From carl at newsfromneptune.com Thu Feb 2 03:46:13 2023 From: carl at newsfromneptune.com (C. G. Estabrook) Date: Wed, 1 Feb 2023 21:46:13 -0600 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: We're Ruled By Assholes Because We Have Asshole Systems: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix References: <20230202031317.3.e882d102f8c7ff52@mg2.substack.com> Message-ID: <487E6186-781C-432D-AA72-483C4FA7A44C@newsfromneptune.com> Sent from my iPhone Begin forwarded message: > From: Caitlin Johnstone from Caitlin?s Newsletter > Date: February 1, 2023 at 9:13:52 PM CST > To: cgestabrook at gmail.com > Subject: We're Ruled By Assholes Because We Have Asshole Systems: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix > Reply-To: Caitlin Johnstone from Caitlin?s Newsletter > > ? > Open in app or online > We're Ruled By Assholes Because We Have Asshole Systems: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix > CAITLIN JOHNSTONE > FEB 2 > > > > > > CROSS-POST > > > Listen to a reading of this article: > > > > We're Ruled By Assholes Because We Have Asshole Systems by Going Rogue With Caitlin Johnstone > Going Rogue With Caitlin Johnstone > Pledge your support > > It's funny to think about how all our abusive, oppressive systems are only there because the people who benefit from them are able to keep everyone else too divided and distracted to notice that we vastly outnumber them and could literally just force change to happen anytime we want. > > ? > > People have a fairly easy time accepting that things are fucked because we are ruled by corrupt assholes. They have a much harder time accepting that we are ruled by corrupt assholes because our corrupt asshole systems will always necessarily elevate corrupt assholes to the top. > > It's easier to blame our problems on oligarchs or the Deep State or a cabal of satanic pedophiles than it is to blame them on systems that we ourselves participate in and have lived our entire lives intertwined with and which have been continuously normalized within our culture. If the problem is just a few corrupt assholes then it's not a very daunting problem, because all you have to do is remove those corrupt assholes and everything's golden. If the problem is the systems around which our entire civilization is structured, it's far more daunting. > > It's easy to imagine a future without corrupt assholes. It's almost impossible to imagine a future where human behavior is not driven by profit for its own sake, where we have moved from competition-based systems to collaboration-based ones where we all work together for the common good. > > In competition-based systems the most powerful governments will always be those who are willing to do whatever it takes to stay on top, the most powerful people will be those who are willing to do whatever it takes to get power, and everyone else gets crushed in the mad scramble. The fact is we'll always be ruled by corrupt assholes as long as we have competition-based systems, because the best competitors will always be the most ruthless individuals who will do anything to get to the top. Get rid the current assholes and new assholes will necessarily arise to take their place. > > It's easy to say "Those assholes at the top need to go." It's much harder to say "Everything I'm familiar with needs to go." It's a giant leap into the dark of the unknown. But that's the only way we'll ever move toward health, and it's the only way our species will avoid being driven to its doom. > > ? > > > Caitlin Johnstone > @caitoz > Why does China keep aggressively surrounding itself with US military forces? > 3:23 AM ? Jan 31, 2023 > 3,476Likes789Retweets > ? > > Art snobs used to call you unsophisticated if you didn't like and appreciate Abstract Expressionism, then decades later it came out that the CIA had artificially popularized Abstract Expressionism as part of its culture war against the Soviet Union. There's probably a lesson in there somewhere. > > ? > > People are making a major confession when they accuse you of having loyalty to Russia or China for criticizing US foreign policy. They're admitting that for them it's not about truth or facts, but about which government you're loyal to. That's why criticism looks like treason to them. > > "You're repeating Russian talking points" really only ever means "You're criticizing US foreign policy," and they only object to criticism of US foreign policy because on some level they believe it's every westerner's duty to advance the information interests of the US empire. Saying words based not on whether they're true but on what government's interests they serve is just being a propagandist. Someone who accuses you of being a propagandist because you criticized US foreign policy is actually admitting that they view themselves as a propagandist. > > Blind conditioned loyalism is the only thing that can cause someone to meet criticism of the US empire not with the question "Are these words true?" but with a reflexive "Are these words sufficiently loyal to my government and its allies?" That's what's behind those accusations. > > This exceedingly common tendency shows us that we live in a civilization guided primarily not by the search for truth but by blind loyalty to rulers, much the same as it was in feudal times. It shows us that western civilization is not at all what it pretends to be. > > A future humanity that is actually guided by truth and facts will simply weigh claims and criticisms about important matters based on how demonstrably true they are in the light of currently available information, not on whose propaganda interests they serve. > > ? > > Jimmy Dore just had a great antiwar rant on Tucker Carlson where he got the message "China's not our enemy" across to the audience most sorely in need of hearing it, and people are on social media trying to act like that's a bad thing. If a peace advocate goes on Tucker Carlson to promote an important antiwar message because other major outlets like MSNBC and CNN refuse to platform any antiwar voices, the very last person you should be angry at in that equation is the peace advocate. > > > Jimmy Dore > @jimmy_dore > Big Thanks to @TuckerCarlson for letting someone say this on TV. I would love to bring this message to @MSNBC @CNN @NPR @abcnews etc..but they won?t have me. We?re going to have to come together to stop the war machine: > 7:12 AM ? Feb 1, 2023 > 21,594Likes7,516Retweets > If you actually opposed the US empire and its warmongering and nuclear brinkmanship, it would enrage you that liberal outlets refuse to platform people who criticize those things. That would be the focus of your outrage. It would never even occur to you to shriek at Jimmy Dore. If you're angry at Dore for going on Carlson's show instead of at the liberal outlets who refuse to platform antiwar voices, then your real objection isn't to Tucker Carlson, it's to antiwar voices getting a platform. > > ? > > Nobody actually believes western proxy warfare in Ukraine is about saving Ukrainian lives. You don't save lives