BartBlog

Take Rah and his nurse like outfit

Courtesy en.wikipedia.org

Courtesy samhs.org.au

And what do you have? The al Qaeda loyalists of the Nusra Front. For extra points add pompoms and you get…

(more…)

Geez Louise! Here I am living in a wonderful town, on a safe street and with food in the refrigerator. But all I ever do is worry about poor Syria being invaded by ISIS, America and the Saudis http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article40005.htm.

Here I am with the best medical care in the world located only six blocks from my home — and I worry about Ebola. According to John Barry’s fascinating book about the 1919 flu epidemic, “The Great Influenza,” viruses have a nasty habit of evolving in order to be more contagious and thus have a longer shelf-life. And remember the bird-flu scare and the swine flu scare? And the fact that Congress has just slashed the CDC’s budget and left us defenseless — now that the very agency that stopped both of those possible epidemics in their tracks is currently operating at half-speed due to budget cuts? Good grief.

Here I am, snug as a bug in a rug, but my neighbor just told me that foam mattresses give off fumes that can ruin my life. So there goes my foam mattress, out to the dumpster. Rats. It was really really comfortable too.

And the Republican party has been telling me since Reagan’s time that I should be afraid — very afraid. Of what? You name it. Undocumented Americans, commie spies, weapons of mass destruction, drug lords, terrorist invasions, I forget what all else.

So now the only sane thing I can think of doing today is to spend the day hiding under my (mattress-less) bed. “But, Jane, you can’t do that! Remember that there might be a bedbug epidemic!” Oops. I forgot.

Maybe I should just move to someplace like Ukraine, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya or Sierra Leone instead — someplace where it’s safe.

According to First Lady Michelle Obama, 25% of everyone trying to enlist in America’s armed forces these days are turned down because of poor health. And of those who actually make it through the physical exams and join the Army, Marines, etc., 50% of these recruits are in poor enough health that they cost our military 150 billion dollars in healthcare expenses — plus $100,000 per patient to repair their bad teeth.

Boots on the ground? Yeah, sure. But first we have to find enough healthy young adults to wear those boots in the first place — and then fix their teeth. I’m sure that ISIS doesn’t have that kind of problem at all.

Apparently, we pretty much have to scrape the bottom of the barrel to find healthy young adults — or even kids — in America these days. “We even have two-year-olds testing with high blood pressure right now,” says the First Lady.

And why is all this happening? One of the major causes of this scary decay in Americans’ health is that they drink too much soda. And also, we have to pay truly outrageous doctor bills as a result. So can we tax soda consumers for their fair share of their own health costs? Something small, like one cent a can? Seems logical. We already tax alcohol and tobacco consumers for their fair share of their own health costs, right?

So the City of Berkeley, which runs three health clinics and a dental clinic, got the bright idea of taxing soda consumers to help cover their own healthcare costs. And they put a measure on the November ballot to this effect. And then all Hell broke loose in Berkeley! Good grief!

Soda manufacturing companies reacted like we had spit in their soup and kidnapped their cat! “Get over it, Big Soda. This is not about you!” This is about the consumers of your products who are dying ten or 20 years early because they like your products. They are the ones who are paying the tax. Not you.

So now I get at least one robo-call a day from Big Soda, plus all kinds of mailers, fliers, canvassers and accosters too. 1.2 million dollars worth of junk mail and hounding, telling us Berkeley residents to “Vote No on Measure D” in November. I think that the people of Berkeley will vote “Yes on D” just because Big Soda has pissed us all off!  http://www.berkeleyvsbigsoda.com/

Further, no single corporation or individual should be allowed to buy any American election. Ever. Not even a city election. And the “One person, one vote” rule should never be allowed to apply to corporations. And we the people, not some company hacks on the Supreme Court, should be the ones who decide whether we want to live in a plutocracy or a democracy. “You have to choose between one or the other,” as Justice Brandeis once warned us back in 1916 when the Robber Barons were in charge — like they are now.

Bottom line: “Help us, Michelle! Put your money where your mouth is. Come to Berkeley. Help us. Save us from Big Soda. Please!”

And you can help too. Please write the First Lady at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Washington DC 20500 and beg her to help little Berkeley out (And also please mention that her hubby needs to get the freak out of the Middle East and start spending all those trillions of dollars that he now spends on killing strangers — on fixing Americans’ teeth instead).

We were on the Bay Area Rapid Transit (BART) train somewhere in South Berkeley near the border with Oakland when the caffeine from our morning coffee kicked it. It was almost noon and we had miles to go and promises to keep before we could get to Press check-in at the Alternative Press Expo 2014 being held at the Fort Mason Center in San Francisco. In October, San Francisco becomes bat country. The Giant sluggers’ bats come alive (only in even numbered years) and the bats lead the way into the World Series. That’s one thing you should probably understand about Frisco. “Only in even number years.”

The home office had neglected to arrange a press pass for us and so we lurched over to press check-in and began babbling. Free lunch, final wisdom, total coverage. How can you tell if someone is a genuine member of the journalism community? The boys on the bus head straight for the free food, and after shoveling some into their mouths, they ask: “Where’s the press release?” We passed the smell test and entered the event that was taking place on a dock overlooking the San Francisco Bay where we could watch the tide roll in and then watch it roll away again.

We noticed that the first booth featured drawings of a huge reptile gnawing on a woman’s neck. The comic book posse falls into two diametrically apposed groups: one that thinks a serial killer lurks inside everybody and the other that thinks the world is full of wonderful kids and loveable animals, especially puppies.

A comic book series titled “Byron,” done by Karl Christian Krumpholz, caught our eye immediately and we honed in on it to learn if it was based on the life of the legendary manager of Club Ocean Park in Santa Monica. It turned out that it was a fictionalized account of a serial killer.

The crew from Whiskey Tango Comics (dotcom) seemed ready to challenge us and draw their guns (cartoonist pun alert!) and we had to reassure them: “We’re just a good patriotic American like yourselves.”

We had promised our curmudgeonly self that we would not buy anything but when we encountered a copy of “L’il Buddha Loves You (then again he loves everybody!),” by Ryan Dow we had to buy a copy to give as a Christmas present (WTF?) to a member of the congregation of the church of loveable puppies and adorable rug rats.

Note: don’t the clergy provide much better sermons during war era Christmases? When the world is at Peace during Christmas time, aren’t the speeches given by the various members of the clergy rather anemic? “We hope your little once got all the swag that Santa could smuggle down your chimney!” GMAFB. During war, the priest/minister/rabbi urges folks to sing “Praise the Lord and pass the ammunition.”

The sermons about praying for Peace on Earth are so much more inspiring.

There used to be a Museum of Robots (dotcom) but all that’s left now is the virtual gift shop.

Squid Row Comics (dotcom), about a quirky, coffee-addicted artist, drawn by Bridgett Spicer (dot com). We wanted to advise her that she should try using that formula for writing columns. We don’t recommend it to everybody but it’s always worked for us.

Somewhere, somehow Erin & Christine Humiston have gotten the mistaken impression that there is a lot of conflict and drama involved in the formation and career of a rock’n’roll band and so they produce a comic book series, titled BAND, based on the misperception. Its home on the Internets resides at Band-Comic (dotcom).

