JOHNSTONE
JOHNSTONE is a podcast featuring readings of articles by Caitlin Johnstone. The readings are usually performed by her co-writer Tim Foley. The show brings her written commentary on politics, media, and current events into audio form. Each episode adapts one or more of her published pieces for listeners.
Episodes
Western Civilization Is A Phony Pop Star
Western liberal democracies are like a narcissistic wife beater who postures as a sensitive he/him feminist on social media. Like a pop star who makes a show of fighting the power and defending the marginalized while supporting Israel.
Our society isn't what it pretends to be.
Our entire civilization sustains itself through an endless river of blood, sweat and tears from the global south while
No, We_re Not Having The _It_s Not Genocide_ Conversation Anymore
It's so undignified how Zionists keep trying to resurrect the "stop calling it a genocide" conversation about Gaza when every relevant human rights group on earth says that's exactly what it is.
The latest effort to revive this long-dead debate comes in the form of a letter signed by 5,000 high-profile Israel supporters like Anti-Defamation League CEO Jonathan Greenblatt, Zionist megadonor Haim S
There's No Good Reason Why Poverty Should Still Exist
We have more than enough resources to care for everyone, if we would only redesign our systems to advance the interests of humanity over the interests of capital.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Three Major Revelations About The Gaza Holocaust In The Israeli Press
The Israeli press has published three significant revelations about the Gaza holocaust, reporting (1) that Benjamin Netanyahu concealed advanced knowledge of the Hamas attack on October 7, (2) that Israel rejected a Hamas offer to release all civilian hostages immediately after October 7, and (3) that according to an IDF drone operator, the Israeli military was intentionally firing on civilians th
Oh My God Shut The Fuck Up About "Antisemitism"
“Antisemitism” watchdog groups are flipping the fuck out about hip hop artist Macklemore saying “Free Palestine” while opening for Ed Sheeran, and the western press are of course helping to spin this ridiculous nonsense as a massive scandal.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Israel Is Destroying Evidence Of Genocide In Gaza
You don’t generally look at construction equipment and think of it as a tool for genocide, but in occupied Palestine that’s exactly what this machinery is used for. They use it to knock down homes. To bury their victims. To conceal the evidence.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Liberal Zionists Are Evil Shitbags
In a recent appearance at the Hampton Institute, Hillary Clinton stated that Benjamin Netanyahu's "first and foremost" offense is the damage he has done to Israel and its reputation.
Reading by Tim Foley.
For A Westerner, Opposing The Empire Is The Only Path To Dignity
"For us, opposing that river of blood is the only path to a respectable life. We have no control over the fact that right now we live in a society that is fueled by a system of imperialist extraction propped up by the barrel of a gun, but we can control our response to that reality."
Reading by Tim Foley.
CIA Veteran Gloria Steinem Has Died
CIA veteran Gloria Steinem has died.
She helped Langley win the Cold War
while women remain blacksited and broken
raining teeth from bloody mouths
like the reds in Pinochet’s torture camps.
In this CIA civilization
women
slap name tags over baby vomit stains
smiling ear to ear for chortling customers
who shovel cheesecarbs into their faces
while she juggles dishpans and breast pumps
and goes hom
Hey Americans! Escape Debt By Going To War With Iran!
Today in dystopia, war pundits have begun suggesting that the US could recruit sufficient troops for a ground invasion of Iran by offering young Americans debt forgiveness in exchange for enlisting.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Supporters Of Capitalism Are Victims Of Their Own Cognitive Biases
People who believe capitalism is working out great are just sloppy thinkers who've fallen victim to survivorship bias and the just-world fallacy.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Israeli Officials Promote Antisemitic Conspiracy Theories About Israel
Israeli officials have spent recent days circulating antisemitic conspiracy theories, with Benjamin Netanyahu boasting that he manipulated the United States into war with Iran, and Itamar Ben-Gvir sharing an AI video of Palestinians being sent to Nazi-style concentration camps.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Today In Dystopia: ICE Robots And Pentagon Puppets
Today in dystopia, a Pentagon employee has published a McCarthyite list of suspected leftists and socialists who can now be tracked with the help of an interactive map.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Unsedated And Undeterred
Reading by Tim Foley.
You're A Terrorist If You Resist Genocide Or Mass Surveillance, And Other Notes
In this dystopia, mass surveillance is now so normalized that you can be designated a terrorist for helping people avoid being surveilled.
