If the threat of "armed insurrectionists" and "domestic terrorists" is as great as some claim, why do they have to keep lying and peddling crude media fictions about it?
You forgot the hallmark of true authoritarian conspiracy nuts: the fact that nothing happened on March 4 is proof that the "counter-measures" worked, and need to be maintained and (god willing!) enhanced.
I first posted months ago about being afraid to live in my own adopted country for the first time in my life. I came here as a one year old child from the Philippines with my mother, the new foreign wife of a soldier returning from the Vietnam War in 1966. When we were stateside, we lived mostly here in the South and it wasn’t easy for my mother to be seen as “colored” or for me to be seen as a small step above being black in south GA. I entered my 1st grade year in 1971, the first year the school was integrated at that level. Before that, I was only allowed to attend a segregated kindergarten. I know more about racism than most of the know-NOTHINGS protesting in our city streets today. Now, my fear has only grown...& it’s NOT Trump supporters that I fear.
Thank you for remaining true to your core beliefs in free speech, Mr. Greenwald. I don’t think I’m overstating how valuable that is.
It was plain to see on January 6th, to everyone with even a modicum of intelligence and a passing affinity for reality, that what took place was a riot carried out by a hodgepodge of Trump supporters and others with a variety of grievances. By every conceivable metric (duration, property damage, violent assaults), this riot was much less severe than the dozens of riots that occurred (to the cheers of the same media pundits of elected Democrats decrying the January 6th riot) throughout 2020. Indeed, most of the "casualties" from the riot occurred because the participants were so infirm and elderly they were dropping from heart attacks and strokes.
It was clear from the beginning that the powers-that-be, however, were going to milk this riot for everything they could. The subtle shift in lies surrounding the narrative woven by our Dear Leaders in the days following the riot were important. They very quickly shifted from blaming Trump himself to blaming, "right wing extremists" and "white supremacy". This was a very telling shift, as well as being critical to their strategy. If the source of the problem was Trump (or any specific, identifiable source), then the crisis could eventually be resolved. Trump could be jailed or otherwise eliminated from the scene, and the crisis would be resolved, with all "emergency" powers relinquished. But that isn't the goal. Like the "war on drugs" or the "war on terror", a war against a slogan or an idea has no achievable victory conditions. How can we know when the war against "white supremacy" has been won? How do we know what freedoms are necessary to sacrifice in order to win the war against "dangerous ring-wing extremists"? Who are these enemies? What does one have to do or say to be considered a domestic terrorist who is so dangerous that they cannot be afforded legal or Constitutional rights? What speech is so dangerous that it cannot be allowed?
These things are all undefined and unknowable by design. There are no powers that cannot be claimed, no person that cannot be silenced, no end to the "emergency" that requires this totalitarianism. Even raising questions about the reality "emergency" itself denotes one as someone who probably harbors sympathy for "the enemy" (as evidenced by the treatment received regularly by Greenwald).
Unfortunately, those feebleminded enough to believe that "our very democracy" is at stake and threatens to be toppled by an unhinged mob of racist Trump supporters that want to sow nationwide destruction, are all in. For them, this is an existential threat, where the ends justify the means. Even those with the capacity to perceive a sliver of objective reality and see through some of the lies, see those lies as inconsequential (or even justified and necessary!). After all, if a false narrative about an officer being beaten to death with a fire extinguisher can rally support in the war against evil, right-wing, white-supremacists whose divisions are laying in wait, ready to take over the country, is that really a bad thing?
Many have described the rise of Trump as the "post-truth era". Unfortunately they didn't know how accurate that was.
I am a socialist and recent events have had me puzzled. What I can say is that today's politicians can be described in the words of cowboy movies as "lily livered." Neither of our 2 Parties represent me. If it were me, I would have gone out to greet the "insurrectionists" and talked with them about their concerns. I am unafraid when it comes to reaching out to those who don't think like I do. what does this say about today's members of Congress that they scuttled Pence out the back door to "safety" when he could have spoken as Trump's VP to the "invaders." To make this short: Elected officials don't know who their constituencies are and fear them because only powerful and wealthy donors matter. Leave it to Glenn to explain a panoply of complicated stuff.
This is all 100% out of the CIA playbook. Use the press to overstate an actual threat (9-11, Covid, Capital riots) make the public frightened in a constant and out of proportion level to the threat. Use it as a way to usurp civil liberties and to create unconstitutional "new norms".
