Free Julian Assange

167 thoughts on “Free Julian Assange”

1. Thank You, Bill, for posting that. Mr Hedges’ bottom-line, bullet-hits-the-bone message is captured completely in his concluding paragraph:

   “We are here to fight for Julian. But we are also here to OVERTHROW — AND LET ME REPEAT THAT WORD FOR THE BENEFIT OF THOSE IN THE FBI AND HOMELAND SECURITY WHO HAVE COME HERE TO MONITOR US — OVERTHROW THE CORPORATE STATE AND CREATE A GOVERNMENT OF THE PEOPLE, BY THE PEOPLE AND FOR THE PEOPLE, THAT WILL CHERISH, RATHER THAN PERSECUTE, THE BEST AMONG US. [EMPHASIS added.]

   One is reminded of Thomas Paine, eh?

   To understand exactly What and Who is at work and at stake regarding America’s attempt to extradite Julian Assange, watch the first 2:02 and from 35:51 to 37:02 of this video from the Free Julian Assange! Global Day Of Action in San Francisco yesterday:
   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zv2bdkIdZeA .

   And to get the latest from Wikileaks on the day in London when Parliament was surrounded by a Human Chain: https://twitter.com/wikileaks/status/1578766991724523521 .

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2. The 1st casualty of every WAR is the TRUTH and especially in this US-RUSSIA WAR over Ukraine in NATO.

   When a US Apache helicopter gunship gunned down a group of Iraqis including 2 Reuters photographers, the Pentagon said video from the helicopter of the massacre didn’t exist.

   Chelsea Manning, just doing her assigned Military Duty and having a higher level access, saw the video did in fact exist, and released it to Julian Assange. Both of them paid dearly for their Acts of Courage exposing the Truth over the Lie.

   What depressed me watching the video was hearing the USAF Pilots in their banter were actually enjoying doing the killing.
   That raises the question, at what level in the Military-Industrial-Congressional-Think Tank Complex does that kind of Psychopathy exist, visible to the Public and invisible to the Public?

   The Truth in this Ukraine WAR is US Oligarchs are making MUCH MORE MONEY off the War than the demonized Russian Oligarchs.

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   1. What’s absurd about this YouTube Warning is kids watch all kinds of Police Crime and War Violence in movies and TV, but showing actual War violence is verboten!

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3. I listened to Chris Hedges speech, and pondered his words. And am very distressed about this.
   Hedges is right as usual.
   But what difference will this speech make? None.
   The US and UK have decided Julian will die in prison.
   Nothing Chris Hedges, Bill Astore, Jeff Moebus or Dennis Merwood does is going to change that.
   Just like we are not going to bring peace in the Ukraine – we are powerless.
   Overthrow ….pfffft!
   Tilting at windmills -To waste time fighting enemies to resolve issues that are impossible to overcome. An act of extreme idealism.

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   1. One speech won’t change the world. One blog won’t (even Bracing Views).

      But consider the alternative of no Chris Hedges. No dissent. No opposition.

      No one ever said confronting power is easy. Just necessary. Keep the faith. I refer to your strong rational faith in Bracing Views, of course. 🙂

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      1. Bill, I think of your singing the praises of Jesus’s dissent and opposition.
         And MLK’s.
         Being in a pessimistic mood today – they paid a huge price for their dissent.
         And would these changes have come about anyway without their having to give their life?
         Without the impact of martyrs.

         Martyrdom…….The concept of the martyr in Islam had been made prominent during the Islamic revolution in Iran and the subsequent Iran-Iraq war, so that the cult of the martyr had a lasting impact on the course of revolution and war.

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      2. Think of your daughters. They’re happy. They’re succeeding within the system. They banish our “doom and gloom” talk from their minds. They focus on their families, their professions, etc., and by your account they’re living valuable and fruitful lives.

         It’s our “job,” I think, to comfort the afflicted and to afflict the comfortable. So sometimes you/we need to tell your daughters that not everything is grand, that it’s not as simple as electing Biden instead of Trump, or supporting Hillary because “I’m with her.” Why isn’t she with me?

         We get dissed when we afflict the comfortable with our doubts, but it will be people like your daughters who will change the future, and we need them to know that not all is well in their world, that indeed it’s worse than they think, even as they navigate the system with skill.

         Put pessimism to work in a positive way, and maybe you can transmute into something truly valuable. That’s my advice for today.

         Now send me a big contribution or a sexy Italian motorcycle or something. None of my readers send me gifts! Now I’m getting pessimistic — or greedy. 🙂

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         1. All good thoughts Bill.
            I have been banned from attaching links to emails to my “overeducated” daughters.
            God bless them!
            Take care.

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            1. So … no Italian motorcycle?

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               1. OK, you twisted my arm!
                  At Varano d ‘Melegari in The Province of Reggio Emilia.
                  Starting a 2017 Ducati racing motorbike.( Only chimes into song up half way thru this video)
                  Every Italian within 100-yds has a hard on a foot long! Passione Amore. Mi piacerebbe molto. Innamorato.

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               2. I’ll look for it outside my garage

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      3. Look what happened to Christ Jesus opposing the Religious Establishment!
         Today everyone wants to sit in a comfortable pew.

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   2. As Edna St. Vincent Millay wrote in the final line of her magnificent poem Dirge Without Music:

      “I know. But I do not approve. And I am not resigned.”

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   3. If Everybody feels like You, Dennis, You are absolutely correct: Hedges’ speech will make no difference whatsoever.

      But the choice is between “extreme idealism” and taking on windmills, on the one hand; and sitting back on one’s ass waiting for Big Brother’s Ruling Political Class to take the next step, whining and whimpering that “we are powerless…waaa-waaa-waaa.”

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      1. It’s not binary choice you are trying to use to smear people my friend Jeff.
         Between those two extreme choices there is the choice of being a realist.
         A term you used yourself here in just the last few days.

         Being not an extreme idealist does not make one a person sitting back on one’s ass waiting for Big Brother’s Ruling Political Class to take the next step, whining and whimpering that “we are powerless…waaa-waaa-waaa.”

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         1. If You took that as a “smear,” Dennis, that was not my intention, even if it is Your perception.

            And i said nothing about “binary choices.”

            Ever hear what happens when an “Idealistic Realist” and a “Realistic Idealist” get together?

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            1. I took your first sentence as a smear Jeff. How could it be otherwise?

               You said that there was two choices! That is, binary.

               “Virtue signalling” running around all day expounding your FREE ASSANGE ideals, when at the end of the day you know full well there is not a fuckin thing you can do about it!

               “Virtue signalling”, according to the Cambridge Dictionary, is “an attempt to show other people that you are a good person, for example by expressing opinions that will be acceptable to them, especially on social media”. The expression is often used to imply that the virtue being signalled is exaggerated or insincere.

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               1. You take it any way You want to, Dennis.

                  And No: i do NOT know fucking well that there is nothing that i and others can do about and for Assange.

                  Call that “virtue signaling” if that’s the way You read it and it pleases You.

                  And have a Great day while You’re at it.

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4. My view on Julian Assange posted 9 years ago.

   My view on Western Media focusing only on Iran and the death of 1 woman, but that very same Western Media totally ignores the IDF killing 1 woman clearly marked as PRESS.
   Why does Israel get a free pass from the Press?

   WIKILEAKS AND DEMOCRATIC FREEDOM OF THE PRESS

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   1. Very well said, Ray. i particularly liked Your conclusion:

      “Please go here to read the rest of ‘The Death of Truth’ as Chris Hedges wrote it, and give it your thoughtful consideration.

      “In the final analysis, as Chris says, IF THE MAINSTREAM MEDIA DO NOT STAND UP FOR JULIAN ASSUANGE AND BRADLEY MANNING, THERE WILL NO DEMOCRATIC FREEDOM OF THE PRESS REMAINING IN THE FASCIST DICTATORSHIP SURREPTITIOUSLY USURPING DEMOCRACY AS WE HAVE KNOWN IT.” [EMPHASIS added.]

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      1. And that is exactly what has been happening, not just in terms of “Freedom of The Press”; but in terms of exactly what sort of “News” that Press is passing out as Information, Fact, and “Truth” ~ whatever that is any more,

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         1. But surely Jeff, who is going to decide what is “News”? Who is going to decide what is “Fact’? Who is going to be the arbiter of what is the “Truth’? No one we hope. Thats why it’s called the FREE press. And hopefully this is what will exactly continue to happen in the future in a society without censorship.
            What am I missing here?

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            1. Whoever owns the news outlet decides what is “News,” Dennis. And those who watch, read, or listen to what the Newscasters have to say then have to decide for themselves whether that News is Fact and Truth.

