Listen to a reading of this article:
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The problem with anti-imperialists who spend all their time criticizing the evil US empire is that there aren’t nearly enough of them.
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People who respond to criticisms of the US by babbling about the misdeeds of other governments are just saying you should never criticize the most powerful government in the world for any reason.
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Hey I’ve got a great idea, let’s start World War Three over a NATO country that most Americans don’t even know exists.
Liberals learned the word “Lithuania” ten seconds ago and they’re ready to nuke Moscow over it.
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They keep incrementally normalizing this idea. https://t.co/lIFmOKzGPd
— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) June 20, 2022
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If you’re on the front lines risking your own life fighting and killing Russians for Ukraine, I will happily listen to your opinion on why there should be no negotiated settlement to end this war. Otherwise, shut the fuck up you pathetic couch warrior.
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The worst thing about the George W Bush administration is that it never ended.
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I don’t know what it’s like elsewhere, but here in Australia it’s pretty easy to convince the average citizen that Assange shouldn’t be extradited to the United States just by sharing a few facts. The only reason more don’t is because the press spent so much time smearing him instead of telling the truth.
It mostly comes down to the fact that the mainstream western press spent so much time aggressively smearing Assange after the 2016 WikiLeaks drops about Hillary Clinton. That shaped public perception of this issue more than anything else. They were relentless, and they were vile.
That’s why it doesn’t make much difference when mainstream publications decry Assange’s persecution after aggressively smearing him all those years. You can’t damn a man ten thousand times and then defend him once and have your defense be remembered. You can’t churn out bullshit smear piece after bullshit smear piece about Assange like this:
The only barrier to Julian Assange leaving Ecuador’s embassy is pride | James Ball https://t.co/r5L1hVMkVZ
— The Guardian (@guardian) January 10, 2018
And then expect the public to just absorb editorials like this:
Guardian Editorial: 'The charges against (#Assange) should never have been brought' @guardian
'The decision ought to worry anyone who cares about journalism and democracy' #FreeAssangeNOW https://t.co/P0k2OVN66G
— WikiLeaks (@wikileaks) June 20, 2022
People aren’t simply going to accept that after you’ve spent years conditioning them to want Assange’s head on a spike.
If people know the facts about Assange’s persecution, they’ll overwhelmingly be supportive. If they just consumed mainstream news media between 2016 and 2019 without really drilling down and researching the Assange case, they’ll tend to be unsupportive.
This is the media’s fault. Between 2016 and 2019 smearing Assange was a way of demonstrating to current and prospective mainstream media employers that you will do anything, anything at all, to defend the empire. It was a great way to advance your career, and many did so.
If the press were actually working to create an informed populace as their job purports to be, there would be a tremendous amount of support for Assange. The reason that hasn’t happened is because their real job is the exact opposite: to manipulate, deceive, and propagandize.
It’s impossible to despise the mainstream western press too much, in my opinion. They’re paving the way to destruction and dystopia just as much as the plutocrats and politicians. They whine that the public hates them, but really the public doesn’t hate them enough.
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The Trump administration was an educational time to observe how the “populist right” is easily manipulated into defending standard Republican actions like killing the Iran deal, assassinating Soleimani, arresting Assange, starving Venezuelans, killing attempts to save Yemen, etc. Every single time Trump rolled out a foreign policy decision that would have looked perfectly at home in the Bush administration, I’d have MAGA people in my notifications explaining why his action was actually good and hurt the Deep State. Literally every single time, without a single, solitary exception. They were led around by the balls the entire time.
The so-called populist sentiments on the American right are manipulated toward the agendas of oligarchy and empire in exactly the same way as the progressive sentiments on America’s so-called left. The whole thing is subject to very aggressive and very effective narrative control.
It’s a safe guideline that any movement which pushes people to align with either of America’s two mainstream political parties is controlled from top to bottom. If their solution to America’s problems at any time includes voting for Republicans or Democrats, they’re not worth listening to.
That’s why when I see people championing obvious empire lackeys like Ron DeSantis as populist heroes and babbling about drag queens and trans people even as we’re moving closer to the brink of nuclear war, I tend to be pretty dismissive of their entire movement.
