U.S. Journalists and Professors Appearing on RT America Get Blacklisted

Click here to access article by Pam Martens and Russ Martens from Wall Street on Parade. (Note: Christopher, an online supporter from northwestern Oregon, alerted me to this article.)

With the election/selection of Donald Trump as CEO of America, Inc. we have seen the dramatic rise of a new campaign to smear dissent by independent journalists, bloggers, and now professors as reported by this article. I am of the opinion that this has little to do with his election, but is a symptom of a fear that is gripping powerful political circles among the US capitalist ruling class. This fear has been activated by setbacks in their extensive efforts to destabilize Syria, the diminishing prospects for a Trans-Pacific Partnership agreement, the increasing influence of dissent within the US (especially among alienated young people), and other indications that the US Empire is losing power in the world in the face of challenges by Russia and China.

Thus if I am correct (I don't pretend to be omniscient), we would have seen exactly the same phenomenon if Hillary Clinton had won the election/selection. This conforms to my long held position that it is the ruling class that decides important issues, policies, and even who is elected/selected to head the government. Because we only see the top of this political iceberg and it is very difficult to see what lies below the sea of ruling class intrigue, we tend to focus too much attention on what lies visibly above. 

What is currently disturbing to many is the increasing appearance of blacklists of dissenters, the most recent of which is what this article reports:

...200 university and college professors have been placed on a new Professor Watchlist being operated by Turning Point USA, a right-wing nonprofit run by 23-year old Charlie Kirk who spoke this year at the Republican National Convention. Kirk has raised well over $1 million from conservatives to spread the “free markets/small government” mantra at high school and university campuses....

Many allusions have been made to the McCarthy period regarding these lists, but I think conditions today are quite different from the 1950s. Then there was very little of an alternative media to challenge ruling class media. The latter had an almost exclusive monopoly over discourse and they used this to instill fear of the Russians and Communist subversion of our country that reached hysterical proportions. Then the US reigned supreme in the world and our ruling class was clearly high on their drugs of power and profit that lay before them for the taking. Today they are increasingly challenged especially by Russia and China, and by the dissenters in alternative media at home. They are losing their battles with Russia and China, but in desperation they are now directing their frustrated wrath on dissenters and alternative media.

If my argument is correct, then we should not cower in fear but redouble our efforts to expose the ongoing lies that our masters spread throughout their corporate media while supporting in any way we can independent journalists and credible dissenters.

Climate change: three tales about extraordinary insanity. Part 1

Click here to access article by Will Denayer from Flassbeck Economics International (Germany).

This short series on climate change is in three parts. In the first part, I explain some of the latest findings about the climate. Things are looking increasingly poor, not to say outright disastrous. Incredibly, there is no reaction whatsoever.

(Part 2 is posted here.)

Why U.S. 'News' Media Shouldn't Be Trusted

Click here to access article by Eric Zuesse from Strategic Culture Foundation.

My quick reading of this article suggests that Zuesse argues that we are constantly being lied to by "authoritative sources"; but in spite of this, we continue to go back to those same sources in the future. He doesn't offer any explanation for this rather startling discovery except he posits that people like to be lied to. So, permit me to offer my explanation of his discovery which I believe to be absolutely true as his assembled evidence attests to.

This phenomenon of lying which many people support offers another clue as to what kind of society we live in. Although out of fashion in today's worldview (dictated by capitalists in the ruling class of the US Empire), we live in a class structured society that pretends, for historical reasons, to be some sort of "democracy". This ideological edifice requires a tremendous amount of lying. Those who fail to go along with ruling class lies are punished as outcasts and forced to live very marginal lives. This fact of reality effectively discourages most people from being dissidents and actively opposing capitalist ruling class policies and actions. It also offers an explanation of why they look to ruling class explanations which are always made clear in corporate media. You see, Karl Rove, one of the major ruling class handlers for George W. Bush, expressed this fact of reality very well when he said:

We're an empire now, and when we act, we create our own reality. And while you're studying that reality—judiciously, as you will—we'll act again, creating other new realities, which you can study too, and that's how things will sort out. We're history's actors … and you, all of you, will be left to just study what we do.

Hence most people who cannot accept leading marginal lives look to corporate media to define their reality; and with the election of Donald Trump as figurehead CEO of the Empire, which was a shock to many people, they figure that the reality has changed and they want to learn about this new reality by following corporate "news" media.

