Listen to a reading of this article:
Minnesota Representative Ilhan Omar has once again been the center of an artificial controversy launched in bad faith, this time over a tweet where she mentioned the United States and Israel in the same breath as Hamas and the Taliban as perpetrators of “unthinkable atrocities”.
“We must have the same level of accountability and justice for all victims of crimes against humanity. We have seen unthinkable atrocities committed by the U.S., Hamas, Israel, Afghanistan, and the Taliban,” Omar said while sharing a video of her wildly unsuccessful effort to get a straight answer from Secretary of State Tony Blinken on accountability for US and Israeli war crimes.
This provoked a bunch of ridiculous garment-rending histrionics from Nancy Pelosi and House Democrats, not because it is absurd to compare murderous warmongering regimes like the US and Israel with vastly less destructive regional forces like Hamas and the Taliban, but because it is considered unacceptable in mainstream politics to suggest that the US and Israel are anything other that beneficent powers who at worst make the occasional innocent oopsie.
We must have the same level of accountability and justice for all victims of crimes against humanity.
We have seen unthinkable atrocities committed by the U.S., Hamas, Israel, Afghanistan, and the Taliban.
I asked @SecBlinken where people are supposed to go for justice. pic.twitter.com/tUtxW5cIow
— Rep. Ilhan Omar (@Ilhan) June 7, 2021
This pathetically mild criticism of a power structure which has killed millions and displaced tens of millions just in the last two decades, during a pathetically unsuccessful attempt to get any kind of concession about war crimes and crimes against humanity from a prominent US official, drew so much outrage and vitriol from the US political/media class that Omar was once again forced to issue another pathetic walkback of her comments.
“On Monday, I asked Secretary of State Antony Blinken about ongoing International Criminal Court investigations,” Omar said in a statement on her congressional website. “To be clear: the conversation was about accountability for specific incidents regarding those ICC cases, not a moral comparison between Hamas and the Taliban and the U.S. and Israel. I was in no way equating terrorist organizations with democratic countries with well-established judicial systems.”
And that is it, ladies and gentlemen. That is as far as you are allowed to take criticism of the empire in mainstream American politics. Even that level of feeble, impotent criticism is far outside the boundaries for anyone in the mainstream political/media class.
So, in case it wasn’t already clear to you, progressive Democrats are a joke. They’re not a real thing. If they are literally barred from even meaningfully criticizing the US empire, let alone actually working to dismantle it, they’re a joke. They will never succeed in advancing any kind of real progressive agenda.
There’s this unspoken and unquestioned assumption among progressive Democrats that it is possible to advance progressive agendas without actually ending the US empire. That you don’t need to actually dismantle the US empire and strip down its military to the bare bones in order to get nice things like universal healthcare, a living wage, and more ethical behavior on the world stage.
This is pure fantasy. It will never happen.
the US is a significantly more violent and destructive terrorist organization than Hamas. This is not remotely controversial
— Rob (@robrousseau) June 10, 2021
As long as the US is the center of a globe-spanning empire, it will be necessary to keep Americans too poor, too busy and too confused to interfere with the operation of the machine. You cannot allow a critical mass of Americans to have enough money to spend on political campaign donations, to have enough free time to research what’s actually happening in their world, to be sufficiently stress-free to look up and realize that your government is murdering children in their name, and also keep the empire running smoothly. You cannot have an imperialist oligarchy who runs things and also have income and wealth equality.
The empire feeds on oppression, exploitation, ignorance, and blood. It is impossible to dominate the planet with a unipolar world order if you don’t use violent force, and the threat of violent force, to uphold that world order. If you’re not strangling people at home and bombing people abroad, then you cannot have an oligarchic empire. Period.
The main rift you see on the leftmost end of the American political spectrum is between people who seek an end to the imperialist murder machine, and people who just want the imperialist murder machine to give them healthcare. The first group faces a very difficult uphill battle to get what it wants. The second group is just masturbating an impossible fantasy.
This is how you can tell who is for real and who is not: do they want to dismantle the oligarchic empire, or don’t they? If they do, they’re fighting for something real, but the oligarch-owned political/media class will not give them a platform. If they don’t, they may get a punditry job or a seat in congress, but they won’t ever actually give you anything besides feel-good empty narrative fluff.
The Left Will Never Achieve Its Goals Until It Prioritizes Countering Establishment Propaganda
"Seize control of the narrative."https://t.co/TElXuByjLh
— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) March 6, 2021
The solution, as I always point out, is to work together to destroy and discredit the oligarchic propaganda apparatus which enables the empire to determine who gets a platform and who doesn’t. As long as they are able to uplift vapid fauxgressives who pretend it’s possible to have a kinder, gentler US empire and marginalize people who actually want to dismantle the status quo, there will never be enough public awareness to force real change. All positive changes in human behavior are always the direct result of an expansion of awareness, so spreading awareness of the fact that there is an oligarchic empire which is exploiting and deceiving everyone should be the foremost priority of anyone who wants real change.
