People Power – Part 4: The Peace Dividend Strategy

The Peace Dividend strategy is a practical plan for achieving a very specific goal. That goal is regime change in Washington DC, i.e. replacing the pro-war, pro-Wall Street, anti-democratic, power-drunk megalomaniacs now in control, with individuals who reflect the real values and priorities of real people living real lives. It’s about getting rid of the lapdogs and liars and electing honest individuals who will answer to and serve the people who put them in office. 

Until WE THE PEOPLE seize power from those who now commandeer the machinery for setting foreign policy, who shape our military priorities and agenda, who view themselves as the indispensable, infallible rulers of the planet, until WE THE PEOPLE are able to decide the direction of our country, create a legal and economic framework which serves all of the people, not just the rich and powerful, the U.S. will continue to bully other countries, topple governments, kill innocent people for geopolitical advantage, create conflict and chaos, inflict untold misery and suffering on everyone on the planet (including increasingly its own citizens), and provoke Russia and China into a major, possibly human life-ending conflict. The rich will just get richer and our best and finest will be sent into battle to protect their portfolios.

Thus, the Peace Dividend strategy is about seizing power, putting it into the hands of a democratically-empowered citizenry, reversing the disastrous trajectory of our foreign policy and aggressive pursuit of world domination, and implementing peaceful solutions for the monumental problems confronting the world in these challenging, tumultuous times.

To lay a foundation for citizen participation and activism, the Peace Dividend strategy focuses on the abuse of political and military power from 1992 to the present. This time frame is chosen for a very specific reason. To achieve its stated goal, the Peace Dividend strategy lays out a carefully constructed but entirely truthful message which the general public, or at least 150-200 million of them, can grasp, appreciate, and embrace. The message is the impetus for very simple and achievable action.

Why take this approach?

Most peace messaging unfortunately is too abstract, too broad, too philosophical. It might seem noble and inspiring to those already in the peace movement, good folks dedicated to achieving a world without war. But to everyday citizens who are bogged down and preoccupied with the more practical pursuits of survival, raising a family, holding down a job, making it from one paycheck to the next, most of the appeals currently wielded by peace activists sound like hippie slogans and pie-in-the-sky pining. Often such activists are viewed as misfits who are out of touch with reality.

The reason is obvious. People can’t feel much empathy for cholera victims in Yemen or refugees in Syria, when members of their immediate family are suffering. Everyday folks can’t pay attention to our aggressions in the South China Sea and Russia’s borders, when they need to pay attention to keeping a job and food on the table.

The approach of the Peace Dividend strategy is simple and direct: Just tell the truth! Tell the truth about our endless wars and bloated DOD budgets! Expose the whole “defense industry” game for what it is: an enormous con, a rip-off, a massive fraud perpetrated on the American citizenry. The Afghanistan War was based on lies. The Iraq War was based on lies. Destroying Libya was based on lies. Attacking Syria was based on lies. The need to upgrade our nuclear weapons is a lie. The need for a Space Force is a lie. The need to go to war with Russia is a lie. The need to go to war with China is a lie. It goes on and on. Trillions and trillions of dollars wasted! Manufactured crises. Manufactured consent.

And then crucially, we connect all this fraud and waste to the rough times people are going through . . .

WAR IS MAKING US POOR!

People should be very angry. When they see what’s really happening, THEY WILL BE VERY ANGRY! Trillions of our taxpayer dollars have gone up in smoke. OUR MONEY has been squandered and our future mortgaged. The facts don’t lie. It’s even on the nightly news now! How $2.3 trillion was wasted in a 20-year war in Afghanistan, which to rub salt in our wounds WE LOST!

The Peace Dividend strategy doesn’t stop there. The war criminals and their puppets in Congress and the White House have stolen our money.

We want it back!

We want back at least some of the trillions taken from us as good, decent citizens under false pretenses, then used to fight unnecessary wars and buy military junk we never needed. Money which just ends up in the coffers of the defense industry, and ultimately in the bank accounts of wealthy investors who profit from the never-ending wars. It’s a pipeline right from the pocketbooks of everyday citizens and their meager family budgets, to the already incomprehensibly rich.

WE DEMAND OUR MONEY BACK!

The Peace Dividend refund currently totals $20,544 for each and every living U.S. citizen.

That’s over $82,000 for a family of four. Everybody gets the same amount. Warren Buffet and Jeff Bezos get the same as you and your 10-year-old kid, your grandma and the guy who picks up your trash.

And if you don’t think we can afford this, stop right there. See Paying For The Peace Dividend.

Understand something . . .

This is not helicopter money. It’s not Covid relief. It’s not UBI. It’s not a bribe. It’s not socialism.

IT’S A REFUND!

