Revelations

Wednesday, March 29, 2023

Ukraine Truths In A World of Propaganda

 
Americans have no idea why they have been at war in the Middle East, Asia and Africa for a decade. They don’t realize that their liberties have been supplanted by a Gestapo Police State. Few understand that hard economic times are here to stay.
- Americans Awash In Spin, 2011
 
Our first objective is to prevent the re-emergence of a new rival, either on the territory of the former Soviet Union or elsewhere that poses a threat on the order of that posed formerly by the Soviet Union. This is a dominant consideration underlying the new regional defense strategy and requires that we endeavor to prevent any hostile power from dominating a region whose resources would, under consolidated control, be sufficient to generate global power. These regions include Western Europe, East Asia, the territory of the former Soviet Union, and Southwest Asia.
- Wolfowitz Doctrine
 
Their military ambitions, in other words, knew no bounds; nor, it seemed, did the money and resources which began to flow into the Pentagon, the weapons industries, the country’s increasingly militarized intelligence services, mercenary companies like Blackwater and KBR that grew fat on a privatizing administrations war plans and the multi-billion-dollar no-bid contracts it was eager to proffer, the new Department of Homeland Security, and a ramped-up, ever more powerful NATIONAL SECURITY STATE.
- Entering the Soviet Style Era in America, 2010

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About the overthrow of the Democracy of Ukraine, Nazis, Joe Biden, and Fake News
Floor Speech Against Ukraine War Resolution

Senator Eric Brakey
March 9, 2023

Madam President, I rise to oppose this resolution in the strongest terms possible, as a piece of war propaganda that I will not have my name or my vote attached to.

This resolution on the War in Ukraine is riddled with half-truths, historical omissions, and dangerous conclusions that urge our nation down the path to global nuclear war the likes of which no one alive or dead on this Earth has ever seen and one that humanity will never see twice.

Rather than urging PEACE TALKS to bring an end to this border dispute halfway across the world, this resolution presents a simplistic narrative - with no grounding in the realities of foreign policy - or the history of Eastern Europe since the end of the Cold War - in order to justify a continued blank check (now over $100 billion, much unaccounted for) from the pockets of U.S. taxpayers to the Ukrainian government, in an undeclared proxy war with no exit strategy and in which continued escalation endangers the entire world.

Passing this resolution, adding the voice of the Maine Senate to this fool’s errand, would be grossly irresponsible.

When I was a young man, I readily admit that I was fooled by war propaganda. To quote the President who fooled me, “Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice… you ain’t going to fool me twice.” After learning the lessons of disastrous Middle East wars, I resolved to follow the advice of another President, Dwight D. Eisenhower, who served as Supreme Commander of the Allied Forces during World War II. In his farewell address, he TOLD AMERICA to “Beware the military industrial complex.” It is also worth remembering the words of Major General Smedley Butler - a decorated Marine of World War I - that “war is a racket.”

So whenever the bipartisan war machine - the uniparty in Washington - urges our country into foreign wars, it is the responsibility of all citizens (especially the lawmakers in bodies like these) to maintain cool heads and ask basic questions. So let’s start with a basic question about one of the claims in this resolution - seemingly parroting a repeated line in the corporate press, funded with advertising dollars from weapons manufacturers - that the Russian invasion in Ukraine was “unprovoked.”

Madam President, there are many justifiable adjectives to describe this war. Bloody. Vicious. Murderous. Tyrannical. Evil. Illegal. I would accept any of these, but I will not sign my name to a lie - and the claim this invasion was “unprovoked” can only be uttered sincerely if history began the day Russian troops crossed the border.

In truth, there has been a long line of provocations, many made by Washington officials (supposedly accountable to the American people), bringing us to this crisis point.

To be clear, provocation does not justify an action. A man may violently stab another who shoved him. That stabbing would be wrong, but it would also be false to say it was “unprovoked.” This word is used to absolve Washington war hawks of the numerous acts of incompetence and malevolence in the DECADES OF BUILD UP to this conflict since the fall of the Berlin Wall. If we do not acknowledge the actions of our own foreign policy elites in our own federal government that have contributed to this war, then we have no hope in prescribing a proper course of action to bring about a peaceful resolution.

Throughout the Cold War, the number one American foreign policy goal with regards to the Soviet Union was to keep nuclear weapons at bay. When the Cold War ended and the Soviet government dissolved, the nuclear arsenals remained. So too did the American interest in avoiding conflict that could bring about the end of the world as we know it. That’s why there were agreements, in those early days of the new era, that Russia would not contest the reunification of Germany and its admittance into NATO. In exchange, American officials committed - in writing - that NATO would not extend “one inch east” beyond the German border.

That agreement was promptly violated in the 1990s under President Clinton - against the explicit warnings of American foreign policy experts who cautioned Russia would fear these violations as nakedly hostile attempts to surround them militarily. Every American president since, Republican and Democrat alike, has continued this manifest destiny policy of eastward NATO EXPANSION toward the Russian border, disregarding the consistent warnings from both U.S. foreign policy realists and repeated red lines from the Russians that this is viewed as an existential threat to their national security.

Some say, “NATO is a defensive alliance, so what does Russia have to worry about?” I would ask them to tell that to Muammar Qaddafi, the former leader of Libya. His government invaded no other nation, and yet he was sodomized to death in the streets after a NATO-led regime change war in his country. Is that what a “defensive” military alliance does? (And for what purpose? Certainly no humanitarian outcome? The people of Libya now find themselves subject to open air slave markets - today, in the 21st century).

There is no excuse for invading a sovereign country.

This is the principle readily proclaimed in this present foreign crisis, and one with which I heartily agree. But it is odd to hear this principle now often repeated in Washington by the very warhawks Ive watched җ since I was twelve years old - lying to the American people with invented pretexts to justify the invasion and occupation of sovereign Middle East countries for decades on end, paid for with the blood of our soldiers and the treasure of our taxpayers.

And I wonder, Madam President, how we would feel as Americans if our roles were reversed.

For a moment, I ask this chamber to imagine a mirror reality - one in which the Russians won the Cold War and the Warsaw Pact was inducting Canada into its membership, putting their military on our border, just north of Aroostook County. Would we shrug our shoulders and rest assured that the Warsaw Pact is only a “defensive” military alliance?

Would we tell ourselves there was nothing to worry about after watching the Soviet Union as the worldגs last empire and super power left standing spend the last two decades on regime change wars across the Middle East with death tolls nearing one million?

As their military alliance snaked its way through Central America toward our southern border (with the KGB running intelligence operations to manipulate election outcomes and overthrow uncooperative leaders), would we not demand our leaders do something to protect our country from the threat encircling us?

And if our economy and military were a shadow of their former glory, and all we had left was a nuclear arsenal to tell Russia not to mess with us, how far would America be pushed before twitchy fingers were on the button?

In truth, we donגt have to imagine too hard how our country would respond to a Russian military threat at our border. We know how America did respond during the “Cuban Missile Crisis.”

President Kennedy considered Russian missiles off our coast a provocation, and he took action to secure our country - just as any national leader responsible to their people would when an antagonistic military force is approaching their border. Only fools would put a country with a nuclear arsenal in that position - cornered, fearful, and desperate - and then reject all offers to negotiate. Thankfully, Kennedy used diplomacy to diffuse the danger - a skill our leaders today in Washington seem unwilling or unable to exercise.

Both presidents Kennedy and Reagan - adamant cold warriors both who no one would call lovers of Russia - always maintained open communication with the leaders of Russia to avoid escalation into nuclear conflict. Instead, our present day leaders refuse diplomacy and push the war forward to the last Ukrainian standing - not for any benefit to the people of Ukraine, but to bleed the Russians dry just as in Afghanistan through the 1980s. This posture isn’t for the Ukrainian people, this isn’t for the American people - this is for the empire that now stands in the place of our once proud republic on a mountain of corpses to maintain global hegemony.

That’s why, in 2014, then Vice President, Joe Biden, oversaw the overthrow of the democratically-elected President of Ukraine, Viktor Yanukovych. His crime was not signing a trade deal with the European Union. In actuality, he wanted to sign two trade deals - with both Russia and the West - but when the E.U. agreement suddenly prohibited any economic agreement with Russia, Yanukovych says that he felt like a bride who showed up for a wedding, only to discover a never before discussed prenuptial agreement and he just wasnt in the mood anymore. For that, he was regime changed - and if you doubt Washington, D.C. had anything to do with it, I have a bridge to sell you in Libya.

Thanks to leaked phone calls, we know for a fact that the current Under Secretary of State, Victoria Nuland, personally handpicked the leaders of the new government to replace Yanukovych. You can hear the phone call in her own voice as she tells an E.U. official who is in and who is out in this new Ukrainian regime to make the whole thing stick. Is this what ғdemocracy looks like?

After the coup, the new government - urged on by local neonazi groups, like the Azov Battalion - banned the speaking of Russian and launched an ethnic cleansing campaign in the eastern regions of Ukraine. Russia responded by annexing the Crimean Peninsula to maintain control of the Sevastopol Naval Base - RussiaԒs only warm water port with access to the Black Sea (which is also a Russian Alamo,Ӕ after many died defending it against German invasion in World War II). At the same time, he rejected petitions from ethnically Russian people in the Donbas region of Eastern Ukraine - now at the center of the war - to secede and join Russia.

Over the next eight years, as a civil war raged in these separatist regions, our own government funneled weapons into the conflict. In 2016, I represented Maine on the national platform committee of my political party, along with our colleague, Senator Guerin of Penobscot County. At the time, I was shocked to read calls for sending these weapons into this civil war. Thats why I opposed that language and fought to strike it from the document, warning that these policies could escalate into a nuclear conflict. Seven years later, here we are, living under the shadow of it all.

These are only some of the most significant provocations - NATO expansion, deposing a democratically-elected government, and funneling weapons into a civil war on Russia’s border. I haven’t even mentioned the torn-up nuclear treaties and the years of domestic anti-Russian propaganda pushed onto the American people through an unholy alliance between U.S. intelligence agencies and the corporate press.

Do we all remember the report that Vladamir Putin was putting bounties on U.S. soldiers in Afghanistan? That story was as false as the reports of Iraqi solders rippling Quaiti babies from incubators in the lead up to Desert Storm. It was completely debunked. This “disinformation” was planted in the media by anonymous intelligence “officials” in the lead up to a major U.S. election, but if you ever read a retraction, you were lucky to find it on page 36 after months of front page coverage.

That’s how the war propaganda machine works. Lie. Rinse. Repeat. Never apologize.

And let me pre-empt the accusations that I know are coming, whether in this chamber or outside of it, by stating clearly that Vladamir Putin, like so many governmental leaders across the world, is a tyrant. As a lover of human liberty, he could be strung up like Saddam Hussein and I wouldn’t shed a tear. There’s plenty of blood on his hands and I am sure that on the day he meets his maker, he will tremble in fear as his many sins are laid bare.

So it is not for the sake of any despot that I oppose this resolution, but for love of our country and the wisdom of early leaders, like George Washington and John Quincy Adams, who warned our country against entangling alliances, being drawn into European power struggles, and going abroad in search of monsters to destroy.

And for the love of all people caught up in this war - for the conscripted and enslaved men of Ukraine and Russia pitted against each other to the death for the benefit of oligarchs; for the many dead and displaced civilians; for those starving across the world from the consequences of war in the Ukrainian breadbasket; for those in Europe, America, and Maine freezing this winter due to natural gas shortages; and for everyone alive today and generations yet unborn who face the very real threat of nuclear annihilation - we must demand immediate diplomacy to end to this war.

Yet we see no diplomacy from Washington. In the rattling of their sabers for war with Russia, the uniparty claims it is love of democracy and hatred of tyrants that drives them. So where are those affections as they’ve partner with Saudi princes to genocide the people of Yemen. What makes the Yemeni people less worthy of our concern? Is their skin the wrong color? Are their lives of less value because they live in the wrong part of the world? Or is Washington simply so addicted to Saudi oil and the petrodollar that props up our paper currency that the deaths of a quarter million people is worth the cost?

Madam President, it seems George Orwell predicted the state we find ourselves in. If you listen to the talking heads on the television screens, it would seem we’ve always been at war with Eurasia.

But if you go searching down the memory hole for scraps of what was and possibilities of what could have been, you will find stories about the days when George W. Bush and Vladamir Putin toured Texas high schools together, after the Russian President’s call of support following the 9/11 twin tower attacks. You will find stories about Secretary of State Hillary Clinton hitting a “reset button” on U.S. - Russian relations for a new era of peace.

So when did all this change? It certainly is not just that Vladamir Putin is a tyrant, as our leaders are fond of many tyrants around the world.

The public pivot seems to have taken place when Russia stood opposed to the invasions of Iraq, Libya, and Syria all grossly unconstitutional wars by our own American standards and waged for no clear American purpose beyond the profits of that institution Eisenhower warned us of. When Russia blocked the dreams of regime change in Syria, this appears to have been the last straw ח and weve seen nothing but provocation and heard only drum beats for war ever since.

Madame President, the stakes on this matter are higher than any other war in my admittedly short life of thirty-four years. Unlike Iraq, these nuclear weapons are not the imagined fantasies of war profiteers. The arsenals are real. Continued escalation is toying with nuclear fire, which could set the world ablaze. Today, we are fortunate to be alive and to be able to look back at Iraq and admit mistakes were made. Twenty years from now, will we be so able under the clouds of nuclear winter?

Even should the nukes stay put җ and God help us, I hope so - nothing else good can be had from this war. The Ukrainian people die while peace talks should be taking place. Americas strategic position in the world is weakened as China and Russia have formed an alliance against us. Our fair weather friends in Saudi Arabia entertain breaking the petrodollar, threatening the U.S. dollarҒs status as the global reserve currency and unleashing hyperinflation on our country. Rising economic powers, including India, refuse to fall in line with U.S. sanctions as it turns out that, after decades of invading foreign countries in the Middle East, few nations outside Europe recognize Americas moral authority anymore on the question of invading foreign countries.

Madam President, if this resolution was truly in the interest of peace, I will tell you what it would say. It would not call for continued conditionless spending and racking up trillions of dollars more in debt on the American people in order to draw out a war that endangers the whole world. This resolution would demand that Secretary of State Antony Blinken go to Geneva and sit down for peace talks with both Russian and Ukrainian leaders to resolve this border dispute, broker a peace, end the war, end the famine, end the energy crisis, and take the very real threat of nuclear annihilation off the table.

That is what this body should be calling for: peace, not war!

I invite every member of this body to join me in voting for peace by rejecting this resolution.

SOURCE

Sunday, March 26, 2023

No Wonder They Didn’t Teach Us About Marx

 
“Owners of capital will stimulate working class to buy more and more of expensive goods, houses and technology, pushing them to take more and more expensive credits, until their debt becomes unbearable. The unpaid debt will lead to bankruptcy of banks which will have to be nationalized and State will have to take the road which will eventually lead to communism.”
- AZquotes of Karl Marx
 
In the domain of Political Economy, free scientific inquiry meets not merely the same enemies as in all other domains. The peculiar nature of the materials it deals with, summons as foes into the field of battle the most violent, mean and malignant passions of the human breast, the Furies of private interest. The English Established Church, e.g., will more readily pardon an attack on 38 of its 39 articles than on 1/39 of its income
- Capital - Volume 1, Karl Marx, 1867
 
You are horrified at our intending to do away with private property. But in your existing society, private property is already done away with for nine tenths of the population; its existence for the few is solely due to its non-existence in the hands of those nine tenths. You reproach us, therefore, with intending to do away with a form of property, the necessary condition for whose existence is the non-existence of any property for the immense majority of society.
- The Communist Manifesto, Karl Marx
 
Einstein is “convinced” that the only way to eliminate the “grave evils” of capitalism is “through the establishment of a socialist economy, accompanied by an educational system which would be oriented toward social goals.” For Einstein, the “worst evil” of predatory capitalism is the “crippling of individuals” through an educational system that emphasizes an “exaggerated competitive attitude” and trains students “to worship acquisitive success.” But the problems extend far beyond the individual and into the very nature of the political order.
- Albert Einstein Writes the 1949 Essay “Why Socialism?” and Attempts to Find a Solution to the “Grave Evils of Capitalism”
 
The so-called democracy of the powerful U.S. elite continues to live up to its legacy of hypocrisy and deceit..  To the people of this nation of all colors and ethnicities who are losing your jobs, your homes, and your families - to those with no health insurance - to those who cannot afford to send your children to college - and to those languishing in prisons this writer says:  Place not your faith in the rhetoric of politicians or the false promises of such cynical opportunists. Place your faith in yourselves and each other, in your / our ability to discern the difference between rhetoric vs. reality, and in our determination to find and create ways of organizing and coming together to bring about real systemic change dedicated to everyday people and not the corporate blood suckers of the peoples of this nation and world.
- History, Hypocrisy and Empire, Black Commentator, 2009

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Back in Catholic grade school - all us little kids and our developing brains had to go to church every morning before class, and attend mass.  I didn’t realize THE BRAINWASHING OF OUR MINDS STARTED WAY BACK THEN.  Besides the trauma of staring and praying to a larger-than-life statue of a naked, bearded white man bleeding to death in agony, we watched the authority figure priest drink wine from an EXPENSIVE gold cup, internalize whatever he was teaching - and if we didn’t obey - beg for forgiveness in the confessional box. On the way out, we passed a tiny little wooden box to drop pennies in for the poor.  Nobody would question why we’re not helping the poor out more, or ask why the priest wouldn’t sell his expensive gold cup, and use the money to help the hungry and homeless.  The wine would taste just as good in a dixie cup.  Isn’t helping the poor what Jesus was all about? The hypocrisy never registered in my conflicted little brain.

As an older adult, I came to realize RELIGION and CAPITALISM are two evils, and in our OLIGARCHIC, PLUTOCRATIC, INVERTED-TOTALITARIAN society that PROTECTS THE RICH - the manifestations of the darkness that rules us - are IN PLAIN SIGHT.

Now I think I’m STARTING TO UNDERSTAND why they didn’t teach us any Marx stuff in school.

But, what CAN BE a future worse than capitalism - something Marx may not have THOUGHT ABOUT - is THE GREAT RESET - that sounds a lot like socialism or communism with it’s “You will own nothing and be happy” tagline. 

Under the order envisioned by the Great Reset, the advancement of technology is not meant to serve the improvement of the conditions of the people but to submit the individual to the tyranny of a technocratic state. “The experts know better” is the justification.

I wonder what Marx would think of the WEF and the DAVOS crowds?

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Marxism

By Study Smarter

Have you ever wondered what the difference is between Marxism and communism?

Marxism is a key conflict theory in sociology, named after its founder, Karl Marx. It has been one of the most influential sociological theories in the field, as it discusses several aspects of social life, including economics, politics, education and culture.

We will consider the key theorists and concepts of Marxism.

The meaning of Marxism

Marxism in sociology is a key conflict theory originating from the work of Karl Marx. It believes that capitalist society is based on inequalities between the ‘bourgeoisie’ (ruling capitalist class) and ‘proletariat’ (working class). It is a conflict theory, as it sees society as being in constant conflict between these social classes.

Marxism in sociology

We will discuss the core idea of Marxism and the way it is connected to economics.

The role of the economy in Marxism

Marx theorised that the most important aspect of a society is its economy. All other institutions and structures are based on the economy. Whoever is in charge of the economy is in charge of society and its population. Marx’s original philosophy is also referred to as traditional (or classic) Marxism.

In Marx’s view, the bourgeoisie controls the economy and exploits the proletariat through ownership of the ‘means of production’ and ‘relations of production’. Through exploitation, the bourgeoisie can continue to make profits and further the capitalist agenda. The capitalist agenda is based on the private ownership of property, through which individuals can accumulate capital.

Marx highlights the periods of times that Western societies moved through. He called these epochs.

The five epochs

We will look at the five epochs, defined by Marxist philosophy.

Primitive communism

Society was free of social class division, as hunter-gatherers only gathered enough food to survive. There was no surplus production, and therefore there was no exploitation.

Ancient society

This was the first stage of exploitation, as the dynamic between aristocrats and slaves characterised society.

Feudalism

Medieval society was divided into landowners and land occupiers. The landowners exploited the occupiers.

Capitalist society

Our current society. We can trade with anyone, and we are free to make our own money. However, according to Marx, this stage is unjust because the rich exploit the poor.

Advanced communism

Marx’s utopian prediction for the next stage of society. Shared resources, wealth, and equality are traits of Marx’s ideal societal structure.

Marxism vs. Communism

Marxism was a philosophical and sociological perspective, which believed that society was progressing towards the age of communism, where all individuals will be equal. In the 20th century, more than several countries claimed to have established communism. The most famous of them was the Soviet Union.

Soviet Communism, while ideologically based on Marxist ideas, in reality was not what Marx envisioned for society.

When we talk about Marxism, we usually mean the philosophy and sociological theory, while when we talk about communism, we refer to the political regime existing in the Soviet Union and in China in the 20th century.

Marxist philosophy: The key concepts of Marxism

Marx argued that the bourgeoisie maintains and increases their wealth by controlling the means of production and exploiting the proletariat. He came up with the following key concepts to further explain his theory.

The two classes of capitalist society

The bourgeoisie and the proletariat make up the two classes of capitalist society.

The bourgeoisie owns the means of production, which produces goods that they can sell at a profit. For this reason, the bourgeoisie controls the wealth of the country. Meanwhile, the proletariat sells its time and labour to the bourgeoisie for money. Bourgeoisie exploits the proletariat

Marx argued that the bourgeoisie exploits the proletariat by paying them less than they deserve to keep profits high. Capitalist society is unjust because of this exploitation and conflict of interest between the two social classes.

The economic base and superstructure

The bourgeoisie controls the means of production, meaning that they own the land, materials, factories, and equipment for production. They also control the relations of production, which means they organise the workers involved in the production of goods and services.

This combination of power gives the bourgeoisie control over the whole economy. According to Marx, control over the whole economy means control over society, as the ‘superstructure; is based on the economy.

The superstructure is the name given to all other institutions and structures in society, such as government, religion, education, and family. Such institutions reproduce bourgeoisie ideas and values, which helps to maintain the status quo and uphold the capitalist agenda.

Ideological control

Due to the bourgeoisie’s control over the superstructure, the capitalist agenda is present in every institution. The bourgeoisie’s ideas are presented as dominant and the natural way of thinking so that the proletariat is socialised into thinking such a society is normal and just.

False class consciousness and alienation

The results of ideological control ensure that the proletariat does not realise its exploitation because it believes its exploitative working conditions are normal. This delusion is called ‘false class consciousness’.

The capitalist structure also creates ‘alienation’, which is a disengagement from work, community, and a sense of belonging. Marxism argues that this is a necessary and intentional result of capitalist society, as it prevents workers from feeling like they are in control.

Revolution

Marx believed that once the proletariat realised its position in society, a revolution would occur and capitalism would be abolished. The proletariat would overthrow the bourgeoisie and create an equal society where there would be no motivation to profit or exploit others.

Evaluation of traditional Marxism in sociology

Marx’s original theory is also called traditional Marxism. Since then, there have been other forms of Marxism. We will evaluate traditional Marxism as a whole. We will then consider it from the perspectives of newer forms of Marxism.

Strengths of Marxism

· Traditional Marxism was considered a major influence in its time, as it advocated for social and economic change.

· Marxist concepts can help us understand past revolutions in capitalist societies.

· Many claims Marxism is still relevant today. Institutions still use ideological control to promote a capitalist agenda and to justify inequalities. For example, the institution of education socialises children to be obedient and submit to the hierarchy.

Weaknesses of Marxism

· Marxism heavily ignores the influence of other factors on social inequalities, such as ethnicity, religion, and gender.

· Communism has not fared well historically, as shown by the fall of communism in the former socialist state of the USSR.

· It has been argued that Marxism is too idealistic. There is unlikely to be total social class equality in a communist society.

· Marxism is overly simplistic. Society is not just split into two social classes.

· Functionalists claim Marxism has an overly negative view of society. It is good for society when institutions and individuals carry out their ‘functions’, as this promotes social solidarity.

· Feminists claim Marxism overlooks the further social division of gender in society. Marxist FEMINISM, in particular, argues that gender is the most important division in a capitalist society, not social class. Class is not solely defined by socioeconomic status, according to Marxist feminists.

Cultural Marxism

We will look at the two most important, new forms of Marxism, namely humanistic Marxism and scientific Marxism which deal with cultural issues and questions of society.

Gramsci and humanistic Marxism

Antonio Gramsci added to traditional Marxism by introducing the concept of hegemony.

Hegemony refers to the domination of one group or class over another through the ideological leadership of society.

He claimed the capitalist state uses two ways of enforcing control. These are outlined below.

Coercion

This works through the army, police force, and the judicial system, which enforce the rule of the state.

Cultural hegemony

Cultural hegemony works through the ideas and values of the bourgeoisie, which persuades individuals that their lifestyles makes sense.

To counter this, Gramsci claimed that proletarian intellectuals needed to form their own cultural hegemonic control, called ‘counter-hegemony’. This would challenge bourgeois IDEALOGY and allow the proletariat to bring about social change.

Gramsci claimed that although the bourgeoisie has hegemonic control, they are a minority within society, and the proletariat has ‘dual-consciousness’. This refers to the proletariat’s awareness of their exploitation. For these reasons, the bourgeoisie never has complete control and hegemonic control and therefore, the overthrow of the bourgeoisie is possible. However, the overthrow will only be successful if the proletariat has a counter-hegemony.

Gramsci’s ideas challenged the passive nature of the proletariat as described by Marx in traditional Marxism. He claimed that individuals can see through their exploitation, unlike Marx, who claimed that the proletariat experiences false class consciousness.

Gramsci also criticised the idea that change in economic structure is the only way to overthrow capitalism. Through his ideas about counter-hegemony, he claimed that it is necessary to adopt certain ideas and values, as these will play a central role in bringing about change.

Althusser and scientific Marxism

LOUIS ALTHUSSER suggested that instead of there being two structures or levels of control in society (as claimed by traditional Marxism with the economy and superstructure), there are three levels of control. The bourgeoisie controls all three levels that have different functions for upholding capitalist society. These are outlined below.

Economic level

Activities involving the production of goods and services.

Political level

All organisations, such as the government.

Ideological level

The factors that influence the way individuals see themselves and the world, for example, THE MEDIA.

Althusser’s philosophy stated that all three levels of control in society are important for upholding capitalism. Whilst the economic level is dominant, the political level punishes the rebels and the ideological level ensures individuals conform to capitalist values. Althusser claims traditional Marxism does not acknowledge this, as it states the economy is the most important part of society.

Capitalist states split these functions into two ‘apparatuses’ according to Althusser. These apparatuses help to perform the necessary functions.

Repressive state apparatus

At the political level, this includes armed bodies such as the army or the police force that can physically restrain insurgents.

Ideological state apparatus

This includes ‘softer’ methods of ideological control, such as education, THE MEDIA, and religion.

Althusser’s ideas of the emergence of a communist society do not depend on consciousness or realisation, as suggested by traditional Marxism. Instead, Althusser argued that after a crisis in the capitalist structure, capitalism would collapse and pave the way for a communist society.

He did not believe that individuals had the power to overthrow the capitalist system, as the structure we live in determines our thoughts and actions. Due to this, Althusser also criticised humanistic Marxism for suggesting that individuals are more active than they are.

Marxism - Key takeaways

· Marxism in sociology is a key conflict theory that believes capitalist society is based on inequalities between the bourgeoisie (ruling capitalist class) and the proletariat (working class).

· The economy is the base of society, whilst all other institutions form the superstructure. Whoever controls the economy controls society. In this case, it is the bourgeoisie. The bourgeoisie exploits the proletariat by paying it less than it needs.

· Marxism claims the proletariat is unaware of this exploitation. However, once it realises this, it will overthrow the bourgeoisie and form a communist society.

· Gramsci criticised Marx, claiming that the proletariat is aware of its exploitation, but needs to form its own ideas to overthrow the bourgeoisie. Simple awareness of exploitation is not enough.

· Althusser criticised both Marx and Gramsci and claimed that individuals do not have the power to overthrow the state, as their living conditions determine their actions. Instead, he argued that the capitalist structure would collapse and make way for a communist society.

SOURCE

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The Spread of Marxism & Its Influence on Russian Communism

By Dell Markey
The Classroom
June 25, 2018

”THE COMMUNIST MANIFESTO,” published in 1848 by Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, was among the most influential writings in world history. Marx theorized that all of human history was defined by a class struggle between the ruling class and the working class. He further argued that the working class would eventually overthrow the ruling class and usher in a UTOPIAN society in which all property was owned by society as a whole. Marx’s philosophy was highly influential in the development of communism in Russia and throughout the world.

Pre-Revolutionary Russia

Marx taught that industrialization and capitalism were necessary steps for society to go through before the working class could arise and institute communism. Before the Communist Revolution, the Russian Empire was a monarchy, ruled by a tsar. Russia was largely an agricultural country and was in the very early stages of industrialization during Marx’s lifetime. Because of this, the Russian government didn’t consider Marx’s writings to pose a serious threat. Marx’s writings were allowed to be distributed in Russia even though they were banned in many other countries. “The Manifesto” and “Das Kapital” became influential to many of the early Russian socialists and communists.

Influence on Revolutionaries

Marx’s writings had a profound impact on Vladimir Lenin and Leon Trotsky, who would in turn promote communist ideas in Russia through publication of a Marxist periodical called “Iskra”—“The Spark.” Lenin became the most influential figure in early Russian communism. After the Russian Revolution successfully deposed the tsar’s regime, Lenin’s Bolshevik branch of communism rose to power and quickly assimilated or deposed other socialist groups. Lenin modeled his goals after Marx’s, but on a smaller scale. Marx believed that the communist revolution would take place on an international scale. Lenin realized that he lacked the resources to make that happen and contented himself with seeing communism succeed in Russia. Lenin firmly believed Marx’s idea that society must go through a period of dictatorship of the proletariat—or working class—before true communism could be achieved.

Trotsky and Stalin

After Lenin died in 1924, there was a brief power struggle between two of his chief lieutenants, Leon Trotsky and Josef Stalin. Trotsky believed that the world needed to be in a state of constant revolution for communism to survive. Stalin believed that communism could succeed in a single nation and that it could coexist with other forms of government until other countries’ working class staged their own revolutions. In the end, Stalin came to power and his view of Leninist-Marxism prevailed in Soviet Russia. This included a small but powerful ruling party which would enforce the Communist Party’s policy, brutally when deemed necessary.

Post-Stalin Russian Communism

Under Stalin, any supposed challenge to the Communist Party’s leadership was dealt with severely. Political opponents were often assassinated. Religious leaders were persecuted. The Communist Party had dictated most aspects of the Soviet people’s lives. The leaders who followed him, from his successor Nikita Khruschev to Mikhail Gorbachev, under whose leadership the Soviet Union departed from Communist Party rule in 1991, each made changes relaxing some of the harsher controls on the Russian people. At first, this came as an acknowledgment that Stalin had not exemplified the best ideals of Marxism, which taught that the dictatorship of the proletariat would give way to a society in which government was unnecessary. In the end, Gorbachev and other Russian leaders in the 1980s and early 1990s acknowledged that the Communist Party in general had failed to live up to its ideals as the representatives of the working class and Communist Party rule was ended.

SOURCE

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Why Socialism

By Albert Einstein
Monthly Review
May, 1949

Is it advisable for one who is not an expert on economic and social issues to express views on the subject of socialism? I believe for a number of reasons that it is.

Let us first consider the question from the point of view of scientific knowledge. It might appear that there are no essential methodological differences between astronomy and economics: scientists in both fields attempt to discover laws of general acceptability for a circumscribed group of phenomena in order to make the interconnection of these phenomena as clearly understandable as possible. But in reality such methodological differences do exist. The discovery of general laws in the field of economics is made difficult by the circumstance that observed economic phenomena are often affected by many factors which are very hard to evaluate separately. In addition, the experience which has accumulated since the beginning of the so-called civilized period of human history has - as is well known - been largely influenced and limited by causes which are by no means exclusively economic in nature. For example, most of the major states of history owed their existence to conquest. The conquering peoples established themselves, legally and economically, as the privileged class of the conquered country. They seized for themselves a monopoly of the land ownership and appointed a priesthood from among their own ranks. The priests, in control of education, made the class division of society into a permanent institution and created a system of values by which the people were thenceforth, to a large extent unconsciously, guided in their social behavior.

But historic tradition is, so to speak, of yesterday; nowhere have we really overcome what Thorstein Veblen called “the PREDATORY phase” of HUMAN DEVELOPMENT. The observable economic facts belong to that phase and even such laws as we can derive from them are not applicable to other phases. Since the real purpose of socialism is precisely to overcome and advance beyond the predatory phase of human development, economic science in its present state can throw little light on the socialist society of the future.

Second, socialism is directed towards a social-ethical end. Science, however, cannot create ends and, even less, instill them in human beings; science, at most, can supply the means by which to attain certain ends. But the ends themselves are conceived by personalities with lofty ethical ideals andif these ends are not stillborn, but vital and vigorous - are adopted and carried forward by those many human beings who, half unconsciously, determine the slow evolution of society.

For these reasons, we should be on our guard not to overestimate science and scientific methods when it is a question of human problems; and we should not assume that experts are the only ones who have a right to express themselves on questions affecting the organization of society.

Innumerable voices have been asserting for some time now that human society is passing through a crisis, that its stability has been gravely shattered. It is characteristic of such a situation that individuals feel indifferent or even hostile toward the group, small or large, to which they belong. In order to illustrate my meaning, let me record here a personal experience. I recently discussed with an intelligent and well-disposed man the threat of another war, which in my opinion would seriously endanger the existence of mankind, and I remarked that only a supra-national organization would offer protection from that danger. Thereupon my visitor, very calmly and coolly, said to me: “Why are you so deeply opposed to the disappearance of the human race?”

I am sure that as little as a century ago no one would have so lightly made a statement of this kind. It is the statement of a man who has striven in vain to attain an equilibrium within himself and has more or less lost hope of succeeding. It is the expression of a painful solitude and isolation from which so many people are suffering in these days. What is the cause? Is there a way out?

It is easy to raise such questions, but difficult to answer them with any degree of assurance. I must try, however, as best I can, although I am very conscious of the fact that our feelings and strivings are often contradictory and obscure and that they cannot be expressed in easy and simple formulas.

Man is, at one and the same time, a solitary being and a social being. As a solitary being, he attempts to protect his own existence and that of those who are closest to him, to satisfy his personal desires, and to develop his innate abilities. As a social being, he seeks to gain the recognition and affection of his fellow human beings, to share in their pleasures, to comfort them in their sorrows, and to improve their conditions of life. Only the existence of these varied, frequently conflicting, strivings accounts for the special character of a man, and their specific combination determines the extent to which an individual can achieve an inner equilibrium and can contribute to the well-being of society. It is quite possible that the relative strength of these two drives is, in the main, fixed by inheritance. But the personality that finally emerges is largely formed by the environment in which a man happens to find himself during his development, by the structure of the society in which he grows up, by the tradition of that society, and by its appraisal of particular types of behavior. The abstract concept “society” means to the individual human being the sum total of his direct and indirect relations to his contemporaries and to all the people of earlier generations. The individual is able to think, feel, strive, and work by himself; but he depends so much upon society in his physical, intellectual, and emotional existence that it is impossible to think of him, or to understand him, outside the framework of society. It is “society” which provides man with food, clothing, a home, the tools of work, language, the forms of thought, and most of the content of thought; his life is made possible through the labor and the accomplishments of the many millions past and present who are all hidden behind the small word “society.”

It is evident, therefore, that the dependence of the individual upon society is a fact of nature which cannot be abolished - just as in the case of ants and bees. However, while the whole life process of ants and bees is fixed down to the smallest detail by rigid, hereditary instincts, the social pattern and interrelationships of human beings are very variable and susceptible to change. Memory, the capacity to make new combinations, the gift of oral communication have made possible developments among human being which are not dictated by biological necessities. Such developments manifest themselves in traditions, institutions, and organizations; in literature; in scientific and engineering accomplishments; in works of art. This explains how it happens that, in a certain sense, man can influence his life through his own conduct, and that in this process conscious thinking and wanting can play a part.

Man acquires at birth, through heredity, a biological constitution which we must consider fixed and unalterable, including the natural urges which are characteristic of the human species. In addition, during his lifetime, he acquires a cultural constitution which he adopts from society through communication and through many other types of influences. It is this cultural constitution which, with the passage of time, is subject to change and which determines to a very large extent the relationship between the individual and society. Modern anthropology has taught us, through comparative investigation of so-called primitive cultures, that the social behavior of human beings may differ greatly, depending upon prevailing cultural patterns and the types of organization which predominate in society. It is on this that those who are striving to improve the lot of man may ground their hopes: human beings are not condemned, because of their biological constitution, to annihilate each other or to be at the mercy of a cruel, self-inflicted fate.

If we ask ourselves how the structure of society and the cultural attitude of man should be changed in order to make human life as satisfying as possible, we should constantly be conscious of the fact that there are certain conditions which we are unable to modify. As mentioned before, the biological nature of man is, for all practical purposes, not subject to change. Furthermore, technological and demographic developments of the last few centuries have created conditions which are here to stay. In relatively densely settled populations with the goods which are indispensable to their continued existence, an extreme division of labor and a highly-centralized productive apparatus are absolutely necessary. The time - which, looking back, seems so idyllic - is gone forever when individuals or relatively small groups could be completely self-sufficient. It is only a slight exaggeration to say that mankind constitutes even now a planetary community of production and consumption.

