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The day's news roundup + tonight's musical feature: Pee Wee Crayton

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Hey! Good Evening!

This evening's music features Pee Wee Crayton. Enjoy!

^{Pee Wee Crayton - Do Unto Others}

"A think tank is usually just an institution in which scholars are paid by the rich and powerful to think up reasons why it would be good and smart to do something evil and stupid."

-- Caitlin Johnstone

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News and Opinion

Think Tanks Are Information Laundering Ops For War Profiteers

The British billionaire-owned newspaper The Telegraph has an appalling new article out which reads like a paid advertisement for a missile manufactured by Lockheed Martin. The title even sounds like it was written by a marketing team: “A war-winning swarm missile will knock China out of Taiwan — fast”, subtitled “Rapid Dragon is a military gamechanger that provides the US Air Force with a crucial edge in the Pacific”.

The article is written by a war propagandist named David Axe, whose work I have written about before. His covert advertorial for Lockheed Martin’s JASSM missile revolves around the findings of a study by the military industrial complex-funded think tank Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS), who you’ll be shocked and astonished and surprised and stunned to learn lists the Lockheed Martin Corporation as one of its top donors.

Needless to say, David Axe makes no mention of this extreme conflict of interest anywhere in his exuberant prose celebrating the wonders of this new piece of technology in what is falsely presented as an objective news article intended to educate and inform.

“When analysts from the Center for Strategic and International Studies ran a series of war games simulating a Chinese invasion of Taiwan last year, they learned something surprising,” he begins. “The games indicated that the US Air Force, fighting nearly alone after the destruction of much of the US Navy, could almost single-handedly destroy the Chinese invasion force.”

“The key to this simulated aerial victory was a missile: the Lockheed Martin-made Joint Air-to-Surface Strike Missile, or JASSM,” Axe continues. “It’s a stealthy and highly accurate cruise missile that can range hundreds of miles from its launching warplane. There are long-range versions of the JASSM and a specialised anti-ship version, too — and the USAF and its sister services are buying thousands of the missiles for billions of dollars.”

If you want to be even more depressed than you already are about the sheer state of Western media, read this Telegraph article which literally reads like an advertorial for a Lockheed Martin missile, and promotes the idea of war with China.https://t.co/pnovIJN0Lm

— Arnaud Bertrand (@RnaudBertrand) September 5, 2023

“Imagine hundreds or even thousands of stealthy cruise missiles speeding at wavetop height across the western Pacific and zeroing in on Chinese ships, ports and air bases all at the same time,” gushes Axe, adding, “It’s not for no reason the CSIS think-tank called the missile ‘decisive’ in its war games simulating a war over Taiwan.”

Yes, David Axe, I think we can all agree it’s not for no reason that the Lockheed Martin-funded think tank has great things to say about a product that’s making billions of dollars for Lockheed Martin. That’s some great journalism there, bucko.

This weapons system that Axe has been charged with marketing allows for large numbers of cruise missiles to be loaded onto pallets and deployed out the backs of giant cargo planes, and has been the subject of warnings from the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists. Last month the Bulletin’s George M Moore wrote the following:

“The potential to develop Rapid Dragon so it can deliver nuclear weapons does not seem to have received any attention. The AGM-86 Air Launched Cruise Missile (ALCM) is nuclear capable and currently deliverable by the B-52. It appears that nothing would prevent the Rapid Dragon deployment of the ALCM, turning any cargo aircraft capable of using Rapid Dragon into a nuclear delivery aircraft.

“The potential to use Rapid Dragon for nuclear weapons delivery (and eventually this will occur) will create new issues when serious nuclear weapons limitation resume. Unlike some past arms control agreements that required elimination of launch vehicles, there is no way to negotiate a limitation on cargo aircraft with rear ramps.”

So here’s a billionaire-owned news rag marketing a Lockheed Martin product endorsed by a Lockheed Martin-sponsored think tank and disguising it as journalism, while also normalizing the idea of fighting and winning a war against the Chinese military using technology that could lead to nuclear war. Just another day in the world of empire propaganda.

