the unbalanced evolution of homo sapiens

In March 2006, the Harvard Kennedy School published a working paper, “The Israel Lobby and U.S. Foreign Policy,” by influential political scientists John Mearsheimer and Stephen Walt. The paper, which ran in the London Review of Books and became the basis for a book published the following year, was an unflinching analysis of the impact of pro-Israel advocacy and lobbying groups on the U.S. political system, and the role of organizations like the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC) in shaping U.S. foreign policy towards the Middle East. Mearsheimer and Walt described a loose coalition of philanthropists, think tanks, advocacy groups, and Christian Zionist organizations that routinely pulled U.S. policy toward the Middle East away from America’s national interest, as the U.S. was being drawn into a military quagmire in Iraq. “Other special interest groups have managed to skew U.S. foreign policy in directions they favored,” Walt and Mearsheimer wrote, “but no lobby has mana...

The Grayzone   The Grayzone 's Max Blumenthal and Aaron Mate on the UN's approval of the US-Israeli plan to re-occupy Gaza under international cover, and the abstentions of Russia and China despite their stringent objections. 

Geopolitical Economy Report   The most overvalued stock on Earth may be that of Palantir, the corporate Big Brother that is getting huge contracts from the Trump administration and helps the US government wage war and carry out mass surveillance.    Executives have been selling billions of dollars worth of shares, yet CEO Alex Karp attacks short-sellers like "Big Short" investor Michael Burry, claiming they're "crazy" for thinking the company is in a bubble. Ben Norton explains.

GVS Deep Dive  Saudi Arabia just secured two of the most powerful assets in modern geopolitics: the U.S. F-35 stealth fighter and tens of thousands of Nvidia’s most advanced AI chips. Washington hoped this would pull Riyadh firmly back into the American orbit. But the outcome is something neither side fully expected: Mohammad bin Salman outplayed both Washington and Beijing — and used the great-power rivalry to his advantage.

The Grayzone   On Piers Morgan, The Grayzone 's Max Blumenthal confronts former US ambassador to Venezuela James Story over his history of coup plotting and collaboration with violent opposition elements.  

Israel’s genocide is being powered by Microsoft. From creating a massive digital dragnet, aiding in the production of A.I.-generated kill lists, hiring hundreds of Israeli spies to run its internal affairs, and suppressing figures opposing the slaughter, the Seattle-based tech corporation has played a key role in the violence.   by Alan Macleod    Part 6 - Targeting Enemies   Company employees are far from the only target of Microsoft’s wrath, however. In May, Karim Khan, chief prosecutor of the International Criminal Court, announced that Microsoft had locked him out of his official ICC email account, just as he was formalizing charges against Netanyahu and other top Israeli leaders. For many, the timing was not a coincidence, but rather a message. The British lawyer joined a vast plethora of Palestinians who have complained that Microsoft has terminated their accounts without warning. A BBC investigation found dozens of Palestinians who, after attempting to use Mic...

As panic-inducing travel advisories and doomsaying media reports prophesy the fall of Mali to an Al Qaeda affiliate attacking fuel convoys, the government has re-secured supply routes and hosted Mali’s first international defense expo in a supposedly besieged capital.   by Pavan Kulkarni  Part 2 - French-spawned terror groups Mali was among the first and worst affected by these terror groups. Its former colonizer, France, which was a key participant in Libya’s destruction, then deployed its troops, ostensibly to protect Mali. Over the years, its military presence expanded across the Sahel. Alongside, the armed groups also grew in strength, increasing attacks and the area under their control. This led to a growing perception that French troops in the region were not fighting the terror groups it helped create but guarding its own economic and political interests in maintaining its neocolonial grip over the troubled former colonies. Amid mass protests against the French troop de...

Geopolitical Economy Report   The US economy depends on an unsustainable stock market bubble driven by AI companies that are almost all losing money. Nvidia seems healthier, but serious red flags explain why its stock price is extremely volatile, and why its market capitalization dropped $600 billion in just one day. Ben Norton explains.

The Why Files   A behavioral expert who trains Navy SEALs and CIA operatives created a 20-point test that detects psychological manipulation with mathematical precision. Chase Hughes recently appeared on Shawn Ryan's podcast to discuss this system, and the same patterns appear in government propaganda, corporate deception, and social media algorithms. From a teenage girl's testimony that sold the Gulf War to Big Tobacco's forty-year lie, the scoring system reveals when you're being controlled. The formula works on anything—news coverage, corporate messaging, even the controversies you're arguing about right now. But once you learn to spot manipulation everywhere, you face a different danger. Foreign adversaries benefit when Americans trust nothing and question everything so intensely they can't function. The tool shows you how information is delivered. Deciding what's true is still your job.  

Glenn Diesen   Propaganda as a science seeks to manipulate the audience without appealing to reason. Freud's idea of group psychology overwhelming the rational individual was developed further by his nephew, Edward Bernays, who laid the foundation for the propaganda literature. Joseph Goebbels developed the Nazi propaganda based on the work of Bernays, and the same literature has been at the foundation of NATO's propaganda.  Related: A short story of the term invented to replace 'propaganda' in times of peace