By Dennis Baer [dennis.baer@verizon.com ]
Here's how we force congress to pass a progressive agenda. Companies do not like boycotts. I suggest you email these demands to Walmart, Wendy's, Outback Steakhouse, Olive Garden, Red Lobster, Curves for Women health clubs, each big Republican contributors. Also include Eckerd, CVS, and Walgreens Pharmacy chains. You can send this to other companies as well.
Send this email to your friends and to others on political mailing lists. Thank you.
Send this text in email or fax to a company you can afford to boycott which either heavily supports Republicans or should know better that we need progressive legislative change.
We demand that your company executives get the Republican Party to hold a press conference and accede to these demands and then finally legislate and sign these into law. Until such a press conference happens and the legislation gets passed I will boycott your products.
We demand that the Republican party end their aggressive and hateful action to end a woman's right to choose abortion or not.
We demand the resignation of Tom Delay.
We demand that the United States withdraw from Iraq.
We demand that the Congress of the United states and the president of the United States enact a law to increase the minimum wage to TEN dollars an hour and also to extend unemployment benefits for all people whose unemployment benefits expired after 6 months even though they still seek work.
We also demand that the Congress of the United States to not privatize social security benefits in any form including taking a percentage of the social security tax and placing it in private accounts. People can already create their own pensions with money after taxes in the private sector.
We also demand that the congress make all of a person's earned income taxable for social security FICA tax purposes and remove the 88,000 dollar salary cap. This will make social security solvent for many years to come.
We demand the congress increase the payroll tax in order to make social security solvent as well.
We also demand congress and the president enact a prescription drug benefit under Medicare Part B which covers 80 percent of medication cost, with no extra premium, no extra deductibles, no means test and no coverage gaps, and no penalties for signing up in a succeeding year..
We also call for the complete repeal of the faulty Medicare law HR 1 / S 1 passed by congress in Nov 2003.
We also demand vote by mail throughout the United States of America. This will prevent Republicans from vote suppression by skin color which happened electronicly and in person in the 2000 and 2004 elections. Demand that your state implement vote by mail with ballots easy to fill out and difficult to change or invalidate by Republican Party officials.
We demand Civil servants on every state payroll should keep track of voter registrations and vote counting of mail in votes in each precinct and not companies such as Choicepoint. We need to take the Republican Party out of the business of keeping track of voter registration and counting votes.
We demand States ban the secretary of state from engaging in politics especially acting as a campaign official for a presidential campaign.
________________________________________
We do this in the spirit of peaceful resistance to a congress that refuses to enact this legislation
If you don't support what the Republicans did since they took over the House of Representatives in 1995 and don't support the Republican party's plans for this year then Join the revolution for progressive legislation and sign the petition at
http://www.boycott-republicans.com
HIT REPUBLICAN CONTRIBUTORS IN THEIR WALLETS !!
Write this url on your one, five and ten dollar bills in the white areas in Pencil.
--------------------
To each person reading this if you agree with my message please tell your friends and have them tell their friends.
We can stop the war in Iraq by boycotting the defense contractor General Electric corporation.
I want each and every person who wants to stop the War in Iraq to contact the defense contractor General Electric. Go to http://www.ge.com and send them email to the effect that you have decided
not to buy any GE products including Ovens, stoves, refrigerators, light bulbs, televisions, radios, telephones, video recorders, dvd recorders and players, etc.
UNTIL their company executives get the President of the United States aka THE CHIMP to hold a press conference announcing that he will withdraw all US Troops from Iraq, to get replaced by UN troops to defend Iraq until Iraq troops can defend their own country.
In addition to sending email from the web site you can make these demands of GE through their public relations officials. Please act polite when contacting them.
Gary Sheffer
Executive Director, Communications and Public Affairs
(203) 373-3476
gary.sheffer@ge.com
Peter O'Toole
Director, Public Relations
(203) 373-2547
peter.o'toole@ge.com
Yes his name's really Peter O'Toole but Bush appeared the one Lying in Winter about the Iraq war.
Join the revolution for progressive legislation:
http://www.boycott-republicans.com
http://groups.myspace.com/revolutionforprogressivelegislation
http://www.campusprogress.org/page/community/blog/maximus
http://www.network54.com/Forum/259017
http://www.cafepress.com/revolution09
For the complete list of podcasts look here http://savefile.com/projects/330309
Saturday, August 13, 2005
Tears for Ripley Mae Sherwood
The Untold Casualties of War
By Jack Random
“What responsibility do we have as citizens who send people to go fight in our wars? Do we do everything within our power, moving mountains if that’s what it takes, to provide for [them] when they come home?”
Steve Robinson, Executive Director, Gulf War Resources Center.
Why does a 35-year-old man go to war as a private in a volunteer army? Why does he come home on leave to shoot his wife and himself? Why does a 36-year-old man leave an infant child orphaned, motherless and fatherless?
Stephen Sherwood was a musician who played in a heavy metal band. He had long hair, tattoos, and was active in the local music scene. He was twice married and held down a job as a paramedic for ten years.
When his wife became pregnant, Stephen Sherwood joined the army because it was the only way he could find to provide health insurance for his family.
Sent to Iraq, he was assigned to the cannon crew of the Second Brigade Combat Team, serving a year in Baghdad and Ramadi. It was hard duty. The Second Brigade lost sixty-eight soldiers in Ramadi alone, taking some of the heaviest casualties in the war. It also took the lives of a great many Iraqis, undoubtedly including women and children, wives and infant daughters.
When Stephen Sherwood came home on leave to Fort Collins, Colorado, there was no apparent reason to worry. He was just another soldier on his way back to Iraq. Nine days later, he and his wife were dead.
Did the war change Stephen Sherwood?
How could it not?
Stephen, Sara and Ripley Mae Sherwood were not only casualties of an unjust war; they were casualties of an economic system that does not provide health care to the family of a man who held a good job for a decade.
He answered the call of fellow citizens in distress but when it came to filling his most fundamental needs, the privatized medical industry turned its back.
Stephen Sherwood did not want to become a soldier. He did not want to go to war. Like every man, he only wanted to provide for his family. Ten or twenty years from now, Ripley Mae will want to know what happened to her biological parents. A foster parent (or if she’s lucky, an aunt or uncle) may tell her that her daddy went to war and came back a different man. She will want to know why and whether it was worth it.
What will we tell her? What will we tell our own children? That we went to war for a lie and continued to fight for another? Will we say it was to spread the blessings of democracy (without it choking in our throats) or will we finally admit it was all about oil?
Not long ago, America cried a river of tears for Terri Schiavo. Who will cry for Ripley Mae Sherwood? It is safe to say that all America will not cry the tears that this one little girl will cry when she learns the truth.
Forty-five soldiers have gone to war and committed suicide over there. Thirty-five more waited until they came home. Some of them took others with them. They will not be serenaded by honor guards. Parades and memorials will not remember them but they are casualties of the war as much as any other and their numbers are growing.
Lieutenant Colonel Dave Johnson of Fort Carson called Stephen Sherwood “a hero” and maybe, in some strange and twisted way he is, but that is a bitter pill for the surviving family members.
Heather West, his former wife, recalled Stephen as a “creative, thoughtful, very sensitive person.” She added: “This not the person that I knew.”
It is a familiar refrain.
It is what friends and family said when Andres Raya (condemned by the authorities as a gangster) returned home to cut down a local police officer in a probable suicide by cop.
It is what friends and family said when Sergeants Matthew Denni and James Pitts came home to kill their wives. It was what friends and family said when Sergeant Curtis Greene hanged himself in his barracks.
Maybe it is what friends and family are supposed to say or maybe it is simple truth.
War is hell. It is one of the most horrific of human experiences – not only for the fallen but also for the survivors. It cannot help but change a man, a woman, husband, wife, mother or father.
The government that goes to war for less than a compelling reason owes a great deal more to the survivors of war than it can ever begin to repay.
What will our government say to Ripley Mae Sherwood? It will not even send condolences. Unless a sea change happens in this country, it will not even apologize. It will not admit wrong.
Perhaps the government will ask Ripley to go to war so that she can afford a decent education or basic health care.
Do not be fooled, Ripley. A government that will never admit wrong – even in the most egregious cases – cannot be trusted. Tell them to find someone else. Tell them you have already paid enough. There is always another way.
I wish I knew your birthday. I’d like to send you a card in eighteen or twenty years. It would be signed: From someone who remembers. I’m sorry.
Jazz.
Sources:
“Ft. Carson GI, wife shot dead,” By Monte Whaley and Erin Emery, Denver Post 8/5/05.
“2nd BCT Soldier kills wife, self,” The Colorado Springs Gazette, 8/5/05.
“Soldier Just Back From Iraq Kills Wife, Self,” WRAL.com, 8/5/05.
By Jack Random
“What responsibility do we have as citizens who send people to go fight in our wars? Do we do everything within our power, moving mountains if that’s what it takes, to provide for [them] when they come home?”
Steve Robinson, Executive Director, Gulf War Resources Center.
Why does a 35-year-old man go to war as a private in a volunteer army? Why does he come home on leave to shoot his wife and himself? Why does a 36-year-old man leave an infant child orphaned, motherless and fatherless?
Stephen Sherwood was a musician who played in a heavy metal band. He had long hair, tattoos, and was active in the local music scene. He was twice married and held down a job as a paramedic for ten years.
When his wife became pregnant, Stephen Sherwood joined the army because it was the only way he could find to provide health insurance for his family.
Sent to Iraq, he was assigned to the cannon crew of the Second Brigade Combat Team, serving a year in Baghdad and Ramadi. It was hard duty. The Second Brigade lost sixty-eight soldiers in Ramadi alone, taking some of the heaviest casualties in the war. It also took the lives of a great many Iraqis, undoubtedly including women and children, wives and infant daughters.
When Stephen Sherwood came home on leave to Fort Collins, Colorado, there was no apparent reason to worry. He was just another soldier on his way back to Iraq. Nine days later, he and his wife were dead.
Did the war change Stephen Sherwood?
How could it not?
Stephen, Sara and Ripley Mae Sherwood were not only casualties of an unjust war; they were casualties of an economic system that does not provide health care to the family of a man who held a good job for a decade.
He answered the call of fellow citizens in distress but when it came to filling his most fundamental needs, the privatized medical industry turned its back.
Stephen Sherwood did not want to become a soldier. He did not want to go to war. Like every man, he only wanted to provide for his family. Ten or twenty years from now, Ripley Mae will want to know what happened to her biological parents. A foster parent (or if she’s lucky, an aunt or uncle) may tell her that her daddy went to war and came back a different man. She will want to know why and whether it was worth it.
What will we tell her? What will we tell our own children? That we went to war for a lie and continued to fight for another? Will we say it was to spread the blessings of democracy (without it choking in our throats) or will we finally admit it was all about oil?
Not long ago, America cried a river of tears for Terri Schiavo. Who will cry for Ripley Mae Sherwood? It is safe to say that all America will not cry the tears that this one little girl will cry when she learns the truth.
Forty-five soldiers have gone to war and committed suicide over there. Thirty-five more waited until they came home. Some of them took others with them. They will not be serenaded by honor guards. Parades and memorials will not remember them but they are casualties of the war as much as any other and their numbers are growing.
Lieutenant Colonel Dave Johnson of Fort Carson called Stephen Sherwood “a hero” and maybe, in some strange and twisted way he is, but that is a bitter pill for the surviving family members.
Heather West, his former wife, recalled Stephen as a “creative, thoughtful, very sensitive person.” She added: “This not the person that I knew.”
It is a familiar refrain.
It is what friends and family said when Andres Raya (condemned by the authorities as a gangster) returned home to cut down a local police officer in a probable suicide by cop.
It is what friends and family said when Sergeants Matthew Denni and James Pitts came home to kill their wives. It was what friends and family said when Sergeant Curtis Greene hanged himself in his barracks.
Maybe it is what friends and family are supposed to say or maybe it is simple truth.
War is hell. It is one of the most horrific of human experiences – not only for the fallen but also for the survivors. It cannot help but change a man, a woman, husband, wife, mother or father.
The government that goes to war for less than a compelling reason owes a great deal more to the survivors of war than it can ever begin to repay.
What will our government say to Ripley Mae Sherwood? It will not even send condolences. Unless a sea change happens in this country, it will not even apologize. It will not admit wrong.
Perhaps the government will ask Ripley to go to war so that she can afford a decent education or basic health care.
Do not be fooled, Ripley. A government that will never admit wrong – even in the most egregious cases – cannot be trusted. Tell them to find someone else. Tell them you have already paid enough. There is always another way.
I wish I knew your birthday. I’d like to send you a card in eighteen or twenty years. It would be signed: From someone who remembers. I’m sorry.
Jazz.
Sources:
“Ft. Carson GI, wife shot dead,” By Monte Whaley and Erin Emery, Denver Post 8/5/05.
“2nd BCT Soldier kills wife, self,” The Colorado Springs Gazette, 8/5/05.
“Soldier Just Back From Iraq Kills Wife, Self,” WRAL.com, 8/5/05.
Monday, August 08, 2005
Mike's Morality Rant
From the Heart of Michael D. Caine:
Do George Bush and his merry band of conservatives really think that we are safer now than we were before the invasion of Iraq? Is it really possible that they are that blinded by their own stupidity? Does their religious belief in their righteousness really fool themselves?
There were suicide bombers before the Iraq invasion, but were there as many? There was suffering in Iraq, but was there as much? There was hatred for America before Iraqi “Freedom” but did it reach the level we see now?
The Conservative Republicans are spreading a delusionary virus that is killing our democracy at home and our youth in an Arab Nation that never attacked the United States nor was even a threat to do so. Lead by Bush these religious ideologues blatantly scraped the moral high ground right off into the swamp and created a quagmire they can’t seem to understand is too deep to slog through and too wide to bridge especially when the timbers used are our children.
Can the conservatives not see that even religious wars won have their costs, and that some wars aren’t worth it? In Iraq what is worth the cost? They can talk democracy all they want, we wouldn’t be there if Iraq had the same amount of oil as Sudan.
When I hear George Bush pleading for us to back his war because his intentions all along have been to bring Democracy to the Iraqi people, I want to puke. Are the Conservative Republicans really that dumb? Are their memories really that short? Have they truly forgotten that we went there to root out the Weapons of Mass Destruction and the terrorist training camps (that weren’t there in truth until after our invasion)?
The flag bearing, end justifying, super patriotic religious right has kidnapped our nation and is holding us at bay with a knife to the throat of our children, and when those of us that see it say “drop the knife” we are labeled “Traitors”.
The Moral Majority lacks the courage to think and the morality to tell the truth and every one of them is a Conservative Republican. They use a book, a good book, to judge others and hide behind. Lacking the ability to defend their actions they hold up their shields of “belief” as if to believe is to know the truth when their truth lies only in the I of the beholder.
We don’t need the separation of church and state, only the thoughtful, moral use of both.
[Editors Note: I believe the moral majority is now the 62% of the people who no longer support the war. Bring our soldiers home now!]
Do George Bush and his merry band of conservatives really think that we are safer now than we were before the invasion of Iraq? Is it really possible that they are that blinded by their own stupidity? Does their religious belief in their righteousness really fool themselves?
There were suicide bombers before the Iraq invasion, but were there as many? There was suffering in Iraq, but was there as much? There was hatred for America before Iraqi “Freedom” but did it reach the level we see now?
The Conservative Republicans are spreading a delusionary virus that is killing our democracy at home and our youth in an Arab Nation that never attacked the United States nor was even a threat to do so. Lead by Bush these religious ideologues blatantly scraped the moral high ground right off into the swamp and created a quagmire they can’t seem to understand is too deep to slog through and too wide to bridge especially when the timbers used are our children.
Can the conservatives not see that even religious wars won have their costs, and that some wars aren’t worth it? In Iraq what is worth the cost? They can talk democracy all they want, we wouldn’t be there if Iraq had the same amount of oil as Sudan.
When I hear George Bush pleading for us to back his war because his intentions all along have been to bring Democracy to the Iraqi people, I want to puke. Are the Conservative Republicans really that dumb? Are their memories really that short? Have they truly forgotten that we went there to root out the Weapons of Mass Destruction and the terrorist training camps (that weren’t there in truth until after our invasion)?
The flag bearing, end justifying, super patriotic religious right has kidnapped our nation and is holding us at bay with a knife to the throat of our children, and when those of us that see it say “drop the knife” we are labeled “Traitors”.
The Moral Majority lacks the courage to think and the morality to tell the truth and every one of them is a Conservative Republican. They use a book, a good book, to judge others and hide behind. Lacking the ability to defend their actions they hold up their shields of “belief” as if to believe is to know the truth when their truth lies only in the I of the beholder.
We don’t need the separation of church and state, only the thoughtful, moral use of both.
[Editors Note: I believe the moral majority is now the 62% of the people who no longer support the war. Bring our soldiers home now!]
Friday, August 05, 2005
UPDATE FROM LEONARD PELTIER
(From the International Peltier Forum)
July 30, 2005
Aho my relations,
As I sit here in my solitary confinement cell at USP Terre Haute, and reflect over the past month’s events, I can’t help but feel an overwhelming sense of love and gratitude for each and every one of you who have so diligently stood by me in this time of crisis. As you already know by now, on June 30, 2005, I was transferred from Leavenworth Facility, to Terre Haute USP. The reason for my transfer, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons Administrative staff was that the Leavenworth Facility was downgraded from maximum security level to medium, and therefore I could not remain at Leavenworth due to my illegal sentencing and consequent maximum security rank.
I was transferred without notification to my attorney, Barry Bachrach, and my family. Upon my arrival to Terre Haute I was placed in solitary confinement and was told that I would remain in solitary confinement until my personal file arrived. My personal file arrived, but I remain in solitary confinement allegedly for security reasons. I am confined to a cell that is 8’X 8’, it has a window that is covered from the outside with an elaborate shield that allows me to see 2-3 inches of the sky out of the top and 2-3 inches of the ground. All prisoners are supposed to get at least one hour of sunlight or outdoors and so I am taken from my cell to what is called a Recreation Room (Rec Cage), and the only sun or outdoors that I see is from some windows high up in this large room with a few air holes in them. I am able to walk up and down and this fulfills the one hour of sunlight or outdoors recreation time.
Whatever the system’s logic is, it seems that I won’t stay in Terre Haute for much longer and will be transferred again. I do not know when and where, nor do I know if this cruel game will be over after another transfer. After all, removal and relocation have been used to break our people from the beginning of this country’s history. This keeps my Defense Committee from taking the necessary steps to re-establish an office, but they are doing everything they can to help me in this most precarious and uncertain situation.
Before this situation developed, I asked Russ Redner to be the National/International Executive Director of the LPDC. Russ is a brother from our original Northwest AIM crew, a long time ally, and one of the original founders of the LPDC. I have trusted Russ with my life many times and he’s proven himself at every turn. I want him to be the last person I ever have to ask to guide the LPDC, and as such I have given him full authority to do whatever is necessary to prevent problems that have plagued us in the past from ever surfacing again. He and his wife, Paula, bring a renewed energy to the LPDC. It is essential that Russ, Barry Bachrach, Mike Kuzma, and the new team at the LPDC be supported so they can work most effectively to achieve my freedom and accomplish the things that need to be done for my people. I have confidence that all of you who truly support me will extend your vote of confidence to Russ and my new team.
