The U.S. president isn’t trying to fool the Chinese government about the military buildup in the Pacific. His comments are aimed at the Western public and U.S. allies.
That U.S. presidents keep hiring someone so tyrannical, corrupt and murderous tells you everything you need to know about the nature of U.S. foreign policy.
If the war machine is alone responsible for placing checks on its nuclear brinkmanship, then there are no real checks on the nuclear brinkmanship of the war machine.
There is a much less centralized network of factors which tips the scales of media coverage to the advantage of the U.S. empire and the forces which benefit from it.
It is more like water for fish. And when you are swimming in it you can’t see it. Only by stepping way, way back is it possible to get a perspective on the way it surrounds you.
Australians are particularly vulnerable to propaganda because the country has the most concentrated media ownership in the Western world, dominated by Nine Entertainment and the Murdoch-owned News Corp.
The West’s pattern of continually escalating nuclear brinkmanship in Ukraine has built-in incentives for Russia to ramp up its own aggressions directly against NATO.
Simpsons characters waving Ukrainian flags; an opera about a drone operator sponsored by General Dynamics; Bono drawing pictures of Zelenksy and Sesame Street working with USAID in Iraq.
The Biden administration has no way of squaring its free-press rhetoric with its persecution of the world’s most famous journalist, writes Caitlin Johnstone.