Comments by "Xyz Same" (@xyzsame4081) on "The Jimmy Dore Show" channel.

  1. + Dallas The rational explanation: these are propaganda videos and the actors have never or rarely been engaged in rescuing activities. Even without training - if you once had desperately dug into rubble to get someone out - you sure as hell next time make sure to have gloves for that task. Since not even these common sense details are observed - let alone the usual professional practices* - we have to conclude that these are a) propaganda videos and b) they do not really have good actors and know-how for that, no fact checking resources. And they seem incapable to improve - their blunders were called out in the recent years (the most obvious again the missing gloves) - and they still make them. * Doctors also remarked on not using a stretcher. So they supposedly had digged out a child out of the rubble and you could see one of the men carrying it away in his arms. Makes for an emotional shoot - the limp body in the arms of the rescuer. Gets the blood of the commenting doctor boiling. You can suspect that child to have spine or head injuries and then any PROFESSIONAL would handle the body differently and you USE A STRETCHER to avoid harming the injured child even more. On that video one could see severall White Helmets, so we can savely assume that they came with a vehicle and should have at least access to an improvised stretcher. - OR it was a photo shoot before a dramatic rubble scenery and the actors had not clue what a real rescue team would do - well that happens in Western films as well.
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  2. + Dallas Swedish Doctors for Human Rights - critique on professional blunders (insert that name + White Helmets and see what comes up in an internet search). Spoiler alert: one video they comment on: dramatic scene - syringe with extra long needle to insert adrenaline directly in the heart of a little child. The action repeated over. But the man does not really press down the plunger. Comment of REAL doctor: inserting adrenaline could be used in an rescue effort - but certainly not in the style it was shown in the video. The person purporting to be a rescuer or a doctor did not know HOW this is really done. IF that emergency treatment was applied in the way shown in the video (and the adrenaline really injected) it would not rescue that child but kill it for sure. - The doctor also concluded from the skin and the pupilles of the child that it was likely harmed or dying from an opiode overdose - not from any poison gas (that video is older - it was not released as "proof" for the April 2017 alleged poison gas attack but related to another event.) So maybe they had drugged the toddler to use it as prop in the propaganda video and had overdosed.
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  3. * The usual narrative is that the Soviet Union had to give up after the costs of the Afghanistan intervention, that they were economically finished - like North Korea and Cuba had to give up because of economic troubles ? The SU unlike these two countries has a lot of resources and fossil fuels. In the coming years oil became more expensive, so they would have had more oil revenue. Sure they had problems, but they mastered much more difficult times before. Even though the citizens became more restless, demanding more freedom, the suppression aparatus could have easily kept them down. No, there were people in the Polit Bureau who either wanted change and a better life for their citizens OR they were not that into ideology like the old guarde and thought that they as the ruling class in the SU had the a good chance to get filthy rich with a changed economic system. The East German dictators faced increasing opposition from their own citizens. In the old days they would have crushed it - if necessary with the help of the SU. The East German opposition saw Gorbachev as ally. He called for Perestroika - Restructuring and Glasnost - being open. And for the first time the East German dictatorship that had always been obedient to the SU refused to fall in line. What kept the East German government from shooting and killing demonstrators and using even more violence ? The bureaucrats were not quite sure how all this would end - and in case they would not stay in power, they would be held accountable. I think that is what saved the East German opposition and put a check on the worst government violence - and then the Berlin Wall was opened.
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  4. Yes and when only half of them move away jobs and housing must be found for these people. I think many would have gone - Great Financial crisis anyone. And even before - around 2000 millions of jobs got outsourced. When they work in the coal mines they do not have training that is useful elsewhere. Good well paying jobs: Contractors for the surveillance industry, speculation in the financial industry, and to some degree the military.
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  5. The pretext for youtube to demonetize this video: likely talk about war, one can hear about violence. Good to have it in the fine print if one wants to act like a well-behaved government puppet. After all the trade deals might be recycled and come up "fresh and with new formula" and they would help the IT megacorporations as well. To give an example of how well Big IT and governments cooperate (apart from surveillance): Apple is well represented by the lobbyist Obama (will he be able to top Bill Clintons speech fees?) Obama recently warned the EU (standing for 500 million people) that they should not inconvenience Apple. Apple pays the taxes for their European subsidiary in Irland, 0,0005 % (did I get the number of zeros right?) up to maximum 1 % of their PROFIT. That means - and that is certain - 50 Euro from 1 million Euro profit up to maximum 1000 Euro per million profit. No other company pays nearly as little as Apple in Ireland (their usual corporate tax is around 17 or 12 or something (look it up) - which is already the lowest in the EU. Plus they are getting much more money out of the EU than the pay in. Meaning the rich countries in the EU subsidize Ireland in this tax revenue race to the bottom. All hail the free market. And money in politics.
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  6. Peter Jansen well said "At least you don't get a corporate sell out in a friendly package like Barack Hussein Obama is." To undermine the progressives you need some fake progressives. They can do way more harm than the open adversaries. HRC would have stabbed people in the back (like Obama) Trump slaps you in the face and brags about it. At least you are exactely aware of what you get. I saw a video made by Trump supporter posing "gotcha" questions to Hillary supporters. They supported her enthusiastically and were completely clueless. No idea about her policies - when pressed for specifics. (And said 10 seconds before how they liked her policies). Nothing wrong with voting just Democratic or a person you like - not everyone is into politics or has the time to follow it.But at least DO NOT PRETEND you know anything. That at least would keep your mind open to more information should it ever cross your path.
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  7. Belafone is a well spoken and thoughtful man (I do not think he even had notes). I think the crowd and Clinton were relieved about his remark at the end (we need to be firemen pointing the hose where it needs to be turned). The humour broke some of the tension. Laughter can disperse embarassement.
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  8. * In Germany there is a house heating solution with SOLAR ICE. A Solarthermie panel harvests energy = heat on any sunny day (especially in the warm season), first it is used for heating water for daily use, any surplus is sent underground into a cement water tank. It is cool in the earth (frost free depth usually 8 - 11 degree Celsius), the tank is NOT insulated, but the water can get luke warm in summer. And in autumn one can extract heat from that reservoire (it is big but not that huge, height like a tall man, diameter slightly less than that for a normal home). Water to Ice cristallizaion (and in reverse) is used for extracting/ storing energy in the cold season..  If you apply the Celsius scale fresh water freezes at zero degrees and it boils at approx. 96 degrees. Imagine you have a certain amount of water in frozen (cristalline) form at zero degrees - just the temperature where it will start melting if more heat is added. Actually it needs A LOT OF ENERGY to transfer that ice into liquid water with STILL ZERO degree. If you add the SAME amount of energy again, that water will become very hot (about 80 degrees Celsius - remember zero is freezing and 96 is boiling, so that is pretty hot). That means if you switch between water in liquid resp. frozen form both at zero degree that is a possibility to store respectively extract heat - in the cold season ! You could not easily store very hot water in cool underground and preserve that temperature from summer till winter. But if you play around with the low temperatures you do not have that problem nor do you need insulation. What happens is: in autum energy for heating the house will be taken out of the luke warm water reservoire (by a heat pump).The water gets colder. Any sunny autumn or winter day will of course restore some of the lost heat. The roof will be rather full with panels, so that helps you use the power of the sun in spring, autum and on partially cloudy days, or with changing weather (the energy deliverd by the sun is surprisingly high even in cold weather). At some point in late fall or winter the water in the tank will have zero degrees and when then more heat is taken out it will start to cristallize, become ice and release at once that big chunk of energy I mentioned above. And any sunny or even partially sunny winter day will help you thaw (some) of that ice. It also helps that some of the "lost heat" of summer will be still there in the surrounding soil and in any case the earth around the tank will be well above freezing point. So that will also somewhat "warm" up the water in the (uninsulated) tank. The reservoire is not supposed to ever freeze through of course. Nor will a ice blanket form on the surface. The water freezes from the bottom to the top and from the inside out (quite opposite to what happens in nature) to avoid cracking of the concrete tank or ice swimming on top. This is achieved by how the tubes filled with cooling fluid are arranged and where the heat is taken out of the water first. The technology is used for familiy homes but also in industrial sites (office buildings, smaller manufacturing sites etc.). It replaces fossil fuels with local technology and labour.
