Saturday, July 31, 2010
Friday, July 30, 2010
Thursday, July 29, 2010
IRONY/HUBRIS ALERT: MEDIA DISAGREES WITH STONE AND THEN PROCEEDS TO PROVE HIS POINT
Oliver Stone told a reporter from London’s Sunday Times that Adolf Hitler, the subject of his upcoming documentary, did more damage to Russia than he did to the Jews. He also stated that the U.S.’s support for Israel is the result of Jewish domination of the media.
Israeli-American billionaire and media mogul Haim Saban isn’t buying Oliver Stone’s apology.
Saban, a major stakeholder in Univision and chairman of Saban Capital Group, said he is spreading the word among his Hollywood friends to avoid working with Stone.
A furious Haim Saban has mounted a campaign to get Showtime to cancel its planned airing of Oliver Stone’s 10-part series, “A Secret History of America,” in the wake of anti-Jewish remarks by the outspoken director.
The billionaire and outspoken media mogul told TheWrap he had contacted CBS chief Leslie Moonves to urge him to pull the series.
He said that WME chairman Ari Emanuel had also called CBS privately to urge the series be pulled. update: WME had no comment.
HAMID GUL ON WIKILEAKS
Hamid Gul, a former Pakistan general accused of helping the Taliban, says United States orchestrated the mass leak of war files to scapegoat him for its imminent withdrawal from Afghanistan.
Wednesday, July 28, 2010
CLINTON AND AZERBAIJAN
Conn Halinan’s counterpunch article in 2004 aptly highlights an important fact when it comes to the Haliburtons, Perles and Wumsers and their Project for the New American Century (PNAC) as it relates to Central Asia:
The recent move of oil companies and the U.S. military into Central Asia is a case in point. It was President Bill Clinton, not George W. Bush, who crafted that strategy. It was not the Republicans who brought Halliburton and Cheney into the Caspian region, but Clinton advisor Richard Morningstar, now a John Kerry point man.
Halinan is right on target: Clinton appointee Morningstar paved the way for Dick Cheney’s Halliburton’s positioning in Central Asia, and did darn many other good deeds for the main signatories of the Neocon Wet Dream in that region.
GARETH PORTER: LEAKS MAKE WAR POLICY VULNERABLE
WikiLeaks offer no major revelations as did the Pentagon Papers
they increase the political pressure on a war policy by highlighting contradictions between the official assumptions of the strategy and the realities shown in the documents - especially in regard to Pakistan's role in the war.
Pentagon Papers chronicle the policymaking process leading up to the Vietnam War
WikiLeaks documents thousands of incidents that illustrate severe problems Among the themes
casual killing of civilians
night raids by special forces based on bad intelligence
absence of legal constraints on Afghan police
deeply rooted corruption among Afghan officials.
Pakistan's political and material support for the Taliban insurgency
There are many intelligence reports about Lieutenant General Hamid Gul, director of
(ISI) during the 1980s, and he is continuing to work with the Taliban commanders loyal to Mullah Omar as well as the Jalaluddin and Sirajuddin Haqqani and Gulbuddin Hekmatyar insurgent networks
reports reflect anti-Pakistan bias of the Afghan intelligence service under former Northern Alliance intelligence chief Amrullah Saleh. Nevertheless the impression is credible.
New York Times led with Pakistani-Taliban issue. It said the documents reflect "deep suspicions among American officials that Pakistan's military spy service has for years guided the Afghan insurgency with a hidden hand, even as Pakistan receives more than US$1 billion a year from Washington for its help combating the militants."
Pakistani "double-dealing" is administration's greatest political vulnerabilities, national security elite are worried about any hope for success.
Senator Russ Feingold, "highlight a fundamental strategic problem, which is that elements of the Pakistani security services have been complicit in the insurgency"
Hamid Karzai pointing to Pakistani sanctuaries as the primary problem
Last February, then director of National Intelligence Dennis Blair said: Disrupting the "safe havens" "won't be sufficient but it is a "necessary condition"
White House issued a compilation of statements showing that they had been tough with Pakistan But none admitted the reality: Pakistan's policy of supporting the Taliban insurgency firmly fixed and is not going to change
Admitting that Pakistan's fundamental interests in Afghanistan conflict with US war strategy would be a serious - and possibly fatal - blow to the credibility of the Obama administration's strategy of using force to "reverse the momentum" of the Taliban. this contradiction and others could accelerate the process that political support among the foreign policy and political elite continues to diminish. loss of this support has accelerated. prominent national security elite have signaled war strategy cannot succeed, paralleling 2006 in regard to the Iraq War
ATOL: SAYED SALEEM SHAHZAD
Taliban leader Mullah Omar
Pakistan's army chief, General Ashfaq Pervez Kiani with close ties to the US
lines are clearly drawn between the militants and the military
Afghan Senator Arsala Rahmani is the main communication link to the Taliban. (ISI) had ask Rahmani to move to Peshawar, denounced Mullah Omar and formation of Jamiatul Khudamul Koran. This is the moderate Taliban, Pakistan sought to regain its influence in Afghanistan. The US came to accept the idea of "good" Taliban who could join President Hamid Karzai
earlier, Pakistan summoned Jalaluddin Haqqani and asked him to leave Mullah Omar. He was promised that with American support he would be appointed chief executive of Afghanistan. Haqqani's network has become one of the main drivers of the Taliban-led Afghan insurgency. Haqqani understood he would lose any authority and apologized saying that he could not leave Mullah Omar. ISI understood and never abandoned Haqqani.
