Open Thread - Thurs 17 Oct 2024 - What Works?
What Works?
Like I mentioned last week while writing about Frank Church, I've been reading a book called Battlefield America: The War on the American People, by John W. Whitehead, published in 2015. It's well worth a read, although it's very, very depressing. I can't say it takes a right or a left wing slant; it gets angry at both sides. Towards the end of the book, Whitehead lists 10 basic principles that 'We, the People' can, understand, agree with, insist upon and support in our attempt to stop our country's almost finished progression to a police state, an empire. I found the principles interesting, so I thought I'd list them here.
- 'We must come to grips with the reality that the present system does not foster freedom.'
- 'Voting is practically worthless.'
- 'Question everything.'
- 'Materialism is a death knell to freedom.'
- 'There is little hope for true resistance if you are mindlessly connected to the electronic concentration camp.'
- 'An armed revolt will not work.'
- 'Be wise and realize there is power in numbers.'
- 'Act locally but think nationally'.
- 'Local towns, cities and states can nullify or say 'No' to federal laws that violate the rights and freedoms of the citizenry'.
- 'Understand what freedom is all about.'
I think we agree that we already know all these things; maybe most Americans do, whether they acknowledge it or not. So, where do we go from here?
1932: Bonus Army shacks on fire after the attack on their 'Hooverville' in the Anacostia flats (the Capitol is in the background) by the regular army under MacArthur, from Wikipedia. Bye, Bye, Hoover!
Number 6: armed revolts will not work is true. I think they can work, they have in the past, but not here, not recently. Unarmed, 'peaceful' revolts, like that of the Bonus Army in 1932, work. They aren't actually that peaceful, protesters get hurt, and killed, by those in charge (the police, the army, etc); still such protests can work.
Numbers 7-10, when put together, show what has to be done. There has to be peaceful revolt in large numbers including local actions - over and over. Local towns, cities and states, if they are not completely controlled by those in power, should be/will be protesting against the federal government. And freedom means it is not one side (right or left) against another, but all sides (and there are more than two) acting together against those in power so all can be free. Just a pipe dream? Maybe. Another thing to recognize is that this kind of thing has to happen over and over again throughout time. Even if the 'people' 'win', it will only last - maybe - 40 years (hello 1930's and post-wwii improvements) and then the greedy will gain control and we'll be under their heels again.
Matt Taibbi spoke at a recent rally in DC called 'Rescue the Republic'. He talked about freedom of speech and its history. It's a very good speech, here's a link to it and a transcript on his website.
Walter Kirn also spoke at the rally. Here's his wonderful speech with a transcript, including a bit of folk music (and Simon and Garfunkel - is that folk?). Man, these two songs made me remember my childhood, my parents loved these songs and so we listened to them a lot :-).
As these speeches, and the rally, show, we are starting to come together, we are starting to realize 'we' have to do something, anything, about those in control. Maybe victory won't be in our lifetime, but perhaps the start of the road to victory will be. What do you think might work, if anything?
Thanks for reading this post. Here's the open thread - remember, everything is interesting if you dive deep enough, so tell us about where you're diving!
Comments
It's Thursday!!!!
I hope it's going to be, and has been, a great day for everyone. Me, I'm getting a hair cut, that'll be fun! I've had the same hairdresser since, err, ok, for 30 years. Dang. So, we're friends and have fun.
Whatcha up to? How you doing? What are you paying attention to and learning? Let's hear it!
If you're poor now, my friend, then you'll stay poor.
These days, only the rich get given more. -- Martial book 5:81, c. AD 100 or so
Nothing ever changes -- Sima, c. AD 2020 or so
What I learned is that nothing works anymore
may be that is ok, because those things which worked once upon the time, are not amymore.
I have euronews running all the time. it can make you sick.
I want to be reunited with my son.
I want to live in Amerika.
https://www.euronews.com/live
Good morning, mimi
Our borders are open nowadays, so getting a residence visa should not be that difficult.
I have a friend who has a partner who is an attorney. He may know some immigration attorney there. The embassy in Berlin would be helpful.
Send me a pm and I will get you some information.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
Hey, good morning
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Whiteheads' ideas are interesting. I like this one:
Resistance is not futile IMO. It is a coping strategy to maintain sanity.
No excuses.
Thanks for the OT!
truth is considered foreign influence, world peace is a threat to national security
I still believe
the way to crush TPTB is to stop buying their products. Depriving government entities of sales taxes would get their attention.
Do not believe anything in the MSM. Do some research before you swallow their BS.
I am headed to court for 3 trials. Perhaps 1 of them has a chance of settling. A long day, hysterical clients, a little girl victim of sexual assault, one boy being coached and groomed to join a violent gang. Another being forced to spend time with his Dad whom he has not seen in his 4 years of life.