The election in Colombia of a former narco-terrorist Marxist is troubling and disappointing. The spread of left-wing totalitarian ideology in the Western Hemisphere is a growing threat. Florida stands with Colombian Americans on the side of freedom. pic.twitter.com/0O7UVccH6M
— Ron DeSantis (@GovRonDeSantis) June 20, 2022
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All you need to do to kill leftward movement is flood the information ecosystem with enough confusion about socialist and anti-imperialist issues that it becomes impossible to hold a lucid position on them without copious amounts of research. Few are willing and able to do this.
It’s easy to sit back and judge people for believing propaganda and failing to push for real change in adequate numbers, but if you look at the vast quantity of sophisticated psyops distorting everyone’s picture of the world it’s very understandable there’s so much confusion.
As long as only a small minority of people have the willingness and ability to put in long hours to try and understand what’s going on, it will remain easy to manipulate all leftward movement into impotence or complicity. Something very, very big is going to have to change.
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50 responses to “Let’s Fight WW3 Over Lithuania: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix”
It’s definitely not a George Bush problem. It’s a US imperialism problem. Clinton, Bush, Regan, Obama, Nixon, Trump etc etc are all the same. They’re all US imperialists.
Another great little essay.My sentiments entirely.
A long article justifying human madness.
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The stupid are among us.
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They also breed and consume alcohol.
Make mine a gin and tonic.
Since 9/11 the US-UK-EU-Israel became dictatorships. In order to not let anyone contradict the official narrative the MSM is completely absorbed inside of the government just publishing what favors the hardcore policy and some space to act as if there is in fact two political parties but they are just one using different colors.
Social Media came to be absorbed inside of this process.
Supreme Court and. Congress as well.
Everything is filtered according to a bunch of wild guess about what should be the future and outcomes.
Just to make you aware that all MSM machinery is writing an inverted version of our reality in opposition to concrete facts exhausted written in dissertations, thesis about history, sociology, science.
No judge will accept historical facts to refute the emperor’s lies.
The intelligence of all of the comments gives me hope. Thanks Caitlin and thanks to everyone who contributes comments.
i can sort of relate to your hope, but not much. it must be kept in mind that it is only thanks to a global internet that literally reaches billions that someone like caitlin is able to gather together a quite small following of what, hundreds, or at most, a few thousands? focusing on this small group which is spread out over continents can give one a misleading perception of not being alone, when in fact if u live in a rural area such as i do in the northeastern u.s., u may well be the only one of your kind within a 100 km radius. the truth is we are very few and far between.
History is an ironical bitch. We were certainly not ready to start WW3 over Lithuania in 1991 to the point that Vytautas Landsbergis, the founder of the Independence Party Sajudis, who was making the headlines at the time (and seems to have escaped Wikipedia’s attention in their report of the events for some reason) as promoter of said independence, complained of the lack of support of the West in general and London and Washington in particular, like the Czechs had done during their 1968 Prague Spring and the Hungarians in their 1956 Uprising – albeit previously heavily encouraged to rise up by Radio Free Europe’s US propaganda, which reminds us of Cream’s song Politician that says in part: “I support the left though I’m leaning to the right but I’m just not there when it’s coming to a fight”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WOPDzD_P9gg
Lithuania was the first Soviet republic to declare independence from the Union in April 1990 after Gorbachev announced his “glasnost” (openness) and “perestroika” (restructuring) policy and Iceland was the first Western country to recognize it instead.
I went to Vilnius, the capital of Lithuania, in January 1991. I remember the bullet-pierced sandbags in the main staircase and mezzanine of the local parliament where Landsbergis had his office which showed they’d had serious stuff going on there.
When Vilnius declared independence the previous year, Moscow organized a blockade which lasted two and a half months – that’s where history is ironical as it is now Lithuania that blockades Russian goods. Then things cooled off but the Kremlin thought they could get the support of the Lithuanian population if they organized a coup to get rid of Landsbergis, which they did in January 1991.