It’s not that you can’t beat the machine, it’s that you can’t beat the machine using the tools the machine has given you. A grassroots effort to wake each other up to reality is a very achievable goal, and once enough eyes are open, anything is possible.
____________________
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55 responses to “The Lie That A Kinder, Gentler US Empire Is Possible”
[Note] This comment was originally written for consortiumnews.com, but since the comments were closed there and I thought it was important, I will post it here.
I found this virtually unvisited and largely unreadable boomer atrocity masquerading as a news website while randomly browsing wikipedia and stumbling upon an article about its former editor. Curious to see if the website mentioned still existed, I popped over, and choosing randomly from the list of articles I landed on this hot little potato. Not content with the dismay I had already suffered having read a half-literate tirade from someone whose discourse is something on the level of Tumblr or Twitter, I then descended further into the tartarius depths of this online outhouse and perused through the comments. Oh boy.
What can I say about this place and you people that hasn’t already been said about a prion disease?
This is the irate spewings of a diseased mind. The only thing worse than the contents of the article are the bleating of the imbecile mob contained in the comments.
To the author; please stop associating yourself with the left. You do not represent the left. You do not represent anyone. You are a radical and extremist individual who caters to conspiracy theorists and whackjobs. Whatever legitimate work you may have ever done (beyond some original reporting about Assange, which omitted the fact that he is an alleged rapist) is rendered utterly moot by your continued conduct. You have more in common with the oligarchic hardliners in Moscow and Tehran than you do with the global everyman whose interests you have delusions of standing up for.
What a joke. What a waste of life.
[ps] I see that unlike on on the other website, the Nazi attitude that I immediately detected lurking behind this author is on open display here on your own website. People like you and the people that follow you are the scum of the earth. My only comfort is knowing that most of you lead sad, empty, pointless lives. Thankfully most of you are capable of creating and building nothing more than calumny and bitterness. One day your pitiful existence will draw to a close and then, childless and unregarded, you will slide into oblivion, to be followed not long after by your repulsive and errant cognitive ejaculations.
Blue pill.
And then we have countries with the least inequality on earth, like my country of Norway, who was one of the first to join US in the bombing of Libya. Our special forces are in Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Mali. Our former Prime minister is now the warmonger secretary general of NATO. And our social democratic population are happy as clams.
So if this leftist near utopia, compared to US, that is Norway STILL produces a majority of apathetic at best if not perfectly happy Empire supporters then what on Earth will actually work?!
Or do we have to realize that humanity is not good, and any large group of people will happily murder children of another group all day long if it gives them some benefit and they have some nice narratives to keep them from feeling bad about it.. This is why they fight so hard to keep the truth from spilling out, because most people WANT to be propagandized so they can sleep happily at night.
The only solution I can see is if murdering poor brown kids abroad actually has consequences for the group doing it and benefiting from it. That means the poor ppl must be empowered. Power only understands Power. At large enough scales everything becomes psychopatic. Just witness the rot and corruption in our own institution now.. #VirusWithShoes
“We’ll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false.” — William Casey, CIA director 1981-1987
I think he wasn’t ambitious enough for today’s national security state. Seems like nowadays they might be going for “…when we can change the American public’s beliefs 180 degrees whenever we want to.”
There’s an elephant in the room. The jews own our politicians, well paid traitors, who work for them, not us, The fed and big banks, run by jews, strangle us financially, destroy our money, rip us off and send us the bill. Finally the endless drumbeat of jewish media pounds the heads of the sheeple, , fill the brain with shite, lies and deception..
Friend,
I don’t usually position myself as a “moderate,” because I think that is just a form of what has lately been called “virtue signalling.” However, I think you are oversimplifying by saying that the Jews own our politicians. I think there is a hierarchy of corruption, and there are certainly Jews in it. Sometimes I do throw in a loose comment that Jews own us, but by that I only mean that Jewish circles have an inordinate amount of influence in Washington, and that America supports and defends Israeli colonisation and terror against the Palestinians to the detriment of the interests of European civilisation, of which America and Australia are extensions.
Sometimes people who hate Jews even go to the extreme of trying to belittle Albert Einstein’s scientific achievements.
It is true that Jewish influence, almost amounting to control, over our media is a real problem. I always thought of American organised crime as an Italian phenomenon until some evil right-wing person pointed out that Jews control the film industry and the media, and portray it that way, although there are as many Jewish names as Italian ones among the famous gangsters of America.
