Imagine Chinese warships sailing around near California and Hawaii, in the Gulf of Mexico and the Atlantic Ocean, under the same aggressive "freedom of navigation" exercises that US warships routinely perform in waters near China to the anger of Beijing. Imagine People’s Liberation Army military bases in Central and South America, like the network of military bases the US has set up around China and continues to build up to this very day.

Reading by Tim Foley.

Imagine If China Did To The US What The US Is Doing To China

Humans, interestingly, fall somewhere between tiny-brained hive insects and the larger-brained mammals and birds in terms of self-preservation impulses involving violence, despite having the most advanced brains in the animal kingdom. We have the same instinctive aversions to putting ourselves at risk as those other animals, but that instinct can be overridden by putting a bunch of stories in our heads about how the enemy must be destroyed for this or that reason. A few false narratives about God and glory had humans marching off to fight and die in the Crusades like a bunch of mindless insects.

This is because the capacity for abstract thought that our recently evolved brains have given us can be exploited by clever humans with a predisposition toward manipulation. Because we're often finding our way around in the world by thoughts and language rather than instinct, we can be manipulated into acting far more foolishly than a pigeon or a squirrel or a tiger ever would.

Reading by Tim Foley.

Narrative Is Used To Override Healthy Human Self-Interest

Free speech is meaningless and worthless if you don't use it to oppose real power. In western "democracies" the majority of people are so effectively propagandized into speaking in alignment with the interests of the western empire that they may as well be taking orders on what to say at gunpoint.

In totalitarian regimes you say what your rulers want you to say because they physically coerced you using the threat of violence. In "free democracies" you say what your rulers want you to say because they psychologically coerced you using propaganda. The end result is the same.

Reagan once joked about Soviets thinking they are free because they're allowed to criticize the US government as much as they like, but really that was just projection. Westerners think they have free speech, but they never use that "free speech" to criticize the tyrannical empire they live under. 

Free speech is held as an important human right because it helps the people put a check on power. If you're not using for that, you may as well not have it.

Reading by Tim Foley.

Free Speech Is For Fighting The Empire

After the fugue state clears,
after this whole shitshow has been shitshown,
after the stuffed shirts have become unstuffed and the talking heads have found their bodies,
after the Beltway brainchildren have turned back into terrestrial primates,
after the Pentagon has been pierced by the Roman lance and bled out F-22s and Reaper drones,
after our headless corporate gods have been cast into the sea screaming "I'M MELTING! MELLLTING!!!",
after Buddha Godzillas his way across our world,
Earth will heave a deep sigh of relief,
and we will truly hear the birdsongs
for the very first time.

The birdsongs like the full moon's light hitting your eyes after orgasm.
The birdsongs like the gentle tickle of a sleeping lover's breath on your skin.
The birdsongs soaring out of the silence like the opening notes of Sweet Child O' Mine,
born of silence and received by silence, met by the baby's smile of silence,
emerging in complete human stillness
for the very first time.

__________________

Reading by Tim Foley.

After The Fugue

A recent US Chamber of Commerce InSTEP program hosted three empire managers to talk about Washington's top three enemies, with the US ambassador to China Nicholas Burns discussing the PRC, the odious Victoria Nuland discussing Russia, and the US ambassador to Israel Tom Nides talking about Iran. Toward the end of the hour-long discussion, Burns made the very interesting comment that Beijing must accept that the United States is "the leader" in the region and isn't going anywhere.

Reading by Tim Foley.

US Ambassador To China: "We're The Leader" Of The Indo-Pacific

The heroic whistleblower and peace activist Daniel Ellsberg is dying.

In an open letter to his friends and supporters, Ellsberg announced that two weeks ago he learned that he has inoperable pancreatic cancer with a prognosis of three to six months. The letter is beautiful and inspiring, but it's also as heart-rending as anything you'll ever read, largely because within it Ellsberg makes it abundantly clear that he has extremely urgent concerns about the world he will soon be leaving behind.

Reading by Tim Foley.

We're Losing Our Anti-War Heroes Right When We Need Them Most

Every now and then I like to highlight the fact that all this China stuff was forcast way back in 2004 by Michael Parenti, who said that the unipolarist neoconservative ideology that had hijacked US foreign policy envisioned a massive strategic confrontation with Beijing.

"The PNAC plan envisions a strategic confrontation with China, and a still greater permanent military presence in every corner of the world," Parenti wrote in his book Superpatriot. "The objective is not just power for its own sake but power to control the world's natural resources and markets, power to privatize and deregulate the economies of every nation in the world, and power to hoist upon the backs of peoples everywhere — including North America — the blessings of an untrammeled global 'free market.' The end goal is to ensure not merely the supremacy of global capitalism as such, but the supremacy of American global capitalism by preventing the emergence of any other potentially competing superpower."

Reading by Tim Foley.

The Hawks Have Had China In Their Crosshairs For Years

In the latest instance of the Australian media's deluge of propaganda geared toward manufacturing consent for war with China, Nine Entertainment-owned newspapers The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age have brought together a panel of "experts" to assess how well-prepared Australia is for a hot war with its primary trading partner. The question of if that war is necessary or should be prepared for is left completely unexamined.

Reading by Caitlin Johnstone.

No, Australia Does Not Actually Need To Prepare For War With China

Australian media are awash with reporting on the war-with-China propaganda series by The Sydney Morning Herald and The Age that I've been writing about for the last few days. Which is really quite extraordinary, because it's not an actual news story.

Reading by Tim Foley.

They Work So Hard To Manufacture Our Consent Because They Absolutely Require It

Deciding to enter the military is only morally justifiable if your country's military is used in a moral and just way. There's a weird, power-serving taboo against saying this which is born of the idea that it's more important to protect the feelings of "our troops" than to discourage people from enlisting in the most murderous war machine on earth, but it's true.

Reading by Tim Foley.

It's Immoral To Serve In An Immoral Military

I think it's probably a good thing when our idols get knocked off the pedestals we put them on. Chomsky. Bernie. The Dalai Lama. It's not healthy to elevate others to a lofty status above ourselves instead of seeing them as normal human beings who are as capable of error as anyone else.

Reading by Tim Foley.

It's Good When Idols Get Knocked Off Pedestals

Readings of all Caitlin Johnstone's articles, usually by her co-writer Tim Foley.

US Ambassador To China: "We're The Leader" Of The Indo-Pacific

Caitlin Johnstone

Related tracks