Nothing Ever Happened
A review of Seeking Truth in a Country of Lies, by Edward Curtin.
John Steppling
Some books demand slower reading than others. Ed Curtin’s new book is such a case. But then this assemblage of essays, many published elsewhere, is a corrective to the growing intoxication with technology, with the surveillance and the policing it is being used for, and to what Jonathan Crary wrote about in 24/7, a world where an artificial speed (or hurriedness) is layered over daily life: “Sleep is an uncompromising interruption of the theft of time from us by capitalism.” A corrective to the de-humanizing assault of capitalism.
This is a book that draws attention to what Curtin references (via James Douglass) as the *unspeakable* — the US capitalist order of crimes, from assassination to the continuing assault on the poor and marginalized. It is appropriate that the first chapter begins with a quote from Harold Pinter’s Noble Prize speech.
It never happened. Nothing ever happened. Even while it was happening it wasn’t happening. It didn’t matter. It was of no interest. The crimes of the United States have been systematic, constant, vicious, remorseless, but very few people have actually talked about them.”
This book is the unpacking of the delusion ridden world of contemporary America. And running through the pages of Curtin’s book is the metaphor of plague. Of course today is barely metaphorical at all. And so, the symbol carries even more resonance.
In that same first chapter Curtin writes…
One of the first things an authoritarian governing elite must do is to convince people that they are not free. This process has been ongoing for at least forty years. After the Church Committee’s revelations about the CIA in the mid-seventies, including its mind-control programs that left everyone appalled at the epiphany, a different tactic was added.
Now we have “experts,” social, psychological, and biological “scientists,” who repeat ad infinitum that there is no longer any mind control since we now know there is no mind; it is an illusion, and the residence of all intellect is the brain.
This is a particularly astute paragraph. And it dovetails with much of my recent writing. The trend toward mechanistic, instrumental, and technologically modeled versions and explanations of reality is now not just the received wisdom, but it is increasingly etched in stone, and not to be questioned.
Curtin adds:
We have been interminably told that our lives revolve around our brains (our bodies) and that the answers to our problems lie in more brain research, drugs, genetic testing, etc. It is not coincidental that the US government declared the 1990s the decade of brain research, followed up with 2000-2010 as the decade of the behavior project, and our present decade being devoted to mapping the brain and artificial intelligence, organized by the Office of Science and Technology Project and more significantly, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).
The current Covid kabuki spectacle is testimony to the truth of what Curtain is describing, and to the long range implications for this sort of thinking. The human as a machine, and this delusion is reflected in Hollywood nearly every week.
In our current dystopia the appeal of being a robot in the making must have a great appeal, a promise to an end of humanness — something that currently feels as if it only brings pain and suffering with it.
In another related piece the poet Galway Kinnell is quoted from a poem titled “The Fundamental Project of Technology”:
To de-animalize human mentality, to purge it of obsolete,
evolutionary characteristics, in particular of death,
which foreknowledge terrorizes the content of skulls with,
is the fundamental project of technology;
There is a chapter devoted to the disappearance of silence in our modern world. A chapter devoted to the spiritual properties of the pencil. These are wonderful and beautiful reflections. (Most poets and playwrights I know have an almost fetishistic connection to the pencil so I was glad to see it given such a full treatment.) In this sense, Curtin is a bit like America’s Gaston Bachelard.
Curtin catalogues the madness all around us, from the lies surrounding 9/11 to the lies sedimented in seventy years of deceit regarding the JFK assassination. He touches on current bits of grotesque charade, such as the appointment of Gina Haspel to head the CIA…
Thinking here in Rome of the Haspel vote, I am reminded of the “ratlines” organized by ex-CIA Director Allen Dulles and long-time Chief of Counterintelligence James Jesus Angleton.
These were escape routes for Nazi and fascist killers and torturers, so many of whom were brought to the United States and other countries after World War II through Italy to help the newly formed CIA torture the truth out of detainees and assassinate opponents.
Our post September 11 torture is nothing new. Is this what Haspel meant by “American values”? Many victims would attest to that.
Curtin is, in the best sense, a public intellectual. In many respects his work reminds me of everyone from Gore Vidal to Garry Wills to the writers of old Partisan Review.
Russell Jacoby wrote “we face the rise of a new intellectual class using a new scholasticism accessible only to the mandarins, who have turned their back on public life and letters.” And he added “The danger is that we have entered the era of one-stop thinking and instant commenting.”
One recognizes just how denuded the intellectual landscape really is when one is nostalgic about Edmund Wilson. Ed Curtin is a throwback in that sense, and I mean that as a compliment. But I also see Curtin as a voice not divorced from writers like James Baldwin.
Over the last, say, four decades the professionalization of opinion is in the hands of *influencers* and not really thinkers. And I see this all the time. People on social media will literally blather away in gibberish, heatedly debating topics about which they quite literally know nothing.
Curtin is also angry. And the anodyne professional academic is allergic to anger. So this is a wonderful antidote to the usual TED talk circuit.
There is a timely piece on NBA star Kevin Love and his admission to struggling with anxiety. Curtin makes this into a rather profound meditation on American masculinity.
Perhaps my favorite chapter, though, is devoted to Hillary Clinton.
Following the bidding of her oligarchic backers in the hidden government, she has always been fervently eager to lend her immoral authority to the massacre of foreign peoples and the destruction of their central governments. Iraq, Syria, Afghanistan, Ukraine, Serbia, etc. — the list is as long as her moral turpitude is deep.
But as the Queen of Heartless is crowned and feted in the City of Brotherly Love, it is crucially important that we recall her role five years ago in the destruction of the African country that had the highest living standard on the continent, excellent health care, free education, good social services, etc. — Libya.
It is, along with Diana Johnstone’s full-length study of the psychopathic former secretary of state, the best portrait of this quintessentially American ghoul, and the suffering to be laid at her feet.
She was fully aware of developments in Libya from the start; knew that the rebels were Islamic militants armed and trained by the U.S., Britain, France, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, and UAE; knew that they summarily executed anyone they considered their enemies; knew that this war of lies was aimed at preventing Gaddafi from fulfilling his goal of economic independence, not just for Libya, but for the entire continent of Africa by introducing the gold dinar into Africa as common currency; knew, in short, that Libya had to be raped, its Central Bank destroyed, for its exploitation by western globalists.
Thus her boss, Obama, in August 2011, confiscated $30 billion from Libya’s Central Bank that Gaddafi had planned to use for the establishment of the African IMF and African Central Bank. This is what Clinton termed “smart power at its best.” Under the pretext of “humanitarian intervention,” Clinton supported the killing of tens of thousands and the destruction of an independent country to serve her masters.
Paolo Sensini characterizes the Democratic presidential nominee perfectly: ‘Mrs. Clinton’s joyous exclamation on hearing the news of Gaddafi’s death sums up the recklessness and irresponsibility of an entire political class—an unrepentant class that has wreaked havoc around the world on a truly unprecedented scale’.
Ed Curtin is also a man who cares about culture. This is increasingly rare. I don’t even agree with all of his tastes (Terrance Malick for example) but I certainly appreciate there is someone out there writing about this stuff. I am happy to read someone WITH taste…especially when writing from a place of erudition and seriousness.
