Saturday, September 04, 2010

Why You are Free and the Right Wing is Not!

by Len Hart, The Existentialist Cowboy

The essence of Sartre is found in a slim volume of just under 100 pages: Existentialism and Human Emotions. In a single sentence, Sartre turned several centuries of conventional thinking on its head: "Existence precedes essence". Sartre himself, however, credits Rene Descartes whose cogito ergo sum or, en francais, Je pense donc je suis; in English: "I think, therefore I am".

Sartre writes:
"For we mean that man first exists, that is, that man first of all is the being who hurls himself toward a future and who is conscious of imagining himself as being in the future.

Man is at the start a plan which is aware of itself, rather than a patch of moss, a piece of garbage, or a cauliflower; nothing exists prior to this plan; there is nothing in heaven; man will be what he will have planned to be. Not what he will want to be. Because by the word "will" we generally mean a conscious decision, which is subsequent to what we have already made of ourselves.

I may want to belong to a political party, write a book, get married; but all that is only a manifestation of an earlier, more spontaneous choice that is called "will." But if existence really does precede essence, man is responsible for what he is. Thus, existentialism's first move is to make every man aware of what he is and to make the full responsibility of his existence rest on him. And when we say that a man is responsible for himself, we do not only mean that he is responsible for his own individuality, but that he is responsible for all men."

--Jean-Paul Sartre, Existentialism and Human Emotions
"Existence precedes essence", therefore, strikes at the very heart of dogma, prejudice, pre-conceived notions of any sort, ideologies into which humankind is inclined to shoe-horn reality. Existentialism begins with a clean slate. The 'moving finger' may or may not write but most certainly does not dictate what we may or may not make of ourselves.

In existentialism, therefore, there is no place to run, no place hide. It is the price we pay for being free. For that reason, existentialism is liberating. Man is no longer limited by theological notions of his origin with God's breath in the Garden or at the tip of God's finger, as depicted by Michelangelo's Sistine Ceiling. That 'man', alone, is responsible for what he is or becomes is the source of 'existential angst'. And also our freedom.

Existentialism is the enemy of dogma --religious, psuedo-scientific, political ideology. For that reason alone, existentialism is often, though fallaciously, identified with the political left-wing. The 'right wing' undermines itself from within, by what Sartre would call 'mauvaise foi', i.e., bad faith.

'Bad faith' was best illustrated by Bertolt Brecht who summed it up: "A man who does not know the truth is just an idiot; but a man who knows the truth and calls it a lie is a crook!" The photographer Richard Avedon was even more succinct: "You cannot expect another man to carry your shit!"

Thus 'bad faith' defines the 'crook' and, thus, the many American politicians who blame a universe of strawmen for their own failures --minorities, liberals, the world-wide communist conspiracy, Islamic 'terrorists' and left-wing subversives throughout the U.S. labor, anti-war and civil rights movements.

Existentialism is the philosophy that says --grow up! Stop making excuses! Stop blaming others! Existentialism is the tough-minded philosophy of no lies, no excuses, no bullshit!


Jean-Paul Sartre: "I am my liberty!"


Cogito ergo sum
Note: The Existentialist Cowboy is currently bombarded by spam from a lunatic name caller of the right wing ilk! Therefore, comments are moderated. Intelligent comments are, as always, welcome! Ad hominem attacks, spam and psychotic drivel is not! Eventually, the offending party will be committed to an asylum and we adults can once again engage in intelligent, articulate dialogue. Thanks for understanding.

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Wednesday, September 01, 2010

'Conspiracies of Rich Men' to Rob You, Enslave You, and Wage Aggressive Wars at Your Expense!

by Len Hart, The Existentialist Cowboy

It is still fashionable in the American media to deride 'conspiracies' with a blanket if illogical and uninformed smear. Conspiracies are, in fact, how things get done in either crime or commerce. Lately, there is little difference. When just one percent of the U.S. population owns more than the rest of us combined, we are expected to believe that this is the result of merit and 'free enterprise'. But if we should cite the evidence that argues persuasively that this outcome is the result of a conspiracy of right wing politicians and the venal elites who bankroll them we are reviled and/or ridiculed. In fact, 'free enterprise' does not exist in an oligopoly and 'oligopoly' is a polite word for what has happened to and in America. We should expect a pack of lies from those caught with a hand in the cookie jar! We should expect cover stories and propaganda from those caught in the act of looting the United States. We should expect 'excuses' and rationalization from the cadre which cooked up the cover story --'supply side economics'.

Conspiracies are how things get done. If legal, they are called 'corporations'. If not, they are criminal conspiracies and there is a huge body of case law that proves how utterly stupid is the meme: "conspiracies don't exist!" Tell it to the judge!

Very little is accomplished by one person working alone, be it the mythical 'lone gun man' in Dealy Plaza' or Dick Cheney wishing to gain control of the oil fields of Iraq. The Dick, as you may recall, required a conspiracy, his 'Energy Task Force' which met to divvy up the spoils of aggressive war before it would occur, before they would have the convenient pretext to justify it: 911!

Like Hitler with Thyssen, Krupp, I.G. Farben et al, the Dick met with his co-conspirators, his 'Energy Task Force', just prior to 911. They met to carve up the oil fields of Iraq amongst them just as Hitler had coveted the coal in Poland.

We are expected to believe the official cover story that the subsequent 911 attacks were merely coincidental when, in fact, they provided the essential pretext to attack and invade Iraq. We are expected to fall into line and goosestep. We are expected to just shut up and allow the corporate media to brainwash us. We are expected to believe coincidence theories upon faith and faith alone; to ask for evidence or proof is 'unpatriotic'. Not all of us fell for this crock! It was only the gullible, the stupid, the right wing!

Conspiracies need not be illegal though most of them probably are; else --why keep them secret? Why the campaign to convince you that they do not exist? If a conspiracy is legal, it's called a corporation. For awhile, Enron found that 'corporate person-hood' was the perfect cover. Like the Twin Towers later, Enron crashed and burned as a result of its own conspiratorial schemes to include putting the screws to California.

Conspiracy theorists on the high court have provided rich theorists and criminals yet another layer of cover: corporate person-hood! The robed conspiracy theorists have have said that corporations are people! But if should you call those five idiots who, in fact, conspired to subvert the U.S. Constitution, by the term 'conspirators', you will be denounced as a nut job! That the insane will call us 'nuts' is proof that we live in absurd, Kafkaesque times.

A recent decision of the Supreme Court has said that 'corporations' are people! Now any rag tag collection of crooks, ne'erdowells and/or robber barons can send money to the Secretary State in Delaware and receive in return a nice binder with impressive documents along with a genuine Delaware corporate seal! Thereafter, you --too --will be a real person, a 'corporation'! The Delaware Secretary of State has made it so! Now, I ask you, who is nuts? At one time, this cost about $5o to $100 and there were/are numerous 'registered agents' who handle all the paper work for you. All you have to do is send them real money, as real as money can be these days.

The biggest conspiracy theorists since WWII have been the demagogues of the right wing who raised the specter of a World Wide Communist Conspiracy. We were told that there were evil conspiracies of drug dealers and drug cartels which they used to justify crack downs on civil liberties and justify domestic surveillance. We were told about evil schemes to poison our drinking water for the greater glory of communism --a world wide conspiracy. Or so we were told. Later, the same folk would tell us that conspiracies do not exist. No one should believe them.

The government often cites the specter of 'organized crime' in order to rally voters to a 'right wing' cause like 'law and order', a big issue in the 1960s. What is organized crime if not a conspiracy? In order to believe in the specter of 'organized crime', we must believe that 'conspiracies exist'. Either they exist or they do not! Either organized crime is real or it is not! Which is it? I despair that the idiots who run our government will ever make up their mind.

Organized crime was a favorite 'boogie man' back in the 30s, 40s and 50s. After all, Al Capone was selling booze and screwing whores. But what are 'crime syndicates' if not conspiracies? Again --the government will have it both ways if it can get away with it. Having spent several decades scaring the pants off the population by raising the specter of a 'conspiracy' --organized crime --the government now expects us to believe that conspiracies do not exist. When is the government telling the truth? When is it lying? It is reasonable to question everything said by the government about anything at any time! It is clear that the government will tell you anything that is expedient!

The government itself is, as St Thomas More said of the court of King Henry VIII, a 'conspiracy of rich men". These 'rich men', this mere one percent of the total population, will exploit whatever 'threat' is convenient to keep the people uninformed, enslaved and/or pacified. The perceived 'threats' are many and, over the years, the 'threats' have included hippies, black people, rock n' roll, crime syndicates, etc. But, most recently, the 'conspiracy of rich men' we call the government has hit the bonanza: terrorism.

In order to fully exploit this new buggaboo, the government demonized the religion of Islam. It raised the specter of racism, in this case, the 'brown skin' of many who live in the Middle East. These liars and criminals had to resort to every trick in the book. But, to be honest, they were not very good at it and only the very, very stupid fell for it.

The right wing establishment are themselves conspiracy theorists when it is useful but not otherwise. 911 is a case in point. The official theory of 19 Arab Hijackers is a conspiracy theory favored by the Bush administration though there is absolutely no admissible evidence to support it. It is 'Orwellian' that anyone proposing any 'other' conspiracy theory is labeled a 'conspiracy theorist' and reviled or called other names.

The government will turn a blind-eye to the fact that it is, itself, a conspiracy and not always a legal one. It was Ronald Reagan who sold arms to Iran illegally and committed treason in the process. He did not do this on his own. Reagan conspired with the CIA, Bush Sr et al to sell arms to Iran --called at the time an 'avowed enemy of the United States! The CIA used the proceeds of those sales to bankroll --illegally --the Nicaraguan Contras. The CIA, itself, must be considered to be nothing more nor less than an institutionalized conspiracy. There is a word for a conspiracy of this type: traitors guilty of high treason:
The Iran/contra investigation will not end the kind of abuse of power that it addressed any more than the Watergate investigation did. The criminality in both affairs did not arise primarily out of ordinary venality or greed, although some of those charged were driven by both. Instead, the crimes committed in Iran/contra were motivated by the desire of persons in high office to pursue controversial policies and goals even when the pursuit of those policies and goals was inhibited or restricted by executive orders, statutes or the constitutional system of checks and balances.

The tone in Iran/contra was set by President Reagan. He directed that the contras be supported, despite a ban on contra aid imposed on him by Congress. And he was willing to trade arms to Iran for the release of Americans held hostage in the Middle East, even if doing so was contrary to the nation's stated policy and possibly in violation of the law.

The lesson of Iran/contra is that if our system of government is to function properly, the branches of government must deal with one another honestly and cooperatively. When disputes arise between the Executive and Legislative branches, as they surely will, the laws that emerge from such disputes must be obeyed. When a President, even with good motive and intent, chooses to skirt the laws or to circumvent them, it is incumbent upon his subordinates to resist, not join in. Their oath and fealty are to the Constitution and the rule of law, not to the man temporarily occupying the Oval Office. Congress has the duty and the power under our system of checks and balances to ensure that the President and his Cabinet officers are faithful to their oaths.

--Lawrence Walsh, Special Prosecutor, Concluding Observations, FINAL REPORT OF THE INDEPENDENT COUNSEL FOR IRAN/CONTRA MATTERS
No one ever called the Senior Bush a 'conspiracy theorist' though he was, in fact, a conspirator! But worse, he was a 'traitor' and so was Ronald Reagan.
"I can perceive nothing but a certain conspiracy of rich men procuring their own commodities under the name and title of the commonwealth."

- Sir Thomas More (1478 - 1535), Utopia, Of the Religions in Utopia
Let's put the myths to rest forever. Conspiracies exist! OK? Last time I checked the Cornell University Law Library and FINDLAW, I found hundreds if not thousands of court decisions, having to do with conspiracies large and small, of one sort or another. If conspiracies do not exist, I would urge that someone, anyone please send a memo to that effect to the Supreme Court. Tell them to stop handing down decisions having to do with 'conspiracies'. Inform them that conspiracies do not exist! Do that! Then get back with me!

In his 'The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich', William Shirer described a 'conspiracy of rich men'! A record of this conspiracy of Hitler survives. It includes corporate/business supporters, his financiers, his minions. Like Dick Cheney's 'Energy Task Force' with respect to Iraq, Hitler's gang was a conspiracy to invade the nations of Europe, steal their resources and divide up the booty.
Goebbels was jubilant. "Now it will be easy," he wrote in his diary on February 3, "to carry on the fight, for we can call on all the resources of the State. Radio and press are at our disposal. We shall stage a masterpiece of propaganda. And this time, naturally, there is no lack of money."(2)

The big businessmen, pleased with the new government that was going to put the organized workers in their place and leave management to run its business as it wished, were asked to cough up. This they agreed to do at a meeting on February 20 at Goering's Reichstag President's Palace, at which Dr. Schacht acted as host and Goering and Hitler laid down the line to a couple of dozen of Germany's leading magnates, including Krupp von Bohlen, who had become an enthusiastic Nazi overnight, Bosch and Schnitzler of I. G. Farben, and Voegler, head of the United Steel Works. The record of this secret meeting has been preserved.

Hitler began a long speech with a sop to the industrialists. "Private enterprise," he said, "cannot be maintained in the age of democracy; it is conceivable only if the people have a sound idea of authority and personality . . . All the worldly goods we possess we owe to the struggle of the chosen . . . We must not forget that all the benefits of culture must be introduced more or less with an iron fist." He promised the businessmen that he would "eliminate" the Marxists and restore the Wehrmacht (the latter was of special interest to such industries as Krupp, United Steel and I. G. Farben, which stood to gain the most from rearmament). "Now we stand before the last election," Hitler concluded, and he promised his listeners that "regardless of the outcome, there will be no retreat." If he did not win, he would stay in power "by other means . . . with other weapons." Goering, talking more to the immediate point, stressed the necessity of "financial sacrifices" which "surely would be much easier for industry to bear if it realized that the election of March fifth will surely be the last one for the next ten years, probably even for the next hundred years."

All this was made clear enough to the assembled industrialists and they responded with enthusiasm to the promise of the end of the infernal elections, of democracy and disarmament. Krupp, the munitions king, who, according to Thyssen, had urged Hindenburg on January 29 not to appoint Hitler, jumped up and expressed to the Chancellor the "gratitude" of the businessmen "for having given us such a clear picture." Dr. Schacht then passed the hat. "I collected three million marks," he recalled at Nuremberg.(3)

----William Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, The Nazification of Germany: 1933–34
We are fortunate that no one 'informed' Shirer that conspiracies did not exist before he bothered unearthing the mountain of Nazi documents that proved --beyond any reasonable doubt --the Nazi conspiracy, specifically, the meeting that proved and described in considerable detail the Nazi conspiracy to wage war and genocide for the benefit of global corporations that participated. Some of those corporations were American. There is no evidence that these corporations ever stopped being 'Nazis'. It is interesting to note that one of Hitler's early and generous sponsors was Henry Ford, the American car maker. A portrait of Ford hung in Hitler's fancy New Reich Chancellery. A traitor, perhaps he should have been hanged in the Chancellery!

This meeting of 'industrialists' took place just as surely as did meeting of Dick Cheney's 'Energy Task Force' in which the oil fields of the the Middle East, Iraq in particular, were 'divvied' up among the conspirators. The results were published in a 'National Energy Policy' report in May 2001 [PDF], several months before 911 would give them the pretext to make the report come true.

Another example is Heinrich Heydrich's infamous conspiracy --his meeting at Wannsee, attended by Nazi bureaucrats, and corporate kiss ups. Over a civilized lunch, this 'conspiracy of rich men' planned the extermination of the Jews of Europe.
... within a few months after the meeting, the first gas chambers were installed in some of the extermination camps in Poland. These six camps, Belzec, Birkenau, Chelmno, Majdanek, Sobibor, and Treblinka were in operation in Poland.

Responsibility for the entire project was placed in the hands of Heinrich Himmler, Reichsführer-SS, and head of the Gestapo and the Waffen-SS.

The Wannsee Conference did not mark the beginning of the "Final Solution." The mobile killing squads were already slaughtering Jews in the occupied Soviet Union. Rather, the Wannsee Conference was the place where the "final solution" was formally revealed to non-Nazi leaders who would help arrange for Jews to be transported from all over German-occupied Europe to SS-operated "extermination" camps in Poland. Not one of the men present at Wannsee objected to the announced policy. Never before had a modern state committed itself to the murder of an entire people.

--The Wannsee Conference, Holocaust Education & Archive Research Team
Very little is accomplished by one person working alone unless you happen to be Michelangelo. Conspiracies exist! Our own Supreme Court has said so. This is ironic as the high court itself has deteriorated, devolved; they are, themselves, of late, a conspiracy of right wing ideological extremists in service to just one percent of the population, the ruling one percent which, in fact, owns more than the rest of us combined. SCOTUS is owned!

Another tool of the ruling elite is the CIA, an acronym forever linked by time and space to the name George Bush Sr. Like Dan Quayle, Bush Sr was expert at saying nothing while moving his lips. The opposite of ventriloquism. In his presence, one was in danger of death by boredom! Nevertheless, he was a Bonesman, the son of a traitor, a CIA 'operative'. Having known Bush SR, I would testify that that is, indeed, the Senior Bush photographed hanging around the TSBD just prior to the assassination of JFK. Bush Sr was and probably still is a very dangerous man! As Caesar said of Cassius, Bush Sr had 'a lean and hungry look'! Cassius, as you may recall, participated in the murder of Caesar.
A body of leads has been assembled which suggests that George Bush may have been associated with the CIA at some time before the autumn of 1963. According to Joseph McBride of The Nation, “a source with close connections to the intelligence community confirms that Bush started working for the agency in 1960 or 1961, using his oil business as a cover for clandestine activities.” 1

By the time of the Kennedy assassination, we have an official FBI document which refers to “Mr. George Bush of the Central Intelligence Agency,” and despite official disclaimers there is every reason to think that this is indeed the man in the White House today. The mystery of George Bush as a possible covert operator hinges on four points, each one of which represents one of the great political and espionage scandals of postwar American history. These four cardinal points are:
  • The abortive Bay of Pigs invasion of Cuba, launched on April 16-17, 1961, prepared with the assistance of the CIA’s “Miami Station” (also known under the code name JM/WAVE). After the failure of the amphibious landings of Brigade 2506, Miami station, under the leadership of Theodore Shackley, became the focus for Operation Mongoose, a series of covert operations directed against Castro, Cuba, and possibly other targets.

  • The assassination of President John F. Kennedy in Dallas on November 22, 1963, and the cover-up of those responsible for this crime.

  • The Watergate scandal, beginning with an April, 1971 visit to Miami, Florida by E. Howard Hunt on the tenth anniversary of the Bay of Pigs invasion to recruit operatives for the White House Special Investigations Unit (the “Plumbers” and later Watergate burglars) from among Cuban-American Bay of Pigs veterans.

  • The Iran-contra affair, which became a public scandal during October-November 1986, several of whose central figures, such as Felix Rodriguez, were also veterans of the Bay of Pigs.
George Bush’s role in both Watergate and the October surprise/Iran-contra complex will be treated in detail at later points in this book. Right now it is important to see that thirty years of covert operations, in many respects, form a single continuous whole. This is especially true in regard to the dramatis personae. Georgie Anne Geyer points to the obvious in a recent book: “…an entire new Cuban cadre now emerged from the Bay of Pigs.

The names Howard Hunt, Bernard Barker, Rolando Martinez, Felix Rodriguez and Eugenio Martinez would, in the next quarter century, pop up, often decisively, over and over again in the most dangerous American foreign policy crises. There were Cubans flying missions for the CIA in the Congo and even for the Portuguese in Africa; Cubans were the burglars of Watergate; Cubans played key roles in Nicaragua, in Irangate, in the American move into the Persian Gulf.” 2 Felix Rodriguez tells us that he was infiltrated into Cuba with the other members of the “Grey Team” in conjunction with the Bay of Pigs landings; this is the same man we will find directing the contra supply effort in central American during the 1980’s, working under the direct supervision of Don Gregg and George Bush. 3 Theodore Shackley, the JM/WAVE station chief, will later show up in Bush’s 1979-80 presidential campaign.

--Webster Tarpley, , George Bush: The Unauthorized Biography, Chapter 8b – The Bay of Pigs and The Kennedy Assassination
The assassination of JFK is clearly a textbook example of the The Modus Operandi of the CIA. In this source insider Ralph McGehee, chronicles the work he performed for the CIA from 1952 through 1977.

Another book --Deadly Deceits --is sub-titled: My 25 years in the CIA (New York: Sheridan Square Press, 1983). In this source is compiled a computer data base of CIA activities. Persons interested may write to him at: 422 Arkansas Ave., Herndon, VA 22070. (See http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/CIA/CIA_SOP.html .)
“...it is essential to provide background on the scope and nature of its worldwide operations. Between 1961 and 1975 the Agency conducted 900 major or sensitive operations, and thousands of lesser covert actions. The majority of its operations were propaganda, election or paramilitary. Countries of major concern, such as Indonesia in the early 1960s, were usually subjected to the CIA's most concerted attention. Critics of the CIA have aptly described the mainstays of such attention: "discrediting political groups... by forged documents that may be attributed to them. . . ." faking "communist weapon shipments,'' capturing communist documents and then inserting forgeries prepared by the Agency's Technical Services Division.

--Ralph McGehee
Americans may be less informed about the CIA than residents of almost every other country. Americans are routinely lied to and deliberately kept in the dark by a 'mainstream' media that often seems complicit. For example, the MSM dare not tell the truth about the CIA and often seems to be in cahoots with them. As the CIA was known to have infiltrated student groups in the sixties the suspicion that they have, likewise, infiltrated the media is not only reasonable but conservative. It is the rare media outlet that will risk alienating its advertising base. See: Steve Kangas: The Origins of the Overclass.

It is only coincidence, we are told, that the now dead Kennedys had been a threat to the CIA and it is only a coincidence that they are dead because of it. It is only coincidence --we are told --that activist Steve Kangas had zeroed in on conservative crimes and failures just as Richard Mellon Scaife was bankrolling a jihad against Clinton. It was only coincidence that Bush Sr was photographed hanging around the front entrance to the Texas School Book depository just minutes prior to the murder of JFK. It was only coincidence that tramps looking like E. Howard Hunt and Frank Sturgis et al were arrested for just hanging around the rail road tracks that run north and south just behind the grassy knoll. It was just coincidence that Martin Luther King Jr seemed to have prophesied his own death with his 'I Have a Dream' speech.

"The thing I am concerned about, and so is [Deputy Attorney General Nicholas] Katzenbach, is having something issued so we can convince the public that Oswald is the real assassin." --FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover, speaking on the telephone to Johnson aide Walter Jenkins two hours after Oswald was murdered by Jack Ruby, HSCA Report, vol. III, pp. 471-73. (The Warren Commission -charged with determining the truth in the JFK assassination --relied upon Hoover's FBI as its primary investigative arm.)

"We have not been told the truth about Oswald."

--Senator Richard Russell, former Warren Commission member, conversation with researcher Harold Weisberg in 1970, Whitewash IV
We have not been told the truth about the assassination of John Fitzgerald Kennedy. But we know who the liars are and we know what it is they are lying about. We also know a great deal about why they lied as well as who is protected by the lies and why. It has also been my experience that only the guilty are sufficiently motivated to lie about a crime. Those who cover up a crime do so because they are guilty. By contrast, the innocent are motivated to tell the truth or to get at the truth. Their lives often depend upon it. The innocent must insist that truth be told if they are to remain free. It was Conan Doyle's character Sherlock Holmes who said: "When you have eliminated the impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be the truth!"

The answer to that question might well have solved the JFK murder case! Had the train behind the grassy known not been a threat, the FBI would not have removed every trace of it in photos. I know that the FBI did so because I held in my hand the evidence that proved that they did so --slides taken in Dealy Plaza, doctored while in FBI possession. The slides were taken by Phil Willis, kept by the FBI for years, but when they were returned to Rosemary Willis (his daughter) they had been altered. The FBI is responsible.

Cover-ups, of course, are intended to protect the guilty. Something about the train --where earlier well-dressed tramps had been arrested --is germane to the plot to murder JFK. Tampering with evidence is always intended to protect the guilty. By removing the evidence, the FBI was not merely obstructing justice, it was protecting the identity/identities of murderers and traitors! Why would the FBI protect an assassin's get-away? It is reasonable to conclude that the FBI was and remains a part of the plot. See more at: Exposing Lies About the FED, the CIA, the Murder of JFK

The death of Lee Harvey Oswald relieved the government of having to get a conviction. Had Oswald gone to trial, he would have walked. The government 'case' against him would never have convinced a jury.

The magic bullet said to have created all of JFKs wounds was pristine; clearly, it had never been fired, had never struck anything. It was found on the wrong gurney at Parkland Hospital and could not have been placed at the scene of the crime. Oswald had to die because a competent judge would have thrown out the 'magic bullet'. Oswald would have walked and in 'walking' would have been a threat to the liar of the CIA, George Bush Sr who was photographed hanging around the front entrance of the TSBD just minutes before the shooting would start.

Nevertheless, we are expected to believe that a single bullet fired from the Mannlicher-Carcano was responsible for numerous wounds --a fatal one to JFK and serious wounds to Texas Governor John Connally. None of this would have gotten by a competent defense. The plotters concluded that it was better to destroy the evidence and kill all the witnesses.
“Therefore I must say that, as I hope for mercy, I can have no other notion of all the other governments that I see or know, than that they are a conspiracy of the rich, who on pretence of managing the public only pursue their private ends, and devise all the ways and arts they can find out; first, that they may, without danger, preserve all that that they have so ill acquired, and then that they may engage the poor to toil and labour for them at as low rates as possible, and oppress them as much as they pleasure. And if they can but prevail to get these contrivances established by the show of public authority, which is considered as the representative of the whole people, then they are accounted laws. Yet these wicked men after they have, by a most insatiable covetousness, divided that among themselves with which all the rest might have been well supplied, are far from that happiness that is enjoyed among the Utopians; for the use as well as the desire of money being extinguished, much anxiety and great occasions of mischief is cut off with it. And who does not see that the frauds, thefts, robberies, quarrels, tumults, contentions, seditions, murders, treacheries, and witchcrafts, which are indeed rather punished than restrained by the severities of law, would all fall off, if money were not any more valued by the world? Men’s fears, solicitudes, cares, labours, and watchings, would all perish in the same moment with the value of money; even poverty itself, for the relief of which money seems most necessary, would fall.”

--St. Thomas More, Utopia
If the Military-Industrial Complex is not a 'conspiracy of rich men', then what is? If the Supreme Court has not deteriorated into a conspiracy of right wing ideologues, then why are not the dictionaries re-written and the thousands of pages of case law burned or dumped offshore? The 'conspiracy rich men' has been careless. Nevertheless, we are expected to buy the lies and die for them. No thanks!
Note: The Existentialist Cowboy is currently bombarded by spam from a lunatic name caller of the right wing ilk! Therefore, comments are moderated. Intelligent comments are, as always, welcome! Ad hominem attacks, spam and psychotic drivel is not! Eventually, the offending party will be committed to an asylum and we adults can once again engage in intelligent, articulate dialogue. Thanks for understanding.


Monday, August 30, 2010

Gore Vidal: Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace: How We Got to Be So Hated

by Len Hart, The Existentialist Cowboy

Some of the early reviews of Gore Vidal's 'Perpetual War for Perpetual Peace' called it 'inflammatory'. That's because truth is often inflammatory. It is a measure of the American descent into fascism when distinguished authors are denied access to the audience that their work, in fact, created. Neither self-publishing or the blogosphere is, as yet, the solution. Those venues, themselves, are under threat if the news we hear about Google is, in any way, true.

So --what was said by Vidal that scared the pants off the MSM, the mentally constipated, the poohbahs at the Pentagon? Vidal made the case that there are no evils greater than those of the 'state' against its own people! Vidal found fatal flaws in U.S. foreign policy that inspire desperate measures abroad and, of late, at home. An empire whose exploitation of ever greater numbers, leaves its victims desperate, inviting response and retaliation. A nation-state so exploited may fight back with conventional means --armies and weapons! But a 'people' so exploited has only 'terrorism' to fight back with. Tyrants leave them no other choice. Other voices as disparate as Thomas Jefferson and Che Guevara have said the same thing.

Vidal found parallels between Timothy McVeigh and Bin Laden. That, of course, assumes that we know anything at all about Bin Laden. For all we know, Bin Laden is long dead or never existed. He could very well have been a creation of clever video editors. Think about it: how many people do you know who have actually met him? What hard evidence do YOU have that he exists? He probably does (or did) exist, but --to be honest --I don't know that for a fact and cannot prove it! Neither does anyone else who, like me, never met him. Bin Laden is a name in a newspaper article or a blurry image on a TV

Vidal makes little or no distinction between U.S. Foreign policy as practiced by George W. Bush or Bill Clinton. That is consistent with my position that the U.S. has but two wings of a single 'Capitalist Party'. Of the two, I believe the Democrats are preferable but that is a highly 'qualified' endorsement based entirely upon the fact that Democrats have consistently outperformed the GOP economically. For example, every Democratic regime since WWII has presided over greater job growth and GDP growth than any GOP regime. The margin by which the GOP are beaten is impressive, clearly, a result of their utterly wrong and 'top down' ideas about economics. Trickle-down or supply-side economics is the best example.

'Preferable' is, admittedly, a qualifying word used when none of the choices are precise. Neither party has articulated a truly desirable or noble 'America'. Neither party inspires us! Neither party has delivered a 'higher pie'! Both parties have, in fact, triangulated not even a center but an 'electorate' of some amorphous sort. No one --most certainly not Bush --has articulated what is right, noble and correct, merely whatever it is that might get one elected to office. Ronald Reagan, for example, had only to make psychopaths feel good about themselves.

On Phil Donahue, Studs Terkel spoke of the need for a 'major voice' to address the un-addressable of which 911 is the most notable example. Even now --no one dares speak realistically about 911. That, of course, was the perfect cover openly desired by Bush who warned against 'outrageous conspiracy theories' while putting forward his own 'conspiracy theory', the 'official' conspiracy which was, in fact, the most outrageous of them all! It was, in fact, the only conspiracy theory for which there is not a shred of rational or admissible evidence. Just propaganda and bullshit!

The 'patriotism' of anyone daring to speak openly or truthfully about 911 was impugned, castigated. Critics of Bush were called, in effect, 'traitors'. A legitimate government of broad-based support does not behave in this manner. It was Bush and his stolen 'office' who was, rather, the traitor to the people and the last time I checked, the people are sovereign. But America seems to have forgotten that.

Vidal's voice needs to be heard now more than ever. 911 must not simply fade away. What was done to this nation and by whom are issues that must be faced and will be --now or later! Calling opinions of any kind 'un-American' is, itself, 'un-American' and must not be tolerated. The alternative is censorship and fascism; conformity and totalitarianism, in this case, a dictatorship in which Fox and one or two other big networks play the role of 'The Ministry of Truth' i,e. 'The Ministry of Propaganda'.

Vidal committed the unpardonable sin. He questioned U.S. assumptions about the bombing of the Murrah building in Oklahoma City and the World Trade Center bombings in New York. He wrote: "That our ruling junta might have seriously provoked McVeigh and Osama was never dealt with."

Writing prior to many 911 revelations, many of which utterly disprove the official conspiracy theory, his critique of the 911 cover story is incomplete. You will find proof that the Bush version of 911 is impossible, defying the principles of physics, mathematics and common sense at: 911 Inside Job Chronicles

Perhaps the only surprise in this book is Vidal's convincing argument that McVeigh had not been behind the bombing of the Murrah building in OKC. Only Vidal could have held this collection of essays together with a single thesis: that we must take seriously people like Timothy McVeigh whom Vidal proves was genuinely outraged by the outrageous murder of civilians at Waco. We must take seriously people like Bin Laden, who may or may not exist. Vidal stopped short of the simplistic 'evil begats evil' but he might have said it outright and would have been correct had he done so.
The point of the book is captured in the first and only new essay - "September 11, 2001 (A Tuesday)", and it is this essay that, presumably, kept the book from being published in this country until now. Has anyone noticed how quiet Vidal has been since 9/11? Well, it wasn't by choice. Just after the 9-11 attacks on the United States, Vidal's initial comments appeared in Portuguese when he shared his views with a Brazilian publication. Those comments were then translated into Spanish and published in the Mexican newspaper La Jornada. Vidal later revised and expanded these early remarks for a piece intended for Vanity Fair. The magazine—among others, including The Nation, where Vidal is a longtime contributing editor—passed on the piece as a result of its "anti-American sentiments", thereby keeping our leading publishers and primary voices of dissent in lockstep with the rest of the mainstream media's newfound desire to censor itself for the supposed good of the country.

Even in those heady days immediately following the attacks, and given the "unified front" rhetoric that has enveloped the country since (a united front that has since made shopping, and consumption in general, as the way to return to those happy-go-lucky days of last summer), it seems astounding that a major American literary figure and cultural critic would have a hard time placing one of his works concerning the most significant domestic event since W.W.II.

--Perpetual War For Perpetual Peace: How We Got To Be So Hated by Gore Vidal (Thunder's Mouth Press/Nation Books)


The 'State' Commits Mass Murder of U.S. Citizens in Waco



If WTC 7 Was a Controlled Demolition, so were the Twins!
Note: The Existentialist Cowboy is currently bombarded by spam from a lunatic name caller of the right wing ilk! Therefore, comments are moderated. Intelligent comments are, as always, welcome! Ad hominem attacks, spam and psychotic drivel is not! Eventually, the offending party will be committed to an asylum and we adults can once again engage in intelligent, articulate dialogue. Thanks for understanding.

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