@newtboy

"There is no publicly available PROOF that Trump himself colluded to steal the election....yet."

and when i see actual proof i shall adjust my opinion accordingly.

seymour hersh was the journalist who debunked and exposed the fabricated narrative of the assad regime using sarin gas against the syrian people.

that was in 2013.

and i think you need to differentiate between an institution and an individual.
there have been individual analysts who have come out and openly spoken against the current narratives being put forth by their respective intelligence institutions.

not trying to be a dick here,but i think you are painting with too broad a brush.

we actually agree FAR more than disagree.
the difference is i am demanding evidence not politically motivated speculation by agencies who have proven themselves to be extremely deceitful when it serves their interests.

and i refuse to recognize a corporate media outlet which puts profit above all else as a credible "news" source simply because it appeals to my dislike and disgust at our current sitting president.

james o'keefe is a slimeball,and breitbart a rag that appeals to the most base,and biased of us,but even a broken clock is right twice a day.

and to even attempt to give either any validity or credence is akin to accepting a big giant bowl of feces simply because it smells a tad less worse than the other.

still two bowls of shit to chose from....and i refuse both.

so when you say you disagree with me,you really don't.
you are just accepting that "less" smelly bowl of shit.

and hey,you may have chosen correctly,and it may all be true.
i will be the first to congratulate you on being right.

and then they will impeach trump,and then we all get to enjoy president mike pence.

now think on THAT little nugget for awhile.
good luck sleeping.....

@kir_mokum

what makes the irony even more grotesque is that:

1.look at who projectveritas actually IS.it was founded by that slug james o'keefe..yes..THAT james o'keefe,and due to CNN being such an absolute failure of journalistic integrity,they just made that repulsive man actually credible again.

2.CNN had to post a massive retraction,a formal editors note and a at least three correspondents had to fall on the sword.

3.the projectveritas video has a CNN producer openly admitting that it is about the ratings,and nothing more.the russia story makes CNN money....period.

4.there is STILL no evidence of the trump administration "colluding" with russian intelligence,but there IS evidence that the russia story is being pushed by the american "deep state" to discredit,and/or control trump.

*of course this is from independent media who are not part of the corporate media tentacled network of obfuscation,propaganda and gaslighting.

5.the only media still giving the russia story any credence is american media.the rest of the world has moved on.why? no evidence.

this whole situation stinks to high fucking heaven.

I'm also familiar with the relatively small pineberries; neat to see these huge white strawberries. Might just be a curiosity, as its possibly noteworthy that they didn't have the journalist trope of brief interview snippets from customers saying, 'oh I love these white strawberries, they are so delicious', or 'oh my husband doesn't like regular one but loves these white strawberries', etc..

"Punking the shit" sounds very "presidential".

Our own president the other day mentioned to your presidents' best friend Vladimir Putin at a photo-op that "there are too many journalists, some should be liquidated" which seemed to be too "rad" even for Vlad, who backed out with a "perhaps it would be enough to limit their number".

Some presidents. Nice to know they're all just punking the shit out of us, that it should not all be taken seriously.

I think the attempt itself counts as a test!

This article from the Atlantic talks a little about why the Kenyans make such great runners - https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2012/04/why-kenyans-make-such-great-runners-a-story-of-genes-and-cultures/256015/

There was certainly scope for the Wired vid to be much longer and more in-depth. They had an equally short and unsatisfying article about a journalist who trained for a 90 minute half marathon using the same training techniques the Kenyans use here - https://www.wired.com/2017/05/two-hour-marathon-nike-half-marathon/?mbid=synd_digg

@newtboy
i like the 'failing liver" analogy.
appropriate and easily understood.

and i can understand where milkmandan is coming from,but my perspective is more aligned with yours newt.

what consistently baffles me,is how so many people are willing to simply accept this short term strategy from our politicians.

there is no surprise when corporations push for this,they are just focusing on their own interests and bottom line,which is short term profit.

or the politicians who bow to their neoliberal masters to receive those tasty campaign contributions.

or even the banks,who again focus on their short term gains.

these players are all behaving as they always have:for their own self interest.so there should be no shock or surprise when they act exactly as they have always acted.

but when i see everyday,normal people defend the behavior and actions of oliticians,financial institutions and multi-national corporations.it baffles me as to why they would choose to do such a thing.

we can understand why those players seek to retain a system which benefits them,their shareholders and their bottom line,but that system no longer serves the interests of the people,community and society as a whole.

so why make arguments defending it?

it is,quite frankly,killing us slowly as a species.

look at germany.
that country has slowly been recruiting,educating and now poised to corner the market in:new energy,renewable energy and are leading the world in breakthrough technologies in all energy fields.

germany has long played the long game.
they now dominate the entire EU in finance,and are now focusing on dominating the globe with new energy technology.

and what are we doing here in america?
pushing through more and more neoliberal policies that immiserate the working poor,both here and abroad.desperately continuing our destruction of entire ecosystems to exploit our natural resources for:oil and gas.military conflicts,which only make this country less safe,all to exploit other nations and extract THEIR oil and gas,and the cost in human lives is absolutely indefensible.

all of it.
every single bit of it for short term gains for an extremely small minority.

and here we are,with trump opening the flood gates to further exploit and destroy our natural resources with no thought or plan for the future.no investment in our communities,nor our society as a whole.

and for those who wish to make an argument that hillary would be better.i will only concede that on a domestic level this may have been true,but hillary is a neoliberal corporatist,and she would have pushed for even MORE military intervention in the middle east.MORE sanctions against countries unwilling to play ball,in order to politically squeeze them out,and even MORE of this countries policy of "regime change" to exploit and extract from those countries their precious resources.

i strongly suspect Iran would have been next on her agenda.

so when are some of these people going to step up,and realize that both trump AND clinton are (or would have been) disasterous for us as a community,a nation and as a species?

because they both only offer short term solutions to long term problems.and those short term solutions only benefit a minority of the population.

we could turn this ship around TODAY,right now,if we so choose.
we need more politicians like elizabeth warren and tulsi gabbard.we need more integrity in our media and journalists willing to do their job and criticize power,not bow to it just for access.we need the people to become engaged and confront their representatives,and make them uncomfortable,not treat them as celebrities.

and we need to reject the system where rich people choose who we get to vote for,and begin to dismantle this two party duopoly.

because trump vs hillary?
this election cycle has just revealed that both these candidates are not the disease,but rather the symptom of a very broken,and dysfunctional political system.

we need to begin to invest in the future.
and reject the status quo as no longer being viable for the continued existence of the human species.

and with the newly energized american public,who are growing in numbers daily,and is a direct response to the unmitigated disaster that is trump.there may be hope for us yet.

because if we stay on this trajectory,we are fucking doomed.

Tell ya what, I'll boycott The Blaze.

Who, other than The Blaze, was interested in hiring her before? If, as you noted earlier, this was happening to a respected journalist would we be worried about whether they'd still have an audience at the end of it?

I mean, I get that you're trying to be even-handed and fair and wotnot and ye, worse things will always happen to better people...but i mean... Karma tho? I got in the shower this morning and then remembered I had no shampoo. WEEP FOR ME. Let it not be said that I should take my plight in context!

Arrgh, conflicted.

On one hand, she's the worst. Everything wrong with right wing media neatly tied up in the only kind of pretty blond package that women are allowed to be on these things.

On the other (and I can't believe I'm about to say this), it's a pretty shitty way to treat an employee. If they don't want her anymore, they should release her from her contract.

If the same thing happened to a good journalist, we'd all be annoyed about it.