by ramping up escalations, you save lives by negotiating peace, which would require concessions from the US empire. Empire simps just don't want those concessions to be made. > > The US could easily end this war by respecting Moscow's security concerns and rolling back its war machinery and proxy ops from the region. The US won't do this because it wants to use this proxy war to bleed Russia and facilitate regime change in Moscow. That's all this is. > > ? > > Once you get a penetrating insight into how much of our civilization is comprised of narratives people made up, it changes your view of everything. Politics. Government. The media. Money. The economy. Religion. Culture. Even your very self. Our entire species moves in accordance with made-up stories. > > You might think a clear recognition that our entire society is made of bullshit would be a negative experience, and at first it can be, but what's ultimately understood is something very positive: that if our entire civilization is made up, then we can simply make up something else. Something better. Something that works for all of us. > > And then you notice something even cooler: that humanity is already unpacking this insight on a collective level. Longstanding beliefs about power structures and religion are being abandoned en masse. People are making up their own rules about money, gender, relationships, spirituality, etc. That's what you're seeing in these new ideas about cryptocurrencies, in the younger generations' ideas about gender and sexuality, in rewriting the rules of what relationships, marriages and families are supposed to look like. People are beginning to replace the old narratives with narratives of their own making. > > There's a growing recognition throughout our species that the stories which have been guiding our collective behavior are made up ? usually by the powerful, for the powerful ? and they can simply make up something else. And sure it often looks awkward and messy right now, but it would have to look awkward and messy at first. These are baby steps. > > More and more, humanity is collectively looking at the narratives out of which our society is woven and asking, "Why are we acting like this is true when it's just a made-up story? Would our interests be better served by telling another story? Or dispensing with story altogether?" Which is fascinating, because if you look very deeply within yourself you will come to see that most of your suffering as an individual is the result of the mental narratives you believe, which you can then disentangle yourself from. Humanity is moving toward this same kind of insight on a collective level. > > A healthy human is one who has shifted into a functional relationship with mental narrative where thoughts are experienced as tools to be picked up when they are useful and set down when they are not, instead of being believed and clung to and dominating our lives. A healthy humanity will look much the same. > > __________________ > > Pledge your support > > My work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece please consider sharing it around, following me on Facebook, Twitter, Soundcloud or YouTube, throwing some money into my tip jar on Ko-fi, Patreon or Paypal, or buying an issue of my monthly zine. If you want to read more you can buy my books. The best way to make sure you see the stuff I publish is to subscribe to the mailing list for at my website or on Substack, which will get you an email notification for everything I publish. Everyone, racist platforms excluded, has my permission to republish, use or translate any part of this work (or anything else I?ve written) in any way they like free of charge. For more info on who I am, where I stand, and what I?m trying to do with this platform, click here. All works co-authored with my husband Tim Foley. > > > > Bitcoin donations:1Ac7PCQXoQoLA9Sh8fhAgiU3PHA2EX5Zm2 > > Feature image via Adobe Stock. > Caitlin?s Newsletter is free today. But if you enjoyed this post, you can tell Caitlin?s Newsletter that their writing is valuable by pledging a future subscription. You won't be charged unless they enable payments. > > Pledge your support > > CROSS-POST > > > LIKE > COMMENT > SHARE > > ? 2023 Caitlin Johnstone > 548 Market Street PMB 72296, San Francisco, CA 94104 > Unsubscribe > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From carl at newsfromneptune.com Thu Feb 2 03:48:13 2023 From: carl at newsfromneptune.com (C. G. Estabrook) Date: Wed, 1 Feb 2023 21:48:13 -0600 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: We're Ruled By Assholes Because We Have Asshole Systems: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix References: <487E6186-781C-432D-AA72-483C4FA7A44C@newsfromneptune.com> Message-ID: Sent from my iPhone Begin forwarded message: > From: "C. G. Estabrook" > Date: February 1, 2023 at 9:46:13 PM CST > To: Peace > Subject: Fwd: We're Ruled By Assholes Because We Have Asshole Systems: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix > > ? > > Sent from my iPhone > > Begin forwarded message: > >> From: Caitlin Johnstone from Caitlin?s Newsletter >> Date: February 1, 2023 at 9:13:52 PM CST >> To: cgestabrook at gmail.com >> Subject: We're Ruled By Assholes Because We Have Asshole Systems: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix >> Reply-To: Caitlin Johnstone from Caitlin?s Newsletter >> >> ? >> Open in app or online >> We're Ruled By Assholes Because We Have Asshole Systems: Notes From The Edge Of The Narrative Matrix >> CAITLIN JOHNSTONE >> FEB 2 >> >> >> >> >> >> CROSS-POST >> >> >> Listen to a reading of this article: >> >> >> >> We're Ruled By Assholes Because We Have Asshole Systems by Going Rogue With Caitlin Johnstone >> Going Rogue With Caitlin Johnstone >> Pledge your support >> >> It's funny to think about how all our abusive, oppressive systems are only there because the people who benefit from them are able to keep everyone else too divided and distracted to notice that we vastly outnumber them and could literally just force change to happen anytime we want. >> >> ? >> >> People have a fairly easy time accepting that things are fucked because we are ruled by corrupt assholes. They have a much harder time accepting that we are ruled by corrupt assholes because our corrupt asshole systems will always necessarily elevate corrupt assholes to the top. >> >> It's easier to blame our problems on oligarchs or the Deep State or a cabal of satanic pedophiles than it is to blame them on systems that we ourselves participate in and have lived our entire lives intertwined with and which have been continuously normalized within our culture. If the problem is just a few corrupt assholes then it's not a very daunting problem, because all you have to do is remove those corrupt assholes and everything's golden. If the problem is the systems around which our entire civilization is structured, it's far more daunting. >> >> It's easy to imagine a future without corrupt assholes. It's almost impossible to imagine a future where human