FBI really doesn’t want anyone to know about “stingray” use by local cops

Click here to access article by Cyrus Farivar from Ars Technica.

While this article is excellent in bringing this media-obscured issue to our consciousness, it doesn't really examine the important implications for activists that wish to use their limited First Amendment rights to protest, and to engage in political organizing against government actions. I continue to be amazed at the extent of people's naivete regarding government agencies surveillance of citizens and their extensive efforts to coverup such activities. This seems to be especially true of "techno-geeks" like the people who work at Ars Technica. The author seems to be puzzled over the fact that the FBI is opposing any attempts to reveal this type of intrusive surveillance. However, once we learn that the company is owned by Condé Nast, a media corporation serving the One Percent, this is no longer surprising.

If you’ve ever filed a public records request with your local police department to learn more about how cell-site simulators are used in your community—chances are good that the FBI knows about it. And the FBI will attempt to “prevent disclosure” of such information.

Not only can these devices, commonly known as "stingrays," be used to determine a phone’s location, but they can also intercept calls and text messages,

Tsipras pledges to fight austerity but ‘observe euro norms’ as bankers prepare to stonewall Syriza

Click here to access article by Fred Goldstein from Workers World. 

Right now the Syriza leaders are publicly underestimating the enemy. Instead, preparations for a financial and economic assault should be underway. And all revolutionary forces in Greece should be looking for ways to unite in the struggle in the face of the crisis. This applies especially to the working-class organizations and the strategically situated trade unions, which have a glorious history of resisting political reaction, repression and exploitation.

Any strong initiative taken by the Greek masses to ward off the coming attacks would undoubtedly resonate in southern Europe and other European countries. Taking a struggle initiative in Greece is the most certain way to generate international solidarity.

The struggle against austerity and economic strangulation must lead down the path of class struggle and working-class organization for defense of the people.

French Website Shutdown Law Decried as Attack on Free Speech

Click here to access article by Nadia Prupis from Common Dreams.

Here we see another measure from Empire puppets in Europe to circumvent their much heralded "rule of law" and to replace it with ruling class bureaucratic directives. Apparently their legal system was not sufficiently efficient in enforcing their will upon the French Ninety-Nine Percent. Can you now see how effective the use of "terrorist" incidents are in promoting such actions? One might be tempted to think, if one were a member of this ruling class, that creating such incidents might be good for the nation, and incidentally, one's interests. (sorry--a bit of sarcasm)

A new law enacted Monday in France will allow the government to shut down websites without a court order, in a move that officials say will help combat terrorism and child pornography but which civil liberties advocates warn threatens free speech rights.

The law, which has been under consideration for years, gained new traction after last month's attack against the Charlie Hebdo magazine headquarters in Paris.

The great illusion of free press

Click here to access article by Mike Walsh from Euro Weekly News. 

Walsh brags about his publication's commitment to freedom of the press:

I regularly enjoy coffee with two mainstream media editor friends.

Neither will carry my articles because of my ‘pro-Russian leanings.’ I won’t play a part in mainstream media’s orchestrated anti-Russian rhetoric. Be proud of me; my candid nature suggests that, in the Euro Weekly News at least, you enjoy a free press.

Then he continues on to devote merely 440 words to this vital subject. Well, that is something that is better than nothing which is what we get in major media, but I think it is really not something to boast about. Euro Weekly News may not be a major media corporation, but it is of significant size and thus is clearly dependent on advertising by private businesses and corporations. Thus, it's content can hardly offer a significant challenge to their interests. The subject of a free press (or lack of) is of critical importance, and thus deserves a whole series of lengthy articles devoted to it--something that the managers/owners of Euro Weekly News will never permit.

Part III: Killing the dominant male

Click here to access article by Tanja Nijmeijer from FARC-EP/Columbia. 

I was astonished to find this article from a FARC website about my favorite revolutionary organization, PKK, a Kurdish revolutionary party in control of a Kurdish region (Rojava) in northern Syria. (See my previous posts here, here, and here.) The article, and the series, features a representative from FARC interviewing two women from PKK. The links to the previous installments of the interview are included in this post. I'm not sure which of the parts are of most importance--I strongly recommend all three.

PKK, the Workers Party of Kurdistán: many people know their name, few really know what their struggle is about. [FARC-EP/Columbia] had the opportunity to speak with two representatives of the PKK's women's organization - PAJK, Zelal Dersim and Asia Dicle, about the situation in the Middle-East, IS, the role of the United States, the peace process with the Turkish government and, last but not least, the PKK struggle for freedom. This is the third part of the interview.

There is quite an alphabet soup of abbreviations and other references made in the articles, most of which are identified. Here are two which are not: HWP and Abdullah Öcalan

I was particularly interested in their views of ISIS (identified as "IS" in the article) which was presented in part II. Here is the start of this discussion:

Why do you think the US is fighting against IS now?

Zelal: First of all, we know that the US, when they said they had bombed IS, what they were really bombing was desert. They know perfectly well where the central command posts of IS are located so there is no way of talking about mistakes here. There has never been any US attack against IS. All the terrorists of IS travel freely between Turkey (where there are some of their camps) and Syria. They go to the hospital in Turkey when they are wounded and travel to Syria again without any problem. Turkey also supports them.

Why are they holding up the facade of combating IS then?

Imperialist hypocrisy over ISIS execution

Click here to access article by Barry Grey from The Greanville Post.

The release of a video showing the immolation of captured Jordanian pilot First Lt. Moaz al-Kasabeh by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS) has been followed by a wave of hypocritical moralizing, combined with threats of more violence, from the imperialist powers and their regional allies.

And, there are some already beginning to question this latest highly sophisticated video production of another ISIS execution.

Ukraine: Use Of U.S. Ambassador's "False Flag" Offer Aborted

Click here to access article by Bernhard from Moon of Alabama.

Bernhard digs up a lot of material online to illustrate how desperate the Empire's Ukraine fascists are for a major war.

Europe Wary of US ‘All Options’ Threat to Russia

Click here to access article by Finian Cunningham from Strategic Culture Foundation.

What has probably galvanised the European leaders to push the diplomatic envelope is the reckless proposal from Washington earlier in the week to send more military weapons to the Kiev regime. Notably, Berlin and Paris said they were against supplying any more arms into the Ukraine crisis. Even the British government, normally a stalwart ally of Washington, voiced objection to the latest American weapons proposal. ....

While Merkel and Hollande were earnestly endeavouring to find a peaceful way out of the impasse with Putin, it was apparent that a significant divergence between Europe and Washington had emerged. 

American Workers ‘Roadkill’ for Lobbyists, Immigration Lawyers

Click here to access article by Wolf Richter from Wolf Street. 

Referring to the H-1B Program which is often portrayed to the gullible public as protecting American workers from losing their job to foreign workers, Richter writes about a provision of the act which actually makes this legal:

This provision makes it perfectly legal to replace an American at will by an H-1B worker if that worker is paid more than $60,000 or has a master’s degree. You hire a worker with a notorious “Master’s in Computer Applications” from an Indian diploma mill, and you can replace an American. Or, you pay more than $60,000 (the average programmer wage in LA is over $90,000) and you can do the same.

And thus, American workers remain roadkill for lobbyists and immigration lawyers.

Meanwhile, corporations such as Southern California Edison are taking advantage by replacing American workers.

Stop kidding yourself: SYRIZA is an unlikely model for the U.S. Left

Click here to access article by Jehu from The Real Movement. 

