Category Archives: surveillance state

Podcast Roundup

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6/8: Hosts Mickey Huff and Peter Phillips discuss the ongoing situation in the Ukraine with Dr. Michael Parenti, Prof. Michel Chossudovsky, and former Congresswomen and Green Party Presidential candidate Cynthia McKinney on “the Project Censored Show”. All of them are contributors to a new book by Clarity Press edited by Stephen Lendman, “Flashpoint Ukraine: How the US Drive for Hegemony Risks WWIII.”

https://s3.amazonaws.com/Pcradiodos/Project+Censored+060614.mp3

6/9: On “the Progressive Commentary Hour”, host Gary Null interviews Dr. Andrew Wakefield, a gastroenterologist and academician specializing in inflammatory bowel disease and the measles-mumps-rubella vaccine or MMR. They discuss how the US government uses corporations and universities to support policies, silence top scientists, jeopardize public health and protect corporate profits.

http://s36.podbean.com/pb/3f11f4e516587793b6f2d38475623afc/5398ccbc/data1/blogs18/371244/uploads/ProgressiveCommentaryHour_060914.mp3

6/10: On “the Higherside Chats”, Adam Gorightly and Vyzygoth joins host Greg Carlwood for a freewheeling but illuminating conversation about the suppressed history of the United States hidden beneath lies and disinformation most have been led to believe.

http://thehighersidechats.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/06/112-Vyzygoth.mp3

6/12: KMO talks with Vincent Horn of Buddhist Geeks on the lastest C-Realm podcast. They discuss the use of mindfulness techniques in technological society and its connection to DIY, Quanitifed Self and Maker movements. KMO wraps up with commentary on the nature of individualism and community.

http://www.c-realm.com/wp-content/uploads/418_Adaptive_Comtemplation.mp3

 

 

This American Empire, It Too Will Collapse

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Imperial_Overreach

By Dave Lefcourt

Source: RINF.com

Here is my sense; like all empires before it this American one reached its apex after WWII. It’s on a downward trajectory and will eventually fall or be overtaken.

And I believe most Americans will be taken by surprise as in “How could this happen”?

That’s because most Americans are in the words of Paul Craig Roberts “insouciant”, without a care, too passively indifferent, too besotted with technological gadgetry, have feelings of entitlement and believe in American exceptionalism to bother to notice their government has become sinister-which most others in the world recognize, but their governments too intimidated or blackmailed into following us or they will be demonized. Think Iran, Iraq under Saddam-though earlier an ally in his war with Iran in the 80′s-now the newly announced new cold war with Russia and soon to be China.

As for us Americans take an honest look at what passes for our modern American “culture” nowadays-and contributes to maintaining domestic tranquility at all costs. In no particular order:

Consumerism-excessive and beyond all need. And in conjunction with it

Corporatism and commercialization of the public square i.e. the “mallization” of America.

Sports mania, particularly over Pro football and its marketing.

Popular movies featuring gore, crashes, mayhem, aliens, illusion, “virtual” characters replacing real people.

Celebrity gossip as “news”.

Government surveillance by way of technological gadgetry-cell phones, ipods, computers, email, GPS, EZ pass, toll cameras.

MSM becoming complicit in government actions and its propaganda

Addiction with drugs and alcohol

Incarceration-the highest rates of all 1 st world industrialized democraci

Militarization of local and state police

A trillion dollars in college student debt.

Though certainly not contributing to maintaining domestic tranquility, throw in the bailouts of the big banks too big to fail, income inequality worse than the 1920′s and clearly articulated in the 2011 occupy movement that coined the disparity between the 1% and the 99%, no single payer universal health insurance coverage for all, ignoring global warming and the further despoiling of the environment, the demise of domestic manufacturing, the outsourcing of jobs, home foreclosures and bankruptcy stemming from unscrupulous lenders et al and domestically its an America becoming unrecognizable to these old eyes.

As for the policies and actions of our government that unmistakably reveals its true nature, here again in no particular order are:

  • The war industry-the trillion dollar military/corporate/political complex and its revolving door of key players that move seamlessly between each to maintain its control. The other key element is the creation of,
  • “Enemies” contrived such as the “global war on terror”, and the new “cold war” with Russia.
  • Initiating unnecessary and illegal wars and occupations in Afghanistan and Iraq
  • CIA coups, assassinations to create instability to promote endless war
  • NSA surveillance of everyone in the world through “back doors” of computers and software
  • Absolute control of the political agenda and the enacting of laws, regulations oversight and enforcement to the benefit of corporate interests
  • Justice Department lawyers writing memos “legalizing” all executive actions but kept secret for reasons of national security with no oversight by the Congress or the courts
  • Exercise hegemony worldwide, surround Iran, Russia with “allies”, NATO, a thousand military bases worldwide and a floating armada of carrier task forces
  • Initiate cyberwarfare as was done in Iran in 2010 and its enrichment of uranium
  • Engage in extraordinary rendition, indefinite detention and torture of suspects
  • Targeting and prosecuting whistleblowers, hounding Edward Snowden for exposing the NSA‘s illegal surveillance practices.

These domestic and foreign policies and actions are not those of a government that is representative of the people in a democratic republic. These are policies and actions of a plutocracy of oligarchs and an empire willing to go to any length to maintain its hegemony worldwide and control domestically.

Incredibly, what’s propping up this edifice of domestic indulgence and propaganda and foreign villainy is the FED printing money, selling billions in treasury notes to China, Japan, even Russia underpinned by what else, our previous debt in the trillions and all based on the assumption these countries will continue to buy our debt. But it’s a form of blackmail these other countries have accepted, at least for the present. That can’t last forever.

For sure one can’t predict the actual demise of an empire, even the American one. But hubris, American exceptionalism, the sense of entitlement and the idea of it being the “indispensible nation” surely won’t save it from the trash heap of other empires long gone. Such illusions may contribute, even hasten that inevitable collapse.

Dave is the author of “DECEIT AND EXCESS IN AMERICA, HOW THE MONEYED INTERESTS HAVE STOLEN AMERICA AND HOW WE CAN GET IT BACK”, Authorhouse, 2009

Piketty, Meet Orwell: Why Modern Oligarchy MUST Turn Fascist

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By Patrick Walker

Source: OpEdNews.com

If Frenchman Thomas Piketty, for all his brainiac academic wonkiness, has become a U.S. publishing sensation and economics rock star, it’s not merely due to his high-profile promoters. Granted, Piketty touters like Paul Krugman and Joseph Stiglitz carry high-brow clout (rather justified, given their own economics Nobel Prizes), among both fellow economists and intellectually serious progressives; it’s hardly surprising they help set intellectual fashions. But the deeper reason Piketty crossed the Atlantic so well is his timeliness: he had an economic message America’s most politically aware citizens were desperately waiting to hear.