They got it wrong. People flocked in droves from all over Lithuania to Vilnius to defend the Supreme Council of the Republic that they had elected as well as the country’s independence. They were not armed but the Soviet soldiers backing the coup were. They killed fourteen people and injured a few hundreds. So it’s not a big love story between the Russians and the Lithuanians.
However both their governments have moved on. Russia is not the KGB kontrolled Soviet Union anymore and Lithuania has been part of the EU for almost twenty years. But I understand they now take their cues directly from London and Washington being, with the other two Baltic states, Latvia and Estonia, the easternmost Nato countries and as such advanced pawns on the Anglo-Saxon warmongering chessboard.
Needless to say, if push comes to shove, London, Washington and their Nato stooges are prepared to courageously fight Russia in Lithuania down to the last Lithuanian – perhaps even in the face of a nuclear threat which would put the Lithuanians in the first row to see the mushroom. Yummie!
Apart from the political aspect, what struck me at the time in the snow-covered streets of Vilnius is that there was not one single billboard trying to aggressively sell you shit through barefaced lies. I found that relaxing…
Not the kind of in depth topical background you get in just any comment section.
The State Dept./CIA/etc. is gearing-up for the reinstallation of Netanyahu in Israel in the Fall (the center-Right Bennett coalition gov’t there is all-but-dissolved after a recent no-confidence vote). THIS dynamic will return the narrative back toward trying to provoke Syria and/or Iran as a way for the U.S./U.K./DE./NATO oligarchs to once again goad Putin (because: the Ukraine cheerleading propaganda has been so pathetic while…AMERICA IS COLLAPSING ON A DAILY BASIS).
I don’t know how these people in US government are planning to fight another WW, or maybe they are not planning to participate.
There is a shortage of medical bandages in the stores.
Since US State Dept told Americans not to volunteer for a war in Ukraine, perhaps they think all casualties will be on the other side of the ocean.
Or maybe Elon Musk will figure out how to mass produce and distribute bandages in the most cost efficient way.
MSM are like a farmer who gives feed to his/her chickens faithfully only to keep them facing down for life, not knowing that they are there to be slaughtered in the end or to have their eggs stolen in broad daylight. Nothing much must be expected from them because they are one and the same with those who plunder the resources for the benefit of a few on the earth even though they are mere cogs in the wheel of a rabid modern capitalism. We expect too much from these printing press scammers the way we do with fat heads politicians only to inflate their evil egos much to our detriment.
This is simple. We have a system of deeds issued by governments for private property (or state property) ultimately enforced at the barrel of a gun. Ownership/Commerce/Power Games plus increasing destructive capabilities and we will always be a few steps from the next war, the next empire rising up, WWIII, WWIV, WWV, etc.
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The rest is just the details.
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The only Revolution that will actually mean anything, as you have said, is one of human consciousness. It’s just that what is needed is more radical than which media is heard by more people. Once those people are different, it won’t matter. Maybe the environment right now where no one trusts anyone is a step? I don’t know.
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A child cannot grow any faster than it grows, even if “it has to, or else.” In those sad cases, you will always get to “or else.”
One thing for the wish list: that Germany, finally, tells the zionist entity to go fuck itself, that Germany has felt guilty long enough, that the debt has been paid many times over. Time to cut Holocaust Industries Inc. loose.
Not a chance – no business like Shoah business, as they say.
Holocaust survivor Grandchildren are now trying to extend and enforce payments from German WW2 Grandchildren. Sins of the Father’s extend to the grandkids, apparently. Guess the Palestinians are in a for a huge pay out when their time comes.
In the Bible’s vendettas, people are cursed for up to twenty generations. It’s hard to break with traditions…
No worries. Several big, no huge, things are about to happen.
Russia wins in Ukraine. No ifs, ands, or buts. Russia wins.
NATO collapses under the weight of its own collective stupidity.
European governments collapse under the weight of their own stupidity. New administrations begin to grasp, dimly, that being the USA’s vassal is a surefire route to destruction; that the USA’s bases, armies and weapons are not signs of security, but of an occupying force.
The East rises, unstoppably.
Fault lines in the USA grow into unbridgeable canyons. Fission begins.
Me, I’m more optimistic than I’ve been for years. If I die in a nuclear holocaust before any of this happens, then so be it, at least I’ll die happy.
