By Chris Rossini
We live in a fascinating and infinite universe. All of the knowledge discovered about it barely scratches the surface as to what is yet to be known. We live on an amazing planet, and this too contains secrets that are totally unknown to humanity. We didn't create ourselves. Lots of people would have opted for the bodybuilder/supermodel physique if there was a choice in the matter. We know almost nothing about ourselves, how the body works, how the mind works, etc. We know some things, that's for sure; but there's much more that we don't know. Not only did we not create ourselves, but we didn't create other people either. Even if we have children; they may come through us, but they definitely don't come from us. If humanity depended on people literally creating other people, we'd be in serious trouble. We don't know what comes next with certainty, or what choices we will make in the future. We can plan with some confidence of probability, but that's as far as we can go with our plans ... probability. Even if a person has had the same cereal for breakfast for 30 years straight, and is absolutely positive in his mind that he'll have it again tomorrow, a tornado might rip through his neighborhood and force him to change his plans. We don't know what other people will choose either. A vast majority of businesses fail trying to predict what consumers will want to buy. No business plans on failing. They all think they've got a winner. But the market always has the final word, regardless of what anyone thinks. So here we are in a universe that we barely understand, and on a planet that we hardly know. We didn't create ourselves, or anyone else, and we don't know what the future holds. Now let's start to mess things up... Let's say that a person (or more commonly a group of people) are sitting around the country club bar, and they come up with a grand idea ---- They're going to mold the world, and re-make other people with the use of force. Granted they didn't make themselves, or anyone else for that matter, but they're going to re-make others to their own liking. They're going to re-make not only people ... but entire nations. And then finally ... the world! They're going to micromanage every detail, despite the fact that every detail is fundamentally unknowable. The history that they don't like will be erased. The people they don't like will be censored. The news will be the news that's approved-of. Education will be what they say it is. Everyone will hate who they're told they're supposed to hate. Does this plan sound like it lines up with reality? Lots of people live their lives attracted to this belief. It's their mission. And not just governments or so-called "deep states," or "powers behind the throne"....but regular people too. The lust for power is available to everyone. It's an error that everyone is capable of making. Power, going back to the very beginning of recorded history is seductive...but it can only be destructive. The goal is always the same, whether it be 2000 years ago, or today.....An impossible quest to re-make others. So how is one to live while so many people run around forcefully trying to re-make everyone else but themselves? Well, a good place to start is with oneself. The person in the mirror is the only person that we have the power to change. It stops there and goes no further. But how does one change? What does one change? Well, there's really only one major thing that we are in control of: our mindset....our ideas....what we choose to believe, and what we choose not to believe. Everything else follows from that. Actions always follow ideas. Since ideas are what we have the power to change, we need some kind of standard. Which ideas should we believe? Fortunately, a standard exists! Every idea that we individually believe is either true, or false. So perhaps the changes that we should each concentrate on (for ourselves) is to first identify the truth and make it a part of our psyche ... while simultaneously identifying and discarding errors in our thinking. Since there are no individuals who are all-knowing or omnipotent, it necessarily means that we're always a mixed bag. Some things that we each individually know and believe are true, while other things that we believe are in error. While we can never get rid of all errors in our thinking, we can always climb higher and higher, learning more and more truth for as long as we live. Since errors are a necessary part of the human experience, the idea of re-making others seems ridiculous and a road to nowhere. Attempting to re-make others is a HUGE error! So what about other people? Is there anything that makes sense when dealing with others? Should we have an individual "foreign policy" when dealing with others? Well (since force is out of the question) it seems that the best that can be done peacefully is to set a good example ... and to also speak the truth! To speak the truth is to peacefully give of oneself to others. Now, that doesn't mean others will happily listen to the truth with a smile, or even listen at all. Chances are excellent that they won't...and that's ok. What another person does with what they hear is their own business. They may embrace it. They may laugh it. They may chastise it. They may hate it, and try to wish it away. That's on them. The "re-makers" of the world purposefully hide the truth from others. At least your speaking up gives other people a chance. Learn the truth ... speak the truth. Being both an input ... and an output. That sounds like a much better idea than attempting to re-make other people by threatening them (or using) force.
A leaked memo from Sen. Mark Warner's office details a plan for the US government to massively interfere in the Internet. They want to "protect" us from "fake news" and from foreign influence. Will the US government acting more like the Chinese or Iranian governments really protect us from "bad guys"?