behavior is not driven by profit for its own sake, where we have moved from competition-based systems to collaboration-based ones where we all work together for the common good. >> >> In competition-based systems the most powerful governments will always be those who are willing to do whatever it takes to stay on top, the most powerful people will be those who are willing to do whatever it takes to get power, and everyone else gets crushed in the mad scramble. The fact is we'll always be ruled by corrupt assholes as long as we have competition-based systems, because the best competitors will always be the most ruthless individuals who will do anything to get to the top. Get rid the current assholes and new assholes will necessarily arise to take their place. >> >> It's easy to say "Those assholes at the top need to go." It's much harder to say "Everything I'm familiar with needs to go." It's a giant leap into the dark of the unknown. But that's the only way we'll ever move toward health, and it's the only way our species will avoid being driven to its doom. >> >> ? >> >> >> Caitlin Johnstone >> @caitoz >> Why does China keep aggressively surrounding itself with US military forces? >> >> 3:23 AM ? Jan 31, 2023 >> 3,476Likes789Retweets >> ? >> >> Art snobs used to call you unsophisticated if you didn't like and appreciate Abstract Expressionism, then decades later it came out that the CIA had artificially popularized Abstract Expressionism as part of its culture war against the Soviet Union. There's probably a lesson in there somewhere. >> >> ? >> >> People are making a major confession when they accuse you of having loyalty to Russia or China for criticizing US foreign policy. They're admitting that for them it's not about truth or facts, but about which government you're loyal to. That's why criticism looks like treason to them. >> >> "You're repeating Russian talking points" really only ever means "You're criticizing US foreign policy," and they only object to criticism of US foreign policy because on some level they believe it's every westerner's duty to advance the information interests of the US empire. Saying words based not on whether they're true but on what government's interests they serve is just being a propagandist. Someone who accuses you of being a propagandist because you criticized US foreign policy is actually admitting that they view themselves as a propagandist. >> >> Blind conditioned loyalism is the only thing that can cause someone to meet criticism of the US empire not with the question "Are these words true?" but with a reflexive "Are these words sufficiently loyal to my government and its allies?" That's what's behind those accusations. >> >> This exceedingly common tendency shows us that we live in a civilization guided primarily not by the search for truth but by blind loyalty to rulers, much the same as it was in feudal times. It shows us that western civilization is not at all what it pretends to be. >> >> A future humanity that is actually guided by truth and facts will simply weigh claims and criticisms about important matters based on how demonstrably true they are in the light of currently available information, not on whose propaganda interests they serve. >> >> ? >> >> Jimmy Dore just had a great antiwar rant on Tucker Carlson where he got the message "China's not our enemy" across to the audience most sorely in need of hearing it, and people are on social media trying to act like that's a bad thing. If a peace advocate goes on Tucker Carlson to promote an important antiwar message because other major outlets like MSNBC and CNN refuse to platform any antiwar voices, the very last person you should be angry at in that equation is the peace advocate. >> >> >> Jimmy Dore >> @jimmy_dore >> Big Thanks to @TuckerCarlson for letting someone say this on TV. I would love to bring this message to @MSNBC @CNN @NPR @abcnews etc..but they won?t have me. We?re going to have to come together to stop the war machine: >> >> 7:12 AM ? Feb 1, 2023 >> 21,594Likes7,516Retweets >> If you actually opposed the US empire and its warmongering and nuclear brinkmanship, it would enrage you that liberal outlets refuse to platform people who criticize those things. That would be the focus of your outrage. It would never even occur to you to shriek at Jimmy Dore. If you're angry at Dore for going on Carlson's show instead of at the liberal outlets who refuse to platform antiwar voices, then your real objection isn't to Tucker Carlson, it's to antiwar voices getting a platform. >> >> ? >> >> Nobody actually believes western proxy warfare in Ukraine is about saving Ukrainian lives. You don't save lives by ramping up escalations, you save lives by negotiating peace, which would require concessions from the US empire. Empire simps just don't want those concessions to be made. >> >> The US could easily end this war by respecting Moscow's security concerns and rolling back its war machinery and proxy ops from the region. The US won't do this because it wants to use this proxy war to bleed Russia and facilitate regime change in Moscow. That's all this is. >> >> ? >> >> Once you get a penetrating insight into how much of our civilization is comprised of narratives people made up, it changes your view of everything. Politics. Government. The media. Money. The economy. Religion. Culture. Even your very self. Our entire species moves in accordance with made-up stories. >> >> You might think a clear recognition that our entire society is made of bullshit would be a negative experience, and at first it can be, but what's ultimately understood is something very positive: that if our entire civilization is made up, then we can simply make up something else. Something better. Something that works for all of us. >> >> And then you notice something even cooler: that humanity is already unpacking this insight on a collective level. Longstanding beliefs about power structures and religion are being abandoned en masse. People are making up their own rules about money, gender, relationships, spirituality, etc. That's what you're seeing in these new ideas about cryptocurrencies, in the younger generations' ideas about gender and sexuality, in rewriting the rules of what relationships, marriages and families are supposed to look like. People are beginning to replace the old narratives with narratives of their own making. >> >> There's a growing recognition throughout our species that the stories which have been guiding our collective behavior are made up ? usually by the powerful, for the powerful ? and they can simply make up something else. And sure it often looks awkward and messy right now, but it would have to look awkward and messy at first. These are baby steps. >> >> More and more, humanity is collectively looking at the narratives out of which our society is woven and asking, "Why are we acting like this is true when it's just a made-up story? Would our interests be better served by telling another story? Or dispensing with story altogether?" Which is fascinating, because