This Is Neoliberalism: Introducing the Invisible Ideology

 



Neoliberalism is an economic ideology that exists within the framework of capitalism. Over four decades ago, neoliberalism become the dominant economic paradigm of global society. This video presents the history of neoliberalism, starting with a survey of neoliberal philosophy and research, a historical reconstruction of the movement pushing for neoliberal policy solutions, witnessing the damage that neoliberalism did to its first victims in the developing world, and then charting neoliberalism's infiltration of the political systems of the United States and the United Kingdom. 

 This is an excellent primer of how neoliberalism is generating crises for humanity at an unprecedented rate.

The Last Act of The Civil Rights Movement: The Embrace of the Earth

“You shouldn’t have to convince people to go to paradise,”
--Shelton Johnson, Ranger, Yosemite National Park

Speaking in front of a group of African American visitors, Yosemite National Park Ranger Shelton Johnson poses as a sergeant of the Ninth Cavalry Regiment of the United States Army, or one of the “Buffalo Soldiers” who protected settlers during the Indian and Spanish American Wars of the nineteenth century. For many African Americans, a trip to a national park had always been but a dream, an impossibility, something reserved for others; over the years, this story has been changing. What may appear to be a common legacy preserved for all Americans—the national park—turns out to be the resting place of a charged intersection between the past and the present and of a historical awareness whose erasure has as much to do with racial history as it does with a fundamental sense of humanity and appreciation of the land.

“Sorry to Bother You” : Boots Riley’s Dystopian Satire Is an Anti-Capitalist Rallying Cry for Workers

An evil telemarketing company, a corporation making millions off of slave labor, and one Oakland man at the center of it all who discovers a secret that threatens all of humankind. Boots Riley’s “Sorry to Bother You” is the dystopian social satire being hailed as one of the best movies of the summer. The film’s stars include Lakeith Stanfield, Tessa Thompson, Armie Hammer, Terry Crews and Danny Glover. 

 Boots Riley is writer and director of the critically acclaimed film. He is a poet, rapper, songwriter, producer, screenwriter, humorist, political organizer, community activist, lecturer and public speaker—best known as the lead vocalist of The Coup and Street Sweeper Social Club.

The Heart is Not a Technological Construct by Julian Rose

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Post industrial mankind’s fascination with material progress has, since the industrial revolution, played the dominant role in the direction taken by Westernised societies. ‘The machine’, along with the material and financial wealth necessary to own and operate it, has steadily subsumed more human centred values that preceded its dominance.

Fascination with so-called modern technologies of the present day, represent an extension of the general obeysance paid to the rising totem of technological ‘advances’ over the past three centuries.

It has led to the point where such innovations no longer claim to be about ‘lessening the work load’ , but almost openly proffer the claim of being convenience drugs without which much of Westernised society could barely function at all.

Controversially, each step along the way to this point of abstraction has involved leaps of imaginative thinking that draw upon universal energetic principles. The genius of Nicholas Tesla  being an example of such. Yet, simultaneously, each ‘advance’ has brought with it a swathe of deficits to the health and welfare of the natural environment, man, animals and insects; threatening to undermine the very fabric of planetary sustainability.

The synthetic microwave energy that has gained such prominence over the past twenty years, has aped the rhythm and pulse of universal energy, and in so doing it has offered mankind a parallel model to live by. A synthetic reality, not our true reality as spirit-energy led beings.

I am putting the question of whether such ‘innovations’ take mankind – closer to or further from – the place which our hearts call upon us to go? That enlightened state which our deeper consciousness constantly calls upon us to express and live by in the here and now.

If it takes us closer, then why is the incremental price being played by people, plants and insects, so high? Quite possibly so high as to undermine the living fabric of the planet to a point where no natural return is possible. To a state where planetary life becomes a ‘virtual’ copy of the original. A gene modified substratum of real life.

The contradictions stare us in the face: distort natural ecological and human rhythms in order to reach some form of technological enlightenment?

What in the West we call ‘a high standard of living’ now demands access to a whole range of electromagnetic, microwave and electronic gismos that have exploded onto world markets in the past two decades – creating a permanent cloud of electromagnetic smog – and fitting neatly into ‘the hidden hand of control’s’ preferred form of imprisonment of mankind.

A key component of this take-over of the human brain is the so-called ‘singularity’ event: a cross-over point in which computerised power overtakes the capacity of the sentient human brain to exercise normal daily decision-making procedures. A place where genetic engineering and nanotech synthetic realities become the norm, and humans cross the red line that keeps humanity separate from being subsumed into a race of technologically programmed cyborgs. At which point the human race will have lost touch with both its cosmic and earthly reality altogether.

Let’s consider this straight-on. How do you stand with the cell phone/Ipod/Wifi revolution of the past two decades? Do you own one of these inventions? ( I did, but I dumped it)). Where do you want these ‘oh so clever’ technologies to take you? Is it really worth cooking your brains and interfering with the natural rhythms of wave form universal energy, just to be a more ‘smart’ business man or woman?  Just to have almost instant access to friends, family and associates? Just to make it possible to hold mindless conversations that achieve nothing other than a vague sense of comfort – and are just about as useful as the processed junk food in a typical supermarket chain store?

