Trump was elected on lies — no nation building, America First, etc but also by voters overlooking the obvious — millions of Zionist money donated by people who expect to get their monies’ worth and the banks, the pharmaceutical companies, big agriculture. The unspooling of all this corruption and incompetence and ethical collapse will play out until the end and no one knows what that will look like. The worship of money will bring the West down and if China and Russia replace values with this same golden calf, their turn will be next.
He is the King of Lies. Over 30,000 verified lies told in his first Administration and a Big Lie told in 2020 that culminated in thousands of angry MAGAs storming the Capitol.
And Americans said "Yes, we want more of THAT guy, please. That woman has a funny laugh."
the first time, the electorate chose Clinton (also a scumbag) but the slave era Electoral College overturned it. There would have been no second or third Trump run if the US were a democacy. And the legitimacy of government is not consent of the electoralte but consent of the people governed, and of 250 millin adults, Trump got about 63 million, Clinton 66 million. Trump was not chosen by the people but by the Electoral College, designed by slave owners to block democracy. Blaming the victims of tyranny of the minority is stupid.
Not sure that I can pick Trump any time around, John. My friend swears he returned from a meeting in Canada (some time last year I think) several inches shorter!
There may have been several "stand in substitutes", as with Biden. Does "the original Trump" still exist? The world stage is characterized by deception. Look at Elite Gender Inversion, for probably the greatest example of this.
I mean you MIGHT be forgiven for thinking he was some sort of "great businessman" because his name had been slapped on properties all over the world. But it was all an illusion. And if you voted for him a second time you are most definitely NOT forgiven.
How can anyone vote for Donald Trump the first time around? He showed us all who he really was his ENTIRE CAREER!
Hillary didn't help things though but still. We had 3rd party candidates such as Jill Stein. At what point do Americans give up on Democrats and Republicans and try something new for a change? I'm sick of this hellish loop of Blue MAGA Wave always followed by a worse Red MAGA Wave.
Excellent question, but 60 million people or more did just that. Desperation maybe…, hope , because of the Aipac lobby manipulations, ?
I’m still wondering how Trump could have been elected a second time…. I which is even more surprising.
Is it possible that it involves reasons which are similar to those whereas people pray to an invisible God and keep hoping that they will eventually be heard?
Maybe there’s a fundamental answer, but I would bet that most voters who opted for Trump didn’t even know Jill Stein and others even existed.
Didn’t somebody write that “ Men lead lives of quiet desperation.” ?
Hamilton Nolan had a pretty good red line in a column the other day: refuse to vote for any candidate who doesn’t support a wealth tax. Forget the party labels; only vote for those who want to kill the billionaires and end the endless war machinery.
AOC came from 1% to winning over the 4th most powerful Democrat without Big Money, just many small donations.....In 2018 United States House elections, when Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez first ran for Congress in New York’s 14th district, her campaign relied heavily on small donations.
The average donation was about $18.
Roughly 62% of her campaign funding came from small donors giving $200 or less.
This was unusual for a congressional campaign. Most winning House campaigns receive less than about 8% of their funds from small donors, meaning they rely much more on large donations and PAC money.
✅ Summary
Candidate Race Avg. Donation
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez 2018 first run for Congress ≈ $18
Her campaign became widely cited as an example of a grassroots fundraising model, with many small online contributions rather than large donors......Money raised
Candidate Money Raised
Joe Crowley (incumbent) about $3.3–$3.4 million
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (challenger) about $300,000
Crowley had roughly 10× more campaign money than Ocasio-Cortez." The times, they are a changin...and it was Bernie Sanders who inspired her and Bush and Pressly and others that they could win without Big Money. "Presidential campaigns (2016 and 2020)
2016 average donation: about $27
Raised over $230 million, mostly from small donors
More than 7 million individual donations
Although he did not win the presidency, he won many primaries and caucuses using this grassroots model." Without relying on rich donors, the representative can represent the people not the big donors....and that is a critical move from plutocracy to democracy.
Dale, we’re barking at the same tree. But its roots are firmly planted in greenbacks. Money talks, barks and yells. When the power bell tolls, it tolls at the sound of money…
When we realize as a species that we need to make greenbacks a commodity as opposed to a necessity, good people may rise to the surface. Until then, power rules.
Great. So if I want a candidate who represents me, all I have to is move to Brooklyn, where the electorate is sufficiently "blue" to overcome the power of money. Not happening, I hate big cities. In any case, all this talk of the size of AOC's donations and where they came from is capitulation--if we had a genuine democracy it would be illegal to spend money on any candidate, illegal to run campaign ads.
By the way, I live in deep red West Virginia. 100% of the people who supposedly represent me down to the county clerk are Republicans. In 2016, how many of WV's 55 counties did Sanders win, over Clinton? All 55. Yet WV sent more Clinton delegates to the convention, thanks to the superdelegates, notably Joe Manchin. Sanders might well have won over Trump in 2016, but the power structure didn't trust him. The power structure will do whatever it takes to maintain its grip on power--whether Rs or Ds are currently in control. The two parties, and the media, work in collusion to ensure no third party can ever arise. We desperately need to uproot the power structure, the Epstein class--the whole world needs us to--but it ain't gonna happen through voting.
Amending your truthful statement Wildfire: "but it ain't gonna happen through voting." . . .alone, but in combination with an assortment of creative mobilization actions.
I think that is too limited an understanding of what is going on. I'd suggest Power, Profits, and Prophets, are what make the Pathocracy work, and what/who it works for.
Another example of the misuse of the term "we." In any given election, in the US for insstance, those voting for the "winner" are about 80 milion at most in a nation with 250 million adults. And 38 million were not pronounced "murdered" by the Lancet study, which claimed that over 50 years, 38 million died from sanctions by all nations.
Do you think the sanctions by China, Russia, and India are at the US behest. Nations use sanctions for their own reasons. It sounds like you don't like the truth...and want to blame all sanctions on one nation, as your question implies.
That's US sanctionz on Russian Oil, dufus, not Indian sanctions. you think China puts on sanctions at behest of US. Talk of easing sacntions on Russian oil (which has nothing to do with the sanctions Russia puts on other nations) is obviously a political concept to lower gas prices. Indian sanctions on Pakistan and other nations have nothing to do with this.
I have read that throughout history this arrangement called "usury" leads to bigger and bigger wars to extract value to pay interest on loans to global financiers.
Even whole countries who don't want war have to pay.
For 300,000 yrs, the smartest won in communities based on sharing and equality and non-violence; then came civiliation, property and with that haves and have nots, and in this game the haves won by being not the smartest but the most ruthless.
Factually wrong. Check out Goliath's Curse by Luke Kemp. A fairly recent and exhaustively researched book about human civilization. Then you and Dale can argue like lords.
Sadly Philip neither your, nor my, disavowal of our governments sins has any standing to cleanse our hands of the pain or suffering caused by the system we are both a part of.
