Yes, it’s is totally disgusting, my poor fellow Americans so brain washed by propaganda. Biden long apart of the immoral Democrat Party and DeSantis out to lunch, mentally and morally, along with the Republican Party. What to do! What to do!????
The first thing I would suggest is recognize that no individual who reaches the pinnacle of either fake party is worthy of our collective hope. The WH is not open to any honest aspirants.
If people actually engaged in their precinct politics, we would choose the candidates. So indeed it does say something about the electorate. An$ not a very positive something.
It tells us about the power of money in a corrupt election system and the weakness of a populace that wants to project its own power onto a figurehead. There’s no cavalry coming. We have to save ourselves.
Pinnacle? ANY slavering kleptocrat, United Democracy Project ALLOWS us to LOTE in (to rob, indenture, incarcerate or induct us as WEF/ Wall Street death squad thugs) is yet another reason to take in DC residents, & try out a neutron bomb then donate yard sale Bushmasters to folks, willing to return to a lovely, equitable, friendly & cheerful museum & library studded swamp community of patriots!
Bernie Sanders taught me an extremely valuable lesson, the cost 4,800.00 and two yrs. of door knocking, fund raising parties, I can be fooled. Run to the Light.
Having just read a little on DeSantis and also having seen Biden and his nasty Neocons in action, it seems that if DeSantis receives the blessing of Republicans for the next presidential running, then it will rest with the Democrats to find someone worthy to be nominated to replace the militarist's puppet Biden and all his Israeli owned controllers from all the nooks and crannies in Washington. They are everywhere.
Then, step one could mean meeting the Chinese leader on a pleasant Greek island and then shaking hands, which seems like a simple first step to removing all the US generated aggravation in the world today. I'll pay the airfares if someone else picks up the tab for the Moussaka, the· Papoutsakia and Pastitsio with a good wine for a toast to "world peace".
Oops. I forgot about the soon-to-be-ignored military arms makers. Give them some interest free public money for a couple of years from the US $850 billion defence budget (not needed any more) and tell them to restructure their organisation s to create something useful. As a starter, ask them to find a source of employment for the 21,000 employees of the CIA, no longer of interest to anyone
It seems this is the only way out, one political party equally as bad as the other, as in all the Anglo countries such as Australia and the UK, all united under the newly minted AUKUS banner.
Look it up, readers. AUKUS. The most ridiculously dramatic association of bored warmongers designed to satisfy a final American splurge at being king of the kids, before the empire crumbles. Then read up on QUAD as another effort as well, Asia oriented this time. (Yes, re-arming Japan as well. Some people in the USA do have short memories).
Don't leave it too long or the US will have a couple more frighteningly theatrical military consortiums in place as well, along the lines of NATO, ANZUS, QUAD, AUKUS and on it goes.
Against who, you ask? They will find others to threaten, to harass, sanction, drone to death, kill off with depleted uranium weapons, have no fears. And if they can grow a big crop of heroin as well, as in Afghanistan, it's all good for business.
We are back to the Cold War madness. They will simply insert Lloyd Austin as a replacement presidential candidate, whip up more war escalation - and that will be that with the unofficial military takeover of the country.
The military was in charge of the US govt for decades. Eisenhower was military man who placated the masses while at home during a long recession while in the same period Dulles was wrecking the entire planet in cold war mania.
Kennedy brothers came in, didnt understand the situation, crossed Dulles, and well yeah see how that turned out - the spooks took that round. LBJ was a frontman while the military and spooks continued to run amok in cold war mania.
In that period nuclear war almost happened several times.
Problem is all of that generation is gone. Currently the spook world is run by rabid ideologues like Nuland, Kagan, Rice, Power, who take no learnings from history and really dont care if the entire planet is destroyed. They do believe they can emerge from the bunkers and the world will be better off then, or they believe that they can colonise Mars or something in Bezo’s spaceships.
I read an article from Matt Taibbi about the speech Eisenhower gave at the end of his term and he said he was sorry that not even he himself could protect the US from the Arms industry and the military. I went on to read more of what Matt had researched and from my understanding of it all both the military and the arms producers declared war on not just the people of the US but the whole world. They outright stated they would not allow any dissent from no matter how high up the person might be in the government.
The audio interviews of Leslie Grove are quite illuminating in that regard. He was hellbent on making sure the atomic project goes to completion no matter the need.
From what I understand it cannot be proved that Truman authorized the bombings. Rather, the military went ahead and he was forced to backdate his "approval".
The core problem, doing the right thing as well as the useful thing isn't nearly as profitable. Capitalism demands destruction. It really is as simple as not making war. Run to the Light. I vote your plan : ) Contrarian 33 2024
Patricia Blair: Keep your sense of humor and joy in noticing the simple things in life. Think of how hard life was 200 years ago and enjoy the comforts we have today.
Caitlin: A GREAT ending to your article here. Frankly, I tend to look at and care for our lawn, garden, house, and vehicles more than people nowadays. But then I live in Sonoma County, California Hell.
DeSantis is no saint. He's a politician who doesn't understand that the boilerplate political non-speech doesn't work anymore. The man is an idiot.
BTW, record low temperatures here in Sonoma County for this time of year. The grape crop will be a late harvest. The plants are loving the cooler weather with high humidity. Only 63F today. Usually around 88F and sometimes 100F.
Haha. Actually you get more for your money up there than down here in Bay Area. I lived in a 5th Wheel trailer on a ranch in west Sebastopol and was perfectly happy there. Unfortunately my job in Santa Rosa fell through and I had to move...
GabeReal: A shame you had to leave the "Nuclear Free Zone" of Sebastopol. That welcoming sign on Hwy 12 always cracks me up. You can always try for a job in Healdsburg and one of the subsidized apartments that are being built here in town.
It's not that there is any more darkness than before. Sociopaths always end up with the power, because they are the ones who will do anything to get it.
Just that the power available, and the consequences for the rest of the world, are infinitely greater than at any time in the past.
Neither flip of the duopoly politician coin desires or intends to end ‘the debt ceiling’, which the remainder of the world’s nations except Denmark regard as arcane.
When asked if a debt ceiling should be cast aside, Republican or Democrat, even Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders have recently replied “...it would be irresponsible”.
The debt ceiling, you see, is the demolition device which duopoly Congress may employ to destroy the inconvenience of popular social programs which both Wall Street parties find unprofitable for their corporate benefactors, but cannot raise as an issue before Congress and in the public eye.
The now familiar hostage-taking has served a dubious chore of ridding popular social programs and commons from public hands, without eliciting direct blame at either herd of Wall Street servants.
Just as American military power is beset upon non-cooperative nations by creating a pretext for military action with lies projected by a corporate theatre of monopolized media, the Legislative Branch, Congress, drags up its trebuchet of an arcane, idiotic ‘debt ceiling issue’ to demolish the walls of necessary yet corporate-undesirable social programs & protections until their targets are broken to rubble to be written off in a corporate media as ‘casualties of intense party polarization’.
The weaponization of a ‘debt ceiling standoff’ is a seasonal ruse used by Punch and Judy parties of Wall Street to dismantle social benefits which would otherwise bring pitchforks to either side of the duopoly ruse to have suggested an end to well liked public benefits on the floor of Congress.
A ‘debt ceiling’ is Congress’ seasonal pick of a fish in a social pond to put into a pot for the corporate soup line, while society remains unhoused, unwell and unrepresented.
Other than speed limits (which are ignored anyway), the debt ceiling might be the only "limit" to the US capitalist imperial project. The whole concept of limits is repudiated by the culture.