The author challenges the hoopla we are witnessing in liberal-left circles in the US over the latest hope for radical change: Syriza party in Greece.

Briefly stated, any serious examination of SYRIZA’s victory will show that victory was a triumph for many of the principles on which neoliberalism is founded.

Also, read Pepe Escobar's take on what's happening to Greece.

It is now crystal clear the ECB will pull no punches to turn Greece into a European failed state. The rationale: others – from Spain to even, in the near future, France – must not entertain funny ideas. Toe the austerity line, or we’ll get medieval on you.

Let liberal Jews weep for their dream of Israel, and move on

Click here to access article by Philip Weiss from Mondoweiss.

From Our Body Ourselves website we learn:

Alice Rothchild is a Boston ob-gyn who has been active in the women’s movement since the early 1970s, when she worked on the first “Our Bodies, Ourselves” and joined her first consciousness raising group.

She also became involved in the health care reform movement and is a longtime member of Physicians for a National Health Program. She currently is focused on the Israel/Palestine conflict and co-organizes health and human rights delegations to Israel/Palestine through American Jews for a Just Peace. She is also active in Jewish Voice for Peace Boston.

Weiss provides two videos and a report by Rothchild on her widespread efforts to demolish the myths about Israel that many Jews have which are based on their experience in Nazi Germany and their subsequent hopes and dreams for Israel, and the indoctrination in these myths by other Zionists and Jewish sympathizers.

The other night I went to Hunter College to hear Alice Rothchild read from her new book, On the Brink: Israel and Palestine on the eve of the 2014 Gaza Invasion. The room was jammed with students and faculty, and Rothchild, a doctor and activist, was engaging, lively, warm, and genuine– the most you could ask from someone describing what she’d seen and seeking to change people’s minds back home. 

The High Cost of Capitalism

Click here to access article by Paul Craig Roberts from his blog.

I continue to be astonished by his commentaries. Here this former Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy in the Reagan administration takes direct aim at capitalism.

Noam Chomsky Compares Right-Wing Media to Nazi Germany

Click here if you wish to access this 3:18m video of Chomsky's comments directly from The Greanville Post. This talk was over five years ago. I wonder what he would think today. I think that ruling class media and the ruling class government is far worse than it was then. Forget about right-wing or left-wing--there is now only a desperate imperialist wing.

Sami Al-Arian, Professor Who Defeated Controversial Terrorism Charges, is Deported from U.S.

Click here to access article by Murtaza Hussain and Glenn Greenwald from The Intercept.

This provides an excellent illustration that the US ruling class under Zionist influence will prosecute thought and free speech crimes to the fullest extent that they can get away with. The way Al-Arian was treated by US authorities for advocating Palestinian causes can be described as kafkaesque--his experience reads like a horror story.

Describing his visceral, firsthand experience of America’s eroding democratic values Al-Arian said, “I came to the United States because I valued living as a free person, one who is able to advocate in a democratic society. Unfortunately, the U.S. has been turning into a less free society, a police and surveillance state, especially after 9/11.”

West's agri-giants snap up Ukraine

Click here to access article by Frederic Mousseau, Policy Director at the Oakland Institute, from Uncommon Thought Journal.

Western corporations have not just taken control of certain profitable agribusinesses and agricultural activities, they have now initiated a vertical integration of the agricultural sector and extended their grip on infrastructure and shipping.

My only criticism of this report is that the author too frequently uses a favorite term of neoliberal agents to provide a nice sounding cover for activities that promote the purchase of assets in foreign countries by capitalists in the Empire: "reform".

Polymer diet

Click here if you wish to access this cartoon by Max Gustafson directly from his website.

Bush Campaign Hopes to Stoke Nostalgia for Nation’s Most Glorious Era

Click here to access article by Andy Borowitz from The New Yorker. (satire)

A centerpiece of the marketing strategy [for the Jeb Bush campaign] will be evoking memories of the 2003 invasion of Iraq. “It’s been a long time since the United States has [directly] invaded another country for no reason,” he said. “People are sentimental about those simpler times.”

Why Local Matters, and Why It’s Inevitable

Click here to access article by Asher Miller, the Executive Director of the Post Carbon Institute. 

At a recent conference Miller gave a slide and lecture presentation in which he provided an excellent perspective on the use of fossil fuels and their impact over the last century on the economy. This perspective functions to introduce his main thesis advocating local conservation measures. He refers to the latter as a "critical strategy in reversing and responding to many of our environmental, energy, economic, and equity issues." Ironically, he prefaces this thesis with a gross understatement: "Of course, 'going local' doesn’t solve everything, particularly problems—like climate change—that are global in nature."

While offering some very important insights on the major issues facing humans today such as climate destabilization and the problems posed by the rising cost of energy, he can only offer an anemic solution. "Going local" will hardly make a dent in all these problems! I think it is very likely that such an intelligent person knows what the real fundamental problem is and the real solution, but he must engage in self-censorship in order to keep his job at the institute which is funded by major foundations and the rich-- after all, their wealth and influence depend on the capitalist system. Meanwhile, working people (if they are lucky enough to be working at all) are so bamboozled by the lies and distractions proliferated in corporate media that they are effectively neutralized as a force for change.

If the capitalist ruling classes had not come to power, and in their place cooperative, publicly owned, and democratically controlled economies had taken control, we more likely would have seen the benefits of cheap energy raising the material living conditions of the vast majority instead of a tiny minority, avoidance of so many devastating wars, and a responsible usage of fossil fuels that wouldn't be threatening climate destabilization as we see today.

U.S. Pushes For War In Europe

Click here to access article by Bernhard from Moon of Alabama.

It is pretty obvious that significant forces in Washington push for a big war in Europe, cold at least but hot if possible. European countries, aside from some small U.S. puppets, are well aware that they would be hit hard in such a war, and do not want it.

The U.S. wants to deliver additional weapons to Ukraine and to thereby goad Russia into such a wider war.

Gallup CEO Fears He Might “Suddenly Disappear” for Questioning U.S. Jobs Data

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

The fact that hourly earnings are not improving with the improvement in the official unemployment rate and that the labor force participation rate of working age men (ages 25 to 54) now stands at the lowest level since the BLS [Bureau of Labor Statistics] started keeping records more than 60 years ago adds further fodder to “The Big Lie” theory. [my link]

Two degrees of warming closer than you may think

Click here to access article by David Spratt from Climate Code Red. 

It's taken a hundred years of human-caused greenhouse emissions to push the global temperature up almost one degree Celsius (1C°), so another degree is still some time away. Right?  And there seems to have been a "pause" in warming over the last two decades, so getting to 2C° is going to take a good while, and we may have more time that we thought.

Wrong on both counts. 

Spratt provides the latest scientific findings on climate change, and it's a rather complicated picture. One thing is becoming certain--we humans are in deep doo-doo thanks to capitalists' addictions to wealth and power and our acceptance of their rule.

How Warming May Alter Critical ‘Atmospheric Rivers’

Click here to access article by Andrea Thompson from Climate Central.

The relentless drought in California, now in its fourth year, has left the state with a dismal snowpack and below-normal stores in many reservoirs, which has hobbled the state’s agriculture and sent some communities to the brink of waterlessness, among numerous other impacts.

Although the information provided in this article focuses on California, the current weather and rising temperatures apply to the entire west coast of the US. Unlike California, we have received plenty of rain over the past several years, but the rain, because of higher temperatures, is falling onto the land and going right down to the sea. We have much less snow pack than usual, and water supply to the greater Seattle area depends on snow pack. Ski areas in the mountains are mostly closed. The warmer temperatures have been great for my heating bill, but otherwise they are deadly harbingers of things to come over the next decades. 

