Obama & Congress: Spending Our Money To Kill Babies

[Author's note:  Yes, I know that I should be grateful that John McCain wasn't elected in 2008 because he would have had America in the middle of WW III by now and there probably would have been bunkers and anti-aircraft missile launchers (and also lots of American dead babies) outside my bedroom window instead of just robins, but still...we are already up to our necks in wars, proxy wars and dead babies as it is -- and I'm sick of it.]

President Obama and Congress may hate each other’s guts regarding a whole lot of domestic issues — but with regard to foreign policy, Obama and Congress just can’t kiss each other’s butts fast enough when it comes to agreeing to kill as many babies as humanly possible in as many foreign countries as they possibly can.  And ASAP.

Obama and Congress spend American taxpayers’ money on killing babies in foreign lands like there is no tomorrow; as if all our hard-earned money could just magically and automatically replenish itself overnight like some magical ATM that never stops working, an inexhaustible resource that has no limits or end.

“Seven trillion dollars gone forever?  No problem.  It’ll grow back.  The important thing here is to keep producing all those dead babies.”  Can’t stop now.  There are still a few left alive.

In Haiti, dead babies.  “They all would have died in fifty or sixty years anyway.”

In Ukraine, dead babies.  “But those babies were rebels, clearly red-diaper babies!”

Afghanistan’s dead babies keep piling up like cordwood.  “We thought they were Taliban!  Diapers, not head-cloths?  Nah.”

Dead babies in Iraq, murdered by ISIS, weaponized and trained by Obama and Congress.  “Just collateral damage that got in the way of the oil.  Again.  Pesky babies.”

Dead babies in Pakistan, Yemen, Somalia, Sudan and, hopefully, Iran next.  “Those babies possessed WMDs!”

Dead babies in Libya, Egypt, Africa and Palestine.  “Ah, the smell of dead babies in the morning.” Dead babies in Honduras.  “They won’t be camping at our borders any more — because they are dead.”

And don’t forget poor bleeding Syria, where Congress and Obama happily released the Kraken, er, ISIS on all kinds of babies that used to be living.  “Those babies were dictators!  They had to go!”

And now Obama and Congress have solemnly shaken hands and agreed that Palestine and Gaza both need more dead babies too.

“The only difference between the “shooting fish in a barrel” attack on the USS Liberty and the “shooting fish in a barrel” attack on Gaza is that there were no babies on board the USS Liberty.  What a waste.”

And even as we speak, Obama and Congress still tirelessly continue to work together, constantly dragging gigantic bags of gold coins over to the Pentagon; hundreds of thousands of black bags that contain over half of all the money that we Americans will ever earn in our lifetimes — huge black bags of gold, all clearly labeled “Dead Baby Fund”.

I want no part of any of this.

Do you?

Ukraine, Negroponte & Missiles

Poor Ukraine just can’t seem to catch a break.

Its ancient history reads like a whole patchwork quilt of disaster stories and its modern history gets even worse.  First there was that insanely terrible Ukraine famine of 1932-33, artificially manufactured by Joseph Stalin in order to forestall a revolt.  And in just those two short years, 25,000 Ukrainians a day died of starvation — until more than 10 million people were dead.

Then Hitler’s Nazis killed 150,000 Jewish Ukrainians at Babi Yar and used eastern Ukraine as a bloody staging area for the siege of Stalingrad.  3.5 million Soviet soldiers died in Nazi prison camps during World War II and many of those soldiers were local boys.  Ultimately, more than five million Ukrainians died fighting Nazi Germany and most of Ukraine’s 1.5 million Jews were wiped out.  Poor Ukraine!

Then Chernobyl blew up.

Then there was a series of corruption scandals, assassinations, price de-regulations, worker strikes, coal mine explosions and a 3.5 billion deficit to deal with during the 1990s, and the new Ukraine republic was destabilized to the point where its major exports became online porn, mail-order brides and Mafioso types running protection rackets in Sacramento.

Then there was that famous CIA-backed “Orange Revolution” in 2004, yet another total disaster — followed this year by Kiev’s famous beer hall putsch.

Geez Louise, why can’t our CIA ever come up with a plan that Americans can be proud of?

The 2014 neo-Nazi putsch in Kiev, the various resultant slaughters of Resistance fighters in eastern Ukraine and the recent shooting down of Malaysia’s MH17 all seem to have one thing in common:  Like any other CIA-backed “nation-building” operation throughout the known world, they are all sort of shadowy, shady and hard to define.  However, I am certainly going to try to define them.

To try to understand the pattern of what just happened in Ukraine, you first gotta to go all the way back to Central America during Ronald Reagan’s reign and climb into the mind of John Negroponte — a one-trick-pony kind of guy whose major contribution to America’s international diplomatic policy was the judicious use of snipers and other Trojan-horse-style agitators to initiate various casus-belli false-flag operations.

And since that time when all Hell was unleashed on Central America thanks to John Negroponte (and we still have all those kids at our borders to prove it too), wherever there have been any kind of protests against CIA policy throughout the world, our John’s dead-eye sniper dudes would show up on the sly, take out a few key people on both sides and then just sit back and watch the fun as both sides began to tear each other apart.

Negroponte’s signature handiwork soon became available in Iraq, for instance, happily starting wars between Sunnis and Shias.

And even before Iraq received the benefit of Negroponte’s ingenious full monty, there was also the bloody aftermath of 9-11 — wherein some crazy Saudi dudes blew up the Twin Towers and Negroponte’s homeys then blamed it on Afghanistan.  And we taxpayers are still paying for that one.

And wasn’t Negrgoponte’s can’t-fail modus operandi also employed in Syria too?  And Scotland?  And Gaza?  But I digress.

It’s almost 100% certain that Negroponte’s brain-children were also at play during the Ukraine protests in Maidan Square last winter too, when both police and protestors were shot at by snipers.   And the result?  Kiev’s very own beer-hall putsch and seizure of the government by pro-CIA thugs.  Poor Ukraine.

The breadbasket of eastern Europe and a jewel in anybody’s crown is now once again wracked by war and killing and death.  And the Odessa Steps run red with blood.  Again.

“So get to your point, Jane.”

What am I really trying to say here?  That perhaps Negroponte and his ballistic-favoring minions have now taken his sniper-attack method of starting conflicts to a whole new level — and are now using long-range missiles instead of long-range rifles to get the dance started?  And thus shooting down the Malaysia airline and blaming it on Russia or Ukrainian Resistance fighters is an idea that he and/or his CIA buddies would definitely come up with?  Just saying.

PS:   According to several MSM reports regarding the deadly missile that shot down Malaysia MH17, apparently the Russians did it.  Apparently Russian bad guys loaded a BUK missile onto a truck, drove through the night like Humphrey Bogart, arrived in eastern Ukraine, set up the equipment, fired at the plane and then high-tailed it back to Russia, not even stopping for coffee or to blow up anything else on their way back.

That doesn’t make any sense.

Russia wouldn’t benefit at all from doing something like this — but who else had means, motive and opportunity?   Let’s ask our John.

And blaming it on Ukrainian Resistance fighters doesn’t make any sense either.  They haven’t done anything like this before or since.  Why just this one time?

Has anyone asked this one simple question yet?  “Has the Resistance shot anything else out of the sky with missiles besides just this one plane?”  Have any fighter jets, helicopters, dragons, pterodactyls or sea serpents been shot down by the Resistance as well?  Or was it only this just one lucky shot from, perhaps, some out-of-control pissed-off Ukrainian Resistance fighter’s high-powered BB gun super-soaker?  

Democrats Want Votes Republicans Want Cheap Labor

But What Do Globalists Want?

The invasion of illegal aliens across our southern border is no extemporaneous event. It is a cold, calculated, and cunning attempt to fundamentally change America. The Obama Administration has sent a loud and clear signal to our neighbors to the south that illegals are welcome, that they won’t be sent home, and that they will be provided either real or de facto amnesty–especially if those illegals are minors. The result is a torrent of illegals pouring over the border into the United States. These illegals are being housed, fed, given medical care, and are being transported to destinations throughout the U.S. Few are being deported. Several military installations have been essentially turned into daycare centers and nurseries, and according to several published reports, up to 70% of U.S. Border Patrol personnel are now being assigned to administrative duties in an attempt to process the hundreds of thousands of illegals that have amassed at the border.

Giving amnesty to illegal aliens is a long time goal of both Democrats and Republicans in Washington, D.C. U.S. Congressman Kerry Bentivolio (R-Mich) stated it succinctly: “Democrats want the votes, and the Republicans want the cheap labor.”

The only people opposing granting amnesty to illegals in Washington, D.C., are the Tea Party Republicans. And had it not been for the defeat of Republican House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (a major proponent of amnesty) by Tea Party Republicans in Virginia a few weeks ago, there is absolutely no question that the GOP-led House and Democrat-led Senate would have collaborated on, and passed, an amnesty bill this summer. But with the defeat of Cantor, scores of GOP House members are extremely skittish about supporting amnesty–especially with the fall elections just around the corner.

Of course, the pro-amnesty media and their fellow-travelers in the Congress are pitching the idea that all of these illegal immigrant children are “refugees” escaping war-torn conditions in Central America. This plays well on the heartstrings of a compassionate American citizenry–just as it is designed to do. Even pseudo-conservatives such as Glenn Beck and Joe Scarborough are trying to score ratings points by getting into the “help the children” act by stunts like sending soccer balls and teddy bears to the border. But the facts just don’t support the hype.

Think about it: Does anyone really believe those youngsters traveled hundreds of miles on their own? Get real! They were led, fed, and supervised all the way to the border. Someone paid those coyotes (human smugglers) hundreds or even thousands of dollars to take those young people to the border. Make no mistake about it: This is a premeditated strategy of insurgents.

The only veteran of both the Vietnam and Iraq wars serving in Congress, Rep. Bentivolio took a fact-finding trip to Central America to assess conditions there. The congressman told World Net Daily that “conditions in Guatemala, Honduras and El Salvador are certainly not great and there is much hardship, but they are not war zones.” In fact, the congressman noted that the conditions of the Central American countries are not dissimilar from many of the inner city neighborhoods of big U.S. cities.

Congressman Bentivolio also said that solving the illegal immigration problem is not complex: “If we had secure borders, we wouldn’t have this problem. We need to send a strong message that, if you want to come to America, do it legally, and get in line.”

See the WND report here:

Exactly! “Do it legally, and get it line.” That is the way it’s been historically done. The next time you hear someone say America is “a nation of immigrants,” realize that is not strictly true. America is a nation of LEGAL immigrants.

But neither Republican nor Democrat presidential administrations (Bush I, Clinton, Bush II, Obama) have done diddly-squat to protect America’s southern border. Does anyone not find it interesting that the federal government will send U.S. military forces to the Middle East with assignments that include protecting and securing the borders of those countries but will not protect the borders of the United States?

Of course, if the federal government was not underwriting illegal immigration with all kinds of government services, illegals would not even have that much incentive to enter the country in the first place. First, the federal government provides every incentive for illegals to sneak into the country via copious government-subsidized benefits, then it refuses to remotely secure the border, and then it refuses to deport them after they have arrived: DUH! I wonder why we have an illegal alien problem!

Beyond that, the federal government has released thousands of illegals from U.S. jails and prisons who have committed the most heinous crimes within this country. At the same time, it has not even attempted to arrest the influx of hundreds of thousands of violent illegals.

According to Texas State Senator Dan Patrick, there are at least 100,000 illegal immigrant gang members in the State of Texas alone. Breitbart.com covered the story:

“On Monday’s The Laura Ingraham Show, Patrick, who is also the Republican candidate for lieutenant governor, said from 2008 to 2012, 143,000 illegal immigrant criminals were arrested and jailed in Texas. He said these were ‘hardened criminals, gang members, and other criminals that we identified as being in Texas illegally.’

“‘We charged them with 447,000 crimes, a half-million crimes in four years, just in Texas, including over 5,000 rapes and 2,000 murders,’ Patrick said. ‘We estimate we have 100,000 gang members here illegally.’”

Patrick also noted that only between one in five or one in ten illegals are actually apprehended. So, do the math.

See the report at:

If we know there are at least that many violent criminals coming across the border, how many potential terrorists must we assume have also come into the United States through this porous, unprotected southern border? The prospect is absolutely frightening!

In addition, the unchecked stream of illegals from Mexico and Central America is also taking a toll upon the health of everyone involved in this debacle. Border Patrol agents are coming down with diseases. There are reports of contagious diseases spreading rapidly.

ABC 15 TV (Phoenix, Arizona) recently gave a report regarding the concern many people have about the spread of contagious diseases being brought into the country by illegals from the third-world countries below the United States. Health workers are already seeing scabies, chicken pox, MRSA staph infections, and other diseases.

A quick note on the MRSA disease: MRSA is considered to be one of the 18 microbes listed by the CDC as a multidrug resistant microbe or “superbug.” You should Google up that disease and see what our children in the public schools are going to be subjected to when all of these illegals get farmed out to the schools of America’s heartland.

And, interestingly enough, the DHS has prohibited health care providers from talking to the media. I wonder why?

See the ABC report here:

Plus, the ABC report above does not even touch on the spread of Sexually Transmitted Diseases (STD) that are being reported as being rampant among the tens of thousands of illegals on the border.

And, yes, America’s schoolchildren (and the rest of the U.S. citizenry) will certainly be subjected to the health risks described above. Listen to this:

“The U.S. Senate Appropriations Subcommittee approved a Department of Homeland Security (DHS) budget for Fiscal Year (FY) 2015 that includes $5.508 billion for Immigration and Customs Enforcement operations. Included in that amount is more than $87 million for the transportation of illegal immigrants–most often via plane–from the U.S.-Mexico border to federal facilities around the nation.

“The FY 2015 bill summary states that the federal government will provide ‘$87.6 million above the request for the transportation of unaccompanied immigrant children–often via commercial or charter aircraft–from DHS custody to the legally required shelters operated by the Office of Refugee Resettlement within Department of Health and Human Services.’

“A DHS request for ‘escort services for unaccompanied alien children,’ posted online in January, claimed that 50 percent of transported foreign minors are brought to interior U.S. cities via commercial planes. The others are transported via local ground transport and ICE charter air crafts.”

See the report here:

So, the people of the United States must be subjected to all of the above because “Democrats want the votes, and the Republicans want the cheap labor.” But what do the globalists want? The globalists are the real power behind both the Democrat and Republican parties in Washington, D.C. Nothing substantial happens in politics or business without their approbation. So, what do they want to get out of a chaotic border crisis?

Remember, the goal of globalists is the dismantlement of nationhood. They envision a global government complete with a global economy and global military. The United States is the biggest hindrance to this objective. America, alone, has the freedom-oriented history, heritage, culture, laws, arms, attitude, etc., that stands as a huge impediment to the globalists’ agenda. This is in spite of the fact that every presidential administration since Ronald Reagan, most congresses, and the national media have been dominated by globalists.

Remember, too, that the two main assets assisting the cause of globalism are perpetual war abroad and the rise of a Police State domestically. In fact, the latter is dependent upon the former. Perpetual war, conflict, crisis, upheaval, etc., is the impetus for the rise of the Super State, (aka the Police State), which is ostensibly designed to “protect” the people from the crisis. It is no exaggeration to say that most of the crises in the post-World War II world have been manufactured crises for the purposes of creating the Super State. The illegal immigration crisis is no exception.

The influx of millions of illegals–many of whom are violent criminals, murderous gang members, potential terrorists, disease-carriers, and people from third-world, socialist countries who have absolutely no understanding of, or appreciation for, constitutional law, Natural Law, republican government, etc.–will most definitely turn American cities into war zones. And that’s exactly what globalists want. They want every city in America to look like Chicago.

Do you know that there have been more murders in Chicago than in all of the mass-killings throughout the United States combined? See AWR Hawkins’ report:

And what is the City of Chicago but a Police State with barely any rights of self-defense. My friends, that is what the globalists have planned for your city. And illegal immigration is the vehicle that is designed to bring it to pass.

Yes, “Democrats want the votes, and the Republicans want the cheap labor,” but the globalists want a national crisis that will further facilitate turning America into a giant Police State. But, I suppose the biggest question is what do the American people want? We’ll soon see.

