Twitter Bans RT and Sputnik Ads - McCarthyist Assault on #AltMedia Continues

Can't say I'm surprised by this one bit.

Twitter Inc on Thursday banned advertisements from accounts owned by Russian media outlets Russia Today (RT) and Sputnik, citing allegations by U.S. intelligence agencies that the outlets tried to interfere with the 2016 U.S. election. [..]

Election-meddling is “not something we want on Twitter,” the San Francisco-based social network said in an unsigned statement.

“We did not come to this decision lightly, and are taking this step now as part of our ongoing commitment to help protect the integrity of the user experience on Twitter,” the company said.

[Source]

What election meddling? Telling the truth is now election meddling? Reporting facts rather than mere suppositions and lies is now election meddling? Real Journalism is now election meddling? Are we all Russian agents now when we expose the lies and propaganda being spread in mainstream, major media outlets (e.g., NY TImes, Washington Post, Fox News, MsNBC, CNN, to name but a few) every damn day?

YouTube has already demonetized many popular RT programs, as well as many other progressive sites from The Sane Progressive (who has moved to bitchute as a result of having her videos removed by YouTube), to Secular Report to Tim Black, among countless others.

So to say I am surprised Twitter is moving toward censorship of alternative news sources is shocking would be a lie. But the fact they are doing it as a result of naked allegations by "US intelligence agencies" without any basis in fact is disturbing to say the least. We are quickly headed down a road where the only news outlets that will be allowed to broadcast will be owned by large multinational corporations doing the bidding of their corporate sponsors and advertisers, which includes the US military oh by the way, with an ad budget of over $1.4 Billion.

Anyone reporting stories that don't comply with the approved narratives of large corporations, or that threaten the agenda of the intelligence community and the US Military, are now squarely in the cross-hairs. They mean to take alternative media down by marginalizing its influence, making it too expensive for alternative news outlets to remain in business and by direct censorship where they deem it necessary. Those of us who frequent political sites are aware of this dangerous trend, but the vast majority of Americans who do not spend much time watching the news are often unaware how much "fake news" is being promoted by major media outlets. It's been going on for a while now, but Trump's election seems to have accelerated the process. The "New McCarthyism" is in full swing.

And whether you like Trump or despise him, as I do, this is not "good news" for the future of our country, and more importantly for the future of its people.

Share
up
0 users have voted.

Comments

detroitmechworks's picture

who don't do nice, friendly censored work for a mainstream media audience.

Apparently there were rumors that an "Expose" on their enabling of pornography was imminent.

Honestly, it is now to the point where unless you toe EXACTLY the corporate line, they will take away your money.

And if you claim it's your livelihood, they claim that's not their problem.

up
0 users have voted.

I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@detroitmechworks Oh fuck.

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

k9disc's picture

media.

And I know everybody "knows" that, but do they?

I've never heard it said like that before, and I've been an anti-corporate activist for decades.

We need to push that, HARD, expand upon it, and make it real live conventional wisdom.

Pretty scary stuff.

up
0 users have voted.

“Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” ~ Sun Tzu

k9disc's picture

I mean, isn't that election meddling via the media?

up
0 users have voted.

“Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” ~ Sun Tzu

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@k9disc Only if you're opposing Hillary Clinton.

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

do we want to discuss what we want to do to secure our connections to each other--our ability to communicate?

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

detroitmechworks's picture

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal But I absolutely would like to discuss your Cheese for sale.

[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ystMcVC9JVI]

up
0 users have voted.

I do not pretend I know what I do not know.

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@detroitmechworks Good point.

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Pluto's Republic's picture

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal

Finding an alternate opt-in communication method.

But now that we have Adolph Twitler enthusiastically acting as the Thought Police of American minds, which is an historic moment of Constitutional failure, we might have to acknowledge the risk could be greater than the reward. Our success in influencing influencers in their own analysis and critical thinking puts the spotlight on us. That was fine when the plutocrats weren't panicking over their dead Petrodollar and worthless bonds and freaking out that their empire might actually be dead and the sun finally setting on dollar hegemony after yesterday's convertible gold-yuan debut. God only knows what they will do when the only "enemy" they can get their hands on is the domestic intelligentsia. The media and journalists folded like cheap suits, early on. We're swimming naked.

up
0 users have voted.
Populations don’t like wars. They have to be lied into it.
That means we can be “truthed” into peace. — Julian Assange
Anja Geitz's picture

@Pluto's Republic

About the gold/yuan debut yet? I'm not sure I fully understand the implications of it in relation to the U.S. Dollar, and I suspect I am not alone in my desire to understand the connection.

up
0 users have voted.

There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier

Pluto's Republic's picture

@Anja Geitz

But I've been waiting for it to make the news in the US. That would give it relevance and speed the learning curve, and allow me to counter any specific misinformation.

Meanwhile, the rest of the world is having a conversation about it and making plans. Change is in bloom, one would think the US would want to participate. This, out of a think tank in the Netherlands, is not untypical:

It’s time to stop the monetary dominance of the USA by the USD: it not only gives them a free ride on the global economy, it delivers them also the possibility to ‘jail’ any nation of the world without any evidence let alone any objective public trial. It’s time to ‘jail break’ out of this very unfair USD powered global submission system. Time to stop paying for our own jailing (which is what using the USD basically is). Less risks, more security, not only national, nor only economic, but also and foremost monetary. It’s time that other nations have a fair playing field with the USA.

How to do that? How to realize in a short time a monetary world where the USD does not have the big role it had before, and therefore the USA has no leverage over global monetary systems, over global economic systems, over global political systems and over global military systems. And even more important: how to do all this in a peaceful way that doesn’t backfire.

Simply conduct international business in your own currency. When this is done, the USA can’t ‘tax’ the transactions anymore (i.e. can’t profit off the demand for USD that the transaction requires, which artificially raises the dollar's value long enough to give the US a discount at our expense). Your economy and monetary system would be pulled out of the USA sphere of influence/power (making or breaking) and therefore also out of their ‘global taxation by the USD’. Simply by stipulating that international business is done in your own currency, the grip of the USA on the world (which is quite arsenic since 2001: they have become the hooligans of the world, economic, political and military, openly -Iraq, Libya, etc- or semi-stealth by proxy -Syria, Ukraine, etc-) will be sized down instantly and effectively.

The world knows what needs to be done. Ending the Dollar's reserve currency bullying will create an opportunity for Americans to take their country back. I wish they could be forewarned so they knew what to expect (and whom to blame).

up
0 users have voted.
Populations don’t like wars. They have to be lied into it.
That means we can be “truthed” into peace. — Julian Assange
Anja Geitz's picture

@Pluto's Republic

Especially since money is the ultimate driving force infecting the sociopaths running this country, it seems prudent to understand the bigger picture.

up
0 users have voted.

