Ted Rall.
If Trump Wins, Don’t Blame Progressives. This Is on You, Centrists.
It's not Sanders. It's the Bernie Bros.
Showing posts with label langue de bois. Show all posts
Showing posts with label langue de bois. Show all posts
Monday, May 18, 2020
Sunday, May 17, 2020
The bullshit never stops
Coronavirus propaganda from all directions endlessly shouting "War! It's a war!" and endlessly flattering in worshipful, teary, patriotic tones what a great, brave, swell, noble, loving, capable country and people we are, gee, wow.
Can they give it a rest for a day? And hour?
Can they give it a rest for a day? And hour?
Sunday, July 8, 2018
Is it time to leave, after all?
Time and past time, since the Cold War alliance system and both the Democrats' containment policy and the Republicans' rollback policy were products of absurd capitalist terror of and hatred for communism and, indeed, anything that smelled a bit like socialism.
And maybe, too, a lot of them drank their own Kool Aid, and actually believed of the Reds, as they had claimed they believed of Hitler, that they were out for world conquest.
And that, if we didn't oppose them everywhere in everything, they really could do it.
They really could conquer the whole world, including us.
And that, if they succeeded, the loss of freedom and democracy from the whole planet, the global triumph of totalitarian communism, would be irreversible, a fate so awful that the nuclear destruction of the world would actually be preferable.
Humbug, all of it.
As to the issue of the day, it's not just Trump who's a NATO skeptic.
It's a lot of Americans.
And it was, until Hillary became their candidate and Trump their opponent, a lot of the Americans in the Democratic Party - and I don't just mean the Bernie Sanders supporters - and a lot of people who spoke for them at MSNBC, as well as other major and conspicuous Democratic media.
But most of them have shut up since the election as Trump and the Trumpist wing of the Republican Party have stolen anti-globalism completely from all but the further and more anti-Democrat left.
And it's not just our alliance with Europe the skeptics are and have been long skeptical of.
Look at what Trump has really done in Korea, aided by Kim's cooperation in putting on an amazing propaganda show giving Trump a purely fictitious Cold War II triumph.
He has declared victory, weakened the US military defense of the peninsula, and publicly said he wants to remove US forces both from there and from Europe.
And Europeans see it, too.
For most of its history, the US has sought to avoid entanglement in Europe, and more or less succeeded from independence in 1776 until 1917 and the country’s reluctant entrance into the first world war.
Even then, most Americans were keen to leave again as soon as possible.
Congress turned its back on President Woodrow Wilson’s international ideals and refused to ratify the Versailles peace treaty or to allow the US to join the new League of Nations.
Congress was just as resistant to being sucked into the second world war, and the US could well have sat on the sidelines had Japan not attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941, and then Germany declared war on the US four days later.
When the second world war was over in 1945, Americans again made plans to pull out, demobilising 90% of their troops.
But over the next two years it became increasingly clear European states were not going to recover economically without US help and that Stalin’s Soviet Union was looming as a global threat.
So the US stayed in Europe, rebuilding Germany, and forming Nato.
Now Europe is mostly prosperous, and the Soviet Union has gone. A revanchist Russia has taken its place, but it is a far punier power, with only the fifth biggest economy in Europe.
“Russia is not an existential threat. It’s not felt in London, Paris or Rome as an existential threat. It’s not a unifying threat,” the senior European official said.
With the cold war conditions that persuaded the US to stay engaged in Europe now in the past, some argue that it is inevitable Americans would at some point reconsider their role.
But the American military, diplomatic, and national security establishments are still globalist.
Globalism, after all, is their job.
And there are all those fans of all those books and essays about how awful the world would have been without America's past globalism, how awful it would be now without today's American globalism, and how awful it will be in the future without continuing, persistent, one might even say unrelenting American globalism.
All those people who think that America is, for the good of all mankind, the indispensable nation.
