The Evening Blues - 11-7-24
Hey! Good Evening!
This evening's music features blues and soul singer and guitarist Syl Johnson. Enjoy!
Syl Johnson - Different Strokes
"Democrats are sitting on a mountain of hundreds of thousands of human corpses they helped kill by mass military slaughter in the last four years, weeping and lamenting that now bad things are going to start happening."
-- Caitlin Johnstone
News and Opinion
The Evil Warmongering Zionist Won (No Not That One, The Other One)
The Democratic Party has lost control of both the White House and the Senate. As of this writing it is still unclear which party will secure control of the House of Representatives. Turns out campaigning on the promise of continuing a genocide while courting endorsements from war criminals like Dick Cheney is not a great way to get progressives to vote for you.
One interesting point is that Donald Trump appears to have taken the battleground state of Michigan, where Kamala Harris was soundly rejected by the large Arab American population of Dearborn despite their voting overwhelmingly for Biden in 2020. Back in August, Harris famously shushed Muslim anti-genocide protesters at a campaign rally in Michigan by admonishing them with the words “I’m speaking”.
Well, who’s speaking now?
Who's speaking now, bitch? https://t.co/XhLmReCgCy
— Caitlin Johnstone (@caitoz) November 6, 2024
To be clear, this is not a good result. A good result was not possible this election. The warmongering Zionist genocide monster lost, which means the other warmongering Zionist genocide monster won.
Donald Trump is still bought and owned by Adelson cash, which means we can expect him to be just as much of a groveling simp for Israel as he was during his first term. The president elect has publicly admitted that when he was president the Zionist plutocrats Sheldon and Miriam Adelson were at the White House “probably almost more than anybody” asking him to do favors for Israel like moving the US embassy to Jerusalem and acknowledging Israel’s illegitimate claim to the Golan Heights, which he eagerly did.
Trump closed out his campaign tour alongside his former CIA director and secretary of state Mike Pompeo, which should be enough to dash the hopes of even the most naive Trump supporters that US foreign policy is headed in a positive direction in January. As CIA director, Pompeo led a plot to assassinate Julian Assange and cheerfully admitted that “we lied, we cheated, we stole” at the agency. This odious swamp creature has remained in Trump’s good graces for the last eight years, and is reportedly expected to have a position in Trump’s cabinet once again.
Speaking at a campaign event in Pittsburgh on Monday, Pompeo boasted that he has been called “the most loyal cabinet member to Donald J Trump” and said that when Trump is re-elected “we will take down the ring of fire; we will support our friends in Israel.” The “ring of fire” is think tank speak for Iran and the militias in Lebanon, Iraq, Syria, Yemen and Palestine who oppose Israel.
So things are probably going to get uglier and uglier. But they were getting uglier and uglier under Biden, and they would have gotten uglier and uglier under Harris as well. That’s just what it looks like when you’ve got a dying empire fighting to retain planetary control like a cornered animal. You don’t get to be the US president unless you are willing and eager to do ugly things.
Democrats exaggerate how destructive Trump is relative to their own bloodthirsty psychopath candidates. While we can expect Trump to inflict tyranny and abuse upon Americans, it will be nothing compared to the tyranny and abuse he’s going to inflict on people in other countries, and it will be nothing compared to the tyranny and abuse his predecessor has been inflicting on people in other countries. All the histrionic shrieking we see from US liberals about Trump only works inside a western supremacist worldview that does not see the victims of US warmongering as fully human, and therefore sees scorched earth genocidal atrocities as less significant than comparatively minor abuses concerning US domestic policy.
Abandon hope that any positive changes will come from this election result.
Abandon hope that Trump will do good things.
Abandon hope that Democrats will learn any lessons from this loss.
Abandon hope that liberals will suddenly remember that genocide is bad and start protesting against the US-backed slaughter in Gaza.
Abandon hope in US election results, period.
US elections do not yield positive results. They are not designed to benefit ordinary human beings.
Nothing changes for those of us who are dedicated to fighting against the abuses of the US empire. It will be the same fight after January 20 as it was on January 19. We fight on.
Max Blumenthal : Neocons and the Security State
Palestinians will not be allowed to return to homes in northern Gaza, says IDF
Israeli ground forces are getting closer to “the complete evacuation” of northern Gaza and residents will not be allowed to return home, the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has said, in what appears to be the first official acknowledgment from Israel it is systematically removing Palestinians from the area.