For those dimly aware that the electromagnetic microwaves that emanate from these gismos –

and from the sinister towers that provide their pulsed signals – may also be disrupting the background resonance (Schumann Resonance) that provides balance to the human brain and heart, the flight of birds, bees and other insects, plant growth and the very stability of the atmosphere itself  – is it too much to expect that those who possess these gadgets will work at freeing themselves from their toxic convenience addictions?

Are we allowing our lives to be dominated by a simulated electronic pulse that is the perfect tool for mass mind control? Or, are we seeking to attune ourselves  a natural pulse which is guiding the subtle sensibilities of our very own hearts?

To which of these do you give priority in your daily life?

The heart is not a technological construct. It operates on a wavelength which is critical to the flowering of our spiritual path. It responds to a Universal rhythm of which man is an integral part and which is every individual’s birth-rite. Had we been consciously operating on this heart and spirit led frequency over the past centuries, mankind and planet Earth would not be in the perilous psycho-physical state of imbalance it is in today.

If all technology had been kept to largely benign and human scale proportions, it would have been inconceivable to have come up with weapons of mass destruction our nations arm themselves with today; or indeed the uranium fuelled nuclear power stations that provide their fissionable materials.

As we stand today – at the eleventh hour of our demise or possible reprieve – these issues stand starkly in front of us. Something has to give.

The rapidly approaching threat of a WiFi 5G roll-out, with its violent, volatile microwave transmissions tuned to almost exactly the same wave length as the human neocortex, must serve as the red line technology that simply cannot be allowed to happen. For it quite literally cannot be tolerated by our living organism: physically, psychologically, mentally or spiritually.

The entire animal and plant kingdom, already battered by 2, 3 and 4G microwaves, cannot survive any further bombardment and retain any chance of remaining sentient, sensitive and truly alive. All those who are aware, however dimly, of the harm we are doing to ourselves, others and our shared environment by carelessly adopting the latest pocket-sized weapons of mass destruction and the ‘internet of everything’ which they plug into – have just a few months to join in a mass protest to prevent the 5G horror from becoming reality.

We are at a turning point in the affairs of man. A new ‘awareness-energy’ is emerging within all of us; an energy which is the antithesis of the synthetic variety. It is a God-given energy, a gift which is bestowed upon us as an integral part of our condition of being human.

Now is the time for us to use this gift and to turn the tide on our misadventure. A misadventure under the jackboot of a centralised global cabal that cares not one iota for the fate of our planet, other than the fact that it is held captive and submissive. However, it is a force which pales into insignificance when compared with the full power of awakened consciousness. Yet it has nevertheless been allowed (by us) to turn this planet into something approaching an emotional, spiritual and physical desert. 5G is perhaps the ultimate tool of repression, because it comes disguised as a seeming technological break-through that the unknowing will adopt without giving a thought of what it actually is.

5G is scheduled to be put into affect next year, 2019. The plan is for more than four thousand satellites to be launched into the planet’s upper atmosphere over a two-year period. These satellites are designed to blanket cover every square inch of the planet with a Wifi web of unparalleled output. Nowhere will escape the affects of the 360 degree microwave grid. Meanwhile millions of new ‘masts’ will be constructed to transmit the extra short Wifi pulses to cities, towns and countryside locations throughout the planet. 2,3 and 4G transmissions have already raised deep scientific worries about their affects on humans, animals, insects and plant life; 5G is set to vastly escalate existing concerns. It presents an almost unimaginable danger to life on Earth.

Should such a scenario ever be fulfilled, mankind will have ‘souled-out’ to a lethal technological toy whose only claim to fame is that it will provide ‘instant’ access to fake news and mega volumes of corporate enriching junk information.

Are we going to continue to allow ourselves to be led into a world dominated by a processed Wifi microwave pulse tuned so as to directly interfere with our natural communication channels? Channels to and from the Divine source of all life on this Universe?

Are we going to completely submit our God-given creativity to be hacked by a ‘smart’ mechanical construct controlled by a less than human corporate cabal? Are we going to continue to idly flirt with a Cyborg Transhumanist agenda that promotes a technology that ‘does our thinking for us’? Are we seriously ready to abandon ourselves and our planet to the neutering, sterilising affects of the engineered electromagnetic microwave?  I ask all these questions because that is the way it looks like going – unless a big wake-up call swings humanity into a another trajectory.

That trajectory involves us seizing hold of the genuine creative upsurge that fuels our quest for truth – and  learning to align ourselves with the synergistic harmony of our quantum universe.

The road of truth cannot be walked by following the ‘convenience script’. So kiss goodbye to the toxic cell phone; throw out the mind control machine called television; start the process of saying bye bye to the corporate controlled energy grid – and start a new life – while you still can.

Whatever you do, get involved in all efforts to block 5G from gaining momentum – or start your own initiative. As a precondition for the sanity of human kind – it must be stopped.

Take back control of your destiny as an individual able to think outside the box, and learn to retune yourself to the infinite wavelength of conscious awareness. Let it direct you out of the godless prison so cunningly devised by our oppressors.

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Julian Rose is an early pioneer of UK organic farming, a writer, actor and international activist.

He is President of the International Coalition to Protect the Polish Countryside. Julian is the author of two acclaimed titles: Changing Course for Life and In Defense of Life, which can be purchased by visiting www.julianrose.info. He has just completed his third book ‘Overcoming the Mechanistic Mind’ for which he is currently seeking a publisher.

Your Phone is a Snitch and Your Privacy Laws Aren't Helping You

 

Writer Cyrus Farivar explains why yesterday's privacy laws are no match for today's surveillance technology - as our devices generate massive quantities of data on our locations and activity, a patchwork of 20th century laws and 21st century workarounds from corporations and the state expose us to the threat of perfect, secret surveillance. 

 Cyrus is the author of "Habeas Data: Privacy vs. the Rise of Surveillance Tech"

Russiagate is a Ruling Class Diversion by Glen Ford

“Trump supporters see themselves as a distinct and independent force in the nation -- the saviors of America, in their diseased minds -- and they now hate the Democratic Party in a far deeper way than before.”

So this is what we can look forward to in the long twilight of a shrinking U.S. empire: the shrieks of a delirious ruling class, concocting endless diversions from the central reality of late-stage capitalism’s inability to offer the people anything but widening wars and deepening austerity. The Lords of Capital have led us to a dark yet insanely cacophonous realm, a throbbing madhouse din. “Traitor!” scream the minions of corporate communications, calling for the blood of the corporate government’s orange-branded CEO -- a no longer exceptional spectacle for the self-proclaimed exceptional nation.

Donald Trump is, indeed, a kind of traitor to the Washington Consensus, a hyper-militarized capitalist utopia of corporate dominated global supply chains that doubled the international wage-slave workforce in the last two decades of the 20th century and herded these desperate billions into a race to the bottom. The leadership of both corporate parties conspired to force U.S. workers into the global meat-grinder. Democrat Bill Clinton inflicted NAFTA on his party’s wage-earning base and, two decades later, Democrat Barack Obama tried, but failed, to pass the even more devastating Trans Pacific Partnership corporate trade and governance bill. Donald Trump captured the Republican Party by feeding its base the overt racist rhetoric they crave, rather than the more polite “dog whistle” menu cultivated by White Man’s Party politicians since Richard Nixon. With the indispensable assistance of Democrat-oriented corporate media and the Democratic National Committee -- both of which saw Trump as the most easily beatable Republican -- Trump trounced the entire GOP presidential wanna-be menagerie to seize the reins of half the electoral duopoly, and carried a majority of white voters – including white women -- in the general election.

“Global supply chains doubled the international wage-slave workforce in the last two decades of the 20thcentury and herded these desperate billions into a race to the bottom.”

It was not Trump’s flaming racism that made him a traitor to his class and to the empire. One of the U.S. duopoly parties has always played the role of White Man’s Party, with white supremacy as its organizing principle. Were it not for endemic, fervent, nationwide white racism, the most reactionary wing of the U.S. ruling class would have no effective electoral base. Trump simply serves up a stronger brew of white supremacist elixir for the good ole boys and girls. His heresy – precipitating the crisis in ruling class politics -- was to rhetorically oppose “free trade” and U.S. “regime change” policies, and to call for normalizing relations with Russia. “Free trade” -- a euphemism for the unfettered ability of the ruling class to move money and jobs wherever it chooses on the planet – and the “exceptional” right of U.S. imperialism to remove and replace sovereign governments at will, are the pillars of the Washington Consensus. Donald Trump became anathema to the Lords of Capital and their servants in the national security “deep state,” who crowded into Hillary Clinton’s Democratic tent, where Russiagate was invented out of whole cloth.

Again, racism was not Trump’s unpardonable sin, although it plays into the strategies of the (financial and high tech) ruling class sectors at the helm of the Democratic Party, whose own electoral organizing principle is an anemic anti-racism, a phony politics of “inclusion” that welcomes representatives of minority populations to help enforce the race-to-the-bottom and to join in the general capitalist plunder. Trump’s howling racism was what made Democrats believe he was the ideal candidate for a trouncing by Hillary Clinton, who could be counted on to escalate Barack Obama’s general military offensive and to aggressively pursue TPP and other corporate governance arrangements. (Only fools believed Clinton’s late switch, opposing TPP.) When Clinton lost, the ruling class panicked and resolved to bring down the Orange Menace no matter the cost to U.S. institutions and to the appearance of stability in the very bosom of the empire. The rolling coup was begun.

“Trump’s heresy – precipitating the crisis in ruling class politics -- was to rhetorically oppose ‘free trade’ and U.S. ‘regime change’ policies, and to call for normalizing relations with Russia.”

Black folks think the crisis is about race. It is – and it isn’t. If the ruling class, including those that fund and run the Democratic Party, were really concerned about Black people’s rights, they would have challenged Trump’s election victory based on blatant Black voter suppression in key Midwest states. As Greg Palast pointed out, the Republican “Crosscheck” scheme fraudulently and illegally purged 449,000 disproportionately Black voters from the rolls in Michigan, alone -- about 40 times larger than Trump's 10,700-vote margin of victory. Yet, Hillary Clinton and the Democrats only reluctantly joined in Green Party candidate Jill Stein’s recount action, and the first words out of Black Congressman John Lewis’s mouth when the polls closed in November were “Russia…Russia...Russia.” Republicans have been stealing elections through Black voter suppression in broad daylight since 2000, but only one Democratic senator and one congresswoman -- California’s Barbara Boxer and Ohio Rep. Stephanie Tubbs Jones, in 2004 – have in this century challenged the thefts . Black voter suppression has been part of the gentlemen’s agreement between the two corporate parties. Rich white people do not plunge the system into crisis for the sake of Black voting rights, or any Black rights at all, including the right to life. But the Lords of Capital will roll the dice on the fate of all humanity to preserve and expand their global dominion and the military machine that is their only remaining advantage. Their survival as a class is at stake. Trump must go because he cannot be depended on to preserve the Washington Consensus -- the imperial project.

“Republicans have been stealing elections through Black voter suppression in broad daylight since 2000.”

Trump’s racism did factor into the ruling class decision to oust him from the White House, but not in the way that most people believe. Donald Trump proved that his white base is more enthusiastic to support a candidate that affirms white supremacist “values” (yes, that’s what they value most) than they are about maintaining an aggressive military posture everywhere in the world. They did not blink or budge when Trump denigrated NATO, opposed regime change and U.S. efforts at “nation-building” (a euphemism for prolonged military occupation of other peoples), and called for better relations with Russia. These same voters were presumed to be the most militaristic cohort in the nation, dependable fodder to elect fire-breathing war hawks. But clearly, Trump’s base -- composed of a majority of whites – cares more about white supremacy in the U.S. than waging endless wars abroad. And, they either hate “free trade,” or don’t care enough about it either way to abandon their White Man’s President.

The national security state, the military industrial complex and the oligarchs whose interests the empire defends were forced to confront the reality, that their presumed prime constituency was not nearly as gung-ho for war as previously assumed. How, then, to continue the “generational” War on Terror (war of imperial conquest)? Answer: Make Russia a clear and present danger, aided and abetted by “useful idiots” (like BAR), domestically.

Trump still retains the support of his white majority. Most importantly, these white supremacists feel affirmed, as “a people,” by his presence, and what they perceive as Trump’s loyalty to them. They are feeling “Great Again.” And they are reveling in their national strength, as a bloc. That’s why they seem unmovable. This re-energized, aggressively white supremacist, intensely self-aware White Man’s Party will assert its permanent, militant and very large presence in the U.S. political spectrum, no matter what happens to Donald Trump. Other politicians, with billions to spend, will appeal to this majority bloc of whites, after Trump leaves the scene. They see themselves as a distinct and independent force in the nation -- the saviors of America, in their diseased minds -- and they now hate the Democratic Party in a far deeper way than before, when it was perceived as too concerned with Blacks and other “minorities.” Hillary Clinton turned a new chapter when she called Trump voters “deplorables” -- a kind of white trash, but connoting moral degeneracy, transcending financial condition. The “witch-hunt” against Trump is perceived as an elite mob out to lynch the “deplorables” -- or, at the least, to decertify them as decent Americans.

“This re-energized, aggressively white supremacist, intensely self-aware White Man’s Party will assert its permanent, militant and very large presence in the U.S. political spectrum, no matter what happens to Donald Trump.”

The Democrats can forget about ever getting back most of these self-aware white supremacist voters, but the establishment corporate Republicans that Trump crushed in winning the GOP nomination will not win back his followers’ allegiance unless they become more like Trump, i.e. more blatantly white supremacist. Which is decidedly not the corporate way, in the 21st century. Thus, corporate America, wedded as it is to a “diversity” doctrine that means little to the masses of Black people but is a red flag to the White Man’s Party “deplorables,” will be forced to identify more publicly with the Democrats, or pretend to be apolitical.

The Trump phenomena -- and the resultant ruling class hysteria -- has stolen the corporations’ option to pose as “non-partisan” actors in U.S. politics. They are forced deeper into the Democratic camp, creating further contradictions for the “inclusive” party, which must ultimately answer to a more clearly defined -- and also more self-aware – constituency of the “left,” most broadly speaking, if it is to preserve the duopoly. This other half of the country, slightly bigger than Trump’s white majority base, is composed of a minority of whites, virtually all Blacks, and large majorities of Latinos and other minorities. It is way to the left of the Democratic Party and roiling with economic demands that the Lords of Capital will not, and cannot, fulfill while keeping on the path of a global race-to-the-bottom and deepening austerity, enforced by endless wars.

“Corporate America, wedded as it is to a ‘diversity’ doctrine that means little to the masses of Black people but is a red flag to the White Man’s Party ‘deplorables,’ will be forced to identify more publicly with the Democrats.”

Therefore, there must be Russiagate hysteria -- or some other fictitious obsession -- primarily to divert the attentions of the “left” half of the electorate, most of which is broadly social democratic (the Black component is the most left-leaning, and peace-oriented). If the duopoly were to collapse, and the various cohorts of the U.S. political spectrum were reorganized along ideological lines, the two biggest parties would be the Trumpist White Man’s party and a social democratic party with a platform to the left of 2016 Bernie Sanders, with the (rightwing) Democrats and establishment Republicans coming together in an avowedly “centrist” party, the smallest of the three. Space would also be created for more radical and libertarian politics.

The ruling class is determined to prevent such a scenario from occurring, and thus needs a permanent, all-consuming diversion. But the Russiagate hysteria -- or something else like it -- cannot be maintained indefinitely; U.S. political structures cannot withstand such an institutional assault by the ruling class, itself.

The Lords of Capital are caught in the contradiction. To save the corporate state, they are besieging the corporate state, with no vision or timetable for the outcome.

The Body Still Comes First: What Happens When Black Athletes Stand Up

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Journalist Howard Bryant explores the protest politics of Black athletes in America - as a historical committment of the country's highest profile Black workers towards the communities that raised them, and the subject of intense backlash from an ownership class pushing sports, and culture at large, towards unquestioning authoritarianism.

Howard is the author of "The Heritage: Black Athletes, a Divided America, and the Politics of Patriotism"

Musings

The inspiration you seek is already within you, Be silent and listen.~~~~  Rumi

Lauren Greenfield on Rise of 'Generation Wealth' and Fall of the Empire by Jordan Riefe

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While the crash of 2008 unleashed panic on Wall Street and in seats of power worldwide, not much has been done to remedy its causes. In 2010, President Barack Obama signed the Dodd-Frank Act, expanding government oversight of the U.S. financial system, designed to safeguard against future collapse. But in May, President Donald Trump signed into law a partial rollback of Dodd-Frank, affecting banking regulations.

Although shady financial dealings and banking practices facilitated the crash, low-interest rates and the general public’s impractical desire to own houses and big-ticket items they could not afford drove it. This fact, to photographer and documentary filmmaker Lauren Greenfield, pointed to something rotten at the core of American culture.

She goes in search of that rotten something in her new film, “Generation Wealth,”  What she finds are variations on the same issues she has examined throughout her career, beginning with “Thin,” her 2007 Emmy-nominated documentary looking at bulimia. Her short, “Kids + Money,” about the impact of too much cash on precocious children in Los Angeles, explores a theme mirrored in her 2012 breakout, “The Queen of Versailles,” about real estate and business tycoon David Siegel and his trophy wife, Jaqueline, whose plans to erect the largest private home in North America go bust when the 2008 crash hits.

“What was going on in this country in the ’80s and ’90s was a demarcation from what had come before,” Greenfield told Truthdig. “Materialism has always been a part of the American dream, but it was connected to a purpose. It was about making a contribution, being a part of a society, being part of a community, perpetuating certain values. Those things have kind of gone away, and it has just become about having more, and playing at celebrity and narcissism. I feel like over the past 25 years, it’s just gone on steroids.”

Greenfield’s parents are psychologist and professor Patricia Marks Greenfieldand Dr. Sheldon Greenfield, both graduates of Harvard, where Lauren graduated magna cum laude in 1987 with a bachelor’s degree in visual and environmental studies. Raised in Venice, Calif., she attended Santa Monica’s prestigious Crossroads School, alongside people like Kim Kardashian and actress Kate Hudson, both of whom appear as teenagers in photos in the film.

“Research shows that the more people see these images of luxury, the more they think that’s how most people live and the more they desire that. When Trump was elected, he was the apotheosis of generation wealth, not just about money but about image, about celebrity, about real estate, about fake it till you make it,” Greenfield said, noting how “keeping up with the Joneses” has literally become “keeping up with the Kardashians.”

“We have this crazy aspirational gap of what we want, which has not correlated to what we can afford. And I think that’s what led us to the buying that brought on the financial crisis. But it’s also what gives us vulnerability for capitalism. It’s a great driver for creating avid consumers.”

In the movie, Cathy Grant neglects her daughter and takes on debt to pay for multiple plastic surgeries. And Kacey Jordan, a porn star and former Charlie Sheen consort, ends up filming her own suicide attempt. The addictive need to literally remake themselves binds both.

“It resonates with what I have seen with eating-disorder patients, where they want to get to a number on the scale,” Greenfield said. “And when they did [reach their desired weight], it wasn’t enough. That really spoke to the addictive quality and pathology where we can’t stop, we won’t stop until we crash.”

Then there are the Siegels, featured in Greenfield’s “The Queen of Versailles,” who, years after the crash, return to resume their quest to build the biggest house of all in “Generation Wealth.”

“I thought the financial crash was going to teach us, that we had learned our lesson from that,” Greenfield said. “And yet a lot of people went right back to living the same way as they had before.”

It would all seem to precipitate the fall of the empire, as journalist Chris Hedges and others provide context to the grand bacchanalia at the end of American pre-eminence. Yet a 2013 Millennial Impact Report shows 73 percent of millennials volunteered for a cause they believe in and helped double the rate of volunteering in the U.S. from 1989 to 2005 among 16- to 24-year-olds. The same report indicates their low rate of disposable income and rejection of materialism undermines the very basis of capitalism, and they generally hold a leery view of government as a solution to anything.

“We see the children, in a way, being the redemption of the parents,”  Greenfield suggested. “Like the millennials, hopefully there is some possibility of getting out of that cycle of addiction and having agency.”

The Birth of American Empire by H. Patricia (Pat) Hynes

By the final decade of the 19th century, the American project sanctified as Manifest Destiny was complete. The western boundary of the United States now stretched to the Pacific Ocean, leaving in its wake the genocide of Native Americans, the purchase of Louisiana without the consent of the governed, and a war of aggression against Mexico. What next? Pursue the colonialist mandate beyond continental borders—or not?

Stephen Kinzer’s “The True Flag: Theodore Roosevelt, Mark Twain, and the Birth of the Empire” is a compact, bracing history of the answer to What next? It features the drama and decisions of four years—1898-1902—that, in Kinzer’s thesis, set the course of American wars, military expansion and the overthrow of governments throughout the 20th and into the 21st century, interrupted with brief, impermanent periods of “isolationism.”  

The author collates the eloquent rhetoric and caustic debates between expansionist members of Congress, including alpha male Theodore Roosevelt, aristocrat Henry Cabot Lodge, media giant William Randolph Hearst, and prominent anti-empire social critics and populist orators including Mark Twain, William Jennings Bryan and steel magnate and philanthropist Andrew Carnegie to capture vividly the divided political passions and high stakes of the day.   

The empire builders used robust, positively coded terms like “the large policy” to label their aspirations for America’s pre-eminence among world powers and for the aggressive market ambitions of America’s capitalists. The anti-imperialists warned of the erosion of democracy at home, the rise of plutocracy and the blowback from military subordination of other peoples against their will, forecasting what, a century later, Chalmers Johnson incisively named the “sorrows of empire.”

The Spanish-American War of 1898 was the spark that inflamed the U.S. quest for overseas colonies. It began with Cuba and quickly stole Puerto Rico, then the Philippines, Guam (seized en route to the Philippines) and Hawaii—all in nine months. In public, expansionists framed these takeovers as beneficent: rescuing oppressed and backward people to catechize and civilize them.  

Independence movements in Cuba, the Philippines and Hawaii were brutally suppressed. Hundreds of thousands of people were killed, particularly in the Philippines, which waged guerrilla warfare until its defeat in 1902. While American soldiers tortured and assassinated prisoners, burned villages and killed farm animals (a precursor to the later American War in Vietnam), a pliant press followed military orders and carried no unfavorable coverage.

The war in the Philippines was intensely terrorizing for women in particular. The Anti-Imperialist Review reported that “American soldiers had turned Manila into a world center of prostitution.” Amplifying this too-brief reference to the extreme toll of U.S. militarism on women, Janice Raymond writes in “Not a Choice, Not a Job,” that “U.S. prostitution colonialism, especially during the Philippine-American War, created the model for the U.S. military–prostitution complex in all parts of the world.” The system “assured U.S. soldiers certified sexual access to Filipinas and … became an intrinsic part of colonial practice in Cuba and Puerto Rico.”

Meanwhile, the empire seekers rubbed their covetous hands over the prospect of new customers for manufactured goods, and, in the case of the Philippines, a springboard to the Chinese and Japanese markets. Military bases in the Philippines and Guam would follow to protect and project U.S. economic and military power in East Asia.

Kinzer’s considerable talent joins meticulous research and engaging stories with a canine ability to sniff out the lies beneath the platitudes that sold the public on war. What he foregrounds so credibly are the oversize male egos of “large policy” politicians with more morally grounded and prescient anti-imperialist crusaders. Among these are Booker T. Washington, who, in speaking against U.S. imperialism abroad, warned that the cancer in our midst—racism, the legacy of slavery—will prove to be as dangerous to the country’s well-being as an attack from without. Many African-American anti-imperialist groups emerged and assailed U.S. imperialism for its intrinsic white racist arrogance.

With much detail and nuance, Kinzer tracks the fatal flaws of the immensely talented and populist orator William Jennings Bryan who, for his contrarian vote that sealed the doom of the Philippines, helped determine the fate of our country’s future as an empire. Likewise, the seemingly passive-aggressive William McKinley, elected in 1896 and again in 1900, is unmasked as the imperialist he grew to be over the course of his presidency.  

The final chapter, “The Deep Hurt,” traces the arc of U.S. militarism across the 20th century and into the 21st—a long and unfinished arc that is neither moral nor bends toward justice. At each end of this ongoing arc, the words of two military veterans of U.S. foreign wars distill and corroborate Kinzer’s stateside exposé in “The True Flag.” Brig. Gen. Smedley Butler, born in 1881, began his career as a teenage Marine combat soldier assigned to Cuba and Puerto Rico during the U.S. invasion of those islands. He fought next in the U.S. war in the Philippines, ostensibly against Spanish imperialism but ultimately against the Philippine revolution for independence. Next he was assigned to fight against China during the Boxer Rebellion and was also stationed in Guam. He gained the highest rank and a host of medals during subsequent U.S. occupations and military interventions in Central America and the Caribbean, popularly known as the Banana Wars.

As Butler confessed in his iconoclastic book, “War Is a Racket,” he was “a bully boy for American corporations,” making countries safe for U.S. capitalism. More isolationist than anti-war, he nonetheless nailed the war profiteers—racketeers, in his unsparing lexicon—or the blood on their hands, as bracingly as any pacifist. War is the oldest, most profitable racket, he wrote—one in which billions of dollars are made for millions of lives destroyed.  

Making the world “safe for democracy” was, at its core, making the world safe for war profits. Of diplomacy Butler wrote, “The State Department … is always talking about peace but thinking about war.” He proposed an “Amendment for Peace”: In essence, keep the military (Army, Navy, Air Force) on the continental U.S. for the purpose of defense against military invasions here.   

And in the 21st century, Maj. Danny Sjursen, who served tours with reconnaissance units in Iraq and Afghanistan, proposes that the Department of Defense should be renamed the Department of Offense. His reasons: American troops are deployed in 70 percent of the world’s countries; American pilots are currently bombing seven countries; and the U.S., alone among nations, has divided the six inhabited continents into six military commands. Our military operations exceed U.S. national interests and are “unmoored” from reasoned strategy and our society’s needs, Sjursen concludes.

For all of this book’s strengths, one glaring lacuna is the minimalist presence of women in Kinzer’s depiction of the early anti-imperialist movement. “The True Flag” is premised on history as made by “great men”—good and bad. A “great woman” of this era, Jane Addams, elected vice-president of the Anti-Imperialist League after a brilliant speech, has only a bit part. Addams was renowned not only for her settlement house work at Hull House in Chicago, but also for speaking out unceasingly against imperialism and war. The FBI kept a file on her, and she was labeled among the most dangerous women in America. The author overlooked her influence in this era.

A second lacuna is omitting the original sins of imperial America: the genocide of Native Americans for their land, and the enslavement of Africans, which ultimately became the combustion engine of U.S. capitalism. Ironically, it was the pro-empire exhorters of 1898 who used the exploitative expansion within the early U.S. to defend extending Manifest Destiny to the Pacific region. “If we should not do this in the Philippines, why was it acceptable to do here?” challenged Henry Cabot Lodge, the imperialist senator from Massachusetts.  

The Lebanese poet Khalil Gibran could have penned these words from 1933 for our national dilemma today: Pity the nation that acclaims the bully as hero and that deems the glittering conqueror bountiful. …

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H. Patricia (Pat) Hynes is a retired environmental engineer and professor of environmental health who worked on such issues as the low-income, multiracial urban environment (including lead poisoning, asthma

Red Team vs. Blue Team | Toxic Tribalism We Must Transcend by David Matthew

In Brief:

• The Facts: Public discourse is dominated by a dual-based system of categorization and rigid identity. The end-goal of interaction is not to broaden perspective and work together – but to argue and “win” a debate. It is time to transcend this paradigm.
• Reflect On: How can we institute a more open-minded framework whereby public discourse can be influenced by a multi-directional approach to sharing information and viewpoints? The need for a new narrative is upon us – we are all a part of it.

We’ve all experienced it.  You log on to Facebook and scroll through your timeline – and there it is: a fiery argument where insults are flying freely on a subject that charges you.  Though you may aim to steer clear of the sludge and toxicity of social media comment sections – perhaps you decided to lunge into a particular topic that you care deeply about.

Almost inevitably – an argument takes place where emotions reach a crescendo and the “debate” devolves into sophomoric insults where both sides are trying to tear each other’s character down instead of engaging in discourse on the merits of respective viewpoints.

Often, we find ourselves scrambling to score points by reflexively reacting to current events based on agenda and cultural identifiers, (nationality, orientation, race, creed, religion etc..) arguing over semantics, using trigger terms, stereotypes, and gross generalizations to stir the pot of frantic frenzy.  There is a primordial root to this way of interacting with each other.  From the very beginning of our history on this planet, we were thrust into a world where “the others” were viewed as an imminent danger that must be defeated, lest we be invaded and taken over.  In modern times, this tribal notion of “the others” often manifests as an idea, viewpoint, or perspective outside of our own, and it is often perceived as a threat that must be beaten down.

This has come to typify our state of discourse – whether it’s in corporate media, in Congress, on social media, or elsewhere – it has become abundantly clear that we are feeding into endless argumentation that features polarized “sides” of an argument – and there are often only two viewpoints presented as acceptable to latch onto. We anger quickly, posit ourselves in a reflexive defensive posture, and prepare to debate with one another in a way that perpetuates conflict instead of fostering education and cooperation.

The quest to be “right” or to “win” the argument takes precedence over actually listening with an open mind to an alternative viewpoint, robbing us of the opportunity to learn something new, expand our perspective, and integrate new data into our thought process to assist in evolving our consciousness.  Scientists call this motivative reasoning: a phenomenon where our unconscious motivations (beliefs/desires/fears) shape the way we interpret information.  Some ideas resonate with what we identify with – and we want them to win.  Other ideas sound like the “other” side – and we want to denigrate, defeat and banish those ideas out of the discourse.  When we apply this to our world we see how the polarizing power of partisanship and deeply held belief-systems influences our perceptions of the world around us.

“Motivated reasoning theory suggests that reasoning processes (information selection and evaluation, memory encoding, attitude formation, judgment, and decision-making) are influenced by motivations or goals. Motivations are desired end-states that individuals want to achieve. The number of these goals that have been theorized is numerous, but political scientists have focused principally on two broad categories of motivations: accuracy motivations (the desire to be “right” or “correct”) and directional or defensive motivations (the desire to protect or bolster a predetermined attitude or identity).” ~Thomas J. Leeper

Even when we think we’re being objective/fair-minded – we still can wind up unconsciously arguing for something with mechanical repetition – even when the empirical evidence shows that there is no sound basis for our argument.  We’ve become more adept at crafting and presenting an argument than conducting an actual investigation and critical thinking into the truth of the matter at hand.

But shouldn’t our motivation to find truth be more prominent than our motivation to be “right” or to cherry-pick arguments and articles that reinforce our own views? How can we cut through our prejudices/biases and motivation – and look at data and information as objectively as possible?

