Now check out this article in the German paper Zeit Online where the author bemoans the media’s loss of influence. The article is titled “How Putin Divides”:

“Why do so many German citizens judge the crisis in Crimea in a completely different way than politicians and the media?

In my 30 years of experience with debates, I have never seen anything like what is now happening in Germany in the dispute over Russia and Crimea….

Unless surveys are misleading, two-thirds of German citizens, voters and readers stand opposed to four-fifths of the political class – in other words, to the government, to the overwhelming majority of members of parliament and to most newspapers and broadcasters. But what does “stand” mean? Many are downright up in arms. And from what one can gauge from letters to the editor, the share of critics seems significantly higher now than what was triggered by Sarrazin’s inflammatory book back then.” (Zeit Online)

Did you catch that part about the “two-thirds of German citizens.. stand opposed to four-fifths of the political class…and to most newspapers and broadcasters”?

That’s a triumph in itself, isn’t it? And what is the issue they disagree about?

They disagree “about the conflict between an aggressive autocrat (Bad Vlad) and Western democracies.”(the Washington-led troublemakers)

Here’s more from the same article:

“…the legitimacy of international law is being questioned in an offensive manner, while the legitimacy of Putin’s nationalist-imperialist ideology is being seriously considered….. It doesn’t do any good to accuse the majority of sheepishness or base economic selfishness, even if that seems to be the driving motive of some business leaders… The issue goes deeper, much deeper.” (How Putin Divides, Von Bernd Ulrich, Zeit Online)

“The legitimacy of international law is being questioned”?!?

Have you ever read such crybaby gibberish in your life?

Why is “the legitimacy of international law is being questioned”? Because people don’t accept blindly what they read the papers and hear on the news anymore? Because corporate editors no longer control how people think about issues? Because people are using their critical thinking skills to see through the lies and bullshit that idiots like the author ladle out in heaping doses every day? Is that why?

It seems to me that that’s a positive development, that people should question whatever they read in the papers and look for other sources of information before they form an opinion.

The bottom line is that no one believes the goofy propaganda the western media is trying to ram down the everyone’s throat anymore.

As kyle555 at Zero Hedge says: “India, China, Brazil and a host of other countries, representing more than half the world’s population, aren’t buying the western imperialist narrative on Ukraine. Nor are major segments of the domestic populations of the countries that are warmongering against Russia.”

Nor do they believe that US wars are a force for good in the world. Here’s strannick at Zero Hedge:

“Russia has seen firsthand the American dream for other nations, as American backed Oligarchs pillaged Russia while it’s people starved and were impoverished. Putin loves his country, and won’t sit on his thumbs while America attempts to encircle it through proxies while rationalizing its actions through corrupt MSMedia propaganda.”

Nor are they buying the “Putin is Hitler” crappola.

This is from smacker:

“People see in Putin a proud national leader who has the guts to stand up to our own criminals and who has over 80% support from his own population. That is enough to admire the guy, whatever else he might be.”

This is from Gaius frakkin':

“A lot of the hatred from the political puppets in the West is due to Putin’s popularity. They’re jealous sociopaths who yearn to be respected and admired as much as him. The fact that Putin’s popularity is never mentioned is the key tell.”

And this from Joe Tierney:

“Vladdy-Poot is hammering home the point that the euros need to stop being America’s bitches, think for themselves, consider the terrible “costs” accruing to them for “wearing the blue dress” for America.

…America’s “global chaos ploy” is failing. Its cynical, “throw everyone under the bus” strategy just to cut across the rise of Russia-China is exposed for what it is – America cares nothing about the euros or anyone else. All it cares about is its own global dominance in perpetuity, no matter the “costs” to the rest of the world, including its friends and allies.

Putin has balls the size of the moon, and you can damn well bet that right now Russia and Putin are secretly being cheered on a grand scale around the globe.”

There’s a reason why, according to Gallup, Trust in Media (is at an) All-Time Low. It’s because the corporate media is the most perfidious, double-dealing, hypocritical institution in the country today. That’s why the anti-Putin propaganda has fallen on deaf ears. It’s because most people know you can’t believe anything you read in the news.

Obama Lame Duck In A NeoCon Congress

You just have to love the wit and precision of a political image. Pat Dollard’s title NY Post Destroys Obama With Brutal Cover, says it all. The arrogant despot was indeed STRIPPED! The belated question is why did it take so long? In order to answer the obvious, most political analysts’ will fall into the partisan trap of party politics. Hope and change finally was seen as dictatorial haughtiness. Most voters do not believe that they are deceived by skilled liars when they cast their ballot. Yet, that is a pattern that is uninterrupted in most elections. Only the style of administrations differs, while the establishment continues to pull the strings and policies to move the consolidation of the New World Order forward.

That Nefarious Warrior Organism is eager to accelerate the next stage of the master plan.  Under an openly NeoCon front, John McCain’s chairmanship of a Senate Armed Services Committee will get to pressure the public into believing that their national security requires vigorous interventionism. Before you think that the Democrats differ from this same post WWII strategy, it would be best to brush up on a necessary history lesson.

Obama never attempted to confront, much less reverse the foreign policy of defending an empire. At the core of American power is the use of force that threatens any regime, which will not capitulate to the dictates of the financial elites that put Obama in office. The same can be said for most of the presidencies from FDR onward. The mere attempt to buck this system got JFK killed and Reagan shot. Yet to even mention such vial thoughts earns the historiographer a place in the conspiracy hall of infamy.

The abandonment of truth is a primary requirement to be part of the system. The reverse also applies. To be a successful player in the corridors of power, the skills of deception and prevarication must be demonstrated. Obama excelled in this task. However, his usefulness is now over.

For the indoctrinated clones that only see politics through a progressive lens, dealing with defeat seems inconceivable. Conversely, the novice supporters of Republican candidates vote with the erroneous belief that the country will now get back on track. Both crowds operate in a mindset that does not work in the real world.

Winning a GOP majority in the Senate removes the crook Harry Reid and his Mafioso tactics but the added seats in the House just gives Boehner flexibility to ignore Tea Party representatives. When you hear of an atmosphere of collaboration between Obama and the new anticipated Senate leader Mitch McConnell, you should shudder.

Democracy Now provides a correct assessment on Obama & McConnell Pledge Cooperation; Will Fast-Tracking Secretive TPP Trade Deal Top Their Agenda?

“We get analysis from Lori Wallach of Public Citizen’s Global Trade Watch, who notes that while some analysts say GOP gains will accelerate the passage of fast-track legislation in Congress to enable an agreement on the TPP, “it is kind of hard for the Republicans to voluntarily delegate more authority to the guy they’ve been attacking as the imperial president who grabs power that’s not his.” The controversial so-called free trade deal involves 12 countries and nearly 40 percent of the global economy. Trade ministers from the 12 countries negotiating the trade deal are due to meet in Beijing ahead of the Asia-Pacific economic summit next week to continue negotiations.”

Oh if only such logic would be applied to the deal making sell out process. Here is a central point to most political arrangements. Forget about compromises, the deal boils down to serving the interests of the shady figures behind the officials. Corporatist Republicans want to continue the globalism sellout just as much as the Democrat partisans, who take the same contributions from the financial elites.

No honest observers of the nuclear fallout from the Reid run Senate can conclude that passing legislation through the conference process with the House was ever considered. Will the new GOP Senate leadership return to the 60 vote filibuster tradition? This test will determine if any optimism would return.

In a on Facebook, the always provocative Karen De Coster asks: “Why the F$%K – Does a Congress with a 10% approval rating has a 90% Re-election rate?” Reelection Rates Over the Years provides added evidence of this tragedy.

Maybe the immediate query should be why the newly elected Republican Senators would vote for a known deal maker betrayer of principles like McConnell as their leader? For a more detailed analysis of Expectations after the 2014 Elections, the Radical Reactionary essay is worthy of a read.

THE MEGALOMANICALITY OF BARACK HUSSEIN OBAMA cites the Obama the Insane comes out with this… Delusional behavior occurs next out of a mad man.

• EXCERPT:  “The American people sent a message,’ he claimed, ‘one that they’ve sent for several elections now. They expect the people they elect to work as hard as they do. They expect us to focus on their ambitions, and not ours.”
• EXCERPT: “Our economy is outpacing most of the world. But we’ve just gotta keep at it. Much of that will take action from Congress. And I’m eager to work with the next Congress.”
• EXCERPT:  “He said he would only work with Republicans if they seek to ‘make responsible changes’ to the law. I’m going to be very receptive to hearing those ideas. Despite all the contention,” Obama claimed, “we now know that the law works.”
• EXCERPT:  “Executive orders,” he said, “will be replaced and supplanted by a bill from Congress. You send me a bill that I can sign and those executive actions go away. But what I’m not gonna do is just wait.”

For some unsolicited advice for any honorable Democrats left in their party, consider the following. Jeffrey Steinberg of Executive Intelligence Review floated this option back in October 2010, Invoke the 25th Amendment To Remove Obama. Undoubtedly the situation has worsened dramatically since then. “LaRouche demanded the invocation of the 25th Amendment, which provides for the orderly removal of a President, and his replacement by the Vice President, due to physical or mental impairment.”

The actual 25^th amendment says:

Section 4.

Whenever the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive departments or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall immediately assume the powers and duties of the office as Acting President.

Thereafter, when the President transmits to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives his written declaration that no inability exists, he shall resume the powers and duties of his office unless the Vice President and a majority of either the principal officers of the executive department or of such other body as Congress may by law provide, transmit within four days to the President pro tempore of the Senate and the Speaker of the House of Representatives their written declaration that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office. Thereupon Congress shall decide the issue, assembling within forty-eight hours for that purpose if not in session. If the Congress, within twenty-one days after receipt of the latter written declaration, or, if Congress is not in session, within twenty-one days after Congress is required to assemble, determines by two-thirds vote of both Houses that the President is unable to discharge the powers and duties of his office, the Vice President shall continue to discharge the same as Acting President; otherwise, the President shall resume the powers and duties of his office.

Barack Hussein Obama thinks he is an emperor but is actually a dysfunctional psychopath. His dictates need to be ignored and his irrelevancy demands his replacement. Since the Congress does not have the courage to impeach this unhinged traitor, the Democratic careerists need to step up, (for no better reason) than to save their own skins.

Even a two year term under Joe “wacko” Biden would be preferable to an insane sociopath with his finger on the nuclear button.

Discard any pure or noble reasons for adopting such a removal process. Bank on sheer self-interest to blame all the failures on the best fall guy since Richard Nixon. The establishment needs a cover-up to distract the public from the coming economic collapse. When a liar commander in chief no longer is believable, his clothes are STRIPPED from the throne.

Republicans must feel maximum heat NOT to save Obama. Those cowardly chicken hawks will bomb anyone on the globe to maintain the empire, but will not lift a finger to remove a modern day Emperor Justin II. Praetorian Prefect warns of a bi-partisan malady. Now it is time to act and dispatch Obama to a disgraceful internment.

“There You Go Again”

Reince Priebus, the chairman of the Republican National Committee (RNC), was on a conference call this past Monday evening, which was sponsored by TheTeaParty.net and attended by hundreds of Tea Party activists. During the conference call, a Tea Party activist asked him about President Barack Obama’s plans for executive amnesty. Priebus replied, “It’s unconstitutional, illegal, and we don’t support it.”

Breitbart.com covered the story. “‘While I can’t speak for the legislature, I’m very confident we will stop that,’ Priebus said. ‘We will do everything we can to make sure it doesn’t happen: Defunding, going to court, injunction. You name it. It’s wrong. It’s illegal. And for so many reasons, and just the basic fabric of this country, we can’t allow it to happen and we won’t let it happen. I don’t know how to be any stronger than that. I’m telling you, everything we can do to stop it we will.’”