A month in solitary is beginning to take a toll on me but your letters give me much hope and encouragement. Many of you have written, e-mailed and called USP Terre Haute, and other organizations. This has brought some improvement to my solitary confinement. I am now getting my medications on a daily basis, I can write out, I am receiving my mail, and I am allowed one phone call a month. I am allowed contact visits for those persons authorized on my visiting list. The contact visit is restricted to a two hour period, and is conducted through a glass pane and a phone. I am allowed to visit with my attorney without those restrictions.
At this time I am asking that you continue to call/write/e-mail the contacts below requesting that my security level be downgraded to medium due to my health, age and good behavior and that I be transferred to a medium security institution with all my hard earned prisoner privileges restored. In case I am transferred please add the new facility (keep checking our official website: http://www.leonardpeltier.org) to your contact list and ask them to respect my human rights and prisoner privileges. Again, I thank you for your support and prayers and hope that I may one day soon be among you.
In the Spirit of Crazy Horse,
Leonard Peltier
*-*-*-*
CONTACT LIST:
U.S. Penitentiary
4700 Bureau Road South
Terre Haute, IN 47802
Phone-812-244-4400
Fax----812-244-4789
THP/EXECASSISTANT@BOP.GOV
Federal Bureau of Prisons
320 First Street NW
Washington, DC 20534
202-307-3198
info@bop.gov
Amnesty International
5 Penn Plaza – 14th Floor
New York, NY 10001
Phone: 212-807-8400
Fax: 212-463-9193 / 212-627-1451
admin-us@aiusa.org
Human Rights Watch
350 Fifth Avenue, 34th floor
New York, NY 10118-3299
Tel: 1-(212) 290-4700
Fax: 1-(212) 736-1300
hrwnyc@hrw.org
Senate Judiciary Committee:
* Arlen Specter, Chairman
711 Hart Building
Washington, DC 20510
Tel: 202-224-4254
* Senator Patrick Leahy, Ranking Member
433 Russell Senate Office Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
(202) 224-4242
senator_leahy@leahy.senate.gov
* Senator Edward Kennedy
317 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
202/224-4543
FAX: 202/224-2417
* Senator Joseph Biden
201 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510
Phone: 202-224-5042
Fax: 202-224-0139
* Senator Dianne Feinstein
United States Senate
331 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Phone: (202) 224-3841
Fax: (202) 228-3954
* Senator Richard Durbin
332 Dirksen Senate Bldg.
Washington, DC 20510
Phone: (202) 224-2152
Fax: (202) 228-0400
* Senator Herb Kohl
330 Hart Senate Office Building
United States Senate
Washington, D.C. 20510
Phone: (202) 224-5653
Fax: (202) 224-9787
* Sen. Charles E. Schumer
313 Hart Senate Building
Washington, DC 20510
Phone: 202-224-6542
Fax: 202-228-3027
TDD: 202-224-0420
Congressional Judiciary Committee:
* Honorable John Conyers, Jr.
2426 Rayburn Building
Washington, DC 20515
(202) 225-5126
John.Conyers@mail.house.gov
* Honorable Robert C. Scott
1201 Longworth House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Phone: (202) 225-8351
Fax: (202) 225-8354
bobby.scott@mail.house.gov
* Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee
2435 Rayburn Building
Washington, DC 20515
(202) 225-3816
* Honorable Maxine Waters
2344 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20515
202-225-2201 phone
202-225-7854 fax
* Honorable Martin Meehan
2229 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Phone: (202) 225-3411
Fax: (202) 226-0771
TTY: (202) 225-1904
* Honorable Bill Delahunt
2454 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Phone: (202) 225-3111
Fax: (202) 225-5658
William.Delahunt@mail.house.gov
* Honorable Anthony Weiner
1122 Longworth House Office Building
Washington DC 20515
(202) 225-6616
weiner@mail.house.gov
United Nations:
Louise Arbour, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights
United Nations Office at Geneva
1211 Geneva 10
Switzerland
Fax: 41-22-917-9022
E-mail: tb-petitions@ohchr.org
U.N. Working Group on Indigenous Populations
United Nations Office at Geneva
1211 Geneva 10
Switzerland
Email: WGindigenous@ohchr.org
Fax: 41-22-917-9008
The Special Rapporteur on human rights and fundamental freedoms of
indigenous peoples: Mr. Rodolfo Stavenhagen
His contact person is: Pablo Espiniella, Human Rights Officer
Tel. 41-22-917-9413
Fax 41-22-917-9008
email: indigenous@ohchr.org
U.N. Working Group on Arbitrary Detentions
c/o Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights
CH-1211, Geneva 10
Switzerland
Fax: 41-22- 917-9006
=+=+= FREE LEONARD PELTIER NOW! =+=+=
From: International Peltier Forum [mailto:kolahq@skynet.be]
Sent: Thursday, August 04, 2005 2:50 PM
To: IPF
Subject: [LP Forum News] Update from Leonard Peltier
=+=+= INTERNATIONAL FORUM of VIPs for PELTIER =+=+=
August 4th 2005 :
10772 days of WRONGFUL IMPRISONMENT!
=+=+=+=+=+=
ONLINE PETITION FOR EXECUTIVE CLEMENCY
http://users.skynet.be/kola/lppet.htm
ONLINE PETITION FOR PAROLE
http://campaign-pyramid.com/kola/leonard/
=+=+=+=+=+=
July 30, 2005
Aho my relations,
As I sit here in my solitary confinement cell at USP Terre Haute, and reflect over the past month’s events, I can’t help but feel an overwhelming sense of love and gratitude for each and every one of you who have so diligently stood by me in this time of crisis. As you already know by now, on June 30, 2005, I was transferred from Leavenworth Facility, to Terre Haute USP. The reason for my transfer, according to the Federal Bureau of Prisons Administrative staff was that the Leavenworth Facility was downgraded from maximum security level to medium, and therefore I could not remain at Leavenworth due to my illegal sentencing and consequent maximum security rank.
I was transferred without notification to my attorney, Barry Bachrach, and my family. Upon my arrival to Terre Haute I was placed in solitary confinement and was told that I would remain in solitary confinement until my personal file arrived. My personal file arrived, but I remain in solitary confinement allegedly for security reasons. I am confined to a cell that is 8’X 8’, it has a window that is covered from the outside with an elaborate shield that allows me to see 2-3 inches of the sky out of the top and 2-3 inches of the ground. All prisoners are supposed to get at least one hour of sunlight or outdoors and so I am taken from my cell to what is called a Recreation Room (Rec Cage), and the only sun or outdoors that I see is from some windows high up in this large room with a few air holes in them. I am able to walk up and down and this fulfills the one hour of sunlight or outdoors recreation time.
Whatever the system’s logic is, it seems that I won’t stay in Terre Haute for much longer and will be transferred again. I do not know when and where, nor do I know if this cruel game will be over after another transfer. After all, removal and relocation have been used to break our people from the beginning of this country’s history. This keeps my Defense Committee from taking the necessary steps to re-establish an office, but they are doing everything they can to help me in this most precarious and uncertain situation.
Before this situation developed, I asked Russ Redner to be the National/International Executive Director of the LPDC. Russ is a brother from our original Northwest AIM crew, a long time ally, and one of the original founders of the LPDC. I have trusted Russ with my life many times and he’s proven himself at every turn. I want him to be the last person I ever have to ask to guide the LPDC, and as such I have given him full authority to do whatever is necessary to prevent problems that have plagued us in the past from ever surfacing again. He and his wife, Paula, bring a renewed energy to the LPDC. It is essential that Russ, Barry Bachrach, Mike Kuzma, and the new team at the LPDC be supported so they can work most effectively to achieve my freedom and accomplish the things that need to be done for my people. I have confidence that all of you who truly support me will extend your vote of confidence to Russ and my new team.
A month in solitary is beginning to take a toll on me but your letters give me much hope and encouragement. Many of you have written, e-mailed and called USP Terre Haute, and other organizations. This has brought some improvement to my solitary confinement. I am now getting my medications on a daily basis, I can write out, I am receiving my mail, and I am allowed one phone call a month. I am allowed contact visits for those persons authorized on my visiting list. The contact visit is restricted to a two hour period, and is conducted through a glass pane and a phone. I am allowed to visit with my attorney without those restrictions.
At this time I am asking that you continue to call/write/e-mail the contacts below requesting that my security level be downgraded to medium due to my health, age and good behavior and that I be transferred to a medium security institution with all my hard earned prisoner privileges restored. In case I am transferred please add the new facility (keep checking our official website: http://www.leonardpeltier.org) to your contact list and ask them to respect my human rights and prisoner privileges. Again, I thank you for your support and prayers and hope that I may one day soon be among you.
In the Spirit of Crazy Horse,
Leonard Peltier
*-*-*-*
CONTACT LIST:
U.S. Penitentiary
4700 Bureau Road South
Terre Haute, IN 47802
Phone-812-244-4400
Fax----812-244-4789
THP/EXECASSISTANT@BOP.GOV
Federal Bureau of Prisons
320 First Street NW
Washington, DC 20534
202-307-3198
info@bop.gov
Amnesty International
5 Penn Plaza – 14th Floor
New York, NY 10001
Phone: 212-807-8400
Fax: 212-463-9193 / 212-627-1451
admin-us@aiusa.org
Human Rights Watch
350 Fifth Avenue, 34th floor
New York, NY 10118-3299
Tel: 1-(212) 290-4700
Fax: 1-(212) 736-1300
hrwnyc@hrw.org
Senate Judiciary Committee:
* Arlen Specter, Chairman
711 Hart Building
Washington, DC 20510
Tel: 202-224-4254
* Senator Patrick Leahy, Ranking Member
433 Russell Senate Office Bldg
Washington, DC 20510
(202) 224-4242
senator_leahy@leahy.senate.gov
* Senator Edward Kennedy
317 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
202/224-4543
FAX: 202/224-2417
* Senator Joseph Biden
201 Russell Senate Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20510
Phone: 202-224-5042
Fax: 202-224-0139
* Senator Dianne Feinstein
United States Senate
331 Hart Senate Office Building
Washington, DC 20510
Phone: (202) 224-3841
Fax: (202) 228-3954
* Senator Richard Durbin
332 Dirksen Senate Bldg.
Washington, DC 20510
Phone: (202) 224-2152
Fax: (202) 228-0400
* Senator Herb Kohl
330 Hart Senate Office Building
United States Senate
Washington, D.C. 20510
Phone: (202) 224-5653
Fax: (202) 224-9787
* Sen. Charles E. Schumer
313 Hart Senate Building
Washington, DC 20510
Phone: 202-224-6542
Fax: 202-228-3027
TDD: 202-224-0420
Congressional Judiciary Committee:
* Honorable John Conyers, Jr.
2426 Rayburn Building
Washington, DC 20515
(202) 225-5126
John.Conyers@mail.house.gov
* Honorable Robert C. Scott
1201 Longworth House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Phone: (202) 225-8351
Fax: (202) 225-8354
bobby.scott@mail.house.gov
* Honorable Sheila Jackson Lee
2435 Rayburn Building
Washington, DC 20515
(202) 225-3816
* Honorable Maxine Waters
2344 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, D.C. 20515
202-225-2201 phone
202-225-7854 fax
* Honorable Martin Meehan
2229 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Phone: (202) 225-3411
Fax: (202) 226-0771
TTY: (202) 225-1904
* Honorable Bill Delahunt
2454 Rayburn House Office Building
Washington, DC 20515
Phone: (202) 225-3111
Fax: (202) 225-5658
William.Delahunt@mail.house.gov
* Honorable Anthony Weiner
1122 Longworth House Office Building
Washington DC 20515
(202) 225-6616
weiner@mail.house.gov
United Nations:
Louise Arbour, U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights
United Nations Office at Geneva
1211 Geneva 10
Switzerland
Fax: 41-22-917-9022
E-mail: tb-petitions@ohchr.org
U.N. Working Group on Indigenous Populations
United Nations Office at Geneva
1211 Geneva 10
Switzerland
Email: WGindigenous@ohchr.org
Fax: 41-22-917-9008
The Special Rapporteur on human rights and fundamental freedoms of
indigenous peoples: Mr. Rodolfo Stavenhagen
His contact person is: Pablo Espiniella, Human Rights Officer
Tel. 41-22-917-9413
Fax 41-22-917-9008
email: indigenous@ohchr.org
U.N. Working Group on Arbitrary Detentions
c/o Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights
CH-1211, Geneva 10
Switzerland
Fax: 41-22- 917-9006
=+=+= FREE LEONARD PELTIER NOW! =+=+=
From: International Peltier Forum [mailto:kolahq@skynet.be]
Sent: Thursday, August 04, 2005 2:50 PM
To: IPF
Subject: [LP Forum News] Update from Leonard Peltier
=+=+= INTERNATIONAL FORUM of VIPs for PELTIER =+=+=
August 4th 2005 :
10772 days of WRONGFUL IMPRISONMENT!
=+=+=+=+=+=
ONLINE PETITION FOR EXECUTIVE CLEMENCY
http://users.skynet.be/kola/lppet.htm
ONLINE PETITION FOR PAROLE
http://campaign-pyramid.com/kola/leonard/
=+=+=+=+=+=
Wednesday, July 27, 2005
Over There: The Duality of War
It is difficult to imagine what Fox is up to: If they think their new series on FX “Over There” is a recruiting tool, I believe they are mistaken. If they think it will fill impressionable young minds with that gung ho spirit of patriotic fervor, they will surely be disappointed. Only the psychopathic would find this depiction of war attractive.
There is a lot wrong with Steven Bochco’s Iraq war series. Virtually everyone in the platoon is young and attractive, belying the fact that so many of the soldiers in this war are drawn from the Guard and Reserves. Check the latest casualty list: It is no longer an army of high school graduates, the young and naïve. There is probably more bravado and thoughtful reflection than reality allows but there is also something beneath the surface of this Hollywood production that strikes deep and rings true.
What comes across in “Over There” is a potent message concerning the duality of war, the same message that Stanley Kubrick delivered in the Vietnam classic “Full Metal Jacket.” It is the acknowledgment that no matter where the individual begins in philosophy, values and character, the experience of war will force every soldier to confront internal demons. In war, only a soldier’s duty is clear and even that may be called into question. It is the realization that the soldier on the far side of the field is not fundamentally different than the soldier on the near side. It is the understanding that words like democracy, insurgency, terrorist, freedom, occupation, liberation, good and evil have very little meaning in the line of fire. It is the reality that war is hell and no one escapes unscathed.
It will be interesting to see where the series goes from its beginning, whether it will temper the antiwar portion of the equation that compels the viewer to confront a moral dilemma. If it remains true and gains a growing audience, Fox will confront its own dilemma: Whether to kill a rare program with critical and popular appeal or allow it to raise the very questions its news division has fought so long and hard to deny.
If it lives up to its pilot, “Over There” has the power to reach many American hearts and minds. When both are engaged in sufficient numbers, the end of the occupation will be at hand.
Jazz.
There is a lot wrong with Steven Bochco’s Iraq war series. Virtually everyone in the platoon is young and attractive, belying the fact that so many of the soldiers in this war are drawn from the Guard and Reserves. Check the latest casualty list: It is no longer an army of high school graduates, the young and naïve. There is probably more bravado and thoughtful reflection than reality allows but there is also something beneath the surface of this Hollywood production that strikes deep and rings true.
What comes across in “Over There” is a potent message concerning the duality of war, the same message that Stanley Kubrick delivered in the Vietnam classic “Full Metal Jacket.” It is the acknowledgment that no matter where the individual begins in philosophy, values and character, the experience of war will force every soldier to confront internal demons. In war, only a soldier’s duty is clear and even that may be called into question. It is the realization that the soldier on the far side of the field is not fundamentally different than the soldier on the near side. It is the understanding that words like democracy, insurgency, terrorist, freedom, occupation, liberation, good and evil have very little meaning in the line of fire. It is the reality that war is hell and no one escapes unscathed.
It will be interesting to see where the series goes from its beginning, whether it will temper the antiwar portion of the equation that compels the viewer to confront a moral dilemma. If it remains true and gains a growing audience, Fox will confront its own dilemma: Whether to kill a rare program with critical and popular appeal or allow it to raise the very questions its news division has fought so long and hard to deny.
If it lives up to its pilot, “Over There” has the power to reach many American hearts and minds. When both are engaged in sufficient numbers, the end of the occupation will be at hand.
Jazz.
Sunday, July 24, 2005
SHORTSTACKED: SPOTLIGHT ON ROVE & CHENEY
By Jack Random
An article on Common Dreams (“Rove Scandal Could Stick” by Mark Weisbrot) was the first I have seen to seriously ask the obvious question: What did the president know and when did he know it?
My own reading of this sordid affair (the exposure of a CIA agent and its subsequent cover-up) is that it will not reach the desk of the president but that is hardly a reason to relent.
If anyone in the White House were to have informed the president, the question would be: Why would he do that?
The elders among us may recall how forces conspired to knock out vice president Spiro Agnew (the president’s hatchet man) before Nixon took the fall. In a parallel twist of irony, if someone in Cheney’s office gave information to the president that exposed him to liability, it would be a vice presidential insurance policy. It would be Cheney saying to Bush: If you take us down, we’ll take you with us.
There is an enormous difference between Dick Nixon and George W. Bush. There are similarities as well: In psychoanalytical terms, both seem blessed or cursed (depending on your point of view) with the combination of gigantic egos and dwarfed super egos. The critical difference, however, is that Nixon did not need a Karl Rove because he was a Karl Rove. For all his moral shortcomings (or perhaps because of them), Nixon was a master politico and one can be sure that many Republican candidates consulted him even in exile.
Watergate would not have had a profound impact on American politics if it had not gone to the very top. Mitchell, Haldeman and Ehrlichmann [1] may have been capable of any number of immoral deeds but they were not essential to the Nixon White House. The Chief Executive wore all the hats and had his finger in every pie. By contrast, our current president’s greatest virtue (again, a two-edged sword) is that he knows his limitations. He depends on others to formulate policy and guide the ship of state.
Colin Powell, George Tenet, John Ashcroft and (most curiously) Paul Wolfowitz have already jumped ship. With her promotion to Secretary of State, Karl Rove and Dick Cheney have effectively removed Condoleezza Rice as the president’s daily adviser. They can send her off on global publicity tours, leaving themselves to run the office.
As enamored as the president is with Condoleezza and Rummy (Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld), he is as dependent on Cheney and Rove as Rush Limbaugh is on pharmaceutical remedies. The president’s enormous ego gives them carte blanche to secure his legacy and record his pages in history. Without Cheney and Rove, he is what he is: A notoriously incompetent and ill-informed executive who has failed at every venture he has attempted short of politics.
Having won a second term in the last election, we might be tempted to think that Rove no longer has a function. We would be wrong. Aside from orchestrating White House spin, Rove has two critical items on his agenda: Building Republican dominance in the midterm elections and positioning the Republican Party to continue the Bush legacy. Dick Cheney’s agenda is to forward the current policies of free trade and expand the war on terror with all that entails.
To the extent that Rove and Cheney succeed, the horrors of the Bush administration will be visited on future generations not only in America but in the world at large.
