The Evening Blues - 4-12-17



eb1pt12


The day's news roundup + tonight's musical feature: George "Harmonica" Smith

Hey! Good Evening!

This evening's music features blues harmonica player and singer George "Harmonica" Smith. Enjoy!

George Harmonica Smith - Telephone Blues

"From “Remember the Maine” in the Spanish American War, to Germans bayonetting Belgian babies in WW I, to the Gulf of Tonkin incident in Vietnam, to WMD in Iraq, America’s crusading middle class prefers to shoot first and wring hands later when it comes to righting wrongs that later prove to have never occurred."

-- Jeffrey Sommers


News and Opinion

Trump Withholds Syria-Sarin Evidence

After making the provocative and dangerous charge that Russia is covering up Syria’s use of chemical weapons, the Trump administration withheld key evidence to support its core charge that a Syrian warplane dropped sarin on a northern Syrian town on April 4.

A four-page white paper, prepared by President Trump’s National Security Council staff and released by the White House on Tuesday, claimed that U.S. intelligence has proof that the plane carrying the sarin gas left from the Syrian military airfield that Trump ordered hit by Tomahawk missiles on April 6. The paper asserted that “we have signals intelligence and geospatial intelligence,” but then added that “we cannot publicly release all available intelligence on this attack due to the need to protect sources and methods.”

I’m told that the key evidence was satellite surveillance of the area, a body of material that U.S. intelligence analysts were reviewing late last week even after the Trump-ordered bombardment of 59 Tomahawk missiles that, according to Syrian media reports, killed seven or eight Syrian soldiers and nine civilians, including four children. Yet, it is unclear why releasing these overhead videos would be so detrimental to “sources and methods” since everyone knows the U.S. has this capability and the issue at hand – if it gets further out of hand – could lead to a nuclear confrontation with Russia.

In similarly tense situations in the past, U.S. Presidents have released sensitive intelligence to buttress U.S. government assertions, including John F. Kennedy’s disclosure of U-2 spy flights in the 1962 Cuban Missile Crisis and Ronald Reagan revealing electronic intercepts after the Soviet shoot-down of Korean Airlines Flight 007 in 1983. Yet, in this current case, as U.S.-Russian relations spiral downward into what is potentially an extermination event for the human species, Trump’s White House insists that the world must trust it despite its record of consistently misstating facts.

Vladimir Putin: "This US strike reminds me strongly of events in Iraq in 2003"

Trump is setting himself up for more military action in Syria

Just 48 hours after saying the Assad regime’s alleged chemical weapons attack last week “crossed many, many lines,” President Trump approved the immediate launch of 59 cruise missiles on a Syrian airfield. Yet in the days since his decisive action, Trump has been conspicuously quiet on Syria while his administration has struggled to articulate if Thursday’s missile drop was a symbolic “one-off” or part of a broader U.S. strategy targeting Syrian dictator Bashar Assad. ...

On Sunday senior administration officials were offering seemingly contradictory statements. Nikki Haley, the U.S. ambassador to the United Nations, said there could be no peace in Syria as long as Assad was in power. But the very same day, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson struck a more reserved note, saying there “has been no change” in the administration’s “posture relative to our military activities in Syria today.” ... By Tuesday, Tillerson was offering yet another take, issuing Russia an ultimatum that Moscow must choose between the U.S. and its allies or Assad. “I think it is clear to all of us that the reign of the Assad family is coming to an end,” Tillerson added. Yet he stopped short of calling for Assad to step down.

Rather than being a symbolic show of U.S. military might that scares Assad into following international law, the Trump administration’s limited strikes and confused rhetoric may push the U.S. deeper into Syria’s intractable six-year civil war. ... And the U.S. military’s recent history in this area doesn’t bode well, warns Micah Zenko, senior fellow at Council on Foreign Relations. “I have studied limited U.S. military operations such as Thursday evening’s cruise missile strikes for almost 20 years,” he wrote in Foreign Policy Magazine on Sunday. “[T]hey rarely achieve their political objectives of deterring a foreign government or armed group from doing something, or compelling them from stopping an ongoing activity.”

Putin hardens Moscow's support of Syria regime before Tillerson visit

Vladimir Putin has deepened his support of the Syrian regime, claiming its opponents planned false-flag chemical weapon attacks to justify further US missile strikes. The Russian president’s predictions on Tuesday of an escalation in the Syrian war involving more use of chemical weapons came as US officials provided further details of what they insist was a sarin attack by Bashar al-Assad’s forces against civilians on 4 April, and accused Moscow of a cover-up and possible complicity.

The hardening of the Kremlin’s position, and its denial of Assad’s responsibility, accelerated a tailspin in US-Russian relations, just as the US secretary of state, Rex Tillerson, arrived in Moscow for direct talks.

Tillerson had hoped to underscore the US position with a unified message from the G7, which condemned the chemical attack at a summit in Italy on Tuesday. However, G7 foreign ministers were divided over possible next steps and refused to back a British call for fresh sanctions.

