It will be madness in America soon, Out of control
I bought a copy of USA Today Weekend at the supermarket and wanted to gag. A front-page lead story showing a picture of Edward Snowden's Russian permit was titled: "Welcome, Comrade Snowden" (Is John McCain now writing their headlines?). To read American mainstream news is to collide with an illusory but impenetrable wall of rigid propaganda (rah, rah, America #1; rah, rah, S&P 1700; rah, rah, Washington vs. a world of enemies). In short, the paper's almost one-million readers were encouraged. In so many words, "Don't worry about NSA. Congress has heard the American people and is now moving to reform it. Sleep well tonight, Senator Patrick Leahy is awake."
The mood is critically nervous among those who have written for years about America's war atrocities, descent into post-democracy, vulture economics, systemic corruption and international lawlessness; they might be seeing their worst nightmares - the ones they wished to prevent - occurring, and ones worse becoming more probable. Why write for a people who appear to have done nothing to preempt their current security (police) state and growing despotism? Why write (or be a whistle-blower) to be demonized, criminalized and decapitated by the very people you are trying to warn? On one hand, writers might pay a heavy price for what they commit to print; on the other hand, they fulfill themselves and fulfill the First Amendment - they speak the truth as they see it. At this juncture, however, the time for using words freely, casually and directly might be changing.
And the time for sustaining the juvenile notion of a world jealous of America's wealth and liberty needs be long buried.
Writer Paul Craig Roberts is correct this week in his vitriol:
"The schizophrenic denizens of Washington have made Americans a hated people. Those with the foresight to know to escape from the growing tyranny also know that wherever they might seek refuge, they will be seen as vermin from the most hated nation and subjected to being scapegoated as spies and evil influences, and at risk of being decimated in reprisals against Washington’s latest atrocity.
"Washington has destroyed the prospects of Americans both at home and abroad."
Not one person wants "the People" to share blame or wants to apply the word "fascism" to the American security-state. Yet, it is the majority of people in America who, for one reason or another, are responsible for their predicament, as the majority of German people during WWII were responsible for theirs and the Japanese people theirs. A democracy thrives from awake, alert individuals; an unbiased press; a tolerance of diverse opinions; and laws (the Constitution and international treaties). As it stands today, Americans have chosen authoritarianism over democracy; consumerism over citizenship; censorship over free-thought; militancy over diplomacy; financial oppression over equity. When they should have they didn't force President Obama to close Gitmo; end the wars; constrain the FBI, CIA, NSA and Gen. Keith B. Alexander; indict financial CEOs and officers. They didn't rebel over airport body scanners; RFID chips in passports; indefinite detentions; torture; state-sponsored assassinations; death squads; military war crimes; drones; Wall Street and corporate pillage of Main Street; or, for that matter, they didn't criminalize anyone except those who "blew the whistle" or dissented. Mr. Obama's constituents are "waking up" (after five years) if comments left at The New York Times over Snowden revelations are any indication. But I place much blame on "Obama people" who, on the one hand, voted for the president to reverse the tide of war and international disgrace generated by former President George W. Bush (or so they claimed); and on the other enabled if not cheered Mr. Obama as he perpetuated the same and worse practices. These are hypocrites.
What destruction and death has been and is propagated by the United States armed forces against the world will now be visited on "the People". What economic exploitation has been waged against the third world countries by American banks and investors will now be waged against "the People". What civil wars the Pentagon and CIA have engineered in the Mid-East will now be applied at home. And if it takes a regime change in Washington, it too will be done. It will be madness in America from this point forward; the world is in its cross hairs and knows it.
Some Americans will cheer a military coup, an assassination, a civil war, a de facto war against most of the planet. The world believed in a president who was never his own man; who sold out early; who relied on stage managers and PR to conceal his identity and conceal the identities of controllers from finance, the Pentagon and intelligence community. Since Snowden, the world has a clearer idea of the untrustworthiness of America's leadership, its corporations and military.
(I believe Mr. Obama might not continue as President, and believe a financial-military coup might have already occurred.)
In this week's Asia Times, Pepe Escobar concludes:
"For the moment, what we have is an Orwellian/Panopticon complex that will persist with its unchecked powers; an aphasic populace; a quiet, invisible man in a Moscow multitude; and a POTUS consumed with boundless rage. Watch out. He may be tempted to wag the (war) dog."
It will be madness in America soon, out of control.