Useful Idiots
Politics • Comedy
Ukrainian Historian Exposes the Real Zelensky
Professor Marta Havryshko has received death threats for criticizing Ukraine's far-right
February 21, 2025
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“Every single day, we are losing territories. Every single day, we are losing people. Every single day, our children in Ukraine are suffering from these rocket attacks, drone attacks. And nobody knows what happened next.”

Dr. Marta Havryshko is a Ukrainian historian and professor at Clark University. She has watched as the proxy war between the United States and Russia has destroyed her country.

“Those who want to continue this disaster and this hell,” she says, calling out the proxy warriors and those who have criticized her for seeking peace, “are you ready to sacrifice your life? Are you ready to sacrifice the life of your brother, son, and other loved ones for this crazy idea that victory can be achieved?”

Ukraine, she believes, was doomed from the beginning of the war.

“Russia is bigger, Russia has a lot of resources, Russia has powerful friends. I can't even understand who in their right mind actually can believe that Ukraine can change the situation on the front line and retake all those territories.”

Marta has watched as her family members were forced to fight and die for this proxy war. She shows us footage of the Ukrainian army chasing and kidnapping men as a method of forced conscription as the fighting population wanes.

“Who will retake those territories? Many of my friends, many of my relatives are in the army now. They suffer from suicidal thoughts. They suffer from this desperation, frustration. But nobody can replace them because we have this problem with mobilization, we are running out of manpower.”

And she explains who Ukrainians are blaming: “That's why the popularity of Zelensky nowadays is really low. Ukraine under Zelensky is not a democracy.”

Subscribe for the full interview with Marta Havryshko on how western media whitewashes neo-Nazis, why comparing Putin to Hitler doesn’t work, and how Zelensky shut down TV channels to censor opponents.

Plus, catch this week’s Thursday Throwdown: Rachel Maddow Incites a New January 6 Over Ukraine Peace Talks

Thanks for supporting independent media. Subscribe for the full episode here:

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Sanctions Are a Form of Warfare

“Sanctions are a form of war. They’re economic warfare. And they destroy people’s lives.”

Joshua Landis (https://twitter.com/joshua_landis), Sandra Mackey Chair in Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma, is one of the foremost experts on Syria. This week, as Syria, along with neighbor Turkiye, grapples with the aftermath of the devastating earthquake, Professor Landis joins the Useful Idiots to explain the deadly consequences that sanctions pile on to the damage.

“America likes to talk about all its precision bombing and hitting someone with a drone to avoid collateral damage,” Landis explains. “But sanctions? It’s all about collateral damage. Very little of it is targeted.”

But if you read corporate media outlets like the New York Times or Washington Post, you’d find a much different story. Both papers this week published headlines that were hastily changed when they realized they were being a little too truthful. See if you can tell the difference:

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"Shameful" New York Times Changes Headline to Protect Sanctions

“Sanctions are a form of war. They’re economic warfare. And they destroy people’s lives.”

Joshua Landis (https://twitter.com/joshua_landis), Sandra Mackey Chair in Middle East Studies at the University of Oklahoma, is one of the foremost experts on Syria. This week, as Syria, along with neighbor Turkiye, grapples with the aftermath of the devastating earthquake, Professor Landis joins the Useful Idiots to explain the deadly consequences that sanctions pile on to the damage.

“America likes to talk about all its precision bombing and hitting someone with a drone to avoid collateral damage,” Landis explains. “But sanctions? It’s all about collateral damage. Very little of it is targeted.”

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Has the Gaza Pier Been Beached? | Army Watercraft come ashore off Gaza and Israel

March 26, 2024

Good to be part of the community. I think that Aaron and Katie do a brilliant job in these hellish times when such great in - depth research and reporting are essential.

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Trump’s Plan: Genocide in Gaza, Peace with Putin?
Watch a free preview of our episode and subscribe for the full chat with Richard Sakwa on the extent of Biden's Ukraine lies

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Useful Idiots has another Double Header this week: we’re looking at Trump from two angles as decision time nears and he’ll be forced to come clean about his motives on Israel and Ukraine. Which side are you on, Donald?

First up we’re speaking with Dr. Omar Abdel-Mannan, founder of Health Workers 4 Palestine. The news out of the Trump Admin this week is that Jewish-supremacist, right-wing-conspiracy-theorist, and self-described “proud Islamophobe” Laura Loomer influenced Secretary of State Marco Rubio to stop all visas for people from Gaza, including wounded children in need of medical care.

Dr. Omar explains how his organization has fought to help Palestinian children reach medical care, how the draconian shift in policy signifies Trump bowing deeper than ever to Israel, and how media propagandists like The Free Press are complicit by fueling lies about the children suffering the worst:

 

Plus, we ask Dr. Omar: is Palantir selling your health data to Israel?

Next we speak with Professor Richard Sakwa to discuss the latest in Russia-Ukraine after Trump’s controversial summit with Putin.

We ask Sakwa: what are Putin’s true motives? Does he see Ukraine as a real country? Does he want revenge on the US and UK after Biden and Boris Johnson colluded to push Ukraine out of peace talks? And is Trump treating Putin as his equal, conning him into taking a worse deal, or bowing down to him just like he does with Netanyahu?

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MSNBC Claims It’s Now Independent Media
After getting booted from NBC, Morning Joe is struggling to spin the split

There’s a new crew in the independent journalism space: the corporate media conglomerate formerly known as MSNBC!

After NBC announced that they would be splitting off from MSNBC, a new logo and name were announced, with the stragglers on the network left swimming in the open seas of independent media. It’s going to be called MS Now, which Joe Scarborough says through clenched jaw and held-back tears stands for My Source Now.

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Intelligence Expert: Trump Would TAKE OVER the CIA if US was Attacked
Watch a free preview of our episode and subscribe for the full chat with Tim Weiner on how the CIA got CAUGHT spying on the Senate

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For nearly 40 years, journalist Tim Weiner has closely covered the CIA, finding his way inside crucial meetings, speaking with retired officials, and gaining the trust of people with classified information. And his latest book, The Mission, does something we’ve never seen before:

It gives an in-depth history of the CIA without any anonymous sources. Everyone’s on the record. We don’t know how Tim did it, but he joins Useful Idiots to share what he’s learned from 40 years of digging.

Useful Idiots: You spoke to former CIA Director Richard Helms, and you wrote: “He wanted me to understand that the agency hadn't dreamed up the idea of overthrowing Iran or killing Fidel Castro. Every president since Truman had commanded the CIA to intervene with guns and money to control the fate of nations when sending in the Marines was not an option.” Did you get the sense that the CIA was always just unquestioningly following orders?

Tim Weiner: It took me a while to understand this simple but important point: the CIA is an executor of American foreign policy. It doesn't dream up coups and plots and other nefarious covert activities. With rare exceptions, it does what the president tells it to do.

It's not like a couple of CI officers were sitting around drinking martinis in 1960 saying, ‘Hey, I got a good idea. Let's go kill Fidel Castro.’ Presidents Eisenhower and Kennedy and President Kennedy's brother, Bobby, wanted Castro gone.

When it came time to investigate the first twenty five years of the CIA, the Church Committee in the 1970s dove deep into this: Frank Church, the senator who ran them, wondered aloud if “the CIA has become a rogue elephant trampling people and nations.”

But, we later find out, after the hearings, Church amended his statement: “When the elephant tramples people and nations, it's not the elephant's fault. It is the fault of the mahout, the elephant driver.” And that was the President of the United States.

The Church Committee, and even the torture report about CIA secret prisons that the Senate finally released ten years ago, really tiptoes around this question of presidential authority for violations of the laws of God and man and the Geneva Convention by the CIA. It's the president's outfit. And it is a unique expression of presidential power to order the CIA to go and kill people or torture them or throw them in secret prisons for the rest of their lives, never to see the light of day.

Useful Idiots: Your book tells the story of the great lengths to which the CIA went to cover up for torture. You have this controversy over an attempt to destroy videotapes of torture at a CIA secret prison in Thailand. And then you also have the CIA spying on the Senate as the Senate is investigating the CIA's torture program.

Tim Weiner: Two unhappy stories. The first is rather dramatic.

The CIA set up this base in Thailand where two of its first so-called high value prisoners were taken and tortured. Present at the base for one of those prisoner tortures was

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