Abby Martin is an international known journalist
who hosted the known(?) Breaking the Set, on Russia Today.
She currently writes and directs a weekly documentary series called The Empire Files.
And tell us story(?) english.
She founded her own media organization, Media Roots,
and sits on the board of Project Censored, one of the largest research groups in the country.
Abby’s empathy, passion and editorial independence makes her unique and relatable voice
to those seeking honest independent media.
The place is yours. Thank you.
Thank you so much everyone for that,
and first of all, thank you so much for The Venus Project for hosting me at this amazing event.
And happy birthday to visionary Jacque Fresco.
This is a man who spent his entire life innovating for a better world,
and i think we need to give him one more round of applause for that.
Happy 100th birthday!
It’s a total honour to be asked to speak at the centennial celebration,
so thanks again.
And it is great to me that so many people here
who already know my work from Russia Today, Breaking the Set.
My new show tells stories a little different from a little bit,
and less energy, but a little more depressing, maybe.
And i was (?) the Empire Files and i (?) tell a story (?).
It is a weekly documentary series that provides (?) historical(?) and political contacts
to the most fascination that we face today.
Which i think that is very important when we are looking at these issues in an isolated context,
specially reacting to the mainstream media (?) new cycle(?).
And for the alliance for the brutal (?)cracy to the US funding(?) America,
each chapter the Empire Files related(?) there
another devastating effect of the militaristic imperialism.
So that was we check it out, if you have it yet, on YouTube. Thank you.
Most people are here because they are very currently aware already
after the crisis of the civilization that we face.
But i want to be (?) statistic that i think are really exemplified
that is everything that is wrong in the world we look in today.
According to the latest (?) study, 62 people now own more wealth
than half than every body living on the planet.
Think about this statistic for one second.
62 people, just 62 people own more than half of the world’s population.
The gap between the richer and poorer is widening at an alarming rate.
The wealth of the poorest half 3.6 billion people, following by 1 trillion dollars since 2010.
And at the same time, the wealth of the world’s richest 62 lucky mother fuckers
has increased by more than half of trillion dollars.
These obscene trajectory proves that if people made more money does not trickled down,
instead untapped trillions hold(?) offshore.
In the US for the first time, were over 50 years,
over half of the public school students are living in poverty or food insecure.
Think about that too.
I mean, how are teachers supposed to meat standardized testing requriements,
when they are busy worried about whether or not are students eating food or wearing shoes.
Instead of organizing the help those most in need,
our rootless system criminalizes its poverty and homelessness.
The extreme consequences of which we are plain(?) all around us,
driving desperate people to commit violence, crimes and terrorism.
This growing dysfunction is built into an economical structure
that institutionalized its barbarism at any quality(?).
But it is not just a system in the abstract.
This global war installed its powerful rulers.
I saw the way it works first in during my carreer.
I didn’t start out wanting to be a journalist.
I began as an anti-war activist and organized when were in college during the lead of the Iraq war.
But i quickly saw the issues i was (?) behind
whether(?) being distorted or completely ignored in the media.
And what we see in the media is completely obedience
to the criminal and murderous of Bush administration,
propelled me, forced me to act.
I though myself video production and put myself out of there in the community,
for San Diego and Oakland.
And the first journalism and project that i founded called Media Roots.
You know, was not just one issue.
It was every issue, because it all stands for the same criminal corrupt system.
From net neutrality to food justice, i wanted to build an under reported aggregate(?) of stories
that impacted everyone because i was convinced that people (?) knew what is happening.
If they only knew what this government was doing around the world,
then of course it would organize to stop it.
But, in (?) masses today’s world, is a dumping challenge, given the state of journalism.
It doesn’t take long your protocol awakening to realize that
the establishment press we have(?) all being trained to trust.
It exists just as not arm of the corporatocracy. Only utilized to maintain itself.
Didn’t start often that way, it started of as a free public service.
But as the corporatocracy became more in (?),
telecom companies got hugely rich and profiting in (?) public air waves.
And begin (?)ing the (?) on the market, (?) up, just as we have seen in the average industry.
And in 1980’s, 50 corporations controlled most news media in America.