Although I can't be certain at this early stage, I believe that political reality really hasn't changed significantly--only superficially. The Broadway musical "Hamilton" may have signaled a change of style of ruling class ideology, but not its practice. However conformist Americans, especially among the middle class, may need to learn about the new style so that they can parrot the memes of this new reality to preserve their own comfortable lifestyles. 

America's Addiction to Terrorism

Click here to access article by Shabbir Lakha from CounterPunch. 

The author points to many of the issues raised in an interesting new book entitled America’s Addiction to Terrorism by Henry A. Giroux.

As well as explaining in detail some of the biggest issues faced by society today, Giroux very eloquently connects the dots between them and highlights their roots within the neoliberal project. Giroux discusses torture, militarisation, surveillance, racism, education and austerity among other things and draws the links to the military-industrial-academic complex. In this review, I will go through some of Giroux’s arguments and his suggestions for working-class resistance against them.

Saving Face: America's TPP Disaster

Click here to access article by Joseph Thomas for New Eastern Outlook. 

The author poses some interesting thoughts as suggested in the headline about the significance of Trump's election/selection to be the CEO of US Empire, Inc. According to Thomas, while our masters may have given up the idea of TPP, they will continue with the other methods of containing China.

Record losses as global warming worsens

Click here to access article by Paul Brown from Climate News Network. 

As summers get hotter, seas get warmer and extreme wind and rainstorms inflict ever-greater loss of human life and property, the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) is trying to develop and early warning system for vulnerable countries and regions.

In a report yesterday to governments at the UN’s COP22 climate talks in Marrakesh, Morocco, the WMO said that 2016 was almost certain to be the warmest year on record, and detailed the “considerable socio-economic losses in all regions of the world” that has resulted.

Living Through the Death of Capitalism

Click here to access article by Joe Brewer as posted on Uncommon Thought Journal.

Because the US ruling class directorate has selected as figurehead CEO of the Empire someone who so crassly illustrates the worst traits among successful businessmen, the US somnolent public, and much of the world, is in a state of shock. Donald Trump appears to be the antithesis of the smooth talking, articulate, African appearing figurehead of Barack Obama. What people don't realize is that in spite of the fact there might be a change of emphasis here and there, nothing substantial will change with this change of figureheads. On the other hand, this change appears to be serving as a wake-up call to many Americans--and this is very good news. 

Joe Brewer has certainly woken up, but I think he fails to justify bringing a new human into a world when every awake person must become an activist and revolutionary to accelerate the death of capitalism and to prevent the disappearance of humans along with capitalism from our Earth-home--which is a very real threat. Being a parent is a full-time job which reduces one's effectiveness as a revolutionary.  

The following 1:17m video, which should be titled as "This is why we are here", explains this urgency and our responsibility.

Old Cold War Revives as Castro Dies

Click here to access article by William Blum from Consortium News. 

What I think is the most valuable about this piece is his explanation of why a few states try desperately to insulate themselves from the insidious influence of the capitalist Empire by imposing restrictions that appear to violate the principles of free speech and thought. With the Empire's giant megaphones of media, education, and entertainment that reach to nearly every corner of the Earth, they effectively drown out independent voices in all these sectors and regions. And if in rare cases that doesn't work, the directors of the capitalist Empire manage to have such dissidents purged and/or legally harassed (see this, this, and this). 

Apart from the question of how free Western media is, if that’s to be the standard, what would happen if Cuba announced that from now on anyone in the country could own any kind of media? How long would it be before CIA money – secret and unlimited CIA money [and/or capitalist NGO] financing all kinds of fronts in Cuba – would own or control almost all the media worth owning or controlling?

Is it “free elections” that Cuba lacks? They regularly have elections at municipal, regional and national levels. They do not have direct election of the president, but neither do Germany or the United Kingdom and many other countries. The Cuban president is chosen by the parliament, The National Assembly of People’s Power. Money plays virtually no role in these elections; neither does party politics, including the Communist Party, since all candidates run as individuals.

Again, what is the standard by which Cuban elections are to be judged? Is it that they don’t have private corporations to pour in a billion dollars? Most Americans, if they gave it any thought, might find it difficult to even imagine what a free and democratic election, without great concentrations of corporate money, would look like, or how it would operate.

Trump promises

by Pat Bagley.

‘You don't end up elected president of the US without being a fast track insider’

Click here to access article featuring an interview with Joachim Hagopian by the Muslim Press.

