Black Lives Matter And The Christian Message Whites Have Spread But Have Not Yet Learned

 There are tens of millions of whites who are afraid to face blacks in a non-confrontational way. Without the threat of violence, which is what law essentially is. They have no idea of how to relate to a black person except by expecting that person to behave according to their own expectations, which is to say, in a way that makes the white person feel entirely comfortable and in control. They say they are more than willing to get along with black people who act the way they expect them to act, but they never once consider if the person on the other side also has certain expectations that are worthy of being considered. 

They have no idea how to react to black people in the way blacks have always been forced to face whites. In the way all races have been forced to face whites. In the United States, indigenous people and African Americans have always had an extremely unequal relationship with white people, and the threat of violence has always been implicit. Overseas it has been no different. Asia, Africa, Australia, and South America have all been colonized by Europeans and when the people were not exterminated they were subjugated. Always with the threat of violence, backed by laws written by and intended for white people.

 But something sublime and miraculous has come of this. It has given birth to the likes of Martin Luther King Jr. and Mahatma Gandhi. Hell, Jesus was a Middle Easterner who was living in a country occupied by Europeans. And since then, Europeans have spread His message of non-violence and loving one’s enemies all over the world, and many who saw the futility in violence saw the wisdom of Christ’s message. Those who could not match violence with violence learned that the battle for justice could be taken to a higher plane, one in which the use of violence demonstrated not superiority but the truth that violence is a tool of oppression. But while the Europeans spread the message of Christ throughout the world, few of them took the time to learn it themselves. They haven’t had to. It is a lesson not willingly learned. But it is a profound one, and it must be learned. 

It falls upon the European race to learn the lesson by choice and not of necessity. If white people wish to prove their race is in any way special, they can do so by being the first to freely come to grips with a message they’ve been sharing with others for thousands of years now. They can be the first group of people to find alternatives to violence and dominance without being first subjugated. It will not be easy, but they can learn from the examples of countless people of color whose people have been decimated and enslaved and have still found room for love and forgiveness in their hearts. It would perhaps be humbling, but it would be an astonishing accomplishment. This would not be an act of weakness, it would be an act of incredible bravery. 

A first step would be to just say the words so many are longing to hear: Black Lives Matter. Go ahead, do it. It will cost you nothing. You won't have to subscribe to some philosophy or join some group that might use the three words to promote ideas that you don't get behind. It's just three words and you know they are absolutely true. It won't just be comforting to others, it will untie that knot of fear and hate that has been clogging your heart for way too long. It will feel good. And just so you know, your life matters too

Putin's Making Me Not Vote For Biden

 I want to share my story with you as a warning of how easily you can be led astray. Stick to the straight and truth path and never once deviate from it, because this could happen to you.

Like most of you, I was once very excited by the prospect of having Joe Biden as our next president. Sure, I really wanted Kamala Harris or Pete Buttigieg, but I was more than comfortable with good ol' Uncle Joe. More than anything, I JUST WANTED TO GET TRUMP OUT OF OFFICE. IN ALL MY SWEET JESUS LIFE I'VE NEVER WANTED ANYTHING MORE THAN TO GET TRUMP OUT OF OFFICE. I WOULD LITERALLY VOTE FOR A FLAMING BUCKET OF TURDS AS OUR PRESIDENT JUST SO LONG AS THE BUCKET WAS A DEMOCRAT.

So like I said, I was once pretty normal, just like you.

And God knows, I tried to be good. I did what the media and the intelligence agencies told me to do. I stopped listening to some of my favorite journalists, people like Chris Hedges and Greg Palast, because they appeared on RT. I stopped following my favorite comedians, people like Jimmy Dore and Lee Camp, for the same reason. I turned my back on Coleen Rowley, Time Magazine's 2002 person of the year, because she was a regular on Sputnik Radio (God, was she working for the Ruskies back then, too?)

I pretty much stopped listening to or following everyone I respected and trusted because my party and anonymous intelligence agents told me I should. And I did it, I did it gladly, because the last thing I wanted to ever be was a stooge for a foreign government.

I started referring to Borscht as liberty soup. I got rid of all offensively named salad dressings  from my refrigerator. I'm even in the process of changing my last name to Rozoski in order to accent my Polish heritage.

You'd think that would make me safe, wouldn't you? Ah, but the Ruskies are cunning. Hell, anybody that can flip a multi-billion dollar election with $46,000 in Facebook ads must be pretty damn sly.

But I kept the faith from the moment Hillary lost through the time when my preferred candidates (Kamala and Pete) were forced to drop out as well. During the Russiagate scandal when bombshells fell day after day, I strove to keep my mind ideologically pure, saying three Hail Muellers a day that Donald Trump would be removed from office (A Hail Mueller is like a Hail Mary, except they always drop the ball).

Ironically, I think I was done in by the very intelligence agencies and media sources I had trusted to keep me safe. 

You see, I saw some of the pictures the devious Russians had placed in Facebook. Two in particular stand out in my mind. 

The first was an image of Bernie Sander in a speedo. But he did not look like the elderly man he was, saggy and lacking muscles. No, he had large muscles as though he had been working out his entire life. His body was yellow and his red nipples seem to stare at me as though they were the eyes of the devil himself. Those nipple/eyes just stared at me as though they were hypnotizing me. And I could not look away.

The second was a picture of Jesus, our lord God and Caucasian Savior, arm wrestling with Satan. Even though I'm not a religious man, this image burned itself into my soul. I cannot explain it. But then, only those within our intelligence communities know the true power of Russian Juju. 

And slowly doubt crept into my mind. I had been exposed to a Russian disease and did not know it, in the same way you can carry Chinese Covid and be unaware. From then on I began to question about whether Jeffrey Epstein really hung himself while the cameras malfunctioned and the guards were not doing their jobs. From there I started to wonder if President Obama really had the Libyans' best interest in mind when he destroyed their country. I started watching videos where U.S. officials converse about who they should pick to lead another country's government. I even started to wonder if the Democratic Primaries were on the up and up. God help me...I started to doubt.

I'm not proud of myself. But though the shame weighs heavily upon me, I felt that if I shared my story with you it might prevent some other poor soul from falling into the same trap. And I am not alone. According to Kamala Harris, Colin Kaepernick would not have taken a knee if it were not for Russia. Assuredly Kamala would not have attacked Joe Biden on his racist policies if it were not for subliminal messaging from Russian GRUs. And let us not forget those who were subjected to the insidious Pokemon Go Aps.

It's too late for me. I've lost my innocence and nothing will bring it back. But it's not too late for you. Keep your eyes closed. Stay on the straight and narrow path the Atlantic Council has prepared for you. Do what you are told, and a glorious new day awaits for you.

Biden/Harris 2020

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A Letter From A Progressive To Democrats

 Dear Democrats:

 This conversation is long overdue. I’ve been trying to engage over the last four years but you had no time for it. But now you’re panicking because it’s getting near to the election and you expect everyone must conform to the worldview you have built up in your minds since the last election. And while I’ve long known this day would come and have prepared for it, that doesn’t make it any easier for me.

 I and many others like me are not voting for Joe Biden. To anyone who has been listening for the last four years, this should be abundantly clear. Sadly, Democrats have not been listening to progressives  for the last four years. For four years, mainstream Democrats have managed to ignore those who are to the left of them. They’ve ignored them, berated them, blamed them, bullied them, and called them Russian bots and Putin puppets. But not once have they listened to them.

 Instead of listening to us, they have been listening to unnamed sources within intelligence agencies. They have believed them uncritically, never once requiring a scrap of evidence before giving them their unthinking credence.

 Instead of listening to us, they have been making homophobic and body shaming memes of Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin.

 Instead of listening to us, they have been busy telling the Democratic establishment they were fully willing to vote for a flaming bag of dogshit if it meant getting rid of Donald Trump.

 And now they’re stuck with a flaming bag of dog shit. With dementia. And now they’re trying to sell it to us, the people who warned them four years ago that we were sick of Democratic rigging of primaries, sick of corporate politicians, sick of voting for the evil of two lessers. WE TOLD YOU we had standards. If we could not get a commitment to genuine change, we were going to walk. In fact, most of us had already decided the Democratic Party was beyond redemption.

 Boy, did we call that right.

 And now you come and knock on our front door, place your flaming bag of dog shit on it, and demand fealty to the flaming bag. You insist all that matters is we replace the flaming bag that now resides in the White House with your demented flaming bag. And you have no idea how you look to us.

 So perhaps you will allow me to ask a question: What has the Democratic Party done in the last four years to earn my vote?

 Perhaps you might have an answer I have overlooked. But I assure if you do come up with one, I will give you four or five examples of how the Democratic Party has become a greater enemy of all I hold dear in the last four years than I could have imagined.

 Let me ask you another question: What have you done personally to hold the Democratic Party to any kind of standards? I will answer for you: nothing. You have groveled at the party’s feet, never once insisting they reflect upon their unthinkable defeat to a 5^th grade bully. Your one standard, if it can be called such, is that you will vote for anybody who is not Donald Trump. That is a standard even many Republicans can hold to, and I am not a Republican.

 I demand better. I get it that you do not. Your depth of allegiance to the Democratic Party is bottomless. It’s your choice and it’s not my place to criticize, But if you were really serious about beating Trump in 2020, you should have got your head in the game four years ago and started devising a realistic strategy on how to accomplish that. It’s really not hard. He’s the most beatable candidate in U.S. history. Except for Hillary Clinton. And, likely, Joe Biden.

 You’ve failed at strategizing and failed hard. You have been completely deranged for the last four years, demanding that the entire world share in your derangement. Perhaps in your deranged fantasies you truly believed the entire world did share your ideas.

 You were wrong.

 Now I know your immediate reaction is to yell at me and tell me that I’m stupid for taking a principled stand. But you might want to try a different approach. Because in the last four years that hasn’t worked on me or anyone working from reason rather than emotion. I really don’t know where we go for here, but hell if I’m going to take the blame for the situation we find ourselves in.

There. I've had my say. Let's keep the lines of communication open and perhaps we can yet work something out. But please, be respectful. And next time, let's not wait so long.

P.S. Here is a meme I made a couple of years back, just to show you I've been trying to have this conversation for a while, now.

Weighing The Lesser Of Two Evils In A Broken System

 

I keep going around and around about who is the greater evil and I keep landing on the Democrats. I know, it’s not an obvious choice, but anyone willing to look at things honestly has to at least consider the idea.

 Consider for example, Trump’s willingness to attack the U.S. Postal System. It seems utterly evil and stupid. And it is, though the extent of it or the veracity of it I admit I have yet to determine. That made me swing towards considering him the greater threat. But as I was considering this I was doing a YouTube search and was becoming frustrated with my inability to find the exact clip I wanted. Search engines used to be so much easier to use.

 Then it occurred to me how manipulated search engines have become as a result of the cries to enforce censorship coming from the Democrats under the guise of Russian interference. I was typing in “Russian bounty Nikko House” and all I was coming up with were videos from major corporate news outlets covering the Russian bounty story. It was not until I rearranged the words that I was able to find the Nikko House clip I wanted.

The point is, if you weren’t specifically looking for the clip, you never would have stumbled upon it. All you would ever see is what major corporate media permits you to see, and their take is vastly different from non-sanctioned perspectives. If you do not simply accept one of the two accepted positions on any given issue (Republican or Democrat), you will find it difficult to find alternative voices. And if you have a different take on any given issue, you will find it extremely difficult for your voice to be heard. If you speak out against war or imperialism, it will be harder still. And if you are critical of Israel in any way, expect to be marginalized more than if you were promoting violence and hate.

Censorship at this moment is very real and it is getting worse. And the blame for that can be placed clearly in the lap of the Democrats. I hear no one on the Right calling for clamping down on non-sanctioned voices.

“But,” Democrats say, “the right to vote is being impeded by Trump’s attacks on the Post Office, which is one of the most sacred foundations of our Democracy.” To which I agree, both in regards to the wrongness and the degree of harm inflicted by Trump’s behavior. Trump is very bad, Trump is very wrong.

But of the two, the attack against our first amendment rights is at least on par with what Trump is doing. And nobody in the liberal left is saying anything about it, and if they do they are actively encouraging it. Russian interference is the pretext. Silencing dissent against U.S. foreign policy is the reality.

Which would make it a toss-up, each side being approximately as harmful to our country, Trump threatening our democratic elections, Democrats threatening free speech.

Except the Democratic Party has been making a travesty of our elections as well. Well before the first primary votes were cast, there was a full court press to delegitimize the progressive wing of the party. Vacuous candidates like Beto O’Rourke were given nothing but positive press while Tulsi Gabbard and Bernie Sanders were smeared when they were not simply ignored. When Gabbard’s debate performance prompted voters to make her the most Googled candidate, Google suppressed her ads.

And then there was the cancellation of the Iowa polls before the Iowa Caucus. Followed by an even more bewildering inability to actually determine a winner. Followed by further problems actually tabulating votes in other states. Followed by changing the rules determining who would be in the debate after Tulsi qualified for the debate. Followed by more shenanigans than I can now remember, but culminating in an orchestrated maneuver to have all remaining centrists suspend their campaigns while Elizabeth Warren stayed in to syphon off progressive votes from Sanders. Oh, and let us not forget the ridiculously long lines voters had to wait in while polling stations were being closed in the midst of a pandemic.

So the Democrats are at least complicit in voter suppression and keeping any meaningful change from taking place. They are more actively involved in internet censorship. In four years, they have done nothing to oppose Trump in what I most care about. They’ve applauded Trump when he’s been most militarily aggressive and gone to his right to attack him when he’s failed to warmonger sufficiently. In most issues that matter to me, Democrats have either mirrored Trump, supported Trump, or else been to the Right of Trump.

There is one last matter to consider. Trump is an individual, whereas the Democratic Party is an establishment. The Trump movement is a cult of personality doomed to disintegrate the moment the man either becomes too old or falls from favor due to his own incompetency. The Democratic Party has the potential to remain a problem indefinitely. Not tied to one individual, it is capable of shedding its failures with a given candidate and using another empty vessel to promote the agenda of a powerful elite. So even if Trump were Hitler, I don’t view him as being as dangerous as an undemocratic power that uses secrecy and censorship to push the agenda of the military industrial complex. If comparisons of Trump to Hitler can be made, then comparing the Democratic Party and the forces it protects to The Gestapo, or at least Joseph Goebbels, is not beyond the pale.

So if forced to choose, there is a very real case to be made that Trump is the lesser of two evils, though granted he is the more odious of two presidential candidates.

But this is of course a foolish discussion to have. When given two absolutely unacceptable options, the only logical response is to insist upon a third one. When a system gives you no way to change the system, it’s time to stop playing by the rules the system has laid down. And the system will not bring about the kind of change we require. It will never give you the tools you need to change things. The system will not give you the option of changing the system.

You ask me what the alternatives are. It doesn’t matter what suggestions I give you, you will not accept them until you are willing to admit the two options you are given are insufficient. For now, I can only tell you that I am not buying either one of them. I’m sorry this does not fit into the paradigm you’ve been led to accept. But smashing that paradigm is going to be necessary if we are ever to achieve the meaningful change we need.

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The Monkey At The Typewriter

A thousand monkeys pecking away at typewriters will never write Hamlet. Even if one did, it wouldn’t make him Shakespeare. But one will eventually come near enough that he will be considered a great playwright by those who want to believe. And once someone is convinced a monkey is a genius, good luck trying to convince them otherwise.

When the monkey types “to pee or not to pee,” his defenders will say “oh, we knew what he meant to type, stop making a big deal over a little typo.”

I get it, the idea of a monkey typing great works is so cool that people just want to believe it. And when you want to believe in something, signs start appearing all around you.

And monkeys, like other animals, are good at picking up cues. There once was a man who believed he had taught his horse to do math because he would ask it a question like “What’s 3+4?” and the horse would paw at the ground the correct amount of times. It wasn’t until the matter was studied by others that it was discovered the owner was giving the horse an unnoticed cue when he wanted it to stop. Predictably, the horse’s owner didn’t believe the explanation and continued to believe his horse was as talented in mathematics as he.

Same thing with my dog. She just seems to know what’s up even before I say “Wanna go for walkies?” I love my dog, but I’m pretty sure she’s neither a genius nor psychic. She’s just responding to some cue I’m giving her I’m unaware of.

And same with the monkey. It is looking for a cue on how people react. Most monkeys don’t give a shit about how people perceive them, but some monkeys crave attention. Some monkeys want to be the star of the whole damn circus, even if it means biting the truly talented performers in the ass just to get a laugh. The monkey is appealing to the cheap seats.

So the monkey sits at its typewriter and bangs out a hole bunch of crap. Most of it is gibberish, but it doesn’t matter. The gibberish is tossed aside by those looking for a line that comes close enough to “To thine own self be true.” And once the monkey realizes it has a winner on its hands, he’s going to type it over and over so long as people continue to give him approval.

So how does one dissuade another that a monkey is not Shakespeare? Sadly, it can’t be done. And the more you point to the pages of nonsense the monkey has written, the more the true believer will read method in the madness. You’ll just have to be patient, I’m afraid. Saps wake up eventually, they just need to do it in their own time and in their own way. Nobody likes to admit that they’ve been had, least of all by a monkey. The more you call them stupid and the more you point out the typos the monkey makes, the more they will dig in their heels. It will happen, though. You’ve got to know that, right? Or is it possible that you might be giving the monkey a little more credit for his talents than he deserves?

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The Russian Bounty Story Is Pretty Stupid If You Think About It (You Won't)

If for one brief moment you were to question what you have been told by anonymous agents who offer no evidence, you might find some holes in the narrative provided to you by the media. Indulge me for a moment while I point out a few.

The story: Russia offered bounties to Taliban fighters to kill U.S. troops

If Russia had wanted the Taliban to kill U.S. troops, it would have given them what they required, not what they already had in abundance. A question for you all: does anybody wish to argue that the Taliban requires motivation to kill U.S. troops? Isn’t that why we hate them in the first place, because they hate us? Weren’t we told they hate us for our freedom?

If they hated us and wanted to kill us prior to 9/11, do you think their hatred has abated since then? Do you think thousands of drone strikes and a 19-year war on their own soil are not motivation enough? Do you not think Trump dropping MOAB (Mother Of All Bombs) on the Taliban might not motivate them more than anything the Russians could do? And do you think Putin talked Trump into doing that?

No, Taliban soldiers don’t need frequent killer cards stamped by Putin, or any other kind of motivator. Ask any Taliban fighter, and he’d likely tell you that if you want to help them kill U.S. and allied soldiers, give them weapons and let them do what they do best.

Think about it: if you wanted someone dead, and you knew some psycho who also wanted that person dead, would you pay that person, or would you simply leave a weapon handy for that person and let nature take it’s course? If you pay him to do the job, you just might be implicated for your part in the crime. But provide access to a weapon, and you have plausible denial.

That’s what the U.S. does all the time. Look at how much advanced weaponry we’re selling to Ukraine. We didn’t even hide it, we proudly celebrated it. One of the central arguments the Democrats had against President Trump at his impeachment trial is that he temporarily suspended arms shipments to Ukraine that were to (allegedly) be used to protect them from Russia. Hell, we’re the largest exporter of military equipment in the world. We even supply weapons to people we’re supposed to be against.

If Russia wanted the Taliban to kill U.S. troops, they would arm them, not try to motivate them. This is so obvious I would be shocked if anyone bothered to argue with me.

Why, then would our intelligence agencies say Russia was offering bounties to kill U.S. troops if they could provide no evidence? I can’t say for sure, but it wouldn’t surprise me too greatly to learn that Russia WAS supplying arms to our enemies. Hell, if WE are supplying arms not only to Russia’s enemies but our own as well, it would be kind of weird if Russia wasn’t selling a little something something to The Taliban. Russia is, after all, the world’s second largest arms supplier. Behind the U.S.

So why a pronouncement that Russia is offering bounties? Shock value. It’s pretty clear. Accusing—or even, God forbid, providing evidence—that Russia sold weapons to our enemies would make them no more guilty than our government is. And it makes them look less stupid, because they aren’t selling arms to ISIS. Offering bounties, on the other hand, while making no sense, would make them appear especially evil.

That does sound pretty, evil, doesn’t it? Yeah, it does. It also sounds undeniably stupid. And while you might make the case that Putin’s Russia is evil, you cannot convince me that Putin is stupid. But if anyone wants to try, be my guest.

You could make some convoluted explanation that that’s how evil people do things: they just don’t care how they are perceived. They laugh in the face of international opinion, spitting in the rest of the world's eye and defying them to stop them. 

That’s not a realistic argument. Hitler was as evil as they come but even he was pretty thoughtful about how he presented himself to the world. Nobody really knew the true horrors of his death camps until they were liberated. Generally, people only act this way in narratives concocted by intelligence agencies, narratives that are used as propaganda to promote their nation’s agendas.

The same picture was painted of Saddam Hussein in the buildup to the Iraq War. Saddam was undeniably evil. But he was not stupid. He wasn’t the guy portrayed to us by our government. He did everything possible to avoid the U.S.’s intent to overthrow him. Evil dictators are pretty smart when it comes to self-preservation.

Same thing with President Assad in Syria. Again, not a nice guy, but not bath-salts-eat-the-face-off-a-guy-while-the-police-are-watching kind of crazy. Which is what he would have had to have been to use chemical weapons on his own people at the very moment when victory seemed most assured. I heard the desperate attempts to explain why Assad would do this in the Washington Post and The New York Times, and they boiled down to the idea that he did it out of sheer evil intent. Again, this works in comic books and propaganda, but in real life, not so much.

The idea that Putin paid bounties to Taliban fighters to kill U.S. soldiers has no precedent I’m aware of in history, though there are countless instances of such stories being used for propaganda purposes by our own and other governments that are intent on aggression against other nations. This alone strongly suggests which way we should lean in judging the veracity of the narrative. The fact that no evidence is provided to back such claims, and the fact that they are accepted so readily by so many, is ample evidence of the power propaganda techniques have always had.

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Advice To Democrats From A Vermin Supreme Voter

First off, let me say that the headline was not 100% truthful and was merely used to grab your attention. I have not as yet firmly committed myself to voting for Mr. Supreme, I’m still hoping a more appealing third-party candidate arises.

But will I vote for Vermin Supreme if he is the only option besides Donald Trump and Joe Biden? You betcha.

It won’t pay for me to try to convince you why I’d vote for a guy who wears a boot on his head rather than the Democratic Party’s candidate, just as it will avail you nothing to tell me how I’d be insane not to vote for a racist/imperialist in undeniable cognitive decline. I’m just here to share some facts with you in the hopes that your next presidential candidate is less morally repugnant than the last two have been.

You see, while I broke with the Democratic Party after voting for Bill Clinton in 1992 and feeling very dirty about myself, I’m not above voting for the lesser of two evils. While I voted Green in 1996, 2000, 2004, 2008, and 2016, I did vote for President Obama in 2012. The Republicans seemed especially odious that year and Obama, while still evil, was a poke in the eye, not necessarily of Mitt Romney, but of the Republican base.

So my vote IS attainable, but it isn’t a guaranteed lock Democrats can rely on no matter how bad a candidate they put forth, and no matter how badly they manipulate the system to keep a candidate I like from ever winning. You can’t expect me to vote election after election not for a candidate but merely against one. My thought is if we unconditionally give our vote to the Democratic Party, the Democratic Party will just get worse and worse. Time seems to have borne this out. And so I offer you—not advice—but facts from which you can begin to piece together the reality you now face.

You’ve rallied the troops. The core of Democratic voters hate President Trump more than they hate cancer. They hate him more than they hate virtually anyone or anything in the entire history of the world, with the possible exception of Vladimir Putin. Which is odd, because eight years ago Obama would have told you the 80’s were calling and they want their foreign policy back.

Unfortunately, the core of Democratic voters are not enough to beat Trump. At least they weren’t in 2016. Granted, four years of Trump undoubtedly peeled away some of his support, but the Democrats still need to do something more than rile up the base. It serves no purpose to continue to beat a horse that is already running in the direction you want it to go with all the speed it can muster. The problem is, that horse has been beaten into such a frenzy it has become rather frightening to those outside the base

Your job is to garner whatever votes you can that are outside of the core Democratic constituency. You have failed miserably at this. The only votes you might be gaining have nothing to do with your efforts but with the undeniable fact that Trump is an incompetent and unlikeable president.

I’m trying my best to provide you not with opinions—to which you are immune—but with facts, which just might make you stop and ponder for a moment. Because you need to consider what your reactions to date have looked like to those whose votes you require to achieve your great purpose in life: defeating Trump. They look a little something like this:

Speaking as one to the left of the Democratic Party, they frighten me. Deeply. Existentially. They disturb me so greatly that I am constantly vacillating between which idea frightens me more, a Trump re-election or a Biden presidency.

The Russiagate narrative has captured the soul of the Democratic Party the way the fear of witches captured the soul of Salemites in the 17th Century. This troubles me for the following reasons:

1. It is used as an excuse for continued U.S. imperialism and militarism and is a real threat to global peace.

2. It is used as an excuse for censorhip.

3. It has allowed people to think that presenting the assertions of anonymous agents within intelligence agencies is proof of anything, an idea that is about as Orwellian as you can get.

Now while I have briefly veered from facts to opinions, let me circle back and say that it is a fact that these opinions are widely held by the very voters the Democratic Party will need to beat Trump and regain the Senate. Below are some examples of the view from outside Democratic orthodoxy:

Here is the view from the left of the Democratic mainstream, a voting bloc you need: https://www.mintpressnews.com/afghanistan-bounty-scandal-comes-at-suspiciously-important-time-us-military/269138/

Here is the view of the Black Left, a voting bloc you need: https://www.blackagendareport.com/freedom-rider-russia-afghanistan-and-big-lie?fbclid=IwAR1BMUIWLKRkIDTVPT08t5QixX44ufMtkobl2rUk5be5y_Rv9qKsZcjcGR4

Here is an article taken from the Ron Paul Institute, whose libertarian voters could be swayed by an alternative to Trump that had something more to offer than perpetual hostilities and military entanglement, a bloc that takes civil liberties very seriously and is appalled at attempts at censorship: http://www.ronpaulinstitute.org/archives/featured-articles/2020/june/30/russiagate-s-last-gasp/

This is the view from the conservative side of things, not all of whom are thrilled with Trump and could be wooed by an alternative: https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/three-glaring-problems-with-the-nyt-russian-taliban-bounty-story/?fbclid=IwAR1e-LJX9EL5haFm5713rQs-8lQTt2ECdCAsSx4MZXRNVE4j9uPEbRukugk

These are the opinions you must accept others as having. They are held by millions of people who otherwise might be willing to consider voting Democrat. You cannot permit yourself to shut them out. Censoring them will not cause them to go away nor will calling people who have them "Putin puppets" endear them to your cause or help in your professed goal of ousting Trump from office. These are facts I present to you, ignore them at your own peril.

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