Not every parent is good at it, to put it mildly!
Thanks sima, and I will get that book.
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
Best of luck with your legal wrangling
.
sounds like a crazy packed day
comes in bunches
full moon?
truth is considered foreign influence, world peace is a threat to national security
It will be interesting
to see which one(s) the judge re-sets due to time constraints.
We have circuit judges who work in 3 counties. Mine is the least populous, sees the judges far less than the other 2 counties. Trial dockets happen once a month per judge, twice if we get lucky. What can happen during the month you wait for your turn is the likely time parents abscond to another state with the kids. It is the time for a parent to bribe, coach, and pressure a kid on what to say to a judge or attorney.
Oh, well...
"We'll know our disinformation program is complete when everything the American public believes is false." ---- William Casey, CIA Director, 1981
It is Friday eve.
And I woke up not dead again this morning. So it will be a good day, I think.
I'm now quite convinced that the publicly-announced placement of the THAAD batteries in Israel is intended to provide the casus belli for the US to directly enter the many Israeli conflicts with all guns blazing, and nothing else. The system is essentially useless against hypersonic missiles, and has only 48 warshots against literally thousands of missiles. So, to my way of thinking, its only purpose will be to provide a flare-lit, high-priority target, *manned by US soldiers*. And the whole US population *knows* that those US soldiers are there, now, with boots on the ground. The destruction of that materiel, and the killing of the accompanying troops, will no doubt be covered breathlessly by all the news outlets, in living color (but with pixelated greeking over the dismembered bodies), as the latest example of how to lie the American people into a new war.
And the American people, of course, will absolutely eat it up. We've been being primed for this war for so long that no other outcome is likely. I'm reminded of William Randolph Hearst's statement to Frederic Remington in a telegram prior to the Spanish-American War: "You furnish the pictures, and I'll furnish the war!" Remember the Maine!
Of course, that would be a good tip-off for the Chinese to take Taiwan, and for the North Koreans to erase Seoul, and for the Russians to airdrop a few thousand troops into Kiev, all at the same time. So then Blinken and his cronies can briefly enjoy running a 4- or 5-fronted war: best entitled "the US versus the world."
With a very predictable outcome.
It would be so much easier for the dems to simply accept that they can't win the election, don't you think? Starting WWIII just weeks before an election seems like a fatally flawed electoral strategy to me. But what do I know? I'm just a useless eater, after all.
Not a fan.
And on edit: apparently, we sortied some number of B-2s out of Whiteman AFB last night to go drop bunker-busters in Yemen. We only have 19 of those left, so they must have really wanted to go blow up some Yemeni folks. And the Houthis have shown that they are pretty good at shooting down our Reaper drones, so there was some nonzero risk there as well...
Twice bitten, permanently shy.
@usefewersyllables One possible way for the
One possible way for the Iranians et al to deal with THAAD might be to largely ignore it. Let it shoot off the full supply of interceptors (I've seen that Lockheed Martin only made 1000 total and there are 7-8 THAAD batteries around the world to divide them among) by swamping it with a lot of incoming targets aimed nearby and then it will sit there largely useless. The US soldiers can watch from the sidelines.
agree
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after all, this is a war between the west and Iran
let US waste weapons on a diversion strike
btw, how is the supply to nazi land holding up?
Foreign policy dictated by the MIC means moar war.
truth is considered foreign influence, world peace is a threat to national security
Ideas
Years ago, I read that the public should just go on strike for a day. I know that it's easy for someone like me who gets Social Security every month to say that but how many businesses would that affect? I do not advocate anyone taking risks to lose their jobs but even if a small percentage were to do so, how much of a domino effect would there be?
Another idea was for the public to not buy certain things on certain days. As an example, no one buys gas on Tuesday, no one buys groceries on Wednesday, or no one buys fast food on Thursday. You wonder if even 10 or 20 percent did that don't you think that businesses would notice mighty fast. Something like that could snowball and quite literally shut the country down. There is power in numbers.
organizing limited strikes is difficult
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how would that impact business is not a political issue
so much as a financial one. If your 20% stop spending
on x business on y day, does that change their
recognition as consumers being the driving force?
Maybe, but this is already the case. How does that
change executive decisions for the benefit of the people?
Not much methinks.
truth is considered foreign influence, world peace is a threat to national security
Remember or have you read or heard about the grape boycott?
It worked because grapes were not a necessary product. Sure, it was easy to sneer about limousine liberals doing without table grapes. Why they might have to switch to melon balls for their fancy fruit salads. The boycott worked because it targeted a non-essential product. It worked because compliance was easy.
So I think, if you want to organize a boycott, don't give in to your inner Puritan. You want the capitalists to feel the pain, not your friends and neighbors.
Mary Bennett