Ricky Varandas, host of “The Ripple Effect Podcast” (RvTHEORY6), conducted a long Skype interview of Ray on Jan. 21, 2016. A discursive, laid-back conversation, they covered a broad spectrum of issues, past and present.

Issues included were:

-The creation of the CIA and the role of Pearl Harbor.

-Vietnam: the Communist “domino effect” scare; LBJ lying politics, spinelessness of his courtiers; Tonkin Gulf; unacknowledged rift between Russians and Chinese.

-The misconceived conception of the CIA – the notion that covert action over-throwers of governments should be thrown in with the tell-it-like-it-is analysis group that Truman envisaged for the CIA; a structural fault from the outset (witness Nicaragua, Chile, for example).

-CIA Director William Colby fired for disobeying Kissinger’s orders to lie to Congress about earlier CIA abuses.

-How CIA analysts, with the help of innovative technical collection systems, were able to assure Nixon, Reagan, et al. that they could verify agreements on strategic arms limitations and reductions (“trust but verify”).

-Two Bushes – two attitudes toward “the crazies.”

-How and why the “mainstream” media, owned and operated by the “blood-drenched arms traders,” beat the drum (almost always successfully) for war; the powerful incentives for endless war; drone strikes = a good way to do that.

-How more sober forces overcame both media and neocons, in thwarting an overt attack on Syria in late summer 2013; how President Vladimir Putin then pulled Obama’s chestnuts out of the fire – another reason the media/neocons hate Putin.

-Ukraine – one “regime change” too many; Feb. 22, 2014 Putsch in Kiev was advertised in advance on YouTube; was later called “the most blatant coup in history” (George Friedman of STRATFOR).

-Surveillance and blackmail opportunities; is Obama afraid?

-Assassination of John Kennedy; James Douglass book: “JFK and the Unspeakable.”

-Drones: All those killed are assumed to be terrorists, unless they can later prove they were not terrorists and not dead (like Lazarus).

-Israel: The elephant in the room.

-Irish grandparents on the “Upper Crust,” and why the sun never sets on the British Empire.

 

(Intro can be skipped by starting at minute 11:00; interview was on Jan. 21, 2016; posted Feb. 5.)

The UN rules “arbitrary detention” in Julian Assange case. Ah, but UK Foreign Minister Philip Hammond calls the ruling “frankly ridiculous.”

Frankly, what is “frankly ridiculous” is further proof that “British Justice” is an oxymoron, as Ray learned years ago at his Irish grandmother’s knee. (She and her kin knew quite a lot about “arbitrary detention.”) So Ray found it a little much, reading Hammond’s statement that the UN finding “ignores the facts and the well recognized protections of the British legal system.” Right!

Sadly, that “legal system” has become so corrupted by subservience to U.S. diktat, that the gutsy nobles who forced the Magna Carta on King John 800 years ago must be rolling over in their graves. Same for the servile Swedes – a particular pity, since they once enjoyed a decent reputation on human rights.

(6 minutes)

When Hillary “Pulled the Plug” on Ray for His Witness at GWU 5 years ago…

In a Feb. 2014 interview Abby Martin and Mara Verheyden-Hilliard of the Partnership for Civil Justice Fund recall what happened to Ray as then Secretary of State Hillary Clinton drove home the point that authorities need to respect freedom of expression – in Iran. The Partnership for Civil Justice Fund was able to get an unconstitutionally draconian BOLO (for “Be On Look-Out”) order for Ray rescinded 7 months after this interview. (8 minutes)

 

​Ray uses fresh opportunity on brief video interview to:

1-Comment on the (in)effectiveness of bulk surveillance, quoting Ed Snowden: “If you collect everything, you understand nothing;” ​

2-Ape retired East German Stasi Col. Wolfgang Schmidt on why “they” collect everything anyway.

Ray found a quiet corner in a McDonalds in Hagerstown, MD, Friday on his way south from arrest/jail/bail with the Hancock 12 on Jan. 28; he persuaded McDonalds staff to turn off the music; but it was dinner time, so the background noise is from fellow-diners.

Arrest, jail, charges with 11 other witnesses against drone killings enabled by Air Force video-game warriors of the NY State National Guard based at Hancock base, NY, was an uplifting action for Ray last Thursday.

