Jimmy Dore, War: Trump, Obama, hopeless.

Great Debates
1

I just watched this Jim Dore video and it was deeply disturbed.

I think Jimmy Dore is the face of the “never Hillary” voter, that believed Obama and Hillary where basically no different than Republicans—in the pockets of the corporate-establishment, globalist-elites, and millitary industrial complex— so, never Hillary! …And that was the viewpoint I was firmly against in the election, because I wanted the democrats to win.

But then I watched this video and for the first time I can see how some people became so anti-Hillary, anti-Obama, they took the “never Hillary” stance even though they where democrats.

It makes me feel like there is no hope. US is just a perpetual war machine no matter who is in office and nothing is going to get better.

2

I’ve noticed that there are some anti-war, anti-interventionist libertarian types out on the fringes - one might call them “isolationists” - who are hoping that Trump will put an end to the reign of the neo-cons. That seems naïve, I think. Quite frankly the only thing I see guaranteeing that the Americans won’t attack Iran in the next four years is that Iran somehow acquires nuclear weapons ASAP. Here’s hoping that won’t be necessary.

3

I’m hoping that “it was deeply disturbed” was NOT a typo for “I was deeply disturbed” or for “it was deeply disturbing.” If my hope is in vain, then …

I’m also disturbed. Jimmy Dore’s “logic” is identical to the syllogism:
(1) Joseph Goebbels tied his shoelaces.
(2) Trevor Noah ties his shoelaces.
(3) Therefore Trevor Noah is the same as Joseph Goebbels.

I’m disturbed that SDMB needs to waste its time refuting utter nonsense.

4

“Globalist-elites”
Who is that? Tell me who those guys are. I hear this a lot. “Elites” or variations of it. Is that a right wing radio thing, like SJW or Democrat party?

5

globalist elites- I think of it as a lose term for billionaires at the head of international banks and corps who have lobbyists and influence on politics. Not necessarily Republican or Democrat.

6

I meant global elite as described here.

The Rise of the New Global Elite - The Atlantic

7

Why did the video disturb you, OP? Have you never seen that old Wesley Clark blurb? Is it due to the recent escalation in Somalia? America has been openly operating there for the better part of a year now.

You can defend Obama as being better than Bush, but I think his campaigns in Libya, Syria, Somalia, and Yemen rise above the seriousness of tying shoelaces, even in comparison to Bush’s invasions of Iraq and Afghanistan. The comparison is certainly murky, since Obama has preferred proxy forces over direct intervention. It’s unclear how much of Syria one can fairly lay at Obama’s feet.

This would place Dore as even more radical than Chomsky for example, who regularly implores listeners to vote Democrat with the logic that even small differences can be amplified over large systems. Is Dore an accelerationist?

It’s not all bad. America’s efforts have been stymied, in part by opposition at home and resistance from Russia. Perhaps there’s less reason to be hopeful in the short term due to the recent election. But over the long haul things seem to be improving. Compare America’s behavior now to that of the Vietnam era, including those of the military, the elites, and the attitudes of the common people.

8

Jimmy Dore is pretty good IMO, however I think he’s symbolizes alot of what sane left leaning non Alex-Jones types have been wanting to articulate for a long time, and most of the time Jimmy’s not wrong either.

9

Well, that’s makes me feel a tad bit better.

10

That Jimmy Dore guy is clueless.

For those who don’t want to watch the video, he plays clips of retired general Wes Clark who says that Rumsfeld was drawing up plans to invade several Middle Eastern countries immediately after 9/11. Dore then asserts that Obama is carrying out what Bush started. Which is stupid. Here’s why.

Some of Bush’s people clearly fantasized about toppling several dictators in the ME, generally for the goal of reshaping the politics of the whole region. One can argue about the reasons why they wanted to do this, but their vision was clear.

Dore asserts that Obama’s intervention in Syria, Libya, Somalia, and Yemen are eerily consistent with this plan. I am NOT suggesting that one ought to support those interventions, but here’s why Dore is either an idiot or trying to lie to you.

Obama’s intervention in Yemen came after an Al Qaida affiliate very nearly succeeded in bombing an airliner on Christmas Day. There is no doubt that this plot came from Yemen. Also, for many years the US cooperated with the quite repressive government there.

The intervention in Libya was a direct result of the Arab Spring and a violent uprising against Qaddafi. Here the US was supporting a change in government, but really didn’t try very hard at all to shape the post-war situation. It was kind of a half-assed thing.

Somalia has a sort-of AQ affiliate that is quite threatening to Kenya, a friend of the US, not to mention that Western people are often kidnapped there. Sure, the US drops a bomb there every once in a while, but let’s get real - Somalia is a long way from the Middle East.

Syria - well, its a mess, but US policy is about stopping ISIL. We aren’t bombing Assad’s armies. (At least not on purpose.) The main effort to get Assad out is actually diplomatic, and it isn’t really working very well.

And then there’s Iran. There’s a black president who signed an agreement to try to peacefully end Iran’s nuclear weapons program while affording Iran relief from economic sanctions, which led conservatives to say that he’s shoring up a terrorist regime. I forget the name of the president who did that, but the general policy seems to be the exact fucking opposite of regime change.

So any commentator not suffering from severe head trauma can see that Bush’s people clearly had a plan to go stir shit up in several countries with particular provocation, which I think was a bad idea. On the other hand, Obama’s interventions seem to be a mix of opportunism (Qaddafi might fall - let’s give him a little push!) to purely reacting to events (those guys in Yemen are handing out underwear bombs to attack our airliners - we can’t let them do that!)

This mouth breathing comedian thinks that because some of the same countries are involved, Obama is the same as Bush. This is like saying that there must be a connection between the assassination of JFK and the death of Elvis: Kennedy died in Dallas, and the King died on the toilet: it’s just too much of a conincidence to be explained away!!1!

11

Thanks for your, ummm, setting things straight, Ravenman.

Now I am curious of what you would say about this.

12

I don’t really have an interest in watching more videos. Why don’t you write out what you think about the subject?

13

Can you assure us first that you’re not Jimmy Dore, and/or that you have no vested interest in promoting his youtube channel?

14

Ravenman, here’s my summary of Dore’s talk.

And I am in no way trying to promote Jim Dore’s show and am not him.

The show was a discussion on an article titled “Syria: Another Pipeline War” written by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. for EcoWatch.

Summary
The real reason the US is in Syria is because there is a pipeline being built that goes from Quatar to Turkey. Saudi Arabia, US, Turkey, Quatar, all support this pipeline.

The pipeline goes through Syria, but Syria and Russia are allies, they both do not want the pipeline.

Russia does not want the pipeline because it sells gas to Europe and sees it as a threat. Putin sees the pipeline as NATO plot to change the status quo, deprive Russia of its only foot hold in the Middle East, strangle the Russian economy and end Russian leverage in European energy market.

In 2009, Assad announced that he would refuse to sign the agreement to allow the pipeline to run through Syria “to protect the interests of our Russian ally.”

When Assad rejected the Qatari pipeline, military and intelligence planners quickly arrived at the consensus that fomenting a Sunni uprising in Syria would be a good thing.

In 2013 Sec of State John Kerry told a congressional hearing that the Sunni kingdoms had offered to foot the bill for a US invasion of Syria to oust Assad. Kerry also stated “In fact, some of them [Sunni Nations] have said if the US is prepared to go do the whole thing, the way we’ve done it previously in other places [Iraq], they’ll carry the cost.

In 2011, the US joined France, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Turkey and England to form the “Friends of Syria Coalition” which formally demanded the removal of Assad.

Saudi intelligence documents, published by Wikileaks, show that by 2012, Turkey, Qatar and Saudi Arabia were arming, training and funding radical Jihadist Sunni Fighters from Syria, Iraq and elsewhere to overthrow the Assad’s Shia allied regime.

So, American allies in the middle east are funding the Radical Jihadists fighters, that the US fights?

And the War in Syria is over a pipeline?

15

You can’t swing a dead cat without hitting a pipeline of some sort, but what’s the evidence that the US cares about this pipeline? Obama rejected the Keystone XL that would have brought jobs to the US, but some Internet know-nothing thinks he’s sending the country to war over a pipeline between one country that doesn’t like us at all and another that has oil coming out of its ears anyway?

Doesn’t pass the common sense test.

ETA - even lefties are disregarding this nonsense: http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/37685-the-war-against-the-assad-regime-is-not-a-pipeline-war

16

You know, if I were building a pipeline, the last thing I’d do is try to build it through an unstable country in the middle of a fucking civil war. Saudi Arabia does just fine shipping petroleum to Europe via regular channels, why would they make themselves hostages to Syria?

This is the most retarded conspiracy theory I’ve ever heard, aside from the holographic planes on 9/11 theory.

17

Ravenman, Thanks for that.

I really don’t know very much about the US War in the Middle East or the many warring factions. But the explanation given in the article above in the link you posted, that the US is not fighting over a pipeline it is fighting because of its “primordial interest of the US permanent war state” doesn’t make sense much more sense than fighting over a pipeline. Also… Also, Jimmy Dore say that too.

Well, I disagree, it is not as retarded of a conspiracy theory as holographic planes. If it is a conspiracy theory it was a 8 pages long and written by a well educated person— John F. Kennedy Jr. Degrees from:
Harvard University
London School of Economics
University of Virginia

So not on the same level as the holographic planes theory.

18

Out of curiousity, why do you think it is worth turning to a comedian on YouTube for expert opinion on world affairs?

19

ROBERT F. Kennedy, Jr., who also believes that vaccines cause autism. A college degree doesn’t necessarily confer intelligence or logical thinking.

20

Seconded.
When the US starting giving (very limited) support to the rebels, I knew that many on the anti-interventionist side would need to find a cynical “real” reason for the US getting involved. This time there is no oil for the US to supposedly loot.

But then, they found it: the pipeline! The US is going to put its ass on the line politically, and get into another ME quagmire, and perhaps a proxy war with Russia, because they give all the fucks about the route of one of the pipes that crisscross the region and wider world.