For me (and, I suspect, for millions like me), the translated Piketty message–and I mean translated not just from French to English, but from economics to political activism, is this: your governance is illegitimate, and you now have the go-ahead signal to REVOLT. Not that many of us weren’t ready to revolt anyway (Occupy Wall Street, the anti-XL pipeline movement, and the food service workers’ strike were among the most prominent foreshocks), but the point is that Piketty gave us a new intellectual legitimacy. All true idealists are at some level truth seekers, and nothing gives us the needed conviction to go overturning the social order (a task people of conscience don’t undertake lightly) than indisputable evidence that the current order is illegitimate–a menace to the common good.

Having been irreversibly persuaded ourselves of the need for revolt, we feel free–in good conscience and citing the same evidence that persuaded us–to spread the message of revolt.

Piketty gave us the needed evidence–and as I mean to argue passionately here, Orwell closes the deal. I mean to say the twentieth-century Brit has “crossed the pond” perhaps even better than Piketty, and that we’ll fail to grasp the truly sinister implications of Piketty if we don’t make Orwell his required intellectual “diet supplement.” All modern oligarchic governance must end, in Orwell’s unforgettable image, in “a boot stamping on a human face forever.” Nothing less is at stake in our call to radical action.

Before proceeding, I wish to make one point of intellectual clarity. Careful readers will perhaps have noted that what I called illegitimate, in light of Piketty, is our governance. Now, I could easily have chosen a more familiar word, like government or system or society, but I fear that in doing so, I would have lost needed precision. Even a qualification like political system might not do the trick. For by governance I mean something wider than government and narrower than society, and wish to avoid (for now) distracting questions about the adequacy or legitimacy of the political system bequeathed to us by this nations’ founders. By governance, I means the whole collection of institutions, organizations, laws, and practices that determine how we are actually governed. So in the term, I very much intend to include the media, police and military, political parties, PACs, and other interest groups. Everything variable, in short, that enters the equation of how our nation is governed. It’s the final result of that equation–summarized in the word governance– that’s now provably illegitimate.

As I feel no shame (but rather, great pride) in saying, I write as a tribal progressive–NOT as a tribal Democrat. In fact, it’s my being a tribal progressive that frees me of the intellectual blinders necessarily entailed by being a tribal Democrat. For no tribal Democrat is intellectually equipped to grasp the illegitimacy of our governance, which is clearly–in a system monopolized by two parties–a bipartisan affair. Not that any sane person would say that both parties share culpability equally; anyone who fails to properly assign greater blame to Republicans has respected, heavyweight constitutional scholars like Thomas Mann and Norman Ornstein–writers long noted for their nonpartisan balance and objectivity–to answer to. Their deservedly popular book It’s Even Worse than It Looks places the lion’s share of the blame for Congressional dysfunction (the piece of the illegitimacy puzzle they deal with) squarely on right-wing extremism. But our governance is scarcely a matter simply of Congress–or of one party. Any thorough analysis of our current illegitimacy would have to include Congressional Democrats, the Supreme Court, President Obama, the “shadow governance” of the Deep State, and the maggot swarms of lobbyists who descend on Washington daily. And that’s just the tip of the iceberg. But it’s hardly my purpose to sort out in depth the agents responsible for our gravely dysfunctional oligarchy, but rather to spotlight its grievous, jackboot-trampling-face consequences. For, as I intend to prove, oligarchs can ultimately rule us in no other way.

Now, my calling myself a “tribal progressive” is something of a joke, modeled of course on the notion of unthinking, party-line-towing tribal Democrats and Republicans. In fact, I also self-identify as an intellectual and truth seeker, and therefore as someone for whom–as for Orwell–there’s something deeply sinister in the notion of a banned or off-limits book. Consequently, I’ve been known to indulge myself in authors and works whose reputation among the politically correct Left is, to put it mildly, dubious. Hence, I’ve read with pleasure Friedrich Hayek’s Road to Serfdom, a thoughtful and thought-provoking work once favorably reviewed by no less a lefty idol than John Maynard Keynes. And I’m now reading Francis Fukuyama’s The End of History and the Last Man, a work bearing even the sulfurous stench of favorable reviews by adoring neocons. Yet, it’s reading Fukuyama that–far from reinforcing my faith in current U.S. governance–has, in conjunction with Piketty, obliterated all sense of its legitimacy. In fact, it’s because of Fukuyama (a learned, thoughtful author unfortunate in his associates and admirers–perhaps culpably) that I consider the whole question raised by Picketty as one of legitimacy.

And it’s the crucial question of legitimacy–the very heart of governance–that forcefully links Piketty to Orwell.

So here we’ve reached the heart of my topic. As Fukuyama deeply understands, the very survival of a political system or government depend on its legitimacy in the eyes of enough of its citizens. Crucially, not all of its citizens, indeed not even a majority, but enough citizens wielding the means of force and control to keep the doubters of its legitimacy in line. Hitler, as Fukuyama for example notes, was never elected by a majority, and probably never even freely supported by one. Little matter; the millions of Nazi supporters he did have were able to acquire near-monopoly of the means of force and control in German society, with the lethal consequences known to history. The complacent, misguided souls who cowishly nod their heads to Sinclair Lewis’s famous title statement “It Can’t Happen Here” probably fail to grasp that fascists’ required legitimacy is a minority matter; they certainly fail to grasp that Lewis himself believed it could. The it of course being U.S. fascism–and I believe it’s not only possible, but largely in place, and inevitable if we don’t soon change course.

Why? This is where Piketty’s strongly argued thesis about the nature of capitalism meets the brutal rubber of Orwell’s fascist road. See, Piketty’s central thesis is that the very nature of capitalism, because rewards to capital owners normally accumulate faster than general economic growth, is to produce oligarchic societies. Unless, says Piketty, extraordinary circumstances or government intervention–like high taxes–bring the rewards to capital in line with everyone else’s benefits from the economy. Now, the extraordinary circumstances, like world wars, are hardly desirable, and even depend for much of their effect on giving society a compelling rationale to tax the very rich. But as Piketty is keenly aware, extraordinary circumstances are by definition rare, and barring them, capital-owning oligarchs possess powerful means for thwarting government correctives to natural capitalist inequality. Like, say, buying the governments that would implement those correctives. Which clearly describes our current U.S. predicament–especially after the Supreme Court, itself an oligarchs’ plaything, has made buying our government infinitely easier.

So where does Orwell come in? The quick-and-dirty answer is, in vividly detailing the thoroughly modern, technology-based methods by which a tiny minority, hell-bent on exploiting a majority, recruits a critical mass of supporters (only a minority–though of millions–is needed) to keep the exploited majority at bay. In other words, as the word supporters clearly implies, the tiny minority (in our case, capitalist oligarchs) recruits just enough people who believe the exploitative governance of a majority by a capitalist minority is legitimate. And uses those millions of recruits to hold the exploited majority in terror. For once the majority gradually awakens to the illegitimacy of their exploitation by a handful of oligarchs, only a sizable minority (say, millions) of brainwashed or paid-off recruits wielding powerful modern weaponry, can keep the awakening majority from turning on the oligarchs. In other words, only a fascist government–one that recruits by technologies of propaganda and reigns by technologies of terror–can ultimately serve the aims of modern oligarchs.

Now, Piketty’s own historic examples might seem to refute the notion of oligarchs needing the modern Orwellian toolkit, but citing such historical counterexamples is shallow, and does not account for the fact that times–and above all, technologies–have changed. The key notion is that Orwellian methods are serving the aims of modern twenty-first century oligarchs, not those of nineteenth century France or England–a golden age for oligarchs Piketty often cites. In fact, today’s oligarchs require an economically richer, better-educated populace of servants than their nineteenth century counterparts; and even where they don’t strictly require it, such a populace is a fact on the ground they simply have to deal with–and control.

So, for example, even your average Walmart or McDonald’s peon needs to be–and in fact is–more literate and economically better off than your average eighteenth-century peon (or factory drudge) pure and simple. While condemning large segments of the population to unthinking drudgery (with no leisure for thoughtful politics) remains a perennial part of the oligarch toolkit, it simply can’t play the same role in population control it did when the drudges weren’t even allowed to vote. And of course, with legions of the unemployed poor, often replaced by cheaper foreign workers or robots, now having leisure for politics (if not necessarily thoughtful politics), the old-timey oligarch trick of denying the franchise is quickly making a comeback. But sadly for oligarchs, big enough segments of the U.S. population consider this trick illegitimate that it can never come anywhere close to being the chief means of control. So again, this is where Orwell comes in–and even building support for denial of the franchise requires massive Orwellian propaganda. Oligarchs must thank God every day for a critical mass of fearful, resentful racists and xenophobes–which clearly describes much of the Republican Party’s base.

Of course, racism and xenophobia are the hardly only Orwellian propaganda tools for recruiting oligarch lapdogs, though it must admitted they have served –and will long continue to serve–Republican oligarchs admirably. Patriotism, especially of the self-interested zero-sum variety where foreigners’ agendas and competition for resources and market share make them a threat to “our way of life,” has admirably served oligarchs from both parties. This has been especially true of fossil fuel oligarchs, who’ve successfully brainwashed Americans on the “energy independence” necessity of fossil fuels–even though our nation has been dramatically affected by the global climate harm these outmoded fuels are causing. And fossil-oligarch propaganda is remarkably adaptable; fossil fuels’ role as geopolitical muscle can be stressed now that large-scale plans for export prove the energy-independence argument was always hogwash.

But neither propaganda nor force exhaust the control tools in the oligarch toolkit; the fact is, there are certain “oligarch support industries” that have distinct trickle-down benefits. Not that trickle-down economists ever worked in the manner its ideologues proposed; in fact, the successful trickle-down depends on Big Government in a way that would have horrified trickle-down economics’ original small-government proponents. Understanding the mechanism involves understanding what I mean by “oligarch support industries”; by and large, I mean the industries, based on force and spying, that either distract attention from oligarchs, or potentially crack skulls on their behalf, once the legitimacy of their governance has been shaken in the eyes of large segments of the population. Offhand, I’d say this constitutes all branches of the U.S. military, mercenaries, and military contractors; government and private surveillance organizations; and police and private security organizations. Now, no one ever went broke serving the needs of the rich; in fact, providing oligarch support industries has become a huge U.S. business sector. But the very hugeness of that sector has swollen well beyond meeting oligarch needs, and can only be attributed to a perverse (perverse because it depends on Big Government) form of trickle-down.

See, precisely because no one ever went broke meeting the needs of the rich–and protecting their sorry asses in case the legitimacy of their governance breaks down is a huge oligarch need–investors in oligarch support industries soon become–if they weren’t already–oligarchs themselves. Now, a standard part of Piketty’s model is that oligarchs spend a portion of their vast wealth to buy government, in order both to protect and expand their already excessive wealth. Unsurprisingly, oligarchs created by oligarch support industries behave in exactly the same way: they invest heavily in lobbying government to support and expand their industries. Now, since the oligarch support industries in question straddle the public and private sectors, the lobbying successfully expands jobs–essentially, spying and potentially cracking skulls, both inside and outside our government. In no other case I can think of has “trickle-down economics” been so wildly successful. And even without oligarch propaganda, the overly swollen leagues of soldiers, spies, cops, rent-a-cops, and surveillance and weapons manufacturers–by now swollen well beyond the original protection needs of their oligarch employers–have a vested interest in serving oligarchs both inside and outside their industries.

And of course–though legally and morally this is not supposed to be the case–one must include many elected officials, elected and unelected judges, and journalists in corporate-owned media–as unofficial members of the oligarch support industries. While Republicans are clearly worse, it’s clear once again that these illegitimate members of the oligarch support industries are bipartisan–as was most recently proved by the eleven Democrat Senators (let’s brand them “the Keystone Eleven”) who were ready to surpass even Obama’s service to fossil fuel oligarchs by taking approval of the environmentally insane Keystone XL pipeline out of his cowardly, dithering election-year hands. Clearly, these Democrats are prepared to use the fascist jackboot against conscientious Americans on behalf of fossil-fuel oligarchs, since thousands of heroic citizens are pledged to civil disobedience against the unconscionable pipeline.

While the “boot stamping a human face” approach, backed by fascist pro-government courts, has already been used against Occupy Wall Street, I suspect approval of the XL pipeline will show us fascism–Orwellian brutality supporting Piketty’s increasingly dominant oligarchs–in its most blatant form. This will be, of course, because enough conscientious citizen have seen through oligarch propaganda to realize oligarch agendas threatens humanity’s very survival. So bipartisan is the push for pro-oligarch fascism that eleven Democrats openly decided noble Keystone protesters deserved Orwellian brutality.