Reading by Tim Foley.
All It Takes Is One Crack In The Lie We've Been Sold
You start pulling on one thread and then the whole thing unravels. Maybe you start with the Iraq war lies. Maybe 9/11. These days for a lot of folks it's Palestine.
You keep pulling on that thread, uncovering more and more uncomfortable truths, until eventually you discover that pretty much everything you've been taught about your world was a lie.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Don't Let The Values Of This Dystopian Society Shape How You Live Your Life
According to the rules of our dysfunctional society, you are inadequate unless you've become a productive gear-turner for capitalism and obtained enough wealth to consume products at large volume.
Reading by Tim Foley.
It's Obnoxious For Westerners To Criticize The Targets Of The Western Empire
It's crazy this even needs to be said, but if you are a westerner your ONLY job is to oppose the abuses of the western empire. Not Iran. Not China. Not Russia, Cuba or North Korea.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Our Entire Civilization Is Run By Oligarchs And Empire Managers - And Other Notes
The Wall Street Journal has a new article out titled “The Hidden Debt That Apple Owes to the CIA,” subtitled “Without CIA funding that helped keep NeXT afloat in the ’80s, Steve Jobs might not have made a triumphant return to Apple — and the iPhone might not have its foundational operating code.”
All the top tech giants have deep ties to the CIA. Apple, Google, Microsoft, Amazon. Facebook and Ins
"What Radicalized You?"
I dunno man maybe it was all the wars based on lies or the corporate ecocide or the live-streamed genocide or the people sleeping on sidewalks while billionaires become trillionaires or the plundering of the global south or the mass surveillance or the police drones or the Israeli torture prisons or the IDF rape dogs or the starvation sanctions or the proxy wars or the acts of nuclear brinkmanship
Today In Dystopia: Burning Books For Israel, Burning Books For AI
Today in dystopia they're really going after books. A library in Sydney has removed the book "How to Sell a Genocide" by Adam Johnson from its shelves after Zionists complained about its criticisms of Israeli mass atrocities in Gaza.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Today In Dystopia: "We Have Cameras Everywhere In That Town"
Today in dystopia, police have been wrongfully arresting people based on faulty information from AI-assisted Flock surveillance footage instead of actually investigating the evidence of the crime.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Let Your Love For This World Both Fill You With Joy And Compel You To Action
Love and cherish our world. That's the secret to remaining both (A) deeply happy and (B) well-informed about the dystopian abuses of the empire.
Reading by Tim Foley.
We All Know This Civilization Is Doomed, But They Keep Telling Us Everything's Normal
Life in the 2020s comes with so much dissonance and dysphoria because everyone knows this civilization is doomed, but it's not being acknowledged by any of our mainstream institutions.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Capitalism Trains Us To Blame Each Other For Systemic Abuses
Our minds have been carefully groomed to accept the imperial status quo as normal and healthy, and to see every failure of the system as a failure of the individual.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Today In Dystopia: Flock Camera Tyranny And Sam Altman Surveillance
"That's right kids, welcome to the future, where the sky is filling with AI police drones while the planet burns."
Reading by Tim Foley.
If We Could See Everything, It Would Radicalize Us All Instantly
The only thing keeping the heads of the oligarchs and empire managers attached to their necks is the limitations of human perception.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Joe Biden Should Be Dying Of Cancer In The Hague
I've seen a lot of people on social media expressing sadness and grief at the news of Biden's situation, and I agree it is very sad that this is happening. Joe Biden shouldn't be sitting at home dying of cancer, he should be sitting in a cell at The Hague dying of cancer.
Reading by Tim Foley.
There Is Beauty Everywhere. Even In Dystopia. Even In Armageddon
One point I will always adamantly insist on is that it’s entirely possible to live a joyful and exuberant life in the midst of this abusive dystopia.
Reading by Tim Foley.
ALL Mainstream Western Institutions View Palestinian Lives As Worthless
"I mean, it is a bit rich watching a BBC reporter act shocked and offended by somebody saying they think Jewish lives are worth more than Palestinian lives."
Reading by Tim Foley.
"I'm Not Political" Just Means "I Support Status Quo Politics"
"I don't do politics" means I support genocide. It means I support war. It means I support injustice and exploitation. It means I support ordinary people getting poorer and sicker while the biosphere dies and the billionaires turn into trillionaires. It means I support our headlong plunge into mass extinction and dystopia.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Let's Stay Human
They're trying to make us worse. These billionaire generative AI corporations reap profits by making us worse human beings.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Anthropocene
We can make a home here.
In these ruins.
In this shattered civilization
full of walking autopsies
where every twinkle in the night sky
is an Elon Musk satellite.
Life can still thrive here.
Even in the Anthropocene.
Even in the middle
of secular armageddon.
There is still moss
in the cracks of the parking lot.
There are still pigeons
roosting in the rafters.
We can make a nest here, too,
out of
Trump Inherited Peace Deals But Torched Them For More War
We're seeing more US airstrikes on Iran, joint US-Saudi strikes in Iraq, surging military escalations between Yemen and Saudi Arabia, and Israeli drone strikes in Lebanon, all just in the last couple of days. The middle east is becoming more and more of a powder keg, and it all could have been so easily avoided.
Reading by Tim Foley.
How To Be An Empire Propagandist
If you want to help the western empire administer war propaganda, one of the best ways to do this is to pretend the violence of empire-targeted governments happens in a vacuum, completely divorced from western imperial agendas.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Have I Mentioned It's Great That Lindsey Graham Is Dead?
Lindsey Graham's funeral was today, and as I watch all the worst people in the world express their grief at the loss of their dear darling friend, I find myself awash with gratitude that this particular warmonger lived a shorter life than such creatures often do.
Reading by Tim Foley.
We're Being Plunged Into Dystopia When We Could Be Living In Paradise
It's not just all the war, injustice, ecocide and dystopia that hurts. It's knowing it didn't have to be this way. It's knowing what could have been.
Reading by Tim Foley.
'Earth's Greatest Enemy' Delivers A Penetrating Insight Into The Heart Of Our Dystopia
There's a powerful new documentary out called Earth's Greatest Enemy by Abby Martin about the ecocidal abuses of the US war machine, and it addresses the most pressing existential hurdles we face as a species like nothing I've seen before.
Reading by Tim Foley.
There Will Be Times, Oh My Child, When It All Seems Hopeless
There will be times,
oh my child,
when it all seems hopeless.
When the trees all have QR codes
and the bank boys and balrogs
are holding all the cards.
When your refrigerator tells you
"THE IRANIAN PEOPLE YEARN FOR FREEDOM"
and your electric shaver can smell
if you've been reading Parenti.
When you're on a first-name basis
with the police surveillance drones
and your colonoscopy screen
in th
De-Normalize Israel
Basically we've got two choices: we either aggressively denormalize Israel or we watch our society become more and more Israeli.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Not Even Israelis Are Willing To Die For Israel
Israelis are happy for Americans to die for Israel, but they are unwilling to put their own lives on the line for the Zionist project.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Trump Is NOT A Reluctant War President
One of the dumbest popular narratives you see today is the idea that Zionists persuaded a reluctant Trump to start a war with Iran after he was re-elected, like they were chasing him around going "Would you like to bomb Iran?" like the guy from Green Eggs and Ham while he yelled "Not in a box! Not with a fox!" until he eventually caved in.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Revolutionary Optimism Takes Practice
Revolutionary optimism is a skill that you learn over time. Like any other skill, it takes practice to get good at it. Like any other skill, it can seem very difficult when you first start trying.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Where The Real Romance Begins
Our culture tells us that you do what you need to do to get the girl, and then once you’ve got her you just sort of coast along taking each other for granted until one of you dies. Because all the stories end before the real romance begins.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Trump Killed Those US Troops In Jordan
They were killed by the oligarchs and empire managers whose decisions sent them to die in yet another middle eastern war based on lies, and who will never lose a wink's sleep over it.
Reading by Tim Foley.
They're Launching A New COINTELPRO For The 21st Century
The Trump administration has announced a renewed crusade against "far-left terrorism," which sounds okay if you don't know that the word "terrorism" only ever means "behavior which goes against the agendas of the western empire."
Reading by Tim Foley.
Oh For The Day When The Bombs Stop Falling
Oh for the day
when the bombs stop falling.
When the humans stop biting
and stabbing each other
and spraying everything
with blood and oil.
When the men remove
their iron breastplates
and stand tender and vulnerable
in their original beauty.
When the women retrieve
their tongues
from the lead-lined jars
in the basement
and sing feral and free
beneath the streetlights.