How The NeoCons ‘Managed’ Saddam Hussein

And Why the Facts Matter Now…

Part One of Four…

“I’m not a journalist and the facts don’t matter.” - Rayelan Allen, RMN owner and editor

“All politics is personal,” or “the personal is political.” Early feminist sayings

In November of 2002 we had been lied to about Weapons of Mass Destruction, the reason given for invading Iraq, resistance to the war was waning. Standing in the way, though this was not publicly known at the time, was Saddam Hussein, who was very willing to leave Iraq forever – if he was paid.

Paying him off would have been far cheaper than the cost of the war. But it would not have accomplished the real goals.

The real drive for war was oil and the dollar. The details were carried out by a group of people who had no conscience, willing to lie themselves into power and lie, cheat, steal and kill, to keep it. Together, they have changed our world, bringing us to the precipice of destruction. These are the acts of individuals who behave in exactly the same way in their personal lives. I know.

The build up to war, constructed by the Bush White House, took place as events in my own life played out in shocking ways but which proved to be highly informative in a horrible way.

The strategies used by those I was forced to deal with personally were the same as those used by the NeoCons who were driving us to war. At the time, I was fighting to protect my daughter, Morgan, from the consequences of her life-long bad behavior and judgment. Later, I realized this was not possible.

She is a psychopath acting on the mistaken belief she can get away with anything. Harming others, or even killing them, was perfectly acceptable to her.

Our internal values determine all parts of our lives and for all parts we are responsible and accountable.

How many people died because of the War in Iraq and the lies told to us? At least a million and a half, though the total is probably higher.

How many people misdirected their life efforts through patriotic fervor incited by people who had intentionally used the symbols and language of honor to defraud us? The number is unbearably high.

How many of us have struggled to understand how this could have happened?

Hold the impact of the war and how this was accomplished in mind as we consider what happened from the time this story began in 1997 until the invasion of Iraq began in the spring of 2003.

The Personal

I first became active in politics during the Goldwater campaign. My goal was to achieve social justice and individual empowerment. While pursing these goals I joined the Libertarian Party in 1974. I managed campaigns, ran for office, did fundraising and organized. I left when it was clear the Kochs had destroyed any potential for effective action in 1988.

I studied the problem of organizations while remaining active. In 1997 I was a Regent for the National Federation of Republican Women and coping with the continuing crises generated by my husband, Craig Franklin. Not filing his taxes, when he owed nothing, was typical of Craig’s irresponsible behavior. I wrote this article about what we called, “The Tax Crisis,” in 2008. 

After I solved the problem Craig decided to leave me and take all the money with him.

Beginning in 1997 Morgan, who had committed the incredibly ugly act of working with Craig to defraud me of millions of dollars during our divorce, had, in October of 1998, started a sexual relationship with an old boy friend of mine, John Fund, then on the Editorial Board of the Wall Street Journal. She wanted a rich husband and decided he would do.

Always ambitious, she had emerged from her childhood, which had traumatized her entire family, functionally illiterate – and her previous prospect for marital bounty,, had flown the coop the month before.

She was actually traveling with my estranged husband, on a tour of New York, London, and Paris, when she and John started their affair. Would she have hesitated if she had known how promiscuous John had become, enabled by the power accrued as a NeoCon operative? Probably not. But she might have played things differently.

John Fund was placed at the WSJ in 1984 by connections who maintained close ties with the people who were already working to put Bush in office by stealing the election in 2000. Positioned as a journalist he is actually a political operative, his first experiences in this coming through the Koch Brothers’ attempt to take over the Libertarian Party.

Taking up with your mother’s former boy friend, someone you have referred to as ‘Uncle John’ since you were a child, is scandalous behavior, there is no other word for it. This type of behavior is normal for Morgan.

I had no idea this was going on because I was thousands of miles away caring for my oldest son, Arthur, who had attempted suicide by shooting himself through the brain on March 22, 1998. It would be another year before he would be able to even go to the bathroom himself. My entire focus was on his care.

Morgan and I were not talking because her deviousness and lies had included attempting to persuade me she needed a heart transplant in an attempt to get me to turn off her brother’s life support. She called me to ask for his heart. This happened, I later realized, soon after she had been paid $10,000 to do this by my estranged husband, Craig Franklin.

One of the reasons psychopaths get away with so much is our inability to believe the ugliness of their real motives. This is also true in politics.

When John started his liaison with Morgan he expected a job as speechwriter for the Bush administration, still two years in the future. They were already discussing war with Iraq. John would assist, pushing the agenda in the media.

After years of dealing with Morgan I knew not to believe her if she did not offer proof but I had no reason to distrust John. So, in September, 1999, for practically the only time in her life, Morgan told the truth, with proof.

Puzzled at the persistent rumors about a relationship between her and John, I called to ask him. John and I had been chatting regularly for over twenty years. Asked about the relationship he expressed shock. He denied it, saying he had fed her cat for her once or twice. I believed him. He was completely persuasive, giving the impression of absolute openness.

It was the  recorded by Morgan in September of 1999, which changed my mind.

This is a man who helped lie us into war. His personal ethics match the ones he uses professionally.

One afternoon that September Morgan called me to beg for help. She was broke and about to be evicted from her apartment in Jersey City. John, she said, had forced her to abort his baby the previous March and then dumped her. A heated discussion ensued as I relayed to her my recent conversation with John.

Hearing a call coming in, Morgan put me on hold. It was John. She recorded her conversation with him. You can listen to it on the tape above. A few minutes later I had heard the whole of it.

I was stunned and confronted him on the phone soon afterward. He hung up on me. His cover blown he moved to the next strategy, distancing.

As a result of a  I sent to the WSJ moments later, the job as a speechwriter for the Bush White House, already being promised, vanished. The fax, I was told, was copied at least five times on its way to his office.

The illusion of family values needed to be retained.

Instead of a job in the White House, which John had earned through his work as an operative for the NeoCons, then coming to power, he was told to write a book about how liberals steal elections. This would provide cover for the electronic hacking about to begin.

, would be published September 24, 2004.

The relationship between John and Morgan seemed to stabilize for a while. Fund spent nearly half his time at the apartment I rented in NY at the Rivergate. I was rarely there. John told me he intended to marry Morgan, who he said really loved. I wished them well, glad they had come to some resolution.

But then, in December of 2000 Morgan realized he was sneaking into my empty room to , including Federal judge Diane Sykes, late at night. He left emails where Morgan could find them.

I received copies of these from Morgan via email. This one, Fund sent on  this same year, was typical.

Morgan’s relationship with John continued, headed for rockier and rockier ground as the number of ‘other women’ Morgan discovered increased.

Despite this, they moved in together in Jersey City in July of 2001, just days after Morgan had vented to John Connolly of Vanity Fair. From those interviews Connolly wrote an article titled,  Over my objections Morgan had given him a copy of the tape she had made in 1999.

The article was published September 4, 2001, along with the tape.

Connolly had arranged for the article to be published in Talk Magazine – but Fund intimidated Tina Brown into canceling the story by having his attorney, John J. Walsh, call and make threats. Walsh later billed for services, producing this  Morgan also found a  later.

Instead, the article was published only online on a site called WeaselSearch, from which it got its name. When the site folded it was hosted on American Politics Journal, where it is today.

What Fund did to stop publication is standard operating procedure for NeoCons. He used this later against me.

But because the article refuted the lies John had continued to tell, a scandal erupted anyway.

Understandably, this event did not contribute to bliss in John and Morgan’s relationship but the reasons were far more complex than just one little article.

Morgan called me, outraged. She had refurbished John’s apartment at his request and he was refusing to pay her back. When she moved in the utilities had been turned off because of his non-payment and the plumbing did not work. I made her produce the receipts since I still did not trust her. She kept track of payment for cleaning supplies and repairs, which were complete before she told me John was battering her in the later part of September.

The violence, she later said, had begun one evening after an event at the ALEC Conference in New York in early August.

I had hoped the relationship would work out. To say it didn’t vastly understates the case.

I did not believe her until I heard it happening over the phone, which happened in late September. When I heard John’s demonic glee as he pounded her I felt obligated to take action. As I have said, Morgan lies. Another friend of her’s, Eric Buchanan, confirmed he had also heard this taking place on another occasion. Both of us advised Morgan to leave him. She refused.

During this time , a Republican Woman, called me to express concern for Morgan as a battered woman. She told me she counseled women who had been battered.

Then it came out that her motive was reigniting her brief fling with Fund by assisting him with Morgan. The fling had taken place some time earlier, after Fund spoke to a group to which Molin belonged. Liking what she saw, evidently, she took him home with her. Fund’s parting words were, by report, “You got to swallow.”

We learned Molin had complained to the management at the Wall Street Journal about how she had been treated the year before.

The beatings continued. Morgan filed police  in New Jersey.

Morgan became aware John was still lying about their relationship, saying he barely knew her, while she was living with him. At one point she used her cell phone so I could hear him telling these lies to Lloyd Grove from the Washington Post.

Listening to him lie was stunning. Again, I begged her to leave.

After she found even more emails, from a growing list of other women, she agreed. The emails included these between him and Michele Davis, on ^, and this , revealing the sexual relationship he had begun with law professor Gail Heriot, also on the 13^th of January.

Christine Hall Reis, a new bride, offered the services of herself and her friend, Julie Currie, from Kroll Opposition Research to John on . Christine had sent an unusual photo of herself to John, which he printed and left on the floor, where Morgan found it.

Morgan moved out of the apartment in Jersey City and into an apartment I rented for her in New York around January 24 – 26, 2002. I breathed a sigh of relief, but it was not over. The craziness escalated.

John found out where Morgan was living and moved in with her. He left a litter of papers there, some of which Morgan scanned and sent me to prove this was happening. This letter from  is dated January 25, 2002. Morgan picked it up off the floor in her Manhattan apartment after John left it there. Another incident of battery soon took place just moments before I arrived at the apartment. When I walked in I saw Morgan bloodied and bruised.

The New York  was filed.

John had been told by his two closest friends, Dick Cheney and Karl Rove, who occupied adjacent spaces on his speed dial, he needed to provide evidence Morgan had lied. Which she might well have done. But there were witnesses. Buchanan and I had heard beatings take place and were ignored by authorities. Neither of us were ever called though the authorities knew we were witnesses.

Fund received help from some of the other women in his life. A few of these were victims themselves, unaware of what was really happening and are not named. Others, like Gail Heriot, whose relationship with Fund began in a hotel room in December of 2001 or January of 2002, assisted in building the website Fund used to insert lies into public view and wrote letters for him, libeling both Morgan and myself.

Desperate, we sought help from people who were politically at odds with the NeoCons. One of these individuals was Sidney Blumenthal.

It was at this time Blumenthal put a keylogger on Morgan’s computer to steal information about Fund. He had refused to help, trying to persuade her it was enough to  politically. So Morgan returned the keylogger favor, against my advice.

While she can’t write a literate sentence Morgan was a wiz with computers. It was this act which would expose to us the strategy adopted by the Bush White House to ensure the War in Iraq was not stopped in November of 2002.

An attempt to kill Morgan took place in May, 2002. I heard this over the phone as the key turned in the door of her apartment. Morgan threw herself against it and engaged the dead bolt. I believed her. She is not that good an actress.

Then, she went into hiding with a couple in Georgia.

As the campaign to sell the fiction of Weapons of Mass Destruction was hammered into accepted fact Morgan was following Sidney via his emails and reading early chapters of his book, Clinton’s War. Occasionally she would forward me a copy.

By November war appeared to be inevitable. Then, Morgan called me and asked if U-Day was something like E-Bay. The keylogger had turned up something with more surprises than Blumenthal’s book.

Saddam, in communication with Blumenthal, wanted to cut a deal to be paid to leave so war would not be necessary. I had the origin of the email checked out and the expert said it had come from the Emirates and Baghdad was a likely source.

The appointed agents for insuring Saddam would stay put were the Clintons and their old friend, Sidney Blumenthal. This activism on their parts is likely the real source of the largess which flowed into the Clinton coffers, not Hillary’s public speaking abilities or investment savvy.

The previous January Fund had forced Morgan to sign a ‘confession’ saying no abuse had taken place. The documents were dated January 24, 2002, just before she moved out.

Evidently, Fund promised to pay her what he owned her if she signed and, stupidly, she did. Since an accounting of what Fund owed matched what was asked if you add in the outdated checks Morgan found while cleaning, which Fund had given her, it is likely Rove and Cheney decided this was not enough ‘proof’ to be persuasive.

Eric and I knew the statement was hogwash and would have so testified.

The real campaign to destroy our credibility began in 2003, after Fund’s friends realized they had more than one political operation to protect. They needed to protect John, a pivotal political operative, and the truth about Saddam.

So evidence was sought and obtained through trade with those holding it.

Craig, my former husband, was Senior Vice President of Green Hills Software, Inc. He and the company’s president, Dan O’Dowd, had made a deal in 1997 to defraud their partners. Dan would have a fake stock option agreement made to deny me a marital share during our divorce and Craig would lead a walk out to keep Glenn Hightower, Dan’s partner, from exercising his buy out option when Dan exercised it and made him an offer.

Morgan had supplied a recording of Craig gloating about this and in late 1999 I had filed a law suit. Morgan gave a deposition on February 22, 2001. The suit settled and the deposition was never certified, making it illegal to copy.

Green Hills Software, LLC. exchanged a copy of this deposition for defense contracts. Today, Green Hills Software, Inc. is a billion dollar company heavily into drone technology and supplying the Military Industrial Complex.

The campaign to destroy our credibility began in early 2003.

On January 23, 2003 Fund filed an answer to Morgan’s  in New York.

On April 1, 2003 Melinda’s webmaster received a .

On April 3, 2003, Dan O’Dowd decided the desperate need for servicemembers was to provide a measly $5,000 for a child’s college education. He amount pledged, $100.000, with matching funds up to $250.000. The non-profit was incorporated on the 9th and announced publicly on April 10th. The is an embarrassingly minor contribution for a corporation which made billions from contracts flowing from the military.

On April 7, 2003 Craig Franklin handed an enveloped copy of Morgan’s  to Anne
Fisher, his then girl friend, telling her it contained Morgan’s deposition. It was addressed to John Fund.  It was a Green Hills envelope with the postage paid by the company in advance.

On April 8, 2003  was down.

On May 11, 2003, Mother’s Day morning, I wrote an email responding to questions received early that morning from Eric Alterman for an article which would be published on the 15th.

On May 15, 2003 Eric Alterman’s hit piece, “” was published in The
Nation.

On May 16, 2003 Gene Gaudette, Editor of American Politics Journal, received a  from Gail Heriot, one of Funds many girl friends libeling us.

On June 21, 2003 JohnFund.com, a hit site, appeared online. The site came down sometime after May 19th this year. It can be viewed through the 

On July 22, 2003 Wendy MacElroy, who calls herself a feminist but focuses her attack pieces on women, traded a hit piece on Morgan for a gig at Fox News. Wendy, who has known Melinda since the 1970s, failed to call her or Morgan. The  is titled, False Rape Charges Hurt Real Victims.

During this time Melinda received notice from the IRS claiming she owed money. The IRS refused to tell her why since her returns were produced by a CPA and documented all expenses.

Carried out this way, the NeoCon campaign was masked and did not appear to have any relationship with the War in Iraq. It was all ‘personal.’

But all parts of our lives reflect our values, which is why trying to separate the two in this was is wrong.

Clearly, everyone else had agendas which had nothing to do with the simple, provable fact John Fund committed domestic violence. This is a crime and should be prosecuted even if the victim has lied previously and is a jerk. 

In 2004 I wrote , a lightly fictionalized autobiography framed around my daughter, not myself. I am now reissuing a non-fiction version, which includes “the Bunker in Georgia” Story. That story about Saddam began in , in subsection The Bunker in Georgia.

Saddam also knew too much.

No one read the book, though the reviews were very good.

I wonder what would have happened if I had understood the ruthless lack of conscience these people carry behind smiling, and lying, faces in both their personal and professional lives. What choices would I have made, personal and political?

The next years were given over to stark survival and caring for my son. Since Morgan had drained me of money this was much more difficult. I fought back because I had to, using the only tool I could afford, the truth.

Stay tuned for Part Two - What Happens When You Know Too Much

How American Propaganda Works: Guilt By Insinuation

Why hasn’t Washington joined Russian President Putin in calling for an objective, non-politicized international investigation by experts of the case of the Malaysian jetliner?

The Russian government continues to release facts, including satellite photos showing the presence of Ukrainian Buk anti-aircraft missiles in locations from which the airliner could have been brought down by the missile system and documentation that a Ukrainian SU-25 fighter jet rapidly approached the Malaysian airliner prior to its downing. The head of the Operations Directorate of Russian military headquarters said at a Moscow press conference today (July 21) that the presence of the Ukrainian military jet is confirmed by the Rostov monitoring center.

