W.J. Astore
Why write so much about the military-industrial complex?
Loyal readers may recall that in June of 2022 M. Davout and I posted a debate between the two of us on the Russia-Ukraine War. This debate is still worth reading, I think.
The other day, my old friend Davout quipped that I had MIC on the brain. Of course, I had suggested that he had Putin on the brain because of his keen support of Ukraine’s war of national liberation, so it was a fair retort. It was also one that I embraced, for as I wrote back to him:
You’re right that I have MIC on the brain. MICIMATT is a useful acronym. The military industrial congressional intelligence media academia think tank complex. Awkward, but it captures some of the scope of the MIC.
There’s a reason Ike warned us about the MIC in 1961. It absorbs more than half of federal discretionary spending. This year Congress gave it $45 billion more than even Biden and the Pentagon wanted. And it just failed its fifth financial audit in a row.
Biden, back in the day, stated “show me your budget and I’ll tell you what you value.” Looking at the federal budget, we see what they value.
The MIC’s budget is at least 14 times greater than the State Department’s. And there are times when State acts as a salesman for U.S. weaponry overseas, as I wrote about here: https://www.huffpost.com/entry/our-state-department-a-ti_b_748658
Back when I wrote that article (2010), the Pentagon Budget was 10 times as great as State. Now it’s 14 or 15 times as great. Progress!
So, yes, I have the MIC on my brain. All Americans should. That’s why Ike said “only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry” has any hope of keeping the MIC under control.
So far, we’ve failed, myself included.
Davout then made this reply:
What are the real problems with the MIC?
That it functions as a mini-welfare state for many Americans is not a big problem for me. That it supports weapons systems we do not need and in numbers we do not need is a big problem.
That it needlessly supports redundant bases across the country because of protection from members of congress worried about employment and small business in their congressional districts is not a big problem for me. That it provides military surplus to local police departments is a big problem.
The more crucial issue is to what extent and in which ways are military contractors like Boeing more corrupt, wasteful of US taxpayer dollars or endangering to the common good than Exxon Mobil or Philip Morris or Merck?
Haven’t you squeezed enough meaning out of Ike’s speech by now? Why not do a deep dive into the Pentagon budget and give like-minded people better arguments to make to their congressional reps than the top line DOD budget figure and Ike’s warning?
To which I made this reply:
One “deep diver” on the Pentagon budget is William Hartung. You can read his stuff at TomDispatch.com and Responsible Statecraft. There are other deep divers as well. One of my colleagues, Christian Sorensen, has done detailed work on the MIC. Here’s one of his articles: https://www.businessinsider.com/military-industrial-complex-budget-us-security-profit-forever-wars-2021-5
Google his name for more “deep dives.”
“Deep divers” already exist. I don’t need to duplicate their fine work.
I’m not sure of the relevance of comparing big oil or big tobacco to the MIC. My focus is on the MIC because that’s what I know best. Do I need to add nuance to my critique of the MIC by saying there are other bad corporate actors out there too?
You can see I was getting testy, but we’re old friends, so we don’t mince words.
Davout responded by saying:
The point I was making (inelegantly) about the one-sided focus on the MIC is that if one does not see it in the context of other factors, one might tend to deploy it as an explanation in cases where it doesn’t apply. (If one only has a hammer in one’s toolbox, then one might try to use it for tasks for which it is not fitted.)
For example, you have suggested the US MIC is a major factor explaining the transfer of weapons from western countries to Ukraine. While I think the US MIC does benefit from those transfers (though not so much as one might think, given that some of that weaponry is drawing on overstocks of weapons systems no longer in use), it is not driving this war. Russian aggression, Ukrainian resistance, and NATO countries’ concerns about future Russian aggression are the prime factors driving those weapons transfers.
To which I replied:
For a grimmer take on the Ukraine war and its implications for the US, consider this article by Chris Hedges:
Ukraine: The War That Went Wrong
And you’re wrong about the MIC and its profits here. For example, in the case of M-1 tanks, the 31 going to Ukraine will be newly built, despite the fact that we have thousands of Abrams tanks in Army inventory. Also, most of the weapons/ammo being sent from U.S. inventories have to be replaced. (Yes, a few weapons systems are obsolete, like MRAPs and M113 APCs, but most aren’t.). Assuming we send F-16s, again these will be new, and Lockheed Martin has already announced they’re willing and eager to produce more.
