The Exercise of Imagination

 

“The exercise of imagination is dangerous to those who profit from the way things are because it has the power to show that the way things are is not permanent, not universal, not necessary.”

—Ursula K. LeGuin

The Exercise of Imagination

by C.A. Matthews

My husband has a new hobby. Every evening he turns on the local newscast to view the weather forecast so we know how much watering our garden will need the next day. Lately he waits until the national newscast comes on. This is when his cathartic yelling at the screen begins.

“What the…? It’s not a war, asshole. The children of Gaza are being murdered. It’s a goddamn genocide. Say the word, you stupid bastard!”

Mercifully, the six o’clock newscast runs only about sixteen minutes or else he’d be permanently hoarse. I timed the commercials one night, and discovered the half hour is made up of mostly commercials for Big Pharma. That gives you some idea who their target audience is—older Americans with deep pockets who love popping pills.

National newscasts really don’t provide news as much as they give out headlines. Their headlines tend to be predictable propaganda soundbites courtesy of the Ministry of Truth or the government propaganda machine. The news readers with their Hollywood-movie-star looks aren’t trying to impart factual information as much as they’re trying to persuade and provoke emotions, such as hatred and animosity toward those whom the oligarchy wants us to hate. They want us to despise and fear others so much that we’d be willing to go to war with them and die—or at least we’re okay with our children or grandchildren dying for the cause.

After watching several national newscasts, the emotional manipulation became bleedin’ obvious (as my British husband says). Do the regular consumers of mainstream (legacy) media realize they’re being manipulated to believe and feel a certain way in the first place? (See last week’s post about who does the manipulating and why.) What do they really get out of it? Do they actually enjoy being lied to? Do the lies reinforce their deep-seated prejudices and feed their wildest fears, making them fat and content in their hatred? Is warmongering propaganda a source of entertainment for them?

 

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The Ugliness To History

 

We need to tell the truth about the ugliness to history. We don't honor our forefathers if we don't learn from their mistakes. —Radical Jesus on X.

The Ugliness To History

by C. A. Matthews

I had an dream about what to call what I wanted to write about this week. My original title idea was along the lines of “The Truth of the Matter” But then I came across Radical Jesus’ awesome post and thought it summed up what I wanted to say nicely (so I borrowed it with permission).

All of human history is ugly. Anyone who tells you otherwise is lying. You will know what you’re reading is the truth if the author doesn’t varnish over the nasty, disgusting, horrific bits that happened in the past. You’ll know what you’re reading is the truth if the past isn’t painted in uniform, glowing colors and all the actors therein portrayed as decent folks “just doing their best during tough times.”

Because if everyone is just doing their “best” why do things still suck nowadays? How did so much evil come into the world if our ancestors were “doing their best” for all of humankind? Doesn’t voting for the “lesser evil” bring about good eventually? (If you read this piece, you’d know that’s impossible.) Let’s be absolutely honest with ourselves: Human beings all lie, and they have done (and still do) some rather selfishly shitty things to each other and our planet.

There. I said it. I confessed humanity’s deepest sin. We are all liars. We are all manipulators of our own history in order to make ourselves look like decent, non-shitty actors on this stage called life. Countries and corporations are no different. In fact, they’re worse—way worse...

 

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Biden's Berlin Wall

Biden’s Berlin Wall

by C.A. Matthews

Having worked closely with immigrants over the years, I can’t help but take each setback in their collective struggle for equal rights and justice as personal. So many come to the US fleeing gang violence, destitution, climate catastrophe, religious and racial discrimination… And what do they find when they land on US shores? Often more of the same.

The US hides its bias behind a veneer of supposed legality and practicality. But is it really legal? Take for instance Biden’s latest twist in immigration law that prevents individuals from claiming asylum when they come to our southern border. In other words, he wants to get rid of US Code 8, Section 1158 which clearly states:

§1158. Asylum
Any alien who is physically present in the United States or who arrives in the United States (whether or not at a designated port of arrival and including an alien who is brought to the United States after having been interdicted in international or United States waters), irrespective of such alien's status, may apply for asylum in accordance with this section or, where applicable, section 1225(b) of this title.