Gulbuddin Hekmatyar and his Hezb-e-Islami Afghanistan (HIA), gathered by the ISI and asked to open offices in Karachi, Peshawar and Quetta, the capital of Balochistan province. They were urged to go to Kabul and become involved. a few years ago HIA leader Qutubuddin Hilal went to Kabul to see President Hamid Karzai. Karzai welcomed the HIA delegation with respect, but American officials humiliated them and insisted that they should be condemned as terrorists.
Pakistan wanted a Pashtun-dominated, pro-Pakistan government in Kabul. US agreed to moderate Taliban. Rahmani, former Taliban foreign minister Abdul Wakeel Mutawakil welcomed in Kabul. HIA members were allowed to contest elections.
ISI launched the Jaishul Muslim, a militant organization aimed at fighting foreign occupation, but one that condemned Mullah Omar's support for al-Qaeda. This was a ploy to divide the Taliban. Several Taliban joined. At the same time, al-Qaeda was active. plans were undermined, Jaishul Muslim soon joined the Taliban.
Western agencies took this as a betrayal. By 2007, al-Qaeda had taken the insurgency
to Pakistan's cities and took over ISI's jihadi assets As a result, a battle was orchestrated between state forces and jihadi elements.
A key, in 2005 Kashmiri militants joined with al-Qaeda and the Taliban. In 2007, Ilyas Kashmiri and Sirajuddin Haqqani (Jalaluddin Haqqani's son) changed the dynamics of Taliban-led attacks. This opened a gap between Haqqani and Pakistan.
For instance, in 2009, Naseeruddin Haqqani, a brother of Sirajuddin Haqqani, was arrested by the Pakistan. Pakistani Taliban leader Baitullah Mehsud (now killed) secured his release by swapping some Pakistan army prisoners. Similarly, Sirajuddin Haqqani provided shelter to fleeing members of the Pakistani Taliban when the military began operations in the South Waziristan tribal area.
Pakistan has long-standing ties to the Taliban and militants, the country is on the brink of an unprecedented showdown with militants and their organizations.
In response, streams of militants are believed to be grouping in North Waziristan; Pakistan is at a critical juncture and a false move by it - or by its ally the US - could place it in the lap of extremist forces.
Mullah Omar
General Ashfaq Pervez Kiani
Senator Arsala Rahmani
Jamiatul Khudamul Koran
Jalaluddin Haqqani
Gulbuddin Hekmatyar
Hezb-e-Islami Afghanistan (HIA)
Qutubuddin Hilal
Abdul Wakeel Mutawakil
Jaishul Muslim
Ilyas Kashmiri
Sirajuddin Haqqani
Naseeruddin Haqqani
Baitullah Mehsud
Tuesday, July 27, 2010
WIKILEAKS TARGET PAKISTAN
Not long after Wikileaks dumped tens of thousands of classified Afghanistan “war” documents into the public arena for consumption, the corporate media zoomed in on Pakistan. “WikiLeaks documents released Sunday shine a spotlight on Pakistan’s Inter-Services Intelligence, a spy agency that has been accused for years of having links to terrorist groups,” writes the Wall Street Journal.
Plus Al-Jazeera is underwhelmed, see here and here. and here,
The all-time classic 2001 de Borchgrave-Gul interview is here,
WORLD'S FIRST STATELESS NEWS ORGANZATION
1. Ask yourself: Why didn’t Wikileaks just publish the Afghanistan war logs and let journalists ‘round the world have at them? Why hand them over to The New York Times, the Guardian and Der Spiegel first?
2. The initial response from the White House was extremely unimpressive:
This leak will harm national security
There’s nothing new here.
Wikileaks is irresponsible; they didn’t even try to contact us!
Wikileaks is against the war in Afghanistan; they’re not an objective news source
“The period of time covered in these documents… is before the President announced his new strategy.
3. If you don’t know much about Wikileaks or why it exists, the best way to catch up is this New Yorker profile of Julien Assange.
4. If you go to the Wikileaks Twitter profile, next to “location” it says: Everywhere. world’s first stateless news organization.
5. And just as government doesn’t know what to think, the traditional press isn’t used to this
Notice how effective this combination is. The information is released in two forms: vetted and narrated to gain old media cred, and released online in full text, Internet-style, which corrects for any timidity or blind spot the editors at Der Spiegel, The Times or the Guardian may show.
