The Amount Of Contempt Elites Have For Public Intelligence Is Breathtaking

“Elites think we’re morons.”

That’s just because we mostly are. Get NPR to peddle this line (probably not hard), and I have no doubt most turbolibs will buy it hook, line and sinker. They will believe *anything* of Russia, thanks to Clinton being the worst presidential candidate in US history.

Good post… but lots of errors in word use… ‘they liked about Hamas’… ‘they liked about Gaza…’, Corby (instead of Corbyn)

Corbyn, right time, wrong man, much like bernie. his own worst enemy, and a appeaser. he was for a second vote on brexit, stabbing his voters in the back.

he even took advise from blair, bernie, my friend joe.

labor lost because of blairs policies. voters hated thatcher, but they hated blair even more. just as democrats lost and greased the skids for trump.

corbyns loss was because of free trade and open borders, economic suicide. those were the policies of the third Reich.

the E.U. was fashioned by WWII fascist war criminals.

https://americanaffairsjournal.org/2019/12/momentum-lost-surveying-the-fractured-british-left/

“Despite what the Right wants us to believe, the 2019 election was not a defeat of Corbyn and his left-wing economic ideas. Despite what the woke Left wants us to believe, the election result should not primarily be discussed with reference to age—and we should certainly not imagine that generational change will make their ideas more popular. Instead, what we have seen is a realignment. The North East of England did not vote Conservative because they had suddenly embraced the free market. It is far more likely that they associate Brexit with an end to free trade and free movement of people—two forces they see as pressing particularly hard on their communities.

The 2019 election in Britain was the first British election that was determined by a new type of culture war. That war was fought over Brexit but both sides knew that “Brexit” was a synonym for a number of different ideas—some of them economic, like free trade; some of them cultural, like the domination of our culture by “woke” activists; and some of them in between, like open borders which is justified by woke politics but the effects of which are primarily economic.”
———–

https://www.counterpunch.org/2019/12/16/brexit-and-the-collapse-of-british-labour-a-post-mortem-on-the-uk-election/

“There are no doubt several reasons why British voters handed Labour its defeat and opened the door again, now even wider, to Boris Johnson to leave the European Union. The election shows that a large number of voters still wanted to leave the EU, despite three and a half years of British Parliamentary maneuvering and delay.

Another voter block that weren’t so sure of leaving the EU perhaps probably voted conservative because they just wanted to ‘get the damn thing over with’. Three and half years of debate and parliamentary maneuvers since the original 2016 Brexit vote have left many disgusted with the political efforts of the British elite to block the 2016 democratic vote of the will of the majority in the country.

Another short term factor in the election outcome no doubt is that Johnson cleverly manipulated voter sentiment with promises he would protect–and even expand–social programs, add more government spending, end austerity, save the health service, etc. That’s a cynical tactic directly out of the Trump playbook.

Another factor probably was the slanderous business-media campaign to depict Corbyn and the Labour party as anti-semitic. As in the US with Trump, manipulating the ‘jewish vote’ and painting Corbyn-Labour as discriminating, or even racist, played a role in Boris’ victory. Corbyn and Labour fell for the ploy and spent too much time defending against it, instead of pushing their own proposals more forcefully.

They were caught off guard and didn’t know how to respond, and did so only after losing valuable time. Of course, having the capitalist media and press running interference on the issue on behalf of Boris and the Conservatives didn’t help either.

As in France in support of Macron, British capitalists rallied and united together against Corbyn, terrified that if he and Labour won it would mean the re-nationalization of industries long privatized under British Neoliberalism since the 1980s.

Finally, Labour’s strategy was itself equivocating at times and on a number of fronts insufficiently differentiating from the Conservatives. In many voters minds, especially youth, Labour was viewed as still the junior partner in pro-business Neoliberal policies and not to be fully trusted. The legacies of Blair and Gordon continue to haunt the part (just as Clinton and Obama do in the USA for the Democrats).”

“The Tony Blairs and Bill Clintons are today multi-millionaires serving on corporate boards and as business consultants being nicely rewarded for their past services. But they traded that role and personal gain for the the living standards of their working class members.”
————–
there looks to be a power struggle in china, that might be neo-liberal driven.

either you drive them out like what franklin/paine advocated for and were partially successful, or what stalin and Moa did, otherwise millions are ready to step into the vacated shoes of a clinton/blair type.

under FDR and Truman, a lot of leeches and parasites went to jail.

Epstein Files: Putin says Zelensky is run by Israelis

https://www.wionews.com/world/epstein-files-ukraine-zelensky-putin-overthrow-claims-1769942846783

Putin of course has never said this publicly.

