2016 Election, Historical Amnesia, and Deep Politics

[Andrew Prutsok]

19 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

 

Now you bring up Assange and Trump.  Again, I have no idea on that since I have not seen the CIA/NSA/ FBI evidence on it.  Have you?  How?  What is it then?  Once I see it, then I can form a logical opinion.  Please let us know where it is if you have seen it Tommy.

 

I believe the president-elect is briefing intelligence officials about what the Russians did or did not do as we speak. Maybe we will see the evidence soon.

[John Butler]

I have been reading through what you guys are saying and it would sound like looney tunes except it is real.  The stuff on YouTube is mind blowing.  I idea that Obama is a homosexual and his wife Michelle is a transgender is something I didn't know.  Is it real?  Why am I hearing about something like that on YouTube 8 years after Obama became president.  Really strange stuff.

The question I want to ask is If Trump follows through with what he says he is going to do then what is the chance he will he be assassinated by the same elite forces that got Kennedy.

[James DiEugenio]

I don't know what the above two comments mean,  especially the one by Butler.

 

But I will say this, Alex Sill's article is now getting over 2000 views per day--views not hits.  It is, by far, the highest rated article we have had at Kennedysandking.com yet. But further, it is begin passed around Facebook also.  Which is really good.  As I said, its these kinds of essays that help us break out of our confining niche.

 Since it tells others that the JFK case is not just an historical subject for tin foil hat types.

 

 

[John Butler]

I'm just saying YouTube is a hoot.  I've learned more about strange things like snake eyed reptilian aliens than I ever want to know.  Supposedly, 82 alien races are infesting the earth.  I'm just saying these things are fantastical.

Trump assassination thing is all over youtube.

[Guest]

Is it fair to point out that the author of this piece is 24 years old?  This is not to say that it isn't well-written and worth reading.  Indeed, it could serve as a Deep Politics Manifesto, if one were needed.  But it does provide some perspective to mentally add "says a 24-year-old guitarist" at the end of each sentence - sort of like adding "in bed" at the end of every Chinese fortune cookie, which can be quite amusing.

One of the odd things about the election to me was that bright young people like this guy ended up having a choice among dinosaurs like Sanders, Clinton and Trump, all of whom are even older than moi.  Deep Politics, I suppose.  You only have to be 35 to be President.  I can't understand why young people like this didn't absolutely demand a candidate that actually represents their perspective.  Deep Politics, I suppose.  If Deep Politics theology were true, what on earth could someone like Sanders hope to accomplish?  So, Bernie would have won - and what then?  It almost seems to me that if you think Sanders could have made a genuine difference, then you are admitting you don't really believe Deep Politics theology is true.

"Says a 67-year-old fart," who thought he had written a paper solving The Problem of Evil when he was a 24-year-old seminary student.

Edited January 12, 2017 by Guest

[Jeffrey Reilley]

On 1/12/2017 at 9:26 AM, Lance Payette said:

Is it fair to point out that the author of this piece is 24 years old?  This is not to say that it isn't well-written and worth reading.  Indeed, it could serve as a Deep Politics Manifesto, if one were needed.  But it does provide some perspective to mentally add "says a 24-year-old guitarist" at the end of each sentence - sort of like adding "in bed" at the end of every Chinese fortune cookie, which can be quite amusing.

One of the odd things about the election to me was that bright young people like this guy ended up having a choice among dinosaurs like Sanders, Clinton and Trump, all of whom are even older than moi.  Deep Politics, I suppose.  You only have to be 35 to be President.  I can't understand why young people like this didn't absolutely demand a candidate that actually represents their perspective.  Deep Politics, I suppose.  If Deep Politics theology were true, what on earth could someone like Sanders hope to accomplish?  So, Bernie would have won - and what then?  It almost seems to me that if you think Sanders could have made a genuine difference, then you are admitting you don't really believe Deep Politics theology is true.

"Says a 67-year-old fart," who thought he had written a paper solving The Problem of Evil when he was a 24-year-old seminary student.

    If Sanders had won the ticket, Sanders would not be alive. Of that, I am certain. Of the two remaining after that, it didn't much matter. They all are aiming towards the same outcome. I'm not saying there is some organized group of elitists that sit at a table making plans with each other, but it wouldn't surprise me if there were. Greed, says history, knows no bounds. I wouldn't put anything past powerful people with means, in bed.