               And Reality determines what is and is not “Fact.” As a simple example: Reality determined that Colin Powell was lying thru his ass when he told the UN and the World that Saddam had WMDs. And the MSM went right along with it, chomping at the bit for an even bigger and better War.

               And what happens in the future is the ultimate determiner and decider of what the “Truth” is in the present. How much did it cost in Iraqi, American, and Others’ Blood and Treasure to expose the TRUTH about Powell’s lies?

               At the moment, there is relatively little active, overt censorship in America, except, increasingly, on social media. [That excludes, of course, all the Mis-, Dis-, and Mal-Information perpetually coming out of Governments and Corporations.]

               But again, if it is a privately owned social media outlet, that is ~ or should be ~ the owner’s call.

               But when the owner of that social media has an understanding with the Government as to what is to be deemed appropriate or not, then matters of “Fact” and “Truth” get quite a bit hazier.

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      2. I appreciate you taking the Time to read the article, JG and highlighting such a relevant point as a danger to Freedom in the Future.

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5. SAD FACT: there are too many people in high places in the US and the UK who think Julian Assange is a criminal guilty of breaking multiple Laws.

   It’s unrealistic to think they are going to change their mind. MLK suffered from the same persecution.

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   1. “WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange is not a free-speech champion but an ordinary criminal whose publication of secret documents put many people at risk of torture and death, a lawyer for the US government said as Assange’s extradition hearing opened in a London court.

      US authorities want to try Assange on espionage charges over the 2010 publication of hundreds of thousands of secret military documents and diplomatic cables. The charges carry a maximum sentence of 175 years in prison.

      Lawyer James Lewis, representing the US government, called WikiLeaks’ 2010 document deluge “one of the largest compromises of classified information in the history of the United States”.

      “Reporting or journalism is not an excuse for criminal activities or a license to break ordinary criminal laws,” he said.

      “By disseminating the materials in an unredacted form, he likely put people – human rights activists, journalists, advocates, religious leaders, dissidents and their families – at risk of serious harm, torture or even death,” the lawyer said.

      ttps://www.smh.com.au/world/europe/julian-assange-an-ordinary-criminal-who-put-lives-at-risk-court-told-20200225-p543yj.html

      This will be impossible to defend. Even OJ’s lawyer could not have prevailed here!

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6. George Bush and Tony Blair broke more laws and got more people killed than Julian Assange did. But are they rotting away in prison? Nope. They were in “high places”. The world is neither fair nor unfair. It just is.

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7. Can this authors point of view be argued against?
   Does he have a valid point?

   “Like other illiberal sects, the cult of Assange rationalizes its contempt for law and ordinary politics by dismissing the “general public” as passive fools brainwashed by the “media with a political agenda.” So much for democracy.

   As in other forms of anti-liberal thought, like anarchism and fascism and Marxism-Leninism and radical Islamism, the central idea of cyber-anarchism is that society must be saved by a self-appointed vanguard of vigilantes who themselves are above the law and whose motives are beyond question: “Anonymous is here to ensure punishment does not go unserved to those who deserve it.” So much for liberalism, which dreads arbitrary power, fears hero worship and assumes that charismatic rebels as well as bureaucratic authorities are likely to be fallible, biased and corrupt.

   ……the strategy of Assange and the criminal leakers and criminal hackers who support him is similar to that of terrorists who seek to provoke over-reactions by the governments they oppose. This point has been made by a thoughtful American analyst who recently compared the strategy of Assange’s cult to that of al-Qaida.
   These kinds of disclosures will end up subverting American imperial power, as Assange sees it … It will drive government and the Pentagon, and the military industrial complex, into further degrees of secrecy which will essentially paralyze it and make it less effective and more corrupt, and that will cause it further to collapse in on itself precisely because openness is such an effective attribute of large organizations.”

   https://www.salon.com/2010/12/22/lind_wikileaks/

   This case will be argued long after Assange dies in prison.

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   1. The “cult” of Assange is “illiberal”?

      Count me as not an Assange cultist, whatever that is. Assange is a journalist who seeks to enlighten people about what their governments are truly doing. I don’t call that “illiberal.” I call that doing his job.

      Assange is being punished primarily to intimidate others but also to silence anyone seeking to reveal harsh truths about what our “liberal” “democratic” governments are really doing.

      The true “cult” is a cult of secrecy that protects illiberal wealthy elites. They’re winning since they’re not in prison — they’re celebrated and protected.

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   2. “Cult,” eh? Heh.

      Wasn’t that what the British and their Colonial Lackeys were calling folks like Jefferson, Paine, Henry, et al, back in the early 1770s?

      And if that article was written in 2010, the author was spot on when he predicted the greater secrecy and attendant ineffectiveness and increased corruption of not just the MICC, but of the whole American System of Government and Governance.

      Ie: Witness the failures of that System over the last twelve years: Iraq, Afghanistan, COVID-19, Election2020 and January 6, Ukraine, inflation, food, fuel, and energy shortages, and so on and so forth.

      To paraphrase Archie and Edith Bunker: “Mister, we could another Cult like that again… .”

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      1. Were not the American founding fathers British?
         Conquering a faraway land?
         Would you say they were “Colonial Lackeys”?
         Were they not worse than colonial lackeys?
         After all they were conquering and plundering not for Mother England but their own greed eh?

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         1. No, Dennis. The “Founding Fathers” ~ the guys in Philadelphia ~ were American Colonialists, subject to the British Crown. i seriously doubt any of them considered themselves “British.”

            And some of those original “conquerors and plunderers” were British indeed, along with French, and originally out west, Spanish. And all that conquering and plundering was bought and paid for by the British, French, and/or Spanish Crowns and/or their commercial subsidiaries.

            Americans became successful conquerors and plunderers in their own right only after they got rid of the Brits.

            And those “Colonial Lackeys” were Colonists who did still considered themselves “British,” and sought to maintain Rule Brittania in the North American Colonies.

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            1. …..American Colonialists, subject to the British Crown. I seriously doubt any of them considered themselves “British.”
               So what did they consider themselves? Where did they born, and set sail from?
               Terminological masturbation maybe eh?

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               1. As i said, they considered themselves American Colonist subject to the British Crown.

                  Where did they born and set sail from?

                  “48 of the 56 signers [of the Declaration of Independence] were born in America. Two were born in England (Button Gwinnett, Robert Morris), two in Ireland (George Taylor, Matthew Thornton), two in Scotland (James Wilson, John Witherspoon), one in Northern Ireland (James Smith), and one in Wales (Francis Lewis).”

                  [ https://declaration.fas.harvard.edu/faq/how-many-signers-were-born-american-colonies ]

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8. Google dictionary:
   Illiberal: opposed to liberal principles; restricting freedom of thought or behaviour:
   as in…”illiberal and anti-democratic policies”
   synonyms:
   intolerant · narrow-minded · unenlightened · puritanical

   I read this authors use of the word to refer the “cult” of Assange’s followers?
   Are you and I members of a “cult” Bill?
   That Salon article, written in 2010, raises a lot of things to think about I think.

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   1. Trump has a “cult.”
      Assange has Defenders of Freedom

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      1. Thats an unfair generalization Ray.
         There are as many “crazies” on both sides of the American political aisle.
         The proverbial old English saying ‘One man’s meat is another man’s poison’ puts forward the idea that what is agreeable to one may be distasteful to another.

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         1. I think it’s specifically accurate describing Trump’s devotees from all I’ve seen watching from CanaDa.

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            1. I am fearful, or suspicious, of generalizations… They cannot guide me reliably in making decisions about particular individuals.

               Ruth Bader Ginsburg

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               1. The problem with labels is that they lead to stereotypes and stereotypes lead to generalizations and generalizations lead to assumptions and assumptions lead back to stereotypes. It’s a vicious cycle, and after you go around and around a bunch of times you end up believing that all vegans only eat cabbage and all gay people love musicals.

                  Ellen DeGeneres

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                  1. Wait a minute — all gay people don’t love musicals?

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            2. Hahaha…. it may surprise you Bill and Ray, but Ray’s post describing Trump as a “Cult” got me studying the good book:

               “Judge not lest you be judged” is a snippet from Christ’s Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:3—7:27) Christ’s teaching was primarily directed to believers, but the principle can be applied to anyone. Jesus wants us to discern sin in others so we can help them get rid of it. The purpose of judging someone else’s weakness is to help him or her walk in freedom (1 Corinthians 5:12). But how can we help someone else if we are not free? We must first be willing to look honestly at our own lives and exercise the same judgment toward ourselves. When we do this, we judge from a position of humility.”

