Exclusive: Democrats and liberals have climbed into bed with the neocons to push the “Russia-did-it” conspiracy theory as a way to “get Trump,” but this New McCarthyism has grave dangers, writes Robert Parry.
By Robert Parry
The anti-Russian McCarthyism that has spread out from the United States to encompass the European Union, Canada and Australia has at its core an implicit recognition that neoliberal economics and neoconservative foreign policy have failed.
A scene from “Dr. Strangelove,” in which the bomber pilot (played by actor Slim Pickens) rides a nuclear bomb to its target in the Soviet Union.
When I recently asked a European journalist why this anti-Russian hysteria had taken root among mainstream European political parties, he answered with a question: “Do you think they can run on their success in handling the recession and the refugees?”
In other words, European voters are angry about the painful economic conditions that followed the Wall Street crash of 2008 and the destabilizing surge of immigrants fleeing from Western “regime change” wars in Iraq, Syria, Libya and Afghanistan.
So, like the Democratic Party that doesn’t want to engage in a soul-searching self-examination about Donald Trump’s victory, the European “establishment” parties need a handy excuse to divert criticism – and that excuse is Russia, a blame-shifting that has allowed nearly every recent criticism of an establishment government official to be sloughed off as “Russian disinformation.”
It doesn’t even matter anymore that the criticism may be based on solid fact. Even truthful information is now deemed “Russian disinformation” or Russian-inspired “fake news.”
We saw that in the Canadian mainstream media’s denunciations of Consortiumnews.com for running an article that pointed out that Canada’s Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland had misrepresented her family history to white-out her maternal grandfather’s role editing a Nazi newspaper in Poland that demonized Jews and justified the Holocaust.
Virtually every mainstream outlet in Canada rallied to Freeland’s side when she dismissed our article as Russian disinformation. Only later did a few newspapers grudgingly acknowledge that our story was true and that Freeland knew it was true. Still, the attacks on us continued. We were labeled “Russian disinformationists,” with no evidence needed to support the slander and no defense allowed.
Though arguably a small example, the Freeland story reflects what is happening across the Western mainstream news media. Almost every independent-minded news article that questions the establishment narratives on international affairs is dismissed as “Russian propaganda.” The few politicians, academics and journalists who don’t march in the establishment’s parade are “Moscow stooges” or “Putin apologists.”
The Russian Resistance
This anti-Russian hysteria began some years ago when Russian President Vladimir Putin made clear that Russia would no longer bow to dictates from Washington and Brussels. Russia bristled at the encroachment of NATO on its borders, rejected the neoconservative agenda of “regime change” wars in Muslim countries, and resisted the U.S.-backed putsch ousting Ukraine’s elected president in 2014.
Hillary Clinton speaking at a rally in Phoenix, Arizona, March 21, 2016. (Photo by Gage Skidmore)
But the anti-Russian frenzy gained unstoppable momentum with the U.S. election in 2016. The Democrats, liberals and neoconservatives were horrified at the shocking upset of their presidential choice, Hillary Clinton, by the boorish and buffoonish Donald Trump.
After this bitter defeat, the losers looked for scapegoats rather than order up a serious autopsy on how they lost to the “unelectable” Trump, i.e, by choosing a corporate candidate who was associated with neoliberal economics and neoconservative war policies. Blaming Russia became the easy excuse that could unify the various pro-Clinton camps.
So, the Obama administration – in an unprecedented step – sought to poison the well for its successor by having the U.S. intelligence community put out evidence-lacking allegations about Russian “meddling” in the U.S. election to elect Trump.
The promoters of this Russia-did-it narrative merged with the “#Resistance” movement to do whatever was necessary to push Trump out of office. It didn’t seem to matter that there was very little evidence that the Russians actually did meddle in the election.
The chief claim was that the Russians gave WikiLeaks the Democratic emails revealing the Democratic National Committee’s sabotage of Sen. Bernie Sanders’s campaign and the emails of Clinton campaign chairman John Podesta exposing the contents of Clinton’s hidden speeches to Wall Street and some pay-to-play features of the Clinton Foundation.
WikiLeaks denied getting the material from the Russians, but – more to the point – there was no evidence of collusion between Moscow and the Trump campaign, as even Obama’s Director of National Intelligence James Clapper and New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman have acknowledged. (The WikiLeaks disclosures also were not a major factor in Clinton’s defeat, which she primarily blamed on FBI Director James Comey briefly reopening the investigation of her using a private email server while Secretary of State.)
Still, the absence of evidence has not deterred Democrats, liberals and neocons from spinning a vast Russian conspiracy theory that ties together Trump’s past business dealings in Russia with the notion that somehow Putin foresaw that Trump would become U.S. president, an eventuality that nearly every American pundit considered an impossibility as recently as last year.
But skeptics of the Trump/Russia conspiracy — if they dare note that Putin would have needed the world’s best Ouija board to foresee Trump’s victory — must then prove that they are not “Russian propaganda/disinformation agents” for having these doubts.
New McCarthyism and Maddow
Given the emergence of this New Cold War, I suppose it made sense that we would soon have a New McCarthyism, although it may have come as a surprise that this witch-hunting is being led by the liberals and the mainstream media, albeit with important assistance from the neoconservatives who have long engaged in smearing the patriotism of anyone who doubted their geopolitical genius.
MSNBC host Rachel Maddow.
Remember back in 1984 when U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Jeane Kirkpatrick, an early neocon, denounced traitorous Americans who would “blame America first.”
But it appears now that many liberals and even progressives are so blinded by their hatred of Trump that they haven’t thought through the wisdom of their new alliance with the neocons — or the fairness of smearing fellow Americans as “Putin apologists.”
Meanwhile, mainstream news organizations have abandoned even the pretense of professional objectivity in their propagandistic approach toward anything related to Russia or Trump. For instance, I would defy anyone reading The New York Times’ coverage of Russia to assess it as fair and balanced when it is clearly snarky and sneering.
It also turns out that this New McCarthyism has become profitable for its leading practitioners. The New York Times reported on Monday that the ratings for MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow are soaring with her frequent anti-Russian rants.
“Now, rattled liberals are surging back [to network television], seeking catharsis, solidarity and relief,” the Times wrote, citing a Kentucky woman explaining why she has become a devotee of Maddow: “She’s always talking about the Russians!”
Frankly, for the past dozen years, I’ve wondered about Maddow. I first heard her on the radio in August 2005 when she was a summer fill-in at Air America reporting on President George W. Bush’s Katrina fiasco, which she partly blamed on the deployment of Louisiana National Guard units to Iraq, so they couldn’t help evacuate flooded New Orleans.
It was clear that Maddow was talented and her excoriation of the Iraq War was on point, although – by summer 2005 – it didn’t require a huge amount of journalistic courage to slam Bush over the Iraq War. As I watched her career rise through a regular Air America gig to her show on MSNBC and then to stardom as an anchor on the network’s election coverage, I always wondered whether she would put her lucrative corporate acceptance at risk and go against the grain at a tough journalistic moment.
Now, Maddow’s behavior in becoming a modern-day mainstream-media Joe McCarthy has put my doubts to rest. She is riding high in the ratings by keeping her whip hand coming down hard on the bash-Russia steed. She is putting her career or her politics ahead of journalism.
Like so many other Democrat/liberal/neocon activists, Maddow not only ignores the evidentiary gaps in the Russia-did-it conspiracy theory but she seems oblivious to the dangers of her opportunism. By stirring up this McCarthyistic frenzy, she and her “never-Trump” allies make a rational policy toward nuclear-armed Russia nearly impossible. Thus, she is contributing to the real risk of a hot war with Russia that could lead to the annihilation of life on the planet.
Thin-Skinned Trump
One of the bitter ironies here is that Trump’s critics correctly noted that his thin-skinned temperament made him unfit to possess the nuclear button, but they are now egging him into a mano-a-mano confrontation with Putin. If Trump doesn’t get the better of Putin in every situation, Trump will face renewed pummeling for “selling out” to the Russians.
President Donald Trump being sworn in on Jan. 20, 2017. (Screen shot from Whitehouse.gov)
Already, neocon Sen. Lindsey Graham has declared, “2017 is going to be a year of kicking Russia in the ass in Congress.” If Trump doesn’t go along, he will face battering from the likes of Maddow, The New York Times, The Washington Post, CNN and pretty much every mainstream news outlet. So, Trump may have no political choice but to get tough. But what happens when Putin pushes back?
In the past when I’ve made this point about the recklessness of Russia-bashing, I’ve been told that I’m being alarmist, that “kicking Russia in the ass” and baiting Trump to join in the kicking won’t lead to a nuclear war, that the Russians aren’t that stupid. Yeah, let’s hope not.
On the upside of this anti-Russia strategy, the anti-Trump activists insist it is the most promising route to get rid of Trump, which they view as justifying almost any action. It’s not for them to prove that Trump did conspire with Putin to rig the U.S. presidential election; it’s enough to raise the suspicion and use it to push for Trump’s impeachment.
As someone who has covered national security scandals since the 1980s, I am familiar with the kind of evidence that should be required for making serious allegations. For instance, when Brian Barger and I wrote the first story about Nicaraguan Contra drug trafficking in 1985 for The Associated Press, we had about two dozen sources, plus documents. Most of the sources were insiders – i.e., inside the Contra movement and inside the Reagan administration – who described how the operation was run. We had this evidence before we made any public accusation.
In the case of the Russia-Trump conspiracy theory, the U.S. intelligence community has presented almost no evidence of Russian “hacking” and admits that it has no evidence of Trump’s collusion with the Russians. As far as we know, there is no insider who has described how this alleged conspiracy occurred.
That is not to say that some evidence might not eventually surface that confirms the Russia-Trump suspicions, but that is true of all conspiracy theories. Who knows, maybe Joe McCarthy was right about all those Communists inside the U.S. government secretly working for the Kremlin? Maybe he did have a real list of names. But that is what “witch hunts” are all about – investigations designed to prove a point whether true or not.
In this current case, however, the downside is not “just” the destruction of people’s careers and a few imprisonments. The downside of playing chicken with nuclear-armed Russia is the end of life as we know it. At such a moment, journalists and politicians should demand the highest standards of proof, not no proof at all.
Sometimes, I envision the argument that I would hear as the mushroom clouds begin rising over U.S. and Russian cities. If not incinerated in the first moments of the cataclysm, the “smart” people of the mainstream U.S. media (and their liberal and neocon allies) would be insisting that it wasn’t their fault; it was someone else’s fault; blame-shifting to the end.
So, as the Democrats and liberals join with the neocons in launching this New McCarthyism over Russia – and with people like Rachel Maddow leading the charge – what is arguably the most depressing fact is that there appears to be no Edward R. Murrow, a mainstream journalist with a conscience, anywhere on the horizon.
Investigative reporter Robert Parry broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Press and Newsweek in the 1980s. You can buy his latest book, America’s Stolen Narrative, either in print here or as an e-book (from Amazon and barnesandnoble.com).
One- [1] assigned right-wing “reporter” sent to Asia with Secretary Tillerson in this very crucial moment-of-time in that smoldering region.
— Dim the lights, we’re in Surprise !!!! Party mode with our Authoritarian president Trump. What does Tillerson know about Asia or Asian culture, diplomacy, politic? Is there Oil to be exploited in the South China Sea? What does he know about Fukushima? ANYTHING?!
Those questions asked, how are We The People to know what agreements/deals/collusions will be forthcoming out of backroom talks led by Trump ‘Associates’ who chaperone the Secret-ary of State???
http://www.atimes.com/article/asian-americans-look-self-defense-amid-rising-violence/
::
http://www.atimes.com/article/dark-shadows-chinese-exclusion-act-trumps-muslim-ban/
Great article. Years ago, I liked Maddow. Now it appears she’s become a stooge for the neo-cons or the CIA, or both.
The difference being that government policies leave paper trails and fail to completely punish security failures, while organized crime and aristocratic inherited wealth elites have no such complications.
This is Trump as part of the juncture between international organized crime and inherited wealth elites. Intelligence agencies and governments are a small Venn diagram overlap in this world. Russian and former Soviet republic oligarchs made wealthy by Neocon fiddling with post Soviet states via neoliberal policy implantation and privatisation created a gold rush of wealth to mafia like groups who are now thrust into the rarified air of the fraction of the one percent. They tell presidents and spies and courts what to do and they have people who for money will make it okay.
That’s why the McCarthy schtick is a joke of an inapt metaphor for what appears to be happening. This is where the mob and the wealthy make the sausage, not where the wealthy hijack statecraft to further wealth (e.g. OSS, CIA).
Thank you, Mr. Parry for your work and I note you mentioned the lack of a “Edward R. Murrow” type and many of the responders here to your fine article have mention others who they feel are up to some serious journalism such as Mr. Murrow– I must ask here–
My question is this, Mr. Parry– since the so-called right and so-called left have polarized– and with the other radicalizing of the neo-liberal and neo-conservative– where is the 21st Century version of George Seldes when we need them?