In a media briefing on Tuesday night, the IDF Brig Gen Itzik Cohen told Israeli reporters that since troops had been forced to enter some areas twice, such as Jabaliya camp, “there is no intention of allowing the residents of the northern Gaza Strip to return to their homes”. He added that humanitarian aid would be allowed to “regularly” enter the south of the territory but not the north, since there are “no more civilians left”.
International humanitarian law experts have said that such actions would amount to the war crimes of forcible transfer and the use of food as a weapon.
The Israeli army and government have repeatedly denied trying to force the remaining population of northern Gaza to flee to the relative safety of the south during a month-long renewed offensive and tightened siege. Residents still clinging on in the north have said the new operation has created the worst conditions of the war to date. Israel said the push is necessary to combat regrouped Hamas cells.
It is unclear how many people remain in northern Gaza; last month, the UN estimated there were about 400,000 civilians unable or unwilling to follow Israeli evacuation orders. On Wednesday social media footage showed waves of several dozen displaced people carrying children and rucksacks and walking south through flattened areas of Gaza City. Many had not eaten in days, Huda Abu Laila told the Associated Press. “We came barefoot. We have no sandals, no clothes, nothing. We have no money. There is no food or drink,” she said.
Peace Advocates Fear Trump May Hand Israel 'Full Control of Gaza and the West Bank'
While many critics of U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris opposed the Democratic presidential nominee due to the Biden-Harris administration's nearly unconditional support for Israel's annihilation of Gaza, peace advocates on Wednesday warned that Republican President-elect Donald Trump could lift the few guardrails the Democrats had placed on Israel and unleash the key ally to seize all of Palestine.
"A Harris victory would not have stopped Israel's genocide in Gaza or drive to war across the Middle East, but Trump's racism, Islamophobia, and bigotry, and his close relationship with [Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin] Netanyahu, could well enable Israel to pursue its desire for full control of Gaza and the West Bank," Lindsey German of the London-based Stop the War Coalition said in a statement.
Israel has gradually and systematically seized more and more Palestinian lands since illegally occupying the Gaza Strip and West Bank, including East Jerusalem, in 1967. The goal of Israel's far right is expansion of Israeli territory to include what proponents call "Greater Israel," which is based on biblical boundaries that stretched from Africa to Turkey to Mesopotamia. Netanyahu has repeatedly displayed maps showing the Middle East without Palestine, all of whose territory is shown as part of Israel.
On Wednesday, far-right Israelis including senior government officials like National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir and Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich celebrated Trump's win. They are openly plotting ways to steal more land, including by ethnically cleansing Palestinians during the current war on Gaza, through home demolitions and forced expulsions in the West Bank and East Jerusalem, and by expanding Jewish-only apartheid settlements that are illegal under international law.
David Friedman, who served as U.S. ambassador to Israel during Trump's first term, recently released a book advocating Israel's annexation of all of Palestine, a policy "based first and foremost on biblical prophecies and values," according to the author. Friedman envisions a situation in Palestine akin to the U.S. conquest and rule of Puerto Rico, in which Palestinians don't have voting rights but are granted limited autonomy so long as they act in accordance with Israeli law.
The Trump/Friedman plan for Palestinians is to “Let Israel be Israel.”
Via @AvrahamAtLaw. https://t.co/oWhRrZ4QbJ. pic.twitter.com/GhxqG2TlvN— Richard Goldwasser (@_Goldwasser_) November 2, 2024
Powerful Trump backers also support annexation. Republican megadonor Miriam Adelson's wish list for the president-elect's second term includes Israeli annexation of the West Bank and U.S. recognition of the move.
During Trump's first term, then-Secretary of State Mike Pompeo ended a 30-year State Department policy under which Israeli settler colonies in the occupied West Bank were viewed as inconsistent with international law. Pompeo later explained that as an evangelical Christian, his position was based on the biblical belief that Israel is God's "promised land" for his "chosen people," the Jews.
In February, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken reversed the so-called Pompeo Doctrine, declaring Israeli settlements to be "inconsistent with international law"—even as he provided diplomatic cover for the war on Gaza for which Israel is on trial at the International Court of Justice for alleged genocide.
According to Israeli media reports, Trump has pushed Netanyahu to wrap up the Gaza war before he takes office next January. Many observers fear that could mean Israeli forces ramp up already devastating attacks that have killed more than 43,000 Palestinians, mostly women and children, while wounding more than 102,000 others and displacing, starving, and sickening most of Gaza's population.
United Nations human rights officials said last week that Israeli forces are creating an "apocalyptic" situation in northern Gaza, where the invaders are being accused of carrying out the so-called General's Plan to starve and then ethnically cleanse Palestinians from parts of the coastal enclave in order to make way for Israeli recolonization.