A think tank is usually just an institution in which scholars are paid by the rich and powerful to think up reasons why it would be good and smart to do something evil and stupid. One of the most depraved things that happens in the world today is the way war profiteering corporations and plutocrats are allowed to fund immensely influential warmongering think tanks, which then go on to influence the thinking of government policymakers in support of war and militarism. Media outlets like The Telegraph routinely cite these war profiteer-funded think tanks as experts on foreign policy and international affairs without ever disclosing this immense conflict of interest to their audiences; a recent study by the Quincy Institute found that 85 percent of the think tanks cited in the mainstream press when reporting on the war in Ukraine were funded by war profiteers like Lockheed Martin, Raytheon and Northrop Grumman.

This is journalistic malpractice. It is never, ever in accord with journalistic ethics to cite war profiteer-funded think tanks on matters of war, militarism or foreign relations, but the western press do it constantly, without even disclosing this immense conflict of interest to their audience, because the western press are propaganda firms for the western empire.

Western reporters cite empire-funded think tanks because they generally align with the empire-approved lines that a mass media stenographer knows they can advance their career by pushing, and they do it because it gives them an official-looking “expert” “source” to cite while proclaiming more expensive war machinery needs to be sent to this or that part of the world or what have you. But in reality there’s only one story to be found in such citations: “War Industry Supports More War.”

This “War Industry Supports More War” headline is all stories like the above are really communicating, yet they dress it up as news reporting, because propaganda only works if you don’t know you’re being propagandized. All we ordinary members of the public can do is throw sand in the gears of this information laundering operation at every opportunity by highlighting again and again and again where people are being propagandized and how.

Worth a watch:

Ukraine Shifting the World's Stage w/Col. Doug Macgregor

Return of US nuclear weapons to UK would be an escalation, says Russia

The Russian foreign ministry has said Moscow will view any move to return US nuclear weapons to the UK as an escalation and will respond with “countermeasures” for its own security.

The foreign ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova was responding to a report last week about an item in the 2024 US air force budget for building a dormitory at RAF Lakenheath in Suffolk for personnel on a “potential surety mission” – military jargon for nuclear safety and security. It raised the prospect of the return of US nuclear weapons to British soil for the first time in more than 15 years.

“If this step is ever made, we will view it as escalation, as a step toward escalation that would take things to a direction that is quite opposite to addressing the pressing issue of pulling all nuclear weapons out of European countries,” Zakharova said.

“In the context of the transition of the United States and Nato to an openly confrontational course of inflicting a ‘strategic defeat’ on Russia, this practice and its development force us to take compensating countermeasures designed to reliably protect the security interests of our country and its allies.”

Putin; Ukraine offensive is not stalled, it is a failure

"Alarming": Biden to Supply Depleted Uranium Shells to Ukraine Despite Contamination Risks

British Challenger 2 tank destroyed in combat for first time, Ukraine footage shows

A battlefield video circulating on social media overnight showed the destruction of a British Challenger 2 from a mine and Russian drone in Ukraine, which would be the first time one of the tanks has been destroyed in combat.

At the beginning of the clip, filmed from a car involved in the fighting, the Challenger 2 with its distinctive gun barrel is seen shrouded in thick, grey smoke after the battlefield incident.

Western sources indicated on Tuesday night that the tank first struck a Russian mine on Monday, which blew a rear fuel compartment, causing it to be immobilised. The crew then evacuated safely, but as it lay dormant it was then hit by a Lancet drone.

There was no confirmation of the location but it is likely to have been on the southern Zaporizhzhia front, where the brigade of which the tanks are a part has been reported to be fighting.

Blinken: ‘We want to make sure Ukraine has what it needs’

U.S. gangster state threatens nuclear-armed North Korea:

North Korea will ‘pay a price’ if it supplies arms to Russia, says US

The US warned Kim Jong-un that North Korea would “pay a price” for supplying Russia with weapons to use in Ukraine, saying that arms negotiations between the two states were actively advancing.

Providing weapons to Russia “is not going to reflect well on North Korea and they will pay a price for this in the international community,” US national security adviser Jake Sullivan told reporters at the White House.

The Kremlin said earlier on Tuesday it had “nothing to say” about statements by US officials that Kim planned to travel to Russia this month to meet President Vladimir Putin and discuss weapons supplies to Moscow.

Kim expects discussions about weapons to continue, Sullivan said, including at leader level and “perhaps even in person”.

