To what degree are we brainwashed? What is true and what is false

So, are you attacking all journalism? Recognizing "yellow" journalism exists and separating the grain from the chaff has always been part of being a responsible citizen. What's not responsible is labeling everything you don't like or find unflattering as "fake".

 

so if someone said, how Hitler cleansed his country of Jews was genius, that would be ok?

the problem was this was an ex-President saying this

I support their "right" to say it, just think it's wrong fro them to say it

 

i don't know what a former president should say about hitler or putin, but i am highly skeptical of any human who calls himself a "genius," stable or otherwise.

 

I think it's important to question things, but the basic facts are really against Putin being anything except the bad guy here. He invaded another country without provocation. At best, the war crimes aspect could be overblown, but not by much. When people who are going through evacuation corridors are being shelled, it's reckless disregard at best. To be fair to the Russian soldiers though, it's true that they're in a country where civilians are willing to fight them, to pick up arms and make molotov cocktails to incinerate them. It's already more than just a conventional war and most people in that situation would have a low threshold for lethal force rather than risk the lives of themselves and their comrades.

As for the rest - past atrocities by others would not excuse current ones.

 

Generally, the left's perception of right and wrong depends totally on whom it benefits.
Anything said or done by their opponents is bad, but the same thing done by their own people is good.
There is no rationalizing or justifying that selective view of things, and it would cause an honorable man great shame to do so- but that depends on the individual.

If a man invented the airplane then used it to bomb enemies, the invention is still an achievement of genius. The use of it to harm others is an act of evil.
It is the people who use these things wrongfully who are sometimes abhorrent, not the mechanisms. That is self-evident.
Facts stand alone, their validity is not dependent on who agrees or disagrees.
You didn't know that, right?

 

agree, the left is pro-america

 

I've noticed that the left is never happy with anyone who has confidence in themselves or their values. Birds of a father, I guess.

 

The left is pro- go to hell America.

Unlike anything I've seen in my life, a totally self-destructive attitude towards their own world.

 

That would or should be BIRDS OF A FEATHER, not father.​

 

seriously? you think trump needs this constant external affirmation because he is "confident in himself and his values?"

(the c span video is much longer and this is the disgusting part. )

Trump Invites His Employees To Praise Him During Cabinet Meeting | HuffPost Latest News

 

Psychology has a huge role in human perceptions and conduct. Self-image for example is often critical in critical roles- if you have a fighter pilot that thinks of himself as ordinary, he's going to be even less.
Trump has an earned reputation for narcissism and ego, and that of course also irritates people who measure themselves by comparing to others. It's like thinking you are good is the same as thinking they are not, and using their way of measuring, they feel they have lost relative position, "lost points" so it's an insult- just because someone else has more confidence than they do and lets it show. The same is true with money; to many, those who are financially more successful constitute an insult to them in their own mind, a standard of unfairness because they want to think thy are equal..... even if they can't pour water out of a boot.

Trump had a reputation for getting things done when others could not. It's true, he has indeed done that- and the only people who can do such things are those with great confidence. Because if you don't think you can, you won't try and risk the failure you think will happen. This is why ball teams have cheerleaders- pump the players up so they play harder. Trump promotes himself, to himself, and frequently does so openly. So Trump is guilty as charged in believing he is somewhat exceptional. Many people will hate you for being exceptional- and will refuse to recognize it even when it's obviously true. That's one of the reasons we often don't learn from those who excel; we hate them for it instead. They are supposed to be grateful to us, because our egos need support too.

Now if Trump had political experience, perhaps he would have known he had to be phony to reach all the people- to create an acceptable persona rather than be who he was. It's a game, Rampart- living in a facade, being a kind of fake. Most every politician does this, because the majority of voters want it. That's why we keep electing people who screw us over instead of competent, capable ones who will do their best. We elect- fakers.

I learned many years ago that the personal price you pay to get people's support in that way just isn't worth it, because you sell yourself out. This is something I observed in the people I came to highly respect in life. They were who they were; they acted in ways that they could respect and admire- and if you didn't like them or the way they lived, that was your problem. They were true to themselves. You don't get all the flowers, but most of those aren't worth much, and being a fake is very unhealthy for your spirit.

Nobody's flawless, but I can accept honest flaws much easier than pure BS, incompetence, lies and fakery- and that is what rules politics today.

 

I don't recall any US president stating that Hitler was a genius but a young JFK wrote in his diary:

"Hitler will emerge from the hatred that surrounds him now as one of the most significant figures who ever lived".

"He had in him the stuff of which legends are made," (1)

It will apparently still take some time for residual Allied propaganda to wear off to the point that Hitler, the man, is actually looked at and discussed calmly, honestly and objectively rather than being demonized by Hollywood as feverishly as if the war were still on.

