Why Jews Would Have To Be Stupid Or Insane To Vote Republican

Jews would have to be crazy or stupid to vote for a party that embraces a maniac like this.

Joseph Epstein, in his WSJ op-ed, 'The Political Stupidity of the Jews Revisited', Mar, 14, p. A19) insults and slanders all Jews who have ever voted Democratic - but never Republican.  In his scurrilous words:

"The Jews have been in the pocket of the Democratic Party at least as far back as Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and though there are few Jews alive today who were old enough to have voted for FDR, are still in his pocket".

Adding:

"This despite the fact that we now know that FDR was not such a grand friend to the Jews for he did nothing to even stop or slow the Nazi genocide during World War II."

No mention at all that the key evidence, namely film smuggled out of Auschwitz and Sobibor, did not even emerge until 1943.  Even then, it fell into the hands of the  O.S.S. and Allen Dulles - who deemed it "Soviet propaganda" (according to the documentary 'The Holocaust Testaments'), and ensured it never saw the light of day. So FDR did not even see it to pass judgment, Dulles et al having filtered it out of his attention and scope for action, decision.

Epstein rambles on:

"The best face that can be put on this unwillingness to vote Republican is that Jewishness, if not Judaism, has at its center a hatred of injustice and a concomitant yearning for equality."

Which is absolutely true and what inspired a German Jew, Karl Marx, to write 'Das Kapital'  - exposing the sundry ways capitalism exploits the working classes in every nation.  And barely fifty years later Marx was vindicated as Hitler earned the trust and backing of German big business to further his agenda - including exploitation of Jewish labor as slaves for the Nazi armaments factories, while collecting hair, skin (for chairs), gold fillings in teeth, after gassings.. As Ian Kershaw notes (Hitler Nemesis, p. xxxiii):

“Leaders of big business, .... for their part,  were grateful to Hitler for the destruction of the left-wing parties and trade unions. They were again ‘masters in the house’ in their dealings with their work force”

Note carefully: It wasn't Hitler destroying right wing parties but LEFT WING PARTIES and TRADE UNIONS! THIS is why the German capitalists, such as Krupp, Volkswagen, I.G. Farben (infamous for later manufacturing the Zyklon B gas used in the gas chambers) etc. threw their lot behind him and provided the political ballast, without which he could never have become 'Der Fuehrer'. This is why Jews are averse to voting for a party historically tied to injustice, despite Epstein's deficits in historical memory,

Epstein then adds further insult to his slander:

"All this presumably has been ingrained in Jews by their own long history as the scapegoats of tyrants. Being underdogs, the Jews ipso facto are themselves for underdogs The Republicans traditionally have been top dogs ."

Which again, is true. Given the Republicans are the party of Big Business, entailing corporate campaign largesse, corporate welfare and screwing over the little guy - while getting too many to expunge their own interests to vote for them - it is no wonder a decent Jew would be appalled at the prospect of voting GOP.

So Epstein castigates his own people, as "slaves" to Dems while not appreciating why. But further reason for Jewish aversion to GOP agendas might be associated with the fact that Nazi infiltrations have infected the GOP from as far back as 1952. All this is well documented  by Russ Bellant, in his book 'Old Nazis, The New Right and the Republican Party' ( South End Press, Boston, 1991, p. 77). Bellant painstakingly documented how Nazis, and former S.S. infiltrated the Republican Heritage Groups and Council from the time of Reagan's ascension in 1980. Actual letters are provided, written and received,  as well as how their agenda is spelled out. He also noted a key figure who had established connections many decades earlier, i.e.

"Philip Guarino helped establish the ethnic division of the GOP in 1952. He was vice-chair of the Republican Heritage Groups Council from 1971-75."

By April 8, 1980, Guarino "was a senior member of the Republican Party National Committee, which at the time was concentrating all its efforts on getting Ronald Reagan elected President."

Recall Reagan also gave a nod to these vermin when he visited the grave site of a Waffen S.S. in Bitburg, W. Germany in 1985. The PR at the time was that it was "an accident", but don't buy it for a second!  The "ethnic division of the GOP" refers to Ukrainian and Latvian assistants and associates, or members of the extension group affiliated with the German Waffen S.S. which had helped carry out pogroms during WWII- usually butchering Jews and communists in their own nations. (Recall, Hitler often conflated the Jews with Marxists, communists based on the fact Karl Marx was a Jew.)

Let's also note Bellant's claims re: associations, groups - apart from establishing direct ties of former S.S. affiliates to the GOP, were also well substantiated in the Newsweek article ('The Right Wing Web', February 22, 1999, p.34).  The reason for reinforcing Bellant's book is that the putative basis for widespread former Nazi use and recruitment (including in our intelligence agencies, e.g. CIA) would have been laid bare....but it seemed evident to me even then that the GOP congress wished to cover its party tracks and all possible links to Nazi interests.

So tell me now: Can a political party which has knowingly harbored known Nazis - even allowing them to be integrated into its "Heritage" groups and RNC, be trusted by Jews who (from their heritage)  abhor injustice - not to mention Nazi affiliations? I think not, but you'd never realize that reading Epstein's hogswill.

Much of this, as well as CIA efforts to integrate Nazis into their formal structure is already known,  see e.g.

http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/Fascism/Bloodstone_B_CS.html

Readers can also find more information on the Nazi- CIA ties here:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/27/us/in-cold-war-us-spy-agencies-used-1000-nazis.html

All the above and much more would have been fully revealed to Americans' eyes if all the documents had been released under the Nazi Wartime Disclosure Act, but it was shot down by GOP congress members in 1999 so never became law. According to an earlier Baltimore Sun article ('Government May Soon Open Files on Nazi War Criminals', Aug. 2, 1998, p. 20A):

"Under pressure from Congress, the Justice Department and other agencies may be forced to declassify tens of thousands of top-secret documents describing the U.S. intelligence community's dealings with Nazi war criminals in the Cold War years. Legislation to open most of those files has already passed the Senate and could come up for a vote in the House this week. Some historians suspect that the opened files could cause 'tremendous embarrassments' for the United States."

Less than one year later the GOP congress voted against passage, and that was it. No one has heard much about it since. Perhaps the GOP Neocons and their fellow travelers knew then, as they do now, they didn't want to let the "cat out of the bag" that they harbored Nazi DNA in their agendas.

As a litmus test, what would a prospective pro-GOP Jewish voter find at a typical Trump rally? Well, taking a cue from last night in a clip shown on MSNBC, one heard a Trump supporter yell at a bystander merely holding a sign: "Get your ass to Auschwitz!"  That had to be incendiary to any Jewish person within earshot and clearly a warning to avoid such a rally.

As for the violence at Trump's rallies, they are already legendary and nothing to be proud of, and as one Denver Post letter writer noted in today's paper, the single fault of Trump - not the protesters. Trump is the one who has continually encouraged violence in his feeble -minded lackeys (with his "Punch 'em in the face!" etc. exhortations)  as part of the "entertainment". As the letter writer put it:

"The civic virtue called tolerance does not require tolerating bigotry and intolerance, that is only craven acquiescence. Active opposition to intolerance is a vital part of the eternal vigilance that is the price of liberty."

Sadly, the pro-Nazi Germans forgot that lesson in 1932 and paid dearly as they watched passively while S.A. thugs beat up Jews, socialists, communists and trade union members at rallies. Fortunately, most Americans today - including Jews- have not fallen into that dark pit, i.e. by supporting Trump.

Contrary to Epstein's quisling-based foolishness, no respectable  Jew in his right mind would ever vote for these latter day Nazis, now or ever! Hell, no respectable American in his right mind would either!

As for Germans,, they appear at least to have learned the lessons of the past. According to an article in today's WSJ ('Merkel Stands By Migrant Strategy', p. A9):

"Generations of German voters - living in the shadow of the Nazi past - have overwhelmingly rejected right wing populists."

Maybe it's time Americans do as well, especially one in the person of Herr Donald Drumpf.

See also:
http://smirkingchimp.com/thread/thom-hartmann/66447/a-key-component-of-us-fascism-is-already-in-place

Why "Miracles" Are A Load Of Malarkey

Carlo, the math -accountant monkey in Barbados. Is he a "miracle"? Hardly! Just well trained with an abacus!



In a would be age of reason and enlightenment it is incredible how many still believe in "miracles" in the most advanced technological nation on Earth. I can understand it a bit better in Barbados, where the local Cable & Wireless Earth station dish is still the biggest scientific advancement in decades - and a monkey on the East coast is supposedly able to do accounting with an abacus for sales of breadfruit. I can't understand it in a nation that's sent men to the Moon, landed specialized craft on the planet Mars and has even flown another craft past Pluto.

The miracle meme is being pushed even harder (despite 80 percent of Americans already believing in them) as we behold a headline article "Do You Believe In Miracles?" in one of the Sunday magazines. The actual article account focuses on one Annabel Beam -  the subject of a new movie (just in time for Easter) entitled "Miracles from Heaven".  Annabel had evidently suffered "from two painful, life threatening digestive diseases requiring a regimen of 10 drugs daily". (One was defined as 'pseudo-obstruction motility disorder'- suggesting the young girl's organs were a bit out of alignment.)

Anyway, "miraculously", the girl fell from a tree one day and lo and behold, instead of suffering serious injury she miraculously recovered - and never again asked for her medications. Her folks and friends immediately concluded it was a "miracle from heaven" but it more likely was just that the fall suddenly re-aligned her displaced digestive organs as they should have been.

Which do you accept?  If you believe it was a genuine miracle, implying some kind of "divine" or supernatural intervention, then you commit the fallacy of ignotum per ignotius. That means using the least well understood explanation to account for a not well understood event.  

Basically, the issue is not about faith or humility, or belief or the lack thereof. It is, rather, whether the concept of "miracle" has validity in the physical world. A serious claim has been made about the nature of the universe and how it is alleged to behave. This claim implies that physical laws can be repealed haphazardly. It further implies that all scientific predictions rest on a wholly uncertain foundation, and that they cannot be trusted to yield reliable information from one era to the next, or one day to the next. (Since at any time, a supernatural intrusion can neutralize the law.)If accepted, the premise of variable physical laws introduces a horrendous set of consequences. For example, it allows for the possibility that all cars on the planet work on gasoline today, but may require water tomorrow. Or, one minute my word processor may be here on the table and the next it may rise up and dissipate into atoms. Or this year I may be able to predict lunar and solar eclipses - or asteroid close approaches - but not next year!

This is not an attempt to be facetious, or to necessarily ridicule religious beliefs. I am illustrating the sort of haphazard universe that results when physical laws are treated frivolously and with disdain for their predictability and repeatability. Hundreds of years of painstaking effort and research have gone into the discovery of these laws. Precisely for this reason it is incumbent on the miracle claimer to shoulder the burden of proof, or at least provide substantial evidence in proportion to the claim made.
Basically when all is said and done, the optimal test for a bona fide miracle remains that provided by philosopher David Hume:

"No testimony is sufficient to establish a miracle, unless the testimony be of such a kind that its falsehood would be more miraculous than the fact which it endeavors to establish."

In his essay collection Unweaving the Rainbow, biologist Richard Dawkins, Britain's most prominent atheist, chose the Fatima miracle of 1917, where 70,000 people reportedly saw the Sun move back and  forth, to apply Hume's principle: As Dawkins observed:

"On the one hand, we are asked to believe in a mass hallucination, a trick of the light, or mass lie involving 70,000 people. This is admittedly improbable. But it is LESS improbable than the alternative: that the sun really did move...If the sun had moved in truth, but the event was seen only by the people of Fatima, an even greater miracle would have been perpetrated: an illusion of NON-movement had to be staged for all the millions of witnesses not in Fatima."

In other words, the aim of the Hume miracle test is - given two equally improbable choices- one always elects the LESS improbable one as the most likely description. For example, consider the claim of Jesus “walking on water”. Prof. Hugh Schonfeld (The Passover Plot) offers a much simpler and more sensible explanation: a mistranslation of the Hebrew word “al” which can mean “by” or “on”. So, when a scribe really wrote “walking by the water” it was translated as “walking on the water”.

Now let us apply the Hume miracle test. Is the Schonfeld claim of mistranslation MORE or LESS miraculous (i.e. improbable) than a man actually violating the law of gravity and walking on water? It doesn’t require a lot of thought or effort to see that the mistranslation of a passage of the New Testament is LESS miraculous (or if you prefer, less improbable) than that a man actually, literally walked on water.

