NATO member blasts US for blocking Gaza peace resolution

 

A fair world is impossible with America in it, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan said

US Ambassador to the UN Robert A. Wood speaks during a United Nations Security Council meeting on Gaza. ©  AFP / Yuki Iwamura

Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan criticized the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) on Saturday, stating that it has become a “protector of Israel” due to the influence of Washington. This statement followed the US blocking a resolution calling for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire in Gaza.

“Due to a veto by the US, no decision was reached. It’s essential for the UN Security Council to be reformed,” Erdogan stressed in his address at the World Human Rights Day event in Istanbul.

The Turkish leader argued that the world extends beyond the five permanent members of the UNSC with veto power: China, France, Russia, the UK, and the US.

Expressing disappointment in the UNSC, Erdogan, despite Türkiye being a NATO ally of the US, said, “We have lost our hope and expectation from the UN Security Council.”

Erdogan asserted that since October 7, when the Israel Defense Forces (IDF) initiated attacks on Gaza in response to an incursion by the Palestinian armed group Hamas that killed at least 1,200 people, the UNSC, “whose mission is to establish global peace, has turned into a protector of Israel.” 

Read more

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“The Israeli administration, which has the unwavering support of Western countries, is committing murderous atrocities and massacres in Gaza that will make all humans blush… A fair world is possible, but not with America, because America sides with Israel,” the Turkish president insisted.

According to the Gaza Health Ministry, the death toll from Israeli actions in the past two months stands at 17,700 people, with 48,800 others injured.

Following the breakdown of a week-long humanitarian pause with Hamas, Israel resumed its military offensive in Gaza on December 1. The US vetoed the UNSC resolution for an immediate humanitarian ceasefire on Friday, with the vote in the 15-member council being 13-1 and the UK abstaining.

US Deputy Ambassador to the UN Robert Wood justified the move, stating that a halt in fighting would allow Hamas to maintain control of Gaza and “only plant the seeds for the next war.” Wood emphasized Washington’s preference for a “durable peace” based on a two-state solution, but he argued that Hamas has “no desire” for such an outcome.

READ MORE: US blocks UN Gaza ceasefire appeal

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu welcomed the US veto, asserting that “the correct stance [was] taken by the US.” He also criticized the UNSC members who supported the ceasefire, stating that it is impossible to both endorse the elimination of Hamas and call for an end to the war against the group. “Other countries should understand that it is impossible to both support the elimination of Hamas and call for an end to the war aimed at eliminating Hamas,” the PM said.

https://www.rt.com/news/588820-us-un-gaza-erdogan/

Dying to Be Free: Releasing Palestinian Captives is Not a Numbers Game

 

BY RAMZY BAROUD

Image by Sohaib Al Kharsa.

There is a reason why Palestinians are keen on releasing their prisoners, despite the heavy price they continue to pay for their freedom.

It may seem rational to ask the question: what is the point of releasing a few Palestinian detainees from Israeli prisons, if the price of doing so is the death of over 15,000 Palestinians in Gaza?

In fact, even if all Palestinian prisoners – numbering about 7,000 – are released, they would not even amount to 30 percent of the total number of Palestinian dead and missing, so far, in the ongoing Israeli genocide in the Strip.

The logic may sound even more puzzling when we consider that, between October 7 and November 28, Israel has detained over 3,290 Palestinians in the West Bank and Occupied East Jerusalem.

Namely, the number of Palestinian women and children detainees released – following several prisoner swaps between Palestinian Resistance and the Israeli army, in the period between November 24 to November 30 – is insignificant compared to those who were detained during the same period.

But mathematical equations are irrelevant in liberation wars. Because if we resort to this kind of logic, then, perhaps, it is more rational for colonized nations and oppressed groups not to resist in the first place, because doing so could multiply the harm inflicted upon them by their colonizers and oppressors.

While Israelis see their captives, whether civilians or military, held in Gaza in terms of numbers, Palestinians approach the issue from an entirely different perspective.

