New Documents Further Unveil Obama's Anti-Trump Campaign
A number of recent document releases shine new lights on 'Russiagate'. That conspiracy theory, peddled by the Obama administration, the Democratic Party aligned media and 'deep state' actors opposed to President Trump, alleged that Trump was in cahoots with Russia. The disinformation campaign had the purpose of sabotaging his presidency.
To some extent it has worked as intended. But due to the legal investigation of the whole affair much more is now known about those who conspired against Trump. Some of them are likely to end up in legal jeopardy.
Some of those are the agents under FBI director Comey who used the easily debunked Steele dossier, paid for by the Democratic party, to gain a FISA court warrants that allowed them to spy on the Trump campaign. It now turns out that the main source for the dossier they used was a shady actor who the FBI had earlier investigated for an alleged connection to Russian intelligence:
The primary sub-source for the Steele dossier was the subject of an earlier counterintelligence investigation by the FBI, and those facts were known to the Crossfire Hurricane team as early as December 2016, according to newly released records from the Justice Department that were first reported by CBS News.The timing matters because the dossier was first used two months earlier, in October 2016, to help secure a surveillance warrant for former Trump campaign aide Carter Page, and then used in three subsequent surveillance renewals.
"Between May 2009 and March 2011, the FBI maintained an investigation into the individual who later would be identified as Christopher Steele's Primary Sub-source," the two page FBI memo states. "The FBI commenced this investigation based on information by the FBI indicating that the Primary Sub-source may be a threat to national security."
That the Steele dossier was potentially based on the words of a Russian spy should have been a red flag against its use. It seems that the FBI had not informed the FISA court about the dubious sourcing of the dossier allegations.
Igor Danchenko, the premier sub-source for the Steele dossier, had earlier worked for the Democrat affiliate Brookings Institute:
Danchenko worked at the time as a Russia analyst for the Brookings Institution, a prominent liberal foreign policy think tank.An employee of the think tank said that another employee, seemingly Danchenko, told others that if they got jobs in the government and obtained classified security clearances, they might be put them in touch with people so they could “make a little extra money.”
“The coworker did express suspicion of the employee and had questioned the possibility that the employee might actually be a Russian spy,” the FBI memo says.
Danchenko may or may not have been a Russian spy. But the fact the FBI had once opened a full counter-intelligence investigation of him which was never concluded shines a very bad light on the dossier peddlers.
Shortly before Trump was inaugurated the Obama administration released an 'Intelligence Community Assessment', concocted by hand-selected agents under CIA director John Brennan, that claimed that Russia had preferred Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton. That had never made sense. Clinton was a well known factor to the Kremlin while Trump was a wild card that potentially would cause chaos - which is what he ended up doing. It only now turns out that several CIA analysts had come to that conclusion but that their thinking was excluded from the published analysis:
Former CIA Director John Brennan personally edited a crucial section of the intelligence report on Russian interference in the 2016 election and assigned a political ally to take a lead role in writing it after career analysts disputed Brennan's take that Russian leader Vladimir Putin intervened in the 2016 election to help Donald Trump clinch the White House, according to two senior U.S. intelligence officials who have seen classified materials detailing Brennan’s role in drafting the document.The explosive conclusion Brennan inserted into the report was used to help justify continuing the Trump-Russia “collusion” investigation, which had been launched by the FBI in 2016. It was picked up after the election by Special Counsel Robert Mueller, who in the end found no proof that Trump or his campaign conspired with Moscow.
The Obama administration publicly released a declassified version of the report — known as the "Intelligence Community Assessment on Russian Activities and Intentions in Recent Elections (ICA)” — just two weeks before Trump took office, casting a cloud of suspicion over his presidency. Democrats and national media have cited the report to suggest Russia influenced the 2016 outcome and warn that Putin is likely meddling again to reelect Trump.
The ICA is a key focus of U.S. Attorney John Durham’s ongoing investigation into the origins of the “collusion” probe. He wants to know if the intelligence findings were juiced for political purposes.
Around the same time the ICA was written FBI agents involved in the anti-Trump investigation were messaging each other about Russiagate issues. A new release of parts of their conversations is quite damaging:
Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents tasked by fired former Director James Comey to take down Donald Trump during and after the 2016 election were so concerned about the agency’s potentially illegal behavior that they purchased liability insurance to protect themselves less than two weeks before Trump was inaugurated president, previously hidden FBI text messages show. The explosive new communications and internal FBI notes were disclosed in federal court filings today from Sidney Powell, the attorney who heads Michael Flynn’s legal defense team.
...
The new disclosures made by DOJ also show that the FBI used so-called national security letters (NSLs) to spy on Flynn’s finances. Unlike traditional subpoenas, which require judicial review and approval before authorities can seize an innocent person’s property and information, NSLs are never independently reviewed by courts. One of the agents noted in a text message that the NSLs were just being used as a pretext by FBI leadership to buy time to find dirt on Flynn after the first investigation of him yielded no derogatory information.
...
In one series of texts sent the same day as the infamous Jan. 5 Oval Office meeting between Obama, Biden, Comey, Sally Yates, and Susan Rice, one agent admits that “Trump was right” when he tweeted that the FBI was delaying his briefings as incoming president so they could cook up evidence against him. As The Federalist first reported last May, that Jan. 5 meeting was the key to understanding the entire anti-Trump operation run out of Obama’s FBI.“The ‘Intelligence’ briefing on so-called ‘Russian hacking’ was delayed until Friday, perhaps more time needed to build a case,” Trump tweeted on January 3. “Very strange!”
Brennan's 'Intelligence Community Assessment' was published on January 5. The White House round also led to a renewal of the investigation of Trump's incoming National Security Advisor General Michael Flynn. That investigation, codenamed 'razor', had had no results and was supposed to be closed. The FBI agents did not like the White House plans at all:
“So razor is going to stay open???” an agent wrote on Jan. 5.“[Y]ep,” another FBI agent responded. “[C]rimes report being drafted.”
“F,” the first agent wrote back.
“[W]hat’s the word on how [Obama’s] briefing went?” one agent asked, referring to the Jan. 5 meeting.
“Dont know but people here are scrambling for info to support certain things and its a mad house,” an FBI agent responded.
“[J]esus,” an agent wrote back. “[T]rump was right. [S]till not put together….why do we do this to ourselves. [W]hat is wrong with these people[?]
Last but not least the Durham investigation into the FBI's operation against Trump released a protocol of an interview with an FBI agent who was involved in the investigation against General Flynn and in the later Mueller investigation against Trump:
A 13-page summary of an interview with Flynn case agent William Barnett, made public in a court filing by prosecutors just before midnight Thursday, [..] revealed that the veteran agent harbored deep doubts and skepticism about the merits of the investigation into Flynn’s potential ties with Russia — at least in its early stages — and questioned the Mueller team’s tactics in the broader probe of the Trump campaign’s contacts with Russians, known as Crossfire Hurricane.Though Barnett said he repeatedly expressed those doubts to colleagues and superiors — and says he feared groupthink and a “get Trump” attitude was driving the investigation forward — he continued to be included in the work of Mueller’s attorneys during sensitive interviews.
All together those releases by the Justice Department and the new reports again demonstrate that there was no legit Russiagate and no reason to investigate the Trump campaign. It was all a conspiracy theory concocted to make it more difficult for Trump to pursue the policies he had advocated during his election campaign.
It was even more than that. Mike Whitney is right in calling it an illicit coup attempt. Obama, his éminence grise John Brennan, and all those willing minions who were part of it should be in jail.
If all the energy wasted on peddling Russiagate had instead been used to push real political alternatives to Trump's programs the Democrats and their voters would likely be in a better position.
Posted by b on September 25, 2020 at 16:52 UTC | Permalink
PS Real evidence for Obama's anti-Trump campaign would be about how he encouraged Clinton to contest Trump's loss of the vote. She had vastly more ground for refusing to concede than Trump does. And unlike this BS, this anti-Trump campaign doesn't violate any laws or even regulations. It would even be a principled stand for majority rule. Every single person who upheld the legitimacy of minority rule because, Electoral College, is dedicated to Trump's legitimacy. Rube Goldberg conspiracy theories purporting to show Trump is a victim of the Deep State determined to fight his salvation of humanity are refuted by this alone.
Posted by: steven t johnson | Sep 25 2020 17:33 utc | 2
The link at “excluded from the published analysis” does not work.
Posted by: David G | Sep 25 2020 17:36 utc | 3
True enough. Luckily for us, that was just the beginning of their increasingly bizzare behavior. It's been quite a show so far, and they haven't even finished figuring out how to hang this election yet...
More to come, surely.
Good article B.
Thanks again.
b: "Obama's Anti-Trump Campaign"
LMFAO.
So we are to believe that Russia can't kill their targets and that the US Deep State can't prevent an unwanted "populist" from being President despite the ease of manipulating the USA money-driven selection of a President?
Really?
Well, it was NOT an "anti-Trump campaign". It was an anti-Russia campaign flavored with "Trump is a populist!" sweetener.
Because the US Deep State WANTED to initiate a new McCarthyism AND to elect MAGA Nationalist Trump.
Obama himself was a Deep-State approved faux populist Presidential stooge that conducted secret wars and betrayed his 'base' to advance the interests of the establishment. Trump is merely the Republican Obama.
<> <> <> <> <> <>
The US Presidency is the lynchpin of the Empire. No true "populist outsider" will EVER be allowed to occupy that office.
It's difficult to fathom why smart people can't see this.
!!
Posted by: Jackrabbit | Sep 25 2020 17:37 utc | 5
Do a search on "Danchenko and Fiona Hill", the latter being one of those who testified with Marie Yovanovich and was sainted by the media.
Posted by: Bart Hansen | Sep 25 2020 17:42 utc | 6
If all the energy wasted on peddling Russiagate had instead been used to push real political alternatives to Trump's programs the Democrats and their voters would likely be in a better position.
The Ds defeated that possibility when they conspired to derail Sanders and promote Clinton. As a result, Obama's legacy is Trump. But there was a Deep State faction pulling Obama's strings that's likely supporting the attempt to foment a domestic Color Revolution, yet for the life of me I can't see why as all the grifters are getting billions--unless--it's perceived that Trump's stalled their imperialist projects or stopped what they hoped to accomplish via JCPOA. In other words, we need a better motive for Russiagate than the mere disruption of Trump's administration.
The Nexus is Ukraine, where the DNC, Obama and others were heavily involved with corruption, money into their pockets and money laundered for campaign uses, illegally brought back into the US.
It was never Russia or Russians. It was always the Podesta-Clinton-Obama operatives and their true believers in FBI and DOJ, working with the Russophobes in NGOs and the State Dept.
The desperation as Trump became a real possible President and then an actual elected President was to cover their crimes in Ukraine and the illegal actions to spy on Trump and set up Trump campaign associates.