There is an excellent piece on Frank Serpico. A piece that also forensically takes apart the troubling implications of modern manhood in the West. There are essays on the cell phone and on suicide. On cyberspace and on the CIA. And Curtin draws on sources as diverse as Norman O. Brown, Gaston Bachelard, Lewis Carroll, Albert Camus, Rollo May, Marcuse and D.H. Lawrence.
There is a splendid valentine to Bob Dylan, too. Most of all, and in nearly every piece, there is Curtin’s distillation of contemporary experience under the aegis of our new dystopia.
Speed and panic go hand-in-hand in today’s fabricated world of engineered emergencies and digital alerts. “We have no time” is today’s mantra — “We are running out of time” — and while this mood of urgency has come to grip most people’s minds, deep thinking about why this is so and who benefits is in short supply. I believe most people sense this to be true but don’t know how to extract themselves from the addictive nature of speed long enough to grasp how deeply they have been propagandized, and why.
This is a rare and uplifting book despite the litany of catastrophes Curtin addresses. Curtin is always clear that the problem is Capitalism, in the short form. The dissolution of the USSR created the hole in intellectual energy that has been filled with a suffocating banality and marketed coercion.
The spiritual herein is the kind only those who reject institutional religion can provide. And I believe this book is so valuable because of the love Curtin has for genuine art and radical thought. Culture matters in these pages, and that is something increasingly rare today.
It is not possible to recommend this book highly enough.
Seeking Truth in A Country of Lies by Edward Curtin is published by Clarity Press is available through their website and most major book sellers.
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A minor correction; that should be “Nobel” Prize, not “Noble”.
Capitalism in its incarnation as Free Enterprise is no one’s enemy. What we have is fascism– the melding of megacorps with the State. Democratic capitalism failed to keep the State pointed at the control of the megacorps. The people are s’posed to be in control of corporate power through their control of the govt.
It’s a cheap shot to label “capitalism” as the problem. A mixed system of socialism/capitalism worked well in the 50s. Certainly communism isn’t to be preferred or any other form of totalitarianism.
Psuedo-Scientific Bureaucratic Nihilism…
… is what the octopus that lives in the rock-pool at the end of the beach reckons.
.
And your ever-reliable guide to deep state vetted pseudo Left news, Skwawkbox brings you up to date on the true situation:
So, whatever they’re telling you on the MSM, the truth is far worse!
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-54221953
“Covid restrictions in England will get tougher if rules are not followed, Matt Hancock has warned, as the government introduces £10,000 fines for people who fail to self-isolate.
…
Asked whether the government’s response was an overreaction given coronavirus death rates were still low, Mr Hancock said the number of hospital admissions was rising and an increase in deaths would follow.”
This guy has interesting precognitive powers. But I’m sure the mafioso tone is purely accidental. It’s not as if he’s saying, “If you don’t agree to these crippling penalties for offenders then …well, you don’t want to see more corpses, do you?”
These fines are amazing, the only people who could afford to pay them would be those untouchable by the police~” do you know who I am, if you value your job….”
In seeking to blame nation states and failing to examine the global governance that orchestrates internal and external crises, the crimes of the bankers and industry (cryptocracy) that profit from the wars, are excluded. In order to see the whole picture instead of glimpses, one must recognize that nation states are simply a tool for wars, just as religions were used as a tool to justify wars for thousands of years, before nation states or faux democracies could be conjured, or fictional borders could be mapped. Sporadically, during the twentieth century, manufactured terror and state sponsored terrorist militias became another tool to repress, confuse and terrorize the people, further enabling more wars, increased militarization, removal of civil rights, wealth and land ownership from the majority, to the banks and the cryptocracy. Manufactured financial terror and asymmetric warfare has been another well disguised and documented tool of war, used with cruel… Read more »
What exactly to we mean by power? For from our definition. all else proceeds in like kind. Power ‘set over and against’ is the wish to ‘lording it over’, but the power of living is unconflicted in itself. All freedom is here. They are not at all the same but are alternate basis FROM which to live. While these can be called love and fear, the use of those terms is also degraded such that fear can mask in care and protection while love can seem exposing, weakening and treacherous. What then of love of self (natural to being) is given to a masking usurpation by fear? To give fear protection and allegiance as our self is to be phished, but in the payload of the deceit is an active dissociation – indeed a prodigal mistake. Jesus uses the parable to give focus only to a true Inherence, never lost… Read more »
Mind control “experiments” have been ongoing for decades. These experiments are not limited to the urbanized United States, but are now utilized everywhere where radio and cellular broadcast exist. The persons doing this are committing a crime. It is not humorous…
New “Brain Science” Specialization, “Neuroetics”: Remote Control of Human Thinking, Neuroweapons, “Personality Simulations”, Nanobotes
By Mojmir Babacek
July 28, 2020
“It is good to know that to interfere with the brain activity energies more than hundred times smaller are needed than the energies needed to produce firing of neurons (see this) and that, in experiments with remote control of the animal nervous system, more than hundred times smaller energies were needed to produce its activity, than are the limits of exposure to electromagnetic fields set by the majority of the world governments (see this).”
Please read complete article: https://www.globalresearch.ca/neurotics-proves-politicians-not-able-solve-principal-crisis-civilization-any-other-way-than-classifying/5719680?utm_campaign=magnet&utm_source=article_page&utm_medium=related_articles
Since we already have global governance, they are ready to go live with some of these technologies against citizens in the 5g rollout.
Did you read that NASA Bushnell presentation? They leave nothing on the table.
2020 is the date from which they predicted the bio-nano age transitions from the IT age.
The “tele-shopping, tele-education, tele-commuting, tele-shopping, tele-commerce, tele-policitics, tele-travel, tele-medicine, tele-socialization.” aspects have been realized.
EMP, VLF, ELF. EHF. V2K. Nanobots. Nanowires. Nanotubes. Nanoparticles. It’s all ready for deployment. Including cyber warfare against civilians.
DARPA’s plan X. National Cyber Range (NCR) and USCYBERCOM and USSTRATCOM. The Joint Information Warfare programs at the JAIC.
Nano nanny is here.
am unable to e-mail this article.is there a problem?
thanks
Another culture cancel essay…
“…this quintessentially American ghoul” – referring to Ms Clinton. So, she is typical of Americans?
Don’t equate the American people with the evil forces that have taken over their country, (and most others).
One doesn’t have to take that as implying ghoulishness in Americans.
Clinton’s ghoulishness just happens to have incarnated in an all-American body, brought up in a decrepit political environment whose corruption has an American stamp on it.
Every country has its ghouls, and in fact I can’t think of a single country that doesn’t have some rather spectacular specimens right now.
I have lived in America, and I love the people I got to know there over three years, but Americans are represented, and spoken for, by their ghouls, just as I am spoken for by my British ghouls.