My concern, if this 21st Century “George Seldes” appears and tells the truth and runs, where will they run to at this rate to tell? Not the MSM, that’s for sure! Anyway–
Forgive me, I couldn’t help mention the late Mr. Seldes and I do hope we do get another variation on George Seldes to muckrackin’ ASAP!
Thank you again for your fine work.
Peace.
Thank you for your solid reporting and refreshingly sane analysis. Never give up
Sir: I’m glad that you are addressing the anti-Russia hysteria in the U.S. media and in much of the U.S. congress as well. You do not, however, come near to explaining the reason for this hysteria, which is so irrational as to be a sort of political and emotional madness.
I would like to send you my views on the origin of this dangerous political mal-practice if I thought for a moment that you had the time and the least bit of interest in reading the analysis of an avowed non-expert in Russian affairs. I am a retired English professor with a long term interest in propaganda.
Of course Hedges condemns Trump, but what he is saying is that, amid the mounting ecological catastrophes, for which there is clear evidence and Fukushima being truly of planetary magnitude, nothing is ever done to address other than the economy. The same could be said for any nation, but the US wastes the most of its budget on the military while deserting everything else to fall apart, including the people. Which is why it is a tragedy that the main topic is purely geopolitics. Trump is falling into the same imperialist trap, devoting more time to military than real needs. Both parties are utterly bereft of any wisdom and are marching us toward Gomorrah with the idea that it’s all about business and banks.
Harvard Library is on-board for the latest disinformation initiative.
The new Harvard Library guide on “Fake News, Misinformation, and Propaganda” http://guides.library.harvard.edu/fake features a purported “Huge list of fake news sites” produced by Melissa “Mish” Zimdars, an Assistant Professor of Communication at Merrimack College.
Zimdars’ OpenSources “list” includes a peculiar note:
“Some people are asking which news sources I trust, and all I can say is that I read/watch/listen very widely, from mainstream, corporate owned sources (The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Boston Globe, The Wall Street Journal, Forbes) as well as The Atlantic, National Public Radio, and various local and alternative sources with different political perspectives (Truth-Out) some of which are included on this list. The problem: Even typically reliable sources, whether mainstream or alternative, corporate or nonprofit, rely on particular media frames to report stories and select stories based on different notions of newsworthiness. The best thing to do in our contemporary media environment is to read/watch/listen widely and often, and to be critical of the sources we share and engage with on social media.”
The problem: Zimdars and OpenSources are highly selective in determining precisely what sources are worthy of “critical” examination.
In 2016, the nefarious PropOrNot “list” was produced to cast doubt on independent investigative journalism sources like Consortium News, and to create the illusion of “professional” legitimacy for Bellingcat and other hybrid war propaganda sites.
Now in 2017, we have Zimdars’ OpenSources “list” featured by Harvard Library.
OpenSources lists Consortium News among eight sites it tagged as “credible”, including Nutrition Facts dot org. Six of the “credible” sites were additionally tagged as “political”: Advocate (gay news and commentary), Alternet (a project of the non-profit Independent Media Institute), American Progress (a progressive public policy research center), the conservative Cato Institute blog, Christian Post (an Evangelical Christian newspaper based in Washington, D.C.), and Fusion dot net (a satiric news and entertainment media site).
Obviously it was not necessary to list or fact check any other mainstream or “new” media sites, because they are always “credible” and never “political”.
In fact, the “Post-Truth” mainstream and “new” media now have their own club, the First Draft Partner Network, that is planning a big year ahead “facilitating knowledge exchange” https://firstdraftnews.com/first-draft-prepares-big-year-ahead-support-40-new-partners/
Formed by Google in June 2015 with Bellingcat as a founding member, the First Draft Partner Network includes all the usual mainstream media war propagandists.
First Draft “partners” include the Washington Post, New York Times, CNN, the UK Guardian and Telegraph, and BBC News are stalwart mainstream media organs for Western “regime change” propaganda.
The First Draft coalition of Propaganda 3.0 organizations also includes the Atlantic Council’s Digital Forensics Research Lab and Stopfake. Kiev-based Stopfake site functions as a direct media outlet for Higgins’ Bellingcat “investigation reports” and uses the same fake fact-check post-truth strategy that Higgins employs.
In a remarkable post-truth declaration, Google’s new First Draft hybrid war propaganda coalition insists that members will “work together to tackle common issues, including ways to streamline the verification process”.
In the post-truth regime of US and NATO hybrid warfare, the deliberate distortion of truth and facts is called “verification”.
The Washington Post / PropOrNot imbroglio, and First Draft Coalition member organizations’ zeal to “verify” US intelligence-backed fake news claims about Russian hacking of the US presidential election, reveal the post-truth mission of this new Google-backed hybrid war propaganda alliance
Academic institutions like Harvard have an important role to play in advancing the propaganda agenda.
The “Fake News, Misinformation, and Propaganda” guide at Harvard Library online prominently features articles by First Draft “partners” New York Times, Washington Post, and Buzzfeed.
The new Harvard Library guide also links to a report from the Tow Center for Digital Journalism at Columbia University School of Journalism: “Lies, Damn Lies and Viral Content: How News Websites Spread (and Debunk) Online Rumors, Unverified Claims and Misinformation”.
Claire Wardle, the Research Director at the Tow Center, had served as Director of News Services
for First Draft coalition founding member Storyful. She had designed the social media training
program for the BBC in 2009, and authored a chapter on “Verifying User-Generated Content” for the Verification Handbook developed by the European Journalism Centre, based in the Netherlands.
In November 2016, Wardle left her position at the Tow Center to work full time with the First Draft Partner Network.
On 26 January 2017, a conference on “Libraries in a Post-Truth World” was hosted in the Oliver Wendell Holmes Library at Phillips Academy in Andover, MA. Melissa Zimdars and Claire Wardle of First Draft News were featured panelists. “Melissa’s List” was preparatory reading for the conference.
GHW Bush and the setup for Saddam’s “invasion of Kuwait” was termed “Gulf War 1.
This laid the groundwork for a ‘new world order’ regime change named Apocalypse.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=txukr5zgHnw
Judith Miller acted as CIA leaker-in-chief in the run up to Operation Iraq Liberation.
She was a True dispenser of FAKE NEWS that went Truly Mainstream at-the-time.
Scott Ritter yelled at the height of his lungs, that everything they said Was A Lie.
His muzzled Voice legitimized the US’ 2nd Felonious Assault against an Arab nation.
GHW Bush and the setup for Saddam’s “invasion of Kuwait” was termed “Gulf War 1.
This laid the groundwork for a ‘new world order’ regime change named Apocalypse.
All of this Right-Wing Construct of ‘majority’ rules is built upon Foundational Wealth.
Lost in this turmoil for relevancy is any concept/thought or consideration for actual Truth.
Where When Why and How have we species/humans fallen sessile to some form of Commonality
where all Humanity seeks to Live for Life as opposed to some Mutuality Accepted(Truth)Denial..?
“How plausible is it, really, that Democrats, the media, every U.S. intelligence agency, and the vast majority of cybersecurity professionals are in on a conspiracy to spare Hillary Clinton’s feelings and discredit Donald Trump?”
–Taylor Griffin
What worries me about articles such as this one, and many of the responses, is what H.L. Menken warned of: “For every complex problem there is an answer that is clear, simple, and wrong.”
The mainstream (and I really don’t even know what the hell “mainstream” means anymore) belief is that Russia was involved in shifting the 2016 election. On the other hand, some, who claim to be “not mainstream” (and I don’t know what that means either), claim that it’s a canard, a false flag, a ruse…etc.
Does this really have to be a zero-sum-game? My intuition tells me that: 1. governments do things, and 2. governments lie. I will add to that: 3. people in power (or who want to be) do things, and they lie.
So, in the vein of not playing the zero-sum-game, I will say that I believe there was/is a good motive and ability for Russia/Putin to meddle in our affairs, same as we’ve meddled in theirs. I believe there is a fairly strong case that this was done to favor Trump and that he and his team probably lied about it (calling Michael Flynn, Jeff Sessions, etc.). OTOH, I also believe that the Democratic Party AND some of the “mainstream” media are using this to deflect and confuse.
Finally, I will add that RT is an organ of the Russian government, same as many of the U.S. media are organs of the U.S. government. Not all they say is right, and not all is wrong, and some is just flat out propagandist…just like ours.
Black & white may belong to the old broadsheet, but it isn’t reality and can be very dangerous when not checked against the endless shades of grey that make up reality.
Feds’ Damning Report on Russian Election Hack Won’t Convince Skeptics: https://www.wired.com/2017/01/feds-damning-report-russian-election-hack-wont-convince-skeptics/
Damn those skeptics who won’t be convinced by “Post-Truth” reports!
Same as it ever was, Ted.
Wired has been in flagrante delicto with Eliot Higgins since 2012.
Andy Greeberg is one of several gushing techno-hack “writers” for Wired to hold a torch for Higgins and Bellingcat
https://www.wired.com/2016/04/googles-youtube-montage-crowdsources-war-reporting/
Harvard Library features a guide on “Fake News, Misinformation, and Propaganda” http://guides.library.harvard.edu/fake
In the lower right-hand corner of the page, ynder the heading “Identifying Fake News Sites”, appears a link to a list of “False, Misleading, Clickbait-y, and Satirical ‘News’ Sources”.
The list, provided by a group called OpenSources, includes Consortium News.
Although Consortium News is tagged as “credible”, OpenSources qualifies the definition: “(Remember: even credible sources sometimes rely on clickbait-style headlines or occasionally make mistakes. No news organization is perfect, which is why a healthy news diet consists of multiple sources of information)”
Apparently, for Harvard Library and OpenSources, a “healthy news diet” means primary consumption of mainstream media.
I think you are twisting what the quote you present is saying: . . . “No news organization is perfect, which is why a healthy news diet consists of multiple sources of information)”
Agreed.
I have been a regular on a few Left/progressive news aggregator and opinion sites. Every one has used red meat to get clicks and donations. To my mind, the least of these is Democracy Now and I hold Amy Goodman and her team in high regard.
As far as who to believe, it is getting to be more difficult – however, I attribute that to my belief that I am more aware than ever as to how spin works. This is good, but can also lead to a high degree of cynicism…which is not so good. And thus, I am learning to sharpen and exercise my own intuition. If I smell a rat, I investigate. Usually, I find a rat.
I also believe that art can show us the truth, as in the following stanza from the Talking Heads song, Crosseyed and Painless:
Facts are simple and facts are straight
Facts are lazy and facts are late
Facts all come with points of view
Facts don’t do what I want them to
Facts just twist the truth around
Facts are living turned inside out
Facts are getting the best of them
Facts are nothing on the face of things.
A great shame that Amy Goodman and her team have allowed themselves to get bamboozled by both the White Helmets and the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights, especially when their colleague Max Blumenthal could have disabused them in a moment.
What’s truly twisted is that Harvard Library and librarians across the globe are rapidly being enrolled into a disinformation ecosystem that includes fake “media researchers,” fake “journalists,” and fake “civil society groups”.
Ob arm, ob reich, im Tode gleich.
Whether rich or poor, [all are] equal in death.
Lübecker Totentanz by Bernt Notke (around 1463, destroyed in the March 1942 bombing raid on Lübeck)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Danse_Macabre#/media/File:Totentanz_L%C3%BCbeckR.jpg
The first work known to have been made by late Gothic artist Bernt Notke was the Lübecker Totentanz. The 2 metres (6.6 ft) high and at least 26 metres (85 ft) long tapestry depicting the popular late medieval motif of the Danse Macabre (the dance of Death), made for a chapel of St. Mary’s Church in Lübeck.
The original tapestry was lost or destroyed but survived in the form of a copy, made in 1701, until 1942, when it was destroyed during the British bombing of Lübeck in 1942.
By the winter of 1941/1942 both the British and German strategic bombing campaigns had reached a low ebb. The German offensive, a nine-month period of night bombing known as the Blitz, which had left London and many other British cities heavily damaged, had come to an end in May 1941, when the Luftwaffe had switched its resources to the invasion of the Soviet Union.
An ancient Hanseatic port and cultural centre on the shores of the Baltic Sea, Lübeck was the first German city to be attacked in substantial numbers by the Royal Air Force. The bombing was the first major success for RAF Bomber Command, and followed the Area Bombing Directive issued to the RAF on 14 February 1942 which authorized the deliberate targeting of civilian areas.
The attack on the night of 28 March 1942 created a firestorm that caused severe damage to the historic centre, with bombs destroying three of the main churches and large parts of the built-up area. Joseph Stalin congratulated Winston Churchill on the outcome, expressing his satisfaction at the “merciless bombing” and expressing the hope that such attacks would cause severe damage to German public morale – a key objective for Churchill.