               Excellent advice I would say.

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               1. In other words Dennis, as the Christ teaches, ‘remove the log in your own eye before you remove the splinter in your brother’s eye’

                  And of course, the Resurrect Christ these 2000 years later, sees not has changed in the hearts of the People from when Jesus said these words way back then,
                  “You hypocrites, well did Isaiah prophesy of you, saying,
                  This people draws close to me with their mouth, and honours me with their lips; but their heart is far from me.
                  But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrines the commandments of men.

                  I would say the greater majority of Literate People would interpret those words of the Christ as not being addressed to Atheists, but to those who claim to believe in him.

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               2. It’s about time! Perhaps the result of our prayers, Ray! 🙂

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         2. Btw Dennis, your ‘One man’s meat is another man’s poison’ is just a variation of the proverbial Bible saying from some 2600 years ago,
            ‘Woe to those who say of the evil that it is good and of the good that it is evil; who present darkness as light and light as darkness, who present bitter as sweet and sweet as bitter. Woe to those who are wise in their own eyes, and in their own estimation, of profound understanding.’

            The Reality of the World TODAY is People just don’t know what to believe in anymore that’s a surety!

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            1. Ray, I am having trouble with your last sentence….People just don’t know what to believe in anymore that’s a surety!….would you say that its a surety that your fellow Bracing Views commenters don’t know what to believe anymore?
               Sure, we question a lot of what we read on the internet, but we surely know what’s right and wrong, and from experience who and what to believe. And insist on proof of the things we believe. And know that believing things purely on faith without evidence has the potential to lead us down the wrong path. We, including you my friend, need to give ourselves credit for that.

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            2. Believe in Bracing Views.

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9. Just plagiarizing (corrupting maybe) a few sentences from that authors piece…..

   “The strategy of Assange’s cult…….will drive government and the Pentagon, and the military industrial complex, into further degrees of secrecy……… which will make it more corrupt.”

   I’ve been thinking about that!

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10. Thank you for posting this. Truer words were never spoken. Chris Hedges is one of my heroes.

    What is to be done? Only time will tell.

    In the meantime, keep up the good work, Bill!

    I read your Bracing Views because it expresses the OUTRAGE that’s missing, sadly, from TomDispatch.

    Gore Vidal, when asked, “What gets you up in the morning. What keeps you going?” replied, “RAGE!” That’s kind of what keeps me reading, and proofing, and going on and on… And you know who said, “Rage, rage, against the dying of the light…”

    Peace & Love, Chris

    >

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    1. Thanks, Chris.

       Hedges is our modern day Cassandra. His warnings are important but no one in power seems to care.

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11. Economics 101 in simple language most could understand if they read it carefully, and really cared about where this World is heading with Them, Family and Friends in it?

    https://portside.org/2022-10-09/destiny-civilization-michael-hudson-finance-capitalism-economic-consequences-ukraine-and

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12. The mainstream British media ignored or underreported the extraordinary event. The Independent said only “hundreds” of people showed up, as did The Daily Mail. The Guardian, The Times, The Sunday Times had no report at all. The BBC hasn’t had a story about Assange since July 1.

    (6) of the major media companies in the UK have declared Julian guilty! Coincidence maybe? Nope! Any further proceedings will be a “Kangaroo Court”. “Show Trial” as it’s called in the USA

    A show trial is a public trial in which the judicial authorities have already determined the guilt or innocence of the defendant. The actual trial has as its only goal the presentation of both the accusation and the verdict to the public so they will serve as both an impressive example and a warning to other would-be dissidents or transgressors.

    Very sadly the poor guy’s goose is cooked*. He offended too many people in too many in high places.

    Your ‘goose is cooked’ coming from the Czech legend referring to the burning of the Christian reformer and priest John Hus.

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13. Bill, I posted a link to Michael Hudson saying in 2015, the year after the 2014 US Coup in Ukraine, the US was funding Nazis.
    Posting the comment and link it did not appear here. Refreshing the page and posting it again I get the message it was already posted and it still hasn’t appeared on this page as comments usually do.

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    1. trying again

       Micheal Hudson in 2015 explains US funding Nazis in Ukraine pic.twitter.com/jGFvLo68H9

       — nuclear war avoider (@TrumanBurrbank) October 9, 2022

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       1. I just came across this 2018 analysis of the 2014 US Coup in Ukraine and Generally, I agree with it.
          The US/CIA has made Coups/regime change of governments that don’t toe the US line as American as Apple Pie!

          This will document that the ‘new Cold War’ between the U.S. and Russia did not start, as the Western myth has it, with Russia’s involvement in the breakaway of Crimea and Donbass from Ukraine, after Ukraine — next door to Russia — had suddenly turned rabidly hostile toward Russia in February 2014.

          Ukraine’s replacing its democratically elected neutralist Government in February 2014, by a rabidly anti-Russian Government, was a violent event, which produced many corpses.
          It’s presented in The West as having been a ‘revolution’ instead of a coup; but whatever it was, it certainly generated the ‘new Cold War’ (the economic sanctions and NATO buildup on Russia’s borders); and, to know whether it was a coup, or instead a revolution, is to know what actually started the ‘new Cold War’, and why. So, this is historically very important………………………………………………………………….

          https://moderndiplomacy.eu/2018/06/04/how-and-why-the-u-s-government-perpetrated-the-2014-coup-in-ukraine/

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          1. As the saying goes Ray – there is nothing new under the sun.

             What few people know today is that Henry Ford, not only held deeply prejudiced personal views but also became one of Hitler’s key American friends in the years before the war……. Ford’s views were more than just a private matter—they translated into real-world action that had a major effect on Germany’s military preparedness before World War II. Certainly, Ford was far from the only American businessman who was enticed by Nazi Germany. His rival—General Motors—had a German division of its own and manufactured aircraft parts for the Luftwaffe.

             https://www.thehistoryreader.com/us-history/hitlers-american-friends-henry-ford-and-nazism/

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14. Sure Julian Assange may not be guilty of committing any LEGAL crimes – but he committed the ultimate crime of exposing the human weaknesses of too many of his fellow human beings. And he is finding out that what goes around comes around. And I feel very sorry for him.

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15. The Independent has 478,000 subscribers on YouTube.
    But as of the 11/10/2022(in New Zealand) – ONLY a pathetic 6,754 views Worldwide!
    100’s ??? they report.
    What does that tell us? Anything?

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    1. This one got 1,899 views! Depressingly pathetic.

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       1. https://consortiumnews.com/2022/10/10/watch-cn-lives-coverage-of-dc-assange-rally/
          1,290 views for this consortiumnews Article on the Assange rally.
          Pretty discouraging!

          Out of the 31% of adults in the United States who are online almost constantly as of February 2021.
          https://www.statista.com/statistics/497040/usa-adults-online-constantly-ethnicity/

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16. Donald Trump meeting the Queen at Buckingham Palace got 393,266 views!

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17. This Chris Hedges speech at DOJ, that Bill posted here, has only 21,640 views on its most watched YouTube video this morning, and 766(!) on one other that has been demonetized. (At least that’s what the TouTube search algorithm is giving this internet surfer)
    Do these numbers prove anything to my fellow Bracing Views commenters? Are internet viewers way more interested in Trump than Julian Assange by a factor of 20:1?

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18. I’m happy to see that Consortium and Common Dreams also published Hedges article and I presume there are others. It’s important that a lot of people read it. What he has to say about the CIA is accurate but I suspect most people reading it will think it is overblown. It’s not!! There is a book out called “Operation Gladio – the unholy alliance between the Vatican, the CIA, and the Mafia” by Paul Williams published in 2018.
    Allen Dulles and his brother John hated communism and Russia so much that they (especially Allen who created the CIA after WWII) built into that organization a profound hatred which has continued to this day. Anything that smacked of socialism or communism had to be eradicated. Truman let Dulles do what he wanted with his new agency patterned slightly after the OSS which Dulles also ran, but Truman didn’t fund the new agency, so Dulles had to find money for his plans and he settled on drugs as the quickest and easiest way – siphoning drugs into Harlem and soon had a scourge of addicts there. It was so successful that as Dulles plans grew so did the drug trade and soon not just millions but billions were coming in. What to do with the money? How to hide it from bank audits, how to launder it? Dulles turned to the Italian Mafia which in turn turned him on to the Pope and the Vatican’s system of banking, so with the agreement of the pope and every pope since, except maybe the last, the Vatican banks were used to launder billions.
    Yes, “Operation Gladio” describes with well documented footnotes hows the CIA essentially has run the world drug trade. When one area growing poppies etc. grew thin, they would switch to another area. Afghanistan is one; it wasn’t always a major poppy grower, but the CIA turned it into that before and during the period Russia was trying to subdue the land.
    When Hedges says the CIA is an evil government unto itself, essentially detached from our regular government, he is speaking reality. It’s time the citizens of this country woke up and spoke up!

