New Year's bonus

Just gimme some truth!

Jeju Island protests continue each day

The daily counter indicating how long protests have been going on outside new Navy base in Gangjeong village on Jeju Island, South Korea.  Imagine a protest every day for the last 11 years.  If the US starts war with China this base, and the village, are now prime targets.  People protest knowing that they are preventing war.

Catholic mass is held each day outside the Navy base

Following the mass people head to the Navy base gate for a protest, singing and dancing.  (New Navy base personnel barracks on the right side of the photo sits where famous Jeju tangerine trees used to grow.) 

Trump gets trumped in Mexico

M.A.M.O.N. (Monitor Against Mexicans Over Nationwide) is a satirical fantasy sci-fi shortfilm that explores with black humor and lots of VFX the outrageous consequences of Donald Trump´s plan of banning immigration and building an enormous wall on the Mexico - US border.

The dark comedy showcases a spectacular fight involving bizarre weapons, and numerous dark jokes about the cliches and stereotypical antics of the Mexican and Latino community, as the quinceañera, the quetzalcoatl, the lucha libre, the mariachi, the chapulín colorado, etc.

 M.A.M.O.N. is part of the Wecanfxit project, powered by Uruguayan production house Aparato. Our mission is to change the world using our geeky weapons: cinematography, visual effects and CGI.

Our motto: Making the world a better place, one pixel at a time.

No, Mexico is not going to pay for the wall....

Arkin on media's slavish support for endless war

Longtime NBC reporter and analyst William Arkin announced he was leaving the network last week in a blistering letter that took aim at the mainstream media for encouraging perpetual warfare and bolstering the national security state.

In his letter, Arkin writes of Trump, “Of course he is an ignorant and incompetent impostor. And yet I’m alarmed at how quick NBC is to mechanically argue the contrary, to be in favor of policies that just spell more conflict and more war. Really? We shouldn’t get out Syria? We shouldn’t go for the bold move of denuclearizing the Korean peninsula? Even on Russia, though we should be concerned about the brittleness of our democracy that it is so vulnerable to manipulation, do we really yearn for the Cold War? And don’t even get me started with the FBI: What? We now lionize this historically destructive institution?”

Arkin is the author of many books, including “Top Secret America: The Rise of the New American Security State.”

Bi-Partisan crusade in Latin America created the immigration crisis

Professor Gerald Horne (University of Houston) and Paul Jay discuss Donald Trump's address to the nation on the wall and border security.

Horne shares the history of US intervention, propping up dictators and suppressing redistribution of wealth, as the root cause of immigration flows toward the US.

The eternal struggle

“Things change but one thing does not change,
The battle between Good and Evil does not change”.

~ TS Eliot

While in the car this morning, driving through a wet snow, I was listening to a program on NPR (National Public Radio) about the national debt and the operative question was, "Should the rich be taxed more to help pay for the debt?"

One of the guests on the show was adamant that no taxes should be raised on the wealthy.  In fact his prescription for dealing with the debt problem is to cut Social Security and Medicare.  Of course Social Security is a pension that workers pay into and is not responsible for the debt.  But facts like that are incidental to those who intend to finish off what little bit of social progress we have left in this country.  Their goal is to create a neo-feudal society - we are damn close to it now with the ever widening gap between the rich and practically everyone else.

Amazing to me was that the NPR radio show host never mentioned the colossally expensive endless wars that have been instrumental in creating much of America's debt.  After 18 years in Afghanistan and the wars in Yugoslavia, Iraq, Libya and Syria, with only chaos created, one would think that any intellectually honest person would proclaim that it is 'these damn wars' that are busting the budget!  But people who would say that are never invited on NPR.

The pissing away of more than $4 trillion on the wars insured that there would be no money available to fix roads, bridges, schools, water and sewer systems, nor fund alternative energy development.  The fossil fuel corporations have successfully drowned the country in debt and now (in the best tradition of neo-liberalism) claim that the only way out was to finish off what little social funding is still in the budget.

With all of this in mind I'd highly recommend you go see the new movie Vice.  It's tells the story about how V-P Dick Cheney locked all of this into motion.  We need to get folks to see this film.

The decision had been made during the George W. Bush administration that America's role in the global capitalist system would be 'security export'.  We would not have decent jobs in America anymore because it was cheaper for Mr. Big to go overseas where wages were minimal.  Profit swelled.

For the kids back home that meant few if any jobs in their communities so they join the military and the 9-11 false flag made sure they felt a swell of nationalist pride as they went overseas to fight fossil fuel wars.  After repeated deployments they came home with a psyche stretched like a rubber band that has to eventually break.  They become largely forgotten - GI suicides are now at 22 per day.

So the plan is to take America down - break it emotionally, intellectually, culturally, spiritually, economically, environmentally, and politically.  Every social institution is being destabilized.  That is how feudalism works.  The American people are in for a rough ride ahead - Trump is the perfect man to put at the helm.  He won't be impeached because he is delivering the goods for Mr. Big who owns both major political parties. Trump keeps the citizens snarling at each other so they miss all that is going on behind the scenes to lock their fate.

The current Democratic party leadership in Washington this week supported the fossil fuel corporate agenda when they smashed the effort to put forward the 'Green New Deal' that would begin the conversion process to redirect monies for sustainable production.  But the 'new and improved' House of Representatives will largely stay in their 'political operating zones' which are assigned by Mr. Big's handlers.  The handlers are put in place with corporate money and their role is to control all levels of government in Washington and in state legislatures across the county.

The job of Congress is to debate various inflammatory domestic issues like immigration, religion, sexual orientation, gun control, abortion and more.  The handlers (bag men really) ensure that no links are made between these 'important domestic issues' and foreign policy.  This denial of real public debate about the wars (and costs of the wars) is key because Mr. Big's strategy is to control the whole world.  It's a war between regional global oligarchies. Most nations want to be left alone but Washington (and its underlings like the UK, France, Israel, Saudi Arabia) are rolling the dice and going for the whole ball of wax.  Mr. Big figures it's best if the American people don't pay attention to this costly corporate gamble.

It's a very risky, dangerous and provocative drive for total control.  It is the epitome of evil and the opposite of what we truly need here on Earth.

So the struggle goes on - daily facing the little devil inside each of us and all that which permeates our lives.  Best wishes to all who are on such paths.

God bless the French people for showing their spirit is not dead.

Bruce

Empire of chaos - Iran up next?

This former chief of staff for Colin Powell says the Trump administration is priming Americans for war with Iran — and he would know, since he helped George W. Bush do the same for Iraq.

If you've not yet seen the new film called 'Vice' about Dick Cheney be sure to go see it.  It's an important and well made movie.

Sunday song