If you lack time to discover many top level meaningful videos about major events, problems, and solutions, here is a weekly share for you to check and share onward. Major issues this time: mentality for change, the global rule of money, and how to find affordable homes. Also a smart insight on COVID.
Stars & channels: Chris Hedges, Katie Halper, Jimmy Dore, Scott Santens, Ryan Hibbs, Richard Wolff (Democracy At Work), The Hill, Medlife Crisis, BiggerPockets, Homemade Home, Morning Invest, Bryan Casella, DebSpecs.com, and more.
Topics:
Cultural Irrationality: Are We Adult Enough to Handle our Crises and Corrupt System?
Another collection of great recent videos best not to miss. JFKâs much forgotten amazing speech on Medicare for All, the ways the oligarchy meddles with our minds, the war on journalism and free speech, the peopleâs uprising sparked by Bernie Sanders, and more and more and more…
Stars & channels: The Political Vigilante, Bernie, Ilhan Omar, The New School, John Spritzler, Jimmy Dore, Democracy At Work, The Real News Network, The Grayzone, The Zero Hour, Democracy Now!, TEDx Talks, goingundergroundRT, World Affairs, The Humanist Report, The Rational National, The Rational National, and more…
Topics:
Amazing Speech: JFK on Medicare for All
Alleged Personal Failings vs Reality
2015 Panel Chris Hedges and Cornel West
Society for the Rich (Letâs Compete to Death)
Modernizing Cuban Socialism
U.S. War on Journalism and Free Speech
Inequality and the Apparatus of Justification
Violence by the State on Homeless People
Disillusion
MSM Blacking out Bernie AGAIN (Over and Over)
Midwest Voters Snubbed by the âElitesâ
Bernie for Farmers
Bernie & Ilhan Rally High Points (Minnesota)
Humor: Obama Shames Voters For Criticizing Corrupt Politicians
1. Amazing Speech: JFK on Medicare for All
JFK Explains Why US Needs Med4All In 1962 â The Political Vigilante ~ Graham Elwood
Money âMakingâ Money (in reality siphoning it away from those who earn it). The super-rich taking from the rich and turning our government into their puppet. A little explanation of index funds and the hedge fund scam, plus an additional little insight into the current tax âreformâ gift to the rich:
(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Warren Buffett Wins $1 Million Bet That Hedge Funds Are a Rip-Off “)
How the Predatory Capitalists Crashed the World Economy. Whatâs sadly funny is that the makers of this documentary in 2011 still thought the mortgage banksters and Wall Street predators who with their self-enriching criminal gambles crashed the world economy and robbed millions of working people of their homes, jobs, and careers â in other words their chance at a tolerable life â were about to be held accountable:
(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “The men who crashed the world“)
II. Russia, Russia, Russia!
Some real info about Russia:
(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “American Journalist In Russia Tells Truth About RT“)
Note: 21:22 min in, a great point is made. Namely, if the Russian political elite had really wanted to boost Trumpâs candidacy in 2016, all they would have had to do is publicize what they know about the Clintonâs uranium deal with them. No need for them to hack into the DNCâs emails to commit the oh so horrible âelection hackingâ of revealing important truths to the public. That was clearly done by others. Plus, the Russian political elite doesnât care whoâs in office in the U.S. because it wonât make a difference since ALL U.S. governments, R or D, have been hostile to them.
III. Celebrity Politics
For most people, politics has always been about particular personalities in politics. Not for me. I prefer to look at the big picture, find the faults, and design strategies to fix them. However, sometimes it is useful to review what the corporate politicians do to us and remove their false halos:
(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Obama Chose Wall St. Over Main St. – Thomas Frank on RAI (8/9) “)
Thomas Frank is someone with whom I donât agree under the bottom line. He stays faithful to the treacherous âDemocraticâ Party, and he even endorsed Hillary if I recall correctly, an attitude which in my opinion misses the point that we will only go further down the drain if ALL the main parties (currently two) keep betraying the people, our country, and world to the robber billionaires because they can keep doing so as long as we keep playing into their hands.