Breitbart goes on to quote Priebus, “‘I have said repeatedly on immigration that the first thing is border security and the second thing is upholding the law that’s in place today. What ever happened to the border fence that was promised by Congress in 2006? It never happened. What about these sanctuary cities out there that take federal money and they’re not even upholding the law that we have in place? So somehow or another what can’t get lost in any of this conversation is the importance of border security and making sure that any sort of immigration reform talk doesn’t even begin without taking that first step.’”

As Ronald Reagan said to President Jimmy Carter, “There you go again.” There the GOP goes again: making a promise they have absolutely no intention of keeping.

Priebus’ promise that, should the GOP capture the U.S. Senate, they will stop Obama’s executive amnesty is just so much hot air. I guess he thinks that we have all forgotten then Speaker of The House Newt Gingrich’s “Contract With America.”

During the congressional elections of 1994, Gingrich promised the American people that if they put Republicans in charge of the Congress, they would pass legislation to eliminate five federal departments (Education, Energy, Commerce, Interior, and Housing and Urban Development), 95 federal domestic programs, and slash federal spending across the board. The GOP promises made during the ’94 elections became known as the “Contract With America.”

GOP promises during that election cycle proved extremely successful. In the House of Representatives there was a 54-seat swing to the Republicans, which gave them a majority of seats for the first time since 1954. In the U.S. Senate there was an eight-seat swing, which allowed the GOP to capture both houses of Congress.

During the succeeding congressional session, many of the elements of the Contract were indeed passed by the Republican-led House of Representatives. It was quite another story in the GOP-led Senate. In the Senate, most of the promised bills were either killed altogether or seriously compromised through a variety of watered-down amendments. A few bills–and I mean a precious few bills–made it somewhat intact out of the Senate. At the end of the session, very little of the Contract survived. In fact, during that time, Republican senators reminded everyone that the Contract With America was only the promise of the GOP House, that the GOP Senate never joined in that promise. (Politicians are the slickest liars in the world, are they not?)

While there were several positive results of that “Republican Revolution” of 1994, including a balanced budget in 1998 and surpluses in the federal budgets from 1999-2001–all of these budgets being proposed by Democratic President Bill Clinton–Gingrich and Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott quickly began to compromise away most of the principles of the 1994 Contract. This led to Gingrich being ousted as Speaker of the House.

Of course, none of the five federal departments targeted were eliminated–neither were any of the 95 targeted federal programs. In fact, not only were these departments and programs not eliminated, funding for all of these departments and programs actually INCREASED under the GOP-led Congress. In 2000, Edward Crane, president of the Cato Institute, noted that “the combined budgets of the 95 major programs that the Contract With America promised to eliminate have increased by 13%.” And, in case Republicans want to try and blame the Democrat Bill Clinton for these budgetary backslidings, the facts just don’t support it.

Consider the fact that from 2001 through 2006, the GOP controlled the entire federal government: the White House, House of Representatives, and Senate. Plus, Republican-appointed justices comprised a majority on the U.S. Supreme Court. (That has been the case since the early 1970s). During those long six years, the GOP-dominated federal government NEVER revisited the principles of the Contract With America. In fact, the Bush years are on record as seeing the most explosive growth in federal spending and overreach in U.S. history to that time. There has been absolutely NOTHING fiscally conservative about the Twenty-First Century GOP. And that’s a fact.

Again, even though the GOP controlled the entire federal government for the first six years of this century, there was no attention given to the promises of the 1994 Contract With America. In addition, no attention was given to overturning Roe v. Wade and ending legalized abortion-on-demand, and no attention was given to overturning Bill Clinton’s egregiously unconstitutional Executive Orders. In fact, no attention was given to G.W. Bush’s campaign promises of fiscal restraint and no-nation building, non-aggressive foreign policy promises, or his vow to honor the Constitution by curbing the usurpations of Washington, D.C., of individual liberties and civil rights. What a joke that turned out to be!

Now we have a Democratic President, Barack Obama, who is one of the most unpopular presidents of our entire history, and the GOP is struggling to energize its own base. How pathetic is that? That’s why RNC Chairman Reince Priebus took to the air with a live conference call with Tea Party activists. The national GOP has so alienated Tea Party conservatives that it is concerned that even with a despised Democrat President, disenfranchised conservatives within the GOP could stay home in large numbers next Tuesday.

Priebus’ concern is warranted.

So, Priebus makes a Contract With America-type promise: give us the Senate and we will stop Obama’s executive amnesty. And even though it was a conference call, I assume he said it with a straight face. The problem is, it is a lie, and Priebus knows it.

Obama is going to sign his executive amnesty order soon after the elections and before the Senate convenes next year. And there are about as many Republicans in the Senate that favor amnesty as there are Democrats. Does anyone really think that John McCain, Lindsey Graham, Lamar Alexander, et al. are going to get exercised over amnesty? The Chamber of Commerce establishment Republicans are salivating over amnesty for illegals. Some of them are trying to hide an amnesty amendment in the upcoming NDAA even as we speak. Plus, just exactly what is the Senate going to do to overturn an executive amnesty order? I can already hear it. After the GOP wins the Senate, they will say, “Well, as the U.S. Senate, we can’t really do anything; we need a Republican President in 2016. Then we will do something about it.” And the beat goes on.

It’s not about stopping amnesty; it’s about political posturing for a November election. House Speaker John Boehner has promised Big Business Republicans an amnesty deal. Does anyone in their right mind believe the GOP is going to overturn an Obama amnesty order? It’s a campaign bluff. I know it; and so does Barack Obama. (I would love to be proven wrong; but the GOP track record says I am 100% right.)

The Breitbart report goes on to say, “Priebus said at the end of the town hall that he thinks it’s important for Tea Partiers and the grassroots to hold Republicans accountable.

“‘I think it’s important to build our party through addition and make sure that we don’t subtract people out of our party,’ he said. ‘It’s also important for the Tea Party to hold the Republican Party accountable. I get that. It’s not always a cheerleading opportunity. It’s both that we’re going to be with you and help you, but we have to hold you accountable once in a while. And I understand that and respect it.’”

See the report here:

No, Priebus doesn’t understand that; neither does he respect it. This is pure partisan party electioneering.

The GOP leadership has not allowed itself to be held accountable to ANYBODY. They wouldn’t let Ross Perot do it; they wouldn’t let Pat Buchanan do it; they wouldn’t let Ron Paul do it; and they aren’t letting the Tea Party Republicans do it. They think themselves above their own platform, above their conservative base, and even above the U.S. Constitution. Accordingly, they have been subtracting numbers from their own ranks for a long, long time. Where do you think the Libertarian and Constitution parties came from? Where do you think so many of the registered independent voters came from?

In any given national election the numbers of people who stay home and don’t vote always outnumber the ones who do vote. Why is that? It’s because both the Democrat and Republican parties have been ignoring so much of their grassroots base that people from both parties have been drifting away by the millions. People by the millions have given up on both major parties. Neither party in Washington, D.C., respects the people of the United States or the U.S. Constitution. Both parties grovel before Big Money. That’s why so many people have removed themselves from the two major parties.

If the Republican leadership in Washington, D.C., had been listening to its base over the past several years, Barack Obama would not be President today and the GOP would not be biting its fingernails as to whether they can take back the Senate. This should be a slam-dunk election for the GOP. And, despite the stiff-necked, Big Business, Big Brother leadership of the national Republican Party, I think the GOP will take the Senate. But if you think for one minute that a GOP-led Senate and House will do diddly squat to stop Obama’s amnesty order or to close our Southern Border, there is this bridge in the Mojave Desert you need to look at. The GOP is famous for doing NOTHING after elections are won.

Reince Priebus lamented over the failure of Congress to honor its promise to close the Southern Border back in 2006. Well, Mr. Priebus, it was the Republican Party that controlled the federal government from 2001-2006, and despite their promises to close the Southern Border, did NOTHING to actually do it. And you think a GOP-led Congress is going to do something about it now? What a joke! Most of the anti-amnesty Republicans are in the House, and they are not even a majority within their own caucus there. Try to name the anti-amnesty senators. The only ones I can recall who have been outspoken against amnesty are Jeff Sessions, Ted Cruz, and Mike Lee. Even Rand Paul has softened on the subject.

I wasn’t on the Tea Party conference call last Monday evening with Mr. Priebus when he said what he said, but I’m hoping someone on the call hollered, “There you go again.”

In Search of An Ebola And ISIS Free Zone

The Comité De Salut Public during the French Revolution exhibited a pattern for nightmares far removed from their stated purpose as a Committee of Public Safety. The reign of terror that arose from the shambles created by the Society of the Jacobins, based upon extreme egalitarianism, actually produced a most violent outcome.  If you are one of those lost souls who cling to the latest narrative from the designer media reporting machine, the fear factor is working overtime. What can be more impartial than the threat of succumbing to an Ebola epidemic? Well, if you believe this hysteria, maybe the imminent acts of terror from those Islamic fascists; now called ISIS, will get your blood pressure to spike. Both share a paranoia manufactured in the labs of mind control more than in the actuary records of fact.

Worry that a global pandemic is in the making causes more psychosis than any screenplay coming out of tinsel town. Ebola has much in common with “The stuff that dreams are made of” for the social engineers and population control psychopaths. While human life is lost to this virus, when did this planet ever value the existence of individual human beings?

One viewpoint purports that The 5 Biggest Lies About Ebola Being Pushed by Government & Mass Media are inhibiting a proper response.

Lie #1) Ebola won’t ever come to the United States

Well, that one has been disproved.

Lie #2) Ebola is only spread via direct contact with body fluids

Nice to ignore those aerosols – airborne particles

Lie #3) Don’t worry: Health authorities have everything under control

Now who in their right mind is going to believe this nonsense?

Lie #4) The only defense against Ebola is a vaccine or a pharmaceutical drug

This one starts to shed light on some of the motivation behind the response.

Lie #5) Ebola came out of nowhere and was a random fluke of nature

The big lie theory always seems to work on the naïve public.

Think outside the box. Pose the question that no one in the mainstream culture dares to ask. Why expend extreme dread about a mutating infection when most of the “so called” civilized world is currently consumed on intentionally taking a road to annihilation. If the Ebola outbreak is the ultimate culling of the herd, the argument of the disinformation artists already won the day.

Wearing down the natural immunized capacity of people to discount and reject the hype and fabricated perception of reality, is far more lethal than the actual threat of a medical disease. Prudence prescribes preparative precautions. However, ignoring the far more dangerous menaces to our well being can truly be terminable.

Survival seems paramount to secular society. Since this is the case, why is so much energy and mental attention devoted to chasing false Armageddons? ISIS is an obvious example of the playing out the same old strategy of creating an enemy in order that the ruling class can come to the rescue. Alas, delivering a solution or victory is intentionally unattainable.

Senators like Lindsay Graham and John McCain revel in juicing up their NeoCon followers with their fright campaign to keep the war machine rumbling along. Their manta is not just old, it is laughable. So many Americans are deluded by the fantasy of fighting a war against terrorism for generations to come, that they are oblivious from learning the history that created this madness.

The New York Times publishes an article, For Many Iranians, the ‘Evidence’ Is Clear: ISIS Is an American Invention. Oh dear, who could believe any observation from that axis of evil regime?

“Ayatollah Khamenei reminded them that Al Qaeda — a creation of the Central Intelligence Agency, Iran has said — and the Taliban were, in the eyes of Iranian intelligence, devised by the West as a counterweight to Iran.”

When Iranian television aired images of Senator John McCain, the hawkish Arizona Republican, at a meeting with the current caliph of ISIS, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, an announcer added.