There is a substantial Chabad Lubavitch network inside Russia and it no doubt coordinates at higher levels with other Zionist-Jewish Supremacist entities the world over.

The fact that nobody in a serious position of power inside Russia has ever utterred the words ‘ethnic cleansing’ in relation to occupied Palestine – let alone the word ‘genocide’ – this fact is a red flag and speaks volumes.

There are a few million Jewish Russians – Russian Jews – inside ‘Israel’ and given that a solid ninety percent or more of the ‘Israeli’ population supports the genocide The Jewish State is carrying out that means most of these particular ‘Israelis’ or ‘Russians’ or ‘Jews’ or ‘people of the Jewish tradition but also from Russia and Russian ‘ or whatever the personal identity may be…this means they also support the genocide.

https://blogs.timesofisrael.com/epstein-files-fbi-source-alleged-israel-russia-uae-influence-on-us-officials/

Epstein files: Ex-Israeli PM urged Putin to send ‘one million’ Russians to dilute Palestinian presence

‘Barak says the earlier wave of Russian immigration in the 1990s and early 2000s “changed Israel in a dramatic manner”, adding that “young… girls who can’t talk” also came, with Epstein heard chuckling in the background.

In the Epstein files, it is revealed that many young women – particularly from Russia – who have been reported as unable to speak English were trafficked to rich and powerful people.’

Note that almost all of this happened on Putin’s watch. In fact, Epstein was most active during this time (early 2000’s onward).

https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/epstein-files-ex-israeli-pm-urged-putin-send-one-more-million-russians-israel

https://www.middleeasteye.net/news/epstein-files-fbi-memo-says-israel-compromised-trump-epstein-had-mossad-ties

—

I still can’t believe there has been no serious response to the droning and attempted assassination of the president of the Russian Federation.

Russian derangement syndrome (US) — causes:

1. Hillary Clinton’s 2016 loss to Trump was humiliating. Rather than own it as her failure, she and her crew pinned it on Russia rigging the election for Trump.

2. Hillary’s weepy “with her” women fans — gutted by the defeat — gulped it down. From then on, they despised Putin and Russia for robbing a WOMAN the White House.

3. Democrats dodged a real autopsy on Hillary’s flops and their hated neoliberal schtick. Russia-hating became their official cop-out and party gospel: if you don’t hate Russia, then you must be MAGA and evil.

Diagnosis:

1. Elite loss trauma: 2016 shattered the belief that women power + cultural dominance guaranteed power.

2. Identity threat: Losing to Trump wasn’t just losing an election—it was losing to the wrong kind of people.

3. Moral outsourcing: Blame external evil → avoid confronting:
• Neoliberal hollowing-out
• Cultural alienation
• Voter contempt
• Candidate weakness

Once a group moralizes failure, it stops learning.

Democrats hooked on the Russia boogeyman to dodge responsibilities for their 2016 flop. Blind hate ever since.

Notes: The EU variant of Russian derangement syndrome has a different set of causes and diagnoses.

The majority of the public are both thick and indifferent to the nature of the power structures that govern them.
I think we all have psychological defence mechanisms against acknowledging scary aspects of reality and in general people can’t handle the idea that they are helpless slaves in a brutal, genocidal system run by paedos.
But then I would aay that because I’m dark and pessimistic and maybe even a misanthrope haha.

I don’t think Maxwell should be characterized as Israel’s greatest spy. There are too many assets who were vastly more important to the survival of the state of Israel at various points for that to hold true. (Most important spy for selling books to an early 21st century audience, maybe.) He was definitely an important “friend of Israel” and was involved in areas where it makes some sense that he would have been run as an asset (I would not have wanted that job – very loose cannon), but I suspect that is at least partly a reflection of how Israel runs things, with Mossad as the PM’s very responsive executive action arm.

Less tangentially, having watched this for some time from a range of distances and perspectives, I would say that for the vast majority of those participating it’s not so much an issue of psychopathy (in a clinical sense) as it is having systems evolve making it very easy to be blind to the consequences of actions. It’s not that one has to be willfully blind to consequences, one actually has to go to particular effort to be willfully *aware* of the consequences of any given decision. Any elucidation of likely negative outcomes is immediately met with a range of assertions downplaying not just the decision at hand, but the utility of looking at that dimension of the decision at all – beyond scope, issue not truly linked to the decision taken, not the responsibility of the bodies involved, not possible to address in any case, natural order of the universe, sunspots, etc. etc. Overall, system-wide, the ratio of psychos to soma-drinkers is surprisingly low.

