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Just like we’ve had no new major political assassinations since MLK involuntarily bought the farm in 1968, there’s been no new 9-11 attacks in America since 2001 either. Do you ever ask yourself why? It’s because there’s really no need for bad guys to actually murder good guys in order to create chaos in America any more. Terrorism and assassinations used to create chaos back in the day but now bad guys can simply poison good guys’ lamb chops, plant drugs or call-girls in their hotel suites or help them jump out a window. Gets the job done — with no inconvenient fact-finding commissions involved or citizen-sleuths always screaming “fraud”.

Nowadays bad guys can just simply ruin good guys’ reputations — and it’s far more effective. Just look at Julian Assange. Or the infamous “Dean Scream”. Or Bernie Sanders being called that dread word “Socialist”. The bad guys falsely claim that AOC is nuts and that Omar sympathizes with terrorists. Character assassination? Gets the job done.

And on the level of foreign policy? Same rules apply. Character assassination gets the job done here as well. Just look at the ongoing media crucifixion of Russia — rabidly accused of crimes that the Zionists and Saudis have committed daily for decades (and still do). And how about all those horrible things the media is saying about Syria, Cuba and Venezuela? None of them true. Watching the news today is like watching a freaking telenovela! https://israelpalestinenews.org/julian-assange-exposed-the-crimes-of-powerful-actors-including-israel/

Yep, the powers-that-be clearly no longer need to set off “terrorist” bombs or assassinate progressives these days. When they really want to get America’s knickers in a twist, blowing up the Twin Towers has totally become old-school. To create chaos in America today, all the powers-that-be have to do is, er, create chaos. http://www.naomiklein.org/shock-doctrine

Encouraging racial bigotry, kidnapping children at the border, fomenting riots over abortion, closing down the government, yelling “Second Amendment Rights” in a crowded theater — any of that shite. And then, BOOM! America is suddenly in chaos — and no tall buildings were even hurt during the filming. Genius! Gotta hand it to them (whoever they are). https://www.sevenstories.com/books/4097-giants

These powers-that-be own something like 99% of the media, 99% of America’s wealth and 99% of our propaganda. And they use all this power to mislead, misdirect and misinform. Why do Americans put up with this craziness? Generalized chaos weakens each of us individually. We are no longer a community. It is our Kryptonite. The powers that be know this. “Divide and conquer.” Why the freak don’t we know it too.
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The answer? Let’s fight back. The very first step in “tidying up” America’s chaos? Let’s each of us take someone we think is definitely “The Other” out to lunch next week. A homeless guy. A redneck. A bankster, a cop, someone on food stamps, an undocumented alien, a Native, a Black person, an Asian, an oligarch, a Muslim or Christian or Jew, a homosexual, a woman. Whatever it is that you are not. And then listen to their story. And tell them yours too.

We are all Americans. We must all work to prevent the powers-that-be from creating even more chaos — both at home and abroad. In a supposedly-civilized country such as ours, is this really too big of an ask?

“Love your hat!” I said to the grey-bearded Hasidic rabbi next to me as we stood in front of the White House the other day. We were both preparing to march up New York Avenue to the DC Convention Center where members of the American Israel Public Affairs Action Committee (AIPAC) were happily doing brunch and getting ready to listen to their hero Bibi Netanyahu spew out his favorite brand of nationalism and hate. https://mondoweiss.net/2019/04/why-glad-netanyahu/

“My father died in a Nazi concentration camp,” said the old rabbi, “and we Jews all vowed ‘never again’. And yet here we are, 75 years later, and now it is Zionists instead of Nazis who are running concentration camps.” The old rabbi sighed. “But what is even worse,” he continued, ” is that when people on the street see me in my traditional Hasidic garments, they frown and avoid me because they think that I myself support Zionist atrocities — but the Zionists, the real troublemakers, are all wearing suits and trying to fit in. And the irony of this is that these Zionists don’t even represent Judaism at all.”

Netanyahu wears thousand-dollar designer suits while Gaza children wear rags. Netanyahu supports the Saudis, who are slowly turning Yemen into Auschwitz. Netanyahu supports American fascism which in turn supports all kinds of murder both at home and abroad. Ten Commandments? The Torah? Mere propaganda tools. https://www.mintpressnews.com/us-admits-supplying-saudis-with-white-phosphorus-munitions/220553/

And America’s so-called Christians aren’t doing much better at representing Jesus either. “Sanctuary Cities.” OMG, that’s what America’s current shamelessly un-Christian regime is now calling all those miserable concentration camps for kidnapped babies which now fester away at our southern border like open sores. That’s just like, back in the day, when Nazis declared that Theresienstadt, their fake “Model Town” concentration camp for Jewish artists and musicians, was a “cultural center” — just before sending these same talented Jews off to the ovens, playing their violins as they went. https://chicago.suntimes.com/columnists/donald-trump-civil-war-in-yemen-libya-forgotten-wars/

Recently I joined some Palestinian genocide survivors, some actually-moral Americans and a bunch of Hasidic Jews as we met near the White House, marched up New York Avenue and picketed AIPAC’s annual convention — filled with Zionists who have been influencing our federal elections ever since before Eisenhower and Johnson.

And please don’t try to accuse me of anti-Semitism either. As the old rabbi pointed out, real Jews try to obey the Ten Commandments. Real Jews try to seek justice. And real Jews don’t run concentration camps like Gaza — just like real Christians don’t run concentration camps like the one in Tomillo, Texas.

“Over the centuries,” the Hasidic rabbi said, ” Anti-Semitism has caused much bloodshed and right-thinking people recognize how tragic it is. But the term is often used incorrectly today — abused to promote people’s agendas. Zionism isn’t Judaism. It’s nationalism.” And the absolutely worst sort of nationalism too. Colonialism, power grabs, brutality, really bad stuff. Not religious at all. https://mondoweiss.net/2019/04/approached-resolution-settlements/

“Encouraging the conflation of Zionism with Judaism also encourages hatred toward the innocent — and the result is that real Jews end up being the target of anger over actions perpetrated by Zionists, supposedly in the name of Jews.”  That’s so unjust.  For 75 years now, Zionists have been violently stirring up hatred for Palestinian Christians and Muslims.  The result?  Zionist “settlers” feel free to murder and plunder at will.  And after 75 years of Zionists trumpeting hate speech, the whole Middle East is now in flames — and domestic terrorists also run wild in the United States.  The hate that Zionists give screws up all of us.