I often see capitalism as organized crime in which a relatively few highly organized "owners" of our economy have taken nearly complete control of our country and much of the world. Although it is still too soon to determine with confidence, the evidence is mounting that suggests the election of Trump signals a more aggressive criminal element of the capitalist ruling class has taken control of our their country.

Joachim Hagopian: What I meant calling Trump "an insider" is the fact that he was born into a wealthy family with a silver spoon in his mouth, receiving an Ivy League education (University of Pennsylvania). When the Donald was a mere lad in his mid-twenties, he met his mentor Roy Cohn who as the quintessential insider essentially owned New York City. Cohn was the high-powered, ruthless attorney who represented Senator McCarthy during the McCarthyism reign of terror in early 1950's America as well as the consigliore attorney representing all five heads of the infamous NYC mobster families. Trump became a real estate tycoon who for years used Cohn as his personal attorney, mentor and steppingstone ladder to making countless deals with New York mayors, mobsters and top Wall Street banksters.

Fidel Castro’s legacy: The Power of Ideas

Click here to access article by Susan Babbitt from Muslim Press. 

...ideas change how we think, which changes how we speak and how we act. It’s a simple truth, recognizing cause and effect. In Caracus, after Hugo Chávez was first elected, Fidel said people suffer because of “nicely sweetened but rotten ideas ... that man is an animal moved only by a carrot or when beaten by a whip.” That is, we suffer because of false ideas about what it means to be human.

The power of ideas is precisely why a ruling class makes vigorous efforts to control the vehicles of ideas--education, media, and even entertainment. 

Meanwhile, back at the Empire's ranch, we see a different take on Castro's death. 

Millions of Muslims March Against ISIS During Pilgrimage and Mainstream Media Completely Ignores It

Click here to access article by Matt Agorist from The Free Thought Project. 

The author, who is a former US Marine, NSA intelligence operator, and now independent journalist, writes about a huge gathering in Karbala, Iraq of Shia Muslims who have been targeted by ISIS, the fundamentalist terrorist organization sponsored and trained by Saudi-Qatari regimes and Empire allies.

Many of the stories on Muslims in the U.S. that make it on to the mainstream are those that stoke divide. When a Muslim hero saves hundreds of lives by jumping on a bomb — which actually happened in July — the mainstream and the Islamophobic alternative media is mum.

Those who would judge 1.6 billion people by the actions of just a few are creating a narrative in which innocent lives are put in danger.

Throughout history, most mainstream religions have perpetuated extreme violence upon the world. To attempt to paint Islam as the problem is no better than labeling all Catholics murders for the inquisition.

But peace and empathy are enemies to the establishment who need you to hate others. When the establishment can paint things as black and white, it is easier for you to be controlled. Consequently, this is the exact mission of ISIS [and their sponsors in the US Empire and medieval Arab allies].

Citigroup Whistleblower Charges Should Raise Red Flags at the Fed

Click here to access article by Pam Martens and Russ Martens from their blog Wall Street on Parade. 

But, of course, no red flags will be raised at the Fed simply because they share in the capitalist rule of the US with their Citigroup counterparts. 

This is a report on more whistleblowers losing their jobs by reporting the illegal practices of banksters to government agencies that pretend to regulate and oversee banking practices.

Between Standing Rock and a hard place

by cartoonist Steve Greenberg.

Class before Trumponomics, part 2

Click here to access article by David Ruccio from Real-World Economics Review Blog.

This economist provides charts and data to support the following observation about our lives in recent decades:

What is clear from this brief survey of the changes in the condition of the U.S. working-class in recent decades is that, while American workers have created enormous wealth, most of the increase in that wealth has been captured by their employers and a tiny group at the top—as workers have been forced to compete with one another for new kinds of jobs, with fewer protections, at lower wages, and with less security than they once expected. And the period of recovery from the Second Great Depression has done nothing to change that fundamental dynamic. 

Reflections on the ‘Dispossessed’

Click here to access article by Nicolas J S Davies from Consortium News. 

Davies takes us on an historical journey over the past several centuries since near the end of feudalism and the rise of capitalism to see how humans have benefited--or not. Both systems have divided societies into a tiny group of "haves" and a multitude of "have-nots", into owners and the dispossessed. Then he brings us up-to-date with the advanced stage of capitalism known as neoliberalism which we are now entering.