Regarding residual Allied propaganda, in the tons of captured WW 2 documents that have been studied over and over, there is not one written order from Hitler for the destruction of Europe's Jews(2).

There are, however, written orders from Stalin, Eisenhower and Churchill showing them to be complicit in the racist mass murder of millions but Allied propagandists have built them up to being heroic demigods that faint hearted book publishers dare not sully that manufactured image so many have worked so hard to create.

For example, James Bacque wrote a thoroughly researched book exposing Eisenhower's true death camps, went through 3 agents and over 30 book publishers in the US and they all refused to touch it showing how censorship and propaganda go together..
Finally, the book, "Other Losses", was published in Canada.

Because one of the benefits of winning a war is being able to perpetuate wartime propaganda, (aka "Write the History") the atrocities committed by the victor's leadership is, obviously, heavily repressed while we are treated to relentless demonization of those "evil" Germans.

Thanks,


(1) “JFK diary calls Hitler 'stuff of legends’”
https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-39371715

EXCERPT “Kennedy, then 28, predicted "Hitler will emerge from the hatred that surrounds him now as one of the most significant figures who ever lived".

"He had in him the stuff of which legends are made," he continued.

Kennedy wrote the entry in the summer of 1945 after touring the German dictator's Bavarian mountain retreat.” CONTINUED


(2) “To the present day a written order by Hitler regarding the destruction of the European Jewish community has not been found, and, in all probability, this order was never given.”

- Walter Laqueur, Was niemand wissen wollte: Die Unterdruckung der Nachrichten uber Hitlers Endlösung (What Nobody Wanted to Know: The Suppression of News About Hitler’s “Final Solution”), (Berlin-Vienna, 1981), p.190

 

not the left that is praising Putin and calling his actions genius

 

But it's lefties who will selectively pick one remark out of context and try to turn it into an entire case history..... while ignoring everything that speaks to the opposite of it.
And that is NOT genius; it's self-deception, ignorance, stupidity- and weakness.

You certainly don't have to worry about anyone thinking Biden is a genius. Or even could hold his own in a grade-school debate without a coach and earplug telling him what to do and say.

 

Trump has praised Putin and other dictators for years, this is not a one off thing

 

just seen that you added to your post, so adding

Biden is an elderly old man like Trump, both past their primes

let's elect younger people in 2024

 

And you think the way to keep peace in the world is to always call them *******s first thing out of the box, right?
Yeah. That should improve the negotiations a lot.

They write books to help people who think that way.

 

praising dictators while attacking our allies was not good

timing is everything, now is not the time to praise Putin - sure there is books for that too

 

No question Putin is the aggressor but all we hear is how he is deliberately targeting civilians and committing war crimes. How much of this is collateral dmg vs deliberate? When the US killed thousands of civilians, during so many wars, was always sold as collateral dmg, no war crimes.

Past atrocities don't excuse current ones but they tend to repeat themselves. What we all have to try to do is challenge our own government. I posted a short video in OP that is worthwhile seeing, a vietnam vet who whilst he was in vietnam, he was hearing and reading news from US outlets and what was being reported was the complete opposite of what he was actually experiencing.

The Iraq war was sold to us as good vs evil but there is another side. The US killed thousands of people, many innocent bystanders. Look up Highway of death where US decided to exterminate thousands of fleeing Iraqis, who were fleeing Kuwait. This was murder on a mass scale but sold to us as something entirely different. This was viewed by many as war crimes.

https://www.amusingplanet.com/2016/05/the-highway-of-death.html

'The day before, Baghdad had radio announced that Iraq's Foreign Minister had accepted the Soviet ceasefire proposal and had ordered all Iraqi troops to withdraw from Kuwait in compliance with UN Resolution 660'

'Rather than accept the offer of Iraq to surrender and leave the field of battle, thereby risking a settlement that might not be favorable to the United States, Bush and the U.S. military strategists decided simply to kill as many Iraqis as they possibly could.'

'Fighter planes of the coalition forces swooped down upon the unarmed convoy and disabled the vehicles in the front, and at the rear, so that they couldn’t escape. Then wave after wave of aircraft pounded the trapped vehicles for hours on end. After the carnage was over, some 2,000 mangled Iraqi vehicles, and charred and dismembered bodies of tens of thousands of Iraqi soldiers lay for miles along'

'
“The massacre of withdrawing Iraqi soldiers violates the Geneva Conventions of 1949, Common Article III, which outlaws the killing of soldiers who are out of combat,” wrote Joyce Chediac. “The Iraqi troops were not being driven out of Kuwait by U.S. troops as the Bush administration maintains. They were not retreating in order to regroup and fight again. In fact, they were withdrawing, they were going home.”

“To attack the soldiers returning home under these circumstances is a war crime,” Chediac added.

 

During Kosovo war, we bombed the heck out of Serbia, convincing everyone, again, we were fighting evil. The people we were backing, the KLA, were separatists who resorted to terror. Here's a picture of these 'good' guys we were backing:

 

Interesting...

As long as the victors write the history and conduct vengeful & corrupt "War Trials", atrocities like the one you just cited will continue.

This particular war crime is especially egregious because a cease fire was in place and the Iraqis had simply quit and were going home.

I wonder who ordered this massacre and what sort of person would carry it out without question? How is this any different than machine-gunning people in a ditch?

The same pro war people who believe that only the "other side" uses propaganda either deny or try to justify their own country's war crimes and even get hostile when you point them out.

I doubt that we'll see any star studded movies or blockbuster books about the Road of Death because most people want to feel that they're on the "Right" side & the other side is evil.

If James Bacque's experience is any indicator, no publisher would touch this story. Bacque went through 3 agents and 30 publishers and no one in America would publish his book "Other Losses", about Eisenhower's real death camps.

Thanks,

 

You’ll never see anyone in government touch this story. It’s hush hush

the biggest war crime ever was probably hiroshima and nagasaki. Nuclear bombs on civilians. Has there ever been a bigger war crime? Amazingly, was never viewed as one and truman never tried for it, it was justified.

what’s in the past is in the past but the point here is the extraordinary lengths governments will go to in order to justify their wars

 

During WW 2, the American propaganda ministry was: OWI (Office of War Information) and it is claimed to have been disbanded but only the dimmest of wits could believe it wasn't replaced with a similar agency.

The whole concept of indiscriminately nuking or firebombing civilians in an attempt to demoralize the populace was initiated and perpetrated by the Allies (1)

Since it is argued by some that the use of nukes on Hiroshima and Nagasaki was done to save a greater number of lives, I feel that the deliberate firebombing of Dresden when the war was virtually over was one of the most atrocious war crimes.
What sort of perverted sadist had the idea to burn defenseless civilians alive, wait a while and then firebomb again to incinerate fire and rescue personnel plus more civilians?

By the way, Dresden like the historic center of Oxford were declared off-limits. Guess who honored the agreement(2)?



(1) “Hitler didn’t start indiscriminate bombings — Churchill did”
https://www.spectator.co.uk/article/hitler-didn-t-start-indiscriminate-bombings-churchill-did-



(2) "The historic city centre of Oxford escaped bombing entirely"
https://www.oxford-royale.com/articles/oxford-second-world-war/

 

The rationale for nuking Japan and killing 200k civilians was that an invasion of Japan may have resulted in over 1 million deaths. It's possible but imagine of Putin makes the same calculation one day. He drops a nuke on a city and then claims 'well, based on our calculations, an invasion would've cost more deaths, so i'm actually saving lives'.

Dropping a nuke to deliberately kill over 100k civilians - babies, children was the biggest f war crime in our history. The rationale that an invasion would've resulted in more deaths is BS as i don't think an invasion was necessary, Japan had been defeated. This is how nonsensical war is, Japan HAD TO BE INVADED... instead of just claiming victory and negotiating. So the logic went like this - 'There is no negotiating here, we have to invade and destroy Japan but that's gonna cost upwards to 1 million or more deaths. Let's drop these nukes and kill indiscriminantly'. Most americans actually believe this was justified and yet, as a matter of fact, this was one of the largest war crimes ever committed.

this is what the Allies did to Dresden... looks as if a nuclear bomb went off and every living thing was killed.

 

With this you have said it all: "No question Putin is the aggressor".

Aggression matters. Putin, Russia and the rest of the world will eventually pay a very high price for this astonishing miscalculation by Putin and Russia's divided ruling political class.

“Russia’s recognition of the self-declared Donetsk People’s Republic and the Luhansk People’s Republic has been viewed as the possible first step of Russia’s expected invasion of Ukraine.

Putin is seen in a viral video telling intelligence director Sergei Naryshkin to “speak plainly” multiple times, interrupting and speaking over him as he pushes the spy chief to see if he supports recognizing Donetsk and Luhank’s sovereignty.

“Speak, speak, speak — plainly,” a visibly annoyed Putin says, according to a translation by journalist Peter Liakhov.”

Naryshkin stumbles over his words “I will support the proposal about the recognition of…”

Putin then interjects again. “I will support? Or I support?” he says, telling him to speak plainly again.

“I support the proposal…” Naryshkin said.”

“Putin fired back: “Then say it like that! Yes or no.”

“I support the proposal about the entry of the Donetsk and Luhansk People’s Republics into the Russian Federation,” the spy chief then said.

Putin laughed at that stumble.”
NEW YORK POST, Putin smacks down Russia spy chief over backing Ukraine separatist regions, By Mark Lungariello, February 22, .
https://nypost.com/2022/02/22/putin-lashes-out-at-russia-intelligence-chief-in-viral-video/

The Guardian’s video