There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier

k9disc's picture

I came to the conclusion a few days ago that there is a significant difference between a Sociopath and a Psychopath:
Sociopaths care if you know.

So if you know someone is a sociopath, or you have the goods on them, they WILL come for you with a complete lack of morality. Psychopaths? They don't care if you know.

Any thoughts on this?
@Anja Geitz

up
0 users have voted.

“Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” ~ Sun Tzu

WaterLily's picture

@Pluto's Republic And, learning a lot from it. Thanks in advance for all the hard work.

Heading out on a rather unexpected and serendipitous bucket list trip on Saturday, to New Zealand. Not taking any electronics save a camera. I may never come back ...

... but when I inevitably do (sigh), C99 is the first place I'm going to visit to get caught up.

up
0 users have voted.

@WaterLily has a clear and concise article on the Yuan, the Ruble, and the Dollar System. Delves into some history and current context.
Basically, if the Yuan moves ahead of the Euro as a reserve currency, the Dollar will be weakened as more counties along the OBOR adopt the Yuan.
Check the article, worth the read.

Stop These Fucking Wars

peace

up
0 users have voted.

Ya got to be a Spirit, cain't be no Ghost. . .

Explain Bldg #7. . . still waiting. . .

If you’ve ever wondered whether you would have complied in 1930’s Germany,
Now you know. . .
sign at protest march

WaterLily's picture

@Tall Bald and Ugly I will definitely read that article. And I appreciate the TL;DL version. Is it bad to root for the dollar to be weakened? Seems like our only hope for real change.

up
0 users have voted.
snoopydawg's picture

@WaterLily

Hopefully you will post some of your photos on the Friday night photography essays.
This is on my bucket list.

up
0 users have voted.

“When out of fear you twist the lesser evil into the lie that it is something good, you eventually rob people of the capacity to distinguish between good and evil.”
~ Hannah Arendt

WaterLily's picture

@snoopydawg I will make it a point to post photos on the Friday essay the week I return!

up
0 users have voted.
divineorder's picture

@Pluto's Republic

up
0 users have voted.

A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.

Pluto's Republic's picture

@divineorder

…of Max Keiser. I am quite comfortable with his style, even though he derails with some frequency. He has a certain kind of genius.

Thanks for the link. I agree with the facts on the ground as Max describes them. When he describe what is motivating the various players, what they are thinking… he's not going deep. He doesn't know how to read the Chinese, but neither do other Western economists. His insight into financial operations and geopolitical stakes are accurate, and he knows it.

Some of what he has said about US reactions is really interesting. The business about the US attacking a neighboring state to China is right out of the ME playbook. North Korea, in this case. Tens of millions of humans would die, but the the US Dollar would still be history. I don't think Americans would be safe anywhere but inside their colony. So, the Neocons who are running this operation would have little to gain. I know Israel has its heart set on having its own golem running the world, but it's not going to happen in this cosmos. Look at the mess they have made. They will be hunkered down for a thousand years.

The motivations Max states are correct, but incomplete. Certainly, the Saudis were pissed about being hung out for 9/11, but moreso for being accused at all. While he was still a Crown Prince, during a 2012 event with international student journalists, the Saudi involvement in 9/11 came up. An inexperienced Prince Salman blurted out defensively. "We didn't do it. It was Mossad." Who really knows? That aside, the reason the Saudis are willing to break the PetroDollar rule and accept the Yuan for Chinese oil purchases is not due to anger. It's a matter of simple economics. The US isn't a big customer for the Saudis, anymore. China, on the other hand, is huge and willing to build a pipeline to the Saudi's door. China can go elsewhere for oil if the Saudi's demur, but that would cut Saudi Arabia out of the rapidly expanding Asian market, one that it desperately needs. If the Saudi's go for the Yuan, that puts the trading currency in Asia, the Middle East, and Africa. Canada and Mexico are both eying the Yuan trade. The US made itself "energy independent."

As for China's motivation for the gold-Yuan, that didn't just happen. The West doesn't seem to have any concept of the way the Chinese think. China determined decades ago that they had to build a global banking system to pursue their own interests peacefully. They needed to established system of global banking, trade infrastructure, and communications, along with a strong currency with exchanges throughout the world — all while growing a vigorous, sustainable economy and establishing firm trading networks and infrastructure. This is what I wrote about it:

Until now, China couldn't have made this transition. It took China fifteen years of painstaking strategic planing and unwavering effort to establish themselves as a global financial power, Their accomplishments were mocked and degraded every step of the way by the US business media and representatives of the Federal Government. China's currency had to be strengthened and introduced to the world. The economy of China had to demonstrate financial stability and endurance. To hardened the value of their currency and investment vehicles, China slowly built a vast stockpile of gold to serve as collateral. Banks of all kinds had to be established — private, commercial, settlement, and exchange — and they had to be operational in the world's key financial centers. The Western banking transfer system, SWIFT, had to be challenged with a new system so that open transactions could take place outside of US authority. It had to function in a way that would prevent sovereign accounts from being spuriously seized by countries using extrajudicial political methods, without due process. Above all, China's financial system had to be compatible and well-aligned with the IMF and World Bank, and with all current central banks and foreign exchange systems.

China had to build an economic destination out in the future — a place where China's new global financial system could be managed with democratic and multilateral values. Only then, could the Convertible Golden Yuan trading note be introduced.

up
0 users have voted.
Populations don’t like wars. They have to be lied into it.
That means we can be “truthed” into peace. — Julian Assange
Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Pluto's Republic
Being hung out for 9/11? Er...most of the hijackers were Saudis and then we gave all the Saudi VIPs a plane out of town first thing we could. At what point did we ever pressure the Saudis about the fact that it was a lot of their nationals who committed that atrocity (and it was one, regardless of the fact that the people killed were living in a brutal empire. It's not like most of them had actual power in that empire. Some, yes; not most. And then there's the non-Americans who got killed as well. Wrong place, wrong time. Bad luck.)

It will be a cold day in hell before I shed tears for the Saudi nobles and royalty--we kiss their asses on a regular basis while many of them do things like fund the Islamic State and lead groups that do suicide bombings of civilians on our own soil.

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Bisbonian's picture

@Pluto's Republic If so, would you mind if I shared it?

up
0 users have voted.