The destruction of Lübeck, and, the following month, of Rostock, shocked both the leadership and the population in Germany. Up to this point they had been little affected by the RAF’s strategic bombing campaign. Hitler was enraged, and demanded his air force retaliate with Vergeltungsangriffe or “vengeance attacks” on towns other than London.
The Chris Hedges article is here http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/the_dance_of_death_20170312.
It sketches the last stages of empire, but prematurely condemns Trump, the only recent hope of demilitarizing foreign policy. While Trump will betray his non-wealthy constituents, the Trump-bashing is purely from Hillary warmongers, so the article fails in falling for the Dem propaganda. The Dem Russia-bashing is itself a good example of end-of-empire demagogic fearmongering tyranny.
If anyone is responsible for continued warmongering it is the Dem. Of course the Reps are just as indulgent of genocide; but they don’t like to pay for it.
Chris Hedges has a great article on Truthdig, a meta-analysis, overview of failure of power structures in context of collapse of civilizations, titled “The Dance of Death”. I would even like to see his article on Consortium News, recommend everyone read it.
Excellent article and I will post it on Facebook immediately. There is a problem, though, with the conclusion:
“as the Democrats and liberals join with the neocons in launching this New McCarthyism over Russia – and with people like Rachel Maddow leading the charge – what is arguably the most depressing fact is that there appears to be no Edward R. Murrow, a mainstream journalist with a conscience, anywhere on the horizon.”
That is actually false. There is Bill Moyers, Jim Hightower, and Paul Craig Roberts are all very good journalists—it’s just that the mainstream doesn’t acknowledge journalists who don’t beat the same drum as it.
This only further confirms my account in my Deep State versus Trump book, available on Amazon.
Dr. Bart Gruzalski, Professor Emeritus, Philosophy (ethics and public policy) and Religion (books: “On the Buddha”; “On Gandhi”; and “Why Christians and World-Peace Advocates Voted for President Donald Trump”), Northeastern University, Boston, MA—and the only philosopher I and a mentor know who support Trump
And for the Clinton drones:
Is US democracy so decrepit and weak that Russia can decide an election here? You’re basically implying were one of the most pathetic countries in the world. Maybe we are but not for the reasons you’re all wailing.
“I always wondered whether she would put her lucrative corporate acceptance at risk and go against the grain at a tough journalistic moment.
Maddow’s behavior in becoming a modern-day mainstream-media Joe McCarthy has put my doubts to rest.”
I’m surprised it took you so much time. She, like Amy Goodman, was a cheerleader for the war on Libya. I haven’t listened to a word either of them has said since. They’re horrible people that have no sympathy for the thousands of people that have died in Libya and Syria since 2011. Nor did they have or express any foresight about the millions of people that would suffer. Way to go maddow and goodman!
Maddow and Goodman are Jewish, and probably Clinton. Over 50% of US news media are controlled directly by people of Jewish surname, fewer than 50% of whom can be identified by surname.
Not to suggest that all Jewish people have any particular characteristic, or that ethnic control is the only problem, or that they have no accomplices. But obviously those are not coincidences.
Do you have evidence for that?
“Back in reality, the American public is beginning to suspect in much larger numbers than ever before, that the US government is simply carrying out a singular agenda – regardless of election results and political affiliations – of a permanent, deeply rooted conglomeration of special interests that transcend political parties, ideologies, presidential terms, as well as both domestic and international law.
“The creation of an attractive, provocative, almost irresistible strategy of tension between various functionaries within the real deep state is intentionally designed to draw in and trap political discourse long before it reaches and reveals the true nature of both the real deep state and the solutions required to dismantle it.”
Exposing the Real Deep State
By Tony Cartalucci
http://landdestroyer.blogspot.com/2017/03/exposing-real-deep-state.html
Thank you Abe for that link. I noticed this article yesterday on another site but with the incorporated graphics this is better. Tony Cartalucci presents in this article, one of the best explanations yet about what the “Deep state” represents, and his paragraph on “Solving The Deep State Problem” is as good as I’ve read.
”Placing stock in political functionaries of the deep state to solve the deep state problem is beyond futile – it is a rouse intentionally engineered to preserve and perpetuate the deep state. By identifying the true source of the real deep state’s power and influence – the wealth it derives from its corporate-financier monopolies, its control over national and international infrastructure, and its media – we can begin devising practical alternatives to dilute these monopolies and thus the power and influence they grant those who control them.”. Tony Cartalucci
This is the best discussion I have seen of these serious life-threatening issues which reveal that the democrat power structure has gone over into a nihilistic militaristic fascism which can only end badly unless they are resisted successfully.
There may not be an Edward L Murrow but there is a Glen Greenwald, professor Steven Cohen, comedian Jimmy Dore, and of course Robert Parry doing great things at the Intercept, on Utube, and accross the internet of alternative sights. AntiWar.com usually gets it right as does Democracy Now, (sometimes).
Personally I gave up on the mainstream press and their propaganda a long time ago. Why not watch Jimmy Dore make fun of Rachel Maddow on Utube and cut the expensive cable programs.
Perhaps the greatest danger facing humanity today is the group of war criminals who have never faced legal accountability, have “enjoyed” impunity, for their responsibility in planning,organizing and carrying out immensely harmful crimes in recent illegal wars – the 2003 Iraq War being the one most people are familiar with, among others. When the average murderer takes the life of another through criminal action, that individual will most of the time become identified, apprehended, prosecuted in a courtroom, sentenced and endure rightful punishment.
Not so for those who carry out mass-murder through illegal wars of aggression, because – in the case of George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, Colin Powell (Iraq, Afghanistan, etc.) and Barack Obama, Joseph Biden, Hillary Clinton (Libya, Syria, etc.) – they have impunity through non-membership (using the U.S. examples) in the International Criminal Court (ICC).
There is no deterrence to prevent war crimes from becoming committed by leaders in nations who have not signed the Rome Statute, and thereby agreeing to come under the jurisdiction of the ICC. Imagine living in a town or city where certain citizens can murder their fellow citizens with impunity, and walk freely, operating as before their murderous act, in the community afterward with no punishment. There are mass-murderers walking freely, operating as before their mass-murderous actions, committing only God knows what further horrific crimes,on this Earth today.
Because nations have declined joining the ICC (including the U.S., Russia, China, and others), a relatively straightforward and simple reform of the United Nations would ensure universal and unanimous ICC membership, thereby providing the strongest deterrent ever created to stop war criminals’ fomenting of illegal wars of aggression. The reform is one which makes it mandatory for every United Nations member state to sign the Rome Statute and join the ICC, or face expulsion form the United Nations organization. Every nation would join the ICC, because the negative consequences for any nation of becoming perceived as the “black sheep” of the world, the “pariah state”, will be determined untenable.
Albert Einstein (1879-1955) spoke about this optional necessity to end war to Dr. Freud in 1932:
“This is the problem: Is there any way of delivering mankind from the menace of war?… As one immune from nationalist bias, I personally see a simple way of dealing with the superficial (i.e. administrative) aspect of the problem: the setting up by international consent of a legislative and judicial body to settle every conflict arising between nations…”
“Thus I am led to my first axiom: the quest of international security involves the unconditional surrender by every nation, in a certain measure, of its liberty of action, its sovereignty that is to say, and it is clear beyond all doubt that no other road can lead to such security.”
Albert Einstein addressed this greatest of world issues with his last written words in April 1955; quoted by Otto Nathan and Heinz Norden in “Einstein on Peace”:
“Not one statesman in a position of responsibility has dared to pursue the only course that holds out any promise of peace, the promise of supra-national security, since for a statesman to follow such a course would be tantamount to political suicide”.
Where did you get an idea that US Empire does not want peace, of course is does. It is called Pax Americana, whereby anybody who rebels against its rule gets obliterated. And the peace is kept. US went into Iraq to create the peace, also to Libya and Syria, Vietnam before and so on and so on. Peace everywhere.
I know you have the best of intentions but you are offering a solution worse than the problem. You want a single court to rule them all. In technology, such thing is called a “single point of failure”. All the US would have to do is control that single court to impose Pax Americana on the World. This would be similar to how Saudi Arabia became the chair of the UN Human Rights Council. Well who is better qualified to worry about human rights than the key sponsor/payer of terrorism (US is only the key trainer of terrorists) in the whole World. In short, the US complains about UN only when it does not control some of its parts.
Like all leftists, you propose a Globalized solution for the World’s problems, right into the arms of George Soros & Co. Russia is such a nemesis for the US “left” exactly because it rejects any uch globalized concentration of judicial, political, trade and economic power. The Russian and Chinese model is fundamentally different – it is a model of distributed power, unlike the AngloZionist model of concentrated globalist power. The distributed power model carries much less risk of being diverted, if its one branch gets infected by the AngloZionist 0.01%-er rulers of the World, the whole tree of international law will not suffer. But it is a model which is possibly less stable than the Pax Americana – with one emperor to rule them all.
The best world order policy for the average person in my view is ‘the distributed power model’. Competition is good. Americans thrived when Communism was around. A one world power would just be too much power to center in one place. For many Americans who ancestors had migrated here to North America their arrival was a departure from another place. These immigrants at least believed they would find a better world here in the U.S., and that should always exist.
That is exactly the point, Joe. For us the 99.99% of humanity the “distributed power model” is a much better one because it spells a degree of freedom. The “centralised power model” means no freedom at all, constant warrantless surveillance of everything and everybody (NSA, CIA, FBI), totalitarian thought police (“fake-news”), crimes of sedition (“hate talk”), economic slavery (elimination of cash) and so on. And it is, as you say, about competition: when there are competing models of human organisation, then most humans thrive.
The distributed power model does not have to be based on nation state, but this is the only one powerful enough to resist the globalists at the moment. Thus, Russia and China as nation states, to be joined by any other (Iran, India, Pakistan, who knows) capable of resisting. The AngloZionist globalist domination is likely to join together the elites of Israel, US, UK, France. Not sure about Germany.
The dream of Cecil Rhodes and Winston Churchill isn’t a dream as much it is a nightmare. After America and it’s coalition drove Saddam out of Kuwait Poppy Bush hailed a toast to the New World Order, and that should have been awake up call for all of us. The 1% idea of Utopia doesn’t promise the majority of our over abundant population a decent standard of living to survive on. With the age of robotics and the over population engulfing our planet I shutter to think of what the elitist has in store for us. Now may possibly be the last time that mankind could or may be able to do something about creating a decent society where our heirs may live in. So before we go to a one world order let’s fight for a diverse distribution of power, and see how that works out for us.
One last thought; after the robots create a robotic consumer market mankind won’t be needed. God only knows what the 1% will decide to do with all of us idle clumps of meat. If you do survive through this coming age of moving parts I would advice that you invest heavily in silicone spray.
Joe Tedesky This horror isn’t at all new. There was a Spanish Inquisition, Caligula’s Rome , North Korea today. Remember 70’s flicks like Solyent Green, Rollerball, books like Brave New World, 1984, Fahrenheit 451 . How about Terminator or Koyaanisqatsi People have had visions of a dystopian future since they have been having visions. The book of Revelation comes to mind or The Hopi Book of the Dead. It isn’t over yet . ……,It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to heaven, we were all going direct the other way – in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only. Dickens
LJ you are right. It would appear that all this awful evilness isn’t anything new to man, and that this dark ugly side is standard operation procedure within mankind’s deep selfish soul. For all the terrible things you had mentioned inside your comment LJ and for all the tragedy yet to come, let’s at least all hold out with some hope that we someday will destroy this demon we all carry around with us all so ignorantly.
The idea is interesting but would likely be blocked, because the Security Council members, at least the US, will not sign the Rome Treaty to be subject to the ICC. The US also controls many UN member votes and UN officials by money and other influence. So the UN would have to be redesigned in some areas to function as a truly international order.
The comments about distributed government to avoid such corruptions of unipolar government are good. Political thought seldom looks closely at the corruption process.
In high-reliability control systems, each major component consists of multiple redundant parts that vote on the decisions, so that a defective component is out-voted and flagged for replacement, having no effect on the overall system. Multiple simultaneous failures are made extremely unlikely. This can be done within governments with multiple heads of each branch of government (executive, legislative, judicial).
The Constitutional Convention attempted an early form of that with Checks and Balances between the branches. This did not work because the branches have different powers, so it was like having aircraft wings double as rudders in case of rudder failure. The executive branch has all of the day-to-day power can seized policymaking power from the legislature.
In addition, means to protect democratic institutions (mass media and elections and officials) from corruption by money were not implemented by the Convention because there were no economic concentrations greater than a plantation or sailing ship, all of which would be classed as small businesses today. A democracy must prohibit economic influence upon mass media and elections by restricting their funding to limited and registered individual contributions, and by lifelong financial monitoring of all officials and their relatives and business associates.
there were great concentrations of wealth and power, the European trading companies and Empires, but correct, the New England Slave , Whale and Rum were propabably the wealthiest.
