Listen to a reading of this article (reading by Tim Foley):
President Biden is reportedly preparing to begin a new weeks-long bombing campaign in the middle east in retaliation for a drone attack which killed three US troops this past weekend. These strikes are expected to include Iranian targets, tempting the nightmare scenario of a full-blown war with Iran, despite the public acknowledgement that there’s no evidence Iran was behind the drone strike.
Antiwar’s Dave DeCamp explains:
“US officials told NBC News that the US is planning to launch a weeks-long bombing campaign in the Middle East in retaliation for the drone attack in northeast Jordan that killed three American soldiers.
“The officials said that the targets are expected to include Iranian targets outside of Iran, and the campaign will involve strikes and cyber operations. Other reports have said the US is considering targeting Iranians in Iraq and Syria or the Iranian navy.
“While the potential targets are not inside Iran, direct attacks on the Iranian military could provoke a full-blown war between the US and Iran. The US is considering taking this course of action even though the Pentagon admitted it has no evidence Iran was directly involved in the drone attack in Jordan.”
Iran threatened to “decisively respond” to any US attack, either upon the Islamic Republic itself or upon the nation’s “interests and nationals under any pretexts.”
So this looks to be yet another dramatic escalation in the middle east by the warmongering policies of the sitting US president, who has also been waging a new bombing campaign in Yemen and backing a genocide in Gaza of unbelievable savagery where starving Palestinians are now eating grass and drinking polluted water in a desperate attempt to survive. According to a memo obtained by The Intercept, US troops have been put on standby for possible involvement in Israel’s assault on Gaza as well.
In the midst of all that murderousness the Twitter account from this bloodthirsty ghoul of a president is posting cutesey tweets at Elmo from Sesame Street about the importance of emotional wellbeing, which is about the most dystopian thing you can possibly imagine.
“Our friend Elmo is right: We have to be there for each other, offer our help to a neighbor in need, and above all else, ask for help when we need it,” Biden tweeted during an active US-backed genocide.
Longtime Democratic Party leader Nancy Pelosi has been behaving even more freakishly. The former House Speaker said this past Sunday that people advocating a ceasefire in Gaza are promoting “Mr. Putin’s message,” claiming on no basis whatsoever that some pro-Palestine demonstrations are backed by Russia and should be investigated by the FBI.
In a video posted the very next day by antiwar activist group Code Pink, Pelosi is seen admonishing protesters against Biden’s Gaza genocide to “Go back to China where your headquarters is.” Pelosi’s demented accusation is presumably a reference to a New York Times smear piece which used sleazy insinuations to falsely imply a connection between Code Pink and the Chinese government without ever actually showing one to exist, and not even that smear piece ever claimed that Code Pink had a headquarters in China.
The “progressive” wing of the Democratic Party isn’t much better, with political pop stars like Bernie Sanders flailing all over the place to avoid advocating a ceasefire and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez saying she fully supports Biden despite his actions in Gaza and adamantly refusing to say if the president is backing a genocide.
A Democratic president engaging in genocide during a re-election year is highlighting the depravity of this warmongering capitalist party more starkly than anything else I can remember. Democrats frame themselves as responsible humanitarians who stand in opposition to the reckless murderousness and fascism of the Republican Party’s worst impulses, yet here they are openly falling all over themselves to justify mass atrocities driven by the racist feeding frenzy of a tyrannical far-right regime.
In reality the Democratic Party exists to promote the interests of the murderous US empire just as much as the Republican Party does. They might sometimes promote imperial interests in different ways, in the same way the left jab and the right cross are used differently in boxing. But just as a boxer uses jabs and crosses together to score a knockout blow, the empire uses the Democratic and Republican parties in conjunction to keep the imperial war machine trudging forward over human bodies, year after year and administration after administration.
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Featured images via Wikimedia Commons.
The image stuck in my visual system comes from a video of Pelosi climbing into an SUV as she fled the scene after her Russia-China-connection comments. Harangued by shouts of protestors, she peremptorily raises her hand like the aristocrat she perceives herself to be, waving off the objections of the peons. It's quite telling. These long-term congressional residents, corruptly funded by AIPAC et al. have lost all conception of the idea of public service, of populace representation, and deep down in whatever neural circuits remain, perceive themselves as above the fray. Of course they sympathize with Israel. They are the god's chosen people; they get it. Everyone else is mere chattel; rubbish.
Just as October 7th was a pretext, the attack on US troops is a pretext.
Pretend three US soldiers were killed on a bad weekend in Nevada. Would the Pentagon demand that Reno be bombed?