All Palestinians are captives, according to the reality on the ground, because all Palestinians are victims of Israeli colonialism, military occupation and apartheid. The difference between being a prisoner in Megiddo, Ofer or Ramleh prison, for example, and being a prisoner in an isolated, walled-off Palestinian town under Israeli military Occupation in Area C in the West Bank, is rather technical.

True, those in Megiddo are subjected to more violence, torture even. They are denied proper food, medicine, and the freedom to move about. But how is that fundamentally different from the incarceration of 2.3 million people living in Gaza now?

Some would even argue that living in Gaza during a time of genocide is more confining and far less safe than being a political prisoner in Israel, under ‘normal’ circumstances.

So clearly, the issue is not related to numbers, but to power relations.

Under international law, Israel is the Occupying Power. This entitles Israel to certain rights per, for example, the Fourth Geneva Convention, but also numerous responsibilities. For decades, Israel has abused those ‘rights’ and completely ignored all its responsibilities.  Over the same period, Palestinians have appealed to – even implored – the international community to enforce international law on Israel, unsuccessfully.

This was illustrated in the pitiful display by Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas during a speech at the United Nations General Assembly on May 15. “Protect us,” he said, repeatedly, before making an analogy between Palestinians and animals. “Aren’t we human beings? Even animals should be protected. If you have an animal, won’t you protect it? Protect us!”

Most Palestinians know well that the US, West-dominated international institutions will not provide protection for Palestinians based on any kind of moral rationale or even their love for animals.

This realization dawned on Palestinians generations ago, when the international community failed to enforce a single UN resolution on Israel. Regarding the ongoing Gaza genocide, it proved particularly irrelevant, to the extent that UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres pronounced it outright when he said, on November 8, that the UN has neither “money nor power” to prevent genocide in Gaza.

Guterres and other top UN officials must be aware of the marginal role that the international community is able to play in the Israeli war on Gaza because of the strong US stance in support of Israel. As long as Washington continues to serve the role of the vanguard of Israeli war crimes in Palestine, Tel Aviv has no reason to stop.

So, Palestinians do what every other occupied, colonized people did in this situation. They resist. Through their resistance, they hope to introduce a new factor to a long-skewed equation, largely controlled by Israel and its Western allies.

By releasing their prisoners, as a direct result of their own resistance, Palestinians are, therefore, able to influence outcomes. It means that they are political agents; in fact, political actors who can redefine the rules of the game altogether.

Indeed, Palestinians approach the issue of prisoners as part of a larger campaign of liberation struggle. Those who can free 100, or 7,000 detainees would, then, set a historical precedent that would, eventually, allow them to free the whole Palestinian people.

Israel is fully aware of the power and representation of the prisoners’ issue because Israel imprisons Palestinians as an expression of power and control over every aspect of Palestinian lives. Though some of the Palestinian detainees are considered, in the eyes of Israel, ‘security prisoners’, many were detained for social media posts, for WhatsApp status, or for no reason at all.

Many Palestinian women were detained for visiting the families of other prisoners, or for mourning the deaths of Palestinian youths killed by Israel. Israel detained these women for the same reason that far-right National Security Minister Itamar Ben-Gvir had outlawed the rights of Palestinians to celebrate their children’s freedom.

Specifically, Israel wants to control every aspect of Palestinian lives – their actions, real or symbolic, but even their anger, their joy and all other emotions.

When Palestinians are released through prisoner exchanges, they emerge, proudly and with heads held high, from Israeli dungeons, despite the numerous obstacles, restrictions, and Israel’s insistence on keeping all Palestinian captives. For Palestinians, this is an unparalleled victory.

So, no, this is not a numbers game. Though every Palestinian individual matters, whether those being killed in Gaza, or those held captive in Israeli prisons, for Palestinians all issues are linked to one single project called liberation.