Don’t worry: the MIC is doing very well indeed [from the Russia-Ukraine War]. It has decades of practice at this.
That was the end of our exchange. I’d add that the MIC profits far more from the atmosphere of uncertainty and anxiety created by the Russia-Ukraine War than it does from the war itself. Even though Russia’s forces haven’t performed well in this war, even though Russia is arguably weaker today than it was before the invasion, the MIC and various preening politicians are exaggerating the Russian threat as a way of boosting military spending. And it’s working, hence the $45 billion extra given to the Pentagon by Congress in this year’s budget.
And so I will continue to have “MIC on the brain” because it continues to grow ever more powerful within our society, and ever more ambitious on the world stage. You might say it’s invaded my brain as well, though (so far) I haven’t sent it more than half of my discretionary income.
Davout and I don’t always agree, but we’re always willing to talk and to listen. We need more conversations among Americans about war and the MIC, for conversing leads to clarity and clarity can lead to a shared commitment to act.
Bracing Views 
Please continue with the “MIC” vein or thread. DON’T Stop!!
And you might share this topic with your debate partner: https://www.city-journal.org/html/americas-missing-money-15725.html …the 2.3 Trillion that Rumsfeld announced could not be explained in DOD ledgers on September 10, 2001 (and documented on video/YouTube as well as written about by many).
The concept of such funneling of monies to unexplained destinations is bad enough. But many of the same people enabling and causing such diversion of tax payers money also play large in the policy realm. To say that they aren’t influenced in their policy making by the largess they and their compadres derive from these massive financial shenanigans is delusional. These people are literally playing with lives on a scale that, at times, is beyond large.
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I, too, suffer from MIC. For all the reasons you stated plus MIC denigrates & render diplomacy as less important than military weapons & warfare & greatly prioritizes military weaponry & warfare as the only or best approach in dealing with conflict & controversy between nations. Our top priority should be diplomacy via the State Department, e.g., as demonstrated dramatically by Senator Mitchell’s diplomatic intervention bringing about peace between Great Britain & the Irish Republican Army (Northern Ireland); and Presiden Carter’s diplomatic intervention between Egypt &:Israel also bringing about peace between Egypt & Israel & leading to peace between Jordan & Israel. Diplomacy works!
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“The US MIC … is not driving this war. Russian aggression, Ukrainian resistance, and NATO countries’ concerns about future Russian aggression are the prime factors driving those weapons transfers. ” — M Davout
“Even though Russia’s forces haven’t performed well in this war, even though Russia is arguably weaker today than it was before the invasion ….” – Bill Astore
I do not consider either of these statements accurate, let alone dispositive. Those interested in reality as opposed to comfortable narrative cocoons might want to consider Mike Whitney’s rather comprehensive treatment at Unz Review: Setting the Record Straight; Stuff You Should Know About Ukraine (2/5/2023) or anything by retired Army Colonel Douglas Macgregor (either published articles or YouTube video interviews).
In the meantime, waiting for reality to explode the NATO-inflated narrative Hindenburg, a little something from last year:
A Putin Paragraph Paraphrased
(a terza rima sonnet in homage to Dante Alighieri and Percy Shelley)
Today we hear of their desire to beat us
upon the battlefield. What can I say?
It seems they think that slander can defeat us,
that vitriolic screeds will win the day.
And crazy as that seems to Russian minds,
these cretins of the “West” think words can slay
along with “Wonder Weapons” of all kinds
that only mean Ukrainians will die
as Russia into dust their army grinds.
The question then becomes a simple: Why?
The longer Peace postponed, the more regret
at all the loss and waste. So let them try.
But they should know before their next big bet
that we have not begun in earnest yet.
Michael Murry, “The Misfortune Teller,” Copyright © 2022
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As far as foreign policy and U.S. power abroad, John Quincy Adams best expressed the general sentiment of the early Republic. Well aware that his rapidly expanding country would soon become a world power, in 1821 Adams warned the U.S. not to get involved in foreign wars “in search of monsters to destroy”. (At that time, Adams was the most experienced diplomat; and he went on to be the sixth U.S. president).