“And this is why we are marching here today.” Go, you! Justice is always a good thing.

“But, Jane, why are you being so especially hard on the Zionists,” you might ask. No. It’s not just them that I’m being hard on. I also resent all those un-Christians in Europe and America who pretend to worship Jesus and yet murder and torture others in Jesus’ name. Or those un-Muslim Saudis who finance ISIS and fire-bomb babies in Yemen. Mohammad (PBUH) would never approve of that. So why should I give un-Jews a pass just because they brutally colonized Jerusalem? Obviously I don’t.

How to fix this problem? The problem of false propaganda turning religions into tools to gain power and greed? Easy. Demagogues and power-hungry Calf-worshiping blasphemers need to reassess both their methods and their goals. When a group’s goal is to dominate the world and make everyone else suffer, they really do need to stop calling themselves “religious”. https://www.salon.com/2019/04/21/reporter-sharmine-narwani-on-the-secret-history-of-americas-defeat-in-syria/

The real goal of truly religious people is to be kind, loving, compassionate and helpful. But Zionists and un-Jews, just like their counterparts the un-Christians and un-Muslims, simply aren’t any fun.

To quote Gloria Steinem, “Whenever one person stands up and says: ‘Wait a minute. This is wrong,’ it helps other people do the same.” I stood up with the Hasidic Jews and the Palestinians on that march — and had fun doing it too. Plus it’s gonna be really hard to accuse these Hasidic Jews, marching in full regalia down New York Avenue, of being anti-Semitic or even self-hating — but I imagine that Netanyahu and AIPAC will find some way to do it anyway. But the friendly grey-bearded Hasidic rabbi I marched next to sure didn’t look like an anti-Semitic self-hating Jew to me.

PS: “Why do religions even have such strong laws to support ethics?” asks author Barbara Ehrenreich. “Because humans need some sort of ethics touchstone in order to survive.” If only bullies, corporate shills, armed forces and corrupt regimes rule the world, then the human race is doomed. Hence guidelines like the Ten Commandments and the Golden Rule are necessary — unless of course you relish the idea of becoming toast. Which I don’t. http://barbaraehrenreich.com/living-with-a-wild-god/

So. If our leaders are liars, cheats, torturers and bullies, then it’s time for us all to stand up and have our objections counted — or else go down with their sinking ship.

How the freak did I end up totally lost and stranded in the sub-sub-basement of the Rayburn office building in Washington DC last week? Long story. I was actually trying to find the offices of Congressional Representatives Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez and Ilhan Omar so I could shake their hands and tell them how wonderful they were — but got seriously distracted by the temptation of gluten-free pizza on offer in the congressional cafeteria instead. Unlimited toppings! Yummers!

While waiting for my order to finish baking, I asked several pizza-eating Congressional aides for directions regarding how to get to AOC’s and Omar’s offices, and one of them told me to take an elevator down to the connecting tunnels that run beneath the Rayburn, Cannon and Longworth buildings — but I must have pushed the wrong button because I ended up lost in some dark spooky narrow sub-sub-basement hallway littered with unwanted office furniture and black garbage bags. But that was okay because I still had my pizza-to-go so I wouldn’t starve before someone found me months later.

Seeing that I was buried in the bowels of Congress already, it seemed appropriate to start contemplating the actual underground nature of our government and its tenancy to bury inconvenient facts and hide corruption (as well as unwanted furniture) out of sight of us taxpayers — stuff like how lobbyists run Congress, how the Pentagon “misplaced” 21 trillion bucks but wasn’t even investigated and how Zionists and Saudis are the real powers behind the throne in America these days. https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/04/18/nearly-100000-pentagon-whistleblower-complaints-have-been-silenced

But then a middle-aged bureaucrat in a grey flannel suit wandered by and showed me the light — down four corridors, up three staircases, through two doors marked “employees only” and onto an elevator going to the second floor of Longworth. Or was it Cannon?

In any case, I found Rep. Omar’s office first and shook her aide’s hand, shook her other aide’s hand and also signed the guestbook. “Keep up the good work!” Top government officials who happily commit genocide for fun and profit need to get a reality check every so often, but that clearly hasn’t happened in DC since before the Korean and Vietnam “wars,” back in the dark ages when America really was truly “great” — at mass murder. But Omar is definitely calling their bluff now. No wonder the powers-that-be hate her.  https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/rep-tulsi-gabbard-eviscerates-trump-saudi-arabia-s-bitch-n939011

Then I visited AOC’s office too. What a delight! One entire wall in front of her office was covered with post-it notes saying, “We love you, AOC!” or words to that effect. Lots of stars and hearts too. And inside her office was another entire wall with hundreds of post-it notes saying basically the same thing.

“Can I sign a post-it note too?” I asked.

“Sorry, we’ve run out.” So I signed the guest book instead. Yay! I also love Alexandra Ocasio-Cortez! We need far more ex-waitresses like her in Congress. And also a lot of former bus-drivers and teachers and farmers and all other kinds of salt-of-the-earth types as well.

Then, feeling a bit like that guy in Dante’s Inferno, I descended back down into the Congressional tunnels and trudged off to the Library of Congress to explore its amazing resources (and restrooms). Gotta love touring Washington DC.

“You absolutely must go visit Frederick Douglass’s house while you’re here,” said the friend I was staying with in Washington DC. “They’ve turned it into a museum. It’s totally amazing.” http://www.frederick-douglass-heritage.org/cedar-hill-house/

“Define amazing,” I replied. “Amazing like a baby’s first steps? Amazing like America’s brutal and un-Christian foreign policy? Or amazing like Captain Marvel?”