By 1992, that number fallen to 2 dozen.
And today, only 6 corporations control 90% of everything in America can see (?).
About a 120 or so executives on the board of these 6 companies
also are in a inter locking(?) positions in every industry,
from defense to pharmaceuticals, to banking.
A sign from this (?) conflict of interest lies on the problem of self centered share(?)
and advertise pressure which makes it(?) now works.
Right now, who is heard of the TPP? I am sure many people. Okay, good job.
But, of course, this hugely important so called free trade deal,
what people are calling (?) in steroids between all countries,
they are completely (?) national sovereinghty undermining US laws,
totally blacked out.
100% on the mainstream media. Why?
Well, the corporate sponsors are under these negotiations in a secret deal.
600 corporate advisers negotiating this deal (?) countries,
without any sort of a semblance of democratic participation from the people (?). Unbelievable.
Net neutrality, another important issue of our time, maintain the (?) nature of the web,
has been totally sidelined by the same media companies,
controlled by (?) telecommunication companies.
The same companies that are trying to install a pay-to-play network on the internet.
Many people around the world maybe wondering how reality started bilionaire,
with zero political experience as this close to becoming
a president of the United States of America, as (?).
But i think a quick scan of our (?) media tells us one reason.
America’s salivating mainstream media (?) is (?) legitimizing Donald Trump
by covering him 24/7, because he fears souls, baby.
And apparently such as fascism.
Trump has been giving media coverage than hell Democratic campaigns combined,
23 times more than Bernie Sanders. It is unbelievable.
The CBS had last (?) actually recently busted about this.
He said, Trump may not be good for America but he is damn good for CBS.
The money is rolling in. And this is fun.
It is going to be a very good year for us.
Sorry, is a terrible thing to say, but bringing on Donald, keep going.
The media may understand the consequences of promoting Trump’s xenophobic bigotry.
But the short term profits from companies like CBS,
far out of the away of the dangers of the Trump’s presidency.
The corporate take over (?) has (?)
any (?)semblance with the democracy in this country.
For decades, journalists in DC have cared far more about their access,
but about their jobs.
I saw this in first hand in DC when i was an actually scolded by media officials
for asking questions on soliciting to Rand Paul in congress.
When i first was a newbie, i got my official press badge,
and i was, cool, now i just go ask and confront politicians in the hall of congress.
And very quickly, you know, the first person i saw walking on the hall was Rand Paul,
and i asked my question, i said why did you endorse Matt Romney.
He ignored me, kept going, and i thought it was the end of it.
A week later, RT was starting to get calls from the congress press (?),
trying to arrest me for stalking and harassment.
Yes, i wanted to put on air and they didn’t want to,
because they were really caring(?) on audience about that time,
and i was really new and really didn’t know what to do.
The charges were all basically empty threads.
But they did call me into the office,
and i sat down into an interrogation within the halls of congress,
with all that main bureau chief heads(?), from the corporate media networks,
and they basically told me you don’t do that.
You don’t come in here, and we were access that we worked for decades to maintain.
And now it is my first lesson of how journalism actually worked in DC.
You know, the media doesn’t only work to protect its bottom line.
And also plays the key role in manufacturing consent for empire.
Conditioning us to believe that somehow be caused or (?) in a particular manner,
(?) that world game to go killing millions of people around the world.
Displace mean countless millions more.
Dictate the future for tenths of millions, if not hundreds of millions of people,
every year around the world.
Even so called alternative press out like Vice and others promoted US empire American exceptional(?),
have very dangerous notions that keeps society subservient.
The myth self justify untold criminal policies by nationalizing the war economy
that runs on dept and destruction.
Those in power have to have reasons to control the media, of course,
not only told why white washed the long list of injustices and crimes they cared every day.
But they can seal the cataclysmic course that is driving us down.
Those in power doesn’t just control the media, of course. They control energy resources too.
Under this system, the US continues to rely on the industry of imperialism all life on Earth.
According to the latest UN report,
in order to avoid the worst predicted affects of climate change,
3/4 of non existent fossil fuels need to stay in the ground.
That mean halt all production stopping right now.
And that is to avoid the worst effects, the worst effects.