The above phrase uttered by Adams before the House of Representatives is well known, but scholars rarely quote what he said next. Here’s more of his speech, which helps us to understand the moral predicament of U.S. foreign policy today.
“[The U.S.] goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy.
She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all.
She is the champion and vindicator only of her own…
“[The U.S] well knows that by once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even the banners of foreign independence,
she would involve herself beyond the power of extrication, in all the wars of interest and intrigue, of individual avarice, envy,
and ambition, which assume the colors and usurp the standard of freedom.
The fundamental maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to force….
She might become the dictatress of the world. She would be no longer the ruler of her own spirit….”
Those prophetic words were said 200 years ago and are well known today to our foreign policy elite. However, they deliberately ignore and disregard Adams’ warning. Clearly, the temptation of power and wealth are too great. Foreign adventures are very profitable for the American ruling class. Just look at the conflict in Ukraine……………………………
https://john365.substack.com/p/dictatress-of-the-world-a-prophetic?publication_id=486263
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Adapters and Converters
(an experiment in rhymed free verse or, “anti-verse”)
First, buy a microwave if you
desire to bake potato.
Next, you install it.
Step One: Check for electrical outlets. Then Step Two:
Read provided instructions as to what it is you must do.
Oops! Since the U. S. and Europe do not use the same power for home and appliance
(either one-ten or two-twenty volts),
you gather your cadre of dolts,
form an “alliance,”
and call it
NATO
Michael Murry, “The Misfortune Teller,” Copyright © 2023
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Fermented Friends
(an experiment in rhymed free verse or, “anti-verse”)
The Russians need not have a care
about the lies we’ve spoken.
We’ve even told them:
the French Hollande, the German Merkel have both laid bare
their countries’ deception for eight years, merely stalling, aware
that in time Kiev’s de facto NATO army would attack the Russian-speaking east.
Except that Russia intervened first
leaving NATO adrift and cursed:
the glasses of yeast
we sold them
broken
Michael Murry, “The Misfortune Teller,” Copyright © 2023
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THE ATTACK OF THE KILLER BALLOON by Jacob G. Hornberger 020623
I confess that I did not leave my house last week. I wasn’t about to take a chance that that Chinese Giant Balloon would attack me or, at the very least, monitor my trips to the grocery store. Why take that chance when I could remain safe within the confines of my home?
Even Pentagon assurances that China’s Giant Balloon posed no military threat did not provide any comfort to me. After all, the Pentagon could have been lying about the military capabilities of the Giant Balloon to prevent a nationwide panic. Moreover, keep in mind that this wasn’t just any Giant Balloon. It was a communist Giant Balloon!
As the Giant Balloon began heading eastward, I was sure it was headed to Virginia, where I live and, more important, where the CIA and the Pentagon are located! I just kept imagining massive cannons suddenly extruding out of the Giant Balloon and firing on me as I was driving to the grocery store.
Oh, I’m sure that there are many of you are scoffing over my concerns. It’s always easy to be courageous when a Giant Balloon isn’t headed in your direction. And I’ll bet most of you have never seen movies in which Americans are attacked by Big Scary Things, such as:
THE ATTACK OF THE 50-FOOT WOMAN
THE ATTACK OF THE GIANT LEECHES
ATTACK OF THE KILLER TOMATOES
THE ATTACK OF THE GIANT CHEERLEADER [Note: All with links to Amazon for our viewing pleasure.]
The press was reporting that China’s Giant Balloon was flying over Montana. Some reporters were disclosing that Montana is where the Pentagon’s nuclear silos are located. Are they supposed to do that? Surely, the Pentagon keeps the locations of its nuclear missiles secret, right? Has the mainstream press violated the Trading with the Enemy Act by telling the Reds where America’s nuclear missiles are? The people of Montana shouldn’t be too happy about that. If the Pentagon succeeds in ginning up a nuclear war with China before it succeeds in ginning one up with Russia, China is now likely to inundate Montana with nuclear missiles.
The Pentagon reported that the Giant Balloon also flew over Kansas. Kansas? Why Kansas? Hey, haven’t you noticed who is in the Super Bowl next Sunday? That would be the Kansas City Chiefs! I’ll bet those crafty Chinese Reds are trying to figure out which team to bet on.
