Month: November 2022

Clinton/Rice Interview Demonstrates Both Parties Are Equally Imperialistic

Jon Stewart recently had a joint interview with Hilary Clinton (former Democratic Secretary of State for the Obama administration) and Condoleezza Rice (former Republican Secretary of State for the Bush administration).

Below I have posted the full interview followed by two excellent analyses from a couple of my favorite news commentators: Kristal Ball (former journalist for MSNBC; currently cohost of the independent news program, Breaking Points) and Briahna Joy Gray (lawyer and political consultant with a profession pedigree too long to list here).

If you can’t watch the entire interview, I encourage you to check out both of the following commentaries. In addition to Ms. Gray’s and Ms. Ball’s excellent insights, I will add a few observations of my own:

  1. Both Clinton and Rice illustrate the inevitably corrupting effects of power and political success. The hypocrisy, self-justification, and dissimulation demonstrated by these women is astounding.  Their apparent obliviousness to the jarring disconnect between their past actions and their current “explanations” makes one wonder if a professional diagnosis of “sociopath” is a job requirement for all federal Secretaries of State.
  2. There are no differences whatsoever between Democrats and Republicans when it comes to US foreign policy. The US political establishment is monolithic on this score. Everyone is equally imperialistic, arrogant, and utterly indifferent to the extensive damage America leaves in its wake as we blithely cruise from one catastrophe to another “policing” the rest of the world.
  3. Women become warmongers as easily as men.
  4. This interview strengthens my belief in the Christian doctrine of Original Sin.
  5. Christians who understand themselves as citizens of the kingdom of God will realize that we cannot align ourselves with either of our major political parties and that the military-industrial complex stinks of fire and brimstone.

Here is the Stewart interview:

Below is Briahna Joy Gray:

Here is Kristal Ball:

https://https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uj8p2CZ1Ox8

 

 

Medea Benjamin Explains the War in Ukraine and How to End It

Medea Benjamin is a cofounder of the activist organization CODEPINK. She has recently published a good book investigating the various forces at work in the current war in Ukraine.

She has also released an excellent video covering in the same ground in under 19 minutes.

If you are still wondering how this war began; why the US continues to send billions of dollars in military support; what is motivating Vladimir Putin; and how this war came be brought to a peaceful end; then, by all means, you will find the answers to all your questions in Medea’s video.

“To lose a friendship over politics suggests that something is deeply disordered in our souls”

David Corey is a professor at Baylor University. He has a fine article on the Comment website discussing the divisive role played by politics in the fractious life of the American church.

He does not address the spiritual disease at play when so-called Christians prioritize political agreement over and above shared devotion to Jesus Christ.

But he does offer an excellent analysis of the spiritual dimension of true friendship and what our divisive politics tells us about the absence of true friendship in American life.

The article is titled “Politics, Friendship, and the Search for Meaning.”

Below is an excerpt:

All around us, friendships old and new are coming to grief over politics. What is the cause of this? Part of the problem relates to how we practice politics today: we have become more warlike and tribal. Another part of the problem stems from our contemporary understanding of friendship. Genuine friendship places weighty demands on us, and most of us prefer relationships that are quicker and easier, and thus less enduring.

Politics and friendship are deeply connected. As strange as it sounds, how we understand what politics is has an effect on the kinds of friendships we are likely to enjoy. And, conversely, how we understand friendship will affect our practice of politics.

What exactly is the connection between politics and friendship, and how should we assess the relative value of each when they come into conflict?

Click here to read the entire piece.

Republicans/Democrats — Two Different Shades of the Same Anti-Democratic, Corporate Masters

In anticipation of tomorrow’s national elections, Chris Hedges’ most recent post is appropriately titled “Destroyers of Democracy.”

If you know anything about Hedges, then you already have guessed that his critique of our electoral system and the political options given to us includes a condemnation of both political parties.

Democrats and the Republicans are equally corrupt.

Neither party has the needs or the interests of working people on their lists of political, social priorities.

Though their styles are different, both parties are equally authoritarian. Biden’s recent speech about the preservation of American democracy was nothing more than a blatant attempt at fear-mongering undecided voters into casting their ballots for the do-nothing shills that march in lock-step behind Nancy Pelosi and Chuck Shumer.

Don’t fall for it.

Though I will vote tomorrow, I have no expectation that my vote — nor your vote, nor anyone else’s who doesn’t make enough money to be listed among the Fortune 500 — will make any difference in the state of my country or its future.

Am I too gloomy? No. I am old, experienced and thus realistic.

Thankfully, I know that my true citizenship is in the kingdom of God. I know that God’s kingdom will one day make all things right, as they should be.

I eagerly anticipate that day and pray for its speedy arrival. With all the saints from the past, all Christians can pray, “Come Lord Jesus. Come!”

In the meantime, I do the best I can to live out a kingdom lifestyle pleasing to my Lord; to explain Jesus’ kingdom values to others; to work, agitate, and yes to vote in ways that may help to spread the benefits of Jesus’ kingdom values to others.

But I place no hope in any political party or its candidates.

I have no expectations that any candidate will remain true to his/her campaign promises — unless, of course, those promises offer more money, influence and power to the wealthy.

I am too old to naively imagine that our current, corrupt political system will ever change for the better — though I am certain it will continue to deteriorate and become worse.

Don’t listen to the mindless muttering of the feckless false prophets, the modern-day soothsayers of evangelical idolatry, men and women who have sold their souls to the godless architects of Republican political power.

You know their names…

These blind guides have betrayed the kingdom of God in exchange for a lukewarm bowl of tasteless political porridge.

Thus they have already earned their only reward:  a millisecond of Twitter fame that will one day condemn them as wasteful servants who failed to prepare for eternity.

Their anti-Christ foolishness seems to know no bounds while they feverishly expand the selfish boundaries of their own ministry domains filled to the brim with thoughtless flocks of misguided followers.

No. Instead, do this: Memorize the Sermon on the Mount.

Give great thought to how your political commitments ought to be molded by Jesus’ own ethical priorities and instructions.

Plant yourself on the side of the poor and the needy.

Speak up for the voiceless. Labor for those who lack the resources needed to improve their lives by themselves. Give yourself away to those who have nothing left to give back to you.

Remember that money is not speech, its power.

Remember that power ALWAYS corrupts.

Remember that every government lies.

All politicians, but especially winning politicians, are compromised by their largest donors.

No interest is as powerful as self-interest.

In this world, money will always rule the roost.

Remember the social commentary of Thucydides who lamented the fact that “The rich always do as they choose, while the poor suffer as they must.”

Then decide to spend your life working to overturn the status quo, for the rules of wealth and power are as true today as they were in the days of Thucydides.

Obediently following hard after Jesus is the only way to get this right.

Remember, the ends never justify the means. In fact, corrupted means only lead to corrupted ends. Sure, compromise may win you a seat at the table, but you’ll find yourself dining with the devil rather than serving with Jesus.

Our only hope is found in the Jesus prayer: Father in heaven, cause your kingdom to come and your will to be done on earth as it is in heaven. Amen

And now for an excerpt from Chris Hedges’ prophetic article:

With the U.S. midterm elections on Tuesday, Biden and other establishment politicians hope to paper over the rot and pain of the system they created with the same decorum they used to sell the country the con of neoliberalism.

The bipartisan project of dismantling U.S. democracy, which took place over the last few decades on behalf of corporations and the rich, has left only the outward shell of democracy.

The courts, legislative bodies, the executive branch and the media, including public broadcasting, are captive to corporate power. There is no institution left that can be considered authentically democratic. The corporate coup d’état is over. They won. Americans lost.

The wreckage of this neoliberal project is appalling: endless and futile wars to enrich a military-industrial-complex that bleeds the U.S. Treasury of half of all discretionary spending; deindustrialization that has turned U.S. cities into decayed ruins; the slashing and privatization of social programs, including education, utility services and health care — which saw over one million Americans account for one-fifth of global deaths from Covid, although the U.S. has 4 percent of the world’s population; draconian forms of social control embodied in militarized police, functioning as lethal armies of occupation in poor urban areas; the largest prison system in the world; a virtual tax boycott by the richest individuals and corporations; money-saturated elections that perpetuate our system of legalized bribery; and the most intrusive state surveillance of the citizenry in U.S. history. . .

. . . Biden, morally vacuous and of limited intelligence, is responsible for more suffering and death at home and abroad than Donald Trump. But the victims in the U.S. Punch-and-Judy media shows are rendered invisible. And that is why the victims despise the whole superstructure and want to tear it down.

These establishment politicians and their appointed  judges promulgated laws that permitted the top 1 percent to loot $54 trillion from the bottom 90 percent, from 1975 to 2022, at a rate of $2.5 trillion a year, according to a study by the RAND corporation. 

The fertile ground of our political, economic, cultural and social wreckage spawned an array of neo-fascists, con artists, racists, criminals, charlatans, conspiracy theorists, right-wing militias and demagogues that will soon take power. . .

To read the entire essay, click here.

What if Putin Had a Plan for Breaking Up America?

How would you react if you discovered that the Russian government had a plan for controlling the US and dividing the country into smaller regional units, with the goal of limiting American influence in the rest of the world?

I suspect that we all would be outraged. Anti-Russian sentiment would surge.

Well, guess what. Many American foreign policy experts in Washington DC have long had exactly such plans for Russia!

And, of course, Russian leaders have always known about these plans, even if they have never been adopted “officially” as US policy towards Russia.

Knowing these facts should help everyone understand — and sympathize with — Putin’s aggression sparked by NATO’s expansion to Russia’s western border.

This does not excuse Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. But sympathetic understanding is essential to successful negotiations for anyone hoping to end a war.

Mike Whitney’s article, “Washington’s Plan to Break Up Russian,” explains the problems well at The Greenville Post.

Click on the title above to read the entire piece. Here is an excerpt:

Washington’s animus towards Russia has a long history dating back to 1918 when Woodrow Wilson deployed over 7,000 troops to Siberia as part of an Allied effort to roll back the gains of the Bolshevik Revolution. The activities of the American Expeditionary Force, which remained in the country for 18 months, have long vanished from history books in the US, but Russians still point to the incident as yet another example of America’s relentless intervention in the affairs of its neighbors. The fact is, Washington elites have always meddled in Russia’s business despite Moscow’s strong objections. In fact, a great number of western elites not only think that Russia should be split-up into smaller geographical units, but that the Russian people should welcome such an outcome. Western leaders in the Anglosphere are so consumed by hubris and their own blinkered sense of entitlement, they honestly believe that ordinary Russians would like to see their country splintered into bite-sized statelets that remain open to the voracious exploitation of the western oil giants, mining corporations and, of course, the Pentagon. Here’s how Washington’s geopolitical mastermind Zbigniew Brzezinski summed it up an article in Foreign Affairs:

 

“Given (Russia’s) size and diversity, a decentralized political system and free-market economics would be most likely to unleash the creative potential of the Russian people and Russia’s vast natural resources. A loosely confederated Russia — composed of a European Russia, a Siberian Republic, and a Far Eastern Republic — would also find it easier to cultivate closer economic relations with its neighbors. Each of the confederated entitles would be able to tap its local creative potential, stifled for centuries by Moscow’s heavy bureaucratic hand. In turn, a decentralized Russia would be less susceptible to imperial mobilization.”