It’s pretty straightforward. If you are fleeing for your life, and you claim asylum, you are to be given an asylum hearing inside the US no matter how or where you enter the country. Until your claim has been adjudicated by an immigration judge, you're allowed to stay safely within the US. That is the law.

But Genocide Joe is trying hard to get the Trump bigots on his side for the upcoming presidential election. He has decided that brown and black people who usually enter on foot at our southern border shouldn’t be able to qualify for asylum even before they can open their mouths to request it. It's telling how immigrants with money (usually white and European in origin) can fly directly into any US airport and request asylum then and there, no problem. Very telling.

Does the president even have the authority to prevent non-citizens from entering the US? Some say he does under INA Section 212(f), however:

INA § 212(f) does not allow the president to interfere with or subvert other parts of the INA or other federal laws. That includes INA § 208, which grants people the right to seek asylum in the United States… While 212(f) authority has been used in recent years in an attempt to restrict access to asylum at the U.S./Mexico border, the courts have identified significant limitations. Some courts have also ruled that the president may not invoke this authority to address purely domestic considerations, such as high unemployment or costs to taxpayers. From Understanding INA Section 212f

The ongoing genocides in Gaza, Sudan, and other parts of the world—along with a potential for World War III involving Ukraine to begin any day now—have stolen the news limelight lately, making this heinous stunt violating human rights at our southern border almost invisible to the majority of Americans. But these types of violent conflicts are the driving forces behind much of the immigration to the US today. 

The US is the driver of its own immigration problems because it can’t keep itself from stealing others' land and resources. It can't stop itself from overthrowing democratically elected governments in countries that won’t do business with American businesses on US corporations' terms alone.

Until we shut down the US war machine and dismantle the military-industrial-Congressional complex, we’re going to see more and more people coming to our borders fleeing from the violence and climate catastrophes the US military has instigated in their homelands.

As the executive director at Catholic Legal Immigration Network, Inc. (CLINIC) states:

"This move to drastically reduce asylum access is dangerous, immoral, and illegal," said Anna Gallagher, executive director at CLINIC. "We are appalled that the United States is abandoning its commitment to humanitarian protection and national and international asylum law in issuing this executive order. The policy will strip countless migrants of their legal right to seek asylum with due process, and as a result many lives will be endangered and lost, and families separated."

Who really needs due process or to respect the legal rights of others, huh? Obviously, we’ve decided that the migrants we don’t want to let in for whatever reasons don’t have any rights at all. It was bad enough when Trump and his cadre use the misnomer “illegals” to describe immigrants coming to our border seeking asylum, but now we have Butcher Biden continuing the Trump tradition of separating family members, separating children from their parents. This move will cause ever more desperate immigrants to seek the services of human traffickers to help smuggle them into the US. More deaths, more lawsuits, more unhappiness…

The US Southern Border Wall https://borgenproject.org/10-facts-about-mexicos-southern-border/

I talked to our resident historian, Coast Watcher, about the walls at our southern border, the barbwire-covered walls circling the bomb-pummeled territory of Gaza, historic walls such as the one that divided East and West Berlin. That got Coast Watcher thinking about how certain patterns of history are once again repeating themselves. 

Is Biden really trying to keep desperate people out of the US, or is he very slyly trying to keep desperate Americans locked in? Why would the Biden administration fear Americans escaping? Are there not enough cannon fodder (soldiers) for a big war planned in the near future? Should we expect American citizens to be denied human rights like we're currently denying them to asylum seekers, like the Israeli government denies the rights of the indigenous Palestinian people?

 https://rarehistoricalphotos.com/berlin-wall-pictures-1961-1989/

The New Iron Curtain?

by Coast Watcher

A common theme of far-right criticism leveled at Biden is, “He’s a Commie!” On the face of it such an accusation is far from accurate. Biden was, is, and (for what little remains of his putrid life) always will be a conservative authoritarian.

And yet, that little comment throws up a few surprising parallels between the United States of Israel—er, America—with the former Communist Deutsche Demokratische Republik or DDR. In English, we called it the German Democratic Republic, or more commonly East Germany.

The first parallel is how in both nations the mainstream media was/is almost entirely state-controlled. (Not owned by the state necessarily in the US but controlled.) Little is published that contradicts or criticizes The Regime. Social media takes up a lot of the slack here in the US, but with increasing levels of censorship it’s taking on the appearance of samizdat. In terms of online material much that is frowned upon is self-censored by the corporations who own the social media platforms on behalf of the status quo. 