The Pentagon announced that the Giant Balloon was also spying on several military bases. If so, there is an easy solution: just shut down the bases, which would obviate the need for the Chinese to send a Giant Balloon to spy on them. As I wrote last week in my article “Why Not Defund the Military?” the Pentagon’s empire of domestic military bases serves no useful function and should go the way of the dodo bird.
As China’s Giant Balloon was slowly making its way eastward, I couldn’t help but think about Francis Gary Powers. He was the CIA officer who was piloting the CIA’s top-secret U-2 spy plane that was shot down over the Soviet Union (i.e, Russia) in 1960.
What was Powers doing flying a CIA spy plane over Russia? Why, spying, of course. Illegally spying!
You mean, the United States was doing to Russia with its spy plane what China was supposedly doing to the United States with its Giant Balloon?
Yep. And I guarantee you that you’ll never guess what happened after Powers was shot down. CIA officials maintained with straight faces that their plane was a “weather plane” that had strayed off course. Isn’t that what Chinese officials are saying about their Giant Balloon?
What the CIA didn’t know was that Powers had disobeyed orders to take a cyanide capsule in the event of a shoot-down. Powers decided that he’d rather stay alive. So he was taken captive and told the Russians the truth about his spy mission. That’s how the Russians knew that the CIA was lying with its “weather plane” charade.
The CIA’s spy mission set back talks between Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev and U.S. president Dwight Eisenhower. There has been speculation over the decades that the CIA intentionally sabotaged Powers’ spy plane to ensure that Khrushchev and Eisenhower would not reach an agreement that would bring an end to the national-security establishment’s lucrative Cold War racket.
Ironically, because of the Giant Balloon incident, Secretary of State Antony Blinken has suspended a planned trip to China. That might not disappoint Chinese officials, however, given that the primary purpose of Blinken’s trip was to castigate China for supposedly assisting Russia with its war in Ukraine.
In any event, the U.S. military finally decided to shoot down the Chinese Giant Balloon over the coast of South Carolina. They didn’t want to shoot down the balloon when it was over the continental United States because falling debris could hurt people. Apparently, they didn’t have the same concern for boaters off the American coast.
According to the media, the military used a Sidewinder missile to kill the Giant Balloon. The cost of that operation was around half-a-million dollars. Oh well, what’s another half-million dollars added onto the $31 trillion in debt that U.S. officials have already placed onto the backs of American taxpayers?
In any event, now that the Giant Balloon is gone, I’m feeling safe and I’m now going out of my house again. Oh wait! The mainstream press is reporting that another Chinese Giant Balloon is now flying over Latin America! OMG! The Reds are going to spy on Trump’s Berlin Wall along the border and then send their new Giant Balloon north to Virginia. I’m headed back indoors.
https://www.fff.org/2023/02/06/the-attack-of-the-killer-balloon/
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As has been stated several times on this forum in the past:
The problem is not with the Military-Industrial-Congressional Complex. Nor is it with the Big Corporatism of Big Banks, Big Energy, Big Agriculture, Big Pharmaceutical, and Big Media Cartels, who, put “profits before people.” Nor is it with the Medical, Legal, Law Enforcement, and Guns and Drugs Cabals. Nor is it with the Surveillance-Secrecy-Security-Safety Panopticon now flourishing as never before.
These are but Symptoms of the disease afflicting America.
The ultimate, root cause and source of America’s crisis today is that it has a system of government and governance in which various and sundry Vested Special Interests use the legal power, the administrative authority, and particularly, the spending capability of the federal government, to accomplish whatever it is that those VSIs want to accomplish as individuals, groups, organizations, and institutions for their clients, cohorts, constituents, and/or themselves. Regardless of what the Citizens of this Nation may need or want.
These are who make up America’s Ruling Political Class, and who own and operate, and command and control the governors ~ the elected politicians, entrenched civilian and military bureaucrats, and anointed appointees ~ at center stage in America’s reality-tv extravaganza; and America’s $ 1 = 1 Vote system of government and governance that gets, puts, and keeps them there.