Tsionist imperial project. Plutocratic and busybodied, too. Some knowledge of tanakh is warranted here. "tikkun olam", too. As it turns out, Hitler was not entirely wrong.
Jerrold Nadler is not doing anything new of different. He has been the same amoral unprincipled channeler of dirty money and hatred that he has been his entire political career. A front row member of the “Russiagate” fake news crew, he is not unironically a massive recipient of AIPAC money, in return for which he has faithfully and unquestioningly supported all of Israel’s aggressivions against its neighbours and its apartheid regime. He has been an advocate of Israel’s stoking conflicts and supports that they should atrack Iran.
A disgusting person.
And so no doubt he would be happy for the Ukrainian puppets to attack a nuclear armed country. Why? He doesn’t care and like the rest of the war hawks he will of course be forewarned and prepositioned in a nuclear bunker like all govt officials . What would happen to the rest of us, or even his own extended family ? Doesnt care.
This is what passes for elected representatives of the public in the sham of a “democracy”.
I totally agree. Except that I don’t think even our most venal reps believe they can survive a nuke attack on DC and environs, bunkered or not. These guys won’t give up their cushy lives and “house in the Hamptons” for any reason. They are chicken hawks and only want war elsewhere. Other people’s children, other people’s arms and legs, other people’s countries. That’s why Caitlin is so right to fear our take over of the Aussie Military. We’ll have ‘em in a shooting war in no time and Jerry Gonads will be smirking away in Manhattan saying kill more, kill more, kill more.
It's getting harder and harder to read Caitlin's column, because I don't watch TV or read Mainstream (corporate) media--so I don't see how toxic and crazy it's getting in here till I read what she posts. And then I find myself silently screaming. I live in the US, which currently is like Germany in about 1933.
If you could afford to get out of Germany & be sufficiently aware of media obfuscation to GET out, in time. There were ways to escape Nazis & their enablers, to survive! We lost that capability, quite a long time ago? Look at how pervasive libertarian think-tank lies have been, verbatim in repitition; how our senile kleptocrats can't even BE bothered to prevaricate, BS us with obfuscatory pleonasm or gaslight "brain fog," denial or conditioned response victims, anymore? A big feature of große Lüge, is intentionally being BLATANT & obnoxious about how preposterously obvious the lie is?
Mary, I didn't know that the Reichstag and chancellor's residence in 1933 were infested with Jews like the Congress and the WH in 2023. Please tell us more.
I'm sure if you asked the (other) Nazis in Germany in 1933 they would have told you the Reighstag and chancellor's residence WERE "crawling with Jews". Using a word that calls to mind insects is a typical trope of racists, and claiming that places of power are infested with whichever group is being demonized is part and parcel of the paranoid approach to the world. There are real problems--places of power are infested with a type of human that is exceedingly dangerous but you can't tell them by their appearance or last names--sociopaths.
Read Bereshit 49:8-12 for Judean supremacy verses. Then see Shemot 19:5-6 for the evidence of narcissism which must lead the usual subversives into conflict with Hindus, too. Mata Bharat isn't big enough for both the brahmins and the children of Israel to be the brahmins of Bharat.
While you're at it, feel free to ponder Isaiah 66:22-24. Figure what it would take to keep the worm alive indefinity. When you've figured out a correct answer, mosey on over to the JTA's website to peruse atheist David Ben-Gurion's fantasy, published in 1962, about a federation of the continents, a "Supreme Court of Mankind" in Jerusalem, and the fulfillment of the prophesy of Isaiah.
It's easy enough to collect evidence of any paranoid theory. Certainly the Bible is full of such stuff--I'm sure the Old Testament is full of Jewish superiority; there are plenty of people who believe that Christians, or specifically Catholics or Protestants or one denomination of Protestants, or Hindus or Muslims are superior and it would be better if everyone converted. There are those who believe the absurd idea that the US is a chosen country and should be exempt from the normal international rules and laws--this has a name, American Exceptionalism, and is officially US policy. This sort of thing is childish but it isn't really a threat. The fact that you can find quotations of Jewish supremacy in ancient texts, and plenty of Jews (and women and black people and Hispanics and oh my God, there is a HUGE number of MEN IN SUITS in high places, Washington is absolutely INFESTED with them!) doesn't mean there is a deadly conspiracy ongoing.
Which "(other) Nazis" would have told us that the Reichstag and chancellor's res. were crawling with Jews? Name them. And what evidence would they have cited? The Haavara agreement of '33? Receipts of donations, dated from 1928, to the NSDAP from two Jewish bankers in Berlin?
While you're sputtering about that, bear in mind that cying and complaining about "racists" and "typical" tropes won't change the fact that the WH and the Congress are crawling with, and have been long infested by, Jews who act in concert according to their chauvinism and ancient sense of entitlement to dominate the world. This was true during W's admin. It was true during the admin of DJT, supposedly the new, new Hitler. It's true today—the Biden admin recently boasted of this fact on Twitter. If Tsion Ron slithers into the WH in Jan 2025 (because, say, DJT is tossed into prison) it will remain true from 2025 through at least 2029.
Sure, we shouldn't "give up hope", nor "joy". There definitely were people with the same attitude prior to past World Wars and all prior calamities. That didn't prevent them from happening.
Those who were lucky to have survived could assume the posture of hope and joy for real, thinking humans have wised up and "never again" and so on. Only for the shit to hit the fans once more a few decades later. One reason may be the shit keeps being produced and the fans happen to be in abundance.
I think we aren’t talking about human failings. Power-tripping and greed are as old as humans, but the scale to which free and open communication has become strangled by oligarchs, and the degree to which laws have been rewritten by their Ivy League soldiers has reached the point where status quo rhetoric is as hollow as an empty drum. No honest, informed person can possibly believe anything that the MSM asserts.
Well it's all relative - I mean no matter how much you love, how much you appreciate life - it all ends for all of us. No one you know or love now, will be alive. We're all on a stop watch called "mortality". The real hope is wrapped in an enigma - what is this really all about? Are we just ghosts trapped in a machine?
I'm not particularly eloquent. What I'm trying to convey is - yes, one should go for hope and joy. Only it won't matter as far as "saving the world". But it does help one cope better with whatever happens.
Insert your favorite religion here in its purest form, but most in Caitlin's forum (including her) don't seem to appreciate it.
For me, it's not about religion (particularly organized religion) - it's just an existential question about existence. What is this all about? Why is there even existence in the first place? How did I end up writing messages to a complete stranger calling himself "russian_bot"? How did I get here? Is there any good reason for it? Some kind of short lived phantasmagoria of love and horror mixed in with the mundane and old age, while youth laughs away on sunny beaches.
Well, whatever one thinks it is it must be ordered or reasoned about somehow so it's worth it. Otherwise why even bother - blame your parents' tryst that brought you into this world and find the quickest way to do away with yourself. In fact, all this transgender crap might be one way to handle it - mangle oneself so it becomes suicide of sorts.
So any system that helps one deal with it, a system of beliefs or convictions of which religions, organized or otherwise, are part of is needed. Such a system at a very minimum should direct humans towards survival and advancement and not at the expense of other humans and environment. That requires coercion as humans left to their own devices tend to disintegrate quite quickly. So anything that directs - and forces - them in the right direction should be considered reasonable. Even if "undemocratic". In fact, it looks like it must be such. Why that is - well, that's what they try to put in words as far as all those ancient texts. For anyone to try to understand it in their own way, which would be fine as long as the non-destruction ends are achieved.
The transgender debates and wokeness really has gone off the rails. Similar to the "MeToo" crap we had to put up with for years. The same "MeToo" crowd looked the other way when it came to Biden and Tara Reade - that's when it really cemented for me that it was all a pile of political propaganda and hypocrisy.
