Fear of Democracy

As all our noble presidents such as Donald Trump and Barak Obama and George W. Bush have reminded us, there are many dictatorial and collective governments which are not only jealous of our democracy, but fear it as well. They fear that Western democracy may expand in their land and spark a popular uprising. Almost every citizen of the Western world has accepted to be the inhabitant of a great nation that enjoys democracy to the fullest. There have been many referendums initiated to prove that people in democratic countries of the west acknowledge their freedom and cherish it, and will fight to keep such God given, State provided freedom of choice from any hostile attack. Of course, it stems partially from the capitalist system in the West that gives everyone choices in abundance. This democracy is spread out all over Western countries, which can be narrowed down to the freedom one can experience in the United States. For instance, we elect our own government representatives through elections, with the last one completed just a few days ago. National elections in the US are from seven o’clock in the morning until eight o’clock at night on the first Tuesday of November of every other year. You may ask why it is in November when it is cold in many of the states because of rain and snow, which makes it hard to stand in lines for hours to vote. The logical answer is to examine how much one values his or her democracy and would sacrifice for his country, just one day every other year to exercise his or her choice granted by forefathers of this great nation. It is in fact a test to see how much one can withstand blizzard in order to elect his or her representatives. You may also ask why on a Tuesday, a day that everyone is at work, and considering the present economy, some have to have two jobs and therefore will never get a chance to vote in elections. There is a simple response to this question as well, which we call auto-selection, meaning that right persons to vote are automatically selected this way. It is not surprising to say that not all people are intelligent enough to know how to elect a candidate, and intelligent people are occupied in an occupation that allows them to spare one day every other year to exercise their rights to vote. As a result of this auto-selection, wrong candidates are automatically prevented from winning the election. Some people speak of what they call “voter suppression”, claiming that some tactics are used to prevent people of certain races or economic classes to vote. In a democracy, any innovative way to win the election is in fact a sign of democracy. Those who are intelligent enough to find inventive and groundbreaking ideas to win an election, deserve fruits of their accomplishments. Finally, there are those who believe that money should not be involved in politics. Ronald Reagan brought about a new economic system that he called “trickle down economy”. It meant for a society to be economically fair, rich people needed to become so rich that when they held their wealth in currency and in the palm of both hands, money would trickle down from their hands, and the rest of the society could pick those extra wealth up. That is why every president since then, Democrat or Republican, has eased taxing the rich. For the same reason, money in politics is favored by every president who has been backed by industry which is the backbone of a capitalist economy, and even our judiciary branch of the government considered corporations as people, who could contribute to candidates of their choice any amount they could afford. This is the true meaning of democracy.

Why Iran Needs a War Economy

November 6, 2018
Link: https://www.counterpunch.org/2018/11/06/why-iran-needs-a-war-economy/
by Ismael Hossein-Zadeh

Faced with the relentless U.S. economic war, Iran needs a war economy. Indeed, the plan of a war economy should not be very difficult for Iran to implement since it has a relatively successful experience of carrying out such a plan: during the 8-year war with Saddam Hussein’s Iraq, Iran embarked on an extensive state-guided economic management that effectively provided for both its military and civilian needs. Because of the revolutionary atmosphere of the time, and because of the corresponding spirit of generosity, selflessness, social cohesion, and national unity the country was able to effectively withstand both the military and economic wars launched against its territory and its people. Despite the extremely costly war, both in terms of blood and treasure, and despite the fact that Iran’s total output, or national income, at the time was only a fraction of what it is today, its people did not experience nearly as much economic hardship as they do today. Why? Mainly because its national resources were at the time distributed relatively equitably—unlike today where those resources are monopolized and plundered by a clique of financial oligarchs and economic mafias.

The Price Of Bin Salman’s Head

By Ghassan Kadi
October 26, 2018
Link: http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/50507.htm

With the ever-changing and escalating aftermath of the Khashoggi disappearance episode, there remain many fixed marks that are interesting to identify.

But before we do, we must stop and briefly look at the official American, Turkish and Saudi stands on this issue.

The Americans are best seen to be playing yoyo with their Saudi “friends”. One moment they seem to be totally abandoning them and sending them spiraling down in a free-fall, and the next moment they lift them up, clutch them, and give them a sense of safety. Notwithstanding that on the 3^rd of October, and just before the Khashoggi story hit the media frenzy, Trump reiterated that Saudi Arabia would not last two weeks without America’s support, and what followed was a series of fluctuations and backflips on the American side. At the time of promising severe measures against the Saudis, Trump said that this will not mean canceling the arms deal with Saudi Arabia. And when Pompeo visited Al Saud to talk to the royals, leaving the Kingdom of Sand with an understanding that his boss Trump articulated by hinting at vindicating the royals and putting the blame on some rogue elements, America turned again supporting Turkish investigations and awaiting their outcome, but just before Erdogan’s speech of the 23^rd of October, Trump reiterated that he was prepared to accept the Saudi Government denial of involvement.

Saudi Spy Met With Team Trump About Taking Down Iran

By Betsy Woodruff And Erin Banco
October 26, 2018
Link: http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/50504.htm

Gen. Ahmed al-Assiri, the Saudi intelligence chief taking the fall for the murder of journalist Jamal Khashoggi, hobnobbed in New York with Michael Flynn and other members of the transition team shortly before Trump’s inauguration. The topic of their discussion: regime change in Iran.

Mohammed bin Salman, the powerful Saudi crown prince, dispatched Assiri from Riyadh for the meetings, which took place over the course of two days in early January 2017, according to communications reviewed by The Daily Beast. The January meetings have come under scrutiny by special counsel Robert Mueller’s office as part of his probe into foreign governments’ attempts to gain influence in the Trump campaign and in the White House, an individual familiar with the investigation told The Daily Beast. A spokesperson for Mueller declined to comment.

Report Says Russia-gaters Should Go Quietly in the Night

By Caitlin Johnstone

Link: https://consortiumnews.com/2018/10/20/report-says-russia-gaters-should-go-quietly-in-the-night/

In a new article titled “Mueller report PSA: Prepare for disappointment”, Politico cites information provided by defense attorneys and “more than 15 former government officials with investigation experience spanning Watergate to the 2016 election case” to warn everyone who’s been lighting candles at their Saint Mueller altars that their hopes of Trump being removed from office are about to be dashed to the floor.

“While [Mueller is] under no deadline to complete his work, several sources tracking the investigation say the special counsel and his team appear eager to wrap up,” Politico reports.

The Royal Touch

By: Ben Freeman
Oct. 4, 2018

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 How Saudi Money Keeps Washington at War in Yemen

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It was May 2017. The Saudis were growing increasingly nervous. For more than two years they had been relying heavily on U.S. military support and bombs to defeat Houthi rebels in Yemen. Now, the Senate was considering a bipartisan resolution to cut off military aid and halt a big sale of American-made bombs to Saudi Arabia. Fortunately for them, despite mounting evidence that the U.S.-backed, supplied, and fueled air campaign in Yemen was targeting civilians, the Saudi government turned out to have just the weapon needed to keep those bombs and other kinds of aid coming their way: an army of lobbyists.

That year, their forces in Washington included members of more than two dozen lobbying and public relations firms. Key among them was Marc Lampkin, managing partner of the Washington office of Brownstein Hyatt Farber Schreck (BHFS), a company that would be paid nearly half a million dollars by the Saudi government in 2017. Records from the Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA) show that Lampkin contacted Senate offices more than 20 times about that resolution, speaking, for instance, with the legislative director for Senator Tim Scott (R-SC) on May 16, 2017. Perhaps coincidentally, Lampkin reported making a $2,000 contribution to the senator’s political action committee that very day. On June 13th, along with a majority of his fellow senators, Scott voted to allow the Saudis to get their bombs. A year later, the type of bomb authorized in that sale has reportedly been used in air strikes that have killed civilians in Yemen.

ریشه‌یابیِ پدیدار شدنِ رژیم اسلامی و رهائی از آن

 در مورد رژیم حاکم بر ایران و دلایل وجودیِ آن نظریات متفاوتی ابراز شده است. بسته به اینکه افراد با چه گرایش سیاسی نظر میدهند، در واقع از موضع آن دیدگاه سیاسی سخن میرانند. مجاهدین که در اوان انقلاب با پشتیبانی‌ عظیمی‌ که داشتند، و چنانچه دخالت‌ خمینی نبود براحتی می‌توانستند حکومت را در دست بگیرند، هم اکنون به چنان نقطه ضعفی رسیده‌اند که به دنبال هارترین شخصیتهای سیاسی آمریکا در پی براندازی حکومت ایران از طریق یورش نظامی غرب هستند. سلطنت طلبان نیز همین راه را در پیش گرفته‌اند، که البته از آنها انتظار دیگری نمی‌رود. عقیده سلطنت طلبان در مورد چگونگی‌ پیدایش رژیم آخوندی این است که چون شاه در آستانه رسیدن به تمدن بزرگ بود، ملت (و نه دولتهای غربی) که خوشی‌ زیر دلشان زده بود و از پول نفت که شاه افزایش داده بود شکم‌هایشان سیر شده بود، به شاه محبوب‌شان پشت کردند. البته از اینکه مجاهدین و ملی‌ گریان از نخستین روز به دنبال خمینی افتادند، به دلیل جنبه‌های مذهبی‌ که داشتند استبعادی نیست. ولی‌ از اینکه گروه‌های چپ‌گرا، حتی زمانیکه خمینی دندانهای هار و کریه خود را نشان داد، همچنان به دنبال او سینه میزدند، باعث حیرت بود.

Soundtrack of the Revolution

Every revolution has its own victims. A political revolution terminates the regime in charge in favor of a new regime. This change dramatically affects every facet of life, as it outmodes and prosecutes old values to be replaced with new ones. Those who belonged to the old system, especially ex-government officials in high ranking, are surrendered or sacrificed in the process. One of the early victims of the Islamic Revolution was joy, or celebration, and happiness in general! For instance, it was forbidden to clap hands in response to an atmosphere of delight, or in appreciation of. As Islam (categorically Shia) is the religion of weeping and mourning, anything that would elate someone was banned. Among the first instruments of joy were musical and game apparatuses, as they have traditionally been forbidden by Islam. Of course Islam’s attack on women was almost at the same time. Ironically, no matter how much Khomeini and his followers tried to keep women hidden in a sack, and in spite of daily violence against them, women in Iran are considered exemplary for all women in the Middle East. In addition to their success in education and music, they have changed the rigid hijab decree by many fashionable forms, and as of today they are still fighting against the roots of it. A speech was distributed in social media of the most reactionary and fossil brain mullah who professed what Khomeini and other mullahs have always had in mind, but they have never dared to verbalize it. He said: “God created three kinds of animals. One that is for carrying human’s load, such as donkey, mule, and horse. A second kind for humans to eat, such as cow, sheep, and chicken. And finally he created a third kind for men to enjoy, called women. Of course, in order for human being not to get scared of them, He created them like humans! There should be (or there may be) another book specifically about this subject, however it was mentioned briefly here since women have been more involved in music, and its sanction has impacted them more. But, like other liberties that Islamists tried to impede and did not succeed, music, film, and other expressions of art which were not approved by Khomeini at the beginning, found new ways of expressing themselves, and continues to expand.

FASTING

What is the most popular way of losing weight? This has been a long-time question for those who believe they have an extra layer of fat. Forget low carb, Atkinson, exercise, calorie count, calorie restriction and all the old ways of losing weight. The new way is in fact one of the oldest way of discharging extra layer, although it was not necessarily undertaken to lose weight.

عمر خيام؛ نابغه پرسشگر - مستند

عاشقانه= فروغ فرخزاد

ای شب از رویای تو رنگین شده سینه از عطر تو ام سنگین شده ای به روی چشم من گسترده خویش شادی‌ام بخشیده از اندوه بیش همچو بارانی که شوید جسم خاک هستیم ز آلودگی‌ها کرده پاک

با تو ام دیگر ز دردی بیم نیست
هست اگر، جز درد خوشبختیم نیست

ای تپش‌های تن سوزان من آتشی در سایۀ مژگان من ای ز گندم‌زارها سرشارتر ای ز زرین شاخه‌ها پُر بارتر ای در بگشوده بر خورشیدها در هجوم ظلمت تردیدها

The Costs of 9/11 Continue to Mount

By Paul Craig Roberts

September 11, 2018

Source: http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/50236.htm

This is the 17th anniversary of 9/11. During the years that have passed large numbers of experts have established conclusively that the official government account of the event is false. Every year fewer people believe the unbelievable conspiracy theory that a handful of Saudi Arabians outwitted the entirety of the US National Security State and attacked with hijacked airliners the World Trade Center and the Pentagon. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9eTzV7HvKHU

Nevertheless, the official story still stands, just as the official story of President Kennedy’s assassination still stands despite majority disbelief, just like the official story of Israel’s attack on the USS Liberty still stands despite all evidence to the contrary. In the US the government never corrects its proven lies.

People all over the world are amazed that Americans could witness videos of the two towers blowing up floor by floor and the obvious controlled demolition of Building 7 and conclude that they were witnessing buildings collapsing from asymmetrical structural damage and limited, short-lived office fires.

The 9/11 fabrication and the Osama bin Laden myth were used by the Cheney/Bush regime to destroy the civil liberty protections in the US Constitution and to elevate the executive branch above both domestic and international law. This has culminated in yesterday’s declaration of US lawlessness by President Trump’s National Security Advisor, John Bolton, who stated that the US government will use any and all means to protect US and Israeli war criminals from prosecution by the International Criminal Court. The cost of 9/11 far exceeds the WTC buildings and the lives that were lost. The real cost is the US Constitution, the separation of powers, civil liberty, and the rule of law.

ای بی وطنان، میگم خفه

Killing Hope: U.S. Military and CIA Interventions since World War II- Part Four

A war is a feud between two leaders. The science of sociology combined with history reflects this simple fact that people generally avoid hostility and find ways to settle conflicts in a peaceful manner. Reading through war documents, we realize that the rulers of so called democratic countries go through so much fabrication and unending explanations and struggles in order to convince people to participate in wars. In dictatorships, people have no choice anyway. And, there are multitude of reasons why leaders of a country ignite a war to begin with. At the very beginning of the revolution in Iran, Khomeini had showed his true identity to people, and Iranians realized that he was not the soft hearted human loving religious man he claimed to be before the collapse of the old regime, but a hard headed theocrat who did not have any love for his country or people, and a brutal dictator. As people started demanding their rights at the beginning of the post-revolution Iran, he realized that a war was the best thing to keep the society under his leash. He started egging on Saddam Hussein, as it is documented. Saddam, another brutal ruler, received American blessing and support to start his aggression: “During Iraq’s epic struggle against the Ayatollah Khomeini, the United States of course had more than spoken to Baghdad. Washington- choosing Iraq as lesser evil against Shiite extremism- was responsible for huge amounts of weaponry, military training, sophisticated technology, satellite-photo intelligence, and billions of dollars reaching a needy Hussein, who was also lavishly supported by Kuwait and Saudi Arabia, they being concerned that Iran’s anti-monarchist sentiments might spread to their own realms. Indeed, there is evidence that Washington encouraged Iraq to attack Iran and ignite the war in the first place. And during this period on American support of Hussein, he was certainly the same odious, repressive, beastly thug as when he later came under American moralistic rhetorical fire. Similarly, absent Washington’s prodding, the UN did not condemn Iraq’s invasion, nor did it impose any sanctions or lay down any demands. Even as it officially banned arms sales to either combatant, the US secretly provided weapons to both. The other bête noire of the region, the Ayatollah, received American arms and military intelligence on Iraq during the war, so as to enhance the ability of the two countries to inflict maximum devastation upon each other and stunt their growth as strong Middle-East nations, (P. 332).” It is worth repeating this fact that Khomeini also went to Iran as the leader of the revolution with American blessing, and the aim of the war for the west was to destroy Shah’s ammunition stockpile.

John McCain: The View from the Middle East

September 4, 2018
By As`ad AbuKhalil
Link: https://consortiumnews.com/2018/09/04/john-mccain-the-view-from-the-middle-east/

It is not unusual that Arabs and Americans look at the same event from divergent lenses. Take, for instance, a scene from John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign when he told  a woman in the audience who had called Obama an Arab: “No, Ma`am. He is not an Arab. He’s a decent family man.” 

That brief exchange has been tweeted and retweeted thousands of time in the last few days following McCain’s death. It has been promoted by people in mainstream media (and think tanks and academia) as evidence of the civility, “classiness”, and lack of prejudice of McCain.  Yet, Arabs saw something entirely different in that exchange.  They saw bigotry from McCain, who was denying that Obama was Arab in the same way one denies that someone is a Nazi.  He clearly implied that an Arab can’t be a decent family man.  In fact, Gen. Colin Powell was the only U.S. politician who pointed this out at the time.  But a new image of McCain is being formulated before our eyes.

For Arabs in the Middle East and in the U.S., the view of McCain does not conform to the hagiography of U.S. media.  People in the region remember well that McCain supported every U.S. and Israeli war, invasion, or attack against any Arab target. They remember that he was a major proponent of invading Iraq and argued for the expansion of U.S. wars into Iran, Libya and Syria in the wake of Sep. 11. 

The destruction of Mosul. (Wikimedia Commons)

The Other Side of John McCain

August 27, 2018
By Max Blumenthal in Washington
Link: https://consortiumnews.com/2018/08/27/the-other-side-of-john-mccain/

As the Cold War entered its final act in 1985, journalist Helena Cobban participated in an academic conference at an upscale resort near Tucson, Arizona, on U.S.-Soviet interactions in the Middle East. When she attended what was listed as the “Gala Dinner with keynote speech”, she quickly learned that the virtual theme of the evening was, “Adopt a Muj.”

“I remember mingling with all of these wealthy Republican women from the Phoenix suburbs and being asked, ‘Have you adopted a muj?” Cobban told me. “Each one had pledged money to sponsor a member of the Afghan mujahedin in the name of beating the communists. Some were even seated at the event next to their personal ‘muj.’”

The keynote speaker of the evening, according to Cobban, was a hard-charging freshman member of Congress named John McCain.

During the Vietnam war, McCain had been captured by the North Vietnamese Army after being shot down on his way to bomb a civilian lightbulb factory. He spent two years in solitary confinement and underwent torture that left him with crippling injuries. McCain returned from the war with a deep, abiding loathing of his former captors, remarking as late as 2000, “I hate the gooks. I will hate them as long as I live.” After he was criticized for the racist remark, McCain refused to apologize. “I was referring to my prison guards,” he said, “and I will continue to refer to them in language that might offend some people because of the beating and torture of my friends.”

‘Hanoi Hilton’ prison where McCain was tortured. (Wikimedia Commons)

