I believe that the situation in Ukraine is a crisis created solely by Moscow and that the US power alliance is just an innocent little flower who is being unfairly blamed. I also believe Santa is real, because I am a tiny little child who will believe anything.
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After watching the way the US and its allies have been handling the Ukraine situation, how confident are you that they can be trusted to navigate all these dangerous cold war escalations without inadvertently triggering a nuclear exchange? I’m not in the slightest bit confident, myself.
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I keep seeing people on the left making awkward, labored statements condemning Russia’s Donbas intervention in these weird “Look at me I can criticize Putin just like I criticize the US” performances that they’re clearly only putting on to avoid accusations of Kremlin loyalty, and it’s just silly. The US empire is still the power structure one’s criticisms should be focused on, no matter how badly empire apologists wish it weren’t so.
Don’t feel pressured to denounce Russia’s actions just to make a show of appearing impartial. If you understand that the US empire both (A) created this problem and (B) is many orders of magnitude worse than Russia, then stand by that, because you’re right and they’re wrong.
It’s so stupid how the Overton window of acceptable debate has been moved so far in favor of the empire that we’re now expected to treat this very mild step by Moscow like it’s on equal footing with the worst atrocities of the most powerful and destructive government on earth. Imperial narrative management has made people feel so ashamed and apologetic for criticizing the empire that they’ll seize even the dopiest opportunity to show everyone that they’re not some kind of Russian troll or secret agent or whatever. It’s dumb, it’s debasing, and it should stop.
Focusing one’s criticisms on the most powerful and destructive government on earth requires no justification and no apology, and it’s certainly nothing to feel ashamed of. It’s not strange and suspicious that you do it, it’s strange and suspicious that more people don’t.
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The US is the very last government on this entire planet who has any business talking about respecting the sovereignty of other nations. Absolute dead last.
Pointing out things the US has done while it shrieks about the actions of a foreign government will get you accused of “whataboutism”, but it’s not a whataboutism. It’s pointing out that the US is the absolute least qualified government on earth to comment on the issue at hand.
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It’s not actually legitimate to constantly violate international law all around the world and then cry when another nation does it. You don’t get to make the rules meaningless and then bitch when they are treated like they’re meaningless. That’s not a thing.
It’s not really about hypocrisy; being hypocritical is no great evil in and of itself. What it’s about is actively creating an environment which causes these things to happen, and then shrieking bloody murder when they happen. It’s about placing the blame exactly where it belongs.
If you want nations to respect international law, Step 1 is to cease being the single worst violator of international law in the entire world. It’s not valid to create an environment of lawlessness and then rend your garments when people treat it like what it is.
If someone starts stealing everyone’s stuff and nobody stops him, pretty soon you’re going to see other people start stealing to make sure they have stuff too. Whose fault would that be in that situation? It’s the one who created that Wild West environment in the first place.
You can’t have a serious conversation about opposing Russia’s actions in Ukraine without answering these questions:
If we're against annexation, why aren't we sanctioning Israel? If we're against illegal wars, why are we supplying bombs to Saudi Arabia? If we oppose brutal dictators, why are we training the military of Cameroon? Incredible double-standards from Britain and America.
— Anti-imperialist News (@antiempirenews) February 22, 2022
You can’t just bleat “whataboutism” or “two wrongs don’t make a right”; you have to answer them. Otherwise it looks like you’re just making whatever empty noises will let you rule the planet.
You can’t just put your fingers in your ears and compartmentalize away from the fact that everything the western political/media class is saying about Russia and Ukraine today is completely meaningless under the shadow of the behavior of the globe-spanning US-centralized empire. Either squarely address the fact that the US and its allies do not play by the rules they are demanding Russia play by or stop pretending you’re doing anything other than pro bono propaganda work for the largest and deadliest power structure on earth.
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The country with no democracy says it’s important to defend the democracy of the other country with no democracy.
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Ukraine’s sovereignty is important enough to risk World War 3 over but not important enough to refrain from backing neo-Nazi militias to stage a coup there in 2014.
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If the Democrats have been moving to the left then why are they indistinguishable from Bush administration Republicans?