Although throughout this long period there have been sporadic gains along with horrific periods of wars and famine, we are now faced with a neoliberal world order which threatens to mire most of humanity in a swamp of poverty along with the threat of our extinction either from climate destabilization or a nuclear holocaust--depends on which comes first. 

In the Western world, the prior gains of movements for labor, environmental, civil and human rights have fallen victim to a rampage of neoliberal political and economic policies, backed by triumphalist claims for the “magic of the market” that have more in common with religious dogma than social science. But the laws of economics have not really changed since the 1930s, when an apocryphal saying attributed to J.M. Keynes defined this kind of laissez-faire capitalism as “the absurd idea that the worst people, for the worst reasons, will do what is best for all of us.”

The parasites who Orwell called the “so-called owners” of the world think they have built an impregnable legal fortress on the equally absurd idea that they own everything and that the rest of us therefore come into the world with nothing and must pay them for the privilege of living here. This is not the way that human beings have lived throughout our history on Earth, and it is not an improvement.

These so-called owners now threaten our very existence with their insatiable greed and genocidal behavior. So let us make sure that this disastrous experiment is short-lived, and that it ends, not in a nuclear holocaust, nor with a society destroyed by climate change, but with a peaceful, sustainable world that we will all love, share, and safeguard for future generations.

In the end it is up to all of us to see whether this human saga ends or whether we survive in reasonably dignified conditions, or survive at all. Are we simply going to submit to the predations of our capitalist masters, or are we going to model our lives after Fidel Castro, Helen Keller, and many others, and fight back with every ounce of our courage and intelligence? Stay tuned, or better yet, stay informed and active. 

Washington’s Secret War on Syria

Click here to access article by Martin Berger from New Eastern Outlook.

It goes without saying that the so-called Syria’s civil war is the most dangerous and destructive crisis on the planet. Hundreds of thousands have already perished in this conflict, while around ten million Syrians have been displaced since early 2011.

To start this conflict and then keep its fires burning the US and its Satellites have spent billions of dollars.

You may be tired of reading about this subject (as I am), but this author uncovers many reports that document the sources of supplies to terrorists (identified as "rebels" in corporate media, you know, the good guys fighting the bad Assad government in Syria). These sources and participants do not include the CIA training of these terrorists that was revealed in one of my recent posts.

Unlike the lies of our puppet leaders of the Empire, President Erdogan of Turkey doesn't use the complicated fighting "Islamic terrorism" myth so prevalent in US Empire propaganda. Instead he uses simpler lies as reported in this post because he knows that the people in this region know the whole story about Turkey's role in supporting ISIS.

President Erdogan told the group of international parliamentary leaders that his country’s only intention in Syria was to “end the rule of the tyrant al-Assad who terrorizes with state terror.” Erdogan says he wanted to make clear that the Turks “do not have an eye on Syrian soil. The issue is to provide lands to their real owners. That is to say we are there for the establishment of justice.”

The Major Purveyor of ‘Fake News’ is the CIA-Corporate Complex

Click here to access article by Wayne Madsen from Strategic Culture Foundation.

Considering the long close relationship between the newspaper and the CIA, the Post is the last media outlet that should be writing about fake news.

And I was outraged as Madsen was at the inclusion of the website maintained by the USS Liberty Veterans Association on a list of fake news websites. This inclusion shows strong Zionist influence behind the purveyors of this list. If you want to know the full story of the much censored incident that the website is devoted to, I suggest you read Assault on the Liberty by James M. Ennes, Jr. The author was serving on the USS Liberty when it was attacked by Israeli warplanes in 1967 and almost sunk while killing 34 Americans and wounding 171 others during the Arab-Israeli Six-Day War. 

And if you wish to learn more about fake news perpetrated by the deep state that controls the US Empire, you might be interested in this confession by a German journalist in 2014:

“Orders to Kill” Dr. Martin Luther King: The Government that Honors MLK with a National Holiday Killed Him

Click here to access article by Edward Curtin from Global Research.

This is a review of the latest book of three (also in an audio edition) by William F. Pepper with the full title The Plot to Kill King: The Truth Behind the Assassination of Martin Luther King Jr. His previous books on the subject were An Act of State and The Plot to Kill King. I read An Act of State which provided the details about the only trial held by jury of the three major assassinations carried out by the deep state which rules the US. The jury in Memphis, Tennessee essentially found the US (deep state) guilty of the crime. I write "essentially" because the King family was only able to bring a civil suit against Lloyd Jowers who confessed to his involvement in the crime. Pepper was the attorney for the King family.