if you look very deeply within yourself you will come to see that most of your suffering as an individual is the result of the mental narratives you believe, which you can then disentangle yourself from. Humanity is moving toward this same kind of insight on a collective level. >> >> A healthy human is one who has shifted into a functional relationship with mental narrative where thoughts are experienced as tools to be picked up when they are useful and set down when they are not, instead of being believed and clung to and dominating our lives. A healthy humanity will look much the same. >> >> __________________ >> >> Pledge your support >> >> My work is entirely reader-supported, so if you enjoyed this piece please consider sharing it around, following me on Facebook, Twitter, Soundcloud or YouTube, throwing some money into my tip jar on Ko-fi, Patreon or Paypal, or buying an issue of my monthly zine. If you want to read more you can buy my books. The best way to make sure you see the stuff I publish is to subscribe to the mailing list for at my website or on Substack, which will get you an email notification for everything I publish. Everyone, racist platforms excluded, has my permission to republish, use or translate any part of this work (or anything else I?ve written) in any way they like free of charge. For more info on who I am, where I stand, and what I?m trying to do with this platform, click here. All works co-authored with my husband Tim Foley. >> >> >> >> Bitcoin donations:1Ac7PCQXoQoLA9Sh8fhAgiU3PHA2EX5Zm2 >> >> Feature image via Adobe Stock. >> Caitlin?s Newsletter is free today. But if you enjoyed this post, you can tell Caitlin?s Newsletter that their writing is valuable by pledging a future subscription. You won't be charged unless they enable payments. >> >> Pledge your support >> >> CROSS-POST >> >> >> LIKE >> COMMENT >> SHARE >> >> ? 2023 Caitlin Johnstone >> 548 Market Street PMB 72296, San Francisco, CA 94104 >> Unsubscribe >> -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From carl at newsfromneptune.com Sun Feb 5 23:34:23 2023 From: carl at newsfromneptune.com (C. G. Estabrook) Date: Sun, 5 Feb 2023 17:34:23 -0600 Subject: [Peace] a-panicked-empire-tries-to-make-russia-an-offer-it-cant-refuse Message-ID: https://thecradle.co/article-view/20878/a-panicked-empire-tries-to-make-russia-an-offer-it-cant-refuse From carl at newsfromneptune.com Sun Feb 12 19:20:05 2023 From: carl at newsfromneptune.com (C. G. Estabrook) Date: Sun, 12 Feb 2023 13:20:05 -0600 Subject: [Peace] Realistic assessment of US proxy war against Russia Message-ID: <6E3B2FCB-4D7D-4963-B591-29241848EE87@newsfromneptune.com> https://www.theamericanconservative.com/this-time-its-different/ From carl at newsfromneptune.com Mon Feb 13 05:17:18 2023 From: carl at newsfromneptune.com (C. G. Estabrook) Date: Sun, 12 Feb 2023 23:17:18 -0600 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: [New post] Chris Hedges: There Are No Permanent Allies, Only Permanent Power References: <174340743.34873.0@wordpress.com> Message-ID: <8507EB22-354B-4C1A-8A15-47F0DECC64E1@newsfromneptune.com> Sent from my iPhone Begin forwarded message: > From: "scheerpost.com" > Date: February 12, 2023 at 11:14:36 PM CST > To: carl at newsfromneptune.com > Subject: [New post] Chris Hedges: There Are No Permanent Allies, Only Permanent Power > > ? > scheerpost.com > Chris Hedges: There Are No Permanent Allies, Only Permanent Power > Editor > Feb 12 > > Give Enough Rope - by Mr. Fish > By Chris Hedges / Original to ScheerPost > > On Sunday, February 19, I will be at the Lincoln Memorial in Washington at noon to speak at the anti-war rally, Rage Against the War Machine. There, I will be joined by Jimmy Dore, Dennis Kucinich, Ann Wright, Jill Stein, Max Blumenthal, Cynthia McKinney, Anya Parampil, David Swanson and other left-wing, anti-war activists I have shared platforms with for many years. I will also be joined by Ron Paul, Scott Horton and right-libertarian, anti-war figures whose political and cultural opinions I often disagree with. The inclusion of the right-wing has seen anti-war groups I respect, such as Veterans for Peace (VFP), refuse to join the rally. VFP issued a statement sent to me on Friday saying that ?to endorse this event would have caused a huge disruption in VFP and had little effect on the outcome of the demonstration.? The board of Code Pink asked its co-founder, Medea Benjamin, one of the nation?s most important and effective left-wing and anti-war activists, to cancel her scheduled talk at the rally. > > ?The left has become largely irrelevant in the U.S. because it is incapable of working with the right,? said Nick Brana, chair of The People?s Party, which organized the rally with libertarians. ?It clings to identity politics over jobs, health care, wages and war, and condemns half the country as deplorables.? > > We will not topple corporate power and the war machine alone. There has to be a left-right coalition, which will include people whose opinions are not only unpalatable but even repugnant, or we will remain marginalized and ineffectual. This is a fact of political life. Alliances are built around particular issues, in this case permanent war, which often fall apart when confronting other concerns. If I had organized the rally, there are some speakers I would not have invited. But I didn?t. This does not mean that there are no red lines: I would not join a protest that included neo-Nazi groups such as Aryan Nations or militias such as The Proud Boys or Oath Keepers. > > My father, a Presbyterian minister who was an army sergeant in North Africa during World War II, was a member of Concerned Clergy and Laity About Vietnam, an anti-war group that included the radical Catholic priests Philip and Daniel Berrigan. He took me with other clergy, almost all veterans, to anti-war rallies. There was much in the anti-war movement that he and other members of the religious group opposed, from the Yippies ? who put forward a 145-pound pig named Pigasus the Immortal as a presidential candidate in 1968 ? to groups such as the Weather Underground that embraced violence. He and the other clergy disliked the widespread drug use and propensity of some protestors to insult and bait the police. They had little in common with the Maoists, Stalinists, Leninists and Trotskyites within the movement. Daniel Berrigan, one of the most important anti-war activists in American history who was constantly in and out of jail and spent two years in federal prison, opposed abortion ? a stance that today would probably see him deplatformed by many on the left. These clergy understood that the masters of war were their real enemies. They understood that the success of the anti-war movement meant forming alliances with people whose ideologies and beliefs were far removed from their pacifism, abstemious lifestyles and Christian faith. When I was about 12, my father told me that if the war was still going on when I turned 18 and I was drafted, he would go to prison with me. The jolt of that promise has