“More like Captain Marvel,” replied my friend Wow! Sign me up!

So I took the Metro to Anacosta, trudged through yet another of Washington’s rapidly-gentrifying ghettos and finally found Frederick Douglass’s old-fashioned home perched high on a hill overlooking DC. “Douglass was born a slave,” said our tour guide. “His mother had been sold down-river. He was whipped and beaten and starved as a child; overburdened and overworked. His back was covered with deep scars from the lashes. He stole food scraps from the Big House’s garbage just to stay alive, was given one gunny-sack a year for clothing. No one taught him to read.” Huddled naked and alone.

And yet this poor abused and tortured slave child grew up to be one of the finest orators and statesmen in America. Sounds like a Marvel to me!

I looked at Douglass’s original piano, his original writing desk, his parlor and his bedroom. I saw the exact spot where he suddenly collapsed of a heart attack and died at age 74. (Good grief how I hate it when people use that phony term “passed away” like somehow death doesn’t really exist if you only stop using the “D’ word. But everybody dies. Stop trying to sugar-coat it. When I die, I wanna be D.E.A.D. — not just “passed”)

Douglass died an honorable death after living an honorable life. “I would unite with anybody to do right and with nobody to do wrong,” he said.

Our little tour group tromped up Douglass’s back stairs and then down his front ones. “How the freak did he do it?” I asked our guide with tears in my eyes. “How did he even survive being a slave — let alone become an advisor to presidents, an ambassador to Haiti and one of the greatest men of the 19th Century?” The guy must really have possessed superpowers.

And Douglass was also the first Freedom Rider. For over 60 years he constantly fought against Jim Crow laws in the brutally-segregated and un-Christian South. “Dozens of times he would buy first-class tickets on railroads, attempt to take his seat and then be cruelly beaten, spit upon, handcuffed and/or jailed every single time.” Can Captain Marvel do that?

On the very day that he died, America’s real Captain Marvel gave a young Black man some very good advice. “Wherever you see injustice happening, then agitate. Agitate. Agitate.” And, boy howdy, do we have a hecka lot of injustice in America right now too. And Douglass’s most prescient advice to those of us today who also love justice? “Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will”. It’s time that we too demand justice as well. Jesus did it. Nathan Hale did it. Crazy Horse did it. Douglass did it. Julian Assange did it. A.O.C. does it. We can too. “Agitate. Agitate. Agitate.” https://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/55991-rsn-the-julian-assange-case-revealing-war-crimes-is-not-a-crime

Right now America desperately needs heroic men and women who will stand up for justice like Douglass did in the past. We need them now more than ever. Will another Captain Marvel like our own Frederick Douglass please stand up? Yes, I am talking about you — and, yes, I am even talking about me. https://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Eleven-year-old-ordered-deported-without-her-13760566.php

“You absolutely must go see Frederick Douglass’s house while you’re here,” said a friend I was staying with in Washington DC recently. “They’ve turned it into a museum. It’s totally amazing.” http://www.frederick-douglass-heritage.org/cedar-hill-house/

“Define amazing,” I replied. “Amazing like a baby’s first steps? Amazing like America’s brutal and un-Christian foreign policy? Or amazing like Captain Marvel?”

“More like Captain Marvel,” replied my friend Wow! Sign me up!

So I took the Metro to the Anacosta station, trudged through yet another of Washington’s rapidly-gentrifying ghettos and finally found Frederick Douglass’s old-fashioned home perched high up on a hill overlooking DC. “Douglass was born a slave,” said our tour guide. “His mother had been sold down-river. He was whipped and beaten and starved; overburdened and overworked. His back was covered with deep scars from the lashes. He stole food scraps from the Big House’s garbage just to stay alive, was given one gunny-sack a year for clothing. No one taught him to read.” Huddled naked and alone.

And yet this poor abused and tortured slave child grew up to be one of the finest orators and statesmen in America. Sounds like a Marvel to me!

I looked at Douglass’s original piano, his original writing desk, his parlor and his bedroom. I saw the exact spot where he suddenly collapsed of a heart attack and died at age 74. (Good grief how I hate it when people use that phony term “passed away” like somehow death doesn’t really exist if you only stop using the “D’ word. But everybody dies. Stop trying to sugar-coat it. When I die, I wanna be D.E.A.D. — not just “passed”)

Douglass died an honorable death after living an honorable life. “I would unite with anybody to do right and with nobody to do wrong,” he said.

Our little tour group tromped up Douglass’s back stairs and back down his front ones. “How the freak did he do it?” I asked our guide with tears in my eyes. “How did he even survive being a slave — let alone become an advisor to presidents, an ambassador to Haiti and one of the greatest men of the 19th Century?” The guy must really have possessed superpowers.

And Douglass was also the first Freedom Rider. For over 60 years he constantly fought against Jim Crow laws in the brutally-segregated and un-Christian South. “Dozens of times he would buy first-class tickets on railroads, attempt to take his seat and then be cruelly beaten, spit upon, handcuffed and/or jailed every single time.” Can Captain Marvel do that?

On the very day that he died, America’s real Captain Marvel gave a young Black man some very good advice. “Wherever you see injustice happening, then agitate. Agitate. Agitate.” And, boy howdy, do we have a hecka lot of injustice in America right now too. And Douglass’s most prescient advice to those of us today who also love justice? “Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will”. It’s time that we too demand justice as well. Jesus did it. Nathan Hale did it. Crazy Horse did it. Douglass did it. Julian Assange did it. A.O.C. does it. We can too. “Agitate. Agitate. Agitate.” https://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/55991-rsn-the-julian-assange-case-revealing-war-crimes-is-not-a-crime

Right now America desperately needs heroic men and women who will stand up for justice like Douglass did.  We need them now more than ever.  Will another Captain Marvel like our own Frederick Douglass please stand up?  Yes, I am talking about you — and, yes, I am even talking about me.  https://www.chron.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Eleven-year-old-ordered-deported-without-her-13760566.php

Have you ever been to our nation’s capital? If not, please consider getting your arse over there ASAP. So much to see! Unbelievable. You could spend a whole year just going to museums here and still not have seen everything!

