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The Powers-That-Be Are Secretly Terrified of the People’s Power … And Only PRETEND They’re Firmly In Control
Our Actions Are More Powerful Than We Realize
David Swanson writes:
Almost every [history of past activism] includes belated discoveries of the extent to which government officials were influenced by activist groups even while pretending to ignore popular pressure.
These revelations can be found in the memoirs of the government officials as well, such as in George W. Bush's recollection of how seriously the Republican Senate Majority Leader was taking public pressure against the war on Iraq in 2006.
Of course, activism that appears ineffectual at the time can succeed in a great many ways, including by influencing others, even young children, who go on to become effective activists -- or by influencing firm opponents who begin to change their minds and eventually switch sides.
The beautiful thing about nonviolent activism is that, while risking no harm, it has the potential to do good in ways small and large that ripple out from it in directions we cannot track or measure.
Wittner participated in his first political demonstration in 1961. The USSR was withdrawing from a moratorium on nuclear testing. A protest at the White House urged President Kennedy not to follow suit:
"Picking up what I considered a very clever sign ('Kennedy, Don't Mimic the Russians!'), I joined the others (supplemented by a second busload of students from a Quaker college in the Midwest) circling around a couple of trees outside the White House. Mike and I -- as new and zealous recruits -- circled all day without taking a lunch or a dinner break.
"For decades I looked back on this venture as a trifle ridiculous. After all, we and other small bands of protesters couldn't have had any impact on U.S. policy, could we? Then in the mid-1990s, while doing research at the Kennedy Library on the history of the world nuclear disarmament movement, I stumbled onto an oral history interview with Adrian Fisher, deputy director of the U.S. Arms Control and Disarmament Agency. He was explaining why Kennedy delayed resuming atmospheric nuclear tests until April 1962. Kennedy personally wanted to resume such tests, Fisher recalled, 'but he also recognized that there were a lot of people that were going to be deeply offended by the United States resuming atmospheric testing. We had people picketing the White House, and there was a lot of excitement about it -- just because the Russians do it, why do we have to do it?'"
Yes, Kennedy delayed a horrible action. He didn't, at that time, block it permanently. But if the picketers in 1961 had had the slightest notion that Kennedy was being influenced by them, their numbers would have multiplied 10-fold, as would the delay have correspondingly lengthened.
Yes, our government was more responsive to public opinion in the 1960s than now, but part of the reason is that more people were active then. And another reason is that government officials are doing a better job now of hiding any responsiveness to public sentiment, which helps convince the public it has no impact, which reduces activism further. We also focus far too much on the most difficult individuals to move, such as presidents.
In 1973-1974, Wittner visited GI coffee houses in Japan including in Yokusaka, where the Midway aircraft carrier was in port. The Japanese were protesting the ship's carrying of nuclear weapons, which was illegal in Japan, and which the U.S. military, of course, lied about. But U.S. soldiers with whom Wittner and other activists had talked, brought them onto the ship and showed them the nukes. The following summer, when Wittner read in a newspaper that,
"a substantial number of American GIs had refused to board the Midway for a mission to South Korea, then swept by popular protest against the U.S.-backed dictatorship, it occurred to me that I might have played some small role in inspiring their mutiny."
Soldiers can still be reached much more easily than presidents, more easily in many cases in fact than the average citizen. War lies are harder to sell to the people who have been fighting the wars.
In the late 1990s, Wittner was researching the anti-nuclear movement of decades past. He interviewed Robert "Bud" McFarlane, President Ronald Reagan's former national security advisor:
"Other administration officials had claimed that they had barely noticed the nuclear freeze movement. But when I asked McFarlane about it, he lit up and began outlining a massive administration campaign to counter and discredit the freeze -- one that he had directed. . . . A month later, I interviewed Edwin Meese, a top White House staffer and U.S. attorney general during the Reagan administration. When I asked him about the administration's response to the freeze campaign, he followed the usual line by saying that there was little official notice taken of it. In response, I recounted what McFarlane had revealed. A sheepish grin now spread across this former government official's face, and I knew that I had caught him. 'If Bud says that,' he remarked tactfully, 'it must be true.'"
When someone tells you to stop imagining that you're having an impact, ask them to please redirect their energy into getting 10 friends to join you in doing what needs to be done. If it has no impact, you'll have gone down trying. If it has an impact, nobody will tell you for many years.
Mr. Swanson is right. I noted in 2009:
As MSNBC news correspondent Jonathan Capehart tells Dylan Ratigan, the main problem is that people aren’t making enough noise. Capehart says that the people not only have to “burn up the phone lines to Congress”, but also to hit the streets and protest in D.C.
Even though most politicians are totally corrupt, if many millions of Americans poured into the streets of D.C., a critical mass would be reached, and the politicians would start changing things in a hurry.
As [liberal] PhD economist Dean Baker points out:
The elites hate to acknowledge it, but when large numbers of ordinary people are moved to action, it changes the narrow political world where the elites call the shots. Inside accounts reveal the extent to which Johnson and Nixon’s conduct of the Vietnam War was constrained by the huge anti-war movement. It was the civil rights movement, not compelling arguments, that convinced members of Congress to end legal racial discrimination. More recently, the townhall meetings, dominated by people opposed to health care reform, have been a serious roadblock for those pushing reform….