"I’m a human being, first and foremost, and as such I’m for whoever and whatever benefits humanity as a whole.” —Malcolm X

Pluto's Republic's picture

@Bisbonian

You'll find this paper at the Planck Foundation. It's translated from the Dutch, so it can be awkward in places.

up
0 users have voted.
Populations don’t like wars. They have to be lied into it.
That means we can be “truthed” into peace. — Julian Assange
snoopydawg's picture

@Pluto's Republic

losing its influence and Trump giving countries the excuse to pull away from our influence is the scene from the movie V for vendetta. The newsman is showing scenes of the riots in this country and him asking if anyone cares that this country has collapsed because of its violent goals for global hegemony? The audience shouts "NO".
The next thing I want to see is our war criminals on trial.

up
0 users have voted.

“When out of fear you twist the lesser evil into the lie that it is something good, you eventually rob people of the capacity to distinguish between good and evil.”
~ Hannah Arendt

ggersh's picture

@Anja Geitz Zoebear has plenty of oil that the Us wants,
it then makes a deal to get it out of the ground and to
buy it in Dollars, Zoebear agree's and then want's to buy
good's from the US that sell's it's goods in Dollars but
Zoebear buys way more than the money from the oil allows
with help from the US allowing Zoebear to go into debt, that's
when the US says no more Dollars for you but we will take
your country and oil for the pleasure of letting the US
lend you worthless paper dollars for your precious black oil.

I think that's about right, excuse any punctuation please.

It’s time to stop the monetary dominance of the USA by the USD: it not only gives them a free ride on the global economy, it delivers them also the possibility to ‘jail’ any nation of the world without any evidence let alone any objective public trial. It’s time to ‘jail break’ out of this very unfair USD powered global submission system. Time to stop paying for the own jailing (which is what using the USD basically is). Less risks, more security, not only national, nor only economic, but also and foremost monetary. It’s time that other nations will have a fair playing field with the USA.

up
0 users have voted.

I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish

"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"

Heard from Margaret Kimberley

@Pluto's Republic

Lol, we're fucked anyway and our best hope is to speak out while we can, rather than rolling up like cheap, disposable socks on top of the cheap suits of which you speak.

If nobody even tries to counter the propaganda in even a small way, we're just knuckling under to ease the way for the fascists.

What exactly would you term denying access by nationality, if not bigotry, if not prejudice?

If Twitter denied access based on skin colour, sexual orientation or gender, wouldn't a boycott be organized?

Personally, if I'd ever joined FB or Twitter, I'd be quitting 'in droves'. It's the users that drive these things and the corporate ads directed at the users that provides the income that gives the wealthy the ability to exert political power by proxy over the public.

In order to target, 'other' and make vulnerable to attack any population group, you first isolate them, prevent them from communicating their shared humanity with the general population, and pour out propaganda against them.

The Psychopaths and Parasites That Be are having a tough time trying to revive that long-debunked 'Commie' scare over what's now a crony-capitalist state, having a hard time trying to scare people over Russians as a people to be bombed, as a country to be invaded. And they think we're stupid and easily manipulated - but this does work on some of the less-well-informed who are limited to corporate propaganda media.

And they're doing the same to us. If we shut up and go undercover, they can normalize McCarthism and fascism that much more easily to the point of creating acceptance of eliminating pacific citizens who speak out. Is that really the way we want to go, cowering silenced and cowed, in a corner until they start coming for internet commenters en masse anyway, based on previous comments?

Maybe, and that would be each person's free choice. But as stated, in any such event, we're fucked already - and we're actually less likely to be disposed of if enough groups like us are standing together, letting it be known that we are some of the many who are not fooled, no matter how many times they make annoying fools of themselves endlessly repeating already debunked Big Lies.

Just had a late dinner while watching this. Man, Jimmy's got it together...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=waGnHlRIsWM

Clinton Colluded With Russia To Smear Trump During Election
The Jimmy Dore Show

Published on 26 Oct 2017
Clinton Colluded With Russia To Smear Trump During Election

If you haven't watched this, and not just the first part about the search engine, then you might really want to learn about the next phase that FB is shifting into, to further reduce exposure to alternate news sources, starting with separating them into a separate section that you have to go to search through and explore. The isolation and 'othering' begins, and will not stop unless protested strongly enough by users, perhaps at the level that would have stopped internet censorship in its tracks, had it been tackled when Google first started censoring Youtube videos by demonetization.

What is the point of running ads if the people intended to see them aren't there anymore, having gone elsewhere due to censorship having been initiated by corporate demand - thereby losing itself the customers they hoped to manipulate and dumb down with uninterrupted propaganda? Their leverage depended upon the sheep submitting to being herded as well as fleeced, and having driven away the sheep, they've lost their peeps - and any hope of sales.

Advertising is kinda like the ticks going to where the sheep hang out to climb on and start sucking their blood - it only works if the sheep keep coming to feed the ticks.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E13lh2khU6M

[83] Search Engine Literally Combats Climate Change
Redacted Tonight
Published on 26 Oct 2017
Trees are the most cost effective way of absorbing carbon emissions. Ecosia is a search engine that donates 80% of its surplus income to nonprofit conservationist organizations, with a focus on tree planting.

Horribly tired and can only hope that this makes sense, lol. That'd make a nice change if it did.

Edited to add forgotten block-quotes and two letter-typos. Going to try to sleep lying down, lol. And again for a missed letter... they sure do stand out while you're waiting for something to post...

up
0 users have voted.

Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.

snoopydawg's picture

@Ellen North

website that starts censoring websites is that they started to a Russian website first. Too many people have bought the propaganda that Russia interfered with the election which caused Hillary the election. These types of people are going to cheer this action and not see it for the slippery slope it is.

This same thing happened when the TSA was created after 9/11. Whether it was a real attack or not, the government played on people's fears about being on a plane that will crash into buildings. Then they kept increasing their restrictions on what people can take on planes. Next they made people take their shoes off and......
Next thing you know is that people now have to go through security for ballgames, concerts and other public gatherings. But I'm sure you noticed that people who go to operas and other events that rich people attend don't have to play this game. This is only for the rubes who bought the propaganda.

Then we found out that the government was spying on everyone without a warrant or no probable cause. And again, instead of people being upset about this, they gave them their permission to do it by saying that they had nothing to hide. Look where we are now with all our freedoms nullified without a whimper.
Over 800 private companies are now taking our money to spy on us. Apparently our government isn't sufficient to do this themselves. Billions that should be spent on this country are being transferred to private companies and again without our consent. Then when Snowden went public about this, instead of people being outraged at our government, they were outraged at him for telling us what they were doing. Figure this out.