"We face an extremely dangerous situation worldwide, with a growing arms race," warned German. "We in the anti-war movement must redouble our efforts to end the genocide and wars in the Middle East. We also need peace in Ukraine, for the West to stop arming Ukraine, and for an end to the escalation of militarism and conflict aimed at China in the Pacific."
Prof. Jeffrey Sachs : Netanyahu On the Ropes
If It Looks Like Ethnic Cleansing, It Probably Is
For three and a half weeks, Israeli forces have been besieging the northern Gaza Strip. Israel has almost completely blocked the entry of humanitarian aid, thereby starving the hundreds of thousands of people who live there. Information emerging from the besieged area is only partial, because ever since the war began, Israel has barred journalists from entering Gaza.
But even based on the little that has been revealed to the public, two things can be said about the siege. First, the scale of the civilian casualties from the army's daily bombings of towns and refugee camps in northern Gaza – children, women, elderly people and men who are innocent of any crime – is enormous. Moreover, medical and other aid facilities have largely collapsed, and other institutions are also collapsing. Consequently, hundreds of thousands of people are now at risk of starvation or are already suffering terrible hunger.
Israel says it told the residents that they needed to leave northern Gaza, and even now, they can still move southward on routes the army has designated for this purpose. Thus the residents, many of whom have already been uprooted two or three times or even more from the places to which they have fled the terrors of war, are now being asked to move again. Yet Israel has refrained from giving the displaced any guarantee that they will be able to return once the war ends. ...
Israel is sliding into ethnic cleansing; its soldiers are carrying out the criminal policies of the messianic, Kahanist right; and even the opposition on the center and center-left isn't making a peep. This consensus behind ethnic cleansing is shameful, and every public leader who doesn't demand an end to the de facto expulsion is supporting this crime and has become a party to it.
If this process doesn't stop immediately, hundreds of thousands of people will become refugees, entire communities will be destroyed and the moral and legal stain of this crime will cling to and pursue every Israeli.
Netanyahu Congratulates Trump, Says They Discussed ‘Iranian Threat’
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu spoke with President-elect Donald Trump to congratulate him on his victory against Vice President Kamala Harris and said the two discussed the “Iranian threat.” ...
The Washington Post reported that during a call in October, Trump praised Israeli military actions in Lebanon following Israel’s dramatic escalations. “He didn’t tell him what to do militarily, but he expressed that he was impressed by the pagers,” Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC), who was also on the call, told the Post. “He expressed his awe for their military operations and what they have done. He told them, do what you have to do to defend yourself.” ...
Trump has vowed that he will strongly support Israel when if he returns to office and has said Israel has to “finish the problem,” referring to the genocidal campaign in Gaza. According to a report from The Times of Israel, Trump has told Netanyahu that he wants the war to be over by the time he returns to office by January 20, 2025. However, one of the Times’ sources stressed that Trump wasn’t specific in his appeal to Netanyahu and could well back “residual” Israeli military activity in Gaza.
US Warns Iraq Not To Allow Iran To Attack Israel From Iraqi Territory
The Biden administration has warned the Iraq government that if it allows Iran to attack Israel from its soil, the US won’t stop Israel from striking Iraq, Axios reported on Tuesday.
The report said US and Israeli intelligence believe that Iran is preparing to launch a significant attack from Iraq in response to Israel’s October 26 airstrikes on Iran, which killed four Iranian soldiers and one civilian. Iranian officials have been vowing that there will be a response.
US and Israeli officials claim Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has been moving drones and ballistic missiles to Shia militias in Iraq in preparation for a joint attack.
Ali Abunimah: why 'Holocaust Harris' deserved to lose
Ukrainian Officials Feeling ‘A Lot of Anxiety’ After Trump Victory
On Wednesday, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky congratulated President-elect Donald Trump on his “impressive election victory,” but behind the scenes, Ukrainian officials are really feeling “a lot of anxiety,” according to a report from Financial Times.
Trump campaigned on ending the war in Ukraine, although he never laid out a plan to reach that goal. His running mate, Sen. J.D. Vance, has been more explicit, saying he favors a deal to end the war that would freeze the current battle lines and guarantee Ukrainian neutrality and independence but still allow some sort of US military assistance for Ukraine.
An unnamed Ukrainian defense official told FT that many people in the Ukrainian military are “afraid” that a Trump victory means US aid will stop and “we’ll lose Donbas at least.” Another Ukrainian official said, “For us, [US] support means life or death. We need to convince Trump to be with us.”
