Blogosphere
Blogosphere
Afghanistan the World’s Largest Opium Producer
Stephen Lendman: Opium is used to produce heroin and other illicit opioids. ... In his book titled “The Politics of Heroin: CIA Complicity in the Global Drug Trade,” Alfred McCoy documented CIA and US government complicity in drugs trafficking at the highest official levels. ... Heroin and other illicit drugs produce hundreds of billions of dollars in annual revenues – a US government-supported bonanza for corrupt regime officials, the CIA, organized crime and Western financial institutions, heavily involved in money laundering. ... Pre-9/11, Afghanistan under Taliban rule eradicated 94% of opium production according to UN estimates, one of various reasons why Bush/Cheney launched naked aggression on the country in October 2001...
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Jun 23, 2017, 4:35pm
Blogosphere
UNAC (United National Anti-War Coalition) Brings Power to the People
Margaret Kimbeley: The United National Antiwar Coalition (UNAC) recently convened its fourth national conference in Richmond, Virginia. The organizations that comprise this coalition are unwavering in their determination to fight for peace and justice. ... All of the oppressions are intertwined. Millions of Americans toil under wage slavery or prison slavery and make fortunes for other people. But the contradictions of capitalism are growing more acute, and imperialist war is the outcome of a system trying to maintain itself. The fight for a living minimum wage and the fight against interventions abroad must therefore be addressed together because they are in fact part of a whole...
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Jun 21, 2017, 4:11pm
Blogosphere
Under the Democrats’ Bus
Margaret Kimberley: Democratic party leaders are up to their old tricks. They have lost at every level of government across the country because they fail to give voters reasons to support them. This seemingly inexplicable behavior is quite deliberate. Giving the people what they want endangers their relations with wealthy individuals, corporations and big banks. ... But the Democratic rank and file always end up being the losers, whether their party wins or doesn’t. The banks always get a bailout and so does the military industrial complex. Even Obamacare was a Republican plan promoted by right wing thank tanks. Election outcomes never give banksters, defense contractors or Big Pharma cause for alarm...
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Jun 14, 2017, 4:39pm
Blogosphere
UK hung Parliament: Is Trumpism pushing Europe Left?
Juan Cole: Any election in a country of 65 million is extremely complex, and Labour’s good showing had several major ingredients. For one thing, the Conservative policy of offloading the cost of university education onto middle class families produced a substantial backlash in college towns. In general, youthful voters rebelled against austerity and the paring back of services, and such voters came out in strength. ... Theresa May was famously buddy-buddy with Trump, who is deeply unpopular in the UK. When the American president attacked (under false pretenses) the Labour mayor of London, Sadiq Khan, May took a long time to reply, and then tepidly...
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Jun 9, 2017, 12:26pm
Blogosphere
Climate Agreement Smoke and Mirrors
Margaret Kimberley: Donald Trump backed out of the Paris climate accords, but “the world leaders who condemn him are even more guilty because they have used sleight of hand to give an appearance of concern and of action when they lie to the world and continue killing the planet.” The big polluters gave themselves a free pass on previous emissions, while agreeing “not to pay poor countries for the damage that global warming does to them and to their people.”... “The signatory nations had little to fear because the agreement actually permitted world temperatures to rise 2 degrees.”...
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Jun 7, 2017, 3:56pm
Blogosphere
Did Trump’s Climate Disavowal just kill Capitalism?
Juan Cole: It wasn’t Donald Trump or alt-NeoNazi Steve Bannon who was mainly responsible for taking the US back out of the Paris climate accord. ... It was the Koch Brothers and the rest of Big Oil, and Big Gas, and Big Coal. ... It was “energy” corporations who have vast inventories of worthless fossil fuels that they want to unload on the marks quick before everybody realizes they have all the usefulness for human beings of eating arsenic...
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Jun 3, 2017, 11:24am
Blogosphere
Obama vs. Trump
Margaret Kimberley, BAR: The Saudi bombing and blockade of Yemen has resulted in starvation and a cholera epidemic. The corporate media and their talking heads ignored the crime as long as Barack Obama was in the White House. ... The corporate media and foreign governments don’t care about the damage Trump is doing domestically. The ICE raids, emboldened racism, voter suppression and cuts to government programs don’t concern them. But Trump’s victory already killed the TPP trade deal. His white America first philosophy leaves less room for NATO machinations and imperial imperatives...
