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1,389 thoughts on “Wow

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  • Mary

    This is very true. Remember Helen Thomas the outspoken White House reporter?

    ‘Thomas said in an October 2011 radio interview with Scott Spears of WMRN that she realized soon after making the comments that she would be fired, stating, “I hit the third rail. You cannot criticize Israel in this country and survive.” She added that she issued an apology because people were upset, but that ultimately, she still “had the same feelings about Israel’s aggression and brutality.”‘
    http://www.counterpunch.org/2010/06/16/the-scourging-of-helen-thomas/

    February 09, 2015
    What Israel Does to Palestinians Doesn’t Stay in Palestine
    by MARK HAND

    If you’re hoping to enjoy a long, successful career as a reporter in the U.S. mainstream media, don’t follow the lead of journalist Rania Khalek. For starters, Khalek doesn’t shy away from providing candid coverage of sacrosanct topics like Israel and the U.S. military.

    Her refusal to kowtow to the politically correct view on Israel does not play well in U.S. newsrooms. Corporate media owners want reporters who they trust will cover foreign policy issues from a pro-government angle. Since Israel receives unanimous and unconditional support from Washington — no matter the scale of the nation’s brutality against Palestinians — there is little doubt which side the U.S. press will support in its reporting on Israel and Palestine.

    Even progressive media outlets in the U.S. are guilty of downplaying Israel’s atrocities. “What I’ve noticed is that Palestine and how it is reported on is a good barometer for how far progressive news outlets still need to go,” Khalek said in an interview. “I see a lot of apologism taking place for Israel. You still have progressive outlets like The Nation giving Israel legitimacy and credibility it doesn’t deserve.”

    /..
    http://www.counterpunch.org/2015/02/09/what-israel-does-to-palestinians-doesnt-stay-in-palestine/

  • Macky

    Ba’al Zevul; “I doubt his enthusiasm for Russia will be shared by too many of his countrymen, whether that’s the US or Lithuania”

    Indeed; judging by his website, seems to be a serious academic, even sharing awards in Philology, like Chomsky !

  • Peacewisher

    Morning all!

    After last weeks “gaff” about brokering the Maidan “deal”, looks like US ptb are getting even more open about its motives by referring Ukraine troops as “pro-US troops”. Other news outlets being generous about this, saying it is a Freudian slip. Does CNN make Freudian slips?

    Good news though that US won’t (yet) be supplying arms to them.

  • Macky

    Good question Ba’al as Google does not seem to know apart from stating that although Yiddish was his parents first language, it was taboo to be spoken in their home ! I should imagine that he must of later acquired at least a working knowledge of it, if only for his work in Philology, but that’s just my speculation.

    (Interesting that his father was Ukrainian and mother from Belarus.)

  • Ba'al Zevul

    In the interests of discord –

    http://blogs.spectator.co.uk/coffeehouse/2014/03/chomsky-in-the-crimea/

    When solidarity goes, all kinds of contortions become possible. The worst elements of the Western left opposed Saddam Hussein, and wept hot tears for his victims. But when Saddam stopped being America’s de facto ally his crimes became “the atrocities of someone else,’ which they dismissed with a shrug. If Western governments were supporting Assad as a bulwark against radical Islam, the left would be marching against Baathist crimes. Equally, if NATO had intervened after Assad had used chemical weapons the left would also be marching – but this time against a ‘western war’.

    As events have turned out, the West has done nothing worth mentioning in the Levant, so the mass murder in Syria can be dumped in the file marked ‘the atrocities of someone else,’ and forgotten.

    Something in that.

  • Herbie

    “Chomsky = linguistics, not philology.

    Should have stuck to it.”

    Perhaps they’re related, eh.

  • Macky

    Linguistics & Philology are inherently connected, the former being impossible without knowledge of the latter;

    “When I was maybe 10 or 11 years old, I was actually reading the proofs of my father’s doctoral dissertation, which was on David Kimhi’s Hebrew grammar, and then I read articles on the history of the language and Semitic philology.”

    http://www.chomsky.info/interviews/20101112.htm

  • Par for the course

    Re GG, not only did the IDF trainee add his bias to the agreed question, Freedland actually had a prepared answer as well. The zio “owners” at the Beeb were in on it as well, since the program is not broadcast live and could have had at least a health warning about the yiddish setup.

  • Herbie

    Ba’al

    Any chance of a translation of Nick Cohen’s piece, above?

    It’s hard to work out what he’s on about.

  • Macky

    Sorry Ba’al it’s a sign that you are really losing the plot when you find yourself in agreement with anything Nick Cohen writes; what is it about Russia that makes normally sensible people so soft in their critical thinking !!

  • Herbie

    Chomsky just goes to the official record, reads it and tells lazy fuckers what it says.

    What’s wrong with that?

  • Ba'al Zevul

    what is it about Russia that makes normally sensible people so soft in their critical thinking !!

    That one cuts both ways, doesn’t it? Mind you, I’ve got nothing against Russia per se. Its current regime’s intentions are what worry me. Short answer to your question: history.

  • Ba'al Zevul

    If Nick Cohen makes a fair point, I am happy to acknowledge it. In this case, that whether an identifiable section of opinion supports or opposes a regime, all too often depends on whether the West does. If the West supports, the ‘left’ (to use his term, which is unfair, as some of the left manifestly think for themselves) will automatically oppose…more or less anything you care to name. I think that’s a valid criticism.

  • Old Mark

    The excellent article by Dovid Katz that Macky linked to @ 09.30 refers in passing to the activities of the ‘Azov battalion’ in the current conflict.

    They are presently engaged in ‘counter offensive’ operations around Mariupol; the Beeb politely refers to them as ‘a volunteer force affiliated with the interior ministry’.

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-31357588

    Up to a point, Lord Copper.

  • Ba'al Zevul

    Dovid Katz is a vehement opponent of antisemitism, of course, which he sees in the Lithuanian leadership. But not, apparently, elsewhere:

    http://www.jpost.com/Diaspora/Separatist-leader-says-miserable-Jews-running-Ukraine-389883

    (A little unfair, as it is well known by all here that they are vicious Nazis, to a man, in Kiev)

    Russia-pointing Zakharchenko is of course a peaceloving cuddly bunny:

    http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-europe-31089142

    Where will he get them? Not Russia, obviously. No, no, no. Perish the thought.

  • Old Mark

    As Prof. Katz noted in his article last year, it should indeed be disconcerting to ‘the West’ that the Kiev government relies on this ‘volunteer battalion’ to such an extent to do the military heavy lifting in its campaign against the Russian backed separatists.

    As other links on this elephantine thread have shown, Kiev’s conscript army just seems to lack the desire to engage the ‘enemy’ more closely in offensive operations. The gifting of hi-tech US weaponry to the Kiev government, which may be imminent, may not alter this fact. Kiev may continue to find it difficult to maintain the morale of the consript grunts on the ground if they don’t hate the Donbass insurgents with the same venom as as the Azov battalion clearly do.

  • Macky

    Ba’a; “That one cuts both ways, doesn’t it? Mind you, I’ve got nothing against Russia per se. Its current regime’s intentions are what worry me. Short answer to your question: history”

    How do you square “current regime’s intentions”, when Russia is clearly being reactive in the face of delibrate proactive existential threats ?

    Re Cohen, his “point” is just that another repeat of that intelligence insulting slur that Westerners who object to crimes being carried out by their own Governments, are only doing so simply because they are anti-Western self-haters ! A “argument” only brain-dead fools can believe in, & only charlatans can advocate.

  • Old Mark

    Russia-pointing Zakharchenko is of course a peaceloving cuddly bunny

    More likely, he is all mouth and no trousers, as Strelkov turned out to be.

  • Ba'al Zevul

    Old Mark – His deputy, Vladimir Antyufeyev, has very elegant trousers, on the other hand. He probably bought them in GUM.

    Look him up. See also, Transdniester, Abkhazia, Latvia, etc.

    There’s (but this is obviously mere propaganda from the Western-backed fascist Kiev regime, so you may not want to look at it) a potted bio here:

    http://www.kyivpost.com/content/ukraine/who-is-who-among-kremlin-backed-separatists-in-eastern-ukraine-361825.html?flavour=mobile

  • Ba'al Zevul

    Still doesn’t quite fit with them being the new SS, though, does it, Herbie?

    I am of course as dependent as anyone else here on what is actually available, and the JP piece I cited in fact gives the full quotation. In full, via the ADL:

    “The anti-Semitic jibe is clear in the video of the press conference,” a spokesman for the Anti-Defamation League asserted.

    “After several minutes of calling on Ukrainian citizens to disobey and reject President Poroshenko and his government, Zakharenko and Plotnitsky snicker and ask how ‘Cossacks could be ruled by the not quite right kind of people.’ Zakharenko then explicitly mentions ‘Jews.’ “Plotnitsky immediately tries to provide cover against any accusation of anti-Semitism by saying there is a YouTube video about Jewish Cossacks, and Kyiv’s leaders are ‘pathetic representatives of the great Jewish people.’ But their body language gives them away.

    “Plotnitsky begins to smirk at the beginning of the performance, knowing what is coming. Zakharenko tries not to laugh as he’s speaking, and says ‘Jews’ very subtly, before Plotnitsky tries to inoculate them from the anti-Semitism accusation with comments that came so quickly they were obviously planned.

    Those watching understood very well that this was an anti-Semitic dog whistle.”

    Yeah, yeah. ADL…AIPAC…USrael…The West. I know, But what fucking mug would haul the Jews into this particular conversation? Particularly when separatist propaganda absolutely depends on Kiev being populated entirely by brownshirts? Answer – someone looking for resonance in Russia.

  • Herbie

    “Still doesn’t quite fit with them being the new SS, though, does it, Herbie?”

    What was the purpose of the old SS and how does it differ from this new Nazi movement that’s popping up all over Europe, with Western support.

    The old Nazi function was primarily to defeat Russia. That’s what they thought. These new Nazis at least believe themselves to have a similar function.

    “I am of course as dependent as anyone else here on what is actually available, and the JP piece I cited in fact gives the full quotation.”

    Not in the headline, it don’t. That’s probably the trick, eh. Bit of intent to mislead. Theirs, not yours.

    Is there a copy of the video?

  • Ba'al Zevul

    Is there a copy of the video?

    Feel free to look. You apparently have internet access too.

    The function of any headline is to attract attention. Russian headlines do it too.

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