Trump Could Halt BILLIONS in Weapons Shipments to Ukraine, Promises to END War with Russia
German government on brink of collapse after Olaf Scholz sacks finance minister
The German government was left on the brink of collapse after the chancellor, Olaf Scholz, unexpectedly sacked his finance minister, plunging Europe’s largest economy into political disarray. Christian Lindner was thrown out of the three-way coalition during a meeting of high-level government members on Wednesday evening, after months of bitter infighting that has contributed to the administration’s growing unpopularity.
Government insiders had suggested Donald Trump’s electoral victory would focus minds in Berlin and force leaders of the Social Democrats, Greens and the FDP to recognise the need for unity. But the discord and rancour in Berlin appeared to show no signs of subsiding.
Hours after Lindner’s sacking, the FDP withdrew the rest of its ministers from the cabinet, spelling the end of the beleaguered and unpopular three-way coalition.
In a televised address to the nation, Scholz said that he will seek a vote of confidence in January that would pave the way for early elections by March.
German government heading towards collapse
Sheinbaum tells Mexicans stunning Trump win is ‘nothing to worry about’
Mexico’s president, Claudia Sheinbaum, has reassured her country that “there’s nothing to worry about” after Donald Trump’s stunning victory in the US presidential election. But Trump’s extreme campaign promises have left Mexico bracing for punishing tariffs, mass migrant deportations – and even the far-fetched but alarming suggestion of US military strikes on organised crime groups in Mexican territory.
Addressing reporters at her daily press conference, the Mexican leader said: “We are a free, independent, sovereign country and there will be good relations with the United States. I am convinced of this.” Later on Wednesday she offered her “sincere congratulations” to Trump, adding in that she was sure the neighboring countries would “work together with dialogue and respect of our sovereignties, to advance the broad bilateral agenda that links us”.
The US-Mexico relationship is one of massive interdependence, and always diplomatically complex, but a Trump presidency will inevitably ramp up the tension.
Trump and his vice-president, JD Vance, have promised to take a range of hardline measures that span trade, migration and security. Trump has variously proposed a baseline 10% tariff on all imports and a 25% tariff on those from Mexico if it doesn’t do more to stop “the onslaught of criminals and drugs” coming through the border.
These tariffs could violate the free trade agreement between the US, Mexico and Canada, known as the USMCA, but that deal is up for renegotiation in 2026 and Trump wants changes – despite having negotiated it himself during his last presidency. Mexico exports almost $500bn of goods a year to the US, which is significantly more than the US sends in the other direction. The economic uncertainty created by Trump’s threats has already had a chilling effect on foreign investment in Mexico, with companies preferring to wait and see what the new rules of the game will be.
‘Red’ US states pass progressive laws while ‘blue’ states vote for conservative measures
While Donald Trump comfortably cruised to victory over Kamala Harris, , voters in a handful of red states cast their ballots for policies favored by centrists and progressives – such as minimum wage protections. Meanwhile voters in some deep-blue states favored measures that are conventionally associated with conservatism, such as tough-on-crime initiatives. ...
Missouri is among the most striking examples. Trump won this midwestern state’s 10 electoral votes after receiving 1,739,020 ballots, compared with Harris’s 1,190,806 – a landslide 58.5%. But Missouri also also green lit a union-backed ballot initiative to increase the state’s minimum wage to $15 an hour by January 2026. This initiative also provides paid sick leave to workers of large employers. And voters overturned the state’s near-total abortion ban, establishing a constitutional right to abortion until fetal viability. ...
Voters in Arizona, which at press time is poised to hand its 11 electoral votes to Trump, OK’d a ballot measure to create a fundamental right to abortion. The measure prohibits the state from restricting or banning it before 24 weeks. ...
In several heavily Democratic states, voters indicated that they weren’t all-in for progressivism. In California, residents voted in favor of Proposition 36. This ballot initiative enacts harsher punishments for retail theft, drug offenses and property crimes. The proposition revamps portions of a watershed 2014 law that downgraded several non-violent felony charges to misdemeanor charges. ...
As of press time, Massachusetts voters have struck down a proposal to increase tipped employees’ wages. The measure would have incrementally increased tipped workers’ wages until reaching the state minimum wage in 2029, while still allowing tipping, NBC News said.
Trump's Landslide Win EXPLAINED
US special counsel to wind down criminal cases against Donald Trump
Special counsel prosecutors will shut down their criminal cases against Donald Trump before he takes office, according to two people with direct knowledge of the matter, after his stunning victory against Kamala Harris meant they would not proceed to trial. The move reflects the reality that the cases will not be completed before inauguration day. Once the former president returns to the White House, the special counsel’s office would be prohibited from pursuing further criminal actions under justice department policy.
