The Republic of Cuba and US Actions against it

https://soundcloud.com/empire-files/soscuba?ref=clipboard&p=i&c=0&utm_source=clipboard&utm_medium=text&utm_campaign=social_sharing

More Russiaphobia

Recently, the sleeping Russiagate psyop created by the US Deep State (especially CIA) bounced back to life with a new claim from one of its central conspiracy theorists, Luke Harding, who published another unsubstantiated account (totally unbelieveable IMO) in the Guardian which was lovingly echoed by several of my friends.

Since then, I've seen a number of debunkings and near-debunkings.  Sadly I've been too preoccupied with personal matters (and a new backyard cat I need to get spayed, somehow, and don't let pets take over your life) to keep up with this and I've now misplaced the mother lode of debunkings on this particular new claim I stumbled across one night.

Here's Doctorow's take, which I completely agree with.  It's not really a debunking though.

Aaron Mate tweeted that MSNBC wouldn't touch the story, and got some more info in the comments.  I don't think I found that "treasure trove of debunking" here however, though there are some others.

Matt Taibbi has weighed in.

The US is the Absolute Worst

https://caitlinjohnstone.substack.com/p/the-us-is-the-absolute-worst-notes/comments

I agree with the thesis and about 95% of the content here.

All except the nearl-anti-Vax and anti-AOC parts (though I will concede, AOC is not strongly anti-Imperialist, but pining for a 3rd party sweep does little good).

I've had the "US is the worst empire" in mind for at least 10 years now.  It's not one I can get many friends to agree with however.

Nowadays many are primed to fight back against the valid "10's of millions" charge with the made up claim that "Communism (or particular Communist countries) killed 100 million."  Which is utterly wrong on many levels.  Or if it's not wrong, then it can be equivalently shown that Capitalism has killed billions.

Caitlin defuses this counterattack with the focus on "no other country is doing this now," a pretty good approach.

Touring Xinjiang

 A member of German Green Party visits Xinjiang again with his wife from the region.

Chinese society is run so much better than US and US Vassal and Occupied states, I think we'd be better off if Chinese were running the world.

While I bitterly oppose US Imperialism in principle, and especially the way it destabilizes the world by supporting religious and other extremists to endlessly and mercilessly attack "enemies," I have not done enough to stop it to wash my hands of guilt.

Message to Anthropologist David Orenstein

Hi David,

I loved your presentation for the Freethinkers today.  It seems to me if we are already being visited by extraterrestrials, as recent disclosures suggest, then the are almost certain not to be "takers," otherwise, they would already have taken us.  They are apparently just studying us now, and perhaps they may help us later.  There is only a remote chance they are takers but they are just biding their time, perhaps waiting for us to do ourselves in and save them the trouble.  But it seems unlikely they would want to wait and would have better means at their disposal to get the job done more quickly, perhaps sterilizing the planet with heat or radiation.  Which gets to another thought of mine.  It doesn't seem worthwhile for ET to come here just for raw materials, which can almost certainly be obtained more cheaply elsewhere.  The most useful thing they might want would be The Planet Itself situated in a wonderful orbit for carbon and water based life.  But anyway, if they've been here a long time, it seems more likely they are studying or even perhaps helping already.  I wouldn't think they would be needed for the Pyramids, but what they might be needed for is saving us from nuclear accidents and the like.  It seems we have already survived great dangers against difficult odds.  Finally I think Hawking and others are thinking too much of the limits.  With billion year science and technology, it might be more like the Heart of Gold spaceship and Infinite Improbability Drive, where you can just set the coordinates to any point in spacetime.  And then, given that such god-like technology were available, such ET's would no doubt be everywhere in the universe already.  Why?  It would seem most reasonable to believe because they would like to see more natural beauty, even if they have to help it along in most cases.  I too love Sagan and am watching Episode 13 of Cosmos tonight.  Just because you brought it up, I finally unwrapped my box set.  Thanks!

Wow !

 This is the kind of article, very deep, that I created this blog for.  But in this case, I couldn't have done it.

History of Canaan-Phoenicia

https://www.worldhistory.org/canaan/

Canaan was the name of the place, not the name of any particular "people."  There were many many different peoples in the region, in different locales and times.  Some of them were the Phoenicians, inventors of the phonetic alphabet.  The Phoenicians started from coastal cities in the southeast Mediterranean in the Bronze age, originally as far south as Gaza, and established a maritime empire throughout the Mediterranean foreshadowing Greece and Rome.  They were great exporters of paper and purple dye and became very rich.  "Canaan" and "Phoenicia" are both names for purple, the latter being the Greek name for purple, though not all Canaanites were Phoenicians.  Originally extending to Gaza, their major city state became Tyre, in modern Lebanon.  The Phoenician civilization was destroyed by Rome in 64 BCE with great prejudice...salting the earth in Carthage which was their greatest African settlement.

After Herodotus called the region previously known as "Canaan" (as originally inscribed in early Bronze Age mesopotamian texts) "Palestine" (after the then Philistine cities on the coast, though there are other theories, such as the Canaanite god Pales) in his 5th century BCE texts, the newer name gradually replaced the old names.

https://www.worldhistory.org/palestine/