[First published as Gideon Polya, “Massive Lying By Omission In Mendacious Obama's Final State Of The Union Address”, Countercurrents, 16 January, 2016: https://www.countercurrents.org/polya160116.htm ].
Analysis of President Barack Obama's final State of the Union address reveals massive lying by omission. Not mentioned by Obama are that so far during his presidency 12 million Americans have died preventably; 50,000 US veterans have suicided; Americans in poverty reached circa 15% of the population ; the US national debt reached nearly $19 trillion; the Carbon Debt of the US and the world reached $90 trillion and $360 trillion, respectively; the US finally used up its fair share of the world's Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget; the US violently invaded the territory of a record 7 countries; and 120 million people died avoidably world-wide from deprivation on Spaceship Earth with Obama in charge of the flight deck.
Obama's speech was full of wonderful progressive rhetoric for a better America and was full of self-praise for his asserted achievements [1], but careful analysis reveals massive lying by omission, with Obama resolutely ignoring Elephant in the Room realities. The following analysis deals with elements of Obama's speech in order of delivery.
1. Obama on drugs: “So I hope we can work together this year on some bipartisan priorities like criminal justice reform -- (applause) -- and helping people who are battling prescription drug abuse and heroin abuse. (Applause.)”
Reality: 1.2 million people have died world-wide since 9-11 due to US Alliance restoration of the Taliban-destroyed Afghan opium industry from 6% of world market share in 2001 to 93% in 2007, the breakdown (as of 2015) including 280,000 Americans, 256,000 Indonesians, 68,000 Iranians, 25,000 British, 14,000 Canadians, 10,000 Germans, and 5,000 Australians [2, 3]. Plants are sessile which is why they have evolved chemical defenses (as exampled by opioids) to deter herbivores (see my huge pharmacological book “Biochemical Targets of Plant Bioactive Compounds”) but are of course defenceless against ground or aerial spraying of herbicides. In April 2008 Australian PM Kevin Rudd failed in his attempt to get the US Alliance to destroy the Afghan opium crops [4] and in June 2010 he was removed as PM by a US approved, mining corporation-supported and pro-Zionist-led coup [5]. In 2014 under Obama, US-occupied Afghanistan opium production was 84% of the world total [6], this making Obama the world's biggest opiate drug pusher.
2. Obama on gun violence: “But tonight, I want to go easy on the traditional list of proposals for the year ahead. Don't worry, I've got plenty… Protecting our kids from gun violence. (Applause.)”
Reality: Obviously all decent people (but evidently none of the bottom-of-the-barrel Republican presidential candidates) want to seriously protect American children , and indeed all Americans, from gun violence. The latest estimate is that 33,000 Americans die gun-related deaths each year [7] but about 93% of the victims are adults. Thus according to the Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence: “2,465 children and teens (0-19) died by gunfire in 2013. Of these deaths, 1,410 (57%) were homicides, 877 (36%) were suicides and 124 (5%) were shot unintentionally. Firearms were used in 61% of youth homicides and 41% of youth suicides” [8]. However Obama restricted his comments to circa 2,500 children killed by guns annually and also ignored the circa 1.7 million Americans, including children, who die preventably each year from all kinds of other causes. As detailed below, an estimated total of about 1.67 million Americans die preventably each year out of a population of 319 million (2014) [3]. Accordingly, the “empirical annual probability of an American dying preventably in the US ” (P) is 1.67 million x 1,000/319 million = 5.2 in 1000 or 1 in 192. In contrast, about 30 American residents were killed in America by “terrorists” in the 10 years since 9/11 [9] and the average US population in this period was about 298 million (UN Population Division data). Accordingly, the “empirical annual probability of an American dying in the US from terrorism” is 30/(10 years x 298 million) = 1 in 100 million per year. With respect to an upwardly revised estimate of 1.67 million Americans who die preventably each year [3] the breakdown and annual P values ( “empirical annual probability of death”) are as follows (note that gun, homicide and suicide deaths overlap):
1. 443,000 Americans die from smoking-related causes annually (P = 443,000 /319,000,000 = 1.39 in 1,000 = 1 in 719).
2. 440,000 Americans die from adverse events in hospitals each year (P = 1 in 725).
3. 300,000 Americans die from obesity-related causes annually (P = 1 in 1,063).
4. 200,000 Americans die annually from air pollution (e.g. from coal burning, vehicle exhaust, carbon burning in general) (P = 1 in 1,595).
5. 75,000 American alcohol-related deaths annually (P = 1 in 4,253) .
6. 45,000 US deaths annually from lack of medical insurance (P = 1 in 7,089).
7. 38,000 US drug-related deaths annually (P = 1 in 8,395) , this including 21,000 US opiate drug-related deaths annually from US restoration and protection of the Taliban-destroyed Afghan opium industry (P = 1 in 15,190) .
8. 33,000 Americans killed by motor vehicles each year (P = 1 in 9,667).
9. 31,000 gun-related US deaths annually, 2,500 being children (P = 1 in 10,290) .
10. 30,000 Americans suicide annually (P = 1 in 10,633) with 7,000 being US veterans (P = 1 in 45,571).
11. 21,000 avoidable under-5 year old US infant deaths annually (P= 1 in 15,190).
12. 15,000 Americans are violently murdered annually (P= 1 in 21,267) but, as this list shows, 1.67 million Americans are passively murdered each year by One Percenter-subverted politician inaction and fiscal perversion for war and One Percenter enrichment (P = 1 in 192 ).
3. Obama on terrorists: “We live in a time of extraordinary change -- change that's reshaping the way we live, the way we work, our planet, our place in the world. It's change that promises amazing medical breakthroughs, but also economic disruptions that strain working families. It promises education for girls in the most remote villages, but also connects terrorists plotting an ocean away.”
Reality: To the US and US Alliance state terrorists, as exemplified by Obama, “ terrorists” are basically people they don't like to the extent that they are trying to kill them and indeed utterly destroy them as a group. As with the ever-changing alliances in George Orwell's novel “1984”, such people are “freedom fighters” in one decade and “terrorists” in another [10, 11]. Thus the US backed Al Qaeda, the Taliban and the mujaheddin as “freedom fighters” against the Russians and secular socialist rule in Afghanistan (1978-1989) [12] and now are trying to utterly destroy such jihadi groups from Mauritania (the Atlantic Ocean away from the US) to the Philippines (the Pacific Ocean away from the US) [13]. While Obama fulminates against the fundamentalist, sectarian jihadis, the US has a major responsibility for the replacement of secular regimes with fundamentalist religious regimes in Apartheid Israel, Iran, Afghanistan, Iraq, Libya and Syria with Obama playing a major role in this in Apartheid Israel, Iraq, Syria and Libya [14].
4. Obama on 7 years of progress: “In fact, it's that [American] spirit that made the progress of these past seven years possible. It's how we recovered from the worst economic crisis in generations. It's how we reformed our health care system, and reinvented our energy sector; how we delivered more care and benefits to our troops and veterans, and how we secured the freedom in every state to marry the person we love.”
Reality: (a) Dr Paul Craig Roberts (the so-called Father of Reaganomics) dismisses the American Recovery as a fairy tale “that supports America's image as the safe haven, an image that keeps the dollar up, the stock market up, and interest rates down. It is an image that causes the massive numbers of unemployed Americans to blame themselves and not the mishandled economy” [15]; (b) compromise has meant the continuing exclusion of Americans from a decent health care system and 1.7 million preventable American deaths each year (570 times more such victims each year than died on 9-11 and including 45,000 who die each year from lack of health insurance ) [3, 15]; (c) the US is among the worst countries for annual per capita greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution; (d) American veterans are disproportionately homeless and about 7,300 US veterans commit suicide each year [2, 16]; and (e) the Obama- and US-backed rogue state of Apartheid Israel, after the fashion of the former US- and Apartheid Israel-backed Apartheid South Africa, expressly forbids non-religious, Jewish-to-non-Jewish and Israeli-Occupied Palestinian marriages [17]. How disgusting. And how disgusting that whatever his personal views, Obama, an African –American president of Muslim paternal family background, provides massive US support for genocidal racism, Segregation, Apartheid , anti-Arab anti-Semitism and Islamophobia by Apartheid Israel, the racist tail that wags the Neocon American and Zionist Imperialist (NAZI)-perverted and subverted American dog.