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  9. Peace talks are coming up, Trump lets it be known that he retracts from "Assad has to go". OF COURSE this is the time the Syrian government would use such an INEFFECTIVE and unprecise weapon as poison gas ! At a time when they are winning (in a military sense) anyway and when they are in the process of getting complete control of the country. Assad is stupid - he does not realize, that this is exactely the pretext the "international community" needs to justify a war escalation, the enforcement of a no-fly zone, and last but not least the extension of the draconian sanctions (even medical drugs supply is impacted !). It is not like the US neocons and all the other US war mongerers, Israel, KSA, Qatar, Turkey, France UK and all the other actors who have promoted regime change in Syria for years (damned be 500.000 dead Syrians) are going nuts.  Admitted: they were proclaiming the "Fall of Aleppo" and the possibility of "genocide" in winter 2016. When the genocide did not happen and the population seemed quite relieved that the government took back control - then the hysteria immediately stopped. Aleppo (Eastern Aleppo to be precise, the gov. had control of Western Aleppo for the longest time, and the citizens were supportive of the gov. there) was immediately dropped from the front pages as soon as the defeat ! was unavoidable. Not only the rebels were defeated - the international fans of regime change in Syria suffered a heavy blow as well. (So we were treated to an Amnesty International report in January 2017 - the regime changers seem to follow the strategy of steadily working public opinion)
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  10. Inofficially it is clear the the European Union's "leadership" (not citizens) tie the opportunity of becoming a new EU member to becoming a NATO member BEFORE. There are a few, small, poor countries in Europe that are not yet fit to join the EU for economic reasons - for instance Serbia, and since they were bombed by the US in the 90s (using an invented pretext as came out later) - they are not going to join NATO anytime soon. So they have no future chance to join what is usually sold to European citizens as "economic and peace project" because of military reasons. The US dominated NATO definitely wants to continue to control Europe. The spineless EU elites - instead of becoming neutral and do business with both blocks - assist the US eilites in that endeavor.
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  11. How are these Corporate Democrats SOCIAL JUSTICE WARRIORS. I would think a living wage was the base of Social Justice.
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  12. EU securing peace ?? It stared to develop in it's current form in the mid 1990s.The EURO came in 1999. Austria or Sweden for example joined in 1995. As for the Euro "peace keeping": see Heiner Flassbeck video "Warum der Euro in 2017 scheitern wird" = - Why the Euro will fail in 2017 - France has elections in 2017, Marie Le Pen anyone ?) The EU did not secure peace after WW2. The occupying Allied Forces in Germany and Austria made sure there was an orderly transition into democracy. And I think it was our good fortune that we do not have much natural resources like oil or gas. It was the relatively protectionistic post-war economy . There were high taxes, no chance for tax evasion, limited flow of capital, strong unions meaning wages rising with economic growth, tariffs and import restrictions shielding markets, public housing projects that regulated the property market and kept prices affordable, universal not-for-profit healthcare systems, a strictly regulated banking and finance sector allowed only banking activities that were necessary and usefull in a macro economic sense. When the economy grew the working population got their fair share (that is proven by economic data!) , so people could buy/build houses, buy consumer goods thus further strengthening the economy. I also think the relatively high energy prices were a blessing in disguise for Germany and Austria - or Japan another phoenix out of the ashes. The elites did not take good care of the working and middle class out of the goodness of their heart. Europe went left after WW2 and there was an ideological and military capacity battle going on with the Soviet Union. So ironically the implementation of the Marshall plan, the economic miracle and post war prosperity have a lot to do with the Cold War. After the SU split and that ideological and political obstacle was removed, the ruling classes all over Europe did not feel the need to appease the unwashed masses anymore, now it's neo liberalism on steroids. Gregor Gysi gave an almost prophetic speech AGAINST the introduction of the EURO in the German parliament (Bundestag). It's on Youtube. He said then the Euro was prone to promote unhealthy economic inbalances, putting some European countries at disadvantage. And if the population of these countries consequently would have to endure economic hardships the EURO would not promote peace but unrest, envy and hostility between the member states. Boy was he right. Now the same argument can be made for the whole EU project (in it's current form). The EU - unfortunately - is a now a project of and for the neoliberal elites all over Europe and also strongly in favour of the NATO interests. No wonder the most important NATO allies of the US are also big players in the EU. The economic and military policies of the EU cannot be better than the policies of major member states of Germany, France, UK, Italy. Neither these single nations nor the EU did anything to prevent the financial crisis of 2008/2009 - and that crisis COULD have been prevented and there were warnings. Of course they did nothing, that would have meant regulating the banks, restricting their speculation - meaning less profit and business opportunities for the financial industry, less cushy jobs for ex politicians, maybe less illegal political party financing. After the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989 a lot of us thought it would be a repetition of the economic miracle for the countries of the Warsaw Pact. Starting with Eastern Germany of course. Didn't turn out that way. Why ? In the case of Eastern Germany that was the first failed currency project (after that came the EURO). The rushed unification and the transition to the West Mark finished the industries in Eastern Germany that might have had a chance. Make a time travel and try to imagine a German industry of 1970 who would have had to compete with the German industry of 1990. Of course the 1970 version would have been crushed. Western Germany did not develop it's economic strength in one year, they needed (and had) decades in a relatevely sheltered environment. Now the industry of Western Germany had no interest to tolerate a competitor. That would have been like having Northern Italy on your door step - with the ability to speak German ! - a capable industry and workforce who could always devalue their currency against the West Mark. All of the economies of the former Warsaw pact - unlike the rich Western European countries directly after WW2 - had to operate under globalization, the tyranny of the highest profit and the lowest price, the myth of the so called "free markets", free flow of capital, tax evasion, beggar thy neighbour (Germany! after 1999) - all those lovely neoliberal accomplishments that make sure a tiny fraction of the population hugely benefits from the economy, a part of the population is doing fine or O.K. and a major and ever increasing part is thrown under the bus and can hardly scrap by. When the citizens have to endure economic hardships, they are searching for the root cause and they want to blame someone. People differ in their reactions. Some turn left and want to kick the establishment (comfort the afflicted and afflict the comfortable). Some - especially if they are psychologically prone to the authoritarian mindset - kick their peers or - even more likely - those they perceive to be weaker or the "other" (immigrants, other races, gays, people on welfare, ...). So they are going to the right side of the political spectrum. Also anger is a much stronger and more "empowering" emotion that feeling helpless, depressed, deprived, hopeless. I am sure some people are sort of addicted to the kick they get out of being enraged. The situation starts to remind me of the 1930s - and I am worried. Then there was a lot of economic hardship (I know people were much poorer, but then look at what is going on in Greece, Portugal, Spain, the Baltic states). In the 1930s there was this battle going on between the Left and the Right in Germany and all over Europe. The Far Right became popular and very powerful - not only in Germany all over Europe! The German police and justice system willingly put a blind eye to right wing violence. The German industry generously financed the NAZI party. And industry bosses- unlike the citizens - were well aware that Hitler intended to go to war. Unfortunately the Nazis prevailed in the end - though that was not as inevitable as it may seem from hind sight. The EU - as it works now - will continue to undermine the prosperity, clean enviroment and the livelyhood of the majority of the European citizens. See TTIP, TISA, CETA. Either they start adopting completely different economic policies or there will be a spectacular rise of fascist movements (way more than we have today) and the far right might take over like in the 1930s. Or there will be civil unrest - well we allready have a militarized police, mass surveillance, anti riot legislation, allowing the death penalty in Europe in case of riots! So the elites on some levels seem to anticipate what might be coming. If the system is so dysfunctional that we cannot make the economy work for everyone, how are we going to deal with the big challenges like Climate change, Peak Oil, Peak natural ressources (metals, potassium, ...) Last but not least how are we going to deal with the refugee and immigration crisis partly caused by the insane Middle East policies of NATO, partly caused by the greedy and dysfunctional economic policies where the rich nations strongarm the developing countries. If you sow economic greed, destruction and war, you will reap terrorism international crime and (economic) refugees. The EURO project gives you a peek at how economic illiterate our ruling classes are. How they are caught up in their (neoliberal) ideology. So they are unable to understand the writing on the wall, didn't understand the build up for the financial crisis, could not be bothered by the increasing inbalances in the EURO community, seem unable to grasp what the rise of the far right all over Europe could mean. I recommend the video of Heiner Flassbeck "Warum der EURO in 2017 scheitern wird" (Why the EURO will fail in 2017) - France is going to vote in 2017. The video is not long (around 15 minutes) and highly informative. Heiner Flassbeck has a lot of info in German on the web, I think he has articles and videos in English too. I am Austrian, I chose to react to your statement in English so others might be able to understand my arguments. Let me add that I know the export industry very well (their needs and the claims of how Austrian has profited from the EU/EURO - and to what extent that is true). I would love to be a raving fan of the EU and the EURO - but I cannot. I hope (but I am not very confident) that BREXIT is the strong kick in the a** the EU establishment - and we - desperately need.
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  13. + Ragitsu: Interesting fact on the role of Germany: the head of the then German government Adenauer - a staunch Communism hater - felt compelled to advise his young transatlantic partner Kennedy to be hard and non-compromising towards the Soviet Union. That was when there were already a lot of tensions but not yet the international huge crisis. JFK commented it: Doesn't the old man know, that Europe and especially Germany would be among the first targets for a nuclear strike ? (as reported in Robert Kennedys book). Bob was Justice Minister under JFK and once the crisis broke out all the cabinet was assembled around the president so the book gives a lot of insights - like that some generals advised JFK to strike first. They had the idea of a winable nuclear war. The same advise may have been given in the Polit Bureau. Fortunately both heads of government were scared enough to adopt some reason. At that time there was the slogan: Better dead than read. And in 1989 the Soviet Union (the big bad bogeyman dissolved) without a single shot fired.
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  14. Credit where credit is due. Well done Trump (that and the TPP)
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  15.  @lazylady8591  China and the U.S. use in total the same amount of energy. China 1,3 bn and it is the workbench of the world (also supplies a lot of good to the U.S.) - the U.S. has 325 million people and has deindustrialized.
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  16. Donna Brazil a) maybe wants to increase sales of the book b) had enough of taking the blame for the DNC
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  17.  @sandragray4598  he can't work on mid level issues in a HISTORIC CRISIS. Other can do charities. Sanders has political leverage because he can REACH a lot of people (citizens did a car protest to suspend rent for instance) - he has to EXPLAIN what is going on. People sense that they are being ripped off, but many do not KNOW what is happening. Needless to say no one - not even Sanders - calls a spade a spade. The "stimulus" bill is a handout, and it is way more than 2 trillions. (the official number). Also the Fed already has created TRILLIONS for the "market" which is the casino that poses as stock exchange. if Sanders would have explained that the 1,5 trn on March 12th equals 18,000 USD for a family of four or 4,500 for every of the 330 millionsin the country. THAT would have gotten attention. The pundits (on behalf of the specultors, and big biz) would huff and puff and draw even MORE attention. he could have tried a filibuster, sure the Senate CAN override that (R and D always find the votes to screw regular people), likely they would have. But then Sanders would have gotten airtime to EXPLAIN why the bill is so bad. And of course sanders would have needed to talk to the progressives in Congress and to encourage them to NOT toe the line of Pelosi. One of the first things Pelosi came up with: Means testing. Which means red tape, and delay. There is means testing that is simple: Income tax in the next years. But that would mean there would be a taxation project pending, can't have that. Nothing is more terrible for the PR and their self-image ** than "Taxes on the "middle class" = more like taxes on the suburban upper class that have to be collected later. That is not in line with the agenda of serving the top 20 % income bracket. When such taxation is done later - the peasants could get more ideas who should pay more taxes. ** that is why Warren tied herself into a pretzel with her "plan" to finance M4A w/o "raising taxes on the middle class". If people only sense something is wrong - plus the real world anxiety and economic stress - they WILL TURN to the FAR RIGHT. It is always like this. Either they go decidedly to the left or to the far, nationalistic, scapegoating right, even fascism. Nice lefties rolling over with a whimper is also historically a well know phenomen. Maybe because the genuine lefties are supposed to be nuanced, and to really CARE. In the end the right populist have the lust for power and the killer instinct and they play dirty.
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  18.  @sandragray4598  Trump NEEDED the stimulus bill. Wallstreet etc. was hungry for the bill. THIS was the moment of LEVERAGE and the feckless progressives gave it completely away. They rolled over. If they would have fought against the bill, daily pressers, working Social media. Asking the mail list to call their representative. While the bill is discussed they immediately leak it to the citizens and EXPLAIN why the bill for citizens and small biz should be separate from the bill for big biz. (that would give them time to look at the tax cuts they had gotten, what about that nest egg !) Of course Mitch the Turtle wanted a combined bill. Crumbs for the peasanst, the progressives fought hard for an extra bone, and a BIG handout for the top predators. See 2008. They could have had a look at the Tea Party fraction in 2009 and afterwards. Even inept Pelosi and Schumer can organize the robbery in broad daylight. They perform a good cop / bad cop while serving the 1 %. And the few people that might not want to do that do not have the spine to call the bluff.
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  19. Fantastic interview - Kiriakou was in the middle of the thicket when the CIA tried to find out whether or not Iraq had WMDs. Agents were at each other's throat. (It is reassuring that the agents were fighting considering this could lead to war, so they were not just rolling over.). And they were undecided. - In the end Cheney, who had clearly and agenda introduced a report from the pentagon, very specific, but the CIA was never allowed to talk to the source.
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  20. Atlantic has an interesting articlee Robert Malone vaccine scientist, vaccine sceptic.
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  21. +Skank Hunt - corporations are ALLOWED by society to exist - we are so used to them, but they were not always around (and had special laws for them). Persons can go to jail, but corporations do not go to jail (they are a legal fiction) - and their management (real persons) do not either, at least not of the 60 % of powerful multinationals that dominate 60 % of the economy. Corporations can exist for long time (longer than a human being can exist). They can split, reunite, etc. - in short they are nothing natural ! And the idea of incorporating was much more controversial in the old days - read what some of the founding fathers and later economists and politicians had to say on the issue. So for the sake of making some operations possible and/or easier "incorporation" was allowed. When a company uses that legal system, and all of societies provision and the members of society as participants, customers, advertising targets, content providers - and when those corporations become TOO powerful too dominant in the scene - then their power must be reduced by regulation. . There are natural monopolies, too - same with them. Regan announced that he would not enforce the anti trust laws anymore(they are now in the books since more than 100 years) . And no president since then could be bothered either. It couldn't possibly have anything to do with Big Biz financing (bribing) the political parties ? - BOTH of the two major parties.
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  22. Before the deregulation of media in the early 80s there were much more networks, etc. And news had not the purpose to make the networks money. They were the badge with which the corporations proved their "usefulness for society". That secured them the BROADCASTING LICENCE in the next round. Were they truly independent, unbiased ? - No, they weren't. Not even then. But still better than today. And one could call it news and not infotainement. Instead of 30 or 40 major networks now there are 5 or 6 major FOR PROFIT news CORPORATIONS who tcontrol what news make it to the public. How is that BETTER ? - for SOCIETY I mean ! How many large search engines are around ? What other channels are there online ? There is youtube (again google !), facebook, twitter .... well also instagram and pinterest, but that is already less relevant and is about lifestyle, not news. Not sure what offers Apple has, but that's it. Plus the large traditional players trying to have a presence. You can add the very few companies that control the INFRASTRUCTURE of the internet. We are in the double digit number of relevant corporations if we are lucky - with the players that dominate the scene. Do you feel comfortable to leave freedom of speech to THEM ? Or that they can HINDER people from using the power of the internet to organize if they want. Never mind how easy it is for GOVERNMENT to control the narrative - they do not have to collude with many people. Turkey shut down youtube and twitter. google left China. Well of course these authoritarian governments have no use for a free internet. Naturally THEY censor and shut down. But what about HERE ? Society is not there to serve the corporations. It is the other way round. The gate keepers on information and the "powers that be" now realize the danger for their power that lies in the free flow of information on the web and the possibility of people to organize and spread info w/o depending on the gate keepers. The U.S. elections 2016, Brexit, etc. were a wake up call for the elites.Silicon Valley will be glad to help out to claim back control.. It's a big club and you and I aint in it. (George Carlin). After the deregulation mainstream media, (TV !) resorted to making money with the news portion of their program, that meant "breaking news" 24/7 - and it meant they cheered on war even more than in the past decades - war brings good ratings. Whether you like or dislike the Trump administration: He has not exactely gotten a favourable reporting (except FOX News), as much is clear. With one exception: When in April 2017 Trump ordered the attack on Syria and the dropping of a bomb in Afghanistan. (From a political, diplomatic, and military point it was pointless, even foolish - but it seems Trump wanted a good distraction. Well, with the current state of the media it worked. This was the one time the TV networks treated him very kindly, no questions asked. THEY LOVE WAR AND CONFLICT. This was the time when he was called "presidential". (Larry Wilkerson and Ray MacGovern think differently. Seymour Hersh has an even more interesting story to tell - in the case of Hersh only anonymous sources but quite plausible. According to him the Russians were forwarned, so the Syrians knew about the U.S. missile attack, a few sacrificial lambs were "left in the open" to be bombed. Apart from that the Russian backchannels were NOT amused. - They are already used to an erratic / short term / foolish U.S. foreign policy. GWB was a war monger, ideologue and puppet, and likely not too smart or knowledgeable. Obama was an intelligent puppet or too weak to stand up against the machine - and Trump ... oh well.
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  23.  @kwakkers68  That's not true, Austria, Netherlands,Belgiu, the Nordic countries. Switzerland, France, .... most wealthy first world nations have kept at least quality manufacturing. the U.S. and U.K. were the first to undermine domestic production and instead "financialized" (= most of it is speculation, and nonproductive activities). That is why the U.K. and the U.S. have large trade deficits.
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  24.  @kwakkers68  deficits are side effects of having an economy that does not produce the value compared to the output of money. Thus the well paying jobs vanish, and it is missed in the tax revenue and in the need to finance more welfare, and in less purchasing power. The U.S. to just "print" a lot of money, much more than is justified by the production of goods and services, but the meanwhile undeserved status of having the world reserve currency is squandered on the military spending.
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  25. The government protection is needed because the internet providers were ALLOWED to build the infrastructure (a natural monopoly). And BTW the government (the military) heavily subsidized the technical developments necessary to even allow us today to have PCs, electronics, the internet or mobile and smartphones).
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  26. +Joshua Flores was passed to keep families together. (look it up !!) the Trump admin CHOSE 100 % criminal prosecution - it was called "zero tolerance" . BEFORE: they ususllay held the people (incl. parents WITH the kids) in DETENTION (unless they were suspected to be criminal). In detention centers the kids and the parents CAN stay together until a decision is made (allowed to stay or deportation - but then at least all of them together). prosecution was even used when when they asked for asylum !! - which is by definition NOT a crime and not even a misdemeanour. Well if everything is criminally ! prosecuted (when it could be much better, humane and cost-efficient ! - handled with detention) then of course the children must be taken from the adults. Innocent minors cannot be held longer than 20 days in jail. That is one of the rules under Flores. I do not assume you want innocent minors be held in jail for a long time - do you ?? The Trump admin were eager to "look tough". And when has the Trump admin ever bothered with the details or how to ADMINSTRATE things ?? Or shown some empathy or common sense in case of unintended (??) consequences. Remember the chaos with the Muslim bans ?? And who knew that healthcare was so complicated. Actually we can assume the consequences - the separation of even of small children from their families - WERE intended. The fear that it would instill in families was cited as advantage for instance by Jeff Sessions - it was used as argument why it was the right thing to take the children from the parents. It would make people fearful. Maybe it would stop them from fleeing rampant crime, drug cartels, gang violence, U.S. backed militias and poverty (a lot of it the short and longterm outfall from U.S. imperialism)
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  27. I have download helper installed (it is free, they ask for donations) - one can download a lot of videos. If you wanted to re-upload such videos there might be copyright issues - but that can be counteracted * see how blockbuster movies are uploaded: usually they have them in a frame or they have other footage at the beginning and the end. When the copyright owners search the web they examin the beginning and the end. And they do a direct comparsion that will find identical files. So when the film is squeezed into a picture frame or a movie theater frame the data for the file changes completely (but that means of course processing the video). So they cannot detect it except when a human would report it. Or using the footage with commentary under the fair use doctrin.
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  28.  @ohms497  In other words: you did your part regarding world peace !
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  29. Fairy godmother to Corporate Dems: Chose between 2 scenarios They can win the midterms in a landslide (so they can do damage control on Trump), in 2020 they win the presidency and get a supermajority in the Houses. Then they can SHAPE policies. Undo the damage caused by Trump. They can save the country, partially even the world (Global Warming) Getting reelected is EASY, campaigning is mostly pleasant, grassroots efforts. Their jobs, the salaries and benefits as representatives are secure. Oh - and they MUST switch to publicly funded campaigns, and small individual donations no SuperPac Money. MONEY OUT OF POLITICS: Important. Also restrictions on the Revolving door. It gets much harder to cash in on pro Big Biz votes after they leave office. (Other Western "democracies" still have corruption and the politicians working for Big Biz because of THAT). So they must be content with the pay they are getting. And work for their constituency - not Big Donors. **************************** OR 2) They can KEEP the MONEY in POLITICS. They continue to get Big Donations for party leadership and individual campaigns. And the whole lucrative circus for ex-politicians continues (incl. them becoming part of the election game, in media, as strategists or consultants) There are higher risks involved, one can lose a seat - therefore it is important to have served the party leadership + the Big Donors loyally. Then they will provide cushy jobs and lucrative contracts for ex politicians. **************************** The Corporate Dems can chose only ONE scenario (with all pro and cons of the package) What would the Dems choose ? Well, scenario 2 - MONEY - OF COURSE. P.S: Scenario 1) is realistic (even the super majority). - If they would rally behind a Sanders platform in a BELIEVABLE MANNER they could win convincingly and with increasing numbers.
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  30.  Josh The Prince Of The Degenerates Fink  Single Payer has much lower costs per person if - IF - you argue in good faith - I KNOW single payer systems from experience, these citizens would not put up with what is going on in the U.S. (the hassle and the costs). They are used to have a good, affordable system, and reasonbly organized healthcare. Maybe you know expats or soldiers that were at a base in Germany, Italy, Japan, ... who had contact with the locals or you come accross European, Canadian, Australia tourists. ASK them how it is to have single payer healthcare. How they like it, how it performs for them. It is obviously in existence in OTHER countries and it is not because of the extravagant funding of their governments - No the systems work well with much lower costs per person. EVERWHERE (in wealthy Western countries mind you) the expenditures per person are lower, Iceland, Denmark, France, Germany ... Australia, New Zealand. Small or large nations it does not matter. There is so much money wasted in the U.S. system that it would be easy to cover everyone - and still save some. (I guess after a transition phase and taking care of the backlog). Even cost-efficient modern healthcare is expensive so the single payer nations also have plenty of government subsidies. The individual contributions of citizens would of course not be enough: they have affordable mandatory wage deductions. Health risks do not matter. You have a job. You pay,. You are in (plus dependent family members, no extra price for that). FULL coverage. And no bills later - that is the meaning of "Free at the point of delivery". Threre is no dividing up between classes of patients. (basic plan versus platinum). Citizens know in advance what they pay (wage deductions) and what they can expect - the same treatment in a First World medical system like everybody else. That is very streamlined, not much chasing after the money (of broke patients) and allows for low adminstration costs. it also means that the doctors decide (with the patients) about the treatment. That government funding in single payer systems (for the most part) does not go into profits or an insance bureaucraZy. The only ! powerful large ! for-profit player in the system is Big Pharma. Medical drugs are internationally comparable, very standardized substances. Read: it is easy for the non-profit public agencies to achieve a good price. They deliver the price list and they - with the help of politcians passing the necessary laws - organize the purchasing (the big picture, retail is left to small !! pharmacies that are regulated and have a contract with the non-profit agency). Doctors and hospitals w/o vested interests decide when and how to use the (not overpriced !) drugs. Small pharmacies (highly regulated) distribute the drugs to the patients throughout the country. The hospitals order their own - and the prices Big Pharma can demand are standardized in all of the country. Prescribing the meds or tests, the medical examination, is the complicated part that would be impossible to control for regulators. Because of the inherent complexity (and each case is individual) there would be countless opportunities to game the system for the for-profit players. In single payer systems the profit motive has been eliminated in all areas where rigging realistically must be expected.
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  31. 7:58 what really happened on the bridge
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  32. Gen. Butler on the U.S. REGIME CHANGES in Latin America: " I spent 33 years and four months in active military service and during that period I spent most of my time as a high class muscle man for Big Business, for Wall Street and the bankers. In short, I was a racketeer, a gangster for capitalism. I helped make Mexico and especially Tampico safe for American oil interests in 1914. I helped make Haiti and Cuba a decent place for the National City Bank boys to collect revenues in. I helped in the raping of half a dozen Central American republics for the benefit of Wall Street. I helped purify Nicaragua for the International Banking House of Brown Brothers in 1902-1912. I brought light to the Dominican Republic for the American sugar interests in 1916. I helped make Honduras right for the American fruit companies in 1903. In China in 1927 I helped see to it that Standard Oil went on its way unmolested. Looking back on it, I might have given Al Capone a few hints. The best he could do was to operate his racket in three districts. I operated on three continents.  Gen. Smedley Butler He was a highly decorated marine.  His short book: War is a racket is online as pdf.
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  33. other POWs called him a songbird, a "misfiled" audio recording was "found" recently - a message that he was treated well in he camp by the Vietcong etc. - they played that via loud speakers in the camp. - And he was a reckless pilot - user +A1Cveno (see comment outside thread): He was a terrible Navy pilot who basically killed 134 of his own men by being reckless on an aircraft carrier. I remember reading about him being reckless or a bad pilot - you can search the web for the details. His Admiral daddy helped him avoid consequences. - and got him a medal after he was released by the Vietcong.
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  34. Or top Hillary Clinton
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  35. Death by a 1000 cuts. Use EVERY institutional advantage and procedural trick. Generously bend the rules and insist that the other side must keep the rules to perfection. The Democratic establishment played that game in the late 1960s as well - and successfully. Have your people in every position, just in case. Do not give the left wing of the party one inch. Minimal concessions and make them work really hard for even that little. Keep them busy, wear them out. Under DNC chair Keith Ellison the list would look differently. Nor would Keith have given hostile CNN more than 1 debate. The DNC is not doing well financially. AOC refuses to pay her dues to the DCCC. She recently founded her own pac. If the DNC would have a fair list of superdelegates - the big donors would withhold the money. The base COULD finance an efficient party organisation. But there would be few cushy jobs for insiders, loyalists and fmr shills of special interests. And the base is not going to donate to the party a lot as long as the consituents of the DNC are the big donors. The Republicans play the same long game / little things add up / and death by thousand cuts when it comes to voter suppression. Examples: Georgia or Florida. Stacy Abrams and Andrew Gillum were on a Bloomberg panel in March 2019. After an epic battle the Progressives achieved that the superdelegates only come into play in the second round. THAT is what the Progressives can get after a rigged 2016 primary and after the "most qualified candidate ever" lost to the orange clown. The insiders figured out they could work around that if they have everyone and their dog joining the 2020 primay. Bless Gillum he did not feel the need to join the crowded field, he is working in Florida to register voters and to turn out the vote. (On the Bloomberg panel: "In Nov. the nation can thank us that we helped to deliver the eviction note to Donald Trump in the White House").
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  36. 8:59 death by deterrence policies TRANSCRIPT Abby Martin: …the ACLU report that's been going around showing the kids in cages - that was during the Obama administration. But that was the CPD. …. Border Patrol are equally as fascistic. These are people who are raping these these young kids, sexually assault them. One of them ran a young girl over with their car. I think the bottom line is: Yes, Obama did build this. This goes back to the Clinton administration, which we should talk about, and the death by deterrence policy at the border. How they funnel people into the most death-defying routes. How children are dying every year. Where - where's the outrage about that ? Children literally dying in the middle of the desert seeking refuge because of our policies, predominantly But I think ICE is ratcheting it up to a new level because of this anti-immigrant rhetoric and kind of hostility that's been cultivated and emboldened in the Trump era and that's what scares me the most. You have ICE staking out hospitals .. to basically do these mass arrests and they said their jobs are fun now. We're talking about a Gestapo force, they are neo-nazis. It doesn't stop with ICE. Again it's the Customs and Border Patrol that go and destroy the water in the desert being left for these migrants just seeking life and dignity. It's really really a disgrace, but I just can't stand the hypocrisy. Everyone from Barack fucking Obama himself putting a Facebook note out there saying: This is not the America that I know. Really ? REALLY ? Hillary Clinton's sending out a donation letter to the Democratic Party saying: This isn't America, guys. [Minimally edited - fill words, repetitions]
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  37. Sanders supported an initiative (with another politician) a few years ago that tomatoes would be sold for 50 ct higher per pound. That allowed the farmers to pay the farm workers better - many of them Latinas with children (and no doubt many undocumented immigrants). Walmart did not join, but some other retailers did. - And I think as mayor he has a good track record to put things in place that HELP women and children resp. families. (A society where the females with the children are doing fine, will work well for single women, men, childless couples as well). - I guess it was always on his radar, and at the time he became mayor he also met his wife Jane, then a single mother of three. This might have given him even more insight into the practical problems of low income parents.
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  38. Hillary Clinton the Breshnev of U.S. elections (the technocrat, with the top down approach)
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  39. 6:00 This is a DOCTOR ?? of medicine ? And under which rock has Jimmy Dore been hiding ? Of course the booster shots are NOT different from those that were tested in long trials with thousands of volunteers over months. Many anti vaxxers think that is not good enough (not even after they had given billions of shots after the extensive trials).. And just changing the code (which they could do technically speaking) would never, ever get an emergency approval. There is a tiny risk that it would have severe side effects and no one wants to risk that. And it is not necessary the booster shots are STILL working fairly good against the things that matter the most : deaths and severe illnesses. See the FAST dropping case numbers of Israel. Death lag with 3 wees. The protection against spread dropped to 39 % so that is a bummer, but STILL better than not being vaccinated. See my other comments sort for "latest". The other protections went down 10 resp. 8 % (from 99 or 98 % - the risk to die and the risk to have severe complications). And: there is a group whose immune systems are bad / slow learners who got the shots firs.. The more contagious Delta has found them, and they plus the UNVACCINATED marde up the overwhelming majority of thosein the ICU's.  - In general for OTHER diseases there is more time, and they would like to have another vaccine, but there is not the pressure of a pandemic. against OTHER diseases they will be able to develop vaccines faster in the past. I will not last 3 years but 1.5 or 2 Does not help us with a constantly evolving pandemic virus that has caused a pandemic.
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  40.  @deadrose007  ... so are you going to vote for Sanders ??? (you forgot to mention that he is a fascist communist, never mind a misogynistic antisemite. And he kicks puppies and does not like apple pie - or so I heard).
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  41. Kasie also claims that Assad just likes / wants to kill his own people. It is like the serial killer in the movie - the script does not need any plausibility, it frees the writers from the need to develop a logical story or provide a sufficient motivation if one of the characters does weird things. If Assad is just crazy like that you do not need to dig into it deeper. - Because even cruel very power-hungry dictators do not necessarily want or enjoy killing a lot of citizens. (Not saying that Assad is a terrible cruel dictator - at the least he is an authoriatarian leader who tolerates / or makes use of some shit the security forces are doing. It looks like he leaves the dirty work to one of his brothers. When growing up he did not expect to become president. His older brother was the designated heir. When he died in a car accident, the brother got a promotion. Before he had been a doctor in London, expecting to live a regular life there and courting the daughter of a Syrian immigrant (a wealthy surgeon I think the family had left because of Assad the father). So the eye doctor became the new president in waiting. His father (who had rule Syria for decades) saw to it that the new heir did some extra military service, that he was well established with the military (leadership). Assad also married the lady from London, who had a good career going on in finance in London. She is an educated, well behaved, eloquent person, if she speaks it sounds like she thought before. She dresses in Western style, a very attractive woman, and is used to the Western lifestyle - at the same time she is a Sunni muslima Comment by ? Richard Baer (former CIA): if the U.S. wants someone seriously interrogated they extradite him or her to Jordan, to Syria for being tortured and to Egypt for being disappeared. I would add that I can imagine torture or brutal interrogation methods also used in Jordan. The CIA has had free reign there for decades. I am not sure if the quote applies to Assad the father or now the son. Libya and Syria tried to play nice with the West and the U.S. after 9/11 (likely both countries saw a chance to improve relationships and trade). Assad came into power in 2000 and toured Europe with official visits (not sure if he was in the U.S.) They also offered cooperation to fight terrorism after 9/11. Those jihadists were also trying to undermine their reign, so a cooperation seemed natural. They may have assumed the U.S. ruling class had a problem with terrorism **. On the contrary, terrorism was the convenient pretext to undermine the constitution, install mass surveillance and it was the pretext to give more contracts to the Military Industrial Surveillance Complex. Dictators may ruthlessly remove individuals (imprison, torture, kill them) - but they want to dominate a people remember ? Dictators / authoritarian leaders work with fear not with ACTUALLY having to do a lot of the killing. And if they have to do the killing it gets counterproductive - because there will be growing ressentment. P.S.: I saw Assad come alive in interviews when he talked about the amnesty and the programs they have to re-integrate Syrian fighters that have fought for the opposition. Didn't sound like he enjoys having people killed. ** In the end not that many people die of terrorist attacks in the U.S. (let alone Islamic terrorism as opposed to domestic terrorists usually rightwingers) - the death toll of traffic or the inadequate healthcare system is much higher. But these deaths get much more media attention and do not come from a "normal life risk" that the citizens feel they can control (like driving a car). So "terrorism" incites more fear or can be used that way and it means ratings for the media. The "elites" do not expect to be harmed by terrorism, like the regular citizens do not expect to be harmed. In the end the critical, ORGANIZED, freely communicating (internet !!) CITIZENS exercising peacefully their constitutional rights are dangerous for the oligarchs. Much more dangerous than terrorism. Woke citizens could end the "free" "trade" deals that are so profitable for few (and make outsourcing of jobs safe and lucrative). They could alter taxation and demand the end of the costly wars (costly for most, lucrative for some). They could demand a healthcare system that serves them and not the corporations. The insurance industry stands to lose a major part of GDP - it may be as much as the military manufacturers get - or much more. All of healthcare is 7 - 11 % of GDP in any wealthy country with a cost-efficient single payer - around 17 % in the U.S. The additional 6 - 10 % of GDP (that is huge) funds dysfunction and profits and it does not all go to hospitals and big pharma - insurers get a good chunk of it.
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  42. * The danger of being assassinated for a president that works against the status quo - see The Real News video of spring 2017: Wilkerson: Practically Everyone Opposes Trump's Reversal of Obama's Cuba Opening https://youtu . be/eMO4o5nRGQs (delete blanks of link) Excerpt from the transcript (see comments) Larry Wilkerson Chief of Staff to Colin Powell: Obama might have risked being assassinated if he had chosen an anti-war, anti deep state stance. Wilkerson: ...If I call President Obama for anything, it was his timidity, and his lack of courage. His lack of courage with respect to politics, and his lack of courage with respect to particularly his last three years in office. Where I know from talking with him personally, talking with him in the Roosevelt Room, that he understood. He said [to me] there was a bias in this town towards war, with his Secretary of State sitting beside him. He said quote : "There's a bias in this town towards war" unquote. Well, he went on for another 20 minutes to elaborate on that. Well, Mr. President if you knew that - why didn't you start doing something about it ? I mean, he could have done a lot more, if he'd had the political courage to do it ..... I think it's because, first you get trapped in that environment, and you want to make lots of money, and you wanna be very happy, and you wanna be very satisfied when you leave that office, especially if you're as young as he is. And you realize that if you start these fights, if you start these battles, not only might you be assassinated, you're probably going to leave without anything like the dignity, and the honor, and the emoluments, and the fortune that he left with. And I don't say that lightly, that's a very difficult decision to make, when you stand up for principle, when you stand up for the country, when you are a true patriot, you usually are punished, not rewarded. the complete transcript of that comment (only) is under the video (on the youtube channel of The Real News) - usually they have a complete transcript and the youtube video embedded on their website - but in this case there is not transcript on their site.
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  43.  @GoEqBro  Was he though ? he encouraged Carter to start the peace process with Israel / Palestine. I think both Carter and Brzezinski had the Cold War mindset, they certainly started the problem in Afghanistan, but shit hit the fan under Reagan.
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  44.  @GoEqBro  I find it hard to believe that he could compete with Truman, Eisenhower (threatened to nuke Korea, they dropped more bombs on Korea than during WW2, it was completely destroyed, even WW2 generals were schocked. Mind you: a country that had never attacked the U.S. and could not have been a threat to the U.S. if they had wanted to. Same applies to Vietnam. Kissinger, Nixon, Reagan, John Bolton, Dick Cheney, Bush 1 or Bush 2, Teddy Roosevelt (and before and after him till FDR who was busy with domestic affairs. A lot of shit happened see Smedly Butler: "I was a gangster for Capitalism." Andrew Jackson. Not to forget Obama. Or Hillary Clinton. Under Carter the murderous regime in Indonesia got weapons supplies. Else the Carter admin was much less aggressive than other admins and their body count is not as terrible. Carter gave the Panama canal back for instance. While Brzezinski was his advisor.
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  45. And where is AOC on this ? It is a New York judge after all. (I am not sure she made a stink. Just assuming she didn't. Or Rachel Maddow while we are at it. If she has some time to spare and recovered from Trump Derangement Syndrome).
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  46. I didn't hear anyone talk negatively about white people (not Jimmy, not Greg). But I hear them criticize journalistic sellouts. White privileged ivy-league educated pricks who never come out of their bubble. - If the oligarchs would fear that white low-income people would vote in a way that they do not like they no doubt would hinder them to vote as well. but that has not been necessary so far (it might if some right or conservative areas start voting for Sanders). Those white privileged careerists would rather maintain their comfortable (and well paid) view that minorities have a chance to vote and everything is fine with the U.S. democracy - then go out and check it for themselves (that is what journalists would do). The election system of the U.S. resembles that of a Banana Republic. I mean the oligarchs try to take over in other democracies as well, neoliberalism hit other wealthy democracies too, The powers that be hijack the press and media - but the idea that you will be purged from the voter rolls or that people have to line up for 30 minutes, even hours to vote, is unthinkable. The regular European voters would feel very badly treated if they had to wait longer than 15 minutes. Of course they use only paper ballots and hand count -and they do the counting in each and every polling station. It is impossible to manipulate - but even IF one polling station would manipulate - that would not make a dent. I can only imagine that on a local level (for mayor or city council - but there the opposition is on the election board and will watch things like hawks, especially if it is a tight race). During election day when the voters come in and then when the hand count is done - the WHOLE panel is always present, participates in the procedures. They all witness and certify the integrity of the procedures in that place. That panel that has volunteers of all parties on it, plus some civil servants. The elections are either on a sunday/holiday or the polling places are open until 10 pm (U.K.) on a weekday. So that everyone has a chance and has it easy to cast their vote. Of course there are enough places. Of course it is not a red tape labyrinth to get ID if that is required - it isn't everywhere. And a driver's licence issued in one part of the country will be certainly O.K. as indentification in other parts of the country. There are enough civil servants to staff those offices that issue replicas of birth certificates, new driver's licences, and IDs. Almost all other nations have found a system to enter their citizens into a system of keeping track when they are born and they will remove them when they die. (Not in the U.K. but there it is easy to register to vote - it can be done online in a few minutes - that is the modern part of it - else it is old fashioned SAFE paper ballot and handcount (they bring the sealed boxed into large halls and volunteers count them under the eyes of the public, which has some charm). In most countries the young adults will be put on the voter rolls automatically and they are invited to participate. So there is no reason - or PRETEXT - for "voter roll purges". Citizens are responsible to announce when they move - if not they will have to vote at the old place, because that is where their name is still on the list. Those elections can also function during a blackout. paper, pen, cubicles, and the election commission that crosses the voters off the list manually ! so double voting is not possible. That works with lists that are printed out a few days in advance. It is easy to increase capacities (have another pen, desk and cardboard cubicle if that should be necessary). It is impossible to strategically defund the technical support in poor areas. So that the machines will cause more waiting time because they "fail" - which can happen "naturally" if they are old. And that does not even account for the possibility to mess with the easily hackable machines. Either to make them malfunction (to create prohibitively long waiting lines) or to rigg the count / tabulation. The subresults of the handcount per polling station are subject to public inquiry. They are summed up per town (if the town is tiny - more like a village they might have only one polling place). Those numbers per town are published. So citizens could do the recount if they feel inclined. And if results are implausible something like a FOIA request the public - media, citizens, NGOs and the political parties - can go one level deeper and revisit the count per polling place. Sometimes there are recounts - for regional races for mayor for instance if it is a tight race. Else that is hardly ever necessary.