It’s everyday citizens getting back money which NEVER should have been taken from them in the first place, and putting that money back in their bank accounts where it belongs.

Our case is clear and our logic unassailable. The public for the past 30 years have been victims of the greatest rip-off in the history of the world!

Another way to look at this:  We are demanding “war reparations” in the form of a Peace Dividend Refund, for the war the power-drunk, war-crazed lunatics have been waging, not just on our alleged enemies, but on us, our families, our communities, our schools.

FOR THE WAR THEY’VE BEEN WAGING ON THE TRUTH!

Will our establishment politicians, now in the pockets of defense industry and Wall Street, beholden to the imperial fantasies of the neocon fanatics, go along with this?

Probably not. THAT’S THE POINT OF THIS STRATEGY. If they can’t serve the people, send them packing. They are fabulously talented. They can become an Amway distributor or a greeter at Walmart. Their phony smiles are perfect for any number of job opportunities.

Then again, maybe a few of the establishment politicians will come around. That’s fine. It’s entirely their choice: But either they commit in writing with the Peace Dividend candidate contract to GIVE US OUR MONEY BACK or . . . we don’t vote for them. We vote for someone who will. Then we’ll get a government that works for all of us and Walmart or Target will get a bubbly employee at the front entrance, just in time for Black Friday.

Is such an ultimatum really necessary?

YES! It’s come to this. The reason is simple. The war machine will continue to accelerate until we stop it.

However, there’s hope. There’s a very proven method for stopping our out-of-control government from further squandering. It’s a proven method! Works every time . . .

Empty the vault! No money. No money for military expansion. No money. No money for imperial wars.

This is exactly what the conservatives have done to us for years, only we’re turning the tables. THEY spend all the money on war and military. “Oh gosh, folks. We ran out of money. Sorry. We have to cut social programs. And there’s nothing now to fix our infrastructure.”

Ah hah! We see how this works! So . . .

We do exactly the same thing to them. THE REFUND (now we’re getting to the real reason for such an outrageous, drastic approach) EMPTIES THE VAULT. Refund $6.832 trillion to THE PEOPLE. No money for war. “Oh gosh, warmongers. We ran out of money. Sorry. You’ll have to close the bases. Start with Guantanamo and Okinawa. And we’ll have to cancel all that silly militarization of outer space. And the upgrading our nuclear weapons? Out of the question. Building more ships and tanks and missiles. FUHGEDDABOUDIT!”

Do you folks get this? This is so obvious. This could work!

But instead we flounder around talking about trimming this and trimming that. SCREW THE TRIMMING! Get people angry! Show them the LIES! The outrageous waste and fraud. Get people to DEMAND THEIR PEACE DIVIDEND REFUND … $20,544 for every single citizen! Spend the money on THE PEOPLE! No money for senseless wars!

How can the people get the power back?

How can we get our military, our economy, our government back on track?

ONLY VOTE FOR PEACE DIVIDEND CANDIDATES!

If we get a veto-proof majority in the House and the Senate, and these newly elected representatives go to DC and pass the Peace Dividend legislation, EVERYTHING CHANGES! Just sit back with a glass of your favorite evening comfort drink and think about it. EVERYTHING CHANGES … at least for now. People get a windfall. The DOD is stopped in its tracks. The MIC has to completely rethink and retool. And we can actually talk about things that matter to most Americans. The entire two-party duopoly gets turned on its head. Why? Because 99% of the establishment candidates from the two major parties will refuse to go along with this. They’ll fight it tooth, nail, cloak, dagger, go nuclear, go INSANE! I already know the kaka that they’ll be spewing. You do too. You hear it every time anybody wants to do something for THE PEOPLE of this country.

Listen, folks. We’ve got nothing to lose here. Here’s the worst case scenario . . .

Even if we don’t get our refund, if we got this in front of the public, if we got media to pay attention to this idea — and yes, if in 250 congressional races THIS was a big deal, it would be headline news on MSM —  for the first time in decades we’d be talking about the insanity and waste and lies surrounding the endless wars. We’d be talking about PEACE for a change! And maybe have a serious discussion about how truly screwed up the priorities are right now.

Please keep this thought front and center at all times: The Peace Dividend Project has a very specific goal. Stop the war machine before it destroys the country and possibly all life on the planet. Of course, I feel horrible for the people in Yemen, Ukraine, Syria, Venezuela, Cuba and all the other victims of U.S. military aggression and twisted foreign policies. But none of them are HERE in the belly of this horrible beast. None of them can vote. We start here and if we can stop the hate and lies inside our borders, we can start spreading the love and truth outside our borders. Maybe the world will forgive us our sins and we can get a fresh start.

