The Evening Blues - 5-30-24
Hey! Good Evening!
This evening's music features organist Jmmy McGriff. Enjoy!
Jimmy McGriff - Keep Loose
"The defendants knew that cynical mockery at the laws and customs of war constituted the gravest crime. They knew it, but they hoped that the total war, by bringing victory, would also secure their immunity. But victory did not arrive on the heels of their crimes."
-- Sergei Rudenko (Nuremberg prosecutor)
News and Opinion
The ICC Takes on Israel and the US Congressional Mafia
Senator Lindsay Graham was bursting with contempt for the International Criminal Court when he grilled Secretary of State Antony Blinken at a May 21 congressional hearing. Wagging his finger, he warned that, if the ICC gets away with issuing arrest warrants for Israel’s Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Defense Minister Yoav Gallant, “We are next.”
The audience at the hearing, stacked with CODEPINK pro-Palestine supporters, burst out in applause at the notion of the U.S. being hauled before the world’s highest court. “You can clap all you want,” an angry Graham retorted, “but they tried to come after our soldiers in Afghanistan.” Graham was thankful that in the Afghan case “reason prevailed” when the case was dropped, adding that the U.S. must level sanctions against the ICC “not only to protect our friends in Israel but to protect ourselves.”
Graham was referring to the 2019 efforts of former ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda to hold both the Taliban and the U.S. accountable for war crimes in Afghanistan. When Graham said that “reason prevailed,” he really meant that U.S. thuggery prevailed because the Trump administration brazenly imposed sanctions against ICC officials, denying them visas to the U.S. and freezing their assets in U.S. banks. U.S. President Joe Biden lifted the sanctions but did so with the tacit understanding that the court would not resume the probe of U.S. crimes in Afghanistan. The message from both Democratic and Republican presidents was clear: Do not dare hold the U.S. to the same standards you use for others.
The International Criminal Court was founded in 1998 as the result of a lifetime’s work by an American (and Jewish) international lawyer, Benjamin Ferencz, rooted in his experience as an investigator and chief prosecutor at the Nuremberg tribunals after the Second World War. Ben passed away in 2023 at the age of 103, but the universal jurisdiction that the court is exercising in this case is the fruition of his life’s work to hold war criminals accountable under international law, no matter what country they are from or who their victims are.
Enter Israel. The ICC has been building a case against Israel for nearly a decade. A recent blockbuster investigation by The Guardian and two Israeli-based news outlets revealed a shocking almost decade-long secret campaign against the court by Israeli intelligence agencies, who surveilled, hacked, pressured, smeared, and threatened ICC officials in an effort to derail the court’s inquiries.
Despite the pressure, on May 20, ICC prosecutor Karim Khan made his request for Israeli and Hamas arrest warrants. Among the charges against the Israeli officials are extermination, using starvation as a method of warfare, willfully causing great suffering, and intentionally directing attacks against a civilian population.
Prosecutor Khan’s request has now gone to a panel of three judges who will determine in the coming weeks whether the request is granted. But pro-Israel forces in the U.S. are trying their best to throw sand in the wheels of justice with threats of new sanctions.
One ultimatum already came from Sen. Tom Cotton (R-Ark.) and 11 other Republican senators in a toxic April 24 letter. “Target Israel and we will target you,” the senators signaled to the ICC. “If you move forward with the measures indicated in the report, we will move to end all American support for the ICC, sanction your employees and associates, and bar you and your families from the United States.” The letter concluded with a hair-raising: “You have been warned.”
The Biden administration has responded to the ICC by flip-flopping like a fish on dry land. On May 20, the White House put out a statement calling the ICC prosecutor’s application for arrest warrants against Israeli leaders “outrageous,” adding, “Whatever this prosecutor might imply, there is no equivalence—none—between Israel and Hamas. We will always stand with Israel against threats to its security.” Secretary of State Blinken called the request “shameful.” At a hearing on May 22, he told Sen. Graham that he welcomed working with him on efforts to sanction the ICC.
But on May 28, National Security Council Communications Adviser John Kirby said at a White House press briefing, “We don't believe that sanctions against the ICC is the right approach here.” White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre, who spoke after Kirby, reiterated that message. She said that legislation against the ICC “is not something the administration is going to support” and that “sanctions on the ICC are not an effective or appropriate tool to address U.S. concerns.”
This new position from the White House will make it easier for more Democrats to say no to the bills that will be introduced as soon as Congress returns from recess on June 3. Already, dueling statements are coming out from congressional members. While Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) called the ICC appeal “reprehensible” and Sen. Joe Manchin (D-W.Va.) joined with Republicans to call for visa bans for ICC officials and sanctions on the international body, Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) defended the court, saying, “The ICC is doing its job. It’s doing what it is supposed to do. We cannot only apply international law when it is convenient.”
On the House side, progressives voiced support for the ICC. Rep. Cori Bush (D-Mo.) said, “Seeking arrest warrants for human rights abuses is an important step towards accountability. It’s shameful for U.S. officials to threaten the ICC while continuing to send weapons that enable war crimes.” Rep. Pocan gave a gutsy response, saying, “If Netanyahu comes to address Congress, I would be more than glad to show the ICC the way to the House floor to issue that warrant.”
While most Republicans and pro-Israel hawks in the Democratic Party will likely join hands to hammer the international court, President Biden may ultimately feel pressured to adopt the position best articulated by Sen. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.). “It is fine to express opposition to a possible judicial action, but it is absolutely wrong to interfere in a judicial matter by threatening judicial officers, their family members and their employees with retribution. This thuggery is something befitting the mafia, not U.S. senators.”
It is also not befitting the White House, especially one that has been such a willing partner to Israel’s war crimes.
Defending Rafah massacre, White House vows to defy “public opinion”
On Wednesday, the Biden administration endorsed Israeli airstrikes on women and children in refugee camps in Rafah that killed 45 people Sunday and 21 Tuesday. The strikes, White House National Security spokesman John Kirby said, were “limited,” “targeted,” and succeeded in their aim to “kill Hamas operatives and a Hamas compound.” In embracing these massacres and Israel’s broader assault on Rafah, the Biden administration asserted its right to sponsor war crimes and genocide on a limitless scale.
Asked by a reporter, “How many more charred corpses does he have to see before the president considers a change?” Kirby bluntly declared there will be “no policy changes.” When Kirby was asked if the White House would do anything in response to condemnations of Israel and the United States in the wake of the strikes, he replied:
The president does not make decisions or execute policy based on public opinion polling. He bases his decisions on our own national security interests.
This statement is a public admission on the part of the government that it is consciously acting in defiance of the views of the vast majority of the population, which overwhelmingly opposes the US sponsorship of the Gaza genocide. Moreover, it asserts as the fundamental principle that the actions of the government are determined not by the will of the people, but the “national security” interests of the state—that is, the global interests of the financial oligarchy on whose behalf the state governs. ...
The Biden administration is advancing the concept that “democracy” is a government that does whatever it wants, in which elections are a formality to provide a fig leaf of legitimacy for policies opposed by the vast majority of the population.
Israel's Secret Undermining of the ICC to Derail War Crimes Charges
Israeli campaign against ICC may be ‘crimes against justice’, say legal experts
Efforts by Israel’s intelligence agencies to undermine and influence the international criminal court (ICC) could amount to “offences against the administration of justice” and should be investigated by its chief prosecutor, legal experts have said. Responding to revelations about Israeli surveillance and espionage operations against the ICC, multiple leading international law experts said the conduct of Israeli intelligence services could amount to criminal offences. ...
The ICC’s prosecutor, Karim Khan, last week announced he was seeking arrest warrants for war crimes and crimes against humanity for Hamas and Israeli leaders. The decision to seek warrants against Israel’s prime minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, and defence minister, Yoav Gallant, were the first time an ICC prosecutor had taken action against the leaders of a close western ally.
Before Tuesday’s revelations, Khan had alleged that unspecified attempts to “impede, intimidate or improperly influence the officials of this court” had already been made by unnamed parties. Such conduct could constitute a criminal offence under article 70 of the court’s founding statute relating to the administration of justice.
Toby Cadman, a British barrister specialising in international criminal and humanitarian law, said the Guardian’s findings were “deeply disturbing” and include allegations that “constitute an attempt to pervert the course of justice through the use of threats” to the former ICC prosecutor Fatou Bensouda. “It is quite clear that these are matters that fall within the jurisdiction of the ICC, in particular under article 70 of the statute. Any person who has attempted to obstruct the independent investigations of the prosecutor must face the consequences,” Cadman said.
Longtime observers of the ICC said Israel’s actions warranted further investigation. Matt Cannock, the head of Amnesty International’s centre for international justice in The Hague, said: “It is abundantly clear that many of the examples highlighted in the reporting would amount to [article 70 offences]. Such charges should be brought against anyone who has sought to impede, intimidate or corruptly influence the ICC’s officials.” Another ICC expert, Mark Kersten, an assistant professor in criminal law at the University of the Fraser Valley in Canada, said: “It is hard to imagine what could be a more blatant attempt to wrongfully interfere in a prosecutorial process.”
Aaron Maté : Biden and Rafah: More Deception
How a single comma is allowing Israel to question ICJ Rafah ruling
Israel has asserted that Sunday’s attack, which set ablaze a crowded refugee camp in Rafah and killed 45 Palestinians, is not in breach of last week’s International Court of Justice ruling – a directive widely seen to have instructed Israel to completely stop its military offensive in the southern Gaza city. The apparent contradiction reflects a fierce and continuing debate over the ambivalent language of the ruling – and the placing of a single comma in a key sentence.
