They were never held accountable for Iraq, so why wouldn’t they try the same playbook with Iran? If the lie carried no consequences the first time, why would they stop telling it now
They sold the Iraq War by telling you there was no doubt Iraq had WMDs and intended to use them against Americans.
Now they’re selling Iran by claiming there’s no doubt Iran wants to build nuclear weapons and would use them against Americans.
They sold the Iraq War by telling you there was no doubt Iraq had WMDs and intended to use them against Americans.
Now they’re selling Iran by claiming there’s no doubt Iran wants to build nuclear weapons and would use them against Americans.
Peter Thiel and AI builders see themselves as the Elves of Valinor, crafting humanity’s greatest tools. But they may actually be the Sarumans of Middle-earth, knowingly or unknowingly building the very instruments that end up serving Sauron
@realJudebela Nigerians are very good at killing talent. I’m extremely picky when it comes to geopolitical analysts, and the fact that I rank you alongside Caspian Report and Johnny Harris is proof of your talent and the quality of your work.
But one foolish egbon wants you to be Sabinus
When a Western government negotiates a trade deal that locks a developing country into exporting raw materials while prohibiting the industrial policy that would let it manufacture finished goods:
They call it "competitiveness."
When an African country is structurally adjusted by the IMF into cutting health and education budgets in exchange for loans it needed partly because commodity prices were suppressed by Western agricultural subsidies:
They call it "fiscal responsibility."
When a Latin American government that tries to nationalize its own resources is destabilized by external pressure and internal funded opposition:
They call it "democracy promotion."
The language is always neutral. Always technical. Always about principles that supposedly apply universally.
The outcomes are never universal.
The outcomes flow in one direction, consistently, across decades, across continents, across every change of government in the countries doing the adjusting.
At what point does a coincidence become a system?
When Obama bombed Libya, the justification was "humanitarian intervention." "Protection of civilians." "Responsibility to protect." The language of international law and moral obligation.
Libya was subsequently destroyed. It has open slave markets today. The humanitarian outcome was catastrophic.
But the language was immaculate. The syntax was perfect. The suits were pressed and the speeches were moving and the Nobel Peace Prize sat on the shelf while the drones flew.
Trump bombs things and says it's about the oil.
In terms of honesty, pure, raw, unmediated honesty about what American power actually does, Trump is more accurate than any of his predecessors.
This is not a defense of Trump.
This is an indictment of everyone who made the polished version seem acceptable.
The lie was always more dangerous than the liar currently in office.
Because the lie had good manners.
The problem was never Trump.
Trump is the readable version of a text that was always there, written in language most people couldn't access.
The problem is the system that produced him, that uses him, that will survive him, and that will next time find someone equally willing to do what he does but competent enough to do it quietly.
The competent version is more dangerous.
The competent version rebuilds the language. Restores the branding. Hires the speechwriters who know how to say "shared values" and "rules-based order" while executing identical policy.
And the people who spent four years appalled by Trump's vulgarity will feel the relief of good grammar and take it for moral improvement.
The empire doesn't need Trump specifically.
It needed what he provided: a stress test. A period of operation without the usual ideological cover, to see what held and what didn't.
What held: the sanctions. The bases. The vetoes. The dollar. The weapons sales. The regime change operations.
What didn't hold: the manners.
And when someone comes along who can restore the manners while keeping everything else, and they will, they always do, the people who thought the problem was the manners will call it a recovery.
The rest of us will know what it actually is.
This is not an accident of policy.
This is the policy.
The extraction is the point.
The debt is the product.
The sick person is the raw material.
(No Truer words)
Medical debt is the leading cause of personal bankruptcy in the United States.
Not gambling. Not reckless spending. Not the moral failures that the rhetoric of personal responsibility loves to invoke.
Getting sick.
The leading cause of financial ruin in the wealthiest country in human history is the biological inevitability of the human body breaking down.
This happens nowhere else in the developed world.
In no other wealthy nation does a person survive cancer and then spend a decade paying for the survival.
In no other wealthy nation does a grandmother choose between insulin and rent.
In no other wealthy nation is the question "can I afford to call an ambulance" a question a person has to genuinely ask.
This is not an accident of policy.
This is the policy.
The extraction is the point.
The debt is the product.
The sick person is the raw material.
The United States spends more on healthcare per capita than any country on earth.
More than Canada. More than Germany. More than France. More than Switzerland. More than Japan.
More than every country with universal coverage.
More than every country where a hospital visit does not require a financial advisor.
More than every country where aging does not mean choosing between medicine and the mortgage.
More than all of them.
And Americans have a lower life expectancy than most of them.
Worse maternal mortality than most of them.
Higher infant mortality than most of them.
This is not a healthcare system that is underfunded.
This is a healthcare system that is extraordinarily profitable.
Those are not the same thing.
One measures outcomes for patients.
The other measures outcomes for shareholders.
America chose which number to optimize.
The shareholders are doing very well.