Meanwhile, TV talking heads employed by our ruling capitalist class, a class whose perspective is limited to next quarter's financial statements, report record temperatures as some kind of an achievement like the breaking of Olympic records. 

Meanwhile, try out an excellent interactive graphic from Climate Central at this link to see how your area's temperatures will change by 2100.

The Perpetrators of the 2001 Anthrax Attacks Are Still At Large

Click here if you wish to access the transcript of this important interview posted on nsnbc. (This is a best post.)

So far I have had time to listen to over half of this fascinating one hour interview involving one professor who has done considerable research on the anthrax attacks. He has uncovered numerous connections between people connected with 9/11, media deceptions regarding the anthrax attacks, and other information all of which show signs of another false-flag attempt that was successfully used to pressure Congress into passing the first Patriot Act. 

In this podcast interview, German journalist Lars Schall talks with Dr. Graeme MacQueen, founding Director of the Centre for Peace Studies at McMaster University in Canada. Topic of their discussion: the research that MacQueen did for his recent book “The 2001 Anthrax Deception: The Case for a Domestic Conspiracy.” Moreover, they address the fact that the 9/11 Commission Report is heavily based on tortured testimony.

Graeme MacQueen received his Ph.D. in Buddhist Studies from Harvard University and taught in the Religious Studies Department of McMaster University for 30 years. While at McMaster he became founding Director of its Centre for Peace Studies, after which he helped develop the B.A. program in Peace Studies and oversaw the development of peace-building projects in Sri Lanka, Gaza, Croatia and Afghanistan. Graeme MacQueen was a member of the organizing committee of the “Toronto Hearings” held on the 10th anniversary of 9/11 and is co-editor of “The Journal of 9/11 Studies” – a peer-reviewed, electronic-only journal covering research related to the events of September 11, 2001. For an overview of MacQueen’s book “The 2001 Anthrax Deception: The Case for a Domestic Conspiracy” see here. And here you can read a review of MacQueen’s book by Professor Edward Curtin.

Al-Qaeda, Saudi Arabia and Israel

Click here to access article by Robert Parry from ConsortiumNews.

I am very impressed with the way Parry has carefully assembled many bits and pieces of evidence to construct an interpretation of events that remain obscured by the Empire's propaganda machinery. His construction ties together so many very important events reaching back to 9/11 and "terrorist" incidents even before then, terrorist events in Chechnya, the overthrow of Ukraine's government by neo-Nazis, and recent events in the Middle East. The project he constructs is still unfinished, but it contributes another major part of the giant puzzle that other honest geopolitical analysts can add to. His construction also confirms many suspicions about the major role of the Zionist/neocon faction in determining Empire actions.

Earth is crossing multiple points of no return

Click here to access article by Pete Dolack from Systemic Disorder. 

If we are to be serious about reversing global warming and repairing the environment, we have to create an economic system based on human need, that is stable as a steady-state system and under democratic control, rather than our present authoritarian system that is designed to maximize private profit. The scientists who prepared the Planetary Boundaries paper no doubt have the highest sincerity, but they have much company in being unable to imagine a world without capitalism. Until we do live in such a world, we will continue to hurtle toward catastrophe regardless of good intentions and well-designed research reports.

Dr. Daniele Ganser : NATO's Secret Armies - GLADIO & The Strategy of Tension

Click here to access the introduction and the link to the audio interview from The Mind Renewed.

While the Empire's capitalist authorities always suppressed any information about their secret armies following WWII; after they were discovered in the early 1990s, they tried to portray Operation Gladio as a purely defensive operation to protect western European countries from a Russian invasion. In reality its actual operations served to smash radical labor unions, left-wing parties, to rig elections all to protect capitalist rule in Europe following WWII. Operation Gladio were paramilitary armies often using former Nazis and false-flag terrorist operations (sound familiar?) to serve the early Anglo-American Empire's control of western Europe against any kind of challenge from left-wing groups.

This 1hr 21m interview offers an excellent summary of Ganser's very important book entitled NATO's Secret Armies. (I especially urge you to listen to this if you don't have time to read the book).

Examining the Stasi, Seeing the NSA

Click here to access article by Elizabeth Murray from ConsortiumNews.

After a group of former intelligence officers in the spy services of the US and Britain toured a Stasi museum in the former East Germany (German Democratic Republic), they commented on their observations. Here are two: 

Annie Machon, a ... former MI5 officer who lived in exile for three years after blowing the whistle on MI5 illegalities along with her then-partner David Shayler, commented that the techniques used by the Stasi “brought back a lot of memories for me from the 1990s. Despite it being the analog [versus digital] era, it was startling how much personal data they could capture — and how much worse it is now for all of us.”

                                      ***************************************

Former FBI Special Agent Coleen Rowley ... commented that “what jumped out at me from that [Stasi Museum] tour in comparing all the excessive spying on the personal lives of citizens and oppression and abuse during that period of East German history was that — despite the use of different ideologies, religions and loyalty groups, and despite the use of new spy technologies — what remains constant is this form of ‘control-freak’ perceived need for domination.

“Those in power do tend to be ‘true believers’ in their own noble cause justifying their terribly wrongful, illegal methods.”

Rowley added that current “FBI-CIA methods against the Muslim community in the United States are not much different [from Stasi tactics], most likely also assisted by intelligence unlawfully gained through electronic surveillance to extort and coerce collusion.”

However, I think that authorities in the former East Germany had much more of an excuse to engage in such activities than their counterparts today in the Empire. They were very much under the threat of subversive activities from the West. Thus, their police state activities were purely defensive. This is not to justify such activities, but given the aggressive activities and intentions from the West, it is much more understandable.

Saudi Arabia and the U.S. Intelligence Community: Allies Against 9/11 Transparency?

Click here to access article by Brian McGlinchey from 28Pages.org.

While the people behind this website, most often families of 9/11 victims, have relentlessly pursued the truth behind the 9/11 tragedy, their political analysis of the event falls short due to a naive understanding of capitalist geopolitics.

Saudi Arabia’s reasons for wanting the 28 pages kept secret are clear, but what about America’s intelligence community? Actually, its motives are likely identical: Shielding itself from public humiliation and the consequences that would accompany it.

Saudi Arabia is a key ally in the Empire's ruling class due to the fact of their enormous oil resources and the deal engineered in the 1970s by Kissinger (see this or this) to insure that their country lent its support to the dollar by selling oil only in US dollars and storing their money in US banks in return for protection. This medieval kingdom would have long ago disappeared into history without this protection and the US dollar would have become nearly worthless. This is why the US can sustain it's trillion dollar annual deficits, fund its huge military, 1000 plus military bases all over the world, and fund it's subversive activities all for the purpose of serving the Empire's ruling capitalist class.

“While the capitalists are winning every battle between the two classes, they are nonetheless losing the war.”

Click here to access article from The New Inquiry.

Much food for thought in this article...

...the social forces of production have today become entirely incompatible with the nation state and national politics. Which is to say, SYRIZA’s politics may ultimately turn out to be merely a progressive variant of neoliberalism — and this may just be a final expression of bourgeois politics, rather than a true anti-politics.... 

...considering this piece and this.

Russia And China’s Growing Energy Relationship

Click here to access article by Nick Cunningham from OilPrice. 