    Did the young people succeed when you weren't a 67-year-old fart? Or did the younger generation's best chance at a candidate for change get whacked? If anything, your 24-year-old self has probably been desensitized to the point of indifferent acceptance. I think most people are victim of that, myself included. Youth has the advantage of not being as tainted as we older people. Though I am only 33, I have an engine with lots of miles and very few oil changes, if ya dig.

    Too many times has the "small" guy been shown what happens when the "big" guy feels their power threatened. I'm losing my train of thought so I will just abruptly end this, for I am merely a golf ball whacker guy. It is sunny and I must do my job.

[David Andrews]

I do have one question - why is it that when Kennedy wanted to reach out to Russia and Cuba he was basically pilloried, while crooked ba##ard Dick Nixon goes over to Russia and China in the 70's and he's hailed as an esteemed statesman? This from a guy who disrupted peace talks for Vietnam in '68 and who used one of the most outrageous foreign policies in US history (the "madman theory")?

Just to mention, Michael - if you check Rick Perlstein's books (I think this is in Nixonland, but it may be in the sequel, The Invisible Bridge), Nixon's Russia and China overtures were frowned on by the Rockefeller-centered Eastern Establishment, and the trips may have contributed to the climate that led to the resignation.  The visits seem to have been Nixon's attempts to create a legend as a statesman for himself, and were not more than icebreakers policywise, though Nixon surely also explored and exploited the divisions between Russia and China.  Rockefeller protégé Henry Kissinger may have been caught in the middle on these trips, though his own vanity was surely stoked.  

Edited February 16, 2017 by David Andrews

[John Butler]

Nixon was a far deeper and a more cunning thinker than most people believe.  He was way over on the dark side channeling the emperor.  People didn't "pillory" Nixon because they knew what he was doing.  Peace with Honor meant nothing to him.  He was trying to win the Viet Nam War.  Getting the Chinese to back off would help.

The monsters of my youth were not Dracula, not the Mummy, and not Frankenstein.  The monsters of my youth were Kennedy, Johnson, and Nixon. 

[David Andrews]

He was trying to win the Viet Nam War.  Getting the Chinese to back off would help.

...By dealing with the Chinese independently of the Russians.  Another reason why his trips would be opposed by the Eastern Establishment, who hoped to be invested longer in Vietnam..

Edited February 16, 2017 by David Andrews

[James DiEugenio]

Nixon knew the Vietnam War was lost in 1969.  He knew he could not win because Creighton Abrams told him so.  And he repeated this to lower level speechwriters like Buchanan. (See Fatal Politics by Ken Hughes.)

The real, absolute perfidy of what Nixon and Kissinger did in Indochina, is this: knowing they could not win, they expanded the war into Laos and Cambodia in an unprecedented way, slaughtering tens of thousands of innocent civilians in a huge bombing campaign, in order to salvage Nixon's mythological Peace With Honor.

What was Nixon's Peace with Honor?  As CIA officer Frank Snepp later wrote, it was simply this: Vietnam would not fall so soon as to be blamed on Nixon.  In other words, as Kissinger actually wrote in a cable, there needed to be a Decent Interval, for sheer political camouflage.

What made this even worse, tactically and morally, is that all of the bombing, all of the so called Vietnamization, all of the expansion of the war, causing the fall of Cambodia to the Kyhmer Rouge, and the hundreds of thousands exterminated by Pol Pot, was for essentially nothing in a military sense.  In the book, The Palace File, it is exposed that there is no significant difference between the truce proposal made by the Americans in 1969, and the one accepted in 1972.  (Theodore Draper also made this observation in his book Present History.)  And the whole idea that the USSR or ChIna was helping end the war is another cover story.  Because declassified tapes and cables reveal that the Russians had little or no influence in Hanoi's war policy: they wanted to talk about arms control. And the Russian ambassador saw through the whole "madman ploy", which Kissinger actually rehearsed with Nixon.

As more and more gets declassified by the Nixon Library, we see two things about those two men.  First, its pretty obvious now why both RMN and his family did not want those documents and tapes revealed. It was not all about money.  Secondly, the reputation that Nixon and Kissinger had as foreign policy savants was a creation--in some ways a self-creation--of the media. Especially on Kissinger's part.  In reality, their record in foreign policy, in many ways, was just awful in multiple areas.  

And the more that gets declassified, the worse it gets.

Edited February 16, 2017 by James DiEugenio

[James DiEugenio]

Let me add one more point about this.

Most authors write about how LBJ turned around many of Kennedy's foreign policy initiatives.  And that is true.

But what is also true is that Nixon and Kissinger, in some cases, turned them around even more.  There is Indochina, the Middle East, and also in Africa.

I was really struck by this in reading a couple of books, The Palace File, and Decent Interval. That  is not the point of those books of course, but if you come in informed about the intervening years, you can see that aspect.  The case of Indochina goes way back when Nixon was vice president.  He was proposing American troop involvement back in the fifties.  Far from being a sophisticated, modernist foreign policy thinker, the more one studies him, Nixon was really a disciple of Foster Dulles.  This was most obvious when he was telling Reagan not to deal with Gorbachev.  Gorby was really  a Kremlin hardliner.  Kissinger told Reagan the same.

Could anyone  have been more wrong?  I mean if Reagan's ideas are more accurate than yours, then what is the worth of your foreign policy acumen anyway?

[Thomas Graves]

On 1/10/2017 at 8:05 AM, John Butler said:

I have been reading through what you guys are saying and it would sound like looney tunes except it is real.  The stuff on YouTube is mind blowing.  I idea that Obama is a homosexual and his wife Michelle is a transgender is something I didn't know.  Is it real?  Why am I hearing about something like that on YouTube 8 years after Obama became president.  Really strange stuff.

The question I want to ask is If Trump follows through with what he says he is going to do then what is the chance he will he be assassinated by the same elite forces that got Kennedy.

https://mediabiasfactcheck.com

Edited February 16, 2017 by Thomas Graves

[Kirk Gallaway]

16 hours ago, Jeffrey Reilley said:

    If Sanders had won the ticket, Sanders would not be alive. Of that, I am certain. Of the two remaining after that, it didn't much matter. They all are aiming towards the same outcome. I'm not saying there is some organized group of elitists that sit at a table making plans with each other, but it wouldn't surprise me if there were. Greed, says history, knows no bounds. I wouldn't put anything past powerful people with means, in bed.

    Did the young people succeed when you weren't a 67-year-old fart? Or did the younger generation's best chance at a candidate for change get whacked? If anything, your 24-year-old self has probably been desensitized to the point of indifferent acceptance. I think most people are victim of that, myself included. Youth has the advantage of not being as tainted as we older people. Though I am only 33, I have an engine with lots of miles and very few oil changes, if ya dig.

    Too many times has the "small" guy been shown what happens when the "big" guy feels their power threatened. I'm losing my train of thought so I will just abruptly end this, for I am merely a golf ball whacker guy. It is sunny and I must do my job.

To the guy who resurrected this thread, I say Jefferey, great post!! I agree with your ageist criticism.

I hear a lot of talking about the "Deep State" here but there isn't much articulation by many people of what it is. Almost as if it's better left unsaid and to one's most evil imaginings. If this is such an ongoing threat, does anyone ever think to "know thy enemy". But people just go over and over a 50 year past, which I enjoy too, but they never ask. Are the same forces in aggregate present today? Do they still need to leach off the government defense spending of the most powerful nation on earth as they did in the 50's and 60's? Are they the same type of people with the same goals?

Does anyone here really think Trump will be assassinated?  I say, If Trump goes it will be because of his own undoing. For people to hail Trump as the second JFK is the most absurd thing I could imagine, and i find sort of offensive.This gets to the bottom of "know thy enemy." Despite whatever populist rhetoric Trump is a globalist with investments in 25 countries. Trump wants financial deregulation,less security deregulation, (fewer cops on Wall Street)relax restrictions on banks, lower taxes across the board, lower corporate taxes, repatriation of foreign dollars, less environmental regulation. Why do you think the stock markets not just here, but around the world are going bonkers, and the banks in particular? Trump's agenda is music to any "Deep States" ears. That is the world financial elite corporate agenda. They make money if there is talk of war, the threat of war, or no war at all. They can always make money through black arms sales and drugs.

If Sanders had won the ticket, Sanders would not be alive. Of that, I am certain. Of the two remaining after that, it didn't much matter. They all are aiming towards the same outcome. 

Right, and who is the real threat to this, of course the socialist who wants, free health care, free public education, a strong environmental platform, decrease in Defense spending and a pulling back  of American power abroad. But the truth is, to the international elites, though the trend would be very disturbing, Sanders with Republicans controlling both houses, would mean gridlock, which would be perfectly acceptable to them. But I could imagine such a scenario, if in another 4 years, if the current problems of discontent are still not addressed, and the rich get richer and the poor poorer, and worse yet there were to be yet another financial collapse, and the Democrats were to regain control of both houses in a counter populist uprising and had a charismatic candidate who talked like FDR. That candidate could be in the cross hairs of the "Deep State"or maybe like Roosevelt, they might attempt a coup, like they tried to do with Smedley Butler in 1933.

 

 

[Jeffrey Reilley]

6 hours ago, Kirk Gallaway said:

 

Right, and who is the real threat to this, of course the socialist who wants, free health care, free public education, a strong environmental platform, decrease in Defense spending and a pulling back  of American power abroad. But the truth is, to the international elites, though the trend would be very disturbing, Sanders with Republicans controlling both houses, would mean gridlock, which would be perfectly acceptable to them. But I could imagine such a scenario, if in another 4 years, if the current problems of discontent are still not addressed, and the rich get richer and the poor poorer, and worse yet there were to be yet another financial collapse, and the Democrats were to regain control of both houses in a counter populist uprising and had a charismatic candidate who talked like FDR. That candidate could be in the cross hairs of the "Deep State"or maybe like Roosevelt, they might attempt a coup, like they tried to do with Smedley Butler in 1933.

 

 

 

If Sanders had won, and then gone on to become president, would the youth have felt empowered, and in that feeling of strength, would these "deep state" folks lose some rather important footing?

Keeping the masses thinking they are helpless, weak, and without options is what keeps them in power. I hate using "them", so I guess "powerful yet undefined others" is better, but I am at work and typing, and I am going for speed over grammatical prowess. Anyhow, I doubt, if said people exist, they would simply let youth gain momentum. Far too risky for "powerful yet undefined others", and they too know what happened in the 60's.

 

"...There was madness in any direction, at any hour. If not across the Bay, then up the Golden Gate or down 101 to Los Altos or La Honda. . . . You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning. . . .

And that, I think, was the handle—that sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we didn’t need that. Our energy would simply prevail. There was no point in fighting—on our side or theirs. We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave. . . .

So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark—that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back.”-Hunter S.

Reminds me of that for some reason

 

Edited February 17, 2017 by Jeffrey Reilley

[Kirk Gallaway]

15 hours ago, Jeffrey Reilley said:

If Sanders had won, and then gone on to become president, would the youth have felt empowered, and in that feeling of strength, would these "deep state" folks lose some rather important footing?

Keeping the masses thinking they are helpless, weak, and without options is what keeps them in power. I hate using "them", so I guess "powerful yet undefined others" is better, but I am at work and typing, and I am going for speed over grammatical prowess. Anyhow, I doubt, if said people exist, they would simply let youth gain momentum. Far too risky for "powerful yet undefined others", and they too know what happened in the 60's.

"...There was madness in any direction, at any hour. If not across the Bay, then up the Golden Gate or down 101 to Los Altos or La Honda. . . . You could strike sparks anywhere. There was a fantastic universal sense that whatever we were doing was right, that we were winning. . . .

And that, I think, was the handle—that sense of inevitable victory over the forces of Old and Evil. Not in any mean or military sense; we didn’t need that. Our energy would simply prevail. There was no point in fighting—on our side or theirs. We had all the momentum; we were riding the crest of a high and beautiful wave. . . .

So now, less than five years later, you can go up on a steep hill in Las Vegas and look West, and with the right kind of eyes you can almost see the high-water mark—that place where the wave finally broke and rolled back.”-Hunter S.

Reminds me of that for some reason

 

 

 

Jeff, I don't really like to use "them" either, but it is sort of part of the venue.

I relate so much to that HST passage, I feel almost foolish admitting it. That's what age will do to you. Those were even my stomping grounds. I even forgot that passage! heh heh

Reminds me of that for some reason

If that's your personal observation, I don't know if you should feel that way. You've got the numbers. On a social political level your group is just starting to be felt. For years I watched the main stream media and entertainment ignore my rock and roll, my music, literature, films. They'd  sneak in  snippets of my "alternative lifestyle" into tv shows just enough that  that the mainstream culture could stomach it. That's not even to mention that people got thrown in jail for long periods of time for doing things that I did! Keep in mind, it wasn't until I reached my 40's that another baby boomer was actually elected President. So Jeff, I'd say to you that the high water mark is still ahead.

 

Edited February 18, 2017 by Kirk Gallaway