This video says about itself:
Orwell’s 1984 Tops Sales Under Trump
3 February 2017
“War is peace.
Freedom is slavery.
Ignorance is strength.”
-George Orwell, 1984
This video says about itself:
Donald Trump’s Alternative Facts & George Orwell’s 1984
28 January 2017
This is just US President Donald Trump’s first week in office and we already have years’ worth of controversies. Recently, when NBC’s Chuck Todd interviewed Kellyanne Conway, senior advisor to Donald Trump about the first white house press conference held by Sean Spicer, official white house press secretary and Donald Trump’s inauguration ceremony, she said something quite dangerous. She spoke of ‘Alternative Facts’, something similar to ‘Doublethink’ and ‘Doublespeak’.
So, this episode of Journal of Things discusses the hidden implications behind that word while analyzing the influence of language in politics while comparing today’s political scenario to George Orwell’s dystopian novel 1984 and its Ingsoc language Newspeak. It also refers to Orwell’s another book ‘Politics & The English Language’ and Edward Herman’s Beyond Hypocrisy. Is Donald Trump dangerous? This is Donald Trump’s version of 1984.
By Steve Sweeney in Britain:
Dump the Chump
Saturday 4th February 2017
THOUSANDS of people are gathering in London today as a united front opposes the hateful politics of US President Donald Trump.
Today’s Stand Up to Trump rally has been called by a broad coalition of labour and progressive movement organisations in Britain.
It is the first anti-Trump event backed by the Muslim Association of Britain, the Muslim Council of Britain and the Muslim Engagement and Development group in a display of unity against Mr Trump’s policies.
Protesters will meet at the US embassy in Grosvenor Square at 11am before marching to Downing Street for a rally.
Organisers are demanding that PM Theresa May cancel a state visit offered to the US leader and are urging unity to build a mass movement against his divisive politics.
A Stand Up to Trump statement signed by by trade union leaders, MPs and faith groups says: “Time is short. We cannot allow racism to seep deeper into society and whatever our other differences, we must unite together to meet this serious threat.”
Shadow home secretary Diane Abbott said: “Now is the time for people of goodwill to unite and stand up to racism.”
And the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament urged supporters to “demonstrate against the special nuclear relationship and say no ‘Muslim Ban’ this Saturday in London.”
Ms May’s continued silence over the travel ban as she toured Malta yesterday, where she tried to persuade European Nato allies to increase defence spending, has led to her being branded a “Trump sycophant” and accused of doing the US president’s bidding.
Ms May’s call comes after Mr Trump refused to rule out military action against Iran on Thursday, saying: “Nothing is off the table.”
Further sanctions were imposed on Iran by the US government yesterday in response to the country’s test launch of a ballistic missile last weekend.
Mr Trump tweeted: “Iran has been formally PUT ON NOTICE for firing a ballistic missile. Should have been thankful for the terrible deal the US made with them!”
Later he channelled former Egypt autocrat Hosni Mubarak’s habit of blaming conspiracies in the face of popular opposition, saying: “Professional anarchists, thugs and paid protesters are proving the point of the millions of people who voted to MAKE AMERICA GREAT AGAIN!”
Today’s rally sees the broadest coalition since the 2002-2003 anti-war movement.
A Stand Up to Trump summit will be held from 10.30am at Friends Meeting House in London on February 18.
Dear Kitty. Some blog 
Saturday 4th February 2017
posted by Morning Star in Features
Trump’s misogyny, racism and disdain for the working class pose a threat to us in Britain too. The People’s Assembly marches against this today, says TOM GRIFFITHS
DONALD TRUMP’S rise to power has struck a nerve. Perhaps it’s something to do with the man himself, an outrageous narcissist, sexist, racist and bully, Trump is certainly one of the most vile individuals imaginable.
Even underneath all that bronzer, his broad fleshy face betrays the nauseating smugness and petulant rage of a man born into immense wealth and power. He’s easy to hate. Understandably, his openly aggressive misogyny, the so-called “locker room talk” which is not acceptable in any space — locker room or oval office — and his outrageous position on abortion and women generally has triggered a large part of the revulsion and resistance to the man.
The Women’s Marches against Trump were global and they were huge. Certainly the largest single moment of protest since the anti-war demonstrations across the world in 2003. And rightly so.
Donald Trump is also a racist. Let’s make no bones about that.
The whole narrative around the wall he has been threatening to build along the Mexican border, the proposed Muslim register and many more examples signaled to us in the run up to the election that the anti-racist movement was going to have its work cut out with him should he come to power.
Now he has done so and immediately brought in one of the most controversial executive orders in living memory with his racist Muslim travel ban.
What has also connected with people in such a powerful way and brought so many of them onto the streets is his blatant corruption of the democratic process. Trump is the personification of capitalist greed and he has clearly bought his way to the presidency; in his crass and openly manipulative way, he has successfully become the most powerful and dangerous man on the planet. He does not hide his disdain for US democracy and its institutions, nor indeed does he hide his disdain for the US electorate.
His victory, therefore, is a Damasc ene moment for lots of people; their treasured institutions are exposed a fraud. The emperor is not wearing any clothes. This is nothing short of an existential crisis.
Is Western democracy really so cheap, just theatre? For all these reasons and more, a huge protest movement, which is bringing in lots of first-timers and young people, is springing up all over the world.
For the People’s Assembly Against Austerity, we too stand in opposition to Trump for all these reasons. We have always stood for the rights of women, always stood against scapegoating of migrants and any form of racism.
But we also have a very real responsibility to mobilise on the issues that make us what we are.
Trump is also a president for the super-rich. He is rolling through yet more corporation tax breaks and the Financial Times has warned that the first is a cut in the corporate tax rate from 35 per cent to perhaps 20 per cent. While US workers are facing the highest levels of poverty in a generation, these new measures show how little Trump intends on being “the president for the people.”
Unsurprisingly Trump’s administration will also be mounting more attacks on trade unions.
The Republicans’ so-called “right to work” laws, which in another staggering example of newspeak, claim to protect workers’ rights while in reality limiting the rights of workers to organise to such a degree that if followed through, they will all but destroy the trade unions in the United States.
On health, Trump’s policies are just as disastrous. His own website declares: “On day one of the Trump administration, we will ask Congress to immediately deliver a full repeal of Obamacare. However it is not enough to simply repeal this terrible legislation.
“We will work with Congress to make sure we have a series of reforms ready for implementation that follow free-market principles and that will restore economic freedom and certainty to everyone in this country.”
This is devastating news for not only for the 50 million US citizens Oxfam estimates to be living in poverty but to the entire US working class.
All these things are precisely the sorts of policies we oppose in this country and we must stand in solidarity with those standing against Trump in the US.
But this is not just a matter of principle. Should the most powerful nation on earth be allowed to set the tone for such vicious neoliberalism, it will only serve to embolden those at home to do more of the same. And this is already a very real threat.
Theresa May has begun opening the door for the greater involvement of US businesses in the NHS as part of a trade deal with Trump’s administration. This should ring alarm bells of very real dangers on the horizon. We must say loud and clear why this is utterly unacceptable and has to be resisted at all costs.
This is why we’re playing a key role in building the anti-Trump protests and why we’ve been mobilising to make this Saturday’s demonstration in London as big as it can be.
It is also why we’re playing a key role in building the movement to save our NHS. It has been under threat from cuts and closures and sneaking privatisation for years. But with the era of Trump upon us, this process could accelerate and while the NHS is already in the grips of its now annual “winter crisis” and is — as the Red Cross has stated — nothing short of a “humanitarian crisis,” this is a critical moment for our greatest achievement.
That is why we are also urging everyone to come on the #OurNHS National Demonstration on Saturday March 4 in London, to make sure these are not the last days of a publicly owned and publically run NHS.
The rising resistance against Trump, represents a huge opportunity for those on the left to make the case for a different kind of world.
Let’s make sure we’re on the streets in our hundreds of thousands saying: “No to Trump,” “Shame on May” and “Save Our NHS.” See you there.
Tom Griffiths is the national organiser for the People’s Assembly Against Austerity.
https://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/a-fa59-Capitalist-greed-personified#.WJWKBfKff6g
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Saturday 4th February 2017
posted by Morning Star in Features
There has never been a more important time in recent history to stand up to racism, writes Sabby Dhalu
THE world feels like a frightening place since Donald Trump’s inauguration as US president.
His first two weeks in office have unfortunately lived up to the racism, hatred and Islamophobia unleashed during his campaign.
It is a profound irony that on Monday morning we woke up to the news of what Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau correctly described as a “terrorist attack on Muslims” on a mosque in Quebec, yet days before its neighbouring country closed its doors to many Muslims in the world.
There is a direct link between racist and Islamophobic terrorist attacks and racist policies and political hate speech that receive global coverage.
Muslims are always portrayed as the perpetrators of terrorism, but never the victims.
Muslims in the countries affected by this ban are often refugees fleeing terrorism, war and persecution.
The US is closing its borders to the victims of terrorism not the perpetrators.
Chillingly, the executive order on the Muslim travel ban was issued on Holocaust Memorial Day, a day which felt more sombre than previous years. Since the end of the second world war, the world confidently said: “Never again.”
Now we are less certain about whether the horrors of nazism’s rise to power will never be repeated.
Front National leader Marine Le Pen could poll a high vote in the French presidential election.
Meanwhile refugees are being abandoned by Britain and Europe to destitution, drowning and exploitation.
May’s refusal to strongly condemn Trump’s Muslim ban is somewhat reminiscent of Neville Chamberlain’s appeasement of fascism in the 1930s. She claimed that immigration policy is a matter for the US government. May is wrong. Trump’s Muslim ban is a matter for all decent people and must be opposed.
May’s approach to withdrawing from the EU is conceding to racism, the Tory hard right and Ukip.
May is due to trigger Article 50 by the end of March to “have the freedom to choose the way we control immigration.” This is prioritising cutting immigration over and above anything else.
Polls show Leave and Remain voters are united in refusing to accept cutting immigration at the expense of jobs and the economy. May’s “hard Brexit” will cost people jobs, so let’s unite against racism.
We must tell the truth about immigration — our economy, jobs and pensions depend on them.
Trump and May’s shift to the right stems from the same problem: austerity and the fall in living standards.
The Establishment has failed to implement policies that make people better off.
Instead of scapegoating Muslims, Mexicans, Polish immigrants and others, we need policies that give us jobs, houses and secure the NHS.
There is hope. We can stop this surge of the racist right. Today we are marching in great numbers against Trump’s Muslim ban.
Earlier this week there was a huge demonstration against the Muslim ban and huge demos at JFK airport in New York and in Los Angeles.
Two weeks ago, three million women and others across the globe marched against Trump’s racism, sexism, homophobia and bigotry.
The lesson of history is that we must unite against racism and fascism.
The chosen target of attack may be Muslims now but tomorrow it will be women, trade unions, Jews and LGBT communities.
Join us on the March Against Racism on Saturday March 18 marking UN Anti-Racism Day. This is a global day of action against racism in all its forms.
The event is supported by the TUC, Unison, Unite, NUT, CWU, UCU, Aslef, PCS, BFAWU and Muslim Engagement and Development.
There has never been a more important time in recent history to stand up to racism.
We can turn back the tide of racism.
Sabby Dhalu is co-convener of Stand Up to Racism. For more information on Stand Up to Racism visit: http://standuptoracism.org.uk.
Today a protest organised by Stop the War, Stand Up to Racism, the Muslim Association of Britain and other organisations against US President Donald Trump’s Muslim ban and possible state visit to Britain will be held from 11am, starting at the US embassy in Grosvenor Square, London.
https://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/a-1553-We-can-stop-the-rise-of-the-racist-right#.WJWKt_Kff6g
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Friday 3rd February 2017
posted by Morning Star in Features
May’s failure to condemn Trump’s racist Mulism ban has revealed her true colours. LINDSEY GERMAN writes on why we must unite against their bigotry and get out on the streets
DONALD TRUMP has achieved a few things in his under two weeks in office.
He has become the president with the lowest rating ever at this stage of the presidency. And he has created a mass movement against him, both in the US and internationally, which is unprecedented against an incoming president.
There were plenty of reasons to oppose Trump before he came into office but every day since has underlined in the most graphic way the need to drive him from office.
The day after his inauguration, millions marched worldwide in support of women’s rights.
But what has galvanised the most recent protests is the ban on Muslims from seven named countries from travelling to the US.
The ban is racist to the core, adding insult to injury to citizens of those countries which have already suffered bombing and occupation by the US. It has provoked rage in Iraq, where thousands of US troops are still stationed.
But it has provoked a huge wave of protests in the US itself, with huge numbers demonstrating at airports across the country, demanding an end to the ban and the immediate release of those caught by it.
The protests in Britain this week have also been very large spontaneous actions. A huge crowd gathered in Downing Street on Monday, and thousands took part in demos from Edinburgh to Bristol.
The mood in Britain is not just a reaction to Trump but to our own government.
Theresa May has played a uniquely bad role in supporting Trump. First, she rushed with unseemly haste to be the first European leader to meet him. She and her advisers cooked up the idea of offering him a state visit, complete with banquets with the Queen and enough gold and splendour to impress even Trump.
This is unprecedented so early in any presidency, let alone with a president as unpredictable and disliked as Trump.
She then allowed herself to be pictured holding hands with a man regarded as odious by millions of women.
Worse, she was informed about the ban during her visit and obviously agreed with it, to the extent that when she was questioned the following day, she refused three times to condemn or even criticise it.
Her craven determination to win a trade deal with Trump, and to appear as though she can maintain the “special relationship” with him, has led her down the path of supporting him uncritically.
This is not a good place for her to be. Outrage at this behaviour is palpable, even from within May’s own Tory Party.
Jeremy Corbyn was right to say that there should be no state visit while the ban stands.
The potential to build a really huge movement against Trump is already there. The proposed state visit can be stopped.
Already there is talk of postponing it or scaling it down, and it is possible to get it cancelled altogether.
When George W Bush had a state visit in 2003, months after the Iraq war, we brought London to a halt with hundreds of thousands demonstrating on a weekday.
This time will be even bigger. The movement must be built as broadly as possible. We must get on the streets.
Stop the War is part of organising a protest against the ban and the state visit this Saturday.
That means involving the Muslim community, a number of whose organisations are co-organising the march.
It also means we need the trade unions, students, community organisations, faith groups, charities and NGOs, women’s organisations, school students and everyone who wants to stand up against the kind of racism, bigotry, militarism and Islamophobia that Trump represents.
The rising tide of Islamophobia and attacks on migrants is growing across Europe and the US.
In Canada, six Muslims were shot in a Montreal mosque, allegedly by a far-right terrorist. In Texas, a mosque was burned down over the weekend.
Politicians and media are fanning the flames of hate for cheap electoral advantage.
May is interpreting the Brexit vote in a way which can only give succour to Ukip and the far right.
In France, the Netherlands and Germany the right are expected to do well in upcoming elections.
That is why the street movements are so important and why we need the broadest possible unity across the left in order to combat the right.
There are issues we can fight on which unite us all: against Trump’s racist ban and the state visit; against scapegoating of migrants and Muslims and for those issues which can help lessen scapegoating and racism; defence of public services such as the NHS and a mass programme for decent council housing.
We also need to break the “special relationship” between the US and Britain.
This “relationship” has always been harmful to Britain, most recently dragging us into the disastrous war in Iraq. It is now, under a Trump presidency, positively toxic. Stop the War is campaigning to end the special relationship now.
There is a huge amount at stake here. Working people are feeling the terrible effects of austerity and they are fearful and angry about the future.
We must unite to ensure that this anger is channelled at the people who caused their misery, not those who are at present being blamed.
If events so far are anything to go by, this year looks as though it will be marked by a series of mass protests. Nothing could send a better message to Trump and May that they do not represent us and that we will resist them.
Lindsey German is convener of the Stop the War Coalition. Stop the War, Stand up to Racism, the Muslim Association of Britain and a number of other organisations have organised a protest march through London on Saturday February 4 against President Donald Trump’s Muslim ban and possible state visit to Britain. It will begin outside the US embassy, Grosvenor Square, London at 11am.
https://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/a-ed17-The-unprecedented-resistance#.WJWLQfKff6g
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Friday 3rd February 2017
posted by Morning Star in Features
If Trump can introduce a Muslim ban and visit Britain with it in place, his regime will be emboldened to attack those it dare not just yet, says KEVIN OVENDEN
DONALD TRUMP is attacking on a broad front.
There are many reasons to fight him and to stop him coming to Britain for a propaganda boost. But we should be clear, firmly in the crosshairs are the Muslims. He has started his assault on all of us by attacking them. The racist travel ban targets Muslims.
The far-right media in the US — Fox, Breitbart, etc — tried to claim the terror attack by a white supremacist and Trump fan on the mosque in Quebec was actually committed by a Muslim. A sickening lie worthy of Goebbels.
A mosque was burnt to the ground in Texas on Saturday, hours after Trump announced his racist ban.
On Wednesday, Reuters reported that the US equivalent of the “prevent” strategy in Britain is to be rewritten explicitly and only to “target Islam.”
That would scrap even the pretence of dealing with the far-right and white supremacists, such as Dylan Roof, who opened fire on a black church in Charleston killing nine worshippers.
So why target Muslims? In part because Trump’s team are themselves viciously racist against Muslims. But it is also that anti-Muslim racism and prejudice have been growing for 20 years, fuelled by the war on terror. Trump’s administration is modifying the terms of that long war but far from abandoning it.
This week alone it has threatened outright war in the South China sea and against Iran. Trump has ordered a new plan for military operations in the Middle East and is not talking about jihadi terrorism but Muslims as a whole as the problem.
Islamophobia is the central propaganda that the fascist Marine Le Pen hopes to use to win the French presidential election. Germany’s far-right party Alternative for Germany has made Islamophobia the lynchpin of its advance.
The forces of reaction and barbarism everywhere see Trump’s attack on Muslims as their path to power, including the reactionaries of Isis who believe it will bring them more recruits.
Amid all the apparent chaos around the Trump gang’s executive orders, we can safely conclude there is a strategy. They think that by taking the antiMuslim racism one stage further with the racist ban, they can rely on the US’s already built up Islamophobia.
If they can make the ban hold, if Theresa May can bring Trump to Britain with the ban in place, then the door will be open to all the other attacks at home and abroad where the Trump regime wants to go, but is too nervous to implement now.
There have been rumours of a draft anti-gay executive order but Trump’s press secretary declined to comment when asked earlier this week. How long do you think he will hold back on these? If he gets away with the Muslim ban today, he will feel confident to legitimise anti-LGBT bigotry tomorrow.
The Trump gang want to ban all forms of abortion and he would like to make his misogyny the new normal. If five-year-old Muslim children can be handcuffed at a US airport today, women can be handcuffed, abused and forced to carry a pregnancy they do not want tomorrow.
He has announced that he will indeed build a wall with Mexico. Work hasn’t started yet. Stopping that work tomorrow means ending the Muslim ban today.
Trump’s plan faces two big problems. The reality of the ban has led political figures and many ordinary people who may have gone along with, or even supported, previous Islamophobic measures and military actions to speak out and oppose it because they think it goes too far.
The echoes of the 1930s — burning places of worship, terror attacks on a congregation at prayer and people denied the right to travel on the basis of their religion — are just too close.
More importantly, masses of people are taking action to stop it. The protests began with the inauguration. They are continuing every day. We all need to do what we can to build on those and take them wider still.
Today — we cannot wait for worse tomorrow. That means uniting everyone who does not like Trump and what he represents and explaining to everyone we know why we must take a stand now against this racist ban, which is a critical part of the Trump gang’s bid for power.
The protests are working. Trump had to cancel a visit to a Harley Davidson factory in Milwaukee on Wednesday for fear of protests.
He had to retreat on a part of his Muslim ban on Saturday and exempt US Green Card holders, whom his chief of staff and white supremacist Steve Bannon had initially included. The protests are forcing divisions in Washington.
In Britain they can force Theresa May to come out against Trump, the ban and the state visit.
If the visit planned for five months’ time gets cancelled now, it would be an enormous boost to everyone in the US standing up to Trump and to those in France opposing Le Pen.
Many people are recalling the words of German pastor and outspoken critic of Adolf Hitler Martin Niemoller: “First they came for…”
Well, first the Trump gang has come for the Muslims. Will we all stand together now to fight that and prevent what may come next?
Please encourage everyone to join the protests, to sign the petitions and to raise their voices with all their imagination and creativity.
https://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/a-b638-First-they-came-for-the-Muslims,-then-for-me#.WJWLpvKff6g
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Reblogged this on sdbast.
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