Hillary Clinton only “won” Iowa because she won all six coin tosses in tied precincts. What are the odds against six successive coin toss wins? I calculate 1 in 64, or you have a 1.5% chance of pulling it off. If I am right, do we really believe it did happen? That question is posed without taking into account the indisputable bias for Clinton of the Democrat machine which was organising the vote, and other startling irregularities, including the falure of the organising committee to staff over sixty caucus meetings. It all stinks, frankly.
I have been trying to think up a word to describe the kind of society we have now, in which a tiny number of extremely wealthy people control the politicians and manipulate the public through the mass media. Then I realised we already have a perfectly adequate word for it – plutocracy.
It is a plutocracy where 85 people own the same wealth as the other 50% of the population of the entire world, and the wealth gap still grows at astonishing pace. A reaction from the people who actually create that wealth is inevitable. The extraordinary concentration of capital has only been possible because of the existence of state mechanisms designed to promote it, and a popular movement to end that state bias was bound to happen. It was also predictable that it would be dominated by the young. To see youth mobilise for Scottish independence, for Corbyn or for Sanders has been life-affirming for me.
I might wish the movement for change to be sometimes better directed. But there is now a generational shift, a desire of young people for fundamental change, resisted by their elders. This phenomenon has not been seen so strongly since the 60’s. In the battle between the growing and the dying, there is only one ultimate winner. A good time to be alive (again). Almost makes up for struggling on through Thatcher and Blair…
This seems interesting, “World Zionist Organisation”, hmmm, sounds ominous and intimidating I wonder if the IDF or JDF are the real ones behind this, yeah of course they are.
“Sniper App” sounds appropriate, next app will be called “bulldozer squash app.”
The World Zionist Organization (WZO) is expected to launch its Sniper app, which it says is a search engine for anti-Semitic content.
The Sniper system is set up to scan the internet using an algorithm that will identify certain keywords in different languages. A crew of WZO members will scan the results, confirm the cases that actually show real anti-Semitism, and respond with direct replies or contact authorities in the offending party’s country.
WZO emphasizes the fact that the app will be monitored and supervised, so that its use will be proper, and not aimed at shaming individuals or groups without proper evidence.
“The Sniper will create deterrence,” say the entrepreneurs behind it, “it won’t be so easy to publish a status calling for the murder of Jews, or pictures of burning Israeli flags.”
The Sniper’s first users will be members of the WZO’s global network for combating anti-Semitism, at the WZO’s communications center. Later, other users are expected to join in.
Their role will be to create a kind of “wall” on the site, on which they will write the personal details of anti-Semitic content publishers, as well as what they published (quotes, screen grabs, pictures, videos, and more).
The app is set to be launched Sunday, during a WZO conference aimed at combating anti-Semitism in the modern era, which will be attended by Israel’s Ambassador to the UN Danny Danon and Knesset Speaker MK Yuli Edelstein.
It will initially operate on a trial basis in countries in Latin America, which has seen a recent rise in anti-Semitism that has not been as well-publicized as European anti-Semitism.
You would however think that they’d try to figure out why people from all over the world are anti-semitic to start with rather than logging comments.
Staying on this, I do hope the World Zionist Organisation develop a anti-Muslim app or a anti-Christian app as well afterall the J##s aren’t the only Abrahamic religion group to suffer prejudice.
Republicofscotland
“Thanks for the links the first link won’t let me access it (connection not secure).
The second link Haaretz, wants my money before it will let me read the link.”
___________________
The implication of the above is
either that Baal is just giving a headline (he wouldn’t be the first, of course)
or that he has managed to get past the Ha’aretz paywall
or that he has a subscription to the online Ha’aretz!
I shall not speculate further, of course.
Habb 18.56pm
Thank you for that answer, I didn’t realise how complicit the Netherlands were. ?
Baal, I wonder if this particular story was at the heart of your post to me.
An Israeli pro-settlement company has been accused of forging acquisitions relating to more than a dozen real estate deals in the West Bank. A Channel 10 program alleged that 14 of 15 land deals police examined were fraudulent.
The Israeli authorities have been trying to clear illegal Jewish outposts from the Binyamin region of the West Bank. These include settlements such as Migron and Givat Asaf, which have proved to be flashpoints between pro-Israeli settlers and Palestinians.
An investigative report by Channel 10, as cited by Haaretz claimed that officials from Al-Watan, a company run by Zeev Hever, who has been a key figure in the Israeli settlement movement, were responsible for the forged deals.
Republicofpalestine
“Thank you for that answer, I didn’t realise how complicit the Netherlands were.”
__________________
1/. My answer was addressed to all, not specifically to you.
2/. “Complicity” is the wrong word because it hints at active (or even passive)support. Which was not the case unless you feel that inanimate objects such as pre-war residence rolls, etc, assumed human characteristics.
Is this voter fraud?