The Russian Defense Ministry pointed out that, at the moment of destruction of MH-17, an American satellite was flying over the area. The Russian government urges Washington to make available the photos and data captured by the satellite.

President Putin has repeatedly stressed that the investigation of MH-17 requires “a fully representative group of experts to be working at the site under the guidance of the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO).” Putin’s call for an independent expert examination by ICAO does not sound like a person with anything to hide.

Turning to Washington, Putin stated, “In the meantime, no one [not even the “exceptional nation”] has the right to use this tragedy to achieve their narrowly selfish political goals.”

Putin reminded Washington, “We repeatedly called upon all conflicting sides to stop the bloodshed immediately and to sit down at the negotiating table. I can say with confidence that if military operations were not resumed [by Kiev] on June 28 in eastern Ukraine, this tragedy wouldn’t have happened.”

What is the American response?

Lies and insinuations.

Yesterday (July 20) US Secretary of State John Kerry said that pro-Russian separatists were involved in the downing of the Malaysian airliner and said that it was “pretty clear” that Russia was involved. Here are Kerry’s words: “It’s pretty clear that this is a system that was transferred from Russia into the hands of separatists. We know with confidence, with confidence, that the Ukrainians did not have such a system anywhere near the vicinity at that point and time, so it obviously points a very clear finger at the separatists.”

Kerry’s statement is just another of the endless lies told by US secretaries of state in the 21st century. Who can forget Colin Powell’s package of lies delivered to the UN about Saddam Hussein’s “weapons of mass destruction” or Kerry’s lie repeated endlessly that Assad “used chemical weapons against his own people” or the endless lies about “Iranian nukes”?

Remember that Kerry, on a number of occasions, stated that the US had proof that Assad crossed the “red line” by using chemical weapons. However, Kerry was never able to back up his statements with evidence. The US had no evidence to give the British prime minister, whose effort to have parliament approve Britain’s participation with Washington in a military attack on Syria was voted down. Parliament told the prime minister, “no evidence, no war.”

Again, here is Kerry declaring “confidence” in statements that are directly contradicted by the Russian satellite photos and endless eye witnesses on the ground.

Why doesn’t Washington release its photos from its satellite?

The answer is for the same reason that Washington will not release all the videos it confiscated and that it claims prove that a hijacked 9/11 airliner hit the Pentagon. The videos do not support Washington’s claim, and the US satellite photos do not support Kerry’s claim.

The UN weapons inspectors on the ground in Iraq reported that Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction. However, the fact did not support Washington’s propaganda and was ignored. Washington started a highly destructive war based on nothing but Washington’s intentional lie.

The International Atomic Energy Agency’s inspectors on the ground in Iran and all 16 US intelligence agencies reported that Iran had no nuclear weapons program. However, the fact was inconsistent with Washington’s agenda and was ignored by both the US government and the presstitute media.

We are witnessing the same thing right now with the assertions in the absence of evidence that Russia is responsible for the downing of the Malaysian airliner.

Not every member of the US government is as reckless as Kerry and John McCain. In place of direct lies, many US officials use insinuations.

US Senator Diane Feinstein is the perfect example. Interviewed on the presstitute TV station CNN, Feinstein said, “The issue is where is Putin? I would say, ‘Putin, you have to man up. You should talk to the world. You should say, if this is a mistake, which I hope it was, say it.’”

Putin has been talking to the world nonstop calling for an expert non-politicized investigation, and Feinstein is asking Putin why he is hiding behind silence. We know you did it, Feinstein insinuates, so just tell us whether you meant to or whether it was an accident.

The way the entire Western news cycle was orchestrated with blame instantly being placed on Russia long in advance of real information suggests that the downing of the airliner was a Washington operation. It is, of course, possible that the well-trained presstitute media needed no orchestration from Washington in order to lay the blame on Russia. On the other hand, some of the news performances seem too scripted not to have been prepared in advance.

We also have the advanced preparation of the youtube video that purports to show a Russian general and Ukrainian separatists discussing having mistakenly downed a civilian airliner. As I pointed out earlier, this video is twice damned. It was ready in advance and by implicating the Russian military, it overlooked that the Russian military can tell the difference between a civilian airliner and a military airplane. The existence of the video itself implies that there was a plot to down the airliner and blame Russia.

I have seen reports that the Russian anti-aircraft missile system, as a safety device, is capable of contacting aircraft transponders in order to verify the type of aircraft. If the reports are correct and if the transponders from MH-17 are found, they might record the contact.

I have seen reports that Ukrainian air control changed the route of MH-17 and directed it to fly over the conflict area. The transponders should also indicate whether this is correct. If so, there clearly is at least circumstantial evidence that this was an intentional act on the part of Kiev, an act which would have required Washington’s blessing.

There are other reports that there is a divergence between the Ukrainian military and the unofficial militias formed by the right-wing Ukrainian extremists who apparently were the first to attack the separatists. It is possible that Washington used the extremists to plot the airliner’s destruction in order to blame Russia and use the accusations to pressure the EU to go along with Washington’s unilateral sanctions against Russia. We do know that Washington is desperate to break up the growing economic and political ties between Russia and Europe.

If it was a plot to down an airliner, any safety device on the missile system could have been turned off so as to give no warning or leave any telltale sign. That could be the reason a Ukrainian fighter was sent to inspect the airliner. Possibly the real target was Putin’s airliner and incompetence in implementing the plot resulted in the destruction of a civilian airliner.

As there are a number of possible explanations, let’s keep open minds and resist Washington’s propaganda until facts and evidence are in. In the very least, Washington is guilty of using the incident to blame Russia in advance of the evidence. All Washington has shown us so far are accusations and insinuations. If that is all Washington continues to show us, we will know where the blame resides.

In the meantime, remember the story of the boy who cried “wolf!” He lied so many times that when the wolf did come, no one believed him. Will this be Washington’s ultimate fate?

Instead of declaring war on Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Somalia, and Syria, why did Washington hide behind lies? If Washington wants war with Iran, Russia, and China, why not simply declare war? The reason that the US Constitution requires war to begin with a declaration of war by Congress is to prevent the executive branch from orchestrating wars in order to further hidden agendas. By abdicating its constitutional responsibility, the US Congress is complicit in the executive branch’s war crimes. By approving Israel’s premeditated murder of Palestinians, the US government is complicit in Israel’s war crimes.

Ask yourself this question: Would the world be a safer place with less death, destruction and displaced peoples and more truth and justice if the United States and Israel did not exist?

Dr Paul Craig Roberts was Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy and associate editor of the Wall Street Journal. He was columnist for Business Week, Scripps Howard News Service, and Creators Syndicate. He has had many university appointments. His internet columns have attracted a worldwide following. His latest book, The Failure of Laissez Faire Capitalism and Economic Dissolution of the West is now available. 

What Putin Knows

Putin Knows What Happened to MH17, But He’s Not Saying — Yet…

“We have repeatedly called on all parties to immediately stop the bloodshed and sit down at the negotiating table. We strongly believe that if military action in the East of Ukraine had not been renewed on the 28th of June, this tragedy wouldn’t have happened. However, no one has the right to use this tragedy to pursue their own political aims. Such events should unite and not divide people.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin, Official statement on the downing of Malaysia Airlines flight 17

“Lets be clear, both Russia and the US know what happened. They’d have to. Their intelligence and orbital systems saw it all…. They’d have to know.”

Omen 4, comments line Zero Hedge

Washington’s plan to “pivot” to Asia by establishing a beachhead in Ukraine and sabotaging trade relations between Europe and Russia, entered a new phase last Thursday when Malaysia Airlines flight 17 was shot down by a surface-to-air missile launched from east Ukraine. Since then, the western media and prominent members of the US political establishment have used the incident to attack Russia mercilessly and to hold Russian President Vladimir Putin personally responsible for the deaths of the 295 passengers.

On Sunday, the Obama administration launched its most impressive propaganda blitz to date, scheduling appearances for  US Secretary of State John Kerry  on all five Sunday morning talk shows where he made unsubstantiated claims that MH17 was shot down by Russia-backed rebels in east Ukraine.  According to Kerry, Russia has not only “supported, armed and trained” the separatists, but also provided them with the missile system (BUK) which was used to bring down the jetliner.

On CBS’s  “Face the Nation”, Kerry said:

“We know for certain that the separatists have a proficiency that they’ve gained by training from Russians as to how to use these sophisticated SA-11 systems….. there’s enormous amount of evidence, even more evidence than I just documented, that points to the involvement of Russia in providing these system, training the people on them.” (“Kerry Says Russia Trained Separatists to Use Antiaircraft Missiles”, New York Times)

Amazingly, Kerry’s claims don’t square with those of his boss, President Barack Obama who admitted on Friday that he didn’t know who shot down MH17 or why. He said, “I think it’s too early for us to be able to guess what intentions those who might have launched the surface-to-air missile might have had… In terms of identifying specifically what individual or group of individuals, you know, personnel ordered the strike, how it came about—those are things that I think are going to be subject to additional information that we’re going to be gathering.”

The fact that neither the contents of the black boxes or the cockpit recordings have yet been revealed didn’t deter Kerry from making accusations and possibly tainting the investigation. Nor did Kerry mention the fact that the Ukrainian military –who also had BUK missile systems in the area–may have mistakenly taken down the airliner. None of the five hosts challenged Kerry on any of his claims. He was able to provide the state’s view of the incident without challenge or debate, just as one would expect in a dictatorship where information is carefully monitored.

And Kerry didn’t stop there either. He went on to claim that Moscow had sent “a convoy several weeks ago of about 150 vehicles with armored personnel carriers, multiple rocket launchers, tanks, artillery, all of which crossed over from Russia into the eastern part of Ukraine and was turned over to the separatists.”

Needless to say, none of the major media or respective Intel agencies (who closely follow activities on the border) have uttered a word about Kerry’s phantom convoy. Without satellite imagery or some other proof, we must assume that Kerry’s claim is about as reliable as his bogus 4-page “White Paper” that pinned the use of sarin gas on the Syrian government, a charge that was designed to escalate US involvement in the Syrian war and–as journalist Robert Parry says, “spur President Obama into a quick decision to bomb Syrian government targets.”

It’s also worth noting that the journalist who co-authored Sunday’s piece on Kerry in the New York Times was none other than Michael R. Gordon. In 2002 Gordon co-wrote a piece about aluminum tubes with Judith Miller which was intended to scare readers “with images of mushroom clouds” into supporting the war in Iraq.   The story turned out to be complete baloney, but it helped to pave the way for the US invasion as it was intended to do.   Gordon escaped blame for the article, while the discredited  Miller was released.

Now the politicians and the media are at it again; trying to whip up war fever to get the public on board for another bloody intervention. Only this time, the target audience is not really the American people as much as it is Europeans. The real objective here, is to build support for additional economic sanctions as well as a deployment of NATO troops to Russia’s western border. Washington want to sabotage further economic integration between the EU and Russia so that it can control  the flow of vital resources to the EU, crash the Russian economy, and establish a tollbooth between the continents. It’s all part of Washington’s “pivot” strategy that is critical to maintaining global hegemony throughout the 21st century. This is from the NY Times:

“If investigators are able to confirm suspicions that the Malaysia Airlines jet was brought down by a surface-to-air missile fired by pro-Russian rebels who mistook it for a military aircraft, American officials expressed hope that the tragedy will underscore their case that Moscow has been violating Ukrainian sovereignty. While Mr. Obama imposed new sanctions on Russia just a day before, Europeans refused to adopt measures as stringent out of fear of jeopardizing their own economic ties….

The Obama administration already has additional sanctions prepared that could be put into effect quickly if Mr. Obama so chooses. “The question is does this finally move the Europeans across that threshold,” said a senior administration official, who insisted on anonymity to speak more candidly. “I don’t know, but how could it not?”

European officials were cautious in their initial reactions, seeking time and information before jumping to possible consequences, and were reluctant to assign blame. But most of the passengers were Europeans. The majority of them, 154 in all, were from the Netherlands, where the flight originated, which could increase pressure on European governments to respond….Some analysts said the disaster would invariably lead to a re-evaluation of Europe’s approach to Russia.

“Ultimately this is going to ratchet up pressure within Europe to do what they should have done a long time ago,” said John E. Herbst, a former American ambassador to Ukraine now at the Atlantic Council in Washington. “The strength of the opposition to firm steps remains strong, and so it’s not going to go away. It’s just that their position just took a serious hit and it should lead to a stronger set of European sanctions.”…

While Mr. Obama did not articulate such a position, his former secretary of state, Hillary Rodham Clinton, gave voice publicly to what administration officials were saying privately….“Europeans have to be the ones to take the lead on this. It was a flight from Amsterdam to Kuala Lumpur over European territory. There should be outrage in European capitals.”

Can you see what’s going on? Washington doesn’t care about the facts. What matters to Obama and Co. is getting the Europeans on board (“ratcheting up pressure within Europe”) so they can gin up the sanctions, shut off  Russian gas, deprive Putin of a vital source of revenue, and set up shop (NATO bases) in Eurasia.” Whether US Intel agencies were involved in the missile attack or not doesn’t change the fact that Washington clearly benefits from the tragedy.

Keep in mind, that the reason Putin hasn’t deployed Russian troops to stop the violence in east Ukraine is because the EU is his biggest trading partner and he doesn’t want to do anything that will put the kibosh on their business dealings.  Russia needs Europe just like Europe needs Russia. They’re a perfect fit, which is why Washington has concocted this goofy plan to throw a wrench in the works. It’s because Washington wants to be the Kingfish in Eurasia and control the continents’ resources as well as the growth of regional economies. To achieve that objective, they need to convince EU leaders and people that Putin is a reckless aggressor who can’t be trusted. That’s why Kiev has launched one provocation after another since the legitimate Ukrainian government (Viktor Yanukovych) was ousted in late February and replaced with by a US-backed junta government. Most of the provocations have gone unreported in the western media, although they have regularly involved violations of international law and crimes against humanity, like the use of incendiary “phosphorous” ordnance on June, 12 in Slavyansk,    or the bombing of a kindergarten in Slavyansk  or the deliberate bombing of hospitals in east Ukraine,  or the killing of journalists  or the firing of mortar rounds across the border into Russia  or the massacre at Odessa where 42 people were burned to death in a fire at the Trade Unions Building that was started by pro-junta hooligans and neo Nazis. None of these were reported in the western media where the coverage is tailored to advance the corporate-state agenda.

All of these incidents were concocted with one goal in mind; to provoke Putin into sending in the tanks thus providing the media with the opportunity to demonize him as the new Hitler. Putin has wisely avoided that trap deciding instead to work collaboratively with EU leaders Merkel and  Hollande to try to persuade Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko to stop the bombardment in the east and agree to an immediate ceasefire.

Poroshenko, however, who takes his orders from Washington, has refused to end the violence. In fact, on Monday the “chocolate king” launched a massive attack on the city of Donetsk, home to nearly one million civilians. Here’s a clip from a report from RT on Monday July 21:

“A heavy firefight is underway in a section of the city of Donetsk, with cannonade heard downtown. Self-defense reports of pro-Kiev armored vehicles and infantry trying to cut through defenses next to the central railway terminal.

Ukrainian troops equipped with tanks and armored vehicles are making an attempt to break into Donetsk, a city of approximately 950,000 people, an official of the rebels’ self-proclaimed Donetsk People’s Republic, Sergey Kavtaradze, informed Reuters.” (“Kiev forces attack city of Donetsk, civilian casualties reported“, RT)

Poroshenko has no intention of complying with a ceasefire, because a ceasefire does not achieve the Obama administration’s objective, which is to lure Putin into a bloody and protracted guerilla war. This is what makes the downing of MH17 so suspicious, because it could very well be a false flag operation intended to hurl more mud on Putin.

In any event, the fate of MH17 isn’t going to be a secret for long. As journalist Pepe Escobar points out in a recent piece in the Asia Times,  Russian intelligence has collected tons of data that will help connect the dots. Here’s a clip from Escobar’s latest titled “It was Putin’s missile?”:

“Russian intelligence (has)  been surveilling/tracking everything that happens in Ukraine 24/7. In the next 72 hours, after poring over a lot of tracking data, using telemetry, radar and satellite tracking, they will know which type of missile was launched, from where, and even produce communications from the battery that launched it. And they will have access to forensic evidence.” (“It was Putin’s missile?” Pepe Escobar, Asia Times)

So, one way or another, we’re going to know what happened.  The US and Russia have the data they need to figure out where the missile was launched and who launched it. They probably even have recordings of  communications between Air Traffic Tower and the airliner. They know it all, but they’ll probably be cautious about what they reveal and when they reveal it.

