The U.S. Corporate oligarchy which controls what is broadcast on television in America has virtually banned Al-Jazeera English in this country. It is only available on two small cable providers (one in Vermont, the most normal state in the U.S.) plus the capital city of the empire, Washington, D.C., where the Imperialist elites have used it to get their information on the uprisings in their middle eastern client states. (How ironic, the network they revile, which their military has repeatedly bombed, is where they go to get a realistic view of the "facts on the ground." To escape their own propaganda system, they turn to one of their hated enemies. Al-Jazeera's crime, of course, is being too honest.)
The lie, which you can read in places like The New York Times, is that there is no demand for Al-J in America, that it's merely a business decision, all about ratings, nothing more. The bogusness of this bullshit is easily revealed. For one, millions of people in America have tuned in to Al-J English via the Internet during the past couple of months. For another, as anyone with cable well knows, there are hundreds of channels on cable, many of them empty, and many of them filled with unbelievable sludge that no one watches, plus a lot of duplication. Ergo, this is another Lie designed to disguise the ideological and political motivation of the oligarchs.
In the same vein, Rupert Murdoch's reactionary motives are ALWAYS denied in the media, including the "liberal" media like the aforementioned NY Times. He is said to be motivated solely by business factors. Pure bullshit, as anyone who has observed him at all can see. Just two examples: keeping the NY Post for decades, which loses millions of dollars a year, but provides a platform for vile reactionary agitprop in New York City, and his Fox "News," which contains no objective news at all, but functions as a 24 hour platform for incessant reactionary ideological drumbeating. Murdoch personally appointed lifelong GOP political operative Roger Ailes, who masterminded Nixon's media strategy in 1968, among other crimes, to run it. Ailes is a hardcore, dogmatic fanatic.
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Tuesday, March 08, 2011
Wednesday, March 02, 2011
Hostage-Taking Qaddafi Vows Massacre If He's Raided
Gadhafi vowed that "we will fight until the last man and woman." He made a veiled threat to murder thousands more Libyans if the West intervened.
"We will not accept an intervention like that of the Italians that lasted decades," Gadhafi said, referring to Italy's colonial rule early in the 20th Century. "This will lead to a bloody war and thousands of Libyans will die if America and NATO enter Libya." While on its face this seems to mean people fighting for him will die, it's reasonable to interpret it as a death threat towards his Libyan former subjects, as he and his vile son (the one the U.S. media told us was a "reformer" with a "modern, Western" outlook) have already made a number of bloodcurdling threats about blood running in the streets and etc.
Note also phony anti-Colonial posturing. That stuff is generally catnip for leftists. But this time their pro-people bias trumps it. But among Third Worlders it probably still has some resonance.
His fellow phony tyrant thug "revolutionary leader" Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, a murderous burden on the long-suffering people of that nation, has been sending his soulmate Qaddafi reinforcements.
"We will not accept an intervention like that of the Italians that lasted decades," Gadhafi said, referring to Italy's colonial rule early in the 20th Century. "This will lead to a bloody war and thousands of Libyans will die if America and NATO enter Libya." While on its face this seems to mean people fighting for him will die, it's reasonable to interpret it as a death threat towards his Libyan former subjects, as he and his vile son (the one the U.S. media told us was a "reformer" with a "modern, Western" outlook) have already made a number of bloodcurdling threats about blood running in the streets and etc.
Note also phony anti-Colonial posturing. That stuff is generally catnip for leftists. But this time their pro-people bias trumps it. But among Third Worlders it probably still has some resonance.
His fellow phony tyrant thug "revolutionary leader" Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, a murderous burden on the long-suffering people of that nation, has been sending his soulmate Qaddafi reinforcements.
Friday, February 25, 2011
U.S. Rulers' Savage New Assault on Workers' Rights
The last citadel of organized labor in America, the public (government) workers' unions, are under assault. Givebacks, reneging on contracts, welshing on pensions, all this isn't enough to satisfy the plutocrats and their political hatchetmen who do their dirty work. Now the very RIGHT to organize and bargain collectively is under attack. In America, only the RICH are allowed to be organized collectively as a class to defend and promote their economic interests. It's class warfare on the overwhelming majority of the population. Controlling literally trillions of dollars of wealth still hasn't satiated their greed. (The Forbes 400 alone are "worth" several trillion dollars.) To avoid ever being taxed at reasonable levels, they are now ruthlessly attacking any government expenditures outside their military and domestic repression. This necessitates smashing any organized source of potential resistance by the population.
In Wisconsin, Ohio, Indiana- for starters- reactionary GOP governors are attempting to strip public employees' of their rights by passing laws banning their unions from representing them in negotiations with their employers, the state governments of these states. Scott Walker, Wisconsin Governor and stooge of the Koch brother billionaire thieves, has led the assault. He ran a stealth campaign as a "moderate" Republican to get elected, then revealed himself as a throwback to the 1920s. He plotted to plant agent provocateurs among union protesters in the state capital, to do god knows what violent mischief to justify violent repression and to discredit the unionized workers. The corporate media, including the self-styled "newspaper of record," has totally blacked out this criminal plot, even though Walker was captured on tape mentioning it to Ian Murphy, who got him on the phone by impersonating David Koch. (Revealing that this loathsome little puppet of the plutocrats, who was elected in part with large amounts of Koch money, has apparently never even spoke to his master before, since he was unfamiliar with his voice. He's too insignificant for the Kochs to talk to directly; his status might be that of a midlevel manager in the Kochs' corporate empire.)
The corporate propaganda system has been working assiduously to divide "middle class" people by whipping up resentment against the "lavish" and overly generous compensation deals of public workers. (No such campaign against corporate oligarchs who pull in millions or tens of millions a year routinely.) This "misery loves company" psychological warfare campaign has proven effective for the oligarchs. (And the more downmarket the rag, the more crude and blatant the anti-union propaganda. Check out the NY Daily News, a tabloid rag owned by Canadian real estate baron Mortimer B. Zuckerman, which affects a working class voice, for examples of tawdry union-bashing. In late February they used a dispute over a restaurant bill as a pretext for an attack on public unions day after day.)
Judging from the many resentful comments against workers posted by people who it's safe to assume aren't RICH, the corporate media and right-wing politician strategy of pitting workers against each other is working. It plays on the principle of "misery loves company." Since corporations, which now are sitting on two TRILLION dollars in CASH, and trillions more in other assets CREATED BY THE WORKERS, have systematically whittled away the benefits of their workers, the last bastion of unionism, the public sector, is being portrayed as having undeserved benefits. Like workers in general DON'T DESERVE PENSIONS, or health care (like every other civilized country provides as a public service). Some people are easy to dupe.
Would be nice if the corporate media EVEN MENTIONED ONCE that in the weeks preceding the savage assault on workers' rights by WI Governor Scott Wwalker and his GOP henchmen, he handed a big tax cut to corporations, creating the budget "hole" that is the excuse for destroying the collective bargaining rights of Wisconsin's public employees (except the Cops' and Firemen's unions, who supported his election. But tellingly, cops and firemen turned out in solidarity with the other state workers at their Capitol occupation anyway.)
The Tea Party types are like Brownshirts, a reactionary mob organized as a strong arm force for big business interests. (The infamous Koch brothers, who cheat the Govenment out of oil royalties on oil taken from public lands, fund this "movement.")
In Wisconsin, Ohio, Indiana- for starters- reactionary GOP governors are attempting to strip public employees' of their rights by passing laws banning their unions from representing them in negotiations with their employers, the state governments of these states. Scott Walker, Wisconsin Governor and stooge of the Koch brother billionaire thieves, has led the assault. He ran a stealth campaign as a "moderate" Republican to get elected, then revealed himself as a throwback to the 1920s. He plotted to plant agent provocateurs among union protesters in the state capital, to do god knows what violent mischief to justify violent repression and to discredit the unionized workers. The corporate media, including the self-styled "newspaper of record," has totally blacked out this criminal plot, even though Walker was captured on tape mentioning it to Ian Murphy, who got him on the phone by impersonating David Koch. (Revealing that this loathsome little puppet of the plutocrats, who was elected in part with large amounts of Koch money, has apparently never even spoke to his master before, since he was unfamiliar with his voice. He's too insignificant for the Kochs to talk to directly; his status might be that of a midlevel manager in the Kochs' corporate empire.)
The corporate propaganda system has been working assiduously to divide "middle class" people by whipping up resentment against the "lavish" and overly generous compensation deals of public workers. (No such campaign against corporate oligarchs who pull in millions or tens of millions a year routinely.) This "misery loves company" psychological warfare campaign has proven effective for the oligarchs. (And the more downmarket the rag, the more crude and blatant the anti-union propaganda. Check out the NY Daily News, a tabloid rag owned by Canadian real estate baron Mortimer B. Zuckerman, which affects a working class voice, for examples of tawdry union-bashing. In late February they used a dispute over a restaurant bill as a pretext for an attack on public unions day after day.)
Judging from the many resentful comments against workers posted by people who it's safe to assume aren't RICH, the corporate media and right-wing politician strategy of pitting workers against each other is working. It plays on the principle of "misery loves company." Since corporations, which now are sitting on two TRILLION dollars in CASH, and trillions more in other assets CREATED BY THE WORKERS, have systematically whittled away the benefits of their workers, the last bastion of unionism, the public sector, is being portrayed as having undeserved benefits. Like workers in general DON'T DESERVE PENSIONS, or health care (like every other civilized country provides as a public service). Some people are easy to dupe.
