Useful Idiots with Katie Halper and Aaron Maté

Click here for the full episode, including the extended interview with Alan MacCleod and fan suggestions for military-grade baby names: https://usefulidiots.substack.com/p/extended-episode-media-and-biden?r=je5va&s=w&utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=web This week, Palestinian-American journalist Shireen Abu Akleh was killed by Israeli forces. The way the New York Times reported it was that she “die[d]”: The Times, CBS News, the Associated Press, and more corporate media outlets all referred to the incident, in which Israeli military opened fire on journalists, through words like “clash,” “conflict,” or other misleading terms to cast doubt on who the attackers were. Multiple eye witnesses confirmed the Israeli military shot and killed Abu Akleh. Journalist Alan MacCleod of MintPress News joins the Useful Idiots to expose media bias and propaganda that’s become increasingly difficult to dig through. (We highly recommend following his twitter to stay informed) In the extended interview, Alan uncovers the dark truth of TikTok’s shady executives and a Ukrainian news source that’s become a favorite of western corporate media but isn’t what it seems. And unfortunately, as we learned with Mnar Adley last week, MintPress’s journalism is at stake after sites like PayPal decided to wipeout the accounts of dissenting voices. “If you are going to challenge the government or challenge power in any way,” MacCleod explains. “You might want to remove your money from PayPal because it could get zapped at any point just like it happened to me.” Plus, Biden ditches Covid relief to spend more money on weapons for Ukraine, Lindsey Graham’s war-mongering speech, and a funeral proposal. It’s all this, and more, on this week’s episode of Useful Idiots. Check it out. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesOur Sponsors:* Check out American Giant and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.american-giant.com* Check out MyBookie and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.mybookie.agAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Click here for the full episode, including the extended episode with Mnar Adley, proof that Nancy Pelosi doesn’t care about Roe v. Wade, and a bonus Biden Stoned Moment. MintPress News’ Mnar Adley has bravely reported on Israel, Ukraine, and national security agents running TikTok. In response, PayPal shut down MintPress’s account and threatened to take their money. PayPal has begun doing this with multiple independent media outlets who don’t fall in lock-step with the Biden administration’s policies. And it’s gone nearly unreported. Google “PayPal” and you’ll mainly see why you should buy their stock today (!). And as the MintPress name gets attacked, notice that the people calling MintPress News “fake news” are the ones tampering with the Wikipedia page to slander their name. Check out the site and read their journalism for yourself. And hurry, because the way censorship has been trending, you may not be able to read them for long. Plus, Rep. Gaetz and Justice Alito lead Republicans in the Roe v. Wade decision, Biden and Pelosi refuse to do anything about it, and in case anyone forgot, Amazon doesn’t care about its workers. It’s all this, and more, on this week’s episode of Useful Idiots. Check it out. Plan C for safe, at-home abortion access: https://www.plancpills.org/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesOur Sponsors:* Check out American Giant and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.american-giant.com* Check out MyBookie and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.mybookie.agAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Click here for the full episode, including the extended interview with Michael Hudson. We asked economist and “futurist” Michael Hudson, economic advisor and professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City, his thoughts on the people who have run our country for the 50 years he’s studied US politics. “They’re sociopaths. They think it’s a game. They don’t care about the things you and I care about.” He shares a dark story of the Carter administration’s strategy to cause a drought that would raise American grain prices so they could pay for higher priced oil. This, plus the constant racist, elitist sacrifice of people in third-world countries, caused him to leave his post as economic advisor. And nearly 50 years later, the US strategy in Ukraine, Yemen, Syria, Africa, and all over hasn’t changed. It’s all about money and power. “I won’t say that Biden and Trump are Chinese agents,” he says in a scathing review of the presidents. “But if they were, they couldn’t have done anything to serve China more.” Hudson is the next in a long line of Useful Idiots guests to take down President Joe. And after last week’s explosive clip of Biden mocking a former marine, we’re pretty sure a lot of people are beginning to agree. Plus, Taibbi exposes defense contractors on MSM, Greg Abbott accidentally helps migrants, and we help you get out of your next boring zoom meeting. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesOur Sponsors:* Check out American Giant and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.american-giant.com* Check out MyBookie and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.mybookie.agAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Click here for the full episode, including an explosive extended interview with Scott Ritter. Former US Marine Corps intelligence officer and Chief UN Weapons Inspector Scott Ritter resigned his post in protest of US war mongering. Immediately, he was mocked by Joe Biden. And when the FBI came after him, well, as he puts it, it went something like: So when he joined the Useful Idiots to discuss Joe Biden, he (like many of our recent guests), didn’t have much nice to say. “The marine in me says he stinks. He went to war knowing it was a lie and his chief of staff told me he knew it was a lie. And yet he held a hearing that lied to the American people about a threat that put marines, soldiers, sailors, and airmen’s lives at risk. People died. And not just our people, Iraqis. They didn’t deserve this, but they got it. “And the person that gave it to them? Joe Biden. He’s the President of the United States today, and I have zero use for the man. That’s about as honest as I can get.” He details Biden’s terrible approach to the war in Ukraine and the simple steps he’d need to end the whole thing and reach peace. But of course, Biden’s gonna Biden. And hear the extended episode where Ritter shares some explosive takes and seething views of the government whose war crimes have led to countless deaths. Oh, and if you want to win our hearts, take advice from Scott Ritter with quotes like: “You guys probably get far more viewers than CNN does, so you’re far more influential.” He’s right, especially after CNN+ officially shut down this week (thanks to viewers like you). Plus, Biden’s Trumpian approach to Assange, an MSNBC pundit joins the war, and Katie and Wilson debate whether Ted Cruz meant that Mickey would be “going at it” with Pluto or with Goofy. It’s all this, and more, on this week’s episode of Useful Idiots. Check it out. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesOur Sponsors:* Check out American Giant and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.american-giant.com* Check out MyBookie and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.mybookie.agAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Click here for the full episode, including an extended interview with Dr. Charisse Burden-Stelly. Dr. Charisse Burden-Stelly, professor at Carlton College, coordinating committee member of the Black Alliance for Peace, and author of many books including the upcoming Black Scare/Red Scare, has had it with liberals pretending to care about regular people. Biden promises to help people with student loans while prosecuting bankrupt people in courts. Obama pretended to fight for civil rights while shutting down protests in Ferguson. Kamala Harris claims to help migrants while blaming them for underlying causes and telling them not to come. Liberal media calls to aid Nazis in Ukraine while ignoring genocides in other countries. And just this month we got the newest liberal win: “Ketanji Brown Jackson said Bush and Rumsfeld should be tried for war crimes, but that’s easy to say in retrospect. She didn’t say Joe Biden should be tried for war crimes, or Obama, or Kamala Harris.” And to all the people who do criticize Obama, she’s not cheering them on either. “Obama’s an easy target now, but where were your antennas in the moment?” The scholar goes through a history of liberal lies and war crimes and comes to the stark conclusion that “liberalism has always been amenable to fascism.” Plus, Dr. Charisse shares her reading list of books by Black scholars, and when it comes to controversies over CRT and the 1619 Project and other issues of race, she only has one piece of advice: just read Gerald Horne. It’s all this, and more, on this week’s episode of Useful Idiots. Check it out. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesOur Sponsors:* Check out American Giant and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.american-giant.com* Check out MyBookie and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.mybookie.agAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Click here for the full episode, including the extended interview with David Sirota and a Biden Stoned Moment. David Sirota, whose site Daily Poster is now The Lever, returns to Useful Idiots as an Academy-Award nominee for his movie Don’t Look Up. And he’s got a message for the Oscars: We’ve got to do something today about climate change. It’s like a giant comet is headed towards earth and no one seems to care. “The movie’s giant audience proves that you don’t have to choose between focusing on important