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       #Post#: 2344--------------------------------------------------
       “The U.S Empire refuses to grow up”
       |🕯️🗽🕊️ Dr. Cornel West |
       UNAPOLOGETIC
   DIR By: AGelbert
       Date: September 8, 2024, 8:23 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       [center]“The
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       />[glow=red,2,300]U.S Empire[/glow] refuses to grow up”[/center]
       [center][b]&#128367;&#65039;&#128509;&#128330;&#65039; Dr.
       Cornel West | UNAPOLOGETIC[/b][/center]
       [center]
  HTML https://youtu.be/KVRNS3VQAuE[/center]
       [img
       width=80]
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       />2.38M subscribers Sep 6, 2024
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       />UNAPOLOGETIC
       “That’s part of an
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       />[glow=red,2,300]empire[/glow] that has grown rich and grown
       powerful but refuses to grow up” - Cornel West.
       In an impassioned and lengthy conversation, Dr Cornel West
       unapologetically shares moments from his life that shaped him
       and his ideas and inspired his decision to run as a US
       presidential candidate.
       He reflects on his upbringing in the West household, the
       influence that his parents had on him, how his grandmother was
       left to bleed to death on the stairs of a whites-only hospital
       at the age of 31 and how his uncle was lynched.
       Dr West also speaks about the influence that Malcolm X and Dr
       Martin Luther King had on him, his years studying and teaching
       at Harvard, Princeton and Yale, and how the civil rights
       movement has evolved throughout his life. He addresses his
       “critical” support for and eventual disillusionment with Barack
       Obama, as well as the reasons behind his current presidential
       run, Israel’s war crimes in Gaza and the “hypocrisy”,
       “mendacity” and “criminality” of the US political system.
       CHAPTERS
       00:00 - Intro and welcome
       01:29 - Growing up in the West household
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       11:04 - On Malcolm X and MLK and the impact they had on Prof
       West
       14:32 - Student life at Ivy League schools in the 70s
       19:50 - Harvard and the civil rights movement
       26:34 - The
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       />[glow=red,2,300]US'[/glow] philosophical
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       />problem
       30:14 - On becoming a globalist and getting arrested
       35:47 - Conflict with &#128013; Lawrence Summers
       46:21 - Overcoming cancer &#128077; and &#128530; Barack Obama
       57:07 - Reviewing Obama, drone wars, Nafta
       01:01:20 - Bernie, Trump and riots in the capital
       01:04:45 - Why Cornel West is running for president
       01:11:55 - What is real joy
       01:19:17 - A year of campaigning
       01:26:14 - Addressing controversies and death threats &#128533;
       01:32:00 - Is your candidacy just making it more likely for
       Trump to win?
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       #Post#: 2367--------------------------------------------------
       US Politics
   DIR By: AGelbert
       Date: September 14, 2024, 7:31 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
  HTML https://soberthinking.createaforum.com/gallery/soberthinking/1-110822002740-17411392.gif<br
       />Thread Source:
  HTML https://ongoingclassstruggle.blogspot.com/2024/09/undebatable-what-harris-and-trump-could.html#comment-6549122218
       AGelbert
       It will be a cold day in Hell before either "Lawyer" Kamala
       Harris or "Finish the Job" Donald Trump even pay lip service to,
       never mind actually abidng by, INTERNATIONAL LAW:
       [center]
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       [move][glow=red,2,300]Carrefour is complicit in Israel’s
       apartheid and genocide against Palestinians! [/glow]Take
       action[/move]
       BDS Movement <info@bdsmovement.net>
       11:49&#8239;AM September 12, 2024
       [center]Boycott[glow=red,2,300]Carrefour[/glow] - Join the
       social media storm happening now[/center]
       ­
       [glow=red,2,300]Carrefour is complicit in Israel’s
       genocide[/glow] against 2.3 million Palestinians in Gaza and in
       its apartheid against Palestinians everywhere.
       Earlier this month, we exposed the French retailer’s lies to its
       shareholders and the general public. During Carrefour’s AGM
       2024, it assured its shareholders that it had not opened stores
       in the occupied Palestinian territory (OPT).
       [glow=red,2,300]Carrefour [/glow]has at least one open branch in
       Modi'in-Maccabim-Re'ut — an Israeli settlement classified by the
       UN and even the EU as partially located on occupied Palestinian
       territory, a war crime under international law.
