Friday 27th of December 2024
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the ebbs and flows of our mendacium...

Over the years I’ve learnt to chew and walk at the same time. It’s taken a while, but I think I’ve mastered it. Being able and willing to condemn the actions of Hamas, and criticising Iran while also condemning the callousness of Israel’s incursions into Gaza, the West Bank and now Lebanon is something I think most reasonable people can and should do.

 

The slow strangulation of truth    By Richard Hil

 

In recent days I’ve been stunned by the number of commentators who seem utterly incapable of entertaining this wider view. Surely international law, justice and humanity should be the yardsticks by which we judge the actions of the governments and nation states? You can’t be selective about this, – can you? Yet sadly, people are.

More often than not, mourning the loss of life at the hands of Hamas on 7 October occurs with scant regard for the consequent cruelties being inflicted on the Palestinian people. It’s tempting to call this a blinkered outlook, or as privileging one form of suffering over another. At worst, it’s callous indifference. But it happens all the time.

Take the current onslaught against Hezbollah. The rationale appears to be that the Israeli government wants to secure the right of its citizens to return to safety in the border region. Laudable though this might appear, it rubs against the realities facing Palestinians over the past 75 years: the forced removal of three quarters of a million people from their homes in 1948 and the ongoing mass displacement in the West Bank. It ignores too that most Gazans have no homes to go back to, and that they are bludgeoned and starving.

This sort of hypocrisy runs deep in much of the official discourse. It’s as if we’ve entered a hyper reality. So it is that the US claims moral rectitude – calling for a ceasefire and expressing faux angst over “too many civilian casualties” – while supplying the very weapons causing the bloodshed and destruction. And then there’s the splintering of truth – the sustained and coordinated attempt to equate any criticism of Israel with antisemitism. The latter is now used with such arbitrariness that it has lost its meaning, other than to styme any criticism of the Israeli state. To be sure, as professor Phillip Mendes makes clear in an interview with the Sydney Morning Herald, it is vital to hold the Israeli government to account without slipping into anti-Jewish tropes. Sadly, the latter happens too often.

At the same time however, the accusation of antisemitism should not be used as a blunt instrument. British author, Howard Jacobson has fallen into this trap in a recent Observer article in which he equates the very mention of child deaths in Gaza with blood libel – a view rightly excoriated by journalist, Jonathan Cook.

We’ve seen too how universities and other institutions have adopted sweeping definitions of antisemitism that equate criticism of the Israeli government with antisemitism. The upshot is the undermining of open debate and academic freedom. This slow strangulation of public discourse feels increasingly like being coerced into seeing, speaking and hearing no evil.

One of the most telling instances of this occurred when political scientist and activist Norman Finkelstein, in response to historian Benny Morris, cited report after report by respected international NGOs highlighting the indiscriminate slaughter of Gazans by the Israeli military, only for professor Morris to chuckle, “I think you read too much”. That a once respected historian could stoop to such a level in front of millions of people (on Piers Morgan Uncensored) seemed hugely significant. It seems that Morris has utterly abandoned his commitment to carefully documented evidence, preferring instead to prosecute the official line.

Such differences are emblematic of a much wider problem of knowledge production. As Yuval Noah Harari points out in Nexus: A Brief History of Information Networks from the Stone Age to AI, we’re awash with wild, largely unregulated and distorted information that not only befuddles the mind, leading to a kind of intellectual stupor, but which also obscures any sense of what might constitute the truth. That’s the point, of course, as the pathological lying of Donald Trump attests. The objective is to create an anything goes moral void that can be filled with all manner of nonsense, in the literal sense of that word.

As philosopher Hannah Arendt pointed out: “The result of a consistent and total substitution of lies for factual truth is not that the lie will now be accepted as truth and truth be defamed as a lie, but that the sense by which we take our bearings in the real world—and the category of truth versus falsehood is among the mental means to this end—is being destroyed.” And so it is that in Austria, a far-right leader can brazenly lie about the climate catastrophe or the threat posed by migrants, or that in the US, Haitian migrants can be accused of eating their neighbours’ pets. The end result is a ratcheting up of hatred with real-life consequences for those besmirched.

Somehow in the midst of all this we have to bind the threads that approximates to a truth. The problem, as Harari points out, is that few of us have the skill or expertise to do so. And that makes us prey to the weird, ridiculous and power-hungry.

As Gideon Polya has noted, there is lying by omission and lying by commission. If we knowingly or otherwise privilege the suffering of our own, our brethren, over others then we offer up a skewed, self-serving story. If we deliberately deny the evidence before us, evidence repeated over and over, then we too engage in a form of deliberate deceit. Our guide in all commentary on the Middle East should be the right of all people to be treated with dignity and kindness.

Anything less is cruelty.

https://johnmenadue.com/the-slow-strangulation-of-truth/

 

YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT.

 

SINCE WE FELL FROM OUR TREE, WE'V TOLD TRILLION TRILLIONS OF LIES, MOST OF THEM RELIGIOUS AND POLITICAL... AND WE STILL LIE TO OURSELF DAILY... NOTHING NEW...

EXTRANOTE: CARTOON AT TOP BY GUS LEONISKY, 2001....

casual casualty counts...

 

Why Is the Pentagon Now Pushing the False Narrative About Russian Casualties? Nima and I Discuss the War in Palestine and Lebanon

 

by 

 

Three months ago, MediaZona tried to do a volte face and claimed Russian casualties were soaring. But their analysis was based on an algorithm, not data. Simplicius did an excellent job of deconstructing the falsity of the claim. So now, the US Pentagon is pushing the same story, which was reported in the New York Times two days ago — September Was Deadly Month for Russian Troops in Ukraine, U.S. Says.

Here is the US propaganda courtesy of the NY Times reporter, Eric Schmitt:

September was the bloodiest month of the war for Russian forces in Ukraine, U.S. officials said, with the costly offensive in the east bringing the number of Russia’s dead and wounded to more than 600,000 troops since the war started.

U.S. officials attribute the high number of Russian casualties to what they describe as a grinding war of attrition, with each side trying to exhaust the other by inflicting maximum losses, hoping to break the enemy’s capacity and will to continue. Russian troops have made steady but incremental gains in recent months in the Donbas region in eastern Ukraine, U.S. officials said. . . .

“It’s kind of the Russian way of war in that they continue to throw mass into the problem,” a senior U.S. military official said this week, speaking on the condition of anonymity to discuss internal assessments, in announcing the Pentagon’s latest Russian casualty estimate. “And I think we’ll continue to see high losses on the Ukrainian side.”

According to U.S. assessments, Russian casualties in the war so far number as many as 615,000 — 115,000 Russians killed and 500,000 wounded. Ukrainian officials have zealously guarded their casualty figures, even from the Americans, but a U.S. official estimated that Ukraine had suffered a bit more than half of Russia’s casualties, or more than 57,500 killed and 250,000 wounded.

This is complete, utter bullshit. So, why is the US military pushing this line of malarkey? A couple of reasons come to mind. First, the Biden Administration and the US military are desperately trying to make the case that Ukraine really is winning the war and that the West just needs to keep pouring in weapons and money. Alternatively, the US is trying to lay the foundation for halting continued funding of Ukraine by claiming that Russia has lost the war by virtue of suffering so many casualties. What is known is that the figures cited by unnamed US officials are fabrications.

How do we know? It is simple mathematics. At no point in the last two years of the battles in Ukraine has the Ukrainian side enjoyed an advantage in artillery, tanks or drones. With respect to artillery, not only is Russia producing more artillery shells then what the entire West is producing, it is firing as many as eight shells for each one Ukraine manages to crank off. Here is Newsweek’s spin on the matter from July:

Russian and Ukrainian military forces are firing tens of thousands of ammunition shells daily, requiring increased production from Ukraine-backed NATO allies as a counteroffensive remains ongoing. . . .

It was estimated earlier this year that Ukraine fires as many 155-millimeter artillery rounds in about five days as the U.S. produces in a month, but that is likely a low estimate according to Guy McCardle, managing editor of Special Operations Forces Report (SOFREP).

“By most accounts, Russia is firing at least four times as many artillery shells as Ukraine,” McCardle told Newsweek via email. “That’s significant. 20,000 rounds per day for Russia is a low estimate, as is 5,000 rounds per day for Ukraine.”

Artillery is the biggest killer on both sides of the war, he added, projecting it causes about 80 percent of all casualties overall in this ongoing war. The high rates of artillery rounds being used seemingly without effort is because “they are effective.”

With Russia consistently firing several times more artillery rounds at Ukrainian forces, it is a simple fact that Ukraine will suffer more casualties. And I have not even factored in Russia’s advantage with the use of drones and FAB bombs, which has intensified over the last six months.

The Ukrainian situation with respect to artillery is made even more dire by two factors. First, the Russians are destroying many times more of the Western-supplied artillery pieces. Second, Ukraine’s rate of fire causes it to burn through the barrels of the artillery pieces, and there are no ready replacements for them.

The Pentagon also is lying about Russia “making incremental gains” and using human-wave attacks. The truth of the matter is exactly the opposite — it is Ukraine that is suffering massive losses — an average of 2,000+ a day over the last three months. While Russia has adjusted its tactics, using smaller, mobile assault squads to hit Ukrainian positions all along the front, it is causing the Ukrainian lines to crumble.

Simplicius summarizes the recent Ukrainian setbacks:

So now, we’ve had the usual incremental advances in the known areas: for instance toward Kurakhove, more areas north of Ugledar captured, around Selydove in the Pokrovsk direction—which town is being slowly enveloped in a cauldron.

Then there was the total capture of Tsukuryne in the same direction.

Consolidation and deep advances into Toretsk, which appears nearly 50% captured. As well as more small breakthroughs into Chasov Yar.

New massive chunk of Toretsk captured. . . .

A sudden gambit across the dry reservoir established a beachhead on Kamianske, opposite Russia’s positions south of Zaporozhye city. . . .

The other most surprising was an advance toward long-contested Siversk near the Donetsk-Kharkov border. . . .

The most significant though was an advance southward past recently-captured Sinkovka up in the north, near Kupyansk. Russian forces finally reached Petropavlovka again.

There are many other small advances made in that region, including Vyshneve to the south (circled in yellow) and the whole area circled in red, which is turning everything between there and Sinkovka into a giant cauldron trapped against the Oskil River. . . . 

Russian Army Begins Breakthrough on Kursk Front: Powerful Assault on Lyubimovka and Attack on Zeleny Shlyakh to Cut Off Ukrainian Armed Forces Group

Today our armored groups unexpectedly attacked and broke through the enemy’s defenses in the Kursk border area.

About 30 units of Russian equipment are storming the village of Lyubimovka, wrote media officer of the Armed Forces of Ukraine “Alex”. Russian troops managed to advance and are now consolidating, the fighting continues. . . .

Ukrainian Army is gradually withdrawing to the town of Sudzha. Russian Army has entered Zelenyi Shlyakh and Novoivanovka and is approaching Nizhnii Klin from Obukhovka.

 

If you compare the pictures on social media of Ukrainian cemeteries with those of Russia’s, the pictorial record shows staggering losses for Ukraine.

https://sonar21.com/why-is-the-pentagon-now-pushing-the-false-narrative-about-russian-casualties-nima-and-i-discuss-the-war-in-palestine-and-lebanon/

 

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YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT.

 

no news is....

Are you a news avoider? Do you turn off the six o’clock TV news, scroll past headlines, skip radio bulletins – or just ignore news entirely? 

If you do some or all of these things, you are not alone. A new survey shows New Zealand has some of the highest rates of news avoidance in the world. 

With news media already struggling with declining revenues and audiences, this adds to the immense challenges the sector faces in a competitive and politically polarised environment.

Previous research has found news avoidance is increasing around the world. But New Zealanders have also shown something of a love-hate relationship with the news: avoidance rates are high, but so too is general interest in the news. At the same time, trust in the media has been steadily declining.

To make sense of this, we surveyed 1,204 people in New Zealand in February 2023. We asked about news avoidance and the motivation for it, and recorded demographic details such as age, gender and political belief.

We found 60% of survey participants reported they sometimes, often, or almost always avoid the news. This combined total is higher than any other national figure reported in other studies, with Greece and Bulgaria the next highest at 57%.

Women reported higher rates of news avoidance than men. This could be due to a legacy of unequal access to the news, and a perceived lack of diverse voices in New Zealand’s news production, causing some to feel the news just isn’t for them.

READ MORE:

https://theconversation.com/news-blues-study-reveals-why-60-of-kiwis-avoid-the-news-at-least-some-of-the-time-240544

 

NEWS ARE LIKE PESTS... THEY ARE THERE....

SEE ALSO:

and here is the 2026 nuz.....

 

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YOURDEMOCRACY.NET RECORDS HISTORY AS IT SHOULD BE — NOT AS THE WESTERN MEDIA WRONGLY REPORTS IT.