Itâs not some kind of impractical âpurityâ stance by me, when I insist we must create a new major party (or coalition of parties) to represent us. Rather, itâs an external pressure strategy combined with a fallback strategy. And it is also the simple reality on the ground, meaning itâs happenng and wonât just go away.
We are too close to the cliff now, to let corrupted politicians push us ever closer to it or â as has become ever more common in this century â sell us out at a rate that can only be described as a frantic fire-sale. We canât expect different results by doing the same thing. We canât expect the crooks in politics to go away if we give a pass to those crooks who rule a party we think we can take over. Taking over a party must include outing the crooks in it. And historically, it has always required massive pressure from outside the party, as well. Study up on what pressured FDR into going for the New Deal. Established political parties donât change when the crooks running them feel assured that voters have nowhere else to go. Hillary and her machine were a blatant example of that attitude, as are Tom Perez and the lingering corporatist elite in the âDemocraticâ Party. They want their corporate money and figure we are helpless. Letâs prove them wrong!
IV. Moving Forward
Thoughts about breaking the corrupt party duopoly:
(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Peopleâs Party Founder Nick Brana, Live! Paradise Or Oblivion!?”)
Great points:
57:15 min: âWhatâs the U.S. mission statement? â
1:43:38: âPeople get so normalized into the way the world is that they have a hard time seeing what it could be. In a weird way, they believe that society is organized in a natural way. They believe that the way we are organized is the natural way to organize. … No, these were policy choices that people made to advantage themselves while disadvantaging others. And all these policy choices can be changed. â
Election Integrity:
I really do wonder why so many Americans seem to be so sold on electronic voting or electronic vote counts, and that in the face of massive election fraud in our country, a good deal of which made possible because of our electronic voting and vote counting. In other countries, much greater election integrity exists because they count votes by hand at the polling stations in the public and with opposing party members double-checking (recounting) each othersâ counts. Simple and solid. The only chance of tampering exists up-chain in the count reporting. As long as that is handled in a transparent way, there can be no tampering with the cast votes.
So, why does Nick Brana seem to like block chain voting which is toted as a means of more tamper-proof electronic voting? Maybe because the American public isnât yet ready to ban electronic voting and vote counting like, for example, Europe has done? Maybe he is looking forward to greater citizen participation in decision making by letting us all vote on issues rather than leaving them to corruptible delegates? The latter is something I toy with. I just donât yet know if it can be done in ways that (A) eliminate tampering and (B) maintain voter anonymity. Itâs another thing to research in the future. One question in my mind: can block chain voting really be transparent?
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Ending Note: It takes me at least 100 hours a month to research and write for this site and work on my book. If you find any value in what I do, please consider becoming a patron and supporting this site with an automatic monthly donation of $1 or more. If you canât afford this, then donât, but please share my posts, tell folks about my online course offering, refer others to this site, refer me to paying outlets or companionable fellow blogs, partake in discussion, or contribute essays of your own. Or help my book get out there when itâs finished. Thanks. Only together can we change this world. đ
Sometimes it is useful to look a few years back to see where we and our conversation were back then and compare it with now. Which predictions came true? Which hopes were dashed? And which topics that were taboo are finally on the table? It gives us an idea of the process of change and the trends we are in, as opposed to the mere momentary snapshot we usually see every day. From this we can better tell how to move forward. Here are three astoundingly great episodes, three one-hour classics, of Moyers & Company, which can open our eyes a little more:
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(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Moyers & Company Show 141:Plutocracy Rising”)
Quotes (with comments):
Moyers: âIncome inequality has soared to the highest level since the great depression, with the top 1% taking 93% of the income earned in the first year of the recovery.â
Chrystia Freeland: âThirty-seven percent of the recovery went to the top 0.01 percent.â(Thatâs one in a hundred of them, the 1% of the 1%!)