Rex Tillerson faces tough task in Moscow as Syria tension rises

The question is not so much whether Rex Tillerson can reach an agreement on Syria, but whether he can start any sort of dialogue at all. His first meeting with Sergei Lavrov, the Russian foreign minister, at February’s G20 summit in Germany began with an apparent disagreement over the presence of journalists. Their interaction seemed cold compared to the fellow feeling between Lavrov and the former US secretary of state John Kerry.

Lavrov sounded an ominous note just before his meeting with Tillerson on Wednesday, referring to the cruise missile attack as “unlawful”. Russia had lots of questions about the Trump administration’s “very ambiguous” and “contradictory” ideas, he added, saying that it was important for Moscow to understand America’s “real intentions”.

The mood music before the visit was not promising. In light of the chemical attack that killed more than 70 people in Syria last week, Tillerson said Russia had “failed to uphold” its 2013 promise to destroy Assad’s chemical weapons, adding that Washington saw “no further role” for Assad as the country’s leader, a harsher line on him than it had taken before.

On Wednesday the Russia president said ties with the US appear appeared to have deteriorated. “You can say that the level of trust on a working level, especially on the military side, has not improved but most likely worsened,” Putin said in a TV interview transcript posted by the Kremlin. The toughest talk has come from the Russian defence ministry, which vowed to boost Syrian anti-aircraft capabilities. A programme on its nationwide television channel Zvezda on Tuesday night declared that “only a demonstration of force” could stop Trump in Syria.

Mad Dog says he's certain that the Russians will back down.

Idiot.

U.S.-Russia tensions over Syria will not 'spiral out of control': Mattis

Tensions between the United States and Russia will not "spiral out of control" following last week's U.S. cruise missile strikes on a Syrian air base, Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said on Tuesday, describing it as a one-off response to Syria's use of banned chemical weapons. ...

"I'm confident the Russians will act in their own best interest and there is nothing in their best interest to say they want this situation to go out of control."

Mattis has repeatedly warned that the U.S. military remained ready to act again should Assad use chemical weapons, saying on Tuesday that Assad would "pay a very, very stiff price."

Allan Nairn: Civilian Deaths Are Spiking in Syria & Iraq as U.S. Launches Unrestrained Raids

Gabbard: ‘We need to learn from Iraq’

Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) has a message for the liberals attacking her criticism of President Trump’s missile strike on Syria, warning that a rush to aggression risks repeating the same mistakes that led the United States into the Iraq War.

“We need to learn from Iraq and Libya — wars that were propagated as necessary to relieve human suffering, but actually increased human suffering many times over,” she said in an email to The Hill.

Gabbard, a major in the Hawaii Army National Guard who served two tours in Iraq, has been highly critical of Trump’s decision last Thursday to launch 59 missiles at a Syrian airfield in response to a deadly chemical attack that killed scores of civilians, including children, in a western Syrian town days before.

The Trump administration says the chemical attacks were carried out by Syrian President Bashar Assad — a charge Damascus denies — and congressional leaders from both parties have endorsed the president’s response.

Gabbard’s position — particularly her skepticism that the Syrian government was behind the chemical attacks — has led to an outcry from some establishment Democrats, including former Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean, who want her out of Congress.


With his blistering pace of war escalation, Trump appears to be gunning for the position of garnering the most popular support amongst news media, think tanks and politicians from both parties in US history.

55 Bipartisan Lawmakers Demand Trump Pump Brakes on Military Action in Yemen

As conflict swirls over the recent U.S. bombing in Syria, more than 50 bipartisan lawmakers have demanded President Donald Trump seek approval from Congress before expanding U.S. military action in another Middle East theater: Yemen.

The letter sent this week came in response to reports that the Trump administration is considering a proposal to directly engage the U.S. military in Saudi Arabia's war against the Houthis in Yemen, including a planned United Arab Emirates-led attack on the Yemeni port of Hodeida, currently held by Houthi rebels.

"Such an attack could push the country into full-blown famine, where nearly half a million children in Yemen are facing starvation," said U.S. Rep. Mark Pocan (D-Wis.), who led the letter campaign along with Reps. Justin Amash (R-Mich.), Ted Lieu (D-Calif.), Walter Jones (R-N.C.), and Barbara Lee (D-Calif.).

Allan Nairn: Only Mass Disruption From Below Can Stop Right-Wing Revolution & Trump's Absolute Power

North Korea warns of nuclear strike if provoked; Trump 'armada' steams on

North Korean state media warned on Tuesday of a nuclear attack on the United States at any sign of American aggression, as a U.S. Navy strike group steamed toward the western Pacific - a force U.S. President Donald Trump described as an "armada".

Trump, who has urged China to do more to rein in its impoverished ally and neighbor, said in a tweet that North Korea was "looking for trouble" and the United States would "solve the problem" with or without Beijing's help. "We are sending an armada. Very powerful," Trump told Fox Business Network. "We have submarines. Very powerful. Far more powerful than the aircraft carrier. That I can tell you.”

Referring to North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, Trump said: “He is doing the wrong thing.” Asked if he thought Kim was mentally fit, Trump replied: “I don’t know. I don’t know him.”

North Korea said earlier it was prepared to respond to any U.S. aggression. "Our revolutionary strong army is keenly watching every move by enemy elements with our nuclear sight focused on the U.S. invasionary bases not only in South Korea and the Pacific operation theater but also in the U.S. mainland," its official Rodong Sinmun newspaper said.

