Monday, August 31, 2015

Friday, August 28, 2015

Confirmation Tianjin Was Nuked

Two weeks ago a devastating explosion took place in the port city of Tianjin, China. Official reports claimed a chemical storage facility had caught fire and exploded. Mobile phone footage taken by residents showed an enormous blast and fireball.

Within days, aerial photos revealed the stunning extent of the damage. A steaming black crater marks ground zero, while the apocalyptic surrounding landscape is charred and flattened. Rows of burnt-out cars and twisted shipping containers stretch into the distance on all sides.

The total burned area spans 20,000 square meters and continues to be dangerous—more explosions were reported by Chinese authorities on the 15th of August. Residents within a 3-mile radius have been relocated; at least 85 victims of the accident have been reported dead.

We were immediately suspicious, such huge explosions have to be viewed with suspicion these days when tactical nuclear weapons can and are used with alarming frequency – 9-11, The Khobar Towers, the Haiti Earthquake and most recently, air dropped on Yemen.

Read the entire article

Wednesday, August 26, 2015

Thanks to Congress the UN Plot to Confiscate American Guns Took a Giant Step Forward

We are safe from the ravages of the UN Small Arms Treaty, aren’t we? In fact, many Senators have openly stated that they refuse to ratify this controversial treaty. Well, that is not exactly true. There is a new process established by the new Corker bill may very well have changed the way treaties are passed from here on out.

Under our Constitution, a full two thirds vote from senators for ratification to approve any kind of a treaty. This provision of the Constitution is very clear on this point and it is designed to prevent a treasonous subversion of the Constitution. However when one is living under a criminal enterprise, such as the one presented by the present criminal enterprise in power, who worries about following the rules? As a case in point, under the Corker bill, in order to have stopped the Iran nuclear deal, a two thirds vote to stop it from being implemented by the White House. This is not what the Constitution says and this out and out treason against the people of the United States as the Corker bill is a back door to taking our guns while nullifying the second Amendment.

Under the Corker bill, the following paragraphs describe what we are in for.

Read the entire article

Tuesday, August 25, 2015

Monday, August 24, 2015

Jean Jaures And Donald Trump: A New Dissident Right Taking Shape In France And America?

There’s an important connection between political firestorms on opposite sides of the Atlantic—the rise of Donald Trump and the“cuckservative” controversy fascinating the American Right; and the recent claim by the French National Front that they support the ideals of a noted French socialist. These debates shows the Right in the West may be reconstituting itself around ideals of traditionalism, identity, and immigration patriotism rather than the defense of corporate interests.

The “cuckservative” label was a satirical and brutal take on why the GOP and more broadly, the American “conservative movement,” behave like cuckolded husbands—or like those warblers that allow the cuckoo bird to occupy and exploit their nests. Contemporary conservatives accommodate the social agenda of their sworn enemies and occasionally even promote it—Professional Token Conservatives like David Brooks have made careers out of writing “The Conservative Case For…” [gay marriage, immigration reform, etc.] In return, they receive minor concessions such as being allowed to quibble with Obamacare or support cuts in the capital gains tax.

A recent illustration of the uselessness of this programmed opposition: when Hillary Clinton attacked Jeb Bush at the National Urban League, Bush didn’t even respond. Instead, the man who seems to believe he should be President because he has a Mexican wife used “his speech to offer a message of unity” [Hillary Clinton takes on Jeb Bush on racial equality issues, By Zachary Fagenson, Reuters, July 31, 2015].

And sadly, Jeb’s disinclination to even criticize a female Democrat is apparently acceptable to much of the party—Jeb Bush has far lower negative ratings among likely Republican voters than Donald Trump, even though Trump remains the frontrunner [Here’s the lowdown on who supports Donald Trump, by Emily Ekins, Federalist, August 5, 2015].

Read the entire article

Thursday, August 20, 2015

Israel undermining Obama using fifth columnists

President Obama may feel besieged by the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) and its allies over their strident opposition to the P5+1 nuclear deal with Iran but the American president is but one of a long line of Western leaders who have been faced with an Israeli-directed fifth column in their own countries. 

Israel backers shirk off the notion of dual loyalists—those who have divided loyalties between the country of their citizenship and Israel—as anti-Semitic rhetoric but President Obama has a point about AIPAC critics and others, including Senator Charles Schumer (D-NY), who have opted to support the Israeli government over the Iran deal over their own president. In Schumer’s case, he is also bucking the titular head of his own political party. 