Or say they do to dress up their arrogance of power, their ambition, their delusions of national and personal grandeur, their imitation of global altruism, and their fear of losing such control as America, through its participation in those far-flung alliances as well as other global institutions, actually has of global events and developments.
These are the people who reject immediately and with angry contempt the least suggestion that, for most purposes and most of the time, the rest of the world and what happens in it is not our problem, no skin off our nose, no threat to us, and no business of ours.
These are the people who have irreversibly spun Russiagate into a seemingly endless barrage of pro-NATO, anti-Putin, anti-Russia propaganda and painted every effort of Trump to back off the most extreme of these globalist policies as bought and paid for treason.
Even as Trump rails against Nato, his administration – the Pentagon in particular – has been boosting its commitment to the alliance in resources and troops deployed on its eastern flank.
This month’s summit will see the creation of two new commands, one on the US east coast to oversee the protection of transatlantic sea lanes, and another in Germany to run logistics to ensure that the alliance can reinforce quickly when threatened.
The new commitments reflect the atlanticist convictions of the US military and diplomatic corps, who may well be seeking to compensate for Trump’s anti-Nato rhetoric.
And maybe, too, a lot of them drank their own Kool Aid, and actually believed of the Reds, as they had claimed they believed of Hitler, that they were out for world conquest.
And that, if we didn't oppose them everywhere in everything, they really could do it.
They really could conquer the whole world, including us.
Humbug, all of it.
As to the issue of the day, it's not just Trump who's a NATO skeptic.
It's a lot of Americans.
And it was, until Hillary became their candidate and Trump their opponent, a lot of the Americans in the Democratic Party - and I don't just mean the Bernie Sanders supporters - and a lot of people who spoke for them at MSNBC, as well as other major and conspicuous Democratic media.
But most of them have shut up since the election as Trump and the Trumpist wing of the Republican Party have stolen anti-globalism completely from all but the further and more anti-Democrat left.
And it's not just our alliance with Europe the skeptics are and have been long skeptical of.
Look at what Trump has really done in Korea, aided by Kim's cooperation in putting on an amazing propaganda show giving Trump a purely fictitious Cold War II triumph.
He has declared victory, weakened the US military defense of the peninsula, and publicly said he wants to remove US forces both from there and from Europe.
And Europeans see it, too.
For most of its history, the US has sought to avoid entanglement in Europe, and more or less succeeded from independence in 1776 until 1917 and the country’s reluctant entrance into the first world war.
Even then, most Americans were keen to leave again as soon as possible.
Congress turned its back on President Woodrow Wilson’s international ideals and refused to ratify the Versailles peace treaty or to allow the US to join the new League of Nations.
Congress was just as resistant to being sucked into the second world war, and the US could well have sat on the sidelines had Japan not attacked Pearl Harbor in 1941, and then Germany declared war on the US four days later.
When the second world war was over in 1945, Americans again made plans to pull out, demobilising 90% of their troops.
But over the next two years it became increasingly clear European states were not going to recover economically without US help and that Stalin’s Soviet Union was looming as a global threat.
So the US stayed in Europe, rebuilding Germany, and forming Nato.
Now Europe is mostly prosperous, and the Soviet Union has gone. A revanchist Russia has taken its place, but it is a far punier power, with only the fifth biggest economy in Europe.
“Russia is not an existential threat. It’s not felt in London, Paris or Rome as an existential threat. It’s not a unifying threat,” the senior European official said.
With the cold war conditions that persuaded the US to stay engaged in Europe now in the past, some argue that it is inevitable Americans would at some point reconsider their role.
But the American military, diplomatic, and national security establishments are still globalist.
Globalism, after all, is their job.
And there are all those fans of all those books and essays about how awful the world would have been without America's past globalism, how awful it would be now without today's American globalism, and how awful it will be in the future without continuing, persistent, one might even say unrelenting American globalism.
All those people who think that America is, for the good of all mankind, the indispensable nation.
Or say they do to dress up their arrogance of power, their ambition, their delusions of national and personal grandeur, their imitation of global altruism, and their fear of losing such control as America, through its participation in those far-flung alliances as well as other global institutions, actually has of global events and developments.
These are the people who reject immediately and with angry contempt the least suggestion that, for most purposes and most of the time, the rest of the world and what happens in it is not our problem, no skin off our nose, no threat to us, and no business of ours.
These are the people who have irreversibly spun Russiagate into a seemingly endless barrage of pro-NATO, anti-Putin, anti-Russia propaganda and painted every effort of Trump to back off the most extreme of these globalist policies as bought and paid for treason.
Even as Trump rails against Nato, his administration – the Pentagon in particular – has been boosting its commitment to the alliance in resources and troops deployed on its eastern flank.
This month’s summit will see the creation of two new commands, one on the US east coast to oversee the protection of transatlantic sea lanes, and another in Germany to run logistics to ensure that the alliance can reinforce quickly when threatened.
The new commitments reflect the atlanticist convictions of the US military and diplomatic corps, who may well be seeking to compensate for Trump’s anti-Nato rhetoric.
Monday, June 18, 2018
He sheds lies like other dogs shed hair
President Trump blames Democrats, doubles down on immigration amid backlash
How should they change the law to prevent his policy of prosecuting all illegals, including first timers, from causing family separation?
Change the law to allow whole families, kids and all, to share the same jail and prison cells?
Or maybe change the law so that first time offenders cannot be prosecuted?
The idea that an entirely intended effect of his own policy results from something in the law that could or should be changed is utter bollocks.
As the outcry over the nearly 2,000 child separations caused as a result of the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” policy on illegal border crossings grows, President Donald Trump doubled down on Monday down on his controversial policies and blamed them on Democrats.
He also tried to divest himself of any responsibility for the practice, heartbreaking photos of which are becoming more and more readily available.
"The United States will not be a migrant camp and it will not be a refugee holding facility," he said during an event on space policy.
Earlier in the day, he issued a series of tweets and claimed that crime has risen in Germany as a result of migration.
“Crime in Germany is way up,” the president tweeted while warning that migrants have “so strongly and violently changed their culture!”
The latest government statistics show that crime actually decreased in Germany in 2017 by 5.1 percent to its lowest level since 1992.
The president also continued to blame Democrats, tweeting in all caps “CHANGE THE LAWS!”
Enacted earlier this year, the administration’s policy dictates that every adult caught illegally crossing the U.S. southern border face criminal prosecution. As a result, children found making the illegal crossings along with those adults have been separated and sent to detention centers.
The president and his allies also have been increasingly accusing Democrats, while decrying the child separations, of not showing adequate outrage over killings and crime by undocumented immigrants.
. . . .
But as the White House and its allies continue to make crime-based arguments in justifying tough policy stances as it relates to illegal immigration, multiple academic studies have not found any evidence that undocumented immigration increases crime.
How should they change the law to prevent his policy of prosecuting all illegals, including first timers, from causing family separation?
Change the law to allow whole families, kids and all, to share the same jail and prison cells?
Or maybe change the law so that first time offenders cannot be prosecuted?
The idea that an entirely intended effect of his own policy results from something in the law that could or should be changed is utter bollocks.
As the outcry over the nearly 2,000 child separations caused as a result of the Trump administration’s “zero tolerance” policy on illegal border crossings grows, President Donald Trump doubled down on Monday down on his controversial policies and blamed them on Democrats.
He also tried to divest himself of any responsibility for the practice, heartbreaking photos of which are becoming more and more readily available.
"The United States will not be a migrant camp and it will not be a refugee holding facility," he said during an event on space policy.
Earlier in the day, he issued a series of tweets and claimed that crime has risen in Germany as a result of migration.
“Crime in Germany is way up,” the president tweeted while warning that migrants have “so strongly and violently changed their culture!”
The latest government statistics show that crime actually decreased in Germany in 2017 by 5.1 percent to its lowest level since 1992.
The president also continued to blame Democrats, tweeting in all caps “CHANGE THE LAWS!”
