We’ve lived so long under the spell of hierarchy—from god-kings to feudal lords to party bosses—that only recently have we awakened to see not only that “regular” citizens have the capacity for self-governance, but that without their engagement our huge global crises cannot be addressed. The changes needed for human society simply to survive, let alone thrive, are so profound that the only way we will move toward them is if we ourselves, regular citizens, feel meaningful ownership of solutions through direct engagement. Our problems are too big, interrelated, and pervasive to yield to directives from on high.
—Frances Moore Lappé, excerpt from Time for Progressives to Grow Up

Friday, October 17, 2014

The Anti-Empire Report #133

Click here to access the current report from William Blum posted on The Anti-Empire Report.

If you haven't already subscribed to his reports, I advise you to do so. 

This report contain three articles. The first, entitled "The Islamist State" looks askance at all the chaos created by the Empire and the many lies they are telling about it.
The groundwork for this awful mess of political and religious horrors sweeping through the Middle East was laid – laid deeply – by the United States during 35 years (1979-2014) of overthrowing the secular governments of Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya, and Syria. (Adding to the mess in the same period we should not forget the US endlessly bombing Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen.) You cannot destroy modern, relatively developed and educated societies, ripping apart the social, political, economic and legal fabric, torturing thousands, killing millions, and expect civilization and human decency to survive.

Particularly crucial in this groundwork was the US decision to essentially throw 400,000 Iraqis with military training, including a full officer corps, out onto the streets of its cities, jobless. It was a formula for creating an insurgency.
The second entitled "The Berlin Wall – Another Cold War Myth" exposes the real history of the Cold Wars years in the context of the Empire's propaganda about the Berlin Wall. I highly recommend that you read an article referenced in Blum's report entitled "Humpty-Dumpty and the Fall of Berlin's Wall" authored by a McCarthy-era American political refugee who fled to East Germany in the 1950s and has lived there ever since--Victor Grossman.

The third article entitled "Al Franken, the liberal’s darling" features an accurate exposé of another liberal supported by fake progressives. Empire directors like to have a sprinkling of such people in their government to preserve some semblance of diversity in their "representative" government and to support their myths about "democracy".