Sail On, Sail On, Oh Mighty Ship of State

There’s a madman in the White House (or what’s left of it) who thinks he’s a king, and he’s threatening to send US Marines on a suicide mission to Iran, but 67 percent of the US people are against it. The reasons and goals were made up, as they moved through his fever dreams on “Truth Social” in the middle of the night. “We’ve already won the war,” the madman was reported to say. It was a “preemptive strike,” but no enemy strike was planned. The US left negotiations about to conclude and the war crimes started the very next day. US bombs hit a girls primary school leaving the parents to bury the bodies of their children.

At the gas pump a man connects the dots between the illegal war and our own depravations.

A Retired Major General says in disgust that the Secretary of Defense, a former Fox News TV personality who was kicked out of the National Guard, has no qualifications for the job. Pete Hegseth grabs the spotlight with delusional testosterone-fueled bluster staged to sound like war strategies, talking about the “stupid rules of engagement” he won’t follow. Instead, he instructs our “war fighters” to “hunt down” and “kill” our enemies. Shaking his head the Major General says, “Those are the words of a potential war criminal.” Hegseth is apparently unaware that he may be sending Marines to the “graveyard of the American Empire,” as former presidential candidate Dennis Kucinich tells the Scheer Intelligence podcast.

Marco Rubio claimed US bombs were instigated by Israel, a state reviled the world over for its genocide of Palestinians that destroyed all the schools, the clinics, the hospitals, the mosques, the housing, the water, and the sanitation in the Gaza Strip. Then they hired influencers, (but didn’t pay them) to keep calling their slaughter in Gaza a hoax. Behind-the-screens Israel now destroys Lebanese villages just like they did in Gaza, and kills journalists and first responders, just like they did in Gaza, for the same reasons—to stop the truth from getting out.

US Marines are sent to retrieve a mysterious prize, because God’s chosen people, as Gideon Levy called Israelis, don’t have any soldiers to send. They are busy killing in the West Bank and torturing the doctors and nurses and even the children in their dungeons of inhuman hate.

“Through the Squalls of Hate’”

Francesca Albanese releases yet another report on the heinous crimes perpetrated against Palestinians, this time through Isreal’s widespread systematic and sadistic use of torture of thousands of prisoners kidnapped since October 7, who are beaten, raped and starved to death on a scale of brutality never seen before in the modern world. And the story of a Rabbi who was once a tank sergeant in Israel’s army, arrested for sexually abusing a child, is re-circulated online, but never makes it to corporate media. He was also known for having publicly spread the false claims about Hamas systematically raping Israeli women on October 7. Yes, every Israeli accusation is a confession, and they are the one who use human shields.

Islamophobia runs wild with the howls of right-wing politicians repeated by their favorite media outlets.

And the once high-value news source—rendered now as little more than a tired-grey shipwreck of a newspaper—recounts with grand illustrations the “exceptionally critical journey” of the sacred “oil and gas tankers,” and how their precious cargos proceed globally in a truly moving story. There were no moving headlines in the legacy press about the 18-month-old toddler whose legs were burned with cigarettes by Israeli torturers. We saw his small blood-soaked pants telling a story that should have been printed above the fold on every newspaper if the media’s mandate was still democracy.

Some independent commentators conclude that “we are the villains in this story.” Another posts warns that nuclear weapons are poised to wipe out the Middle East, and the Israeli death cult passes a far-right inspired death penalty law making it easier for them to execute Palestinians. Israeli police beat anti-war and anti-occupation protesters and judicial critics at HaBima Square in Tel Aviv.

Democracy is Coming, to the USA

Palestinian Pulitzer Prize winning writer Mosab Abu Toba, sings a heart wrenching melody accapela in Riverside Church overlooking the Hudson where MLK shouted out his opposition to the Vietnam War. Bruce Springsteen takes the stage and thrills as he sings The Streets of Minneapolis, just after the wise Angela Davis reminds those in the pews celebrating Democracy Now! that protests are a form of resistance that gives us the feeling of our own power. They are rehearsals for the revolution about to be born.

Patti Smith sings “People Have the Power,” with her arms spread out in a holy gesture as a writer belts out the song and passes out postcards of where to see the film, Steal this Story, Please.  Within a week in the USA, 9 million people would protest against the mad king in what was left of the White House.

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