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If you spend any time on Twitter, you’ll probably be familiar with the latest pathetic attempt to defend and insulate the U.S. status quo from criticism. It centers around the usage of an infantile and meaningless term, “whataboutism.”

Let’s begin with one particularly absurd accusation of “whataboutism” promoted by NPR last year:

When O’Reilly countered that “Putin is a killer,” Trump responded, “There are a lot of killers. You got a lot of killers. What, you think our country is so innocent?”

This particular brand of changing the subject is called “whataboutism” — a simple rhetorical tactic heavily used by the Soviet Union and, later, Russia. And its use in Russia helps illustrate how it could be such a useful tool now, in America. As Russian political experts told NPR, it’s an attractive tactic for populists in particular, allowing them to be vague but appear straight-talking at the same time.

The idea behind whataboutism is simple: Party A accuses Party B of doing something bad. Party B responds by changing the subject and pointing out one of Party A’s faults — “Yeah? Well what about that bad thing you did?” (Hence the name.)

It’s not exactly a complicated tactic — any grade-schooler can master the “yeah-well-you-suck-too-so-there” defense. But it came to be associated with the USSR because of the Soviet Union’s heavy reliance upon whataboutism throughout the Cold War and afterward, as Russia.

This is a really embarrassing take by NPR. First, the author tries to associate a tactic that’s been around since humans first wandered into caves — deflecting attention away from yourself by pointing out the flaws in others — into some uniquely nefarious Russian propaganda tool. Second, that’s not even what Trump did in this example.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

As Trump Moves Toward War, “The Resistance” Refuses to Resist

March 16, 2018

As Trump Moves Toward War, “The Resistance” Refuses to Resist

Tuesday’s post, It’s Impossible to Overstate How Terrible Mike Pompeo Is, laid out the view that Trump’s firing of Rex Tillerson represents a major shift toward war footing for the Trump administration, with Iran the specific target. This pivot was easily predictable, and I wrote numerous articles doing just that during 2017. Nevertheless, forecasting it and then seeing the disastrous pieces being moved into place are two different things.

Trump’s push to install Mike Pompeo as U.S. Secretary of State is a crystal clear indication that he’s begun the process of building his war cabinet. The next steps, likely to begin over the course of 2018, is to walk away from the Iran deal. I suspect relentless war propaganda to be unleashed simultaneously as the neocon/neoliberal/mass media war-monger alliance plays its well established role in selling the American public on another pointless and destructive war.

My prior post discussed Pompeo in detail, so I don’t want to be repetitive, but to revisit: Pompeo has contempt for the First Amendment, referred to torturers as patriots, wants Edward Snowden executed and is an extreme warhawk when it comes to Iran. In other words, he’s your typical neocon lunatic who’s just a bit more rough around the edges publicly. He represents the exact opposite sort of foreign policy to what so many Trump voters thought they were getting.

Switching gears a bit, today’s piece will zero in on Trump’s other desired appointment, Gina Haspel to head the CIA. Gina’s famous for running a CIA black site in Thailand where detainees were tortured. In fact, she performed her role with such gusto she was nicknamed “Bloody Gina” by some colleagues, and also played a key role in destroying videotape evidence of the torture. Her promotion represents a bizarre way to “drain the swamp,” but I digress.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

What’s Going Down in China is Very Dangerous – Part 2

March 2, 2018

What’s Going Down in China is Very Dangerous – Part 2

One of the more concerning ramifications of China’s recent turn toward a more totalitarian stance at home is what it means for the geopolitical environment in the years ahead. Several people asked in the comment section of Part 1 why I care about what’s going on in China when we have so many serious problems in the U.S. The reason is because a major shift in the polices of the second largest economy in the world, populated with over a billion people and run by leadership intent on establishing a far more dominant position on the world scale militarily and politically, will affect everyone.

Government propaganda is one of the most insidious and dangerous things that regularly occurs within human society, and it’s been pervasive in essentially all civilizations to-date. The media’s always a key ally in the dissemination of propaganda, something much of the American public has finally come to understand. The election of Donald Trump despite the U.S media’s unanimous support of Hillary Clinton was the real wakeup call, and has led to incessant calls for platform monopolies like Google and Facebook to censor speech that questions the dominant intelligence agency narratives. There’s nothing more terrifying to an entrenched power structure than a loss of the narrative, and the election of Trump proved to them that they lost it. The American establishment isn’t really afraid of Trump, it’s far more concerned that his election signified a loss of narrative control.