“These say more than a thousand words regarding the links between the United States and this group.”

So when Iranians express their distrust, the full thrust of the NWO establishment condemns their conclusions.

“But the claim that ISIS is a creation of the Obama administration has gained wide traction here. From the Iranian viewpoint, shaped by their spotty exposure to Western culture, analysts say, creating a terrorist organization opposed to Iranian interests is the obvious thing for a superpower to do.”

Exactly what is the advantage of being under the spell of exposure to Western culture, when the flagship of approved news reporting refuses to admit that interventionism into the Middle East has been a total disaster for ordinary Americans?

That old JFK trademark, “in the final analysis” the betrayal of real national security has become the hallmark of U.S. foreign policy.

Wasting time on all the breaking news about the latest development on ISIS is pure folly. The absurd assertions that ISIS is about to initiate attacks on domestic soil, only serves to alarm an already high-anxiety induced citizenry.

Both Ebola and ISIS alleged scourges could be precluded with very basic border control measures. Common sense is a prime casualty in preventive national protection. Yet, the Homeland Security culture asserts the same delusional rhetoric as the Committee of Public Safety exhibited as the bloodbath of the French Revolution flowed into the streets of Paris.

The difference in this age of instant communication and immediate gratification is that the speed and scope of scares spread instantaneously. Where is the prioritization of risk? What will it take to focus on true distress targets of momentous calamities, which are consistently ignored in our brainwashed culture?

When was the last time you read or heard a significant report of the ongoing Fukushima contamination from the radiation meltdown? Or has that little catastrophe been wiped from the consciousness of the collective mind? All these questions become taxing. People are not used to thinking beyond the sound bites from yesterday.

Energy News provides the following:  US gov’t analysis says Fukushima is more serious than ‘China Syndrome’ — Destroyed reactors suffered worst type of containment failure. Review the best resources on this topic from Rense.com links. Nonetheless, most would reply that an Ebola epidemic is an immediate health hazard, while radiation migration will only cause cancer deaths over time.

Gee, another acquiescence that open borders are inevitable – the prevailing wind and currents know no national boundary. Well, to the simple mind, that must mean the same is true for blocking air flights from West African contaminated zones or for CIA trained jihad Islamists.

Government boasts that their mission to protect the public takes precedent over civil liberties or constitutional law. Just how well are these Jacobin thugs doing in keeping you safe?

Listing all the steps that have practical probability for success to eliminate the Ebola and ISIS dilemmas are futile to debate as long as the intended purpose of the careerist political class and globalist financial elite is to implement their reign of terror.

That infamous New World Order icon Franklin D. Roosevelt’s First Inaugural Address quote: “Only Thing We Have to Fear Is Fear Itself”, actually should read “Only Thing We Have to Fear Is Government Itself”. The Bull S#$& that constitutes the 24/7 news cycle which expounds and rationalizes government policy and the police state is the true plague.

In order to establish a “Free Zone” from all the Ebola and ISIS propaganda, folks need to escape the BS and engage the real world by dropping out from the controlled grid of establishment lunacy.

Most of the literal risks that people are susceptible to encounter are avoidable with behavioral modifications. While life itself is the supreme adventure, avoiding perilous circumstances should be a component of sensible conduct. Regrettably, government rejects this standard and most of the time is devoted to create the circumstance that endangers their citizens.

Treacherous planning for martial law imposition thrives on the outbreak of Ebola hysteria. The frenzy amplifies calls for cures. Healing by quarantine is not a medical remedy, it is a reactionary response. What an ideal environment to foster even greater control. Keep illness intact, while reducing free association among the healthy.

ISIS may want to spread this deadly version of wellness destruction when they capture their next stash of armament weapons. Keeping the threat alive is much more important than merely killing non-combatants. A free zone of analysis accepts the Iranian interruption over the MSM version. The same analytic thinking leads to the inference that a mass phobia stampede leads to the desired public demand for government salvation.

Tune out this effort to herd the sheeple to slaughter. Start protecting yourself and prepare for your own safety. The hazmat response team will not rescue you from a system based upon deception, fraud and disinformation. Then what is the difference, the Fukushima contagion illustrates that the cockroaches will inherent the planet. Maybe they will do better than this mentally ill society.

America’s “Terrorist Academy” In Iraq Produced ISIS Leaders

The University of Al-Qaeda?

“Since 2003, Anglo-American power has secretly and openly coordinated direct and indirect support for Islamist terrorist groups linked to al-Qaeda across the Middle East and North Africa. This ill-conceived patchwork geostrategy is a legacy of the persistent influence of neoconservative ideology, motivated by longstanding but often contradictory ambitions to dominate regional oil resources, defend an expansionist Israel, and in pursuit of these, re-draw the map of the Middle East.” Nafeez Ahmed, “How the West Created the Islamic State“, CounterPunch

“The US created these terrorist organizations. America does not have the moral authority to lead a coalition against terrorism.” Hassan Nasralla, Secretary General of Hezbollah

October 06, 2014 “ICH” – “Counterpunch” –  The Obama administration’s determination to topple Syrian President Bashar al-Assad is pushing the Middle East towards a regional war that could lead to a confrontation between the two nuclear-armed rivals, Russia and the United States.

Last week, Turkey joined the US-led coalition following a vote in parliament approving a measure to give the government the authority to launch military action against Isis in Syria. Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan made it clear that Turkish involvement would come at a price, and that price would be the removal of al Assad. According to Turkey’s Hurriyet Daily News:

“Turkey will not allow coalition members to use its military bases or its territory in the fight against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) if the objective does not also include ousting the Bashar al-Assad regime, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan hinted on Oct. 1…

“We are open and ready for any cooperation in the fight against terrorism. However, it should be understood by everybody that Turkey is not a country in pursuit of temporary solutions, nor will Turkey allow others to take advantage of it,” Erdoğan said in his lengthy address to Parliament.”..

“Turkey cannot be content with the current situation and cannot be a by-stander and spectator in the face of such developments.” (“Turkey will fight terror but not for temporary solutions: Erdoğan“, Hurriyet)

Officials in the Obama administration applauded Turkey’s decision to join the makeshift coalition. U.S. Secretary of Defense Chuck Hagel hailed the vote as a “very positive development” while State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said, “We welcome the Turkish Parliament’s vote to authorize Turkish military action…We’ve had numerous high-level discussions with Turkish officials to discuss how to advance our cooperation in countering the threat posed by ISIL in Iraq and Syria.”

In the last week, “Turkish tanks and other military units have taken position on the Syrian border.” Did the Obama administration strike a deal with Turkey to spearhead an attack on Syria pushing south towards Damascus while a small army of so called “moderate” jihadis– who are presently on the Israeli border– move north towards the Capital? If that is the case, then the US would probably deploy some or all of its 15,000 troops currently stationed in Kuwait “including an entire armored brigade” to assist in the invasion or to provide backup if Turkish forces get bogged down. The timeline for such an invasion is uncertain, but it does appear that the decision to go to war has already been made.

Turkish involvement greatly increases the chances of a broader regional war. It’s unlikely that Syria’s allies, Russia and Iran, will remain on the sidelines while Turkish tanks stream across the country on their way to Damascus. And while the response from Tehran and Moscow may be measured at first, it is bound to escalate as the fighting intensifies and tempers flare. The struggle for Syria will be a long, hard slog that will probably produce no clear winner. If Damascus falls, the conflict will morph into a protracted guerilla war that could spill over borders engulfing both Lebanon and Jordan. Apparently, the Obama administration feels the potential rewards from such a reckless and homicidal gambit are worth the risks.

No-Fly Zone Fakery

The Obama administration has made little effort to conceal its real objectives in Syria. The fight against Isis is merely a pretext for regime change. The fact that Major General Martin Dempsey, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and Chuck Hagel are angling for a no-fly zone over Syria exposes the “war against Isis” as a fraud. Why does the US need a no-fly zone against a group of Sunni militants who have no air force? The idea is ridiculous. The obvious purpose of the no-fly zone is to put Assad on notice that the US is planning to take control of Syrian airspace on its way to toppling the regime. Clearly, Congress could have figured this out before rubber stamping Obama’s request for $500 million dollars to arm and train “moderate” militants. Instead, they decided to add more fuel to the fire. If Congress seriously believes that Assad is a threat to US national security and “must go”, then they should have the courage to vote for sending US troops to Syria to do the heavy lifting. The idea of funding shadowy terrorist groups that pretend to be moderate rebels is lunacy in the extreme. It merely compounds the problem and increases the prospects of another Iraq-type bloodbath. Is it any wonder why Congress’s public approval rating is stuck in single digits?

TURKEY: A Major Player

According to many sources, Turkey has played a pivotal role in the present crisis, perhaps more than Saudi Arabia or Qatar. Consider the comments made by Vice President Joe Biden in an exchange with students at the John F. Kennedy Jr. Forum at the Institute of Politics at Harvard University last week. Biden was asked: “In retrospect do you believe the United States should have acted earlier in Syria, and if not why is now the right moment?” Here’s part of what he said:

“…my constant cry was that our biggest problem is our allies – our allies in the region were our largest problem in Syria. The Turks were great friends – and I have the greatest relationship with Erdogan, which I just spent a lot of time with – the Saudis, the Emiratis, etc. What were they doing? They were so determined to take down Assad and essentially have a proxy Sunni-Shia war, what did they do? They poured hundreds of millions of dollars and tens, thousands of tons of weapons into anyone who would fight against Assad except that the people who were being supplied were Al Nusra and Al Qaeda and the extremist elements of jihadis coming from other parts of the world…

So now what’s happening? All of a sudden everybody’s awakened because this outfit called ISIL which was Al Qaeda in Iraq, which when they were essentially thrown out of Iraq, found open space in territory in eastern Syria, work with Al Nusra who we declared a terrorist group early on and we could not convince our colleagues to stop supplying them. So what happened? Now all of a sudden – I don’t want to be too facetious – but they had seen the Lord. Now we have – the President’s been able to put together a coalition of our Sunni neighbors, because America can’t once again go into a Muslim nation and be seen as the aggressor – it has to be led by Sunnis to go and attack a Sunni organization.”

Biden apologized for his remarks on Sunday, but he basically let the cat out of the bag. Actually, what he said wasn’t new at all, but it did lend credibility to what many of the critics have been saying since the very beginning, that Washington’s allies in the region have been arming and funding this terrorist Frankenstein from the onset without seriously weighing the risks involved. Here’s more background on Turkey’s role in the current troubles from author Nafeez Ahmed:

“With their command and control centre based in Istanbul, Turkey, military supplies from Saudi Arabia and Qatar in particular were transported by Turkish intelligence to the border for rebel acquisition. CIA operatives along with Israeli and Jordanian commandos were also training FSA rebels on the Jordanian-Syrian border with anti-tank and anti-aircraft weapons. In addition, other reports show that British and French military were also involved in these secret training programmes. It appears that the same FSA rebels receiving this elite training went straight into ISIS – last month one ISIS commander, Abu Yusaf, said, “Many of the FSA people who the west has trained are actually joining us.” (“How the West Created the Islamic State“, Nafeez Ahmed, CounterPunch

Notice how the author points out the involvement of “CIA operatives”. While Biden’s comments were an obvious attempt to absolve the administration from blame, it’s clear US Intel agencies knew what was going on and were at least tangentially involved. Here’s more from the same article:

“Classified assessments of the military assistance supplied by US allies Saudi Arabia and Qatar obtained by the New York Times showed that “most of the arms shipped at the behest of Saudi Arabia and Qatar to supply Syrian rebel groups… are going to hardline Islamic jihadists, and not the more secular opposition groups that the West wants to bolster.”

Once again, classified documents prove that the US officialdom knew what was going on and simply looked the other way. All the while, the hardcore takfiri troublemakers were loading up on weapons and munitions preparing for their own crusade. Here’s a clip that Congress should have read before approving $500 million more for this fiasco:

” … Mother Jones found that the US government has “little oversight over whether US supplies are falling prey to corruption – or into the hands of extremists,” and relies “on too much good faith.” The US government keeps track of rebels receiving assistance purely through “handwritten receipts provided by rebel commanders in the field,” and the judgment of its allies. Countries supporting the rebels – the very same which have empowered al-Qaeda affiliated Islamists – “are doing audits of the delivery of lethal and nonlethal supplies.”…

the government’s vetting procedures to block Islamist extremists from receiving US weapons have never worked.” (“How the West Created the Islamic State”, Nafeez Ahmed, CounterPunch)

These few excerpts should help to connect the dots in what is really a very hard-to-grasp situation presently unfolding in Syria. Yes, the US is ultimately responsible for Isis because it knew what was going on and played a significant part in arming and training jihadi recruits. And, no, Isis does not take its orders directly from Washington (or Langley) although its actions have conveniently coincided with US strategic goals in the region. (Many readers will undoubtedly disagree with my views on this.) Here’s one last clip on Turkey from an article in the Telegraph. The story ran a full year ago in October 2013:

“Hundreds of al-Qaeda recruits are being kept in safe houses in southern Turkey, before being smuggled over the border to wage “jihad” in Syria, The Daily Telegraph has learned.

The network of hideouts is enabling a steady flow of foreign fighters – including Britons – to join the country’s civil war, according to some of the volunteers involved.

These foreign jihadists have now largely eclipsed the “moderate” wing of the rebel Free Syrian Army, which is supported by the West. Al-Qaeda’s ability to use Turkish territory will raise questions about the role the Nato member is playing in Syria’s civil war.

Turkey has backed the rebels from the beginning – and its government has been assumed to share the West’s concerns about al-Qaeda. But experts say there are growing fears over whether the Turkish authorities may have lost control of the movement of new al-Qaeda recruits – or may even be turning a blind eye.” (“Al-Qaeda recruits entering Syria from Turkey safehouses“, Telegraph)

Get the picture? This is a major region-shaping operation that the Turks, the Saudis, the Qataris, the Americans etc are in on. Sure, maybe some of the jihadis went off the reservation and started doing their own thing, but even that’s not certain. After all, Isis has already achieved many of Washington’s implicit objectives: Dump Nuri al Maliki and replace him with a US stooge who will amend the Status of Forces Agreement. (SOFA), allow Sunni militants and Kurds to create their own de facto mini-states within Iraq (thus, eliminating the threat of a strong, unified Iraq that will challenge Israeli hegemony), and create a tangible threat to regional security (Isis) thereby justifying US meddling and occupation for the foreseeable future. So far, arming terrorists has been a winning strategy for Obama and Co. Unfortunately for the president, we are still in the early rounds of the emerging crisis. Things could backfire quite badly, and probably will.

(NOTE: According to Iran’s Press TV: “The ISIL terrorists have purportedly opened a consulate in Ankara, Turkey and use it to issue visas for those who want to join the fight against the Syrian and Iraqi governments….The militants are said to be operating freely inside the country without much problem.” I have my doubts about this report which is why I have put parentheses around it, but it is interesting all the same.)

CAMP BUCCA: University of Al-Qaeda

So where do the Sunni extremists in Isis come from?

There are varying theories on this, the least likely of which is that they responded to promotional videos and propaganda on social media. The whole “Isis advertising campaign” nonsense strikes me as a clever disinformation ploy to conceal what’s really going on, which is, that the various western Intel agencies have been recruiting these jokers from other (former) hotspots like Afghanistan, Libya, Chechnya, Kosovo, Somalia and prisons in Iraq. Isis not a spontaneous amalgam of Caliphate-aspiring revolutionaries who spend their off-hours trolling the Internet, but a collection of ex Baathists and religious zealots who have been painstakingly gathered to perform the task at hand, which is to lob off heads, spread mayhem, and create the pretext for US-proxy war. Check out this illuminating article on Alakhbar English titled “The mysterious link between the US military prison Camp Bucca and ISIS leaders”. It helps explain what’s really been going on behind the scenes:

“We have to ask why the majority of the leaders of the Islamic State (IS), formerly the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS), had all been incarcerated in the same prison at Camp Bucca, which was run by the US occupation forces near Omm Qasr in southeastern Iraq….. First of all, most IS leaders had passed through the former U.S. detention facility at Camp Bucca in Iraq. So who were the most prominent of these detainees?

The leader of IS, Abu Bakr al-Baghdadi, tops the list. He was detained from 2004 until mid-2006. After he was released, he formed the Army of Sunnis, which later merged with the so-called Mujahideen Shura Council…

Another prominent IS leader today is Abu Ayman al-Iraqi, who was a former officer in the Iraqi army under Saddam Hussein. This man also “graduated” from Camp Bucca, and currently serves as a member on IS’ military council.

Another member of the military council who was in Bucca is Adnan Ismail Najm. … He was detained on January 2005 in Bucca, and was also a former officer in Saddam’s army. He was the head of a shura council in IS, before he was killed by the Iraqi army near Mosul on June 4, 2014.

Camp Bucca was also home to Haji Samir, aka Haji Bakr, whose real name is Samir Abed Hamad al-Obeidi al-Dulaimi. He was a colonel in the army of the former Iraqi regime. He was detained in Bucca, and after his release, he joined al-Qaeda. He was the top man in ISIS in Syria…

According to the testimonies of US officers who worked in the prison, the administration of Camp Bucca had taken measures including the segregation of prisoners on the basis of their ideology. This, according to experts, made it possible to recruit people directly and indirectly.

Former detainees had said in documented television interviews that Bucca…was akin to an “al-Qaeda school,” where senior extremist gave lessons on explosives and suicide attacks to younger prisoners. A former prisoner named Adel Jassem Mohammed said that one of the extremists remained in the prison for two weeks only, but even so was able to recruit 25 out of 34 inmates who were there. Mohammed also said that U.S. military officials did nothing to stop the extremists from mentoring the other detainees…

No doubt, we will one day discover that many more leaders in the group had been detained in Bucca as well, which seems to have been more of a “terrorist academy” than a prison.” (“The mysterious link between the US military prison Camp Bucca and ISIS leaders“, Alakhbar English)

US foreign policy is tailored to meet US strategic objectives, which in this case are regime change, installing a US puppet in Damascus, erasing the existing borders, establishing forward-operating bases across the country, opening up vital pipeline corridors between Qatar and the Mediterranean so the western energy giants can rake in bigger profits off gas sales to the EU market, and reducing Syria to a condition of “permanent colonial dependency.” (Chomsky)

Would the United States oversee what-amounts-to a “terrorist academy” if they thought their jihadi graduates would act in a way that served US interests?

Indeed, they would. In fact, they’d probably pat themselves on the back for coming up with such a clever idea.

State Sponsored Assassination Culture

The ongoing failures of the Secret Service to provide proper protection for the President have political careerists in a tizzy. Scares that harm could come to the commander-in-chief, also worries the press. Ordinary citizens on principle, accept that the White House should be secure grounds. Rotating blame usually means that the buck does not stop on the oval office desk. Indeed, who could expect any President to be responsible for their own safety? Surely, policy decisions made as a government could not possibly have any bearing on the lunatics that harbor ill will towards our fearless leaders.

Refreshing your memory, Abraham Lincoln, James Garfield, William McKinley and John F. Kennedy got whacked. Andrew Jackson, Theodore Roosevelt, Franklin Roosevelt, Harry Truman, Gerald Ford and Ronald Reagan were targets of serious assassination attempts.

With all the Secret Service trial and tribulations experienced in the last years, the popular assessment is that the Praetorian Guard bodyguards have become a dysfunctional band of self-indulgent thrill seekers.

How much money is enough to spend on Presidential security? Some like ousted Secret Service Director Julia Pierson presumably would say a price tag cannot be placed on keeping the leader alive and safe from assassination. Though, Pierson failed to provide fresh start for Secret Service that administration wanted, proves that the culture of political privilege deems their importance to be most costly.

“Homeland Security requested $1.49 billion in operating funds for the Secret Service, a $60 million dip from last fiscal year. But even spending-conscious Republicans said that was too much. So Congress instead agreed to a rare increase over the administration’s request, giving the agency $1.53 billion.”

Such benevolence must come from a motivation to avoid another national tragedy. Absent in budget hearings is a serious debate if the propensity for violently eliminating presidents comes from pragmatic power political expediency as opposed to the usual conclusion that madmen (or women)  are acting alone. Well, it is a nice myth if keeping the public living in a dream is the intent. Names like Lawrence, Guiteau, Czolgosz, Fromme and Moore do not carry the same notoriety as icons of assassins like Booth and Oswald, but official accounts paint them all as deranged.

Heads of state are far more cautious and seldom fall into the trap that their greatest danger comes from lone guns. There is good reason for Argentina president claims US plotting to oust her.

“Argentinian opposition politicians have accused the country’s president, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, of being “completely out of touch with reality” after she gave a rambling televised address in which she claimed the US may be behind a plot to overthrow her government and possibly even assassinate her.

“If something should happen to me, don’t look to the Middle East, look to the North,” Fernández said during the address on Tuesday night, in which she alluded to an alleged plot against her by local bankers and businessmen “with foreign help”.

Is Ms. Fernández paranoid or just expressing a healthy appreciation of practices that have long been condoned?

When FDR approved Operation Vengeance, the killing of Admiral Isoroku Yamamoto, it was during WWII. The NDAA Actually Gives Obama the Legal Authority to Kill. Just ponder the perversion in the meaning of the term legal. Examples of killing the king in history usually means the victor won the war. Somehow justifying NDAA methods as acceptable demeans every citizen who pledges their allegiance to a constitutional republic.

The New York Times confirms that the Secret ‘Kill List’ Proves a Test of Obama’s Principles and Will, but that begs the theoretical question what authority endows the right to even accept that a kill list is principled, much less a sensible decree of any government? Just where does the moral imperative enter into the craft of statesmanship?

“Mr. Obama has placed himself at the helm of a top secret “nominations” process to designate terrorists for kill or capture, of which the capture part has become largely theoretical. He had vowed to align the fight against Al Qaeda with American values; the chart, introducing people whose deaths he might soon be asked to order, underscored just what a moral and legal conundrum this could be.”

Those American values in the 21th century have little in common from those practiced at the inception of the country. Covert agencies on missions of foreign intrigue are commonly practiced. The use of “special forces” and ex-military contractors seek to enjoy the cover and exoneration that fighting terrorists is the biggest growth industry on the planet. Delineating war loosely without a declared and defined enemy state provides broad discretion to place any antagonist in the crosshairs.

Truth Lies Deception and Cover-ups argues The Presidents Kill List and State Sponsored Assassination is far more dangerous and frequently employed than publically admitted.

“If the “Kill List” nominally exists in the interest of National Security – it is fair to predict that, particularly in a country that estimates it’s own domestic enemies (who are tracked with their surveillance systems) to be in the order of millions – it would be easy to tack journalists or whistle-blowers on to such a list.

This would not be because journalists and whistleblowers present a risk to National Security – but, they present a risk of embarrassing the ruling elite in the government, government agencies, government contractors and the financial giants (or other cronies that lurk in the shadows and pull the strings of politicians and other officials with influence).”

Recall the evidence surrounding the Suspicions Growing Over Death of Journalist Probing NSA and CIA Abuses. The malicious culture that routinely orders foes neutralized by means once considered abhorrent, now defy restraints of civilized society.

