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

Saturday, September 25, 2021

Posts that I especially recommend for Saturday, September 25, 2021

Federal employees sharing their uncensored thoughts and experiences about the vaccines not working and causing adverse effects greater but unwilling to come out, is not a surprise.

Surviving Capitalism, in modern America, is about going along with the narratives the elites decide, without question, without hesitancy. The Federal Government is hostage to corporations and those financiers that profit from them, and nearly all the employees know this, but carry on in order to be able to live.

Capitalist censorship in the time of COVID has resulted in the rise of a cult-like faith in the neoliberalized left, that their "Science" is supreme, and it is blasphemy to challenge their narratives in a search for evidence and information--just trust big-brother.
  • A Parable of (All-American) Violence by Kelly Denton-Borhaug from TomDispatch. (Note: If you wish to skip the introduction by Engelhardt, the editor of TomDispatch, you will need to scroll down to the article.)
... too few in this country have absorbed the truth about the misplaced violence that characterized our occupation of Afghanistan. Our culture remained both remarkably naïve and blindly arrogant when it came to widespread assumptions about our violent acts in the world that only surged thanks to the further militarization of this society and the wars we never stopped fighting.
 
My reaction: Most Americans continue to obtain information from mainstream media that is owned and controlled by the capitalist ruling class just like they follow guidelines advocated by the CDC, a government health agency controlled by the ruling class.
  • The Release Of Meng Wanzhou's Is A Small But Decisive Victory For China by Bernhard, a German independent blogger, from his weblog Moon of Alabama. (Note: You may also be interested in this concise version as reported by Rick Sanchez in this podcast (the first 07:46m) via RT's channel on YouTube.) My reaction: This is how the US/Anglo/Zionist Empire functions to punish individuals for sanctions imposed by major banks, under their control, against Iran. But, in this case, the operation appears to have backfired.
So in the end we’re back to…the Scythians. The prevailing neo-Eurasia concept revives the mobility of nomadic civilizations – via top transportation infrastructure – to connect everything between Europe and Asia. We could call it the Revenge of the Heartland: they are the powers building this new, interconnected Eurasia. Say goodbye to the ephemeral, post-Cold War US unipolar moment.
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Friday, September 24, 2021

Posts that I especially recommend for Friday, September 24, 2021

  • CrossTalk | Hegemony Challenged from RT's channel on YouTube (24:56m). My reaction: I was particularly pleasantly surprised by the insightful comments of Joe Lauria, who normally posts on Consortium News in contrast to George Szamuely who takes a more amoral geopolitical view of world events.
Since Americans have long recognized that their ability to transform or conquer the world is limited, why do they still frequently launch wars that eventually fail? One reason is that its defense industry is meant to make money off of war. It provides a constant source of power for the US to maintain its dominant to the world and make huge profits from the process.

The desire of arms dealers to get profited is constantly pushing Washington to keep pursuing war targets, creating tensions in some hot spots, and gaining profits by pulling in allies in a remote, proxy manner. 
  • Interview 1662 – New World Next Week with James Evan Pilato featuring James Corbett and James Evan Pilato discussing the huge profits and corruption derived from big defense (sic) contractors and Big Pharma in a 28:18m video from Corbett's website. In addition, Pilato reports and comments on other topics especially the classic fascist suppression of protests in Australia. My reaction: Corbett and Pilato don't mention that mainstream media hides this corruption, and is therefore a part of this capitalist scam on ordinary Americans. In prior podcasts, Corbett, at least, favored small capitalists in past eras; but when in the present era they have inevitably grown to the huge monsters they are with the concentration of power and profits, they are critical of them.
  • Professor Guy McPherson on Reversing Abrupt, Irreversible Climate Change featuring the views and analysis of Prof. (retired) Guy McPherson, an independent scientist (via his YouTube channel--13:48m), who has fearlessly focused his attention throughout his career on the climate crisis. My reaction: What are the chances that the transnational capitalist ruling classes have of backing this proposal regarding the use of mirrors? I think less than none. They like the alcohol-addicted will lie and engage in destructive behaviors because they are thoroughly addicted to wealth and power. Only we can save humans and many other species from becoming extinct, and I see no prospect of that happening because of the thoroughly addicted ruling capitalist class (the billionaires) who control all institutions ... and the media being only one!
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Thursday, September 23, 2021