For all his innumerable faults Our President ran on a platform of peace… turned out to be one of an almost endless number of lies… but a plurality voted for him… just as a majority of Congressional representatives voted for the military spending that funded the war….
…The money market mutual fund inside each of your 401k funds is full of the treasury bonds sold to pay for the weapons. It was never “them” - it was always us. This is why a million young people occupied the capitol for a month in the 1970’s… that’s what it takes to end an unjust war. Those young people weren’t smarter than us… they were just more motivated because of the risk of the draft for themselves, their brother, their cousin, their sweetheart…
All we can do is speak out against it and try to make as may people we can see the evil of it.
All is not lost… the far left (Bernie/AOC and the far right (Rand Paul / Tucker Carlson) are united on just one single issue… both are vocal opponents of the war...
We’re half way to the reckoning. Just a little farther until the ball starts rolling downhill.
Hate to break this to you, but Bernie/AOC are not "left" in any sense of the word. They belong with those on the "right" in your scenario and occupy the biggest party in the US--the duopoly. (If you want to learn more about true leftists, start reading Marx and Lenin. Or try my blog--I keep things simple.)
Hate to expose your rule as the useful idiot, but Bernie has been a democratic socialist, going to jail in his early 20's and promoting universal healthcare, labor rights, free education, and banning arms to Israel for decades, and AOC is left in the sense that she struggle to promote the working class, which is the core feature of the left. Your simplistic thinking actually helps the right by doing their work of trashing the alternative to war, inquality, private healthcare, and deregulation. You do no promote revolution by denoucning those leading the charge, facing death threats, speak out and voting for change.
Dale--Bernie Sanders votes for arming Israel EVERY SINGLE TIME it comes up for a vote. He's working for the elites/oligarchy and cooperates with them. He's a puppet of the duopoly. I know all about Bernie--I even worked for him in 2016. He's demonstrated time and time again that he's all for the war machine with his support for Israel for decades now. That's not "leftist". Look up "The Overton Window" and see where Bernie ends up. He's right beside Joe Biden. It's okay you still like Bernie, but don't make him into someone he isn't. (He'll never say the word "genocide" as in "Israel is committing a genocide of the Palestinian people" either if you notice and care. The duopoly supports Biden's/Trump's pro-Israel/pro-genocide agenda.)
Dude, I worked for the Bernie campaign of '16 and I was there in Philly during the convention. The shock we all felt at his announcement the night he endorsed You Know Who was profound. After all the sh!t the so-called 'Democrats' threw at him and his delegates we expected him to rally us and drop the f@cking hammer on her and her party. He could've won the election by a landslide against T-rump. But no... Like many others I saw him for what he was/is - a useful fool.
They invited me back for his run for '20. I declined. The only thing that surprised me that year was the speed with which he fell on his knees. F@ck him.
I think it more that Musk voted for him with his tech. When it looked like a possible win for Harris, there was a sudden uprising in votes for Drumpf - hell, Musk even said he'd won the election for Drumpf.
This is what I keep saying. Language matters. When we say "we sent arms" or "our army is..." and thus take responsibility for what a massive mafia headquartered in Washington DC are doing, that removes agency. Any chance of overturning this murderous government--no, not just the Republicans, the whole thing--depends on being clear-eyed--we DO have an enemy, we Americans, and it isn't across an ocean.
If the last 2-3 years have shown me anything then it is how deeply racist both the vast majority of Americans but also Western Europeans are. I mean really racist and most of them dont even recognize it anymore. They are so used to seeing dead muslims and the middle east on fire, it barely even registers anymore.
I will never forget the outrage over Ukraine and everyone literally saying how seeing blonde haired blue eyed people live in a war zone was so horrific to them because we are used to these kinds of images from people in the global south, not the "worthy" white race.
The same people who walk around with their BLM and pride flags yammering about equality and accepting everyone, only mean other white people. The dehumanization of thr muslims and middle easterners is complete. The entire region has been set ablaze by the West, their leaders murdered, abducted, their children incinerated, their assets stolen like we are some common pirate. they are dropping phosphorus on Lebanon, a sovereign nation that poses no threat to anyone is under siege and its citizens are being killed and threatened with existential ruin and nukes and for most it's just a Tuesday. After Iraq I expected opposition to this war to be vehement, not tepid. Yet here we are.
I was lucky, and did just that for a long time. When Lady Luck knocked at my door, and I opened it. I did not deserve the opportunity to enjoy the freedom I experienced … so I completely agree with your narrative.
Michael Parenti used to call this “we-we syndrome”. The idea was to dispense with the false notion of collective action on behalf of the ruling class and redirect consciousness to class analysis.
Appreciate you sharing your perception , but I'm afraid it not reality.
Well , unless the President , his administration, , Congress , and Senate and the court officials which swore them in to office, they are all foreign invaders?
Or was there a coupe , and your media is being prevented from reporting it?
Or the last elections were rigged, ballot boxes stuffed, voters intimidated?
No my friend, those in Government are part of your society, be they outstanding law obeying school teachers, or degenerate compromised politicians, and it does not matter that they did not get your personal vote,
You can disagree with their actions, their polices, you can protest , you can shout, kick and scream , howl at the moon, but this is your government, your society, your fellowman, your empire.
Me, I`m not a citizen myself, but I am nevertheless a subject of the empire, its tentacles reach very far, those degenerate psychopaths are also my fellowmen, and so are you.
So instead of us rejecting our unpleasant lot in life, how about we do something to rein in these psychopaths , be it a phone call to your congressman, join a protest march, or attend a PTA meeting, let others know why you think this government is illegitimate, get organized, throw a few wrenches in the machine, and oust them.
“So instead of us rejecting our unpleasant lot in life, how about we do something to rein in these psychopaths , be it a phone call to your congressman, join a protest march, or attend a PTA meeting, let others know why you think this government is illegitimate, get organized, throw a few wrenches in the machine, and oust them.”
Do you think that just maybe that is what I am doing by talking about it here?
And yes, AIPAC/Isn’treal has bought off our government. It’s a simple matter to verify that by looking at the donations all of our politicians have accepted on behalf of a foreign nation.
FFS, Trump has admitted multiple times about Miriam and Sheldon Adelsonn paying him off to do their bidding on behalf of Israel.
Not sure where I lost you here, but it’s all right in plain sight.
That’s an easy out eh? This shit happened under our collective watch. We have indeed sat and watched people get slaughtered and done absolutely nothing meaningful to stop it. So i always use we and our.
We, yes us, you and I and probably ever pair of eyeballs on this note. Look outside the window. All that convenient shit that makes our lives so much easier - benefits of the depravity. We can’t live in the midst of all the “benefits” of the murder and theft and then wriggle out of the responsibility for them happening and also to stop it.
Yes you did. Voting is not a right, something to do proudly every four years so you can fulfill a childhood fantasy of democratic actions.
