MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE
by Michael Wolraich
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MURDER, POLITICS, AND THE END OF THE JAZZ AGE by Michael Wolraich Order today at Barnes & Noble / Amazon / Books-A-Million / Bookshop |
In its probe of an alleged chemical attack in Syria, the OPCW shunned the critical investigative area of forensic pathology and censored a recommendation to pursue it. The Douma killings remain unsolved.
Comments
Toxic Legacy - ChemWeapons & Birth Defects in Syria
https://syriaaccountability.org/updates/2021/12/02/a-toxic-legacy-chemic...
A Reflection On Accountability For Chemical Weapon Use In Syria
https://www.interaction.org/blog/a-reflection-on-accountability-for-chem...
'Syria has not disclosed its chemical weapons arsenal yet'
https://www.middleeastmonitor.com/20211130-syria-has-not-disclosed-its-c...
At least 1,510 Syrian Citizens, Including 205 Children and 260 Women, Have Been Killed and 12,000 Injured, With Victims Still Waiting for the Syrian Regime to be Held Accountable
https://sn4hr.org/blog/2021/11/30/57099/
by PeraclesPlease on Tue, 12/07/2021 - 8:02am
Your first link speculates on the connection between chemical weapons use and a spike in birth defects. Such a connection seems very believable to me just like a connection between reprocessed uranium artillery shells and birth defects seems likely even though neither has been proven. The fact is though, that whether true or not, birth defects being caused by chemical attack in Syria has nothing to say one way or another about whether the OPCW has misrepresented and covered up evidence about the one particular case which Mate’s reporting deals with.
Your second link, published this past November, mentions several gas attacks but does not mention Douma. The third link reports on a statement by Fernando Arias, the Director-General of the OPCW, that says Syria is still hiding chemical weapons. Maybe so, but the statement says nothing about Douma and adds nothing to the controversy over the Douma investigation. Any statement by Arias that does pertain to the Douma investigation should be considered in light of the fact that it was Arias who got to find himself not guilty of Mate’s charges but continues to hide information. The fourth link, also from last month, also stops short of mentioning Douma, but at one point says:
If you trust that assertion from your own link then it must be hard to deny the possibility that the Douma attack could have been a false flag carried out by ISIS or some other group. Do you have anything of substance which actually pertains to the subject. The subject is the corruption of science and the shunning of forensic expertise by the OPCW which left the Douma murders in Syria unsolved
by A Guy Called LULU on Tue, 12/07/2021 - 7:30pm
You like Douma Douma Douma at the expense of all else. Even if Matés contention were true, there's enough other civilian atrocity by Assad (with Putin's support) to be horrified by. But Aaron doesn't care - he's got a few basic tasks on his agenda, and everything else can go hang
by PeraclesPlease on Wed, 12/08/2021 - 12:25am
actual Syrian news:
Israeli air strikes hit Syrian port city of Latakia, local media says @ Twitter events
by artappraiser on Tue, 12/07/2021 - 3:10pm
“Actual” Syrian news. That is your introduction to a report that has nothing at all to do with the subject of this post but is a way to take a backhanded swipe at it without supporting your view in any way. Correct me if I am wrong: [Or if you can't maybe PP will jump in and run interference for you] It looks to me that by totally ignoring the subject [Something I have seen you get livid about when others do it while commenting on a post by you] and calling your post “actual news”, that you are snidely intending to draw a distinction that incriminates the reporting by Mate’ as being non-news or fake news or maybe something else, but not “actual” news. Do you really believe that there are not legitimate questions about the OPCW investigation of the Douma attack and that there is no actual "news" worth posting about it
by A Guy Called LULU on Tue, 12/07/2021 - 7:50pm
Syria disinfo is the subject of this post, and you're getting the blowback it deserves.
by PeraclesPlease on Wed, 12/08/2021 - 12:26am
No, how the OPCW handled an important, and therefore newsworthy, investigation is the subject. I don't think you are so stupid you can't see that, I think you are being intellectually dishonest in trying to deflect since you cannot argue on the merits.
by A Guy Called LULU on Thu, 12/09/2021 - 8:52pm
I've argued on merits numerous times. It's a dead end, a time sinkhole. All of 2 Syrian dictatorships, Russian involvement in Syria, a Civil War with massive civilian death, and a weird conflagration involving Kurds, ISIS & Turkish troops disappear into whether a single chemical weapon shell was faked (and whether the UN hushed up renegade leaking inspectors). Apparently the UN and all its members are too stupid to see the brilliant wisdom of Aaron Mate and the Russian delegation to the UN, and insist on sanctioning Syria instead. Must be heartbreaking.
by PeraclesPlease on Fri, 12/10/2021 - 12:07am
by artappraiser on Fri, 12/10/2021 - 1:25am
I spent some time looking at the home page of Grayzone after looking at your link. Nearly every single one of their "news" posts is actually not just not news, but pretty much on the same topic: the United States is bad and we're searching the world to find anyone willing to say that. It's beyond me how you can't see that, it's very blatant.
by artappraiser on Wed, 12/08/2021 - 12:43am
How does reporting on one area of interest say anything one way or the other about the quality and accurateness of the reporting? It doesn't. I cannot see why you cannot see that.
by A Guy Called LULU on Thu, 12/09/2021 - 8:55pm
A few more news tweets make clear how simple things are in the general area and how easy it is to figure out what's going on -
but surely Aaron Mate sitting in Brooklyn, NY can figure it all out using Wikileaks.
by artappraiser on Wed, 12/08/2021 - 1:30am
He already did - US responsible whatever bad happens.
Russia's just helping humanitarily and/or asserting its natural rights/strategic interests.
by PeraclesPlease on Wed, 12/08/2021 - 4:14am
This one is funnier than most. You start out saying how a few tweets [that are not about or relevant to the subject] show "how simple things are and how easy it is to figure out what's going on". Then ending with a sarcastic remark indicating that Mate' actually cannot figure anything out because he is sitting in Brooklyn. Where are you sitting that gives you a special perch to see all the answers so clearly?
by A Guy Called LULU on Thu, 12/09/2021 - 9:06pm
6 ghosts of fellow travelers past
https://digbysblog.net/2021/12/08/a-system-gone-insane/
by PeraclesPlease on Wed, 12/08/2021 - 11:22am
PP you might want to use this one some day in the future
France Court: Assad Official Cannot Be Prosecuted — Because Assad Regime Has Not Signed War Crimes Statute
Posted by Scott Lucas | Nov 26, 2021
by artappraiser on Fri, 12/10/2021 - 2:59am
both found retweeted by Scott Lucas who is a Brit, self-describes as
went to his site, found this
US Sanctions Senior Assad Officers Involved in Chemical Attacks
Posted by Scott Lucas | Dec 8, 2021
and this
“Narco-State”: The Assad Regime and the Surge in Illegal Drug Trade
Posted by Scott Lucas | Dec 7, 2021
and this
Israel Hits Assad Regime’s Port at Latakia
Posted by Scott Lucas | Dec 7, 2021
OR ALTERNATELY, I would especially recommend
Al-Monitor's SYRIA SECTION
https://www.al-monitor.com/syria
as they offer news, analysis and opinion from various experts on Syria and don't beat a dead horse.
by artappraiser on Fri, 12/10/2021 - 1:51am
oh I see now, that EA Worldview has a Syria section too:
https://eaworldview.com/topics/syria/
and I also checked out the U.N. News Service, which has a Mideast Section
https://news.un.org/en/news/region/middle-east?page=1
where there's not a lot on Syria recently except on their food shortage BUT SHEESH they sure are bashing Israel a lot lately about the situation in Palestine and also on settlements, not exactly a U.S. lackey on that point, seems like they don't always follow U.S. instructions, imagine that
by artappraiser on Fri, 12/10/2021 - 2:02am
Wow, I'm sure Aaron Maté will be right on it. A pretty horrific tale.
by PeraclesPlease on Fri, 12/10/2021 - 9:04am
Aaron's distracted with the Assange story right now.
By the way, I get a kick out of the way people like Lulu bash me for using Twitter not realizing that people like Aaron Mate tweet like several times a day mostly U.S. bashing. He last promoted the OPCW Douma Syria story like 10 tweets ago on Dec. 8. If you like Aaron's "reporting" that's where he promotes it, like virtually anyone else purporting to practice journalism.
P.S. And The Grayzone Tweets here.They promoted and linked to Aaron's story here:
Turns out Twitter DOES have all the U.S. bashing you might want. You just got to use the Search box, it's not internet rocket science. I just don't follow them because I know, like they say there, their emphasis is on investigative journalism on empire. That's a big negative indicator for me because I don't believe any "empire" exists anymore, I see that and I think: well, these people are not worth my time, they got a distorted old timey ax to grind and they use Jack's site to do it.
by artappraiser on Fri, 12/10/2021 - 10:05am
You are going to great effort to disagree with Mate's reporting without in any way even mentioning, much less disputing, what he reported. This comment train should at least occasionally refer to what he reported by those who bash it, don't you think? The report is about an international organization, It is not primarily about the U.S. It is about the OPCW, it is not about Assad. Promoting a story at twitter is hardly the same as reporting a story at twitter which I do not think can be effectively or correctly done. A movie poster promoting a movie is not the movie. Did you read the report this thread is about? Do you dispute anything that Mate' reported? I will wait for PP to answer for you.
At what point, approximately, did we cease to be an empire if we ever were one? Was it very recently? I ask because very recently a couple of your Republican neocon heroes of late, Bill Kristol and Max Boot, have said that we are in fact an empire. You have shown that those two clowns have been worth a lot of your time including the time spent reading their opinions and chewing the mental cud of those opinions until they were somehow digestible and then bringing their opinions here and defending them as enlightened wisdom. The NYT has said recently that we are an empire as have several highly acclaimed books published in the last few years. Do you think we quit being an empire in the last couple months or maybe even way back two or three years ago? I won’t be surprised if you reject Niall Ferguson’s conclusion that we are an empire because he is a historian and you have so often dismissed history as having little to do with today.
by A Guy Called LULU on Fri, 12/10/2021 - 6:01pm
Lulu - why are you wasting your time arguing with people whose minds are completely closed? Life is too short. Eat, drink, and be merry.
by HSG on Fri, 12/10/2021 - 7:45pm
Hey HSG, good to see you checking in.
by A Guy Called LULU on Fri, 12/10/2021 - 9:40pm
mho, Lulu looks for confirmation bias on analysis sites that have ply the same old timey narrative of the world that he is fixated on because of emotional memories. Fine, but to over and over and over and over expect others to waste time pointing out the faults in the articles IS A WASTE OF TIME. He's looking to argue with adversaries about the narrative he obviously has belief in with a few anonymous users on Dagblog. I REFUSE TO WASTE MY TIME DOING HIS WORK FOR HIM. If he wants interlocutors to challenge the cherry-picked narrative in long debates over and over and over, there's tons of news materials on the internet that can furnish that besides Peracles Please and artappraiser on Dagblog. I refuse to meticulously debate line by line the old timey lefty analysis he presents. I'll look at it, grateful that he wants to share an article he likes but I consider it a collosol waste of time to serve as as a debater picking apart his article and narrative choices over and over and over. There's plenty of counter-information narratives available, why doesn't he just read and share those too? The whole thing that Dagblog participants (or TPMCafe before that) should serve as his debate partners or they have a closed mind IS ABSURD and self-centered.LIFE IS TOO SHORT to have the closed mind he does and expect others to confirm that bias he has even further.
by artappraiser on Sat, 12/11/2021 - 9:59am
Is Russia an Empire? or China? asking for a friend.
by PeraclesPlease on Sat, 12/11/2021 - 2:59am
Ooh, now your friend has a very interesting question!
China is definitely working on it!
A few examples here, I see plenty more all the time
re: Gwadar port built by China in Pakistan:
Mho, on the other hand, Russia is small, is no longer the USSR, but Putin always trying to get that mojo back regarding patriotic pride. Reality is that no way can they do the USSR empire thing, it's for show now. Plus plenty of people there still have bitter memories about spending Russian blood in takeover of Afghanistan, they don't want lots of international projects, just the patriotic pride. The Russian trolls causing chaos in social media is doing that on the cheap. World dominance is no longer a supportable project, but regional is. Putin is truly genuinely afraid of NATO,.and (like it or not, just sayin') that is a balance to any ambitions he might have.
by artappraiser on Sat, 12/11/2021 - 9:44am
Like I said, I read your article, and then I looked at their home page. And I found them pushing a narrative that as usual is extremely biased to the point of ridiculousness, trying to confirm his narrative that there is some order in the world and the U.S. is in charge of it.
Then I went to some of my favorite sources for related news on Twitter and then in like 5 minutes found counter-narratives galore and even objectivity.
It's fine that Mate has fixated on this one incident in the past and do a deep dive to find things that confirm his con narrative. It's like a hobby! (Though no doubt he would only last a couple days as an actual detective, would be fired for deluding himself with cherry picking.)
THE WORLD HAS CHANGED SINCE THEN, RADICALLY, HAVE YOU HEARD? There's a pandemic on, one much greater than the "Spanish flu" that changed the world and one that might still rival the Black Death.
You might get a sense of comfort by pretending the Cold War is still on and the U.S. is the bogeyman in cahoots with the U.N. and reading to confirm that delusion, but I don't. I don't want to waste my time debating your delusions, I'd rather spend the time reading to figure out what is really going on. I put things in threads not to ply a narrative BUT to actually figure out what's really going on, whether I like it or not. You don't help me by posting things on crime and police in the U.S., why should I help you promote your old timey narrative that the Cold War is still on.
For the umpteenth time I explain why I don't want to debate a silly navel-gazing old timey lefty point with you (especially on Syria use of chemical weapons, that few care about anymore they care more about the Syrian refugees piling up on their shores, they wish Assad or someone else would take them back)
Why do I do that? Because you have this insidious thing of making people feel guilty because they see that things are not as simple as you suggest and won't school you on how to find better news.
Those links didn't take me anywhere near as much time as responding in written word like this to you. I consider it a respectful favor to answer you and tell you that I found it wanting. ISN'T THAT ENOUGH FOR YOU? Why don't you just say: thank you arta and PP, I disagree? Instead you use it as whipping boy to accuse me of what you actually do: fixate on a narrative that is comforting to you by reading only sources that confirm. You are supposed to do the work, write more shit up defending it and I might or might not read. Why do I have to do your work if I find the article wanting. I offered my opinion, why isn't it enough.
Please lord, help me to resist being polite to Lulu by taking his bullshit challenges and accusations seriously. I could have been reading better sources, MANY, in the time I s
I EVER complain that you don't look at the stuff I post. Why do you do that about yours? Expect hours and weeks of debate about it .I am not your seminar leader, I don't have to go through the article point by point, to debate it with you.
Again, I actually did read it and found it a waste of my time compared to other things I pointed to on Twitter that would serve me far better if I read them.
PP is the one who has raised interesting topics about the present and future on this thread, which got me interested enough to look for more. You as usual furnish crap and then get upset that I offer the opinion that it's a crappy article and I feel I wasted my time.
by artappraiser on Sat, 12/11/2021 - 10:34am
Your first paragraph is loaded with demeaning accusations and IMO is wrong. You then say:
You even found objectivity? Cool. And you recognized objectivity? Double cool. And you saw objectivity there but not in the Mate’s reporting? Hmm. I guess we have to take your word for it since you say it but do not support it. There are no doubts on my part that some pundits defend the OPCW’s alleged cover up and some attack Mate’ in the process. I have seen some of them but none which I believe made a good case. That said, I think local protocol would expect you to provide a link to your quick and easy find of evidence that he is wrong.
Soon you start screaming.
When in the last hundred and fifty years of rapid development would that statement not be true, but also when would the statement, “The more things change the more they stay the same” not point to a strong element of historical truth? And how about history does not repeat itself but it often rhymes? The next time a government lies to justify something they did or something they intend to do will not be the first time. When you say everything has changed do you mean that our government has quit playing loose with and covering up the truth and that critical looks by independent journalists at what they say are of no value because even if the government lied it was yesterday that they lied and yesterday is so ... uh ... yesterday and that we should now only listen to what the government says today and journalists should not question what they say today because today is a new day and the world has changed.
Next you start to really lose it.
You start out calling me delusional which is one of several times you have made unflattering analysis of my psyche and go on to say that you are just into gathering information. As you do you are spreading onfo on your own psyche too.
Maybe so many people that think a new cold war actually is beginning are wrong, I don't think so, but that is not what I posted about anyway although it is related. And you go on to say that because I am not “helping” you make whatever point you are trying to make by posting an endless stream of crime by blacks is why you will not help me promote what information I offer a few times a month on international policy. Simple and cold as that huh? That’s part of how your approval-needy mind works? No thanks. Your relentless posting of black crime news and accompanying comments, as a whole, look more like a vendetta against the now departed than any simple gathering of information.
Well pardon me if I don’t see the respect. Until now you have brought me up in the third person described with derisive comments of your own or to PP or by high-fiving his cheap shots all the while ignoring both the subject of my news post and my direct questions to you that are directly relevant to the comment of yours where they appear. You also ask somewhere in this mess why I get angry. This is, I believe, another case of projection. You seem quite angry. It has been a long time since I have become angry at anyone here.
Now that screaming is fucking screamingly hilarious. And so is the rest of that paragraph. Actually, your entire comment is pretty funny. What am I expected to defend when nothing stated by the article is addressed, directly disputed, or compared to countervailing evidence.. You don't attack the article, you smear the author. You don't bring counter arguments, you just say that there are some but add that it is an old story and we should all just move on. And you express anger at wasting time which nobody asked you to spend one way or another but that you did in fact waste spouting nonsense. And you say I should thank you.
Are you losing your voice from screaming? I assume you tried to holler ‘never’ instead of ‘ever’. Actually, just above you did complain that I never “help you” on your crime posts. And I have never ever, not once, complained that you did not look at what I post or that you did not respond to what I wrote or linked to. I have pointed out here and other times when you only come in with deflection from the topic and with straw men to shoot at while refusing to address the actual topic. This thread is an example.
In a response to HSG above you say,
Those interesting topics on different subjects could be presented on a blog of his own and you two could stroke each other there rather than flooding this blog with ad hominem straw man off-topic deflections which I think PP does for perverse trolling pleasure.
And in an earlier response to HSG further above there is more screaming:
Relax AA, I am not asking and have not asked you to do any work for me.
by A Guy Called LULU on Sat, 12/11/2021 - 11:19pm