Would be nice if the corporate media EVEN MENTIONED ONCE that in the weeks preceding the savage assault on workers' rights by WI Governor Scott Wwalker and his GOP henchmen, he handed a big tax cut to corporations, creating the budget "hole" that is the excuse for destroying the collective bargaining rights of Wisconsin's public employees (except the Cops' and Firemen's unions, who supported his election. But tellingly, cops and firemen turned out in solidarity with the other state workers at their Capitol occupation anyway.)
The Tea Party types are like Brownshirts, a reactionary mob organized as a strong arm force for big business interests. (The infamous Koch brothers, who cheat the Govenment out of oil royalties on oil taken from public lands, fund this "movement.")
The More Things Change....
...the more they stay the same.
Here is a headline and subhead from the New York Times of Sept. 12, 2000, top of the front page (p. A 1):
DOCUMENTS INDICATE FORD KNEW OF ENGINE DEFECT BUT WAS SILENT
Company Denied An Ignition Problem For Years
Gee, how very like the current situation with Toyota!
Then of course there was the murderous Ford Pinto. Mother Jones magazine (not the New York Times or their ilk) exposed the fact that Ford coldly calculated the cost of
Con Man Kerry Tries To Pull Pathetic Scam On Pakis
Self-satisfied Senator John Kerry, Democratic Chair of the Senate so-called "Foreign Relations Committee" (U.S. Global Domination Committee would be more honest) went to Pakistan last week to try and talk the Pakis into releasing professional U.S. cutthroat Raymond A. Davis. Davis, a former Special Forces soldier- (i.e. a highly-trained killer and ideological fanatic, as this elite unit is limited to hard rightwingers, plus the U.S. military systematically indoctrinates its troops, especially the elite ones), shot and killed two Pakis in the middle of the city of Lahore. He claimed they were trying to rob him. He fired through his windshield, shooting one several times in the back as he was fleeing and killing him. Davis told the police he's a "consultant" to the embassy. Turns out he works covertly for the CIA, apparently scouting targets if not doing the actual assassinations. Now the U.S. is insisting he's a "diplomat," contrary to what Davis himself told the authorities in Pakistan.
Additionally, two of his crew racing to him at the scene of the shooting drove their SUV the wrong way down a one-way street and killed a motorcyclist. These two have been spirited out of the country by the U.S. Davis was working out of a safehouse, not the embassy.
Kerry's pathetic con angle was to promise the Pakis that Davis would be "investigated" and maybe prosecuted in the U.S. Fat chance. After the U.S. let the Blackwater Butchers of Nisur Square, Iraq, off scot-free after their massacre in which 17 helpless civilians were slaughtered in their cars, stuck in a traffic jam, what kind of shameless gall and cynicism does it take to make such a proposal? With insults to their intelligence like this, no wonder the Pakis are pissed. And what sovereign nation likes foreign assassins running around in their country with a license to kill?
As for the U,.S. pious insistence that the Pakis must free Davis under the bogus premise that he's a "diplomat" with immunity, we have here another glaring example of the U.S.' hypocritical double standard when it comes to international law. The U.S. seized a number of Iranian diplomats in Iraq, which it accused of subversive activities, and subjected them to the tender mercies of its interrrogators. Still haven't heard that they were ever freed. And when a drunken Georgian diplomat killed a pedestrian in the U.S., the U.S. twisted Georgia's arm to waive his ACTUAL immunity (not spurious immunity as in the Davis case), then tried him and imprisoned him. And that death, while loathsome and criminal under U.S. state law, was an accident.
Additionally, two of his crew racing to him at the scene of the shooting drove their SUV the wrong way down a one-way street and killed a motorcyclist. These two have been spirited out of the country by the U.S. Davis was working out of a safehouse, not the embassy.
Kerry's pathetic con angle was to promise the Pakis that Davis would be "investigated" and maybe prosecuted in the U.S. Fat chance. After the U.S. let the Blackwater Butchers of Nisur Square, Iraq, off scot-free after their massacre in which 17 helpless civilians were slaughtered in their cars, stuck in a traffic jam, what kind of shameless gall and cynicism does it take to make such a proposal? With insults to their intelligence like this, no wonder the Pakis are pissed. And what sovereign nation likes foreign assassins running around in their country with a license to kill?
As for the U,.S. pious insistence that the Pakis must free Davis under the bogus premise that he's a "diplomat" with immunity, we have here another glaring example of the U.S.' hypocritical double standard when it comes to international law. The U.S. seized a number of Iranian diplomats in Iraq, which it accused of subversive activities, and subjected them to the tender mercies of its interrrogators. Still haven't heard that they were ever freed. And when a drunken Georgian diplomat killed a pedestrian in the U.S., the U.S. twisted Georgia's arm to waive his ACTUAL immunity (not spurious immunity as in the Davis case), then tried him and imprisoned him. And that death, while loathsome and criminal under U.S. state law, was an accident.
Tuesday, February 15, 2011
Clarence Thomas, Tax Evader?
This corrupt empire just keeps sinking lower and lower into personal decadence. Bad enough that Bush the Elder, Joe Biden, and John Danforth put a known sex offender on the Supreme Court. And that he is bored to death by his duties. (He hasn't asked a question during oral arguments for five years, it was just reported.)
Now it seems he may be a tax evader. The Federalist Society, an extreme right-wing conspiracy devoted to packing the U.S. judiciary with arch-reactionaries, paid all his expenses to attend a four day conspiracy conclave of the sinister billionaire Koch brothers 3 years ago. That should be reported as a gift under Federal law and tax paid. Instead, Thomas lied and said he dropped by briefly and gave a talk. [click on title for link to articles]
Jane Mayer and Jill Abramson, former Wall Street Journal reporters, wrote a book about Thomas' confirmation and the character assassination of Anita Hill. They document in damning detail the many corroborating facts and other victims' of Thomas' vulgar harassment. In particular, they show how Biden suppressed the evidence, discouraged witnesses, and lied to his fellow Senators to push Thomas onto the Supreme Court. (The Democratic Party has a long, despicable history of packing the courts with reactionaries, then using the prospect of the GOP appointing reactionary judges to scare people into voting Democratic. As if the Dems didn't aid and abet the GOP court-packing, not merely by refusing to put holds on or filibustering awful nominees, and the GOP does routinely with most Dem. nominees, but by actually voting for the worst reactionaries. Remember, Scalia was put on the High Court by a Democratically-controlled Senate by a vote of 98-0. Including the vote of then-Senator Al Gore. In a bit of poetic justice, Scalia in 2000 helped steal the election for President from Gore, dashing his lifelong dream of becoming President. Boo-hoo, Albert.
Now it seems he may be a tax evader. The Federalist Society, an extreme right-wing conspiracy devoted to packing the U.S. judiciary with arch-reactionaries, paid all his expenses to attend a four day conspiracy conclave of the sinister billionaire Koch brothers 3 years ago. That should be reported as a gift under Federal law and tax paid. Instead, Thomas lied and said he dropped by briefly and gave a talk. [click on title for link to articles]
Jane Mayer and Jill Abramson, former Wall Street Journal reporters, wrote a book about Thomas' confirmation and the character assassination of Anita Hill. They document in damning detail the many corroborating facts and other victims' of Thomas' vulgar harassment. In particular, they show how Biden suppressed the evidence, discouraged witnesses, and lied to his fellow Senators to push Thomas onto the Supreme Court. (The Democratic Party has a long, despicable history of packing the courts with reactionaries, then using the prospect of the GOP appointing reactionary judges to scare people into voting Democratic. As if the Dems didn't aid and abet the GOP court-packing, not merely by refusing to put holds on or filibustering awful nominees, and the GOP does routinely with most Dem. nominees, but by actually voting for the worst reactionaries. Remember, Scalia was put on the High Court by a Democratically-controlled Senate by a vote of 98-0. Including the vote of then-Senator Al Gore. In a bit of poetic justice, Scalia in 2000 helped steal the election for President from Gore, dashing his lifelong dream of becoming President. Boo-hoo, Albert.
Monday, February 14, 2011
Toyota Drivers Uniquely Klutzy, U.S. Gov't Finds
On February 8th we got the news about what caused all those runaway Toyotas and Lexuses- turned out it was klutzes stepping on the gas pedal, which they thought was the brake.
Ray LaHood, an Illinois machine hack pol elevated to head of the Department of Transportation by Chicago machine politician Barack ("Pied Piper") Obama, announced the results of a National Highway Traffic Safety Administration study, written with the help of a NASA engineer no less! (The same NASA whose space shuttles keep blowing up in the sky, so you know these are some crackerjack engineers.)
LaHood, his NASA engineer, and the corporate media didn't bother explaining why klutzes apparently ONLY DRIVE TOYOTAS, since OTHER MAKES OF CARS didn't have the problem of uncontrolled accelerations which couldn't be stopped.
Actually the study gave 3 reasons for the runaway cars. Pedals stuck on floor mats, pedals sticking, and drivers desperately stomping on the accelerators to try and stop their cars.
Hack pol LaHood announced, "The jury is back. The verdict is in. There is no electronic-based cause for unintended high speed acceleration in Toyotas. Period." So now shut up.
