When you spend that long on the outer reaches of empire, you understand the cruelty of empire ... and the lies we tell ourselves about what is done i… - Chris Hedges

I don’t know where this will end up. We must remember, as Putin reminded us, that Russia is a nuclear power. We must remember that once you open the Pandora’s box of war it unleashes dark and murderous forces no one can control. I know this from personal experience. The match has been lit. The tragedy is that there was never any dispute about how the conflagration would start.

Our prison system, the world's largest, is filled with the destitute. There is no shortage of artists, intellectuals, and writers, from Martin Bubar and George Orwell to James Baldwin, who warned us that this dystopian era was fast approaching. But in our Disneyland world of intoxicating and endless images, cult of the self and willful illiteracy, we did not listen. We will pay for our negligence.

The relationship between those who are constantly watched and tracked and those who watch and track them is the relationship between masters and slaves.