Nuggets of Wisdom (AKA nuggetsNOW dot com) was so different from all the rest, we wondered how they sneaked (the past participle of the verb sneak is not snuck; it’s “sneaked”) in.

Wandering around we were trying to get a handle for putting all the diverse examples of fine comic style drawings and wild imaginative stories into perspective and one coherent column. Lumping well crated images of pre-historic animals, gun toting seekers of vengeance, and cute animals together on one dock in San Francisco is what the whole hep world would be like if the Germans had won WWII, we thought.

We had been toying with the idea of doing a column on publicity and how it is the key to success for any artistic endeavor and at A. P. E. 2014 we saw that the key to success is to stand out from the crowd and the best way to achieve that is through publicity.

A surge in publicity got massive amounts of pop culture clout for a group of writers and poets in the Fiftiies, when they were labeled as “beatniks.” (Actually Herb Caen, a San Francisco based columnist coined the word.) The new literary movement and the demand for copy about the phenomenon was phenomenal.

Hunter S. Thompson and Tom Wolfe took the idea of the writer as protagonist and repackaged beat as hippie and got plenty of press and greenbacks. (Hadn’t Hemingway gotten into Paris before the Allied Armies?)

Thompson claimed the “Outlaw Journalist” title and shot to the front of the list of the hippie era writers.

When the country music boys needed to boost sales, someone cooked-up the “Outlaw” label for use with their songs and then (to quote a line from a Waylon Jennings song): “New York sent a posse down like I’ve never seen.” The rest is pop culture history.

In the early Forties, Gypsy Rose Lee wanted to expand her career to other money making endeavors and so she became a mystery writer. If she had been a stripper with a comic strip, she probably would have achieved an even great amount of fame and fortune than she did. (Homework assignment: Google “Stripper girl comic strip.”) Isn’t the rule in Hollywood: “Ya gott have a gimmick?”

Cartoons and motion pictures have been a winning combination since the first “talkies” were made. Boo oop ee doop! We wonder if Pixar sent a cartoon talent scout to the San Francisco Bay Area event.

Hunter Thompson fans should fact check the comic book series “The Transmetropolitan,” which featured a famous fictional gonzo journalist, named Spider Jerusalem, who wears sun glasses and has a shaved head. (Try a Google Image search.)

Speaking of suing a cartoonist for plagiarizing a life, when we noticed the comic book series “Kill-Weather,” (written by Jesse E. Lichtenstein and drawn by Abraham Mong), which is about the adventures of a conservative political pundit, we thundered: “You changed liberal to conservative and stole my life story; my Samoan lawyer will contact you.” They responded “There’s nothing for him to take away from us and we need the publicity; so go ahead and make our day with a newsworthy lawsuit!”

Last weekend was the A. P. E. event; this weekend in San Francisco will be Satire weekend. (Wasn’t he on the NY Times OpEd team roster some time ago?) Maybe for next Friday, we’ll do a column and use the headline: “Sartre, Satire, and Safire”?

Charles M. Shulz (creator of the Peanuts comic strip) has said: “There is a difference a philosophy and a bumper sticker.”

Now the disk jockey will play the Coasters’ song “Charlie Brown,” the Hollywood Argyles’ “Alley Oop,” and the Royal Guardsmen’s “Snoopy vs. the Red Barron.” We have to go see if we can get a one-day press pass for when the Giants play home games during the World Series. Have a “Curses! Foiled again!” type week.

Okay, so what? So what if you’ve just joined ISIS, been given a sword and been sent off to Syria and Iraq. So what if you now have a huge bloody sword in your hand and you’ve just cut off somebody’s head? Big freaking deal. You’re the one that will be going to Hell, not me. But what I want to know is this: Where, exactly, did you get that huge bloody sword in the first place? “Swords R Us”?

From your local “Samurai of the Desert” katana convenience store?

To find out who is really financing, training and supplying ISIS, just check out who is supplying its swords.

“Made in China”? Of course. Isn’t everything these days. But who are the swords being shipped to?

Syrians aren’t supplying the swords. Syrians stand solidly behind Assad — as evidenced by their June elections, and also by the fact that almost all Syrian internal refugees flee to Assad refugee camps, and no one, I repeat, no one ever flees off to ISIS.

Syrians hate ISIS — almost as much as they hate being beheaded! Plus ISIS is still beheading their fathers and mothers and nephews and cousins and aunts. How can you possibly become BFFs with someone like that? Let alone give them more swords so that they can go after your wives and kids too? http://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2014/09/26/fighting-isil-is-a-smokescreen-for-us-mobilization-against-syria-and-iran.html

According to a new Tweet just sent out from Kurdish Syria, “Hoped American planes will help us. Instead American tanks in the hands of ISIS are killing us.”

And Libya isn’t supplying the swords either. Why? Because Libya itself just had its head handed to it on a platter too — courtesy of the dread Sword of NATO. All that those American-backed “rebels” now in charge of the failed state of Libya are supplying ISIS with currently are some used American rocket launchers and RPGs left over from Benghazi, and a bunch of guys trained by the US to behead Gaddafi.

But perhaps Saudi Arabia is supplying the swords? After all, their state symbol is two swords and a palm tree. But I still don’t understand why the Saudis would do such a dumb thing — buy entire shipments of swords to give to creepy guys hovering right outside their borders? Aren’t the Saudis afraid of blow-back? http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/sep/30/isis-bomb-muslim-world-air-strikes-saudi-arabia

Aren’t the Saudi princes afraid that “Behead like a Pirate” day might be coming to Riyadh too?

And isn’t it bad enough already that a bunch of Saudis got their hands on those box-cutters over on the other side of the Atlantic back in 2001 — and just look at all the mischief that caused! http://whowhatwhy.com/2014/10/05/the-hidden-government-group-linking-jfk-watergate-iran-contra-and-911/ Can Saudis really be trusted to play well with swords right in their very own backyards? Saudi Arabia is about to find out.

And how about Turkey? Seen any bloody swords stamped “Made in Istanbul” lately? But why would the Turks want to do that? The blow-back there would be even more immense. You’d have to be crazy to arm a horde of ISIS madmen to go next door and cut off your Syrian neighbors’ heads — no matter how much you hate Syrians. Oops, too late. http://www.hawarnews.com/english/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=2587:turkish-troops-attack-vigil-and-send-military-equipment-to-isis&catid=1:news&Itemid=2 Turkey has already supplied ISIS with every kind of weapon you can think of — and then naively hired ISIS to be its Neighborhood Watch. http://dissidentvoice.org/2014/10/u-s-alliance-with-fsa-and-isil-in-six-photographs/#more-55881

But apparently Turkey thinks that by supplying weapons to ISIS (and also establishing a no-fly zone over Syria) that Syria will fail too and then Turkey will get the Ottoman empire back. http://muslimvillage.com/2014/09/28/58258/turkey-changes-posture-after-hostage-release/

Sorry, Turkey. It’s heads. You lose.

But what about Israel? Did Israeli neo-cons supply all those swords? Who will ever know? Who the freak ever knows what Israeli neo-cons are up to? Certainly not the Jews who first hired them. And definitely not me. Ask the Mossad. But a fly on the wall at Mossad headquarters would probably hear something like this: “Those stupid Americans actually think that we are their only friends in the Middle East. However, before we came along America had no enemies there at all. Good job, guys!” Followed by a high-five.