The great Meyer Lansky almost rose to the point of dealing with governments on equal terms. He set up gambling industries in Florida, Cuba, and the American West (Las Vegas.) Two of these were eventually closed down: the American West gambling industry was taken over by the American Government, which made far more money out of it than Lansky ever did. He in association with Lucky Luciano ran a counter-sabotage operation on the American docks during World War Two, against German sympathisers among the wharfies. (That is the reason that Lucky Luciano was released from jail and allowed to live out his life as a wealthy and revered old man in Italy.) He ran arms to the Jewish terrorists in Palestine who were driving the Palestinians from their homes. He was invited to General Eisenhower’s presidential inauguration party, but declined to go, saying that he preferred to remain in the shadows.
Jews couldn’t get away with as much as they do without the active complicity of Gentiles. There aren’t enough of them, however bright they are. I know it is hard to resist when you are being told lies in school, in the media, by many deluded people you know. I was lucky in a way, because I was an isolated child and did a lot of my schooling by correspondence, and the (government) correspondence school was run on what were for those days fairly old-fashioned lines, with the idea that education was for the purpose of providing knowledge rather than brainwashing. (I am not saying that the schools don’t still provide a lot of knowledge, and the nice ladies in charge probably don’t think they are brainwashing the kids, but most of them are really too dim to notice when they are teaching facts and when they are putting over official lies.) But ultimately it is our fault if we let Jews and other people put things over on us.
I can only suggest getting politically involved, if you can afford the time. You don’t have to be a leader. You will make friends and gain contacts – network, if you like. So few people bother with politics that those that do, really matter. You may also learn: a lot of us, even very bright people, find in the course of political experience that not everything is quite as we thought it was.
Fair enough. You’re a n eyewitness to a slow motion genocide, there’s an unspeakable evil behind it. Face it or look away, that’s up to you.
WOW! Caitlin. Thank you, brave warrior. I fled the USA and now live free of all you describe– except for little details like my belongings and my bank are still in CA. Hah. At least I don’t have to live with the sheeple, masks, rules and fear.
Bless you– our modern Paul Revere.
New for me: “You can’t wake up people pretending to be asleep.”
Carry ON!! <3
It’s some kind of magic trick. Ever since I had a brain curious enough and critical enough I realised that it was the US that was the world’s worst perpetrator of evil. I’ve known this for years, my whole adult life. And yet most people are blind to this stunningly obvious fact! Ask any Joe Sixpack on the street and he’ll be sure to tell you it’s China, followed by Iran, then Syria and so on. The USA won’t even make the list. It’s a paragon of virtue in their eyes. I don’t understand? How? It’s a magic trick and a bloody good one.
Most people are blind to this stunningly obvious fact?
Rubbish.
As Chomsky never tires of repeating, polls, organised by the likes of Gallup, say the great majority of people see the USA as the biggest threat to the world. Or rather polls said that; they stopped doing them because the answer was supposed to be someone else.
Sorry. I should have been more specific. I meant to say that residents of the USA think that other countries are a greater threat. Globally you are correct. The US is perceived as the greatest threat to world peace.
“That you don’t need to actually dismantle the US empire and strip down its military to the bare bones in order to get nice things like universal healthcare, a living wage, and more ethical behavior on the world stage.”
Might I suggest disposing of the empire before laying out the results of that end that you prefer.
Universal Health Care, and a guaranteed living wage require armed robbery to finance. I have no objection to using armed robbery to dismantle corporate wealth, since corporations are part of the empire. I on the other hand am not. The property I have was accumulated through investing my time, my life, and much effort and sacrifice. The state did not give it to me, and in fact fought me tooth and nail to prevent me from gaining it. I happen to be a charitable person, but that charity ends when goons with guns come to my door demanding I surrender that property, regardless how saintly the purpose claimed.
No, I am NOT independently wealthy. Not even close. In fact the empire may succeed in destroying that wealth before anyone has a chance to steal it, capitalist or socialist.
You have to stop listening to the framing of the elites – they are masters of class warfare. They keep the masses busy fighting each other, so the masses are distracted from the real source of their problems: the rich and powerful, who created the system we live in. The majority need to work together in order to force the elites to actually listen to their wants and needs of government.
The framing, “Universal Health Care, and a guaranteed living wage require armed robbery to finance” simply isn’t true. You just need to look at the rest of the developed World – who all have these things; only the USA doesn’t. You have been subject to propaganda your whole life – without realizing it. Don’t worry, most of the population has been similarly duped.
In the US workers pay a larger percentage of their income in taxes than the wealthy, and get little to nothing in return. You need to demand a tax system that works for you (the citizens) and provides the services you require, rather than allowing corporations and the rich to pay sweet f’all in taxes (as a proportion of their income) and receive government hand-outs on top of that to boot. The whole system needs to be restructured from the bottom up.
Apparently you prefer the word “taxes” instead of “armed robbery”. If so, please explain the difference.
You pay for everything one way or another, regardless of how you actually pay – via taxes, directly to service providers or indirectly via negative consequences.
If everyone paid a fair share of taxes via a progressive taxation system – where low income earners pay a lower percentage of their total income than higher income individuals, and income tax rates increase incrementally the more you earn – the government could afford to provide all of it’s citizens a fairer, more equal, quality of life. Remember the government is their to serve the people, not the other way around.