A big turnout … can make a real difference.
Baker is right about Vietnam.
Specifically – according to Daniel Ellsberg and many others – Richard Nixon actually planned on dropping a nuclear bomb on Vietnam. Nixon also said he didn’t care what the American people thought. He said that — no matter what the public did or said — he was going to escalate the war in Vietnam.
However, a well-known biographer says that Nixon backed off when hundreds of thousands of people turned out in Washington, D.C. to protest an escalation of the war.
And Pulitzer prize winning reporter Chris Hedges pointed out recently:
I was in Leipzig on November 9, 1989 with leaders of East German opposition and they told me that - perhaps within a year – there would be free passes back and forth across the Berlin wall.
Within a few hours, the Berlin Wall, at least as far as an impediment to human traffic, did not exist.
Week after week, month after month, these clergy in Leipzig held these candlelit vigils. And it was slow at first … people forget. Just like the Egyptian revolution has been percolating for many many months, and even years.
And suddenly, it began to grow.
And Honecker – who had been in ruling East Germany since the time of the dinosaurs – sent down a paratroop division to Leipzig .. . and they won’t attack the demonstrators.
Part of the reason that our actions are more powerful than we think is that courage is contagious. So is the ability to think.
As we've previously noted:
[Studies show ] that even one dissenting voice can give people permission to think for themselves. Specifically:
Solomon Asch, with experiments originally carried out in the 1950s and well-replicated since, highlighted a phenomenon now known as “conformity”. In the classic experiment, a subject sees a puzzle like the one in the nearby diagram: Which of the lines A, B, and C is the same size as the line X? Take a moment to determine your own answer…The gotcha is that the subject is seated alongside a number of other people looking at the diagram – seemingly other subjects, actually confederates of the experimenter. The other “subjects” in the experiment, one after the other, say that line C seems to be the same size as X. The real subject is seated next-to-last. How many people, placed in this situation, would say “C” – giving an obviously incorrect answer that agrees with the unanimous answer of the other subjects? What do you think the percentage would be?
Three-quarters of the subjects in Asch’s experiment gave a “conforming” answer at least once. A third of the subjects conformed more than half the time.
Get it so far? People tend to defer to what the herd thinks.
But here’s the good news:
Adding a single dissenter – just one other person who gives the correct answer, or even an incorrect answer that’s different from the group’s incorrect answer – reduces conformity very sharply, down to 5-10%.
Why is this important? Well, it means that one person who publicly speaks the truth can sway a group of people away from group-think.
If a group of people is leaning towards believing the government’s version of events, a single person who speaks the truth can help snap the group out of its trance.
There is an important point here regarding the web, as well. The above-cited article states that:
When subjects can respond in a way that will not be seen by the group, conformity also drops.What does that mean? Well, on the web, many people post anonymously. The anonymity gives people permission to “respond in a way that will not be seen by the group”. But most Americans still don’t get their news from the web, or only go to mainstream corporate news sites.
Away from the keyboard, we are not very anonymous. So that is where the conformity dynamic — and the need for courageous dissent — is vital. It is doubly important that we apply the same hard-hitting truthtelling we do on the Internet in our face-to-face interactions; because it is there that dissent is urgently needed.
Bottom line: Each person‘s voice has the power to snap entire groups out of their coma of irrational group-think. So go forth and be a light of rationality and truth among the sleeping masses.
And a recent study shows that when only 10% of a population have strongly-held beliefs, their belief will often be adopted by the majority of the society.
True, governments worldwide are cracking down on liberty with the iron fist of repression.
But some argue that this is actually a sign that we are winning.
As Truthout’s Matt Renner writes:
Recently I sat down with two of the young adults who organized and led the Egyptian resistance movement that overthrew Hosni Mubarak. The media narrative said it took 18 days, when in fact, they had been organizing for over five years.
According to these young men, the moment they knew they had won was the day Mubarak’s government shut off the Internet and blocked cellphone communications. When people could no longer get updates about what was happening in Tahrir Square, they had to come out of their homes and see for themselves, tripling the size of the protests in one fell swoop.
The global plutocracy is terrified of dissent. In some places, the war on dissent is being fought with bullets. In others, the war on dissent targets social media and mobile communications, while repressing and deceiving communities of struggle. It’s already happening.
Indeed, the use of heavy-handed tactics – taking the velvet glove off of the iron fist – could backfire, as it will show the “emperor’s ruthlessness” for all to see.
The powers-that-be are terrified of political awakening and dissent. For example, Zbigniew Brzezinski – National Security Adviser to President Carter, creator of America’s strategy to lure Russia into Afghanistan, creator of America’s plans for Eurasia in general, and Obama’s former foreign affairs adviser - said:
For the first time in human history almost all of humanity is politically activated, politically conscious and politically interactive. There are only a few pockets of humanity left in the remotest corners of the world that are not politically alert and engaged with the political turmoil and stirrings that are so widespread today around the world.
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America needs to face squarely a centrally important new global reality: that the world’s population is experiencing a political awakening unprecedented in scope and intensity, with the result that the politics of populism are transforming the politics of power.