The nightmare of having ISIS swordsmen let loose to create panic and havoc in the Arab world sounds like an Israeli neo-con wet dream to me.

And what about American neo-cons? Nah. Their most important product is weapons, sure, but they prefer selling Tomahawks rather than swords.

“But Jane,” you might say, “American weapons-manufacturers will sell anything to anyone, even swords to ISIS, if it will make them a buck.” Hell, they’d even sell drones to the Taliban if they thought that money was involved. They’d sell out America in a heartbeat for money. They’d probably even behead their own mothers for a few dollars more. http://antiwar.com/blog/2014/09/26/the-boomerang-effect-how-foreign-policy-changes-domestic-policy/

According to former Austrian general Matthias Ghalem, several years ago Al Qaeda wannabes “signed a financial-military contract to confront upcoming military and security challenges in southern Syria in the future…and that two deputies of Robert Stephen Ford, US former ambassador to Syria, were also present at the meeting…. And according to the Los Angeles Times, since the opening of a new US base in the desert in southwest of Jordan in November 2012, CIA operatives and US special operations troops have covertly trained these militants in groups of 20 to 45 at a time in two-week courses.” http://en.alalam.ir/news/1511636

But according to US vice-president Joe Biden, the Saudis are to blame for arming ISIS. Of course they are. But it is American weapons that these ISIS cutthroats are firing — and it is American humvees that ISIS is doing donuts with out in the desert too. So why not brandish American swords as well? American neo-cons suddenly draw a line in the sand against swords? But RPGs are okay? http://pacificfreepress.com/rss/13501-from-the-mouth-of-biden-veep-admits-us-allies-fund-arm-al-qaeda-al-nusra.html

And then there’s Russia. Russia stood silently by while the “Coalition of the Willing” beheaded Iraq and Libya. Would it really be in their best interests to let Syria and Iran get beheaded next? Or is Russia playing the “Afghanistan Game” with the US instead — wherein America slowly but surely beheads its own economy by trying to put eleven trillion dollars worth of “boots on the ground” all over the freaking world where they don’t belong? http://rudaw.net/english/middleeast/syria/28092014

Or did Iran sell ISIS the swords? With the American military-industrial complex and Israeli neo-cons using every trick in the book to try to find an excuse to put Iran’s head on the chopping block for fun and profit even as we speak? I think not.

And a friend of mine just asked me the following question: “Or else could it be that Libya and Syria are/were among the few remaining countries that have resisted the imposition of a central bank associated with the Bank of England/Federal Reserve?” Hadn’t thought of that. Hell, maybe the banksters bought ISIS their swords!

And now we get to the next question. Who the freak would ever even want to behead anyone in the first place? That takes a whole bunch of work. Not to mention all that blood-splatter involved — and with no laundromats in sight either.

You’ve got to be really really angry or crazy or both to cut off someone’s head. So what got these ISIS fruitcakes so pissed off in the first place? Perhaps it might have been all these past 60 or 70 years that they, their parents and their grandparents have spent trying to survive the constant “War on Arabs” by American colonialists and Israeli neo-cons? Perhaps this is what has finally sent them around the bend and into horror-movie mode?

Just be glad that ISIS got their inspiration for weapons from watching the “Walking Dead” and not from watching the “Texas Chainsaw Massacre”. But I’m sure that the weapons industry would far rather prefer producing chainsaws than swords. Chainsaws are a bit more profitable to make, more effectively bloody and just a bit less Old School.

*****
Yes, those are Marines and large weapons in the background of the photo above.  Yes, that is a Sunni sheik in Al Ambar province, Iraq.    And, yes, that’s me too — trying to think up a not-dumb question to ask.

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Author’s note: Who among our founding fathers way back in 1776 would ever have guessed that, just two hundred and thirty eight years later, America’s main driving force, highest ideal, most efficient function and top-priority goal would be to sell weapons and hoard oil.
_______________________________________________________

I recently dared to ask a Nigerian-American friend of mine the same dreaded question that I had asked him the last time we had talked. “How are things going over in Nigeria right now?” http://jpstillwater.blogspot.com/2012/09/nigeria-today-taking-corporate-power-to.html.

“Bad. Really bad,” he once again replied. “I’m sure you don’t even want to hear about it.” Yeah I do.

“There have been lots of bombings over there lately. And not just any kind of bombs either. Definitely not the old-fashioned home-made pipe bombs and glorified Molotov cocktails that one would expect. These are sophisticated, well-placed and expensive bombs being set off by so-called Muslim terrorist groups. And hiring and training mercenaries like that doesn’t come cheap. Many of them may be misinformed fanatics but still — they still need to be trained and equipped and fed. A whole lot of money is involved. Billions.”

“But from what I had learned from studying about Nigeria in college, its Muslim population, the Fulani, mostly used to herd cows,” I replied. Apparently that’s no longer true.

“The Boko Haram and other terrorist groups in Nigeria today have amazingly well-equipped and well-trained troops — and their main goal seems to be to de-civilize the country. Farmers and herders who should only have been able to stage revolutions with blunderbusses at best, are now expert sappers and know the advanced operation mechanisms of RPGs by heart.”

Now why do these techniques sound so familiar? Well-trained troops? Expensive equipment? Causing chaos? Attempting to destabilize countries? Oh, right. The “rebels” who seized the government in Libya, the “rebels” who tried to seize the government in Syria and the “rebels” who seized the government of Ukraine and parts of Iraq — not to mention the “rebels” who had seized Chile, Vietnam, Indonesia, Iran, Honduras, Guatemala, Afghanistan and the Congo back in the day. http://thinkprogress.org/security/2007/02/25/10609/hersh-qaeda/

These rebels are definitely getting paychecks!

And we are definitely not talking about the idealistic, poorly-trained and ill-equipped rebels fighting for freedom and their lives against despots and madmen who have seized control over places like eastern Ukraine, Palestine, East Timor, Iraq, Yemen, Bahrain and Saudi Arabia (or the American colonies in 1776 for that matter). Those rebel chumps are only trying to protect their families, homes, lives, liberties and pursuit of happiness. Those kinds of rebels don’t matter. The CIA doesn’t equip or train those kinds of chumps. They don’t count. http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-lies-and-deceit-of-president-barack-obama/5404240

“And aside from the constant threat from terrorists,” my friend continued, “we also have to deal with the highest level of corruption in the world. For instance, one storefront lawyer with almost no clients was suddenly promoted to governor of a Nigerian state — and suddenly he’s spending $150 million on a private jet and socking away millions more in a private bank account offshore.

“And now if he wants any money, he just transfers it out to the state’s coffers and into his own. And it’s all perfectly legal to do that.”

This sounds like what a U.S. Army officer once told me about Afghanistan. “The corruption here is amazing, sure, but leaders do the same thing in America too — the only difference being that in America, they pass laws to make the corruption legal first.” Citizens United comes to mind. And a whole bunch of shady oil and weapons deals too. http://www.legitgov.org/13000-US-troops-be-deployed-Iraq-Officials

“And here’s another bad thing,” said my Nigerian-American friend. “In the river-delta area of Nigeria, land that used to grow produce is now hopelessly and dangerously polluted by American oil concessions.”