And this is exactly why America has reached the state that it has today as:
~ a Bankrupt Debtor State;
~ an Imperialist Warfare State;
~ a Redistributionist Welfare State;
~ a Secrecy/Surveillance/Security/proto-Police State;
~ an Autocratic/Patriarchal/Oligarchic/Plutocratic Deep State;
~ an at-best Flailing Nation State and a definitely Failing Empire;
~ an Overshoot State; and, perhaps most importantly,
~ a People and Nation no longer merely “divided,” but fractured ~ even to the point of disintegration ~ in ways not seen in more than 160 years, since the eve of what may end up being merely the First American Civil War.
And the only way that any of this has and could have happened is because of that flawed System of government and governance. Which, as also stated before, is nothing new. The Federalists worked very hard to lay the groundwork and build the foundation to make all this happen back when this system was being put together back in Philadelphia in the late 1780s, and it has succeeded for their successors ~ America’s Ruling Political Class ~ ever since.
And ultimately, hence the legitimacy of the question: “Will the United States survive to celebrate its 250th birthday on July 4, 2026, a mere 1,244 days from today?”
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And so, somebody might be led to ask: “What system of government and government is the alternative to the system America has now?”
The alternative would be a government that fulfills the proper function of Government:
~ To protect the Human Rights of Life, Liberty, Property, Privacy, the Pursuit of Happiness, and the precursor to all of these, Peace.
In doing that and Only that, Government would get out of the way of the Economy and Civil Society in fulfilling their tasks of the meeting of Human Needs for and the satisfying of Human Wants of Health, Prosperity, Security, and the Pursuit of Wants.
The ultimate reason for this is that a Government cannot meet the Needs and satisfy the Wants of some of its Citizens without violating the Rights of some other of its Citizens. Governments cannot do both at the same time at all, let alone do it well.
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Oh, woe is us!
“Russia hasn’t just hacked our computer systems. It’s hacked our minds.” – CNN’s Fareed Zakaria
Boobie Tiresome “terror” Tropes
(from Fernando Po, U.S.A., America’s post-literate retreat to Plato’s Cave)
The Boobie bureaucratic class
Tried hard to think, then quit.
They found it too exhausting so
They staged a comic skit
Where shadows on a wall stood for
Some truly scary shit.
They named the shadows “Russians” ‘cause
They’d heard the sound before
From friends of theirs at parties who
Find evidence a bore
Unsuited to disguising what
They really have in store.
These “leaders” pantomimed a farce
And mimicked monstrous trolls
And “heroes” who would fight them for
A few votes at the polls
And taxes paid for spell-marks on
Some ancient parchment scrolls.
“Democracy” they named this scam
Where Boobies ruled the roost
In theory. But in practice, frauds
Gave wealth an upward boost,
With subsidies for those who WAR
Upon the world had loosed.
But lest the Boobies focus on
Their predatory “betters”
Who’ve lied like rugs from dawn till dusk
And wrapped them up in fetters
The thieves scream “Russia!” “Over there!”
Like terrified bed-wetters.
Unfortunately for the frauds
Some Boobies now can see it.
The trick has gotten old and stale
When graft can’t guarantee it.
The proffered panic hasn’t sold:
If “Russian,” then “so be it.”
No damage have we heard or seen
From those in far Eurasia
Who do not share America’s
Inculcated aphasia
Where “Ignorance is Strength” deserves
The swiftest euthanasia.
So let us give up now since we
Cannot prevent the “hacking.”
Which, anyway, looks nothing like
Traditional “attacking.”
With no real enemies, that means
Our “soldiers” can start packing.
What need have we for “troops” and such?
Why Sailors and Marines?
Why Airmen and a “Space Force” just
To prove that war demeans?
To guard our brigs and embassies?
To “save” the Philippines?
We’ve only made-up foes to “fight,”
Invented from whole cloth.
So why spend blood and money on
Such bogus mental sloth
Delivered through some paid-for lips:
All insubstantial froth.
Michael Murry, “The Misfortune Teller,” Copyright © 2020
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Love this,
Where “Ignorance is Strength” deserves
The swiftest euthanasia.”
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GOVERNMENT BY PANIC by Matt Taibbi
<<< We may never know if it was spying, but the Chinese balloon served its purpose, feeding our political establishment’s tireless efforts to keep the public freaked out >>>
Empires can’t be ruled without belief. Without confidence in official words, subjects will lack direction, becoming “lost at sea,” as Revolt of the Public author Martin Gurri put it. They’ll support Brexit, Catalan independence, Trump; they’ll wear yellow vests, throw away masks, even refuse the shot. When you tell them Beto O’Rourke is Robert Kennedy, they vote as if he were Ralph Nader.