A recent example of censorship in Biden’s America is how the Columbia Law Review’s website was closed down by the university board of directors after the site published an article by Rabea Eghbariah criticizing Israel.

Secondly, there’s The Regime’s obsession with walls. The DDR created a beauty when it erected the Antifaschistischer Schutzwall (the Anti-fascist Protection Barrier, a.k.a. The Berlin Wall, a.k.a. The Iron Curtain). Supposedly a wall against the pernicious influence of capitalism, the Berlin Wall acted to prevent the hemorrhaging of the East German population to the West. Something in the region of 20% of the DDR’s people voted with their feet against the totalitarian regime during its existence, causing immense harm to the DDR's economy and its image.

Part of the Gaza Wall activestills.org

Of course, both Biden and Trump claim the wall built along America’s southern border is to prevent mass illegal immigration. Looking at posts on X (Twitter) from people seeking to leave the increasingly totalitarian United States, I wonder how long it’ll be before the border wall is turned around to face inward. If the US wants you to stay put, you will be walled in similar to how the Gazans have been walled into their own homeland by the white settler colonists, a.k.a. Israeli Zionists.

The DDR shut down political dissent as soon as it appeared. We’re seeing that very same phenomena in the United States nowadays. Police response to pro-Palestine demonstrations on university campuses has been far beyond proportional to any trouble caused. Zionist vigilantes have been allowed to beat up on student protesters while the cops look the other way and arrest the peaceful students who were beaten. 

The message is clear. There is to be no resistance, no objections to the official narrative. Anyone who supports the Palestinian people are “Hamas” and subsequently “terrorists” to be locked up.

And when it comes to protesting the government’s policies in any way, shape or form, here’s a quote from Police Superintendent Larry Snelling in reference to the upcoming so-called “Democratic” Party conference in Chicago: “Protesting peacefully doesn’t always mean you’re protected by the First Amendment.”

What’s free speech good for if you can’t even be protected from harm by your own government while exercising your First Amendment rights peacefully? The East German Stasi would have been proud.

CodePink SE Los Angeles and Inland Empire joined other activists in vocally disrupting Vice President Kamala Harris’s guest spot on the Jimmy Kimmel Live television show. They were forcefully removed, assaulted, and illegally detained by the show’s security. So much for free speech anywhere in the US.

And then there’s the economy… The DDR suffered massive financial stress due to its totalitarian policies. Everything from food to furniture to cars became harder for the workers to afford. The East Germans were left with rising food costs and increasingly decrepit infrastructure.

The United States is on course for the same trouble with, as an example, a week’s grocery bill for two people in New York City costing over $750. The price of eggs has skyrocketed. Locally this most staple of cheap foods costs about $1.49 a dozen as of this past week. What will it cost next week? Will working class people even be able to afford eggs at all by November?

And it’s not like the US has experienced any recent example of infrastructure failures such as derailed trains carrying toxic chemicals deliberately set on fire in the middle of a small town or bridges falling over from a small tap from an overloaded ocean-going container barge.

It should be noted that the DDR was not above dealing with the hated Capitalist West when it came to earning hard currency to keep its failing economy afloat. The DDR took incredible quantities of industrial waste from West Germany, dumping it on its own soil and causing pollution for generations. Sounds familiar when you consider how states like Ohio take in toxic fracking water waste to make some extra cash at the expense of their own citizens’ health when the pollutants leak into their drinking water.

It's not hard to draw a parallel between the East German government taking capitalist cash like this and the US taking “backhanders and gifts” from oil companies to license fracking and drilling for oil on federal lands and preserves. In the US they sometimes call this money influx “campaign donations.”

Of course the DDR government paid little to no attention to climate change. Thirty plus years on from the Berlin Wall’s collaspe, the US government is doing as little or less. This in spite of record-breaking heatwaves across the Southwest and dramatic flooding in parts of the Central and Eastern states so far this season. There are just too many more important things to occupy the attention of the powers-that-be, like growing the US military budget.

When it came to the DDR’s military budget, it was given a 6% increase each year until it reached the point where the regime’s military became a major partner in the Warsaw Pact alliance. Military and security expenditures amounted to a 9.2% slice of the DDR budget, a sizable chunk of change.