“But what about the Ebola virus?” I asked next.

“That’s a problem in Liberia, not in Nigeria. Yet.” Nope, too late. It’s already arrived at the airport http://time.com/3159464/nigeria-ebola-lagos-abuja/

And then he told me about another situation — one that I am sadly familiar with myself, having spent a lot of time in Africa and the Middle East. “Here in America, I am leading a double life. Part of me goes to Target to shop and eats at Olive Garden and feels perfectly happy and safe. But the other part of me just constantly marvels at how my fellow Americans can be so completely unaware of all the pain and killing and hunger that exists in other parts of the world — and that are the direct result of brutal and monstrous actions done in their name.”

I too feel the same way — torn between utter gratitude that I have electricity and my children are safe, on the one hand, and on the other hand, knowing that all across the world, the CIA is arming mercenaries to kill and maim children in far away places with names like Libya, Syria, Ukraine, Gaza, Iraq and Nigeria; names that many Americans couldn’t even find on a map.

“The powerful people in Nigeria will do anything for money,” said my friend sadly.

“And so will the powerful people of America too,” I sadly replied.

Despite all of its vivid past history of enlightened protests in favor of Truth and Justice https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PhFvZRT7Ds0#t=96, my home town of Berkeley hasn’t been very radical at all lately. In fact, the city has pretty much turned into a Yuppie paradise and a developer’s dream. But, boy, Berkeley has still managed to somehow put its foot in the lion’s mouth!

And all that we did to raise this huge nation-wide brouhaha was to simply propose a new November ballot measure wherein a small tax would be levied on sodas — then suddenly all Hell has broken loose here. Suddenly we woke up one morning to find that the American Beverage Association was staging a full frontal assault on our town.

The ABA has taped “Vote No on Measure D” posters on almost every one of our lamp posts, has hired friendly ladies to hand out “Vote No on Measure D” fliers at our flea market — and has begun distributing large numbers of “Vote No on Measure D” T-shirts, fliers, billboards, push-polls and mailers that follow us everywhere we go.

The American Beverage Association has spent $300,000 on its campaign against Measure D so far — and apparently has another $200,000 more yet to spend. Its minions come and bang on our doors. I dare not even answer the phone any more!

The American Beverage Association has gone total beast-mode on Berkeley.

But none of these posters, fliers, telemarketers, canvassers and/or mailers have ever made any offers to pay the City of Berkeley back for all the money that the City spends annually to run its three excellent medical clinics geared to help Berkeley’s obese children with the diabetes that they got from drinking sodas — or on Berkeley’s wonderful dental clinic that helps our residents recover from their soda-loving rotten teeth.

In fact, none of these harmful health hazards are even mentioned in the “No on D” posters, fliers, mailers, robo-calls and brochures. In fact, after being the overwhelmed victim of all this avalanche of corporate information, you might actually start to think that soda is really actually great stuff, is not mostly composed of harmful chemicals, and has no negative effect at all on our health — or on America’s skyrocketing hospital costs either. http://health.howstuffworks.com/wellness/food-nutrition/facts/artificial-sweetners-unhealthy-eco.htm

In fact, what all of these fliers, billboards, mailers, robo-calls and posters actually do say only consists of some sort of weak psycho-babble such as “Measure D is not what it seems”. Yeah, well. What exactly does it seem like? It seems to me like my town is being invaded by the American Beverage Association. That’s what it seems like to me.

And it also seems like the American Beverage Association does not have Berkeley residents’ best interests at heart either.

If the ABA had really wanted to defeat Measure D here in Berkeley, it should have just donated its half-million bucks to our city’s medical clinics and said, “See! We know our products cause a whole lot of damage — and are willing to help to repair it. We are the good guys!”

PS: Berkeley needs to get its revenue from somewhere now that Proposition 13 has drained our state coffers and too much of our federal money is now happily winging its way overseas to help bomb countries that most of us can’t even find on a map — let alone even care about one way or the other. http://www.newyorker.com/humor/borowitz-report/americans-read-single-article-syria-strongly-support-bombing So why not get some revenue from the taxation of sodas — which, unlike Ukrainians, Syrians and Palestinians, are actually doing us some actual harm?

PPS: Even though I am basically a hermit by nature, I had finally decided to throw a birthday party for my six-year-old granddaughter Mena — and thought I would combine it with a worthy cause too: Stopping diabetes in kids her age. So I’m going to throw a party in support of “Yes on Measure D” as well as a BD party for Mena. And all of you are invited to come too (as long as you don’t expect me to supply sodas!)

This party will be held on Sunday October 5, 2014 from 2:00 pm to 4:00 pm, at Dreamland Park http://www.great-kids-parks.com/aquatic-park-berkeley-ca.html. And if you can’t make it to the party but still want to donate to help keep Big Soda from taking over our town, just click here: http://www.berkeleyvsbigsoda.com/

And here’s a link to an informative article by Robert Reich in defense of Measure D too: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-reich/berkeley-vs-big-soda_b_5786028.html

And if it rains, just bring an umbrella and pretend that you are Mary Poppins! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b8Y__H99cs4

PPPS: If First Lady Michelle Obama is truly serious about fighting against obesity in American kids, then she truly needs to come to Berkeley and support Measure D. We are currently dug in here on the front lines of the battle to prevent childhood obesity — and if we don’t get any desperately-needed reinforcements from you soon, then we will have to retreat.

First Lady Obama, Measure D is now offering you the perfect chance to actually walk the walk. Are you really in favor of ending childhood obesity? Or are you more in favor of never going up against large corporations?

In fact, First Lady Obama, consider this as your personal invitation to come to my “Yes on Measure D” party on October 5. And you can take our “Soda Bucket Challenge” too! And please bring Sasha, Malia and Bo with you as well. Mena would love that.

PPPPS: What do you think that the “Soda Bucket Challenge” should be? To drink a half-pint of healthy carrot juice in less than a minute? Or maybe even drink a pint of our own locally-bottled kombucha from the Cultured Pickle Shop! http://www.culturedpickleshop.com/kombucha.html

CBS is premiering a new TV show called “Stalker” this October, and this program is fierce and scary as hell — all about a bunch of creepy guys who go around stalking their prey mercilessly. http://www.cbs.com/shows/stalker/video/B0B62848-22B9-1295-487F-F8062516D6D8/stalker-first-look/

But what is the exact definition of a stalker? “A person who harasses or persecutes someone with unwanted and obsessive attention.” Further, “Any unwanted contact between two people that directly or indirectly communicates a threat or places the victim in fear can be considered stalking.”

I personally know of two insanely obsessive examples of stalking at its worst.