remained with me my entire life. > > Support our Independent Journalism ? Donate Today! > > SUBSCRIBE TO PATREON DONATE ON PAYPAL > The demands of the Rage Against the War Machine rally are ones I share. They include Not One More Penny for War in Ukraine; Negotiate Peace; Stop the War Inflation; Disband NATO; Global Nuclear De-Escalation; Slash the Pentagon Budget; Abolish the CIA and Military Industrial Deep State; Abolish War and Empire; Restore Civil Liberties; and Free Julian Assange. > > I know war. I spent two decades reporting on conflicts all over the globe, including many months in Gaza, the world?s largest open-air prison, containing two million people including over a million children. I saw thousands of lives destroyed by United States military adventurism in Central America, Africa and the Middle East. Dozens of people I knew and worked with, including Kurt Schork, a Reuters reporter, and the Spanish cameraman Miguel Gil Moreno de Mora, died violent deaths. > > We must halt the decades of rampant and futile industrial killing. This includes ending the proxy war in Ukraine. It includes drastic cuts to the funding of the U.S. war machine, a state within a state. It includes disbanding NATO, which was established to prevent Soviet expansion into Eastern and Central Europe, not wage war around the globe. If Western promises to Moscow not to expand NATO beyond the borders of a unified Germany had been kept, I expect the Ukrainian war would have never happened. > > To those who suffer directly from U.S. aggression, these demands are not academic and theoretical issues. The victims of this militarism do not have the luxury of virtue-signaling. They want the rule of law to be reinstated and the slaughter stopped. So do I. They welcome any ally who opposes endless war. For them, it is a matter of life or death. If some of those on the right are anti-war, if they also want to free Julian Assange, it makes no sense to ignore them. These are urgent existential issues that, if we do not mobilize soon, could see us slip into a direct confrontation with Russia, and perhaps China, which could lead to nuclear war. > > The Democratic Party, along with most of the Republican Party, is captive to the militarists. Each year, Congress increases the budget for the war industry, including for fiscal year 2023. It approved $847 billion for the military ? a total that is boosted to $858 billion when accounts that don?t fall under the Armed Services committees? jurisdiction are included. The Democrats, including nearly all 100 members of the House Congressional Progressive Caucus, and Republicans slavishly hand the Pentagon everything it demands. > > The rally on February 19 is not about eliminating Social Security and Medicare or abolishing the minimum wage, which many libertarians propose. It is not a rally to denounce the rights of the LGBTQ community, which has been attacked by at least one of the speakers. It is a rally to end permanent war. Should these right-wing participants organize around those other issues, I will be on the other side of the barricades. > > ?I supported the Rage Against the War Machine Rally from the time of its conception and I support it today, even though I will not be one of the speakers because the organization I have been associated with for 20 years, CODEPINK, urged me not to speak,? Medea Benjamin told me in an email. ?The CODEPINK staff felt that my participation would hurt the group's standing with other coalitions committed to gay rights, women's rights and anti-racism. They felt that Jackson Hinkle has taken stands that are anti-gay, anti-trans, anti-feminist and Islamophobic, and they were concerned about the sponsorship of the Libertarian Party?s Mises Caucus which, according to the Southern Poverty Law Center, has ties to white nationalists.? > > ?So why do I support the rally?? she asked. ?Because I am heartbroken by a war that is causing such death and destruction in Ukraine. Because I have real fears that this war could lead us into World War III or a nuclear confrontation. Because both political parties are complicit in giving over $100 billion to Ukraine to keep this war going. Because the Biden administration is pushing this war to weaken Russia instead of promoting solutions. Because we urgently need as many voices as possible, from a broad variety of perspectives, to speak out so we can be much more effective at pressuring Congress and the White House to move this conflict from the bloody battlefield to the negotiating table. The future of our world stands in the balance.? > > Benjamin said although she will not speak, she will be at the rally ?cheering on the speakers? and is planning a lobby day two days later, on February 21, for those who want to take their anti-war message directly to the offices of Congress. You can register for the lobby day here. > > Ralph Nader, who has just founded the Capitol Hill Citizen, a newspaper focused on Congress, has long advocated a left-right coalition as the only effective mechanism to push back against corporate power. He argues that those on the left who refuse to join left-right alliances are engaging in ?self-immolation.? This refusal, he says, fosters political paralysis, not unlike the paralysis in the face of Senator Joseph McCarthy?s witch hunts in the 1950s against supposed Communists. Although many loathed McCarthy, the Republican establishment refused to join forces with the liberals and Democrats to end the smearing, blacklisting and imprisonment of dissidents. The left-right coalition is especially important if we are to rebuild labor unions, Nader points out, the only mechanism capable of crippling the ruling oligarchy. If we cannot reach across ideological divides, we will slit our own throats. > > ?A left-right alliance on issue after issue, whether it?s on a living wage, ending endless wars of aggression by the United States; whether it?s striking down hard on corporate crime, fraud and abuse; whether it?s universal health insurance is an unbeatable movement,? Nader told me when I reached him by phone. ?Just think of a senator receiving ten constituents from back home and five are liberals and five are conservatives. How is a senator going to game them? How is a senator going to sugarcoat them? It?s very difficult. Any time there is a left-right alliance, as in the enactment over 30 years ago of the Federal False Claims Act to go after corporate fraud in government programs and contracts, it?s an unbeatable combination.? > > Sponsored by leading Republicans and Democrats, the False Claims Act amendments of 1986 have been used by the federal government to recover more than $62 billion of fraud and mismanagement funds stolen by corporations with government contracts. > > ?If you want to prevail on Congress to fulfill its duties under the Constitution and never engage in wars or become co-belligerents without a declaration of war by Congress ? the last war that was declared by Congress was World War II, and we?ve engaged in many wars since then and are continuing to do