Until we widely disseminate the fact that Orwell is other side of Piketty–that a “boot stamping on a human face forever” is the logical conclusion of runaway economic inequality–we’ll never (until we’re ALL destroyed by climate change) see an end to illegitimate oligarch rule.

The Global Money Matrix: The Forces behind America’s Economic Destruction

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By Dr. Gary Null

Source: GlobalResearch.ca

On the Brink of Economic Calamity

We are witnessing unprecedented low points in American economic history as 50 million Americans—17 million of them children—are living below the poverty line[i],[ii] while 47 million citizens rely on food stamps[iii].  All told, the 2008 economic collapse cost over $20 trillion globally[iv]. Millions of people lost their homes and jobs, while many of our nation’s children fell deeper into hunger. According to some figures, 53 million people entered the poverty ranks.[v] In the US and other developed nations, suicide rates skyrocketed due to financial stress and disruption of families. The Bureau of Labor Statistics has listed unemployment at 7.5% — a rate that is irreconcilable with reality. The more reliable figure, calculated by economist John Williams from Shadow Government Statistics, places unemployment at 22%. If we are to believe the analyses of Tyler Cowen at the Mercatus Center at George Mason University, we might be looking at an unemployment rate as high as 41%, since 33% of Americans are not working and no longer have the desire to find jobs.[vi]  This group is categorically removed from the government’s labor radar and is absent from the Bureau of Labor Statistics’ fudged data. 

 The Global Money Matrix

In the midst of this economic turmoil there is one group that still manages to flourish: the global elite. With more than $32 trillion stashed in offshore banks around the world, the wealth of the so-called “1%” is staggeringly obscene and grows by the day.[vii]  Their aggregate wealth, larger than the US GDP and national debt combined, is a testament to the tremendous influence and lobbying power held by a coterie of private interests that dominate nearly every sector of society.

Instead of reining in the inordinate control exercised by the elite, most of our elected officials have become little more than shills for these corporate overlords, creating policies that favor their campaign donors instead of the American people. Hundreds of millions of dollars were funneled into Barack Obama’s 2012 presidential campaign by donors whose business affiliations run the gamut from real estate and finance to media and law firms. According to Opensecrets.org, “Together, 769 elites are directing at least $186,500,000 for Obama’s re-election efforts — money that has gone into the coffers of his campaign as well as the Democratic National Committee.”[viii] This figure doesn’t even account for the massive contributions to Obama’s reelection by corporate-driven SuperPACs. Obama is just one example of how our politicians are beholden to the elite agenda. A quick glance at the campaign donation figures presented at Opensecrets.org reveals just how much special interests control Washington’s policymakers.

Given the corporatist influence that infects our halls of power, it is little wonder that our tax dollars continue to fund unconstitutional spying, perpetual war, and neoliberal policies that extend the powers of the world’s richest individuals and organizations. As Americans struggle financially, our social safety nets are increasingly losing priority to military and security expenditures that are historically unmatched anywhere in the world. Increasingly, the actions taken by the world’s most powerful corporations and governments seem to be at odds with public perception and wellbeing. Here are a few examples of how this combined influence has increased at the expense of the average American:

ALEC – This conservative group, funded by donors like the Koch brothers and Exxon Mobil and fueled by politicians including Ohio Governor John Kasich and Wisconsin Governor Scott Walker,[ix] writes model legislation calling to “privatize education, break unions, deregulate major industries, pass voter ID laws, and more.”[x] They do so with the stated aim to “form formal internal Task Forces to develop policy covering virtually every responsibility of state government.”[xi] ALEC’s website claims, “Each year, close to 1,000 bills, based at least in part on ALEC Model Legislation, are introduced in the states. Of these, an average of 20% become law.”[xii]

Federal Taxes and Expenditures – In 2014, President Obama plans to spend 57% of his discretionary budget on military, with 6% going to education, 3% to science, and 1% to food and agriculture.[xiii] And while the federal corporate tax rate is 35% in America, a variety of loopholes means that the average rate paid by corporations is 25%, with some companies paying as low as 10%.[xiv]

Citizens United – This US Supreme Court case set the legal precedent for unlimited campaign donations in US elections, qualifying corporate donations as a form a free speech. Since this case concluded, campaign expenditures have tripled.[xv]

TARP, or “the Bailout” – Following the economic crisis of 2008, US taxpayers handed $700 billion to major players in the automotive, financial, and insurance industries[xvi]. According to The New York Times, “Treasury…provided the money to banks with no effective policy or effort to compel the extension of credit. There were no strings attached: no requirement or even incentive to increase lending to home buyers, and…not even a request that banks report how they used TARP funds.”[xvii]  The Huffington Post reports, “Twenty-five top recipients of government bailout funds spent more than $71 million on lobbying in the year since they were rescued.”

In the Name of Security

The most concerning imbalance of power, however, may lie in the ‘security state’. In 2010, there were over 1900 private corporations with government contracts working for Homeland Security and NSA intelligence projects. Just one of these firms, Booz Allen Hamilton, where Edward Snowden was employed, has over 25,000 employees, nearly half of whom have security clearance of “top secret or higher”.[xviii]  Overall, there are an estimated half million individuals in private firms with access to intelligence secrets.[xix]  The federal intelligence agencies only employ 107,000 individuals; therefore, the bulk of intelligence and surveillance operations are conducted by private workforces.[xx] For fiscal year 2013, the country’s budget for intelligence, across 16 agencies, was approximately $52.6 billion, with 70% going to private contractors.[xxi]

Recent revelations by Edward Snowden unearthed the breadth and scope of this surveillance network. The National Security Agency has collected vast amounts of data to spy upon American citizens, elected legislators in Congress, leaders and populations of other nations, multilateral and international administrations, non profit organizations, and a variety of public and environmental advocacy groups. This defines the current trajectory of the US as a failed republic degenerating into a fascist regime.  For both corporate Republicans and Democrats, the rise of surreptitious surveillance on citizens, in direct violation of the Constitution, is perceived as a matter of national security to protect both the country’s domestic and foreign interests.

NSA Director Gen. Keith Alexander claimed publicly that intelligence surveillance of the American public “foiled” 54 terrorist attacks by extremists. Independent research confirmed that in fact only one, and a possible second attack, could be directly associated with the war on terrorism.  Speaking on the matter, Vermont Senator Patrick J. Leahy stated,

“There is no evidence that [bulk] phone records collection helped to thwart dozens or even several terrorist plots….These weren’t all plots and they weren’t all foiled.”.[xxii]

The Washington Times reported that “Keith B. Alexander admitted that the number of terrorist plots foiled by the NSA’s huge database of every phone call made in or to America was only one or perhaps two—far smaller than the 54 originally claimed by the administration.” General Alexander, under the questioning of Senator Leahy, also admitted that only 13 of the 54 cases were in any way connected to the U.S.  As the Washington Times clarifies,

“The [NSA phone records] database contains so-called metadata—the numbers dialing and dialed, time and duration of call—for every phone call made in or to the U.S.”[xxiii] 

This is but one example highlighting how the consolidation of corporate and political power comes at the cost of human rights and personal liberties for the average citizen.

 Obama has lied to the American people repeatedly about the extent of the security state and its infiltration into the lives of average citizens, including massive data collection of private phone calls, emails, and internet activity. The NSA revelations of Edward Snowden provide documented proof that intelligence surveillance is far more extensive than ever believed. The activities of the FBI, CIA, Pentagon, FISA courts, USDA and FDA, and the Justice Department contribute to the deterioration of citizens’ privacy and freedom. And a recent report by Essential Information entitled Spooky Business describes how some of America’s largest corporations have engaged in corporate espionage to spy on non-profit organizations. Ralph Nader writes, “In effect, big corporations have been able to hire portions of the national security apparatus, and train their tools of spycraft on the citizen groups of our country.”[xxiv] Thus, the powers of government and corporations are fostered and increased by one another, while those of the average American continue to dwindle

Groupthink and the 15%

It is unrealistic to frame the problem of control and socio-economic manipulation as a war between the 1 and the 99.  The 1 percent cannot achieve its goals without support from armies of technocrats and workforces willing to sacrifice moral values to secure careers in corporations and political parties, regardless of the inhumane ruthlessness behind their undemocratic agendas. The private industrial complexes of Too Big to Fail corporations require minions of technocrats and employees—as well as a large network of contracted small businesses, advisors, and consultants—to exert control over the population.  Therefore, we should realistically be speaking of a 15 versus 85 percent in the war on inequality, control, and power.

 When this additional 45 million people, or 15 percent of the population, are added to the formula for who controls the major stakes of power, wealth, influence and policymaking today, we can more easily understand how the psychology of “group think” creates a protective shield around the power brokers calling the shots.  When the psychologist Irving Janis first used the term “groupthink”, he referred to a collective weakening of individuals’ “mental efficiency, reality testing and moral judgment” through pressure to stick with the corporate plan.[xxv]  Among the characteristics common to groupthink, which enables the privileged elite to exert compliance to their mission without dissent, is a false belief in the inherent morality of their jobs. For example, the neoliberal free-market ideology posits that trickle down economics from the top will create more jobs and raise families’ personal income—a persistent myth that has no historical example to prove it as fact.  

The actual facts, according to the 2012 Global Wealth Data Book, show that since the implementation of neoliberal economics in the late 1970s and early 1980s, the financial health of America’s middle class has fallen to 27th globally, behind Qatar, Taiwan, Cyprus and Kuwait. Simultaneously, the US has the most millionaires and billionaires of any other nation.[xxvi]  Groupthink also generates an “illusion of invulnerability,” an insincere and narrow confidence that enables workers to take extreme risks and a distorted group rationalization to deny facts to the contrary of their optimism.  Other characteristics include stereotyping enemies, managerial pressure on nonconformists, and self-censorship of doubts within the organization.  An illusion of unanimity is sustained whereby the image is created and perpetuated that the majority agree with organization’s purpose and mission.[xxvii]

Without the possibility of groupthink and this additional 15 percent passively serving the most powerful 1 percent’s destructive acts, life in the US would be far more democratic, just, and free today. Unfortunately, our society currently necessitates profit for both legitimacy and survival. This unprecedented economic and political atmosphere is giving birth to a new face of fascism.

 The Dominant Culture

When considering the human element in our societal structure, the question arises as to how human beings can act with such blatant disregard for damage incurred. There are varying figures assessing the percent of psychopathology among high level financial and corporate executives. In the general population, approximately 1% can be clinically diagnosed with sociopathic and psychopathic disorders[xxviii]. However, for the wealthy and power elite, estimates are higher.

Canadian psychiatrist Dr. Robert Hare estimates that 4 percent of corporate executives are clinically sociopathic.[xxix] Sherree DeCovny, a former high-powered investment banker now with CFA Financial Magazine, believes it is as high as 10 percent.[xxx] Figures from psychological surveys in the UK place estimates even higher. Psychologist Clive Boddy has argued that the psychopathological behavior of financial executives was a major cause for the 2007 economic collapse. He also notes that individuals with the strongest psychopathic tendencies are those who tend to be promoted fastest.[xxxi]

Research supports this claim. In a survey of 500 senior executives in the US and UK, 26 percent observed firsthand wrongdoing in the workplace and 24 percent believed that it was necessary for professionals in the financial sector to engage in unethical and even illegal conduct in order to be successful. Sixteen percent said they would commit insider trading if they were certain they could get away with it, and 30 percent said that the pressures of compensation plans were an incentive to break the law.[xxxii]

Today, this banking elite owns the lives of millions of Americans by imprisoning them in debt. In the third quarter of 2013, consumer indebtedness reached $11.28 trillion.[xxxiii]  2014 and every year thereafter will see household debt increase. The majority of this debt, in the form of mortgages and outstanding home equity, student loans, auto loans, and credit cards, is money owed to the banking industry. It is by keeping the masses indebted, securing government allegiance and protection to extract money from citizens, that bankers are able to control the economy.

In a letter to Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke, Representative Alan Grayson and three of his Congressional colleagues raised their concern over large investment banks taking over the real economy.  According to their investment relations reports, both banks are engaged in the “production, storage, transportation, marketing and trading of numerous commodities.”[xxxiv] These include crude oil and oil products, natural gas, coal, electric power, agricultural and food products, and precious and rare metals. Additionally, JP Morgan markets electric power and “owns electricity generating facilities in the US and Europe.”[xxxv] Goldman Sachs has entered the uranium mining market.  According to Rep. Grayson, none of these activities have anything to do with the business of banking, and there is no indication that the Fed or any other agency is regulating these irregular business undertakings.[xxxvi]

In early 2013, the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich conducted the most thorough analysis of the financial ties between over 43,000 transnational banks and corporations. This was the first empirical study to identify a network where global power and wealth is most heavily concentrated. Their startling results observed that a small faction of 147 super companies controls over 40 percent of the entire transnational network, with an additional 36 million companies below them. 

Predictably, almost all of the 147 super companies were financial institutions, with Barclays, Capital Group, the Vanguard Group, Deutsche Bank, JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs, Credit Suisse, and Bank of New York among the top of the list.[xxxvii]  With financial instruments of speculative trade insufficient to satisfy greed, such companies have every incentive to move into new territory, particularly resources and services that are essential to life. This includes fuel, water, food and minerals. As it stands, at least twenty-five major US companies have more wealth than entire countries.[xxxviii]

The prediction can be suggested that with current trends, the largest global banks will become the world’s most powerful “nations,” acting with complete autonomy outside of international laws that apply to sovereign states.  As corporate groupthink increases and infiltrates the larger civilian community, the transnationalist mind will persist as a breeding ground for psychopathology.

Conclusion

The consequences of today’s cowboy free market culture have sent the US middle class and economic mobility spiraling downward. Laid off workers have nowhere to use their skills to earn a livelihood for themselves and their families. Consequently, the worker is unable to meet expenditures and falls into a lower income bracket or poverty.  Mortgage defaults, credit card payments, and loans drag him further into debt. Without work and hence unable to pay taxes, the state, county and town suffer. In turn, local entities are forced to reduce their workforce and public services. The final result is the decline in the national quality of life, and the gradual deterioration of the US.  The inequality gap widens as the wealthy get richer and more powerful, while growing numbers of families become destitute.

A clear conflict exists between the values that we promote in the home and those values that are rewarded in the workplace. Unless we apply the same moral requirements to governments and corporations as we do to ourselves, friends, and families, the revolving door at the top of society will continue to consolidate power and wealth at any cost.

Notes

[i] Fessler, Pam. “How Many Americans Live In Poverty?” NPR. http://www.npr.org/blogs/money/2013/11/06/243498168/how-many-americans-live-in-poverty (accessed December 2, 2013).

[ii] National Center for Children in Poverty. “Child Poverty.” NCCP. http://www.nccp.org/topics/childpoverty.html (accessed December 1, 2013).

[iii] Plumer, Brad. “Why are 47 million Americans on food stamps? It’s the recession — mostly.” WashingtonPost.com. http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/wonkblog/wp/2013/09/23/why-are-47-million-americans-on-food-stamps-its-the-recession-mostly/ (accessed December 3, 2013).

[iv] Melendez, Eleazar. “Financial Crisis Cost Tops $22 Trillion, GAO Says.” The Huffington Post. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/02/14/financial-crisis-cost-gao_n_2687553.html (accessed December 3, 2013).

 [v] Moench, Brian. “Death by Corporation, Part II: Companies as Cancer Cells.” Truthout. http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/17705-death-by-corporation-part-ii-companies-as-cancer-cells (accessed December 3, 2013).

 [vi]  “The real jobs numbers: 41% of America unemployed, 1 in 3 doesn’t want work at all – RT USA.” RT.com. http://rt.com/usa/jobs-us-employment-welfare-749/ (accessed December 3, 2013).

 [vii] Vellacott, Chris. “Super Rich Hold $32 Trillion in Offshore Havens.” Reuters.com. http://www.reuters.com/article/2012/07/22/us-offshore-wealth-idUSBRE86L03U20120722 (accessed December 13, 2003).

 [viii] “Barack Obama’s Bundlers.” Opensecrets RSS. http://www.opensecrets.org/pres12/bundlers.php

[ix] “What is ALEC?.” ALEC Exposed. http://www.alecexposed.org/wiki/What_is_ALEC%3F#Who_funds_ALEC.3F (accessed December 3, 2013).

[x] Nichols, John. “ALEC Exposed.” The Nation. http://www.thenation.com/article/161978/alec-exposed# (accessed December 3, 2013).

[xi] “History.” ALEC American Legislative Exchange Council. http://www.alec.org/about-alec/history/ (accessed December 3, 2013).

[xii] Ibid.

[xiii] “Where Does the Money Go? Federal Budget 101.” National Priorities Project. http://nationalpriorities.org/budget-basics/federal-budget-101/spending/ (accessed December 2, 2013).

[xiv] The Economist Newspaper. “The Trouble with Tax Reform.” The Economist. http://www.economist.com/blogs/democracyinamerica/2011/02/corporate-tax_reform (accessed December 3, 2013).

[xv] “Daily Kos.” : Buying Elections: Campaign Spending TRIPLES Since Citizens United. If You Can’t Win, Cheat + News!. http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/03/11/1193246/-Buying-Elections-Campaign-Spending-TRIPLES-Since-Citizens-United-If-You-Can-t-Win-Cheat# (accessed December 3, 2013).

[xvi] Stein, Sam. “Top Bailout Recipients Spent $71 Million On Lobbying In Year Since Bailout.” The Huffington Post. http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/11/05/top-bailout-recipients-sp_n_346877.html (accessed December 3, 2013).

[xvii] Barofski, Neil. “Where the Bank Bailout Went Wrong.” NYTimes.com. http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/30/opinion/30barofsky.html (accessed March 12, 2013).

[xviii] Murphy, Dan. “Booz Allen Hamilton, federal contractor.” Christian Science Monitor. http://www.csmonitor.com/World/Security-Watch/Backchannels/2013/0610/Booz-Allen-Hamilton-federal-contractor (accessed December 4, 2013).

[xix] Jonathan Fahey, Adam Goldman. “NSA Leak Highlights Key Role of Private Contractors,”  Huffington Post. June 10, 2013  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/06/10/nsa-leak-contractors_n_3418876.html

[xx] Barton Gellman, Greg Miller.  “US Spy Network’s Successes, Failures and Objectives Detailed in ‘Black Budget’ Summary,”  Washington Post. August 29. 2013  http://articles.washingtonpost.com/2013-08-29/world/41709796_1_intelligence-community-intelligence-spending-national-intelligence-program

[xxi] Aubrey Bloomfield. “Booz Allen Hamilton: 70% of the US Intelligence Budget Goes to Private Contractors,”  Policymic.  http://www.policymic.com/articles/48845/booz-allen-hamilton-70-of-the-u-s-intelligence-budget-goes-to-private-contractors

[xxii] Waterman, Shaun. “NSA chief’s admission of misleading numbers adds to Obama administration blunders.” Washington Times. http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/oct/2/nsa-chief-figures-foiled-terror-plots-misleading/ (accessed December 3, 2013).

 [xxiii] Ibid.

[xxiv] Nader, Ralph. “Corporate espionage undermines democracy.” The Great Debate RSS. http://blogs.reuters.com/great-debate/2013/11/26/corporate-espionage-undermines-democracy/ (accessed December 2, 2013).

[xxv] “Groupthink in Service of Government.” BATR. http://www.batr.org/wrack/080413.html (accessed December 3, 2013).

 [xxvi] “How Does America’s Middle Class Rank Globally?.” A Lightning War for Liberty. http://libertyblitzkrieg.com/2013/07/23/how-does-americas-middle-class-rank-globally-27/ (accessed December 3, 2013).

[xxvii] BATR.  Ibid.

[xxviii] Hare, Robert. “Focus on Psychopathy.” FBI. http://www.fbi.gov/stats-services/publications/law-enforcement-bulletin/july-2012/focus-on-psychopathy (accessed December 1, 2013).

 [xxix] Bercovici, Jeff. “Why (Some) Psychopaths Make Great CEOs.” Forbes. http://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffbercovici/2011/06/14/why-some-psychopaths-make-great-ceos/ (accessed December 2, 2013).

[xxx] Decovny, Sherree. “The Financial Psychopath Next Door.” CFA Magazine, Mar. – Apr. 2012. http://www.cfapubs.org/doi/pdf/10.2469/cfm.v23.n2.20 (accessed December 3, 2013).

 [xxxi] Boddy, Clive R.. “The Corporate Psychopaths Theory Of The Global Financial Crisis.” Journal of Business Ethics 102, no. 2 (2011): 255-259.

  [xxxii] LaCapra, Lauren Tara, and Leslie Adler. “Many Wall Street Executives Say Wrongdoing is Necessary: Survey.” Reuters. http://uk.reuters.com/article/2012/07/10/business-us-wallstreet-survey-idUKBRE86906G20120710 (accessed December 3, 2013).

[xxxiii] Salas Gage, Caroline. “Household Debt in US Climbed 1.1% in Third Quarter, Fed Says.” Bloomberg.com. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-11-14/household-debt-in-u-s-climbed-1-1-in-third-quarter-fed-says.html (Accessed December 4, 2013.)

 [xxxiv]“Giant Banks Take Over Real Economy As Well As Financial System … Enabling Manipulation On a Vast Scale.” Washingtons Blog. http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/07/giant-banks-take-over-real-economy-as-well-as-financial-system-enabling-manipulation-on-a-vast-scale.html (accessed December 3, 2013).

  [xxxv] Hopkins, Cheyenne. “Fed Said to Review Commodities at Goldman, Morgan Stanley.” Bloomberg.com. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-10-01/fed-said-to-review-commodities-at-goldman-morgan-stanley.html (accessed December 3, 2013). 

[xxxvi] “Giant Banks Take Over Real Economy As Well As Financial System … Enabling Manipulation On a Vast Scale.” Washingtons Blog. http://www.washingtonsblog.com/2013/07/giant-banks-take-over-real-economy-as-well-as-financial-system-enabling-manipulation-on-a-vast-scale.html (accessed December 3, 2013).

 [xxxvii] Upbin, Bruce. “The 147 Companies That Control Everything.” Forbes. http://www.forbes.com/sites/bruceupbin/2011/10/22/the-147-companies-that-control-everything/ (accessed December 3, 2013).

Is the US or the World Coming to an End?

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Source: Paul Craig Roberts

2014 is shaping up as a year of reckoning for the United States.

Two pressures are building on the US dollar. One pressure comes from the Federal Reserve’s declining ability to rig the price of gold as Western gold supplies shrivel and market knowledge of the Fed’s illegal price rigging spreads. The evidence of massive amounts of naked shorts being dumped into the paper gold futures market at times of day when trading is thin is unequivocal. It has become obvious that the price of gold is being rigged in the futures market in order to protect the dollar’s value from QE.

The other pressure arises from the Obama regime’s foolish threats of sanctions on Russia. Other countries are no longer willing to tolerate Washington’s abuse of the world dollar standard. Washington uses the dollar-based international payments system to inflict damage on the economies of countries that resist Washington’s political hegemony.

Russia and China have had enough. As I have reported and as Peter Koenig reports here http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article38165.htm Russia and China are disconnecting their international trade from the dollar. Henceforth, Russia will conduct its trade, including the sale of oil and natural gas to Europe, in rubles and in the currencies of its BRICS partners.

This means a big drop in the demand for US dollars and a corresponding drop in the dollar’s exchange value.

As John Williams (shadowstats.com) has made clear, the US economy has not recovered from the downturn in 2008 and has weakened further. The vast majority of the US population is hard pressed from the lack of income growth for years. As the US is now an import-dependent economy, a drop in the dollar’s value will raise US prices and push living standards lower.

All evidence points to US economic failure in 2014, and that is the conclusion of John Williams’ April 9 report.

This year could also see the breakup of NATO and even the EU. Washington’s reckless coup in Ukraine and threat of sanctions against Russia have pushed its NATO puppet states onto dangerous ground. Washington misjudged the reaction in Ukraine to its overthrow of the elected democratic government and imposition of a stooge government. Crimea quickly departed Ukraine and rejoined Russia. Other former Russian territories in Ukraine might soon follow. Protesters in Lugansk, Donetsk, and Kharkov are demanding their own referendums. Protesters have declared the Donetsk People’s Republic and Kharkov People’s Republic. Washington’s stooge government in Kiev has threatened to put the protests down with violence. http://rt.com/news/eastern-ukraine-violence-threats-405/ Washington claims that the protests are organized by Russia, but no one believes Washington, not even its Ukrainian stooges.

Russian news reports have identified US mercenaries among the Kiev force that has been sent to put down the separatists in eastern Ukraine. A member of the right-wing, neo-Nazi Fatherland Party in the Kiev parliament has called for shooting the protesters dead.

Violence against the protesters is likely to bring in the Russian Army and result in the return to Russia of its former territories in Eastern Ukraine that were attached to Ukraine by the Soviet Communist Party.

With Washington out on a limb issuing threats hand over fist, Washington is pushing Europe into two highly undesirable confrontations. Europeans do not want a war with Russia over Washington’s coup in Kiev, and Europeans understand that any real sanctions on Russia, if observed, would do far more damage to Europeans. Within the EU, growing economic inequality among the countries, high unemployment, and stringent economic austerity imposed on poorer members have produced enormous strains. Europeans are in no mood to bear the brunt of a Washington-orchestrated conflict with Russia. While Washington presents Europe with war and sacrifice, Russia and China offer trade and friendship. Washington will do its best to keep European politicians bought-and-paid-for and in line with Washington’s policies, but the downside for Europe of going along with Washington is now much larger.

Across many fronts, Washington is emerging in the world’s eye as duplicitous, untrustworthy, and totally corrupt. A Securities and Exchange Commission prosecuting attorney, James Kidney used the occasion of his retirement to reveal that higher ups had squelched his prosecutions of Goldman Sachs and other “banks too big to fail,” because his SEC bosses were not focused on justice but “on getting high-paying jobs after their government service” by protecting the banks from prosecution for their illegal actions. http://www.counterpunch.org/2014/04/09/65578/

The US Agency for International Development has been caught trying to use social media to overthrow the government of Cuba. http://rt.com/news/cuba-usaid-senate-zunzuneo-241/

This audacious recklessness comes on top of Washington’s overthrow of the Ukrainian government, the NSA spying scandal, Seymour Hersh’s investigative report that the Sarin gas attack in Syria was a false flag event arranged by NATO member Turkey in order to justify a US military attack on Syria, Washington’s forcing down Bolivian President Evo Morales’ presidential plane to be searched, Saddam Hussein’s “weapons of mass destruction,” the misuse of the Libyan no-fly resolution for military attack, and on and on. Essentially, Washington has so badly damaged other countries’ confidence in the judgment and integrity of the US government that the world has lost its belief in US leadership. Washington is reduced to threats and bribes and increasingly presents as a bully.

The self-inflicted hammer blows to Washington’s credibility have taken a toll. The most serious blow of all is the dawning realization everywhere that Washington’s crackpot conspiracy theory of 9/11 is false. Large numbers of independent experts as well as more than one hundred first responders have contradicted every aspect of Washington’s absurd conspiracy theory. No aware person believes that a few Saudi Arabians, who could not fly airplanes, operating without help from any intelligence agency, outwitted the entire National Security State, not only all 16 US intelligence agencies but also all intelligence agencies of NATO and Israel as well.

Nothing worked on 9/11. Airport security failed four times in one hour, more failures in one hour than have occurred during the other 116,232 hours of the 21st century combined. For the first time in history the US Air Force could not get interceptor fighters off the ground and into the sky. For the first time in history Air Traffic Control lost airliners for up to one hour and did not report it. For the first time in history low temperature, short-lived, fires on a few floors caused massive steel structures to weaken and collapse. For the first time in history 3 skyscrapers fell at essentially free fall acceleration without the benefit of controlled demolition removing resistance from below.

Two-thirds of Americans fell for this crackpot story. The left-wing fell for it, because they saw the story as the oppressed striking back at America’s evil empire. The right-wing fell for the story, because they saw it as the demonized Muslims striking out at American goodness. President George W. Bush expressed the right-wing view very well: “They hate us for our freedom and democracy.”

But no one else believed it, least of all the Italians. Italians had been informed some years previously about government false flag events when their President revealed the truth about secret Operation Gladio. Operation Gladio was an operation run by the CIA and Italian intelligence during the second half of the 20th century to set off bombs that would kill European women and children in order to blame communists and, thereby, erode support for European communist parties.

Italians were among the first to make video presentations challenging Washington’s crackpot story of 9/11. The ultimate of this challenge is the 1 hour and 45 minute film, “Zero.” You can watch it here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QU961SGps8g&feature=youtu.be

Zero was produced as a film investigating 9/ll by the Italian company Telemaco. Many prominent people appear in the film along with independent experts. Together, they disprove every assertion made by the US government regarding its explanation of 9/11.

The film was shown to the European parliament.

It is impossible for anyone who watches this film to believe one word of the official explanation of 9/11.

The conclusion is increasingly difficult to avoid that elements of the US government blew up three New York skyscrapers in order to destroy Iraq, Afghanistan, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Iran, and Hezbollah and to launch the US on the neoconservatives agenda of US world hegemony.

China and Russia protested but accepted Libya’s destruction even though it was to their own detriment. But Iran became a red line. Washington was blocked, so Washington decided to cause major problems for Russia in Ukraine in order to distract Russia from Washington’s agenda elsewhere.

China has been uncertain about the trade-offs between its trade surpluses with the US and Washington’s growing encirclement of China with naval and air bases. China has come to the conclusion that China has the same enemy as Russia has–Washington.

One of two things is likely: Either the US dollar will be abandoned and collapse in value, thus ending Washington’s superpower status and Washington’s threat to world peace, or Washington will lead its puppets into military conflict with Russia and China. The outcome of such a war would be far more devastating than the collapse of the US dollar.

Podcast Roundup

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4/2: Guillermo Jimenez has a conversation with Danny Benavides at Traces of Reality to discuss the drug war, the surveillance state, and the increasing use of violence by the Border Patrol among other topics:

http://tracesofreality.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/Traces-of-Reality-Radio-2014.03.28-Danny-Benavides.mp3

4/2: At Red Ice Radio, host Henrik Palmgren interviews Mark Gray to discuss occult symbolism, synchronicity and geomancy in  connection to a number of current events. Mystical phenomenon or pattern recognition gone awry? You decide:

http://rediceradio.net/radio/2014/RIR-140402-markgray-hr1.mp3

4/3: Dave Lindorff of This Can’t Be Happening interviews Elena Teyer mother-in-law of Ibragim Todashev, the man executed by the FBI during their “investigation” of the Boston Bombing. They reveal many details about the case which were ignored by corporate news coverage:

http://media62.podbean.com/pb/ca9ac429bc5bf18a823cf98eb9a28f7a/533db613/data1/blogs18/661545/uploads/ThisCantBeHappening_040214.mp3

4/4: On the Meria Heller show, Meria and guest Catherine Austin Fitts deliver useful information on the banking system, investing on priorities and improving one’s lifestyle:

http://meria.net/ipod/040114.mp3

4/5: Computer security expert Conrad Jaeger joins host Greg Carlwood at The Higher Side Chats to talk about the deep web, cyber security and the surveillance state:

http://thehighersidechats.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/101-Deep-Web.mp3

News Video Roundup

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1/27  Luke Rudkowski of We Are Change interviews Gerald Celente on a variety of topics including economic turmoil, bitcoin and revolution:

1/28 An informative primer from James Corbett on the use of propaganda, false dichotomies and “divide and conquer” tactics by the ruling elite to keep the public powerless:

1/28 Ben Swann on the Grocery Manufacturers Association’s lobbying efforts to create a Federal Ban on GMO labeling:

1/28 Seattle Councilmember Kshama Sawant’s exceptional response to Obama’s State of the Union address:

1/28 An inspiring scene from the underrated “musical documentary” The American Ruling Class (2005) posted by the filmmakers in memory of Pete Seeger: