Dems And Repubs Create Sneaky Backdoor to Privatize Medicare

Instead of looking to improve and expand Medicare as the majority in the U.S. favor, the Biden administration is using a back door created by the Trump administration to invite Wall St. to privatize it. Since this would be an unpopular move, a bureaucratic structure known as Direct Contracting Entities (DCE) has crept in behind the scenes.

In case you think the U.S. health care system already has too many middlemen raking in profits from people's illnesses, you ain't seen nothing yet.  

Doctors are enticed to sign up for a DCE on the promise that their revenues will go up. 

Then patients are opted into the DCE without their consent or even knowledge. They can opt out again and change doctors, but only if they know about it.

Physicians for a National Health Program has put together this explainer about the threat posed by DCEs -- which already exist in 43 states, including Maine. (It's a pdf so I can't embed it but I'll include a screenshot.)

Why would both Democratic and Republican administrations create a way for private investors to prey on the elderly or people with disabilities who currently receive Medicare?

Because when Wall St. says Jump, both Democrats and Republicans ask, How high? 

The big bucks that flow into campaign coffers on "both sides of the aisle" are what buys representation in this alleged democracy, while the people get fleeced with the government's cooperation.

We already spend the most on health -- enough and then some to fund universal health care -- and rather than good health we have lousy outcomes. The fact that we alone of rich countries have no public health system is a direct result of ultra wealthy health "insurance" corporations sponsoring our government.  

Commerce and health just don't mix.

A more in-depth discussion of DCEs is here on YouTube.

Join me in signing the PNHP petition to stop DCEs here.

Weaponized Drones Are The Real Threat To Security Say Protesters At Creech AFB In Nevada

Afghans inspect damage of Ahmadi family house after U.S. drone strike in Kabul, Afghanistan, Sunday, Aug. 29, 2021. (AP Photo/Khwaja Tawfiq Sediqi) Source: Military.com

Amid the chaotic and embarassing retreat from Taliban-controlled Afghanistan came a drone strike on the Ahmadi family whose aid worker dad was transporting water in his car with little children aboard. "The Pentagon admitted Friday an airstrike in Kabul, Afghanistan, on Aug. 29 killed 10 civilians, including seven children, but not any terrorist planners as officials first claimed," according to Military.com.

Now it is even more urgent to demand the use of flying killer robots be banned. A large group of dedicated activists return each year to the Nevada desert where U.S. drone operators sit in trailers and decide to kill entire families without enough information to evaluate whether or not those targeted actually pose a threat to security. 

Weaponized drones are the real threat to security.

Here's the organizers' press release with detailed information on the week long protest.

2019: People protest against drone warfare at the entrance to Creech Air Force Base. Six people were detained and charged with misdemeanors during the week-long event, which is held several times a year. (John Locher/AP) Source: AirForceTimes.com

PROTESTORS FROM 12 STATES CONVERGE AT CREECH AFB FOR WEEK OF PROTEST TO DEMAND AN END TO REMOTE DRONE KILLING, AND BAN ON KILLER DRONES 

Kabul Killing of Afghan family, including 3 adults and 7 children, by U.S. Drone Last Month will be Memorialized

LAS VEGAS/CREECH AFB, NV – Anti-war/anti-drone demonstrators from the East and West coasts announced they are converging here Sept. 26-Oct. 2 to hold daily protests – which will include efforts to interrupt "business as usual"  – at the U.S. Drone Base at Creech Air Force Base, an hour north of Las Vegas, Nevada. 

U.S. anti-drone activists across the country will be holding solidarity protests at drone bases and in communities across the country during the same week, to amplify their common call for a ban on killer drones.  Contact Nick Mottern for more info:  (914) 806-6179.

In the aftermath of the horrific “mistake” from a U.S. drone attack on a civilian family in Kabul last month, that left three adults and seven young children dead, protesters are demanding that the U.S. cease its secret remote assassination program that they say is illegal and immoral. 