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Not that anyone cares but the fastest way to lose my respect as an anti-imperialist is to spend your energy attacking other anti-imperialists. Because it shows that your understanding is so shallow that you think we’re doing well enough for us to be able to afford wasting our firepower on each other. Either that or it shows that your ego comes before the cause. It’s one or the other, and either way you’ve shown yourself to be fairly worthless.
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Mass-scale psychological manipulation is a science that’s still advancing. The government agencies who use that science would have every reason to test out mass psyops for no other reason than to learn and gather data to advance the science. It’s not like you can test it in a lab.
I mean, we know for a fact that they’ve already done this. We just don’t know how far it goes.
_______________________
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77 responses to “No Actually The US Empire Is Still The Power To Criticize: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix”
Propaganda science is indeed powerful. I’ve had attendants pop off with near-quotes of the corporate narrative to me at the gas pump this week. But I tell my despair that the bastards have had to resort to censorship to keep their bs from drowning in real information, and that gives me hope. Not optimism, but a dab of hope for the stale dry crust of my results.
PUTIN TESTS DEADLY BIO-WEAPON……on HIS OWN PEOPLE!
If it works it will immediately be sent to Ukraine.
The bastard!!!
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=Ri7YIGk_qOI
….n.a.t.o……new alliance toward oblivion…..never ask, thus obey…..national amerikkkan theatrical oligarchy….not allowed to object……new amerikkkan technological ordinance………………..
Well, when you can get people to believe there’s an invisible man in the sky always watching them, you can get them to believe pretty much anything. Imagine if China overthrew the Mexican government then sent hundreds of millions in deadly weapons to the anti-American regime it installed. Old Uncle Sam would have his jock in a twist too. As the Russian Duma Committee Deputy Chairman on International Affairs Vyacheslav Nikonov said from long experience a couple of days ago, “America is lying as easily as it breathes.”
*
It is satisfying to see shock and awe unleashed at last for a good purpose. And what a hilarious spectacle goes with it, an amerikan president reduced to making impotent threats that will blow back on his own people, while propped up by a gusher of falsehoods in the state propaganda apparatus. By some accounts Ukraine was finished in the first four hours, the neonazi paramilitaries who terrorized Donbas for eight years have melted away or been incinerated, and now the push seems to be on to decapitate the phony US-installed puppet regime altogether.
^
Can’t help but think of the Franco-Prussian War when another vain little man thought he could spit on his eastern neighbor and get away with it.
Yah. Imagine. The Flying Spaghetti Monster that says “ And Allah will surely make evident those who believe, and He will surely make evident the hypocrites.”
Or “ Be careful not to practice your righteousness in front of others to be seen by them. If you do, you will have no reward from your Father in heaven.”
Or “ Woe to you, teachers of the law and Pharisees, you hypocrites! You are like whitewashed tombs, which look beautiful on the outside but on the inside are full of the bones of the dead and everything unclean. In the same way, on the outside you appear to people as righteous but on the inside you are full of hypocrisy and wickedness.”
Some FSM in the sky saying this? How silly! Everything’s just words, right?
Read on gazeta.ru
Putin called the US “Empire of Lies.” Said Ukraine has been taken hostage, and that all peoples of Ukraine have a right to self-determination.
Announced military operation in Donbass. Said the goal is not occupation of Ukraine, but protecting civilians from nazis and denazification.
All Airforce bases in Ukraine were subjected to ballistic rocket attacks, which could not be intercepted by older S-300 systems that Ukraine has.
Does not sound like babbling to me, yet some lady (was it on CNN?) said Putin said something incoherent before starting a war.
As long as the US calls the shots and Nato exist, European countries will act against their own peoples interests, just as Ukrainians did that led them to here. European countries need to kick out and stop listening to Washington, only then will things improve for the people of Europe.
Russia has the right to defend itself from Nato aggression, aggression channeled through Ukraine with the permission of the Ukrainians this makes Ukraine a legitimate target, frankly I’m surprised Putin waited until Nato was at the door to take significant action to save his country.
The majority of Russia’s population live in Europe. Moscow is the largest city entirely in Europe.
I have seen comments here that I agree with that the US government is controlled from Britain. I also have an impression that even Nato is controlled from London.
