Hillary Clinton is American, owned by financial interests to whom she is completely in thrall, a rabid neo-conservative warmonger, completely uncritical of Israel and focused for any claim to be progressive entirely on identity politics. Which is also a precise description of today’s Guardian newspaper. The once august and intellectual title is now a shrill cheerleader for far right Blairites and wealthy American feminists.
The Guardian is as unabashed in its support for Clinton as in its support for the Blairites. The stream of “feminist” articles about why it would advance the cause of women to have a deeply corrupt right winger in the White House is steadily growing into a torrent. It is a perfect example of what I wrote of a month ago, the cause of feminism being hijacked to neo-conservative ends.
Bernie Sanders is not perfect – nobody is. But he understands that obscene and still burgeoning wealth inequality is the greatest problem of western society, and that the state framework supporting crazed banking structures is the root cause of this. The support for him is a sign of the inevitable popular reaction to the extreme inequality of society. Sanders is channelling that reaction effectively.
The establishment therefore circles its wagons around Hillary Clinton. The hope is that women can be persuaded it is an act of misogyny simply to stand in her way. The other great establishment hope is that the Democrat party machinery is so strong in black communities, that black Americans can be in effect ordered to vote for a woman who epitomises the system which disadvantages them, rather than an apostle of genuine change in the economic order. I retain hope the establishment may find that black Americans are cleverer than that.
The machinery used to manipulate identity politics – racial and gender – is all that Clinton has. If Clinton beats Sanders, it will be the perfect demonstration of the fact that identity politics has become the enemy of progress in society.
In the field of identity, Bernie Sanders would be the first non-Christian President of the United States. Would that not be wonderful in a country whose politicians feel the need to genuflect to swarms of religious evolution-denying nutters who believe foreign wars are good because they presage the Rapture?
And would it not be great if the first President since Carter not in thrall to Israel were Jewish?
Chris Rogers
11/02/16 1:15pm
I presume Oliver Kamm was paid a fee by LBC for appearing. I’d be ashamed to cram it in my pocket, but I suppose if he had any integrity, he wouldn’t be where he is.
There’s always plenty of money for people prepared to lie in the service of the establishment.
Kind regards,
John
Came across this interesting quote, under Kamm’s byline, in the JC –
Contrary to the pro-Corbyn tweeter, I have no connection with the Henry Jackson Society, a foreign-policy pressure group, …
http://www.thejc.com/comment-and-debate/columnists/142780/corbyns-deplorable-allies
But what’s this?:
Like Stephen (Pollard -BZ), I was at the Society’s launch, and I’m glad to be a signatory of its statement of principles.
http://oliverkamm.typepad.com/blog/2005/11/henry_jacksons_.html
The tweet said this:
Corbyn refuses to be interviewed by Oliver Kamm. He’s one of the prime movers in the Henry Jackson Society. Arch Zionist. F–k him & the JC.
“No connection”?
…and – as an outsider, having visited Israel only a handful of times* – I’ve never adopted the honourable term, “Zionist”.
The qualification is equally valid for Zionists who have never visited Israel in their lives. Nonsequitur.
*Hotel bill paid by the Israeli government in 2005
Just a quick point.
This chachter Joan Smith manifestly is suffering from narcissism (don’t why given her appearance; ie the clip of her) as her rejection of any points countering her claims proves! She perceives her rejection as oppose to rejection of her forwarded point, thus these negative feelings invoking a reaction to the extent of getting angry and blocking or taking other actions to suppress any kind of dissent from her world view. So it should come as no surprise to anyone interaction with here; they are not dealing with a balanced individual.
=================
Although upon his tripping and falling why on Earth his man servant (no not his butler silly) penetrated the sleeping girl and not his finger, toe, or even elbow, remains to be a pertinent question?
Agreed that Jury decide based on their findings. However given that this millionaires case is not the only aquittal based on him tripping and falling on the hapless sleeping girl.
The other case in the same period concerns one of the the Dragons of Dragon’s Den; 57-year-old Dough Richard whom happens to be a former business adviser to the prime minster Cameron has been found not guilty of child sex offences at the Old Bailey.
As you know this is statutory rape and his defence ought not hold because he is rather far removed from the age of twenty one, yet he has been cleared. Does this not mean that the Judges summation and the direction leave the jurors with little choice other than retuning a not guilty verdict? Can This be a valid point given the reticence/reluctance/rejection of the DPP in prosecution of Janner for his child rape cases.
@Ba’al Zevul,
Until CM brought Kann’s name to my attention on this blog one had never heard of this disagreeable fellow – such is is import.