Posts that I especially recommend for Thursday, September 23, 2021

  • 💥Bombshell! Damning Evidence Leaked! by Chris Martenson, PhD, from his weblog PeakProsperity. This is a best post. (Note: Submitted to this website by Brad Fredricks.) My reaction: If this careful collection of evidence doesn't prove that Covid-19 was engineered, I don't know what does.
  • The Profits of War by William Hartung from TomDispatch. (Note: If you wish to skip the introduction by Engelhardt, the administrator of TomDispatch, you will need to scroll down to the article.) My reaction: This reminds me of the Vietnam War during which military generals constantly lied about progress during this awful war.
The surprise announcement of the new AUKUS alliance has predictably provoked an outcry from the European side of NATO, in particular France whose $90B plans with Australia were nixed without forewarning or mutual agreement. The entire fiasco only pushed the realization of a European continental army further along its path, a path that is all but inevitable and can only be either slowed or hurried by world events and political pressures.

As we wrote towards the end of August in ‘NATO’s Obsolescence’, the NATO alliance is coming undone and what we are seeing internationally is the rise of multipolarity.
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Wednesday, September 22, 2021

Posts that I especially recommend for Wednesday, September 22, 2021

  • Freedom from Fear: Stop Playing the Government’s Mind Games by John W. Whitehead & Nisha Whitehead from The Rutherford Institute. My reaction: The Whiteheads show their bias by the headline. The government is not playing mind games, but the capitalist ruling class is--via their control of the government. Whiteheads' observations fit well with an anarchist perspective which is highly influential of what represents a far-left perspective in the USA.
  • Fighting Vaccine Mandates – #SolutionsWatch featuring James Corbett from his website discussing in a video (about one hour) what he has investigated about the growing worry in relation to "no vaccine, no jobs, or no service".
  • 💥We Won’t Be Free Until Our Minds Are Free 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. And Johnstone and Tim Foley, her American husband, are living in Australia! This is a best post. My brief commentary follows:
I have followed various political writers who have challenged the mainstream narratives and have ended up being disappointed. It seems that living in the United State casts a spell on people to prevent them from challenging the very premises that founds our society and its capitalist system. It is almost impossible not to succumb to the many distorting messages that inundate our minds and corrupt them. 
 
I've noticed the people who are the most free of this all-encompassing bias are the ones who have spent significant amounts of time living overseas, especially in countries outside of the US/Anglo/Zionist Empire. Thus, I find people such as Whitney Webb (Chile), Brian Berletic (Thailand), Vanessa Beeley (a British journalist currently living in Syria), Eva Bartlett (a Canadian who has lived in a variety of countries), Pepe Escobar (also living in a variety of countries), Glenn Greenwald (Brazil), and even Jame Corbett (Japan) and Caitlin Johnstone with her American husband, Tim Foley (Australia), always very credible. Corbett, who I often differ with, I find his investigative pieces valuable. After all, Corbett is living in Japan which is an integral part of the Empire. And, I can't help thinking that Foley found living in the USA intolerable, and the two of them created their own ideological space in Australia which is experiencing the worst control methods of the pandemic. If I were younger, I would carefully consider living in another country outside of the Empire. 
 
Regardless of how well-read one is, it is usually impossible to totally escape one's milieu and the distorted political outlook that people have--friends, relatives, and associates. All but a few people living in the USA are fully saturated by the ruling class's ideology.
  • A Solution Without a Solution by John Steppling, an American dramatist currently living in Norway, from his weblog. (Note: This highly erudite, intelligent author is not for everyone, but I've found in the past that I agree with many of his observations. His writings are often lengthy, but numerous, unrelated pictures are interspersed with his writing.) 
Today, artificial intelligence, or AI, is the centerpiece of the U.S. empire’s plan to maintain global dominance.