By the way, if you want to participate in the Peace Dividend Project, please sign up here . . .

Join us in making the world safer and more peaceful.

[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . https://jdrachel.com ]

People Power – Part 4: The Peace Dividend Strategy | John Rachel

“Daddy is a drunk!”

I’ve spent at least ten years talking about “regime change in Washington DC”, trying to explain exactly what that entails, and why it’s necessary for the survival of our nation.

Here’s my last go at it. Daddy is a drunk! It’s an allegory.

Before I start with this heartwarming story about a dad who’s a drunk, let me just make one qualifier. When I advocate regime change in our nation’s capitol, I’m not suggesting a violent revolution. In fact, the idea is to AVOID that, because if there is a violent overthrow of authorities here in the U.S., I have no doubt it will be the bloodiest, most horrifying one in history. We as a citizenry are armed to the teeth, are obsessed with and glorify violence in our myths about ourselves as people and as a nation. Even those who claim to abhor violence seem inexplicably tolerant, with all sorts of rationalizations for never getting serious about eliminating guns or attempting to refashion a culture which is predicated on less adversity, competition, and confrontation. I’m not here to argue any of that. I’m just stating the obvious. If there’s another civil war, it will be a bloodbath.

Regime change, from my perhaps naive perspective — and I do mean total regime change — can be accomplished peacefully, humanely, and legally. But understand what I mean is truly, in fact, without qualification or compromise: REGIME CHANGE. It is removing every single person now holding public office from power and replacing them with qualified public officials who will actually serve the citizens of the country.

Today’s message is directed to the hugely vast majority of fellow citizens, who to my utter and complete astonishment, don’t see any need to replace ALL OF THEM. They don’t see that there are times in life, when things can’t be repaired. Something is so broken, it simply has to be tossed in the trash and replaced.

On to the most touching story you’ll read in the next several minutes.

………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

Daddy Is A Drunk!

Daddy in his twenties was pretty much like most guys his age. He liked to go out and have a good time with his buddies. Have a few beers. Cheer the home team at a sports bar.

When he married mom, they’d occasionally share wine with the meal at a nice restaurant, or even once or twice a month have cocktails with their friends or other young couples.

Twenty years later, daddy was a different human being. The kids were in high school, he worked very hard and since he’d been very successful at his job, he didn’t “hang out” with his personal buddies anymore, but spent a lot of time socializing with colleagues from the corporation he worked at, and VIPs from the international customer base they serviced. Lots of travel now. High pressure and high stakes. But he got paid very well for it.

There was one problem. Now he drank constantly. Morning to night. He literally started the day with two stiff tumblers of bourbon, either of which would put most people on their tushies. Drinks at lunch. Drinks at happy hour. As soon as he arrived at home, he’d pour large glasses of whiskey, drink through dinner, then cap the night off with a few “sweet dreams” shots of liqueur before collapsing in a sloppy stupor on their king-size bed.

Daddy was a drunk.

But it wasn’t just his problem. It was a problem for every member of the family, for the few friends he and mommy still had, sometimes even for neighbors. Like when he drove his new Porsche onto the lawn of the neighbors next door, and wiped out $3000 of their professionally-landscaped lawn and garden.

Daddy had changed from a affable, well-liked, often funny, always entertaining young man into a ego-maniacal, self-possessed, graceless, humorless prick. Oh yes, he could still pour on the charm, even be funny, and in his own self-aggrandizing way be entertaining, nice, sympathetic, affable, whatever the occasion might call for. But the Mr. Fun Guy act would eventually fall apart, and behind the scenes he’d again become Mr. Hyde. Life at home was unbearable. He ranted. He paced. Appeared angry most of the time. Never took any real joy or satisfaction out of being there with his wife and kids.

It was tearing the family apart. Correction. Since this had been going on for three years — it started right when their oldest boy started high school — it had already torn the family apart. There was nothing left to salvage. The kids hated daddy. The wife hated daddy.

Over the three years, there had been five sessions of marriage counseling. Daddy had even agreed on and off to get psychiatric help. At least six times Daddy had been in and out of Alcoholics Anonymous. He’d even been to a hypnotist. Except for very brief periods off the bottle — only days, not weeks — it was the same story. And getting worse by the day.

Within the family — at least at first — they’d talk to daddy, plead with him, try to reason with him. They said all the right things. They thought what they said was persuasive and would make a difference: Daddy, you’re destroying yourself. Daddy, when you drink, you’re not the same person we know and love . Daddy, we just want to be with you and want what’s best for you. Daddy, you’ll be a much happier person — we’d all be happier — if you stop drinking. Daddy, you’re going to die if you keep this up. Please, daddy!

Through it all, with the rare glimpses of the pain and havoc he was creating in their lives, with a fleeting awareness that he had a serious problem, that he was hurting himself and those he who loved him, daddy would listen and apologize, promise to do better and claim he really appreciated their concern and help. He would do what was best for all of them and quit. Of course, that never happened. After only a few days off the bottle, when he went back, it seemed like he even drank more.

And so the family was — and still is — facing one stark, disheartening, unavoidable reality.

Daddy is a drunk.

Mommy can’t take it anymore. The verbal abuse. No affection. Nothing resembling companionship. No possibility of communication. Nothing could be done to fix things.

It was time for a drastic solution.

Daddy had to go. He had to be removed from the family before he did any more harm.

Mommy filed for and won a divorce. Daddy was gone.

If life was generous, mommy would find another man to love, to love her, and be the father to the kids they deserved.

……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….

What’s the moral of the story? Sometimes things get so bad, there’s so much damage and bad history, you have to start all over.

That’s where we are at with our government, with the elected officials now in office, who time and again, over and over, make it clear they do not and will not serve the people who elected them to do just that. They are beholden to their deep-pocketed patrons, both major parties serve the ruling class. The connection between WE THE PEOPLE and those who are chosen — not by us but by the pay-for-play insiders of the Democratic and Republican parties — for us to vote for on election day, exists as a figment of fantasy, the product of very effective and very deceptive messaging. Regardless of what these puppets say during their money-drenched electoral campaigns, they are not on the side of the people.

We can’t take this anymore. We should be mad as hell!

The abuse of power. No loyalty to the voting public. They sidle up to us when they want our votes, then disappear inside the Washington DC bubble. They talk at us. They don’t listen. The iron grip of the rich and powerful on our current elected officials is absolute. There’s no fixing anything with those now in office.

It’s time for drastic action.

These lapdogs of the rich and powerful need to go. They must be removed before they do anymore damage. Examples: More looting of the Treasury to serve Wall Street and the big investment banks. More stalling on climate change, minimum wage, health care, abortion, criminal justice reform, election reform, infrastructure. None of it will get done. What will get done is privatizing social security, more tax breaks for corporations and the rich . . . MORE WAR!

Throw these bums out! You could randomly go through a telephone directory and select names and come up with a better Congress and White House than this circus of clowns who now pose as our national leaders. No . . . I’m not being funny. I’m dead serious!

And you should be too.

[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . https://jdrachel.com ]

“Daddy is a drunk!” | John Rachel

The future is so bright . . .

Idiots in power! (I try not to judge people by their looks
but I have to be honest. These people are scary!)

Above are just some of the people in positions of enormous influence and power who are promoting the war in the Ukraine. Make no mistake about it. They couldn’t care less about Ukraine or the Ukrainian people. What they truly care about is destroying Russia.

Contrary to what 111.99% of what is reported in the Western MSM, Russia did not want this conflict. Putin did not want to “invade” Ukraine. Putin and the Kremlin do not want to kill innocent Ukrainian citizens. Russia does not want to take over and occupy Ukraine.

Russia was FORCED intentionally into this military action. This nightmare is the product of US/NATO provocation, intimidation, aggression, all engineered at minimum to give Russia a bloody nose, at maximum to liquidate Russia as an independent country.

So where is this heading?

Everyone in the idiot gallery above is for sending more arms to Ukraine. Of course, arming Ukraine with lethal weaponry, the threat of Ukraine arming itself with nuclear weapons, is what made it necessary for Russia to destroy the Ukrainian military — which is what it is now doing — because it had become an existential threat. So what’s the solution proposed by the above brain trust for addressing the crisis? How do they propose fixing this mess?

More arms . . . more weapons . . . more threats to Russia!

“Gee, what started that apartment building on fire, chief?”

“Apparently, open cans of gasoline and kerosene in the basement.”

“Well, gosh darn, there’s only one option. Let’s pour more gasoline and kerosene into the building and see what happens.”

Several of the idiots in the scary collage above have moreover suggested that NATO and the US establish a no-fly zone over Ukraine. Which will mean — please give this your full attention — US/NATO planes and missiles deployed to shoot down Russian aircraft. Translation: Direct engagement, military conflict — yes, war! — with Russia.

Gee . . . how will this turn out?

After decade after decade of bombing; after twenty years of the War on Terror; a meltdown of the economy in 2008-2009; two years and counting of Covid-19 technocratic terrorism still hovering over us like a sledgehammer; with a coming economic meltdown which will make 2008 look like a rounding error; with the raucous, maniacal, increasingly fever-pitch pounding of war drums and shrill harangues against Russia and China; with a Congress and White House apparently inhabited by the certifiably insane (again just look at the above collection of whackos) . . . hmm. Whaddya think?

What will the future look like?

My prediction is that if we keep going the way we are, the future will indeed be . . . bright!

Very bright! And hot! Here’s how I imagine it’ll turn out . . .

[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . https://jdrachel.com ]

The future is so bright . . . | John Rachel

Ban the Bomb!

The first philosophy book I ever read was Bertrand Russell’s Common Sense and Nuclear Warfare. I was 13 years old.

Lord Russell’s writing made a huge impression on me. Though at the time I was reading mostly science and math books, the enterprise of looking at the pursuit of knowledge and wisdom from the broad perspective of a philosopher made deep roots in my sub-conscious and thus my first year of college I changed my major from chemistry to philosophy.

Even more central to the development of my world view and political priorities was the focus of this monumental book on the madness of arming ourselves with nuclear weapons. Here’s the abstract:

“Written at the height of the Cold War in 1959, Common Sense and Nuclear Warfare was published in an effort ‘to prevent the catastrophe which would result from a large scale H-bomb war’. Bertrand Russell’s staunch anti-war stance is made very clear in this highly controversial text, which outlines his sharp insights into the threat of nuclear conflict and what should be done to avoid it. Russell’s argument, that the only way to end the threat of nuclear war is to end war itself, is as relevant today as it was on first publication.”

Compared to today, those were innocent times. 1959 in my view was hardly the height of the Cold War, rather a way station for subsequent ramping up of tensions, which would first peak during the Cuban Missile Crisis at the end of 1962, discernably slow down with the resolution of that confrontation first part of 1963, then again continue to build until 1986 when Russia and the U.S. between them had nearly 65,000 nuclear bombs. Here’s a of the nuclear arms race between the two super-powers:

So in 1959, there were about 12,000 nuclear weapons available for mass annihilation. It is notable that most of those were in the U.S. arsenal, that of the U.S.S.R. less than 10% of the total. The U.S. continued its huge advantage until the U.S.S.R. finally reached parity twenty years later.

We now have active and immediately deployable about 8,000 nuclear weapons. If we count “inactivated” nukes which while not immediately deployable, could very quickly be put online, the total is slightly over 12,000, about the same as 1959. I say that the late 50s represented more innocent times for two reasons. First, back then as I just pointed out, the U.S. had almost all the nukes. The U.S.S.R. certainly wasn’t going to launch their 100+. It would have been almost instantaneous suicide. And while there was some talk a little later about destroying the “commies” both in China and the U.S.S.R. while we had the upper hand, sanity and some shred of moral conscience prevailed. The second reason we are less innocent now and in fact find ourselves living among the greatest threats to human survival in history is simple. Nukes are now in the hands of seven more nations. Three of them don’t inspire much confidence. North Korea, Pakistan, and India are considered “unstable” and U.S. policy toward them doesn’t exactly incentivize them to be less volatile. Likewise with China, which the U.S. openly antagonizes, insults, provokes, and officially has declared it will eventually have to go to war with to keep it from becoming a peer power. China has around 350 nuclear bombs, enough to destroy life on Earth 3 1/2 times over. India and Pakistan combined have about 300 nukes and have made no secret about their intent to use them if they end up in a major war with one another.

Have we learned anything from our flirtation with self-engineered extinction?

What really captured my attention and fired my imagination was Bertrand Russell’s open and highly public opposition. He wasn’t a cowering academic. And because there were still a few sane thought leaders in the world at that time who had high visibility and enormous public respect, Lord Russell was not alone in his passionate appeals for ending the scourge of war.

It’s tempting to say we haven’t learned anything in the past seven decades. But that’s a ridiculous conclusion. The truth is we knew back then and know now exactly what’s wrong and what needs to be done. We had celebrations across the globe recently when the 50th nation ratified the Treaty on the Prohibition of Nuclear Weapons and the U.N. “officially” declared nuclear weapons illegal. Any sane, decent human being knows nuclear weapons have no place in the world now or ever, and are a death sentence for the human species waiting for signature — which will be the first mushroom cloud over a major city anywhere on the planet. Of course, none of the nations who have nuclear weapons signed the treaty, there’s no way to enforce the treaty, and the nuclear nations will do whatever they damn please regardless.

Bertrand Russell speaking at a
Ban The Bomb rally.

Which requires us to pause and inhale a deep breath . . . OF REALITY.

For seven decades I’ve been listening to the same painful moans and pitiful mantras. About a whole host of crises and problems: poverty, famine, war, terror, infanticide, genocide, war crimes, bioweapons, oppression, exploitation, on and on and on. And anyone my age will tell you the same. Not much has changed. The excuses are more compelling, the euphemisms are cleverer, the blame-game is Olympic Gold Medal material, the talking heads delivering the 24/7 stream of non-sequiturs prettier and more handsome. Yeah, there are incremental improvements here and there. But SEVENTY YEARS? We’ve put humans in space, transplanted organs, created self-driving cars, mass-produced a telephone-camera-computer-video conferencing computer that fits in the palm of a hand, yet 24,000 people still starve to death EVERY DAY. And we’re still snarling at one another like rabid hyenas threatening war and flirting with extinction. Come on!

The one lesson that obviously has not sunk in is that . . . ALL OF THESE STRUGGLES ARE ABOUT POWER: Those who have it and those who don’t. We can — as Lord Russell did and many good, well-meaning contemporary activists currently do — say all of the right things. But those fighting the good fight DON’T HAVE THE POWER. Those who subject the rest of the human race to indignities, oppression, the sickening homicidal wars, DO HAVE THE POWER and they are not listening. Not to us anyway. They listen to themselves, they serve themselves, their only loyalty is to an agenda that will keep them in power and secure their ability to use and abuse that power as they see fit.

THAT is the lesson we haven’t learned. We know that nuclear weapons are a death warrant. We know that they are a suicide pact. But there they are and there they will continue to sit, ready to unleash more death and destruction — and if not the annihilation of the human species at least the end of anything resembling civilization — than ever before imagined.

If we stop to think, to look at it objectively, the vast majority of people in the world want no part of this. It is a tiny, power-drunk, empire-obsessed, sociopathic few who hold us hostage to their psychotic fantasies.

Let’s break it down . . .

We know what needs to be done.

The lunatics are not now and will never listen to us.

We know how to change everything to make a better world.

The lunatics have their own plan and refuse to change.

The lunatics have the power.

We don’t have the power.

What should we do?

Isn’t it obvious?

But how?

[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . https://jdrachel.com ]

Ban the Bomb! | John Rachel

The Peace Dividend: Some Perspective

I'm addressing this article to the "professional left" and to the typically white middle-class point-and-click political activists who are at the insular core of today's peace movement.  They do keep trying -- we give them all the much-deserved credit for that -- yet keep doing the same things over and over -- wash, rinse, repeat -- never pausing to look objectively at how ineffective they're being.

[ Insert Einstein's definition of insanity here. ]

Despite a slight surge of street protests since Trump ascended the throne -- largely not specific to peace -- the peace movement is essentially going backwards.  Missives vital for the survival of the human race are not being heard because the folks currently advocating peace: 1) are drowned out by a militarized war-hungry media; 2) are mumbling worn out messages, rehashing stale slogans, pushing boring clichés, reciting sound bites that should have been retired when disco stopped being the rage; and 3) are lacking necessary focus, mojo and momentum.

It's a veritable cacophonous roar out there these days.  If what's being trumpeted is not pitch perfect and outrageously spectacular, it's just more white noise in the din.

To get people to pay attention, you need to get their attention.  That means fresh, exciting new ideas; galvanizing calls to action; relevant, achievable payoffs.  The peace movement can't survive anymore on high fives, or peace sign t-shirts and bumper stickers.  People just aren't buying the old tropes.

Mind you, when I talk about 'people', I'm talking about tens of millions of people.  I am talking about creating a true 'people's movement' of 'people power', not just a marginal slice of the population which happens to have a lot of time on its hands.  This unified bloc can change everything, especially if it is fashioned into a voting bloc.

 

I'm talking about the 'people power' of the bottom 160 million Americans who are hurting much more than you and I, much more than anyone who has the time and luxury of participating in marches and bake sales for peace, sit-ins, teach-ins, or online petitions.  These folks are struggling and are those whose lives are most devastated by our war economy and pursuit of empire.

THESE FOLKS ARE FRUSTRATED, ANGRY, BEGGING FOR A COHERENT SOLUTION TO THEIR MISERY.  They live paycheck-to-paycheck, day-to-day, just trying to survive.  Am I imagining all of this?  I direct you to the orange imbecile sitting in the Oval Office.  The folks I'm talking about put him there.  You don't think they can make a difference in the political direction of the country?  You don't think they can be mobilized?  You better guess again.

This is the principal reason why my Peace Dividend initiative targets Trump voters, the very same folks who are becoming increasingly disillusioned with the orange demagogue, as he blithely now jettisons the campaign promises he made to get their votes.  With the unfolding Mad Hatter military confrontations in the Middle East and North Korea, the risky intimidation of Russia and China, the increasing likelihood of WWIII, and growing potential for nuclear annihilation, the urgency is obvious: We need EVERYONE on board!

The Trump supporters are, as they say, low hanging fruit.  And there's a lot of fruit.

By design the Peace Dividend strategy is about reaching HUGE NUMBERS of politically marginalized, dispossessed, previously ignored -- until Trump came along -- voters.  The Peace Dividend talks their language, their needs, addresses their immediate concerns and growing rage with the system.  And it does it honestly!  Everything in my proposal is based on available data, most of it directly from government sources and speeches by our elected officials.  I've taken the official data and the promises, just reconfigured it, reinterpreted it, refashioned it, turned it into a weapon to take apart the military machine.  It's completely legal, it's in the best traditions of our alleged democracy, it's completely consistent with the Constitution, in fact, it even reinforces much of what our leadership has stated in the past -- Google 'peace dividend 1992’ -- at a time they found that particular version of reality politically expedient.

Most of the folks in the bottom half of the economy are not going to have PhDs in Political Science.  We will confront some big differences of opinion, demeanor, vocabulary, basic courtesy, open-mindedness, instincts, mutual respect.  It's a rough crowd.  Many will be racist, homophobic, superstitious, ultra-religious, misinformed, and just plain ignorant.

 

Granted, it would be nice to try to work out our differences in world view, our political philosophies, our sense of where the nation should be headed.  But with the crisis we face right now, we don't have that luxury. We must act immediately to stop the military madness, the march to war, the complete takeover of the country and its political and economic institutions by the menacing and deranged neocon/neoliberal junta.  The Peace Dividend is a battle cry, it is a call to action to 200 million Americans to DO SOMETHING, TO ACT NOW, before it's too late -- if it isn't already.  It gives concerned citizens something specific they can do, starting today.

Moreover, as facts on the ground now alarmingly demonstrate, there is no longer much room for conversation.  Effective, unbiased reporting has been abolished, public dissent increasingly is being squashed.  More devastatingly, talk has become so cheapened, most of the people we need to reach, don't want any more talk.  THEY WANT ACTION!

It's easy to blame Trump for the deterioration of the national conversation, relegating it to empty nonsensical utterances and abrupt Tweets.  But let's be honest.  This degradation has been in the works for a long time and had a good head start long before he took office.

That's neither here nor there.  Here's what we need to keep in focus.

 

As Trump's neoliberal/neocon assault troops continue to wreak havoc -- picture coming military conflicts and the inevitable crash of the economy this year or next -- the masses will be singularly outraged, hungry for REAL ACTION.  They will be crying both for heads to roll and for something to be done.  All of the necessary incentives will be there to get them on board with constructive activism.

The Peace Dividend offers a simple, direct, decisive plan of action.  It's as simple as voting.

You've seen how it forces a total transformation of the federal budget.

You've seen how it can engineer a complete changing of the guard.

This is our chance for a non-violent coup d'tat.  We need to be prepared.  We can't squander this opportunity by being safe or boring.  We must be bold and decisive, yet affable and receptive, sensitive and sensible.  We need to listen, then talk to others in their language, on their terms.  We must play down differences, seek understanding, unite in a common purpose.  Most of all, we need to welcome everyone who shows the slightest interest.  We need everyone on board to defeat a determined and ruthless enemy . . .

A bloodthirsty military and their ruling class puppet masters.


[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . http://jdrachel.com ]


The Peace Dividend: Some Perspective

No Negotiating With Terrorists

 

"No negotiating with terrorists!"

Now that's something I can get behind.

A terrorist not only doesn't share the same goals as you and I, they also don't play by the same rules.  
Terrorists are the ultimate bullies.  They will lie, cheat, steal, even murder, in order to get their way.  The ends justify the means.  They're right, we're wrong.  Terrorists can't fathom compromise, so what is the point of negotiating?

We face terrorism on many fronts and at many levels because sociopathy and barbarism are not subtle or selective.  Perhaps they represent bad wiring in some small but wickedly destructive sub-class of humans, or maybe we all carry the defect, but it only rises up to preempt the better instincts among a minority of us.

In either case, if we don't want to be "terrorized" into submission, we must decisively stand our ground and entertain no compromise.

"No negotiating with terrorists!"

The United States has become a terrorist nation.

Not you and I as such . . . because regular folks like us are generally peaceful and sane.

Unfortunately, we no longer have any say in the decisions and direction of the country.

But there is a national agenda, driven on many fronts at many different levels, promoted in our names as citizens of the country, which has transformed the U.S. into the greatest scourge in the history of the planet.  We have unbridled power coupled with no coherent political philosophy, fueled by unchecked imperial ambition and delusions of world rule, unimpeded by considerations of morality or sensitivity to the value of human life.

U.S. terrorism expresses itself internationally as wars, regime changes, special operations missions, economic manipulation and interference, cyber and propaganda warfare, and is implemented with the forward-basing of troops, NGOs, embedded intelligence agents, foreign mercenaries, and often outright military occupation of over 140 countries.