I understand from my friends that I am not a ghoul myself, and I’m sure your friends show you the same courtesy 🙂
It’s only from studying the American perspective that I have gained any realisation of how we are so imperialised in Britain. How thoroughly everything we are told about America is skewed to demonize it’s independent spirit. Recently re reading Charlotte Iserbyt brought this home to me. Socialism is the european device of control to subvert the escaped colony and bring it back under the financial yoke. It’s just a lie that keeps the Europeans under control; in reality it’s a cloak for fascism,a ruse to make any independent endeavours look bad. Long live the American dream~freedom from the Empire of greed.
I like Iserbyt a lot. Completely matter-of-fact and straight to the point. However, I think today’s Europe is far from what “socialism” is generally taken to mean, and I see little evidence that any serious attempt is being made to “subvert the escaped colony”, as you put it. I would agree that both the US and Europe are kept under control, but my experience is that it is the US which controls all important decisions in Europe. One example: Blair’s nauseating fawning over GWBush in what they called a “coalition of the willing”, but was, in fact an illegal invasion of Iraq, wanted by Washington, and cravenly followed by Westminster. Then there is covid… Reasonable steps taken in Europe to combat the risk, then, suddenly, because of a sudden realization by Trump that his administration had been careless, Europe adopts much harsher measures too. The Wall Street crash of 2008…… Read more »
Have you seen “the spider’s web, the empire of the city”? About tax havens,it’s good up to a point,but they seem to want the EU to tax them. Like they want criminals to be honest! The City (of London) is not part of Britain, the UK or whatever, countries are unimportant to Finance, it’s global. So the UK and the USA don’t mean anything to the people who run the show, they’re for the punters,the suckers. It’s like Dad and the pocket money, governments need the cash and the money masters,the Big Daddies come up with the readies if they promise to be good boys. Look how Trump and Johnson caved in over lockdown,the Headmaster waved his cane! The WEF is the Headmaster’s Union, but who are the School’s Governors? That’s for them to know and we, the first formers can only guess!
What you say about The City is all true.
I just got the impression that you thought Britain was the “Empire”, but, as you say, countries like Britain can be dismissed with a slight wave of the hand.
I still believe that it is Washington which does most of the waving, however. America’s assets dwarf Britain’s today. But your point about the global nature of Finance is an important one.
I think it’s all family business. Various relatives move to other countries but Europe is so OLD as far as trade is concerned, the base is there. I guess you know that the City is the centre of world law. I have gleaned that some Inns of Court, I think they’re called are above the law of the City,which is above national law! It would be so fascinating to explore that world and see what really goes on. Have you read Disraeli’s Coningsby? It’s pretty dull but Sidonia’s statements are very interesting though romantically spun. Sidon is a Phoenician port,which to me,says a lot. America’s the muscle, the war~workhorse but I wouldn’t be surprised if China is next in line. In a fraction of a second all the “money” in the world could go there,or anywhere for that matter!
And then there is freemasonry, which is, perhaps, not only that thing which the general public imagine it is. There is a very strong international aspect to that too, and not all individual freemasons are alike.
what hope is there in those you are defending?
which war/bombing/destruction/upheaval did they manage to stop?
https://worldchangebrief.webnode.comTREASON: Election Transition Integrity Project/
NY Cabbies Shut Down BBridge/
Supreme Frontrunner Lagoa/
DOJ Investigation Terrifies Dems.66 Devices Wiped/
FBI Director Compromised/
OZ Thought Crime/
Danish TV: Kids Chat With Nude Adults
What gets to me is people thinking America was once a great country with a moral compass? When was that? I must have missed that part of history. From the massacres of Indians, to slavery, to Hiroshima, Vietnam, to policies of murder and resource theft in Latin America, to support for the creation of the terrorist state of Israel, to supporting the Shah of Iran, to supporting Saddam with intelligence and chemical weapons against the Iranian people, to these modern day Middle East massacres, America has by far the worst track record. They just have a very powerful propaganda machine to con enough people into thinking they are “the land of the free.” “We” stole half of Mexico by armed force — the nice parts with rich deposits of gold and silver (and, as it turned out, oil — though “we” didn’t actually recognize that at the time.) “We” made… Read more »
The greatness of America and Americans is written on paper…And in their hearts Everything you are talking about was perpetrated by a few people lobbying to direct your taxe money to do those things. So calm down, you’re good people you just proved it with your comment. Unless you’re not really you.
Great summary. I would only add that “we” did it under political manipulation and threat of socioeconomic extortion by US and global ruling elites.
“We” one way or another followed imperial folly of Ghoulish “American Dream” spreading nightmare to others worldwide.
it is not to say that American empire is in principle any different from ancient and modern empires, Spanish, French, Dutch, Russian or British as the evil is systemic similar through all historical epochs of last ten millennia.
Pax Americana is as horrific and bloody as Pax Romana and while absolute numbers of victims exploded in recent centuries the relative scale of atrocities remained almost the same.
While “our” individual hearts and souls have been corrupted by imperial system and anti social culture of capitalism, that is not primary problem, the socioeconomic system of extortion of our evil attitudes of conflict and abandonment of the rest of humanity is.
It’s the money power, next it will probably rule through China. Just another entity to shoulder the blame before it moves to it’s next victim.
Great photo.
Similar things happened in every other country unfortunate enough to attract colonialism.
The N. American natives found the invaders’ emphasis on amassing things alien. When asked to sell land, they explained that it was like a mother, available to share but not for sale. Those who signed treaties as well as those who resisted all fell to the greed and perfidy of the self-Chosen. Now, their reservations are getting special attention for “covid”.
Nonsense, Indians didn’t “share” the land like a mother– they fought over hunting rights with other tribes. They were sufficiently primitive that it was fine to practice kinapping, rape, torture and slavery. Politically, they were unable to unite into a nation; their largest political entity was the tribe. They had no appreciation for property. When the head of family died, the widows had to give up all their possessions cuz they no longer had anyone to hunt for them– it was a death sentence. Women had no rights.
How much more do you need? Ludicrous idealization of primitive people. Many American pioneers were fair-dealing w those who could understand property, but the elite-run govt was not in any way fair to them.
The propaganda that characterizes American history is both too idealistic in its evaluation of Indians, and too judgemental concerning the American pioneer; they weren’t monsters.
amazes me too!
One of the best comments I’ve seen here in a while regards the supposed land of the free. You nailed it, and the photo says it all. I was involved in a Central American solidarity group back in the 1980s and early 90s, and I learnt all about places like Guatemala and El Salvador and the massacres and death squads and Reagan’s “moral equivalent of our founding fathers” aka the Contra’s, and no I don’t think he was being ironic either.
Yoyoyo, me2, GP. Which got me thinking, who will stand for herds of Buffalo sweeping majestically across the plains? Perhaps the indigenous aboriginal populations have a right to express their way of life & cultures, more in tune with nature’s cycles…
Californication, who am i kidding, when the key to grabbing the sea & poles, too, lies in the Data one presents to the Continental Shelf Commission, if you want to own the reserves in either Arctic or Polynesian islands, in France’s case…
World gone mad, Gezzah, world gone mad, i mean it’s obvious innit’, that Dennark owns all reserves and North Pole Territory, because, they are officially the happiest people in the world and eee, we know why, lol, blissful ignorance …
Greetings, Brud.