Enacted earlier this year, the administration’s policy dictates that every adult caught illegally crossing the U.S. southern border face criminal prosecution. As a result, children found making the illegal crossings along with those adults have been separated and sent to detention centers.
The president and his allies also have been increasingly accusing Democrats, while decrying the child separations, of not showing adequate outrage over killings and crime by undocumented immigrants.
. . . .
But as the White House and its allies continue to make crime-based arguments in justifying tough policy stances as it relates to illegal immigration, multiple academic studies have not found any evidence that undocumented immigration increases crime.
Sunday, June 17, 2018
AM Joy on family separation at the border
Racism, racism!
MSNBC, and especially the professional race hustlers on the network, are in full outrage mode.
Bozo's current policy is to prosecute first time illegal border crossings as well as repetitions in the criminal system rather than sending them to immigration courts.
Prosecution in the criminal system forces family separation and may result in prison time; running illegals through immigration courts does not force family separation - families are kept together at immigration detention centers - and results at worst in deportation.
The point of the Trump policy is to deter illegal immigration of whole families more effectively than is done by mere family detention and deportation.
The same policy was also adopted for a time by Presidents Obama and Bush fils, for the same purpose.
Since nobody in the propaganda networks - oops! News, I meant - that I watch has even mentioned that, so far as I am aware, nobody has compared the numbers to see whether Bozo is causing more separations than they did.
Family separation.
And yet it remains true that Bozo is falsely and hypocritically blaming family separation on the Democrats.
And that he may be holding children hostage to force the Congress - not just the Democrats - to give him money for his border wall.
And that, directly contrary to the invitation on the Statue of Liberty, he wants to restrict immigration to fewer people, and only people who meet criteria of ability that Democrats correctly point out would cause the stream of legal immigration to the country to be a bit whiter than it now is - more than likely at least in part for that reason.
Propaganda of the Deed.
MSNBC, and especially the professional race hustlers on the network, are in full outrage mode.
Bozo's current policy is to prosecute first time illegal border crossings as well as repetitions in the criminal system rather than sending them to immigration courts.
Prosecution in the criminal system forces family separation and may result in prison time; running illegals through immigration courts does not force family separation - families are kept together at immigration detention centers - and results at worst in deportation.
The point of the Trump policy is to deter illegal immigration of whole families more effectively than is done by mere family detention and deportation.
The same policy was also adopted for a time by Presidents Obama and Bush fils, for the same purpose.
Since nobody in the propaganda networks - oops! News, I meant - that I watch has even mentioned that, so far as I am aware, nobody has compared the numbers to see whether Bozo is causing more separations than they did.
Family separation.
And yet it remains true that Bozo is falsely and hypocritically blaming family separation on the Democrats.
And that he may be holding children hostage to force the Congress - not just the Democrats - to give him money for his border wall.
And that, directly contrary to the invitation on the Statue of Liberty, he wants to restrict immigration to fewer people, and only people who meet criteria of ability that Democrats correctly point out would cause the stream of legal immigration to the country to be a bit whiter than it now is - more than likely at least in part for that reason.
Propaganda of the Deed.
Tuesday, August 2, 2016
Carrying the Democrats' propaganda strategy of egregious and mendacious denial pretty far.
OK, laughably, absurdly far.
Howard Dean: ‘I Don’t Consider Iran to Be a Muslim Country’
PARIS — Former Vermont Governor Howard Dean told Breitbart News that “Iran is the farthest thing from an Islamic Republic” and that Iran is not “a Muslim country.”
Instead, Dean said, Iran is “a republic that’s been hijacked by thugs and murderers.”
He explained that he does not know Muslims whom he respects and who behave the way the regime does.
Sometimes the intentional and baldfaced stupidity of politicians' remarks is like fingernails on a blackboard.
It almost hurts to listen.
It does hurt.
Howard Dean: ‘I Don’t Consider Iran to Be a Muslim Country’
PARIS — Former Vermont Governor Howard Dean told Breitbart News that “Iran is the farthest thing from an Islamic Republic” and that Iran is not “a Muslim country.”