In the case of neocon Republican Bible thumpers like Senators Tim Cotton (R-AR) and Lindsey Graham (R-SC), both of whom recently served in the military, their “God” is the major “Israel Firster,” billionaire casino magnate and noted Macao gangster Sheldon Adelson. Their military chain-of-command has the Israeli government sitting over President Obama. 

In a historic speech at American University, Obama called the Israel Lobby out on their perfidy. “The lobbying that is taking place on the other side is fierce, it is well-financed, it is relentless,” Obama said. Referencing the neocon opponents of the deal, Obama added, “you are going to see the same array of forces that got us into the Iraq War, leading to a situation in which we forgo a historic opportunity and we are back on the path of potential military conflict.” 

Read the entire article

Wednesday, August 19, 2015

Tuesday, August 18, 2015

Immigration — Issue of the Century

“Trump’s immigration proposals are as dangerous as they are stunning,” railed amnesty activist Frank Sharry.

“Trump … promises to rescind protections for Dreamers and deport them. He wants to redefine the constitutional definition of U.S. citizenship as codified by the 14th Amendment. He plans to impose a moratorium on legal immigration.”

While Sharry is a bit hysterical, he is not entirely wrong.

For the six-page policy paper, to secure America’s border and send back aliens here illegally, released by Trump last weekend, is the toughest, most comprehensive, stunning immigration proposal of the election cycle.

The Trump folks were aided by people around Sen. Jeff Sessions who says Trump’s plan “reestablishes the principle that America’s immigration laws should serve the interests of its own citizens.”

The issue is joined, the battle lines are drawn, and the GOP will debate and may decide which way America shall go. And the basic issues — how to secure our borders, whether to repatriate the millions here illegally, whether to declare a moratorium on immigration into the USA — are part of a greater question.

Read the entire article

Friday, August 14, 2015

Chelsea Manning and Hillary Clinton: A Case of Double Standards

Chelsea Manning, the former US Army intelligence officer behind the one of biggest leaks of diplomatic and other sensitive (i.e. embarrassing) material in American history, is facing indefinite solitary confinement at the Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, brig where she is serving a 35-year sentence. Formerly known as Bradley Manning, before her decision to go transgender, Chelsea is charged with four “crimes”:
  • Sweeping food off a table at dinnertime that “almost” hit a correctional officer.
  • Asking to see her lawyer after being approached by said correctional officer.
  • Having a copy of the Caitlyn Jenner issue of Vanity Fair, along with other “forbidden” books dealing with transgender issues.
  • Having a tube of toothpaste inside her cell that was past its expiration date of April 9, 2015.
While this last infraction surely is heinous, the other three seem like pure harassment. Sweeping food off a table hardly seems like a very big deal. And what about the “forbidden” reading material, which, in addition to Vanity Fair, apparently consisted of I Am Malala by Nobel Peace Prize winner Malala Yousafzai, a novel entitled A Safe Girl to Love, Out Magazine, an issue of Cosmopolitan that featured an interview with Manning, and the US Senate report on torture?

Okay, so Cosmo‘s “20 Meanest Things Celebrities Have Said About the Kardashiansis a bit on the subversive side, but hey, if we start censoring ourselves doesn’t this mean that The Terrorists will have won?

Read the entire article

Thursday, August 13, 2015

Wednesday, August 12, 2015

Don’t Be Fooled by the Political Game: The Illusion of Freedom in America

Being a citizen in the American corporate state is much like playing against a stacked deck: you’re always going to lose.

The game is rigged, and “we the people” keep getting dealt the same losing hand. Even so, most stay in the game, against all odds, trusting that their luck will change.

The problem, of course, is that luck will not save us. As I make clear in my book, Battlefield America: The War on the American People, the people dealing the cards—the politicians, the corporations, the judges, the prosecutors, the police, the bureaucrats, the military, the media, etc.—have only one prevailing concern, and that is to maintain their power and control over the citizenry, while milking us of our money and possessions.

It really doesn’t matter what you call them—Republicans, Democrats, the 1%, the elite, the controllers, the masterminds, the shadow government, the police state, the surveillance state, the military industrial complex—so long as you understand that while they are dealing the cards, the deck will always be stacked in their favor.

Incredibly, no matter how many times we see this played out, Americans continue to naively buy into the idea that politics matter, as if there really were a difference between the Republicans and Democrats (there’s not).

Read the entire article

Monday, August 10, 2015

On the A-Bomb's 70th Anniversary, Obama Wants to Spend a Trillion Dollars on New Nuclear Weapons

News organizations love anniversary stories, and if for some reason you haven't heard, it's the 70th anniversary of when the United States dropped two atomic bombs on Japan. The first exploded over Hiroshima on August 6, and the second over Nagasaki on August 9.

Not surprisingly, there's been a proliferation of print and broadcast stories on the making of the bomb, the politics of the bomb, the dropping of the bomb, the survivors of the bomb -- you name it. The Washington Post even ran a story about a 390-year-old Japanese white pine now in the U.S. National Arboretum that survived the Hiroshima blast.

Despite all this coverage, however, I didn't notice any stories that bothered to mention the fact that the Obama administration wants the U.S. government to spend as much as $1 trillion over the next three decades on a new generation of nuclear warheads, bombers, submarines and intercontinental ballistic missiles (ICBMs).

Isn't it time, as nutritionist Susan Powter used to say, to stop the insanity?

U.S. Military Budget Higher than Cold War Average 

Read the entire article

Friday, August 7, 2015

Thursday, August 6, 2015

Obama’s Speech on the Nuclear Deal

Obama delivered a very cogent and combative case for the nuclear deal with Iran earlier today at American University. He offered a clear and persuasive explanation of the deal’s merits and dismantled various criticisms of the deal quite effectively. This was obviously not aimed at trying to win over members of the other party, since it was already clear that Republicans in Congress are virtually unanimous in their opposition and aren’t going to change their position for anything. His responses to hawkish criticisms of the deal were pointed and sometimes mocking, which is understandable given how shoddy the arguments against the deal typically are. The speech seems to have been aimed primarily at fence-sitting Democrats in Congress and members of the public that don’t yet have a definite view of the deal. It was another reminder that Obama is particularly interested in non-proliferation and arms control issues and that he is willing to pursue them aggressively.

There were a few things from the speech that stood out. One was Obama’s emphasis on the fact that the U.S. is giving up nothing as part of this deal except the punitive measures imposed on Iran over the nuclear issue. He compared this deal with Cold War-era arms control treaties to make the point that the latter imposed limitations on the U.S. and were somewhat riskier than the current deal. The implicit argument here was that these arms control treaties were also the right thing to do, and the deal is even more obviously so. Another striking part of the speech was how uncompromising Obama was in his conviction that the deal is clearly the best available option:
I’ve had to make a lot of tough calls as president, but whether or not this deal is good for American security is not one of those calls, it’s not even close.
I would agree that it’s “not even close” to being a difficult decision, but I didn’t expect to hear that. Obama also countered hawkish alarmism about the “windfall” Iran will receive from sanctions relief by stating that Iran would be getting sanctions relief anyway in the absence of a deal or in the event that the deal was rejected, and he dismissed fears of Iran’s regional dominance by correctly pointing out the regime’s relative military weakness. He also repeatedly reminded the audience that Iran belongs to the Non-Proliferation Treaty and will always be barred from building a nuclear weapon. This is a very relevant detail that strangely goes unmentioned in much of the debate over the deal.

Read the entire article

Wednesday, August 5, 2015

Tuesday, August 4, 2015

AIPAC taking all but 3 freshmen Congresspeople to Israel in effort to sabotage Iran deal

The American Israel Education Foundation (AIEF), the educational wing of hardline right-wing pro-Israel lobbying organization the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC), is taking all but three freshmen US lawmakers on a tour of Israel, in hopes of turning them against the Iran nuclear deal. 

Over 50 US congresspeople will meet with Prime Minister Netanyahu in Israel in August. 

Two separate trips are being organized along partisan lines—one for Democrats, and another for Republicans. 

The Democrat trip begins on August 3, and will be led by House Minority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Maryland). 

The Republican trip begins on August 8, and will be led by House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-California). 

Human rights and anti-war group CODEPINK, which has been advocating on behalf of the Iran nuclear deal—which will prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons in return for lifting US sanctions on the country, and which is supported by the overwhelming majority of the international community—has been closely monitoring the planned trips. 

Read the entire article

Monday, August 3, 2015