Now take a hypothetical. Say you’re a member of the American political establishment after the 2016 election of Donald Trump. You’re staring at four years as part of a government-in-exile and need a new message to solve your belief problem. What’s your answer?
My hypothesis is such people never bothered to find one. Instead, they declared a state of emergency.
What emergency? Doesn’t matter. Russian interference was a good startup disaster, but you can keep changing them. THE IMPORTANT THING IS THE PATTERN. ONE, DECLARE A CRISIS. TWO, SPREAD PANIC. THREE, TAKE EMERGENCY MEASURES. IF YOU DO THIS OVER AND OVER, YOU END UP WITH PERMANENT CRISIS, PERMANENT PANIC, PERMANENT EMERGENCY RULE. SO LONG AS NEW CRISES KEEP EVOKING UNCONSCIOUS FEAR AND ANXIETY, THE LEGITIMACY OF THE POLITICAL ESTABLISHMENT IS CONTINUOUSLY JUSTIFIED.
An episode that took place over the weekend speaks directly to our leaders’ new dependence on government-by-panic. A Chinese balloon of unknown etiology drifted into American airspace, and wigs flipped from coast to coast. The episode ended in Kubrickian spoof, with one unsmiling official after another lining up to declare victory over a balloon. And nobody thought it was odd.
The Chinese airship was declared a “spy balloon” on the Internet instantaneously. Hype and fear built all weekend until finally, in a story I initially thought was a joke, the United States military shot the thing down off the coast of South Carolina with an F-22 Raptor jet launched from Langley Air Force in Virginia.
The comedy factor is off the charts. The F-22 is one of the most expensive weapons ever built, costing taxpayers $334 million per plane, with a program tab of more than $60 billion. The jet has the radar signature of a hummingbird, screams upward at 62,000 feet a minute, and is generally so super-awesome that we’ve banned its export, not wanting the Japanese or the Saudis or even the Australians to possess our secret Promethean fire.
THE IDEA THAT THIS CELEBRATED SUPER-WEAPON GOT ITS FIRST AIR-TO-AIR VICTORY SHOOTING DOWN A FUCKING BALLOON IS AS PERFECT A DEMONSTRATION OF THE PITIFUL MINDSET OF MODERN AMERICAN LEADERS AS COULD BE CONCEIVED. THAT IT APPARENTLY HAPPENED BEFORE WE WERE EVEN SURE IT WAS A SPY CRAFT, JUST BEFORE SUPPOSED DIPLOMATIC TALKS WITH CHINA, AND WHILE MORE SOPHISTICATED CHINESE SATELLITES ZOOMED OVER US IN SPACE MADE THIS AN EVEN MORE DAMNING SATIRICAL BULLSEYE.
News stories full of frightened official commentary were legion. They dragged out a NORAD general to warn us there’s “a domain awareness gap that we have to figure out.” New York Senator Chuck Schumer gave an impromptu presser stressing that the balloon episode could end up being a good thing. “We can learn a great deal about China’s capabilities and what they are up to,” he said, referring to the chance to retrieve balloon debris. Former CIA head Leon Panetta ripped Joe Biden for not shooting the balloon down sooner, instead of letting it “traverse the entire country.” Secretary of State Tony Blinken admitted upcoming talks with China mattered, but balloon freakout took precedence.
“We continue to believe that having open lines of communication is important,” pronounced Blinken. “But the most important thing right now is to see that this surveillance asset gets out of our airspace, and we’ll take it from there.”
Translation: I have real diplomatic work to do, but the tenuous nature of my authority requires I spend the weekend humping a panic button, so my government can keep the public in a nervous stupor and ultimately declare victory over a balloon.
IN AMERICA, THE RITUAL OF PANIC HAS NOW BECOME MORE IMPORTANT THAN REAL-WORLD GOVERNANCE. WE BECAME A WORLD POWER BUILDING CARS, PLANES, LIGHT BULBS. NOW WE MAKE PANICS, AND TENDING TO THEM IS THE FIRST BUSINESS OF STATE.