Capitalist gangs will always vie for dominance versus competitors with the ultimate aim of attaining a dominant position. Much like street gangs that want to attain dominance in a neighborhood, capitalist powers are out to obtain dominance in the world neighborhood. 

The 21st century has seen the rise of new capitalist gangs that are challenging the heretofore mostly dominant Western gang led by the USA. The latter has been aggressively pursuing its aims since the end of WWII when it survived with its industrial and military establishment largely intact. The new challengers most effectively represented by Russia and China refuse to take orders from the dominant capitalist gang. Consequently we are witnessing a closer relationship between Russian and China and a new ramped-up cold war between the latter two countries and the US-led Empire in the form of mostly an economic war, but also we are noticing that the participants are beefing up their military capabilities which, of course, includes devastating nuclear weapons. This on top of the never-ending "terrorist wars" is signalling that we are entering a new and very dangerous phase in human history.

Cunningham reports on the type of deals that the two countries, Russia and China, have made in reaction to the Empire's aggressive policies toward Russia, and to a lessor extent toward China.

Russia’s economic freefall and isolation from the West has made it increasingly eager to build its relationship with China, even at the cost of lost leverage with Beijing.

But new economic data from China shows that Russia has succeeded in capturing a larger share of the massive – and growing – Chinese oil import market. 

David Harvey: Looking Toward a Moneyless Economy and Sleeping Well at Night

Click here to access article by Laura Flanders from TruthOut. 

This is rather light stuff when it comes to an anti-capitalist critique and pro-social ideas, but it may open more minds to more ideas now that the defects of capitalism are becoming harder to ignore. 

This article starts with an introduction to David Harvey, and then features a 17:16m video segment of Flanders' show in which she interviews Harvey regarding his ideas. A transcript of the interview follows the YouTube video.

The Doomsday Clock Moves to Three Minutes to Midnight

Click here to access article by John Harrison from Sputnik International.

Atomic scientists at the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists have moved their clock closest to midnight not seen since 1984. Addressing this change (in this rather confusing article), the first part features a 15:03m audio recording of an interview conducted by Harrison with two scientists:

One of the clock’s timekeepers; Dr. Kennette Benedict, Executive Director and Publisher of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, and also Mr. John Large, an independent nuclear expert, and Consulting Engineer with Large & Associates in London....

Following this interview there is a transcript of another interview with Sharon Squassoni who is a member of the Doomsday Clock committee of the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists. She highlights the current international situation in comparison to the Cold War era.

The tensions of the Cold War period look almost calm in comparison to what is happening now internationally, with at least two international conflicts occurring, each one of which could lead to a Third World War. From this perspective, the Cold War period looks almost safe. Then there are Climate Change issues, which are just as serious, although because of their delayed effect, easier to ignore. As a result, a group of scientists has come up with a sobering reflection of the salience of current international events. The Doomsday Clock.

It's clear to me that the increasing tension in the world and desire of many smaller countries to obtain nuclear weapons are related, and both are related to the rampaging US Empire to control the entire world. The latter's activities are provoking countries like Russia and China, whose ruling capitalist classes refuse to take orders from the Empire, to beef up their nuclear arsenals. Noam Chomsky also supports this view and corroborates the views of these scientists in a post on RT entitled "World ominously close to nuclear war".

Europe slouching towards anxiety & war

Click here to access article by Pepe Escobar from RT. 

Escobar, who has been recently reading Edward Gibbon's classic book The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, sees many parallels with Roman history and Greek mythology in the ominous scene developing in Europe. Although the current war is strictly economic (except for the real war in Ukraine), with European masters firmly wedded to the Empire, things could spiral out of control. So far, he sees the Greeks under the new party Syriza standing firm against the masters of the European division of the Empire.

For the moment, German Economy Minister Sigmar Gabriel is definitely bluffing, warning Greek Prime Minister Tsipras that the eurozone could survive without Greece ("We no longer have to worry like we did back then.")

If, however, Brussels admits a de facto, even partial, default, it would result in Spain, Portugal, Ireland, and scores of other EU sufferers screaming “We want the same deal.”

Then there is the Russian card that factors into this scene which Escobar explores. 

I think that Syriza leaders are also bluffing, and we will see extended negotiations that will result in a reduction of Greek debts owed to European banks many of which were assumed by previous neoliberal Greek governments. However, Escobar is right: such a compromise will trigger demands by the other debt ridden countries for the same deal. So, European events will likely generate even more anxieties in the near future.

Venezuela: a Coup in Real Time

Click here to access article by Eva Golinger from CounterPunch. 

There is a coup underway in Venezuela. The pieces are all falling into place like a bad CIA movie. At every turn a new traitor is revealed, a betrayal is born, full of promises to reveal the smoking gun that will justify the unjustifiable. Infiltrations are rampant, rumors spread like wildfire, and the panic mentality threatens to overcome logic. Headlines scream danger, crisis and imminent demise, while the usual suspects declare covert war on a people whose only crime is being gatekeeper to the largest pot of black gold in the world.

The Empire directors have unleashed a propaganda war against the government of Venezuela in our media, and we can only imagine what they are up to inside Venezuela. Besides the NY Times, The Atlantic, and NPR mentioned in the article, there appears to be a broad-base propaganda attack being launched in the US and Britain to smear the government of Venezuela. I've found similar articles in liberal media such as The Guardian and the Huffington Post. I find it hard to believe that this coverage is purely coincidental.

One antidote to this Empire propaganda is this piece from Venezuela Analysis by Cory Fischer-Hoffman which reports on views of ordinary Venezuelans. They appear to be much smarter about the Empire's intentions than they were in the years before the CIA engineered coup attempt in 2002. 

After the Peak

Click here to access article by Richard Heinberg from Post Carbon Institute.

After reading this article affirming peak oil theory and others which are disputing peak oil theory (conveniently after this current glut of oil on world markets), I am reminded of the metaphor regarding the blind men and the elephant. Obviously, peak oil deniers are so focused on this short term oil glut as well as being committed to capitalism that they refuse to look at the science of peak oil.  

Heinberg has written in support of the science behind peak oil theory since the beginning and is highly regarded as an expert. I, also, am thoroughly convinced of the validity of this theory after having read many articles on the subject. However, his overwhelming focus on only one part of this phenomenon has skewed his perception of related issues. I am referring here to his omission, or ignorance about, the capitalist system. Thus, he looks around and finds only the economics profession to blame for the failure of peak oil warnings!

There’s no cause for shame in that: the deck was stacked against us. The economics profession, which has a stranglehold on government policy, steadfastly continues to insist that energy is a fully substitutable ingredient in the economy, and that resource depletion poses no limit to economic growth. Believing this to be true, policy makers have effectively had their fingers jammed in their ears.

He appears to be totally unaware that capitalism requires growth and cheap, abundant energy to exist. Those who receive huge benefits from the system in terms of wealth and especially overwhelming political power cannot but resist and deny peak oil warnings. 

If people are not sufficiently motivated by the social disasters produced by capitalism, then surely they must be by the disasters that lie ahead for their children, grandchildren, and the human race due to diminishing supplies of cheap oil and climate destabilization caused by the overuse of fossil fuels. Thus, peak oil as well as climate destabilization are revolutionary issues.

British Police Do NOT Want You Watching Live Terror Events! Why might that be?

Click here to access article by Stuart J. Hooper from 21st Century Wire. 

