MAY LOVE PREVAIL ON EARTH
January 8, 2004
The Empire of Darkness Series #4: Connect The Dots... And Shine Back
Hello everyone
As much as my previous compilation shined the light on just some of the brightest spots available to Seekers and Servers of the Light, this one is in many respects at the antipode, bringing us down to some of the lowest levels of darkness ever seen on this planet. Looking at this information without falling in the abysmal trap of disheartening fear or futile anger requires complete equanimity of mind and a rock solid faith in the Victory of Light, as well as an understanding that bringing those darkly hatched plans and plots to the bright light of the day is how we may soon be able to help cleanse this planet from the hubris and sufferings created by those lost souls who rejected long ago the helping hand of Love continuously extended by God's angels.
I've tried to balance out some of these recommended articles with news of positive efforts and suggestions made to counter the advance of darkness and pave the way for the coming Era of Love and Peace. Which is why this compilation is once again so large. My apologies for this. I'll strive to bring the size of future compilations back to 3 parts (about 30 pages). Promised!
Jean Hudon
Earth Rainbow Network Coordinator
http://www.EarthRainbowNetwork.com
Free subscription to such compilations through this website above or by sending a blank email to earthrainbownetwork-subscribe@lists.riseup.net
This compilation is archived at http://www.EarthRainbowNetwork.com/Archives2004/EmpireDarkness4.htm
"To know what is right and not to do it is the worst cowardice."
- Confucius
"All politics are based on the indifference of the majority."
- James Reston
"With "the PATRIOT Act" and other legal monstrosities foisted upon the people, what emerges is a repressive "coordination" (as the Nazis used to call it) of the entities of force and deception, the police, intelligence and the military, in the interests of a "permanent" counterinsurgency, by way of the centralization and broadening of surveillance capabilities, arrest capabilities, and harassment capabilities, which target anyone corporate America doesn't like. Homeland defense is, in essence, a form of state terrorism directed against the American people and democracy itself. It is the Pentagon Inc. declaring war on America."
- Frank Morales, taken from "Homeland Defense: The Pentagon Declares War on America", #9 below or at http://globalresearch.ca/articles/MOR312A.html
"It does not require a majority to prevail, but rather an irate, tireless minority keen to set brush fires in people's minds."
- Samuel Adams
Worthy of your Attention
Remind Us: Why did the United States invade Iraq? (Powerful Flash presentation!)
http://www.oakie.net/remindus/remindus.swf
Recommended by "Mark Graffis" mgraffis@vitelcom.net>
Past Defeat and Personal Quest Shape Kucinich Bid
http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/010304J.shtml
Interesting detailed New York Times article on Kucinich
Behind Every Terrorist There is a Bush
http://www.deceptiondollar.com/TempArt/BehindTerrorEvent.htm
International Inquiry into 9-11
http://www.deceptiondollar.com/Inquiry911.htm
March 26-28th, 2004 at the San Francisco War Memorial and Veteran's Building in San Francisco
Mark R. Elsis On The Meria Heller Show Thursday January 8th
http://Meria.net
You can listen to the show through Monday
THE MISSING PIECE: YELLOWSTONE! (Looks like this supervolcano could be about to blow!...)
http://www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?noframes;read=42459
(...) There is a mad frenzy going on here in Montana to beef up all the bridges in the path of the two BIG, high, Yellowstone lakes. They don't begin these improvements until they are about a hundred miles away from Yellowstone, which gives you some idea of the horrendous amounts of water we are talking about. These bridge improvements are specifically designed NOT for Quakes but to survive HUGE ONRUSH OF WATER. They are making these changes even to bridges built this summer. And they are doing so (pouring concrete) in 5 feet of snow and zero degree weather which gives you some sense of the urgency. CLIP
YELLOWSTONE SUPERVOLCANO GETTING READY TO BLOW ITS CORK (January 4, 2004)
http://www.rumormillnews.com/cgi-bin/forum.cgi?noframes;read=42462
(...) Date: 10/10/2003: Thought you'd be interested in this. My sister is married to a certain geologist. He was working in the underground caverns near New Madrid. They are concerned of a huge quake happening in the Midwest like previously in 1811 & 1812. He and others were pulled from the research and told to get to Yellowstone ASAP. My sister told us just 4 weeks ago that he cannot talk about it. Anyone talking to the media or family will be arrested and detained without counsel. She said he and others were very afraid. Another friend drives a truck all over the US. He has been taking loads out of the area and transferring business and factory equipment to places farther East. They won't tell him either. This has been going on since this past March and is picking up speed as the year comes to a close. (...) October 6, 2003 Dear Sis: Sis, I just haven't had time to send you the info on Yellowstone. But here is the scoop. Yellowstone National Park is about to blow off the face of the Earth, and our wonderful leaders are keeping the whole thing squelched. In July the Park rangers closed the entire Norris Geyser Basin because of the deformation of the land and the excess temperature. There is an area there that is 28 miles long by 7 miles wide that has bulged upward over five inches since 1996, and this year the ground temperature on that bulge has reached over 200 degrees. There was no choice but to close off the whole area. Everything in that area is dying. The trees, flowers, grass, etc. A dead zone is developing and spreading outward. The animals are literally migrating out of the park. This isn't hearsay. It is coming from people who have actually visited the park in just the last few weeks. (...) Sis, Yellowstone is what geologists call a "super volcano." There is a massive caldera of molten fire beneath Yellowstone National Park. When this thing blows, geologists are saying that every living thing within six hundred miles is likely to die. (...) When that happens the super-volcano will blow violently, blowing out a chunk of its cap-rock and sending millions of cubic feet of ash into the atmosphere in a Pompeii-like explosion, but 100,000 times worse. (...) "When Yellowstone goes off again, and it will, it will be a disaster for the United States and eventually, for the whole world. We volcanologists believe it would all begin with the magma chamber becoming unstable. Observations would begin by seeing bigger earthquakes, greater uplifting as magma intrudes and gets nearer and nearer the surface. An earthquake may send a rupture through a brittle layer similar to breaking the lid off a pressure cooker. This would generate sheets of magma, which will perhaps rise up to 30, 40 or 50 kilometers sending gigantic amounts of debris into the atmosphere. Pyroclastic flows would cover the whole region, killing tens of thousands of people in the surrounding area. The ash carried in the atmosphere and deposited over vast areas of the United States would have devastating effects. A plume of material that goes up into the atmosphere, globally, from the eruption would produce the climatic effects. This would spread worldwide and have a cooling effect that would most likely destroy the growing season on a global scale. The eruption will throw out cubic kilometers of rock, ash, dust, sulfur dioxide and so on into the upper atmosphere, where it will reflect incoming solar radiation, forcing down temperatures on the earths surface. It would be the equivalent of a nuclear winter. The effects would last for four or five years with crops failing and the whole ecosystem breaking down."
CONTENTS
1. My Vision for South Asia
2. Feedback on The Empire of Darkness Series #3
3. Quarantining dissent How the Secret Service protects Bush from free speech
4. MoveOn Ad contest finalists
5. One day at the Post Office
6. U.S. TERRORISM UNCHALLENGED
7. MOST AUTHENTIC 9-11 SCENARIO
8. 10 Good Things About a Bad Year
9. 2004 begins with massive military mobilization in US cities
10. Pentagon Declares War on America
11. A report and review of the documentary: Inside the corporation
12. Sex Slaves in Israel
13. Sweeping Restrictions in Nablus in the Wake of Israeli Military Operations
14. SUPPORT ISRAELI REFUSENIKS!
15. Mayhem in Occupied Baghdad
See also:
A Truly Wide-Awake American (Dec 25 - TOO PESSIMISTIC WITH SOME KERNELS OF TRUTH)
http://www.rense.com/general46/wake.html
I am one American who IS wide awake on what is going on in my country and around
the world. I could explain things that would curl your toe nails. As a free nation, the United States is done. Via the pre-planned "inside job" 9-11, and the subsequent Patriot Acts, Dept of Homeland Security, Presidential Executive Orders, and new "enforcement" laws buried deep in legislation passed by our "zombied" Congress, the peoples of the United States are being placed under increased "lockdown", and, with another pre-planned 9-11 looming on the horizon, the endgame is total lockdown. Hitler's concentration camps for the Jews and other undesirables will pale in comparison for what the U.S. government has in store for its "undesirables". CLIP
British soldiers 'kicked Iraqi prisoner to death' (Jan 4 - by Robert Fisk)
http://news.independent.co.uk/world/fisk/story.jsp?story=477915
Eight young Iraqis arrested in Basra were kicked and assaulted by British soldiers, one of them so badly that he died in British custody, according to military and medical records seen by The Independent on Sunday.
British Official: Troops in Iraq Through 2007
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/010604A.shtml
Iraqis Doubt Real Hussein Behind Bars (Jan 3)
http://www.rense.com/general47/iraqisdoubtrealhussein.htm
(...) Mr. Ahmed, an athlete who knew Mr. Hussein's oldest son Uday personally, says he is positive the person the United States is parading as their prize catch is not the former dictator. Mr. Hussein is known to have a tiny tattoo on his left hand, but in the relentlessly replayed video that shows him having his throat checked by a U.S. Army medic -- the video that most of the world accepts as footage of the humbled former dictator -- the markings are not apparent as Mr. Hussein strokes his straggly beard. It's not the only detail that disbelievers have seized on. Others find it strange that Mr. Hussein's hair is black in the footage, but his beard is white. "Everyone knows that Saddam dyes his hair, but after eight months hiding in a hole, it's still black?" asked Diaa, a 37-year-old taxi driver who gave only his first name. "Tell me how this is possible. When they captured [former information minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf] after a few weeks, his hair was already white." Some, like Mr. Ahmed, believe the ex-dictator's dead sons are also alive, and that the whole family has struck a deal with U.S. President George W. Bush to live abroad in secret exile. CLIP
Brazil gives US fingerprint taste (Jan 3)
http://www.telegraphindia.com/1040104/asp/foreign/story_2749285.asp
With only two days to go before the US authorities start fingerprinting and photographing visitors from Third World countries at all points of entry, Brazil has become the first country to retaliate by imposing similar restrictions on Americans. More than 200 Americans, who arrived at Sao Paulo international airport yesterday, were photographed and fingerprinted following orders from a federal judge in Brazil insisting on reciprocity in immigration matters with the US. Judge Julier Sebastiao in the state of Mato Grosso said in a court order this week that he considered discriminatory fingerprinting and photographing of visitors from some countries to the US as absolutely brutal, threatening human rights, violating human dignity, xenophobic and worthy of the worst horrors committed by the Nazis. Visitors from Canada, Japan and 26 West European countries do not require visas to enter the US and stay for up to 90 days: they will not be photographed or fingerprinted on arrival. Judge Sebastiaos order followed complaints from civil rights organisations in Brazil against the new US regulations, known as US-VISIT or US Visitor and Immigrant Status Indicator Technology. (...) Judge Sebastiaos order could be overturned on appeal, but foreign ministry officials in Brasilia told news agencies that the government never considered such an appeal. They are, however, expected to ask Washington to exempt Brazilians from US-VISIT, as required by the court order. According to Wagner Castilho, press officer for the federal police in Sao Paulo, most of the Americans were angered initially at having to go through all this, but they were usually more understanding once they learned that Brazilians are subjected to the same treatment in the US.
Condi and the 9/11 Commission (Dec 20)
http://www.truthout.org/docs_03/010304A.shtml
National Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice is apparently not keen on going under oath for the Kean 9/11 commission.
Free Press International - Pentagon Officials Cancel Flights On September 10, 2001
http://www.freepressinternational.com/sept102001.html
Many States Face Mess at Polls (Jan 5 - BIG TIME MESS!!)
http://www.truthout.org/docs_04/010604F.shtml
Radical Author and Anti-Imperialist Chalmers Johnson talks about US Imperialism and Empire-Building (MUST LISTEN TO!! MOST EXCELLENT!!)
http://www.kpfa.org/cgi-bin/gen-mpegurl.m3u?server=209.81.10.18&port=80&mount=/data/20040101-Thu1700.mp3
Empire! As the US accelerates towards control of global resources and navigating the future of the world, Chalmers Johnson, author of the hard-hitting national best-seller Blowback, turns his attention to US militarism and empire-building. In The Sorrows of Empire - Militarism, Secrecy and the End of the Republic, Johnson maps America's expanding empire of military bases and the vast web of services that support them. Chalmers Johnson is President of the Japan Policy Research Institute (http://www.jpri.org/) and professor emeritus of the University of California in San Diego. Dennis discusses the astonishing extent and costs of US military deployment worldwide. For more on the costs of Empire see http://www.skyhen.org/decline_of_empire.asp and http://www.thirdworldtraveler.com/American_Empire/Blowback_Sorrows_Empire.html
Look! The execution of JFK by Oswald was a LIE (stunning secret footage)
http://www.abidemiracles.com/federal/greershotjfk2.gif
http://www.abidemiracles.com/federal/greershotjfk.gif
Two film clips that show how JFK actually died--a point-blank shot to the face by his own Secret Service agent, William Greer!
Protesters Wary of New Tactic by Feds (Dec 30)
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2003/12/30/MNG1640F501.DTL
Obscure 1872 law cited in case against Greenpeace. - Bay Area nonprofits and anti-war leaders are fuming about what they see as an attempt by the Justice Department to clamp down on peaceful dissent by filing criminal charges against a group for the nonviolent actions of its followers. Local activists are closely watching a case winding through the federal courts in Miami. There, a federal prosecutor has dusted off a 19th century law designed to prevent bar owners from luring sailors ashore with booze and prostitutes to file charges against Greenpeace in connection with an April 2002 case in which two activists tried to hang an anti-President Bush banner on a container ship headed into port. The sign-hangers and four other Greenpeace activists pleaded no contest last year to misdemeanor charges and were sentenced to time served. Now it's their 32-year-old parent organization's turn in court. If convicted of conspiring to illegally board a ship, Greenpeace could be sentenced to five years' probation and a $10,000 fine, and be required to allow federal probation officers to oversee certain parts of its organization. (...) What most frightens activists on both sides of the political spectrum are the penalties that could be invoked, ranging from stripping the organization of its tax-exempt status to allowing federal officials to view its records -- including everything from membership rolls to internal communications. (...) "This is setting a dangerous precedent when you're politicizing a law for a purpose for which it is never intended," said Stephen Zunes, an associate professor of history at the University of San Francisco and an expert on social movements. "It's (also) somewhat of a stretch to be using a law that hasn't been used for 100 years. "If the federal government is going to do that, it has a chilling effect, as people are going to wonder what obscure law they're going to dust off next." That chill is spreading to advocacy organizations across the political spectrum. Major actions are planned this year at everything from national political conventions in Boston and New York to a June biotechnology conference in San Francisco. Abortion-related demonstrations will be held in Washington, D.C., and anti-war demonstrations will mark the one-year anniversary of the start of the Iraq war. CLIP
Orange Code Terror Alert based on Fabricated Intelligence
http://globalresearch.ca/articles/CHO401A.html
On December 21st, the country was put on High Terror Alert by the Department of Homeland Security. Based on "credible" intelligence sources, presumed Al-Qaeda and Taliban terrorists were planning to hijack an Air France plane and "crash it on US soil in a suicide terror strike similar to those carried out on September 11, 2001." Air France Christmas flights out of Paris were grounded. F-16 fighters were patrolling the skies. Following the investigation by the French authorities, the Al Qaeda terrorists turned out to be a five year old boy, an elderly Chinese lady and a Welsh insurance salesman. A routine case of "mistaken identity" had contributed to breaking the Spirit of Christmas, across the Land. Based on erroneous intelligence, an entire Nation had been brought under Orange Code terror alert. Was it incompetence or was it deliberate? Either way, a public inquiry into the workings of the Homeland Security Department is long overdue. CLIP
What is Fascism?
http://www.couplescompany.com/Features/Politics/Structure3.htm
Make sure to read "The 14 Defining Characteristics Of Fascism" on this webpage. These characteristics are: "Powerful and Continuing Nationalism - Disdain for the Recognition of Human Rights - Identification of Enemies/Scapegoats as a Unifying Cause - Supremacy of the Military - Rampant Sexism - Controlled Mass Media - Obsession with National Security - Religion and Government are Intertwined - Corporate Power is Protected - Labor Power is Suppressed - Disdain for Intellectuals and the Arts - Obsession with Crime and Punishment - Rampant Cronyism and Corruption - Fraudulent Elections". Doesn't it all appear familiar to you? To which country does it increasingly apply today?...
Recommended by Rudolf Schneider ipsbox@ipsgeneva.com>
BUSH VS. HITLER (Jan 3 - POWERFUL ARTICLE! SOME KEY EXCERPTS BELOW)
http://tinyurl.com/yq597
(...) Fascism fits well into the simplistic ideologies of the Bush dictatorship. While fascists essentially agree with America's forefathers that people are basically evil, they actively manipulate this evil by trumpeting emotion over logic, and "great lies" over truth. This is normally accomplished through the exploitation of "scapegoats," who are marketed as the source of all social ills, coupled with appeals to humanity's basest instincts -- bigotry, greed, fanatical nationalism, fear, and lust for conquest (just to name a few). In fact, several disturbing analogies exist between George W. Bush and history's most infamous fascist, Adolph Hitler: Both men assumed power in defiance of the will of the majority; both men used "great lies" to pursue their warmongering agendas; both men preyed upon humanity's basest instincts to disseminate those "great lies"; both men were appeased by the British government, Hitler through Neville Chamberlain and Bush through Tony Blair; both men were willing to use national tragedies to justify the destruction of civil liberties, Hitler through the burning of the Reichstag and Bush through the September 11th terrorist attacks; both men were/are suspected of either participating in, or ignoring warnings about the imminence of, these tragedies in order to enhance their political stature and power; both men demonstrated no compunction about exploiting a culture of death for political self-aggrandizement, Hitler through his well- publicized genocide campaigns, and Bush who, while governor of Texas, routinely denied DNA tests to death row inmates, even though such tests could prevent wrongful executions; both men were willing to appeal to racism, Hitler through his quest for a "master race," and Bush through his condemnation of affirmative action policies, which primarily benefit racial minorities. While denouncing such policies as "preferential treatment," Bush predictably displayed no such aversion to the preferential treatment enjoyed by wealthy white people, like himself, through a system of nepotism and cronyism; both men reveled in war and exploited the military to satiate their personal ambitions and vendettas; both men used war to enrich their political cronies; both men demonstrated contempt for international law and the concerns of the world community; and both men believed they were/are on some holy crusade inspired by a "divine province" that placed them into power. But the disconcerting advantages the Bush dictatorship enjoys over Hitler's are the scientific advances that have made the implementation of fascism much easier. New technologies have given the government Orwellian capabilities. Programs now exist to decipher every stroke made on a computer keyboard, to spy upon people from great distances, to create databases designed to blacklist and harass those who don't obsequiously genuflect before official dogma, and to install microchips into vehicles, and even into people, to monitor their every move. (...) Of course some may argue that Hitler clearly was compelled by evil motives, while Bush was compelled by "benevolent" ones. But this ignores the reality that the primary difference between Bush and Hitler may simply be milieu, not mind-set. In fact, actor/activist Harry Belafonte once courageously asserted that the Bush administration is "possessed of evil". These words should not be dismissed as hyperbole. Hitler, after all, did not begin his campaign for world domination until fascism was deeply entrenched in Germany. The Bush dictatorship is still manufacturing this entrenchment. Given the analogies above, one must wonder if history would have been so radically different if George W. Bush and his war-crazed cronies were in power in 1938 Berlin instead of 2004 America. CLIP
Bioweapon Labs Will Bring Threat of Lethal Viruses to Urban America (June 29, 2003)
http://www.commondreams.org/headlines03/0629-02.htm
A network of high-security laboratories for storing and investigating some of the most lethal viruses known to mankind is being built across the US, leaving communities in uproar. They not only fear the risk of the viruses escaping, but also contend that the programme, part of the $6bn (£3.5bn) Project BioShield, is a stunning case of overkill. For none of the germs to be studied is related to bioweaponry.
CIA Says Experts See 'Darker Bioweapons Future' (Nov 16, 2003)
http://vancouver.indymedia.org/news/2003/11/84075.php
Genomic research could produce the worst known diseases and the "most frightening" biological weapons, according to a CIA report, "The Darker Bioweapons Future." "Traditional intelligence means for monitoring WMD development could prove inadequate to deal with the threat from these advanced biological weapons," the report noted. "Growing understanding of the complex biochemical pathways that underlie life processes has the potential to enable a class of new, more virulent biological agents engineered to attack distinct biochemical pathways and elicit specific effects." For example, "'designer' BW agents created to be antibiotic resistant or to evade an immune response; weaponized gene therapy vectors that effect permanent change in the victim's genetic makeup' or a 'stealth' virus, which could lie dormant inside the victim for an extended period before being triggered."
Check also:
http://www.google.ca/search?q=CIA+Says+Experts+See+%27Darker+Bioweapons+Future%27&ie=ISO-8859-1&hl=en&btnG=Google+Search&meta=
The ''Big Secret' is coming out (November 16 - Comment by Joe on this article above)
http://vancouver.indymedia.org/news/2003/11/84075_comment.php#84202
This extremely mild, understatement of the actual situation is a welcome continuation of the process of beginning to publicize this issue - the most serious and important issue on the planet, along with the PNAC / Fascist plan for global domination, which is directly connected to the bioweapons looming disaster, portending a global catastrophe of unimaginable dimensions, unless massive corrective action is taken immediately. The key to corrective action is creating a free press in America, and empowering the Kucinich campaign to defeat Bush in the November 2004 US elections.
Bush prepares to launch biowarfare on the American populace
http://www.vancouver.indymedia.org/news/2002/10/18706.php
(...) Eugenics - population modification by selective genocide, controlled breeding patterns, genetic engineering, birth control, abortion, sterilizations, and "nonlethal" civilian targeted biowarfare are all central tenets of their philosophy which they historically have and continue to pursue with great determination. I know that this is a ugly subject, and that we hate to contemplate that people could actually be so demented and cruel, but the massive genocides of indigenous peoples, the residential schools, the mass forced sterilizations which are still being conducted around the world, the vaccination programs, the engineered plagues, the hundreds of billions being spent on developing genetically targetable bioweapons, etc. are all very real and important world events that fit into a deliberate and premeditated cultural context. In fact, this is probably the most important subject that we need to carefully study and address as a global society at this time. The British Medical Association has recently made several strong warnings, stating that biological weapons development built on so-called medical research (with America at the forefront by a country mile) is the greatest threat to world security that the planet has ever known, and is currently far more threatening to world security than the nuclear arms race of the Cold War. CLIP
Television and the Hive Mind (Dec 21, 2002)
http://memes.org/modules.php?op=modload&name=News&file=article&sid=1438&mode=thread&order=0&thold=0
Highly recommended by Christopher Rudy safetrek@mcn.net> (...) We see the globalist agenda at work in Star Trek and its spin-offs as well. Over the years, many a television viewer's mind has been imprinted with the idea that centralized government is the solution for our problems. Never mind the complexities of the issue--never mind the fact that, in the real world, centralization of power leads to tyranny. The reptile brain, hypnotized by the flickering television screen, has seen Captain Kirk and his culturally diverse crew demonstrate time and again that the United Federation of Planets is a good thing. Therefore, it must be so. It remains to be seen whether the Masters of Deception will, like those scientists in The Outer Limits, stage an invasion from space with anti-gravity machines and holograms, but, if they do, it will surely be broadcast on television, so that anyone out of range of that light show in the sky, will be able to see it, and all with eyes to see will believe. It will be War of the Worlds on a grand scale. (...) Every day, millions upon millions of human beings sit down at the same time to watch the same football game, the same mini-series, the same newscast. And where might all this shared experience and uniformity of thought be taking us? A recent report co-sponsored by the U.S. National Science Foundation and the Commerce Department calls for a broad-based research program to find ways to use nanotechnology, biotechnology, information technology, and cognitive sciences, to achieve telepathy, machine-to-human communication, amplified sensory experience, enhanced intellectual capacity, and mass participation in a "hive mind." Quoting the report: "With knowledge no longer encapsulated in individuals, the distinction between individuals and the entirety of humanity would blur. Think Vulcan mind-meld. We would perhaps become more of a hive mind--an enormous, single, intelligent entity." There is no doubt that we have been brought closer to the "hive mind" by the mass media. For, what is the shared experience of television but a type of "Vulcan mind-meld"? (Note the terminology borrowed from Star Trek, no doubt to make the concept more familiar and palatable. If Spock does it, it must be okay.) This government report would have us believe that the hive mind will be for our good--a wonderful leap in evolution. It is nothing of the kind. For one thing, if the government is behind it, you may rest assured it is not for our good. For another, common sense should tell us that blurring the line "between individuals and the entirety of humanity" means mass conformity, the death of human individuality. Make no mistake about it--if humanity is to become a hive, there will be at the center of that hive a Queen Bee, whom all the lesser "insects" will serve. This is not evolution--this is devolution. Worse, it is the ultimate slavery--the slavery of the mind. CLIP
Related article: U.S. Government Report: Human Beings to be Merged with Technology to Create a "Hive Mind" at http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2002/07/20/1026898931815.html
Sperm counts down by a third, study shows (05 January 2004)
http://news.independent.co.uk/uk/health/story.jsp?story=478185
Fears about the declining levels of male fertility have been raised by new research which reveals sperm counts dropped by almost a third in little more than a decade. The average sperm count plummeted by 29 per cent between 1989 and 2002, a study at the Aberdeen Fertility Centre in Scotland shows. The findings of the research prompted immediate calls for further investigation into the factors that influence male fertility. Dr Siladitya Bhattacharya, who led the research, said: "It highlights the need for research to discover what the reasons might be as well as the need for further studies elsewhere in the country to see if they support our results." Previous research recorded sperm counts falling around the world by an estimated 50 per cent in the past half-century, but scientists have not established the full extent of external influences that may affect a decline in the quality of sperm. Drug use, alcohol, smoking and obesity are among the factors most frequently blamed. The effects of the environment, including the presence of pesticides, chemicals and radioactive material, have also been linked to decreases in fertility. The preliminary findings of the research will be presented today to the Association of Clinical Embryologists and the British Fertility Society at a conference in Liverpool. The study, entitled Semen Parameters in the Northeast, was based on an analysis of 16,000 semen samples from men who attended the Aberdeen Fertility Centre, the only such clinic in the Grampian region. There has been speculation that the low sperm levels may be a consequence of fallout from the Chernobyl nuclear disaster in 1986. Rainfall as the radioactive dustcloud passed over eastern Scotland may have exposed people in the area to unusually high amounts of radiation. But Dr Bhattacharya said it was "almost impossible" to confirm or deny precise factors.
Iranians Treated at U.S Field Hospital (GOOD DEEDS!)
http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=540&ncid=736&e=2&u=/ap/20040104/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iran_us
Weary and dusty, wheezing and bleeding, people of the quake-hit Iranian city of Bam filed into a field hospital where American volunteers worked around the clock to provide medical aid, transcending two decades of hostility between the two countries.
Carol Brouillet's Event of 2004 Newsletter
http://www.communitycurrency.org/Dec27.html
A shining example of another courageous woman undaunted by the US oppressive regime.
1.
HERE IS A BIT OF A RELIEF FROM THE MATERIAL ABOVE - AN INSPIRING VISION INDEED!
Subject: My Vision for South Asia
Date: 04 Jan 2004
From: Ashok Sharma agrostar@sify.com>
My Vision for South Asia (and the whole world!)
I envision a day when it becomes obvious to all of us on earth that everything we see out of us is born out of Consciousness, including the vast expanse and our universe. The state where outer and inner world fuse into one Reality beyond expression.
I envision the mystical moods and states of great ecstasy becoming a permanent feature of human personality so that we dwell more on matters of spirit and everything else may seems trash to us.
I envision material desires springing in us only to relieve the pain of others.
I envision mankind out of her sleep and ready to install a system of Peace, plenty, abundance and joys for all.
I envision a day when we shall learn how to separate our soul from the imperfect brain and remove handicaps, sufferings, pains and grief and convert all this into shadows of the past by learning to pull us apart from this malice with which we have been living for many epochs.
I envision when we learn to have dreams of Nature's glory spread near and far and find new ways to end pain, war and all kind of suffering and yet remain humble because all the learning comes from a Cosmic Source where we are all reaching out.
I also envision that we all remember forever that we are Unborn and Eternal and in fact cream of all this Creation and were lost in some kind of a dream life after life.
I envision the day when grown up will learn to look at everything like a child looks at the starlit sky with wide open eyes and wonders to give a joyful cry and like this we set our life to a mission to explore the outer cosmos by a magic by opening of an inner hole in our consciousness.
I envision a time where there are no religions for the mankind except to worship the Nature dwelling in us as our Consciousness and when all religions are united in ONE UNITED HUMAN RACE in love and service to humanity becomes a prayer of this newfound love for ourselves and for all others. When we always remember that it is one Absolute whole acting in countless forms between you and me.
I envision when we can be free of the prisons that we built for us that debarred us from the celestial eyes and divine properties existing in us.
I envision a world where we all realized that we allowed their soul to roll in dust and knowing this now we start and sets on to a path of exploration of the glorious Empires of our inner being, consciousness and our soul.
And I envision when the earth with all of us suddenly becomes introspective for a day and rises next morning in a new knowledge that will shake off all that we carried all our life at the expanse of our inner joys and abilities to manifest.
And I also envision people in countries India, Pakistan, Nepal, Sri Lanka, Bangladesh, Bhutan, Tibet controlling the affairs of this region in spirit of welfare and Governments announcing schemes and programs that will enhance and assure a better quality of life for its people.
I envision prosperity plans to be announced by the governments to relieve the pains and acute suffering of millions of people living in this region.
And I also envision soon this region to leave their narrow restricts of their boundaries and become one big community living in free trade where all can travel without visa or passports. Just one border for USAC (Union of South Asian Countries) and one currency. If India can be a home of so many states living in Communal Harmony with different languages and races why not we can enlarge this vision to accommodate 6 or 8 more languages or cultures.
Possibilities are endless for this region to save immense amount of money that they spend on border defense and wars and other non productive acts and such savings in billions can be diverted to improve the lives of millions upon millions living in this region and save them from the Superpowers breaking peace and meddling in their affairs. Possibilities do exist now for this region to project ancient wisdom and its spiritual Light for entire global community for Peace and Harmony.
I envision that the leaders will understand the need that it is a futile and destructive effort to live in narrow communal approach when the world has outgrown those times. The tempo of the evolution of human race and consciousness has become so fast now that thinkers and planners of every nation must apply similar changes in their national policies and programs for communities to suit these incredible times of fast evolving consciousness.
It is better if we change ourselves and make the way for the changes that Nature has planned for humanity or else it may be too late and a painful process for all of us to bear the forced changes that will cause major upheavals as All powerful Nature Cosmic Mother of us all and Time always have the last word.
I envision soon emergence of New Leaders with vision in South Asia who could understand this awakening times and tune their acts accordingly in positive and constructive manner that will bring soon days to celebrate an era of peace, harmony and prosperity in this region.
With my love to all my friends here.
Ashok Sharma
agrostar@sify.com
---
See also:
Pakistanis and Indians optimistic over future (Jan 6 - EXCELLENT NEWS!!)
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/south_asia/3372913.stm
Many people in India and Pakistan are now optimistic that the ice has finally melted between India and Pakistan following Monday's landmark talks between the two countries' leaders - a meeting followed by a commitment to hold peace talks. Analysts say the decision by President Pervez Musharraf and Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee to start talks next month is a step forward towards resolving long-standing differences. "I think this time both the leaders mean business," Delhi-based analyst Prem Shankar Jha told BBC News Online. "There is an awareness that time is slipping by and the changed world situation makes the cost of bickering between the subcontinental neighbours very high."
2.
Note from Jean: In reference to an excerpt of the following article I networked recently...
'Anti-Semitism' and 'Fundamentalism'
http://www.marchforjustice.com/12.12.03.Terms.php
... Nattanya Andersen nattanya@telus.net> had the following comment:
Season's Greetings, Jean,
And, as usual, thank-you for your immense work.
Reading the first part of this compilation (The Empire of Darkness Series #3: Evil Vempire's Creature Found in a Hole), "Anti-Semitism and Fundamentalism" makes me wonder if you've read Arthur Koestler's book "The Thirteenth Tribe?" Why it is important to read the book? Because this well-researched book points out that the vast majority of Jews in this world today are of Eastern-European-origin, and have no semite blood in them. Their Khazarian ruler (Khazaria being once upon a time a country located between the Caucasus, the Black Sea, and the Caspian Sea) adopted the Jewish faith for him and his people in or about AD 740.
Koestler himself was a Hungarian Jew of Austrian/Hungarian parentage, and brought this fact to light in the 1970's. As you are well aware, one can not be anti-semitic against someone without semitic blood. The 13th tribe, those Khazarians ruling the world today, have not a drop of semitic blood within them.
CLIP
3.
AL BUSHIONE IS TURNING HIS GOONS AGAINST HARMLESS PROTESTERS AND WHEREVER HE GOES, FREE SPEECH IS SANITIZED IN VIEW OF THE CAMERAS TO EXPRESS ONLY PRAISE FOR THE WORLD CORPORATE MAFIA BOSS. THE SAURONIC FOOTPRINT OF DARKNESS IS SPREADING AND MAY SUCCEED TO BLOT THE SUN OF LOVE FROM THE FACE OF THE EARTH IF ALLOWED TO CONTINUE... WHERE ARE OUR TRUE CHAMPIONS OF FREEDOM? WHEN ARE YOU GOING TO WAKE UP?
Forwarded bhy Ken NCEpanacea@aol.com>
From: http://www.sfgate.com/article.cgi?file=/chronicle/archive/2004/01/04/INGPQ40MB81.DTL
Quarantining dissent: How the Secret Service protects Bush from free speech
James Bovard
January 4, 2004
When President Bush travels around the United States, the Secret Service visits the location ahead of time and orders local police to set up "free speech zones" or "protest zones," where people opposed to Bush policies (and sometimes sign-carrying supporters) are quarantined. These zones routinely succeed in keeping protesters out of presidential sight and outside the view of media covering the event.
When Bush went to the Pittsburgh area on Labor Day 2002, 65-year-old retired steel worker Bill Neel was there to greet him with a sign proclaiming, "The Bush family must surely love the poor, they made so many of us."
The local police, at the Secret Service's behest, set up a "designated free-speech zone" on a baseball field surrounded by a chain-link fence a third of a mile from the location of Bush's speech.
The police cleared the path of the motorcade of all critical signs, but folks with pro-Bush signs were permitted to line the president's path. Neel refused to go to the designated area and was arrested for disorderly conduct; the police also confiscated his sign.
Neel later commented, "As far as I'm concerned, the whole country is a free-speech zone. If the Bush administration has its way, anyone who criticizes them will be out of sight and out of mind."
At Neel's trial, police Detective John Ianachione testified that the Secret Service told local police to confine "people that were there making a statement pretty much against the president and his views" in a so-called free- speech area.
Paul Wolf, one of the top officials in the Allegheny County Police Department, told Salon that the Secret Service "come in and do a site survey, and say, 'Here's a place where the people can be, and we'd like to have any protesters put in a place that is able to be secured.' "
Pennsylvania District Judge Shirley Rowe Trkula threw out the disorderly conduct charge against Neel, declaring, "I believe this is America. Whatever happened to 'I don't agree with you, but I'll defend to the death your right to say it'?"
Similar suppressions have occurred during Bush visits to Florida. A recent St. Petersburg Times editorial noted, "At a Bush rally at Legends Field in 2001, three demonstrators -- two of whom were grandmothers -- were arrested for holding up small handwritten protest signs outside the designated zone. And last year, seven protesters were arrested when Bush came to a rally at the USF Sun Dome. They had refused to be cordoned off into a protest zone hundreds of yards from the entrance to the Dome."
One of the arrested protesters was a 62-year-old man holding up a sign, "War is good business. Invest your sons." The seven were charged with trespassing, "obstructing without violence and disorderly conduct."
Police have repressed protesters during several Bush visits to the St. Louis area as well. When Bush visited on Jan. 22, 150 people carrying signs were shunted far away from the main action and effectively quarantined.
Denise Lieberman of the American Civil Liberties Union of Eastern Missouri commented, "No one could see them from the street. In addition, the media were not allowed to talk to them. The police would not allow any media inside the protest area and wouldn't allow any of the protesters out of the protest zone to talk to the media."
When Bush stopped by a Boeing plant to talk to workers, Christine Mains and her 5-year-old daughter disobeyed orders to move to a small protest area far from the action. Police arrested Mains and took her and her crying daughter away in separate squad cars.
The Justice Department is now prosecuting Brett Bursey, who was arrested for holding a "No War for Oil" sign at a Bush visit to Columbia, S.C. Local police, acting under Secret Service orders, established a "free-speech zone" half a mile from where Bush would speak. Bursey was standing amid hundreds of people carrying signs praising the president. Police told Bursey to remove himself to the "free-speech zone."
Bursey refused and was arrested. Bursey said that he asked the police officer if "it was the content of my sign, and he said, 'Yes, sir, it's the content of your sign that's the problem.' " Bursey stated that he had already moved 200 yards from where Bush was supposed to speak. Bursey later complained, "The problem was, the restricted area kept moving. It was wherever I happened to be standing."
Bursey was charged with trespassing. Five months later, the charge was dropped because South Carolina law prohibits arresting people for trespassing on public property. But the Justice Department -- in the person of U.S. Attorney Strom Thurmond Jr. -- quickly jumped in, charging Bursey with violating a rarely enforced federal law regarding "entering a restricted area around the president of the United States."
If convicted, Bursey faces a six-month trip up the river and a $5,000 fine. Federal Magistrate Bristow Marchant denied Bursey's request for a jury trial because his violation is categorized as a petty offense. Some observers believe that the feds are seeking to set a precedent in a conservative state such as South Carolina that could then be used against protesters nationwide.
Bursey's trial took place on Nov. 12 and 13. His lawyers sought the Secret Service documents they believed would lay out the official policies on restricting critical speech at presidential visits. The Bush administration sought to block all access to the documents, but Marchant ruled that the lawyers could have limited access.
Bursey sought to subpoena Attorney General John Ashcroft and presidential adviser Karl Rove to testify. Bursey lawyer Lewis Pitts declared, "We intend to find out from Mr. Ashcroft why and how the decision to prosecute Mr. Bursey was reached." The magistrate refused, however, to enforce the subpoenas. Secret Service agent Holly Abel testified at the trial that Bursey was told to move to the "free-speech zone" but refused to cooperate.
The feds have offered some bizarre rationales for hog-tying protesters. Secret Service agent Brian Marr explained to National Public Radio, "These individuals may be so involved with trying to shout their support or nonsupport that inadvertently they may walk out into the motorcade route and be injured. And that is really the reason why we set these places up, so we can make sure that they have the right of free speech, but, two, we want to be sure that they are able to go home at the end of the evening and not be injured in any way." Except for having their constitutional rights shredded.
The ACLU, along with several other organizations, is suing the Secret Service for what it charges is a pattern and practice of suppressing protesters at Bush events in Arizona, California, Connecticut, Michigan, New Jersey, New Mexico, Texas and elsewhere. The ACLU's Witold Walczak said of the protesters, "The individuals we are talking about didn't pose a security threat; they posed a political threat."
CLIP
Such aggressive tactics become more ominous in the light of the Bush administration's advocacy, in its Patriot II draft legislation, of nullifying all judicial consent decrees restricting state and local police from spying on those groups who may oppose government policies.
On May 30, 2002, Ashcroft effectively abolished restrictions on FBI surveillance of Americans' everyday lives first imposed in 1976. One FBI internal newsletter encouraged FBI agents to conduct more interviews with antiwar activists "for plenty of reasons, chief of which it will enhance the paranoia endemic in such circles and will further service to get the point across that there is an FBI agent behind every mailbox."
The FBI took a shotgun approach toward protesters partly because of the FBI's "belief that dissident speech and association should be prevented because they were incipient steps toward the possible ultimate commission of act which might be criminal," according to a Senate report.
On Nov. 23 news broke that the FBI is actively conducting surveillance of antiwar demonstrators, supposedly to "blunt potential violence by extremist elements," according to a Reuters interview with a federal law enforcement official.
Given the FBI's expansive definition of "potential violence" in the past, this is a net that could catch almost any group or individual who falls into official disfavor.
---
James Bovard is the author of "Terrorism & Tyranny: Trampling Freedom, Justice, and Peace to Rid the World of Evil." This article is adapted from one that appeared in the Dec. 15 issue of the American Conservative.
4.
WELL AS IT TURNS OUT, THERE ARE PLENTY OF CHAMPIONS OF FREEDOM, INCLUDING ELI PARISER FROM MOVEON, A LONG-TIME SUBSCRIBER TO THIS LIST. PLEASE GIVE HIM AND OTHER DEFENDERS OF LIGHT ALL THE SUPPORT YOU CAN. NOTE: TO SEE THE 15 DEMOCRATICALLY-SELECTED FINALISTS, GO AT http://www.bushin30seconds.org/ AND CHECK ALSO THE RECENT CONTROVERSY IN "GOP Plays Dirty Politics in Attempt to Smear MoveOn.org Voter Fund" AT http://moveonvoterfund.org/smear/release.html
Forwarded by "Mark Graffis" mgraffis@vitelcom.net>
From: "Eli Pariser, MoveOn Voter Fund" moveon-help@list.moveon.org>
Date: 05 Jan 2004
Subject: MoveOn Ad contest finalists
Dear MoveOn member,
With over 2.9 million votes cast, we're proud to announce the finalists in the Bush in 30 Seconds ad contest. These ads have been selected by the rating public from among over 1,000 ads submitted. They're potent, poignant, and funny - it's a great mix. They perfectly capture the grassroots approach to politics we're pioneering together.
If you're in the New York area next Monday (1/12), please join us at Bush in 30 Seconds Live, an awards show to celebrate these ads and announce the winner. The show will be hosted by Janeane Garofalo and include performances and presentations by Margaret Cho, Moby, Chuck D, John Sayles, and other special guests. With comedy, music, and some of the best political ads the world has ever seen, it'll be a great night. And thanks to a few generous donors who are covering the costs, every cent you pay for tickets will go toward our $10 million campaign to expose Bush's policies in swing states.
You can get tickets now online for $35, $75, and $150 at:
http://www.moveonvoterfund.org/b30slive.html
CLIP
You can also view all of the ads on the Bush in 30 Seconds website at
http://www.bushin30seconds.org/
Due to popular demand, we're also adding three new categories for the contest: Funniest Ad, Best Youth Market Ad, and Best Animation. If you register, you'll be able to vote on the finalists in each of these categories starting on Thursday. You can register at:
http://www.bushin30seconds.org/runoff/index.html
We're also working on making the top 250 ads available online indefinitely.
For everyone who submitted an ad or participated in the voting process, thanks for making Bush in 30 Seconds an incredible grassroots phenomenon. With this kind of creativity on our side, President Bush's policies don't stand a chance.
Sincerely,
--Adam, Carrie, Eli, James, Joan, Noah, Peter, Wes, and Zack
The MoveOn.org Team
January 5th, 2003
5.
Subj: One day at the Post Office
Date: 12/28/03
From: Steelbed12446
While in the Post Office, checking the PO Box, I noticed a pamphlet entitled "Men 18-25 years Do the right thing: Read it, Fill it, Mail it. Register - It's quick, it's easy, it's the law."
It addresses a few questions, such as: 1) Will I be Drafted? (it goes on to say that registering does not mean that you are joining or will be Drafted into the military). It says that no one has been drafted since 1973, and no one can be drafted unless ordered by Congress and the President. It then continues, saying that a draft is only likely to occur, in the event of war or a national emergency. 2) What happens if I don't register? In Bold Letters - it goes on to state that "NOT REGISTERING IS A FELONY" and if convicted, "MEN" are subject to a $250,000 fine, and up to five years imprisonment! In addition to permanently forfeiting certain benefits. (these include Student financial aid, government employment, job training, and US citizenship for foreign immigrants.
When one reads such things, you just cant help but wonder, about the inequalities, and unfairness of such a thing. If a number of people in the Whitehouse, and / or Congress take it upon themselves to start thinking that they want to make war, and start taking the lives of another country's population, they are telling you that you must obey thier wishes under the law, or be imprisoned and fined. Thats right! there is no discussion, you don't get to choose if these people are your enemy. You don't even get to question if they deserve to be killed or not. Once your number is called, you don't have the right to question or even give voice to any thought on the matter. We have heard rumor that there is a possibility of reviving the draft! People are not Re-enlisting at the rates that the armed services would like. People are not joining in numbers that are satisfying the military's needs.
First off, this Selective service discriminates sexually. MEN must register. Its no surprise that the numbers are getting real thin. The White House decided it wanted to start a "pre-emtive" war. There is all sorts of evidence that there was absolutely no need to do so. And when those in the armed forces even dared to "QUESTION" the decision, Bush had hurled hints of "treason, and unpatriotic" accusations at those who even dared question his decision to bring death to another land
A good description of a Soldier: Is one who will unquestioningly carry out the command to kill and or capture, those people, his commander orders - captured or killed. Up to this point in time, we have people "volunteering to do this". To sign a contract, agreeing to turn over their free will and ability to choose and even question, who to kill, burn, or bomb, (and this includes Hospitals, schools, museums, houses of worship, and yes even civilian homes). Those that are unfortunate enough to get in the way are referred to as "Collateral Damage". More often than not, they are children, Moms and sisters, or the elderly, simply trying to survive in a war zone. After finding this out FIRST HAND, many soldiers are not likely to think about re-enlisting. Anyone who might talk with someone coming home after his time is up, is probably not likely to join. If a recruiter is trying to sell the idea of how military life is an enjoyable experience, that is highly rewarding. Is it even possible he is coming close to telling the whole truth? These recruiting personel are actually WELCOMED, DURING THE HIGH SCHOOL CAREER DAY SEMINARS! They portray all the glamorous parts of training.
They show the huge muscled soldier climbing mountains, or jumping from planes, or using a computer to slam a round of artillery into an armored vehicle. (Never occupied of course). There is never any pain, or blood, or suffering. (they never even show an enemy). The High School never even has the right (it seems) to at least demand the whole truth from the recruiter. "THE PRIME DIRECTIVE / PURPOSE OF A SOLDIER, IS TO KILL, MAIM, OR IMMOBILIZE / INCAPACITATE - THE ENEMY" It is not to "have fun" mountain climbing, or playing with a computer, or parachuting from a plane, while playing war GAMES. It is true that "TRUTH IS THE FIRST CASUALTY IN WAR". Another message that is NEVER taught, is that "He who pulls the trigger - is as guilty of taking life, as those who order it to be done".
BRAD S.
6.
Date: 7 Jan 2004
From: SpiritNet@webtv.net
Subject: U.S. TERRORISM UNCHALLENGED
Aloha to All ~ Why is a half-century of U.S. terrorism not a political issue for debate? Why have the presidential and congressional candidates not brought it before the public? Why does the media avoid the questions? Is it fear?
Secret Government, including the National Security Agency and CIA, has spent an "estimated" $50 billion a year of taxpayers funds for decades on their own secret wars, killings, and other black (evil) operations around the world. U.S. terrorism continues today but nobody challenges the candidates to expose/discuss it.
For the uninitiated, a good eye-opener is by two former "insiders" who wrote the book "The CIA and the Cult of Intelligence". Or see Grievance #2 http://creativemediahosting.com/swn
Goodwill to you,
Triaka
7.
Date: 29 Dec 2003
From: BILL D tanchu@olypen.com>
Subject: MOST AUTHENTIC 9-11 SCENARIO (MUST READ)
Hi Jean, in case you have not already viewed this, i could not put it away.
You must read this makes the most sense of all 9-11 articles I've read so far. It might be good idea to print before its hacked.
I wish you the best for 2004, thanks for all you do, and a happier NEW YEAR
STAY WELL
Bill Derau
WTC: STRANGER THAN FICTION
http://www.apfn.org/apfn/WTC_STF.htm
Over 100 megs of official records and photos detailing government lies to We The People.
8.
From: http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=17471
10 Good Things About a Bad Year
By Medea Benjamin, AlterNet January 1, 2004
No two ways about it, 2003 was a demoralizing year for those of us working for peace and justice. With George Bush in the White House, Arnold Schwarzenegger in the California State House, and Paul Bremer ruling Iraq, it was a chore just to get out of bed each morning. But get out of bed we did, and we spent our days educating, strategizing, organizing and mobilizing. As we greet the new year, let's remember and celebrate some of our hard-fought victories in a time of adversity.
1. We organized the most massive, global protests against war the world has ever seen. On February 15 alone, over 12 million people came out on the streets in over 700 cities in 60 countries and on every continent. So impressive was this outpouring of anti-war sentiment that the New York Times, not known for hyperbole, claimed there were now two superpowers: the US and global public opinion.
2. Over the last few months, mainstream Americans have been buying progressive books by the millions. Authors such as Michael Moore, Al Franken, Molly Ivins, Paul Krugman and David Corn have seen their books soar to the New York Times bestsellers list. With humor and biting exposes of the Bush administration, these authors helped our movement gain legions of new converts. No more preaching to the choir this year!
3. When the World Trade Organization met in Cancun in September to promote global rules that give even greater power to transnational corporations, they were met by well coordinated opposition from countries in the global south, hundreds of non-governmental organizations and thousands of activists. When our movement's sophisticated inside-outside strategy forced the talks to collapse, there was "gloom in the suites and dancing in the streets." And as a counter to these corporate-dominated global institutions, the fair trade movement had a stellar year.
4. The poorest country in South America, Bolivia, proved that people power is alive and well. Sparked by the Bolivian president's plan to privatize and export the nation's natural gas, an astounding grassroots movement of peasants, miners, workers, and indigenous people poured into the streets to demand his resignation. After five weeks of intense protests and a government crackdown that left 70 dead, Sanchez de Lozada was forced to resign. Now that's regime change!
5. The silver lining in the budget crisis affecting the states throughout this nation is that from Louisiana to Texas to Michigan and even in Arnold Schwarzenegger's California state governments are cutting prison budgets by releasing non-violent drug offenders. The year has been marked by a steady move toward treatment instead of incarceration and a greater understanding that drug abuse should be handled in the doctors' office, not the prison cell.
6. For so long, celebrities have put their careers above their beliefs. This year witnessed a "coming out" of all types of celebrities on all manner of progressive issues. Jay-Z and Mariah Carey railed against the racist Rockefeller drug laws, Bono and Beyonce Knowles called for the world to fight AIDS, and a host of celebs such as Sean Penn, Susan Saradon and Laurence Fishbourne courageously took a stand against the invasion of Iraq.
7. Progressives now have a powerful new tool for organizing: the Internet. E-activism through venues such as MoveOn, Working Assets and Meetup.com have allowed ordinary people to challenge big money and powerful institutions. We raised millions of dollars to run ads, we've confronted corporate-dominated institutions like the Federal Communications Commission, and e-activism has allowed an anti-war candidate, Howard Dean, to become a frontrunner in the 2004 elections.
8. In an unprecedented outpouring of local opposition to the assault on our civil liberties, over 200 cities, towns, counties and states across the country have passed resolutions against the Patriot Act. In fact, the outcry has been so profound that plans for a successor act, dubbed Patriot Act II, that would further broaden federal investigatory powers, have been scuttled.
9. While eclipsed by the war in Iraq, the corporate scandals that topped the headlines in 2002 continued in 2003, with indefatigable New York State Attorney-General Eliot Spitzer exposing the trading abuses in the mutual funds industry. The Enron, WorldCom and accounting scandals produced some positive legislation against corporate crime and forced institutional investors like pension funds to become more active. And anti-corporate crusaders joined with peace activists to expose the obscene war profiteering of Halliburton and Bechtel, with more exposes to come in 2004!
10. Despite the conservative takeover of the courts, this year produced several landmark rulings we can be proud of. The Supreme Court upheld affirmative action, giving a sweeping victory to the University of Michigan and colleges all over the country. It struck down sodomy laws criminalizing gay sex, affirming the constitutional right to privacy. The Massachusetts Supreme Court ruled that gays should be able to marry. The Appeals Court ruled that the US military could not detain American citizen Jose Padilla as an "enemy combatant", and in an even more significant decision, found that all 600 detainees at Guantanamo Bay should be granted access to lawyers.
There are many more the immigrants' freedom march that crisscrossed the nation to counter the anti-immigrant backlash, the amazing youth movement that is bringing new culture and vibrancy to organizing, the renewed women's activism through groups like Code Pink, the awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize to an Iranian woman, Shirin Ebadi. And each one of us could add to the list.
So while we lament the present state of the world and the present occupant in the White House, just remember that even in the gloomiest days of 2003, we kept slugging away-and sometimes even winning. Now let's move on to score the big victory in 2004 by sending George Bush back to Crawford.
Medea Benjamin is co-founder of Global Exchange and the women's group Code Pink.
---
See also:
2003 Media Follies! (By Geov Parrish, WorkingForChange.com)
http://www.alternet.org/story.html?StoryID=17475
They told us they'd lie to us. They were telling the truth. Witness our annual list of the year's most overhyped, underreported and misreported stories.
9.
From: http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/jan2004/2004-j03.shtml
2004 begins with massive military mobilization in US cities
Black Hawk helicopters over Las Vegas, snipers in Times Square
By David Walsh
3 January 2004
The new year began in the US under conditions of an unparalleled mobilization of police, army and federal law enforcement agents in major urban centers. Alleging a heightened threat of terrorist attacks and operating under the Department of Homeland Securitys Orange Alert, the Bush administration undertook measures such as were never seen during the Second World War or at the height of the Cold War.
Major events scheduled for New Years Eve and New Years Day took place under bizarre circumstances. Homeland Security chief Tom Ridge declared that Americans need to go out and celebrate New Years, even as he banned flights over New York City, Chicago and Las Vegas and ordered Black Hawk military helicopters to hover over Manhattans Times Square, where some 750,000 people gathered to welcome in the new year, the Las Vegas strip, and the Rose Bowl football game in Pasadena, California.
Snipers manned the rooftops over Times Square, while New York streets and its harbor were flooded with thousands of police, including many plainclothes officers. Bomb-sniffing dogs were on duty in New York and counter-terror units carried equipment to detect chemical, biological or radiological contamination.
Authorities suspended oil shipments for two days from Alaskas major port of Valdez as part of a continuing effort to ensure the security of our homeland, in the words of a Department of Homeland Security official.
These measures, aimed at terrorizing and intimidating the population, must be taken as a serious warning of the aims of the Bush administration in 2004 and beyond.
The military and police mobilization over New Years failed to produce any arrests or evidence of a terrorist plot. Yet this far-flung operation did not provoke the slightest skepticism or criticism from within the media and political establishment. Not a single voiceleast of all from the Democratic Partysuggested that the government should be required to substantiate its claims or justify its extraordinary measures.
This posture of unquestioning faith in the good word of the Bush administration follows the thorough exposure of its pre-war statements in support of war against Iraqfrom lurid tales of WMD stockpiles to allegations of Iraqi links to Al Qaedaas a tissue of lies. No one on the public airwaves so much as suggests that a government that lies in order to drag its population into war should not be given a carte blanche to militarize all aspects of daily life within the US.
US officials also took unprecedented steps in regard to air travel. They forced British and Mexican airlines to cancel flights and US fighter jets escorted several Air France flights into American airspace. These actions were taken, according to government spokesmen, in response to real and definite threats.
Six flights between Paris and Los Angeles were canceled December 24 and 25. Passengers on board British Airways Flight 223 from London on New Years Eve were detained for several hours at Washington DCs Dulles International Airport and questioned by federal agents. The daily flights from London to Washington DC were subsequently cancelled on January 1 and 2. British Airways also cancelled a flight from London to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia.
Ridge suggested that Al Qaeda-trained pilots or flight crew members might have infiltrated an international airline. Since we know that theyve trained pilots before, we take it as a fact that there may be some out there that have been trainedhow completely trained, we dont know, he told reporters.
US intelligence may possibly have wind of further terrorist attacks on air traffic. The measures taken are so financially damaging to the airlines that the existence of serious threats can by no means be ruled out. At the same time, the refusal of the US government to give the public any information about the alleged threats tends, if anything, to undermine the credibility of its claims, while militating against effective measures to protect the flying public and the population as a whole.
If, in fact, the threat to the traveling public has grown to the desperate level indicated by the US-dictated measures, the responsibility rests squarely with American imperialism and the policies of the Bush administration. The US governments open-ended war on terror, including the invasion and occupation of Iraq, has enraged and alienated vast layers of the worlds Muslim population, who believe, with justification, that US imperialism is waging a war against them. The reckless and bloodthirsty policies of Bush and Company have doubtless produced new recruits for reactionary movements like Osama bin Ladens.
These policies, far from protecting the people of the US and the world from terrorist crimes, have heightened the chances that thousands more innocent people will die in such attacks. They may very well have dangerously compromised the air traffic safety system. The feverish actions of the past several days suggest that the Bush administration is sitting atop a crisis of its own making, with which it does not know how to cope.
None of this can be discussed in the American media. The gangster character of the Bush administration is well known in official political and media circles, but no one suggests that it could have ulterior motives in setting its Code Orange alert in motion, or that the permanent terrorist threat might be linked in any fashion to US foreign policy.
Former Vermont governor Howard Dean, the current frontrunner and supposed antiwar candidate for the Democratic presidential nomination, refused to answer a question about the Code Orange while campaigning in New Hampshire, saying, Im not the one who sets the terror alert level. Seeking to position himself as tougher on security issues than the Bush administration, Massachusetts Senator John Kerry, another Democratic candidate, denounced the preparedness gap in the administrations homeland security policies and proposed spending more federal money to build up the police and military presence at home.
Senator Joseph Lieberman of Connecticut simply solidarized himself with Ridge and his Department of Homeland Security, declaring, They made the right decision. They had enough intelligence information to make me worry about the possibility of another terrorist threat, and a serious one.
The notion that the claims of the Bush administration should be taken at face value is absurd. This is a government that took office through the hijacking of a national election and systematically lied to justify an illegal invasion of Iraq.
It has provided no explanation for the events of September 11, 2001, and has opposed any serious probe of the terrorist attacks, including an examination of the past and present connections of US intelligence to Osama bin Laden and the Al Qaeda network. The anthrax attack, an attempt to assassinate the leadership of the opposition party in Congress, has resulted in no arrests or indictments.
What are the Bush administrations real aims?
* To keep the population in a constant state of fear and anxiety as a means of justifying the occupation of Iraq and future wars presently in the planning stage, as well as the destruction of democratic rights at home.
* To acclimate the American people to the presence of the military in every facet of daily life.
* To carry out dry-run rehearsals for mass repression and the imposition of martial law at some future date.
* To divert attention from the mounting social crisis in Americathe destruction of millions of jobs, the growth of long-term unemployment, and the increasingly malignant gap between the wealthy elite and the rest of the population.
The intensity and aggressiveness of the war drive and the assault on democratic rights are fueled by the social crisis, for which no section of the political establishment, conservative or liberal, has any answer. In addition to the nearly 20 million unemployed or underemployed, tens of millions more live on wages that are barely subsistence level.
The government and the media can crow all they like about the economic recovery, but the deterioration of the conditions of wide layers of the population is a fact of American life that must find explosive political expression, sooner rather than later.
The recent actions are directly linked as well to the Republicans 2004 electoral strategy. Black Hawk helicopters overhead, snipers on rooftopsthis is an essential component of the Bush teams election campaign. They intend to intimidate as much of the population as they can. They intend to keep the people off guard and on the defensive, hesitant about opposing a president in war-time.
Real or fabricated terrorist plots will be used to rationalize the most extreme attacks on democratic rights, up to and including the calling off of the national election itself.
As the World Socialist Web Site has previously stated, the gravest threat to the safety, security and basic rights of the American people does not come from foreign terrorists, real or imaginary, but from the US government, which is a government of conspiracy, secrecy and lies.
The complicity of the media establishment and the Democrats in the Bush administrations provocations flows from the consensus that exists within the American ruling elite on the goal of US world hegemony. The war on terror, which every wing of the political elite supports, is the official euphemism for this strategy of global domination. The domestic consequence of this foreign policy is the regimentation and militarization of American life and the drift toward authoritarian rule.
These international and domestic processes are interconnected and inseparable. A critical political lessonwhich can already be drawn from the war in Iraq and its repercussions in the UShas to be grasped as we enter 2004. It is not possible to resist the attacks on civil liberties and democratic rights at home without mounting a conscious and systematic opposition to US imperialist aggression abroad.
Conversely, it is not possible to effectively oppose US militarism apart from the building of a mass, independent movement of the working class in defense of democratic rights and the social interests of the broad masses of the people. Such a movement must strive to end the rule of the financial oligarchy and replace it with a workers government armed with a socialist program.
---
See Also:
Orange alert in US--terrorizing the American public again (24 December 2003)
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/dec2003/terr-d24.shtml
For the first time in six months, the Bush administration has raised its terrorist attacks threat advisory from elevated, or Code Yellowits default statusto high, or Code Orange. The action combines the ominous with the ridiculous. It immediately translates into heavily armed troops and specialized police patrolling US airports, train stations, government buildings, the Wall Street stock exchange in New York City, bridges, tunnels and other sites. Missile batteries are deployed near the White House and F-16s are scrambled for round-the-clock combat patrols over New York and Washington. Foreign visitors to the US are subjected to intense scrutiny and some are turned back for no justifiable reason, while immigrants residing in the US are once again threatened with arbitrary interrogations and arrests. President Bush, Homeland Security Secretary Tom Ridge and other officials feed the public a mixture of panic and placidity, warning on the one hand that terrorists may be preparing an attack even worse than those of September 11, 2001, while urging, on the other, that everyone go about his normal holiday plans. The effort seems designed to terrorize the public without unduly affecting the already depleted profit margins of the retail and airline industries. (...) A far more imminent and verifiable threat is the one posed to the democratic rights of the American people by a government that is intent on using terrorism as a pretext for ramming through policies that serve the interests of a tiny minority at the top of the economic ladder and repressing opposition both at home and abroad. Significantly, an advisory panel on the US response to the threat of terrorism felt compelled to include in a report released last week a warning against the impression that the US is establishing a kind of secret police. If another massive terrorist attack does take place, it will happen with the last such eventmore than two years agoyet to be explained to the American people by an administration that has done all in its power to stonewall any serious investigation. Under these conditions, it is impossible to exclude the danger that this administrationin the run-up to national electionscould escalate from unfounded terrorist warnings to actually provoking or permitting a terrorist attack to take place in order to consolidate its rule and provide the justification for new wars abroad and intensified repression at home.
The war on terror and American democracysome ominous warnings (Nov 27)
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2003/nov2003/warn-n27.shtml
Three commentaries published recently in the US media, all by well-connected observers of the US military, have suggested that a major new terrorist attack within the United States could disrupt the 2004 elections and even result in military intervention on the streets of America as well as the suspension of the Constitution.
New York Times Safire predicts major terror attack in the US on eve of 2004 election (Jan 3)
http://www.wsws.org/articles/2004/jan2004/saf-j03.shtml
In a column published December 31, New York Times columnist William Safire blandly predicts that the October surprise affecting our [2004] election will be a major terror attack in the US. This ominous prognostication is given in passing as one of 16 predictions about the new year, in a piece carrying the semi-jocular headline, Office Pool, 2004. Safire, Richard Nixons former speechwriter and political aide, and a consummate Washington insider, neither explains nor elaborates on his prediction, and gives no sources. But the off-hand manner in which he posits a major attack on US soil affecting the presidential election suggests he is merely echoing a common theme of discussions in the corridors of power of the American capital. (...) Given the record of lies, conspiracies and provocations of the Bush administration, and Safires well-known connections to the centers of power in Washington and the White House, several obvious questions arise from the New Years eve column: (1) Who are the sources and what is the information on which Safire bases his prediction of a major pre-election terror attack, and, (2) Is the perpetration, or at least allowance, of such an attack being discussed within government, intelligence or military circles as a serious option for keeping Bush in power in 2004, regardless the sentiment of the electorate?
10.
Date: 04 Jan 2004
From: "globalresearch.ca" chossudovsky@videotron.ca>
Subject: Pentagon Declares War on America
GLOBAL RESEARCH (CANADA) : FEATURE ARTICLE
Best wishes and greetings to our Readers for the New Year. For a World of Peace!
4 January 2004
Homeland Defense: The Pentagon Declares War on America
by Frank Morales
Global Outlook, Issue 3, Winter 2003
24 December 2003
The URL of this article is: http://globalresearch.ca/articles/MOR312A.html
In 2003, Frank Morales was granted a Project Censored Award, Sonoma University, Cal.
The article published below was ranked Second in the Top 25 Most Censored Stories, Project Censored Award.
The "PATRIOT Act" is a repressive "coordination" of the entities of force and deception, the police, intelligence and the military. It broadens, centralizes and combines the surveillance, arrest and harassment capabilities of the police and intelligence apparatus. Homeland defense is, in essence, a form of state terrorism directed against the American people and democracy itself. It is the Pentagon Inc. declaring war on America.
The "domestic war on terrorism" hinges upon the Pentagon's doctrine of homeland defense. Mountains of repressive legislation are being enacted in the name of internal security. So called "homeland security", originally set within the Pentagon's "operations other than war", is actually a case in which the Pentagon has declared war on America. Shaping up as the new battleground, this proliferating military "doctrine" seeks to justify new roles and missions for the Pentagon within America. Vast "legal" authority and funds to spy on the dissenting public, reconfigured as terrorist threats, is being lavished upon the defense, intelligence and law enforcement "community."
All this is taking place amidst an increasingly perfected "fusion" of the police and military functions both within the US and abroad, where the phenomena is referred to as "peacekeeping", or the "policization of the military". Here in America, all distinction between the military and police functions is about to be forever expunged with the looming repeal of the Posse Comitatus Act. The latter, was passed after the Civil War to rein in the military. It bars federal troops from doing police work within United States borders, although strictly speaking, the Act refers only to the Army and the Air Force, not to the Marines or the National Guard in "state status." According to the New York Times:
"the Bush administration has directed lawyers in the Department of Justice and Defense to review the Posse Comitatus Act of 1878 and any other laws that sharply restrict the military's ability to participate in domestic law enforcement."
The Washington Post (7/21/02) put it a bit more starkly, stating that the Bush administration:
"has called on Congress to thoroughly review the law that bans the Army, Navy, Air Force and Marines from participating in arrests, searches, seizure of evidence and other police-type activity on US soil."
In other words, the "New World Law and Order" based on the repeal of the Posse Comitatus Act, requires a system of domestic and global counterinsurgency led by the Pentagon.
The first requirement of this counterinsurgency, which is directed at all forms of social dissent is the "collection", "retention" and "dissemination" of information, information on anyone who resists, whether through violent means or otherwise. Recall, that the protests in Seattle and numerous other cities in recent years were more often than not classified within official DoD and FEMA documents as "terrorist events". The objective is to centralize all intelligence gathering under one roof, the Department of Homeland Security and to widely cast the net over all of us, making certain that we all fall in line with the Pentagon Inc. agenda.
To this end the myriad modes of intelligence gathering or "collection" have been beefed up: From CALEA (Communications Assistance for Law Enforcement Act) to Carnivore (e-mail spying), from the NSA's Echelon (global listening device), to spy satellite imagery, from FBI "roving wiretaps", to CIA access to grand juries and secret FISA "foreign intelligence" courts, the means, legal sanctions and technology of social control proliferate, are sanctioned, are demanded by a paranoid public. Homeland security requires manufactured insecurity. A bit of anthrax to keep em on their toes and minding their p's and q's
Terrorism Information and Prevention System (TIPS)
Typical of the need for "tactical (on the ground) intelligence" is the creation of TIPS or the Terrorism Information and Prevention System. Set up in January 2002 by Ashcroft's Justice Department, TIPS is described as a "national system for concerned workers to report suspicious activity". In fact, TIPS is a hotline to the National White Collar Crime Center, a Justice Department organization that deals with "economic crime" and cyberattack. For a little under a million bucks they plan to register all "suspicious, publicly observable activity that could be related to terrorism" and forward it to law enforcement and other agencies "opting to receive TIPS information." These agencies "would be responsible for determining how to respond to the tips they receive."
The "workers" that TIPS is willing to offer its hotline service are those in the transportation, trucking, shipping, maritime, and mass transit industries. The truckers, for their part, are jumping in with both feet. The trucker magazine FleetOwner recently noted (6/1/02) that:
"attempting to stay ahead of Federal regulators charged with securing US transportation networks from terrorist attacks, the American Trucking Assns. has readied a 'Neighborhood Watch' program for the nation's highways."
The ATA's "Anti-Terrorism Action Plan", geared to keeping the "wheels of commerce" rolling, envision a plan in which "a potential 3 million professional truck drivers will be trained to spot and report any suspicious activities that might have terrorism or national security implications." As if truckers don't have enough on their minds, although it might be wise for them to keep their eyes wide open.
It seems that the Bush administration concern for workers knows no bounds. According to the New York Times (8/!4/02) President Bush wants to exempt all homeland security coordinated agencies "from collective bargaining requirements if (he) were to determine that our national security demands it." Little known to the public, the president is seeking not only to "exempt agency employees from federal labor relations rules and prohibit them from joining unions", but he's also prepared to force them to work, under the conditions he chooses, if "national security demands it". The "flexibility" that Bush is calling for, a "fast moving homeland security department unfettered by work rules and red tape" is sure to result in a lot less "flexibility" on the part of workers who may soon be confronted with a form of involuntary employment during "times of war", all set out in Department of Defense directives.
Financing Homeland Defense
TIPS, which is an integral part of the CitizenCorps/FreedomCorps/AmeriCorps axis of patriotic, police loving do-gooders, is buttressed with funds from the Corporation for National and Community Service (CNCS). In the wake of 9/11, CNCS was fully integrated into "homeland defense efforts". In March 2002, the Corporation issued a "notice of availability of funds to strengthen communities and organizations in using service and volunteers to support homeland security." With an emphasis on "public safety" and "freeing up police time", the grants offered under the announcement "are to assist communities in getting involved in the war against terrorism on the home front." In the area of "public safety" the grants "will help provide members to support police departments in tasks and other functions that can be performed by non-sworn officers." Now mind you, the volunteers "are not armed, nor can they make arrests, but they carry out vital tasks including organizing neighborhood watch groups " They also "organize communities to identify and respond to crime and disorder problems "
In July 2002, Homeland Security Director Tom Ridge announced, while sitting in a Washington DC police station, the first round of CNCS homeland security grants totaling $10.3 million, an "initiative" that is to involve some 37,000 volunteers nationwide. One recipient of a $484,000 Corporation grant, based in NYC, is the Center for Court Innovation. Linked to the NYC Public Safety Corps, the grant "will enhance homeland security by assisting criminal justice officials (police, probation officers, judges) as they perform their duties (while) 40 full time AmeriCorps members will free up police to address conditions of disorder that if left unchecked create a climate where crime would flourish."
In NYC, ground zero for the attack, homeland defense equates to the same old thing, cracking down on "disorder" (protest) and "quality of life crimes", which is a racist police code for arresting and jailing more poor people.
The euphemism of "homeland defense", codified within the halls of the Pentagon as early as the mid-1990's, long before 9/11, buttressed with various Presidential Decision Directives and Executive Orders, includes, within the doctrinal rubric of "operations other than war", continual training to suppress dissent, or as it is conveniently phrased, to put down "civil disturbance." The decades old "Garden Plot" operation, which is the Pentagon's stand alone "civil disturbance" plan, has become generalized in the "homeland defense" concept and it's focus on the "asymmetric threat". With the creation of the Department of Homeland Defense, Homeland Security Council etc. the Bush administration is seeking to institutionalize it's "permanent war" against "terrorism", dovetailed with it's ongoing war against dissent.
So while Garden Plot directives, geared for domestic use, are exported to "peacekeeping" troops abroad, "homeland defense" tightens the grip at home. The recent appointment of General Ralph E. Eberhart and the creation of a Northern Command within the Pentagon reflect the depth of commitment the elite have to maintaining "full spectrum dominance" at home.
With "the PATRIOT Act" and other legal monstrosities foisted upon the people, what emerges is a repressive "coordination" (as the Nazis used to call it) of the entities of force and deception, the police, intelligence and the military, in the interests of a "permanent" counterinsurgency, by way of the centralization and broadening of surveillance capabilities, arrest capabilities, and harassment capabilities, which target anyone corporate America doesn't like. Homeland defense is, in essence, a form of state terrorism directed against the American people and democracy itself. It is the Pentagon Inc. declaring war on America.
Global Counterinsurgency
The "war on terrorism" is a global counterinsurgency whose aim is to wipe out any and all resistance to US global hegemony and corporate domination. Utilizing "operations other than war" (OOTW), corporate America and it's military are taking a more direct, hands on approach to the needs and requirements of corporate globalization. OOTW, with its host of new missions (e.g. peacekeeping and civil disturbance operations), is based on a pre-emptive doctrine. In this new war, which relies on both standard means of killing along with so-called non-lethal weapons, so-called " non-combatants" (i.e. civilians) become the primary target. And in so doing, the military, via its OOTW doctrine, is violating one of the sacred tenets of the so-called "laws of war", namely, that militaries not target civilian populations. But after all, as Defense Secretary Rumsfeld noted in a (12/12/01) statement to the Senate Armed Services Committee, the "enemy" "hides in caves abroad", and more importantly, "among us here at home."
Now, despite the fact that both the Presidential and military directives target "non-United States citizens" (as if that's not bad enough), in June 2002, the Bush administration jailed a New York City man of Puerto Rican descent, Jose Padilla - or as he now calls himself - Abdullah al Muhajir, and is holding him in a military brig in South Carolina. He has yet to be charged with any crime. Like the hundreds of Muslim immigrants still being held in detention since September 11, he is considered a "material witness" to the investigation of the attack. And yet, rather than have him subject to the discretion of Federal courts, he was handed over to the military as an "enemy combatant" after Ashcroft and the Pentagon talked it over. At that moment, Padilla was taken out of his New York prison cell and transferred to a US Navy brig in South Carolina. His attorney, Donna Newman of NYC was not informed of his transfer and has been denied access to her client. Even the Washington Post, which has backed virtually all of the repressive measures of the Bush administration since September 11, wrote at the time of Padilla's jailing that:
"the governments actions in this latest case cut against basic elements of life under the rule of law" and that "if its positions are correct, nothing would prevent the president - even in the absence of a formal declaration of war - from designating any American as an enemy combatant If that's the case, nobody's constitutional rights are safe."
This "chilling legal precedent" is but the tip of the iceberg of the complete subsuming of normal judicial processes to the growing militarization of law enforcement and jurisprudence.
"Homeland defense", as we experience it today, has been percolating in the bowels of the Pentagon and corporate think tanks like the Center for Strategic and International Studies, and the Council on Foreign Relations, along with their Congressional counterparts, for nearly a decade. What it required was an emergency situation. The "homeland security" apparatus presently being constructed is modeled roughly after the military's "combatant command structure" and is - in the wake of 9/11 - set within the context of the "laws and customs of war", hence the introduction of military courts and the shifting of jurisdictions for so-called "crimes associated with terrorism". The Northern Command, based at Peterson Air Force Base, Colorado, whose job as of October 1st is to patrol America, will head up this homeland defense "command structure".
Concurrent with the round-up of over a thousand people following the September 11 attack, many of whom have been held in solitary confinement, with no charges being filed, President Bush signed in November 2991 order, establishing military "tribunals" for those non-citizens accused, anywhere, of "terrorist related crimes". According to the National Legal Aid & Defender Association, the order violates the constitutional separation of powers:
"[It] has not been authorized by the Congress and is outside the President's constitutional powers"... the order strips away a variety of checks and balances on governmental power and the reliability and integrity of criminal judgments... [T]he order undermines the rule of law worldwide, and invites reciprocal treatment of US nationals by hostile nations utilizing secret trials, a single entity as prosecutor, judge and jury, no judicial review and summary executions."
Department of Defense Military Commission Order No.1, issued March 21, 2002, is concerned with "procedures for trials by military commissions of certain non-United States citizens in the War Against Terrorism." The "commissions", according to the order, "shall have jurisdiction over violations of the laws of war and all other offenses triable by military commission." Overseen by a "military officer" who will "admit or exclude evidence at trial", the "prosecutor" would be a "special trial counsel of the Department of Justice." On the defense side, well, one could opt to go with the DoD's version of the public defender, namely another "military officer", or one could secure an attorney. Although "the Accused may also retain the services of a civilian attorney of the Accused's own choosing at no expense to the United States Government", this would only be possible once it "has been determined" that the civilian attorney is "eligible for access to information classified at the level of SECRET or higher " In other words, to get any kind of impartial and efficient legal representation in Mr. Rumsfeld's court, your attorney has to be cleared by the Pentagon.
* * *
The Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG) at www.globalresearch.ca grants permission to cross-post original CRG articles in their entirety, or any portions thereof, on community internet sites, as long as the text and title of the article are not modified. The source must be acknowledged as follows: Centre for Research on Globalization (CRG) at www.globalresearch.ca. The active URL hyperlink address of the original CRG article and the author's copyright note must be clearly displayed. (For articles from other news sources, check with the original copyright holder, where applicable.) For publication of CRG articles in print or other forms including commercial internet sites, contact: editor@globalresearch.ca.
* * *
JUST RELEASED FROM GLOBAL OUTLOOK:
THE GLOBALIZATION OF POVERTY AND THE NEW WORLD ORDER, 2nd Edition, 2003,
by Michel Chossudovsky
http://globalresearch.ca/globaloutlook/GofP.html
In this new and expanded edition of Chossudovsky's international best-seller, the author outlines the contours of a New World Order which feeds on human poverty and the destruction of the environment, generates social apartheid, encourages racism and ethnic strife and undermines the rights of women. The result as his detailed examples from all parts of the world show so convincingly, is a globalization of poverty.
In this new enlarged edition -which includes ten new chapters and a new introduction-- the author reviews the causes and consequences of famine in Sub-Saharan Africa, the dramatic meltdown of financial markets, the demise of State social programs and the devastation resulting from corporate downsizing and trade liberalization.
For ordering details click: http://globalresearch.ca/globaloutlook/GofP.html
To visit our website click:
http://www.globalresearch.ca
Centre for Research on Globalization
Centre de recherche sur la mondialisation
To subscribe to Global Research (Canada): Feature Articles, send email to: subscribe@globalresearch.ca
11.
I ABSOLUTELY CONCUR WITH GOLDI! THIS UPCOMING MOVIE ALONG WITH THE BOOK STAND TO ME AS A MAJOR PARADIGM-SHIFT BREAKTHROUGH
Date: 29 Dec 2003
From: Goldi goldi316@ameritech.net>
Subject: A report and review of the documentary: Inside the corporation
This sounds very much like something very much worth checking out! I have signed up for their newsletter so I can find out when it will appear in my area, as well as when they plan to release this for home viewing. Definitely browse their website, lots of highly interesting info there (link is at the bottom of this review). There's even a couple of quicktime movie clips you can view. I downloaded them so I can watch later, when I have more time.
I think it's about time we start focusing more on this problem that is plaguing our society. I really do believe the issues of corporate lack of accountability and rampant greed are at the core of the corruption that has been destroying our democracy for many years now. Unless we address this, it will only continue to grow, like a malignant tumor - and we know what the end result of that is...
Goldi
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From: http://www.peak.sfu.ca/the-peak/2003-3/issue10/ar-thecorp.html
Documentary: Inside the corporation
Sally Rudd, The Peak
November 3, 2003
In today's era of globalization and free-market capitalism , there has been a steady erosion of public control over private corporations. Considering that corporations directly affect the lives of Canadians and of people all over the world, there has been a severe lack of public discourse and education on this issue. The documentary, The Corporation, tries to fill this void and to encourage debate. Using an exquisite combination of humour and horror to make its message, The Corporation provides a much needed examination of one of society's most powerful institutions.
Although the film does have a radical streak (it diagnoses the corporation as a psychopath), it provides a balanced and in depth analysis of corporate activities. It holds appeal not only for the "protest-crowd" but also for moderates, and yes, maybe even conservatives. For example, along with interviews of Noam Chomsky, Michael Moore, and Naomi Klein, the film also gives space to business representatives, such as the former chairman of Royal Dutch Shell and the CEO of Interface (one of the largest carpet manufactures), and to economists, such as Michael Walker, President of the Fraser Institute.
The Corporation covers issues that are relevant to everyone. For investors, the film shows how corporate crime is not just limited to a few "bad apples." For international labour advocates, the film inspects the conditions and wages in the factories of corporations in less developed countries. For consumers, the film exposes the health dangers of Monsanto's Bovine hormone, which is given to cows in America to make them produce more milk. For conspiracy theorists, the film documents how Monsanto was able to prevent Fox News from airing its exclusive on the Bovine hormone. For parents, the film describes the extent to which corporate marketers plot to get their children to nag for their products.
For environmentalists, the film details the devastating actions of chemical corporations such as Dupont Chemical. For those fighting for international social justice, the film explains the consequences of a water privatisation scheme in Cochabamba, Bolivia, and the local people's struggle to win back control of their water from a foreign corporation. Lastly, the business class might be interested in the film to get an idea of how business may hopefully change in the future.
Seven years in the making, the creators put a tremendous effort into this film, and when they ran out of funding, they were dedicated enough to fund it out of their own pockets. The masterminds behind this film are Mark Achbar, Jennifer Abbott, and Joel Bakan. Mark Achbar is best known for co-directing Manufacturing Consent: Noam Chomsky and the Media. Jennifer Abbott is an internationally recognised documentary maker, editor, media artist, and cultural activist whose past works include A Cow at My Table, a feature documentary about the agribusiness vs. animal rights controversy and the battle for the consumer's mind. Joel Bakan is a renowned legal theorist and a law professor at UBC. Along with being a Rhodes scholar, Bakan also has law degrees from Dalhousie and Harvard. While making the documentary, Bakan also wrote the book The Corporation: The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power, which will be released by Penguin Canada in March 2004.
The official world premiere of the documentary was at the Toronto Film Festival in September 2003, but keeping true to the grassroots spirit of the film, the unofficial premiere was before this at a rave sponsored by the Squamish nation of British Columbia. The Corporation played three sold out shows at the Vancouver International Film Festival this year, where it received many spontaneous outbursts of applause and cheers from the crowd and was voted the Most Popular Canadian Film at the festival.
This thought provoking documentary should not be missed.
For more information and updates on the film, the Web site is http://www.thecorporation.tv/
---
From: http://www.thecorporation.tv/filingcabinet.html
Book: " The Corporation - The Pathological Pursuit of Power"
Eminent Canadian law professor and legal theorist Joel Bakan contends the modern business corporation is created by law to function like a psychopathic personality.
Bakans most recent book, The Corporation: The Pathological Pursuit of Profit and Power, will be released by Penguin Canada in March 2004, and in the US by Simon & Schuster. Bakans book was written during the making of the film THE CORPORATION (Co-created with Mark Achbar) and formed the basis of the research and writing for the film.
Beginning with its origins in the sixteenth century, Bakan traces the corporation's rise to dominance.In what Simon and Schuster describes as the most revolutionary assessment of the corporation since Peter Drucker's early works, THE CORPORATION makes the following claims:
Corporations are required by law to elevate their own interests above those of others, making them prone to prey upon and exploit others without regard for legal rules or moral limits.
Corporate social responsibility, though sometimes yielding positive results, most often serves to mask the corporation's true character, not to change it.
The corporation's unbridled self interest victimizes individuals, the environment, and even shareholders, and can cause corporations to self-destruct, as recent Wall Street scandals reveal.
Despite its flawed character, governments have freed the corporation from legal constraints through deregulation, and granted it ever greater power over society through privatization.
Bakan urges restoration of the corporation's original purpose, to serve the public interest, and calls for re-establishment of democratic control over the institution. Concrete, pragmatic, and realistic reforms are proposed. A groundbreaking book filled with big ideas and fascinating stories, THE CORPORATION is original, provocative and informative.
"This fine book was virtually begging to be written. With lucidity and verve, expert knowledge and incisive analysis, Joel Bakan unveils the history and the character of a devilish instrument that has been created and is nurtured by powerful modern states. They have endowed their creature with the rights of persons -- and by now, rights far exceeding persons of flesh and blood -- but a person that is pathological by nature and by law, and systematically crushes democracy, freedom, rights, and the natural human instincts on which a decent life and even human survival depends: the modern corporation. This incisive study should be read carefully, and pondered. And it should be a stimulus to constructive action -- not at all beyond our means, as the author outlines."
- Noam Chomsky
"Bakan's "The Corporation" is one of those rare books that opens up a new world. It's message is compelling-- and more important now than ever. With exquisite historical evocations and incisive contemporary examples, the author challenges us to recognize the flaws inherent in the very nature of the corporation and the practical possibilities for reform. You will want to have the book at hand for frequent reference for many years to come."
- Robert Monks
"Since Rachel Carson's Silent Spring began to expose the abuses of the modern industrial system, there has been a growing awareness that profit at the expense of Earth--of individuals, society, and the environment--is unsustainable. Joel Bakan has performed a valuable service to corporations everywhere by holding up a mirror for them to see their destructive selves as others see them. The clarion call for change is here for all who would listen."
- Ray Anderson
MAKE SURE TO GIVE A LONG LOOK AT http://www.thecorporation.tv/productdemos.html
Revealing CLIPS from the movie.
12.
Date: 4 Jan 2004
Subject: Sex Slaves in Israel
From: "Olga Scully" oscully@iinet.net.au>
Article Confirms Israel's White Slave Trade
Posted on: 2003-12-08
By Jeff Hook
Have you read the article Fighting the Flesh Trade? If not, please do. It confirms every fact revealed by the late Dr. William L. Pierce in his various American Dissident Voices broadcasts on the subject of Israel's White Slave Trade.
On December 5, 2001, the article appeared on the Jewsweek.com Web site -- complete with accompanying images. I hosted a copy of it on the old Jeff's archive Web site, until I received an e-mail from a law firm representing Jewsweek, informing me of their intent to sue if the article wasn't removed immediately. I removed the article, and linked directly to their site. They then removed the article.
I then linked directly to the site of the copyright holder, the Jerusalem Post. By that evening, the Jerusalem Post had also removed the article. Well, that was two years ago. Now the Jerusalem Post has seen fit to re-activate the URL, so you might want to take a gander at what the Jews are doing to the women of our race. Here's a synopsis:
1. 3,000 White European women per year are smuggled into Israel as sex slaves.
2. They are promised legitimate jobs, but put to work as prostitutes.
3. They are locked in apartments with barred windows.
4. They are relieved of their passports.
5. They are beaten, tortured, and gang-raped (Jewish method of "breaking them in").
6. They are sold at pimping auctions! - during which they are forced to undress.
7. They are forced to service up to 15 Jews a day, 7 days a week, in Israel's 400+ brothels.
8. There are 250 brothels in Tel Aviv alone!
9. Pimps and traffickers are ignored by police - prostitution is not a crime.
Fighting the Flesh Trade
Here's more information on the subject from the National Alliance:
Jews and the White Slave Trade
http://www.natvan.com/free-speech/fs982a.html
The Evil Among Us
http://www.natvan.com/free-speech/fs007c.html
The Nature of the Beast
http://www.natvan.com/free-speech/fs008b.html
Here are excerpts from another excellent article (which has been removed from the Jerusalem Report's website). Luckily, another site has picked it up; see link below.
Source: The Jerusalem Report, | November 2001 http://www.themodernreligion.com/jihad/victoria.html
Victoria's, and Israel's, Ugly Secret
by Ina Friedman
Of the thousands of women brought to Israel each year to work as prostitutes, many are enslaved, beaten and raped by their pimps. Now, one of them is fighting back...
... it was a similar impetus that led Victoria (who asks that her last name not be published) into the nightmare she has been living for the past 16 months. In mid-1999, when she ran out of funds to continue her studies and found that her family would not help her, she was lured by the offer of a job in Israel as a masseuse. The promised monthly salary was $1,000 (astronomical compared to the $30 a month she was earning in Moldova), and she was assured that she could return there whenever she chose.
... it was only after she arrived in Israel, in August 1999, that she learned the truth about her new "job" from the man who met her at the airport, took the passport from her, and drove her to a town in the Negev. And the truth was harrowing: The "recruiter," she was told, had sold her into prostitution and debt bondage - meaning that she would have to work off her purchase price ($6,500) before she could be released or even start earning a wage. She would also be required to have sex with her "owner" and his friends for free. The best she could expect for herself was tips from satisfied clients, which she soon discovered averaged $4 to $8 per john.
"We were locked in an apartment or under guard every time we moved from place to place," Victoria explains when asked why she didn't flee. "And even if I could get away, I had no passport, I had no money for a ticket to go back." She also had reason to suspect that local policemen were in cahoots with her "owners," because they were among the clients being "serviced" in one of the places in which she worked. ("They showed up in uniform," she relates, "with a squad car parked outside waiting for them.") But most of all she feared reprisal by her pimps. "They threatened that if I ran away, their people would track me down in Moldova and make sure I was punished."
AND SO, OVER THE COURSE OF 11 months, Victoria worked in various brothels, apartments and hotels in Beersheba and Tel Aviv from 10 a.m. to 11 p.m., seven days a week, "servicing" between 10 and 20 clients a day. Five times she was sold by one pimp to another, each new "owner" requiring her to work off her purchase price. Along the way, she was raped and sodomized by three of her "owners" and one's son, as well.
"Israelis have simply grown used to the idea that women can be bought," concurs Leah Gruenpeter-Gold, co-director of the Awareness Center in Tel Aviv, which specializes in research on trafficking in women and prostitution.
The influx of 1 million immigrants from the CIS over the past decade has also made it easier for the crime syndicates operating there - whose tentacles reach deep into Israel - to traffic women with forged documents. "Some prostitutes come in under the forged identities of Jewish women in Russia and the Ukraine," explains Hagay Herzl, an advisor to the internal security minister on foreign-workers issues.
"... the discussion of Israel's struggle crops up from time to time, the press gives it a blast of coverage - like when the four Russian prostitutes were burned to death in a locked brothel, with bars on the windows, in Tel Aviv last August - and then it goes back to sleep again," says Gruenpeter-Gold.
One reason for the lack of sustained attention by the government and media is that prostitution, per se, is not illegal in Israel. In short, it is pimps who stand to spend up to five years in prison (seven under aggravated circumstances) for their actions. Yet in the case of trafficked women, it is the prostitutes who have been consistently punished by Israel's law-enforcement agencies - as illegal aliens - by being arrested, detained for weeks, and deported, while the owners of brothels have gotten off scot-free.
Another reason for the lack of vigor in attacking the problem is that Israeli officials, to this day, seem somewhat ambivalent.
Probably made it easier to turn a blind eye to the egregious violations of human rights often entailed in the sex trafficking business. And typically, perhaps, it took an outside party to rub Israel's nose in this problem.
That service was provided last May by Amnesty International, which issued a blistering 23-page report on trafficking in women in Israel that slammed the government for "[failing] to take adequate measures to prevent, investigate, prosecute and punish human rights abuses against trafficked women" from the former Soviet Union. The report included a list of specific recommendations, among them: making slavery and trafficking unlawful.
"Just two months ago, we had a hard time getting the police interested in even hearing Victoria's testimony," reports the Hotline's Rozen. "They said it would be her word against that of her pimps, and they couldn't build a case on that. It was only after I had testified before the Knesset inquiry commission that the police called back to say they would like to see her. They were shamed into it. And we should all be ashamed that things like this exist in our 'enlightened,' democratic society and we still prefer to turn the other way."
13.
HORRENDOUS HUMAN RIGHTS ABUSES PAID FOR IN PART WITH U.S. TAXPAYERS' MONEY
Joint Appeal
31 December 2003
Sweeping Restrictions in Nablus in the Wake of Israeli Military Operations
Last night, 30th of December 2003, Israeli army forces entered the neighborhood of Qarion in the Old City of Nablus. They commenced house-to-house searches, breaking walls and doors of residential houses. 76 women, children and old people living in the neighborhood were gathered into two small rooms for the duration of the operation, and to the best of our knowledge are still held there without access to basic needs. 25 men were gathered into a separate apartment, and underwent investigation by Israeli special services. 18 people have been injured so far in the course of the operation, most of them minors who were throwing stones at the tanks. Their evacuation to hospital was permitted, but the evacuation of a heart attack case in the neighborhood was only enabled after long delays and protest by medical personnel against the conduct of the Israeli soldiers. Curfew is imposed upon this neighborhood and others in the Old City. Operations expanded this morning to other neighborhoods in the Old City.
These actions come as a continuation to two weeks in which severe restrictions were imposed on local civilian populations in Nablus and Balata refugee camp, as a result of military operations by the Israeli army. According to the Palestinian Medical Relief Society (PMRS), two of its medical personnel were injured in Nablus in the course of the past two weeks. In Balata alone, 3 people were killed and 48 injured. These escalating violations have had little or no coverage in the Israeli media, and are increasingly ignored by the public.
We call upon the Israeli army to end its policy of collective punishment in the form of sweeping restrictions of movement on civilian residents of Nablus, and attacks on the civilian population; this policy has paralyzed everyday life in all spheres, including health, and will have severe cumulative effects on the population.
For details and interviews please contact:
Ghassan Hamdan, PMRS, +972-59-877793
Oceane Lahanque, MdM, +972-57-249445
Miri Weingarten, PHR-Israel, +972-67-700477
Joint Appeal issued by:
PHR-Israel
http://www.phr.org.il
Médecins du monde
http://www.medecinsdumonde.org
UPMRC
http://www.upmrc.org
---
"(...) they are doing to the Palestinians much the same as the Nazis did to the Jews"
- Donangelo taken from SUPPORT ISRAELI REFUSENIKS! below.
14.
From: "Don Angelo" donangelo@bendnet.com>
Subject: SUPPORT ISRAELI REFUSENIKS!
Date: 5 Jan 2004
Jean -- Would you consider distributing the following over your network? Even more valuable than information is the opportunity to actually do something! This strikes me a pivotal issue that needs to be broadcast far and wide. Thank you!
Donangelo
SUPPORT ISRAELI REFUSENIKS!
A military justice system that has remained indifferent to hundreds of incidents of injury and killing of unarmed Palestinian civilians, now proves its dedication to the rule of law by its savage treatment of five youngsters for the "offence" of remaining true to conscience and refusing to take a hand in the bloody campaign of repression.
Here is an opportunity to express solidarity with five Israeli refuseniks who have just been sentenced to jail, possibly until they agree to serve in the Israeli army. They refuse because the Israeli treatment of Palestinians is utterly immoral and genocidal. "Never again, resolved the Zionists, but they are doing to the Palestinians much the same as the Nazis did to the Jews. They steal the Palestinians water; they steal the Palestinians land and thereby their food supply; they are currently starving the citizens of Nablus, Balata and Beit Foreek, and they humiliate the Palestinians in every conceivable way. By and large Palestinians become suicide bombers because of the way they are treated, not the other way around. Under the same circumstances I might be tempted to become a suicide bomber. So might you! Good thing I believe in nonviolence. Israel has demonstrated conclusively that fighting terrorism with terrorism only produces more terrorists, a lesson the Bush administration has yet to learn. The way to stop terrorism is to heal the injustices that create it.
You can sign a petition to Prime Minister Sharon at http://www.refuz.org.il/petition.php
This is easy, and you do not need to download Hebrew to read the site. You can also fax the following letter to Brigadier General Gil Regev. He has the authority to allow or disallow the carrying out of the sentence. Regev's fax number from USA is 011 972 3 569 2933. Other countries may have a different first three numerals. After the letter is a full discussion of the case. If you agree with the point of view expressed here and desire genuine peace in the Middle East, please forward this email far and wide.
Thank you!
Donangelo
---
To: Brigadier General Gil Regev
Head of the Manpower Department, I.D.F.
Hakirya Tel Aviv
M.P. 02919
I.D.F
Dear General
What a wonderful opportunity! You could become another Mikhail Gorbachev. You have the power to affirm or annul the convictions of the five Refuseniks. In this pivotal event you hold the future of Israel in your hands. Do you want a moral Israel, moving forward to a peaceful future, or do you want endless, ugly bloodshed?
You know the facts. Israel has demonstrated conclusively that fighting terrorism with terrorism only creates more terrorists, eager to revenge the latest atrocity. The only way to reduce terrorism is to heal the injustice that creates it. And you know that injustice is rampant. For more than fifty years Israel has stolen Palestinian land, stolen Palestinian water, murdered innocents, is now starving the citizens of Nablus, Balata and Beit Foreek, and has humiliated Palestinians in every conceivable way. The question is not what are the Palestinians doing to Israel in response; the question is what are you doing, what are you putting out, how can you possibly justify such actions?
Never again! What does that mean? Does it mean only that Jews will never again tolerate being humiliated and murdered as they were by the Nazis, or does it mean that Jews will never again tolerate any people persecuting another people? We are all just people. Therefore, cannot we be just?
The Refuseniks are saying, No, we will not take part in the persecution of another people. It is not right. Of course it isnt. Anyone who isnt mired in the offal of their own creating can see that. You can see it. Your heart knows it. I am sure you are a sensitive, well educated man. You are aware of all the rationalizations that enable Israelis to pretend that their persecution of the Palestinians is somehow ok.
What would happen if you said that the Refuseniks are right? Let them go! Drop all charges and expectations. They have served their country in the highest possible way, bringing it back to virtue. Perhaps the whole sorry edifice of Israeli persecution of Palestinians would crumble. The state would be forced to change course, and start healing the injustices. Two states would emerge in joyous relief, prepared to accept one another and live together in peace. Just as Gorbachev ended the sham of the Soviet Union, you would end the sad sham that is destroying Israel. What does God want, if not love, peace, and justice? It is up to you. What will you do?
With sincere hope,
undersigned
GUSH SHALOM pob 3322, Tel-Aviv 61033
http://www.gush-shalom.org
Gush Shalom is expressing its shock about the harsh punishment of the five courageous young Occupation Objectors - on the same day where the army announces that the soldier who shot and severely wounded peace demonstrator Gil Na'amati will not be prosecuted, or punished in any way.
CLIP
To find out much more got at
http://www.google.ca/search?q=LAST+DAY+IN+COURT+--+report+by+Adam+Keller&ie=ISO-8859-1&hl=en&btnG=Google+Search&meta=
or contact "Don Angelo" donangelo@bendnet.com> to get his entire email on this.
I also recommend to your attention the testimony of one of these 5 Refuseniks at http://www.refuz.org.il/maatartestimony.php - and explore also http://www.refuz.org.il
15.
From: "James Twyman" jamestwyman@email.emissaryoflight.org>
Subject: Baghdad Children's Center update
Date: 5 Jan 2004
Beloved Friends,
As you know, about a month ago, the Beloved Community was responsible for funding a center for homeless children effected by the war in Iraq. Our friend Donna Muhearn rented a house in Baghdad and has already served dozens of children who would have otherwise been living on the street. This has been one of the major ongoing problems since the war "ended," and because so much of our work at the Beloved Community is about children, we feel this is an important calling. (Many of you are contributing to the center, and as always, we are eternally grateful.)
I also wanted to give all of you an idea of what Donna has had to endure to do this work. I have included a recent email where she describes a bomb that was detonated right outside the children's home. Some of the details of the letter are graphic, so please use your discretion. Why am I sharing this with you? Each one of us feel that we have been called to be Spiritual Peacemakers in the world today, and though the REAL solution can not be found through our leaders and governments, it is important that we not live with our heads in the sand. We need to embrace every aspect of peace, especially where it seems to be most lacking. I hope you will read this letter in that Light. Donna and the others who are working with her have risked everything to be Emissaries of Light, and we are each called to do the same wherever we live.
Thank you for answering the call. In Peace, James Twyman
FROM DONNA:
Dear friends
About 8 o'clock this morning I was trying to do decide what to do: 'should I have a shower now or go down the street and fetch some milk first?'
I quickly jumped in the shower - I usually can't function in the morning without one.
That decision may have saved my life.
A few minutes later, as I stood with wet hair in the kitchen of our apartment, the force of a bomb blast knocked me off my feet. The sound of the bomb and then of a thousand plates of glass shattering, hit my ears like a cricket bat across the head. I screamed as I hit the floor.
Down on the street near our apartment, a roadside bomb had detonated as a US military convoy passed. It blew the head off an Iraqi man and maimed the bodies of two others.
We quickly ran down to the street as a large crowd of locals gathered. I saw the body of the man killed as it lie on the road, it was still but for the fingers twitching every now and then. A sheet was quickly thrown over him but a thick trail of dark red blood flowed from under the sheet. It slithered like a fat snake through the mud and settled in a puddle of rainwater. I also heard the groans of the man whose right arm was blown off and I saw the flesh of his left arm as it hung off his body.
Mayhem settled in.
People were yelling and screaming. Questions. Confusion. Journalists and cameras arrived. The American soldiers, scared and nervous, barked out orders that didn't seem to make any sense.
I stood there with my hands shaking so much I couldn't hold my camera still.
As a westerner, a journalist, perhaps I should have been stronger, but as people ran around me here and there, I just stood back and watched the scene.
I started to cry.
I put my head down so nobody would see me. No one else was crying, foreigners anyway. They were busy taking pictures, hearing the story, talking.
I kept crying. I couldn't talk. The sight of the body, the blood, the tanks, the soldiers, the guns, the yelling, the broken glass strewn across the street, the chaos that had taken over my otherwise safe Kerrada neighborhood - it all struck me speechless. I watched the children as they watched the chaos unfold and I cursed it all under my breathe.
The soldiers got angrier. They aimed their guns at the crowd, then the tops of buildings, then back at the crowd. More journalists arrived. More cameras.
I wondered if this would make it onto the news at home, but with no American soldiers killed, I figured it was unlikely to rate a mention.*
"There's no story here," one soldier yelled at me when I approached him to ask what happened.
The people disagreed. The man killed was a well-known local who was on his way to the bank. He stopped at a cigarette stall and was hit by flying shrapnel as he bought a packet of smokes. He had a wife and family.
The people also disagreed on who was to blame.
"They are terrorists, those who planted this bomb," one told a journalist.
"The Americans are the terrorists," a man next to him said. "They've brought with them nothing but death. They are responsible for this."
Most of the crowd agreed and a group started chanting anti-American slogans up and down the street.
I tried to talk to the soldiers, to ask them how they felt, but they didn't want to chat with me. They responded angrily prompting one bystander (who looked and sounded remarkably like me) to challenge their presence here ... One soldier responded in no uncertain terms: "We don't want to be here! I have a wife and daughter at home, do you think I want to be here?"
So the soldiers don't want to be here. The Iraqis don't want them here. It seems one point on which both sides here agree! It's just a few politicians sitting behind desks on the other side of the world who want these young kids to risk their lives for a mission they admit they don't understand.
I asked a fresh-faced soldier, only 22 years old, why he was here in Iraq and not back at college studying to be an accountant?
"For the excitement," he said. "Like today, this is exciting!"
As the crowd gently lifted the body of the Kerrada father of two into a wooden coffin and into a nearby mosque the mood was far from 'exciting'.
The shopkeepers of Kerrada Street started to sweep up the glass of their smashed shopfronts from the footpaths. It's a busy street, with colourful fruit shops, falafel stores, vegetable carts, bakeries, gift stores, furniture shops. It's bustling and cosmopolitan - reminds me of King Street, Newton. Today dozens of shops with smashed windows and extensive damage were forced to close. Who knows when they'll be back in business? I looked up to the shop-top apartment buildings that line the road - every second window smashed. Tonight the fresh winter air will be an uninvited guest into many family homes, all the more bitter with no electricity to power heaters. But there'll be no insurance claims or compensation payouts for these hard-working business people and the residents of Kerrada Street. All this is just part of life in 'liberated' Iraq.
But remarkably, as the cameras started to leave, the fruit vendors unpacked their bananas and the furniture shop swept up its glass and then put its lamps and lounges out onto the footpath as usual.
Kerrada Street, in inner city Baghdad - today it saw tanks, blood, guns, angry crowds and grief.
It also saw Iraqi people determined to get on with life with a resilient spirit.
Today I was going to write home about Christmas. About the kids. About other aspects of life here in Baghdad.
I'm sorry that I've had to write about bombs and death. But I guess it's an aspect of life here in Baghdad. Life under occupation
But so is resilience and hope.
And there's one girl here whose grateful that she can't leave the house without a shower, and she's extremely grateful that she didn't today.
Your pilgrim Donna
---
See also:
The Occupiers, As Ever, Are Damned Either Way - Especially When The Innocent Die
(Dec 31, Robert Fisk in Baghdad)
http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article5445.htm
The Independent - Cigarette sellers don't have names. They said he was called Fouad but even the shopkeeper whose nephew drove the wounded, screaming man to hospital didn't know his family name. There was just a pile of crushed Marlboro boxes and a lot of blood that had poured from his half-severed arm when the bomb went off in the middle of Karradah. It was aimed at the Americans of course, and, as so often happens, the Iraqis paid the price. None more so than the man in black trousers and white shirt who was torn apart by the explosion and whose crushed body was dragged off on a wooden cart. Another day in the life and death of Baghdad. As always, there were the odd little ironies of violence. The dead man - and nobody in Karradah knew him because he had arrived in a taxi - was on his way to the local bank to change currencies, from the old dinar notes with Saddam's face on them to the new dinars with the ancient Iraqi mathematician Al-Hassan Ibn al-Haitham in place of the captured dictator. CLIP
Originally from http://news.independent.co.uk/world/fisk/story.jsp?story=477089
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