Stuart Jeanne Bramhall's Blog: The Most Revolutionary Act , page 1126
November 27, 2017
Russia: McDonalds A “Foreign Agent”
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I love it. The best post I’ve read in weeks.
If citizens in the USA were valued over corporations (as they once were) we would have more appropriate consumer protection and truth in advertising by law. At times foreign countries refuse American foods and products on the grounds that they are unhealthy. Russia considering labeling McDonalds as a “foreign agent” is could be another such case. Although, from a cynical point of view, this may just be an intimidation ploy to get more money from the corporation.
On Friday, a Russian politician proposed labeling American fast food chains like McDonald’s and KFC as foreign agents because of marketing materials deemed manipulative or misleading.
“The food sold by American fast food restaurants, according to some studies, negatively affects the body and human health,” Boris Chernyshov, a Moscow lawmaker in the federal Russian Assembly, said to RBC. “In advertising, a positive image of consumption of these products is presented.”
“The first step is to…
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The American Dream Has Been Irreparably Broken
By William Hanna | Global Research
“There are many respects in which America, if it can bring itself to act with the magnanimity and the empathy appropriate to its size and power, can be an intelligent example to the world. We have the opportunity to set an example of generous understanding in our relations with China, of practical cooperation for peace in our relations with Russia, of reliable and respectful partnership in our relations with Western Europe, of material helpfulness without moral presumption in our relations with the developing nations, of abstention from the temptations of hegemony in our relations with Latin America, and of the all-around advantages of minding one’s own business in our relations with everybody.
Most of all, we have the opportunity to serve as an example of democracy to the world by the way in which we run our own society; America, in the words of John Quincy Adams, should be ‘the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all’ but ‘the champion and vindicator only of her own.’”
U.S. Senator James W. Fulbright (1905-1995) The Arrogance of Power, 1966.
Despite having met and befriended some fine Americans over the years, my long-held opinion of the U.S. in particular and the American people in general — an opinion confirmed after I read Senator Fulbright’s book in the late 60s — has not only remained doggedly unchanged, but has in fact become more entrenched and pessimistic. Such entrenched pessimism stems from the inescapable truth that regardless of an illusory concept of the “American exceptionalism” that arrogantly presumes to present itself as the “superpower” champion of democracy and human rights, the U.S. is in reality the world’s biggest violator of the very ideals it so hypocritically claims to champion.
This superpower which straddles the world with some 800 military bases in more than 70 countries and territories abroad — Britain, France, and Russia combined have only about 30 foreign bases — has been responsible for the killing of more than 20 million people in 37 “Victim Nations” Since World War Two.
“In the councils of government, we must guard against the acquisition of unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex. The potential for the disastrous rise of misplaced power exists and will persist. We must never let the weight of this combination endanger our liberties or democratic processes. We should take nothing for granted. Only an alert and knowledgeable citizenry can compel the proper meshing of the huge industrial and military machinery of defence with our peaceful methods and goals, so that security and liberty may prosper together.” President Eisenhower in his 1961 farewell address to the nation.
Needless to say, Eisenhower’s warning fell on deaf ears and the latest Congressional homage to the military-industrial complex was recently payed in September to the tune of a $700 billion defence policy bill designed to maintain America’s position — with an endless War on Terror and military interventions including regime changes — as a global military power.
As a consequence of such largesse to the military-industrial complex and billions more in aid to a brutal Apartheid Israeli state bent on an expansion policy of Palestinian land grabbing to build more settlements for Jews only, the U.S. has become a nation where more than 50 million Americans live below the poverty line; where 48 million of them receive food stamps; where more than one in five children is on food stamps and living in poverty; where an astounding 15% of senior citizens live in poverty; where ethnic poverty rates are 28% for Blacks, 24% for Hispanics, 10.5% for Asians, and 10% for Whites; were being Black lowers one’s credit score by 71 Points; where a new AFL-CIO study on corporate salaries found that CEOs made 335 times more than the average employee who earned $36,875 while the the big company CEOs got approximately $12,400,000; where according to a Forbes survey 56% of Americans have less than $1,000 in their combined cheque and savings bank accounts; and where an observation once made in 1967 by Martin Luther King Jr. has become a stark reality:
“A nation that continues year after year to spend more money on military defence than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual doom.”