In one case, the unwanted and illegal harassment has gone on for years and involves relentless fear-producing acts of violence so intense that it is like being in a horror movie. Home invasions in the middle of the night. Masked attackers brandishing weapons. Harassing phone calls. False lies and accusations. Family members followed and stalked. http://www.palestinechronicle.com/now-through-the-front-door-into-syria/#.VBog9BYa6d8

Imagine your worst nightmare and multiply it by a thousand — and then imagine this horror going on for three years. Imagine going to the authorities and begging for help but having no one believe you or even listen to you! http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-history-of-isis-beheadings-part-of-the-training-manual-of-us-sponsored-syria-pro-democracy-terrorists/5402566

And of course you immediately realize that I’m talking about President Obama’s strange and evil obsession with stalking Syria. And Obama continues to stalk Syria even now — and with deadly intent. And it appears that Syria is helpless against her attacker. http://dissidentvoice.org/2014/09/how-to-bomb-syria-2/

Or not. Not if everyone in America gets on the phone and calls the White House and says, “America sees you. We know what you do. Stop stalking Syria.”
http://jpstillwater.blogspot.com/2014/06/normal-0-false-false-false-en-us-x-none.html

And the second case of stalking? Just as bad as the first — with evil intent and malice aforehand. Ukraine is also being stalked. Home invasions. Planes being shot down. Fear-inducing jack-boot visits in the middle of the night. Lots of blood. Lots and lots and lots of blood. http://www.globalresearch.ca/in-the-wake-of-the-ukraine-cease-fire-the-road-map-to-war-with-russia/5402574

In CBS’s online preview of “Stalker,” Maggie Q states that stalkers are motivated by “rejection, jealousy and revenge”. Well, Syria and Ukraine have both rejected Obama’s demands for a dance — so that is probably the cause. http://www.globalresearch.ca/train-and-equip-the-islamic-state-white-house-might-still-be-arming-isil/5403459

But exactly why have Syria and Ukraine rejected Obama’s offer? Because they both saw what happened to Libya when Obama took her to the prom! Obama tortured and raped her while John McCain, Lindsey Graham and John Bolton held her down. http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/25958-focus-stupid-stuff-on-steroids-syria-and-comic-book-thinking

And Obama learned his grisly stalking techniques from the masters. First he watched Bush and Cheney stalk, torture and rape Afghanistan. Then he watched Bush and Cheney stalk, torture and rape Iraq. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article39697.htm

“But, Jane,” you might ask, “why are you being so hard on President Obama?” http://dgibbs.faculty.arizona.edu/brzezinski_interview

Why? Why? Because even if all this psychopathic stalking is actually being orchestrated by Wall Street and War Street or the military-industrial complex or the wingnuts and war-hawks in Congress or even the PNAC and Dick Cheney — all of these stalking nightmares are still happening on Obama’s watch. http://thearabdailynews.com/2014/09/15/obama-bites-can-chew/

PS: If the CIA, the American military-industrial complex, the PNAC war hawks, the Pentagon and even the White House and Congress can get so deeply involved in stalking and tormenting and threatening and bullying other countries throughout the world — and apparently get away with it too, then what’s to keep these evil stalkers from saying to themselves, “Hmmm. Let’s stalk Americans next.” My blood runs cold at the thought. http://jpstillwater.blogspot.com/2014/06/syria-iraq-captain-phillips-isis.html

Where is Maggie Q when we need her!
_______

From journalist David Swanson: “In violation of the Constitution, our Constitutional scholar president, in violation of the UN Charter and the Kellogg-Briand Pact, our Nobel Peace Laureate president, in compliance with the stated desire of ISIS that the United States help it grow by attacking it, President Barack ‘don’t-do-stupid-stuff’ Obama has just attacked another country and no good can come of it.

“He’s attacked the opponents of the Syrian regime he said needed to be attacked a year ago, and done so in defense of Iraqis who just held a demonstration opposing such U.S. action. The world needs actual aid and serious support for the rule of law, diplomacy, and good government. So-called ‘military aid’ doesn’t aid anyone, and the U.S. public’s willingness to stand for more of it being offered in our name has been greatly overestimated.”
http://warisacrime.org/content/isis-weapons-makers-thugs-benefit-crime
______

From Judy Bello of the Upstate Coalition to Ground the Drones and End the Wars: “On Democracy Now, Vijay Prashad just pointed out that the US airstrikes on Syria are more symbolic than otherwise. They are destroying a lot of infrastructure in Raqqa around Aleppo and Dier Ezzor. But they aren’t attacking ISIS’ hardened positions and forward positions around Kobani on the Turkish Border. There are also reports that ISIS has abandoned its bunkers in Raqqa and moved into residential areas so US bombing merely destroyed the buildings and bystanders.” http://www.democracynow.org/2014/9/23/expanding_us_strikes_to_isis_in

The one percent won’t need a laxative this weekend. The voters of Scotland threw a big scare into those who believe that the status quo is sacred. All’s well that ends well and the voters came to their senses at the last minute and voted to keep things the way they were.

News reports said that British officials at first thought it would be a lark. Then they refused to even consider a negative result. Recently some influential Brits were dispensing condescending bromides to the Scottish citizens with the “yes, yes, of course; now run along and play” tone.

Some late polls indicated an upset “Yes” victory was possible.

Polling used to be such a precise science, but lately, more often than not, the polls go one way and then when the votes are cast, the results give the pontificating pundits a chance to solemnly intone a comment that the voters mind is not that easily quantified and that it is always best to wait for the official results before celebrating a victory.

ISIS’s weekly beheading got short shrift in the news media. Some arrests this week in Sydney made the news in the USA and we couldn’t help but wonder how many of those bad guys were nabbed in the King’s Cross Section.

The National Football League hired some women to advise the players how they should behave at home. There was no indication of whether this service would also include instructions on how they should vote at election time.

The political activists who are monitoring the numbers regarding young men who have been shot while reaching for a police officer’s weapon will want to do Google news searches for Darien Hunt and Richard Perez.

After years of being George W. Bush’s war, President Obama urged congress to officially do a new vote and make it a bipartisan effort under his stewardship. They complied very rapidly. Thus the World’s Laziest Journalist’s streak of weekly criticism of Dubya’s war, will now end.

Since this political shift expunges the stigma from the “Bush Dynasty” concept, we will continue to inundate our audience with dire predictions that all this is just an elaborate prelude to the election of JEB in 2016.

Is this all going on schedule with a dire, diabolical, and draconian plan devised long ago by Karl Rove?

In other news this week, the staff of the Amalgamated Conspiracy Theory Factory was caught completely off guard and unaware when the Getty and Armstrong radio program scored a scoop with the report of a rumor that the trendy new theory alleges that Joan Rivers was “offed” because she had authored the assertion that President Obama is gay and that his wife is a “tranny.”

Indian Summer is the best time of year in many areas of the world and particularly so in the San Francisco Bay Area. Perhaps it is time to go for a long walk there and jettison the old ways of thinking, feeling, and reacting.

Do they have Indian Summer in Australia?

Is “September Song” particularly poignant if you hear it sitting in a café in Paris?

Is an Italian meal in Frisco’s North Beach area a panacea for ennui? Or a ticket to Paris?

We read somewhere that when Paris was being liberated, the French radio station played the Marseillaise and in an textbook perfect example of mental telepathy people throughout the city cranked up the volume and opened their windows in the real Howard Beal moment.

Since it is obvious that no one wants to hear (let alone “like”) disparaging remarks about George W. Bush and his Forever War we may have to shift the focus of our weekly rants. Maybe the thing that we can say that might someday wind up in a future edition of Bartlett’s is: “I’ve been to Casablanca and I’ve been to Paris; I prefer Paris.”