       The ICJ historic ruling in July, finding Israel guilty of
       apartheid against Palestinians and maintaining an illegal
       occupation and annexation of Palestinian territory, has
       confirmed that ending the complicity of states, corporations and
       institutions with Israel’s regime of illegal occupation and
       apartheid is not just a moral obligation but also a legal one.
       milo > AGelbert
       The supreme irony is that Anthony Blinken insists we are
       fighting for an "international rules-based order".
       AGelbert  > milo
       Well, if you carefully parse exactly what the "Rules" of the
       "Rules based order" Blinken claims to be defending ACTUALLY ARE,
       there is more Orwellian legerdemain to Blinken's posturing than
       irony:
       Eric Weinstein quote (emojies and reference to Orwell by
       Agelbert &#128513;):
       --- Quote ---
       > [glow=red,2,300]The rules-based international order [/glow]is
       an interlocking series of agreements, tacit understandings,
       explicit understandings, and clandestine understandings about
       how the [glow=red,2,300]most &#128520;&#127913; important
       structures"keep the world free of war"[/glow] (SEE: ORWELL)
       [glow=red,2,300]and keep &#128181;&#127820;&#128061;markets
       open.[/glow] There has been a system in place, whether
       understood explicitly or behind the scenes or implicitly, that
       says the purpose of the two American parties is to &#128013;
       prune the field of populist &#128367;&#65039;&#128509;&#128330;
       candidate[/b]s so that whatever two candidates exist in a
       faceoff are both acceptable to that world order.
       --- End Quote ---
       [center]
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       Orwell PREDICTED The [glow=red,2,300]Malice Aforethought
       "Rules-Based" International WAR for Profit "Order"[/glow]
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       milo > AGelbert
       The most important of the rules is that the US reserves the
       exclusive right to break any of the rules. Other nations do not
       enjoy that privilege.
       For example we categorically refuse to ever ne brought before
       the International Court of Justice. We are above that law.
       AGelbert  > milo
       Yep. Mafia is US. Empires always go to Hell in a handbasket when
       they get so corrupt that they violate the social contract for
       the overwhelming majority of the populace. We are there.
       It's genna get[b] [glow=red,2,300]UGLIER and UGLIER [/glow]as
       this monstrosity of a system continues to spasm with more and
       more drastic, [glow=red,2,300]socially destructive
       attemtps[/glow] to maintain its "&#128127; We Da &#129421; Boss"
       Vulture Capitalist Fascist tyranny.[/b]
       [center]
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       [center]
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       [center]
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       [center]
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       [center]
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       #Post#: 2418--------------------------------------------------
       Why Kamala Harris must be defeated
   DIR By: AGelbert
       Date: September 28, 2024, 3:39 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       [center]Why Kamala Harris must be defeated[/center]
       SNIPPETS:
       [glow=red,2,300]
  HTML https://soberthinking.createaforum.com/gallery/soberthinking/1-010723181622.png<br
       />Red line[/glow]
       For their role in underwriting these crimes against humanity,
       Biden and Harris alike deserve to be voted out of office – as a
       bare minimum punishment. Their pathological dishonesty and
       grotesque virtue signaling only add to their reprehensibility.
       Anyone with a shred of morality must see this as a basic,
       irreversible red line.
       Liberals will retort: What about Trump? Wouldn’t he be worse
       than Biden and Harris?
       Frankly, it is a [glow=red,2,300]moral obscenity[/glow] that so
       many of my fellow Americans can proclaim so blithely that there
       is something “worse” than an actively unfolding genocide.
       But let us address the question directly. Today there is only
       one administration that is currently strategizing for
       simultaneous nuclear confrontation with China, Russia and North
       Korea.
       There is only one administration that has made
       the[glow=red,2,300] reckless expansion of NATO the lynchpin of
       its foreign policy agenda.[/glow]
       And as Israel pushes for a full-scale war with Iran and Lebanon,
       the US is likely to become a direct participant: because there
       is one administration that has sent aircraft carrier strike
       groups to the region to protect Israel. [glow=red,2,300]That is
       the Biden-Harris administration.[/glow]
       On these terms, the Democratic Party’s leadership and army of
       willing functionaries must be treated not only as guilty of
       genocide but as a [glow=red,2,300]unique existential threat
       [/glow]to humankind. ... ...
