Comments by "Catherine Birch" (@catherinebirch8263) on "Pod Save the World" channel.

  1. Obama is studiously avoiding the whole truth along with everyone else. The whole truth is that the overriding factor in this conflict has been and remains the establishment, perpetuation, and increase of US power and wealth by access to cheap Middle East oil. The US wants a military ally in the heart of the world's most important oil producing district and will do anything, and I mean anything, to keep that. Anything with the possible exception of the loss of too many People's lives, and that only because the powers that be learned their lesson in Vietnam - if too many People die then that inconvenient US domestic public starts to exercise its muscle. (People being American citizens who whose deaths can be directly attributed to the US government. Very few if any Gazan's are People.)
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  2. As I get older (and wiser?) I've come to realise that when one thinks someone's behaviour is "stupid", it's usually just a failure to realise that the other person's objective aren't what I thought. Sam's behaviour only looks stupid to you because you assume he wants to protect the bystanders, or at the very least that he would pay some penalty for endangering them.
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  3.  @robertbritt6134  I respectfully disagree about Ukraine. Just as history in Israel/Gaza/West Bank did not begin on October 7 2024, despite Israeli propaganda, history in Ukraine did not begin when the Russians invaded in 2022, despite US propaganda. NATO expansion towards Russia had been US policy since the 1990s, and prior to that invasion Zelensky was talking about installing an American controlled (via NATO) military base on Russia's back doorstep (Ukraine). Ukraine is even closer to Russia that Cuba is to the US. Ukraine is really about continuing military expansion by the US. Describing Israel as a mistake is very blinkered. Netanyahou signalled Israel's intentions in advance and the US sent weapons, political and financial support, and military intelligence to Israel. Israel enacted its intentions, US collusion continued. If it was a mistake it was a very deliberate one. Netanyahou and Putin are only relevant in terms of the degree of ruthlessness they are injecting into what would be their country's policy no matter who their leaders were. Russia could never do nothing while an American controlled military base was buit on its back doorstep. Israel knew who and what they were getting when they elected and then re-elected Netanyahou - military backed expansion of Israel into the West Bank and Gaza.
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  4.  @Maja-Danmark  In fact NATO arrived at the Russian border twenty years ago when it included Latvia (and maybe earlier, I'm not an expert). However Ukraine is of far higher strategic importance to Russia. The US doesn't need to overrun countries militarily - it uses its economic power to subvert them and installs NATO military bases later with government permission. I for one hope that Russia and China manage to stand free from US domination. It sickens me that the US is using Ukraine and Ukrainians in yet another proxy war. Zelensky pops up when and where he's told to. The US tried to use Navalny's wife the same way, but Navalny was a true patriot and so is his wife. She might still end up a martyr in the quest to oust Putin, as Navalny himself was, but she still hasn't acceded to being used against Russia even for possible personal revenge against Putin.
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  5. Obama is incredibly charismatic, and probably a good man in many ways. However killing bin Laden seems to have been some kind of turning point in his regard for non-American human life. I can kind of accept that killing bin Laden might have been necessary and if Obama had said he regretted the necessity but there was no choice, I wouldn't hold it against him. However he didn't say that; he bragged about it. Repeatedly. Then, after having opposed the death penalty in the US, he issued kill orders for Muslims overseas without trial. He kept sending drones to kill them, although there were repeated accidental killings of their neighbors and families instead. So he had zero moral authority on the issue of protesters against killing Muslims in Gaza inconveniencing the conference.
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  6. As to what else you can do - nothing. Do nothing. In particular, do not send arms, money. and military support and intelligence.
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  7. Who thinks the US won't be doing its worst to set up a favourable puppet regime in Syria, which, if US efforts are successful, then becomes the latest US backed Middle-Eastern tyranny.
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  8. Mumbling about how killing tens of thousands of civilians is all a bit much didn't solve the problem. Neither did promising to get some food to people before they get killed. Even deciding not to veto a UN resolution calling for an immediate ceasefire in Gaza (as opposed to actually supporting the ceasefire) didn't do it. For goodness sake, what does one have to DO to continue arming and funding ethnic cleansing with less domestic electoral risk? Deploy the token Socialist! (No offense to Bernie; I believe he personally is sincere. However the hypocrisy of the US Government is so blatant it's cartoon-like. Seems like delay, delay, delay is the watchword for 2024 all around. Waiting with bated breath to see what the next deflection will be.)