Israeli sources have claimed that a close reading of the order shows it was not as prescriptive as many thought and that the wording was a compromise deliberately open to different interpretations, so as to maximise support from the 15 Judges.
The ruling, passed by 13 votes to two, said Israel should: “Immediately halt its military offensive, and any other action in the Rafah governorate, which may inflict on the Palestinian group in Gaza conditions of life that could bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part.” That language reflects the 1948 Genocide convention, and much immediate media and diplomatic reporting interpreted the order as a blanket directive to end the offensive in Rafah.
But soon afterwards, the Israel foreign ministry suggested it was being directed to stop its offensive only if it was inflicting conditions that might lead to the physical destruction of the Palestinian population. In a statement, the foreign ministry said:“Israel has not and will not conduct military actions in the Rafah area which may inflict on the Palestinian civilian population in Gaza conditions of life that could bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part”. In effect, Israel argues that the court ruling does not apply because the Israeli military is not carrying out the prohibited actions.
Nikki Hailey in Israel scribbling "FINISH THEM"on the shells that the IDF is about to fire into Rafah in defiance of the International Court of Justice. Biden provided the shells, Republicans autograph them. The US political class is united in its complicity with this genocide. pic.twitter.com/hejqVAjq8M
— Yanis Varoufakis (@yanisvaroufakis) May 28, 2024
Israel in effective control of entire Gaza land border after taking Philadelphi Corridor in south
Israel is in effective control of Gaza’s entire land border after taking control of a buffer zone along the border with Egypt, Israel’s military has said, a move that risks complicating its relationship with Egypt.
In a televised briefing on Wednesday, chief military spokesperson Daniel Hagari said Israeli forces had gained “operational” control over the Philadelphi Corridor, using the Israeli military’s code name for the 14km-long corridor along the Gaza Strip’s only border with Egypt.
Hagari did not spell out what “operational” control referred to, but an Israeli military official earlier said there were Israeli “boots on the ground” along parts of the corridor. The border with Egypt along the southern edge was Gaza’s only land border that Israel had not controlled directly. “The Philadelphi Corridor served as an oxygen line for Hamas, which it regularly used to smuggle weapons into the area of the Gaza Strip,” Hagari said, claiming that troops had “discovered around 20 tunnels” in the area.
Egypt’s state-linked Al-Qahera News reported a “high-level Egyptian source” as saying that Israel was using claims of tunnels under Egypt’s border with Gaza as cover for its Rafah offensive. “There is no truth to Israeli media reports of the existence of tunnels on the Egyptian border with Gaza,” the source told Al-Qahera, which is linked to state intelligence. “Israel is using these allegations to justify continuing the operation on the Palestinian city of Rafah and prolonging the war for political purposes.”
Max Blumenthal: How Zionism Hurts the Jews
'We Did the Same Thing,' US Official Says After Israel's Rafah Massacre
U.S. National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby on Tuesday defended Israel after its military killed and wounded hundreds of Palestinians in attacks on refugee encampments in and near the southern Gaza city of Rafah inside an Israeli-designated "safe zone."
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu called the first of the two attacks—which ignited a fire that burned people, including many women and children, alive inside their tents—a "tragic mistake."
Asked by a reporter what the consequences would be "if there were an American strike on a legitimate terrorist target that ended resulting with 45 civilian deaths and some 200 others injured," Kirby replied, "I can't answer a hypothetical like that."
"But we have conducted airstrikes in places like Iraq and Afghanistan, where tragically we caused civilian casualties," he continued. "We did the same thing. We owned up to it. We investigated it. And we tried to make changes... We tried to learn from it to make changes so that those set of mistakes wouldn't happen again."
Just because John Kirby admits (years later) that US airstrikes killed civilians in Iraq and Afghanistan (@BarackObama made Afghanistan the most drone-bombed country) does not excuse what @JoeBiden’s allies in Israel did in Rafah pic.twitter.com/7cj4mkGvUG
— Ali M Latifi (@alibomaye) May 29, 2024
Kirby referred to an August 2021 drone strike in Kabul that occurred during the U.S. withdrawal from Afghanistan that killed an aid worker and nine members of his family including seven children outside their home. A New York Times investigation subsequently revealed that the U.S. military knew that the strike likely killed civilians but initially lied about it, claiming there was "no indication" that noncombatants were harmed in the attack.
"We atoned for it, we learned from it, and we put in place procedures to try and prevent that from happening again," Kirby said of the strike, "and that's what our expectations would be in this case."
According to the Costs of War Project at Brown University's Watson Institute for International & Public Affairs, more than 432,000 civilians in over half a dozen countries have been killed by all sides during the course of the continuing open-ended U.S.-led War on Terror.