Currently you pay taxes, but the government just doesn’t spend it on you – so you have to pay excessive amounts for life’s essentials like health and education.
Also, when people aren’t paid a living wage, they require taxpayer support to survive – in the form of food stamps or other forms of income support. If they were paid a living wage by their employers, they would pay more taxes and wouldn’t require taxpayer support. And low income earners spend most, or all, of their income just to survive. So paying them more not only reduces their reliance on taxpayers but helps stimulate the economy for everyone.
However, choosing not to adequately support people via taxes only makes them desperate to survive; leading to an increase in crime, requiring an increase in taxpayer funds for policing, the judicial system and the prison system. It also leads to an increase in social unrest, which can lead to violence and destruction of property.
So you can choose how you pay for things. But you will pay one way or another. Personally, I think it’s better to pay via taxes, which results in a far more harmonious society and gives everyone a chance to succeed – regardless of the situation into which they are born.
‘Every person for themselves’ only makes every person worse-off. Working together we actually have a fighting chance to make our governments work for us – like they should – and not only the elite, ruling class.
Your reply doesn’t contain an explanation of the difference. without the threat of violence who would pay taxes? Damn few I suspect. The only way to get government to work for you is to abolish it. All are predicated on the notion they have sole authority to kill you if you don’t go along, Such power does not attract the sane. Per Albert Einstein, paraphrased, “a system that creates a problem is incapable of solving it.” We keep looking in the same place for solutions that created the problems. Government. Ever since the emergence of omnipotent, ubiquitous central government, we continue to look for solutions such as , “if we only had the “right” system, or “if we only had the “right” people in charge, every thing would be peachy.’
Death is governments coin. Without the above mentioned threat of death, none could exist.
You asked about the difference between taxes and armed robbery? It depends on how the taxes are apportioned. If taxes aren’t applied fairly, and to the benefit of all, then equating them to armed robbery might be apt. However, taxes are supposed to allow government to act for the benefit of all society. And if this were done fairly I doubt many would oppose paying the cost, because the benefits would be far greater. My previous reply was explaining that the difference really depends on the type of society you would prefer – no taxes would lead to to a breakdown of society.
A democratic government is supposed to be elected by the people, to enact the wishes of the people. However most, if not all Western governments are only pretend democracies – just political theater and propaganda used to persuade the citizenry into believing they actually have a choice of government. The reality is that we live under an oligarchy/plutocracy that exploit the working class for their benefit.
As to abolishing government… our choices are very limited. The only hope of enacting real change is for the people to work together to force change upon the ruling class. If we allow ourselves to be divided we have no chance of changing anything for the better.
But having no government would be a far worse. A World where there isn’t even the pretense of law and order would be something out of a Mad Max movie. And that would be far worse than what we have currently; at least in my opinion.
Ilhan Omar is a politician.
Thank the heavens for the Internet where independent thought is still allowed. This is interesting!
~
In the most clear and simple terms, Kamala Harris trip to Mexico was a clean-up job in the aftermath of an aborted plan to flood the United States with refugees in the event that Donald Trump attempted to remain in office after January 20th. Without that understanding, we are left with vague generalities about “Root Causes” of migration which are almost always going to be described in banal economic terms, or (conveniently within the rubric of Great Reset mythology), climate change.
~
This article can be read here:
Kamalas “New Era” Mexico Trip was an “Anti-Trump Coup” Clean-up Job by
Joaquin Flores!
https://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2021/06/11/kamalas-new-era-mexico-trip-was-an-anti-trump-coup-clean-up-job/
Sure. Migrants are fleeing central America not due to many decades of US destabilisation, coups, invasions, puppet governments and poverty production schemes, but because of some convoluted Democrat versus Republican nonsense.
Might makes right, it’s as simple as that. Ahh, it’s so terrible the terrible Russians are interfering in amerikas democracy. The fool’s, we, amerika either get the local Military or oligarchy to do what we want and pay them well or we put them in debt and let the IMF and world Bank screw then over and of course sanctions to starve them into submission. If that falls, we invade and kill em and bomb em back to the stone age by the millions, yes millions.
Every empire, without exception, has indulged in overreach.
Every empire has collapsed, or been greatly diminished.
The last empire will be no exception.
We are witnessing the last plague of psychopathic hubris.
Whether we are still here after the collapse is the burning question.
And I do mean burning.
A touch of good news. A cross-party group of UK parliamentarians is calling on Biden to drop charges against Julian Assange. Still only one Conservative (governing party) MP by my reckoning – David Davis, but it’s encouraging.
https://dontextraditeassange.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/Assange-Biden-2021.pdf
a kinder, gentler US empire = kinder gentler mass murder, terrorism, subversion and looting.
