Here’s Orlov on the demise of the INF treaty and general US idiocy, including a summary of the new Russian weapons capabilities.
http://cluborlov.blogspot.com/2019/02/rip-inf-treaty-russias-victory-americas.html

Posted by: Russ | Feb 8 2019 18:23 utc | 4

We finally know what all the Cisco telephones were needed for:

Year Before Killing, Saudi Prince Told Aide He Would Use ‘a Bullet’ on Jamal Khashoggi – New York Times, February 7, 2019
Intercepted conversations revealed evidence that the Saudi crown prince, Mohammed bin Salman, considered killing Jamal Khashoggi long before his death in Istanbul.
The conversation, intercepted by American intelligence agencies, is the most detailed evidence to date that the crown prince considered killing Mr. Khashoggi long before a team of Saudi operatives strangled him inside the Saudi Consulate in Istanbul and dismembered his body using a bone saw.

Posted by: Petri Krohn | Feb 8 2019 18:25 utc | 6

@ vk with the CongressCritters chant at SOTU about socialism…thanks,
I am sorry but not surprised to read that. It is also my understanding that both House and Senate, multiple times per year when called upon, re-assert the change to the original motto of E Pluribus Unum to In God We Trust.
The monotheistic God of Mammon religion rules the West and has the government puppets to prove it. It is interesting to watch the elite turning on each other and exposing even more perfidy under the guise of doing God’s work
More faith in the leadership of the West is not the answer. I hope resolution comes soon to our geopolitical nightmare.

Posted by: psychohistorian | Feb 8 2019 18:28 utc | 8

Wrote two posts on the State of the Union. Major takeaways: Trump’s address is being misread as “anti-war” and Bernie, not Stacey Abrams, had history on his side that night:
Trump’s Speech-
“Tonight I ask you to choose greatness,” Trump said, beginning a nationalistic tirade. His message was clear: “America above all.” Although many commentators saw his appeals to bipartisanship as a moderate stance, his calls for “national unity” in fact slot neatly into nationalist and militarist traditions. Rather than unity around climate change or the perils posed by massive tech giants, Trump’s appeal was that America “must be united at home to defeat our adversaries abroad, ie Russia and China, along with smaller powers like Iran, which Trump warmongered loudly against throughout his address.
The most disturbing portions of Trump’s speech focused on Venezuela and socialism. Trump demanded the illegal removal of President Nicolas Maduro and blamed socialism for that country’s sanctions-induced economic wipeout. His themes resemble classical extreme right appeals to socialism and communism as the greatest enemy, most recently expressed by Brazil’s Jair Bolsonaro
Bernie’s speech:
Identity politics aside, however, it was clear who had the force of history behind him: Sanders’s message, delivered as a sharp indictment of global neoliberal polices since the 1970s, attacking point-by-point this noxious ideology, and establishing a real counter-hegemony.
By contrast, Abrams’s speech was void of policy and served as a call to bipartisanship in the abstract sense: not around policies but around tone, style and rhetoric. With references to Reaganism and national unity against “foreign and domestic enemies,” the speech had more than a whiff of Trumpism.
At the end of the day Sanders’s barb against Trump’s identitarianism serves as a subtle critique of this kind of politics. Though far to the right of most Indymedia readers, he forged himself last night into the weapon against neoliberalism that may yet be wielded by the public to finish off today’s economic Frankenstein.
Read more:
http://boston.indymedia.org/newswire/display/227568/index.php
http://boston.indymedia.org/newswire/display/227573/index.php

Posted by: Blooming Barricade | Feb 8 2019 18:37 utc | 10

Also, in case anyone missed it, the Venezuela bridge photo plastered around the media will go down in history already alongside babies out of incubators, Bin Laden’s supervillain hideaway and Saddam’s wood chipper as one of the Greatest Hits of US fraudulent war propaganda:
From the Young World, a German independent socialist newspaper (picked up by Venezuela Analysis)
“In fact, the Las Tienditas Bridge has never been open. Its construction was started in 2013 to relieve the two existing border crossings in San Antonio and Ureña, which are passed by more than 50,000 people each day in both directions. It was completed in 2016, but never opened. The only regular users were smugglers who managed cheap gas from Venezuela to Colombia at night.”

Posted by: Blooming Barricade | Feb 8 2019 18:44 utc | 12

Blooming Barricade @10
I’m surprised that Trump’s State of the Union Speech hasn’t gotten more attention given that it is a clear warning of where USA is headed.
The nationalism and anti-Russia/anti-China bent is right in line with my oft-repeated message that Trump was SELECTED to lead the MAGA effort to counter the challenge from Russia and China.
What stood out for me (as expressed in previous Open Thread):

1) “Choose greatness”
– “Greatness” is Trump’s “exceptionalism”
– “Exceptionalism” is just the establishment’s way of saying “Empire First”.
– the establishment has already chosen for you
2) Preparing Americans for war
– Citing Iran’s intention to commit “genocide against the Jewish people”, an exaggeration that is driven home by feting a Holocaust survivor
– Evoking WWII, complete with veterans as props
The only thing missing from this foul spectacle was a rousing sound track.