Yeah, I do think you have to decide for yourself what "system" you're going to believe in. You have to believe in something - to get yourself out of bed in the morning. But what will that be?
The "Metoo" initiative wasn't "crap". It was a response to the fact the law did not protect women : about 1% of rape charges ever made it to court- and only a small percent of that resulted in convictions. Women were held responsible for any "unwanted" sex.
Metoo has forced men to be as careful in their actions and presumptions as women have always had to be. I call the fair - at last.
No other way but look for it. I don't think we should strive to invent anything new as billions of people have already gone through the process. What we already have should be sufficient but the challenge is for one to get a handle on it. And to do that I can think of no other way but read great thinkers' takes and find ones that resonate.
And then *you* will know. And it won't matter what others might think.
I don’t fault anyone for taking an occasional hit of their favorite form of hopium. People still fall head over heals in love, or they they watch their kids take a first step, or they have a good dog at their feet or a purring cat on their lap, or they catch a glimpse of sunlight hitting the autumn leaves just right, and for long moments, even days, everything seems right with the world.
But then one day Joe Biden—who was always a soulless mediocrity and a petty criminal, and who is now made pathetic by cognitive decline—is convinced by two other soulless mediocrities, Jake Sullivan and Vicky Nuland, to push the big red button on his desk, and it’s suddenly curtains for half the population of the world, while the other half suffers grim slow deaths. (Except for Joe, Jake, and Vicky and their families who all survive in the luxury bunker/ark deep underground in the Raven Rock Mountain Complex in Pennsylvania, and, no matter how many years they live afterwards, they never for a moment have a single regret.)
To those paying close attention—which is probably a small minority precisely because it’s too painful to pay attention—we can only shake our heads and ask: Was there ever any point? All that said, hope springs eternal in the human heart. But, in a creation filled with design flaws, that human addiction to fleeting and false hope may be the biggest design flaw of all. Still, there are some in history who have sorted most of this out, and they found the truth (mostly). Of course, they were all burned at the stake and their books were hidden away in the basement of the Vatican or the Smithsonian. But if you look hard enough you’ll slowly find some of the clues they managed to leave behind. The rest is up to us.
It may help to look beyond the self, the ego and look to not just the human species, but all life on this planet. Life which evolved and developed through many struggles over four and a half billion years. I want to work to preserve and further develop that life.
Our planet Earth is after all, the planet we know of in the observable universe that supports what we call life and to throw that away, out of ...what?...apathy, despair, selfishness is beyond a crime against humanity. It's a crime against the whole known universe.
Dr. Carl Sagan in summing up the original series of 'Cosmos' said, that having evolved from atoms created in the Big Bang, "We are the eyes and ears of the Universe, listening to itself".
One could substitute ‘God’ for ‘universe’ in that Sagan quote. I’ve heard it said we are all fragments of God and incarnated here to learn about itself...
William James often wrote if the universe only works in generalities, and is just a utility function for the species, what meaning does that give to the individual other than a kind of existence that is a mere utilitarian function for universal values, but not individual values? Frederic Myers, William James' good friend (and quite a scholar in his own right), once said he felt perhaps one of the most important questions one could ask was, "Is the Universe friendly?"
Reductive materialists scoffed then (and still do) at Myers' question, said it was nonsensical. Some even go so far as insisting consciousness itself is just an illusion. That the only reason and meaning we ought to derive from life is to promulgate the species (i.e. fuck early and often) and all the rest is added fluff.
Sagan worshipers insist you are to be moral in a universe that is not moral in itself, they insist Frankenstein, albeit he is a monster that did not ask for his existence, should still take responsibility for his existence. Shelley wrote Frankenstein when she was 19. Now there was real genius ...
Is response sufficient for individual meaning? Was Frankenstein's monster justified for not feeling any kind of moral responsibility for his horrific Being that he never requested?
I'm afraid I haven't read the William James you cite, but I can't accept "just a utility function for the species" since the universe existed well before any species. It looks more like the species are a utility for the universe.
According to many theorists, any coherent system that grows large enough will become self aware so perhaps the Buddhists / Taoists , who say our world is illusion and maybe John Lennon, who said the universe is God were and are on the right track.
Lennon did go on to say that since we are an integral part of the universe, we are God but to accept that means throwing all theories of cosmology in the bin. But no, there are no grounds at all for thinking the universe is friendly. It just functions according to the laws of physics and mathematics.
As for your last paragraph, sorry but I think you're wrong there. We cannot take responsibility for our existence, that's completely beyond our control, but we can and should take responsibility for our decisions and actions once we're here.
P.S I think 'Sagan worshippers' is borderline offensive. I read a lot of writers, but I don't worship any of them.
Miller, my astronomy professor at UC Santa Cruz didn't think much of Sagan (I remember him going on about Sagan at a lecture like it was yesterday!). Said he was more interested in the publicity than serious astronomy, and said most of his astronomy and astrophysics colleagues considered Sagan a 2nd rate astronomer at best. It is wearisome how much Sagan is idolized like a God, whereas William James, the brother of Henry James, founded the first school of psychology at Harvard (you will find the psychology building named after him there) - people either have never even heard of James, or bothered to read what he wrote.
No one yet knows what produces consciousness, least of all the reductive materialists.
ps: "but we can and should take responsibility for our decisions and actions once we're here." In a universe that doesn't give a fuck, according to physics and mathematics? Now that really is borderline offensive!
I prefer to "play the ball, not the man". Make that 'person' if you wish.
But no, no one knows what produces consciousness and may never know, but I don't spend too much time on the matter since as Caitlin describes in her piece, we have more immediate issues to deal with.
But the meaning is derived from the wonder of being part of a long human and natural endeavor that will continue into the future to evolve.
These idiots are on the verge of either blowing it all up or burning it up (climate catastrophe and biological extinction). So, we're talking about a lot more than a single individual human life, my friend.
"But the meaning is derived from the wonder of being part of a long human and natural endeavor that will continue into the future to evolve."
Sounds like a Carl Sagan catechism, a pronouncement of faith. If only meaning were that simplistic.
Similar to the materialistic myth that life spontaneously emerged from a pond - and that is all one need believe - that you only need a tornado going through a junkyard to produce a jumbo jet. Forget the apple and Adam and Eve - the materialists have a new myth you are required to believe in now.
Is there anywhere on the earth which is detached enough from the western MSM that the madness so well described by Caitlin can be completely avoided except by one’s own choice, and in one’s own way? Asking for a friend...but, quite seriously. Any suggestions will be welcome.
I'd think any place where culturally and geographically they're removed from the "West" as much as possible. That would also have to be a non-English environment.
But to get there would still have to be a "one's own choice". And learning the new language there would have to be *not* by consuming the local media as that will be under the western influence for sure.
There are many reasons to do nothing, right? Gotta put a wet blanket and bucket of water on any emergence or glimmer of light, right? Things must be tough among the feral cats.
Do you think, back in 2016, if Bernie told the DNC that if they fucked with him he'd expose it, organize his supporters, destroy the Democratic Party, and focus his campaign on that and form a new third party, that things would turned out like they did?
Well, you can guarantee that those are the conversations RFK Jr. has had and will continue to have with the Democrats.
I can guarantee you that if Sanders or Kennedy were to attempt anything like an independent foreign policy, smears similar to those that were used on Trump would be used on him.
Every winning candidate since arguably Bush 1.0 (“Kinder, gentler America”) has run for office as a non-interventionist, and then morphed into John McCain immediately upon taking the Oath of Office. Not only that, but each president has arguably been a more reckless imperialist than his predecessor.
