Australia’s public broadcasting network gave Hillary Clinton an open mike to defame WikiLeaks’ Julian Assange as “a tool of Russian intelligence” without giving him a chance to respond, as John Pilger describes.
By John Pilger
On Oct. 16, the Australian Broadcasting Corporation aired an interview with Hillary Clinton: one of many to promote her score-settling book about why she was not elected President of the United States.
Hillary Clinton at the Code 2017 conference on May 31, 2017.
Wading through the Clinton book, What Happened, is an unpleasant experience, like a stomach upset. Smears and tears. Threats and enemies. “They” (voters) were brainwashed and herded against her by the odious Donald Trump in cahoots with sinister Slavs sent from the great darkness known as Russia, assisted by an Australian “nihilist,” Julian Assange.
In The New York Times, there was a striking photograph of a female reporter consoling Clinton, having just interviewed her. The lost leader was, above all, “absolutely a feminist.” The thousands of women’s lives this “feminist” destroyed while in government — Libya, Syria, Honduras — were of no interest.
In New York magazine, Rebecca Trainster wrote that Clinton was finally “expressing some righteous anger.” It was even hard for her to smile: “so hard that the muscles in her face ache.” Surely, she concluded, “if we allowed women’s resentments the same bearing we allow men’s grudges, America would be forced to reckon with the fact that all these angry women might just have a point.”
Drivel such as this, trivializing women’s struggles, marks the media hagiographies of Hillary Clinton. Her political extremism and warmongering are of no consequence. Her problem, wrote Trainster, was a “damaging infatuation with the email story.” The truth, in other words.
The leaked emails of Clinton’s campaign manager, John Podesta, revealed a direct connection between Clinton and the foundation and funding of organized jihadism in the Middle East and Islamic State (known as ISIS, ISIL or Daesh). The ultimate source of most Islamic terrorism, Saudi Arabia, was central to her career.
One email, in 2014, sent by Clinton to Podesta soon after she stepped down as U.S. Secretary of State, discloses that Islamic State is funded by the governments of Saudi Arabia and Qatar. Clinton accepted huge donations from both governments for the Clinton Foundation.
As Secretary of State, she approved the world’s biggest ever arms sale to her benefactors in Saudi Arabia, worth more than $80 billion. Thanks to her, U.S. arms sales to the world – for use in stricken countries like Yemen – doubled.
This was revealed by WikiLeaks and published by The New York Times. No one doubts the emails are authentic. The subsequent campaign to smear WikiLeaks and its editor-in-chief, Julian Assange, as “agents of Russia,” has grown into a spectacular fantasy known as “Russiagate.” The “plot” is said to have been signed off on by Vladimir Putin himself. There is not a shred of public evidence.
Smear and Omission
The ABC Australia interview with Clinton is an outstanding example of smear and censorship by omission. I would say it is a model.
Russian President Vladimir Putin addresses UN General Assembly on Sept. 28, 2015. (UN Photo)
“No one,” the interviewer, Sarah Ferguson, says to Clinton, “could fail to be moved by the pain on your face at that moment [of the inauguration of Trump] … Do you remember how visceral it was for you?”
Having established Clinton’s visceral suffering, Ferguson asks about “Russia’s role.”
CLINTON: I think Russia affected the perceptions and views of millions of voters, we now know. I think that their intention coming from the very top with Putin was to hurt me and to help Trump.
FERGUSON: How much of that was a personal vendetta by Vladimir Putin against you?
CLINTON: … I mean he wants to destabilize democracy. He wants to undermine America, he wants to go after the Atlantic Alliance and we consider Australia kind of a … an extension of that …
(The opposite is true. It is a combination of Western armies massing on Russia’s border for the first time since the Russian Revolution 100 years ago.)
FERGUSON: How much damage did [Julian Assange] do personally to you?
CLINTON: Well, I had a lot of history with him because I was Secretary of State when, ah, WikiLeaks published a lot of very sensitive, ah, information from our State Department and our Defense Department.
(What Clinton fails to say – and her interviewer fails to remind her – is that in 2010, WikiLeaks revealed that Secretary of State Hillary Clinton had ordered a secret intelligence campaign targeted at the United Nations leadership, including the Secretary General, Ban Ki-Moon and the permanent Security Council representatives from China, Russia, France and the U.K. A classified directive, signed by Clinton, was issued to U.S. diplomats in July 2009, demanding forensic technical details about the communications systems used by top U.N. officials, including passwords and personal encryption keys used in private and commercial networks. This was known as Cablegate. It was lawless spying.)
CLINTON: He [Assange] is very clearly a tool of Russian intelligence. And, ah, he has done their bidding.
(Clinton offered no evidence to back up this serious accusation, nor did Ferguson challenge her.)
CLINTON: You don’t see damaging negative information coming out about the Kremlin on WikiLeaks. You didn’t see any of that published.
(This was false. WikiLeaks has published a massive number of documents on Russia – more than 800,000, most of them critical, many of them used in books and as evidence in court cases.)
A ‘Nihilistic Opportunist’
CLINTON: So I think Assange has become a kind of nihilistic opportunist who does the bidding of a dictator.
WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange at a media conference in Copenhagen, Denmark. (Photo credit: New Media Days / Peter Erichsen)
FERGUSON: Lots of people, including in Australia, think that Assange is a martyr for free speech and freedom of information. How would you describe him? Well, you’ve just described him as a nihilist.
CLINTON: Yeah, well, and a tool. I mean he’s a tool of Russian intelligence. And if he’s such, ah, you know, martyr of free speech, why doesn’t WikiLeaks ever publish anything coming out of Russia?
(Again, Ferguson said nothing to challenge this or correct her.)