so ? you must have a left-right coalition,? Nader said. Because there is no coalition in Congress, both Republicans and Democrats are war parties. They support a Pentagon budget that gives the generals more than they ask for. They have done this for almost eight years, most recently giving the Pentagon $48 billion more than the generals and President Biden requested, instead of giving that money for public health to prevent pandemics, death, injury and disease.? > > Those who will pay the steepest price for this paralysis are those killed, wounded and displaced by the war machine, including the over 900,000 civilians killed directly, and millions more indirectly, as a result in the post-9/11 U.S. wars in Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Syria, Libya, Somalia and Pakistan. But the left, mesmerized by a self-defeating boutique activism, also pays a price. As the empire unravels, the woke left, demanding moral absolutism, marginalizes and discredits itself at a moment of crisis. This myopia is a gift to the oligarchs, militarists and Christian fascists we must defeat. > > NOTE TO SCHEERPOST READERS FROM CHRIS HEDGES: There is now no way left for me to continue to write a weekly column for ScheerPost and produce my weekly television show without your help. The walls are closing in, with startling rapidity, on independent journalism, with the elites, including the Democratic Party elites, clamoring for more and more censorship. Bob Scheer, who runs ScheerPost on a shoestring budget, and I will not waver in our commitment to independent and honest journalism, and we will never put ScheerPost behind a paywall, charge a subscription for it, sell your data or accept advertising. Please, if you can, sign up at chrishedges.substack.com so I can continue to post my now weekly Monday column on ScheerPost and produce my weekly television show, The Chris Hedges Report. > > Subscribe to our weekly newsletter > > * indicates required > Email Address * > > > > > > Chris Hedges > Chris Hedges is a Pulitzer Prize?winning journalist who was a foreign correspondent for fifteen years for The New York Times, where he served as the Middle East Bureau Chief and Balkan Bureau Chief for the paper. He previously worked overseas for The Dallas Morning News, The Christian Science Monitor, and NPR. He is the host of show The Chris Hedges Report. > > Author Site > Comment > Unsubscribe to no longer receive posts from scheerpost.com. > Change your email settings at manage subscriptions. > Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: > https://scheerpost.com/2023/02/12/chris-hedges-there-are-no-permanent-allies-only-permanent-power/ > Powered by WordPress.com > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From carl at newsfromneptune.com Mon Feb 27 03:07:00 2023 From: carl at newsfromneptune.com (C. G. Estabrook) Date: Sun, 26 Feb 2023 21:07:00 -0600 Subject: [Peace] How US and Ukraine's far-right made pro-peace Zelensky a 'no peace' president Message-ID: https://open.substack.com/pub/mate/p/how-us-and-ukraines-far-right-made?r=692a&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web From carl at newsfromneptune.com Mon Feb 27 03:12:16 2023 From: carl at newsfromneptune.com (C. G. Estabrook) Date: Sun, 26 Feb 2023 21:12:16 -0600 Subject: [Peace] How US and Ukraine's far-right made pro-peace Zelensky a 'no peace' president Message-ID: https://open.substack.com/pub/mate/p/how-us-and-ukraines-far-right-made?r=692a&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web From carl at newsfromneptune.com Mon Feb 27 05:33:41 2023 From: carl at newsfromneptune.com (C. G. Estabrook) Date: Sun, 26 Feb 2023 23:33:41 -0600 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: [New post] Chris Hedges: The Trump-Russia Saga and the Death Spiral of American Journalism References: <174340743.35828.0@wordpress.com> Message-ID: <52A718B5-3253-409B-8D73-B9B221F18A2B@newsfromneptune.com> Sent from my iPhone Begin forwarded message: > From: "scheerpost.com" > Date: February 26, 2023 at 11:02:25 PM CST > To: carl at newsfromneptune.com > Subject: [New post] Chris Hedges: The Trump-Russia Saga and the Death Spiral of American Journalism > > ? > scheerpost.com > Chris Hedges: The Trump-Russia Saga and the Death Spiral of American Journalism > Editor > Feb 26 > > De-Pressed - Mr. Fish > By Chris Hedges / Original to ScheerPost > > Reporters make mistakes. It is the nature of the trade. There are always a few stories we wish were reported more carefully. Writing on deadline with often only a few hours before publication is an imperfect art. But when mistakes occur, they must be acknowledged and publicized. To cover them up, to pretend they did not happen, destroys our credibility. Once this credibility is gone, the press becomes nothing more than an echo chamber for a selected demographic. This, unfortunately, is the model that now defines the commerical media. > > The failure to report accurately on the Trump-Russia saga for the four years of the Trump presidency is bad enough. What is worse, major media organizations, which produced thousands of stories and reports that were false, refuse to engage in a serious postmortem. The systematic failure was so egregious and widespread that it casts a very troubling shadow over the press. How do CNN, ABC, NBC, CBS, MSNBC, The Washington Post, The New York Times and Mother Jones admit that for four years they reported salacious, unverified gossip as fact? How do they level with viewers and readers that the most basic rules of journalism were ignored to participate in a witch hunt, a virulent New McCarthyism? How do they explain to the public that their hatred for Trump led them to accuse him, for years, of activities and crimes he did not commit? How do they justify their current lack of transparency and dishonesty? It is not a pretty confession, which is why it won?t happen. The U.S. media has the lowest credibility ? 26 percent ? among 46 nations, according to a 2022 report from the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. And with good reason. > > The commercial model of journalism has changed from when I began working as a reporter, covering conflicts in Central America in the early 1980s. In those days, there were a few large media outlets that sought to reach a broad public. I do not want to romanticize the old press. Those who reported stories that challenged the dominant narrative were targets, not only of the U.S. government but also of the hierarchies within news organizations such as The New York Times. Ray Bonner, for example, was reprimanded by the editors at The New York Times when he exposed egregious human rights violations committed by the El Salvadoran government, which the Reagan administration funded and armed. He quit shortly after being transferred to a dead-end job at the financial desk. Sydney Schanberg won a Pulitzer Prize for his reporting in Cambodia on the Khmer Rouge, which was the basis for the film ?The Killing Fields.? He was subsequently appointed metropolitan editor at The New York Times where he assigned reporters to cover the homeless, the poor and those being driven from their homes and apartments by Manhattan real estate developers. The paper?s Executive Editor, Abe Rosenthal, Schanberg told me, derisively referred to him as his ?resident commie.? He terminated Schanberg?s twice-weekly column and forced him out. I saw my career at the paper end when I publicly criticized the invasion of Iraq. The career-killing campaigns against those who reported controversial stories or expressed controversial opinions was not lost on other reporters and editors who, to protect themselves, practiced self-censorship. > > Support our Independent Journalism ? Donate Today! > > SUBSCRIBE TO PATREON DONATE ON PAYPAL > But the old media, because it sought to reach a broad public, reported on events and issues that did not please all of its readers. It left a lot out, to be sure. It gave too much credibility to officialdom, but, as Schanberg told me, the old model of news arguably kept ?the swamp from getting any deeper, from rising higher.? > > The advent of digital media and the compartmentalizing of the public into antagonistic demographics has destroyed the traditional model of commercial journalism. Devastated by a loss of advertising revenue and a steep decline in viewers and readers, the commercial media has a vested interest in catering to those who remain. The approximately three and a half million digital news subscribers The New York Times gained during the Trump presidency were, internal surveys found, overwhelmingly anti-Trump. A feedback loop began where the paper fed its digital subscribers what they wanted to hear. Digital subscribers, it turns out, are also very thin-skinned. > > ?If the paper reported something that could be interpreted as supportive of Trump or not sufficiently critical of Trump,? Jeff Gerth, an investigative journalist who spent many years at The New York Times recently told me, they would sometimes ?drop their subscription or go on social media and complain about it.? > > Giving subscribers what they want makes commercial sense. However, it is not journalism. > > News organizations, whose future is digital, have at the same time filled newsrooms with those who are tech-savvy and able to attract followers on social media, even if they lack reportorial skills. Margaret Coker, the bureau chief for The New York Times in Baghdad, was fired by the newspaper?s editors in 2018, after management claimed she was responsible for its star terrorism reporter, Rukmini Callimachi, being barred from re-entering Iraq, a charge Coker consistently denied. It was well known, however, by many at the paper, that Coker filed a number of complaints about Callimachi?s work and considered Callimachi to be untrustworthy. The paper would later have to retract a highly acclaimed 12-part podcast, ?Caliphate,? hosted by Callimachi in 2018, because it was based on the testimony of an imposter. ??Caliphate? represents the modern New York Times,? Sam Dolnick, an assistant managing editor,said in announcing the launch of the podcast. The statement proved true, although in a way Dolnick probably did not anticipate. > > Gerth, a Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative reporter who worked at The New York Times from 1976 until 2005, spent the last two years writing an exhaustive look at the systemic failure of the press during the Trump-Russia story, authoring a four-part series of 24,000 words that has been published by The Columbia Journalism Review. It is an important, if depressing, read. News organizations repeatedly seized on any story, he documents, no matter how unverified, to discredit Trump and routinely ignored reports that cast doubt on the rumors they presented as fact. You can see my interview with Gerth here. > > The New York Times, for example, in January 2018, ignored a publicly available document showing that the FBI?s lead investigator, after a ten month inquiry, did not find evidence of collusion between Trump and Moscow. The lie of omission was combined with reliance on sources that peddled fictions designed to cater to Trump-haters, as well as a failure to interview those being accused of collaborating with Russia. > > The Washington Post and NPR reported, incorrectly, that Trump had weakened the GOP?s stance on Ukraine in the party platform because he opposed language calling for arming Ukraine with so-called ?lethal defensive weapons? ? a position identicalto that of his predecessor President Barack Obama. These outlets ignored the platform?s support for sanctions against Russia as well its call for ?appropriate assistance to the armed forces of Ukraine and greater coordination with NATO defense planning.? News organizations amplified this charge. In a New York Times column that called Trump the ?Siberian candidate,? Paul Krugman wrote that the platform was ?watered down to blandness? by the Republican president. Jeffrey Goldberg, editor of The Atlantic, described Trump as a ?de facto agent? of Vladimir Putin. Those who tried to call out this shoddy reporting, including Russian-American journalist and Putin critic Masha Gessen were ignored. > > After Trump?s first meeting as president with Putin, he was attacked as if the meeting itself proved he was a Russian stooge. Then New York Times columnist Roger Cohen wrote of the ?disgusting spectacle of the American president kowtowing in Helsinki to Vladimir Putin.? Rachel Maddow, MSNBC?s most popular host, said that the meeting between Trump and Putin validated her covering the Trump-Russia allegations ?more than anyone else in the national press? and strongly implied ? and her show?s Twitteraccount and YouTube page explicitly stated ? that Americans were now ?coming to grips with a worst-case scenario that the U.S. president is compromised by a hostile foreign power.? > > The anti-Trump reporting, Gerth notes, hid behind the wall of anonymous sources, frequently identified as ?people (or person) familiar with? ? The New York Times used it over a thousand times in stories involving Trump and Russia, between October 2016 and the end of his presidency, Gerth found. Any rumor or smear was picked up in the news cycle with the sources often unidentified and the information unverified. > > A routine soon took shape in the Trump-Russia saga. ?First, a federal agency like the CIA or FBI secretly briefs Congress,? Gerth writes. ?Then Democrats or Republicans selectively leak snippets. Finally, the story comes out, using vague attribution.? These cherry-picked pieces of information largely distorted the conclusions of the briefings. > > The reports that Trump was a Russian asset began with the so-called Steele dossier, financed at first by Republican opponents of Trump and later by Hillary Clinton?s campaign. The charges in the dossier ? which included reports of Trump receiving a ?golden shower? from prostituted women in a Moscow hotel room and claims that Trump and the Kremlin had ties going back five years ? were discredited by the FBI. > > ?Bob Woodward, appearing on Fox News, called the dossier a ?garbage document? that ?never should have? been part of an intelligence briefing,? Gerth writes in his report. ?He later told me that the Post wasn?t interested in his harsh criticism of the dossier. After his remarks on Fox, Woodward said he ?reached out to people who covered this? at the paper, identifying them only generically as ?reporters,? to explain why he was so critical. Asked how they reacted, Woodward said: ?To be honest, there was a lack of curiosity on the part of the people at the Post about what I had said, why I said this, and I accepted that and I didn?t force it on anyone.?? > > Other reporters who exposed the fabrications ? Glenn Greenwald at The Intercept, Matt Taibbi at Rolling Stone and Aaron Mate at The Nation ? ran afoul of their news organizations and now work as independent journalists. > > The New York Times and The Washington Post shared Pulitzer Prizes in 2019 for their reporting on ?Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election and its connection to the Trump campaign, the President-elect?s transition team and his eventual administration.? > > The silence by news organizations that for years perpetuated this fraud is ominous. It cements into place a new media model, one without credibility or accountability. The handful of reporters who have responded to Gerth?s investigative piece, such as David Corn at Mother Jones, have doubled down on the old lies, as if the mountain of evidence discrediting their reporting, most of it coming from the FBI and the Mueller Report, does not exist. > > Once fact becomes interchangeable with opinion, once truth is irrelevant, once people are told only what they wish to hear, journalism ceases to be journalism and becomes propaganda. > > NOTE TO SCHEERPOST READERS FROM CHRIS HEDGES: There is now no way left for me to continue to write a weekly column for ScheerPost and produce my weekly television show without your help. The walls are closing in, with startling rapidity, on independent journalism, with the elites, including the Democratic Party elites, clamoring for more and more censorship. Bob Scheer, who runs ScheerPost on a shoestring budget, and I will not waver in our commitment to independent and honest journalism, and we will never put ScheerPost behind a paywall, charge a subscription for it, sell your data or accept advertising. Please, if you can, sign up at chrishedges.substack.com so I can continue to post my now weekly Monday column on ScheerPost and produce my weekly television show, The Chris Hedges Report. > > Subscribe to our weekly newsletter > > * indicates required > Email Address * > > > > > > Chris Hedges > Chris Hedges is a Pulitzer Prize?winning journalist who was a foreign correspondent for fifteen years for The New York Times, where he served as the Middle East Bureau Chief and Balkan Bureau Chief for the paper. He previously worked overseas for The Dallas Morning News, The Christian Science Monitor, and NPR. He is the host of show The Chris Hedges Report. > > Author Site > Comment > Unsubscribe to no longer receive posts from scheerpost.com. > Change your email settings at manage subscriptions. > Trouble clicking? Copy and paste this URL into your browser: > https://scheerpost.com/2023/02/26/chris-hedges-the-trump-russia-saga-and-the-death-spiral-of-american-journalism/ > Powered by WordPress.com > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From carl at newsfromneptune.com Mon Feb 27 05:40:56 2023 From: carl at newsfromneptune.com (C. G. Estabrook) Date: Sun, 26 Feb 2023 23:40:56 -0600 Subject: [Peace] Fwd: How US and Ukraine's far-right made pro-peace Zelensky a 'no peace' president References: <20230226181758.3.d773da8ce1daa1e5@mg-d0.substack.com> Message-ID: Sent from my iPhone Begin forwarded message: > From: Aaron Mat? from Aaron Mate > Date: February 26, 2023 at 12:18:49 PM CST > To: galliher at illinois.edu > Subject: How US and Ukraine's far-right made pro-peace Zelensky a 'no peace' president > Reply-To: Aaron Mat? from Aaron Mate > > ? > Open in app or online > This is a preview of a post for paid subscribers. > How US and Ukraine's far-right made pro-peace Zelensky a 'no peace' president > Elected in 2019 to bring peace to Ukraine, a Zelensky aide now declares that "there is no peace with Russia, and Ukraine must arm itself to the teeth." > AARON MAT? > FEB 26 > ? > PREVIEW > > > > > > SAVE > > > (Photo by STR/NurPhoto via Getty Images) > Volodymyr Zelensky marked the one-year anniversary of Russia?s invasion of Ukraine by rejecting any negotiations with the Kremlin. > > ?There is nothing to talk about and nobody to talk about over there,? Zelensky declared. > > The Ukrainian President delivered the message just two weeks after his French and German counterparts urged him, at a meeting in Paris, ?to start considering peace talks with Moscow,? the Wall Street Journal reports. > > But as an adviser explained to the New York Times, Zelensky is now ?more at peace with himself,? and therefore has no need to entertain the possibility of peace with his neighbor. > > ?He has a clear understanding what Ukraine should do,? the adviser said. ?There is no ambiguity: There is no peace with Russia, and Ukraine must arm itself to the teeth.? > > Zelensky?s ?clear understanding? of the need to reject peace with Russia and turn his country into a NATO arms depot is a resounding victory for the Ukrainian far-right and its US government allies. As I wrote here last year, these two powerful forces, aligned by their converging interests in prolonging the post-2014 war in Ukraine?s Donbas region, sabotaged the peace platform that Zelensky was elected on in April 2019. As Adam Schiff put it, the US has used Ukraine?s civil war ?so that we can fight Russia over there, and we don't have to fight Russia here.? > > The commemoration of the first anniversary of Russia?s cross-border invasion to end Schiff?s bipartisan ?fight? has yielded more insight into how the US, in concert with its ideological allies in Ukraine?s powerful far-right, helped convert Zelensky from pro-peace candidate to ?no peace? president... > Keep reading with a 7-day free trial > Subscribe to Aaron Mate to keep reading this post and get 7 days of free access to the full post archives. > > Start trial > A subscription gets you: > > Subscriber-only posts and full archive > Post comments and join the community > > LIKE > COMMENT > SHARE > > Read Aaron Mate in the app > Listen to posts, join subscriber chats, and never miss an update from Aaron Mat?. > > ? 2023 Aaron Mat? > 548 Market Street PMB 72296, San Francisco, CA 94104 > Unsubscribe > -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: From carl at newsfromneptune.com Tue Feb 28 23:43:50 2023 From: carl at newsfromneptune.com (C. G. Estabrook) Date: Tue, 28 Feb 2023 17:43:50 -0600 Subject: [Peace] How US and Ukraine's far-right made pro-peace Zelensky a 'no peace' president Message-ID: <040275E2-0E27-480A-83F5-C523BD8EDD49@newsfromneptune.com> https://open.substack.com/pub/mate/p/how-us-and-ukraines-far-right-made