My guess, is that Putin will drag his feet to see whether the investigation is thorough, transparent and even-handed or an elaborate hoax used to discredit him in the eyes of his trading partners.

Clearly, the Obama team see this as an opportunity to do a number on Putin, so they could be tempted to use fake evidence like the grainy photos that popped up in the New York Times some months ago that were supposed to prove that Russian military experts were secretly directing the rebellion in east Ukraine. (The photos were fake.) If they try a stunt like that this time around, Putin will be ready for them. And, of course, if he has solid proof that the plane was blown up by Poroshenko’s henchmen, then there could be hell to pay. In fact, it might just bring Obama’s proxy war to a screeching halt.

One can only hope.

Conquered But Not Occupied

First used in the Fifteen Century the word “Levant” has evolved over the centuries. It was originally used to refer to land east of Italy but today it has several different definitions but often refers to the countries of Cyprus, Israel, Jordan, Lebanon, Syria, Palestine, and part of southern Turkey. It has been used as a surname, and as a reference to particular countries. Its popularity has been enhanced by the immense publicity given to the tiny state of Israel which in spite of its diminutive size dominates the region and has tentacles throughout the world. See a map of the ancient Levant here.

Islamic jihadist forces have now conquered vast parts of Iraq and are calling the territory ISIS (Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant). It appears to be a victory for the forces the United States was attempting to destroy but consolidating power could be a victory cloaked in defeat. Consolidation decreases the blocks that must controlled and makes total control easier, it could be a victory for world government. Centralized power creates tyranny; dispersed power contributes to freedom.

From antiquity war and murder have been major problems for humanity. In a jealous rage Cain murdered his brother Abel. War has been the plight of mankind throughout history.

Though the intent was lasting peace, war was the vehicle that allowed God’s Chosen People to conquer the Promised Land. Disobedience caused wars to continue and finally wrested the land from its conquerors scattering those who refused the mercy of the New Covenant. The Temple was destroyed and the Jews of the First Covenant were scattered – by war.

The battle between obedience and disobedience (righteousness and sin) is an everlasting battle that will continue until Jesus comes again.

Sound theology is scarce in America. Arminianism and antinomianism have created a useless pietism that has resulted in the rise of a totalitarian government making the United States an enemy to the world and to its own people. Instead of confronted evil with personal rebukes we have evaded our responsibility transferring it to an increasingly totalitarian government.

Man was not created to govern himself. The anarchy of human opinion always ends in evil humanistic tyranny. We were created to obey God’s Law and when obedience is common conflict is minimized.

The emotional resistance to governmental tyranny that is evident throughout the world is worthless against the obdurate pressure from greedy power centers that consistently win the battle for hegemony. Democracy; government of the people, by the people, and for the people, has not and will not result in lasting freedom for the proletariat.

Manipulation by a controlled press and media keeps the people stuck in a dead end two party system. We have been successfully duped into centering our hope in politics (democracy, republic, monarchy, autocracy, autarky, etc.) believing that we can elect a leader who will bring us righteous government. This, of course, never happens because the leaders are pre-selected to obey the powerful hidden cabal.

Comic Stephen Colbert has coined a new word,” truthiness – truth that comes from the gut, and not from books”. A Washington Post article by cognitive psychologist Eryn Newman reports on the various ways people can “believe things are true when they are not”. Color and contrast affect our beliefs. Photographs bolster our certainties. Newman writes that “people are often unaware of their biases and how biased information influences their judgments”. The article infers that we should seek truth from books and not from the gut. While correct that the gut is often wrong, books are equally erroneous – truth is a product of God’s Word.

In my early Christian walk I was certain that the “Baptism of the Holy Spirit” was the ultimate goal of Christianity. I was adamant against any question concerning its manifestations. In spite of Charismania’s serious heresies, I defended it enthusiastically. .

Human beings are often wrong while adamant about being right. It is a fault common to the brilliant and the mundane; both need the immutable righteousness of God’s Law to exist in equanimity. We were not created to govern ourselves and when leaders bring error to bear on an entire population the results are disastrous.

Though I am an opponent of Christian Libertarianism, Christianity does have a common interest; both seek maximum freedom and minimum government. The Christian model is dependent on a population that is obedient to God’s perfect legal system while the Libertarian model is utopian and humanistic, equally as dangerous as any of the other human systems.

We have a serious problem with any attempt to rectify our current plunge into chaos. Most of our population, Christians included, act as if human beings control the world. The world was created by the God of the Bible and He controls it. What is happening in the United States is a result of the behavior of its citizens and what is required to stop it is a change in behavior.

“Scripture is very clear that the oppression of man follows apostasy from God. It is impossible to read scripture and come to any other conclusion: certainly, Leviticus 26 and Deuteronomy 28 are emphatic on this point. The Lord therefore regards it as further evidence of apostasy if we resist evil for personal reasons while continuing in apostasy. The root to eliminating the wicked ones who rule over us begins with ordering our lives, churches, families, communities, and civil governments in terms of God’s word. When the people are apostate or disobedient they will suffer as God declared through Samuel. Oppression will come upon them. They will cry out against their oppressors, and they will pray to God, but ‘the Lord will not hear you in that day’ (1Sam. 8:10-18). They were crying out against their oppressors, not against their sins and themselves. They were manifesting both sin and blindness.” R. J. Rushdoony, “The Sermon on the Mount”, Pg. 64

Neo-Israel and the Zionists are in the process of gaining control over the Levant. The United States of America is their weapon of choice. It is American soldiers that die supporting the neo-con agenda but it is Israel and the Zionist quest for power that benefits. As Iraq erupts in war and ISIS takes control rumor has it that the CIA controls ISIS. If ISIS can be controlled Iraq will be conquered.

As neo-Israel again bombards and invades Gaza, M. J. Rosenberg writes, “In short, America is a pathetic helpless giant in the Israeli-Palestinian arena. The donors have shut us down. They own our policy.” We are a conquered nation and the church of Jesus Christ and the people that claim the Name of Christ are substantially responsible.

Globalist Republicans Pounce On Rand Paul

The CFR Has Controlled Both Major Parties In Washington, D.C., For Decades…

Just as they did with his father, Ron Paul, globalist elitists within the GOP are pouncing on Kentucky Senator Dr. Rand Paul. Obviously, the only reason for Republican leaders to be ganging up on Rand like this is because they are scared silly that he might just win the Republican nomination for President in 2016. And if there is anything that frightens the GOP establishment, it is an independent-minded, non-interventionist, reader of the Constitution–you know, someone like George Washington or Thomas Jefferson–or Rand Paul.

Here is how Politico covered the story:

“If you had any doubts about how seriously some Republicans are taking the notion of a Rand Paul presidency, look at how far they’re going to shut down his views on foreign policy.

“In the past three days alone, Texas Gov. Rick Perry used a Washington Post op-ed to warn about the dangers of ‘isolationism’ and describe Paul as ‘curiously blind’ to growing threats in Iraq. Sen. John McCain (R-Ariz.) accused the Kentucky senator on CNN of wanting a ‘withdrawal to fortress America.’ And former Vice President Dick Cheney declared at a POLITICO Playbook luncheon on Monday that ‘isolationism is crazy,’ while his daughter, Liz Cheney, said Paul ‘leaves something to be desired, in terms of national security policy.’

“The preemptive strikes suggest that many in GOP fear Paul is winning the foreign policy argument with the American people–and that that could make him a formidable candidate in 2016. After all, second-tier presidential hopefuls don’t usually get shouted down this way.

“‘I think the general fear on the part of a lot of leaders in the Republican Party is that there’s an isolationist temptation after two big wars, an isolationist temptation in the American electorate,’ said Elliott Abrams, a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations who was a deputy national security adviser in the George W. Bush administration. ‘And I think people are genuinely concerned about it and desirous of trying to stop it before it spreads further.’”

See the report here:

Abrams said the GOP establishment is “genuinely concerned” about a Rand Paul presidency. Baloney! They are pee-in-their-pants, scared-out-of-their-minds about it. The GOP establishment is far more concerned over someone like Rand Paul obtaining the White House than they are a Democrat obtaining the White House. In truth, when it comes to globalism, there really isn’t a dime’s worth of difference between the Democrat and Republican parties in Washington, D.C. The movers and shakers of both parties are globalist to the core.

It is more than interesting that the Politico report quoted above sought the opinion of CFR member Elliot Abrams. The Council on Foreign Relations (CFR) is an elitist cabal of globalists that has dominated the presidential administrations of both Democrats and Republicans for much of the Twentieth (and now Twenty-First) Century.

At this point it is important to remind readers of what Rear Admiral Chester Ward–himself a CFR member until he realized what it was all about and withdrew–said about the CFR. Remember, Admiral Ward was the Judge Advocate General of the Navy from 1956-1960.

Admiral Ward said, “The most powerful clique in these elitist groups [such as the CFR, Trilateral Commission, et al] have one objective in common–they want to bring about the surrender of the sovereignty and the national independence of the United States. A second clique of international members in the CFR . . . comprises the Wall Street international bankers and their key agents. Primarily, they want the world banking monopoly from whatever power ends up in the control of global government.”

He also said, “The main purpose of the Council on Foreign Relations is promoting the disarmament of U.S. sovereignty and national independence and submergence into an all-powerful, one world government.”

Admiral Ward was exactly right. Even a cursory look at the names of the most prominent politicians, media personalities, and leaders of the Federal Reserve shows a preponderance of influence by the CFR. For example, here is a small listing of some of the most influential members of the CFR or Trilateral Commission (or sometimes both):

George Herbert Walker Bush. Bill Clinton. Sandra Day O’Connor. Dick Cheney. Les Aspin. Colin Powell. Robert Gates. Brent Scowcroft. Jesse Jackson, Sr. Mario Cuomo. Dan Rather. Tom Brokaw. David Brinkley. John Chancellor. Marvin Kalb. Diane Sawyer. Barbara Walters. Cyrus Vance. Paul Volcker. Henry Kissinger. George Schultz. Alan Greenspan. Madeleine Albright. Roger Altman. Bruce Babbitt. Howard Baker. Samuel Berger. Elaine Chao. Dianne Feinstein. Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Chuck Hagel. Gary Hart. John McCain. George Mitchell. Bill Moyers. Jay Rockefeller. Donna Shalala. Strobe Talbott. Fred Thompson. Robert Zoellick. Richard Nixon. Hubert H. Humphrey. George McGovern. Gerald Ford. Jimmy Carter. John Anderson. Walter Mondale. Michael Dukakis. Al Gore. John Kerry.

What readers should immediately notice about this list is the fact that it is filled with both Democrats and Republicans. Can one imagine the outrage if the above names were all members of the Christian Coalition or even the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU)? But the fact that so many of America’s leaders from both major parties all share membership in the CFR seems to go completely unnoticed.

What we have in Washington, D.C., is CFR-dominated party D and CFR-dominated party R. No wonder there hasn’t been any significant change in America’s foreign policy since World War II, no matter which major party controlled the White House and Congress.

The globalists within the two major parties will do anything to make sure that a non-globalist is not elected President of the United States or given a too-powerful position of congressional leadership. Hence, the GOP establishment is pouncing on Rand Paul early to try and kill any momentum he might garner going into the 2016 presidential race. Virtually everything the global elite plan to do hinge on America engaging in perpetual war. Perpetual war is the linchpin that holds the entire globalist agenda intact. Anyone who threatens that linchpin is declared an enemy by the establishment and is slated for political destruction.

Perpetual war allows the internationalists to continue to fund dirty black-ops drug smuggling, corrupt banking practices, political briberies, political assassinations, etc. Perpetual war is also the number one excuse for creating a universal surveillance society within the United States. Perpetual war justifies spying on the American citizenry, militarizing local and State police agencies, passing legislation that allows the federal government to declare any American citizen an “enemy combatant” or seize and incarcerate indefinitely any U.S. citizen without warrant or Habeas Corpus, and send drones into America’s heartland.

And when it comes to perpetual war and building a Police State at home, the neocons within the Republican Party are far more dangerous than Democrats. Far more! With support for abortion-on-demand, homosexual marriages, the secularization of America’s schools and public institutions, globalists use liberal Democrats to dismantle America’s Christian traditions and value systems. But when it comes to building both the Warfare State and the Police State, globalists primarily use “conservative” Republicans. And, of course, when it comes to obliterating America’s traditional culture by swamping the country with illegal immigrants, both Republicans and Democrats are employed. That’s why you will find as many Republicans (including those at the U.S. Chamber of Commerce) as Democrats pushing amnesty for illegals. There is absolutely no doubt that had not Tea-Party Republicans recently defeated House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (a major proponent of amnesty) in the Virginia primaries, the GOP-led House would have joined with Barack Obama and Senate Democrats to pass amnesty for illegals this summer. That is absolutely undeniable. We owe Virginia Republicans a huge “Thank You!” (I will write more about the illegal immigration problem in an upcoming column.)

There is no question that right now the battle for the heart and soul (not to mention the future) of America is the burgeoning police state complete with its twin-sister perpetual war. And, yes, illegal immigration is also a major battlefield right now. If the globalist attempt to turn the United States into a Police State–and again ramp up more wars of intervention–is not stopped in the next few short years, it will mean the death of freedom and independence in America forever. And neocon Republicans are the primary culprits in this regard.

Ladies and gentlemen, I don’t know how to say it any plainer: if you are forced to choose between a pro-war, pro-police state, neocon Republican candidate for federal office and a Democrat, and if you believe in voting for the “lesser-of-two-evils,” the Democrat is the one for whom you must vote.

Unfortunately, that is exactly the choice that the citizens of Montana have this year in its lone U.S. House race. We have a Democrat, John Lewis, running against a pro-war, pro-police state, neocon Republican Ryan Zinke. Without a doubt, the Democrat John Lewis is by far the lesser evil than Ryan Zinke.

Ryan Zinke never met a war he doesn’t like. He is already on public record saying “civilians” should not be allowed to possess .50 caliber rifles. (Of course, now that he is a candidate for Congress, he has had a sudden election year conversion on the subject.) He has owning-interest in a drone manufacturing company. He is trying to use his credentials as a former Navy SEAL to propel him to the U.S. Congress; but Ryan Zinke is a warmongering, police state facilitator of the lowest order. Being the U.S. House seat in Montana is typically a Republican seat, it is very likely that if the Democrat Lewis wins, he would be a one-termer. A GOP candidate (someone besides Ryan Zinke, who was the absolute worst of all the candidates that the GOP had to offer this year) would have a very good chance of defeating the Democrat Lewis in 2016. On the other hand, if Zinke wins this November, we are probably going to be stuck with this neocon indefinitely. This would be a monstrous mistake for Montana and the U.S. House of Representatives.

Without a doubt, what the globalist elite at the CFR fear most is a presidential candidate who refuses to comply with the pro-war, pro-police state agenda. And while I am still not certain that Rand Paul has the same courage and convictions of his father, Ron Paul, he is, without a doubt, the closest ideologically to the Washington and Jeffersonian vision of non-entanglement in foreign affairs and the philosophical sacredness of individual liberty that we seem to have at the national level these days. As such, the GOP establishment is literally trying to skewer Senator Paul.

The GOP establishment is not worried about Texas Governor Rick Perry, New Jersey Governor Chris Christie, Mitt Romney, former Florida Governor Jeb Bush, or Wisconsin Congressman Paul Ryan. None of these men would stand in the way of the globalist agenda. But the GOP establishment is terrified of Rand Paul–and to a lesser extent Texas Senator Ted Cruz. But given the way that Republican leaders are pouncing on Mr. Paul, it is obvious that he is the one they believe poses the greatest threat to the globalist agenda.

Tracking ISIS’s Supply Line: Even The Devil Has To Eat

Anyone watching the nightly news in America these days has surely seen some of those in-your-worst-nightmare videos showing hair-raising images of the fire-breathing minions of ISIS as they invade Syria and Iraq — blazing across bone-dry deserts in brand new Toyota trucks, brandishing AK-47s and looking like something out of a Hounds of Hell horror movie.  And we all shudder involuntarily, imagining the chaos and terror being spread by these horrible men-in-black, waving pirate flags and screaming for blood.