TJ
Good morning Tim! How are you and Danielle coping? I think I remember reading your son is in London? It looks like London and the UK heading for lockdown from information I’ve seen today on my newsfeed. Are things as mad in Bulgaria as they are here in Australia? Is there much resistance going on there? Actually, no, scrub that, I don’t think anywhere could be as barking mad as what is happening in Melbourne. We’re in a right pickle, aye. I’ve toyed with the idea of trying to get to some Island in Vanuatu or Solomon Islands, but the modest amount I have in my Super Fund would last me 2 years. Returning to New Zealand means mandatory testing and 2 weeks quarantine. They’re not getting my DNA! You would’ve noticed the most severe restrictions are in countries with one thing in common: Five Eyes. Hope your week goes… Read more »
Greetings again Tim. Hope your week has been going well. Give me your prognosis of how you think this is going. Are we fecked… or really royally fecked? And do you hold much hope that the parasitical vampires, aka the 0.01% at the top of the pile can be stopped? Have you heard about the Rockefellers Lockstep Document?
Sometimes I daydream that a small Island in the Indian Ocean would be a good escape. The Andaman Islands?
Somewhere off the coast of Madagascar? Anywhere?
Enjoy your weekend✌️
I think the confusion arises simply because of the people who have assumed power in America, despite the many Americans who would never dream of a career in that moral cesspit which western politics has become. Intelligent, decent, wise Americans are found all over the US, but they have more to offer than the pretence of “representing” their fellow countrymen, and they just don’t go into politics. Since the media cannot focus on anything at all which might be a millimetre under the surface, these “other” Americans are given no publicity. I know from experience that there are as many Americans of truly great spirit as there are such people from any other country, but they are not the noisy, attention-craving ones, so of course they go relatively unnoticed. That said, the economic, military, media and cultural influence of the USA worldwide has assumed such insanely gross proportions that decent… Read more »
Absolutely, Wardropper. You nailed it.
Oh Wow!!!!
One of the strongest things I have ever read.
Great Photo too.
Thanks. I feel better now.
Tony
Well stated! But, gee whiz, you make the Shining City on a Hill, the political jewel in the Enlightenment’s crown, seem so tawdry and sordid. In the interest of presenting a fair and balanced view, here are the first two verses of “The Marines’ Hymn”. As a parochial school pupil, I was curious to find a “hymn” that didn’t mention Jesus Christ or at least a saint, and didn’t come from a church. I liked it a lot; it was fun to sing! But of course the phrase “virtue signaling” was decades in the future, so I didn’t realize that “hymn” was a clue to the purpose of the song– apart from organizational morale-building, in case the self-righteous hubris of being a working member of a force internationally reputed as egregiously effective and vicious killers needed a sentimental boost. I also didn’t realize then that the lyrics were a naked tribute to… Read more »
The Mohawks exterminated the Sioux almost completely… and so on.. as shown in this surprising documentary… The idea that white man is bad… anywhere, … is a naive perception perpetrated by some “people”… and actors like… I forgot his name… huh we can’t understand what he’s saying and likes to butter up the buttocks of young girls when he’s visiting Paris for a last tango
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xDhb4WWqQHs
I realize that this is only speech without the video, but the documentary is well spread…
here’s a link to the full movie w video
http://www.documentarymania.com/player.php?title=America%20Imagine%20the%20World%20Without%20Her
Sorry the Sioux to the Cheyennes…
Don’t forget this……….https://www.amazon.com/ISIS-US-Shocking-Behind-Terror/dp/1615771522
The European money control never left America and has used it as it’s vassal in it’s urge to Dale the world.
Re: The Unspeakable
FTA: This is a book that draws attention to what Curtin references (via James Douglass) as the *unspeakable* — the US capitalist order of crimes, from assassination to the continuing assault on the poor and marginalized.
—
As acknowledged by both Douglass and Curtin, the term “the unspeakable” comes from Thomas Merton; specifically his book “Raids on The Unspeakable”. (Unless, of course, Merton has borrowed it from somewhere.) Curtin references Merton (but not Raids) here:
http://edwardcurtin.com/speaking-the-unspeakable-the-assassination-and-martyrdom-of-thomas-merton/
The book has sat mostly unread on my bookshelf for a couple years. (It’s rather grimly depressive.) Merton describes “The Unspeakable” on page 4. Ill perhaps do a scan, or find it online somewhere, but it’s not specific to capitalism. It’s concerned with a void in human relations – things that cannot be said. And it’s resolution depends on “Christian hope”.
I am not a Christian and am suspicious of “Christian hope” (often oversimplified to acquiescence to the evils of this world in hopes of a heavenly reward that is never explained), but I have great respect for Merton and his observations. I would substitute the term “Christian hope” for a phrase I learned on this board and resonates for me, “orthogonal ways of knowing”. This would include Christian contemplative prayer, but it is not exclusive to it, and when done correctly it addresses the void in human relations.
Sounds like you might, in fact, be a true Christian after all… 🙂 For most of my adult life I have considered Christianity to be an entirely separate thing from the Church, and so this sentence in the article has a particular resonance for me: “The spiritual herein is the kind only those who reject institutional religion can provide.” It still astonishes me that so many people cannot see Christianity in terms of simply following Christ’s work, but feel duty-bound to glue their faith to a large, cold building, as well as to countless priests of variable virtue, and to the superstitious quoting of clichéd sound-bites, none of which was given the blessing of the great teacher himself. I hesitate to risk sounding like a preacher myself, but it is becoming very clear to me that the wisdom in the Old Testament was, indeed, wisdom, but it was created and… Read more »
My critique of this article is that it sees the United States as a homogenous entity, a monolithic society engaged in the systematic subjugation of other socieities and cultures for profit. The subjugation bit may be entirely true but the monolithic bit is not. Having lived in the US for many years I tend to describe the system of government here as ‘organized anarchy’. Its an interlocking collection of entities, each with its own jurisdiction and agendas, an arrangement that was designed to promote democracy but as we’ve learned from our history it all too easily can be perverted to promote tyrrany. One big flaw in the system is that it is asymmetical — its easy to formulate negative policies that might disscriminate against or wage war on unfortunate peoples but its really difficult to shut them down, it requires huge amounts of resources to support endless arguments with no… Read more »
The US is a client state – it’s been doing what it’s told to since at least 1913
And before.
“You are a den of vipers. I intend to rout you out and by the Eternal God I will rout you out. If the people only understood the rank injustice of our money and banking system, there would be a revolution before morning.“
Andrew Jackson
They’ve all had
The fraud works by not acknowledging the realities of mind and being where technology can never be superior, or even functioning. Instead, they offer not life, not consciousness, but the small subset of human faculties within the limited reach of algorithmic simulation. These become the allowable, legitimate arenas of human effort, and our implied blueprint, a sub-human “trans-humanism.” That cookie-cutter definition of mankind is the straw man the technocrats can best and control; therefore, much schooling and propaganda goes into crafting that definition and getting us to conform to it.
The Lure of Technocracy’s Chessboard: https://www.minds.com/darzoum/blog/the-lure-of-technocracy-s-chessboard-1149097237262352384
Corporatism (what we have now) is NOT capitalism……stop conflating the two.
Same with cultural appreciation not being appropriation.