SO- Toyota recalled millions of their cars to do what, straighten out floor mats? And DOT fined them millions of dollars because their floor mats got in the way?
In fact, at one point last year, LaHood warned Toyota owners it was too dangerous to even drive their cars, and they should take them back to the dealers immediately.
One key fact, that the New York Times buried in their favorite hiding place- the 3rd to last paragraph of the story, which was itself hidden in the business section to keep most of the general public from reading it- is this: an earlier gov't "preliminary examination" "found only one instance in which an accelerator pedal became trapped under a floor mat and none in which a pedal became stuck or sprung back too slowly." "A likely cause of the unintended accelerations - pushing on the accelerator instead of the brake."
Which means ALL BUT ONE case were caused by KLUTZ DRIVERS, according to the U.S. Government and its "experts." They gave Toyota's software a clean bill of health.
The article made of point of noting LaHood's irritation when a reporter interpreted the report to say that drivers stepped on the accelerator. "Pedal misapplication" he peevishly corrected, a political euphemism to try and camouflage the fact that the Government is calling the victims dimwits.
UPDATE: A couple of weeks later, Toyota is recalling 2 million more cars- for floormat adjustments. They didn't say it's because of 2 million klutzy drivers.
Ray LaHood, an Illinois machine hack pol elevated to head of the Department of Transportation by Chicago machine politician Barack ("Pied Piper") Obama, announced the results of a National Highway Traffic Safety Administration study, written with the help of a NASA engineer no less! (The same NASA whose space shuttles keep blowing up in the sky, so you know these are some crackerjack engineers.)
LaHood, his NASA engineer, and the corporate media didn't bother explaining why klutzes apparently ONLY DRIVE TOYOTAS, since OTHER MAKES OF CARS didn't have the problem of uncontrolled accelerations which couldn't be stopped.
Actually the study gave 3 reasons for the runaway cars. Pedals stuck on floor mats, pedals sticking, and drivers desperately stomping on the accelerators to try and stop their cars.
Hack pol LaHood announced, "The jury is back. The verdict is in. There is no electronic-based cause for unintended high speed acceleration in Toyotas. Period." So now shut up.
SO- Toyota recalled millions of their cars to do what, straighten out floor mats? And DOT fined them millions of dollars because their floor mats got in the way?
In fact, at one point last year, LaHood warned Toyota owners it was too dangerous to even drive their cars, and they should take them back to the dealers immediately.
One key fact, that the New York Times buried in their favorite hiding place- the 3rd to last paragraph of the story, which was itself hidden in the business section to keep most of the general public from reading it- is this: an earlier gov't "preliminary examination" "found only one instance in which an accelerator pedal became trapped under a floor mat and none in which a pedal became stuck or sprung back too slowly." "A likely cause of the unintended accelerations - pushing on the accelerator instead of the brake."
Which means ALL BUT ONE case were caused by KLUTZ DRIVERS, according to the U.S. Government and its "experts." They gave Toyota's software a clean bill of health.
The article made of point of noting LaHood's irritation when a reporter interpreted the report to say that drivers stepped on the accelerator. "Pedal misapplication" he peevishly corrected, a political euphemism to try and camouflage the fact that the Government is calling the victims dimwits.
UPDATE: A couple of weeks later, Toyota is recalling 2 million more cars- for floormat adjustments. They didn't say it's because of 2 million klutzy drivers.
Wednesday, February 09, 2011
Afghan War Looking More and More Like Vietnam
Revealing and depressing article in The New Yorker February 14, 2011 by Dexter Filkins about the looting of the largest bank in Afghanistan, and the larger issue of the hopeless corruption, venality, and cynicism of Karzai and his crew. (By the way, the Afghan thieves suggest that the U.S. treasury guarantee the looted deposits of the poor saps who had their money in the bank.)
I couldn't help noticing the parallels between the Afghan and Vietnam wars in Filkins' article: Corrupt faux government of kleptomaniacs who couldn't care less about the country they ostensibly rule...U.S. taxpayer dollars poured down a rathole...U.S.-supplied weapons going to the enemy via corruption (and money too in the case of Afghanistan)...a major role played by heroin trafficking, in Afghanistan funding both sides, probably, in Vietnam sold to U.S. soldiers and imported into the U.S....an enemy highly motivated by a cause, the U.S.-backed side completely cynical and opportunistic.With the Afghans looking ahead to the U.S. leaving, the clique around Karzai has already prepared their own private Swiss-style retirement in Dubai. Oh yes, one more parallel: U.S. officials knowing all this, covering it up, and feeding more American lives into meatgrinder of war when they know darn well the U.S. cannot win. (And who cares about the lives of Third World people anyway?)
article linked to my title. article at http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2011/02/14/110214fa_fact_filkins
Tuesday, February 08, 2011
U.S. Navy, Jealous of Air Force, Spends $636 MILLION on 2 Drones
The U.S. Navy is purchasing two- count 'em, two- test drones from Northrop Grumman for only $636 million. That's a mere $318 million per unmanned drone.
According to Peter Singer, a cheerleader for war and technofetishist, subcategory militarist, the drone, with the cool 1950s-style sci-fi-ish designation X-47B, is "potential game-changing technology for the naval air wing." The "game" being the killing of defenseless targets from a safe distance.
The Wall Street Journal cites a report from the "Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments," part of the Imperialist superstructure located in the Empire's capital, D.C., as hailing long-range pilotless drones flown from aircraft carriers as having the potential to transform carriers from merely "a power-projection system with outstanding global mobility but relatively limited tactical reach and persistence into a key component of a global surveillance strike network." Well, that certainly makes it worth the price. After all, it's very important for the entire planet to be under the constant watch of the U.S. military, which can then kill anybody who gets out of line- the line laid down by the U.S. No more "nonsense!" in the word of CIA international terrorist Duane "Dewey" Claridge about people rebelling against U.S.-backed oppressive regimes.
But really, isn't it just that same old interservice jealousy rearing its head again? The Air Force has drones, the Air Force is getting all the glory of killing terrorists (or civilians who stupidly happened to be too close to where U.S. missiles landed) in Pakistan and Yemen and who knows where else. The Navy never gets any writeups in the New York Times or Washington Post or breathless tv wow look at that explosion "coverage." Hell, even the CIA is getting more drone action than the Navy! It's humiliating!
(Source: WSJ, 2/8/11, p. A7.)
According to Peter Singer, a cheerleader for war and technofetishist, subcategory militarist, the drone, with the cool 1950s-style sci-fi-ish designation X-47B, is "potential game-changing technology for the naval air wing." The "game" being the killing of defenseless targets from a safe distance.
The Wall Street Journal cites a report from the "Center for Strategic and Budgetary Assessments," part of the Imperialist superstructure located in the Empire's capital, D.C., as hailing long-range pilotless drones flown from aircraft carriers as having the potential to transform carriers from merely "a power-projection system with outstanding global mobility but relatively limited tactical reach and persistence into a key component of a global surveillance strike network." Well, that certainly makes it worth the price. After all, it's very important for the entire planet to be under the constant watch of the U.S. military, which can then kill anybody who gets out of line- the line laid down by the U.S. No more "nonsense!" in the word of CIA international terrorist Duane "Dewey" Claridge about people rebelling against U.S.-backed oppressive regimes.
But really, isn't it just that same old interservice jealousy rearing its head again? The Air Force has drones, the Air Force is getting all the glory of killing terrorists (or civilians who stupidly happened to be too close to where U.S. missiles landed) in Pakistan and Yemen and who knows where else. The Navy never gets any writeups in the New York Times or Washington Post or breathless tv wow look at that explosion "coverage." Hell, even the CIA is getting more drone action than the Navy! It's humiliating!
(Source: WSJ, 2/8/11, p. A7.)
Friday, February 04, 2011
Why Doesn't the ICC Indict Duvalier?
Gee, it sure does make the International Criminal Court at The Hague look like a political instrument of the Western powers when it never indicts vicious killer kleptocrat dictators like Jean-Claude Duvalier, for example. Sure, Slobodan Milosevic, Bastard Bashir of Sudan, and assorted African monsters deserve to be tried. (And executed, which the ICC isn't empowered to do. Those wimpy Europeans can't bring themselves to kill a mass murderer.) They forgot Idi Amin too- 'cause their buddies the Saudis are shielding him.
Oh, I just remembered: France, the country that has ruined Haiti for two centuries, sheltered Duvalier for the last 25 years.
Oh, I just remembered: France, the country that has ruined Haiti for two centuries, sheltered Duvalier for the last 25 years.
Tuesday, February 01, 2011
How Reactionary Lies Become Historical "Fact"
The short answer is: through sheer repetition.
For example, with the current "crisis" in Egypt- in fact a crisis for the U.S. rulers, not for humanity, for whom it's an exhilarating breaking of a tyrant's shackles on a people- reactionaries are trotting out the old lie that Jimmy Carter lost Iran. (Funny how the Democrats let the GOP smear them as quasi-traitors all the time, constantly "losing" U.S. property- China, Cuba (for which JFK paid with his life), Vietnam, Nicaragua, and now Egypt. The despicable Wall Street Journal in particular is pushing this lie.