The justice department has long known that if Trump won, the criminal cases – over Trump’s retention of classified documents and his efforts to overturn the 2020 election – would be finished because Trump’s attorney general would likely drop the charges. But it is also understood to be a preemptive measure to ensure that Trump will not be able to order the dismissal of the special counsel, Jack Smith, as he had vowed to do if he takes office and Smith remained in his role.
The justice department is still examining how to wind down the cases, which are in different stages and are complicated. In particular, the department does not want the classified documents case, which was dismissed and currently under appeal, to go unchallenged. Failure to pursue an appeal over the dismissal of the classified documents case on grounds that the special counsel himself was illegally appointed could set a problematic precedent and hamper the department’s ability to use special counsels in the future.
Fatima Bhutto: Kamala Harris's Support for Israel's Genocide in Gaza Is a Betrayal
In Tiny State of Maine, a Big Election Day Win Against Dark Money in Politics
As billionaire-backed Republicans dominated U.S. elections on Tuesday, voters in Maine—among the top 10 states in terms of smallest populations—overwhelmingly approved a ballot measure to limit political spending, an initiative that could reach the country's top court.
Maine Question 1 targets super political action committees (PACs), dark money groups that, for the most part, are barred from directly contributing or coordinating with a candidate but can raise and spend unlimited amounts of funds.
Question 1 asked Mainers, "Do you want to set a $5,000 limit for giving to political action committees that spend money independently to support or defeat candidates for office?"
WMTW reported earlier this year that "the $5,000 contributions cap would only apply to state races, not United States House or Senate races."
As of Wednesday afternoon, the measure had passed 531,573 to 186,707, or 74% to 26%, with 89% of the estimated vote reported, according toThe New York Times.
"We're grateful to the Maine people for once again leading the way to help fix our broken political system," said Cara McCormick, chair of Maine Citizens to End Super PACs, which collected signatures to get the citizen-initiated measure on the ballot.
"The Maine people deserve a system that is not only free from corruption, but also free from the appearance of corruption," McCormick added. "Our greatest hope is to restore people's faith in our democracy and increase participation across the board."
The campaign highlighted that "some of America's leading constitutional law experts—Laurence Tribe, Lawrence Lessig, Neal Katyal, Al Alschuler, and others—have argued that Question 1 is the most immediate pathway to ending super PACs, the biggest source of dark money in elections."
Welcoming the measure's passage, Lessig declared Wednesday that "this is a great gift from Maine to democracy in America."
"We expect this initiative will be challenged," he explained. "But when the Supreme Court affirms what Maine voters have done, it could end super PACs everywhere."
As Maine Morning Star detailed Wednesday:
Since Buckley v. Valeo in 1976, the Supreme Court has allowed contributions to be regulated when there is a risk of "quid pro quo" corruption, essentially a favor for a favor. In the case of elections, if there is a risk someone could be making a donation to a candidate in exchange for a favor, only then can Congress regulate that contribution. In 2010, the Supreme Court extended this reasoning to corporations and unions in Citizens United v. Federal Election Campaign Act
Three months later, in SpeechNow.org v. FEC, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit upheld that contributions to groups making independent expenditures can't corrupt or create the appearance of corruption. That decision essentially created the "super PAC," which can receive unlimited contributions but can’t contribute directly to candidates. Other lower federal and state courts followed suit, and the ruling was never reviewed by the Supreme Court.
The editorial boards of both the Bangor Daily News and Portland Press Herald backed the ballot measure, with the latter writing last month that "ours would be the first state in the nation since the Supreme Court's Citizens United ruling in 2010 to move to limit contributions to PACs that can make independent expenditures."
"We believe that political spending has spiraled out of control, in many cases, and that the absence of any limit on PACs is inappropriate and leaves America's system of campaigning and voting vulnerable to the whims of bad actors," the board argued. "If Maine can play a leading role in bringing some order and fairness to political spending nationally, we should seize the chance."
Bernie Sanders BLASTS Harris Campaign, CORPORATE Democratic Party
Ohio Refuses to Count Jill Stein’s Votes!
‘A wrecking ball’: experts warn Trump’s win sets back global climate action
Donald Trump’s new term as US president poses a grave threat to the planet if it blows up the international effort to curb dangerous global heating, stunned climate experts have warned in the wake of his decisive election victory. Trump’s return to the White House is widely expected to result in the US, yet again, exiting the Paris climate agreement and may even remove American involvement in the underpinning United Nations framework to deal with the climate crisis.