Bill Clinton (according to Matt Taibbi): âYou canât attack these people [the super rich] for their success.â(Success?!? What success is it when you are born rich, as most of those at the top of our dunghill were? And how laudable is the success of those few who clawed themselves to the top of the dunghill by robbing the rest of us, just like the dynastic forebears of the born-rich ripped off our forebears?)
We must get over this idea that has been hammered into our heads that, if we are poor, we deserve to be poor and that the rich deserve to be rich. We were all born alike, bringing nothing but ourselves to this world; and none of us created the horribly unjust wealth distribution system of our lopsided economy and money market. This injustice machine grew over many generations through vile acts of crooks and goons who passed their loot, their advantage, and their abominable methods of screwing everyone else, on to their descendants. This created dynasties of economic and political aristocracy who keep doing everything in their power to uphold the vast wealth and income inequality that ruins the lives of almost all human beings, and even hurts the rich themselves â to some degree in their prime when they, for example, have to deal with gold diggers â but most especially as they get old and the biological curse with which we are all born comes to haunt them as it haunts all of us: with death of loved ones, with our own advancing decrepitude, and with our own death after just a few decades spent on Earth.
Why do I mention this biological curse? I do so because it is something that â in our scientific and technological society â we actually can do something about; but we wonât if we only keep spending our energies in a never-ending class war that â in contrast to what the corporate mediaâs propaganda machine keeps telling us â was never started at the bottom. It always started at the top, when crooks and goons began grabbing everything in their sights and ripping everybody off through either violent force or devious economic rip-off schemes, many of which we have become so accustomed to that we donât even question their legitimacy anymore, although we darn well should!
Chrystia Freeland: âSo, you know, if you want my dystopia scenario for the United States, it is that Americaâs moving into a more Latin American structure of the economy.â(Banana republic, anyone?)
The funny thing about the âgoodâ plutocrats and the âbadâ plutocrats (with each plutocrat always seeing himself as on of the âgoodâ plutocrats) is this: Sure, some of them built their huge companies from scratch, but â putting aside that they usually started out with a head start in life plus friendly help from all sides that most of us never get â there remains the often overlooked fact that they didnât do it alone! Just as no general has ever won a battle alone (he gave the orders, but his soldiers did the actual fighting!), no Bill Gates or Steve Jobs built his company alone! They were helped by all those who worked for them and didnât even remotely get a similarly sized share.
In the 1950âs the top tax rate (for the richest of the rich) was 91% while today they pay a lower rate (15% max) than the working everyday Americans like you and me! Let that sink in! And thatâs ignoring the rampant tax evasion at the top of our dungheap society!
The government hasnât been doing its job which our founders defined in no uncertain terms when they demanded it âpromote the general Welfare.â
The story of Russia, where â after the end of the Soviet Union â a division of its people into poor and rich was created instantly (by giving all the formerly state-owned companies to a few privileged folks, mostly former KGB officials) is really no different from what created our own dungheap society, only faster. In both cases we are looking at a self-perpetuating division into rich and poor through a never-ending chain of distorted property and economic rigging.
The carried interest tax break, by the way, explains why working in an investment firm is the lower rung on the ladder leading up to the divine world of plutocracy for those who covet wealth and live for money rather than for human values, and who unsurprisingly threat their fellow human beings accordingly.
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And here is a really interesting parallel to our current fight for Net Neutrality, and a chance to meet Bernie Sanders in a Bill Moyers interview a few years ago. And then, fascinating to compare, an interview with a former Republican congressman who is disgusted by what his party has become.
(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Moyers & Company Show 148: Bernie Sanders on Big Mediaâs Power Play”)
As Bernie said in the interview, one way for officials to betray the public to the robber billionaires is to be moving quickly, quietly, and secretly. Doesnât this remind you of the Trumpcare bill this year?
Consider this insanity: One out of four corporations in America doesnât pay a nickel in taxes, but if I should try to make my living as a tutor selling my time to help students graduate from school, Iâd have to pay business taxes on top of my income tax making my tax burden even higher!