Judgment! 1/3 - The Bosnian 'Death Camp' Accusation: An Expose
Staring in 1991, this nation unified since 1918 was torn apart by ferocious wars of secession, this film was shot in Bosnia Herzegovina in 1992, during the previous five months Islamic fundamentalist secessionist had started a rebellion. They were supported by the US and German governments who coveted the economic and strategic Balkans. Secession was opposed by loyalist Yugoslavs from all ethnic groups. Powerful western groups wanted to intervene, but they couldn't just start bombing. They needed favorable public opinion. They needed the work of the mass media. The media claimed that the loyalists Serbs were motivated by the hatred of Muslims. In fact, the Serbs were not motivated by hatred at all. They wanted to hold Yugoslavia together and they didn’t want to be ruled by an Islamic fundamentalist faction. Many if not most Muslims agreed, they too, were loyal to Yugoslavia. The western media labeled the
Loyalist Serbs = the new Nazi’s, the media called the
Loyalist Muslims = rebels, but the media called the
Islamic Fundamentalist = moderate democrats.
ITN, the British news station, was the first to mass distribute images to support demonisation of the loyalist Serbs and Muslims. Those images came from film that ITN shot in two locations. At a detention center for POW, and at a refugee center for in Bosnia Herzegovina. By chance, a crew from Serbian television, RPF, was filming at the same locations that day. We filmed the same things they filmed and sometimes we filmed them too. The Serbian producers of this film were part of that RPF film crew. The US production work was done by the website, Emperors Clothes.com.
We will show you what ITN left out and how ITN doctored raw images to pictures that fooled the world.
2:47
Nebojsa Malic, Antiwar Blog
Monday, July 26, 2010
INDIA AND CHABAHAR PORT
clipped from: India is keen to expedite the development of Iran's Chabahar port, which will give the country direct access to Afghanistan and Central Asia, without needing to go through Pakistan.
The port's strategic significance also lies in the fact that it is barely 72 km away from Pakistan's deep-sea Gwadar port, which has been built with Chinese assistance.
India has already built the Zaranj-Delaram road in Afghanistan's Nimroz province, which will connect to the Chabahar port via Milak.
Sources said the Chabahar-Milak-Zaranj-Delaram highway will open up the Indian market to Afghan agricultural products and other exports.
LEAKISTAN; THE NEW INSURGENCY
clipped from: www.tnr.com
Wikileaks action shows the notion of “information warfare” is changing.
now includes actions taken by disaffected functionaries within government to discredit the officially approved view of reality. This action is the handiwork of subversives, perhaps soldiers, perhaps civilians. Within our own national security apparatus, a second insurgent campaign may well have begun. Its purpose: bring America’s longest war to an end.
Wikileaks action shows the notion of “information warfare” is changing.
now includes actions taken by disaffected functionaries within government to discredit the officially approved view of reality. This action is the handiwork of subversives, perhaps soldiers, perhaps civilians. Within our own national security apparatus, a second insurgent campaign may well have begun. Its purpose: bring America’s longest war to an end.
PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS SEES THE END
When hubris sent America in pursuit of overseas empire, the venture coincided with the offshoring of American manufacturing, industrial, and professional service jobs and the corresponding erosion of the government’s tax base, with the advent of massive budget and trade deficits, with the erosion of the fiat paper currency’s value, and with America’s dependence on foreign creditors and puppet rulers.
GRASSROOTS
"grassroots = four billionaires contributing 97 percent of the $4.7 million it has raised to date". Democracy you can smoke, baby. Light 'em if you got 'em.
LOS ZETAS INVADE
"Mexlamofascist overlords starting the reconquista of the SW USA. The bloodbath continues in the "heartland", word is coming in that the People's Liberation Army (ChiComs) have crossed into the US by tunneling through the center of the Earth and have taken over at least two ranches in the Omaha area"
I SAY -- SO WHAT?
The White House and the Pentagon are said to be 'enraged'. I say --so what? I am enraged by the war of naked aggression, fought solely for the benefit of America's increasingly rich but tiny 'ruling elite and the shills and pimps on K-street who conceived it and assisted Pentagon militarists waging that war on behalf of venal interests throughout America.
Saturday, July 24, 2010
PLS REFUDIATE
Larry Silverstein bought the asbestos ridden World Trade Center for mere $125 million and a short six months later collected a colossal $4.55 billion in the insurance settlement. I would say, given the scope of that payoff, a mosque is the only appropriate monument to build there. How could you consider anything else.
Refudiate that
Why has the Post series created so little reaction?
Glenn Greenwald is one of the greats. In an honest world this is the kind of guy who would routinely be on the news hour. He is one of many unbiased, investigative reporters who are banned on the USG corporate media because he refuses to censor himself to their specifications. Thanks to the internet, we get him anyway. Here is Greenwald talking about the Washington Post's (WaPo) Secret Government article.
Remember how The Washington Post spent three days documenting on its front page that we basically live under a vast Secret Government -- composed of military and intelligence agencies and the largest corporations -- so sprawling and unaccountable that nobody even knows what it does? This public/private Secret Government spies, detains, interrogates, and even wages wars in the dark, while sucking up untold hundreds of billions of dollars every year for the private corporations which run it. Has any investigative series ever caused less of a ripple than this one?
