Caitlin Johnstone, JFK and the Insurrection

[Cliff Varnell]

6 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

IMO, the American republic ended in November of 1963. 

Jim Crow ended in 1965 with the passage of the Voting Rights Act.
 
https://www.thoughtco.com/what-is-jim-crow-45387

The USA was more of a republic in 1960 than it is today?

https://www.history.com/news/african-american-voting-right-15th-amendment

Before passage of the Voting Rights Act, an estimated 23 percent of eligible Black voters were registered nationwide; by 1969 that number rose to 61 percent. By 1980, the percentage of the adult Black population on Southern voter rolls surpassed that in the rest of the country, the historian James C. Cobb wrote in 2015, adding that by the mid-1980s there were more Black people in public office in the South than in the rest of the nation combined. 

In 2012, turnout of Black voters exceeded that of white voters for the first time in history, as 66.6 percent of eligible Black voters turned out to help reelect Barack Obama, the nation’s first African American president. </q>

[Ron Bulman]

On 2/1/2021 at 1:12 PM, Matt Allison said:

Trump killed more Americans than any war has, and then tried to end the Republic.

 

It is laughable to think any other President has been worse than that.

None of the others, promulgating an oligarchy, sought a dictatorship through fascism.  mussolini and hitler got what they deserved in the end.  

[James DiEugenio]

But actually Matt, that is not correct.

The revised fatalities of the Civil War are now up to about 750,000.

Which does not make Buchanan and his states rights cause look any better.

[W. Niederhut]

3 hours ago, James DiEugenio said:

But actually Matt, that is not correct.

The revised fatalities of the Civil War are now up to about 750,000.

Which does not make Buchanan and his states rights cause look any better.

Jim,

      Not sure how I dragged myself into the rather odd, thankless role of defending James Buchanan, but, surely, we can't blame Buchanan for the casualties of the Civil War!

      On the contrary, Buchanan was the last of the Jacksonian Democratic Presidents who strove to maintain the hopelessly frayed coalition of Northern and Southern (pro-slavery) Democrats-- preserving the Union and Constitutionally-sanctioned slavery.  For this, he was later vilified and nearly lynched at his Pennsylvania estate.

      Lincoln famously said during his Douglas debates that, "The country cannot endure half-slave and half-free."

      Buchanan, like all of his Jacksonian Democratic predecessors, believed precisely the opposite--  that the rights of Southern slave owners were protected by the Constitution, itself.  (And he was a highly-respected lawyer.)

      

      

Edited February 3, 2021 by W. Niederhut

[James DiEugenio]

William, the very spinelessness of the Democrats refusing to take a stand on the issue gave the Republican Party its almost amazing rocket boost into the stratosphere. 

If you recall, it was really Douglass and the Kansas Nebraska Act which enraged many northerners since it meant that now you could have slavery north of the Mason Dixon line, theoretically all the way to Canada.  This helped form the Republican party which in just two years ran a nearly successful presidential candidate, who would have been better than Buchanan.

Then came Dred Scott. They won the presidency next time out.  

[Benjamin Cole]

On 1/31/2021 at 12:44 PM, James DiEugenio said:

Nice one Benjamin: 

"The newly tabulated figures indicate that at least 260 million U.S. cluster bomblets were released over Laos during the war — eighty-six bomblets for every person living in the country (the population was approximately 3 million in 1970)."

That's just a toe on the body. The carnage was everywhere.

Most people, even intelligent people, do not fully understand what happened in Indochina.  That is why John Newman begins the new version of  JFK and Vietnam with Laos. Its why David Kaiser included about 60 pages on Laos in his book American Tragedy. One of the things LBJ had altered in NSAM 273 were restrictions on operations into Laos and justifications for excursions into Cambodia. (Newman, 1992 version, pp 447-48). These were widened as time went on until, under LBJ there was bombing in those countries.  In Laos in late 1964 and Cambodia in 1965.  This was greatly expanded under Nixon.  From 1965 to 1973, the US dropped nearly 2.8 million tons of bombs over Cambodia. There is little doubt that this indiscriminate bombing created the conditions for the fall of SIhanouk, the rise of Lon Nol, and the coming to power of Pol Pot. Same thing in Laos.  LBJ started that even earlier than Cambodia. In that case is was 2.5 million tons. In fact, the USA dropped more bombs on those two countries individually, than the USAF dropped on both Japan and Germany combined. Many of these were cluster bombs which did not detonate.  So they acted like land mines later.

https://gsp.yale.edu/sites/default/files/walrus_cambodiabombing_oct06.pdf

The bombing of Laos was just nutty. I mean if there was nothing to really bomb in Vietnam, there was that much less to bomb in Laos. As Clark Clifford figured out, if the idea was to cut off the Ho Chi MInh Trail, it was not succeeding.  I think Nixon expanded it to play his madman act thing with Hanoi.  That did not work either. What the USA ended up doing in Indochina was simply an all out epic bloody debacle.  And I don't know who was worse, LBJ or Nixon.