One of the reasons that the Democrats are acting like this is because they know, as everyone else does, that they stole the election. When you steal something, it makes you wide-eyed and alert for anyone who could possibly find out/turn you in/or be a threat in any way. They have to exaggerate that threat to keep the narrative on the "threat" rather than the facts.
If you believe that Joe Biden got TWELVE MILLION more votes than Barack Obama, you're an idiot and a fool. I lived through the election of Barack Obama and his reelection. It pained me to do so, but I would NEVER deny that he was a popular candidate with charm and charisma. Joe Biden couldn't draw flies to his political rallies.
There was a red wave in the House. Unsurprisingly, it went unreported. Also, unsurprisingly, the establishment GOP (the controlled opposition) never talks about that.
Just like no one talks about stopping the counting of ballots in six states (unheard of in prior elections) while Trump was ahead. And wouldn't ya know it, Biden managed to come from behind and win. Ain't that sumthin'.
The increasingly extreme, coordinated, and crude manipulation of public narratives, coupled with the emotional bullying to get the general public to JOIN in the enforcement of these narratives, is a serious and clear warning of what is coming.
While mainstream narratives about what the US stands for and the integrity of our various institutions have long been full of shit, the last few years represent an marked shift into fact-free, brain-stem stimulation perhaps worse than the Red Scare.
This has become so extreme and powerful that even truth speakers like Greenwald and Chomsky refuse to touch new "third rails" that are no less propagandized than the issues these authors feel comfortable addressing.
Hell, even as an "anonymous" poster I have concerns about saying it plainly.
If the implications of all this weren't so serious, it would be a farcical comedy of the highest order. Dems should be embarrassed, but aren't in the slightest. You just can't make this shit up.
"If the threat of "armed insurrectionists" and "domestic terrorists" is as great as some claim, why do they have to keep lying and peddling crude media fictions about it?"
Because upwards of 70 million people will believe anything you tell them.
I still want to know where are all these QAnon people. One august media source (Washington Post reporter Dave Weigel) reports that he was told by some guy named “Ken” that Trump would be inaugurated on March 4th (but now I gather it’s actually going to be March 20th)...
That’s it??? Some random guy named Ken is driving all this madness?
Examples of genuine armed Insurrection in our history are: the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, the Whiskey Rebellion, John Brown's group at Harpers Ferry. These were carried out by people who bet their lives on it, and were armed with clear intent to overthrow the government. The incidents in Washington don't begin to compare with these. But there are so many who parrot Nancy Pelosi's words in a chorus of misinformation and propaganda.
Glenn’s biggest problem as a journalist is that he is a real journalist. Go figure! Rather than propagandize a hidden agenda, he is a truth teller. He also has too much common sense and that doesn’t work in today’s world of “hysteria”reporting. With all of this said, thank goodness for Glenn’s CALM and RATIONAL essays. I always come away from his articles thinking that is still hope for the blithering world we live in.
A minor point, but I think subconsciously they are also nervous about the imminent lifting of COVID restrictions. The destabilizing, temporary medical-like shock of the past year is wearing off and more people are beginning to question the authoritarian measures to which we agreed in that climate of "emergency. It wasn't just medical purity motivating the rage of the COVID pietists when two states just went full-on "open"--the DNC/MSM/Big Tech leadership are depending upon the noise of "crisis" in the background to continue hiding Biden, and to consolidate their gains over the past year.
Trump was the first supposed destabilizing narrative, and then the virus--with both gone, citizens are dusting off the shock.
There's another dimension to this too, reminiscent of people who grow up in crazy families--you get addicted to the adrenaline rush of chaos and emergency, and you're afraid of what will happen during stability because the focus is taken off someone else and put back onto you. The crisis-junkies don't just need another "Other," they need a threat to give their lives meaning, if they haven't cultivated that elsewhere.
Keep treating millions of well-armed people, many of whom have firsthand experience in guerrilla warfare as veterans, who already distrust the government, and are already in your country as if they are terrorists. I mean what could possibly go wrong? If only there were history books and after action reports that said this was a bad idea.
You forgot the hallmark of true authoritarian conspiracy nuts: the fact that nothing happened on March 4 is proof that the "counter-measures" worked, and need to be maintained and (god willing!) enhanced.
I first posted months ago about being afraid to live in my own adopted country for the first time in my life. I came here as a one year old child from the Philippines with my mother, the new foreign wife of a soldier returning from the Vietnam War in 1966. When we were stateside, we lived mostly here in the South and it wasn’t easy for my mother to be seen as “colored” or for me to be seen as a small step above being black in south GA. I entered my 1st grade year in 1971, the first year the school was integrated at that level. Before that, I was only allowed to attend a segregated kindergarten. I know more about racism than most of the know-NOTHINGS protesting in our city streets today. Now, my fear has only grown...& it’s NOT Trump supporters that I fear.
Thank you for remaining true to your core beliefs in free speech, Mr. Greenwald. I don’t think I’m overstating how valuable that is.
It was plain to see on January 6th, to everyone with even a modicum of intelligence and a passing affinity for reality, that what took place was a riot carried out by a hodgepodge of Trump supporters and others with a variety of grievances. By every conceivable metric (duration, property damage, violent assaults), this riot was much less severe than the dozens of riots that occurred (to the cheers of the same media pundits of elected Democrats decrying the January 6th riot) throughout 2020. Indeed, most of the "casualties" from the riot occurred because the participants were so infirm and elderly they were dropping from heart attacks and strokes.
It was clear from the beginning that the powers-that-be, however, were going to milk this riot for everything they could. The subtle shift in lies surrounding the narrative woven by our Dear Leaders in the days following the riot were important. They very quickly shifted from blaming Trump himself to blaming, "right wing extremists" and "white supremacy". This was a very telling shift, as well as being critical to their strategy. If the source of the problem was Trump (or any specific, identifiable source), then the crisis could eventually be resolved. Trump could be jailed or otherwise eliminated from the scene, and the crisis would be resolved, with all "emergency" powers relinquished. But that isn't the goal. Like the "war on drugs" or the "war on terror", a war against a slogan or an idea has no achievable victory conditions. How can we know when the war against "white supremacy" has been won? How do we know what freedoms are necessary to sacrifice in order to win the war against "dangerous ring-wing extremists"? Who are these enemies? What does one have to do or say to be considered a domestic terrorist who is so dangerous that they cannot be afforded legal or Constitutional rights? What speech is so dangerous that it cannot be allowed?
These things are all undefined and unknowable by design. There are no powers that cannot be claimed, no person that cannot be silenced, no end to the "emergency" that requires this totalitarianism. Even raising questions about the reality "emergency" itself denotes one as someone who probably harbors sympathy for "the enemy" (as evidenced by the treatment received regularly by Greenwald).
Unfortunately, those feebleminded enough to believe that "our very democracy" is at stake and threatens to be toppled by an unhinged mob of racist Trump supporters that want to sow nationwide destruction, are all in. For them, this is an existential threat, where the ends justify the means. Even those with the capacity to perceive a sliver of objective reality and see through some of the lies, see those lies as inconsequential (or even justified and necessary!). After all, if a false narrative about an officer being beaten to death with a fire extinguisher can rally support in the war against evil, right-wing, white-supremacists whose divisions are laying in wait, ready to take over the country, is that really a bad thing?
Many have described the rise of Trump as the "post-truth era". Unfortunately they didn't know how accurate that was.
This is what happens when the demand for insurrection exceeds the supply.
I am a socialist and recent events have had me puzzled. What I can say is that today's politicians can be described in the words of cowboy movies as "lily livered." Neither of our 2 Parties represent me. If it were me, I would have gone out to greet the "insurrectionists" and talked with them about their concerns. I am unafraid when it comes to reaching out to those who don't think like I do. what does this say about today's members of Congress that they scuttled Pence out the back door to "safety" when he could have spoken as Trump's VP to the "invaders." To make this short: Elected officials don't know who their constituencies are and fear them because only powerful and wealthy donors matter. Leave it to Glenn to explain a panoply of complicated stuff.
This is all 100% out of the CIA playbook. Use the press to overstate an actual threat (9-11, Covid, Capital riots) make the public frightened in a constant and out of proportion level to the threat. Use it as a way to usurp civil liberties and to create unconstitutional "new norms".
One of the reasons that the Democrats are acting like this is because they know, as everyone else does, that they stole the election. When you steal something, it makes you wide-eyed and alert for anyone who could possibly find out/turn you in/or be a threat in any way. They have to exaggerate that threat to keep the narrative on the "threat" rather than the facts.
If you believe that Joe Biden got TWELVE MILLION more votes than Barack Obama, you're an idiot and a fool. I lived through the election of Barack Obama and his reelection. It pained me to do so, but I would NEVER deny that he was a popular candidate with charm and charisma. Joe Biden couldn't draw flies to his political rallies.
There was a red wave in the House. Unsurprisingly, it went unreported. Also, unsurprisingly, the establishment GOP (the controlled opposition) never talks about that.
Just like no one talks about stopping the counting of ballots in six states (unheard of in prior elections) while Trump was ahead. And wouldn't ya know it, Biden managed to come from behind and win. Ain't that sumthin'.
They know and we know.
At some point, they may create their own "insurrection" just to prove themselves right. That scares me more than anything.
The increasingly extreme, coordinated, and crude manipulation of public narratives, coupled with the emotional bullying to get the general public to JOIN in the enforcement of these narratives, is a serious and clear warning of what is coming.
While mainstream narratives about what the US stands for and the integrity of our various institutions have long been full of shit, the last few years represent an marked shift into fact-free, brain-stem stimulation perhaps worse than the Red Scare.
This has become so extreme and powerful that even truth speakers like Greenwald and Chomsky refuse to touch new "third rails" that are no less propagandized than the issues these authors feel comfortable addressing.
Hell, even as an "anonymous" poster I have concerns about saying it plainly.
If the implications of all this weren't so serious, it would be a farcical comedy of the highest order. Dems should be embarrassed, but aren't in the slightest. You just can't make this shit up.
"If the threat of "armed insurrectionists" and "domestic terrorists" is as great as some claim, why do they have to keep lying and peddling crude media fictions about it?"
Because upwards of 70 million people will believe anything you tell them.
I still want to know where are all these QAnon people. One august media source (Washington Post reporter Dave Weigel) reports that he was told by some guy named “Ken” that Trump would be inaugurated on March 4th (but now I gather it’s actually going to be March 20th)...
That’s it??? Some random guy named Ken is driving all this madness?
https://www.newsweek.com/qanon-theorists-switch-date-march-20-after-no-trump-inauguration-call-4th-false-flag-1573871
If this isn’t a complete sham to justify eliminating peoples’ liberties, then what is??
Examples of genuine armed Insurrection in our history are: the Revolutionary War, the Civil War, the Whiskey Rebellion, John Brown's group at Harpers Ferry. These were carried out by people who bet their lives on it, and were armed with clear intent to overthrow the government. The incidents in Washington don't begin to compare with these. But there are so many who parrot Nancy Pelosi's words in a chorus of misinformation and propaganda.
Glenn’s biggest problem as a journalist is that he is a real journalist. Go figure! Rather than propagandize a hidden agenda, he is a truth teller. He also has too much common sense and that doesn’t work in today’s world of “hysteria”reporting. With all of this said, thank goodness for Glenn’s CALM and RATIONAL essays. I always come away from his articles thinking that is still hope for the blithering world we live in.
A minor point, but I think subconsciously they are also nervous about the imminent lifting of COVID restrictions. The destabilizing, temporary medical-like shock of the past year is wearing off and more people are beginning to question the authoritarian measures to which we agreed in that climate of "emergency. It wasn't just medical purity motivating the rage of the COVID pietists when two states just went full-on "open"--the DNC/MSM/Big Tech leadership are depending upon the noise of "crisis" in the background to continue hiding Biden, and to consolidate their gains over the past year.
Trump was the first supposed destabilizing narrative, and then the virus--with both gone, citizens are dusting off the shock.
There's another dimension to this too, reminiscent of people who grow up in crazy families--you get addicted to the adrenaline rush of chaos and emergency, and you're afraid of what will happen during stability because the focus is taken off someone else and put back onto you. The crisis-junkies don't just need another "Other," they need a threat to give their lives meaning, if they haven't cultivated that elsewhere.
Keep treating millions of well-armed people, many of whom have firsthand experience in guerrilla warfare as veterans, who already distrust the government, and are already in your country as if they are terrorists. I mean what could possibly go wrong? If only there were history books and after action reports that said this was a bad idea.