Ummm, How does this mesh with the letter Einstein wrote to FDR in 1939 advancing the importance of the immediate undertaking of an all out effort to continue further experiments with Nuclear Fission towards the develop of a Nuclear Bomb (Before the Germans could exploit their Czech Uranium deposits) ? Peace in Our Time.
Fear is the mind killer and the greatest tool of any authoritarian government to remain in control. Islamophobia, Russian paranoia, Deep State (aka) surveillance,alarmist fears on global warming, racial , health scares, financial worries, job security, etc.
Couple that with divisions of party, race, sex, religion, region, ethnicity, class, immigrant status and you have all the elements of control via Divide and Rule by Fear.
The Russian fear is a ruse but not without some truth. Its not Putin but the Russian Mafia and more importantly those they are aligned with that are being covered up. So long as we focus on Putin those who must be protected are safe, plus we really want to eliminate Russia as any potential threat to our global hegemony so this works out well for both sides.
Putin is a great enemy of those behind Trump so his Putin support was all a ruse, and I think he and others pretty much set this up going back to last summer when he called on Putin to help out with the emails. Hollywood must have scripted this. Maybe thats why so many TV series are delayed this year.
Good article. Anecdotally, the other day on a progressive website that I had often visited, and admired the thoughtful writing and articles, I commented on an article regarding Russian hacking. I asked “What is this Russian hacking you speak of?” And went on to point out information as I understand it from articles here and other sites such as Veteran Intelligence Professionals for Sanity, The Intercept, etc…
I was attacked by one saying to me, “Putin couldn’t have said it better himself.” Another described me as a right wing troll masquerading as a progressive. Such is the level of discourse where it is not permitted to even question the current anti Russia sentiment. It made me sad and disheartened.
I’ll throw out an alternative geopolitical theory as a possibility – I don’t claim it’s true or even more than half likely, but it might be true and worth considering….Russia’s economy in the modern era came to depend primarily on oil/natural gas exports. The decline in world pricing and greater availability of supply in recent years has hurt Russia economically. At the same time, the boom in US production has turned the US from a net importer to a net exporter. Arms exports are another key Russian industry, where Russia is the distant #2 to the US. In recent years the US has pushed for growth in arms exports and has politically destabilized some traditional Russia clients, including Syria. These acts bring the US and Russia into greater economic conflict. For obvious reasons, it’s good for the world that they not engage in open warfare…and, in fact, that hasn’t happened since WWII, despite some covert skirmishes.
In this situation, the Deep State in the US and the Deep State in Russia, both of which profit from arms mfg. and technology, may both desire increased levels of public strategic tension so long as it doesn’t lead to any big war. For the US Deep State, that helps justify even more military spending and less opposition in a Congress that rarely opposes military spending anyway. For Russia, it is the same, and also justifies public sacrifice to invest in arms research to try and keep pace with the US.
To what extent does Putin willing play the role of bad guy Iron Sheik in the WWE Deep State Universe of nonsense? I don’t know the answer. But I wonder…why are official Russian govt. sources usually relatively quiet about the US covert activity? There are other possible answers, but agreeing not to talk about that as part of a secret pact is one explanation that makes some sense.
I think one historical point is missing here. Nothing is really new and was to the point described in Putin’s speech at Munich Security conference in 2007. http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/transcripts
Those who actually read the speech were flabbergasted with how all MSM’s reported on it at that time.
Why McCarthysm is comming back, 1948-58, 1978-1988 and now 2008 – 2018. Of course there are specific circumstances and degree of McCarthysm viciousness and anti intellectualism but the main culprit here is Americans.
Already 25 years ago Chomsky described foundation on which mental and actual terrorism and public intimidation campaign in America thrives namely it thrives because of ubiquitous American totalitarian culture embedded into seemingly open society.
Usually, an informational chaos meanigless gossip or simple obliviousness, lack of intellectual curiosity is purposefully interpreted as freedoms of thought and expression while in fact it a strict totalitarian order of indisputable dogmas methodically randomized when needed for the freedom effect while able to be to turned instantly into a form concentrated sharp propaganda spear on moment’s notice from the rulers of the US regime.
America’s are trained in forgetting as Orwell posited, a fundamental feature of American totalitarian culture.
This whole Russian hysteria business (and it is a profitable business) is very fishy-smelling to me. The establishment plutocrats and their political puppets on both sides of the aisle resurrect the Russian straw man and we all, like the gullible fools we are, start bleating about Russia this, Russia that, did they do it, did they not do it. We’re the ones “doing it,” allowing this fake BS becoming an accepted fact, that Russia did do _something_, why else would anyone debate it? Classic hysteria. Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Trump and his cabal are doing some truly deplorable things that SHOULD be front and center every day. Instead we get this bleating noise machine from phoney’s like Maddow. Turn off your tv’s everyone, if you’re expecting anything like truth or journalism or integrity, or even a single voice that gives a crap about this country, you’re looking in the wrong place. TV is only there to entertain (distract) you – see above woman in KS or wherever that can’t get enough of Maddow, not because Maddow’s informing that lady of anything but because Maddow is daily dishing up the favorite special on the menu. Maybe Vince MacMahon should schedule a nice cage match between Maddow and Linda. Just imagine the eyeballs….k-ching, k-ching
I have a couple of questions. They are not controversial, and are actually merely a reflection of my own (self-wrought) ignorance. I haven’t been able to follow the news, daily, since the middle of last summer. It is just so horrible, so wretched and insulting. It’s hard to say what is worse, the so-called newsmakers or the ones who report the so-called news. At least when we all had newspapers this crap was broken up by nice big harmless ads for recliners and tvs and tires. Celine said that as he got older he didn’t need to read the news, the ads told the whole story. When I was young and I read that I thought wow! I hope my mind is that incisive when I’m old. Now I’m old I see that what he was really describing was a gift, a little safe bit of geography on every page for those of us who’ve had enough, who can appreciate the simple poetry of: braeburn apples, 49 cents/ lb., who get more out of that than paragraph after paragraph of washed up prostitutes like Robert Reich screaming about the most dangerous thing Trump’s done yet or Van Jones pontificating about style of the president. I’m not even talking about the obvious fools. . . . I guess maybe I am. This country is going the way of all the classic degenerates, and not for the reasons people say. Not because of an over-extended military, not because of rotting infrastructure, not because of garbage food and illiteracy . . they are all problems . . . but the real problem is the royal court, flatterers and strivers and panderers who stand between those who make and implement the laws and the problems I’ve mentioned. People like Thomas Friedman. People who’ve been making us throw up into our morning cereal before we’d even heard of GW Bush. And Robert Kagan. Why is it that blubbery slob hasn’t choked to death on a waffle yet? Or is it because Victoria is too evil to let him die? My god . . .
So my understanding of current events is necessarily kind of spotty. Every few days I read a bit, try to piece it together, then go looking for a good article on climate change and the melting of the ice, and devour it slowly, the coming end.
Anyway. I’d like to know: Michael Flynn resigned because it was revealed that he had spoken to the Russian Ambassador and then lied about it. Since he was not in an official position, his conversation is said to have been illegal. But if he was a private citizen, who was monitoring his phone conversations? Was such monitoring legal? Did they have a FISA warrant? And why would they? What legitimate reason could they give for requesting a warrant to spy on him? And if they didn’t have any kind of warrant, why are we to believe they would have needed one to spy on Trump?
These are probably lame questions. But I don’t know the answers. Thanks.
the ambassador was being monitored. NSA captures almost all communications in the world. some is analyzed in real time.
I thought this was a good presentation of the Flynn case by Michael Tracey on TYT
Mike Flynn Was Forced Out Of Office For The Stupidest Possible Reason
https://medium.com/theyoungturks/mike-flynn-was-forced-out-of-office-for-the-stupidest-possible-reason-5cc12ebbb1fd#.4azf9jdb6
‘… spinning a vast Russian conspiracy theory that ties together Trump’s past business dealings in Russia …’
Not to be picky but from what I have read I don’t believe he had any business dealings. He wanted to develop some hotel deals … but was unsuccessful.
john podesta is a shameful liar. rachel meadow hast lost all credibility too. i used to think she wasn’t for sale.
Now he has become lobbyist for a Russian bank with connection to Putin.
No Rachel apoplexy attack on the air yet. What a hypocrisy.
Is that John or his brother, Tony? Not that it makes much difference probably but just as note. Which Russian bank?
“One of the bitter ironies here is that Trump’s critics correctly noted that his thin-skinned temperament made him unfit to possess the nuclear button, but they are now egging him into a mano-a-mano confrontation with Putin. If Trump doesn’t get the better of Putin in every situation, Trump will face renewed pummeling for “selling out” to the Russians.”
The perfect set-up. Label a fictitious enemy, trump up a bunch of lies with the help of the media about this enemy, label you a supporter of this fictitious enemy (with absolutely no evidence at all), and you are then compelled to play along out of fear of being impeached. Anyone who thinks this is funny or good is a complete idiot. This is criminal behavior.
What Trump and the people around him need to do is lay out a chronology of events, stating clearly the accusations, the complete lack of evidence, the parties involved who are promoting this witch-hunt (Soros, Clinton, Obama, etc.), the investigations he has called for in order to get to the truth, and then he needs to give a Presidential address to the nation. The best defense is a good offense. He needs to get to the American people, explain to them exactly what is happening, and then put it aside.
I don’t think that Trump has changed his mind about anything. I think he still wants peace, but is being hampered by the lies. I was glad that he asked for the State Department resignations. And when the truth DOES come out about this Russia business, I hope that the perpetrators spend some necessary time behind bars. If Obama had the Trump Tower bugged, then Obama needs to be sent off to Siberia.
As long as the oligarchy-controlled mass media and Congress oppose Trump, he must at least pose a risk of doing something right.
Is it worth to ponder over how much power Trump could have loss amongst his executive Cabinet Officers having a horrible rollout of the ‘Muslim travel ban’ disaster, the knee jerk decision to send in a Navy Seal Team into Yemen territory where we would lose a Navy Seal and kill women and children to gain nothing, or his going ahead and firing Flynn…. Seriously, would it be not worth at least to score this on a bullet list of what his presidency is turning out to look like? I mean could Pence and some others have walked in and finally told Trump and Bannon that the A Team will take over from here, and that Trump can go tweet to his hearts content, and have Sean and Kellyanne do the leg work putting up with the media press? The best part is, it was never going to be any other way. It was always in the plan!
Joe – there was absolutely nothing wrong with Trump’s travel ban. The fact that others saw it as racist is their problem. These are countries that do not have functional governments, so the vetting procedure was essentially nil.
As far as Yemen, yes, that was a mistake I’m sure he won’t be making again (probably trying to appease the neocons). But, let’s face it, the people of Yemen were being bombed hard well before Trump’s decision. This is something new? The U.S. is written all over this again! They need to get out of Yemen, but it’s all about the oil, isn’t it?
As far as Flynn, I’m not so sure that wasn’t the correct decision. Flynn’s company had some lobbying work with Turkey (he got paid over $500,000.00), and Flynn was lobbying for the return of Erdogan’s enemy (who is holed up in the States somewhere) to be returned to Turkey. Apparently Erdogan thinks that this enemy was instrumental in the failed coup against him last year. Can’t have that.
Joe, it’s a mixed up world, isn’t it? I don’t see Trump giving up. He’s not a quitter. The progressives will give up long before he does. But Trump has been left with an absolute economic mess. I wish him well.
My comment wasn’t so much of a judgement of Trump’s policies, as much as I’m trying to point out how there are those within his circle who are ready to jump on his every failed move. I honestly believe that as every White House Adminstration has its varied factions of though and agenda cliques, is that Trump may have an over abundance of decent within his ranks. There again I’m just part of the ‘fake news’ inspired public, and who in the hell cares what I think? But yeah Trump’s darkest enemies I’m thinking are closer to him than he may realize. You will be able to notice this defection as policies will roll out to be much different than what he promised while campaigning…isn’t this always the one barometer we can go by? Obama’s ‘hope and change’ was preempted with ‘more of the same and get use to it’, so what will Trump’s failures be hinged on?
Joe – good comments. Yeah, it does appear that Trump has gone from “peace with Russia” to propping up NATO and the military. Not good signs, and perhaps he IS being pushed in this direction by those closest to him. I still think that Trump believes in peace, would call all of the troops home tomorrow if he could. Did they get something on Trump? Some bad pictures or something? It could be he wants something badly (like the infrastructure rebuild or bringing jobs home) that he’s compromising with the neocons to get it. What is going on? Time will tell.
When you combine (A), the NeoLibCons’ frenzied warmongering with their corollary policies of (B), genocidal cuts to the socioeconomic safety net; (C), refusing to ameliorate terminal climate change; (D), refusing to repair our crumbling infrastructure; (E), refusing to restore employment and (F), demanding forcible population reduction, what emerges is a truly terrifying portrait of a mostly white, mostly male, avowedly patriarchal Capitalist Ruling Class that believes it can perpetuate itself by “cleansing” the planet with thermonuclear war.