The stakes are high and both men are short stacked with a diminishing supply of cards to be played. Rove and Scooter Libby (Cheney’s Chief of Staff) have fully exploited their access to privileged information and their connections in the media. While they may have pulled it off in Florida and Ohio, it is extremely difficult for politicos to operate in the spotlight. As long as the Plame-Wilson-Miller case hangs over them, they are compelled to spend most of their time and efforts covering their trails.
With Times reporter Judy Miller in jail, a parade of her colleagues under subpoena, and every other operative in Washington cowering in their executive suites, anyone who receives a call from Rove, Cheney or their minions is conveniently on vacation.
It does not matter if the president himself takes the fall. As long as the dirty underside of his manufactured case for war is fully exposed, a legacy will be secured. The younger Bush pages will combine with the Nixon pages in a chapter on infamy.
If Rove and Cheney take the fall, the legacy is mortally wounded and even the spineless Democrats may be emboldened to distance themselves from the policies of the Bush White House. Who knows but that they may even be so emboldened as to demand an end to the occupation?
If not, the door to an effective third party or independent political movement will swing wide open.
Jazz.
[Note: Attorney General John Mitchell resigned in disgrace. Chief of Staff H.R. Haldeman and Domestic Policy Advisor John Ehrlichmann were fired as intended fall guys.]
An article on Common Dreams (“Rove Scandal Could Stick” by Mark Weisbrot) was the first I have seen to seriously ask the obvious question: What did the president know and when did he know it?
My own reading of this sordid affair (the exposure of a CIA agent and its subsequent cover-up) is that it will not reach the desk of the president but that is hardly a reason to relent.
If anyone in the White House were to have informed the president, the question would be: Why would he do that?
The elders among us may recall how forces conspired to knock out vice president Spiro Agnew (the president’s hatchet man) before Nixon took the fall. In a parallel twist of irony, if someone in Cheney’s office gave information to the president that exposed him to liability, it would be a vice presidential insurance policy. It would be Cheney saying to Bush: If you take us down, we’ll take you with us.
There is an enormous difference between Dick Nixon and George W. Bush. There are similarities as well: In psychoanalytical terms, both seem blessed or cursed (depending on your point of view) with the combination of gigantic egos and dwarfed super egos. The critical difference, however, is that Nixon did not need a Karl Rove because he was a Karl Rove. For all his moral shortcomings (or perhaps because of them), Nixon was a master politico and one can be sure that many Republican candidates consulted him even in exile.
Watergate would not have had a profound impact on American politics if it had not gone to the very top. Mitchell, Haldeman and Ehrlichmann [1] may have been capable of any number of immoral deeds but they were not essential to the Nixon White House. The Chief Executive wore all the hats and had his finger in every pie. By contrast, our current president’s greatest virtue (again, a two-edged sword) is that he knows his limitations. He depends on others to formulate policy and guide the ship of state.
Colin Powell, George Tenet, John Ashcroft and (most curiously) Paul Wolfowitz have already jumped ship. With her promotion to Secretary of State, Karl Rove and Dick Cheney have effectively removed Condoleezza Rice as the president’s daily adviser. They can send her off on global publicity tours, leaving themselves to run the office.
As enamored as the president is with Condoleezza and Rummy (Secretary of Defense, Donald Rumsfeld), he is as dependent on Cheney and Rove as Rush Limbaugh is on pharmaceutical remedies. The president’s enormous ego gives them carte blanche to secure his legacy and record his pages in history. Without Cheney and Rove, he is what he is: A notoriously incompetent and ill-informed executive who has failed at every venture he has attempted short of politics.
Having won a second term in the last election, we might be tempted to think that Rove no longer has a function. We would be wrong. Aside from orchestrating White House spin, Rove has two critical items on his agenda: Building Republican dominance in the midterm elections and positioning the Republican Party to continue the Bush legacy. Dick Cheney’s agenda is to forward the current policies of free trade and expand the war on terror with all that entails.
To the extent that Rove and Cheney succeed, the horrors of the Bush administration will be visited on future generations not only in America but in the world at large.
The stakes are high and both men are short stacked with a diminishing supply of cards to be played. Rove and Scooter Libby (Cheney’s Chief of Staff) have fully exploited their access to privileged information and their connections in the media. While they may have pulled it off in Florida and Ohio, it is extremely difficult for politicos to operate in the spotlight. As long as the Plame-Wilson-Miller case hangs over them, they are compelled to spend most of their time and efforts covering their trails.
With Times reporter Judy Miller in jail, a parade of her colleagues under subpoena, and every other operative in Washington cowering in their executive suites, anyone who receives a call from Rove, Cheney or their minions is conveniently on vacation.
It does not matter if the president himself takes the fall. As long as the dirty underside of his manufactured case for war is fully exposed, a legacy will be secured. The younger Bush pages will combine with the Nixon pages in a chapter on infamy.
If Rove and Cheney take the fall, the legacy is mortally wounded and even the spineless Democrats may be emboldened to distance themselves from the policies of the Bush White House. Who knows but that they may even be so emboldened as to demand an end to the occupation?
If not, the door to an effective third party or independent political movement will swing wide open.
Jazz.
[Note: Attorney General John Mitchell resigned in disgrace. Chief of Staff H.R. Haldeman and Domestic Policy Advisor John Ehrlichmann were fired as intended fall guys.]
Tuesday, July 19, 2005
CounterPunch Response: Miller Time
[Note: This is a response to "Miller Time/Pull the Threads" as posted by CounterPunch 7/15/05]
Read your Miller Time ...
I have a feeling that the right is making us go in circles. Too much time is being spent in opposing their lies, which is making us look partisan.
We should shift the focus on to Judith Miller, as in my opinion that is where the real truth lies. Rove seems to be a distraction and is rightly taking the flak at present because nothing really may be proven against him.
If we shift the focus to "Special Plan Office" in the White House operating under the VeePee and the disinformation they generated with "General Judith Miller" etc., in the lead-up to the Iraq fiasco, we will be getting closer to where all this should be leading.
It looks like Libby and Miller had a conversation, which is the root of this. My feeling is that subsequently Miller told Novak about Valerie [Plame] but in the context of being Wilson's wife in the CIA, who so called "engineered" the trip, rather than being a covert agent. Again my gut says both Novak and Rove were ignorant of the covert status, otherwise Novak would not have gone public. Rove is highly disciplined in what he does, thus exposing a covert agent does not really fit into being his modus operandi.
The problem is that Miller has taken on a so-called martyr role and the liberal media has rolled over in her favor. They have to get out of this and realize how she is taking us all for a ride to hide her own "false journalism" and "march beats to war".
I think Miller is the key and the prosecuter "is telling us so" based on whatever he has said or done till now. Cooper/Rove is not in the same category as Miller/VeePee/Rumsfeld in lead up to war. That is the story Americans need to know, and then we can talk treason of the highest order!!!!
-- Allwar Isbad
Read your Miller Time ...
I have a feeling that the right is making us go in circles. Too much time is being spent in opposing their lies, which is making us look partisan.
We should shift the focus on to Judith Miller, as in my opinion that is where the real truth lies. Rove seems to be a distraction and is rightly taking the flak at present because nothing really may be proven against him.
If we shift the focus to "Special Plan Office" in the White House operating under the VeePee and the disinformation they generated with "General Judith Miller" etc., in the lead-up to the Iraq fiasco, we will be getting closer to where all this should be leading.
It looks like Libby and Miller had a conversation, which is the root of this. My feeling is that subsequently Miller told Novak about Valerie [Plame] but in the context of being Wilson's wife in the CIA, who so called "engineered" the trip, rather than being a covert agent. Again my gut says both Novak and Rove were ignorant of the covert status, otherwise Novak would not have gone public. Rove is highly disciplined in what he does, thus exposing a covert agent does not really fit into being his modus operandi.
The problem is that Miller has taken on a so-called martyr role and the liberal media has rolled over in her favor. They have to get out of this and realize how she is taking us all for a ride to hide her own "false journalism" and "march beats to war".
I think Miller is the key and the prosecuter "is telling us so" based on whatever he has said or done till now. Cooper/Rove is not in the same category as Miller/VeePee/Rumsfeld in lead up to war. That is the story Americans need to know, and then we can talk treason of the highest order!!!!
-- Allwar Isbad
Monday, July 18, 2005
Mark of The Beast
Unlike the White House propaganda machine, numbers do not lie; rather, they speak for themselves:
1.....2.....3.....4.....5.....6.....7.....8.....9
a......b.....c.....d.....e.....F.....g.....h.....i
j.......k.....l.....m.....n....O.....p.....q.....r
s.......t.....u.....v.....w....X.....y......z
What are the odds?
1.....2.....3.....4.....5.....6.....7.....8.....9
a......b.....c.....d.....e.....F.....g.....h.....i
j.......k.....l.....m.....n....O.....p.....q.....r
s.......t.....u.....v.....w....X.....y......z
What are the odds?
Saturday, July 16, 2005
Why I Love The British
Sunday will mark the final round of the 134th Open Golf Tournament at the Old Course of Saint Andrews. The Open dates back to 1860 (play was suspended for the world wars) on a course that is centuries old.
I love The Open. Here’s why:
The Royal & Ancient course was landscaped by the earth.
A trap is a trap – a hazard that punishes a wayward shot, not a safe haven from which to par or birdie. Traps at the Old Course sport names like the grave, cat’s trap, the coffins, Nick’s bunker, the Hell bunker and the Beardies.
Greens are greens, not pool tables on a putt-putt layout.
The elements are in play: the wind and the rain, the weather and terrain.
The Royal & Ancient refuses to pretend that a championship course is anything but par 72. The combined greens at Saint Andrews add up to 18, keeping faith with the mystical bond of golf to the number nine.
At its best, an Open course requires an array of shots not required of an American style course. With few exceptions, you cannot win an Open without mastery of the knockdown, the bump-and-run, the stinger, the low runner, the bank shot, the draw and the fade.
Despite American dominance in recent years (8 of 10 champions), the Open is the truly international major. While Americans may be infatuated with the Masters and the US Open, the rest of the world recognizes the Claret Jug as the most prized treasure in golf.
The islanders love their champions and know the game, from the least recognized golfing masters (Old Tom Morris and Young Tom Morris) to the contemporary greats. All who would rise to the status of immortals (Hogan, Jones, Nicklaus, Woods) must pass the test of the Open.
It ain’t over ‘til it’s over. A ball lost in the gorse, out-of-bounds at the Road Hole, or five shots out of a pot bunker is always possible. According to script, the leaders come back to the field as the afternoon winds kick up and the sun bakes the already hard ground.
As they say, play on and may the best golfer win.
Postscript: All hail the Tiger! Long may he reign!
[Tiger Woods Major championships: 2 Opens, 4 Masters, 2 US, 2 PGA + 3 US Amateurs. If the Amateur is included, Tiger now ranks second, tied with Bobby Jones, seven behind Jack Nicklaus, two ahead of Walter Hagen, and four clear of Gary Player and the immortal Ben Hogan.]
I love The Open. Here’s why:
The Royal & Ancient course was landscaped by the earth.
A trap is a trap – a hazard that punishes a wayward shot, not a safe haven from which to par or birdie. Traps at the Old Course sport names like the grave, cat’s trap, the coffins, Nick’s bunker, the Hell bunker and the Beardies.
Greens are greens, not pool tables on a putt-putt layout.
The elements are in play: the wind and the rain, the weather and terrain.
The Royal & Ancient refuses to pretend that a championship course is anything but par 72. The combined greens at Saint Andrews add up to 18, keeping faith with the mystical bond of golf to the number nine.
At its best, an Open course requires an array of shots not required of an American style course. With few exceptions, you cannot win an Open without mastery of the knockdown, the bump-and-run, the stinger, the low runner, the bank shot, the draw and the fade.
Despite American dominance in recent years (8 of 10 champions), the Open is the truly international major. While Americans may be infatuated with the Masters and the US Open, the rest of the world recognizes the Claret Jug as the most prized treasure in golf.
The islanders love their champions and know the game, from the least recognized golfing masters (Old Tom Morris and Young Tom Morris) to the contemporary greats. All who would rise to the status of immortals (Hogan, Jones, Nicklaus, Woods) must pass the test of the Open.
It ain’t over ‘til it’s over. A ball lost in the gorse, out-of-bounds at the Road Hole, or five shots out of a pot bunker is always possible. According to script, the leaders come back to the field as the afternoon winds kick up and the sun bakes the already hard ground.
As they say, play on and may the best golfer win.
Postscript: All hail the Tiger! Long may he reign!
[Tiger Woods Major championships: 2 Opens, 4 Masters, 2 US, 2 PGA + 3 US Amateurs. If the Amateur is included, Tiger now ranks second, tied with Bobby Jones, seven behind Jack Nicklaus, two ahead of Walter Hagen, and four clear of Gary Player and the immortal Ben Hogan.]
Wednesday, July 13, 2005
Response from The UK
[Note: This was a response to "London & Madrid: Days of Sorrow & Refection" as published on Buzzle.com.]
Thank you
I was born and raised in London; all of my family still live there, and I just a few miles away. Of course it is difficult not to get caught up in the outrage, the sorrow, and the accompanying rhetoric and tub-thumping. Of course we must not bow to terrorism, and of course we never will.
But we must not forget that these events are the fruit of a poisoned tree which we have allowed to be planted.
Sadly we in the UK, as in the US, have elected a leader for whom the concept of Crusade is as fresh and as meaningful as that of Jihad is for those who have perpetrated these acts.
It is a mentality which is self perpetuating; it justifies any act, any intervention, any interference we may wish to perpetrate in the name of righteousness and in pursuit of our own interests. It denies utterly our long history of colonial abuse, political betrayal and bloody-minded double -dealing. It then demonizes those on whom we inflict our will, and denies any justice there might be in their viewpoint or their actions or re-actions.
My viewpoint is not one of Marxist self-abuse, it is simply that I lack the nationalist penchant for ignoring any truth [that] does not sit well with our benevolent self-image.
You have spoken a truth which is unfashionable, even unpalatable, but which must find a way through the propaganda if we are ever to bring these horrors to an end for all concerned.
This was the first of your articles I have read, but I will be seeking out others, and sending this one to my friends, whether they want it or not.
best regards
Neal Dowsett
Thank you
I was born and raised in London; all of my family still live there, and I just a few miles away. Of course it is difficult not to get caught up in the outrage, the sorrow, and the accompanying rhetoric and tub-thumping. Of course we must not bow to terrorism, and of course we never will.
But we must not forget that these events are the fruit of a poisoned tree which we have allowed to be planted.
Sadly we in the UK, as in the US, have elected a leader for whom the concept of Crusade is as fresh and as meaningful as that of Jihad is for those who have perpetrated these acts.
It is a mentality which is self perpetuating; it justifies any act, any intervention, any interference we may wish to perpetrate in the name of righteousness and in pursuit of our own interests. It denies utterly our long history of colonial abuse, political betrayal and bloody-minded double -dealing. It then demonizes those on whom we inflict our will, and denies any justice there might be in their viewpoint or their actions or re-actions.
My viewpoint is not one of Marxist self-abuse, it is simply that I lack the nationalist penchant for ignoring any truth [that] does not sit well with our benevolent self-image.
You have spoken a truth which is unfashionable, even unpalatable, but which must find a way through the propaganda if we are ever to bring these horrors to an end for all concerned.
This was the first of your articles I have read, but I will be seeking out others, and sending this one to my friends, whether they want it or not.
best regards
Neal Dowsett
Tuesday, July 12, 2005
FDR THEY AIN'T
Excerpt from "George & Tony Get Their Al Qaeda Fix" by Greg Palast.
The cruel, evil jerks who blew up the London subway last week, despite appropriating al-Qaeda's name for their website and T-shirts, have about as much to do with al-Qaeda as a Beatles tribute band has to do with the Fab Four.
I'm not belittling the heartbreaking hideousness of this crime, but let's get the facts straight. If al-Qaeda is the Panzer Division of terrorism, these London bombers were terrorism's Cub Scouts. We're talking a few pounds of nitro wired to a clock -- a design badly copied off the Internet.
Al-Qaeda this ain't.
Blair knows it. And Bush knows it... because Blair and Bush are al-Qaeda junkies. They've sold us on everything from fingerprinting five-year olds to invading Baghdad to tolerating plummeting paychecks all on the slick line that we are under attack by a well-trained, well-armed, well-funded hidden army called al-Qaeda.
For Bush and Blair, organized terror's diminishing powers was a political problem -- until last week, when the al-Queda addicts of the White House and Downing Street got a new terror fix. Even if it wasn't the real al-Qaeda, it was enough for them to mainline into the body politic a big, fat dose of fear.
FDR calmed a nation when he said, "We have nothing to fear but fear itself." But the Bush and Blair slogan is, "We have nothing to sell but fear itself."
[Note: Greg Palast is the reporter who blew the lid off the Great Disenfranchisement Florida 2000. SEE: www.GregPalast.com.]
The cruel, evil jerks who blew up the London subway last week, despite appropriating al-Qaeda's name for their website and T-shirts, have about as much to do with al-Qaeda as a Beatles tribute band has to do with the Fab Four.
I'm not belittling the heartbreaking hideousness of this crime, but let's get the facts straight. If al-Qaeda is the Panzer Division of terrorism, these London bombers were terrorism's Cub Scouts. We're talking a few pounds of nitro wired to a clock -- a design badly copied off the Internet.
Al-Qaeda this ain't.
Blair knows it. And Bush knows it... because Blair and Bush are al-Qaeda junkies. They've sold us on everything from fingerprinting five-year olds to invading Baghdad to tolerating plummeting paychecks all on the slick line that we are under attack by a well-trained, well-armed, well-funded hidden army called al-Qaeda.
For Bush and Blair, organized terror's diminishing powers was a political problem -- until last week, when the al-Queda addicts of the White House and Downing Street got a new terror fix. Even if it wasn't the real al-Qaeda, it was enough for them to mainline into the body politic a big, fat dose of fear.
FDR calmed a nation when he said, "We have nothing to fear but fear itself." But the Bush and Blair slogan is, "We have nothing to sell but fear itself."
[Note: Greg Palast is the reporter who blew the lid off the Great Disenfranchisement Florida 2000. SEE: www.GregPalast.com.]
Monday, July 11, 2005
Even The Dead Stand On End At The End Of The Day
Lock and load fellow citizens and let him have it with paint guns filled with the same hate he has spewed at so many others.
- Chris Mansel
Karl Rove sits in front of several television sets taking notes on the coverage of the attack on Fallujah. He counts how many times each network mentions the number of dead, the number wounded. Like a ghastly documentarian he organizes the numbers and leaks stories to the press in ways that will change the story of Iraq so subtlety that it would take constant attention to each newscast to tell the difference. Staffers come and go and bring fresh wine coolers for Rove to swill down and laugh a menacing uncontrollable laughter.
Karl Rove (on the phone): Yea, the latest report is that the citizens of Iraq are offering meals to the soldiers as they enter their homes. Many of the wounded Iraqi soldiers are asking about the prize on Saddam?s head.
A Reporter from the Fox Network: Ok, we?ll get it on the air. Any news on any changes in the cabinet yet?
Karl Rove: I should know something in about two weeks tops.
A Reporter from the Fox Network: Is there any word on the massacres in the Sudan?
With that comment the line goes dead.