       This does not excuse the [glow=red,2,300]Republican
       Party[/glow], which has been a [glow=red,2,300]joint partner
       with the Democrats in supporting and funding Israel’s genocidal
       rampage against the Palestinians[/glow].
       But the fact remains that the Biden-Harris administration is
       uniquely responsible for the genocide in Gaza. Harris is not
       some powerless bystander in this equation. She is an active and
       willing participant in [glow=red,2,300]it[/glow]. ... ...
       It also means that Democratic Party elites recognize they must
       try to assuage the guilty consciences of some of their voters if
       they are to have a chance of beating Donald Trump.
       Meanwhile, the Biden-Harris administration continues to arm the
       Israeli regime as it razes the Gaza Strip and assaults the West
       Bank; deliberately slaughters children, dawn worshippers and
       journalists; and provokes Iran and Hizballah, accelerating the
       current massive bombardment of Lebanon in the reckless hope of
       precipitating a regional war in western Asia. ... ...
       Voters who are gravitating to the Republican Party are
       undergoing a distinctly different transition: toward a form of
       isolationism or imperial retreat. Each side has its own
       contradictions – especially when it comes to Israel – but the
       two constituencies are not exactly the same.
       Indeed, the Democratic Party base’s opposition to the genocide
       in Gaza is the one glaring exception that clashes against the
       wider war agenda pushed by party elites. This exception is
       currently being drowned out by a much stronger impulse to
       support Harris, no matter the cost in Palestinian lives.
       In the final analysis, [glow=red,2,300]those Americans and
       institutions that most embrace the ideology of empire[/glow],
       regardless of political affiliation, [glow=red,2,300]embody the
       most insidious and vicious form of white supremacy.[/glow]
       That said, Trump too must be held to account for
       [glow=red,2,300]his actions: from his embrace of Israeli Prime
       Minister
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       />Benjamin Netanyahu, to his urging of Israel to “get the
       &#9760;&#65039; job done” quickly in Gaza[/glow], to his
       gloating that he has done more for Israel than any US president
       in history. His groveling toward the
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       />[glow=red,2,300]Zionist forces[/glow] in American society and
       global politics, exemplified by his dependence on the Adelson
       family for campaign funding, deserves unequivocal condemnation.
       ... ...
       The last crucial element of this dynamic is that of America’s
       own history. ... ...
       [glow=blue,2,300]&#128509; True freedom[/glow]
       It is for this reason that the Democratic Party has invested an
       enormous amount of energy to present itself as the torchbearer
       of that same legacy.
       The attempt to portray Harris as the continuation of freedom
       fighters like Fannie Lou Hamer and Diane Nash is not merely a
       distortion of history. It is an ideological attack upon the
       American people at the exact moment when so many of us are
       reaching toward the memory of the Civil Rights movement as a
       resource and guide to help us in this moment of profound crisis.
       Here, Harris’ identity as a woman of color gives an air of
       legitimacy to the Democratic Party, as if it is steering us
       safely to progress, democracy and freedom. ... ...
       Moreover, one must distinguish the Democrats’
  HTML https://soberthinking.createaforum.com/gallery/soberthinking/1-040622153114-13822364.jpegfatuous<br
       />moral posturing today from the &#128367;&#65039; courageous
       moral choices once made by participants in the 1950s-’70s Black
       freedom movement to
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       />struggle and sacrifice for the sake of humanity.
       The Democratic Party is saying, in effect, that the legacy of
       the Civil Rights movement is compatible with
       [glow=maroon,2,300]war and genocide[/glow]
  HTML https://soberthinking.createaforum.com/gallery/soberthinking/1-110422162337.gif:<br
       />a [glow=red,2,300]genocide[/glow] whose architects are
       explicitly defending &#128181;&#127913; Western civilization and
       white
  HTML https://soberthinking.createaforum.com/gallery/soberthinking/1-110422205132-6451602.gif<br
       />supremacy. It does not take a genius to realize that this is a
       preposterous and exceedingly dangerous notion.
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       In taking his stand against the US war in Vietnam,
       &#128330;&#65039; Martin Luther King Jr. declared that war is
       the antithesis of [glow=blue,2,300]democracy[/glow]. He
       recognized that America’s
  HTML https://soberthinking.createaforum.com/gallery/soberthinking/1-040622202719-1406786.gif<br
       />rulers had become fundamentally more interested in managing
       and
       protecting an empire than upholding a [glow=green,2,300]basic
       social
  HTML http://renewablerevolution.createaforum.com/gallery/renewablerevolution/3-250817122408.gif<br
       />contract[/glow] with their own citizens.
       Today, the US government’s unrelenting support for Israel as it
       undertakes a [glow=red,2,300]genocidal crusade[/glow] – against
       the wishes of the majority of Americans – exposes the brutal
       truth of King’s message.
       What it comes down to is this: Are we truly so powerless, so
       meekly acquiescent, that we will allow these atrocities to be
       performed in broad daylight, repeatedly, in our name? ... ...
       In the immediate future, this must mean defeating Kamala Harris
       and the Democratic Party. Whether it means not voting, voting
       third party, or anything else, we must be willing to say – to
       both parties – that we do not accept the terms of their
       “democracy” of [glow=red,2,300]war[/glow].
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       Read more:
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  HTML https://electronicintifada.net/content/why-kamala-harris-must-be-defeated/49016
       #Post#: 2515--------------------------------------------------
       “We have two greater evil candidates; there is no lesser evil
       ...&quot; – Dr. Jill Stein
   DIR By: AGelbert
       Date: October 28, 2024, 7:38 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
  HTML https://soberthinking.createaforum.com/gallery/soberthinking/1-221223124036-2627683.png
       October 28, 2024 By
  HTML https://soberthinking.createaforum.com/gallery/soberthinking/1-120422122431-6691826.gif<br
       />Karan Singh Articles, Features, Videos
       [center]‘You Can’t Create a Revolution within a
       Counter-Revolutionary Party’ – Dr. Jill Stein Speaks to The
       Palestine Chronicle[/center]
       [center]
  HTML https://www.palestinechronicle.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/10/Stein_Jill_PC-678x455.png[/center]
       US Presidential Candidate &#128330;&#65039; Dr. Jill Stein.
       (Photo: Karan Singh, The Palestine Chronicle)
       [move]“We have [glow=red,2,300]two greater evil
       candidates[/glow]; there is no lesser evil .. We are at the
       tipping point. It feels like we’re closer now than ever before.”
       – [glow=green,2,300]Dr. Jill Stein[/glow][/move]
       Every four years, politicians and lobbyists urge citizens of the
       United States to participate in the “most important elections”
       in the history of the country. Whereas 2024 is no different in
       that regard, there is in fact a now-or-never sense of urgency
       looming over the current race to the White House.
       On the other side of the world, far removed from the average
       American’s direct line of sight, Palestine and Lebanon remain in
       a state of bloody unrest at the hands of the Israeli government.
       What’s unique about this ordeal is that social media users and
       independent media outlets based in the region have been
       broadcasting the war crimes taking place there on a day-to-day
       basis, leaving no doubts about the callousness of Prime Minister
       Benjamin Netanyahu’s leadership.
       For that reason, Netanyahu’s assaults on the surrounding
       civilian population are crucial to the upcoming elections since
       the violence in question has always been funded by US taxpayer
       dollars.
       Privy to this pressing threat of war and its broader
       implications, Dr. Jill Stein has once again stepped up as the
       presidential candidate for the Green Party in an attempt to put
       an end to the vicious crusade the Democrats and Republicans are
       set to persist in.
       Her unabated denunciation of the Joe Biden–Kamala Harris
       administration illustrates that not all Jewish people are
       Zionists and not all Zionists are Jewish — accordingly,
       Palestinian liberation is at the center of her campaign for
       People, Planet and Peace.
       On Saturday, October 26, the veteran humanitarian passed through
       Southern California for the Alex Odeh Memorial Banquet.
       Following her speech at the event, Dr Stein spoke to the
       Palestine Chronicle about her unyielding fight for civil
       liberties not just in the United States but across the globe.
       [center]
  HTML https://youtu.be/w_5EyqOQsEc[/center]
       The fact that you’re Jewish and your running mate is Muslim adds
       a great deal of credibility to your advocacy for Palestinian
       liberation. What can you tell us about the Jewish solidarity
       with Gaza that you’ve witnessed on the campaign trail?
       From the very start, you had Jewish Voice For Peace out there
       with the students at the campus protests. At Columbia
       University, there was a huge community Seder for Passover at the
       Gaza solidarity encampment. It’s wonderful to see that the
       opponents of genocide and advocates for Palestinian human rights
       are basically advocates for humanity, and they’ve made it clear
       that this is not a religious conflict. Jews and Muslims and
       Christians and atheists and humanists are all together in this
       shared cause for humanity, so the notion that it’s antisemitic
       to oppose genocide, in my view, is the most antisemitic thing
       one could possibly say.
       The issue has never been a conflict of religions; the issue is a
       matter of Zionism, which is a political ideology basically
       dedicated to moving people off their land and claiming it. From
       the get-go, it’s been about ethnic cleansing and massacres that
       were being conducted against the Palestinian people before the
       State of Israel was even founded. The world has come to a
       consensus about how to solve that problem, including the rulings
       of the International Court of Justice, the United Nations
       Security Council, etc. People are really quite unified in
       understanding what needs to be done — we need compliance with
       international law and human rights, and we need to end not only
       the genocide but also the occupation as well as the apartheid
       nature of the Israeli Zionist state.
       You were born not long after the Nazi Holocaust, so you remember
       a world in which Israel existed for decades before Hamas did.
       How central is Hamas truly to the turmoil in Palestine today?
       Not at all. Hamas is just the latest form of resistance.
       Occupation is not some innocent incidental; it is about abuse
       and displacement. It is a murderous and vicious way of life, so
       occupation will generate pushback, like the institution of
       slavery did. That’s just reality — people may not like that, but
       if you don’t like that, then you have to fix the underlying
       cause of it. The Palestinian Liberation Organization were
       considered the “terrorists” before Hamas, but this is all
       essentially a resistance to occupation and ethnic cleansing.
       Christians, Jews and Muslims lived together peacefully in
       historic Palestine for millennia. The problem did not arise
       until Zionists came from Europe and basically began to displace
       Palestinians. According to the historic archives of the Zionist
       state, the propaganda surrounding Israel was not true. Israeli
       historians led the way in surfacing this material and the fact
       that Zionism was a system of displacement and ethnic cleansing
       by design. That is the problem. Whether it’s Hamas or some other
       group, there will be resistance to occupation and ethnic
       cleansing, so let’s get rid of that resistance by getting rid of
       the fundamental violation of human rights generating that
       self-defense.
       There seems to be a tug of war over progressive values based on
       what Israel represents to different groups. How do you respond
       to people who claim that uncompromising support for Palestinian
       liberation is tantamount to excusing sexual assault and the
       oppression of women?
       Oh, well that’s been debunked a long time ago. There’s
       absolutely no evidence that has held up (proving) that the
       October 7 attacks involved the systematic abuse of women or rape
       — that didn’t hold up any more than beheaded babies or women
       having their breasts cut off or the fetuses sliced open from the
       abdomen of pregnant women. That basically did not hold up,
       whatsoever.
       You know, the abuse of women is totally out of control now,
       where women are being slaughtered along with children by the
       thousands in Gaza. That’s where women are actually really being
       abused and destroyed, so I don’t think this is about trying to
       single out the violence of October 7. Really, (the region) is so
       overwhelmed by this unending violence that has happened since
       October 7 and before October 7. I think trying to narrowly focus
       on October 7 is just misguided, and people who do that have
       their eyes closed to the much larger situation. You should not
       miss the forest for the trees here.
       We can absolutely solve this problem of violence, so let’s get
       focused on that — how we stop the violence and how we prevent
       the recurrent episodes of violence here by basically putting an
       end to the systematic abuse of human rights and the massacres of
       women and children and innocent civilians, and displacement and
       ethnic cleansing as a way of life. That’s what has to happen. We
       need compliance with international law and human rights, and
       when we do that, the other problems will go away.
       [center]
  HTML https://youtu.be/hXYpzhJC7o8[/center]
       You’ve previously said that the United States can end Israel’s
       ongoing onslaughts in the blink of an eye. How do you pull the
       plug on an active operation that so many politicians helped
       enable?
       The fortunate thing is that the American people oppose this in
       huge numbers. That this genocide is being conducted by our
       colonial misleaders against the will and intentions of the
       American people is a violation of basic democratic principles.
       Three sets of American laws are being violated by delivering aid
       to Israel. It is illegal to send aid to any country that is
       violating human rights, interfering with the delivery of
       humanitarian aid and not complying with the nuclear weapons
       treaties — Israel is in violation of the Treaty On The
       Non-Proliferation Of Nuclear Weapons. On all three counts,
       providing military aid to Israel is illegal.
       Ever since October 7 of last year, the government of Israel has
       killed thousands of innocent Palestinians, extended that
       violence to Lebanon and is now on the brink of war with Iran.
       What do you believe Netanyahu is trying to accomplish here?
       He’s trying to stay out of jail. He wants the war to keep going
       so that the corruption case against him will not come into
       action. I think he has personal motives here, which may be the
       most important thing to him, but he has also always kind of
       pursued a greater Israel through expansion. He’s been begging
       for a war with Iran for decades.
       The man does not have an honest bone in his body. His
       assassination of Hassan Nasrallah, the leader of Hezbollah, took
       place after Nasrallah had agreed to a ceasefire. In a similar
       way, they knocked off Ismail Haniyeh, the very moderate
       negotiator for Hamas. Bibi Netanyahu is very much opposed to
       anything that would advance the peace process.
       What does Israel moving farther and farther away from a peace
       process entail for the United States?
       There hasn’t been much discussion or reporting about the draft,
       but it was actually reenacted a couple of years ago. Now, people
       are being automatically registered for it. They won’t be called
       up until the president decides that we’re at war and we need
       bodies. How horrific would that be if we start paying not only
       in money and weapons but also in blood? Biden has expressed
       support for whatever Israel does — the baton for
       commander-in-chief has basically been passed to Bibi Netanyahu,
       who’s been given free rein to do what he wants, so it’s very
       much of concern.
       There’s this notion that Kamala Harris is bad but Donald Trump
       is far worse. Would the Middle East look any different under a
       Republican presidency or do you think it’s already as bad as it
       can get?
       How much worse can it get than the genocide that’s being
       conducted right now? I mean, you could nuke Palestine. Will
       Trump do that? Who knows? To me, it’s just such propaganda to
       say that one is better or worse than the other. The current
       administration is committing genocide right now, and Harris is a
       part of that. Then, you have Donald Trump saying that he’ll
       finish the job, but who knows what that means because he’s also
       trying to sell himself as a peace president right now. You’d be
       a fool to believe either of them. We should not be in the
       business of measuring genocides against each other.
       So yeah, Donald Trump did interfere with the peaceful transition
       of power after the last election, but the Democrats try to throw
       political competition off the ballot. That’s not okay either. We
       don’t have to wait for Donald Trump for fascism to arrive in
       this country when the heads of peaceful protesters are being
       bashed in on college campuses simply because they are expressing
       the will of the people and the rulings of the International
       Court of Justice. Making a case for Donald Trump being better or
       worse is absolutely nonsense. We have two greater evil
       candidates; there is no lesser evil.
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       There are Democrats such as Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar who
       have taken a stance similar to yours on Palestine. Do you feel
       an affinity with them or view their involvement with the Blue
       Party as still being part of the problem?
       I think they’re definitely part of the solution, but they would
       accomplish a lot more if they weren’t encumbered by the
       Democratic Party, which is going to pull the rug out from under
       them. We have to build power at every turn, because where did
       Bernie Sanders go with his campaign? He headed the budget
       committee, but everything he did there was basically dumbed down
       and tossed out. You can’t create a revolution within a
       counter-revolutionary party. There are just too many mechanisms
       within — you are accountable to big money and to a leadership
       that will not provide you appointments, committee membership or
       the money that they distribute. You’re essentially powerless if
       you’re trying to fight for the right thing from inside the
       Democratic Party, which simply isn’t based on those principles.
       We don’t have time to keep shilly-shallying around and watching
       Bernie Sanders get savaged twice. I think it should have been
       enough for anybody to see that was the best they could possibly
       do, and even the best didn’t amount to a hill of beans. If you
       try to run a campaign with integrity as a Democrat or
       Republican, every trace of it disappears once it is over. We
       have a grassroots party that is not controlled by money. The
       Green Party doesn’t accept big money or use any of the loopholes
       for legalized corruption — there are a whole lot of those
       loopholes, but we don’t use them. We are what we say we are and
       we’ll do what we say we’ll do, which the other parties don’t.
       We’re trying to encourage people to break off this abusive
       political relationship that they’re in right now.
       The United States is directly responsible for reducing Gaza to
       rubble over the past year. Do you also consider it the country’s
       responsibility to remedy those damages and help rebuild the
       Strip?
       Absolutely. I mean, who else is going to do it? The parties
       responsible have to do it, which is the State of Israel and the
       US. There are also others who’ve chipped in and sold weapons to
       Israel. France just pledged 100 million euros in support of
       Lebanon, so that’s a start. We need both humanitarian aid as
       well as reconstruction, and they have to happen emergently. It’s
       a tragedy that this magnificent and historic place has been
       purposefully destroyed.
       What do you believe is the actual reason behind the United
       States’ undying support for Israel?
       Ronald Reagan’s Secretary of Defense Caspar Weinberger said it
       very well: Israel is the unsinkable battleship for the US in the
       Middle East. Why does the US need a battleship? To control
       Middle Eastern oil. That is really an application of the United
       States’ basic foreign-policy framework, which has been described
       as “full-spectrum dominance.” We must dominate all resources as
       well as all potential areas of conflict and competition — that
       is our country’s foreign policy in a nutshell.
       It’s absolutely disastrous and it still applies. On that
       account, we are headed toward nuclear war on three fronts right
       now, and we’re not going to get out of here alive if that’s
       allowed to persist.
       Do you support a two-state solution or a one-state solution?
       Right now, we have one apartheid state; I think we need one
       democracy. As for a two-state solution, the logical question
       would be to ask how that would look different from what we have
       now. Palestine now has representation and strong support in the
       United Nations, but can that work when it hasn’t for so many
       decades? Ultimately, it’s hard to believe this is going to get
       solved without one democratic state that brings justice,
       equality and dignity to all its citizens.
       The United States government pumps billions of dollars into the
       Israeli military every year. Based on the plans you’ve charted
       out for your presidency and the data you have about these
       spendings, what issues within the US could that money be used
       for instead?
       We’re spending half of our congressional budget on the endless
       war machine and the Pentagon. If you add up the costs of taking
       care of our wounded soldiers for the Veterans Administration,
       nuclear weapons as part of the Department Of Energy, the FBI,
       customs and border protection, it’s more like 60–65% of the
       budget. It is just like robbing us blind, so we need to cut that
       budget at least in half and put those dollars into healthcare
       for everyone through a Medicare for All system. We bailed out
       the crooks on Wall Street, so we can bail out victims of that
       same economy by putting an end to student and medical debt. We
       need at least 15 million units of quality, environmentally sound
       housing — so-called “social housing.” And of course, we need a
       Green New Deal to combat the climate crisis.
       Right now, power is held by politicians who are unaccountable to
       the people. They are bought and paid for by AIPAC, war
       profiteers and Wall Street, so it behooves the American people
       to stand up for what it is that we want and need. The genocide
       itself is a microcosm of our imperial foreign policy, which has
       left no money to treat the emergencies that Americans are
       dealing with. 50% of Americans right now are struggling to keep
       a roof over their heads and meet their monthly rent or mortgage.
       50% are within one or two paychecks of being evicted, and the
       number of people who are subject to eviction and homelessness
       are absolutely skyrocketing now.
       That’s just one issue. We also need rent control. We need a
       tenant bill of rights. There are many things that can be done,
       some of which need resources while others don’t, but our
       government is instead serving the real estate industry and
       private equity that is buying our homes, taking them off the
       market and driving the prices up. The system that is serving the
       war profiteers right now is also serving Big Pharma and health
       insurance companies.
       One out of every three eligible voters did not vote in the 2020
       presidential race. Who are those voters? They are younger, lower
       income and of color — the people who are the most marginalized
       are not voting because the zombies being rammed down their
       throats do not serve their interests. There’s a lot of voting
       power out there if we can get the word out. As a grassroots
       campaign, we encourage people to volunteer because it’s all
       about phone banking, flyers, door knocking and tabling to just
       get the word out and let people know that we can stop the
       genocide in Gaza and the endless war machine. We can stop the
       squandering of a trillion dollars a year that should be cut in
       half so we have the funds here at home for public higher
       education and to ensure that there’s a $25-an-hour minimum wage.
       The war abroad is also a war at home, against democracy and
       against working people.
       MSNBC, CBS and The New York Times are just some of the major
       outlets that have published alarmist articles about your
       presidential bid. How important a role do you think the
       mainstream media has played in hindering your reach across the
       country?