We can’t find a passage we stumble upon in Anais Nin’s Volume Three of her Diary (1939 – 1944) but it seemed she knew a French woman who lived on a boat docked in the Sein River and the vessel was named “La Bell Aurure” and that in turn was the name of Ricky Blane’s bar in Paris.

[Note from the photo editor: to illustrate the concept of jettisoning a moribund political philosophy we dug out some photos of the art installation called “Defenestration.” The images signify that liberal objections to the Forever War have also been dismantled and only photo files and memories can bring the past back to life.]

Lawrence Durrell, in a letter to Anais Nin wrote: “My heart sinks when I read the manifestos of the leaders, when I really see the pygmies at work in the world with their hysteria and violence.”

Now the disk jockey will play Judy Collins’ “Amazing Grace,” Natalie Cardone’s “Hasta Siempre” (AKA the Che Guevara Song), and “The Poor People of Paris.” We have to go to the Pacific Film Archive to see “Lolita” tonight. Have a “we’ll always have Paris” type week.

With election time almost upon us, here’s a rather sobering thought: By spending as little as a mere two billion dollars, anyone with that amount of money can now afford to buy an entire American election — Congress, the White House, governorships and all.

“But Jane,” you might ask, “why would anyone even want to do that?” Why? Just look at all the immense amount of loot you can score with just this tiny investment. Access to national park land, bank deregulation, profits from weapons production, corporate monopoly status, pro-pollution laws, judges’ rulings in your favor…need I go on? http://m.thenation.com/article/181601-whos-paying-pro-war-pundits

For instance, eleven trillion dollars has been recently spent on escalating and pursuing fake wars. So if you “invest” in American elections and still only receive, say, just ten percent of that eleven trillion singles for your weapons-manufacturing services or whatever the heck else companies like Halliburton do, you still have just grown your measly two-billion-buck investment at least a thousand times over. Forever War really pays off! http://www.globalresearch.ca/going-after-the-islamic-state/5401439

Or if you are guys like Obama, Bush and Cheney — and can’t resist playing with war toys? Then you get to buy your very own wars! Lots and lots of wars. You get to play with actual life-sized GI Joe dolls and call yourself “Commander in Chief”. You get to bomb Libya and Ukraine and Iraq and Syria. What fun! Two billion dollars can buy you a hecka lot of war toys — eleven trillion dollars worth to be exact. http://thedailyshow.cc.com/videos/po4ivw/the-big-bang-strategy

Or let’s say that your net worth is approximately 100 billion dollars, like, say, the Koch brothers’ worth is. You spend less than three percent of that money on buying elections — and voila! You too get over a thousand percent return on every dollar you spend. What kind of crazy-good investment is that! http://mic.com/articles/98188/the-10-billionaires-who-run-america

Or let’s say you are a member of the notorious WalMart family, worth hundreds of billions of dollars. You spend just a few paltry billion on election buyouts — and suddenly us taxpayers are paying for all of your employees’ healthcare. And we’re throwing food stamps into the bargain too. Brilliant idea!

Or what if you own a giant coal company, oil company, car company, power company or some other major polluter? Common sense tells us voters that we need to cut down on polluting the atmosphere so as to avoid drastic climate change that even now threatens to kill off the whole human race. http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2014/09/15/3567464/nasa-hottest-august/

We could have been using solar power all this time for instance — and also cleaned up our rivers and even eliminated the need for fossil fuel. But no. For a few (billion) dollars more at election time, you can potentially doom the entire human race. America, are we having fun yet? http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2014/sep/13/greenwashing-sticky-business-naomi-klein

Or let’s say for instance that you are AIPAC, that Israeli political action committee. Spend just two billion dollars to buy every election in America — up to and including the dog catcher? What a deal! And since Israel is already receiving three billion dollars every year from America, guaranteed, voted by Congress, you don’t even have to risk using your own moolah. You can use ours. Fabulous investment. http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/09/12/how-the-west-created-the-islamic-state/

Plus you also get permission to bomb Gaza, take over the West Bank, design America’s stupid “Bomb Syria” policy, have red-carpet access to the entire Middle East (as in red carpets of blood) and get away with committing all kinds of other violations of the Nuremberg precedents and Geneva war crime conventions too. http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/09/11/us-violations-of-international-law/

According to Middle East expert Paul Larudee, “Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu infamously bragged that ‘America is a thing you can move very easily’.” Apparently all you need is just two billion bucks. http://dissidentvoice.org/2014/09/strangler-fig-nation/ Hell, Attila the Hun never even had that kind of power. Or even Josef Stalin. All he ever got out his American investments was the freaking Cold War.

But don’t worry, Josef! The Cold War is about to heat up again, thanks to AIPAC. Hell, now AIPAC is even an unofficial member of NATO (and apparently its most influential member too). And, as such, Israeli war hawks seem hell-bent on fomenting World War III. Does the American public really want to go there? I think not. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/europe/turkey/11093478/Turkish-government-co-operated-with-al-Qaeda-in-Syria-says-former-US-ambassador.html

Or you could invest your capital in running America’s prison-industrial complex? Just think of all the cheap labor you’ll get! For much less than two billion in folding money, you don’t even have to ship your goods over from China any more. Plus you get to have them stamped “Made in America” too. Definitely a win-win for you. http://www.truth-out.org/progressivepicks/item/16003-the-prison-industrial-complex-the-pac-man-that-destroys-lives%20target=

Or what if you are Monsanto or Big Pharma or Bank of America or CitiCorp or Goldman Sachs or General Electric? For far less than two billion dollars, you can get rid of unions, create your own monopolies, write your own “regulations”, appoint your own “regulators” and rake in the profits. And if you are Big Media, publicly-owned airwaves now belong to you. Think Rupert Murdock. Or net neutrality up in smoke. Think AT&T. Boo-yah!

Yep, America is for sale for really cheap these days. The total assets of the United States of America is currently 188 trillion dollars. And just think. For just a mere two billion simoleons, all that can be yours! Buy a little false advertizing, do a bit of voter-suppression, get your hands on a few electronic voting machines, tell a few lies on Fox News and CNN and, boom shake the room, you can own all of that. All $188,000,000,000,000.00 worth. “Worth playing for?” Yeah.

My country these days has become like some aging cheap whore, selling herself on street corners to the first two-bit John who comes along and offers her a couple of dollars.

America these days isn’t even a high-priced call girl any more.

Back when we took biology classes in high school, we all studied the life-cycle of the caterpillar, right? Where it went from being a caterpillar to spinning a cocoon to becoming a butterfly to laying its eggs to hatching back into a caterpillar again, right?

I’m thinking that this life-cycle is rather similar to the life-cycle of Wall Street & War Street’s huge, scary war machine — which started out being mostly financed by American taxpayers, right? But then as the “world’s greatest super-power” began to grow and grow, its insatiable appetite for more and more weaponization began to grow and grow too — and it started to need a whole big bunch of more “lettuce” to pay for these weapons as well.

And so even though the huge amount of taxes paid by our parents and grandparents had clearly been enough to keep the American armies of World War II afloat, the American military-industrial complex of the 21st century really couldn’t just rely on just us lowly taxpayers to keep their huge new American “peace-keeping” forces supplied — especially with so many of us now not even having any more income left to tax!