- Chris Mansel
[See the Mansel Report: www.chrismansel.blogspot.com]
- Chris Mansel
Karl Rove sits in front of several television sets taking notes on the coverage of the attack on Fallujah. He counts how many times each network mentions the number of dead, the number wounded. Like a ghastly documentarian he organizes the numbers and leaks stories to the press in ways that will change the story of Iraq so subtlety that it would take constant attention to each newscast to tell the difference. Staffers come and go and bring fresh wine coolers for Rove to swill down and laugh a menacing uncontrollable laughter.
Karl Rove (on the phone): Yea, the latest report is that the citizens of Iraq are offering meals to the soldiers as they enter their homes. Many of the wounded Iraqi soldiers are asking about the prize on Saddam?s head.
A Reporter from the Fox Network: Ok, we?ll get it on the air. Any news on any changes in the cabinet yet?
Karl Rove: I should know something in about two weeks tops.
A Reporter from the Fox Network: Is there any word on the massacres in the Sudan?
With that comment the line goes dead.
- Chris Mansel
[See the Mansel Report: www.chrismansel.blogspot.com]
Sunday, July 10, 2005
From the Mind of Chris Mansel
Air Force One (The Sadistic Wagon With A Squeaky Wheel) [Random Note: Shades of Gonzo.]
(for Jack Random)
Air Force One left London and as soon as it was in the air the flight crew disrobed and the alcohol started to run in-between the aisles. President Bush went into his secret office near the fuselage and put in a DVD that contains a montage of Condi Rice strolling in front of the camera. The creases in her pants suit moving in slow motion. The President thrusts his groin into the television screen, aides gather together intelligence on the bombings and begin to make secure phone calls to Saudi Arabia to schedule another. When the President gets all worked up to the point of climax he opens a door located inside his closet to enter a small pool of oil so he can commit coitus with himself. President Clinton kept vagina cigars in this secret room and former President Reagan kept stag films of Hedy Lamar and Clara Bow. Jelly Beans tied on gold string reeking of excrement.
In the President’s office Karl Rove and Karen Hughes watch footage of the attacks in London and sculpt data for Scott McClellan and the White House press core, for speeches in the upcoming elections and to use in the files that Rove keeps in his secured bunker of misinformation. Rove laughs greedily and spits in his hand and grabs Karen Hughes by the neck and bends her toward him. Karen Hughes performs a sadomasochistic act on Rove’s person. The President walks in and opens a beer.
President Bush: Now Karl, when I go sign this book at the embassy what do I write…a message of some sorts or what? Sorry you didn’t die Tony, something like that?
Karl Rove relieves himself into a bucket on the floor and Karen Hughes hits a button and a Secret Service agent arrives instantly to dispose of the waste. Karen Hughes arranges herself and the talk continues.
Karl Rove: You just sign your name and express your sympathies.
President Bush looks at Karen Hughes and at Karl Rove with a confused expression.
Karl Rove: Sympathies, how sorry you are…(laughs) ok just write whatever you want to.
Karen Hughes: Mr. President can we please turn off this tape of Condi?
The President looks across the room at Condi and then returns his gaze to the television screen.
-------------------------------------------
Predictions: The Bush/Clinton Alliance
I have seen the line in the darkness and it is hellish. I have a prediction and it is so goddamn twisted it just might come true. Okay, former President Clinton was appointed by current President George W. Bush to serve with his father former President Bush to aid in raising money for victims of the Tsunami. They have gotten to be friends despite their “differences” and Barbara Bush has even referred to former President Bill Clinton as her son. The Bush family is friendly with the Clinton family and Senator Hillary Clinton will most certainly run for President. This is where it gets weird.
Senator Hillary Clinton will run on the friendship of the Bush family, the photo-ops, etc., and will garner the attention of Bush Republicans. She will win the presidency with his “further than center” views but now the kicker, a preemptive strike. I can’t believe I am saying this; Hillary will get her second term by pardoning either Karl Rove or current President George W. Bush for his role in using 9/11 for a reason to invade Iraq illegally and the approval of torture beyond the restrictions of the Geneva Convention. When does torture get to beat something even the Republican Party will not allow? When it interferes with the votes being tallied in the home districts of the candidates in the house and the senate.
This is so twisted like I said that it just could come true. Slicker than Willie, darker than Nixon, and crueler than Idi Amin the Bush/Clinton alliance could dispel any and all rumors that true evil rests only in the hearts of men.
- Chris Mansel
See The Mansel Report: www.chrismansel.blogspot.com.
--------------------------------------------
Random Note: Say a prayer for Jimmy wZ, hunkered down in the path of Hurricane Dennis. Somewhere on the Florida panhandle, the celestial sounds of a silver flute are praying for us all. Be well, wZ man. Mitakuye Oyasin. Let it be so.
(for Jack Random)
Air Force One left London and as soon as it was in the air the flight crew disrobed and the alcohol started to run in-between the aisles. President Bush went into his secret office near the fuselage and put in a DVD that contains a montage of Condi Rice strolling in front of the camera. The creases in her pants suit moving in slow motion. The President thrusts his groin into the television screen, aides gather together intelligence on the bombings and begin to make secure phone calls to Saudi Arabia to schedule another. When the President gets all worked up to the point of climax he opens a door located inside his closet to enter a small pool of oil so he can commit coitus with himself. President Clinton kept vagina cigars in this secret room and former President Reagan kept stag films of Hedy Lamar and Clara Bow. Jelly Beans tied on gold string reeking of excrement.
In the President’s office Karl Rove and Karen Hughes watch footage of the attacks in London and sculpt data for Scott McClellan and the White House press core, for speeches in the upcoming elections and to use in the files that Rove keeps in his secured bunker of misinformation. Rove laughs greedily and spits in his hand and grabs Karen Hughes by the neck and bends her toward him. Karen Hughes performs a sadomasochistic act on Rove’s person. The President walks in and opens a beer.
President Bush: Now Karl, when I go sign this book at the embassy what do I write…a message of some sorts or what? Sorry you didn’t die Tony, something like that?
Karl Rove relieves himself into a bucket on the floor and Karen Hughes hits a button and a Secret Service agent arrives instantly to dispose of the waste. Karen Hughes arranges herself and the talk continues.
Karl Rove: You just sign your name and express your sympathies.
President Bush looks at Karen Hughes and at Karl Rove with a confused expression.
Karl Rove: Sympathies, how sorry you are…(laughs) ok just write whatever you want to.
Karen Hughes: Mr. President can we please turn off this tape of Condi?
The President looks across the room at Condi and then returns his gaze to the television screen.
-------------------------------------------
Predictions: The Bush/Clinton Alliance
I have seen the line in the darkness and it is hellish. I have a prediction and it is so goddamn twisted it just might come true. Okay, former President Clinton was appointed by current President George W. Bush to serve with his father former President Bush to aid in raising money for victims of the Tsunami. They have gotten to be friends despite their “differences” and Barbara Bush has even referred to former President Bill Clinton as her son. The Bush family is friendly with the Clinton family and Senator Hillary Clinton will most certainly run for President. This is where it gets weird.
Senator Hillary Clinton will run on the friendship of the Bush family, the photo-ops, etc., and will garner the attention of Bush Republicans. She will win the presidency with his “further than center” views but now the kicker, a preemptive strike. I can’t believe I am saying this; Hillary will get her second term by pardoning either Karl Rove or current President George W. Bush for his role in using 9/11 for a reason to invade Iraq illegally and the approval of torture beyond the restrictions of the Geneva Convention. When does torture get to beat something even the Republican Party will not allow? When it interferes with the votes being tallied in the home districts of the candidates in the house and the senate.
This is so twisted like I said that it just could come true. Slicker than Willie, darker than Nixon, and crueler than Idi Amin the Bush/Clinton alliance could dispel any and all rumors that true evil rests only in the hearts of men.
- Chris Mansel
See The Mansel Report: www.chrismansel.blogspot.com.
--------------------------------------------
Random Note: Say a prayer for Jimmy wZ, hunkered down in the path of Hurricane Dennis. Somewhere on the Florida panhandle, the celestial sounds of a silver flute are praying for us all. Be well, wZ man. Mitakuye Oyasin. Let it be so.
Wednesday, July 06, 2005
LEONARD PELTIER IN SOLITARY CONFINEMENT
San Francisco Bay Area Independent Media Center
--------------------------------------------
As Americans celebrate their myth of freedom and justice for all, Leonard Peltier is moved without warning or notification to Terre Haute, Indiana, USP and is held in solitary confinement at least through the long holiday weekend.
At a time when this country seeks understanding for its obvious wrongs around the planet and cannot understand why the global village mistrusts it, the U.S. government is mistreating and using extraordinary domestic rendition upon the most beloved contemporary Native American warrior. Leonard Peltier, whom - again in defiance of the global opinion - this country refuses to acknowledge as a political prisoner, today sits in a tiny cell without windows and human contact as the American people prepare to celebrate their myth of justice and freedom for all.
After twenty nine years in prison for a crime he didn't commit he was moved without rhyme or reason, and without notification to his family and attorney, from Leavenworth USP to Terre Haute Indiana USP. He was immediately placed in solitary confinement, "the hole". Leonard is sixty years old, he suffers from arthritis, bone spurs, all the discomforts associated with diabetes, and recently had a stroke.
The Bureau of Prisons may argue that placing a transferred prisoner in solitary confinement is a routine procedure until all the appropriate paperwork is processed, but the timing of this action adds to its cruelty since it was carried out right before the long weekend preceding this 4th of July. In addition, this development comes at a time when Peltier’s legal team is successfully arguing very important motions and the US Courts might be obligated to release him. It is no too far fetched to imagine that to prevent his release, he is subjected to this psychological and physical torture in hope that it will break his body and spirit, and literally kill him.
As seen in the world stage today, the U.S. concepts of freedom fighters, terrorists, illegal combatants, murders, and battle casualties, are relative at their best, and duplicitous, deceptive, and capricious in their application. The same government that manipulated Canadian sovereignty and false affidavits to obtain the extradition of Leonard Peltier, our freedom fighter, today protects Jose Posada Carriles, a real terrorist, and denies his extradition to Venezuela where he was involved in the bombing of a Cuban airliner resulting in the murder of all its passengers. On the other hand, the “crime scene” in which they have framed Peltier is a battle in which armed and trained US government combatants, illegally entered non-US territory, and attacked a group of armed civilians defending their land and families, and they, as well as one of those civilians (Joe Stuntz), became casualties of war. Why must then Peltier pay with his life?
Does the FBI feel any remorse for any of its victims: Joe Stuntz, Buddy Lamont, or Frank Clearwater? How about Pedro Bissonette or the Jimmy Little Incident? Both murdered by US backed forces, using deadly force, and bludgeoning Jimmy Little in front of his family. His son Jimmy, Jr. witnessed this terrible act and when he reached 21 committed suicide--a note revealed that he missed his Dad and saw no reason to live. Jimmy, Jr was an Olympic cross-country talent when he was at Loneman School as a 7th grader. He was the next Billy Mills but the trauma of the US invasion and its violence killed him before he had a chance to mature, he really was dead before he lived.
Who pays for our dead? Or are our lives still as worthless to the American people as when they would pay money for our skins red with our blood (hence the term redskins so celebrated by this culture). Our wounds are deep, and the torment that created them is unforgettable. We know we cannot go back in time, but what can be done today is to put an end to the assault on indigenous people, that has been taking place without reprieve since the beginning of this country. Enough is enough America! Basta ya! Honor our treaties, stop taking and destroying our land and resources, respect our sovereignty and our culture, rectify the language of your history, and free our warriors! Free Peltier!
Wanbli Watakpe aka Russ Redner
Executive Director, LPDC
Paula Ostrovsky
Media PR Officer, LPDC
leonardpeltier.org
--------------------------------------------
As Americans celebrate their myth of freedom and justice for all, Leonard Peltier is moved without warning or notification to Terre Haute, Indiana, USP and is held in solitary confinement at least through the long holiday weekend.
At a time when this country seeks understanding for its obvious wrongs around the planet and cannot understand why the global village mistrusts it, the U.S. government is mistreating and using extraordinary domestic rendition upon the most beloved contemporary Native American warrior. Leonard Peltier, whom - again in defiance of the global opinion - this country refuses to acknowledge as a political prisoner, today sits in a tiny cell without windows and human contact as the American people prepare to celebrate their myth of justice and freedom for all.
After twenty nine years in prison for a crime he didn't commit he was moved without rhyme or reason, and without notification to his family and attorney, from Leavenworth USP to Terre Haute Indiana USP. He was immediately placed in solitary confinement, "the hole". Leonard is sixty years old, he suffers from arthritis, bone spurs, all the discomforts associated with diabetes, and recently had a stroke.
The Bureau of Prisons may argue that placing a transferred prisoner in solitary confinement is a routine procedure until all the appropriate paperwork is processed, but the timing of this action adds to its cruelty since it was carried out right before the long weekend preceding this 4th of July. In addition, this development comes at a time when Peltier’s legal team is successfully arguing very important motions and the US Courts might be obligated to release him. It is no too far fetched to imagine that to prevent his release, he is subjected to this psychological and physical torture in hope that it will break his body and spirit, and literally kill him.
As seen in the world stage today, the U.S. concepts of freedom fighters, terrorists, illegal combatants, murders, and battle casualties, are relative at their best, and duplicitous, deceptive, and capricious in their application. The same government that manipulated Canadian sovereignty and false affidavits to obtain the extradition of Leonard Peltier, our freedom fighter, today protects Jose Posada Carriles, a real terrorist, and denies his extradition to Venezuela where he was involved in the bombing of a Cuban airliner resulting in the murder of all its passengers. On the other hand, the “crime scene” in which they have framed Peltier is a battle in which armed and trained US government combatants, illegally entered non-US territory, and attacked a group of armed civilians defending their land and families, and they, as well as one of those civilians (Joe Stuntz), became casualties of war. Why must then Peltier pay with his life?
Does the FBI feel any remorse for any of its victims: Joe Stuntz, Buddy Lamont, or Frank Clearwater? How about Pedro Bissonette or the Jimmy Little Incident? Both murdered by US backed forces, using deadly force, and bludgeoning Jimmy Little in front of his family. His son Jimmy, Jr. witnessed this terrible act and when he reached 21 committed suicide--a note revealed that he missed his Dad and saw no reason to live. Jimmy, Jr was an Olympic cross-country talent when he was at Loneman School as a 7th grader. He was the next Billy Mills but the trauma of the US invasion and its violence killed him before he had a chance to mature, he really was dead before he lived.
Who pays for our dead? Or are our lives still as worthless to the American people as when they would pay money for our skins red with our blood (hence the term redskins so celebrated by this culture). Our wounds are deep, and the torment that created them is unforgettable. We know we cannot go back in time, but what can be done today is to put an end to the assault on indigenous people, that has been taking place without reprieve since the beginning of this country. Enough is enough America! Basta ya! Honor our treaties, stop taking and destroying our land and resources, respect our sovereignty and our culture, rectify the language of your history, and free our warriors! Free Peltier!
Wanbli Watakpe aka Russ Redner
Executive Director, LPDC
Paula Ostrovsky
Media PR Officer, LPDC
leonardpeltier.org
Friday, July 01, 2005
SCHIZO SCHERZO: THE LAST WALTZ
By Jack Random
Schizo: Split, irrational, bizarre.
Scherzo: A playful movement in a symphony.
The psychological theory of cognitive dissonance holds that two incompatible thoughts cannot be held in one mind simultaneously – or rather, they cannot be held without damage to the psyche.
For example, if you believe that good people do not do bad things and that Joe is a good person and then learn that Joe hit his wife, you are confronted with a dilemma: Either Joe is not a good person or good people do bad things. Something must give.
A recent poll suggested that nearly 70% of Americans no longer support the war in Iraq. They do not believe that the war was necessary, justified or worth the cost. A subsequent poll suggested that fully 60% of the people believe we must stay in Iraq to a successful conclusion.
Curiously, these polls mirror the position of the mainstream Democrats and support the current policy of the Bush White House (though they object to certain administrative details). It is a portrait of two parties in spasmodic harmony, waltzing in blissful ignorance while the flames of war rage just beyond the sight and sound of our fearless patriotic leaders. It is the portrait of a mythology-pathology designed for cinematic rendition and set to the tune of Schizo Scherzo in B flat major. It is strangely reassuring and hauntingly stimulating but it is not founded in reality. Something must give.
With all due respect, the consensus position is a hybrid of incompatible beliefs. We are in effect saying we oppose the war but support the occupation. It is like acknowledging that we raided the wrong house but we might as well finish the search. More accurately, it is like slaughtering half a village only to learn that the victims are innocent. Rather than acknowledge our mistake, apologize and make amends, we wipe out the survivors so that no one lives to tell the tale.
This is the American pathology and it has never been more dangerous than it is today. To us, Iraq is like a walk in the park – even if the park is a little risky at night. To the Iraqis, having lost over a million people, more than half a million children, to the western liberators over the last decade, it is an endless nightmare. Not only do we destroy and occupy their country, laying contractual claim to their bountiful resources, but we expect them to be grateful as well: Schizo Scherzo.
It is time we confronted our own dark truths. We have been allowed to shelter ourselves from responsibility by pretending that we have faith in our leaders. We are not to blame if our leaders deceived us. We were told Iraq was the enemy. We were told they posed a threat to the world. We were told they conspired to knock down the Twin Towers. We were ill equipped to distinguish between the lies, the deceptions and the ultimate truth.
The truth is the polls do not tell the story they pretend to tell. They pretend to be a snapshot of public opinion at a given time. They are no such things. We have taken our cues from our leaders. It is not what we believe but what we say we believe that matters. The polls are nothing but a façade, a masquerade, so much puff and stuff.
We Americans are neither stupid nor ignorant. We did not believe in the weapons of mass destruction fantasy. We did not believe even for an instant that Saddam Hussein knocked down those towers. We did not believe that diplomacy was played out at the United Nations. Rather, we simply required something to tell our children and grandchildren now and in the future. Our leaders gave us the lies so that we could hand them down through the decades like Manifest Destiny and absolve ourselves of blame.
The fact is, like Cheney and Wolfowitz and all the president’s men, we believed it would be a cakewalk. We believed that no matter how many Iraqis died in Shock and Awe, they would be grateful and no more than a handful of our soldiers would pay the price. We believed it would be a long weekend in the desert (like the first Gulf War) and when it was over there would be parades and parties and medals of distinction.
We believed that the world would salute in awe and allow us to play the Cowboy King one more time. Just another episode of Duke Wayne, the Lone Ranger, 20 Mule Team Borax and How the West Was Won. We’re the best and the brightest. We’ve earned our stripes. When the chips were down and all the cards were on the table, we picked ourselves up by our own bootstraps, summoning every last ounce of courage and willpower, gave it one last college try, and won one for the Gipper. Why?
Cue music (Queen):
We are champions, my friend!
We’ll keep on fighting ‘til the end!
No time for losers ‘cause we are the champions … of the world!
What a shame it is not a movie. We could demand a better ending. As it is, we are saddled with the reality we have helped to create. There is no more pretending. As we stand with the president and his vision of endless war, we will find no redemption. The blood is on our hands now and all the waters of the Tigres and Euphrates will not wash the stain from our collective soul.
