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Saturday, November 23, 2024

The Sixth Annual Neoliberal Darwin Awards

“I will ensure America always has the strongest, most lethal fighting force in the world.”

By Gregg Wall (11-23-2024)

There's not much going well for the West these days... especially the Greed first - Neolib - Necro economic paradigm for which the West stands. Many Western capitals are mired in catastrophic debt, debt accumulated bailing out our illustrious Western economies, bankers, billionaires, businesses, funding for-profit wars, and tax breaks for multinationals & the wealthy. The best example of this is the U.S. w/ $40 trillion in national debt.

The American/Western empire is challenged as never before: externally, grossly overextended with somewhere between 700 and 800 military bases around the globe (what the American taxpayer gets out of this no politician dares attempt to explain) … and internally, the empire is dominated by cowardice in the congress, corporate greed, military monopolies, psychopaths that are mired in corruption, & a DOD that cannot be audited.

Western political leadership is as morally bankrupt & rudderless as they are worthless... see the series of heads of state who have been voted out of office (as 45 years of corporatism, globalization, laissez-faire, neoliberalism, and political centrism are revealed to be an unmitigated disaster). There’s a deep malaise that has spread across the West, as America, Germany, and Japan stumble. The tariffs that both Biden and Trump said would return the American economy & jobs home have failed to do so.

In brief, there’s no end to the top tier candidates for this year’s Neoliberal Darwin Award winner. But two candidates really stood out.

First, there’s Israel, which under Bibi Netanyahu’s leadership has revealed itself to be - for all the world to see - a fascist state. The relentless bombing of Gaza and the slaughter of tens of thousands of innocent Palestinians, inside Bibi’s death camp, has burned up decades of goodwill. Arrest warrants have been issued for Bibi and former minister of defense, Yoav Gallant, by the International Criminal Court in the Hague.

UN resolution for ceasefire, and a UN report identifying Israel's war crimes are front page news… the U.S. standing pat by its ally finds itself increasingly isolated. The genocide, now nearly fourteen months in, shows no sign of abating or winding down. This as Israel murders thousands in Lebanon (as it deploys an all too familiar gruesome Gaza strategy). Bibi sticking to the line that it must defend itself, when no nation in the Middle East is presently a threat to Israel, least of all prisoners… unarmed women and children… in a Gaza concentration camp. The Biden administration has made excuse after excuse, told lie after lie, strung along the American public with ceasefire promises, only to see the Palestinian body count climb higher and higher with thousands buried under the rubble. The death camp looks like pictures of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The cruelty necessary to carry out such actions exhibits a truly depraved and psychotic mindset.

Bibi’s lust to retain power and megalomania knows no end… and aside from the colonial land & resource grab, that’s what this entire episode is about: keeping Bibi out of prison and on the throne. Netanyahu’s antisemitism, his willingness to slaughter Israelis and use the Jewish population to propel the nation forward in war crimes, is now legendary. The brightest spot in Israel these days is the Israeli Press, particularly Haaretz, which puts the NY Times and the Washington Post to shame (especially when it comes to calling out America’s and Israel’s sick and wicked leadership).

But the destruction in Israel & Palestine, by the Zionist cause, have only been matched by the destruction AIPAC, Bibi, and Biden have rendered to the United States’ credibility & reputation and in particular, this year’s second Neoliberal Darwin Award winner: The Democratic Party.

Four years of failed leadership went up in flames earlier this month, as Trump and the GOP crushed the Dems in this year's election. The GOP swept the trifecta, and the establishment is pulling out the same old bag of tricks to explain the Dem party’s defeat: blaming Russia, Kam’s nonexistent shift left, Arab and minority voters. And then, to see Dems and Libs gloat online about the GOP coming to power as payback for failure to support Dems on November 5th… is too much. This party, along with the GOP, is truly irredeemable.

Dems and Biden, of course, completely blew it. Starting with Biden’s first hundred days and a failure to push through his BBB mandate. But instead, the president signed into law billions and trillions in corporate welfare and funding for Biden’s defense budgets, Ukraine War, war with Russia, America’s overextended empire, the new Cold War with China, and Bibi’s Gaza genocide. Absolutely sickening as climate catastrophes, homelessness, poverty go unaddressed within the United States. This, at the same time essential Americans are getting stomped by corporate greed, price gouging utilities, a housing crisis, a health care affordability crisis, and what can only be described as a recession for the bottom 60%. A country flooded and in flames, seemingly endlessly.

And Kam and the Dems rolled out the celebrities, did the talk shows, burned through apparently $1.5 billion, practically ran a campaign devoid of content & policy, and then had the audacity to ask for more money, after they were soundly trounced. The Dems deserved to lose. If this is what America can expect from these two parties going forward, then the American people should march on the nation’s capital & disband this government.

And to pour battery acid onto the nation’s wounds, with roughly sixty to seventy days left in his presidency, there’s Biden and his administration – too senile to run for a second term – calling audibles in the White House: arming and running cover for Killer Bibi and granting long-range missiles to Clown Wonder, Zelensky, so he can start up WW3 with the world’s largest nuclear power.

The best Hollywood fiction writers couldn’t have written this script.

Western leadership… no longer capable of defending their actions, economy, empire, or the charade that is political duopoly… have resorted to attacks on the press, campus protest, threaten social media, and congress is passing legislation that amounts to a direct assault upon the right to speak freely & protest. Israel has murdered scores of journalists.

No, things are not going well for the West, at all. One hundred - plus nations are reportedly ready to arrest Bibi Netanyahu and his ex-defense minister, Gallant. America’s disgust with Democratic party leadership, its revulsion over corruption in congress are at all-time highs, so that Dems lost a great many voters, versus 2020.

Citizens are restive, their economic prospects are dim & worse for their children. Voting out one set of crooks means voting in another party of bootlickers, celebs, corporate lackeys, and oligarchs (under duopoly, kleptocracy, and with an avalanche of money flowing into elections). And the fossil fuels climate crisis has been, conveniently, pushed off the front pages by the establishment & corporate media.

Greed, Wall St, and the War lobby seemingly incapable of reform. And presently, one has to wonder if any of us will be around for next year’s Neoliberal Darwin Awards.

Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2024

Saturday, November 9, 2024

WIPEOUT

President-elect Donald Trump, fresh on the heels of his victory in the election, is already working on staffing up his next administration. Some high-profile options for Cabinet posts, such as Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas and Virginia Gov. Glenn Youngkin, have removed themselves from contention for now, but other hires are underway, like the selection of co-campaign chair Susie Wiles to be the first female White House chief of staff.

- Election 2024 live updates: Trump prepares for a second term; Judge halts Jack Smith's election interference case, NBC News

By Gregg Wall (11-9-2024)

Brutal but not entirely unexpected either, given that Biden is the worst President in U.S. history; and the excuses, finger pointing, and recriminations began almost immediately. Apparently, many were surprised by the Dem defeat last Tuesday and to some degree, it’s to be expected given the fraudulent polling that took place (characterizing the race between Harris and Trump as “too close to call”). Just as Dems took the House, Senate, and White House in 2020, this go around the Republicans appear to have won the Triple Crown.

But why was the outcome a surprise? This race wasn’t so much for Trump’s to win, but for the Demo party’s to lose. And lose Dems did, four years of losing. After all, the Dems, Biden, Pelosi, and Schumer failed from every conceivable angle, a complete abdication of responsibility, a dereliction of duty and professionalism, a betrayal of the nation and its people. If these were the adults in the room, Dems should all be tried and sent to prison for parental abuse and neglect. The only question remaining: Why haven’t the two parties disbanded and dissolved a long time ago? If these two parties were running a business, the bond and shareholders would have sacked these management teams decades ago, both Dem and GOP.

Didn’t Dems see the writing on the wall? The necro-neolib-neocon-wartime economy has been a disaster for the American people, with 39% working gig, 50% unable to see a doctor or afford one, 66% unable to meet a $400 emergency, another 70% living check to check. Perhaps the voters were tired of the endless litany of gaslighting and lies issuing forth from economists, elites, pundits, the MSM… telling Americans how great the economy is, how inflation has ‘cooled,’ and it’s all better now, be grateful children, be of good cheer? Maybe it’s the billionaires, who saw their net worth double during the pandemic, the record profits for cartels, monopolies, utilities, and Wall St, while child poverty climbed, eating for far too many Americans became a luxury, and homelessness soared. Whatever could have angered the American voters? Maybe it was the constant fearmongering from Dem party grandees on how bad and evil Trump was and is; and yet, this same cadre of cowards failed to prosecute Trump for the one thing that would have kept Trump out of power for a second term, insurrection? Wars, all kinds of new wars… the genocide in Gaza, the genocide in the Ukraine, Cold & Hot wars with Mother Russia, and a shiny new Cold & Trade war with China… as the national debt and deficits continue to climb, higher & higher, to catastrophic levels (leaving Americans to pick up the tab w/ zero to show for it). Maybe it was abdication of all responsibility for the soaring cost of living, the corporate greed, the price gouging… instead, the day trading congress cashed in on monopoly profits, punted to the Federal Reserve, who in turn jacked up interest rates (only for the FED to capitulate to greed and bring the rates back down, when they lost all appetite for the fight because of soaring debt service loads on the national debt - the extravagant debt the central bank created bailing out the rich, repeatedly)?

What could it have been, what could it have been? I know, it was the middle finger Biden, Nancy, and Schumer gave the American people when they delivered endless corporate welfare, paybacks for bribes, tax cuts, wars, land & resource grants to Oil & Gas companies & corporate interests… while telling the American people: Sorry, no BBB, child tax credit, cannabis legalization, higher minimum wage, student loan forgiveness for you, America. Don’t the Americans get it, this is how the game is played. Lofty words and promises (that will never be kept) for the people, and endless grants of monopoly, welfare, and taxpayer money for the donors, the rich & the powerful. Kamala covering for her senile boss for nearly four years, four years of fraud, mismanagement, plus a year of genocide in America’s name… probably didn’t help Kam’s credibility, did it? Kam's sudden love of fracking and no mention of a planet that is burning and flooding, under the yoke of repugnant fossil fuels? Maybe it was Kam running around on the campaign trail with right-wing, war hawks… adopting Hillary’s winning playbook, circa 2016…. attempting to out-Republican, out-rightwing Team Trump and the GOP?

Maybe it was American women tired of being used as the duopoly’s chew toy on abortion rights, when Dems had not one but two opportunities to codify Roe? Nah, that couldn’t have been it… I know, it was Bill Clinton and Obama talking down to the public on the campaign trail, after they both played singular roles in gutting the middle class, unions, and workers??? Obama chastising black men; Clinton telling Muslims how to vote? As if America owed the repugnant Demo party their vote. Really? That’s the sales pitch, America owes the Democratic party.

Perhaps it was the genocide and the refusal to pullover on genocide, after the majority of Americans demanded it? No?

Gee, when we look at the Dem’s track record, honestly, it’s really no wonder Dems lost. Maybe the only real mystery is why voter turnout was as high as it was, given the collapse and failure of the two-party system (it’s been reported 16 million Americans chose not to vote, versus 2020… which let’s be honest, not voting is voting, a vote for none of the above).

And still a catastrophically failed establishment and party elites play the blame game… Kam’s shift right-wing (forgive me, Kam’s nonexistent shift left), voter misogyny, racism, a lack of gratitude… per The Party & MSM, all account for Kam’s defeat and the Ogre’s rise & resurrection.

Anybody and everybody are to blame, except Dem party leaders, the deep state, the kleptocracy, the monopolies, SV, and Wall St. (more specifically, BlackRock). Then again, America is only kidding itself… the MSM and the party knows full well why they lost but have zero interest in assessing blame to themselves or seeking help and reform. And they never will, after all Dems did their job: they delivered for donors; perpetuated & caretakers for a failed status quo - check; they delivered for Wall St & War. It's another reason America is failing: never accept responsibility for your actions, never do legitimate postmortems, and never apologize.

In some respects, the American people won. Last Tuesday they voted the crooks and criminals out of power, the Democratic party…. But it’s the nature of political duopolies that another party of crooks came in through the revolving door & in that sense, the American people lost. Four more years of abject criminality, corruption, failure, fraud, looting, neglect, wars… under new Trump management… are you ready America? Consider this, it’s time to ditch these parties, and not necessarily find or create new parties; but much better, expand the franchise with greater direct democracy, greater decision making for The People as a whole. The technology is there, we should finally use the promise of the internet for the greater good… to take back that which is our birthright, the United States government and the United States.

Imagine a world without crony democracy, manipulative elites, and political parties… it’s easy if you try.

Copyright JM Hamilton Publishing 2024

Saturday, October 26, 2024

Election Day: November 5, 2024

Vice President Kamala Harris has raised $1 billion in less than three months as a presidential candidate, according to three people with knowledge of her fund-raising haul, a remarkable sum that has remade the race against former President Donald J. Trump.

The historic sum does not include money donated to allied super PACs.

- Kamala Harris Has Raised $1 Billion Since Entering 2024 Presidential Race, NY Times

Later, when asked about the plight of Palestinians in Gaza, she jumped into a loaded critique of her rival.

“For many people who care about this issue, they also care about bringing down the price of groceries,” she said. “They also care about our democracy and not having a president of the United States who admires dictators and is a fascist.”

- Harris Calls Trump a Fascist: 6 Takeaways From Her CNN Town Hall, NY Times

By Gregg Wall (10-26-2024)

As of this writing, we are less than ten days out from the end of this very ugly political contest, by far the worst I have seen in my lifetime. Not necessarily ugly in terms of the sheer nastiness of the candidates toward one another; but nasty in terms of the complete lack of content, ideas, and policies offered by the two candidates. The lack of meaningful debate, the dearth of proposals, the failure of the corporate media to hold the two candidates to account. The endless finger pointing and I’m not my opponent, that passes for this pathetic tribalism, we now call American democracy. The two candidates entirely bought off, entirely corrupt… so inadequate, so poorly vetted - in the case of the Dem nominee - that she didn’t even submit to a primary contest (after dropping out early in 2020, due to a complete lack of support). And in the case of Trump, his candidacy clearly illustrates what a failed economy can do to nearly half the electorate, after financial engineering, greed, price gouging, and the eradication of the middle class take their toll (like Weimar, Germany early 1920s). I’d think we’d be naïve to believe that like the economy itself, America’s tolerance for fascism and pivot hard right wasn’t, at least in part, engineered.

And despite the fever dream, the screaming and the shouting, the ad hominem attacks, the MSM that does its absolute best to drum up the theatre… the two candidates, especially on the border, economy, foreign policy, law & order, the military industrial complex, and the security state panopticon could not possibly be more alike, more identical. It’s like looking at mirror images, so closely shaped by the kleptocracy and multinationals they both serve. The only thing more absurd than the idea that these two candidates will serve anyone, but the failed kleptocracy, monopolies, necroeconomy, and war machine… is the surreal spectacle of the 2024 election itself, the endless farce, the endless campaign specifically designed to suck the oxygen out of any idea or reality that America could have a fully functioning democracy and government.

This, as the planet floods, the yearlong taxpayer funded genocide continues, the national debt soars, child poverty rises, and America burns. There’s no reason for any of it, really.

And yet, it’s the nature of the failed binary dynamic and very much explains why the two parties do absolutely everything in their power to eliminate and foreclose upon third party challengers; because the oligarchy, ultimately, consists of totalitarians and their preference is to buyoff only one party. In America that one party is the duopoly or what many have come to call, the Uniparty. And we see it in Canada and throughout Europe as well… two major parties that serve, exclusively, the establishment. Sometimes with third party challengers that enjoy varying degrees of success, but always the preference for two parties that almost without fail drift further and further right-wing.

Dems are quick to vilify Trump on abortion, because that’s a culture war issue and fair game.

Israel and endless war… are something near and dear to their donors’ hearts. And therefore, Kam is suddenly united with Trump, the taxpayer funded genocide must continue.

When Kam avoids answering questions or makes excuses for the need to genocide, she’s really pandering to her donors. You see this on economic and foreign policy issues where the two parties are in lock step.

What Kam and Trump fail to realize, and this goes for Trudeau… is increasingly voters won’t play the binary, tribal game. (Indeed, a sizable share of the electorate’s refusal to accept Kam and genocide may very well cost Dems the White House.)

An increasing number of voters have come to expect that leadership will meet their expectations, their reasonable demands, not the binary options framed and presented by the predatory elite, who have lost all credibility.

Our current predicament is very bad: a bought off, corrupt government; a totalitarian economy – dominated by cartels, monopolies, and utilities (pretending to be a free market); an increasingly totalitarian government, complete with police state, wholly unresponsive to the public, the world’s largest prison system, and slave labor; $40 trillion debt; endemic poverty and homelessness; a crisis of affordability, housing, and healthcare; and a deregulatory state that has turned America into a Superfund site, a poisoned, toxic landfill. And overriding all, this degeneracy and complete moral collapse, with zero accountability for the ruling class.

We are so mired in corruption, mismanagement, and poor leadership… we’ve forgotten what a gift the country once was and remains (no matter how fraught America’s history with colonialism, genocide, indentured servitude, and slavery, which we must never forget & make every effort to better educate our children on).

We’ve forgotten that our Constitution is but a steppingstone to a better world, and that the founding fathers produced a constitution and government that was supposed to evolve and change… not stagnate and perpetuate a failed status quo. We forget that America… if it is to survive, freedom and democracy if they are to survive… must adapt, evolve, and grow. The possibilities are endless, as are tech’s ability to be harnessed to make direct democracy and decision making by the public, to govern our own affairs, very real.

Even if in order to achieve that end… greater direct democracy, a complete overhaul of the economy and government… requires another revolution.

So, in 2024, so much of the chaos, division, and strife Americans and America finds itself in is by design, engineered, man-made and via violent machinations to keep the public’s head spinning, beaten down, confused, and struggling to survive. And shame on us, many – myself included, for many years – were under the delusion and spell that our government and two major parties served the people. When we all now know, nothing could be further from the truth… it’s ultimately Biden’s greatest achievement and legacy, that America’s government, kleptocracy, multinationals, and the two major parties are revealed as entirely evil. Americans must rally, must focus on taking back our government, and ensuring both the economy and government serves The People, and not only the one percent and the political class.

A better world is available. Where we truly restore our faith in and execute and deliver upon the beliefs in direct democracy and that all humanity is created equal; but this can only be achieved, if we are willing to fight for it. At the present, Kam and Trump, their billionaire/multinational donors, the elitist corporate media (failures all of them) are betting and working towards ensuring that America and the world have lost all will to fight or will return to despondency and dependence upon hopiates and very low expectations. That we resign ourselves to the fate appointed us by the malefactors of war, wealth, and great economic and political violence.

The fate of the slaughterhouse. I can assure you, dear reader, they really think so little of us.