Let's review the facts. In 1953, the CIA (under orders of that great foe of the military-industrial complex, Eisenhower) and MI6 overthrew the elected President of Iran, Mossadegh, and destroyed Iranian democracy, installing a weak tyrant, the Shah, on his throne. This was done because the "West" didn't like Mossadegh's plans for taking a bigger cut of Iran's own oil to use for the Iranian people. (Leaders trying to use their countries' own resources to benefit their own people is a crime that frequently leads to their overthrow by the U.S.) The CIA set up one of the most monstrous secret police organizations in history, the SAVAK, to make sure that anyone with even a thought of social reform would be tortured and murdered. Amnesty International rated Iran under the Shah as the world's worst violator of human rights.
The Shah managed to murder a quarter million Iranians during his reign, including 10,000 gunned down in the last week before he had to flee in 1979. At that point his army lost its stomach for killing the Iranian people. Unfortunately, since the CIA and SAVAK did such an excellent job of murdering any and all progressives and preventing any civic organizations at all from developing, only Islam was left as an organizing principle for society. Thus the senior religious figure, the reactionary Khomeini, and the religious cadres filled the power vacuum.
How exactly Jimmy Carter overthrew the Shah is a mystery. The Shah certainly didn't shrink from using maximum force to crush the Iranian people. There were idiotic calls at the time for the U.S. to invade Iran and pick up the murdering of the Iranians from where the Shah's army had left off. Maybe if they had killed millions, like they did in Vietnam, they would have "won" and could have reinstalled the Shah. (Oh wait, that didn't work in Vietnam anyway.)
How does this Big Lie become a fact? By constant repetition and the absence of anyone in the bourgeois media calling it out.
Here's another Big Lie that NEVER is exposed, even though simple arithmetic shows it to be false: JFK "stole" the 1960 election from Nixon by "stealing" Illinois.
To see, how ridiculously false this is, all anyone has to do (doesn't anyone ever do this?) is look up the numbers for the electoral count of 1960. Numerous websites, including government ones, have the necessary data.
The electoral count in 1960 was: JFK: 303, Nixon: 219. Illinois that year had 27 electoral votes. Now here comes the tricky part. Assume Nixon "really" won Illinois. What would the outcome have been? To determine whether history was changed by Kennedy family nefariousness, we have to use complex, advanced mathematics: subtraction and addition.
First, we subtract 27 from the election-stealing JFK's 303, leaving him with 276 electoral votes. Then we add 27 to the rightful winner Nixon, who was cheated out of what he earned by a bunch of Ivy League snobs, giving him 246. Voila: JFK: 276, Nixon: 246.
Now, in the actually-existing world that normal people habit, using the mathematical system that actual mathematicians use, 276 is bigger than 246. Thus JFK STILL WINS.
But in the imaginary "reality" that reactionary fanatics inhabit, 246 is bigger than 276, apparently. Or maybe the rule is that whoever gets fewer votes win. Whatever.
There's two points here: 1) U.S. reactionaries are as deranged as Nazis, and tell as whoppingly fantastic lies as the Nazis ever did, and 2) the entire establishment media and commentariat aids and abets them by NEVER EXPOSING OR CONTRADICTING EVEN OBVIOUS LIES LIKE THIS. Even the "alternative" paper, the NYC Village Voice, ran a rant a few years back by reactionary dog playright Tom Stoppard asserting the canard that Kennedy "stole" the election- and the "alternative" rag refused to print a correction pointing out the factual fallacy on which the canard is based. The phonies who control the rag wanted to dupe their readers with right-wing disinformation.
In such an extremely reactionary political environment, it's no wonder that the U.S. is socially, economically, and politically one of the most backward countries on earth. (Yes it is, but proving it will take another, lengthier, essay.)
For example, with the current "crisis" in Egypt- in fact a crisis for the U.S. rulers, not for humanity, for whom it's an exhilarating breaking of a tyrant's shackles on a people- reactionaries are trotting out the old lie that Jimmy Carter lost Iran. (Funny how the Democrats let the GOP smear them as quasi-traitors all the time, constantly "losing" U.S. property- China, Cuba (for which JFK paid with his life), Vietnam, Nicaragua, and now Egypt. The despicable Wall Street Journal in particular is pushing this lie.
Let's review the facts. In 1953, the CIA (under orders of that great foe of the military-industrial complex, Eisenhower) and MI6 overthrew the elected President of Iran, Mossadegh, and destroyed Iranian democracy, installing a weak tyrant, the Shah, on his throne. This was done because the "West" didn't like Mossadegh's plans for taking a bigger cut of Iran's own oil to use for the Iranian people. (Leaders trying to use their countries' own resources to benefit their own people is a crime that frequently leads to their overthrow by the U.S.) The CIA set up one of the most monstrous secret police organizations in history, the SAVAK, to make sure that anyone with even a thought of social reform would be tortured and murdered. Amnesty International rated Iran under the Shah as the world's worst violator of human rights.
The Shah managed to murder a quarter million Iranians during his reign, including 10,000 gunned down in the last week before he had to flee in 1979. At that point his army lost its stomach for killing the Iranian people. Unfortunately, since the CIA and SAVAK did such an excellent job of murdering any and all progressives and preventing any civic organizations at all from developing, only Islam was left as an organizing principle for society. Thus the senior religious figure, the reactionary Khomeini, and the religious cadres filled the power vacuum.
How exactly Jimmy Carter overthrew the Shah is a mystery. The Shah certainly didn't shrink from using maximum force to crush the Iranian people. There were idiotic calls at the time for the U.S. to invade Iran and pick up the murdering of the Iranians from where the Shah's army had left off. Maybe if they had killed millions, like they did in Vietnam, they would have "won" and could have reinstalled the Shah. (Oh wait, that didn't work in Vietnam anyway.)
How does this Big Lie become a fact? By constant repetition and the absence of anyone in the bourgeois media calling it out.
Here's another Big Lie that NEVER is exposed, even though simple arithmetic shows it to be false: JFK "stole" the 1960 election from Nixon by "stealing" Illinois.
To see, how ridiculously false this is, all anyone has to do (doesn't anyone ever do this?) is look up the numbers for the electoral count of 1960. Numerous websites, including government ones, have the necessary data.
The electoral count in 1960 was: JFK: 303, Nixon: 219. Illinois that year had 27 electoral votes. Now here comes the tricky part. Assume Nixon "really" won Illinois. What would the outcome have been? To determine whether history was changed by Kennedy family nefariousness, we have to use complex, advanced mathematics: subtraction and addition.
First, we subtract 27 from the election-stealing JFK's 303, leaving him with 276 electoral votes. Then we add 27 to the rightful winner Nixon, who was cheated out of what he earned by a bunch of Ivy League snobs, giving him 246. Voila: JFK: 276, Nixon: 246.
Now, in the actually-existing world that normal people habit, using the mathematical system that actual mathematicians use, 276 is bigger than 246. Thus JFK STILL WINS.
But in the imaginary "reality" that reactionary fanatics inhabit, 246 is bigger than 276, apparently. Or maybe the rule is that whoever gets fewer votes win. Whatever.
There's two points here: 1) U.S. reactionaries are as deranged as Nazis, and tell as whoppingly fantastic lies as the Nazis ever did, and 2) the entire establishment media and commentariat aids and abets them by NEVER EXPOSING OR CONTRADICTING EVEN OBVIOUS LIES LIKE THIS. Even the "alternative" paper, the NYC Village Voice, ran a rant a few years back by reactionary dog playright Tom Stoppard asserting the canard that Kennedy "stole" the election- and the "alternative" rag refused to print a correction pointing out the factual fallacy on which the canard is based. The phonies who control the rag wanted to dupe their readers with right-wing disinformation.
In such an extremely reactionary political environment, it's no wonder that the U.S. is socially, economically, and politically one of the most backward countries on earth. (Yes it is, but proving it will take another, lengthier, essay.)
Friday, January 28, 2011
U.S. Sweats As Its Lovely Arab Dictators Wobble
The U.S. is sweating over the "stability" of its favorite Arab dictatorships. First the Tunisian tyrant Ben-Ali fell. Now Egyptians have found their courage and are defying the state thugs of the monstrous Mubarak, armed by the U.S. The question becomes, what will the U.S. tell the Egyptian army? As that army is recipient of arms purchased with a good chunk of the $2 billion yearly U.S. bonanza, the U.S. is in a position to tell it either "Make sure Mubarak doesn't fall, or you're off the weaponry gravy train," or "Let Mubarak fall or you're off the gravy train. (By the way it's our tax money, being used to oppress and torture Egyptians- but hey, people who oppose abortion have a RIGHT not to have THEIR MONEY spent by the Federal Government on abortion- hence poor women who don't live in states willing to foot the bill, ahve to pay, and foreign population control orgs. that want U.S. funds can't even MENTION abortion, and on and on, because abortion is a MORAL issue, don't you know, unlike, say, torture, or state terrorism, or dictatorship, or police state repression. I'm SO glad the United States is sooooo moral!)
Yemen and Jordan, two other U.S.-propped-up dictatorships, are seeing their people start to rise up now, inspired by the examples of the Tunisians and Egyptians- which they know about thanks to Al-Jazeera, a force for decency and humanity- quite unlike the U.S. media. (I.e. corporate propaganda system.)