AI is essentially computer super-intelligence that does what human brains can not. Exponential technological advances have rendered our human brains, constrained by the slow process of biological evolution, inferior to modern supercomputers.

Applied in the service of humanity, artificial intelligence has incredible promise. But applied in the service of empire and the permanent war state, it spells disaster.
  • BBC Retracts Blatant Lies About Syria featuring Jimmy Dore and Aaron Maté discussing the lies of mainstream media in relation to Syria in general and BBC in particular via YouTube video (31:56m).
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Tuesday, September 21, 2021

Posts that I especially recommend for Tuesday, September 21, 2021

General Note: I have another appointment today related to my problems with my hearing aid. The effect for my today's posting will be that I will be posting in two parts: earlier and later (today). The following will be edition one:
The unchecked expansion of the US secretive military biolabs network along the Russian borders is a matter of concern not only to Moscow but also to many post-Soviet republics and the international community. To this date, the United States has created an actual spider web of secret biolabs around the world. Since 1997, Pentagon has dragged in this program more than 30 countries as partners of this American “initiative”. All these installations do not include 400 facilities on the mainland United States which are also involved in working with pathogens.
A false premise. This is the way minds are shaped in the era of mass propaganda and servile journalism. Assume (or make believe) something is true despite overwhelming evidence to the contrary, and build from there. Slip in this premise or background assumption as if it were truer than true. This is what has happened throughout the media in the last two weeks. It is not new but worth pointing out.

The false premise is this: That 9/11 was a terror attack carried out by Osama bin Laden and al Qaeda as blow-back for American wars against Muslims, and this terror attack on the U.S. led to the invasion of Afghanistan, Iraq, etc.
  • EPA exposed for hiding chemical risks, favoring corporate interests by Carey Gillam from
    U.S. Right to Know. My reaction: I've read so many books and articles charging the EPA with major crimes that I'm not surprised. It is another small piece of evidence that the government serves corporations and not the people--in other words, fascism.
Edition two:
I think that this interview is very significant because it illustrates how normally intelligent, honest people have swallowed most other capitalist ruling class narratives, but when aroused sufficiently through fear campaigns and the loss of comforts, they don't realize that they have been swallowing whole all the other lies that they have been fed for many decades. 
 
The transnational capitalist ruling class has used their power in the world to extract extra benefits from the rest of the world outside the US/Anglo/Zionist Empire and shared some of the loot with the classes in the Empire below them. Many of the latter classes have enjoyed comforts denied to much of the world outside of the Empire. However, people living in resisting nations such as Russia, China, Iran, etc. are not going along with the Empire's hegemonic fantasies.
 
Meanwhile, the ruling class directors of the Empire have longed waged an assault on the minds of people under their control to view history and contemporary events as reflecting what they wanted ordinary people to believe. These narratives were a revised history and propaganda that all served capitalist interests of wealth and power. Now that some intelligent people are beginning to investigate these narratives and question them during a pandemic that brought misery to them, they are beginning to wake up. Hopefully, this trend will result in further investigations and questions which will result in the vast majority of people under the Empire becoming aware that they have been thoroughly deceived about reality.
  • The Fallout From The AUKUS Deal by Bernhard, a German independent thinker, from his weblog Moon of Alabama. (Note: You might also by interested in this post by M. K. Bhadrakumar, and Indian analyst, from Indian Punchline.)
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Monday, September 20, 2021

Note for Monday, September 20, 2021

I arrived here at my home in southern Minnesota late Saturday afternoon. But because my right ear hearing aid went out the Sunday before I was beginning this trip, I need to take it in for repairs. Thus, I won't be posting today, but I expect I will be tomorrow. 

My trip out to the east coast was greatly facilitated by my visit in a suburb of Chicago. He took me to where I was to buy a toll-pass for the trip eastward. Without his guidance and participation I would have experienced severe difficulties. But on the trip back I was presented with difficulties mainly because of finding a hotel in the South Bend area. I assume there was a Notre Dame football game the next day. This experience made me return home in the speediest way I could.

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