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“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:
The ...
“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:
The ...
With Matt Taibbi’s Twitter Files and Jeff Gerth’s new in-depth reporting for CJR exposing the years of lies spread by Russiagaters, bitter attacks from outed journalists are rolling in.
Gerth and Taibbi, who come from the old style of journalism where you fact check your work and don’t accept government officials’ claims on faith, have each shown clear, indisputable evidence of disinformation campaigns pushed by corporate reporters. And since the so-called journalists can’t argue the facts, they dig themselves a deeper hole with more lies and name-calling.
Jeff Gerth has been working as a reporter for decades and published, in the very mainstream Columbia Journalism Review, a 20,000-word report on his findings, only to be called a liar and misdirecting magician in the most self-important article by Mother Jones’ David Corn (“The true media failure is that Trump got away with it and that articles like this one that you are now reading are still necessary.”) And possibly worse ...
Emphasized "Dancing with 88
I have altered space here— to
a rupture in the silent fabric,
where every atom reclaims its song.
A change, seen on my 90° angle,
becomes the pivot of a daring ballet,
the precise intersection where fate unspools.
In that crisp right-angle lie the secrets
of all absorbed twilight and reborn dawns,
a moment where geometry becomes prophecy,
transmuting static lines into dynamic rhythms,
inviting the cosmos to twirl in unexpected arcs.
And then—
I find myself dancing with 88,
a numeral of resonance, a muse of mystery.
It whispers in binary beats,
each pulse a portal leading into
symphonies scribbled on the canvas of space-time.
This is no choreographed routine,
but a wild, liberated waltz
where dimensions bend and merge—
where the old order crumbles
under the heat of relentless transformation
and every step unearths a layer of being.
At that 90° juncture,
the universe unfolds like a secret map,
revealing uncharted realms in every fracture,
while 88 becomes the score for a cosmic ballet,
...
You may know him as the founder of Syria’s branch of al-Qaeda, the organization responsible for 9/11. Or you may know him as a man labeled by the US as a terrorist who was arrested in Iraq for attacking US soldiers.
But to Donald Trump, he’s a “young, attractive guy” with a “strong past.” And Trump thinks he has a shot with him…
We’re talking about Syrian President al-Sharaa, formerly known as Mohammed al-Jolani. This week, Trump took a tour throughout the Middle East and fawned over leaders like al-Sharaa and Saudi Arabia’s Mohammed bin Salman. (Notably, he did not visit Israel.)
And while the things Trump said were certainly weird, with excessive praise dumped onto US-labeled terrorists, his policy announcements were notable. After the fall of Syria’s Assad government, politicians across the aisle were suddenly able to admit that US sanctions on Syria did nothing to hurt the Syrian leadership, only devastating the Syrian people. So now, disregarding the flirting, the lifting of sanctions will hopefully allow the country to rebuild.
On the trip it was also announced that Trump was being gifted a multi-million dollar “palace in the sky” private jet from Qatar. Politicians like Hakeem Jeffries were quick to slam Trump for this act of corruption, illegally accepting huge gifts from a foreign country.
…
They never seem to care so much when those gifts come from Israel:
It’s a weird week filled with flirting, corruption, hypocrisy, and madness. Watch with Katie and Aaron so you can laugh instead of cry at it all. Thanks for supporting independent media, subscribe to watch the full episode here:
Watch our full, unpaywalled interview with Freedom Flotilla organizers Huwaida Arraf and Thiago Ávila here:
The Conscience, a civilian ship that is part of the Gaza Freedom Flotilla was attempting to bring humanitarian aid into Gaza when it was was attacked by drones last week. Greta Thunberg, who was scheduled to board the ship on its way to Gaza, as well as organizers of the Freedom Flotilla Coalition and Israeli media, blamed Israel for the attack. Israel, for its part, has not denied responsibility.
We spoke with Freedom Flotilla organizers Huwaida Arraf and Thiago Ávila who explain the mission of the Conscience, describe the attack, and their commitment to breaking the ilegal and inhumane siege on Gaza.
Useful Idiots: There were calls from the ship during the attack. Were you guys scared at this point that people were potentially going to die?
Huwaida Arraf: We lost contact with them for many hours and we knew that the ship was bombed and that it was taking on water. So we were very concerned. We organized people to take a couple of boats and sail out to them, but they were prevented from reaching them twice. The Maltese authorities prevented them from reaching the ship. We were pressuring the Maltese authorities to let them get the people off the ship. And the requests continue to be inexplicably denied.
The vessel right now is still in the place where it was bombed. We are still asking the Maltese authorities to let us in. But the crew all remains on the ship for now.
Useful Idiots: Have you confirmed that this drone attack was carried out by Israel?
Thiago Ávila: It has come to light that just hours before Israel bombed our ship, there was an Israeli military plane in Maltese airspace that flew right over the area where the ship was bombed before going back to Israel. And there are a lot of other factors that indicate that there are other countries that knew.
We have a situation where not only is the United States obviously fully on board with what Israel is doing and enabling it, but other countries are not only not living up to their obligations under international law, but they're also hampering civilian efforts to do something about it. People should ask themselves ‘why should civilians try to organize a boat and aid and try to confront the Israeli military to make their way into Gaza which is illegally besieged like this, when countries should be doing this?’ But not only are countries not putting aid on ships and insisting on getting into Gaza, they are doing Israel's work by trying to sabotage our efforts.
Huwaida also recalls being on another ship in 2010 which suffered a lethal attack from Israel that killed nine humanitarians.
Huwaida Arraf: The reason why the flotillas exist is because the people of Gaza are suffering a genocide and they're under illegal Israeli blockade for eighteen years. And now for more than two months without a single bottle of water entering Gaza. So that's why people are not with their families here on the flotilla, because we are here for a purpose, to serve as a solidarity mission to the Palestinian people.
Watch our full, unpaywalled talk with the Freedom Flotilla organizers where we watch video of the crew during the attack, Thiago explains the role that President Lula’s Brazil has in Israel’s destruction of Gaza, and Huwaida lays out a plan for their next attempt to get aid past the siege.
Plus, catch this week’s Thursday Throwdown: Here’s What We Found Inside Harvard’s Antisemitism Report
This week Harvard released it’s final report from the Presidential Task Force on Combating Antisemitism and Anti-Israeli Bias. In a video released by The Free Press, a site which once fought censorship and blasted cancel culture, the worst crimes of antisemitism are listed, given as reasons to cancel and censor students.
We will restate their list here:
• Some Jewish students reported that they have been “ghosted” by longterm friends for expressing sympathy for Israel
• One student was told by another that “Zionists are not welcome at Harvard Medical School
• A professor began a class about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict by telling students that “the discourse is saturated with the Israeli narrative” and that she had decided to, “with a heavy heart, remove Israeli sources from the syllabus.”
• In a Harvard-run privilege training, Jewish students were deemed to be privileged not only for being identified as white, but also because they were Jewish
• When Jewish students reported concerns about bias, they were asked “Who is more marginalized, Jews or Palestinians?”
• A student was asked: “Do you believe in decolonization in theory or in practice?”
None of these top examples are antisemitic, and certainly aren’t considered illegal speech on a college campus. But cancel culture grifters like Bari Weiss and CNN’s Dana Bash are using them to justify President Trump’s draconian crackdown on free speech, and are part of the larger cause of dehumanizing Palestinians to justify the US-funded genocide of children in Gaza.
Also in this week’s Thursday Throwdown: Trump makes a strange deal with the Houthis, Fox News mocks the dolls of poor children, and a former-marine-turned-GOP Congressman pretends to get assaulted.
It’s a funny week filled with the most ridiculous people in the world – watch with Katie and Aaron so you can laugh instead of cry at it all. Thanks for supporting independent media, subscribe to watch the full episode here:
