Hello, Common Sense? Are you there?

Much has been made about the recent US Presidential election and quite frankly I have never witnessed anything like it. It’s like Mark Burnett and Donald Trump took their reality TV game to a whole new level. Only difference is that this reality show has no edits, no scripted performances and very real consequences. Oh this one puts the “real” in reality show.
A little back story; I first took interest in American politics after the 9/11 attacks. My dad was obsessed with it and would sleep with the TV on CNN. I myself caught the bug a little but I was too young to decipher what was really going on and the history of how things came to that point. But by the time George Bush went into Iraq my eyes were wide open. I don’t know what the reaction was in The US but from here, in South Africa, everyone said this is a big mistake. It didn’t take long until that war became real and American soldiers started dying for a war they shouldn’t have entered in the first place. Didn’t matter how many Iraqis they killed or tortured, each American dying in Iraq was always going to be one too many since A) they were sent there on a false premise (nonexistent WMD’s) and B) They had no clear objective once Saddam was ousted.

YES WE CAN!
Fast forward to 2008. A black man is about to be president of the most powerful nation in the world. And OMG!!! He has direct lineage to Africa. Even I am caught in the hype. He is saying all the right things, wants “change” and the campaign slogan “Yes We Can”, becomes a worldwide hit. Especially with the young. I was really hoping this change would be in the form of getting out of the Middle East completely; let those societies determine their own future. Let them decide if they want democracy or not (by the way I personally think Islam and democracy are incompatible). There are countries that still struggle with their democracy to this day and they’ve been at it for hundreds of years what more to countries still figuring out how to even begin to implement it in accordance with their cultures. As the years go by I start to feel that the promises Obama made in his campaign are being swept under the rug, and I’ll admit I was willing to give him the benefit of the doubt because he’s black. The republicans didn’t make it easy either but the main thing that got me was the statistic of his administration killing more Muslims in the Middle East with drones than George Bush and secondly, after making claims in his campaign about clean energy, somewhat of a fracking revolution took place in his first term. Just saw a documentary that said nearly twenty million Americans live within 5 miles of a drill hole. So no, the leader of the free world is not really going green.

Iraq 2.0
Then just before the end of his first term, the Arab Spring happens. But one country catches the eye of our American saviours, who always just want to know one thing, “how can we help?” Hillary Clinton leads the charge of three of five United Nations Security council members. Gaddafi never had a chance. Meanwhile I’m getting flashbacks of 2003 thinking to myself “this is a coup”. There was no way killing Gaddafi was going to work. And personally it ripped me to pieces. I am still not over it. I knew Libya was the next Iraq but this time on a continent that could barely afford a state awash with jihadist militants. I can barely explain the feeling when I saw an interview where Hillary Clinton “said we came, we saw, he died!” with joy on her face, arms in the air. Meanwhile back Libya, ISIS had moved in and making videos of executions of Christians by the sea. No interventions this time. It was at this moment my eyes blew wide open about the nature of America and its elections.
After Barrack Obama won his second term, I was scrutinizing everything the US does outside its borders, and the campaign to remove the Syrian President went into overdrive. Day after day we saw the rise of a new flavour of Jihadist, the Islamic State. Running around the desert with their long convoys and black pyjamas and I’m thinking “who’s funding these guys?” my second question, no satellite or drone can pick this up? You can Google drone footage of people getting killed walking their dogs. That’s the level of detail and precision a drone can achieve. But a convoy of 50 cars in a fucking desert? Nah must have missed that one. Not a single media outlet dares asks this question of the CIA.

THE RUSSIANS ARE COMING!
Forward to September 28/2015, Vladimir Putin gives a speech at the United Nations General Assembly showing a man fed up with the US policy of burning countries for sport. The most recent being Russia’s neighbour Ukraine. The United States spent a reported figure of around 5 billion to destabilise Ukraine, instil a puppet government and try and turn it against Russia. It must have been one of those plans that looked good on paper because saying it’s been a disaster would be somewhat of an understatement. Actually that deserves its own blog post. Suffice to say Vlad was pissed about the Ukraine at the UNGA. He delivers a spine chilling line at the US and Western Nations with their constant interventions “do you realise what you’ve done?” I had gooosebumps.
Two days later Vlad, with the permission of the internationally recognised Syrian government sends his biggest and baddest planes to Syria amongst other things. Sending a message that “we can do it too” to the US. Washington is shocked. The jihadists are shocked (while getting shot and bombed) and curiously the videos of convoys in the desert stop completely. CNN and the other alphabet networks start to decry the poor Syrian people being bombed by the Russian jets. That’s right folks, Assad hates his people so much that he got the called the Russians to bring in some sophisticated equipment to help him bomb them. Makes total sense.

IT’S THE PIPELINE, STUPID.
Anyone who followed this conflict closely from the start knows that Turkey was financing and arming equipping and all the 99 flavours of jihad in Syria backed by the Gulf States Saudi Arabia and Qatar, who above all else want to remove Assad from power in order to get a green light on a pipeline that goes through Syria and into Europe. I know, seems too trivial, too easy an explanation for such chaos and destruction. But that’s what it boils down to. Any nation that doesn’t kneel and kiss the ring of the House of Saud (hint hint: Iran) in the Middle East is the enemy. And once you put these events in motion they have a snowball effect and people die. Lives get destroyed. Forever. Who cares, only thing that matters is money.
If you doubt the lengths that the US government would go for their friends in the Gulf, you only need to look at the way the dealt with the 9/11 report, and the secrecy around the 28 pages. Why would you stay friends with the people that are responsible for the greatest attack on your homeland? While you consistently attack others that would never dare stage such attack?
The Western Europe market would bring trillions in oil revenue to the Gulf States and the value of the dollar and one man stands in the way, Bashar al Assad. He is blocking the path of a trillion dollar pipeline like Gandalf against a Balrog Demon screaming “YOU SHALL NOT PASS!!!” And he would have been gone by now if it wasn’t that Putin! Hmph!
With what you have just read, you can now put into context what you’re about to read in part two of this post regarding the hysteria around Putin, Trump, Syria, and all the other players in this tragic reality show that is certain to end in tears for many.

The mayhem was just beginning.