***
[T]he central challenge of our time is posed not by global terrorism, but rather by the intensifying turbulence caused by the phenomenon of global political awakening. That awakening is socially massive and politically radicalizing.
It is no overstatement to assert that now in the 21st century the population of much of the developing world is politically stirring and in many places seething with unrest. It is a population acutely conscious of social injustice to an unprecedented degree, and often resentful of its perceived lack of political dignity.
***
These energies transcend sovereign borders and pose a challenge both to existing states as well as to the existing global hierarchy, on top of which America still perches.
***
The misdiagnosis [of foreign policy] pertains to a relatively vague, excessively abstract, highly emotional, semi-theological definition of the chief menace that we face today in the world, and the consequent slighting of what I view as the unprecedented global challenge arising out of the unique phenomenon of a truly massive global political awakening of mankind. We live in an age in which mankind writ large is becoming politically conscious and politically activated to an unprecedented degree, and it is this condition which is producing a great deal of international turmoil.
That turmoil is the product of the political awakening, the fact that today vast masses of the world are not politically neutered, as they have been throughout history. They have political consciousness.
***
The other major change in international affairs is that for the first time, in all of human history, mankind has been politically awakened. That is a total new reality – total new reality. It has not been so for most of human history until the last one hundred years. And in the course of the last one hundred years, the whole world has become politically awakened. And no matter where you go, politics is a matter of social engagement, and most people know what is generally going on –generally going on – in the world, and are consciously aware of global inequities, inequalities, lack of respect, exploitation. Mankind is now politically awakened and stirring.
And a reader notes:
We do not understand our own power. Look around you. Almost everything you see was not only made, but created by people like yourselves. Most of the horrors existing on earth were engendered by the elites, WITH OUR CO-OPERATION. Without our consent, most of the terrifying situations existing in our world will cease to exist. Resist. It certainly may be difficult initially, but it grows easier moment by moment.
Some historical quotes may be helpful in illustrating the importance of struggling to make things better ...
It is from numberless diverse acts of courage and belief that human history is shaped. Each time a man stands up for an ideal, or acts to improve the lot of others, or strikes out against injustice, he sends forth a tiny ripple of hope, and crossing each other from a million different centers of energy and daring, those ripples build a current that can sweep down the mightiest walls of oppression and resistance.
- Robert F . Kennedy
We must never despair; our situation has been compromising before; and it changed for the better; so I trust it will again. If difficulties arise; we must put forth new exertion and proportion our efforts to the exigencies of the times.
- George Washington
We must remember that one determined person can make a significant difference, and that a small group of determined people can change the course of history.
-Sonia Johnson
Never doubt that a small, group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.
- Margaret Mead
Hope has never trickled down. It has always sprung up.
- Studs Terkel
At certain points in history, the energy level of people, the indignation level of people rises. And at that point it becomes possible for people to organize and to agitate and to educate one another, and to create an atmosphere in which the government must do something.
- Howard Zinn, historian
There is no act too small, no act too bold. The history of social change is the history of millions of actions, small and large, coming together at points in history and creating a power that governments cannot suppress.
- Howard Zinn
Cynicism Is Not Realistic
Millions of Americans think that hope is for the foolish, and that the smart people are cynics.
But if all of the people who think of themselves as cynics or skeptics made noise, things would instantly change for the better. In other words, the millions of cynics/skeptics/self-described “realists” aren’t raising a ruckus against the fraud being committed by the giant banks, the corruption of our political system, or the lawlessness and imperial arrogance of our intelligence-military-industrial complex because they think things can’t change.
But by staying silent, they are actually creating the conditions in which nothing can change. As Edmund Burke points out:
All tyranny needs to gain a foothold is for people of good conscience to remain silent.
If the millions of cynics woke up to the fact that they are a huge group – especially when combined with the people who are already actively working for the restoration of a liberty, justice and the rule of law – they would suddenly realize that collectively we can change things in a heart beat.
Don't Want to Go First?
Most people don't want to go first ...
Most people want to see others succeeding before they give it a shot.
But the truth - as pointed out by Zbigniew Brzezinski above - is that people are waking up worldwide ... and things are changing quickly.
A few short years ago, Americans wouldn't have believed that the White House would lie us into a major war, that our government would choose Wall Street over the little guy, or that the NSA spied on every American citizen. Now, this is all common knowledge.
A few years ago, most Americans trusted government and corporate leaders. Now, polls show that trust has collapsed, as people realize that our core institutions are rotten with corruption.
You will not be taking the first step. More people than you realize are already working to challenge the corrupt people in positions of power.
When you act to make things better, you're actually joining a large group of people doing the same thing.
And as Hellen Keller pointed out:
Avoiding danger is no safer in the long run than outright exposure. Life is either a daring adventure, or nothing.
Postscript: In any event, hiding our head in the sand doesn't work.
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ZH - CALL TO ACTION - REVOLUTION - NOT
I would agree that ALL posts are carefully selected bullshit articles that GOLDMAN-SACHS feels will 'boil the frog' into complacency.
Has there ever been a "CALL TO ACTION" post here?
NOPE NOT FUCKING NEVER.
I hesitate to comment regarding the time I spend reading the internet but it is because I am up all night due to late shift and being too wound up to sleep. I go everywhere and read just about everything, including the comments, and have for about a decade.