We are told that there are “fears that broadcast of live images could increase difficulties for police and military and risk lives of hostages”. Alternatively, we could suggest that ‘authorities’ do not want anybody to have any evidence available to them that could possibly used to argue against, and damage, their ‘official’ narrative of an event.

.... A detailed analysis of the events in Paris, including expert testimony on what was witnessed, suggests that the attacks fit the bill for what can deemed a false flag event for geopolitical purposes.

Half of Humanity Now Forms the ‘Resistance’

Click here to access article by Andre Vltchek from CounterPunch. 

Vltchek like Pepe Escobar seems to be everywhere in the world. We now find him in Kashmir reporting on the resistance there facing the violence of Indian government troops. While local Indians seem a bit depressed over their situation, Vltchek attempts to boost their morale, and ours, with inspirational messages like those contained in this article. I think he sometimes overstates his inspiration; but it is certainly needed by people in the front-lines who are waging this daily battle against forces of the fascist Empire, and often by people like us behind the lines who are also engaged, although with less risk to our lives and limbs, in this daily struggle. 

Vltchek frequent reporting on the resistance occurring in various parts of the world is by itself very inspiring.

During that dark night, several men and women were gathered in a cramped room, asking me one simple and essential question: “Could the brutality of the Empire be prevented, and if not prevented, could it be stopped?”

I replied that “Yes!” And “Yes!” again.

Because no matter how dark the night appears to be, no matter how hopeless the struggles seems to be, the world had changed in the last several years; and it had changed profoundly.

TTIP: Regulatory Cooperation - a Threat to Democracy

Click here if you wish to access this posting directly form Corporate Europe Observatory.

We denounce “regulatory cooperation“ as a danger to democracy and an attempt to put the interests of big business before the protection of citizens, workers and the environment.

The video is a joint project of Campact, Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO), LobbyControl, Seattle to Brussels Network and SumOfUs.

The new Global Corporate Law

Click here to access article by Juan Hernández Zubizarreta from Transnational Institute. (This link goes to an introduction which includes a link to the 11 page paper by this author.)

We have witnessed within the US the move by the capitalist ruling class through its control of the Supreme Court to level the playing field between corporations and ordinary citizens by the latter's ruling in the Citizens United v. FEC case which culminated a long history of such rulings. Well, it appears that worse things are happening on the global level where there is developing a global corporate law that is being inserted into national laws of many states in addition to the reinterpretation of existing laws all, of which, even go beyond a level playing field--they actually favor corporate rights and interests. This is the natural development of capitalism which has reached a late stage in which the wealth accumulation of capitalists is so large that states have little real control over their economies--they must now go begging to capitalists for investments in their economies.

The global economic crisis that unfolded in 2009 was significant not just for the questions it raised over the power of big finance, but also for the attention it drew to other crises facing our planet – notably food, ecology and care work. What has been given less attention is the national and international legal systems that underpin these crises and the way legislation has been skewed in favour of capital and transnational corporations.

Death-Dealing Politics in the Age of Extreme Violence

Click here to access article by Henry Giroux from TruthOut.

I am posting this article not because it sheds much light on its subject matter, but as another example of material you find throughout liberal-left media (TruthOut, Democracy Now!, The Nation, AlterNet, etc) and by prominent activists and critics such as Naomi Klein. Thus, if you are already familiar with Giroux's writings, I am not recommending that you read this article. What I want to do is use this and similar writings in order to define a major boundary between reformist and radical ideological positions. Those who write in the reformist camp always limit their critiques to preserve the system of capitalism while wanting only modifications of it. In contrast, radical writers see the capitalist system as basically or inherently flawed and want to replace the system with something else, although this may be unspecified.  

The crucial feature of capitalism is the right to "own" value produced on the premises or using material "owned" by private parties. Hence, the need to convert everything into a commodity that can be owned, bought and sold directly or indirectly for a profit. Thus we see all kinds of ideas and even life forms being "owned" to serve profit-making, privately owned enterprises. Labor has long been transformed into a commodity through wage labor, a kind of rented labor.

Reformist writers often go to great lengths to criticize existing economic practices and their harmful effects on society. People like Giroux and Naomi Klein do this with so much passion, but it is not passion that divides reformists from radicals.

The way we can identify this piece as reformist is rather easy when we see such phrases as the following to bolster Giroux's arguments: "free-market fundamentalism" instead of simply "market operations", "neoliberal" or "neoliberalism" or "neoliberal authoritarianism" in place of "the current stage of capitalism", or "predatory capitalism" or "savage form of free-market capitalism" used in place of simply "capitalism". (Klein frequently uses "deregulated capitalism") He, like other reformists, argue that the current form of capitalism is replacing what we had before which he implies was democracy. This is patently false. Under capitalist class rule there has always existed this primary principle: the more money you have in your bank account the more rights and privileges you enjoy. It's just that nowadays with capitalist wealth becoming so concentrated, the increasing inequality and disparity between the rich and the poor has become so dramatic that it can no longer be downplayed or ignored.

Giroux and Klein are two of the most passionate writers who attack the abuses of capitalism, however they always stop short of attacking the system itself; instead they focus their attacks on what they see as corruption of the system. Thus, they always suggest that only reforms are needed to restore things to what we enjoyed in some mythical democracy. Their passionate concern for the victims of capitalism often reminds me of Bill Clinton's theme of "I feel your pain" which he (and Obama uses) used so effectively while promoting legislation in support of neoliberal trade treaties.

Thus, we can see why liberals, or the capitalist left-wing, are tolerated in capitalist class rule: they serve to co-opt or convert radical-revolutionary types into reformists with their emotional pitches of concern for the victims of capitalism.

There Is No Scientific Consensus On GMO Safety

Click here to access article by Colin Todhunter from his blog.

Todhunter draws material from scientists to argue that science has not arrived at agreement on this issue. Meanwhile agricultural corporations using GMO technology keep maintaining that the technology is perfectly safe. Of course, the technology is creating vast amounts of wealth for the owners of these corporations. 

As I've argued before, capitalists pursue wealth because of its easy convertibility into power over others which is its main objective. The pursuit of wealth is mostly a means to such power. 

Another unique feature of the capitalist system is mostly a great secret: the nature of capitalist class power is that it is very indirect so that it usually functions without the use of coercive physical force. Instead capitalists rely more on "market forces". To be sure, ruling capitalist classes have installed powerful coercive forces (militarized police forces, a huge military-industrial complex producing all sorts of lethal weapons, a huge prison system, etc) whenever market forces cannot accomplish their aims. With their ownership/control of media, they are also able to spread lies about their operations whenever the truth gets in their way. Todhunter is a media activist that is putting the lie to messages amplified by corporate media that GMO foods have been shown by scientists to pose no significant hazards to the health of humans or the environment.

The industry's claim that there is a 'scientific consensus' on the safety of GMOs is about as bogus as its claim that this technology is required to 'feed the world'. That too is a deception....

Unraveling the Mystery of Boko Haram

Click here to access article by Eric Draitser from CounterPunch.

I don't think that Draitser fully unravels the "mystery of Boko Haram" in this two part, lengthy article; instead he answers the question as to who benefits. In so doing, he provides an excellent overview of Western neocolonial operations in resource rich Africa. All the former European colonial powers are back competing for the continent's wealth; but there are new capitalist actors, US and China, that are on the scene to make it even more complicated. 

While many of the details remain murky at best, with powerful players operating behind the scenes, the contours of a regional destabilization and a proxy war become discernible.  

Although China is a major player, Draitser does not give much information about their involvement. From my memory of other reliable reports, I think the Chinese participation in this continent has had positive benefits for African countries by their promotion of infrastructure construction. 

Sibel Edmonds on Gladio B and the Paris Shooting

Click here if you wish to access the original posting on the Corbett Report. I particularly recommend the first 32:07m of the interview.

I'm sure observers of alternative media will be shocked by Edmond's commentary about a recent report in the NY Times regarding an incident in Xinjiang, China (sarcasm). This courageous FBI whistleblower has covered the Empire's creation of subversive terrorist projects identified by her as "Gladio B" in this and other regions two years ago in the excellent Gladio B series with James Corbett, so she was ready to offer her insights on what is really happening there in this latest incident.

Oil routes and pipelines actual & planned

(Here are some maps that you might find useful when listening to the first part of Edmond's interview.)

Related to this, I found another article posted on MintPress News entitled "ISIS Member Claims The U.S. Has Secretly Been Funding Their Operations" which was most interesting.

Below is a list of other topics covered in the rest of the 32:07m segment of the interview that may interest you.

 -Antiterror raids suggest Belgium  has become centre for extremists

 -Turkey mafia paid to smuggle Paris suspect into Syria: Sources

 -Information on Democracy Now! funding

-BFP Exposé: CIA-Obama-George Soros Coordinated Misinformation Campaign with Democracy Now!

New Saudi King Named In 9/11 Suits

Click here to access article by Jon Gold from 911 Blogger.

Gold digs up more information about the new monarch of the Empire's important ally in the Middle East, the country that only sells its oil in US dollars in return for protection. (Sounds like a Mafia operation, does it not?) I particularly recommend his link to History Commons website, a project of activists who are doing such great work in uncovering the real history of the Empire. 

Because the people at 911 Blogger are focused on excavating the real truth about 9/11, they make frequent references to 28 redacted pages of the official 9/11 Commission Report that they want revealed. If you are not familiar with this issue, Gold provides links to more information.

 

This week, Obama cancelled a trip to the Taj Mahal so he could go pay his respects for King Abdullah in Saudi Arabia. He went to see the new King, Salman bin Abdul-Aziz Al Saud, who just happens to be named as a defendant in a law suit against Saudi Arabia brought about by 9/11 Families. Some of the people that accompanied him were John McCain (who loves the 9/11 Report which absolved the Saudi Arabian Government), James A. Baker (his law firm Baker Botts represented the Saudis against the 9/11 Families in a lawsuit), and Condoleezza Rice (who lied before the 9/11 Commission, and had an oil rig named after her).

U.S. Set to Spend $95 Million a Day for 10 Years to Update Nuclear Arsenal

Click here to access article by Carey Wedler from The Anti-Media. 

Last week, millions of Americans were busy ‘flagsturbating’ to the latest American war porn, American Sniper. While they were distracted, the federal government was busy bolstering the war machinery that the film helps to glorify.

According to a new estimate published by the Congressional Budget Office last week, it will cost $348 billion over a decade for the United States to update its nuclear weapons.  Should they do it, they will continue a stranglehold on one of the world’s biggest arsenals.

Russia In The Cross Hairs — Paul Craig Roberts

Click here to access article by Paul Craig Roberts from his blog. 

I almost entirely agree with his astonishment over the Empire's various attacks on Russia and the dangers the latter faces in this new cold war. However, I also have for a long time been astonished at this former Assistant Secretary of the Treasury for Economic Policy in the Reagan administration. The Treasury Department is typically loaded with ruling class directors. I would be very interested to find out the history of Robert's split with the ruling class. I can only surmise that he is an old fashioned conservative in the older ruling class who because of his loyalty and skills was appointed to the position, but over the years since then the neo-conservatives and Zionists have heavily infiltrated the ruling class.

In the first sentence above I specified "almost entirely agree" with Robert's views in this article because there was one paragraph with which I disagreed:

Standard and Poor’s downgrade is, without any doubt, a political act. It proves what we already know, and that is that the American rating firms are corrupt political operations. Remember the Investment Grade rating the American rating agencies gave to obvious subprime junk? These rating agencies are paid by Wall Street, and like Wall Street they serve the US government.

No, it is the reverse: the US government along with the rating agencies serve Wall Street.

We have no money so central banks give more money to banks

Click here to access article by Pete Dolack from Systemic Disorder. 

We must thank Dolack once again for explaining what the language of our capitalist masters really means and what is occurring in the economies of the Empire, mostly NATO countries and Japan, which are under the control of these people who are a tiny segment of their respective populations. What I don't think he makes clear is that the decisions our masters are making are dictated to a large extent by the inherent nature of capitalism which is a "systemic disorder" that promotes the interests of capitalists, our masters. Thus, their decisions are not irrational or stupid, but the logical consequence of class rule guided by an economic system that favors them with wealth which readily transfers into power. It is power that they are primarily after, not wealth. Wealth is a means to power. Perhaps I need to explain this further.

There is no doubt that the capitalist system brings tremendous wealth and fabulous lifestyles to capitalists, but I am thoroughly convinced that this is far less important to them than the power it gives capitalists to decide on every significant issue facing societies. This conviction is based on various serendipitous experiences I've had ranging from a personal observation of a CEO of a major corporation, my contacts with other high ranking people in banking, and the observations of other observing people whose experiences brought them into contact with powerful capitalists. After all, after one has a million dollars or so, what more does one need to satisfy their material needs whims and fantasies? These capitalists are amassing fortunes of 1000 times more than that! And they are always plotting to make more money, and they don't care how they do it and whether it wrecks the planet for future generations. Thus, it can't be because they are striving to improve their lifestyles. Obviously they want more control of, or dominance over, other capitalists and over entire societies--that's us. Capitalists are essentially control freaks and they are in control of most of the world! 

However, is capitalism any different in this way than the systems of domination that have governed societies since civilization began around 10 to 15 thousand years ago? We have learned that control structures existed in theocratic, military, and feudal societies. Capitalism is just another "systemic disorder". I think we must learn from anthropological evidence which indicates the major role that cooperation and egalitarian social relations played in the 98% of human existence which preceded the advent of civilization. 

It appears that the more humans began to control their material means of survival, the more they have viewed nature and their fellow humans in instrumental terms to be exploited for their own benefit. This type of experience has alienated humans from the deeper reality of humans as merely another life form created by nature and dependent on it. There must also be a fundamental acknowledgement that nature is our planet and that we must give up any illusions of transferring to another planet. It follows logically from this argument that to survive, humans must return to much more cooperative societal arrangements that emphasize real equality or we will be eliminated like so many other creatures that preceded us and couldn't adapt.

Must watch: Ukrainian Deputy: US to stage a civil war in Ukraine! This was 20.11.2013!! BEFORE Maidan

Click here if you wish to access the transcript and comments from the posting on The Vineyard of the Saker.

The is more striking evidence that this pseudo revolution was carefully planned by US secret services using methods that were carefully honed from previous "color revolutions". 

What is not explained the chanting in the background which almost put a stop midway in this speaker's address. A note following the post from "Kat Kan" offered this explanation: "The people inexplicably allowed onto the floor of their parliament to chant slogans when a deputy is speaking look like Maidan types already."

Collective Efforts + Self-Education = Social Change

Click here to access article by Mickey Z. from World News Trust.

Some very worthy words of wisdom from an activist.