Trump ends by glorifying previous sacrifices:

“Everything that has come since — our triumph over communism, our giant leaps of science and discovery, our unrivaled progress toward equality and justice — all of it is possible thanks to the blood and tears and courage and vision of the Americans who came before.”

But this conflates necessary sacrifice with the chosen sacrifice of Trump’s call to “choose greatness”.
Will Americans lay their willing sacrifice at the alter of the Empire exceptionalist fancy?
<> <> <> <> <> <> <> <>
Welcome to the rabbit hole.

Posted by: Jackrabbit | Feb 8 2019 19:46 utc | 14

That post @ 15 is actually mine, I don’t know why my monicker got cut off by my laptop – it sometimes has hiccups.

Posted by: Jen | Feb 8 2019 19:49 utc | 16

On the news the other day they mentioned the development of America’s low yield nukes that were 2/3 less powerful than the ones used on Japan. Since the early 2000’s this country has taken a posture to withdraw from nuclear agreement’s that were put in place by more sane people. If this country drops one low yield nuke and not on China or Russia. It’s game on and every missile site will have a finger on the trigger. Even a false move will send the birds flying and we are all dust. Trump as Obama failed to control the neocons and this is very dangerous.

Posted by: Dennis | Feb 8 2019 19:55 utc | 18

@ 15
“By conflating humanistic philosophies that emphasise the ability of individual persons to reason and to improve themselves (and thereby be in a position to help uplift their communities) with those ideologies that judge humans as incapable of spiritual and moral improvement…[they] deliver a slap to socialist philosophies.”
You think bourgeois liberal individualism can be a healthy part of what needs to go into the kind of socialism we need? I’d say history has conclusively disproven any such notion. In fact the part about how one should be an individual and “thereby..uplift their communities” sounds a lot like “a rising tide lifts all boats”, or to shift the metaphor, “trickle-down”. And of course the “invisible hand”. We know all these are false. History has proven that it’s precisely the modern “individual” which needs to perish. Humans evolved to be tight-knit social primates acting automatically as a group, and automatically enmeshed within the ecological web. The liberal construct of the entitled, privileged “individual” has no place there, and it’s no accident that the rise of this ideology has gone hand in hand every step of the way with modernity’s campaign of total war against humanity and the Earth.
Of course I say none of that in defense of the silly monotheist manifesto, which I already rejected above.

Posted by: Russ | Feb 8 2019 20:06 utc | 20

reply to Dennis 18
Yes my heart sank when I read that these “low yield” nuclear bombs were now rolling off the assembly line.
My guess is the US neocon loons are going to ship a number of them to all of the NATO and near NATO membership countries ringing Russia.
Then all you need is one fool, Ukraine perhaps, maybe Poland to launch one and it is game over.
And as this plan to build mini nukes has been ongoing for two years, either Trump is an unwitting pawn or he is in on it. Either way, game over.

Posted by: frances | Feb 8 2019 20:17 utc | 22

Dennis 18
Putin “We would consider any use of nuclear weapons against Russia or its allies to be a nuclear attack on our country. The response would be immediate,”
Trump is building dial a yield bombs to use on countries such as Iran. Iran is named in the NPR. Venezuela I think in the Trump admin mid is considered in the same light as Iran.
The danger in Clinton is that she was crazy. The danger in Trump is in what risks he is willing to take to “Make America great again.” Venezuela and Iran are very much a part of his MAGA plan.

Posted by: Peter AU 1 | Feb 8 2019 20:24 utc | 24

Jackrabbit
Regardless of our differences in what we think is behind Trump becoming president, I think we both see the US in Trump era heading the same way.
A change in course for the US to enable it continuing world dominance rather than a withdrawal to become part of the multi-polar world.

Posted by: Peter AU 1 | Feb 8 2019 20:32 utc | 26

@19 karloff
In Islam the verse translates that God created man in this image. Not in his image. Since there isn’t the concept of comma in Arabic that’s where a confusion might happen for translator.
Plus in common Islamic thought a human can improve as opposed to angels who are static beings.

Posted by: Occidentosis | Feb 8 2019 20:47 utc | 28

@ karlof1 | Feb 8, 2019 2:54:05 PM | 17
If the great body of American citizenry ever takes seriously the words “I will support and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign AND DOMESTIC,” then I would suggest that the denizens of the federal halls of state consider wearing body armor.