Or maybe Boris Johnson (who thinks Peppa the Pig is genius is being very loud to raise campaign cash.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/policy/foreign/boris-johnson-endorses-pure-genius-peppa-pig-as-power-of-uk-creativity
Johnson’s trying to turn attention away from repeated flouting of his government’s own covid regulations by himself and his ministers, and from a wave of strikes against the new austerity – https://www.thecanary.co/trending/2022/02/23/heres-a-round-up-of-the-strikes-happening-nationwide/ .
But it’s pure fantasy to imagine Washington is controlled from Britain. The UK is a global has-been. It still has its offshore banking network, and a sizeable weapons industry, but without the USA, it’d be nothing.
It seems that while the US propaganda machine still hold sway with the many in the west. Its effectiveness has dropped to zero in regards to the biggest game on the planet. The geopolitical stage is beset by actors with scripts vying for assendency. Putins actions in recognising independant territories and now in the process of disabling Ukraines military capability has exposed the truth of the current world situation.
After years of inept Euro energy policy of which a teenager was put forward as its face, a barely cognitive US president installed by those whos agenda was as vast as it was convuluted and 2 years of a relationship between democratic western gvernments and their people of an ever increasing abusive nature in the name of their safety, or a reset, or a vaccine, or something. Russia with 100 dollar a barrel oil and nat gas up the ying yang are set for an easy win.
After the breakup of the USSR, did anyone ever ask the Russians if they would join NATO?
The idea’s been suggested by Danish and German officials, and:
.
‘The idea of Russia becoming a NATO member has at different times been floated by both Western and Russian leaders, as well as some experts. No serious discussions were ever held.[155]
In 1990, while negotiating German reunification at the end of the Cold War with U.S. Secretary of State James Baker, Soviet president Mikhail Gorbachev said that “You say that NATO is not directed against us, that it is simply a security structure that is adapting to new realities … therefore, we propose to join NATO.” However, Baker dismissed the possibility as a “dream”.[156] During a series of interviews with filmmaker Oliver Stone, President Vladimir Putin told him that he floated the possibility of Russia joining NATO to President Bill Clinton when he visited Moscow in 2000.’
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russia%E2%80%93NATO_relations#Suggestions_of_Russia_joining_NATO
You are a veritable wealth of information.
I suppose NATO needed a rival/bogeyman so that the USA could rationalize its military spending and adventures.
To paraphrase Voltaire,
“If the enemy did not exist, it would be necessary to invent one.”
They asked to join NATO. they were refused iirc.
FERD BERFEL
When Bill Clinton was POTUS, Putin asked him if Russia could join Nato and he was quickly snubbed. I take it Nato needed a supposed bad guy and Russia was it, if Russia had been allowed to join it might have cut the finances to the Military Industrial Complex, as the bad guy (Russia) would no longer be seen as that.
What is more important, the land of Donbass or people living here for hundred of years but now , not liking the Ukrainian rules ? ….
Ukrainians have crossed with tanks into Russia and so far except for citizens they are the only ones to have suffered casualties
Where did you hear that Ukrainians have crossed with tanks into Russia?
After reading Caitlin’s post doubting if some social media accounts are “organic”, I asked my American spouse today if he knows anybody on social media who dedicates their life to the US propaganda for a war in Ukraine with Russia, (bcs I do not have social media accounts).
He said No, people mostly say the US should not be getting involved in Ukraine.
Then he opined that the US is stepping in again to “save the Europe”.
I said of course that the US is destabilizing the Europe now, not saving it.
This is how we started our day LOL.
Wonder what you all think.
I think that decades of slow motion aggression against Russia have finally borne fruit. who benefits from this in the long run is not clear to me at all. in the short run, the usual riffraff in DC.
https://off-guardian.org/2022/02/27/7-fake-news-stories-coming-out-of-ukraine/
My wife, near tears for the crushed peoples of the Ukraine, read the above story with disbelief, then started following the links. It’s like a decongestant for the brain.
Even better for actually understanding the situation, the following excellent synopsis in Tablet (most of Tablet’s articles are rabidly pro-west and russophobic, btw) will provide a reader willing to hear it the historical context necessary to evaluate the current hysterical context.
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/ukraines-deadly-gamble
Peace arise, and goodwill follow.
I support Russia completely in this matter.
Russia has NOT annexed the two breakaway republics. It has RECOGNISED them as independent sovereign entities. As such, it has offered them protection against their enemies … who have been slaughtering their citizens for years, and now have been armed with much more powerful weapons by the US and its lackeys.