CLINTON: There was a concerted operation between WikiLeaks and Russia and most likely people in the United States to weaponize that information, to make up stories … to help Trump.
FERGUSON: Now, along with some of those outlandish stories, there was information that was revealed about the Clinton Foundation that at least in some of the voters’ minds seemed to associate you ….
CLINTON: Yeah, but it was false!
FERGUSON: … with the peddling of information …
CLINTON: It was false! It was totally false! …..
FERGUSON: Do you understand how difficult it was for some voters to understand the amounts of money that the [Clinton] Foundation is raising, the confusion with the consultancy that was also raising money, getting gifts and travel and so on for Bill Clinton that even Chelsea had some issues with? …
CLINTON: Well you know, I’m sorry, Sarah, I mean I, I know the facts ….
Generational ‘Icon’
The ABC interviewer lauded Clinton as “the icon of your generation.” She asked her nothing about the enormous sums she creamed off from Wall Street, such as the $675,000 for speaking to Goldman Sachs, one of the banks at the center of the 2008 crash. Clinton’s greed deeply upset the kind of voters she abused as “deplorables.”
Ousted Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi shortly before he was murdered on Oct. 20, 2011.
Clearly looking for a cheap headline in the Australian press, Ferguson asked her if Trump was “a clear and present danger to Australia” and got her predictable response.
This high-profile journalist made no mention of Clinton’s own “clear and present danger” to the people of Iran whom she once threatened to “obliterate totally,” and the 40,000 Libyans who died in the attack on Libya in 2011 that Clinton orchestrated. Flushed with excitement, the Secretary of State rejoiced at the gruesome murder of the Libyan leader, Colonel Gaddafi.
“Libya was Hillary Clinton’s war,” Julian Assange said in a filmed interview with me last year. “Barack Obama initially opposed it. Who was the person championing it? Hillary Clinton. That’s documented throughout her emails … there’s more than 1,700 emails out of the 33,000 Hillary Clinton emails that we’ve published, just about Libya. It’s not that Libya has cheap oil. She perceived the removal of Gaddafi and the overthrow of the Libyan state — something that she would use in her run-up to the general election for President.
“So in late 2011 there is an internal document called the Libya Tick Tock that was produced for Hillary Clinton, and it’s the chronological description of how she was the central figure in the destruction of the Libyan state, which resulted in around 40,000 deaths within Libya; jihadists moved in, ISIS moved in, leading to the European refugee and migrant crisis.
“Not only did you have people fleeing Libya, people fleeing Syria, the destabilization of other African countries as a result of arms flows, but the Libyan state itself was no longer able to control the movement of people through it.”
This – not Clinton’s “visceral” pain in losing to Trump nor the rest of the self-serving scuttlebutt in her ABC interview – was the story. Clinton shared responsibility for massively de-stabilizing the Middle East, which led to the death, suffering and flight of thousands of women, men and children.
Ferguson raised not a word of it. Clinton repeatedly defamed Assange, who was neither defended nor offered a right of reply on his own country’s state broadcaster.
In a tweet from London, Assange cited the ABC’s own Code of Practice, which states: “Where allegations are made about a person or organisation, make reasonable efforts in the circumstances to provide a fair opportunity to respond.”
‘Putin’s Bitch’
Following the ABC broadcast, Ferguson’s executive producer, Sally Neighbour, re-tweeted the following: “Assange is Putin’s bitch. We all know it!”
The slander, since deleted, was even used as a link to the ABC interview captioned ‘Assange is Putins (sic) b****. We all know it!’
In the years I have known Julian Assange, I have watched a vituperative personal campaign try to stop him and WikiLeaks. It has been a frontal assault on whistleblowing, on free speech and free journalism, all of which are now under sustained attack from governments and corporate Internet controllers.
The first serious attacks on Assange came from the Guardian, which, like a spurned lover, turned on its besieged former source, having hugely profited from WikiLeaks’ disclosures. With not a penny going to Assange or WikiLeaks, a Guardian book led to a lucrative Hollywood movie deal. Assange was portrayed as “callous” and a “damaged personality.”
It was as if a rampant jealousy could not accept that his remarkable achievements stood in marked contrast to that of his detractors in the “mainstream” media. It is like watching the guardians of the status quo, regardless of age, struggling to silence real dissent and prevent the emergence of the new and hopeful.
Today, Assange remains a political refugee from the war-making dark state of which Donald Trump is a caricature and Hillary Clinton the embodiment. His resilience and courage are astonishing. Unlike him, his tormentors are cowards.
John Pilger is an Australian-British journalist based in London. Pilger’s Web site is: www.johnpilger.com. His new film, “The Coming War on China,” is available in the U.S. from www.bullfrogfilms.com
Every dog has it’s day
https://clarityofsignal.com/2017/10/19/metoo-a-course-in-deductive-reasoning-separating-fact-from-fiction-through-the-child-exploitation-of-8-year-old-bana-alabed/
Stay at home mom Kelly Richards from New York after resigning from her full time job managed to average from $6000-$8000 a month from freelancing at home… This is how she done it
……. 21155
???USA~JOB-START
Hillary Clinton – What Happened?
The answer to the question is in the title of the book.
It sounds like more of the usual mis-direction and hog wash.
Follow the leader, as the herd goes off the cliff.
Mr. John Pilger and many like-minded men and women on this Earth provide the example – the easy-to-comprehend “raw truth” model – necessary to emulate if humanity is to successfully end the scourge of criminal, aggressive war.
Mr. Pilger’s interview with Julian Assange before the 2016 vote garnered over 1 million views, and most relevant here and now is that Mr. Assange noted emails revealing Hillary Clinton knew about Saudi/Qatari financing of ISIS was the most important of them all. Ms. Clinton has never faced questioning on that profoundly important and breathtakingly scandalous matter. Neither Hillary Clinton or Donald Trump said anything, nor took any form of corrective moral actions, during the last stretch of the election or since, while Trump has joined Clinton as an active accomplice to state-sponsored terrorism by signing massive weapons contracts with Saudi Arabia’s monarchy.