A blockbuster new investigative report on mainstream news outlet AP uncovers the disturbing fact that the US is in a de facto coalition in Yemen with al-Qaeda -- who we have been told for 17 plus years are our arch-enemy. What's going on here?
By Ron Paul
You can always count on the neocons in Congress to ignore reality, ignore evidence, and ignore common sense in their endless drive to get us involved in another war. Last week, for example, Senators John McCain (R-AZ), Lindsey Graham (R-NC), Bob Menendez (D-NJ), and others joined up to introduce what Senator Graham called “the sanctions bill from hell,” aimed at applying “crushing” sanctions on Russia. Senator Graham bragged that the bill would include “everything but the kitchen sink” in its attempt to ratchet up tensions with Russia. Sen Cory Gardner (R-CO) bragged that the new sanctions bill “includes my language requiring the State Department to determine whether Russia merits the designation of a State Sponsor of Terror.” Does he even know what the word “terrorism” means? Sen Ben Cardin (D-MD) warns that the bill must be passed to strengthen our resolve against “Vladimir Putin’s pattern of corroding democratic institutions and values around the world, a direct and growing threat to US national security.” What has Russia done that warrants “kitchen sink” sanctions that will “crush” the country and possibly designate it as a sponsor of terrorism? Sen. Menendez tells us: “The Kremlin continues to attack our democracy, support a war criminal in Syria, and violate Ukraine’s sovereignty.” There is a big problem with these accusations on Russia: they’re based on outright lies and unproven accusations that continue to get more bizarre with each re-telling. How strange that when US Senators like Menendez demand that we stand by our NATO allies even if it means war, they attack Russia for doing the same in Syria. Is the Syrian president a “war criminal,” as he claims? We do know that his army is finally, with Russian and Iranian help, about to defeat ISIS and al-Qaeda, which with US backing for seven years have turned Syria into a smoking ruin. Does Menendez and his allies prefer ISIS in charge of Syria? And how hypocritical for Menendez to talk about Russia violating Ukraine’s sovereignty. The unrest in Ukraine was started by the 2014 US-backed coup against an elected leader. We have that all on tape! How is Russia “attacking our democracy”? We’re still waiting for any real evidence that Russia was involved in our 2016 elections and intends to become involved in our 2018 elections. But that doesn’t stop the propagandists, who claim with no proof that Russia was behind the election of Donald Trump. These Senators claim that sanctions will bring the Russians to heel, but they are wrong. Sanctions are good at two things only: destroying the lives of innocent civilians and leading to war. As I mentioned in an episode of my Liberty Report last week, even our own history shows that sanctions do lead to war and should not be taken lightly. In the run-up to US involvement in the War of 1812, the US was doing business with both France and the UK, which were at war with each other. When the UK decided that the US was favoring France in its commerce, it imposed sanctions on the US. What did Washington do in response? Declared war. Hence the War of 1812, which most Americans remember as that time when the British burned down the White House. Recent polls show that the majority of Americans approve of President Trump’s recent meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin. Among Republicans, a vast majority support the meeting. Perhaps a good defeat in November will wake these neocon warmongers up. Let’s hope so!
As promised, a new and sweeping round of US sanctions against Iran will kick in today. Though the EU has sworn to do its best to protect European companies from US sanctions, there is little doubt the Europeans can resist US demands. What's next?
Nothing is more expensive than something provided by government for "free." But there is more than a crippling monetary burden to their schemes. Endless waiting lists, rationing, black markets, and a whole host of new problems await Americans if they let government put the final nail in the healthcare coffin.
The liberation of southwest Syria from ISIS and al-Qaeda is complete. The "experts" were wrong. Many rebels surrendered or joined up with the Syrian army. After seven years of outside-funded "regime change" and unimaginable destruction, the country begins to recover. Will any lessons be learned in the West?
