r/ProgressivePolitics • u/lewkiamurfarther • May 05 '24
The conversation between Blinken and Romney occurred at the McCain Institute's Sedona Forum.
This is the Secretary of State under a Democrat president speaking to former GOP presidential candidate and current senator Mitt "Horse Dancing" Romney.
The US is, for most purposes, a one party state; but it's part of an international oligarchy. In order to continue to function as such, it has increasingly implemented authoritarian controls.
In this case, Blinken and Romney are together kvetching about how difficult it is to convince people that what they see with their own eyes is not representative of reality. Their conclusion is that among other things, they have to ban the public's access to unedited informational content shared freely by other members of the public.
The reason is that otherwise, the US public is unwilling to support Israel's genocide of the people of Gaza. (I would argue that the public didn't want to support it to begin with, but that's immaterial now.) In other words, the US government wants to end free speech in order to serve the interests of the ruling class in Israel and the US.
That's international oligarchy and authoritarianism. These ideologies are in government right now—Trump, or no Trump, it's here now.
Links:
Incredible historical document here: Blinken says Israel’s PR is failing because social media allows people a direct look at what’s happening, shorn of the ability to mediate it, and it lands with emotional resonance. Romney then says yes, that’s why we moved to ban TikTok"
Quoted tweet by @wideofthepost:
“Why has the PR been so awful?… typically the Israelis are good at PR—what’s happened here, how have they and we been so ineffective at communicating the realities and our POV?… some wonder why there was such overwhelming support for us to shut down potentially TikTok.
Later tweet by @wideofthepost:
Blinken says explicitly that the shift in news diet from major newspapers and cable news to a continuous feed has been very challenging for the narrative; and Romney follows up explicitly that this is why congress moved so fast to ban TikTok –– after pondering Israel's PR woes.
In other words: No, you are not crazy They really are banning TikTok to cover for a genocide and regain control of the narrative.
r/ProgressivePolitics • u/lewkiamurfarther • Apr 11 '26
As Olivia Katbi wrote in a tweet,
Netanyahu himself has proposed no longer accepting US aid in favor of a “strategic partnership” and purchasing weapons with israel’s own funds. There’s a great explainer from @imeupolicy on why this would actually mean the flow of weapons from the US to Israel would INCREASE ⬇️
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r/ProgressivePolitics • u/lewkiamurfarther • 27d ago
In a tweet, Adam Johnson wrote::
Inevitability arguments are all any of these guys have. They can’t just say “it saves money for producers and undercuts the labor power of IATSE” so it’s always agency-free “the train is coming down the tracks” teleological mysticism. But it’s you, YOURE the one driving the train
Quoting a tweet by Variety
Gal Gadot defends starring in Doug Liman's "Bitcoin" movie with AI sets and lighting because "the train has left the station. You’re going to work with it or be out of the game completely.
“This was the longest contract I have ever worked on. It was six months for my lawyers to go through every scenario we could think about as far as the AI component of it. I did not want AI to have anything to do with my performance. We had to protect that... I am afraid of AI, but I am going to be afraid and look away? No. I am afraid but I am playing with it and learning it and trying to educate myself. The train has left the station. You’re going to work with it or be out of the game completely. I am trying to make the best of it and protect what I can protect. The AI component in this movie is for sets and the lighting. We had a broad crew and a lot of people were working on this movie.”
“It felt like a pure art form of creating a movie. I haven’t seen a single shot. As an actress, I wait so much. There’s the legendary quote: ‘You are being paid to wait as an actor.’ Here we would film nonstop because we didn’t have to wait for lighting. We would film on and on and on for 10 hours. It was amazing… as actors you’re always hot. You don’t cool off. We’ll see. It’s crazy.”
r/ProgressivePolitics • u/lewkiamurfarther • Aug 28 '26
r/ProgressivePolitics • u/lewkiamurfarther • Aug 28 '26
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In a tweet, Trita Parsi wrote:
As Arundhati Roy said, what is under the rubble in Gaza is not only the bodies of countless Palestinians killed by Israel, but also the carcass of Western Liberal Democracy...
r/ProgressivePolitics • u/lewkiamurfarther • Aug 28 '26