Vigils every morning and afternoon during commute hours will take place with varied themes each day. See schedule below. Nonviolent interruptions of flow of traffic into the base are planned during the week to oppose the inherent abuse, illegality and injustice of the U.S. targeted remote assassination program.  Rejecting the very nature of U.S. extrajudicial killings that has led to the death of thousands of civilians, protesters demand an immediate ban on all killer drones. 

Many military veterans, now members of Veterans for Peace, will be joining, including post-911 veterans. The event is co-sponsored by CODEPINK, Veterans for Peace and Ban Killer Drones.

At Creech, U.S. Air Force personnel, coordinating with C.I.A. officials, are, regularly and secretly, killing people remotely using unmanned armed drone planes, primarily the MQ-9 Reaper drones.  

Thousands of civilians have been killed and injured, in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iraq, Yemen, Somalia, Libya, and elsewhere, since 2001, by U.S. drone strikes, according to independent investigative journalism.    

Over the last 20 years, the use of  armed drones have led to deadly atrocities that have included strikes on wedding parties, funerals, schools, mosques, homes, farm laborers  and in January, 2020, included direct hits on high level foreign military and government officials from Iran and Iraq.  

These drone massacres have, at times, resulted in the deaths of dozens of civilians with a single drone attack. To date not a single U.S. official has ever been held accountable for these ongoing atrocities – Yet, drone whistleblower, Daniel Hale, who leaked documents revealing the high rate of civilian casualties from U.S. drone strikes, is currently serving 45 months in prison.

“U.S. officials and military leaders exhibit total disregard for the value of human lives in the countries targeted under the so-called War on Terror,” said Toby Blomé, one of the organizers of the week long protest. “Over and over again, innocent lives are being purposefully sacrificed in drone strikes, in order for the U.S. to continue its 'counter-terrorism campaign,’” said Blomé.

“The Ahmadi family drone massacre that occurred in Kabul last month is not an example of accidental mis-judgement. It is an example of an ongoing reckless pattern of abuse whereby the U.S. assumes the right to kill a person on suspicion alone, just in case that person may be a threat, while also sacrificing everyone else who happens to be in the area,” Blomé added.

Organizers say that the only reason the truth about this recent drone tragedy was exposed is because it took place in Kabul, where investigative journalists were available to scrutinize the event. For 2 weeks after the incident U.S. military had insisted that they killed an ISIS affiliate. The evidence proved otherwise. Most drone strikes are underreported and not investigated because they occur in remote rural areas, far from international media.  

Participants of the week-long protest are calling for a complete ban on killer drones, an immediate end to the targeted killing program, and full accountability for the innocents killed, including reparations to the surviving victims of U.S. drone strikes, past and present.

“Given the murder of 10 innocent people in Kabul, including seven children, we know that the U.S. drone program is a disaster,” said organizer Eleanor Levine. “It makes enemies and it has to end now.”

Demonstrators are also calling for the immediate release of Daniel Hale  the drone whistleblower who exposed the criminality of the drone program. The documents leaked by Hale revealed that in many cases, up to 90% of those killed by U.S. drones were not the intended target. Demanding a pivotal shift toward justice, Shut Down Creech participants declare:  "Arrest the war criminals, not the truth-tellers.”

Mon, Sept 27, 6:30-8:30 a.m.  DRONE FUNERAL PROCESSION:  Dressed in black with white “death masks,” activists will process down the highway, in a solemn death march, carrying small coffins with the names of the countries that have been the primary targets of ongoing U.S. drone attacks that have led to high civilian casualties.  (Afghanistan, Syria, Iraq, Somalia, Yemen, Pakistan and Libya)

Mon, Sept 27, 3:30-5:30 p.m. "DRONE ATTACKS ARE…”  Participants will hold large bold signs with varied descriptive words to demonstrate the failure of the U.S. Drone Program:   ILLEGAL, RACIST, IMMORAL, BARBARIC, CRUEL, FUTILE, WRONG, DISGRACEFUL, etc.