Instead, Dean said, Iran is “a republic that’s been hijacked by thugs and murderers.”
He explained that he does not know Muslims whom he respects and who behave the way the regime does.
Sometimes the intentional and baldfaced stupidity of politicians' remarks is like fingernails on a blackboard.
It almost hurts to listen.
It does hurt.
Tuesday, March 15, 2016
Drudge highlights this Trumpista squib
Grieving Mom Responds to Kasich’s Amnesty-In-100-Days Pledge: Visit Grave of My Murdered Child
Wow.
That's a hell of a piece, and probably at least as effective as the presence on stage at a Democratic debate some time back of a woman who told of her dread that her husband, living here illegally, might be deported.
Actually, below the title and the photo of Kasich I didn't see a word about his proposal.
There is voting in Ohio today, and the state is very, very important in the GOP nomination process.
Wow.
That's a hell of a piece, and probably at least as effective as the presence on stage at a Democratic debate some time back of a woman who told of her dread that her husband, living here illegally, might be deported.
Actually, below the title and the photo of Kasich I didn't see a word about his proposal.
There is voting in Ohio today, and the state is very, very important in the GOP nomination process.
It's a meme with legs
Just the other day, Josh Marshall joined the concern trolls, wringing his hands and crying out, "Someone will die."
Well, now it's a thing, or maybe it already was, and even "news" outlets as well as wholly suspect blabberers and obvious propaganda venues are asking people whether - or maybe just when - Trump's inflammatory rhetoric will get someone killed.
They can hardly wait, eh?
Juicy.
It occurs to me that this sort of thing happens with every election, or has with more than one recent election, with Democrats pouring out accusations, often in connection with the fight about gun rights, that the right wing is creating an atmosphere of fear and violence and the 2nd Amendment enables and encourages their political terrorism.
It's not often, however, that losing Republicans who loathe their own candidate join them in this sort of attack.
Of course, it is difficult not to suppose Trump is deliberately provocative.
It pleases his supporters and he seems to think the publicity surrounding the behavior of the disrupters does his campaign good.
He might be right.
Meanwhile, people have left off calling him Hitler and Mussolini and settled on George Wallace.
Glad we've finally got that sorted out.
Well, now it's a thing, or maybe it already was, and even "news" outlets as well as wholly suspect blabberers and obvious propaganda venues are asking people whether - or maybe just when - Trump's inflammatory rhetoric will get someone killed.
They can hardly wait, eh?
Juicy.
It occurs to me that this sort of thing happens with every election, or has with more than one recent election, with Democrats pouring out accusations, often in connection with the fight about gun rights, that the right wing is creating an atmosphere of fear and violence and the 2nd Amendment enables and encourages their political terrorism.
It's not often, however, that losing Republicans who loathe their own candidate join them in this sort of attack.
Of course, it is difficult not to suppose Trump is deliberately provocative.
It pleases his supporters and he seems to think the publicity surrounding the behavior of the disrupters does his campaign good.
He might be right.
Meanwhile, people have left off calling him Hitler and Mussolini and settled on George Wallace.
Glad we've finally got that sorted out.
Monday, August 3, 2015
Sunday, August 2, 2015
Framing the tax on scofflaws
It's opponents call taxation of gambling a "tax on stupidity."
Municipal reliance on traffic fines could be called a "tax on scofflaws."
Heavy taxation on tobacco is a "tax on addiction" and on alcohol is a "sin tax," the latter two engaging the government in collusion with producers in exploitation.
Heavy taxation on gasoline could be regarded as a tax on working away from home.
All of these are regressive ways to finance government and several are much favored by liberals.
But not the second which, associated in liberal discourse with racism and police violence, is now referred to exclusively as "shaking down the poor" by its authors.
Here's a sample.
Shaking Down Poor People Is Tied To Police Violence
Municipal reliance on traffic fines could be called a "tax on scofflaws."