5. Obama on 4 big questions for the future: “So let's talk about the future, and four big questions that I believe we as a country have to answer -- regardless of who the next President is, or who controls the next Congress. First, how do we give everyone a fair shot at opportunity and security in this new economy? (Applause.) Second, how do we make technology work for us, and not against us -- especially when it comes to solving urgent challenges like climate change? (Applause.) Third, how do we keep America safe and lead the world without becoming its policeman? (Applause.) And finally, how can we make our politics reflect what's best in us, and not what's worst?”
Reality: (a) One Percenter share of wealth and annual income is remorselessly increasing [18, 19]; (b) the US is one of the world's worst for annual per capita greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution and in 2015 used up its “fair share” of the world's Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget that cannot be exceeded if we are to have a 75% chance of avoiding a catastrophic plus 2 degree Centigrade temperature rise [20]; (c) the US has invaded 70 countries (50 since WW2) [12, 21], the US subverts all nations, has military bases in at least 74 countries with troops all over the world [22], and the US Alliance has killed 32 million Muslims through violence (5 million) or imposed deprivation (27 million) in 20 countries it has invaded since the US Government's 9-11 false flag operation [13, 23]; and (d) America has become a Neocon American and Zionist Imperialist (NAZI)-perverted and subverted Plutocracy, Murdochracy, Lobbyocracy, Corporatocracy , Kleptocracy, and Dollarocracy in which Big Money purchases people, politicians, parties, policies, public perception of reality, political power and thence more profits in an obscene positive feed-back loop [24].
6. Obama on the cost of education: “And we have to make college affordable for every American. (Applause.) No hardworking student should be stuck in the red. We've already reduced student loan payments to 10 percent of a borrower's income. And that's good. But now, we've actually got to cut the cost of college. (Applause.) Providing two years of community college at no cost for every responsible student is one of the best ways to do that, and I'm going to keep fighting to get that started this year. (Applause.).”
Reality: All education can and should be free. Indeed numerous countries have made tertiary education (college education) free, the list (with annual per capita income in brackets) including Argentina ($14,760) , Brazil ($11, 199), Cuba ($6.985), Denmark ($59,921), Estonia ($19,328), Finland ($49,265), France ($42, 399), Germany ($45,091), Greece ($21,722), Libya ($12,029 before devastation by the France, UK, US (FUKUS) Coalition), Mauritius ($9,593), Norway ($103,586) and Sweden ($60,566) but not Australia ($65,600). Undergraduate teaching can be provided for about 10% of the current cost using casual, part-time academics, and for about 1% of the current through part-time experts giving accrediting assessments for top quality courses emplaced for free on the web (MOOCs) by top institutions like 152-Nobel-Laureate Harvard and 83-Nobel-Laureate MIT [25, 26].
7. Obama on health care: “That's why Social Security and Medicare are more important than ever. We shouldn't weaken them; we should strengthen them. (Applause.) And for Americans short of retirement, basic benefits should be just as mobile as everything else is today. That, by the way, is what the Affordable Care Act is all about. It's about filling the gaps in employer-based care so that when you lose a job, or you go back to school, or you strike out and launch that new business, you'll still have coverage. Nearly 18 million people have gained coverage so far.”
Reality: Political compromise by Obama with Big Health , Big Pharma and the racist, religious right Republicans (R4s) has meant, despite some progress, the continuing exclusion of many Americans from a decent health care system and 1.7 million preventable American deaths each year (570 times more such victims each year than died on 9-11 and including 45,000 who die each year from lack of health insurance ) [3, 15]. In contrast, in the decade after 9-11 an average of only about 4 Americans died each year in America from terrorist attack [3].
8. Obama on poverty: “I also know Speaker Ryan has talked about his interest in tackling poverty. America is about giving everybody willing to work a chance, a hand up. And I'd welcome a serious discussion about strategies we can all support, like expanding tax cuts for low-income workers who don't have children. (Applause.)”.
Reality: America is the richest and most powerful country on earth but 45 million Americans (14.5% of the population, up from 11.3% in 2000) live in poverty [27]. According to the US Census: “In 2014, the official poverty rate was 14.8 percent. There were 46.7 million people in poverty. Neither the poverty rate nor the number of people in poverty were statistically different from the 2013 estimates. For the fourth consecutive year, the number of people in poverty at the national level was not statistically different from the previous year's estimates” [28]. The number of African Americans living under the poverty line ( $11,139 for an individual in 2010) rose to 10.7 million i.e. 27.4 percent of African Americans were living in poverty in 2011 [29, 30].
9. Obama on honesty and corporate power: “But there are some areas where we just have to be honest -- it has been difficult to find agreement over the last seven years. And a lot of them fall under the category of what role the government should play in making sure the system's not rigged in favor of the wealthiest and biggest corporations. (Applause.) And it's an honest disagreement, and the American people have a choice to make.”
Reality: “But there are some areas where we just have to be honest” – a remarkable confession that is substantiated by this comprehensive analysis. The system is rigged in favor of the wealthiest and biggest corporations. I repeat: America is a Neocon American and Zionist Imperialist (NAZI)-perverted and subverted, One Percenter-dominated Plutocracy, Murdochracy, Lobbyocracy, Corporatocracy , Kleptocracy, and Dollarocracy in which Big Money purchases people, politicians, parties, policies, public perception of reality, political power and thence even more profits.
10. Obama on wages: “I believe a thriving private sector is the lifeblood of our economy. I think there are outdated regulations that need to be changed. There is red tape that needs to be cut. (Applause.) There you go! Yes! (Applause) But after years now of record corporate profits, working families won't get more opportunity or bigger paychecks just by letting big banks or big oil or hedge funds make their own rules at everybody else's expense. (Applause.) Middle-class families are not going to feel more secure because we allowed attacks on collective bargaining to go unanswered. Food Stamp recipients did not cause the financial crisis; recklessness on Wall Street did. (Applause.) Immigrants aren't the principal reason wages haven't gone up; those decisions are made in the boardrooms that all too often put quarterly earnings over long-term returns. It's sure not the average family watching tonight that avoids paying taxes through offshore accounts. (Applause.)”
Reality: According to Wikipedia: “One key measure is the real median level, meaning half of households have income above that level and half below, adjusted for inflation. According to the Federal Reserve, this measure was $51,939 in 2013, below the 1999 peak of around $57,000… Extreme poverty in the United States, meaning households living on less than $2 per day before government benefits, more than doubled from 636,000 to 1.46 million households (including 2.8 million children) between 1996 and 2011, with most of this increase occurring after 2008” [31]. The number of Americans living in poverty hit a 52 year high in 2011 [30]. In contrast, One Percenter wealth and share of annual income has remorselessly increased [18, 19].
11. Obama on cure for cancer: “Last year, Vice President Biden said that with a new moonshot, America can cure cancer. Last month, he worked with this Congress to give scientists at the National Institutes of Health the strongest resources that they've had in over a decade. (Applause.) So tonight, I'm announcing a new national effort to get it done. And because he's gone to the mat for all of us on so many issues over the past 40 years, I'm putting Joe in charge of Mission Control. (Applause.) For the loved ones we've all lost, for the families that we can still save, let's make America the country that cures cancer once and for all. (Applause.)”.