To make matters even worse, according to the most recent study conducted by the U.S. Department of Education and the National Institute of Literacy, 32 million adults (14 percent of the population) in the U.S. can’t read; 21 percent of adults in the U.S. read below a 5th grade level; and 19 percent of high school graduates can’t read at all. The prevalence of such illiteracy in the U.S. may explain why 62,979,984 Americans voted for Donald Trump — an egocentric mentally disturbed racist illiterate with psychopathic tendencies — to become President of a nation whose government’s first allegiance is not to the welfare of the American people, but to the Apartheid policies of an Israeli state guilty of barbaric crimes against humanity. Some of the wide ranging downsides of illiteracy — the U.S. Federal Outlay on education is only 3% — are outlined on this link. . .
via The American Dream Has Been Irreparably Broken
November 26, 2017
Seymour Hersh: Hillary Clinton Sold Nerve Gas To Syrian Terrorists To Use Them As an Excuse to Invade Syria
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Respected investigative journalist, Seymour Hersh, has claimed that Hillary Clinton sold nerve gas to Syrian terrorists whilst she was acting as secretary of state.
Respected investigative journalist, Seymour Hersh, has claimed that Hillary Clinton sold nerve gas to Syrian terrorists whilst she was acting as secretary of state.
Hersh claimed that the Obama Administration falsely blamed the Government of Syria’s Bashar al-Assad for the sarin gas attack, which they were hoping to use as an excuse to invade Syria.
Hersh also claims that the Obama administration assisted in approving the transfer of deadly chemical weapons from Libya to terrorists who were operational in Syria.According to Zero Hedge: “By the terms of the agreement, funding came from Turkey, as well as Saudi Arabia and Qatar; the CIA, with the support of MI6, was responsible for getting arms from Gaddafi’s arsenals into Syria.”However, now, for the first time, Hersh has implicated Hillary Clinton directly in this ‘rat line’.
In an interview with Alternet.org, Hersh was asked about the then-US-Secretary-of-State’s role in the Benghazi Libya US consulate’s…
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Anarchy: How a Region of Somalia Just Solidified Its Independence
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“In the south, you see corruption, crime, and gang-like government oppression. This is what the United Nations and most of the international community call the official government of Somalia.” – I wish this was satire, but it’s not – it’s real life Somalia.
If you hate the government so much, why don’t you move to Somalia?
That might soon be a great option. The truth is Somalia is not without government. It actually has multiple governments.
In the south, you see corruption, crime, and gang-like government oppression. This is what the United Nations and most of the international community call the official government of Somalia.
And in the north there is aseparatist state called Somaliland. Here crime is lower, and the economy is freer. More people have power and water. The standard of living is higher. The region bases itslaw on thehistorical Xeer system, similar toCommon Law.
And until now, no international entity wanted to recognize Somaliland.
Did the people protest? Did the government petition the UN? Did they rebel against the southern “official” government?
No. Economic opportunity surfaced. Somaliland’s first international ally is not…
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The Movement to Abolish Prisons
Moana Jackson: Why Did Maori Never Have Prisons?
(2017)
At present, New Zealand has the second highest rate of mass incarceration in the world (after the US) – with the majority of inmates identifying as Maori. In the following presentation, Maori constitutional lawyer Moana Jackson makes the case for abolishing prisons. He cites the example of Norway, Finland and other Scandinavian countries, which decided decades ago that prisons were unsustainable and ineffective in reducing crime. In Norway, prisons are being replaced by open “habilitation” centers. In Finland, the number of prisons has been reduced from 100 to 20. The latter have mainly been replaced by mental health treatment centers.