STEVEN WALT: TWO STATE OR ONE STATE
clipped from: antiwar.com
http://antiwar.com/radio/2010/07/21/stephen-m-walt/
In the attempt to create a Greater Israel, colonize the West Bank, Israel controls 5 million Palestinians
There will be one course or the other. Palestinians
get a state, or, at least half of the people will not be Jewish, not have any political rights
In a world which Israel controls is a world they have to either become a multi-ethnic, truly, a liberal democracy where everybody has the right to vote which is no longer a Jewish state. or, an apartheid state
unconditional and uncritical US support has allowed that situation, thereby threatening Israel’s long-term future.
Some think that “It’s already too late. There are too many colonies in the West Bank. Bantustans already created. walls built, done deal — there never will be a two-state solution
Eventually, not just de facto, but an outright single state with the Jewish character destroyed and the future will be a struggle for political rights within Israel.
“What is American policy?”, support an apartheid state
Or, “one person, one vote” which is consistent with America’s political traditions
many Israelis, who argue a one-state system of control exists in de facto brings us to the United State
the only country with sufficient potential leverage
Obama came out on this big roll “No, I’m determined. We’re going to get this done, failed, and fell back to a bush-light policy
Andrew Cockburn defined the neoconservative movement
“This is where the Israel lobby crosses with the military industrial complex.” And basically Lockheed and Northrop Grumman and all those companies needed to hire some intellectuals to come up with excuses for selling their weapons and so they made this kind of mob marriage with the neocons back in the ’70s, and so we have this immense power behind this neoconservative movement.
Emergency Committee for Israel, Bill Kristol and Gary Bauer. groups like AIPAC, the Conference of Presidents
Washington Institute for Near East Policy, American Enterprise Institute, and the Saban Center at Brookings
What does Obama have planned next for Latin America?
clipped from: onlinejournal.com
Obama’s Latin American policy resembles Richard Nixon’s Operation Condor and its assassinations and covert operations.
He has deploy thousands of Marines and dozens of Coast Guard vessels to Costa Rica, more military bases in Colombia and Honduras, authorized a coup against Zelaya. He is more threatening than the benign George W. Bush.
Thee are increasing reports of political assassinations, illegal detention of opposition figures and journalists in Colombia, Panama, and Honduras.
Pinochet supporters of the Chilean Senate recently charged by Venezuela with interference in elections. Under President Sebastian Pinera, Chile has become
with Colombia, Panama, and Costa Rica U.S. base to destabilize progressive-led governments.
The current doctrine is found in CIA manuals for “PBSuccess,”
Brazil’s leftist President Joao Goulart, overthrown in a 1964 coup, died.
Chile’s Eduardo Frei Montalva. PBSuccess’s “Study of Assassination” talks about the machine gun option, to kill Allende.
renewed low-key Operation Condor appears to have taken shape under Obama
And Obama’s decision not to rescind George W. Bush’s re-establishment of the U.S. Navy’s Fourth Fleet as part of the US Southern Command means that the United States can always resort to its old “gunboat diplomacy” to enforce its military might and will in Latin America.
For Obama, whose Indonesian stepfather, Lolo Soetoro, was a top officer in the armed forces of General Suharto, who carried out the CIA’s 1965-66 coup against President Sukarno and the Indonesian Communist Party, which saw almost one million accused Communists, as well as ethnic Chinese, systematically genocided, such re-imposition of covert activities in Latin America presents no moral dilemma to Obama, who first witnessed the CIA’s repression as an impressionable young boy of 7 and 8 years old while living in Jakarta. Soetoro was still a senior officer in Suharto’s army when Soetoro enrolled Barack Obama in 1967 as Barry Soetoro in Jakarta’s Fransiskus Assisi Catholic school. In 1967, the Indonesian army and its CIA handlers were still mopping up Indonesia’s left-wing opposition forces. Obama has studiously refrained from mentioning Indonesia’s CIA coup and has twice canceled presidential visits to the country.
Thursday, July 22, 2010
COUNTERINSURGENCY: ITS BLOODY HORRIBLE
Counter-Counterinsurgency: The Video from Maximilian Forte on Vimeo.
These are some of my favourite lines:
* counterinsurgency: it’s like a wild horse, only you bet on it;
* counterinsurgency involves a thousand small healing steps;
* the manual can never be wrong, only the practice;
* cultural knowledge for the military: it’s so basic and fundamental, absolute common sense; and,
* basic common sense makes you so very smart.
Making the “application of force” (called killing, by regular human beings) more precise…and that makes it “humanitarian.” They must imagine themselves to be at the helm of a Global SPCA.
“I read The Economist,” when I want to learn about Africa. Africanists and African anthropologists: you’re dismissed.
Wednesday, July 21, 2010
AL QAEDA AND AND THE DOG THAT DIDNT BARK
al Qaeda never seriously attacks jewish targets.
When al Qaeda ‘attacked’ the WTC, it made millions of dollars for the owners,
Imagine if al Qaeda performed a serious, damaging attack on a jewish target. Wouldn’t that come as a considerable surprise?
Don’t we all know that it primarily attacks Muslims? And conversely, the jews no longer bother to say a word about al Qaeda. It’s someone else’s problem, not theirs. Their enemies are Shi’ites, who are also al Qaeda’s enemies.