Yemen and Jordan, two other U.S.-propped-up dictatorships, are seeing their people start to rise up now, inspired by the examples of the Tunisians and Egyptians- which they know about thanks to Al-Jazeera, a force for decency and humanity- quite unlike the U.S. media. (I.e. corporate propaganda system.)
Who Promotes Democracy and Human Rights, the U.S. or Al-Jazeera?
In the Middle East, Al-Jazeera is hated by almost all arab regimes. This is because it's on the side of the people.
A perfect example is during the current crisis of stability for a number of U.S. lackey dictatorships in the region- Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, and Jordan so far.
In Tunisia, after a month of the people taking to the streets and standing up to "state security" thuggery, the long-time dictator and U.S. chum, a brazen thief named Ben-Ali, had to take it on the lam to Saudi Arabia (which provided sanctuary for Ugandan butcher dictator Idi Amin when he had to hotfoot it out one step ahead of his victims).
Inspired by the example, which they knew about from Al-Jazeera's coverage, the people of Egypt are now braving U.S.-supplied tear gas, bullets (both rubber-coated and the naked metal kind), armored vehicles, batons and etc. to shake the awful dictatorship of U.S. favorite Hosni Mubarak. While the U.S. pays lip service to human rights and democracy, its money doesn't go where its mouth is, but rather to weapons of repression for the dictator to the tune of $2 billion a year, second largest recipient of anti-human U.S. largesse in the world, after the sainted state of Israel.
In Yemen, seeing the examples of the Tunisian and Egyptian people on Al-Jazeera, tens of thousands are demonstrating against another tyrant pal of the U.S., "President" Saleh, a good ally in "the war on terror." (As was Ben-Ali of Tunisia.)
Turd Joe Biden, a loathsome piece of work who gave us doltish masher Clarence Thomas on the Supreme Court, among other crimes, insisted on PBS that Mubarak isn't a "dictator." Because he's very "responsible." "Responsible" is U.S. Imperialismspeak for "does the U.S.' bidding." Like helps oppress the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, the world's largest open-air concentration camp. And makes nice with Israel. That's the most imporltant U.S. goal in the middle east, that Israel should be accepted on the regional hegemon by the arab states. Hence Syria is the "bad" arab state, because it doesn't. And they could bludgeon Lebanon into line, if only they could exterminate Hezbollah, as Israel tried and failed to do in 2006. (Right now you can read handwringing articles bemoaning Hezbollah's rising influence, in the NY Times, Wall Street Journal, and other such high-tone ruling class rags.) Jordan, also with a restive population, has a Made-In-USA "King," son of a previous Made-In-USA "King." Both married American uber-WASP type women, who they made their "Queens." (I put them in quotes because as a democrat, I do not recognize aristocracy as legitimate.)
So Al-Jazeera, by standing with the people, for their freedom, their human rights, and their democratic rights, is helping to shake the loathsome, backward dictatorships that keep their people in poverty and fear, armed and back by the U.S. So which one is pro-human, and which one is arab?
Now you know why the U.S. murders Al-Jazeera journalists and precision-bombs their offices in Kabul and Baghdad.
A perfect example is during the current crisis of stability for a number of U.S. lackey dictatorships in the region- Tunisia, Egypt, Yemen, and Jordan so far.
In Tunisia, after a month of the people taking to the streets and standing up to "state security" thuggery, the long-time dictator and U.S. chum, a brazen thief named Ben-Ali, had to take it on the lam to Saudi Arabia (which provided sanctuary for Ugandan butcher dictator Idi Amin when he had to hotfoot it out one step ahead of his victims).
Inspired by the example, which they knew about from Al-Jazeera's coverage, the people of Egypt are now braving U.S.-supplied tear gas, bullets (both rubber-coated and the naked metal kind), armored vehicles, batons and etc. to shake the awful dictatorship of U.S. favorite Hosni Mubarak. While the U.S. pays lip service to human rights and democracy, its money doesn't go where its mouth is, but rather to weapons of repression for the dictator to the tune of $2 billion a year, second largest recipient of anti-human U.S. largesse in the world, after the sainted state of Israel.
In Yemen, seeing the examples of the Tunisian and Egyptian people on Al-Jazeera, tens of thousands are demonstrating against another tyrant pal of the U.S., "President" Saleh, a good ally in "the war on terror." (As was Ben-Ali of Tunisia.)
Turd Joe Biden, a loathsome piece of work who gave us doltish masher Clarence Thomas on the Supreme Court, among other crimes, insisted on PBS that Mubarak isn't a "dictator." Because he's very "responsible." "Responsible" is U.S. Imperialismspeak for "does the U.S.' bidding." Like helps oppress the Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, the world's largest open-air concentration camp. And makes nice with Israel. That's the most imporltant U.S. goal in the middle east, that Israel should be accepted on the regional hegemon by the arab states. Hence Syria is the "bad" arab state, because it doesn't. And they could bludgeon Lebanon into line, if only they could exterminate Hezbollah, as Israel tried and failed to do in 2006. (Right now you can read handwringing articles bemoaning Hezbollah's rising influence, in the NY Times, Wall Street Journal, and other such high-tone ruling class rags.) Jordan, also with a restive population, has a Made-In-USA "King," son of a previous Made-In-USA "King." Both married American uber-WASP type women, who they made their "Queens." (I put them in quotes because as a democrat, I do not recognize aristocracy as legitimate.)
So Al-Jazeera, by standing with the people, for their freedom, their human rights, and their democratic rights, is helping to shake the loathsome, backward dictatorships that keep their people in poverty and fear, armed and back by the U.S. So which one is pro-human, and which one is arab?
Now you know why the U.S. murders Al-Jazeera journalists and precision-bombs their offices in Kabul and Baghdad.
Rahm Emanuel Gets Ruling Class Privilege
Rahm Emanuel is running for Mayor of Chicago. He's virtually inheriting the seat from torture Mayor Richard M. Daley, the spawn of 1968 Democratic Convention Police Riot Mayor Richard J. Daley.
Emanuel is only running because Daley decided to retire.
Illinois law says a candidate for Mayor of Chicago must be a resident of the state for at least a year prior to the election. Emanuel was living in Washington D.C. during that time as chief of staff to President Barack "Pied Piper of Chump Lefties" Obama.
You probably thought "residing" means "living there." Well, that's true for Chicago civil servants, who are required to live in the city.
It doesn't mean that for Rahm, though. He gets the Establishment Made Man privilege.
The Illinois Supreme Court unanimously overturned a lower appeals court ruling that Emanuel didn't "reside" in the state while he was living in Washington. They had to reach all the way back to a musty, moldy, cobwebbed decision from 1867 to kinda sorta justify their "reasoning."That was all they could come up with.
So, does this mean Chicago's teachers, firemen, and police, etc. don't actually have to live in Chicago to be "residents"?
Don't bet on it.
It's nice to be a made member of the Establishment.
Emanuel is a thuggish product of the Chicago Democratic political machine. His stock in trade is screaming verbal abuse, especially of progressives who whine when the Democrats screw them. A super Zionist, his father is a hate-filled anti-Arab bigot.
As for the Daley's, the elder dead one unleashed his goon police on people against American slaughter of Vietnamese, in the streets of Chicago, and even had them attack convention delegates. Famously, Dan Rather was punched in the stomach on the convention floor by Daley's goons. The official government report on the violence called it a "police riot." (Rewriting history, bourgeois propagandists these days pretend the protesters were rioting, a political libel.) Even in the years before the convention, Daley's thugs clubbed peaceful anti-war marchers and chased them off the streets.
His loathsome son is an accomplice in the Chicago PD's torture program, which tortured at least 100 black men, obtaining false confessions in order to imprison them, even putting some on death row. As the City attorney, and then as Mayor, he shielded the police torture squad.
Emanuel is only running because Daley decided to retire.
Illinois law says a candidate for Mayor of Chicago must be a resident of the state for at least a year prior to the election. Emanuel was living in Washington D.C. during that time as chief of staff to President Barack "Pied Piper of Chump Lefties" Obama.
You probably thought "residing" means "living there." Well, that's true for Chicago civil servants, who are required to live in the city.
It doesn't mean that for Rahm, though. He gets the Establishment Made Man privilege.
The Illinois Supreme Court unanimously overturned a lower appeals court ruling that Emanuel didn't "reside" in the state while he was living in Washington. They had to reach all the way back to a musty, moldy, cobwebbed decision from 1867 to kinda sorta justify their "reasoning."That was all they could come up with.
So, does this mean Chicago's teachers, firemen, and police, etc. don't actually have to live in Chicago to be "residents"?
Don't bet on it.
It's nice to be a made member of the Establishment.
Emanuel is a thuggish product of the Chicago Democratic political machine. His stock in trade is screaming verbal abuse, especially of progressives who whine when the Democrats screw them. A super Zionist, his father is a hate-filled anti-Arab bigot.
As for the Daley's, the elder dead one unleashed his goon police on people against American slaughter of Vietnamese, in the streets of Chicago, and even had them attack convention delegates. Famously, Dan Rather was punched in the stomach on the convention floor by Daley's goons. The official government report on the violence called it a "police riot." (Rewriting history, bourgeois propagandists these days pretend the protesters were rioting, a political libel.) Even in the years before the convention, Daley's thugs clubbed peaceful anti-war marchers and chased them off the streets.
