August 20, 2015

Fight for what is right, not what is self-serving.

Otherwise, you'll end up being the same as the sharks you're struggling against.

Don't neglect to question the motives of compatriots as much as the opposition because some among those at your side (in any group) do not have the common goals in mind, but their own. Your own side is just as corrupt as the one you're fighting because humans are humans, remember that. Keep an eye on those who start climbing the ladder of influence. Don't get cynical but be observant and become a good judge of character. Be objective, and think for yourself, always. Find all the programming in your head that you can, no matter where it comes from (including the pc variety), and get rid of it. Don't tell everything you know, especially about yourself.

Figure that you have roughly 20% for-real people, 20% judases, and about 60% bandwagon riders -- they're in it for as long as it's the cool thing to do.

As someone upthread said, don't damage your whole future life on an immediate objective. It isn't a bad idea to create an alternate identify before you start out on activities like this, but it may already be too late as I gather your own side already knows you as yourself.

Have very good lawyers. Study OWS, they learned a lot, and it's recent. If you haven't already, read the Church Committee report, and you'll know the kinds of things that go on, and what you're up against. It's much bigger than you think, and different that you think. Always follow the money.

If you are effective, first the powers that be will try to bribe you. Usually that works, but if it doesn't the ptb wants you one of 3 ways: either dead, institutionalized, or discredited. Yes, they will flat out set you up, to do that.

I am 65, class of 1968. Look at what happened to my age-group, and you'll avoid a lot of potholes (MLK riots, Chicago Convention riots, Kent State, marches on D.C., etc.). A lot of clips of these things exist right on youtube. There were the public protests, like those, which everybody knew about and then there was the at least equally effective underground which never had its story told to this day. Believe it or not, it wasn't violent, it was economic. (Few people remember that an entire counter-economy was created then, and it was massive.) It grew steadily up until 1972 or so, when Nixon suddenly started using heavily armed black ops mercs. But enough was already done and the war did end anyway -- later than it would have. The public never knew the names of the figures behind the underground. Those remaining chose to live to fight another day, so to speak. There's no gain in being an unknown martyr.

I'll leave you with this. The music of that time wasn't just catchy tunes on the radio as people today think of it, it was about our current reality, and our music overall told our story "between the lines" because it couldn't safely be written. We were hunted in our own streets (even being white), and that's an eye-opening education in itself, maybe something we have in common more than you think... which continued more sneakily well into the next decade.

************



We were fighting to reverse a coup d'etat -- a coup that happened in broad daylight, right on tv, and nothing was done about it (similar to 9/11).

Many wouldn't call it reversing a coup, but other commonly stated causes boil down to that, including ending the war. It still hasn't been reversed, though we did seem to get close in the 70's with the Nixon/Agnew impeachments and the Watergate and Church investigations etc. But they didn't go far enough fast enough, and the culprits remained and got a second wind with Reagan/Bush and the creation of the RW church movement to elect them. (That's another story though.)

Without drawing any conclusions, I'll simply state this: did you know what Hillary's career got started as a staff lawyer on the Watergate Committee? Did you also know that Bush Sr. headed up the CIA during the Watergate aftermath? And who's running for president now? And that's AFTER 3 terms of a Bush, and 2 terms of a Clinton. And if we count the office of VP, it's 5 terms of a Bush and 2 of a Clinton -- 7 terms, close to 3 decades at the top of this government, almost all of the time since the investigations, except for Obama's 2 terms. One last name on each side of the fence, and what do people say, "both parties are alike"? I'm sure it's just a coincidence.

I believe in your cause, although I have very deep misgivings about BLM. But I will be watching how it develops, with interest. I want to see what happens with the Farrakhan march, for one thing.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10027079137#post17

August 16, 2015

You're an asset to DU, Cordell.

Thanks for sharing your thoughts. In response, let me just say that I don't know if anyone is alert-stalking black DUers -- maybe so, maybe not. I very rarely alert on anybody.

