Neocons have new home on MSNBC, slandering critics of Biden Ukraine policy

 

 By Reginald Johnson

     Commentary

  The same people who arrogantly pushed for the disastrous Iraq War (1 million Iraqi dead, 6,000 American dead) are back on MSNBC and CNN to push for war with Russia.

 These neo-con hawks have been rehabilitated by the so-called liberal channels to peddle their lies. And they're using the same slimey, McCarthyite tactics to get an edge --- calling people who oppose US involvement in Ukraine as stooges of the Kremlin.

 Discredited warmongers like Bill Kristol and David Frum talk of the urgency of confronting the Russians militarily and slam people like Tucker Carlson of FOX as “apologists” for Vladimir Putin. To his credit, Carlson has had several shows raising questions about the Biden administration’s irrational Ukraine policy.

 But the neocons have no shame.

 It brings to mind attorney Joseph Welch's famous rebuke of Senator Joseph McCarthy who was leading the communist witchhunt in the 1950s. McCarthy was making a career out of calling people communist and ruining their lives.

 At a congressional hearing in 1954 where McCarthy was trying to impugn the patriotism of one of Welch’s young law firm partners, Welch turned and confronted the senator:

  "Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency?"

 The fine writer Glenn Greenwald has written an excellent piece on the subject of the neocons, their tactics and their alliance with liberal media, called  “The Neocon’s Primary War Tactic: Branding Opponents of U.S. Intervention as Traitors.”  The article can be found on Substack and I highly recommend it.

 

Tulsi Gabbard calls out the warmongers

 

       By Reginald Johnson

   Tulsi Gabbard says it’s time for the American people to stand up to the military- industrial complex and reject the idea of war in Ukraine.

   “We will not be sheep, allowing these warmongers in Washington to lead us down this very, very dangerous and quite costly path,” she told Tucker Carlson on Fox News Channel a few days ago.

  Asked to comment by Carlson on the growing crisis in Ukraine, which could develop into a major war between Russia and the United States, the former congresswoman said that the problem in Washington is that Democrats, Republicans and others are “in the pocket of the military-industrial complex.”

  Rather than looking out for what’s in the best interest the American people, our national security or country, she said, “they see dollar signs when they look at Ukraine, they see how they can line their pockets, see how they can look tough and see how they can posture themselves in a position where they personally, politically or financially benefit.”

  Carlson, one of the only mainstream news commentators raising questions about US policy in Ukraine, has had several shows recently exploring the dangers of war with Russia. (The interview with Gabbard can be found at video.foxnews.com)

  President Joseph Biden, supported by members of both parties in Congress, has been threatening Russia with harsh economic sanctions should Russia invade Ukraine on behalf of pro-Russian separatists in the eastern part of the country. The insurgents have been fighting the pro-western, far right-wing government in Kiev for eight years, following a violent coup which ousted the pro-Russian government of Viktor Yankanovych. The putsch was engineered by the US, using the CIA and the National Endowment for Democracy.

 Biden administration officials have said it is critical to “protect the sovereignty of Ukraine” and “hold Russia accountable for any acts of aggression.”

 The US has poured $2.5 billion of military aid into Ukraine since 2014, and both US and NATO forces have been engaged in military exercises near Russia in recent months.

  The Russians have complained about this and statements by US officials that Ukraine might join NATO, an anti-Russian military alliance formed in 1949.

  US and Russian officials have been negotiating in recent weeks to try to de-escalate tensions and head off any possible military clash.

 Russian President Vladimir Putin said that any peace agreement must include a guarantee from the US that Ukraine will not be given NATO membership. Since 1990, NATO has moved eastward towards Russia, picking up all of the old Soviet-bloc countries.

  Carlson asked Gabbard if there was a chance that the people in charge of US policy “may talk themselves into getting us into war inadvertently.”

  “I’m deeply worried about that because that’s very much the direction we’re headed in,” replied Gabbard.

   “You know, Tucker, I look back to early 2017 when then President Trump said ‘Hey, it would be good if we got along with Russia.’ You remember the reaction to that --- everyone from Democratic leaders, Republican leaders, people in the mainstream media, they said ‘Absolutely no way!’ There were people in Trump’s own administration, warmongers like John Bolton, Nikki Haley, Mike Pompeo, outright rejected it and went on their own agenda and now we’re seeing the results of this, seeing the results of how we have continued to have these war mongers escalating tensions, putting us in this disastrous position today, leaving us, the American people with frankly the responsibility to stand up and say we will not accept this.”

 

 

Yale scientist: early treatment could have averted hundreds of thousands of COVID deaths

 

 

   By Reginald Johnson

    A prominent epidemiologist from Yale University believes that a majority of the deaths from COVID-19 in the United States could have been prevented through the use of therapeutic treatments.

   Dr. Harvey Risch, a professor at the Yale School of Public Health, said in an interview with Mark Levin on the FOX News Channel that if the drugs hydroxychloroquine, Ivermectin and others had been allowed by the federal government and used at an early stage on COVID patients, “80 or 85 percent” of the fatalities could have been prevented.

  In the interview on Dec. 26, Levin asked Risch if therapeutics had been used to treat COVID patients, “Do you think we could have saved a lot more people?”

   Risch responded, “Absolutely. If the number of deaths that’s been reported of 700,000 Americans is an accurate count, we could have saved 80 or 85%, at least of those, by early and aggressive treatment.”

  In addition to hydroxychorloquine and Ivermectin, Risch said the following drugs were useful in treating the Coronavirus: fluvoxamine, budesonide, colchicine, antibiotics and aspirin.

  The Yale professor, also an MD, is well known in the field of epidemiology. He is the author of more than 300 peer-reviewed publications and currently holds senior positions on the editorial boards of several leading scientific journals.

  Since the pandemic began in early 2020, Risch is one of a small number of medical doctors and epidemiologists who have been questioning the approach of the federal government in dealing with COVID.  That policy has seen top government officials such as National Institute of Allergies and Infectious Diseases Director Dr. Anthony Fauci push vaccines almost exclusively as the best way of dealing with the outbreak ---- to safeguard people from getting the disease and ultimately to stamp out the scourge. So far, about 63% of all Americans have been fully vaccinated.

   Nonetheless, 700,000 to 800,000 Americans have perished from Covid, with the exact count determined by the data being used. The consensus view of government officials and many in the medical establishment is that that level of fatalities --- about three-quarters of a million people --- would be a lot higher if it were not for the vaccination program.

  

A roadside poster in Bridgeport, CT promoting vaccinations. The federal government has authorized giving the Pfizer vaccine to children 5-11 years old. 

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  Doctors like Risch have been roundly criticized for supporting drugs like hydroxychloroquine and Ivermectin, neither of which the FDA has authorized for use in treating COVID. Critics have pointed out that with hydroxychloroquine, for instance, studies have shown the drug is not effective and in some cases poses a cardiac risk. 

   Some 20 faculty members at the Yale School of Public Health took Risch to task for his stand in a statement released in the Medium on August 4, 2020, according to the Yale Daily News.

   “As his colleagues, we defend the right of Dr. Risch, a respected cancer epidemiologist, to voice his opinions,” the letter states. “But he is not an expert in infectious disease epidemiology and he has not been swayed by the body of scientific evidence from rigorously conducted clinical trials, which refute the plausibility of his belief and arguments.”

  The college newspaper said that Risch had no comment on the letter.

Other doctors agree with Risch on the use of drugs such as hydroxychloroquine and Ivermectin, but their views for the most part have gotten little play in the mainstream media but instead have been reported only by small websites on the Internet. Social media sites like Facebook and Twitter have actively censored posts offering alternative views on how to deal with the pandemic.

   In general, doctors and scientists who have offered alternative views on dealing with COVID have been attacked as spreading “misinformation.”  For example, Dr. Robert Malone, inventor of the RMna vaccine --- and a critic of the government's vaccine centered approach --- has been banned from Twitter.

 ( Editor's note: When a link to this story was posted on Twitter, it was removed.)

 Dissident doctors maintain that there’s been misinformation spread from the other side, as well, against the value of therapeutics. They note, for instance, two of the studies criticizing the use of hydroxychloroquine and cited widely by critics --- one by the prestigious medical journal Lancet and the other in the New England Journal of Medicine --- were later found to be flawed and their findings retracted. They also say that a number of other studies have found hydroxychloroquine to be beneficial with few side effects, and news of those studies has received little attention.

  In the interview with Levin, Risch reported that “What we know is across the country, I’ve surveyed telemedicine groups and large group practices most recently, and it totaled more than a 150,000 people who have been treated early as outpatients with hydroxychloroquine, Ivermectin and other medications, extremely successfully, less than two dozen deaths out of that large number of people who been treated early. So they’re the ones who have the knowledge of how to treat patients. However, the government doesn’t want any of that to be known publicly, so it’s an open secret that I talk about it and others talk about it, but the government denies that it exists and pretends these medications are harmful.”

  On other topics related to the government’s response to the pandemic, the Yale professor said it made no sense to be vaccinating healthy children. The FDA in October authorized giving the Pfizer vaccine to kids aged 5-11.

  “ This is a risk benefit analysis. From what I understand, the adverse events occurring from COVID itself in 5-11 year-olds are so infrequent, that the hazards from the vaccines are likely to be greater than the hazards from the illness,” Risch said.  “So the benefit is against vaccination for almost all that age group except children with chronic conditions like obesity, diabetes, asthma and respiratory diseases. There you have more of an equation to balance.”

   In general, Risch said the whole emphasis by the government during the pandemic has been to sell vaccines.

  “Well you know, the real bottom line and everything that comes out and every decision that is made in every pronouncement from Dr. Fauci and the government, is to sell vaccines. There is nothing that I have heard that ever takes a step back and says, maybe the vaccines are not indicated for such and such person. Everything in every direction has always been to sell vaccines. That includes the suppression of early treatment.”

   

 

 

 

 

 

Peace groups urged to take action on Ukraine

 

 

 By Reginald Johnson

 

      As the crisis in Ukraine escalates, a national peace organization is calling on all peace and anti-war groups to pressure the Biden administration to change its “dangerous belligerent policy against Russia” to head off disaster.

  “If the armed standoff between the Ukrainian military and the Russian-supported separatist forces in eastern Ukraine becomes --- by miscalculation or design --- a conventional war between Russia and NATO, it could escalate into nuclear war,” said a statement issued by the U.S. Peace Council this week.  “We must act urgently to push for immediate de-escalation of this NATO-created crisis before it is too late.”

  The U.S. Peace Council, one of the oldest peace and disarmament organizations and affiliated with the World Peace Council, said the peace movement must demand that a negotiated settlement be achieved to defuse the crisis, using the Minsk II agreement as a framework; that the “US and its allies cease unnecessary provocations including increased arms sales to Ukraine and suggested NATO membership;”  and that  “potential threats to international peace be taken up by the United Nations and subjected to the provisions of the UN charter and other elements of international law instead of arbitrary and illegal actions by any state or regional formation.”

  Other groups in the peace movement, the council urged, should “reject demonization of Russian leaders,” such as Russian President Vladimir Putin.  The villification of Putin and Russia in the media “is an integral part of (a) policy of inventing imaginary enemies as has been done to a long list of foreign leaders and nations” who have attempted to pursue an independent foreign policy, the statement said.

   The peace council took their position as the situation in Ukraine grows worse by the day. NATO warplanes in recent months have been conducting exercises near the Russian border and the US has led military exercises involving 30,000 NATO troops in the region stretching from the Baltic to the Black Sea. Last month the US staged simulation bombing raids within 12 miles of Russian airspace and US warships have entered both the Baltic and Black seas, which border the Russian Federation.

   In response, Russia has stationed thousands of troops near the Ukrainian border.

The United States has given $2.5 billion in military aid to the Ukrainian regime to help in its fight against Russian-backed separatists. The US has warned Russia not to invade Ukraine, triggering a diplomatic crisis. (Istock photo)

   There’s been considerable talk in the American press that Russia is getting set to invade Ukraine since it is “massing troops” along its border with Ukraine. No mention is made in the reports about US and NATO activity in the area.

    Meanwhile, President Joseph Biden --- citing the need to protect Ukraine’s “sovereignty” ---- has threatened Russia with harsh economic sanctions, if an invasion takes place.

    Media pundits and members of Congress --- from both parties --- have been denouncing Russia and prodding Biden to act “tough” towards Putin to stop “Russian aggression.” The rhetoric from some lawmakers is getting reckless, with one senator suggesting the US consider launching a first strike nuclear attack if Russia invades Ukraine.

   Since 2014, when the US engineered a coup in Ukraine to establish an anti-Russian government, America has given Ukraine $2.5 billion worth of military aid. In 2021 alone, the US has given $275 million in aid.

  The Russians clearly see these developments --- the continued flow of lethal aid to a neighboring country, the NATO military activity and talk of Ukraine joining NATO, as constituting a security threat.

  Russian officials have made clear that the idea of Ukraine joining NATO is a nonstarter for any diplomatic solution to Ukraine crisis. The Russians are bitter that the United States reneged on its pledge made by Secretary of State James Baker in 1991 to Soviet leader Mikhael Gorbachev that NATO would not expand its membership by taking in any of the old Soviet bloc countries in Eastern Europe. In fact, by the late ‘90s almost all of the old so-called Iron Curtain countries --- East Germany, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Romania and the Baltic states were all allowed to join NATO.

   At a December 23 press conference, Putin stressed that “Further movement of NATO eastward is unacceptable. They are on the threshold of our house. Is it an excessive demand – no more attack weapon systems near our home? Is there something unusual about this?”

   Henry Lowendorf, a member of the US Peace Council, commented that “One need not be an unqualified admirer of the politics of Vladimir Putin to acknowledge that the Russian leader has legitimate security concerns.”

  The council statement said that recently-announced security proposals by Russia, together with the steps outlined in the Minsk agreement, could form the basis of a diplomatic solution to Ukraine crisis.

  The Russian proposals given to the US include a promise for each side to refrain from carrying out activities affecting each other’s security, preventing NATO’s expansion further eastward to include Ukraine, and abandoning any NATO military activities in all of Eastern Europe, Transcaucasia and Central Asia.

   The Minsk II Accords signed in 2015 by France, Germany, Russia, and Ukraine and endorsed unanimously by the UN Security Council, including the United States, provide for the demilitarization of eastern Ukraine, restoration of Ukrainian sovereignty over the eastern regions and full autonomy for the Donbass region.

  U.S. Peace Council officials said it is a welcome development that the United States will participate in talks in Geneva on Monday, January 10 on the new Russian proposals and it is also a good sign that on December 30 President Biden had another phone conversation with President Putin.

  But the council statement noted that, “ Despite these diplomatic efforts, powerful institutional and economic forces in the US – the military-industrial complex, Lockheed Martin, Boeing, Raytheon Technologies, General Dynamics, Northrop Grumman and others – are eager for a new Cold War with Russia which would provide them with boundless opportunities for profitable contracts.”