We are on the brink of economic, social, and environmental collapse. What an extraordinary time to be alive. How lucky are we? We've been trusted with the most vital mission of all time: survival.

This is the best time ever to be working towards collective liberation. Let’s join together to make sure it’s not the last.

TTIP: Regulations Handcuffed

Click here to access article by Kenneth Haar and Max Bank from Corporate Europe Observatory.

A new leaked proposal from the transatlantic trade treaty negotiations (TTIP) shows the European Commission seemingly unstoppable in its drive to constrain regulations to protect the public interest – including potentially those made by regional authorities. 

Saudi oil and U.S. hypocrisy

Click here to access article by Sara Flounders from Workers World.

Flounders provides an excellent description of the Empire's close ally in this Medieval kingdom of Saudia Arabia. Such reporting rarely makes it into the Empire's mainstream media. The only thing that is missing is the key role that this kingdom plays in the backing of petro-dollars which enables the US ruling class to create as much money as it wants.

Saudi Arabia is an absolute and brutal dictatorship. The country is named after the royal Saud family that has expropriated the country’s fabulous oil wealth, and treats it as a wholly owned family asset. Their control is maintained by massive state-organized repression. All forms of political dissent and social organization, from political parties to trade unions, are banned under pain of death.

Money Talks

Click here to access article by Nathan J. Robinson from Jacobin. 

Robinson criticizes liberals for believing that one can legislate free speech (influence) in a society that creates gross inequality in the distribution of money. Money is influence. 

Capitalism creates classes by essentially dividing people into "owners" of productive property and workers who work in their property for wages controlled by the owners. The owners will always come of better in this system because of their control of wages. Over time this control has inevitably resulted in what we see today: a small segment of the population who are rich and vast number of people who tend to be poor and powerless (without influence). Thus, you can have many laws regulating the use of money to influence the political process, but money (influence) will always be used by capitalists to dominate society. Capitalists will always find ways to work around any laws or regulations that tend to restrict their influence. This last conclusion has been demonstrated throughout the history of capitalist societies.

...money not only buys political power, it is political power. Its possession confers godlike capability, and its deprivation creates servitude. With money one can manipulate public taste, ruin one’s enemies, and build, destroy, and conquer.

Movement Ferguson, Beware the Nonprofit Industrial Complex

Click here to access article by Netfa Freeman from Black Agenda Report.

Freeman puts a spotlight on the dangers of seeking funding from non-profits that are funded by the rich, instead of building grass-roots movements that fund themselves.

While, of course, few if anyone may be “getting rich,” no one – particularly those of us working in the non-profit industry – can deny the influence funders have on what not-for-profit formations do or won’t do, what political positions they take or don’t take, etc. Even if, as the director of Soros's fund disclaims “they have no ‘direct’ control over the groups they give to, and said they are all trying to improve accountability.” “Direct” is the operative word.

If we think of this as funders literally dictating to organizations we will miss how this works. An organization or individual doesn’t have to be told anything directly.

The problem, as she recognizes, is that in order to build a grass-roots movement political consciousness raising is a necessary, but also a very difficult, effort to accomplish. That is why I have always stressed the importance of creating a self-funded alternative media by the grass-roots. 

American Sniper: Hollywood and Our Homeland Insecurity Complex

Click here to access article by Patrick Henningsen from 21st Century Wire.

There are a number of reviews of this latest, much ballyhooed film (American Sniper), but none that I've read come close to the quality of this study of the film in many contexts: film art, war propaganda in service to the Empire, CIA and military participation, comparisons with earlier war films, and some information regarding the "sniper's" actual life in contrast to the film version.

After reading the review, it's clear to me that the film fits perfectly with the needs of the Empire directors to keep the hoi polloi supporting their military adventures all over the globe. As such it appears to be a masterpiece of war propaganda designed most especially for the American audience. It is also another illustration of how entertainment is used by the ruling capitalist class along with popular media and education to promote their power and wealth agendas throughout the world. 

It is central to both the Pentagon and the CIA missions, to make absolutely certain that when military blockbuster films hit cinemas they convey the correct message, in the context of what is going on around the world and within the country at that particular time. It’s expected that after this film, the amount of recruitment applications for military sniper positions will skyrocket. .... All the signs are pointing to the inevitability of US troops returning to the Middle East combat theater, either in Iraq, Yemen, or along a new NATO-sanctioned ‘No-Fly’ buffer zone along the Turkey-Syria border. As we speak, media war messaging is centered around ISIS, and that Washington ‘may be forced to send our boys back there.’ To do this, they will need more men, and also more snipers, and more Chris Kyles. 

More Cowbells: new NSA leaks reveal extent of spying tactics

Click here to access article via Reflections on a Revolution from Associated Whistleblowing Press.

In the last few years we have been living a critical moment in the history of the Internet. The good old days, in which optimism was widespread among engineers and new technologies were considered a solution to the great problems of humanity, seem to have disappeared. Nowadays, the Internet has become a very lucrative spying machine, and many of those same engineers are fighting to preserve the most basic rights to privacy.

It’s mostly thanks to Edward Snowden and Wikileaks that we have caught a glimpse of the most obscure practices in the world of industrial-level spying, carried out by the National Security Agency (NSA) and its allies.

Under the pretense of fighting terrorism, these agencies now have direct access to the servers of the largest internet platforms like Facebook, Google, Apple and Yahoo....

International Press Gets Briefly Excited about Coup Prospects in Venezuela

Click here to access article by Joe Emersberger from TeleSur.

In a survey of the "international press" Emersberger sees a lot of excitement about another coup attempt. Of course, what he means by the "international press" is media from NATO countries, which is to say those countries under the control of the Empire. 

Ever since the 2002 coup in Venezuela was defeated, the international corporate press has generally ignored it, downplayed its significance, or accused the government of using it as a “distraction” and as a way to smear opponents. However, the recent plunge in oil prices – and absurd predictions that Venezuela could be forced into defaulting on its foreign bonds - clearly had many foreign journalists excited about the prospects of a coup while President Nicolas Maduro was out of the country.

However, is his concluding paragraph he argues that the situation is very different than it was in 2002 when the right-wing opposition controlled most of Venezuelan's media and was instrumental in bring off the temporary coup.

4 Ways American Corporations Supported Slavery and Horrific Racial Oppression

Click here to access article by Paul Buchheit from AlterNet. 

Many of the modern-day practices of our free-market capitalist system are at least partly responsible for the oppression of black people in America.

The fundamental purpose of capitalism is to create profit for private "owners", which essentially means to buy low and sell high. Another feature is transformation of all inputs of an economic operation into commodities that can be bought and sold. Since all economic value in industrial capitalism requires labor to transform nature into products that humans can use, labor also has also become a commodity, although a particular form of commodity known as wage labor or rented labor. However, in this article Buchheit explains how US corporations were to a large extent built on the earlier form of very cheap commodified labor known as slavery.

New Saudi King Was Major Supporter of Al Qaeda

Click here to access article by Wayne Madsen from Strategic Culture Foundation. (Note regarding Madsen: Although I dislike his practice of not furnishing any linking documentation, I regard Madsen as a very well informed and reliable source of information and analysis.)

"The king is dead, long live the king!" This means essentially that the monarchy is eternal, that nothing changes because a particular king dies. This seems to be the case--maybe even worse--for Saudi Arabia according to Madsen.

The new king of Saudi Arabia, Salman bin Abdulaziz al Saud, the half-brother of King Abdullah, who died in his early 90s from complications from pneumonia, is expected to rule with a more Wahhabist-oriented religious bent and concentrate on limiting cautious political reforms started by Abdullah. Salman is also expected to devote his energies to increasing Saudi national security.