I don’t pretend to know how the process works, or even if it is the same for every president, but the results speak for themselves. Hell, look at Obama, who was elected in large part on a platform of ending the stupid wars. He not only failed to end a single war, he gave us a bunch of new and stupider ones.
And then there's Trump. He was arguably an even more explicit non-interventionist than 2008 Obama, and he also hadn't ended anything. and has brought us into new conflicts in Venezuela and Niger, as well as expanded our wars on Ukraine and Yemen.
The less said about Biden, the better.
TL:DR: unless and until the Deep State is eradicated root and branch, it matters not who is elected.
Even if RFK Jr. is the real thing, unlike what Sanders turned out to be - I've been traumatized so much by Sanders backstabbing - that there is no way I'm going to play the same game with RFK Jr. If he decides to actually run Independent, instead of in the Democratic party - well maybe it might be a different dynamic. But he isn't doing that is he?
Excellent column. And a true benediction. In the words of Bob Dylan, “they say the darkest hour is just before the dawn.” I welcome these idiots being so dark they actually are telling it as they see it, not trying to cover it in pretty clothes and cheap perfume, like the Clinton’s did and do. And the darker they make it, the sooner we’ll see the dawn. People like to mock “woke” culture but it’s strong and growing and dawning.
I can't help but agree with you. Human normalcy bias - can be very dangerous. Everything appears "normal" so it isn't going to happen to me or to us - is the bias. Therefore, people will not be as alarmed as they ought to be. Where Caitlin often writes, we should be screaming from the rooftops that this warmongering needs to stop. That the danger is very real.
I suspect she doesn't think it is that different. I can't speak for Caitlin and her amazing skill with words, but what she appears to be trying to say is something along the lines of what Victor Frankl might have said when writing about Auschwitz - that even in the darkest times, one still can find meaning and hope - even if it only resides within one's self, and nowhere else at the moment.
And that can't be argued with. My impression is she insists we can do something this time. Theoretically yes, just like back then. Not in practice, though. The evildoers are not stupid and took care of that, now as well as before.
And yet there’s a cycle in the ways of men. It gets really really dark and then it gets really really good—like the way the West gets to live while sucking up every natural resource in the world at gun point—while others in the world don’t have it so good, and the cycle turns bad for us and gets better for them. Historical inevitability. Homeostasis. Karma. Call it what you will—those who are gloating in their good fortune will see that the wheel is still in spin. Might as well relish the day, do the best you can, and hope you’re as good as you think you are.
You over there, you American voters, yes you ! You are the ones responsible for unleashing such a monster and idiot politicians on the world, because you voted for both parties, which are actually one and the same ! You are the ones who boasted every single day that based on the II. Amendment, you have the right to bear arms, and yes, you have as many guns in your homes as all other inhabitants of the world combined, but what do you use them for ? I tell you, you play with it, while, for example, the Hungarians destroyed the Soviet tanks with their bare hands in 1956 and died while the freer half of the world, including you who liked to talk about freedom and rights watched with folded arms, living in prosperity and freedom ! When are you going to start cleaning out the stinking barn of Augias from overseas, the smell of which permeates the whole world ? Yes, it's true that you have more important things to do, because you have to go on a holiday trip with the huge polluting and gas-guzzling monsters and grill delicious meat on the BBQ, and of course you have to wash it all down with a "delicious" Bud Light, looking at the label, which shows a "child-loving" patient with a deformed mind is visible.
I know you don't have time for this kind of planning, because you have to enjoy the last day until the world turns upside down and the first nuclear missile arrives, which the world owes to you, because eternal war is the existence of the American military industry, others need to benefit at the cost of his life!
Make it a national slogan
" "We heard that half a million children died [due to sanctions against Iraq]. I mean, that's more children than died in Hiroshima. And - do you know it's worth the price?"
Albright: "I think it's a very difficult choice, but the price - we think the price is worth it."
That, just about sums it up! We proles grew up, not even going to bourgeois white-flight suburbs, since we'd be followed around by cranked-up cops. It was FAR worse for Black or Latino kids, picking up parents working there! When rich honkey kids turned from hippy to yuppies, gentrifing red-lined homes, we KNEW "our" party was now their multinational LLC; as Debbie Wasserman Schultz SNEERED under oath. Biden was sucking Koch with Strom Thurmond, as Powell's Memo removed anything remotely resembling DEMOCRACY from working hand's reach. Reactionary racist union Democrats might've voted Reagan in, but PMC yuppies CRUSHED hopes, aspirations & dreams of 90% dumpster diving, varmint hunting, sex & dope selling unemployed, un-represented working class ex-Democrats, LONG before Citizens United, WTO, WEF, Dopplegangster duopoly or monopoly media by, of, for & solely from brainwashed ofay, yuppie perspectives & 46% voter turn-out & WAR or prison, as OUR only job program? I've NEVER misapplied the term "fascist" or exaggerated culpability of echo-chamber Liberals' denial, in US Catastrophe Capital's feeding frenzies!
It's not so mu ch that she said that, as that she wasn't fired immediately, that there weren't screams of horrified outrage. Of course, the DC crowd HAD all decided it was worth it--she was just too stupid to find a long way to not answer.
Yesterday's Greenwald explores the geriatric nature of the current US government supposing that's one reason they don't really care what's going to happen as they're on their way out, literally. Some hilarious stuff that I didn't know, like Gerry Nadler pooping his pants during a press conference, or Diane Feinstein claims. To say nothing of Biden fighting his script.
We can't let the stupid and warmongers put a damper on our "light". We have to keep swatting the little buzzing insects away until the light unhindered shines for all the world to see. But some days... Yeah, I really worry about the sanity of the children we've put in charge. It's time to change their diapers and put them bed and let some real adults who have everyone's best interests (including the planet's) take the lead.
For me, your work continues to result in the most profound moments of appreciation. Tears on my face moments. Thank you.
Yes, it’s is totally disgusting, my poor fellow Americans so brain washed by propaganda. Biden long apart of the immoral Democrat Party and DeSantis out to lunch, mentally and morally, along with the Republican Party. What to do! What to do!????
The first thing I would suggest is recognize that no individual who reaches the pinnacle of either fake party is worthy of our collective hope. The WH is not open to any honest aspirants.
"The WH is not open to any honest aspirants."
Perhaps that tells us something about the electorate?
Does it? Are you thinking that we, the electorate, choose the candidates that appear on the ballot?
If people actually engaged in their precinct politics, we would choose the candidates. So indeed it does say something about the electorate. An$ not a very positive something.
It tells us about the power of money in a corrupt election system and the weakness of a populace that wants to project its own power onto a figurehead. There’s no cavalry coming. We have to save ourselves.
Ron Paul is still doing a good job.
Pinnacle? ANY slavering kleptocrat, United Democracy Project ALLOWS us to LOTE in (to rob, indenture, incarcerate or induct us as WEF/ Wall Street death squad thugs) is yet another reason to take in DC residents, & try out a neutron bomb then donate yard sale Bushmasters to folks, willing to return to a lovely, equitable, friendly & cheerful museum & library studded swamp community of patriots!
Bernie Sanders taught me an extremely valuable lesson, the cost 4,800.00 and two yrs. of door knocking, fund raising parties, I can be fooled. Run to the Light.
Good that you got wise.
Too many people keep doubling down, rather than admit that they were fooled.
Having just read a little on DeSantis and also having seen Biden and his nasty Neocons in action, it seems that if DeSantis receives the blessing of Republicans for the next presidential running, then it will rest with the Democrats to find someone worthy to be nominated to replace the militarist's puppet Biden and all his Israeli owned controllers from all the nooks and crannies in Washington. They are everywhere.