His loathsome son is an accomplice in the Chicago PD's torture program, which tortured at least 100 black men, obtaining false confessions in order to imprison them, even putting some on death row. As the City attorney, and then as Mayor, he shielded the police torture squad.
Tuesday, January 25, 2011
Push To Strip Marijuana Smokers Of Second Amendment Rights
The U.S. political elites never miss an opportunity to take away more human rights or increase their repressive powers, it seems. Now they're using- predictably- the murderous rampage by the vicious weirdo Jared Loughner in Tucson, AZ, as a wedge to strip grass smokers (who number in the tens of millions) of their "guaranteed" right to keep and bear arms. The Second Amendment to the Constitution, part of the Bill of Rights, says that "the right of the people to keep and bear arms, shall not be infringed." Of course there's been plenty of infringing of that right for the last century. Now "drug users" are to be banned from gun ownership, if Senator Charles Schumer (Wall Street's main agent in the Senate and a big fan of repressive legislation) and the New York Times get their way.
Schumer says that Loughner could have been barred from buying a gun had the military, which rejected his enlistment attempt because he smoked grass, had reported him as a drug user, and if "drug users" (marijuana is a plant, of course, not a "drug," not a "narcotic" either, both epithets routinely applied to it by the establishment propagandists) are excluded from gun ownership. The NY Times thinks this is a swell idea. And dwarf economist and Bill Clinton stooge Robert Reich chimed in in an op-ed piece in the Sunday NY Times Week in Review section on Jan. 23, 2011. Not only does he call for the stripping of Second Amendment rights from people who fail military "drug" tests, he also wants everyone on the Government's "terrorist watch lists" added, as well as people who receive mental health treatment.
Well, there's hundreds of thousands of people on these various "terrorist" watch lists. As it has done throughout its history, the FBI shitlists everyone it can identify with progressive political or social values. These days they're branded "terrorists." Every year the FBI sends out 50,000 demands for personal information on people from banks, ISPs, email providers, libraries, and the like. Do you really think there are hundreds of thousands of terrorists in the U.S.? Examples of people the Government considers "terrorists" include environmentalists, peace activists, Quakers, and nuns. Reich thinks all of the above and more are too dangerous to be allowed to have guns. (Too bad most of them don't even want guns- they could sure use them.)
Of course, once you establish the principle that "drug users" should be stripped of a basic constitutional right, there's no reason to stop at barring just those who try to join the military. MILLIONS of people are arrested EVERY YEAR in this very repressive country for marijuana possession. All those people have court records. (Which includes "sealed" ones, a bogus farce.) They've already stripped us of our right to be secure in our homes and possessions (and cars) using the "war on drugs" as an excuse. What's one more basic right down the toilet?
And would such massive crushing of rights have stopped a deranged missile like Loughner? Of course, Loughner could still have bought a gun at a gun show, from a private individual, or stole a gun, or borrowed a gun. Or used ID other than his own to buy in a store. The gun "controllers will never admit that their end goal is total disarming of the civilian population. All their half measures inevitably fall short of "preventing tragedies" and "keeping guns out of the hands of criminals." And they give the game away by describing their suggestions as "the minimum" or "a good first step." (NY Times anti-gun editorials do this for example.)
Schumer says that Loughner could have been barred from buying a gun had the military, which rejected his enlistment attempt because he smoked grass, had reported him as a drug user, and if "drug users" (marijuana is a plant, of course, not a "drug," not a "narcotic" either, both epithets routinely applied to it by the establishment propagandists) are excluded from gun ownership. The NY Times thinks this is a swell idea. And dwarf economist and Bill Clinton stooge Robert Reich chimed in in an op-ed piece in the Sunday NY Times Week in Review section on Jan. 23, 2011. Not only does he call for the stripping of Second Amendment rights from people who fail military "drug" tests, he also wants everyone on the Government's "terrorist watch lists" added, as well as people who receive mental health treatment.
Well, there's hundreds of thousands of people on these various "terrorist" watch lists. As it has done throughout its history, the FBI shitlists everyone it can identify with progressive political or social values. These days they're branded "terrorists." Every year the FBI sends out 50,000 demands for personal information on people from banks, ISPs, email providers, libraries, and the like. Do you really think there are hundreds of thousands of terrorists in the U.S.? Examples of people the Government considers "terrorists" include environmentalists, peace activists, Quakers, and nuns. Reich thinks all of the above and more are too dangerous to be allowed to have guns. (Too bad most of them don't even want guns- they could sure use them.)
Of course, once you establish the principle that "drug users" should be stripped of a basic constitutional right, there's no reason to stop at barring just those who try to join the military. MILLIONS of people are arrested EVERY YEAR in this very repressive country for marijuana possession. All those people have court records. (Which includes "sealed" ones, a bogus farce.) They've already stripped us of our right to be secure in our homes and possessions (and cars) using the "war on drugs" as an excuse. What's one more basic right down the toilet?
And would such massive crushing of rights have stopped a deranged missile like Loughner? Of course, Loughner could still have bought a gun at a gun show, from a private individual, or stole a gun, or borrowed a gun. Or used ID other than his own to buy in a store. The gun "controllers will never admit that their end goal is total disarming of the civilian population. All their half measures inevitably fall short of "preventing tragedies" and "keeping guns out of the hands of criminals." And they give the game away by describing their suggestions as "the minimum" or "a good first step." (NY Times anti-gun editorials do this for example.)
Saturday, January 15, 2011
Obama's Latest Crime
The "anti-business" (as the crackpot big business ideologues and CEOs of huge corps. have it) Obama has ordered the Dept. of "Justice" to exhort the Supreme Court to rule in favor of big greedy pharmaceutical companies that overcharged public hospitals and clinics serving the poor. Legally, these providers are entitled to discounts, which the evil drug corps. cheated them out of. The Obama regime, typical for U.S. administrations, and esp. for "New" Democrats in the Clinton-Gore-DLC mold, takes the side of Big Business against people. They are actually arguing on behalf of the thieving drug corps. that those they ripped off have NO RIGHT TO SUE.
But don't expect neofascist rags like the Wall Street Journal to stop raving that Obama is "anti-business." You can't appease fascists.
See "U.S. Backs Drug Firms in Lawsuit Over Prices," NY Times.
By ROBERT PEAR
Published: January 9, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/10/us/politics/10drug.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=us%20bakcs%20drug%20firms%20in%20lawsuit%20over%20prices&st=cse
But don't expect neofascist rags like the Wall Street Journal to stop raving that Obama is "anti-business." You can't appease fascists.
See "U.S. Backs Drug Firms in Lawsuit Over Prices," NY Times.
By ROBERT PEAR
Published: January 9, 2011
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/01/10/us/politics/10drug.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=us%20bakcs%20drug%20firms%20in%20lawsuit%20over%20prices&st=cse
Tuesday, January 11, 2011
Creepy Murderer Loughner Won't Be Executed
Bad news about the nasty wacko Jared L. Loughner, who murdered 6 people in Tucson, AZ, including a Federal Judge and a 9 year old girl, and put a bullet through the brain of Representative Giselle Giffords- he won't be executed, in all probability. (Just look at the creep's mugshot- it is completely revealing of who he is. An evil Uncle Fester.) He has defending him Judy Clarke. Judy Clarke has a history of saving notorious murderers from the death penalty by some kind of legal magic.
http://www.aolnews.com/2011/01/10/jared-loughner-mugshot-released-photo/
She got Ted "Unabomber" Kaczynski off the death penalty hook. That was an extremely notorious case of multiple mailbombs, which took years to catch him. (And only because his brother turned him in after the FBI finally forced itself to overcome its hypersecretitiveness and release his philosophical writing.)
Anti-abortion cop murderer, nurse maimer, Olympics bomber Eric Robert Rudolph is another piece of vicious scum who she saved.
And toddler-slaughterer Susan Smith of South Carolina, who drove her car into a lake to drown her own children, in the delusional belief that being rid of them would enable her to hook up with a start a new life with some guy she longed for, after originally sentenced to death in that cruel southern state, got resentenced thanks to Judy Clarke.
I don't know what legal alchemy Clarke works, but she's obviously very effective. Too bad in some cases.
there are various youtube posts of the mugshot with commentary.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrQ2bRUbo20
http://www.aolnews.com/2011/01/10/jared-loughner-mugshot-released-photo/
She got Ted "Unabomber" Kaczynski off the death penalty hook. That was an extremely notorious case of multiple mailbombs, which took years to catch him. (And only because his brother turned him in after the FBI finally forced itself to overcome its hypersecretitiveness and release his philosophical writing.)
Anti-abortion cop murderer, nurse maimer, Olympics bomber Eric Robert Rudolph is another piece of vicious scum who she saved.
And toddler-slaughterer Susan Smith of South Carolina, who drove her car into a lake to drown her own children, in the delusional belief that being rid of them would enable her to hook up with a start a new life with some guy she longed for, after originally sentenced to death in that cruel southern state, got resentenced thanks to Judy Clarke.
I don't know what legal alchemy Clarke works, but she's obviously very effective. Too bad in some cases.
there are various youtube posts of the mugshot with commentary.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrQ2bRUbo20
Tuesday, December 28, 2010
Loathsome Lanny Davis Has More Blood On His Hands
Lanny Davis, one of the scummy, soulless, immoral self-promoters who latched onto the Clintons and served a key role in the regime of Bill Clinton, is at it again. These days he whores his ass out as a propagandist for dictators.