Ms. Clinton considers Lynn Rothschild one of her closest friends, Libyan leader Gaddafi’s plan for an alternative monetary system for the continent of Africa directly, possibly irrevocably, confronted Rothschild power, Rothschild and Murdoch are major owners of Genie Energy, advised by Dick Cheney, intent on oil/gas extraction in the illegally-occupied by Israel Syrian Golan Heights, and Ms. Clinton guided covert terrorist wars in Libya and Syria, perhaps operating from the “private” branch of her dual “public-private image” Enough said?…
No, not enough said… The warmongers must absolutely be stopped. Thank you to John Pilger and all men and women around the Earth speaking the raw truth..
Martin – Swedish Citizen,
There was a more than 10,000 strong Neo-Nazi torch-lit march in Kiev last Saturday- very threatening pictures. Some sites put the figure at 20,000. There was no mention of it in major U.S. Newspapers or on TV. Do they report it Swedish papers or on TV?
Also, There was a speech by Vladimir Putin at Valdai Discussion Club meeting in Sochi this week. This event or speech is not mentioned in the media. Do they report it in your Media?
It is a very good speech. The link for the text of the speech is:
https://thesaker.is/vladimir-putins-speech-at-the-meeting-of-the-valdai-international-discussion-club/
Thanks for the link. Imagine how much the average person’s opinion of Putin would change if the MSM actually covered what the man says instead of constantly seeking to make him into a boogyman.
Thank you, Mr Pilger for another important article.
I find it incomprehensible this bloody-handed Lady Macbeth has not been ostracized. There is no cure for her dementia.
Read more: https://canadianviews-ymo.ca/our-universal-affliction/
Dishonest does not even scratch the surface.
The level of criminality of our leaders and the lengths to which every aspect of our system, (media, social media, politicians, justice Department, Attorney General, FBI, CIA) go about protecting and colluding with their crimes is truely mindboggling.
Thank you! You inspired your fellow Australian, and we’d love to see you interview with her! https://medium.com/@caityjohnstone/hillary-clinton-just-told-five-blatant-lies-about-wikileaks-f463d66b63ef
I’d also love to see Consortium News pick up some of Caitlin’s articles.
I shared your excellent article, Mr. Pilger.
Thank you John Pilger for this excellent piece. MSM journalism has no legitimacy left in the USA since the repeal of the Fairness Doctrine. And the same is obviously true of it’s vassal states. Now it is all STRATCOM, propaganda’s new acronym. Thank you for speaking truth to power. I wish you a long life and success in your battle.
Who is Hillary’s bitch? MSNBC? CNN? The New York Times? The Washington Post? The entire mainstream media?
“Clinton repeatedly defamed Assange, who was neither defended nor offered a right of reply on his own country’s state broadcaster.
In a tweet from London, Assange cited the ABC’s own Code of Practice, which states: “Where allegations are made about a person or organisation, make reasonable efforts in the circumstances to provide a fair opportunity to respond.”
‘Putin’s Bitch’
Following the ABC broadcast, Ferguson’s executive producer, Sally Neighbour, re-tweeted the following: “Assange is Putin’s bitch. We all know it!”
The slander, since deleted, was even used as a link to the ABC interview captioned ‘Assange is Putins (sic) b****. We all know it!’“
Disgusting! I shouldn’t be surprised, as this demonstrates that Ferguson, Neighbour, and Clinton are very much alike. They flout international, organizational, or ethical rules, then cackle their delight in having done so! (We came, we saw, we slandered…?)
I’m surprised that Hillary Clinton can even talk given the torrent of bile gushing into her throat. This venal, avaricious, hideously ambitious and self-entitled woman must die a thousand deaths when alone in the dark and pinned down under the weight of having lost to an orange ogre. Considering the chaos, death and destruction she has sown there just might be something to the notion of karma after all.
In the photograph associated with this article, you can see how bloated her face is and how phony her expression looks. I would bet she is on anti-depressants. I firmly believe that there is something to the notion of karma, and that her actions are already causing her much suffering. One of the real ironies is that she has become an icon for the feminist movement, and it seems her main goal is to be as evil as the Rich White Fat Men that rule the world. If that is equality, thinking women should want none of it.
There is a book review of “What Happened” by Emmett Rensin which has raised some eyebrows because of this title for the review:
“A Review of What Happened by an Author Who Insists He Has Never Heard of Hillary Clinton or the 2016 Election”
That title bugged me a bit too, especially after I googled the author’s name and learned that he had written quite extensively about the 2016 election. Upon closer examination I found what I and most others had missed on the first pass.
My take on this now is that if Hillary could invent a world where her book “What Happened” made some kind of sense, then Mr. Rensin could do the same by pretending to be a Man From Mars who was looking at the book as if all parties involved were strangers to him.
Seen in that light, I found his review to be quite good reading about Queen Hillary and her airs.
h**ps://www.pastemagazine.com/articles/2017/10/what-happened-review-so-long.html
Thatr’s a masterpiece!
WikiLeaks was created and funded by Karl Lundstrum a Swedish Nazi…..everyone sends in information or Data to wikileaks and all that goes into BND database servers.
Snowden and his bunch are also nazis (cia)….alt right new cover name for fascists…..wake up.
Agenda 21….beware fascism.
Meanwhile, the DNC subverts democracy in the name of, well, in the name of democracy! Hillary’s hands are dripping with blood. ALL are out-in-the-open-facts. I doubt Karl and crew could manage to do anything that would even register on the radar, IF, that is, they are purposely engaged in distortion and killing as are the “democracy champions” known as the US govt.