“When the Obama administration was exposed spying on journalists earlier this year, the investigative reporter blasted what he referred to as the president’s “war” on journalism. “The Obama administration has clearly declared war on the press. It has declared war on investigative journalists — our sources,” he said during a recent TV interview, blasting the administration’s lawless behavior, obsession with secrecy, and vicious persecution of whistleblowers. Beyond simple criticism, though, Hastings openly said it was time for journalists to fight back.”

Government cover-ups operate as bait and switch sophistry. Exposing corruption once was the pursuit of the art of refined reporting. Now, serious investigative journalism is a threat to any imperial administration.

Revealing and documenting subversion is viewed as endangering the Oval Office. Threats to authoritarian presidents are not limited to high powered rifles. Without regard to life and limb, earning a place on the enemy list is becoming deadly serious.

If the Secret Service has the charge to protect the life of the President, the entire military-intelligence-security complex functions as a hit squad for the institution of the presidency itself. While conflicting factions within the government vie for their own parochial seats of power on a continuous basis the precarious real national security declines. Blowback against the country is evident in every foreign policy arena. Such resentment unsurprisingly places the President in a self-induced greater risk of retaliation.

However, it must be acknowledged that the successful presidential assassinations (and several of those that failed) aimed their fatal bullet at an office holder who defied the ruling cabal that actually controls the financial and economic establishment.

It is difficult to believe that a truly independent and patriotic warrior could ever campaign through the election process and vote count to become President. The enormous entourage that protects the Chief Executive has grown to become its own cottage industry. Lost in the concern for protecting one man is that the makes the elimination of a President merely a lateral move.

Since responsible citizens value the life and safety of legitimate authority, the task of reversing the State sponsored assassination culture is imperative. When your own government conducts their “Murder Inc.” bureau as part of their survival plan, people need to question the degree of loyalty which that same government deserves.

Clint Eastwood’s latest movie production ‘’ about Navy SEAL Chris Kyle will hopefully compliment ‘In Line of Fire’ in which he starred as a secret service agent present at the JFK assassination. The other side of the assassination equation is mostly ignored.

Sorrowfully, government officials are locked into a denial mindset that disassociates any relationship and connection between increased levels of risks to officials and the sanctioned killings approved by their governments. Review 82 pages of a list of assassinated heads of state. It is hard to believe that such a record of terminal violence will end any time soon.

Royal guards have an impossible task, no matter how much their budget allows. Until the power structure “gets religion” and renounces their evil ways, the system will never permit a civilized society. Assassination is wrong and adopting such an approach only invites backfire threats. Keeping the President safe begins in implementing moral conduct and renouncing the killer elite mentality.

2014 Election Business As Usual

Thus far this election cycle has been a dud. Hardly a sweat is broken in the rarified air of partisan politics punditry. The only consistent factor that can always be counted upon to amuse is the reams of paper wasted on the false promises and prevarication made by the esteemed party regulars. It is easy to simply blame the entrenched incumbents or the current crop of insurgents, but it goes much deeper when an entire nation remains mute in the face of the worse run and most condemnable conduct, coming out of the District of Criminals in decades. The party in power traditionally will suffer huge losses in Congress, while the gang of “pols” out of power will start contacting real estate agents within the beltway.

What passes for political news today is not even fit to wrap fish. The meat and potatoes of journalism, once upon a time, were made up of scandals. Under the protection racket department of the media government alliance, the abuse of power never reaches the point of national saturation. The Obama administration has outdone the nastiest of offenses under Lyndon Johnson and William Clinton. The Democrats in the Senate allow Harry Reid to be the sickest dictatorial tyrant in living memory.

Customarily, the party with the majority takes the blame for failures. Yet, with each new transgression and unlawful activity, the purported opposition crew of RINOs shirks their constitutional responsibility and shutter out of fear of being labeled a racist. How sad. But that is exactly the condition and lack of courage out of the GOP leadership.

One might think the Democrats just keep digging the hole deeper that they created. Then again, many partisans will look to shift blame and pin shared responsibility on the Republican deadheads in Congress. Forgotten in the fog out of foggy bottom is that Obama owns the failed policies that have been followed after five and a half years in office.

The chaos at the border is intentional. Failure to revive the economy and implement policies that favor job creation is also deliberate. Perpetuating a foreign policy based upon defiance of international law is maintained in the proud tradition of interventionist empire building. Truly this is the institutional synergism, between both parties, that steer career politicians to the dark side. Lastly, the infamous and destructive Obamacare fiasco is the apex of social engineering.

So why won’t the political establishment respond to this laundry list of malfeasance and repeal bad legislation and caustic regulation or change the direction of national policy? It is very difficult for most Americans to accept that the political class is actively working for the downfall of the country and the substitution of a constitutional republic for the dictatorship of permanent privileged elites.

What makes this faction of ruling vermin different from previous ages is that the overriding sentiment for dominance is based upon the systematic dismantling of the nation state. The façade of protecting the homeland is pure hogwash. With the rise of the internationalism culture for governance, the motivation to legislate as if a representative was a sincere patriot has evaporated.

There are not many reasons to even project an appearance of restoring an independent and self-sustaining national economy, a civilization based upon individual liberties and a society where opportunity builds a viable middle class. No, the day that politicians had sincere respect and devotion to institutions of lawful administration and beneficial programs that actually advanced the public interest are long gone.

So why do the hard core political junkies get so exercised over the latest news on how a particular race is turning? With the bipartisan gerrymandering that takes places after each census, every state gets their chance to game the election system. Since there are a small number of elections that can be described as truly competitive, the attention garnished on the few races that could be decided by greater campaign efforts, goes under the microscope.

Back in 2010 the decisive involvement of the genuine grassroots Tea Party captured the House of Representative for the GOP. How did that work out? For traditional conservatives, this freshman class made a substantial attempt to rock the floor of the chamber. Nevertheless, let no good Congressperson go left unpunished. The leadership of the do nothing and gutless Republicans, could not bring themselves to demonstrate fiscal prudence or foreign policy statesmanship.

Sorry folks, the NeoCons are still very much in control.

For this election cycle, the Senate seems to be in play by nearly all accounts. Races for a Senate seat in Alaska, Colorado, Iowa, North Carolina and Kansas are most often talked about holding the keys to the cloakroom. It is incomprehensible that majority leader Senate Harry Reid could muster even the lowest level of respect for the way he has conducted himself in the role of the perfect obstructionist. Yet, Democrat loyalists come to the rescue of his tainted honor, no matter how offensive his behavior and conduct degenerates.

Optimism that Reid will be relegated to the closet motivates discontented votes in the few States that matter. OK, even if the slimy and seedy boss of the Democrat crime syndicate gets demoted, what might be reasonably expected from a Republican majority in the Senate?

Most would expect that the remainder of the Obama Presidency will be dead in the water. Oh, how nice if that would be true. However, be prepared. For what you have already seen from this pathological liar and pretender, who have more in common with Mobutu the African despot, may well foretell an explosive ending.

The nihilism and the mental illness that marks the behavior of this egomaniac gives little reason to think that anything will restrain his one man one rule arrogance. If you watched the blushing admiration that Barry Soetoro showered on the biggest crook that even headed up the Department of Injustice, Eric Holder; you know that this psychotic president flaunts his disgust for America, has more insults left to inflict.

The fact that Republican representatives had no stomach to impeach this madman illustrates the nature of the existential problem that plagues the very foundation of legitimacy and threatens the civil liberties of every honest citizen.

Would a GOP Senate interject backbone into the jelly spines of the legislature branch and commence a revival of in an era of “good government”? Excuse me again, only the dreamers believe that an ethical administration can and will emerge, when morality in its most basic application, is almost nonexistent in the popular culture and the secular society.

Back in the ancient days of the network news monopoly, the three broadcast organizations would sometimes pool their resources to access the same voter count. Tallying ballots always presented the risk of voter fraud. Now, the projection and predicting prognostications are so much more refined. Voter scams are so advanced, using electronic machines to program in the results that only a Boss Tweed could fully appreciate.

Ah, just knowing the time wasted on campaigning is reward enough for those who rate congressional candidates lower than your latest terrorist splinter group. The suspense for the 2014 season better start to build soon or the media moguls will need to invent a different realty show to stage.

Maybe a slight threat of citizen participation could have a remote chance to influence the results in a primary run, but that time has passed. Tuesday, the 4th of November has all the making of another day of shame. Not because there is no qualified champion to support, you already know that to be the case. But for the reason that the likelihood that if a “good” person could be elected, merely means that he or she will be destroyed by the professional caste of political untouchables.

Play ball or your days are numbered. That’s the game and what better chamber exemplifies the experience of blackmail than the “World’s Greatest Deliberative Body”.

If some stubborn and obstinate reformer sticks to their guns, just bring in the NSA for the maximum level of authoritarian extortion.

By now you should all be psyched up for making your X. Soon the latest round of illegal invaders will be getting their identity credentials and drive on over to the booth to pick their macho man official. How many more of these futile elections will it take before the pretense of voting will be just as silly as those candidate projected appearances of being a trustworthy representative of the populace?

This year’s Election Day recommendation has not changed. Show up, be vocal, express your disgust, vote third party or make a point that none of the above is your real selection. The charade of a loyal opposition to the party in power has never been so clear for even the densest “true believer” to come to their senses.

Little ever changes for the good and nothing actually reverses the direction towards national suicide. The reason is clear, it is the plan and every system is firing on all cylinders. The rest of the Obama term is poised to have deceased Americans turning in their graves. For those who claim they are still alive, prove it – show your outrage.

Ukraine And Neo-Nazis

Ever since serious protest broke out in Ukraine in February the Western mainstream media, particularly in the United States, has seriously downplayed the fact that the usual suspects – the US/European Union/NATO triumvirate – have been on the same side as the neo-Nazis. In the US it’s been virtually unmentionable. I’m sure that a poll taken in the United States on this issue would reveal near universal ignorance of the numerous neo-Nazi actions, including publicly calling for death to “Russians, Communists and Jews”. But in the past week the dirty little secret has somehow poked its head out from behind the curtain a bit.

On September 9 NBCnews.com reported that “German TV shows Nazi symbols on helmets of Ukraine soldiers”. The German station showed pictures of a soldier wearing a combat helmet with the “SS runes” of Hitler’s infamous black-uniformed elite corps. (Runes are the letters of an alphabet used by ancient Germanic peoples.) A second soldier was shown with a swastika on his helmet.

On the 13th, the Washington Post showed a photo of the sleeping quarter of a member of the Azov Battalion, one of the Ukrainian paramilitary units fighting the pro-Russian separatists. On the wall above the bed is a large swastika. Not to worry, the Post quoted the platoon leader stating that the soldiers embrace symbols and espouse extremist notions as part of some kind of “romantic” idea.

Yet, it is Russian president Vladimir Putin who is compared to Adolf Hitler by everyone from Prince Charles to Princess Hillary because of the incorporation of Crimea as part of Russia. On this question Putin has stated:

The Crimean authorities have relied on the well-known Kosovo precedent, a precedent our Western partners created themselves, with their own hands, so to speak. In a situation absolutely similar to the Crimean one, they deemed Kosovo’s secession from Serbia to be legitimate, arguing everywhere that no permission from the country’s central authorities was required for the unilateral declaration of independence. The UN’s international court, based on Paragraph 2 of Article 1 of the UN Charter, agreed with that, and in its decision of 22 July 2010 noted the following, and I quote verbatim: No general prohibition may be inferred from the practice of the Security Council with regard to unilateral declarations of independence.