Again, going back to the Annabel Beam case, it makes more sense to accept that her digestive organs were suddenly aligned properly in her fall, than that there was any supernatural intervention.

In the PARADE piece, spiritual guru and author of "A Course In Miracles", Marianne Williamson insists that "people are evolving beyond a purely rationalistic world view to a more holistic perspective" and part of this is due to "quantum physics".  But while, quantum mechanics does support a nonlocal cosmos, as I showed in my recent book, Beyond Atheism, Beyond God, that doesn't meant it supports miracles.

Much of the over extension is predicated on physicist David Bohm's development of the quantum potential, in a number of his papers (published in Foundations Of Physics) and in his books, especially 'Wholeness and the Implicate Order'.   Bohm is also the author of one of the most trenchant textbooks, Quantum Theory (Dover, 1951) Below the quantum potential is depicted by Bohm for a pair of Gaussian slits:




















Bohm is also credited with first pointing out (op. cit., p. 169), the very precise analogy of quantum processes to thought. In particular, the quantum "wave packet collapse" (e.g. to a single eigenstate, from a superposition of eigenstates) is exactly analogous to the phenomenon of trying to pinpoint what one is thinking about at the instant he is doing such thinking. More often than not, when one does this, as Bohm notes: "uncontrollable and unpredictable changes" are introduced into the thought process or train.

Recall as I noted from earlier blogs (See: 'A Material Model of Consciousness', Parts I-III), that Bohm also provided a putative basis for a "quantum mind" which he referred to as the Holomovement. This was done by positing a hyper-dimensional reality (e.g. 5- dimensional) in which mind was enfolded as part of an "implicate order".  A lot of this was based on his postulate of "hidden variables".

While all this looks fascinating, even Bohm admitted the plausible acceptance of his conjecture rested on the outcome of a particular experiment. The experiment he proposed was actually designed by Rapisarda and Gozzini and became known as the "Gozzini experiment". It was originally to be conducted near Pisa, Italy ca. 1995. Alas, up to now - so far as I know- it hasn't been carried out. But if it had, and real de Broglie waves had been detected then this would be at least an indirect basis for Bohm's claims, as well as a feather in the hat for the claim of "quantum mind". Without it, we have no valid basis to assert such a claim, and can only adopt Bohm's vision as "inspiration".

So long as this vast gulf exists, there is no plausible basis for invoking quantum mechanics (QM)  as a handmaiden to either the world view promoted by Williamson, or Deepak Chopra or author Michael Talbot (The Holographic Universe) among others. If there isn't one can't press QM into service to support miracles either.

One of the most compelling reasons to consider miracles as rubbish was revealed in the same article, based on research by Kate Fowler of Duke University Divinity School. She found that "religious people are convinced God makes targeted or random choices on whom he will heal or save at any given time over another".

Which is pure poppycock.  If really believed it means a person who survives an airplane crash, where all others have perished,  can claim some special divine dispensation. Based on what? She read her Bible or said her rosary more times than the others? Or, noting Aurora victim Bonnie Kate Pourciau - who claimed "God was holding us in His hands" as the Aurora massacre unfolded-  was one of the chosen few spared- while a six year old (Veronica Moser) had to lose her life. Because ...what? She didn't say her prayers before bedtime? Give me a break! But when gullible people embrace special instances of LUCK as divine intervention, this is what you get: bare bollocks.

In the end, belief in miracles is a waste of mental capital, as bad as investment in crank scientific theories like the "Reciprocal system" (which also carries supernatural overtones in some of its presentations), and the "natural cycles" alternative to anthropogenic  global warming. Contrary to Williamson's argument that we can "either believe in an  age of miracles or violence" I say we have a third: we can believe and promote an age of genuine reason, and that must include critical thinking!

See also:

http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2012/07/god-was-holding-you-in-his-hands-dont.html

Do Scientific Cranks Even Know They Are Cranks?

One indispensable character trait needed by any serious research scientist, especially in physics, is immense patience. Why? Because as one's name and background get circulated, including at public sites like All Experts, one is certain to be bombarded with new "theories" or hypotheses - often on how the universe actually works, or what really constitutes stellar matter or how solar flares get their energy.

How many cockeyed theories have I had to dismiss over some thirty years? Probably more than I can count. It seems very manjack  - at least who fancies himself an iconoclast  and has some minimal level of education- thinks he has a new theory or physical  insight. But when you get down to it, even after wasting time (hours) plowing through their nonsense it ends up being just the codswallop you thought it was at first glance.

What is it about certain sciences (like astronomy, astrophysics and cosmology) that draws the nuts and cranks out of the woodwork? In the past  4 years, no fewer than five individuals who've no astronomy background, not even taking a single college course, have proffered five different theories for my reaction, consideration and assessment. In no case did any of these meet even basic requirements, including articulating a testable hypothesis, and making predictions based on it.

Often when you wade through their questions (often posed as a challenge) the one significant attribute all of them lack is tests for falsification.   I don't give a damn if you've had your I.Q. tested and it comes out at the Poetic Genius or Triple Nine Society level, if your precious "theory" lacks tests for its own falsification it isn't worth an ounce of doggie lickspittle.  Which brings up the question of why these cranks can't even see that this is the cornerstone criterion of what passes for a genuine scientific hypothesis as opposed to gibberish.

For example, Ronald Satz, in a veritable waste of 19 -pages in an article in the Nov./Dec. 2015 issue of Intertel's  Integra - under the fulsome header: 'The Case Against Modern Physics' , never once produced a single test of falsification for his "reciprocal theory" bollocks. He invests plenty of time trying to tear down  assorted aspects of modern physics (which I have responded to in the latest - February- issue of Integra) but never delivers the goods to show his theory has any worth.

This reminded me of my 1980s debates with an Einstein iconoclast named Dr. Stephan Gift who expended dozens of pages in the Journal of the Trinidad And Tobago Astronomical Society trying to disprove Einstein's special theory of relativity. Despite my showing that his use of inertial reference frames wasn't faithful to Einstein's usage, he kept on keeping on and even - when I asked why his theory wasn't published in a peer-reviewed physics journal - insisted their reviewers "lacked the I.Q. to be able to parse my claims".  Well, I did and found them wanting and exposed their prime deficiency in: a) not being able to account for the energy difference in fission reactions (while Einstein did with the mass-energy equation, E  = m c² ) and b) omitting any test for their own falsification.

Again, we see two hallmarks of the classical crank: 1) My theory is so profound, so rarefied and abstract that few men of even Mensa level (or Intertel level) I.Q. will be able to judge its merits.  (I.e. one actual reciprocal theory respondent in a recent comment (which shall remain unpublished until he meets the specifications set out in this post), claimed "I have the same I.Q. as Einstein so I don't have to take any crap" i.e. from these reviewers of pedestrian intellect). 

And (2) I don't have to provide any tests for falsification because I KNOW it's true! Nah, nah, nah! (Or "My genius is of such stratospheric heights that falsification tests are manifestly redundant in my wondrously sublime intellectual cosmos!")

Alas, this doesn't work. You can come up with all the clever databases you want to try to dispose of modern physics or modern astronomy but lacking tests for your own model's falsification they aren't worth diddly squat.

Which brings us to a third attribute for crank theories and models: their own "proofiness", or the use of data and numbers  to blind people to actual principles or physical laws. Charles Seife referenced this in his book, Proofiness: How You're Being Fooled by the Numbers.  Seife decries the tactic of using numbers not just to lie but to baffle the susceptible with bullshit.  He refers to a common failing of most people unversed in math to be hoodwinked merely because some form of math or numbers are interjected into arguments.  Not just using numbers to bolster one's argument. In Seife's words, to use fake numbers to prove falsehoods and to seek to prove something is true - even when it's not- is one of the most egregious forms of  intellectual  fraud.

http://members.shaw.ca/warmbeach/FAQ.htm

A much more subtle example (and would be readers at the outset are warned they need to be "degreed", sic) is this site containing supposed "databases" to support Satz' Reciprocal theory.

http://reciprocalsystem.guru/

But on scanning the ones posed (especially for astronomy), I found nothing to convince me. Just a bunch of numbers entered in barely legible-readable tables but devoid of coherence and internal logic. In other words, nothing to 'take to the bank'. Nor having any organization of thoughts and compelling arguments to tie this supposed data to end point conclusions or hypotheses. In other words, not too dissimilar from the numbers thrown together to try to overturn Einstein from the previous cited link.  If the author(s) want to convince me their  model has heft let them show me a reciprocal model substitute to account for quantum tunneling - which is essential to the working of our modern electronic devices from HDTVs, to smart phones to computers.  Or, let them present an alternative to the gravitational deflection of star light documented in respect of Einstein's theory of general relativity. Or ....let them account for the recent discovery of gravitational waves from two black holes.

Above, all - let them present me with a major test of falsification for their own model! Because until they do that, all their elaborate baloney to try to show alternatives to modern physics ends up as dumpster drivel.

Given they haven't been able to produce falsification tests (or even firm predictions from their models), it's no wonder that no genuine Physics journal of any repute would accept their papers and they can only get them published on their own Wordpress-based blogs.

Lastly, I issue this challenge: let one of these geniuses (since that's close to what they imagine themselves to be) provide me with one paper  (not just a bunch of meaningless tables) that  coherently meets ALL the criteria noted above and I will publish it on this blog with their name in neon lights.

I especially want to see their tests for falsification. Failing that, don't waste my time! I don't intend to publish any more comments, replies or other drivel until the Satz-Larson acolytes  can show me at least TWO tests for falsification of the reciprocal theory. I don't give a damn if your I.Q. is 200!

See also this takedown of Gift:

http://www.caribscape.com/baldeosingh/religion/sober/2004/gift.html

And we see from this exchange - from several years ago- Stephan Gift is still sticking to his "relativity is wrong" malarkey:

----

1. Stephan Gift | November 30, 2011 at 6:58 PM | Reply

   
   

   I wish to point out that while Galilean Relativity applies to mechanical systems, Einstein’s principle of relativity applies to all of physics including light, and not just mechanical systems. This is a major difference. While the former principle has been confirmed, the latter remains unconfirmed. A situation where the latter principle appears to fail is the following: Consider a light source stationary on the surface of the Earth and a stationary detector at some distance away from the source. If the detector moves toward the stationary source, a Doppler shift is immediately observed. If instead the source moves toward the stationary detector (at the same speed), a Doppler shift is only observed after a time delay which can be made arbitrarily large by increasing the initial distance between the source and the detector. However by Einstein’s principle of relativity the two situations are equivalent since only relative motion is important and therefore there should be no difference between them as is observed.
•     Matt Strassler | April 5, 2012 at 12:00 AM | Reply

  
  

  Stephan: this is incorrect. You are confusing the source of the photons with the photons themselves. It is a classic mistake.
• If you move the source, the photons you are affecting are the ones being emitted by the source *now*. The ones that were emitted long ago are not affected by this motion. The detector will not see the effect until the photons reach the detector, which takes a light-travel time.
• 
  If you move the detector, you are changing the detector relative to the photons that it is detecting — which were emitted by the source long ago.
• 
  This is a nice example of one of the many classic mistakes people make in misunderstanding relativity. You have to pay very close attention to what Einstein’s equations do and do not say — otherwise you will get yourself profoundly confused.
  What Einstein’s equations say is that if you have a source moving toward the detector FOREVER it is the same as a detector moving toward the source FOREVER. If the source and detector are initially stationary and you CHANGE the situation, then you have to calculate much more carefully what the effect is.
• 
  Incidentally particular mistake this has nothing to do with Einstein’s relativity. You can make the same mistake with Galilean relativity using sound waves.
• --------------------------------------
• 
  
• Clearly, you can take a crank to the scientific facts but you can't make him accept them. 

Can We EVER Educate Trumpkins On The Difference Between REAL Socialists and Nazis?

Doofus image  put up by a Trumpkin who clearly doesn't know the difference between a socialist and a Nazi

I said it before but it bears repeating, that too many are insufficiently educated in political history to know basic  differences, say between National Socialism (Nazism) and real Socialism. And not to put too fine a point on it, it's a big issue to me because as a (Democratic) Socialist I won't want to be fucking compared to or conflated with, Nazi scumballs.

Sadly, most of those who don't know any better - and likely have read the least real history- appear to be Trumpkins or those who slavishly follow their master, The Donna, aka Donald Drumpf.  As shown in previous posts the right wing blogosphere is replete with disinformation, misinformation - in particular of deliberate conflation of  textbook socialism  with  German National Socialism, despite the fact that Hitler not only dispossessed and brutalized leftists: Marxists, Socialists and commies, but dispatched them for "final solution" in concentration camps as well.

When one accesses serious resources and history texts, as opposed to comics and Faux News, one can easily see Hitler couldn't have been a real socialist by his very actions and policies most of which were totally antithetical to Socialist values. Thus, he didn't use trade unions to parlay them into any "workers' paradise" - he squashed them like bugs!

Why did Hitler hate Socialists so much, with such intensity? Robert Payne in his biography of Hitler (The Life and Death of Adolf Hitler)) acknowledges it was because the originator of Marxism, Karl Marx, was a Jew. Hitler thereby erroneously inferred that Socialism was an inherently Jewish economic philosophy and its practitioners were also Jews. Hitler, like so many Americans today, committed the fallacy of composition - a logical error attributing to an entire class (the whole) what is true of only one part,  or in this case one person (Marx).

Why can't these conflaters just admit their error and walk away? Because most are Right extremists and to admit that would be to admit ideological kinship with the Nazi Right or "National Socialists" - who merely employed the S -word to misdirect the gullible. Hitler is associated with the RIGHT because he espoused FASCISM, which is RIGHTIST! In addition, as documented by Ian Kershaw in his magnificent account of Hitler’s rise to power (‘Hitler Nemesis’) the pre-Reich Weimar Republic constituted a weak democracy which had little or no control over the most radical Rightists, especially Hitler’s (actually, originally Ernst Röhm's) NSDAP party. They would regularly beat Marxists, socialists, and any leftists on the streets while holding up signs that read: “Tot dem Marxem!” (Death to Marxists!) 

Kind of a damned funny way to show kinship with REAL Left Socialists! IF the fucking Nazis were real Socialists why did they regularly beat the living crap out of actual Socialists? So far none of the geniuses that make these false cartoons - like the one shown- has been able to answer that question.

Now, if these geniuses who insist Hitler "wasn't of the Right" are correct, then WHY beat up on Marxists, Socialists and Commies of the LEFT? Huh? My late friend Kurt's films - from his archives -also showed the same thing! 

Hundreds of gangster S.A. (enlisted by Hitler) swooping in on a crowd of union workers, Socialists and Marxists and beating them half to death.

THIS IS HISTORY, ACTUALLY DOCUMENTED! If the American Right doesn't wish to be associated with this, I fully understand, but to try to revise history because you abhor the Rightist link is both pigheaded, and disingenuous. Take ownership, then move on!

 Hey, it's understandable the American fanatical Right doesn't want to be associated with a mass murdering psycho but blatant historical revisionism isn't the way to make your case.  Kershaw again - on Hitler's links to capitalism (‘Hitler Nemesis’, p. xxxiii):

“Leaders of big business, though often harboring private concerns about current difficulties and looming future problems for the economy, for their part were grateful to Hitler for the destruction of the left-wing parties and trade unions. They were again ‘masters in the house’ in their dealings with their work force”

Note carefully: It wasn't Hitler destroying right wing parties but LEFT WING PARTIES and TRADE UNIONS! THIS is why the German capitalists, such as Krupp, Volkswagen, I.G. Farben (infamous for later manufacturing the Zyklon B gas used in the gas chambers) etc. threw their lot behind him and provided the political ballast, without which he could never have become 'Der Fuehrer'.

Beyond all this, we now have very solid evidence, thanks to released FOIA files, of how close the Republican Party has been to the Nazis of Europe. We have to thank author Russ Bellant (Old Nazis, The New Right and The Republican Party, South End Press, 1990), for meticulously documenting how and when Nazi-SS elements and cliques infiltrated the GOP and insinuated themselves into the national political framework. (Which makes one wonder how many of their past policy formulations, e.g. Paul Ryan's "Medicare Voucher plan" are Nazi-based, or hatched originally by Republican Heritage groups. Or how much the Koch brothers - who were raised by a Nazi nanny imported from the Reich- were influenced by her thinking and ideology.)

The key link are the Republican Heritage Groups, which attained major ascendancy after Reagan became president. Bellant notes (p. 4):

"In a sense...the foundation of the Republican Heritage Groups Council lay in Hitler's networks into Eastern Europe before World War II. In each of those Eastern European countries the German SS set up or funded political action organizations that helped form SS militias during the war."

He cites, for example, that in Hungary the "Arrow Cross" was the SS affiliate. In Romania it was the "Iron Guard". In Latvia, it was the "Latvian Legion". And members from ALL of these - and others - obtained passage to the U.S. and found a home in various groups after the War. Under the umbrella of the Republican Heritage Groups Council and later its "Ethnic Division". Their main purpose was in Republican campaign fund raising but they were also used for assorted "dirty tricks" against Democrats and may well have come up with the noisome plan to bargain with Iran to keep American hostages there, until after Reagan was elected (as opposed to Carter, in 1980).

No connection between the Nazis and American Right? Hell, they're freakin' bedfellows! 

The continuing display of ignorance by the Trumpkins only reinforces the perceptions that current analyses of supporter backgrounds disclose.  Rather than provide grist to that mill I'd have thought Trumpian bloggers would seek to show their education is vastly greater than those data appear to show - not less.

Krugman Loses It: Brands Bernie A Demagogue Like Trump

 False equivalence is on the rampage again as we now behold Paul Krugman - formerly believed to be a stout liberal economist- revealing his Neoliberal DNA in going after Bernie  Sanders as a comparable demagogue to Donald Trump. In his Friday editorial, Krugman attacked those on the left and right for criticizing the current set of free-trade policies without offering a solution that would accomplish the complementary political goals behind them..

What "complementary political goals"? You mean a race to the bottom? Massive job losses by Americans in order to infuse more global capital into less  developed nations like Vietnam? Else, what the fuck are you blabbering about? Or...do you mean granting legal hegemony to  trade "partners" - as in the TPP- to bring cases into American courts if we don't submit to the same lower thresholds for regulation, whether in labor abuses, allowing parasites in our meat and fish, or enabling use of more potent, carcinogenic pesticides.

One good thing about the current general election campaign is it's exposing once and for all whose side the assorted elites are on, as well as separating the Neoliberal chaff from liberal 'wheat'. (Or goats from sheep if you prefer that analog).

But I never thought in a million years I'd be levelling broadsides at Krugman who I'd always respected before his outbursts against Sanders. Now, he's proven he's just another Neolib  simpleton (wifey says I shouldn't use "labels" but holy fuck  - if it talks like a Neolib, and writes like one then it must be one! DUH!)

Krugman wrote:

"Global trade agreements from the 1940s to the 1980s were used to bind democratic nations together during the Cold War, [and] Nafta was used to reward and encourage Mexican reformers,”

 Yes, but Krugman is dishonest in not pointing out the earlier trade model (originating at Bretton Woods in  1944) was based on FAIR trade, at least in a relative sense, and not trade used to amass huge advantages for one side (mainly multinational global entities)  over another. NAFTA, was part and parcel of the latter - designed to  bulk up  the profits of corporations at the expense of American capital and jobs. Send more jobs to Mexico - like Chainsaw Al Dunlap did with 'Sunbeam' - and get cheaper labor so you can close more expensive American plants and lay off higher salaried American workers.

Auto manufacturing jobs were also sent overseas, because it cost the "Big Three" and others less to assemble them there - saving billions.  A lot of this was traced to Clinton's NAFTA. Robert Scott, chief economist at the Economic Policy Institute has observed:

“Jobs making cars, electronics, apparel and other goods moved to Mexico, and job losses piled up in the United States, especially in the Midwest where those products used to be made.....By 2010, trade deficits with Mexico had eliminated 682,900 U.S. jobs, mostly (60.8 %) in manufacturing.”

 This was the model not only for Mexico vis -a - vis the U.S. labor and capital -  but also dispatching Americans  jobs to India and China and other 3rd world locales where labor was much cheaper, worker health regulations and benefits could be ignored and vast profits were possible.

William Greider pointed out what would transpire in his terrific book, 'One World Ready Or Not: The Manic Logic Of Global Capitalism', e.g. page 401:

"It does not require great political  imagination to see that the world system is heading toward a further dispersion of governing power so the closet dictator of the marketplace can command things more efficiently, from everywhere and nowhere. The historic paradox is breathtaking: At the very moment when Western democracies and capitalism  have triumphed over the communist alternative, their own systems of self-government are being gradually unraveled by the market system."

And further (ibid.):

"Like feudal lords, the stateless corporations will make alliances with one another or launch raids against one another's stake. They will play weakening national governments off against each  other..... In that event, vast throngs of citizens are reduced to a political position resembling that of the serfs.... "

Ian McDonald, writing in The Barbados NATION (Aug.14 1998) was even more blunt on globalized "free" trade:

"Do we really believe for one moment that those who preach free trade and the inevitable triumph of market forces have anything other than their own increased wealth and aggrandizement in mind? Do we honestly believe they think the system they espouse is fundamentally a good one for all concerned? Are we so naïve as to think if, by any chance, the system were to operate against their interests, that they would not make sure it was changed or abridged to suit them? Are we so innocent and trusting that we cannot recognize bullying and crude self-interest when our noses are being rubbed in it constantly?"

Adding:

"We should cease making speech after speech accepting that our fate and the fate of the world, will inevitably be decided by impersonal, market controlled forces and the sooner we accept this the better off we will be. Instead we should be denying most strongly, in every forum available to us, that such a fate is inevitable... That instead the world deserves a better future than the one on offer from the ruthless money men and sleaze-ridden free trade marketeers, who are making this terrible bid to dominate the world."

So maybe it's time Paul pulled his head out of his ass, and ceased drinking the Neolib cocktails of "kool aid"  left over from Jonestown, 1978.  If he and the other Neoliberals ensconced in their comfort zones paid any attention they'd see the rage erupting now - not only on the Right but the Left, can be traced directly to Neoliberal trade policies that came onstream in the 1990s.  Their effects on the populace were captured most succinctly in a December, 1998 column by Baltimore Sun syndicated author Jay Bookman ('The New World Disorder'):

"The global economy has been constructed  on the premise that government guarantees of security and protection must be avoided at all costs, because they discourage personal initiative. In times of crisis, however, that premise cannot be sustained politically. In times of trouble it is human nature to seek security and protection and to be drawn toward those who promise to provide it. That is how men such as Adolf Hitler, and Vladimir Ilyich Lenin came to power, with disastrous consequences. "

And if I may say so, it may also be how a Donald Drumpf (his actual family name) comes to power in Jan. 2017. Krugman places Bernie Sanders and Drumpf on the same level of demagogue but would he really prefer having the latter as commander in chief of this country over Bernie?

Krugman went on to say that if candidates want to “rag” on those deals, “like Mr. Trump or Mr. Sanders, [he] should be asked what, exactly, he proposes doing now.”

So, in other words, since these deals have been signed,, sealed and delivered - to transform the bulk of global workers into serfs - as William Greider has put it -  then we could as well accept it as a fait accompli.  NO further thoughts or initiatives for liberation must ensue, we just accept our collective fate while the Elites enjoy their special $1 m golf getaways, gated enclaves and upscale lives?. Meanwhile we just let further American labor capital be destroyed right under our noses because well ...."it's too late to do anything"  about it according to Paul K. Sorry, I beg to differ and so does Bernie, and I believe Sen. Elizabeth Warren too.

The most pathetic rebuttal was Krugman asserting Bernie's proposals cannot include "simply ripping up America’s international commitments, as that would destroy what little is left of the country’s credibility and standing in the world.”

I have news for you, Paulie, that sacred 'cow' already left the barn - decades ago. The country's credibility was  destroyed the day its Elites signed the first trade pact to turn over citizen governance and welfare to multi-national corporations and bond pirates via NAFTA. And then compounded it by setting up the World Trade Organization to ensure these supranational entities commandeered power over actual nations.  As far as "international commitments" they 're not worth the paper they're printed on unless the citizens themselves are behind them....100 percent. The leaders alone don't mean diddly if their citizens see themselves being shafted.

And don't even think  of running that Paris Climate Change bogus "treaty"  as something to hang over our heads (to ensure "credibility" and adherence to "international commitments") , when anyone with a grain of scientific sense knows its prescriptions are too little, too late. See e.g.
http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2015/12/paris-climate-summit-reaches-accord-but.html

In the end, Krugman has merely shown himself to be another  mouthpiece for the billionaires and multi-nationals that dominate and determine trade negotiations and deals - which is why they are mostly kept under wraps. But the public anger, even rage now,  at being shafted over will not be quelled no matter who wins. And the Trans Pacific Partnership deal will be among the first casualties as the PEOPLE say: "ENOUGH! FUCK OFF!"

See also:

http://www.smirkingchimp.com/thread/robert-parry/66392/two-corrupt-establishments

Excerpt:

"What is notable about the “free trade” issue is that it has long been a consensus position of both the Republican and Democratic establishments. For years, anyone who questioned these deals was mocked as a know-nothing or a protectionist. All the smart money was on “free trade,” a signature issue of both the Bushes and the Clintons, praised by editorialists from The Wall Street Journal through The New York Times.

The fact that “free trade” – over the past two decades – has become a major factor in hollowing out of the middle class, especially across the industrial heartland of Middle America, was of little concern to the financial and other elites concentrated on the coasts. At election time, those “loser” Americans could be kept in line with appeals to social issues and patriotism, even as many faced borderline poverty, growing heroin addiction rates and shorter life spans."

And:

http://brane-space.blogspot.com/2015/04/obama-needs-to-tone-down-his-rhetoric.html

Author Maria Konnikova on Maher's 'REAL TIME' Confirms Trump Is Playing Confidence Game

Maria Konnikova exposed Trump's confidence game on Bill Maher's Real Time last night.

Well, someone had to come out and say it. Namely, that the Trump (Drumpf) supporting suckers are being taken for a confidence game ride. If you've ever been snookered by an over-hyped investment, a snake oil product that doesn't deliver as per its advertised claims, or a business deal that was lousy from the start, you know what I mean. These confidence game deals succeed because as P.T .Barnum once put it, "there's a sucker born every minute" and alas, 'Murica is full of suckers.

Anyway, Bill Maher's timely guest last night was the author of 'The Confidence Game', Maria Konnikova. She and Maher began the discussion by showing the image of all Trump's phony products - from Trump steaks to "Finest Super Premium Vodka" (described on the site 'Vodkaphiles'  as "havng the flavor of gas station burritos and expired Skim milk") to 'Success' eau de toilette (described on one site as like "household cleaner and headache -inducing")  and other crap. As Ms. Knnikova put it:

"When I saw that I said, 'I'm a psychic', because I clearly predicted this was going to happen. The moment that they analyzed what his products actually were they found out they weren't his products. He was blatantly lying and the hallmark of a psychopath - and also a con artist - is someone who deceives you for their own ends. So they're trying to convince you to support them, to vote for them and they're doing it by tactics that are disreputable."

Wow! Couldn't put it better. Trump steaks, for example, were produced at an entity called Bush Brothers Provisions, They weren't even sold at any formal supermarket chain, or outlet, but - good grief- at a downstream clothing company called 'The Sharper Image'. Plus the trademark was discontinued two years ago. You can read more here:

http://www.nbcnews.com/news/us-news/trademark-trump-steaks-was-canceled-two-years-ago-records-show-n535876

It's like comedian John Oliver put it on his last show: "Uh...I'd like one of those crappy puff collar suits and ten pounds of Trump  steaks!" I mean, cheese Louise, why the hell would you sell your alleged premier steaks at a place like that? The only reason would be to perhaps conceal the fact their quality wasn't much better than a Mao-style puff suit.

As Bill put it last night:

"Am I reading too much into this? I mean standing there in front of a table full of steaks. I mean I don't eat steaks....I thought this was like subliminal advertising. I mean people looking at that and going Trump - Steak, Trump - Steak....if I vote Trump I'll eat steak."

Ms. Konnikova then replied:

"Yes, think of the voters he's actually going for, people who want steak but can't afford it. So ...let them eat steak! And we see him in trying to get the popular vote saying he's honest, he's a man of the people. He's telling everyone exactly what they want to hear.  And he doesn't actually say anything. That's what confidence artists do!"

The last sentence is especially germane if one has read the Wall Street Journal breakdown of Trump's campaign ('Trump's Campaign Based On His Book', March 3, p. A1) and how it could have been forecast years in advance if anyone had read 'The Art of the Deal'. All the main bullet points of the book were highlighted in the Journal piece, one by one (p. A6), including 'Think big', 'Know your market' (i.e. view the electorate as the target market),  'Enhance location', 'Contain the costs' (Trump does this by using only a pittance of his own $$ and extracting the rest - over $17 m - as "loans" from his campaign), and 'Have fun'.

In other words, Trump's public is being played for suckers in a lousy deal. But back to the point of his never saying anything, the WSJ piece quotes him as saying "I play it very loose". In other words, he never follows a policy guide line or script he just spouts BS off the top of his head. This was also substantiated in David von Drehle's recent (Mar. 14, p. 36) TIME piece on Trump, describing how he actually took a raft of documents, papers his campaign team had given him - and tossed them off his table while on his Trump ONE jet. His answer: "I can't be bothered with that!" And this is the guy these fools want to be president?

What the fuck is this asshole going to do when the CIA head delivers to him the PDB (President's Daily Brief') and it notes an imminent terror attack by ISIS? Will he toss it away and say "I can't be bothered with that"? Will he "play it loose"?  The American electorate that thinks he's the greatest thing since sliced cheese better hope not.

So, at the end both Maher and Konnikova agreed Trump is a consummate con artist, who knows how to exploit images, PR and pure baloney to mind fuck millions into thinking he's their savior. The only turd who can "de-Obama-ize" the nation and make it safe for white people

Knnikova also noted it's a myth that Trump "hijacked" the Republican Party. No, the whole nature of the confidence game, according to Konnikova is "we give them our confidence. The whole origin of the game is that a guy on the street walked up to people and asked 'Do you have confidence in me to lend me your watch until tomorrow and I'll give it back plus an extra five bucks?' And they gave him their confidence,, their watches, and this is exactly what Trump is doing to the Party. He isn't asking for anything, people are willingly giving their trust to him."

The most important takeaway from last night's interview with Konnikova is how she explained that truth to Trump is a "fungible thing", it is never absolute, only what you can make it at the time. Trump meets this standard and also displays the "triad" of traits recognized as: 1) Psychopathy, 2)Narcissism and 3)Machiavellianism.

Where did we see these before, in one person? Well, in Adolf Hitler.