Narrative is particularly important to lunatics who run a global empire, and the U.S. media’s almost always happy to oblige. For example, the media’s enthusiasm to swallow government propaganda is what led to the Iraq war disaster, in addition to so many other societal tragedies I write about here on a daily basis.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

What’s Going Down in China is Very Dangerous – Part 1

February 28, 2018

What’s Going Down in China is Very Dangerous – Part 1

I’m sure all of you are aware of the dramatic power play pulled off over the weekend by China’s Communist Party to eliminate term limits for both the president and vice president. Prior to the move, Chinese leaders have stuck to two five-year terms since the presidency of Jiang Zemin (1993-2003), but that’s about to change as wannabe emperor Xi Jinping positions himself as indefinite ruler of the increasingly totalitarian superstate.

While the weekend announcement was illuminating enough, I found the panicked reactions by Chinese authorities in the immediate aftermath far more telling. The country’s propagandists took censorship to such an embarrassing level in attempts to portray the decision as widely popular amongst the masses, it merely served to betray that opposite might be true.

China Digital Times compiled a fascinating list of words and terms banned from being posted or searched on Weibo. Here’s just a sample of some I found particularly interesting.

The Emperor’s Dream (皇帝梦) — The title of a 1947 animated puppet film.
Disney (迪士尼) — See also “Winnie the Pooh,” below.
personality cult (个人崇拜) — Read more about the image-crafting campaign that has been steadily cultivated by state media over Xi’s first term.
Brave New World (美丽新世界) — See also “1984,” below.
my emperor (吾皇)
Yuan Shikai (袁世凯) — Influential warlord during the late Qing Dynasty, Yuan became the first formal president of the newly established Republic of China in 1912. In 1915, he briefly re-established China as a Confucian monarchy.
Hongxian (洪憲) — Reign title of the short-lived, re-established monarchy led by Yuan Shikai, who declared himself the Hongxian Emperor. After much popular disapproval and rebellion, Yuan formally abandoned the empire after 83 days as emperor.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Insanity Fatigue

February 16, 2018

Insanity Fatigue

Oligarchs, though they speak of deconstructing the administrative state, actually increase deficits and the size and power of law enforcement and the military to protect their global business interests and ensure domestic social control. The parts of the state that serve the common good wither in the name of deregulation and austerity. The parts that promote the oligarchs’ power expand in the name of national security, economic growth and law and order.

– Chris Hedges, The Deadly Rule of the Oligarchs

If you’ve been checking in with this site in recent days, you may have wondered if I was on vacation. I’m not. Rather, I’ve been suffering from a bit of sluggishness and writers block, and it wasn’t until I took some time to think about why earlier this morning that I was able to determine the cause of my affliction. The best way to describe what I’ve been dealing with in recent days is insanity fatigue.

It’s not as if there’s been a lack of news or things to talk about. There’s plenty. The problem is I’ve once again become exhausted and overwhelmed by the superficial stupidity and narcissism of our national political dialogue. I first expressed this sentiment about a year ago in the piece, Lost in the Political Wilderness, and the feeling came back in spades in recent days.

It’s been a year since I wrote that post and not much has changed. The political conversation, if you can call it that, remains largely polarized between two groups primarily focused on whether they support Trump or swear he’s Putin’s devilish puppet. One side insists he’s going to Make America Great Again, while the other thinks everything was perfectly fine before his election, and all will be well as long as we can rid ourselves of his presence. Meanwhile, the oligarch class continues to loot and pillage at will.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Donald Trump’s Superficial Patriotism at the Twilight of U.S. Empire

February 9, 2018

Donald Trump’s Superficial Patriotism at the Twilight of U.S. Empire

Already long ago, from when we sold our vote to no man, the People have abdicated our duties; for the People who once upon a time handed out military command, high civil office, legions — everything, now restrains itself and anxiously hopes for just two things: bread and circuses.

– Juvenal

Despite the title, I don’t want this post to be all about Donald Trump. The truth of the matter is all politicians love superficial patriotism. It’s why they all claim to care deeply about the troops, yet allow veterans to wait weeks or months to see a doctor after sending them to fight pointless imperial overseas wars based on fabrications. All these disingenuous politicians are total frauds, but they tend sell the same destructive policies in different ways. As such, it’s important to understand how they manipulate and divide us.

First and foremost, standing for the National Anthem, saluting the flag or cheering a military parade is not “supporting the troops.” If you think such trivial and superficial acts represent anything beyond lazy surface level virtue signaling you’re a huge part of the problem. Your thoughtlessness and fake patriotism is exactly why our young kids are being sent off to die and murder other young kids halfway across the world to pad the coffers of plutocrats and the egos of empire obsessed sociopaths in D.C. Not only are such acts not patriotism, your phony gestures help grease the wheels of global death and destruction.

Having a strong military for national defense is a necessary thing, but the purpose of such a force should always and in all circumstances be defense. A major problem arises when you have a global empire coupled with the strongest military on earth.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Four Pillars for a Better Future: Knowledge, Consciousness, Innovation, Local Action – Part 3

January 30, 2018

Four Pillars for a Better Future: Knowledge, Consciousness, Innovation, Local Action – Part 3

There’s a reason education sucks, and it’s the same reason it will never ever ever be fixed. It’s never going to get any better. Don’t look for it. Be happy with what you’ve got… because the owners of this country don’t want that. I’m talking about the real owners now… the real owners. The big wealthy business interests that control things and make all the important decisions.

Forget the politicians. The politicians are put there to give you the idea that you have freedom of choice. You don’t. You have no choice. You have owners. They own you. They own everything. They own all the important land. They own and control the corporations. They’ve long since bought and paid for the Senate, the Congress, the state houses, the city halls. They got the judges in their back pockets and they own all the big media companies, so they control just about all of the news and information you get to hear. They got you by the balls. They spend billions of dollars every year lobbying. Lobbying to get what they want. Well, we know what they want. They want more for themselves and less for everybody else, but I’ll tell you what they don’t want. They don’t want a population of citizens capable of critical thinking. They don’t want well-informed, well-educated people capable of critical thinking. They’re not interested in that. That doesn’t help them. That’s against their interests.

– George Carlin on The American Dream

Part 2 of this series dived into the importance of technology and innovation to the evolution of the human species. Indeed, innovation is one of the most important pieces to the puzzle, with the caveat that such advancements must be rooted in higher consciousness.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Four Pillars for a Better Future: Knowledge, Consciousness, Innovation, Local Action – Part 1

January 25, 2018

Four Pillars for a Better Future: Knowledge, Consciousness, Innovation, Local Action – Part 1

For many years now, my message has been that tweaking around the edges of a systemically corrupt and discredited economic and political system is not good enough. Rather, what we need is a full scale, species-wide paradigm shift in the way human affairs are conducted on this planet. No small task I know, which is why this series of posts will zero in on four key areas, or pillars, we need to focus on if we’re to evolve and leave this earth meaningfully better than when we arrived.

Knowledge

Let’s kick things off with the low-hanging fruit, knowledge. This is the area I’ve focused on the longest, and my desire to acquire knowledge and share it is what inspired the creation of this website and my dedication to it in the first place.

In this case, the knowledge I’ve been accumulating relates to how the world around us actually functions, as opposed to how we’re told it functions. Some people inform us we live in a Democracy where our vote matters, but overwhelming evidence and life experience demonstrates this to be total nonsense. Others tell us we reside in a Republic where the U.S. Constitution is the supreme inviolable law of the land, but that’s also a lie. In real life, the Constitution is completely ignored by politicians, and most certainly by the unaccountable and unelected shadowy intelligence agencies. Finally, there are those who insist we live in a free market system characterized by countless choices and vibrant competition, but this is rapidly becoming a fantasy to anyone who actually engages in the economy.

The glaring truth of the matter is the U.S. is managed by a unified corporate and political oligarchy that agrees and collaborates on all issues of importance to them irrespective of the meaningless and dishonest Republican or Democratic flags they fly in public.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

We Can Do A Lot Better Than This

January 22, 2018

We Can Do A Lot Better Than This

The dark ages still reign over all humanity, and the depth and persistence of this domination are only now becoming clear.

Politics is absolutely hopeless. That’s why everything has gone wrong. You have ninety-nine percent of the people thinking “politics,” and hollering and yelling. And that won’t get you anywhere. Hollering and yelling won’t get you across the English Channel. It won’t reach from continent to continent; you need electronics for that, and you have to know what you’re doing. Evolution has been at work doing all these things so it is now possible. Nobody has consciously been doing it. The universe is a lot bigger than you and me. We didn’t invent it. If you take all the machinery in the world and dump it in the ocean, within months more than half of all humanity will die and within another six months they’d almost all be gone; if you took all the politicians in the world, put them in a rocket, and sent them to the moon, everyone would get along fine.

– Quotes by Buckminster Fuller

When thinking about the financial crisis of nearly a decade ago, many people wrongly focus on the event itself as opposed to the response. I’m of the view that the most destructive aspect of that grotesque period of American history wasn’t the collapse itself, but the government and central bank response to it. This response centered around bailing out and rewarding those most responsible for the disaster, which merely served to further concentrate power and wealth in the hands of people who should be rotting in jail as opposed to guzzling Château Lafite at Davos.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Self-Reflection at the Twilight of U.S. Empire

January 17, 2018

Self-Reflection at the Twilight of U.S. Empire

There is a true law, a right reason, conformable to nature, universal, unchangeable, eternal, whose commands urge us to duty, and whose prohibitions restrain us from evil. Whether it enjoins or forbids, the good respect its injunctions, and the wicked treat them with indifference. This law cannot be contradicted by any other law, and is not liable either to derogation or abrogation. Neither the senate nor the people can give us any dispensation for not obeying this universal law of justice. It needs no other expositor and interpreter than our own conscience. It is not one thing at Rome and another at Athens; one thing today and another tomorrow; but in all times and nations this universal law must for ever reign, eternal and imperishable. It is the sovereign master and emperor of all beings. God himself is its author,—its promulgator,—its enforcer. He who obeys it not, flies from himself, and does violence to the very nature of man. For his crime he must endure the severest penalties hereafter, even if he avoid the usual misfortunes of the present life.

– Marcus Tullius Cicero

American influence abroad, as defined by the power and status of the U.S. empire, has been in consistent decline for nearly two decades now. Indeed, when the history books are written it’ll be clear that the dotcom boom and bust at the end of the 20th century marked the peak of U.S. imperial strength. Shortly after that bubble burst our nation was faced with the brutal and traumatizing 9/11 attacks, and the overreaction to this event unleashed a mass insanity across the American public from which we have never recovered.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Global Networks Are Necessary to Overcome Abusive Governments and Oligarchy

January 12, 2018

Global Networks Are Necessary to Overcome Abusive Governments and Oligarchy

The world around us is changing at an incredible pace, and with such change come many pitfalls as well as immeasurable opportunities. At the same time, the more things change the more some things stay the same. For example, the most important issue humans will have to confront in the years ahead is the age old issue of concentrated power.

One of the most destructive side effects of the financial crisis and the corrupt official response to it, has been an even greater concentration of wealth and power in the hands of some of the most unsavory characters planet earth has to offer. If we are to evolve and create a better paradigm, we’ll need to address this forcefully and thoughtfully.

I say thoughtfully, because what history has shown is that the typical response to a small group of crooked elites seizing all money and power is to launch a violent revolt that merely empowers another small group who said all the right things during their crusade, but then act as viciously and unethically as those they replaced once in power. This situation can and should be avoided at all costs. The idea isn’t to swap one group of rulers for another. We need to think about building a world defined by networks governed by rules, but with no rulers.

Indeed, this is the greatest lesson Bitcoin has shown to the world. It is a global network/community of people who have voluntarily opted into an alternative monetary system with no one in charge. Let me repeat that again, nobody is in charge. There’s no CEO, there’s no individual empowered to come in and just make changes to the code. In contrast, there’s a sprawling community of developers, entrepreneurs, hodlers, thinkers, writers, etc, whose degree of influence within the network changes over time.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

I Don’t Want Your Leaders

January 10, 2018

I Don’t Want Your Leaders

In 2017, I wrote a lot about how dangerously centralized our political system in the U.S. has become, and how we need to decentralize governance in order to restore power, liberty and policy experimentation to the local level. This notion that a sprawling and culturally diverse nation of 325 million individuals should constantly battle to the death over the ring of political power in Washington D.C. so as to impose their view on the other half of the country which completely disagrees is patently ludicrous. States, and even metro areas themselves, should be making most of the important decisions that impact their citizens’ lives on a day to day basis.

This isn’t complicated. People who live in Boulder, Colorado such as myself have a very distinct worldview on most things from the average resident of let’s say Houston, Texas. This isn’t to say one is superior to the other, we’re just talking generally different mindsets and cultures. The residents of these distinct places should be able to express themselves via policy in a way that most fits the desires and values reflective of these particular regions. While this does happen to some degree, all U.S. citizens are still beholden to the whims of centralized political power in Washington D.C. to a very unhealthy and dysfunctional degree.

One of the worst side effects of centralized power in Washington D.C. is most Americans waste all their political energy speculating on, or rooting for, who will be elected the next supreme ruler (President) every four years. This is such a gigantic waste of time and energy, but one reason it happens is because the U.S. has an imperial Presidency these days. The executive simply acts in a manner that the founders had never intended, and the other branches of government (legislative and judiciary) permit it.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Welcome to 2018 – We Are All Connected

January 3, 2018

Welcome to 2018 – We Are All Connected

To see a world in a grain of sand
And to see heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.

A robin redbreast in a cage
Puts all heaven in a rage.

A dove-house fill’d with doves and pigeons
Shudders hell thro’ all its regions.
A dog starv’d at his master’s gate
Predicts the ruin of the state.

A horse misused upon the road
Calls to heaven for human blood.
Each outcry of the hunted hare
A fibre from the brain does tear.

– William Blake, Auguries of Innocence

Over the course of 2017, I spent a lot of time detailing where we stand as a species and where I think we’re going. To summarize, I think the positive impact of the internet and social media on humanity is still very much in its infancy. The more connected we become to one another across the planet, the more we’ll realize we have far more in common with one another than we do with the sociopathic oligarchs and politicians in charge of our respective nation-states.

Much of the 20th century was defined by unimaginable human conflict and terror, unleashed upon the public by crazed elites and rulers who were able to successfully manipulate large populations. The key to preventing a repeat of this sort of thing in the 21st century is billions of human beings across the planet communicating and sharing friendship with one another to the point we can no longer be tricked in killing each other. We need to learn to see “the other” in ourselves and voluntarily collaborate with our fellow humans on the challenges that face us in order to bring our species to the next level. This isn’t just a pipe-dream or insane utopian ramblings, I think it’s entirely possible.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Reflections on 2017 – A Personal Journey

December 28, 2017

Reflections on 2017 – A Personal Journey

2017 was a tumultuous and extremely binary year for a considerable number of Americans. For those who thought everything was going swimmingly during the Obama years, Trump’s election wasn’t simply a shock to the system, but an extinction level event for civilization that handed the U.S. government to bunch of Putin-controlled fascists. In stark contrast, Trump’s election was seen as divine deliverance by his devoted cheerleaders and red hat wearing obsessives. Finally, someone from outside the swamp had successfully trash-talked their way into the Presidency. As such, an imminent restoration of American greatness is all but assured.

Naturally, neither one of these perspectives is remotely accurate. They’re just distinct fairytales that quarreling groups of Americans have enthusiastically embraced within an increasingly insane and divided political environment. The societal pressure to self-segregate into either passionate support for “The Resistance” or “Trumpism” was overwhelming all year and has continued to this day. I recognized this early on, and wrote about it back in February.

Here’s an excerpt from that piece, Lost in the Political Wilderness:

I think the U.S. citizenry is being afflicted by a sort of mass insanity at the moment. There are no good outcomes if this continues. As a result, I feel compelled to provide a voice for those of us lost in the political wilderness. We must persevere and not be manipulated into the obvious and nefarious divide and conquer tactics being aggressively unleashed across the societal spectrum. If we lose our grounding and our fortitude, who will be left to speak for those of us who simply don’t fit into any of the currently ascendant political ideologies?

Little did I know it at the time, but the sentiments expressed in that piece, coupled with the four-part series on Spiral Dynamics that followed, would result in profound changes to my overall outlook on life and the evolution of this website.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

It’s Time to Rethink Education – Part 1 (Indoctrination)

December 13, 2017

It’s Time to Rethink Education – Part 1 (Indoctrination)

Education consists mainly of what we have unlearned.
– Mark Twain

As a father of two young children, my thoughts have increasingly started to center around their young lives and the future world they’ll inhabit. Such considerations quickly lead to stressful questions such as, what are the best schools in the area? Which option can provide the best environment in which to thrive? If the best options aren’t public, can we afford them? Is it worth the money? All these questions and more have filled the minds of my wife and I over the past couple of years, but lately we’ve started to ask even bigger questions; such as whether the compulsory education system as it exists in the U.S. in 2017 makes any sense in the first place. I’m increasingly starting to conclude that it doesn’t.

Before I get into that, let’s take a step back. A lot of what I do here at Liberty Blitzkrieg is highlight what’s perverse and destructive about human behavior at this time, and how things can be made dramatically better in the future. If I had to summarize my worldview concisely, I’d state that human beings at the moment are living under highly centralized, hierarchical power structures which are gamed by unethical, greedy and corrupt people at the top who exploit the masses ruthlessly.

Since the worst of humanity will always work hardest and most violently to attain power (this will always be the case), the only way to achieve lasting, positive change is to systemically move to a different model for human activity. Trying to get decent people at the top of a highly centralized power structure is counterproductive and merely a short-term solution if it can even be achieved in the first place.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

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