Obama's CIA Family

I've been on to this story since at least 2016.  And it fits the wider pattern.  All US Presidents since Truman if not before have deep US Intelligence connections, often including family ties.

A retired Intelligence friend of mine likes to say Putin "is KGB."  That's oversimplification, Putin is also arguably anti-KGB and certainly anti-Communist.  But the same phenomenon is illustrated, much better I think, by US Presidents.  And all the better, for maintaining the control from Intelligence,  that there be a revolving door of them, rather than a singular personality who can become independent (and at least potentially serve the entire nation, instead of merely the elite).

The Bush Family is the best illustration.  George HW Bush was certainly CIA director in the late 1970's, but many accounts place him central to attempts to assassinate Castro as well, as proprietor of the CIA-front "Zapata Oil Company" which was a short distance from Cuba and used as a platform for launching attacks against Cuba, and from there to the successful assassination of the becoming-rogue President Kennedy who failed to back his operation up with the USAF.  GHW Bush's father had worked for the same law firm as Allen Dulles, which notoriously arranged banking for the Nazi's (that was Prescott Bush's personal job).  If you were looking for anti-Communist US elites who would do anything, anything to destroy the Soviet Union, you'd come straight to the Bush Family.  Except they were already there, right at the center of Intelligence, already.

Out of that, the Bush Family got 5 US Presidencies, 2 with puppet Reagan as front man, one for himself (and curiously when the "collapse" of the Soviet Union occurred), and two for his son GWB.  So far.

Trump came from the contracting dark side of the company, being personally tutored by Roy Cohn--himself not so much ever a professional employee of the firm but instead a top asset, devoted to trashing enemies of the state.

Obama's Mother's life reads like that of a very enterprising asset, if not agent.  And his official father too.  And there's more.  I've seen much of this before, but never with so many good pictures.

https://covertactionmagazine.com/2021/10/01/a-company-family-the-untold-history-of-obama-and-the-cia/

Politics is Important

Though voting for debate on a measure which might (barring Filibuster reform) never come up for a vote, or voting for a vote on a measure which will surely lose, might seem mere theatrics, they are in fact the stuff of Politics, and we should leverage them as much as possible.

Two of the worst Democratic Party Senators have become dark stars in recent fights.  More attention needs to be focussed on the actual details, such as the elimination of the only serious tool to fight global warming (the clean electricity standard) and negotiation for drug prices.  IF our government could only pass those two things, and skip (for now) crap such as a childcare subsidy for those with family income below $60k, I'd feel that at least some progress had been made.

How are those with family income less than $60k going to hire the help needed to prove to authorities that they have income less than $60k?  Neoliberal programs such as this (remember Obama's "help" for low income homeowners) typically barely gets utilized.

But of course the establishment leans toward token benefits (as little benefit as possible, and feeding some new predatory industries) and business as usual (predatory capitalism).  We need to see fundamental institutional changes.  The rest leaves us still headed toward the abyss, just with more bullshit paperwork.

Nevertheless, it's important to tie obstruction of needed changes to names and make the worst of the obstructionists lose in elections and look like losers too.  That's Politics too. 

Storyville

October 10, 1917 was the day Storyville was closed.  I share the take of historian Eric Loomis on this.

https://twitter.com/ErikLoomis/status/1447203382117249030?s=20

Meanwhile, many Communists I see on Twitter are calling sex work the greatest of all Capitalist exploitation, which no true Communist can defend.

Also often bragging about not drinking or smoking.

First, socialism is not end-communism.  End-communism is not only the end of all exploitation, but the end of all unmet needs.  Socialism is the middle ground where some exploitation has been eliminated, but people still work for wages under a boss of some kind (not a capitalist boss, but nonetheless a boss).  As long as there's a boss, or any kind of paymaster, there is exploitation.

During this intermediate time of socialism, some will have their minds exploited, some their pluck, some their bodies, and so on.

Worst is those who sell their soul in service of the imperial state.  But a state, even a socialist state, needs defense.

Second worst is those who sell their rage to the protection of capital and supremacism at home.  But there must be peace officers.

Way way down on the list of exploitation is medical doctors.  Medical doctors as claimants on the health insurance industry and in other ways are exploited, meanwhile as small business, may in term exploit workers.  But we will always need medical doctors!

I see sex workers about the same level.  Given the natural imbalance in heterosexual needs, we will always need sexual surrogates of many kinds, direct and intermediated.

Drugs are an equally essential part of living, alcohol, marijuana, and caffeine are the most useable and useful in moderation.  Tobacco is deadly, and should always be substituted with something better, but was a key part of The Greatest Generation, and before, FWIW.

Anything to do with "personal purity" is a religious matter, best not discussed in secular company.