Even after factoring in the current cannibalistically-insane rate that our federal government is violently stripping America’s infrastructure, park services and cultural glories of their funding in order to build even more grisly “Wars and Walls,” Washington DC today is still totally awesome — even if not for much longer. https://www.nbcnews.com/leftfield/video/federal-wildlife-refuge-areas-are-cleared-for-border-wall-1465712195955

I recently spent a few days touring the U.S. Holocaust Museum and the National Museum of the American Indian. Those two museums were both very similar — and also very different.

The U.S. Holocaust Museum is devoted to chronicling the inexcusable horrors of the systematic genocide of Jews in Nazi Germany — and this museum rightfully reminds us that genocide is a bad thing. And one of the exhibits there that moved me to tears was the exhibit commemorating the heroic Jewish resistance fighters. They risked their lives over and over again fighting for justice and against fascism. So many of them were tortured and murdered.

Then I moved on to the American Indian Museum — same story there. Genocide on a grand scale. Millions of Native Americans murdered in cold blood. But there was one big difference between the two museums. When the Jews fought back against the evil Nazis, they were called resistance fighters and heroes. But when the Natives fought back against genocidal attacks by evil Americans, they were given no place of honor in the American Indian Museum. They were not considered heroes. In fact, they were barely mentioned at all.

There was only a very small collage-type thingie in a back corner of the fourth floor of the museum that mentioned a few Native “activists” and the 1973 protest at Wounded Knee. Custer’s last stand was mentioned. And there was just one mention in passing about the American Indian Movement — but nothing at all about Leonard Peltier, the resistance fighter who defended his people from a deadly FBI attack and who is now serving his 44th year of a life sentence in some lonely Florida prison for a crime that he didn’t commit. https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/322000/in-the-spirit-of-crazy-horse-by-peter-matthiessen/9780140144567/

But let’s move on.

There is yet another kind of genocide going on in America today — or should I say “femicide”. Apparently it is totally legal, even today, for any non-Native to enter any Native reservation and then murder or rape or kidnap any Native woman or child who catches his eye — and get cleanly away with it because tribal police on American Indian reservations have no jurisdiction to arrest any non-Native.

So while I was at the American Indian Museum, I suddenly found myself in the tragic midst of the REDress Project — dozens of empty red dresses, swaying tragically in the wind and rain, symbolizing the thousands of raped, maimed, murdered and disappeared Native women on reservations across America today. Something like 95% of these heinous crimes are committed by White men. Not American Natives, not hapless immigrants, not members of M-13 gangs — but White men. White men. Homegrown terrorists.

At a symposium entitled “Safety for Our Sisters” held at this museum, we were told that officially almost half of Native women have been abused or raped or disappeared. “It’s actually closer to 87%” said one speaker. Native women have become an endangered species in America — and only Congress can solve this problem. But Congress is too busy reveling in its sick and addictive love affair with Walls and Wars.

Here are some videotapes from this eye-opening symposium:

Sarah Deer speaks regarding legally-sanctioned violence against Native women: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wz-kswpgMgU

Mary Katheryn Nagle on legally ending the violence: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nNsOyovhhgA

Cherrah Giles, domestic violence and what happens next: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KW60X2OFmOs

Jamie Black, the REDress project: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_xt-II2rzpY

Marita Growing Thunder on the important role of culture: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yHj3VuDY5iA

Q & A: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bBph4kVTfjM

The grim history of all these many centuries of violence and genocide against Native Americans is just pathetic and sad — that White Americans seem to value money and greed and power over any kind of humanity, Christianity or love of our fellow human beings. The Jewish Holocaust tragedy lasted a few shameful decades before it was forcibly halted. The Native American genocide has gone on for centuries and is still going on today.

Americans are morally doomed.

Unless of course we can take a page from the Jewish (and Native) resistance fighters and resist. Resist injustice. Resist fascism in our very own government that is supposed to belong to us (but doesn’t). Resist corporate greed. Resist colonialism. Resist bigotry.

For centuries it was mainly the American Indians who suffered from genocide by American colonialists — but now it is the Natives of the entire world who are also facing calculated extinction by corporate America’s bottomless greed. But always remember. “What goes around comes around”. https://www.thisisinsider.com/migrants-detained-under-el-paso-bridge-border-patrol-surge-2019-3

Isn’t it time for all of us to start righting these horrendous wrongs? Joining our Native brothers and sisters in seeking justice and morality? Non-violently of course. “But why should we do this non-violently,” you might ask. Why? Because all human life is sacred. Because why would we ever want to become like Them?

Don’t get me wrong. I really do believe that Americans need to finally stop kowtowing to Zionist corruption and influence-peddling and, yes, I still continue to think that Zionists are war-mongering White supremacists who are doing Judaism all sorts of harm. And for this reason, I totally object to moving our U.S. embassy away from Tel Aviv. But there is an even bigger issue to consider here — that it’s never a good idea to waste American taxpayers’ money on still maintaining a U.S. embassy in Tel Aviv, a city that is pretty much doomed. https://ahtribune.com/us/2932-israel-lobby-rebuts-omars-claims-about-its-immense-influence.html

“But why is that?” you might ask. “Seems counter-intuitive. Isn’t half the world already pissed off that Trump, the Zionists and AIPAC are trying to politicize three of the world’s greatest religions by moving the Zionists’ capital to Jerusalem?”

Sure, there is that. But new data has also come to light. I’m currently reading Dahr Jamail’s scary new book, The End of Ice, and he says that the last time our planet had such a high rate of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere as it now does, sea levels all over the world rose 130 feet. However, with methane gas being steadily released in the Arctic, the sea levels will rise even higher. And if there is a sudden large methane-release event, which is entirely possible, only one in seven human beings will be left after that. If we’re lucky.

But assuming that sea-levels will only rise 130 feet in the not-too-far-distant future, it will still be “Bye-bye Tel Aviv.” Tel Aviv is only 16.4 feet above sea level. American diplomats would have a far better chance of not having to swim for their lives if they were in Jerusalem (2,474 feet). Makes sense to me.

Unless the Mediterranean Sea is going to get blocked off at Gibraltar in the near future, Tel Aviv is gonna be the new Atlantis — right up there with the Vatican (63 feet). And even Mecca (909 feet) could still be up for grabs by the Red Sea. Only the Buddhists in Tibet (11,995 feet) will be absolutely safe! Perhaps Israelis and Saudis should spend more time worrying about how to keep their countries from drowning and less time worrying about how to keep murdering babies in Yemen and Gaza.

The moral of this story? That we all need to wake up to the fact that America’s real enemies aren’t Syria, Venezuela, Iraq, Afghanistan, Yemen, Libya or even Native American water protectors, heartland anti-frackers or Alaskan ecologists. America’s real enemy is the fossil fuel industry. And hopefully it’s not too late to do something about that.
https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2019/04/04/future-without-fossil-fuels/

PS: Let’s not forget that Washington DC (zero feet) will also be underwater soon too. But then isn’t the District of Columbia a Swamp already?

PPS: I’ll be in Washington to protest at the AIPAC convention next week. Wish me luck. Perhaps Ilhan Omar will be on the picket line too! Or even A.O.C. But I’ll definitely not run into Kushner or Trump on the picket line however. Bet ya anything they’re be inside the AIPAC conference itself, selling America out. https://israellobbyandamericanpolicy.org/

What would you do if some felonious bad guy stole your credit card and used it to buy a bazooka, an AR-15 and 20,000 rounds of ammo? Would you be pissed off? My guess would be yes — especially when you were driven into bankruptcy as a result.

Now imagine that something like this happens to a country instead of to you — perhaps a country named America. “But that can’t possibly happen here,” you might say. Wrong answer. It already has. Sleazy bad guys up on Wall Street and down in DC have already stolen our credit cards and hit up our ATMs. And then with our precious life-savings grasped firmly in their hot little hands, they ran out and bought twenty-one (21) trillion dollars worth of RPGs, F-16s, border Walls, drones and atomic bombs.

“No they didn’t.” Oh yes they did.

And when America goes bankrupt? Will it be the sleazy bad guys who suffer? Not at all. It will be me and you. The bad guys will have armies to protect themselves — armies weaponized by you and me. And we will have nothing to show for our lives but the shirts on our backs, if that. It’s a shell game. We’ve been conned.

”But they are trying to keep us safe!” you might say. No they’re not. “But do I even get a BB gun and a few large rocks of my own out of this?” No.

So what can you and I do change our sorry fate regarding this lame and dangerous situation? Let’s evict all those creeps in Washington from power. Let’s vote them all out before it’s too late — if it’s not too late already, that is.

According to Forbes Magazine, the Denver Post recently “confirmed that the Department of Homeland Security has issued an open purchase order for 1.6 billion rounds of ammunition. As reported elsewhere, some of this purchase order is for hollow-point rounds, forbidden by international law for use in war, along with a frightening amount specialized for snipers. Also reported elsewhere, at the height of the Iraq War the Army was expending less than 6 million rounds a month. Therefore 1.6 billion rounds would be enough to sustain a hot war for 20+ years. In America.” https://www.forbes.com/sites/ralphbenko/2013/03/11/1-6-billion-rounds-of-ammo-for-homeland-security-its-time-for-a-national-conversation/#71f7d734624b

“But how do we even know who to vote against?” you might ask next. That’s easy. Stop voting for politicians who have low self-esteem. Why? Because people with low self-esteem always go for instant gratification for themselves instead of for long-term benefits (to the American people).

“But how can we tell if someone has high self-esteem?” That’s easy too. According to psychologist David J. Lieberman, someone with high self-esteem tends to be moral, to treat both themselves and others with kindness and dignity, and isn’t afraid to tell the truth. Only folks with very low self-esteem go around blowing other people up – so always vote for peace candidates (such as Tulsi Gabbard).  https://www.antiwar.com/blog/2019/03/05/rep-tulsi-gabbard-on-regime-change-wars/

Here in Berkeley, you can meet all kinds of people — people from all over the world. I even know someone who is visiting here from Venezuela. “Yo tengo miedo,” she told me yesterday. “I am afraid.” Afraid of what? “I am afraid of all those thousands of refugees coming up here to America from Honduras!”

Yeah, but…. “They really aren’t people you should be afraid of,” I reassured her. “They are only trying to find a safe life for their children. Don’t worry about them.”

“It’s not them that I’m worried about,” she replied. “It’s America that scares me. The American militaria went down to Honduras and mercilessly broke that country apart like it was a piñata. They broke it. And then Hondurans had no choice but to scatter like ants. And now the Gringos are about to break Venezuela too.” I was starting to see her point. https://nakbatour.com/

“And if that happens, yo tengo miedo that thousands and thousands of Venezuelans will be forced to become refugees to here as well! With their babies taken away. Dying in Border Patrol prisons! Leaving my country shattered and broken just like Honduras!” https://www.npr.org/2019/02/22/696057482/trumps-venezuela-moves-follow-long-history-of-intervention-in-latin-america

What could I say? What could I do? Food always helps! So I took her up to Telegraph Avenue and bought her a burrito at Sinaloa Tacos and then we went to the movies. Saw Green Book. “Venezuela is safe.” I reassured her. “The Honduras nightmare will never happen there. Venezuelans will not allow America to use their country like a freaking piñata too. There will be no flood of refugee caravans coming up here from Venezuela.”

My friend just laughed. Laughter through tears.