Then, step one could mean meeting the Chinese leader on a pleasant Greek island and then shaking hands, which seems like a simple first step to removing all the US generated aggravation in the world today. I'll pay the airfares if someone else picks up the tab for the Moussaka, the· Papoutsakia and Pastitsio with a good wine for a toast to "world peace".
Oops. I forgot about the soon-to-be-ignored military arms makers. Give them some interest free public money for a couple of years from the US $850 billion defence budget (not needed any more) and tell them to restructure their organisation s to create something useful. As a starter, ask them to find a source of employment for the 21,000 employees of the CIA, no longer of interest to anyone
It seems this is the only way out, one political party equally as bad as the other, as in all the Anglo countries such as Australia and the UK, all united under the newly minted AUKUS banner.
Look it up, readers. AUKUS. The most ridiculously dramatic association of bored warmongers designed to satisfy a final American splurge at being king of the kids, before the empire crumbles. Then read up on QUAD as another effort as well, Asia oriented this time. (Yes, re-arming Japan as well. Some people in the USA do have short memories).
Don't leave it too long or the US will have a couple more frighteningly theatrical military consortiums in place as well, along the lines of NATO, ANZUS, QUAD, AUKUS and on it goes.
Against who, you ask? They will find others to threaten, to harass, sanction, drone to death, kill off with depleted uranium weapons, have no fears. And if they can grow a big crop of heroin as well, as in Afghanistan, it's all good for business.
'If ya can't kill 'em, drug 'em to death'.
What a world.
We are back to the Cold War madness. They will simply insert Lloyd Austin as a replacement presidential candidate, whip up more war escalation - and that will be that with the unofficial military takeover of the country.
I don't think the cold war was ever this mad . . .
The military was in charge of the US govt for decades. Eisenhower was military man who placated the masses while at home during a long recession while in the same period Dulles was wrecking the entire planet in cold war mania.
Kennedy brothers came in, didnt understand the situation, crossed Dulles, and well yeah see how that turned out - the spooks took that round. LBJ was a frontman while the military and spooks continued to run amok in cold war mania.
In that period nuclear war almost happened several times.
Problem is all of that generation is gone. Currently the spook world is run by rabid ideologues like Nuland, Kagan, Rice, Power, who take no learnings from history and really dont care if the entire planet is destroyed. They do believe they can emerge from the bunkers and the world will be better off then, or they believe that they can colonise Mars or something in Bezo’s spaceships.
These people are insane.
I read an article from Matt Taibbi about the speech Eisenhower gave at the end of his term and he said he was sorry that not even he himself could protect the US from the Arms industry and the military. I went on to read more of what Matt had researched and from my understanding of it all both the military and the arms producers declared war on not just the people of the US but the whole world. They outright stated they would not allow any dissent from no matter how high up the person might be in the government.
The audio interviews of Leslie Grove are quite illuminating in that regard. He was hellbent on making sure the atomic project goes to completion no matter the need.
From what I understand it cannot be proved that Truman authorized the bombings. Rather, the military went ahead and he was forced to backdate his "approval".
You are so right, then gov. knew nuclear war isn't survivable, now they embrace it. Owning all the rubble is extremely important.
Military coup took over a long time ago.
The core problem, doing the right thing as well as the useful thing isn't nearly as profitable. Capitalism demands destruction. It really is as simple as not making war. Run to the Light. I vote your plan : ) Contrarian 33 2024
The democrat ace in the hole is Michelle Obama.
Patricia Blair: Keep your sense of humor and joy in noticing the simple things in life. Think of how hard life was 200 years ago and enjoy the comforts we have today.
I enjoyed a nice health walk, this evening, in my neighborhood ; sunny and about 73 degrees. A great day in May.
Caitlin: A GREAT ending to your article here. Frankly, I tend to look at and care for our lawn, garden, house, and vehicles more than people nowadays. But then I live in Sonoma County, California Hell.
DeSantis is no saint. He's a politician who doesn't understand that the boilerplate political non-speech doesn't work anymore. The man is an idiot.
BTW, record low temperatures here in Sonoma County for this time of year. The grape crop will be a late harvest. The plants are loving the cooler weather with high humidity. Only 63F today. Usually around 88F and sometimes 100F.
I recently moved back to Berkeley after living in Sebastopol for 2 years. I miss it up there and want to move back!
GabeReal: Bring money. LOL.
Haha. Actually you get more for your money up there than down here in Bay Area. I lived in a 5th Wheel trailer on a ranch in west Sebastopol and was perfectly happy there. Unfortunately my job in Santa Rosa fell through and I had to move...
GabeReal: A shame you had to leave the "Nuclear Free Zone" of Sebastopol. That welcoming sign on Hwy 12 always cracks me up. You can always try for a job in Healdsburg and one of the subsidized apartments that are being built here in town.
It's not that there is any more darkness than before. Sociopaths always end up with the power, because they are the ones who will do anything to get it.
Just that the power available, and the consequences for the rest of the world, are infinitely greater than at any time in the past.
Neither flip of the duopoly politician coin desires or intends to end ‘the debt ceiling’, which the remainder of the world’s nations except Denmark regard as arcane.
When asked if a debt ceiling should be cast aside, Republican or Democrat, even Joe Biden and Bernie Sanders have recently replied “...it would be irresponsible”.
The debt ceiling, you see, is the demolition device which duopoly Congress may employ to destroy the inconvenience of popular social programs which both Wall Street parties find unprofitable for their corporate benefactors, but cannot raise as an issue before Congress and in the public eye.
The now familiar hostage-taking has served a dubious chore of ridding popular social programs and commons from public hands, without eliciting direct blame at either herd of Wall Street servants.
Just as American military power is beset upon non-cooperative nations by creating a pretext for military action with lies projected by a corporate theatre of monopolized media, the Legislative Branch, Congress, drags up its trebuchet of an arcane, idiotic ‘debt ceiling issue’ to demolish the walls of necessary yet corporate-undesirable social programs & protections until their targets are broken to rubble to be written off in a corporate media as ‘casualties of intense party polarization’.
The weaponization of a ‘debt ceiling standoff’ is a seasonal ruse used by Punch and Judy parties of Wall Street to dismantle social benefits which would otherwise bring pitchforks to either side of the duopoly ruse to have suggested an end to well liked public benefits on the floor of Congress.
A ‘debt ceiling’ is Congress’ seasonal pick of a fish in a social pond to put into a pot for the corporate soup line, while society remains unhoused, unwell and unrepresented.
Other than speed limits (which are ignored anyway), the debt ceiling might be the only "limit" to the US capitalist imperial project. The whole concept of limits is repudiated by the culture.
Tsionist imperial project. Plutocratic and busybodied, too. Some knowledge of tanakh is warranted here. "tikkun olam", too. As it turns out, Hitler was not entirely wrong.
Oh so right on target!
Jerrold Nadler is not doing anything new of different. He has been the same amoral unprincipled channeler of dirty money and hatred that he has been his entire political career. A front row member of the “Russiagate” fake news crew, he is not unironically a massive recipient of AIPAC money, in return for which he has faithfully and unquestioningly supported all of Israel’s aggressivions against its neighbours and its apartheid regime. He has been an advocate of Israel’s stoking conflicts and supports that they should atrack Iran.
A disgusting person.
And so no doubt he would be happy for the Ukrainian puppets to attack a nuclear armed country. Why? He doesn’t care and like the rest of the war hawks he will of course be forewarned and prepositioned in a nuclear bunker like all govt officials . What would happen to the rest of us, or even his own extended family ? Doesnt care.