While campaigning for president, Trump has called climate change “a big hoax”, scorned wind energy and electric cars and vowed to gut environmental rules and the “green new scam” of the Inflation Reduction Act, a major bill passed by Democrats to support clean energy projects.
Trump’s agenda, analysts have found, risks adding several billion tonnes of extra heat-trapping gases to the atmosphere, further imperiling goals to stave off disastrous global heating that governments are already failing to meet. Michael Mann, a climate scientist at the University of Pennsylvania, said that the US is now a “failed democracy” and that “we now pose a major threat to the planet.”
The election result will send shockwaves through annual UN climate talks that start in Azerbaijan on Monday. “The election of a climate denier to the US presidency is extremely dangerous for the world,” said Bill Hare, a senior scientist at Climate Analytics, who warned a Trump administration would likely “damage efforts” to keep the world from heating by more than 1.5C above pre-industrial levels, a Paris target that now appears even further out of reach. ...
When he was last president, Trump took several months to decide to remove the US from the Paris deal, raising fears the agreement would collapse. Countries did manage to avoid such a fate prior to Biden re-entering the pact and there is some optimism that the transition to cleaner energy isn’t something that Trump, despite his demands that the US “drill, baby drill” for oil and gas, can reverse.
Californians forced to flee as ferocious wildfires destroy homes and buildings
Fast-moving fires erupted across California on Wednesday as the state was lashed by powerful winds that complicated firefighting efforts, necessitated power shutoffs and raised the danger for more ignitions.
Just hours after igniting in Ventura county, the Mountain fire rapidly swept through more than 10,000 acres as flames jumped into rural and residential communities tucked close to the burning hillsides, leaving devastation in its wake.
“It has hopscotched over several ridgelines and is now burning structure to structure in neighborhoods,” climate scientist Daniel Swain said in an online broadcast, calling the event a “suburban fire storm” that could rank among the most destructive in California this year. “And the fire is still spreading.”
Fueled by gusts of up to 80mph, the fire spewed flames and embers up to 2.5 miles out, making it difficult and dangerous to fight. Every firefighting resource in the area has been thrown at the fire, according to Ventura county fire chief Dustin Gardner, who added that is is “still moving at a dangerous rate of spread”. By Wednesday evening, the fire remained at 0% containment.
Also of Interest
Here are some articles of interest, some which defied fair-use abstraction.
We are witnessing the final stage of genocide in Gaza
Oh No, Now The US Will Have A President Who Does Bad Things
Israeli settlers acquire hundreds of high-caliber rifles to 'prepare for war' in West Bank
Netanyahu Replaces Fired Israeli Defense Minister With ‘Another Genocidal Lunatic’
Democrats will not adapt to this defeat and must be overthrown or abandoned
Election 2024 - Random Thoughts
Why did voters abandon Kamala Harris? Because they feel trapped – and Trump offered a way out
It’s The Economy, Stupid (AKA Economists)
How Trump Won and What Black People Should Do
Dave Smith DESTROYS Establishment Shill Mehdi Hasan!
Trump’s LANDSLIDE Victory Makes Liberal Media FANTASIZE About Censorship: Robby Soave
Dearborn Mayor SPEAKS OUT After Trump WINS Muslim Voters
A Little Night Music
Syl Johnson - Take Me To The River
Syl Johnson - Soul Heaven
Syl Johnson - Steppin' Out
Syl Johnson - Come On, Sock It To Me
Syl Johnson - I Hear the Love Chimes
Syl Johnson - Concrete Reservation
Syl Johnson - Dresses Too Short
Syl Johnson - Back In The Game
Syl Johnson - Come Together
Comments
Good to hear the Muslim Americans in Dearborn
have found their voice and stated the issues clearly
for the rest of anarchy america to hear
It may be a wake-up call?
Resistance works.
Thanks for the Syl tunes!
question everything
evening qms...
i'm glad to see that killer kamala couldn't interrupt them when they were speaking this time.
Heard a song today
called
"blues got the world by the balls"
don't remember the performer,
but made me think of you
question everything
heh...
well, there's at least a couple of possibilities of artists ...
I spent a few hours
working on my contacts list. After all these years, I have about 1500 actual contacts. However, since I'm an Apple user, the iCloud contacts "server" has bloated the list up to 22,000 or so, in one of its periodic snits.
Apple has never figured out how to do address books that sync across multiple devices, and over the past week the database has abruptly gone from 425 MB to 11.5GB. When your iThings all start going "Tilt!" at the same time, it is the contacts.
It is always the contacts.
So, I laboriously edited it back down to the roughly 1500 that ought to be in there. But that isn't the thing I wanted to write about.