Making a Change

Perhaps it begins with shedding overly rigid identities and boxes that have been created for us in order to herd us into predictable boxes.  How often do you find yourself parroting a viewpoint or argument that you feel is aligned with your primary identity?  Perhaps you identify primarily as a Democrat.  If so – should your entire viewpoint be defined by this identifier to where you only agree with policies and/or ideas presented by those on your team (Team Democrat)?  If you identify as a woman – is that all you are?  If you consider yourself a Christian – must your perspective only be aligned with a narrow prescription of popularized Christian “values”?  If you consider yourself part of the “conscious community” – must everything be understood and reasoned through that filter?

This isn’t to say that identity isn’t important.  Expressing a sense of who we are is paramount – but that expression is unnecessarily limited when we aren’t open-minded and don’t allow for a full-spectrum experience. Identity politics is always an ever-evolving realm, and many of us attach more value to certain identifiers than others, be it race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, etc.. It’s respectful to be supportive of an individual’s universal right to self-identify (or even their right not to identify at all), but it is also helpful to exercise a level of suspicion about the ability of rigid identifiers and social constructs (like race and gender) to accurately portray the multi-dimensional beings that we are.

“There’s a dangerous corrosive side to identity politics, ie: making one’s gender/skin color/religion/sect/sexuality one’s *defining* trait. Between groups this can divide people rather than unite them, promoting rather than reducing group stereotypes, and therefore increasing discrimination.

Within groups this can lend itself to reinforcing a hegemony for those individual members who refuse to conform to what being a member of that group is *meant* to mean, as defined by that community’s internal power structures. This is like the old trope “You can’t be a true Muslim/black man, and be gay”.  ~Maajid Nawaz

Breaking down these constructs and constrictive identifiers will usher in a new framework for discourse.  Currently, major media and news outlets rarely put forth effort in facilitating an open-range discourse, and are capitalizing (and in many instances feeding) the toxic tribalism where only two-view points are presented without any real effort to find intersectionality or genuine exchange. We see the phenomena of “both sides of the same coin” playing itself out again and again as it pertains to a polarized duality of public opinion.   Thus, the vast percentage of the populace are unconsciously bombarded with polarized view-points that unseat their own ability to find the neutral and to explore new thought-forms outside of the limits of dual categorization.

“An unknown ‘something’ has taken possession of a smaller or greater portion of the psyche and asserts its hateful and harmful existence undeterred by all our insight, reason, and energy, thereby proclaiming the power of the unconscious over the conscious mind, the sovereign power of possession.”  ~Carl Jung

It would be prudent for all of us to examine whether our own psyches and intellects have been unseated by an unknown, unconscious force. We are now tasked to get back in the driver’s seat of our own consciousness, turn off cruise-control, and navigate our own vehicles.  Just as the fleshly body must be cleansed of parasites and toxins such that they don’t become hosts for worms that weaken the body’s vitality, the mind must go through its own filtration process to clear out intrusions and predictive programming that wane our original core vibrational thought patterns.  Otherwise, we are often just passive receivers of whatever the TV is downloading into our minds.

The Need for Innovative Narrative

So who are the new story-tellers who can create a more progressive narrative of universality?  A narrative where we seek to understand each other by coalescing in multi-sensory empathy and cosmic commonality?  A narrative which rejects that humanity is a simple, basic species that can easily be divided into boxes of artificially devised social constructs.  A narrative which recognizes that we are coming out of an age of spiritual amnesia – and many of our societal problems are related to our universal yearning for meaning, truth, and a desire to be connected, balanced, and whole in our relationship with each other and our selves. The need for a new narrative is upon us – and we each bring a unique gift that is required to comprise the tapestry of our immediate position in this time/space.

Path To Radicalization: A Mother Turns to Hate

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Jacob Goodwin, a self-proclaimed white nationalist, was charged with injuring a black counterprotester in the wake of the August Unite the Right rally in Charlottesville, Virginia. As Goodwin awaits trial, his parents become increasingly more involved in Goodwin’s extremist group, following a gradual path to their own radicalization.

America is becoming more hateful & ignorant --it's by design. Those in power play by an old but effective rule: divide & conquer. Racism & class conflicts reap rewards for the bankers, military, corporations, politicians & lobbyists. While the few amass fortunes from this demonic setup, the rest of us pretty much stay where we are fighting each other while they laugh all the way to the bank.....think about it & realize who your real enemies are.

The Anti-War Speech That Jailed Eugene Debs For 10 Years

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Musings

"Being in a minority, even a minority of one, did not make you mad.
There was truth and there was untruth, and if you clung to the truth
even against the whole world, you were not mad.”

- George Orwell, “1984”

Poet's Nook: "Follow Your Destiny" by Fernando Pessoa

"Follow your destiny,
Water your plants,
Love your roses.
The rest is shadow
Of unknown trees.

Reality is always
More or less
Than what we want.
Only we are always
Equal to ourselves.

It’s good to live alone,
And noble and great
Always to live simply.
Leave pain on the altar
As an offering to the gods.

See life from a distance.
Never question it.
There’s nothing it can
Tell you. The answer
Lies beyond the Gods.

But quietly imitate
Olympus in your heart.
The gods are gods
Because they don’t think
About what they are."