The difficult call now is how high up do the present investigators have cover to save the institutions of the FBI and DOJ? A real take down would go to Obama, Biden, Clapper, Comey, Brennan, Podesta, Clinton and all their lieutenants. It would collapse the CIA, State, FBI, DOJ, and all the lying experts on Russia who perjured to Congress.
Posted by: Red Ryder | Sep 25 2020 18:03 utc | 8
Red Ryder gets it -- Ukraine is the specific catalyst, linked to the New Cold War against Russia and the corruption of the Democrats involved in that conflict.
There is also Flynn and his dirt on Obama's Syria/ISIS policy -- remember his Al Jazeera interview about Obama's "wilful decision" to ignore DIA reports on ISIS. Flynn knows the US and its allies had some kind of links to ISIS and Nusra Front (Al Qaeda) in Syria.
And there is also the more general concern, raised by Karlof1, about the Presidency and the empire.
Posted by: profk | Sep 25 2020 18:17 utc | 10
I have been reading and nodding in agreement with Mike Whitney since his work started showing up on counterpunch. Does counterpunch still feature his work? My guess is not. Mike Whitney is a full-blown unapologetic Trump-defender and has consistently and very clearly shown that the recent BLM and urban riots are entirely funded and sewn by Democratic-party alligned elite.
I'm glad b can agree with some things the above writer has put-forth. I wonder if b knows about the den of vipers brooding here at the bar, spouting off about white-supremacists and other fictions designed to obfuscate the clear and present danger to our duly-elected POTUS and to render his supporters as racist fascists.
I wish b would just come out and say it. There is a real difference btw the two options on Nov. 3. Yes, both parties are elites and not in any way to be given cart blanche with our trust, but only one party has proven that it has attempted to usurp our democracy, infiltrate and hijack and make partisan the checks and balances of our government and FBI, and call 50% of the population "deplorables."
My only question to the idiots still holding onto their noble quest of dethroning POTUS because he is immoral: what do you think will happen after? At some point it becomes imperative for you to think about that and wonder if DJT really is the only one standing btw the people and utter tyranny.
Posted by: NemesisCalling | Sep 25 2020 18:31 utc | 11
I found this barb delivered by Lavrov during his presser with Zarif I linked to on the open thread to be very curious when thought about in the context of Russiagate:
"The fact that the United States has threatened to impose sanctions on those who defy the American interpretation of the current situation serves as further proof of Washington’s desire to move like a bull in a china shop, putting ultimatums to everyone and punishing everyone indiscriminately because, in my view, the incumbent US administration has lost its diplomatic skills almost for good." [My Emphasis]
Red Ryder @8 & profk @10 connect Ukraine and the outing of the Empire's role in the creation of Daesh. Yes, it seems much is related to Russia's Phoenix-like rise and outwitting the Empire's buffoons beginning in 2013 that's generated the above behavior noted by Lavrov. If TrumpCo does get a second term, unless the entire foreign policy team is dumped and replaced, its agenda will go nowhere other than further into the hole they've dug for themselves over the past 20 years--almost every nation is now against Bush's USA as many now know who the terrorists really are and where they live.
David G | Sep 25 2020 17:36 utc | 3
here is the link to “excluded from the published analysis”
Posted by: dan of steele | Sep 25 2020 19:44 utc | 13
What if the goal of 2016 election was to set up the 2020 American color revolution? If so Trump needed to win. Obama and the FBI did the groundwork here at home. There is some debate if the first Trump dossier was actually the second one to cover for the Cody Shearer one that was given to Strobe Talbot to give to Christopher Steele. Still it had the same goal as to foster doubt about the legitimacy of 2016 that is currently culminating with the gun toting, fire bombing hissy fit of the children of liberal privilege. Now if those blasted supreme righties would just show up, and the whole thing can go really hot like it did in Ukraine, Libya, Egypt, almost Syria, and any country I might be forgetting. Notice the Trump administration is parroting the left's white supremacist conspiracy. Its all really bad theater, but does anyone really care the crumbing infrastructure and the looming economic collapse when you can instead root for your team. Yes, I am guilty of the later too. Added bonus we already have a twofer of enemies (Russian and China) for yet another elitist war.
Posted by: Old and Grumpy | Sep 25 2020 19:47 utc | 14
I very doubt that it was "Russiagate" who make it difficult for Trump to pursue the policies he had been advocating during his election campaign...In fact, "Russiagate" has long ago been debunked and we have not seen Trump worrying a bit about the average American Joe, most flagrant during this pandemic...I doubt he would had behaved different were the "Russiagate" to have never existed..
Simply, electoral "promises" almost never are fullfilled in the already dating decades neoliberal order, both from the right or the "alleged" liberal left...
On the same grounds, we could affirm then that conspiracy theories about Obama´s birth place made it difficult for Obama to pursue the policies he had been advocating during his election campaign....
That Trump has ties to Russian oligarchs is, to my view, out of doubt for anyone following a bit some writers who use to deeply research their analyses out there like John Helmer.... That these oligarchas had anything to do, in this respect, with the Kremlin, it is doubtful, but highly likely related to business shenanigans amongst them and Trump & Co...related to illegal bribes and money laundering...
What have been largely proved is that Trump and his administration have been using big data management corporations and social networks engineering to manipulate elections and give coups eveywhere ( as the thorough research I posted at the Week in Review leaves in evidence it happened in several countries in Latin America , which leads us to suspect that they would not resist the desire to use the same methods in the US...before...and after the 2016 elections...having Bannon ad chief of campaign and then as chief of staff in 2016 so as that does not add for tranquility, with what legal methods is respected for achieving whatever goal..as the last events have clearly showed...
It was during Trump´s mandate that the war on Yemen continued towards total erradication of Yemenis, especially of Shia belief, by indiscriminate bombing and blockade of essential goods...that Qasem Soleimani was murdered without any justified reason...that NATO started a cheeky build up in Russian borders who remained still free of it...that the US withdrew from most international agreements leaving US/Russia, US/Iran, US/LatinAmerican relations at its lowest levels, by underminig any remaining trust...Trump reinstated and made even harsher sanctions against everybody who was not already a "puppet regime", including Venezuela, Cuba, Argentina, Russia, Iran, China, and, even looping the loop, against puppet governments in the EU...
I very doubt it was Russiagate which kept him from releasing his tax records as requested by governance transparecny, returning the ammounts of money defrauded in the "University Loans" affair, clarifying his ties to Epstein network, stopping sowing hatred and divide amongst US population, build the most world wide network of far-right extremists since post WWII around the world but especially in Europe to undermine what of "democracy" remains left, labeled and declared as "terrorists" any political party abroad who does not go along and oppose his puppet government´s corrupt policies anywhere, lit the Middle East on fire by continuously provoking Iran, Lebanon, Syria, sent his regime envoys to the EU to twist arm so that the European countries dedicate more budget to buy provedly ineffective arms from the US when the money is most needed for socio-economic and health issues in the middle of a pandemic, not to mention the requisition of health supplies´ cargos in the very Chinese tarmac which had been previously ordered and bought by European countries which needed them urgently, criminalized, and tried to label them as second cathegory citizens, a great part of US population of non-white foreign descent through whose hard work and shameful labor conditions US thrived along all these decades, well, you name it, the list would be almost for a book...or two...
To blame all this mess on "Russiagate" is, well, in the best case, underestimating the readership here...
Posted by: H.Schmatz | Sep 25 2020 19:54 utc | 15
Oh please, b: "legal jeopardy", don't make me laugh. It's been four years. The whole political part of Trump's career he's been under the tutelage of mafia consigliere Roy Cohn. Even better known, he's flown on the Lolita Express, and the FBI has a trove of videos etc from Epstein's safe (hmm, what else does the latter have in common with Roy Cohn besides the Trump connection). Bottom line, he's a deeply compromised individual who's concluded long ago, and correctly, that he's in over his head and better off just playing along. He's had no reservations appointing professional Russophobes like Fiona Hill; in fact, which of his appointees has not been a Cold Warrior besides perhaps T-Rex, who was a mere Venezuela hawk because of some old Exxon bad blood, and who was quickly ditched anyway. Even now, his own FBI director spouts RussiaGate red meat, and the Donald is doing squat about it.
What does it all matter to Trump? He doesn't have a good name to clear. He didn't run for president expecting to win, let alone to carry out this or that specific program. This Vale Tudo carnival atmosphere clearly suits him: if his opponents can make baseless accusations, so can he. If they can expect to skate beyond some meaningless fall guys, so can he. To actually uphold the law--it's just not how he rolls.
Had he mostly contented himself with playing president on TV and enjoying the perks of the office, and understood you can't just let a pandemic kill off your own voters, all would've been dandy. But, predictably, his ego got the better of him, and he just had to be the statesman who was finally going to bring China to heel. Again, merely tweeting about it could've been ignored, but by appointing an array of rabid ideologues who went to work on "decoupling", he's sided with a Deep State which will hate him regardless, against Corporate America which went into China to, you know, make money. In this way, he's made himself enemies a Republican can ill afford; combine this with his personal style (or lack of it), and just about nobody has his back any more. So the machine goes about purging this alien body from its system.
Posted by: Ma Laoshi | Sep 25 2020 19:54 utc | 16
when do the American people get to investigate Truman, Ike, John McCain, JFK, Johnson, Bush, Obama, FBI, Trump, 9/11, CIA, invasion of Iraq, wall street, the US Treasury, the military, Afghanistan, Yemen, Syria, Lebanon and the like..?
,==He did it==> he did not do it, <=someone else did it, ==>avoids the basic problem:
America has a government that
a.) conducts wars to protect the economic interest of its favored few.
b.) uses law , to grant feudal lords wealth creating by extracting bits of wealth from Americans.
c.) conducts nearly all its affairs in classified secret..
d.) is un accountable for the money it spends.
e.) is un accountable for the genocides it conducts in foreign lands.
f.) has two crime families which divide and conquer the citizens to control all election outcomes
g.) has given to private bankers, its power to print money, control the economy, and tax the people.
h.) has not adhered to the Bill of Rights or the un amended constitution.
i.) refuses to require private media to speak only the truth.
j.) Refuses to comply with and orto enforce the 1st and 4th amendment<=papers and effects t/b secure
expand this list as you like
and
Americans have
a.) no access to the USA. <= 3 votes, insolation of state or voting district,
out 527 positions don't get it & none for the President
b.) must pay to the USA taxes and have no input as to how such taxes are collected or used,
c.) must register their presence to the USA with id numbers
d.) must obey USA laws which Americans had no say in writing, or passing.
e.) must endure foreign wars and domestic programs that serve no legitimate domestic interest.
expand this list as you like.
Posted by: snake | Sep 25 2020 19:56 utc | 17
This kind of stuff have always happened in the USA.
The question to be made is this: why is this time more damaging to the social fabric of the USA?