There was definitely no longer enough “lettuce” left in the United States to keep this big caterpillar fed, right? http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/09/04/wealth-gap-recession_n_5767320.html

So how is Wall Street & War Street going to continue to feed its insatiable appetite? By expanding its reach, right? By conquering other countries and then getting these new vassals to finance their own destruction — and to also finance the American weapons machine as well. Whew! Bad news for the conquered countries — but good news for American taxpayers. We don’t get stuck with the bill at the end of the meal. Maybe.

And so Africa is forced to pay for its own colonization. http://www.aljazeera.com/programmes/empire/newscrambleforafrica/2014/07/new-scramble-africa-2014723203324932466.html And the Middle East is forced to pay for its own colonization. And Europe is forced to pay for its own colonization. And so on and so forth. You get the idea, right?
http://rt.com/op-edge/178640-immigrants-global-strategy-us/

So then the big fat happy American war machine caterpillar finally begins spinning its cocoon. And soon that part of its life-cycle is accomplished, thanks to tanks and guns and NATO and the World Bank and the IMF. http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/sep/03/nato-peace-threat-ukraine-military-conflict

And then what happens next? Out pops a big beautiful butterfly, right? Well, not exactly. The butterfly then dies in the cocoon? Not that either. What actually happens next is that the butterfly goes on to lay even more eggs — but they are eggs of destruction, and soon the whole world will have been eaten up by its infinite number of baby vassals and baby wars, gobbling up everything in sight. http://www.globalresearch.ca/isis-is-americas-new-terror-brand-endless-propaganda-fuels-war-on-terror/5398675

Just look what happened to the American war machine’s babies in Ukraine. That whole country is now toast after it let the Iron Butterfly in. And its baby, Israel? Almost every “gardener” in the world hates Israel now — because it has become yet another caterpillar pest, eating up everything in sight. http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article39574.htm

And just look at those ISIS “rebels” in Syria that the American war machine has sponsored, supported, encouraged and trained. John McCain even had his photo taken with some of these guys. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oXjAEZPXIHw&list=UUPLAYER_globalresearchtv

According to Rick Sterling, writing in Counterpunch, “The names of James Foley and Steven Sotloff can be added to those of about 200,000 Syrians who have died as a direct consequence of US policy of regime change by proxy war in Syria.” http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/09/05/foley-sotloffs-reporting-show-why-the-us-should-stop-its-proxy-war-on-syria/

And according to journalist Thierry Meyssan, “We know from the British news agency Reuters that, in January 2014, a secret session of Congress voted financing and arming the Free Syrian Army, the Islamic Front, and Al-Nosra Front of the Islamic Emirate until September 30, 2014…[and] finally, in mid-February, a two-day seminar at the US National Security Council was attended by heads of allied secret services involved in Syria, definitely to prepare the EIS offensive in Iraq.” http://www.voltairenet.org/article185132.html

But now America’s war machine is currently bombing the crap out of ISIS, its own baby. Eating it alive too. What’s with that?

Nigeria thought it could cuddle up to this butterfly mother too. Well, Nigeria’s oil is now paying for America’s endless wars. And so is Iraq’s oil. And Syria’s oil. And Libya’s. Libyan “rebel” leaders thought they could kiss up to its mother as well — and now they also have had their heads bitten off by good old Mom.

And Saudi Arabia had better watch out. It is next. That’s all I gotta say about that. http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/aug/31/combat-terror-end-support-saudi-arabia-dictatorships-fundamentalism

I guess that the only difference between the life-cycle of the caterpillar and the life-cycle of the American war machine is that caterpillars turn into butterflies, go on to lay more eggs and so the cycle continues — whereas the American war machine just eats its young.

Calling it treason: When American leaders steal over 11 trillion dollars from US taxpayers

“None dare call it treason,” intoned various Joe McCarthy supporters back in the 1950s. https://www.kirkusreviews.com/book-reviews/douglas-t-marion-nowak-miller/the-fifties-the-way-we-really-were/ But I’m daring to call it treason now — when the very people that Americans elect and trust set about to deliberately and purposely steal all our money so they can run a serial-killer torture chamber in our basement.

What red-blooded decent patriotic American has ever said, “Gee, I want to spend my tax money on Abu Ghraib and blowing up women and children and ‘full spectrum dominance’ rather than infrastructure and schools!” But yet that is where our money is now going. In my book, that is treason.

People are starving on the mean streets of New York City and Houston and Miami so that others can afford to bomb women and children in Syria, Libya, Iraq, Palestine and Ukraine. Sounds like treason to me.

We Americans have neglected our own country for far too long. And if we ourselves don’t stop the American military-industrial complex’s war machine, then we too should be tried for treason and sent to jail for forsaking the precious values of freedom and equality that this country was founded upon.

Us. Off to jail too — along with the faceless serial-killer treasonous ogres in Washington who hide behind their benevolent Jason-like masks of Patriotism and War.

When I was in India several years ago, I learned a lot about its historic caste system and the role of its “untouchables”. But I never put two and two together — that we might have “untouchables” and a caste system here in America too — until I saw photos of what happened in Ferguson, Missouri, this August. http://www.stltoday.com/news/multimedia/special/ferguson-in-pictures/html_24b2b105-90e3-5ef0-9c65-769e848c0d31.html

When I was in the Peace Corps in South Africa, I learned all about its grim apartheid practices in the past. But I never actually figured it out — until Ferguson — that America practiced apartheid too, and that the old apartheid bantustans of South Africa strongly resemble modern African-American bantustans like Ferguson; deliberately kept isolated, controlled and apart from the rest of America until there is almost no hope of ever getting out of them except by doing hard time in prison. http://www.blackagendareport.com/node/14361

When I visited the slums of Kampala, I was struck by what a third-world country Uganda was, with many of its poorest citizens being jobless, homeless, hopeless and living a bleak hand-to-mouth existence. But it never occurred to me that parts of America have similar unemployment rates, sparse education systems and the hopelessness of a third-world country too — until Ferguson gave me that new perspective. http://www.berkeleydailyplanet.com/issue/2014-08-22/article/42376?headline=Why-Ferguson-Blew-Up–and-What-Can-We-Learn-About-Gaza—By-Becky-O-Malley

In Israel/Palestine, I saw people constantly discriminated against “not by the content of their character but by the color of their skin,” to paraphrase Martin Luther King. But not until Ferguson, where whites clearly hold all the power and use it corruptly http://stlouis.cbslocal.com/2013/08/21/subpoena-reveals-focus-federal-probe-in-st-louis-county/, did I realize how deeply ingrained institutional racial and economic prejudice was in America too. http://vimeo.com/103920346

When I was embedded in Iraq, I saw American tanks and weaponry like you wouldn’t believe, used on Iraqi civilians to keep them in line. But it wasn’t until I saw videos of Ferguson that I realized that the use of tanks and military weaponry have become standard warfare procedure against civilians here in America too. http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/25310-the-most-wanted-man-in-the-world