Heavy taxation on tobacco is a "tax on addiction" and on alcohol is a "sin tax," the latter two engaging the government in collusion with producers in exploitation.
Heavy taxation on gasoline could be regarded as a tax on working away from home.
All of these are regressive ways to finance government and several are much favored by liberals.
But not the second which, associated in liberal discourse with racism and police violence, is now referred to exclusively as "shaking down the poor" by its authors.
Here's a sample.
Shaking Down Poor People Is Tied To Police Violence
Tuesday, June 16, 2015
An important question for liberals
Well, a question-begging question, a type of question that plays a common role in propaganda.
At what point does an exchange of cultures cross the line into appropriation?
At what point does an exchange of cultures cross the line into appropriation?
Wednesday, September 24, 2014
" . . . until you run out of other people's money."
Taxation to support any of the following is theft.
Wars for somebody else's good, not our own
Wars to keep the military-industrial complex in work.
(How many of America's wars were fought entirely with stolen money, then?)
Subsidies or tax breaks for any enterprise "too big to fail" are theft, too.
And tax breaks or subsidies to support the military-industrial complex.
And what about the costs of policing illegal corporate behavior not picked up by the policed corporations but by the rest of us?
And the costs of cleaning up the mess they leave?
Where do conservatives get the balls to label all and only what they hate as theft?
GOP Candidate: Romney's 47 Percent Comment Was True, 'It's Bigger Now'
Wars for somebody else's good, not our own
Wars to keep the military-industrial complex in work.
(How many of America's wars were fought entirely with stolen money, then?)
Subsidies or tax breaks for any enterprise "too big to fail" are theft, too.
And tax breaks or subsidies to support the military-industrial complex.
And what about the costs of policing illegal corporate behavior not picked up by the policed corporations but by the rest of us?
And the costs of cleaning up the mess they leave?
Where do conservatives get the balls to label all and only what they hate as theft?
GOP Candidate: Romney's 47 Percent Comment Was True, 'It's Bigger Now'
Tuesday, September 23, 2014
Liberal langue de bois about religion from the pope
Liberals, claiming to be "reality based," can be counted on to talk the most utter stupidity about religion in general and Islam in particular.
Pope Francis: You Can’t Use Religion To Justify Violence
And this pope in so many ways is their guy.
Why ISIS Is Not, In Fact, Islamic
Wow. They so live in the inverted world.
If Islam is the religion of peace then Orwell was right and war is peace.
Anti-Islam ads
The post begins,
An anti-Islam group is preparing to plaster New York City buses with advertisements that defame Islam and use images from the recent execution of American journalist James Foley by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), the latest in the organization’s longstanding effort to recast Islam as an inherently violent religion.
The ads "defame" Islam only with the truth.
Need I point out the liars about Islam are the liberals?
Pope Francis: You Can’t Use Religion To Justify Violence
And this pope in so many ways is their guy.
Why ISIS Is Not, In Fact, Islamic
Wow. They so live in the inverted world.
If Islam is the religion of peace then Orwell was right and war is peace.
Anti-Islam ads
The post begins,
An anti-Islam group is preparing to plaster New York City buses with advertisements that defame Islam and use images from the recent execution of American journalist James Foley by the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria (ISIS), the latest in the organization’s longstanding effort to recast Islam as an inherently violent religion.
The ads "defame" Islam only with the truth.
Need I point out the liars about Islam are the liberals?
Monday, September 22, 2014
Self serving move for which they are praised
They sold the assets they anticipate will lose value and even become worthless owing to public policies they now are free to encourage
Heirs to an oil fortune join the divestment drive
They are betting on that sort of policy, that as a result the series of divesters will absorb the losses they have escaped.
And it gets spun by all concerned as a noble gesture.
Heirs to an oil fortune join the divestment drive
They are betting on that sort of policy, that as a result the series of divesters will absorb the losses they have escaped.
And it gets spun by all concerned as a noble gesture.