The important problem is that the Bernie counters recounted everyone, while the Hillary counter was literally recorded telling someone else that she only added newcomers to the count she had before, and then when asked if she recounted everyone, she lied to the organiser and said “Yes”.
This means that if anyone left the caucus site who was supporting Bernie, then they were removed by Bernie’s recounters, but any Hillary supporter who left the caucus site was treated as though they were still there for the purposes of the recount.
Thus, artificial inflation of her numbers occurred unless everyone who left was a Bernie delegate, on top of the Hillary campaign surrogate lying to an election official to cover up her.
And they left the recount up to a Yea Nay vote.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=153&v=eXOPuFQkve4
A lot of Dutch civil servants may have been complicit with the German crimes, but the official Dutch government, which went into exile with Queen Wilhelmina, was not.
I imagine all governments of the time kept records that an occupying Nazi power might have misused. The United States, for example, had census records which its own government used in 1942 to identify and intern Japanese and Japanese-Americans.
This is a rather interesting link, showing how Israeli companies profit immensely from embargoed goods entering Gaza and the West Bank, companies, such as Nesher cement have a virtual monopoly in those areas.
EU officials said it can be very difficult to export materials to Gaza. A lot of goods for Gaza’s private sector reconstruction project we had, ended up being held in Ashdod port for very lengthy periods of time – months if not years – so there was de facto no alternative but to use Israeli sources.
Certainly worth a read.
http://www.whoprofits.org/content/reconstruction-gaza-zero-buildings-massive-profit
If collaboration with the Nazis is such a black mark for countries like the Netherlands, let it be remembered that it was the J**ish Agency for Palestine, Israel’s predecessor, that in August 1933 helped consolidate the Nazi regime in Germany by concluding the Transfer Agreement with Nazi Germany, which allowed German J**s to emigrate to Palestine, so long as they transferred a large portion of their assets to the German state, which then stood in great need of foreign exchange to pay for its imports. Germany at the time was in such a fragile economic condition that, without the agreement, the Nazi government might well have fallen.
The Stern Gang, one of the ancestors of Netanyahu’s Likud Party, and led at the time by Yitzhak Shamir, who later became prime minister of Israel, in 1941 offered Nazi Germany a military alliance against Britain.
‘do we really believe it did happen?’
I agree the whole US electoral system stinks, but I believe the ‘Hildabeast’ (see Snopes’ ‘Hildabeast’) could have won 6 flips in a row: the devil looks after his own!
The Hill: Trump says he ‘probably will’ sue over results of Iowa caucuses.
Trump was playing the good loser after Iowa. He’s right about Cruz being the anti-christ though. I don’t know why serious people even consider politics other than for entertainment value.
“So he is probably no more than a wishy-washy Liberal. I write this because of my elation when Barack Obama got elected on all his promises.” -John Goss
A lot of Sanders’ support must be coming from disillusioned ‘Hope and Change” supporters. Thus Sanders campaign is based upon concrete policy promises rather than vague suggestions of good will: Free Tuition, Increased Pensions, a living minimum wage, NHS style Health care (that’s Bevanite NHS)and so on. Whether he will deliver-he could not without big changes in Congress (which are perfectly feasible)- is another matter but at least he is making specific policy statements and his supporters are signing on to them.
It will probably take another election cycle but the trend is inexorable: the old Cold War policies are unsustainable. They can only be maintained now by cannibalising working class living standards, neglecting infrastructure (physical and social), a reign of terror in the inner cities, vast expenditure on waste in the Defence budget (including much that Sanders supports opportunistically like the F35 flying circus vehicle) and constantly chipping away at pensions, food stamps, welfare, education, workers rights etc.
One thing that the left does not need to worry about is Bernie’s imperialist foreign policies. He is simply doing what the right wing has been doing for decades, except that where they ensure that there is no money for social policies by insisting on tax cuts, he is ensuring that there will be no money for wars by insisting on popular social programmes.
The right didn’t openly campaign against Social Security and Sanders is not going to openly campaign against bloated Pentagon budgets: the American people will have a choice between social security, educational opportunity, clean water and safe roads, on the one hand, and building weapons to be scrapped on the other.
@Ba’al Zevul
3 Feb, 2016 – 1:17 pm
It might be because yet another ‘independent site’ has become a CIA front.
If those charming people in Langley and Cheltenham will allow, here’s the latest from PCR…
http://www.paulcraigroberts.org/2016/02/02/there-is-no-freedom-without-truth-paul-craig-roberts/
And by the way, you charming people are all going to be put on trial.
RobG, you know I’ve been involved with this site for years. It is not controlled by the CIA nor by GCHQ. Certain people go to a lot of (unpaid) trouble to ensure its independence Are you calling me a liar?
” he is ensuring that there will be no money for wars by insisting on popular social programmes.”