Later in the article things look, indeed, worse for that Medieval country and close ally of the US Empire.

Drug money laundering in support of Al Qaeda terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan, a strict interpretation of the Koran in the future governance of Saudi Arabia, the return of the feared religious police, the "mutaween", and a crackdown on legitimate internal dissent in Saudi Arabia: this is the legacy and governance style that King Salman brings to Saudi Arabia.

On the Supersonic Track to Extinction

Click here to access article by xraymike79 from Collapse of Industrial Civilization. 

The author provides a lot of content to show how energy and climate change are driving us to extinction under capitalism.

As far as scientists can tell, the current warming from industrial civilization is the most rapid in geologic time. Ice core and marine sediment data in the paleoclimatology archive have revealed brief periods of rapid warming and there is no reason to believe modern man is immune to such catastrophic and abrupt climate events. In fact, we know that the Arctic is already warming twice as fast as anywhere else on the planet. Earth sensitivity to climate change is now thought to be possibly double that of previous estimates. An entirely different planet can result from just a slight change in temperature....


Many are under the delusion that we’ll be able to turn this process around with “green energy” while ignoring that such technologies are derivatives of fossil fuel or that increased efficiencies will lower our carbon footprint while ignoring Jevons paradox. Countless other self-reinforcing feedbacks loops driving our socioeconomic system come into play as well such as rampant overpopulation (Overpopulation key driver of climate change, mass extinction), chemical pollution (“Every year, up to 400 million tonnes are produced and a thousand new substances concocted“), and capitalism’s inherent growth dynamics....

How the CIA made Google: Inside the secret network behind mass surveillance, endless war, and Skynet— part 2 of 2

Click here to access article by Nafeez Ahmed who is supported by crowdfunding--people like you and I. (Commentary updated at 6 PM Seattle time.)

In this series he explores the new field of information and surveillance policies and programs of this corporate-military nexus by focusing mainly on Google corporation and its government counterparts. Although not the focus of the series, there is occasional references to ruling class forces that lie in major banking institutions which sponsor these policies and programs. For example, this summary statement from Part 1:

...the investment firm [Goldman Sachs] responsible for creating the billion dollar fortunes of the tech sensations of the 21st century, from Google to Facebook, is intimately linked to the US military intelligence community; with Venables, Lee and Friedman [all top executives associated with Goldman Sachs] either directly connected to the Pentagon Highlands Forum, or to senior members of the Forum.

This lengthy article provides more information about the close linkage of the Pentagon with major corporations. By outsourcing questionable and nefarious policies and programs to corporations, this partnership provides cover from government regulations that require public access to what the ruling class's government is actually doing. Also, corporations employ vast numbers of highly skilled scientists and technicians needed by the ruling class's Pentagon to wage both covert and overt wars, to develop methods of subversion to topple unfriendly governments, and even to help organize terrorist armies in pursuit of Empire goals. To top this all off, they outsource the selling of these policies to private public relations firms.

This close collaboration between--one could argue integration of--government, corporations, and military is the very essence of what is referred to as a fascist form of rule. Thus, I differ with Pete Dolack who has argued that we don't have a fascist rule in the US because it doesn't look exactly like what existed in German and Italy in the 1930s.

Militarism, extreme nationalism, the creation of enemies and scapegoats, and, perhaps the most critical component, a rabid propaganda that intentionally raises panic and hate while disguising its true nature and intentions under the cover of a phony populism, are among the necessary elements. 

Aren't Muslims, usually depicted as terrorists, scapegoats? Don't we view daily TV news which is packed with incidents of crime which causes many to fear their fellow Americans? Don't we have rabid propaganda spewed daily from corporate media that evokes hatred, panic, and fear? Don't we have a militarized police force and a huge prison industry? We don't see many flagrant acts to suppress dissent--yet: the exceptions being that of whistleblowers like Edward Snowden, Bradley Manning, and Julian Assange. But, our masters have a legal structure in place (the Patriot Acts) ready to be used when many citizens can no longer be bamboozled by the corporate propaganda apparatus.

Embarrassment as US and ISIS tributes to King Abdullah almost identical

Click here to access article from The Pan-Arabia Enquirer. (humorous satire)

There were red faces in both the corridors of the White House and across the Islamic State last night....

The Rich are funding GM research to protect their babies

Click here if you wish to access information about the cartoonist, Fearguth, from his blog. (humorous satire)

 


Believing that the womb is a dangerous place, the rich are "investing" in protection for their "unborn" children.

How the CIA made Google: Inside the secret network behind mass surveillance, endless war, and Skynet— part 1

Click here to access article by Nafeez Ahmed from Insurge Intelligence. (I'll try to comment on Part 2 tomorrow.)

This lengthy article Ahmed, who refused to be censored by The Guardian, offers a bonanza of information about a section of our shadow government and ties together so many details of the relatively recent Total Information Awareness project (mostly focusing on Google corporation) that it might become overwhelming to the average informed reader. 

For me, it offers an excellent illustration of the current stage in the evolution of US capitalism that really took off around the turn of the 19th/20th centuries after the capitalist class in the US inflicted major defeats on worker and farmer movements, reversed most of the gains by African-Americans after the Civil War, made fake attempts to reign in monopolies, and co-opted other sections of society--essentially bringing under control all the working people of the US. At this time the capitalist class had obtained uncontested control of industry, finance, and money issuance (the Federal Reserve). In turn, this control enabled them to consolidate their control over every other institution: education, media, entertainment, etc.

The next significant stage in this evolution began after WWII when the US ruling class reigned supreme with their intact industrial establishment and a huge military. The capitalist democratic form of government that they had inherited from their earlier predecessors presented obstacles to the exploitative opportunities now abundant in this post-WWII world. 

They had always used some agencies such as the FBI, private agencies such as Pinkerton, various front organizations such as the American Legion, sub rosa groups like the Ku Klux Klan to enforce their will upon American society, but now there was a need to accelerate the construction of covert agencies of rule which would function out of sight and in control of the official agencies (Congress, Supreme Court and legal system, and the Executive branch). This task was undertaken most prominently by Wall Street lawyers such as Allan Dulles who built the CIA, but there were many others who participated in the construction of all the secret agencies. 

This brings us to where we are now in US society which is a society ruled by a covert "deep state" or "shadow government" that functions behind the scenes of official government. Along with this covert apparatus has seen the recent development of the Total Information Awareness project. This article focuses on mainly Google corporation as an illustration of the key role that corporations, which are an integral part of the ruling class, play in our current society and world. 

INSURGE INTELLIGENCE, a new crowd-funded investigative journalism project, breaks the exclusive story of how the United States intelligence community funded, nurtured and incubated Google as part of a drive to dominate the world through control of information. Seed-funded by the NSA and CIA, Google was merely the first among a plethora of private sector start-ups co-opted by US intelligence to retain ‘information superiority.

The origins of this ingenious strategy trace back to a secret Pentagon-sponsored group, that for the last two decades has functioned as a bridge between the US government and elites across the business, industry, finance, corporate, and media sectors. The group has allowed some of the most powerful special interests in corporate America to systematically circumvent democratic accountability and the rule of law to influence government policies, as well as public opinion in the US and around the world. The results have been catastrophic: NSA mass surveillance, a permanent state of global war, and a new initiative to transform the US military into Skynet.