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May 31, 2017, 2:45pm
Blogosphere
Endless Propaganda
Matgaret Kimberley, BAR: Now that Trump and his team have been stymied and the masses have been distracted the status quo reigns supreme. ... The war party wants to keep Trump from deviating from their script of endless conflict. The Democrats want to get back into power without presenting any policies that the people want to see enacted. The kabuki theater of an uninformed, ill prepared, bigoted president versus people who want to get rid of him, but not for the right reasons, is fascinating drama. But none of the parties involved want to bring justice and peace...
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May 24, 2017, 4:06pm
Blogosphere
Financial Weapons Of Mass Destruction: The Top 25 U.S. Banks Have 222 Trillion Dollars Of Exposure To Derivatives
Michael Snyder: The recklessness of the “too big to fail” banks almost doomed them the last time around, but apparently they still haven’t learned from their past mistakes. Today, the top 25 U.S. banks have 222 trillion dollars of exposure to derivatives. ... When you buy a stock you are purchasing an ownership interest in a company, and when you buy a bond you are purchasing the debt of a company. But when you buy a derivative, you are not actually getting anything tangible. Instead, you are simply making a side bet about whether something will or will not happen in the future. ...
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May 19, 2017, 12:47pm
Blogosphere
Which Middle East Authoritarian Leader is Trump most Like?
Juan Cole: Trump’s abrupt and virtually unprecedented firing of FBI director Jim Comey raises the question of whether he and his far right wing circle of Neofascists intend to reshape the Bureau as (even more of) an instrument of white nationalism and executive authoritarianism. ... there are two countries that had made small steps toward democracy and which are now backsliding, Egypt and Turkey. Looking at how they are descending into seedy dictatorships could be instructive with regard to keeping a watch on the authoritarian Trump...
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May 10, 2017, 5:24pm
Blogosphere
Democratic Party Death Spiral
Margaret Kimberley: The Democrats are locked in a fatal contradiction: they cannot serve the people and their rich paymasters, too. The people want higher wages, affordable education and the right to healthcare. Instead, the Democrats “engage in wishful thinking that the same tired nostrums would work one more time.” The Democrats only run for office so they can “make deals on behalf of the corporate interests which feed them ... If they promised free college or student debt abolition or a $15 per hour minimum wage they would surely resurrect themselves...
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May 10, 2017, 5:03pm
Blogosphere
Planet Ravagers: How Trump & GOP are like Aliens in “Independence Day”
Juan Cole: You expect the Republican Party, when it wins a national election, to pass some laws benefiting the business classes. The GOP mainly stands for the interests of the 0.1% who are typically involved in business. ... (But) Trump and his cohort are Planet Ravagers. (This is a common Hollywood trope, but they are the real thing). They just want to suck the earth dry, and apparently they don’t in the slightest care what happens to people or even businesses after they go out of office. Their quest is for short term megaprofits....
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Apr 27, 2017, 3:05pm
Blogosphere
Do Americans Have No Shame?
Margaret Kimberley, BAR: Putting aside the lack of any proof of Russian interference in U.S. elections, Americans have some nerve complaining about outside meddling when they have violated the sovereign rights of much of the planet. Americans owe the world heartfelt acts of contrition. “There ought to be a march of apology from Americans to people in Grenada, Haiti, Honduras, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Somalia, Libya, and yes in Russia too.” ... People in this country ought to reflect on their history instead of behaving as if they are entitled to rights they routinely disregard elsewhere...
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Apr 26, 2017, 5:00pm
 Blogosphere
Political Prisoner Marwan Barghouti on Why Palestinians Hunger Strike
Stephen Lendman: "HADARIM PRISON, Israel — Having spent the last 15 years in an Israeli prison, I have been both a witness to and a victim of Israel’s illegal system of mass arbitrary arrests and ill-treatment of Palestinian prisoners. After exhausting all other options, I decided there was no choice but to resist these abuses by going on a hunger strike. ... Rights are not bestowed by an oppressor. Freedom and dignity are universal rights that are inherent in humanity, to be enjoyed by every nation and all human beings. Palestinians will not be an exception...."
Apr 19, 2017, 2:35pm
Blogosphere
Obama and Clinton Brought Slavery to Libya
Margaret Kimberley, BAR: While the corporate media make hay out of very dubious evidence of atrocities allegedly committed by the Syrian government, the atrocities caused directly by the American government go unmentioned. Or rather they are reported absent of any context of American responsibility. ... Even press reports of slave trading in Libya follow the same proscribed language. They will say that Gaddafi was an autocrat and a dictator, but omit that the humanitarian disaster was carried out by the United States, NATO, and Gulf monarchs...
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Apr 19, 2017, 1:27pm
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