The eastern part of Ukraine is largely Russian ethnicity.
How could Russia stand by and watch them slaughtered?
So far they have allowed citizens from those areas who had joined the Russian army to return to their homes to defend them … these are the Russian troops the US and Kiev bleat about.
Russia is acting from the moral high-ground. The US hasn’t ever mounted that area in history.
That is interesting Helen. I did not know any of that.
I wish our U.S. News Reporters would talk about such things.
But then they would just end up like Julian Assange….
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/ukraines-deadly-gamble
Lee King
I don’t know who Lee King is or where he or she is from, but this is a well-written and concise synopsis of the path that led to this conflict. Highly recommend.
You are so right as in the Western perspective people of Donbass are forgotten in their political games… everybody knows what happened to Spanish Catalonia…
I agree with you but Morrison and Albo are still making lock-step policy. People actually look askance at me when I put up Russia Today as an alternate news source. As I’ve finally given up on our ABC. Talk about a rah-rah team!
What is this latest US crap about the ‘…war of 1945’? Does the US mean WW2? Why 1945? Unless it is to congratulate the USSR on defeating Germany’s military/fascist government almost singlehandedly.
After being comprehensively beaten by the Viet Minh and the Taliban – why is the US overreaching itself in the Ukraine?
FJB or Brandon as he is commonly known, needs to protect his “10% for the Big Guy”.
It always seemed to me a pretty good idea to look under the tree in order to decide what to call it. All this charade about Ukraine is pretty surrealistic. Who wants to fight a war in, for or over Ukraine? As this US general famously put it in the Afghanistan papers, “we didn’t even know what winning that war would look like!” It clearly was only a cash cow for the MIC. Anybody who’s ever been a salesman knows how salesmanship works. You’ve got financial objectives to meet or you’re fired. It would be next to impossible to find a reason why salesmanship in armament would operate along different rules – except of course by introducing moral reasons which have as much to do with the financial world as respect for female dignity with serial rapists. What would winning a war in Ukraine look like for the West? Nobody knows… It doesn’t even seem possible. The whole Western rigmarole is ludicrous. However, if you look at the fruits under the tree, the US and UK have packed Ukraine with weapons up to the brim. It’s difficult to imagine how Ukraine could fight even a conventional war with Russia and could be the new cash cow. More likely the arms dealers will have to finalize their bill and satisfy themselves with this deal – there’s no small profit – but more importantly, the Nord Stream II pipeline meant to deliver cheap Russian gas to Germany and that the US has been trying to sabotage for years has just been shut down by the German government as part of the sanctions against Russia. Germany will therefore have to buy expensive American gas. And quickly because it’s at the end of its reserves. Now we’re talking business! The rest is window dressing.
seems i’m “rootin’ for putin” on this one. i can’t see anything wrong with recognizing the republics and deploying peace-keepers.
https://www.veteranstoday.com/2022/02/23/neo-the-nasty-truth-behind-2020s-world-war/
So then, shouldn’t we pass laws against money? Or impose horrendous tax rates upon it? When so many of these trillionairs speak publicly of either destroying our lives or livelihoods don’t we have the right to protect ourselves?
Yes, that is the conversation I had with my mom.
I disagreed with her that it is human nature to continuously kill and covet others’ property.
While there is some of that, it is made unlimited by the invention of money.
If you notice how much money the US (and global corporations) spend trying to stir up wars and keep them going, you can also observe that all they do is keep the money printed by central bankers in circulation.
Central banks print money and loan it to the governments at a cost of interest.
US Politicians abhor war “peace”, because it takes so much money to pay for their campaigns. There is actually ongoing campaign in the news against peace, and they portrait everybody who wants is as dangerous lunatics.
Peace is the only reality. Money is fake news.
word “peace”, sorry for the typo.
Sorry Americans! As long as the US governments attempts to assert its dominance over the whole world, you will also get the blame for everything that goes wrong in the world.
You cannot have unipolar hegemony – and to blame Putin every time things do not go according to the US plan.
If you admitted that Putin or Russia have their own sphere of influence, then you could blame them for asserting their will, whether you think it is good or bad.
