thegreanvillepostbiasrating--2020-06-10--New York Times in crisis over op-ed backing military takeover

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New York Times in crisis over op-ed backing military takeover he decision by the New York Times to publish an op-ed column by Republicansupporting President Trump ’ s call for a military takeover of the United States has produced a political uproar among the newspaper ’ s staff and readers and forced the editorial page editor , James Bennet , to issue a public apology .
There is a lot to apologize for , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ fascistic diatribe that sought to justify the use of the military to suppress the ongoing mass demonstrations against police violence and brutality , sparked by the murder of George Floyd , a 46-year-old African American man , by four Minneapolis cops .
The column was based on the most flagrant lies , claiming “ rioters have plunged many American cities into anarchy , ” that the police were by and large the victims of protester violence , rather than the other way around , that even after governors have called up the National @ @ @ @ @ @ @ rioters still outnumber the police and National Guard combined.
” Cotton particularly cited “ cadres of left-wing radicals like antifa infiltrating protest marches to exploit Floyd ’ s death for their own anarchic purposes.
” In fact , however , there is no evidence of any role by the nebulous Antifa in alleged rioting , and not one person arrested on federal charges in the course of any of the protests has been linked to it , although several have been identified as white supremacists engaged in provocations .
Even FBI Director Christopher @ @ @ @ @ @ @ ago , admitted that the group did not exist as such , saying , “ we ’ re not investigating antifa as antifa—that ’ s an ideology , and we don ’ t investigate ideologies.
” On the basis of wild and unsupported claims , which smeared hundreds of thousands of peaceful protesters as violent rioters , Cotton demanded “ an overwhelming show of force to disperse , detain and ultimately deter lawbreakers.
” He called for use of the Insurrection Act of 1807 to authorize deployment of the regular military against the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Times website Wednesday night , and then in its Thursday print edition .
It provoked wide opposition among the staff , with more than 800 signing a letter of protest , dozens calling in sick Thursday , and many more planning more public action Friday .
The initial response from Bennet and publisher A. G. Sulzberger was to defend the decision .
“ I believe in the principle of openness to a range of opinions , even those we may disagree with , and this piece was published in that spirit , ” @ @ @ @ @ @ @ staff .
Bennet claimed that it was important to make the views of public officials known , even if editors disagreed with them .
This threadbare justification for printing a piece of fascist propaganda was blown apart , however , when Bennet admitted that he had not even read the op-ed before it was posted on the newspaper ’ s web site .
Late Thursday , Sulzberger reversed himself , and the Times issued a statement declaring that the op-ed column did not meet the newspaper ’ s standards because of a “ @ @ @ @ @ @ @ result , we ’ re planning to examine both short-term and long-term changes ” to the opinion pages , the statement said .
Press reports from an internal staff meeting indicated that it was the Times that solicited Cotton ’ s input , rather than Cotton asking for space on the op-ed page .
This is extremely significant , if true , since it was well known in political and media circles that Cotton was the most vehement advocate of using troops to drown the mass protests in blood .
In a statement @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s appearance in the Rose Garden to threaten military force , Cotton called for “ No quarter for insurrectionists , anarchists , rioters , and looters ” —in other words , kill them without mercy .
Under the Geneva Conventions , giving “ no quarter ” to enemy combatants is a war crime .
The initial claim by Sulzberger and Bennet that they were merely encouraging public debate over the policies of the Trump administration by publishing Cotton ’ s column is belied by one unambiguous fact : the Times has itself not @ @ @ @ @ @ @ threat to invoke the Insurrection Act and send troops into major cities—possibly including New York City—in the four days that have passed since Trump ’ s six-minute statement in the Rose Garden .
In this , of course , they are in lockstep with the leadership of the Democratic Party , which has also been completely silent about Trump ’ s open preparations for an unconstitutional mobilization of the military against the American people .
The publication of Cotton ’ s column thus takes on a different character : it was more of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ just a newspaper , but also a multimillion-dollar business—to take out an insurance policy .
In the event Trump went forward with his demands for the mobilization of troops all over America , carrying out what would amount to a military coup against the Constitution and democratic rights , the Times would be recognized by the newly empowered presidential junta as a potential ally .
Sulzberger , Bennet and Executive Editor Dean Baquet are now backpedaling furiously .
They okayed the publication Friday of an op-ed column by Michelle Goldberg that was headlined @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Op-Ed.
” The commentary attacked management ’ s claim that publication of op-ed columns by Vladimir Putin and Taliban leader Sirajuddin Haqqani had set a precedent that justified publishing Cotton ’ s .
Goldberg noted that Putin and Haqqani ’ s columns had not been advocating armed attacks on Americans , while “ Cotton , by contrast , is calling for what would almost certainly amount to massive violence against his fellow citizens.
” Given the serious blow the op-ed column has given to the newspaper ’ s claim to be the standard-bearer @ @ @ @ @ @ @ and Bennet ’ s amazing claim that he did not even read the op-ed column before it was published , it would not be surprising if the editor were given his walking papers by publisher Sulzberger .
But Bennet is not just any editor .
His brother Michael is a US senator from Colorado .
His father was a State Department official in both the Carter and Clinton administrations , and spent three years as the administrator of the Agency for International Development , a longtime instrument of American foreign policy , notorious @ @ @ @ @ @ @ overseas .
The Bennets are part of the permanent national security apparatus , concentrated in New York and Washington , in which individuals shift roles and responsibilities , moving from government to think tanks to editorial positions , but always having as their top duty the defense of the interests of American imperialism .
In the 1970s , that integration was symbolized by the notorious switch in which Leslie Gelb , Times foreign correspondent and Democrat , effectively exchanged positions with Richard Burt , Times foreign correspondent and Republican .
Gelb had moved @ @ @ @ @ @ @ politico-military affairs at the State Department in the Democratic administration of Jimmy Carter .
When Carter was defeated by Reagan , Burt moved from the Times to take over the position Gelb had occupied at the State Department .
Gelb replaced Burt at the Times .
Today , such figures as op-ed columnist and former foreign correspondent Thomas Friedman and senior correspondents David Sanger and Michael Schmidt play similar roles , acting as direct conduits for the military-intelligence apparatus .
It was Friedman , for example , who first issued the slogan , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ than the disease , ” which has become the mantra of the back-to-work campaign in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic .
Sanger and Schmidt have been de facto drop boxes for the views of that section of the national security establishment that is hostile to Trump from the standpoint of demanding a more aggressive approach to Russia and Syria .
The Times is a key institution of American imperialism , helping sell the policies through which Wall Street , the Pentagon and CIA pursue the interests of the financial aristocracy , both @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as the conductor for what one critic called the “ Mighty Wurlitzer ” of imperialist propaganda and lies , setting the agenda for the television networks and the regional daily newspapers , and effectively determining much of what the American public reads and views .
Its exposure over the Cotton op-ed provocation only underscores the necessity for building and expanding the influence of the voice of international socialism , the World Socialist Web Site .
Addendum New York Times editor James Bennet resigns over fascist op-ed By Patrick Martin 9 June 2020 New @ @ @ @ @ @ @ resigned Sunday , four days after the newspaper published an op-ed by Republican Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas , calling for the use of Army troops to crush the mass protests against police violence that are sweeping the United States .
Bennet told a staff meeting Friday that he had not read the column before it was published by the opinion pages he edits .
His deputy editorial page editor , James Dao , who is responsible for the op-ed columns and edited Cotton ’ s fascist screed , has been removed from @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Times newsroom .
The Cotton op-ed , headlined , “ Send in the Troops , ” was an unambiguous call for massive military violence against the American people .
Making an amalgam of the relatively small number of rioters and looters and the huge popular demonstrations against the police murder of George Floyd , Cotton declared : “ One thing above all else will restore order to our streets : an overwhelming show of force to disperse , detain and ultimately deter lawbreakers.
” Earlier in the week , Cotton issued a notorious @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in the military , claiming that the ( largely nonexistent ) Antifa would be put to flight by the 101st Airborne Division and other heavily armed commando forces .
“ No quarter for insurrectionists , anarchists , rioters , and looters , ” he declared .
Such an appeal to kill without mercy is a war crime under international law .
But it was just this bloodthirstiness that attracted notice from the Times editors , who invited Cotton to submit a column and then published it in the newspaper ’ s print edition @ @ @ @ @ @ @ among the newspaper ’ s staff , with more than 800 signing a letter of opposition .
Bennet and publisher A. G. Sulzberger initially defended the decision on the grounds that , as Sulzberger put it , “ I believe in the principle of openness to a range of opinions , even those we may disagree with , and this piece was published in that spirit.
” Within hours , however , the ground had shifted , Sulzberger and Bennet declared that the op-ed column did not meet the standards set by the @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Bennet was gone .
After 15 years as a Times correspondent , including roles as White House correspondent and Jerusalem bureau chief , Bennet became editor-in-chief at The Atlantic , before returning to the Times in May 2016 as editorial page editor .
The Bennet family is fully “ plugged-in ” to the national security establishment .
Bennet ’ s father Douglas was a top State Department official , head of the Agency for International Development—a notorious front for the CIA—and later head of National Public Radio .
His brother Michael is a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Finance Committee and the Select Committee on Intelligence .
From the beginning , Bennet ’ s role at the Times was to push those causes that were of greatest concern to the military-intelligence apparatus .
The Times editorial page was the first to raise the charge that then Republican nominee Donald Trump was a Russian agent , in the op-ed column by Paul Krugman given the headline , “ The Siberian candidate.
” This set the tone for the role of the Times as the spearhead of the bogus anti-Russia campaign .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ unnecessary , to retrace every step of Bennet ’ s work as one of the key opinion-setters for Wall Street and the CIA .
It is possible to find that exposed in detail , and on almost a daily basis , in the articles posted on the World Socialist Web Site over the past four years .
But it must be said that Bennet was a particularly unskilled manipulator of public opinion , a characteristic that was displayed in some of his personnel choices .
A few highlights will suffice .
The New @ @ @ @ @ @ @ making of an amalgam : Who is James Bennet ?
On July 26 , 2016 , the WSWS first took note of the role of the new editorial page editor in promoting the anti-Russia campaign .
The New York Times indicts Trump for questioning the CIA ’ s moral superiority On February 9 , 2017 , we replied to an editorial in which Bennet & Co. defended the moral principles of the CIA , a byword for conspiracy , assassination and torture .
Why did the New York Times hire neoconservative columnist Bret @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , we discussed the hiring of Bret Stephens , deputy editor of the ultra-right Wall Street Journal , as an op-ed columnist .
Stephens had been editor of the right-wing Jerusalem Post from 2002 to 2004 , overlapping with Bennet ’ s tenure as Times bureau chief in the Israeli capital .
The New York Times and the strange case of Quinn Norton On February 22 , 2018 , we analyzed the hiring and near-instantaneous firing of blogger Quinn Norton as the editorial page ’ s “ lead opinion writer on the power @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Twitter users quickly circulated blog posts in which Norton described a neo-Nazi contributor to the fascist Daily Stormer as a personal friend , as well as messages containing homophobic slurs .
Why did New York Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger meet with Trump ?
On August 6 , 2018 , we took note of a tweet in which Trump revealed a meeting with Sulzberger and Bennet at the White House , which all had agreed was to be off the record .
Embarrassed by the disclosure , Sulzberger claimed he attended the meeting to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ s deeply troubling anti-press rhetoric , ” but he gave no explanation of why his visit to the White House had to be carried out in secret .
New York Times op-ed by anonymous Trump official gives implicit support to palace coup On September 6 , 2018 , we commented on the decision of the Times editorial page to publish an anonymous opinion piece by a supposed “ senior official ” in the Trump administration , claiming to be part of the anti-Trump resistance .
This was a further effort to foster a @ @ @ @ @ @ @ removed , or his administration ’ s policies shifted towards a more direct intervention against Syria and Russia .
New York Times laments stalled Venezuelan coup On April 5 , 2019 , we commented on the Times ’ editorial bemoaning the evident failure of the Venezuelan military to overthrow the elected president , Nicolas Maduro , and install in his place Juan Guaidó , a US-selected puppet largely unknown to the Venezuelan population , but immediately recognized by Washington as the “ legitimate ” head of government .
The editorial board , headed @ @ @ @ @ @ @ over the failure of the CIA and its Venezuelan assets to swiftly topple the Venezuelan government , ” we wrote .
New York Times publishes anti-Semitic caricature of Harvey Weinstein No sketch of Bennet ’ s four years at the helm would be complete without reference to the publication of an editorial cartoon , which , as we wrote on February 26 , 2020 , was “ a caricature of Harvey Weinstein , the film producer convicted Monday of felony sex crimes , with overtly antisemitic overtones .
Weinstein is Jewish.
” The @ @ @ @ @ @ @ those of the Third Reich was all the more despicable given that Bennet ’ s mother is a Holocaust survivor .
Another deputy editorial page editor , Kathleen Kingsbury , former editorial page editor of the Boston Globe , becomes acting editorial page editor through the November election , according to a statement issued on behalf of Sulzberger .
The five-month interim period might appear odd but is easily explained : editing the editorial page of the New York Times is a position of enormous importance to the US ruling elite , much @ @ @ @ @ @ @ state , and requiring the same vetting by the military-intelligence apparatus .
It is logical , therefore , that a new , permanent editor will be selected in step with the formation of the new administration in Washington .
The internal kerfuffle at the NYTimes—as seen and reported by the paper itself .
Click on the orange button to read the NYTimes own account of this unusual inernal event .

Please make sure these dispatches reach as many readers as possible. Share with kin, friends and workmates and ask them to do likewise.
By Patrick Martin
wsws.org
New York Times in crisis over op-ed backing military takeover
By Patrick Martin
6 June 2020
T
he decision by the New York Times to publish an op-ed column by Republicansupporting President Trump’s call for a military takeover of the United States has produced a political uproar among the newspaper’s staff and readers and forced the editorial page editor, James Bennet, to issue a public apology.
There is a lot to apologize for, since Cotton’s column was a fascistic diatribe that sought to justify the use of the military to suppress the ongoing mass demonstrations against police violence and brutality, sparked by the murder of George Floyd, a 46-year-old African American man, by four Minneapolis cops.
The column was based on the most flagrant lies, claiming “rioters have plunged many American cities into anarchy,” that the police were by and large the victims of protester violence, rather than the other way around, that even after governors have called up the National Guard, in some cases “the rioters still outnumber the police and National Guard combined.”
Cotton particularly cited “cadres of left-wing radicals like antifa infiltrating protest marches to exploit Floyd’s death for their own anarchic purposes.” In fact, however, there is no evidence of any role by the nebulous Antifa in alleged rioting, and not one person arrested on federal charges in the course of any of the protests has been linked to it, although several have been identified as white supremacists engaged in provocations. Even FBI Director Christopher Wray, in congressional testimony three years ago, admitted that the group did not exist as such, saying, “we’re not investigating antifa as antifa—that’s an ideology, and we don’t investigate ideologies.”
On the basis of wild and unsupported claims, which smeared hundreds of thousands of peaceful protesters as violent rioters, Cotton demanded “an overwhelming show of force to disperse, detain and ultimately deter lawbreakers.” He called for use of the Insurrection Act of 1807 to authorize deployment of the regular military against the protests.
The op-ed appeared on the Times website Wednesday night, and then in its Thursday print edition. It provoked wide opposition among the staff, with more than 800 signing a letter of protest, dozens calling in sick Thursday, and many more planning more public action Friday.
The initial response from Bennet and publisher A. G. Sulzberger was to defend the decision. “I believe in the principle of openness to a range of opinions, even those we may disagree with, and this piece was published in that spirit,” Sulzberger wrote in an email to the staff. Bennet claimed that it was important to make the views of public officials known, even if editors disagreed with them. This threadbare justification for printing a piece of fascist propaganda was blown apart, however, when Bennet admitted that he had not even read the op-ed before it was posted on the newspaper’s web site.
Late Thursday, Sulzberger reversed himself, and the Times issued a statement declaring that the op-ed column did not meet the newspaper’s standards because of a “rushed editorial process.”
“As a result, we’re planning to examine both short-term and long-term changes” to the opinion pages, the statement said.
Press reports from an internal staff meeting indicated that it was the Times that solicited Cotton’s input, rather than Cotton asking for space on the op-ed page. This is extremely significant, if true, since it was well known in political and media circles that Cotton was the most vehement advocate of using troops to drown the mass protests in blood. In a statement issued Monday, hours before Trump’s appearance in the Rose Garden to threaten military force, Cotton called for “No quarter for insurrectionists, anarchists, rioters, and looters”—in other words, kill them without mercy. Under the Geneva Conventions, giving “no quarter” to enemy combatants is a war crime.
The initial claim by Sulzberger and Bennet that they were merely encouraging public debate over the policies of the Trump administration by publishing Cotton’s column is belied by one unambiguous fact: the Times has itself not published any editorial on Trump’s threat to invoke the Insurrection Act and send troops into major cities—possibly including New York City—in the four days that have passed since Trump’s six-minute statement in the Rose Garden.
In this, of course, they are in lockstep with the leadership of the Democratic Party, which has also been completely silent about Trump’s open preparations for an unconstitutional mobilization of the military against the American people.
The publication of Cotton’s column thus takes on a different character: it was more of an effort by the Times—which is not just a newspaper, but also a multimillion-dollar business—to take out an insurance policy. In the event Trump went forward with his demands for the mobilization of troops all over America, carrying out what would amount to a military coup against the Constitution and democratic rights, the Times would be recognized by the newly empowered presidential junta as a potential ally.
Sulzberger, Bennet and Executive Editor Dean Baquet are now backpedaling furiously. They okayed the publication Friday of an op-ed column by Michelle Goldberg that was headlined, “Tom Cotton’s Fascist Op-Ed.” The commentary attacked management’s claim that publication of op-ed columns by Vladimir Putin and Taliban leader Sirajuddin Haqqani had set a precedent that justified publishing Cotton’s. Goldberg noted that Putin and Haqqani’s columns had not been advocating armed attacks on Americans, while “Cotton, by contrast, is calling for what would almost certainly amount to massive violence against his fellow citizens.”
Given the serious blow the op-ed column has given to the newspaper’s claim to be the standard-bearer for liberal public opinion against Trump, and Bennet’s amazing claim that he did not even read the op-ed column before it was published, it would not be surprising if the editor were given his walking papers by publisher Sulzberger.
But Bennet is not just any editor. His brother Michael is a US senator from Colorado. His father was a State Department official in both the Carter and Clinton administrations, and spent three years as the administrator of the Agency for International Development, a longtime instrument of American foreign policy, notorious for its role in CIA covert operations overseas.
The Bennets are part of the permanent national security apparatus, concentrated in New York and Washington, in which individuals shift roles and responsibilities, moving from government to think tanks to editorial positions, but always having as their top duty the defense of the interests of American imperialism.
In the 1970s, that integration was symbolized by the notorious switch in which Leslie Gelb, Times foreign correspondent and Democrat, effectively exchanged positions with Richard Burt, Times foreign correspondent and Republican. Gelb had moved from the Times to become director of politico-military affairs at the State Department in the Democratic administration of Jimmy Carter. When Carter was defeated by Reagan, Burt moved from the Times to take over the position Gelb had occupied at the State Department. Gelb replaced Burt at the Times.
Today, such figures as op-ed columnist and former foreign correspondent Thomas Friedman and senior correspondents David Sanger and Michael Schmidt play similar roles, acting as direct conduits for the military-intelligence apparatus. It was Friedman, for example, who first issued the slogan, “The cure must not be worse than the disease,” which has become the mantra of the back-to-work campaign in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic. Sanger and Schmidt have been de facto drop boxes for the views of that section of the national security establishment that is hostile to Trump from the standpoint of demanding a more aggressive approach to Russia and Syria.
The Times is a key institution of American imperialism, helping sell the policies through which Wall Street, the Pentagon and CIA pursue the interests of the financial aristocracy, both at home and abroad. It acts as the conductor for what one critic called the “Mighty Wurlitzer” of imperialist propaganda and lies, setting the agenda for the television networks and the regional daily newspapers, and effectively determining much of what the American public reads and views.
Its exposure over the Cotton op-ed provocation only underscores the necessity for building and expanding the influence of the voice of international socialism, the World Socialist Web Site.
Patrick Martin is a senior editorial member of wsws.org, a socialist (Trotskyist) publication. As an independent leftist publication which uses Marxian class analysis, The Greanville Post however does not endorse Trotskyist positions, per se, or any other Marxian faction.
Addendum
New York Times editor James Bennet resigns over fascist op-ed
By Patrick Martin
9 June 2020
New York Times editorial page director James Bennet resigned Sunday, four days after the newspaper published an op-ed by Republican Senator Tom Cotton of Arkansas, calling for the use of Army troops to crush the mass protests against police violence that are sweeping the United States.
Bennet told a staff meeting Friday that he had not read the column before it was published by the opinion pages he edits. His deputy editorial page editor, James Dao, who is responsible for the op-ed columns and edited Cotton’s fascist screed, has been removed from the editorial pages and reassigned to the Times newsroom.
The Cotton op-ed, headlined, “Send in the Troops,” was an unambiguous call for massive military violence against the American people. Making an amalgam of the relatively small number of rioters and looters and the huge popular demonstrations against the police murder of George Floyd, Cotton declared: “One thing above all else will restore order to our streets: an overwhelming show of force to disperse, detain and ultimately deter lawbreakers.”
Earlier in the week, Cotton issued a notorious statement calling on President Trump to send in the military, claiming that the (largely nonexistent) Antifa would be put to flight by the 101st Airborne Division and other heavily armed commando forces. “No quarter for insurrectionists, anarchists, rioters, and looters,” he declared. Such an appeal to kill without mercy is a war crime under international law. But it was just this bloodthirstiness that attracted notice from the Times editors, who invited Cotton to submit a column and then published it in the newspaper’s print edition Thursday.
The column provoked a rebellion among the newspaper’s staff, with more than 800 signing a letter of opposition. Bennet and publisher A. G. Sulzberger initially defended the decision on the grounds that, as Sulzberger put it, “I believe in the principle of openness to a range of opinions, even those we may disagree with, and this piece was published in that spirit.” Within hours, however, the ground had shifted, Sulzberger and Bennet declared that the op-ed column did not meet the standards set by the Times. Two days more, and Bennet was gone.
After 15 years as a Times correspondent, including roles as White House correspondent and Jerusalem bureau chief, Bennet became editor-in-chief at The Atlantic, before returning to the Times in May 2016 as editorial page editor. The Bennet family is fully “plugged-in” to the national security establishment. Bennet’s father Douglas was a top State Department official, head of the Agency for International Development—a notorious front for the CIA—and later head of National Public Radio. His brother Michael is a US senator from Colorado, serving on the Finance Committee and the Select Committee on Intelligence.
From the beginning, Bennet’s role at the Times was to push those causes that were of greatest concern to the military-intelligence apparatus. The Times editorial page was the first to raise the charge that then Republican nominee Donald Trump was a Russian agent, in the op-ed column by Paul Krugman given the headline, “The Siberian candidate.” This set the tone for the role of the Times as the spearhead of the bogus anti-Russia campaign.
It would be tedious, and now unnecessary, to retrace every step of Bennet’s work as one of the key opinion-setters for Wall Street and the CIA. It is possible to find that exposed in detail, and on almost a daily basis, in the articles posted on the World Socialist Web Site over the past four years. But it must be said that Bennet was a particularly unskilled manipulator of public opinion, a characteristic that was displayed in some of his personnel choices. A few highlights will suffice.
The New York Times, the state and the making of an amalgam: Who is James Bennet?
On July 26, 2016, the WSWS first took note of the role of the new editorial page editor in promoting the anti-Russia campaign.
The New York Times indicts Trump for questioning the CIA’s moral superiority
On February 9, 2017, we replied to an editorial in which Bennet & Co. defended the moral principles of the CIA, a byword for conspiracy, assassination and torture.
Why did the New York Times hire neoconservative columnist Bret Stephens?
On May 31, 2017, we discussed the hiring of Bret Stephens, deputy editor of the ultra-right Wall Street Journal, as an op-ed columnist. Stephens had been editor of the right-wing Jerusalem Post from 2002 to 2004, overlapping with Bennet’s tenure as Times bureau chief in the Israeli capital.
The New York Times and the strange case of Quinn Norton
On February 22, 2018, we analyzed the hiring and near-instantaneous firing of blogger Quinn Norton as the editorial page’s “lead opinion writer on the power, culture and consequences of technology.” Twitter users quickly circulated blog posts in which Norton described a neo-Nazi contributor to the fascist Daily Stormer as a personal friend, as well as messages containing homophobic slurs.
Why did New York Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger meet with Trump?
On August 6, 2018, we took note of a tweet in which Trump revealed a meeting with Sulzberger and Bennet at the White House, which all had agreed was to be off the record. Embarrassed by the disclosure, Sulzberger claimed he attended the meeting to “raise concerns about the president’s deeply troubling anti-press rhetoric,” but he gave no explanation of why his visit to the White House had to be carried out in secret.
New York Times op-ed by anonymous Trump official gives implicit support to palace coup
On September 6, 2018, we commented on the decision of the Times editorial page to publish an anonymous opinion piece by a supposed “senior official” in the Trump administration, claiming to be part of the anti-Trump resistance. This was a further effort to foster a palace coup in which Trump would be removed, or his administration’s policies shifted towards a more direct intervention against Syria and Russia.
New York Times laments stalled Venezuelan coup
On April 5, 2019, we commented on the Times’ editorial bemoaning the evident failure of the Venezuelan military to overthrow the elected president, Nicolas Maduro, and install in his place
Juan Guaidó, a US-selected puppet largely unknown to the Venezuelan population, but immediately recognized by Washington as the “legitimate” head of government. The editorial board, headed by Bennet, “offered a lament over the failure of the CIA and its Venezuelan assets to swiftly topple the Venezuelan government,” we wrote.
New York Times publishes anti-Semitic caricature of Harvey Weinstein
No sketch of Bennet’s four years at the helm would be complete without reference to the publication of an editorial cartoon, which, as we wrote on February 26, 2020, was “a caricature of Harvey Weinstein, the film producer convicted Monday of felony sex crimes, with overtly antisemitic overtones. Weinstein is Jewish.” The use of an image clearly modeled on those of the Third Reich was all the more despicable given that Bennet’s mother is a Holocaust survivor.
Another deputy editorial page editor, Kathleen Kingsbury, former editorial page editor of the Boston Globe, becomes acting editorial page editor through the November election, according to a statement issued on behalf of Sulzberger. The five-month interim period might appear odd but is easily explained: editing the editorial page of the New York Times is a position of enormous importance to the US ruling elite, much like being CIA director or secretary of state, and requiring the same vetting by the military-intelligence apparatus. It is logical, therefore, that a new, permanent editor will be selected in step with the formation of the new administration in Washington.
The internal kerfuffle at the NYTimes—as seen and reported by the paper itself.
Click on the orange button to read the NYTimes own account of this unusual internal event.
[bg_collapse view="button-orange" color="#4a4949" expand_text="The NYTimes internal brawl" collapse_text="Show Less" ] James Bennet Resigns as New York Times Opinion Editor A. G. Sulzberger noted “a significant breakdown in our editing processes” before the publication of an Op-Ed by a United States senator calling for a military response to civic unrest. By
June 7, 2020 James Bennet resigned on Sunday from his job as the editorial page editor of The New York Times, days after the newspaper’s opinion section, which he oversaw, published a much-criticized Op-Ed by a United States senator calling for a military response to civic unrest in American cities. “Last week we saw a significant breakdown in our editing processes, not the first we’ve experienced in recent years,” said A. G. Sulzberger, the publisher, in a note to the staff on Sunday announcing Mr. Bennet’s departure. In a brief interview, Mr. Sulzberger added: “Both of us concluded that James would not be able to lead the team through the next leg of change that is required.” At an all-staff virtual meeting on Friday, Mr. Bennet, 54, apologized for the Op-Ed, saying that it should not have been published and that it had not been edited carefully enough. An editors’ note posted late Friday noted factual inaccuracies and a “needlessly harsh” tone. “The essay fell short of our standards and should not have been published,” the note said. The Op-Ed , by Senator Tom Cotton, Republican of Arkansas, had “Send In the Troops” as its headline. “One thing above all else will restore order to our streets: an overwhelming show of force to disperse, detain and ultimately deter lawbreakers,” he wrote. The piece, published on Wednesday, drew anger from readers and Times journalists. Mr. Bennet declined to comment. Mr. Bennet’s swift fall from one of the most powerful positions in American journalism comes as hundreds of thousands of peoplehave marched in recent weeks in protest of racism in law enforcement and society. The protests were set in motion when George Floyd, a black man in Minneapolis, died last month after being handcuffed and pinned to the ground by a white police officer’s knee. Thanks for reading The Times. The foment has reached other newsrooms . On Saturday night, Stan Wischnowski resigned as top editor of The Philadelphia Inquirer days after an article in the newspaper about the effects of protests on the urban landscape carried the headline “Buildings Matter, Too.” The headline prompted an apology published in The Inquirer, a heated staff meeting and a “sickout” by dozens of journalists at the paper. During Mr. Bennet’s first year on the job, two Times national security reporters publicly objected to an Op-Ed by the journalist Louise Mensch, who cited her own reporting on United States law enforcement’s purported monitoring of the Trump presidential campaign. Times reporters who had covered the same story, along with reporters at other outlets, were skeptical of her claim. Mr. Bennet worked and held key jobs in the Times newsroom from 1991 until 2006, when he left the newspaper to become the editor of The Atlantic. Since his return, he has widely been considered a possible successor to Dean Baquet, who has been in charge of the newsroom for six years. In his four years as editorial page editor, Mr. Bennet sought to expand Opinion’s range, making it more responsive to breaking news and better positioned to cover the tech industry. While he hired several progressive columnists and contributors, he also added conservative voices to the traditionally liberal department. He reduced the number of unsigned editorials and encouraged editorial board members to write more signed opinion pieces; one editorial board member, Brent Staples, won the Pulitzer Prize for editorial writing last year for a series of opinion columns on race in America. Under Mr. Bennet, the opinion section also published investigative journalism, developed newsletters and a podcast. It also publisheda much-discussed Op-Ed by an anonymous Trump administration official who described a “quiet resistance” within the federal government. The most prominent conservative columnist hired by Mr. Bennet, Bret Stephens, angered many readers with his inaugural Times column, in which he chastised the “moral superiority” of those who look down on climate-change skeptics. Late last year, Mr. Stephens published another column, headlined “The Secrets of Jewish Genius,” that led to widespread criticism. After a review, the editors appended a note to the column and re-edited it to remove a reference to a study cited in the original version after it was revealed that one of the study’s authors had promoted racist views. Mr. Bennet is the brother of Michael Bennet, a U.S. senator from Colorado, and he recused himself from presidential campaign coverage during his brother’s unsuccessful run for this year’s Democratic nomination. Katie Kingsbury, a deputy editorial page editor, will be the acting editorial page editor through the November election, Mr. Sulzberger said in his memo to the staff. Jim Dao, the deputy editorial page editor who oversees Op-Eds, is stepping down from his position, which was on the Times masthead, and taking a new job in the newsroom. Mr. Baquet, the executive editor, said Sunday that he and Mr. Dao had just started discussing possible jobs for Mr. Dao. Mr. Dao did not reply to a request for comment. Ms. Kingsbury, 41, was hired in 2017. Previously she was on The Boston Globe’s editorial board, where she won a Pulitzer for editorial writing and edited another Pulitzer-winning series. In a note to the Opinion staff Sunday, Ms. Kingsbury, who declined to comment for this article, said that until a more “technical solution” is in place, anyone who sees “any piece of Opinion journalism — including headlines or social posts or photos or you name it — that gives you the slightest pause, please call or text me immediately.” Senator Cotton’s Op-Ed prompted criticism on social media from many Times employees from different departments, an online protest that was led by African-American staff members. Much of the dissent included tweets that said the Op-Ed “puts Black @NYTimes staff in danger.” Times employees objected despite a company policy instructing them not to post partisan comments on social media or take sides on issues in public forums. In addition, more than 800 staff members had signed a letter by Thursday evening protesting the Op-Ed’s publication. The letter, addressed to high-ranking editors in the opinion and news divisions, as well as New York Times Company executives, argued that Mr. Cotton’s essay contained misinformation, such as his depiction of the role of “antifa” in the protests. Mr. Sulzberger said at the Friday town hall meeting and in his note on Sunday that a rethinking of Opinion was necessary for an era in which readers are likely to come upon Op-Eds in social media posts, divorced from their print context next to the editorial page. Marc Tracy covers print and digital media. He previously covered college sports. @ marcatracy covers print and digital media. He previously covered college sports. June 8, 2020 , Section B, Page 1 of the New York edition with the headline: The Times’s Opinion Editor Resigns Over Controversy. Today’s Paper | Subscribe A version of this article appears in print on, Section B, Page 1 of the New York edition with the headline: The Times’s Opinion Editor Resigns Over Controversy. Order Reprints [/bg_collapse]
Up to You. ^3000US citizens have no real political representation. We don't live in a democracy. And our freedom is disappearing fast. I don't want to be ruled by hypocrites, whores, and war criminals. What about you? Time to push back against the corporate oligarchy. And its multitude of minions and lackeys.
[post-views]


thegreanvillepostbiasrating--2020-06-11--Sir Dearlove Joins Anti-China Counter-Gang Operation

Former MI6 chief Sir Richard Dearlove ’ s new role as anti-China provocateur gives us the opportunity to look into the mind of empire and see how our society is being played to acquiesce to an agenda that will ultimately lead to WW III .
By adding his voice to those Anglo-American fanatics blaming China for creating COVID-19 in a lab and intentionally spreading it around the world , Sir Dearlove has demonstrated a classic case of “ gang/counter-gang operations ” practiced by the British Empire for centuries .
British agent Frank Kitson produced an insidious little 1960 handbook called @ @ @ @ @ @ @ coordinating special operations against the 1955 Mau Mau uprising in Kenya which threatened to break this valuable African region free of British colonialism .
Kitson ’ s handbook was a modern adaption of a centuries-old practice according to the needs of putting down independence and civil rights movements that threatened to undo the age of empires .
During his work in Kenya , Kitson recognized that when outnumbered and faced with organized independence movements , it is just not very effective for thinly spread colonialists to try to put them down by force @ @ @ @ @ @ @ rules of the game by a slight of hand .
The formula for changing the game is to cultivate one or more opposition groups to whatever force is posing a threat to the empire… and then cultivate a counter-gang to that opposition group to create a new set of conflicts within your target population ( Hence the name “ gang/counter-gang ” ) .
While the target society becomes polarized by the two warring ( yet ultimately controlled ) opposition movements , the genuine independence movement simply gets diffused and lost in the chaos @ @ @ @ @ @ @ be put to use in the FBI ’ s COINTEL program within America soon thereafter , Kitson wrote : “ As a result of our informers and pseudo gangs we were getting to know a bit about the future movements of the gangs which was much better than merely analysing past events .
We had a long way to go before we could say that we were producing the information that would enable the Security Forces to destroy the Mau Mau in our area… I began to feel that at last I was @ @ @ @ @ @ @ desired goal.
” [ p.90 ] The Case of the Civil War A useful pre-20th century example of this sort of operation was witnessed with British Intelligence ’ s support for BOTH southern rebels one the one side of the 1861-65 Civil War and radical abolitionists on the northern side of the war .
To add a degree of sophistication here , the abolitionist movement itself was polarized between violent vigilante abolitionists like John Brown vs the “ peaceful ” abolitionists like William Lloyd Garrison who really just wanted the Union to dissolve @ @ @ @ @ @ @ with the slave-loving confederacy to the South .
Before and during the war , President Lincoln and his allies had to contend with all of these controlled opposition movements who could only seem to agree on one thing : Break up the Union .
When he realized how this gang/counter-gang operation was being run , former slave Frederick Douglass broke with the abolitionists in order to support Lincoln whom he recognized had the only principled strategy to fully ending slavery ( and colonialism ) forever from the earth .
A more recent display @ @ @ @ @ @ @ found in the efforts to lay the blame on the coronavirus pandemic squarely on China .
In late January 2020 , with the publication of a report from the Kuzuma School of Biological Sciences , the theory of COVID-19 ’ s natural evolution was first put into serious doubt .
Although the Indian team was forced to retract their paper under immense pressure , researchers such as Dr. Luc Montagnier , Francis Boyle , Dr. Judy Mikovits and Pierre Brigage increasingly pointed out the anomalous traces of HIV sequences spliced throughout the COVID-19 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ doctors working on the front lines in New York such as Dr. Kyle-Sidell began reporting the anomalous behaviour of COVID-19 symptoms as unlike any pneumonia he had ever seen and observed that COVID-19 acted more like some form of high altitude sickness , with ventilators not only useless but resulting in deaths in 9 out of 10 patients ( meaning they were actually provoking deaths ) .
With these growing anomalies , thinking citizens became increasingly concerned by the disturbing matter of the vast Pentagon-controlled bioweapons infrastructure scattered throughout the globe .
Bulgarian @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Pentagon ’ s 25 bioweapons labs- all of whom were conducting billions of dollars of secretive research on new and more virulent forms of viruses , with over $ 50 billion spent on the practice officially ever since Dick Cheney ’ s Bioshield Act of 2004 was signed into law .
By March , even China ’ s foreign Ministry raised the possibility that the virus came to China via the American team who participated in the Wuhan Military Games in October 2019- an event at which several athletes were hospitalized for @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the Russian government directly put into question America ’ s bioweapons laboratories in Georgia and Ukraine with Sergei Lavrov saying : `` These [ US ] laboratories are densely formed along the perimeter of the borders of the Russian Federation , and , accordingly , next to the borders of the People 's Republic of China . ''
A May 14th report from China ’ s Global Times stated : “ The US ca n't just claim all reasonable inquiries to its bio-labs as `` conspiracy theories , '' and when US politicians @ @ @ @ @ @ @ as the origin of COVID-19 without providing any evidence , they should respond to the questions on US bio-labs , including the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick.
” It is tough to dismiss this sort of matter as “ conspiracy theory ” when North Carolina ’ s Chapel Hill bioweapons labs went so far as to create a novel coronavirus called SHCO14 designed to jump from bats to humans with USAID/CIA grant money in 2015 and events sponsored by both the Rockefeller Foundation , the CIA and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ in their pandemic scenarios for over a decade .
When it became evident that the story of the laboratory origins of COVID-19 wasn ’ t going to disappear on its own , a new counter-narrative was spun which involved embracing the evidence of the laboratory origins while shifting the blame from the hands of Anglo-American intelligence to… China .
Emerging out of the bowels of Oxford ’ s Henry Jackson Society , the lie was concocted early on that the culprit behind this virus ’ origins was none other than China whose BSL-4 @ @ @ @ @ @ @ on novel coronaviruses and had received $ 3.7 million grant from the US National Institute of Health from 2014-2019 .
Is this proof that China caused COVID-19 ?
Some people who want you to think emotionally while ignoring big swaths of reality say so .
Here the story subdivided itself further , as one group represented by Niall Ferguson , Mike Pompeo and Steve Bannon maintain that the international spread of the virus was done deliberately with China apparently going so far as to intentionally pack planes full of sick people to contaminate @ @ @ @ @ @ @ by Daniel A .
Bell on April 21st ) , and another group which includes some well-intended dupes like Francis Boyle or Montagnier which maintain that COVID-19 leaked out by accident .
No matter what form this sleight of hand has taken , it has been just that : a misdirection designed to ensure that the truth of the Pentagon ’ s bioweapons labs would be lost in the chaos stirred up by the blame-game with President Trump now falling for the anti-China line and entertaining the possibility of cutting America from all @ @ @ @ @ @ @ COVID are paid trillions in reparations .
Now we should not be surprised to find MI6 ’ s very own former director Sir Richard Dearlove to be a loud voice in this anti-China clamor .
The same Sir Richard Dearlove that covered up Princess Diana ’ s death while director of MI6 ’ s Special Operations from 1994-1999 , who oversaw the Yellowcake Dodgy dossier while director of MI6 in 2002 and who vetted another dodgy dossier created by his former employee Christopher Steele in 2016 designed to overthrow President Trump and usher @ @ @ @ @ @ @ now joined the propaganda operation to blame COVID-19 entirely on China .
On June 4 , Sir Dearlove stated “ I think this started as an accident… if China ever admits responsibility , will it pay for repairs ?
I think this will make every country in the world rethink how it sets up its relations with China and how the international community will behave towards Chinese leadership… Of course , the Chinese must have thought “ If we are to suffer a pandemic , perhaps we should not try too hard to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , that they will suffer from the same disadvantages that we have.
” Sir Dearlove ’ s comments were timed to coincide with a new University of London peer-reviewed paper entitled “ A Reconstruction of Historical Etiology of the SARS-CoV-2 Epidemic ” which stated that the virus ’ sequencing indicated “ intentional manipulation ” .
The British researchers stated that the virus “ was probably designed through a Wuhan laboratory experiment to develop ‘ high potency chimeric viruses ” .
Amidst the turmoil and confusion caused by these gang/counter-gang operations radiating noise and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ , the reality of the financial collapse looms over head as one system sits upon the precipice of collapse and a battle wages over who will control the emergence of the new system .
Will this inevitable new system be a multi-polar order defined by cooperation on space exploration , new discoveries and long term infrastructure benefiting all nations and cultures , or will it be an order defined by a 21st century Anglo-American oligarchy sitting atop an ivory tower as a divided world of chaos and depopulation suffers from below ?

By Matthew Ehret
Former MI6 chief Sir Richard Dearlove’s new role as anti-China provocateur gives us the opportunity to look into the mind of empire and see how our society is being played to acquiesce to an agenda that will ultimately lead to WW III. By adding his voice to those Anglo-American fanatics blaming China for creating COVID-19 in a lab and intentionally spreading it around the world, Sir Dearlove has demonstrated a classic case of “gang/counter-gang operations” practiced by the British Empire for centuries.
The Origins of Gang/Counter-gang Operations
British agent Frank Kitson produced an insidious little 1960 handbook called Gangs and Counter-gangs based on his work coordinating special operations against the 1955 Mau Mau uprising in Kenya which threatened to break this valuable African region free of British colonialism. Kitson’s handbook was a modern adaption of a centuries-old practice according to the needs of putting down independence and civil rights movements that threatened to undo the age of empires.
During his work in Kenya, Kitson recognized that when outnumbered and faced with organized independence movements, it is just not very effective for thinly spread colonialists to try to put them down by force directly and much wiser to change the rules of the game by a slight of hand. The formula for changing the game is to cultivate one or more opposition groups to whatever force is posing a threat to the empire… and then cultivate a counter-gang to that opposition group to create a new set of conflicts within your target population (Hence the name “gang/counter-gang”). While the target society becomes polarized by the two warring (yet ultimately controlled) opposition movements, the genuine independence movement simply gets diffused and lost in the chaos.
Describing his insight which would later be put to use in the FBI’s COINTEL program within America soon thereafter, Kitson wrote:
“As a result of our informers and pseudo gangs we were getting to know a bit about the future movements of the gangs which was much better than merely analysing past events. We had a long way to go before we could say that we were producing the information that would enable the Security Forces to destroy the Mau Mau in our area… I began to feel that at last I was on the road which led to the desired goal.” [p.90]
The Case of the Civil War
A useful pre-20th century example of this sort of operation was witnessed with British Intelligence’s support for BOTH southern rebels one the one side of the 1861-65 Civil War and radical abolitionists on the northern side of the war. To add a degree of sophistication here, the abolitionist movement itself was polarized between violent vigilante abolitionists like John Brown vs the “peaceful” abolitionists like William Lloyd Garrison who really just wanted the Union to dissolve and liberally “agree to disagree” with the slave-loving confederacy to the South.
Before and during the war, President Lincoln and his allies had to contend with all of these controlled opposition movements who could only seem to agree on one thing: Break up the Union. When he realized how this gang/counter-gang operation was being run, former slave Frederick Douglass broke with the abolitionists in order to support Lincoln whom he recognized had the only principled strategy to fully ending slavery (and colonialism) forever from the earth.
A more recent display of Kitson’s strategy can be found in the efforts to lay the blame on the coronavirus pandemic squarely on China.
COVID-19’s Anomalous Origins
In late January 2020, with the publication of a report from the Kuzuma School of Biological Sciences, the theory of COVID-19’s natural evolution was first put into serious doubt. Although the Indian team was forced to retract their paper under immense pressure, researchers such as Dr. Luc Montagnier, Francis Boyle, Dr. Judy Mikovits and Pierre Brigage increasingly pointed out the anomalous traces of HIV sequences spliced throughout the COVID-19 genome implying a laboratory origin.
Increasingly doctors working on the front lines in New York such as Dr. Kyle-Sidell began reporting the anomalous behaviour of COVID-19 symptoms as unlike any pneumonia he had ever seen and observed that COVID-19 acted more like some form of high altitude sickness, with ventilators not only useless but resulting in deaths in 9 out of 10 patients (meaning they were actually provoking deaths).
With these growing anomalies, thinking citizens became increasingly concerned by the disturbing matter of the vast Pentagon-controlled bioweapons infrastructure scattered throughout the globe. Bulgarian researcher Dilyana Gaytandzhieva’s reported on the Pentagon’s 25 bioweapons labs- all of whom were conducting billions of dollars of secretive research on new and more virulent forms of viruses, with over $50 billion spent on the practice officially ever since Dick Cheney’s Bioshield Act of 2004 was signed into law.
By March, even China’s foreign Ministry raised the possibility that the virus came to China via the American team who participated in the Wuhan Military Games in October 2019- an event at which several athletes were hospitalized for COVID-like symptoms.
On May 13th, the Russian government directly put into question America’s bioweapons laboratories in Georgia and Ukraine with Sergei Lavrov saying: "These [US] laboratories are densely formed along the perimeter of the borders of the Russian Federation, and, accordingly, next to the borders of the People's Republic of China."
A May 14th report from China’s Global Times stated: “The US can't just claim all reasonable inquiries to its bio-labs as "conspiracy theories," and when US politicians keep accusing China's lab in Wuhan as the origin of COVID-19 without providing any evidence, they should respond to the questions on US bio-labs, including the US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases at Fort Detrick.”
It is tough to dismiss this sort of matter as “conspiracy theory” when North Carolina’s Chapel Hill bioweapons labs went so far as to create a novel coronavirus called SHCO14 designed to jump from bats to humans with USAID/CIA grant money in 2015 and events sponsored by both the Rockefeller Foundation, the CIA and Bill Gates have been using novel coronaviruses in their pandemic scenarios for over a decade.
The China Counter-Gang Narrative
When it became evident that the story of the laboratory origins of COVID-19 wasn’t going to disappear on its own, a new counter-narrative was spun which involved embracing the evidence of the laboratory origins while shifting the blame from the hands of Anglo-American intelligence to… China.
Emerging out of the bowels of Oxford’s Henry Jackson Society, the lie was concocted early on that the culprit behind this virus’ origins was none other than China whose BSL-4 laboratory in Wuhan had been conducting research on novel coronaviruses and had received $3.7 million grant from the US National Institute of Health from 2014-2019. Is this proof that China caused COVID-19? Some people who want you to think emotionally while ignoring big swaths of reality say so.
Here the story subdivided itself further, as one group represented by Niall Ferguson, Mike Pompeo and Steve Bannon maintain that the international spread of the virus was done deliberately with China apparently going so far as to intentionally pack planes full of sick people to contaminate the world (a lie entirely annihilated by Daniel A. Bell on April 21st), and another group which includes some well-intended dupes like Francis Boyle or Montagnier which maintain that COVID-19 leaked out by accident.
No matter what form this sleight of hand has taken, it has been just that: a misdirection designed to ensure that the truth of the Pentagon’s bioweapons labs would be lost in the chaos stirred up by the blame-game with President Trump now falling for the anti-China line and entertaining the possibility of cutting America from all relations with China unless nations suffering from COVID are paid trillions in reparations.
Now we should not be surprised to find MI6’s very own former director Sir Richard Dearlove to be a loud voice in this anti-China clamor.
The same Sir Richard Dearlove that covered up Princess Diana’s death while director of MI6’s Special Operations from 1994-1999, who oversaw the Yellowcake Dodgy dossier while director of MI6 in 2002 and who vetted another dodgy dossier created by his former employee Christopher Steele in 2016 designed to overthrow President Trump and usher in a war with Russia, has now joined the propaganda operation to blame COVID-19 entirely on China.
On June 4, Sir Dearlove stated “I think this started as an accident… if China ever admits responsibility, will it pay for repairs? I think this will make every country in the world rethink how it sets up its relations with China and how the international community will behave towards Chinese leadership… Of course, the Chinese must have thought “If we are to suffer a pandemic, perhaps we should not try too hard to warn our competitors, so to speak, that they will suffer from the same disadvantages that we have.”
Sir Dearlove’s comments were timed to coincide with a new University of London peer-reviewed paper entitled “A Reconstruction of Historical Etiology of the SARS-CoV-2 Epidemic” which stated that the virus’ sequencing indicated “intentional manipulation”. The British researchers stated that the virus “was probably designed through a Wuhan laboratory experiment to develop ‘high potency chimeric viruses”.
Amidst the turmoil and confusion caused by these gang/counter-gang operations radiating noise and polarization across the political and scientific landscape, the reality of the financial collapse looms over head as one system sits upon the precipice of collapse and a battle wages over who will control the emergence of the new system. Will this inevitable new system be a multi-polar order defined by cooperation on space exploration, new discoveries and long term infrastructure benefiting all nations and cultures, or will it be an order defined by a 21st century Anglo-American oligarchy sitting atop an ivory tower as a divided world of chaos and depopulation suffers from below?


thegreanvillepostbiasrating--2020-06-10--In Focus: Understanding what the police is, whence it came, and what can be done about it

Please make sure these dispatches reach as many readers as possible .
Share with kin , friends and workmates and ask them to do likewise .
PREFATORY NOTE The existence of police and the act of `` policing '' encompass many functions that have organically evolved over the centuries .
In most cases , police forces were not created and do not serve , even today , chiefly to protect the populace against violence and criminality from their peers , but to serve as protectors—taxpayer-supported shields— for big property and the privileges of persons of high standing in society—nobles , @ @ @ @ @ @ @ pre-modern societies ) and finally big industrial magnates and their high retainers in our time .
This particular group , a puny segment of society not much larger than 0.001 % in the US , comprises the chief beneficiaries of capitalist regimes , the ruling class in self-denominated `` capitalist democracies '' , a deliberately misleading oxymoron .
This role of the police—often an offshoot of an standing army ( Chile 's famous Carabineros used to be a regular army regiment ) , decommissioned soldiers , or an ad hoc corps with variegated @ @ @ @ @ @ @ creation , role and eventual dissolution/transformation of the Guardias de Asalto ( Assault Guard ) in Spain ) , and the existence of supporting local militias—has been observed in diverse sedentary civilizations across the globe since antiquity ( 1 ) .
Thus ancient Egypt , Rome , the Mesopotamian kingdoms and empires , and Chinese emperors , all had recourse to some form of organised guard or force to provide constant protection for the ruling caste and the day to day enforcement of state functions and specific royal commands .
Law enforcement relating @ @ @ @ @ @ @ peacekeeping '' according to the established rules and customs of the social order ( especially in the countryside ( 2 ) ) and in many cases the whims of the monarchs or regional potentates ( dukes , counts , popes , bishops , etc . )
, represented the bulk of the police job .
From inception , this role automatically made the police a conservative , highly militarised , coercive force charged with the preservation of the status quo .
In this series , we will try to discuss this subject from @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the police , as seen by a friendly source ( mainstream view ) The word police comes from the ancient Greek word , polis , meaning “ city.
” The first policing organization , however , began in about 3000 BC in Egypt .
Pharaohs were in charge of appointing an official to oversee and enforce justice and security for each jurisdiction .
This official was assisted by the area 's tax collector .
Ancient Greece also had a police force made up of Scythian slaves who were regulated by magistrates .
Ancient @ @ @ @ @ @ @ citizens ( sometimes with criminal pasts ) to be part of the police force .
These teams of men were in charge of protecting the city , but prosecuting everyday crimes ( even murder ) was often left to be resolved between individuals .
Emperor Augustus created three groups of police to protect Rome from crime and fire in 6 AD .
These men were recruited from the Roman Army .
After the collapse of the Roman Empire in the 5th century , the Byzantine Empire went back to the original model of @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to be dealt with by individuals .
In England , however , a new structure of police was being formed .
In this model , groups of 100 men were responsible to enforce good conduct between each other while protecting the community .
These groups were headed by a Shire-Reeve .
The role of the Shire-Reeve eventually developed into what we know today as a Sheriff .
By the late 13th Century , the role of Constable was created .
Constables were responsible for overseeing the night watch and for providing security .
@ @ @ @ @ @ @ prosecution of crimes was still left up to individuals .
In 1285 , the Statute of Winchester made enforcing the law a social responsibility .
Any person who did n't report or try to stop a crime could be prosecuted .
In 1361 , the Justice of the Peace Act revoked public responsibility and placed it on the Justices who were appointed by the monarch .
Their responsibilities included police , judicial and administrative duties .
Law enforcement in England rested almost solely on the shoulders of Justices , Constables and the night @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 1631 , Boston became the first U.S city to establish a night watch .
New Amsterdam ( later New York City ) soon followed suit in 1647 .
In the late 18th and 19th Centuries , “ regulators ” ( vigilantes ) became commonplace in many U.S cities .
Their role was to enforce order in areas where there was none .
It was n't until 1829 that the Metropolitan Police Act was passed and the London Metropolitan Police Department was formed .
The structure of the department was based on the military @ @ @ @ @ @ @ to influence police departments in Great Britain , the British Commonwealth and the United States .
In the middle of the 19th Century in the U.S , laws were passed in order to regulate social behaviour , and penitentiaries , asylums and official police forces were established .
New York City was the first to have an official police department in 1844 .
The NYPD was based on the London Metropolitan Police Department .
Soon after , departments were established in New Orleans and Cincinnati ( 1852 ) , Boston and Philadelphia ( @ @ @ @ @ @ @ 1855 ) , and Baltimore and Newark ( 1857 ) .
Authority over police was left to neighbourhoods and neighbourhood leaders .
Officers did n't wear uniforms and the initial function of the police was to prevent crimes .
Once this proved a very difficult task , one of their main purposes became investigating crimes that had already been committed .
The first detective unit began in New York City in 1857 .
In the mid to late 19th Century , U.S police were still governed mostly by the communities they were serving @ @ @ @ @ @ @ political favoratism were rampant and created major problems .
By the end of the century , with much public influence , the police force became a civil service with control of the force being placed on the city and/or the state .
Between 1900 and 1920 , the prohibition movement , as well as fears of corruption and Communist influence lead to the need for Federal and State police organizations .
The Federal Bureau of Investigation ( FBI ) was created in 1908 to investigate antitrust and fraud cases , as well as @ @ @ @ @ @ @ government officials .
In 1920 , the Department of Treasury created the first large federal police agency which was in charge of enforcing prohibition .
In order to deal with and prevent corruption and striking among local police forces , Pennsylvania established the first state police department in 1905 .
New York followed in 1917 , Michigan , Colorado , and West Virginia in 1919 , and Massachusetts in 1920 .
Public confidence in the police was waning in the 20s and early 30s due to the effects of prohibition , corruption and @ @ @ @ @ @ @ .
August Vollmer began lobbying to professionalize the police in the early 20th Century .
In 1916 , he helped create the first university-level police educational program at the University of California , Berkeley .
He also pushed for prosecution of delinquent youths , started the Uniform Crime Reports program which kept track of the annual national crime rate , and helped to abolish the physical and/or mental torture the police had been using in suspect interrogation .
J. Edgar Hoover became head of the FBI in 1924 and began actively trying to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Bureau , and the police force as a whole .
He made it mandatory for new agents to have a formal education , nearly eliminated corruption and almost single-handedly restored public opinion of the police .
A new model was adopted which became known as the “ three R 's ” : random preventive patrols , rapid response to calls for service , and reactive criminal investigation .
This model , as well as Hoover 's military-based structure of the police force became commonplace among all departments .
( Op cit.
, badgeandwallet.com @ @ @ @

Please make sure these dispatches reach as many readers as possible. Share with kin, friends and workmates and ask them to do likewise.
ANNOTATED BY PATRICE GREANVILLE
PREFATORY NOTE
The existence of police and the act of "policing" encompass many functions that have organically evolved over the centuries. In most cases, police forces were not created and do not serve, even today, chiefly to protect the populace against violence and criminality from their peers, but to serve as protectors—taxpayer-supported shields— for big property and the privileges of persons of high standing in society—nobles, big landowners (almost always nobles in pre-modern societies) and finally big industrial magnates and their high retainers in our time. This particular group, a puny segment of society not much larger than 0.001% in the US, comprises the chief beneficiaries of capitalist regimes, the ruling class in self-denominated "capitalist democracies", a deliberately misleading oxymoron.
This role of the police—often an offshoot of an standing army (Chile's famous Carabineros used to be a regular army regiment), decommissioned soldiers, or an ad hoc corps with variegated origins (look for example into the creation, role and eventual dissolution/transformation of the Guardias de Asalto (Assault Guard) in Spain), and the existence of supporting local militias—has been observed in diverse sedentary civilizations across the globe since antiquity (1). Thus ancient Egypt, Rome, the Mesopotamian kingdoms and empires, and Chinese emperors, all had recourse to some form of organised guard or force to provide constant protection for the ruling caste and the day to day enforcement of state functions and specific royal commands. Law enforcement relating to taxation, conscription, and "peacekeeping" according to the established rules and customs of the social order (especially in the countryside (2)) and in many cases the whims of the monarchs or regional potentates (dukes, counts, popes, bishops, etc.), represented the bulk of the police job. From inception, this role automatically made the police a conservative, highly militarised, coercive force charged with the preservation of the status quo.
In this series, we will try to discuss this subject from various perspectives.
—PG
Part One: Police origins
1.1 History of the police, as seen by a friendly source (mainstream view)
A Brief History of Law Enforcement [dropcap]A[/dropcap]lthough the police are an ever-present force in our lives—providing protection, enforcing the law, preventing crime and maintaining order—the form they take today took hundreds of years to perfect. Nearly 400 years ago, the U.S police force as we know it was merely in its infancy. Policing in Europe, however has been around in some form since 3000 BC. [dropcap]A[/dropcap]lthough the police are an ever-present force in our lives—providing protection, enforcing the law, preventing crime and maintaining order—the form they take today took hundreds of years to perfect. Nearly 400 years ago, the U.S police force as we know it was merely in its infancy. Policing in Europe, however has been around in some form since 3000 BC.
The word police comes from the ancient Greek word, polis, meaning “city.” The first policing organization, however, began in about 3000 BC in Egypt. Pharaohs were in charge of appointing an official to oversee and enforce justice and security for each jurisdiction. This official was assisted by the area's tax collector. Ancient Greece also had a police force made up of Scythian slaves who were regulated by magistrates. Ancient Rome continued the practise of recruiting lower-class citizens (sometimes with criminal pasts) to be part of the police force. These teams of men were in charge of protecting the city, but prosecuting everyday crimes (even murder) was often left to be resolved between individuals. Emperor Augustus created three groups of police to protect Rome from crime and fire in 6 AD. These men were recruited from the Roman Army.
After the collapse of the Roman Empire in the 5th century, the Byzantine Empire went back to the original model of law enforcement where most crimes were left to be dealt with by individuals. In England, however, a new structure of police was being formed. In this model, groups of 100 men were responsible to enforce good conduct between each other while protecting the community. These groups were headed by a Shire-Reeve. The role of the Shire-Reeve eventually developed into what we know today as a Sheriff. By the late 13th Century, the role of Constable was created. Constables were responsible for overseeing the night watch and for providing security. At this time, the investigation and prosecution of crimes was still left up to individuals.
In 1285, the Statute of Winchester made enforcing the law a social responsibility. Any person who didn't report or try to stop a crime could be prosecuted. In 1361, the Justice of the Peace Act revoked public responsibility and placed it on the Justices who were appointed by the monarch. Their responsibilities included police, judicial and administrative duties. Law enforcement in England rested almost solely on the shoulders of Justices, Constables and the night watch until the 19th Century.
In 1631, Boston became the first U.S city to establish a night watch. New Amsterdam (later New York City) soon followed suit in 1647. In the late 18th and 19th Centuries, “regulators” (vigilantes) became commonplace in many U.S cities. Their role was to enforce order in areas where there was none.
It wasn't until 1829 that the Metropolitan Police Act was passed and the London Metropolitan Police Department was formed. The structure of the department was based on the military. This law enforcement model went on to influence police departments in Great Britain, the British Commonwealth and the United States.
In the middle of the 19th Century in the U.S, laws were passed in order to regulate social behaviour, and penitentiaries, asylums and official police forces were established. New York City was the first to have an official police department in 1844. The NYPD was based on the London Metropolitan Police Department. Soon after, departments were established in New Orleans and Cincinnati (1852), Boston and Philadelphia (1854), Chicago and Milwaukee (1855), and Baltimore and Newark (1857). Authority over police was left to neighbourhoods and neighbourhood leaders. Officers didn't wear uniforms and the initial function of the police was to prevent crimes. Once this proved a very difficult task, one of their main purposes became investigating crimes that had already been committed. The first detective unit began in New York City in 1857.
In the mid to late 19th Century, U.S police were still governed mostly by the communities they were serving. Because of this, corruption and political favoratism were rampant and created major problems. By the end of the century, with much public influence, the police force became a civil service with control of the force being placed on the city and/or the state.
Between 1900 and 1920, the prohibition movement, as well as fears of corruption and Communist influence lead to the need for Federal and State police organizations. The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) was created in 1908 to investigate antitrust and fraud cases, as well as crimes committed on government property or by government officials. In 1920, the Department of Treasury created the first large federal police agency which was in charge of enforcing prohibition. In order to deal with and prevent corruption and striking among local police forces, Pennsylvania established the first state police department in 1905. New York followed in 1917, Michigan, Colorado, and West Virginia in 1919, and Massachusetts in 1920.
Public confidence in the police was waning in the 20s and early 30s due to the effects of prohibition, corruption and the frightening growth in gangs and crime. August Vollmer began lobbying to professionalize the police in the early 20th Century. In 1916, he helped create the first university-level police educational program at the University of California, Berkeley. He also pushed for prosecution of delinquent youths, started the Uniform Crime Reports program which kept track of the annual national crime rate, and helped to abolish the physical and/or mental torture the police had been using in suspect interrogation.
J. Edgar Hoover became head of the FBI in 1924 and began actively trying to change the image of detectives, the Bureau, and the police force as a whole. He made it mandatory for new agents to have a formal education, nearly eliminated corruption and almost single-handedly restored public opinion of the police. A new model was adopted which became known as the “three R's”: random preventive patrols, rapid response to calls for service, and reactive criminal investigation. This model, as well as Hoover's military-based structure of the police force became commonplace among all departments. (Op cit., badgeandwallet.com) (3)
1.2 History of the police: A radical view
By T.P. Wilkinson
[dropcap]W[/dropcap]hile it may be common knowledge that fire departments originated as private organisations to defend the interests of property insurers, it has probably been forgotten that in the US police were originally the hired gangs of landowners and merchant-industrialists. As urban conurbations like New York City grew, the police were the action arm of the political machines that served to dominate native and immigrant workers. A job in the police department was a patronage post, i.e. one either bought a job or by demonstrated willingness to act for the political boss(es) could be given a shield, a license to use violence and commit crimes on behalf of the machine or for personal gain as long as it did not conflict with the interests of the former. "Even today the major urban armies of the US Eastern seaboard, e.g. Boston, New York, Philadelphia, are dominated by Irish and Italian dynasties for whom the police force is also a cult." When in the so-called Progressive Era corporate cartels realised it was necessary to counter emergent mass democratic movements, the ruling elite began a process of "professionalisation". ["Professionalisation" was applied not just to the police, but also to the journalistic occupation, which until then operated in a rather sensationalist and anarchic manner without any formal rules, or "professionalism", but telling the reader, with honesty, what their standpoint truly was. Ironically, or perhaps inevitably considering who owns the media, the widely publicised pursuit of "objectivity" in modern journalism has served to hide the media bias. —Ed) This trend actually covered most of the West. Ideological catalyst for "progressivism" was the adoption of the ideas of Auguste Comte, best illustrated in the case of Brazil whose flag today is adorned with the motto of Positivism (and the Positivist Church) "Order and Progress". The emphasis was on technocratic order, embodied in the military as an emerging scientific bureaucracy. Progress meant resisting democratic demands with gradual technocratic solutions. In the expanding continental empire that became the USA, the rural police were either the auxiliaries of the slave patrols or the "deputised" vigilantes in the service of big landowners, railroads, mining companies or ranchers. Community policing, let alone "democratic" policing was never a meaningful part of the US political system. What has recently been condemned as corrupt and brutal policing is actually consistent with [the] historical tradition of localised repression.When in the so-called Progressive Era corporate cartels realised it was necessary to counter emergent mass democratic movements, the ruling elite began a process of "professionalisation". ["Professionalisation" was applied not just to the police, but also to the journalistic occupation, which until then operated in a rather sensationalist and anarchic manner without any formal rules, or "professionalism", but telling the reader, with honesty, what their standpoint truly was. Ironically, or perhaps inevitably considering who owns the media, the widely publicised pursuit of "objectivity" in modern journalism has served to hide the media bias. —Ed) This trend actually covered most of the West. Ideological catalyst for "progressivism" was the adoption of the ideas of Auguste Comte, best illustrated in the case of Brazil whose flag today is adorned with the motto of Positivism (and the Positivist Church) "Order and Progress". The emphasis was on technocratic order, embodied in the military as an emerging scientific bureaucracy. Progress meant resisting democratic demands with gradual technocratic solutions.


thegreanvillepostbiasrating--2020-06-11--Voices in the fog: The Performative Political BS Has To Stop

Shannon Keating , a senior culture editor at Buzzfeed , recently delivered a piece that I find impeccable in terms of fact and logic .
Point after irrefutable point , Shannon serves a withering critique of establishment worthies pretending to embrace the struggle of the people .
Disgusted by the blatant hypocrisy , she is saying something that all genuine progressives probably agree with , and that needs to be said .
Obviously Shannon is no dullard .
But , after you read her piece ( and I hope you do , excerpts below ) the question that arises is @ @ @ @ @ @ @ writer like Shannon K. doing by giving editorial respectability to a shameless imperialist disinformation tool like Buzzfeed ?
Her piece rightly belongs on Black Agenda Report , or here , on this platform ( admittedly far less powerful than Buzzfeed ) , where there would be no editorial dissonance .
And you wonder why confusion reigns .
Let 's make something clear .
On Syria alone , to give just one example , Buzzfeed has eagerly run many pieces straight from the State Dept .
's hybrid war playbook .
Like this little @ @ @ @ @ @ @ Why You Probably Wo n't Read This Article About Syria The piece , including as illustration the notorious British intel propaganda asset White Helmets as heroes , is one of many items dripping with the sickening cynicism deployed by the empire to put pressure on Damascus and the Russians to stop their bombing , as they struggled to liberate Syria from precisely the bloodthirsty jihadists injected into that nation by the US and its Gulf allies .
The US goal in this sordid enterprise was never to liberate Syria from some putative tyranny @ @ @ @ @ @ @ the US has never really given a damn , as witness what we did in Vietnam , Central America or Indonesia , for that matter ) but to impose a Washington-controlled failed regime a la Libya ready to do America and Israel 's bidding .
Further , for those who remain stubbornly naive about America 's intentions , as other pieces of this ilk , the outcry to halt the bombing `` to spare the innocent and the children '' is actually designed to give the Washington-backed fanatics a reprieve—yea , those admirable @ @ @ @ @ @ @ may regroup and continue indefinitely their brutal mayhem in Syria , which suits the neocons in Washington , London , Paris and Tel Aviv just fine .
So the question remains , what is a certifiable progressive like Shannon Keating doing in such company ?
In her righteous lucidity , Shannon reminds us of Caitlin Johnstone , the Aussie firebrand .
It 's a confusing world , is n't it ?
—PG The Performative Political BS Has To Stop As Black Lives Matter protests yield results , it ’ s become harder to @ @ @ @ @ @ @ worthless gestures and real , radical change .

Shannon Keating, a senior culture editor at Buzzfeed, recently delivered a piece that I find impeccable in terms of fact and logic. Point after irrefutable point, Shannon serves a withering critique of establishment worthies pretending to embrace the struggle of the people. Disgusted by the blatant hypocrisy, she is saying something that all genuine progressives probably agree with, and that needs to be said. Obviously Shannon is no dullard. But, after you read her piece (and I hope you do, excerpts below) the question that arises is this: What is a super bright writer like Shannon K. doing by giving editorial respectability to a shameless imperialist disinformation tool like Buzzfeed? Her piece rightly belongs on Black Agenda Report, or here, on this platform (admittedly far less powerful than Buzzfeed ), where there would be no editorial dissonance. And you wonder why confusion reigns.
Let's make something clear. On Syria alone, to give just one example, Buzzfeed has eagerly run many pieces straight from the State Dept.'s hybrid war playbook. Like this little gem in March 2018:
CLICK—>Here's Why You Probably Won't Read This Article About Syria
The piece, including as illustration the notorious British intel propaganda asset White Helmets as heroes, is one of many items dripping with the sickening cynicism deployed by the empire to put pressure on Damascus and the Russians to stop their bombing, as they struggled to liberate Syria from precisely the bloodthirsty jihadists injected into that nation by the US and its Gulf allies. The US goal in this sordid enterprise was never to liberate Syria from some putative tyranny and human rights abuses (about which the US has never really given a damn, as witness what we did in Vietnam, Central America or Indonesia, for that matter) but to impose a Washington-controlled failed regime a la Libya ready to do America and Israel's bidding. Further, for those who remain stubbornly naive about America's intentions, as other pieces of this ilk, the outcry to halt the bombing "to spare the innocent and the children" is actually designed to give the Washington-backed fanatics a reprieve—yea, those admirable head-chopping "moderate rebels"—so they may regroup and continue indefinitely their brutal mayhem in Syria, which suits the neocons in Washington, London, Paris and Tel Aviv just fine.
So the question remains, what is a certifiable progressive like Shannon Keating doing in such company? In her righteous lucidity, Shannon reminds us of Caitlin Johnstone, the Aussie firebrand. It's a confusing world, isn't it?
—PG
Excerpts
The Performative Political BS Has To Stop
As Black Lives Matter protests yield results, it’s become harder to ignore the gulf between well-meaning but ultimately worthless gestures and real, radical change.