The US military sucks up a woeful 14.7% of national expenditure. It’s not like that money could be spent on things like universal health care or providing a free education from kindergarten through college such as the East Germans had. We wouldn’t want Americans to become used to things like that. They could become “Commies.” And who really wants that?

When it comes to the government, the East German public had little say in how it was run. Show elections happened every few years. You might think there would be a big difference between the DDR and the USA when it comes to elections, but the Princeton study shows real input from the American public amounts to no more than 3% of all policies fielded in Congress. This is much like the DDR, where the status quo Communist Party always won 98% or more of the vote—something which was shown to be false when independent observers oversaw the ballot count in the elections of May 1989.

That particular election led to huge trouble for the DDR government, paving the way for the massive uprising against the totalitarian regime that threw down the Berlin Wall and brought about German reunification.

But it’s not like that at all in the US where exit polls are no longer taken in presidential elections. It’s not like Americans don’t have a wide variety of candidates to choose from when they open up their ballot for president every four years… Even in states like New York that force independent and third party candidates to collect 45,000 verified signatures within a short six week period. No comparison at all to GDR with its limited choice of candidates. Nothing to see here, folks. Move along now.

Perhaps my analogy will only go so far, although the parallels are there to see. Perhaps someday Americans will finally tell their bought-and-paid-for politicians where they can shove their military budget appropriations and demand serious and lasting beneficial changes for the people—hopefully before we all get blown to hell by the nuclear fires of World War III. 

Sources:
The Berlin Wall
https://www.stiftung-berliner-mauer.de/en/topics/berlin-wall
US military spending
https://www.usaspending.gov/agency/department-of-defense
 DDR military spending
https://www.rand.org/pubs/reports/R3726z1.html

Don’t Forget the USS Liberty’s Dead and Wounded https://scheerpost.com/2024/06/08/dont-forget-the-uss-libertys-dead-and-wounded/

Related Articles and Other Interesting Links

Understanding INA Section 212f https://www.americanimmigrationcouncil.org/research/understanding-ina-section-212f-president-authority-suspend-entry-migrants

‘What Are They Afraid Of?’: Columbia Law Review Board Shuts Down Website Over Nakba Article https://scheerpost.com/2024/06/06/what-are-they-afraid-of-columbia-law-review-board-shuts-down-website-over-nakba-article/ 

Peace Activists Assaulted And Forcibly Removed From Jimmy Kimmel Taping https://popularresistance.org/peace-activists-assaulted-and-forcibly-removed-from-jimmy-kimmel-taping

Biden's new immigration order restricts asylum claims along the border. https://www.cbsnews.com/news/biden-executive-order-immigration-border-asylum/

A century ago, anti-immigrant backlash almost closed America’s doors https://theconversation.com/a-century-ago-anti-immigrant-backlash-almost-closed-americas-doors-228589

'Historic, But So, So Late': Israel Added to UN's Child-Killing 'List of Shame' https://www.commondreams.org/news/israel-killing-children-2668478068

Israel has bombed a school less than a day since it bombed the last one https://www.councilestatemedia.uk/p/israel-has-bombed-a-school-less-than

Israel kills over 200 Palestinians to rescue 4 captives; U.S. allegedly involved in operation https://mondoweiss.net/2024/06/israel-kills-over-200-palestinians-to-rescue-4-captives-u-s-allegedly-involved-in-operation/

Narcissistic Personality Disorder in the USA https://www.counterpunch.org/2024/06/07/narcissistic-personality-disorder-in-the-usa/

Rights group accuses Israel of hitting residential buildings with white phosphorous in Lebanon  https://apnews.com/article/israel-lebanon-human-rights-watch-white-phosphorus-616984b69e1cbe1efc5bbee4cb3ba8ae

US weapons parts used in Israeli attack on Gaza school https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2024/6/6/us-weapons-parts-used-in-israeli-attack-on-gaza-school-al-jazeera-analysis

US Bombs Used in Israeli Massacre of 40 in Gaza Refugee Camp https://scheerpost.com/2024/06/07/us-bombs-used-in-israeli-massacre-of-40-in-gaza-refugee-camp/

Israeli forces killed captives during Nuseirat 'massacre', alleges Hamas https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/war-gaza-israeli-forces-kill-other-captives-during-nuseirat-massacre-alleges-hamas

US Targets Journalists Who Criticize Administration's Foreign Policy https://denniskucinich.substack.com/p/us-targets-journalists-who-

State department says it's Hamas' fault Israel won't accept Biden's peace deal (Hamas is willing to accept the deal) https://www.councilestatemedia.uk/p/state-department-says-its-hamas-fault

The Reckless Brinkmanship With Russia Just Keeps On Escalating https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/the-reckless-brinkmanship-with-russia

Lawmakers move to automate Selective Service registration for all men  https://www.federaltimes.com/news/pentagon-congress/2024/05/23/lawmakers-move-to-automate-selective-service-registration-for-all-men/

If You Want to See White “Supremacy” at Work, Don’t go to a Trump Rally, Observe the Democrats’ Approach to Climate Change
https://www.blackagendareport.com/index.php/if-you-want-see-white-supremacy-work-dont-go-trump-rally-observe-democrats-approach-climate-change

The CIA Has “Georgia On Its Mind” https://joebrunoli.substack.com/p/the-cia-has-georgia-on-its-mind

Police Are Sending Student Protesters to the ER. Campus Cops Don’t Keep Us Safe. https://scheerpost.com/2024/06/05/police-are-sending-student-protesters-to-the-er-campus-cops-dont-keep-us-safe/

The Fight for Palestinian Recognition in American Academia https://www.citizenschronicle.org/p/the-fight-for-palestinian-recognition

Some of AIPAC’s Biggest Donors Are Also Financing Attacks Against Labor Rights https://truthout.org/articles/some-of-aipacs-biggest-donors-are-also-financing-attacks-against-labor-rights/

Scott Ritter: On My Way to Russia I Met Big Brother. https://www.youtube.com/live/lOsW84wYdzg?si=G3L4wgiRDIrK6z9A

Russian warships will arrive in Havana next week, say Cuban officials citing ‘friendly relations’ https://apnews.com/article/cuba-russia-warships-caribbean-ukraine-97905c0a6072e39e2869a18e28b0aeef

Israel Reportedly Used Fake Social Media Accounts To Garner Support From US Lawmakers On Gaza War https://www.forbes.com/sites/siladityaray/2024/06/05/israel-reportedly-used-fake-social-media-accounts-to-garner-support-from-us-lawmakers-on-gaza-war/

When Opposing A Genocide Means You're A Nazi https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/when-opposing-a-genocide-means-youre

Everything About Israel Is Fake https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/everything-about-israel-is-fake

The Media Skew Public Perception By Manipulating People's Attention https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/the-media-skew-public-perception

'We Want Peace': Spain Applies to Join ICJ Genocide Case Against Israel  https://www.commondreams.org/news/spain-genocide-case

Police Can Be Held Liable for Killing a Dog but Not a Black Person https://scheerpost.com/2024/06/07/police-can-be-held-liable-for-killing-a-dog-but-not-a-black-person/

Mexico Elected a Climate Scientist. But Will She Be a Climate President? https://insideclimatenews.org/news/07062024/mexico-president-elect-claudia-sheinbaum-climate-policy/

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There’s Always Money For Bombs

“The sinews of war are infinite money.” --Marcus Tullius Cicero

"How many free school lunches could have been bought with the money we used to send bombs to Israel so they could bury children under rubble?" --Professor Anthony Zenkus on X https://twitter.com/anthonyzenkus/status/1797464596552585340

There’s Always Money For Bombs

by C.A. Matthews

The images out of Gaza have been unrelentingly traumatic, but the slaughter in Rafah was just unbearably upsetting. Reports of decapitated babies. Charred children. People burned alive. All just days after the International Court of Justice (ICJ) ordered Israel to halt its military offensive in Rafah. All while the US government makes excuse after excuse for Israel’s flagrant breaches of international law, which Israel said was just a “tragic mistake”.