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    1. RANNEY, people have been saying the CIA is corrupt and should be abolished for longer that I lived in America. A long time! Whole books have been written about their malfeasance. The CIA in the drug trade – pfffft! – movies (Air America) have been made chronicling the CIA-financed airline to transport drug hauls in Cambodia, Laos and South Vietnam during the Vietnam War. Nearly 50-years ago! Thats a long time for “this country woke up and spoke up” eh! When are Americans going to find out what the CIA budget is?Neither the number of employees nor the size of the Agency’s “black” budget can be publicly disclosed.

       Nothing changes! A couple Consortium and Common Dreams articles and speeches in front of the DOJ are surely not more than ingrown toenail to the folks at Langley?

       I am in a pessimistic mood today eh!

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    2. Ranny you may have missed the post in some past article,
       Harry Truman who created the CIA, wanted it hauled in for it’s excesses.
       The Washington Post December 22, 1963 – page A11

       Harry Truman Writes: Limit CIA Role To Intelligence
       By Harry S Truman Copyright, 1963, by Harry S Truman

       INDEPENDENCE, MO., Dec. 21 — I think it has become necessary to take another look at the purpose and operations of our Central Intelligence Agency—CIA. At least, I would like to submit here the original reason why I thought it necessary to organize this Agency during my Administration, what I expected it to do and how it was to operate as an arm of the President. […]
       […]For some time I have been disturbed by the way CIA has been diverted from its original assignment. It has become an operational and at times a policy-making arm of the Government. This has led to trouble and may have compounded our difficulties in several explosive areas.

       I never had any thought that when I set up the CIA that it would be injected into peacetime cloak and dagger operations. Some of the complications and embarrassment I think we have experienced are in part attributable to the fact that this quiet intelligence arm of the President has been so removed from its intended role that it is being interpreted as a symbol of sinister and mysterious foreign intrigue—and a subject for cold war enemy propaganda.

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       1. 59-years ago Ray! Harry Truman wanted the CIA hauled in for it’s excesses! And if I’ve researched this correctly; they are now pissing away over US$80-billion per year. Thank goodness they were hauled in for excesses eh!

          The US intelligence budget comprises all the funding for the 16 (!) agencies of the US Intelligence Community. Divided into two components, the budget funds the National Intelligence Program (NIP) and the Military Intelligence Program (MIP).

          The Director of National Intelligence (DNI) releases the top line amount given to the NIP. It has been on a rising trend with a record budget request in 2021 of US$62.8-billion. This amount excludes the US$20.7 billion for the Military Intelligence Program (MIP).

          In 2007, it was revealed that 70% of the intelligence budget went to defense contracting companies. The largest concentration of computing power in the world is located at an office park near Fort Meade, containing the operations of the various CIA and NSA contracting companies.

          The Director of National Intelligence discloses the aggregate amount of funds appropriated by Congress for the NIP. The press release always includes the following disclaimer: “Any and all subsidiary information concerning the NIP budget, whether the information concerns particular intelligence agencies or particular intelligence programs, will not be disclosed. Beyond the disclosure of the NIP top-line figure, there will be no other disclosures of currently classified NIP budget information, because such disclosures could harm national security. The only exceptions to the foregoing are for unclassified appropriations, primarily for the Community Management Account.”

          Its outa control whichever way you look at it eh!

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          1. Ray, I wonder if President Joe Biden has ever thought for more than 5-minutes whether it has become necessary to take another look at the purpose of the CIA? Worrying by the way it has been diverted from its original assignment and become a policy-making arm of the Government?

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    3. “The documents revealed that interrogators-in-training lined up to take turns experimenting on him, including one CIA-approved technique called “walling”, in which the detainee’s heels are placed against a plywood wall “which had flexibility to it”, and a rolled-up towel was put around their neck. The detainee is then repeatedly slammed into the wall by their collar. Baluchi was naked during the interrogation.”

       https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/ailing-guantanamo-detainees-legal-battle-medical-care

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19. Am I being a skeptic – but doesn’t this illustrate the futility of 21,640 people who are going to overthrow the corporate state and create a government of the people, by the people and for the people, that will cherish, rather than persecute, the best among us? Pie in the sky stuff? Most of this people are more interested in getting a Taxi out of there!
    And you know, I like and agree with Chris’s incredible intellect, but he has been ending his rousing speech’s (preaching to the Choir if you will) with the same rhetoric for years now! Defund the FBI and Homeland Security! Yeah! Revolution! Yeah! Overthrow! Yeah! Or am I just getting old and jaded?

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20. A pair of “powerless” poetic polemics (almost a decade apart now) :

    (1)

    “The Ship of State leaks from the top” — U.S. President John F. Kennedy

    “Kill the chicken, scare the monkey” — Ancient Chinese proverb

    Free Bradley Manning (in forty-four syllables)

    Petulant President
    Barack Obama who
    Hates him some leakers (just
    Not from the top),
    Makes an example of
    Low-level privates so
    Cabinet ministers
    Don’t have to stop.

    Michael Murry, “The Misfortune Teller,” Copyright © 2012

    (2)

    “Blame, in every case, appears to be a modification, often accompanied by a transference, or “projection” of the primary feeling of self-reproach” — Charles Sanders Peirce

    Stenographers’ Assange Envy

    Julian languishes,
    Rotting in prison while
    Those he exposed speak of
    “Character flaws”
    Which they attribute to
    Him while they trample on
    Every last vestige of
    Freedom and “Laws.”

    Julian published the
    Truth about governments’
    Wars and corruption and
    Criminal lies,
    Things other “journalists”
    Should have uncovered, too,
    But since they didn’t they
    Hope that he dies.

    Michael Murry, “The Misfortune Teller,” Copyright © 2021

    LikeLiked by 1 person

21. Dennis and Ray, thank you for your comments. Ray I knew Truman was not happy with the CIA after it got started, but I hadn’t seen the quotes you provided, too bad he didn’t just take it out or did the quotes come after he was out of office?
    Dennis, I know people have been complaining about the CIA for years and we all saw the movie Air America but that implied that the CIA running drugs in Viet Nam was a one shot, but I was trying to point out that it wasn’t, that the CIA has been running drugs for the world for a long time and has made billions and the money was hidden in Vatican banks which I think is not something that is commonly known. In any event, I was pointing out that Hedges remarks calling the CIA an evil institution is accurate though not a description most Americans would use. I’m suggesting that they should start using it regularly, and maybe something would begin to change.

    LikeLiked by 2 people

22. 72,755 views! Thats more like it!
    John Bolton is WAY more evil than Julian ever was!
    Bolton the war criminal lecturing anyone on morality.
    Guilty until proven innocent in his opinion.

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23. Ron Paul speeks up on war:

    “Last week the New York Times ran a shocking article claiming that the US intelligence community believes the Ukrainian government to be responsible for the August attack that killed Darya Dugina, the daughter of a prominent Russian philosopher.

    Surely the established narrative that Ukraine is a model western democracy standing strong for our shared values against an aggressive Russian invader is damaged with reporting that Kiev conducted an al-Qaeda style attack on an innocent civilian inside Russia. The murder of Dugina was a textbook definition of terrorism, which is, “the use of violence or the threat of violence, especially against civilians, in the pursuit of political goals.”

    Just over a month later, the Nord Stream pipelines were blown up, seemingly ending at least in the near term the possibility that Germany may find a way to save its economy by mending fences with its main energy supplier. A leading Polish politician thanked the US for doing the job.

    Then over the weekend, the bridge connecting mainland Russia to Crimea was bombed, killing at least six civilians and leaving part of the bridge under water. Traffic was restored hours after the attack, but Russian President Vladimir Putin placed the blame on Ukraine’s intelligence service. We all know that Ukraine relies on its US masters, so we can assume the US provided the intelligence allowing the targeting of the bridge.

    There is a pattern here. More and more brazen attacks are being launched against Russia and Washington is doing little to hide US fingerprints. Why?”