Try this exercise. Go to Google (I stopped using that devious propaganda site about a month ago, but it’s useful for this exercise). Enter “attack on our democracy,” “attacks on democracy,” or any similar phrase. You’ll find a deluge. Here’s a brief thumbnail list of “attacks” we’ve endured since late 2016
Continued at https://www.racket.news/p/government-by-panic . [EMPHASES added.]
[Note: Google’s findings do not include the ultimate manifestation of American “government by panic”: The COVID Event.
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This isn’t off topic. It’s the same topic looked at from a different perspective.
This Jewish produced 6 minute video on the History of the Star of David says it was a common design and decorative symbol for many Middle Eastern Cultures before Jews appropriated it exclusively for themselves.
My understanding of it’s symbolism for OUR Times is more Universal than limited exclusively to Israel and Jews.
What it is, is 2 Pyramid Systems inverse to each other.
The upright Pyramid, secure on it’s base with God at the Top, represents the realization and actualization of “The Promised Land” or in New Testament Times, “thy Kingdom come, thy Will be done on Earth, as it is in Heaven.”
The other Pyramid on it’s tip ready to topple over, is the Pyramid System we have erected over us with the rich at the top.
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The Star of David is on the back of every US Dollar. Is that real or imaginary?
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Perhaps in anticipation of a discussion thread soon to come …
State of the Urine
It reeks
as one would think who has a nose.
It leaks
from every bladder till it flows.
It seeks
its level, so the puddle grows.
It speaks
with every fetid breeze that blows.
Our freaks
adore such pissing-contest shows.
Techniques
for staging these each of them knows.
For weeks
(all fifty-two) they primp and pose,
their cheeks
stained urine-yellow. So it goes . . .
Michael Murry, “The Misfortune Teller,” Copyright © 2023
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“As the Russian Army crossed the Ukrainian border in the early hours of February 24th, not only did it spell the end of decades of Russian warnings about NATO’s eastward expansion up to its borders, it may also have marked the end of a global world order dominated by the U.S. and its dollar.”
That 1 sentence in the article below sums up what is at stake in our Generations and how volatile and unpredictable the outcome?
Knowing the quality of comments by the regular contributors here, I expect most of you, like me, came to the same impressions conveyed in this article Independently.
‘Ukraine — The Inevitable War’
Why negotiate a diplomatic settlement and adhere to the Minsk agreement when there is so much money in war?
During a recent interview with German magazine Der Spiegel, former Chancellor and European political heavyweight Angela Merkel revealed that the Minsk accords, a comprehensive 2015 diplomatic treaty, agreed by the EU, United States, Russia, and Kyiv to end the civil war in eastern Ukraine, was essentially subverted by the Ukrainians in an attempt to buy time to expand its military capabilities.
The fact that the accords, which were widely regarded as a truly workable solution to the conflict, were not prioritized by the U.S. for implementation, speaks volumes when assessing the sincerity of the U.S. position. Just prior to Merkel’s stunning revelations, Former Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko was also covertly recorded admitting that the process was abused by Ukraine and used to prepare for war with Russia.
Given the high level of interface between NATO and Ukraine during this period, it is difficult to imagine that this manipulation of the peace process was not carried out with the full knowledge, and probable assistance, of NATO and the U.S. It is now abundantly clear, at least to all objective observers, that the U.S. never seriously intended to prevent the current conflict in Ukraine. On the contrary, any cursory assessment of their past and contemporary covert and overt involvement in the region suggests they have been working to destabilize Russia via Ukraine for decades.
Facts such as their encouragement, and material assistance, in the building of a huge 250,000-man, NATO-trained and equipped army facing Russia’s border, illustrate the reality of what the U.S. project in Ukraine was about, regardless of their diplomatic pronouncements.
Despite decades of Russian warnings on NATO expansion, and despite the sincere attempts of some European countries, NATO and its U.S. kingpins forged ahead along a path to what would become an inevitable war. Considering this, can any of the numerous U.S./NATO statements suggesting they “exhausted all diplomatic efforts” to prevent this conflict be taken seriously? The facts suggest not…….
https://www.globalresearch.ca/ukraine-inevitable-war/5807450
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Roger Waters addressing the United Nations Security Council
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Reblogged this on Calculus of Decay .
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