Because the US Deep State WANTED to initiate a new McCarthyism
@Posted by: Jackrabbit | Sep 25 2020 17:37 utc | 5
You are onto something there...I do not recall whose US think tank analyse I read about US youth tending ideologically to the left...the same could be said of any youth around the world after they have been left without future prospect and past opportunities to rise through the social ladder by rampant savage neoliberal capitalism...
I said at the time that the Ukrainian experiment of 2014 was a general dressed rehearsal for a future planned authoritarian fascist rule in most of the world, especially the West, once the prospects, already known by the elites, of collapsing capitalism are obvious for the general public and cause the consequent uprising..It is in this context that the pandemic and its sudden impoverishing outcome fits, along with the "orchestrated" violent riots at various locations, to justify martial law...
Notice that "rewritting of history of WWII" in favor of fascism is a feature of any US administration since the fall of the USSR...
Past days I read that Roger Stone, former Trump advisor, if i am not wrong also implied in a corruption case, advised Trump to declare martial law after winning in Novemeber...It is in that context that all the noise we have been hearing all these past months about the riots, militias, coups, and so on fit...What we have not heard about is about hundreds of thousands of evictions, inacabable line ups for food banks, and the total socio-economic disaster more than anything willingly built by TPTB...
Recal that they "built their own reality, and when you are catching up with that reality, they build another one"...
Posted by: H.Schmatz | Sep 25 2020 20:24 utc | 19
Thank you H Schmatz and Ma Laoshi - clarifying material.
Meanwhile India Punchline has swallowed the entire stock of BLUE PILLS!
Posted by: uncle tungsten | Sep 25 2020 20:37 utc | 20
Ma Laoshi @16:
Right on money, man! I can't help but chuckle and recall a quote from Agatha Christie's A Mirror Crack'd: "Yes, you can see her. You seem to-understand her very well." Here, change 'her' to 'him' and you pretty much summed up how Trump stumbling into that house on Penn Ave. and his antics in office since. In pretending to be the stateman to bring China to heel, this gangster of a stateman manifested the loss of diplomatic skill almost for good.
Chances are he stands a good chance of stumbling into the same office again in Nov. Heaven help the US of A in diplomacy for the next four years.
Posted by: Oriental Voice | Sep 25 2020 20:40 utc | 21
Old and Grumpy @14: "What if the goal of 2016 election was to set up the 2020 American color revolution?"
But to what end? If you can control the outcome of the election sufficiently to pick the winner, then what point does a color revolution serve? You put a candidate in office just so that you can then remove him with a coup? This just injects tremendous expense and uncertainty into the management of the empire.
I realize that there are some who are deeply invested in the notion that the establishment wanted a Trump win, despite all of the opposition from them that Trump ended up facing, but it makes no sense. PNAC, the former roadmap for the empire, is now all but dead and the establishment is grudgingly falling in line behind the hail-mary play of a "Great Reset". Most of the empire's proxies in Syria have been wiped out, the US influence in Libya is likewise mostly gone, and Myanmar is slipping away. Venezuela is still holding their own against the empire. The "Pivot to Asia" is spinning in place and going nowhere fast, and Russia and China are diplomatically outmaneuvering the US before the eyes of the rest of the world. This is definitely not where the elites wanted things to end up four years after 2016.
The efforts to foster a color revolution in the US are just signs of panicked desperation. It is not what they were aiming for in 2016.
Posted by: William Gruff | Sep 25 2020 20:46 utc | 22
I know he is the United States Attorney General, but who is William Barr and what is his agenda?
Posted by: Hal Duell | Sep 25 2020 20:46 utc | 23
Posted by: Hal Duell | Sep 25 2020 20:46 utc | 23
William Barr's role? Um. Just fancy a lifelong crime scene cleaner for Empire Inc.
Posted by: v | Sep 25 2020 20:53 utc | 24
Yes, karlof1, ukraine and Syria are connected. Good point.
Posted by: Profk | Sep 25 2020 20:53 utc | 25
In reply to vk | Sep 25 2020 19:59 utc |18
Assuming your question is rhetorical, no it isn't. My question is whether or not the FISA court is culpable in this event. While we repeat the mantra that the FBI didn't inform the court about the dubious source, it is apparent to me the court failed in proper diligence. The scheme smells of rotten fish and there's an attempt to deflect attention from the real problem which centers on a corrupt 'secret society' of jurists. The right waves its hands in our faces while the left plunges the knives in our backs. Who are Donald Trump's handlers?
Posted by: Curmudgeon | Sep 25 2020 21:29 utc | 26
@NemesisCalling 11
"recent BLM and urban riots are entirely funded and sewn by Democratic-party alligned elite."
Prove it. Perhaps you're confusing the DNC BLM national organization withe the autonomous BLM actions in the streets. Two very different animals.
Your problem is that you still think the two parties are separate entities. There is only one party in this country, the Property Party, and it has two right wings, the Democrats and the Republicans.
"At some point it becomes imperative for you to think about that and wonder if DJT really is the only one standing btw the people and utter tyranny."
Only morons wonder about such things. No one here wants to read your delusional Qanon/MAGA bullshit.
Posted by: anonymous | Sep 25 2020 21:51 utc | 27
All these stupid games and crazy foreign policy decisions demolish US credibility world wide:
US credibility and image won't be coming back anytime soon, regardless who wins the elections.
There is a killer question for Trump supporters: what is it you like about Trump?
Posted by: Paul | Sep 25 2020 22:27 utc | 28
I'm in semi-agreement with the rabbit @5:
Well, it was NOT an "anti-Trump campaign". It was an anti-Russia campaign flavored with "Trump is a populist!" sweetener.
That's as far as I'll go. With all the "McCarthyite" laws already on the books, a new ideological battle isn't needed.
IMO, as I wrote @12, the diversion of focus from controlling Russia to aiding the expansion of Occupied Palestine using the 911 diversion and evidence destruction as discussed on open thread seems to have angered a significant Deep State faction. Thus a short review is required:
2001--The Russia-China Friendship and Cooperation Treaty was inked and became the foundation upgraded many times into what is now a symbiotic strategic partnership.
2007--Putin's Munich Security Conference Speech where he clearly channels FDR, a man whose principles and morals remain anathema to the current Deep State. I highly suggest rereading Putin's searing critique that was a complete rebuke of the Deep State and its Empire.
2008--NATO goads Georgia to attack Russian peacekeepers just as the 2008 Olympics were beginning in China with Russia decimating Georgia's military.
2011--NATO wantonly rapes and loots Libya in a manner that awakens and motivates Putin and China.
2013--Putin & Lavrov con Obama & Kerry, avert direct war on Syria, forcing Obama to deploy Daesh and directly supply a multitude of terrorists, thus further proving the Deep States fascist credentials.
2014--Ukraine coup results in Crimea going Russian and Donbas defeating NATO-backed Ukrainian Neonazis followed by humiliation of Minsk Accords.
2015--Russia intervenes in support of Syrian government and deploys novel method to avoid civilian deaths in terrorist held urban areas. Greatly eradicates Daesh.
2019--Putin declares Liberalism dead at end of interview with Financial Times.
2020--UNGA speeches of Xi & Putin portray vivid gulf between the world and Trump's Outlaw US Empire.
That doesn't cover every item, just what I see as the major and most irksome. Except initially in Libya, Putin and Russia--often with China in the background--have foiled the designs of the Outlaw US Empire's Deep State and enraged them. And since the Deep State very much reacts and operates as a Mafia gang, they feel the need to hit back at Putin/Russia in some manner to satisfy their bully-egos, and thus their bull in china shop behavior.
Posted by: Hal Duell | Sep 25 2020 20:46 utc | 23
My guess is that he sees himself as a man of the law, and really believes in the stuff he's pushing.
Posted by: pym | Sep 25 2020 22:43 utc | 30
"..The claim that of course it would make no sense for Putin et al. to favor Trump because Clinton was a "known quantity" is shameless nonsense." @1
This is mere assertion, which your arguments fail to justify.
b's point in correct. Anyone who understands Russian diplomacy, which is careful, conservative and measured realised that, as a known quantity and as the odds on favourite to win, Clinton was the candidate that the Kremlin expected to have to deal with and were prepared for. The idea that Russia feared Clinton's windy attitude of hostility is nonsense. It is what they expect and they know how to profit from it: talk is cheap and talk from a Clinton is particularly so.
The point about "Russiagate" is that it never had anything to do with Russia at all, it was just an attempt to tap into the ancient slavophobia, combined with anti-communism, in US culture. Trump, being a Republican, taps into the even more virulent strain of sinophobia. In both cases the victims are Americans distracted from understanding what is actually going on in a world in which the countdown to US irrelevance is well advanced.
As to 'Jackrabbit's' silly conspiracy theories, they too are as American as racism and paranoia.
Posted by: bevin | Sep 25 2020 23:08 utc | 31
bevin @31--
IMO, the anticipation of Clinton winning is correct such that they also likely determined that the current state of Russophobia would continue and likely be escalated as Obama did during 2016. IMO, it's possible Russian diplomacy was more surprised by Trump's continuation through his choice of Tillerson as SoS. You're correct that the entire exercise serves as an obfuscation. For example, very few people in the West would know of all the items listed on my timeline, even the most recent that took place 3+ days ago.
Posted by: Ma Laoshi | Sep 25 2020 19:54 utc | 16 He didn't run for president expecting to win, let alone to carry out this or that specific program...Had he mostly contented himself with playing president on TV and enjoying the perks of the office, and understood you can't just let a pandemic kill off your own voters, all would've been dandy.
Absolutely correct. I've said since Trump started his campaign that the only reasons he ran in the first place were 1) ego and narcissism, and 2) he knows he will get billions of dollars of business opportunities once he leaves office due to the cachet of doing deals with an ex-President.
He has no program, never did and never will. Anyone who thinks this guy can even put two words together to make a sentence is delusional. Read some of his Cabinet meeting transcripts - they're just rants and bumbling around. "Playing President on TV" (and Twitter) is indeed all he can do - and that unbelievably badly compared with just about any US President in history. Even George Dubya was more Presidential than this moron and he couldn't even pronounce "nuclear" properly.
Trump's primary value is he unwittingly holds up the stupidity of the US electorate and the corruption of the US government to the world in a picture that cannot be denied any more even by US "allies". It's over. Stick a fork in it. The US is done. The existence of Trump as President merely confirms it.
Posted by: Richard Steven Hack | Sep 25 2020 23:33 utc | 33
bevin@31 wrote "b's point in correct. Anyone who understands Russian diplomacy, which is careful, conservative and measured realised that, as a known quantity and as the odds on favourite to win, Clinton was the candidate that the Kremlin expected to have to deal with and were prepared for. The idea that Russia feared Clinton's windy attitude of hostility is nonsense. It is what they expect and they know how to profit from it: talk is cheap and talk from a Clinton is particularly so."