When we release the eels
Liberals Have Relaxed About Trump Because They Trust Him To Keep The Wars Going
Have you noticed how the liberal establishment hasn't been nearly as emotional and outraged about Trump's second term as they were about his first? Now that he's the president who bombed Iran, the entire western political/media class is cool with him.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Trump Supporters Are Pathetic Cucks, And Other Notes
Being a Trump supporter in 2026 is like staying best friends with a man who stole your wife. He's deceived and betrayed you at every turn and you're still swinging from his nuts? That's cucky, humiliating behavior.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Lindsey Graham
Caitlin and Tim discuss the importance of emotional maturity in the struggle against the empire.
Well, At Least Lindsey Graham Is Dead
The only positive thing about the Iran war heating up again is that Lindsey Graham won’t be around to enjoy it.
Reading by Tim Foley.
It's A Race Between Revolutionary Consciousness And The Implementation Of Police Robots
The story of humanity in the 21st century is the story of a race between revolution and the technologies designed to prevent it. A race between the awakening of collective consciousness to the urgent need for revolutionary change on one hand, and the technological ability to quash a people's rebellion on the other.
We're all in this race, whether we realize it or not. We'd better pick up the pace
It's Been Ten Years. It's Time To Admit Bernie Sanders Was Wrong
The experiment has been run, and the results are in. You can't conduct a socialist revolution using a party whose primary function is to suppress socialist revolution. This has been conclusively established.
Reading by Tim Foley.
The Cure For Despair Is Awe, Wonder, And Humility
It is true that there is unfathomable cruelty in this world that will bring you crashing to your knees. And it is true that we are ruled by monsters with deeply entrenched power.
But it is also true that we live in a mysterious universe whose ways are almost entirely unknown to us. And it is also true that we don't really have any idea where humanity's adventure is headed.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Today In Dystopia
The longer we wait for revolution, the more weapons they'll have in place to stop us.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Manipulators Do Not Use Language The Same Way Normal People Do
Normal people use language to communicate and connect, while manipulative people use language to control and extract.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Empire Managers Invent Fake Threats So We Won't Fight The Real Monsters
Western politics is mostly just empire managers making up fake problems to fight so they don't have to address the real problems.
Can't stop waging wars or the western empire will collapse. So they make up fake threats from dictators and tyrants and take action to stop them.
Can't stop inflating the military budget and circling the planet with more and more war machinery or the military-industri
The Gaza Ethnic Cleansing Agenda Continues To Roll Forward
Israel's mass atrocities in Gaza have always been about ethnic cleansing from the very beginning.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Why I Hold Out Hope For Humanity
I hold out hope because people aren't buying the propaganda like they used to.
I hold out hope because trust in the imperial media is at an all-time low while our ability to attack and discredit the official narrative is at an all-time high.
I hold out hope because more and more people are realizing that capitalism simply does not work.
I hold out hope because empires don't last forever.
Readi
They're Still Pushing The Ethnic Cleansing Of Gaza
Israel was founded on the premise that the country’s previous inhabitants need to be eliminated in some way.
That’s all this has ever been about.
It was never about October 7.
It was never about Hamas.
It was never about hostages.
It was never about terrorism.
It was never about self-defense.
It was never about any of the countless excuses the hasbarists and imperial spinmeisters have offer
We're Expected To Remember October 7 But Never Ask Questions About It
Ask why there's been so much violence in the middle east these last three years and you'll be told it's because of October 7.
Ask why October 7 happened and you'll be called an antisemite.
Ask what specifically transpired on that day and you'll be called a conspiracy theorist.
Reading by Tim Foley.
din
They're designing park benches
so that homeless people can't sleep on them
and placing metal spikes beneath overpasses
so they can't be used as shelter.
Jerry Seinfeld says Palestine doesn't exist
and that sometimes socks go missing in the dryer,
wocka wocka
ha ha ha
it's funny because it's a witty observation
about life's everyday little goofy goofs.
Fast food wrappers blow in the wind
like the
The Polite Kind Of Racism
There are two types of racism in the west: the kind that's considered acceptable in polite liberal society, and the kind that's widely frowned upon.
The acceptable type of racism is the kind which considers it fine and normal to drop bombs on Muslim families overseas. The kind which sees starvation sanctions as a minor issue whose pros and cons are assessed solely on the basis of whether they wil
Blaming Ordinary People For The Ecocidal Consequences Of AI
There are plenty of reasons why we should all avoid using AI, but the push to offload all the responsibility for the ecological consequences of data centers onto individual users instead of just regulating AI companies is typical capitalist power-serving bullshit.