It has been my observation that Americans have indeed woken up. The shocking part is how few arguments there are. Trolls are taken out fast with down arrows and the shared links contribute to greater understanding to what is going down in this new world of ours. The years spent compiling information and creating rather sophisticated videos and web sites (www.thirdworldtraveler.com) is just part of it. People are talking to each other and agreeing with the consensus - a serious attempt at oppression of the middle class is underway and this is occurring simultaneously with the theft of their wealth and their jobs (a death sentence).
Backs are against the wall and we all know that the next step, without a plan in govt for solution to the dilemma, we all have a garotte around our necks.
That is only true on the sites you go to. Try reading the comments on Bloomberg, NTY, or MSNBC, to name but a few (not the stories but the comments). Ideologies have become more isolated and homogenous. There is another side and they aren't on the same side as the people fighting for liberty unless you limit liberty to sexual choice, government support, and no standards for education or behavior. They are legion. Even if we force a change at the top there is still a large group of people in this country that will fight just as hard for a dictatorship of the majority (communism by another term). It is a close run thing.
Have you tried to have these same conversations in 'real time' with neighbors, friends, enemies, associates, work buddies?
I have been practically shut out of any dialogue when it comes to dealing with serious issues. Even my own GF is hesitant about inviting me to her work/social occasions and forbids me to raise them among our friends, because my penchant of wanting to get past the small talk and find out others' opinions about what is happening to them and their kids is considered rude, disruptive and disturbing to the dinner, party, or pot luck.
Someone below mentioned courage. Or the lack of it in the american people. I don't know exactly what that is but I do know it is not something that you get one day on the battlefield in a moment of self-sacrifice, and what little good that kind of one off would do you anyway in day to day living, where courage is essential to the every moment that requires a decision. We have, as a people, allowed our character building to fall to levels that make ants look like heroes.
Courage is like any other trait we seek to have. It is built as surely as any edifice, little by little, in a thousand decisions we make ever day of the week. It's not a trait that magically appears one day when we decide to revolt. I know of no revolution that happened overnight. They all took many years to move to action. And we have yet to begin to even talk about it but at a far remove, as we do freely in these blogs.
Words are hard to find in real-time. Who would have expected this to have been allowed to happen? How could the very politicians that are paid by tax dollars deceive the voting public? It is incomprehensible. But, it is happening not only in US but also every other developed nation. The only response I get from men is, "there is going to be a civil war." The women just look at me with fear in their eyes.
The only response I get from men is, "there is going to be a civil war." The women just look at me with fear in their eyes. -- bunnyswanson
Well deserved fear. I don't know how many folks here have seen war firsthand, esp. a civil war. It's brutal for everyone, not just the active combatants. Those are trite words (terribly inadequate to convey the horror) when I think about it, even though true. For my family's sake, I prefer to avoid a civil war.
And while that may not be possible, it seems to me that in order to prevail if it does come to that, we need to be actively seeking political solutions now, to clarify both whom "we" are and our political ideas and ideals. Otherwise we will simply be painted as terrorists...
For sure, Spanky, it is well-deserved fear! The women and children usually suffer the worst during wars, and especially during civil wars! Moreover, after the development of weapons of mass destruction, violent revolution has no more plausible good theory than real war anymore! That remains the case, behind the scenes, despite the fact that anyone who spends enough time looking at the "war on terror" discovers that it was started by the ruling classes, and was designed to become a self-fulfilling prophesy, since it fits in the prolonged historical pattern of the ruling classes backing up debt slavery with wars based on deceits.
Therefore, I would paint the rulers as being the worst terrorists, and I regard them as being criminally insane for deliberately pushing and pushing things towards insane civil war, with democidal martail law, to match the genocidal wars elsewhere. However, in that context, as far as I can tell, "actively seeking political solutions" amounts to irrational hope for a series of political miracles. Lots more people are being forced to face the problems, but the results appear to more be that they then regress under stress, than that they think of better solutions.
I always found that the more one knows, the worse it gets, and therefore, I find it easy to understand why so many people do not want to know! But nevertheless, more and more are being forced to find out, due to the ways that things personally impact them!
Which is why if you see a civil war coming, you get your family out, long before the shooting starts.
Anybody that is still in the USA with a family is a fucking death wishing asshole, and doesn't give a flying fuck about his family.
Hard medicine, but yer right. (I can never be sure if it's "whom" or "who", though).
What the Omnipotent Ones know is this:
The First Amendment is sacrosanct, and not because of any democratic principle. The 1% revere it, worship it, sacrifice young virgins to it.
".....Because as long as the proletariat can speak, write, discuss, in open forums, in all media, they will do just that: talk.
And as long as we preserve that right for them to keep talkikng, we will not be beheaded, assassinated or otherwise rendered extinct, or much interfered with. We will instead prosper as never before. That is what former fascists in the United States did not understand. Let them vent. It's all they can do".
A couple of years ago I came to work and was startled to find my Persian lab assistant was crying. She told me she had just received an email that a dear friend of hers was planning to attend a protest they do in Tehran every year. They all remove their burkas together publicly as a protest to the injustice to women. Other groups around the world do as well in solidarity. Many women around the world send them money and the government has jailed some of them when they have found they have received cash from outside the country. My friend has said it is more difficult to do every year because the government is closely watching the conspirators and is prepared to jail anyone that is likely to participate.