Voting is transferring your God-given or spiritually endowed - call it what you want - agency to another person. In its essence it is a moral action, not a legal action. It is a sacred handoff of individual authority and power to someone who will use that agency for any number of actions they have revealed.
The problem in granting your spiritually endowed power to someone else is the risk that you have not taken the time to clarify the many ways they might use it and commit a moral sin or legal crime.
And we know that at every level of government candidates will take an oath to uphold the Constitution. But we also know that the Constitution upholds many actions that are immoral - eg legalistic corporations allowed to act as spiritual humans or deportation of people who have committed no crime and lived in America for decades, or misdirected violence by executive powers unhindered by a Congress. Allowances such as these prove our current Constitution to be both immoral and corrupted. And the people who take the oath to uphold it are unfit for office.
This is very significant even on the Internet podcasts You find people who are totally opposed to the Ian war. If they’re American they still talk about “our” troops and “we” and the fact is if the American troops go to kill people they deserve to get killed so bugger ‘em. And same with the Aussies if they go to UAE well that’s it.
So true! And people in the west are mired in the bullshit, especially our political representatives. I just heard Mark Carney say he objects to Iran exporting terrorism -- wtf?!
Hopefully we can stop thinking of Carney as some kind of Che Guevara figure. He is carbon copy lesser evil, like Starmer and macron and Harris and, indeed, Trudeau.
Former governor of the Bank of England! Seriously! Did we need to go any further than that?
This certain Mark Carney knows who created ISIS and who financed its operations, who provided it with fashionable identical Toyota SUVs and uniforms ? Then what kind of terrorism export is this stupid Mark Carney talking about ?
Uh, yeah, so it's Iran that's the terrorist and not the two countries that started dropping bombs on their schools and hospitals? Political puppets can't help but twist the narrative to cover for their own sins, can they?
Yes, disgusting! I just found out why these Elite leaders spout the same crap. The G-7 has a block-politic system just like before WW-I. In case of any "security crisis" (which they define), every G-7 member must make the same agreed-on statement. Was this scheme ever brought up in an election campaign? Or voted on? No, we are the doormats (or worse) for the Elites, who spend their lives flying around and entertaining each other.
There is nothing "elite" about the Epstein Predatory Pirana Class Parasites, they live in an alternative bubble and regard every thing outside that as just a resource, humans are just factory or cannon fodder, apart from those wiping their arses.
Yes, certainly not "elite" as a Rhodes Scholar, etc., but they put themselves in this separated class, always in the air, with a disconnect from those paying the freight. That's the geopolitical "Elite" and that also often shares linkage to the Epstein class, and the Epstein operating system is deeply involved with intel collection, that form of Kompromat is common in all intel agencies, it isn't a special cruelty in just a special group.
That is disgusting, Kathleen. It explains why when Israel started its genocide of Gaza, the whole western world started saying that criticizing this was anti-semitic. And why our leaders are spewing pure BS about Iran.
The populations of the vassal countries of the outlaw US empire allow themselves to be ruled by genocide-enabling psychopaths. And when I say “ruled” I’m talking about the politicians, media managers and bureaucrats who serve only the interests of the oligarchs. This is disgusting. We allow this. Well, the Iranian people are going to teach us a lesson in morality. They are going to prepare the way for us to rid our societies of this depraved oligarchy. The Iranian people are giving us the chance to reclaim our own humanity. We cannot afford to miss this opportunity because it’s probably the last one we get.
I agree but if the people of the US are like the majority in the UK, they will not take the chance that the Iranians are going to give us. It will all be too much like hard work and they will lazily turn back to the latest "reality" show. They're so busy living their lives through the black screen in the corner, or now on the wall, they have lost the idea of what real life is or rather should be.
With due respect, I think you may have misunderstood the situation. The masses may be hypnotised and anaesthetised by the oligarchs’ narcotic narrative-control apparatus, but what is happening now will mean that in a short time most people in the empire’s vassal countries will not have the luxury to “lazily turn back to the latest reality show”. The real economy as well as the financialised economy are both toast. Oil, natural gas and fertilizer will become scarce and expensive. Logistics moving just-in-time cargos for consumption and production will be disrupted, leading to the execution of very harsh continuity contingency plans. The old normal is over. When ordinary people are no longer able to fill their car or make their credit card payments, there will be a sudden, collective, traumatic collision with reality. This mass-scale “We were lied to!” moment of clarity will reverberate unpredictably. This is not just another crisis. Iran is dismantling the empire, at great cost to themselves.
They brought television in to control the masses, like the radio programs before it, I doubt if that side of it will be taken away as quickly as that. The rest I completely agree with.
"It’s time to wake up to the reality that western civilization is a depraved dystopia where most people are sleepwalking in a propaganda-addled stupor under an empire that is fueled by human blood." When we resist, we wake up. When we refuse to be silent about how the west is a dystopia, murdering people, fomenting war; when we look at our complicity and depravity and stop blaming others, then maybe it could be the start of a turn around that has been waiting decades to happen.
When a former US spear carrier, marine Brian McGinnes challenged the regime narrative of Israel First, he received a broken arm courtesy of US Senator Tim Sheehy. The typical sort of totalitarian response by repressive governments and vassel states against their own citizens.
Sounds about right, bad men get rewarded, Brian McGinnes won't. But boy, didn't he show those up trying to strong arm him out the door, the amount that had to assist them. I'm sure if his arm hadn't snapped like that, they would still be trying to remove him now.
I worry though what punishment will be inflicted upon him, a man who had more truth and morality in his little finger than all those four star Generals facing forward with their rigid backs.
The USA and Israel are censoring photos and videos and amplifying war propaganda. Some footage is making its way out because the truth can not be suppressed for long. Some Chinese nationals, for example, took footage of massive bombing near the Ben Gurion Airport and it has appeared in some videos and accounts. USA bases are taking massive hits. The "eyes and ears" are being blinded methodically. Warning alarms aren't working. Most of the Strait of Hormuz is empty of ships- down to perhaps 6% traffic. The damage and loss of life is far greater than people are being told.
I'm very interested to see the response when the dam breaks and the truth escapes. Most people will demand to know why this war started if they don't already know.
Would that include the Israeli's demanding Netanyahu make a public appearance to explain what's going on and demanding he end the war with Iran. Not that it would help, Trump once again attempted a ceasefire agreement and Iran simply said NO.
I agree with you on that. The problem with polls especially Israel's polls, the small sample of the population used like so many polls, would be those taken from the biggest supporters of Netanyahu, it's the Israeli way.
The protesters who I did see on video, calling out Netanyahu for either leaving the country or being hidden in a special bunker were mostly from the settlers occupiers who have been tearing down parts of the West Bank recently and taking it over. Iran sent a missile their way, there's the usual military base in the middle of the houses, as a strong warning to leave the West Bank alone. I'm afraid I had no sympathy, my immediate thought was, now you know in a small way how the Palestinians feel.