Earlier this year he was shilling for the Honduran oligarchy, which overthrew the democratically-elected president for the crime of raising the minimum wage. (The official excuse was he "tried to change the Constitution so he could run again." A lie, but even if true not a crime. He tried to put a NONBINDING resolution before the Honduran people to let them vote on the idea.) Being the enemy of poor people everywhere, and friend of the rich in all lands, the U.S. sneakily supported the coup while publicly pretending not to. (Another one of WikiLeaks "crimes" was exposing this duplicity via leaked State Department documents.)
The Honduran criminals have murdered many Hondurans since seizing power, and repressed all rights of dissent. Lanny Davis uses all his skills as a sophist and twister of reality and just flat out liar to defend this criminal regime.
Another of his "clients" is the dictator of Equatorial Guinea, who he tries to trick the world into believing is a swell guy and worthy of respect and support. And anything to the contrary is just a lie, according to Despicable Davis.
Now he's at it again. This time he's aiding the dictator of Ivory Coast, a greedy piece of work named Laurent Gbagbo. (This thug's official title is "President," but that's totally misleading.) Gbagbo refuses to admit that he just lost an election. For once, the U.S., other African "leaders,
and others are insisting that the dictator leave office and abide by the will of the people.
So who pops up spewing lies and propaganda on Gbagbo's behalf? Lanny the Lying Leech. Here's how he trashes a UN report about Gbagbo's thugs' murder of 200 (so far) people: he says he wants to "talk to who wrote it" and "see the evidence," and anyway UN "reports" (sic) about the Gaza War (there was just one, the Goldstone Report, by an eminent JEWISH, self-professed ZIONIST, South African jurist) have been "discredited." (Well, the U.S. and Israel trashed it, but that hardly constitutes "discrediting," except maybe in the propaganda sense.) The body of at least one journalist has already been dumped roadside by Davis' client's hoodlums.
Davis claims he only wants to "present the facts and the law as to why there is substantial documentary evidence that President Laurent Gbagbo is the duly elected president as a result of the Nov. 28 elections." Funny, no one else agrees with this, except the tyrant Gbagbo, and his goons.. Not even the rulers of the surrounding African states agree.
Few spewing his vile propaganda, Davis is getting $100,000 a month. Some would say he "sold his soul." That is stupid cant, since Davis obviously has no soul. He's an anti-human, not a human.
It's a mark of the moral depravity of the culture of American Power that this creep is no pariah, but a respected voice in D.C. who can charge big bucks to defend thugs. He's not the first, and he won't be the last. Until the vicious U.S. system is either overthrown, evolves into something resembling a normal human system, or self-destructs or rots to the point of collapse, there will always be loathsome dirtbags like Lanny Davis.
Update: according to the NY Times of 12/30/10, Davis apparently couldn't take the heat- and no doubt feared that damage to his reputation would hurt his chances of future propaganda gigs- so he's suddenly dropping Gbagbo as a client.
12/31/10: another Times article confirms what I said yesterday. ("Key Lobbyist's Client List Puts Him on the Defensive," p. A10.) The article is pretty disgusting in its own right, giving us copious Davis bullshit, such as Davis "said his client list reflected his philosophy [sic] that everyone deserved a voice, particularly companies and causes [sic] that challenged conventional wisdom [i.e. reality] or the public's sense of the politically correct." There's a lot more sick bullshit in this vein, pure self-serving, disgustingly self-righteous and phony Davis propaganda about himself rewritten by the Times hacks. But they're just being "balanced," I guess. Except if you're going to transmit someone's bullshit, you should also report the information that clearly shows what a load of horsecrap it is. They do mention some of his loathsome "causes," and Davis absurdly calling himself a "liberal Democrat." That in reference to his propaganda work for the kleptomaniac tyrant of Equatorial Guinea, Teodoro Obiang Nguema.
The transcript of Davis' appearance on Democracy Now, defending the Honduran coupists, is a great example of his bullying, lying, twisting-reality methodology.
Earlier this year he was shilling for the Honduran oligarchy, which overthrew the democratically-elected president for the crime of raising the minimum wage. (The official excuse was he "tried to change the Constitution so he could run again." A lie, but even if true not a crime. He tried to put a NONBINDING resolution before the Honduran people to let them vote on the idea.) Being the enemy of poor people everywhere, and friend of the rich in all lands, the U.S. sneakily supported the coup while publicly pretending not to. (Another one of WikiLeaks "crimes" was exposing this duplicity via leaked State Department documents.)
The Honduran criminals have murdered many Hondurans since seizing power, and repressed all rights of dissent. Lanny Davis uses all his skills as a sophist and twister of reality and just flat out liar to defend this criminal regime.
Another of his "clients" is the dictator of Equatorial Guinea, who he tries to trick the world into believing is a swell guy and worthy of respect and support. And anything to the contrary is just a lie, according to Despicable Davis.
Now he's at it again. This time he's aiding the dictator of Ivory Coast, a greedy piece of work named Laurent Gbagbo. (This thug's official title is "President," but that's totally misleading.) Gbagbo refuses to admit that he just lost an election. For once, the U.S., other African "leaders,
and others are insisting that the dictator leave office and abide by the will of the people.
So who pops up spewing lies and propaganda on Gbagbo's behalf? Lanny the Lying Leech. Here's how he trashes a UN report about Gbagbo's thugs' murder of 200 (so far) people: he says he wants to "talk to who wrote it" and "see the evidence," and anyway UN "reports" (sic) about the Gaza War (there was just one, the Goldstone Report, by an eminent JEWISH, self-professed ZIONIST, South African jurist) have been "discredited." (Well, the U.S. and Israel trashed it, but that hardly constitutes "discrediting," except maybe in the propaganda sense.) The body of at least one journalist has already been dumped roadside by Davis' client's hoodlums.
Davis claims he only wants to "present the facts and the law as to why there is substantial documentary evidence that President Laurent Gbagbo is the duly elected president as a result of the Nov. 28 elections." Funny, no one else agrees with this, except the tyrant Gbagbo, and his goons.. Not even the rulers of the surrounding African states agree.
Few spewing his vile propaganda, Davis is getting $100,000 a month. Some would say he "sold his soul." That is stupid cant, since Davis obviously has no soul. He's an anti-human, not a human.
It's a mark of the moral depravity of the culture of American Power that this creep is no pariah, but a respected voice in D.C. who can charge big bucks to defend thugs. He's not the first, and he won't be the last. Until the vicious U.S. system is either overthrown, evolves into something resembling a normal human system, or self-destructs or rots to the point of collapse, there will always be loathsome dirtbags like Lanny Davis.
Update: according to the NY Times of 12/30/10, Davis apparently couldn't take the heat- and no doubt feared that damage to his reputation would hurt his chances of future propaganda gigs- so he's suddenly dropping Gbagbo as a client.
12/31/10: another Times article confirms what I said yesterday. ("Key Lobbyist's Client List Puts Him on the Defensive," p. A10.) The article is pretty disgusting in its own right, giving us copious Davis bullshit, such as Davis "said his client list reflected his philosophy [sic] that everyone deserved a voice, particularly companies and causes [sic] that challenged conventional wisdom [i.e. reality] or the public's sense of the politically correct." There's a lot more sick bullshit in this vein, pure self-serving, disgustingly self-righteous and phony Davis propaganda about himself rewritten by the Times hacks. But they're just being "balanced," I guess. Except if you're going to transmit someone's bullshit, you should also report the information that clearly shows what a load of horsecrap it is. They do mention some of his loathsome "causes," and Davis absurdly calling himself a "liberal Democrat." That in reference to his propaganda work for the kleptomaniac tyrant of Equatorial Guinea, Teodoro Obiang Nguema.
The transcript of Davis' appearance on Democracy Now, defending the Honduran coupists, is a great example of his bullying, lying, twisting-reality methodology.
Saturday, December 04, 2010
U.S. Military Unleashes Cyberwar Against WikiLeaks
The U.S. hasn't been content to get their Swede stooges to trump up bogus sex charges against WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange. (The various versions we're getting is that he didn't stop humping when two women changed his mind, or he didn't use a condom.) Nor having Interpol pu this dangerous global menace atop its Most Wanted list. (Which is doesn't do with genocidal dictators who have indictments, or CIA officers wanted in Italy and convicted in absentia, for example.) And threats of prosecution and long imprisonment, and calls for his assassination, aren't all the U.S. is doing either. WikiLeaks the website is being hounded from pillar to post. Their domain name provider unceremoniously dumped them, claiming that the tornado of cyber attacks on WikiLeaks endangered their architecture. Amazon threw them off their server after menacing grows from right wing dog Sen. Joe Lieberman, whose aide called Amazon to "inquire" about it. Amazon put out a lame excuse that W. violated Amazon's terms of use because they didn't own the copyright to the Government documents W. posts. (As a matter of law, U.S. Government documents CANNOT BE COPYRIGHTED.) PayPal dropped WikiLeaks due to unspecified "illegal activity." That's funny, they haven't been indicted, at least not yet.
The U.S. military has launched what are called Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) attacks on WikiLeaks. This means taking over numerous computers with implanted malware that causes those computers to try and log on to the target website. The idea is to crash the victim website by overwhelming it with a large number contacts that are more than the host server can handle.