Last year my lab assistant's friend was jailed and beaten for three days for her participation. The beating were so bad she has severe palsy and is confined to a wheelchair. She was determined to participate again against my friend's pleading for her not to. My Persian friend turned to me and said something that haunts me to this day. "Why don't you Americans have any courage?" I could not answer her.
I look back in this country's past and I see much courage and sacrifice. I do see it in my own past as well. However today I don't see that kind of courage being displayed. I am not sure why. Perhaps things are just not bad enough to risk three days of beating in the vague hope of turning things around. I do pray that if the time does come I will have the courage of my Persian lab assistant's friend. Because at some point non violent protest will morph into violent when conditions are right.
Miffed;-)
Miffed: Ever notice that some of the most so-called influential disidents, defectors, and tortured people who lived to tell about it had their days in the sun, yet nothing ever came of it? And those that survived eventually emigrated to another country and still we couldn't hear them (or never listened beyond the media sound bite).
I knew a former SAS guy who's tour was back in the 70's doing battle with the IRA in Ireland. In his retired years he had to lie to women he was dating. He could never tell the truth about his service... until one day. A gal he was seeing asked him if he believed in violence. His reply, without thinking about it, was "ABSOLUTELY". He said sometimes violence is necessary to either protect yourself or other people.
That was the last he saw of her. Doesn't matter what he did in the 70's and whether or not people agree with it. Fact is, we will all do similar things when threatened by the STATE, or a drunken wanker with a knife. The woman that wasn't interested in my buddy never had to fight for anything. And she can thank a soldier for that. Oh, the irony!... lol.
This is so true Angus.My Persian friend and her other fellow protesters whom I met were lucky to escape Iran when they did ( her father worked for Shell Oil and had connections fortunately to get her out. He died in Iran). She still works tirelessly for women's causes in the ME but the best she has done is to get women out of the country ( usually to Germany) who wish to escape. She certainly hasn't made much of a societal impact and I'm amazed she still continues.
Your story is sad. Twenty years ago I was renting a cabin from an old WWII vet. Every evening I would join him on his porch as he smoked his godawful European cigs and gazed at his cattle. After three months of chewing the fat he told me an incredible story. He was captured by the Japanese in the South Pacific. He was slowly being tortured to death with a group of about 20 other guys. When he knew they weren't going to survive, he and a buddy got a wire, garroted the guard and escaped into the jungle. After three days his buddy died from the treatment he had received. My friend was rescued after a week, the only one who survived. This was a very graphic tale and I was basically gape mouthed dumbfounded. After he was done I touched his arm and told him how much I had appreciated him for telling me his tale and I was so happy he was alive to tell it to me. He turned to me and said I was the only one in the world that heard it. None of his friends or family knew. But he knew I would understand and not judge him for the things he had done. He turned away from me so I wouldn't see the tears in his eyes. I just held his arm and was quiet.
Angus, I know many soldiers have many such tales weighing heavy on their souls. It is very sad there aren't many who feel confident and comfortable hearing their stories with out judgement. I guess growing up in the school of hard knocks has made me a bit more resilient than the average woman. No one should have to take that sadness to their grave.
Miffed;-)
I think the entire narrative that the USA man ever had balls is just a myth.
The USA was a penal colony, and they beat shit out of anybody that didn't do as they were told.
Now its the same, but the stick&carrot, is now just carrot and money.
Like the 100 monkeys in china, in the USA they show you daily what happens if you 'speak up'.
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When ever I hear or read about REVOLUTION in the USA, I just yawn, never fucking ever happened yesterday and ain't going happen tomorrow.
THE USA colony is probably the must succesfully managed CARGO-CULT on earth, its a role model for every dictator on earth, even PUTIN marvels about how americans eat OBAMA's bile.
Russians are fucking smart and hit back, ... in no time in history has american's ever hit back.
In the civil war, most men were forced to fight, and most died in line on forced marches to their deaths.
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History shows no time in history did anybody stand up.
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Look to IRELAND for a the model, in 1917 the IRA started, one night they slit the throat of 20 political leaders, in the morning the english, were largely ran out of Southern Ireland,
That is how its done, but at no time in USA history has there ever been real men like the IRISH.
*
Today with the NSA, and full information awareness and un-limited FIAT to BUY cops and guns, ... there is no way in hell that anybody in the USA will make a peep, let alone get off their ass and turn off the TV.
"Why don't you Americans have any courage?"
nie moj cyrk, nie moje malpy.
It is a polish phrase someone mentioned to me. Even google translate got it correct.
not my circus, not my monkeys.
Expect it to become more prevalent in the future.
The forces are gathering
"if you like your police state, you can keep your police state"
Long ago I left the USA, and this is why, I didn't want to live in a police state
When did the USA go full retard NAZI? In the mid 1980's. Nobody spoke up then, and nobody still even has a clue now.
The frog was boiled dead a long fucking time ago.
Yep, and talk about your gun's, they mean nothing in the hand's of cowards.
"Why don't you Americans have any courage?"