And we can also probably imagine, far back in the most primitive lobes of our brains, what it would be like to see these very same nightmarish denizens screaming down Route 66, heading toward us too, driving straight for our own town, positively drooling over the thought of beheading us in our sleep and raping our sons and daughters.

But then we come to our senses and realize that this sort of thing can never happen here in America.  This sort of nightmare only plays out in the Middle East (hopefully).

But forget about all that.  Instead, let’s just focus in on the ISIS terrorists and pirates themselves, now safely out there in the Iraqi desert, aka “those terrible rough beasts, their hour come round at last, slouching toward Baghdad to be born, their gaze blank and pitiless as the sun,” to paraphrase William Butler Yeats.

And then let’s ask ourselves next, “While happily out there terrorizing and raping the countryside, just what the freak do these guys eat and drink?  And where in the freak do they find a 7-11 or a Raley’s way out there in the desert?  And when the freak do they even have time to cook and do dishes or pee?”  And don’t even tell me that they are the Devil’s minions and thus live only on air.  And where are their burn barrels and port-a-potties?  And where are their grab-and-go bins full of “Meal, Ready-to-Eat,” menu number 15, beef enchilada, made by the Ameriqual Packaging Company, Evansville, Indiana 47710?

Surely even these devilish super-fiends must have an occasional craving for toilet paper?  Or even perhaps the occasional shower?

So exactly who is providing ISIS with its supply line?

Don’t even dare tell me that ISIS doesn’t have one.

These aren’t ghosts or krakens or the mythological First Beasts referred to in the Book of Revelations.  These are just ordinary human schmucks like the rest of us, who still put on their terrorist Halloween costumes one leg at a time.  The Devil’s minions still have to eat.  And pee.  And they still have to get their shiny new Toyota trucks from an automobile showroom somewhere — one obviously not located in Hell.  And they still have to use earthly rocket-launchers, not ones supplied by Lucifer himself.

Plus sacking and looting can only get these pirates so far before they run out of booty.  And even if they now have billions of $$$ in plundered oil, they still have to sell it to someone.  OPEC they are not.

So where do all these tons and tons of food and weapons and terrorist-chic outfits and port-a-potties all come from?   Your guess is as good as mine.  And I am guessing, based on all that I have read and seen lately, that all these goodies are being supplied by American, Israeli and Saudi oligarchs and neo-cons.  And probably at us taxpayers’ expense too. 

These terrible terrorist ISIS operations appear to be all a part of the American, Israeli and Saudi neo-con oligarchs’ continuing (and very successful) “Land for Blood” program — wherein neo-cons get all the land and the men, women and children of the Middle East get to bleed.  

Of course I can’t prove most of this without breaking and entering NASDAQ and CIA vaults.  Hoping for transparency is like flogging a dead horse.  Just ask Edward Snowden about that one.  But there still is a pattern here, one that started in Vietnam, worked its way through East Timor, Kuwait, Iraq and Guatemala, and is now surfacing again in Ukraine, Syria, Libya and Gaza.  Leopards don’t change their spots.

“What the devil…” you might say at this point.  And you would be right.

PS:  And speaking of tracking supply lines, what about all those other supply lines — all those abundant supply lines that should have been pouring out goodies all this time, streaming them out to the average American, Israeli/Palestinian and Saudi citizen like you and me?  What happened to those?

Those supply lines are all pretty much toast.

Just think of all the trillions of dollars that have been spent on all these damned, useless, murderous and unnecessary “wars” that the oligarchs ruling our countries in the past 15-odd years have indulged themselves in — enough dollars to fix all of our infrastructures, pave all of our roads, create jobs for all of us like there was no tomorrow, educate all of our children for free up to a doctoral degree, make sure we all have top-notch healthcare, and dress every single man, woman and child in America, Arabia and Israel/Palestine with at least one pair of Jimmy Choo shoes!

Just because we don’t dress up like Freddy Kruger, don’t play at being the Devil’s disciples and don’t eat live human hearts on national TV doesn’t mean that we don’t need supply lines too.

All these amazing opportunities for you and me have been wasted.  All that money is now gone with the wind, lost, wasted, never to return.  That ship has sailed.

“But Jane,” you might ask next, “does this mean that America, Israel/Palestine and Saudi Arabia are currently being ruled by selfish, immoral and blood-thirsty idiots?”  Well, yeah.

And here’s another hard truth:  American, Israeli and Saudi neo-con supply lines are also limited too.  They just can’t keep goosing us for our life-blood forever.  Eventually the oligarchs will run out of MREs, cruise missiles and port-a-potties too.  Theirs is not an endless supply line either.

Sooner or later, we average Americans, Israelis and Saudi Arabians are going to be empty and broken like the victims of so many vampires.  What then?  How will the neo-cons keep their war machines supplied once We the People are drained of our life’s blood?

How much money can these three countries spend on weapons and Iron Domes that don’t work and drones and bullets and missiles that cost a half-million dollars each (Israeli neo-cons just fired off 1,500 of them at the poor trapped citizens of Gaza) before the economies of these three countries are broken like rag dolls?  Oops, too late.  We are almost already there.

PPS:  And here’s another supply line to track:  Whoever is supplying the United Nations has also clearly purchased its soul as well — lock, stock and barrel.  For instance, this whole devastation of the civilian population of Gaza?  Women and children being slaughtered for their land — and not a peep from the UN in their defense.  Not even one word.  That’s just shameful.

According to journalist Robert Fisk, “The people who lived in Sederot in early 1948 were not Israelis, but Palestinian Arabs.  Their village was called Huj.  Nor were they enemies of Israel.  Two years earlier, these same Arabs had actually hidden Jewish Haganah fighters from the British Army.  But when the Israeli army turned up at Huj on 31 May 1948, they expelled all the Arab villagers – to the Gaza Strip!  Refugees, they became.  David Ben Gurion (Israel’s first Prime Minister) called it an ‘unjust and unjustified action’.  Too bad.  The  Palestinians of Huj were never allowed back.  And today, well over 6,000 descendants of the Palestinians from Huj – now Sederot – live in the squalor of Gaza….” 

The UN is currently as incapable of stopping wars now as the old League of Nations had been back in the day — because the UN’s very reason for being has been bought off by American and Israeli oligarchs.  It is now as dead as the old League of Nations.  The only real difference is that the UN has yet to lie down.

Yankee Blowback

What would a psychiatrist call this? Delusions of grandeur?

US Secretary of State John Kerry, July 8, 2014:
“In my travels as secretary of state, I have seen as never before the thirst for American leadership in the world.”

President Barack Obama, May 28, 2014:
“Here’s my bottom line, America must always lead on the world stage. If we don’t, no one else will.”

Nicholas Burns, former US Under Secretary of State for Political Affairs, May 8, 2014:
“Where is American power and leadership when the world needs it most?”

Mitt Romney, Republican Party candidate for President, September 13, 2012:
“The world needs American leadership. The Middle East needs American leadership and I intend to be a president that provides the leadership that America respects and keep us admired throughout the world.”

Paul Ryan, Congressman, Republican Party candidate for Vice President, September 12, 2012:
“We need to be reminded that the world needs American leadership.”

John McCain, Senator, September 9, 2012:
“The situation in Syria and elsewhere ‘cries out for American leadership’.”

Hillary Clinton, September 8, 2010:
“Let me say it clearly: The United States can, must, and will lead in this new century. Indeed, the complexities and connections of today’s world have yielded a new American Moment — a moment when our global leadership is essential, even if we must often lead in new ways.”

Senator Barack Obama, April 23, 2007:
“In the words of President Franklin Roosevelt, we lead the world in battling immediate evils and promoting the ultimate good. I still believe that America is the last, best hope of Earth.”

Gallup poll, 2013:

Question asked: “Which country do you think is the greatest threat to peace in the world today?”

Replies:

• United States 24%
• Pakistan 8%
• China 6%
• Afghanistan, Iran, Israel, North Korea, each 5%
• India, Iraq, Japan, each 4%
• Syria 3%
• Russia 2%
• Australia, Germany, Palestinian territories, Saudi Arabia, Somalia, South Korea, UK, each 1%

The question is not what pacifism has achieved throughout history, but what has war achieved?

Remark made to a pacifist: “If only everyone else would live in the way you recommend, I would gladly live that way as well – but not until everyone else does.”

The Pacifist’s reply: “Why then, sir, you would be the last man on earth to do good. I would rather be one of the first.”

Article 9 of the Japanese Constitution, 1947, words long cherished by a large majority of the Japanese people:

“Aspiring sincerely to an international peace based on justice and order, the Japanese people forever renounce war as a sovereign right of the nation and the threat or use of force as means of settling international disputes.

“In order to accomplish the aim of the preceding paragraph, land, sea, and air forces, as well as other war potential, will never be maintained. The right of belligerency of the state will not be recognized.”

This statement is probably unique amongst the world’s constitutions.

But on July 1, 2014 the government of Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe, without changing a word of Article 9, announced a “reinterpretation” of it to allow for military action in conjunction with allies. This decision can be seen as the culmination of a decades-long effort by the United States to wean Japan away from its post-WW2 pacifist constitution and foreign policy and set it back on the righteous path of being a military power once again, only this time acting in coordination with US foreign policy needs.

In the triumphalism of the end of the Second World War, the American occupation of Japan, in the person of General Douglas MacArthur, played a major role in the creation of this constitution. But after the communists came to power in China in 1949, the United States opted for a strong Japan safely ensconced in the anti-communist camp. For pacifism, it’s been downhill ever since … step by step … MacArthur himself ordered the creation of a “national police reserve”, which became the embryo of the future Japanese military … visiting Tokyo in 1956, US Secretary of State John Foster Dulles told Japanese officials: “In the past, Japan had demonstrated her superiority over the Russians and over China. It was time for Japan to think again of being and acting like a Great Power.”  … various US-Japanese security and defense cooperation treaties, which called on Japan to integrate its military technology with that of the US and NATO … the US supplying new sophisticated military aircraft and destroyers … all manner of Japanese logistical assistance to the US in Washington’s frequent military operations in Asia … repeated US pressure on Japan to increase its military budget and the size of its armed forces … more than a hundred US military bases in Japan, protected by the Japanese military … US-Japanese joint military exercises and joint research on a missile defense system … the US Ambassador to Japan, 2001: “I think the reality of circumstances in the world is going to suggest to the Japanese that they reinterpret or redefine Article 9.”  … Under pressure from Washington, Japan sent several naval vessels to the Indian Ocean to refuel US and British warships as part of the Afghanistan campaign in 2002, then sent non-combat forces to Iraq to assist the American war as well as to East Timor, another made-in-America war scenario … US Secretary of State Colin Powell, 2004: “If Japan is going to play a full role on the world stage and become a full active participating member of the Security Council, and have the kind of obligations that it would pick up as a member of the Security Council, Article Nine would have to be examined in that light.”  …

In 2012 Japan was induced to take part in a military exercise with 21 other countries, converging on Hawaii for the largest-ever Rim of the Pacific naval exercises and war games, with a Japanese admiral serving as vice commander of the combined task force.  And so it went … until, finally, on July 1 of this year, the Abe administration announced their historic decision. Abe, it should be noted, is a member of the Liberal Democratic Party, with which the CIA has had a long and intimate connection, even when party leaders were convicted World War 2 war criminals.

If and when the American empire engages in combat with China or Russia, it appears that Washington will be able to count on their Japanese brothers-in-arms. In the meantime, the many US bases in Japan serve as part of the encirclement of China, and during the Vietnam War the United States used their Japanese bases as launching pads to bomb Vietnam.

The US policies and propaganda not only got rid of the annoying Article 9, but along the way it gave rise to a Japanese version of McCarthyism. A prime example of this is the case of Kimiko Nezu, a 54-year-old Japanese teacher, who was punished by being transferred from school to school, by suspensions, salary cuts, and threats of dismissal because of her refusal to stand during the playing of the national anthem, a World War II song chosen as the anthem in 1999. She opposed the song because it was the same one sung as the Imperial Army set forth from Japan calling for an “eternal reign” of the emperor. At graduation ceremonies in 2004, 198 teachers refused to stand for the song. After a series of fines and disciplinary actions, Nezu and nine other teachers were the only protesters the following year. Nezu was then allowed to teach only when another teacher was present.

Yankee Blowback

The number of children attempting to cross the Mexican border into the United States has risen dramatically in the last five years: In fiscal year 2009 (October 1, 2009 – September 30, 2010) about 6,000 unaccompanied minors were detained near the border. The US Department of Homeland Security estimates for the fiscal year 2014 the detention of as many as 74,000 unaccompanied minors. Approximately 28% of the children detained this year are from Honduras, 24% from Guatemala, and 21% from El Salvador. The particularly severe increases in Honduran migration are a direct result of the June 28, 2009 military coup that overthrew the democratically-elected president, Manuel Zelaya, after he did things like raising the minimum wage, giving subsidies to small farmers, and instituting free education. The coup – like so many others in Latin America – was led by a graduate of Washington’s infamous School of the Americas.

As per the standard Western Hemisphere script, the Honduran coup was followed by the abusive policies of the new regime, loyally supported by the United States. The State Department was virtually alone in the Western Hemisphere in not unequivocally condemning the Honduran coup. Indeed, the Obama administration has refused to call it a coup, which, under American law, would tie Washington’s hands as to the amount of support it could give the coup government. This denial of reality still persists even though a US embassy cable released by Wikileaks in 2010 declared: “There is no doubt that the military, Supreme Court and National Congress conspired on June 28 [2009] in what constituted an illegal and unconstitutional coup against the Executive Branch”. Washington’s support of the far-right Honduran government has been unwavering ever since.

The questions concerning immigration into the United States from south of the border go on year after year, with the same issues argued back and forth: What’s the best way to block the flow into the country? How shall we punish those caught here illegally? Should we separate families, which happens when parents are deported but their American-born children remain? Should the police and various other institutions have the right to ask for proof of legal residence from anyone they suspect of being here illegally? Should we punish employers who hire illegal immigrants? Should we grant amnesty to at least some of the immigrants already here for years? … on and on, round and round it goes, decade after decade. Those in the US generally opposed to immigration make it a point to declare that the United States does not have any moral obligation to take in these Latino immigrants.

But the counter-argument to this last point is almost never mentioned: Yes, the United States does indeed have a moral obligation because so many of the immigrants are escaping a situation in their homeland made hopeless by American intervention and policy. In addition to Honduras, Washington overthrew progressive governments which were sincerely committed to fighting poverty in Guatemala and Nicaragua; while in El Salvador the US played a major role in suppressing a movement striving to install such a government. And in Mexico, though Washington has not intervened militarily since 1919, over the years the US has been providing training, arms, and surveillance technology to Mexico’s police and armed forces to better their ability to suppress their own people’s aspirations, as in Chiapas, and this has added to the influx of the oppressed to the United States, irony notwithstanding.

Moreover, Washington’s North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), has brought a flood of cheap, subsidized US agricultural products into Mexico, ravaging campesino communities and driving many Mexican farmers off the land when they couldn’t compete with the giant from the north. The subsequent Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA) has brought the same joys to the people of that area.

These “free trade” agreements – as they do all over the world – also result in government enterprises being privatized, the regulation of corporations being reduced, and cuts to the social budget. Add to this the displacement of communities by foreign mining projects and the drastic US-led militarization of the War on Drugs with accompanying violence and you have the perfect storm of suffering followed by the attempt to escape from suffering.

It’s not that all these people prefer to live in the United States. They’d much rather remain with their families and friends, be able to speak their native language at all times, and avoid the hardships imposed on them by American police and other right-wingers.

M’lady Hillary

Madame Clinton, in her new memoir, referring to her 2002 Senate vote supporting military action in Iraq, says: “I thought I had acted in good faith and made the best decision I could with the information I had. And I wasn’t alone in getting it wrong. But I still got it wrong. Plain and simple.”

In a 2006 TV interview, Clinton said: “Obviously, if we knew then what we know now, there wouldn’t have been a vote. And I certainly wouldn’t have voted that way.”

On October 16, 2002 the US Congress adopted a joint resolution titled “Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq”. This was done in the face of numerous protests and other political events against an American invasion.

On February 15, 2003, a month before the actual invasion, there was a coordinated protest around the world in which people in some 60 countries marched in a last desperate attempt to stop the war from happening. It has been described as “the largest protest event in human history.” Estimations of the total number of participants involved reach 30 million. The protest in Rome involved around three million people, and is listed in the 2004 Guinness Book of World Records as the largest anti-war rally in history. Madrid hosted the second largest rally with more than 1½ million protesters. About half a million marched in the United States. How many demonstrations in support of the war can be cited? It can be said that the day was one of humanity’s finest moments.

