Going Rogue With Caitlin Johnstone

It seems pretty clear to me that the pressure westerners have been putting on their own governments regarding Israel's criminality in Gaza is the primary reason why the western empire couldn't just sign off on a swift final solution to the Palestinian problem back in October, and has had to settle for this awkward slow-motion genocide disguised as self-defense instead. It's not that the empire has a conscience, it's that it is sufficiently afraid of sparking mass-scale unrest on its own turf to need to disguise its own psychopathy a bit. Reading by Tim Foley.

People often object to criticisms of Israel's ongoing mass atrocity in Gaza by saying, "Well what SHOULD Israel have done in response to October 7 then?" They say it like the question should confound you, as though it's some kind of thought-terminating unanswerable Zen koan or something.  But it isn't. The question is very answerable, and the most correct answer is that Israel should have done what it always should have done: right the wrongs of the past and make peace. Reading by Tim Foley.

All they're doing here is trying to wash this administration's hands of the horrors that are being inflicted in the middle east with the direct facilitation of this administration. Reading by Tim Foley.

In the last few days Israel has assassinated leaders in multiple neighboring nations, assassinated multiple journalists, deliberately destroyed a water facility in Gaza during a polio outbreak, and had riots defending the right of IDF soldiers to rape Palestinian prisoners. Clearly the sort of country we should all want to send our sons and daughters to go fight and die for. Reading by Tim Foley.

In reality, the US isn't vowing to defend the state of Israel, the US is vowing to help Israel attack other countries. If you're pledging unconditional support to an extremely belligerent aggressor while it commits the most demented acts of aggression imaginable, all you're doing is condoning those acts of aggression and making sure it will suffer no consequences when it conducts more of them. A kevlar vest stops being a tool of defense when you wear one to prevent yourself from being stopped by police while conducting a mass shooting. Reading by Tim Foley.

Israel has been on another assassination spree, killing Hamas political leader Ismael Haniyeh on Wednesday with an airstrike while he was in Tehran for the swearing in of the new Iranian president. Israel also claims to have killed Hezbollah commander Fuad Shukr in an airstrike on Beirut on Tuesday evening. Reading by Tim Foley.

They lied about mass rapes so that they could systemically rape.  They lied about beheaded babies so that they could kill babies.  They lied about "human shields" to shield themselves while killing civilians.  They lied about being victims so that they could victimize others. Reading by Tim Foley.

Saying a US politician is "bad on foreign policy but good on domestic policy" is like saying "Sure my husband spends his weekends murdering hitchhikers, but he's a good provider and he knows how to fix a flat tire." Reading by Tim Foley.

One of the dumbest things about US politics today is the way both parties constantly attack each other for holding foreign policy positions they don't actually hold in order to create the illusion that they have meaningful disagreements on foreign policy. Reading by Tim Foley.

The thing I hate about western electoral politics in general and US presidential races in particular is that they take the focus off the depravity of the US-centralized empire itself, and run cover for its criminality. Reading by Tim Foley.

"You couldn’t ask for a better example of everything Washington stands for than this. Both houses of Congress rising to feverishly applaud one of history’s worst genocidal monsters dozens of times as he lies over and over again is a much better representation of what the US government is about than anything you’ll see during the presidential race from now until November." Reading by Tim Foley. Article version: https://www.caitlinjohnst.one/p/netanyahus-speech-was-as-american

"I'm not a big fan of that presidential candidate's pro-genocide policies, but I like her positions on women's reproductive healthcare" is not the sort of thing that would be said in a sane and normal country. Reading by Tim Foley.

"Look, I’m not saying Six-Headed Zombie Hitler is perfect, but come on! He’s obviously WAY better than Seven-Headed Zombie Hitler! Sometimes you just have to vote for the lesser evil." Reading by Caitlin Johnstone and Tim Foley.

Just as we all have a responsibility to help create a healthy and truth-based world, we also all have a responsibility to develop healthy and truth-based minds. Reading by Tim Foley.

The UN court ruling that Israel is an illegal occupying force will be used to argue that the whole entire world is against Jews and used to justify more abuses and atrocities. That's the beauty of the "criticism of Israel is antisemitism" narrative: it reinforces itself. The more abusive and murderous Israel is the more criticism it gets, and that criticism is framed as antisemitism and used to justify more Israeli abuses and murderousness with the claim that it's being done to defend Jews from a hostile world that's out to get them. Reading by Tim Foley.

He called the dog "habibi"  - my darling -  as it mauled him to death while his family listened nearby. They had never heard him speak before. He had the mind of an infant. "Enough, my darling," Muhammed said to the dog, because it was killing him, and because he was in pain, and because his family had spoken to him  so lovingly all his life. Those were the words he knew. That's how he was spoken to. That's what you say to someone  when you need them to stop. When you need them to listen. When their behavior is challenging, but you have deep love in your heart. Enough, my darling. Enough, my darling. As Gaza burns: enough, my darling. Enough. As attack dogs on two legs send attack dogs on four legs to bite and maul and kill: Enough, my darling. Enough. A murder of crows  follows a murder of IDF soldiers, cawing, "Enough, my darling. Enough." The bombed out hospitals. The children without limbs. The sniper drones playing recorded babies' cries to try and lure out civilians. The attack dog maulings. The

"Man that assassination thing with Trump was so freaky," said Carl while stepping over a woman in a hijab clutching a dead child to her chest. Reading by Tim Foley.

All the high-profile Democrats who've been wishing Trump a speedy recovery from his assassination attempt after years of calling him an existential threat are the same people who now treat George W Bush like a cuddly wuddly snugglepoo after years of calling him an evil dictator. The enmity between these factions is a performance, like cage fighters who hug warmly after weeks of trash talk once their match is over and admit all the drama was really just about promoting the fight and selling Pay-Per-Views. Reading by Tim Foley.

The western political-media class hasn't been this sympathetic and supportive toward Trump since he bombed Damascus. Reading by Tim Foley.

This is who Joe Biden is. This is who western liberals are. They are the carnage, starvation and disease in Gaza. They are the biosphere strangling to death under the boot of ecocidal capitalism. They are the nuclear missiles being rolled into position around the world. They are a dying brain and a dying heart on a dying world of their own making. Reading by Tim Foley.