After those images, I couldn’t function anymore. I certainly couldn’t sit down and try and write. The hopelessness and the horror and my rage felt too overwhelming. My complicity felt too overwhelming – the knowledge that this mass slaughter is being facilitated and funded by the US taxpayer, the knowledge that a little portion of my writing income goes towards this suffering. All while the public school around the corner from me in Philadelphia is failing because there’s never enough money for education and the library near me shuts on Sundays because there’s never enough money for public services and there are people going bankrupt in the US from medical bills because there’s never enough money to invest in public health. But there’s always money for bombs. --from Where is Joe Biden’s fury about decapitated Palestinian babies? by Arwa Mahdawi

When I read Arwa’s impassioned plea for sanity, I identified with it completely. I knew I had to write about it.

There is always—and I mean always—enough money for bombs in the annual budget that the US Congress passes. Sure, some of the money goes for tanks, nuclear subs, the dockyard queen known as the “Littoral Combat Ship,” and for the crash-worthy F-35, too, but that’s the gist of where the majority of our tax dollars go toward. Armaments. War. Death. Destruction.

Genocide.

Why is that? Arwa makes some pertinent points here. There’s never any money for universal health care or to help struggling public schools in America, but there’s plenty of money to give to genocidal maniacs like Israel, always billions of dollars worth of bombs to hand over to these ethnic cleansing mass murderers. Bombs that have killed and maimed over 100,000 human beings in Gaza alone. Bombs that don’t create goodwill among the nations. Bombs that only create more animosity and fear.

Bombs that are bringing us each and every day closer to a nuclear war and the end of the world as we know it.

I’m sure there are plenty who feel that I’m exaggerating the point and that poor Arwa needs to take a chill pill and lie down until her brain fog clears. I call those types of people “idiots.” Okay, perhaps “morons” might be the better term in an intellectual sense, but either term works for me. Nowadays we can’t afford to keep listening to morons and idiots because these moron and idiots are trying to start World War III.

Don’t believe me? Believe another intelligent person who has looked into this issue:

The Biden administration has given Ukraine permission to use US-provided weapons to hit targets inside Russian territory (...) a step that marks a significant escalation of the proxy war.

“Ukraine needs support from the US for targeting when it fires US-provided missiles, which means the US will now be directly supporting strikes inside Russia. The escalation risks provoking a major response from Russia, as Moscow recently warned the UK that it would target British military sites in Ukraine and “beyond” if British missiles were used in strikes on Russian territory. (…)

Russian President Vladimir Putin has warned that any NATO countries that let Ukraine strike Russia with their weapons would face “major consequences.”  From Biden Gives Ukraine Permission To Strike Inside Russia With US Weapons by Dave DeCamp

There it is in black and white. The US is threatening Russia. One nuclear power is threatening another by giving bombs to another country, Ukraine, even after what President Putin said about the first country will be held accountable for whatever damage their bombs do. And the idiots and morons in the US allow Ukraine to shoot American bombs/missiles into Russia, targeting nuclear radar sites, knowing full well that these actions could escalate the current conventional bloodbath into full-fledged nuclear warfare. For added fun, US NATO ally France is sending some of its troops into Ukraine to get slaughtered as quickly as Ukrainian troops have. There can never be enough cannon fodder—I mean “soldiers”.

I know it’s difficult to get your head around this horrific state of affairs, but allow me to help. I believe the word you’re looking for to describe this situation is “suicide.”

To reiterate: There’s always money for bombs. AND the US will always make certain there are bombs enough worldwide to commit a nuclear genocide against every last living thing on earth. Why? Because the US is hell-bent to get its way and remain the top dog economically and militarily while standing on the apex of a pile of smoldering rubble called the Late Great Planet Earth.

See, that’s not too difficult to understand, is it? It isn’t a good thing. In fact, it’s something that the rest of the people of the planet desperately want to stop. It’s what keeping both Arwa and me awake at nights.

If you’re a regular reader of this blog, you’ll know what I mean by the terms “zio-bully” and “zionarcissism”  and how to apply them to the behaviors of the United States of Israel. The US suffers greatly from the mental illness of zionarcissism. It believes the best thing in the world is to zio-bully everyone into doing what they say by threatening them with bombs raining down on them from the sky, along with the parts from more than a few Boeing jets for good measure. [Editor’s note: The US bombs that were rained down upon the sleeping refugee camp in Rafah were actually made by Boeing, the Boeing GBU-39. (Cost reports range from $30,000-$40,000 per bomb.)Yes, Boeing can make something that actually works as intended. Too bad this something was intended to maim and kill.]

by Mark Taylor www.DeMOCKracy.Ink

I know what you’re thinking, if you’re a sane and moral person, that is. You’re thinking: “It doesn’t make any sense for the US, or anyone for that matter, to provoke a nuclear confrontation. Nobody wins in a nuclear war.” You’re absolutely right. But if you’ve been following recent events, you’ll have come to the conclusion that the US is not run by anyone the least sane and/or moral.