It looks like Trump is itching for a fight with North Korea

President Donald Trump has yet to establish his own brand of foreign policy, but it seems he’s starting to employ his own version of Theodore Roosevelt’s famed “speak softly and carry a big stick” doctrine — minus the part about speaking softly. ...

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said last month that if North Korea were to “elevate the threat of their weapons program to a level that we believe requires action,” then a pre-emptive military strike would be “on the table.” Tillerson is currently headed to Moscow for meetings about the situation in Syria, but the possibility of a “unilateral military scenario” involving the U.S. in North Korea has the Russians “really worried,” according to a statement released Tuesday by the Kremlin.

Trump has enjoyed relatively positive U.S. media coverage of his retaliatory strike on Syria last week after the Assad regime used chemical weapons on civilians. With North Korea expected to launch more missiles or possibly conduct a sixth nuclear test to celebrate the birthday of Kim Jong Un’s grandfather on April 15, Trump could be tempted to try another intervention.

If only people could eat bombs, world hunger would disappear.

Mass starvation threatens the lives of 20 million people in the Horn of Africa, U.N. warns

The United Nations warned Tuesday that mass starvation is threatening the lives of 20 million people in the Horn of Africa. This stark message comes just five years after the “worst humanitarian crisis in 60 years” hit the region, claiming the lives of 260,000 people – half of whom were children under the age of 5.

Severe drought, conflict, collapsing economies, political instability, and a lack of aid means that 20 million people primarily in Nigeria, Somalia, South Sudan, and Yemen are at huge risk of starvation once again — and as before, it is children who are most at risk.

This was the message delivered by UNHCR spokesman Adrian Edwards, who said that “an avoidable humanitarian crisis” was “fast becoming an inevitability” as a result of a severe funding shortfall. Of the $4.4 billion UNHCR requested for the four affected countries, it has received less than $984 million (or 21 percent) to date.

Here are a couple of excerpts from an Intercept interview with Ron Wyden. The interview is worth a peek if you've been following privacy issues.

Sen. Ron Wyden Talks Trump-Russia, “Warrantless Backdoor Queries” and Hacking of U.S. Phone System

[Intercept] Domestic and incidental collection has been a passionate subject for you. Do you have any response to those who are either upset by Susan Rice’s actions, or [by unmasking] in general?

[Ron Wyden] Although the facts are far from clear, the media reports of the last week raise, in my view, very substantial questions about how information is collected on Americans and how it gets distributed and used. I have been trying to reform these practices for about a decade. Hopefully my Republican colleagues are now going to finally take this issue seriously. And there will be bipartisan support for the kinds of reforms that I’m seeking. I think we have to be given an accounting of the number of Americans’ communications collected under section 702 of FISA, the number of warrantless backdoor queries of Americans, how minimization of procedures work  —because they are continually cited as why the status quo is good. All of those issues — communications collected under section 702, warrantless backdoor queries of communications, minimum procedures for how this system works — have to be given to the Congress so that Congress can start looking at how to reform surveillance authorities that expire at the end of this year.

[Intercept] Do you think there’s a better chance than in years past of getting these reforms through?

[Ron Wyden] Yes, I think there is, just on the basis of the additional awareness, people want to examine this as an issue, they start with some political judgment, as if often the case, and I tell them, hey, I took on overreach in the George W Bush administration, I took on overreach in the Barack Obama administration, I’m clearly tackling overreach in the Trump administration, and I think if you put it that way, you have an opportunity now to build a bipartisan coalition for reforms of FISA 702 that you wouldn’t have had six months ago…apparently [Virginia Republican Congressman] Bob Goodlatte and [Michigan Democrat Rep.] John Conyers even [on Friday] asked for the same thing I’ve been trying to get for almost a decade, the number of law abiding Americans who get swept up in searches. So I do think we are making progress.

UK lawmakers allege that foreign states may have interfered in the Brexit vote

UK lawmakers have alleged that a foreign government may have been involved in a plot to interfere with the Brexit vote by hobbling a website designed to register voters — despite failing to present any firm evidence of this claim, leading one expert to accuse MPs of “crying wolf.”

In the wake of ongoing investigations into Russian interference in the U.S. elections, and fears that similar campaigns may be targeting this month’s French election and September’s German elections, U.K. lawmakers have sought to discover whether the Brexit vote was also influenced by state-sponsors actors. ...

On June 7, following a televised debate about the referendum to leave the EU, the “Register to Vote” website — which allowed U.K. citizens to sign up to take part in the referendum — crashed at 10.15 p.m, just ahead of the midnight deadline. At the time, the government said it was the result of an overwhelming volume of traffic, adding that “there is no evidence to suggest malign intervention.”

In a report published Wednesday, MPs on the parliamentary public administration and constitutional affairs committee contested that explanation, saying they do “not rule out the possibility that the crash may have been caused by a DDoS (distributed denial of service attack) using botnets.”

Trump Trial Balloon to Eliminate Social Security Tax Undermines Key Defense of the Program

The Trump administration is considering a proposal to remove Social Security’s dedicated funding stream by eliminating the payroll tax that funds it, the Associated Press reports. That would generate a considerable and highly visible tax cut for workers — 6.2 percent of their wages, putting an extra $3,720 a year into the paychecks of someone who makes $60,000 a year. And it would save the same amount for their employers.

But Social Security advocates worry that it would undermine the program’s finances by making it reliant on general revenues. Nancy Altman, who co-directs the Social Security Works advocacy group, called it a potential stealth attack. “We were always able to say Social Security doesn’t add a penny to the deficit, and if all of a sudden there’s general revenue flowing to it, then it does contribute to the deficit,” she said. “It undermines the idea that it’s an earned benefit.”

The Social Security payroll tax — assessed on all earnings up to $127,200 — is regressive in nature. It is, for instance, by far the heftiest federal tax burden on those who earn too little annually to owe much income tax. Its elimination would be a boon to most workers — but only if the funding stream were reliably and fully replaced. That would require counting on Trump’s economic team to shepherd a solution through Congress — and for Congress to treat Social Security unlike other “discretionary” general-fund programs whose budgets rise and fall with political currents.

Furthermore, the rumored mechanism for making up the lost funding — said to be a form of value-added tax (VAT), based on eliminating deductions on labor expenses — would hit workers the hardest.



the horse race



FBI obtained FISA warrant to monitor Trump adviser Carter Page

The FBI obtained a secret court order last summer to monitor the communications of an adviser to presidential candidate Donald Trump, part of an investigation into possible links between Russia and the campaign, law enforcement and other U.S. officials said.

The FBI and the Justice Department obtained the warrant targeting Carter Page’s communications after convincing a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court judge that there was probable cause to believe Page was acting as an agent of a foreign power, in this case Russia, according to the officials.

This is the clearest evidence so far that the FBI had reason to believe during the 2016 presidential campaign that a Trump campaign adviser was in touch with Russian agents. ... Page has not been accused of any crimes, and it is unclear whether the Justice Department might later seek charges against him or others in connection with Russia’s meddling in the 2016 presidential election. The counterintelligence investigation into Russian efforts to influence U.S. elections began in July, officials have said. Most such investigations don’t result in criminal charges.

The Bernie Sanders Show is interactive TV talk for the era of Facebook activism

There have been four episodes of The Bernie Sanders Show so far, with the most popular seeing Sanders and his guest, Bill Nye, seated on stylish red armchairs. A coffee table is in front of them and shelves of hardback books line the wall behind. ...

The Bernie Sanders show, which is filmed in the Democratic party’s DC-based studio, is atypical in ways beyond just presentation. Sanders has decided to bypass traditional media and broadcast exclusively on Facebook. And it is attracting – to borrow a Sandersism – a huge audience.

The first episode of the show featured the Rev William Barber, a protestant minister and activist who is a national board member of the NAACP. The conversation, aired on 16 February, focussed on grassroots mobilizing, and has been viewed more than 950,000 times. But it was the Nye broadcast that really got the Sanders’ team excited. “That was the moment when we really saw the power of this. We got 75,000 people watching at the same time and it got over 4.5m views,” said Josh Miller-Lewis, Sanders’ deputy communications director.

Miller-Lewis said Sanders himself is the brains behind much of the output. “A lot of it’s Bernie to be honest. He is the creative source for this. All of the success that we have on social media stems from his message and it’s a powerful message that people respond to,” Miller-Lewis said. “He’ll go through comments on his Facebook posts and talk with us about how people are responding, their reaction to certain policies, things they are struggling with in their lives.” That information feeds into who Sanders invites onto the show, the issues he discusses, and his ambitious plans to take the show on the road.

With Eyes on 2018, Dems Prep Sanders-Style Populist Economic Agenda

Democrats are working on a populist economic plan, à la Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.), to be unveiled as soon as early summer, Politico reported Wednesday. Top party members are crafting "a strong, sharp-edged, bold economic message," Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.) said during a conference call with reporters on Tuesday.

Schumer and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) have met twice, in addition to other staff meetings, to hammer down a "populist" economic agenda that is meant to "unite both wings of both caucuses," one aide told Politico. Infrastructure and trade are expected to be top components.

Democrats' pursuit of a populist agenda reflects the lasting impact of Sanders' presidential campaign, Politico's Heather Caygle and Elana Schor write. Many lawmakers saw the party's inability to put forward an enticing economic message as one of the fatal blows to Hillary Clinton's 2016 run.



the evening greens


This is an interesting introduction to a new approach to economics. There's too much to fairly extract, but here's a teaser:

Finally, a breakthrough alternative to growth economics – the doughnut

So what are we going to do about it? This is the only question worth asking. But the answers appear elusive. Faced with a multifaceted crisis – the capture of governments by billionaires and their lobbyists, extreme inequality, the rise of demagogues, above all the collapse of the living world – those to whom we look for leadership appear stunned, voiceless, clueless. Even if they had the courage to act, they have no idea what to do. The most they tend to offer is more economic growth: the fairy dust supposed to make all the bad stuff disappear. ...