Roger Cohen testified before Congress today, mumbling a bunch of evasive answers to some really dumb questions — as our very own Congressional representatives asked him again and again about “collusion with a foreign power,” and “communications with Russia,” trying their very best to hook up Russia with Donald Trump. But, hell, any American who spends even five minutes reading the New York Times knows that Trump is really in bed with Israeli Zionists.

It’s clearly obvious to anyone with half a brain or any familiarity with the mainstream media at all — that Trump’s heart clearly belongs to Israeli Zionists. Just replace the word “Russia” with the word “Israel” and Congress would never have had to go phishing for all those evasive answers. The New York Times and AIPAC have already supplied them to us. Daily. For years. In our faces. With no shame. They shout Trump’s affair with Israeli Zionists from the rooftops. Like one of those rent-by-the-hour love motels!

But Trump isn’t the only one in bed with Zionist Israel. Congress is too. And we Americans need to start guarding our freedoms from being “influenced by a foreign power” such as Israel (and Saudi Arabia) before we too start to get cooties. https://israellobbyandamericanpolicy.org/

PS: Am I being anti-Semitic here? Not really sure. In my own defense, I do equally decry the Saudis as well as the Zionists — and those dictatorial genocide-committing corrupt bigoted Saudis are technically considered to be Semites as well, so perhaps I am.

On the other hand, most Zionist neocolonialist genocide-committing dictatorial corrupt bigots are not even Semites, being of European ancestry. And Zionists are not even Jews either, actually, because Zionists keep ignoring the Torah — especially that bit about “Thou shalt not kill” — and also the bit about “Thou shalt not steal”. So I’m not anti-Semitic at all!

But judging by the way Zionists treat Palestinians (who actually are Semites), Zionists are actually anti-Semites themselves!

Sigmund Freud got it all wrong. The real cure for our neuroses doesn’t lie in our past — but in our future!

Here’s one of my most favorite quotations: “Neurosis is caused by the lack of a sense of future.” What great psychologist said that? Hardly any of them — but it is true nonetheless. Or to put it in layman’s terms, “If we sense danger instead of hope around every corner, then we’re screwed.” We are bound to make bad choices based on fear instead of on logic — or even on joy.

“Make America Great Again” says it all — forcing us to follow some decrepit weed-strewn yellow brick road back into America’s dim and dismal past. That way only leads to neurosis — and worse. Let’s look to the future instead. America can still have a bright future, honest! But not one based on our falsely-imagined past — that sleazy pot-holed broken-down and morally disheveled road based on genocide, slavery, poverty, exploitation, oppression, corruption, false “war” myths, false promises and outright lies.

https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/01/30/trumps-coup-in-venezuela-the-full-story/

https://consortiumnews.com/2019/02/22/john-pilger-the-war-on-venezuela-is-built-on-lies/

https://therealnews.com/stories/massive-protest-in-support-of-the-bolivarian-revolution-largely-ignored

If Americans ever want to have a shining and hopeful future, then we need to dump our sleazy past first. Dwelling on robber barons, climate-change deniers, racism, economic depression, breaking the Sixth Commandment time after time, sabotaging democracy at every point and keeping our women chained in domestic slavery? Pretending to be holier-than-thou “Christians” — ones who know every inch of all those weird stories in the Bible and yet act like they’ve never even heard of the Sixth Commandment, the Golden Rule or anything at all that Jesus preached? Not gonna help. Is really gonna hurt. MAGA gets it totally wrong.

If you are proudly wearing a MAGA hat right now, then perhaps it’s time to consider going to see a psychologist after all. A forward-thinking psychologist that is. America has been neurotically mired in fake nostalgia and “false brain messages” for far too long. It’s clearly time to throw off all that debilitating weight of craziness from our past and strive toward a safe, happy and do-able future for all of us. https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/306804/you-are-not-your-brain-by-jeffrey-schwartz/9781583334836/

And then dump those MAGA hats in the trash.

Suppose you threw a small party for friends but a bunch of uninvited rowdy thugs showed up? “We demand a border Wall,” they chanted. “Otherwise we are going to bust this party up!” https://medium.com/@BetoORourke/the-president-is-coming-to-el-paso-monday-bbd4a023c77c

So you reluctantly say “Yes to the Wall” and that’s that. Or is it?

A few years pass. You finally dredge up the nerve to throw another small party. And the same thing happens again. Only this time it’s the entire Atlantic Ocean that shows up at your door uninvited. https://kpfa.org/player/?audio=303683

This time you really are in danger.

This time you really do want a freaking Wall.

But, sadly, there’s no money left in your budget for Walls. You’ve spent it all on that stupid border Wall. Bad choice. https://www.npr.org/2019/01/20/686980898/a-mountaineer-writes-a-firsthand-report-from-the-worlds-melting-glaciers

Soon Los Angeles and Miami and New York City are gone. Swept away by the tides. “Doh!” you say to yourself. “I coulda had a Sea Wall” — instead of just a stupid Donald Wall-Banger hangover.

Now your entire apartment complex is under at least ten feet of cold ugly grey sea water. Now octopuses swim in your bathtub and sharks hang out on your couch. No more parties for you!

Unless you move to Montana — or Mexico City.

“Everyone in Syria really loves President Assad,” I keep telling anyone who will stand still long enough to listen — and yet almost nobody believes me. Even my FaceBook friends are fairly tired of me always getting in their faces about the virtues of Bashar Assad.

“But Assad is a dictator!” they always parrot back to me in reply. Now where did they get that idea? I’ll tell you where. It comes from public relations firms such as Omnicon, Hill & Knowlton, WPP and the Rendon Group — the very same folks who brought us that messy “war” on Yugoslavia, that brutal “war” on Libya, that sleazy “war” on Afghanistan, that trumped-up “war” on Iraq (twice), those cruel proxy-wars on Palestine and Yemen, the murderous “wars” on Central America and even America’s future wannabe “wars” on Venezuela, Russia and Iran. https://caitlinjohnstone.com/2019/02/14/ilhan-omar-shreds-elliott-abrams-on-the-house-floor/?fbclid=IwAR0rPj8a7OFuM-4fGB5Nqn8LPjFWVYdkHbTBtarDPgC3RvjY9ckPGKfeZ9Q

And Americans just keep falling for it every freaking time.

