Nobody ever rioted for austerity. (p. 96) - George Monbiot

[E]ight days after the Khan Shaykhun attack John Pilger, famous for exposing propaganda and lies, was interviewed on the website Consortium News. He praised [Theodore] Postol as "the distinguished MIT professor", suggested that the Syrian government could not have carried out the attack – as he claimed it had destroyed its chemical arsenal in 2014 – and maintained that jihadists in Khan Shaykhun "have been playing with nerve gases and sarin … for some years now. There’s no doubt about that." Despite many claims to the contrary, I have found no credible evidence that Syrian jihadists have access to sarin.

Fascism has been famously described as "a counter-revolution against a revolution that never took place". You don't have to succeed in generating a new movement committed to a campaign of violence to create a monster much bigger than you are: a monster that will close down the last chance of saving Earth systems. If you are going to take a physical shot at capitalism, you had better not miss.

The power of consumerism is that it renders us powerless. It traps us within a narrow circle of decision-making, in which we mistake insignificant choices between different varieties of destruction for effective change. It is, we must admit, a brilliant con. It’s the system we need to change, rather than the products of the system. It is as citizens that we must act, rather than as consumers. [...] Only mass political disruption, out of which can be built new and more responsive democratic structures, can deliver the necessary transformation.