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SOTT.net Exclusive: Paul Craig Roberts: 'Western Civilization Has Shed Its Values'

Paul Craig Roberts
Sott.net
Sun, 05 Dec 2010 04:12 UTC
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© Susan Walsh / AP Photo
She won't be welcome around here any more
"The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth becomes the greatest enemy of the State."

-- Dr. Joseph Goebbels
Western Civilization no longer upholds the values it proclaims, so what is the basis for its claim to virtue?

For example, the US print and TV media and the US government have made it completely clear that they have no regard for the First Amendment. Consider CNN's Wolf Blitzer's reaction to the leaked diplomatic cables that reveal how the US government uses deceptions, bribes, and threats to control other governments and to deceive the American and other publics. Blitzer is outraged that information revealing the US government's improprieties reached the people, or some of them. As Alexander Cockburn wrote, Blitzer demanded that the US government take the necessary steps to make certain that journalists and the American people never again find out what their government is up to.

The disregard for the First Amendment is well established in the US media, which functions as a propaganda ministry for the government. Remember the NSA leak given to the New York Times that the George W. Bush regime was violating the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and spying on Americans without obtaining warrants from the FISA court? The New York Times spiked the story for one year and did not release it until after Bush's reelection. By then, the Bush regime had fabricated a legal doctrine that "authorized" Bush to violate US law.

Glenn Greenwald writing in Salon has exposed the absence of moral standards among WikiLeaks' critics. A number of American politicians have called for the US government to murder Julian Assange, as have journalists such as neoconservative propagandist Jonah Goldberg, who wrote: "Why wasn't Assange garroted in his hotel room years ago?"
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Newspaper

The SOTT Report: Interview with Paul Craig Roberts

Joe Quinn
Sott.net
Sat, 04 Dec 2010 15:00 UTC
In this two-part SOTT Report special, Paul Craig Roberts talks about why government officials can no longer tell the truth, U.S. financial hegemony, evidence that the terrorist threat doesn't exist, and more.

Part 1:

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Question

Wiki-Leaks and Plausible Lies - Where Have All The Critical Thinkers Gone?

Joe Quinn
Sott.net
Thu, 02 Dec 2010 00:00 UTC
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While the revelations in the Wiki-leaks documents about the true nature of the US government and its imperial attitude towards other nations are welcome, I find myself in the strange position of having to agree with Hillary Clinton, David Cameron et al that the leaks won't affect anyone's relations with anyone.

Our leaders are an inherently hypocritical bunch and over the past 10 years, even the most uninformed have come to understand that our leaders have a definite tendency to say one thing and do another. Who doubts that such hardened politicians fully understand that lying to each other is par for the course in the sordid game of modern global governance? As such, why should the public be overly surprised to see confirmation of this in the Wiki-leaks documents? Entertained and even intrigued, but surprised?

I am not saying that there is no value in certain aspects of the documents themselves to the extent that they provide a chance to disseminate government corruption and mendacity to a wide audience, but titillating details such as Gadaffi's buxom 'nurse' is nothing new and, much more importantly, such details are by no means the main focus of the documents themselves.
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Pills

Drug Company Used Ghost Writers to Author Work Bylined by Academics, Documents Show

Marian Wang
Raw Story
Thu, 02 Dec 2010 16:55 UTC
Drugs
© Raw Story

According to newly released documents from GlaxoSmithKline, the pharmaceutical company often paid ghostwriters to pen medical studies, editorials and even a textbook that listed physicians as the authors.

The documents - some of which date back to late 1990s - were recently unsealed in litigation over a GlaxoSmithKline product. We saw them after they were attached to a letter released this week by a nonprofit watchdog group urging the National Institutes of Health to crack down on ghostwriting in medical academia. The documents and the letter by Project on Government Oversight together outline several examples of how a major drug company contributed to the funding, writing and approval of material published in medical journals and elsewhere.

The textbook, published in 1999, listed two physician co-authors who at the time were chairs of the psychiatry departments at the medical schools of Stanford University and Emory University, the New York Times reported this week in a piece that focused only on the textbook. According to the Times, it's the first instance where a book has been criticized for the same issues with ghostwriting and drug industry influence that have plagued medical journals.

Comment: For further reading on the scam of modern medicine see:

How Scientific Is Modern Medicine Really?

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People

Helpless

Linh Dinh
Sott.net
Fri, 03 Dec 2010 00:00 UTC
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Concepcion Picciotto has maintained an anti-war camp outside the White House for 29 years
"A man, without force, is without the essential dignity of humanity. Human nature is so constituted, that it cannot honor a helpless man, although it can pity him; and even this it cannot do long, if the signs of power do not arise."
- Frederick Douglass
The strong act. The weak react. Protest is a tool of the weak. The main aim of any protest is to draw attention to an injustice. It appeals, broadcasts and seeks to impress you with its number. So many of us are feeling this way. You are few, we are many, etc. After each mass protest, there is always a disagreement over the size of the crowd, with the estimate of the organizers usually doubling that of the authority, i.e., the target of the protest.

