AN ANALYSIS BY GUS LEONISKY: Power in politics or in social constructs presents a very bleak picture to the ordinary person seeking freedom.

A division of ideology is apparently sweeping France. Immigration has shifted representations in governments at local and national levels.

Some French people are going back to Foucault’s views in order to make sense of what is power. They know that philosphers can explain power... and that philosophers can't influence the powerful...

In Australia, the extreme right is gaining momentum. Madame Pauline, whose voice is shivering like that of a humble goat, draws power from white supremacy expressions — void of broad philosophical compassion. One hears the Ku Klux Klan’s mantras taking root in the mind of the Murdoch-media-hammered-sods who think the grass has been trampled into death tax, by the bleeding-hearts of the “socialist” Labor Party…

This view is also complexed by political parties favouring Israel, while betting on Pope Jesus — despite rare noises to the contrary — and a full-frontal despise of anything Russian. 

In Europe, there is a distrust of government leading to public acts of dissent, bordering on madness, while many governments are themselves madly concentrating on the enemy “RUSSIA” to manage explanations for their mad internal failures — in which Russia has nothing to do with…

In Germany, the right wing is nearly in bed with the left wanting a rapprochement with Russia — against a faltering “centrist” government that is madly concentrating on the enemy “RUSSIA” to provide explanations for its internal failures — in which Russia has nothing to do with…

In America, like the fascism of Europe, the tone of power is about exceptionalism and absolutism with two parties — one giving a few lollies such as genderisation [see a Foucault’s study of sex], while the other is using sticks [bullets] via ICE, to control the masses….

So what does Foucault tell us about power to rule and power to resist?

Michel Foucault (1926–1984) was a French historian and philosopher, associated with the structuralist and post-structuralist movements. He has had strong influence not only in philosophy but also in a wide range of humanistic and social scientific disciplines.

As well, like Noam Chomsky, Foucault was a linguist… 

Gus would venture to add that some forms of “madness” [folie] come from language losing the meaning of words in the minds of “the sick”… [Been there, done that] Our memory plays tricks of recall.

Meanwhile, those in power make sure we end up not knowing the word “truth”…

An editorial from Ron Paul:

When Our Word is No Longer Good

The pattern of media reports – based on White House leaks – that an agreement with Iran is almost completed has become predictable. Where once the markets fluctuated wildly (and some insiders made huge profits with the information), each time we hear that the deal is almost complete only to see it fall through, the markets barely move.

It is dangerous to have a US Administration that no one in the US or the rest of the world believes. When White House “sources” claim a deal is in sight only to have President Trump post another AI graphic of the US military – or himself – firing missiles at Iran, the futility of engaging with the United States becomes reinforced to the rest of the world.

This is not projecting strength. It is signaling moral and ethical bankruptcy. And it is dangerous. In a world where no other country sees value in negotiating to end disputes with the US government, the only solution is to prepare to use force against it.

A US government whose word is no good will soon find a world that refuses to speak with it.

That is what we have seen with the Iranian response to the US surprise attacks of last June and this February 28th. Two times the US used lies and deception that we were negotiating as an honest partner as cover for a pre-planned attack. How can any country negotiate in such circumstances?

There is a word for this: nihilism. It is the belief that there is no truth. Only the convenient lies and deceptions to force one’s will. Governmental nihilism leads to bankruptcies both financial and moral. Nearly $40 trillion in debt demonstrates the former bankruptcy, while our foreign policy of war and aggression demonstrates the latter.

A world that sees force as the only way to negotiate with the United States may not attack us immediately. But it will prepare to do so. That is what Iran has done for the past four decades. That is what our “rivals” China and Russia have done. Others are following suit.

The government and its neocon mouthpieces continue to propagandize the American people that we have the strongest military in the history of the world. And while it is true that we have a powerful military, more expensive than most others combined and capable of projecting force worldwide, it is also irrelevant.

Despite the relentless propaganda of “War Secretary” Hegseth, we are slowly learning the truth about the US war of aggression against Iran. Just a few weeks of fighting has nearly depleted our arsenal while barely denting that of Iran. Despite the US Administration’s initial claims that 90 percent or more of Iran’s military was destroyed, we now know that the opposite is the case: nearly 90 percent of Iran’s military remains intact.

What we should have learned from 20 years wasted in Afghanistan – that a nation fighting for its homeland has an immense advantage – has still not been learned.

Having the “most powerful military in the world” is irrelevant if the US continues to pursue a global military empire. There will never be a military strong enough for that. It is a lesson we have just learned in Iran.

If the American people are not willing to demand that their elected officials uphold the Constitution and restore our good name as honest brokers, I am afraid the future consequences of our current nihilism will be grave.

https://ronpaulinstitute.org/when-our-word-is-no-longer-good/

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GUS: This article exposes the power of one state versus another, in which lies are a major currency to capture as many as possible people to accept a stupid decision [or was it stupid] to go to war — in which many “innocent” [not part of the decisions] people die.

Are we mad to accept the American administration’s obvious twisted views? Is the US president “loco”, “mental” despite being able to distinguished between a bear and a squirrel? 

Are the mad people in charge of the asylum?