These public relations firms are really that good — they’re even better than Goebbels. Much better in fact.

How many times have these PR firms spent billions of dollars convincing Americans to run off to the mall, click on Amazon (or send Lockheed-Martin a huge check) in order to buy stuff that they really didn’t want — or need? Including fake wars? And yet Americans still fall for it every time, still get sucker-punched every single time, either at the mall, online — or at the Pentagon. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2019/02/18/private-mossad-for-hire

I was an election observer in Syria in 2014, five long hard years ago — long hard years for the Syrian people as they struggled and died in order to keep Syria from becoming yet another ISIS and al Qaeda stronghold like Libya.

Hell, even the Syrian Kurds prefer Assad. And what do the Syrian Christians have to say about Assad? “He is our person.” Even the Sunni Muslims love him — and that’s a hard sell.

I recently e-mailed a Syrian friend of mine living in Aleppo. “Who would you prefer to be your president?” I asked her. “Assad or Trump?” And what was her instant reply? A huge yellow emoji — laughing its head off!

Yeah, I know. It really is hard to convince Americans that they are being played. “Assad is a dictator. He gassed his own people,” they constantly parrot back to me. Blah blah blah. But still. I still can’t resist trying to tell people the truth. Somebody’s gotta do it.

PS: And now folks like Omnicon, Hill & Knowlton, WPP, the Rendon Group and all the rest of those sleazy con-men are now busy wasting our tax dollars on telling us how to think about Venezuela too. “Madero is a corrupt bum. Our guy is a God among men!” they constantly tell us.

Hell, nobody in America (or even in Venezuela) can even remember what their guy’s name even is. And Venezuelans also love Madero — if for no other reason than they would greatly prefer to keep their own oil to themselves rather than be forced to hand it over to Exxon and John Bolton. Not to mention how many billions of dollars this phony “war” is gonna cost us taxpayers — but with not a penny coming from Bolton or Exxon. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-venezuela-cuba/cuba-charges-u-s-moving-special-forces-preparing-venezuelan-intervention-idUSKCN1Q31RU

Face it, guys, religions are basically just teaching tools. “So what exactly are they supposed to teach us?” you might ask. They are supposed to teach us how to be good.

But then we have rogue states who use religions to do bad.

Take America for instance. Who ever heard of a good Christian nation that would sanction torture, fight like the Devil himself for the freedom to slaughter as many civilians in the Middle East as humanly possible, advocate racism, steal from the poor in order to give to the rich and tear babies from their mothers just because said babies were brown instead of white? “America, America, God shed His grace on thee…” Er, no. God does not approve this message. Not at all. https://www.mintpressnews.com/us-troop-count-in-syria-jumps-by-50-percent-since-trumps-withdrawal-announcement/254681/

Colin Kaepernick, even though he’s only yesterday’s news cycle (yawn), is probably one of the last true Christians in America today. Kaepernick was right to take a knee in the face of all this American barbarism. Jesus woulda taken a knee too! Bad, bad, bad.

And then we come to Myanmar. American hearts bleed for the poor Rohingya Muslims who are systematically being slaughtered there. And yet Myanmar is a Buddhist state. “Hey, Buddha, when did you ever teach that sort of stuff?” Er, uh, never. Yet another prime example of using a good religion to do bad.

     Not to mention the notorious Zionist Israelis, busy giving Judaism a very bad name.  Slaughter in Gaza.  Injustice in the Occupied Territories.  Prison camps, torture, propaganda.  “Come visit lovely Jerusalem,” the TV ads tell us — unless you are Palestinian of course.  Palestinians only have bad things happen to them there.  No pretty girls on beaches for them.  https://mondoweiss.net/2019/02/settlements-alienated-eizenstat/

     Dontcha just wish that we too were worth one-point-three million bucks each to Congress (annually).

And here’s another one of the worst offenders. Didn’t Mohammad (PBUH) tell the Saudis to respect and protect other Muslims? The Prophet never, ever said anything about making an exception for Yemenis, Iranians, Syrians, Lebanese, Libyans, Iraqis — or any Muslim who has the nerve to crave just a little bit of democracy in The Kingdom. Mohammad (PBUH) never, ever said, “Off with their heads!” Definitely breaking bad in Saudi Arabia these days.

Comparative religions 101? What have we learned? That many state religions can (and do) lead us down the garden path to corruption, sadism, greed and stupidity in God’s name — if we are not vigilant. And apparently nobody has been vigilant in America, Saudi Arabia, Israel or Myanmar for a very long time.

God must be very pissed off.

Assuming that there even actually is a God.

But if there really is one, then He is as guilty as the rest of us for not smiting down all this hypocrisy and all this other just plain evil stuff done in His name. The Golden Calf is clearly running the show these days.

But the story doesn’t have to end here. We ourselves can simply ignore the bad guys who have seized our temples, mosques, synagogues, pulpits and pews. We can pray on our own freaking knees, take our own religions to heart and become good Christians, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists or whatever instead — all by ourselves. Hell, we can even be atheists — as long as we work to do what religions were invented to do.

“And what exactly is that?” you might ask again. Pay attention here! Religions are supposed to help us be good! Jeez.

__________________________________________

Stop Wall Street and War Street from destroying our world. And while you’re at it, please buy my books. https://www.amazon.com/Jane-Stillwater/e/B00IW6O1RM

Face it, guys. Back in the 1960s and 1970s, you and I were all brainwashed into paying out unimaginable amounts of $$$$ — just for the pleasure and privilege of losing that phony American “war” on Vietnam. And since then we’ve also paid through our teeth for the supreme privilege of losing all those other phony American “wars” on Libya, Syria, Iraq, Terror and Drugs. We lost them all big-time. And we have paid and paid and paid endlessly for the opportunity to do so.

