When reading wild propaganda about Canada’s role in Haiti I often wonder if the reporter is a sycophant or whether they’ve been duped.
With the Caribbean nation set to hold its most credible presidential election in sixteen years Ottawa announced it was withdrawing support for the October 9 poll. The Trudeau government’s decision to follow Washington in seeking to undermine the election was confirmed in an anti-Haitian screed titled “Canada showing Haiti some tough love”. In it CBC reporter Evan Dyer ignores …
As the Syrian Arab Army dug in for a fight against the self-declared Islamic State on September 17, they were struck by an air raid that killed 62 soldiers and injured 100 more. The culprit was a foreign military that has never been attacked by, and has not declared war on, Syria. Two weeks later, that same nation’s military killed 22 soldiers in a strike inside Somalia, another country which it had never been attacked by nor declared war on. The very next day the New York Times published a stinging editorial decrying flagrant violations of international law …
“To me, freedom of speech is something that represents the very dignity of what a human being is… that’s what marks us off from the stones and stars.” These are words spoken by Mario Savio, the spokesperson for the Free Speech Movement in the 60’s. Decades later, the power of free speech has surged onto the global stage and began reclaiming the dignity of humanity.
We are now entering WikiLeaks 10 year anniversary. The organization registered their domain on October 4, 2006 and blazed into the public limelight in the spring of 2010 with the publication of Collateral …
In my recent article “The Climate Religion”, I argued that “climate change”, the widespread belief that atmospheric CO2 controls climate and climate events, satisfies the defining criteria of a state religion. Professor Paul Brown responded to my article in his article entitled “The Religion of Climate Change Denial”. This is my reply to Professor Brown.
Professor Brown is silent on my argument that climate change science and policy serve global financiers and US-dominated geopolitics. He prefers a sanitized argument essentially limited to a pronouncement that “most scientists…”. Fine, let us examine the scientific question.
There is a hypocritical disconnect in Western and especially U.S. foreign policy. When it comes to Israel, the US is quick to claim “Israel has a right to defend itself”. For Syria, that same right does not seem to exist.
Is Israel Defending Itself or Defending Occupation/Apartheid?
When Israel executed intense bombing campaigns against Gaza in 2008, 2012 and 2014 the US justified the attacks. At the United Nations on 18 July 2014, US Ambassador Samantha Power said:
President Obama spoke with Prime Minister Netanyahu this morning to reaffirm the United States’ strong support for Israel’s right to defend itself…. Hamas’ …
On 29 April, 2016, Syria Solidarity Movement member Vanesa Beeley placed the following petition on Change.org. On or about 27 September, Change.org removed the petition, citing “violation of community standards”. What community standards? Judge for yourself.
Do Not Give the Nobel Peace Price 2016 to the Syrian White Helmets
To do so would prolong the suffering of the Syrian people and reward the White Helmets for being US and UK Government funded and trained agents of “regime change” in Syria.
The White Helmets have received over $40 million in funding from the US Government [USAID] and the UK Foreign Office despite their claims of …
“Russia suspected of election scheme. U.S. probes plan to sow voter distrust.”
That’s the Washington Post page-one lead headline of September 6. Think about it. The election that Americans are suffering through, cringing in embarrassment, making them think of moving abroad, renouncing their citizenship; an election causing the Founding Fathers to throw up as they turn in their graves … this is because the Russian Devils are sowing voter distrust! Who knew?
But, of course, that’s the way Commies are – Oh wait, I forgot. They’re no longer Commies. So what are they? Ah yes, they still have that awful old hangup …
By the turn of the 21st century, the United States military had already appropriated the entire earth, and was ready to flood the most obscure areas of it with troops at a moment’s notice. The Pentagon divided the planet into five area commands–similar to the way that the Indian Country of the American West had been divided in the mid-nineteenth century by the U.S. Army…’Welcome to Injun Country’ was the refrain I heard from troops from Columbia to the Philippines, including Afghanistan and Iraq. To be sure, the problem for the American military was less (Islamic) fundamentalism than anarchy. The …
Former Israeli Prime Minister and President, Shimon Peres, was a very successful brand. He was presented to the world as stately, wise, a relentless advocate of peace, and a sane voice amidst a conflict deemed senseless and unending.
Now that he is dead at 93, international media are rife with touching tributes and heartwarming eulogies of the Nobel Peace Prize winner, one of Israel’s most sagacious ‘founding fathers’, who was also seen as a ‘giant among men’.
These attributes were mostly based on sentiment rather than fact, however. Full knowledge of the man’s legacy certainly lingers among many Palestinians, …
On his second day in office as president of the United States, Barack Obama issued an executive order to make good on his promise to shut down the Guantánamo Bay incarceration facility in Cuba. Nearly at the end of his second term as president, Obama has not yet realized his promise. The act of holding rendered people continues.
It is hardly surprising to the people when their political representatives fail to make good on their pledges. It is all too common in a system that the ruling classes bill as “democracy.”
North of the border the political process plays out much the …
National newspapers were ‘unimpressed by Jeremy Corbyn’s victory’ in the Labour leadership election, Roy Greenslade noted in the Guardian, surprising no-one. Corbyn secured almost 62% of the 506,000 votes cast, up from the 59% share he won in 2015, ‘with virtually no press backing whatsoever’.
In reality, of course, Corbyn did not just lack press backing. He won in the face of more than one year of relentless corporate media campaigning to politically, ethically, professionally, psychologically and even sartorially discredit him. That Corbyn survived is impressive. That he won again, increased his vote-share, and took Labour Party membership …
There is an inverse relationship between public access to the Internet and the inability of governments and institutions to control information flow and hence state allegiance, ideology, public opinion, and policy formulation. Increase in public access to the Internet results in an equivalent decrease in government and institutional power. Indeed, after September 11, 2001, Internet traffic statistics show that many millions of Americans have connected to alternative news sources outside the continental United States. The information they consume can be and often is contrary to US government statements and US mainstream media reporting. Recognizing this, terrorists will coordinate their assaults …
Washington’s quest for perpetual world power is underwritten by systematic and perpetual propaganda wars. Every major and minor war has been preceded, accompanied and followed by unremitting government propaganda designed to secure public approval, exploit victims, slander critics, dehumanize targeted adversaries and justify its allies’ collaboration.
In this paper we will discuss the most common recent techniques used to support ongoing imperial wars.
Cairo, Egypt — It is hard to imagine a more resilient, more heroic nation than Syria!
With only 17 million inhabitants (according to 2014 estimate), Syria is now facing the mightiest coalition on Earth – the coalition that consists of virtually all traditional Western colonialist and neo-colonialist nations.
It is also facing some of the cruelest and deadliest inventions of the West – the extremist and murderous post- and pseudo-Islamic groupings, similar to those that were already unleashed against the Soviet Union during the war in Afghanistan.
Because of tremendous determination of its people, Syria is still standing! But it is standing against all …
by The Real News Network (TRNN) / October 1st, 2016
Previewing Abby Martin’s on-the-ground investigation in Palestine, The Empire Files looks at the long history of Zionist colonization, expansion, and expulsion of Palestine’s indigenous inhabitants.
It is tough to fight any real war. And it takes true guts, discipline and determination to win it.
For years and decades, the so-called ‘left’ in the West has been moderately critical of North American (and sometimes even of European) imperialism and neo-colonialism. But whenever some individual or country rose up and began openly challenging the Empire, most of the Western left-wing intellectuals simply closed their eyes, and refused to offer their full, unconditional support to those who were putting their lives (and often even the existence of their countries) on the line.
I will never forget all those derogatory punches …
The most important quality in politics is ideology – the set of values you hold to be both right, and good. The British Tory party, for example, believe in an ideology known as capitalism, an ideology that’s right and good for only a tiny portion of society – the super-rich 1%. For all the rest of us it’s demonstrably bad. The Labour party is supposed to believe in socialism, a set of values that are the exact opposite: bad for the super-rich 1%, good for all the rest of us.
The conflict within Labour boils down to what appears to be …
FBI Director James Comey went before the House Judiciary Committee to discuss the Hillary Clinton email investigation after new evidence emerged which suggested Hillary Clinton’s IT specialist, Paul Combetta (under the “Stonetear” moniker), sought advice on Reddit on how to cover her tracks. He addressed claims about the FBI’s treatment of Hillary Clinton and whether or not the they were biased in her favor. He was angered by such claims, yet continued to make up excuses for Hillary Clinton.
An ambassador is a … gentleman sent to lie abroad for the good of his country.
— Attributed to Sir Henry Wotton, 1568-1639
When Vitaly Churkin, Russia’s Permanent Representative to the United Nations (“We the people of the United Nations, determined to save succeeding generations from the scourge of war …”) rose to speak at the UN to address Syria’s ongoing tragedy, on Sunday September 25th, US Ambassador to the UN, Samantha Power, François Delattre, Permanent Representative for France and British Permanent Representative, Matthew Rycroft, metaphorically threw their toys out of the pram and walked out. Anything more infantile and further away …
It was momentous on one fundamental level. Here was the President of the United States, Barack Obama, holding the torch for a wretched ally the politicians on the Hill and others have had reservations over for many years. Saudi Arabia, ever the thorn and asset of US interests, facing the grief of families who lost members on September 11, 2001. This, the same ally whose theocratic bent remains the most bruising of obstacles in any claims that the US is open to a global democratic experiment.
In the end, it came down to a very American formula, one born in the …
In his article, “How Genuine Are NGOs?” Joseph Mudingu stated that NGOs “are the vehicles through which the exploiters seek to influence the opinions of ‘civil society’.” Thus it would not be surprising, given America’s pivot to Asia in response to its waning economic influence, that some NGOs would be prodded to excoriate a designated enemy — even though that enemy country does not surround other countries with its military bases, neither does it threaten violence nor militarily attack other countries; conversely, it seeks cooperation with other nations.
On 23 September, I received an email from Christina Smethurst, …
Shooting a man slowly backing away is no way to preserve or protect
Some reasonable people are weighing the available evidence and waiting for more definitive proof of various allegations before they decide whether or not they think the death of Keith Lamont Scott, 43, in broad daylight in a parking lot in a housing development in Charlotte, North Carolina, on the sunny afternoon of September 20 was a police execution.
Those reasonable people are being unreasonable: the police clearly executed Keith Lamont Scott as he was slowly backing away from them, his hands at his sides, his body slack. The …
And it was interesting, because afterwards, there was a party, and there were couples who were arguing. Basically, the men, in general, didn’t like the movie. They were like, ‘I had hard times, he should have gotten a job, he should have pulled himself together, he had a kid.’ They were very tough with him. And the women were, ‘No, you don’t understand, he had mental illness, he was broken, he lost his wife.’ They were much more understanding toward him. I just stood back and thought, look at this.”
— An after-screening party at the Sarasota Film Festival: writer-director Oren Moverman …
Bombs, domestic and foreign, are defining the nature of politics in the United States, the European Union and among radical Islamist groups and individuals. The scale and scope of bomb-politics varies with the practitioner. ‘Wholesale bombers’ are state actors, who engage in large-scale, long-term bombing designed to destroy adversary governments or movements. ‘Retail bombers’ are groups or individuals engaging in small-scale, sporadic bombings, designed to provoked fear and secure symbolic outcomes.
Apart from planned bombings, there are improvised bombings committed by deranged individuals who engage in …
Significant sums in Canadian “aid” are spent promoting international mining initiatives.
In a press release last week Ontario-based Carube Copper said it acquired over “500 square kilometres of the most prospective ground in Jamaica based on historic showings, the work completed and reported in 1993 by the Canadian International Development Agency (‘CIDA’).”
Canadian aid has facilitated similar work elsewhere. Researching Canada in Africa: 300 years of aid and exploitation I discovered examples of Ottawa funding the collection of geological data in Tanzania, Angola, Cameroon, Niger, Uganda, Kenya and elsewhere. Long time West Africa-based freelance journalist, Joan Baxter, describes a …
— Donald Trump, Hofstra University, September 26, 2016
It really doesn’t matter that these two creatures loathed and feared in varying degrees should even be conducting a debate. What, after all, is there to dispute? Both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump inhabit worlds of the disparately dislikeable, and reaped the bounty of the US with varying degrees of ruthlessness.
Of course, the assessment from the pundits resembled everything that had transpired before. Take the NBC live coverage, filled with the tepid, the unsure and the stunned. The presidential debate had been “surreal”; Clinton was “overly prepared” yet …
In search of a haircut, I found Analog, Eugene’s favorite barber shop according to Yelp. Also a tattoo parlor. Upstairs, the walls are lined with LP album covers of the 60s, 70s and 80s, with good tunes on the sound system. But it was too busy that morning, with a long wait.
A few blocks away Anderson’s took me right away. They had free IPA on tap for customers. “The Big Lebowski” was playing on their large-screen TV, next to the small wire-frame house where one barber’s small dog dwells. All very homey and laid back. Everyone there was relaxed and …
I remember a time when a cabbage could sell itself by being a cabbage. Nowadays it’s no good being a cabbage – unless you have an agent and pay him a commission. Nothing is free anymore to sell itself or give itself away. These days, Countess, every cabbage has its pimp.
? Jean Giraudoux, The Madwoman of Chaillot
This election seems to have traumatized the usually, and increasingly, somnambulant public in the US to the degree that a number of various mental affects are activated, and maybe even some old wounds finally surfacing again, but most of all it has generated a …
Following the EU referendum, a friend told me that he had voted to leave. His reasons were nothing to do with immigration or the democratic deficit in EU institutions. No. He said he just wanted to deliver a slap in the face to the establishment who were lining up to tell him of the dire consequences that would befall the British people if they left the European Union. Isn’t that a bit like cutting off your nose to spite your face, I said. Yes, he replied, but it felt good to puncture the smugness of the high and mighty who …
Ban Ki-Moon’s second term as the Secretary General of the United Nations is ending this December. He was the most ideal man for the job as far as the United States and its allies are concerned.
Of course, there will always be other Ban Ki-Moons. In fact, the man himself was a modified version of his predecessor, Kofi Annan.
The unspoken, but unmistakable rule about UN Secretary Generals is that they must come across as affable enough so as not to be the cause of international controversies, but also flexible enough to accommodate the US disproportionate influence over the United Nations, particularly …