    “The time to end US participation in this war is yesterday. And if it takes millions of Americans in the streets peacefully protesting while demanding that their representatives stop this madness, then bring it on. Tomorrow may be too late.”

    https://original.antiwar.com/paul/2022/10/10/its-time-to-tell-biden-we-say-no-to-nuclear-war/

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24. Sorry Bill, two off-topic posts in a row. But indirectly addressing Chris Hedges’ 3rd paragraph:

    “Vladimir Putin’s decision to mobilize reserves for the war in Ukraine has stirred feelings around the world. The former politician and Russian opposition leader Gennady Gudkov posted an aerial view of a 15-lane desert highway with a traffic jam pushing into the horizon. “I am being told,” Gudkov wrote, “this is the [Russian] border with Mongolia on September 22. Be sure to zoom in to examine the picture.” Multiple large vehicles, perhaps buses, were mingled among sedans, suggesting that we are witnessing some sort of mass evacuation of Russians unwilling to serve in Ukraine.

    A day earlier I saw the same picture passed on by a Russian blue-check account (I forgot which) claiming that it was the Russia-Kazakhstan border. But, as any resident of the Western United States knows, the photograph, which as of this writing is still available for viewing on Twitter, is of neither. It’s the road to the Burning Man festival in the Nevada desert, and the large vehicles are the RVs in which revelers intend to stay at the event.”

    https://www.theamericanconservative.com/dont-buy-the-narrative-on-ukraine/

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    1. US WAR Propaganda points to Putin’s partial mobilization September 21 to deploy 300,000 additional troops as Russian escalation.
       That’s one more example TRUTH is the 1st casualty of WAR with so many SINS of Historical OMISSION in their non stop demonization of Putin.

       In the Timeline, NATO announced it will increase high-readiness force to ‘well over’ 300,000 troops 3 months earlier on June 27, thereby escalating the already tense and volatile situation.

       As President of Russia, Putin had no choice but to match that increase of NATO troops in the Vassal States of Eastern Europe. NATO made him do it.

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    2. Those Russians are no different than the masses of Americans who fled the US and came to CanaDa to escape the US Draft for the Vietnam WAR.

       US and Russian Youth don’t want to be forced to randomly kill People they don’t even know, while those running the WAR, both Military & Civilian, stay safely behind the Lines enjoying all the comforts.

       Americans have been brainwashed to believe they’re exceptional, always the Good guys 100% of the Time in it’s dealings in this Material World and all those who oppose the morally superior US are the evil liars.

       American Christianity has also fallen in that delusion. The Bible! The Bible they say, is the Word of God and the People and Nations have to do what it says. There’s no distinction. God is One Word, and the Bible has 735,127 words.

       The US is the BIGGEST ARMS MERCHANT in the History of Nations and this WAR is good for US Business and jobs over here, as long as the People are killed with American Weapons ‘over there.
       The American Christian Establishment supports that Status Quo despite these 18 words in all Bibles, “‘Not by military force and not by physical strength, but by My spirit,’ says the Lord of Hosts.”

       Americans are so brainwashed, there are no Peace Maker Children of God coming out of the closet as they Praise The Lord but pass the ammunition.

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25. WATCH: CN Live!’s Coverage of DC Assange Rally

    Protestors circled the Justice Dept. building in Washington with a 240-foot long yellow ribbon and then heard Jill Stein, Chris Hedges, John Kiriakou, Scott Ritter, Randy Credico and others speak out for Assange.
    https://consortiumnews.com/2022/10/10/watch-cn-lives-coverage-of-dc-assange-rally/

    WORLD-WIDE BACKING AS PARLIAMENT ENCIRCLED FOR ASSANGE [Includes video[
    Protests around the world supported the human chain that formed around the British parliament in support of an imprisoned publisher, reports Mohamed Elmaazi.
    https://consortiumnews.com/2022/10/09/world-wide-backing-as-parliament-encircled-for-assange/

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    1. There are 1,579 views of this 1st consortiumviews link as I type here.
       And 5,009 of the 2nd
       There are 253,768,092 adults in the US. 81% are on the internet everyday = 205,552,154.
       So that is 0.003% of US adults have chosen to watch these links on Julian Assange’s plight.

       If this old Engineer has pushed his calculator correctly.

       (For interest sake: 1,273,773 viewed this The Sun YouTube video: Ukrainian Ground Forces destroy Russian tanks with precision strikes – I know its a different audience population)

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       1. And Your point being….. ?

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          1. Just statistics Jeff
             Draw your own conclusions.
             if indeed there are conclusions to be drawn.

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       2. Maybe Your point is that Americans don’t give a shit about the Lies, Scams, Hoaxes, and Shams their Government and its Media passes off as “Information,” “Crises,” and “Policy.”

          And that they haven’t given a shit about any of that since 9/11: Saddam’s “WMDs,” the 2008 “Too-Big-To-Fail” financial “¢risi$,” Clapper’s lies to Congress about NSA surveillance of Americans, POTUS Maxximmuss XLV, The COVID Event, Election2020 and January 6, and now Ukraine [actually since 2014], and soon Taiwan.

          A nation and a people get the Government it and they deserve, and for our sins, we now have this one.

          If You don’t want Your Daughters and their Children to live in Orwell’s 1984 updated for 21st century America, Dennis, You need to hope and pray that Assange, Snowden, and All the Whistleblowers are set free.

          LikeLiked by 1 person

          1. And MAYBE a conclusion to be drawn is that all of us who immerse ourselves in this alternate media stuff every waking minute of our day make the mistake of thinking that everybody thinks as we do about these issues.

             In fact, there many many well educated people who think that the fate of Assange and Snowden makes very little difference to their daily existence and well being. Snowden went to Russia 10-years ago next year. Maybe things have changed because of his actions – maybe they have not.

             Snowden has been variously called a traitor, a hero, a whistleblower, a dissident, a coward, and a patriot. It depends on how you look at things and your perspective. And everybody, including you and me, looks at it differently.

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             1. Many ignorant people think that the fate of Assange, Snowden, and the rest of the Whistleblowers makes little difference in their world as well, Dennis.

                And i doubt that anybody who IS concerned about America’s War On Whistleblowers and America’s Future does not know very well that very few people think like they/we do.

                That’s a big part of why this Government has been able to get away with the Lies, Hoaxes, Scams, and Shams it has since 9/11, and will continue to get away with them.

                And it doesn’t matter what Snowden has been called by anybody: especially in the Government, its Media, Academia, and other agents of its Propaganda [the whole MICCMATT]. The simple fact is that he exposed just a very small portion of those Lies, Hoaxes, Scams, and Shams.

                My guess is that the overwhelming majority of the American people DO NOT WANT TO KNOW the Facts, the Realities, and the Truths about exactly what their Government has been doing for these past 21 years and is doing now.

                Or as Colonel Jessup put it: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9FnO3igOkOk

                LikeLiked by 1 person

             2. Researching whistleblower Daniel Ellsburg I found this Gem addressing a subject covered here in the Bracing Views comment thread in the last week….

                “According to Ellsberg the “nuclear football” carried by an aide near the US president at all times is primarily a piece of political theater, a hoax, to keep the public ignorant of the real problems of nuclear command and control”

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                1. And speaking of whistleblower Ellsburg: While employed by the RAND Corporation, Ellsberg precipitated a national political controversy in 1971 when he released the Pentagon Papers, a top-secret Pentagon study of the U.S. government decision-making in relation to the Vietnam War, to The New York Times, The Washington Post and other newspapers.

                   On January 3, 1973, Ellsberg was charged under the Espionage Act of 1917 along with other charges of theft and conspiracy, carrying a total maximum sentence of 115 years. Because of governmental misconduct and illegal evidence-gathering, (irrespective of whether he had broken the law) Judge William Matthew Byrne Jr. dismissed all charges against Ellsberg on May 11, 1973.

                   That was 50-years next year Jeff. Has anything changed because of his brave actions? In fact in 2008 he admitted to this revealing fact:

                   “The public is lied to every day by the President, by his spokespeople, by his officers. If you can’t handle the thought that the President lies to the public for all kinds of reasons, you couldn’t stay in the government at that level, or you’re made aware of it, a week. … The fact is Presidents rarely say the whole truth—essentially, never say the whole truth—of what they expect and what they’re doing and what they believe and why they’re doing it and rarely refrain from lying, actually, about these matters” Conversations with History: Daniel Ellsberg – University of California Television (UCTV)

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                   1. Some things changed after The Pentagon Papers blew the cover on the whole Vietnam GoatFuck: specifically, The War Powers Resolution of 1973 [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/War_Powers_Resolution ] and The Church Committee in 1975 [ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Church_Committee ].

                      The War Powers Resolution actually worked for almost twenty years until, as Pappy Bush put it, we “licked the Vietnam Syndrome” by “liberating” Kuwait in 1990, and setting up the Chess Board for 9/11 and The Forever War.

                      And the Church Committee probably had some effect until the 80s when Bozo turned Ollie North loose with his cocaine, Contras, and dealings with Iran; and we turned Saddam loose for our Holy war against The Great Satan in Tehran.

                      LikeLiked by 1 person

26. “Strange Fruit”: https://scheerpost.com/2022/10/11/strange-fruit/

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27. THE U.S. IS LEADING THE WORLD INTO THE ABYSS by Edward Curtin

    A few years after WW I, the poet T.S. Eliot opened his famous poem “The Wasteland” with these words: “April is the cruelest month … “ I think he may be wrong, for this October may be the cruelest month of all, followed by November. Unprecedented. You can hear the clicking and grating of spades if your antennae are attuned.

    We are on the brink of ominous events created by the U.S. war against Russia. Yet so many people prefer to turn away and swallow the lies that the U.S. wants peace and not war and is the aggrieved party in the crisis.

    A friend of mine, who is constantly charging me with having turned right-wing because of my writing that accuses many traditional liberal/leftists of buying the national security state’s propaganda on the JFK assassination, “9/11,” Syria, Ukraine, Covid-19, censorship, the “New” Cold War, etc., and whose go-to news sources are The Guardian, CNN, The New York Times, NPR, ABC, seems oblivious to the fact that RIGHT AND LEFT HAVE BECOME USELESS TERMS AND THAT THESE MEDIA ARE ALL MOUTHPIECES FOR THE CIA AND THEIR INTELLIGENCE ALLIES IN THE NEW COLD WAR; THAT THE SO-CALLED RIGHT AND LEFT ARE JOINED AT THE HIP WITH THEIR OBSESSION WITH PAX AMERICANA.

    THERE ARE NO RIGHT AND LEFT ANYMORE; THERE ARE ONLY FREE AND INDEPENDENT VOICES OR THOSE OF THE CAGED PARROTS REPEATING WHAT THEY HAVE BEEN TAUGHT TO SAY:

    “POLLY WANTS A WAR!” “POLLY WANTS A WAR.”

    Continued at https://www.globalresearch.ca/us-leading-world-into-abyss/5795887 [EMPHASIS added.]

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    1. Extract:

       Today we can ask: Where have all the artists gone?

       We know that the U.S. has, for the time being, abandoned sending hundreds of thousands of troops into another country; now it is drones, air warfare, special forces, the CIA, mercenaries, terrorists, and intermediaries such as the Ukrainian conscripts, Azov Nazis, and NATO surrogates. Such was the lesson of Vietnam when the draft led to massive protests and resistance. Now war is waged less obviously and the propaganda is more extensive and constant as a result of digital media.

       There are many such examples of U.S. treachery, most notably the attacks of September 11, 2001, but such history is only open to those who take it upon themselves to investigate.

       Now there is the corrupt Ukrainian U.S. puppet government, which is nearly 6,000 miles from the United States, and must be defended from Russian “aggression,” just like the corrupt South Vietnamese U.S. puppet government was.

       TO THOSE WHO BUY THE MASS MEDIA PROPAGANDA, I ASK: WHY IS THE U.S.A. ALWAYS FIGHTING TO KILL PEOPLE SO FAR FROM ITS SHORES?

       DOESN’T IT SOUND A BIT ODD THAT OUR WONDERFUL LEADERS DESTROYED LIBYA, VIETNAM, SERBIA, THE PHILIPPINES, IRAQ, SYRIA, AFGHANISTAN, ETC., COUNTRIES SO FAR AWAY, AND NOW THAT RUSSIA DEFENDS ITSELF FROM U.S./NATO ENCROACHMENT A FEW MILES FROM ITS BORDERS, IT IS ACCUSED OF BEING THE EVIL AGGRESSORS AND VLADIMIR PUTIN CALLED ANOTHER HITLER LIKE ALL THE LEADERS OF THE COUNTRIES WE ATTACKED?

       Have you completely lost your ability to think? Or do you, like little children, actually believe the disembodied newsreaders who deliver your prepackaged television propaganda? [EMPHASIS added.]

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28. Thats a great piece of writing Jeff.
    But it’s not only the USs’ wonderful leaders. Or only the US mass media that propagate this propoganda.
    Our allies, the UK, has been at for years. And the French. And the…oh never mind! And still are to this day!

    1,342,755 views actually believe the disembodied newsreaders who delivered this prepackaged television propaganda in this example from our British comrades in arms! (A far stretch from the truth being put out on YouTube today by Alexander Mercouris who got a comparatively measly 128,000 viewers)

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    1. What’s the surprise about the British, French, Russian, Chinese, etc Medias being the Propaganda Wings of their Governments and their respective Ruling Political Classes? That’s what Main Stream Medias do.

       And except on very rare occasion, that is what MSMs have always done.

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29. While we are looking at numbers today……
    A review of the great ConsortiumNews website with Joe Lauria, John Pilger, Chris Hedges, Alexander Mercouris, Ray McGovern, Gareth Porter, Max Blumenthal, and Caitlin Johnstones – is kinda depressing.

    It’s most read article in months has been Chris Hedges: ‘The Greatest Evil is War’.
    10, 586 views (and with 25 comments.)
    0.0051% of American adults on the internet read it.

    The daily “fluff” rag, USA Today, has a 2,600,000 digital and print daily circulation. The largest in the US.
    1.2648% of American adult readers.
    250 times that of ConsortiumNews!

    The 10 most-watched cable news shows for June 2022, as per live-plus-same-day data from Nielsen.
    (The so-called Mainstream media?)

    1.Fox News | 5 p.m. /The Five: 3,142,000
    2.Fox News | 8 p.m. / Tucker Carlson Tonight: 3,068,000
    3.Fox News | 7 p.m./ Jesse Watters Primetime: 2,571,000
    4.Fox News | 9 p.m./ Hannity: 2,555,000
    5.Fox News | 6 p.m. / Special Report with Bret Baier: 2,312,000
    6.Fox News | 10 p.m./The Ingraham Angle: 2,124,000
    7.MSNBC | 9 p.m./The Rachel Maddow Show: 2,124,000
    8.Fox News | 11 p.m./Gutfeld!: 1,952,000
    9.Fox News | 12 p.m. / Outnumbered: 1,723,000
    10. Fox News | 9-10 a.m./10-11 a.m./America’s Newsroom: 1,566,000

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    1. 500 times more Americans watch Hannity on any day than read a ConsortiumNews article!

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       1. The chances of you finding another American who has read a John Pilger ConsortiumNews article…
          1 in 1,022!

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30. Definitely not the Mainstream Media.
    Colonel Richard Black. Ret US Air Force.
    Only 5, 556 views – so discouraging!

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    1. The maverick tennis pro Jimmy Connors proclaimed his personal credo quite some time ago: “One man in the right is a majority.”

       As Charles Sanders Peirce wrote in his canonical essay The Fixation of Belief (Popular Science Monthly, November 1877): “the true conclusion would remain true if we had no impulse to accept it; and the false one would remain false, though we could not resist the tendency to believe in it.”

       In other words, Truth — or Reality — does not depend on whether anyone believes in it or not. The Truth would still be true even if no one believed in it, while Falsehood would remain false even if everyone believed in it. It helps not to let a comfortable conformity with the crowd dull the search for Truth — meaning Reality — no matter how lonely and unpopular that search may seem at times.

       LikeLiked by 1 person

       1. Richard Black served as a pilot in the US Marines during the Vietnam War, earning the Purple Heart medal.He flew 269 combat helicopter missions with HMM-362, which operated out of Ky Ha, Vietnam.

          From 11 February to 17 June 1967, he served as Forward Air Controller (FAC) for the 1st Marine Regiment, making 70 combat patrols in the jungle. He engaged in intense combat around Nui Loc Son in April 1967. He received the Navy Commendation Medal with “V” for valor, while serving as FAC for 2nd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment. Lt. Black volunteered to join Fox Company, 1st Marines, which held the ridgeline at Nui Loc Son—an extremely dangerous and remote outpost in the Que Son Valley.

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       2. Thanks Michael. Jimmy Connors was the man!

          LikeLiked by 1 person

       3. 

          LikeLiked by 1 person

    2. The flag over Mr Black’s left shoulder represents the U.S. Marine Corps, in which he served from 1963-1970. He also served later in the U.S. Army from 1976-1994 (active duty and reserves). Nothing about the Air Force in his biography. His brief remarks do correspond to reality concerning tactical minutiae at the moment in one area the Ukrainian (i.e., NATO-Russian) battlefield. For American and European audiences, such exposure still constitutes something of a rarity.

       LikeLiked by 1 person

31. “Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov on Tuesday said that Moscow was open to talks with Western powers as Turkey is looking to broker negotiations.