James DiEugenio is a leading historian, in part as he recognizes what happened in Indochina: A holocaust. But also the whole JFK assassination and back story....and much that has happened in foreign policy since....

I wonder what it mean for US historians when the best historians are often self-taught guys....same thing is happening in macroeconomics....

Hats off to DiEugenio. 

[James DiEugenio]

Thanks  Benjamin.

And I agree about macroeconomics.

The ultimate irony of Indochina is that it was Hanoi that went into Cambodia to stop the nuttiness of Pol Pot.

[Dennis Berube]

On 2/1/2021 at 2:12 PM, Matt Allison said:

Trump killed more Americans than any war has

Im assuming your referring to the covid death count. If the CDC hadn't changed the epidemiology of how we counted viral deaths since 2003 in April 2020, we would be talking about 15,000-20,000 deaths from Covid, not 400k+. A "normal" flu season has sometimes up to 75,000 deaths counted the "old" way, amazingly, the flu has been historically low this past year. In terms of cases, the PCR test has been manipulated to create many false positives. Just ask the next person who says they have covid, how many cycles did they test you at? I bet they have no clue what your talking about. 15% of all "flu" historically has been a coronavirus variant, considering covid has never been purified, how do you know what your detecting!? There is much more to the story obviously, but my point is blaming Trump for 400k deaths is an MSM wet dream and pure propaganda, it sure worked on the left. The censorship/propaganda is unprecedented imo. Dictators do not get censored. 

 

 

[Matt Allison]

13 hours ago, Dennis Berube said:

Im assuming your referring to the covid death count. If the CDC hadn't changed the epidemiology of how we counted viral deaths since 2003 in April 2020, we would be talking about 15,000-20,000 deaths from Covid, not 400k+.

This is total bullsh*t.

 

Edited February 11, 2021 by Matt Allison
Politeness

[James DiEugenio]

BTW, getting back to the topic, I watched a lot of the Democrats' presentation yesterday and today.

Pretty impressive and everyone should see it. Very professional, calm, lucid, logical, sequential, studded with evidence.

I am now convinced Caitlin was even more wrong. That crowd was going to kill Pence and Pelosi.

In fact, Trump was actually calling out Pence while he was still in the senate. The chant then went up for Pence. They barely got him out. They were actually pounding on Pelosi's door.  She was not in, but her assistants barricaded themselves in an interior room.

If this were any kind of real trial, Trump would be toast right now.

 

Edited February 11, 2021 by James DiEugenio

[James DiEugenio]

Matt, let us not get too emotional about arguments.

Although I also disagree with Dennis on this issues, he is a smart guy. who is well read and bright. And so are you.

Let us not turn to that kind of baiting.

[Dennis Berube]

Sorry for the topic distraction. I will leave it at this for those interested. This study was published in October regarding the CDC changes and covers the topic fairly well.

https://healthimpactnews.com/wp-content/uploads/sites/2/2021/02/CDC-Illegal-COVID-Deaths.pdf

 

Regarding the proper topic of which I am not up to date on, has there been any further information on the supposed walk through the day before? That struck me as amazing. It nearly implies either Trump had some incredibly sinister aspects to this operation, or that a covert group was operating in parallel in order to create a spectacle. Admittedly those are both speculative, but if the area was closed and security forces were (apparently) deliberately withheld the next day, I would say the implications are leaning towards one of those directions.

 

[James DiEugenio]

The Dems did not present that, probably because they decided not to call witnesses.

There are four witnesses who said they saw it.

The other thing I wish they would have talked about was the night before meeting at the Trump hotel. That is pretty well documented to the point people are lying about being there.

[Dennis Berube]

Interesting. Both of those items seem fairly important to the story. Hopefully, we will eventually know the names and positions of those people and exactly who told them to be there and why.

[W. Niederhut]

A related issue is the Trump administration's apparent thwarting of security measures in D.C. on January 6th.

Perhaps these matters will be brought to light by future investigations.

But the evidence may have very little impact on Trump's base, since 44% of Republicans in a recent poll, apparently, approved of the January 6th attack on the Capitol!