Tues, Sept.28 , 6:30 - 8:30 a.m. THE DRONE MASSACRE MEMORIAL:  A long series of banners will be stretched along the highway, each one highlighting details of past U.S. drone massacres, including strikes that have hit wedding parties, funerals, schools, farm laborers and mosques.  Statistics on civilian deaths are included on each banner. This time, the horrific tragedy of the Ahmadi family killed in a Kabul neighborhood will be added to the historical record.

Tues, Sept 28, 3:30 - 5:30 p.m.  THE WAR IS A LIE;  To demonstrate the concept that the "first casualty in war is the truth,” a series of signs will convey examples: Presidents Lie, Congress Lies, Generals Lie, CIA lies, etc.  The messages will conclude with banners calling on more critical thinking:  Question Authority; Resist the Lies They Tell...Resist the Wars They Sell;  Truth-teller and Drone Whistleblower, Daniel Hale, will be featured:  "FREE DANIEL HALE.”

Wed, Sept 29, 6:30 - 8:30 a.m.   GO BACK, WRONG WAY!  A nonviolent, peaceful action will be planned to “interrupt business as usual” and to resist the illegal and immoral activity that takes place at Creech Killer Drone Base.  Details will be available later in the week.  NO MORE DEATHS! Other nonviolent acts of resistance may be planned at other times during the week.

Wed, Sept 29, 3:30 - 5:30 p.m.  ALTERNATIVES TO WAR;  A series of signs will offer alternatives to the military working at Creech AFB:  Doctors NOT Drones, Bread NOT Bombs, Housing NOT Hellfire Missiles, Peace Jobs NOT War Jobs, etc.

Thurs. Sept 30, 6:30 - 8:30 a.m.  “CREECHERS FOR THE PLANET”;  In a playful approach to connect the very serious global problems of climate crisis and environmental devastation with militarism, participants will dress in their favorite “Creecher Costumes” (Creature Costumes) and/or hold large animal puppets, while holding educational signs "connecting the dots”:  U.S. Military #1 Polluter, War is Toxic, End War for Climate Justice, U.S. Military = #1 User of FOSSIL FUEL, War in NOT Green:  PROTECT EARTH, etc.

Thurs. Sept 30, 3:30 - 5:30 p.m.  TBD:  Creech AFB may or may not have a vigil.  Stay tuned for updates.  A Las Vegas Anti-drone Street Theater Action planned at the Fremont Street Pedestrian Mall (4:00 - 6:00pm) in Las Vegas.  Details to come later. 

Fri. Oct. 1, 6:30 - 8:30 a.m.  FLY A KITE, NOT A DRONE;  In a colorful display of beautiful kites in the sky, participants will hold their final demonstration of the week, focusing on the positive benefits of alternatives to war, where all sides win.  The central large banner:  DIPLOMACY NOT DRONES!  The vigil will also honor the Afghan People, who have been forced to live under the terror of U.S. drones for 20 years, with immeasurable human losses.  The U.S. has “officially withdrawn” it’s troops and closed it’s bases in Afghanistan, the most droned country on earth; however, the drone strikes are expected to continue under Biden’s unspecified “Over the Horizon” policy.  Another large banner will declare:   STOP DRONING AFGHANISTAN:  20 YEARS ENOUGH!

Contact:  
Toby Blomé, 510.501.5412;  toby4peace@sonic.net
Eleanor Levine, 510-290-7071;  eastbaycodepink@gmail.com

For more details:   www.ShutDownCreech

AUKUS Excludes, Angers France And It's Odd Because Acronym Cries Out For An F

Photo of Bush speech program folder source: @JebSprague (graphic overlay by me)

I've been watching with delight the news that rehabilitated (by the corporate media) war criminal President George W. Bush cannot speak in public without being confronted by veterans and their family members.

W's hecklers reported scattered boos but also complimentary responses from the audience and even police. 

Here is video of me shutting down George Bush last night.

The wars he started in the Middle East damaged the lives of so many. He wasted trillions of $ for nothing.

Meanwhile, he’s made tens of millions of $ in speaker fees since leaving office. Sick!pic.twitter.com/RqV7poonAz

— Jeb Sprague (@JebSprague) September 22, 2021

https://t.co/5ohAdxxBJk

— FREE PALESTINE (@MikePrysner) September 20, 2021

When Michelle Obama tells reporters that she and W are on friendly terms because "our values are the same," this must be inconvenient for the blaring narrative that there are huge, HUGE differences between the Democratic and Republican parties. But in the cult of personality surrounding the chief executive office of the U.S., a good smile for the cameras counts as a "value" I guess.

Fawning over the architect of the War on Terror is likely a needed counterweight to the public's vast dillusionment with the war on Afghanistan coming to an end (sort of). 

source: https://socialistchina.org/2021/09/22/aukus-a-dangerous-military-escalation-of-the-new-cold-war/

And the absurdly named AUKUS rises from its ashes.

The "security pact" to menace China in its own backyard has angered France due to the cancellation of a lucrative contract to build submarines for Australia. The Aussies will now purchase U.S.-made nuclear-powered submarines capable of launching nuclear weapons.

The nonsensical aspect of Australian "defence" menacing its chief trading partner is beautifully captured in this clip from the satirical show Utopia.

This is the kind of international relations we in the U.S. get when our Secretary of "Defense" just resigned and cashed out from the board of Raytheon. (And many of the Pentagon brass arrived through the revolving door from other big weapons manufacturers like General Dynamics, Boeing, and Northrup Grumann.)

When President Obama announced a "pivot to Asia" he was hampered by having to operate under the auspices of that belligerent alliance, NATO. China is just so inconveniently far from the North Atlantic. (As was Afghanistan. But, 9/11.)

In the intervening years, the U.S. has bullied Japan into dropping its post WW2 commitment to self-defense only and has continuously built up military bases in Okinawa, South Korea, and Australia.

War as a marketing scheme continues to make its purveyors filthy rich.

War as a lived experience continues to produce corpses, orphans, widows, PTSD, starvation, and massive contributions to climate chaos -- our biggest actual security threat.

Maybe this is why the People's Republic of China does not start wars?

Haters Gonna Hate Haitians

© Paul Ratje/AFP via Getty Images

United States Border Patrol agents on horseback try to stop Haitian migrants from entering an encampment on the banks of the Rio Grande near the Acuna Del Rio International Bridge in Del Rio, Texas on September 19, 2021.

Many people leave social media platforms like Facebook because they become sickened by displays of hatred toward marginalized groups.

The astounding ignorance of history that underlies comments about refugees massing at the Mexican border in Texas underlies current hate speech in response to videos of Border Patrol agents on horseback whipping Black migrants. I'm not going to repeat any of their nastiness but I am going to respond to a Maine news outlet's post of the whipping story that generated a long string of comments from haters.

The super wealthy who own media outlets have taught white people to hate immigrants and fear that their presence contributes to the steady decline of wealth for working class people and the truly poor. 

Conservative haters are fond of the word patriotism and they express love for national borders with cruel practices in place to keep non-white people out of the U.S.

How much do they or you or I really know about Haiti and the people emigrating from there in the 21st century? What, if anything, does the U.S. owe them?

Here's a thumbnail sketch of significant events in Haiti's history:

• Haiti is 1/3 of the Caribbean island colonized by Europeans after genocidal maniac Columbus made landfall there in 1492.

• Haiti was once France's richest colony, using the labor of Africans who had been kidnapped from their homes and enslaved on plantations.

• Haiti successfully overthrew its colonial masters with a revolution 1791-1804. They established the first Black republic and were the second to successfully break away from the colonizers who exploited them (guess who the first was?).

• Crippling debt in the form of reparations to France was agreed to in order to gain diplomatic recognition as a legitimate country. 90 million gold francs would be equivalent to around $21 billion today. Haitians endured poverty while these payments to the already wealthy France were made for decades.

• The U.S. Marine Corps invaded and occupied Haiti 1915-1934. They imposed trade relations favorable to the U.S. that continued to impoverish Haitians.

• Starting in the 1980's, the CIA funded and otherwise supported the Haitian military and the Haitian National Intelligence Service.

• Beginning in 1990 popular candidate Jean-Bertrand Aristide was elected president. A military coup forced him out and he went into exile until 1994 when he returned and served out his term.

• The U.S. military again occupied Haiti 1994-1997.

• Aristide was re-elected in a landslide in 2000. A military coup removed him in 2004 and he went into exile again.

• In 2010 Haitians suffered a devastating earthquake followed by a flood of alleged aid workers and peace keepers that brutally exploited upheaval and chaos following the quake. 200,000 died and many of the survivors emigrated to South America. Those people and their children who were born abroad are a large proportion of the migrants now gathered in Texas.

• In July, 2021 President Jovenel Moïse, who was closely aligned with the U.S. and the Haitian military and overstaying his term of office, was assassinated.

• Last month (August, 2021) Haitians suffered another big earthquake killing around 2,000 and injuring around 12,000 people.

• Climate chaos in the form of devastating hurricanes strikes Haiti regularly.

• Mass deportations even of people not born in Haiti are the Biden administration's response to the suffering at the border.

• Haiti remains the poorest nation in the Western hemisphere.

If you read this far hoping that U.S. President Joe Biden, a Democrat, would come off better than his immigrant-hating predecessor -- the reality is far more disappointing.

My photo -- Federal building, Bangor, Maine, July 3, 2019

Because guess what? There are still children being kept in cages for crossing the border, too. And it's still a national disgrace.

Dems And Repubs Team Up To Profit From CMP Corridor Project

I fished my copy of this junk mail out of the trash.

I wanted to share the latest in deceptive advertising funded by big money interests promoting a loathsome clear cut through the northern Maine woods. 

Photo credit: Joel Dorr

Miles of tree removal eliminates their beauty and carbon sequestration in a time of climate chaos in order to enable a transmission line from Canada to Massachusetts. That project will benefit Canadian energy behemoth Hydro-Quebec, Spanish energy behemoth Iberdrola (owner of Central "Maine" Power, or CMP), and Goldman Sachs (the project's investment bankers).

The project is strongly opposed by most actual people who live in Maine.

A bill to block foreign corporate entities from pouring money into Maine to influence the outcome of referendum items was vetoed by Democratic Governor Janet Mills. She also vetoed the bill to establish a consumer-owned utility in Maine that would replace the rapacious CMP. 

Do I need to tell you that Mills supports the CMP corridor project?

Do I need to tell you that her predecessor, a Republican, also supported the CMP project?

I heard Bangor Daily News political editor Michael Shepherd laughing with conservative radio host Mike Violette (starts at 3:55 mark in the clip) about the strange bedfellows teaming up to produce the deceptive message: Willy Ritch, former spokesperson for progressive Democrat Congresswoman Chellie Pingree and Adrienne Bennett, former spokesperson for arch conservative Republican Governor Paul LePage.

Willy Ritch was last seen in action heading up the 16 Counties Coalition, a Democratic Party front group that aimed to unseat incumbent Senator Susan Collins. He presided over a "with or without her" town hall event in Portland in August, 2019 that my husband and I attended. 

My husband, Mark Roman, submitted a question on military spending at the August 20, 2019 meeting managed by Willy Ritch, so I know there was at least one in the pile.

Ritch allowed not a single question "from the audience" about the military whose budget is well over half the federal discretionary budget each year, and only one question on climate despite these perilous times. 

So, he is an experienced manager of messaging and public perception, whose last job boiled down to "Republicans bad, Democrats good." 

I suppose Ritch and Bennett are chummy in the way of paid professional communicators who will work for whoever is paying well at the moment.

Their newest astroturf group, Mainers For Fair Laws, wants voters to believe that, if something illegal was done in the past -- like issuing permits for use of public lands without the necessary consent of 2/3 of the legislature -- rescinding it now would be dangerous.

But we should and often do overturn bad laws to set things straight. For instance, Black people were once counted as 3/5 of a person in the census. (Some people argued against fixing that, too.)

The battle against the CMP corridor continues on many fronts: a lawsuit aimed at the corporate-controlled DEP, and November's upcoming referendum question among them.

Want to stand with Native people whose lands are destroyed by mega dams to produce dirty energy in Canada?

Do We Really Have A Free Press In the U.S.? You Be The Judge

My graphic incorporating the now disappeared photo of napalm on the runway in Brunswick, 2012.

One of the reasons I started writing this blog in 2010 was to keep my head from exploding over current events.

The other reason is a persistent interest in battling information control. I am inspired by blogs and websites who peek around the corporate media monolith and report what they see and hear. 

I've written about this big picture topic many times but today I thought I'd share a specific, detailed example of information control on behalf of the U.S. military by corporate news entities in my home state of Maine.

Recently the Blue Angels brought their noise and air polluting daredevil show to Brunswick and I organized a protest that included speeches. It's not the first time I've protested air shows which are recruiting events and terribly harmful to our already struggling climate.

In my remarks, I mentioned that in 2012 the same air show had burned napalm on the runway as a grand finale. Vietnam vets that were inside at the time recognized it and I heard them talk about it; also, the local newspaper The Forecaster ran a photograph of the napalm burning with a plane overhead as part of their August 26, 2012 coverage of the show.

In my blog post about it, I inserted the photo using a url that directly linked to the photo. I used to put photos in blog posts this way because it was faster than downloading and then uploading photos, and also because it was more respectful to the source as it pinged back to them if a reader clicked on it.

Sadly, this is what my blog post looks like today:

Ok, so the old link is broken. Happens all the time. Just go to the archive of The Forecaster and get it again, right?

Wrong.

The Forecaster, now owned by the Portland Press Herald, mysteriously has no archived articles about that air show -- a two-day event that typically produces at least two articles. In fact, it mysteriously has zero articles on any topic for the two day duration of the show: August 25 & 26, 2012. 

Bear with me, it gets even stranger.

In my searching I did uncover an article reporting on the planned protests for the 2012 air show from a press release sent out by the organizers of the protest. This is from the Times Record, another local paper now owned by the Portland Press Herald. 

It, too, has a missing photograph though the caption remains humorously intact:

Who is this dude? No idea. 

Did a clerical error result in his face appearing where the banner pic was intended to go? We'll probably never know but in case you're curious, here's the banner:

Bruce Gagnon and Mark Roman at air show protest Sep. 4, 2021 Photo credit: Gigi Larc

Fast forward to this week when the Times Record refused to print a letter to the editor by Brunswick organizer Rosie Paul about the 20th anniversary of a weekly vigil for peace. Especially significant on the 20th anniversary of the events of 9/11, wouldn't you say? 

Here's the text of her letter:

Greater Brunswick PeaceWorks marks this Twentieth Anniversary

In the week following 9/11/01, members of the Brunswick community met together looking for what might be an effective response to the tragic events of that date.

We put out a call for a Vigil for Peace for that next Friday at 5, a Vigil urging non-retaliation so we could move ahead wisely from the crossroad all of us faced.

On that Friday, and for several subsequent Fridays, the edge of the Town Green was lined with as many as 90 community members who felt keenly the need to reflect on what had happened, to think about why it may have happened, and to see how we could help to shape a response that would lead to more understanding and certainly not to more violence.

When the United States chose to retaliate against Iraq and Afghanistan, the numbers at the vigil dropped, both in frustration and in disappointment. A core of some 10-15 members has met at the edge of the Green nearly every Friday since.