That said, i find it strange how a Zionist like Kamm can have the temerity to despoil Noam Chomsky’s good name by utilising a quote from him on his Blog, the one eulogising the Henry Jackson Society of which he claims he has no association – but one of many lies this pressitute and failed businessman espouses.
What is worse in my book, given Kamm’s reference to Chomsky is that Norman Finkelstein is a acolyte of Chomsky, and Chomsky has come to NF’s defence as he was hounded out of US academia by Zionist scum, of which Kamm also states he’s not a member, despite his own orchestrated attacks on NF.
In a nutshell, Mr. Kamm is a fucking fraud, a non-entity who has no right to tarnish Chomsky or tar Finkelstein with his lies and propaganda. We have seen Finkestein swat Kamm like the repugnant insect that he is, this in my book was hilarious, but lest we forget, compared to both Finkelstein and Chomsky Kamm is but an intellectual pygmy, one with a high opinion of himself, but in reality a person of the lowest order – in my neck of the woods we’d utilise the word ‘C–T’ to describe him, indeed, he’s last zero seconds in a workingmen’s club, he’d be knocked on his arse and outed for the scum he is.
Many thanks for the links and highlighting again how much of a shit Kamm is, which highlights once again how poor the writers are who inhabit The Guardian today. And yet, as CP Scott states: “Facts are sacred,’ well yes, unless you are a Zionist who happens to write for The Guardian, in which case facts mean fuck all. How sad, how very sad!
Typo alert my end, of course its Kamm and not Kann, although I’d like to see the bugger truly canned shall we say!
John:
You should be honoured that the Neocon Witch Joan Smith slammed the Twitter door on you.
Regards,
Njegos
Fedup
11/02/16 2:20pm
Thank you for your observations on Joan Smith.
As I understand the law, sexual activity including penetration with a child between the ages of 13 and 16 is not statutory rape, as it would be with children under the age of 13. It is termed “sexual activity with a child” under the Sexual Offences Act 2003, a lesser offence.
Consent is not a defence, but if the defendant can demonstrate that he had a reasonable belief that the child was over 16, that is a defence to the charge.
Judges can direct a jury to acquit, but I don’t think that was done here. However, the summing-up may have been designed to influence the jury towards a verdict that the judge regards as appropriate. There is nothing necessarily wrong in that, as long as the judge reminds the jury that the final decision is theirs.
What I find most disturbing about this case is that a man in his mid to late 50’s was prepared to go on a website and make arrangements to have paid intercourse with two females under the age of 18. That is extremely disturbing no matter whether he believed them to be under 16 or over 16. What kind of creature is this man? Then he had the nerve to whine that it had ruined his business. That’s hardly very surprising. I would not want to be within a hundred miles of him. I have twin girls who are fourteen years old.
Kind regards,
John
@JSD,
My daughter is 8, so feel your pain, and although usually against capital punishment – too many mistakes and innocents hung – the fact remains I’d like to personally hang this bastard from the nearest yard arm, particularly given a family member was raped at 9, its has caused great mental anguish and has remained with her ever since and caused my family great anguish.
And yes, I’d tie the rope and pull the lever myself – its all they deserve as they are sexual predators and our daughters are very much at risk.
Chris Rogers
11/02/16 2:35pm
“Norman Finkelstein is a[n] acolyte of Chomsky”
I would actually be careful about saying that. It’s a common charge of people who dislike them both, for example that delightful man Alan Dershowitz.
Finkelstein is a great scholar in his own right who made his name by dismantling the fraudulent work From Time Immemorial by Joan Peters. Almost the only academic who would touch him at that early stage was Noam Chomsky, because he was so radioactive both regarding Israel and the US literary establishment. I do not think that makes him an “acolyte” of Chomsky, more that they share some common interests and convictions.
If you want a good laugh, go and find Frank Menetrez’s analysis of the Finkelstein-Dershowitz disputes. Absolutely riveting reading and makes me burn with anger against Dershowitz as well as laughing.
Kind regards,
John
“@Republicofscotland,
I think we both share a similar opinion of the Clinton’s, whom in my book are just money grabbing scum, just like that other couple the Blair’s.
That said, strange is it now how backwards the USA is to the UK and Europe, at least in the UK we can console ourselves with the fact we have had both a woman PM and Jewish PM, we have yet to have a Catholic PM since the Reformation.
As such, I’d welcome Saunders as the next President of the USA, if only because he seems more concerned about domestic issues, rather than foreign policy. However, given the odds against him it would be a long shot for him to win the Democratic Ticket, but anything is preferable to HRC, even bloody the lunatic Trump.”
