Have you ever tried to work with people you couldn’t depend on to tell you the truth? It isn’t pretty. Without the ability to rely on what you’ve been told (or the assurance that you’ve been told everything relevant), effective cooperation at almost every margin of choice is reduced. That’s because the foundation on which cooperation is built has been undermined.
As John Donne succinctly put it, “No man is an island.” In a modern economy, all of us are dependent on multitudes of s... (more)
Anti-war Iraq war veteran Adam Kokesh just released an new 'Man on the Street' video where he interviews a wide range of Americans to get their take on the movie American Sniper. What we learn is your average American has put no thought into determining their beliefs, but merely act as autonomous robots, choosing to believe what they were programmed to believ... (more)
I confess to having been more than a bit shocked, and even mystified, to have recently found myself on the receiving end of some wildly baseless attacks by people, Iraq War devotees, who accused me of "tearing down" the late Chris Kyle, the subject of Clint Eastwood's latest blockbuster film, American Sniper.
I have written three articles on Kyle. Unlike those who have derided him, I at no time and in no way uttered a single syllable to slander the man. In fact, I have conceded... (more)
Ross Caputi, a former marine who participated in the US’s second siege of Fallujah, writes that the reason the American Sniper book and film have been so successful is that they “tell us exactly what we want to hear”: that US America is “benevolent” and “righteous”. That, he says, is why the book and film are so popular; their popularity speaks volumes about US society, and signals more dan... (more)
A couple of weeks ago, cops and their supporters started circulating sarcastic little memes about “The next time you need help, call a crackhead.” They thought they were really clever and putting anyone who dared to question police for any reason in their place. Really that’s an irrational emotional response worthy of a 12 year old. Let me lay some real logic and reasoning on you.
That statement is a false dichotomy. It suggests that the two options it puts forward are the only t... (more)
Khaled al-Qazzaz wants to know why U.S. officials were silent during the time he was incarcerated by the military dictatorship that rules Egypt. An engineer and educator, he had joined the government of democratically elected Mohamed Morsi as foreign relations secretary. According to ... (more)
The mindset that is common to U.S. troops serving overseas is that they are all doing it for America, for us, for our rights and freedoms, for our safety and security. They'll all tell you that they are doing it because they love their country.
There's one big problem with that mindset, however. The truth is that the troops, through what they're doing over there, are indirectly destroying our country, our rights and freedoms, our safety and security, and our economic well-being.<... (more)
"I only wish I had killed more." –Navy Seal and "American Sniper", Chris Kyle
“I can’t kill anyone.” –US working-class soldier before his short deployment to Iraq, Casey Sheehan
This is something that I don’t want to revisit—I never want to relive the worst experience of my life. However, with the 11th anniversary of my son’s death in Iraq on 04/04/04 approaching and the new “blockbuster” infecting movie screens around the world, I really must get this off of my ch... (more)
Some people hated it. Some people loved it. Just about everyone seems to miss the real point.
The most disturbing part of the annual “State of the Union” address by the US president does not concern the specifics of the content, or the policies – as wonderful or objectionable as they may be. The core problem is the very strange presumption that one man comprehends an entire nation and its meaning, embodies something like a guiding spirit of a people, and thereby earns the right t... (more)
Last evening I went to see the new movie American Sniper because I wanted to see how they portrayed American soldiers killing people in Iraq, especially Chris Kyle, the man whose life the movie revolved around.
As Nazi official Herman Goering pointed out, it is easy for any regime to get people to back a war. All that it has to do, Goering said, was to tell people that they've been attacked and then denounce opponents for lacking patriotism and exposing the country to danger. ... (more)
Note: The second video in the URL below has been taken down, but it is the first video which is just prior to the second one, that has the most visual information.
Here is a video of the execution of Amedy Coulibaly. It is a German website with the actual live French video of the police assault on the deli. There are three videos. The first one repeatedly shows Coulibaly with tied hands containing no weapons shot down and killed when he could easily have been captured. It ... (more)
About three months ago, 29-year-old Brittany Maynard ended her life. Diagnosed with a rare form of cancer, her prognosis was less than grim, with the average life expectancy of similar patients about 14 months.
Upon receiving her diagnosis, Maynard and her husband moved to Oregon, where the state's "Death with Dignity" law ... (more)
In the aftermath of the terrorist attack in France on Charlie Hebdo, U.S. officials are telling the world how committed they are to the principles of freedom of speech.
Really?
How about Lynne Stewart, the New York lawyer who was convicted and sentenced to serve time in a federal penitentiary for doing nothing more than speaking the following words to the press:
I am not withdrawing my support of the cease-fire, I am merely questioning it and I a
The trial of Ross Ulbricht, alleged to be the administrator of the Silk Road website that distributed illicit drugs peer-to-peer, opened with a shocker.
His attorney very quickly admitted that the Silk Road was Ross's idea. He envisioned a free market in the cloud in which people could circumvent prohibitions and restrictions and gain from trade in... (more)
“If I don’t have my black robe on, I’m just like anybody else,” Oregon District Judge Gregory Baxter once pontificated from the bench. “But if I am wearing my black robe I expect my orders to be followed.”
Once he is clothed in the robes of the punitive priesthood, Baxter isn’t subject to the law, but rather its embodiment – or so he would have those not similarly attired bel... (more)
Who are the so-called terrorism experts? In the wake of the Paris attacks, the corporate media has once again flooded its news programs with pundits claiming authority on terrorism, foreign policy and world events. We discuss the growing and questionable field of "terrorism experts" with three guests: Glenn Greenwald... (more)
Legal recreational cannabis/marijuana/pot is almost one year old in Colorado. The Denver Business Journal recently published a retrospective containing several articles reviewing the experience. The general conclusion is that it has been a big success, not the tragedy some had predicted or claimed. The remarkable thing is that the report claims the b... (more)