    Lavrov also said that Russia would consider a meeting between Russian President Vladimir Putin and President Biden if one was proposed. “We have repeatedly said that we never refuse meetings. If there is a proposal, then we will consider it,” he said.

    A potential venue for talks between Biden and Putin could be the sidelines of the upcoming summit of G20 leaders that will be held in mid-November in Indonesia. But according to Lavrov, Russia has not received any serious proposals from the US to negotiate.

    The US was quick to dismiss Lavrov’s comments, accusing him of “posturing” and calling for Russia to stop launching strikes across Ukraine. “We see this as posturing. We do not see this as a constructive, legitimate offer to engage in the dialogue and diplomacy that is absolutely necessary to see an end to this brutal war of aggression,” State Department spokesman Ned Price said”.

    https://news.antiwar.com/2022/10/11/lavrov-says-russia-open-to-talks-with-the-west-us-dismisses-his-comments/

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    1. Typical US posture. You do what we say and then we’ll talk!

       LikeLiked by 1 person

       1. Let’s negotiate! Here is what we are going to decide.

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          1. What I meant was… Lets negotiate. Provided we agree beforehand that I get 95% and you get 5%.
             Or, we agree beforehand that I get the gold mine, you get the shaft!

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32. “Every civilization carries the seeds of its own destruction, and the same cycle shows in them all. The Republic is born, flourishes, decays into plutocracy, and is captured by the shoemaker whom the mercenaries and millionaires make into a king. The people invent their oppressors, and the oppressors serve the function for which they are invented.” – Mark Twain in Eruption

    http://www.twainquotes.com/Civilization.html

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    1. “Every generalization is dangerous, especially this one.” Mark Twain.

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33. “If Assange hadn’t published evidence of me fixing primaries and lying, I’d be running the country right now. He has to answer for that!” – Hillary Clinton, 2019

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34. Naturally, I would pay much closer attention to the subsequent unfolding events than most People, because of this record in my Curriculum Vitae published by The Kansas City Times September 13, 1976 with a followup on ALL SOULS DAY, November 2, 1976,
    “He came to town for the Republican National Convention and will stay until the election in November TO DO GOD’S BIDDING: To tell the World, from Kansas City, this country has been found wanting and its days are numbered […] He gestured toward a gleaming church dome. “The gold dome is the symbol of BABYLON,” he said.” […] He wanted to bring to the Public’s attention an “idea being put out subtly and deceptively” by the government that we have to get prepared for a War with Russia.”

    That 1976 FUTURE is NOW with the Revelation of the details GENERALLY unfolding in the spirit of the letter.
    The World is waking up to see Americans may hasten “its days are numbered” part of the 1976 Vision, and waits with bated breath.

    With the benefit of 45 years hindsight, the last 8 years of intensified FBI, Military, Intelligence and Think Tank “experts” on TV constantly, unanimously, demonizing Putin and Russia, with no dissent allowed, the People have been prepared.

    With that context, Dave Smith is stating what I came to believe independently from him, and before this video with Joe Rogan was made.

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35. This site will not allow posting the link to Caitlin’s Newsletter, ‘US Rejection Of Moscow’s Offer For Peace Talks Is Utterly Inexcusable’

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    1. It also will not allow posting the link to an RT article about reporting Tulsi Gabbards speech that she was quitting the Democratic Party. I tried 3-times.

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    2. I’ll try it on my New Zealand server Ray.
       https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2022/10/12/us-rejection-of-moscows-offer-for-peace-talks-is-utterly-inexcusable/

       LikeLiked by 1 person

36. Caitlin Johnstone on the Biden administration’s rejection of talks with Russia:
    https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2022/10/12/us-rejection-of-moscows-offer-for-peace-talks-is-utterly-inexcusable/

    LikeLiked by 1 person

    1. Thanks for posting the link, Bill. It’s weird how that happens from Time to Time. I tried to post it 3 times and pressing post comment, it doesn’t post and the page goes to the top.

       Maybe your site has gremlins on certain topics?

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37. Tulsi Gabbard on why she quit the Democratic Party
    https://www.npr.org/2022/10/12/1128307544/tulsi-gabbard-democratic-party

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    1. Thanks Bill.

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    2. Former congresswoman and 2020 presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard has announced she is leaving the Democratic party.

       “I can no longer remain in today’s Democratic party,” she said on an episode of her podcast. “It’s now under the complete control of an elitist cabal of warmongers, driven by cowardly wokeness…”

       Gabbard additionally accused the party of “stoking anti-white racism,” being contemptuous toward religion and police and driving the country closer to nuclear war.

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38. The Hypocrisy of the “World’s Policeman” does not go unnoticed by the rest of the World.
    If Julian Assange had of revealed Russian crimes rather than American crimes he would have a Nobel Prize
    Let’s willfully ignore that we never heard of Julian Assange and pretending that the US and its esteemed allies are the paragons of freedom and human rights.

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39. ‘U.S. in Damning Admission of Long-Planning War Against Russia’

    October 11, 2022: Information Clearing House — The United States and its allies are guilty of perpetrating a deliberate war of aggression against Russia that has long been in the planning works.

    A study by the Rand Corporation published more than three years ago demonstrates incontestably that the war in Ukraine is in fact the manifestation of a bigger willful confrontation against Russia whereby the United States is attempting to weaken and subjugate Moscow.

    What is happening is without doubt the culmination of U.S. long-held planning. That puts a wholly different meaning on the current conflict in the Ukraine – now in its eighth month. This is not, as the Western governments and media would make out, an “unprovoked” assault on Ukraine and “Western democratic values” by “Russian aggression”. The conflict has been deliberately fomented, stoked and now exacerbated by policy choices made by Washington and its NATO partners……………………………….

    http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/57277.htm

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40. Much of what Tulsi says about the Democrats is true — but it’s also true (in a different way) of Republicans. I think she exaggerates the whole “woke” thing, the alleged demonization of police, the idea that Democrats believe in “open borders,” and so on.

    In short, I’m disappointed that Tulsi is hitting so many talking points that are beloved by the Fox News crowd. But that’s where she appears now, Fox News, so I guess you learn to preach to your fans …

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    1. In a similar vein, I had this exchange with Richard Falk on his latest article, ‘Protesting Mahsa Amini’s Tragic Death in Iran’
       What made me reply was reading this line, “What I find most disturbing about the main media approach in the West is its total failure to discuss…………..”

       Taking it as the opening segue, I posted, “Richard, while Mahsa Amini’s Death is tragic, what I find most disturbing about the main media approach in the West is its total failure to discuss Shireen Abu Aqleh killed by a ‘seemingly well-aimed’ Israeli bullet.
       Review finds Al Jazeera journalist was not hit by firing from Palestinians, as was initially claimed by Israel.

       Shireen Abu Aqleh was clearly marked as PRESS when an IDF sniper shot her.

       Why does Israel get a free pass from Western Press for all it’s indignities to Palestinians with it’s shoot to kill policy?

       Professor Falk’s reply, “Hi Ray: You and I both know the answer, and I should have noted the hypocrisy involved. Human rights have become a geopolitical policy tool with which to whip enemies and spare friends.”

       https://richardfalk.org/2022/10/09/protesting-mahsa-aminis-tragic-death-in-iran/

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    2. I suppose the undeniable fact Bill is politics is a popularity game.
       A numbers game. You have to get the votes.

       When Tucker Carlson on Fox gets 3,068,000 viewers per night..
       …and Rachel Maddow, with views maybe more in line with Tulsi’s political philosophy, gets 2,104,000.
       Thats over 1,000,000 potential voters per night that can’t get to know you.

       And nowadays, with the two parties being so alike, does it really matter if you get elected as a D or an R?

       And frankly, this lifelong lefty is finding I’m more attracted to the elephants rather than the do-nothing donkeys every day. Shoot, seems like the R’s are more anti-war than the D’s. Look at Richard Black the retired Republican Senator from Wyoming – he’s my kind of candidate as far as being anti-war – and a lot of the other “woke” nonsense. Compare with Patty Murray (D) from WA who has never met a weapons spending bill she can’t approve of. And will die on the job the way she is going!

       The question is – can Tulsi Gabbard do as good for us Bracing Views readers running as an R? Or I guess, firstly, does she have a better chance getting elected in Honolulu as an R? Or is she running as an Independent? Running as an Independent in Hawaii would seem to be…let’s say, not a winning strategy.

       Wiki says……Gabbard’s domestic policy platform in her 2020 presidential campaign was economically and socially progressive. After the presidential campaign, she agreed with Republicans on some cultural and social issues. Thats why I like her. More and more of the Democratic Party platform turns me off!