WWII never ended… Digital eugenics… The Genesis Of The “Deep State” 1. ABSTRACT: Fascism was never defeated in WWII. Long before Hitler took his cyanide capsule in his Berlin bunker many of his more perceptive generals and larger corporate weapons suppliers, who could see the coming defeat, were already planning and negotiating their dis-entanglements and escapes. These covert machinations, aided and abetted by their many war time fascist collaborators (fascists themselves, with many located in the United States), facilitated the propagation of a new and improved fascism that now operates in the present day in a ‘hidden in plain sight’ global, multi-modal format. This new and improved multi faceted format is a secretive (birds of a feather flock together) cabal of unelected self anointed elite psychopaths that make global policy. This policy making power and their control has been gained and implemented through an ingenious use of: the Noble Lie; corporatism;… Read more »
Ratlines a programme by Phillipe Sands is available on BBC Sounds for the interested.
We need an offBBC!
Actually it just occurred to me that this would be a great way to consolidate a lot of like minded media; offNBC, offCBS, offPBS, offNPR, offFOX, etc. All of these media conglomerates have many like minded whistleblowers that have left in protest, and many still employed by them that would love to leave. The key would be funding, crowd funding and advertising for nurture the earth only advertising (with a charge by wealth policy) and an open commenting system for feeling stifled readers, of which there are many. Also create a facebook, twitter, and tiktok knock off, with a save the earth low cost subscription fee.
What say the powers that be here?
Great idea. But the people who run this site are continually pushing false narratives and excluding the two most important issues of our time. Bankers and Radiation.
https://off-guardian.org/?s=bankers&submit=Search
https://off-guardian.org/2020/02/20/telecom-jackboot-a-5g-kick-to-the-groin/
Ugh. No. In relation to COVISCAM.
For myself, it seems I’ve had a colonoscopy and every turd I’m trying to produce is now awaiting approval, or being automatically dumped in a “folder”
This obsession with evil nazis has to end – the idea we fought that war for freedom and democracy is farical
The winners write history
It’s not an obsession with evil Nazis. It’s a focus on Xtrevilism and its genetic causes in human nature.
“We’ll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false.”
William Casey, CIA Director 1981-1987
Sounds pretty much like Australia 2020, especially regards the scamdemic.
They starting the big one up.Look at the lack of comments.Stop bigging you shithouse selves up and doing nowt.Write something good x
Nonsense.
All the articles here are like this. Lost confused and disorientating, almost like they want the aspirant intellectuals who read them to be more dumb after, then before digesting them.
Next article will be ‘from elvis to nano-tech and the origins of the oxygen molecule and its affects on Clintons electoral chances’. Your description is fitting but there will still many confused souls congratulating the writer on his insightfulness. If the CIA were to right books they would look like this one.
I made the mistake of reading the article again.
I think you’re being a bit unkind. People are trying to describe the ineffable, something that they’re aware of but don’t necessarily have the language to frame their arguments. (Its a variation of the situation decribed in “1984” where the goal behind NewSpeak was to make opposition unthinkable by depriving of the words it would need to use to be an opposition.) We’re used to history being a number of point events or people because that’s how its presented to us. We may be aware that its more of a continum but maintaining that thought is difficult, its like walk against a flood tide of conventional thought.– i.e. those experts Its difficult to avoid coming across like a crackpot (or their contemporary equivalent, the conspiracy theorist). Remember, just because a line of reasoning — a theory — is off the wall doesn’t necessercearily make it wrong and even it is… Read more »
Most of the articles herein are rather like op-eds; they blend facts and opinion. Perhaps I’m way too dumbed down already; but I’ve never thought of Off-Guardian as a philosophic journal or an art critics’ corner. It’s like, well, an alternate news site. Am I wrong?
Firstly, are you aware of any irony lurking in this convoluted, rather po-faced comment? What is your point exactly? Given your limited choice of alt. media which is prepared to stand its ground against the covid rollout, perhaps you could make any improvement suggestions succinct and ideally upbeat, or at least pithy. We’re honestly doing the best we can and we are pretty busy. Perhaps contrary to common belief, OffG doesn’t necessarily benefit from a surfeit of vague, disapproving dressings down. Frankly, we’re all just as sick and tired of life’s BS as everyone else, so please be nice and let’s keep feedback light and to the point. Thank you. A2
Surely you meant pro-faced comment… from johnnyBoy, lol
Broadsword calling … the eagle has landed.
Well, I guess we would like the articles to be more light and to the point… (relax A2, it’s ok, I get it)… but you know being rare and one of the few options might be a reason to be “overwhelmed”, but it could be a big responsibility to be as great as possible… Less poetry more … oh let’s call it respect to the reader (Not that. I know what I’ve done), would help pertinent info to flow more efficiently, and I’m addressing commenters as well… Some of them sound that they are looking for a publisher, and to my opinion, burning their chances.
We don’t have capitalism( or a democracy) we, as a central banking nation, have an economic and political monopoly.
Culture is but a set of beliefs, highly valued but constricting and changing constantly due to environment(banksters toxic political spewing media).
Its our humanity that has been forgotten but not lost .
Our being-ness .
That is the changeless in the ever changeful.
We are possessed by thoughts, and these obsessive thoughts are propagated(eg fear of death =covid thought form) by those that mind control.
https://notpublicaddress.wordpress.com/2020/09/16/the-rise-of-the-alt-right-msm/
Bollocks. The music I am listening to is not a set of beliefs. An Indian curry is not a set of beliefs.
No its music and Indian curry.
“Bollocks” right back at you.
You are listening to music and eating curry.
There is something to that point. What great music does for the soul is not dependent upon a set of beliefs, yet it does represent culture.
To be serious about this matter, I would say that culture is the formalized group experience and recognition – not belief – that spiritual, emotional and instinctual relationships to subjective things like “beauty”, “truth”, or “goodness” are realities.
We might disagree with Beethoven on various abstract philosophic matters, but his music directly transfers the beauty and truth of his experience of life from his soul to ours – if we’re listening, of course, and that is a cultural gift.
“Curtin is, in the best sense, a public intellectual. In many respects his work reminds me of everyone from Gore Vidal to Garry Wills to the writers of old Partisan Review.” John Steppling
Many thanks, John John Steppling. Totally agree.
In 1978 I used to wish I could see who I was talking to on the phone, that wish stayed alive till mobile phones were invented – now I refuse to have one because they are the most godawful intrusive things ever invented.
Glad to see a chapter of the god awful Billary who has among her closest friends the world’s greatest war criminals and is by any measure a war criminal as much as Kissinger and Albright are.
In the early 1970s, I had the opportunity to purchase the very-much-underground ‘black box’, which could phone anywhere in the world. The price was $500..Knowing hardly anybody outside of San Francisco, I declined the offer..
Now, I hardly know anybody outside of China, and have an old banged-up Nokia mobile in a drawer somewhere..
Why do people remain in a country which only makes them crazy; wallowing in their misery?
“suffocating banality”
Suffocation banality an vulgarity, that is exactly the way which I would describe the church of democracy.