Even without number, even when the protest is made up of a few quixotic weirdos, or just one, it can still have meaning. The sight of a lonely protester on a city street, ignored by the crowd, is basically pathetic, if not comic, but if he happens to make some sense, then his very isolation can become an indictment of this crowd. Concepcion Picciotto, born 1945, has been encamped across the White House for twenty-nine years, since 1981. She lives in a tent, surrounded by signs denouncing U.S. militarism and its support for Israel. When Picciotto began, Carter was the President who had gotten us involved in Afghanistan. In 2010, Obama is fighting the same mujahideen armed by Carter. As long as the guns sell, it's all good. A lonely protester is not unlike Jonah ranting away in Nineveh, except Jonah got results. Folks actually heard him and changed their ways.
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Star of David

What would you do if . . .

Mohammed Said Alnadi
Mondoweiss
Mon, 29 Nov 2010 20:57 UTC
Checkpoint
© 1994-2010 Miguel Cruz
Checkpoint
Someone had assailed your home, ethnically cleansed its people, annexed its land, exhausted its bounteous resources, and decimated its geographical characteristics?

Someone had denied you your inalienable right of defending your home and self, and mendaciously accused you of being "terrorist", justifying crimes and oppression by "self-defense"?

Someone, by using humiliation and most degrading ways, had gotten in your way when you are dying and desperately in need of medical treatment?

Someone had taken away your most beloved ones and incarcerated them in a non-human environment?
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Heart - Black

TSA and cop abuse new mother - A Blood Boiler!

newport81
YouTube
Sun, 28 Nov 2010 15:31 UTC
New Mother Harassed and Threatened by TSA because she requests alternate screening for her breast milk. Video contains two errors: she was not pregnant at the time (became pregnant 6 weeks later) and her child at home was 7 months old (not 1 year).

Comment: Breast Milk. The latest "threat" the Public needs protecting from, your own regulations be damned!

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Light Saber

People Power! Ireland's largest demonstration in 30 years draws over 100,000 onto Dublin streets

Henry McDonald & Andrew Clark
The Guardian
Sun, 28 Nov 2010 02:15 UTC
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© AP Photo/Peter Morrison
One of the largest demonstrations in the Irish Republic's history brought more than 100,000 people on to Dublin's streets in protest over the international bailout and four years of austerity ahead.

As European officials thrashed out the finer details of an €85bn rescue package, huge crowds braved freezing temperatures to demonstrate against the cuts, aimed at driving down Ireland's colossal national debt.

The main march to O'Connell Street passed off peacefully but there was an uneasy standoff outside the Irish parliament as two lines of Garda Siochána officers hemmed in around 100 leftwing demonstrators who had broken away from the union-organised protest. Fireworks were thrown at gardai outside the gates of the Dail as protesters shouted: "Burn it down, burn it down." Extra police were rushed to the scene to surround the ad hoc demonstration by leftwing and anarchist groups, who also set fire to a picture of the taoiseach, Brian Cowen.

Among those on the main march there was deep anger that most of the €80bn-plus from the EU and IMF will be used to shore up Ireland's ailing banks.
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Padlock

Patriot Act for Food: A Close Look at Bizarre Propaganda for S.510

Rady Ananda
foodfreedom.wordpress.com
Sat, 27 Nov 2010 13:00 UTC
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© foodfreedom.wordpress.com
Need a good laugh? Check out the bizarre reasoning offered in support of the Patriot Act for Food (S 510, the Food Safety Modernization Act), which the U.S. Senate will vote on shortly. From a need to stop food smuggling, to the law is too old, to the terrorists are gonna get us, elites sure are shy of brains when it comes to credible propaganda. They must be drinking the fluoridated water and smoking Monsanto marijuana, or hoping you are.

A couple weeks ago, we reported that Senator Bob Casey informed his Pennsylvania constituents that S.510 will stop food smuggling in the United States. Never heard of the problem? That might be because the "biggest food smuggling case in the history of the U.S." amounted to $40 million worth of commercial grade honey over a five-year period. Food smuggling is clearly not a problem - nor is it a fiscally sound reason for giving the Food and Drug Administration an extra $1.6 billion.
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2 + 2 = 4

SOTT Exclusive: The Stench of US Economic Decay Grows Stronger

Paul Craig Roberts
Sott.net
Fri, 26 Nov 2010 20:00 UTC
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© Sott.net
On Thanksgiving Eve, the English language China Daily and People's Daily Online reported that Russia and China have concluded an agreement to abandon the use of the US dollar in their bilateral trade and to use their own currencies in its place. The Russians and Chinese said that they had taken this step in order to insulate their economies from the risks that have undermined their confidence in the US dollar as world reserve currency.

This is big news, especially for the news dead Thanksgiving holiday period, but I did not see it reported on Bloomberg, CNN, New York Times or anywhere in the US media. The ostrich's head remains in the sand.

Previously, China concluded the same agreement with Brazil.

As China has a large and growing supply of dollars from trade surpluses with which to conduct trade, China is signaling that she prefers Russian rubles and Brazilian reals to more US dollars.

The American financial press finds solace in the episodes when sovereign debt scares in the EU send the dollar up against the euro and UK pound. But these currency movements are just measures of financial players shorting troubled EU-denominated debt. They are not a measure of dollar strength.
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