Clinton wasn't the main perpetrator of Libya by a long shot. But her part proved there was a lot more than wind to her. The Russians are still trapped in Syria with no endgame still in sight and that's with the pacifist Trump at the helm. The airy dismissal of the notion Clinton was less of a threat than unpredictability is the best example of a mere assertion unsupported by argument. One of my arguments is the video of Qaddafi's murder. The off-hand assumption that Clinton is a mere crook and pompous blowhard comes from years of Republican demonization, not common sense. (As well as making one wonder what you see when looking at Trump.) The Russians would have been stupid to dismiss Clinton. The notion they would have been smart enough to make bank on Clinton is mere assertion, which you have no arguments to justify.
I never saw Clinton as a sure thing, dreading a repeat of 2000 for months before the election. You are no doubt certain I'm stupid. But even if you decide I must be making this up, then the brilliant Russians who can handle a mere woman, surely noticed it too. Which means they very well could have decided that Trump was a person to take seriously...and smell an opportunity. What it does not mean it, is that a woman who strenuously carried water for ISIS gun runners, even after the Deep State hung her out to dry, was a good bet, because...predictable? The brilliant Russians surely know US foreign policy is remarkably constant despite the vagaries of individual presidents and partisan politics. And therefore any alleged benefits to "predictable" fool Clinton, as opposed to the dangers posed by the stable genius Trump, are purely imaginary, products of obsessive Clinton hate/Trump adulation. The claim the Russians favored Clinton simultaneously assumes they are stupid and brilliant, a sure sign it is incoherent nonsense. Every reason for the Russians to be able to "handle" Clinton, applies to Trump, except Trump would be more likely to be incompetent, because he would basically continue policy, which rarely ever changes. You are saying, a coach would prefer to play a practiced team that will use good strategy to playing a new team that might do random crap because they've prepped for the good team! Seriously, dude, b is wrong.
Even worse, the notion slavophobia in the US is ancient is simply incompetent. It's not even clear it's a thing at all. US/Russian relations have historically been quite good, as the ghost of John Quincy Adams can attest. The Russians were much friendlier in the US Civil War than England and France. Anglophobia is far more ancient in US culture...as if popular attitudes determine US foreign policy in the first place.
As to the notion there is no real policy dispute over Russian foreign policy, that it's all theater, that's every bit as crazy as some of the theories. Even worse, it is a main principle of jackrabbit's theories. If his theories are silly, so are yours. There is a genuine fight over who to attack first, Russia or China. It's only crazy Deep State theories that imagine it's just the Deep State versus the populist superman.
Lastly of course, it is precisely the "countdown to irrelevance" that makes a Clinton so much less predictable than your condescension acknowledges. Resorting to force to shore up a failing position is ultimately madness. It's why only a fool would assume Clinton's hostility was meaningless bluster, precisely because of the long term weakening of the US. And that is why the notion the Russians would favor Clinton was in fact nonsense.
Posted by: steven t johnson | Sep 26 2020 0:12 utc | 34
steven T Johnson, what about the immediate assault upon Trump as he scrambled to form his government by the Democrats do you see as an orderly transition after the election on the part of the Democratic Party? They attacked Trump before he was even able to change his inaugural shoes. And yet the compromised press has the nerve to ask Trump, after four years of this, to say yes, he will support their leadership should they win? I think Trump has shown enormous strength of character in his responses to that insulting question. Whatever it was he could have accomplished with their support went by the wayside, and they are saying they are going to keep it up, even a second charade of an impeachment on offer!!
Just on the strength of fairness, even not knowing all that b is revealing and in some part restating here, Trump deserves a quiet four years in which to craft a decent legacy. Admittedly, the first four have been a dismal failure - but a good presidential term requires some element of protocol and decency from the opposition, and he hasn't had that! I don't remember any other president who has faced the sheer malignancy that has been shown towards him all this time, and yes, we saw him fail, and I even doubted his sanity at one point, but he found safety in sticking to the persona he had developed over the years, and he has credible support from serious quarters even though his tactics have been to keep everyone guessing.
How would it be if the pressure was off and he was free to make of a second term a better account? I don't know; I only know the people are sick and tired of the manipulations that have consumed Congress, which said manipulations are not the norm, not even what Jimmy Carter faced, in my opinion, though I do feel his chance of a second term better than the first were knowingly wrecked in the same way. Perhaps this is payback, but above all it is not fair to the American people; they have not been governed as their history ought to demand. And that is not entirely Trump's fault.
Posted by: juliania | Sep 26 2020 0:21 utc | 35
Russiagate has shown some of those in high position in Washington DC are the most corrupt, dishonest, despicable, and psychopathic bastards upon this earth.
Posted by: Dick | Sep 26 2020 0:22 utc | 36
‘I Feel Sorry for Americans’: A Baffled World Watches the U.S.
Judging by this article - and much of the comments there - it seems like it's not that the Democrats disagree with Trumps policies, but that he's vulgar.
In their minds, they think electing a Democrat (in this case, Biden) will restore the strength and prestige of the American Empire (many commenters there got out of the closet and admit the USA is an empire).
@Richard Steven Hack:
We get it: You absolutely loath anything pertaining to Trump - even going so far as to compare him to another complete ignoramus former POTUS: GWB.
But...in actuality, GWB was really only a cosmetic Presidential 'front' for the little-dick Cheney administration. At least Trump, in all his bottomless ineptitude, completely f*cks stuff up directly...whereas Bush didn't even have the "nuclar" wherewithal to actually attempt to govern himself
- hence his recent successful 'rehabilitation' as being "not as bad as Trump".
And keep up your "stupidity of the US electorate" harangue .. as if the US political apparatus might actually function properly if not for the mouth breathing heathens that voted for Trump in 2016 - many of which also voted for Obama (twice).
I think that maybe you aren't taking into account that the increasing majority "of the US electorate" that don't, or won't participate in these commercially produced erectoral charades - but in reality, making them somewhat less "stupid" in result.
Posted by: time2wakeup | Sep 26 2020 0:32 utc | 38
Statement by President of Russia Vladimir Putin on a comprehensive program of measures for restoring the Russia – US cooperation in the filed of international information security
September 25, 2020
One of today’s major strategic challenges is the risk of a large-scale confrontation in the digital field. A special responsibility for its prevention lies on the key players in the field of ensuring international information security (IIS). In this regard, we would like to once again address the US with a suggestion to agree on a comprehensive program of practical measures to reboot our relations in the field of security in the use of information and communication technologies (ICTs).
First. To restore a regular full-scale bilateral interagency high-level dialogue on the key issues of ensuring IIS.
Second. To maintain a continuous and effective functioning of the communication channels between competent agencies of our States through Nuclear Risk Reduction Centers, Computer Emergency Readiness Teams and high-level officials in charge of the issues of IIS within the bodies involved in ensuring national security, includig that of information.
Third. To jointly develop and conclude a bilateral intergovernmental agreement on preventing incidents in the information space similarly to the Soviet-American Agreement on the Prevention of Incidents On and Over the High Seas in force since 25 May 1972.
Fourth. To exchange, in a mutually acceptable format, guarantees of non-intervention into internal affairs of each other, including into electoral processes, inter alia, by means of the ICTs and high-tech methods.
We call on the US to greenlight the Russian-American professional expert dialogue on IIS without making it a hostage to our political disagreements.
These measures are aimed at building up trust between our States, promoting security and prosperity of our peoples. They will significantly contribute to ensuring global peace in the information space. Addressing all countries, including the US, we suggest reaching global agreement on a political commitment of States on no-first-strike with the use of ICTs against each other.
http://en.kremlin.ru/events/president/news/64086
Posted by: Mao | Sep 26 2020 0:35 utc | 39
Putin Asked Trump For A Mutual Ban On Election Interference. The White House Said Russia Should Stop Its Ongoing Meddling First.
“A good starting point for discussion would be Russia discontinuing its ongoing meddling with the US election,” a senior Trump administration official told BuzzFeed News.
Posted by: Mao | Sep 26 2020 0:37 utc | 40
vk
hehe, the whining of intellectually malnourished... they can't see themselves as anything other than victims, and look what they post as a potential candidate. Can they be serious?
Posted by: Curmudgeon | Sep 26 2020 0:38 utc | 41
karlof@29
great summary, i'm looking forward to your book, sure to be a must read.
Posted by: emersonreturn | Sep 26 2020 0:39 utc | 42
@31 bevin
Don't see how you can conflate sinophobia with Russophobia in the U.S. or claim they are interchangeable and "natural."
As Stevn T. puts it above, Russophobia, or what is currently infecting people of the Democratic persuasion in its current iteration, is akin to the phantom limb phenomenon. We used to use the Red-commie boogeyman to great effect in the U.S. in the MIC. But this tool was rendered obsolete when the Berlin Wall came down. Two decades and change later, the elites realized that the sensation of this old psychological boogeyman could be ressurected and harnessed for use on the dullards who still trust their government (read: Democrats and zionist-rethugz). We can feel the familiar sensation of the limb, but it isn't there anymore really.
The current mistrust of the Chinese stems from actual and factual grievances that comes from resentment that they are able to outcompete unfairly the American worker and that they have wooed our two-timing husbands (Big Biz/corp./CEO) away and left us smoking cigarettes around the kitchen table, staring at the clock well into the early morning hours.
We have no right to be angry with Russia. Totally different story with the Chinese and our business leaders/political class.
We want our fucking husbands back from those whores, the Chinese and the like. We want to make this marriage work...for the kids...our future.
Posted by: NemesisCalling | Sep 26 2020 1:06 utc | 43
William Gruff @ 22, I agree. And it all fell apart visibly in the Rose Garden when Obama showed his barely contained anger that the Brit Parliament had foiled the push that was to be his legacy, the push against Syria. That was when they just might have succeeded - we barely knew what was going on. Russia stepped in then, maybe Iran as well -( Lavrov and Zarif are old friends, covid be damned!) Assad isn't Saddam, but history rhymes for those who would manipulate it. Chemical warfare by Assad on his own people? Where had we heard that one before? Oh yes, Iraq. Iraq?
Twenty years isn't a long time. Twenty terrible years. It hasn't been fun, any of it.
Posted by: juliania | Sep 26 2020 1:09 utc | 44
Anonymous @27
Thank you for your comments on the Antifa and BLM Protests
I have spent a number of nights on the streets as a legal observer and these kids are not being paid by anyone! As matter of fact I tend to be super suspicious having worked in the political and environmental world and watched the complete sell out of both. These kids are incredibly in that they clearly understand how corrupt our country is. Honestly coming from Black and native Americans how could they not? American history is built on stealing land and using biological warfare to kill off native people. Steal Africans from their home lands and use them to create wealth for a few. Along the way they raped the women and then took their kids at the age of 7 to 12 and sold them. It certainly didn’t end there, as they started police forces to track free slave and arrest them on trumped up charges and made them into indentured servants. This practice is on going today in the private prison complex. Kamala knows something about free prison labor. These kids get this but they also get that we are doing this same behavior all over the world! I cannot say this about any of the climate protests I have been to! The United States Military being the largest emitter of carbon in the world is NEVER mentioned. Yet these kids have made it part of their talking point along with capitalist and oligarchs who love to steal anything from anyone. Trump and biden are no exception. They stood outside Bezo’s home with a gelatin for a reason, it was not soros.