Ilhan Omar, coming from a different culture, doesn’t understand the concept of exceptionalism. The Israelis are exceptional because God told them so in a book they themselves wrote. Couldn’t get better source than that! Straight from the horse’s mouth. And the Americans are exceptional because the Pilgrims carried that book overseas and unilaterally (but who’s gonna call their bluff?) identified with the Hebrews to conquer what they perceived as their own Promised Land. God (Mammon for the ladies) gave them the same mission he’d given to Josuah: kill ’em all and we’ll split the bounty. All this is God’s will pure and simple. Which is basically why they have such religious fanatics. Now what characterizes the exceptional dude is that he’s the good guy, whatever he does, because he’s God blessed. He feels threatened by your look and socks you one, it’s not acute paranoia, it’s preemptive strike. He’s defending himself against your obvious planned agression. The good guy always defends himself. The guy who’s gassed in Al Aqsa Mosque or expelled from Sheikh Jarrah doesn’t defend himself. Therefore he’s not the good guy. The one who pounds Gaza to test his new weapons because “tested in real world conditions” is a good selling argument in Colombia and elsewhere is defending himself. He is therefore the good guy! Easy! And he’s the one controlling the narrative anyway, especially after he’s blasted the media building to smithereens, so WTF! Why does Ilhan Omar think he wanted to control the narrative in the first place?
As US exceptionalism goes, this is pretty minor (unless it escalates to another bout of troop incursion, carpet bombing and Agent Orange), but the US is demanding full access to Cambodia’s Ream naval base for its Defense Attaché:
https://www.phnompenhpost.com/national-politics/us-wants-full-access-ream-naval-base
“We don’t have to talk about foreign military attaché as even ordinary people cannot have access to a military base. Our question to the US is that, will the US let ordinary people enter their 800 military bases even outside the US?” as one Cambodian responded.
And an official statement from the Empire’s embassy:
https://m.facebook.com/us.embassy.phnom.penh/photos/a.390395653223/10158273742558224/
‘When it became clear he would not be granted adequate access, Colonel Ferrara ended the tour and requested Cambodian military officials reschedule the visit with full access at the earliest opportunity.’
Caitlin,
I think you are basically right here. A military machine has to go on being a bigger, better military machine. An empire has to murder and torture people, or it will get out of practice at murdering and torturing. The American Government is a military government in the sense that its top people think like soldiers, not like priests or merchants as the top people in other kinds of governments do. (It might be important to note here that America is the top seller of arms around the world, so it does have a business interest in war as well as an imperial interest.)
However, in “Poverty Is A Weapon Of The Powerful,” you say, “If you don’t oppose western imperialistic agendas against China then none of your other anti-imperialism matters. All of the western empire’s aggressions on the world stage are ultimately about smashing China.” I would have thought that Jewish colonisation against Arabs mattered too; but apart from that, aren’t you just saying that the Chinese or Mongolian race must be allowed to exterminate all other races, and that those of the other races who have some ability to fight back, mustn’t do so?
I know you have a doctrine that we mustn’t be competitive, which you would know is really dumb if you could spare the time to read anarcho-capitalist literature, but I don’t suppose you ever will. But how are you going to persuade the Chinese not to compete with us for survival? As I understand it, they know perfectly well that China is the centre of the universe, and that the Jews are really evil people because they have de facto possession of humans, which makes the Jews thieves and the humans stolen property, since everything in the universe naturally and legally belongs to China. Correct me if I’m wrong.
Nice straw men and race baiting. Otherwise incoherent.
You’re too polite. “Jews are really evil people” sounds just like Nazi propaganda, and “the Chinese or Mongolian race must be allowed to exterminate all other races” is about as repugnant.
Say whut?
I resent the U.S. being grouped with those three pikers. We are head and shoulders knees and toes above them.
Like Derek Chauvin was above George Floyd?
Ilhan Omar and rashida tlaib wolves in Sheep clothing???
Explain.
You’re thinking of the neoliberal Democrats who can’t get enough sheep clothing. Of course, Republicans don’t bother with the sheep clothing at all.
Ms Johnstone; you are much too kind in your description. Extremely few people ever dare to say what needs to be said about Israel or the United States. We are ” War Criminals “!! Your Attention Please!!
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Injustice and extreme suffering is not what ” democracy ” is supposed to be about! The ” evil empire ” is something we should all be ashamed about; instead we just continue to look the other way!!
~
What is there about our shared journey that permits us, with ease, to consciously blind ourselves to the grief of others because it aches too much to see the obvious? That upends echoes of pain as screams come in unbearable waves that leave no doubt of its horrible source of crimes, in progress, of broken families and dreams never to be dreamt? What finds escape in crafted denial that accepts no combat from waves of reality… for to handle truth is, seemingly, well beyond our collective capacity? It is the story of our day. Star of David … land of myth.
