On Praising Dick Cheney and the Lethality of the U.S. Military
Monday Musings
+ Presidential election seasons are always crazy times in America, but I never expected to see a Democratic candidate for president praise Dick Cheney and John McCain (sorry: “the late, great John McCain”) while also celebrating the “lethality” of the U.S. military. Kamala Harris, you surprised me!
+ The Russia-Ukraine War is trending downwards for Ukraine. The Kursk Offensive expended resources to little effect, Russian forces continue to advance, and Ukraine is increasingly outmanned and outgunned. Incredibly, the Republicans are more willing to consider diplomacy to end the war than the Democrats. The Democrats want to continue sending arms to Ukraine until that country collapses, until Ukraine “wins,” or until World War III.
+ Caitlin Johnstone recently had a telling line about Democrats and the so-called pivot to the center (or right) after the primary season. Yes, she said, the conventional wisdom is to become less liberal and progressive in the alleged cause of winning more votes from the undecided center. The problem is that Democrats, once they win, pivot even further to the right after they secure victory. Barack Obama in 2009 is a perfect example.
+ It’s been said many times but it bears repeating: The Democrats are going to save democracy by running a Harris/Walz team that together earned no votes in the primary season from Democratic voters. The saviors of democracy, handpicked for you by your moneyed friends at the DNC!
+ Is it “forward” with Harris or is it “for war”? Because Harris fully support Israel’s genocide in Gaza and also fully supports Ukraine with billions and billions in more weaponry.
+ Another American set himself on fire to protest the genocide against Palestinians in Gaza. His act has been almost completely ignored by corporate-owned news (the CON). Here’s an account from CounterCurrents.org:
For the third time since Israel launched a war on Gaza for which it is currently on trial for genocide at the World Court, a person in the United States has set themself on fire to protest Israel’s killing of more than 41,000 Palestinians and U.S. complicity in the slaughter.
In an incident all but completely ignored by the U.S. corporate media, a man identified as Matt Nelson set himself alight near the Israeli Consulate in Boston at around 8:15 pm local time on Wednesday, September 11.
“My name is Matt Nelson and I’m about to engage in an extreme act of protest,” he said in a video first uploaded to YouTube on Wednesday. “We are all culpable in the ongoing genocide in Gaza.”
“We are slaves to capitalism and the military-industrial complex. Most of us are too apathetic to care,” Nelson continued. “The protest I’m about to engage in is a call to our government to stop supplying Israel with the money and weapons it uses to imprison and murder innocent Palestinians, to pressure Israel to end the genocide in Gaza, and to support the [International Criminal Court] indictment of [Israeli Prime Minister] Benjamin Netanyahu and other members of the Israeli government.”
“A democracy is supposed to serve the will of the people, not the interests of the wealthy,” he added. “Take the power back. Free Palestine.”
According to NBC Boston, first responders confirmed a man suffered serious burn injuries. Nelson’s current condition has not been reported.
NBC Boston and other local media took flak from critics on social media, who noted that the outlets chose to report the incident’s location as “outside the Four Seasons Hotel” instead of by the Israeli Consulate.
Nelson is the third person known to have self-immolated in Gaza-related protests in the United States since October.
If a man sets himself on fire and the CON fails to make a sound, did he really burn?
+ Another assassination attempt against Donald Trump, this time at a golf course in Florida. The shooter was apparently a strong supporter of Ukraine and a frequent critic of Trump. Joe Biden and Kamala Harris condemned violence and expressed their relief that the former president was unharmed.
+ There are 50 days until the election on November 5th. Something tells me more “crazy times” are coming between now and then.
It's surreal, and the really awful thing is that real people, thousands of real people, are dying in order to further enrich arms manufacturers and the whole MIC. If ten or twenty more people self immolate, would the mainstream media takes notice? I doubt it. Yet, people are noticing and getting more and more desperate, as they feel they have no control over world events.
The American century looks more and more like the Roman Republican century between the brothers the time of Tiberius and Gaius Grachus, circa 120 BC and the demise of Mark Antony in 30 BC. The Romans were politically split between the Optimates (conservative elite) and the Populares (progressive reformers. Both factions were led by members of Rome‘s upper class. The competition was fueled by popular discontent, military adventures (fortunes were made by war for both faction leaders), the old system of the Republic as described by Polybius (2nd century BC) was breaking under the increasing societal split into a small section of super rich individuals and the increasing impoverishment of Rome‘s citizens. Wars (domestic and foreign), electoral manipulation and assassination became quite common. It ended with the rise to power of Octavian who had been adopted by Julius Caesar before his assassination. It was Octavian who re-established a facade of the Republic by retaining the traditional structure, but reserved ultimate power for himself by use of the army and adopted the title Augustus and thus was created the Principate that inaugurated a time of relative peace that lasted till 180 A.D. when Markus Aurelius died and was succeeded as „princeps“, Augustus Caesar) by Commodus, a mad man. I know parallels to past history are fraught with oversimplifications and yet the parallels to America‘s past century and especially since the assassination of JFK give me an eerie feeling of deja vu.