___________________
Yes I agree with that Chris, the Blair’s the Bush’s, and the Clinton’s of this world are self serving scunmbags.
As for US foreign policy I doubt any US president, in a long time has had the full say on that.
Big pharma, and US big business along with Zionist handlers are the real power at the Whitehouse.
Here the head of Merrill-Lynch, tell US puppet president Ronald Reagan to hurry it up.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=QTcL6Xc_eMM
Thanks, Njegos, much obliged to you. J
Meanwhile the giant war machine cranks into life under the guise of saving refugees.
How many times have we heard that line.
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/europe/nato-orders-fleet-to-deploy-in-aegean-sea-to-help-end-europes-refugee-crisis-a6867076.html
Craig gets a mention in the National.
http://www.thenational.scot/news/former-university-rectors-want-end-to-back-room-deals.13595
Chris Rogers: don’t be bloody silly.
It is precisely because of irrational revenge that capital punishment, which leads to the conviction of thousands of innocents (most by being intimidated by the possibility of capital sentencing) every year in the United States is popular among people who fear that not to be ‘hard’ is to be an accessory in crimes. You know very well that it isn’t. And that there is no crime worse than to tolerate the killing of innocents simply in order to conform with a lynch mob.
Love and kindness, forgiveness and understanding are not things of which to feel ashamed. As a Socialist, in the tradition of the authors of The Miner’s Next Step, you must understand that.
ROS; “Meanwhile the giant war machine cranks into life under the guise of saving refugees.”
Yes, “under the guise” would be correct; here’s a first hand account of how pressure is being applied to Greece, and the net practical results are even worse for the desperate refugees;
“This is a very difficult message to write, but here we go:
Greece came under considerable pressure last autumn to “secure Europe’s borders”, threatened even with exclusion from Schengen, accused that it wasn’t doing enough to control the EU’s borders and it wouldn’t accept help from other European countries.
Let me say outright here that the EU’s help was piffle. Even the fingerprint registration equipment they promised hasn’t arrived yet, let alone financial aid and personnel. The EU opted to give away 3 billion euros to Turkey to convince them to stop letting people board boats essentially. With 4000 people arriving almost daily still, that didn’t work out.
In the end, Syriza backed down (again) and is accepting European “help”. The first actions are to arrest volunteers in Chios and Lesvos with ridiculous charges (some were charged with trafficking, others with carrying small amounts of weed), close down infrastructure like soup kitchens and observatories for approaching boats to help those arriving and establish fast deportation routes back to Turkey, where a recent BBC report showed that refugees have been tortured.
This breaks two promises: the first is that under Syriza, solidarity networks that essentially fill in the gaps for a semi-collapsed central government, would be allowed to operate unabated.The experiment was successful, but now it’s being curtailed.
The second promise broken is that of the promotion of human rights and humane treatment of refugees. By agreeing to allow Frontex to operate as border police and with the tactical police cracking down on activists, Syriza is succumbing to turning Greece to an open air detention centre for refugees, and the country as a whole to a European borderland where a quasi-autonomous force (Frontex) operates with a hazy mandate.
The final straw is the extension of the operation of detention camps in Greece, all of which have come under heavy criticism for the squalid conditions under which detainees live, until at least 2018. The government has vowed time and time again that they would be shut down. Now they won’t be.
Unfortunately these are the facts. I would normally reserve all this for an article, but my disappointment and disillusionment are too urgent. What’s happening in Greece is the inevitable outcome of a Europe that doesn’t know what to do with itself. It’s just part of the wave of reactionary politics engulfing the continent. Unwilling to act in Syria, bitter against Greece, divided, shocked by eastern european countries turning ever rightwards and with a heap of economic troubles on the way.
I have no idea how all this might play out and I’m not even sure there’s anything we can do about it. But I felt these things needed saying. So here you go.”
https://www.facebook.com/yiannisbaboulias/posts/10207726570338360?hc_location=ufi
Two good pieces in CounterPunch on our topic:
http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/02/11/warring-against-sanders-totalitarian-thinking-feminism-and-the-clintons/
and better yet
http://www.counterpunch.org/2016/02/11/can-the-establishment-fix-its-bernie-sanders-problem/
Macky, the competition was tough but Syriza’s leadership are beginning to take the lead in the Betrayal of Socialist Voters’ stakes.
Chris Rogers
11/02/16 2:49pm
I am very sorry to hear about your family member. I feel that your anger and desire for harsh treatment are quite understandable in the light of that.
Evidence is accumulating that important, influential and powerful people have been getting away with this kind of thing for decades, with high-level police and prosecutors turning a blind eye and doing anything they could to wriggle out of bringing such people to justice. The children involved have been terribly, terribly let down by people who have been charged with the duty of protecting them.
What’s the UK state starting to look like to people looking in from outside, I wonder? Nice thought, isn’t it?
Kind regards,
John
Bevin; “Macky, the competition was tough but Syriza’s leadership are beginning to take the lead in the Betrayal of Socialist Voters’ stakes.”
Initially they could point to the many guns being held against their heads, but it’s getting harder & harder to give them even that now, as they continue to betray even more & more people & principles;
https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/articles/inquiry/22532-syrizas-u-turn-on-israel-is-now-complete
So giving the comments a quick glance it seems that Nato deploying warships in the Aegean to help with the refuge crisis, bad, Russia and Iran supporting the Assad regime, and by extension possibly ISIL, in creating thousands more refugees from the Aleppo region, good?
Here is an analysis of how badly Clinton did:
http://www.commondreams.org/views/2016/02/10/hillary-clintons-very-bad-night
Bort,
I have read the Paul Graham article and would say the following
You have to remember that Paul Graham was a maths and computing nerd (not meant badly) who was lucky enough to have been born at just the right time.
The internet started to become mainstream in 1994 (say) and people like Paul, who had the programming skills, were in heaven.
With great timing he ran a start-up and sold it to Yahoo at a fancy price.
Not only that, but Graham then used his nerd skills to clone baby Grahams (not literally-he funded start ups)
The thing is, that this story is very important to Graham and how he sees the world and wealth creation-lots of people like Graham overcoming their school bullies and getting rich through programming.
However and it is a big however, most of the big earners in society are not of that world. They are people who are in the financial sector and got paid lots for doing…(who knows what).
So, I would take Graham’s views with a pinch of salt.
Yes, inequality is good if it is due to tech guys making stuff, but not so much if it is due to bankers and the like getting paid in spite of being wealth destroyers.
Bevin,
As a socialist I’m also obliged to try and right wrongs, the rapist of a close family member was never punished. And fucking right I wanted to kill him as i bloody knew him, the rape did not become apparent to our family for some 5 years after, by which time suicide had been attempted on three occasions – it was not until mental health assistance was demanded that we found out. So, unlike the bloody Feminists I actually personally have the experience of rape and its consequences, and it’s so much worse when the victim is under 10 and the rapist some 5 years older. Come and speak to me on the issue when your sister or daughter is raped, until then you have no understanding.
Further, I’ve also dealt on the defence side with rape cases in the UK and as such have been privy to some disturbing photographic evidence, the same applies to physical assault cases against babies. And I did my job to the best of my abilities despite my personal disgust. In law we are not allowed to let feelings overcome us, however, when its family you feel different. I’m not calling for a return of capital punishment, but just stated at a personal level I understand the misery and desire for revenge against evil, and rape in my book is evil, although accusations of rape have been misused, which is regrettable as we see with the AS case, where no rape was actually undertaken period. Now try explaining all this to the middle class non-entity feminists who pontificate on The Guardian and elsewhere – they make my blood boil with their political agenda;s and yet they care not one fucking iota for working class women, that i can assure you, which is why I don’t like bloody liberals.
Macky I recall reading an article that said something similar a veiled threat towards Greece, from Germany and France who by all accounts run the EU. They threatened to bring in their own immigration controls and staff to oversee and check refugee status.
Although Greece entered the EU under a somewhat false financial guise, in my opinion they’ve been made scapegoat, and set as an example, this is what happens when you attempt to defy the EU money train and its banks.
@JSD,
I understanding of Finkelstein and Chomsky is that they are quite close, further, and whilst i don’t like saying it, Chomsky is now old and not with us much longer, it’s my firm belief that Finkelstein should take over from where Chomsky presently sits. Its a known fact Finkelstein for his views is toxic in America, allegedly the land of the free, further, Chomsky has mentioned many times that in this century he’s unlikely have ‘tenure’ or a teaching position in the USA for his beliefs and efforts to shine a light on the USA’s dark secrets and its unfailing support for Israel come what may.
Both Finkelstein and Chomsky I hold in the highest regard, both represent what is good in mankind and Finkelstein has paid a dear price for his views, which again makes my blood boil, Indeed, whilst both Prof. Graeber and Steve Keen have been able to gain university positions in the UK, Finkelstein has not – which is a great shame as Bradford University would be a good fit, although in my humble opinion he should be teaching at the LSE or Oxbridge.
Again my opinion, but that he’s hounded as they hounded David Irvine is utterly disgusting, particularly given both he parents were Holocaust survivors and Finkelstein ain’t no Holocaust denier, quite the reverse, he’s a good holocaust historian closed down by those with contemptible political agenda’s.
O/T
I suspect we will shortly have more to worry about than which figurehead for big business will be running the USA:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-35548117
Falls in bank shares this year
Barclays down 31%
RBS down 25%
Credit Suisse down 42%
Deutsche Bank down 38%
Soc Gen down 34%
Feeling lucky, taxpayers? Are you too big to fail, too?
James C
11/02/16 3:46pm
Well said. I do urge everyone to read Bort’s article, which is very interesting and gives a very different perspective to the one most people on here probably have. However, even more rewarding, in my opinion, is genuinely trying to give a critique of the article and thinking for oneself what may be wrong with it.
For example:
There is a difference between a woodworker making five chairs a week and a computer programmer designing a programming system for recording and valuing loans and selling it to a finance house for $x million. Is that not so?
Where does the money come from for venture capitalists investing in start-up businesses?
Where does the money come from for entrepreneurs who have developed major new software to make things easier for banks and other financial institutions and now sell it to those institutions and make themselves wealthy for life?
Kind regards,
John
Republicofscotland,
look at Italy first and Greece before even looking at how the Commission, ECB and ECB Finance ministers treated Greece – the facts are their, the Italian Constitution and electoral system was usurped by Brussels, whilst Cyprus was effectively butchered. I know several insiders, one of whom being a former Finance Minister and their accounts make uneasy reading, which is why I’ll probably vote for the UK to exit the EU in its present guise, which is most undemocratic and a cheerleader for neoliberalism, not the Social Europe that Delors wanted. My personal view is, because of Treaty obligation, a No vote would entail an existential threat to the EU and a No vote does not mean we’ll leave, but the EU only acts when its existence is under threat, and that comes from the mouth of a leading EU advocate who so happens to also be the second in command of the ECB. Interesting times indeed, just a shame the MSM, including The Guardian fails to report on any of this, too busy pushing neoliberal feminist agenda’s and anti-Russian propaganda.
Chris Rogers
11/02/16 4:06pm
Yes, I agree broadly with everything you have said, I just don’t like the word “acolyte”, for me it has ugly connotations of one person blindly following another, like following some fundamentalist religion. I don’t regard that as helpful.
Personally, I can’t see anyone inheriting Chomsky’s mantle nor do I necessarily think that it is a good idea. He seems to me to have been uniquely placed, and I am certain that it is an embarrassment to him to be this kind of libertarian socialist messiah; his own focus is on the hard working average person with similar views, building in a granular way. Finkelstein also strikes me as personally quite a bit more combative, rude and aggressive than Chomsky – understandably enough, to be sure, but again not necessarily great qualities for intellectual leadership.
There is sometimes quite a fine line between honest examination of the history and legacy of the Shoah and revisionism. That line is mercilessly blurred and exploited by people who perceive it as in their interests to discredit honest enquiry. Dershowitz is a cracking example of such a person. I must share with you this from Finkelstein’s website, which strikes me as disgraceful beyond description.
http://normanfinkelstein.com/2006/01/13/who-was-maryla-husyt-finkelstein/
Just ot of astonishment I will also cut and paste, verbatim, a text sent by Dershowitz to a Dutch concentration camp survivor regarding this matter. Take a look at the level of language use. This person is supposed to be a Harvard law professor. If he’s dyslexic, then all credit to him for becoming that, but I do in fact wonder how someone who talks like this in any context was able to finagle his way into Harvard faculty. Really, really weird.
I believe that the context suggests that he believed is mother may
collaborated. His mother also doubted that people (like you)who
claimed to be suvivers actually were. He quotes his mothe as saying
that if everyone who claims to be a suriver really was one than who
did hitler kill. He has also questioned the accounts of survivors like
elie wiesel and argued against compensation for survivors. All this
leads me to belive he was questioning his mothers deniel of complicty.
If you read I’d differently so be it. Why do you care about muy
reading unless you and or uyou daughter support finkelsteins bigotry
Kind regards,
John
JS-D
If it helps, just think of the profits, dividends, bonuses of the finance houses – and their lawyers, accountants, ‘their uncles and their cousins and their aunts’ – as being a tax levied on productive industry. Looks different then, or should do to a libertarian neocon…
Ba’al Zevul
11/02/16 4:40pm
Yes: a private tax that enters private pockets.
Kind regards,
John