Posted by: AntiSpin | Feb 8 2019 21:13 utc | 30

A couple of section of Hudson’s interview with Saker.
“The refusal of England and the United States to grant an elected government control of its foreign assets demonstrates to the entire world that U.S. diplomats and courts alone can and will control foreign countries as an extension of U.S. nationalism.
The price of the U.S. economic attack on Venezuela is thus to fracture the global monetary system.”
“The U.S. has overplayed its hand in destroying the foundation of the dollar-centered global financial order. That order has enabled the United States to be “the exceptional nation” able to run balance-of-payments deficits and foreign debt that it has no intention (or ability) to pay,”
This began with Trump pulling out of the Iran nuke agreement. Both Obama and Kerry specifically stated the US needed the nuke agreement to save the US dollar. They believed that without the agreement, other countries, Europe and so forth would begin bypassing the dollar.
I believe that rather than inadvertently wrecking the dollar as Hudson and Escobar seem to think, it is a planned move. Now that the move has been made, there is no turning back, the dollar cannot be saved, and the US under Trump must push its planned change through or collapse in a similar fashion to the USSR.
This will make the coming months and years extremely dangerous, depending on what risks the US is willing to take to see its plans through.
Russia and China will be constantly working to bloc these moves, while at the same time trying to prevent the US setting off WWIII.
If US moves are blocked, and it can be prevented from setting off a major war, the US will quickly collapse of its own accord.

Posted by: Peter AU 1 | Feb 8 2019 21:28 utc | 32

– A love song for the NSA:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YMJ2VDTQWSI

Posted by: Willy2 | Feb 8 2019 21:35 utc | 34

Don Bacon @28–
“It’s just a gad damned piece of paper” & “If this were a dictatorship, it’d be a hell-of-a-lot easier.” George W. Bush
There are two things defining the United States as a nation. First, is the Declaration of Independence; but, that says nothing about how the nation is to be organized and governed–it isn’t the Primary Law of the Land. Second is that document codifying how the nation’s to be governed by setting forth the Fundamental Law of the Land. Neither, therefore, are merely crusty pieces of parchment; rather, they are the most priceless, fundamental relics (defined as venerated, priceless, ownerless objects of reverence and devotion) that define the United States of America. Certainly, the former is somewhat subjective while the latter’s certainly imperfect; yet, neither of those traits deny them their position. People–subjects–were once required to swear allegiance to the occupant of the throne of the realm. That concept was enlightenly modified so citizens could swear allegiance to a body of law as represented by the Constitution in our case. You and others may deem such as old fashioned, passé; but, what other tool do we have that’s accessible by the entire citizenry by which we can combat the tyranny afflicting us and humanity globally? If we decline to use guns, then the law is the only weapon remaining. Or do we meekly surrender and become Orwell’s Proles?
If all that we own is our honor and dignity, what do we become if we don’t stand up for ourselves and our kin?

Posted by: karlof1 | Feb 8 2019 21:54 utc | 36

Not sure if this one has been shared at MOA yet, but I’ve found it to be the most informative, deep-dive out there in explaining the dynamics at play in Venezuela, and including the food lines, illicit hoarding, diversion of foods to Colombia, the Maduro regime’s attempts to close that porous border (hence the recent pictures of the Tienditas Bridge – which has actually been closed since 2016, a fact totally missing from the breathless US and EU media reports…
Here is an excerpt, from later in the (well-footnoted) article, which itself is a very long read:
There are direct parallels between present-day Venezuela and Chile in the 1970s under Salvador Allende, where the U.S. strategy, in the words of Richard Nixon, was to “make the economy scream.”37 The United States employed the same methods of destabilization, including a financial blockade, and supported the right-wing counterrevolution, likewise manifested in shortages, lines, and street protests, among other forms of disruption. The depressed prices of Chile’s main source of foreign exchange, copper, parallels declining oil prices Venezuela. While the extent of U.S. involvement in Chile’s counterrevolution would not be fully understood until years later, when key documents were declassified, overt U.S. aggression toward Venezuela is already evident in the intensifying economic sanctions imposed by the Obama and Trump administrations, as well as an all-out economic blockade that has made it extremely difficult for the government to make payments on food imports and manage its debt.38 As one State Department representative put it:

continuing
The image promoted by the international press has been one of “the people” rising in response to a “humanitarian crisis” wrought by an “authoritarian regime.” In reality, however, the combination of peaceful resistance and blatant acts of guarimba violence has only served to further isolate the popular sectors from the opposition. A look behind the headlines and images shows some glaring contradictions, particularly in the description of guarimbas as “food riots,” given the class and racial composition of the protesters crying hambre (hunger), described above. Furthermore, a quick glance at social media, such as posts by Freddy Guevara and others, dispels any illusion that the protests arose spontaneously. Finally, both the targets and tactics of the guarimbas—including burning food instead of redistributing it (indeed, food designated for the poor), along with violent assaults on the poor and dark-skinned—put the lie to any narrative of the guarimbas as “food riots” of the hungry.
An event far more aptly described as a “food riot” or “food rebellion” was the Caracazo of 1989, mentioned above. At the time, reports in the New York Times and other outlets made few criticisms of the government of President Andrés Pérez, but did include graphic accounts of mass graves, people lined up at morgues in search of loved ones, imposition of curfews, curtailing of civil liberties and press freedom, and death estimates upwards of 600 people, with one doctor quoted as saying “no country is prepared for what we have confronted this week.”50 Today, in contrast, while government repression is regularly denounced in the Times and elsewhere, a total of fourteen deaths associated with the 2017 guarimbas have been directly traced to government security forces, while twenty-three have been attributed to opposition violence.51 While any government-sanctioned violence merits concern, attention, and investigation, it nevertheless bears asking why the international outcry has been so much greater than during the Caracazo, and, why, as one media watchdog group has noted, “the imperfect state of democracy in Venezuela” attracts singular attention, even as many atrocities in the world today go underreported.52
Again, very much long-form, but highly comprehensive and informative.
https://monthlyreview.org/2018/06/01/the-politics-of-food-in-venezuela/