I hope this comment is directed at the government of the U.S., and not the average working class citizen. As citizens, most of us know that our government is the most aggressive, violent and dangerous entity on the planet and it not only murdering people in other countries, but is also murdering its own citizens at home through lack of health care, lack of a livable wage, lack of affordable housing and lack of anything that benefits working people. Yep. We know that.
Important point to make. BUT is it not also true that average working class American citizens have by now become either complacent with or complicit in the evils of their government–manipulated by the MSM into so being, no doubt, but there in their complacency/complicity nonetheless? How else to explain each vote to re-elect W, for example, cast after the criminal Iraq War?
What has Australia done to get Julian Assange out of prison?
I think more Americans have protested to Free Assange than Australians have.
ouch. and what has Australia done about the US interference in an Australian election in the 70’s? since then it has acted more like another poodle for the empire.
Carolyn, I was not blaming you. I am just pointing out that with absolute power comes absolute responsibility. The US cannot project absolute power in the world, and put absolute responsibility on Putin.
I know Americans do not really have a say in what the US is doing abroad, and not even at home – I have tried to write to my US Congressmen and have not gotten anywhere with that.
I participated in elections, and most likely will not anymore, because it is just a political theater.
The only thing I can think of is to extract myself from the US economic machine, because I have been paying for their wars since 2001 and I am not willing to support them with my labor or taxes anymore.
Learned today from lecture on Energy and Policy that the US is still paying interest on the debt incurred in all the previous wars.
IMO the US allows people to immigrate here to use us as ant colony to work for the warmongers.
That’s not true Amerika just needs better PR or lieing press and govt. officials.
America does not have a government in Washington.
It has a Vichy duplicate owned by Perfidious Albion in London.
At Prime Minsters Questions in the UK today, there was a feeding frenzy among its politicians to put as many and as far reaching sanctions on Russia as possible, RT is broadcast in the UK and calls have been made to stop that. RT aside there’s far too much Russian (mainly Oligarch) money floating around for England’s Prime Minister to actually take the calls seriously without damaging his party’s own interests and that of his party’s donors, so I suspect the sanctions will be limited and specific so as not to damage any real interests.
Meanwhile Ukraine’s president Zelensky gave a speech today where he lauded Poland for its support of Ukraine, Poland has taken over the Chair of the OSCE, so I think it wouldn’t to be too far a stretch of the imagination to say that OSCE reports of hostilities in the Donbas could be skewed in Ukraine’s favour.
Also Ukraine has called up at least 36,0000 reserve troops as the country reports a massive cyber attack underway right now.
https://www.rt.com/russia/550368-massive-cyberattack-underway-ukraine/
On the topic of oligarchs’ money colouring Johnson’s view of sanctions:
https://www.thedailymash.co.uk/politics/no-points-at-eurovision-boris-johnsons-incredibly-harsh-sanctions-on-russia-20220223217670
This is all about the next American elections. Biden wants to look tough. Seems he’s taking a big risk.
Having turned the word “ freedom” into a pejorative cf. freedom fries and “ freedom” to behave like idiots, the US has set its sights on the word “tough” as in overcooked to the point of being inedible.
In English slang, a tough is basically – and appropriately – a thug.
Kiev’s been busy denying that its paramilitary groups are active in the region. Yet the New York Times, hardly a mouthpiece for Russian propaganda, recently interviewed and videoed some of them there, showing how they get through checkpoints with ease, and coordinate with official Kiev troops:
‘Ukraine’s paramilitaries prepare for conflict with Russia.’
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/19/world/europe/ukraine-russia-donbas.html
(some text & 8 minute video)
or
https://archive.ph/g1HxZ#selection-761.0-764.0 (no paywall, but video may not work)
.
The Ukrainian government insists that independent armed groups have no part in its war in the east, and that these fighters don’t exist there. But New York Times journalists recently contacted three paramilitary groups that claim to operate near the front line of the conflict. One allowed us to film them this month.
We followed Ruslan Postovoit and Yuriy Ulshin, who first took up arms in 2014 as part of the nationalist volunteer movement that was formed during the protests in Kyiv’s Maidan Square. …
“There are no volunteers outside of structured battalions right now in Ukraine,” said Serhiy Sobko, chief of staff of the Territorial Defense Force of the Armed Forces of Ukraine. “I don’t have personal evidence of the existence of these unofficial groups,” he added. …
On the ground hundreds of miles from Kyiv, the presence of paramilitary units is an open secret. Local commanders say they see them as an asset to help regular soldiers. And Ukraine’s chief commander of the armed forces, Valeriy Zaluzhnny, shared a photo on Facebook posing with Mr. Ulshin and other volunteer fighters.