Conscience is much more the issue. However, in the modern dis-intermediated world, conscience isn’t exactly having an easy go of it. The number of folks making decisions who have seen consequences, and particularly the potential, of alternatives first- or even second-hand is really, really low. Even the number who have had exposure to people not part of the monoculture is on the decline. That is, I think, one of the key differences between today and the earlier post-WW II era.

Lots of worthy comments, but Dan Kelly’s link to WION viz Zelensky wins the prize for relevance. Of course the Z-Man Comedian was begging for Epstein access even before his election, he knew exactly who the Globalist Powers That Be were, wanted a place at the table– even a subordinate place as a puppet.

He’s always been a Zio/Israeli Stooge. Back before his first (& 2nd) big Armies funded by the West were fully destroyed (halfway there once Russians took Bakhmut, another gone by now, see MoonofAlabama generally) he boasted Ukraine would be “Big Israel” in the region, ethnically cleansing the area per the ideology of Stepan Bandera, Deutsche and Ukrainians the “Chosen People”, Russians, Poles, Romanians, Hungarians etc. to be exterminated in the name of racial superiority (imagined). It was never going to happen, but he was snorting lots of good coke and jetting around to massive applause as the “modern Churchill” among the Globalist Capitals at the time, hob-nobbing with Sean Penn (very surprised he’s not an Epstein pal) and the likes, world’s highest paid actor. A boy’s gotta dream, right?

Dan’s point about the 3 million Russian Jews inside Israel is relevant as well. There is some divided loyalty there that is like a Cancer in the Russian Body Politic, and it goes beyond Putin to others in the leadership class. If China really is the big dog pushing Russia around (this seems a bit simplistic to me, China the economic power, Russia the military one) they might want to try to mitigate this. As with Kalla Kallas and her ranting about Russian subhuman orcs, I have no doubt that the Israelis see Chinese as sub-humans vying for power they don’t deserve. Just as the Zionist project for over a century has been to exterminate the actual Semites (Ashkenazi Jews from Russia, Poland, Romania etc. are a Turkic Northern people for the most part, nothing to do with Semites or the historical Jews of the Levant, mass-conversion for political reasons in the 14th century. Some are additionally Slavic, clearly, as well.)

Best laugh of the thread, I want to thank Spud for the swill from “Leontias Xenophilos” (that name suggests he imagines he’s an immortal Ancient Sage, perhaps one of Madame Blavatsky’s immortal Ascended Masters?) in “American (sic) Affairs.” Not sure who the Villains in the opening pic are, nor the “revolutionary” (or counter-revolutionary?) mob they are slashing with swords are . . . Incoherent through and through. The funniest coincidence for me is highlighting the “activist” (really just a Woke Media wanna-be) Ash Sarkar as central to Corbyn’s defeat. I know her as one of the idiot “sages” of Novara Media, which started out pretending to be a Communist Prosperity for All cult, devolved into a British psuedo-Left “Let’s invade and crush the Russian bug” Cheerleading session.

The surprise of Trump’s first term (incoherent through and through, maybe lucky, had Mrs. Clinton held the reins of power the War on Russia would’ve started years earlier, and she would’ve gladly nuked the entire planet to “Get Putin”) led to lots of Alt.Right (crypto-fascist) online Pundits, many using pretentious Ancient Wise Man handles like Leontias. They’re still around, Batia Ungar Sargon, a MAGA-Ultra-Zionist who professes her undying defense of the White Working Class (her real name actually) and others, there was a “Sargon the Akkadian” in the early crew.

Speaking of dumb, all the tears L&S sheds over the poor Chinese prisoners in the Gulag might be better directed toward the victims of the American Carceral State, but I guess “la Revolucion” he believes in is about attacking outside “enemies.” USA has had the world’s biggest prison population since at least the 1950s, beat Apartheid South Africa out by miles, still the same, but “Yawn” always easier to hate the furriners, right? A little too MAGA-adjacent for me.

As the prophet said, “Why do you look at the speck of sawdust in your brother’s eye and pay no attention to the plank in your own eye? 4 How can you say to your brother, ‘Let me take the speck out of your eye,’ when all the time there is a plank in your own eye? 5 You hypocrite, first take the plank out of your own eye, and then you will see clearly to remove the speck from your brother’s eye.” Always easier to hate and blame the Other, so that no “Revolution” ever comes.

On a personal note, I am making progress on my journey away from social media. Persuading X-twitter to delete my accounts to delete my accounts proved almost as difficult as persuading myself.

