Caitlin Johnstone
Joe Biden’s inauguration as the 46th president of the United States is now all but certain.
In order to have any chance of successfully advancing his legal narrative of electoral shenanigans President Trump would have to both (A) really want to remain president and (B) have the backing of sufficiently large power structures, neither of which appear to be the case. When you’re a Republican president and Murdoch is actively fighting against you, it doesn’t matter what the facts are. The narrative war is lost. Trump is done.
[Forrest Gump voice:] And just like that, the Russians were gone.Two months ago, Kamala told CNN that Russian interference -- undefined, of course, because who needs details? -- could cost Biden the election. Since Biden won, expect us to now hear zilch about "Russian interference." It's outlived its partisan utility. pic.twitter.com/fvJP9csvYn
— Aaron Maté (@aaronjmate) November 7, 2020
Every Kremlin agent hiding under every bed, every Saint Petersburg troll lurking around every corner, every Russian hacker we’ve been told was working around the clock to destroy America’s imaginary democracy–poof! We’re not hearing a word about them anymore.
If the Russians had really been trying to influence this election, as we’ve been told for years they most definitely would, and if foreign election interference really is an act of war comparable to 9/11 and Pearl Harbor, as we’ve been told for years that it is, then it should be just as big a deal regardless of which candidate win. Yet we’re not hearing a peep on the subject from the blue-checkmarked commentariat who’ve been shrieking about the Russian menace for four years.
We have, oh so very predictably, been hearing a fair bit about China though.
The Chinese Communist Party is celebrating.
Because they interfered in this election and think they’ve won. https://t.co/uztmmSkYrI
— Raheem Kassam (@RaheemKassam) November 6, 2020
President Trump puts America first.
Joe Biden puts China first.
— Nick Adams (@NickAdamsinUSA) November 7, 2020
If Biden Wins, Russiagate Will Magically Morph Into Chinagate
"Ohhh god. It’s happening again."https://t.co/SeCQFhvCqE
— Caitlin Johnstone ⏳ (@caitoz) October 27, 2020
Liberals are heaving a sigh of relief around the country, not because their actual lives have gotten much worse as a result of Trump’s presidency (they have not), but because it means at long last they’ll stop being psychologically abused by the mass media who’ve been screaming hysterical nonsense in their faces and making them feel crazy.
Bit by bit cautious celebrations are beginning to erupt from coast to coast (okay maybe just the coasts) as Biden’s January inauguration becomes less of a possibility and more of a certainty. It’s not the thunderous rejoicing it will be when they make it official, but little expressions of glee are popping up everywhere. Kids are being hugged. Parents are being called. Bold tie choices are being made.
When Trump was elected, I decided I’d only wear black ties. It was a personal and private act of mourning. I didn’t say anything about it. And almost no one noticed over these past four years.
Today.... pic.twitter.com/dlWrq6lDNs
— David Corn (@DavidCornDC) November 6, 2020
“At long last there will be adults in the White House again!” goes the common refrain.
And I couldn’t agree more! I think we’re all breathing a lot easier knowing that the US government will now be run by grown-ups who murder people instead of emotionally stunted children who murder people. We’ll all sleep so much better knowing that there are adults in the room who murder people, and that the insatiable US murder monster is under competent management once more.
And make no mistake, murdering people is what the Biden administration will be doing. This will in fact be the only president in recent memory who actually campaigned on being more interventionist and attacking his opponent for not being hawkish enough. Trump ran on a platform of scaling back US interventionism, as did Obama, as did even Bush, but Biden did the opposite. He is beginning from a much more hawkish position than he predecessors right off the bat.
Add to this the bloodthirsty ghouls who appear likely to wind up in Biden’s cabinet and the hawkish rhetoric of his foreign policy advisors, and you’re likely looking at a president who will serve as an empty vessel for whatever the US war machine wants to pour into him. Mass murders are being planned, and it’s going to get ugly.
Vote Biden, for a Competent Imperialism™️. https://t.co/kLK5DkjE5i
— Caitlin Johnstone ⏳ (@caitoz) October 19, 2020
It’s odd, you know. US political leaders are so revered by the media and so normalized on our screens that it’s easy to forget how many children they’ve killed. You see the doddering old man eating ice cream enough times and it becomes difficult to marry him in your mind with the butcher who played a crucial leading role in advancing the Iraq invasion which killed a million people and ushered in an unprecedented new age of military expansionism.
But the important thing is that he won’t be making rude tweets and bungling coup attempts in the Global South. He will be a Competent Grown-Up, like the daddy we always wanted. He will pilot the insatiable death machine with grace and decency, right into the homes of the world’s most vulnerable.
Despite all the partisan shrieking and melodrama and hyperbole, Trump is not uniquely evil. Despite all the partisan shrieking and melodrama and hyperbole, Biden is not uniquely evil. What’s uniquely evil is the murderous globe-spanning empire which dictates the fate of our species fueled on human blood and posing as a nice guy. Our world has never seen anything quite like it. It is a one of a kind monster.
A D D E N D U M
Of further interest
The US Empire Is A Smiley-Faced Serial Killer
Dave Calhoun, CEO of top war profiteer company Boeing, said back in July that he’ll be quite happy regardless of what happens on November third.
“I think both candidates, at least in my view, appear globally oriented and interested in the defense of our country and I believe they’ll support the industries,” Calhoun said. “I don’t think we’re going to take a position on one being better than the other.”
And of course he didn’t take such a position. Why would he? Arms manufacturers have been pouring money into the campaigns of both candidates, and they know that no matter who wins the presidential election they’re going to reap highly profitable mountains of corpses. Since they know they win no matter who wins, why risk offending a future business partner?
CEOs of arms manufacturers and their investors are confident about their prospects, regardless of which candidate wins the election.https://t.co/RXqw7qvJXR
— The Nation (@thenation) October 30, 2020
The fact that war plutocrats are happy with either candidate tells you more about the reality of this presidential race than all the billions of dollars worth of mass media reporting and punditry that’s gone into it over the last two years combined. No matter what happens in the election and its aftermath, this is the real headline.
It’s so unspeakably insane that people can become unimaginably wealthy by using campaign donations to help warmongering politicians rise to the top of the political system of the most bloodthirsty government on earth and then selling the weapons used in the wars those politicians start.
Really, just think about that for a second. Imagine if someone said “I’m going to become a billionaire by killing people in the Middle East and Africa and selling their organs on the black market.”
That would be insane, right? That person would immediately be branded the most disgusting person in the world.
But if someone becomes a billionaire by starting wars in the Middle East and Africa and selling the weapons used to kill the same number of people in those wars, they’re considered industrious businessmen and philanthropists.
They did functionally exactly the same thing as someone killing those people and selling their organs, but their evil is completely invisible to the scrutiny of the mass media which informs the way people think, act and vote. War profiteers pour money into political campaigns, think tanks, mass media advertising and other narrative management operations which have the direct result of more mass military violence and more public support for it, but they are seldom even criticized for that depravity let alone held accountable for it.
No Matter Who Wins, The War Machine Wins
"US government agencies are advancing the narrative that unabsorbed governments are attacking the United States in a completely invisible yet extremely outrageous way."https://t.co/s41nyXV5d4— Caitlin Johnstone ⏳ (@caitoz) October 23, 2020
The more you think about it, the creepier it gets. This is true not just of the military-industrial complex, but of the US-centralized empire as a whole.
There is nothing more creepy than the close power alliance loosely centralized around the United States which functions as a single empire on foreign policy.
Its leaders promote ideals like “freedom” and “democracy” while brutalizing any nation which disobeys its dictates and squeezing its own populace with increasingly authoritarian measures.
They extol the virtues of “human rights” while butchering human beings around the world whenever it is geostrategically convenient.
Their media virtually never point out the fact that their government is never not murdering human beings to fill the coffers of war profiteers and ensure unipolar planetary hegemony, but they will churn out sitcoms and feel-good stories about unity and togetherness like no one’s business.
The reality that they are riding on the parade float dressing of an insatiable death machine is carefully concealed from the denizens of this murderous empire, and instead they are fed a constant Hollywood diet of movies and shows about how fun and hilarious and awesome their country is.
The US empire is a serial killer with a horrifying grin stretched over its blood-spattered face. A smiley faced psychopath babbling about civil rights and the importance of inclusive language while chopping a Yemeni child to pieces.
Once you’ve seen it, you can never see the smiling nice guy again.
Despite all the partisan shrieking and melodrama and hyperbole, Trump is not uniquely evil.
Despite all the partisan shrieking and melodrama and hyperbole, Biden is not uniquely evil.
What’s uniquely evil is the murderous globe-spanning empire which dictates the fate of our species fueled on human blood and posing as a nice guy. Our world has never seen anything quite like it. It is a one of a kind monster.
Only deeply depraved people are capable of serving such a deeply depraved machine, and only deeply depraved people will ever be given an opportunity to. Trump and Biden are not unique in their depravity. They’re not even remarkable. They’re just the next in line to serve at the front desk of the smiley faced murder factory.
This will be the case regardless of who is inaugurated on January 20th. It should remain at the forefront of everyone’s attention above the hysterical partisan fray. Ignore the drama over who gets to be DeathCorp’s secretary and keep your gaze fixed on the smiling killer.
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This is a dispatch from our ongoing series by Caitlin Johnstone
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