But the empires are doing the opposite of that. Chasing profits at any cost.
Under Obama, the US was become the world’s largest oil and natural gas producer.
That is outstanding.
The US military is the biggest polluter on the planet.
You have the example from all environmental legislation,
from the clean air act to the Kyoto treaty.
With all interrogation about how the richest country in the world
could possibly pay for health care and education for its citizens.
Little(?) as asked, about how we can possibly afford to maintain endless war occupation,
as well as the military budget that stands bigger than the next 7 countries combined.
It is this system put the needs at the people and the environment first,
there would be very little dependency in such damaging field(?) source.
Stand for engineers as you have seen in the documentary this morning,
if already developed the cost effect of state by state planned transition,
the entire US to renewable energy sources by 2050.
The money spent on the Iraq war 1, which killed 1 million people,
5% of Iraq’s entire population, and planted the seeds for ISIS to flourish,
could have covered all global investments to halt climate change trends.
Think about that. The Iraq war could have halt the global climate change trend,
just a cost of that.
There is plenty of money to solve many of the pressing problems.
The issue is in resources. It is how they are being used.
You know, as much as Cuba criticized it’s never (?) achievements,
i was able to spend weeks there, reporting and (?) fascinated that,
under a (?) economic embargo, this small island nation still able to produce,
instead of living comfortable(?) with most European(?) countries.
High quality free education, high quality free health care,
a (?) more, as human rights.
Not to mention that completely green sustainable agricultural system.
Amazingly, or not so amazingly, Cuba’s crime rate is one of the lowest in the entire hemispheres.
Often enough, we have seen that people would have their basic human needs met,
they are less likely to commit crimes.
I mean, you know, these (?) accomplishments were made
in an economy based on scarcity.
Imagine what can be done in the richest country in the world
if people came first, not profits
To continue to success the any nation (?) the global economical order,
even a small island nation like Cuba, poses a huge treat to the corporate hegemony.
This is wide, this (?) this normalization process,
the US government is still spending countless millions on the ground for (?) there.
We have seen how far their empire will blow, to crush any and all alternatives.
Those in power also wield the most mass military in human history,
into a way that (?) very real (?) ideas that provided an alternative to their system.
Both in broad an (?) home.
Over the last century, (?) US government has done everything that is powered(?),
to (?) out alternatives to its rule,
from ground up to to massive arrests of thousands of anarchists, socialists, lefts(?) in US,
making it illegal to even be a communist,
to carry on military interventions in over 70 nations just sent in world war 2,
causing an untold(?) human misery, all in the name of fighting ideas.
Today, the us empire has at least 900 military installations around the world,
the Pentagon does not even know,
because they (?) military bases they have, what the number really is.
They have (?) in almost every region on world to maintain an endless war of occupation.
But it was done(?) all it is(?).
Very rarely, sometimes, a glitch in the matrix provide a rare political opening for us.
Those in power are also (?) elections, obviously,
a familiar through a college delegate process their own mission of third parties from the debates(?).
But Bernie Sanders has defined all odds,
because he is bringing a message of occupy Wall Street,
a movement completely and radically marginalized in the mainstream, to the mainstream.
To the entire nation.
His popularity, he is made it okay that criticizing capitalism.
For all the critiques on Bernie Sanders (?) policy (?) look.
His popularity is opening a path for us to criticize the system,
when just 5 years ago was unheard.
This is a huge thing for us now, according to a recent (?),
young people between ages of 18 and 29,
more favourably look at socialism than they do capitalism.
It’s a huge feet(?) against the relentless propaganda campaign
that existed for almost a century.
The two party dictatorship is unraveling fast.
Having voters rejecting the candidates
that the establishment literally begging them to accept as amazing.
Only good things that comes from the corporate monopolies (?) like this.
Those in power have an end game. It’s purely dystopic.
And right now there is a huge opportunity for change.
Real change. Real alternatives.
And the voices in this room has so much potential to be heard right now.
It is time to see the momentum (?), start building an Utopia we wish to see.
Because in the words of Jacque Fresco,
if you think we can’t change the world, it just means you are the ones that wont.
Thank you.