Israeli propaganda just like they did about Gaza. Now Hezbollah are helping by taking several out several means of surveillance, hitting Israeli war bases and barracks. For Hezbollah it's a double fight, Israel had restarted bombing Southern Lebanon and of course Iran.
I'm sure the Western media will still have the ability to lie when the truth starts leaking out, let's hope we can shout louder than the media.
Well that didn't make total sense did it? taking several out several means of surveillance. Blame it on writing a comment on here while one ear on my phone keeping up with latest news of what's going on.
"War is a racket", Smedley Butler said, and he knew that was a fact, because he was an army officer, and fought for his country, the US, in good faith all over the world. Or that was what he was told and believed: we have to fight them there, or fight them here. Because they're coming for us next, unless we kill them first. That's the crap he believed until he could no longer deny what his mind and spirit told him : it was all a contemptible lie. But we still fall for it, although with no real enthusiasm except on the part of those who still make great profit from human beings killing and maiming other human beings.
"Prof. John Mearsheimer: Between 1971 and 2021, the US murdered 38 million people:" That is not what he said: he cited a Lancet study that extrapolated that sanctions, from all natoins, had led to about 550,000 excess deaths a yr so about 38 million due not to war but to the results of sanctions by all nations, such as malnutrition, disease, etc. It is likely that most were the result of US sanctions...but let's set an example of honest reporting lest we become the enemy.
Now do I like automatically conflating the people with the regimes that do murder and put on sanctions. I for one do not consider myself part of the evil WE. Most nations are ruled by elites and some sujpport them a some do not. If you do not support the regime and its policies, if you work to end them, you are not an evil We. You are us, struggling for justice.
Yes: but the Lancet study did not say that there were 38 million murders but rather 38 million excess deaths after sanctions, by all nations, were applied. Sanctions are not an act of war under international law; blockades are.
they are economic warfare but not acts of war; blockades are. In my view, economic warfare that leads to deaths IS murder, but legally, it is not. We need to change the law, eh?
I’m sick of our weak-kneed PM and Foreign Affairs Minister here in Australia who just cannot bring themselves to even criticise the orange turd and his war mongering mates, no matter how illegal their actions. Now they are heading us down the slippery slope of joining this illegal war by stealth, thinking we might not notice. We, the people, did not vote for this, or sadly maybe we did 😞
all i have seen asshole white westerners care about is gas prices. Not the immorality of the war, or the people dying, just how it affects their ability to get around. That just about sums up the West and it's so called morality.
It's a sad state of affairs but I have to agree with you, the energy companies here in England are rubbing their hands with glee as they mention most likely 40% rise in electricity and gas, as we have had a rise recently you would think they would be satisfied but so what, people will moan and I will just say, you didn't say tickety boo when the government, both sides of the house supported the US and Israeli aggression against Iran. Conservative leader, evil woman, wants us to join in the bombing.
When I was at primary school I proudly dressed up as Luke Skywalker for the school 'book' day. I carried a broom handle as a lightsaber.
Daniel Crimmins from the US Army 3rd Infantry Division: "You grew up wanting so bad to be Luke Skywalker, but you realize that you were basically a Stormtrooper, a faceless, nameless rifleman, carrying a spear for empire, and you start to accept the startlingly obvious truth that these are people like you.”
To my great disappointment, Luke Skywalker himself, Mark Hamill, is pro-empire Zionist.
On Oct 8 2023 Hamill posted Israeli and US flags together with the message "America stands with Israel #always". Its the tag that hurt the most.
On 19 Nov 2023 Hamill retweeted a post from Jon Cooper "I’m pro-Palestinian AND vehemently anti-Hamas. I’m also pro-Israel AND vehemently anti-Netanyahu. Those views are not contradictory." Hamill added the words "same here".
When asked to comment on whether Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, Hamill has pointedly remained silent. As far I am aware he has never criticised Israel.
In regards to the Gorman geocide, Luke Skywalker probably still believes all the denials spread by the Empire. In terms of Palestine, it seems Skywalker is still listening to his Uncle Owen. #starwars #genocide #freepalestine
this entire story is exactly the same tactics as covid19 operation, the same agents from CIA, the same from military... And the problem of humanity is to have the GUTS TO SAY NO!
Imagine nobody would put the masks on the faces, allowed to stay locked up, took the lethal genetically modifying injections!
One thing I've learned to do is to stop calling it "We" or "Our" government/military.
WE did not vote for this or approve it. It is an illegitimate war waged by an illegitimate government.
I was born and live in this country. But the government and military have nothing to do with me.
They are not mine, and I refuse to lend my name to them.
Trump was elected on lies — no nation building, America First, etc but also by voters overlooking the obvious — millions of Zionist money donated by people who expect to get their monies’ worth and the banks, the pharmaceutical companies, big agriculture. The unspooling of all this corruption and incompetence and ethical collapse will play out until the end and no one knows what that will look like. The worship of money will bring the West down and if China and Russia replace values with this same golden calf, their turn will be next.
He is the King of Lies. Over 30,000 verified lies told in his first Administration and a Big Lie told in 2020 that culminated in thousands of angry MAGAs storming the Capitol.
And Americans said "Yes, we want more of THAT guy, please. That woman has a funny laugh."
Anyone can pick Trump the first time around, but the second ????!
Well, Genocide Joe was probably why Trump got MORE votes second time around.
Nice try Dale…. But it was the American electorate that sealed the deal.
the first time, the electorate chose Clinton (also a scumbag) but the slave era Electoral College overturned it. There would have been no second or third Trump run if the US were a democacy. And the legitimacy of government is not consent of the electoralte but consent of the people governed, and of 250 millin adults, Trump got about 63 million, Clinton 66 million. Trump was not chosen by the people but by the Electoral College, designed by slave owners to block democracy. Blaming the victims of tyranny of the minority is stupid.
Who voted for Trump? You did. Were there other candidates?
Are you insane? Oh, my sympathy.
Not sure that I can pick Trump any time around, John. My friend swears he returned from a meeting in Canada (some time last year I think) several inches shorter!
Yea.. “Several inches shorter”. Haha! I know the feeling….
Shorter as in; not the same Trump? But a stand in substitute?
There may have been several "stand in substitutes", as with Biden. Does "the original Trump" still exist? The world stage is characterized by deception. Look at Elite Gender Inversion, for probably the greatest example of this.
I mean you MIGHT be forgiven for thinking he was some sort of "great businessman" because his name had been slapped on properties all over the world. But it was all an illusion. And if you voted for him a second time you are most definitely NOT forgiven.
How can anyone vote for Donald Trump the first time around? He showed us all who he really was his ENTIRE CAREER!
Hillary didn't help things though but still. We had 3rd party candidates such as Jill Stein. At what point do Americans give up on Democrats and Republicans and try something new for a change? I'm sick of this hellish loop of Blue MAGA Wave always followed by a worse Red MAGA Wave.
Eddie,
“How can anyone vote for Donald Trump?”