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  9. @SomethingBlonde-oc7sc You've got to be kidding. Biden has gone on record saying the ICC shouldn't be attempting to hold Israelis to account. Turns out that Biden and Trump aren't that different after all when they don't like what a Court has to say.
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  10. Isn't it about time Canada was saved? The US has been so busy saving countries around the globe, particularly those with resources and political vulnerability, that it hasn't even thought about its own neighbour.
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  11. Because Israel is a Western colony.
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  12. 1:07:18 Yes, it would be great if the US did something to help the acute humanitarian situation in Gaza. But in a pinch, Gaza can do without that. Many other countries will be able to help far more than they already are once the bombing stops. As for dealing with threats of retaliation from Iran and driving a hostage and ceasefire deal to closure - no thanks. Just stop sending Israel weapons until the Palestinian death rate drops to what it was 5 years ago. As a bonus, Iran will have nothing further to retaliate against. Great news! The US doesn't need to do anything. In fact, it can stop doing something it's already doing (sending Israel weapons). Then it can help country desperately in need of help; a country where there's huge support for a nascent dictator, where a large percentage of the population lives below the poverty line, where medical help is unavailable to many, where democracy is widely suppressed and threatened even further, where corruption is endemic both within government and withing the justice system ... the United State of America.
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  13. ​ @magicthegatheringlover4277  Your use of the word "correct" to mean "my preferred" isn't really helpful here.
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  14. There have been are a number of young Jewish adults in the press lately who feel very distressed about Gaza. Not what's happening there - what they're distressed abut is that some other students are protesting against it.
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  15. What a terribly sad and tragic thing and a huge loss to the world. 3:02 Putin unarguably killed Navalny, regardless of the exact circumstances of his death. Yes, indisputable. There has been zero doubt for as far back as I can remember that Putin is a ruthless, cold-blooded, killer. Subsequent "my memories of Navalny". Absolutely fascinating and totally appreciated. That it's inevitable that Biden and other US figures will use Navalny's killing to justify and prolong the current proxy war against Russia via Ukrainian lands and personnel - stomach-turning. Especially since it's totally the opposite of what it sounds as if Navalny himself would want if I've correctly interpreted Ben's description of him as an archetypal Russian and a true Russian patriot. 37:10 That Ben himself is one of those figures is so disappointing. Characterizing the war against Russia as a war against Putin is just plain lying. 40:46 The US should make a propaganda video targeted at a Russian audience about Putin's corruption. Give. Me. A. Break! Those Russians who want to know already do. No Russian who didn't believe Navalny would EVER believe the US government.
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  16. Much the same thing as when you hand over political power to Big Business under capitalism.
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  17. Genocide with plausible (to those who desperately want to be fooled) deniability is still genocide.
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  18.  @vanessawhitneypro  Not only did Netanyahu actually win, he won multiple times. I'm sure you think Biden didn't win also.
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  19. And I am not going to like the US invading China. It's OK for you - assuming you live in the US. You're far enough away that you'll probably be OK, except of course for the flow-on economic costs, which will be significant for the ordinary person. Unless China should decide that self-defense merits an assault of the US mainland, as opposed to just retaliation against the countries hosting the attacking US forces. But I live in one of the countries that has agreed to be a host for your war. Maybe they felt they had no option, but typically countries that host US wars do not come out of it well. Do you guys really not care about ANYONE who isn't a US citizen?
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  20. Since pulling the last American troops out of Afghanistan three years ago, Biden has spent much of his presidency mobilizing public opinion and military might against Russia and playing a deeply engaged role in Israel's attacks on Iran and on the Palestinians. It's evident that his heart (and mind?) is firmly focused on the good fights of his youth. The thing is, 50 years later the world has evolved. I don't think it's too strong to describe Biden's war escalations as tragic. So sick of being inundated with anti-Russian news.