Since the Hamas-led October 7 attacks that left more than 1,100 Israelis and foreign nationals dead and over 240 others taken hostage, Israeli forces have killed at least 36,171 Palestinians—mostly women and children—according to Gazan and international officials. Israel's Gaza onslaught has also wounded at least 81,420 Palestinians; another 11,000 are missing and presumed dead and buried beneath the rubble of bombed buildings.
During Tuesday's press conference, CBS News reporter Ed O'Keefe asked Kirby how Israel's tent massacre doesn't violate U.S. President Joe Biden's shifting "red line" warning against invading Rafah.
"We don't want to see a major ground operation," Kirby replied. "We haven't seen that at this point."
O'Keefe followed up by asking, "How many more charred corpses does he have to see before the president considers a change in policy?"
"We don't want to see a single more innocent life taken, and I kind of take a little offense at the question," Kirby retorted. "No civilian casualties is the right number of civilian casualties, and this is not something that we've turned a blind eye to, nor has it been something we've ignored or neglected to raise with our Israeli counterparts."
Kirby's remarks came on the same day that Israeli tank fire on a makeshift refugee encampment in southern Gaza killed at least 21 people, at least a dozen of whom were women and children.
Israel Promises FOREVER WAR In Gaza
Israeli Official Says Gaza Slaughter Will Continue for at Least Another 7 Months
Tzachi Hanegbi, head of the Israeli National Security Council, said Wednesday that he expects Israeli military operations in Gaza to continue for at least another seven months into early 2025.
“We expect another seven months of fighting in order to deepen the accomplishments and achieve what we have defined as ‘the destruction of the governmental and military capabilities of Hamas,'” Hanegbi said.
US "DYING EMPIRE Led By Bad People" Say Young Voters
Another senior State official resigns over Gaza, taking aim at aid
A career State Department official involved in the Biden administration’s contentious debates over Israel’s conduct in Gaza resigned this week, citing disagreements with a recently published U.S. government report that claimed that Israel was not impeding humanitarian assistance to Gaza, two officials told The Washington Post.
The outgoing official, Stacy Gilbert, served in the State Department’s Bureau of Population, Refugees and Migration. Gilbert sent an email to staff Tuesday explaining her view that the State Department was wrong to conclude that Israel had not obstructed humanitarian assistance to Gaza, officials who read the letter said.
The cause for resignation is unusual in that it speaks to internal dissent over a hotly disputed report that the Biden administration relied on to justify continuing to send billions of dollars of weapons to Israel. ...
“On the day when the White House announced that the latest atrocity in Rafah did not cross its red line, this resignation demonstrates that the Biden Administration will do anything to avoid the truth,” Josh Paul, the first State Department official to resign over Gaza policy, wrote on LinkedIn after this article was published online.
“This is not just a story of bureaucratic complicity or ineptitude — there are people signing off on arms transfers, people drafting arms transfer approval memos, people turning a blind eye,” Paul wrote. People “who could be speaking up, people who have an awesome responsibility to do good, and a lifelong commitment to human rights — whose choice is to let the bureaucracy function as though it were business as usual.”
US/NATO escalation to strike Russia
Putin Warns of 'Serious Consequences' If Ukraine Uses Western Arms in Russia
As the head of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization and leaders of NATO member nations joined the United States in advocating Ukrainian use of Western-supplied weapons to strike inside Russia, Russian President Vladimir Putin warned Tuesday that any such attacks could have grave repercussions.
"This constant escalation can lead to serious consequences," Putin told reporters during a visit to Uzbekistan. "If these serious consequences occur in Europe, how will the United States behave, bearing in mind our parity in the field of strategic weapons? It's hard to say—do they want a global conflict?"
Putin's remarks came after French President Emmanuel Macron said Ukraine should be allowed to "neutralize" bases inside Russia from which Russian forces are launching missiles at Ukrainian targets.
"We should not allow them to touch other targets in Russia, and obviously civilian capacities," Macron said during a visit to Germany.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz—who has so far declined to approve the transfer of his country's Taurus long-range cruise missiles to Ukraine—said he agreed with Macron, so long as Kyiv adheres to any restrictions imposed by suppliers.
"Ukraine has every possibility under international law for what it is doing. That has to be said explicitly," Scholz said during a joint press conference with Macron. "I find it strange when some people argue that it should not be allowed to defend itself and take measures that are suitable for this."
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said Tuesday that he also supports letting Ukrainian forces use Western-supplied arms to attack Russia, which launched its invasion of Ukraine in February 2022.
"The time has come to consider whether it will be right to lift some of the restrictions which have been imposed because we see now that especially in the Kharkiv region, the front line and the borderline is more or less the same," he asserted.
The United Kingdom, Canada, Poland, the Netherlands, Denmark, Finland, the Czech Republic, and other NATO members also say Ukraine should be permitted to attack targets inside Russia.
In the United States, NATO's most powerful member, there is disagreement within the Biden administration over the policy. While Secretary of State Antony Blinken is reportedly pushing for a change in the administration's stance against the use of U.S.-supplied weapons to attack Russian soil, National Security Council spokesperson John Kirby told reporters Tuesday that "there's no change to our policy at this point."
"We don't encourage or enable the use of U.S.-supplied weapons to strike inside Russia," Kirby said.
Blinken, speaking in Moldova on Wednesday ahead of NATO talks in Prague, Czech Republic, responded to a question about whether the U.S. would support Ukrainian use of Western-supplied arms to attack Russia by saying that "we're always listening, we're always learning, and we're always making determinations about what's necessary to make sure that Ukraine can effectively continue to defend itself."
"At every step along the way we've adapted and adjusted as necessary," he added. "And so that's exactly what we'll do going forward."
Police in Chișinău, Moldova's capital, violently arrested anti-war demonstrators protesting Blinken's visit. Protesters reportedly doused American flags in beetroot juice simulating blood and chanted messages including "Blinken, go home; we don't want war!" and "We don't need NATO."
Dr. Gilbert Doctorow, PhD. : How Close #Ukraine Is to Defeat.
Atlanta police surveil people opposing ‘Cop City’: ‘There’s this constant stalking feeling’
Atlanta police have been carrying out around-the-clock surveillance in several neighborhoods for months, on people and houses linked to opposition against the police training center colloquially known as “Cop City”. The surveillance in Georgia has included following people in cars, blasting sirens outside bedroom windows and shining headlights into houses at night, the Guardian has learned.
While no arrests have been made, residents said they’re at a loss as to what legal protections of privacy and freedom from harassment are available to them. Chata Spikes, the Atlanta police spokesperson, did not respond to requests for comment.
The ongoing actions started soon after an 8 February pre-dawn, Swat-style raid on three Atlanta houses in which Atlanta police and agents from the federal Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives sought evidence relating to arson of construction and police equipment.
Police have since established themselves in four neighborhoods, centering on about 12 houses – including those that were previously raided – with marked and unmarked cars parking near them, driving slowly by and leaving when approached by residents. Social movement historian Dan Berger said this low-tech type of surveillance and related behavior – blasting sirens and flashing lights, following people – has precedence dating at least to the civil rights era. He called the actions “naked intimidation with plausible deniability attached to it”.
Berger added that “[a] common strategy of police work is, when a movement reaches a point of threat, the powers that be begin actively trying to scare them out of existence – showing them they know where they live, who they hang out with”.
Glenn Greenwald On Rising: Biden Risks LOSING Reelection Over Pro-Israel Policies
Charlamagne Tha God: Biden Is LOSING BLACK VOTERS And 'The Exhausted Majority'
PFAS Cover-Up: How 3M Hid Risks of Forever Chemicals & "Gaslit" Scientist Who Tried to Sound Alarm
Increasing use of renewable energy in US yields billions of dollars of benefits
By increasing its use of renewable energy, the US has not only slashed its planet-warming emissions but also improved its air quality, yielding hundreds of billions of dollars of benefits, a new report has found. The study, published in Cell Reports Sustainability on Wednesday and based on publicly available data, focuses on uptick of renewable energy in the US from 2019 to 2022.
“From 2019 through 2022, wind and solar generation increased by about 55%,” said Dev Millstein, a scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. “By 2022, wind and solar provided roughly 14% of total electricity needs for the US.” During that time period, by reducing the use of fossil fuel power plants, the nation’s use of wind and solar power cut its carbon dioxide emissions by 900m metric tons, the authors found. That’s the equivalent of taking 71m cars off the road every year.
Those major climate benefits can obscure the air quality benefits renewable power yielded, wrote the authors, from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and the renewable consulting firm Clean Kilowatts. To illuminate those co-benefits, the researchers quantified how much the use of wind and solar reduced toxic air emissions, focusing specifically on sulfur dioxide (SO2) and nitrogen dioxides (NOx), which are both produced during fossil fuel combustion. They found emissions of SO2 and NOx – both linked to increased asthma risk and a variety of other health issues – decreased by a total of 1m metric tons over that three-year period. ...
All told, the emission reductions from SO2 and NOx provided $249bn of climate and health benefits to the US, the authors found – a figure Millstein said he found was “noteworthy”.
Beloved surfboard-stealing otter seen in California after disappearing for months
Otter 841, who shot to international fame last year for her surfboard-stealing interactions with northern California surfers and kayakers, has been spotted recently after disappearing for several months. Over Memorial day weekend, photos of the now six-year-old otter posted to social media showed her floating on her back at Steamer Lane, a popular surfing spot in Santa Cruz. She was identified by her signature blue tag attached to one of her flippers.
When you and a friend spot each other after a long absence #841 pic.twitter.com/nMO1PG3MLQ
— Native Santa Cruz (@NativeSantaCruz) May 27, 2024
Otter 841 began making waves last summer after Mark Woodward, a local photographer, began posting images and videos to social media of her biting and commandeering surfboards. People were captivated by her fearlessness when interacting with humans and quickly projected human motivations to her behavior. ...
Otter 841’s celebrity came amid growing acknowledgement of the role that sea otters can play in keeping kelp forests healthy. Before the fur trade drove them to near extinction, sea otters once roamed the waters of North America from Alaska to Baja California. They are the smallest marine mammal in North America at up to 4ft long and 70lbs, and play an integral role in the coastal ecosystem and are known to help keep sea urchin populations in check, which is vital to protect kelp forests.
Today, a small population of southern sea otters lives on California’s central coast and the threatened animal occupies just 13% of its historic range.
Also of Interest
Here are some articles of interest, some which defied fair-use abstraction.
Presidents Who Gamble With Nuclear Armageddon
Mass Slaughtering Civilians To Stop Terrorism
Attacks on ICC Show ‘Condemning Hamas’ Is Really About Absolving Israel
The ICC spying revelations show the Israeli government to be a lawless regime
Houthis Say They Downed Another US MQ-9 Reaper Drone
‘Bodies everywhere’: the horrors of Israel’s strike on a Rafah camp
Why is Nikki Haley scrawling genocidal messages on Israeli bombs?
Vijay Prashad: ‘Rockin’ in the Free World’
The West Foments Chaos in the Caucasus
University of Toronto Protesters Vow to Continue Gaza Encampment as Admin Demands Police Clear It
Top Biden Ally FLIPS AND TURNS On Israel Lies
TERRIFIED Biden Moves DNC Online
A Little Night Music
Jimmy McGriff - I've Got A Woman
Jimmy McGriff - A Thing To Come By Part II
Jimmy McGriff - The Worm
Jimmy McGriff & Hank Crawford Quartet - The Sermon
Jimmy McGriff - Turn Blue
Jimmy McGriff - Groove Grease
Jimmy McGriff - All about my girl
Jimmy Smith & Jimmy McGriff - Honky Tonk
Jimmy McGriff - Root Down (And Get It) (Live)
Comments
How surprising
.
Trump found guilty. Color me surprised….not.
Blockbuster: Russia has moved 11 nuclear submarines into the Atlantic Ocean in Response to US Attacks on Strategic Radars
by INTEL-DROP May 29, 2024 https://www.theinteldrop.or...
."
Call that wambulance! You play with fire for 3 decades you get burned.
Link is dead for me. Try this one.
https://halturnerradioshow.com/index.php/news-selections/world-news/bull...
Latest update on the radars are that they are damaged, but still operational and they can be repaired in a few months. Putin stated that Ukraine attacks on Russian territory are being run by NATO space intelligence and they are so sophisticated that they are run on every level by NATO troops. Anti war reports that Biden has given the go ahead for Ukraine to use American bombs on Russia….they’ve been doing it for months already. This is actually rocket science.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.
~Hannah Arendt
Well, now, it's my understanding that most of
....Russia's vast submarine fleet lives just a few miles from the East Coast, on the ocean floor. From Maine to Key West. And they have done so for half a century.
evening snoopy...
what is it that these nato nerds don't understand? russia's actions seem perfectly reasonable if a little delayed. i believe that it all falls under the universal principle of "fuck around and find out."
Turner has changed from what I remember
He ends the article with this:
Shitlibs want Ukraine to hit Russia. They’re happy when Ukraine attacks Crimea and they are cheering for the Kerch bridge to be destroyed. They want Biden to create a no fly zone over Ukraine. Calling them stupid fools might not go far enough. Especially when they don’t understand who started the war, that Ukraine was killing its own civilians in Donbas or how we overthrew Ukraine’s president and then armed Ukraine to the teeth before provoking the war. I just can’t believe how misinformed many Americans are.
I agree that Biden is playing fuck around and find out. This was a deliberate NATO attack on Russia and for what gain? I think Russia has a total of 11 such radar stations and one of the 2 was pointed at Iran/Israel.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.
~Hannah Arendt
heh...
lately, this song has been my earworm:
The finding-out will be
unpleasant, but brief.
Twice bitten, permanently shy.
inteldrop.org
Your link dropped the last letter. Add a "g' and it works.
You, Missy, are on fire tonight! Great comments!
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
Ahh….
Thanks.
Did you see this?
Wait for it and you will see a Sam dawg's reaction to playing ball.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.
~Hannah Arendt
Canary in the Gold Mine, Here.
This is a first time for me.
At 4PM today I decided to sell 4 gold coins in my possession. I have a few of pressing financial matters, and a bit of a deadline. I owe some money and the illegal sanction-fueled inflation and soaring interest rates are killing consumers with debt. Plus, I have the opportunity to take a quick foreign trip, and what better time to complete some light remodeling and upgrades that I've been putting off. And, by the way, my property taxes are overdue. Four gold coins should do the trick.
I picked up the phone and called one of the larger gold companies in the US, because they happened to be located just down the block from me. I told the gold-guy who answered, "I have just 4 coins to sell. I'd like to come in and do that today. I can get there before you close. Do you handle transactions that small?" The gold-guy told me to come on over. He said they can take care of my transaction right away. Great. Then, he said: "We can buy your coins right now (lock in the price), but we are asking everyone for 48 hours before the money is wired into your bank or investment account."
Wait. What? .... When? .... Wire? Where?
I don't want to run the money through my bank account. I don't want to confuse the IRS. I just want to pass on chunks of money that, technically, isn't mine anymore. And I want to get away for a couple of weeks. Isn't that how the world works?
He says, well, we have a situation at the moment. The spot price of gold is the highest right now than it ever has been in human history. Everyone is selling gold to lock in that price and do some profit taking. And everyone is also buying gold because their vaults feel little empty. So, there's a run.
I thought to myself: "And the financiers are also madly shorting gold, as they have been doing for centuries, to hold the price of gold down, down, down!" Human civilizations don't work if gold is not deeply underpriced.
I could have sold gold at any time. People do it all the time. But I've never sold gold before. Until now. And now, it's simply not working the way it always has. I've never heard of this alternative "hurry up and wait" gold market.
Being modern sophisticates, we all know that gold is a racket, with a trading range that is forcefully suppressed by a confederacy of plutocrats. We know that banks regularly sell gold they don't exactly have access to. We know that physical gold is commonly leased by central banks and financial institutions to make the vaults look good. And this market sector moves so fast and secretly that gold has its own Uncertainty Principle.
The gold market rocks around the clock, six days a week, 24 hours a day. And until now, everybody else could sell 4 gold coins (4 lousy ounces) any time they wanted to.
Is this a sign? Cause it's sure not normal.
Good luck
Keep us updated on this. I hope you can get it sorted and take your trip.
I’m seeing lots of doom and gloom on how the economy is going to collapse.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.
~Hannah Arendt
evening pluto...
sorry to hear that you are getting the run-around from banksters that want you to give them a free 48 hour loan. it seems to me that gold is the sort of thing that one pays cash on the barrelhead for, that's kind of the point of having it, isn't it?
Sachs is always a good listen
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.
~Hannah Arendt
thanks for posting ...
the full show. i've seen a bunch of clips, but haven't gotten around to tracking down the show.
An excellent interview!
Worth watching.
“ …and when we destroy nature, we diminish our capacity to sense the divine,and understand who God is, and what our own potential is and duties are as human beings.- RFK jr. 8/26/2024
Macgregor
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.
~Hannah Arendt
heh...
macgregor has gotten pretty good at stating the obvious.
the other thing that caught my eye today was krystal ball citing a poll of people under 30 which had them overwhelmingly saying that the us is a dying empire led by bad people. the kids are right.
Good news
I’m embarrassed to admit how long I was snowed on believing the propaganda I was taught. I’m still finding things that I believe not being true. Like I believed that we won ww2 and defeated Nazi Germany. Russia may have defeated the German Nazis, but not Nazism itself.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.
~Hannah Arendt
Not only does Israel thumb its nose at the ICC with regards
to Gaza now we get this.
evening humphrey...
what a lovely fellow that beelzebub smotrich is!
And still the Israel apologists will deny
that Israel is the bad guys. How many Israelis have come right out and said that they want all Palestinians dead?
I’m sure Kirby will find a way to deny he said that. I sure hope that Kirby sits in the dock one day because maybe that will wipe the smirk off his f-ing face!
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.
~Hannah Arendt
Kirby, Blinken and Sullivan have said that they
haven’t seen any evidence that Israel is deliberately blocking aid coming into Gaza.
Some reporter should ask them about this.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.
~Hannah Arendt
I admit that I was not following the trial but from afar I think
that Trump will benefit from the results.
It was a sham
Cohen admitted that he paid the porn star without Trump,s knowledge and then he billed Trump for his service as his lawyer. I don’t think Trump actually signed the check because he has people who do that for him and besides Cohen was paid in 2017 after the election.
Cohen lied at least once and the defense caught him on it. The judge was very biased against Trump which was obvious. This will be overturned on appeal and shame on the 2 lawyers who voted guilty. Plus the district the trial was held in voted 87% for Biden. It should have been moved to where he could have gotten a fair trial. And boy do I hate defending Trump, but this case was bogus from the git-go.
What was definitely election interference was Blinken getting 51 ex intelligence officers saying that the Hunter Biden laptop was Russian propaganda. And Hillary paying for the Steele dossier and sticking the intelligence agencies on Trump’s campaign to spy on him. Hillary paid a fine for that, but Trump was found guilty for signing checks after he won the election? Please!
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.
~Hannah Arendt
The Doctorow interview was great
Also liked Vijay's essay. Rockin in the Free World, in your other links Joe.
Recommend the article at Tricontinental Vijay linked to in his article- The New Cold War is Sending Tremors Through Northeast Asia
I think I copied this link below from one of the Vijay links as well. It's on the "small yard, high fence," decoupling, the trading curbs on the semiconductor supply chain etc., being imposed to protect US markets, and restrain China. Even though it's CSIS, when you set aside some of the judgement laden observations, it tells a story of how the supply chain may in fact be ungovernable in many respects because of its complexity and diversity, (such that few people are qualified to define it or follow it for purposes of enforcement) and that it is permeable in some of the usual ways, while at the same time, placing handicaps on the US sector despite subsidies. Anyway, it was interesting. Would it keep China from being competitive? How much will US allies cooperate?
Balancing the Ledger: Export Controls on U.S. Chip Technology to China
Thanks for the EBs Joe!
語必忠信 行必正直
Not sure if you have previously mentioned this but It gave me a
chuckle.
https://globalnews.ca/news/10531357/north-korea-balloons-feces-trash-south/
Edited to add this. LOL
the human waste story
... is not corroborated in my opinion. Later versions of the reports just say waste. I don't think the distinction is all that important, it just makes the story better for click bait.
Kim Yeo-jong's message with the balloon's is a response to the US ngo sponsored balloons the "defector group" in South Korea sends to the north. Moon's military agreement and a statute passed by the democratic administration prohibited sending flying objects of any kind over the DMZ because of the risk of provoking a national security incident, like the current one. A South Korean high court invalidated the law which was appealed, based upon "the right of free expression" without consideration of time, place and manner restrictions like considering the context of screaming F..You to guards at the DMZ. KYJ sarcastically claims the North Korean side is merely exercising their freedom of speech.
Another aspect of the current tense situation, is the firing of short ranged ballistic missiles which has gone from one to a half dozen, and to something less than or around 20 firings into the East Sea. In addition to this, North Korea has been using their GPS jamming capabilities to endanger tracking devices used to monitor fishing vessels in the West Sea, and also air traffic which has operational safety implications for fisherman at sea, military and civil aviation. So this entire set of "provocations" was invited.
Former general Kim Byong-ju a democratic National Assembly member, noted that during this military tension, the ROK military ordered no drinking for troops on active duty, in case they needed to be mobilized on short notice. Meanwhile the "commander in chief" Yoon Seok-yeol was observed drinking and celebrating at a civic event for government employees. He did not even call for a meeting of national security advisors during this national security farce, entirely invited by his policies, and the recent huge joint military air live strike exercises near the DMZ.
(edited x2 typos/spelling
語必忠信 行必正直
the defector group
.
.
got their heads defecated upon
funny
question everything
evening soryang...
i think that biden's sanctions on semicondutors for china is stupid and self-defeating. the best that the u.s. can do at this point is delay china temporarily as it will develop its own semiconductor technology that is just as good (or better) than the u.s. produces. in doing so, biden is denying the u.s. a major market for its products. the u.s. stood by and twiddled its thumbs while its rich people shipped its industrial base to china, the thinking was that the u.s. would specialize in more advanced goods (like chip manufacturing) and let china break the u.s. labor market on the wheel of lower costs. so now biden wants to give china the advanced technology market, too. fabulous.
I share that view
I have a similar feeling about the tariffs placed on alternative energy related products like electric batteries, solar panels, and windmills. The increased costs to the US will hamper the effort in the US to adjust to the climate challenges.
語必忠信 行必正直
Hush up! This is a secret and highly confidential and a national
security matter.
Caitlin of course writes about this
Biden let’s Ukrainia strike Russia
Her patience for stupid people has run out.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.
~Hannah Arendt
Remember when Biden said that sending tanks to Ukraine
wouldn’t be okay because it risked starting www3?
Tanks, F-16 jets, long range missiles…..crossed, crossed, crossed……
would be crossing Russia’a’s red line?
One by one everything that Biden said he wouldn’t do he has done. Russia did tactics nuclear weapons drills and now has sent nuclear armed submarines into the Atlantic Ocean. I think they are out of responses to test Biden to back off. I hate to think what their next step is.
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.
~Hannah Arendt
This is how genocidal maniacs operate.
This
No one I above the law my ass!
The ideal subject of totalitarian rule is not the convinced Nazi or the dedicated communist, but people for whom the distinction between fact and fiction, true and false, no longer exists.
~Hannah Arendt