Posted by: KC | Feb 8 2019 22:25 utc | 38

Peter @31–
I believe that rather than inadvertently wrecking the dollar as Hudson and Escobar seem to think, it is a planned move. Now that the move has been made, there is no turning back, the dollar cannot be saved, and the US under Trump must push its planned change through or collapse in a similar fashion to the USSR.
Your inference is one to ask Hudson about. Here’s the link to his communication form if you’re so inclined.

Posted by: karlof1 | Feb 8 2019 22:40 utc | 40

@28 Don Bacon
I was actually shocked to read your words of disparagement for the US Constitution.
If there is one thing left in the USA that stands above the fray it is the Constitution. I suspect this resonates in the hearts of many of the people of the country – I know it does with the military.
If there is any scenario that one can imagine wherein the people ever regain control of their government, I suggest that, while it may be difficult to imagine such a scenario, it becomes totally impossible to imagine such a scenario without the Constitution. As karlof1 points out, this is actually the source of all US law. There is no rule of law without it.
In countries all over the world we see struggling forces citing their constitution. Even revolution requires a manifesto. Especially revolution. It would be a vast error not to see the immense tactical and strategic value of the Constitution for the US. I suspect that as a focus of devotion it constitutes the single most potent rallying cry for the people. I can’t prove this, but it is just conceivable that the passage of time yet may.

Posted by: Grieved | Feb 8 2019 22:50 utc | 42

Psychohistorian @ 49
Might I respond to this – “BREXIT is happening because the City of London does not want any transparency into their evil”
The Brexit imbroglio. It’s important to understand that this was an accidental referendum. It just happened that internal party strife in the Conservative party led to it. It was not a genuine “Let’s ask the people” referendum. It was a chance outcome of party manoeuvering. No one expected “Leave” to win and the government had prepared no plans for doing so.
So it was an impromptu vote and a confused campaign, leading to a confused outcome.
It’s therefore difficult to accurately identify the factors that led to 17 million or so of us voting “Leave”. We all had our different reasons. How many of us were thinking primarily of the City when we voted I don’t know. I doubt very many, though the City is one of the major earners in the British economy so few will have wanted to see it damaged.
I suspect we all dip into that Brexit imbroglio and see in it elements we want to see. It’s partly a revolt of the deplorables, as we see with the Yellow Vests or with the Trump victory. It’s partly a dislike of the EU per se and a desire to return to self-government. I saw it too as a rejection of globalism – but the most fervent “Leavers” in Parliament seem to be apostles of Globalism, so it’s a confused picture there too. It’s also a fairly minor event in the context of the great forces that are changing the political landscape for us in Europe at present.
Eventually the strands will become clearer and we’ll all say “We knew it was that all along”. But we don’t really know what the forces behind Brexit are at present. It may therefore be premature to identify the City as a determining influence one way to the other, even if it is permissible to see “the City” as a discrete entity and as a discrete force.
On another point it’s premature to say Brexit is happening. It may be, or it may be half-happening – the most likely outcome – or, as many in Berlin or Westminster still hope, it may happen in name only. I doubt
even the people in the middle of it know yet what the outcome will be. The only thing we can be sure of is that most of it’s theatre and PR, all sides, and until the phoney war stage is over it’s unsafe to take any statement by any of the parties as indicating genuine intent.

Posted by: English Outsider | Feb 8 2019 22:58 utc | 44

@psychohistorian 2
Not sure where the religions are going with this joint statement, perhaps just making sure everyone follows one version or another of their nonsense. The Abrahamic religions all use the anthropomorphized God, something that doesn’t even exist, and most seem to like the Devil notion as well, another thing that doesn’t exist, to exert fear. They all have snippets of the truth from older beliefs, however all are severally edited and contrived into control systems to fit their business model.
Eastern religions are closer to the truth, but again have morphed into control systems or like to play around with black “magic” to try and enhance their occult development, again a dead end.
Our spiritual development, as it were, is a solo journey, there is no buying a stairway to heaven, all these religious systems, although some offering at least a partial moral code, tend to retard that development. We are currently at the lowest point in the cycle, something our societies do reflect, those seeking “enlightenment” waste their time with organized religion and new age misdirection for that matter.

Posted by: Rancid | Feb 8 2019 23:13 utc | 46

james @ 30 said;”honour is direct.. it is in owns actions, much more then words… none of the usa presidents for a very long time have expressed anything close to honour, or integrity.. that is the sad truth..”
You bet james, right on!!
The other sad truth is, that none of the empire’s actions, neither here, or abroad, are about honor or truth, only about greed and avarice.
The world begs to be rid of this on-going abomination….