I have always been a news junkie, but my addiction became significantly less satisfying as the information vacuum intensified. It took awhile for me to realize that the rising flood tide of propaganda was creating a vacuum — even at the level of lame metaphor, a “flood” creating a “vacuum” doesn’t make much physical sense I suppose.

In the early days of the internet, when blogs flowered, I was encouraged by the fashion for the analysis of narrative. Remember the Daily Howler? He went after the lazy way political reporters followed simple scripts while doing mind-numbing “analysis” of Presidential campaigns and candidates. The New York Times, stung by valid criticism, got an ombudsman (er, “public editor”) and so did the Washington Post. Digby? Very subtle and insightful analysis of how subliminal suggestion was conveyed to people who gleaned headlines and two-minute teevee opinions. Kos attacked the Democratic consultant class who controlled “messaging”. Atrios ridiculed Tom “six months” Friedman and his lame “flat earth” metaphors. I loved Stirling Newberry, who somehow conveyed the sense that he was wearing spats, while doing sweeping historical context. The Washington Post had a blog on their website called White House Briefing (or something like that) that did meta commentary on press releases from the White House and the lame way the reporters in the actual Briefing Room reported them. Those were the days, my friends, we thought they would never end — or at least would end better than Obama.

I remember a UCLA professor 35? years ago telling me a theory of revolution based on events in Iran when the Shah was overthrown and in Romania when Ceaușescu was overthrown. The theory was one of a suddenly crystallizing consensus — a moment when when enough people “in a crowd” looked right and left and realized in a moment that other people, too, were ready to shed belief in lies enforced by fear. Or something like that. I am probably not saying it well. But, something like that happened in Romania where the regime assembled a huge crowd to hear a speech by the dictator, who had done absurd and often horrifyingly irrational and immoral things for years and years and gotten no effective resistance, and the crowd and guards alike spontaneously revolted. I suppose I believed that narrative or at least in the possibility.

I expect lots of people believed in the power of something like a higher consciousness taking over and governing politics after the Soviet Union collapsed. It was hopelessly naive in a way. I remember a spontaneous college classroom discussion of the implications when the Iran-Contra scandal was revealed near the end of the Reagan Administration. Half the students could not seem to grasp just how stupid Oliver North’s scheme was for defying Congress in order to overcharge Iran for weapons they were not suppose to sell at all in order to finance arms sales to Nicaragua rebels that were also illegal. The greater significance turned out to be that the ability of Congress to constrain the secret state was broken. And, though it is not often recognized with fatuous talk of the “Imperial Presidency”, so was the ability of a President to even know what the secret state was doing, let alone rationalize policy.

I am an idealist with a fair tolerance for abstraction and I often struggle to understand why most people are not, even if only for selfish reasons of desiring personal safety. But, I recognize that the world is messy and strict ideals can be brittle and impractical. Law is not something that humans are all that good at making work well. We want the rules to be simple and absolute and then we do not want the rules to apply to us. We set a reasonable speed limit and most everyone drives just a bit faster.

I bring this up, because, in addition to the information vacuum, I have noticed the emergence of moralistic narrative as a lifestyle choice. In blog days, I thought the meta insights about narrative would lead most people to become less susceptible to propaganda, to WMD, but it didn’t seem to work out. We got Trump Derangement Syndrome and Ukrainian flags posted on Instagram accounts and personal pronoun preferences.

People are ambivalent about everything and that is a substrate to politics. It is not politically healthy for people to passionately act as if those “other” people are evil “fascists” whose only motivation is “racist” and evil and “we” have the franchise on pure goodness. Democracy becomes impossible when it is no longer possible to deliberate and agree to disagree on a lot while still acting coherently. Ian rails against American elites as the fount of all evil and I don’t necessarily disagree entirely, but I think what we’re seeing is the collective Freudian Id being exposed by the inability collectively to assemble common rationality — to model and elevate prudent, rational political leadership. American politics has lost its frontal cortex. Individually, I expect Americans are mostly OK, albeit cynical and demoralized, though a fair number seem enveloped in either passionate intensity or smug ignorance or both. The ability of governing elites and their media lackeys to maintain a narrative line even in the face of overwhelming evidence is kept intact by the information vacuum and corruption of the remaining tiny very thin layer of journalists and handful of independent politicians. I cannot help but see the situation as brittle and fragile, which I suspect is a nearly universal perception.

“heuristic vulnerability to propaganda”

I see the words, but what does the phrase mean? I am clueless.