We have lost our senses. We have gone mad. What is the world to do when its most powerful member has wandered over the rainbow to the dark side of the moon?
It’s a waltz and we’re spinning our way through history like Scarlet O’Hara and Rhett Butler, pretending that the war is about honor and not slavery, like Charlotte Corday with a dagger to the heart of Jean Paul Marat, convinced that Marat is the source of all evil, like brave Colonel Custer at the Little Big Horn, Chivington at Sand Creek and the eighteen recipients of the Congressional Medal of Honor for the slaughter of 350 unarmed Lakota at Wounded Knee.
It’s Schizo Scherzo and we all have our parts, dancing continuously in the flames of war and bathing in the waters of penitence.
Jazz.
JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). THE CHRONICLES HAVE APPEARED ON THE ALBION MONITOR, BUZZLE, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE & OTHER SITES. SEE JACKRANDOM.COM.
Schizo: Split, irrational, bizarre.
Scherzo: A playful movement in a symphony.
The psychological theory of cognitive dissonance holds that two incompatible thoughts cannot be held in one mind simultaneously – or rather, they cannot be held without damage to the psyche.
For example, if you believe that good people do not do bad things and that Joe is a good person and then learn that Joe hit his wife, you are confronted with a dilemma: Either Joe is not a good person or good people do bad things. Something must give.
A recent poll suggested that nearly 70% of Americans no longer support the war in Iraq. They do not believe that the war was necessary, justified or worth the cost. A subsequent poll suggested that fully 60% of the people believe we must stay in Iraq to a successful conclusion.
Curiously, these polls mirror the position of the mainstream Democrats and support the current policy of the Bush White House (though they object to certain administrative details). It is a portrait of two parties in spasmodic harmony, waltzing in blissful ignorance while the flames of war rage just beyond the sight and sound of our fearless patriotic leaders. It is the portrait of a mythology-pathology designed for cinematic rendition and set to the tune of Schizo Scherzo in B flat major. It is strangely reassuring and hauntingly stimulating but it is not founded in reality. Something must give.
With all due respect, the consensus position is a hybrid of incompatible beliefs. We are in effect saying we oppose the war but support the occupation. It is like acknowledging that we raided the wrong house but we might as well finish the search. More accurately, it is like slaughtering half a village only to learn that the victims are innocent. Rather than acknowledge our mistake, apologize and make amends, we wipe out the survivors so that no one lives to tell the tale.
This is the American pathology and it has never been more dangerous than it is today. To us, Iraq is like a walk in the park – even if the park is a little risky at night. To the Iraqis, having lost over a million people, more than half a million children, to the western liberators over the last decade, it is an endless nightmare. Not only do we destroy and occupy their country, laying contractual claim to their bountiful resources, but we expect them to be grateful as well: Schizo Scherzo.
It is time we confronted our own dark truths. We have been allowed to shelter ourselves from responsibility by pretending that we have faith in our leaders. We are not to blame if our leaders deceived us. We were told Iraq was the enemy. We were told they posed a threat to the world. We were told they conspired to knock down the Twin Towers. We were ill equipped to distinguish between the lies, the deceptions and the ultimate truth.
The truth is the polls do not tell the story they pretend to tell. They pretend to be a snapshot of public opinion at a given time. They are no such things. We have taken our cues from our leaders. It is not what we believe but what we say we believe that matters. The polls are nothing but a façade, a masquerade, so much puff and stuff.
We Americans are neither stupid nor ignorant. We did not believe in the weapons of mass destruction fantasy. We did not believe even for an instant that Saddam Hussein knocked down those towers. We did not believe that diplomacy was played out at the United Nations. Rather, we simply required something to tell our children and grandchildren now and in the future. Our leaders gave us the lies so that we could hand them down through the decades like Manifest Destiny and absolve ourselves of blame.
The fact is, like Cheney and Wolfowitz and all the president’s men, we believed it would be a cakewalk. We believed that no matter how many Iraqis died in Shock and Awe, they would be grateful and no more than a handful of our soldiers would pay the price. We believed it would be a long weekend in the desert (like the first Gulf War) and when it was over there would be parades and parties and medals of distinction.
We believed that the world would salute in awe and allow us to play the Cowboy King one more time. Just another episode of Duke Wayne, the Lone Ranger, 20 Mule Team Borax and How the West Was Won. We’re the best and the brightest. We’ve earned our stripes. When the chips were down and all the cards were on the table, we picked ourselves up by our own bootstraps, summoning every last ounce of courage and willpower, gave it one last college try, and won one for the Gipper. Why?
Cue music (Queen):
We are champions, my friend!
We’ll keep on fighting ‘til the end!
No time for losers ‘cause we are the champions … of the world!
What a shame it is not a movie. We could demand a better ending. As it is, we are saddled with the reality we have helped to create. There is no more pretending. As we stand with the president and his vision of endless war, we will find no redemption. The blood is on our hands now and all the waters of the Tigres and Euphrates will not wash the stain from our collective soul.
We have lost our senses. We have gone mad. What is the world to do when its most powerful member has wandered over the rainbow to the dark side of the moon?
It’s a waltz and we’re spinning our way through history like Scarlet O’Hara and Rhett Butler, pretending that the war is about honor and not slavery, like Charlotte Corday with a dagger to the heart of Jean Paul Marat, convinced that Marat is the source of all evil, like brave Colonel Custer at the Little Big Horn, Chivington at Sand Creek and the eighteen recipients of the Congressional Medal of Honor for the slaughter of 350 unarmed Lakota at Wounded Knee.
It’s Schizo Scherzo and we all have our parts, dancing continuously in the flames of war and bathing in the waters of penitence.
Jazz.
JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). THE CHRONICLES HAVE APPEARED ON THE ALBION MONITOR, BUZZLE, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE & OTHER SITES. SEE JACKRANDOM.COM.
Tuesday, June 28, 2005
Reading from the Script: In Response to The President 6/28/05
By Jack Random
Tonight the president addressed a solemn assembly of soldiers at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. His case for the continued occupation of Iraq can be summarized in one word: Tired.
Did he respond to the Downing Street memos? No.
On a day when two more American soldiers and 30-40 Iraqis, including a member of the Iraqi Parliament, were killed, did he offer a realistic assessment of where we are in relation to where we have been? No.
As our investment in this war approaches 1,800 dead, 20,000 wounded and $400 billion dollars, did he provide any assurance that our mission would be completed in the coming months, years or decades? No.
The president repeatedly reasserted his false and discredited claim that this war was somehow related to the attack on this nation nearly four years ago.
If we are to take the president at his word, it was never about weapons of mass destruction. If it was our troops would long be home. Instead, it was all about ideology. If we take the president at his word, he cleverly deceived the American people and tried to deceive the world community in order to fan the flames of Islamic jihad by implanting an ideological war in the Middle East – an ill-fated venture by any objective analysis.
The president makes no distinction between terrorists and insurgents fighting a foreign invader. He implies that the “coalition” allies are growing in number and strength when in fact nation after nation has drawn down their troops and pledged withdrawal in deference to the democratic will of their people: Ukraine, Italy, Spain and Poland. The allied forces that remain will not engage in battle and the second largest fighting force in Iraq is neither Britain nor Australia but the army of American paid mercenaries.
The president claims that we are making significant progress but the reports on the ground tell a different story. There is no progress on security, jobs, electricity, water or sewage and the insurgency is growing daily. Ironically, if we were to succeed in establishing a truly democratic government in Iraq their first act would be to demand our removal.
The president has the audacity to quote Osama bin Laden the day after an American helicopter is shot down in the forgotten war in Afghanistan and a week after political appointee and Director of Central Intelligence Porter Goss testified that we know where bin Laden is but we cannot violate sovereignty. Since when has sovereignty prevented military action in this administration?
The president asserts that ours is an ideology of freedom while the enemy has an ideology of hatred but the occupier of a foreign land cannot bestow freedom on the occupied and it is not for us to define Iraqi freedom.
Finally, the president claims that we will stand down when the Iraqis stand up. The difficulty is that the Iraqis that are standing up now (against the greatest fighting force on earth) are not standing by our side.
It is an insult to every American for our president to compare this war to the American Revolution and the Civil War. We have brought civil war to Iraq and civil war will be our legacy whether or not we honor our promise to leave. As for the revolution, we fought for our freedom against a colonial power and one that brought a scourge of Hessian mercenaries to oppose us. Whom in this equation do we most resemble?
Before another life is lost in this historical misadventure, take a hard look at where this president has led us and where he intends to go.
Stop the war machine.
End the occupation.
Bury the doctrine of perpetual war.
Jazz.
Note: For a responsible withdrawal plan see www.democracyrising.us.
Tonight the president addressed a solemn assembly of soldiers at Fort Bragg, North Carolina. His case for the continued occupation of Iraq can be summarized in one word: Tired.
Did he respond to the Downing Street memos? No.
On a day when two more American soldiers and 30-40 Iraqis, including a member of the Iraqi Parliament, were killed, did he offer a realistic assessment of where we are in relation to where we have been? No.
As our investment in this war approaches 1,800 dead, 20,000 wounded and $400 billion dollars, did he provide any assurance that our mission would be completed in the coming months, years or decades? No.
The president repeatedly reasserted his false and discredited claim that this war was somehow related to the attack on this nation nearly four years ago.
If we are to take the president at his word, it was never about weapons of mass destruction. If it was our troops would long be home. Instead, it was all about ideology. If we take the president at his word, he cleverly deceived the American people and tried to deceive the world community in order to fan the flames of Islamic jihad by implanting an ideological war in the Middle East – an ill-fated venture by any objective analysis.
The president makes no distinction between terrorists and insurgents fighting a foreign invader. He implies that the “coalition” allies are growing in number and strength when in fact nation after nation has drawn down their troops and pledged withdrawal in deference to the democratic will of their people: Ukraine, Italy, Spain and Poland. The allied forces that remain will not engage in battle and the second largest fighting force in Iraq is neither Britain nor Australia but the army of American paid mercenaries.
The president claims that we are making significant progress but the reports on the ground tell a different story. There is no progress on security, jobs, electricity, water or sewage and the insurgency is growing daily. Ironically, if we were to succeed in establishing a truly democratic government in Iraq their first act would be to demand our removal.
The president has the audacity to quote Osama bin Laden the day after an American helicopter is shot down in the forgotten war in Afghanistan and a week after political appointee and Director of Central Intelligence Porter Goss testified that we know where bin Laden is but we cannot violate sovereignty. Since when has sovereignty prevented military action in this administration?
The president asserts that ours is an ideology of freedom while the enemy has an ideology of hatred but the occupier of a foreign land cannot bestow freedom on the occupied and it is not for us to define Iraqi freedom.
Finally, the president claims that we will stand down when the Iraqis stand up. The difficulty is that the Iraqis that are standing up now (against the greatest fighting force on earth) are not standing by our side.
It is an insult to every American for our president to compare this war to the American Revolution and the Civil War. We have brought civil war to Iraq and civil war will be our legacy whether or not we honor our promise to leave. As for the revolution, we fought for our freedom against a colonial power and one that brought a scourge of Hessian mercenaries to oppose us. Whom in this equation do we most resemble?
Before another life is lost in this historical misadventure, take a hard look at where this president has led us and where he intends to go.
Stop the war machine.
End the occupation.
Bury the doctrine of perpetual war.
Jazz.
Note: For a responsible withdrawal plan see www.democracyrising.us.
Tuesday, June 21, 2005
HEALING AN ANCIENT SORROW
JAZZMAN CHRONICLES: DISSEMINATE FREELY.
THE DISHONOR OF WOUNDED KNEE
By Jack Random
“The Sun Dance is the most enigmatic of all Lakota ceremonies. It is a blood sacrifice, a trial by fire, and a vision quest by pain and suffering. It is not, as the white man believes, a rite of passage or a test of manhood. It is a pipeline to the overworld, a sacred bond connecting mother earth to father sky, connecting all sentient beings to the Great Spirit beyond. It is the tree of life and the great wheel of the universe.”
From the novel Cries for a Vision by Jack Random.
Buffalo Man took the vow of Kablaya, the Lakota spirit guide who received the vision of the Sun Dance. A thong from the hide of a buffalo was tied to the Sun Dance Tree and its two ends were attached with wooden spikes to his chest. He would sing the ancient chants beneath a blistering sun and dance until the thongs broke free.
He prayed for the people who were massacred on a cold winter’s day at Wounded Knee. He prayed for the soldiers who killed them. He prayed for the great healing that would mend the Sacred Hoop and help his people live good and fruitful lives.
On the third day of the Sun Dance, he received a vision. He was told that the Sacred Hoop was broken on December 29, 1890. He was told that it would take seven generations to heal the wound and that the healing could not begin until the Medals of Honor bestowed on the soldiers at Wounded Knee were rescinded. Since that day, he has worked toward this end.
On Monday, June 13, the United States Senate took the belated measure of apologizing to the African American descendants of the victims of lynching. Combined with reopened cases of Emmett Till and a 1964 KKK murder of three civil rights workers, it was a powerful reminder that justice will be heard and the wounds of great wrongs require decades, even centuries to heal.
On Tuesday, June 14, J.D. Kotrla-Chipps (AKA Buffalo Man) wrote me to request assistance in fulfilling his mission. He informed me that eighteen Congressional Medals of Honor were awarded to the soldiers and officers of the Seventh Calvary for their actions in the Massacre of Wounded Knee.
He did not need to recount the events of that massacre. I am certain that I do not need to retell the story here for it is familiar to every man and woman who has studied this nation’s history. To know the story is to know the greatest crime ever committed by Americans on American soil.
It is not necessary to summon the memory of the Paiute prophet Wavoka, whose fevered vision gave birth to the Ghost Dance, a dance that called forth the spirits of the ancestors and prophesied the return of the buffalo. It is not necessary to retell how the Ghost Dance spread across the plains like a raging wildfire. It is not necessary to tell how it gave birth to renewed hope in defeated peoples and desperate lives. It is not necessary to tell how it captured the hearts of brave warriors and chiefs like Crazy Horse, Sitting Bull and Big Foot of the Lakota nation. It is not necessary to tell how an elderly Sitting Bull was killed by turncoat Indian police acting on the fears of the bluecoat war chiefs. It is not necessary to tell how the Seventh Calvary, revenge still burning in their hearts for the demise of Custer at the Little Big Horn, tracked down and encircled Big Foot’s band to prevent them from dancing the forbidden dance, to prevent their cries from reaching the ancestors, and to block their prayers to the Great Spirit.
It is not necessary to retell how the encircled Lakota, mostly old men, women, children and infants, were disarmed before an uncertain catalyst – a dropped gun or an untimely cry of remorse – triggered the massacre of 350 defenseless Lakota Indians. It is not necessary to recount that the Lakota had been peaceful for fourteen years and that Big Foot carried the white flag of peace. It was 1890 and the first opportunity the bluecoats had to employ their Hotchkiss cannons. The rolling thunder of bullets mowed down the renegade dancers with record efficiency.
It is not necessary to draw a portrait of the mass grave or the body of Big Foot frozen in his dance of death on the barren landscape of a South Dakota winter. It is not necessary to pull once more at the strings of the reader’s heart for it has been done a thousand times by words more powerful than mine.
It is not necessary to tell the story of Wounded Knee again and yet, why do I sense that the young are happily unaware, as if the story skipped a generation of school children?
Every child in every town and city in America should be compelled to read Dee Brown’s Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee for until they know the story they do not know what it is to be American. Until they know and understand, as a child always understands the truth, there will always be a dark and toxic seed within the soul of the nation.
We are not asking that the land be returned to its rightful owners. We are not asking for full and just reparations. We are not asking that the sacrilegious images of the Great White Fathers be removed from the sacred mountains of the Lakota Black Hills. We are not asking that the church of the Black Robes be swept from the holy burial ground of the Wounded Knee Memorial.
We are only asking that eighteen medals of dishonor be rescinded. We ask not only for the victims of Wounded Knee and their descendants but for the perpetrators and theirs as well. Imagine having committed this crime, having its bloody spectacle etched in your memory, knowing that what was done that day would not be forgotten as long as the rivers run and clouds inhabit the sky, and being “honored” by your government for this deadly, horrendous deed.
We cannot know what ran through those soldiers’ minds that day, as the bullets flew and the bodies fell, but we do know that what any human being would feel on the day they were honored was not pride but unbearable shame. Little wonder there was no ceremony. It would surely have been spoiled by cries of horror and tears of shame.
If those soldiers were alive today, they would tell you enough is enough. They have carried the burden of hypocrisy beyond the grave. For their sake, as well as for 350 lost Lakota souls, their descendants and survivors, rescind the medals and let the healing begin.
It is the mission of a man who has buried his heart at Wounded Knee, planted his staff, and committed his life. It is not too much to ask. Indeed, it is the very least a civilized nation can do.
Mitakuye Oyasin.
Jazz.
JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS).
Contact J.D. Kotrla-Chipps at www.woptura.com.
THE DISHONOR OF WOUNDED KNEE
By Jack Random
“The Sun Dance is the most enigmatic of all Lakota ceremonies. It is a blood sacrifice, a trial by fire, and a vision quest by pain and suffering. It is not, as the white man believes, a rite of passage or a test of manhood. It is a pipeline to the overworld, a sacred bond connecting mother earth to father sky, connecting all sentient beings to the Great Spirit beyond. It is the tree of life and the great wheel of the universe.”
From the novel Cries for a Vision by Jack Random.
Buffalo Man took the vow of Kablaya, the Lakota spirit guide who received the vision of the Sun Dance. A thong from the hide of a buffalo was tied to the Sun Dance Tree and its two ends were attached with wooden spikes to his chest. He would sing the ancient chants beneath a blistering sun and dance until the thongs broke free.
He prayed for the people who were massacred on a cold winter’s day at Wounded Knee. He prayed for the soldiers who killed them. He prayed for the great healing that would mend the Sacred Hoop and help his people live good and fruitful lives.
On the third day of the Sun Dance, he received a vision. He was told that the Sacred Hoop was broken on December 29, 1890. He was told that it would take seven generations to heal the wound and that the healing could not begin until the Medals of Honor bestowed on the soldiers at Wounded Knee were rescinded. Since that day, he has worked toward this end.
On Monday, June 13, the United States Senate took the belated measure of apologizing to the African American descendants of the victims of lynching. Combined with reopened cases of Emmett Till and a 1964 KKK murder of three civil rights workers, it was a powerful reminder that justice will be heard and the wounds of great wrongs require decades, even centuries to heal.
On Tuesday, June 14, J.D. Kotrla-Chipps (AKA Buffalo Man) wrote me to request assistance in fulfilling his mission. He informed me that eighteen Congressional Medals of Honor were awarded to the soldiers and officers of the Seventh Calvary for their actions in the Massacre of Wounded Knee.
He did not need to recount the events of that massacre. I am certain that I do not need to retell the story here for it is familiar to every man and woman who has studied this nation’s history. To know the story is to know the greatest crime ever committed by Americans on American soil.
It is not necessary to summon the memory of the Paiute prophet Wavoka, whose fevered vision gave birth to the Ghost Dance, a dance that called forth the spirits of the ancestors and prophesied the return of the buffalo. It is not necessary to retell how the Ghost Dance spread across the plains like a raging wildfire. It is not necessary to tell how it gave birth to renewed hope in defeated peoples and desperate lives. It is not necessary to tell how it captured the hearts of brave warriors and chiefs like Crazy Horse, Sitting Bull and Big Foot of the Lakota nation. It is not necessary to tell how an elderly Sitting Bull was killed by turncoat Indian police acting on the fears of the bluecoat war chiefs. It is not necessary to tell how the Seventh Calvary, revenge still burning in their hearts for the demise of Custer at the Little Big Horn, tracked down and encircled Big Foot’s band to prevent them from dancing the forbidden dance, to prevent their cries from reaching the ancestors, and to block their prayers to the Great Spirit.
It is not necessary to retell how the encircled Lakota, mostly old men, women, children and infants, were disarmed before an uncertain catalyst – a dropped gun or an untimely cry of remorse – triggered the massacre of 350 defenseless Lakota Indians. It is not necessary to recount that the Lakota had been peaceful for fourteen years and that Big Foot carried the white flag of peace. It was 1890 and the first opportunity the bluecoats had to employ their Hotchkiss cannons. The rolling thunder of bullets mowed down the renegade dancers with record efficiency.
It is not necessary to draw a portrait of the mass grave or the body of Big Foot frozen in his dance of death on the barren landscape of a South Dakota winter. It is not necessary to pull once more at the strings of the reader’s heart for it has been done a thousand times by words more powerful than mine.
It is not necessary to tell the story of Wounded Knee again and yet, why do I sense that the young are happily unaware, as if the story skipped a generation of school children?
Every child in every town and city in America should be compelled to read Dee Brown’s Bury My Heart at Wounded Knee for until they know the story they do not know what it is to be American. Until they know and understand, as a child always understands the truth, there will always be a dark and toxic seed within the soul of the nation.
We are not asking that the land be returned to its rightful owners. We are not asking for full and just reparations. We are not asking that the sacrilegious images of the Great White Fathers be removed from the sacred mountains of the Lakota Black Hills. We are not asking that the church of the Black Robes be swept from the holy burial ground of the Wounded Knee Memorial.
We are only asking that eighteen medals of dishonor be rescinded. We ask not only for the victims of Wounded Knee and their descendants but for the perpetrators and theirs as well. Imagine having committed this crime, having its bloody spectacle etched in your memory, knowing that what was done that day would not be forgotten as long as the rivers run and clouds inhabit the sky, and being “honored” by your government for this deadly, horrendous deed.
We cannot know what ran through those soldiers’ minds that day, as the bullets flew and the bodies fell, but we do know that what any human being would feel on the day they were honored was not pride but unbearable shame. Little wonder there was no ceremony. It would surely have been spoiled by cries of horror and tears of shame.
If those soldiers were alive today, they would tell you enough is enough. They have carried the burden of hypocrisy beyond the grave. For their sake, as well as for 350 lost Lakota souls, their descendants and survivors, rescind the medals and let the healing begin.
It is the mission of a man who has buried his heart at Wounded Knee, planted his staff, and committed his life. It is not too much to ask. Indeed, it is the very least a civilized nation can do.
Mitakuye Oyasin.
Jazz.
JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS).
Contact J.D. Kotrla-Chipps at www.woptura.com.
Tuesday, June 14, 2005
THE DISHONOR OF WOUNDED KNEE
Dear Reader:
Yesterday, the United States Senate took the belated measure of apologizing to the African American descendants of the victims of lynching. Combined with the case of Emmett Till and the reopening of the case of the 1964 KKK murder of three civil rights volunteers, it is a powerful reminder that justice will be heard and the wounds of great wrongs require decades, even centuries to heal.
It has recently come to my attention that there were 18 Medals of Honor awarded to the soldiers and officers of the Seventh Calvary for their participation in the Massacre of Wounded Knee. I need not recount the events of that massacre. They are burned into the conscience of every man and woman who has studied the history of this nation. I am certain you are fully acquainted with them and feel, as I do, that a greater crime has never been committed on American soil.
The wounds of Wounded Knee have never healed. Perhaps it is too much to ask for reparations (I do not believe so) but I have no doubt that no individual of conscience can possibly believe that those medals should still be honored.
In recent years, our government has apologized for past crimes, including the internment of Japanese Americans during WW II. Presidents have apologized for our nation's exploitation of blacks as slaves. Our nation has never apologized for genocide.
I ask your assistance in contacting your representatives in Congress to affect a simple act of atonement: Repeal the Medals of Dishonor. Let the healing begin.
Sincerely,
Jack Random - Author of Ghost Dance Insurrection
Contact: J.D. Kotrla-Chipps (aka Buffalo Man) www.woptura.com
Yesterday, the United States Senate took the belated measure of apologizing to the African American descendants of the victims of lynching. Combined with the case of Emmett Till and the reopening of the case of the 1964 KKK murder of three civil rights volunteers, it is a powerful reminder that justice will be heard and the wounds of great wrongs require decades, even centuries to heal.
It has recently come to my attention that there were 18 Medals of Honor awarded to the soldiers and officers of the Seventh Calvary for their participation in the Massacre of Wounded Knee. I need not recount the events of that massacre. They are burned into the conscience of every man and woman who has studied the history of this nation. I am certain you are fully acquainted with them and feel, as I do, that a greater crime has never been committed on American soil.
The wounds of Wounded Knee have never healed. Perhaps it is too much to ask for reparations (I do not believe so) but I have no doubt that no individual of conscience can possibly believe that those medals should still be honored.
In recent years, our government has apologized for past crimes, including the internment of Japanese Americans during WW II. Presidents have apologized for our nation's exploitation of blacks as slaves. Our nation has never apologized for genocide.
I ask your assistance in contacting your representatives in Congress to affect a simple act of atonement: Repeal the Medals of Dishonor. Let the healing begin.
Sincerely,
Jack Random - Author of Ghost Dance Insurrection
Contact: J.D. Kotrla-Chipps (aka Buffalo Man) www.woptura.com
Monday, June 13, 2005
SCHWARZENEGGER BLUES
RECALL THE GOVERNATOR
By Jack Random
Aside from the fact that the governator suddenly looks old and fragile, there is little encouraging about Schwarzenegger’s latest political maneuvering. His call for a special election might be admirable if he or his sponsors were paying for it. After all, it is more about a man’s ego and ambition than any concept of good governance.
The worst thing about the governor’s abuse of the initiative process is that it will likely damage the process itself. Initiatives and referendums are the application of direct democracy and those of us who truly believe in democracy are wary when politicians attack the process when it does not serve their purposes. Certainly, there should be reform to remove big money and restore the grassroots to the process. No one should be paid to collect signatures and contributions should be limited to individuals at fixed limits but that is not the issue now. The real question is: Since we are going ahead with this lame brained special election, why is the governor not on the ballot?
It is not difficult to understand the governor’s motives. Arnold loves the lights. A Democratic legislature has brazenly chosen to stand in his way rather than to demure and assist him in building a national campaign. If a constitutional amendment is not in the cards, Schwarzenegger’s persona ought to be good for a cabinet post or a high-profile ambassadorship. Certainly, he would be a suitable Emperor for the next occupation.
I understand the governor’s distaste for teachers and nurses. They tend to read, listen to the news, analyze policies and events, and communicate their ideas to family and friends. They know a fraud when they see one and Arnold’s compassionate conservative act is growing old. He wants to get rid of tenure so unruly teachers can be fired, neglecting the critical shortage facing both the state and the nation for years to come. He wants to deny the nurse-to-teacher ratio demanded by the people in a previous initiative. If he succeeds, health professionals will find greener pastures elsewhere but the governator will be able to hire more energy and political consultants.
I understand the need for redistricting reform but it is not a pressing matter for a state in fiscal crisis and it is nothing more than self-serving in the hands of this governor.
What I do not understand is why Recall Arnold has not already qualified for this ballot. Where is the party of opposition? Asleep at the wheel? Gone fishing? Striking a pose for the cameras? There is only one effective restraint to the abuse of the initiative process that began with the recall of Gray Davis: Recall Arnold. What comes around goes around and all that jazz. Unfortunately, we are saddled with a gutless and self-serving brand of politician on both sides of the proverbial aisle.
It is thick with irony that this special election ballot will offer a proposition to “re-regulate the power industry.” How special indeed. It has been five years since the fleecing of California to the tune of fifty billion dollars by a handful of Texas energy companies. Made possible by a Republican drive for deregulation that is still in process, with the corrupt cooperation of corporate Democrats, it is in fact the reason for our current crisis. There is something truly rotten in the bowels of the state legislature. What have they been waiting for? Another episode of massive fraud and redistribution of wealth, California to Texas, with the blessings of both parties? The last chapter ended with the crucifixion of the governor. Who will take the blame for the next?
If we have learned anything at all from these sorry events, it is that neither major party offers any real solution to our long-term problems. Both are more interested in securing their power base and lining their pockets with corporate payoffs. The obvious answer is not to disable direct democracy but to enable greater, broader and uncorrupted participation in electoral politics. Give democracy a chance: Vote for an independent or third party candidate. When enough people say no the political machinations of entrenched politicians, they will finally begin to listen.
Meantime, regulation of the energy industry is the only sure Yes on the special election ballot but there ought to be another: Shall the governor of the state of California be removed from office? Yes, Yes, a thousand times Yes!
Jazz.
JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). THE CHRONICLES HAVE APPEARED ON THE ALBION MONITOR, BUZZLE, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE & OTHER SITES. SEE JACKRANDOM.COM.
By Jack Random
Aside from the fact that the governator suddenly looks old and fragile, there is little encouraging about Schwarzenegger’s latest political maneuvering. His call for a special election might be admirable if he or his sponsors were paying for it. After all, it is more about a man’s ego and ambition than any concept of good governance.
The worst thing about the governor’s abuse of the initiative process is that it will likely damage the process itself. Initiatives and referendums are the application of direct democracy and those of us who truly believe in democracy are wary when politicians attack the process when it does not serve their purposes. Certainly, there should be reform to remove big money and restore the grassroots to the process. No one should be paid to collect signatures and contributions should be limited to individuals at fixed limits but that is not the issue now. The real question is: Since we are going ahead with this lame brained special election, why is the governor not on the ballot?
It is not difficult to understand the governor’s motives. Arnold loves the lights. A Democratic legislature has brazenly chosen to stand in his way rather than to demure and assist him in building a national campaign. If a constitutional amendment is not in the cards, Schwarzenegger’s persona ought to be good for a cabinet post or a high-profile ambassadorship. Certainly, he would be a suitable Emperor for the next occupation.
I understand the governor’s distaste for teachers and nurses. They tend to read, listen to the news, analyze policies and events, and communicate their ideas to family and friends. They know a fraud when they see one and Arnold’s compassionate conservative act is growing old. He wants to get rid of tenure so unruly teachers can be fired, neglecting the critical shortage facing both the state and the nation for years to come. He wants to deny the nurse-to-teacher ratio demanded by the people in a previous initiative. If he succeeds, health professionals will find greener pastures elsewhere but the governator will be able to hire more energy and political consultants.
I understand the need for redistricting reform but it is not a pressing matter for a state in fiscal crisis and it is nothing more than self-serving in the hands of this governor.
What I do not understand is why Recall Arnold has not already qualified for this ballot. Where is the party of opposition? Asleep at the wheel? Gone fishing? Striking a pose for the cameras? There is only one effective restraint to the abuse of the initiative process that began with the recall of Gray Davis: Recall Arnold. What comes around goes around and all that jazz. Unfortunately, we are saddled with a gutless and self-serving brand of politician on both sides of the proverbial aisle.
It is thick with irony that this special election ballot will offer a proposition to “re-regulate the power industry.” How special indeed. It has been five years since the fleecing of California to the tune of fifty billion dollars by a handful of Texas energy companies. Made possible by a Republican drive for deregulation that is still in process, with the corrupt cooperation of corporate Democrats, it is in fact the reason for our current crisis. There is something truly rotten in the bowels of the state legislature. What have they been waiting for? Another episode of massive fraud and redistribution of wealth, California to Texas, with the blessings of both parties? The last chapter ended with the crucifixion of the governor. Who will take the blame for the next?
If we have learned anything at all from these sorry events, it is that neither major party offers any real solution to our long-term problems. Both are more interested in securing their power base and lining their pockets with corporate payoffs. The obvious answer is not to disable direct democracy but to enable greater, broader and uncorrupted participation in electoral politics. Give democracy a chance: Vote for an independent or third party candidate. When enough people say no the political machinations of entrenched politicians, they will finally begin to listen.
Meantime, regulation of the energy industry is the only sure Yes on the special election ballot but there ought to be another: Shall the governor of the state of California be removed from office? Yes, Yes, a thousand times Yes!
Jazz.
JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). THE CHRONICLES HAVE APPEARED ON THE ALBION MONITOR, BUZZLE, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE & OTHER SITES. SEE JACKRANDOM.COM.
Friday, June 10, 2005
RANDOM'S SOUND & FURY
A Random Death & Resurrection by Chris Mansel
The body of Jack Random is being exhumed for the second time in this exhaustive trial, a trial that began with the demise of Jack Random after he experienced the ?sickness? of righteousness in the Bush namesake. Jack Random started supporting the war in Iraq and began soliciting his friends for donations to elect Bill Frist, the scourge of Tennessee.
Jack Random was done away with in the simplest of ways and it is that vivid night that brings the jury to this desert known as the Joshua Tree monument. First the body was exhumed to see if the body was in fact located in the grave. The second was for the carbon dating to exact the time of death in concert with the phase of the moon. Both times the body was unearthed the corpse of Jack Random had managed to roll him self over and hide his face in shame.
Upon the exhumation of the body of Jack Random it was found that Jack Random had obviously been forgiven by his demons and reassumed his life's work known as the Jazz Chronicles. Jack Random disappeared in the back of a red Cadillac being driven by a mysterious figure from Alabama known only as that guy who writes those reports. That night in the sunset several spectators swore they saw Gram Parsons strumming a guitar and smoking a joint the size of Texas.
SEE THE MANSEL REPORT (www.chrismansel.com)
The body of Jack Random is being exhumed for the second time in this exhaustive trial, a trial that began with the demise of Jack Random after he experienced the ?sickness? of righteousness in the Bush namesake. Jack Random started supporting the war in Iraq and began soliciting his friends for donations to elect Bill Frist, the scourge of Tennessee.
Jack Random was done away with in the simplest of ways and it is that vivid night that brings the jury to this desert known as the Joshua Tree monument. First the body was exhumed to see if the body was in fact located in the grave. The second was for the carbon dating to exact the time of death in concert with the phase of the moon. Both times the body was unearthed the corpse of Jack Random had managed to roll him self over and hide his face in shame.
Upon the exhumation of the body of Jack Random it was found that Jack Random had obviously been forgiven by his demons and reassumed his life's work known as the Jazz Chronicles. Jack Random disappeared in the back of a red Cadillac being driven by a mysterious figure from Alabama known only as that guy who writes those reports. That night in the sunset several spectators swore they saw Gram Parsons strumming a guitar and smoking a joint the size of Texas.
SEE THE MANSEL REPORT (www.chrismansel.com)
Tuesday, June 07, 2005
APOLOGY TO IKE (& Gonzo)
By Jack Random
It has been brought to my attention that it was Truman and not Eisenhower who made the decision to drop the big ones on Nagasaki and Hiroshima as I stated in a recent chronicle (Defending Dick Nixon). To be falsely accused of unleashing the horror of the millennia on an unsuspecting world, even fifty years after the fact, is simply inexcusable.
I feel like Hunter Thompson on a desolate highway somewhere in the Amargosa Desert. The highway patrol with its swirling red light and screaming siren is bearing down in the rear view mirror. I go through a checklist of must do activities in this circumstance: Hide incriminating evidence, assume a posture of calm sincerity and polite respect, license and registration, straighten the shades, take a breath. The officer pulls over, steps out of his patrol car and approaches, one hand on his pistol.
“Name?” he asks as I hand over the documents.
“Crap!” I reply. It is the one question for which I am not prepared.
As one who is profoundly appreciative of historical ironies, it is irony upon irony that I should forget that arguably the most important decision in history to date was made by a man who assumed the presidency only months before decision time. Roosevelt died and Truman stood in for the end of the war and the beginning of the Cold War era.
My personal theory is that the chemicals in our water supply and the trails that are being used to create artificial cloud covers are affecting the channels of my brain, leaving gaps and holes that may trigger a jump in the continuum of my knowledge at any given time. I am fearful that the mass consciousness is similarly afflicted. I am fearful that our senses are being dulled and our ability to see through the distractions, decoys and deceptions is being impaired.
If my theory is correct, the reader may begin to see an increase in the usual errors gradually glossed over while the underlying analytical process is increasingly diseased. You may find the chronicles defending international monetary policy and the occupation of Iraq. You may find the Jazzman attacking the liberal press and the radical fringe. You may find Random referring to himself in third person and advocating a constitutional amendment to enable a canonized president to serve a third and fourth term. Who needs an Arnold when you can have another round of Bush? Sin of all sins, you may find me defending the two party system as if it was enshrined in the constitution.
If these things come to pass, you will know my disease has progress too far. You have my permission in advance to put me out of my misery.
Jazz.
JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). HIS CHRONICLES APPEAR ON THE ALBION MONITOR, BUZZLE.COM, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE & OTHER SITES. SEE JACKRANDOM.COM. See Defending Dick Nixon on Albion Monitor (www.monitor.com).
It has been brought to my attention that it was Truman and not Eisenhower who made the decision to drop the big ones on Nagasaki and Hiroshima as I stated in a recent chronicle (Defending Dick Nixon). To be falsely accused of unleashing the horror of the millennia on an unsuspecting world, even fifty years after the fact, is simply inexcusable.
I feel like Hunter Thompson on a desolate highway somewhere in the Amargosa Desert. The highway patrol with its swirling red light and screaming siren is bearing down in the rear view mirror. I go through a checklist of must do activities in this circumstance: Hide incriminating evidence, assume a posture of calm sincerity and polite respect, license and registration, straighten the shades, take a breath. The officer pulls over, steps out of his patrol car and approaches, one hand on his pistol.
“Name?” he asks as I hand over the documents.
“Crap!” I reply. It is the one question for which I am not prepared.
As one who is profoundly appreciative of historical ironies, it is irony upon irony that I should forget that arguably the most important decision in history to date was made by a man who assumed the presidency only months before decision time. Roosevelt died and Truman stood in for the end of the war and the beginning of the Cold War era.
My personal theory is that the chemicals in our water supply and the trails that are being used to create artificial cloud covers are affecting the channels of my brain, leaving gaps and holes that may trigger a jump in the continuum of my knowledge at any given time. I am fearful that the mass consciousness is similarly afflicted. I am fearful that our senses are being dulled and our ability to see through the distractions, decoys and deceptions is being impaired.
If my theory is correct, the reader may begin to see an increase in the usual errors gradually glossed over while the underlying analytical process is increasingly diseased. You may find the chronicles defending international monetary policy and the occupation of Iraq. You may find the Jazzman attacking the liberal press and the radical fringe. You may find Random referring to himself in third person and advocating a constitutional amendment to enable a canonized president to serve a third and fourth term. Who needs an Arnold when you can have another round of Bush? Sin of all sins, you may find me defending the two party system as if it was enshrined in the constitution.
If these things come to pass, you will know my disease has progress too far. You have my permission in advance to put me out of my misery.
