"Republicans and Democrats alike are all but certain to seize on the F.B.I.’s findings to bolster their cases, and some current and former agents fear that politics will drown out any truth uncovered by the investigation." Well, eternal vigilance is the price of liberty and the people's movement has to monitor and make sure the Republicans don't try and use this investigation to whitewash Kavanaugh's reputation. In any case, the whole sordid affair has discredited the confirmation process, the nomination should be withdrawn for the sake of the reputation of the Supreme Court (what remains of it) and if Kavanaugh put the interests of the Court before his own he would voluntarily step down.
Sunday, September 30, 2018
Will the FBI End of Whitewashing Kavanaugh?
"Republicans and Democrats alike are all but certain to seize on the F.B.I.’s findings to bolster their cases, and some current and former agents fear that politics will drown out any truth uncovered by the investigation." Well, eternal vigilance is the price of liberty and the people's movement has to monitor and make sure the Republicans don't try and use this investigation to whitewash Kavanaugh's reputation. In any case, the whole sordid affair has discredited the confirmation process, the nomination should be withdrawn for the sake of the reputation of the Supreme Court (what remains of it) and if Kavanaugh put the interests of the Court before his own he would voluntarily step down.
Wednesday, September 26, 2018
Propaganda versus Truth & Light
"Mr. Malkevich said he aimed to turn USAReally into a kind of digital-first version of RT or Sputnik — both Russian media organizations that broadcast pro-Kremlin views inside the United States — and a counterweight to organizations funded by the United States, like Radio Free Europe, that broadcast in Russia and other countries." Well there you have it: one side misinforms people with propaganda and the other brings truth and light. One side presents the values of a system that produced Trump, the other one that produced Putin. Diogenes with his lamp would have quite a search ahead of him.
Wednesday, September 19, 2018
Kissinger Rides Again
Kissinger is certainly an egomaniacal jerk but the weakness of this article is that it seems to blame the victory of the National Liberation Front and the Communist government in the North against American aggression in Vietnam on his incompetence rather than on the superior military skills of the Vietnamese under the leadership of Vo Nguyen Giap and the justice of the cause for national liberation. Incidentally, the total incompetence of the US military was a contributing factor as its continuing incompetence has shown to this very day (it has no generals who know how to win a war and only throws out money and death in its efforts to postpone defeat -- its the most expensive, destructive and useless organization in history and should be prevented from hoodwinking young American men and women into thinking they are somehow "serving their country" by joining it when it is merely a political extension of Republican and Democratic politicians furthering the interests of Wall Street Banks and Arms Manufacturers and the tool of fraudsters such as Kissinger.
Wednesday, September 12, 2018
Russia Falls Behind on Domestic Abuse: Bring Back USSR!
Seventy years of "socialist" education and many Russian men (most?) and women still have medieval outlooks re the role of women. Women's rights have gone backward since the end of the Soviet Union as the following quote indicates: "Activists say that the idea that women in Russia are equal is a cliché left over from the constitution of the Soviet Union, particularly in the area of domestic abuse. And various organizations focused on domestic violence ... have been labeled “foreign agents,” forcing some of them to close." The US rejected the "Equal Rights Amendment" for its constitution and we also have a big problem with domestic violence but this article indicates Russian women are worse off than they were in Soviet times as under Putin the laws against domestic violence have been weakened to protect the family! Are families based on violence? Violence is the woman's fault for not obeying her husband: “A man beating his wife is less offensive than when a man is humiliated,” Yelena Mizulina, the lawmaker who led the effort to decriminalize domestic abuse, told reporters in 2016. She added that it was “mandatory” for a woman to respect her husband as the “authority” in the marriage." Sounds like some of the Republican Congressmen we read about!
Thursday, September 06, 2018
"Fear" by Bob Woodward: Cheat Sheet
Don't have time to read 420 pages of Woodward? Here is the "Fear" CHEAT SHEET"-- 10 points "to get" just from the NYT review -- the least you need for a nodding acquaintance!
[All points, except in brackets, are quotes from the NYT review]
1. Nothing in Bob Woodward’s sober and grainy new book, “Fear: Trump in the White House,” is especially surprising.
2. “Fear” is a typical Woodward book in that named sources for scenes, thoughts and quotations appear only sometimes.
3. Woodward dispenses in “Fear” with most of the small human details that brightened his earlier books. There is no moment like the one in “Bush at War” (2002) in which George W. Bush said to a Navy steward on
duty in the West Wing, “Ferdie, I want a hamburger.”[Do we really these brightened details?]
4. Among the primary sources for this book are clearly [Reince] Priebus; Gary D. Cohn, Trump’s former chief economic adviser; and Rob Porter, Trump’s former staff secretary'
5. Cohn is in some ways this book’s moral center. If this were a first-person novel, he would be its narrator. He is shocked at every turn by Trump’s lack of knowledge and utter lack of interest in learning anything at
all. It was pointless to prepare a presentation of any sort for him.
6. Mike Pence, the vice president, comes off as a glorified golf caddy who doesn’t want to rock the boat lest Trump tweet something mean about him.
7. About Melania Trump, [Steve] Bannon says: “Behind the scenes she’s a hammer.”
8. Robert S. Mueller III’s investigation rattles Trump to his core in “Fear.”
9. John M. Dowd, Trump’s former lawyer, does not think Trump is mentally capable of testifying to the special counsel. “Don’t testify,” he is quoted as saying. “It’s either that or an orange jump suit.”
10. If this book has a single point to drive home, it is that the president of the United States is a congenital liar.
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