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  21.  @gailseatonhumbert  Oh they understand it alright. They just choose to ignore it. It is not a good fit with their narrative.
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  22. 8:30 As to the "stupidity" of American Foreign Policy. What's stupid about America obstructing a successful transition to a genuinely Syrian government? Presumably its intention is to install its own puppet government - because Power and Money are the same thing (each follows from the other). It's egregiously harmful and immoral, but not stupid. P.S. Kudos are due to the Russians for their evacuations.
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  23. Where does this odd idea that Netanyahu is ignoring the US come from? Yes, he's not acting in accordance with US government statements to its public. Hardly the same thing.
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  24. It's so dishonest pretending that what Israel is doing in Gaza and the West Bank is down to Netanyahu. He signalled what he was going to use the American weapons and military intelligence BEFORE they were sent. For anyone who was unable to read the signals, which American intelligence organizations of course can .. he did it ... then he kept on doing it. Killing Palestinians has had a lot of support on the news both from Israeli politicians and from Jewish spokespeople in the US.
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  25. Biden is an embarrassment.
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  26. The point is, what are the likely consequences in the 2024 US Elections.
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  27. Huh? Leverage? What I'd like to know is why the US government refuses to stop violating ITS OWN LAWS. And yes, Biden as President bears a sprecial responsibility there.
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  28. The USA cannot endure a simultaneous trade war with everybody else. The time has come for the rest of the world to choose. Continue to capitulate to the US one by one? (Whether the face-saving way, under a pretense of vassal states being allies, or the up-front way, under a public "or else" threat. ) Or make a united stand for self-determination and sovereignty? Does the EU serve any real practical purpose or will it hang Denmark out to dry? And what about Canada, Panama, and, really, everyone else? Because whatever country you are ... chances are you're next. In fact you've probably already had a turn, or several turns.
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  29. In the 1950s the Iranians had no religious overlords. Then the US decided to overturn their democratically government and replace it with a dictator who provided them with cheaper access to oil. The only group who were able to get enough people together to overturn him decades later was the mullahs ... of whom a faction moved into the ensuing vacuum.
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  30. I don't know what's worse. Sitting there after Israel's track record and actually believing the ceasefire thing. Or sitting there pretending to believe it. Even though when he announces it Biden says it's OK for Israel to break the ceasefire whenever it feels like it provided it says the magic words.
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  31. Biden is still fighting the wars of his youth. The war against Russia. The war against China. The wars to establish US access to cheap Middle East oil. And in the same ways - with proxy military engagements at obscene levels of harm to the host countries, accompanied by intensive propaganda campaigns.
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  32. 4:10 This documents an occasion when despite pressure from the American President, an American city was excluded in the first round. In other words, an occasion when the IOC, to its credit, withstood external pressure. 6:53 This concerns corruption within Russia by Putin over assigning building contracts. It has nothing to do with IOC corruption and has presumably only been included, along with many other negative Russian narratives, because the US is currently in the middle of its latest proxy war with Russia. (If there's been no construction related corruption within the US when it hosted the Olympics I'll eat my hat.) The slanted commentary on the 2024 Games is striking! A country that has been told by the ICJ to get out of the areas it is occupying and to stop massacring civilians, has been allowed to compete. Russia has supposedly been banned for invading Ukraine. However the juxtaposition of differential treatment of Israel and Russia is stark. The most obvious suspect country for having applied extreme pressure to bring that contradictory result being ... well, the wealthy, powerful country that led the illegal invasion of a little country on the other side of the world in 2003 and was NOT banned.
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  33.  @hamlet557  To evacuate where and how exactly? The death toll from terrorism in Israeli controlled areas in Palestine in the last 10 years didn't start October 7. It's just that before that the bulk of deaths were Palestinian. A significant percentage of them were children. The power-imbalance between Israel and the Palestinians is enormous and that includes Zionist influence over rhetoric within the US. Watch the 2014 Jon Stewart clip.
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  34. What Ben is actually talking about isn't Ukraine; it's the Zelensky regime. The regime that does not allow any men between the ages of 18 and 60 to leave the country. Led by the man who decided to push for joining NATO knowing that Russia would never stand by and allow that, and furthermore knowing that Russia is currently led by a ruthless, cold-blooded killer. The Zelensky who gets paraded about by the US at their whim. His future in his own country when this war ends looks pretty grim.
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  35. It's called desperation. Better fast genocide with a bang than slow genocide with a whimper.
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  36. But ... but ... international justice is the responsibility of the USA. The inescapable moral burden of its shining-light-on-the-hill Goodness. These ICC pretenders are an Abomination. Don't they even know about American Exceptionalism?
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  37. Netanyahu isn't the problem. Trump isn't the problem. The problem is their countrymen and countrywomen. The people who voted for them. At least in the US there was the excuse that people couldn't be sure exactly what kind of leader he'd be. But even after that WAS known he received the second highest vote of any US Presidential candidate ever, despite Biden winning. And now he's the official candidate of a major US political party. Netanyahu on the other hand was always known. Before his election he publicly and dramatically called for the assassination of Yitsak Rabin, the then Prime Minister of Israel. He was elected after the assassination took place, and re-elected multiple times since then.
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  38. Let's face it. China has committed an unforgivable crime. It profited more from trade with the USA than the USA did. Invade! To save its people of course.
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  39. What's the world coming to when you can't massacre tens of thousands of Palestinians without street protests in the country that funded, armed, and provided political cover for said massacre? Truly the Jews are the Real Victims Here.
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  40. Facts are facts. "The cannibals ate my uncle" however is not.
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  41. It isn't unusual for the elderly to blurt out a skewed idea that firmly implanted itself in their mind back in their youth after some shocking event. That's probably all the cannibalism thing is. Although, considering he's the US President, that's bad enough. However, what if is were something more sinister? What if PNG has something the US wants? I would have thought the US could just buy anything they wanted but it's never averse to forcing down the price. What if PNG doesn't want to be one of the hosts of Americas's next war, the one against China? Because those wars never work out well for the host country. Already Americans are dutifully writing about PNG cannibalism. It doesn't take much to dehumanize any foreign peoples just enough in American eyes.
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  42.  @DuvJones  Hakuna patata, The last annexation was weeks ago.
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  43. Biden is frustrated! Furthermore he thinks that massacring 30.000 people directly, and likely significantly more via disease, starvation, etc is “over the top”! Shrug. Meanwhile the US will soon be giving Israel a few additional billion dollars to carry on doing what they’re doing. Hypocrisy is way too weak a word for it. The applicable words are collusion and (although I very rarely if ever use this word) … evil. The holocaust that Israel and the US are visiting upon the Palestinians is evil.
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  44. Since when? Certainly not since the Vietnam War where 4 million civilians were killed. Not all by the Americans it should be said. Even though as a result of US efforts to gain power in that country.
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  45.  @user36112  Not so sure about the dumb part. It's worked well for the US up until now.
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  46. No, Kissinger didn't do that. The USA did that.
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  47. Huh? What line is that? The BOTTOM line is that Russia was never going to accept a government in its backyard (Ukraine) that supported American controlled military bases on its territory. Both Zelensky and the US knew that but supported the NATO push east anyway. Handing the US an American proxy war advocate's wet dream - a war in which no lives are lost (that matter!) and a country that would stand very long term against American world dominance is seriously weakened. Every day this war lasts weakens Russia further, which is why the US wants it to last as long as possible.
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  48.  @user36112  Frankly, I suspect you might be right. Which really should make most in the West sit up and take notice. Israel gets a lot of publicity one way or another, but when I realised the big difference between how I'd been led to think about it, and how it really is, I for one felt I'd effectively been lied to. Even its origins - we've been misled for a long time. I was brought up knowing about "greening the desert" and "giving the Jews a homeland after the Holocaust". And NOT knowing that way was cleared for the Jewish settlers by Jewish terrorists who burned out the Palestinians who wouldn't move.
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  49. "He started it!" Used to say my brothers and sisters to my parents when we were young children. "Got you last!" Used to say my bothers and sisters and I to each other. However we weren't using missiles.
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  50. Don't forget journalists. So clearly and so naively labelled
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