What should have happened when the TSA was first created was that people should have boycotted flying until their freedoms were restored.
People should have boycotted every event that they had to go through security for.

Our government has been invading countries on the false pretenses that they were doing it to keep us safe. If they didn't do a full scale invasion, they illegally sent drones into countries again on false pretenses and started murdering innocent civilians.

Obama's invasion of Libya on false pretenses destroyed a country that had been its ally on the bogus war of terror. This act has made the world much more dangerous because Gaddafi's weapons are being found in countless countries and in the hands of terrorists groups.

This article explains this better than I can.
How the West’s war on Libya aided these Islamists.

So even though I agree with you that people should boycott twitter, I don't see it happening.
Good idea though.

up
0 users have voted.

“When out of fear you twist the lesser evil into the lie that it is something good, you eventually rob people of the capacity to distinguish between good and evil.”
~ Hannah Arendt

lotlizard's picture

@snoopydawg  
I see articles pointing out that both sides’ narratives, Trump’s and the Hillary-loyal Democrats’, are lies (as is the Western-E.U.-NATO, U.S. exceptionalist narrative in general).

Looks as if it’s right up our c99 alley.

up
0 users have voted.

@Ellen North

up
0 users have voted.

"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981

Alphalop's picture

@detroitmechworks and you had to give me yet another show to add to my netflix queue?

Seriously though, looks funny and I will have to check it out. Smile

up
0 users have voted.

"I used to vote Republican & Democrat, I also used to shit my pants. Eventually I got smart enough to stop doing both things." -Me

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

What election meddling? Telling the truth is now election meddling? Reporting facts rather than mere suppositions and lies is now election meddling? Real Journalism is now election meddling? Are we all Russian agents now when we expose the lies and propaganda being spread in mainstream, major media outlets (e.g., NY TImes, Washington Post, Fox News, MsNBC, CNN, to name but a few) every damn day?

In order:

Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes. Yes.

And also, campaigning against a candidate the establishment wants is "election meddling."

In fact, anything that affects the outcome of an election could be called "election meddling;" what they're really saying is that no one except those backed by establishment power have the right to influence an election outcome.

The only thing they're saying that's untrue is that we are all Russian agents, which is typical nonsense endemic to those who follow in the footsteps of Joe McCarthy.

However, the fact is that "election meddling" could also be called "a free and open democracy." In other words, it's the business of the people to engage in "election meddling." It's also the business of the press to do so, but only in the context of pursuing their primary function: telling the truth. If telling the truth "meddles" in an election outcome, the press can't be concerned with that. They are supposed to do their job and tell the truth regardless of the outcome, unless the outcome would specifically and immediately result in a threat to people's lives. So if a given truth is inconvenient to a politician's electoral campaign, it's the press' duty to "meddle" in that election because it is their duty to tell the truth.

It is not, however, the duty of the press to meddle in an election by giving one candidate massive amounts of coverage and other candidates none. Or to meddle in an election by engaging in character assassination or lies.

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Anja Geitz's picture

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal

However, the fact is that "election meddling" could also be called "a free and open democracy." In other words, it's the business of the people to engage in "election meddling

."

Apparently our overlords are handing out special permission slips to exercise our freedom of democracy. As they define it.

up
0 users have voted.

There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier

Pluto's Republic's picture

@Anja Geitz

…no one knows better they they how easily Americans can be bamboozled. RussiaGate took the cake. Now that they know how truly guileless Americans are, they don't want Russia getting a piece of the action.

Apparently our overlords are handing out special permission slips to exercise our freedom of democracy. As they define it.

up
0 users have voted.
Populations don’t like wars. They have to be lied into it.
That means we can be “truthed” into peace. — Julian Assange
Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Anja Geitz Count Olaf: "Do you have a hall pass?"

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Anja Geitz's picture

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal

We might as well go back to castles with moats. At least back then you only had the Black Plague and starvation to worry about.

up
0 users have voted.

There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Anja Geitz

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal For some reason that video didn't embed well, but if you click on it, it will still play.

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

Anja Geitz's picture

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal

Reminds me of something one of my history professors said about living in New York City in the 19th century.

At the turn of the nineteenth century, New York City's infrastructure relied upon horses. Between 100,000 and 200,000 horses lived in the city at any given time. Each one of those horses gave off 24 pounds of manure and several quarts of urine a day...

Each horse. A day. Oh, how lovely that must've smelled in the summer.

Of course, if we went back further, there were some palpable benefits to being wealthy, aromas aside. They definitely ate better. I don't know how many of us are aware of how bland your food would've been if you didn't have the gold to purchase ships and a crew to go get salt, sugar, and other spices to season your food. Personally I like a dash of cinnamon in my morning gruel.

up
0 users have voted.

There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier

@Anja Geitz

As we know, it was they who have always hated humanity for our freedom from their absolute control and unrestrained abuses; they always accuse others of what they do themselves.

Psychopathic personalities have to be kept out of positions where they can exert power over others to their detriment; the defining qualities of psychopaths in lacking empathy, ethics and their accompanying inability to recognize the intrinsic value of human lives and happiness or to see beyond their own egos and the achievement of their desires at whatever cost to others is an absolute disqualification for any public office or other position where they can inflict harm upon others, whether intentionally or 'expediently' in pursuit of their goals.

There needs to be independent testing, with oversight, using publicly live-streamed brain scans conducted during empathy testing and remaining accessible on the public record during any run for public office and during the time of holding any such office, to determine whether human capacities of empathy are engaging and registering at reasonable and reasoning human levels prior to any run for public office.

We do not allow vehicles to be run on the public roads when the systems already glitch out of control to create a public hazard and it's commonsense to ensure that they are inspected and verified as being stable and capable of running properly and safely before sale, and where this has been neglected, the unsafe vehicles are recalled. (Not re-issued as 'legal' public hazards under false pretenses, especially not with no reasonable option actually permitted the public, suspicious test results or with blatant test cheating.)

We cannot any longer allow politicians in public office who have not been safety-checked as having the associated human qualities of empathy, ethics and a conscience because we have seen and are seeing what the results can be, and that they include far worse than routine criminal behaviour they 'normalize', enabling such as their massive personal theft and despoiling of public property, programs and resources, of public and environmental health, (resulting in premature human death and the extinction of species forming the interdependent global life support system,) ultimately destroying economies, social structure and the very concept of democracy, encompassing the destruction of individual lives, ecosystems and planetary life altogether.

We cannot afford to continue allow those most ruthless - the psychopathic - to drain and poison the rest of us, to use their often-stolen wealth in clawing their way into power where they can do so more freely to destroy all we hold most dear and most require for a decent life, all that is most necessary, all that we are and could be, because they are psychopaths and hold normal humans and all human survival capacities of compassion, caring and integrity in contempt.