things and not having a big audience, or focusing on stupid, silly things and getting a big audience.” In this interview, David gives us the fun stuff: a tour of his celebrity sitings and stories; and then the dark stuff: Fossil fuels: “Why are we preserving an industry and jobs if in 10 or 20 years, the livable ecosystem that supports all human life is going to be significantly deteriorated or gone?” And student debt: “Student debt and Joe Biden are a 40-year story. You have to understand how motivated he has been, how much he believes in the idea of student debt. He has been a sculptor of the laws in this country that govern debt for 40 years.” To put it lightly, David Sirota doesn’t trust Joe Biden. “If you want to tell people not to believe anything politicians say, if you really want to deeply disillusion people to not believe the government will ever do something concrete and permanent to help, that seems to be the message that Joe Biden is trying to deliver. “This is how you turn a country into the joker.” Plus, dems are confused why drug prices (that they set) are so high, Marjorie Taylor Greene thinks we’re pro-pedophile, and a total jerk-off on a flight. It’s all this, and more, on this week’s episode of Useful Idiots. Check it out. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesOur Sponsors:* Check out American Giant and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.american-giant.com* Check out MyBookie and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.mybookie.agAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Click here for the the full episode, including an extended interview with Larry Wilkerson on why the FBI is tailing him and why others don’t stand up to the machine. Larry Wilkerson, former US Army Colonel and high-ranking member of Bush’s White House as Colin Powell’s chief of staff, has spent his post-government career criticizing our war-mongering policies. Wilkerson discusses the Russian invasion of Ukraine and the US response from an inside-the-government perspective: He’s worked with Biden and understands his motives. He knows the US oligarchs whose wallets will be hurt if Russian oligarchs are hit. He’s been through the army and Washington and understands why the current strategy isn’t designed to help anyone but the US. So we think he’s a good person to listen to. We also think that may be why the FBI is suddenly following him around. And, it seems that Wilkerson’s advice on drone strike information doubles as a pretty good characterization of some of the politicians in power today: “Your intelligence is never as good as you think it is.” Plus, Dems are ripping up the shelters of the unhoused while Republicans are having cocaine orgies. Oh yeah, and @usefulidiotpod is now #truthing on Truth Social. It’s all this, and more, on this week’s episode of Useful Idiots. Check it out. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesOur Sponsors:* Check out American Giant and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.american-giant.com* Check out MyBookie and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.mybookie.agAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

This week, we’re unpaywalling our extended interview with multiple-Oscar-winner Oliver Stone. His new documentary Ukraine on Fire has been censored by Youtube, but you can still see it on Rumble. He wrote and directed multiple classic, culture-defining American movies. He created groundbreaking documentaries, interviewing Putin, debunking Russiagate, and uncovering JFK’s murder. He won three Academy Awards. There was only one thing left for Oliver Stone to do: Become a Useful Idiot. Stone’s new documentary, JFK Revisited: Through the Looking Glass, uses newly declassified and reexamined footage to present a case that conspiracy theories about the president’s death are actually “conspiracy facts.” And it creates a big debate on Useful Idiots. Watch the pod, watch the doc, then let us know: do you agree with Matt, Katie, or Oliver? Who really killed President John F. Kennedy? The Oscar-winning filmmaker shares stories of censorship, getting yelled at about Russiagate by Bill Maher (kinda like another Useful Idiot we know), and being pushed out of the mainstream for being a controversial filmmaker, cementing his legacy as a Useful Idiot. Plus, watch Matt’s reaction when one of his all-time favorite directors quotes his “vampire squid” piece. It’s pretty cool. It’s Oliver Stone on Useful Idiots. Don’t miss this one. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesOur Sponsors:* Check out American Giant and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.american-giant.com* Check out MyBookie and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.mybookie.agAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Click here for the full episode, including the extended interview with Abby Martin, the moment when Abby confronted Nancy Pelosi, the latest dishonest attack from The Young Turks against Aaron Maté, and Biden’s stoned moment. The Empire Files’ Abby Martin returns to Useful Idiots to speak out against censorship and the corporate media’s duplicitous and hypocritical coverage of Russia’s war against Ukraine. Censorship is something Abby knows quite a bit about, given that Youtube has removed every single episode of “Breaking The Set,” the show she hosted at RT from 2012-2014. Abby can’t help but notice how the corporate media is celebrating Ukrainians for doing things they condemn when the people doing it are, say, Palestinian. “I feel like I woke up in an alternate universe,” she says. “Where there’s wall-to-wall coverage of anti-war messaging and everyone decided: ‘We hate war and we support occupied people’s right to resist.’ “For people like us who have been sounding the alarm on so many heinous US atrocities that are committed in our names on a daily basis, this manufactured outrage is shocking.” “Why now?” she asks. “Where were you all these years? Because people have been dying this whole time.” Why didn’t Rachel Maddow cry on TV for Palestinians or Yemenis. Because they US supports the occupation of Palestine and the siege of Yemen. And it’s good for the arms industry. And now, Abby, who is bravely calling out the BBC and CNN and New York Times, is, you guessed it, censored. With her videos being scrubbed off Youtube and RT getting banned in so many western countries, it’s scary to think how far this censorship could go. “None of us should be okay with this and none of us should be celebrating this,” she says. “I believe in critical thinking and media literacy and the answer to all of this is not censorship.” And as we head closer and closer to war, the danger (and ignorance) grows: “Censoring media poses a big problem because when you are facing down a conflict that could potentially turn into a hot war with two nuclear-armed powers, don’t you want the Russian perspective? Don’t you want the Chinese perspective?” But say that on TV and you get blacklisted as a Russian apologist. So listen here, because it’s getting harder and harder to find real journalists anywhere else. And until we get taken out too, we won’t stop searching for reporting and analysis that challenges, and doesn’t merely regurgitate, state department talking points. Plus, Trump wants you to lay down your life to fight CRT, Iranian-revenge-killing dating apps, and our new favorite segment: ‘This Week in MSM Nazi Propaganda.’ It’s all this, and more, on this week’s episode of Useful Idiots. Check it out. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesOur Sponsors:* Check out American Giant and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.american-giant.com* Check out MyBookie and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.mybookie.agAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy

Click here for the extended episode, including the full interview with Afshin Rattansi. And don’t miss Aaron’s take on The Young Turks meltdown over him. Afshin Rattansi’s show Going Underground is becoming harder and harder to see as the US, UK, and EU have all censored the RT. But Afshin has some good news for viewers: “With a VPN, you can always say you don’t live in unfree places like the US or Europe or Britain, and say you live in Pyongyang where there is freedom to watch it.” Rattansi, whose channel RT has become known as pro-Russia propaganda, regularly calls out the Russian invasion and has guests who condemn Russian aggression. But that doesn’t fit with the western narrative for the channel, so we don’t actually get to see him. If only we lived in North Korea. In this interview, we examine the problems that led to the crisis in Ukraine and how world leaders dangerously get history wrong. “Scholars only talk about Putin and Putin’s mind. This is corollary to the idea that WWII was about Adolph Hitler and not the Treaty of Versailles and the impoverishment of the German people after the war of reparations.” Without understanding the structures around leaders, like the hawkish state department and Russian Duma, “we’re in the realm of Marvel comics and Hollywood individual good and evil.” This individualism is what leads people to blindly call for a no-fly zone, which sounds good in terms of good-against-evil, but in reality, will only cause more destruction. Or, as Rattansi puts it: “It’ll be the end of the earth.” In this episode of Useful Idiots, we analyze no-fly zones, media censorship, and the path to peace in Ukraine. And we get treated to a very fun letter from Donald Trump. It’s all this, and more, on this week’s episode of Useful Idiots. Check it out. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit podcastchoices.com/adchoicesOur Sponsors:* Check out American Giant and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.american-giant.com* Check out MyBookie and use my code USEFUL for a great deal: www.mybookie.agAdvertising Inquiries: https://redcircle.com/brandsPrivacy & Opt-Out: https://redcircle.com/privacy