So what did all these people know that Hillary Clinton didn’t know? What information did they have access to that she as a member of Congress did not have?

The answer to both questions is of course “Nothing”. She voted the way she did because she was, as she remains today, a wholly committed supporter of the Empire and its unending wars.

And what did the actual war teach her? Here she is in 2007, after four years of horrible death, destruction and torture:

“The American military has done its job. Look what they accomplished. They got rid of Saddam Hussein. They gave the Iraqis a chance for free and fair elections. They gave the Iraqi government the chance to begin to demonstrate that it understood its responsibilities to make the hard political decisions necessary to give the people of Iraq a better future. So the American military has succeeded.”

And she spoke the above words at a conference of liberals, committed liberal Democrats and others further left. She didn’t have to cater to them with any flag-waving pro-war rhetoric; they wanted to hear anti-war rhetoric (and she of course gave them a tiny bit of that as well out of the other side of her mouth), so we can assume that this is how she really feels, if indeed the woman feels anything. The audience, it should be noted, booed her, for the second year in a row.

“We came, we saw, he died.” – Hillary Clinton as US Secretary of State, giggling, as she referred to the uncivilized and utterly depraved murder of Moammar Gaddafi in 2011.

Imagine Osama bin Laden or some other Islamic leader speaking of September 11, 2001: “We came, we saw, 3,000 died, ha-ha.”

Notes

1. Los Angeles Times, September 23, 1994
2. Washington Post, July 18, 2001
3. BBC, August 14, 2004
4. Honolulu Star-Advertiser, June 23 and July 2, 2012
5. Tim Weiner, “Legacy of Ashes: The History of the CIA” (2007), p.116-21
6. Washington Post, August 30, 2005
7. Washington Post, June 6, 2014
8. Speaking at the “Take Back America” conference, organized by the Campaign for America’s Future, June 20, 2007, Washington, DC; this excerpt can be heard on the June 21, 2007 edition of Democracy Now!

Pushing Ukraine To The Brink

“The unipolar world model has failed. People everywhere have shown their desire to choose their own destiny, preserve their own cultural identity, and oppose the West’s attempts at military, financial, political and ideological domination.”

– Vladimir Putin

“While the human politics of the crisis in Ukraine garner all the headlines, it is the gas politics that in many ways lies at the heart of the conflict.”

– Eric Draitser, Waging war against Russia, one pipeline at a time, RT

What does a pipeline in Afghanistan have to do with the crisis in Ukraine?

Everything. It reveals the commercial interests that drive US policy. Just as the War in Afghanistan was largely fought to facilitate the transfer of natural gas from Turkmenistan to the Arabian Sea, so too, Washington engineered the bloody coup in Kiev to cut off energy supplies from Russia to Europe to facilitate the US pivot to Asia.

This is why policymakers in Washington are reasonably satisfied with the outcome of the war in Afghanistan despite the fact that none of the stated goals were achieved. Afghanistan is not a functioning democracy with a strong central government, drug trafficking has not been eradicated, women haven’t been liberated, and the infrastructure and school systems are worse than they were before the war. By every objective standard the war was a failure. But, of course, the stated goals were just public relations blather anyway. They don’t mean anything. What matters is gas, namely the vast untapped reserves in Turkmenistan that could be extracted by privately-owned US corporations who would use their authority to control the growth of US competitors or would-be rivals like China. That’s what the war was all about. The gas is going to be transported via a pipeline from Turkmenistan, across Afghanistan, Pakistan and India to the Arabian sea, eschewing Russian and Iranian territory. The completion of the so called TAPI pipeline will undermine the development of an Iranian pipeline, thus sabotaging the efforts of a US adversary.

The TAPI pipeline illustrates how Washington is aggressively securing the assets it needs to maintain its dominance for the foreseeable future. Now, check this out from The Express Tribune, July 5:

“Officials of Pakistan, India, Afghanistan and Turkmenistan are set to meet in Ashgabat next week to push ahead with a planned transnational gas pipeline connecting the four countries and reach a settlement on the award of the multi-billion-dollar project to US companies.

“The US is pushing the four countries to grant the lucrative pipeline contract to its energy giants. Two US firms – Chevron and ExxonMobil – are in the race to become consortium leaders, win the project and finance the laying of the pipeline,” a senior government official said while talking to The Express Tribune.

Washington has been lobbying for the gas supply project, called Turkmenistan, Afghanistan, Pakistan and India (Tapi) pipeline, terming it an ideal scheme to tackle energy shortages in Pakistan. On the other side, it pressed Islamabad to shelve the Iran-Pakistan gas pipeline because of a nuclear standoff with Tehran…

According to officials, Petroleum and Natural Resources Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi will lead a delegation at the meeting of the TAPI pipeline steering committee on July 8 in Ashgabat.

…At present, bid documents are being prepared in consultation with the Asian Development Bank, which is playing the role of transaction adviser. The documents will be given to the two companies only for taking part in the tender.

Chevron is lobbying in India, Pakistan and Afghanistan to clinch a deal, backed by the US State Department. However, other companies could also become part of the consortium that will be led either by Chevron or ExxonMobil.” (TAPI pipeline: Officials to finalise contract award in Ashgabat next week, The Express Tribune)

So the pipeline plan is finally moving forward and, as the article notes, “The documents will be given to the two companies only for taking part in the tender.”

Nice, eh? So the State Department applies a little muscle and “Voila”, Chevron and Exxon clinch the deal. How’s that for a free market?

And who do you think is going to protect that 1,000 mile stretch of pipeline through hostile Taliban-controlled Afghanistan?

Why US troops, of course, which is why US military bases are conveniently located up an down the pipeline route. Coincidence?

Not on your life. Operation “Enduring Freedom” is a bigger hoax than the threadbare war on terror.

So let’s not kid ourselves. The war had nothing to do with liberating women or bringing democracy to the unwashed masses. It was all about power politics and geostrategic maneuvering; stealing resources, trouncing potential rivals, and beefing up profits for the voracious oil giants. Who doesn’t know that already? Here’s more background from the Wall Street Journal:

“Earlier this month, President Obama sent a letter to (Turkmenistan) President Berdimuhamedow emphasizing a common interest in helping develop Afghanistan and expressing Mr. Obama’s support for TAPI and his desire for a major U.S. firm to construct it.

…Progress on TAPI will also jump-start many of the other trans-Afghan transport projects—including roads and railroads—that are at the heart of America’s “New Silk Road Strategy” for the Afghan economy.

The White House should understand that if TAPI isn’t built, neither U.S. nor U.N. sanctions will prevent Pakistan from building a pipeline from Iran.” (The Pipeline That Could Keep the Peace in Afghanistan, Wall Street Journal)

Can you see what’s going on? Afghanistan, which is central to Washington’s pivot strategy, is going to be used for military bases, resource extraction and transportation. That’s it. There’s not going to be any reconstruction or nation building. The US doesn’t do that anymore. This is the stripped-down, no-frills, 21st century imperialism. “No nation for you, buddy. Just give us your gas and off we’ll go.” That’s how the system works now. It’s alot like Iraq –the biggest hellhole on earth–where “oil production has surged to its highest level in over 30 years”. (according to the Wall Street Journal) And who’s raking in the profits on that oil windfall?

Why the oil giants, of course. (ExxonMobil, BP and Shell) Maybe that’s why you never read about what a terrible mistake the war was. Because for the people who count, it really wasn’t a mistake at all. In fact, it all worked out pretty well.

Of course, the US will support the appearance of democracy in Kabul, but the government won’t have any real power beyond the capital. It never did anyway. (Locals jokingly called Karzai the “mayor of Kabul”) As for the rest of the country; it will be ruled by warlords as it has been since the invasion in 2001. (Remember the Northern Alliance? Hate to break the news, but they’re all bloodthirsty, misogynist warlords who were reinstated by Rumsfeld and Co.)

This is the new anarchic “Mad Max” template Washington is applying wherever it intervenes. The intention is to dissolve the nation-state in order to remove any obstacle to resource extraction, which is why failed states are popping up wherever the US sticks its big nose. It’s all by design. Chaos is the objective. Simply put: It’s easier to steal whatever one wants when there’s no center of power to resist.

This is why political leaders in Europe are so worried, because they don’t like the idea of sharing a border with Somalia, which is exactly what Ukraine is going to look like when the US is done with it.

In Ukraine, the US is using a divide and conquer strategy to pit the EU against trading partner Moscow. The State Department and CIA helped to topple Ukraine’s elected President Viktor Yanukovych and install a US stooge in Kiev who was ordered to cut off the flow of Russian gas to the EU and lure Putin into a protracted guerilla war in Ukraine. The bigwigs in Washington figured that, with some provocation, Putin would react the same way he did when Georgia invaded South Ossetia in 2006. But, so far, Putin has resisted the temptation to get involved which is why new puppet president Petro Poroshenko has gone all “Jackie Chan” and stepped up the provocations by pummeling east Ukraine mercilessly. It’s just a way of goading Putin into sending in the tanks.

But here’s the odd part: Washington doesn’t have a back-up plan. It’s obvious by the way Poroshenko keeps doing the same thing over and over again expecting a different result. That demonstrates that there’s no Plan B. Either Poroshenko lures Putin across the border and into the conflict, or the neocon plan falls apart, which it will if they can’t demonize Putin as a “dangerous aggressor” who can’t be trusted as a business partner.

So all Putin has to do is sit-tight and he wins, mainly because the EU needs Moscow’s gas. If energy supplies are terminated or drastically reduced, prices will rise, the EU will slide back into recession, and Washington will take the blame. So Washington has a very small window to draw Putin into the fray, which is why we should expect another false flag incident on a much larger scale than the fire in Odessa. Washington is going to have to do something really big and make it look like it was Moscow’s doing. Otherwise, their pivot plan is going to hit a brick wall. Here’s a tidbit readers might have missed in the Sofia News Agency’s novinite site:

“Ukraine’s Parliament adopted .. a bill under which up to 49% of the country’s gas pipeline network could be sold to foreign investors. This could pave the way for US or EU companies, which have eyed Ukrainian gas transportation system over the last months.

…Prime Minister Arseniy Yatsenyuk was earlier quoted as saying that the bill would allow Kiev to “attract European and American partners to the exploitation and modernization of Ukraine’s gas transportation,” in a situation on Ukraine’s energy market he described as “super-critical”. Critics of the bill have repeatedly pointed the West has long been interest in Ukraine’s pipelines, with some seeing in the Ukrainian revolution a means to get access to the system. (Ukraine allowed to sell up to 49% of gas pipeline system, novinite.com)

Boy, you got to hand it to the Obama throng. They really know how to pick their coup-leaders, don’t they? These puppets have only been in office for a couple months and they’re already giving away the farm.

And, such a deal! US corporations will be able to buy up nearly half of a pipeline that moves 60 percent of the gas that flows from Russia to Europe. That’s what you call a tollbooth, my friend; and US companies will be in just the right spot to gouge Moscow for every drop of natural gas that transits those pipelines. And gouge they will too, you can bet on it.

Is that why the State Department cooked up this loony putsch, so their fatcat, freeloading friends could rake in more dough?

This also explains why the Obama crowd is trying to torpedo Russia’s other big pipeline project called Southstream. Southstream is a good deal for Europe and Russia. On the one hand, it would greatly enhance the EU’s energy security, and on the other, it will provide needed revenues for Russia so they can continue to modernize, upgrade their dilapidated infrastructure, and improve standards of living. But “the proposed pipeline (which) would snake about 2,400 kilometers, or roughly 1,500 miles, from southern Russia via the Black Sea to Bulgaria, Serbia, Hungary and ultimately Austria. (and) could handle about 60 billion cubic meters of natural gas a year, enough to allow Russian exports to Europe to largely bypass Ukraine” (New York Times) The proposed pipeline further undermines Washington’s pivot strategy, so Obama, the State Department and powerful US senators (Ron Johnson, John McCain, and Chris Murphy) are doing everything in their power to torpedo the project.

“What gives Vladimir Putin his power and control is his oil and gas reserves and West and Eastern Europe’s dependence on them,” Senator Johnson said in an interview. “We need to break up his stranglehold on energy supplies. We need to bust up that monopoly.” (New York Times)

What a bunch of baloney. Putin doesn’t have a monopoly on gas. Russia only provides 30 percent of the gas the EU uses every year. And Putin isn’t blackmailing anyone either. Countries in the EU can either buy Russian gas or not buy it. It’s up to them. No one has a gun to their heads. And Gazprom’s prices are competitive too, sometimes well-below market rates which has been the case for Ukraine for years, until crackpot politicians started sticking their thumb in Putin’s eye at every opportunity; until they decided that that they didn’t have to pay their bills anymore because, well, because Washington told them not to pay their bills. That’s why.

Ukraine is in the mess it’s in today for one reason, because they decided to follow Washington’s advice and shoot themselves in both feet. Their leaders thought that was a good idea. So now the country is broken, penniless and riven by social unrest. Regrettably, there’s no cure for stupidity.

The neocon geniuses apparently believe that if they sabotage Southstream and nail down 49 percent ownership of Ukraine’s pipeline infrastructure, then the vast majority of Russian gas will have to flow through Ukrainian pipelines. They think that this will give them greater control over Moscow. But there’s a glitch to this plan which analyst Jeffrey Mankoff pointed out in an article titled “Can Ukraine Use Its Gas Pipelines to Threaten Russia?”. Here’s what he said:

“The biggest problem with this approach is a cut in gas supplies creates real risks for the European economy… In fact, Kyiv’s efforts to siphon off Russian gas destined to Europe to offset the impact of a Russian cutoff in January 2009 provide a window onto why manipulating gas supplies is a risky strategy for Ukraine. Moscow responded to the siphoning by halting all gas sales through Ukraine for a couple of weeks, leaving much of eastern and southern Europe literally out in the cold. European leaders reacted angrily, blaming both Moscow and Kyiv for the disruption and demanding that they sort out their problems. While the EU response would likely be somewhat more sympathetic to Ukraine today, Kyiv’s very vulnerability and need for outside financial support makes incurring European anger by manipulating gas supplies very risky.” (Can Ukraine Use Its Gas Pipelines to Threaten Russia, two paragraphs)

The funny thing about gas is that, when you stop paying the bills, they turn the heat off. Is that hard to understand?

So, yes, the State Department crystal-gazers and their corporate-racketeer friends might think they have Putin by the shorthairs by buying up Ukraine’s pipelines, but the guy who owns the gas (Gazprom) is still in the drivers seat. And he’s going to do what’s in the best interests of himself and his shareholders. Someone should explain to John Kerry that that’s just how capitalism works.

Washington’s policy in Ukraine is such a mess, it really makes one wonder about the competence of the people who come up with these wacko ideas. Did the brainiacs who concocted this plan really think they’d be able to set up camp between two major trading partners, turn off the gas, reduce a vital transit country into an Iraq-type basketcase, and start calling the shots for everyone in the region?

It’s crazy.

Europe and Russia are a perfect fit. Europe needs gas to heat its homes and run its machinery. Russia has gas to sell and needs the money to strengthen its economy. It’s a win-win situation. What Europe and Russia don’t need is the United States. In fact, the US is the problem. As long as US meddling persists, there’s going to be social unrest, division, and war. It’s that simple. So the goal should be to undermine Washington’s ability to conduct these destabilizing operations and force US policymakers to mind their own freaking business. That means there should be a concerted effort to abandon the dollar, ditch US Treasuries, jettison the petrodollar system, and force the US to become a responsible citizen that complies with International law.

It won’t happen overnight, but it will happen, mainly because everyone is sick and tired of all the troublemaking.

Comedy Central: America’s Foreign Policy Is Laughable!

Almost nobody remembers the Keystone Kops any more — those hilariously bewildered, confused and zany silent-movie clowns who ran around in circles like chickens with their heads cut off and whose crazy antics were shown on theater screens all across America, exactly 100 years ago today..

But I remember the Keystone Kops because they used to be on TV in the 1950s when I was a kid.  Boy did I laugh!

And now, one hundred years later, the Keystone-Kop-wannabe antics of America’s crazy, bewildered and confused foreign policy is making me laugh too — at least when it isn’t making me cry.

How easy would it be — to develop a whole new stand-up comedy routine based solely on America’s foreign policy in Ukraine.  And describing America’s foreign policy in the Middle East would surely be funny enough to land me a spot on Saturday Night Live.