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41. She’s very appealing to me as someone to represent my family.
    I wish her well.
    Illegitimi non carborundum Tulsi – Don’t let the bastards grind you down

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    1. I agree with Tulsi on a lot of issues. But her attack on the Democrats was cartoonish at times. The Dems don’t demonize the police: they fund them. The Dems don’t believe in open borders: Biden is expelling people faster than Trump did.

       Both sides “weaponize” the security state and justice to attack the other for partisan political gain.

       Tulsi is smarter than her video, but I admit that subtlety as well as non-partisan honesty are lost on too many Americans today.

       Certainly, I’d far rather have Tulsi than Harris, Biden, Trump, DeSantis, and Company.

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       1. Lt. Col., I’m told that this is what you are taught in the military when you going to address the troupes.

          TELL EM WHAT YOU ARE GOING TO TELL EM. TELL EM. TELL EM WHAT YOU TOLD EM.

          Tulsi has military upbringing right? LOL

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       2. Tulsi is an aspiring American Politician doing what she needs to do to stay in the news, relevant, and on her donors’ lists.

          And what makes You think, Bill, that Gabbard is not as owned, operated, commanded, and controlled as Harris, Biden, Trump, DeSantis, or any of the rest of those scumbags?

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    2. She posted that back in October, 2020. Has she said anything about Assange more recently?

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42. One point Tulsi makes that’s important. She says she was inspired by Dems who were anti-war during the Vietnam War. Inspired by RFK and MLK. Inspired by a “big tent” party that included workers and their priorities. And she’s right to say that today’s Dems are yesterday’s Republicans: pro-business, pro-war, largely anti-worker. They aren’t close to being the party of 1968 and 1972.

    So she was right to leave the Dem. Party. Except she probably should have left about a decade ago, if not before.

    Because the party that had some interest in RFK and MLK is long dead. As are, by assassination, RFK and MLK.

    LikeLiked by 1 person

    1. RFK and MLK were but one, relatively and effectively minor wing of the Democratic Party at that time; at least when it came to stopping that War.

       That was LBJ’s and his owners’, operators’, commanders’, and controllers’ Party. It was no Republican Congress that gave Johnson a carte blanche to wage and endlessly funded Vietnam after the Lie of Tonkin Gulf.

       And just as a side note: Wasn’t it “Workers” ~ particularly Unionized Workers ~ who were the biggest and loudest supporters of that War? Ie, Nixon’s so-called “Silent Majority”? Which part of that “big tent party” were they part of?

       This was at a KKK rally, but could very well have been shot when some of Tricky Dick’s “Silent Majorityers” showed up at an anti-War protest: https://www.bostonherald.com/wp-content/uploads/migration/2016/03/11/050603busing.jpg?w=1024 .

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43. And here we are getting all depressed about how Julian Assange is being treated:

    “Ammar al-Baluchi, who has spent close to two decades at Guantanamo, has been for years suffering from severe brain damage as a result of his treatment at CIA black sites.

    And despite Guantanamo Bay’s chief medical officer noting earlier this year that the facilities at the detention centre are inadequate in providing complex treatments for the prison’s ailing and ageing population, the Biden administration is continuing to oppose Baluchi’s requests for an independent commission of medical experts to come to the prison and assess his condition.

    Alka Pradhan, Baluchi’s defence lawyer who returned from Guantanamo last week, told Middle East Eye that during her last session with the detainee, his condition was so bad he wasn’t able to read or form complete thoughts.

    “Ammar has brain damage, stemming from his time in the black sites – and the effects of that brain damage have become really pronounced in his cognitive abilities,” Pradhan said.”

    Baluchi, a 44-year-old Kuwaiti national also known as Ali Abdul Aziz Ali, spent more than three years in CIA custody and was moved between a total of six “black sites” before being transferred in 2006 to Guantanamo Bay.”

    https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/ailing-guantanamo-detainees-legal-battle-medical-care

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    1. Exactly who in America is “getting depressed about Assange”? i must have missed that in the News.

       And Baluchi is just one of many, many, many.

       What needs to happen is that the entire surviving senior leadership of the Clinton, Cheney/Bush the Lesser, Obama, Trump, and now Biden regimes need to be sent to Guantanamo themselves, and invited to tell the American people everything they know about 9/11 and everything that has happened since, or get to experience a little bit of that “enhanced interrogation” on their own bodies.

       They need to be invited to tell The Whole, Real, Actual TRUTH about 9/11, or experience the following:

       WHAT THE C.I.A.’S TORTURE PROGRAM LOOKED LIKE TO THE TORTURED: Drawings done in captivity by the first prisoner known to undergo “enhanced interrogation” portray his account of what happened to him in vivid and disturbing ways. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/12/04/us/politics/cia-torture-drawings.html

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       1. I meant Bracing views readers are depressed about Assange.

          Thirty-six men remain held at Guantanamo Bay, 20 of whom have been approved for transfer. Five are currently in indefinite detention and not approved for transfer, ten are awaiting trial and two have been convicted, including Majid Khan, who has finished his sentence and is in need of a country to be transferred to.

          Jeff, how can these prisoners be held in Guantanamo in indefinite detention without trial? Is that not unconstitutional? Is it because they are deemed prisoners of war – and the war is FOREVER? And what is the purpose of torturing these folk? What is to be gained from that? The short explanation please!

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          1. i must have missed anybody on BV getting depressed about Assange, as well.

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          2. So what do You think about my proposal to send all those bastards to Guantanamo for a little enhanced interrogation of their own?

             It’s a shame Secretary Rumsfeld, General/Secretary/Ambassador Powell, and Madam “500,000 Iraqi Kids was worth it” Albright are already dead so they get exempted from the proposed visit to Gitmo.

             i’m curious Ray: Does Your “Hell” have a special place for folks like them?

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44. The Hill TV asks: “Is Tulsi Gabbard A War-Profiteering HYPOCRITE?” And answers with a resounding “YES!!!” https://attackthesystem.com/2022/10/12/is-tulsi-gabbard-a-war-profiteering-hypocrite/

    Unfortunately, it appears that Ms Gabbard is just another run-of-the-mill, wholly-owned and -operated by her funders American politician. So it goes.

    1.361 days to July 4, 2026 and USA-CCL, and counting.

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45. Gabbard was the U.S. Representative for Hawaii’s heavily-dependent-upon-the MICCMATT 2nd Congressional District [Pearl Harbor, and all that] from 2013 to 2021.

    During that time, did she cast one vote against further funding of The Forever War? Did she ever denounce it?

    In any event, maybe this is what this is all about: “Tulsi Gabbard’s Dem Decision Fuels Speculation She’s Trump’s VP Choice” https://www.newsweek.com/tulsi-gabbards-dem-decision-fuels-speculation-shes-trumps-vp-choice-1750971

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46. If Tulsi has repeatedly promoted anti-LGBT positions, taken a pro-Russia stance on the war in Ukraine and advocated against “woke” culture that sounds like a pretty good start to me.

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    1. Congratulations. So how much money are You prepared to put where Your mouth is to promote her as the Next Great White Hope, even if she is a Samoan-American Hindu [first ever, btw]?

       The latter of which might help in some mysterious way to explain her criticism of “the Barack Obama administration for ‘refusing’ to say that the ‘real enemy’ of the United States is ‘radical Islam’ or ‘Islamic extremism’.” [Source: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tulsi_Gabbard ]

       i’m sure that ~ now that the GWOT is old news ~ The Russkies and The Chinks are the New, No Shit, REAL “enemies” of the US.

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47. Jeff have you watched this video of Tulsi Gabbard on Joe Rogan?
    Addressing the issues you are questioning here ????
    Is she just another run-of-the-mill, wholly-owned and -operated by her funders American politician?
    And how do we know when this video was recorded?
    2,094,451 views – Holy cow. Rogan has 13,200,000 subscribers.

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48. If I am not wrong this was recorded on Oct 11th.

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49. Nope. Like You, Dennis: My mind is made up and i am not interested in anything that Joe Rogan, in particular among all the rest of Your “reliable sources,” has to say about anything.

    i have my own reliable sources, Thank You.

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50. 2,094,451 people watched Tulsi and Joe as of today.
    Compare to 4,998 who have read Chris Hedges speech on Assange in Consortiumnews.
    And 4,371 who have read Scott Ritters article today on the pipeline sabotage today in Consortiumnews.
    As I have pointed out ad nauseum – the readership here is only 0.003% of adults on the internet.
    Rogan is getting 420 times that amount. And young people – not just us old folk.
    Question: how do you get on the Joe Rogan show? Who is funding the people that he has on? I like to think its not the oligarchs and political elites.

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