When al Qaeda ‘attacked’ the WTC, it made millions of dollars for the owners,
Imagine if al Qaeda performed a serious, damaging attack on a jewish target. Wouldn’t that come as a considerable surprise?
Don’t we all know that it primarily attacks Muslims? And conversely, the jews no longer bother to say a word about al Qaeda. It’s someone else’s problem, not theirs. Their enemies are Shi’ites, who are also al Qaeda’s enemies.
JULIEN ASSANGE: CONSPIRACY
Julian_Assange_of_Nairobi,_Kenya_Awarded_Doctor_of_Journalism_and_Communications.jpg)
Julian Assange, founder of Wikileaks – a website that publishes millions of documents, from military intelligence to internal company memos and has, in four years, exposed more secrets than many newspapers have in a century
"I believe in facts about conspiracies," he says, choosing his words slowly. "Any time people with power plan in secret, they are conducting a conspiracy. So there are conspiracies everywhere. There are also crazed conspiracy theories. It's important not to confuse these two. Generally, when there's enough facts about a conspiracy we simply call this news."
THE BLOOD BANKERS
As an attorney, James S. Henry, former chief economist at McKinsey and Co, and now an investigative journalist who has spent 10 years researching corruption
between 1970 and 2003, over three trillion dollars loaned to developing countries by First World banks and governments disappeared, leaving "little to show... except giant white elephant projects, widespread corruption and private elites that had learned to stash much of their liquid wealth back in the First World".
gigantic aid projects...which typically went hideously over-budget and involved widespread corruption and environmental destruction.
1992, experts at the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund came up with the Washington Consensus, that a new agenda for global trade and aid was established that was to cripple the economies of the developing world even more...than the "white elephants ...this agenda of 'free trade' and 'neo-liberalisation'
SEE
Tuesday, July 20, 2010
THE MINISTRY OF TRUTH
clipped from: www.campaignforliberty.com
If one goes into an internet café it is now legally required in most countries in the European Union to present a government issued form of identification. When I used an internet connection at a Venice hotel, my passport was demanded as a precondition and the inner page, containing all my personal information, was scanned and a copy made for the Ministry of the Interior -- which controls the police force.
there is de facto no right to privacy and a government bureaucrat decides what can and cannot be "reviewed" by the authorities
The excuses
security argument, that managing the internet is an integral part of the "global war on terror" in that it is used by terrorists to plan their attacks requiring governments to control those who use it
internet itself is a vulnerable "natural asset" that could be seized or damaged by terrorists and must be protected, making the case for a massive $100 billion program of cyberwarfare.
Sunday, July 18, 2010
WHY I AM A LIBERAL
- abolitionists worked to end the scourge of slavery in this country–a country founded as a slave republic. In the original, unamended, U.S. Constitution, enslaved persons of African descent are only counted as 3/5ths of a person (for the purposes of census)
- Liberals fought for 70 years to win the right to vote for women.
- ended child labor
- created the public school system
- the rights of workers to organize and bargain collectively for fair wages, times of rest, safe working conditions and benefits
- exposed the dangers of tainted meat and other food and created government safety inspections of food and medicines
- created Social Security (greatly decreasing poverty among the elderly–old age had been a time of absolute fear and horror beforehand), Medicare, Medicaid
- Liberals ended segregation (American apartheid)
- to work for racial equality and justice and a multi-cultural society where difference is celebrated rather than demonized
- began the environmental movement
- passed the Clean Air Act, the Clean Water Act, the Endangered Species Act and the
- Environmental Protection Agency
- A liberal Republicanbroke up the corporate monopolies and created the national park system
People matter more than profits.
unlimited profit can never be the bottom line. Profits cannot come at all costs.
People matter more than profits, the welfare of people trumps higher profits
Corporations are not persons
Money is not speech.
They must not be allowed to use their money to purchase “more democracy” than others.
The Earth is meant to be humanity’s home–not our toilet.
We are all connected in a great web of life
Individual liberties are balanced with concern for the common good.
The primary moral values of the political liberal are liberty, equality, & justice, & compassion.
Government (of the people, by the people, for the people) exists not just for defense of property and the enforcement of contracts (the conservative view), but to enable people to work together to those good ends which are difficult or impossible to do separately. debate should be over what constitutes good government.
- Clean government vs. corrupt government,
- competent government vs. ineffective government, or
- responsive government vs. out-of-touch government–
Taxes are a civic tithe.
roads paved, bridges built and kept in repair, levees built and kept in repair–all the infrastructure needed for a healthy society–including a healthy marketplace. Taxes pay for firefighters and police officers and public schools, Social Security, clean water and air, and much else. The rich should pay a greater percentage of their income in taxes because...
Regulations exist to protect the vulnerable.
