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      • The American sheeple will believe anyone and anything. The CIA are the world's REAL terrorists but Americans are so brainwashed with the Land of Freedom and By the People For the People rubbish that they will never see the forest for the trees.

        "More sports for everyone, group spirit, fun, and you don't have to think, eh? Organize and organize and super organize super-super sports. More cartoons in books. More pictures. The mind drinks less and less." ...Fahrenheit 451.

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            But please don't negate Hillary Clinton. What better diplomat have we seen?
            She is willing to step forward for us .. let us be grateful for her amazing strength and resilience thus far.
            Why chip away? While we seem to expect nothing less than Santa Claus or an Ascended Master to serve us, we drain the human heros among us.

              • Let's examine just a few of the events that occurred under various U.S. Secretaries of State in the period since the World War 2. John Foster Dulles, who had the unique situation that his brother, Allen, was the head of the CIA, exercised the freest hand of any Sec of State in the modern era. He played a major role in the Coups in Iran in 1953 and Guatemala in 1954, the various attacks on Cuba after Castro came to power, the first attempt at a coup in Indonesia in 1958 (later successful in 1965), and of course the early lead up to the largest single U.S. crime the War in Vietnam. Good Presbyterians, the two of them took good care of their previous corporate clients at the law firm of Sullivan and Cromwell in New York. The ramifications of some of their actions are still with us to this day. The most prominent being the Islamic Republic of Iran, a regime that might never have occurred had the conservative nationalist Mohammed Mosaddegh not been deposed.

                Good old boy Dean Rusk was the Sec of State when the Brazilian president Joao Goulart was deposed in a military Coup d'etat that saw considerable maneuvering by the CIA. The military government that took power after the coup was notorious for their heavy handed repression. Eventually Goulart died of a heart attack in 1976 that many see as suspicious, the previous president Juscelino Kubitschek de Oliveira, another nationalist reformer died in a suspicious car crash, also in 1976 (both when Kisssinger was Sec of State). The CIA often operates (as do many intelligence agencies from various countries) out of the embassy under diplomatic "cover"; thus the Sec of State is ultimately responsible for what is done by these CIA agents. The final successful coup against Sukharno of Indonesia took place under Rusk, here the final death toll was in the area of 1 million killed in the slaughters that followed his deposal.

                Kissinger further sullied his tenure with numerous Vietnam and other SE Asian hardline actions. He was a hardline counsel to Nixon to stay the course in Vietnam and attempt to get the most "favorable" settlement possible; always at the expense of the long-suffering people of SE Asia in terms of more bombing raids or various military offensives. Not to be forgotten is, of course, the overthrow of Salvador Allende in Chile in 1973 (interestingly this occurred on Sept. 11, 1973, the first 9-11 outrage) with a killing of socialists and other supporters of the elected Allende regime that, in the end, numbered around 50,000. Special sadism was shown in the killings of Victor Jara and Pablo Neruda cultural figures in Chile supportive of the Allende government.

                Finally the cases of Iraq and Afghanistan deserve mention. Iraq was bombed in a series of campaigns that intentionally destroyed the nation's infrastructure that supplied safe drinking water, health care, and electricity. This policy led directly, and quite predictably, to the deaths of about 1 million people mostly children, the elderly, and the poor; this particular outrage only intensifies the repugnace of Madeleine Albright's famous comment that the deaths were "worth it". This was first degree murder of over a million people; certainly a first rank war crime for which Bush Sr., James Baker, Lawrence Eagleburger, Bill Clinton and Warren Cristopher (in addition to Albright) at the least should be answering for crimes against humanity at the World Criminal Court in the Hague. Afghanistan, after 45 years of independence and minimal great power intrigue from 1927 - 1972, was developing as a moderate Islamic state with high levels of education and professional development among at least the more prosperous urban women when it fell afoul of great power intrigue between the USSR and the U.S. Here Zbiegniew Brezinski (Carter's National Security advisor), a Polish nobleman, with a deep abiding hatred for all things Russian, saw a chance to make trouble for the Soviets. He planned to bait them into their own "Vietnam" and still considers it a great triumph, Warren Christopher was the Sec of State then. These early outrages were then followed by the Bush Jr. era attacks where Collin Powell and Condaleeza Rice take up their assigned roles.

                So it goes on, whether white males, Jews, African Americans, male or female the drum beat of murder and mayhem, facilitated by the venerable leaders of the diplomatic corps, in the service of U.S. imperialism keeps occurring. Not that the U.S. is out of step with the rotten record of the other great powers, but the holier than thou attitude, the shining city on a hill tripe is what is most ridiculous.