“We have continued to squeeze Russia’s defence industrial base,” Sullivan said, and Moscow is now “looking to whatever source they can find” for goods such as ammunition.

China dodges western 5G chip embargo with new Huawei Mate 60 phone

China has produced a 5G smartphone using an advanced silicon chip on a scale of miniaturisation that was thought to be beyond its capabilities due to US-led export restrictions, analysts have said. Huawei’s Mate 60 Pro is powered by a new Kirin 9000s chip that was made in China by the partly state-owned Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp (SMIC), the analysis firm TechInsights said.

Its processor is the first to use SMIC’s most advanced 7 nanometre (nm) technology and suggests the Chinese government is making some headway in attempts to build a domestic chip ecosystem, the research firm said.

Since 2019, the US has restricted Huawei’s access to chipmaking tools essential for producing the most advanced handset models. Despite being a manufacturer of 5G network equipment, Huawei was previously only able to launch limited batches of actual 5G phones using stockpiled chips. ...

Dan Hutcheson, an analyst with TechInsights, told Reuters the latest development came as a “slap in the face” to the US.

Senator files ethics complaint against supreme court justice Samuel Alito

Amid rumbling scandal over gifts given to conservative justices by wealthy rightwing donors, one such justice, Samuel Alito, became the subject of an ethics complaint filed by a senior Democrat on the Senate judiciary committee.

Senator Sheldon Whitehouse of Rhode Island said recent public comments by Alito “appear to violate several canons of judicial ethics, including standards the supreme court has long applied to itself”.

Whitehouse lodged the complaint in a letter to the chief justice, John Roberts.

"A Political Prosecution": 61 Cop City Opponents Hit with RICO Charges by Georgia's Republican AG

Organizers Condemn 'Anti-Democratic' RICO Charges Against Cop City Protesters

Organizers with the Stop Cop City movement in Atlanta said Tuesday that new organized crime and racketeering charges against more than 60 campaigners were aimed at quashing all dissent against the construction of a $90 million police training facility in the city, as well as similar law enforcement projects.

Georgia's Republican attorney general, Chris Carr, announced that a grand jury indicted 61 protesters under the state's Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act, with some accused only of distributing fliers.

"These charges, like the previous repressive prosecutions by the State of Georgia, seek to intimidate protesters, legal observers, and bail funds alike, and send the chilling message that any dissent to Cop City will be punished with the full power and violence of the government," organizers with the Cop City Vote Coalition (CCVC) toldThe Appeal. "The Cop City Vote Coalition strongly condemns these anti-democratic charges."

The indictments are the latest escalation by the state against movement to "Stop Cop City," as opponents have called the proposed 85-acre Public Safety Training Center planned in the Weelaunee Forest in DeKalb County.

Twitter/X Advertiser Boycott Is STATE-FUNDED; Inside the War on FREE SPEECH: Michael Shellenberger

Revealed: how US immigration uses fake social media profiles across investigations

Authorities within several Department of Homeland Security (DHS) immigration agencies, including Customs and Border Protection (CBP) and Immigration and Customs Enforcement (Ice), have repeatedly discussed using “aliases”, or undercover online accounts for investigations, according to records obtained through an open records request by the civil rights non-profit Brennan Center for Justice and shared with the Guardian. Officials have also expressed concern about social media sites’ policies that prohibit the use of fake profiles and discussed bypassing those rules. The records did not specify which online platforms officers were using, but for many, including Facebook, the use of aliases and fake profiles, including by government agencies, is a direct violation of its terms of service agreement. And the DHS’s practices were so concerning that a representative from the company contacted the agency warning of a potential breach in the social network’s rules, records revealed.

The revelations come amid growing privacy concerns about how law enforcement across the US monitors online activity and collects and shares people’s data, in some cases without a warrant or subpoena. In recent years, police have used fake accounts to spy on Black Lives Matter protesters; pose as ordinary citizens and post comments attacking law enforcement critics; and send Facebook friend requests to targets of their investigations and then gather personal information without a judge’s approval for the digital search. Facebook officials have publicly objected to the practice by the police departments of Los Angeles and Memphis, and the new records reveal a private rebuke of the DHS.

The DHS files, which date back several years, are likely to raise alarms from civil rights groups, given the agency already has a vast surveillance network that allows it to track migrants and at times US citizens, whether by accessing location data from tech companies, buying user information from data brokers or utilizing facial recognition.

