Recent comments
ADHD: Hunter in a Farmer's World
Thom Hartmann has written a dozen books covering ADD / ADHD - Attention Deficit Hyperactive Disorder.
Join Thom for his new twice-weekly email newsletters on ADHD, whether it affects you or a member of your family.
Thom's Blog Is On the Move
By webmaster
Hello All
Thom's blog in this space and moving to a new home.
Please follow us across to hartmannreport.com - this will be the only place going forward to read Thom's blog posts and articles.
Strevell: I have only watched part of one episode of Homeland but I had the same feelings toward the show as your daughter. To me, it smacked of right-wing NEOCON propaganda. I have not even watched FOX news for probably 15 years...always careful to skip over that channel. The only time I've watched parts of it was when short segments were posted on various web sites like Crooks and Liars or The Daily Show With Jon Stewart or The Colbert Report. The term Homeland Security has always ticked me off because it reminded me of Nazi Germany...and because I believe that the Neocons were primarily responsible for 9/11 to begin with. I believe they remotely, electronically, hijacked those planes and guided them to their targets, and used the 19 "hijackers" as patsies.
I suspect that they, the US ruling elite, are about to do another false flag attack on the US as a way of scaring us so badly that we won't object to sending in lots of boots-on-the-ground in the Middle East. And they will do so under the pretension of wiping out ISIS in Iraq and Syria. And, perhaps, they'll also take out Assad's Syrian forces, depose Assad, and maybe set up Iran for an attack as well. Will they attack ISIS in Iraq and then attack Syria like GB did when we struck Afghanistan initially but then invaded Iraq?
They are already setting us up by warning us that the attacks on the US by ISIS is now imminent. Very scary huh? So, if they make us expect an attack, and an attack happens, they'll have everyone shaking in their boots, putting on ridiculous little flag pins and patriotic signs in our yards. Will the US citizens be fooled once again? Most likely! Just stay out of tall buildings or shopping centers, perhaps. Don't go shopping as usual.
Didn't Senator Prescott Bush, the grandfather of Dubya, actively consort with the Nazis? Or at least "leverage" arms dealing with them...Not to mention The German-American Bund. Now that the Repubs have let that Right Wing Demonic hold sway, the "Nazi accoutrements" are sure to re-emerge. Isn't Bush One part of the Carlisle Corp? Aren't they International Arms Dealers? "War IS a Racket" (See, YouTube, Gen. Smedley Butler)
Question:
When was the last U.S. military invasion/incursion that actually succeeded in making America and Americans more safe, without those "unintended consequences?"
Why stop at eliminating just the word 'homeland' or 'heimat'? Can we eliminate the entire Department of Homeland Security? What are they doing, other than tracking us, reading our emails, and acting like Big Brother?
I always thought that their main purpose was to get as many hackers as possible on the gov't payroll, pay 'em big bucks, and keep 'em busy snooping on us, instead of hacking the Military-Industrial-Congressional Complex or Anonymous-type whistle-blowing.
Besides, we had all the intelligence capability that we needed to stop the 9-11 attacks. No need for a whole additional Department.
I can keep an eye on myself just fine, thank you.
Does anyone watch the Showtime series. "Homeland". ? It has Claire Danes as one the main characters. As a show, I really enjoy the. Acting, the actors, the drama, the mystery and it really makes me think. Because it is called HOMELAND, my adult daughter will not watch it. It is a continuing series and I am caught up in this night time soap opera called HOMELAND. I don't feel that my watching it will hurt me, as it is like any exciting drama ~ but my daughter will not ....because of that nasty word: Homeland.. I do agree that we need to stay outa these countries, like stop unilateral global invasions.
If I remember correctly, the idea of the "homeland" actually goes back to the poet Hoelderlin, who wrote of the connection of the German people to their soil with religious reverence. His poems inspired Heidegger, Hitler and others, and the longing for the homeland became quite a romatic passtime for college-age youth in the early 1900's. Whatever its origins, its connotations have become odious, and I will be glad when they announce that department has been re-named properly!
But Joe... "putting ourselves in countries we are not welcome in..." That's what fascist empires do! It's the nature of the beast.
Thom, I appreciate your basic premise. But as far as I’m concerned, they can keep right on using that fascist language, because it shows their fascist colors. I suspect a few of those Nazi scumbags imbedded themselves in American culture and policy right after WWII, and there they remain! In my youth, even as cynical as the Vietnam War made me, I never would have guessed the breadth and scope of Nazi influence on American politics, nor would I have imagined how Nazi-friendly “My Country ’Tis Of Thee” actually was… and is, to this day.
Nearly half a century has passed since the last time I recited the pledge to the flag. At a town hall meeting last year, I was the only person in that crowded auditorium who remained seated. I will never participate in that insipid ritual again.
For a country that is merely two centuries old, the product of colonialism, genocide and land theft, “Homeland” also has a mighty pretentious ring to it. - AIW
These terms, as well as putting ourselves in countries we are not welcome in, make others very resentfull of us.
Another source says "homeland" also referred to "any of ten partially self-governing areas in South Africa designated for particular indigenous African peoples under the former policy of apartheid."
The Bush/Nazi connection was firmly established when the Thyssen funds managed by Prescott Bush in 1942 were ordered frozen by President Roosevelt.
I thought everyone knew H.S. was created so that the other security agencies wouldn't know what Cheney and old GHW were doing with their faction of the CIA.
"Homeland" is a nice name for eggs, dairy products, or bread. Perhaps the use of "Homeland" during Apartheid was what confused G.W. when he referred to "the African nation."
Yes, lets erase this one word! Please! This word is a symptom, not a cause of any problem. Anyone who was paying attention in 2001 noticed a lot of 'symptoms.' First and foremost was the flipping of the stars on the Republican logo. Shortly after that 9/11. Then the "Patriot Act". After that the creation of The Department of 'Homeland' Security. (Like the FBI, CIA, and the NSA isn't already security overkill.) Then war declared on the wrong country. And finally, that fateful day when it was proudly announced and intentionally leaked to the entire world media that the United States now tortures it's prisoners--complete with a media package of pictures to support the story. After all, who would believe that the one nation that has condemned such behavior publically for over a century would stoop to such action without visual evidence.?
No, Thom! We have a much bigger problem here than using a creepy. spooky dark Nazi word. We have a creepy, spooky dark Nazi influence that has taken over our country; and, that is what we need to get rid of. Operation Paperclip has finally come back around to bite us on the ass.
I couldn't agree more with Thom's assessment. The word "heimat" has always suggested to me the Nazis and their interpretation and use of it. I was appalled when we decided to use it (actually the English translation of it) for one of our major security-related departments after 9/11. I hope peope pick up on this and retire the term "homeland" to the dustbin of history where it belongs. It is not the sort of imagery that we should be promoting.
I've always hated that term. In addition to the German's "Fatherland", it reminds me of when the Soviets referred to "Mother Russia."
I agree. I was out of the country on 9/11, and returned to a very different country on 9/14. It was almost immediately that I heard the word 'Homeland,' and I, too, found it creepy and a little Nazi-like. Not that Bush & Cheney would surprise me by using Nazi techniques to gin up passions that they could exploit. But I have always hated the word, and really would like to see disappear from our lexicon. We need to retire it, and all of the other awful things we came up with in response to that terrible attack.
This is a hard one. But, I have to stick to what I know in my head (not in my heart, which is just floored by the videos I see...)---bombing people never, ever produces the results we want
For many years, since 9/11, I've been disturbed by the use of emotionally charged phrases, such as "Homeland Security" and "Patriot Act". Fascist governments have a long history of using emotionally charged phrases to influence public thinking, and rally support for causes that would otherwise be seen as undesirable. It's propaganda in its most insidious and subtle form.
And now the United States is following that path; it's all down hill from here.
Not by doing nothing, you won't, either.
The previous post lists the many--the many--things wrong with CAFOs. Any one of those assaults on the Earth, the animals, or humans should be enough for us to get rid of that horrible process.
But to stick just to climate change, it is worthwhile to realize that producing a pound of grass-fed beef produces more CO2 and CH4 than in a feedlot. The main reason for that is because grass-fed cows fatten more slowly--producing those gasses all the while.
If humans ate 75% less meat--let's include pork in this--that would go a long way toward resolving the problem. Better yet, we can stop breeding as if the Earth has an infinite amount of space for us, our cities, our farms, and our waste.
I might be getting off subject here but it seems to me that the best way out is to strive for NPG (Negative Population Growth.) There is about seven billion of us now. I think that might be more people living now than the total of previous human history.
With some sort of world-wide birth control (I know that I'm probably dreaming here) we could have the births of the next seven billion earth citizens spread out of the next one thousand years or so. That way we could--at least in principle--have those billions living in prosperity. The alternative is to continue to do what we have been doing for millennia--and have 90% of those seven billion living on the edge of starvation.
Natural Lefty: Yes, I would not "out" anyone's real name, either.
What is the meaning of Life?
3.1415926535897932384626433832795028841971693993751058209749445.....ad infinitum.
The "Big Bang" may just be one of many and/or may be recursive. Collapse, bang, collapse, bang! As humans only use a small fraction of their brain capabilities...other lifeforms throughout the Universe may have much greater capacity. We may all be made up of vibrating strings with immense distances between them. We may all be a minuscule part of an unimaginably gigantic unintelligible Cosmic gnat's ass floating around in a vast nothingness. The "meaning of life" may just be totally unimportant because it might just be nonsense. It just is. Suffering the illusion that we can know the "meaning of life"may get us to Mars or beyond but it won't stop us from killing each other, unfortunately. It will certainly keep us busy postulating ridiculous ideas about mythical beings and trying to impose those beliefs on others.
Other life forms have different numbers of chromosomes and so the 23 pairs of chromosomes of humans would not be the right answer unless one believes that earthly humans are the only highly evolved creatures in the Universe.
Someone, who may be more evolved than us, say from another planet...or from our interplanetary visitors at Area 51( but the government tends to hide these things for whatever reason..and so unless one has actually, personally, come into contact with one...the rest of us don't really know if they exist)...;-}...and ET may may know more than we humans do what the answer to life is. But we can only know what we can know and so everything else is purely theoretical or speculative.
Even Max Cohen**, in the end, found more meaning, and perhaps bliss, in the phrase "I don't know" than he did when he spent so much energy and mental toil, assisted by his computer, Euclid, in search of the answer to "pi" ( π). Max's headaches went away at that point of resignation to "I don't know". Many people, who may be frustrated at not knowing, conjure up all kinds of fantastical answers. They claim it gives them "peace of mind"...but I doubt it really does...not really...it only puts up roadblocks to understanding the Universe.
The meaning of the universe may very well be "pi" but whatever it is...so what? Female spiders will still continue to bite the head off of their male mates after mating. Now, that's a real power trip! Some females still demand to be on top. Talk about power trips....
But while Aronofsky's π was not a comedy (?) as was Douglas Adams' Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy (42), you have to remember that π is Universal but HHGTTG (42) was only about the "Galaxy" which is miniscule compared to the Universe.
** http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0138704/
Why do female spiders kill and eat their male spider mates? Because they are bigger...much bigger...and very hungry. Or, because they (the males) deserved it? Or, to stop them (the males) from snoring? ;-}
Remember, people don't know that the IRS also targeted liberal groups, because Darrell Issa's investigation asked only for information on conservative groups being targeted. He was looking for an enumeration of favorable circumstances.
I voted "yes" to the second question, but having a "no" option just for fun would be nice too.
Whether oil & gas production is in the public interest is irrelevant to the idea of faction brought up by the caller. You don't have to say that we should have solar and wind instead of carbon. You can add it on, because of the destruction wrought by carbon spewing, but there's so much more to make the case, and the effect of ubiquitous use of a product is an issue of weighing trade-offs. That sort of thing can come up with other products too, and may not be avoidable.
The faction involved in oil & gas is the lobbying on behalf of the few people that run the companies producing oil and gas (to increase their personal wealth at the expense of others) and lobbying to allow unsafe production (at the expense of the ecological commons and of human life and limb).
Java 1.7.0_67 not.................
frankr@teksavvy.com
Leigh, I respectfully ask you, what the heck are you talking about?! Zenzoe's name is what?!!! - AIW
Hi Kend. That’s nice of you to miss me, considering what a hard time I’ve given you these past couple years!
I could have answered your question about corporate farming’s role in global warming with just two words: cow farts. These are a significant source of CO2 pollution. However not being a scientist or biologist, I couldn’t give as detailed a response as I would’ve liked, so I google searched and found an article by Ronnie Cummins. And here is an exerpt from that article:
“Today, nearly 65 billion animals worldwide, including cows, chickens and pigs, are crammed into CAFOs (confined animal feeding operations). These animals are literally imprisoned and tortured in unhealthy, unsanitary and unconscionably cruel conditions. Sickness is the norm for animals who are confined rather than pastured, and who eat GMO corn and soybeans, rather than grass and forage as nature intended. To prevent the inevitable spread of disease from stress, overcrowding and lack of vitamin D, animals are fed a steady diet of antibiotics. Those antibiotics pose a direct threat to the environment when they run off into our lakes, rivers, aquifers and drinking water.”
“CAFOs contribute directly to global warming by releasing vast amounts of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere—more than the entire global transportation industry. The air at some factory farm test sites in the U.S. is dirtier than in America’s most polluted cities, according to the Environmental Integrity Project. According to a 2006 report by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), animal agriculture is responsible for 18 percent of all human-induced greenhouse gas emissions, including 37 percent of methane emissions and 65 percent of nitrous oxide emissions. The methane releases from billions of imprisoned animals on factory farms are 70 times more damaging per ton to the earth’s atmosphere than CO2.”
“Indirectly, factory farms contribute to climate disruption by their impact on deforestation and draining of wetlands, and because of the nitrous oxide emissions from huge amounts of pesticides used to grow the genetically engineered corn and soy fed to animals raised in CAFOs. Nitrous oxide pollution is even worse than methane—200 times more damaging per ton than CO2. And just as animal waste leaches antibiotics and hormones into ground and water, pesticides and fertilizers also eventually find their way into our waterways, further damaging the environment.”
Factory farms cause 37% of methane emissions, and methane is over twenty times as potent as CO2. The use of fossil fuels on farms emits 90 million tons of CO2 into the atmosphere worldwide, each year. Meanwhile deforestation for animal grazing is another source of the problem, emitting 2.4 billion tons of CO2 annually. Also factory farms contribute to air pollution by releasing compounds such as hydrogen sulfide, ammonia and methane.
Factory farms are bad news, Kend. We need to go back to older methods of farming. New is not always better. - AIW
Hi Alice. Miss ya. How the heck is factory farming a major contributor to climate change compared to 1.3 billion Indians polluting the world? Or a billion Chinese pumping pollution into the air mining earth metals for your solar panels? All the environmentalist are here because that's where the money is. Take Gore for example. If I remember right he said the oceans would rise by two inches by now. Oh well what is a few little tales when you make a hundred million.