Because they are psychopaths and take what they want from those they see as a world of prey animals who should have nothing because they feel that all rights, all property and wealth, should be theirs alone.

This issue is too important to humanity and too desperately essential to human survival not to prevent such hazards inherent in anyone lacking the capacity for the essential qualities of humanity from gaining the ability to exert their agendas over others or over policy of any kind.

Psychopathic personalities and those conditioned to the ongoing 'normalization' of pathology within various societies will, of course, object to the very idea of this protection for all of humanity and of life on the planet, which they see as the rightful prey of those ruthless enough to gain power over them, but it is evident that allowing them to do so is not survivable by anyone.

If we know that scorpions will sting those carrying it anywhere, even if this causes their own deaths, we have to identify them and stop letting them swarm up onto our backs.

This is not a war between political ideologies, but a war of the psychopathic against the world. Best defense is: 'no (let them) be there' anymore.

up
0 users have voted.

Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.

Anja Geitz's picture

@Ellen North

Strange system.

up
0 users have voted.

There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal

*Startles the neighbours with an abrupt burst of prolonged applause*

up
0 users have voted.

Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Ellen North Thank you; thank you; I'll be here all week! Try the veal. Smile

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

movie buff's picture

Twitter has been under heightened scrutiny from lawmakers, who very publicly criticized the company in late September, after closed-door briefings indicated it had not done enough to investigate its role in misinformation campaigns during 2016 election.
Sen. Mark Warner of Virginia, the ranking Democrat on the Senate intelligence panel, called its presentation “inadequate on almost every level,” adding Twitter’s efforts “showed an enormous lack of understanding ... of how serious this issue is, [and] the threat it poses to democratic institutions.”

Link.

This is what that clown did to Facebook. After Facebook repeatedly failed to offer up any dirty Reds for the Intelligence Committee, Mark Warner flew out to Silicon Valley to make direct threats meet with their executives. Suddenly, Facebook "found" about 3000 ads. The message couldn't be more clear. Toe the neocon line, or you'll get called before HUAC 2.0.

But the internet, of course, is international. Someone in Hong Kong can log on and talk directly with someone in Mexico City. Ideas flow freely across borders to the point that online, there are no borders. The irony is that just about everyone considered this a good thing until November 8th, 2016, when Her Heinous lost an election that was supposed to be a shoe-in. Now the internet's greatest strength is being turned against it. And they won't stop with algorithms--I think things will get a lot more blatant. Before long, expect that when you do a Google search, you will see a little checkmark next to any site that has been officially approved as being "propaganda free." And all "serious journalists" will be expected only to link to those approved sites. That day is coming, and we'll have the likes of putrid capitalist tools like Mark Warner to thank for it.

up
0 users have voted.

"The smart way to keep people passive and obedient is to strictly limit the spectrum of acceptable opinion, but allow very lively debate within that spectrum." --Noam Chomsky

@movie buff GWB, McCain, Graham, Pelosi, Schumer, etc ad nauseum - all of them should go down in infamy for this.

Boycott ALL social media, I say. I know, a useful tool up until now, but just how useful will any of those tools be in the future? I am so glad I have never set up one account on any of those sites.

up
0 users have voted.

Only a fool lets someone else tell him who his enemy is. Assata Shakur

@lizzyh7

I couldn't agree more! Why actively support those acting/being used against you, to encourage more and worse? why do we keep doing that?!

up
0 users have voted.

Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@movie buff That's one disgusting piece of shit, Warner.

I'd rather have John Warner, even though he was a Republican.

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

dervish's picture

@movie buff and the American media has a similar reputation to their Soviet counterparts (or Baghdad Bob, if you prefer) in many circles. The only difference is that the complete rejection of everything the media says isn't quite universal yet, although they're working on it.

up
0 users have voted.

"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."

Amanda Matthews's picture

the Clinton Creature’s loss. The place should just rename itself ‘Twatter’ and use her a picture of her face in it’s masthead.

Her corporate media-owning buddies are mad that they spent all that money and gave her all that support and she still blew it. Now they’re going to attempt to make certain we never get anymore uppity ideas in our heads, like thinking that our vote is ours or that we have a right to the truth and a different way of seeing things.

I do believe we are at war with our ‘betters’. They are blockading our access to the truth.

EDIT: usually auto fill gets’Creature’ right. Not today.

up
0 users have voted.

I'm tired of this back-slapping "Isn't humanity neat?" bullshit. We're a virus with shoes, okay? That's all we are. - Bill Hicks

Politics is the entertainment branch of industry. - Frank Zappa

WaterLily's picture

@Amanda Matthews It's me, spewing coffee all over my monitor. Brava!

The place should just rename itself ‘Twatter’ and use her a picture of her face in it’s masthead.

up
0 users have voted.
Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@WaterLily Have a great time in NZ. Eagles. Smile

BTW are the Eagles in your name the Philadelphia Eagles? If so, I was once a fan as well.

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

WaterLily's picture

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal No relation to the NFL team, although I also once enjoyed watching football. Can't do it anymore; both the NFL and NCAA are two more corrupt institutions I can't support. It's a bummer.

up
0 users have voted.
Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@WaterLily God, do I know what you mean. That's been a source of much angst around our house. I'm not altogether happy with the NBA either.

We've mostly fled to the British Premier League.

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

MarilynW's picture

they might think about banning international threats of violence. I understand they do ban threats of violence from individuals. When Trump or any other insane world leader who plays dangerous brinkmanship games that could initiate nuclear war, they are not banned. I think they should be.

up
0 users have voted.

To thine own self be true.

@MarilynW

ISIS. Have they banned ISIS yet from advocating and videoing beheading?

up
0 users have voted.
Deja's picture

@MarilynW
Half the US Twitter accounts would leave. It'll never happen. Plus, can you imagine the threats the nut bags would make against Twitter? Hell, Trump wouldn't have to break the law to retaliate - a nutter would blow up HQ within a week.

up
0 users have voted.
Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Deja It's not just that. What would the establishment do without Trump? If Trump didn't exist, they'd have to invent him.

Ironic, since they didn't want him to win, but all it's really done is make them extend the campaign indefinitely.

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

divineorder's picture

@MarilynW ..

up
0 users have voted.

A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.

@divineorder

Comment from posted Twitter link on their censorship of Russian news ads:

https://twitter.com/nytimes/status/923558409865170944

Monty McKeever‏ @montymckeever Oct 26

Russia is an autocracy where political rivals and journalists are murdered and people are jailed or worse for dissent. Nothing to do with US

Damn, I don't do Twitter and they lack room there anyway, so my rant is landing here.