Jazz.
JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). HIS CHRONICLES APPEAR ON THE ALBION MONITOR, BUZZLE.COM, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE & OTHER SITES. SEE JACKRANDOM.COM. See Defending Dick Nixon on Albion Monitor (www.monitor.com).
Sunday, June 05, 2005
TAO 30: A Message for Our Leaders
He who knows how to guide a ruler in the path of Tao
Does not try to override the world with the force of arms.
It is in the nature of a military weapon to turn against its wielder.
Wherever armies are stationed, thorny bushes grow.
After a great war, bad years invariably follow.
What you want is to protect efficiently your own state.
But not to aim at self aggrandizement.
After you have attained your purpose
You must not parade your success,
You must not boast of your ability,
You must not feel proud,
You must rather regret that you had not been able to prevent war.
You must never think of conquering others by force.
For to be over-developed is to hasten decay.
And this is the Tao,
And what is against Tao will cease to be.
Lao Tzu,
Tao teh ching (XXX)
Does not try to override the world with the force of arms.
It is in the nature of a military weapon to turn against its wielder.
Wherever armies are stationed, thorny bushes grow.
After a great war, bad years invariably follow.
What you want is to protect efficiently your own state.
But not to aim at self aggrandizement.
After you have attained your purpose
You must not parade your success,
You must not boast of your ability,
You must not feel proud,
You must rather regret that you had not been able to prevent war.
You must never think of conquering others by force.
For to be over-developed is to hasten decay.
And this is the Tao,
And what is against Tao will cease to be.
Lao Tzu,
Tao teh ching (XXX)
Tuesday, May 31, 2005
STIR IT UP!
By Chris Mansel
Just a day after Memorial Day and the celebrating is over. A new story breaks about the suspected deep throat and the news wires and television erupt over his identity. Pundits get face time on television and the required stand-up message from the family is read. But in South Africa on Memorial Day over 6,000 people died of AIDS. In Iraq a child was too terrified to tell his parents about the soldier he saw poking a weapon into a car. In the streets of America a man sits in a truck on the Arizona border and waits for a man to cross the fence and illegally detain him at gunpoint until the authorities arrive. A woman dies trying to give birth by herself. Where is the holiday from suffering? If they could pick a day would it be observed? If a day off from work is all the public wants from Memorial day, Martin Luther King day, or New Year?s day then give them a day off. Give them every day they want off with pay and let an immigrant who doesn?t take a work day for granted do their work. This immigrant who came to America to escape starvation, or to escape torture, who is now in hiding in the same country that detained him in his home country. The land of the free and the home of the brave are but a melting pot stirred with someone else's hand.
SEE THE MANSEL REPORT
Just a day after Memorial Day and the celebrating is over. A new story breaks about the suspected deep throat and the news wires and television erupt over his identity. Pundits get face time on television and the required stand-up message from the family is read. But in South Africa on Memorial Day over 6,000 people died of AIDS. In Iraq a child was too terrified to tell his parents about the soldier he saw poking a weapon into a car. In the streets of America a man sits in a truck on the Arizona border and waits for a man to cross the fence and illegally detain him at gunpoint until the authorities arrive. A woman dies trying to give birth by herself. Where is the holiday from suffering? If they could pick a day would it be observed? If a day off from work is all the public wants from Memorial day, Martin Luther King day, or New Year?s day then give them a day off. Give them every day they want off with pay and let an immigrant who doesn?t take a work day for granted do their work. This immigrant who came to America to escape starvation, or to escape torture, who is now in hiding in the same country that detained him in his home country. The land of the free and the home of the brave are but a melting pot stirred with someone else's hand.
SEE THE MANSEL REPORT
Sunday, May 29, 2005
In Memorium: A Tribute to The Fallen
NOTE: JACK RANDOM WILL BE INTERVIEWED ON GORILLA RADIO MEMORIAL DAY 5PM PACIFIC TIME. WEBCAST AT http://cfuv.uvic.ca.
MEMORIAL DAY 2005
By Jack Random
It is Memorial Day. It is a time to remember those who have fallen in war. It is a time to pay tribute to the soldiers who have sacrificed their lives in duty to country. It is a time to reflect on the absence of so many, on the sorrow and loneliness of those they left behind, and the contributions they might have made in fuller, richer lives.
On this Memorial Day, of all memorial days, it is a time to wonder why.
Today, there will be speeches in every town and city, in parades decorated with stars and stripes, in gatherings of uniformed veterans and the halls of the American Legion, giving praise to the nation’s best and bravest who gave their lives so that we might be free.
Here we must take pause and reflect that rhetoric has meaning and words can be employed to both good and harmful purpose. For too long we have nodded in thoughtless agreement to words that must be questioned for the good of our nation and the betterment of humankind.
It has been a long time since the end of World War II. While few would deny the justification and righteousness of that war, all subsequent military actions are far less clear. The history of intervention from the Cold War era (Korea, Vietnam, Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, Chile, Cuba, El Salvador, Panama, Columbia, Lebanon, etc.) to the modern anti-terrorism era (Afghanistan, Haiti, Iraq) is shrouded in doubt. Even the most loyal and patriotic historian will have difficulty rescuing the narrative of modern American warfare from the moral purgatory that former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara christened the “fog of war.”
Now, on this Memorial Day, as our troops are on the fields of battle in two foreign wars, let us finally take an honest account and a solemn oath that we will never again commit a single soldier to a cause of war that is neither necessary nor justified.
We can no longer place our faith in the leaders of both major parties who accede to war at every calling. If ever there was a clear example of unnecessary and unjustified war, we are currently engaged in it. It is one thing to hold accountable an administration so bent on war it twisted intelligence and tailored facts to its own design, yet what can be said of an opposition party that instantly threw up its hands in unison once the bombs began to rain on Baghdad?
I do not believe that any man or woman, in war or civilian life, dies in vain. People die in vain only when the lessons of their fallen lives are not learned by those who survive them.
The lessons of every soldier lost and wounded in the land of ancient Mesopotamia are that we cannot rule the world by virtue of our might; that we cannot make a cause righteous when it is founded on lies and deceptions; that we cannot right a wrong by continuing the abuse to its bitter end; and that we cannot trust our own government on the critical matter of war.
Let us pay tribute to our fallen soldiers by withdrawing those who have survived, by granting amnesty to those who have abandoned an immoral cause, by dismantling our military bases, by making just reparations and by declaring an end to this modern day crusade.
Jazz.
JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). HIS CHRONICLES APPEAR ON BUZZLE.COM, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE & OTHER SITES.
MEMORIAL DAY 2005
By Jack Random
It is Memorial Day. It is a time to remember those who have fallen in war. It is a time to pay tribute to the soldiers who have sacrificed their lives in duty to country. It is a time to reflect on the absence of so many, on the sorrow and loneliness of those they left behind, and the contributions they might have made in fuller, richer lives.
On this Memorial Day, of all memorial days, it is a time to wonder why.
Today, there will be speeches in every town and city, in parades decorated with stars and stripes, in gatherings of uniformed veterans and the halls of the American Legion, giving praise to the nation’s best and bravest who gave their lives so that we might be free.
Here we must take pause and reflect that rhetoric has meaning and words can be employed to both good and harmful purpose. For too long we have nodded in thoughtless agreement to words that must be questioned for the good of our nation and the betterment of humankind.
It has been a long time since the end of World War II. While few would deny the justification and righteousness of that war, all subsequent military actions are far less clear. The history of intervention from the Cold War era (Korea, Vietnam, Dominican Republic, Nicaragua, Chile, Cuba, El Salvador, Panama, Columbia, Lebanon, etc.) to the modern anti-terrorism era (Afghanistan, Haiti, Iraq) is shrouded in doubt. Even the most loyal and patriotic historian will have difficulty rescuing the narrative of modern American warfare from the moral purgatory that former Secretary of Defense Robert McNamara christened the “fog of war.”
Now, on this Memorial Day, as our troops are on the fields of battle in two foreign wars, let us finally take an honest account and a solemn oath that we will never again commit a single soldier to a cause of war that is neither necessary nor justified.
We can no longer place our faith in the leaders of both major parties who accede to war at every calling. If ever there was a clear example of unnecessary and unjustified war, we are currently engaged in it. It is one thing to hold accountable an administration so bent on war it twisted intelligence and tailored facts to its own design, yet what can be said of an opposition party that instantly threw up its hands in unison once the bombs began to rain on Baghdad?
I do not believe that any man or woman, in war or civilian life, dies in vain. People die in vain only when the lessons of their fallen lives are not learned by those who survive them.
The lessons of every soldier lost and wounded in the land of ancient Mesopotamia are that we cannot rule the world by virtue of our might; that we cannot make a cause righteous when it is founded on lies and deceptions; that we cannot right a wrong by continuing the abuse to its bitter end; and that we cannot trust our own government on the critical matter of war.
Let us pay tribute to our fallen soldiers by withdrawing those who have survived, by granting amnesty to those who have abandoned an immoral cause, by dismantling our military bases, by making just reparations and by declaring an end to this modern day crusade.
Jazz.
JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). HIS CHRONICLES APPEAR ON BUZZLE.COM, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE & OTHER SITES.
Thursday, May 26, 2005
ADDICTED TO WAR
By Evan Augustine Peterson III, J.D.
Warlust eventually ravages nations just like a highly addictive narcotic ravages people. Warfare’s savagery inflicts destruction on prey nations immediately, whereas it destroys predator nations mediately. War initially produces a stimulative “high” for the predator’s domestic economy. Leaders in predator nations ignore this opiate-like economic addiction to war because it serves to enrich their upper classes. Warfare is instantaneously lucrative for the military-industrial complex’s depraved war profiteers but can cause an entire region’s economy to become depraved war addicts over time.
Consider that the economic high from an addiction to war is always a Faustian bargain. It compels the addicted nation to start an endless succession of destructive wars in order to avoid severe withdrawal symptoms, which otherwise would appear in the form of recessions and depressions. Penultimately, it forces the working class to pay the highest price in blood and treasure. Their children become cannon fodder and their taxes are squandered to finance military adventures. Ultimately, war destroys empires as well as it does people. Militaristic nations always collapse because their criminal acts of aggression are not only morally indefensible but also economically unsustainable.
One certainly need not be a pacifist to recognize that …the USA is economically addicted to war. If so, this would explain why our political system is dominated by the ultra-militarist War Party and the crypto-fascist Bush family (i.e., the pushers), while our economic system is dominated by the military-industrial complex and its mafiosiesque war profiteers (i.e., the kingpins).
Finally, if the USA is economically addicted to war, that raises some important moral questions. Readers of good conscience should be asking themselves: Am I willing to engage in loving acts of nonviolent noncooperation with evil in order to stop my nation’s wars of aggression? Or will I watch in craven silence as this nation descends – like the Bush family’s multigenerational war profiteers – into a vampiric career of bloodthirsty murderousness? If it’s the latter, won’t I be sending America’s children the depraved message that it’s permissible to murder people, so long as it’s profitable? Which destiny am I going to choose – nonviolent redemption or militaristic perdition?
In short, we’ve proved in Iraq that violence only begets more violence, and war more wars. It’s time to show the world the force of our example, not the example of our force.
[Excerpted from “American Militarism: Is the USA Addicted to War?” See Orb Standard at http://orbstandard.com/News/Peterson/peterson_is_the_us_addicted_to_war.html.]
Warlust eventually ravages nations just like a highly addictive narcotic ravages people. Warfare’s savagery inflicts destruction on prey nations immediately, whereas it destroys predator nations mediately. War initially produces a stimulative “high” for the predator’s domestic economy. Leaders in predator nations ignore this opiate-like economic addiction to war because it serves to enrich their upper classes. Warfare is instantaneously lucrative for the military-industrial complex’s depraved war profiteers but can cause an entire region’s economy to become depraved war addicts over time.
Consider that the economic high from an addiction to war is always a Faustian bargain. It compels the addicted nation to start an endless succession of destructive wars in order to avoid severe withdrawal symptoms, which otherwise would appear in the form of recessions and depressions. Penultimately, it forces the working class to pay the highest price in blood and treasure. Their children become cannon fodder and their taxes are squandered to finance military adventures. Ultimately, war destroys empires as well as it does people. Militaristic nations always collapse because their criminal acts of aggression are not only morally indefensible but also economically unsustainable.
One certainly need not be a pacifist to recognize that …the USA is economically addicted to war. If so, this would explain why our political system is dominated by the ultra-militarist War Party and the crypto-fascist Bush family (i.e., the pushers), while our economic system is dominated by the military-industrial complex and its mafiosiesque war profiteers (i.e., the kingpins).
Finally, if the USA is economically addicted to war, that raises some important moral questions. Readers of good conscience should be asking themselves: Am I willing to engage in loving acts of nonviolent noncooperation with evil in order to stop my nation’s wars of aggression? Or will I watch in craven silence as this nation descends – like the Bush family’s multigenerational war profiteers – into a vampiric career of bloodthirsty murderousness? If it’s the latter, won’t I be sending America’s children the depraved message that it’s permissible to murder people, so long as it’s profitable? Which destiny am I going to choose – nonviolent redemption or militaristic perdition?
In short, we’ve proved in Iraq that violence only begets more violence, and war more wars. It’s time to show the world the force of our example, not the example of our force.
[Excerpted from “American Militarism: Is the USA Addicted to War?” See Orb Standard at http://orbstandard.com/News/Peterson/peterson_is_the_us_addicted_to_war.html.]
Sunday, May 22, 2005
SF JAZZ & OTHER PLEASURES
Everything is politics but politics is not everything. Those of us who are fortunate to live on the left coast, particularly in the greater San Francisco area, enjoy the opportunity to engage in a rich cultural life as well as enlightened politics.
In its sixth season, San Francisco Jazz has featured such icons and luminaries as Ornette Coleman, Sonny Rollins, Michael Brecker, McCoy Tyner, Dianne Reeves and Etta James. The torch has been carried forward by Portuguese Fado singer, Mariza, whose performance is as much a seduction as an entertainment, by Brazilian Maria Rita, who summons the memory of Etta Fitzgerald, and this Saturday last at the Palace of Fine Arts by Madeleine Peyroux, a Brooklyn kid by way of Paris who channels the voice and spirit of the immortal Lady Day and, in sacred moments, captures her very soul.
The San Francisco Jazz Collective has featured the masterful renditions of Joshua Redman, Branford Marsalis and Bobby Hutcherson among others, with this year's work dedicated to the incomparable John Coltrane, whose son Ravi played a magnificent set as warmup to the Marsalis Quartet.
Theatres are offering challenging materials (see The Intersection for the Arts) and theatres beyond the bay have rediscovered Beckett, Stoppard and Miller. Even cinema has suddenly come alive for the audience that wants more than candy (Kingdom of Heaven, The Interpreter, Crash).
For baseball fans, Pac Bell (I refuse to rename it) remains the greatest ball park in America east of Fenway. This weekend the Giants unveiled a statue of the Dominican-born legend, Juan Maricial, and for the first time in Major League history, sported uniforms with a Spanish team logo: Viva Gigantes!
Politics aside, life is good on the left coast.
Jazz.
In its sixth season, San Francisco Jazz has featured such icons and luminaries as Ornette Coleman, Sonny Rollins, Michael Brecker, McCoy Tyner, Dianne Reeves and Etta James. The torch has been carried forward by Portuguese Fado singer, Mariza, whose performance is as much a seduction as an entertainment, by Brazilian Maria Rita, who summons the memory of Etta Fitzgerald, and this Saturday last at the Palace of Fine Arts by Madeleine Peyroux, a Brooklyn kid by way of Paris who channels the voice and spirit of the immortal Lady Day and, in sacred moments, captures her very soul.
The San Francisco Jazz Collective has featured the masterful renditions of Joshua Redman, Branford Marsalis and Bobby Hutcherson among others, with this year's work dedicated to the incomparable John Coltrane, whose son Ravi played a magnificent set as warmup to the Marsalis Quartet.
Theatres are offering challenging materials (see The Intersection for the Arts) and theatres beyond the bay have rediscovered Beckett, Stoppard and Miller. Even cinema has suddenly come alive for the audience that wants more than candy (Kingdom of Heaven, The Interpreter, Crash).
For baseball fans, Pac Bell (I refuse to rename it) remains the greatest ball park in America east of Fenway. This weekend the Giants unveiled a statue of the Dominican-born legend, Juan Maricial, and for the first time in Major League history, sported uniforms with a Spanish team logo: Viva Gigantes!
Politics aside, life is good on the left coast.
Jazz.
Monday, May 16, 2005
HOLLYWOOD, POLITICS & RELIGION
JAZZMAN CHRONICLES: DISSEMINATE FREELY.
REFLECTIONS ON THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN
By Jack Random
The role of religion in the 2004 presidential election is well chronicled. Much has been written regarding the exploitation of religious issues by the Karl Rove machine, less so about the role of Hollywood in the convergence of politics and religion.
The right wing of the Republican Party (is there a another wing?) was so incensed by Michael Moore’s straightforward political documentary Fahrenheit 911, they condemned him on the floor of the national convention. The media played ball by challenging the objectivity of Moore’s work and largely dismissing it as leftist propaganda.
By contrast, the controversy surrounding Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ evolved around its historical accuracy and its inflammatory treatment of the Jews. The greater truth that it was made to order for the Republican political strategy was never broached by media analysts or political pundits.
There is in fact a potent argument that The Passion is largely if not wholly responsible for the reelection of the president and the White House is therefore beholden to Gibson’s Opus Dei, an extremist Catholic sect dedicated to 12th century morality, self-flagellation, and the fulfillment of the Biblical end of days.
It is a shame that Ridley Scott’s Kingdom of Heaven was not released concurrent with The Passion of Christ. It might have brought the real issue to the fore and set the stage for a meaningful exchange of ideas. The central issue is not the depth of devotion as measured by one’s empathy for the suffering of Jesus; rather, it pits the gospel of the crusaders against the enlightened testament of Christ himself. It is the preaching of those who wish to deliver their interpretation of the word of God to all, at any cost, by all means, including the sword, against those who preach tolerance, forbearance and peace.
Opus Dei and its appointed Hollywood Holy Warrior are the embodiment of the new crusade. Like their adversaries at another extreme, they believe in Holy War. They believe that the war in Iraq is a battle for ancient Mesopotamia. They believe that the conflict in the Middle East is centered over the Temple Mound. They believe that strategic nuclear weapons may be employed to the greater good and for the Glory of God.
There is a particularly poignant moment in the Kingdom of Heaven. It occurs at the Port of Messina where the crusaders await boarding for the last leg of their journey to Jerusalem. Virtually unnoticed and pointedly unobstructed, a crier repeats the slogan “Killing a Muslim is not a sin” as the followers of Mohammed pray to a dying sun on the rocky shore below.
The Kingdom of Heaven is about true history. Its purpose is to set the record straight. In contrast to the popular historical novel, The DaVinci Code, it depicts the Knights Templar as vicious, bloodthirsty killers fomenting hatred and war. It is the story of the Islamic Holy Warrior Saladin’s reconquest of the city of Jerusalem in 1187. It portrays a divide within the occupying forces, one favoring moderation, tolerance and coexistence and the other obsessed with a vision of eternal war. It observes that when the crusaders conquered Jerusalem they killed every man, woman and Muslim child for the Glory of God. It bears witness that when Saladin took Jerusalem back, he granted all its inhabitants safe passage out of the region.
The underlying question inevitably arises in the mind of the observer: On which side of the crusades would Jesus walk? Indeed, if Jesus were alive today, would he be an advocate for tolerance and diplomacy or a crusader for war?
Sometime in the coming months, we will be treated to the Hollywood version of The DaVinci Code. Like The Last Temptation of Christ, the book has already brought to the public mind the question of the role of Mary Magdalene among the apostles of Christ. It is an intriguing question with profound implications and ones that would alter the Christian universe. (As the flat earth society will attest, it is a universe that has undergone revision before and surely will again.)
Another question that is rarely if ever asked is this: Where is the Gospel of Christ?
I offer it now as a proper subject for inquisitive minds with a penchant for the spiritual. If you believe, as I do, that Jesus was among the most enlightened and educated beings on the planet, it is inconceivable that Christ was illiterate. If we conclude that he possessed the facility of writing, how can any reasonable person believe that the man who integrated eastern and western thought and earned a sacred place in three of the world’s great religions, could not find the time or did not appreciate the importance of setting his words in written form? How is it that he chose not to write the gospel upon which all others would be based and against which all would be measured?
Allow me to suggest an alternative hypothesis: Either the written works of Christ exist as a closely guarded secret or they were destroyed by men with an ulterior motive. If they existed, his true followers would have taken every measure to protect them. If they were destroyed, it was a determined act with a deliberate purpose.
If the words of Christ exist, it is time for them to be revealed. If they were destroyed, it is time for the truth.
In any case, the universe of religious belief must always yield to acquired knowledge.
Jazz.
JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). HIS CHRONICLES APPEAR ON BUZZLE.COM, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE & OTHER SITES.
REFLECTIONS ON THE KINGDOM OF HEAVEN
By Jack Random
The role of religion in the 2004 presidential election is well chronicled. Much has been written regarding the exploitation of religious issues by the Karl Rove machine, less so about the role of Hollywood in the convergence of politics and religion.
The right wing of the Republican Party (is there a another wing?) was so incensed by Michael Moore’s straightforward political documentary Fahrenheit 911, they condemned him on the floor of the national convention. The media played ball by challenging the objectivity of Moore’s work and largely dismissing it as leftist propaganda.
By contrast, the controversy surrounding Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ evolved around its historical accuracy and its inflammatory treatment of the Jews. The greater truth that it was made to order for the Republican political strategy was never broached by media analysts or political pundits.
There is in fact a potent argument that The Passion is largely if not wholly responsible for the reelection of the president and the White House is therefore beholden to Gibson’s Opus Dei, an extremist Catholic sect dedicated to 12th century morality, self-flagellation, and the fulfillment of the Biblical end of days.
It is a shame that Ridley Scott’s Kingdom of Heaven was not released concurrent with The Passion of Christ. It might have brought the real issue to the fore and set the stage for a meaningful exchange of ideas. The central issue is not the depth of devotion as measured by one’s empathy for the suffering of Jesus; rather, it pits the gospel of the crusaders against the enlightened testament of Christ himself. It is the preaching of those who wish to deliver their interpretation of the word of God to all, at any cost, by all means, including the sword, against those who preach tolerance, forbearance and peace.
Opus Dei and its appointed Hollywood Holy Warrior are the embodiment of the new crusade. Like their adversaries at another extreme, they believe in Holy War. They believe that the war in Iraq is a battle for ancient Mesopotamia. They believe that the conflict in the Middle East is centered over the Temple Mound. They believe that strategic nuclear weapons may be employed to the greater good and for the Glory of God.
There is a particularly poignant moment in the Kingdom of Heaven. It occurs at the Port of Messina where the crusaders await boarding for the last leg of their journey to Jerusalem. Virtually unnoticed and pointedly unobstructed, a crier repeats the slogan “Killing a Muslim is not a sin” as the followers of Mohammed pray to a dying sun on the rocky shore below.
The Kingdom of Heaven is about true history. Its purpose is to set the record straight. In contrast to the popular historical novel, The DaVinci Code, it depicts the Knights Templar as vicious, bloodthirsty killers fomenting hatred and war. It is the story of the Islamic Holy Warrior Saladin’s reconquest of the city of Jerusalem in 1187. It portrays a divide within the occupying forces, one favoring moderation, tolerance and coexistence and the other obsessed with a vision of eternal war. It observes that when the crusaders conquered Jerusalem they killed every man, woman and Muslim child for the Glory of God. It bears witness that when Saladin took Jerusalem back, he granted all its inhabitants safe passage out of the region.
The underlying question inevitably arises in the mind of the observer: On which side of the crusades would Jesus walk? Indeed, if Jesus were alive today, would he be an advocate for tolerance and diplomacy or a crusader for war?
Sometime in the coming months, we will be treated to the Hollywood version of The DaVinci Code. Like The Last Temptation of Christ, the book has already brought to the public mind the question of the role of Mary Magdalene among the apostles of Christ. It is an intriguing question with profound implications and ones that would alter the Christian universe. (As the flat earth society will attest, it is a universe that has undergone revision before and surely will again.)
Another question that is rarely if ever asked is this: Where is the Gospel of Christ?
I offer it now as a proper subject for inquisitive minds with a penchant for the spiritual. If you believe, as I do, that Jesus was among the most enlightened and educated beings on the planet, it is inconceivable that Christ was illiterate. If we conclude that he possessed the facility of writing, how can any reasonable person believe that the man who integrated eastern and western thought and earned a sacred place in three of the world’s great religions, could not find the time or did not appreciate the importance of setting his words in written form? How is it that he chose not to write the gospel upon which all others would be based and against which all would be measured?
Allow me to suggest an alternative hypothesis: Either the written works of Christ exist as a closely guarded secret or they were destroyed by men with an ulterior motive. If they existed, his true followers would have taken every measure to protect them. If they were destroyed, it was a determined act with a deliberate purpose.
If the words of Christ exist, it is time for them to be revealed. If they were destroyed, it is time for the truth.
In any case, the universe of religious belief must always yield to acquired knowledge.
Jazz.
JACK RANDOM IS THE AUTHOR OF THE JAZZMAN CRONICLES (CROW DOG PRESS) AND GHOST DANCE INSURRECTION (DRY BONES PRESS). HIS CHRONICLES APPEAR ON BUZZLE.COM, COUNTERPUNCH, DISSIDENT VOICE & OTHER SITES.
Monday, May 09, 2005
RALLY FOR LEONARD PELTIER
Contact: Coordinator, Lakota Student Alliance > lakotastudentalliance@yahoo.com (605) 441-9453 (ph)
The 6th Annual Oglala Commemoration Event set to begin on June 26, 2005 at the Jumping Bull Property south of Oglala South Dakota marks the 30th anniversary of the Incident at Oglala. The event is free to the public, and begins at Noon (MST).
"It's a time for healing and prayers to remember those warriors who lost their freedom and their lives during the Reign of Terror on Pine Ridge. Hopefully the healing emphasis will prevent another bloody civil war from happening again on the sacred land of the Lakota Nation," said Event coordinator Robert Quiver Jr. Quiver, a student at Oglala Lakota College, is co-founder of the Lakota Student Alliance, a grassroots group on Pine Ridge Reservation. The Lakota Student Alliance and Oglala Commemoration Committee jointly sponsor the event to honor and remember the lives lost during the 1970s civil conflict on the reservation and to also raise awareness toward the unjust imprisonment of AIM member Leonard Peltier, currently jailed in Leavenworth Kansas. Peltier's imprisonment resulted from a shooting Incident between AIM members and Federal Agents at the Jumping Bull property which was precipitated by numerous unjust deaths of AIM supporters during a tumultuous 1970s Civil War on Pine Ridge Reservation known as the "Reign of Terror."
"Leonard Peltier needs to be set free," said Commemoration Committee member Rosalyn Jumping Bull of Oglala. Rosalyn remembers the year the FBI ransacked and shot at her elder mothers home following the deaths of two FBI agents. It's those kind of days that Rosalyn does not wish upon the future generations of Lakota people who will be living on the reservation.
Annually, normal activities scheduled for this event include a traditional Lakota ceremonial prayer service near the gravesites of AIM members Jun Little and Joe Stuntz (Little Family cemetary). A memorial walk for justice follows from the gravesites to the Jumping Bull Property. This is followed by a special memorial and giveaway for deceased relatives, coordinated by the Jumping Bull Family. Finally, a concert for youth awareness is held, concluding this special day. Speakers for the 2004 event include important figures that played a vital role in the justice movement for Peltier's freedom. They include: Vernon Bellecourt, principle spokesperson for American Indian Movement; Rosalyn Jumping Bull of Oglala; Harvey Arden, an Author and Advocate for Peltier's release; Members of the Leonard Peltier Defense Committee; Members of Leonard Peltier's Legal Team, and International Guests as well. Special Entertainment Performances from: Lakota Hoopdancer Clem Holy Eagle, Nammy Award Winner Wayquay, Oglala Hiphop artists Native Era, Muscogee Hiphop artist Julian B., Spyderzback, Pop Rocker Darren Geffre and more to be announced. Oglala Commemoration Committee members Wayquay (2000 Native American Music Award Winner), and Andy Mader will co-emcee this year's event. We invite the public to this free event. For more information on this event you can visit the website at http://www.oglalacommemoration.com
Lakota Student Alliance (LaStAlli) PO Box 225 Kyle, SD 57752 > http://www.geocities.com/lakotastudentalliance/index.html
The 6th Annual Oglala Commemoration Event set to begin on June 26, 2005 at the Jumping Bull Property south of Oglala South Dakota marks the 30th anniversary of the Incident at Oglala. The event is free to the public, and begins at Noon (MST).
"It's a time for healing and prayers to remember those warriors who lost their freedom and their lives during the Reign of Terror on Pine Ridge. Hopefully the healing emphasis will prevent another bloody civil war from happening again on the sacred land of the Lakota Nation," said Event coordinator Robert Quiver Jr. Quiver, a student at Oglala Lakota College, is co-founder of the Lakota Student Alliance, a grassroots group on Pine Ridge Reservation. The Lakota Student Alliance and Oglala Commemoration Committee jointly sponsor the event to honor and remember the lives lost during the 1970s civil conflict on the reservation and to also raise awareness toward the unjust imprisonment of AIM member Leonard Peltier, currently jailed in Leavenworth Kansas. Peltier's imprisonment resulted from a shooting Incident between AIM members and Federal Agents at the Jumping Bull property which was precipitated by numerous unjust deaths of AIM supporters during a tumultuous 1970s Civil War on Pine Ridge Reservation known as the "Reign of Terror."
"Leonard Peltier needs to be set free," said Commemoration Committee member Rosalyn Jumping Bull of Oglala. Rosalyn remembers the year the FBI ransacked and shot at her elder mothers home following the deaths of two FBI agents. It's those kind of days that Rosalyn does not wish upon the future generations of Lakota people who will be living on the reservation.
Annually, normal activities scheduled for this event include a traditional Lakota ceremonial prayer service near the gravesites of AIM members Jun Little and Joe Stuntz (Little Family cemetary). A memorial walk for justice follows from the gravesites to the Jumping Bull Property. This is followed by a special memorial and giveaway for deceased relatives, coordinated by the Jumping Bull Family. Finally, a concert for youth awareness is held, concluding this special day. Speakers for the 2004 event include important figures that played a vital role in the justice movement for Peltier's freedom. They include: Vernon Bellecourt, principle spokesperson for American Indian Movement; Rosalyn Jumping Bull of Oglala; Harvey Arden, an Author and Advocate for Peltier's release; Members of the Leonard Peltier Defense Committee; Members of Leonard Peltier's Legal Team, and International Guests as well. Special Entertainment Performances from: Lakota Hoopdancer Clem Holy Eagle, Nammy Award Winner Wayquay, Oglala Hiphop artists Native Era, Muscogee Hiphop artist Julian B., Spyderzback, Pop Rocker Darren Geffre and more to be announced. Oglala Commemoration Committee members Wayquay (2000 Native American Music Award Winner), and Andy Mader will co-emcee this year's event. We invite the public to this free event. For more information on this event you can visit the website at http://www.oglalacommemoration.com
Lakota Student Alliance (LaStAlli) PO Box 225 Kyle, SD 57752
Saturday, May 07, 2005
FREE LEONARD PELTIER!
A message from The Dreamkeeper...
A SINGLE AFTERNOON
There shall soon be a day when
We, the People of America,
will stand up together as One
on a Single Afternoon
--yes, a Single Afternoon--
and shake these criminals from our national life
as a dog shakes off its fleas.
We will show then compassion as human beings--as they never did to us--
but the leash of power will never be put back in their bloodied hands again.
Yes, in a Single Afternoon.
It CAN be DONE!!
We CAN do it!
Rise shoulder-to-shoulder
and heart-to-heart and soul-to-soul
and physically occupy the corridors of power
in every town, every city, every state, every corporation.
Yes, on a Single Afternoon.
Leave the comfort of your home and join the People
in the peaceful retrieval of our own Power
and in the re-establishment of the Constitution of the United States.
Yes, on a Single Afternoon it can be done.
By ALL & EACH of us.
AMERICA WILL BE AMERICA AGAIN!!
-Harvey Arden
Mitakuye Oyasin--We are ALL related
~FREE LEONARD PELTIER~ (And we WILL!!)
A SINGLE AFTERNOON
There shall soon be a day when
We, the People of America,
will stand up together as One
on a Single Afternoon
--yes, a Single Afternoon--
and shake these criminals from our national life
as a dog shakes off its fleas.
We will show then compassion as human beings--as they never did to us--
but the leash of power will never be put back in their bloodied hands again.
Yes, in a Single Afternoon.
It CAN be DONE!!
We CAN do it!
Rise shoulder-to-shoulder
and heart-to-heart and soul-to-soul
and physically occupy the corridors of power
in every town, every city, every state, every corporation.
Yes, on a Single Afternoon.
Leave the comfort of your home and join the People
in the peaceful retrieval of our own Power
and in the re-establishment of the Constitution of the United States.
Yes, on a Single Afternoon it can be done.
By ALL & EACH of us.
AMERICA WILL BE AMERICA AGAIN!!
-Harvey Arden
Mitakuye Oyasin--We are ALL related
~FREE LEONARD PELTIER~ (And we WILL!!)
Wednesday, April 27, 2005
WAR & DEBT: WHO HOLDS THE CHIPS?
By Jack Random
“Even if the United States can lower its troop commitment to 40,000 by 2010, the war could still end up costing up to $646 billion by 2015. If insurgency, corruption and incompetence continue to plague the occupation as they have for the last two years, the number could surge to a trillion dollars or more.”
- Robert Scheer, “In Love with Conquest,” 4/27/05.
Regarding the dire prediction that the war and occupation could cost a trillion dollars, we must remember that this is only monopoly money. America is trillions in debt already and we have no intention of paying any of it.
The man in the White House gives the world a wink and a nod like a good old boy down in Laredo who sells confidence for the price of a favor. Unfortunately, the man in the White House is a second-string hustler in a game of Titans. He misreads the satisfied smile behind Asian eyes as they hold the markers for the mounting debt. They have us exactly where they want us: Throwing away borrowed cash in a Texas poker house, as if it really was monopoly money, while they patiently collect the chips.
We have the guns and the girls while they buy out the company store. Maybe we’ll get lucky. Maybe they’ll let us hang around as security guards when the chips are called in. If not, we’re out in the cold.
The American holiday is over. The American empire was just a Texas nightmare, another bungled business deal by the second son of a grifter in over his head.
Meantime, the president’s soul mate, Vlady Putin, has decided to put his chips down on the other side of the table. Syria, you may recall, was our first choice in expanding the war but that prospect has now suffered a triple blow. First, the CIA announces that not only did Iraq not possess weapons of mass destruction, it did not hand them over to Syria either. Second, to the dismay of White House warlords, Syrian troops withdraw from Lebanon as promised. Finally, the steely-eyed Putin decides to sell Syria anti-aircraft defense systems.
So much for the spring invasion.
Tony Blair is back peddling as fast as he can. Facing a steady decline in support, the electorate is demanding that he withdraw British troops by the end of the year when the United Nations mandate ends. Silvio Berlusconi has already pledged withdrawal and may actually keep his promise now that the Americans have thumbed their noses at Italy’s request for justice in the shooting death of their most esteemed intelligence agent.
Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez boldly chides the boy king of the north and his ineffectual agents at every opportunity. New Europe’s Viktor Yushchenko decides to keep his electoral promise to withdraw Ukrainian troops despite the entreaties of the president, himself, and North Korea’s little dictator delivers his latest response to a Texas bluff: Stuff it in your ear.
It is as if the whole world is laughing and we are the only ones who do not get the joke.
We are the joke and we deserve it – at least to the extent that we elected him.
Jazz.
“Even if the United States can lower its troop commitment to 40,000 by 2010, the war could still end up costing up to $646 billion by 2015. If insurgency, corruption and incompetence continue to plague the occupation as they have for the last two years, the number could surge to a trillion dollars or more.”
- Robert Scheer, “In Love with Conquest,” 4/27/05.
Regarding the dire prediction that the war and occupation could cost a trillion dollars, we must remember that this is only monopoly money. America is trillions in debt already and we have no intention of paying any of it.
The man in the White House gives the world a wink and a nod like a good old boy down in Laredo who sells confidence for the price of a favor. Unfortunately, the man in the White House is a second-string hustler in a game of Titans. He misreads the satisfied smile behind Asian eyes as they hold the markers for the mounting debt. They have us exactly where they want us: Throwing away borrowed cash in a Texas poker house, as if it really was monopoly money, while they patiently collect the chips.
We have the guns and the girls while they buy out the company store. Maybe we’ll get lucky. Maybe they’ll let us hang around as security guards when the chips are called in. If not, we’re out in the cold.
The American holiday is over. The American empire was just a Texas nightmare, another bungled business deal by the second son of a grifter in over his head.
Meantime, the president’s soul mate, Vlady Putin, has decided to put his chips down on the other side of the table. Syria, you may recall, was our first choice in expanding the war but that prospect has now suffered a triple blow. First, the CIA announces that not only did Iraq not possess weapons of mass destruction, it did not hand them over to Syria either. Second, to the dismay of White House warlords, Syrian troops withdraw from Lebanon as promised. Finally, the steely-eyed Putin decides to sell Syria anti-aircraft defense systems.
So much for the spring invasion.
Tony Blair is back peddling as fast as he can. Facing a steady decline in support, the electorate is demanding that he withdraw British troops by the end of the year when the United Nations mandate ends. Silvio Berlusconi has already pledged withdrawal and may actually keep his promise now that the Americans have thumbed their noses at Italy’s request for justice in the shooting death of their most esteemed intelligence agent.
Venezuela’s Hugo Chavez boldly chides the boy king of the north and his ineffectual agents at every opportunity. New Europe’s Viktor Yushchenko decides to keep his electoral promise to withdraw Ukrainian troops despite the entreaties of the president, himself, and North Korea’s little dictator delivers his latest response to a Texas bluff: Stuff it in your ear.
It is as if the whole world is laughing and we are the only ones who do not get the joke.
We are the joke and we deserve it – at least to the extent that we elected him.
Jazz.
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