It’s more than a little telling that John Steppling opens this review with a note about sleep, and how it interrupts capitalism’s “theft of time” – telling precisely because sleep deprivation has become our premier form of torture. Deprive us of sleep and there is no shut down of capitalism’s onslaught.
And, of course, once 5G (and now they speak of 6G in the wings) is up and running, and we all have our very own ID chip, sleep can be deprived any time, day or night. No longer the “New Normal,” this will be the New Horror, something not even the most dedicated torturer could have ever imagined.
And it only requires a half asleep low level functionary seated at a desk to make it all work.
I always say work is the same thing as a holiday.
She is a product of Baloneywood…
http://www.boxthefox.com/index.html
Pity that this is not my popculture playground.
I was going to post THe Workaholic by 2Unlimited or something with
The Jack That House Built.
Will Brittney rise again or will the memories just have to do?
I guess we will get to know one way or the other.
This also illustrates that nothing happened.
Besides lowbrow trashy amusement that is. Kanye 2020!!
For now I don’t have wifi at home and sleep in a Faraday cage (not really but seriously thinking of it)… The minute I unplugged 5 g and even 2,4, I slept like a baby… which effect is reported by many people according to the study I was reading
Unfortunately, we are already surrounded by electro-magnetic fields 24/7. And to anyone with any kind of heart problem, the cardiologists always – and I mean always – recommend a defibrillator, which is like having your very own smart meter right next to your heart. So nice and cozy.
a meter… not a solution then… for the rest of your comment, that is what the Faraday cage would be for
And if you’re implying there is no use to stay away from wifi because there are other magnetic fields, try it. Unplug the wifi tonight. isn’t your curiosity supersedes any preconceived idea? (Conceived by a bunch of murderers might you)
Oh no, I’m not advocating for wifi because “What’s the use?” Believe me, I’m not. I won’t go near wifi – not intentionally. I got a router for cable internet – but specifically told the cable guy I DID NOT WANT WIFI! Problem solved, right? Wrong!
When I tested the Non-wifi Meter, it registered in the Red on an emf detector. So I ordered some shielding from an online store; and I at least got the reading down to Amber.
Plus, living in a condo, I have eleven smart meters on the other side of my bedroom wall (it would be twelve but I opted out). The reading is actually much lower than from the non-wifi router. I’ve found that mirrors help shield the emf somewhat.
Sorry my emails warning that I had a response from OG users have gone into spam folder for some reason… Hope you’ll get this.. I suppose mirrors have a coating of metal on them… shield. I have an on/off button for wi-fi on my router. Switches off the wi-fi as far as I can tell… I also configured the router web settings to only use 2,4 instead of 5… In rare instances that I may need it, I just turn the switch on, but I got everything wired… I also found a device that allows connecting iphones and ipad with wire… connects to Lightning… This is fairly new I think… didn’t order yet but that could be useful… I’m wondering about this add I saw, about a disk stick on that is supposed to absorb radiations… to be stuck on Iphones, Ipads, computer etc… even router… weird because the connection… Read more »
It sounds like your email provider is starting a process with Off-G comments/replies that mine (Verizon/AOL) did when I was using Disqus on other blogs. Just out of nowhere all Disqus notifications went into the Spam folder.
So I complained to AOL. Their response: I stopped getting Disqus notifications entirely – no Spam, just absolutely nothing.
great…. chills your spine does it… ment this way
which is the point of the Faraday cage… just unplug 5G in your home… you’ll be fine and learn something. And do a little research will you… I don’t feel like redoing it all over again…
Oh crap ok I will… be back (after all it’s Sunday and this is important)
Here’s a fairly good one, https://smartech.gatech.edu/bitstream/handle/1853/62452/LARGEST_UNETHICAL_MEDICAL_EXPERIMENT_FINAL.pdf?sequence=4&isAllowed=y In it, on page 37, you will find this text: 2D2. Adverse Health Effects Identified in Major Review Studies Many thousands of papers have been published over the past sixty+ years showing adverse effects from wireless radiation applied in isolation or as part of a combination with other toxic stimuli. Extensive reviews of these wireless radiation biological and health effects have been published, including [Belpomme et al, 2018; Desai et al, 2009; Di Ciaula, 2018; Doyon and Johansson, 2017; Havas, 2017; Kaplan et al, 2016; Kostoff and Lau, 2013, 2017; Kostoff et al, 2020; Lerchl et al, 2015; Levitt and Lai, 2010; Miller et al, 2019; Pall, 2016, 2018; Panagopoulos, 2019; Panagopoulos et al, 2015; Russell, 2018; Sage and Burgio, 2018; Van Rongen et al, 2009; Yakymenko et al, 2016; Bioinitiative, 2019]. In aggregate, for the high frequency (radiofrequency-RF) part of the spectrum, these… Read more »
Ok lets see… on page 37 of that study… will try to get you the link somehow, everything I fart seems to be disappearing now. Just when I started to support my ranting w some actual studies 2D2. Adverse Health Effects Identified in Major Review Studies Many thousands of papers have been published over the past sixty+ years showing adverse effects from wireless radiation applied in isolation or as part of a combination with other toxic stimuli. Extensive reviews of these wireless radiation biological and health effects have been published, including [Belpomme et al, 2018; Desai et al, 2009; Di Ciaula, 2018; Doyon and Johansson, 2017; Havas, 2017; Kaplan et al, 2016; Kostoff and Lau, 2013, 2017; Kostoff et al, 2020; Lerchl et al, 2015; Levitt and Lai, 2010; Miller et al, 2019; Pall, 2016, 2018; Panagopoulos, 2019; Panagopoulos et al, 2015; Russell, 2018; Sage and Burgio, 2018; Van Rongen… Read more »
From all I’ve read and watched on the internet, emf exposure is extremely detrimental to a person’s health. This was first documented by the US Navy in the 1940s!!!!! Yet the mainstream is still trying to say the only danger of emf/rf is thermal!
The best documentary, BTW, that I’ve seen on the dangers of emf is “Resonance: Beings of Frequency.” I found it so good I ordered the DVD; and I haul it out periodically to watch.
We’ll be safe as long as we stay wild.
More from Baloneywood…
http://www.boxthefox.com/index.html
Thank you for sharing, I truly enjoyed this song and its message!
It never took long to say something worth saying. It never took much silver to buy a charlatan’s participation. All police and military, unIntelligent orificers and uncivil servants taking part in this charade are charlatans. It is long past the time to speak about the penalty they’re going to pay. If they are your friend or relative and you remain silent, you also sign up and qualify for the punishment. Read Solzhenitsyn on the preservational and satisfactional need to act now not later. “And how we burned in the camps later, thinking: What would things have been like if every Security operative, when he went out at night to make an arrest, had been uncertain whether he would return alive and had to say goodbye to his family? “Or if, during periods of mass arrest, as for example in Leningrad, when they arrested a quarter of the entire city, people… Read more »
I don’t speak to anyone in my family now who believes in or actively encourages all this. I can’t.
One of the worst effects of the lockdowns is the separation of friends and family members. Divide and rule.
Even so, many of the programed believe the lie ‘we’re all in this together’. Or, as the state of Victoria proudly proclaims ‘staying apart keeps us together’.