Either Pilger is a stooge or he’s also a Nazi supporter. Good look supporting either ridiculous angle.
CN is awash in propaganda troll “comments” peddling all angles of conspiracy theory. From the “fascism” frets of “ed” to the “Synarchism” scares of “Brad Owen”, there’s ridiculous bilge aplenty.
Agenda 21 is a non-binding, voluntarily implemented action plan of the United Nations with regard to sustainable development.
Adopted during the Earth Summit (UN Conference on Environment and Development) held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 1992, Agenda 21 is an action agenda for the UN, other multilateral organizations, and individual governments around the world that can be executed at local, national, and global levels.
https://www.alternet.org/story/153554/how_right-wing_conspiracy_theories_may_pose_a_genuine_threat_to_humanity?
Tea Party movement activists and others have promoted the conspiracy theory that Agenda 21 was part of a UN plot to deny property rights, undermine U.S. sovereignty, force citizens to move to cities, and “subjugate humanity under an eco-totalitarian regime.”
Agenda 21 fears have played a role in opposition to local government’s efforts to promote resource and land conservation, build bike lanes, and construct hubs for public transportation.
In 2012, conservative media pundit Glenn Beck, well-known for echoing the decades-old right-wing extremism of the John Birch Society, co-wrote a dystopian novel titled “Agenda 21”. In the same year, Agenda 21 paranoia “went mainstream” when the Republican National Committee adopted a platform resolution stated that “We strongly reject the U.N. Agenda 21 as erosive of American sovereignty.” Several state and local governments have considered or passed motions and legislation “opposed” to the purported evils of Agenda 21.
The only problem with Julian Assange and Wikileaks is the fact that they managed to piss off the wrong people.
Imagine if the shoe were on the other foot and the Washington Post got hold of a batch of compromising Putin emails a month before the Russian presidential election. Do you think they would not publish them for fear of corrupting Russian democracy? Nonsense! It would raining Pulitzer Prizes at the WaPo for such a scoop.
As Hillary is so hot on globalization it seems she would be happy to have foreign news outlets reporting on her “doings” as Assange et.al. are doing. When a domestic news source like the WaPo feels to pressured to run a negative political story, a foreign outlet will have no such qualms, thus strengthening global government transparency.
It sounds like you think Trump and Putin are not pushing the same NWO agenda.
Big mistake.
OK, ed, why is it you fear a BAD system taking over the entire planet? You think it’s really capable of thwarting nature too?
Any NWO structure is going to take more energy to maintain than nature is going to be able to provide. Entropy wins, every time.
Don’t get me wrong, I DO believe there are folks with such aspirations (all the world’s top power players). But, if you look around the world what you’ll see is less to do with convergence than with divergence: up until the world’s banking system collapsed in 2008 things looked like a shoe-in, global trade was really pushing us all toward that NWO end. I suppose you could try and convince me that the BREXIT stuff is really to push countries out of the EU and into a NWO. Maybe that’s part of some plan. But, I see a lot of angry and disenfranchised people who are more and more leery of politicians: this is one reason why the likes of Trump got enough support to creep into the WH. Could you be implying, perhaps, that this move toward nationalism is really about making the jump to NWO? In the US there’s a push for nationalism and I can see it actually being a front for corporate take-over (destruction of the govt); and it is corporations, not some super nation state, that is more likely to transcend borders and take global control.
At any rate, and this is what I pretty much KNOW, it all fails. Panic left. Panic right. Don’t much matter. The real “enemy” is entropy (and you ain’t going to beat it).
The Universe is organized along anti-entropic principles. That is WHY Life has carried on, on this Planet, for billions of years, in the face of your Great God Entropy. Wake up and see, Seer.
Not only has Life carried on, IT has organized Itself into ever-higher Complexities, also in the face of your Great God Entropy. Wake up!
Not only has Life organized Itself into ever higher Complexity, IT has spawned the Grand Heirarchy of Gods and Goddesses. The Creator IS LIFE itself, made manifest, in Cosmogenic Panentheism, and will continue the Grand Play of LIFE as long as IT wishes to, in the face of your Great God Entropy. Wake up!
Light appeared in the midst of Darkness, and Darkness comprehended IT not. Wake up, as YOU are of The Light, NOT the Darkness.
reply to Seer….
The energy you allude to is already in existence ….the point being is harnessing that energy to weaponize it….that too is already done.
As far as Brexit goes that is a good thing…breaking up the EU is a good thing.
But in reality I believe the reason for Brexit is,,,,to allow Britain out and the eventual Taking over of NATO by Germany…officially.
Beware delusional trolls like “ed” and “Brad Owen”
Julian Assange and Wikileaks have no connection to Swedish financier Carl Lundström.
In 2003-2005, Lundström’s company Rix Telecom provided services and equipment to torrent tracker The Pirate Bay. Lundström was one of the four defendants in 2009 The Pirate Bay trial charged with “accessory to breaching copyright law”. Stockholm district court found all defendants guilty, but the verdict was appealed and the appeal was a partial success.
WikiLeaks founder Assange came to global prominence in 2010, when WikiLeaks published a series of leaks provided by Chelsea Manning. These leaks included the Collateral Murder video (April 2010), the Afghanistan war logs (July 2010), the Iraq war logs (October 2010), the CableGate release of a quarter of a million diplomatic cables (November 2010).
After WikiLeaks released the Manning material, US authorities began investigating WikiLeaks and Assange personally with a view to prosecuting them under the Espionage Act of 1917.