Reading by Tim Foley.
True Spirituality Confronts The Abuses Of The Empire
A spirituality that is uninterested in ending war, genocide, poverty and injustice is a dead spirituality. If you hold your time on the meditation cushion as something separate from the weeping mother clutching a small body in Lebanon, you're wasting your time.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Some Guy Broke Into My House
They keep saying I hate the guy because of his religion. I don't even care about his religion, I just don't like sharing my house with some random outsider who broke in here out of nowhere and took my stuff.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Rumbling
If you can hear the whales
through your glowing foot roots,
then stand up.
Open your mouth.
Let their aria rip through you.
Let it pound up and out
so the others can find you.
Burrrp!
Now’s not the time for politeness, my love.
We’re staring down mass extinction.
We don’t have time to be cool.
Care! It’s fine!
There’s a rumbling in your belly.
Can you feel it?
An inner ocean,
still teeming wit
Israelis Invade Lebanon And Then Cry Victim When Their Soldiers Get Killed, And Other Notes
From all this melodramatic garment-rending and victim-LARPing you'd assume the four Israelis were killed in their beds in Tel Aviv, not traveling by tank through a foreign country they'd invaded.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Humans Create Empires For The Same Reason They Create Egos
We're basically ruled by emotional toddlers who never learned to rein in their egos. They're trying to control the planet in the same way they tried to control their access to toys and candy when they were small.
Reading by Tim Foley.
I Hope Iran Keeps Winning And The US Empire Keeps Losing
The US empire is the most destructive and tyrannical force on the planet, and it is good when it fails to accomplish its goals.
Reading by Tim Foley.
The World's First Trillionaire Is Not Your Friend, And Other Notes
Elon Musk is a military-industrial complex plutocrat who is balls deep in the US intelligence cartel and recently facilitated the US-Israeli regime change operation in Iran. You have infinitely more in common with the average person in Iran, Cuba, Lebanon or Palestine than you have with the world's first trillionaire.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Podcast: Painting Pete Hegseth And Then Burning The Painting
Caitlin and Tim discuss Trump, trillionaires and other tribulations. Caitlin paints the US Secretary of War and then sets fire to the painting.
Video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ixOiTYdMCLM
Under The Western Empire You Get Punished For Having A Conscience
It's a war on the human conscience. Sentencing anti-genocide activists as terrorists. Working to deport mainstream foreign policy experts for criticizing an American war. They're actually punishing people for not acting like sociopaths.
Reading by Tim Foley.
The Entire Human Species Has Been Turned Into A Profit-Generating Machine
Under capitalism, humanity exists to serve the interests of the corporation. We are all livestock; beasts of burden used to carry margin expansion forward from quarterly statement to quarterly statement. Enjoyment of life has no value other than the extent to which it can be used to increase the net worth of the shareholders.
Reading by Tim Foley.
US Empire Managers View Iranian Sovereignty As An Act Of Aggression, And Other Notes
Secretary of War Pete Hegseth announced on Wednesday that the US is going to be launching major strikes in Iran, while President Trump says he'll "bomb the shit out of" the Iranians if they don't agree to a deal of his liking.
Reading by Tim Foley.
AI Won't Save Us From The Need To End Capitalism
One reason AI is being pushed so hard is because it's the last "humanity can capitalism its way out of all its problems" narrative that has yet to be fully discredited.
Reading by Tim Foley.
The US Starts Wars On The Other Side Of The Planet And Then Claims "Self-Defense"
The US is bombing Iran again after an American attack helicopter was downed over the Strait of Hormuz amid renewed escalations in the conflict.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Blind Submission To Authority Is Caused By Bad Parenting
Raising kids who aren't allowed to say no to you is raising adults who don't think anyone should be allowed to oppose their rulers.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Human Life Is So Much Harder Than It Needs To Be
We could just be taking care of one another and holding each other's hands as we hurtle toward the grave.
Reading by Tim Foley.
Israel Could Solve Its PR Problem By Simply Ceasing To Be Evil
Israel's +972 Magazine reports that the Israeli military establishment has launched a training program designed to "influence public consciousness" around the world, with courses aimed at training hundreds of operatives per year in strategies for "actively disrupting or manipulating the beliefs, attitudes, and behaviors of target audiences."
Reading by Tim Foley.
