Things to consider—

Since early 2011, Obama's been waging proxy war on Syria. Imported death squads masquerade as freedom fighters. The scheme's familiar. It repeats. It reflects US imperialism's dark side. In the 1980s, CIA-recruited mujahideen fighters battled Afghanistan's Soviet occupiers. Ronald Reagan called them "the moral equivalent of our founding fathers." He characterized Contra killers the same way. —Stephen LendmanFor over a century now US ambassadors have acted as fifth columns in the nations they are embedded in, their role chiefly to foster corporate and plutocratic power and coordinate machinations against any truly pro-democratic government.•••••"The dead end identity politics of SF Pride, which sells out a peace hero like Bradley Manning to curry favor with the American ruling class, is what I had in mind. The empire loves your tameness, irrelevance and cowardice, SF Pride. You don’t bother the American ruling class — a five foot two, 105 pound soldier does because he has a conscience and because he didn’t make comfort the guiding principle of his life...." —Randy Shields
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  • Rise Up or Die

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  • Religious Barbarians

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    From Tbilisi to Worchester by CHRISTOPHER BRAUCHLI (With report by PressTV, see addendum and video below) It was humanity at its best.  Showing compassion for the quick and the dead.  The quick made news in Tbilisi, Georgia.  The dead made news in Worcester, Massachusetts. Did you like this? Share it:

  • The Strange Trial of Ríos Montt

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  • Why Disinformation Works —

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  • UK soldier killed in London in reprisal for Afghanistan and Iraq wars

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    By Robert Stevens,wsws.org The killing of drummer Lee Rigby, 2nd Battalion Royal Regiment of Fusiliers, near London’s Woolwich army barracks on Wednesday was a horrific act. Rigby was first run down by two men in a car, who then set about him with knives and a cleaver. One of the men who carried out the [...]

Barack had a ball

 ASSHOLES, BASTARDS & CRIMINALS, CLASS STRUGGLE, HUMBUG CENTRAL  Comments Off
Apr 182011
 

The old Obama reappeared this week. Well, sorta, anyhow.

He gave a speech that liberals could find inspiring.

Again, sorta. And only if you don’t pay attention to a few gigantic caveats.

Let’s come back to that. First, though, the good news. The president got closer than he has in a very long to time to drawing serious lines of distinction between two very different approaches to the social compact in American society. This is work he has desperately needed to do these last two years, and work that has been wholly lacking from this most anemic of presidencies. When I and others criticize Obama for failing to present to the American people an overarching narrative that helps to define for us where the battle lines are drawn, who the good and bad guys are, and what we should believe in and fight for, this is what we critics are talking about. The absence of this narrative (and the gaping vacuum that absence has created for others to fill) is one of the main reasons that this presidency has failed so miserably. Continue reading »

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 Posted by at 11:37 pm

U.S. secretly backed Syrian opposition groups, cables released by WikiLeaks show

 HEADLINERS, THE WORLD, US Foreign Policy  Comments Off
Apr 182011
 

Meddling into other nations’ affairs or military assaulting them is what we do best, as if it were a birthright, which most Americans believe the US actually has.

The Washington Post | Sunday, April 17, 2011

Editor’s Note: This is a mainstream, establishment paper’s account so be on guard for those inevitable distortions and bits of self-serving propaganda.

By Craig Whitlock

Syrians are justifiably angered by revelations of US meddling in their internal affairs.

The State Department has secretly financed Syrian political opposition groups and related projects, including a satellite TV channel that beams anti-government programming into the country, according to previously undisclosed diplomatic cables.

The London-based satellite channel, Barada TV, began broadcasting in April 2009 but has ramped up operations to cover the mass protests in Syria as part of a long-standing campaign to overthrow the country’s autocratic leader, Bashar al-Assad. Human rights groups say scores of people have been killed by Assad’s security forces since the demonstrations began March 18; Syria has blamed the violence on “armed gangs.” Continue reading »

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 Posted by at 11:29 pm

Let’s Not Be Civil

 CLASS STRUGGLE, IDEOLOGICAL STRUGGLE  Comments Off
Apr 182011
 

April 17, 2011

By PAUL KRUGMAN

Paul Krugman and feline friend.

Last week, President Obama offered a spirited defense of his party’s values — in effect, of the legacy of the New Deal and the Great Society. Immediately thereafter, as always happens when Democrats take a stand, the civility police came out in force. The president, we were told, was being too partisan; he needs to treat his opponents with respect; he should have lunch with them, and work out a consensus.

That’s a bad idea. Equally important, it’s an undemocratic idea. Continue reading »

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 Posted by at 11:01 pm