After spending some time around people from various anti-science/government/vaccination circles I realized that if the New World Order is what they describe it is, then I'd love to join it. At least those NWO conspirators seem to have a clue.
But that introduces complexity in your thought process. Most people are far too lazy for that.
Not trying to compare David R. to such monsters, but I can see how some people can cast him as such, even with the best intentions on his part (I can only assume).
Regularly most of us step on others peoples toes (knowingly and unknowingly in more mundane settings). It just happens that some people have very, very, very big shoes.
The line between good and evil is not defined by intentions.
Just read the Wikipedia article on the Gulf War. It's clear GH Bush pursued it to keep the oil price stable. It's clear the US developed some enemies in despots that don't listen to us. It's clear America has a mandate to not allow harm to its image of ultimate strength on earth. It's clear that George W came to finish the job in his first year in office nearly 10 years later. The idea being it would secure oil prices once and for all while letting the world know America won't tolerate despots. It's way easier to control a democratic country than despots adamant on doing things their way. There are more ways to manipulate said country/government. It makes for a more "integrated" world for the ruling elite.
I believe they have good intentions. With outdated thinking. Narrowly constrained by personal self-interest. And as a result their intentions are not in fact good for all. I don't believe in James Bond style villains. Everyone is doing what they think is best. It's just unfortunate that the cabal's big picture is severely small and doesn't include all.
... Have you made any effort to try to learn foreign policy? Or are you relying only on piecemeal reading of events and your predisposed biases to determine your worldview?
Most politicians read a lot (Trump is an exception, and he's terrifying for it), and much of what they read is public policy theory books, things like Why Nations Fail or On the Origins of War and the Preservation of Peace. From these books, they tend to formulate their views on policy (including foreign policy) based on certain schools of thought, and you can often tell who influences these thoughts based on how they frame arguments and defenses.
The Gulf War was principally caused by Saddam Hussein reckoning he could invade Kuwait quickly enough that no one would care to try to stop him (this is what Russia more or less successfully did in Crimea). The other principal Arab states who did not like Iraq--notably Saudi Arabia and Egypt--were never particularly likely to accede to these demands. (Iraq did try to link Kuwait to the Israeli-Palestinian peace process, but that was more of a stalling tactic than an actual honest effort to further that peace process, although it did incidentally do so). When Iraq began making noises about invading Saudi Arabia, that's when the US launched Desert Shield and subsequently Desert Storm.
And yet, when you listen to the testimonies of the officials who planned the war, it's clear that they hewed to a definitive Clausewitzian view of war: the planning of war needs to be shaped around the political objectives it is meant to achieve. And the political objectives they gave as their design for war was to a) remove Iraq from Kuwait and b) prevent Iraq from being able to exert regional power for 20 years. Note that oil isn't a primary objective. Of course, the Middle East being what it was, any planning of major operations in there is going to take into account near- and long-term impact on oil supplies, and it's not exactly a secret that the State Department's general grand strategy for the Middle East is "keep the oil flowing." But that doesn't mean that the only goal is keeping oil--if it were, the US would not have invaded but instead pressured Saudi Arabia to just deal with the Iraqi annexation of Kuwait (note that oil didn't stop flowing until Iraq's withdrawal from Kuwait).
You also have to keep in mind that you can't stick your head in the sand, ignore the world, and expect to suffer no consequences. The current migrant crisis in Europe is entirely caused by European unwillingness to deal with the issue in Syria.
All you need to do is use personal logic. Take JFK as an example: a man killed JFK. Then he was killed. And then within 3 years that guy was dead too. Is that not extremely fishy. Gun to my head and I have to make a split second decision whether that was a plot or not--the logical answer, for me at least, is that it's a plot. There are too many things like that. And all those events will never be proven until they are, at which point we'll be living in a very different world. That was their whole point--to hide and obscure what really happened and true intents. All these so called conspiracies were carried out by extremely powerful and formidable people with the sole aim of keeping them secret--do you think it will easily come out. Of course not. But with too many discrepancies it's become increasingly difficult to believe anymore.
All you really need to do is watch this short interview of General Wesley Clark on his shock about our pre-planned strategy to invade a bunch of Middle Eastern countries and--provided this guy is real--you know something is up:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ojcoKnTGf4s&feature=share
Anyway brother, just remember one's true intent is extremely easy to conceal if that is your goal. Do you think all the true intents of all the politicians and heads of states are really out out there worn as a pin on their breast? No, it's not. If they are smart they will always find ways to make it seem like the enemy's fault, e.g. Saddam Hussein invading kuwait because what he claims was them lending Iraq money to fight Iran and benefiting from it and therefore should mean the debt is wiped clean. I'm not saying whatever nonsense he had in his head wasn't "nonsense" or that he wasn't working is way through Kuwait to Saudi Arabia. What I'm saying is a power as powerful as the United States can dodge and weave and use any circumstances to its advantage. That's part of the advantage of being the top dog--you can counter punch anything and still come out unscathed. But it doesn't make it right when the powerful intentionally blow things out of proportion to attain an aim the public would otherwise not support. And it's definitely not right if they fabricate lies to do so. I do believe everything is a matter of degree, and do I believe the US is far on the evil side? No. Do I believe they've taken it too far and tipped the see-saw to a very dangerous side. This I know to be true, even if they have been wrongly pegged by conspiracy theorists--their handling of conspiracy theories alone has been egregious in its inability to allow for any perspective other than a hyper patriotic one; no perspective is allowed other than one that thinks America can do no evil. I think it can, and I don't think the thought needs to be the end of us, but rather the beginning of a conversation and hopefully a new era. Either way, it's going to take something big to reverse the dangerous course we're on.
