Who is Victoria Nuland? Most Americans have never heard of her because the U.S. corporate media’s foreign policy coverage is a wasteland. Most Americans have no idea that President-elect Biden’s pick for Deputy Secretary of State for Political Affairs is stuck in the quicksand of 1950s U.S.-Russia Cold War politics and dreams of continued NATO expansion, an arms race on steroids and further encirclement of Russia. Continue reading →
America is just starting to discover that it came within a hair’s breadth of witnessing its Constitution upended and a fascist dictatorship declared by Donald Trump as a result of the January 6 insurrection targeting the U.S. Capitol. Indeed, it is all but certain that Trump was borrowing a page from Adolf Hitler’s playbook in ordering Brown Shirts to set fire to the Reichstag in Berlin in 1933 and blaming the arson attack on “Communists” as a reason to suspend the democratic guarantees contained in the Weimar Constitution. According to those few witnesses to Trump’s expletive-laden rants in the Oval Office, the would-be dictator continues to blame the non-existent “antifa” for the attack on the Capitol. Bogus “antifa” attackers in 2021 are as much a propaganda device for Trump as fake “Communists” were for Hitler in 1933. Continue reading →
The heirs of the just-passed Sheldon Adelson, the biggest campaign donor of our time, could be poisoning our democracy for generations to come.
We haven’t seen the last of billionaire Sheldon Adelson. Or, to put the matter a bit more exactly, we haven’t seen the last of Sheldon Adelson’s fortune. Continue reading →
A week ago, on Jan. 6, Donald J. Trump secured his place in history by becoming the only president of the United States to ever incite the violent overthrow of the government. His legacy in now further cemented by his becoming the first president to ever be impeached twice. The House of Representative has voted 232 to 197 to impeach Trump, formally branding him “a threat to national security, democracy, and the Constitution.” Ten Republicans broke with their party and joined the Democrats in condemning the White House occupant. Continue reading →
These proposed laws are "aimed at police brutality protests, not right-wing insurrection."
Progressives are sounding the alarm that a handful of Republican lawmakers are exploiting the deadly attack on the U.S. Capitol on January 6 by an insurrectionist pro-Trump mob to push for anti-protest bills that critics say do not aim to stem the tide of right-wing extremism but instead criminalize dissent by those seeking social change and justice. Continue reading →
On January 11, in his final days before leaving office, Secretary of State Mike Pompeo added one parting blow to the series of bludgeons his administration has inflicted on Cuba for four years: putting the island on the list of “state sponsors of terror” that includes only Iran, North Korea and Syria. The designation drew swift condemnation from policymakers and humanitarian groups as a decision widely characterized as “politically motivated.” It comes six years after the Obama administration had removed Cuba from the same list as part of his policy of rapprochement. Continue reading →
How the GOP abandoned democracy and became an accomplice to insurrection, and what must be done now.
In 1923, Hitler and the Nazis stormed a beer hall in Munich, Germany, from whence they planned to overthrow German democracy. The putsch failed ignominiously, and Hitler was briefly jailed. Continue reading →
By now, most people are aware of the US obesity statistics. In 2016, almost 70 percent of US adults were obese of overweight says the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). That means normal sized people are in the minority. (Some are even considered “anorexics.”) Continue reading →
As the US ruling elites have fully succumbed to Israel’s political discourse on Palestine, the Israeli government of right-wing Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, may feel that it, alone, is capable of determining the future of the Palestinian people. Continue reading →
‘Good government’ has always rested on equitable distributions of wealth and power.
How best to understand the assault on the Capitol this week? Might some historical perspective help us better comprehend how endangered our democracy has become? Could that perspective point us to a more promising post-Trump path? Continue reading →
The extraordinary breach of security at the US congressional building wasn’t just a “failure of planning” which allowed thousands of Trump supporters to trash the seat of government and to interrupt the electoral certification of Joe Biden as the next president. It was a coup attempt. Continue reading →
"Their complicity endangers America, erodes our democracy, and it must end."
A Republican congressman from West Virginia on Monday blocked a resolution calling on Vice President Mike Pence to invoke the 25th Amendment and remove President Donald Trump from office, a move that came as Democratic lawmakers unveiled articles of impeachment against the president that are expected to receive a vote later this week. Continue reading →
Founded in 1844, the American “Know Nothing Party,” officially known as the Native American Party—not to be confused with the indigenous native Americans—rallied around the causes of anti-immigration, xenophobia, and anti-Catholicism. Its name derived from the party’s secretive membership list and political operations. When non-members of the party queried a member about specific details of the organization, they were to reply, “I know nothing.” Continue reading →
Call me old-fashioned, but when the president of the United States encourages armed insurgents to breach the Capitol and threaten the physical safety of Congress, in order to remain in power, I call it an attempted coup. Continue reading →
"If another head of state came in and ordered an attack on the United States Congress, would we say that that should not be prosecuted?" the New York Democrat said Sunday.
Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez on Sunday stressed a need for President Donald Trump’s removal from office, saying that failing to hold him accountable for Wednesday’s violent attack on the Capitol could ensure “it will happen again.” Continue reading →
Government propaganda: deflecting public attention from the most serious crimes of the oligarchy
Posted on January 19, 2021 by Carla Binion
People of the U.S. often fail to notice the methods their own government uses to do what amounts to brainwashing them. The book “Manufacturing Consent” by Edward S. Hermann and Noam Chomsky details how U.S. corporate-controlled mainstream media outlets (today that includes mainstream TV “news” networks, most mainstream magazines, newspapers, etc.) act as propagandists. Another excellent source on U. S. media propaganda is Michael Parenti’s book, “Inventing Reality.” Continue reading →