If you don’t want your food to poison you, it needs to be inspected by the U.S. Dairy and Agriculture dept. (USDA) or the restaraunt you’re going to needs inspecting by the health department. If you don’t want your kids to get sick from lead toys from China, then you need regulations–and enough inspectors to prevent this. If you don’t want oil companies to ravish the planet, then you need strict regulations–and a robust enforcement regime. With “deregulation” of financing comes risky behavior that results in a collapsed economy. Regulations need regular reexamination to see if they need reform, but “deregulation” as a battle cry or a political philosophy is a cry for anarchy and a recipe for disaster.
Liberals do not worship the “good ol’ days.” liberals see the promise of the American dream as always being a struggle–”toward a more perfect union.”
Friday, July 16, 2010
EMPIRE
So the empire uses its state power to gather private wealth for its investor class. And it uses its public wealth to shore up its state power and prevent other nations from self-developing.
When Michael Parenti's Against Empire was written in 1995, It was believed that U.S. rulers intervened abroad only out of self-defense or for humanitarian rescue operations or to restore order in a troubled region or overthrow tyranny, fight terrorism, and propagate democracy
But by the year 2000, everyone started talking about the United States as an empire and writing books with titles like Sorrows of Empire, Follies of Empire, Twilight of Empire, or Empire of Illusions--- all referring to the United States when they spoke of empire.
imperialism is where the dominant investor interests in one country bring to bear their economic and military power upon another nation or region in order to expropriate its land, labor, natural resources, capital, and markets
Empires are enormously profitable for the dominant economic interests of the imperial nation but enormously costly to the people of the colonized country.
Obama and the national security state for which he works are waging two and a half wars (Iraq, Afghanistan, and northern Pakistan) with military threats against Yemen, Iran, and, on a slow day, North Korea.
(The graph is misleading. When everything is added up, including all the black budget items, it easily tops 1 trillion)
RACHEL MADDOW: LEFT WING GATEKEEPER AND NOT EVEN SUBTLE ABOUT IT
Liberal television host Rachel Maddow solidarizes herself with US military in Afghanistan. Maddow is a principal voice of the liberal-left.
Maddow solidarized herself fully with the occupation and the US military, endorsing the bloody suppression of the insurgency. The ruling elite's propaganda was that the war had something to do with bringing terrorists and their Taliban sponsors to justice. ruling elite seized on the 9/11 to stepped up its drive for global domination
The war never had anything to do with democracy, freeing the Afghan people from oppression, or safeguarding the US population from future terrorist attacks.
But rather, vast energy reserves in the Caspian Sea, oil pipeline routes, to implant itself in the strategically critical Central Asian region, to thwart rivals in Europe, Russia, China
Maddow and American liberal-left accept the premise of the Bush and now the Obama administration’s argument that US forces are attempting to set Afghanistan on its feet.
She set the tone, she and her crew had come to Afghanistan “to try to figure ou
“One, If you take as given America’s goals here, is putting 105,000 troops here the right to way to achieve those goals?
second, what does all that mean for Americans who are here?”
Her broadcast exclude all critical thinking. Any investigation would begin with
“America’s goals,” deceit during the Vietnam War, and Iraq was launched on a gigantic lie?
Maddow buys the official propaganda, she is predisposed to do so by her class position and political outlook. She feels at one with the American imperial project
Maddow asserted, “You fight insurgents by killing and capturing them, sure.”, which is the manner of speaking of the semi-criminal elements who came to prominence in the Bush regime and continued under Obama. She went on: “But you also try to create an environment in which the insurgency can’t survive
nation-building… That‘s honestly what they‘re trying to do here. American forces
attempting to set up a “government, and law and order via the government, so that no one in the population wants what the Taliban is offering.” Maddow provided a platform for Brig. Gen. Ben Hodges, the head of the regional southern command in Afghanistan.. The unpopularity of the occupation among Afghans never arose as an issue during Maddow’s visit.
Maddow’s question, where the money to come from, Hodges states the incredible mineral wealth potential.”
Maddow’s endorsement of US prison facility near the Bagram airfield. law and order is locking people up.” Parwan Detention Facility, close to Bagram. “The US is trying,” “to make the world forget the alleged atrocity that took place here.” at Parwan the goals “is to educate the detainees so they will be able to earn a living and not be tempted to join the Taliban.” “another mission” is “to interrogate prisoners for information about the enemy in Afghanistan.”
Red Cross confirmed the US continuing to operate a secret “black jail” at its Bagram facility, prisoners at the site were abused, beaten, humiliated and subjected to sleep deprivation, sensory deprivation and other forms of torture. BBC’s Hilary Andersson described Parwan facility what she saw prisoners moved around in wheelchairs with goggles and headphones on
Corrupt regime, “no infrastructure”
NBC’s foreign affairs correspondent Richard Engel admitted, of Kabul, “There is no infrastructure. There are open sewers over there.” after nine years of US occupation and tens of billions of dollars. misconception, he noted, “is that this is a narco state and that people here who are corrupt live off drug money.” No, he said, “by far, the biggest industry is the war… $5.5 billion a month… So anyone connected with the war has made much, much more money than anyone connected with drugs.”
Maddow labels herself as a “national security liberal.”
