The cause for which Aaron Bushnell gave his life in the most agonizing way possible is being intentionally subverted by people who claim to care about justice and human rights.
Feb. 26, 2024: A vigil in Washington for Aaron Bushnell, the active-duty member of the U.S. Air Force who self-immolated outside the Israel embassy to avoid being complicit in genocide. (Elvert Barnes, Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 2.0)
By Caitlin Johnstone
CaitlinJohnstone.com.au
Listen to Tim Foley reading this article.
Democratic candidate Kamala Harris shouted down protesters against the U.S.-backed incineration of Gaza during a campaign rally on Wednesday, responding to their chants of “we won’t vote for genocide” by telling them they’re helping Trump win.
The Hill reports:
“Demonstrators in the crowd at Harris’s Detroit rally repeatedly shouted out as the vice president spoke to an airplane hangar packed with supporters, ‘Kamala, Kamala you can’t Hide, we won’t vote for genocide.’ The crowd booed and drowned out the protesters with chants of ‘Kamala.’
‘I’m here because we believe in democracy. Everyone’s voice matters, but I am speaking now. I am speaking now,’ Harris said to applause.
As protesters continued to interrupt, Harris delivered a more blunt warning.
‘You know what, if you want Donald Trump to win then say that. Otherwise I’m speaking,’ she said.”
The crowd thunderously applauded the comments from Harris. Social media is full of Democrats sharing the footage of the interaction and fawning over what a commanding girlboss she is.
Madam VP is not to be played with!
The stare down.
The squint.
The extra head nod.
The looking around like “who else wants to try me.”Perfection!
— Juliana Stratton (@JulianaStratton) August 8, 2024
Shortly after Biden withdrew from the race and endorsed Harris I noted that we were “already seeing some strong ‘shut up shut up SHUT UP about Gaza’ energy from Kamala supporters toward those to their left,” and since that time this phenomenon has been growing steadily worse.
Now we’ve got this freakish dynamic where criticizing an administration that is guilty of the crime of genocide will get people telling you, “Hey, nobody’s perfect!” like it’s some petty little quibble.
Normal person: Genocide is bad
Crazy person: DO YOU WANT TRUMP TO WIN
— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) August 8, 2024
I can’t help watching all this and wondering what Aaron Bushnell would think.
On Feb. 25 Bushnell self-immolated in front of the Israeli embassy in Washington while screaming “Free Palestine” to draw attention to the horrors his country was helping to inflict upon the people of Gaza.
Now the cause for which he gave his life in the most agonizing way possible is being intentionally subverted by people who claim to care about justice and human rights. What would this look like to him?
If, before igniting the accelerant, Bushnell had been granted a vision of Harris silencing anti-genocide protesters to the applause of her followers months in the future, would he still have gone through with it?
Or would he have cast his lighter aside and collapsed in a fit of despair while Gaza burns, like the rest of us are doing right now?
Five months. In a bit over five months we went from seeing an active-duty airman light himself on fire to turn America’s eyes toward Gaza, followed by a highly energized student protest movement against their country’s facilitation of genocidal war crimes, to seeing those student protests crushed with the approval of the current president, and then his would-be successor telling anti-genocide protesters to shut the fuck up and fall in line so that Democrats can win.
Every time a light gets sparked in the darkness, the empire scrambles to snuff it out. Which wouldn’t be so depressing if not for all the brainwashed masses falling all over themselves to help them do it.
The fight goes on.
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This article is from CaitlinJohnstone.com.au and re-published with permission.
The views expressed are solely those of the author and may or may not reflect those of Consortium News.
I’ve never been so scared of a politician as I am of Harris and I knew how rotten Biden was in the 90’s.
Caitlin, the comments here are so honest. I wait in earnest for your articles-perfect in brevity yet deep in thought.