And then the interview of Marvin Henry âMickeyâ Edwards, a former Republican congressman, who â seeing our political system sink ever deeper into corruption â wrote a book titled: âThe Parties Versus the People: How to Turn Republicans and Democrats into Americansâ
Watching this video, I canât help but think that both Bernie and this life-long self-identified conservative (a former Republican congressman, at that!) might both agree with me that the political fight we must wage is neither ârightâ against âleftâ, nor âleftâ against ârightâ, but the people against public enemy #1: the political corruption and plutocracy ruling, squeezing, and oppressing us from atop the dungheap society they have created. Americans who have been traditionally grouped into the âDemocratâ and GOP camps, disdaining or hating each other, should actually be able to unite and fight together for the America we both want, putting aside our comparatively minor differences in a struggle for justice and liberty for all.
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Here is yet another flashback to a few years ago, from back when basically none of us knew about the TPP, yet. Also, Bill Moyers exposed the inhumanity of our drone war which many of us are still innocently ignorant about. You really shouldnât miss this recorded episode:
(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Moyers & Company Show 148: Bernie Sanders on Big Mediaâs Power Play”)
In conclusion, I think we can all see here that we have come quite some way in just a few years. Back then, only some were aware of Obamaâs and Trumpâs corruption. The TPP was still an unknown in the public mind. Yet the people participating on the Moyers & Company Show predicted or foreshadowed much of what we have woken up to â even the idea that our traditional political party divide is a thing of the past that we should leave behind to unite as Americans for a just and fair America with good lives for all. Some voices are always worth listening to.
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A nice video for this weekend, if you havenât seen it already â or perhaps even if you have:
(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Who Is More Corrupt: Trump, Clinton or Obama? Surprising Answer!”)
Different people have a wide range of notions as to what makes a progressive. Especially people warped by right-wing media often have an upside-down misconception which sees progressives as liberals and liberals as neoliberals, in other words: the very opposite of progressives. Even progressive-minded people are sometimes so confused, they donât know they are progressives and perceive the term as a red flag.Continue reading “What Really Are or Arenât Progressives”→
Letâs be honest. The âDemocraticâ and Republican Party are not extremes of one another! They are almost identical! No true alternatives, at all. And the same goes for Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. Yes, you read correctly. They all screw us (the American working class people) to enrich themselves and their wealthy cronies. And, there is at least one very critically reason why Hillary would have been actually worse than Trump!
Jamarl Thomas, an unusually smart video blogger who I rate highly, gave a very sharp analysis arguing that the confused ones among us should stop, once and for all, to perpetuate the canard that Hillary would have been better than Trump in the Oval Office. In fact, the exact opposite is true! The very sensible argumentation comes from someone situated on what we, in America, traditionally consider the political âleft,â a term which in the past was synonymous with the âDemocraticâ Party, but today is anything but that. Listen or read (or do both). Itâs well worth it.
Here is the video, and below it my own summary and commentary:
(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Verdict Segment. Is Hillary Clinton the Lesser Evil? For Once and For all, NO!”)
(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Bernie Sanders SLAMS mick Mulvaney Trumps Budget plan, estate taxes”)
2.) Jimmy Dore on the dishonesty of our corporate mass media, the formerly “free” press, the so-called 4th estate which was supposed to keep a watch on governmnet for us. The case exposed: The Washington Post
(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Washington Post Caught Blatantly Lying To Their Readers Yet Again”)
3.) Noam Chomsky agrees with Jimmy Dore and me (and you?) on the reprehensible election rigging of the 2016 “Democratic” primaries:
(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Chomskyâs Comments Give Support For DNC Lawsuit”)
4.) Jimmy Dore on our plutocrats’ horrible arms deals with the Saudi-Arabian terror regime (and thus ISIS, as well):
(Note: if the video linked above gets deleted, you may search the Internet for the title: “Saudi Arms Deal Exposes Obama Administrationâs Jaw Dropping Hypocrisy”)
As always, you are invited to comment below, and if you agree that the dishonesty of our corporate mass media is a problem, you can help independent media like this one, perhaps the only way to keep us all informed and the ideas flowing.