I would respond by asking why Iranian men are so lacking in it. Women getting beaten by police for peacefully protesting is not something that would stand for very long in America, especially when their cause is so obviously just. So where are the Iranian men? Why isn't there a massive wall of them between them and the police that would abuse and defile their mothers, sisters and daughters?
I'll make a prediction here. Iran, and indeed Islam itself has a day of reckoning directly ahead. The betrayal of women in the various "arab springs" has not gone unoticed by HALF the population of the muslim world. That anger lies just below the surface, and all it will take is one spark - just like that guy in Tunisia who set fire to himself. Once woken, women are an unstoppable force I wouldn't want to get in the way of. Better to get on side now, while you still can, my muslim brothers. You other brothers too. When you stand up for women, you stand up for everyone, including yourself.
This is a valid point. Perhaps young men are indoctrinated very early that the subjugation of women is religiously justified in some way. I am not well educated in Islam but after reading quite a few suras of the Quran I appreciate how it must be like to be raised under this religious strict law. Bending to the will of God seemed to be the theme. There was no gentleness, mercy or kindness, just dogmatic adherence to assure God's Will. Charity was recommended but not because one had need, only to please God. As in the Old Testiment, there were sections on how to properly beat women when they violated the rules ( different number of lashes depending on the infraction).
I found Islam to be religion that attracts people who want to be governed by a ridged set of rules to guarantee Salvation. That this religion is the fastest growing one in the world should be a wake up call to western women who have enjoyed freedoms for so long they have taken them for granted. They should be more supportive of their Sisters in the Middle East.
Miffed;-)
"Perhaps young men are indoctrinated very early that the subjugation of women is religiously justified in some way."
A key feature of male-dominated society is control of access to women; women (and the children they produce) being the reward for male support of the status quo. This has its roots in biology - the fact that a man cannot be sure of his own progeny unless he has complete control of the female. Once away from the female, however (hunting, work, military service, etc) how can he guarantee her fidelity? Well, by embedding it in her beliefs via religion, and likewise the people around her who keep close watch lest she stray.
This isn't unique to Islam - you find it in all religions to one degree or another, which suggests that it predates religion as a form of social control. The ultimate control mechanism of course is the fear of being outcast, which in former times meant certain death or enslavement. Thus, strict obedience wasn't hard to obtain, given the alternatives. The most insideous aspect though, is the role of women in their own subjugation, for it is they who raise the children and teach them the social norms.
All this flies out the window when you introduce technology and mass communication. That is the hidden ground of the last century - the gradual (and generally invisible) overthrow of the old social order. This is the substrate change I was talking about on the conspiracy thread. Mass literacy and mass communication are undoing the old control systems.
Yes, we are ultimately products of our biology. Something we can never fully escape no matter what religion or social mores are indoctrinated. "There is always a penis" someone here once wisely said. The fallacy is there is true control even in a ridged freedomless society. Men and women are still stoned for infidelity in the Middle East and these are only the ones that are caught. There is a high rate of infidelity in France where there is freedom. So it seems to me in any case there is no way to assure anyone will respect their pledge of faithfulness. My personal fidelity to my husband was simply I had no desire to be with anyone else so I accepted no other offers, religion and society had no true part in my decision.
With communication and education, eyes are opened to other possibilities. Because entrenched old control systems are inherently resistant to change, this makes violence and civil war more likely. Freedom never seems to be an outcome of this however. Usually what results is a new control system. That is never permanent, and the human soul cries out again for freedom even with the insidious use of self domestication of properly indoctrinated women of whom you speak.
Miffed;-)
I AM sure why. Behind every apathy, there is usually an addiction of some sort. In this country and others that have an apathetic population, the drug of choice is: Circuses.
Take away the programming in the TV set, the cable or satellite; the IPads, Androids; the computer as game machine, and watch how fast the young, particklerly, will rise up. If there is an achilles heel in the establishment, that is it.
As long as there are those distractions from what is seriously wrong in this country, as long as the socialists mollify the crowd with subsistence level goodies, including cell phones, the powers that be on Wall Street have nothing to be concerned about.
The activists may have forsaken their fight because of fear of the repercussions from law enforcement.
Altogether I do not expect in my lifetime to see another 60s radicalist movement.
See: Neil Postman, Chris Lasch, and the best one: "Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television"
You took the words right out of my mouth, Comte. I repeat Lenin's famous/notorious dictum 'worse is better'. In today's terms it means that TPTB will succeed with their boiling the frog approach unless something serious enough to unhook the addicts from their teevee brain-rot occurs in the meantime.
The frog is long dead, ...
"If you like being a boiled frog, you can keep being a boiled frog"
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It's hard to tell a zombie he's dead, in his mind he's alive, ...
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I say, that until you actually GO live in a free country, ... you don't even know you were in a prison, now most of the kids in the USA today, were born in a prison, how are they to even know of 'freedom'?
The 'freedom to shop', is not freedom.
Like they say "FREEDOM IS SLAVERY", ... yes all in the USA are free.
When you have 4th generation slaves, or welfare meth whores, .. how do the slaves revolt? With every generation the IQ drops 10 points,...
We have now reached the point where the conversation is meaningless.
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DOES the PTB FEAR the IQ-72 hairlip? Yeh right. Go have a beer and watch TV.
Little of topic, but whatever...
anuary 31-February 2, 2014 -- The "Grimm" facts about Staten Island's congressman
Following President Obama's January 28 State of the Union address, New York Republican congressman Michael Grimm not only threatened to throw Michael Scotto, a reporter for NY1 news, over a balcony in the Cannon House Office building but threatened to "break him in half . . . like a boy." Grimm was upset over Scotto asking Grimm about allegations of campaign malfeasance. Grimm told Scotto, "Let me be clear to you, you ever do that to me again I'll throw you off this fucking balcony."
Scotto's uncle is Anthony Scotto, a former head of the Brooklyn Longshoreman's Union and a boss in the Gambino mafia crime family.
Grimm, a former Marine and FBI agent, is accused of accepting illegal campaign cash in his 2010 campaign. One of his campaign cash bundlers, Ofer Biton, an Israeli citizen, pleaded guilty to visa fraud last August. Grimm's former girlfriend, Diana Durand, was arrested earlier this month in connection with the federal investigation of Grimm's alleged campaign fraud.
Grimm also stands accused of accepting illegal cash donations from
Rabbi Yoshiyahu Yosef Pinto, whose Manhattan East Side congregation has attracted the likes of former New York Congressman and lewd Twitter aficionado Anthony Weiner. A former aide to Pinto claimed on Israeli television that Pinto foresaw the 9/11 attack. Pinto's aide said, "We came to New York and we saw these two towers standing out in Manhattan . . .[Pinto said] ‘A devastating tragedy with airplanes will occur here.’” After a multi-year investigation of 9/11, WMR concluded that Israel was actively involved in the planning for and carrying out of the 9/11 attacks, using Saudi agents, as well as Arab dupes as cover.
A clash in the Cannon building opens up Michael Grimm to more scrutiny.
WMR has been informed by sources close to New York's legal community that Grimm's rabbi troubles do not end with Pinto. Grimm also allegedly received foreign contributions to his campaign through the auspices of individuals connected to Orthodox Rabbi Jacob Ostreicher.
Ostreicher was arrested in Bolivia in 2011 for his alleged involvement in a fraudulent investment scheme involving co-conspirators in Bolivia, Brazil, and Switzerland. Ostreicher was held in a Bolivian prison for 18 months for alleged money laundering. Ostreicher's case was taken up by actor Sean Penn who pressured the government of Bolivian President Evo Morales to release Ostreicher. In December 2013, Ostreicher was released by Bolivia, traveled to Peru, and flown to the United States where he was reported to be in an undisclosed location with Penn.
In turn, Bolivia's government arrested fifteen people, including many of the prosecutors, judges, and government officials who handled the case against5 Ostreicher, for running an extortion ring. Israel's lobby in the United States, including New York State Assemblyman Dov Hifkind and the Anti-Defamation League, brought pressure on the Bolivian government to drop its case against Ostreicher and release him from prison. Bolivia went one step better for the Lobby by charging all those who helped investigate and bring charges against the Brooklyn rabbi and the alleged money laundering and drug smuggling ring in Bolivia of running an extortion operation.
Our New York legal sources also claim that Grimm's problems extend further to accepting illegal donations from the late New York slum lord and Hasidic Rabbi Menachem Stark. In early January, Stark's half burnt corpse was pulled from a dumpster at a Getty gas station in Great Neck, New York. Stark owned some of New York's worst roach- and rat-infested dwellings that served mainly as crack houses and centers for other illegal activity. Although members of New York's Jewish community praise Stark for his "philanthropy," the New York Postquoted one New York City police official saying of Stark, "He’s a Hasidic Jew from Williamsburg, and we think he’s a scammer,” . . . And he fucked over a few people."
The word from the corridors of New York City's court houses is that Grimm was placed in office by a group of crooked Jewish rabbis who are suspected of running rackets from organ harvesting, money laundering, diamond and drug smuggling, usurious loan sharking operations, as well as covering up for child sexual abuse among Brooklyn's large Hasidic population. It is the last item on the rabbinical rap sheet that likely helped prompt Grimm to warn Scotto, who is reportedly gay, "I'll break you in half . . . like a boy."
These are the Grimm facts on one of the dirtiest members of the U.S. Congress, a distinction that is difficult to achieve with all the competition.
Not so off topic, really. One of the comments about Grimm's election to Congress was that Staten Island was a place they had to know your grandfather before you got elected to city council, and here was Grimm out of nowhere winning an election to Congress.
There are several Congressmen out of nowhere these days, and they're nearly without exception right wing blowhards, tea baggers, and corporate stooges. And they all cheer on repression, anti muslim racism, the Empire.
The normal, legal method of influencing government has been hijacked. Election fraud is rampant, covered up by silence and distractions about voter fraud. Mere conspiracy theory, until it's conspiracy fact.
One more way the elite keeps themselves in power. And it'll work until it doesn't.