If the US PTB don't want to allow actual on-the-ground war reporting which Americans can see on war crimes routinely committed at the orders of TPTB, just target and kill off the reporters - and lock up the whistleblowers.

Now, THAT's censorship! at home and abroad. Just have to block the reporting from other countries - spreading to that at home - that reveals what's actually going on...

http://www.middleeasteye.net/news/us-facing-court-challenges-killer-dron...

US facing court challenges from drone 'kill list' survivors
#DroneWar

Rights groups, journalists and the family of an anti-al-Qaeda imam in Yemen take US to task for targeted assassination programme

Amandla Thomas-Johnson
Tuesday 19 September 2017 10:00 UTC
Last update:
Wednesday 20 September 2017 18:46 UTC

...'Death by data'

Meanwhile, US courts have moved to dismiss a joint case brought by two journalists who want their names removed from a US secret kill list.

Known in counter-terrorism circles as the "Disposition Matrix”, the kill list was first drawn up during the Obama presidency in 2010 and includes a database of information for tracking, capturing, rendering or killing suspected US enemies, according to the Washington Post.

"If he's in Saudi Arabia, pick up with the Saudis,” a former counter-terrorism official told the Post. "If traveling overseas to al-Shabab [in Somalia] we can pick him up by ship. If in Yemen, kill or have the Yemenis pick him up.”

Bilal Abdul Kareem, a US citizen and a Muslim, claims to have narrowly avoided five separate air strikes while reporting on the ground from Syria.

But he said he has doubts over whether he can clear his name. "I'm black, first problem, and we've seen all the bigotry that comes from the White House, and second thing, I'm a Muslim,” he told MEE.

"There hasn't been any targeting since the case was opened,” he said, adding that "I think the case has opened a situation that now we had to talk about it”.

Ahmed Zaidan, who is a Syrian and one of Al Jazeera's most prominent journalists, was included in a top-secret National Security Agency presentation about a secretive programme called "SKYNET” where he was listed as a member of both al-Qaeda and the Muslim Brotherhood.

Details of the programme which were leaked by former NSA contractor Edward Snowden in 2013, show that it uses metadata - including a person's travel behaviour, social network and phone usage - to decide who is a target.

Zaidan's work as a former Islamabad bureau chief for Al Jazeera Arabic, and as one of the first journalists to interview Osama Bin Laden before 9/11, may have caused him to be flagged-up, said Maya Foa, director of Reprieve, which is supporting the joint case.

"If you're a journalist making calls to make contact to report on cutting-edge issues, you might well have people in your social network that are on that list which would make you designated by that programme,” Foa said.

"It's algorithms, it's death by data.”

But in June the US government urged the court to dismiss the case. Zaidan and Kareem "provide no plausible factual support for their speculative assertion that the US government placed their names on a kill list and has authorised lethal action against them”, government lawyers said.

These kinds of cases are difficult to win, said Hina Shamsi, director of the National Security Project at the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU), because "courts are too deferential to government claims based on national security grounds". ...

And the agenda continues, under the same grasping hands, irrespective of which wing of the Corporate Party technically heads the mess.

https://www.commondreams.org/news/2017/03/31/journalists-sue-trump-over-...

Published on
Friday, March 31, 2017
by
Common Dreams
Journalists Sue Trump Over Inclusion on 'Kill List'

'It is an affront to U.S. values that journalists are living in fear of being killed by U.S. drones, simply for doing their jobs'
by
Andrea Germanos, staff writer

Two journalists have sued President Donald Trump saying they are on the "Kill List"—an "illegal death sentence" that violates their constitutional rights and impedes their professional work, the lawsuit charges.

The plaintiffs are 46-year-old Bilal Abdul Kareem, a U.S. citizen and freelance journalist who reports on the ongoing conflict in Syria. The other, 54-year-old Ahmed Zaidan, is a senior journalist with Al Jazeera and is a Syrian and Pakistani citizen. In 1998 Zaidan was the first journalist to interview Osama Bin Laden, and his work has been featured on CNN and PBS's "Frontline."

The lawsuit (pdf) filed Thursday by human rights organization Reprieve and the Washington, D.C. law firm Lewis Baach in the U.S. District Court in Washington, D.C. argues: "Plaintiffs' inclusion on the Kill List is the result of arbitrary and capricious agency action, accomplished without due process, and in violation of the United States Constitution and U.S. and international law."

Their designation on the list, the suit argues, was due to the fact that their "travel, communications, social media content and contacts, related data, and metadata have been input into 'algorithms' used by the United States to identify terrorists."

And though the two journalists were put on list by President Barack Obama, that list has been inherited by Trump, who "has continued to include them on the Kill List and has, in addition, removed certain restrictions and criteria previously employed in the designation of persons to be included on the Kill List." ...

...Outlining the urgency of their plea, the suit states: "During the past year, Kareem has narrowly avoided being killed by five separate air strikes, at least one of which was carried out by a drone."

Their inclusion on the list constitutes a violation of their First Amendment rights; "is a direct result of their activities arising out of and necessary to their work as journalists covering the conflict in Syria, the War on Terror, and other matters"; and has undermined their ability to continue their journalistic work effectively, the suit states.

As a result of the latter, people in the U.S. and beyond are being deprived "of important information and viewpoints about the conflicts in Syria and Pakistan and the War on Terror, interfering with their ability to participate effectively in the ongoing political debate regarding these matters," it adds. ...

Yet they'll claim that they don't deliberately target those letting the American public know what they're up to...

https://www.rt.com/usa/361459-secretary-clinton-drone-assange/

Hillary Clinton considered drone attack on Julian Assange - report
Published time: 3 Oct, 2016 14:37 Edited time: 4 Oct, 2016 14:27

Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton reportedly wanted to drone Wikileaks founder Julian Assange when she was secretary of state.

According to True Pundit, Clinton and the state department were under pressure to silence Assange and Wikileaks in the months before the whistleblowing site released a massive dump of 250,000 diplomatic cables from 1966 up to 2010, dubbed CableGate.

“Can’t we just drone this guy?” Clinton asked, according to unidentified state department sources.

Published by True Pundit on Sunday, Wikileaks posted a link to the story on their official Twitter account on Monday, along with a screenshot of the article.

Clinton and the state department held numerous meetings to discuss what could be done about Assange and his site which had already exposed damning military secrets about the war in Afghanistan and Iraq before the promised document dump was to come. The department was under pressure from both the White House and foreign governments to silence Wikileaks.