Posted by: ben | Feb 8 2019 23:17 utc | 48

Grieved @41–
Actually, I was somewhat pleased Don wrote what he did as it made me formulate a response in writing that I’d been rehearsing in my mind since W uttered his words. And as you point out, it’s about the only argument remaining to employ–which I intend to do ASAP. It’s cognitively difficult to come to grips with the fact that for my entire life the federal government of the USA has been continuously Treasonous to the point of being illegitimate in its serial violation of the Constitution and the millions upon millions of oaths taken to uphold and defend it from its Domestic Enemies–for only one who is domestic can violate the Constitution of his/her nation. It’s rather simple really: Either we have a Constitution and Law and thus a nation, or we have no Constitution, thus no Law but Anarchy and thus no Nation because no laws establishing one.
As most know, I deem it the Outlaw US Empire for a very specific reason–it’s an Outlaw to its own and international law. IMO, the only way short of a most terrible war to rein in the Outlaw is to get the US Citizenry to make it conform to its Fundamental Law–to completely drain the Treasonous Swamp; arrest, try and imprison the treasonous and corrupt; modify the Fundamental Law so history doesn’t repeat; and resume life once again as a normal nation amongst 190+ other nations.
Ben Franklin’s credited with saying we have a Republic “if we can keep it.” As any student of history ought to know, keeping it would be close to a fulltime occupation given human nature to become corrupt. Either we do the work to keep it and continue as citizens or we cry Oh woes me and become slaves within a Totalitarian Corporatocracy. Funny, but it seems to me this argument has occurred before in a similar fashion beginning about 1768.

Posted by: karlof1 | Feb 8 2019 23:25 utc | 50

ben @48–
If we peons have thus sworn allegiance to ourselves and our nation, then it ought to be easy to throw the treasonous “elite” out since they are “All for one and only one” instead of “One for All and All for one.”

Posted by: karlof1 | Feb 8 2019 23:44 utc | 52

@ karlof1 with the ongoing truth about the R2P of the US constitution….THANKS!
@ Grieved with the Duterte solution to leadership. It sounds good but if that leadership is under the jackboot of global private finance, what is it able to do but keep digging down?
@ commenters that are seeing that this is all planned demolition of empire to save the elite….great!
@ karlof1 and others that want to start imprisoning the war criminals tomorrow……breathe and be happy that humanity is closer that ever to escaping the jackboot of global private finance and the win/lose world built on its precepts. The lower elite are devouring each other already and it shouldn’t take much for them to move upchain and expose/chew on the Fortune 500 Trust Fund types. Also, think of this as a wonderful education for the faith breathing zombies to see clearly the hypocrisy of the leaders of their beliefs

Posted by: psychohistorian | Feb 8 2019 23:48 utc | 54

juliania @52–
You and I would have excellent conversations just as my wife and I do regarding religion–I’m a Naturalist; she’s a Theist; our honesty about our differing POVs in no way impinges on our relationship; indeed, such honesty and openness enhances it; it’s possible to debate without enmity or the need to establish oneupsmanship.
My wife has a co-worker from Brazil who just passed his test and swore his oath. I find it a great interest the differing citizenship standards for natives versus immigrants, which I’ve known for awhile but never took much notice until now. And I don’t recall ever hearing the differences pointed out by any of my teachers/professors, although they ought to have. Now I’ll need to review a book–The Republic written in 1943 by Charles Beard dealing with the issue of citizenship during wartime–as it’s in a style I might use.

Posted by: karlof1 | Feb 9 2019 0:24 utc | 56

Grieved@41 You are correct. In my senior year at a liberal arts college we took for seminar discussion documents pertaining to the American Revolution, on to the Constitution, the Federalist Papers, and “The People Shall Judge”. This was at a small college in the east, the colonial era coming visibly to light in these discussions. It was memorable. And it struck me then, as it always has since, that what was constructed in those years, flawed as it was for many historical reasons as has often been discussed here, was yet an attempt to counter all forseeable consequences, as that document replaced what was then an unworkable covenant between the forming states. There were ways to improve upon it, and it was improved upon. And until now, I believe, it has never happened that all three of the balancing divisions of government have been so corrupted as to destroy that balance.
But I believe it has indeed happened.