In Doughnut Economics: Seven Ways to Think Like a 21st-Century Economist, Kate Raworth of Oxford University’s Environmental Change Institute reminds us that economic growth was not, at first, intended to signify wellbeing. Raworth points out that economics in the 20th century “lost the desire to articulate its goals”. It aspired to be a science of human behaviour: a science based on a deeply flawed portrait of humanity. The dominant model – “rational economic man”, self-interested, isolated, calculating – says more about the nature of economists than it does about other humans. The loss of an explicit objective allowed the discipline to be captured by a proxy goal: endless growth.

The aim of economic activity, she argues, should be “meeting the needs of all within the means of the planet”. Instead of economies that need to grow, whether or not they make us thrive, we need economies that “make us thrive, whether or not they grow”. This means changing our picture of what the economy is and how it works.

Another book review, which book has a somewhat different slant.

Confessions of a Recovering Environmentalist review – why the human race is heading for the fire

The future for humanity and many other life forms is grim. The crisis gathers force. Melting ice caps, rising seas, vanishing topsoil, felled rainforests, dwindling animal and plant species, a human population forever growing and gobbling and using everything up. What’s to be done? Paul Kingsnorth thinks nothing very much. We have to suck it up. He writes in a typical sentence: “This is bigger than anything there has ever been for as long as humans have existed, and we have done it, and now we are going to have to live through it, if we can.”

Hope finds very little room in this enjoyable, sometimes annoying and mystical collection of essays. Kingsnorth despises the word’s false promise; it comforts us with a lie, when the truth is that we have created an “all-consuming global industrial system” which is “effectively unstoppable; it will run on until it runs out”. To imagine otherwise – to believe that our actions can make the future less dire, even ever so slightly – means that we probably belong to the group of “highly politicised people, whose values and self-image are predicated on being activists”.

According to Kingsnorth, such people find it hard to be honest with themselves. He was once one of them.

We might tell ourselves that The People are ignorant of The Facts and that if we enlighten them they will Act. We might believe that the right treaty has yet to be signed, or the right technology yet to be found, or that the problem is not too much growth and science and progress but too little of it. Or we might choose to believe that a Movement is needed to expose the lies being told to The People by the Bad Men in Power who are preventing The People from doing the rising up they will all want to do when they learn The Truth.

[There's much more along those lines at the link. - js]

Sheriff Who Met DAPL Opponents With Brute Force Now Advising Other Law Enforcement

Morton County Sheriff Kyle Kirchmeier, made infamous for leading his department in brutal confrontations with opponents of the Dakota Access Pipeline, is reportedly advising other law enforcement on how to deal with protesters. In an interview with the Omaha World-Herald published Tuesday, Kirchmeier predicted that the next flashpoint will come in Nebraska over the pending construction of the Keystone XL (KXL) tar sands pipeline.

Throughout the months-long standoff in North Dakota, the sheriff's office was repeatedly criticized for acting as a security force for pipeline company Energy Transfer Partners, as well as for routinely employing an excessive use of force against demonstrators. Police in riot gear attacked the water protectors with rubber bullets, water cannons, teargas grenades, and other weapons. In addition, military vehicles such as a BearCat and MRAPs were deployed, while protesters were monitored by helicopters and identification check-points. Yet, Kirchmeier told the World-Herald "that several other states, including South Dakota, have asked him to relay what he learned from the Standing Rock protests, and said that eventually he expects to talk with those from Nebraska," the newspaper reported.

Among the lessons learned, according to reporter Paul Hammel, is how the county and state both "declared emergencies so they could utilize emergency funds to buy riot gear and cover the costs of officers who came from other states, including Nebraska." Further, "Kirchmeier said some tactical lessons were learned in confronting protesters, but he declined to share them," Hammel wrote.


Also of Interest

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

Intercepted Podcast: The Emperor’s New Cruise Missiles

Syria: Where the Rubber Meets the Road

Trump’s Syria Attack Trampled Many Laws

Five Top Papers Run 18 Opinion Pieces Praising Syria Strikes–Zero Are Critical

Trump Repairs His Ratings: Syria and the Democrats’ Denunciations of Dissent

BREAKING — Anonymous Sources Say Entire Syria Thing Is Fucking Bullshit

Did Assad Really Use Sarin?

DeVos Just Put Interests of 'Predatory Profiteers' Over Student Loan Borrowers

Victims of Criminal Cops in Chicago Are Fighting to Overturn Their Wrongful Convictions


A Little Night Music

George "Harmonica" Smith - Blowin' The Blues

George Harmonica Smith - Mississippi River Blues

George Harmonica Smith - Juke

George "Harmonica" Smith - Roaming

George Harmonica Smith - I Don't Want To Go , Baby

Little George Smith - Oopin Doopin Doopin

"Little George" Smith - Blues Stay Away

George Harmonica Smith - Sometimes You Win, Sometimes You Lose

George Harmonica Smith - Woke up this mornin'

George Smith - Down in New Orleans

George Smith - Yes Baby



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mimi's picture

with NATO Secretary General Stoltenberg. I didn't follow. It's 55 minutes in the live stream
[video:https://youtu.be/ssSFSxMAZ78]

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joe shikspack's picture

@mimi

in the car earlier today i caught some national propaganda radio and they said that trump was making nice with nato. he said that pursuant to his complaints on the campaign trail that nato had made some changes and now he was satisfied that nato was fighting terrorism.

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Azazello's picture

@joe shikspack
I just heard him on NPR too. He was saying that Assad is "an evil, evil man" or some such shit. When they want to manufacture consent for some war they always personalize it. They talk about how evil the "brutal dictator" is and make it seem like the war is about one guy. It's not, it never is. You don't go to war against one guy, you go to war against an entire nation. But to the American public, stupidified as they are by generations of television abuse, it makes some kind of sense that a nation might launch a war just to get one guy, the evil mastermind. Here's the whole text from the last time the US actually declared war:

Seventy-Seventh Congress of the United States of America; At the First Session Begun and held at the City of Washington, on Friday, the third day of January, 1941.

JOINT RESOLUTION Declaring That a State of War Exists Between The Government of Germany and the Government and the People of the United States and Making Provisions To Prosecute The Same

Whereas the Government of Germany has formally declared war against the Government and the people of the United States of America: Therefore be it Resolved by the Senate and House of Representatives of the United States of America in Congress assembled, That the state of war between the United States and the Government of Germany which has thus been thrust upon the United States is hereby formally declared; and the President is hereby authorized and directed to employ the entire naval and military forces of the United States and the resources of the Government to carry on war against the Government of Germany; and, to bring the conflict to a successful termination, all of the resources of the country are hereby pledged by the Congress of the United States.

(Signed) Sam Rayburn, Speaker of the House of Representatives
(Signed) H. A. Wallace, Vice President of the United States and President of the Senate
Approved December 11, 1941 3:05 PM E.S.T.

Note that there's no mention of Hitler, the most evil of all brutal dictators. They declared war against another country, not some evil cartoon villain.
I tremble for my country when I reflect that we are dumb.
Here's Mr. Jimmy on the treatment Tulsi Gabbard has received.
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E1oECQ6r6do width:500 height:300]

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We wanted decent healthcare, a living wage and free college.
The Democrats gave us Biden and war instead.

joe shikspack's picture

@Azazello

heh, jimmy dore did a great job of telling howard dean to go piss up a rope. i hope that dean hears that from a lot of people.

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Azazello's picture

@joe shikspack
tune out those liars on NPR and go to 91.3 on your dial for the best 4 hours on radio. Now here's a tune that some might not recognize as blues, but it is. Listen to the changes, it's the I-IV-V all the way.
[video:https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcguLZaMelE width:500 height:300]

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We wanted decent healthcare, a living wage and free college.
The Democrats gave us Biden and war instead.

joe shikspack's picture

@Azazello

i only listen to npr in the car sometimes. sadly, there isn't much else worth listening to in the baltimore market.

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Azazello's picture

@joe shikspack
Still, ya' gotta' know what propaganda is currently being catapulted and they're a good indicator. Now they're treating Fucking W like some kind of fucking elder statesman and they promise to let us hear his wisdom tomorrow morning.

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We wanted decent healthcare, a living wage and free college.
The Democrats gave us Biden and war instead.

mimi's picture

@Azazello

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mimi's picture

@joe shikspack @joe shikspack
jump on your horse, take your lasso, shout a Deanish "Yeehaw" and throw 'something' around their neck.

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snoopydawg's picture

Trump has no reason or right to put the military in Yemen. The war in Yemen has nothing to do with keeping our country safe or anything to do with the war on terror. The Yemen war is between Saudi Arabia and Iran.
If congress is only saying that Trump needs their permission to get our military involved with that war, then they are war criminals too. The Nuremberg trials layed out the reasons for another country to invade another one and that is only if that country threatens another country. And the War Powers act that congress passed states that the president can only use force for these 3 reasons

The resolution, however, allows the President to introduce U.S. Armed Forces into hostilities or imminent hostilities in only three situations: First, after Congress has declared war, which has not happened in this case; second, in “a national emergency created by attack upon the United States, its territories or possessions, or its armed forces,” which has not occurred; third, when there is “specific statutory authorization,” which there is not.

And United Nations Charter states this.

Regarding international law, the United Nations Charter prohibits the “use of force against the territorial integrity or political independence of any state.” There are only two exceptions: when conducted in self-defense after an armed attack, or with the approval of the Security Council.

Period. I know that hasn't stopped this country from invading countries, but it should and the countries involved with NATO should have put a stop to our country decades ago.
Obama should have been brought up on war crimes because he too had no right to use our Air Force and our navy to help the Saudis refuel their jets.

Just like I abhor Hillary for her Iraq war vote, I feel the same for Tulsi Gabbard for participating in the Iraq war.
So what that she is speaking out against Trump for bombing the Syrian airport, where was she when Obama was doing what he did the last 8 years?

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Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

joe shikspack's picture

@snoopydawg

every living president should be in jail for war crimes. (yes, even jimmy carter did some pretty wretched things.)

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snoopydawg's picture

@joe shikspack
I have that article bookmarked too just in case someone wanted to give him a pass on war crimes.
Wasn't young Barack a witness to what happened in East Timor and during Suharto's reign?
His grandparents were members of the Ford foundation IIRC.

I'd still like to know why countries put up with the USA and its warmongering and continue to allow bases in their countries?
Anyone? Bueller?

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Which AIPAC/MIC/pharma/bank bought politician are you going to vote for? Don’t be surprised when nothing changes.

joe shikspack's picture

@snoopydawg

I'd still like to know why countries put up with the USA and its warmongering and continue to allow bases in their countries?

probably for the very same reason that we put up with our government pissing away vast amounts of the product of our labor on military adventures - because we haven't figured out a way to put a stop to it.

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OzoneTom's picture

@snoopydawg
Friends in Hawai'i have advised me that Tulsi Gabbard underwent a transformation between going into the military and returning home. So I am not going to hold her military service against her.

Full disclosure, I am a veteran myself -- but that isn't really a big part of my identity. Maybe because I was never anywhere near combat -- unlike Gabbard.

Anyway according to these friends, her father was a socially-conservative state senator -- I mean huge same-sex rights opponent. They said that she was pretty blue-doggy when she was in the state legislature. Before her service, she opposed LGBT rights but was still a big supporter of renewables -- so some generational progress.

But according to these friends, her attitudes were significantly more progressive after her return home from war. And I believe that last year and since have shown how much that may be the case.

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coloradoblue's picture

It's going to take you until summer? Shit, let me help:

1. Medicare for All, and not the 80% Medicare we have now.
2. A Living Wage, $15 per hour or more.
3. Remove the SS cap.
4. No more corporate or billionaire money in politics. Yes, this one would probably take a constitutional amendment.
5. A true infrastructure project that addresses our D- country.

I could keep going but won't bother since you won't listen anyway.

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Dear Dems: You lost the WH, Senate, House, dozens of governors, state level SOS and AG and about 1,000 state legislative seats. Maybe...you're doing something wrong.

joe shikspack's picture

@coloradoblue

it's going to take them that long because they have to figure out how to appear to be supporting an actual progressive agenda, while actually continuing to keep the machine greased for their dark corporate overlords. they're going to have to create a masterpiece of deceptive language.

perhaps they can get obama to help them word it, he was a talented weasel.

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Steven D's picture

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"You can't just leave those who created the problem in charge of the solution."---Tyree Scott

joe shikspack's picture

@Steven D

an excellent choice of spokesperson!

i hope that all is going well for you and your family these days and everybody is in good health.

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featheredsprite's picture

Both China and the US have promised direct action if NK sets off another rocket. NK in the meantime is hinting that it intends to set off a nuclear device in a tunnel Saturday morning. http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2017-04-12/north-korea-said-have-placed-nu...

Sigh.

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Life is strong. I'm weak, but Life is strong.

joe shikspack's picture

@featheredsprite

it seems like all over the world people are playing brinksmanship games with incendiary devices and incendiary rhetoric. sometimes i think that if the human race makes it to the point where nature performs the coup de grace rather than our beautiful weapons, it will be a miracle.

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Lots of bad/horrific stuff in the news.
The Greenwald tweet was so cool, reminded me of the rich folks back in the day who could avoid the draft AND harass anti-war protesters! Mitt Romney comes to mind... of course, there were others.
Perez sent a DNC request asking for $ because Trump is so dangerous. My response that I consider the DNC my current No. 1 enemy, among many other harsh truths.
Bernie could get me to vote for him, Bernie can't get me to re-join the Democratic party.
The snail mail cost of the reply is on them.

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

joe shikspack's picture

@on the cusp

i'm not on perez' list. i get begging emails from nancy pelosi, james carville, michelle obama, carole king, keith ellison among others. they are desperate for just $1 and their pitches are pretty pathetic - except for carville who is a demanding jerk.

i've found over the years that the more you reply to them, even with diatribes, the more democratic lists you get on.

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@joe shikspack @joe shikspack Who knows, joe. Al Franken stopped sending me stuff.
Maybe some staffer read my reply.
Who knows.

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

lotlizard's picture

@joe shikspack Since the electoral process, being “critical infrastructure,” now falls under the Department of Homeland Security, the DNC just needs to reorganize itself as the party’s police force.

Having law enforcement powers offers a whole new vista of fund-raising opportunities.

https://thinkprogress.org/alabama-senate-votes-to-let-church-create-its-...
http://loweringthebar.net/2017/04/report-no-discernible-connection.html

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joe shikspack's picture

@lotlizard

that's just too frightening to contemplate.

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smiley7's picture

The DeVos story portends bad things in our future, 'owing our soul to the company store.' Many thanks for the news and blues and have a great evening.

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joe shikspack's picture

@smiley7

devos is a danger to humanity. while trump has appointed many vile, horrible people to public office, devos is probably the bottom of the barrel.

i guess this administration will help us find out the answer to bush's question, "is our children learning?"

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Big Al's picture

anything about Trump's illegal firing of 60 missiles into Syria, what's to stop Trump from doing something even bigger? How about dropping a nuke on Pyongpang? There's nothing to stop him except his own staff and the Pentagon. The people won't do it, Congress won't do it, the world won't do it. We're all held hostage in that respect.
This is partly why we should look at abolishing the office of the presidency. It's become too powerful of a tool under permanent war for those that control us, regardless of whether it's the president making the decisions or they're being made for the president.

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joe shikspack's picture

@Big Al

it's clear that we have neither a functioning democracy, nor an economy that works for the vast majority of our people. things like decency, equity and justice are in very short supply.

frankly, it is not just the presidency that we need to revise - it is the whole mechanism of social/political and economic organization that needs a complete overhaul.

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MarilynW's picture

Trump told him that he had just launched 59 missiles "while eating a beautiful chocolate cake."

I did suspect part of the reason for the launch at this time was to impress China but I thought Trump had the decency to wait for his guests to leave his pleasure palace first. Apparently Xi took 10 seconds to respond as if in shock.

http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2017/04/trump-ate-beautiful-chocola...

And furthermore, shouldn't the big idiot have been in the situation room at the WH instead of in his pleasure palace when he launched the missiles?

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To thine own self be true.

mimi's picture

@MarilynW @MarilynW @MarilynW
to be grateful to Bartiromo to have schmoozed out the best sides of Generalissimo Drumpelstilzchen, but that video is "a dream come through". I will always remember it when I eat one of those very high, beautiful chocolate cakes. Nevermind that Drumpelstilzchen couldn't do this performance without cheating sometimes and reading from his notes fed to him (what did he drink with Chinese President Xi Jinping?) May be he should eat his notes and leave the chocoloate cake to those children he pours tears over in the tens of buckets, because them beautiful children are starving to death. They could need some sugar.

Jesus fucking Christ, Houston, you have some problems. You wanna ask the Germans for some help? Why not, even Spicer thinks that might be ok, given our history.

Bad Diablo more Bomb please.
(for the snark and sarcasm challenged - this is how I sound when I am angry).

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joe shikspack's picture

@MarilynW

kind of reminds you of a scene out of one of those movies about the mafia where the big cheese is depicted instructing his stenchly henchmen as to the gory details of the action he wants performed over a gorgeous, super-abundant dinner spread.

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enhydra lutris's picture

The/this government is not your/our friend. Whatever it orders/asks you to do, your first impulse should be to resist.

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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 --

Well, the first time I heard the phrase it was from a popular winger on youtube about 2 months ago. It seemed to be a useful phrase. All the UN sanctions, the outrage that Hitler used no chemical weapons,even the the support for the Tomahawks (for the children you know) is nothing but virtue signalling. Only the lethal version.

As I listened to the outrage about the mishandled claim of Spicer over Hilter's use of chemical weapons I remember reading that Saddam let loose the biggest chemical weapons attack (on Iran) in the history of warfare. When he was our ally who we supported in his war against the Iranians.

No American leader, pundit, law maker, hawkish voters, etc has the moral standing to wag their fingers at any country or leader in regards to war and foreign policy. Invocations of morality and humanitarianism are just cheap rhetorical devices and techniques used by the ruling class and its enablers to attack their enemies. And then put back into the rhetorical tool box.

This now when I get some moral argument that leads to death, I say the moral argument means jackshit to me.

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lotlizard's picture

@MrWebster Trump launched the attack on Syria.

Pains were taken to depict Trump as lying or misguided about everything and his appointees as unreliable figures from the fringe.

Yet ever since Trump attacked Syria, they have been reporting “Assad used sarin” as if that were a fact and a certainty.

As with 9/11, one moment everyone is saying Bush is a fool and his Republican administration is being run by fascists and liars; the next moment whatever U.S. officials say about 9/11 must be believed without question.

This kind of “turn on a dime” signalling of virtue and manufacturing of consent has gotten to be so blatant, it’s no wonder some Germans on the Left and the Right think of German mainstream media as the Lügenpresse (lying press).

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@lotlizard My vague impression is that European media pretty much reflects the norms of American media. Russian conspiracies everywhere.

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Cassiodorus's picture

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"The war on Gaza, backed by the West, is a demonstration that the West is willing to cross all lines. That it will discard any nuance of humanity. That it is willing to commit genocide" -- Moon of Alabama

joe shikspack's picture

@Cassiodorus

heh, quite so. however, isn't it suspicious when a person has never had any sort of run-in with the law? perhaps they are attempting to hide deviant personal behavior behind a facade of public conformity to norms.

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janis b's picture

As I wonder and wait for the effects of the predicted cyclone ‘Cook’, I wonder about the future. At the moment all is still, the birds are talking and the sky is clouded but reasonably bright. I just read from and listened to Paul Kingsnorth, who I am immensely grateful for your introduction to. I found this talk of his to be profoundly resonant, and important food for thought and consideration. I will now follow the work of The Dark Mountain Project.

[video:https://youtu.be/o1NAF4yHZWE]

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joe shikspack's picture

@janis b

i hope that you are all safe and well. hopefully, you still have power and are on high ground.

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janis b's picture

@joe shikspack

I thought that Cook was the most perfect name for a cyclone I’ve ever heard! Thankfully it passed Auckland by. We’ve already had enough flooding and other weird stuff. It’s good to have a reprieve.

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mimi's picture

(added a sentence and redacted another)
just saw it and can't read it right now. I usually try to not overlook what Scott Ritter writes.

May be some of you want to read it too:
Dereliction of Duty, Redux - Posted on Apr 12, 2017 - By Scott Ritter

I scanned the article now, it's long, detailed and convincing on factual basis, I think.

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