Putin as Hitler is dwarfed by the stories of Putin as invader (Vlad the Impaler?). For months the Western media has been beating the drums about Russia having (actually) invaded Ukraine. I recommend reading: “How Can You Tell Whether Russia has Invaded Ukraine?” by Dmitry Orlov

And keep in mind the NATO encirclement of Russia. Imagine Russia setting up military bases in Canada and Mexico, from the Atlantic to the Pacific. Remember what a Soviet base in Cuba led to.

Has the United States ever set a bad example?

Ever since that fateful day of September 11, 2001, the primary public relations goal of the United States has been to discredit the idea that somehow America had it coming because of its numerous political and military acts of aggression. Here’s everyone’s favorite hero, George W. Bush, speaking a month after 9-11:

“How do I respond when I see that in some Islamic countries there is vitriolic hatred for America? I’ll tell you how I respond: I’m amazed. I’m amazed that there’s such misunderstanding of what our country is about that people would hate us. I am – like most Americans, I just can’t believe it because I know how good we are.”

Thank you, George. Now take your pills.

I and other historians of US foreign policy have documented at length the statements of anti-American terrorists who have made it explicitly clear that their actions were in retaliation for Washington’s decades of international abominations. But American officials and media routinely ignore this evidence and cling to the party line that terrorists are simply cruel and crazed by religion; which many of them indeed are, but that doesn’t change the political and historical facts.

This American mindset appears to be alive and well. At least four hostages held in Syria recently by Islamic State militants, including US journalist James Foley, were waterboarded during their captivity. The Washington Post quoted a US official: “ISIL is a group that routinely crucifies and beheads people. To suggest that there is any correlation between ISIL’s brutality and past U.S. actions is ridiculous and feeds into their twisted propaganda.”

The Post, however, may have actually evolved a bit, adding that the “Islamic State militants … appeared to model the technique on the CIA’s use of waterboarding to interrogate suspected terrorists after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.”

Talk given by William Blum at a Teach-In on US Foreign Policy, American University, Washington, DC, September 6, 2014

Each of you I’m sure has met many people who support American foreign policy, with whom you’ve argued and argued. You point out one horror after another, from Vietnam to Iraq. From god-awful bombings and invasions to violations of international law and torture. And nothing helps. Nothing moves this person.

Now why is that? Are these people just stupid? I think a better answer is that they have certain preconceptions. Consciously or unconsciously, they have certain basic beliefs about the United States and its foreign policy, and if you don’t deal with these basic beliefs you may as well be talking to a stone wall.

The most basic of these basic beliefs, I think, is a deeply-held conviction that no matter what the United States does abroad, no matter how bad it may look, no matter what horror may result, the government of the United States means well. American leaders may make mistakes, they may blunder, they may lie, they may even on the odd occasion cause more harm than good, but they do mean well. Their intentions are always honorable, even noble. Of that the great majority of Americans are certain.

Frances Fitzgerald, in her famous study of American school textbooks, summarized the message of these books: “The United States has been a kind of Salvation Army to the rest of the world: throughout history it had done little but dispense benefits to poor, ignorant, and diseased countries. The U.S. always acted in a disinterested fashion, always from the highest of motives; it gave, never took.”

And Americans genuinely wonder why the rest of the world can’t see how benevolent and self-sacrificing America has been. Even many people who take part in the anti-war movement have a hard time shaking off some of this mindset; they march to spur America – the America they love and worship and trust – they march to spur this noble America back onto its path of goodness.

Many of the citizens fall for US government propaganda justifying its military actions as often and as naively as Charlie Brown falling for Lucy’s football.

The American people are very much like the children of a Mafia boss who do not know what their father does for a living, and don’t want to know, but then wonder why someone just threw a firebomb through the living room window.

This basic belief in America’s good intentions is often linked to “American exceptionalism”. Let’s look at how exceptional US foreign policy has been. Since the end of World War 2, the United States has:

1. Attempted to overthrow more than 50 foreign governments, most of which were democratically-elected.
2. Dropped bombs on the people of more than 30 countries.
3. Attempted to assassinate more than 50 foreign leaders.
4. Attempted to suppress a populist or nationalist movement in 20 countries.
5. Grossly interfered in democratic elections in at least 30 countries.
6. Led the world in torture; not only the torture performed directly by Americans upon foreigners, but providing torture equipment, torture manuals, lists of people to be tortured, and in-person guidance by American teachers, especially in Latin America.

This is indeed exceptional. No other country in all of history comes anywhere close to such a record.

So the next time you’re up against a stone wall … ask the person what the United States would have to do in its foreign policy to lose his support. What for this person would finally be TOO MUCH. If the person mentions something really bad, chances are the United States has already done it, perhaps repeatedly.

Keep in mind that our precious homeland, above all, seeks to dominate the world. For economic reasons, nationalistic reasons, ideological, Christian, and for other reasons, world hegemony has long been America’s bottom line. And let’s not forget the powerful Executive Branch officials whose salaries, promotions, agency budgets and future well-paying private sector jobs depend upon perpetual war. These leaders are not especially concerned about the consequences for the world of their wars. They’re not necessarily bad people; but they’re amoral, like a sociopath is.

Take the Middle East and South Asia. The people in those areas have suffered horribly because of Islamic fundamentalism. What they desperately need are secular governments, which have respect for different religions. And such governments were actually instituted in the recent past. But what has been the fate of those governments?

Well, in the late 1970s through much of the 1980s, Afghanistan had a secular government that was relatively progressive, with full rights for women, which is hard to believe, isn’t it? But even a Pentagon report of the time testified to the actuality of women’s rights in Afghanistan. And what happened to that government? The United States overthrew it, allowing the Taliban to come to power. So keep that in mind the next time you hear an American official say that we have to remain in Afghanistan for the sake of women’s rights.

After Afghanistan came Iraq, another secular society, under Saddam Hussein. And the United States overthrew that government as well, and now the country is overrun by crazed and bloody jihadists and fundamentalists of all kinds; and women who are not covered up are running a serious risk.

Next came Libya; again, a secular country, under Moammar Gaddafi, who, like Saddam Hussein, had a tyrant side to him but could in important ways be benevolent and do marvelous things for Libya and Africa. To name just one example, Libya had a high ranking on the United Nation’s Human Development Index. So, of course, the United States overthrew that government as well. In 2011, with the help of NATO we bombed the people of Libya almost every day for more than six months. And, once again, this led to messianic jihadists having a field day. How it will all turn out for the people of Libya, only God knows, or perhaps Allah.

And for the past three years, the United States has been doing its best to overthrow the secular government of Syria. And guess what? Syria is now a playground and battleground for all manner of ultra militant fundamentalists, including everyone’s new favorite, IS, the Islamic State. The rise of IS owes a lot to what the US has done in Iraq, Libya, and Syria in recent years.

We can add to this marvelous list the case of the former Yugoslavia, another secular government that was overthrown by the United States, in the form of NATO, in 1999, giving rise to the creation of the largely-Muslim state of Kosovo, run by the Kosovo Liberation Army (KLA). The KLA was considered a terrorist organization by the US, the UK and France for years, with numerous reports of the KLA being armed and trained by al-Qaeda, in al-Qaeda camps in Pakistan, and even having members of al-Qaeda in KLA ranks fighting against the Serbs of Yugoslavia. Washington’s main concern was dealing a blow to Serbia, widely known as “the last communist government in Europe”.

The KLA became renowned for their torture, their trafficking in women, heroin, and human body parts; another charming client of the empire.

Someone looking down upon all this from outer space could be forgiven for thinking that the United States is an Islamic power doing its best to spread the word – Allah Akbar!

But what, you might wonder, did each of these overthrown governments have in common that made them a target of Washington’s wrath? The answer is that they could not easily be controlled by the empire; they refused to be client states; they were nationalistic; in a word, they were independent; a serious crime in the eyes of the empire.

So mention all this as well to our hypothetical supporter of US foreign policy and see whether he still believes that the United States means well. If he wonders how long it’s been this way, point out to him that it would be difficult to name a single brutal dictatorship of the second half of the 20th Century that was not supported by the United States; not only supported, but often put into power and kept in power against the wishes of the population. And in recent years as well, Washington has supported very repressive governments, such as Saudi Arabia, Honduras, Indonesia, Egypt, Colombia, Qatar, and Israel.

And what do American leaders think of their own record? Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice was probably speaking for the whole private club of our foreign-policy leadership when she wrote in 2000 that in the pursuit of its national security the United States no longer needed to be guided by “notions of international law and norms” or “institutions like the United Nations” because America was “on the right side of history.”

Let me remind you of Daniel Ellsberg’s conclusion about the US in Vietnam: “It wasn’t that we were on the wrong side; we were the wrong side.”

Well, far from being on the right side of history, we have in fact fought – I mean actually engaged in warfare – on the same side as al Qaeda and their offspring on several occasions, beginning with Afghanistan in the 1980s and 90s in support of the Islamic Moujahedeen, or Holy Warriors.

The US then gave military assistance, including bombing support, to Bosnia and Kosovo, both of which were being supported by al Qaeda in the Yugoslav conflicts of the early 1990s.

In Libya, in 2011, Washington and the Jihadists shared a common enemy, Gaddafi, and as mentioned, the US bombed the people of Libya for more than six months, allowing jihadists to take over parts of the country; and they’re now fighting for the remaining parts. These wartime allies showed their gratitude to Washington by assassinating the US ambassador and three other Americans, apparently CIA, in the city of Benghazi.

Then, for some years in the mid and late 2000s, the United States backed Islamic militants in the Caucasus region of Russia, an area that has seen more than its share of religious terror going back to the Chechnyan actions of the 1990s.

Finally, in Syria, in attempting to overthrow the Assad government, the US has fought on the same side as several varieties of Islamic militants. That makes six occasions of the US being wartime allies of jihadist forces.

I realize that I have fed you an awful lot of negativity about what America has done to the world, and maybe it’s been kind of hard for some of you to swallow. But my purpose has been to try to loosen the grip on your intellect and your emotions that you’ve been raised with – or to help you to help others to loosen that grip – the grip that assures you that your beloved America means well. US foreign policy will not make much sense to you as long as you believe that its intentions are noble; as long as you ignore the consistent pattern of seeking world domination, which is a national compulsion of very long standing, known previously under other names such as Manifest Destiny, the American Century, American exceptionalism, globalization, or, as Madeleine Albright put it, “the indispensable nation” … while others less kind have used the term “imperialist”.

In this context I can’t resist giving the example of Bill Clinton. While president, in 1995, he was moved to say: “Whatever we may think about the political decisions of the Vietnam era, the brave Americans who fought and died there had noble motives. They fought for the freedom and the independence of the Vietnamese people.” Yes, that’s really the way our leaders talk. But who knows what they really believe?

It is my hope that many of you who are not now activists against the empire and its wars will join the anti-war movement as I did in 1965 against the war in Vietnam. It’s what radicalized me and so many others. When I hear from people of a certain age about what began the process of losing their faith that the United States means well, it’s Vietnam that far and away is given as the main cause. I think that if the American powers-that-be had known in advance how their “Oh what a lovely war” was going to turn out they might not have made their mammoth historical blunder. Their invasion of Iraq in 2003 indicates that no Vietnam lesson had been learned at that point, but our continuing protest against war and threatened war in Afghanistan, Iran, Syria, and elsewhere may have – may have! – finally made a dent in the awful war mentality. I invite you all to join our movement. Thank you.

