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 LappĆ©, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Saturday, January 15, 2022

Posts that I especially recommend for Saturday, January 15, 2022

  • States Hoarding Billion Of Welfare $$$ featuring Naomi Karavani, a comedian, who uses sarcastic comedy to expose, under covid's government policies, how the rich are getting richer and the poor poorer--from Redacted Tonight's channel on YouTube (07:06).
  • Hang On…. Have We All Been CONNED By Jan 6th?! featuring Russell Brand, a British comedian, turned serious political analyst, astutely commenting, on what sounds like the Deep State, regarding the latter's distorted and hostile emphasis on the Jan. 6 protests at Congress--from Brand's channel on YouTube (18:05).
They’ve been working tirelessly to ensure that the internet serves as a net positive for themselves and a net negative for the rest of us, manipulating the large-scale movements of information so that dissident voices are increasingly marginalized and inconsequential while giving themselves the ability to funnel propaganda into public minds far more rapidly and efficiently than ever before. If they succeed in their objectives, ordinary people will wind up no better at sharing unauthorized ideas and information than they were before the internet, while our rulers will be far more effective in controlling the way we think at mass scale.
  • Andrew Cuomo Investigations DROPPED! featuring Jimmy Dore and whoever is posing as Cuomo as a sarcastic commentary on the dropped charges by various prosecutors--using his channel on YouTube (06:37).  
  • Pentagon Just Admitted They're Unaccountable featuring Lee Camp, a comedian, using his humorous asides to maintain his comedy, but meanwhile lambasting media corporations for cooperating with the Pentagon (under the Department of "Defense") to downplay its unaccountability--from his Redacted Tonight's channel on YouTube (07:37).
The world is entering what looks like a new, even more complex cold war, in which any misunderstanding, mishap or false move could rapidly escalate into nuclear confrontation
 
My reaction: I've recently been in communication with a friend who is traveling the world, and he has observed that a secret US base in some nation is acting as a relay base to send a huge contingent of American troops to other areas. This worries me.
  • Kazakhstan coup fails, US-Russia talks go nowhere. Is war on horizon? featuring Pepe Escobar in a lengthy, but an important interview conducted by Max Blumenthal of The Grayzone using the latter's channel on YouTube (1:50:12). My reaction: I obviously haven't listened to all of this interview, but I will. I consider Escobar as the world's top journalist.
Max Blumenthal and geopolitical analyst Pepe Escobar discuss the violent coup attempt in Kazakhstan, and its crucial importance as an ally of Russia and the center of China's Belt and Road Initiative. Pepe addresses US and Turkish meddling, and why this massive and misunderstood country is suddenly at the heart of the new cold war.

They also talk about the failure of the US-Russia talks in Geneva and if war could be on the horizon. 
  • Kazakhstan Chaos: An Opportunity, But for Who? by Brian Berletic, an independent blogger, ex-Marine, who lives in Thailand with his family--from New Eastern Outlook. My reaction: Berletic points to US organizations whose policies are propaganda and subversion.
Sean Twomey, an Irish physicist, flew into clouds to measure their reflectivity, and found that the smaller and more numerous the water droplets, the higher the albedo. Watching the white spray from crashing waves, John Latham realized that Twomey's idea could work to keep the Arctic cool. If tiny droplets of seawater could be seeded into clouds, they would reflect more sunlight, and prevent ice from melting in the summer. He asked #StephenSalter to design a system to make it work. He did. Peter Wadhams agrees that this method would apply a sticking plaster to global warming and buy time to restore the climate. The same process could help preserve coral reefs.
 
Now the question is, can someone be found to finance the operation soon enough to prevent the melting of the Arctic and subsequent release of methane? As #PaulBeckwith points out, it's not rocket science. Instead of sending rockets into space, if Messrs. Musk, Bezos, or Branson would focus on saving the planet, they could provide the ships needed for marine cloud brightening. #PeterWadhams notes that the cost is low for such a powerful intervention and well worth it. It could save the sea ice, the coral reefs, and help cool the ocean. If nations won't do it, maybe a scientifically minded billionaire can rise to the challenge. 
 
My reaction: The capitalist ruling classes that are in control of the US/British/Zionist Empire are certainly not going to fund this effort because it is not profitable or won't extend their power. Depending on billionaires to save us is foolish. Meanwhile, the leading nations who have declared independence from the Empire have all they can handle to survive the ongoing efforts of the Empire to destroy them.
at

Friday, January 14, 2022

Posts that I especially recommend for Friday, January 14, 2022

  • My Head Talking About Zircon And Other Things. By Andrei Martyanov from his weblog  Reminiscence of the Future... in a video presentation via his channel on YouTube (25:18). My reaction: This is a classic post by Martyanov, an American military expert and emigrant from Russia. I think his views are reasons for Escobar's recommendation that the USA and NATO, the US/British/Zionist Empire's military, should not provoke Russia.
  • Tibet, the CIA & the Dalai Lama… by Mickey Z., a reliable political analyst, from his weblog on Substack. My reaction: I'm omitting a part of the post's title because I don't see what the article has to do with Thelonius Monk, but it has everything to do with the ever-deceptive CIA and its operations in Tibet.
  • Paolo Sorbello: Kazakhstan Protests Sparked by Inequality, Inflation, & Lack of Representation posted by the interviewer from Geopolitics & Empire's channel on YouTube (36:01). My reaction: The (unnamed) interviewer (now living in Mexico but has lived in a number of countries including Kazakhstan) who wants to get the real story on the Kazakhstan protests, interviews an acquaintance (I think) who lives in Kazakhstan, but is vacationing in Italy, about his opinions on what he thinks about the uprising. Sorbello was born and raised in Sicily.
The editors distinguish four periods in the methods of management of sovereign debt by States and private creditors. We largely agree with their division into four periods, of which I offer here a short summary. 
at

Thursday, January 13, 2022

Posts that I especially recommend for Thursday, January 13, 2022 (Abbreviated aggregated post because of an eye appointment.)

Denis G. Rancourt is a former tenured full professor of physics at the University of Ottawa, Canada. He is a researcher for the Ontario Civil Liberties Association and a social theorist. He has published more than 100 articles in leading scientific journals, on physics and environmental science. He is the author of the book Hierarchy and Free Expression in the Fight Against Racism.
  • Fascism in the USA (part 2 of 2) featuring a video (1:09:24) of three participants in a discussion of Jan. 6 demonstration at Congress from Breakthrough News. (Note: I didn't have time to listen to most of the discussion.)
Brian Becker, Claudia De La Cruz and Gabriel Rockhill continue The Socialist Program’s coverage of the anniversary of the January 6 assault that dispersed Congress. One year after the attack attempted to overturn the election, the architects of that plan have yet to face prosecution and a movement of the far-right consolidates.
 
Brian is joined by Claudia De La Cruz, co-Executive Director of The People’s Forum, popular educator, community organizer and theologian, and Dr. Gabriel Rockhill, Founding Director of the Critical Theory Workshop and Professor of Philosophy at Villanova University.
  • Monday~Choices by John Allen from his new weblog on Substack. My reaction: I welcome Allen back! He would like you to subscribe to his new weblog to replace others from his former weblog on Medium where he was suspended because of their censorship rules.
  • Science Update: Did We Just Blow It? featuring the views and analysis of Prof. (retired) Guy McPherson, an independent scientist (via his YouTube channel--18:19), who has fearlessly focused his attention throughout much of his career on the climate crisis.
at
Labels:

Wednesday, January 12, 2022

Posts that I especially recommend for Wednesday, January 12, 2022

As of now, the province is looking to make this financial penalty “significant” claiming that something like $50 or $100 is not significant enough. However there is no estimation of what the cost will be as of yet.
 
[Premier] Legault also stated that “the vaccine is the key to fight the virus,” a common talking point used by politicians and health authorities that is not backed up by science. Mounting evidence continues to indicate that the vaccine does not prevent COVID-19 transmission and is not necessary for younger individuals as their rates of severe disease are extremely small. This means by blanket mandating vaccines and boosters, many people’s lives are unnecessarily being put at risk.
But before we begin talking about that, Professor Hudson, another reason I wanted to have you today is to talk about a big story that went viral. It was just published, and it’s on the website Wall Street on Parade. It went so viral that the website actually went down, because it was being shared so much.

This is an article just published at Wall Street on Parade. I have it up in the archive because the website is down. And the article is titled, There’s a News Blackout on the Fed’s Naming of the Banks that Got Its Emergency Repo Loans; Some Journalists Appear to Be Under Gag Orders. And this is by Pam Martens and Russ Martens, published on January 3.
 
(Note: I posted this article from Wall Street on Parade on Jan. 4, 2022--second from the bottom.)
 
My reaction: The moral of this (short) story is "go to the source of this issue" (the critiques of Wall Street contained in Wall Street on Parade's weblog rather than read this lengthy transcript. The only reason for this interview is because of Hudson's publication of Super Imperialism (back in 1972) after which he attracted many leftist critics. Since then, Hudson has played it safe (def.) mostly to preserve his career at the University of Missouri.
The populist left has slowly understood that the institutions and networks of power that rule over us are systematically corrupt, and that they will continue on the current ecocidal path to maintain their power. This left is internally divided – and largely ineffective – because it cannot agree on whether the remedy is to be more assertive in seeking reform or to work towards overthrowing the corrupt system. 
 