It is for this coveted collective freedom that Palestinians have fought, generation after generation, however the high cost of death, imprisonment, and perpetual captivity.

Ramzy Baroud is a journalist and the Editor of The Palestine Chronicle. He is the author of five books. His latest is “These Chains Will Be Broken: Palestinian Stories of Struggle and Defiance in Israeli Prisons” (Clarity Press, Atlanta). Dr. Baroud is a Non-resident Senior Research Fellow at the Center for Islam and Global Affairs (CIGA), Istanbul Zaim University (IZU). His website is www.ramzybaroud.net                        

 https://www.counterpunch.org/2023/12/08/dying-to-be-free-releasing-palestinian-captives-is-not-a-numbers-game/

Classic Intelligence Failure: The Impact Of Arrogance and Hubris

BY MELVIN GOODMAN

Image Source: Ecrusized, influenced by user Rr016 – CC BY-SA 4.0

Over the past 80 years, there have been costly intelligence failures in the United States and Israel despite sufficient intelligence collection and the presence of classic warning signals.  For the United States, the attacks on Pearl Harbor in December 1941 could have been prevented or ameliorated because we had deciphered Japanese diplomatic codes that revealed the Japanese instructions to their embassy in Washington to destroy coded materials and to break relations with the United States.  These are classic warning signals.

The failure to warn of the surprise attack on Israel by Egypt and Syria in 1973 was particularly shocking because the Israelis had a high-level Egyptian spy who provided his Israeli handlers with detailed information on the attack.  The spy was the son-in-law of Egyptian President Gamal Nasser and one of President Anwar Sadat’s closest advisers. Moreover, the CIA learned on October 4, two days before the attack, that Antonov-22 aircraft had arrived in Cairo and Damascus to withdraw the families of Soviet advisor and technicians, an indicator of imminent hostilities.  This information was shared with Mossad.

In the case of the 9/11 attacks in 2001, there was sufficient information for several years on al Qaeda’s interest in attacking the United States but, with the single exception of an article in the President’s Daily Brief in August, there was no attempt to rigorously or systematically analyze this information.  President George W. Bush was right when he dismissed the August briefing as a “cover your ass” exercise.  When a female FBI agent, Colleen Rowley, provided warning to FBI headquarters of a possible al Qaeda attack, her supervisor respond with “Well, that ain’t going to happen, Honey.”

Israel had a 40-page Hamas attack plan for more than a year before the invasion, but Israeli military and intelligence officials dismissed it as aspirational and far too difficult for Hamas to employ.  The plan called for 60 openings in the Israeli wall, but senior Israeli officials said that only two were vulnerable.  The plan called for 2,000 invaders; senior Israeli officials said Hamas could deploy no more than 70.  When a female Israeli analyst referred to a Hamas “invasion,” she was told that it could be no more than a “raid,” and that it was aspirational and imaginative.  Egyptian intelligence provided additional strategic warning several months later.

In July 2023, Israeli intelligence analysts noted that a Hamas training exercise closely followed the invasion plan.  A high-level official in Israeli military intelligence dismissed the exercise as part of a “totally imaginative” scenario, not an indication that Hamas was actually planning to carry it off.  When the invasion took place in October, according to the New York Times, it “followed the blueprint with shocking precision.”  It is not known whether Prime Minister Netanyahu was aware of the plan, but for the past several years he had dismissed Hamas as a threat, stating that Hamas was comfortable with the status quo.  (It is also unknown whether Israel shared this intelligence information with the CIA, which was customary in the run-up to the October War.)

In every one of these examples, there was evidence of cultural bias, with too many U.S. and Israeli intelligence analysts and policymakers convinced that their powers were, if not invincible, much too superior for their adversaries to challenge.  The conventional wisdom was that these adversaries would not be able to strike the United States or Israel directly.  U.S. decision makers believed that the Japanese could not develop the necessary technology to reach Pearl Harbor let alone modify weapons for the shallow waters there.

In the October War in 1973, CIA  and Mossad intelligence analysts completely underestimated the Arabs, refusing to believe that Egyptians and Syrians could cooperate at the highest level to plan and conduct an attack or that they would have the courage to take on an overwhelmingly powerful Israeli state.  CIA and Mossad analysts were guilty of a cultural arrogance that refused to accept that Arab states had the courage and ability to conduct a joint operation against Israel’s superior military forces.

As a result, after the October War, the major Israeli intelligence agency–Mossad–was given greater responsibility for both political and military intelligence.  And Israeli military intelligence established a “devil’s advocate” department to challenge conventional wisdom inside the intelligence establishment.  The devil’s advocate over the past year was apparently AWOL.  In any event, civilians in the intelligence world are just as vulnerable to cultural bias and “group think” as their military counterparts. For example, both CIA and Mossad believed that Egyptian President Sadat’s ouster of Soviet military forces meant that he had taken the military option against Israel off the table.

The CIA’s failure to provide strategic warning to the Carter administration on the political and social upheaval in Iran in the late 1970s was an additional example of cultural bias.  The failure was a corporate one that contributed to Carter’s election defeat in 1980.  The CIA totally misunderstood the emergence of Islamic Fundamentalism in the 1970s, despite the presence of the movement in Iran, Egypt, and Turkey.  The situation at the Department of State’s Bureau of Intelligence and Research was no better; INR had no full-time analyst on the problem of Iran.

The 9/11 failure was waiting to happen because the best intelligence analysts were not interested in the issue of counterterrorism, and the best operational officers considered non-state terrorist organizations such as al Qaeda to be impenetrable.  The failure was particularly stunning because intelligence analysts had access to the infamous Bojinka plot, which pointed to aerial attacks against Wall Street, the Pentagon, and the CIA headquarters in Langley, Virginia.  Even when the Philippines intelligence service provided evidence linking Ramzi Yousef, who masterminded the 1993 bombing of the World Trade Center and drafted the Bojinka plot, to a terrorist plot to hijack and destroy U.S. airliners in the Pacific, there was no reexamination of intelligence assumptions regarding terrorism.

Regarding the Hamas invasion, Israeli intelligence simply could not accept the notion that Hamas had the capability to attack, let alone the courage to do so.  The intelligence failure was a classic example of the failure of analysis and imagination.  Instead of using the invasion plan to inform or direct intelligence collection of Hamas’ capabilities and intentions, senior Israeli officials debated the reliability of the source and his seemingly incredible information.

Overall, preconceived notions based on cultural bias played a major role in the failures dealing with Pearl Harbor; the October War; 9/11; and the Hamas invasion.  Flawed assumptions played a primary role in all of these failures, and there was no mechanism for challenging conventional wisdom.  In each case, the intelligence collection was sufficient to prevent, or at least mitigate, the impending disaster, but the intelligence analysis was flawed and inadequate.  With the exception of Pearl Harbor, these intelligence failures took place in the Middle East and Southwest Asia, which points to serious problems of collection and analysis in a region that has become a briar patch for the United States and a war-torn hellscape for Israel.

Melvin A. Goodman is a senior fellow at the Center for International Policy and a professor of government at Johns Hopkins University.  A former CIA analyst, Goodman is the author of Failure of Intelligence: The Decline and Fall of the CIA and National Insecurity: The Cost of American Militarism. and A Whistleblower at the CIA. His most recent books are “American Carnage: The Wars of Donald Trump” (Opus Publishing, 2019) and “Containing the National Security State” (Opus Publishing, 2021). Goodman is the national security columnist for counterpunch.org.                                

https://www.counterpunch.org/2023/12/08/classic-intelligence-failure-the-impact-of-arrogance-and-hubris/ 

Will Hunter’s crimes destroy Joe Biden’s political career?

 

The US president’s son could face up to 17 years in prison on charges that could incriminate his father

Robert Bridge is an American writer and journalist. He is the author of 'Midnight in the American Empire,' How Corporations and Their Political Servants are Destroying the American Dream.

@Robert_Bridge

FILE PHOTO ©  ANDREW CABALLERO-REYNOLDS / AFP

The year 2023 certainly cannot end soon enough for the Biden regime. On the very same day House Republicans moved to formalize an impeachment inquiry against President Joe Biden, special counsel David Weiss filed a nine-count indictment against Hunter Biden alleging failure to file and pay taxes; evasion of tax investigation; and filing fraudulent tax returns.

The timing is no coincidence, as father and son were practically joined at bank accounts throughout Joe Biden’s two-term vice presidency, which is when the alleged criminal activities occurred.

The charges laid out in the 56-page indictment against Hunter Biden shed a painful light on his infamously fast and furious lifestyle, which included drug use and prostitutes.

“The defendant engaged in a four-year scheme to not pay at least $1.4 million in self-assessed federal taxes he owed for tax years 2016 through 2019,” the indictment read, adding that Biden “spent millions of dollars on an extravagant lifestyle rather than paying his tax bills.”

In 2018 alone, the indictment continued, Biden “spent more than $1.8 million, including approximately $772,000 in cash withdrawals, approximately $383,000 in payments to women, approximately $151,000 in clothing and accessories,” as well as a host of other expenditures, including “drugs, escorts and girlfriends, luxury hotels and rental properties, exotic cars, clothing, and other items of a personal nature.”

If found guilty of the charges (don’t hold your breath), which include three felonies and six misdemeanor offenses, Hunter Biden, 53, would be eligible for up to 17 years behind bars. Previously, Washington’s prodigal son was prepared to plead guilty to misdemeanor tax charges as part of a plea bargain, which the Republicans chastised as a “sweetheart deal” and was ultimately rejected by the judge.

READ MORE: Hunter Biden charged with $1.4 million tax evasion

Worse, it remains unknown to what degree, if any, US President Joe Biden is ensnared in his son’s international intrigues, but it isn’t looking good. And this is where the story gets very precarious for the sitting president and his future political career.

Ever since Joe Biden hit the campaign trail, he promised to the American people that he had never been involved in influence-peddling schemes with family members while serving as vice president in the Obama administration. Now that story appears to be imploding at lightning speed.

This week, House Oversight Committee Chairman James Comer released subpoenaed bank records showing an enterprise owned by Hunter Biden had made “direct monthly payments to Joe Biden.” The allegations were substantiated by the courageous work of two IRS whistleblowers.

“This wasn’t a payment from Hunter Biden’s personal account but an account for his corporation that received payments from China and other shady corners of the world,” Comer said just days before Hunter was charged. The indictment says Hunter “earned handsomely” while serving on the boards of Burisma, a Ukrainian industrial conglomerate, and a Chinese equity fund, and this is where it gets problematic for “the big guy.”

In 2017, Hunter sent a WhatsApp message censuring Henry Zhao, the CEO of Beijing-based firm Harvest Fund Management, for not fulfilling a “commitment.” He also mentioned, apparently for dramatic effect, that his father, then vice president of the United States, was sitting beside him.

“I am sitting here with my father, and we would like to understand why the commitment made has not been fulfilled,” Hunter wrote. “Tell the director that I would like to resolve this now before it gets out of hand, and now means tonight.” 

READ MORE: Hunter Biden’s Ukraine pay cut revealed

Days later, on August 4, 2017, Chinese firm CEFC Infrastructure Investment wired $100,000 to Hunter Biden’s law firm, Owasco. While it is arguably criminal to threaten a business partner by name-dropping the sitting vice president, it was also reported that at least $40,000 eventually trickled into Joe Biden’s bank account, which Hunter had tagged as a “loan repayment.”

“Payments from Hunter’s business entity to Joe Biden are now part of a pattern revealing Joe Biden knew about, participated in, and benefited from his family’s influence peddling schemes,” Comer said.  

For the record, Joe Biden has consistently denied any knowledge or participation in his son’s business dealings.

It goes without saying that Hunter Biden’s indictment and Joe Biden’s possible impeachment has been cheered on by former President Donald Trump, the leading candidate for the Republican nomination to challenge Biden in November, and the only president in US history to be impeached twice.

A final curious note about the indictment against Hunter Biden. It came as some surprise not just because Hunter happens to be the son of the most powerful octogenarian in the world, but because it happened to be a grand jury in California that handed down the indictment. Not only are we talking about the liberal capital of the free world, but it just so happens to be run by a Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, who has serious presidential ambitions. 

“I think a lot of people felt … that David Weiss was going to let these charges skate and Hunter Biden would never be held accountable for making millions of dollars overseas,” Republican lawmaker Sean Duffy told Fox News, adding that if the legal landscape worsens for the Bidens in this Los Angeles case, the Democrats will be forced to seek an “off ramp [and] look to the hair-gel governor” there in 2024.

Those who are inclined to believe that ‘there are no coincidences in politics’ will probably also not be surprised if Joe Biden is replaced as the Democratic presidential candidate in the very near future. Just a hunch.

The statements, views and opinions expressed in this column are solely those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of RT.

https://www.rt.com/news/588802-hunter-biden-crimes-joe/

Is Truth Becoming Valueless?

PAUL CRAIG ROBERTS • DECEMBER 8, 2023

The United States in the 1940s and 1950s was a far better place than it is today. There was a homogeneous population and, thereby, far more social cohesion. Pre-puberty kids, and everyone else, were far freer than they are today. On weekend days, we disappeared all day on our bikes. There were no cell phones with which to communicate with us. We even biked at night to watch Atlanta Crackers baseball games. Our bikes were always there when the game was over, and we biked home without being captured and sold into child prostitution. Our parents had no cause to worry about us.

For pocket money and to build up savings, we had paper routes. After school we delivered to nearby homes the Atlanta Journal. The Atlanta Constitution was the morning paper, delivered before or as people woke up. It was the breakfast paper that men read before they went off to their jobs. This paper was delivered by grownups. But on Sundays the papers were combined, and they were heavy. We pre-puberty kids had to get up at 4am, collect our heavy newspapers–if you put them in the front basket without stabilizing the bike, the bike would tip over–and after delivering them return home to get ready for Sunday school at church.

On Friday evenings you knocked on the door of your customers and collected 25 cents, a quarter dollar, for the week’s delivery. To cut down collection work, we endeavored to convert weekly payers to monthly payers, which was one dollar. It was difficult, as a dollar was real money, not like today. The point is that no one worried about pre-puberty kids being out delivering newspapers in the early morning dark hours or collecting from their route customers in the evening.

We were raised with the obligation instilled in us to tell the truth. A person who lied was too reprehensible to be associated with or to do business with. This standard, if applied today, would eliminate the entirety of the Western print and TV media, NPR, BBC, and all the rest of the Ministry of Propaganda, and all Western governments, and a large percentage of university faculties, administrators, and public school officials and teachers, who all lie in order to advance evil agendas, such as the demonization of white gentiles, sexual perversion, transgenderism and war.

Today the inroad on truth has reached the point in which Zionist Israel’s genocide of the Palestinian people is described as Israel’s right to self-defense, Russia’s rescue of the Donbas Russians is said to be an invasion of Ukraine, and national sovereignty is said to be fascist and racist.

In America and its Western puppet states, there is today no greater crime than to be a truth-teller. Despite habeas corpus and due process enshrined in British law and the US Constitution, Julian Assange has been illegally detained for a decade for telling the truth. Reiner Fuellmich, the Germany attorney, who was about to file charges against the pharmaceutical companies for deaths and injuries from the Covid “vaccine,” was kidnapped in Mexico by the German government and placed in solitary confinement in Germany on obviously false charges in order to prevent the lawsuit. Barry Young, the New Zealand Covid database administrator who released the official data showing that the alleged “vaccine” was a deadly killer, has been arrested for revealing the truth.