Notes

1. NBC News, “German TV Shows Nazi Symbols on Helmets of Ukraine Soldiers”, September 6 2014
2. BBC, March 18, 2014
3. Information Clearinghouse, “How Can You Tell Whether Russia has Invaded Ukraine?”, September 1 2014
4. Boston Globe, October 12, 2001
5. See, for example, William Blum, Rogue State: A Guide to the World’s Only Superpower(2005), chapter 1
6. Washington Post, August 28, 2014
7. Foreign Affairs magazine (Council on Foreign Relations), January/February 2000

If You Want To Get Into A Really Big War, Elect A Liberal

If I pointed out that involvement in every major 20th-century conflict the US was part of occurred on liberals’ watch, it might not be entirely fair. True, there was WWI under Wilson, WWII under FDR, Korea under Truman, and Vietnam under Kennedy and Johnson. But the second Great War needed to be fought, four conflicts aren’t exactly a scientific sample, and some could contend that these men were, to some extent, victims of timing and circumstance. It also should be said that with modernity’s characteristic flaw of relativism causing ever shifting social visions, yesterday’s liberals aren’t like today’s. As to this, some may mention that it’s a tad tendentious to limit the conflict timeframe to the 20th century, with George W. Bush getting us into Iraq and Afghanistan. But like his father, Bush was always a traditional statist, an old-line liberal in the mold of JFK. Moreover, our Middle East adventures weren’t quite like Korea or Vietnam: the wars were won fast. The problem was winning the peace.

But, fair enough, the historical record itself isn’t sufficient to indict liberals as warmongers. No matter, though, because I don’t claim liberals are warmongers. They are ignorance and naïveté mongers.

Avoiding disastrous war is the stuff of foreign policy, and foreign policy involves dealing with other humans; as such, it can only be as good as your understanding of human nature. Thus, just as in the schoolyard or the street, your ability to avoid disastrous international fights will be commensurate with your understanding of human nature. Can you read people — some of whom are potential threats — well? Can you differentiate between a gathering storm that needs to be nipped in the bud and a situation exacerbated by meddling? Do you know what’s your business and what isn’t? Can you strike the balance between projecting the strength that deters aggression and seeming as a threat yourself? Complicating matters is that foreign policy is about dealing with foreign human beings, people sharing your basic nature but not your basic conception of the world.

Given this, it’s clear that a leader can only avoid unnecessary or disastrous war insofar as he grasps man’s nature. And how do liberals measure up in this area?

During the 1990s budget battles, liberals said that with the alleged Republican “budget cuts,” the elderly would have to eat dog food to afford medicine. Spoofing this, radio host Rush Limbaugh said that he purchased a new can opener for his mother “so that she can get the dog food easier when she has to eat it.” The next day, liberal Congresswoman Pat Schroeder took to the House floor and said, flabbergasted, “[T]his is what it’s come to! …Rush Limbaugh actually said he’s going to buy his mother a can opener so she can have dog food. Wow!”

Yeah, wow. Schroeder took seriously the most obvious of jokes. Talk about an inability to read people. Talk about a foreign human being.

Exhibit B: at a 1990s feminist conference in my area, I made a rather articulate statement during the question-and-answer session, prompting some agitated feminist organizers to subsequently approach me and ask if I represented some group. Finding me unpalatable, they ultimately begged out of the conversation by offering to send me literature and asking for my address. I consented but quipped, “As long as you don’t send a hit squad to my house.”

You guessed it. Schroederesquely, they took me seriously and said sternly, “We don’t do things like that.” Bizarre. Just bizarre.

Then I think of Charles Jenkins, an American soldier who spent 39 years in North Korean captivity. After finally returning to the US, he said about his arch-leftist captors, “[W]hen you lie they think you are telling the truth, and when you tell the truth they think you are lying. You learn real quick to say no when you mean yes, and yes when you mean no.” I guess the North Koreans are just like our leftists — only more so.

My last example concerns the nuclear-war scare of 1983. When the CIA reported that the Soviets actually thought NATO command-post exercise Able Archer 83 might be a prelude to a nuclear attack, President Ronald Reagan was shocked. Reagan’s deputy CIA director Robert Gates would later , “Was the Soviet leadership so out of touch that they really believed a preemptive attack was a real possibility?”

Yes, they were.

They were leftists.

Of course, it’s no put-down to mention that just as the Soviets misread Washington, Reagan and, it appears, all his advisors misread the Soviets. We all fail in this regard at times, mistaking a joke for a serious comment, taking offense when none was intended or something else. Discernment is a continuum. But while some people occupy the Amazing Kreskin end of the scale, others populate the Schroeder end. And having such a person in power can mean the bitter end.

And what of Obama? Is he at all a mind-reader or just a Teleprompter reader? He misread ISIS, calling it the “JV team.” He misread the tribalistic, Muslim humans in Iraq, saying they had a “sovereign, stable and self-reliant” “representative government.” He misread the Middle East in general, stating “the tide of war is receding.” As the usually sympathetic New York Times wrote about the president, “Time and again, he has expressed assessments of the world that in the harsh glare of hindsight look out of kilter with the changed reality he now confronts.”

Moreover, just last week Obama said in Estonia that an attack on that nation (alluding to Russian aggression) would be considered an attack on all of NATO and be met with the “armed forces of the United States of America.” Huh? As Pat Buchanan pointed out, such a statement about Russia’s sphere of influence is unprecedented and is something Obama’s “Cold War predecessors would have regarded as certifiable madness.” Would the president really risk nuclear war over tiny Estonia? Was it prudent to enter Vladimir Putin’s backyard and saber rattle? Was Obama wise to send the message that he’s either the world’s worst bluffer or its most insane leader?

But, again, liberals are the Braille bunch of human understanding. Just consider their prescriptions for deterring criminals, disciplining children, interpreting sexual inclinations or perceived statuses, encouraging productivity, avoiding nuclear war (unilateral disarmament), dealing with bullies in schools, thwarting school shootings (gun-free zones) or just about anything else that involves understanding man’s nature. Like old Patsy, who mistook a most comedic comment for the most serious callousness, they don’t just get others wrong — they get things completely backwards.

Why is this? Because liberals live lives of rationalization, something debating them reveals. You can make an airtight point and a leftist not only won’t cede it, he’ll disgorge a completely absurd denial of reality. Of course, that’s what a rationalization is: when you lie to yourself, bend reality for yourself. And when you deny reality habitually, year after year — refusing to see one pixel here, another there, and a thousand others in different places — you never assemble enough elements of reality to see the big picture; this is called being out of touch with reality. Yet living in a Matrix of his own design, the person doesn’t know he’s thus detached. But the consequence is that he has difficulty discerning truth; he misreads people, events, life, the Universe and everything.

What explains liberals’ propensity for rationalization? Note here that by “liberals” I mean people who are relativists, who don’t believe in Absolute Truth, because this defines liberals (generally speaking) at the deepest level: the philosophical. And while we all may rationalize, there is a difference. If a person believes in Truth, he’ll likely care about it and be less likely to deny one of its inconvenient or uncomfortable aspects. He’ll be wont to say, “Okay, I don’t like reality here, but, heck, the Truth’s the Truth; I’ll just have to man up and accept it.” He also may understand, or at least sense intuitively, that denial of Truth is a moral defect.

But the person fancying that morality is just values and values are man-made, that everything is relative, approaches things differently. You can’t be denying Truth if Truth doesn’t exist; you’re just denying a different perspective. Moreover, even in matters of outright deception, such as peddling forged documents damaging to George W. Bush, what of it? A lie can’t be any worse than the “truth” in a relativistic universe. For everything there boils down to occultist Aleister Crowley’s maxim, “Do what thou wilt shall be the whole of the law.”

So what can we expect from our detached-from-reality ignorance mongers? Well, pondering this I’m reminded of a woman whose somewhat liberal husband would be namby-pamby with their son, let him take too many liberties and allow the tension to build, until he would explode and react to the boy inappropriately. That’s the danger with leftists. If anyone would get us into a really big war, it would be someone who misreads situations and other people, fails to take necessary preventive action, and then reacts rashly. It would be a liberal.

Of course, the bigger problem is the detached ignorance mongers who would elect an Obama — twice. But, hey, perhaps they can persevere if they maintain their ability to rationalize. After all, with the onset of a nuclear winter, there would be no reason to worry about global warming.

Ted Cruz Another Israeli Mouthpiece

Presidential wannabe politicians seldom will champion an American First foreign policy, but are eager to stand behind a Pro-Zionist agenda, even at the expense of our own essential national interest. The mess that engulfs the Middle East is only getting worse. Throughout all the past administrations and swings in the post World War II cast of enemies, Israel is never mentioned by the establishment as a force that undermines American national security. The axiom that Zionism is an unquestioned ally and friend of the United States, goes unchallenged. Any honest evaluation of world affairs must concede that the political class accepts this illusion as fact. If this was not true, why does nothing ever improve in the regional caldron of eternal conflict?

Israel is a country based upon apartheid animus. The claim that it is a practicing democracy is preposterous with the exclusion of displaced Palestinians from the political process. Zionism is a political ideology and any assertions that it is a religion, totally ignores the policy-making nature of the Israeli government. Judaism historically, based upon a religious adherence to the tenants of the Old Testament, is not universally homogeneous. The differences in the Torah and the Talmud are contentions among some Jews since antiquity. Not all Israelis are professing religious believers. Jews are people. A false assertion, that interchangeably substitutes a population for the identity of the State of Israel, is a fatal error. If Jews, bonded together by a tribal lineage was true, the universe of converts would be most limited.

However, in a world, that advances a culture of guilt and adoration to a tribe of self-appointed “Chosen” that proclaims their superiority race, has deadly consequences for the rest of the globe. Practicing the Mosaic Jewish religion is not the problem. Adhering to the Khazars version of Talmudic Pharisaism is the conundrum.

Unless a distinctive separation from the Israeli state is made regarding the different communities of Orthodox Hebrew Semites, Jewish Babylonian zealots, secular Zionists and Kabbalah Satanic Worshipers, understanding the proper and necessary boundaries for a valid foreign policy towards Israel is impossible.

Democrat and Republican politicians have a habit of taking a vow of allegiance to Israel. Virtually all career-oriented aspirants take the pledge. Heretofore, few prostrate themselves so publically by displaying their own ignorance, as Senator Ted Cruz. Wearing his badge of courage, in the asinine hope that deranged Evangelical Zionists will rally enough support for his election, he largely closes the door on rational voters.

The Daily Caller reports, Ted Cruz Booed Off Stage At Middle East Christian Conference.

“Christians have no greater ally than Israel.”

“Those who hate Israel hate America,” he continued, as the boos and calls for him to leave the stage got louder.

“If you will not stand with Israel and the Jews,” he said. “Then I will not stand with you.”

Watch a video segment address, at .

What motivates such statements and assertions by Cruz? According to a post on the Daily Paul Liberty Forum, Ted Cruz is a hardcore Zionist and aligns himself with interests that are destroying America.

“Zionism is any enemy to the United States of America. We have subjugated our economic and military sovereignty to Israel, and the Israelis have taken advantage for far too long. We should not be engaged in wars for Israel and the U.S. and Israeli Zionists who were responsible for 9-11 must be brought to justice. AIPAC should NOT be ruling America and have her politicians in their back pockets. The banking system must be overhauled and rid of Zionist influence. The United States has become Israel’s whore and it must stop.

Zionism and its belief system has enormous control over our media, banking, and political systems and has masses of Americans snowed under. We must stop this and awaken to its effects.

It causes us to be involved in never ending war that is of no benefit to the U.S., it causes us to be fed a false version of reality such that the policies and the money keep flowing in Israel’s favor, and it causes the American people to be placed in the role of debt slaves under our masters in Israel.”

The Cruz fan club may marvel at his Tea Party advocacy, but the underlying question is whether Christian-Zionists, in this grass root movement, are just as clueless as the Senator is when it comes to a ridiculous support for an antagonistic regime, who threatens nuclear annihilation on any foe that challenges their greater Israel expansion.

Coming to the defense of Cruz is a dependable Glenn “Judas Goat” Beck and his Blaze, Listen to the Last Thing Ted Cruz Tells Audience Before He’s Booed Off Stage at Middle Eastern Christians Event. This article also cites another NeoCon exponent of Zionism, the Washington Free Beacon.

“As the Washington Free Beacon reported, “the roster of speakers includes some of the Assad regime’s most vocal Christian supporters, as well as religious leaders allied with the Iranian-backed terrorist group Hezbollah.”A Cruz spokesperson said the Texas senator decided to headline the event despite some of the associated individuals “because he wants to take every opportunity to highlight this crisis, the unspeakable persecution of Christians.”

So what was the reaction from the organizers of the sponsoring conference? Mideast Christian Conference Organizers Never Told Cruz That Israel Was Off Limits, quotes:

“Joseph Cella, a senior adviser to In Defense of Christians, confirmed there were no specific instructions for speakers, including Cruz, to shy away from Israel.”We gave him the following guideline: The theme to stick to is religious freedom and human dignity,” Cella told The Daily Signal. “There were really no guidelines beyond that. We anticipated he would focus on the theme and stick to it.”

When asked if Cruz deviated from that message, Cella said:

We didn’t expect the speech to delve into the matters of relationships of Jewish, Muslim and Christian brothers and sisters over the years. That was certainly a surprise as well as the reaction.

There is newly intense pressure for push back against Israeli mouthpiece politicians. In the Political Vel Craft article, Zionist Ted Cruz Praises Rothschild’s “State” Of Israel: Gets Booed Off Stage At D.C. Conference, the following appears.

“As we keep saying, Gaza has changed Israel’s image in American politics: the grassroots are appalled by Israel’s carnage and they’re going to be more and more of a force in American elections, countering the [Rothschild] Israel lobby. Last month [Rothschild Czar] Bernie Sanders stood by Israel at a Vermont Town Hall meeting and got heckled so angrily by his own leftwing base that he threatened to call the police. “Bullshit!” someone shouted when he said that Israel has a right to defend itself.

Well the rightwing grassroots are conscious too. Texas [Rothschild Proxy] Senator Ted Cruz got booed off a Washington stage last night after a Christian audience railed at him for praising Israel for defending Christians (when it’s undermining Christian life in the occupied territories).”

Those mostly ignored facts and dirty little inconsistencies have a way of popping up to spoil the Zionist luv fests.

Lastly, the incendiary Loonwatch.com essay Ted Cruz: Christian Dominionism’s Manchurian Candidate, lives up to their name. However, the Emperor author makes a valid point, even if he fails to understand what it is.

“When Keith Ellison ran for Congress he was incessantly attacked by the Islamophobia industry. For years he was assaulted by hostile Conservative organizations and lobbyists as a “stealth Jihadist.” His victories were viewed as a sign of “creeping Islamization.”To this very day the fact that he is in Congress is still a sore point that produces all sorts of vitriolic hatred on the Right.Ironically, the Christian fundamentalists who rant and rave about the phantasm of Muslim fundamentalist takeover of the USA are only projecting their own (hidden) inner desires. It is the Christian Dominionists who have a theology of covertly taking the levers of power and tilting the USA towards theocracy.”

The theocracy that really underpins American political life is not an immerging Islamic Sharia law movement or even the Christian gospel of Jesus Christ. Woefully, what permeates every stratum of politics is an unholy devotion to the temple of Baal. The country of Israel betrays YHVH with their heretical worldview of pre-eminence. America has blasphemed against the Prince of Peace. The United States cannot be a Good Shepherd by following the dictates of Israel. And Yahweh is not a Zionist.

Ted Cruz needs a lesson in religion from .

Texe Marrs in the account, Senator Ted Cruz an Israeli Lackey, sums up the situation nicely. “In the first month after winning the election, Cruz flew to Israel twice to get instructions from his new masters.”

The future restoration of America is impossible, unless and until, the blind obedience to the Israel lobby is broken for the last time. Genuine conservative populists will never support any candidate that subjugates national interests under the approved direction of Zionists. Ted Cruz is one of many, who deserve to be booed.

Suckering The Public On A War On Terror

The gullibility of the American public only exceeded by the ease that the fascist establishment is able to conduct their criminal government without any meaningful protest – just keeps rolling along. The mainstream media is still able to practice their black art of painting their masterpiece, entitled discovering a new cell of terrorists in every news report. Making up a scripted narrative to fix all seasons, take the creative ability of a screenwriter and the guidance of the intelligence community to shepherd the story to fix the immediate political objective. In a world where truth is the rarest of all commodities, you can be assured that the simpletons, who believe the psychological warfare accounts reported as fact, will invariably remain docile fools.

The news machine has become pure government propaganda. If the fantasy spin was merely benign diversion or trivia, one might be able to simply ignore or dismiss the poppycock as the price of driving broadcasts for ratings. However, when national survival as a free society, systematically being dismantled to rationalize some phony made up terrorist threat, the luxury of pampering an imbecilic public attitude that accept lies as reality, can no longer be tolerated.

Mikael Thalen’s article, ISIS Beheadings of Journalists: CIA Admitted to Staging Fake Jihadist Videos in 2010, cites “A 2010 Washington Post article authored by former Army Intelligence Officer Jeff Stein features a detailed account of how the CIA admittedly filmed a fake Bin Laden video during the run up to the 2003 Iraq war.”

Mr. Thalen goes on to say: “Only days after in the James Foley beheading video, top British forensic experts concluded that the video was likely staged using “camera trickery and slick post-production techniques.”

Whether or not Foley lost his head, the accounts provided by a hysterical media, calling for an immediate reversal from rejecting a bombing campaign against Syria, has the smell of a cooked up plan to expand the Middle East regional conflict.

Note that the LiveLeak provides several links to information that supports the claim, Headless James Foley – His Secret Life and the CIA.

“James Foley was a key propagandist in sparking the U.S. air invasion of Libya, in 2011. The proof is here. Believe it or not, it was through his kidnapping then ALSO… part of it spent on a posh resort island! Just about a year after his ‘release’ from that, he’s kidnapped AGAIN! This time, he’s calling us to attack Assad… apparently.

There seems to be plenty of evidence, that we have NOT been told the truth about Foley’s life at all – AND, perhaps not surprisingly, that he works for the CIA… under “press” cover.”

Most people only hear, and sequentially believe, what their prejudicial indoctrination from the government press releases say, and reported as fact, by the controlled media. Those who doubt this occurrence need to reflect on the Intercept account by Ken Silverstein, The CIA’S Mop-Up Man: L.A. Times Reported Cleared Stories With Agency Before Publication.

“A prominent national security reporter for the Los Angeles Times routinely submitted drafts and detailed summaries of his stories to CIA press handlers prior to publication, according to documents obtained by The Intercept.

Email exchanges between CIA public affairs officers and Ken Dilanian, now an Associated Press intelligence reporter who previously covered the CIA for the Times, show that Dilanian enjoyed a closely collaborative relationship with the agency, explicitly promising positive news coverage and sometimes sending the press office entire story drafts for review prior to publication. In at least one instance, the CIA’s reaction appears to have led to significant changes in the story that was eventually published in the Times.

“I’m working on a story about congressional oversight of drone strikes that can present a good opportunity for you guys,” Dilanian wrote in one email to a CIA press officer, explaining that what he intended to report would be “reassuring to the public” about CIA drone strikes. In another, after a series of back-and-forth emails about a pending story on CIA operations in Yemen, he sent a full draft of an unpublished report along with the subject line, “does this look better?” In another, he directly asks the flack: “You wouldn’t put out disinformation on this, would you?”

Some of the most bold and significant revelations appear under the byline of the Intercept. It comes as no surprise that the founding editor Glenn Greenwald is front and center on the government’s radar as a press source that needs silencing. Simply dismissing him as a tin foil hat conspiracy kook does not fly even in the delusional minds of the NeoCons.

Now that the thirteenth anniversary of the false flag spectacle of September 11, 2001 approaches, it would be useful to review the two BATR articles. 911 has become the ultimate excuse and 911 Ten Years After. With all the chatter and hype, that another attack is imminent coming from the airwaves and presses, creating another diversion to warrant the insidious police state, which has engulfed our land, is probable.
The “presstitutes” are the gatekeepers for the New World Order, AKA the Nefarious Warrior Organism. The War of Terror is and always has been a colossal fraud. Even so, the collective mind of the MSM audience sucks up the disinformation and spin and accepts the account as fact and truth. If this was not so, how can it be objectively explained why it is so easy to turn the psyche dislocation of society on the preverbal dime?

Volumes in the social literature, written on the techniques and practices of mind manipulation, do not adequately excuse, and certainly do not vindicate the pernicious undermining of our lawful and traditional social order. Most analysis makes a feeble attempt to rationalize the scientific perfection of mass adverting and focus group polling to gauge current public sentiment.

In a gonzo and ideological viewpoint published in Truthout, presents her Fourteen Propaganda Techniques Fox “News” Uses to Brainwash Americans.

1. Panic Mongering

2. Character Assassination/Ad Hominem

3. Projection/Flipping

4. Rewriting History

5. Scapegoating/Othering

6. Conflating Violence With Power and Opposition to Violence With Weakness

7. Bullying

8. Confusion

9. Populism

10. Invoking the Christian God

11. Saturation

12. Disparaging Education

13. Guilt by Association

14. Diversion

“Pause for a moment and ask yourself what it means that the world’s largest, most profitable and most popular news channel passes off as fact every whim, impulse and outrageously incompetent analysis of its so-called reporters. How did we get here?

My curiosity about this question compelled me to sit down and document the most oft-used methods by which willful ignorance has been turned into dogma by Fox News and other propagandists disguised as media. The techniques I identify here also help to explain the simultaneously powerful identification the Fox media audience has with the network, as well as their ardent, reflexive defenses of it.”
Academia liberal bias never disappoints. Even a proponent of peaceful nonviolent struggle and civil resistance backs herself in a corner by simply trashing FAUX News as a purveyor of indoctrination. Surely, the collectivist progressives teach the brain path road to authoritarian fascism better than any self respecting genuine “conservative”. The NeoCon persuasion from such stalwart beacons of “Kill’em all, and let God sort’em out” philosophy, does not solely reside at Fox. There is more than enough blood on the hands of the last two Democratic administrations to rival the horrible record of George W. Bush.

Government propaganda continues under a bipartisan umbrella of protection. The War of Terror, entirely embraced by the political class of careerist parasites, has only one litmus test; namely, preservation of the empire.

Deflecting the emphasis away from the root cause in the despotism that is rampant in every institution and agency of government merely practices several of the propaganda techniques that Dr. Boaz condemns.

Rewriting history is the function and purpose of an obedient press. Who can dispute that the corporatist media coverage of the entire Obama administration is a textbook example of submissive adoration? The reign of terror is real, but it stems from internal tyrannical policy, not from an external terrorism, which reinvents itself as the situation demands. ISIS is just the latest morphing of a manufactured enemy whose existence is a direct result of clandestine funding, training and mission selection, from our own intelligence community.

Why has this latest maturation of Islamic assassins not set their sights on Zionist Israel? Just look to the controllers of U.S. foreign policy for the obvious answer. Yet a trusting domestic public so easily accepts the latest photoshop images and video cropping of a bogyman executioner. Jihad John, single handily shifted public sentiment to bomb Syria now that you can envision what the lying eyes in the media sees. It is assured that future ISIS locations for drone annihilations must protect all those stolen weapons from Muammar Gaddafi Libya’s arsenals.

The War of Terror is the surest bet in town. Tricking American suckers is just as easy as tuning into your latest government propaganda public service announcement.

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