So no I'm not convinced America is a benevolent force operating for the broadest picture of the greater good, and I'm not going to be intimidated by anyone who's read tomb after tomb of perspectives biased toward the anglo-saxon tradition/hierarchy of the west or whatever you wanna call it. The west has been dominating the world in the open for Millenia. With the advent of media and various news networks, it now needs to do so in the shadows. I highly doubt the agenda has changed. I highly doubt those with lots to gain are able to see how ends-justify-the-means-mentality is not in interest of the biggest picture for humanity when they stand to benefit in the immediate short term by such actions. I do believe they think they are doing good. I dont believe in James Bond villains. I believe their perspective is outdated, skewed by self-interest and will not ultimately create a cooperative more integrated world as they hope. We have gun-to-your-head peace in the world now, thanks to the US. History has told us that never lasts. Somebody will creep up behind us and eat our lunch, and use our same aggressive tactics against us, and at this point in history with so much technological progress, it might be catastrophic. In short, America needs to lead by not muscling around so much. Our time will come unless we start to back down. It's as simple as that. We're dealing with people who have the thought process that you can only stay on top by ruling through strength. And I disagree. My opinion is it lasts for a time, but always comes to an end, and that what has far more longevity is a cooperative attitude that sometimes requires backing down, specifically when ur wrong. But America won't back down even when they're wrong--hence we never apologized for Vietnam, hence our approaching 20 years in the middle east that didn't need to happen. I firmly believe we should 100% get out today, and that THAT would be the best decision for humanity, even if it leaves things in a disarray. Most people believe we now have to pick up the pieces for the mess we made. Well, that's about to lead to us in Syria, etc, and all the other countries General Wesley Clark says has been on our list since 2001. Yea, we need to get out immediately. The world doesn't want this. It's only a matter of time before it results in a major conflict. In addition, it's just wrong. It's not the right way to go about it. You can't make a cooperative world through the lack of it. What goes around will eventually come around. America is the Roman Empire and it doesn't need to go down in flames--rather it can be a stepping stone to a more conscious cooperative planet. But our invasions will lead to us going down in flames, regardless of what good intents we can get the media and foreign policy authors to claim it was about.
So unless you're a foreign policy expert trying to see everything through the lens of "who's really pulling the strings," I don't value much what such a writer says. The reality is all the writers that are looking for whose pulling the strings are cast off as conspiracy theorists. So you're basically saying: if you don't trust the consensus the powers that be and the media put out, your point of view is a conspiracy theory or that of a dilettante. That's unfair and nonsense. The good thing is that times are changing--most educated people in their 20s and 30s, that i meet at least, believe the conspiracies or strongly entertain them. The world is changing, and though we may not have proof, we aren't stupid and it's not going to last much longer. Trump is a reflection of that. He may be egregious, but it's a step toward unraveling the powers that be within the Intelligence/Military Industrial Complex.
There have always been leaders in society. We have parents, bosses, and presidents. It's just the way things are. You can still work to change your own situation.
What I'm doing is sharing info in a more balanced less conspiracy-laden way than many would. And believe me I am--what I'm saying is tame relative to what many others would say and how they would say it. The problem is too many people still believe 911 wasn't manufactured just as the weapons of mass destruction Iraq never had was.
But this is changing. Alternative media networks like hacker news itself are growing in influence. Sharing this info in a balanced way and seeing what people think is what I'm doing. Our media is getting displaced just like every sector of society is fragmenting and decentralizing (think music industry, what Netflix and Amazon are now doing to film, etc). We need to form our own concensus to destroy the grip western media has on people. For example, without sharing a bit of proof and providing a bogus motive-centric report, the DNI told the media that Russia hacked the DNC and the media repeated it without question. That's a problem. It's a problem when we are all just supposed to believe our intelligence agencies without question. It's a bigger problem that the media actually did it. Russia likely didn't hack us, yet we'll never know--yet most people believe it without question!
The real problem is the journalists and politicians have no choice but to believe it in order to not appear anti-establishment. Basically our leaders can't go against a corrupt worsening country because it hurts their careers by making them appear anti-establishment. Some--Trump--have made a political career out of being anti-establishment, but he's an outlier. However as egregious as he is, he might be the impetus to many more taking stronger stances against our hidden government.
The only thing we CAN do my friend is achieve concenus in a grass roots manner amongst the people. That's the only thing that will stop this train. Do you think 911 was likely a false flag attack to spur action or not? That is the question.
As time goes on, the anti-elite movement comes off more and more as a pack of vandals.