But soon he gives another related insight to the title of this post:
 
Those who try to open up a little space – in politics, academia, and journalism – to think critically about our society and how power is misused are the chief targets. Western establishments have grown increasingly concerned about the expansion of popular freedoms that arrived with social media a decade or so ago, which have allowed us to analyze and critique elite interests and strategies. This has posed a very obvious threat to the establishment’s continuing ability to propagandize us and has led to far more unpredictable and unstable social and political landscapes.

Our increased ability to bypass corporate, billionaire-owned media has led to inevitable polarization. We have seen the emergence of three antagonistic tribes, based largely on the way each consumes media. 
High-level international banking officials and organizations last month gathered in Israel for a global “war game” exercise simulating the collapse of the global financial system.

The tabletop exercise was reminiscent of “Event 201” — the pandemic simulation exercise that took place in October 2019, shortly before COVID-19 entered the global scene.
The breakdown of the messy Kazakh op necessarily starts with the usual suspects: the US Deep State, which all but “sang” its strategy in a 2019 RAND corporation report, Extending Russia. Chapter 4, on “geopolitical measures”, details everything from “providing lethal aid to Ukraine”, “promoting regime change in Belarus”, and “increasing support for Syrian rebels” – all major fails – to “reducing Russian influence in Central Asia.”

That was the master concept. Implementation fell to the MI6-Turk connection.
 
Escobar's final sentence is: "Beware the rage of a humiliated Empire."
  • The Straight Gas on Kazakhstan’s Recent Upheaval by Phil Butler from New Eastern Outlook. My reaction: Butler provides initial evidence that subversive agents were behind the chaos in Kazackhstan. I've found throughout foreign events since WWII that when major US "news" outlets initially interpret foreign events in one way before the "dust has settled", it is a sure sign of US involvement behind the events.
at

Tuesday, January 11, 2022

Posts that I especially recommend for Tuesday, January 11, 2022

  • The Dark Secret History of Capitalism featuring Lee Camp, a comedian, that concentrates the history of capitalism in 9 minutes and 48 minutes while occasionally injecting humor from RT America's channel on YouTube. My reaction: Camp gets away with his expose because YouTube has already impugned RT as sponsored by Russia, the ruling class's enemy number one, while impugning Jimmy Dore as a comedian. Both examples illustrate how YouTube "cancels" any of their influence on you, but both are astute individuals who see what is false about the indoctrination that you receive in educational institutions, Hollywood films, etc. and propaganda shows of the daily "news reporting" by media corporations.
NATO officials have thumbed their noses at Putin’s concern with Russia’s security. Trump’s National Security Advisor and neocon warmonger John Bolton encourages more provocation of Russia, which as Putin has made clear will result in war.

Clearly as 2021 comes to an end, there is no intelligence to be found anywhere in the Western World as all vie to show how tough they are with Russia.

When Putin says Russia has nowhere left to which to retreat, he is telling the idiot West that Russia has reached the extent of its ability to avoid war. “We simply have no room to retreat” means Russia has done all she can do to avoid war and now the Americans must get off Russia’s doorstep.
 
Putin is relying on Biden to show awareness and responsibility and to work for peace by acknowledging Russia’s legitimate security concern. But what if Biden is just a figurehead, and the shots are called by the military/security complex who will go for profits despite the risk that Putin will not back down?
 
What if Washington’s concern is limited to destabilizing Russia in the interest of US hegemony and Russia’s security is precisely what Washington intends to undermine, not secure.
 
My reaction: Roberts knows the Deep State well (see this, this, and this).
The US and organizations including NATO will hold a series of emergency meetings with Russia this week, beginning with Monday's US-Russia meeting in Geneva. Then it moves on to the Russian-NATO Council in Brussels on Wednesday and ends on Thursday's meeting in Vienna at the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE).
 
My reaction: If the Global Times reflects the thinking of the Chinese Communist Party, as some major writers have argued, the Chinese government, in the world's most populous nation, sympathizes with Russia. This is the second most popular article from this source--behind a news item that an earthquake destroyed a section of the Great Wall. For they (China) have experienced similar threats, and they, too, have been painted as an "enemy" by the aggressive growing encroachment of the US/British/Zionist Empire. 
 
