BartBlog

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.

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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!