A criminal trial of the official guilty party, James Earl Ray, was never held because he initially confessed to the killing. Later he recanted this confession, but the government blocked all attempts to bring him to trial. Ray eventually died in prison. 

In 1999 the King Family pursued a civil trial in Memphis, Tennessee. They were not going after monetary gain, only justice and truth which the King family felt strongly that they, and the government's patsy James Earl Ray, had been denied. Thus a civil suit was brought against Jowers, who was terminally ill and confessed to a role in the crime, and "others, including governmental agencies." They were essentially putting the deep state and their secretive enforcers (CIA/FBI) on trial. In less than one hour the jury found that Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated by a conspiracy involving government agencies.

The Lie of the 21st Century: How Mainstream Media “Fake News” Led to the U.S. Invasion of Iraq

Click here to access article by Timothy Alexander Guzman from his website Silent Crow News.

This is the best takedown (#1) of corporate media news that I've seen to date. He concludes his review of fake news produced by mainstream media with this statement:

When Washington uses “propaganda” or fake news reports against a sovereign nation, the outcome is always “regime change” that sometimes leads to an all-out war. The MSM has time and time again been guilty of perpetrating fake news stories to assist in Washington’s Imperial agenda. The Iraq War was the biggest lie of the 21st century. What other fake news stories will appear on the MSM websites and newspapers in the future regarding Syria, Russia, China, Iran, the Palestinians, Venezuela, Cuba, Ecuador, Nicaragua, and even the U.S. President-elect, Donald Trump? To answer that, we just don’t know, but it is up to the alternative media to decipher the “fake” stories and bring out the truth. It is just a matter of time that the MSM will falsify another story; let’s just hope it won’t lead to another war in the process.

Also I highly recommend this international panel, featured on a 24:33m video from RT, discussing the recent US mainstream media attacks on "fake news" websites. 

 

Fake News Alert: CNN Finally Admits White Helmets Staged Fake Video

Click here to access article by Tony Cartalucci from Land Destroyer Report.

Without the diligence of alternative sources and investigative journalists to ascertain the truth in a time when corporate produced fake news is everywhere, this piece about fake news would never have surfaced and CNN would not have admitted the videos as fake and the White Helmets would never have apologized for their contrived videos. 

But this is no mere exception to the daily disinformation and warped views from corporate media that shape how ordinary people think about their world. In mainstream media we see such scenes daily that portray the destruction of hospitals and horrific scenes of wounded infants and civilians all supposedly caused by the Syrian or Russian airplanes. Such fake scenes fit well into the US Empire's propaganda war against Syria with an immediate objective of dismembering Syria with no-fly zones, and ultimately replacing the Assad government with a regime that serves Empire interests.  

I also highly recommend an article posted by a genuine Swedish-based human rights website which is challenging Sweden's ruling class entitled "Analysis: Why Sweden is giving an award to the ‘White Helmets’?". 

How I Produce Fake News for Russia

Click here to access article by David Swanson from Washington's Blog. 

Another blogger "confesses" to using fake news on behalf of Russian interests! And this website is also suspected by our masters of posting fake news. You just can't be too careful! (sarcasm)

Apparently I’ve written “fake news” on behalf of Russia without ever receiving a dime from Russia or realizing what I was doing. It took the intrepid reporting of the Washington Post to alert me to what I have been engaged in. My “fake news” has been published in at least 18 Russian propaganda outlets included on the Washington Post-endorsed Enemies List.

Cuba: Revolution, Sabotage & Un-Normal Relations

Click here to access article by Abby Martin from Media Roots. 

Leader of the Cuban revolution, Fidel Castro, has died on his own terms, after surviving at least 638 assassination attempts by the CIA. Unlike the glorification of brutal theocratic leaders like Saudi Arabia’s late King Abdullah, the establishment will be giving no accolades to Castro.

Capitalism’s defenders vociferously attack Cuba as a freedomless dystopia, while downplaying the country’s amazing achievements under socialism. 

This post features three videos by the outstanding independent journalist Abby Martin describing the history of Cuba under socialism, their relations with the US, and the numerous socialist achievements brought about the Cuban Revolution under the leadership of Fidel Castro.