“Through their own words, sang Sinead O’Connor in The Emperor’s new clothes, “they shall be exposed.” 1
It’s sadly the case that the overwhelming majority of Westerners still have not caught on to the truth – once seen, never unseen – that we are ruled by criminals who wage wars for profit; wars they dress up as motivated by high ideals. As with Jimmy Savile, the evidence is hiding in plain sight but, as with the emperor’s clothes, the naked truth is obscured by a narrative – its depth, breadth and sophistication without precedent – that the West in general, and USA in particular, work for the good of humankind.
The crimes of the USA have been systematic, constant, vicious, remorseless, but very few have talked about them. You have to hand it to America. It has exercised a quite clinical manipulation of power worldwide while masquerading as a force for universal good. It’s a brilliant, even witty, highly successful act of hypnosis.
Harold Pinter, Nobel Acceptance Speech 2005
On April 9 a Republican senator gave an interview with MSNBC’s Chuck Todd. Michael McCaul, a virulent China hawk whose net worth was placed in 2011 at just shy of $300 million and will surely have increased since then – after all, even without Obama’s bail-outs for the super-rich, 2 wealth has always excelled at that – represents huge corporate interests the State of Texas and chairs the House Committee on Foreign Affairs.
Here’s an extract:
CHUCK TODD: Make the basic case for why Americans not only should care about what happens in Taiwan but should be willing to spill American blood and treasure to defend Taiwan.
REP. MICHAEL MCCAUL: No one wants that. I think the deterrence is key here. We traveled to Japan, South Korea, we were in Guam, we were meeting with our allies, our partners here, if you will. They don’t have a NATO in the Pacific, but they do have partners. We want to make sure they’re ready and supportive of the United States in Taiwan.
The case for Taiwan, that’s a very good question, about 50% of international trade goes through the international straits, but I think more important is that TSMC [Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company] manufactures 90% of the global supply of advanced semiconductor chips.
If China invades and either owns or breaks up, we’re in a world of hurt globally.
CHUCK TODD: Congressman, that almost sounds like the case that would be made in the 60s, 70s, and 80s, [and 90s, 00s, and 10s] for why America was spending so much money and military resources in the middle east. Oil was so important for the economy. Is this sort of the 21st century version of that?
REP. MICHAEL MCCAUL: You know, I personally think it is about democracy and freedom. And we need to stand up for that, like we’re doing in Ukraine …
Some at least of the commentariat below the line weren’t having it. For the full range, see the exchanges below the YouTube video. Here’s a sample.
As noted in the passage transcribed above, TSMC = Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company Limited. It’s the world’s largest high end chip producer.
* * *
- The Emperor’s new clothes also houses this line: “they laugh cause they’ know they’re untouchable, not because what I said was wrong …”
- For more on the Obama response in the wake of the 2008 crash, see Michael Hudson’s observations as featured in Debt forgiveness: a lesson in our time.
And talking about real estate markets, there’s been a huge 20% increase in the cost of housing in the United States. Again, that’s because of the policies that were put in place by President Obama. His staff — Obama and Treasury Secretary Geithner — really forced the economy into an avoidable depression by bailing out the banks instead of writing down the junk mortgages in 2009 and 2010. Instead of writing down the mortgages to the realistic market value, Obama evicted eight or nine million American families, primarily Black and Hispanic families or low income families. They had to sell their houses.
Meanwhile the Federal Reserve was lowering interest rates, enabling private capital firms like Blackstone to come in and begin buying up all these properties. Along with other capital firms, they became absentee landlords. So the result is that since 2008 home ownership rates have fallen in the United States from 58% or 59% in 2009 to where they are now, which is below 50%.
Less than half of Americans own their own homes, as a result of monopolists buying tens of thousands — millions — of homes as investment. So the American economy is shifting, from a middle class economy, where people own their own homes, to an absentee-owned landlord-run economy, run by the landlords essentially borrowing from the banks in a kind of symbiotic relationship. Economists call this the FIRE sector: Finance, Insurance, and Real Estate.