True Pundit reports the people in the room with Clinton on November 23, 2010 laughed at her comment, until it became clear that the then-secretary of state was serious. Clinton was reportedly fuming and referred to Assange as a “soft target.”

After Clinton’s drone suggestion, the state department considered offering a reward to anyone whose help secured the Australian journalist’s capture and extradition to the US. Unnamed sources reported a $10 million price was discussed at the meeting.

Following the meeting, Clinton aide Ann-Marie Slaughter emailed Clinton and aides Cheryl Mills, Huma Abedin and Jake Sullivan with the subject, "RE an SP memo on possible legal and nonlegal strategies re Wikileaks."

The email contained an attachment "SP Wikileaks doc final11.23.10.docx." which has not been found by federal investigators investigating Clinton’s use of a private email server. Wikileaks itself does not have this attachment.

Five days after the meeting, Wikileaks began releasing the CableGate files, on November 28, 2010.

Sources familiar with the meeting claim they were reminded of Clinton’s penchant for discussing droning enemies following the release of the FBI’s report on the Clinton email investigation, according to True Pundit.

The FBI’s notes on Clinton’s interview during the investigation referred to Clinton having “many discussions” about “nominating” droning individuals.

“Clinton could not recall a specific process for nominating a target for a drone strike and recalled much debate pertaining to the concurrence process. Clinton knew there was a role for DOD, State and the CIA but could not provide specifics as to what it was. Due to a disagreement between these agencies, Clinton recalled having many discussions related to nominating an individual for a drone strike,” the report reads. ...

This is from 2000, making it plain that brutal police suppression of protesters is not to be reported - or else.

https://www.rcfp.org/browse-media-law-resources/news/reporters-arrested-...

Reporters arrested, assaulted by police at Democratic convention
Newsgathering | Feature | August 18, 2000

Reporters arrested, assaulted by police at Democratic convention

Los Angeles police have been accused of targeting journalists when they clear crowds of protesters from the streets, and at least a few reporters have ended up in jail or in hospitals as a result.

Journalists have been arrested and assaulted in a number of episodes during the Democratic National Convention in Los Angeles this week, in what seems to be a growing trend during protests at large political events. The Los Angeles incidents come on the heels of two reporters' arrests during the Republican National Convention in Philadelphia two weeks ago.

Journalists covering protests in Los Angeles on Monday night, the first night of the Democratic convention, suddenly found themselves being hit by rubber bullets and charged by officers on horseback. The Associated Press reported that when police started moving in on protesters leaving a free concert, the journalists started "separating themselves from the main body of fleeing concertgoers and waving credentials."

A Houston Chronicle reporter was knocked over a barricade by a mounted police officer. According to a Chronicle editor who was on the phone with her at the time, she was waving credentials and begging police to let her inside the security fence when an officer on horseback collided with a group of people she was with. She sought help for a cut knee, but was instead ordered to run. Six different officers refused her pleas for help finding First Aid, according to the editor.

A reporter for Hearst Newspapers wearing a press ID and DNC credentials was reportedly clubbed by a police officer during the same incident. The Chronicle and Hearst have also sent written protests to the city over the police behavior.

A number of reporters and photographers were hit with rubber bullets fired by police, which left large welts on their skin.

Reporters for the Chicago Tribune and The Associated Press were arrested Tuesday night while covering a bicycle-based protest designed to "promote bicycling as a way to relieve traffic congestion and pollution."

Tribune reporter Flynn McRoberts was arrested with protesters in the bicycling event were traveling through downtown streets with police escorts. He was held for eight hours before being released. Editors in Chicago, who had lost communication with McRoberts while he was phoning in a story during the protest, called a special media hotline set up for the convention when McRoberts did not call back. Hotline attorneys worked with police to secure his release.

McRoberts was cited for "reckless driving" of a bicycle, although the charge was modified to "obstructing a public way" after prosecutors found that the recklessness charge cannot apply to bicycles. His rented bicycle is still being held by police as evidence.

Associated Press broadcast reporter Brian Bland also was arrested, and his reporting equipment and bicycle were confiscated. The AP is protesting the arrest. ...

...The LAPD deliberately targeted members of the media, clubbing and shooting them," ACLU chief counsel Michael Small said at a press conference.

"It was a really shocking and, I think, troubling display of excessive force by police," ACLU spokesman Christopher Calhoun said.

"It would be ludicrous to imagine the LAPD would target members of the media,'' LAPD spokesman David Kalish responded. "However, during the incident following the rock concert, it may be possible that media who were in the group were inconvenienced."

On Wednesday, at a protest against police brutality, a Cable News Network sound technician was hospitalized after being struck in the chest by a police baton during a scuffle between police officers and protesters.

According to a broadcast report and a story on CNN.com, a CNN photographer had dropped his cellular telephone during the standoff. After a police officer retrieved the phone, the unnamed CNN sound technician leaned forward to take the phone from the officer. When leaning forward, she reportedly was "jabbed" in the stomach with a baton by another police officer.

After being struck by the officer, she was taken to Glendale Memorial Hospital, where she was diagnosed with bruised and contused ribs and then released, according to CNN.com....

...Interviewed later on CNN's "Larry King Live," police spokesman Kalish said, "We apologize for [the incident] but, unfortunately, that's what happens in these types of situations when journalists are integrated in a violent situation." ...

You report, we deride. And much, much more.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/st-louis-protests-journ...

St Louis protests: Journalists say they were beaten and arrested by police while covering demonstrations

Exclusive: Journalists tell The Independent about being kicked, pepper sprayed

Emily Shugerman New York
Saturday 23 September 2017

(must-see, very short video, including multiple police officers in riot gear wandering around, pepper-spraying prone protesters as though spraying roses for fungus...)

http://www.firstpost.com/world/us-journalists-covering-protests-against-...

US: Journalists covering protests against police killing of black teen, 'arrested'

Aug, 14 2014 10:39:50 IST
Tweet

Washington: Missouri police Wednesday arrested two journalists reporting on the unrest that has roiled a US suburb after an unarmed black teenager was shot dead by police, the duo said.

Aspiring college student Michael Brown, 18, died Saturday in a police shooting in the St. Louis suburb of Ferguson, sparking rioting and stirring comparisons to the February 2012 fatal shooting of unarmed teenager Trayvon Martin.

Wesley Lowery, a Washington Post political reporter, and Ryan Reilly, a Huffington Post reporter, were arrested in a McDonald's after police entered the restaurant and ordered people to leave, the pair wrote on Twitter.