All of this is conceived, planned, and coordinated from within our own borders.  Often it reflects official, if not always publicly-known, foreign policy.  Sometimes it grows out of legacy policies and practices, the product of a group-think world view which has a life of its own established over decades, one which embraces the unquestioned and until recently unchallenged role of the U.S. as the world's policeman and sole superpower.

While we can find fault in the workings of the loose collective of institutions which make up what is now called the Deep State, much direct blame for our terrorism can be assigned to the CIA.  This 70-year-old agency has become the main engine for projecting U.S power, providing the foot soldiers, technology and weaponry, for a vast majority of catastrophes we have precipitated over the past sixty years.  The list of sovereign nations the U.S. has illegally meddled and decisively interfered with -- compiled by the brilliant and highly-acclaimed historian and geopolitical analyst William Blum -- is as formidable as it is disgraceful (please note: *indicates the successful overthrow of a government):

• China 1949 to early 1960s
• Albania 1949-53
• East Germany 1950s
• Iran 1953 *
• Guatemala 1954 *
• Costa Rica mid-1950s
• Syria 1956-7
• Egypt 1957
• Indonesia 1957-8
• British Guiana 1953-64 *
• Iraq 1963 *
• North Vietnam 1945-73
• Cambodia 1955-70 *
• Laos 1958 *, 1959 *, 1960 *
• Ecuador 1960-63 *
• Congo 1960 *
• France 1965
• Brazil 1962-64 *
• Dominican Republic 1963 *
• Cuba 1959 to present
• Bolivia 1964 *
• Indonesia 1965 *
• Ghana 1966 *
• Chile 1964-73 *
• Greece 1967 *
• Costa Rica 1970-71
• Bolivia 1971 *
• Australia 1973-75 *
• Angola 1975, 1980s
• Zaire 1975
• Portugal 1974-76 *
• Jamaica 1976-80 *
• Seychelles 1979-81
• Chad 1981-82 *
• Grenada 1983 *
• South Yemen 1982-84
• Suriname 1982-84
• Fiji 1987 *
• Libya 1980s
• Nicaragua 1981-90 *
• Panama 1989 *
• Bulgaria 1990 *
• Albania 1991 *
• Iraq 1991
• Afghanistan 1980s *
• Somalia 1993
• Yugoslavia 1999-2000 *
• Ecuador 2000 *
• Afghanistan 2001 *
• Venezuela 2002 *
• Iraq 2003 *
• Haiti 2004 *
• Somalia 2007 to present
• Honduras 2009
• Libya 2011 *
• Syria 2012
• Ukraine 2014 *

Among these, at the urging and with the active partnering of the CIA, are 35 countries ruled by horrifyingly oppressive dictators, fascist regimes, drug lords, and jihadists.

This has not just dramatically, malignantly, affected the international order.  It has also created enormous resentment, and generated enemies where there were none before.  In that sense, it is a self-perpetuating reign of mayhem and chaos, keeping the world in flux and disarray, constantly producing even more threats to our country which then, in the adversarial and combative mindset of the CIA, requires further meddling and mayhem.

We have to be honest with ourselves and judiciously apply the same standards across the board when judging such anti-democratic, autocratic abusers of power.  If we've been able thus far to rationalize distressing signs that the CIA was slowly becoming a rogue security agency -- dismissing sordid leaks and disturbing discoveries as isolated rare instances of individual acts of overzealousness and insubordination -- the recent revelations provided by Wikileaks with the publication of their Vault 7 documents provides concrete proof that the CIA has been completely out-of-control for a very long time, and what should truly disturb us is that such behavior is not the exception but the rule.

With terrorist organizations like the ISIS, al Nusra, al Qaeda, and now our own CIA, it is impossible to integrate them with more tempered and balanced institutions, especially in what is portrayed as the institutional framework of a democracy.  These elements violate national and international law and treaties, arrogantly scoff at diplomatic protocol, are adverse to power-sharing, spurn the time-honored boundaries of common sense and decency, and are ruthlessly callous and amoral.

It's the way unchecked power evolves, how a parasite will ultimately kill its host.

We now have little choice.  The CIA and all traces of it must be eradicated, except for an archival installation in the Smithsonian Institute as a warning to future generations.

This is now a matter of survival for the U.S. and perhaps the human race.

We have inadvertently created a monster and lost control.  The CIA is incompatible with the survival of a free, open, just, democratic society.

Understandably, the CIA will plead the case for its own institutional survival.

But the case is closed.  There is nothing more to discuss.

"No negotiating with terrorists!"



[ This originated at the author's personal website . . . http://jdrachel.com ]



No Negotiating With Terrorists