In November 2010 US Attorney-General Eric Holder said there was “an active, ongoing criminal investigation” into WikiLeaks. It emerged from legal documents leaked over the ensuing months that Assange and others were being investigated by a federal grand jury in Alexandria, Virginia.
In November 2010, a request was made for Assange’s extradition to Sweden, where he had been questioned months earlier over allegations of sexual assault. Assange has consistently denied the allegations.Assange expressed concern that he would be extradited from Sweden to the United States because of his perceived role in publishing the secret American documents.
Assange surrendered himself to UK police on 7 December 2010, and was held for ten days before being released on conditional bail.
In 2011, Assange changed his Swedish legal representation to attorneys Per Samuelson and Thomas Olsson. Samuelson was selected by Assange due to his knowledge of the Swedish legal system and its poor treatment of suspects. The attorney had represented Lundström in the 2009 Pirate Bay trial.
Having been unsuccessful in his challenge to the Swedish extradition proceedings, Assange sought political asylum at the Ecuadorian Embassy in London.
Assange was concerned not about any proceedings in Sweden as such, but that deportation to Sweden could lead to a politically motivated deportation to the United States, where he could face severe penalties, up to the death sentence, for his activities related to WikiLeaks.
Formally granted asylum by Ecuador in August 2012, Assange has remained in the London Embassy since then.
On 5 February 2016, the UN’s Working Group on Arbitrary Detention concluded that Assange had been subject to arbitrary detention by the UK and Swedish Governments since 7 December 2010. According to the UN group, Assange should be allowed free of movement and be given compensation. The UK and Swedish governments rejected the claim.
On 19 May 2017, Swedish prosecutors dropped their investigation into the accusation against Assange and applied to revoke the European arrest warrant.
Although Assange is free to leave the Ecuadorian Embassy, the Metropolitan Police in London have indicated that an arrest warrant is still in force for Assange’s breach of the conditional bail.
Hillary and Donald are both sociopaths. They are of the same mold.
As bad as these people are, however, they are not the string-pullers. Hillary, though, cannot plead ignorance (as can, and rightly so, Donald).
Hillary is so disgusting, I can’t even stand to see her picture, much less anything she might have to say.
You are aware that Hilary Clinton is not the president, aren’t you? Donald j Trump is the president. Ms, Clinton cannot cause a war, but Mr. Trump could a lot of damage. Stay in your lane. Defend your president, taking shots at Clinton is not going to change your miserable situation.
tina, I do not like the bashing when it entails gender (specific) references, but I also don’t believe gender gets a free pass. Anyone remember Condoliza(sp?) Rice? A woman AND black! Clearly, being a woman and being black didn’t keep her from pushing for war. Anyway, regarding Clinton, which is what this article by Pilger is much about, her accusations against Assange are totally without merit. Clinton has, in fact, lied, lied a LOT. I consider her just as nasty as any of the other warmongering politicians, which one can now add the clown Trump to this list.
I didn’t vote for the Black guy. I didn’t vote for the Woman. And I didn’t vote for the White guy. ALL were/are NOT supporters of peace. ALL have bloodied hands. As MLK came to see it, there cannot be justice at home if there’s not justice everywhere else. Clinton felt good about killing when she was in Govt. There is no defense for her or her actions (nor will there be for Trump).
Seer – Excellent comments; well put and to the point.
No offense intended John Pilger. I was being a bit snarky with “Loretta”.
Why does anyone bother listening to this notorious liar?
Who are you calling a liar, dear sweet Hillary? Or is it that nasty old man, John Pilger?
All true, and Hillary Clinton is sick making, her lies, her campaign, the bogus claims about “Russiagate”, etc. (Not that Trump isn’t too.)
However 10 days ago Pilger simply lied in a CN essay saying that Bernie Sanders supported the Iraq war, though yes Pilger did say that Sanders voted against it. (What I suppose Pilger was trying to get at ineptly was Sanders voting for funding for that war.)
So tell that big a lie, and you won’t get taken seriously when point out facts about Hillary Clinton.
Thanks for clarifying that, Jay! How stupid of me to think that voting to fund a war wasn’t supporting it.
Roza Shanina, very funny response.
Roza Shanina:
That’s right.
You see how long you remain in office when you cut off funds to families from Vermont fighting in that illegal war.
‘Pilger simply lied in a CN essay saying that Bernie Sanders supported the Iraq war …’
In referring to Sanders, I wrote the following:.
‘Like Clinton, Sanders is a cold-warrior and “anti-communist” obsessive with a proprietorial view of the world beyond the United States. Sanders supported Bill Clinton’s and Tony Blair’s illegal assault on Yugoslavia in 1998 and the invasions of Afghanistan, Syria and Libya, as well as Barack Obama’s campaign of terrorism by drone (although he did vote against George W. Bush’s invasion of Iraq).’
If you are not a stupid troll, why behave like one?
JP
Wow! If you are the real John Pilger, thank you for this article and all of your other work! I think there are only a handful of journalist like yourself on this planet anymore. Thank you!!!
John Pilger:
Sorry not buying it, in there, now missing, was a line about Sanders supporting the Iraq war but having voted against it.
You can start by linking the piece.
Oh, and it’s a big stretch, basically a lie, to say that Sanders supported the Libya fiasco.
(If you’d just stuck with the truth you’d read a bit more informed, but now you’ve undermined yourself further, if you really are John Pilger.)
Thanks for posting, you’ve dug yourself in deeper.
Jay-
I’m pretty sure that most readers see your defense of Sanders as pretty lame. I was a Bernie supporter until he caved to the Clinton machine, but I always thought he wasn’t adamant enough about standing up to the war machine, and his notion that Saudi Arabia should “get their hands dirty” fighting terrorism was laughable, since they are major sponsors of those same terrorists. Their hands are soaked with the blood of innocents.