Be sure you understand what I am telling you. Those who tell you the truth are being arrested and treated worst than mass murderers. Murder is not a threat to the corrupt ruling establishment, but Truth is.

All truth-tellers have a target on their backs, including me. For reporting accurately on Putin’s hopes for reconciliation with Washington, I was labeled a “Putin agent/dupe.”

This was just the beginning. George Soros, who Elon Musk said “appears to want nothing less than the destruction of Western civilization,” finances “fact checkers” and “verification” sites, the purpose of which is to discredit those who tell the truth. The State Department, the FBI, CIA, Mossad, and any number of government agencies and official organizations in the West work overtime to discredit truth-tellers.

Wikipedia labeled me an “anti-semite” for quoting WW II historian David Irving in a book review. A truth-suppression website–NewsGuard–financed by who?–describes my website, which is read in every country in the world, as “A Conspiracy-oriented website that regularly publishes falsehoods about US election, the COVID-19 pandemic, the Russia-Ukraine war, and other issues.”

It is extraordinary that after describing me as a disinformation artist, NewsGuard accurately describes me as an Assistant Secretary of the US Treasury, a presidential appointment which requires confirmation by the US Senate in order to take office, as an editor of the Wall Street Journal, as an author of books published by Harvard University Press and Oxford University Press, highly prestigious publishers who required credibility on the part of their peer-reviewed authors.

So here I stand, with numerous top secret security clearances over many years, confirmed in a presidential appointment by the US Senate, a Wall Street Journal editor, a Business Week columnist for a dozen or more years, an academic at Stanford University and occupant for a dozen years of the William E. Simon Chair for Political Economy at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, Georgetown University, and all of these front line institutions appointed a “conspiracy theorist.”

I have the French Legion of Honor signed by French President Mitterrand, the US Treasury’s Meritorious Service Award, the US Treasury’s Silver Medal, the International Journalism Award from the Press Club of Mexico. I have been in Who’s Who In America and Who Who’s in the World for decades. I have Who’s Who in America’s Lifetime Achievement Award. I have been on boards of multi-billion dollar financial and manufacturing institutions. I have been an adviser to J.P. Morgan Guaranty Trust and other large money managers. I have endless endorsements from distinguished Americans. And a dismal unverified hired gun organization called NewsGuard declares the entire journalistic, academic, business, and political establishment to have appointed a “conspiracy theorist” to the highest positions in the society.

No, I am not bragging on myself. I am pointing out that NewsGuard has no shame. The organization declares a truth-teller who has the highest honors to be a liar.

Every corrupt, evil, material interest has money to demonize the truth. NewsGuard is one of their operatives. These are people devoid of integrity, but these sorts of sites are plentiful online, and given the insouciance of the American people, these sites might have more influence than truth-tellers.

It raises the questions: can truth prevail when endless money can shout truth down? Can truth survive when people show scant interest in supporting truth and those who tell it?

If you look objectively with open eyes at the news and at the indoctrination that passes for education, you will see that you live in a world of lies constructed by official narratives. Throughout the Western world police powers are being used to enforce the official narratives–every one of which is a lie.

Think about what this means for science and scholarship when Big Pharma-paid shills can shout down and discredit honest independent scientists, when educators can turn fiction into fact and fact into lies, when we live in Orwell’s world where Newspeak and Doublethink prevail: “War is peace,” “Freedom is slavery,” “Ignorance is strength.”

Many misinterpret 1984 as a warning against Stalinism and Nazism, but George Orwell was predicting the future of the Western world. That future is here.

Stand with me or soon you will find that you cannot stand at all.

(Republished from PaulCraigRoberts.org by permission of author or representative)

https://www.unz.com/proberts/is-truth-becoming-valueless/