For crying out loud, Butcher Biden has been giving away billions of dollars worth of bombs and armaments to Israel who is clearly committing war crimes against an indigenous civilian population! Children are being burnt alive and suffering amputations without the benefit of anesthetic because Biden allows the Israelis to block food and medicines from coming into Gaza. I ask you how is Biden’s behavior either “sane” or “moral”?

“But what do we Americans get out of all this death and destruction?” you wonder. “Surely we must get something out of it, or why else do it and ruin our reputation on the world stage?”

Good questions. Perhaps there are no satisfactory answers. One thing the NATO countries are getting from watching the Israeli Occupation Forces bomb and sniper-shoot their way across Gaza is lots of great data on how well their instruments of death work in the field. Military scientists now know exactly how many bombs it takes to turn a city the size of Gaza City into rubble. This could make fighting conventional wars in the future (if there is a future) much more organized and cost effective.  If you know you’ll only need like 25,000 bunker buster bombs for your first month’s barrage, then you won’t need to buy or stock any more bombs than that. See how that could save a few trillion bucks in the Pentagon’s budget? (More money for those legendary golden toilet seats for F-35s!)

Even more sinister than that is now all these wonderful military-industrial complex corporations have great feedback on just how deadly their weapons of war really are. I mean, it’s difficult to know just how many children can be burned alive in a refugee tent camp without actually testing out your bombs by dropping them on some human guinea pigs. Isn’t it nice how the people of Gaza have volunteered their services essentially to serve as “crash test dummies” for the past eight months?

You don’t believe me that scientists actually collect this sort of data from the deaths of civilians and use it to make more lethal weapons? Well, if I told you that Nazi scientists tested weapons on the bodies of living (soon dead) concentration camp prisoners during World War II, and that information was snatched up by the US and others at the end of the war and studied closely, would you still not believe me? It’s okay if you don’t. But watch out that you and yours don’t become the next guinea pig they decide to test out their instruments of death on.

In the end, that’s all the military-industrial complex CEOs want—lots of profits (which the US government is providing) and lots of success with their “products” so they get repeat business. And these products won’t necessarily be sold to be used abroad in a distant land against a distant people you don’t like next time. Americans could be the next guinea pigs. Take a look at our militarized policing systems in American cities.

Why the hell does a small town with less than 25,000 people in the heartland of America need a dozen Humvee armored cars, courtesy of a Pentagon rummage sale? Answer: It doesn’t. But I used to drive past the police depot that contained these weapons of war when I lived in that little town, and I wondered if the cops bought them just in case they ever needed to mow down a few protesters who started acting out of line and demanding an end to the genocides, an end to the endless wars.

Small town cops can’t ever be too careful come a full fledged “riot” of five grandmothers and two dogs standing on the corner of Main Street carrying “Free Palestine” banners. Those armored cars will come in handy in running those “killer grannies” down, won’t they? Who’s to say our militarized police won’t use these military-grade weapons against us for other things like being the wrong color, wrong religion, wrong politics, wrong gender identity, wrong… You get the picture.

So remember: There’s always money for bombs. That is, until We the People decide that there isn’t, and we do something to stop these insane genocidal-suicidal morons.

photos by Stefan Fane

One big thing we can do is show solidarity with oppressed people both at home and around the world. We can broadcast their cause to a wider audience, since broadcast mainstream media stations won’t bother to. We can stand together and not let the morons-in-charge divide us and conquer our power.

I did just that this past weekend. I marched in solidarity for Palestine with an interesting mix of people—peace activists, queer activists, LGBTQIA supporters, American Muslim activists and their supporters. I know, these don’t sound like groups that normally would march together in a summer festival parade under the banner of Palestine liberation, but they did. We had a great time and received over all good responses from the community.