~
This great article can be read here:
Star of David; Land of Myth By Stanley L. Cohen
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/56567.htm
The universe entropy is winding down and dissapating. So empires are the very same (shout out to physics). The American Empire is winding down and will dissipate as well. There are nor have ever been any benevolent empires. If we all lived a 150 years ago, we would be discussing the exact same evils of the British Empire…..saw a movie yesterday where everyone was going insane from lack of sleep. A bunch of them stripped naked and stood watching the sun rise. This article made me think of them.
And this only touches upon the crimes perpetrated through direct use of military force by the USA itself, its vassal states, and its terrorist proxies in Yemen, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, and Libya. It doesn’t include the monstrously deliberate economic strangulation of the citizens of small Third World countries (e.g., Venezuela, Cuba, others) that The Empire wants to bend to its grotesque perverted will.
A lull in the action
A statement with proof
And then comes the shout down
By haters of truth
The next false flag
Will begin a new day
Both sides will cheer
Dissenters taken away
Ten years before the state declared its “independence” in 1948 on land stolen from the people of Palestine, Albert Einstein described the proposed creation of Israel as something which conflicted with “the essential nature of Judaism.” Having fled Hitler’s Germany and eventually becoming a US citizen, Einstein needed no lessons in what fascism looked like.
One of the greatest physicists in history, and supported by some other high profile Jewish intellectuals, Einstein spotted the flaws and fault lines in 1946 when he addressed the Anglo-American Committee of Inquiry on the Palestinian issue. He couldn’t understand why Israel was needed. “I believe it is bad,” he said.
Two years later, in 1948, he and a number of Jewish academics sent a letter to the New York Times to protest against a visit to America by Menachem Begin. In the well-documented letter, they denounced Begin’s Herut (Freedom) party, likening it to “a political party closely akin in its organisation, methods, political philosophy and social appeal to the Nazi and Fascist parties.
here is a copy of the letter
https://www.sothebys.com/en/auctions/ecatalogue/2018/important-books-manuscripts-n09885/lot.244.html?fbclid=IwAR04t9su6fDuzCsrVkDux1S5KYpUe7zv3OC_ADWn-Sm9jw_l2tHn5zNr0q8
Thank you for the link, Linda. We can all have opinions about Palestine, but certain original documents carry far more weight than some anonymous internet opinions. Here is the full text of the December 2nd letter sent to the NYT in 1948 following the massacre at Deir Yassin, signed by Albert Einstein and 26 other prominent intellectuals, mostly Jewish:
“TO THE EDITOR OF THE NEW YORK TIMES:
“Among the most disturbing political phenomena of our time is the emergence in the newly created state of Israel of the “Freedom Party” (Tnuat Haherut), a political party closely akin in its organization, methods, political philosophy and social appeal to the Nazi and Fascist parties. It was formed out of the membership and following of the former Irgun Zvai Leumi, a terrorist, right-wing. chauvinist organization in Palestine.
“The current visit of Menachen Begin, leader of this party, to the United States is obviously calculated to give the impression of American support for his party in the coming Israeli elections, and to cement political ties with conservative Zionist elements in the United States. Several Americans of national repute have lent their names to welcome his visit. It is inconceivable that those who oppose fascism throughout the world, if correctly informed as to Mr. Begin’s political record and perspectives, could add their names and support to the movement he represents.
“Before irreparable damage is done by way of financial contributions, public manifestations in Begin’s behalf, and the creation in Palestine of the impression that a large segment of America supports Fascist elements in Israel, the American public must be informed as to the record and objectives of Mr. Begin and his movement.
“The public avowals of Begin’s party are no guide. whatever to its’ actual character. Today their speak of freedom, democracy and anti-imperialism. whereas until recently they openly preached the doctrine of the Fascist state. It is in its actions that the terrorist party betrays its real character; from its past actions we can judge what it may be expected to do in the future.
“”A shocking example was their behavior in the Arab village of Deir Yassin. this village. off the main roads and surrounded by Jewish lands, had taken no part in the war, and had even fought off Arab hands who wanted to use the ‘village as their base. On April 9 (THE NEW YORK TIMES), terrorist bands attacked this peaceful village which was not a military objective in the fighting, killed most of its inhabitants – 240 men, women and children – and kept a few of them alive to parade as captives through the streets of Jerusalem. Most of the Jewish community was horrified at the deed, and the Jewish Agency sent a telegram of apology to King Abdullah of Trans-Jordan. But the terrorists, far from being ashamed of their act, were proud of this massacre, publicized it widely, and invited all the foreign correspondents present in the country to view the heaped corpses and the general havoc at Deir Yassin.
“The Deir Yassin incident exemplifies the character and actions of the Freedom Party.
“Within the Jewish community they have preached an admixture of ultra-nationalism, religious mysticism, and racial superiority. Like other Fascist parties they have been used to break strikes, and have themselves pressed for the destruction of free trade unions. In their stead they have proposed corporate unions on the Italian Fascist model.
“During the last years of spontaneous anti-British violence. the IZL and Stern groups inaugurated a reign of terror in the Palestine Jewish community. Teachers were beaten up for speaking against them, adults were shot for not letting their children join them. By gangster methods, beatings, window-smashing, and wide-spread robberies, the terrorists intimidated the population and exacted a heavy tribute.
“The people of the Freedom Party have had no part in the constructive achievements in Palestine. They have reclaimed no land, built no settlements, and only detracted from the Jewish defense activity. Their much-publicized immigration endeavors were minute, and devoted mainly to bringing in fascist compatriots.
“Discrepancies Seen
“The discrepancies between the bold claims now being made by Begin and his party, and their record of past performance in Palestine bear the imprint of no ordinary political party. This is the unmistakable stamp of a Fascist party for whom terrorism (against Jews, Arabs, and British alike), and misrepresentation are means, and a “Leader state” is the goal.
“In the light of the foregoing considerations, it is imperative that the truth about Mr. Begin and his movement be made known in this country. It is all the more tragic that the top leadership of American Zionism has refused to campaign against Begin’s efforts, or even to expose to its own constituents the dangers to Israel from support to Begin.
“The undersigned therefore take this means of publicly presenting a few salient facts concerning Begin and his party; and of urging all concerned not to support this latest manifestation of fascism.
“ISIDORE ABRAMOWITZ. HANNAH ABENDT, ABRAHAM BRICK, RABBI JESSURUH CARDOZO, ALBERT EINSTEIN, HERMAN EISEN, M.D., HAYIM FINEMAN, M. GALLEH, M.D., H.H. HARBIS, ZELIG S. HARRIS, SIDNEY HOOX, FRED KARUSH, BEURIA KAUFMAN, IRMA L. LlNDHEIM, NACHMAN MAJSEL, SEYMOUR MELMAN, MYER D. MENDELSON, M.D., HARRY M. ORLlNSKY, SAMUEL PITLlCK., FRITZ ROHRLlCH, LOUIS P. ROCKER, RUTH SAGER, ITZHAK SANHOWSKY, J. SCHORNBERG, SAMUEL SHUMAN, AL ZNGER, IRMAL WOLFE, STEFAN WOLF.
“Reprint, New York, December 2, 1948.”
Thank You kindly, very much appreciated.
Hi Linda, here are excerpts from a petition to Woodrow Wilson by the Committee Against Political Zionism, published in the NYT on March 5, 1919, on the eve of the Paris Peace Conference. Lost opportunities:
Protest to President Woodrow Wilson Against Zionist State (excerpts)
We raise our voices in warning and protest against the demand of the Zionists for the reorganization of the Jews as a national unit to whom, now or in the future, territorial sovereignty in Palestine shall be committed. … to aid in redeeming Palestine from the blight of centuries of Turkish misrule is no acceptance of the Zionist project to segregate Jews as a political unit and to reinstitute a section of such a political unit in Palestine or elsewhere.
We object
1. Because the Jews are dedicated, heart and soul, to the welfare of the countries in which they dwell under free conditions. All Jews repudiate every suspicion of a double allegiance, but to our minds it is necessarily implied in, and cannot by any logic be eliminated from, the establishment of a sovereign state for the Jews in Palestine.”
2. The multitudes [of Jews] who remain [without emigrating] would be subject to worse perils, if possible, even though the few who escape might prosper in Palestine.
3. The claims of various sections of this undefined territory would unquestionably evoke bitter controversies. It is not true that Palestine is the national home of the Jewish people, and of no other people. … These are legitimate questions stirred up by the claims of Zionism, but the Zionists have not yet fully faced them. To subject the Jews to the possible recurrence of such bitter and sanguinary conflicts would be a crime against the triumph of their whole past history and against the lofty and world embracing visions of their great prophets and leaders.
4. Though these grave difficulties may be met, still we protest against the political segregation of the Jews and the re-establishment in Palestine of a distinctively Jewish State as utterly opposed to the principles of democracy which it is the avowed purpose of the worldʻs Peach Conference to establish.
Whether the Jews be regarded as a “race” or as a “religion,” it is contrary to democratic principles for which the world war was waged to found a nation on either or both of these bases. … A Jewish state involves fundamental limitations as to race and religion, else the term “Jewish” means nothing. To unite Chruch and State in any form, as under the old Jewish hierarchy, would be a leap backward of 2,000 years.
As to the future of Palestine, it our feverent hope that what was once a “promised land” for the Jews may become a “land of promise” for all races and creeds, safeguarded by the League of Naitons which, it is expected, will be one of the fruits of the Peach Conference to whose deliberations the world now looks forward so anxiously and so full of hope. We ask that Palestine be constituted as a free and independent state, to be governed under a democratic form of government, recognizing no distinctions of creed or race or ethnic descent, and with adequate poser to protect the country against oppression of any kind. We do not wish to see Palestine, either now or at any time in the future, organized as Jewish State.
