The current situation between Iraq and the US is quite revealing. In 2003, when the US illegally invaded Iraq, it initially pretended it was doing so to protect the world from Saddam Hussein’s WMD. When it became clear that he never had any WMD (as many Iraq analysts had already been saying before the invasion), the US pivoted to argue they were invading to remove Saddam and bring the gift of democracy to the Iraqi people.
Now we see the democratically-elected government of Iraq requesting the US remove all of its troops from their country – and the US is flatly refusing. We can infer from this that the US has no respect for democracy, or the government of Iraq or the Iraqi people or, by extension, any other government or people whose interests are in disagreement with those of the United States.
In essence, the US is forcing its military presence upon the Iraqi people – again. I’m pretty sure that’s tantamount to a declaration of war. But this time, there is no Saddam, no WMD mirage. The US’ interests are laid bare. They want a military presence in the world’s third oil-producing nations and they don’t give a flying fuck what the Iraq people think about it. And they don’t give a flying fuck about democracy, either. That’s always been a ruse.
Do you know what kind of person doesn’t care about the rights of others? Psychopaths.
When the government of a country doesn’t care about the rights of others, it is a psychopathic government.
In the book I praise whistleblowers who are prepared to expose the psychopathic behaviours of their employers and colleagues, knowingly putting themselves at risk – physically, emotionally and financially.
Actively working to spread misinformation about climate change is psychopathic behaviour. This News Corp employee deserves praise and respect and I would love to find a way where society can rally to support people like her.
And, of course, it’s difficult for most of us to understand why more News Corp employees don’t speak out about their employer’s support for climate denialism. I actually quote statistics in the book comparing News Corp’s coverage of climate issues to other Australian papers.
A 2013 study of major Australian newspapers by the Australian Centre for Independent Journalism at the University of Technology in Sydney found that one-third of articles in 2011 and 2012 did not accept the consensus of climate scientists. The study found that Australia’s two most prominent newspapers by circulation, the Daily Telegraph and the Herald Sun (both, unsurprisingly, owned by Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation), published articles that were skeptical about anthropogenic climate change more than 60 percent of the time.
The Psychopath Epidemic, page 188
What we need to understand, however, is that people who work at places like News Corp have gone through several filters. They had to get through a hiring filter to work there. Then, if they don’t fit into the culture one they have a job, eg if they question too many things, or can’t accept the dominant culture, they either get filtered out (eg fired) or they filter themselves out (eg resign, like the woman in the above story did). The only people left are those that believe… or don’t care.
It’s from 2011, but pertinent to my book. Without suggesting this judge is a psychopath, this is certainly the kind of behaviour I expect to see from psychopaths.
This AP article comes across as a desperate attempt to resurrect Guadio’s credibility. Mentions people “too preoccupied trying to meet basic needs like finding food and medicine” but neglects to say they are put into that position because of US sanctions.
Iran’s military budget is about 3% of America’s, but the US media continues to make them sound like a serious threat. This is largely, I believe, because the US economy has run on Military Keynesianism since WWII,