Jackson’s main argument is that prisons are a direct result of colonization – that Maori had no prisons before European settlers arrived.* Prior to colonization, the primary Maori concern when people infringed on each other was the disruption in the net of social relationships. Different tribes set aside special facilities where victims and offenders could stay with their families to repair fractured relationships. In modern terminology, the process is referred to as “restorative justice.”** In New Zealand, we have no juvenile lock-up facilities. Instead offenders and their families meet with victims to make reparations.
Jackson also challenges the racist depiction of Maori as violent, naturally aggressive warriors. This stems from a European need to depict indigenous peoples as racially inferior to justify dispossessing. Stripping Maori of their true identity has traumatized generations of young Maori men by providing them with a distorted image of who they really are. Peeling away this lie will be essential to abolishing prisons in New Zealand.
I was intrigued to learned that both Norway and Finland consulted with indigenous Sami (who also had no prisons prior to colonization) in devising alternatives to prison.
*Europeans also had no need for prisons prior to the Enclosure Acts that drove our ancestors off the commons. Deprived of access to land, they had no means of supporting themselves and the majority ended up in prisons and workhouses or “transported” by the courts to the US or Australia. See https://stuartjeannebramhall.com/2015/08/04/forgotten-history-the-theft-of-the-commons/
**South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission is another famous example of restorative justice.
November 25, 2017
Demise of the Petrodollar has the Potential to Reshape the Geopolitical World
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“It was a classic mafia style arrangement. In exchange for Saudi Arabia’s agreement to the sole use of the dollar for oil transactions, the US underwrote Saudi Arabia’s security thereby ensuring the continuity of one of the world’s most corrupt and repressive regimes.”
In the early 1970s President Richard Nixon instigated two changes that had profound effects. The first of these was taking United States off the gold standard; i.e. henceforth US dollars would no longer be convertible to Gold. Ordinarily this might have been expected to have significant ramifications for the value of the US dollar.
Deleterious effects however, were avoided by another equally profound change. Nixon’s National Security Adviser Henry Kissinger negotiated an agreement with Saudi Arabia that henceforth all oil(initially from Saudi Arabia but rapidly extended to all OPEC) countries would be traded only in US dollars, the birth of the so called petrodollar.
It was a classic mafia style arrangement. In exchange for Saudi Arabia’s agreement to the sole use of the dollar for oil transactions, the US underwrote Saudi Arabia’s security thereby ensuring the continuity of one of the world’s most corrupt and repressive regimes.
Also unknown at…
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50 Workers Fired for Refusing Flu Vaccine
By Heather Callaghan | NaturalBlaze
And so it begins… A healthcare system has literally fired 50 employees – in one fell swoop – over a draconian flu jab policy
They can’t fire us all if we stand up, right? That might be the inner wishful thinking of those who refuse vaccinations while working in the healthcare system.
A Minnesota-based health system has fired about 50 employees who refused to get a flu shot.
Essentia Health announced last month that employees would be required to get vaccinated for influenza unless they received a religious or medical exemption.
The system claimed that it was trying to “keep patients from getting sick at its 15 hospitals and 75 clinics in Minnesota, Idaho, North Dakota and Wisconsin.”
From WGN9:
Essentia says 99 percent of the company’s 13,900 eligible employees had gotten the shot, received an exemption or were getting an exemption by the Monday deadline.
The United Steelworkers filed an injunction to try to delay the policy, but a federal judge denied the request. Minnesota Public Radio reports at least two other unions are filing grievances on behalf of workers who lost their jobs.
How do you know when something is truly for the benefit of the people? Why, when you are forced to choose it or lose your entire livelihood, of course!
We’d like to point out that we have heard from workers in other healthcare systems who are being forced to get shots or either lose their jobs or wear masks for over four months of the year. Please remember that it is not just nurses and doctors who are being coerced, but support assistance workers and other department workers in the hospital systems.
Obviously, no one should be forced to take into their bodies any substance or face losing everything. Although the system enforcing these mandates claims it’s for public health, this cannot be the case considering the almost complete lack of efficacy of flu vaccines. (See the Cochrane Collaboration’s review.)