That’s some seriously boundless optimism.
You need to take the Chinese view: decades, not days.
I don’t know what the timescale is supposed to be for dying in a nuclear holocaust, but I guess it ends at that point. Optimism isn’t a sentiment normally associated with that, but maybe we’re finally moving on from WW II. Hopefully we’ll live through it.
There are a few nuclear targets in the southern hemisphere, notably the US controlled bases in Australia but in a nuclear war the northern hemisphere will be obliterated, maybe like the hemispheres of Mars. The northerners will die relatively quickly but I guess no-one really knows how the south will be affected.
Think of people as little child sailboats. They turn according to wind and current. Now the big wind is blowing toward inflation and war. They do not have the time or attention span to think or care about Julian Assange. His moment has long past and been assigned to the dustbin of history. Farewell Julian Assange. At least you tried.
It’s a bit contradictory to assign someone to the dustbin of history when you’re commenting on him online. And bringing Assange to the US will definitely put him back in the headlines. It will be interesting to see just how much lipstick the US government has and how much of it they can get on. I think Assange’s prosecution will be the first such against a private citizen, basically the government telling people to STFU. Easier said than done.
Dont count on it. Assangecwill come to America with a whimper. MSM will hardly notice.
The MSM will do its level best to keep a blanket over it but Assange and company won’t be whimpering.
I came across the following debate last night from 11 April, 2019 – ie the Arrest of Julian Assange. Here’s a taster:
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His arrest follows a decision by the Ecuadorean Government to bring to an end his presence inside its embassy in London. I am pleased that President Moreno has taken this decision and I extend the UK’s thanks to him for resolving the situation. Ecuador’s actions recognise that the UK’s criminal justice system is one in which rights are protected and in which, contrary to what Mr. Assange and his supporters may claim, he and his legitimate interests will be protected……
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Both the UK Government and the Ecuadorean Government have become increasingly concerned about the state of Mr Assange’s health. The first action of the police following his arrest was to have him medically assessed and deemed fit to detain……
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Sajid Javid (and I bet he managed to keep a straight face)
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https://hansard.parliament.uk/Commons/2019-04-11/debates/0650F0B8-1D1E-4FD5-8E6D-9A94FE112986/ArrestOfJulianAssange
A MUST read piece by Jonathan Cook:
In short, rather than use journalism to win the argument and the battle for public opinion, Mason wishes to use the dark arts of the security state to damage independent media, as well as dissident academics and left-wing political activism. He wants no influences on the public that are not tightly aligned with the core foreign policy goals of the national security state.
Mason’s correspondence hints at the reality behind Cadwalladr’s claim that Assange was the “swirling vortex at the centre of everything.”
Assange symbolizes that “swirling vortex” to intelligence-aligned establishment journalists only because WikiLeaks has published plenty of insider information that exposes Western claims to global moral leadership as a complete charade – and the journalists who amplify those claims as utter charlatans.
https://www.jonathan-cook.net/blog/2022-06-21/journalists-lap-dogs-security-state/
MediaLens…..
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Don’t Extradite Assange
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https://www.medialens.org/2022/dont-extradite-assange/
It’s beginning to feel like a war party.
United Soviets of America. That way we can still use all those old T shirts and bumper stickers.
What are you talking about?
(U)nited (S)oviets of (A)merica. New name. Same initials.
‘(U)nited (S)oviets of (A)merica. New name. Same initials.’
duh. this doesn’t address carolyn’s good question. the comment by john knox is completely out of left field and irrelevant to the discussion on this thread, as far as i can tell.
I dont’ know why some European politicians are helping the US to start WW3. The US expects to gain from it, but not Europe. I guess these people do not know their own history.
The choice is the west collapsing while the rest of the world survives or burn it all down and start over as destroyed equals.
Which would you choose if you were a psychopath thirsty for power and control.
I think people in the west have no idea how to respect other people, be it in the west or the bigger rest of the world.
We do not have to threaten each other to reach a peace agreement!
The whole concept of targeting each other’s civilians with the nukes should be the first step in respecting our lives.