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                    The shrewd, fluent, and indispensable coating of humanitarian and democratic double talk that comes with this species' job descriptions, is all that your archetypal liberal who was never let in on the actual game needs to hear in order to go all weak in the knees. It's enough to nourish his or her impervious faith (willful blindness?) in a moral American state, getting its hands dirty to be sure, but never actually itself BECOMING dirty. Rice, Kissinger, et al can do no wrong, literally, in the eyes of these apologizing, abetting saps. And of course it doesn't hurt for this dynamic that the rest of the world's elites, whether "friend" or "foe", are equal part pond scum to our foggy bottom jamokes.

                      • Ahem... just apply set theory.

                        Your four 'safe' war criminals include two women, two blacks and two Jews, and no white gentile of either gender. Just sayin'.

                        Ergo everybody has at least one automatic 'get out of criticism free' card: (screech from the set ["Racist!!!", "Sexist!!!", "anti-Semite!!!"]) - and being megalomaniacal sociopathic parasites by nature, none of them would have the slightest qualms about playing whichever of those cards they possess.

                        (Ignore Kissinger's toadying to Nixon - he was saying whatever he needed to say to suck up to power... 'realpolitik' is to political theory what Isidora Duncan was to ballet: American, shallow and not particularly original).

                        Besides: outside of the US media's cartoon depiction of the political system, Kissinger is despised. He can't travel to half the countries in the world because he knows that the rozzers will be asked to detain him.

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                          • Isn't it disheartening to see how the scum predictably rises to the very, very top? And after it's proven itself scum beyond a shadow of a doubt, the slime acts as teflon.
                            In the first years following the end of the Bush Admin., a parade of all of the worst of the Smirking Chimp's worst made their way through my Canadian city for lucrative speaking engagements and were accorded heroes' welcomes on the nicest red carpets to be found. The only one I actually sat through - on a donated ticket - was Rice. The thoughts expressed in this article looped continuously through my head during the entire outrageous exercise. Not a word was mentioned about the Iraq lies or the 911 outrage - it would have been impolite.
                            Not only does Rice deserve a very lengthy incarceration, I've never understood the respect accorded her intellect. Not once have I heard a particularly intelligent or truthful phrase cross her lips. During our evening with Condi, the deepest insight she could manage was that "Pakistan is going to be a problem" for the U.S. Her audience didn't care - she was brilliant just being Condi - and too smiley to be a war criminal.

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                                I think you don't understand Stephen Colbert... Everything he says is sarcasm and he mocks people that are evil or ignorant for the purpose of informing the general public that cannot understand the traditional way of presenting news. I don't think he thinks it's funny to have "a good time with someone who literally expressed indifference over the prospect of millions of people being put in gas chambers". He's just trying to communicate with all kinds of people, even the ones that watch sensationalistic news. I think that if it were not for him, many people would not watch the news. I rather have people watch his news than no news at all.

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                                    I am "fringe" because I'd like to see all those crimimals in the dock. And brennan and obama should focus their angst on other than Hastings and whistleblowers that recount behavior solidly defined by ourselves at Nuremburg as war crimes. Without accountability Obama and others have carte blanche to do what ever they deem justifiable. Corporations like Shell and Exxon drive and take their lead from those who have escaped justice and restraint. Our celebrated prison system is not working if these traitors are allowed to skate. Let's do it just for those lost in the wars and 9/11. It's the very least we can do. I am fringe enough to expect some semblence of justice even now out of vogue.

                                      • I would piss on all their graves. They are not worthy of any remembrance, except perhaps in the mind of God. Kissinger, Rice, Rumsfeld, Bolton, Powell, Albright, all will 'be forgotten with the rest...' as te whiffingpoof song has it. I hope they all go soon, and that we will as a country to be worthy of real statesmen (statespersons) to lead us, and I don't mean Hillary.

                                          • Why do you yearn to be led?

                                            Why do you think that the system that is designed to 'filter' political appointees will EVER produce "real statesmen"? (Whatever "real statesmen" even means - presumably Churchill-types who have a good line of patter and can keep their massive death tolls hidden from the dummies they rule).

                                            ANYBODY in politics is an enemy of mankind - by its very nature, political life is parasitic, welfare-destroying and megalomaniacal. Even if one enters political life with the best of intentions, there comes a day when principle must be set aside to achieve the 'next layer' of the Inner Ring... and by the time anyone makes it to within telescopic-sight distance of a leadership position, they are so thoroughly compromised that they are indistinguishable from Stalin, Pinochet or Pol Pot (who may have been vermin, but they were more honest than Obama, Bush, Cheney, Cameron, Blair, Straw, Howard, Gillard or Rudd). The same is true of senior buraucrats (and judges, senior military, senior police) - the 'welfare queen' upper-level minions who live at taxpayers' expense in government monopolies.