Posted by: juliania | Feb 9 2019 0:35 utc | 58

@ Robert Snefjella | Feb 8, 2019 4:49:01 PM | 34
The US Constitution is not ‘a piece of paper’ but the basic rules for the people living in the United States.
Baloney. The Constitution basically specifies the architecture of the government, legislative executive and judicial. That structure is not in any danger that I’m aware of, so it doesn’t need supporting.
There is nothing in the basic Constitution about the basic human rights which were the reason for independence. Nothing in the Constitution addressing “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness.” Why was that? Because the newly-independent Constitution-writing Founders apparently no longer cared about human rights and were all about setting up an autocratic government. So in the basic Constitution there is nothing about human rights that we all feel that we have, and deserve.
Since these human rights were not included in the Constitution, some were addressed in Amendments. The first ten were passed as a some part of a compromise I forget the details of. The US shall not make laws ….about this and that, in eight amendments, starting with freedom of expression and ending with excessive bail. And then a ninth giving a backhand recognition of other unmentioned rights — “The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people.” Oh really, what are they? Could they be basic human rights of some sort? . . .And a tenth with delegated powers.
Collectively these ten amendments are commonly referred to as the “Bill of Rights” which is a huge mistake because they imply that the Constitution is a repository of rights. It is not. Only certain rights are listed as “the government can’t take these away” in so many words. (Other “don’t do this” amendments were added later.)
Huge mistake. Chief Justice Roberts for example has declared that there is no right to abortion in the Constitution. He’s correct. Of course women have no Constitutional right to control their own bodies. Out-of-control guys rule. Vasectomies are okay. Constitutionally.
In the courts, all laws have to be judged if they are Constitutional or not. To be lawful they all have to provide some authorization from the Constitution. That’s foolish, to use the Constitution which was written to establish the government as an acid test for human rights laws. Foolish because the Constitution is basically a piece of paper written, without any reference to human rights, to set up the government. THESE PEOPLE CAN’T DEFINE OUR BASIC HUMAN RIGHTS THAT WE WERE BORN WITH.
So the Constitution is just a piece of paper.

Posted by: Don Bacon | Feb 9 2019 1:03 utc | 60

American Values Anniversary:
“On this day in 1963, the CIA backed a coup against the populist Iraqi leader, Abd al-Karim Qasim, jailing, torturing & killing thousands of his supporters & paving the way for Saddam Hussein’s rise to power.”
No Nationalist Leaders Allowed is still the Outlaw US Empire’s mantra today–excepting Trump, of course.

Posted by: karlof1 | Feb 9 2019 1:10 utc | 62

@ mourning dove 62
I share your feelings. I’m old enough to have actually been taught about the constitution and government in school. I also learned American History. However, as I aged, I learned that in my public education I pretty much learned that the US was always the good guys and we were always the victors (Vietnam war was still in process at the time). When I went college I learned that the US was not always on the side of good. From that time forward all I saw was the US doing horrible things around the world as well as to its own people. I’m incredibly embarrassed to be an American. Not just for what my country does, but a populace that doesn’t know and/or doesn’t care. And I don’t forgive the people for not knowing. You have to be a village idiot not to see the blatant lies and inconsistency our government and their Operation Mockingbird MSM feed us. Hardly a day goes by when I don’t find myself singing the Greenwald song with modified lyrics “Ashamed to be an American, wher I’m duped to think I’m free”. If I was younger and able, I would leave this country.

Posted by: lgfocus | Feb 9 2019 1:33 utc | 64

One of the unrecognized ways the US Constitution gets amended is via its Supremacy Clause, which has been discussed here previously. All Treaties ratified by the Senate become the Law of the Land until unratified, perhaps most importantly the UN Charter. Annually, the Department of State publishes a compendium: Treaties in Force: A List of Treaties and Other International Agreements of the United States. That 595 pages only lists the titles, not the content of each treaty, so you can imagine how massively the US Constitution has expanded from its initial meagerness–it’s now thousands of pages in length thanks to the Supremacy Clause.

Posted by: karlof1 | Feb 9 2019 1:41 utc | 66

@ mourning dove | Feb 8, 2019 8:14:09 PM | 62
I think it’s a serious problem in the US that so many people have a whitewashed, idealized view of this country’s founding and that blood drenched [Constitution]
Yes, and I haven’t looked at it recently, but there is an excellent book —
Paperback: The Politically Incorrect Guide to the Constitution
(Part of the Politically Incorrect Guides Series)
by Kevin R.C. Gutzman
What has happened since the Constitution was written?
….There is very little relationship between the Constitution as ratified by the thirteen original states more than two centuries ago and the “constitutional law” imposed upon us since then. Instead of the system of state-level decision makers and elected officials the Constitution was intended to create, judges have given us a highly centralized system in which bureaucrats and appointed–not elected–officials make most of the important policies. . .”here
“constitutional law” — ugh

Posted by: Don Bacon | Feb 9 2019 1:48 utc | 68

On the nature of the Bill of Rights.
The framers of the constitution who met in Philadelphia were delegates sent by each of the 13 states. When they had agreed on the finial draft, they brought it back to the states, which had to ratify it through their legislatures.
The Constitution would NEVER have been ratified if the Bill of Rights had not been made a part of it as the first 10 amendments. Only with these amendments was the Constitution ratified. I have never heard of any argument about this fact. The Bill of Rights was not simply an afterthought tacked on. It was an expression of the popular will.
The people already lived in independent republics, most or maybe all with a parliamentary, bicameral legislature. In their states, the people felt they had representation, and representatives they could approach. But to deliver up a portion of their sovereignty into the Union, the people insisted on safeguards against tyranny.
The task before the framers was to devise an architecture that would create a perpetual union of the states without breaking, over time. This was a technical challenge, and I will suggest that when it was published, the Constitution was admired by many in the world for its technical achievements in creating a more perfect structural Union out of the former Confederation.
But in terms of the rights of any citizens within any nation of the world, it was the Bill of Rights that was the star.
I don’t know, but I suspect that when the US populace thinks of the Constitution it is really thinking of the Bill of Rights. I don’t know how many people would give their lives for the Commerce Clause, or even know what it is. But I suspect many would do so for the right to bear arms and the freedoms of speech and assembly.
So, the Bill of Rights.