Hon. Julius Kahn, Hon. Henry Morganthau, Hon. Simon W. Rosendale, Hon. Simon Wolf, Max Senior, Lee M. Friedman, Hon. Seligman J. Strauss, Prof. Morris Jastrow, Rabbi Henry Berkowitz, Rabbi David Philipson, E. M. Baker, Hon. L.H. Kampner, Jesse Straus, Prof. Edwin R. Seligman, Prof. Jacob H. Hollander, Adoph S. Ochs, Lessing Rosenthal, Abraham Koshland, Jacob R. Morse, Daniel P. Hats, Louis Stern, Rabbi William Rosenau, Rabbi William Landsberg, Judge M.C. Solss, Dr. Julius Rosenstein, I. W. Hellman, Judge Josiah Cohen, Horace Stern, J. Walter Freiberg, Abraham Simon, Isaac W. Bernheili (sp?)
As an ex-Marine, friend of mine once said, “It doesn’t make any difference if you are shot by the left or the right. You’re dead either way.”
If we are so afraid of international investigations, it may be due to our knowledge of the horrible things we have done to other peoples. I have also noticed that all of our wars and “police actions” have been directed against people who are not considered “white”. Whatever “white” means.
We could start at home and look at the policing records of people of color against those who are considered “white.” The number of colored suspects killed during car stops versus the number of white people killed during car stops.
We could examine the records of “health” trials used on non-white communities to see how much informed consent was available to those communities.
I would like to see an explanation why some states, that are so against abortion, are so quick to use the death penalty – are some lives more important than other lives? Or is the explanation simply a desire for votes and attempts to control the lives of women?
This is why I’m telling all of those who entertain themselves with the fantasy that a third party will save us that you can’t plug a third party into a broken system and expect it to change anything.
I’m telling them that we will have to get rid of the system and build a better one. My remarks are greeted with dead silence.
No one wants to defeat the cognitive dissonance that this creates.
As long as your new system doesn’t include people, it might be better. Humans will corrupt any system, and they are especially good at figuring ways to make money from the system and to sideline or kill those who are part of the system.
In theory, we could fix our existing system, but most people aren’t interested. By the time they are interested, it will be too late.
The true horror of DJT is not just the things he did but the large numbers of supporters who enabled him and still support him. I don’t believe that the average Trump supporter realizes the potential horror they are enabling.
All cults are dangerous, especially when the members of the cult start calling for violence against those they perceive as their “enemies.”
According to wikipedia “Festinger argued that some people would inevitably resolve dissonance by blindly believing whatever they wanted to believe.”
Apparently, he was way off the mark. It’s not just ‘some’ people who blindly believe whatever eases their stress, but the overwhelming majority who do.
You said: “No one wants to defeat the cognitive dissonance that this creates.”
What are the internal psychic causes of this subliminal capitulation to mass delusion?
Does this have anything to do with it? They looked at ‘liberals and conservatives’ [Clinton or Trump supporters, I think] within the US, but their findings might apply equally to most pro-US USAmericans generally, who see the USA as their party above all else, and view merely questioning US exceptionalism as ‘inflammatory’.
https://phys.org/news/2021-05-politically-polarized-brains-intolerance-uncertainty.html
“If you are a politically polarized person, your brain syncs up with like-minded individuals in your party to perceive political information in the same way,” FeldmanHall said.
…
“This suggests that aversion to uncertainty governs how the brain processes political information to form black-and-white interpretations of inflammatory political content,” the researchers wrote in the study.
I support a third party: the Socialist Equality Party. And our party has no intention of “plugging in” to the capitalist system. On the contrary, we work to get rid of capitalism, as only true Marxists do. You cannot have read anything on the World Socialist Web Site if you think that we believe in working “within the system”. We do not and never have.
It’s still a control system devised by demons. (Vulture) capitalism allows the peasants to legally rob each other while Socialism grants this privilege only to the chosen few.
If you support UBI and “stack ‘em and pack ‘em” housing for enhanced quality of life, just stay the course. Maslow is standing on his head.
Personally, I’m holding out for something better. It will start by giving them back their minds and taking back our own. And telling the bankers to accept their loss.
Blockchain is a modern day guillotine that is giving capitalism the CHOP!
As usual, Caitlin’s voice is like cool spring water for a world that’s dying of thirst. Please keep your energy up, Caitlin. You have never said a word that is not pure truth.
Lullaby for the Congressional “Progressives”
Rock a bye latte -sipper,
in your Starbucks
When your bombs fall,
you spill not a drop
When Rachel cries “Russia,”
you just nod your head
Now with sleepy Joe,
you can go back to bed.
“The Lie[s]”: “And that is it, ladies and gentlemen.”
https://seaclearly.com/2020/11/21/the-times-they-are-a-changin
16 Words [Lies] and 339,000 Words [Lies] Followed: