Bulletin N° 861
The capitalist conspiracy - La conspiración del capitalismo
(47min)
by G. Edward Griffin
- with Spanish subtitles
A film from the old Cold War
days, showing the “threat of communism” scam of the corporate/military/banking
complex, which has been replaced by the “threat
of terrorism” scam, enriching the same clusters of people and enslaving the
rest of the population (if they somehow are allowed to live). Despite President
Obama's more tactful and restrained language, the instruments and goals of this
“war on terror” remain in place today. Griffin attempts to show that while
political power has shifted from the Democrats to the Republicans and vice
versa over the decades, the plan revealed in this program continues to unfold,
namely the world governed by a small group of men, “The Elite,” whose murderous
ambition is "to control the world."
This documentary film invites an
unambiguous reevaluation of this old elitist theory and an attempt to place it
in its historical context of social class struggle.
Subject
:
Random
Notes on the Dictatorship of the Capitalist Class and the Contradictions it
Engenders.
Cognitive Dissonance:
“How dare you!”
Who are these bovine
gentlemen, feeding the war machine,
by ordering the
mass murder of youth,
struggling for nothing more
Where did these
men come from?
Where are they
taking us?
October 5, 2019
Grenoble,
France
Dear
Colleagues and Friends of CEIMSA,
As
turmoil grows and sideshow distractions multiply, the massive crisis of US
imperialism today rekindles an interest in the classic social science debate
between elitist/idealist theory, on
the one hand, and the theory of historical
materialism in the Marxist tradition: Do great men and their ideas govern
historical change, or do material conditions influence ideas more than ideas
influence material conditions? The fact that ideas sometimes have a material
impact is undeniable, but is the underlying cause of this impact the specific
material conditions of the historic moment, or is there some super-human power
in the ideas of some people that can shape material reality according to their
will?
What
brings idealists and the dialectical materialists together is the plight they
share on this burning planet, and the helplessness they feel when caught in the
web of monopoly capitalism and militarism, regardless of how hard they struggle
(without a clue).
In
this context, we continue to draw attention to the banking and finance
industries that have so much control over our lives.
We also observe how the corporate/military/banking
complex, that threatens the very existence of our planet today,
produces an ideology which conceals its true destructive nature by creating cognitive
dissonance in the public mind, the purpose of which is to advance the class
interest of those who rule society and subject the rest of us (la classe dominée, to use the descriptive French term for the
exploited masses) under their control at minimum expense.
It
has been in fashion for some time to label and dismiss any inconvenient critical
thinking as “conspiracy theory” - a term coined in 1967 by the CIA and placed in the
lexicon of Disinformation tactics with the intent of disarming critics. This in
my opinion is a conspiracy itself. If we give up on the possible existence of specific
conspiracies, we must abandon all critical examination of facts which is
necessary if we are to arrive at a comprehensive understanding of any issue.
This is the stated purpose of “Disinformation Operations,” to shut down the
process.
Today,
this is the lay of the land and the architecture we inhabit, regardless of the
ideologies which might momentarily attract our attention. We find ourselves
divided by self-censorship.
The
elitist theory is no where better illustrated than by the works of the George
Washington University history professor Carroll
Quigley
(1927-1977) who wrote in his book The
Evolution of Civilizations (published posthumously in 1979):
|
For years I have told my students that I have
been trying to train executives rather than clerks. The distinction between the
two is parallel to the distinction previously made between understanding and
knowledge. It is a mighty low executive who cannot hire several people with
command of more knowledge than he has himself. And he can always buy reference
works or electronic devices with better memories for facts than any subordinate.
The chief quality of an executive is that he have
understanding. He should be able to make decisions that make it possible to
utilize the knowledge of other persons. Such executive capacity can be taught,
but it cannot be taught by an educational program that emphasizes knowledge and
only knowledge. Knowledge must be assumed as given, and if it is not sufficient
the candidate must be eliminated. But the vital thing is
understanding. This requires possession of techniques that, fortunately,
can be taught.(Carroll Quigley. The
Evolution of Civilizations. 2nd ed. 1979. p.
420)
The notion of a top-down
“new world order,” reminiscent of
feudalism, casts most of us in the role of serfs, if not slaves, groveling at
the base of the social pyramid, dominated by superstition, fear, and paltry
rewards that occasionally trickle down from the hands of the owners above us.
Meanwhile,
to return to our journey through the long book by Ellen Brown, The Web
of Debt: The Shocking Truth About Our Money System and How We Can Break Free (2007,2011), we
follow her discoveries of behind-the-scenes manipulations by central bankers,
guided by the coded messages in L. Frank Baum’s cautionary American fairytale, The
Wonderful Wizard of Oz (1900), written as a Populist cautionary tale for posterity and raising questions like:
Who are we really? And what are we actually allowing to happen to us?
Ellen
Brown’s research report on the “the shocking truth about our money system” is
organized into nine parts, the headings of each providing a reliable road map of
the terrain that will be covered in this nearly 500-page book:
Introduction: “Captured by the Debt
Spider.”
Section I: “The Yellow Brick Road:
From Gold to Federal Reserve Notes.”
Section II: “The Bankers Capture
the Money Machine.”
Section III: “Enslaved By Debt: The
Bankers’ Net Spreads Over the Glove.”
Section IV: “The Debt Spider
Captures America.”
Section V: “The Magic Slippers:
Taking Back the Money Power.”
Section VI: “Vanquishing the Debt
Spider: A Banking System That Serves The People.”
Afterword: “The Collapse of a 300
Year Ponzi Scheme.”
Postscript: “The Bubble Bursts.”
In
Section IV, at the conclusion of Chapter 34, Brown insists that if we are
indeed captured by the debt-based economy which has been created by central
banks around the world, we (“the people”) are far from being defeated. Under
the subtitle, “Shelter from the Storm,” she offers an assessment of this
current situation of approaching catastrophe:
What can we do to protect ourselves and our assets in the meantime? Like
Auntie Em, market ‘bears’ warn to run for the cellar.
They sat to prepare for the coming storm by getting out of U.S. stocks, the
U.S. dollar, and excess residential real estate, and to invest instead in gold
and silver, precious metal stocks, oil stocks, foreign stocks, and foreign
currencies. Many good books and financial newsletters are available on this
subject.
People in serious Doomsday mode go further. They advise storing canned
and dry food, dirking water, and organic seeds for sprouting and planting;
investing in a water purifier, light source, stove and heater that don’t depend
on functioning electrical outlets; keeping extra cash in the family safe for
when the banks suddenly close their doors; and storing gold and silver coins
for when paper money becomes worthless. They recommend starting a garden in the
backyard, a hydroponic garden (plants grown in water), or a window-box garden;
or joining a local communal farming project. They note that people facing
financial collapse in other countries are better prepared to deal with that
sort of disaster than Americans are, because they have been farming their own
small gardens and surviving in barter economies for centuries. Americans need to study, form groups, and practice in order to be
prepared. Again, many good Internet websites are available on this
subject. Community currency options are discussed in Chapter 36.
Those are all prudent alternatives in the event of economic collapse;
but in the happier ending of our economic fairytale, the financial system would
be salvaged before it collapses. We can stock the cellar just in case
there is a cyclone, but to succumb to the fear of scarcity is to let the Wicked
Witch prevail, to let the cartel one again wind up with all the houses and the
stock bargains. What then of the American dream, the liberty and justice for
all in a land of equal opportunity promised by the Declaration of Independence
and the Constitution? The irony is that our economic nightmare is built on an
illusion. We have been tricked into believing we are inextricably mired in
debt, when the ‘debt’ is for an advance of ‘credit’ that was ours all along.
While trouble boils and bubbles in the pots of the Witches of Wall Street, the
Good Witch stands waiting in the wings, waiting for us to remember our magic
slippers and come into our power.(p.329-330)
In
this same chapter, Brown discusses “the magnitude of the banking crisis and the
desperate attempts to cover it up.” She cites Adrien Douglas, in an article
written for LeMetropoleCafe.com in
June 2007:
This is not just an ugly,
non-malignant tumor that can be conveniently cut off. This massive financial
activity that bets on the outcome of the pricing of the underlying assets has
corrupted the system such that those who would be responsible for paying out
orders of magnitude more money than they have if the bets go against them are
sucked into a black hole of moral and ethical destitution as they have no other
choice but to manipulate the price of the underlying assets to prevent
financial ruin.(cited on p.319)
In
the following Chapter,
entitled “Stepping from Scarcity into Technicolor Abundance,”
cites historian David Parker in his commentary on the cultural context of
Baum’s fairytale, written at a time when “Theosophy” had become a popular
intellectual movement in the United States.
[T]he book emphasized an aspect of
theosophy that Norman Vincent Peal would later call ‘the power of positive
thinking’: theosophy let to ‘a new upbeat and positive psychology’ that
‘opposed all kinds of negative thinking – especially fear, worry and anxiety.’
It was through this positive thinking, and not through any magic of the Wizard,
that Dorothy and her companions (as well as everyone in Oz) got what they
wanted.(cited on p.333)
Placing
it in its historical context, Brown goes on to point out the influence the
“Theosophy” movement had on American thought for at least one hundred years, from
the mid-nineteenth to the mid-twentieth centuries.
Thinking positively was not just
the stuff of children’s fantasies, but was deeply ingrained in the American
psyche. ‘I have learned,’ said Henry David Thoreau, ‘that if one advances
confidently in the direction of his dream, and endeavors to live the life he
has imagined, he will meet with a success unexpected in common hours.’ William
James, another nineteenth century American philosopher, said, ‘The greatest
discovery of my generation is that a human being can alter his life by altering
his attitudes of mind.’ Franklin Roosevelt broadcast this up-beat message in
his Depression-era ‘fireside chats,’ in which he entered people’s homes through
that exciting new medium the radio and galvanized the country with encouraging
words,. ‘The only thing we have to fear is fear itself,’ he said in 1933, when
the ‘enemy’ was poverty and unemployment.(p.333-334)
The
economic collapse is palpable today and is compounded by the environmental and
military catastrophes which we hear about daily. Our trust in authority figures
has been shaken, and the lessons from The
Wonderful Wizard of Oz are timely, those of self-reliance: “We’re smarter
than we think; Braver than we believe; and Stronger than we seem.” If ever
there was, the time is now to apply Theory with Praxis in the midst of
manufactured cognitive dissonance that surrounds us.
The
20 + items below
should provide readers with the opportunity to find a synthesis between the
antagonistic notions of elite rule by ideas, on the one hand, and social class struggle, on the other, as
the primary force that drives historical change in human society.
Francis Feeley
---
Professeur
honoraire de l'Université
Grenoble-Alpes
Ancien Directeur des
Researches
Université de Paris-Nanterre
Director of The Center for the Advanced Study
of American Institutions and Social Movements
(CEIMSA-in-Exile)
The University of California-San Diego
http://www.ceimsa.org
a.
“Tragedy and Hope 101: The Illusion of
Justice,
Freedom and Democracy”
https://tragedyandhope.com/the-deep-end-joseph-plummer-tragedy-and-hope-101/
with Joseph Plummer
+
Neither
Democrats Nor Republicans Will Admit
the Problem Is Capitalism Itself
by Richard Wolff
+
Public
good or private wealth?
https://www.oxfamamerica.org/explore/research-publications/public-good-or-private-wealth/
+
Nancy
Pelosi’s Son Also Board Member of Energy Company, Traveled to Ukraine and Nancy
Featured Prominently in Company’s Ad
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yiuqC_WpGwU
+
The Verve - Bitter Sweet Symphony
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/52343.htm
video with lyrics
(4:30)
===========
b.
Fed pouring billions nightly into US banks
for months
+
“Nothing Ends Homelessness Like
a Home”: Advocates Slam Trump’s Attack on SF & Homeless People
https://www.democracynow.org/2019/10/3/homelessness_california_trump_attacks_water_quality
+
Federal
Tax Cuts in the Bush, Obama, and Trump Years
https://itep.org/federal-tax-cuts-in-the-bush-obama-and-trump-years/
+
The
Disaster of Negative Interest Rates
https://www.globalresearch.ca/disaster-negative-interest-rates/5690577
by Ellen Brown
===========
c.
Greta
Thunberg & the Consolation of Doubt
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/52330.htm
by Jonathan Cook
Greta
Thunberg challenges the UN ‘action summit’ on climate change, telling world
leaders “you have stolen my dreams and my childhood”.
Thunberg
and her generation are living on a dying planet, a planet the older generation
– plundered and despoiled with no thought for those who would follow them.
The more Greta Thunberg
articulates the terrifying emotions of awakening to our imminent extinction as
a species – as she did, filled with trembling rage, at last week’s UN “action
summit” on the climate crisis – the more a section of the progressive left digs
its heels in to resist her role as an agent of change.
+
Climate breakdown is actually increasing the
economic value of polar seas – beware the business opportunists
by Alex Rogers,
Professor of Conservation Biology, University
of Oxford
+
Three Billion Canaries in the Coal Mine
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/09/29/opinion/three-billion-canaries-in-the-coal-mine.html
by Margaret Renkl
+
Sea
Levels Are Rising, and So Are We
Led by Swedish climate activist Greta Thunberg,
young activists and their supporters rally for action on climate change on
September 20, 2019, in New York City. Drew Angerer /
Getty Images
https://truthout.org/articles/sea-levels-are-rising-and-so-are-we/
by Tom Engelhardt
+
[MCM]
Reuters springs to the defense of Greta Thunberg from a cruel attack by
Vladimir Putin (though he did not attack her)
Note how Reuters casts a wholly reasonable
point of disagreement as a stroke of cruelty, if not outright child abuse:
"I may disappoint you," Putin said at
an energy forum in Moscow, "but I don't share the common excitement about
the
speech by Greta Thunberg.
"No one has explained to Greta that the
modern world is complex and different, and ... people in Africa or in many
Asian countries want to live at the same wealth
level as in Sweden."
That point is, in fact, well-taken, and raises
an important larger point about the "climate movement" under
Greta's
influence (or the influence of the NGO that's backing
her): i.e., its assumption that the problem isn't consumer
capitalism, with its grotesque resource
exhaustion and endless toxic waste, or the gigantic "carbon
footprint"
of the elites, or the US war machine. The problem, rather, is
humanity itself (hence the movements nods toward
"population
control"), and its need for rational development—as in Africa.
Now, see how Reuters frames Putin's statement in
its lede (below). To say that Putin thus "took
aim at [the]
teenage activist"—and to lump his point together
with Trump's sarcastic tweet, and Canadian MP Maxime
Bernier's calling her "mentally
unstable"—is to erase his disagreement by portraying it as one
more nasty
shot at that poor girl, just as all views of Greta and
her "movement" that aren't worshipful and/or euphoric
are instantly rejected as "attacks" on her (and
as "climate change denial" to boot).
Thus Greta's stardom is a stroke of propaganda
genius, since it shuts down all critical discussion as abuse,
driving countless liberals and progressives into fits
of rage at any disagreements with—or any questions
raised about—the sudden, vague and panicky new
"movement" catalyzed by Greta's image.
For further critical perspective on the cult of
Greta Thunberg pushed by "our free press," compare the
endless gushing coverage of her "movement"
with the total media blackout on the Yellow Vests, whose
manifesto offers some specific planks on how to
save the planet. (See just below.)
MCM
Putin: I don't share excitement about Greta Thunberg's
U.N. speech
===========
d.
Britain's Unconvicted
Prisoner: Keeping Assange on Lockdown for Neocons in Washington
+
Chelsea
Manning Needs Legal Funds to Resist a Grand Jury Subpoena
+
Edward
Snowden's Julian Assange is an Unfamiliar Julian Assange
https://www.mintpressnews.com/edward-snowden-julian-assange-unfamiliar-permanent-record/262103/
+
What
Julian Assange Really Represents
https://www.globalresearch.ca/what-julian-assange-really-represents/5691064
by True Publica
===========
e.
"Yellow vests" have published their own
manifesto
http://frontnews.eu/news/en/42673/Yellow-vests-have-published-their-own-manifesto
Kyiv:
Protesters in France, dubbed "yellow vests", published their own
manifesto. This is reported by the local media.
It
is known that the document posted the site Le Libre Penseur.
But if at the beginning the goal of the protests was to reduce fuel prices, now
the scale of these 25 points is much wider.
So,
in the text there are the following positions:
1.
To convene a national assembly for tax reform. Legally prohibit taxes in excess
of 25% of the state of a citizen.
2.
To increase by 40% the minimum wage, pensions, and the
subsistence minimum.
3.
Create new jobs in health care, education, public transport, law, and order,
etc.
4.
Immediately start the construction of 5 million units of affordable housing,
thereby ensuring the reduction of rent, mortgage and the creation of jobs in
the construction industry. Strictly punish city halls and prefectures that
leave homeless in the open.
5.
Reduce the size of banks and break bank monopolies. To
prohibit banks with investors to engage in stock speculation. Prohibit
the rescue of illiquid banks for taxpayers' money.
6.
Cancel the domestic debt.
7.
With popular support to rewrite the Constitution in
the interests of the sovereignty of the people. To legalize
general referendums on the popular initiative.
8.
Prohibit lobbying and influence schemes. Prohibit persons with a criminal
conviction for life to hold elected positions, as well as to ban to hold
several elected positions part-time.
9.
Exit the European Union and resume the circulation of its own currency.
10.
Stop the tax evasion practice. Return 80 billion euros,
which 40 largest companies owe to the state.
11.
To stop further privatization and return to the state property already
privatized property (airports, railways and highways, parking lots).
12.
Remove radars and cameras from the roads. They are useless in preventing
traffic accidents and are nothing more than a veiled tax.
13.
Exclude ideology from the national education system and critically review
destructive and discredited teaching methods.
14.
In the field of justice - to increase the budget four
times. Prescribe in-laws the maximum allowed waiting time for legal procedures.
Simplify the judicial system. Make justice free and accessible to all.
15.
Smash media monopolies, eradicate nepotism between the
media and politicians. Make the media public and guarantee a variety of
opinions. To ban editorial propaganda. Stop media
subsidies and tax concessions to reporters.
16.
To guarantee civil liberties. To prescribe in the
constitution a complete ban on state intervention in the affairs of education,
health care and the institution of the family.
17.
The law requires manufacturers to extend the shelf life to 10 years at least.
Require them to have parts available.
18.
Prohibit the production and handling of plastic containers and another
packaging that litter the environment as soon as possible.
19.
Limit the impact of pharmaceutical companies on the health care system. Hold a
national convention on health care reform.
20.
Prohibit GMOs and pesticides. Prohibit the use of agricultural land without
rotation of crops.
21.
Re-conduct industrialization in order to abandon imports as causing the
greatest harm to the environment.
22.
Immediately withdraw from NATO and prohibit the use of French troops in
aggressive wars by law.
23.
Relations between France and Africa. To stop the policy of
robbery, to stop military and political intervention. Give money and
property of dictators, dishonestly acquired, to the people of Africa.
Immediately return home French troops. Ending the colonial system, which obliges African countries to keep foreign exchange reserves
in the central bank of France, which keeps Africa in poverty. Negotiate
as equals with equals.
24.
Stop the flow of immigrants for whom France has no means of acceptance and
integration.
25.
In foreign policy - exceptional respect for
international law and signed agreements.
+
'I see colleagues crying'
French police explain why morale has reached rock
bottom
+
Crumbling
blue line: Overworked, demoralized French police stretched to breaking point
https://www.rt.com/news/470138-french-police-strike-march/
+
Beyond
the Death of Critical Education
https://truthout.org/articles/beyond-the-death-of-critical-education/
by Stanely Aronowitz
+
How
France Insoumise Was Reduced to a Protest Vote
https://www.jacobinmag.com/2019/09/france-insoumise-lfi-jean-luc-melenchon-macron
===========
f.
We
Americans Enable Unspeakable Atrocities Every Day
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/52321.htm
by
Maj. Danny Sjursen
Not so long ago, in November 2010, I took command of B Troop, 4th Squadron, 4th US Cavalry in a ceremony at Fort Riley, Kansas. It was, for me, a proud day. Army officers are taught to revel in their unit’s history, and the 4th Cavalry Regiment had a long, storied past indeed. On that cool, late fall day, the squadron’s colors – a flag with battle streamers – fluttered. One read: Bud Dajo, Philippine Islands – a reference to one of the regiment’s past battles. The unit crest pictured on the flag and pinned on our uniforms included a volcano and a kris
– the
traditional wavy-edged sword of the regiment’s Moro opponents in the
Philippines – but hardly a trooper in the formation knew a thing about that war,
battle, or the 4th Cavalry’s sordid past in the islands.
Bud Dajo was hardly a battle at all. It was a massacre. Some 1,000 Moro separatists, including their families, who opposed the US military occupation of Jolo Island, had fled to the crest of a volcano to avoid American conquest and retribution. Then, from 5-8 March 1906, the 4th Cavalry, along with other army formations, bombarded the overmatched Moros – few had firearms at all – then rushed the summit. The Moro men fought desperately and managed to inflict some 20 deaths on the charging American troopers, but they’d never stood a chance. Reaching the volcanic top, the cavalrymen fired down into the crater until all but six defenders and occupants were dead, a 99% casualty rate. The victorious troopers then proudly posed for a photograph, standing above the dead – which included hundreds of women and children – as though they were naught but big game trophies on a safari hunt.
Few Americans remember the US invasion, occupation, and pacification – a neat euphemism, that – of the Philippine Islands, but Filipinos will never forget. Perhaps half a million locals died (one-sixth of the total population) at the hands of superior US military technology, induced disease and starvation. The war also reflected and affected the US Army culture of the day. Most of the generals were veterans of the vicious Indian Wars of extermination in the previous decades. Racially pejorative terms for the Filipinos entered the military vernacular. Some, such as “nigger,” were reappropriated; others, like gugu – thought to be the etymological precursor to the Vietnam-era epithet gook – were new. The war also informed the army’s leadership for many years. The first twelve of the US Army’s chiefs of staff, including General John Pershing of World War I fame, had all served in the Philippines. The legacy was quite long. Even General George Marshall, architect of World War II victory and a future Secretary of State, had served in the islands as a fresh lieutenant.
+
Foreign Aid
for Dictators
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/52325.htm
by Jacob G. Hornberger
Notice
something important about the hoopla regarding President’s Trump withholding of
U.S. foreign aid to Ukraine while he was requesting Ukrainian officials to
investigate Joe Biden and his son Hunter Biden for possible corruption: Nobody
in Washington, D.C., or within the establishment press is questioning the
concept of foreign aid itself. Foreign aid has become such an established and
accepted way of inducing foreign regimes to comply with the dictates of U.S.
officials that the thought of ending it entirely doesn’t even enter the minds
of Republicans, Democrats, or member of the mainstream media.
But
questioning foreign aid itself is precisely what the American people should be
doing. Not only does foreign aid contribute to the out-of-control federal
spending and debt that is hanging over the American people (with the debt now
at $22.6 trillion and climbing), it also constitutes one of the most evil and
immoral practices of the U.S. government.
Case in
point: Egypt. Notwithstanding the fact that the country is governed by one of
the most brutal military dictatorships in the world, the U.S. government
delivers $1.3 billion in military aid to Egypt’s military dictatorship every
year.
Like the
United States, Egypt’s government is based on the concept of a
national-security state, which is a type of governmental system in which a vast
and permanent military-intelligence establishment plays a major role in
society. In Egypt, that role is much more pronounced and predominant than it is
here in the United States. Here in the United States, the power and influence
that the Pentagon, CIA, and NSA wield are indirect and often hidden. In Egypt
the military-intelligence establishment wields direct control of the government
and the economy.
To get a
sense of how Egypt’s national-security state operates, think back to the
national-security state system of Gen. Augusto Pinochet, who U.S.
national-security state officials helped install into power in 1973. Pinochet
was an unelected military dictator who ruled Chile with an iron fist. His
forces rounded up tens of thousands of people who were considered to be threats
to “national security” and tortured, raped, or killed them.
+
https://truthout.org/articles/beware-of-defense-secretaries-pledging-reform/
===========
g.
The Conspiracy Against Trump
Is Now Out in the Open
https://www.globalresearch.ca/conspiracy-against-trump/5691018
by Dr. Paul Craig Roberts
+
The Ukraine
Impeachment Fiasco: Both Republicans and Democrats Being Manipulated by the
Deep State
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/52326.htm
by Philip Giraldi
The problem with the current imbroglio over Ukraine is that the discussion does not begin where it should. Here is the timeline: the United States decided to make a serious effort to bring about regime change in Ukraine under the Obama Administration after that country’s election on June 2010 returned Viktor Yanukovych, who sought closer ties with Russia rather than Europe, as president. The White House claimed that the election results were fraudulent, even though international observers disagreed, and decided to intervene. The job was given to noted Democratic Party-linked neoconservative Victoria Nuland, who had been appointed Assistant Secretary of State for European and Eurasian Affairs in May 2013. One might recall that she and other intense Russophobes like Senator John McCain would appear in Kyiv in late 2013 after the Maidan protests began, handing out cookies and giving advice to dissidents, suggesting that the United States would support a popular uprising. The uprising did indeed come in February 2014, to include still mysterious snipers who shot into a crowd of demonstrators, and Yanukovych was forced to step down.
Nuland immediately stepped into the void. On February 4, 2014, a Russian intercepted recording of a phone call between Nuland and U.S. ambassador to Ukraine, Geoffrey Pyatt, that took place a week earlier was published. In their phone conversation, Nuland and Pyatt considered how they would arrange for their candidate Arseniy Yatsenyuk to become the new prime minister after the government collapse. They discussed specifically what would have to be offered to other candidates to have them step aside and set up a meeting with a number of political leaders to make arrangements. Their conniving was successful and Yatsenyuk became prime minister of Ukraine on February 27, 2014. During the phone discussion, Nuland famously dismissed the European Union as a possible mediator for the Ukrainian government transition saying, “Fuck the EU.”
*(Victoria Nuland (R) and U.S. Ambassador Geoffrey Pyatt
(2nd R), Kiev December 11, 2013. Credit: Andrew Kravchenko/
Reuters)
One might reasonably suggest that U.S. involvement with Ukraine, which amounted to an intervention that makes even the most toxic interpretations of so-called Russiagate pale in insignificance, began under Barack Obama and it was a neocon project. Ukraine, in a dramatic shift, became dependent on support from Washington while also turning its back on Moscow, a development that the Kremlin accurately saw as an existential security threat, leading to the "annexation" of Crimea and the simmering conflict between Kyiv and Moscow that continues to this day.
+
Impeachment…or CIA Coup?
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/52322.htm
To Impeach or
Not to Impeach? Chris Hedges & John Bonifaz
Debate What Congress Should Do Next
https://www.democracynow.org/2019/10/1/trump_impeachment_inquiry_debate
+
Impeachment,
Brought to You by the CIA
https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/10/04/impeachment-brought-to-you-by-the-cia/
by Rob Urie
+
From Trump to
Nixon: “Watergate” Film Explains
“How We
Learned to Stop an Out of Control President”
https://www.democracynow.org/2019/10/4/charles_ferguson_interview_watergate_impeachment
===========
h.
From: Nancy and Medea,
CODEPINK [mailto:info@codepink.org]
Sent: Wednesday,
October 02, 2019 6:06 PM
Subject: Did Jamal Khashoggi die in vain?
https://www.codepink.org/did_jamal_khashoggi_die_in_vain
Today marks one year since the brutal murder of Washington Post
journalist Jamal Khashoggi at the hands of Saudi Arabia, and the brutal regime is showing no shame as they
try to sweep Khashoggi’s memory under the rug. At the end of this month, they
are hosting an investment conference titled “Davos in the Desert” and have
invited the world's biggest financial giants. Citigroup, Goldman Sachs, and
Larry Fink, the Chairman and CEO of BlackRock, the world’s largest investor
in the weapons of war have all RSVP’d yes.
We’ve long known that companies such as these don’t give a damn about
human rights, but to appear in Saudi Arabia less
than 13 months after a prominent journalist was lured into an embassy,
murdered in cold blood, and then chopped into pieces and disposed of? That just rubs salt in an open wound. Help us call on Larry Fink and others to withdraw from the
Davos in the Desert investment conference.
Last year, in response to Khashoggi’s murder,
Blackrock and others — Google, Uber, JP Morgan
Chase, CNN, The New York Times, and more — all pulled out of the conference.
But now, with a year having passed, despite there still being zero accountability
for those responsible, companies are trying to slip back in. Some, like
Blackrock’s Larry Fink, have publicized their attendance, while others —- and
we are hard at work right now trying to identify who — are trying to attend
quietly.
NO COMPANY OR CEO SHOULD ATTEND DAVOS IN THE DESSERT. Send a message now to Fink, Citigroup, and Goldman Sachs
asking them to cancel. As soon as we find out who
else is planning to attend, we will let you know so you can appeal to them
also.
Even though Fink admits Khashoggi’s
murder was “horrifying,” he is willing to overlook Saudi Arabia’s crimes
against humanity — Khashoggi’s murder, the
imprisonment and torture of women activists, the war in Yemen— as long as it
furthers his company’s business ties, including the launch of a new BlackRock office in the kingdom.
Just this past Sunday Saudi crown prince Mohammed bin Salman (MbS) was
interviewed on CBS’s 60 Minutes. He denied
any personal involvement or knowledge of the murder of journalist Jamal
Khashoggi who was chopped into pieces with a bone saw. This was despite CIA
and UN intelligence that indicated that MbS was not only involved but likely
the person who gave the order.
During
his 60 Minutes interview, MbS also denied any
knowledge of the torture of woman’s rights activist Loujan
al-Hathloul who has been
languishing in a Saudi prison since March 2018, saying Loujan's
release is not up to him. But this is ridiculous, as Saudi Arabia is an
absolute monarchy where MbS has knowledge of and
controls every major decision, from the torturing of Loujan
to the premeditated murder of Khashoggi. We call BS
on MbS!
Saudi Arabia thinks that now that a year has passed since Khashoggi’s murder, that the world should close their eyes and ignore
Saudi crimes. But MbS belongs at the Hague, not on 60 Minutes or hosting
extravagant economic forums. Take action now by telling Larry Fink of Blackrock, as well as
Citigroup and Goldman Sachs, to withdraw from the Saudi Davos
in the Desert investment conference.
Towards
justice and freedom, P.S. If you are in DC, join us and CAIR at 1 pm outside the Saudi Arabia embassy for a vigil and protest on the
anniversary of Jamal Khashoggi’s murder, and read Medea Benjamin's latest
article: One Year After Khashoggi’s Brutal Murder: Business as Usual? |
===========
i.
Former
Israeli army General likens Israel to Nazi Germany: "Israel could end up
like Nazi Germany", Yair Golan
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/52335.htm
by "MEM"
+
From: newsfromunderground@googlegroups.com
Sent: Saturday,
September 28, 2019
Subject: [MCM] Only
11% of the Israeli people voted to end the Occupation
Israelis just
voted for occupation – stop pretending they want peace
Israelis have just voted in favour of continuing to deny all Palestinians, between the
Jordan River and the Mediterranean Sea, equal rights.
September 28,
2019 at 11:16 am | Published in: Article, Inquiry, Opinion
Israel’s election results are in. In terms of narrow party-focused politics, the results were inconclusive. The two main electoral lists resulted in a near draw.
According to the final vote tally, the Blue and White electoral alliance – led by two former Israeli generals and an ex-TV news presenter – ended narrowly ahead with 33 seats in the Knesset, Israel’s parliament.
But they were only a single seat ahead of the ruling Likud Party of the current prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, who won 32 seats.
Nonetheless, the Israeli president has just provided Netanyahu with the first opportunity to form a government, since the incumbent obtained more recommendations from incoming lawmakers overall.
But in terms of what the elections mean for the indigenous people of Palestine, this vote concluded with an emphatic result. Israelis have just voted to continue to permanently impose their racist military occupation regime upon millions of Palestinians.
Liberal Zionists in the UK and the US, when criticised for their support for Israel, quite often take a defensive posture claiming that they oppose “the Netanyahu government.”
Many have been on social media in recent weeks, praying for the downfall of Netanyahu. They also sometimes claim to oppose “the occupation” stating that they work for a “two-state solution” to “the conflict.”
But all that is just so much sophistry.
https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/newsfromunderground/CAGxB6W8zjd%2BaYJqTRBXsSMOeGqy2eYcRx8EdtuS%3DX-5NQb7s9A%40mail.gmail.com
+
How Israel
Controls Its Narrative
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/52324.htm
+
Former
Israeli Intel Official Claims Jeffrey Epstein, Ghislaine
Maxwell Worked for Israel
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/52342.htm
by Whitney Webb
A recent
interview given by a former high-ranking official in Israeli military
intelligence has claimed that Jeffrey Epstein’s sexual blackmail enterprise was
an Israel intelligence operation run for the purpose of entrapping powerful
individuals and politicians in the United States and abroad.
Since the apparent death by suicide of Jeffrey Epstein in a Manhattan prison, much has come to light about his depraved activities and methods used to sexually abuse underage girls and entrap the rich and powerful for the purposes of blackmail. Epstein’s ties to intelligence, described in-depth in a recent MintPress investigative series, have continued to receive minimal mainstream media coverage, which has essentially moved on from the Epstein scandal despite the fact that his many co-conspirators remain on the loose.
For those who have examined Epstein’s ties to intelligence, there are clear links to both U.S. intelligence and Israeli intelligence, leaving it somewhat open to debate as to which country’s intelligence apparatus was closest to Epstein and most involved in his blackmail/sex-trafficking activities. A recent interview given by a former high-ranking official in Israeli military intelligence has claimed that Epstein’s sexual blackmail enterprise was an Israel intelligence operation run for the purpose of entrapping powerful individuals and politicians in the United States and abroad.
In an interview last week with the independent outlet Narativ, Ben-Menashe, who himself was involved in Iran-Contra arms deals, told his interviewer Zev Shalev that he had been introduced to Jeffrey Epstein by Robert Maxwell in the mid-1980s while Maxwell’s and Ben-Menashe’s involvement with Iran-Contra was ongoing. Ben-Menashe did not specify the year he met Epstein.
Ben-Menashe told Shalev that “he [Maxwell] wanted us to accept him [Epstein] as part of our group …. I’m not denying that we were at the time a group that it was Nick Davies [Foreign Editor of the Maxwell-Owned Daily Mirror], it was Maxwell, it was myself and our team from Israel, we were doing what we were doing.” Past reporting by Seymour Hersh and others revealed that Maxwell, Davies and Ben-Menashe were involved in the transfer and sale of military equipment and weapons from Israel to Iran on behalf of Israeli intelligence during this time period.
He then added that Maxwell had stated during the introduction that “your Israeli bosses have already approved” of Epstein. Shalev later noted that Maxwell “had an extensive network in Israel at the time, which included the then-Prime Minister Ariel Sharon, according to Ben-Menashe.”
Ben-Menashe went on to say that he had “met him [Epstein] a few times in Maxwell’s office, that was it.” He also said he was not aware of Epstein being involved in arms deals for anyone else he knew at the time, but that Maxwell wanted to involve Epstein in the arms transfer in which he, Davies and Ben-Menashe were engaged on Israel’s behalf.
However, as MintPress reported in Part IV of the investigative series “Inside the Jeffrey Epstein Scandal: Too Big to Fail,” Epstein was involved with several arms dealers during this period of time, some of whom were directly involved in Iran-Contra arms deals between Israel and Iran. For instance, after leaving Bear Stearns in 1981, Epstein began working in the realms of shadow finance as a self-described “financial bounty hunter,” where he would both hunt down and hide money for powerful people. One of these powerful individuals was Adnan Khashoggi, a Saudi arms dealer with close ties to both Israeli and U.S. intelligence and one of the main brokers of Iran-Contra arms deals between Israel and Iran. Epstein would later forge a business relationship with a CIA front company involved in another aspect of Iran-Contra, the airline Southern Air Transport, on behalf of Leslie Wexner’s company, The Limited.
During this period, it is also known that Epstein became well acquainted with the British arms dealer Sir Douglas Leese, who collaborated with Khashoggi on at least one British-Saudi arms deal in the 1980s. Leese would later introduce Epstein to Steven Hoffenberg, calling Epstein a “genius” and describing his lack of morals during that introduction. Thus, there are indications that Epstein was involved with Middle Eastern arms deals, including some related to Iran-Contra, during this period. In addition, Epstein would later claim (and then subsequently deny) having worked for the CIA during this period.
After having been introduced to Epstein, Ben-Menashe claimed that neither he nor Davies were impressed with Epstein and considered him “not very competent.” He added that Ghislaine Maxwell had “fallen for” Epstein and that he believed that the romantic relationship between his daughter and Epstein led Robert Maxwell to work to bring the latter into the “family business” — i.e., Maxwell’s dealings with Israeli intelligence. This information is very revealing, given that the narrative, until now at least, has been that Ghislaine Maxwell and Jeffrey Epstein did not meet and begin their relationship until after Robert Maxwell’s death in 1991, after which Ghislaine moved to New York.
===========
j.
RT NEWSLETTER
(September
28, 2019)
https://subscribe.rt.com/preview/oTH5fA
===========
k.
Five Years Later, Do Black
Lives Matter?
https://mailchi.mp/jacobinmag.com/five-years-later-do-black-lives-matter?e=997d6d360e
===========
A Careless Bully At The KFC At The End Of Empire
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/52294.htm
Will Trump go
to war with the Iranians or the homeless? Or both?
Trump is a coward. The nation of Iran has the means and the will to fight. Do
you recall the will displayed by Iranians when repelling foreign invaders when
Iraq attempted to invade Iran as a de facto US proxy force? Conversely, the
homeless do not possess any defence against assault
by the agents of the US police state.
Regardless of his image among credulous true believers, Trump, character-wise,
is the diametric opposite of the image he conveys as a titan of supreme
self-confidence. The pose is ego-based compensation for inner feelings of
inferiority and abject weakness. Only those who are terrified of their own
feelings of weakness and vulnerability fixate on the weakness, real or
perceived, of others. If you desire to suss out a
person ridden with self-doubt, no matter how outwardly confident and bestowed
with worldly success, notice if they possess a proclivity to bandy the ultimate
designation of capitalist derision, “loser.” Trump is prone to inflict a
Heinrich Himmler-like evil towards the homeless because, as was the case with
the chinless cipher “toy soldier” Himmler, Trump is contemptuous of his inner
feelings of inadequacy. To avoid a crippling spiral into shame and self-doubt,
feelings of doubt and concomitant animus must be displaced.
The US, in a collective sense, cannot address the societal sin of allowing
homelessness, due to a fear that even regarding the crisis might lead to
feelings of vulnerability…that some form of contact loseritude
might overwhelm and decimate their will. The inherent weakness in the structure
of late US empire compels contempt for the homeless.
Trump’s self doubt is the source of his compulsion to humiliate those he
perceives as weak and shunt them from sight. Only then can he separate himself
from self-hatred.
The reason the mode of mind is lethally dangerous: The psychical trope cannot
be sustained in a viable sense. The sense of weakness remains, compelling the
sufferer to double down on the perpetration of force. There can be no end to
the depth of cruelty inflicted because the pathos rages in the interior life of
the totalitarian bully — not those on whom he projects his feelings of weakness
and vulnerability. The fires of Auschwitz were lit by fires of self-hatred.
When tyrants attempt to cage their self-contempt, hell is unloosed upon the
world.
===========
m.
From:
newsfromunderground@googlegroups.com
[mailto:newsfromunderground@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Mark Crispin Miller
Sent: Thursday, October
03, 2019
Subject: [MCM] US
military will start drills on Venezuelan-Colombian border, "with the aim
of rehearsing a possible invasion of Venezuela"
Who will
protest this? Only some of those who know about it; and those few may include
Colombia's indigenous activists—their plight unknown up here, since "our free
press" ignores their efforts, and their peril, while idolizing
Greta Thunberg.
https://www.wola.org/2019/06/indigenous-and-social-leaders-remain-at-risk-colombia/
MCM
US Military to
Initiate Military Drills Near Venezuelan – Colombian Border
October 1, 2019 orinocotribune 0 Comments Chica, Colombia, Covenas, Cuba, marines, Russia, SouthCom, us military aggression, Venezuela
https://orinocotribune.com/us-military-to-initiate-military-drills-near-venezuelan-colombian-border?fbclid=IwAR30NiYXH8vF6iLBckUe7SUQT9RtrR-R5fqCAkcZy3aohAhtvnD6kl7pzno
The US embassy
in Bogota reported that on Monday they will begin infantry exercises, with the
aim of rehearsing a possible invasion of Venezuela, camouflaged through alleged
“humanitarian aid.”
The announcement
was made by the US SOUTHCOM through its twitter account, where they reported
that: “The Marines came to Covenas, Colombia, while
preparing to begin a week of training in humanitarian assistance,” reported the
US army account.
RELATED CONTENT: Dossier Presented by Colombia’s Duque at
the UN: Another Lie?
They also announced that in this “alleged” humanitarian assistance
activity, communications and aerial operations will be carried out together
with the Colombian Marine Corps.
With these exercises that will take place until next Saturday, October 5,
and that will be held at the Marine Infantry Training Base in Coveñas, in northern Colombia, the US empire thorugh the Colombian government intends to intimidate the
Bolivarian National Armed Forces ( FANB ) and the Government of President Nicolás Maduro.
+
From: newsfromunderground@googlegroups.com [mailto:newsfromunderground@googlegroups.com] On Behalf Of Mark Crispin Miller
Sent: Monday, September 30, 2019 12:21 AM
To: newsfromunderground
Subject: [MCM] Some (awful) truth about the Trump/Ukraine "scandal" (2)
A good discussion between Jimmy Dore and Aaron Maté:
https://www.greanvillepost.com/2019/09/28/jimmy-dore-trump-biden-ukraine-corruption-impeachment-media-ignores-w-aaron-mate/
https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2019/09/28/pers-s28.html?fbclid=IwAR3GBmOn1F-1oI7do5lmh8C-Ty7L6FhjWE-xAjcEqwevTnuXjrXll5vlycI
This past week the bitter political conflict in Washington reached a new and explosive stage.
The Democrats are moving forward with an impeachment inquiry centered on Trump’s July 25 phone call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky, during which Trump urged an investigation into Hunter Biden, the son of former Vice President Joe Biden, a leading contender for the Democratic presidential nomination in 2020.
More than half of all representatives in the House have signaled their support for the impeachment inquiry announced by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi on Tuesday.
Trump responded Friday by demanding the resignation of the head of the House Intelligence Committee, Democrat Adam Schiff, while threatening physical violence against those responsible for leaking information on the Zelensky phone call. He told a group of career State Department officials in New York, “You know what we used to do in the good old days…with spies and treason, right?”
This language, with its allusion to purges and executions, testifies to the degree of political crisis gripping the ruling class and the state.
===========
n.
From: The National Security Archive [mailto:nsarchiv@gwu.edu]
Sent: Thursday, October
03, 2019
Subject: Kennedy and
Cuba: Operation Mongoose
https://nsarchive.gwu.edu/briefing-book/cuba/2019-10-03/kennedy-cuba-operation-mongoose
===========
o.
The Corporate Democrats’ (and Alicia Garza’s) Get-Sanders
Slanders
https://blackagendareport.com/index.php/corporate-democrats-and-alicia-garzas-get-sanders-slanders
+
Alicia Garza
attacks Jill Stein at Behest of the Working Families Party and the Non-Profit
Industrial Complex
by Danny Haiphong
===========
p.
The Drone Strikes on the Saudi Oil Facilities
Have Changed Global Warfare
by Patrick Cockburn
+
The Caliphate Project, Made in America. Declassified
U.S. Government Documents Confirm the US Supported the Creation of ISIS
===========
q.
How the U.S.
Military Undermines the American Economy
https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/10/04/how-the-u-s-military-undermines-the-american-economy/
by David Rosen
===========
r.
Misrepresentations
of American and Soviet Roles in World War II and the Cold War
https://www.globalresearch.ca/misrepresentations-american-soviet-roles-wwii-cold-war/5690937
by Eric Zuesse
===========
s.
A father's grief and the Made in USA bomb dropped in Yemen
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/52334.htm
by Bethan McKernan
t.
From: GAZA PALESTINE [mailto:anahona366@gmail.com]
Sent: Saturday, October 05, 2019 3:23 AM
Subject: A new martyr and more than 60 wounded ..
The situation is getting worse for our work. Please do something for our work. Thank you very much to all of our support.
This is what we are exposed to every week ... For the third week in a row, a young man is killed and more than 60 people are injured. This has become a weekly routine for the Israeli occupation forces. Every week, a young man is killed. Gaza from the house of Hanoub with a shot in the chest and died immediately
I don't want to write too much. All we need from you is a small support in this humanitarian and noble work. I hope that you stand with us and support us and share the link below with friends because we really need great support. I need you very much. I hope you stand with us in getting first aid, medicines and some painkillers. And antibiotics ..
I am very exhausted from work I have not slept so far because of the exhausting work that I experienced today and my team I hope you support us and share this link.
thank you,
Nurses in the Gaza Strip