I hadn’t considered the possibility of a St Ronaldus strategy of ‘starving the beast’ as Sander’s counterpoint to eliminating social programs. Nevertheless the make-up of legislators is not likely to change soon, and any such ambitions would require their support. Sanders is well-intentioned, but as we all know, good intentions are the cheapest of all virtues. You cannot salvage the present electoral system based on economic privilege.
Good to have these new posts from Craig, even if the coin-tossing conspiracies/ technicalities showed the readiness of many commentators to resurrect old antagonisms. The comment that made most sense to me was Phil’s reminder that of all the money going into the US Presidential campaigning, Sanders’s is the least tainted.
Iain Orr, good to see you here. Yes I do wish some commenters would improve their standard of reasoning and refrain from insinuation, insult and smears. I miss the former days; there is still much intelligent conversation here, but there’s more unpleasant nonsense in between.
Des Moines Register: Iowa caucus coin flip count unknown.
@Clark
3 Feb, 2016 – 6:06 pm
I’m not sure why you take the electorial political nonsense in America seriously, because you are in a small minority.
We all know that Hillary will be the next president, totally against the wishes of the majority of the American people, but totally with the wishes/money of Wall Street. It’s so corrupt it’s beyond belief, and every single one of these presidential hopefuls crawled out from under a stone, including Bernie, the pretend socialist.
Meanwhile our Dave came back from Europe with an equally nonsensical agreement. I am derogatory against Eurosceptics in the sense that their main beef is against rule from Brussels, whilst at the same time Britain is widely perceived as being a poodle of Washington.
The British nuclear deterrent being a prime example of this, because it’s entirely controlled from Washington.
RobG, Saunders may be from under a stone; so far as I know, life itself arose from the slime, so the only way is up! Thanks for going to the trouble of writing an actual opinion. Care to retract your (latest) slur against the work of this site’s team?
@Clark
3 Feb, 2016 – 9:33 pm
If this site is independent than maybe you should stop being so anti-Russian with regard to the comments. Anyone with half a brain knows that the USA and its allies are a totally out of control Frankenstein.
Take these news reports today, from opposite sides…
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/feb/03/faltering-un-syria-peace-talks-paused-until-end-of-february
https://www.rt.com/news/331171-syrian-army-siege-aleppo/
People who are more afraid of Russia than America perhaps need a reality check.
But of course that makes me a ‘Putinbot’; ie anyone who has the temerity to criticise the psycho foreign policy of America and its allies.
I find it utterly breathtaking that the vast majority of Americans still buy into the con…
https://consortiumnews.com/2016/02/01/feeding-the-military-industrial-complex/
There will be another false flag event sometime soon, probably in Britain, and then they will bring in martial law, to cover-up the fact that these low-life vermin have wrecked the economy.
You can ban me then, you can ban me now; but never forget, people like me will bring the vermin to justice.
Make no mistake about that.
“…Sanders is the least tainted”.
Hadn’t seen Phil’s comment, but this comparison reminds me that flu is more tolerable than ebola.
RobG, personally I find this site even-handed towards the Kremlin. What, exactly, are you complaining about? Without substantiation, your accusation amounts to no more than another slur.
Incidentally, I’ve never seen YOU complain about about Russia’s nuclear weapons and nuclear industry.
Caucusing is reality TV – reminds me of Container Wars – Gelastic or tragic – you decide…
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dN89WcdCaHQ
RobG, 10:18 pm:
…probably live much closer to Russia.
Mark Golding, 10:32 pm; got anything to say to this from RobG:
Welcome back, Craig.
Sorry for O/T: Russia has the whip hand in Syria and there’s fuck all the Empire can do about it. There’s a huge breakthrough coming in Aleppo, and the SAA are just about up to the Sultan’s borders in Latakia. Great news for the nation state of Syria and plurality in general.
BBC tells us ‘Aleppo offensive threatens peace talks’. Ha ! You mean the eradication of the al Nusra and ISIS crazies? Oh THAT offensive !
Shameful reporting, and more proof that the corporate media and the Empire are in lock-step.
Still waiting for Kuenssberg to tell us who buys ISIS oil and how it gets out of Syria. She can look at Oxitec’s release of GM mosquitoes in Brazil in May 2015 while she’s at it. There might be a news story in either of those.
Another sad day for liberty, those poor (literally and figuratively) Americans are going to have to do it the hard way now..
Senator Rand Paul has suspended his Presidential campaign.
A statement released by Paul this morning confirmed that following a fifth place finish in Iowa, Paul is facing up to the reality that he does not have the numbers to carry on in the race.
The son of former Congressman Ron Paul polled 4.5 percent in the Iowa caucuses.
Although he bettered the majority of other GOP candidates, including Jeb Bush, Paul finished behind Ted Cruz, Donald Trump, Marco Rubio, and Ben Carson.
“It’s been an incredible honor to run a principled campaign for the White House. Today, I will end where I began, ready and willing to fight for the cause of Liberty,” Paul said.