Killing Hope- Part Three

In October 1, 1965 six Indonesian generals were murdered by a group of junior officers who claimed that those generals were supporters of CIA who had planned to oust the first president of the country, Sukarno, and their action was to prevent it. General Suharto: “a man who had served both the Dutch colonialists and the Japanese invaders- and his colleagues charged that the large and influential PKI [Communist Party] was behind the junior officers’ ‘coup attempt’, and that behind the party stood Communist China, (P.193).” This so-called coup was an excuse for Suharto to encourage people, in particular Moslems, to initiate a Communist killing macabre: “The Indonesian people were stirred up in part by the display of photographs on television and in the press of the badly decomposed bodies of the slain generals. The men, the public was told, had been castrated and their eyes gouged out by Communist women. (The army later made the mistake of allowing official medical autopsies to be included as evidence in some of the trials; and the extremely detailed reports of the injuries suffered mentioned only bullet wounds and some bruises, no eye gougings or castration.),(P. 193,194).” Murdered Indonesians during those years are reported to be between half to one million. There are accounts of Muslim men banding known Communists together and mass killing them: “Twenty-five years later, American diplomats disclosed that they had systematically compiled comprehensive lists of ‘Communist’ operatives, from top echelons down to village cadres, and turned over as many as 5,000 names to the Indonesian army, which hunted those persons down and killed them…Robert Martens, a former member of the US Embassy’s political section in Jakarta, stated in 1990: ‘It really was a big help to the army. They probably killed a lot of people, and I probably have a lot of blood on my hands, but that’s not all bad. There’s a time when you have to strike hard at a decisive moment.’, (P. 194).”

US Military Intervention.. Killing Hope- Part Two

After WWII, many Europeans realized that the war that devastated Europe entirely, was nothing but a capitalist ambitions in expanding markets. This knowledge frustrated people to the point of checking socialist doctrines, especially considering the heroism witnessed by communist organizations in many countries involved in the useless war. The Predecessor of CIA fearing expansion of socialism in Europe became very active in every Western European country. Many of the fascists, or fascist sympathizers became agents of CIA: “Then there was the case of Cardinal Battista Montini, another beneficiary of CIA largesse. The payments made to him reveal something of the Agency’s mechanistic thinking about why people become radicals. It seems that the good Cardinal was promoting orphanages in Italy during the 1950s and 1960s and, says Victor Marchetti, ‘The thinking was that if such institutions were adequately supported, many young people would be able to live well there and so would not one day fall into Communist hands.’ The Cardinal, as a Monsignor, had been involved with the Vatican’s operation to smuggle Nazis to freedom after World War II. He had a long history of association with Western governments and their intelligence agencies. In 1963, he became Pope Paul VI, (P. 121).”

US Military Interventions Since World War II- Part One

World War II sealed British Empire as a declining imperialist forever, and opened the door for the United States to rise as the new superpower in the world. In July of 1944, in Bretton Wood in New Hampshire, 44 allied nations got together and established IMF and what is now called World Bank, under the power of the United States, which guaranteed a predicted American Century. The rise was emanating from the pillars of capitalism, and no regime in the world could expand capitalism to such high stages as it has been the case with the US. Of course, this had been prophesied by some, that such great capitalistic prominence could be achieved through force and domination of other nations. Internally, as it was prophesied again, each industry became a monopoly, or conglomerate of several companies in a monopolistic nature, and enormous capitals were amassed in the hands of a few, while the rest of the country continued gradual losing of resources. Overt policing with uniforms, and covert controlling, FBI, keeps people inline to protect riches of capitalists, while military and CIA conduct the same duties beyond the borders. Anyone who could become a role model, a leader, a national hero, or someone who puts societal benefits before personal advantages, such as Martin Luther King or Malcolm X, were uprooted, even if they were in the highest positions such as Kennedy brothers. In other countries, military and CIA covertly, if possible, and without regards to human dignity and even life, mow down any nationalistic or socialistic uprising, and replace it with corrupt and sadistic money hungry dictators. This has been the history of the world in the past seventy years.

در باره بحران حساس اخیر ایران - استقلال، آزادی، عدالت اجتماعی

این سخنرانی‌ یک و نیم
ساعته دکتر مرتضی‌ محیط در مورد بحران اخیر ایران و آینده و سرنوشت ایران را باید ملاحظه
کرد. آیا به ایران حمله نظامی خواهد شد؟ آیا در ایران جنبش خود جوشی به وجود میاید؟
آیا سرنوشت ایران مانند لیبی‌ و افغانستان و عراق و سوریه خواهد بود؟ دلیل بالا رفتن
دلار چیست؟ دکتر مرتضی‌ محیط در این برنامه به تمام این پرسش‌ها پاسخ میدهد. دیدن این برنامه
برای همه ایرانیان ضروری است.