Excellent question, but 60 million people or more did just that. Desperation maybe…, hope , because of the Aipac lobby manipulations, ?
I’m still wondering how Trump could have been elected a second time…. I which is even more surprising.
Is it possible that it involves reasons which are similar to those whereas people pray to an invisible God and keep hoping that they will eventually be heard?
Maybe there’s a fundamental answer, but I would bet that most voters who opted for Trump didn’t even know Jill Stein and others even existed.
Didn’t somebody write that “ Men lead lives of quiet desperation.” ?
"Anyone"???????? Not hardly!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
If the Donald is that bad, and ruled and owned by those who I can’t outwardly mention, then where is the better choice?
The Dems? Don’t make me laugh.
Some other Republican?
Again don’t make me laugh.
Our system is corrupt.
Our “leaders” are bought and paid for, ruled and owned.
So what’s your answer?
Enquiring minds would like to know.
I've coined the phrase The Big Flush--pending enactment.
Hamilton Nolan had a pretty good red line in a column the other day: refuse to vote for any candidate who doesn’t support a wealth tax. Forget the party labels; only vote for those who want to kill the billionaires and end the endless war machinery.
This is the way.
Kamala has a beautiful laugh, while many people are incapable of laughter (including myself). Fox says that's proof of evil motives.
The worship of money is the only game in town. Not much you can do without it..
AOC came from 1% to winning over the 4th most powerful Democrat without Big Money, just many small donations.....In 2018 United States House elections, when Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez first ran for Congress in New York’s 14th district, her campaign relied heavily on small donations.
The average donation was about $18.
Roughly 62% of her campaign funding came from small donors giving $200 or less.
This was unusual for a congressional campaign. Most winning House campaigns receive less than about 8% of their funds from small donors, meaning they rely much more on large donations and PAC money.
✅ Summary
Candidate Race Avg. Donation
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez 2018 first run for Congress ≈ $18
Her campaign became widely cited as an example of a grassroots fundraising model, with many small online contributions rather than large donors......Money raised
Candidate Money Raised
Joe Crowley (incumbent) about $3.3–$3.4 million
Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (challenger) about $300,000
Crowley had roughly 10× more campaign money than Ocasio-Cortez." The times, they are a changin...and it was Bernie Sanders who inspired her and Bush and Pressly and others that they could win without Big Money. "Presidential campaigns (2016 and 2020)
2016 average donation: about $27
Raised over $230 million, mostly from small donors
More than 7 million individual donations
Although he did not win the presidency, he won many primaries and caucuses using this grassroots model." Without relying on rich donors, the representative can represent the people not the big donors....and that is a critical move from plutocracy to democracy.
Dale, we’re barking at the same tree. But its roots are firmly planted in greenbacks. Money talks, barks and yells. When the power bell tolls, it tolls at the sound of money…
When we realize as a species that we need to make greenbacks a commodity as opposed to a necessity, good people may rise to the surface. Until then, power rules.
Great. So if I want a candidate who represents me, all I have to is move to Brooklyn, where the electorate is sufficiently "blue" to overcome the power of money. Not happening, I hate big cities. In any case, all this talk of the size of AOC's donations and where they came from is capitulation--if we had a genuine democracy it would be illegal to spend money on any candidate, illegal to run campaign ads.
By the way, I live in deep red West Virginia. 100% of the people who supposedly represent me down to the county clerk are Republicans. In 2016, how many of WV's 55 counties did Sanders win, over Clinton? All 55. Yet WV sent more Clinton delegates to the convention, thanks to the superdelegates, notably Joe Manchin. Sanders might well have won over Trump in 2016, but the power structure didn't trust him. The power structure will do whatever it takes to maintain its grip on power--whether Rs or Ds are currently in control. The two parties, and the media, work in collusion to ensure no third party can ever arise. We desperately need to uproot the power structure, the Epstein class--the whole world needs us to--but it ain't gonna happen through voting.
Amending your truthful statement Wildfire: "but it ain't gonna happen through voting." . . .alone, but in combination with an assortment of creative mobilization actions.
I think that is too limited an understanding of what is going on. I'd suggest Power, Profits, and Prophets, are what make the Pathocracy work, and what/who it works for.
“We” may not have voted for this war or government, but we certainly voted for all the previous ones that murdered 38 million combined.
I have been voting for who I thought was the most honest POTUS candidate since 1976, and have not "picked a winner" yet.
;-/
I have a similar voting record..
Another example of the misuse of the term "we." In any given election, in the US for insstance, those voting for the "winner" are about 80 milion at most in a nation with 250 million adults. And 38 million were not pronounced "murdered" by the Lancet study, which claimed that over 50 years, 38 million died from sanctions by all nations.
Sanctions by “all nations” at which nation’s behest?
Do you think the sanctions by China, Russia, and India are at the US behest. Nations use sanctions for their own reasons. It sounds like you don't like the truth...and want to blame all sanctions on one nation, as your question implies.
https://www.yahoo.com/news/articles/us-eases-sanctions-russian-oil-071130680.html
What does this look like to you?
That's US sanctionz on Russian Oil, dufus, not Indian sanctions. you think China puts on sanctions at behest of US. Talk of easing sacntions on Russian oil (which has nothing to do with the sanctions Russia puts on other nations) is obviously a political concept to lower gas prices. Indian sanctions on Pakistan and other nations have nothing to do with this.
I have read that throughout history this arrangement called "usury" leads to bigger and bigger wars to extract value to pay interest on loans to global financiers.
Even whole countries who don't want war have to pay.
Quite an arrangement, no?
Yes.. the tribe has been playing Monopoly for a long time… the Smartest members won… not much different than the conditions that exist in nature.
For 300,000 yrs, the smartest won in communities based on sharing and equality and non-violence; then came civiliation, property and with that haves and have nots, and in this game the haves won by being not the smartest but the most ruthless.
Nice try again Dale… but it has always been in a survival agenda. If there was only so much to go around, the strongest won the day.. then and now..
Factually wrong. Check out Goliath's Curse by Luke Kemp. A fairly recent and exhaustively researched book about human civilization. Then you and Dale can argue like lords.
Benjamin, which comment did I make that “ factually wrong”? Just to be sure we are discussing the same fact ?
U.S. and Isn'tReal are just operating arms of the Global Mafia.
Sadly Philip neither your, nor my, disavowal of our governments sins has any standing to cleanse our hands of the pain or suffering caused by the system we are both a part of.
For all his innumerable faults Our President ran on a platform of peace… turned out to be one of an almost endless number of lies… but a plurality voted for him… just as a majority of Congressional representatives voted for the military spending that funded the war….
…The money market mutual fund inside each of your 401k funds is full of the treasury bonds sold to pay for the weapons. It was never “them” - it was always us. This is why a million young people occupied the capitol for a month in the 1970’s… that’s what it takes to end an unjust war. Those young people weren’t smarter than us… they were just more motivated because of the risk of the draft for themselves, their brother, their cousin, their sweetheart…
All we can do is speak out against it and try to make as may people we can see the evil of it.
All is not lost… the far left (Bernie/AOC and the far right (Rand Paul / Tucker Carlson) are united on just one single issue… both are vocal opponents of the war...
We’re half way to the reckoning. Just a little farther until the ball starts rolling downhill.
Peace.
Hate to break this to you, but Bernie/AOC are not "left" in any sense of the word. They belong with those on the "right" in your scenario and occupy the biggest party in the US--the duopoly. (If you want to learn more about true leftists, start reading Marx and Lenin. Or try my blog--I keep things simple.)
Hate to expose your rule as the useful idiot, but Bernie has been a democratic socialist, going to jail in his early 20's and promoting universal healthcare, labor rights, free education, and banning arms to Israel for decades, and AOC is left in the sense that she struggle to promote the working class, which is the core feature of the left. Your simplistic thinking actually helps the right by doing their work of trashing the alternative to war, inquality, private healthcare, and deregulation. You do no promote revolution by denoucning those leading the charge, facing death threats, speak out and voting for change.
Dale--Bernie Sanders votes for arming Israel EVERY SINGLE TIME it comes up for a vote. He's working for the elites/oligarchy and cooperates with them. He's a puppet of the duopoly. I know all about Bernie--I even worked for him in 2016. He's demonstrated time and time again that he's all for the war machine with his support for Israel for decades now. That's not "leftist". Look up "The Overton Window" and see where Bernie ends up. He's right beside Joe Biden. It's okay you still like Bernie, but don't make him into someone he isn't. (He'll never say the word "genocide" as in "Israel is committing a genocide of the Palestinian people" either if you notice and care. The duopoly supports Biden's/Trump's pro-Israel/pro-genocide agenda.)
Dude, I worked for the Bernie campaign of '16 and I was there in Philly during the convention. The shock we all felt at his announcement the night he endorsed You Know Who was profound. After all the sh!t the so-called 'Democrats' threw at him and his delegates we expected him to rally us and drop the f@cking hammer on her and her party. He could've won the election by a landslide against T-rump. But no... Like many others I saw him for what he was/is - a useful fool.
They invited me back for his run for '20. I declined. The only thing that surprised me that year was the speed with which he fell on his knees. F@ck him.
You're either high or complicit. Congress is irretrievably corrupt.
I think it more that Musk voted for him with his tech. When it looked like a possible win for Harris, there was a sudden uprising in votes for Drumpf - hell, Musk even said he'd won the election for Drumpf.
My money is where my mouth is - not supporting an illegitimate government.
And I disagree, with regards to this system, YES, all is lost. There is no righting this ship.
Far left, far right need only agree on one thing. The end of this illegitimate system, and the corruption that it engenders.
If you vote now, YOU are the enemy.
This is what I keep saying. Language matters. When we say "we sent arms" or "our army is..." and thus take responsibility for what a massive mafia headquartered in Washington DC are doing, that removes agency. Any chance of overturning this murderous government--no, not just the Republicans, the whole thing--depends on being clear-eyed--we DO have an enemy, we Americans, and it isn't across an ocean.
Well said, thank you.
If the last 2-3 years have shown me anything then it is how deeply racist both the vast majority of Americans but also Western Europeans are. I mean really racist and most of them dont even recognize it anymore. They are so used to seeing dead muslims and the middle east on fire, it barely even registers anymore.
I will never forget the outrage over Ukraine and everyone literally saying how seeing blonde haired blue eyed people live in a war zone was so horrific to them because we are used to these kinds of images from people in the global south, not the "worthy" white race.
The same people who walk around with their BLM and pride flags yammering about equality and accepting everyone, only mean other white people. The dehumanization of thr muslims and middle easterners is complete. The entire region has been set ablaze by the West, their leaders murdered, abducted, their children incinerated, their assets stolen like we are some common pirate. they are dropping phosphorus on Lebanon, a sovereign nation that poses no threat to anyone is under siege and its citizens are being killed and threatened with existential ruin and nukes and for most it's just a Tuesday. After Iraq I expected opposition to this war to be vehement, not tepid. Yet here we are.
“They are not mine.” So how can you survive without serving the empire?
It takes mindfulness, resolution and determination.
Don't vote, don't pay taxes if at all possible.
Don't invest in weaponry or evil companies.
Arrange your life to be outside their system as much as possible.
Literally just be aware and do what you can do to "not serve the evil empire."
I was lucky, and did just that for a long time. When Lady Luck knocked at my door, and I opened it. I did not deserve the opportunity to enjoy the freedom I experienced … so I completely agree with your narrative.
Exactly....
Michael Parenti used to call this “we-we syndrome”. The idea was to dispense with the false notion of collective action on behalf of the ruling class and redirect consciousness to class analysis.
Exactly right. I just wrote my own response in nearly identical terms, then saw your post! Solidarity!
I make that distinction all the time.
Well you obviously didn't learn enough.
Your a citizen, you can deny it , you can reject it, but you share some responsibility
This Evil exists because too many as yourself see themselves separate from your own society, their own state, their fellowman.
Incorrect - I do not see myself separate from society or my fellowman. Only this corrupt and illegitimate government.
Appreciate you sharing your perception , but I'm afraid it not reality.
Well , unless the President , his administration, , Congress , and Senate and the court officials which swore them in to office, they are all foreign invaders?
Or was there a coupe , and your media is being prevented from reporting it?
Or the last elections were rigged, ballot boxes stuffed, voters intimidated?
No my friend, those in Government are part of your society, be they outstanding law obeying school teachers, or degenerate compromised politicians, and it does not matter that they did not get your personal vote,
You can disagree with their actions, their polices, you can protest , you can shout, kick and scream , howl at the moon, but this is your government, your society, your fellowman, your empire.
Me, I`m not a citizen myself, but I am nevertheless a subject of the empire, its tentacles reach very far, those degenerate psychopaths are also my fellowmen, and so are you.
So instead of us rejecting our unpleasant lot in life, how about we do something to rein in these psychopaths , be it a phone call to your congressman, join a protest march, or attend a PTA meeting, let others know why you think this government is illegitimate, get organized, throw a few wrenches in the machine, and oust them.
“So instead of us rejecting our unpleasant lot in life, how about we do something to rein in these psychopaths , be it a phone call to your congressman, join a protest march, or attend a PTA meeting, let others know why you think this government is illegitimate, get organized, throw a few wrenches in the machine, and oust them.”
Do you think that just maybe that is what I am doing by talking about it here?
And yes, AIPAC/Isn’treal has bought off our government. It’s a simple matter to verify that by looking at the donations all of our politicians have accepted on behalf of a foreign nation.
FFS, Trump has admitted multiple times about Miriam and Sheldon Adelsonn paying him off to do their bidding on behalf of Israel.
Not sure where I lost you here, but it’s all right in plain sight.
You haven't lost me, and thanks for elaborating .
That’s an easy out eh? This shit happened under our collective watch. We have indeed sat and watched people get slaughtered and done absolutely nothing meaningful to stop it. So i always use we and our.
We, yes us, you and I and probably ever pair of eyeballs on this note. Look outside the window. All that convenient shit that makes our lives so much easier - benefits of the depravity. We can’t live in the midst of all the “benefits” of the murder and theft and then wriggle out of the responsibility for them happening and also to stop it.
Be well.
Creating and living our best life does NOT make us responsible for this government.
So, are my Amish neighbors also guilty because they haven't stopped it?
That's "white guilt", and you would be wise to stop doing that.
Same. I've seen this shit far too many times: (in my lifetime) with Bush Jr, Biden, and now Trump.
I would not be surprised if born in the Divided States of America is turns out to be a karmic punishment for past life sins.
Yes you did. Voting is not a right, something to do proudly every four years so you can fulfill a childhood fantasy of democratic actions.
Voting is transferring your God-given or spiritually endowed - call it what you want - agency to another person. In its essence it is a moral action, not a legal action. It is a sacred handoff of individual authority and power to someone who will use that agency for any number of actions they have revealed.
The problem in granting your spiritually endowed power to someone else is the risk that you have not taken the time to clarify the many ways they might use it and commit a moral sin or legal crime.
And we know that at every level of government candidates will take an oath to uphold the Constitution. But we also know that the Constitution upholds many actions that are immoral - eg legalistic corporations allowed to act as spiritual humans or deportation of people who have committed no crime and lived in America for decades, or misdirected violence by executive powers unhindered by a Congress. Allowances such as these prove our current Constitution to be both immoral and corrupted. And the people who take the oath to uphold it are unfit for office.
This is what you are voting for.
This is very significant even on the Internet podcasts You find people who are totally opposed to the Ian war. If they’re American they still talk about “our” troops and “we” and the fact is if the American troops go to kill people they deserve to get killed so bugger ‘em. And same with the Aussies if they go to UAE well that’s it.
So true! And people in the west are mired in the bullshit, especially our political representatives. I just heard Mark Carney say he objects to Iran exporting terrorism -- wtf?!
Hopefully we can stop thinking of Carney as some kind of Che Guevara figure. He is carbon copy lesser evil, like Starmer and macron and Harris and, indeed, Trudeau.
Former governor of the Bank of England! Seriously! Did we need to go any further than that?
He's in the Rothschild's pocket, that's for sure.
This certain Mark Carney knows who created ISIS and who financed its operations, who provided it with fashionable identical Toyota SUVs and uniforms ? Then what kind of terrorism export is this stupid Mark Carney talking about ?
Uh, yeah, so it's Iran that's the terrorist and not the two countries that started dropping bombs on their schools and hospitals? Political puppets can't help but twist the narrative to cover for their own sins, can they?
Yes, disgusting! I just found out why these Elite leaders spout the same crap. The G-7 has a block-politic system just like before WW-I. In case of any "security crisis" (which they define), every G-7 member must make the same agreed-on statement. Was this scheme ever brought up in an election campaign? Or voted on? No, we are the doormats (or worse) for the Elites, who spend their lives flying around and entertaining each other.
There is nothing "elite" about the Epstein Predatory Pirana Class Parasites, they live in an alternative bubble and regard every thing outside that as just a resource, humans are just factory or cannon fodder, apart from those wiping their arses.
Yes, certainly not "elite" as a Rhodes Scholar, etc., but they put themselves in this separated class, always in the air, with a disconnect from those paying the freight. That's the geopolitical "Elite" and that also often shares linkage to the Epstein class, and the Epstein operating system is deeply involved with intel collection, that form of Kompromat is common in all intel agencies, it isn't a special cruelty in just a special group.
I call them THEY: The Hierarchy Enslaving You.
The ones behind the curtain.
Definitely.
That is disgusting, Kathleen. It explains why when Israel started its genocide of Gaza, the whole western world started saying that criticizing this was anti-semitic. And why our leaders are spewing pure BS about Iran.
Yes, Carney is not quite the independent thinker Canadians wish he'd be. He's just savvy enough to recognize that DJ Trump is backstabbing Canada.
Really?
The populations of the vassal countries of the outlaw US empire allow themselves to be ruled by genocide-enabling psychopaths. And when I say “ruled” I’m talking about the politicians, media managers and bureaucrats who serve only the interests of the oligarchs. This is disgusting. We allow this. Well, the Iranian people are going to teach us a lesson in morality. They are going to prepare the way for us to rid our societies of this depraved oligarchy. The Iranian people are giving us the chance to reclaim our own humanity. We cannot afford to miss this opportunity because it’s probably the last one we get.
I agree but if the people of the US are like the majority in the UK, they will not take the chance that the Iranians are going to give us. It will all be too much like hard work and they will lazily turn back to the latest "reality" show. They're so busy living their lives through the black screen in the corner, or now on the wall, they have lost the idea of what real life is or rather should be.
With due respect, I think you may have misunderstood the situation. The masses may be hypnotised and anaesthetised by the oligarchs’ narcotic narrative-control apparatus, but what is happening now will mean that in a short time most people in the empire’s vassal countries will not have the luxury to “lazily turn back to the latest reality show”. The real economy as well as the financialised economy are both toast. Oil, natural gas and fertilizer will become scarce and expensive. Logistics moving just-in-time cargos for consumption and production will be disrupted, leading to the execution of very harsh continuity contingency plans. The old normal is over. When ordinary people are no longer able to fill their car or make their credit card payments, there will be a sudden, collective, traumatic collision with reality. This mass-scale “We were lied to!” moment of clarity will reverberate unpredictably. This is not just another crisis. Iran is dismantling the empire, at great cost to themselves.
They brought television in to control the masses, like the radio programs before it, I doubt if that side of it will be taken away as quickly as that. The rest I completely agree with.
"It’s time to wake up to the reality that western civilization is a depraved dystopia where most people are sleepwalking in a propaganda-addled stupor under an empire that is fueled by human blood." When we resist, we wake up. When we refuse to be silent about how the west is a dystopia, murdering people, fomenting war; when we look at our complicity and depravity and stop blaming others, then maybe it could be the start of a turn around that has been waiting decades to happen.
Yep.. if we can start looking in the mirror to find the culprits, we’ll be half-way there
When a former US spear carrier, marine Brian McGinnes challenged the regime narrative of Israel First, he received a broken arm courtesy of US Senator Tim Sheehy. The typical sort of totalitarian response by repressive governments and vassel states against their own citizens.
Surprise! Sheehy has received $640000
from AIPAC.
Sounds about right, bad men get rewarded, Brian McGinnes won't. But boy, didn't he show those up trying to strong arm him out the door, the amount that had to assist them. I'm sure if his arm hadn't snapped like that, they would still be trying to remove him now.