While real activism is more powerful than most believe, its is not ignorance, sloth, and apathy that are the mortal enemies of activism, it is fear. As an example, I offer Occupy. Grandmothers were roughed-up by thuggish police, meager possessions destroyed, and the freedom to assemble peacably, nullifified. I have smelled tear gas and very nearly felt the baton. And as much as I dislike what is happening, I will be slow to join protests. And, as regards that first vignette, parading around the White House carrying signs - do that today and you would be arrested - or worse. While martial law has not been invoked, it would be naive to believe we do not reside in a police state. Watch your six.
GW,you forgot to mention that Nixon was secretly dealing with China thru Henry Kissinger,to change the globel equation with Russia.
Dropping a nuclear weapon on Hanoi,would blown away any chance of that happening and Nixon's famous opening to China bid would have gone up in a nuclear fireball.
What REALLY sucks more is how Ho Chi Minh asked for help from Truman at the end of WWII, and that help never came......
Quite often, we create our monsters. We have always been at war with Eastasia, right?
Regarding the ZBig section, a political awakening can go in at least two directions: American Revolution vs. French Revolution. I can easily see a Reign of Terror in any number of nation's futures. Plenty of calls for guillotining right here on ZH.
"All successful revolutions are the kicking in of a rotten door." - John Kenneth Galbraith
The problem is, what comes next?
I was just talking about this exact thing with a like minded friend of mine this morning.
Back in the 70's my wife (at the time) was a dedicated activist assisting political refugees from Latin America - mainly Nicaragua, El Salvador and Chile. Through her, I met a lot these people socially and had the opportunity to hear their views on what they felt would be effective change in the event of successful revolution.
Most of it was boilerplate small "m" marxism - not many of them had critiqued their own idealism, which to me - even at my then young age - seemed rather naive. It was clear that most hadn't considered the possibility that sociopaths within their own ranks would sieze whatever opportunity presented itself to raise themselves above the masses and form a new elite, perhaps not as ruthless as the old one, but then these things take time.
Anecdote Alert:
Post the Nicaraguan Revolution, a good number of US and Canadian activists headed there on the notion that they could somehow help with the reconstruction. These people were jokingly known as Sandalistas and became such a burden on the already strained health system (many got very sick) that the govt. actually issued a formal request NOT to come.
This is not to deride activism, simply to point out that knowing what you stand for is at least as important as knowing what you oppose. Burning down the castle is one thing, but if you don't have a workable plan, then all you're left with is a burned out castle.
Wasn't that douchebag Bill DeBlasio aka William Wilhelm a Sandalnista or Sandanista and a Marxist with a large M?
A lot of people attached themselves to the movement after the bullets stopped flying. This happens with any revolution.
+1
For...
...[K]nowing what you stand for is at least as important as knowing what you oppose. Burning down the castle is one thing, but if you don't have a workable plan, then all you're left with is a burned out castle. -- ebear
Heh... don't quote me on that.
One thing I'd like to add is that you don't have to be on the front line to be an activist. Some will recall that the US mounted a counter-revolution (Contras) against Nicaragua, which included mining their harbors. A lot of boats and fishing gear were lost, not to mention lives. The response from West Coast fishermen was to donate gear to replace what was lost. I know this because I was the guy translating the lists of what was needed. I doubt many of those fishermen thought of themselves as activists, much less marxists. They just stood up for what they knew was right: the right to self-determination free from outside force. Like what the US stood for in the Before Time, in the long, long ago.
Yep it is like robbing a bank. You are successful what then as far as how do you spend the money without being caught. Stealing the money is actually the easy part of the equation.
Perhaps I'm just thick, but could you clarify the above statement?
[Edit] +1
OK, I got it. Like I said, thick.
You rob a million dollars for arguments sake how do you live above your means on that million dollars without raising suspicion and getting caught when the wrong people start poking their noses into your business when you start trying to open bank accounts or buy things like cars and homes?
Or like stealing gold how do you melt it all down without getting caught when you have shitload of it and doing it all at once will raise suspicions plus it has identifiable markings on it at the same time?
How do resist the temptation once you have it when you stole it in the first place because of the same temptation?
+1
Like your work BTW.
Paranoia is the signature of narcissism.
It's only paranoia if it isn't true. Suspicion and caution in these matters is not unreasonable.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=axmjLxNFCAY
David Vanderbeek - running 2014 Gov of Nevada - Says Obama has put him on the WH kill list.
No, it's not, not even close. Look at the two words in the dictionary: you do have dictionary.... don't you? If not, use one that's available on-line.
Of course, maybe English isn't your first language. If that is the case, you are forgiven.
Yes, Jim. We will take your word that, despite your obvious inability to use punctuation correctly, you are an expert on both the denotation and connotation of words. (I'm happy to point out the follies of your punctuation if you'd like, such as four-period ellipsis and over-use of commas, chump).
This comment makes sense and supports the article's thesis.
That comment doesn't make sense, at all. You, too, need to use a dictionary.
You don't think Paranoia and narcissism go hand in hand? A narcissist builds an elaborate false image and is constantly on the lookout for sabotage. I have a nice dictionary on a book shelf somewhere that my grandma gave me for HS graduation. Dumb ass
If there are other factors in play, like psychopathic tendancies, the narcissist will believe himself to be above the risk or threat of sabatoge. He may believe he has fooled the little people and they love him or that he is capable of weathering any attack.
Sound like anyone you know?
Always admired you, Fred. And Dino.