But, on the other other hand, a) she's an idiot for signing the contract and b) again she's the WORST, so I can't really bring myself to care.

this article sums up my feelings nicely (written about Bin Laden, but still applies)

@eric3579
agreed,and i suspect most people struggle with this,but i think he made a really important point that we all need to address,and that is our own bias.

too many people for far too long have sought information that aligns with their own narrative,their own,personal and subjective understandings.we see those who identify as conservative reject anything that does not adhere to their own,narrow worldview,and we see those who identify as progressive do the exact same thing.

and yet if challenged,BOTH will stubbornly declare that their information is solid and without reproach.this is statistically impossible.

another great point he makes is how some people have been conditioned to accept opinion and conflict as somehow being "news".

he also makes a point on how some news outlets have done shoddy and poor work,but we should not throw the baby out with the bath water.while this may be true,i feel he was far too lenient on those who profess to be journalists.he gives them a pass for doing mediocre work,because that is what many journalists do in this new climate of:partisan hackery,access and propaganda.

so when we talk about "mainstream media",we are talking about only a few,monolithic corporations who DO have an agenda,and that agenda is PROFIT.

so we can look back to the run up to the iraq war,and see how phil donahue was fired from MSNBC for being critical of the war.the highest rated show on that network at that time.so if PROFIT is the model,then donahue being fired makes no sense..UNLESS you consider that the owners of MSNBC were general electric,who at that time were heavily invested in military contracts on the dawn of a new war.

so the profit was not from advertising from donahue's show,but rather the billions in defense contracts general electric was poised to receive from the impending iraq war,and donahue's criticisms of that war had the possibility to affect the profits of general electric.

and that is the one point that is missing from mr green's take on the mainstream media:their inability or outright refusal to criticize the current corporate establishment,and how many journalists kneel at the altar of their corporate masters.

so while he makes a lot of great points.that particular glaring omission is disturbing.

speaking only for myself i tend to only consume independent media,and focus on journalists who have earned my trust.

ultimately it is up to us to decide who we trust and who we are suspicious of,and to discuss those important issues among ourselves to better refine our understandings.

@MilkmanDan

i do not want to speak for eric,so i will just explain why i downvoted.

this video attempts to explain the syrian crisis,with almost zero critical examination.the video practically regurgitates the current american political narrative and never mentions the conflicts of information.

let me explain:

1.the video states this all started due to the arab spring,but totally fails to mention that the MAIN reason for the continued conflict is not arab spring,but the fact the both qatar and saudi arabia have been pushing syria to allow them to build a pipeline through syria in order for those countries to sell oil and gas to europe.

which would be in direct competition with russia,which is the main provider of oil and gas to europe.

2.this video claims..twice..that assad has used chemical weapons against his own people.while convenient for a western power which may,or may not,wish to engage militarily.there was no evidence in 2013,and there is no evidence this time (mainly due to time.i mean come on,TWO days? and BOOM.assad did it,nothing to see here.move along).

the only journalist in 2013 that challenged the narrative was seymor hersh.who was ridiculed and chastised,and ultimately vindicated in 2014 by the UN securities commission,that assad was not the perpetrator,but rather the al qeada off shoot el nosra.

which was barely covered,if at all,in american corporate media.

it is also important to mention that the assad regime,in full compliance with the UN,handed over all materials that could be used in chemical warfare.i.e:sarin gas.

3.while the video DOES mention it,it does so in a very slick way,and if you are not following this situation,you will miss it.

america IS supporting and funding "rebels",but pay attention to who those rebels are:they are the offshoot of al qeada,el nosra.

so in effect,america sis funding and supporting al qeada to fight against the assad regime.

i will give you time to allow that to sink in a moment.

these are only a few of the glaring inconsistencies in this video,but i will agree that the situation in syria is complicated,but the reasons for that complication are not being mentioned in this video..at all.

and one final thing to chew about before i go,because i think it is an important aspect to ponder,and as of right now,thats all it really is:speculation.

assad was set to meet with a UN peace council in a week to discuss possible diplomatic solutions.add to this that trump had just recently (last week) backed off obama's "red line" approach,and stated quite clearly that america is ONLY interested in dealing with ISIS,and had NO interest in dealing with assad.

question:

why would assad,with only a week to go before peace negotiations,commit politicial suicide by gassing his own people?

who benefits from this attack?

because it sure is not assad.

we all know the situation in syria is dire,complicated and grotesque,but the current narrative being fed to americans simply does NOT add up.

2+2 does not = 5

and this video does nothing to clear that up,it simply regurgitates american corporate media's narrative.

and i refuse to upvote that.

@newtboy
that's what you took away from this?
jimmy dore is akin to glenn beck and alex jones?

ok,not gonna judge.

i thought the real take away,in my opinion,was a journalist was taken to task for being lazy and uncritically accepting the current corporate media narrative,and gets a thrashing from an independent journalist from canada.a polite and soft spoken thrashing,but a thrashing just the same.

eve bartlett has been doing some amazing work in regards to syria,and exposing the lies and manipulations of corporate media.

jimmy dore is a comedian,i am just a loser nobody who comments on the internet,but we all come to our own conclusions.

and i no longer give corporate media any authority,because of their utter and complete failure to inform.

i question any and everything that they attempt to spin as "truth".

Rex Murphy is a long-time, respected Canadian journalist. Unfortunately the joke goes "Rex Murphy, a mug too ugly for even radio" (he used to do the Sunday afternoon call-in show for CBC).

@robdot
trying to unpack your comment.

"spent the entire election cycle ranting about hillary"

what the holy fuck are you blathering about?

the entire election cycle liberals fell asleep at the wheel,and tacitly bought the bullshit pie that:paid political pundits,pollsters and supposed "informed political journalists" were selling.

hillary is going to win,the polls reveal that hillary will beat trump handily.don't worry liberal democrats,hillary is going to win.do not pay attention to hillary's abysmal numbers,because trumps are just as horrid.

and just WHAT was hillary's platform?
what was her political messaging and vision for america's future?

"well,my fellow americans,at least i am not THAT guy".
that was it,that pathetic,weak and facile position,WAS her campaign!

if this is what you are referencing,then yes..i agree..the democrats fucking dropped the ball.they had no message,no platform,no vision.

the democrats lost a massively energized younger population when they openly,and brazenly,fucked over sanders,because sanders threatened the DNC and the democrats corporate money train,and we can't have a politician who has shown integrity,morals and vision now can we?

hillary on the other hand,had already proven to be a willing participant in the corporate train.you know..speak one way to the people,but another way behind closed doors..wink-wink-nudge nudge-know-what-i-mean.

if this is what you are talking about,then yes,i agree,liberal democrats need to take a big,giant bite out of that shit sandwich and stop behaving like they are fucking victims.

If winning requires debating any and every troll then I think I'll take a few losses thanks.

I disagree that laughter is some magical truth test, at least not in all cases, but if were then... has Trump ever made anybody laugh? I mean, apart from at that disabled journalist (wow. very truth) and the farce that is his presidency.

@Janus
you are not alone,many here on the sift tend to lean in your direction,however,i find this to be misplaced skepticism.

when it comes to russian internal policies,and actions abroad i tend to agree with the assertion that RT leans towards russian state "message of the day".similar to how CNN,MSNBC and FOX play that game.

but when it comes to being critical of the USA,and considering just who chris hedges is as a journalist and writer.i find the criticism un-warranted.

that is just my opinion,you are free to disagree of course.

though i would like to point out that many media outlets that have produced fantastic content,with exceptional journalists,are under siege.TeLeSUR and aljazeera english are in the crapper due to funding,and small,independent outlets are also struggling to compete with the megalithic corporate media to bring critical analysis in these dangerous times.

so while i agree that a venue such as RT should be approached with a modicum of skepticism,i also feel very strongly that we should not throw the baby out with the bath water.

chris hedges has been a extremely vocal critic of power,corruption and the devastating affects of neoliberalism.pulitzer prize winning author and journalist.

so while this may be on on RT,it is chris hedges that has credit with me.he has proven to be a man of integrity.