What I wanted to mention was the 280 contacts I deleted because they are deceased. There's nothing that gives you a feeling of aging and mortality like purging the ones who aren't going to call again...
Anybody else do that sort of thing, here recently? It certainly takes one's mind off the election.
Twice bitten, permanently shy.
evening usefewersyllables...
yeah, i've been watching my associates from my younger years slowly disappear. kinda sad, but the pace is picking up.
i've assiduously avoided keeping a contacts file on a computer or in an email account, figuring that unsavory people will just take them, spoof my address and spam my friends. it's kind of unavoidable on my phone, but that may be a little more secure.
oh well, have a good one!
Thinking about this specific election's details, it looks
like die hard GOP folks voted Trump, die hard Dems voted for Harris and a lot of the rest voted for the candidate they considered to be the lesser evil, which, rhetoric aside, turns out to have been NOT Harris. HAH!
be well and have a good one
That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --
evening el...
yeah, well, no matter how you voted, you're still stuck with the evil of two lessers. ain't that america?
Evening Joe - always brings Tuli K to mind
be well and have a good one
That, in its essence, is fascism--ownership of government by an individual, by a group, or by any other controlling private power. -- Franklin D. Roosevelt --
yep...
they were certainly a perspicacious bunch.
Confirming what Greenwald said
That should wake democrats up, but shitlibs are rejecting that it was the economy and they are insisting that it’s misogyny and racism that cost Kamala the presidency.
All most leftists want is a return to supporting the policies they used to support before Clinton decided that democrats should have a piece of the pie of big money from business, pharma and banks and of course the military industrial complex.
The polls showed that Bernie could have beaten Trump and he would have beaten Hillary, but it was her turn even though the base didn’t want more money sellouts and more useless wars. They shoved her down our throats anyway and then she lost. Hell democrats wouldn’t even throw Palestinians a bone at the convention. How costly was that? And her latest trick telling them one thing in one state and telling them something else in another…plus throwing Clinton at them who told them to suck it up and not care that their families were being killed by Biden’s bombs. 85,000 lbs of Biden’s bombs!
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...
what, and lose all those sweet donor checks?
Really....
@snoopydawg
The Democratic Party has long been the place where Leftist values go to suffocate in America.
Democrats ought to be encouraged to fully inhabit what they truly are: Political Soylent Green.
I doubt that the POC of the Millennial and GenZ generations will ever find a place among the Dems. Not that it matters. They will still be trapped in the dead-end dystopia of Lesser-Evil voting.
I was reading that China encompasses 56 separate races, with different cultures, languages, and religions, and they have managed to live together harmoniously for centuries or even millenia. The Chinese Constitution confers full rights and autonomy upon each separate culture/race, and they are additionally granted subsidies to improve and refine their cultural identities. They all have seats in the People's Congress, and because China's government is a strict meritocracy, they all have an opportunity to ascend to the highest offices in the land. China also shares borders with fourteen separate nations, that have very different forms of governments. China respects their sovereignty and does not interfere in their internal affairs. Most of Asia and countries across the Global South (those that have not been destabilized and wrecked by Western hegemony and colonization) have managed to get along with their neighbors and to resolve differences to the benefit of both.
This type of respect for fellow humans is simply out of the question for the civilization that we live in.
The US, which is definitely a recent genocide-nation, was quite easily transformed into Israel's Golem — operated by an international cabal of greedy psychopaths.
Golum: Jewish folklore about certain Rabbis who used secret rituals and Hebrew incantations to turn mounds of clay into a living Hulk-like warrior of immeasurable strength. The Golum protected the Jews from the persecution and anti-semitism that inevitably developed wherever they settled. In the folktales, the Golum would be created in the synagogue and sent out after dark to beat down the local leaders who wanted to lock the Jews in a ghetto at night, or chase them out of town.
.
The US genocide is not unlike the Palestine genocide. The patterns are quite familiar. The Reservations can be mapped. The final outcome is predictable.
This is now our national destiny.
Excellent
As Ian said the democrats can find a way back to winning if they would stop representing their donors over their base.
Shitlibs are stubbornly sticking to it’s the racism and misogyny and not the economy when polls show people are worried about their economic future. Just read about it with someone linking to the poll and he got dawg piled.
One said that she thought all women would have voted for Kamala so they didn’t die from lack of abortion…or something to that effect…
Carville said it over 3p years ago:
It’s the economy stupid.
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 an excellent comment
.