       I think they’re doing us a favor. Every time they smear us, more
       and more people wake up. To tell you the truth, I don’t read the
       articles because I don’t really care what they think. They’ve
       been saying the same stuff about me for a long time because
       they’re very scared, and I consider it quite an achievement that
       they’re now taking out these really dumb ads against me. If you
       read the social-media commentary about the attacks against us,
       people are pretty furious for the most part … except when it’s a
       dedicated Democrat audience, like MSNBC. These smears really
       push people in the opposite direction. For example, the YouTube
       comments under our interview with The Breakfast Club are just
       off the charts. It’s thousands and thousands of people saying,
       “I wasn’t going to vote, but now I’m going to register Green and
       vote for Jill Stein and Butch Ware.”
       We are at the tipping point. The uprising is going really
       strong, more than I’ve ever seen. Now, it’s just a question of
       when we get to the breakthrough point. It feels like we’re
       closer now than ever before.
       (The Palestine Chronicle)
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       #Post#: 2529--------------------------------------------------
       Norman Finkelstein &#10024; -- &#128226; &quot;I can't vote for
       them. They murdered 15,000 children&quot;
   DIR By: AGelbert
       Date: November 5, 2024, 5:52 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       [center]
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       [center]
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       [center]&#128367;&#65039;&#128509; Norman Finkelstein &#10024;
       -- &#128226; "I can't vote for
  HTML https://soberthinking.createaforum.com/gallery/soberthinking/1-211123142300.jpegthem.<br
       />They [glow=pink,2,300]murdered[/glow] [glow=red,2,300]15,000
       children[/glow]"[/center]
       [center]
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       Let's Just Talk with Hammi 3.9K subscribers  Nov 1, 2024
       #MilitaryStrategy #NormanFinkelstein #MiddleEastCrisis
       In this insightful episode, I sit down with political scientist
       and author Norman Finkelstein to discuss the ongoing genocide in
       Gaza and the implications of the 2024 U.S. presidential
       election. Finkelstein examines the progression of Israel’s
       military strategy toward Gaza, tracing it from past operations
       to the current crisis, and offers his perspective on the U.S.
       candidates and what their potential leadership means for the
       future of American foreign policy in the Middle East and
       elsewhere.
       Join us as Finkelstein shares his unfiltered analysis on one of
       today’s most urgent issues, providing historical context and a
       candid look at what’s ahead.
       Hashtags: #NormanFinkelstein #GazaGenocide #Palestine #Israel
       #USPolitics #2024Election #FreePalestine #HumanRights
       #MiddleEastCrisis #USForeignPolicy #EndTheOccupation
       #IsraelPalestineConflict #GlobalJustice #MilitaryStrategy
       #PeaceInTheMiddleEast #PoliticalAnalysis #BreakingNews
       [center]
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       [center]
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       #Post#: 2530--------------------------------------------------
       Trump 2024 &#129417; Trifecta &#129300;
   DIR By: AGelbert
       Date: November 6, 2024, 12:17 pm
       ---------------------------------------------------------
       [center]
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       [center]Trump
  HTML https://soberthinking.createaforum.com/gallery/soberthinking/1-250422163150-10512004.png<br
       />2024 &#129417; POTUS-SENATE-HOUSE Trifecta
  HTML https://soberthinking.createaforum.com/gallery/soberthinking/1-080822134118-1710799.gif[/center]
       November 6, 2024
  HTML https://soberthinking.createaforum.com/gallery/soberthinking/1-050422133034.gif<br
       />AGelbert NOTE:  Thank God the Genocidal "Democratic" (SEE:
       Orwell) Party was TOTALLY
  HTML https://soberthinking.createaforum.com/gallery/soberthinking/2823-6925-Whip-Right.pngDEFEATED<br
       />
  HTML https://soberthinking.createaforum.com/gallery/soberthinking/1-050422133908.gif.<br
       />The morally bankrupt "woke" &#128520; Warmongers have been
  HTML https://soberthinking.createaforum.com/gallery/soberthinking/1-230622123301.gif<br
       />punished for their despicable full throated
  HTML https://soberthinking.createaforum.com/gallery/soberthinking/1-281223163648.png<br
       />support of the
  HTML https://soberthinking.createaforum.com/gallery/soberthinking/1-120422122619-6812456.gif<br
       />Zionist IDF War Criminals' [glow=red,2,300] GENOCIDE[/glow] of
       [glow=red,2,300]&#9760;&#65039;&#129397; Palestinians in
       Gaza[/glow].
       It remains to be seen if this hopeful graphic from Scott Ritter
       [center]
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       Becomes THIS:
       [center]
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       or THIS:
       [center]
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       [center]
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       God is not mocked.
       [center]
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