I have now reached the point where I may indicate briefly what to me constitutes the essence of the crisis of our time. It concerns the relationship of the individual to society. The individual has become more conscious than ever of his dependence upon society. But he does not experience this dependence as a positive asset, as an organic tie, as a protective force, but rather as a threat to his natural rights, or even to his economic existence. Moreover, his position in society is such that the egotistical drives of his make-up are constantly being accentuated, while his social drives, which are by nature weaker, progressively deteriorate. All human beings, whatever their position in society, are suffering from this process of deterioration. Unknowingly prisoners of their own egotism, they feel insecure, lonely, and deprived of the naive, simple, and unsophisticated enjoyment of life. Man can find meaning in life, short and perilous as it is, only through devoting himself to society.

The ECONOMIC ANARCHY of capitalist society as it exists today is, in my opinion, the REAL SOURCE OF EVIL. We see before us a huge community of producers the members of which are unceasingly striving to deprive each other of the fruits of their collective labor - not by force, but on the whole in faithful compliance with legally established rules. In this respect, it is important to realize that the means of productionthat is to say, the entire productive capacity that is needed for producing consumer goods as well as additional capital goods - may legally be, and for the most part are, the private property of individuals.

For the sake of simplicity, in the discussion that follows I shall call “workers” all those who do not share in the ownership of the means of productionalthough this does not quite correspond to the customary use of the term. The owner of the means of production is in a position to purchase the labor power of the worker. By using the means of production, the worker produces new goods which become the property of the capitalist. The essential point about this process is the relation between what the worker produces and what he is paid, both measured in terms of real value. Insofar as the labor contract is דfree, what the worker receives is determined not by the real value of the goods he produces, but by his minimum needs and by the capitalists’ requirements for labor power in relation to the number of workers competing for jobs. It is important to understand that even in theory the payment of the worker is not determined by the value of his product.

Private capital tends to become concentrated in few hands, partly because of competition among the capitalists, and partly because technological development and the increasing division of labor encourage the formation of larger units of production at the expense of smaller ones. The result of these developments is an oligarchy of private capital the enormous power of which cannot be effectively checked even by a democratically organized political society. This is true since the members of legislative bodies are selected by political parties, largely financed or otherwise influenced by private capitalists who, for all practical purposes, separate the electorate from the legislature. The consequence is that the representatives of the people do not in fact sufficiently protect the interests of the underprivileged sections of the population. Moreover, under existing conditions, private capitalists inevitably control, directly or indirectly, the main sources of information (press, radio, education). It is thus extremely difficult, and indeed in most cases quite impossible, for the individual citizen to come to objective conclusions and to make intelligent use of his political rights.

The situation prevailing in an economy based on the private ownership of capital is thus characterized by two main principles: first, means of production (capital) are privately owned and the owners dispose of them as they see fit; second, the labor contract is free. Of course, there is no such thing as a pure capitalist society in this sense. In particular, it should be noted that the workers, through long and bitter political struggles, have succeeded in securing a somewhat improved form of the “free” labor contract for certain categories of workers. But taken as a whole, the present day economy does not differ much from “pure capitalism.”

Production is carried on for profit, not for use. There is no provision that all those able and willing to work will always be in a position to find employment; an “army” of unemployed almost always exists. The worker is constantly in fear of losing his job. Since unemployed and poorly paid workers do not provide a profitable market, the production of consumers’ goods is restricted, and great hardship is the consequence. Technological progress frequently results in more unemployment rather than in an easing of the burden of work for all. The profit motive, in conjunction with competition among capitalists, is responsible for an instability in the accumulation and utilization of capital which leads to increasingly severe depressions. Unlimited competition leads to a huge waste of labor, and to that crippling of the social consciousness of individuals which I mentioned before.

This crippling of individuals I consider the worst evil of capitalism. Our whole educational system suffers from this evil. An exaggerated competitive attitude is inculcated into the student, who is trained to worship acquisitive success as a preparation for his future career.

I am convinced there is only one way to eliminate these grave evils, namely through the establishment of a socialist economy, accompanied by an educational system which would be oriented toward social goals. In such an economy, the means of production are owned by society itself and are utilized in a planned fashion. A planned economy, which adjusts production to the needs of the community, would distribute the work to be done among all those able to work and would guarantee a livelihood to every man, woman, and child. The education of the individual, in addition to promoting his own innate abilities, would attempt to develop in him a sense of responsibility for his fellow men in place of the glorification of power and success in our present society.

Nevertheless, it is necessary to remember that a PLANNED ECONOMY is not yet socialism. A planned economy as such may be accompanied by the complete enslavement of the individual. The achievement of socialism requires the solution of some extremely difficult socio-political problems: how is it possible, in view of the far-reaching centralization of political and economic power, to prevent bureaucracy from becoming all-powerful and overweening? How can the rights of the individual be protected and therewith a democratic counterweight to the power of bureaucracy be assured?

Clarity about the aims and problems of socialism is of greatest significance in our age of transition. Since, under present circumstances, free and unhindered discussion of these problems has come under a powerful taboo, I consider the foundation of this magazine to be an important public service.

SOURCE

Thursday, March 23, 2023

Bad Moon Rising Part 90 - The Iraq War 20 Years Later

As a kid GROWING UP - I believed communism was the MANIFESTATION OF EVIL, and devils ruled Russia and China, while the U.S.A. was the good guys and CAPITALISM promised PROSPERITY.

There’s enough evil to go around the planet now led by THINGS AND PEOPLE WE RATHER NOT THINK ABOUT.

Gotta hand it to CHINA.  They may be full blown TOTALITARIAN, but the country’s RISE as a powerhouse in manufacturing and technology - thanks in a big part from U.S. outsourcing and offshoring GREED is remarkable.  50 years ago our big imports from China were things like toothpicks and firecrackers, while America was the high-tech leader with a growing middle class.  TODAY it’s the opposite.

This year is the 20 year anniversay of the U.S. INVASION OF IRAQ - which WE KNOW WAS DONE under a lie.

Kudos for China trying to make peace in the world, while my own government DOESN’T

[T]op officials of the Bush administration mistook military power for power, a gargantuan misreading of the U.S. economic position in the world and of their moment… The attacks of September 11, 2001, that Pearl Harbor of the twenty-first century, clinched the deal.

You remember the Soviet Union, now almost 20 years in its grave.  But who gives it a SECOND THOUGHT today?  Even in it’s glory years that evil empire was sometimes referred to as the second superpower.  In 1991, after seven decades, it suddenly disintegrated and disappeared, leaving the United States - the sole superpower, even the hyperpower, on planet Earth - surprised but triumphant.

Bush administration officials promptly suggested that they were prepared to use a newly agile American military to drain the swamp of global terrorism.

Their military ambitions, in other words, knew no bounds; nor, it seemed, did the money and resources which began to flow into the Pentagon, the weapons industries, the countrys increasingly militarized intelligence services, mercenary companies like Blackwater and KBR that grew fat on a privatizing administrations war plans and the multi-billion-dollar no-bid contracts it was eager to proffer, the new Department of Homeland Security, and a ramped-up, ever more powerful NATIONAL SECURITY STATE.

Drunk on war as Washington may be, the U.S. is still not the Soviet Union in 1991 - not yet.  But it’s not the triumphant sole superpower anymore either.  Its global power is visibly waning, its ability to win wars distinctly in question, its economic viability open to doubt.  It has been transformed from a can-do into a cant-do nation, a fact only highlighted by the ongoing BP catastrophe and rescue in the Gulf of Mexico.  Its airports are less shiny and more Third World-like every year.  Unlike France or China, it has not a mile of high-speed rail. And when it comes to the FUTURE, especially the CREATION AND SUPPORT of INNOVATIVE INDUSTRIES in alternative energy, its chasing the pack.  It is increasingly a low-end service economy, LOOSING good JOBS that will NEVER RETURN.

Mike Whitney WROTE IN 2006

The inescapable force of public contempt has fallen on the White House like a darkening storm-cloud. The neocon master-plan is unraveling like a spool of yarn skittering across the kitchen floor.

Bush has insinuated corruption into every molecule of the body politic. The torture and violence have removed any claim of legitimacy or moral authority. The social contract has been hacked into small bits and left to feed the crows. The government is now entirely powered by hubris and brute force, the sustenance of tyranny.

The American dream has ripened into a menacing delirium, teeming with torture, violence, and murder. We have become everything we profess to hate.

I didn’t think we can get a president worse than DUBYA.

Until the NEXT GUY, then ANOTHER, and finally THE GUY WE HAVE TODAY.

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Andrew Bacevich on China’s Rise as Global Superpower & Decline of U.S. Empire After Iraq Invasion

Democracy Now
March 22, 2023

Transcript

Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin have declared a “new era” in Chinese-Russian relations after meeting in Moscow earlier this week. The two leaders reportedly discussed CHINA’S 12-POINT PROPOSAL to end the war in Ukraine, with Putin stating that Chinas plan could be the basis for a peace agreement. Though he has not yet met with Xi himself, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky has recently also expressed a willingness to consider China’s peace plan. For more, we speak to Andrew Bacevich, co-founder of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, about the rise of China, as well as the 20th anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq. Bacevich is professor emeritus of international relations and history at Boston University and the author of ON SHEDDING AN OBSOLETE PAST: BIDDING FAREWELL TO THE AMERICAN CENTURY.

AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. Im Amy Goodman.

Chinese President Xi Jinping has left Moscow, where he met with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The two leaders declared a “new era” in Chinese-Russian relations. During a joint news conference, Putin said, quote, “Russia-China relations are at the highest point in the history of our two countries,” he said.

Xi Jinping arrived in Moscow Monday, just three days after the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for Putin, accusing him of committing war crimes in Ukraine. On Tuesday, Xi Jinping discussed China’s 12-point peace proposal to end the war in Ukraine.

PRESIDENT XI JINPING: [translated] I would like to point out that in the Ukrainian settlement, we consistently follow the principles of the U.N. Charter and stand on an objective and unbiased position. We do actively promote reconciliation and resumption of talks. Our stance is based on the very essence of the matter and on the truth. We are always for peace and dialogue. We are firmly standing on the true side of history.

AMY GOODMAN: Russian President Vladimir Putin said China’s plan could be the basis to end the war.

PRESIDENT VLADIMIR PUTIN: [translated] Of course, we did not ignore the situation around Ukraine. We believe that many of the provisions of the peace plan put forward by China are consonant with Russian approaches and can be taken as the basis for a peaceful settlement, when they are ready for that in the West and in Kyiv. However, so far, we see no such readiness from their side.

AMY GOODMAN: In recent weeks, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky expressed willingness to talk to Xi Jinping about ChinaҒs peace plan. A senior Ukrainian official has told CNN that discussions are underway to organize a call between the two leaders, but nothing has been set yet. Zelensky spoke in Kyiv on Tuesday.

PRESIDENT VOLODYMYR ZELENSKY: [translated] We invited China, both publicly as well as through diplomatic channels, to participate in our peace formula. We invite China for dialogue, and we wait for a response.

AMY GOODMAN: Meanwhile, in Washington, D.C., National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby dismissed Chinas ability to be an impartial mediator between Russia and Ukraine.

JOHN KIRBY: But I don’t think you can reasonably look at China as impartial in any way. They haven’t condemned this in - this invasion. They havent stopped buying Russian oil and Russian energy. President Xi saw fit to fly all the way to Moscow, hasn’t talked once to President Zelensky, hasn’t visited Ukraine.

AMY GOODMAN: To talk about the Russia-China summit, the war in Ukraine, as well as the 20th anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, were joined by Andrew Bacevich, chair of the board and co-founder of the Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, retired colonel, Vietnam War veteran. Bacevich is professor emeritus of international relations and history at Boston University and author of several books, his latest, On Shedding an Obsolete Past: Bidding Farewell to the American Century.

Professor Bacevich, welcome back to Democracy Now! It’s great to have you with us.

ANDREW BACEVICH: Well, thank you very much.

AMY GOODMAN: There’s a lot to talk about today, from what happened 20 years ago, the U.S. invasion to Iraq, to the Ukraine war. But let’s begin in the present, this latest news of the Xi-Putin summit, the Chinese peace plan that was offered, and Zelenskys response to it. Do you see a path right now? Start off by talking about the significance of the summit.

ANDREW BACEVICH: Well, first of all, you know, we should not take at face value anything the parties say, whether we’re talking about Russia, China, Ukraine or the United States.

I think what impresses me is the evidence of Chinese diplomatic activism. And I say that also with reference to their role in bringing about the restoration of diplomatic relations between Iran and Saudi Arabia. Our diplomacy, American diplomacy, strikes me as reactive and unimaginative and ineffective. But I think Chinese diplomacy appears to be more imaginative and potentially more effective. What that says is guess what - the world is changing in important and dramatic ways with regard to the distribution of power and influence worldwide. And this simply confirms, in a sense, what we’ve always known, or known for a long time, which is that, yes, indeed, China is emerging as a global superpower on a par with the United States of America.

AMY GOODMAN: Can you talk about the peace plan that they’ve offered? And while Zelensky is not accepting that, saying it would mean that Russia would stay within the occupied areas in Ukraine, in both Crimea and eastern Ukraine, and could allow them to invade at any future point, but just the fact that he is saying, “I do want to talk with the president of China,” and has presented his own peace plan. If youve analyzed that?

ANDREW BACEVICH: Well, I haven’t analyzed it in any great detail, but I think you’re actually making the key point, that Zelensky’s willingness to talk, to hear out China, suggests an openness to China serving as the intermediary, which will make some sort of deal possible. It’s highly unlikely that there’s going to be one side that wins and the other side that loses in this conflict, even though that appears to be the expectation of the Biden administration, you know, that Ukraine will win, Russia will lose. Ain’t gonna happen. And so there has to be a compromise. And it would appear to me that Zelensky is signaling a willingness to compromise, whereas the United States is sticking to a very hardball position.

AMY GOODMAN: So, the U.S. is saying they can’t trust China, but talk about why you think China and other countries could be seminal in mediating a peace deal.

ANDREW BACEVICH: Well, I think the larger context here is one that other commentators have recognized, and that is that the Ukraine-Russia war is a proxy conflict. It’s a proxy conflict that is a subset of a larger competition between the West, led by the United States, even if our leadership is somewhat precarious - between the West and the People’s Republic of China. And again, I think what we’re seeing is assertiveness, imagination on the part of the Peoples Republic that has not met with anything comparable from the United States.

AMY GOODMAN: Andrew Bacevich, if you can talk about this moment in time? The corporate media is hardly dealing with this very significant 20th anniversary of the U.S. invasion of Iraq, and the Ukraine war, you know, going on during this time. And even when the mainstream media does, it’s the same people who 20 years ago pushed, beat the drums for war, for that invasion and Iגm not just talking about Fox - in the same way political leaders, from Joe Biden to Hillary Clinton, when they were in the Senate, voted for the U.S. invasion -

ANDREW BACEVICH: Right.

AMY GOODMAN: - that President George W. Bush pushed forward. Talk about the effects of this disastrous war, where still, unlike in Afghanistan, 2,500 troops are still there.

ANDREW BACEVICH: Well, I think a preliminary question is: Why did the United States invade Iraq in the first place? And there are multiple answers to that question. I think, in many respects, the most important answer is that the Iraq War was envisioned by both the Bush administration and by proponents of the war - for example, in the media - was envisioned as a way to demonstrate that 9/11 really didn’t mean much of anything, that the United States was still the one and only global superpower, that if we sent U.S. troops to Iraq, if we beat up Saddam Hussein, overthrew Saddam Hussein, that that would suffice to erase the obvious implications of the 9/11 attacks, meaning the obvious implications being that we were far more vulnerable, far weaker than the post-Cold War claims of being the indispensable nation would seem to suggest. So, it was an effort to show that 9/11 really didn’t matter. That effort assumed that the United States would win a great, decisive, inexpensive military victory in Iraq. And, of course, that didn’t come to pass.

Here we are 20 years later. I think you’re right: There really is an unwillingness on the part of the establishment to grapple honestly with the implications of the war. And in a sense, an ironic sense, I think the Ukraine war gives the establishment a convenient opportunity to change the subject. So, you’re right: We still have U.S. forces in the Middle East. We persist in the basic structure of national security policy, spend more money on the military than the next 10 biggest military powers in the world, maintain 800-plus bases around the world, maintain these regional command headquarters, like Central Command and NATO and so on. Weve learned nothing. And that’s sad, to put it mildly, and, I think, also sets us up for a repetition of that mistake. Were in this showdown, a proxy showdown, with Russia and Ukraine. We seem to assume that Putin’s war efforts will consist entirely of conventional weapons, despite the fact, of course, that Russia possesses a massive nuclear arsenal. So, we make these convenient assumptions about the way a war is going to go, and then, of course, were utterly surprised when the war doesn’t follow the required script.

AMY GOODMAN: Professor Bacevich, you recently wrote a PIECE for The American Conservative headlined “And the winner is… Twenty years after the Iraq invasion: America’s humiliation was China’s gain.” Talk more about this.

ANDREW BACEVICH: Well, I think - I mean, I think theres no question about it, that over the past 20 years, you know, if you were - if it was a matter of stock prices, China’s stock prices have gone up, have flourished; our stock price has plummeted. We have frittered away power. We have frittered away influence. And I wouldn’t say that the Iraq War is the one and only explanation for relative American decline, but it has been a very important contributing factor. And if the imperative of the moment would include putting a floor under that decline, then it seems to me the place to begin is with an honest recounting of the Iraq War, its origins, its conduct, its implications. But theres not a heck of a lot of evidence to suggest that that honest recounting is going to happen.

AMY GOODMAN: And what do you think of the right, in terms of questioning the Iraq War, leading many to believe, you know, sort of sides are switching and shifting? There are those that are deeply questioning the Ukraine war in the peace movement, who are saying negotiation is the only solution here -

ANDREW BACEVICH: Yeah.

AMY GOODMAN: - fearing that this could lead to a nuclear war. But those on the right - I mean, even in Florida, DeSantis, the governor, who could be challenging Trump, saying it’s just a territorial dispute, and so many Republicans saying stop funding the war in Ukraine.

ANDREW BACEVICH: Yeah. You know, should we - as citizens, should we believe that when politicians speak in public, they are expressing a principled perspective? Or is it more likely that they’re actually saying things that reflect domestic political considerations? I have to say - and I don’t mean to be cynical - I have to say I’m in the latter camp. So, yeah, so now that Biden owns the Ukraine war, we see lots of Republicans sounding dovish, or at the very least cautious, with regard to the use of force. I’m not persuaded that the positions staked out today by Democrats and Republicans reflect principled points of view as opposed to what’s politically convenient in the moment.

AMY GOODMAN: Going back to Iraq, and in a moment we’re going to be speaking with a well-known Iraqi American who, when the U.S. invaded Iraq, left Minneapolis and said, “I don’t care if I just have to sweep the streets of my city of Najaf, I’m going to be there with my people,” and has now returned. We see that President Putin has been now charged by the International Criminal Court with war crimes. The question of where American officials should stand, not 20 years later, but even 10 or before that. President Obama was famous for saying we should always just look forward. But for culpability when it comes to the destruction of this nation of Iraq, what about George W. Bush, who - yesterday I was saying on the show - just a day after 9/11, when we know 15 of the 19 hijackers were from Saudi Arabia, was pushing his counterterrorism czar, Richard Clarke, on the issue of Iraq, How can we make that connection?” And Richard Clarke was saying back to him, “There is zero connection.” But then, what this means, what this led to? Should he also be charged with war crimes? And should others be in the dock with him?

ANDREW BACEVICH: Well, first of all, there’s no question, in my opinion, that the Iraq War, initiated by the United States, a war of choice, was a crime, a really horrid crime. Im probably easier on President Bush than many other people are. You know, I view him as an individual, really, of limited talent, to put it bluntly. He became president because his last name was “Bush.” He was an unimaginative figure and was utterly unprepared for what happened on September 11th. And his reaction, which I wouldnԒt defend, I think is primarily attributable to the associates that he chose to surround himself with. In other words, if Im looking for bad guys, I don’t begin by looking at Bush. I begin with Cheney and Rumsfeld and Wolfowitz and Condoleezza Rice, people who fancied themselves to be strategic thinkers. They fancied themselves to have a grasp of world politics, who believed that American military might was so great that we would sweep aside Saddam HusseinҒs forces, and some vast benefit would result. Well, they miscalculated. They were utterly wrong. And so, when Im looking for somebody to blame, I tend to blame those people more than Bush - not letting Bush of the hook. He was the commander-in-chief. But again, I think, in at least some sense, it was not his hands that were on the controls.

AMY GOODMAN: If Bush was so untalented, why couldn’t the largest antiwar movement in the world stop him? And itҒs not only in the United States. I mean, remember, February 15th, 2003, millions of people took to the streets of the world to stop the U.S. invasion of Iraq.

ANDREW BACEVICH: Well, I don’t think Bush or anybody in the Bush administration cared about world opinion. I mean, they cared about whether or not they were going to be able to line up certain allies, like Great Britain, to support the war. In that, they succeeded. You know, shame on Tony Blair. But I don’t think world opinion factored, in a large sense, in the inner circles of Washington, D.C. But your larger question is - because I remember those. I happened to be in New York City, in Manhattan, on the day of the - was it February, I think, 15th?

AMY GOODMAN: February 15, 2003.

ANDREW BACEVICH: Moving, massive, astonishing, and I think had zero political impact. Why? Well, I think that says something about our democracy, that elites tend to bow toward the will of the people, but then, when they sit around the table and they make decisions, decisions related to war and peace, I don’t think that they think very seriously about, Well, you know, what do the folks back in Indiana think? Their calculation is shaped by considerations of power and, again, I would say, with regard to the Bush administration in 2003, when the war began, radically defective understanding of the war, understanding of ourselves, understanding of the potential of American military power. So, our leadership, elected and appointed, was stupid. The people, actually, I think, had a better grasp of the dangers that we were undertaking when we went to war with Iraq.

AMY GOODMAN: Well, Andrew Bacevich, we want to thank you so much for joining us, chair of the board and co-founder of the antiwar think tank Quincy Institute for Responsible Statecraft, retired colonel, Vietnam War veteran, professor emeritus of international relations and history at Boston University. His latest book, On Shedding an Obsolete Past: Bidding Farewell to the American Century. He’s speaking to us from Punta Gorda, Florida. We’ll link to your latest PIECE in The Boston Globe headlined The self-deceived deceivers of war.

SOURCE

Bad Moon Rising Part 89 - China, Russia and South Africa

South Africa, Russia, China and the Shifting World Situation
United States imperialism escalates its aggressive foreign policy in a deliberate campaign to contain and undermine the influence of the Beijing and Moscow

By Abayomi Azikiwe
Global Research
March 23, 2023

National Assembly Speaker of the Republic of South Africa, Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula, said publicly in a recent statement before the supreme legislative body in Cape Town that the African National Congress (ANC) led government would continue to support the people of the Russian Federation.

This proclamation came amid a highly-publicized visit by Peoples Republic of China President Xi Jinping to Moscow where the strategic partnership between the two countries was further solidified.

The administration of President Joe Biden along with the entire ruling class of the United States are quite concerned about the three-day visit of President Xi to Russia where he held extensive discussions with his counterpart Vladimir Putin. Both China and Russia are principal adversaries of the U.S., the European Union and the entire North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) alliance.

At present a protracted conflict is underway in Ukraine where the U.S. has prompted and continued a proxy war against Moscow and its allies in the region. Since February 24, 2022, the Biden administration has sent emissaries across the globe in an effort to build support for the NATO position in Eastern Europe.

Nonetheless, among many states and peoples within the Global South, there has been a lack of enthusiasm for the U.S. stance in the war. In many cases in Africa, Latin America, Asia and some European states, there is considerable solidarity with the Russian aims and objectives in what Moscow describes as a special military operation.Ӕ For those who have followed and studied the geostrategic situation in Ukraine, the entire process of staging a coup in February 2014 with the ultimate desire to incorporate even more states into NATO can only be viewed by Russia as well as the anti-imperialist, socialist and non-aligned states with suspicion and trepidation.

In regard to the comments from the South African National Assembly Speaker Mapisa-Nqakula, the EYEWITNESS NEWS WEBSITE SAID THAT:

“She was delivering the closing remarks at the second Russia-Africa parliamentary conference in Moscow over the weekend (March 18-19). The gathering was also addressed by Russian president Vladimir Putin, who has pledged ongoing support to African nations in the fields of nuclear energy, training, and education. Mapisa-Nqakula has appealed to Russia to help Africa obtain a permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council. ‘If that does not happen, we will continue to have the kinds of conflicts we are seeing on our continent,’ she added. She said that South Africa would continue to look to Russia for support in the quest for economic and political prosperity. ‘We will continue to lean on you, and you can rest assured that, as a country and as a people of South Africa, we will continue to support the people of Russia,’ she said. Mapisa-Nqakula also offered for South Africa to host peace talks between Russia and Ukraine while attending the inter-parliamentary union in Bahrain. She said that sanctions imposed by the Western world on African nations as a result of conflict on the continent, was a human rights violation.”

South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has repeatedly urged the resolution of the Ukraine crisis through internationally-mediated negotiations. The desperate posture of the Biden administration and its Democratic and Republican colleagues in both branches of Congress has resulted in the drafting of legislation which would punish AU member-states that maintain cordial diplomatic and economic relations with Russia.

Ramaphosa in a state visit to the U.S. during late 2022, urged the abolition of the draft bill which is described as curtailing Russias malign influence in Africa. The AU member-states as a whole have rejected the rationale behind such proposed legislation.

Joint Naval Exercises Draw the Ire of Washington

In late February, the military forces of the Republic of South Africa, Russian Federation and PeopleҒs Republic of China held joint naval exercises in the Indian Ocean. The decision by these three states represented a repudiation of the foreign policy orientation of Washington towards all three countries.

Despite the diplomatic maneuvers of the Biden administration, Afric’as most industrialized state has engaged in these naval exercises with the two governments which represent the major impediments to Washington’s military and diplomatic status. Consequently, there is a sequential trajectory related to the denunciation of the anti-Russia in Africa bill of the U.S. Congress, the call for an end to the war in Ukraine and the burgeoning relations between Moscow, Pretoria and Beijing.

All three states are members of the Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa (BRICS) Summit which holds regular meetings. The concept behind BRICS is to build economic links between these countries, among others, outside the influence and control of Washington and Wall Street. There are proposals for the expansion of BRICS to encompass the entire AU region along with countries within Latin America.

One observer of the rapidly changing dynamics of international diplomacy and economics was quoted in an article published by the Robert H. Smith School of Business at the University of Maryland. Finance Prof. Lemma W. Senbet of the University of Buffalo, State University of New York, noted that the declining influence of the U.S. as it relates to the blatant disregard for its foreign policy interests must be taken into consideration by the State Department and the Pentagon. Smith cites BRICS as one forum which can enhance the capacity of the Global South to loosen its dependence upon the former colonial and present neo-colonial centers of dominance.

This opinion piece published by Newswise EMPHASIZED:

“Senbet says that [this] relationship (BRICS) is in the background of the naval exercises. He indicates its not just about South AfricaҒs relations with Russia, but with China and India as well. ‘China is the largest trading partner in Africa. Tourism is also a big deal in South Africa.’ China is a huge tourism market for the country, as is India. And this is in addition to Chinas trade and investment. ‘So, the extent to which they (South Africa) could suffer economic consequences is mitigated by their participation in this economic partnership.’ The western response to the invasion of Ukraine is mainly about protecting the international order, according to Senbet. But he says, ‘there are many countries, especially in the Global South, that think the order doesn’t work for them.’ South Africa is not the only African country to take a neutral stance in the Russia-Ukraine war. Several others have. The U.S. and EU need to pay more attention to the rest of the globe, who are the lower-income, lower-developed economies that actually feel left out of the order. The order has to be inclusive.’”

Consequently, Washington will inevitably depend more on its military prowess to advance an imperialistic political and economic agenda around the globe. This creates a dangerous international scenario for billions of people to contemplate. As the financing of the Ukraine war continues under the Biden administration, several analysts of the war see a strong possibility for a broader engagement by NATO forces.

As the Ukrainian troops suffer greater casualties and setbacks on the battlefield, provocative military actions will escalate. The recent downing of a Pentagon predator drone over the Black Sea has frustrated the White House which falsely claims that these surveillance weapons are operating in “international airspace”.

Any attempt to widen the Ukraine war would prove disastrous for the majority of working and oppressed peoples living in various geopolitical regions including inside of Western Europe and North America. Within the U.S., the economy has suffered tremendous shocks during the month of March where several high-profile bank collapses have compounded the impact of ongoing layoffs of hundreds of thousands of workers employed in the technological and service sectors of the economy. These developments have precipitated a crisis of confidence in the capitalist and imperialist systems

As Russia and China have written off tens of millions of dollars in loans to African states during 2022-2023, the U.S.-based International Monetary Fund (IMF) is imposing draconian conditionalities on several countries on the continent including, Egypt, Ghana and Zambia. These African states are severely impacted by the rising interest rates imposed by the Federal Reserve of the U.S. and other central banks in the capitalist states.

Moreover, the imperialist proxy war against Russia and the rising tensions between Washington and Beijing, are hampering the free flow of agricultural products and other commodities from Russia and Ukraine to the African continent as well as other geopolitical regions. Rather than address the need for a peaceful settlement of the Ukraine conflict, Washington and Wall Street are leading the world into a possible nuclear confrontation along with a worldwide economic depression.

What is needed at this conjuncture is a broad-based antiwar and anti-imperialist movement in the Western industrialized states which could place political pressure on their governments to end the war in Ukraine and redirect the trillions in military expenditures to social spending and the rebuilding of infrastructure in a way which benefits the working class and oppressed throughout the globe.

About the author:

Abayomi Azikiwe is the editor of the Pan-African News Wire. He is a regular contributor to Global Research.

SOURCE

Wednesday, March 22, 2023

NWO Covid Year 3 Part 9 - Twitter Files and The Virality Project

 
Previous experience with the flu vaccines clearly demonstrates that the safety studies done by researchers and clinical doctors with ties to pharmaceutical companies were essentially all either poorly done or purposefully designed to falsely show safety and coverup side effects and complications. This was dramatically demonstrated with the previously mentioned phony studies designed to indicate that Hydroxy Chloroquine and Ivermectin were ineffective and too dangerous to use. These fake studies resulted in millions of deaths and severe health disasters worldwide. As stated, 80% of all deaths were unnecessary and COULD HAVE BEEN PREVENTED with inexpensive, safe repurposed medications with a very long safety history among millions who have taken them for decades or even a lifetime.
- Covid Update - What Is The Truth, March 2022
 
In the condition, also known as TTS, blood clots appear suddenly in different places throughout the body, sometimes including in the brain; patients also become prone to severe bleeding. That makes it difficult to treat. TTS, CDC researchers told the panel Thursday, was seen once in 250,000 recipients of the J&J vaccine, but was more common among women in their 30s and 40s, where it occurred once in 100,000 recipients. About 15% of cases were fatal.
- The Tragedy of Johnson & Johnson’s Covid vaccine.
 
Scapegoating the unvaccinated as “variant factories” is not only scientifically unproven and ethically deplorable but it criminally likens them to rats carrying a plague.
- Demonising The Unvaccinated
 
“SEME" is one of the most powerful forms of influence ever discovered in the behavioral sciences.  It leaves people thinking they have made up their own minds, which is very much an illusion. It also leaves no paper trail for authorities to trace. Worse still, the very few people who can detect bias in search results shift even farther in the direction of the bias, so merely being able to see the bias doesn’t protect you from it.”
- Search Engine Manipulation
 
The global COVID-19 crisis has significantly shifted the landscape for mis- and disinformation as the pandemic has become the primary concern of almost every nation on the planet. This has perhaps never happened before; few topics have commanded and sustained attention at a global level simultaneously, or provided such a wealth of opportunities for governments, economically motivated actors, and domestic activists alike to spread malign narratives in service to their interests. In response, the Stanford Internet Observatory is launching the Virality Project, a global study aimed at understanding the disinformation dynamics specific to the COVID-19 crisis.
-The Virality Project
 
[T]hey also wanted to limit true content that might promote vaccine hesitancy including true stories of vaccine side effects and any true post that can fuel hesitancy
 

- The Covid Twitter Files Drop: Protecting Fauci While Censoring The Truth w/Matt Taibbi

---

Censorship Masquerades and Disinformation Control

By Andrew Lowenthal
Brownstone Institute
March 19, 2023

TWITTER FILES #19 have dropped. I am happy to have assisted Matt Taibbi and team to put that release together, along with RELEASE #18.

The Files show widespread censorship masquerading as “anti-disinformation,” and intense collusion between government agencies, NGOs, academia, Big Tech, media, philanthropy, the intelligence community, and more.

Tinfoil hat stuff? The Twitter Files show it is real.

They uncover a level of corruption that is hard to grasp, much of it among the “anti-disinformation” and digital-rights fields where I have worked for almost 20 years.

To say this is disappointing would be an incredible understatement. A 180 on what I understood to be our values.

Twitter Files #18 and #19 focus on the Virality Project, an “anti-vaccine misinformation” effort led by Stanford and bringing together elite academia, NGOs, government, and experts in AI and social-media monitoring, with six of the biggest social-media companies on the planet. They went far beyond their “misinformation” remit. Twitter Files show the Virality Project pushed platforms to censor STORIES OF TRUE VACCINE SIDE EFFECTS.

Partnered in the effort were FACEBOOK/INSTAGRAM, Google/YouTube, TikTok, Pinterest, Medium, and Twitter.

Reporting side effects of the NOW-PULLED JOHNSON AND JOHNSON VACCINE vaccine would have been labelled “misinformation” under Virality Project decrees. Had Kerryn Phelps (the first female president of the Australian Medical Association) taken to Twitter to DESCRIBE HER AND HER WIFE’S VACCINE INJURIES, these too would have been labelled misinformation. German Health Minister Karl Lauterbach would have also been censored last week for admitting that as a result of the vaccines THERE ARE SEVERE DISABILITIES, AND SOME OF THEM WILL BE PERMANENT.

RATHER THAN listening out for safety signals to protect the public, leaders in the “anti-disinformation” field ran cover to protect Big Pharma, smearing and censoring critics. The moral depravity is astounding and quite possibly criminal.

The Virality Project, however, is just part of a broader cultural shift that reverses long-standing liberal/left commitments to free expression, and allows censorship in the name of protection and safety. However, in suppressing “stories of true vaccine side effects,” the Virality Project put people in danger. Rather than keeping people safe, they exposed us to the depredations of Big Pharma.

The centrality of censorship ideology to the digital-rights field is illustrated in former New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Arden opening RIGHTSCON 2022, the sector’s biggest civil-society event. ENGAGE MEDIA co-organised RightsCon in 2015 when I was Executive Director. Ardern claims that WEAPONS OF WAR AND DISINFORMATION ARE ONE IN THE SAME

RightsCon 2022 also heavily promoted US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken. Blinken oversees the State Departments Global Engagement Center, one of the most egregious US government promoters of “anti-disinformation” as censorship. (See TWITTER FILES #17)

Western leaders who advocate for censorship in the name of “disinformation” severely undermine those fighting authoritarian regimes around the world. Those regimes frequently evoke the threat of “fake news” to justify their crackdowns.

Is disinformation an actual problem? Yes, though it is overstated and the “anti-disinformation” field is making it worse, not better. It is also contributing to increasing polarisation.

I encourage you to read both releases in full and hold what you have been told about Elon Musk just for a moment. Musk is neither hero nor demon. The Twitter Files, however, are a critical catalyst to challenge the new censorship regime we now live under and reinvigorate the movement for free expression.

(Note that I am a paid consultant for Matt Taibbi and have no relation whatsoever to Musk).

If you can walk and chew gum you’ll know that uncovering liberal/left corruption doesn’t imply support for the reactionary right.

Free speech and expression protect us from the most powerful actors on the planet: corporations, the State, and a growing plethora of international bodies. Ultimately, we need radically decentralised social media that is more immune to their capture. Our safety depends on it.

Many have come before me; however, far too few have been willing to challenge this ethical fall from grace. The good news is that its not too late.

About the Author:

Andrew Lowenthal is co-founder and former executive director of EngageMedia, an Asia-Pacific digital rights, open and secure technology, and documentary non-profit, and a former fellow of Harvards Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society and MIT’s Open Documentary Lab.

SOURCE

---

With Fauci hagiography, PBS’s ‘American Masters’ turns from art to mindless politics

By Russell Cook
American Thinker
March 22,2023

In Ben Bartee’s blog post online, ”EPIC VIDEO: INFORMED BLACK GUY ON DC STREET DESTROYS FAUCI TO HIS FACE” his first line says, “I dont know how this clip slipped past me, but a video has resurfaced of Anthony Fauci and Washington, D.C. mayor Muriel Bowser canvassing the streets to encourage the urban population to get vaxxed ... “

This is not some “resurfaced” video, it is from the first-time tonight BROADCAST of PBS’ multi-year program AMERICAN MASTERS - it’s the top-most feature at their website.

American Masters previously had been solely devoted to programs about iconic musicians, dancers, writers, playwrights, and Hollywood actors. Basic art. Period. Do a Google search for their name in connection with its program producers WNET New York, and you’ll see the show has always been one about art. Their own LIST OF PROGRAMS.

This is an offensive effort by the partly taxpayer-funded PBS empire to elevate Dr Fauci into some kind of ‘cultural’ icon for us to admire, revere, and worship. One more example of leftists having no self-awareness of how crazy their agendas have become.

SOURCE

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Reference

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