Here’s a taste:
Anyone watch Kamala’s rejection speech? Hooboy it was a doozy full of happy crap and we Americans are full of syrup and dawg poo. She was a half hour late to it and she couldn’t bother to address her supporters on the night she lost…poor sore loser.
I see how long you can watch and see if you can outlast me. I lasted 30 seconds.
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 snoopy...
heh, i've been celebrating the fact that i won't have to hear any more word salads out of killer kamala again. i don't think that i can bear to listen to even a moment of her condescension speech.
congrats on making it through 30 seconds!
Heh…
You can buy the book.
Happy reading!
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
30 Seconds?
Seems like a lifetime to me! I made it about 20. heh.
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
Bad wasn’t it?
But the crowd went wild…blehh.
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
Trump also sent military aid to Ukraine
Woodward and Bernstein are on the intelligence agencies payroll. I think the case against Nixon wasn’t what we were told. Bernstein was one of the Watergate burglars…did you know that? The other 3 were CIA agents.
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...
i'm not sure who woodward works for these days, but it wouldn't surprise me if he did a little freelance work for the agency from time to time.
bernstein was one of the burglars? that's a new one on me.
I read about during Trump’s tenure
I’ll see if I saved the article.
Dems turning on everyone but Kamala for her loss…just like they did for Hillary’s loss.
For cripes sake didn’t those people tell us that Biden was all there? And Biden decided nothing…he was pushed out so maybe he should have been pushed out earlier? People need to buy a mirror.
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 do not at all see why --
anyone, ANYONE, bothers to pretend that they can get anything, ANYTHING, out of telling the Democratic Party what to do. It's as stupid as "pressuring" people you're going to vote for anyway, or trusting them when they say they "care" about the victims of genocide while they participate in funding and arming said genocide. Everyone knows that the Democratic Party will present us ALL with candidates, platforms, and policy-making records and tell us: okay, kids, thumbs up or thumbs down, that's your choice.
I will repeat what I said earlier: Outside of Portland, Eugene, Minneapolis, Seattle, Chicago, California, Vermont, Massachusetts, and portions of New York City, you will soon see an America run entirely by Republicans, because the Democrat rank and file has no red lines. There is nothing a Democrat politician can do that is stupid enough to lose the votes of the loyal rank-and-file.
“The loyal Left cannot act decisively. Their devotion to the system is a built-in kill switch limiting dissent.” - Richard Moser
concessions and confessions
seem not to be in the
political tool bag
double down rather
than compromise is the go-to
screwdriver and wrench
for the (slide) rulers
question everything
It's the Blowback from Elder Abuse
I hope there are a million regrets to go with that.
Lol….
.
Trump’s brilliant peace plan.
See? Brilliant. Russia who is winning the war will agree to stop fighting while America continues to arm and train Ukrainians and Russia won’t have to worry about Ukraine joining NATO for 20 years. I’m sure that Putin will jump on the deal…. Good gravy are people really this stupid to think Russia would accept this? No wonder we keep losing wars.
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...
i guess that trump may find that putin is going to drive a hard bargain after four years of dealing with genocide joe. his alleged deal-making skills will surely be tested.
Moon of Alabama concurs
https://www.moonofalabama.org/2024/11/trump-and-ukraine.html#more
And Mark Sleboda delivers the coup de grace:
“The loyal Left cannot act decisively. Their devotion to the system is a built-in kill switch limiting dissent.” - Richard Moser
Yep…
It’ll be interesting to see what Trump does when Putin tells him to take a hike.
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
Hi bluesters
Hi Joe,
I know there are a lot of different ways to calculate the data, but my analysis showed fairly convincingly that the death and destruction brought on by Trump's "I love money F the environment" platform, should give us more time than the Harris/Cheney 'Joy of Fission' platform would.
What I could not work out was if Killer Kamala or Holocaust Harris sounded better.
Great sounds man. Syl had some neat fill licks, and cool wah-wah. This is a very cool Come Together.
Thanks for the news and blues Joe!
happy trails all!
We cannot solve our problems with the same thinking we used when we created them.
Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.
both - Albert Einstein
evening dystopian...
yeah, it really seems a tossup to me as to which candidate's destructive behaviors would more quickly terminate life on earth.
i think that the hard consonants of killer kamala give it a more satisfying feeling to spit out. i dunno, ymmv.
syl was an awesome blues player, have a great evening!
Lol…
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...
sounds right to me.
Dang, this is true!!
I'm gonna start telling my friends and acquaintances this when they tell me I lost Harris the election by voting for Stein!
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
Let us know how it goes
if you get the chance to say it. And remind them that people are free to vote for whoever they choose and no one owes their vote to democrats. Votes are earned not demanded.
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