When I was in Burma, I saw minorities being labeled as inferior, being called insulting names and constantly being accused of laziness, stupidity, immorality and violence to the point where in some cases the minorities actually started suffering from the Stockholm Syndrome and becoming all the things that they were constantly being labeled as — but I never really brought this connection back home until Ferguson. http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/25515-focus-ny-times-dishonesty-on-ferguson-called-out-on-msnbc-and-at-times

When I was in Honduras, I heard tales about how Ronald Reagan funded his brutal death squads there by having the CIA fly whole plane-loads of drugs into secret airfields in Arkansas via “Air America” and then sell all those drugs in the ghettos here at home.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Underground-Empire-Governments-Embrace/dp/0385175353

http://www.amazon.com/Cocaine-Politics-Central-America-Updated/dp/0520214498/ref=pd_sim_b_4?ie=UTF8&refRID=11C8MB7EWPKSZZMEHNQH

http://www.amazon.com/The-Big-White-Lie-Epidemic/dp/156025064X/ref=pd_sim_b_6?ie=UTF8&refRID=11C8MB7EWPKSZZMEHNQH

http://www.amazon.com/Trafficking-Boom-Bust-America-Cocaine/dp/0684190249

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Allegations_of_CIA_drug_trafficking

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Politics_of_Heroin_in_Southeast_Asia

http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-spoils-of-war-afghanistan-s-multibillion-dollar-heroin-trade/91
http://www.geopoliticalmonitor.com/afghan-heroin-the-cia-519/

I knew that, back in the 1980s, the sudden availability of cheap crack cocaine had hit America’s Black communities like a ton of bricks — but I hadn’t really realized how much this crack epidemic had hurt these communities, even decades later, until I saw what the results of this evil agenda of deliberately choreographing drug sales in America’s ghettos had done to the societal fabric of American cities and towns like Ferguson back in the 1980s — and how hard, even today, that “authorities” are still fighting to keep the residents of places like Ferguson from ever putting their lives back together again.

When I was in Afghanistan, I constantly heard all kinds of stories about how American military planes would arrive there all loaded up with military supplies and then fly back to America loaded down with heroin, and that the dirty-money made on these ventures would help finance the American military-industrial complex’s Forever Wars.

But I never thought to associate all of this foreign drug trafficking with the breakdown of African-American cultural norms due to the sudden availability of huge amounts of heroin in ghettos all across our own nation — at least not until Ferguson caused me to see that the break-down of cultural norms in American ghettos had been carefully orchestrated and planned to do just that. And while turning a profit too — so that our own impoverished ghetto bantustans here at home are actually helping to finance the American military-industrial complex’s grim slaughter-for-empire abroad. Think about it. http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-gisn_M08QVM/VAN0ebyytQI/AAAAAAAAJgo/2K-SMW2idPg/s1600/a%2Bmari.jpg

When I was an election observer in Syria last June, I soon learned not to trust anything that the American and British mainstream media claimed about election fraud there. There was no election fraud there. Period. https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=oMjXbuj7BPI So why should I believe anything the MSM says about an American bantustan called Ferguson. Hell, many residents of Ferguson are victims of election fraud themselves. http://www.msnbc.com/melissa-harris-perry/report-warns-voter-suppression-missouri

Shame on me for so easily seeing all the bias, racism, apartheid, military brutality, corruption, caste systems and just down-right immoral behavior by ruling-class Brahmans that routinely happens in other countries — but failing to see that all these grim tactics are being used right here at home too. http://readersupportednews.org/opinion2/277-75/25571-most-police-dont-live-in-the-cities-they-serve

And shame on America for letting all this profiling, perfidy, pilfering and prejudice go on for so long back here at home — where we Americans are supposedly civilized and moral, and supposedly hold ourselves to the higher ideals of liberty, equality and democracy. http://vimeo.com/84249535

What a waste of human resources, human compassion and human life.

Something drastic must be done immediately to rectify this grim situation if we are ever going to pull the emergency brake on America’s rapid downward descent into feudalism and fascism — starting with using the trillions of dollars that we will save when we put a stop to ruthless military adventurism, and instead use that money to open world-class schools in every ghetto (and even in every non-ghetto) in the land, and to provide decent, chemical-free non-mutated food on every table too. http://www.berkeleydailyplanet.com/issue/2014-08-29/article/42408?headline=Berkeley-Soda-Tax-Opponents-File-Suit-Challenging-Ballot-Language–Jeff-Shuttleworth-BCN- And to change America’s reality away from what it is now:

We now live in a nation where
doctors destroy health
lawyers destroy justice
universities destroy knowledge
governments destroy freedom
the press destroys information
religion destroys morals
and our banks
destroy the economy.
–Chris Hedges

PS: Can American taxpayers really afford to pay for the occupation of Ukraine, Palestine, Iraq, Syria and Ferguson? Plus why would we want to? http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article39512.htm

The American military-industrial complex is currently spending 1.5 million dollars a day on military operations in Iraq. Imagine if that money was being spent to send Black kids to college — or to supply a college education to all American kids too for that matter. http://www.theguardian.com/world/2014/aug/29/us-operations-isis-iraq-cost-7million-day

Every single patriotic American who loves his or her country needs to immediately get on the phone (and not even just go on FaceBook either) and make calls to Congress, the White House and the Supreme Court — bluntly telling them, “I’m sick of war!” https://www.aclu.org/secure/communities-warzones

PPS: “But Jane,” you might say, “those people in Ferguson blatantly stole stuff and looted and defied the law.” Yeah they did. But then so did Cliven Bundy — and nobody seemed to object to that. Angry Ferguson-Americans obviously need to learn how to steal and loot and defy the law Bundy-style! Fox News will probably even make them heroes. And maybe Bundy could even give them some tips.

Or maybe the citizens of Ferguson can get some tips from the primitive horde of neo-Nazis that the American military-industrial complex has recently hired (for five billion dollars) to shoot up and loot Ukraine — including but not limited to that Malaysian airplane that we never read about any more after it became public knowledge that Ukrainian neo-Nazis, not Putin, shot it down. http://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2014/08/09/mala-a09.html

When I was in Ukraine several years ago, everything was peaceful — but just look at it now. It’s a war zone. And just another example of our tax dollars at work abroad destroying people’s lives rather than fixing people’s lives here at home.
http://jpstillwater.blogspot.com/2009/09/rosh-hashanah-me-25000-hasidim-arrive.html

I wouldn’t mind at all if that five billion dollars had been spent here at home instead. It could have bought Ferguson a new library, several new schools and probably a new hospital too. http://www.globalresearch.ca/american-conquest-by-subversion-victoria-nulands-admits-washington-has-spent-5-billion-to-subvert-ukraine/5367782

Scribe’s Obvious Conclusion

Courtesy www.democraticunderground.com

When Old Cranky Pants John McCain goes overseas and insists he’s dealing with moderates, gets them support, and they become a more dangerous, nasty, army of fanatical Muslims, then tries to goad Obama into starting a war with them it’s obvious…

A. It was an INTENTIONAL, traitorous, act. He might as well have cut that journalist’s head himself.
B. And, maybe like other religious fanatics, he’s tired he’s tired of waiting for Armageddon and is trying to start it.

Courtesy ap.ign.com

Ye Old Scribe’s Tiny, Yet Scientifically Significant, Theistic Tale

The Beloved is Pleased

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