What have we become if to survive in our so-called “free world” we must turn a blind eye to cold-blooded genocide, must arm ourselves to oppose our major trading partner, must support a contrived war to defeat an adversary that no longer exists, (lest its new form otherwise achieves its potential) must sanction some and not others, trade with some and not others, and now must, yet again, be silent as another sovereign nation is brazenly plundered for its wealth.
Trump’s attack on Venezuela is not a “police operation” against a criminal “fugitive,” nor is it part of an “escalating pressure campaign” against a hostile regime. It’s none of the things that the White House and our media claims, faithfully copying and pasting stories supplied by the New York Times, CNN and the Washington Post .
Blithely asserting the right to “run” Venezuela and “take” the country’s vast oil reserves, in a textbook example of the 19th century colonialism, Trump’s actions brazenly violate international law and numerous entrenched conventions. And all of it whitewashed by our media in euphemistic pseudo-legalese, to impress those gullible enough.
With Trump not only flouting the US Constitution but no longer even pretending that this is about anything other than the theft of another country’s resources, bragging that U.S. oil companies will begin “taking a tremendous amount of wealth out of the ground,” what does it say about us that we accept such brigandry ?
How, in God’s name, have we allowed ourselves to be swayed by the dribblings of a scurrilous misogynist, the associate of a convicted paedophile and a creature so altogether odious that, in any other context, we wouldn’t be seen dead with him?
Brandishing his big black marker, Trump, the unabashed narcissist, has changed the US Constitution from; “We the People…” to now read. “ME the People”!
When can we expect those we have entrusted to defend the principles we claim to represent, to stand up and say something? Or is it simply a matter of us being too gutless ourselves, too intimidated, too craven, to break ranks, step forward and say; “The Emperor has no clothes!”
Well he has to make a lot of noise to distract from his very close relationship with the former de facto Israeli ambassador to the United States.
Turning a blind eye to genocide in Syiia leads to turning a blind eye to genocide in Gaza.
Before Netanyahu began bombing hospitals in Gaza, Putin began bombing hospitals in Ukraine.
One thing leads to the other, blood on your hands.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFwnJFSgBKE
56,228 views Nov 23, 2023
As Mariupol came under Russian attack, Ukrainian AP video journalist Mstyslav Chernov and his colleagues risked their lives to show the world the truth of the war — including the bombing of a maternity hospital. Watch an excerpt from “20 Days in Mariupol,”….
The award-winning documentary “20 Days in Mariupol” follows Chernov as he and his Ukrainian AP colleagues become trapped in the besieged city of Mariupol, struggling to continue their work documenting atrocities of the Russian invasion. The last international journalists remaining in the city as Russian forces close in, Chernov, photographer Evgeniy Maloletka and field producer Vasilisa Stepanenko captured what become some of the most defining images of the war: dying children, mass graves — and the maternity hospital bombing.
The problem is in the outmoded distribution of political power. The UN has the veto vote and is always crippled when it comes to vital and world changing decision making and action. It looks as though the UN might have to be bypassed and a new organization installed with the planet’s whole ecology on the table for review.
Malcolm, I think you focus on the Orange idiot too much. Reality is that he is a continuum, he is following a well trodden path from all recent presidents. He takes his cues from the oligarchs who are all neocons as are the deep state. The Orange idiot is a mere frontman.
“….He takes his cues from the oligarchs who are all neocons as are the deep state. The Orange idiot is a mere frontman. Nick J
And Nick?
Let me complete your thought;
“….He takes his cues from the oligarchs who are all neocons as is the Russian state. Putin is a mere frontman.
Putin and Trump have a common interest in keeping the flow of super-profits acruing from imperialism to oligarchs and billionaires like themselves.
Actually Pat your ignorance is evident in every unsubstantiated claim. I don’t claim to know the truth about Putin, most of the bollocks you spout is second hand garbage from the limitless publishing of fully paid up shills of Washington and NATO. Seventy years after his death and we still don’t have a full picture of Stalin, yet miraculously Pat ODea has a total picture of Putin. Yeah right. How have you gone on so many years spouting voluminous crap without stopping to use your brain?
Nick J makes the following statement:
“….He takes his cues from the oligarchs who are all neocons as are the deep state. The Orange idiot is a mere frontman. Nick J
A statement that I happen to agree with.
I repeat Nick J’s statment back at him replacing Trump with Putin.
Nick J doesn’t say, I agree with this statement, Nick J doesn’t say I disagree with this statement.
Nick J says; “I don’t claim to know the truth about Putin”
He then launches into an ad hominem attack because I dared to compare the two. The hypocrisy is clear, Nick J cliearly holds the opinion that Putin is not a frontman for Russia’s oligarchs, but rather than state his position honestly and defend and argue his case, Nick J indulges in personal attack.
The two statement’s are the same. But Nick J doesn’t say “I don’t claim to know the truth about Trump.”
He knows enough truth about Trump to say Trump is a front man for America’s oligarchs.
There is more than enough evidence that both men are frontmen for the oligarchs of their respective countries. Maybe in slightly different ways. One is an actual oligarch himself, the other is just their frontman.
From YouTube:
Is Vladimir Putin the Actual Richest Man in the World?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tgjbt4EefCg
@0:25 minutes:
…Between his wife’s and his own accounts, the couple seem to have a little over half a milliondollars in cash in various bank accounts…..
….Over the years, people can’t help but notice that Putin has a collection of watches that he wears very publicly, whose purchase price combined is around that of his reported entire net worth, ringing in at about $400,000 to $700,000, if various reports are to be believed. For reference, the highest valued watch he has been spotted wearing costs around $140,000. It’s a PC Philipe perpetual calendar watch.,,,,
Then there are the palaces that he doesn’t actually own.
Nick is right.
Pat, you are too close and obsessive about linking Putin to everything ba in the world.
The thing is, the West has ALWAYS been this. The monstrosity we see today has always been there. Its appearance has just caved in because they fear the opposition and loss of power, and TRump is merely the instrumet of the smash and grab/move fast and reak things straegy they have used since Yugoslavia, but especially this century.
The Cold War kept each side somewhat honest because both sides had good points.
It was not the good points that sw the West win the cold war, it was the voracious impossibilty of beating the capitalist engine in competition. That and the USSR got off on the wrong foot by starting with Stalinism as a template.
In the modern world, the state is a necessary evil. But struggling with internal contradictions aside, the communist/socialist world ALWAYS had a claim to the Lesser Evil tag in its international actions, compared to the depredation of the New Age on Neocolonial Neoliberal Imperialism, personified by Israel, and he promotion of Big Men despots to support global capital in the 3rd world. Post Cold war, the West has been aiming for total victory and control, eradication or subjugation of all viewpoints to the needs of global capital, which has now also subsumed global institutions and global governance. The resistance of Russia, China, Iran ,the BRICS – they are demonstrably LESS EVIL than the entire Western Axis, despite all the provocations and pressures the West incites to create newsworthy spectacles to paint the Resistance as the greeater evil. Look at what our own government is doing to seize more control for global capital – just look at the legislation.
The Cold War is long gone. The West are the bad guys because they not only have the predominant global position, they are busing it for decades, in the interest of non democratic, unaccountable actors, and are reaching for global total control.
Pat and Co – Wake the f up.
Imperial Russia the new socialist’ paradise?
From the Guardian:
Putin compares himself to Peter the Great in quest to take back Russian lands
This article is more than 3 years old
President draws parallel with tsar who waged war on Sweden and says campaign in Ukraine stems from ‘basic values’
Andrew Roth and agencies
Fri 10 Jun 2022
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/jun/10/putin-compares-himself-to-peter-the-great-in-quest-to-take-back-russian-lands#
….“Peter the Great waged the great northern war for 21 years. It would seem that he was at war with Sweden, he took something from them. He did not take anything from them, he returned [what was Russia’s],” the Russian president said on Thursday after a visiting an exhibition dedicated to the tsar….
…..“Apparently, it is also our lot to return [what is Russia’s] and strengthen [the country]. And if we proceed from the fact that these basic values form the basis of our existence, we will certainly succeed in solving the tasks that we face.”…
…Before Putin’s visit to the exhibition, state television aired a documentary praising Peter the Great as a tough military leader, greatly expanding Russian territory at the expense of Sweden and the Ottoman empire with the modernised army and navy he built…..
There are none so blind as those who will not see.
Hala, all above, Halla\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\\1l
Trump allows the republican party to maintain a clean pair of hands as it uses him to fight its increasing demographic irrelevance. Projections indicated that voting rights suppression and gerrymandering of political districts would no longer be enough to keep it in power. Trump appears on the scene almost on cue. It needs to be remembered though that German business interests in the 1930s also found a front man for their fledgling political party they thought they could easily control.