I lost all my friends in NYC after 9/11 for speaking openly. People simply refuse to believe or will not compute that the ‘powers’ would hurt them.
And a Coronel I knew in Argentina said people wanted the junta, begged for it, craved the order in their lives. He took me to a govt building for my visa and it was unbelievable, people bowing and scraping at him (not in a uniform – he’d been civvy for a number of years but they remembered him).
I’m trying but I don’t hold out much hope for us lot getting through this.
Dostoevsky’s Grand Inquisitor arrested and imprisoned the returned Jesus Christ. The Inquisitor argued to his captive that he, Christ, scandalously offered the people freedom– but that the people did not want freedom. The people craved miracle, mystery, and authority.
Although an inveterate agnostic, cynic, and skeptic, I recoil from the Inquisitor’s morbidly cynical assessment. But I can’t rationally deny it.
What in modern terms we would call authoritarian submissiveness seems pervasive. The manufactured Megadeath Virus of Doom crisis alone strongly elicits this response in much of the public, sorry to say.
Perhaps others will cheer you up with a spirited rebuttal to your despair, but in the meantime I can only offer validation.
The normie thinks everyone is wired the same way as he is – that is there is no evil intentions behind anything. He has not comprehended true evil, usually because he refuses to look at it.
There comes a point when these people will become my enemy. Because by the compliance they would see me destroyed (for speaking out, not wearing a mask etc).
Regards your comment about the Junta in Argentina, I’ve said a few times now that being here in Melbourne, I can understand what it must have been like living in Chile under Pinochet.
And no, there haven’t been murders of covid dissidents or people disappeared or torture, however a Bill before the Victorian Parliament would see ‘covid conspiracy theorists’ rounded up and detained to “protect the community”.
People… “wanted the Junta, begged for it, craved the order in their lives”.
It’s like that in Melbourne. The large majority fully support the fascist police state and the draconian lockdowns because they truly believe there’s a ‘pandemic’ and the measures are to keep them safe.
People here are now openly demanding anti lockdown protesters be jailed. That’s the road things are going down here.
Im just trying to get through each day, however hard it is. Take care Grace🙏
“…there haven’t been murders of covid dissidents or people disappeared or torture…”
How can you be so sure? That’s not the kind of thing that would be shown on the news, and it’s exactly the type of thing that cannot spread organically when the whole populace is on house arrest and forcibly alienated from one another. That’s one of the intended features of the mass isolation: the ability to quietly disappear or suicide anyone at will, since their social and communicative networks have been stripped away form them.
The Zen life is a lonely one.
But I do understand.
Personally, I often find a Christian perspective can help (not “Church-Christian”…), having in mind that Christ Himself did not shun His “Flock”, but allowed for their as-yet unawakened spirit.
Like you, I feel isolated from the community I once felt a part of – perhaps doubly so, since I am a classical solo musician, and that is also a very lonely life.
I am still pretty busy, although I no longer teach, but I can imagine how awful it would be to be at the threshold of embarking on such a career in the current circumstances. Concert attendance is drastically down, and many concerts are postponed until “later”…
It’s like “the authorities” want us all to be bank clerks…
Thank you. I remain a part of my community while feeling separate. Like I have always felt to be honest.
I also follow Christ.
Billionaires and Bolsheviks for Biden
Laura Ingraham
Sep 16, 2020
Fox News
Twin forces are propping up the Biden candidacy
So “Bolsheviks” and “socialism” are concerned only with race and culture? But it seems that our salvation depends on the middle class. Which makes it interesting to see what will happen when that class start to shrink – as it inevitably will.
In the US they largely equate Bolshevism with Socialism. My view is more European in that I think Socialism was hijacked by Bolshevism. It may, or may not, be possible to rescue Socialism from Bolshevism; but the problem is that the Socialists need to stand up and kick out the Bolsheviks. I have not seen any real sign of that happening. With regard to the concerns of Bolsheviks, their overriding objective is to smash society and crush humanity. As always, the question remains: “Where’s the omelette?”
Well I actually find your words encouraging. America has always fumed against “socialism”. I would interpret their use of that word as truly referring to “govt interference” – but only when that govt tries to redistribute wealth (which was stolen in the first place) so that more of it goes to the poor. Whenever govt bails out businesses, it’s OK. If they are starting to use the word in a semi-approving way then that must show a sea change. Perhaps they are worried about the growing unrest below. Of course, they have to have new demon word – thus the resurrection of the archaic “Bolshevik”. What this latter signifies in the present context is a socialist who is – oh Good God! – prepared to get up off his arse and do something about it! Hence such attempts to change must be interpreted as “to smash society and crush humanity”… Read more »
Re: Hence such attempts to change must be interpreted as “to smash society and crush humanity” (read: “to smash capitalism and crush the bourgeois parasites”).
Can you clarify this? Is this what you’re advocating:
to smash capitalism and crush the bourgeois parasites
?
I was referring to your comment:
“With regard to the concerns of Bolsheviks, their overriding objective is to smash society and crush humanity.”
That was not their overriding objective. But it is always the way it is presented by the defenders of the ruling order just as any present suggestion to overthrow the oligarchs or plutocrats of today would, without hesitation, be described by them as a suggestion “to smash society and crush humanity” i.e. the ruling class always present themselves as society itself.
And this is the way any true threat to the powers that be is presented. I would say that we need to overthrow not one specific group but the system of capitalism itself which, by definition would result in crushing parasitism.
Re: I would say that we need to overthrow . . .
a.) Who is the “we” that statement?
b.) By “overthrow”, does that potentially include violence?
Your two questions, like the answers, inevitably merge.
a) “We” are the exploited class, which naturally implies a “They” who are the exploiting class. We get poorer as they get richer, the two processes being mutually dependant.
b) As the above implies, violence is already here and indeed has been here all along. It just doesn’t seem that way because we in the pampered affluent West have had it so good for so long. But things are changing fast. And COVID is the first major sign of that.
I don’t know about you, but this operation also has the middleclass as
its target. Is that not clear by now?
It already has shrunk.
I don’t see the middle class as a target. What you are seeing is the speeding up of an inevitable process.
Granted, Marx did not live to see the rise of fascism but one theory I have read (which I think came from Trotsky) is that the most vociferous fascist supporters came from the middle class made explosively bitter about their new found destitution.
Too much eye-liner. Time to dispense with masks of all kinds.
Yes, it is. I don’t want my 10 y/o son having to contend with this fakeness. I don’t want my 8 y/o daughter to feel she has to hide behind a mask.
Who knows what the security state gains from the psychological disarmament of the male population which is forced to interact with the charlatan carnival of dating a mask, while he is judged by his wholesomeness and honesty.
We already know what it does to girls.
Enough bullshit.
I couldn’t get past the “blame it all on capitalism” tripe; and that was probably about the third sentence.
Well, I guess the ‘silver lining’ to your approach is that at least now you won’t have to worry about being forced into anything resembling actual – “critical thinking.”
I’m halfway through Mr. Curtain’s book and unlike you – I recommend it highly to anyone with a mind open enough to be willing to question the amoral neoliberal imperialist MSM drivel served up daily as our only possible – “reality.”