All I will say is keep doing what you are doing-
you are a shining light in this darkness
The problem is the effectiveness of the slogan “Do you want Trump to win?!”which isn’t something Harris is responsible for inventing. It must be one of the top thought crime mechanism of our time along with “conspiracy theory”, “antisemitism” and “communist”. I’m surprised Trump hasn’t turned that phrase to his advantage on the campaign trail.
RE “Aaron Bushnell”
What Bushnell’s desperate act exposes is that some 95-99% of people anywhere DO NOTHING when confronted with grave injustices such as the current US-Israeli Holocaust of the Palestinians, just like all the “bad German people” during the Nazi Holocaust, whom they are happily pointing the finger to as examples of OTHER PEOPLE who are bad and evil in their deep dishonesty, self-delusion, and madness.
He pointed exactly this reality out in one of his last statements:
“Many of us like to ask ourselves, ‘What would I do if I was alive during slavery? Or the Jim Crow South? Or apartheid? What would I do if my country was committing genocide?’ The answer is, you’re doing it. Right now.”
Now WHY is it that 95-99% of people anywhere DO NOTHING when confronted with grave injustices? Because “advanced” humans have a malignant disease called a “Soullessness Spectrum Disorder” …. https://www.rolf-hefti.com/covid-19-coronavirus.html
Because of this big truth Bushnell is pointing to lots of truth-hating cowardly soulless people resort to slandering Bushnell as mentally disturbed or fanatical, having been suicidal (he was not), etc. or try to misrepresent him negatively in some other form –anything in order to NOT see the real truth about themselves.
“America is the greatest exporter of violence the world has ever known. So wear your patriotism on your sleeve and be proud. You are a depraved citizen of the world’s worst killer nation.” — Paul Craig Roberts, Ph.D., economist & former US regime official, in 2015
“The US empire is quantifiably the most destructive and tyrannical force on this planet, by an extremely massive margin. No other power has spent the 21st century killing people by the millions and displacing them by the tens of millions. No other power is circling the planet with hundreds of military bases, starving people around the world with blockades and economic sanctions, staging proxy wars, color revolutions and coups all over the earth, and working to destabilize and destroy any nation anywhere on this planet who dares to defy its dictates. Only the US empire is doing this. No other power comes anywhere remotely close.” — Caitlin Johnstone, Independent Journalist, in 2024
“I am about to engage in an extreme act of protest, but compared to what people have been experiencing in Palestine, at the hands of their colonizers (=the genocidal US regime and its genocidal Israeli colony), it’s not extreme at all.” — Aaron Bushnell, shortly before he set himself on fire
“We can have the world of our dreams tomorrow, but we have to be willing to fight today.” — Aaron Bushnell, in 2023
It appears obvious that Israel is attempting to ignite a globalist war in the mideast.
It is my opinion that the primary source of $250M for Kamala, being laundered by ActBlue, is from globalists that are doing everything they can to complete a coup of the U.S. nation, and Trump is leading resistance with freedom-loving citizens.
I see the Federal Reserve scheme has profited the globalist movement by $35 Trillion over the past 100 years. They use the exclusive FRBNY control of Deficit Spending Treasury securities in auctions that have NEVER been audited. Ref. 31 CFR §375.3. If the value went to the government, there would be no inflation, nor any increase in the National Debt. Their profit this year, which legally belongs to the government, will be almost $2 Trillion. Detailed analysis is available.
Those $35 Trillion funds over 100 years, are theorized to have covertly bought shareholder control of all major Fortune 500 corporations, including all MSM, Hollywood, pharmaceutical companies, and many more. They are also used to fund political campaigns of minion liberals INCLUDING $250 M FOR KAMALA with ActBlue and RINOs. George Soros’ foundation is submitted to laundry their profit. William Blum, Michel Chossudovsky, John Perkins and others have documented their use of the IMF, the UN, the CIA, the US military, and of NATO, to control nations and initiate coups. The US is now under attack.
The way I see it, the embezzlement by the Fed/Rothschild/BIS must be exposed to save the Nation and eliminate globalism.
Question to Trump on his confusion about Harris’s skin hue; whether it reflects her Indian or her African heritage:
Are you blatantly racist, or insurrectionist, or both?
When it comes to governance and policy, all the peas in the duopoly pod are indistinguishable!
The D elite, as neolibs and neocons, are merely repurposing Margaret Thatcher’s claim that “there are no alternatives.”
It’s obvious gaslighting–as if we the unimportant underclass were unaware of the alternatives. Like ones that worked such as the New Deal, Euro corporate compromise, Canadian NDP, etc., all abandoned by the neolibs.
Then add how the Biden Dept. of State is run by Cheney trained neocons. Those fans of empire and the endless wars it takes to maintain empire. Oh, and never mind the associated corporate profiteering.
For decades I’ve been asking D party apologists if they support D neolib economics–deregulation, trickle up, treating human and natural resources as things to be used up for corporate profit. For the last few years, asking if they support the overt neocon agenda as well. Never an answer except personal attacks or deflections, straw man, and whataboutisms like “but but but…Trump!”
Okay, Trump bad. Now please explain why neolib neocon D is somehow good. {*crickets*}
Kamala has shown her total contempt for pro-Palestinian protesters more than once. Here’s what she had to say about those demonstrating outside the Capitol as war criminal Netanyahu’s addressed the US Congress: “We saw despicable acts by unpatriotic protestors and dangerous hate-fuelled rhetoric,” she said of the protesters who burnt the American flag (a constitutionally protected right), “I condemn the burning of the American flag. That flag is a symbol of our highest ideals as a nation and represents the promise of America.” If supplying the bombs for Israel’s genocidal war in Gaza is an expression of “our highest Ideals” and the “promise of America”, a Harris presidency doesn’t hold out much hope for Palestinians.
Kamala is a skillful and shrewd politician and quite full of herself. Flags are not symbols of our highest ideals. Their purpose is to identify where one’s side is in the confusion of a battle. Flags are a necessary tool of war. That so many Americans now post our flag on their front porch is evidence of the warrior nation we have become. We have become this way because our “representatives” are bought and paid for by lobbyists of which the most powerful by far is the American Israeli Political Action Committee (AIPAC)
Our culture and our economy are dependent on our government provoking a continuous state of war. This national design dovetails perfectly with the ambitions of the Neocon Zionists and Israel. So perfect is the fit that we are all docilely being led to hell by these Zionist manipulators. We have now reached the end of any legitimate explanation of the threat that the US poses to the World.
Our time is running out. The rest of the world fears us. For now we can still beat them up…and kill them. But, they will not forget. We’ve become merchants of hatred….no matter how many flags we wave.
Bravo Caitlin for speaking truth to those Americans who would rather not hear the truth. But, does Harris really have any choice in the matter, or is she simply following orders from her corporate and Democratic Party bosses?
For truth seekers, check out a recent YouTube video by the wisest person on this subject on Planet Earth, Chris Hedges, in his one-hour “Q&A on 2024 Election.” With grace, aplomb, and brilliance rarely seen, he fields questions submitted by the watching and listening viewers.
Of course she has a choice. That would be to declare her solidarity with peace and justice and condemn in no uncertain words the Genocide. Guess what? She likes being in power, and her monster celebrity status. She has no principles, so her choice is to keep doing what she’s doing. She made a choice.
Israel is by definition an apartheid state, Apartheid, according to international law, is a crime against humanity. Israel is currently committing the crime of genocide against the Palestinian people confined in the Gaza Strip. Harris says that is a shame, but she refuses to say she will support an arms embargo on Israel to disrupt the genocide.
Harris says she supports a two state solution. What she doesn’t say, but must know, is that the Israeli government is firmly opposed to a two state solution.
She also says Iran, Hezbollah and Hamas, but not Israel, are the enemy, and Israel has a right to defend itself.
Why in the world would anyone who believes in the principles enshrined in the US Constitution and Bill of Rights vote for someone as compromised as the double speaking Kamala Harris obviously is?
@donald johnson:
when people state: “israel has a right to defend itself!”,
they tend to forget – or ignore? – the fact that occupiers
cannot claim the right to self-defense in territories they
have been occupying for decades.
The world has gone madder than mad. Thank you Caitlyn for continuing to see, and to say what you see, when so many others have turned over their own powers of observation to those who would keep them blind.
I do think also though, that it would be helpful to continue to use the words Palestine and Palestinian, rather than Gaza and Gazans. It is as if it is just one more attempt, otherwise, knowingly or unknowingly, to erase them completely, which cannot be allowed. Say it, say it LOUD!! FREE PALESTINE!!!
When any one group or individual considers, and operates under the mistaken notion that their rights matter, at the harmful expense of others, they have ceased to have value to humanity.
Hey Kamala!!! Hey Jonathan Greenblatt!!! WE are speaking!!!!! And we won’t tolerate ANYONE who tolerates Genocide, to lead us!
I guess harris doesn’t realize that if she and biden don’t end this ZIONAZI horror show in Gaza, that she won’t be the next prez and the u.s. will be ruled by bozo. Maybe you, Caitlin, should get a bullhorn and speak with her at her next rally.
Thanks once again to Caitlin Johnstone for reporting the hard, uncomfortable facts.
The intelligence-insulting, irrational and immoral message of the so-called progressive media outlets: ‘This is (yet another) “historic” election, we must “vote” for KH and the Ds to “Save US democracy” and “stop Trump”. You MUST VOTE GENOCIDE, in order to save democracy’. What democracy?
If George Carlin were still around, he would have some choice words, but we all can guess what they would be.
The word is HYPE, HYPE, HYPE. They’re selling a product and the product is a sociopathic woman with serious substance abuse issues. After demented genocide joe, we next buy a drug-addled wacko with the same absence of decency and empathy.
Timing, Caitlin. Timing.
First beat Trump. and – yes. nothing may change in Gaza.
It certainly won’t if Trump is elected.
How do you know nothing will change? Certainly, following the Dem/Repub foreign policy duopoly has landed us after 80 years at supporting out and out apartheid, genocide, and ethnic cleansing.
Perhaps it’s time to consider things will not change unless the system changes entirely … systemic collapse is the only way out. Ater all, if you want to get to a new place, you don’t follow the exact same path.
Bring on Trump. Bring on the collapse. Bring on change.
You might want to actually read and think about what Caitlin Johnstone has written.
Thank you for supporting the D brand of kleptocracy, genocide, oligarchy and war. You will be happy that the status-quo will continue, thanks to folks like you. The Bipartisan Consensus always wins. You can also put your money where your keyboard is and write a big check to the KH campaign and another to the Likud Party in Israel.
So, the Genocide is okay because !Trump! won’t do anything about it, just like Harris won’t. Like many craven and unprincipled Dem Party types, this no doubt makes perfect sense to you.
Thanks to all the above commenters replying to the duff.
MY LORD – Does Juliana Stratton realize how much she sounds like the ardent admirers of fake tin soldier George W Bush, as he strutted, chest out, flight jacket-clothed, down the flight deck of that aircraft carrier after the invasion of Iraq started – MISSION ACCOMPLISHED, indeed – to be followed by millions of dead, wounded, life-destroyed not only in Iraq but the MidEast?! By not listening to the important young (and old, like me) voters, and not stopping the complicity of the US in genocide, Kamala is the one, not the protestors, who runs the risk of a Trump victory. And, as with W, there will follow thousands more deaths of innocents
And talk about political stupidity. Did Kamala forget she was in Michigan, where the large Muslim population has made it clear how abhorrent they find the Biden/Harris Administration complicity, thus possibly throwing that state into the Trump column??
There appears to be a growing, smug overconfidence in the Kamala campaign, that might result in its undoing.
Kamala “i will not be silent” Harris
BDS
But Kamala is being silent on Gaza ….