Marching with Stefan

We can’t allow the morons to break our spirits. We can’t allow them to divide and conquer us as we fight for our case. We can’t quit protesting until we see our objectives met.

One day soon, we will make it so there is never any money for bombs as long as there are oppressed human beings in need of our help anywhere on the planet. I can’t wait to walk beside you then.

Related Articles and Other Interesting Links

Israel’s Tents Massacre in Rafah Is a Heinous War Crime https://www.commondreams.org/opinion/tents-massacre-rafah-war-crime

Rafah Invasion Was Once Biden’s “Red Line” — But Israel Continues to Cross It https://truthout.org/articles/rafah-invasion-was-once-bidens-red-line-but-israel-continues-to-cross-it/

Where is Joe Biden’s fury about decapitated Palestinian babies? https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/article/2024/may/30/biden-palestinian-beheaded-israeli-babies

Biden Lets Ukraine Strike Russia With US Weapons While Ukraine Attacks Russian Nuclear Defenses  https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/biden-lets-ukraine-strike-russia

Biden Gives Ukraine Permission To Strike Inside Russia With US Weapons https://news.antiwar.com/2024/05/30/biden-gives-ukraine-permission-to-strike-inside-russia-with-us-weapons/

US Presidents Who Gamble With Nuclear Armageddon https://consortiumnews.com/2024/05/30/us-presidents-who-gamble-with-nuclear-armageddon/

The Military-Industrial Complex Is Killing Us All https://scheerpost.com/2024/06/03/the-military-industrial-complex-is-killing-us-all/

Surveillance and interference: Israel’s covert war on the ICC exposed https://www.972mag.com/icc-israel-surveillance-investigation/

The ICC Takes on Israel and the US Congressional Mafia https://medeabenjamin.substack.com/p/the-icc-takes-on-israel-and-the-us

Top EU official accused at ICC of ‘complicity’ in Gaza genocide https://thecradle.co/articles/top-eu-official-accused-at-icc-of-complicity-in-gaza-genocide

Israel Seizes Entire Gaza Border! https://rumble.com/v4ygyze-live-israel-seizes-entire-gaza-border-and-much-more.html

Biden pressures Netanyahu to accept peace deal that could have been agreed 40,000 bodies ago https://www.councilestatemedia.uk/p/biden-pressures-netanyahu-to-accept

Falsified US State Department Report Inspires Yet Another Resignation https://popularresistance.org/falsified-us-state-department-report-inspires-yet-another-resignation/

This Texas Company Is Providing the Jet Fuel for Israel’s Assault on Gaza https://truthout.org/articles/this-texas-company-is-providing-the-jet-fuel-for-israels-assault-on-gaza/

UN Calls for International Aid as Sudan Faces Imminent Famine Amid Civil War https://truthout.org/articles/un-calls-for-international-aid-as-sudan-faces-imminent-famine-amid-civil-war/

UCLA's Disturbing Crackdown on Peaceful Protesters: An Injustice Unfolds https://www.citizenschronicle.org/p/uclas-disturbing-crackdown-on-peaceful

Gaza-on-the-Rhine, a history lesson https://autonomies.org/2024/03/yazan-alloujami-gaza-on-the-rhine-a-history-lesson/

From Massachusetts, Some Tax-the-Rich Inspiration https://scheerpost.com/2024/05/28/from-massachusetts-some-tax-the-rich-inspiration/

In a Victory for Assange and First Amendment, UK Court Grants Right to Appeal  https://truthout.org/articles/in-a-victory-for-assange-and-first-amendment-uk-court-grants-right-to-appeal/

Why Celebrities Aren't Speaking Up About Gaza https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/why-celebrities-arent-speaking-up

Educators Celebrate as Judge Strikes Down New Hampshire ‘Banned Concepts’ Law https://scheerpost.com/2024/05/30/educators-celebrate-as-judge-strikes-down-new-hampshire-banned-concepts-law/

Delhi Heat Wave Suggests Underestimated Speed and Intensity of Global Warming https://truthout.org/articles/delhi-heat-wave-suggests-underestimated-speed-and-intensity-of-global-warming/

Murray & Galloway on Ending Israel's Genocide in Gaza https://youtu.be/mW5KF-Z08ug

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