Reality: Advances in immunotherapy hold out hope for a cure for cancer [32]. but even in Australia (which has one of the best health systems in the world) some new but very expensive cancer therapies still await state subsidy by the Pharmaceutical Benefit Scheme (PBS), this making them presently unavailable for ordinary people [33]. Dr Elizabeth Platz (a cancer researcher and professor of epidemiology at the world-leading Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health): “A lot of what I read about is cures and breakthroughs for cures. But what we know from a public health perspective is that the best thing we can do is prevent cancer in the first case” [32]. Thus according to the American Cancer Society: “In 2015, there will be an estimated 1,658,370 new cancer cases diagnosed and 589,430 cancer deaths in the US” [34] whereas about 1.7 million Americans die preventably each year with this including 443,000 American deaths from smoking-related causes annually [3]. Yet Obama has been happy to add to the $6 trillion long-term accrual cost to Americans for US wars and the $40 trillion long-term accrual cost to Americans of Apartheid Israel and the killing of tens of millions of Muslims abroad rather than keeping tens of millions Americans alive at home [3, 35].
12. Obama re climate change: ”But even if -- even if the planet wasn't at stake, even if 2014 wasn't the warmest year on record -- until 2015 turned out to be even hotter -- why would we want to pass up the chance for American businesses to produce and sell the energy of the future? (Applause.) Listen, seven years ago, we made the single biggest investment in clean energy in our history. Here are the results. In fields from Iowa to Texas, wind power is now cheaper than dirtier, conventional power… And meanwhile, we've cut our imports of foreign oil by nearly 60 percent, and cut carbon pollution more than any other country on Earth. (Applause.)”
Reality: Ireland, the US and America's Anglo lackeys New Zealand, Australia and Canada are the biggest “White Anglo” countries for annual per capita greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution with land use included (41.4, 41.0, 53.2, 52.9 and 50.1 tonnes CO2-equivalent per person per year, respectively). America's annual pollution is so huge that in 2015 the US finally used up its “fair share” of the world's Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget that cannot be exceeded if we are to have a 75% chance of avoiding a catastrophic plus 2 degree Centigrade temperature rise [20] - the US is now stealing the entitlement of much less polluting countries. Further, the huge shift from coal burning to gas burning under Obama is good for health but because methane leaks and has a Global Warming Potential 105 time greater than that for CO2 on a 20 year time frame with aerosol impacts considered, burning gas can be dirtier GHG-wise than coal burning [36-39].
13. Obama on US military power: “The United States of America is the most powerful nation on Earth. Period. (Applause.) Period. It's not even close. It's not even close. (Applause.) It's not even close. We spend more on our military than the next eight nations combined. Our troops are the finest fighting force in the history of the world. (Applause.) No nation attacks us directly, or our allies, because they know that's the path to ruin. Surveys show our standing around the world is higher than when I was elected to this office, and when it comes to every important international issue, people of the world do not look to Beijing or Moscow to lead -- they call us. (Applause.)”
Reality: The huge American military expenditure comes at the huge social cost of 1.7 million Americans who die preventably each year, the roughly 1 in 6 Americans who live in poverty, and indeed if we take Obama's “moonshot for cancer” boast seriously, the 0.6 million Americans who die from cancer each year [3, 34, 35]. America having invaded 70 countries (50 since WW2) is clearly feared – thus, for example, 40 million Asians have died from violence or from war-imposed deprivation in post-1950 US Asian wars [12] . A threatened world is increasingly looking to Russia and China to lead as the only significant counters to genocidal American imperialism. Thus, for example, Syria and Iran have been preserved by inviting Russian protection from US Alliance subversion and terrorism, and China has been invited to make massive infrastructure investments for peaceful economic progress in Africa. The BRICS (Brazil, Russia, India, China and South Africa) have set up the New Development Bank (NDB), formerly referred to as the BRICS Development Bank, a multilateral development bank operated by the BRICS states as an alternative to the existing US- and European-dominated World Bank and International Monetary Fund (IMF) [40].
14. Obama on failing states: “In today's world, we're threatened less by evil empires and more by failing states. The Middle East is going through a transformation that will play out for a generation, rooted in conflicts that date back millennia. Economic headwinds are blowing in from a Chinese economy that is in significant transition. Even as their economy severely contracts, Russia is pouring resources in to prop up Ukraine and Syria -- client states that they saw slipping away from their orbit. And the international system we built after World War II is now struggling to keep pace with this new reality.”
Reality: Failing states are typically states that have been subject to prolonged war criminal US or US-backed military intervention and endless war e.g. Afghanistan, Iraq, Syria, Libya, South Sudan, Somalia and the Yemen. Russia clearly does not have a policy to “prop up Ukraine” (perhaps Obama has missed something in his daily, first-thing security briefings) .
15. Obama on ISIL: “But as we focus on destroying ISIL, over-the-top claims that this is World War III just play into their hands. Masses of fighters on the back of pickup trucks, twisted souls plotting in apartments or garages -- they pose an enormous danger to civilians; they have to be stopped. But they do not threaten our national existence. (Applause.)”
Reality: Turkey-, Saudi Arabia- and Qatar-backed ISIL (aka ISIS, IS, or Daesh) is the fundamentalist and sectarian transmutation of the Sunni rebellions in Syria and in Iraq. The Iraqi Sunni rebellion was generated by the war criminal and genocidal US Alliance invasion of Iraq that killed 2.7 million Iraqis through violence (1.5 million) or through war-imposed deprivation (1.2 million), generated 5-6 million refugees, wiped out the major Baath Party, and devastated the Sunni community in particular through mass killing, mass imprisonment and mass torture. The indigenous ISIS rebels are barbarous in executing prisoners, imprisoning and selling non-Sunni Muslim women, having extreme sectarian bigotry, forcing conversions and threatening minorities but is exceeded in barbarity by the non-Indigenous and war criminal US Alliance invaders. Article 2 of the UN Genocide Convention thus: “In the present Convention, genocide means any of the following acts committed with intent to destroy, in whole or in part, a national, ethnic, racial or religious group, as such: a) Killing members of the group; b) Causing serious bodily or mental harm to members of the group; c) Deliberately inflicting on the group conditions of life calculated to bring about its physical destruction in whole or in part; d) Imposing measures intended to prevent births within the group; e) Forcibly transferring children of the group to another group” . Article 3 states that “The following acts shall be punishable: (a) Genocide; (b) Conspiracy to commit genocide; (c) Direct and public incitement to commit genocide; (d) Attempt to commit genocide; (e) Complicity in genocide”; Article 4 states that “Persons committing genocide or any of the other acts enumerated in Article 3 shall be punished, whether they are constitutionally responsible rulers, public officials or private individuals” [41]. The US Alliance policy of destroying sectarian Indigenous movements – no matter how barbarous – is genocide as defined by Article 2 of the UN Genocide Convention. The Nazis were relatively secretive about their genocidal intents but not Obama and his international war crime collaborators who demand total destruction of ISIS and the Taliban [41, 42]. Peace and dialogue is the only way.
16. Obama on religion and war: “We don't need to build them up to show that we're serious, and we sure don't need to push away vital allies in this fight by echoing the lie that ISIL is somehow representative of one of the world's largest religions. (Applause.) We just need to call them what they are -- killers and fanatics who have to be rooted out, hunted down, and destroyed. (Applause.)
Reality: The Sunni-dominated but non-sectarian Saddam Hussein administration of Iraq was secular, pro-women's rights and opposed to sectarian violence. The war criminal US invasion destroyed Iraq as a sophisticated modern state leaving behind a continuing Sunni-Shia sectarian civil war that is now also being played out in Syria, Libya and Yemen, much to the delight of nuclear terrorist, genocidally racist, anti-Arab anti-Semitic and Islamophobic Apartheid Israel which has a policy of devastating and Balkanizing the Middle East. As stated above, the US Alliance policy of destroying sectarian Indigenous movements – no matter how barbarous – is genocide as defined by Article 2 of the UN Genocide Convention. The now 15 year US Alliance campaign to “destroy ” the indigenous Taliban in Afghanistan is genocide in the opinion of Professor Ali Khan, professor of law at Washburn University in Topeka, Kansas [42].
17. Obama on ISIL and inviting Congress to vote for more war : “And that's exactly what we're doing. For more than a year, America has led a coalition of more than 60 countries to cut off ISIL's financing, disrupt their plots, stop the flow of terrorist fighters, and stamp out their vicious ideology. With nearly 10,000 air strikes, we're taking out their leadership, their oil, their training camps, their weapons. We're training, arming, and supporting forces who are steadily reclaiming territory in Iraq and Syria. If this Congress is serious about winning this war, and want to send a message to our troops and the world, authorize the use of military force against ISIL. Take a vote (Applause) … If you doubt America's commitment – or mine – to see that justice is done, just ask Osama bin Laden (Applause.) Ask the leader of al Qaeda in Yemen , who was taken out last year”.
Reality: ISIS in Iraq arose from Sunni resistance to the genocidal US invasion, devastation and occupation of Iraq and installation of a Shia-dominated government. ISIS in Syria arose as the dominant force from UK, France, US, Turkey, Jordan, Qatar and Saudi Arabia support for Sunni rebels against the secular Assad Government. Apartheid Israel is a major beneficiary security-wise of the destruction of the Iraqi and Syrian states and is a major purchaser of ISIS oil via Turkey [43-45]. The US Alliance's “endless war” in Syria and Iraq has so far merely dented ISIS notwithstanding “10,000 air strikes”. The calculated barbarity of ISIS has permitted massive return of Western forces to Iraq and Syria, a further example of how Muslim-origin non-state terrorism has been of major assistance to US imperialism. The full story has yet to be told of France, UK and US (FUKUS) Coalition complicity in the rise of ISIS after Russia vetoed a US Coalition demand for a Libya-style free flight zone over Syria. Serial war criminal and warmonger Obama is asking for Congressional support for his current air war in Syria and Iraq and his war criminal, Australia-targeted drone attacks in Libya, Somalia, Syria, Yemen, Iraq, Afghanistan and Pakistan.
“Non-state terrorism” or “terrorism” are loaded terms variously applied to various intranational or international situations: (a) intranational insurgency for a political cause and/or ethnic independence against a persecuting national government, a foreign occupier or a foreign-backed national government (e.g. the French Resistance in WW2; one man's freedom fighter is another man's terrorist and typically “terrorists” in the Western perception are people the US Government does not like at the time e.g. US-opposed jihadi terrorists versus US-backed insurgents in Syria); (b) international, ideology-cemented actions (e.g. jihadi terrorists responding to European occupation or domination of Muslim countries); (c) intranational actions against soft civilian targets in support of particular political, nationalist or ideological causes (e.g. anti-imperialism, pro-ethnic independence or anti-abortion atrocities ); (d) state-sponsored non-state terrorism involving overt or covert state support for terrorism in categories (a)- (c) (e.g. US support for Al Qaeda, the Taliban and the mujaheddin in Russian-occupied Afghanistan, and different members of the US Alliance – the US, UK, France, Australia, Turkey, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, Apartheid Israel, and Jordan - variously supporting anti-Government insurgents in Syria from the Free Syrian Army to ISIS); (e) false flag terrorist operations (e.g. US-run bombing of Catholic churches in Ecuador in the 1970s so that socialists would be blamed [46]; US Alliance Gladio atrocities in post-war Europe that were blamed on communists [47]; and numerous science, engineering, architecture, medical , aviation, military and intelligence experts conclude that the US Government was responsible for the 9-11 atrocity [23, 48, 49]); and (f) each year about 0.5 million people die from climate change (with 10 billion to die thus this century in a worsening climate genocide if man-made climate change is not requisitely addressed) , 7 million die from air pollution, and 17 million people die from deprivation on Spaceship Earth with variously ecocidal, speciescidal, ethnocidal, genocidal, omnicidal, terracidal, neoliberal, war criminal and climate criminal governments and corporations in charge of the flight deck - hence the largely self-explanatory terms climate terrorism (terrorism via climate change), carbon terrorism (terrorism via carbon fuel burning), corporate terrorism (terrorism via deadly corporate activity), ecoterrorism (terrorism via ecosystem destruction), ethnoterrorism (ethnicity-based terrorism), bioterrorism (terrorism via biological agents or via deadly changes to the biosphere) , and xenoterrorism (terrorism via dangerous biological or chemical agents) [10, 11].
The Obama Administration claims that US troops killed Osama bin Laden in Pakistan and then rapidly disposed of his body at sea. However Seymour Hersh (Pullitzer Prize winner for his reportage of the 1968 Mylai Massacre in Vietnam) dismissed the reported details of the alleged US extrajudicial killing of Osama bin Laden as a massive fabrication. However 2 extremely eminent and well-informed people (American economist and writer Dr Paul Craig Roberts and the late Pakistani leader Benazir Bhutto) would aver that Hersh was wrong on one key thing, specifically asserting that Osama bin Laden was already long dead when Obama claimed to have extrajudicially murdered him [3, 50].
18. Obama on endless war: “Our foreign policy hast to be focused on the threat from ISIL and al Qaeda, but it can't stop there. For even without ISIL, even without al Qaeda, instability will continue for decades in many parts of the world -- in the Middle East, in Afghanistan, parts of Pakistan, in parts of Central America, in Africa, and Asia. Some of these places may become safe havens for new terrorist networks. Others will just fall victim to ethnic conflict, or famine, feeding the next wave of refugees. The world will look to us to help solve these problems, and our answer needs to be more than tough talk or calls to carpet-bomb civilians.”
Reality: Obama is promising an endless War on Muslims and an endless War on Terror as part of an endless American War on Humanity for profit and hegemony that began in 1776, ostensibly over “no taxation without representation” but actually to enable genocidal expansion westward that was constrained by the British in their conflict with France [12]. America has invaded 70 nations (50 since WW2), currently subverts all countries, has bases in 74 countries, and has military personnel in 156 countries. By way of comparison, the British have invaded 193 countries, Australia 85, France 82, the US 70 (50 after WW2), Germany 39, Japan 30, Russia 25, Canada 25, Apartheid Israel 12 and China 2 [3, 12, 13, 14, 21, 22, 51-55].
19. Obama on smarter approaches to wars: “We also can't try to take over and rebuild every country that falls into crisis, even if it's done with the best of intentions. (Applause.) That's not leadership; that's a recipe for quagmire, spilling American blood and treasure that ultimately will weaken us. It's the lesson of Vietnam; it's the lesson of Iraq -- and we should have learned it by now. (Applause.) Fortunately, there is a smarter approach, a patient and disciplined strategy that uses every element of our national power. It says America will always act, alone if necessary, to protect our people and our allies; but on issues of global concern, we will mobilize the world to work with us, and make sure other countries pull their own weight.”
Reality: An appalling whitewash by Obama of American Imperial war crimes – Vietnam and Iraq was about America “try[ing] to take over and rebuild every country that falls into crisis”? No – Vietnam and Iraq were 2 of the bloodier examples of war criminal American invasion and devastation of remote nations. Further, having committed to a long-term accrual cost of $6 trillion for the War on Terror in Iraq and Afghanistan [35, 56] that cost about 7,000 US combat deaths [57] and killed 6 million Muslims through violence or war-imposed deprivation [1, 58, 59] , Obama now wants to do such genocidal wars on the cheap by air and naval bombardment with minimal forces on the ground and in collaboration with war criminal allies like the UK, France and Australia.
20. Obama on Syrian “broken society”: “That's our approach to conflicts like Syria, where we're partnering with local forces and leading international efforts to help that broken society pursue a lasting peace.”
Reality: Syria was a haven of religious tolerance and hosted more refugees than any other country until the France, UK and US (FUKUS) Alliance decided with their Sunni Muslim allies to back rebellion and removal of the secular Assad Government. Syria is now a “a US broken society” that is largely destroyed, 0.3 million people have been killed, it is rent by murderous sectarian warfare, and 12 million Syrians are refugees [59].
21. Nuclear terrorist Obama on nuclear weapons-free Iran: “That's why we built a global coalition, with sanctions and principled diplomacy, to prevent a nuclear-armed Iran. And as we speak, Iran has rolled back its nuclear program, shipped out its uranium stockpile, and the world has avoided another war. (Applause.)”
Reality. Not a word about nuclear terrorism by nuclear terrorist America and other nuclear terrorist states including US-backed, nuclear terrorist Apartheid Israel. A nuclear exchange would wipe out most of Humanity (current population about 7.3 billion), successively through the initial instantaneous destruction of cities, subsequent deaths from burns and from radiation sickness from radioactive fallout, and finally through a “Nuclear Winter” decimating agriculture, photosynthesis and photosynthate-based life in general. This is state terrorism and nuclear terrorism threatening extinction of Humanity and most of the Biosphere. While imposing deadly Sanctions on Iran (that has zero nuclear weapons and repeatedly states that it does not want nuclear weapons and wants a nuclear weapons-free Middle East), the US (7,315 nuclear weapons) is boosting its nuclear and conventional forces in Asia and Australia and continues to pour billions of dollars of military aid into the war criminal, genocidally racist, ethnic cleansing and nuclear terrorist rogue state of Apartheid Israel that reportedly has up to 400 nuclear weapons. The upper estimates of stored nuclear weapons are as follows: US (7,315), Russia (8,000), Apartheid Israel (400), France (300), UK (250), China (250), Pakistan (120), India (100), and North Korea (less than 10). India, Pakistan and North Korea have not ratified the Nuclear non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) [60- 62].
22. Obama on the Trans-Pacific Partnership: “That's how we forged a Trans-Pacific Partnership to open markets, and protect workers and the environment, and advance American leadership in Asia. It cuts 18,000 taxes on products made in America, which will then support more good jobs here in America. With TPP, China does not set the rules in that region; we do. You want to show our strength in this new century? Approve this agreement. Give us the tools to enforce it. It's the right thing to do. (Applause.)”
Reality. The TPP was designed to exclude China and protect the interests of American an multinational corporations. This is an ugly, xenophobic and Sinophobic statement from Obama. China is set in the Asian region whereas the US is a distant but violent and genocidally racist interloper in Asia. The TPP was agreed to by strong-armed US lackeys to the detriment of their citizens. The TPP will allow US corporations to sue the governments of other signatory countries for losses deriving from pro-health or pro-environment legislation or actions by the governments of those countries. Thus criminal American corporations will be able to force foreign governments to cease efforts to stop greenhouse gas pollution, sale of deadly cigarettes, destruction of ecosystems (ecocide)…
23. Obama on the Cold War: “So if you want to consolidate our leadership and credibility in the hemisphere, recognize that the Cold War is over -- lift the embargo [on Cuba]. (Applause.)
Reality: Obama re-initiated the Cold War with Russia by funding and backing the neo-Nazi Coup in Ukraine and imposing sanctions on Russia. Russia has remained resolutely polite and diplomatic even to the extent of supporting the US in its war against ISIS – much to the dismay of the Americans who were conducting a phoney war against an ISIS that was variously backed and supported by the US allies Turkey, Apartheid Israel, Qatar and Saudi Arabia [43-45].
24. Obama on aid for security not charity: “The point is American leadership in the 21st century is not a choice between ignoring the rest of the world -- except when we kill terrorists -- or occupying and rebuilding whatever society is unraveling. Leadership means a wise application of military power, and rallying the world behind causes that are right. It means seeing our foreign assistance as a part of our national security, not something separate, not charity.”
Reality: Obama confesses the moral bottom of the barrel reality that America helps other countries with aid for national security reasons and not for charity. Of course one third of American aid goes to aid to nuclear terrorist, genocidally racist, serial war criminal, America-subverting Apartheid Israel. According to Dr Stephen Zunes: “Total U.S. aid to Israel is approximately one-third of the American foreign-aid budget, even though Israel comprises just .001 percent of the world's population and already has one of the world's higher per capita incomes” [63] . In return, Apartheid Israel spies on America, kills Americans, betrays, subverts and perverts American public life, and utterly trashes America's reputation around the world.
25. Obama on climate change: “When we lead nearly 200 nations to the most ambitious agreement in history to fight climate change, yes, that helps vulnerable countries, but it also protects our kids.”
Reality: The weak, non-binding and dishonest Paris Climate Agreement will have delighted climate criminal and war criminal nations like Saudi Arabia, the US and US lackey Australia, but has betrayed our children, grandchildren, future generations, the Developing World, Humanity and the Biosphere – the target of plus 1.5 to plus 2 degrees C of warming is both unavoidable and catastrophic and key matters are non-binding. The Paris betrayal demands a peaceful, world-wide Climate Revolution involving Boycotts, Divestment and Sanctions (BDS) against all people, politicians, parties, companies, corporations and countries disproportionately involved in climate criminal and terracidal greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution. According to the BBC: “The measures in the agreement included: (1) To peak greenhouse gas emissions as soon as possible and achieve a balance between sources and sinks of greenhouse gases in the second half of this century. (2) To keep global temperature increase "well below" 2C (3.6F) and to pursue efforts to limit it to 1.5C. (3) To review progress every five years. (4) $100 billion a year in climate finance for developing countries by 2020, with a commitment to further finance in the future” [64]. The BBC pointed out that the temperature rise by 2100 would be 4.5C (if countries do not act), 3.6C (following current policies), or 2.7C (based on Paris pledges) i.e. that the Paris Climate Agreement had failed in its key objective of keeping a temperature rise to within 1.5C and 2C [64]. Further, last minute changes to the Draft Agreement under US pressure crucially changed “shall” (implying legal obligation) to “should” (implying merely suggested but non-binding action), thus enabling climate criminal countries like the US and its similarly high polluting, climate criminal First World lackeys, New Zealand, Canada and Australia, to evade their moral responsibilities [65]. The Paris Climate Agreement has been hailed as a breakthrough but in harsh reality is weak and non-binding with a lot of wriggle room for climate criminal politicians, corporations and countries [66]. Climate criminal Obama betrayed Humanity at Paris.
26. Obama on defending democracy and health: “When we help Ukraine defend its democracy, or Colombia resolve a decades-long war, that strengthens the international order we depend on. When we help African countries feed their people and care for the sick -- (applause) -- it's the right thing to do, and it prevents the next pandemic from reaching our shores. Right now, we're on track to end the scourge of HIV/AIDS. That's within our grasp. (Applause.) And we have the chance to accomplish the same thing with malaria -- something I'll be pushing this Congress to fund this year.”
Reality: America supported a neo-Nazi Coup against the democratically elected Ukrainian Government and renewed the Cold War. The scourge of HIV/AIDS continues because Third Worlders cannot afford drugs readily available to Westerners. Malaria threatens 3 billion people, infects 500 million each year and kills about 0.6 million each year, mainly in the Third World – yet part-African Obama will finally push Congress for big malaria research funding in 2016, his last year in office. In contrast, the dire threat of the deadly and untreatable Ebola virus to the US (several US residents died) meant that a vaccine was developed within 2 years of the start of the 2014 West Africa outbreak.
27. Obama on Guantanamo: “That's American strength. That's American leadership. And that kind of leadership depends on the power of our example. That's why I will keep working to shut down the prison at Guantanamo. (Applause.) It is expensive, it is unnecessary, and it only serves as a recruitment brochure for our enemies. (Applause.) There's a better way. (Applause.)”
Reality: The US Guantanamo torture facility is not just expensive, unnecessary and counterproductive – it is also utterly wrong and a gross abuse of human rights and the law, crimes with which Obama is complicit, notwithstanding his progressive rhetoric.
28. Obama on Muslims: “And that's why we need to reject any politics -- any politics -- that targets people because of race or religion. (Applause.) Let me just say this. This is not a matter of political correctness. This is a matter of understanding just what it is that makes us strong. The world respects us not just for our arsenal; it respects us for our diversity, and our openness, and the way we respect every faith. His Holiness, Pope Francis, told this body from the very spot that I'm standing on tonight that “to imitate the hatred and violence of tyrants and murderers is the best way to take their place.” When politicians insult Muslims, whether abroad or our fellow citizens, when a mosque is vandalized, or a kid is called names, that doesn't make us safer. That's not telling it like it is. It's just wrong. (Applause.) It diminishes us in the eyes of the world. It makes it harder to achieve our goals. It betrays who we are as a country. (Applause.)”
Reality: Racism is wrong and the worst expression of racism is the invasion of foreign countries – yet Obama in his 7 years in office has invaded 7 countries (Libya, Somalia, Syria, Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, and the Philippines) . The worse expression of anti-Arab anti-Semitism and Islamophobia is the killing of Muslims. 32 million Muslims have been killed by violence (5 million) or by imposed deprivation (27 million) in 20 countries invaded by the US Alliance since the US Government's false flag atrocity on 9-11 [13].
29. Obama on democracy: “Democracy grinds to a halt without a willingness to compromise, or when even basic facts are contested, or when we listen only to those who agree with us. Our public life withers when only the most extreme voices get all the attention. And most of all, democracy breaks down when the average person feels their voice doesn't matter; that the system is rigged in favor of the rich or the powerful or some special interest. I think we've got to end the practice of drawing our congressional districts so that politicians can pick their voters, and not the other way around. (Applause.) Let a bipartisan group do it. (Applause.) We have to reduce the influence of money in our politics, so that a handful of families or hidden interests can't bankroll our elections. (Applause.) And if our existing approach to campaign finance reform can't pass muster in the courts, we need to work together to find a real solution -- because it's a problem. And most of you don't like raising money. I know; I've done it. (Applause.) We've got to make it easier to vote, not harder. (Applause.) We need to modernize it for the way we live now. (Applause.) This is America: We want to make it easier for people to participate. And over the course of this year, I intend to travel the country to push for reforms that do just that. But if we give up now, then we forsake a better future. Those with money and power will gain greater control over the decisions that could send a young soldier to war, or allow another economic disaster, or roll back the equal rights and voting rights that generations of Americans have fought, even died, to secure.”
Reality: America is a Neocon American and Zionist Imperialist (NAZI)-perverted and subverted, One Percenter-dominated Plutocracy, Murdochracy, Lobbyocracy, Corporatocracy , Kleptocracy, and Dollarocracy in which Big Money purchases people, politicians, parties, policies, public perception of reality, political power and thence even more profit. 5-6 million Americans have been disenfranchised because of felony convictions and more than a million of these disenfranchised Americans are black. Felony convictions restrict 13 percent of the country's black male population from voting. Other restrictions may prevent African Americans from voting [67]. Dr Michelle Alexander ( author of “The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness”, former director of the Racial Justice Project of the ACLU in Northern California, former law clerk to Justice Harry Blackman on the U.S. Supreme Court, and who currently holds a joint appointment with the Kirwan Institute for the Study of Race and Ethnicity and the Moritz College of Law at Ohio State University ): “If you take into account prisoners, a large majority of African American men in some urban areas have been labeled felons for life. (In the Chicago area, the figure is nearly 80 percent.) These men are part of a growing undercaste—not class, caste—permanently relegated by law to a second-class status. They can be denied the right to vote, automatically excluded from juries, and legally discriminated against in employment, housing, access to education, and public benefits, much as their grandparents and great-grandparents were during the Jim Crow era.” [68]. African Americans and Hispanic Americans have about half their “fair share” of representatives in Congress and 5-6 times less Congressional representation than Jewish Americans [29]. Yet the American people are utterly betrayed by One Percenter-owned Mainstream media lying in cahoots with US Government lying, what Professors Edward Herman and Noam Chomsky described as “the propaganda model” in their book “Manufacturing Consent” [69].
30. Obama on “God on our side”: “Thank you, God bless you. God bless the United States of America.”
Reality: Just as the barbarous ISIS invokes religion and “God” to enthuse its fighters in the Syrian Civil War and the Iraqi Civil War (post-2011 deaths totalling about 300,000 and 30,000, respectively), so too does barbarous Obama in support of the US-dominated world order in which 17 million people die avoidably each year from deprivation on Spaceship Earth with Obama in charge of the flight deck, and 32 million Muslims have died from violence (5 million) or from war-imposed deprivation (27 million) in 20 countries invaded by the US Alliance in the US War on Terror and US War on Muslims since the US Government's false flag atrocity on 9-11 [23, 48, 49].
Final comments.
Completely missing from Obama's speech was any mention Israel, Apartheid, Apartheid Israel or of the traitorous and genocidally racist Zionists who together with the Neoconservatives dominate a Neocon and Zionist Imperialist (NAZI)-perverted and subverted America that has committed to a long-term accrual cost to the US totalling $40 trillion of nuclear terrorist, serial war criminal, and genocidally racist Apartheid Israel. By the end of Obama's presidential term this appalling moral and fiscal perversion will have been inescapably linked to 26 million preventable American deaths since the US Government's false flag atrocity on 9-11 that killed about 3,000 people. One wonders what Americans will do when it becomes generally apparent that the US Government did 9-11, very likely with the complicity of traitorous American Zionists and Apartheid Israel.
In stark contrast to Obama's optimism over the US economy and climate change, the Awful Truth is that the US national debt is now about $19 trillion or about $58,000 for every US citizen [73]. However it gets worse. Assuming the damage-related Carbon Price of $200 per tonne CO2-e estimated by Dr Chris Hope of 90-Nobel-Laureate Cambridge University [74], the US and the World have Carbon Debts of about $90 trillion and $360 trillion, respectively [75]. The Carbon Debt, that measures the cost of man-made climate change, will inescapably have to be paid by future generations [76-79]. Unfortunately, under Obama the US is one of the world's worst nations for annual per capita greenhouse gas (GHG) pollution and in 2015 finally used up its “fair share” of the world's Terminal Carbon Pollution Budget that cannot be exceeded if we are to have a 75% chance of avoiding a catastrophic plus 2 degree Centigrade temperature rise [20].
President Obama's chief science adviser, Professor John Holdren, has specified (1) nuclear weapons, (2) poverty and (3) climate change as the 3 most acute , existential threats facing Humanity [80]. However Obama (1) re-started the Cold War and turned a blind eye to nuclear terrorism by Apartheid Israel [60, 61]; (2) has presided over increasing wealth disparity in which 1.7 million Americans die preventably each year [3] and 17 million people die avoidably each year world-wide from deprivation and deprivation-exacerbated disease [12]; and (3) ensured that the US as a leading greenhouse gas (GHG) polluter played a major role in the betrayal of Humanity and the Biosphere at the Paris Climate Change Conference [64-66].
Barack Obama is a brilliant orator and his speech sets him well above his knuckle-dragging, racist, religious right Republican (R4) opponents. However as documented above, Obama's final State of the Union address speech, while inspiring in relation to some progressive social change, was a litany of lies of commission and lies of omission. An endlessly mendacious Barack Obama is a world leader in current drug pushing, war criminal invasion of other countries, de facto anti-Arab anti-Semitism, de facto Islamophobia, state terrorism, corporate terrorism, carbon terrorism, climate terrorism, and active and passive mass murder. Decent, sensible and informed Americans who are not fooled by Obama's casuistry will vote Democrat this year (the Republicans being utterly awful and beyond the pale) but must also inform everyone they can about Obama's betrayal of truth and Humanity.
References.
[1]. Barack Obama, “Remarks of President Barack Obama – state of the union address as delivered”, White House, 13 January 2015: https://www.whitehouse.gov/the-press-office/2016/01/12/remarks-president-barack-obama-%E2%80%93-prepared-delivery-state-union-address .
[2]. “Afghan Holocaust, Afghan Genocide”: http://sites.google.com/site/afghanholocaustafghangenocide/ .
[3]. Gideon Polya, “West Ignores 11 Million Muslim War Deaths & 23 Million Preventable American Deaths Since US Government's False-flag 9-11 Atrocity”, Countercurrents, 9 September, 2015: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya090915.htm .
[4]. “Rudd fails to get NATO support”, Sydney Morning Herald, 4 April 2008: http://www.smh.com.au/news/world/rudd-fails-to-get-nato-support/2008/04/04/1207249391198.html .
[5]. Gideon Polya, Media-Ignored US, Corporate And Zionist Subversion Of Australian Democracy In Ex-PM Rudd-PM Gillard Battle”, Countercurrents, 27 February, 2012: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya270212.htm .
[6]. UN Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), World Drug Report 2015: https://www.unodc.org/documents/wdr2015/World_Drug_Report_2015.pdf .
[7]. The Trace, “How many people have been shot near you this year? An interactive map of American gun violence”, 14 January 2016: http://www.thetrace.org/2015/12/gun-deaths-interactive-map-2015/ .
[8]. Brady Center to Prevent Gun Violence , “The truth about kids & guns: 2015”: http://www.bradycampaign.org/sites/default/files/Brady-Children-and-Guns-Report-Update.pdf .
[9]. Ronald Bailey, “How scared of terrorism should you be?”, Reason.com, 6 September 2011: http://reason.com/archives/2011/09/06/how-scared-of-terrorism-should .
[10]. “Stop state terrorism” : https://sites.google.com/site/stopstateterrorism/ .
[11]. "State crime and non-state terrorism": https://sites.google.com/site/statecrimeandnonstateterrorism/ .
[12]. Gideon Polya, “Body Count. Global avoidable mortality since 1950”, that includes an avoidable mortality-related a history of every country since Neolithic times and now available for free perusal on the web: http://globalbodycount.blogspot.com/ .
[13]. Gideon Polya,“Paris Atrocity Context: 27 Million Muslim Avoidable Deaths From Imposed Deprivation In 20 Countries Violated By US Alliance Since 9-11”, Countercurrents, 22 November, 2015: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya221115A.htm .
[14]. Gideon Polya, “Fundamentalist America Has Trashed Secular Governance, Modernity, Democracy, Women's Rights And Children's Rights In The Muslim World”, Countercurrents, 21 May, 2015: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya210515.htm
[15]. “New study finds 45,000 deaths annually due to lack of health coverage”, Harvard Gazette, 17 February 2012: http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2009/09/new-study-finds-45000-deaths-annually-linked-to-lack-of-health-coverage/ .
[16]. Dr Janet Kemp and Dr Robert Bossarte, “Suicide data report, 2012”, Department of Veterans Affairs, Mental Health Services, Suicide Prevention Program, especially Figure 3: http://www.va.gov/opa/docs/Suicide-Data-Report-2012-final.pdf .
[17]. Saree Makdisi, “Does the term “apartheid” fit Israel? Of course it does”, LA Times, 17 May 2014: http://www.latimes.com/opinion/op-ed/la-oe-makdisi-israel-apartheid-20140518-story.html .
[18]. Thomas Piketty, “Capital In The Twenty-First Century”, Belknap, Harvard, 2014.
[19]. Gideon Polya, “Key Book Review: “Capital In The Twenty-First Century” By Thomas Piketty”, Countercurrents, 1 July, 2014: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya010714.htm .
[20]. Gideon Polya, “Revised Annual Per Capita Greenhouse Gas Pollution For All Countries – What Is Your Country Doing?”, Countercurrents, 6 January, 2016: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya060116.htm .
[21]. William Blum, “Rogue State”.
[22]. “These are all the countries where the US has a military presence”, Global Research, 12 April 2015: http://www.globalresearch.ca/these-are-all-the-countries-where-the-us-has-a-military-presence/5442345 .
[23]. “Experts: US did 9-11”: : https://sites.google.com/site/expertsusdid911/ .
[24]. “Mainstream media lying”: https://sites.google.com/site/mainstreammedialying/ .
[25]. Gideon Polya, “Accredited Remote Learning”: http://accreditedremotelearning.blogspot.com.au/ .
[26]. Gideon Polya, “Book Review: “Selling Students Short” By Richard Hil – Neoliberal Corruption Of Corporatised Australian Universities”, Countercurrents, 29 May, 2015: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya290515.htm
[27]. Adam Johnson, “45 million Americans live in poverty but you wouldn't know it from watching 2016 coverage:, AlterNet, January 2016: http://www.alternet.org/election-2016/45-million-americans-live-poverty-you-wouldnt-know-it-watching-2016-coverage .
[28]. United States Census Bureau, “Poverty. 2014 highlights”: https://www.census.gov/hhes/www/poverty/about/overview/
[29]. Gideon Polya, “Truth & Boycotts, Divestment & Sanctions (BDS) Can Overcome Huge Inequities Suffered By African Americans Under American Apartheid”, Countercurrents, 29 September, 2014: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya290914.htm .
[30]. Trymaine Lee, “Number of Americans living in poverty hits 52 year high, 27.4 percent of blacks under the poverty line”, Huffington Post, 13 September 2011: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/09/13/number-of-americans-livin_n_960345.html .
[31]. “Household income in the United States”, Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Household_income_in_the_United_States#Median_inflation-adjusted_.28.22real.22.29_household_income .
[32]. Eli Rosenberg, “Why Joe Biden's call for “a moonshot to cure cancer” may not be far-fetched”, Guardian, 15 January 2016: http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/jan/14/cancer-cure-joe-biden-medical-research .
[33]. Kate Hagan, “Cost of cancer drugs rises sharply to $586 million”, The Sydney Morning Herald, 24 January 2015: http://www.smh.com.au/national/cost-of-cancer-drugs-rises-sharply-to-586-million-20150123-12wru9.html .
[34]. American Cancer Society, “Cancer facts & figures 2015”: http://www.cancer.org/research/cancerfactsstatistics/cancerfactsfigures2015/ .
[35]. Gideon Polya, “American Holocaust, Millions Of Untimely American Deaths And $40 Trillion Cost Of Israel To Americans”, Countercurrents, 27 August, 2013: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya270813.htm .
[36]. “Stop air pollution deaths”: https://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/stop-air-pollution-deaths .
[37]. “Gas is not clean energy”: https://sites.google.com/site/gasisnotcleanenergy/ .
[38]. Gideon Polya, “Pro-gas Obama's EPA-based Plan To Reduce Coal-based Pollution Amounts To Climate Change Inaction”, Countercurrents, 7 June, 2014: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya070614.htm
[39]. Gideon Polya, “Obama's Clean Power Plan Will Only Cut 2030 US Greenhouse Gas Pollution By 5%”, Countercurrents, 7 August, 2015: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya070815.htm
[40]. “New Development Bank”, Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_Development_Bank .
[41]. “UN Convention on the prevention and punishment of the crime of genocide, UN: http://www.hrweb.org/legal/genocide.html .
[42]. Ali Khan, “Is NATO committing genocide in Afghanistan?”, Counterpunch, 30 January 2008: http://www.counterpunch.org/2008/01/30/is-nato-committing-genocide-in-afghanistan/ .
[43]. Tim Anderson, “Who supports the Islamic State (ISIS)? Saudi Arabia, Turkey, Qatar, Israel, UK , France, USA”, Global Research, 20 November 2015: http://www.globalresearch.ca/who-supports-the-islamic-state-isis-saudi-arabia-turkey-qatar-uk-france-usa/5490271 .
[44]. Ulson Gunnar, “The “state sponsors” of ISIS, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Turkey: why are they not subject to sanctions”, Global Research, 21 September 2014: http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-state-sponsors-of-isis-saudi-arabia-qatar-turkey-why-are-they-no-subjected-to-sanctions/5403310 .
[45]. Enrico Braun, “Israel is the main purchaser f ISIS oil”, Global Research, 5 December: http://www.globalresearch.ca/israel-is-the-main-purchaser-of-isis-oil/549373
[46]. Phillip Agee, “Inside the Company. CIA Diary”, Penguin, London, 1975.
[47]. “Operation Gladio”, Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Operation_Gladio .
[48]. Elias Davidsson, “There is no evidence that Muslims committed the crime of 9-11”, Op Ed News, 10 January 2008: http://www.opednews.com/articles/1/There-is-no-evidence-that-by-Elias-Davidsson-100811-366.html .
[49]. Elias Davidsson, “Hijacking America 's Mind on 9/11. Counterfeiting Evidence”, Algora, New York 2013, 328 pp: http://www.amazon.com/Hijacking-Americas-Mind-11-Counterfeiting/dp/0875869734 .
[50]. “BBC censors Benazir Bhutto's 2007 Frost TV interview assertion about “Omar Sheik, the man who murdered Osama Bin Laden”:, Censorship by the BBC: https://sites.google.com/site/censorshipbythebbc/bbc-censors-benazir .
[51]. Jules Dufour, “The worldwide network of US military bases”, Global Research, 1 July 2007: http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-worldwide-network-of-us-military-bases/5564 .
[52]. Gideon Polya, “The US Has Invaded 70 Nations Since 1776 – Make 4 July Independence From America Day”, Countercurrents, 5 July, 2013: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya050713.htm .
[53]. Gideon Polya, “British Have Invaded 193 Countries: Make 26 January ( Australia Day, Invasion Day) British Invasion Day”, Countercurrents, 23 January, 2015: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya230115.htm .
[54]. Gideon Polya, “As UK Lackeys Or US Lackeys Australians Have Invaded 85 Countries (British 193, French 80, US 70)”, Countercurrents, 9 February, 2015: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya090215.htm .
[55]. Gideon Polya, “President Hollande And French Invasion Of Privacy Versus French Invasion Of 80 Countries Since 800 AD”, Countercurrents, 15 January, 2014: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya150114.htm .
[56]. Stephen Lendman, “Iraq today: America's genocidal legacy”, Global Research, 3 November 2013: http://www.globalresearch.ca/iraq-today-americas-genocidal-legacy/5356592?print=1 .
[57]. Icasualties: http://icasualties.org/ .
[58]. “Iraqi Holocaust, Iraqi Genocide”: http://sites.google.com/site/iraqiholocaustiraqigenocide/
[59]. “Muslim Holocaust Muslim Genocide”: https://sites.google.com/site/muslimholocaustmuslimgenocide/ .
[60]. “Nuclear weapons ban , end poverty & reverse climate change”: https://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/nuclear-weapons-ban .
[61]. “List of states with nuclear weapons”, Wikipedia: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_states_with_nuclear_weapons .
[62]. Gideon Polya, “Congress Of Vienna 2015 For Global Stability Fails To Address Key, Existential Nuclear, Poverty And Climate Change Threats”, Countercurrents, 12 January 2016: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya120116.htm .
[63]. Stephen Zunes. “The strategic functions of US aid to Israel”, Washington Report on Middle East Affairs: http://www.wrmea.org/congress-u.s.-aid-to-israel/u.s.-financial-aid-to-israel-figures-facts-and-impact.html
[64]. COP21 climate change summit reaches deal in Paris”, BBC, 13 December 2015: http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-35084374 .
[65]. Melissa Clarke, “Paris climate deal: one word that almost brought down a global agreement”, ABC News, 13 December 2015: http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-12-13/the-word-that-almost-brought-down-the-paris-climate-accord/7024142 .
[66]. Gideon Polya, “Paris Climate Agreement Betrays Humanity Which Must Apply Boycotts, Divestment And Sanctions (BDS) Against Climate Criminal People, Corporations & Countries”, Countercurrents, 14 December, 2015: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya141215.htm .
[67]. Michelle Alexander, “The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness”, The New Press, 2010.
[68]. Michelle Alexander, “The war on drugs and the New Jim Crow”, Race, Poverty, Environment, Vol. 17, No. 1 | Spring 2010: http://reimaginerpe.org/20years/alexander .
[69]. Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky, “Manufacturing Consent. The political economy of the mass media”, Pantheon, New York, 1988, 2002.
[70]. Edward S. Herman and David Peterson, “The Politics of Genocide”, Monthly Review Press, New York, 2010.
[71]. Gideon Polya, “Book Review: “The Politics Of Genocide” By Edward Herman And David Peterson”, Countercurrents, 5 December, 2011: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya051211.htm .
[72]. “Mainstream media censorship”: https://sites.google.com/site/mainstreammediacensorship/home .
[73]. “U.S. national debt clock”: http://www.brillig.com/debt_clock/ .
[74]. Dr Chris Hope, “How high should climate change taxes be?”, Working Paper Series, Judge Business School, University of Cambridge, 9.2011: http://www.jbs.cam.ac.uk/media/assets/wp1109.pdf .
[75]. “Carbon Debt Carbon Credit”: https://sites.google.com/site/carbondebtcarboncredit/ .
[76]. “Divest from fossil fuels”: https://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/divest-from-fossil-fuels .
[77]. “Climate Justice & Intergenerational Equity”: https://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/climate-justice .
[79]. “Stop climate crime”: https://sites.google.com/site/300orgsite/stop-climate-crime .
[80]. Gideon Polya, “Congress Of Vienna 2015 For Global Stability Fails To Address Key, Existential Nuclear, Poverty And Climate Change Threats”, Countercurrents, 12 January, 2016: http://www.countercurrents.org/polya120116.htm .
Dr Gideon Polya taught science students at a major Australian university for 4 decades. He published some 130 works in a 5 decade scientific career, most recently a huge pharmacological reference text "Biochemical Targets of Plant Bioactive Compounds" (CRC Press/Taylor & Francis, New York & London , 2003). He has published “Body Count. Global avoidable mortality since 1950” (G.M. Polya, Melbourne, 2007: http://globalbodycount.blogspot.com/ ); see also his contributions “Australian complicity in Iraq mass mortality” in “Lies, Deep Fries & Statistics” (edited by Robyn Williams, ABC Books, Sydney, 2007: http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/ockhamsrazor/australian-complicity-in-iraq-mass-mortality/3369002#transcript
) and “Ongoing Palestinian Genocide” in “The Plight of the Palestinians (edited by William Cook, Palgrave Macmillan, London, 2010: http://mwcnews.net/focus/analysis/4047-the-plight-of-the-palestinians.html ). He has published a revised and updated 2008 version of his 1998 book “Jane Austen and the Black Hole of British History” (see: http://janeaustenand.blogspot.com/ ) as biofuel-, globalization- and climate-driven global food price increases threaten a greater famine catastrophe than the man-made famine in British-ruled India that killed 6-7 million Indians in the “forgotten” World War 2 Bengal Famine (see recent BBC broadcast involving Dr Polya, Economics Nobel Laureate Professor Amartya Sen and others: http://www.open.edu/openlearn/history-the-arts/history/social-economic-history/listen-the-bengal-famine ). When words fail one can say it in pictures - for images of Gideon Polya's huge paintings for the Planet, Peace, Mother and Child see: http://sites.google.com/site/artforpeaceplanetmotherchild/ and http://www.flickr.com/photos/gideonpolya/ .