Independent Journalist Corner: A Conversation with Andre Vltchek

Click here to access an interview with Vltchek conducted by Danny Haiphong that is posted on Black Agenda Report. 

I continue to find so much compatibility with what Vltchek says and writes, particularly the following quotes in this piece:

Mass media became synonymous with imperialist propaganda. It is all very well-orchestrated; choreographed. And people in the West are so thoroughly brainwashed that they stopped asking questions regarding the most essential issues.

And most especially this:

The majority of people in the West are not able to commit themselves. They are too selfish, too egotistic. And they are full of nihilism: sweating and shitting nihilism.

They reject all ideologies and they do not want to govern. They despise those who are holding power. However, without ideology and without aiming at governing, no true revolution can take place. I don’t think the Western left is serious: there is no revolutionary force there, no willingness to sacrifice anything for the struggle. It is all weak, spineless and boring: like shouting at the high definition television set, or insulting opponents in the pub.

Recommended articles for 2/22/2018

• The Mueller Indictments Are A F**king Joke & It's Dangerous featuring Lee Camp ranting about the latest Russiagate event. In the 1960s I felt I was living in an open psychiatric ward called the USA, but now I am thoroughly convinced. Credit an activist in northern Oregon for this post. (You may need to wait a few more seconds until the video here and the one following upload onto your device.)

• What You Aren't Being Told About NPR also by Lee Camp. Camp exposes much of the corporate funding of NPR. I have watched the steady deterioration of NPR over the last 50 years into what it is today, a prime propaganda outlet for the ruling capitalist class.

• “Stooge Time” for America. Florida School Killer Nikolas Cruz Diagnosed with Depression, Autism and ADHD by Philip A. Farruggio from Global Research.

How Biblical is Zionism?

Click here to access article by Laurent Guyénot from A bird's eye view of the Vineyard. 

The author, who has a "PhD in Medieval Studies at Paris IV-Sorbonne, 2009", provides a well-documented, in-depth study of how a fundamentalist interpretation of the Hebrew Bible has been a prime influence on the imperialist inclinations of Zionist leaders throughout the history of the Zionist movement.

Only by taking account of the biblical roots of Zionism can one understand why Zionism has never been a nationalist movement like others. It could not be, as Gilad Atzmon remarked, from the moment it defined itself as a Jewish movement, aimed at creating a “Jewish state”.[6] Jewish exceptionalism is a biblical concept that has no equivalent in any other ethnic or religious culture.

I beg to differ (def.) a little bit with the last statement because many American Christians, who have frequently embraced Zionism, have also a fundamentalist interpretation of the Christian Bible.

Bringing us up to date on the post-WWII history of Israel, Guyénot writes:

...when the British started to limit Jewish immigration in Palestine in the 1930s, the Zionists turned to the rising new Imperial power: the United States. Today, the stranglehold of Zionists on US imperial policy is such that a few Jewish neocons can pull the US into a series of wars against Israel’s enemies with a single false flag attack.

The capacity of Israel to hijack the Empire’s foreign and military policy requires that a substantial Jewish elite remain in the US. Even Israel’s survival is entirely dependent on the influence of the Zionist power complex in the United States (euphemistically called the “pro-Israel lobby”).

Did you notice that in the first paragraph in the above quote, the author makes an oblique reference to the real significance of 9/11?

Recommended articles for 2/21/2018

• "Russian bots" - How An Anti-Russian Lobby Creates Fake News by Bernhard from his blog Moon of Alabama.

• The Three Global Super-Powers by Eric Zuesse from The Greanville Post. 

Can it really be that if the world of the future won’t be led by America’s billionaires, then it won’t exist at all? Do they really demand “My way, or the highway” — really? Are America’s billionaires (despite any ‘humanitarian’ pretenses they individually so often hypocritically express, both in the fictionalized and in the real version) so stunningly united in their actual psychopathy (likewise in both versions — “Big Brother,” and today’s reality)? .... And collectively they’ve got the American public fooled into admiring the MIC (“the Military”) above all other US institutions. But whether America’s billionaires will carry their collective evil to the extreme, isn’t yet clear. They are the actual decision-makers regarding US Government policy, but they are playing their cards — as usual — privately and secretly, until their game (whatever it may turn out to be) will already be finished.

• The media and the Mueller indictment: A conspiracy theory to end all conspiracy theories by Patrick Martin from World Socialist Web Site.

Given that the US government has just issued a series of strategy documents that, among other conclusions, suggest that a significant cyberattack on the United States could justify retaliation with nuclear weapons, the implications of the argument put forward on the front page of the Times are chilling: What cyberattack could be more significant than an effort to hijack the US presidential election? By the logic of the leading “newspaper of record,” the US government would be justified in responding militarily to an alleged Russian election operation.

What is propounded in the media coverage is a conspiracy theory to end all conspiracy theories.

• What just happened in Korea and when will we ever learn?! by "The Saker" from his blog.

In my many contacts with Russians I notice one recurrent feature: most of them simply do not understand that they are at war and that the war which is being waged against them has absolutely no rules. Whoever put that Meldonium into Krushelnitsky’s room or bottle or snack took a tiny risk and yet that resulted in yet another major PR blow delivered against Russia’s image and the against the morale of the poor Russian athletes who are already competing with an (illegally) reduced team and in terrible conditions (Hats off to whoever came up with that plan: it was nothing short of brilliant, very low risk and very high yield)

The Coming Wars to End All Wars

Click here to access article by Edward Curtin from his web-log (blog). 

Americans, he argues, are being led step by step into a final series of war "to end all wars". All important political signs confirm he is right: the constant din of anti-Russian, anti-Iranian, anti-Chinese propaganda are designed to prepare gullible Americans into accepting this option. So far there are few signs that Americans are opposing this steady drift into what Empire propagandists portray as a kind of biblical Armageddon.

We are moving toward a global war that will become nuclear if an international ant-war movement doesn’t quickly arise to stop it.  Most people bemoan the thought of such a war to end all wars, but refuse to analyze the factors leading to it. It happens step-by-step, and many steps have already been taken with more coming soon. It’s so obvious that most can’t see it, or don’t want to.

A major source for the Empire's promotion of this final series of wars is the extreme indebtedness of the USA to the holders of US sovereign debts (the total is nearly $21 trillion), and most of these creditors are members of the ruling capitalist class throughout the nations of the US-led Empire. (A careful reading of this report confirms this.) They, for the most part, see successful wars as the only option to climb out of the huge debt hole that the Empire's ruling capitalists have dug to finance their imperial project.

Recommended articles for 2/20/2018

• On the American Inability to Turn Turkey Around by Salman Rafi Sheikh from New Eastern Outlook. The author provides a very insightful look at the tenuous situation of the illegal occupation of Syria by the US military.

• Cindy Sheehan and the Women’s March on the Pentagon: A Movement, Not Just a Protest by Whitney Webb from Mint Press News.

• "Empire Files: War With North Korea - Propaganda vs. Reality" This 32:45m video features an interview conducted by Abby Martin with Tim Shorrock, author, journalist, and expert on Korean affairs. (You may need to wait a few more seconds for the video to upload on your device. Or view the video directly from YouTube.)

On top of overtly genocidal threats, the Trump Administration has announced new terms: that they "will never accept a nuclear North Korea." But, the Democratic Peoples' Republic of Korea already has nuclear weapons. Does that mean a war is imminent?

While the bipartisan warmongering is receiving no push-back from the mainstream media, Abby Martin interviews Tim Shorrock--journalist and expert on US-Korea relations--to learn what is left out of the debate and the potential cost of a new war. 

• The Big Pharma Family that Brought Us the Opioid Crisis by Sam Pizzigati from Inequality.

There are more articles that are very good, but I will save them for tomorrow.

The US-UK Deep State Empire Strikes Back: ‘It’s Russia! Russia! Russia!’

Click here to access article by James George Jatras from Strategic Culture Foundation. (Credit goes to Christopher in northwest Oregon for alerting me to this article.)

Although the author declares that the Deep State, which is also known as the capitalist ruling class by those who are awake, has with this Russiagate stories accomplished the targeting of Russia as the next enemy of the US in the minds of most Americans who are fast asleep. Of course, China is another target often mentioned among those officials who serve the ruling class, but for now the focus is on Russia as the devil incarnate because China is making many American capitalists rich.

Because the ruling capitalist class, aka "the Deep State", remains behind the curtain of reality as represented to us by their media corporations, their role is always hidden from view. The Deep State actors hide behind the secret walls of the Council on Foreign Relations, the Atlantic Council, Brookings Institute, and host of other highly secretive "think tanks". Jatras' treatment of the subject only adds to the confusion by substituting the agents of this major propaganda project in place of the Deep State (the leading political members of the ruling capitalist class). 

Furthermore, he seems to suggest that the whole Russiagate project was designed to re-direct the public's attention from the ruling class project of insuring that Hillary Clinton was elected and to cover up their activities on behalf of HC. To support this argument, he writes:

The growing sense of panic was palpable. Oh my – this is a curtain that just cannot be allowed to be pulled back!

What to do, what to do . . .

It's clear to me that Russia has been in the cross-hairs of the US ruling class after Putin started scuttling their plans to destabilize Syria in 2011. The capitalist ruling class have also watched with growing alarm the rise of an independent Russia which colludes with a rising China, the combination of which seeks to impose a framework of multilateral relations on the world which interferes with the US-led Empire's New World Order project. 

With the public's rejection of Hillary Clinton, the chosen leader to promote this project of the ruling class, the latter were furious. But the reaction was not a "growing sense of panic", it was a realization that they needed to increase their propaganda efforts to impose on ordinary Americans an awareness of the growing threat of Russia which interferes in American elections, in reality, of course, to their imperial project. Initially the ruling class went after Trump; but since he has largely adopted their agenda, they have directed their efforts more at demonizing Russia.

There Is No Time Left

Click here to access article by Robert Hunziker from CounterPunch.

The author refers to scientist James G. Anderson who was one of the leading scientists that warned us about the deteriorating ozone layer in our atmosphere which could have had disastrous effects on humans if corrective measures had not been undertaken in time. 

In his acceptance speech, James G. Anderson, Harvard professor of atmospheric chemistry, now warns that it is foolhardy to assume we can recover from the global warming leviathan simply by cutting back emissions.

Accordingly, the only way humanity can dig itself out of the climate change/global-warming hole is by way of a WWII type effort with total transformation of industry off carbon and removal of carbon from the atmosphere within five years. The situation is so dire that it requires a worldwide Marshall Plan effort, plus kneeling in prayer.

The War on Dissent: the Specter of Divisiveness (with Video)

Click here to access article by CJ Hopkins from The Greanville Post. 

This article is loaded with cynicism as Hopkins exclaims about how many Americans are so easily manipulated into believing into the latest outrageous fake propaganda using the "Russiagate" theme. I have no idea how many of my fellow Americans fall for this latest lie because my attention has been focused on personal tasks; and he doesn't furnish any evidence to support this supposed gullibility. However, judging by past lies promulgated by the ruling class through their media corporations, the majority of Americans probably believe this propaganda also. Remember that a major part of American indoctrination, the part of classroom experience that the ruling capitalist class always refers to as "education", is the major dictum that one must always respect and obey authorities who always have the interests of ordinary Americans at heart.

To launch the phony "War on Terror" this conditioning of obedience was buttressed by the false-flag of the 9/11 tragedy that was engineered by US intelligence agencies in collusion with those of Israel and Saudi Arabia in order to justify all subsequent use of our armed forces in the Middle East and elsewhere. Referring to the 9/11 event, Hopkins writes:

Several million of us figured that one out … or at least figured out that the US government, the “intelligence community,” and the corporate media were using Americans’ emotional response to the September 11 terrorist attacks to con us into supporting the invasion and destabilization of the Middle East for reasons that had nothing to do with terrorism.

Then he continues on to castigate Americans for believing all the subsequent lies that are repeated endless by media corporations. He ends by writing "If you enjoyed ... all the other features of The War on Terror … you’re going to love The War on Dissent."

Recommended articles for 2/18/2018

• Ex-CIA Director Thinks US Hypocrisy About Election Meddling Is Hilarious by Caitlin Johnstone from The Greanville Post. 

• The US is Executing a Global War Plan by Finian Cunningham from Strategic Culture Foundation.