In a series of tweets, Lowery said they were given no explanation for their arrest other than "trespassing" and were not charged with any offenses before being released. ...

Can anyone explain to me how the authoritarian Putin is worse and how repressing the news reporting of other countries which counters US PTB propaganda makes for 'a better deal' for Americans?

Well, anyone here could...

up
0 users have voted.

Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.

@MarilynW

Isn't ISIS one of a sort of part-time public/private partnership between the US PTB and the terrorists?

When Bush-2 said they wouldn't negotiate with terrorists, I expect that he meant that they simply got whatever training and arms they demanded in order to weaken the world for that delayed fascist global takeover which components of the last several administrations still seem to be remarkably actively involved in, as with Dick Cheney 'advising' the Trump Admin and mentoring his acolyte Vice President Pence, next in line for the Porcelain Throne there's so much talk of levering Trump off of, to give someone more reliably Old Boys Gunners Club a chance to shit freely on the population.

up
0 users have voted.

Psychopathy is not a political position, whether labeled 'conservatism', 'centrism' or 'left'.

A tin labeled 'coffee' may be a can of worms or pathology identified by a lack of empathy/willingness to harm others to achieve personal desires.

divineorder's picture

up
0 users have voted.

A truth of the nuclear age/climate change: we can no longer have endless war and survive on this planet. Oh sh*t.

going to ban Trump? He thinks the Russia meme is a hoax. Is he tweeting fake news? If Twitter and Facebook ban everything that disagrees with the Democratic leadership about Russia, does that mean we'll all read Trump's tweets for our news, or will Trump be banned?

up
0 users have voted.

@Linda Wood sigh.

up
0 users have voted.

Idolizing a politician is like believing the stripper really likes you.

dervish's picture

restricted, and eventually banned outright. We'll ban the press in the name of freedom.

What's funny here is that as usual, they won't be banned for falsehoods, they'll be banned for telling the truth.

up
0 users have voted.

"Obama promised transparency, but Assange is the one who brought it."

lotlizard's picture

@dervish  
http://projectcensored.org/11-the-media-can-legally-lie/

In a stunningly narrow interpretation of FCC rules, the Florida Appeals court claimed that the FCC policy against falsification of the news does not rise to the level of a “law, rule, or regulation,” it was simply a “policy.” Therefore, it is up to the station whether or not it wants to report honestly.

During their appeal, FOX asserted that there are no written rules against distorting news in the media. They argued that, under the First Amendment, broadcasters have the right to lie or deliberately distort news reports on public airwaves. Fox attorneys did not dispute Akre’s claim that they pressured her to broadcast a false story, they simply maintained that it was their right to do so. After the appeal verdict WTVT general manager Bob Linger commented, “It’s vindication for WTVT, and we’re very pleased… It’s the case we’ve been making for two years. She never had a legal claim.”

up
0 users have voted.
Pluto's Republic's picture

@lotlizard

to mitigate the wrenching twist in the American brain once it is exposed via the media to such lies.

There once was an effective remedy, but we revoked the Fairness Doctrine in 1987, after the Deep State took their permanent positions in government under the addled Ronald Reagan.

up
0 users have voted.
Populations don’t like wars. They have to be lied into it.
That means we can be “truthed” into peace. — Julian Assange

Or does the fact that Her lost negate their influence on the election.

up
0 users have voted.

Idolizing a politician is like believing the stripper really likes you.

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Dr. John Carpenter There is no equality of standards. As Amanda pointed out, it's OK for her to get dirt on Trump from Russian spies and come up with GoldenShowerGate--that's just opposition research. But it's not OK for Trump Jr to meet with a Russian lawyer who lied and said she had dirt on Hillary, but then proved to have none. That's treasonable.

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

SnappleBC's picture

... that it is the Democratic party that is leading this [latest] assault on civil liberties.

It astonishes me that they are all so short-sighted or just plain authoritarian that they can get behind this.

up
0 users have voted.

A lot of wanderers in the U.S. political desert recognize that all the duopoly has to offer is a choice of mirages. Come, let us trudge towards empty expanse of sand #1, littered with the bleached bones of Deaniacs and Hope and Changers.
-- lotlizard

Looks like a two level campaign. First is financial like demonetizing content on youtube and denying revenue sources. In maybe one of the most extreme forms was against Wikileaks where credit card companies refused to process volunteer donations.

The second is informational by denying access to major media outlets. It will also go to hosting services denying users and organizations access to the general internet. Also, blanking out alternative media and dissenters in searches. I swear it is harder to find Secular Talk on youtube.

One of tactics seems be the development of "informational gatekeepers". Basically methods to black list when outright denial of access to the internet does not work.

But regardless, the proverbial full court press is on. So-called liberals and progressives who support this shit will see it come back on them.

up
0 users have voted.
Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@MrWebster I really think we need to come up with some tactics to preserve our connections. And possibly reach out to some other sites like jackpine radicals and podcasters like Sane Progressive and Jamarl, oh hell, I can't remember the name of his podcast....

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

k9disc's picture

progressive press. Like a variety show of Leftist News, preferably podcasts and video.

Local talent and local chapters, there are many of us. A good curated collection of video and podcasts could be of interest to people seeking non-corporate information.

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal

up
0 users have voted.

“Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” ~ Sun Tzu

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@k9disc I like this idea.

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver

k9disc's picture

I like the idea of a variety show type thing... local/regional chapters and then a curated main portal.

I pitched it on dKos back in the day, never understood why there were not RSS feeds all over the Progressive Blogosphere... until Obama won, and then I realized that it was not a progressive effort, but a profit based one.

@Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal

up
0 users have voted.

“Tactics without strategy is the noise before defeat.” ~ Sun Tzu

Anja Geitz's picture

To better maneuver around government censorship on the Internet like the Chinese people do. And then in our free time we can ridicule Americans who delude themselves into thinking that our government is any better.

up
0 users have voted.

There is always Music amongst the trees in the Garden, but our hearts must be very quiet to hear it. ~ Minnie Aumonier

ggersh's picture

up
0 users have voted.

I never knew that the term "Never Again" only pertained to
those born Jewish

"Antisemite used to be someone who didn't like Jews
now it's someone who Jews don't like"

Heard from Margaret Kimberley

Then ban the state department, CIA, and NSA from your platform as well.

up
0 users have voted.

Solidarity forever

Cant Stop the Macedonian Signal's picture

@Akze

up
0 users have voted.

"More for Gore or the son of a drug lord--None of the above, fuck it, cut the cord."
--Zack de la Rocha

"I tell you I'll have nothing to do with the place...The roof of that hall is made of bones."
-- Fiver