Global

Our two previous podcasts---two full hours---with experts Greg Palast, Mimi Kennedy, Dan Sheehan, Sara Nelson, Steve Rosenfeld, Jon Simon, John Brakey & others are at:  

https://greenpowerwellnessshow.podbean.com/e/solartopia-green-power-and-wellness-hour-102618/
 

They Might Be Giants (TMBG) has gained a lot of traction within the last year. With their latest full album “I Like Fun” being in the top 40 charts and an international tour, things are looking better than ever for this band. A discography of 20 full studio albums and an endless dedication to delivering fantastic live shows on a regular basis to their diverse and eclectic fan base, this surge of attention is long overdue for anybody who’s been paying attention.

Personally, listening to every album that has come out as it came out over the past decade and a half, I am not surprised – and quite refreshed – that they gained enough traction to obtain a wider audience. For those not familiar, TMBG has a colorful spectrum of work, from being the creators of the familiar Malcolm In the Middle theme song, kid’s albums, to hyper-politically suggestive and sometimes very dark songs.

Someone recklessly left a copy of a Washington Post lying around in this coffee shop, and I succumbed to morbid curiosity long enough to notice an article that begins:

“Major U.S. defense manufacturers say they will stand by the Trump administration regarding whether American-made weapons systems should be sold to the Saudi government, despite a global political backlash over the killing of a Saudi journalist and an ongoing humanitarian crisis at the hands of a Saudi-led military campaign in Yemen.”

“Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good!”
“Don’t be such a purist!”
“Be strategic!”
“Do what’s possible!”
“You can’t deny reality / human nature / religious text.”

The phrases used to oppose proposals for major change haven’t changed much for centuries, in both meanings of that phrase. No doubt these sayings sound better in certain circumstances than others, depending on the details. But in general, I find that they sound worse since the status quo locked in the climate collapse, and since the risk of nuclear catastrophe reached it’s current record high and rapidly climbing position.

I’ve just read a new book called War, Law, and Humanity by James Crossland that looks at efforts to regulate or end war from the 1850s up through the beginning of the 1900s. One strain of thought was that war needed to be eliminated and replaced with nonviolent arbitration. Another was that war needed to be regulated, doctors and nurses admitted onto battlefields, standards upheld for the treatment of prisoners, particular weapons banned, etc. The peace advocates were mocked as dreamers. The humanizers were the “realists.”

The target of the ultra-right-wing, racist, white nationalist, ani-immigrant, anti-Semitic, pro-NRA, white nationalist and virulent fundamentalist Christian Robert Bowers, was a small congregation of elderly Jews in Pittsburgh whom Bowers must have thought were members of (or just sympathetic with) a 130-year-old humanitarian organization called HIAS that he had railed against on his neo-fascist online social media community.

Just a few hours before the cold-blooded assault rifle massacre, Bowers had tweeted a message to his online mates, saying: “I’m going in.” Just before he began the mass shooting of the unarmed parishioners, he yelled “All Jews must die.”

Of course, just like the many other fundamentalist Christians that are rabid supporters of the amoral, pathological liar Donald Trump and also have anti-Semitic biases, Bowers had quoted one of Christian supremacy’s favorite passages, the infamous John 8:44, as he was trying to justify his particular anti-Semitic action at the Tree of Life Jewish synagogue, Saturday, October 27, 2018.

Treasonous “October Surprises” gave Republicans the presidency in 1968 and 1980. A staged 1933 Reichstag fire gave Hitler his dictatorship. 

This year’s likeliest pretext for a Trump coup could be that “terror caravan” to the south. 

Amidst yet another automatic weapons slaughter (this time aimed at the Jewish people), mail bombs, silenced media, rapist judges, dead and dissected journalists, threats to “lock up” liberals, internet chaos, stripped voter rolls and flipped vote counts, Trump will predictably escalate his goose-step chorus during this time of horror. 

The corporate media will spread the last-minute “Red Shift” Big Lie while a tsunami of Koch/Adelman/Bezos-funded attack ads spew blatant racism and fascist hate.

The deal is to be sealed with an intimidated electorate, stripped voting rights and flipped ballot tallies.

That march through Mexico is the perfect October “crisis” to trigger the coup.

In 1980 Reagan treasonously took power by making sure US hostages stayed in Iran. In 1968 Nixon treasonously sabotaged the peace that did not come to Vietnam. In 1933 Hitler burned the Reichstag. 

BANGKOK, Thailand -- The army's new commander-in-chief in a veiled
threat warned he may unleash a coup if people "create riots" against
the results of next February's promised elections.

The polls are expected to won by the current putsch-installed military
regime's allies but a surprise victory could be achieved by their
civilian enemies.

Army Commander-in-Chief Gen. Apirat Kongsompong's remarks coincided
with the first visit to Thailand by Admiral Phil Davidson, Commander
of the U.S. Indo-Pacific Command (INDOPACOM).

The U.S. commander's October 16-17 meetings included 2014 coup leader
Prime Minister Prayuth Chan-ocha, his powerful Defense Minister Prawit
Wongsuwan, and newly appointed Supreme Commander Gen. Ponpipaat
Benyasri.

"The U.S. remains committed, as a long-time friend and ally, to
working with Thailand in advancing regional security and prosperity,"
Adm. Davidson said.

Asked during a news conference if the highly politicized U.S.-trained
army which was placed under Gen. Apirat's command on October 1 would

The fact that this president has been so obsessed with immigrants and immigration as a key component of his message, from the day he announced his desire to become president of the U.S. in 2015, should not make any one of us surprised that he’s using the caravan, essentially, to further advance his well-established line against immigrants by demonizing them, by dehumanizing them.

… we should not be surprised—if I regret one thing, it’s that there is no strong counter-narrative from the Democratic Party about an event like this caravan or migration altogether. And I believe that that’s a flaw that we need to deal with and find a way of fixing in the U.S.

– Oscar Chacon of Alianza Americas on Democracy NOW, October 23

Does it matter whether Catholic church officials really believe that they have the power to turn dead people into magical demigods? I don’t think so. I think it matters whether large numbers of people believe that, and I think they don’t. I think making someone a saint is, at this point, just a high honor like any other high honor, and that, as long as the practice exists, we’re better off with better people, rather than worse people, being made saints, for better reasons, rather than worse reasons.