December 4, 2010
The U.S. military has launched what are called Distributed Denial of Service (DDOS) attacks on WikiLeaks. This means taking over numerous computers with implanted malware that causes those computers to try and log on to the target website. The idea is to crash the victim website by overwhelming it with a large number contacts that are more than the host server can handle.
December 4, 2010
Death Threats Against Julian Assange
It didn't take long for my post of late November about the grave danger facing Julian Assange, to be confirmed very blatantly. Various politicians and "commentators" have called for imprisonment and worse for Assange. The 1917 "Espionage Act" has been dusted off. This is one of the vicious bludgeons the U.S. uses to crush dissidents. During WW I it was used to imprison socialists, pacifists, and activists of all stripes. So much as questioning the U.S. jumping into WWI was a felony. (One of the Big Lies in America, periodically exposed as a sham, is the myth of free speech, and the Constitutional "guarantee" of same. Guarantee my ass, you lying dogs.)
Various bourgeois figures have even made public threats against Assange's life, calling for his death.
Sarah Palin, who has a lavishly paid perch on Rupert Murdoch's neofascist agitprop channel Fox "News," wants Assange "hunted down." Like a moose or elk, Sarah? We know what U.S. cutthroats do when they "hunt down" people. They either disappear them into secret torture dungeons or kill them.
One of Murdoch's Minions, the deranged liar and bully Bill O'Reilly, calls WikiLeaks "despicable" and the "leaker" "a traitor" and "traitors should be executed or jailed for life."
Tom Flanagan on Canadian TV, (CBC the main channel), said Assange should be assassinated. He even suggested a method for Obana to use- a drone missile strike. Flanagan is a member of rightwing Canadian PM Harper's inner circle and campaign manager for the "Conservatives" in the last two Canadian elections. Unlike here, where the people are either rabid barbarians or politically comatose sheep, in Canada this open call for state murder created an uproar, and Flanagan had to make light of his death call and "apologize," sort of, kind of.
Michael Huckabee didn't threaten Assange specifically, but called for the execution of leakers. "Anything less than execution" for leakers to WikiLeaks "is too kind a punishment."
I wonder if he feels the same about all those anonymous government officials who plant propaganda in the media on a daily basis.
Huckabee is an arch-reactionary, GOP presidential candidate wanna-be in 2008, a pseudo-Holy Man who presents himself as a pious "Christian" to appeal to the backwoods holy rolling speaking-in-tongues primitives that infest Arkansas and so many other U.S. backwaters. He aches to get elected President in 2012. Currently he too is ensconsed in the neofascist stable of evil media czar Murdoch, for handsome pay of course.
One sickening- and unremarked upon- hypocrisy in Huckabee's Tough Guy stance is that as Governor of Arkansas, Huckabee had a bad habit of freeing dangerous, violent felons (but not deserving prisoners, like victims of the drug war) early, against official advice. One of the objects of his kindness went on to murder four police officers in Washington State. This hasn't harmed Huckabee's media standing in the slightest. Unlike what happened to Michael Dukakis, who was held responsible for a rape and assault by Willie Horton, when Horton fled during a work release program. Horton of course never should have been out, but that wasn't Dukakis' personal doing, but rather a dysfunctional work-release program. Even to this day we get reminders of Dukakis-Horton.
You see, reactionaries can do no wrong in the U.S. Another example: G. Gordon Liddy on his radio show- a travesty that that fascist thug has his own radio show!- exhorted people to shoot ATF agent. Didn't cost him a thing in consequences or media esteem. Or when Ann Coulter slimed 9/11 widows, or called for the NY Times to be bombed, that was fine. Even the NY Times has never stopped promoting her. On the other hand, Professor Ward Churchill was swiftly purged from the University of Colorado for writing in an essay that among the dead on 9/11 were "little Eichmanns." Ideological watchdogs quickly pounced, making the comment a national issue of outrage. (I remember all the posts on military.com after 9/11 ghoulishly calling for the nuking of Afghanistan. I think undoubtedly there are many little Eichmanns in America, many in the media, and no doubt some met a deserved end on 9/11. But so did many people who didn't deserve to die. That's the trouble with the indiscriminate slaughter of civilians, like when, oh, say, the U.S. bombs Afghan wedding parties, or drops atomic bombs on cities like Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Not that two wrongs make a right, just that some LOUD MOUTHED HYPOCRITS ARE MIGHTY ANNOYING IN THEIR MORALISTIC POSTURING.
And oh, Flanagan has a perch as a university professor. You can bet he won't be purged from it.
And funny how the main U.S. "ally" in the war on terrorism is the biggest sponsor of the people the U.S. currently brands "terrorist," namely Pakistan, the country that planned and sponsored the attack on Mumbai, on the Indian parliament, and innumerable other terrorist acts. In fact, the U.S. is grumpy about the fact that the Pakistanis currently provide safe havens for the Afghan Taliban forces. David Rohde, a NY Times correspondent taken hostage by them and kidnapped to Pakistan, has given an account of how his kidnappers were protected by the Paki army. Even after his escape, they did nothing, and this with a Paki military base less than a mile from his kidnappers' lair.
December 4, 2010
Various bourgeois figures have even made public threats against Assange's life, calling for his death.
Sarah Palin, who has a lavishly paid perch on Rupert Murdoch's neofascist agitprop channel Fox "News," wants Assange "hunted down." Like a moose or elk, Sarah? We know what U.S. cutthroats do when they "hunt down" people. They either disappear them into secret torture dungeons or kill them.
One of Murdoch's Minions, the deranged liar and bully Bill O'Reilly, calls WikiLeaks "despicable" and the "leaker" "a traitor" and "traitors should be executed or jailed for life."
Tom Flanagan on Canadian TV, (CBC the main channel), said Assange should be assassinated. He even suggested a method for Obana to use- a drone missile strike. Flanagan is a member of rightwing Canadian PM Harper's inner circle and campaign manager for the "Conservatives" in the last two Canadian elections. Unlike here, where the people are either rabid barbarians or politically comatose sheep, in Canada this open call for state murder created an uproar, and Flanagan had to make light of his death call and "apologize," sort of, kind of.
Michael Huckabee didn't threaten Assange specifically, but called for the execution of leakers. "Anything less than execution" for leakers to WikiLeaks "is too kind a punishment."
I wonder if he feels the same about all those anonymous government officials who plant propaganda in the media on a daily basis.
Huckabee is an arch-reactionary, GOP presidential candidate wanna-be in 2008, a pseudo-Holy Man who presents himself as a pious "Christian" to appeal to the backwoods holy rolling speaking-in-tongues primitives that infest Arkansas and so many other U.S. backwaters. He aches to get elected President in 2012. Currently he too is ensconsed in the neofascist stable of evil media czar Murdoch, for handsome pay of course.
One sickening- and unremarked upon- hypocrisy in Huckabee's Tough Guy stance is that as Governor of Arkansas, Huckabee had a bad habit of freeing dangerous, violent felons (but not deserving prisoners, like victims of the drug war) early, against official advice. One of the objects of his kindness went on to murder four police officers in Washington State. This hasn't harmed Huckabee's media standing in the slightest. Unlike what happened to Michael Dukakis, who was held responsible for a rape and assault by Willie Horton, when Horton fled during a work release program. Horton of course never should have been out, but that wasn't Dukakis' personal doing, but rather a dysfunctional work-release program. Even to this day we get reminders of Dukakis-Horton.
You see, reactionaries can do no wrong in the U.S. Another example: G. Gordon Liddy on his radio show- a travesty that that fascist thug has his own radio show!- exhorted people to shoot ATF agent. Didn't cost him a thing in consequences or media esteem. Or when Ann Coulter slimed 9/11 widows, or called for the NY Times to be bombed, that was fine. Even the NY Times has never stopped promoting her. On the other hand, Professor Ward Churchill was swiftly purged from the University of Colorado for writing in an essay that among the dead on 9/11 were "little Eichmanns." Ideological watchdogs quickly pounced, making the comment a national issue of outrage. (I remember all the posts on military.com after 9/11 ghoulishly calling for the nuking of Afghanistan. I think undoubtedly there are many little Eichmanns in America, many in the media, and no doubt some met a deserved end on 9/11. But so did many people who didn't deserve to die. That's the trouble with the indiscriminate slaughter of civilians, like when, oh, say, the U.S. bombs Afghan wedding parties, or drops atomic bombs on cities like Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Not that two wrongs make a right, just that some LOUD MOUTHED HYPOCRITS ARE MIGHTY ANNOYING IN THEIR MORALISTIC POSTURING.
And oh, Flanagan has a perch as a university professor. You can bet he won't be purged from it.
And funny how the main U.S. "ally" in the war on terrorism is the biggest sponsor of the people the U.S. currently brands "terrorist," namely Pakistan, the country that planned and sponsored the attack on Mumbai, on the Indian parliament, and innumerable other terrorist acts. In fact, the U.S. is grumpy about the fact that the Pakistanis currently provide safe havens for the Afghan Taliban forces. David Rohde, a NY Times correspondent taken hostage by them and kidnapped to Pakistan, has given an account of how his kidnappers were protected by the Paki army. Even after his escape, they did nothing, and this with a Paki military base less than a mile from his kidnappers' lair.
December 4, 2010
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