I don’t accept the premise that capitalism is the root of all evil. And I’ve so far come across only one Marxist (Michael Parenti) who’s worth reading.
Capitalism isn’t the root of all evil. Just most evil.
I posted the following a couple of weeks ago:
https://off-guardian.org/2020/08/31/offg-at-trafalgar-square/#comment-232345
There are a thousand hacking at the branches of evil to one who is striking at the root.
– Henry David Thoreau (Walden)
Do we agree on what is at the root of the evil and what are merely branches?
Do we even agree that we should attempt to strike at the root?
Should we simultaneously promote the highest good, and do we agree on what that is?
The root of the evil:
– Satanism / Satanic abuse of children
– Medical Fascism / Technofascism
The highest good:
– Natural or God-given rights: life, liberty, pursuit of happiness, etc
– Truth
—
Do you believe that capitalism is more evil than satanic child abuse?
My comment was a facetious response to your straw man “I don’t accept the premise that capitalism is the root of all evil”. I generally avoid a word like “Evil” since it is such an amenably propagandist term, but I would agree with Marx that capitalism has been the greatest spur to productivity there has ever been. However, as he pointed out, capitalism has inherently destructive tendencies which will accumulate and eventually overpower all. As for “Satanic child abuse”, if it is real then I abhor it. I have to put in the qualification since it is another familiar trope of right wing shit stirring. I also agree that Parenti is one of the good Marxist writers – and there aren’t many when you consider them in terms of style. Marx was brilliant at rhetoric. Trotsky, as someone once said, was simply incapable of writing a dull page. But much… Read more »
I understand where you’re coming from.
The problem is that we have been conditioned to look at the world through the wrong lenses.
It’s not capitalism vs communism or federalists and libertarians vs socialism.
It’s the lies that have been fed to us through the false narratives and false dichotomies.
There is no capitalism when a small cadre of private entities control the capital in conjunction with industry and undemocratic governments. That’s not capitalism, it’s a pyramid wealth scheme.
Michael Hoffman noted
Murder of Jeffrey Epstein to conceal the #Clinton/#PrinceAndrew child sex ring occurred on Bill Barr and Trump’s watch. It was murder with impunity. Same brazen criminality we’ve seen since murder of JFK.
Funny how the Q MAGATARDS cult doesn’t want to connect the federal prison system that was responsible for Epstein to William Barr who is ultimately responsible.
I am actually quite thankful that Trump isn’t omnipotent; but maybe you’re disappointed.
The stratgey is that people needed to SEE it; with the “it” being Bolshevism and Satanic child abuse. And now that people have seen it, the clowns are trapped, and the plan unfolds into the next phase:
Speaker Pelosi finally condemns riots and looting
https://off-guardian.org/2020/09/15/federal-judge-rules-pennsylvania-lockdown-unconstitutional/#comment-241318
Fmr. CIA Director Brennan: “I Am More Worried Today Than I Ever Have Been Before”
https://off-guardian.org/2020/09/15/federal-judge-rules-pennsylvania-lockdown-unconstitutional/#comment-242090
btw: I’d never before heard of Michael Hoffman, but maybe you can leave him a message somewhere.
FYI
https://nypost.com/2020/07/16/epstein-was-pinocchio-and-ghislaine-was-gepetto-accuser/
Epstein was ‘Pinocchio’ with ‘Gepetto’ Ghislaine pulling the strings, accuser says
July 16, 2020
Ghislaine Maxwell was far worse than Jeffrey Epstein when it came to abusing young women and girls, according to their most outspoken accuser — in fact, she was “Gepetto” to his “Pinocchio.”
“She was pulling the strings,” Virginia Roberts Giuffre told “CBS This Morning” of Maxwell on Thursday, calling Maxwell the mastermind, and a “monster.”
“Ghislaine was much more conniving and smart than Epstein ever was,” Giuffre said.
—
Trump on Ghislaine Maxwell
https://off-guardian.org/2020/08/11/youtube-shuts-down-a-russian-fox/#comment-219913
To begin with: Epsteins murder is doubtful when cross referenced with
the high profile autopsy shenanigans guy.
He can just as well have been set free.
And Trump, Trump is just about helping his jewish buddies.
First priority. He is connected, he is dirty, he is probably also
compromised and bought and sold. And Barr ia just filling a position
to either block or guide along proceedings. Not to make noise.
Not unlike Mueller and yet not as bad.
What I’m finding – and it’s quite an eye opener – since this COVID-19 madness has driven me from “the Left” to “the Right,” is that as many on the right as on the left see capitalism as a bogeyman.
Capitalism is not the root of all evil. But it is the greatest system ever devised…for destroying the natural world. Nothing else in human history even comes close to its efficient destructive capacity. I call it The Ultimate Doomsday Machine.
Do you really think if you get rid of capitalism Hillary Clinton and Barrack Hussien Obama wouldn’t have done the things they did? Lmao. These 2 evil morons are far more leftist socialists than any before them and the very party they support is so far left socialist it’s not funny.
Real problem with this world is the lack of God and family values. And no it doesn’t mean you have to believe everything a religion says.
Family values were smashed to bits by the Rockefeller Foundation,,, Expressed in every movie, TV show and news media since the 70’s and increasing… Men bad, Women very good… Since this is close to the end, it seems that they don’t bother anymore… 3 scandals popping out this summer in Canada (that I can recall), involving ruthless women in power sending their staff to psych wards… another stabbing her child in a park, a personality being exposed for gay sexual abuse in a bar… quite a surprising summer
We are so well brainwashed on this that this comment is probably one of the most uncomfortable to read… It it would have been about bad men, it would go like a letter in the post… now the letter is awaiting approval, lol
So ever present and all pervading capitalism isn’t to blame for Clinton and Obama but the mysteriously floating mystical entity socialism is?
The CIA has its influence right, left, and center.
We might say they have the upper hand, for decades now.
https://isgp-studies.com/liberal-cia-ngo-network#liberal-cia-superclass-i
Diverting the victim’s (mark’s) attention makes the theft go more smoothly.”
https://www.metmuseum.org/art/collection/search/436838
Second lockdown protest in London today – second time this blog has chosen not to report on it. Am I missing something..?
Perhaps it is time to ratchet it up a bit. They have.
“This struggle may be a moral one, or it may be a physical one, and it may be both moral and physical, but it must be a struggle. Power concedes nothing without a demand. It never did and it never will. Find out just what any people will quietly submit to and you have found out the exact measure of injustice and wrong which will be imposed upon them, and these will continue till they are resisted with either words or blows, or with both. The limits of tyrants are prescribed by the endurance of those whom they oppress.”
~ Frederick Douglas, 1857.
“Am I missing something..?”
Yes. That’s not correct, you have missed this,
https://off-guardian.org/2020/08/31/offg-at-trafalgar-square/
this,
https://off-guardian.org/2020/08/29/discuss-unite-for-freedom-day-of-protest/
and this,
https://off-guardian.org/2020/08/24/unite-for-freedom-protest-on-august-29th/
from the last one, which they clearly did report on..
Looks like the covid cult are regretting cancelling the sports. lol.
Thanks so much for posting this video. I totally can relate to its presentation. Well worth a watch and save..