I worry though what punishment will be inflicted upon him, a man who had more truth and morality in his little finger than all those four star Generals facing forward with their rigid backs.
The USA and Israel are censoring photos and videos and amplifying war propaganda. Some footage is making its way out because the truth can not be suppressed for long. Some Chinese nationals, for example, took footage of massive bombing near the Ben Gurion Airport and it has appeared in some videos and accounts. USA bases are taking massive hits. The "eyes and ears" are being blinded methodically. Warning alarms aren't working. Most of the Strait of Hormuz is empty of ships- down to perhaps 6% traffic. The damage and loss of life is far greater than people are being told.
I'm very interested to see the response when the dam breaks and the truth escapes. Most people will demand to know why this war started if they don't already know.
If the opinion polls I read are accurate, most Israelis think that the war is going well and they seek escalation.
https://palestinewillbefree.substack.com/p/9-in-10-israeli-jews-back-war-against-iran-poll
It's a sick society with very sick people.
Would that include the Israeli's demanding Netanyahu make a public appearance to explain what's going on and demanding he end the war with Iran. Not that it would help, Trump once again attempted a ceasefire agreement and Iran simply said NO.
I don't know how the poll was conducted.
I suspect that Trump's talk of a ceasefire was simply to calm oil prices.
I agree with you on that. The problem with polls especially Israel's polls, the small sample of the population used like so many polls, would be those taken from the biggest supporters of Netanyahu, it's the Israeli way.
The protesters who I did see on video, calling out Netanyahu for either leaving the country or being hidden in a special bunker were mostly from the settlers occupiers who have been tearing down parts of the West Bank recently and taking it over. Iran sent a missile their way, there's the usual military base in the middle of the houses, as a strong warning to leave the West Bank alone. I'm afraid I had no sympathy, my immediate thought was, now you know in a small way how the Palestinians feel.
Israeli propaganda just like they did about Gaza. Now Hezbollah are helping by taking several out several means of surveillance, hitting Israeli war bases and barracks. For Hezbollah it's a double fight, Israel had restarted bombing Southern Lebanon and of course Iran.
I'm sure the Western media will still have the ability to lie when the truth starts leaking out, let's hope we can shout louder than the media.
Well that didn't make total sense did it? taking several out several means of surveillance. Blame it on writing a comment on here while one ear on my phone keeping up with latest news of what's going on.
Devastatingly excellent column. All excruciatingly painful in every way.
"War is a racket", Smedley Butler said, and he knew that was a fact, because he was an army officer, and fought for his country, the US, in good faith all over the world. Or that was what he was told and believed: we have to fight them there, or fight them here. Because they're coming for us next, unless we kill them first. That's the crap he believed until he could no longer deny what his mind and spirit told him : it was all a contemptible lie. But we still fall for it, although with no real enthusiasm except on the part of those who still make great profit from human beings killing and maiming other human beings.
"Prof. John Mearsheimer: Between 1971 and 2021, the US murdered 38 million people:" That is not what he said: he cited a Lancet study that extrapolated that sanctions, from all natoins, had led to about 550,000 excess deaths a yr so about 38 million due not to war but to the results of sanctions by all nations, such as malnutrition, disease, etc. It is likely that most were the result of US sanctions...but let's set an example of honest reporting lest we become the enemy.
Now do I like automatically conflating the people with the regimes that do murder and put on sanctions. I for one do not consider myself part of the evil WE. Most nations are ruled by elites and some sujpport them a some do not. If you do not support the regime and its policies, if you work to end them, you are not an evil We. You are us, struggling for justice.
Sanctions are an act of war, whether 'we' agree to that definition or not, therefore what follows from sanctions can be attributed to war.
Yes: but the Lancet study did not say that there were 38 million murders but rather 38 million excess deaths after sanctions, by all nations, were applied. Sanctions are not an act of war under international law; blockades are.
Yet no matter whom we vote for, we get John McCain.
Sanctions are war.
they are economic warfare but not acts of war; blockades are. In my view, economic warfare that leads to deaths IS murder, but legally, it is not. We need to change the law, eh?
Quite simply, yes.
I’m sick of our weak-kneed PM and Foreign Affairs Minister here in Australia who just cannot bring themselves to even criticise the orange turd and his war mongering mates, no matter how illegal their actions. Now they are heading us down the slippery slope of joining this illegal war by stealth, thinking we might not notice. We, the people, did not vote for this, or sadly maybe we did 😞
all i have seen asshole white westerners care about is gas prices. Not the immorality of the war, or the people dying, just how it affects their ability to get around. That just about sums up the West and it's so called morality.
It's a sad state of affairs but I have to agree with you, the energy companies here in England are rubbing their hands with glee as they mention most likely 40% rise in electricity and gas, as we have had a rise recently you would think they would be satisfied but so what, people will moan and I will just say, you didn't say tickety boo when the government, both sides of the house supported the US and Israeli aggression against Iran. Conservative leader, evil woman, wants us to join in the bombing.
Thank you, Caitlin! But to convince Americans, you need to learn to speak Sheep.
Indeed we are the villains , sad to see, sad to say! Let’s do something about it! Ideas???
When I was at primary school I proudly dressed up as Luke Skywalker for the school 'book' day. I carried a broom handle as a lightsaber.
Daniel Crimmins from the US Army 3rd Infantry Division: "You grew up wanting so bad to be Luke Skywalker, but you realize that you were basically a Stormtrooper, a faceless, nameless rifleman, carrying a spear for empire, and you start to accept the startlingly obvious truth that these are people like you.”
To my great disappointment, Luke Skywalker himself, Mark Hamill, is pro-empire Zionist.
On Oct 8 2023 Hamill posted Israeli and US flags together with the message "America stands with Israel #always". Its the tag that hurt the most.
On 19 Nov 2023 Hamill retweeted a post from Jon Cooper "I’m pro-Palestinian AND vehemently anti-Hamas. I’m also pro-Israel AND vehemently anti-Netanyahu. Those views are not contradictory." Hamill added the words "same here".
https://x.com/MarkHamill/status/1725979647991537786
On 23 Apr 2024 Hamill posted - "I fully support Gaza/Palestine. Despise Hamas."
https://x.com/MarkHamill/status/1782595886570483752?s=20
When asked to comment on whether Israel is committing genocide in Gaza, Hamill has pointedly remained silent. As far I am aware he has never criticised Israel.
In regards to the Gorman geocide, Luke Skywalker probably still believes all the denials spread by the Empire. In terms of Palestine, it seems Skywalker is still listening to his Uncle Owen. #starwars #genocide #freepalestine
I am so sad to hear that... I had such high hopes for Hamill.
The West has never truly been civilized.
this entire story is exactly the same tactics as covid19 operation, the same agents from CIA, the same from military... And the problem of humanity is to have the GUTS TO SAY NO!
Imagine nobody would put the masks on the faces, allowed to stay locked up, took the lethal genetically modifying injections!