Mr. Ulshin and Mr. Postovoit said they grew frustrated with the military chain of command and orders not to fight. Today, they say, they fight on their own terms, but that they collaborate and coordinate with local military commanders on missions like drone reconnaissance. …
“You have the official armed forces, and you have the volunteer world, operating parallel to what the government does,” said Jonas Ohman, a Lithuania-based financier who supplies drones and anti-drone jammers to fighters like Mr. Ulshin and Mr. Postovoit.
“We told them, if you want to kill the enemy, tell us what you need and we will get it for you,” Mr. Ohman said, referring to the moment he began financing Ukraine’s volunteer fighters, in 2014.
it’s easy really .. forget about power blocs – be loyal to integrity. Does that mean you’ll be objected to as being “pro Russian”? Well, then that’s a telling objection.
As an American what always surprises me (endlessly) is how easy it is to whip people into a frenzy and get people to believe the US is in the right, just because someone on the “news” says so. These are the same people who know their government lies to them all the time, but they still believe the new fairly tales. NATO was meant to counter the Soviet Union, but somehow mysteriously doubled in size after the Soviet Union longer longer existed. The US has military bases literally surrounding Russia, and then we help institute an anti-Russian coup in one of their closest neighbors. A civil war breaks out and lasts for 8 years (so far), but none of that shows up in the US news. In fact, you never heard any concern in the US “news” for the last 8 years of fighting there. The people in the US who support this are the suckers, with over half of our discretionary tax dollars going to war efforts like this, while our infrastructure crumbles and people can’t afford college or healthcare. I constantly wonder what people in the US think they are going to get out of constant conflicts with Russia and China. It is a true mystery.
It is indeed. See Al Capp’s Shmoo, which debuted in the late 40’s but hit prime time in the 60’s.
After getting Americans into personal and national debt, now global bankers want to invade other countries, install their own puppet governments, and give them loans to buy American weapons – that is half of the US foreign policy.
The second part is that the US prefers to invade countries with lots of fossil fuel reserves, because US dollar is used to settle all the oil (and commodities) trade in the world. To make sure that the dollar remains the dominant reserve currency, they want to control all the oil trade.
I find that the people most likely to believe the lies of the U.S. government are people who depend solely on television for their news and information. What they get is endless propaganda and advertising. I got rid of my television a decade ago and I recommend that others do the same. It is like having the government sitting in your living room telling you lies all day long and urging you to buy crap at the same time. Unless people go on the internet and read the work of investigative reporters, they will never get the accurate information that is available there. Mainstream media will never investigate itself or the government it shills for.
yeah getting rid of TV is very calming, I’m upset second hand at all the propaganda.
“I constantly wonder what people in the US think they are going to get out of constant conflicts with Russia and China.” – european energy and weapons markets trickling down.
It’s not The USA.
It’s the fake regime in Washington dancing like a puppet to the masters in London.Perfidious Albion.
The regime stole the election & is to America what Vichy was to France.
Dominion voting machines stole the election for this phony regime.
Dominion is connected to the British firm Smartmatic.
Lord Mark Malloch Brown was the CEO at Smartmatic.
Brown is a powerful politician in the House of Lords.
He is also a leading member of the Queen’s Privy Council.
He is also a close associate of George Soros & now leader of the Open Society Foundation.
No one is claiming the blue party is moving left except the red party as red meat to their fans. Leftists attacking leftists, framed as you know who you are. YouTube programs seem to mostly be about attacking other programs, as either based or cringe. It appears that ‘the cause’ is primarily about getting paid by superchats. Thank you for the consistent commentary.
There are no leftists in the capitalist political parties. None. There are lots of fakes, to be sure.
“Not that anyone cares but the fastest way to lose my respect as an anti-imperialist is to spend your energy attacking other anti-imperialists.” Same goes IMHO for those leftists who spend their energy attacking others on the left who may not yet be radical enough in their eyes…as in BOTH SIDES of the Jimmy Dore flap, which quickly spun into other flaps in which the left eagerly ate (and is still eating) its own. Questioning whether a particular leftist politician or pundit is radical enough is one thing; questioning his or her character and integrity quite another.
It’s a common failing of highly idealistic people. They tend to eat their siblings and their young.
Yes. There is no genuine idealism without embracing the first ideal upon which all others are based: universal love, which includes the toughest task of all, the love of one’s “enemy.”
The only true leftists are Marxists. There are no leftists in the capitalist Democratic Party. Marxists only attack FAKE leftists, not genuine leftists.
Long time reader and even occassional patron. I vowed that by this point in history I would make a decision based on whether there was any iota of balance or acknowledgement of responsibility other than the usual suspect. There isn’t. So I now understand that whilst your writing is brilliant, your agenda is very narrow. Confirmation bias rules the day. Unless it’s the evil piñata (and it is) you have nothing else to say. So to me at this point it’s just more (well written) manipulative narrative – with nothing new to add. Color me an erstwhile reader.
Don’t you think that there’s something to the argument that the US and NATO pushed Russia into taking the actions it did? And can’t that argument be made without sanctioning those Russian actions? Two wrongs don’t make a right, and I see nothing right about this whole situation. Nor, I suspect, does Caitlin. Stay with us, Rob, and continue to make those counterpoints we need to hear.
I also think that the focus on “Everything is the fault of the U.S.” is very narrow.
And it is not that that is not True…It actually mostly IS true.
But as an American Citizen, it is annoying when an Australian Writer simply makes this point over and over.
What we should ALL be talking about, and doing, is figuring how We the People of the World, and figure out ways to organize and change this.
I was a local Delegate for Bernie Sanders, my oldest son was a Bernie Nevada State Delegate for the Democrat Party state convention for Bernie in Las Vegas.
We all know how that turned out.
Armed Police lined up against the stage and ordering the Convention Closed and all Delegates to LEAVE.
What we need, here in the U.S. is a 3rd Progressive Party. What we need is a world wide organized Socialist and Environmentalist Organization.
That is what all progressive should be talking about.
Here in the U.S. the main political discussion seems to be is Trump Evil or Good?
That is just a stupid waste of time. We need to discuss how to bring progressive change.
Here and in Australia. And Everywhere.
I am an American citizen and a Marxist. I agree with Caitlin 100% in what she writes about the evil and vicious U.S. government of warmongers and capitalist system. As a Marxist I am an internationalist and hold no brief for the U.S. just because I was born here.
There is already a party here, the Socialist Equality Party, that needs support against capitalist imperialism. You are asking for something that already exists. Try reading the World Socialist Web Site and supporting the SEP as I have done for more than 20 years.
as an American citizen, it annoys the holy fuck out of me every time America invades another country or arranges another coup or violates another treaty. you know, if it stopped doing that, it would not be necessary to point it out so often, but…
Complaining that an Australian always criticizes the US empire is like complaining that a Texan always criticizes the US empire; we’re both living in member states of the empire. Focusing one’s criticisms on the most powerful and destructive government on earth is very normal and correct. What’s abnormal and incorrect is how few people are doing so.
Then maybe you should write more about the “member state of the empire” that you live in.
Why has the Australian Government not defended Julian Assange? Why have they not demanded that England send him home to Australia?
I would really like to read about that.
I’ve written multiple articles about exactly that. I’m not going to write one every day.
If I was Australian, and had a online political site as yours, I would at least mention Julian Assange every single day, I consider Free Speech and Julian Assange the line that is being drawn to end it. And when that happens, all is lost.
“Without a Free Press, there can be No Democracy:-
Thomas Jefferson.
Sometimes the readers mention Assange too.
Yeah I have no respect for the position that “balance” means criticizing the vastly less destructive actions of a government that’s already being histrionically criticized 24/7/365 by all of the most influential media outlets and all the most powerful governments in the western world while everyone ignores what the US power alliance has done to get us here. To me it’s just a sign of not having thought very hard about this.
“Vastly less destructive?”
I think what has been done to Julian Assange is vastly destructive. To him personally and to the entire world.
“Without a Free Press, there can be No Democracy”
Thomas Jefferson
I think that as an Australian, you should not excuse or ignore the Australian Government for going along with what the U.S does.
