In the aftermath of President-Elect Trump’s surprise victory over establishment power’s chosen horse, Hillary Clinton, liberal punditry has compiled an impressive list of culprits responsible for this distortion in the fabric of American history.

Everyone from Vladimir Putin to BernieBros to Jill Stein are somehow responsible for obstructing the Pantsuit Khaleesi’s path to the Oval Office; faultless in her inability to use the near-infinite wealth and resources at her disposal to carry out a victory against a reality gameshow neofascist.

When the fourth estate loses its grasp over the pulse of America, and fails to provide answers for the misery millions of Americans face in their day to day toils for a system that actively disregards their despair, the people will look elsewhere. The rise of Breitbart, Alex Jones, and other misinformation despots say there is an answer – these demagogues paint a picture of nefarious masterminds who have manipulated America into servitude, and only you, the loyal viewers at home, are privileged to understand what is really going on. 

This intoxicating melodramatic self-importance has driven people to what can only be described as a collective madness, as the recent “Pizzagate” melodrama has shown. Birthed from the Podesta emails provided by Wikileaks, Pizzagate recently came to a head with a man driving across three states with an assault rifle to shoot up a pizza shop only to discover there never was a secret Democrat pedophile child-trafficking cult in the first place – and now his former Internet comrades are labelling him a “crisis actor,” a magical explanation for all the world’s gun-related tragedies. If random people who never log off are taking their military-grade weapons and driving across three states to shoot up pizza parlors at the drop of a pin, shouldn’t there be a crusade against assault rifles or mental illness?

Instead, the current crusade is against “fake news:” those shady clickbait headlines flooding Facebook and other social media websites, making absurd claims backed by nothing, like DONALD TRUMP FUCKED A SPACE ALIEN AT AREA 51 and HILLARY WORSHIPS THE DEVIL IN SECRET PEDOPHILE RING. Other, more insidious falsifications include Trump keeping factory jobs in America with a simple phone call, when it was actually the work of unions. What makes this venture profitable is the mechanics of social media “sharing” combined with the bullshit economy of ad revenue for pageviews – which should have died a violent death a long time ago, and now we’re seeing the consequences come to fruition.

Worse yet, our youth have struggles telling the difference between fake news and reality. I could have told you this over a decade ago when I was in public school, getting into squabbles with fellow classmates who angrily insisted that Saddam Hussein was responsible for the attacks on September 11th. However, Facebook and the “Fake News” regime wasn’t nearly as prominent as it is now. So how did these young impressionable youth in deeply liberal Western Washington get this idea? Surely, this “fake news” must have come from somewhere?

Oh, right. It originated on NBC, more specifically Meet The Press on December 9th, 2001 – from the mouth of then Vice President Dick Cheney and  corroborated by host Tim Russert – implying that Iraq was hosting al-Qaeda training camps, among other false claims. This became one of the main justifications of America’s illegal devastation and occupation of Iraq, and over half the country was convinced Saddam Hussein played some part in the attacks on September 11th. Which of course, could be instantly disproved by anyone with a rough understanding of the politics of the Middle East – but the “Real News” brigade of respectable, esteemed, award winning journalists pushed this and other lies to manufacture the consent of the American public for yet another reckless military excursion causing the senseless death of devastation of countless lives. Somewhere between half a million to over a million people are counted dead in a conflict that achieved absolutely nothing of worth.

Not only conservative voices, but esteemed liberal voices such as Jonathan Chait and Tom Friedman pushed the case for war – Friedman himself said we needed to “burst that bubble,” and tell them to “suck on this.” Friedman was last seen crying in the New York Times about how millennials needed to “listen to the old spies,” you can probably find him now in some expensive Upper East Side apartment cranking his hog to vintage Tom Clancy novels, waiting for the 24 reboot to start. Chait proudly declared we should “give war a chance” in The New Republic back in October 2002. These were well-paid, award winning, respected opinion havers pushing a false narrative for war that has ended countless lives who will never have justice for what was done to them. Some might be brave enough to call this “a gross display of privilege,” more common people would simply refer to it as criminal.

Is it really that unbelievable that after this utterly avoidable and completely unnecessary shitshow, people might find themselves pursuing alternative sources for the news? Better yet, shouldn’t there be a cause for alarm that millions of adult Americans were led to believe fake news to push a very real real war with no end in sight, even when a President elected on a mandate to end it, manages to extend it indefinitely so that neverending, trillion dollar wars become the mundane?

More importantly, just who exactly defines “Fake News” at this point? The “Real News” has spent the past half a year or so trying to paint any and all opposition to Hillary Clinton as the work of the Kremlin, and just the other day the same publication that broke Watergate just pushed an anonymous blacklist with names like Robert Parry (broke Iran-Contra), Naked Capitalism (well-regarded by anyone in journalism when it comes to finance), and Robert Scheer (former target of the CIA), and Bruce Dixon (radical black leftist voice since the 70s) as agents of the Russian Government, calling for the United States Government to open a formal investigation for espionage.

The problem with such an absurd request is that the federal government is about to be led by an administration which includes an executive chair of the same media organization that helped drive someone to drive across three states with an assault rifle and threaten a pizza joint – Steve Bannon of Breitbart. If the Podesta Emails revealed anything about how political campaigns and the punditry colluded to push disingenuous narratives about Clinton’s primary opponent, Bernie Sanders (and his legion of “bros”), then it would be fair to presume Breitbart would essentially be the propaganda arm of the Trump Administration – the same website which hosts such eye-opening headlines like “Six Reasons Pamela Geller’s Muhammad Cartoon Contest Is No Different than Selma,” “Five Great Home Defense Shotguns For Your Christmas Wish List,” and “Milo Destroys Social Justice Warrior Who Says Trump Support Makes You ‘White Supremacist.” Shotguns and cults of personality – two sensational tastes that taste great together!  

Ironically enough, while men like Parry and Dixon were exposing the abuses of the United States government during the Cold War, the Central Intelligence Agency was running Operation Mockingbird – a state sanctioned “fake news” scheme to forward the foreign policy interests of the same dullards who thought that after countless failed attempts to kill the late Fidel Castro, maybe it was worth one more shot? Oh, were you expecting Silicon Valley to save us? Google and Facebook have grown into influence peddling powerhouses, so don’t expect those mystical algorithms of pure reason and logic to contradict the needs of your favorite alphabet agencies.

Perhaps the answer lies back with our youth – if secondary school prioritized teaching children how perceived authorities like the news media, politicians, corporations, advertisements, and others with power, resources, and an agenda seek to deceive and manufacture consent – we could perhaps better intellectually arm our citizenry to reject the false promises of demagogues like Donald Trump, and not fall so easily for fake news that seeks to forward pointlessly destructive campaigns of misinformation. Of course, that might possibly delegitimize paid opinion havers such as Tom Friedman – and no, we couldn’t possibly have that. Besides, both Democrats and Republicans agree we should privatize all the schools and shove iPads into the hands of youth. Their future is a bleak vision where the only rule is “learn to code.”  

On the other side of the legitimacy spectrum opposite from Friedman sit Alex Jones disciples who find a sense of security in beliefs such as an all-powerful globalist cabal controlling the world’s events & economy – to believe, in all their despair, that at least somebody is in charge, is far more palatable than accepting the reality of unyielding chaos and exploitation, to string together correlation into causation as affirmation and fortification of existing beliefs.

In the rapid-fire misinformation sensory overload that is getting your news through Twitter, it’s easy to see the similarities between the thought processes “George Soros funds every protester” conspiracy theorists and…Nobel laureate and New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, assigned with the simple task of being too smart to fall for this shit, pushing fake news like Jill Stein was the reason Trump was elected also Comey and the Kremlin plotted to rig the election for Trump on his personal Twitter account – which sits atop a network of over two million followers, many in influential circles. What separates the two is what makes them similar – wealth and prestige. For Krugman and many Hillary loyalists, it’s far more comforting to believe that the Kremlin rigged the election than to accept the chaotic reality that their view of the world is wrong, and that their wealth and prestige is well deserved for how right they are, much like the conspiracy theorist’s belief that their lack of it is due to shadowy forces at work, preventing the world from recognizing their brilliance.

With this personal bias at hand, it’s easy to see how one can immediately believe or even push “fake news” to reinforce their personal beliefs – I myself have been guilty of it from time to time, and you only have to look at the recent CNN Porn Broadcast Scandal to see how quickly mistruths can become canonized as fact. 

On the opposite side of the legitimacy spectrum, Clinton loyalists’ rush to blame third party voters, Millennials, and the infinite power of the white working class’ magical racism for Trump’s victory fail to acknowledge the depressing truth: Donald Trump simply campaigned harder, against a deeply unpopular candidate whose campaign decided to play 12th-dimensional-chess via out-of-touch Twitter burns or simply not campaigning in places like the Rust Belt – which had sunk deeper into economic turmoil under the Obama Administration. The comfort of having some external, formless villain to blame for life’s onslaught of disappointments will remain ever more comforting than the depressing reality – a billion dollar campaign machine headed by rich old white people utterly out of touch with the average American ran a campaign for themselves. Donald Trump is a horrific rebuttal of the philosophy of meritocracy this country roots itself in. The “real news” is that voter turnout plummeted, because neither political party was interested in offering real solutions to the riptide of despair that non-millionaire America finds itself waddling deeper and deeper into.

The sad truth is that the real news is never as exciting as “fake news.” There’s no foreign supervillains (Putin), no evil political powerbroker pedophile conspiracies (Pizzagate), no Hollywood twists ending in bombastic shootouts. The machinations of misery – which can largely be filed under either greed, delusion, or incompetence – don’t inspire snazzy headlines or offer easy solutions. The sinking feeling of chaos, the unyielding uncertainty – they burden the mind in unhealthy ways, with no real outlet for anger. One has to wonder if it’s easier, living life like the Pizzagate fanatics, making death threats at random pizza restaurant employees.

But what do I know? I’m just a Russian agent who has a side hustle taking small-time crisis acting gigs, obviously. Blame the gig economy.

Written by Jeff Kunzler 

According to Reuters, the Israeli Air Force (IAF) has now dropped bombs on over 1,000 targets across what has been deemed the world’s largest open-air prison. Scenes of extreme suffering and loss abound, like that in the town of Khan Younis, where a house filled with civilians was bombed, or the missile that leveled Gaza’s police headquarters, killing 18 members of one family.

The Palestinian Center for Human Rights (PCHR) observed “Israeli warplanes launched 39 airstrikes targeting houses, agricultural plots, open areas, a charity and a bank in the southern Gaza Strip town of Khan Yunis.” Furthermore, “Israeli tanks and gunboats … fired dozens of shells at agricultural and open areas,” killing “9 Palestinian civilians, including 2 women …” PCHR also documents that 149 houses in Gaza have been “targeted and destroyed.”

These outbursts of state terror are so periodic and unceasing, it’s difficult to express the gravity of the situation. Much like the previous large-scale Israeli military assault on Gaza in 2012 called ‘Operation Pillar of Defense’, ‘Operation Protective Edge’ has unleashed horrifying levels of violence against Palestinian civilians. Doctors on the ground are now reporting that Israel is using weapons against Gazans which have been banned under international law, “[causing] major damage to [their] bodies, especially the limbs.” Responding to this gruesome development, Palestinian Health Ministry Undersecretary Youssef Abo al-Rish condemned  “Israel’s use of internationally banned weapons” as “a blatant violation of human rights and international agreements.”

Compounded with the devastating human toll this savagery has spawned is a media narrative that all but ensures it will continue. Both television and print media repeatedly cast Israel as merely “defending itself” or “retaliating” against Hamas rockets. Writing in the Boston Globe, Chairman of the Anti Defamation League Jeff Robbins notes “Those who have been fortunate enough not to have endured rockets aimed at their homes can be counted upon to issue the familiar incantations about Israeli ‘collective punishment,’ dodging as always the question of what, precisely, Israel is supposed to do about attacks against its civilians if not to try to prevent them.”

Ignored in this callous dismissal of Israeli war crimes is the fact that the people of Gaza are under a foreign military occupation in violation of international humanitarian law and multiple UN Security Council Resolutions. That this brutal occupation may be the source of the rocketing is untouched in the corporate press. Instead, American audiences are presented with a de-contextualized narrative of a cycle of violence from both sides, accompanied, almost invariably, by vague and insincere demands for a de-escalation of the conflict.

If the vast disparity in firepower between Hamas and the IDF doesn’t illustrate the specious framing, then the death toll certainly does. Since the beginning of Israel’s assault, 170 Palestinians have been killed and over 1,120 have been injured according to the Palestinian Health Ministry. Based on figures from the UN Office for the Coordination of Humanitarian Affairs, “70 percent of Gaza fatalities are civilians,” and of that number, “30 percent are children.” Conversely, zero Israelis have been killed. Nonetheless, the western authors of this mass slaughter are unrestrained in their exuberance, foremost the “leader of the free world.”

In his July 8 Op-Ed in Haaretz, President Obama celebrated the growing “security relationship” between the US and Israel, a bond that is “stronger than ever.” Perhaps the “strength” of this bond can be measured in the overwhelming silence and distortion that has greeted this latest chapter in the Palestinian people’s long record of national humiliation. So when ABC World News anchor Diane Sawyer misidentifies Palestinian civilians devastated by IAF airstrikes as Israelis, a simple one minute apology to American viewers (not to the people of Gaza) suffices.

Any deeper investigation into the dominant narratives of Palestinian villainy that have long characterized US media discourse is forbidden. For example, the New York Times will issue no apology for featuring a front page photograph of a masked Palestinian slinging a stone alongside an article about the brutal lynching of Palestinian teenager Mohammed Abu Khadeir. Unlike Sawyer’s “mistake”, misrepresentations of this kind are the norm, and therefore merit no apologies. These images are illustrative of Palestinian menace or an ominous “demographic problem” pensively waiting to destroy an Israeli state–an island of civilization in a “tough neighborhood”–“forced to take action to protect its civilians.” Rhetoric of this kind is highly reminiscent of the US genocide against North America’s indigenous population, which was carried out to “protect” the European colonists from the “terror” of “merciless Indian savages,” as Thomas Jefferson described them in one of his lesser known contributions to “enlightenment” philosophy.

Incidentally, the traditional imperial pretext of “protecting civilians” has been stretched to surreal dimensions under the current offensive. Among the “military” targets selected in this campaign to “protect” Israelis are beach-side cafes, mosques, and rehabilitation centers. The New York Times headlined the attack on the beach-side cafe as follows: Missile at Beachside Gaza Cafe Finds Patrons Poised for World Cup (my emphasis). It would be instructive to observe the response within the US if the terrorist attack against innocent civilians at the Boston Marathon was headlined Exploding Pressure Cooker Finds Athletes Poised for Boston Marathon. Needless to say, more than a simple “correction” would be demanded.

Underlying these socially sanctioned exhibitions of dehumanization is a doctrine of state violence which was articulated most powerfully by Israel’s first Prime Minister, David Ben Gurion. In a shockingly unambiguous entry in his Independence War Diary he noted “Blowing up a house is not enough. What is necessary is cruel and strong reactions. We need precision in time, place and casualties. If we know the family–[we must] strike mercilessly, women and children included. Otherwise the reaction is inefficient. At the place of action there is no need to distinguish between the guilty and the innocent.” Under ‘Operation Protective Edge’, the Israeli military has adhered to this pernicious doctrine with a frightening degree of discipline.

Overshadowing this record of atrocities is the inescapable fact that the United States is complicit in the killing of every innocent Palestinian under Israeli occupation, a reality systematically omitted from conventional narratives. A particularly dramatic illustration of this norm could be perceived in a recent State Dept. press conference. After establishing the dogma that Palestinians had no “right to defend themselves”, State Dept. spokesperson Jen Psaki was asked what Washington would do to pressure Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas to “rein in” Hamas.

Since Hamas and the PA formed a “unity government”, the journalist protested, Abbas certainly shared “responsibility” for the Hamas rocketing into Israel. Another question could have easily been asked, namely what was the Obama administration going to do to “rein in” Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu. Critical inquiry of this kind is inconceivable in US establishment journalistic circles. Consequently, the leader of the “only democracy in the Middle East” (typical language in imperial societies that lack self-reflection, the US being a dramatic example) can launch missiles at unprotected civilian structures–murdering the elderly, women, and children–and the best headline Human Rights Watch can produce to capture the tragedy is Palestine/Israel: Indiscriminate Palestinian Rocket Attacks. On the IAF airstrikes on houses? They “appear to be” collective punishment.

At a recent Palestine solidarity rally, author and activist Max Blumenthal proclaimed “This is not a conflict. It is a conquest. It is an illegal conquest.” Beyond the highly misleading, and often racist, commentary that prevails in the establishment press, this is arguably the most succinct description of Israel’s ongoing war against Palestinians. Much like the global conquerors in Washington, the regional conquerors in the Israeli government interpret any expression of autonomy by those over whom they rule as not only threatening but criminal. It is through this perverse logic that the systematic subjugation of an entire people is made to look virtuous or, to borrow Benjamin Netanyahu’s words in reference to its threats against Iran, “those in the international community … don’t have a moral right to place a red light before Israel.” Throughout history, all oppressive states have imbibed this psychotic worldview, some in more lethal doses than others. One shudders at the thought of future servants of empire retelling this chronology of suffering and the monstrosities they will inevitably conceal in the name of “freedom”.

Written by Xavier Best @Xav711

Photo by flickr user Jose Mesa

Source: Chomsky, Noam. The Fateful Triangle: The United States, Israel, and the Palestinians. Boston, MA: South End, 1983. Print.

The Trans Pacific Partnership (TPP) consists of twelve Pacific Rim countries: Australia, Brunei, Chile, Canada, Japan, Malaysia, Mexico, New Zealand, Peru, Singapore, Vietnam and the US.

Over 600 corporate advisors are consulting on the TPP to establish an international court tribunal made up of corporate representatives, which could supercede the sovereignty of countries involved and override existing laws. But despite the drastic implications this deal could have concerning everything from food safety to intellectual property rights, a stunning new report by Fairness and Accuracy in Reporting (FAIR) reveals that neither ABC, CBS, nor NBC have even so much as mentioned the TPP since Obama’s State of the Union address in February of 2013.

Given the magnitude of this so called “free trade” agreement and the corporate media’s blacking out of the issue, it’s important to look back at some of Breaking the Set’s coverage of the TPP.

First, Kevin Zeese, co-founder of It’s Our Economy, explains why the mainstream media has ignored the story and calls the TPP a ‘privatization’ of state owned enterprises.

Kevin Zees on the TPP Corporate Coup d’Etat

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Breaking the Set explains how the media distracted citizens in order to allow Congress to sneakily introduce a measure to put the TPP on a legislative fast track, an undemocratic move that undermines public debate.

How Bridgegate Distracted America from TPP Fast Track

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Margaret Flowers, Organizer for Popular Resistance, discusses why fast tracking the TPP is so dangerous to the democratic process, and why everyone should care about this trade deal.

How You Can Stop the TPP: Say No to Fast Track!

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Then, Abby interviews legislative representative of the International Brotherhood of Teamsters, Mike Dolan. Dolan breaks down the content of the TPP chapter released by Wikileaks and explains how the legislation will affect global citizens.

Mike Dolan on Dangers of TPP Fast Track

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The TPP fast track is now facing obstacles in Congress due to grassroots pressure. However, talks are still taking place and the time to act is now.

Once the US and Japan finalize negotiations, the TPP’s global corporate takeover is closer to becoming a reality. Please spread the word about this disastrous trade deal and put pressure on your congressional representatives to vote NO on the TPP fast track and reject the deal.

Two-thirds of Americans stand in opposition to a TPP fast track. Make sure your voice is heard too.

Learn more at:

www.stoptpp.org

www.exposethetpp.org

https://www.citizen.org/TPP

Written by Abby Martin and Anya Parampil, Photo by flickr user DonkeyHotey