One policy document uncovered in the requests says DHS officers, who work on fraud detection and are part of US Citizenship and Immigration Services (USCIS), can use fake accounts to research people “requesting immigration benefits”. The document provides additional detail about a practice USCIS first announced in 2019. Those officers – working for the agency that decides who gets green cards and citizenship – can gather a wide range of data, including physical addresses, relationship information, employment and education affiliations and any social media posts that are “contrary to information submitted by the applicant”, the policy said. Any information collected in these investigations must be “saved” in the individual’s file, even if it is found to be not “derogatory”, according to the document.

“What we see in these documents is just how widespread the use of undercover accounts is, with these attempts to hide their tracks while using social media,” said Rachel Levinson-Waldman, the managing director of the Brennan Center’s liberty and national security program, which provided the records to the Guardian. “It’s clearly going on with the full knowledge that it’s not in compliance with the policies of one of the major platforms.”

NYPD Deploys DRONES To Stalk Citizens In OWN BACKYARDS Over Labor Day Weekend

NYPD agrees to ‘significantly’ change how it handles protests in the city

The New York police department (NYPD) has agreed to ban several controversial policing tactics used on demonstrators – as part of a settlement agreement in response to lawsuits about police behavior during the 2020 racial justice protests.

The New York state attorney general Letitia James, the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) and the Legal Aid Society announced the reforms on Tuesday after the parties sued the city’s police department. James issued a statement noting the agreement will “significantly” change how the NYPD responses to mass demonstrations in future.

The NYPD will adopt a four-tiered response system that emphasizes de-escalation versus flooding protests with police officers, James’s office said, as seen in the 2020 racial justice protests that erupted across the US and internationally after the police in Minneapolis murdered George Floyd in May 2020.

The NYPD will also hire a senior executive who will oversee the implementation of the new response system in public demonstrations. City police tactics such as “kettling”, where officers encircle and press upon a group of demonstrators, will be banned, NYCLU, the New York state affiliate of the ACLU, announced in a post on Twitter, now known as X.

Police will also no longer be allowed to use low-flying helicopters to intimidate protestors in New York City. Officers will only break up protests as a “last resort”, the NYCLU added, and will only make arrests after giving three warnings for crowds to disperse.

Fan the flames: Lahaina on fire

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Former Proud Boys leader sentenced to 22 years over US Capitol attack

The former Proud Boys leader Enrique Tarrio was sentenced to 22 years in prison on Tuesday for his part in the failed plot to keep Donald Trump in power after the 2020 election.

Prosecutors sought a 33-year term. The judge did not agree but nonetheless handed down the longest sentence yet in a case relating to 2020 and the January 6 Capitol attack. The longest sentence previously handed down was 18 years, to both Ethan Nordean, a member of the Proud Boys, and Stewart Rhodes, the founder of the Oath Keepers militia. ...

In May, Tarrio and three lieutenants were convicted of charges including seditious conspiracy, a civil-war-era offense previously rarely brought but now levied against members of far-right groups that took part in the January 6 attack.

In remarks to the court in Washington, Tarrio said he was sorry for the events of January 6, and credited police officers for their bravery in resisting the attack. “What happened on January 6 was a national embarrassment,” Tarrio said, adding that he both now knew Trump lost to Joe Biden and blamed himself for actions that led to him losing his freedom. Becoming emotional, Tarrio said: “I do not think what happened that day was acceptable.” He pleaded with the judge, Timothy Kelly, for leniency. “Please show me mercy,” Tarrio said. “I ask you that you not take my 40s from me.”

Kelly emphasised the damage done. “That day broke our previously unbroken tradition of peacefully transferring power,” he said. “That previously unbroken tradition is broken now, and it’s going to take time and effort to fix it.”

Impeachment trial of Texas attorney general Ken Paxton begins in Austin

The impeachment trial of the Texas attorney general, Ken Paxton, began on Tuesday – a rare and historic event in the state.

The ultra-conservative Paxton has a history of ethically questionable conduct that dates back to his first term in 2014, when he was fined by the Texas state securities board for violating financial laws.

Paxton’s colleagues gathered in the state chamber of the Texas capitol in Austin, preparing to cast a vote that would decide his fate. At the end of the trial, which will probably continue through the week, it will be known if Paxton will be removed from office and if he can ever hold office again.

In a 121-23 vote in May, the Republican-majority house voted to impeach Paxton, also a member of the party, on 20 articles of misconduct, immediately suspending him from office. In this trial, only 16 articles will be considered, and the remaining four will be considered at a later date.

The core of Paxton’s alleged wrongdoing involves his relationship with the Austin real estate developer Nate Paul. Paxton has been accused of illegally using his office to benefit Paul, who in return gave Paxton’s mistress, Laura Olsen, a job in his office. In early June, Paul was arrested on eight charges of making false statements to financial institutions.

GOP SCRAMBLES For McConnell Replacement After Freezes

Black, Hispanic Voters DESERT Dems After DISASTROUS Bidenomics Decimate Economic Future

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Climate crisis could contribute to a global food shortage by 2050, US special envoy on food security warns

The world could fall short of food by 2050 due to falling crop yields, insufficient investment in agricultural research and trade shocks, according to Joe Biden’s special envoy for food security, Dr Cary Fowler.

Fowler, who is also known as the “father” of the Svalbard Global Seed Vault, a global store of seeds for the most significant crops, said studies by agricultural economists showed the world needed to produce 50-60% more food by 2050 in order to feed its growing population. But crop yields rates were projected to decline by between 3-12% as a result of global heating.

“We’re going to fall fairly short of being able to provide that kind of increase in food production by mid-century,” Fowler said. Asked by Guardian Australia whether he described the situation as an “existential crisis”, Fowler replied: “It’s pretty close to it, isn’t it?” ...

“We are in the midst of a global food crisis,” he said. “More than 700 million people were undernourished in 2022 compared to 613 million in 2019. It’s an incomprehensibly large number and a human tragedy. Every country is affected, including countries like Australia, but especially the most vulnerable around the world.”

Cancer cases in under-50s worldwide up nearly 80% in three decades, study finds

The number of under-50s worldwide being diagnosed with cancer has risen by nearly 80% in three decades, according to the largest study of its kind. Global cases of early onset cancer increased from 1.82 million in 1990 to 3.26 million in 2019, while cancer deaths of adults in their 40s, 30s or younger grew by 27%. More than a million under-50s a year are now dying of cancer, the research reveals.

Experts are still in the early stages of understanding the reasons behind the rise in cases. The authors of the study, published in BMJ Oncology, say poor diets, alcohol and tobacco use, physical inactivity and obesity are likely to be among the factors.

“Since 1990, the incidence and deaths of early onset cancers have substantially increased globally,” the report says. ... In 2019, new cancer diagnoses among under-50s totalled 3.26 million, an increase of 79% on the 1990 figure. Breast cancer accounted for the largest number of cases and associated deaths, at 13.7 and 3.5 for every 100,000 of the global population respectively.

Cases of early onset windpipe and prostate cancers rose the fastest between 1990 and 2019, with estimated annual percentage changes of 2.28% and 2.23% respectively. At the other end of the spectrum, cases of early onset liver cancer fell by an estimated 2.88% a year. A total of 1.06 million under-50s died of cancer in 2019, an increase of 27% on the 1990 figure. After breast cancer, the highest death tolls were linked to windpipe, lung, stomach and bowel cancers. The steepest increases in deaths were among people with kidney or ovarian cancer.

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Also of Interest

Here are some articles of interest, some which defied fair-use abstraction.

Australian MPs to lobby US to drop Julian Assange prosecution or risk ‘very dangerous’ precedent for Russia and China

A Call to Remembrance and Action for Hawaiian History Month

US Chip Sanctions On China Appear To Be Failing Hard

The Climate Crisis Will End When Capitalism Ends

Texas fracking billionaire brothers fuel rightwing media with millions of dollars

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A Little Night Music

Pee Wee Crayton – Money Is All We Need

Pee Wee Crayton - Texas Hop

Pee Wee Crayton – Old Fashioned Baby

Pee Wee Crayton - Hillbilly Blues

Pee Wee Crayton - Rockin' The Blues

Pee Wee Crayton – Blues For My Baby

Pee Wee Crayton - The Telephone Is Ringing

Pee Wee Crayton - You Know Yeah

Pee Wee Crayton - Red Rose Boogie

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