And now we’re just about to lose that 17-year phony “war” on Afghanistan as well. Apparently the Taliban now control almost everything outside of Kabul. https://www.rt.com/op-ed/450170-afghanistan-withdrawal-troops-us/

You and I, every single one of us, could have bought ourselves a Cadillac, a designer outfit and a yacht each instead of what we actually got for our money — the right to be called “losers” by the rest of the world.

You and I have also paid out billions and billions and billions of dollars to Zionists in the last 70 years — so that they could commit genocide on poor innocent Palestinians whose only crime has been to get all pissed off after being murdered, bombed, tortured, occupied and imprisoned in their own country by Zionists for the past seven bloody decades.

And, frankly, we have backed the wrong horse here too. Even while profligately and shamelessly throwing our money around like it was Kleenex, those freaking incompetent Zionists still haven’t been able to defeat the Palestinians — even after 70 freaking years! The Palestinians are still winning that “war”. I mean seriously. How hard can it be to accomplish a genocidal final solution against village children armed with rocks? “Losers.”

And now you and I are about to lose yet another phony “war” too — the one on Venezuela. Do you honestly think that Venezuelans (and all Latin Americans too for that matter) are just going to happily sit still and give up their oil and their freedom without a long, protracted fight? I think not. Let’s prepare ourselves for yet another 17-year (or 70-year) phony “war” down south as well. https://www.commondreams.org/views/2019/02/04/venezuela-uss-68th-regime-change-disaster

Latin Americans are already pissed off about US interference in Haiti, Chile, Panama, Columbia, Mexico, Uruguay, Bolivia, Brazil, Ecuador, Nicaragua, Argentina, Honduras, Guatemala, Paraguay, Grenada, El Salvador and Cuba. Hell, they are still pissed off about all those American lies leading up to the 1898 Spanish-American War. This phony attack on Venezuela just might be the last straw. http://www.intrepidreport.com/archives/26073

But who the freak actually does win all these “wars” that we Americans have paid for and lost? The Viet Cong? The Taliban? Drug lords and terrorists? The Syrian people? Al Qaeda? Well, yeah, I guess. Maybe. Some of them. But the real winners in all of these stupid, cruel and wasteful American “wars” are the weapons manufacturers, global elites, international banksters and other sleazy con-men who run the American empire, and they have clearly scammed the rest of us into paying for their “wars” — like we were some dumb hick marks at a small-time carnival sideshow. Easy to fleece.

And we continue to let them do it — over and over again. Like “Groundhog Day”.

Isn’t it time that we finally stopped falling for this same obvious con-game and used our money on ourselves for a change instead of using it to become pathetic “losers” yet again — this time in Venezuela. https://consortiumnews.com/2019/01/29/the-making-of-juan-guaido-us-regime-change-laboratory-created-venezuelas-coup-leader/

Back in the 1950s, America’s major employers used to be huge manufacturing giants like General Motors and U.S. Steel. And after 9-11, our major employers used to be Walmart, the military and McDonalds.

But America’s major employer these days appears to be Craig’s List.

Last week I was lucky enough to work as a background extra in an episode of a TV series that was filming locally. And in the breaks we were given between action shots, us background extras mostly just sat around the holding room, drank hot chocolate, played with our cell phones, read books and/or chatted about our lives.

“What else do you do to support yourselves besides this?” I asked a bunch of extras there. A lot of them drove for Uber or Lyft. Another guy was retired and trying to supplement his meager Social Security income. One extra rented out a spare room on Air BnB. Someone else had occasional housecleaning gigs. https://www.cnbc.com/2018/10/22/silicon-valley-using-contract-employees-to-drive-profits.html

“I deliver food and run errands,” said someone else.

“I do weekend work for Amazon.”

“I work as a caregiver three days a week.” And where do you get most of your jobs? “Thank goodness for Craig’s List.”

“But how can you guys afford to pay your rent on gig incomes?” I asked next.

“We have roommates!” Lots and lots of roommates. Or they sleep on the couch at their parents’ house — or sleep in their cars.

When the mainstream media headlines tell us that America has a 3% unemployment rate, they are flat-out lying. A few gigs here and there is just not the same as a 40-hour-a-week job with healthcare benefits, a pension plan, vacation pay, lunch breaks and sick leave.

America’s new gig economy has an actual employment rate of perhaps 30% — and in America today, one job is never enough. http://www.berkeleydailyplanet.com/issue/2018-10-26/article/47118?headline=The-Marriott-Strike-One-Job-Should-Be-Enough-

“But what about all those illegal aliens who are taking our jobs,” you might ask. Sorry — but it just doesn’t work that way. Undocumented workers mostly take only the low-paying crappy jobs that American citizens don’t want — not even in this harsh gig economy now. Or else undocumented workers take jobs that require skills that Americans simply no longer have and/or don’t want to put in the effort to learn.

PS: Our current American leaders seem to exist back in some weird 1950s time warp — and these wealthy out-of-touch O.G. fools still think and act like they are living in an idealized McCarthyite America of unlimited resources and unlimited domination. But do we really want these old gangstas running our country today too? Now that things have so drastically changed? I think not. http://www.kingsolver.com/books/unsheltered.html

We are currently faced with the most gigantic extinction event (ours) since back in the days when dinosaurs bit the dust. And in these crucial new times that involve our own very survival (as well as the survival of our jobs), do we really want to allow these human dinosaurs to run our world? To die knowing we ourselves have actually voluntarily put up with the very human stegosauruses who are now killing us off? https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2018/11/26/how-extreme-weather-is-shrinking-the-planet?utm_medium=email&utm_source=actionkit

Isn’t it time that we demanded leaders who are just a bit more in touch?

PPS: Hey, the gig economy is really not all that bad. At least Americans haven’t (yet) disintegrated into the terrible conditions that exist in such countries as Libya, Honduras, Gaza, Afghanistan and Yemen (all of them being the lucky recipients of American weapons manufacturers’ famous “democracy” awards). Hell, those countries don’t even have Craig’s List!