Gradually we gave our group a name - PeaceWorks of Greater Brunswick – and set about organizing monthly discussions, film showings, presentations of various kinds, and an annual Peace Fair to celebrate and build on the connections among Maine’s many non-profit groups working for Justice and Peace.

The weekly vigil has continued – fondly known as “Honk for Peace” – and we find our numbers growing again, infused with energy from other areas where violence needs to give way to compassion and cooperation: The Black Lives Matter Movement , The Poor People’s Campaign, and the looming Climate Crisis – all of them connected and all of them crying out for us to wake up, to find the sustainable future we know is possible.

You are warmly invited to join us on the Green (opposite Walgreens) next Friday and for as many Fridays as you can. www.peaceworksbrunswickme.org

Rosalie Paul, Brunswick 

Rosie's queries about why the letter was rejected have met with stonewalling by executive editor John Swinconeck. 

No surprise to me since Swinconeck is the one who terminated Peaceworks' monthly column which Rosie used to coordinate and where I was sometimes published. His reason given at the time was that there was not enough local content in our columns. That won't fly for her recent letter so he simply said, we have no plans to publish this letter at any time.

All this came up because someone who heard me speak on September 4 about napalm being burned for entertainment in 2012 was questioned by an acquaintance who was incredulous that it could be true. So she reached out to me for evidence, and I began my futile search.

Do we really have a free press in the U.S.? You be the judge.

Luke Sekera-Flanders: Reconsider What It Means To Be A Patriot

 

Luke Sekera-Flanders, photo by Ellen Davidson

Growing up in a rural town and through attending public school, I was often exposed to military propaganda.

From kindergarten through 5th grade, each class would have to put on a patriotic performance for the school, whether singing songs like “Proud To Be An American,” making skits depicting war, or listing reasons why America was the greatest country in the world - mainly its military. At my high school, and at all sorts of community events, myself and other young teenagers were presented an enticing image of what military service could offer us: financial benefits, community, and purpose.

But as I learned through my own research, there is far greater reason to be opposed to militarism and the military-industrial complex. For one, investing in war as deeply as the U.S. has robs us of so many opportunities to pursue a healthier, safer future. Changes in our climate and environmental destruction pose an ever increasing threat to human health and safety, and the U.S. military is a leading contributor to this emerging crisis that is rarely addressed. According to a 2019 study, the military emits more greenhouse gasses into the atmosphere than 140 countries. 

my photo

The Blue Angels and shows like it serve as a recruiting tool and a flex of America’s air power, which has been consistently used to devastate civilians across the world as recently as last weekend, when a drone strike on a supposed ISIS target in Afghanistan killed 10 civilians, including 8 children. And because of the marriage between government and corporations, U.S. foreign policy, including decisions to go to war, are dictated by economic interests - and corporations who profit from war are happy to risk military and civilian lives for profit.

Imagine if we invested so much as a fraction of our swelling “defense” budget toward proactively mitigating the coming effects of climate change, such as water insecurity. As of 2014, there were 39,000 different sites in the U.S., including multiple waterways, that were severely contaminated because of environmental disregard by the military. The military supposedly exists for our security - and yet the threat of a coming water crisis has been practically ignored. Climate scientists warn that as climate change worsens, droughts will become more frequent and more severe, even in regions that had seen abundance of water. Water is the cornerstone of all life on earth, so as water scarcity worsens, it will take the forefront of geopolitical issues as the century progresses. A couple years ago, the World Economic Forum confirmed this, placing the probability of future wars being fought over water sources at 95%.

photo by Nickie Sekera

We need to invest in public water infrastructure now, so that corporations don't have their hand on the tap nor the excuse to drag us into an overseas war over water.

While corporate media and the mainstream of environmentalism insist that the solution to climate change can be achieved with consumer choices and electing milquetoast reformers, the real culprits go without any accountability.