Posted by: Susan | Sep 26 2020 1:21 utc | 45
the den of vipers brooding here at the bar, spouting off about white-supremacists and other fictions designed to obfuscate the clear and present danger to our duly-elected POTUS and to render his supporters as racist fascists.
Good gravey, one could say that about the Marxists here. Ban then first and execute them second?
Trump sounds much like Ronald Ray Gun in the '60's. All this is just one set of party hucksters fighting the other with some flavored internal battles amidst the hucksters in their prospective parties.
The three letter boys failed to to their job? They covered stuff up? They lied? What a surprise.
The question one must ask themselves is did this happen to the Bush's? The Obama's? Bill and Hillary were assaulted by the state a few times but they held on. Ronny Ray Gun has his Iran contra crack deal but he was the fall guy for Bush.
In the old days they would just give you an multiple inter cranial lead vaccination and be done with you.
Posted by: circumspect | Sep 26 2020 1:57 utc | 46
to even say that ANTIFA And BLM are paied by Soror or whatever is just another right wing lie. Since everything in the world (and especially in USA) is right now upside down, right is wrong, left is right, up and down and the lies are truth, most of people are so dumb, they just regurgitate the talking points of how Liberals are Marxists and how the biggest problems in USA right now are the silly LGBd and the unions and the Liberals, instead of zeroing on their real problems of the Military industrial complex and Corporations working hand in hand with the government to rob them blind. I never thought Americans to be very smart people in general but the level of self delusion is simply staggering and scary. Americans really deserve all the wonderful things that are about to happen to them. Hopefully they wont drag the whole world down with them as they go down.
Posted by: Hoyeru | Sep 26 2020 2:29 utc | 47
I highly doubt that the Barr/ Durham investigation will put anyone in jail. Clinesmith was giving a slap on the wrist when he should have been tried and put in jail. We keep hearing about Durham’s investigation but nothing is forth coming and might never be. If Biden wins the investigation will be over and the high crimes of O’bumer and his cronies gone for good. Both Democrat and Republican should have been up in arms over an attempted Putsch in American. The U.S. talks about what is wrong in other countries but fail to see our crimes. And worst don’t care….
Posted by: Dennis18 | Sep 26 2020 2:50 utc | 48
@Jackrabbit (5) nailed it. Russiagate is primarily anti-Russia, not anti-Trump. Getting people to believe it’s all about the deep state vs. Donald Trump is part of that particular psyop.
Even the Democrat’s anti-Trump hysteria is largely theater for the benefit of liberal plebs. They scream, shout and moan about the evil Orange Dude but watch their actions (not just their words) and you will see that they pretty much accept everything the Trump administration tries to push through congress. From astronomical military spending increases to his border stuff to massive tax cuts and “bail outs” for the oligarchs. Keep your eyes on the ball, not the shrieking from the sidelines.
Posted by: Daniel | Sep 26 2020 3:04 utc | 49
@ juliania # 44
Obama showed his barely contained anger that the Brit Parliament had foiled the push that was to be his legacy, the push against Syria.
Yes, he had H. Clinton working full time on Syria, coming up with a shadow government and a military force based in Turkey. My favorite prospective Syria PM (of Hillary) from that era was a guy from Texas. Ghassan Hitto was "elected" prime minister on 18 March 2013 by a narrow margin over former Syrian Arab Republic agricultural minister Assad Mustafa. Hitto resigned on 8 July 2013. A Texas-based businessman [Murphy, TX] Hitto had lived in the US for over 30 years. Syria was a big failure for Obama.
Obama had a previous "legacy" move in Afghanistan. Obama had been told soon after he took office that the Taliban was supported by next-door Pakistan. In spite of that, Obama sent 70,000 troops to Afghanistan to augment the 30,000 already there, and sent lots of money to...Pakistan! Stupid Obama gets no (negative) credit for this 'legacy' move either.
Let's not forget Ukraine where a US-led coup would result in Ukraine coming under the US umbrella, and with it Russia's only warm-water naval base in Crimea. Russia foiled that! Damned Russia, killed another Obama legacy.
Posted by: Don Bacon | Sep 26 2020 3:30 utc | 50
First of all this article is a Russian steak dinner for all simple-minded Trump bootlickers like NemesisCalling, William Gruff, Hoarsewhisperer and others. For others like myself, it is propaganda meant to drive the U.S. Titanic mass towards the Trump iceberg.
If I didn't know better, I would think Trump had a Russian chip implanted in his brain that hijacked the USS Titanic's controls.
However, I do know better and I think I can agree with Rabbit that Trump is the chosen Strongman to usher in an era of McCarthyism to crush all democratic socialist dissent and efforts to bring down the fascist capitalist system that has enslaved the lower classes, and he is also the Chosen one that will Make Israel Great Again and In Zionism We Trust the new standard for the U.S.A.
This is why he said he can shoot someone on 5th Avenue and get away with it. He f*cked up in a pandemic and 200,000 are dead, but he knows that those who rule got his back.
Posted by: Circe | Sep 26 2020 3:58 utc | 51
I see two goals in the russiagate affair:
1. Feed the blue / red antagonism
2. Secure support for anti-Russia projects
The first goal is very successful. Beyond the obvious divide and rule strategy, it also offers great opportunities to get people fighting for things that are very much against their interests. One example is support for Russia bashing.
Looking back at 2003, many Americans were opposed to the war on Iraq. This opposition was essentially driven by their strong anti-Bush sentiment, but it was an opposition to the war effort nonetheless.
Today there is little opposition to the anti-russia campaign. Many people which could have been wary of the growing war fever in other circumstances are now fully onboard that train simple because it is an opportunity to beat on the one they just hate so much.
The beauty of the system is that blue haters aren't by any means driven anywhere close to supporting Russia, let alone opposing any Russia-bashing. They essentially shrug off the whole affair and concentrate on that other important project : China bashing. Also note that most Trump haters are not the least bit opposed to China bashing.
Posted by: robin | Sep 26 2020 5:38 utc | 52
@ robin | Sep 26 2020 5:38 utc | 51 who wrote
"
Today there is little opposition to the anti-russia campaign. Many people which could have been wary of the growing war fever in other circumstances are now fully onboard that train simple because it is an opportunity to beat on the one they just hate so much.
"
I assume "the one they just hate so much" is Trump, correct?
I disagree with those that think Trump is some friend or a tool of Putin which is what your statement seems to assume. I think the connection between Trump and Putin is/was manufactured to support the Russiagate meme.
China bashing is getting interesting as I read somewhere that some few thousand US manufactures were suing "trump" for China sanctions....I posed a comment a month or so ago linking to a Xinhuanet posting about how Honeywell has 40 or so manufacturing sites in China so slamming the doors of trade is just not going to be smooth, if possible at all....and not soon with lots of exceptions.
Posted by: psychohistorian | Sep 26 2020 6:02 utc | 53
After the Russiagate attack on US president Donald Trump, those researching JFK's assassination should now focus on possible FBI assistance to CIA elements as the perps.
Edgar J.Hoover was was a true Godfather, in Mafia style.
Posted by: Antonym | Sep 26 2020 6:02 utc | 54
Posted by: bevin | Sep 25 2020 23:08 utc | 31 -- "In both cases the victims are Americans distracted from understanding what is actually going on in a world.... the countdown to US irrelevance is well advanced."
While the elites fight each other to hog the trough, the true victims are Main Streeters, distracted by swill such as the world hating them because they are so exceptionally free and democratic.
But then, just as the average deplorable Roman far away from the corridors of power could not have known that their Empire was slipping away, Main Street America today can hardly see that the US is swirling downwards into that toilet bowl given that their media delivers them their two minutes of hate every single day.
Posted by: kiwiklown | Sep 26 2020 6:05 utc | 55
Posted by: NemesisCalling | Sep 26 2020 1:06 utc | 43 -- "We have no right to be angry with Russia. Totally different story with the Chinese and our business leaders/political class."
You have NO right to be angry with Russia, China, Syria, Iran, Venezuela, or any other nation governing their people their own way.
If your nation is so exceptional, so indispensable, so free, so democratic, so great, then nations will be drawn to you, and you do not have to hand out cookies to organise colour revolutions.
Then other nations will emulate you, ask to be tutored, ask for your assistance, and you will eat off the work of your hands, not off the spoils of thieving warfare.
Posted by: kiwiklown | Sep 26 2020 6:25 utc | 56
Very good article. I don't think it was written by b.
Posted by: Norwegian | Sep 26 2020 6:32 utc | 57
I think we should dispense with the "Obama" vs Trump" description and just say the "interests" behind each party ... One should go and read the Peter Beter letter series to get an idea ... you'll realize that "the more things change" the more they "stay the same" ..
Posted by: Maximus | Sep 26 2020 6:58 utc | 58
Posted by: karlof1 | Sep 25 2020 22:28 utc | 29
2011--NATO wantonly rapes and loots Libya in a manner that awakens and motivates Putin and China.This with full support and participation of the Norwegian government, lead by PM Jens Stoltenberg. Opposition against Israel in his labour party in 2011 is immediately followed by a massacre of 67 labour party youth politicians at the Utøya summer camp 22. July 2011 where former WHO director and former PM Gro Harlem Brundtland and Stoltenberg showed their faces just a couple of days before. Stoltenberg immediately promised "more democracy" in a public speech. Fast forward to 2014 and Stoltenberg is appointed to the position of NATO General Secretary.
Posted by: Norwegian | Sep 26 2020 7:17 utc | 59
A thread full of posters each clutching a couple of pieces of a huge jigsaw puzzle trying to discern "what is really happening". Most people's jigsaw parts have become warped, distorted by too many years of trying to force their own particular 'heart of the matter' into any spot they can find.
I cannot work out why they bother, if the puzzle ever were completed it would show a picture of massive & unending chaos driven by loosely connected hubs of greedy self-interest. There is no one in charge of the machine humanity has constructed, it is chaotic, random and killing us all.
There is only one way to end the damage and that is for people around the world to start over by setting up entities in their community that feed, house & care for the community independent of the flailing antics of the greedies & ninnies who still believe this mess will deliver for them.
As more and more communities separate themselves from the craziness of capitalism, the machinery becomes more irrelevant.
If you live somewhere that no longer has the ability to feed, house & care for you independent of this machine, hard luck has got you, you must choose to either fight for the means to create those three essentials or stay with the chaos and be crushed by it.
OTH from where I sit the one good thing about covid is that it has greatly reduced the numbers of rats deserting the sinking ship of the global north, in order to flee south and fuck it up down here as much as they have up north.