Saturday, September 20, 2014
Fallacies of numbing grossness
Arguments made in propaganda are that.
It is as close to a universal law on the subject as you can get.
On the whole, propaganda aspires to be coarse, ignorant, and very stupid.
That is in its nature.
Is it because it is addressed to people who are coarse, ignorant, and very stupid?
Or because talking such egregious rot to your face demonstrates the power relations at work?
It is a particularly brutal style of talking de haut en bas, after all.
An example is the bland stupidity of the liberal argument that there are no witches because there is no Devil.
Or that witches are harmless because there is no Devil.
It is as close to a universal law on the subject as you can get.
That is in its nature.
Is it because it is addressed to people who are coarse, ignorant, and very stupid?
Or because talking such egregious rot to your face demonstrates the power relations at work?
It is a particularly brutal style of talking de haut en bas, after all.
An example is the bland stupidity of the liberal argument that there are no witches because there is no Devil.
Or that witches are harmless because there is no Devil.
Doublethink
Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia Eurasia
Eastasia.
A month ago it was the liberals in Ebola denial and the conservatives hopping mad nobody was paying attention.
Satanists are funny, and on our side!
So think liberals.
The Satanic Temple’s hilarious response to a pro-religion court ruling
The enemy of my enemy
Is Satanism a religion?
Why, because its adherents say it is?
Because liberals say it is?
The same people who say (wrongly) that Bradley Manning is a girl and (rightly) that atheism is not a religion?
What people say in their propaganda is only incidentally related to truth or falsehood.
That is not a concern.
The Satanic Temple’s hilarious response to a pro-religion court ruling
The enemy of my enemy
Is Satanism a religion?
Why, because its adherents say it is?
Because liberals say it is?
The same people who say (wrongly) that Bradley Manning is a girl and (rightly) that atheism is not a religion?
What people say in their propaganda is only incidentally related to truth or falsehood.
That is not a concern.
Friday, September 19, 2014
Who controls the past . . . .
RNC Condemns AP Exam's 'Radically Revisionist View' Of U.S. History
It's about whether you cheer or boo. It's about spin.
And of course the RNC is right that this does represent a change in attitude toward the American past, though it is by no means a sudden or unexpected one.
Think of Howard Zinn smiling in his grave.
Nothing quite so blatant or crude as omission or fabrication of events or persons.
Nothing outright Stalinist or Maoist in method.
Anyway, not yet.
Time to read 1984, again?
It's about whether you cheer or boo. It's about spin.
And of course the RNC is right that this does represent a change in attitude toward the American past, though it is by no means a sudden or unexpected one.
Think of Howard Zinn smiling in his grave.
Nothing quite so blatant or crude as omission or fabrication of events or persons.
Nothing outright Stalinist or Maoist in method.
Anyway, not yet.
Time to read 1984, again?
Saturday, September 6, 2014
More globalist than thou? Hillary checks in against Romney.
Saturday morning langue de bois.
A little love-bomb for O, too, to make up for the back stabbing of a week or so ago.
In an America made fearful by the screams of politicians of the war party and their media megaphones, Hillary, a leader of that same party, steps boldly on stage and cries, "Wait! I know what to do! I can make you safe!"
Hillary Clinton reviews Henry Kissinger’s ‘World Order’
A disciple of Pat Buchanan?
Justin Raimondo?
Or even the Pauls, father and son?
No, Teddy Roosevelt or William McKinley, more like.
Rehearsing the fundamental myth of contemporary American globalismo - its fundamental lies - and sounding like a McCain clone, she praises America for saving the world repeatedly in all the major conflicts of the 20th Century, always and everywhere - well, almost - standing four square for democracy and what Kissinger calls "liberal economics," by which he and she mean capitalism.
Virgil sings praises for Rome's empire with notes no more false and lyrics no more effusive.
We are so far from a policy aimed at America's safety or in any sense at America's good that you could starve walking from here to there.
She explains the goal of American policy; her goal for us, our taxes, our military.