People here fight about legality of abortions, while modernising their nuclear arsenal.
According to Washington and Europe all what they are doing is to decolonize Russia. I didn’t know Russia had colonies inside Russia. Who teaches history and Geography in America? But Caitlin and gang might be interested to know how the US elite strategists see Russia in the Stranger Things upside-down.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FVzkJvNXEAE0TMl?format=jpg&name=large
That’s incredible Jabba, the USA blames Russia for destroying Libya! How short are their memories?
Makes you wonder if the guy who wrote this is a cheat (like Pom Pom Peo) or simply doesn’t know because he was a kid when the Libya scam was rolled out and he’s been propagandized by his handlers into thinking Russia did it. It is reminiscent of John Lennon’s lyrics in the bridge of Isolation: “I don’t expect you to understand after you’ve caused so much pain. But then again, you’re not to blame. You’re just a human, a victim of the insane”.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8XDJ1oPUjZ4
Funny enough, it was also one of the songs Johnny Depp sang in his concert with Jeff Beck at the end of the trial :o)
Meanwhile, it was Stephen Harper’s (right-wing dipshit) Canadian government that lobbied NATO for the right to have the Canadian Airforce do much of the bombing destruction of Libya!
Caitlin, you have a wonderful mind, and you are very articulate. Thank you again.
I don’t know that it takes hours of intense research to get the bigger picture. I was a staunch Obama support throughout his campaign and into the first 4 or 5 months of his Presidency. I did some research, a lot actually into health care systems, but mostly I just observed actions as opposed to rhetoric. The contrast was astronomical. His health care rhetoric was mussy and extremely non-directive but if you wanted to believe that he supported universal health care, it was appealing. Looking at actions, such as appointing Liz Fawler, ex-VP of WellPoint to head up the drive for health care reform while simultaneously banning single-payer advocates from the table, belief in the sincerity of his rhetoric faded pretty quickly, at least it did for me. Most people though, seem to want to be deluded. For many people, denial has much greater appeal than reality. Anyway, after observing the vast chasm between the words and action pertaining to health care, I learned a bit about neoliberalism and the sham of his whole Presidency became crystal clear. The “liberal” media’s endlessly glowing adulation of every word that sprang from his forked tongue made it crystal clear that the media was nothing but a propaganda machine. Coming out of denial is almost always like this. Once you see what you’ve been denying, you can never unsee it and your life is never the same. Keep up the good work Caitlin. You are helping people come out of denial and into consciousness.
“Most people though, seem to want to be deluded. For many people, denial has much greater appeal than reality”.
Ditto Voltaire: “It is difficult to free fools from the chains they revere”.
When this kind of aphorism flies unscathed through the centuries, you can bet it is a pretty essential component of human nature. And on a side note that propagandists know it and use it ad nauseam :o)
Agree entirely about Assange, who has served years more time than the average convicted murderer in the US, he for the crime of embarrassing.
Lithuania is the country ruled by Doctor Doom. No wait, that’s Latvia. I mean Latveria. Yeah, that’s it, Latveria. What’s Lithuania?
Lithuania didn’t decide to close its border to Russian transport, the US told it to. Maybe Bad Vlad will put an air cap over Russian trains and dare the Lithuanians to stop them. That would be interesting.
Well, it took 2 years and billions of dollars in propaganda-terror-quarantyranny to dislocate the perception about the millennia flu to covid. Which means they can crucify Assange, they can nuke Russia, they can take whatever they want because the vast majority still evolving to reach the quotient of intelligence of a monkey.
DeSantis agrees with you. think about that.
Guilt by association is such a vile and worn to a thread sophism that I wonder how people can still use this insult to intelligence with a straight face. I couldn’t care less about DeSantis but I must admit that when the sky is blue and he says it is, I agree with him, genius. And so will you if you have a modicum of common sense, which remains to be established.
He is being primed to run for president and people are lapping it up. I see great similarities to how they primed Bush. You are again being told how to vote by the MSM and elites. DeSantis is not our savior. It is why I quit voting.
That’s another matter altogether. Whoever thinks DeSantis is America’s savior is clearly out of his mind and should seek professional help :o)