The hospital systems could protect their patients better by cutting down on preventable medical errors which are the third leading cause of death in the U.S.! They could come up with reasonable methods to prevent superbugs and antibiotic resistance among their vulnerable patients.
We hope that all the unions fighting any healthcare systems using these seriously violating policies go all the way and win back basic rights for these employees.
via 50 Workers Just Fired From Health System For Refusing Vaccines
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Economic ‘Growth’ will destroy everything. Greening it won`t work – We Need a New System.
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Promoting economic growth as a solution to poverty is a lie. Studies show the poorest 60% of the world’s people receive only 5% of the additional income generated by rising GDP.
Everything Must Go
By George Monbiot, Everyone wants everything – how is that going to work? The promise of economic growth is that the poor can live like the rich and the rich can live like the oligarchs.
But already we are bursting through the physical limits of the planet that sustains us. Climate breakdown, soil loss, the collapse of habitats and species, the sea of plastic, insectageddon: all are driven by rising consumption.
The promise of private luxury for everyone cannot be met: neither the physical nor the ecological space exists.
But growth must go on: this is everywhere the political imperative.
And we must adjust our tastes accordingly. In the name of autonomy and choice, marketing uses the latest findings in neuroscience to break down our defences.
Research by Oxfam suggests that the world’s richest 1% (if your household has an income of £70,000 or more (78,000…
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November 24, 2017
Harvard Immunologist to Legislators: Unvaccinated Children Pose ZERO Risk to Anyone
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People who have not received the vaccines mentioned below pose no higher threat to the general public than those who have, implying that discrimination against non-immunized children in a public school setting may not be warranted.
AGR Daily 60 Second News Bites
Polio Vaccine
IPV (inactivated poliovirus vaccine) cannot prevent transmission of poliovirus. Wild poliovirus has been non-existent in the USA for at least two decades.
Even if wild poliovirus were to be re-imported by travel, vaccinating for polio with IPV cannot affect the safety of public spaces.
Please note that wild poliovirus eradication is attributed to the use of a different vaccine, OPV or oral poliovirus vaccine. Despite being capable of preventing wild poliovirus transmission, use of OPV was phased out long ago in the USA and replaced with IPV due to safety concerns.
DTaP Vaccine
Tetanus is not a contagious disease, but rather acquired from deep-puncture wounds contaminated with C. tetani spores. Vaccinating for tetanus (via the DTaP combination vaccine) cannot alter the safety of public spaces; it is intended to render personal protection only.
While intended to prevent the disease-causing effects of the diphtheria toxin, the diphtheria toxoid vaccine…
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Srebrenica: Ratko Mladic’s Sham Trial and Conviction
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The break-up of Yugoslavia (where Bill Clinton committed war crimes – see https://stuartjeannebramhall.com/2015/07/25/the-war-crimes-of-bill-clinton/) was a practice run for Iraq, Libya and Syria. Alleged genocide at Srebrenica was more myth than massacre. Deaths were hugely inflated, the ICTY established to blame Serbs for war crimes committed by both sides.
By Stephen Lendman
Global Research, November 23, 2017
VISIT MY NEW WEB SITE:
Contact at lendmanstephen@sbcglobal.net.
The Western-controlled International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) was charged with delivering victor’s justice, polar opposite the real thing.
In March 2016, it wrongfully convicted Bosnian Serb leader Radovan Karadzic on multiple counts of genocide in Srebrenica, war crimes and crimes against humanity, sentencing him to 40 years in prison.
At age-71, it was a virtual life sentence. He served as Bosnian Serb Republika Srpska president from 1992 – 1996, part of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
Alleged genocide at Srebrenica was more myth than massacre. Deaths were hugely inflated, the ICTY established to blame Serbs for war crimes committed by both sides.
Srebrenica was a combined Muslim military base and refugee “safe area.” Serbian President/Federal Republic of Yugoslavia leader Slobodan Milosevic, wanted Serbs restrained…
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The Most Revolutionary Act
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