Imperialism is costly in all respects.

It detracts from what could be invested in healthcare, education, environmental protection and social services. It subjugates, traumatizes, exploits, and robs self determination from people across the world, for little more than political utility and economic gain for corporations.

photo by Peter Woodruff

Its drain on resources and massive pollution condemns future generations to a future of resource scarcity.

We need to end the military-industrial complex, and reconsider what it means to be a patriot. 

-- Luke Sekera Flanders, Community Water Justice

All banners by the Artists' Rapid Response Team of the Maine Union of Visual Artists.

9/11 Is But One Piece Of The Puzzle

A visual comparison of deaths at the World Trade Center and deaths from the pandemic caused by the COVID-19 virus and its variants.

Unlike today's students being preyed upon by military recruiters counting on manufactured patriotism -- patriotism on steroids since the unfortunate events of 9/11 -- I was there. No, not in NYC, or Washington DC, or even in Maine where one of the alleged masterminds of the alleged takedown of the twin towers in lower Manhattan boarded his first plane.

I was in California, on my way to work, with a preteen child in the car -- one whose sense of security was demolished on Sep. 11, 2001.

A few years later I was back in Maine trying to count the flags that had sprung up everywhere (too many to count in a car traveling 45 mph).

Some things are best understood in retrospect.

That nearly 3,000 "Americans" (27 were actually foreign nationals) died in the World Trade Center was a fact repeated as often as the videos of both towers collapsing. Oh, and WTC Building 7 which collapsed 8 hours later. This magnitude of death was the pretext for going to war on Afghanistan which allegedly harbored the Saudi masterminds of the terrorist attack. Except it was Pakistan doing the harboring. But they have nuclear weapons, don't they?

The main things that 9/11 provided were an enormous spectacle to justify the endlessly profitable wars of imperial expansion for the U.S., sometimes doing business as NATO.  (If you wonder what NATO is doing in Australia since that's about as far from North Atlantic as you can get, maybe read blogger Caitlin Johnstone.)

The other signficant thing that 9/11 provided cover for was the 300 page so-called Patriot Act which gutted constitutional rights of citizens and terrorists alike. Swiftly gutted them, and created the Department of Homeland Security and created ICE -- both of which we had gotten along without prior to 9/11.

A lot of torture happened after 9/11. No, not the torture of being an Afghan or Pakistani child trying to sleep while surveillance robots droned overhead 24/7 waiting to unleash their Hellfire missiles on your home. Torture in secret prisons and in the gulag known as Guantánamo which is on Cuba's territory without their consent.

Torture that resulted in persecution of torture whistleblowers. 

Torture of Chelsea Manning for refusing to reveal how she shared evidence of U.S. war crimes. 

Torture of Julian Assange for sharing evidence of U.S. and allied forces' war crimes and dirty financial dealings. 

Almost torture of Edward Snowden for revealing the spying that digital technology and security state overreach have made ubiquitous. He lives in exile in Moscow now, with his young family, still trying to warn us about how to protect ourselves from the "security" state.

9/11 was used to justify war on Iraq via lies that Saddam Hussein had something to do with it. 

Source: Brown University, Watson Institute, Costs of War Project

9/11 was used to drive fossil fuel consumption and thus climate crisis.

9/11 was used to justify war on people in Syria. And Yemen. And Somalia. 

9/11 was used to consolidate U.S. government support of Israel's human rights violations and war crimes against Palestinians.

Source: The Daily Times "Eagleton fifth-graders study 9/11" Sep. 10, 2016 

9/11 was used to produce a lot of canned curriculum that teachers are told they must use to inform kids that are not upset about 9/11. 

Becuase they were not even born when it happened.

And really, how much should they care about 9/11? Their young lives have been upended by a public health disaster of far greater proportions, still rampaging out of control. This time the heroes they're encouraged to worship aren't in firefighter or military uniforms, they're in scrubs and PPE.

What will this much larger disaster be used for?