China says it WILL shoot Pelosi's plane down IF she travels to Taiwan under US fighter escort

[Citysnaps]

So the point of her trip, yet again, is to antagonize China while we’re already staring down a potential nuclear conflict.

No. Pelosi has not stated why she is visiting Taiwan.

 

[NT1440]

No. Pelosi has not stated why she is visiting Taiwan.

As you pointed out previously, to do the same shit stirring she did 30 years ago.

 

[Citysnaps]

As you pointed out previously, to do the same shit stirring she did 30 years ago.

Standing with pro-democracy students?

 

[Nycturne]

At best, the US has very pointedly acknowledged China's claim to Taiwan, it has not recognized it. That subtle difference is very important. This is not a new position of the US government in any real way. From a moral perspective, I'm not sure why the US should take a route of appeasement versus upholding the status quo in the decades since the PRC was recognized as the legal government by the US. So I don't know what signed agreement about a "one China policy" is even being referred to here, as there isn't any. It's a US policy that directs how the US government engages with China. Taiwan has been a sticking point in relations with China ever since the ROC government was kicked out of power. Detente at this point would be ceding ground.

And no, I don't think the US is always in the right, but I don't think you can just outright say that either side in this issue is in the right here. The people of Taiwan have been living autonomously for over half a century. If China is saber rattling over Taiwan, which it has been, it is possible that a little saber rattling back will help hold the status quo. But we've seen what capitulation does multiple times in history.

 

[SuperMatt]

We are clearly building the consent for the future war we want with the future leader of the multipolar world.

This is a PR step in that process. All military estimates expect us to actually fight China in the 2030’s. They’ve been talking about it since the 70’s.

I don’t understand this flippant attitude that America has, where we can just do whatever we want on paper thin pretenses that are hypocritical at best and cynical in reality. We have no reason to antagonize China, and when it comes down to it, barring a major restructuring of the world economy we’re going to lose badly when we finally try, until we’re facing a nuclear situation.

Detente should be the path forward for international relations, but nobody wants it for reasons that are petty regurgitated talking points. America doesn’t give a fuck about Taiwan outside using it as a color revolution staging ground against china, and the fact that we sold our state capacity to build ANYTHING for a couple of decades of Wall Street riches.

The chickens are coming home to roost.

I’m not sure how China has a leg to stand on when they don’t give other nations the respect they demand for themselves.

Standing up to bullies is a good, not a bad thing. China has proven that they don’t respect their commitments, such as supposedly allowing Hong Kong to self-govern. They’ve become more and more demanding about the Taiwan situation as their economic power has grown. There needs to be some pushback, and the small steps taken by Biden and Pelosi in that direction are welcome, IMHO.

 

[Deleted member 215]

I am not for war with China, but I am for ending the BS "polite fiction" of "one China". If we've learned anything from Ukraine, it should be to not underestimate the propensity for autocrats to just go and grab what they want.

 

[NT1440]

Jake Sullivan.

There’s plenty of work going on behind the scenes to shape your average American’s geopolitical understanding of what’s going on in the world.

Unfortunately it’s very clear that our domestic propaganda clearly works marvelously for those unaware of what having “former” intelligence officials at the heads of all the major news agencies actually means.

 

[ronntaylor]

So the point of her trip, yet again, is to antagonize China while we’re already staring down a potential nuclear conflict.

It's a fucking trip by the Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives. If that sets off a war it's because China is full of crazy assholes, with Xi as the head clown. No wonder Pooh and Mango got along so well.

 

[SuperMatt]

Jake Sullivan.

There’s plenty of work going on behind the scenes to shape your average American’s geopolitical understanding of what’s going on in the world.

Unfortunately it’s very clear that our domestic propaganda clearly works marvelously for those unaware of what having “former” intelligence officials at the heads of all the major news agencies actually means.

This sounds like another version of the “MSM” conspiracy from the far right. All the newspapers, TV stations, and websites are working together to lie to America. Does this version also have the one heroic news source who tells the truth as Fox News? Or another ‘truth-teller’ instead?

 

[Nycturne]

I am not for war with China, but I am for ending the BS "polite fiction" of "one China". If we've learned anything from Ukraine, it should be to not underestimate the propensity for autocrats to just go and grab what they want.

The status quo has held for so long that it is hard to end the "polite fiction". And the PRC is rather aggressive about getting public figures to play along to avoid an incident (i.e. John Cena), so it would take a lot to undo it at this point. That said, I do fundamentally agree that we shouldn't just fall into the pattern of appeasement and detente that didn't work for Ukraine, and didn't work for Europe in the 20th century.

There’s plenty of work going on behind the scenes to shape your average American’s geopolitical understanding of what’s going on in the world.

Unfortunately it’s very clear that our domestic propaganda clearly works marvelously for those unaware of what having “former” intelligence officials at the heads of all the major news agencies actually means.

And I seriously hope anyone attempting that sort of nonsense fails, that said, I'd need something a bit more compelling than a screen grab from an unknown source. Or would revealing the source reveal the bias of that source? Propaganda works in both directions.

You seem to be trying to convince us that the US is attempting to intentionally escalate things now of all times. If anything, everyone seems a little busy with Putin's nonsense, and is more just hoping to make sure China doesn't capitalize on Putin as a distraction to change the status quo.

 

[ronntaylor]

And I seriously hope anyone attempting that sort of nonsense fails, that said, I'd need something a bit more compelling than a screen grab from an unknown source.

I did a quick word search after a source was conveniently left off:

Sott.net (short for Signs of the Times) is a website founded in 2002 by the Quantum Future Group, founded by an American conspiracy theorist, Laura Knight-Jadczyk.

It is known for promoting pseudoscientific and esoteric content published on other platforms, as well as right-wing populist views[1] as well as misinformation about the 2020 American presidential election and the COVID-19 pandemic. Media Bias/Fact Check lists the website as strongly conspiritorial and pseudoscientific.[2]

Yeah, no!! A bunch of nutters swallowing Pooh's rhetoric whole.

 

[Nycturne]

Yeah, no!! A bunch of nutters swallowing Pooh's rhetoric whole.

Nothing says trustworthy more than a section entitled "Puppet Masters". /s

 

[NT1440]

This sounds like another version of the “MSM” conspiracy from the far right. All the newspapers, TV stations, and websites are working together to lie to America. Does this version also have the one heroic news source who tells the truth as Fox News? Or another ‘truth-teller’ instead?

I’m a leftist soooo.

Fox News has been a GOP operation from day one. It was literally conceived by Roger Ailes when he worked in the Nixon White House. “A plan for putting the GOP in TV news” was it’s name. https://www.rollingstone.com/politi...an-for-putting-the-gop-on-tv-news-202083/amp/

Meanwhile, in the last 15 years I’ve watched the Democratic Party wholly embrace the intelligence agencies and not batting an eye as the literal heads of intelligence agencies (whoops, “ex-CIA” ) become imbedded in the media narratives and direction of your standard corporate owned CNN’s/ABC’s/MSNBC’s. The very people at the head of the lies of the Iraq, Syria, Yemen, Somalia, wars that have been so easily forgotten. The agencies that got caught SPYING on the very “oversight” committees in congress that allegedly wield power over them.

Meanwhile Republican and Democratic presidents in my lifetime continue to play out the very wars and conflicts (all under different excuses for their bases) that we’re outlined by Cheney and the neocon ghouls that seem to pass seamlessly between administrations.

For christs sakes people we’ve had Elliot Abrams (the Iran contra death squad guy) in charge of Venezuela policy while the CNN’s and NBC’s tell us that of course we’re not the ones behind coup activities. Just a couple of weeks ago John Bolton spilled the beans that he was involved in that very project.

What does it take for Americans to see that what their country DOES and what it SAYS (especially to it’s own people) haven’t matched up for literal decades at this point?

Everyone in the field of geopolitics since it’s inception has agreed that China given it’s resources, population, size, and location in the globe will naturally rise to be a world power. Everything we’re doing is to try to prevent that, and the history of empires shows it’s just simply not going to bode well for us.

We should be unifying as a species around the collective suicide we’ve ushered in with Climate Change, but we’re still spending our last dying days as top dog acting like these bullshit wars NEED to happen, but they will be the very acts that close the window on dealing with the true problem at hand.

So…does that make me a Trump supporting Fox News watching idiot in your eyes or can you people at least see what my perspective is and why I’ve come to it? Are we here to talk, or just make assumptions about each other?

 

[Citysnaps]

Unfortunately it’s very clear that our domestic propaganda clearly works marvelously for those unaware of what having “former” intelligence officials at the heads of all the major news agencies actually means.

Being kind of a US intelligence agencies junkie...I'm curious which former intelligence agency officials now head all of the major news agencies. Can you help me out with that?

 

[SuperMatt]

So…does that make me a Trump supporting Fox News watching idiot in your eyes or can you people at least see what my perspective is and why I’ve come to it? Are we here to talk, or just make assumptions about each other?

I didn’t say you supported Fox or Trump. But the assertion that no media can be trusted and is run by former intelligence officials is an audacious one, usually only seen from those convinced that Fox is the only network telling the truth.

If we are to have a discussion, I think we should start with the question from @citypix … Who are these former intelligence officials that are running every media outlet? From there, I think we definitely can begin a productive discourse.

 

[NT1440]

Being kind of a US intelligence agencies junkie...I'm curious which former intelligence agency officials now head all of the major news agencies. Can you help me out with that?

John Brennan, James Clapper, Chuck Rosenberg, Michael Hayden, Frank Figliuzzi, Fran Townsend, Stephen Hall, Samantha Vinograd, Andrew McCabe, Josh Campbell, Asha Rangappa, Phil Mudd, James Gagliano, Jeremy Bash, Susan Hennessey, Ned Price, Leon Ponetta, etc.

You can look them up if you wish and which news sources they are now the “heads” of. John Brennan for example “serves as a senior national security and intelligence analyst for NBC News and MSNBC”. The same Brennan who spied ON THE CONGRESSIONAL committee that oversees intelligence agencies as head of the CIA under Obama.

But I’m sure that all these people working directly AT news agencies across the board has no sway on that hard hitting reporting these networks do. The acceptance of “unmanned intelligence officials” as “sources” in journalism used to be considered scandalous and even malpractice not even 30 years ago. In the last 10 source accreditation to these anonymous has accelerated massively.

I’m sure they have no part in furthering their “former” employing agencies pet projects.

The media (investigative journalism) was supposed to be the “check” on these powers, now they’re literally stenographers.

I should make it clear that they’re not “running” these news agencies, they’re merely using them to make sure the narratives they want out in the public get there. A tiny unimportant but recent example: the Snake Island story which made its way around the world before eventually having to be retracted. Nobody bothered to ask for evidence and instead just ran with the “intelligence reports”.

 

[Hrafn]

I'll take "let me google that for you for $1000 Ken..."

 

[Citysnaps]

John Brennan, James Clapper, Chuck Rosenberg, Michael Hayden, Frank Figliuzzi, Fran Townsend, Stephen Hall, Samantha Vinograd, Andrew McCabe, Josh Campbell, Asha Rangappa, Phil Mudd, James Gagliano, Jeremy Bash, Susan Hennessey, Ned Price, Leon Ponetta, etc.

You can look them up if you wish and which news sources they are now the “heads” of. John Brennan for example “serves as a senior national security and intelligence analyst for NBC News and MSNBC”. The same Brennan who spied ON THE CONGRESSIONAL committee that oversees intelligence agencies as head of the CIA under Obama.

But I’m sure that all these people working directly AT news agencies across the board has no sway on that hard hitting reporting these networks do. The acceptance of “unmanned intelligence officials” as “sources” in journalism used to be considered scandalous and even malpractice not even 30 years ago. In the last 10 source accreditation to these anonymous has accelerated massively.

I’m sure they have no part in furthering their “former” employing agencies pet projects.

The media (investigative journalism) was supposed to be the “check” on these powers, now they’re literally stenographers.

I should make it clear that they’re not “running” these news agencies, they’re merely using them to make sure the narratives they want out in the public get there. A tiny unimportant but recent example: the Snake Island story which made its way around the world before eventually having to be retracted. Nobody bothered to ask for evidence and instead just ran with the “intelligence reports”.

Ah, OK. I recognize some of those names as working for or leading various agencies in the past. And have been interviewed for their insight on different news events.

I thought "at the heads of all the major news agencies" meant they now are in charge of all the major news agencies.

They are simply sources of information after having many years of experience in various US agencies. They are extremely qualified to interpret different matters relating to intelligence and foreign policy with respect to events that are happening in the world.

 

[NT1440]

I'll take "let me google that for you for $1000 Ken..."

Really? You want a report in each one? The fact that the former head (John Brennan) of the CIA is actually employed as a Senior Analyst for NBC doesn’t lead you to want to look further?

 

[NT1440]

Ah, OK. I recognize those names as being interviewed in the past.

I thought "at the heads of all the major news agencies" meant they now are in charge of all the major news agencies.

No, they’re involved in editorial direction and often turned to on the talk shows for their (agency’s) take on a given topic.

It’s journalistic malpractice to look for framing from the very people the media are supposed to be adversarial by occupation against.

The Spies Who Came in to the TV Studio

Former intelligence officials are enjoying second acts at television pundits. Here’s why that should bother us.

www.politico.com

An example from the 70’s: https://www.nytimes.com/1977/12/26/...ork-built-by-the-cia-a-worldwide-network.html