My first joke about America’s Middle East foreign policy will surely have you in stitches!  “America’s foreign-policy Keystone Kops’ opening gig in the Middle East was first on the marquee in Jerusalem back in the 1940s — when those crazy, zany and confused foreign-policy Kops mistook the Palestinian holy land for a perfect site for the latest Neo-Con Condominium Development Association project.”

Get it?  Holy Land?  Condo development?  That’s hilarious!  Although even most Israelis these days are not laughing at this pratfall any more either — especially after some Israeli neo-con storm troopers just made a Palestinian child drink gasoline and then set him on fire while he was still alive.  .  Looks like this whole Israeli neo-con Occupation skit has fallen flat.

But wait!  I still gots tons of other great jokes about America’s crazy, confused and zany foreign policy in the Middle East.

“Did I ever tell you the one about how America had trained and weaponized Al Qaeda terrorists in Afghanistan, back during Charlie Wilson’s War — until, oops, AQ made a wrong turn at Kabul and blew up the World Trade Center instead?” 

“Not very funny, Jane.”  Yeah, yeah — but wait for the punchline.

“THEN America went on to weaponize and train Al Qaeda terrorists to invade Syria — but only after Americans had bombed Iraq in 2003 in order to defeat Al Qaeda terrorists there, but then, big surprise, wait for it  — it turned out that there WERE no Al Qaeda terrorists in Iraq!  However, there soon would be plenty of Al Qaeda terrorists in Iraq after all those bumbling Keystone Kops in DC left the doors wide open for them to drop in.”  

Do I hear any belly-laughs out there?  Not yet?  Damn, you’re a hard audience to please.

Then how about this joke?  “America spent almost a trillion dollars invading Afghanistan in search of Al Qaeda terrorists — who had by then joined up with the Taliban terrorists and/or moved on to Pakistan and Iraq.”  Hey, I thought that was funny.  Get it?  America chasing Al Qaeda terrorists all through the Middle East like Al Qaeda terrorists were the bad guys and all the while Al Qaeda terrorists were America’s very own crazy and zany country cousins?”  Can’t get much more like Keystone Kops than that!

I’m laughing my head off here!  So — why aren’t you?

To paraphrase Father Dave Smith, “I thought the Americans were trying to wage a war ON terror, not a war to CREATE it.”  Funny how that all got twisted around, right?  

But perhaps this next schtick will be the money-shot joke?  Let’s give it a try.

“Then after tearfully telling Al Qaeda, ‘Come home, all is forgiven,’ America’s DC Kops once again started training and weaponizing AQ in Jordan, and then sent a bunch of Al Qaeda terror-creating operatives off to Syria to do what they do best — and once there, they apparently broke into two groups.”  Al Nustra and ISIS.

“But then Al Nustra terrorists started demanding to get paid the same wages that ISIS terrorists are getting from the Americans, who are funneling ISIS’s paychecks to them through the Saudis.  So the ISIS terrorists chop off the Al Nustra terrorists’ heads — and then run off to Iraq where ISIS then gathers its minions on the Saudi border.”  More Keystone-Kop antics here — only these Kops are brandishing AK-47s and machetes, and the costume department has gone bananas with the new black-bandana look.  But they still run around like chickens with their heads cut off.

“So then the Saudis have to send 30,000 of its own Keystone Kops to their border to keep the ISIS terrorists out of Arabia — and that’s ISIS we’re talking about, the group of terrorists that the Saudis had originally funded themselves in the first place, by using money laundered from America.”

But wait.  This stuff gets even funnier.  Honest.

“America then sends in its own Keystone-Kop special forces to Iraq in order to stop the ISIS terrorists, who were spozed to be our own Keystone Kops in the first place.  Or is it Al Qaeda’s terrorist Keystone Kops that America now wants to stop?”  Now even I am confused.  There’s gotta be a killer punchline in here somewhere.  Oh yeah.  Now I remember.  “And so America’s Keystone Kops end up setting the whole Middle East on fire — but then blaming the whole frigging mess on Iran and Russia!”  LOL.

Meanwhile back in Ukraine, America’s foreign policy has now weaponized and trained another bunch of pseudo-Ukrainian neo-Nazi terrorist Keystone Kop wannabes who are happily blowing up everything in sight too — but mostly blowing up Ukrainians.  I guess that America must have thought that the siege of Stalingrad by the Nazis was so funny that they wanted to do it again. 

And all these hilarious American Keystone-Kop foreign-policy routines — where everyone is running around crazily and blowing things up — have got me just rolling in the aisles, laughing it up.  So why aren’t you laughing too?

Because American taxpayers are the ones that have been forced to pay for all this bloody, crazy, and confused carnage…”  Oh hell.  Even Jon Stewart couldn’t get a laugh out of that one.

The joke is on us.

Regional War Swallowing The Middle East

When the Syrian war jumped its borders into Iraq, surrounding nations had a perfect chance to peacefully cooperate. They’ve thus far refused. The war in Syria now seems to be shifting to Iraq, and the big actors in the regional drama are recklessly pushing events toward more conflict that could transform a regional proxy war into a direct multi-nation battle.

The Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) now controls giant swaths of two nations, which are surrounded by countries that either fear ISIS or previously supported it. Old alliances are being tested as Syria and Iran come to the defense of the Iraqi government against ISIS, while the opposing alliance of U.S., Israel and the Gulf State monarchies are finding their unofficial union strained under the pressure of swelling paradoxes.

For example, the U.S. is supposedly fighting a war on terrorism, but has been in an unofficial military alliance with ISIS and other al-Qaeda groups in Syria, since all of them were actively waging war on the Syrian government.

When ISIS invaded Iraq the governments of Syria and Iran immediately offered assistance, while Obama stalled. Then, strangely, Obama’s Secretary of State John Kerry “warned” Syria against air attacks targeting ISIS in Iraq, a move that was welcomed by the Iraqi government. Kerry’s warning was also meant for Iran, which is finding itself sucked deeper into the two-nation war that now threatens Iran’s border.

As Iraq, Syria and Iran are busy fighting ISIS, what are the U.S. and Israel doing? They are continuing their war against Syria, the war that gave ISIS a new lease on life.

Iraq begged Obama to deliver promised fighter jets to fight ISIS, Obama chose instead to give extra aid to the U.S. backed Syrian rebels, to the tune of $500 million. The Syrian rebels have been completely dominated by Islamic extremists for at least two years.

Israel, for its part, also ignored ISIS and instead bombed nine Syrian military targets. Israel has bombed Syria several times in the last year, rather than bombing ISIS or the other al-Qaeda groups attacking Syria. In reality, an emerging regional war already exists, but is being minimized or ignored by the media.

Because the U.S. would rather fund Islamic extremists in Syria, the Iraqi government requested and received fighter jets from Russia, which will inevitably create more strain between the Iraqi and U.S. governments, since giving and receiving military aid is a crucial way that countries cement alliances and exert influence.

When nations that receive military aid are disobedient, the big war toys are held back as a way to exert leverage. The Iraqi President, Nouri al-Maliki, let his political naivety blind him to this reality,and recently admitted that Iraq was “delusional” to rely completely on U.S. military aid, since Obama is using the ISIS threat and the withholding of aid to pressure Iraqi politicians to ditch al-Maliki, essentially a “legal” form of regime change that will act more in accord with U.S. interests against Iran and Syria. Obama has wanted to replace al-Maliki ever since the Iraqi president refused to join Obama’s war against Syria.

As the Syria-Iraq war expands, the greater the gravitational pull it will exert on surrounding nations, who can’t resist the big profits associated with mass killing. Others will participate indirectly to protect their borders, until they too are drawn in by the centripetal forces of war.

After participating in the Syrian war through proxies like Saudi Arabia and Qatar, the Obama administration finds itself neck deep in the Syrian-Iraqi blood bath, finding it difficult not to join the other sharks in the feeding frenzy.

Obama’s “hands off” approach to Iraq is temporary and strategic, and is in reality “hands on” behind the scenes.  As the war spreads across borders Obama will find it less possible to abstain, since Iran, Syria and Russia will gain wider regional influence at his expense, which is happening by the minute.

The Syria-Iraq war is testing the resilience of decades-long alliances, even the future of the modern nation state, which lies at the foundation of post-WWII international law. This legal sanctity of the nation-state was emphasized by the Nuremberg trials after WWII, which established that the Nazis biggest war crime was not genocide or the holocaust, but the military invasion of sovereign nations, which created the conditions for regional and world war. The only legal war under international law is a defensive one.

But now regional wars are becoming commonplace, and borders are ignored as big powers pay and arm proxy militias to attack governments. More importantly, the U.S.-led invasions of Afghanistan, Iraq, and Libya have essentially eviscerated global international law, since the UN has been powerless in protecting sovereign nations against the aggression of the world’s only superpower. The U.S. invasions have created a climate where the nation-state has lost its revered status, increasing the likelihood of more war, since the old rules no longer apply.

Obama’s recent actions prove he has no intention of leaving the Middle East. As the Syrian war was spilling into Iraq, Obama requested $5 billion more for Middle East war, as if the gargantuan military budget wasn’t already enough. According to The New York Times:

“The White House is asking for $4 billion to go to the Pentagon and $1 billion to the State Department for other counterterrorism operations, including training and equipping partner countries (Israel, Saudi Arabia, etc.). Some of the money, administration officials said, would cover increased costs of Special Operations Forces that have deployed around the world, while $1.5 billion would go toward counterterrorism efforts in the neighborhood around Syria: Jordan, Lebanon, Turkey and Iraq.”

This $5 billion represents yet more blood money that will inevitably exacerbate the Middle East inferno. Years of ongoing U.S. military intervention — direct or indirect — has led to the unnecessary death or suffering of millions of people across the Middle East and to the large-scale destruction of Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Syria, and now Iraq again.

It is possible, as some are predicting, that Obama will complete a major diplomatic deal that includes Iran and the Kurdish section of Iraq. This, if successful, may create a temporary reprieve from the violence, while creating new ethnic-religious tensions that will inevitably explode again.  Any temporary deal will not eliminate the deeper causes of the war, which lie in the waning influence of the U.S. and its allies, and the rising influence of China and Russia.

All these developments emphasize the need to revive the antiwar movement here in the U.S. Those who oppose U.S. government military adventures around the world should unite and demand that no troops be sent to Iraq, that the U.S. advisors in Iraq should be brought home, and that money should be spent on jobs, education and strengthening the safety net here at home, not on war.

ISIS (DAASH) Now Recruiting In Palestinian Camps In Lebanon

Who Are Those Guys?

Ein el Helwe camp — As Washington and London were affirming the past few days their intentions to continue to arm “moderate rebel factions” in Syria, Tel Aviv just announced it would like to be helpful by joining with “moderate Arab nations” to battle their mutual Muslim enemies.

Israel offered on 6/26/14 to help “moderate” Arab nations who may feel threatened by the lightning land grabbing offensive by Islamic militants in Iraq. As its foreign minister Avigdor Lieberman, an arch Zionist Islamophobe and Arabphobe, met with Secretary of State John Kerry in Paris, he reportedly talked sweet about some Arabs and told Kerry that “the extremists currently operating in Iraq and Syria will try to challenge the stability in the entire Gulf region, first of all in Kuwait.” A statement from his office added that “Israel could provide effective and reliable assistance to moderate Arab states who are dealing with extremists.”

Just a few days after visiting Iraq, and being briefed on the pathetic situation, Kerry seems intrigued by the Zionist idea and noted according to a senior U.S. official, that it is “important that countries in the region (including Israel) stand together against the (ISIS) threat.”

Basically “Israel wants to do what Shite Iran has started doing” he continued, which according to the New York Times is flying surveillance drones over Iraq and sending military equipment to help Baghdad fight the Sunni insurgents. Except Israel wants to arm the Sunni tribes in league with the West and the Gulf monarchies and not arm the Shia.

Israeli officials and AIPAC are arguing to Washington that Israeli interests were converging with moderate Arab nations and “both sides should be dealing with the threat of Iran, world jihad and al-Qaida, as well as the spill-over of conflicts in Syria and in Iraq to neighboring countries.” The Israeli embassy issued a statement, “Today, (6/26/14) there is a basis for the creation of a new diplomatic-political structure in the Middle East.” Yet another ‘New Middle East’, one wonders?

This week, (6/22/14) on NBC’s Meet the Press, Israel’s Prime Minister Netanyahu restated the half-century old Zionist project and continuing to permanently divide and control the Middle East. On the subject of the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (DAASH) Netanyahu expressed the intention of his regime to continue to promote internal strife in Israel’s neighboring states. “We must weaken both [Sunni and Shia Muslims],” Netanyahu said, restating his governments preferred policy to have Muslims continue fighting among themselves. “When your enemies are fighting each other, don’t strengthen either one of them, weaken both,” he told the American public.

While it would not be the first time the Zionist regime has worked with preferred members of the Arab League to advance its own interests, another strong incentive to ratchet up its “split the Arabs” policy is the popular spill-over political effects of the advancements of DAASH in Iraq and Syria. Briefly stated, Lebanon is awash with rumors about a “Sunni uprising” to regain what is viewed by some in Lebanon and the region as seeking justice for their substantial political and economic loses since the 2003 Bush-Blair invasion of Iraq.

If the Gulf Kingdoms and the West agree to share information and leverage with respect to Iraq and Syria with Netanyahu & Co., it will be with the knowledge that Israel has another motive in wanting to join the coalescing forces against ISIS (DAASH). Presumably it is also is what its Lebanon based agents are surely reporting from the Palestinian camps.

Briefly put Palestinian camps generally, and using Ein el Helwe, in Saida, Lebanon as an example, are beginning to experience what Nahr el Bared camp near Tripoli, Lebanon did in 2007. At Nahr al Bared, over a period of more than six months began to notice the arrival of ‘strangers.’ Some camp residents asked “Who are those guys”? At first the new arrivals appeared to be rather self-effacing, very polite, and seemingly deeply religious. They tended to keep to themselves and soon their families arrived. More than one Sheik in Nahr al Bared assured the camp residents that the strangers were “good Muslims” and some were even teaching lessons from the Koran at the Mosque.

Fast forward, and as one of the Nahr el Bared camp leader explained in great detail to this observer at the time, soon residents soon began to notice changes in what were in fact affiliates or members of a new group calling itself “Fatah el Islam (FEI).” For example, the Islamists began to accost women on the street demanding that they wear a full length Hijabs and to stop smoking and more generally change their ways to be “better Muslims”.

Today, FEI is relatively strong and growing, but secretively in Ein el Helwe. But they are not alone. New arrivals, plus young, unemployed, discouraged and increasingly disenchanted and angry youth are reportedly secretly holding meetings with DAASH, Al Nusra and other recruiters and they are promised immediate material benefits and soon to be granted the full right to work plus a deepening Resistance to the occupation of their country, Palestine. There are takers naturally, but numbers so far are difficult to learn. Militias are growing in the camps but it’s difficult to calculate just how fast because camp residents know of many outside intelligence agents living among them, ranging from Lebanese Internal Security to Zionist agents and many others, so keeping their work secret is most essential.

According to analysts in Lebanon, and a recent report in Now Lebanon, the small cells based in rural northern Lebanon, the eastern Bekaa, and the Palestinian camps, where law enforcement remains very difficult are expanding due to the ISIS’ surge in Iraq and its apparent success in securing popular support from Sunni tribes and former Baathist groups. Fears continue to spread that the Sunni-Shiite sectarian struggle will explode in Lebanon as well.

But the threat does not come only from outside Lebanon’s borders, according to a security source in Ain al-Helweh Palestinian refugee camp. The source reported that he has been receiving information recently about Jihadist factions mobilizing in several areas of Lebanon, including Palestinian refugee camps with both DAASH (ISIS) and al Nusra Front setting up training camps. According to one source, Jihadists reportedly are not only mobilizing inside the Palestinian camps: it is happening across Lebanon, especially after the Qalamoun second battle. Fanatic Muslims and takfiris are spreading very fast. “What is happening in Iraq and Qalamoun shows that the situation will soon be very dangerous in the region, including Lebanon. It will all become a jihad battlefield,” the source said.

Two active and knowledgeable Palestinians from Ein el Helwe camp explained to this observer this week as they introduced me to the leader of Fatah el Islam, “Of course all the camps are affected just like everyone else around here by what has been happening in Iraq and Syria. Palestinians always want to avoid local fights but we always seem to be pulled in. Look what happened in the Lebanese civil war. Our leadership tried everything it could do stay out of the sectarian fight but we were pulled in and paid a huge price.