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  47. I guess the Pharma industry contacted Wallstreet and the other oligarchs (though not the healthcare insurance industry lol ) for help. They are getting desperate - they lose the battle regarding public opinion so the MUST present a FAKE solutions. PBS very oblingly does not tear holes in the whole scheme (like real journalists would do). They are right to be worried - and it is not only about the people who have ripped of the U.S. citizens (or who now PLAN to do so). It is also an ideological battle - the idea that private (for profit) is always better. It does not need genius to deliver healthcare - a well running machine and ADMINISTRAION will do (see Europe or Canada, or Australia). But there the systems are very suceptible to PUBLIC PRESSURE and POLITICAL ACCOUNTABILITY. If they do not run well it will be ultimately blamed on politicians. Sanders will not shut up, the last "townhall" or better online event had 1 million people watching (the country has 325 millions), but of course more people might have seen it since then.And then there are those who already KNOW and to not take the one hour AGAIN (like me I am satisfied to know it was well received). The appearance on PBS was meant to OBFUSCATE, and to distract, not to have a meaningful debate. That is why so much is not asked, that is very obviously not plausible, wrong, etc. When these oligarchs NOW pull off a private "single payer" this is the convenient excuse pretext to NOT implement the systems that work well in EVERY OTHER wealthy nations. The richest men of the world getting richer and exercising EVEN more power, in an area where you cannot avoid them (you can refuse to buy from Amazon, but not when Bezoes starts "dealing" in healthcare). Single payer is PUBLIC AND !! NON PROFIT in Europe (some players like doctors or even hospitals can be private, but they have a negotiated contract, in the case of hospitals they share the "market" - or better the niche with hospitals run by public entities (like cities) - so the costs CAN BE COMPARED. There is a strong element of solidarity in these systems (people get the same treatment, the costs are very affordable AND you know in advance what you pay. you pay the mandatory deduction, so does the employer - that's it. No surprises when the patient needs care or expensive prodedures). The public insurance is not directly influenced by the government, but of course there is influence - they get some money from them (part of the funding is payroll deduction, part is taxes - especially for the hospitals). - If these systems would not run well it would be seen as the responsibility of the politicians to do something about it. And the politicians KNOW it and FEAR the anger of the voters. - How are you going to hold Warren Buffet or Jeff Bezoes accountable. It is also regulated WHERE hospitals can be built and operated, so they are spread evently - enough beds everywhere, not too long to drive for the population and a large enough case load so that they can be run efficientely (w/o having to milk the patients with a good insurance plan with unnecessary procedures and tests).
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  48. With your good contacts to the mega donors - could you send 1 buck or a few to Mike Gravel, 88 years. Not sure if he plans to speak about policies - but he sure has a few things to say about what is wrong right now. And since he does not want to win he does not need to hold back (he has already endorsed Tulsi Gabbard). she and Sanders need to stay "polite" but he can pull the punches. - For that he needs 65,000 donations however.
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  49. + J.P. Not Straw Mens, lots of them - Did Dr. King just NOT support gay marriage ? Was that even an issue then ? And if he was against being gay, let alone being married (being a man of his time and a devout Southern Christian) - do you think he would have uttered hateful of divisive messages against gay or queer folks ? When was Dr. King on the wrong side of history ? Inflicting harm on fellow citizens (no matter the race) ? Did he support the killing of a lot of people in war ? Was he willing to support a system that made millions of people LESS than human ? When did he talk hostile about the people supporting of profiting from the oppression ?? What would be the justified reason to object to any MLK statue - except for some folks that he was black and/or that he tried to help black people (and also poor people no matter the ethnicity or race). Was the Lincoln proposal to send freed slaves back to Africa made with malicious intent ? Was it rhetoric to have the support of voters (I think he did a lot of that - navigating the mood and trying to appeal to people who had racist feelings and were not so sure they even were against slavery let alone getting dragged into a war over it). Anyway, it was an idea - Lincoln did not start a war over that, nor did he instigate a secession over that issue. Jefferson was a man of his time as well - born in 1743 so we can expect his basic values being formed in 1763 - he profited from a very unjust form of economy (using slave labour). Did Jefferson START A WAR to defend that system - or support a war for that purpose ? No he casually profited from slavery. Would he have started a war around 1850/1860 to defend it - or would he have adjusted to the spirit of the time and been open to at least let slavery end gradually ?
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  50. + J.P. Those statues BTW usually were not erected directly after the war (it is not usual to celebrate the general of a war that was lost at catastrophic costs for the South, not even when he was an excellent strategist). The memorials were erected much later to express defiance against "being ordered around" and aginst the enforced loss of the the lucrative business. The cheap labour of course benefitted only the rich - it was styled as Southern way of living that was worth being "defended" in that bloody war (well is was certainly not worth it even for most white people - if they had been not so brainwashed). The Germans do not have statues of General Rommel around (who was a capable military leader as well). And he was not especially vile - just uncritically serving a vile regime as military brass always does. - The Germans are well able to process their history incl. WW2, the good, the bad and the ugly w/o Rommel statues. If you want to know about him buy a book. What does Lee stand for ? A man who might have been a decent human being, maybe not even a fan of slavery, but giving this military skills to defend the status quo nontheless. A regime that played divide an conquer between poor white people and people of color. An elite and a relatively small segment of the population who did O.K. or incredibly well with the cruel system, while the rest was kept poor or worse - enslaved. Remember: the South had started the military action. Stirring up the worst human emotions against the slaves - for fear the poor whites would find out the white upper class, not the slaves were the enemy. The Southern upper class was wealthy or rich, they had the estates, the fine houses, the furnitures, the fortunes and the possessions. - And it still was not enough. The sons of the slave owners could pay their way out of military service, the poor whites (who did not even profit from the system, never mind the ethics) were (forcefully) drafted to become cannon fodder. The low income males and their dependent families paid a horrible price for the wish of the slaveowners to maximize their profits with a cruel, archaic and uncivilized practice. This is not how they advertised the war and recruited the cannon fodder: if you want to sell possible death, disability and thus poverty because you cannot earn a living after the war, and a lot of suffering to a young poor man, you better come up with some better marketing: Honor, the Values of the South, independence and states rights (for whose advantage ??? ), we protect our women, we defend our way of life. Which part of that history needs public display ?? That folks still claim or think that they defend a "way of life" when they defend the display of such monuments ("parts of our identity" "our history") is a sad reminder that the Stockholm Syndrome and the old propaganda still works. Many in the South never resigned themselves to the defeat, and true most of those states always stayed poorer. The conintued effects of slavery and the 2 class system was so dysfunctional that they never caught up, not even in the good years after WW2 until the 1970s. Those Northeners after the war told them what to do, and the question of the removal of the statues is styled in the same way. (never mind that the local government had decided they could do without the reminder of that part of the history). And that out of state folks (of Ohio ! like the terrrorist) think that is their business. The poor in the South suffered much more from the lost Civil War than the haves which started the trouble and for whose greed the war was fought. The poor THEN could never get themselves to realize how they were played for fools. So they became eager defenders of the narrative crafted by the upper class. They stayed poor but kept the "privilege" to look down on minorities. (a privilege that cost the elites nothing, on the contrary it assisted their ongoing wealth and top position in society). The South never was "the South", not for the slaves and also not for most of the white folks. For most it was not that special, elegant, cultivated, relaxed place where people knew better how to live and eat well and to enjoy life and be connected with their communities. It was aristocracy under another name - and for the top it worked great. A society that was worse and more unequal than what was going on in Europe at that time. A memorial with the names of all those who were killed and did not even possess slaves - and all those who were able to buy themselves out of military service (wealthy and rich people could do it). Such a memorial would make sense and it would deliver a very up-to-date message There are lessons to be learnt about how an economic system can be propped up with ideology to serve the greed of the upper class. Greed and cruelty despite all claims to being refined - it can teach you about class, about divide and conquer, about poor people acting against their best interest, about how ugly, unethical and cruel humans can behave and how they use ideology and religion to justify that. You do not need a statue of General Lee to process those insights.
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