A view from Stanford University:

Foucault’s History of Madness in the Classical Age (1961) originated in his academic study of psychology (a licence de psychologie in 1949 and a diplome de psycho-pathologie in 1952), his work in a Parisian mental hospital, and his own personal psychological problems. It was mainly written during his post-graduate Wanderjahren (1955–59) [Seit dem Beginn der frühen Neuzeit war die Wanderpflicht der Gesellen von den Zünften in den Wanderordnungen festgeschrieben worden. {Since the beginning of the early modern period, the obligation of journeymen to travel had been enshrined in the travel regulations of the guilds.}] through a succession of diplomatic/educational posts in Sweden, Germany, and Poland. A study of the emergence of the modern concept of “mental illness” in Europe, History of Madness is formed from both Foucault’s extensive archival work and his critique of what he saw as the moral hypocrisy of modern psychiatry. 

Standard histories saw the nineteenth-century medical treatment of madness (developed from the reforms of Pinel in France and the Tuke brothers in England) as an enlightened liberation of the mad from the ignorance and brutality of preceding ages. 

But, according to Foucault, the new idea that the mad were merely sick (“mentally” ill) and in need of medical treatment was not at all a clear improvement on earlier conceptions (e.g., the Renaissance idea that the mad were “in contact with the mysterious forces of cosmic tragedy” or the seventeenth-eighteenth-century view of madness as “a renouncing of reason”). 

Moreover, he argued that the alleged scientific neutrality of modern medical treatments of insanity are in fact covers for controlling challenges to conventional bourgeois morality. In short, Foucault argued that what was presented as an objective, incontrovertible scientific discovery (that madness is mental illness) was in fact the product of eminently questionable social and ethical commitments.

https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/foucault/

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SURE… 

A STRANGE POST-FOUCAULT ANALYSIS OF HIS VIEWS COMES SUCH [Foucault had died in 1984]:

The Bill Clinton affair

The point Foucault emphasises is that, even though public institutions often fail to uphold their values of truth, it is these values upon which they are judged. An example is the Bill Clinton sex scandal which led to his impeachment trial in early 1999. The basis of the move for impeachment was not so much that the president had committed adultery. Two far more 'scandalous' issues were at stake: first, those bringing the charges accused him of having misled the nation on the details of that affair; and second, those encounters were supposed to have taken place near the Oval Office in the White House.

These two issues are, of course, closely connected. Presidents ought not to mislead the nation, because the high office of president is supposed to represent values of absolute integrity, honesty and justice. And critically, the president ought not to have committed adultery in the Oval Office, because that office, as the literal embodiment of the presidential role, is also understood to embody presidential values — to be a place of integrity, honesty and justice. Former president Ronald Reagan is reported to have always donned a jacket before entering this inner sanctum. So the Oval Office requires that people put on clothes rather than remove them, because-as with the king's costume referred to previously-clothing and finery contribute to the authority of a position. And while it is acceptable to utilise the Oval Office to make military decisions that might lead to the deaths of millions of people, it is not acceptable to engage in sexual relations there.

The Clinton case is also interesting from a Foucaultian perspective because it indicates that something is, in a sense, not true, and indeed does not exist, until it is articulated through discourse. For example, Clinton is not the first president to engage in extramarital sexual activities in the White House. But this was the first time a president's extramarital affair had become the subject of considerable discourse. The volume of discourse increased exponentially as the case unfolded throughout 1998. It became the subject of the Starr Report (legal discourse-the report by investigator Kenneth Starr into whether the president had lied under oath about his relationship with his intern, Monica Lewinsky); it impacted on political and economic issues (political and economic discourse); and, of course, it had exhaustive press and television coverage (media discourse). This confirms Foucault’s point that something doesn't become a problem, or have a problematic status, until it enters into a discourse.

From Understanding Foucault

By Geoff Danaher, Tony Schirato and Jen Webb

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WE CAN COPE WITH THIS… IT’S THE OLD “CAN ONE HEAR A TREE FALLING IN THE FOREST IF ONE IS NOT THERE?:”….

BUT THE CLINTON EPISODES [WAS IT MORE THAN ONE OCCASION] DISAPPEAR IN THE LANDSCAPE OF THE EPSTEIN SAGA… WHERE MANY PEOPLE OF POWER HAVE BEEN COMPROMISED WITH FAR MORE SORDID REVELATIONS THAT HAVING A SUCK…

ACCEPTING THE TEMPTATION AND THE TRICKERY ON OFFER FROM EPSTEIN WOULD IN OUR VIEW SHOW THAT THESE PEOPLE ARE MAD AND DEVIOUS. THEY ARE MADLY DISGUSTING, INCLUDING THE PRESENT PRESIDENT, WHO FOR ALL WE KNOW IS PROTECTING THE CULPRITS — AND PROBABLY HIMSELF…

DOES MONEY ALLOW POWERFUL PEOPLE TO BE HYPOCRITICAL PERVERTS WHILE DEMANDING THEIR SUBJECTS STICK TO A NARROW MORAL PATH OR DIE ON A GLORIOUS BATTLEFIELD?

WHAT WOULD FOUCAULT HAVE SAID BEYOND WHAT HE ALREADY TOLD US, ABOUT POWER AND DISCOURSE?

HAS THE DONALD DECLARED WAR IN ORDER TO AVOID A SCRUTINY OF HIS EPSTEIN PAST?

CAN WE BE POWERFUL ENOUGH TO DO SOMETHING ABOUT THESE MONSTERS?

AND WHAT ABOUT NOAM CHOMSKY HELPING EPSTEIN? We will have to investigate…

Gus Leonisky

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         Gus Leonisky

         POLITICAL CARTOONIST SINCE 1951.

         RABID ATHEIST.

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