As for the attitude of the general camp population in Lebanon, a recent unscientific poll found that more than 96% of camp residents in Lebanon do not want to stop the Resistance but rather to reclaim all their stolen land. This survey results compares remarkably closely to a June 15-17 poll commissioned by the Zionist Washington Institute. That poll comprised face-to-face interviews with a standard random geographic probability sample of 1,200 adult Palestinians, yielding results with a 3% statistical margin of error. Only 22% of Gazans would opt to give up the ‘by whatever means necessary’ Resistance “to end the occupation of the West Bank and Gaza to achieve a two-state solution.” Even fewer, pick a “one-state solution,” in which “Arabs and Jews having equal rights in one country, but want their country returned from the river to the sea.” The “two-state solution” is the preferred option of a mere 9% in the West Bank and 10% in Gaza. Nearly two-thirds of the Palestinians in the same Zionist poll said “resistance should continue until all of historic Palestine is liberated.”

Both the Zionist poll and the informal one done in Palestinian camps in Lebanon find board support for popular resistance against the Zionist occupation seen as having a positive impact by most respondents in Gaza, the West Bank and Lebanon. These activities include stepped up demonstrations, building more support for the BDS campaign, strikes, marches, and mass refusals to cooperate, though various acts of Resistance to confront the Zionist occupiers.

Increased Resistance is seen as having a positive impact by most respondents in both territories: 62% in the West Bank, 73% in Gaza and close to 90% in Ein el Helwe.

Meanwhile, a twitter account with 21,000 followers, one of many, and this one dubbed the “League of Supporters”, called this week for DAASH sympathizers to post messages warning America not to carry out airstrikes against DAASH. Rather they urged their supporters to prepare to follow them and to confront the Zionists across Palestine.

In summation, the Zionist regime is very aware that the camps are likely to explode for a number of reasons not least of which the lack of civil rights including Palestinians is being banned from most jobs and the rising anger in and among the camps. It is also the case that the Zionists realize that the future looks bleak for its continuing occupation of Palestine internationally and helping stamp our extremist Jihadists, even by working with Arab regimes, and to weaken Iran in the process, it what it must do.

As Canadian freelance writer and journalist Brandon Martinez reminds us: “Fragmenting, weakening and Balkanizing the Middle East has been part and parcel of the Zionist impulse from the very beginnings of the Jewish state. Israeli strategist Oded Yinon candidly outlined this imperialist line of thought in his 1982 paper “A Strategy for Israel in the 1980s.” A strong, unified Iraq is Israel’s primary military concern, Yinon stressed” Yinon went on to push for the territorial dissection of Iraq into three state-lets along ethnic and confessional lines. And we may well witness these developments in Iraq. He promoted much the same scenario for Syria, Egypt, Lebanon, Iran and other Arab/Muslim states bordering the Zionist colony.

Martinez further observes, “The Zionists have used deception, subterfuge and cunning to con the world into entering conflicts and conflagrations that have expedited their ominous aims. But Israel’s insatiable avarice for more land and resources will eventually be its downfall, just as every empire in history has sooner or later collapsed under its own weight.”

Reminding this observer of a quote a valued friend from New Mexico recently sent to me:

“Look back over the past, with its changing empires that rose and fell, and you can foresee the future, too” (Marcus Aurelius).

Not Another Article On Syria? Well, Yeah

“Just exactly how many articles on Syria and Iraq can you actually churn out?” a friend of mine asked me recently.  “You were only over in Damascus for five freaking days.  And you haven’t been to Iraq since 2008.  So what makes YOU such an expert on these two countries?”

Even after less than a week spent in Damascus and after only having been to Iraq four-and-a-half times, I apparently already know more about Syria and Baghdad and Al Ambar than all those dingbats in the U.S. State Department, the Pentagon and the CIA combined.  Unfortunately.

Washington neo-cons and their neo-con counterparts in Tel Aviv have really gotten the Arab world totally wrong.

So, even though I would really rather be writing about almost anything else right now, it is still my civic duty to set these fools straight.  Sorry about that.

What I really want to be writing about this week is the exciting new Freedom Summer 50th-anniversary conference in Jackson, Mississippi, where a bunch of folks are getting together to celebrate having survived the heroic summer of 1964 when so many civil rights workers poured their hearts out in an attempt to finally bring justice to the Ol’ South — and some of them lost their lives while doing it too .

But apparently justice in the Ol’ South will have to wait a bit longer.  Right now we need to talk about justice in the Middle East first.

After the fall of the U.S.S.R., Washington neo-cons needed a new boogeyman to scare Americans into handing over our hard-earned tax dollars to the military-industrial complex.  And so the military-industrial complex came up with the idea of making Islam the bad guy.  But then apparently Washington neo-cons actually began to believe their own hype — and even went so far as to actually start creating and financing “Islamic Militants” where none had existed so far.

According to journalist Fenian Cunningham, “The biggest recruitment office for such groups [as ISIS] is the British government and its criminal militaristic foreign policy, which has been destroying countries for years, overtly and covertly.  That same destructive British state-sponsored terrorism, alongside that of its American and other NATO allies, is also why millions of Syrians and Iraqis are living in tents, unable to feed their families.”

The thumbscrews were not only put onto various Islamic countries until “militants” actually did start to emerge, but then Wall Street and War Street — bound and determined to sell as many weapons as possible — actually started creating “Islamic Militants” themselves (and of course all the while praying for another “Pearl Harbor”)

According to an article in Information Clearinghouse, “Key members of ISIS it now emerges were trained by US CIA and Special Forces command at a secret camp in Jordan in 2012, according to informed Jordanian officials…Former US State Department official Andrew Doran wrote in the conservative National Review magazine that some ISIS warriors also hold US passports.”

Neo-cons began manufacturing these Frankenstein monsters left and right, actually paying thousands of poor unfortunate souls in the Middle East to go on “jihad”.  https://veracityvoice.com/?p=20684

Even way back in the 1970s I could have warned the military-industrial complex that these acts of folly would eventually start leading to blow-back — not to mention the sky-rocketing cost of gasoline as a result of all this footsie-playing in the Middle East.

According to journalist Juan Cole, “During the past ten years, American drivers have seen their gasoline bill go up tremendously – though not as much as it by all rights should have – and stay there.”  

Apparently, The M-IC’s money-making scheme in the Middle East was that various U.S. and Israeli neo-cons would be constantly stirring up the pot there, turning Arab against Arab until they all freaking started to butcher each other like so many crabs in a barrel.  And then the U.S. and Israeli neo-cons would steal everything that wasn’t nailed down while no one over there was looking.  It sounded like a good plan.  Until the rest of us Americans and Israelis finally began to realize that there was nothing in this witches’ brew for the rest of us except danger to ourselves.

According to me, ISIS is nothing but a bunch of pirates, the Taliban are murdering wife-beaters, the idiots in charge of Egypt, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf states and Iraq are dictators and Libya is overrun by barbarians.  And who created all these proto-zombies?  Neo-cons in Israel and the U.S.  Of course.

According to Franklin Lamb, who seems to be legendary in Damascus for fabricating stories and mooching off of the Syrian government, ISIS, Syria’s arch enemy, is practically a freaking benevolent organization who succors the poor, has nukes of its own and whose goal is to unite all the downtrodden Arabs in the Middle East into one coherent version of the freaking Red Cross and then liberate Palestine and wash Israel into the sea. https://veracityvoice.com/?p=20664 .

However, Palestinians in Syria did not support ISIS’s brutality and refused to be drawn in — so ISIS bombed the crap out of them instead.  And the Palestinians in Israel already have neo-cons killing their kids — and don’t need any more neo-con-backed pirates adding even more “creative chaos” to the mix.

Huh?  No.  Forget about the sparkling clean Red Cross wannabe image.  These ISIS guys are down and dirty pirates.  And that’s “all she wrote” about that.  And apparently we American taxpayers are paying for all of ISIS’s new Toyotas, rocket-launchers and Nikes as well.

“You talk as though the military-industrial complex may finally be starting to get its comeuppance for generating such a devious plot — but, frankly, it is not,” you might comment at this point.

No, it is not.  Not yet.  But if Wall Street and War Street continue to play their cutesy little “Divide and Conquer” games in the Middle East, keep on messing with its political eco-system, breaking down its civil society in this bad way, and creating and financing even more Al Qaedas, Talibans and ISISs and driving world gas prices sky-high, then eventually it will suck to be you! 

Even against all odds and proof, I still have faith that the rest of us Americans, us average decent salt-of-the-earth types, will finally put a stop to all these nefarious neo-con schemes and finally start bringing our money and our troops home from the Middle East instead — and stop picking on all these poor Arabs before they end up going completely freaking nuts as they see their parents, wives and children constantly being blown to bits before their very eyes by these neo-con monsters.

Not sure why I keep holding out hope that this will happen.  But do I really have any other choice?

Iraq And The Bloody Price of Lies

Western civilization lied and people died.

It lied, that is, to itself.

It’s a lie that imbues Bushes, Clintons and Obamas, both the left and the right and most everyone in-between. It is the enlightened position of the modern man, a tenet of our times.

It’s the idea that all peoples are basically the same.

I wrote about this seven years ago in “The Folly of Deifying Democracy in Iraq,” in which I predicted that our “nation-building” would ultimately be fruitless:

While we often view democracy as the terminus of governmental evolution, the stable end of political pursuits, the truth is that civilizations have tended to transition not from tyranny to democracy, but democracy to tyranny (e.g., the ancient Romans). …Benjamin Franklin understood this gravitation toward tyranny well, for when asked what kind of government had been created when he emerged from the constitutional convention, he said, “A republic, madam, if you can keep it.”

This brings us to the crux of the matter: Even if we can successfully install democratic republics in countries such as Iraq and Afghanistan, what makes us think they can keep them?

…To average westerners, all groups are essentially the same, despite profound religious and cultural differences. If a civilization — be it Moslem or Christian, Occidental or Oriental — suffers under the yoke of tyranny, it is only due to a twist of fate that has bestowed the wrong system of government upon it. Change that system and “voila!” all live happily ever after.  What eludes these Pollyannas is that politics doesn’t emerge in a vacuum but is a reflection of a far deeper realm, the spiritual/moral.  Alluding to this, Ben Franklin observed,

“Only a moral and virtuous people are capable of freedom; the more corrupt and vicious a society becomes, the more it has need of masters.”

…[S]piritual [and moral] health must precede the political variety….

A good way to illustrate this point is with Lord of the Flies, William Golding’s story about a large group of young British schoolboys who are shipwrecked on an island and who, after an initial effort at democratic governance, quickly descend into brutal autocracy. Being children, they are raw pieces of humanity perfectly illustrative of the “wild man.” After all, one thing distinguishing children is that they aren’t yet morally and spiritually developed enough to govern themselves. This is why a young child must be watched and controlled, with his life micromanaged by his (usually benign) nanny state, the parents. As he grows and matures, however, the parents can gradually allow an increasing degree of self-governance until, it is hoped, a day comes when he’s capable of complete autonomy.

But as our bursting prisons prove, this process isn’t always successfully effected; more to the point, as greatly varying levels of criminality among groups evidence, not all of our nation’s sub-cultures effect this process with equal success.

If this is true of some sub-cultures in our nation, however, why would it surprise anyone that it would be true of some cultures outside our nation?

In fact, I’ve long described moral and spiritual growth as movement toward “authentic adulthood,” which, at its pinnacle, yields that ethereal combination of innocence (meaning, absence of sin) and wisdom, and the former is actually a prerequisite for the latter. Yet some cultural norms can produce just the opposite: a loss of innocence and lack of wisdom.

However you describe this growth, the fact is that peoples mature very differently. George W. Bush was famous for saying that everybody wanted freedom, but this is an imprecise statement. No nation has complete freedom (to kill, steal, etc.), so what freedoms do the people in question supposedly want? But even if a given people does want freedom in the sense of democratic self-determination, wanting isn’t enough. Virtually everyone wants money, but not everyone has the discipline and wherewithal to acquire it; everybody wants health, but some people still can’t resist smoking, eating or drinking themselves to death. Ours is a world full of people too wanting to get what they want, which is one reason why unfulfilled desire is man’s constant companion.

Ironically, the very modernists who stress how foreign Muslims are “just like us” can easily comprehend culture/system incompatibility when our own culture war is at issue. No small number of liberals have concluded that the last opposition to their agenda won’t evaporate until we traditionalists — who, ironically, liberals sometimes liken to the Taliban — die off. Oprah Winfrey said that the old “racists” were just going to have to die; Judge Judy Sheindlin said that those who oppose faux marriage were just going to have to die. What they’re really saying is that the culture on the other side of the culture war has to die (and, believe me, I consider their “culture’s” demise no less necessary). And they figure that it won’t be perpetuated because they’re forging a new culture via the media, academia and entertainment.

So why is it so hard to understand that the same principle applies to foreign intransigents?

If certain moderns can resign themselves to this with respect to Western Christian culture, why can’t they realize that it’s no different with Islamic culture? They don’t think for a moment that they can talk us traditionalists out of our deeply held principles, so why do they think they can talk Muslims out of theirs? And they have only succeeded in shaping the younger generations because they have seized control of the aforementioned culture shapers. So why would they think that Muslim civilization could be reshaped without the same Gramscian march through the madrassahs and other Islamic institutions? They act as if their own domestic political opponents are more foreign than foreigners. But I will explain the reason why.

Just as absence makes the heart grow fonder, distance makes dreams grow fanciful.

As with an irritating neighbor who, owing to continual petty annoyances, you despise more than a tyrant an ocean away, liberals are close enough to us for our behavior to have affected them viscerally so that they feel on an emotional level what they’re incapable of apprehending intellectually. But Muslims are far enough away — and I don’t just mean physically, but, more importantly, psychologically — so that it’s easy to ascribe to them whatever qualities one’s fantasies may prescribe. It’s as with the starry-eyed, naïve young lady who is smitten with an exotic but flawed man and who is just sure (as women so often are) that she’ll be able to change him: after 15 years she can be a cynical old jade who will bitterly lament, “He’ll never change!” The man, you see, made that transition from theoretical foreign naughty boy to up-close domestic nightmare.

So do you really want to know what it would truly take to transform the ‘stan du jour? Alright, but most of you either won’t like it or won’t believe it:

1. Go in with massive force and brutality, Roman style.
2. Execute anyone who offers resistance after dousing him in pig’s blood.
3. Forcibly convert the population to Christianity, and thoroughly infuse their institutions with the faith.
4. Garrison troops there for several generations, repeating steps one and two as necessary to complete the transformation.

And, by the way, there is precedent for this: It’s a version of what the Muslims did when they long ago conquered the old Christian lands of the Mideast and North Africa.

Having said this, I’m not currently recommending such a course. I’m just telling you what would be necessary to effect the kind of change in question. You see, everyone talked about Mideast nation-building when we really just engaged in government-building and what was actually needed was something far grander than both: civilization-building. The moderns thought that if they put sheep’s clothing on a wolf it wouldn’t bite, that they could put the leaves of liberty on a tree of tyranny and they wouldn’t wither and die. We thought we were remedying causes when we were just treating symptoms.

So yesterday’s moderns called WWI “the war to end all wars.” Then their grandchildren gave us the political system to end all wars — democracy — with George W. Bush once saying that democracies don’t go to war with one another. And this is true. After all, when democracy’s birthplace, ancient Athens, democratically decided to launch a disastrous imperialistic war that ultimately cost her people their whole empire, the target was autocratic Sparta; there were no other democracies to war against at the time, you see.

So all we can really say is that democracies haven’t yet gone to war with one another. Perhaps even more to the point, democracies don’t always remain democracies; they often, sometimes quickly and violently, descend into tyranny.

Then they may go to war.

So while some commentators are saying that the current crisis in Iraq vindicates the neo-cons, it only proves that they were better than the liberals at herding cats. A wiser policy was the one we pursued during Cold War days. Understanding that the island boys were going to need a firm hand, we both kept them on their island and tried to ensure a firm hand we could handle: a pro-American dictator, such as Augusto Pinochet or Hosni Mubarak. Oh, the viciously vacuous condemned this as the authoring of tyranny, but they forget that, as Thomas Sowell often points out, in life there often aren’t any solutions, only trade-offs. And accepting this can help prevent making the wrongs ones, such as trading off blood and treasure for that fruit of folderol and fantasy — nothing.

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