NR:

good over view on what fascism is, a fascist has sovereignty, the rest do not. so if the germans wanted to remain pure, they could. anyone else not get a choice.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/nationalism-is-rising-not_b_10281138

“Fascism differs from nationalism in two profound ways. First, fascists did not consider self-determination a universal right. Adolf Hitler, Benito Mussolini and Francisco Franco, to mention three obvious fascists, only endorsed nationalism for Germany, Italy and Spain. The rights of other nations to a nation-state of their own was, at best, unclear to the fascists.

In a very real sense, Hitler and Mussolini believed in multinationalism, albeit with other nations submitting to their will. Fascism was an assault on the right of nations to pursue their self-interest, and an elevation of the fascists’ right to pursue it based on an assertion of their nations’ inherent superiority and right to rule. ”
———

the E.U. is fascist. designed and implemented by fascists.

https://braveneweurope.com/robert-tomb-percy-anderson-a-devastating-indictment-of-the-eu

Speaking of dumb, all the tears L&S sheds over the poor Chinese prisoners in the Gulag might be better directed toward the victims of the American Carceral State, but I guess “la Revolucion” he believes in is about attacking outside “enemies.” USA has had the world’s biggest prison population since at least the 1950s, beat Apartheid South Africa out by miles, still the same, but “Yawn” always easier to hate the furriners, right? A little too MAGA-adjacent for me.

Have some respect for the host and the rules of engagement.

https://www.ianwelsh.net/a-message-to-commenters/

Fyi, to those tuned in and who are paying attention, I think most of you grokked my point. The caveat to my entire comment to which this person is responding, in no uncertain terms, is that there will be no revolution so me heraldking revolution at the end is sarcasm. My comment is predicated on “if there was” but the “if” part is impossible.

Anyone who reads my comment earnestly knows the above italicized attack is a complete misrepresentation and mischaracterization. It’s shameful and it only serves to preclude respectful and thoughtful discussion.

L&S– Who is Harold King? And have you ever done anything to oppose the American Carceral State? Why do you go on ad nauseum about China when you (nor I) don’t pay taxes there and are not responsible for their sins (if any)? Sorry if referencing Rabbi Yeshua offended you.

Thanks for the rules-policing. What about when you accused me of profiting from my Pension’s War Profits? For the record, I’m not Gavin Newsom and I don’t control where the California State Teachers Retirement system invests. I did not run to Ian seeking censorship of such an absurd ad hominem, because I am an adult, and most people will see right thru that. Also as an “extreme” Lefty who might actually be in favor of revolution, I welcome the hatred of certain people. You are entitled, I called you out more than once, so hate on me all you wish. I don’t seek to censor that. (The statements questioning your masculinity by another commenter were wrong, & I did not support nor comment on those.)

I was really here to share something relevant to the thread however, which is the following I just learned from Due Dissidence. On the Senate floor, Ted Cruz, responding to calls for bipartisanship from Cory Booker (a sold-out, Corporatist Union-buster, and enthusiast for the genocide of Palestinians) by saying, “Let’s stop attacking pedophiles”, and then did not correct his “mistake.”

Can’t make this stuff up, incredible.

I had remembered ‘satisfice’ to have a different meaning than what Eric Anderson tells us so I looked it up and Eric Anderson is exactly right.

I had thought it had meant to try carrying out two ( or maybe more) conflicting goals at the same time and achieving a poor average between them. I remember someone once telling me a story of when he was a cook and had a bunch of waitresses all demanding him to: ” do it right. do it now. Do it Right. Do it Now. DO it RIGHT. DO it NOW. DO IT RIGHT! DO IT NOW! ” I had thought the word for that was satisfice.

So now I wonder what the word for that would be.

L&S, there was nothing rules-violating or ad-hominem in how Mark Level suggested your argument is “dumb” for consistently exhibiting certain blind spots that just-so-happen to gel well with certain rightist/imperialistic/fascistic persuasions. The well-spoken aplomb with which he does it, I find rather enjoyable to read. A nice palate cleanser to your righteous sound and fury indicating not-much.

Also, your imploring us to have “respect for the host” would fall less flat if you didn’t open your post by accusing him of censoring your previous post, and expecting more of the same for your upcoming post. Less self-importance and more self-awareness would go far here.

Your point about elites all being bad by virtue of being elites would at least point in the direction of something useful if you distinguished between those who improve conditions for the masses, and those that don’t. But then that would run into the intellectual blinders preventing you from seeing such a difference, as pointed out by Mr. Level and others.

StewartM:

your response was correct. that is why national differs from fascism. if you look at free trade, which the fascists embraced, it was all totally on their terms. and its plain to see that from 1993 on wards today.

bill clinton was not popular either, he never got attained a majority vote, and look at what he did to us.