 weird stupid dystopia. The last few days in the United States have seen a parade of wealthy freaks flating each other's egos and preening for the cameras and outlandish garb while ordinary Americans suffer more and more. The weekend's White House Correspondents Dinner saw a gaggle of media celebrities congregate to congratulate one another on what a great job they've been doing bravely telling the truth and holding the most powerful government on earth to account. The host, Trevor Noah of The Daily Show, gushed with enthusiasm about how much freedom the press have in America to say things the powerful don't like. As we sit here in this room tonight, people, I really hope you all remember what the real purpose of this evening is, Noah said. Yes, it's fun. Yes, we dress nice. Yes, the people eat. They drink. We have fun. But the reason we're here is to honor and celebrate the fourth estates and what you stand for. What you stand for. An additional check and balance that holds power to account and gives voice to those who otherwise wouldn't have one. And if you ever begin to doubt your responsibilities, if you ever begin to doubt how meaningful it is, look no further than what's happening in Ukraine, said Noah. Look what's happening there. Journalists are risking and even losing their lives to show the world what's really happening. You realize how amazing it is. In America you have the right to seek the truth and speak the truth, even if it makes people in power uncomfortable, even if it makes your viewers or your readers uncomfortable. You understand how amazing that is? I stood here tonight and made fun of the President of the United States and I'm going to be fine. I'm going to be fine, right? Do you understand what a blessing that is? Of course there are people who've said things that U.S. presidents don't like who are not in fact fine. Julian Assange continues to waste away in Belmarsh prison as the U.S. government continues its efforts to extradite him so he can become the first publisher ever tried under the Espionage Act. Edward Snowden, an American, remains in exile because one U.S. president after another continues to refuse to pardon his heroic whistleblowing about the sinister surveillance practices of the U.S. intelligence cartel. Daniel Hale, also an American, sits in prison for exposing the depravity of America's monstrous drone program. Trevor Noah did not mention these people or the many others who've been persecuted, silenced, imprisoned, and killed for saying things the powerful individuals who govern the U.S. don't approve of, because as a member of the mainstream media his job is not to inform but to propagandize. Far from providing an additional check and balance that holds power to account and gives voice to those who otherwise wouldn't have one as Noah claims, the people in his audience on Saturday night are tasked with manipulating public thought and facilitation of the interests of the powerful. The mainstream news media in America and throughout all the so-called free democracies of the Western world are propaganda institutions whose first and foremost job is to manufacture consent for oligarchy and empire, which is why the president of the United States, when he took the podium that night, had nothing but friendly words for the mainstream press. What's clear, and I mean this from the bottom of my heart, is that you, the free press, matter more than you ever did in the last century, Biden said. We've all seen the courage of Ukrainian people because of the courage of American reporters in this room and your colleagues across the world who are on the ground taking their lives into their hands. This past weekend also saw a friendly gathering of brave 4th estate truth warriors and political and government operatives of the U.S. empire at a party hosted by the billionaire owner of the neocon war propaganda rag the Atlantic. Politico reports David and Catherine Bradley and Lorraine Powell Jobs hosted a dinner at the Bradley's home, spotted Secretary of State Anthony Blinken and Cabinet Secretary Evan Ryan, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, CIA director Bill Burns, Press Secretary Jen Psaki, Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco, Senator Tina Smith, FCC chair Jessica Rosenwurshal, Delegate Stacey Plaskett, Homeland Security Advisor Elizabeth Sherwood Randall, Jeffrey Goldberg, Nick Thompson, Peter Lattman and Applebaum, Russell Berman, Franklin Four, David Frum, Elaine Godfrey, Adam Harris, Mark Leibovich, Jeff DeFour, Heather Kudel, Kevin Barron, Jose Andres, Ines Contur, Mitch Landro, Daphna Linser, Rachel Martin, Judy Woodruff, Jake Tapper, Wolf Blitzer, Jonathan Capehart, Caddy K, Steve and Gene Case, John Dickinson and Jen Palmeri. Yep, when you see a shady basketball player slash empire propagandist fraternizing with the CIA director while surrounded by media celebrities and government insiders at a party hosted by a media-owning plutocrat, you know you're in a country where power is held to account, right, Trevor? The orgy of embarrassment was capped off by the 2022 Met Gala, a big weird dystopian parade of rich freaks dressed like Hunger Games aristocracy and laughing in the face of everyone who can't afford to live. An honest Met Gala dress would have a corset made from the bones of Yemeni children, draped with a cloth of stolen gold and lithium spun by the tiny hands of child slaves with a full-length train that leached oil and blood wherever it went. This while ordinary Americans struggle just to survive. While American women appear to be on the precipice of losing their reproductive sovereignty, while money is poured into a proxy war which threatens to escalate into a conflict that could easily end all life on earth. This is your dying empire, America. This is your end-stage capitalism. This is your dystopia and all its weird, phony, stupid glory. It is horrifying. The longer you look at it, the creepier it gets. Breathe it all in, folks. We're in for a hell of a ride.