John Pilger is speaking truth to power, and if you want to be part of the peace movement, you should stand with him.
Skip Scott –
Yes. I completely agree.
John Pilger has been one of those very few journalists who had spoken truth to the powers for over five decades now. There had been very few journalists of his caliber – a rare journalist in honesty, integrity, morality, and compassion. He has earned the appreciation and gratitude of millions of us who believe in peace and justice.
Skip Scott:
I’m pretty sure you weren’t a Sanders supporter in 2015/16, else you’d know that he said he’d endorse and campaign for the 2016 Democratic nominee if that person were not he.
Where did I bring up Saudi Arabia? I’m well aware of what Sanders said.
Whatever the original Pilger Oct 7th post said, it included the untruth (quoted above) about Sanders supporting the Libya invasion. Sanders did no such thing. It is a standard Hillary Clinton defender lie to claim that Sanders did so.
(Yes, he did vote on a non-binding resolution saying “it’s best if Gadaffi goes, that’s pretty effin’ far from supporting for the Obama war.)
John Pilger, in the CN Oct 7th essay, would have been on much firmer ground if he’d attacked Sanders for pushing of the neo-McCarthyite “Russian hacking/meddling” garbage. Something Sanders has done repeatedly and clearly for months now.
I note you don’t raise this point either. Again more than suggesting you don’t pay attention to Sanders.
Jay-
When the wikileaks documents came out showing the DNC purposely sandbagged his campaign and promoted Hillary, he had every right at that point to renege on his promise to support the democratic nominee. His caving to the Clinton machine, and expecting his supporters to follow him like he was the pied piper to support Hillary, is a major reason we have his royal Orangeness on the throne.
And frankly, I don’t give a flying f**k what you think I know and don’t know.
Jay-
This from Jeffrey St.Clair at counterpunch:
Sanders supported Bill Clinton’s war on Serbia, voted for the 2001 Authorization Unilateral Military Force Against Terrorists (AUMF), which pretty much allowed Bush to wage war wherever he wanted, backed Obama’s Libyan debacle and supports an expanded US role in the Syrian Civil War.
More problematic for the Senator in Birkenstocks is the little-known fact that Bernie Sanders himself voted twice in support of regime change in Iraq. In 1998 Sanders voted in favor of the Iraq Liberation Act of 1998, which said: “It should be the policy of the United States to support efforts to remove the regime headed by Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq and to promote the emergence of a democratic government to replace that regime.”
Later that same year, Sanders also backed a resolution that stated: “Congress reaffirms that it should be the policy of the United States to support efforts to remove the regime headed by Saddam Hussein from power in Iraq and to promote the emergence of a democratic government to replace that regime.”
Guess you got some ‘splainin’ to do.
“More problematic for the Senator in Birkenstocks”
Kind refutes your entire point.
Big deal, in 1998, Sanders said Saddam Hussein is a bad guy who should go. That’s pretty effin’ far from “we should invade Iraq”. Hills thought that was a great idea. Trump thought it an okay idea. Hillary defended the war for years. Not Sanders, and no not even Trump.
You read a lot like Hillary defenders in 2015 and early 2016 when they realized Sanders wasn’t going away. Not real surprising.
Sanders in say July 2016 hypothetically saying: “I won’t endorse Hillary Clinton because of the evidence of the DNC rigging the primary against my nomination” would have resulted in more blame being cast upon Sanders when Trump won. Hillary has already tried to blame Sanders, so have various NY Times columnist, and other mainstream talking heads.
“And frankly, I don’t give a flying f**k what you think I know and don’t know.”
Well you’ve demonstrated that you don’t know much about Sanders.
Sanders most certainly did NOT back Obama’s Libya war. But please keep posting false equivalences and outright lies, and using terms of belittlement (Birkenstocks). Your actions remind the world of why Hillary lost and how her defenders helped to drive voters away from her.
If you’d just stuck with the Serbia thing, which followed a long civil war which even the likes of Chris Hedges admit occured and had real villains, then you’d be on firmer ground. But instead…
Jay-
Talk about wild speculation:
“Sanders in say July 2016 hypothetically saying: “I won’t endorse Hillary Clinton because of the evidence of the DNC rigging the primary against my nomination” would have resulted in more blame being cast upon Sanders when Trump won.”
My speculation is that like myself, many Sanders supporters absolutely hated Hillary, and went 3rd party in the general election. Some even went over to Trump, and many didn’t vote at all. Sanders had a lot of support among independents. If he had gone over to the Green party after the wikileaks revelations, he probably would have gotten to 15% and been able to make the televised debates. He would have succeeded in blowing up the corrupt two party system, taught the democrats a lesson, and been President today. He blew it big time. Either that or he was in on it as a way to “play” the youth vote.
In any case, there are plenty of other possible outcomes to Bernie challenging the democratic convention and/or going over to the Green Party than the one you offer.
Please provide evidence that Sanders didn’t support the Libyan fiasco. How else did he think Gadaffi was going to “go”? Maybe if we asked him nicely?
As for Bernie spewing the Russiagate nonsense, I was aware of it, but just didn’t bother to mention it. It is however more evidence that he isn’t the man many of us thought he was.
Oh, and BTW, it was St Clair’s quote about the Birkenstocks, not me.
Right Skip,
You’ve wildly speculated that Sanders was going to break with the Democratic party and not endorse the eventual nominee that nominee weren’t he. Again, then he’d be blamed even more for Trump.
Also, you’re stuck with the “Senator Birkenstock” garbage. It screams “I wasn’t a Sanders supporter”. I don’t care if you were quoting, you were quoting with approval. Right, the line isn’t original.
“Please provide evidence that Sanders didn’t support the Libyan fiasco. ”
He specifically spoke out against supporting unknown “rebels” in Libya, didn’t push the war.