Ray suggests that silence, inaction on this critical issue amounts to complicity.

(2 minutes)

On January 28, 2016, thirty life-size cutouts of the late Syracuse peacemaker Jerry Berrigan – brother of Dan and Phil Berrigan – blockaded the main entrance of Hancock Air National Guard Base outside Syracuse, NY. The cutouts of Jerry Berrigan were backed up by 12 live nonviolent drone resisters, who were arrested after blockading for an hour and a half. Press release (slighted edited) follows:

* * *

Jerry Berrigan Memorial Drone Blockade

Hancock Air Drone Base, Jan. 28 – Twelve Activists Arrested

On Thursday morning, January 28, thirty life sized cutouts of Syracuse peacemaker Jerry Berrigan blockaded the main entrance of Hancock Air National Guard Base outside Syracuse, NY. The 30 cutouts were accompanied by twelve, nonviolent, drone-resisters, who were arrested and jailed after blockading for an hour and a half. See 2-minute video (of the blockade and arrests).

​Jerry Berrigan, who died on July 26, 2015 at the age of 95, dedicated his entire life – like his brothers Dan and Phil – to Jesus’ command to love one another, Jerry came to the base on a bi-weekly basis whenever he was able, in his words, “to remind the base commander of our government’s pledge under the Fourth Geneva Convention of 1949, a treaty to safeguard non-combatant’s well-being in any warzone in which U.S. forces are engaged in combat.” And further, “to register horror and indignation at reports of bombing missions by drones in Afghanistan and Pakistan which resulted in the deaths of many innocent civilians; men, women and children.”

Those arrested and jailed for standing with the Memorial were Beth Adams, Bev Rice, Bill Ofenloch, Brian Hynes, Charley Bowman, Ed Kinane, James Ricks, Joan Pleune, Joan Wages, Pete Perry, Steve Baggarly, and Ray McGovern.

They were all charged with one misdemeanor and two violations, with the exception of Bev Rice and Joan Pleune, who were both charged with an additional misdemeanor (for allegedly violating an order of protection taken out by the base commander).

In 2008 Jerry was asked if there was anything he would change in his life. Jerry replied, “I would have resisted more often and been arrested more often.” The activists brought Jerry’s image to the gates to remember that this is where he would be, speaking out and putting his body on the line to say a clear “NO” to killing. Jerry’s widow was among the supporters on Thursday.

The group also remembered Mary Anne Grady Flores, who is serving a six-month sentence for violating an order of protection, taken out by the colonel at Hancock Air Base. Courts in rural New York apparently believe that a colonel at this highly armed base needs protection from nonviolent citizens calling attention to the drone killings.

More and more evidence mounts regarding the illegality of U.S. drone policies, from the “Drone Papers” published by The Intercept, to the four drone pilots who have come forward to speak out about what this policy is doing. (See also: http://www.democracynow.org/2015/11/20/numbing_horrible_former_drone_operator_brandon )

Those malnourished by the New York Times know next to nothing about the drone killings, much less those who believe them to be crimes.

On Thursday, activists tried to deliver a letter addressed to the Hancock military personnel, stating “Under the U.S. Uniform Code of Military Justice you must not be complicit in these crimes against peace, crimes against humanity and war crimes. In fact, you are required to disobey unlawful orders from a superior.”

Hancock Air Base deploys hunter/killer Reaper drones 24/7 over Afghanistan and probably elsewhere. These weaponized robotic drones are instruments of terror. They perpetrate extrajudicial killings, violate due process, violate national sovereignty, and kill non-combatants and civilians.

For more information, see The Upstate Coalition to Ground the Drones and End the Wars,

www.upstatedroneaction.org

Contacts:

Ellen Grady (607) 279-8303, demottgrady6@gmail.com

Carol Baum (315) 383-5738, carol@peacecouncil.net

The Iraq War’s KNOWN UNKNOWNS

​Rumsfeld may have been the most corrupt Pentagon leader in recent memory, but he was not alone. The Joint Chiefs of Staff under President George W. Bush fit neatly into that same category. Apparently, not much has changed since President John F. Kennedy’s Under Secretary of State George Ball used very undiplomatic language to describe the Joint Chiefs inherited by Kennedy. There is reason to believe they were among those responsible for JFK’s assassination.

The Iraq War’s Known Unknowns