“Vastly less destructive” obviously meaning Russia, not Australia.
The birth of the baby twins: Russia’s strategic swing drives NATOstan nuts , Pepe Escobar (excerpts) History will register that the birth of the baby twins – Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics – only a few hours before 2/22/22, was simultaneous to the birth of the real, 21st century multipolar world…
…A few hours later, at an emergency UN Security Council meeting, Russian Permanent Representative Vasily Nebenzya precisely outlined why the recognition of the baby twins does not bury the Minsk agreements.
The baby twins actually declared their independence in May 2014. In 2015 they signed the Minsk agreements as one of the interested parties. Theoretically they could even be back within Ukraine if Kiev would ever decide to respect the agreements, which will never happen because the US has vetoed it since 2015… As Nebenzya outlined, “I would like to remind you that at the time of the conclusion of the Minsk agreements, the LPR and DPR had already declared independence. The fact that Russia today recognized it does not change the composition of the parties to the Minsk agreements, since Russia is not one (…) Another thing is that the Minsk agreements have long been openly sabotaged by Ukraine under the auspices of our Western colleagues. Now we see that many colleagues want to sign that the Minsk agreements are dead. But this is not the case (…) We are still open to diplomacy, but we do not intend to allow a new bloody massacre in the Donbass.”
And here’s the clincher, directly addressing imperial support for the killing of ethnic Russians in Donbass: “The main task of our decision [on recognizing independence] was to preserve and protect these lives. This is more important than all your threats.”
There you go: Responsibility to Protect (R2P), a concept invented by the Americans to launch wars, used by Russia for preventing one……China is a way more complex proposition. One of the key tenets of Beijing’s foreign policy is the fight against separatism – embedded in the foundation of the SCO. So Beijing cannot possibly recognize the baby twins, or what would amount to Novorossiya – yes, Putin did pronounce the magic word – before Kiev itself does or, a serious possibility, completely disintegrates……The intervention of all 12 members at the Security Council session, combined with Putin’s address to the nation was the stuff of gripping geopolitical drama. Putin’s body language and the look in his eyes testified to the immense gravity of the moment – and it all came to the forefront when he embarked in a concise history lesson spanning a century…what mostly stood out was the clear-cut rendition of the insurmountable antagonism between the Anglo-American islands and the civilizational Heartland – or the clash between maritime powers and land powers. That Eurasia classic was the bulk of his exposition: the recognition of the baby twins took less than three minutes… (Weekend Security Conference in) Munich spelled out No Compromise Whatsoever – which was exactly what Putin, Lavrov, Patrushev and co. expected, the warmongering rhetoric burying any meaningful discussion of migration, inflation, cyber wars, the European energy crisis and, of course, the only thing that matters for the MICIMATT (military-industrial-congressional-intelligence-media-academia-think tank complex, as defined by Ray McGovern): let’s milk this Eurotrash lot for untold billions in new contracts, let’s isolate Russia, let’s destroy Nord Stream 2 to sell them our ultra expensive LNG, let’s keep them on a leash – forever… Considering the ideological stupidity of the current Brussels gang – Stoltenberg, von der Leyen, Borrell –, incapable of understanding even basic economics, the fact remains that the EU without Russian energy is doomed. Martyanov stresses the algorithm: Russia can afford the break up with Europe. Europe cannot. The US just wants to collect. And we’re not even talking about the dire, incoming ramifications of the systemic crisis across NATOstan……John Helmer niftly qualified as Russia’s black box defense. The beauty is no one knows what’s inside the black box.
Enter, once again, the “military-technical measures” that will be “reciprocal” (Putin) to what US and NATOstan are already deploying against Russia. They won’t necessarily be implemented in the Black Sea, the Sea of Azov, in the airspace above Donbass, even in cyberspace. It could be anywhere – from the Syrian theater to Latin America.
Surprise! That’s what strategic ambivalence, ambiguity, or – let’s get down to the rhythm – swing is all about.http://thesaker.is/the-birth-of-the-baby-twins-russias-strategic-swing-drives-natostan-nuts/
“Mass-scale psychological manipulation is a science that’s still advancing.”
Sad but true as new algorithms show. Double sad since the science is advanced enough so most people are properly confused and neutralized 100 percent of the time. No improvement in the science is needed. It works well enough.