Posted by: Debsisdead | Sep 26 2020 8:34 utc | 60
@ Posted by: NemesisCalling | Sep 26 2020 1:06 utc | 43
The current mistrust of the Chinese stems from actual and factual grievances that comes from resentment that they are able to outcompete unfairly the American worker and that they have wooed our two-timing husbands (Big Biz/corp./CEO) away and left us smoking cigarettes around the kitchen table, staring at the clock well into the early morning hours.
USA's per capita income is one of the highest of the world (more than USD 50,000). It's by far the largest income per capita between the significant countries, behind only very small countries like UAE, Qatar, Luxembourg, Switzerland etc. If they want to blame China for being poorer, they'll have to blame a lot more countries, too.
By the way, calling poverty in the rest of the world "unfair competition" is not a Trumpian innovation. When Bill Clinton was negotiating the expansion of NAFTA to the rest of Latin America (formation of the ALCA), one of the main elements of discord between the USA and the rest of the American nations was precisely the "social dumping" issue, i.e. that the very low wages of the Latin American countries would siphon industrial and agricultural jobs off the USA to Latin America. Bill Clinton wanted to compensate for that "disequilibrium" by hiking up tariffs on Latin American commodities. His successor's (George W. Bush) decision to hike tariff on Brazilian steel and aluminium by some 30%-40% (!!) finally killed ALCA in 2000-2001.
History showed this was a huge blunder by the Americans.
To begin with, the end of Bill Clinton's reign marked the beginning of the collapse of neoliberalism in Latin America. Hugo Chávez was elected in 1999, and would be followed by Lula in Brazil (2002), Kirchner in Argentina (2003) and Morales in Bolivia ("pink wave", i.e. social-democrat wave). Commodity prices rose either way, in a cyclical spike that lasted from 2002-2008, propping up these "pink" regimes and burying even more any hopes of ALCA ever coming back. If it wasn't enough, the USA continued to deindustrialize. It continued to do so for one very simple reason: it issues the universal fiat currency (USD), therefore it is immune to high inflation due to money printing. In this situation, the only escape valve for capitalism is to export industry (deindustrialization). Bill Clinton's surplus - fruit of the partition of the ex-USSR lebensraum - quickly vanished during George W. Bush (a process accelerated by the invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan), further demolished by the 2008 financial meltdown. It became a gargantuan deficit - of which the Americans never recovered.
The USA is trying to fix their geopolitical error in Latin America. They're regime changing the democratically elected pink heads-of-state and impose the liquidation of these countries' wealth and infrastructure to American corporations. However, this is not enough to cover their debt. Debt is important because it increases the profit margins capital needs to have in order to initiate a new wave of investments and technological revolutions. The only way capitalism has of writing off debt without incurring in its own collapse is through non-MAD war. The USA ultimately has to declare war - and win, with minimum damage to its own territory and other possessions - against China. They must invade, massacre and carve up China so they can find new lebensraum without which capitalism can't survive. That's why the USA hasn't given up annihilating China even though it is still taking care of Latin America - which, by all intents and purposes, already is bust open to ransacking by American capital.
After all that’s happened, it’s difficult to believe that many thinking for themselves Americans will be able to vote in the upcoming elections. I know that the percentage of people who vote is generally poor, but considering, Trump’s ridiculous historical record, russigate, Sanders, Harris, Biden, the pandemic, etc and so on ad nauseam, there’s nothing left to vote on. Where’s even circe to push Biden on us? An absurdity. It’s all completely fabricated at this stage of american “democracy.” Pick your poison, that’s it.
Posted by: Geoff | Sep 26 2020 12:41 utc | 62
Posted by: time2wakeup | Sep 26 2020 0:32 utc | 38 as if the US political apparatus might actually function properly if not for the mouth breathing heathens that voted for Trump in 2016 - many of which also voted for Obama (twice).
Which only goes to prove my point. Apparently you think Obama was "functioning properly". That's a laugh. And the "political apparatus" isn't going to "function properly" because it never has in human history and can't because it's not intended to.
"I think that maybe you aren't taking into account that the increasing majority "of the US electorate" that don't, or won't participate in these commercially produced erectoral charades - but in reality, making them somewhat less "stupid" in result."
Wrong. An increasing number may not vote or may vote for some useless "third party" that hasn't a snowball's chance of winning - but just recognizing that your vote is worthless in terms of actually changing the country isn't actually rocket science. According to Wikipedia, the highest voter turnout in US history was 1876. Since then, with the exception a few years where it got up to 70% or so, it's mostly been between 49% and 61%. So in the last five elections there has been no significant decline or increase.
Posted by: Richard Steven Hack | Sep 26 2020 12:43 utc | 63
This may cost Trump his reelection:
Thousands of US firms sue Trump administration over anti-China tariffs
Trump's a pro-business POTUS. That's his reason of existence. He only survived his first mandate because of his multi-billionaire corporate tax cuts - his very first act as president.
If he loses support of the capitalist class, he'll be discarded as quickly as a used condom.
juliania@35 asks about the shocking speed of the political assault on Trump. Being old, I remember exactly the same thing happening to Jimmy Carter, who by DC terms really was an outsider. (Rich people are owners and thus never true outsiders.) Within days Bill Clinton was targeted with a ginned upon campaign about gays in the military, in which a known womanizer was queerbaited (!) for a fictional policy. The hatred for Hilary that drives so many commenters then began then, not in Libya/Syria.
I would add that Trump has always been a crook but the mass media that supposedly hates him has never tried to truly publicize this, especially not during a campaign. Trump doesn't invest in his own campaign because he knows he has nothing to fear from justice. Fox News continues to get rich people's money for advertising, as they invest in building a crazed right wing constituency (and other outlets, including in their own way Facebook.)
Posted by: steven t johnson | Sep 26 2020 12:55 utc | 65
@Richard Steven Hack | Sep 25 2020 23:33 utc | 33
It's over. Stick a fork in it. The US is done. The existence of Trump as President merely confirms it.Hi, and thanks for this clear statement!
Do You have suggestions how to proceed further?
According to my - a foreigner's - estimation it is a waste of time to discuss journalism in the U.S. or parties in the U.S. or their candidates or all these conspiracies of the past.
What matters only, in my opinion, are the actual conspiracies and their intentions (be aware!).
And, of course, proposals for a better option.No alternatives in sight?
What about preparing (a) new Constitutional Convention(s)?
Gerhard
Posted by: Gerhard | Sep 26 2020 13:03 utc | 66
Why isn't Obama tried as a war criminal into the ICC yet?
Oh wait, he's black and that's all ever matters to the useless cowardly American libs.
Posted by: J W | Sep 26 2020 13:36 utc | 67
Sorry to be the one breaking the bad news to all you "smartest guys in the room," we deplorables will never drop our support for the Donald. There are millions upon millions of us who will never change our opinion of the president, despite all the lies from the media and social networks- and yes, from the traitors left over from the Obama days.
Y
Posted by: morongobill | Sep 26 2020 13:41 utc | 68
Holy smokes! I don't believe it! I fully agree with half of what NemesisCalling @43 posts, and maybe a little more, with some conditions and reservations.
Russophobia in the American public as "phantom limb syndrome" is a brilliant metaphor. That the "limb" of the "Soviet threat to Freedum©, apple pie, and mom!" was never more than a phantom to begin with doesn't dilute the very real sensation of danger that the establishment and its entirely compliant mass media was able implant in the minds of the American public. The power of that manufactured "reality" of there being "Reds under your beds!" was such that more than half a century later, and decades after anything in the real world that could possibly be that imaginary threat is gone, that phantom threat still persists in the public consciousness.
This tells us two things: First is that the obvious brainwashing of the American public that went on in the middle of the last century still works and worse, it is still going on. (Hint: today's brainwashing will seem as obvious to people of 2070 looking back on this period as the McCarthy era brainwashing does to us today... the brainwashing is tuned to the perceptions of the period, and perceptions change, throwing yesteryear's brainwashing into relief).
The second thing this tells us is, from my perspective anyway, just as important: Russia is no longer communist, but the phantom threat from America's past can still be applied to it. This tells us that the American public never really feared real socialism. The terrifying danger planted in the public consciousness never had anything to do with socialism at all, at least for Joe Sixpack. While socialism is certainly what prompted the establishment and capitalist mass media to manufacture the illusory danger, socialism itself has never been part of that danger for the public. The American public has never been afraid of "communism", even if that was the label the mass media applied to their fake boogeyman. Soviet communism is clearly and demonstrably gone, but the phantom limb of fear persists, so the core of the fear had to be something entirely unrelated to socialism.
You know what I think? The American public subconsciously yearns for real socialism. That's why America has supermarket chains called "Publix", and small, local bank chains called "People's Bank", and pharmacy chains called "People's Drug", and things like that. Sure, those are certainly private enterprises, but the names summon the Disney-esque illusion of a better world run by the public and for the public that appeals to America's little people. Even the "Federal Reserve" is only tolerated by the American people because they have been fooled into thinking it is public property.
As for the rest of the post by NemesisCalling @43, if one happens to be a conscious adherent to capitalist ideology, then indeed you have reason to feel bitter towards the Chinese. They played the capitalism game better than the capitalists, and they did so "unfairly" and by "cheating", at least from the "Free Market™" point of view: "Capitalist enterprises are not supposed to be harnessed by the public like draught animals! That are supposed to run free! Like wild stallions! It is just so unfair that the ChiComs enslaved "corporate persons" (they are entitled to free speech in America, you know!) and forced those "corporate persons" to work for the good of the public! The rules are supposed to be "laissez-faire" and "caveat emptor"!"
But the Chinese used "The Market™" as a tool. They maintained control over that tool and never let the tool take control of their society as the West expected them to do. After all, "The Market™" is literally the closest thing to a monotheistic deity in all western societies and the vassals they control, so it made perfect sense that "The Market™" would come to dominate China as well. That the Chinese denied the West's deity control over their society... well, to a capitalist that is just unfair.
Posted by: William Gruff | Sep 26 2020 13:41 utc | 69
*hit the wrong button*
You need to dial back on the TDS and learn to live with the fact that you lost in 2016 fair and square, and are about to take the shellacking of your life in November.
Posted by: morongobill | Sep 26 2020 13:43 utc | 70
morongobill @70
I am no Trump fan, despite what the hysterical drug witch claims, but I hope you are right. It is clearly going to take another four years of their nightmare to break the fools away from the Democrat party.
Or will that just make them more hysterical? I had thought they would have burned the hysteria out by now, calmed the fugue in their heads, and become ready to get serious about politics, but that has not happened yet. Maybe there a more rungs left on that insanity ladder they are climbing?
Posted by: William Gruff | Sep 26 2020 13:57 utc | 71
Trump is NOT a populist. Trump is not the poor unwitting victim of Democrat Russiagate. Trump is a fascist opportunist, a master manipulator of every narrative that fuels division and suspicion of the Left and of anyone left or right who know the system is unjust and corrupt and try to coalesce under the goal of changing or defeating it.
Trump is a phony. Just like you accused Sanders of being a sheepdog; Trump is a barking sheepdog playing on the insecurities of decreasing White exceptionalism, playing up socialism as a threat to the American way of life or Americanism, rounding up the herd for a stricter form of enslavement to the ruling class. Trump is the faux populist barking sheepdog of the ruling class. His latest antic regarding mail-in voting as an establishment attempt to steal the election from him is yet another ruse to drive the herd to the polls to vote for the most extreme right-wing control to ever ascend into power. Trump is harnessing an ironclad ruling class domination for two generations to come.
Trump's re-election represents the power grab of the Century that even blood in the streets will not overturn.
This election must be a landslide against Trump or the die of fascist rule is cast. Already Trump has stacked the Courts and wielded a taste of martial oppression to crush dissent. In a 2nd term he will own Martial Law unfettered by Russiagate or Covidgate, or a left-leaning judiciary now in rapid decline.
Remember, Trump had one hand tied behind his back in his first term and still managed to harness power and create hurt both domestically and abroad in Iran, China, Venezuela and Palestine.
In his second term Trump will be free to unleash a world of hurt on anyone who doesn't heel to the power of the ruling class from which he was Chosen to cement their power in this Century.
That's how critical and pivotal this election is. THROW TRUMP OUT, NOW!
Posted by: Circe | Sep 26 2020 14:26 utc | 72
So all those convictions and sometimes even confessions of guilt on the part of Trumps advisors and campaign managers are all just Deep State Meddling?
Posted by: Malchik Ralf | Sep 26 2020 15:22 utc | 73
anonymous @27 wrote:
"At some point it becomes imperative for you to think about that and wonder if DJT really is the only one standing btw the people and utter tyranny."
Only morons wonder about such things. No one here wants to read your delusional Qanon/MAGA bullshit.
___________________________________________________
You should want to read about it because it is that type of thinking that will get Trump re-elected this November. Many millions of Americans believe that Trump is the one poking his finger in the eye of TPTB and they are very motivated to show up and vote while the voters against trump are only motivated by dislike for Trump. This was the same formula that got Trump elected in 2016 and it will work even better in 2020.
___________________________________
bevin @31
The point about "Russiagate" is that it never had anything to do with Russia at all, it was just an attempt to tap into the ancient slavophobia, combined with anti-communism, in US culture.
___________________________________
The problem with your theory is that it is completely counter factual. The Americans that traditionally are slavo-phobic and anti-communist are the Trump supporters who now are convinced that Russiagate is a hoax. The anti-trumpers are the Americans that Russiagate converted into Russia haters.
But McCarthyism was not about Russia either. It was about gaining tight control of the media(radio, television, newspapers and most important Hollywood) narrative.
In the last 20 years the power establishment has discovered that their lapdog the media no longer has the influence that it once had. What that means is that even though they tightly control the narrative that their lapdog is spewing every bit as much as they did in the 1950's they are not getting the same benefit anymore.
Today online content like the Drudge Report, Alex Jones, Joe Rogan, Zerohedge and many more have far more influence than most MSM outlets.
Controlling the narrative is not so easy as it once was. It requires new strategies. That is where Donald Trump stepped in and said I have a new strategy. Give me control and I will have both the right and the left mesmerized by two competing narratives (both of which are phony)
__________________________________________
How would it be if the pressure was off and he was free to make of a second term a better account?
________________________________
That is such a naive silly question. That is like asking what would a cheetah be like if you took away the claws and fangs and speed.
Do you not see that Trump created the Kayfabe environment of constant phony political battles. He introduced the concept of witch hunt and coup attempt with his birther nonsense against Obama. That was the pilot episode for the reality TV show which has run for the last 4 years. The show is now up for renewal and I predict it will be renewed. It may take something like Joe Biden literally falling on his face on the debate stage but they will make it happen.
Posted by: jinn | Sep 26 2020 15:56 utc | 74
I wrote @74:
Today online content like the Drudge Report, Alex Jones, Joe Rogan, Zerohedge and many more have far more influence than most MSM outlets.
_______________________
And I should add that cable TV has as many right wing media outlets as it has left leaning. There is no longer one MSM. There are two MSM with competing narratives, both of which contain mostly meaningless drivel designed to obscure the truth.
Posted by: jinn | Sep 26 2020 16:02 utc | 75
https://www.scribd.com/document/436363415/English-Translation-Ukrainian-Meeting-January-2016
some very interesting documents regarding the involvement of Biden's son, the Clintons and Obama in Ukraine.
Posted by: Lee Sonne | Sep 26 2020 16:21 utc | 76
@Mao 39-40
In other contexts, Kremlin patience could be considered a virtue. But in failing to stand up to the US, it only demonstrates that bullying the Teddybear is consequence-free fun, because it will always come back to you anyway begging for more. Russia asked the West to be accepted as its partner, and got a clear reply "No, you're more useful to us as an enemy". To then come right back with "But could we be your partner at least for a little bit? Or at a later date?" -- from Putin's mouth it might be a high-class troll, but basically nobody will respect you until you first learn to respect yourself.
The war started long ago, and as we speak those "stupid" Americans with their toadies seem to be on the cusp of killing off Nord Stream II. Man up and do something about it.
Posted by: Ma Laoshi | Sep 26 2020 16:32 utc | 77
Some of them are likely to end up in legal jeopardy
fat chance. the diploid regime in Washington has killed upward of 20 million people since ww2. always beyond reproach, our treasonous war criminals are coddled, not prosecuted, typically living to a ripe old age in the lap of luxury with the best healthcare money can buy. latent exceptionalism and much fanfare apparently reassures the proles who obediently send them their hard earned money every year and even vote for them every four.
Posted by: john | Sep 26 2020 16:44 utc | 78
As Japan learned, invading China is as unpromising a venture as invading Russia. It would be the Vietnam quagmire times 100.
Posted by: lysias | Sep 26 2020 17:26 utc | 79
lysis@79 The Japanese tried to conquer territory in China. The US and its economic system are past that, they will be satisfied with looting some of it, trashing the rest and limiting their long term commitments to one or more of the neoconcessions already extant, possibly Hong Kong, but maybe Shanghai. Worst, it is very possible that, like Hitler, irrational urges to exterminate masses of people may triumph in war time, which undermines all morals. (Conservatives will deny this, but it's still true.)
Their system is fundamentally irrational. History has taken it as far as it can go and the rest is decay. But like the Byzantine Empire, decay can be very slow, even if modern technology has speeded everything up. And like the Byzantine Empire, presiding over the remnants can still seem glorious. See Anna Comnena's Alexiad, if you can stand it.
Posted by: steven t johnson | Sep 26 2020 17:59 utc | 80
...
The war started long ago, and as we speak those "stupid" Americans with their toadies seem to be on the cusp of killing off Nord Stream II. Man up and do something about it.
Posted by: Ma Laoshi | Sep 26 2020 16:32 utc | 77
Don't fret. Germany is far more likely to boot out the obnoxious Yankee occupiers than to cut its economy off at the socks by walking away from NordStream 2. It's only a matter of time until Germany, Japan and South Korea get so sick of being treated like Palestinians that they've probably already decided how much bloodshed would be "worth the price."
If one revolts, the other two will quickly follow.
Posted by: Hoarsewhisperer | Sep 26 2020 17:59 utc | 81
Jinn@75:
And I should add that cable TV has as many right wing media outlets as it has left leaning. There is no longer one MSM. There are two MSM with competing narratives, both of which contain mostly meaningless drivel designed to obscure the truth.
Well said! So is what you said in #74:
In the last 20 years the power establishment has discovered that their lapdog the media no longer has the influence that it once had. What that means is that even though they tightly control the narrative that their lapdog is spewing every bit as much as they did in the 1950's they are not getting the same benefit anymore.
And you have an acute read of Trump the weasel character :o).
Posted by: Oriental Voice | Sep 26 2020 19:05 utc | 82
Posted by: Gerhard | Sep 26 2020 13:03 utc | 66 Do You have suggestions how to proceed further?
Nope. There are no ways to "proceed further" - except on a personal preparedness level.
"According to my - a foreigner's - estimation it is a waste of time to discuss journalism in the U.S. or parties in the U.S. or their candidates or all these conspiracies of the past."
Correct.
"What matters only, in my opinion, are the actual conspiracies and their intentions (be aware!)."
Correct.
"And, of course, proposals for a better option."
As I say, there are none on a social or political level.
"What about preparing (a) new Constitutional Convention(s)?"
The electorate doesn't understand the first one. They would make a dog's breakfast of a second one.
The only thing people can do is...take care of yourself. You need five things to survive in this world: Philosophy; Attitude; Knowledge; Skills; Technology. But it all starts with the first: the correct Philosophy. And that has to be based on, as they say, "what we know to be true", meaning the facts of human evolution, human neuroscience, and human behavior. No philosophical "navel-gazing". No religion - which includes belief in the state. No content-less ambiguous concepts like "truth, justice and the American way", "morality", and "ethics". And especially no denying human nature, which boils down to "capable of reason - but almost never does."
This takes years of reading and contemplation. I spent nine years in Federal prison doing just that, preceded by thirty years of reading alternative viewpoints, and followed by the last twenty years of the same. In the meantime, one has to do what one can to prepare for the disruptions in society to come, up to and including nuclear war.
Posted by: Richard Steven Hack | Sep 26 2020 23:22 utc | 83
You miss the point. The idea was never to actually unseat Trump, which they could not have. The idea was to convert Candidate Trump - a self proclaimed anti war, anti interventionist, anti American Empire radical - into an acceptable President Trump, that is, yet another tool of the military industrial complex and the zionist lobby. Trump got the message quickly enough and at this point what difference do you see between him and what a Clinton presidency would have been like? I don't see any.
Posted by: Biswapriya Purkayast | Sep 27 2020 1:29 utc | 84
The idea was to convert Candidate Trump - a self proclaimed anti war, anti interventionist
_______________________________
I'm sorry who are you talking about?
The candidate Trump that I saw was not anti-war or anti-interventionist. He was the most bellicose candidate in my lifetime. Here are some examples:
https://youtu.be/dRpGcRGygoE
https://youtu.be/ySdhGyqGCZk
https://www.newsmax.com/TheWire/donaldtrump-karlrove-gop-birther/2011/04/22/id/393742/
Posted by: jinn | Sep 27 2020 2:16 utc | 85
@ RSH #83
The only thing people can do is...take care of yourself. . . .Philosophy; Attitude; Knowledge; Skills; Technology
Yes. Look out for #1 above all, with knowledge of how things work and why. Accept what is. Deal with the world the way it is, and might be in future, I think you've also touched on that in the past.
Posted by: Don Bacon | Sep 27 2020 2:29 utc | 86
No matter how much I try, I continue to have a sense that something is fishy about the COVID-19 pandemic. I have seen enough credible arguments from both camps – which are obviously contradictory. So, what should I, as a non-specialist, conclude?
