We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Friday, August 27, 2021

Posts that I especially recommend for Friday, August 27, 2021

Note: I am planning a first road trip to the US east coast probably immediately after Labor Day, September 6, from my home in southern Minnesota. (Most of my adult life was on the west coast.) If any of you regular followers would like to meet me on this road trip, I will try to accommodate you in my itinerary. The arrangement would at least consist of meeting over a beverage of your choice at a location near you or at your home. Please contact me if this interests you at my email address: goatmeal36@yahoo.com.  Ron H.

In such a hostile government environment, the citizens need to individually evaluate the science of immunization with COVID-19 vaccines and not rely on philosophical arguments propagated by government officials. In this case there is no scientific evidence that the COVID-19 vaccines improve the health of the individual, much less of the population as a whole. Mass immunization with COVID-19 vaccines is certainly leading to a catastrophic public
health event.
Sens. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) and Rand Paul (D-Ky.) introduced the Fourth Amendment Is Not for Sale Act in April to prevent agencies from using "illegitimately obtained" biometric data, such as photos from the software company Clearview AI. The company has scraped billions of photos from social media platforms without approval and is currently used by hundreds of police departments across the United States.
 
The bill has not received a vote in either chamber of Congress yet.
 
My brief commentary follows: 
 
I predict that the ruling class will strongly push their member-capitalists to exploit this digital technology and thus, make an end-run around the Fourth Amendment which says simply "The right of the people to be secure in their persons, houses, papers, and effects, against unreasonable searches and seizures, shall not be violated, and no Warrants shall issue, but upon probable cause, supported by Oath or affirmation, and particularly describing the place to be searched, and the persons or things to be seized." 
 
Regardless of whether this bill is passed or not, the ruling capitalist class and their Deep State that is in control of our government will violate this bill anyway. They have a history of violating all kinds of laws restricting the powers of their government: the signing of the international prohibitions on biowarfare is only one example. The latter was thoroughly exposed recently by Nicholas Baker in his book Baseless and in 2013 by Dave Chaddock in his book This Must Be the Place. The ongoing ignoring of our Constitution by the unaccountable and highly secretive CIA is further proof. The ruling class has only the interests of the capitalist class in mind when they pursue their policies in support of their wealth, power, and hegemony in the world. This means that they will turn against the subordinate classes (middle and working classes) in the USA and the nations of their Empire if it is in their interests to do so. The transnational character of major capitalists throughout their US/Anglo/Zionist Empire is now about to turn against the latter classes under the Great Reset (which was announced recently by Klaus Schwab) because it is in their interests to do so. 
 
Their interests? They know that climate destabilization is imminent. This is demonstrated by their ongoing interests to privatize space exploration, hunker down in their escape bunkers here on Earth, and their Great Reset policies to cutback on the Earth's population.
  • The Squad Are "Useful Idiots To The Establishment" says Chris Hedges featuring Jimmy Dore using his channel on YouTube (25:33m) to solicit Hedges' comments, and Dore joins him, regarding the manufactured fake "left". My reaction: The ruling class currently uses the Democratic Party to play ordinary Americans via their control of mainstream media whenever and wherever they want. I believe that Hedges, Ralph Nader, etc. are not revolutionaries because they support old-fashioned capitalism that was characteristic of FDR policies. I don't know about Jimmy Dore.
  • The ‘War On Terror’ Scam Continues by Australian Caitlin Johnstone with her American husband, Tim Foley, also reading the script (but you may miss supporting examples, illustrations, etc.)--from her weblog.
  • EXCLUSIVE | RT speaks to the Taliban's spox following Kabul airport attack from RT. This post is in relation to these posts: see this, this, and this. My reaction: Could it be that the Empire's directors in cooperation with Saudi Arabia have organized, trained, and equipped ISIS? Many believe, including me, that ISIS is the terrorist army of the US/Anglo/Zionist Empire, and the directors of the Empire use this army to destabilize nations that they don't like and for good public relations at home.
In the end, no one aside from ISIS wants a terrorized Afghanistan, just as no one wants a civil war in Afghanistan. So the order of business indicates not only an SCO-led frontal fight against existing ISIS-K terror cells in Afghanistan but also an integrated campaign to drain any potential social base for the takfiris in Central and South Asia. 
 
I think that Iranian Prof. Mohamed Marandi is correct when he commented on a question in an interview posed recently by Vanessa Beeley (02:05m) that the sudden pull-out of US control contributed greatly to the chaos, and probably the incident today caused by the ISSIS-K faction which is (in my opinion) controlled by the directors of the de-facto US/Anglo/Zionist Empire.
Much analysis and commentary has explored why this happened but ultimately it is incredibly simple – the US never intended or attempted to build up a credible government or a unified, stable Afghan nation with the necessary infrastructure required for a modern nation-state to thrive.

America’s presence in Afghanistan served a wider geopolitical objective, the encirclement and containment of Russia, China, and also Iran. Its proximity to Pakistan was also a key motivation.
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