[O]ur continued commitment to renovating and defending the global order will determine whether we build a future of peace, progress and prosperity in which people everywhere have the opportunity to live up to their God-given potential.
Who told her we wanted to do that?
No one.
Who told her if our classe politique insisted the rest of America would follow?
No one.
No worries, though.
The lesson of Vietnam for her and her like was plain and simple.
American rulers can do pretty much anything they want in foreign parts so long as they do it without a draft and don't too much disturb the ordinary lives of the people.
And, anyway, she didn't write this for us, the ordinary people of the country.
She wrote it to re-assure key constituencies and, especially, the military-industrial complex at the heart of it all.
Rand Paul will be the only anti-globalist in this election contest.
Serious challengers to Hillary, if any, among the Democrats will not rattle their self-righteous sabers any less than she.
Interesting when she puts third in her list of current crises the Ebola outbreak that Romney said not a word about.
If that's a woman's touch it's all to the good.
It could easily be the most urgent crisis going on right now.
Where was Hillary on war and peace during the Vietnam years when she and I grew up?
I suppose I should know but I just don't recall.
A little love-bomb for O, too, to make up for the back stabbing of a week or so ago.
In an America made fearful by the screams of politicians of the war party and their media megaphones, Hillary, a leader of that same party, steps boldly on stage and cries, "Wait! I know what to do! I can make you safe!"
Hillary Clinton reviews Henry Kissinger’s ‘World Order’
A disciple of Pat Buchanan?
Justin Raimondo?
Or even the Pauls, father and son?
No, Teddy Roosevelt or William McKinley, more like.
Rehearsing the fundamental myth of contemporary American globalismo - its fundamental lies - and sounding like a McCain clone, she praises America for saving the world repeatedly in all the major conflicts of the 20th Century, always and everywhere - well, almost - standing four square for democracy and what Kissinger calls "liberal economics," by which he and she mean capitalism.
Virgil sings praises for Rome's empire with notes no more false and lyrics no more effusive.
We are so far from a policy aimed at America's safety or in any sense at America's good that you could starve walking from here to there.
She explains the goal of American policy; her goal for us, our taxes, our military.
[O]ur continued commitment to renovating and defending the global order will determine whether we build a future of peace, progress and prosperity in which people everywhere have the opportunity to live up to their God-given potential.
Who told her we wanted to do that?
No one.
Who told her if our classe politique insisted the rest of America would follow?
No one.
No worries, though.
The lesson of Vietnam for her and her like was plain and simple.
American rulers can do pretty much anything they want in foreign parts so long as they do it without a draft and don't too much disturb the ordinary lives of the people.
And, anyway, she didn't write this for us, the ordinary people of the country.
She wrote it to re-assure key constituencies and, especially, the military-industrial complex at the heart of it all.
Rand Paul will be the only anti-globalist in this election contest.
Serious challengers to Hillary, if any, among the Democrats will not rattle their self-righteous sabers any less than she.
Interesting when she puts third in her list of current crises the Ebola outbreak that Romney said not a word about.
If that's a woman's touch it's all to the good.
It could easily be the most urgent crisis going on right now.
Where was Hillary on war and peace during the Vietnam years when she and I grew up?
I suppose I should know but I just don't recall.
Saturday, August 30, 2014
Truth in the wrong place
There was no gaffe, apart from telling a simple and not surprising truth.
Only langue de bois allowed, thanks.
He had already said in a previous press conference that he and his advisors were considering how to go forward, though at present there are no plans for boots on the ground.
Update.
The shit storm is even worse today than yesterday.
As usual, the war party are furious and hysterical, as though the Islamic State was somewhere in the Appalachians and O was still relying on McClellan.
Reminder, the IS is half a world away, in a part of the world we would not give a shit about, were it not for Israel, American Jews, and oil.
And were it not for the needs of the military-industrial complex.
The hysteria is just screaming, demented propaganda
This is a bit too liberal-interventionist for me, but good on the whole.
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