“I’m undoubtedly a liberal, which means that I’m in almost total agreement with the Eisenhower-era Republican party platform.” The New York Times terms her a “defense policy wonk,” who is writing a book on the role of the military in postwar American politics.
supporter of the American military and its operations around the world. She worries, like many left-liberals, that the Afghan war is unwinnable. Maddow, like the editors of the Nation opposes the immediate withdrawal.
part of the upper-middle-class liberal left, questions of personal identity, at the expense of social class, emerged as the major component of the American liberal outlook. striving for privileges by African-American and Latino petty-bourgeoisie, the elevation of gender and sexuality to world-historical political importance.
she is indifferent to the conditions of the working population. searches in vain for
“joblessness” or “the jobless,” or to “unemployment.” “social inequality” appear, or “inequality” by itself. The word “poverty” comes up once, but in relation to Mexico, and not uttered by Maddow.
In what sense then can Maddow be designated “left” or “progressive’?
she is gay. Just as Barack Obama’s ethnicity was enough
The world doesn’t function that way. The determinant division is not ethnicity, race or gender, but social class. By her support for a brutal, neo-colonial war, Rachel Maddow has identified herself in the most indelible fashion.
Thursday, July 15, 2010
SC Lt. Governor André Bauer & Foot Washing For The Lord
Here we see South Carolina Lt. Gov. Andre Bauer, who is most notable for not being gay and wanting Mark Sanford to resign so he could be governor for a bit
Read more at Wonkette: http://www.wonkette.com/#ixzz0tlq0wWn0
Wednesday, July 14, 2010
THE MOST REVOLUTIONARY ACT
“The most revolutionary act is a clear view of the world as it really is.”
—Rosa Luxemburg (1871-1919)
33 Conspiracy Theories That Turned Out To Be True
33 Conspiracy Theories That Turned Out To Be TrueJust as conspiracy theories, such as: the earth rotates around the sun, and; the earth is not actually flat, turned out to have been proven true. What follows are some surprising modern conspiracy theories that turned out true after thorough investigation. Some through congressional hearings, others through investigative journalism. Many of these, however, were just admitted to by those involved. These are just 33 of them, and there is still a long list of others to add. Many of these are listed with original and credible news clips on the matter, as well as documentaries.
1.The Dreyfus Affair:
2.The Mafia:
3.MK-ULTRA:
4.Operation Mockingbird:
5.Manhattan Project:
6.Asbestos:
7.Watergate:
8.The Tuskegee Syphilis Study:
9.Operation Northwoods:
10.1990 Testimony of Nayirah:
11.Counter Intelligence Programs Against Activists in the 60s:
Main Core
Rex 84
12.The Iran-Contra Affair:
13.The BCCI Scandal:
14.CIA Drug Running in LA:
15.Gulf of Tonkin Never Happened:
16.The Business Plot:
17.July 20, 1944 Conspiracy to Assassinate Hitler:
18.Operation Ajax:
19.Operation Snow White:
21.The CIA Assassinates A Lot Of People (Church Committee):
22.The New World Order:
23.Kennedy Assassination - the 2nd Investigation by Congress Few People Know About, United States House of Representatives Select Committee on Assassinations (HSCA):
24.1919 World Series Conspiracy:
25.Karen Silkwood:
26.CIA Drug Smuggling in Arkansas:
27.Bohemian Grove:
28.Operation Paperclip:
29.The Round Table:
30.The Illuminati:
31.The Trilateral Commission:
32.Big Brother or the Shadow Government:
The Secret Team: The CIA and Its Allies in Control of the United States and the World
by Air Force Col. L Fletcher Prouty
The Report From Iron Mountain, by Dial Press
For another powerful, highly revealing documentary on the manipulations of the secret government produced by BBC, click here (view free at link provided). The intrepid BBC team clearly shows how the War on Terror is largely a fabrication. For those interested in very detailed information on the composition of the shadow or secret government from a less well-known source, take a look at the summary available here.
33.The Federal Reserve Bank:
Tuesday, July 13, 2010
BUSH SCANDALS LIST
He may be the Decider but his handlers have long known how to manipulate him.
Bush’s Presidency began in the shadow of a contested and likely stolen election and promised to be unsuccessful in a largely forgettable and unremarkable way. 911 changed all that and transformed a plodding, and essentially AWOL one termer into an accidental hero
he was the perfect mark for every conniver, bumbler, bungler, hack, hanger on, and would be crony that Karl Rove, Dick Cheney, and their friends could find. In the normal course of things, this would have spelled failure. Post-911, it was catastrophic.
At this critical juncture in our history we needed an adult but got an adolescent. Instead of responsibility, we got a truant. In place of flexibility we got obduracy. In the face of great and complex challenges, we got strawmen, a black and white universe, my way or the highway, regurgitated stump speeches, and a steadfast refusal to compromise not just with opponents but with reality.
