US Quits UN Human Rights Council - Should We Cheer?
Friday June 22, 2018
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US Quits UN Human Rights Council - Should We Cheer?
Friday June 22, 2018
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Syria - Damascus And Its Allies Prepare To Remove US Forces From Al-Tanf
Friday June 22, 2018
On June 8 we asked if the then ongoing ISIS attack on Albu Kamal was part of a US plan:
There is sneaking suspicion that the U.S. directed the ongoing ISIS attack on Abu Kamal to gain control over the crossing and to disable road supplies from Iran through Iraq into Syria.
Some reinforcement came in and Albu Kamal was soon back in Syrian government hands. The Syrian army also launched an operation to destroy ISIS positions in southeastern desert.
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The U.S. must be given no chance to use the ISIS pretext to take Abu Kamal. The Syrian government must rush to support its forces in the border city. It must immediately request that Iraqi forces cross the border from Al-Qaim and support the endangered Syrian troops.
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Ron Paul Rewind: The Constitution and Its Rejection by the US Government
Friday June 22, 2018
The United States Constitution was ratified 230 years ago this week as the foundational law of the US government, when on June 21, 1788 New Hampshire became the ninth state to ratify the document. In the year 2000, then-United States House of Representatives Member Ron Paul (R-TX) delivered a speech on the House floor titled “A Republic, If You Can Keep It” in which he discussed in detail his thoughts on the Constitution, the individual rights he viewed the document as seeking to protect, and the great extent to which the US government had expanded beyond and rejected constitutional limits.
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Breaking In a President
Thursday June 21, 2018
I recall how a friend of mine who once served as a senior Pentagon intelligence briefer described what he called “breaking in” a new president. Today, incoming presidents receive some intelligence briefings so that they do not land in office on a cold January day totally unprepared for what awaits them. But generally speaking, the real surprises are unveiled during the first week when they get the full classified briefings that are carefully prepared both to inform and to enhance the value of the agency doing the briefing.
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What Kind of Country Are We?
Thursday June 21, 2018
That’s what Time magazine tweeted this morning. It is trying to place the blame for Trump’s immigration policy—specifically, his separation policy—on all Americans. Time wants us to stand up for the children.
But Time says nothing about the slaughter and starvation of children in Syria, Libya, Iraq, Afghanistan, and in particular Yemen. The US is assisting the Saudis in their genocidal war against the Houthi. It’s helping the fascists in Ukraine kill civilians in Donbas. It’s selling murder hardware to dictators and sadists.
When was the last time they did a cover denouncing Trump for his bombing campaigns in Syria and Iraq that have killed thousands of civilians? Are dead babies buried in rubble less important than immigrants from Mexico and Honduras?
Time’s publisher, Henry Luce, had a close relationship with the CIA. CIA employees traveled with Time-Life credentials as cover in the 1950s. The Luce family financed efforts to kill Fidel Castro.
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Bombs Away! US Airstrikes Every 12 Minutes?
Thursday June 21, 2018
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Pro-War Media Deserve Criticism, Not Sainthood
Thursday June 21, 2018
The media nowadays are busy congratulating themselves for their vigorous criticism of Donald Trump. To exploit that surge of sanctimony, Hollywood producer Steven Spielberg rushed out The Post, a movie depicting an epic press battle with the Nixon administration. Critics raved over the film, which the New York Post enthusiastically labeled “journalism porn of the highest order.” Boston Public Radio station WBUR called it the “most fun you’ll ever have at a civics lesson.”Spielberg, touting his movie, claimed that “the free press is a crusader for truth,” But the media hoopla around The Post is akin to geezers boasting of having shown moments of courage when they were almost 50 years younger.
The Post is built around the Pentagon Papers, a secret study begun in 1967 analyzing where the Vietnam War had gone awry. The 7000-page tome showed that presidents and military leaders had been profoundly deceiving the American people ever since the Truman administration and that the same mistakes were being endlessly repeated. Like many policy autopsies, the report was classified as secret and completely ignored by the White House and federal agencies, which most needed to heed its lessons. New York Times editor Tom Wicker commented in 1971 that “the people who read these documents in the Times were the first to study them.”
Daniel Ellsberg, a former Pentagon official, heroically risked life in prison to smuggle the report to the media after members of Congress were too cowardly to touch it. The New York Times shattered the political sound barrier when it began courageously publishing the report despite a profusion of threats from the Nixon administration Justice Department. After a federal court slapped the Times with an injunction, the Washington Post and other newspapers published additional classified excerpts from the report.
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Border 'Crisis' - Is It All About The Children...Or Hatred Of Trump?
Wednesday June 20, 2018
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Julian Assange and the Mindszenty Case
Wednesday June 20, 2018
During World War II Cardinal Jozsef Mindszenty was a huge critic of fascism and wound up in prison. In Oct. 1945 he became head of the Church in Hungary and spoke out just as strongly against Communist oppression. He wound up back in prison for eight more years, including long periods of solitary confinement and endured other forms of torture. In 1949 he was sentenced to life in a show trial that generated worldwide condemnation.
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The Final Frontier? Trump's Pricey Plan For A New Space Force
Tuesday June 19, 2018
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