That you don’t know these things off the top of your head says again “I wasn’t paying attention to Sanders, I was a Hillary supporter”.
Dictators have been bought off, or encouraged to resign and allow new parties to form. Your insistence that Sanders supported the war in Libya is getting ugly. It’s the kind of ugly false equivalence Hillary used in that Michigan primary debate. Technically, lying in a debate, as she did there, lost her the debate.
Regards the general election:
Right, Hillary turned off voters. But far more importantly than that she didn’t spend big on a get out the vote campaign, this includes getting people registered and getting them to the polls in close states like Michigan.
She was really stupid and and entitled to think she didn’t have to spend big money on the ground in close states. Obama sure did in both 2008 and 2012.
In the book “Shattered”, it’s recorded that in early Oct. 2016, Donna Brazile specifically warned camp Hillary that they were running a weak on the ground game in MI, PA, FL, and NC. Obama won 3 of those 4 states twice. This arrogance is what cost Hillary the election, it wasn’t Green voters.
Jay-
I was never a Hillary supporter, and if I’ve been around this site for a while, so if you’re a regular comment reader, you’d realize how ridiculous that accusation is. Further down this comment stream I made a statement about how evil she is a couple days ago.
You, however, are obsessed with Sanders to the point of willful blindness. I stand with John Pilger’s assessment of Sanders and Clinton. And if you were more than a lazy troll, you’d provide links to support your points. I recall going rounds with you over the inaccuracy of polls some months back; you were wrong then, and you’re wrong now.
LJ:
“His policy positions were for the most part nonsensical and the numbers would never have added up.”
How so? Be specific.
Sanders hasn’t been in the Senate for decades.
LJ:
News to me that Sanders was talking about forgiving current student loan debt. Got a link from 2015?
Also, paying for tuition free public university education was well explained by Sanders. You can look up what financial transaction tax is. The USA had one until the early 1960s.
“How about Single Payer Health Care when no one will vote for it including most Democrats.”
So more “no we can’t”. Thanks for reminding the world of how weak a candidate Hillary Clinton is.
I think Grassley is now starting to stir things up a bit about the Russian Uranium deal. It will be interesting to see if it goes anywhere.
Dear JP,
Thank you for all the incredible work you have done over many years.
It is immeasurably important.
Without journalists like you, Julian Assange and many others such as Vanessa Beeley, Eva Bartlett, and whisleblowers such as Chelsea Manning and Ed Snowden, the lies of the MSM would have gone unchallenged.
Much respect..
So, while against my neighbor going on a rampage and killing a bunch of people (note to HLS: this is a hypothetical! I have NO such neighbor!) I give him money to buy weapons, KNOWING that he’ll do this, THIS is OK?
Seer:
Right, because with those guns for your neighbor, you’re also providing food, medical care, etc for your neighbor and his entire family.
Oh and at that point, yes people really are shooting back at your neighbor.
So cutting off funds would say to your neighbor: “I want you and your kids starving and dead”, see how long you’d hold office after such a vote.
I also suggest you go back and look at each Iraq war funding vote and Sanders position/vote over the years, it’s nowhere near as simple as John Pilger implied ten days ago.
So Pilger’s ‘lie’ was in fact, the truth. Nice one, Jay.
Thank you!
This is more than enough to explain why voters were disgusted with Mrs Clinton .
My country, too, has played a disgusting role in the case of Assange, and Swedish media, not least state broadcaster SVT, demonstrate the same perverted journalism.
Btw, exquisitely put;
“ the war-making dark state of which Donald Trump is a caricature and Hillary Clinton the embodiment”
Although a non-native speaker, I must say Mr Pilger’s language is a fringe benefit to enjoy.
Martin – Swedish Citizen,
I posted a response to your comments. I do not why, it got posted way down. I will post it here again.
Martin – Swedish Citizen,
There was a more than 10,000 strong Neo-Nazi torch-lit march in Kiev last Saturday- very threatening pictures. Some sites put the figure at 20,000. There was no mention of it in major U.S. Newspapers or on TV. Do they report it Swedish papers or on TV?
Also, There was a speech by Vladimir Putin at Valdai Discussion Club meeting in Sochi this week. This event or speech is not mentioned in the media. Do they report it in your Media?
It is a very good speech. The link for the text of the speech is:
https://thesaker.is/vladimir-putins-speech-at-the-meeting-of-the-valdai-international-discussion-club/
The global public are fools; that get pulled to and fro, by the ministries of propaganda, that includes the alt right.
Beware Fascism!
I would rather spend a year with one of Satan’s whores than spend an hour with this evil creature. She embodies everything that’s corrupt and shabby about the American political system. She slithers around MSM outlets like some kind sewer snake, hissing and spewing her bile wherever she can. The woman’s character is so low, its lower than a worms belly. This hideous excuse for a woman is like a festering pustule leaking pus and disease wherever she goes. She makes Dracula’s brides seem positively charming. I really don’t like this woman. I wonder if anyone actually pays Clinton to interview her? “surely not” This spawn of the devil should be kept well away from human and animal society and not feted and lionised by some stupid rsole who thinks they are a journalist.
Over 2000 thousand years of women being compared to snakes, or should I say, skanks, yes, we are a slithery, slimy, moist , creepy
gender. I would rather be all those things than a dick.
FWIW – it doesn’t appear that John Wilson was at *all* referring to women in general. Just Clinton. And that description was apt.
Clinton being female shouldn’t at all protect her from being called out for the slime she is. That’s an essential point of feminism: hold us responsible for our individual characters and actions – gender is utterly irrelevant.