If you dispute it then read Robert Payne's book, 'The Life And Death of Adolf Hitler' (1972) and how the same sort of psychopathic and narcissistic seeds are also evident in Trump's background (see von Drehle's TIME piece, as when Trump in his teens was so fascinated with gang styles that he collected his own set of lethal switch blades.)

So WHY Hasn't Elizabeth Warren Endorsed Bernie?

The interview with Sen. Elizabeth Warren on Rachel Maddow last night was interesting for being basically uninformative. We learned, for example, that the Repukes brought Trump's extremism on  themselves by tolerating extremist obstruction in the Senate. This included blocking every Obama initiative (like the ACA, closing Gitmo and immigration reform) as well as appointments to the National Labor Relations Board and other agencies. And now we have their latest posturing, in the Supreme Court impasse,  another case of the Repuke Senators "refusing to do their jobs" -  e.g. in exercising advise and consent for a soon to come Obama nominee. As many have noted, refusing to even hold hearings is not advise and consent it's delay and obstruct. But we already knew all this and hopefully the extremist Rs will pay at the ballot box on Nov. 8.

Less illuminating was when Maddow asked Warren about the lack of endorsement whereupon  Warren launched into this 7 minute long spiel about "this great democratic conversation" - totally dodging the question while flattening distinctions between Hill and the Bern.  The way Warren seemed to put it: Why should she have to make a choice with two terrific candidates in play? Well, at least  in comparison to the Repuke clowns.  She also left an air of neutrality hanging at the end, almost emulating perfectly the geopolitical strategy of Switzerland. But it doesn't wash, not for Elizabeth Warren.

Anyone who knows anything about Warren and Sanders is aware that Sanders is the inheritor of the same progressive forces and memes that swept Warren to her senate victory in 2012.  I mean they're like two peas in the proverbial pod, They’re perfectly aligned on every issue of consequence. Indeed, at least one salon.com columnist writing a piece for the Jan. 26 web edition noted Warren gave a speech on the Senate floor on Jan. 21. She spent most of her time outlining the steps Congress could take to purge dark money from our political process. Dark money? Like from the Kochs? Where, from whom, have we heard that before? Anyone?

The most relevant takeaway is that Warren's Senate speech already qualified as an indirect endorsement of Bernie.

She said - in part:

“We have a problem: money. Six years ago today, the United States Supreme Court made the problem worse – a lot worse. Thanks to the Supreme Court, our system of elections is riddled with corruption. Money floods our political system. Money that lets a handful of billionaires shape who gets into Congress and may decide who sits in the White House.” 

“Washington works great for a handful of wealthy individuals and powerful corporations that manipulate the system to benefit themselves…It works great for the lobbyists and the lawyers who slither around Washington, day in and day out, but for everyone else, Washington’s not working so well. And if we don’t change, this rigged political game will break our country.”

“We are headed into another presidential election and I speak out today because I’m genuinely alarmed for our democracy…It is time to fight back against a complete capture of our government by the rich and powerful.”

Look over the transcripts of any of Bernie's recent speeches and note  how indistinguishable these remarks are from what you've  heard in his stump speeches. Warren’s agenda is Sanders’s platform, and this speech left no doubt about that. Even the specific phrases Warren uses, like “rigged political game,” mirror Bernie’s language.

The problem with a Senate speech pseudo "endorsement", of course, is that few citizens are likely to see or hear it unless it goes viral. That is about as plausible as aliens landing and kidnapping Donald Trump and hauling him to the third planet in the Zeta Reticuli system for a brain harvest. So, unless the endorsement is public and stand alone - it won't get much media attention or help the candidate who needs it, in this case Bernie.

Some may say, well she is just dithering a bit because she might believe HRC is more "electable" and she'd favor getting things done if even in a more incremental way. But this simply doesn't pass the political smell test. No way.   As the beneficiary of outsized speaking fees from the big banks, Clinton is simply too much a captive of Wall Street. The same Axis of Financial Evil that Warren has spent her entire career battling. To use the analogy of one Boston Globe columnist —" it would be as if an antiabortion candidate like Marco Rubio were giving paid speeches to Planned Parenthood affiliate."

Any putative Hillary endorsement also doesn't wash if one investigates the history of Warren's criticisms of her. For example,  in a 2004 interview with Bill Moyers, Warren accused Clinton, then a senator from New York, of voting for a bankruptcy bill that was sought by the financial industry and that Clinton had previously opposed as first lady.  Asked why Clinton switched, Warren blamed the financial industry donations lining Clinton’s war chest. Of the big banks, Warren said Clinton “worries about them as a constituency.”

Thus, for Warren to endorse Hillary, she’d have to repudiate not only the anti-Wall Street crusade that carried her into office, but also her own words.  She'd look not just like a fool but a malicious, capricious and cynical fool who's been manipulating her supporters all along. Saying one thing and doing another.

This still leaves open why she hasn't explicitly come out for Sanders. Some have said she still truly is of two minds, and cited Warren's signed 2013 letter (with the other Democratic women in the Senate) encouraging Clinton to run for president. Since then, Warren has clarified that it shouldn’t be taken as an endorsement. Given Clinton’s entanglements with Wall Street, it’s easy to see why.

Another possible explanation was offered by  one commenter on reddit.com

"She's keeping her powder dry to use at the convention to helping to bring the Sanders folk on board by getting concessions (whatever those are worth) from Clinton. If she endorses now, that leverage is spent."

Maybe. But now is the time - in the middle of the primary season - when Bernie could really really use her support, especially with key industrial states coming up for grabs next Tuesday. One, unambiguous, no nonsense endorsement for Sanders could be a game changer. It could net him a majority of those states and delegates, and make his chances for later convention gravitas much stronger.

At the convention, the pressure from Hillary's superdelegates and DNC honchos for all to conform (and toe the party line) may simply be too great. It is doubtful that in such conditions Warren's supposed supporting voice would even be heard, especially if Bernie's delegate count is much less than 1,000. If that is so, Hillary will feel she has no real obligation to endorse Bernie's proposals far less use any of them- even in a minor way.

Now is the time to make a stand, which could be more critical than any other speech  - or any interview - that Elizabeth Warren has given.

Will she have the courage or foresight to commit to it? That remains to be seen. For Bernie Sanders's campaign's sake let us hope she commits soon. Like before Tuesday!