This is what passes for elected representatives of the public in the sham of a “democracy”.
I totally agree. Except that I don’t think even our most venal reps believe they can survive a nuke attack on DC and environs, bunkered or not. These guys won’t give up their cushy lives and “house in the Hamptons” for any reason. They are chicken hawks and only want war elsewhere. Other people’s children, other people’s arms and legs, other people’s countries. That’s why Caitlin is so right to fear our take over of the Aussie Military. We’ll have ‘em in a shooting war in no time and Jerry Gonads will be smirking away in Manhattan saying kill more, kill more, kill more.
It's getting harder and harder to read Caitlin's column, because I don't watch TV or read Mainstream (corporate) media--so I don't see how toxic and crazy it's getting in here till I read what she posts. And then I find myself silently screaming. I live in the US, which currently is like Germany in about 1933.
If you could afford to get out of Germany & be sufficiently aware of media obfuscation to GET out, in time. There were ways to escape Nazis & their enablers, to survive! We lost that capability, quite a long time ago? Look at how pervasive libertarian think-tank lies have been, verbatim in repitition; how our senile kleptocrats can't even BE bothered to prevaricate, BS us with obfuscatory pleonasm or gaslight "brain fog," denial or conditioned response victims, anymore? A big feature of große Lüge, is intentionally being BLATANT & obnoxious about how preposterously obvious the lie is?
Mary, I didn't know that the Reichstag and chancellor's residence in 1933 were infested with Jews like the Congress and the WH in 2023. Please tell us more.
I'm sure if you asked the (other) Nazis in Germany in 1933 they would have told you the Reighstag and chancellor's residence WERE "crawling with Jews". Using a word that calls to mind insects is a typical trope of racists, and claiming that places of power are infested with whichever group is being demonized is part and parcel of the paranoid approach to the world. There are real problems--places of power are infested with a type of human that is exceedingly dangerous but you can't tell them by their appearance or last names--sociopaths.
Read Bereshit 49:8-12 for Judean supremacy verses. Then see Shemot 19:5-6 for the evidence of narcissism which must lead the usual subversives into conflict with Hindus, too. Mata Bharat isn't big enough for both the brahmins and the children of Israel to be the brahmins of Bharat.
While you're at it, feel free to ponder Isaiah 66:22-24. Figure what it would take to keep the worm alive indefinity. When you've figured out a correct answer, mosey on over to the JTA's website to peruse atheist David Ben-Gurion's fantasy, published in 1962, about a federation of the continents, a "Supreme Court of Mankind" in Jerusalem, and the fulfillment of the prophesy of Isaiah.
Off you go, now. You have your assignments.
It's easy enough to collect evidence of any paranoid theory. Certainly the Bible is full of such stuff--I'm sure the Old Testament is full of Jewish superiority; there are plenty of people who believe that Christians, or specifically Catholics or Protestants or one denomination of Protestants, or Hindus or Muslims are superior and it would be better if everyone converted. There are those who believe the absurd idea that the US is a chosen country and should be exempt from the normal international rules and laws--this has a name, American Exceptionalism, and is officially US policy. This sort of thing is childish but it isn't really a threat. The fact that you can find quotations of Jewish supremacy in ancient texts, and plenty of Jews (and women and black people and Hispanics and oh my God, there is a HUGE number of MEN IN SUITS in high places, Washington is absolutely INFESTED with them!) doesn't mean there is a deadly conspiracy ongoing.
Which "(other) Nazis" would have told us that the Reichstag and chancellor's res. were crawling with Jews? Name them. And what evidence would they have cited? The Haavara agreement of '33? Receipts of donations, dated from 1928, to the NSDAP from two Jewish bankers in Berlin?
While you're sputtering about that, bear in mind that cying and complaining about "racists" and "typical" tropes won't change the fact that the WH and the Congress are crawling with, and have been long infested by, Jews who act in concert according to their chauvinism and ancient sense of entitlement to dominate the world. This was true during W's admin. It was true during the admin of DJT, supposedly the new, new Hitler. It's true today—the Biden admin recently boasted of this fact on Twitter. If Tsion Ron slithers into the WH in Jan 2025 (because, say, DJT is tossed into prison) it will remain true from 2025 through at least 2029.
I didn't know that the Reichstag and chancellor's residence in 1933 were infested with Jews like the Congress and the WH in 2023. Please tell us more.
Sure, we shouldn't "give up hope", nor "joy". There definitely were people with the same attitude prior to past World Wars and all prior calamities. That didn't prevent them from happening.
Those who were lucky to have survived could assume the posture of hope and joy for real, thinking humans have wised up and "never again" and so on. Only for the shit to hit the fans once more a few decades later. One reason may be the shit keeps being produced and the fans happen to be in abundance.
And because people are as corrupt; if not more so, as they have always been; just more of them, these days.
I think we aren’t talking about human failings. Power-tripping and greed are as old as humans, but the scale to which free and open communication has become strangled by oligarchs, and the degree to which laws have been rewritten by their Ivy League soldiers has reached the point where status quo rhetoric is as hollow as an empty drum. No honest, informed person can possibly believe anything that the MSM asserts.
I assume by "more" you mean proportionally. But that's because of the changed society arrangements. And so it must fluctuate as environment dictates.
As we head back to the Stone Age the proportion might change but only to accommodate those particular new old requirements.
Affirmative.
russian_bot: Are you talking about the fans of shit?
It could be put in many ways. I just picked one.
russian_bot: My comment was a pun.
I took it as such.
Well it's all relative - I mean no matter how much you love, how much you appreciate life - it all ends for all of us. No one you know or love now, will be alive. We're all on a stop watch called "mortality". The real hope is wrapped in an enigma - what is this really all about? Are we just ghosts trapped in a machine?
I'm not particularly eloquent. What I'm trying to convey is - yes, one should go for hope and joy. Only it won't matter as far as "saving the world". But it does help one cope better with whatever happens.
Insert your favorite religion here in its purest form, but most in Caitlin's forum (including her) don't seem to appreciate it.
For me, it's not about religion (particularly organized religion) - it's just an existential question about existence. What is this all about? Why is there even existence in the first place? How did I end up writing messages to a complete stranger calling himself "russian_bot"? How did I get here? Is there any good reason for it? Some kind of short lived phantasmagoria of love and horror mixed in with the mundane and old age, while youth laughs away on sunny beaches.
Well, whatever one thinks it is it must be ordered or reasoned about somehow so it's worth it. Otherwise why even bother - blame your parents' tryst that brought you into this world and find the quickest way to do away with yourself. In fact, all this transgender crap might be one way to handle it - mangle oneself so it becomes suicide of sorts.
So any system that helps one deal with it, a system of beliefs or convictions of which religions, organized or otherwise, are part of is needed. Such a system at a very minimum should direct humans towards survival and advancement and not at the expense of other humans and environment. That requires coercion as humans left to their own devices tend to disintegrate quite quickly. So anything that directs - and forces - them in the right direction should be considered reasonable. Even if "undemocratic". In fact, it looks like it must be such. Why that is - well, that's what they try to put in words as far as all those ancient texts. For anyone to try to understand it in their own way, which would be fine as long as the non-destruction ends are achieved.
Otherwise, well, see the first paragraph...
The transgender debates and wokeness really has gone off the rails. Similar to the "MeToo" crap we had to put up with for years. The same "MeToo" crowd looked the other way when it came to Biden and Tara Reade - that's when it really cemented for me that it was all a pile of political propaganda and hypocrisy.
Yeah, I do think you have to decide for yourself what "system" you're going to believe in. You have to believe in something - to get yourself out of bed in the morning. But what will that be?