Not that anybody cares what I'd prefer, as it isn't up to me, but the only people I'd like to see the back of on DU are those who are consistently and deliberately abusive to others, via a number of commonly seen tactics around here. Just as one pertinent example, one of those who I have found to be so, from my interactions in the past and observations of the exact same thing with others, is someone who is highly revered in the AA group.

As Skinner always says about posting and juries "you take your chances"... meaning one jury may hide what another doesn't; it may be ok to say a given thing today but not tomorrow. I will say that there are more hides now since we went to a 7-person jury. Many of the 4-3 hides would have been a tie before, and ties were not hidden. Many of us were opposed to that change, but so be it.

But returning to the case in hand, that poster in the AA group that I was referring to chose to be nasty to others, and now if some are following them around and alerting on posts that aren't actually objectionable in themselves because of past interactions, well the choice was made to be that way and chickens come home to roost. It may well be that poster has simply pissed a lot of people off, and they are individually alerting on those posts -- it doesn't necessarily need to be a coordinated effort.

There is a prevalent mindset these days (case in point the BLM Sanders event) that being a member of a minority group (the same thing occurs in some others here too) entitles someone to be as nasty as they please to others, and it's A-ok. Sorry, I don't buy that. We have had lots of discussions here over the years going round and round the tree, trying to get these people to clean up their act, but they always insist that they are entitled to act that way. Yes, they state that outright.

I don't interact with any of that type of person anymore. I prefer to remove the oxygen from the fire so to speak. Others may react differently, I don't know about that.

But the point is, being nasty to people will not make them like you or support you. Some here just can't get that through their heads, and insist on continuing that behavior, simply SHIFTING the blame for not being liked or supported onto those they are being abusive to. That makes it 10 times worse. It's a sneaky type of slander blackmail and it's bullshit. A bad reaction to that is not very surprising. It has nothing to do with race or misogyny or homophobia or any other group identity (not that those things don't exist too), it has to do with people feeling entitled to bully others.

I don't care what color bullies are, I don't like them. I just wanted you to know what may be going on here, since you took the trouble to write your thoughts about it.

I wish you the best, Cordell, and enjoy your writing.

August 15, 2015

They shouted slanderous lies at the crowd.

Lies, is that how to build a successful movement? What reaction did they expect?

They called a crowd of white progressives / liberals, "white supremacist liberals". That is not accurate, that is a lie -- an ugly, nasty, slanderous lie at that.

I was 13 when MLK gave his "I have a dream" speech, and I followed all the events in the years afterward. I don't remember him ever shouting lies at a crowd. If you look at film of the 1963 March on Washington crowd, there are a LOT of whites there (roughly 20%). He didn't tell them to shut up and they're part of the problem.

What he did do, is describe a better society, and lead concrete steps toward achieving it. That inspired people, and they followed of all colors. It's the "vision thing", that's what is entirely lacking here. People are motivated by that, not by being berated, and having their past efforts for equality whatever they may be, counted for absolutely nothing.

Wouldn't the natural impulse be to say to themselves after that, fine do it yourself then. What is so surprising about that? If that's the end BLM is trying to achieve, the Seattle Two are doing a good job of it.

They aren't demonstrating to me that Black Lives Matter to them, because they're doing everything they can to strip away the only white allies they have. That tells me they don't really care about effecting any change, regardless of their words. People encouraging this are encouraging that same failure, so how much do they really care as well?

I see it as an attempted psychological manipulation game, and not much more. I don't see it preventing one police shooting. Not now, not ever.


ABC footage without commentary (Burt Lancaster's words about 11 min. in are interesting)...

Narrated, with background on the event...


See the difference?


Extended cell footage showing how patient this crowd tried to be...


Still think the Seattle Two's protest was very much like MLK's? I sure don't.

February 24, 2015

That's kind of ironic.

Did you know that Gloria Steinem used to write a column called "Teddy Bear Tricks" for Glamour Magazine during the mid-1960s? I knew her writing from that column way before she was a famous feminist.

The photo below is of the September 1964 cover. In the bottom left-hand corner it says, "The Spy Story by Gloria Steinem... Plus Ways to Catch James Bond". It's very faint but I know that because a copy of that magazine recently sold on Ebay, which listed the cover articles in the description.

Oh, and... she also wrote for Cosmopolitan too -- for one thing that I know of, an interview with John Lennon in 1964, and possibly more.

February 23, 2015

I couldn't disagree with you more.

Nationalism is not an invention of the right, it's the concept all countries were based on up until recently, except maybe nomadic tribes. Just because some problems cross borders, that doesn't mean there shouldn't BE borders.

Nations are nothing more than logical units of government, just as states are, and nobody says there shouldn't be states, so what is so especially toxic about nations that they shouldn't exist? They are practical, making self-government possible. They are metaphorically like having "yards" which we can keep up and customize ourselves, rather than "open space" which is necessarily hired out and one-size-fits-all.

The more we coalesce into one globalist blob, the more we are prey to the wealthy vultures. It becomes harder for us to manage and defend ourselves, and it becomes easier for the vultures to scoop us out of one nest rather than many.

Up until rather recently, we functioned quite well as a nation, by making bilateral agreements with one other nation at a time, or at most a few, as needed. Each country should be first and foremost its own market, and then import what it doesn't have and export surpluses. That is how the American model was intended to work, and it did work. Now, as globalism spreads, it works less all the time, as the economies of the world compete for and cater mostly to, not their own populations, but the small percentage of affluent consumers in all countries. Gee, that must a coincidence, I suppose? (Not!)

Today, we very seldom even see LOCAL PRODUCE in the grocery stores, in an agricultural state. We have onions etc. (not special ones) from some other country. You know why? Because it's more convenient for the international grocery giants to order that way. Why should ordinary produce, which literally grows surrounding the store, be shipped and trucked from across the globe? And what is THAT doing for the environment? our health? our jobs? our future? And that's just one example.

We have outsmarted ourselves. People are only beginning to admit that fact. Those admitting that globalism is a failure, are not the problem. Those resistant to change are those holding onto globalism... it's a failed ideology which not only doesn't work now, it never will, just like "trickle down" economics never will. Because it's bullshit, fascist-serving bullshit.

Life is not a John Lennon song.

Btw, some liberals do not have so much of a "we're all in this together" mentality as they like to think -- they are very much attached to their niche politics -- the focus on minority rights over civil rights or human rights; and identity by interest-group communities rather than as Americans.

Also, the "invisible hand" has to do with laissez-faire capitalism, not nationalism. There is a difference. And nationalism does not mean "yay, we're the best!" It is maintaining, as much as possible, the autonomy of the nation as a political unit.

February 11, 2015

Maybe POTUS will go on tv and tell all of us believers

not to get on our high horse about atheists too, for merely expressing outrage at the shooter.

It would be just about as relevant as the last time he did it, to Christians about the ISIS atrocities... not relevant at all.

Of course I mean to include along with Obama, the whole bandwagon of people here and elsewhere who did the same thing.

February 7, 2015

I'm not so sure

that there isn't another hidden hand one step up the food chain, pulling the Saudi's strings too. For one thing, the Saudis didn't really have a good enough motive for taking down the WTCs, but some in the US certainly did. Also, I can't quite see the fact of Prescott Bush and friends financing and creating Hitler, as a one-time scheme that didn't pay off for them afterward. (I'm sure it did pay off, as planned, and not in an obvious, traceable way.)

Something just tells me, even if the Saudis get caught red-handed at this level, the endpoint of it comes back to the US and/or London, and the bankers.

Then too, I happen to know that the "gas crisis" was phony, because I happened to be driving across country at that time, and strangely enough... the crisis was almost entirely on the coasts in the big cities. There were long lines for gas in California, and I didn't encounter another one until I got back to Maryland. Prices weren't even terribly high in between. The weird thing was, that nobody was reporting that. It was obviously a fraud, but it sure reallocated a ton of money in a big way... out of the pockets of people who earned it, to -- guess where.

And presto! at roughly the same time, terrorism broke out as a new thing internationally, and never quite went away.

Anyway, you never know what will start the web unraveling. If this gets disclosed... let's just say I believe that every now and then, the human race gets lucky, and the balance gets evened up a bit.

February 6, 2015

Russia leads U.N. initiative to target ISIS financing (Al Arabiya)

Al Arabiya English
By Louis Charbonneau, Reuters | United Nations
Thursday, 5 February 2015


Russia is leading a U.N. Security Council initiative to ratchet up pressure on countries to cut off the cash flow to Islamic State militants, Russia and council diplomats said on Wednesday.

...

Russia circulated a draft to the council’s other permanent members - the United States, Britain, France and China - and is expected to distribute it to the full council soon, Western diplomats said, speaking on condition of anonymity. They noted that Moscow rarely drafts council resolutions.

...

The resolution will focus on the three main sources of revenue for Islamic State: oil, the sale of antiquities and ransom from kidnappings.

The resolution will demand that countries not purchase oil from Islamic State, stop paying ransoms and not buy antiquities looted by the group.

...

http://english.alarabiya.net/en/News/middle-east/2015/02/05/Russia-leads-U-N-initiative-to-target-ISIS-financing.html


_____________________________

Among other details, the article gives specific numbers about income from the three sources, and also mentioned two more: donations, and "illegal taxation" from captured areas (meaning, protection money I suppose). It states that the Russians are interested in doing this resolution about ISIS because of "the number of Chechens that have joined the group".

I'm putting it here because I thought it might be of interest to some, but also thought it might not fit in LBN.

February 5, 2015

Your "point" gives ISIS a pass.

Everybody does it, or has done it, so it's ok. Even if that was true, which it isn't, using the ISIS atrocities to make a self-indulgent point about hypocrisy, is lame beyond description. Is that what matters the most right now?

WTF is wrong with you? ISIS' PR cadre thanks you -- now it knows just what to say to manipulate more Westerners into their cause. And btw, I just heard POTUS make the same dumb point in a speech on tv.

(shaking head) How dumb ARE people right now? Is this puny little axe to grind so earth-shakingly important that you simply CANNOT refrain from grinding it to enable those killers at THIS particular moment? Really?

I usually like your posts, and as noted you aren't the only one who has said this, here and elsewhere. Until now, I had hoped it was just a person here or there having a thoughtless moment, and didn't comment, but no more. Stop it!

Or... next time you see one of ISIS' atrocities you can pat yourself on the back for doing your bit to give it the moral cover and psychological acceptance it will use to do more of the same.

Some people (speaking generally, where the shoe fits) who like to note endless responsibility for things should take stock of their own responsibility.

January 26, 2015

I know next to nothing about this controversy

except that it exists, because I'm not a gamer. But I just finished reading a whole, long article about it on Wikipedia which appears to me to be 99.9% favorable to the women and critical of those harassing them, so... I don't quite get what's supposed to be going on. Link below, if others care to see for themselves...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gamergate_controversy

I don't see the "war on women" in that at all, so if it isn't there in an article specifically about Gamergate then where would one expect to see it, exactly? If it has no reflection in the articles and it's only in the fact of those five particular women being dropped from editing, that decision may have been valid or unfair but whatever else it is, it certainly doesn't constitute a war on women.

The OP article links back to a largely similar one from Gawker, and from what I read on the Wiki piece, I gather that Gawker has itself had some involvement or role of its own in the controversy in some way. I don't know what that says, but it doesn't make the allegations more credible for me.

While I sincerely sympathize with the women who are being threatened by the Gamergaters as described, and that fact that they ARE being bullied in such a manner seems entirely evident, I am not prepared based on this piece to take up pitchforks against Wikipedia as the OP article and its link are clearly trying to persuade readers to do.

I'm aware that there are seemingly valid criticisms about Wikipedia's accuracy on various subjects, but I have to say that on the subjects that I do know a lot about first-hand, their articles have been very well done. So credit where credit is due. It is often a useful site, certainly as worthwhile as lots of others.

I won't be joining the outrage-at-Wikipedia bandwagon just yet, but if more emerges from this story which changes my impression of it, I'll see when / if it happens.