Seriously? Its absolutely amazing that people actually want TRUMP (F'ING TRUMP) to confront a nuclear armed power by firing missiles at them. A nuclear armed power that now claims to not only have missiles with nuclear powered engines (!), but with missiles that are hypersonic. The US has zero defense for this. Zero. People have absolutely lost ALL sense because of this president and soley BECAUSE its this president.
And the sheep still bleet "collusion" and "hacking" with ZERO evidence to back up their claims. But of course REAL election fraud (Tim Canova in Florida, California, New York) doesnt even register. F'ing amazing. No wonder we are in this situation.
I love Nagarjuna and he would disagree with all of your philosophical points 🙂 This is a duality and there is no "one thing" anywhere. Singularities cannot exist, or be known in a duality. I think your point on "one truth" is incorrect. Without mentality, materiality would be pointless. We can only know any event or object by processing that with a mentality and then that is relayed to another being or another being processes his version of what any event would be. Any "truth", which again would be a collection of events itself, would always be open to interpretation by a mentality and each mentality perceives things differently. This can also be applied to simultaniety. No subject or object can be simultaneous with itself and, again, just to perceive change there has to be at least two compounded events with a third compounded event that is called perception. If there were one singular truth, which there cant be, it could never be known precisely because this is a duality and all knowledge we have is filtered and disseminated through the perceptions of beings. And then of course the problem with there being no "one thing" that can be identified anywhere...Conventionally, what you say is correct and would be accepted by most i think. But when one starts to examine objects carefully, they are all compounded phenomena and no one thing can be found anywhere.
According to the US government, the process is not the problem. That is sound as a drum, they say. The problem is what people think and how they arrive at that thought. Americans now, they say, aren't at fault because they were duped into voting for one candidate, and hating another candidate, because of a foreign advertising campaign that sought to change the opinion of a public. That is my understanding of the situation.
During the campaign, I had to stop reading Huffpo due to the overwhelming amount of Trump coverage. I remember only seeing 2 articles on Clinton and only 3 about Sanders. I dont watch TV, so I am unaware of what cable news coverage was like, but as far as I have read, that was all Trump as well. I think that if the press, and I am talking worldwide (Guardian, Independent, Al Jazeera) as well as domestic actually focused on other candidates, giving more information, that would have helped tremendously. People are pigeon holed into this candidate or that candidate when there are legitimate alternatives that who, if given airtime and more public visibility, would be able to draw sizable audiences. The support that Sanders achieved shows that. The support that has been shown in the recent state elections shows that. More information was needed, meaning a wider range of coverage. Instead, information was limited to one individual. This continues to today.
The second part of the climate disaster rarely ever gets talked about: deforestation. If this is not addressed, then all the clean energy in the world wont help. I highly suggest studying Viktor Shauberger's works on water and forestry. The problem we face is much more severe than most people are understanding and no one is even considering alternatives.
"Researchers found that forest areas in South America, Africa and Asia – which have until recently played a key role in absorbing greenhouse gases – are now releasing 425 teragrams of carbon annually, which is more than all the traffic in the United States."
The above should be a huge cause for alarm, yet I have only ever seen this published in the Guardian.
"Alarm as study reveals world’s tropical forests are huge carbon emission source.
Forests globally are so degraded that instead of absorbing emissions they now release more carbon annually than all the traffic in the US, say researchers." Link below.
Something occurred to me as I read your comment. If Hillary received 3 million more votes than Trump, then it would follow that she actually won the popular vote. If she won the popular vote, the population was not swayed by Russian influence. If that is so, then how is Trump the president?
"When Americans vote for a President and Vice President, they are actually voting for presidential electors, known collectively as the electoral college. It is these electors, chosen by the people, who elect the chief executive. The Constitution assigns each state a number of electors equal to the combined total of the state’s Senate and House of Representatives delegations; at present, the number of electors per state ranges from three to 54, for a total of 538."
I am in total agreement that Trump was elected by very crooked means.
"But it could also be a trap."
"Could the Sadrist movement be setting up a Trojan horse?"
I'm confused as to why these two statements are made. The article doesn't seem to say why this alliance would be bad for Iraq, just bad for al-Maliki. Also, it states that the Sadrists have ties to Iran, but I was under the impression that al-Maliki was friendly towards Iran as well. What is the Trojan horse or trap? Thanks.
One thing I barely ever see mentioned about climate change is the impact of factory farming on the environment. Individuals can make a much greater impact on the health of the earth by not eating meat or dairy and withdrawing their support for that model of agrobusiness.
"Yes – but recall Chomsky came out strongly against Trump and for Clinton."
My point was directly related to the types of people in power the US government supports, and has supported, which he has documented extensively. Why would his coming out in support of Clinton have any impact on the facts of history? Please elaborate because I can't see how those are fitting together in your mind.
"It appears even shrill MIT leftists know an existential threat when they see it."
In light of what he has documented, this quote is ironic beyond belief. Talk to Palestinians about existential threats. Or the Vietnamese. Or the Indonesians. Or the Chileans. Or the Salvadorans. Or the Iraqi's. Or the Yemeni's. Or anyone of the peoples that he has documented being tortured, starved, bombed, displaced, kidnapped, imprisoned, extradited. I would argue that existential threast have been imposed on certain peoples for a very long time, and it did not start with Trump.
" and embracing tyrants and dictators"...I often wish I could go back to my rose colored glasses days. Might I recommend a couple of books if you are seriously interested in this topic? Deterring Democracy, Rogue States and Profit Over People by Noam Chomsky are great primers. I also highly suggest Rogue State by William Blum. John Pilgers' film, The War On Democracy, is great too.
Assange has denied time and again that Russia was the source of the leaks. He has presented himself as a truthful individual to this day. Wikileaks has a 100% record of verified information. 100%. Plus, Wikileaks has put up a 20K reward for information in the case of the DNC staffer killed in D.C. One has to ask himself why would he do that for some random guy killed in D.C? And if this staffer was the one found to be responsible, not the Russians, would there be all of this outrage at that staffer? Would we be running around with pitchforks and drooling at the prospect of lynching him too? He would then be called a whistleblower would he not?
What did the emails reveal? They revealed the absolute revulsion of the party leadership to Bernie and their corruption. Who cares where the information came from or who leaked it. They have never denied the veracity of the emails. The party leadership's only complaint is they were stolen. So now we hate the truth? Do you hate Chelsea Manning as well? Do you hate Snowden? We've killed the message because of the messenger...and we dont even know WHO the messenger was.
" the Russian act of illegal breaking into (digitally) the DNC headquarters and the Clinton campaign chair’s office "
This has not even been proven, yet this is the line that people repeat over and over and now its truth.
You dont find the timing of all this Russia baiting a little fishy considering the situation in Syria and along the Russian border and Trumps NATO talk? What is NATOs purpose again? Clinton lost because of Clinton. Period. Shes tried three times and lost three times. We now have Trump because our entire electoral process needs severe reform. But we aren't hearing about that or superdelegates anymore are we? Doesn't even seem to be a concern. Hey look over there! Squirrel! I mean, err, Russia!
I would much rather see a special prosecutor appointed for the inquiry into Israeli influence in our elections.
"Health care must be recognized as a right, not a privilege. Every man, woman and child in our country should be able to access the health care they need regardless of their income. The only long-term solution to America's health care crisis is a single-payer national health care program." - Bernie.
Read the plan, tell your friends and neighbors and lets help Bernie get it done!
Great comments and observations. The military buildup along the Russian borders, especially since they deployed to Syria, is really frightening. The actions of Poland and Sweden, among others, really does not help either.
"Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer was an original co-sponsor on the Jerusalem Embassy Act and has expressed support for relocating the embassy.
“Senator Schumer has long supported moving the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem and has called on both Democratic and Republican Presidents to make this happen,” Matt House, Schumer’s spokesman, told POLITICO in an email."
"Violence is wrong" - this type of individual benefits the world.
"Violence is sometimes just and necessary" - This type of individual does not benefit the world.
Seems to me that violence, and those who use it or are willing to, is the problem. People who use violence as a means to an end will always justify it as being "just and necessary." Its ridiculous to even give examples of "just and necessary" because theres always going to be two sides to that story. The violent are always going to justify their actions as noble. Do they ever claim that it was unjust and unnecessary?
"Violence is sometimes just and necessary, Obama’s included." - a violent person is the problem.
"The violence used to destroy the crews that were raining rocket fire down on Misrata saved thousands of lives." - violent people were the problem.
"The violence used to dismantle al Qaeda has probably saved tens of thousands of lives." - violent people are the problem.
"The violence used by the Vietnamese military to overthrow the Khmer Rouge saved hundreds of thousands of lives." - violent people were the problem.
Its ironic that violent people always laud themselves for rescuing non-violent people from violence.
Seriously? Its absolutely amazing that people actually want TRUMP (F'ING TRUMP) to confront a nuclear armed power by firing missiles at them. A nuclear armed power that now claims to not only have missiles with nuclear powered engines (!), but with missiles that are hypersonic. The US has zero defense for this. Zero. People have absolutely lost ALL sense because of this president and soley BECAUSE its this president.
And the sheep still bleet "collusion" and "hacking" with ZERO evidence to back up their claims. But of course REAL election fraud (Tim Canova in Florida, California, New York) doesnt even register. F'ing amazing. No wonder we are in this situation.
Shortly, Americans will become convinced that Russia is on their border and that Iran is close to nuking them. North Korea will legitimize Trump.
What, if any, was the outcome of his visit to see the Saudis a few months back? Any speculation on what was discussed?
I love Nagarjuna and he would disagree with all of your philosophical points 🙂 This is a duality and there is no "one thing" anywhere. Singularities cannot exist, or be known in a duality. I think your point on "one truth" is incorrect. Without mentality, materiality would be pointless. We can only know any event or object by processing that with a mentality and then that is relayed to another being or another being processes his version of what any event would be. Any "truth", which again would be a collection of events itself, would always be open to interpretation by a mentality and each mentality perceives things differently. This can also be applied to simultaniety. No subject or object can be simultaneous with itself and, again, just to perceive change there has to be at least two compounded events with a third compounded event that is called perception. If there were one singular truth, which there cant be, it could never be known precisely because this is a duality and all knowledge we have is filtered and disseminated through the perceptions of beings. And then of course the problem with there being no "one thing" that can be identified anywhere...Conventionally, what you say is correct and would be accepted by most i think. But when one starts to examine objects carefully, they are all compounded phenomena and no one thing can be found anywhere.
According to the US government, the process is not the problem. That is sound as a drum, they say. The problem is what people think and how they arrive at that thought. Americans now, they say, aren't at fault because they were duped into voting for one candidate, and hating another candidate, because of a foreign advertising campaign that sought to change the opinion of a public. That is my understanding of the situation.
During the campaign, I had to stop reading Huffpo due to the overwhelming amount of Trump coverage. I remember only seeing 2 articles on Clinton and only 3 about Sanders. I dont watch TV, so I am unaware of what cable news coverage was like, but as far as I have read, that was all Trump as well. I think that if the press, and I am talking worldwide (Guardian, Independent, Al Jazeera) as well as domestic actually focused on other candidates, giving more information, that would have helped tremendously. People are pigeon holed into this candidate or that candidate when there are legitimate alternatives that who, if given airtime and more public visibility, would be able to draw sizable audiences. The support that Sanders achieved shows that. The support that has been shown in the recent state elections shows that. More information was needed, meaning a wider range of coverage. Instead, information was limited to one individual. This continues to today.
The second part of the climate disaster rarely ever gets talked about: deforestation. If this is not addressed, then all the clean energy in the world wont help. I highly suggest studying Viktor Shauberger's works on water and forestry. The problem we face is much more severe than most people are understanding and no one is even considering alternatives.
"Researchers found that forest areas in South America, Africa and Asia – which have until recently played a key role in absorbing greenhouse gases – are now releasing 425 teragrams of carbon annually, which is more than all the traffic in the United States."
The above should be a huge cause for alarm, yet I have only ever seen this published in the Guardian.
"Alarm as study reveals world’s tropical forests are huge carbon emission source.
Forests globally are so degraded that instead of absorbing emissions they now release more carbon annually than all the traffic in the US, say researchers." Link below.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/sep/28/alarm-as-study-reveals-worlds-tropical-forests-are-huge-carbon-emission-source
Something occurred to me as I read your comment. If Hillary received 3 million more votes than Trump, then it would follow that she actually won the popular vote. If she won the popular vote, the population was not swayed by Russian influence. If that is so, then how is Trump the president?
"When Americans vote for a President and Vice President, they are actually voting for presidential electors, known collectively as the electoral college. It is these electors, chosen by the people, who elect the chief executive. The Constitution assigns each state a number of electors equal to the combined total of the state’s Senate and House of Representatives delegations; at present, the number of electors per state ranges from three to 54, for a total of 538."
I am in total agreement that Trump was elected by very crooked means.
"But it could also be a trap."
"Could the Sadrist movement be setting up a Trojan horse?"
I'm confused as to why these two statements are made. The article doesn't seem to say why this alliance would be bad for Iraq, just bad for al-Maliki. Also, it states that the Sadrists have ties to Iran, but I was under the impression that al-Maliki was friendly towards Iran as well. What is the Trojan horse or trap? Thanks.
One thing I barely ever see mentioned about climate change is the impact of factory farming on the environment. Individuals can make a much greater impact on the health of the earth by not eating meat or dairy and withdrawing their support for that model of agrobusiness.
This is a great overview for anyone interested:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2367646/
"Yes – but recall Chomsky came out strongly against Trump and for Clinton."
My point was directly related to the types of people in power the US government supports, and has supported, which he has documented extensively. Why would his coming out in support of Clinton have any impact on the facts of history? Please elaborate because I can't see how those are fitting together in your mind.
"It appears even shrill MIT leftists know an existential threat when they see it."
In light of what he has documented, this quote is ironic beyond belief. Talk to Palestinians about existential threats. Or the Vietnamese. Or the Indonesians. Or the Chileans. Or the Salvadorans. Or the Iraqi's. Or the Yemeni's. Or anyone of the peoples that he has documented being tortured, starved, bombed, displaced, kidnapped, imprisoned, extradited. I would argue that existential threast have been imposed on certain peoples for a very long time, and it did not start with Trump.
" and embracing tyrants and dictators"...I often wish I could go back to my rose colored glasses days. Might I recommend a couple of books if you are seriously interested in this topic? Deterring Democracy, Rogue States and Profit Over People by Noam Chomsky are great primers. I also highly suggest Rogue State by William Blum. John Pilgers' film, The War On Democracy, is great too.
Assange has denied time and again that Russia was the source of the leaks. He has presented himself as a truthful individual to this day. Wikileaks has a 100% record of verified information. 100%. Plus, Wikileaks has put up a 20K reward for information in the case of the DNC staffer killed in D.C. One has to ask himself why would he do that for some random guy killed in D.C? And if this staffer was the one found to be responsible, not the Russians, would there be all of this outrage at that staffer? Would we be running around with pitchforks and drooling at the prospect of lynching him too? He would then be called a whistleblower would he not?
What did the emails reveal? They revealed the absolute revulsion of the party leadership to Bernie and their corruption. Who cares where the information came from or who leaked it. They have never denied the veracity of the emails. The party leadership's only complaint is they were stolen. So now we hate the truth? Do you hate Chelsea Manning as well? Do you hate Snowden? We've killed the message because of the messenger...and we dont even know WHO the messenger was.
" the Russian act of illegal breaking into (digitally) the DNC headquarters and the Clinton campaign chair’s office "
This has not even been proven, yet this is the line that people repeat over and over and now its truth.
You dont find the timing of all this Russia baiting a little fishy considering the situation in Syria and along the Russian border and Trumps NATO talk? What is NATOs purpose again? Clinton lost because of Clinton. Period. Shes tried three times and lost three times. We now have Trump because our entire electoral process needs severe reform. But we aren't hearing about that or superdelegates anymore are we? Doesn't even seem to be a concern. Hey look over there! Squirrel! I mean, err, Russia!
I would much rather see a special prosecutor appointed for the inquiry into Israeli influence in our elections.
Ooooooh George!
Bernie has consistently touted single payer healthcare and has done so for a considerable amount of time! Check out his website:
https://berniesanders.com/medicareforall/
"Health care must be recognized as a right, not a privilege. Every man, woman and child in our country should be able to access the health care they need regardless of their income. The only long-term solution to America's health care crisis is a single-payer national health care program." - Bernie.
Read the plan, tell your friends and neighbors and lets help Bernie get it done!
Great comments and observations. The military buildup along the Russian borders, especially since they deployed to Syria, is really frightening. The actions of Poland and Sweden, among others, really does not help either.
"it would still be a good policy to push for a new détente with Russia, based on mutual interests." I agree 100%. The whole problem, though, is that damn pipeline...
"Senate minority leader Chuck Schumer was an original co-sponsor on the Jerusalem Embassy Act and has expressed support for relocating the embassy.
“Senator Schumer has long supported moving the U.S. Embassy to Jerusalem and has called on both Democratic and Republican Presidents to make this happen,” Matt House, Schumer’s spokesman, told POLITICO in an email."
Of course...
http://www.politico.com/story/2016/12/trump-us-embassy-jerusalem-232724
Hi Professor Cole,
what do you think of the Eva Bartlett reporting on Syria . . .
Thanks!
"Violence is wrong" - this type of individual benefits the world.
"Violence is sometimes just and necessary" - This type of individual does not benefit the world.
Seems to me that violence, and those who use it or are willing to, is the problem. People who use violence as a means to an end will always justify it as being "just and necessary." Its ridiculous to even give examples of "just and necessary" because theres always going to be two sides to that story. The violent are always going to justify their actions as noble. Do they ever claim that it was unjust and unnecessary?
"Violence is sometimes just and necessary, Obama’s included." - a violent person is the problem.
"The violence used to destroy the crews that were raining rocket fire down on Misrata saved thousands of lives." - violent people were the problem.
"The violence used to dismantle al Qaeda has probably saved tens of thousands of lives." - violent people are the problem.
"The violence used by the Vietnamese military to overthrow the Khmer Rouge saved hundreds of thousands of lives." - violent people were the problem.
Its ironic that violent people always laud themselves for rescuing non-violent people from violence.