Posted by: Grieved | Feb 9 2019 1:50 utc | 70

Thankfully there are dozens of treaties not ratified by the US here.

Posted by: Don Bacon | Feb 9 2019 1:55 utc | 72

re: The Bill of Rights
>It is not a bill of rights, it is a bill of a few prohibited government actions.
>Calling it a bill of rights implies that it is a complete listing (Article IX is never mentioned).
> It also implies that the government has a right to prescribe our rights. It doesn’t. We were born with them.

Posted by: Don Bacon | Feb 9 2019 2:03 utc | 74

Post #40 is probably the output of a rightwingnut Protestant Rapture missionary.

…why not use it to protect israel and the innocents

My translation: “the Second Coming bonfire to Welcome Jesus is almost fully set up, so why can’t somebody set off a few nukes to light it for Him?”
The last part suggests this person would also like to use enough of the fantasy micronukes to wipe out every known abortion clinic so as to save the “unborn”.

Posted by: Zachary Smith | Feb 9 2019 2:10 utc | 76

@ mourning dove who wrote
”
The blatant hypocricy of the proclamation that all men are created equal by white elitists who were actively engaged in genocide, ethnic cleansing, and slavery, as well as the subjugation and domination of women, is self evident.
”
And then lgfocus with the follow on shame.
When I read sentiments like yours I think back to my anthropology education and look for context. I make no excuse for what happened in the past or what is happening even now. We are animals that profess to know something about less than 5 percent of the universe but are hubristic enough to create Gods in their likeness. The current species seems to have two types of “being” ; one of aggression, competition and control and another that is defensive, sharing and curious. For centuries the aggressive sub-culture has not only been dominant but carried on efforts based on its better than others belief of itself by destroying other cultures and peoples, even those not in direct competition. Along the way a group of the dominant sub-culture tried to dream and instantiate a better way….and while that may seem insignificant to some, it represents the idealism of many in and outside of the US.
We are now at a point where the dominant sub-culture has not succeeded in world domination and is being challenged by nations it has previously oppressed. Is there a snowballs chance in hell of reclaiming any of those lost cultures and people? No!
I think of myself as a realist who is trying their individual hardest to change our species social organization for the better. While I respect and retell the stories of Potlatch I heard and read about in my youth, I don’t see our future society operating under the native American culture. What I think is possible is to remove/change the core precept of the current dominant culture around private to public finance.
I refuse to get get caught up in prosecuting any more of the past than we can pull together if/when given the opportunity. Humanity cannot move forward by looking in the rear view mirror but by grasping the current reality and adjusting it to suit our species potential.

Posted by: psychohistorian | Feb 9 2019 2:14 utc | 78

@ lgfocus | Feb 8, 2019 8:33:28 PM | 63
When I went college I learned that the US was not always on the side of good. From that time forward all I saw was the US doing horrible things around the world as well as to its own people.
Why is the Constitution so wonderful if these horrible things are allowed happen? Is there anything in the Constitution that says that human life is important, that (starting with) Native Americans (and later foreigners) should not be killed arbitrarily? No, there is nothing in the Constitution that prohibited the deaths of so many peopled attacked by the Constitutional United States of America. . . .Thousands of people died recently in Raqqa Syria, targeted by US Marine corps 155mm (6 inch diameter) howitzer rounds fired indiscriminately into their city.

Posted by: Don Bacon | Feb 9 2019 2:18 utc | 80

I think it’s a serious problem in the US that so many people have a whitewashed,
idealized view of this country’s founding and that blood drenched document.

Article 2
This article states the nature of the Mexican nation.
The Mexican nation is unique and indivisible. The nation is pluricultural based originally on its indigenous tribes which are those that are descendants of the people that lived in the current territory of the country at the beginning of the colonization and that preserve their own social, economic, cultural, political institutions. The awareness of their indigenous identity should be fundamental criteria to determine to whom the dispositions over indigenous tribes are applied. They are integral communities of an indigenous tribe that form a social, economic and cultural organization.

Posted by: Guerrero | Feb 9 2019 2:18 utc | 82

Thank you Karlof1, Grieved, psychohistorian and others who have offered observations I believe arise from a provenance of ethical and moral clarity.
‘People–subjects–were once required to swear allegiance to the occupant of the throne of the realm. That concept was enlightenly modified so citizens could swear allegiance to a body of law as represented by the Constitution in our case’
In the backdrop of Karloft1’s comment, the principles embodied in the US Constitution are arguably the singular utilitarian claim to American ‘exceptionalism’. Its enshrined principles, rightly ascribed the high value they deserve have been circumvented and often trampled through the steady erosion of our system of governance. This, IMO has been the product of both individual and institutional appropriation of power. It is driven by unbridled greed whose concomitant is the pursuit of global hegemony.
Just as a foreign policy which runs on the inherent deceit of ‘divide and conquer’ as a means to subdue enemies eventually backfires, the manipulation of public opinion to justify ends of the elite is an internal facet of that strategy. The cumulative effect eventually leads to the opposite of what was intended.
It may well be quixotic on my part to anticipate a reverse in the general direction in we are headed. Doing one’s part within the range of social circles to stimulate questioning has its limits. MoA is an authentic medium with the power to debunk, inform and stir thought but a general public awakening that might lead to a seismic change still appears distant. Meanwhile, we continue tugging at the curtain to reveal the man behind it. It seems to be the only peaceful means to disabuse a populace lulled by the illusion of a ‘benevolent’ but stern Oz.
@61 Karlof1
“On this day in 1963, the CIA backed a coup against the populist Iraqi leader, Abd al-Karim Qasim, jailing, torturing & killing thousands of his supporters & paving the way for Saddam Hussein’s rise to power.”
Yes, I remember that as an adolescent at the time. The media greeted his demise with jubilation. He was, after all, ‘pro-communist’, thus deserving of such a fate. I often wondered how the late nationalist pan-Arab nationalist leader Gamal Abdel Nasser evaded overthrow and assasination. He flirted heavily with the USSR after nationalizing the Suez Canal in 1956 and was also vilified as a Soviet puppet. The poppycok has a long trail. I also read a book by a former CIA operative called ‘The Game of Nations in which the author claims Nasser was a CIA asset. Perhaps, but if that bears any truth, he was betrayed by his handlers when his country was duped into the 6-Day War.

Posted by: metni | Feb 9 2019 2:24 utc | 84

Christianity cheered the slaughter of indigenous peoples and justified slavery.

Original version of The Feelings of the Nation, the classic political text of Morelos,
read by its Secretary at the opening of the Independence Congress in the Church of the Virgen
of the Assumption in Chilpancingo, Guerrero September 14, 1813.
12th That as the good law is superior to every man or woman, those dictated by our Congress must be such, that they force constancy and patriotism, moderate opulence and indigence, and in such a way increase the wages of the poor, improve their customs, moving away from ignorance, rapine and theft.
15th That slavery is outlawed forever and the same distinction of castes, remaining all the same, and only distinguish one Mexican vice and virtue from another.
18th That the new legislation does not admit torture.
 

Posted by: Guerrero | Feb 9 2019 2:29 utc | 86

@ psychohistorian | Feb 8, 2019 9:14:21 PM | 77
The current species seems to have two types of “being” ; one of aggression, competition and control and another that is defensive, sharing and curious.
I don’t think so. I’ve lived in many places, in many countries, and I’ve never encountered what you describe. I’ve met many kinds of people, all different, with many characteristics some of which appealed to me and others that didn’t.
I think the problem you’re describing is one of people who are allowed to attain a position where they can control others. The I go to Edward Abbey: — “No man is wise enough to be another man’s master. Each man’s as good as the next — if not a damn sight better.”

Posted by: Don Bacon | Feb 9 2019 2:36 utc | 88

There were army bases established in the west with the express purpose of eliminating Native Americans, who were wonderfully adaptive people under invasion. The Constitution had no problem with that.

Posted by: Don Bacon | Feb 9 2019 2:41 utc | 90

The US constitution is a deplorable document, but not because it was created by slaveowners, but because it makes it difficult if not impossible to have a left wing government in America. Various rules such as no property seizure by the government without compensation are explicitly anti-socialist, common law benefits the elite class due to its precedent-based system which does not distinguish between cases and provides business stability, the President is both overpowered compared to the legislature while at the same time unable to be decisive thanks to checks and balances, and most importantly because the Senate is an undemocratic monstrosity which, along with first-past-the-Post in the House, gives a grossly disproportionate amount of seats to underpopulated backwaters and blocks multiple parties. It’s a dumpster fire with only the First Amendment in its favour.

Posted by: Anne Jaclard | Feb 9 2019 2:47 utc | 92

historyisaweapon.com has an online copy of A People’s History of the United States if anyone is interested. The first chapter on Columbus is soul wrenching. And it just goes on from there.

Posted by: mourning dove | Feb 9 2019 2:52 utc | 94

I also have to point out that the US is actively participating in the slow genocide of the Palestinian people. We’re even funding it, and shielding Israel from any accountability.

Posted by: mourning dove | Feb 9 2019 3:02 utc | 96

juliania 58
You may find this piece at Patrick Armstrong’s site interesting.
https://patrickarmstrong.ca/2018/06/20/yes-putin-once-dreamed-the-american-dream/

Posted by: Peter AU 1 | Feb 9 2019 3:16 utc | 98

Grieved 46 “The model has much to recommend it.”
Thailand may be near this model. An interesting part of Thai history, is that as far as I am aware, it has never been the possession of an empire. At least not through the last half a millenia when European countries were expanding their borders to take in various parts of the asia pacific.

Posted by: Peter AU 1 | Feb 9 2019 3:29 utc | 100