Add to that the distinct phenomenon of censorship in the corporate and monopoly media of voices that do not support the official narrative. There are some very credible voices that are being blocked completely. Just one great example would be Prof. Dr. Sucharit Bhakti. Many of you may not have heard about him – he lives in Germany. Since b lives in Germany, I’d love to get b’s perspective on why Prof. Bhakti is being censored in the German mainstream media and by the authorities. I’d also like know what b thinks of Dr. Bhakti’s views.
Here I thought I’d bring up something that I had posted about a week ago soliciting your thoughts. Unfortunately, that post did not generate any response (or I may not have searched the responses diligently enough – for which I apologize). Here is what I had done…
I had looked up the total number of COVID deaths for several countries, as well as their population size (from worldometers website). Then I calculated a “COVID-19 deaths per million” metric for each country. I was stunned to see that this metric for USA is similar to that in the UK, 5x higher than in Germany, 63x higher than in Cuba, 188x higher than in China and 1,668x higher than in Vietnam (I understand that the exact number of reported COVID-19 death can be contested for a variety of reasons but that cannot account for a difference in the “COVID-19 deaths per million” metric by several orders of magnitude).
These stunning numbers indicate to me that we are missing the boat by focusing so narrowly on the inherent lethality of SARS-CoV-2 (e.g. whether or not, and how much more lethal it is versus the flue virus). We should recognize that, strictly speaking, viruses don’t kill people. Rather they are just one factor in a long cascade of events that can ultimate kill the patient. Some of the sub-events are biological in nature (“cytokine storm”, complications due to subsequent bacterial infection, etc.), which themselves are contingent upon a host of internal factors (e.g. the strength of the patient’s immune system, comorbidities, etc.) and external factors (kinds of medical intervention, etc.).
The stunningly different mortality rates in different countries, caused by the same virus, indicate to me the presence of one or more invisible elephants. These elephants are invisible because we are (intentionally?) focusing on the wrong metrics, such as the number of infections and deaths in different countries, etc. (without putting them in relation to the total population). Equally unfortunately, the debate is being framed around “premature” solutions like lockdown, mask or no mask, social distancing, etc. I call them “premature” solutions because as long as the elephants remain invisible, the diagnosis of the problem is incomplete, and as such the solution are not only premature but also ought to be ineffective.
Now what are the invisible elephants, that can tip the balance of mortality by multiple orders of magnitude? Some of them could be qualities of the public health system and health care system, the nature of the political system, income inequality, cultural and social norms, etc.
My common sense tells me that the biggest bang for the buck (i.e. fighting the pandemic) would come from attacking the factors that have the biggest impact in a “cascade of events”. Those are the invisible elephants – a few of which I had listed.
Does this make sense? What other invisible elephants do you see?
Posted by: Nathan Mulcahy | Sep 27 2020 2:52 utc | 87
There is so much delusional tossage in this thread it takes my breath away.
At least 90% of it, yes from both 'left' & 'right' is the product of common or garden amerikan exceptionalism, frankly it is amazing so few amerikans have woken up.
My personal favourite is at # 67 which altho it is probably as exceptionalist as the others adds racism/ fascism to the mix by claiming
"Why isn't Obama tried as a war criminal into the ICC yet? sic
Oh wait, he's black and that's all ever matters to the useless cowardly American libs."
There is a very simple reason he hasn't been arrested and put in front of the ICC which has nothing to do with his race, after all the vast majority of alleged war criminals who have been dragged into the ICC are black Africans.
The reason oblamblam isn't there is because he is amerikan and as one of 'J W's likely heroes the fascist Pompeo has repeatedly stated "No amerikan can be tried by the ICC".
Otherwise both bushes, the clintons, obama and all the rest of amerika's vast swathes of war criminals, military, politicians, god botherers & contractors alike, would have been lined up and shot long ago.
Posted by: Debsisdead | Sep 27 2020 7:13 utc | 88
@Richard Steven Hack | Sep 26 2020 23:22 utc | 83
Dear Richard, thanks for Your valuable answer! Respect and appreciation for Your biographical remarks!
I agree with all Your thoughts and Your suggested points, but please allow some complements.
"There are no ways to proceed further - except on a personal preparedness level."
"The only thing people can do is...take care of yourself."
Truely necessary! Unfortunately humans do not exist as individuals. They survive and live only in groups. Furthermore history has driven us to form societies and states. We can not turn back that watch. It is an existential challenge for us today to find a solution for living in groups of several millions, even billions of individuals. We either master that - or will lose all achieved during the last 7.000 years. To take care of myself and my children and grandchildren includes to face that specific problem.
"No religion - which includes belief in the state."
YES! Hands off from all 'religion' which ist connected with politics and states! Religion, and also FREEDOM, begins if You are able to free yourself from Your thoughts. Free Yourself from this continuous streaming nonsense! Make quiet Your mind! Then it starts ...
"In the meantime, one has to do what one can to prepare for the disruptions in society to come, up to and including nuclear war."
Except a few mislead missiles there will come no nuclear devastations. But the other damages humans have already done and will further do, to nature and man, are of the same critical degree of destruction.
"Constitutional Convention: The electorate doesn't understand the first one. They would make a dog's breakfast of a second one."
Agreed! But I said: "p r e p a r i n g a Constitutional Convention". That needs some time. Several years. So that at the end a proposal, a draft, a solution can be submitted to the electorate - when, some day, people are exhausted from the civil (and foreign) wars.
Best wishes from Gerhard
Posted by: Gerhard | Sep 27 2020 13:59 utc | 89
Addendum
Just discovered that a lengthy article exists in Wikipedia about the discussed subject:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Second_Constitutional_Convention_of_the_United_States
Posted by: Gerhard | Sep 27 2020 16:01 utc | 90
69#
Thank you so much for this insightful great comment William Gruff!And Nemesis Calling did trigger it with his indeed very appropriate phantom limb metaphore.You say it very clearly.
I do remember movies from the nineties continuously portraying russians,chechens,ukranians as ruthless killers with their mafias taking over market parts in the USA.Then the enormous MSM lies about the Serbs leading to NATO destructions,and the european public,including myself ,really believing all inhuman and barbaric slavic behaviour of those terrible Yougo's.Until Nato did something about it.
Posted by: willie | Sep 27 2020 18:29 utc | 91
Posted by: Ma Laoshi | Sep 26 2020 16:32 utc | 77
Thgat seems to be my view too. It seems that Russia cannot bring itself to shed some aspects of the 90s. All of Putin's efforts for acceptance, whether his latest suggestion on detente or his article about WWII and the spirit of cooperation emboldens the Anglo-American empire to press more. His unending labeling of mortal enemies as "partners" is no longer courtesy or trolling, whatever his intentions are. It is a lie and Russia's enemies perceive it as weakness.
Posted by: Constantine | Sep 28 2020 0:54 utc | 92
@Constantine 92
Some of these dysfunctions are part of formal Russian doctrine. I'm not knowledgeable on Dugin, and anyway opinions of him and whether he's even relevant diverge widely. But there is something more broadly in Russian thinking that Russia and the Greater USA are the two poles of Christian civilization, who'll ultimately have to find an accommodation. That's how they played it in Syria: slow, slow, with ceasefires and premature withdrawals, giving the Americans time to extend that hand in partnership. At the end of that, the Yanks of course said "Thank you very much, we've fortified our bases, set up a stealth no-fly zone over 1/3 of Syria, and captured the oil which was supposed to pay for Syria's rebuilding. Now you Russkies f off and enjoy your quagmire."
It's all yet another creative way for the Kremlin to misunderstand the West. There is no Western pole regarding Russians as Christian brothers: jews won, christians lost or were Zionized--which is another form of losing.
And spirituality can coexist with, or cover for, baser motives. "Stupid" American elites steal about as much as Russian ones, but they're certainly not so dumb to stash their loot in Moscow, under the jurisdiction of their enemies. As long as Kremlin elites park their wealth and families in NATO capitals, maybe they don't see the truth simply because they can't afford to.
Posted by: Ma Laoshi | Sep 28 2020 10:11 utc | 93
The comments to this entry are closed.
The significance of the FBI opening a counterintelligence file on Danchenko based on one item of gossip depends entirely upon how many such files it opens on such evidence. The significance of the file staying open depends on how quickly the FBI closes such files. My knowledge, such as it is, is that the FBI is quick to open "investigations" on any evidence, including simple gossip and habitually leaves them open to provide an opening for later pursuit (i.e., a serious investigation) if it wishes. That is, the claim the source is tainted is very weak. The added conclusion that a tainted source cannot provide correct information means essentially no informant subject to a possible criminal charge should serve as motive for an investigation. This is an absurdity, indulged as special pleading for Trump. The argument reduces to, "Danchenko" is a Russian, thus may be a Russian spy. This kind of nonsense is what many Democrats rely on, ironically.
The claim that of course it would make no sense for Putin et al. to favor Trump because Clinton was a "known quantity" is shameless nonsense. If the quantity known is a relentless hostility, even the unknown Trump would promise the chance of a more favorable US foreign policy. There are two further points here. First, the tacit admission that Putin didn't get a favorable outcome from Trump concedes all claims about Trump's less warlike, more pacific foreign policy are more shameless nonsense. Second, the phony logic offered to defend Trump proves Trump has always had significant support in the so-called Deep State. Brennan may have had other motives in editing this BS out, but no one will ever prove it wasn't dropped because it was blatantly stupid pro-Trump twaddle.
Similarly, the breathless report of January 5 meeting ignores how James Comey, a man notorious for intervening in the election by announcing yet another nothingburger investigation into email servers, was part of the meeting. It simply was not a meeting of Obama conspirators. The indignant comments by disloyal FBI agents merely concedes again that the supposed Deep State conspiracy was also in favor of Trump. I have no idea why Deep State conspirators favoring Trump would buy liability insurance against being charged with conspiring *against* Trump. Pretending their actions were justified by the pro-Democratic Party faction of the Deep State could easily impel them to make things look better. I would really like to see the actual terms of the policy, though. I suspect it was meant to cover their asses if they were called out by their boss Comey for violating confidentiality, playing partisan politics on the job, all manner of illegal and immoral acts.
The inclusion of a vocal Trump defender in the Mueller investigation of Flynn ("at least in the early stages...") is not, *not,* *NOT,* an indication of hanky panky. It is evidence of an honest investigation. Though hardly conclusive evidence, trying to pretend it is proof of the opposite is a shameless perversion of reason.
Trumpery, Trumpery, Trumpery.
Even the seemingly high-minded conclusion about pushing real political alternatives to Trump's programs fails to merit respect. There is only a limited amount of disagreement on policy issues between Trump (and his Republic Party---not a democracy!---tail) and the Democratic Party. Trumpery about how there is a real difference of principle driving the Deep State conspiracy is unbelievable even when spouting more Trumpery.
Posted by: steven t johnson | Sep 25 2020 17:25 utc | 1