                                            Besides - if you understand Arrow's 1950 Impossibility Theorem (for which, among other contributions, Arrow got the Nobel prize in economics) you would understand that the political class can not possibly represent society. Anything after that (adverse selection, moral hazard, the principal-agent problem, x-inefficiency, bureaucratic capture) simply adds to the 'slam dunk' case against the State.

                                            Theory shows - irrefutably, and with no reliance on assumptions of rationality, utility-maximisation, or competitive markets - that government can't solve the problems it claims are within its just remit. The cake is a lie.

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                                            • Superb summary of this most despicable human. She has parlayed her " poor environment" upbringing into the pinnacle of affirmative action.

                                                • This makes me sick, and just how can we differentiate ourselves from the privileged exceptional leadership, that is worse than shower scum, but paraded by the 6 companies who own the press, that have no scruples and the collective memory of a gnat?

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                                                    • The American people have been brainwashed by a mindless (and totally controlled) press. Pure and simple.

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                                                          There are many beloved war criminals in the US, going back to Andy Jackson. Every president since Eisenhower has broke UN international law.

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                                                            Only one requirement to work in DC: be a lying sack. It's helps to walk in with your palms up and tongue out, as well.

                                                              • Nuremberg Trials, 2020.
                                                                YES WE CAN!

                                                                • Another glorious Condi Rice quote, following the 9/11 attacks: "I don't think anybody could have predicted that ... they would try to use an airplane as a missile, a hijacked airplane as a missile." Meanwhile, reports two years earlier had warned of just that possibility: http://www.cbsnews.com/2100-50...

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                                                                    The same smirk on Jamie Dimon's face, too. Photos about a year apart and same "we can do anything and not be touched 'cause we got all the guns and all the money" stretched faces... Prosecute them and strip them of their power and wealth and then see whatt they amount to, these war criminals like Rice, Kissinger, Allbright, Wolfowitz, Perle, Bush, Cheney, Zelikow, the Clintons, Obama; all committing genocide abroad - and all their Bankster friends that so happily trotted out pallets of cash for the war "efforts"... while committing gross fraud and theft inside the borders of the nation... The "Kill List" Tuesday meeting - if that ain't a war crime, what do you call it?

                                                                      • Nah. Don't you know that the U.S., the city on the hill, NEVER commits war crimes? Neither do its allies. Only U.S. enemies are evil and commit war crimes. The U.S. always means well. If a few million people are killed here and there as a result of U.S. policies, that's "collateral damage." You have to break a few eggs to run an Empire, right?

                                                                          • The real-world consequences of our continuing belief in the myth of American Exceptionalism. How many people have died, have many people have been injured, how many people have been displaced, how many of our politicians have gotten away with these crimes thanks to American Exceptionalism? How long will we allow this worldview to go unchallenged?

                                                                              • More and more of us ARE challenging it, but the Plunderiing Class still controls the politicians, the media, and the military, all of which maintain the arrogant, brutal U.S. Empire. We have few ways to effectively resist this Empire. I think it is time for a General Strike.

                                                                                • The road to heaven is paved with good intentions and sometimes you have to do something bad to get for the good --that is when you turn and walk away from the evil.

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                                                                                  She belongs in American football. She is what the high end of American sports is all about.

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                                                                                    Here's her scary sidekick Philip Zelikow (part of the Bush transition team, Zelikow is a specialist in public myth making and how large populations react to catastrophic events...pretty creepy, Zelikow was conveniently appointed as the director of the 9/11 commission...he wrote the complete and detailed "report" outline 16 months in advance of the commission's findings...he clearly guided the 9/11 commission's myth making process):

                                                                                    https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

                                                                                    Note how Zelikow's university level online "history" class appears to treat students like little children...it's so creepy! Evil incarnnate!

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                                                                                        You can put lipstick on the football; but it's still pigskin!

                                                                                        • Perhaps citizens recognize the SOC is usually nothing more than a mouthpiece, no matter how willing, for the real power interests of the empire.

                                                                                          Maybe history will condemn the Eichmanns of our day but we cannot seem to bother.

                                                                                            • If she is "unscathed", then why does she hide from the public in Palo Alto, California? The reason is that many people on the street would recognize her immediately, and some of them like me have the nerve to give her hell when we see her. So she may be safe on the Stanford campus, but otherwise the b*tch hides.