If you want examples of terrific female politicans that aren’t at ALL slimy, look towards the likes of Nina Turner and Tulsi Gabbard! :)
AMEN Janet. Clinton hides behind her gender and the only people sadder than she is, are the fools who fall for her manipulative BS. She’s nothing but a corrupt demagogue.
In this case the comparisson is apt. To compare her to snakes (or skanks) is an insult to snakes (and skanks).
Good comment!
Tina,
Oh my-such obvious penis envy. (From a Psi Chi member.)
Hillary Clinton continues to show why did not deserve one single vote. The only rational reason any informed and decent person could have voted for her is an assessment that Donald Trump was even worse.
So much for the ABC as any kind of bastion of good journalism and truth telling, at least in this case.
/Donald Trump was even worse/ Maybe, but who is responsible for that?
Julian Assange: “WikiLeaks has a pristine record for accuracy. HRC is not a credible person. The primary cause of her downfall was her own Machiavellian scheme to elevate Mr. Trump (“Pied Piper”).”
Just as Bernie was cheated by the Clintons, DNC and MSM, Trump was elevated:
The ABC is a sewer of hard Right agit-prop. It is dominated by thugs from Rightwing ‘think-tanks’ and the Murdoch cancer, and the Groupthink is 100%. In particularly the pro-jihadist lies re. Syria and the unrelenting hate propaganda against Russia and China is quite hysterical.
Simon says: Donald Trump was even worse
Thanks Mr. Pilger. “Unlike him, his tormentors are cowards.” Truer words have never been written.
Trump campaigned on friendly, cooperative relations with Russia and China. For THIS reason alone, Hillary, your Shadow Government is trying to coup him out of office, because YOUR compatriots insist upon war, cold or hot, to KEEP your compatriots in the Shadow Government in place and strong. Trump goes to China in a couple of weeks, and no doubt will be sold on the value to America in joining the New Silk Road world-wide infrastructure project, which will cancel our on-coming stock market crash and literally beat our swords into plowshares, in a new New Deal. THIS is what your compatriot war criminals strive to PREVENT, as it will ruin YOUR criminal war-gaming around the world. The World gained a new lease on life , with your defeat… However, your Shadow Government compatriots struggle on, trying keep war alive and thriving. This is the true situation. The Creator cancelled plans for WWIII holocaust, and sent Coyote Trickster in (the MOST unlikely hero) to make it happen.
It takes a slimy, deceitful bastard to defeat slimy, deceitful bastards. Coyote Trickster is the Bastard for the job.
Coyote will NEVER measure up to the ideal standards of an iconic Hero, and is no friend (nor enemy, either) to humanity, but He is the “Man” for the job.
Brad, your idea that it takes more crazy to fix this crazy world is crazy. Does it not occur to you that maybe less crazy and more sane is a better way to fix things? The idea that Trump is some kind of secret genius who will save us all is CRAZY.
The Way to less crazy must first be cleared. Did you think the first troops to hit the beaches of Normandy would make it to Germany the following year? Many knew they would die along the way. Do not think there is not already a War going on, for the Soul of America. There is.
Furthermore, Mike, now is not the time for the good reverend jimmy carter to be prez. That comes later. Trump knows what he is dealing with, because he is just like them. His main (ONLY) value is he wants to do something different from what they want to do, and he is not above dirtying himself with their slimy company, if it gains an advantage further down the road. He is not above trickery and deceit, and he won’t telegraph his punch and charge headlong into their ranks, like JFK. He’s by no means a martyr, and he wants to win more than anything else, which means having to stay alive to do so. He wants to hang the scalps of these war-mongering bastards on his belt as trophies. No, now is not the time for the good reverend jimmy carter to be the prez. The “something different” will told to him by Presedent Xi in China, and it will be irresistibly appealing to his businessman/real estate developer instincts, and his overgrown ego. Ironically, it will put him into the top ranks of the few, very best Presidents we ever had, IF he pulls it off (a big if).
And as for your judgement upon me that I am crazy, Mike, I care not in the least. I mean exactly what I say. I am a Reader. I read books, I read maps, I read people. It is my Talent. Books mysteriously find their way to my hands, and I don’t question it. I comment when I feel the need, and not otherwise.
Posted in the wrong place. See my comment above.
The Hasbara propaganda troll army has “hit the beaches”, and “Brad Owen” has got the “conspiracy theory” crazy guns blazing.
Note the signature Hasbara swipe at former president Jimmy Carter, who hosted talks between Menachem Begin of Israel and Anwar Sadat of Egypt that led to the Egypt–Israel Peace Treaty.
Carter observes that Israel’s continued illegal occupation and settlement of Palestinian land have been primary obstacles to a comprehensive peace agreement in the Middle East.
That’s why Carter gets sprayed with the crazy gun of “Brad Owen”.
It’s no mystery why “Brad Owen” comments when “the need” arises, “and not otherwise”.
Brad, i most often agree with you but in this case mike is right (not that you are crazy but about Trump not being our saviour) I mean we are less than a year into his presidency and already he has just all but declared war on North Korea with a cavalier threat to totally annihilate that country, aims to dismantel the Iran nuclear deal, is accelerating Climate Change with a pro-business anti-environment head of the EPA, all these things have diminished respect around the world in way Bush could not have done in 3 terms (NO! I am not defending Bush). The man is unstable and has the power to launch a first strike against North Korea. We need to stop talking about him as someone who has the conviction and character to take on the war machine. He is no lessor evil than Clinton…he is just a different evil. Where she is calculating he is impulsive. God save us if Kim Jong un sends one too many tweets insulting Trump’s manhood. He is a child with no thought to how his words and actions effect the people of the world. He is no “unlikely hero.”
Mom- you are the cruelest and fairest of them all
“Fergusonl and Neighbour are Murdoch’s bitches. We all know that!”