This piece from someone by the name of Fred Reed – who was recently featured on Larry Johnson’s site – provides more useful insight:
https://fredoneverything.org/war-over-taiwan-a-new-and-gorgeous-advance-in-stupidity/
An approach which increasingly seems to be the norm rather than the exception across the Western/Anglo Saxon*/Zone A parts of the world. From the decision makers of the piratised Post Office/’Royal’? Mail threatening to declare insolvency – effectively ending over 500 years of existence (Royal Mail was originally established in 1516) – if the Union’s do not capitulate entirely to their demands through to the motley collection of infantile useful idiots and handmaidens who constantly turn up to grift for and enforce the narrative of ‘The Man’ every time someone utters the words ‘biological reality.’
The West is being run by and effectively held to ransom by toddlers who have a tantrum every time they don’t get to have their own way and who seek to destroy everything and everyone when they cannot.
As Alistair Crooke recently observed via an article in Strategic Culture:
https://strategic-culture.org/news/2023/04/03/the-crucial-ideological-transformation-of-our-time/
* I don’t pretend to be much of a historian and maybe someone will either put me right or confirm here but in context it seems more accurate to use the term ‘Norman’ rather than ‘Anglo Saxon’?
Actually, we “Europeans” are all mongrels I might have my origins in Ireland but I’m(supposedly)English/British.
Celtic Languages in the Ancient World. Posted on April 7, 2023
Episode 3 Celtic Languages and the Ancient World .
The Celtic World Dr Jennifer Paxton (2018) Film Review
In this lecture, Paxton explains how a study of Celtic languages dispels earlier beliefs that the Celts originated in Central Europe and went on to conquer all of Western Europe, including the British Isles and Ireland.
According to Paxton, the Proto-Indo European language from which Pro-Celtic evolved arose about 6000 BC. Ancient inscriptions from western Spain, France and Ireland suggest the latter emerged as a distinct language around 3000 BC.
She supports the view that Celtic language and culture originated on the west coast of Europe (in Ireland and western Spain and France) among cultures that traded heavily with one another and then spread eastward to central and northern Europe.
Paxton believes there’s no other way to explain the geographical distribution of Q-Celtic and P-Celtic languages. At some point, the Celtic language lost its P for some branches of Celtic speakers (ie the Brythonic speaking Welsh, Cornish and Breton).* She believes the P Celtic languages originated in Gaul, whose Gallic language was P-Celtic language. In contrast, the Q-Celtic languages of Ireland, Scotland and the Isle of Mann, seem to have originated in western Spain.
Aside from the total absence of archeological evidence suggesting European Gauls ever invade the British Isles, Paxton also cites the total absence of similarities between the Celtic language and Central European languages. If anything, Celtic is most similar to the Slavic and Baltic languages.***
*The Breton speakers of Brittany are descended from immigrants from the British Isles who emigrated to western France in the 5th century AD.
**There’s no verb for “have” in either Celtic or Russian. Instead both languages use the preposition “at” to indicate possession (eg “at me a cat” means “I have a cat.”). Recent DNA studies indicate two significant waves of migration to Ireland. The first occurred between 10,000 and 5,200 BC from southern Europe (mainly Spain and Sardinia) and the Middle East. The second occurred around 4,000 BC (and not 500 BC as previously believed) from people who originated in the steppe region of Russia and Ukraine and gradually migrated across Europe to the British Isles. The the Celts living in Ireland, Scotland and Wales aren’t directly descended from the European Keltoi described by the Greeks and Romans but likely shared common ancestors. See https://owlcation.com/stem/Irish-Blood-Genetic-Identity
https://pukeariki.kanopy.com/en/pukeariki/watch/video/5701024/5701032
Who Are the Celts? April 3, 2023
Episode 1 Who Are the Celts? The Celtic World Dr Jennifer Paxton (2018) Film Review
In this lecture, Paxton challenges the common fallacy that modern Celts are descended from a great Gaulic empire (which Julius Caesar defeated in 46 BC_ that extended across Europe and invaded the British Isles and Ireland during the Iron Age. There is no archeological evidence the Celts ever invaded Britain. Paxton finds it more likely that Celtic languages and culture arrived there via robust sea trade and gradual settlement.
At present, roughly seven million Celts live in Ireland and Northern Ireland, with another 13 million living in Scotland, Wales, Cornwall, Brittany (in France) and Gallicia (in Spain).
Prior to the Roman conquest of Britain, the Celts dominated the British Isles. Following the withdrawal of Roman troops in the fifth century, the Celts were pushed west and north by heavy influx of Germanic Angles and Saxons.
There are four main type of evidence for our understanding of Celtic history:
1. Historical sources – Greek and Roman historians (Greece and Rome faced significant Celtic invasions) and 6th century Celtic historians.
2. Linguistic evidence – the languages spoken in Ireland, Scotland and Wales are similar to the language spoken in ancient Gaul.
3. Archeological evidence.
4. DNA evidence.
Film can be viewed free with a library card on Kanopy
https://pukeariki.kanopy.com/en/pukeariki/watch/video/5701024/5701026
Inventing History: The Myth of Anglo Saxon Purity. October 22, 2017 The Anglo Saxon Invasion That Never Happened BBC (2015) Film Review
This BBC documentary uses archeological, genetic and linguistic evidence to demolish the myth of a fifth century Anglo Saxon invasion that supposedly drove Britain’s indigenous tribes west and north to Wales, Scotland and Ireland.
There is no archeological evidence whatsoever of an invasion. In fact, current evidence suggests a lengthy period (beginning in 2,000 BC) of Germanic migration and assimilation with Celtic inhabitants was more likely.
For me, the most interesting evidence comes from linguistic study of Old English. The latter differs significantly from other Germanic languages in that it uses word order, rather than word endings, to distinguish between the subject and object of sentences. Linguists attribute this anomaly to the merger of Celtic and Germanic cultures over many centuries and the influence of Celtic speakers on Old English.
Archeologists now believe that the myth of fifth century Anglo Saxon invasion was created by mixed race kings to lay claim to their (fraudulent) claim of pure Teutonic heritage This was frequently used to justify their privilege over genetically equivalent subjects who were stigmatized as irrational and unstable Celts.
The Celts: Advanced Seafarers or Uncivilized Barbarians? January 8, 2020
The Celts: Search for a Civilization By Alice Roberts Heron Books (2015) Book Review
Were the Celts of northern Europe the uncivilized barbarians the Greeks and Romans made them out to be? Alice Roberts thinks not. Her book examines the origin of the Celts, the prehistoric tribe responsible for populating Ireland, Wales, Scotland, Cornwall and early Britain. The conventional view is that the Celts originated in central Europe and gradually migrated west to occupy ancient Gaul (France), Britain, Scotland, Wales an Ireland; south to Egypt and northern Italy; and west as far as Kiev and Turkey. Roberts sides with the more recent view that Celtic civilization developed along the Atlantic coast of Europe – a well-connected group of Bronze Age societies extending from Portugal – and migrated westward to occupy Gaul, parts of Germany, the Balkans, Turkey and northern Italy..
The Celts gives a full inventory of all available archeological, linguistic and genetic evidence, as well as accounts from historical texts and oral myths. The picture Roberts paints is totally at odds with Roman and Greek efforts to portray Celts as uncivilized barbarians. Thanks to their great sophistication in mining, smelting metals into weapons and jewelry, and advanced seafaring, the Celts established major trading centers throughout continental Europe. The Tartessos referred to in the Old Testament at the time of Solomon were early Celts who sailed great ships laden with silver, gold, ivory, apes and peacocks to trade with Mediterranean settlements.
The Phoenicians, the first Eastern Europeans they made contact with, traded wine and manufactured goods for their silver, gold, copper and tin. The earliest written evidence of the Celtic language comes from the beginning of the Iron Age in Southwest Portugal.
In addition to well-developed religious practices, the Celts had a written language and appointed druids to serve as judges, guardians of knowledge, and priests.
During the Iron Age, they developed a reputation as great warriors and often hired themselves as mercenaries to various kings and emperors. In 387, they sacked Rome for the first time, and in 280 BC they conquered Macedonia and moved south into Greece. Julius Caesar’s primary reason for invading and occupying Gaul was to end the constant Celtic raids on Roman territory.
How the Irish Saved Civilization January 10, 2020
How the Irish Saved Civilization: The Untold Story of Ireland’s Role from the Fall of Rome to the Rise of Medieval Europe. by Thomas Cahill Hodder and Stoughton (1995) Book Review
This book covers the history of Ireland from the fall of the Roman Empire in the 5th century to the sacking of most Irish monasteries by Viking invaders in the 11th. It mostly focuses on the life of St Patrick (aka Patricius), a Romanized Britain kidnapped into slavery by Irish pirates in 401. In Ireland, he was forced to work as a shepherd for six years until he heard God’s voice telling him he was free to leave.
On his return to Britain, he undertook religious studies to become a priest and bishop and returned to Ireland as a missionary – the first in Church history to minister to so-called “barbarians.” He was also the first person in history to speak out against slavery.
In addition to converting Irish Celts to Christianity, St Patrick played a crucial role in establishing a network of Irish monasteries. As Ireland lacked significant population centers prior to the Viking invasions, these monasteries served as hubs of wealth, art and learning.
As barbarian hoards overran most of the former Roman Empire, most European libraries were burned and “copyists” who had copied classical texts (mainly for the wealthy Roman elite) vanished everywhere except in Irish monasteries.
The Irish invented the “codex,” a method of producing books as multiple pages of parchment rather than a single scroll. Like the Jews before them, the Irish enshrined literacy as a central religious act. Irish was also the first vernacular language to be used (written down) for popular literature, at a time when books elsewhere in Europe were all in Greek or Latin.
And now you know everything I know about we Brits. Of course there is no mention of the Vikings who came to Europe & Britannia to rape, pillage and generally bastardised the population.
Thanks for this. And your many previous posts. It has been a great puzzle to me why so few seem to have seen through and into the crimes of the USA. Even many of my friends are gung-ho about arming Ukraine and see Putin as evil, blind to the evils of the US. And this is despite having witnessed for the whole of our lives from the Vietnam War on, how the industrial-military complex of the USA and its false narrative of being for freedom and democracy has been exposed again and again as lies and corrupt manipulation. I do not understand the complexities of the geo-political landscape, I am neither an economist nor an informed observer of international dealings, but I can see clearly that the USA is the most dangerous, ruthless and viciously evil force in our increasingly endangered world. I can only conclude that the brainwashing of this utterly false narrative that the US is a force for good is like Catholic Church in mediaeval times that terrified people into believing their corrupt narrative of everyone being sinners and only the Church and priests can redeem and save us from the eternal fires of hell. I was brought up a strict Irish Catholic. When I began to wake up to the evils of the Church after I’d left home, my father bought a gun and went looking for me to kill me. Thank God, (ha ha!) he didn’t find me as he would have killed me. He thought it was better I was dead than alive and free. The dreadful apocalyptic dangers being unleashed on us all by the USA and its evil systemic obliteration of all that is a threat to their deluded narcissistic arrogance and hegemony mirrors for me this ancient blind idiocy of religion. Perhaps the long fight I had to get free of the evil tentacles of religion in my soul have enabled me to see through the lies and brainwashing of the US so I can see instinctively the reality even if I am not well informed of the details. I simply do not understand it otherwise. Though I am learning a lot from your brilliant blog. Thank you again for writing it.
I blame our species-wide tendency to prioritise narrative – especially narratives that simplify a bewildering world into mannichaean oppositions of good and evil – over facts. We do so love a boo-hiss melodrama!
Being a materialist, I have to assume this prioritising of shared myth over inconvenient counter-evidence has served our species well over tens of millennia. But like a few other evolutionary mechanisms which on the whole serve us well, it can also take us to very dark and dysfunctional places.
The thing about your dad, tucked into your post, merits a dedicated response. Which is Wow – fucking wow!
And I thought I came from a toxic family!
Anyways, he didn’t find you and that’s what counts. You eluded his fanaticism and have lived an eventful, useful, meaningful and I think fulfilling life. You still are living it.
Another good article, especially loved the comment by McCaul:
Is this guy for real? Or does he believe if you tell a lie often enough the stupid outnumber the intelligent by half a million to one(we the plebs being THAT stupid)?
Read another good article today supporting what I know you believe: Secrecy, Science, and the National Security State, April 8, 2023. It’s a book review by Cliff Conner of Alex Wellerstein’s Restricted Data: The History of Nuclear Secrecy in the United States.
An excerpt:
Wellerstein’s history of the origins of the US secrecy establishment is a valuable contribution to the ideological battle against it, but final victory requires —to paraphrase Wellerstein himself, as quoted above – “extending the narrative beyond that point,” to include the struggle for a new form of society geared toward fulfilling human needs.
With your headline(below) in my mail box, how could I not follow the link?
WW3? “A matter of semiconductors – oops – I mean freedom and democracy of course!”
Luckily for the ROTW, THEY at least know (often from first hand experience of the US “freedom & democracy”, that Washington would not recognize either, not by word nor deed.
Thanks again for the blog and good to see Dave jumping in with so many good links and also Anne, so glad we women are taking to engage & voice are understandings and opinions!
Regards 🙂
Susan
Regards to you too Susan. Do you have a link to Cliff Conner’s review? I’ve added one – Amazon, alas – to the book itself.
https://socialistaction.org/2023/04/08/secrecy-science-and-the-national-security-state/
This is all I have and where I got the article from
Hope it is of some help
Susan 🙂
Just read it Susan. Outstanding!
Brilliant comments and observations Anne. I’m so glad your dad didn’t find you. I’m constantly amazed at how so many people fall for western propaganda when, as you say, the evils of the US are so evident.
I too was brainwashed as a child into the Catholic “faith”. I totally rejected religion a long time ago but at least nobody in my family tried to shoot me for it, although most of my siblings (there were 8 of us) are deeply unpleasant people.
Thanks for this! I’m glad you also escaped those religious tentacles that wormed their way into our souls telling us the afterlife is more important than this one, stealing the love and beauty that belongs to the animal body and giving it to an artificially created idea of a disembodied soul. Don’t American children stand in schools each morning with their hands on their hearts swearing allegiance to the flag? Another ‘religious’ brainwashing that steals the natural love of children for each other and gives it to the false narrative of the ‘wonderful’ church, I mean nation. I hope our little pockets of different understandings can survive what is looking like an increasingly dark dystopian future. This blog being one of them – despite being written by one of those Baptist heretics! ❤️
Margaret I’m not sure I should be speaking to you and Anne. You were raised as papists while I had it beaten into me that Baptism was the One True Faith …
Is it as the wonderful Leonard Cohen told us a while back – the crack in us let’s the light through. Dead mothers, murderous fathers, dysfunctional religious families of so many kinds… Maybe we saw through the dominant narratives of culture and society and became outsiders long ago. Let’s hope more and more find their way to taking the red pill!
I always liked the version by Julie Christensen and Perla Batalla to that Cohen song:
https://youtu.be/-vKONRcAJnk
Haha funny that! We were told every day that the Roman Catholic Church was the one true faith, and as a child I actually believed it. Made me feel special.
I’m what some would call a heathen now but actually I’m a humanist.
Fewer and fewer believe these days, although religion still has a grip on most children’s minds through “faith” schools. Maybe a government of the future will put an end to this, although the clergy will fight like hell to retain the iron grip and privileged positions they hold in schools, parliament etc.
That Michael McCaul is like a Thunderbirds puppet (Team America World Police).
I just knowed he reminded me of something from the dim and distant, and you nailed it!
On the subject of The Official Narrative (TON):
Not a big fan of billionaires, yet this short video doing the rounds provides a reasonable enough class in how to handle the corporate media 101.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=o3_6X-XGWlc&t=139s