Think about it. Why repair the infrastructure if it’s all going to be blown up? Why try to ameliorate climate change if the ultimate amelioration is to be nuclear winter? Why maintain the safety net or provide jobs for people who will soon by murdered in thermonuclear warfare?
Obviously the Capitalist Ruling Class sees World War III as the solution to all its problems, has already built the secret complexes of bombproof bunkers and warehouses it believes will enable its survival and is now proceeding accordingly to provoke the war.
Which explains entirety the combination of seemingly self-destructive policies and practices listed as (A) through (F) above. Indeed no other hypothesis accommodates all these variables.
I read a curious article today. I’ll paraphrase it, because people jump to conclusions, and I lack sufficient evidence to support or deride the conclusions. The article spoke of “fake news”, and insinuated that those who subscribe to it do so willfully as a result of some “character flaw”. They want to be “duped” because it is somehow exhilarating or exciting. The author, at least in his own estimation, is an ‘expert’ at discerning the difference between “conspiracy theories” and factual information. He mentioned that, as a rule, “No more than 25% of the population are ever taken in by “conspiracy theories” such as the JFK assassination.” He explained that even the most titillating “fake news” eventually collides with “reality”. Since things like ghosts, ufos and God can never be proven to not exist, that somehow bolsters the faith of those poor delusional fools who subscribe to “fake news”.
Since the Kennedy assassination, we’ve had fifty four years of failed wars, failed foreign policy, failed monetary policy, failed education policy, failed healthcare policy (100,000 deaths annually due to medical mistakes), failed pension plans, failing infrastructure, failed energy policy, failed manufacturing, failed trade policy, failed agriculture policy, failed environmental policy and failed immigration policy. That’s the short list. But Americans still don’t “get it”.
Now, the political elite are hyping up the Russia “threat”, and we have already committed to a $54 billion increase in defense spending for – “Wonder Weapons” – fantastical upgrades to weapons systems that we can never EVER use unless we wish to commit suicide. That’s right, we’ll never even know if they work, because we can’t ever use them. It would be suicide. But $54 billion is a small price to pay for “peace of mind”, isn’t it?
To offset these expenditures, our leaders console us with tax cuts for the rich and pension cuts for the working class. What’s good for the goose, and all that. That’s not “fake news”, and it consequently garners little attention. But, a collision with reality is certainly coming. The empire is no longer sustainable, and the crime spree our profiteering political leaders have enjoyed can’t go on forever. NONE of that is President Trump’s fault – and no, I didn’t vote for him or Hillary.
Is there a solution to all of this? I don’t know. “The Saker” thinks the U.S. Empire should be on “suicide watch”. I happen to agree. That being said, there is one “fake news” story out there that I don’t believe yet…but if it turns out to be true, it could save us all. Maybe Americans would finally “get it”. I would love to see the look on Rachel Maddow’s face if she had no choice but to report it. Too fake to be true? God, ghosts and grey aliens notwithstanding, I certainly hope not.
Putting the Empire on a suicide watch is not the best idea, as most comment to Saker’s article show, because it should be a “suicide bomber watch”. The US Empire wants to take down the rest of humanity with it, the old Après nous le déluge.
From Eastern Europe to the Middle East to East Asia, the Empire is on a “nuclear suicide watch”.
What Wonder Weapons would (INSERT NAME OF DEITY) use to maintain the (INSERT NAME OF EXCEPTIONAL NATION)’s “way of life”?
“Standing afar off for the fear of her torment, saying, Alas, alas, that great city Babylon, that mighty city! for in one hour is thy judgment come.” Revelation 18:10
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=M9phuyRknPw
Rachelle Maddow is the most disconcerting, disgusting and dangerous of them all.
She lends the veneer of liberal intellectual respectability to all this toxic Russophobia thereby clearly demonstrating that the liberal wing of the Democratic Party is just as committed as any John McCain-Lindsay Graham Republican to the dominant paradigm of the Washington militarist-imperialists.
That all this fear mongering from the United States’ liberal intellectual class could lead to nuclear conflagration — as the Kremlin’s now forced to have lower level functionaries react to an impending Washington nuke attack b/c Washington has myriad ABMs in Eastern Europe, which reduces Moscow’s reaction time to a mere 7 minutes! — doesn’t seem to phase anyone. Which brings to mind the possible sociopathic mindset of the highly paid propagandists.
Rachel Maddow ignores the story in Israel/Palestine by Michael Arria – http://mondoweiss.net/2014/07/maddow-ignores-israelpalestine.html … The Rachel Maddow Show. Maddow hasn’t mentioned the conflict once since touching upon it fleetingly last month; not one word about dead Palestinian civilians, not even Muhammed Abu Khdeir, the boy who was burned to death by Israeli vigilantes.
“I would defy anyone reading The New York Times’ coverage of Russia to assess it as fair and balanced when it is clearly snarky and sneering.”
Certainly balance is absent, but an exception, the first I believe, was published just today:
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/03/13/opinion/angels-and-demons-in-the-cold-war-and-today.html?ref=opinion
Thanks for the link Bart. As for the NYT, I guess this story proves that even a blind squirrel finds an acorn once in a while.
Maddow had me fooled for awhile as well.
Participation by Democrats in this round of McCarthyism/anticommunism is notable, but we’ve seen this before, beginning with Quaker Democratic “progressive” Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer’s exploitation and promotion of anti-immigrant/anti-soviet hysteria in 1919 (“the red scare”) to the Americans for Democratic Action’s explicit anti-communism, most visibly expressed by “liberal” presidential candidate Hubert Humphrey in the 50s and 60s.
That this is happening again dismays me, but it is no surprise. Nor is the clueless Democratic Party’s need to find a scapegoat. Maddow and her ilk are just disgusting.
I love Consortium News.
Econoclast – last night, while watching a weekly TV program, there was mention made of the American Protective League. I’d never heard of this before, so I looked it up on Wiki:
“The American Protective League (1917-1919) was an organization of private citizens that worked with Federal law enforcement agencies during the World War I era to identify suspected German sympathizers and to counteract the activities of radicals, anarchists, anti-war activists, and left-wing labor and political organizations. At its zenith the APL claimed 250,000 members in 600 cities.”
When I saw you mention Attorney General A. Mitchell Palmer (in your above post), I was shocked because I’d just read this man’s name last night. In this case, he was actually attempting to undo harm:
“A. Mitchell Palmer succeeded Gregory as Attorney General on 5 March 1919. Before assuming office, he had opposed the APL activities. One of Palmer’s first acts was to release 10,000 aliens of German ancestry who had been taken into government custody during the war. He stopped accepting intelligence gathered by the APL. He also refused to share information in his APL-provided files when Ohio Governor James M. Cox requested it. He called the APL materials “gossip, hearsay information, conclusions, and inferences” and added that “information of this character could not be used without danger of doing serious wrong to individuals who were probably innocent.” In March 1919, when some in Congress and the press were urging him to reinstate the Justice Department’s wartime relationship with the APL, he told reporters that “its operation in any community constitutes a grave menace.”
Against one witch hunt, yet for another, I guess because the Bolsheviks had just overthrown the Tsar and the U.S. didn’t want communism coming to the U.S. anytime soon.
The APL could happen again, of course. All of us here on consortiumnews would be candidates for the internment, but the consolation is that the war against Russia and China would not last long and there would be nowhere to run anyway.
I remember my immigrant Italian grandma talking about how my grandpap and her had to keep their head down and walk softly to go unnoticed, and not get in trouble. She even would say, ‘we not a Bolsheviks we Calabrese’. That Palmer Raid era was real to any new comer to the U.S. in the early 20th Century. My grandfather got involved in Union movements, and he supported Italian judges and politicians. Grandpap made a marble cane and personally gave it to FDR. My grandparents history is but a reflection of many of our early 20th Century ancestors, and possibly the answer to our current day problems could be found in what they did to make things work, or for that matter to just get by. My relatives discovered early on there were no gold in the streets of America, and that to stay ahead you had to go out and earn it. The only way you get the prejudice racist bastard to accept you, is when you buy him out…or go 9 to 5 get a pay check, and retire, and hope the kids get a job.
When McCarthyism, anti-coommunism, and Hubert Humphrey are mentioned, I just have to remind readers of the little-known fact that it was the Communist Party vote that put McCarthy in the Senate in the first place:
Because Humphrey was a right-wing social democrat, and thus a main rival/enemy of the CP, the Party opposed him and wanted a vote for McCarthy to defeat him. There weren’t very many CP supporters, but the race was very close, so their votes were enough to make the difference.
Another one of history’s little ironies…
Allow me please to alert interested readers concerned with international affairs from an essentially Russian perspective to an excellent weekly English-language discussion (approx. 30 mins.) posted every Sunday (or Monday) on YouTube by the Newsbud / Boiling Frogs website: viz., Prof. Filip Kovacevic’s RUSSIAN NEWSPAPER MONITOR. As the title suggests, the discussion features synopses of a number of significant news-stories that have appeared in the week before, each followed — and very expressly so — by Kovacevic’s own assessment and opinions. Just yesterday was posted #23, and all of the preceding shows are easily located @ YouTube. Highly recommended for sure.
Thank you Geoffrey de Galles. Here is an index page for that site. Very interesting.
https://m.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLfNq37CZ4pGGKwg7QNKQpBE3njftdTbJj
I have to say, as someone who has always been intrigued by follow-up research, that this new “wired” world is a fascinating environment. I have followed Geoffrey de Galles’ lead to this article about Victoria Nuland as one of the most informative yet. Many thanks…
https://m.youtube.com/watch?list=PLfNq37CZ4pGGKwg7QNKQpBE3njftdTbJj¶ms=OAFIAVgG&v=solbuj1kyX4&mode=NORMAL
I would like to add that people who have just arrived at this site to attack it should keep in mind the large number of consortium readers who have been keeping up with what is posted, hence the utter stupidity (for example) of trying to accuse Robert Parry of not being informed, or not having properly covered the issues of the day such as this fake Russia bashing that has been going on for months. We’ve been talking about it for months, so to come in here and tell us we’re stupid is not likely to get yourself read. It’s fine to have a counter argument, but you’d better make it a good one instead of the usual drivel we’ve been getting lately, and as here again today.
Every week Robert Parry writes an article about how russia was NOT involved. It is no better/different than the neocons, except that Trumps people lied about meeting with Russians. You (Robert Parry) need to prove what you are saying or admit it is just as much hersay as the liberals and neocons!
This statement is a good example of what I was just trying to say below about the occasional visitors who come here to set us straight. There is no evidence for the Russia-tool-of-Trump and tried-to-influence-the-election. If you think you have evidence then let us have it. Go right ahead.
So your idea is that it is alright to base policies on allegations and accusations without any evidence and that no one should criticize this unless he or she can definitively prove that these allegations are wrong (which will hardly ever be possible)?
Of course, I could think up many accusations and allegations for which there is no evidence that cannot easily be disproved (of course, I don’t have any influence that could make the media repeat these allegations all over again).
I think you should think about why there is the idea of a burden of proof. People who make claims and even want to base policies on these claims have to show evidence for these claims. If they do not, they should be harshly criticized, and the absence of evidence should be the main topic if these claims remain in public discourse. It is certainly NOT a prerequisite for this necessary harsh criticism that those who make it beforehand prove that the unsubstantiated claims certainly cannot be true (proving negatives can be very difficult).
Good point. Essentially, people like this are saying this is what we hear, a lot of people are saying it, and it’s up to you to show we’re wrong. No, it’s up to them to check what has no proof. If you tell me the moon is blue cheese because Rachel Maddow said so I it’s not up to me to go up there and find the data. The problem is such thinking is a giveaway as indicating the authoritarian personality. It’s all a matter of black and white because such and whatever says so. These people apparently do not remember the 03 WMD deception, or they probably believe there were WMD there anyway. They are not thinking, they’re genuflecting.
Adrian, you may have missed the trend that the burden of proof of innocence is on the one accused by the media. I have observed this trend for at least the last 20 years. Is not this exactly what owning the media really means – you never have to supply any proof of your accusations or your statements of innocence on your side?
Okay then if we use the hysteria hype you Hillary supporters have conjured up over Putin interfered, then could we give half that much passion to hype up and investigate the unsolved murder of Seth Rich? Could we question Hillary’s motives for blaming Putin on her guilty conscience over what she did to Putin in her pass? Why would any Russian wish Hillary luck after she publicly called Putin a Hitler? It’s only normal that a Russian would welcome candidate Trump for the nice things he said about Putin during his run for the presidency. In the end blaming Russia will only lose a partner that America could have relied upon. None of this high and mighty rant that the Democrate’s have raised will improve the Democratic Party. It’s the mindset like this that didn’t help the Democrate’s win the White House in the first place, so why continue with it? Go back to being, or trying to be, a party of the people.
Plus, doesn’t it seem odd, and shouldn’t scare it you, that you have John McCain and Lynsey Graham on your side?
the pushback is necessary in time of Neo McCartyism. The onus is on the rumor mongers to provide proof, not unattributed possibilities. Ask Seth Rich who really leaked the DNC information!
JM you should do a little homework on your own. The clinton club meet with the Russian also and the clinton foundation took money from a billionaire Russian so the state department under hillabillie would approve a deal so they could buy nuke dirt mines in Amerika.
I am always gently surprised that Trump’s alleged meeting with russians, or that Flynn’s contacts, or Sessions’ contacts should even raise eyebrows in light of the fact that Obama met with Sarkozy while still a mere candidate or that John McCain meets with terrorists in Syria or Neo-Nazis in Ukraine and promises who knows what, in clear violation of the Logan act. We need to have one-law-for-all. And the problem the regressives don’t seem to see is that if they do succeed in impeaching Trump (and they’d have to have some really good evidence) the election result won’t be tossed out and the presidency given to Clinton. Mike Pence will be the new POTUS – they won’t like that one bit. And should anything happen to Pence we get Ryan as POTUS – a scenario that makes me cringe and will doubtless please the regressives even less than Pence. The best thing they can do is accept the election result and use whatever democratic means they have to present their concerns and viewpoints while rebuilding their party – or parties.
As for the anti-russian hysteria, my Virginia senator Mark (the genius) Warner has accused “Russia” of hacking Google’s Search Engine. His evidence? A search for “ODNI report” came back with two references to RT.com near the top of page one. Prompting RT to observe that he needs to learn how search engines work. I’d say he needs to learn how Google works; you don’t need to hack them to get at the top of search results – you just have to pay them, which can be no problem for RT who receive so many billions from the Russian Government coffers directly approved and paid out by Vladimir Putin. If it wasn’t all so serious it would be funny.
This is nonsense.
It is enough to call attention to the lack of evidence.
One cannot prove a negative. That is Logic 101.
Thus, Jerry, it is impossible to prove that something did not happen. Would you pleas prove that you have stopped beating your wife. Thank you.
Now maybe you understand.
It is only possible to prove that something did happen. Those who make accusations that something has occurred bear the onus to provide evidence. Demands that those who demand evidence should “prove” the negative, that something didn’t occur, are logically fallacious and show the “lite” brainpower of people making this kind of demand.
I think you should prove that you did NOT have sex with your mother when you were a boy. Good luck trying to prove a negative.
The European Union recently voted a a sizable junk of tax payers money to form a special group of people to look into and possibly counter “fake news”. Here in the UK our dopey parliament also formed a committee of members of parliament to look into and presumably see if they can find ways to counter “fake news” a few weeks ago. Of course, the establishment can’t bear the fact that there is now an alternative narrative of news on the internet and fine TV channels like RT. I think we’ve got them on the run so keep it boys and gals lets show the buggars they can’t treat us like sheep any more !
Agreed. I’d like to offer again the idea we need a FWW or Fake News Watch type of internet service, as regularly offered like a weather channel, which could report on anything current suspected of being fake, including polling on people’s responses.
Not sure why we would need FNW, I just turn to MSM to read/watch fake news, it is all there no need for a special website. Of official news 99.9% are lies.
I mean a site that identifies and calls out fake news, not those spreading it!!??!
But all the news in MSM are fake, there is just too much of it to put on watch.
My simple approach is that when I hear/watch/read MSM news, I just flip their statements by 180 degrees and I am sure that I am pretty close to what really happened. For the 0.1% of situations where this approach is wrong, I do not care.
All that is needed is to realise that MSM are not the benevolent distributors of life’s truths and events to the people, a kind of free lunch for all out of the goodness of the heart of the media owners. The purpose of MSM is spin, commercial and political. BTW, I trust ads more than I trust news (political infomercials).
D5-5,
> I mean a site that identifies and calls out fake news, not those spreading it!!??
Washington, Brussels, and Google are already working on it — not to mention a Web site ProporNot, which purports to be doing just that.
Three guesses which news sources they mainly target….
Actually, I think most of the alternative new sites I follow already function as correctives
In fact, I think the less we hear and use the term “fake news’ the better. We are talking about the truth vs. lies. The “fake news” phrase just confuses things even more.
Let’s drop it.
Yeah, this whole “fake news” BS is just alot of gnashing of teeth by the MSM because they are losing their ability to be an effective propaganda tool. The “National Enquirer” has been doing fake news for years, nobody with two firing brain cells takes them seriously. People now get to listen to translations of Putin’s interviews and speeches on the internet and outlets like RT, instead of just the slanderous rhetoric coming from the MSM and whores like Maddow. It is only the lazy consumer of TV news that gets duped. Unfortunately that’s still a hell of a lot of people.
Re: “This anti-Russian hysteria began some years ago when Russian President Vladimir Putin made clear that Russia would no longer bow to dictates from Washington and Brussels.” — It sure seems to me that an oft disregarded yet early symptom of this, prior even to Russia’s reclamation of Crimea following the illicit coup in Ukraine that would inevitably have entailed a NATO-fomented eviction from its ancient Black Sea naval base at Sebastopol, and way prior to its direct intervention in Syria at the behest of Assad, was a comparatively trifling event — viz., Putin’s principled refusal in the absence of any extradition treaty to hand over to the US the fugitive US citizen Edward Snowden; and, to add insult to injury, to award the fellow a residency permit, renewable every few years for the foreseeable future. Myself, I can think of no greater wound to the then Commander in Chief’s narcissism, also to that vile dogma that proclaims: ‘American exceptionalism’.
I meant to but forgot to add:- Snowden’s well-earned and altogether warranted ascension to quasi-guru status since summer 2013, especially among the so-called millennials, thanks to his multiple live appearances via video-link at major events at universities and the like in which he is almost always impressive in his erudition and profundity even in the face of often banal and vulgar questions, must have been experienced as salt in a very painful wound by the Obama administration and members of the Deep State. But for me, I readily confess: sheer Schadenfreude.
Thanks for adding that as oldster I hope Millenneals will see how they are being cheated and isn’t me the so-called boomer
Absolutely. I have long thought this.
I think the Snowden episode was critical in leaving American elites gnashing their teeth in rage at Putin. He sure showed up this country. And they vowed they were gonna get him. Papyback time. But so far it hasn’t worked out . . . The world’s opinion of Putin just keeps improving, the more crazy the Americans become.
By the same or a similar token, however, I think the Snowden episode might have been the first time that Putin kind of ended up on the radar of a lot of “normal” Americans, who sympathized with Snowden and his efforts to inform the world of intrusive NSA surveillance. They suddenly were able to make a few comparisons between Putin and Obama, America’s supposed darling, and Putin came out looking a whole lot better. Then came Putin’s real diplomacy and command in both Syria and the Ukraine outrage. But I think the Snowden episode was really Act I in the “Hate Putin” drama.
Don’t forget Georgia 2008.
Americans in general need to catch up on the reality of the nuclear war threat. Some folks seem to think the considered judgement of those scientists involved with nuclear war appraisal in setting the doomsday clock closer to midnight has no significance. How easy it is to brush aside the behavior of those gambling the future of humankind, if it interferes with one’s casual conclusion that “it couldn’t really happen.”
21 years ago, Bill Clinton signed the Telecommunications Act of 1996.
“The negative impact of the law cannot be overstated. The law, which was the first major reform of telecommunications policy since 1934, according to media scholar Robert McChesney, “is widely considered to be one of the three or four most important federal laws of this generation.” The act dramatically reduced important Federal Communications Commission (FCC) regulations on cross ownership, and allowed giant corporations to buy up thousands of media outlets across the country, increasing their monopoly on the flow of information in the United States and around the world.
“Never have so many been held incommunicado by so few,” said Eduardo Galeano, the Latin American journalist, in response to the act.
Twenty years later the devastating impact of the legislation is undeniable: About 90 percent of the country’s major media companies are owned by six corporations. Bill Clinton’s legacy in empowering the consolidation of corporate media is right up there with the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and welfare reform, as being among the most tragic and destructive policies of his administration. […]
Media consolidation was already an extremely pressing concern long before 1996. In 1983, Ben Bagdikian published his groundbreaking book, The Media Monopoly, which revealed that just 50 corporations owned 90 percent of the media. That number gradually dwindled over the coming 13 years and was accelerated by the Telecommunications Act. This has led us to the aforementioned crisis where more than 90 percent of the media is owned by just six companies: Viacom, News Corporation, Comcast, CBS, Time Warner and Disney.”
Had this arm of the establishment (the media) not been allowed to gain such a monopoly, we would not be in the situation we are presently in: essentially one single voice.
Thank you, Bill Clinton.
I can’t imagine why anyone would watch television. Nature shows? Everything else is fake, and laced with sleazy commercials.
Everyone should just turn off the TV and ignore the papers.
The Planet Earth II on BBC America is about the only thing worth watching now, unless you’re into college basketball. Maybe if enough people watch nature shows they will begin to be concerned about the future of our ecosystems. Global warming and Nuclear winter are the two biggest threats to our continued survival.
Probably one of the most important comments posted here today backwardsevolution. I always have a hard time remembering how that all went with Bill Clinton. Yes our media should be small business owned. If it were up to me I’d even like to make it that somehow the media wouldn’t need to run commercials, or at least put in place a law where the media would be restricted from taking bribe money from advertisers…not sure how to do it, but sure would look into it.
anti Trumpists not likely to destroy Trump as long as stock market is booming. But with stocks extremely overvaled by almost any metric, a big drop cannot be far off.
I notice you are now conceding there may actually be truth to the Russian story but you dismiss by saying it doesn’t matter. I think you missed the boat on this one. Also, I don’t hear s lot of progressives or really anyone saying that we need to get aggressive with Russia. Who are you referring to? I hear and read people insisting we need an investigation. That Russia may indeed have tampered with the election and possibly not with Trump as the intended beneficiary but just to sow doubt about the process or to see if they could. Or quid pro quo for our tampering in their govt and the world over. And you are really ramping up the hysteria with your Armageddon scenarios. Trump may be a whack a doodle who’d push the button in a nihilistic pique but I really don’t think Putin would put him in that position. Anyway, I enjoy your publication. Thanks.
HMMMMMMMMMMMM so he is ramping up the hysteria is he?
Well I don´t know about you, but If I was Russian and I saw the USA never an ally or friend, but an avowed enemy according to many members of the US Government, sending 2500 tanks to my border along with troops and rallying the rest of NATO to send troops and equipment, and installing anti missile missiles right to my border, I dont think I would be getting paranoid by being more than a´little nervous about US intentions. Add that to the anti Russian rhetoric emminating from the MSN 24/7 ( sure sounds like they are reving up the US population for another war) and I will be even more nervous. Just what is the purpose of this military buildup? What is the purpose of waving this big stick around while at the same time talking belligerently in a very loud voice? If I was Russia I would certainly be taking off my coat and rolling up my sleeves and preparing for battle. Are the Russians supposed to wait until the US in it´s usual fashion , sets up the entire means to invade them? Should they wait for this invasion to begin before lifting a finger in their own defence? And make no mistake about it, the finger they lift will be the one with which they will push the nuclear button.
Given all this violent rhetoric against Russia, and with that country´s nuclear arsenal on hair trigger shouldn´t you as an American be prepared to take a step back and take a good look at what you are playing around with? Do you not love your country? Your home town? Your Children, Your grandchildren? If so then why are you alowing your government to risk it all in an unnecessary nuclear holocaust? Or are you one of those left overs from the 1950s, who would find it better to be dead than red?
So I believe it is you that is whistling past the graveyard and if you do not want Armegeddon better call off your dogs.
Ecellent!
As an citizen with citizenry going back to the 1600s in Vermont and Massachusetts, I think we must our Ameraggon fanasies . I applaud the foregoing post. Why ever should we send tanks and troops to the borders of a country in Europe. It is insane to do so!
Apparently your opening sentence refers to “some evidence might eventually surface” which is not slyly suggesting the Russia bashing is valid, nor does the article say “it doesn’t matter.” You have bought in to “it sure sounds possible” type of reasoning fanned by the talking heads. But let’s go on to your we need to get aggressive with Russia. Lay it out. What’s your case if you have one, instead of the non-evidence based Russia bashing you’re climbing on to here? You’ve got to come up with more than what you’ve heard people saying.
President Carter said the truth that the USA is no longer a Democracy. 2000 and 2004 were blatantly stolen and possibly 2016. It is easy to manipulate vote tallies, nevermind lobbyists, citizens united and propaganda.
If as you say “Russia” may have hacked the election show us the proof. Show any evidence. Any at all. Anybody who knows anything at all about computer systems knows that the so-called “evidence” of a “russian hack” is just not there. But if I were going to hack your emails you can bet I’d fake a cyrillic keyboard and leave the names of cuddly Bear and gruzzly bear on your computer. But that’s because I’m not a professional hacker. And yet we are told that this alleged hack was done by superbly professional operatives who just happened to carelessly leave evidence that was so glaring that Crowd-strike found it in two hours flat. As the brits used to say “pull the other one mate, it’s got bells on it”.
enjoyed this! This is what they think–we’ve just become so stupid they can pull anything now.
China and India’s soldiers also marched in the parade.
True, the US foreign policy is more horrible than humanistic. Short sighted greed through Mobile Exxon & British Petroleum with the support of the US military/industrial cartel has poisoned American efforts worldwide. However, Russia has an even worse reputation. Only China goes into a country with a non-violent business attitude. They don’t challenger religious traditions nor conspire to redefine economic policy. They don’t try to undermine domestic policy. The just offer to build mines and refineries, the roads necessary to transport the resources and they even offer to build the ports for shipping out these resources. No bullets. Just diplomacy. They also get a fantastic discount on the goods they barter for. Americans, meantime destroy entire countries during attempts to dominate the locals with pre-imagined fantasy that ultimately fails to capture the imaginations of the locals. Russia has an even worse record with neighbors that are not necessarily “Russian”. Trump is vastly unqualified to deal with today’s world; but, as we live his dilussions, he will be making $billions$ enough for both Putin and himself to become the richest men in the world.
The President of China, Xi Xinping and the President of India, Mukherjee were on Putin’s left and right side during the victory parade in Moscow to celebrate the 70th anniversary of the Allied victory over Nazi Germany. So, maybe they don’t share your view on Russia today, or its President.
It should be noted that India made the sixth-largest military manpower contribution to defeating the Axis in WW2 – fighting with distinction in Burma, ME, North Africa and Italy among many other places. No reason why India should not be represented at a victory parade of an old ally.
USA is attacking and presently bombing seven countries. Russia one , and its legal (Ukraine does not rise to the USA destruction and death tolls). China fails with Tibet and Uighurs, also land protectors in Latin America have been assasinated at a higher rate since China’s propertyinterests grew larger. the last time Russian did USA scale slaughter was Afghanistan.
Please see my comment, ‘WHAT THEN?” to Nicolas
Davies article “DREAMS OF WINNING THE NUCLEAR WAR”
Please see my comment “SOME FIRES NEVER ‘BERN'” to
Jonathan Marshall’s article “DEMOCRATS’ DANGEROUS
DIVERSION…”
—-Peter Loeb, Boston, MA, USA
Excellent Article that hits the nail on the head Mr Parry.
US has completely lost the support in my country the last 20 years and especially after the Iraq/Libya intervention wars. They went from being the saviors of Greece during the 1940s Greek Civil War against the Communists to be the most hated country after Germany.
The neocon agenda and their Russian hysteria is only making matters worse. If you take into account that Greece,at the moment, is shifting to a Pro-Russian stance after seeing how the US screwed up everything, it wont be surprising if the US starts losing the grip in the Balkans.
I sincerely hope that Trump will try to meddle the differences and find a middle ground or else they will get completely outclassed by the Russian leadership in this part of the hemisphere….
The US and European elites are flailing about for legitimacy as the push back against their neocon-liberal agenda of austerity for the public and socialism for the rich grows stronger. The sooner they fall, the better for humanity.
Was USA anti communist intervention actually beneficial to Greeks? Slaughter and Napalm seems somewhat negative.
Having watched the interactions between the U.S. and Russia over the recent past I have come to the conclusion that Vladimir Putin and Sergei Lavrov might be the only two grown-ups on the stage. As for Rachel Maddow, I usually grab the remote when she appears on television, but I did endure parts of two recent episodes to observe that not only is her style a turn-off, but she is also full of “it.”
At one time, Chris Hayes came across as an exception in the MSDNC line up, but lately he seems to be becoming infected with the Maddow style.
Maddow, O’Donnell, Hayes and Matthews all received their marching orders that they are expected to follow if they expect to continue drawing their 7 million dollar paychecks. In their capacity as talking heads on a politically-orientated network, they have no freedom of speech, and they have no integrity if they secretly must choke on all the lies they are expected to propagate. In contrast, you’ve got to admire a guy like Ed Schultz who not only lost his job at MSNBC because he was truly liberal in his stance, but also had to courage to take a job at RT, not as a propagandist, but as a truth-teller when being a truth-teller in these days is considered un-American. Same goes for Larry King and Thom Hartmann.
Seems to be a clinical denial of Trump’s collusion with Putin’s Intelligence machine. Money sent, misinformation selectively dispersed and the undermining of the West’s liberal foreign policy (treason). This article is a perfect example of history rewritten to reflect the views of the cartel after all the crimes were committed and booty collected while the victims are being blamed for being poor “losers”. Robert Parry will be inscribed at the museum of fake news. Rachel Maddow has led a heroic charge to hold all the culprits accountable for their crimes against democracy; free press, freedom of religion, government for the people, collusion with hostile regimes, immigration chaos, conflict of interest and the list goes on & on. Don’t fall for this kind of cover up. Impeach Trump NOW before he and his band of idiots can do any more danger.
Rachel Maddow gets paid 7 miliion dollars a year to shill for the ruling establishment war making machine. She doesn’t make that kind of money to lift up the poor and disenfranchised. If she stopped doing the Russia bashing tomorrow, she would find her fanny kicked out to the curb of Rockefeller Center.
‘Trump’s collusion with Putin’s Intelligence machine. Money sent, misinformation selectively dispersed and the undermining of the West’s liberal foreign policy (treason).’
Care to include some evidence?
Evidence? He don’t need no stinkin’ evidence; he’s got Mainstream Media.
Well your comment certainly left me breathless. You should get an invitation to brainwashing school as the perfect example of just how effective brainwashing techniques, properly applied really do work. They will in all likelyhood plant an approval stamp right on your forhead and ship you off to write new absurd comments in serious publications. .
Good response.
Why does Sean Hannity get a free ride while Rachel Maddow is the wicked witch? How much does his rhetoric add to the escalation of the ongoing situation?
Hannity’s interview with Ron Paul left me with more respect for both of them.
They sounded like rational human beings, more than I can say regarding many of the mainstream flubbers.
even if every charge against T is true, would it be worse than O’s and H’s allies Saudis , Qatar and Turkey funding , arming and abetting Dash?
It wouldn’t come even close to Killory’s brown-nosing of the Wahabbis.
I had a chuckle at your comment, regardless of what your intention was. The usual question in such situation is – what are you doing here if you disagree with what is being said? Are you paid to self-sacrifice by going to the web site of pro-Russia traitors and “Putin’s Intelligence machine”? You would certainly not be coming here for any lack of mainstream websites which deliver only your truths and censor out any opposing comments.
He is a paid Dem propagandist in “clinical denial” that his paymasters were exposed as even less concerned with truth and justice than the electorate.
Vicent don’t allow yourself to be a victim of Hillary’s paranoia of Putin’s revenge for what she did to Putin. Guilty people love pulling more people down with them as they fall. Hitler could have died a lone. Rachel sold out, and I don’t care if she enjoys her money, it’s Rachel’s life not my mine. Sean Hannity is chasing after the demographic of white pissed off good Americans, and that’s Donald’s main forfeit.
What you should be reflecting on is a bad campaign strategy starting with screwing over Bernie, then spending over a billion bucks to get all the most votes in all the wrong places….Jared beat your ass by direct marketing in the up for grabs Rust Belt States. Hey I don’t like it either that the Electoral College vote wins it all, but Robbie and Hillary knew the rules going in…so quit with the I hate Russia shit.
Your equating Robert Parry within the same sentence as Rachel Maddow is an insult. Number one Mr Parry is a honest to goodness journalists where I’m not sure what Rachel is…a talk show host???? Rachel’s scripts are corporate approved while Parry’s are posted with his integrity. Robert Parry’s journalistic credentials are good enough to earn him the I.F. Stone Medal…so at least take that into consideration, before saying such stupid things on the man’s very own website. One more question; do they teach you over at Hillary U. to be impolite, or does that come natural?
I would add to your remarks in response to Mr. Metzger, Joe, that just because many of us liberals have seen and recognised the transmogrification of formerly liberal talk show hosts like Maddow into corporate media puppets with an asinine narrative to sell from on high about Russia stealing the election from the incompetent warmongering Hillary and Democratic Party does not mean we have flipped to conservatives and now approve of everything (nay, of anything) that the likes of Hannitty and O’Reilly continue to sell. And most of us certainly don’t now, all of a sudden, support Trump’s attacks on immigrants, proposed reduction of women’s reproductive rights, plans to build a wall on our southern border, inflammatory rhetoric directed at China and Iran, chaotic and vacillating plans for American interference in Syria, more huge tax cuts for the wealthy, tinkering with the national health plan (as bad as it presently may be) in ways that do not improve the lot of anyone but the insurance companies and the rich (removing the mandate and removing subsidies doom it) and a whole bunch of other issues that would fill this page. But those should all be addressed issue by issue by the Democratic opposition in congress, not by a coup, an impeachment, a forced resignation or worse. The filibuster still exists. Use it.
Realist good to have you drop by. What disturbs me the most, is when people like Vicent here start spitting on our shoes with insults. This attitude is why Americans are more at getting at each other’s throats instead of coming to grips with what is really ailing us. This past presidential election is a result of a society who has totally followed in line of a voter base which subscribes to the lesser evil voter philosophy. Our being so widely divided is ruining our chances at finding somekind of unity amongst ourselves in order for us to form a reasonably coherent political platform to turn this country around.
I’m all about people saying what they think, but I’m also all about keeping it a conversation and not a barrage of insults to only get your blood pressure up. This comment board has struggled over the last two years to make sense of any of our nation’s presidential candidates, so don’t come around here talking to us like we all read Breibart or HuffPo. If more were to get into what Robert Parry is all about I think our public debates would at least have a thick thread of sanity left to it.
I haven’t seen a shred of evidence offered to support your fantasy. However, you insurrectionists have attempted at least half a dozen different ploys to get Trump’s election overturned. I call that a coup, and it is you lot of traitors that will be tried for treason, if anyone cares enough in this country to do something about it. I’m no fan of most of Trump’s proposed policies, however, he does represent the legitimately elected head of state and your attack on him is an attack upon the constitution. If traitors like you prevail, the republic is lost, but you care more about the lying warmonger Hillary and the Democratic Party screw-ups than anything as esoteric as 228 years of uninterrupted free elections and peaceful transference of power.
Boy, you really have drunk the coolade! First, where’s the proof? That’s right, there is none. Rachel Maddow is an MSM whore. She eats the same slop from the same trough as Killary. Her “heroic charge” earns her $7,000,000 a year. She’s a regular Joan of Arc. Go back to your TV set, and leave us alone. What a “maroon.”
A bit of background may be helpful: Abby Martin speaking with Mark Ames.
http://therealnews.com/t2/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=31&Itemid=74&jumival=18377
Obviously we need viewpoints and information that is clear, untainted by hysteria and political opportunism. That newscasters we once trusted are folding in to the political fix of today is separating out for us who to rely on. Also fortunately we have many alternate sites with sober and valuable commentary. It has amazed me to see the so-called “liberal” (and these people were never liberal really) transfusion into Establishment Propaganda with their hysterical hatred of Trump. Trump is not a wild dog in the street with bulging eyeballs attacking people’s ankles. But he does need checking on, and his BS called out, which is separate from automatically despising everything about him. It is just possible he may be teachable, if his comments on how Ivanka is a good influence on him mean anything at all. IMV the problem with Trump is mental weakness–I’m not saying mental illness, but mental weakness. This is also nothing to do with “smart.” It has everything to do with being limited in one’s knowledge while presuming not to be under the force of one’s ego. I would like to remind that MSM is not having that much of an influence on the American public as a whole. It is down to something in the thirty percentile realm, Rachel Maddow not withstanding. The Russia BS story is not being bought wholesale across America. Let us not succumb to the hysteria ourselves and sink further into the pit of gloom and doom, bringing out all over again our Titanic and On the Beach metaphors, etc. etc. which I was reading in comments yesterday on how hopeless everything is. We can fight on in the tradition of fighting on historically. Onward, Robert! I raise a glass to you, and all comment makers here on this site! Cheers!
Agree. I wish I had a clearer understanding of whether the American people are really buying this garbage. Trump is a Russian agent?
Gallup polling regularly measures Americans trust in main stream media.
This is now old back to November, but good to know as a continuing activity–this indicates the thirty percentile rating. It also shows steady decline since late 90’s:
https://www.armstrongeconomics.com/international-news/north_america/americas-current-economy/gallup-poll-mainstream-media-falls-to-32-trust-level-2019-is-their-demise/
Trump has to have several guys like he would go fishing with, like me; college educated, mostly non-political or centrist in thinking, of moderate income with a mortgage, have health insurance that might be lost, etc etc. Just average joes. and then bounce his ideas off of them or us before he sets his mouth and tweeter off. might do him (or any other pol some good to sit in the local coffee shop with the guys and gals and jaw a little of what’s goin’ on.) Not many of them do that these days.
“Given the emergence of this New Cold War, I suppose it made sense that we would soon have a New McCarthyism, although it may have come as a surprise that this witch-hunting is being led by the liberals and the mainstream media, albeit with important assistance from the neoconservatives who have long engaged in smearing the patriotism of anyone who doubted their geopolitical genius.” RP
I just read a document by Greg Maybury who has had essays published on this site, where he presents a video interview by Dr. Paul Craig Roberts. Dr. Roberts very interestingly, describes how the neocons bumped the conservatives in the Republican Party aside and took over the party and its various support institutions (Think Tanks). I suspect that that is how they survive and thrive.
Greg Maybury’s piece here: http://poxamerikana.com/2015/12/04/a-confederacy-of-hegemons-episode-two/
Dr. Robert’s interview here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6YeK1TJV05Q
poxamerikana has a lot of great reads…the Paul Craig Roberts interview is really sharp through a range of pertinent issues, the mind renewed has many a good podcast.
A very good cautionary summary in these times of propaganda inundation by the oligarchy-owned mass media. I have doubted whether nuclear war is a likely outcome, although fools can get themselves into irrational corners.
The real problem is that the Dems are using this propaganda to distract from their corruption by Israel, Saudi Arabia, Wall St, the MIC, and the rich generally. They haven’t represented the people since FDR, and have had no decent candidates since Carter.
It is essential to focus attention on the permanent corruption of the Democratic Party, and its attempt to hide this with fearmongering about Russia. Everyone already knows that the Republican Party is run by the greedy, the fundamentalists, and warmongers. It is time for new parties, and for those parties to form coalitions to beat the DemReps and Repocrats in 2018-2020.
Virtually every mainstream outlet in Canada rallied to Freeland’s side when she dismissed our article as Russian disinformation. Only later did a few newspapers grudgingly acknowledge that our story was true and that Freeland knew it was true. Still, the attacks on us continued. We were labeled “Russian disinformationists,” with no evidence needed to support the slander and no defense allowed.
That is how the system works. You step out of the Establishment’s line, and you get vilified. Consider one of many examples – the First World War. Pacifists such as Edmond Morel, Keir Hardy and their friends in Britain, and Eugene Debs in the United States were attacked and imprisoned. The conditions Morel and Debs endured in prison are believed to have shortened their lives. Before Morel’s opposition to the war he exposed the massacres perpetrated by King Leopold on the Congo.
Then there are the more recent cases of persecution of whistleblowers.
For me, the key point of this article is that the US and EU need to hate Russia because they have failed. How can they stay in power if they do not focus people’s anger and frustration on someone outside. It is nothing personal (for the majority of scumbags) it is pure opportunism, it is George Orwell’s own recipe from 1984.
The only miss in this article is that Mr Parry blames “Democrats, liberals and neoconservatives” for the Russia-bashing, without even a mention of the Republicans. There is absolutely no difference between Republicans and Democrats (Coca-Cola and Pepsi-Cola).
Kiza give us a few more years and the corporatocracy will have the Democrats and Republicans replaced with Coca Cola and Pepsi. Everything in American life will be privatized to such an extent that the public sector will be all but replaced by the private sector. Although wherever great amounts of liability were to accrue I’m sure there would at least be one public sector entity left to absorb the financial pain…I mean where to put all that built up debt?
It’s been brought up much too much, but Eisenhower did warn us, and as long as there is this massive defense budget the Russians, Chinese, Iranians, N Koreans, and fill in blank enemy will need to exist. Instead of America being a rampaging dying empire America could be the accepting of each nation’s sovereignty rights leader, and not rule but assist to guide the world to a better tomorrow.
Hillary’s paranoia of Putin’s revenge should be rejected immediately for any support from us U.S. citizens. We shouldn’t suffer for her sins, nor should we allow her to continue to keep shifting the focus for her crimes of instigations. Between the Arab Spring, Ukraine, Honduras, Libya, Syria, all the way to sabotaging Bernie Sanders should be enough to at least exile her to Devils Island.
After taking care of Hillary then dismantle the Think Tanks like Brookings. Tell Zbigniew and Henry to have a nice and happy retirement, and bring on the Diplomates. Cut defense spending by 60%, and get the world to do a Manhattan style nuclear disarmament project and then let’s all of us drink some Coca Cola and Pepsi or whatever wets your whistle.
Hello Joe, no need to replace the Republican Party and the Democratic Party with Coca-Cola and Pepsi-Cola, they have both been replaced already by the wondrous new KoolAid called Brawndo.
Idiocracy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Idiocracy and
http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0387808/
Good one. Wish I had thought of the koolaid aid metaphor.
I still go for Joe’s take on dismantling the ‘think-tanks’ includind all the lefty ones. ANND the people on K Street.
Let’s have an amendment that banishes think-tanks and the other guys to outer darkness. Make Congress think for themselves for a change. At this point I doubt that Congress could make up legislation on their own. And it would be less than 2000 pages. Laws should be understandable by the people they infect, is my take on this.
Jim leading with ‘common sense’ couldn’t hide what’s inside all of these legislative bills, and to the bought and paid for legislator this would only make it that much harder for them to provide the benefits these legislators provide to their donor class masters. Although I’m with you Jim, but why would anyone listen to us…we’re just taxpayers.
It’s simple, really. The US is on a permanent war economy. We’re also at War with Terrorism. And as we know, truth is the first casualty of war. So it’s no wonder the truth has been absent from US official discourse since… well, perhaps from the moment Dan Rather said that JFK’s head was thrown violently forward.
Robert;
Your web site substituted “??????” for “Russia”in Cyrillic letters. Why ???????
Most likely, the website uses ANSI or a similar codepage. When computers were developed, no one thought of adding any non-latin symbols to symbol tables. Old codepages are still very common in the U.S. and Western Europe, and are slowly replaced by more modern Unicode (UTF-8). I presume, European diametrical symbols and Chinese / Japanese characters will also be replaced by “???”.
The word id most likely “ROSSIYA” (in transcription meaning Russia).
In the name of our people, I thank you for your support and wish you good health and luck in fighting your illness!
Thank you for our fulsome freely and good wishes. All the best, Charles
freely = reply
Charles, sorry, the problem is with WordPress. It doesn’t recognize other alphabets, so it puts in question marks.
Respect for the truth is greatly eroded in the US. Whatever sells, whatever wins the argument and furthers a career is what counts. Selfish materialism rules now in every area. Truth is for naïve suckers, who become easy targets for those skilled in pushing lies. The one who is strongest is he who is willing to risk the most – even all life on earth.
The real flaw that ensures our failure on Earth is the demise of our moral fiber and love of truth.
The failure of moral principle is due to oligarchy control of mass media and elections, as Mr. Parry notes: “The anti-Russian McCarthyism … has at its core an implicit recognition that neoliberal economics and neoconservative foreign policy have failed.”
Joe B,
I think the failure is due not to an oligarchy, but to the Deep State and its control. Many neocons are not oligarchs but only powerful voices who work in Think Tanks and at Universities. The real oligarchs (e.g., the Clintons) don’t work that hard and they often delegate.
Parry’s article is excellent and I will post it on Facebook immediately. There is a problem, though, with the conclusion:
“as the Democrats and liberals join with the neocons in launching this New McCarthyism over Russia – and with people like Rachel Maddow leading the charge – what is arguably the most depressing fact is that there appears to be no Edward R. Murrow, a mainstream journalist with a conscience, anywhere on the horizon.”
That is actually false. There is Bill Moyers, Jim Hightower, and Paul Craig Roberts are all very good journalists—it’s just that the mainstream doesn’t acknowledge journalists who don’t beat the same drum as it.
This only further confirms my account in my Deep State versus Trump book, available on Amazon.
Dr. Bart Gruzalski, Professor Emeritus, Philosophy (ethics and public policy) and Religion (books: “On the Buddha”; “On Gandhi”; and “Why Christians and World-Peace Advocates Voted for President Donald Trump”), Northeastern University, Boston, MA—and the only philosopher I and a mentor know who support Trump
Robert:
I wore my cap with ‘??????” in Russian national colors on the front to my radiation treatment and its generated a conversation with the chief therapist on the on why Putin has been good for the Russian people. See Wikipedia on changes in Russian population over past 30 years. She had drunk the Koolaid,
Without Putin and other nationalists standing up to the EU, Banks and IMF during the Russia default, Russia would be in the same position as Greece. (Mired in debt and austerity with no prospect of escape.) My daughter attended university in Moscow 2001-2004. (She, like all the Russia educated intelligentsia, hates Putin.) The positive change over that brief period was astounding. Putin earned his popularity with the Russian people.
Excellent article by Robert Parry, the MSM are truth challenged. They even cover up treachery in high places. See link below:
“The Scumbags of the Western World and Their “Allies” that Fund and Arm Terrorists”
http://graysinfo.blogspot.ca/2017/03/the-scumbags-of-western-world-and-their.html
Stephen – good articles; lots of great links. Thanks. You also quoted one of my favorite lines ever, as there’s so much truth to it:
“Hell is empty and all the devils are here.”
The devils are lined up again, the same devils as have always walked among us. Different names, different dress, but the same wiring.
Thanks backwardsevolution. I try to incorporate links that might be of interest.
Cheers, Stephen.
Stephen and backwardsevolution,
Stephen, I had no idea you were a writer of incisive and hard-hitting columns! Thank you for the link you shared above.
And thank you, backwardsevolution, for your comment which motivated me to check out the link (at first I thought your comment was in error—calling “Parry” the name “Stephen”—that was my fault and I checked again and learned something).
Dr. Bart Gruzalski, Professor Emeritus, Philosophy (ethics and public policy) and Religion (books: “On the Buddha”; “On Gandhi”; and “Why Christians and World-Peace Advocates Voted for President Donald Trump”), Northeastern University, Boston, MA—and the only philosopher I and a mentor know who support Trump
On what basis do you support Trump, Bart? And who are the peace advocates supporting him?
Apropos both the omniscience of the CIA and NSA and the ubiquity of the putinoid folie a deux that those two outfits now share with the Democrats and neocons, I can’t help but be reminded of one of my own favourite lines from Goethe’s Faust, one that is currently haunting me:-
“Nun ist die Luft von solchem Spuk so voll, / Dass niemand weiss, wie er ihn meiden soll.”
‘Now is the air with such spookiness so full / That no one knows just how he might evade it.’
But here I can’t help but propose exchanging Goethe’s “Luft” with the word ‘Welt’ = world.
Geoffrey: I enjoyed Goethe’s quote. Dylan Thomas had words applicable to the
CIA and NSA. “Cows and sows and farmer’s daughters; what a day of dugs.”
While I have appreciated the Consortium, it seems to me to be teetering in a dangerous direction of not questioning the motives of DT. Let me be clear, I’m no fan of the DNC, Hillary Clinton, or MSM (and that includes Rachel Maddow.) But am I to believe that one of Maddow’s latest installments is purely made up information? Here’s a link:
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow/watch/attorney-with-trump-investigations-in-purview-part-of-mass-firing-897203779865
If the entire system is corrupt (and I believe it is) let’s call out all the players. Shed the light of day on those who inhabit the “swamp.” Not my term, but dearly loved and used by the current prez. It just seems to me that this site puts an awful lot of energy into debunking the “Russia did it” meme.
If anyone can provide further information or shed light on the whole Maddow piece I would appreciate it.
You may be relatively new to this site. If so, going back over the archives for a few years would be informational. Of the many very good authors here, just to pick one name to focus on, Ray McGovern worked for the CIA for close to 30 years. Reading him would be rewarded.
As others here have noted, see the books, “The Secret Team” and “JFK” by Col. L. Fletcher Prouty. The late colonel held a very high level position in the Pentagon coordinating with the CIA. You may also wish to read whowhatwhy.org (Russ Baker et al.; see also his book, “Family of Secrets”) and theintercept.com (Glenn Greenwald et al.)
You have to look for the evidence because the MSM give you no truth. Read enough and you will see.
Good Luck.
Stephen: The article was good, but equally so was your link.
It’s comforting to realize that there are some intelligent thinkers
in the vast “out there”. Thank you.
The crux of Perry’s piece is about the danger of driving policy with conspiracy theory. There is a ridiculous amount of coverage on the Trump-Russia topic by the sensational media relative to the amount of actual evidence. You seem to cherry pick this piece to support your own preconception.
I only bothered to read one of your links: http://www.globalresearch.ca/when-terrorism-becomes-counter-terrorism-the-state-sponsors-of-terrorism-are-going-after-the-terrorists/5496051
To use the NIC report as “evidence” to insinuate that the Caliphate is some US intelligence project is blatantly absurd. I’m not going to chip away at your work any more than this; I only care to offer the irony that you, being a conspiracy theorist, would use an anti-conspiracy theory piece to support your conspiracy theory. LOL!