The Chinese Communist Party recognizes that the right-wing aggressive capitalist cabal, which took control of the USA after WWII using mostly the highly secretive CIA, has matured into a Nazi-like hegemon, which is in its last desperate stages, with their long sought after goal of ruling the world. As such, the Empire has recently unleashed multiple fronts in this undeclared war: a pandemic led by their corruption of the UN's World Health Organization (WHO) in the hope of damaging the Chinese economy (and some other purposes), the ever-expanding NATO bases adjacent to Russia, a barrage of economic sanctions against anyone who refuses to submit to their Empire diktats, and a variety of subversive acts designed to topple governments of the latter and replace them with more compliant governments as they did in Ukraine. We are, indeed, living in dangerous times! 
  • A Little Bit Of My Talking Head. By Andrei Martyanov, a emigrant from Russia, who is a reputed expert on weapons systems and recommended by Pepe Escobar, from his weblog Reminiscence of the Future.... (Note: I used the "CC" button of this post to access a machine translation of what he said via his channel on YouTube--I understood most of it. The video lasts until about 17:50 followed by a pitch for more support.)
Following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the U.S.-led Western powers became deluded with arrogant entitlement. As Krainer points out, the Western empire-builders presumed to have the right to wage wars and flout international law. For much of the past three-decade period, Russia was too weak economically and politically to challenge this reckless aggression. But now it has grown strong enough to “check-mate the empire’s global ambitions”. This is why war or regime change in Russia has become an obsessive goal for the U.S. and Western partners. It accounts for the relentless sanctions, Russophobia and surge in tensions over Ukraine and more recently Kazakhstan.

Russia is perceived as an obstacle to Western control over the strategically vital Eurasian continent. The prize of Eurasia has long been coveted by Western imperialists, from the British Empire’s Sir Halford Mackinder to the U.S. strategist Zbigniew Brzezinski.
at

Monday, January 10, 2022

Posts that I especially recommend for Monday, January 10, 2022

  • Fake Science, Invalid Data: There is No Such Thing as a “Confirmed Covid-19 Case”. There is No Pandemic by Prof. Michel Chossudovsky from Global Research. My reaction: I had an experience in my sophomore year at West coast university that is relevant to this article. My class was asked to design and carry out a research project in a psychology class. I came up with a research project that was designed to study data that would indicate whether creative students were more likely score higher on IQ tests. I designed the data derived from the research project to support positive outcomes. Lo and behold, the data supported a positive correlation! The Research Assistant assigned to the class was so impressed that he very enthusiastically complimented me on the conclusions of the project. I thought that he was being extremely naive.
On January 23, 2022, over 10,000 healthcare providers will, for the first time, speak freely about the COVID vaccines. SIMULTANEOUSLY.
  • American Pravda: Our Public Health Problems by Ron Unz from his weblog. (Note: This post has an audio recording of Unz remarks followed by a script.) My reaction: This post will be dismissed by most of the general public simply because he has racist views. But they will do so at the expense of truth which should be their only concern. Instead, we will follow their "truths" proclaimed by their media and educational institutions. The ruling capitalist class has so conditioned Americans, by many decades in power--power we have handed over to them--to control all of "our" social and economic institutions, that the general public will not take this post seriously. Yes, racism is bad, but the general American public has been so manipulated by the ruling class that the ruling class control has caused so much damage to our psyches, and one being racism. But, who among us is without damage? or without fault? Racism has also been one of the damages that they, our capitalist masters, have created to divide us. Haven't you heard the truthful saying that "the best way to control people is to divide them"? We even went to a devastating war (Civil War) over racism. Our masters have accomplished this by separating us into warring camps so that we always fight each other and not them. Meanwhile, most of us will ignore the truth that Unz reveals.
  • Five Companies Control The World. “Conspiracy Theory” or FACT? featuring Russell Brand interviewing Jacques Peretti using Brand's channel on YouTube (11:11). My reaction: I don't know what Peretti's qualifications are, but it is obvious what he describes the truth about our economy. Now that the transnational ruling capitalist class owns everything, they are cashing in on their overwhelming power. They have won the game of "Monopoly" (capitalism)--game over (for us)!
Although this was not a direct threat of Iran’s intent to launch similar strikes against US forces, as it did shortly after the drone strike assassination took place in 2020, most certainly it has made one thing abundantly clear, tensions will escalate. The US Biden administration has been responding with airstrikes against the PMU and Syrian militias, in North Eastern Syria since the third of January, after strikes on their forces. In Iraq, a number of rocket attacks have also targeted the US Embassy in Baghdad, as well as military facilities where American forces are based surrounding the Baghdad airport.

These attacks, in Syria and Iraq, have been brought on by a failed US policy in the region and will likely escalate given the hardline tactics of the Biden administration.
at
Subscribe to: Posts (Atom)