The "Metoo" initiative wasn't "crap". It was a response to the fact the law did not protect women : about 1% of rape charges ever made it to court- and only a small percent of that resulted in convictions. Women were held responsible for any "unwanted" sex.
Metoo has forced men to be as careful in their actions and presumptions as women have always had to be. I call the fair - at last.
“Woke”? A republican presidential candidate openly was revealed to advocate about how men should handle women: “grab them by the p#%%¥”
He got elected. So no this isn’t about the left. No one on the country gives a damn - not even women give a dam about each other.
No other way but look for it. I don't think we should strive to invent anything new as billions of people have already gone through the process. What we already have should be sufficient but the challenge is for one to get a handle on it. And to do that I can think of no other way but read great thinkers' takes and find ones that resonate.
And then *you* will know. And it won't matter what others might think.
I don’t fault anyone for taking an occasional hit of their favorite form of hopium. People still fall head over heals in love, or they they watch their kids take a first step, or they have a good dog at their feet or a purring cat on their lap, or they catch a glimpse of sunlight hitting the autumn leaves just right, and for long moments, even days, everything seems right with the world.
But then one day Joe Biden—who was always a soulless mediocrity and a petty criminal, and who is now made pathetic by cognitive decline—is convinced by two other soulless mediocrities, Jake Sullivan and Vicky Nuland, to push the big red button on his desk, and it’s suddenly curtains for half the population of the world, while the other half suffers grim slow deaths. (Except for Joe, Jake, and Vicky and their families who all survive in the luxury bunker/ark deep underground in the Raven Rock Mountain Complex in Pennsylvania, and, no matter how many years they live afterwards, they never for a moment have a single regret.)
To those paying close attention—which is probably a small minority precisely because it’s too painful to pay attention—we can only shake our heads and ask: Was there ever any point? All that said, hope springs eternal in the human heart. But, in a creation filled with design flaws, that human addiction to fleeting and false hope may be the biggest design flaw of all. Still, there are some in history who have sorted most of this out, and they found the truth (mostly). Of course, they were all burned at the stake and their books were hidden away in the basement of the Vatican or the Smithsonian. But if you look hard enough you’ll slowly find some of the clues they managed to leave behind. The rest is up to us.
Beware of the one book person.
It may help to look beyond the self, the ego and look to not just the human species, but all life on this planet. Life which evolved and developed through many struggles over four and a half billion years. I want to work to preserve and further develop that life.
Our planet Earth is after all, the planet we know of in the observable universe that supports what we call life and to throw that away, out of ...what?...apathy, despair, selfishness is beyond a crime against humanity. It's a crime against the whole known universe.
Dr. Carl Sagan in summing up the original series of 'Cosmos' said, that having evolved from atoms created in the Big Bang, "We are the eyes and ears of the Universe, listening to itself".
One could substitute ‘God’ for ‘universe’ in that Sagan quote. I’ve heard it said we are all fragments of God and incarnated here to learn about itself...
William James often wrote if the universe only works in generalities, and is just a utility function for the species, what meaning does that give to the individual other than a kind of existence that is a mere utilitarian function for universal values, but not individual values? Frederic Myers, William James' good friend (and quite a scholar in his own right), once said he felt perhaps one of the most important questions one could ask was, "Is the Universe friendly?"
Reductive materialists scoffed then (and still do) at Myers' question, said it was nonsensical. Some even go so far as insisting consciousness itself is just an illusion. That the only reason and meaning we ought to derive from life is to promulgate the species (i.e. fuck early and often) and all the rest is added fluff.
Sagan worshipers insist you are to be moral in a universe that is not moral in itself, they insist Frankenstein, albeit he is a monster that did not ask for his existence, should still take responsibility for his existence. Shelley wrote Frankenstein when she was 19. Now there was real genius ...
“Did I request thee, Maker, from my clay
To mould me man? Did I solicit thee
From darkness to promote me?”
I think what's you're driving at is better known as "instrumental reason" and the disenchantment from the world.
Is response sufficient for individual meaning? Was Frankenstein's monster justified for not feeling any kind of moral responsibility for his horrific Being that he never requested?
I'm afraid I haven't read the William James you cite, but I can't accept "just a utility function for the species" since the universe existed well before any species. It looks more like the species are a utility for the universe.
According to many theorists, any coherent system that grows large enough will become self aware so perhaps the Buddhists / Taoists , who say our world is illusion and maybe John Lennon, who said the universe is God were and are on the right track.
Lennon did go on to say that since we are an integral part of the universe, we are God but to accept that means throwing all theories of cosmology in the bin. But no, there are no grounds at all for thinking the universe is friendly. It just functions according to the laws of physics and mathematics.
As for your last paragraph, sorry but I think you're wrong there. We cannot take responsibility for our existence, that's completely beyond our control, but we can and should take responsibility for our decisions and actions once we're here.
P.S I think 'Sagan worshippers' is borderline offensive. I read a lot of writers, but I don't worship any of them.
Miller, my astronomy professor at UC Santa Cruz didn't think much of Sagan (I remember him going on about Sagan at a lecture like it was yesterday!). Said he was more interested in the publicity than serious astronomy, and said most of his astronomy and astrophysics colleagues considered Sagan a 2nd rate astronomer at best. It is wearisome how much Sagan is idolized like a God, whereas William James, the brother of Henry James, founded the first school of psychology at Harvard (you will find the psychology building named after him there) - people either have never even heard of James, or bothered to read what he wrote.
No one yet knows what produces consciousness, least of all the reductive materialists.
ps: "but we can and should take responsibility for our decisions and actions once we're here." In a universe that doesn't give a fuck, according to physics and mathematics? Now that really is borderline offensive!
I prefer to "play the ball, not the man". Make that 'person' if you wish.
But no, no one knows what produces consciousness and may never know, but I don't spend too much time on the matter since as Caitlin describes in her piece, we have more immediate issues to deal with.
But the meaning is derived from the wonder of being part of a long human and natural endeavor that will continue into the future to evolve.
These idiots are on the verge of either blowing it all up or burning it up (climate catastrophe and biological extinction). So, we're talking about a lot more than a single individual human life, my friend.
"But the meaning is derived from the wonder of being part of a long human and natural endeavor that will continue into the future to evolve."
Sounds like a Carl Sagan catechism, a pronouncement of faith. If only meaning were that simplistic.
Similar to the materialistic myth that life spontaneously emerged from a pond - and that is all one need believe - that you only need a tornado going through a junkyard to produce a jumbo jet. Forget the apple and Adam and Eve - the materialists have a new myth you are required to believe in now.
It's just like a drunk I know who says "I'm never going to drink again"! Guess what Saturday nights not far off from today!
Is there anywhere on the earth which is detached enough from the western MSM that the madness so well described by Caitlin can be completely avoided except by one’s own choice, and in one’s own way? Asking for a friend...but, quite seriously. Any suggestions will be welcome.
I'd think any place where culturally and geographically they're removed from the "West" as much as possible. That would also have to be a non-English environment.
But to get there would still have to be a "one's own choice". And learning the new language there would have to be *not* by consuming the local media as that will be under the western influence for sure.
Caitlin, you may have already said something about RFK Jr running for president, as a Democrat. What are your thoughts and how far will he get?
He won't be allowed to interfere with the coronation, and even if he were elected somehow, he would not be allowed to govern.
There are many reasons to do nothing, right? Gotta put a wet blanket and bucket of water on any emergence or glimmer of light, right? Things must be tough among the feral cats.
I am simply stating a fact.
"Facts" are fungible things.
Do you think, back in 2016, if Bernie told the DNC that if they fucked with him he'd expose it, organize his supporters, destroy the Democratic Party, and focus his campaign on that and form a new third party, that things would turned out like they did?
Well, you can guarantee that those are the conversations RFK Jr. has had and will continue to have with the Democrats.
I can guarantee you that if Sanders or Kennedy were to attempt anything like an independent foreign policy, smears similar to those that were used on Trump would be used on him.
Every winning candidate since arguably Bush 1.0 (“Kinder, gentler America”) has run for office as a non-interventionist, and then morphed into John McCain immediately upon taking the Oath of Office. Not only that, but each president has arguably been a more reckless imperialist than his predecessor.
I don’t pretend to know how the process works, or even if it is the same for every president, but the results speak for themselves. Hell, look at Obama, who was elected in large part on a platform of ending the stupid wars. He not only failed to end a single war, he gave us a bunch of new and stupider ones.
And then there's Trump. He was arguably an even more explicit non-interventionist than 2008 Obama, and he also hadn't ended anything. and has brought us into new conflicts in Venezuela and Niger, as well as expanded our wars on Ukraine and Yemen.
The less said about Biden, the better.
TL:DR: unless and until the Deep State is eradicated root and branch, it matters not who is elected.
Exactly you can't argue with reality!
Even if RFK Jr. is the real thing, unlike what Sanders turned out to be - I've been traumatized so much by Sanders backstabbing - that there is no way I'm going to play the same game with RFK Jr. If he decides to actually run Independent, instead of in the Democratic party - well maybe it might be a different dynamic. But he isn't doing that is he?
"Facts" are fungible things and the world is not deterministic.
Excellent column. And a true benediction. In the words of Bob Dylan, “they say the darkest hour is just before the dawn.” I welcome these idiots being so dark they actually are telling it as they see it, not trying to cover it in pretty clothes and cheap perfume, like the Clinton’s did and do. And the darker they make it, the sooner we’ll see the dawn. People like to mock “woke” culture but it’s strong and growing and dawning.
Hope you're right. But we've already had two world wars caused by warmongering "idiots". And it's gotten really dark lately.
And going back we see plenty examples of many people raising alarm. Only to be dismissed in exact same ways we're observing currently.
Many also said it can't happen because it just cannot. Then it did happen.
I can't help but agree with you. Human normalcy bias - can be very dangerous. Everything appears "normal" so it isn't going to happen to me or to us - is the bias. Therefore, people will not be as alarmed as they ought to be. Where Caitlin often writes, we should be screaming from the rooftops that this warmongering needs to stop. That the danger is very real.
But some do scream as they had back then. I can't figure out how Caitlin thinks this time it might be different, based on what exactly?
I suspect she doesn't think it is that different. I can't speak for Caitlin and her amazing skill with words, but what she appears to be trying to say is something along the lines of what Victor Frankl might have said when writing about Auschwitz - that even in the darkest times, one still can find meaning and hope - even if it only resides within one's self, and nowhere else at the moment.
And that can't be argued with. My impression is she insists we can do something this time. Theoretically yes, just like back then. Not in practice, though. The evildoers are not stupid and took care of that, now as well as before.
And yet there’s a cycle in the ways of men. It gets really really dark and then it gets really really good—like the way the West gets to live while sucking up every natural resource in the world at gun point—while others in the world don’t have it so good, and the cycle turns bad for us and gets better for them. Historical inevitability. Homeostasis. Karma. Call it what you will—those who are gloating in their good fortune will see that the wheel is still in spin. Might as well relish the day, do the best you can, and hope you’re as good as you think you are.
They want war and they'll keep coming up with more and more bullshit to pretend that we are consenting to it.
You over there, you American voters, yes you ! You are the ones responsible for unleashing such a monster and idiot politicians on the world, because you voted for both parties, which are actually one and the same ! You are the ones who boasted every single day that based on the II. Amendment, you have the right to bear arms, and yes, you have as many guns in your homes as all other inhabitants of the world combined, but what do you use them for ? I tell you, you play with it, while, for example, the Hungarians destroyed the Soviet tanks with their bare hands in 1956 and died while the freer half of the world, including you who liked to talk about freedom and rights watched with folded arms, living in prosperity and freedom ! When are you going to start cleaning out the stinking barn of Augias from overseas, the smell of which permeates the whole world ? Yes, it's true that you have more important things to do, because you have to go on a holiday trip with the huge polluting and gas-guzzling monsters and grill delicious meat on the BBQ, and of course you have to wash it all down with a "delicious" Bud Light, looking at the label, which shows a "child-loving" patient with a deformed mind is visible.
I know you don't have time for this kind of planning, because you have to enjoy the last day until the world turns upside down and the first nuclear missile arrives, which the world owes to you, because eternal war is the existence of the American military industry, others need to benefit at the cost of his life!
Make it a national slogan
" "We heard that half a million children died [due to sanctions against Iraq]. I mean, that's more children than died in Hiroshima. And - do you know it's worth the price?"
Albright: "I think it's a very difficult choice, but the price - we think the price is worth it."
That, just about sums it up! We proles grew up, not even going to bourgeois white-flight suburbs, since we'd be followed around by cranked-up cops. It was FAR worse for Black or Latino kids, picking up parents working there! When rich honkey kids turned from hippy to yuppies, gentrifing red-lined homes, we KNEW "our" party was now their multinational LLC; as Debbie Wasserman Schultz SNEERED under oath. Biden was sucking Koch with Strom Thurmond, as Powell's Memo removed anything remotely resembling DEMOCRACY from working hand's reach. Reactionary racist union Democrats might've voted Reagan in, but PMC yuppies CRUSHED hopes, aspirations & dreams of 90% dumpster diving, varmint hunting, sex & dope selling unemployed, un-represented working class ex-Democrats, LONG before Citizens United, WTO, WEF, Dopplegangster duopoly or monopoly media by, of, for & solely from brainwashed ofay, yuppie perspectives & 46% voter turn-out & WAR or prison, as OUR only job program? I've NEVER misapplied the term "fascist" or exaggerated culpability of echo-chamber Liberals' denial, in US Catastrophe Capital's feeding frenzies!
It's not so mu ch that she said that, as that she wasn't fired immediately, that there weren't screams of horrified outrage. Of course, the DC crowd HAD all decided it was worth it--she was just too stupid to find a long way to not answer.
The all grew up watching the Bob Barker show "The Price Is Right" - so "Come on down!"
The Ukrainians are stealing our money, but now they want our cultural heroes, too? Oh, no! That is a step too far.
JK Rowling is a Ukraine fan so that might be one reason. Here she is pranked by the famous Russian duo: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J1HsAodHCrA
Yesterday's Greenwald explores the geriatric nature of the current US government supposing that's one reason they don't really care what's going to happen as they're on their way out, literally. Some hilarious stuff that I didn't know, like Gerry Nadler pooping his pants during a press conference, or Diane Feinstein claims. To say nothing of Biden fighting his script.
It's certainly funny, but also terrifying: https://rumble.com/v2q7soy-system-update-show-89.html
~25:58 - Biden
~53:47 - Nadler
~58:50 - Feinstein
I thought it was pretty exposed already. It is SO clear they don't care what the people think, want, or need.
That for sure. What they also don’t care about is that anyone lives since their time is up physically.
"Let there be light...and it was good."
We can't let the stupid and warmongers put a damper on our "light". We have to keep swatting the little buzzing insects away until the light unhindered shines for all the world to see. But some days... Yeah, I really worry about the sanity of the children we've put in charge. It's time to change their diapers and put them bed and let some real adults who have everyone's best interests (including the planet's) take the lead.