1. Patient neglect at Walter Reed Army Hospital
2. US Attorney firings
3. Libby/Plame Affair (Outing a CIA agent)
4. Iraq war
5. Afghanistan (leaving before the job was done)
6. Iran saber rattling
7. North Korea (mishandling nuclear issue)
8. The War on Terror (failure to capture Osama bin Laden, dubious allies)
9. Civilian contractors in Iraq (poor service for big bucks)
10. Military Commissions Act (torture, kangaroo courts, indefinite detention, and loss of habeas corpus)
11. Hurricane Katrina and the drowning of New Orleans
12. NSA warrantless wiretapping
13. SWIFT (international money transfers)
14. Black sites and rendition
15. Department of Homeland Security (a massive boondoggle)
16. K Street lobbyists (for government you can buy)
17. Dusty Foggo (No. 3 at the CIA)
18. Duke Cunningham (a corrupt politician)
19. Tom Delay (another corrupt politician)
20. Mark Foley and the House pages
21. Cheney Energy Task Force (and hiding info about it)
22. Tax cuts for the richest of the rich
23. Global warming (denial and stalling)
24. Terri Schiavo and the attempted trashing of family privacy rights
25. Budget deficits and a greatly increased national debt
26. Stacking of the Supreme Court (Roberts and Alito)
27. Medicare( lack of long term solvency)
28. Medicare Part D (Drug prescriptions)
29. Healthcare general mess
30. Doug Feith (stovepiping Iraq intel)
31. 2000 election (stolen)
32. 2004 election (rigging)
33. 9/11 Commission limitation and manipulation of
34. 9/11 Commission’s recommendations delayed implementation
35. Marginalization of the UN
36. Preventive war doctrine
37. Loss of US prestige
38. Inaction on Israeli-Palestinian peace process
39. Lack of spending on basic research
40. Alberto Gonzales
41. FDA restricting the mission
42. EPA restricting the mission
43. Porter Goss trashing the CIA
44. Militarization of intelligence
45. Rampant cronyism
46. Signing statements
47. Unilateral Executive
48. Abuse of the National Guard
376. Policing the national political conventions
377. Gonzales’ mishandling of national security document
378. KBR and forced labor in Iraq
379. The GSA opposes 9/11 safety changes in building construction
380. Republican US Attorney downplays Obama assassination plot
381. Labor Department pulls rug out from under corporate whistleblowers
382. More corruption in the government’s oil leasing programs
383. Active duty Army unit to be deployed for domestic operations
384. Datamining: Intrusive and it doesn’t work
385. Corruption in the missile defense program
386. Failure to outfit planes to fight fires in Southern California
387. Political censorship at PBS
388. Religious profiling at the DHS
389. A political hit: Michael Garcia and Eliot Spitzer
390. Voter suppression efforts in the 2008 elections
391. The Bureau of Land Management and shady deals in Utah again
392. BP receives a slap on the wrist from Justice Department
393. Oh, and another Bureau of Land Management shady deal in the West
394. Transportation Department relaxes rules on truckdriving safety
395. Lax oversight at the Office of Thrift Supervision contributed to bank failures
396. Wrongdoing in the Air Marshal Service
397. Government OK’s dumping mining debris in and near streams
398. Managing the Obama transition, the NASA example
399. The cockamamie FBI investigation of the Madrid train bombings and Brandon Mayfield
400. An absent President
GLEN GREENWALD ON SCOTT HORTON
Glenn Greenwald, Salon.com blogger and former constitutional lawyer, discusses the military’s formal charging of Bradley Manning for giving classified information to WikiLeaks, Wired‘s refusal to disclose the full chat logs between informant Adrian Lamo and Manning and why whistleblowers who embarrass government are typically subjected to the Daniel Ellsberg treatment.
Ten minutes from the incomprable Glen Greenwald, "...and you see that over and over again where the dirty work of the govt is done by the largest media outlets, that is their role ...when it wanted to spread war prop about Jessica Lynch's ...heroic rescue by the marines... all of those lies ...planted with the Wash Post...uncritical reporters simply repeat what they are told by gov t sources and do their dirty work for them"
TEA PARTY THEOCRACY AND OTHER OBSERVATIONS ABOUT THE RELIGIOS RIGHT
Tea Party theocracy and other observations about the religious right
An interview by Bill Harnsberger, a Daily Kos front page diarist, with Bruce Wilson of Talk To Action, a "platform for reporting on...the religious right." Some highlights:
On Christian Zionism:
[T]here's a Christian Zionist/Likud political symbiosis going back to the late 1970's, and John Hagee and Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu are close allies.
Hagee also demonizes Jews to a remarkably vicious degree. [Link.]
On Sarah Palin:
Palin's long-time personal prayer leader, Mary Glazier, tells evangelical leadersthat Sarah Palin joined her prayer group in '89,
Glazier then advocatescleansing "the land" of unbelievers
On the religious right's quickly changing nature:
Lou Engle...has become the de-facto prayer leader for the Republican Party. It's targeting entire states for political takeover (Hawaii, for example
On the religious right's influence in the US military:
Spend some time browsing the extensive media archives from the Military Religious Freedom FoundationOn the Tea Party movement and the religious right:
Ron Paul was staging 'Tea Party' events across America back in 2007,
He's good friends with Constitution Party Founder Howard Phillips, a leading Christian Reconstructionist
On the growing influence of the religious right within the Republican Party:
state Republican parties - link -].
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)