By Jacob G. Hornberger
The U.S. deep state’s hatred of the Iranian people goes back a long way, at least as far back as 1953. That was the year that the CIA, which was called into existence in 1947 when the U.S. government was being converted to a national-security state, targeted Iran with its first regime-change operation. And guess who paid the price for that operation. Yes, the people of Iran. The Iranian Parliament had elected a man named Mohammad Mossadegh to be their prime minister. Mosaddegh would later be named Time magazine’s “Man of the Year.” As many government officials around the world have done, Mosaddegh nationalized the country’s oil industry, arguing that natural resources belonged to the nation. The oil companies that bore the brunt of the nationalization were British-owned. Not surprisingly, they, along with British public officials, were livid over having the oil wells nationalized. British officials turned to the CIA for help. The CIA asked President Truman for permission to initiate a coup to help the British oil companies, which the CIA knew would destroy the Iranian people’s experiment with democracy. To his everlasting credit, Truman said no. That didn’t stop the CIA however. As soon as President Eisenhower became president in 1952, the CIA renewed its request for a coup, arguing that Mossadegh was a “communist.” Why did that make a difference? Because by this time, the U.S. deep state had launched its Cold War against America’s World War II partner and ally, the Soviet Union, which was run by a communist regime. Americans were inculcated with the fear that the communists were coming to get us, take over the federal government, and turn America Red. Thus, anyone labeled a “communist” automatically became a threat to U.S. “national security.” Ike gave the go-ahead to the Iranian coup. In a brilliantly cunning plan, the CIA successfully toppled Mosaddegh but, surprisingly, left him alive. The CIA then vested the unelected Shah of Iran with total dictatorial power over the Iranian people. The Shah restored oil rights to the British petroleum countries. The Shah’s regime was brutally oppressive, enforced by a national police-military-intelligence force called the SAVAK that was a combination of the Pentagon, CIA, NSA, and FBI. Trained and supported by the CIA, the SAVAK proceeded to subject the Iranian people to one of the most brutal and oppressive totalitarian regimes in the world. The U.S. government reinforced the oppression with money, armaments, and training. For 25 years, the Iranian people suffered under the brutal dictatorship of the U.S.-installed and U.S.-supported Shah. That came to a screeching halt in 1979, when the Iranian people finally had had enough and decided to violently revolt against their U.S.-installed dictator. While the Iranian people succeeded in their revolution, the problem is that they were unable to restore the democratic system that the CIA destroyed 25 years before. They ended up with another brutal dictatorial regime, this time a theocratic one. The U.S. deep state has never forgiven the Iranian people for ousting its dictator, the Shah. As far as the deep staters are concerned, no one has the right to oust a U.S.-installed and U.S.-supported dictator from power, no matter how oppressive his tyranny is. That’s what motivated U.S. officials to partner with Saddam Hussein — yes, that Saddam — the Iraqi dictator who they would later turn on and call the “new Hitler.” But this was back in the 1980s, when they were partnering with the “new Hitler” in his war against Iran. Still angry over what the Iranian people had done in 1979, all that U.S. officials wanted was for Saddam to kill as many Iranians as he could and, in the process, even defeat Iran and install another pro-U.S. dictator to run the Iranian government. I sometimes wonder how many Americans realize that that’s when the United States furnished Saddam with those infamous weapons of mass destruction — the ones that would later be used as an excuse for turning on Iraq and launching a U.S. regime-change operation there. Back then, U.S. officials hoped that Saddam would use those WMDs to kill Iranians. (See “Where Did Iraq Get Its Weapons of Mass Destruction?” by Jacob G. Hornberger: Part 1 and Part 2.) That’s what the economic sanctions on Iran are all about. For years, U.S. officials have targeted the Iranian people by using sanctions to inflict massive economic harm, even death, on them. The aim has been and is: Oust your dictatorship in another revolution and restore a pro-U.S. dictatorship in its stead or we will continue to squeeze the economic lifeblood out of you until you die. That’s also why U.S. officials are now beating the war drums against Iran — to get the same type of regime change they got in in Iran in 1953 and in Iraq in 2003. They know that there is no way that the Iranian regime could stand up to the U.S. Air Force in a war. The entire country would be bombed, just as Iraq was. They would be killing not only Iranians who serve their government as soldiers but also wedding parties and other “collateral damage.” Killing tens of thousands of Iranians in the process of destroying their country would be considered no bigger deal than killing Iraqis and destroying their country. Here is the thing that everyone should keep in mind: Neither Iran nor Iraq has ever attacked the United States. Iran is not over here. It is the U.S. deep state that is over there. The decades-long U.S. war against the Iranian people is just another reflection of what the conversion of the U.S. government to a national-security state has done to the morals and values of the American people. This article was originally published at The Future of Freedom Foundation. |
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