From thinker at thelakebc.ca Thu Jan 1 10:07:55 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Thu Jan 1 10:04:08 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] The illusion of victory Message-ID: <200901011603.n01G3uNH021388@karma.reboot.ca> Subject: The illusion of victory The precedent for the mass murder of civilians has long been established through history, especially during WW2 with the death camps of opposing sides and the planned terror bombing of European cities, again by all sides, killing hundreds of thousands, with the excuse of not having been able to hit military targets. We live in the most corrupt historical era, where the mass murder of civilians pales in comparison to the yearly killing of tens of millions by starvation , poor water and easily preventable illnesses, justified by criminal economic, religious and ideological theories, paid for by special interest sector and promoted by universities as a "sciences". Leave it to the military and economists and the overpopulation of the Earth will be solved. On pure scientific and religious grounds, of course, because God apparently gave contradictory instructions when he appeared to hundreds of prophets of all sides, over the ages. I'm still hoping that one of these New Years may just bring some kind of mental awakening to humanity and shows them how they're being misled, defrauded and enslaved, as always, in the name of "faith", "freedom" and "science". Cheers, Ed. The illusion of victory If Hamas is destroyed, a more radical group will replace it. Israel's security depends on wiser action * Daniel Barenboim * The Guardian, Thursday 1 January 2009 I have just three wishes for the coming year. The first is for the Israeli government to realise once and for all that the Middle East conflict cannot be solved by military means. The second is for Hamas to realise that its interests are not served by violence, and Israel is here to stay. And the third is for the world to acknowledge that this conflict is unlike any other in history. It is uniquely intricate and sensitive - a conflict between two peoples who are both deeply convinced of their right to live on the same very small piece of land. This is why neither diplomacy nor military action can resolve this conflict. The developments of the last few days are extremely worrisome to me for reasons of humane and political natures. While it is self-evident that Israel has the right to defend itself, that it cannot and should not tolerate missile attacks on its citizens, its army's relentless and brutal bombardment of Gaza has raised a few important questions in my mind. The first question is if Israel's government has the right to make all Palestinians culpable for the actions of Hamas. Is the entire population of Gaza to be held responsible for the sins of a terrorist organisation? We, the Jewish people, should know and feel even more acutely than other populations that the murder of innocent civilians is inhumane and unacceptable. The Israeli military has very weakly argued that the Gaza Strip is so overpopulated it is impossible to avoid civilian deaths during operations. The feebleness of this argument leads to my next questions: if civilian deaths are unavoidable, what is the purpose of the bombardment? What, if any, is the logic behind the violence, and what does Israel hope to achieve through it? If the aim is to destroy Hamas then the most important question to ask is whether this is attainable. If not, then the whole attack is not only cruel, barbaric and reprehensible, it is senseless. If, on the other hand, it really is possible to destroy Hamas through military operations, how does Israel envisage the reaction in Gaza once this has been accomplished? One and a half million Gaza residents will not suddenly go down on their knees in reverence for the power of the Israeli army. We must not forget that before Hamas was elected by the Palestinians, it was encouraged by Israel as a tactic to weaken Yasser Arafat. Israel's recent history leads me to believe that if Hamas is bombed out of existence, another group will most certainly take its place, a group that would be more radical, more violent, and more full of hatred towards Israel. Israel cannot afford a military defeat for fear of disappearing from the map, yet history has proved that every military victory has left Israel in a weaker political position because of the emergence of radical groups. I do not underestimate the difficulty of the decisions the Israeli government must make every day, nor do I underestimate the importance of Israel's security. Nevertheless, I stand behind my conviction that the only truly viable plan for long-term security is to gain the acceptance of all our neighbours. I wish for a return in the year 2009 of the famous intelligence always ascribed to the Jews. I wish for a return of King Solomon's wisdom to Israel's decision-makers that they might use it to understand that Palestinians and Israelis have equal human rights. Palestinian violence torments Israelis and does not serve the Palestinian cause; Israeli retaliation is inhuman, immoral, and does not guarantee security. The destinies of the two peoples are inextricably linked, obliging them to live side by side. They have to decide if they want to make of this a blessing or a curse. ? Daniel Barenboim is a pianist and conductor, and a UN messenger of peace danielbarenboim.com From papadop at peak.org Thu Jan 1 21:06:08 2009 From: papadop at peak.org (MichaelP) Date: Thu Jan 1 21:06:32 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] two items on the Greek uprising Message-ID: http://mondediplo.com/2009/01/06greece Le Monde diplomatique - English edition --January BAILOUTS FOR THE BANKS, BULLETS FOR THE PEOPLE Mass uprising of Greece's youth Why did Greek youth take to the streets? For the first time since the second world war young people have no hope of a better life than their parents. But there is also a failure of trust in politicians and all state institutions, particularly the police By Valia Kaimaki *Valia Kaimaki is a journalist based in Athens ############## The veteran Greek politician Leonidas Kyrkos, now in his eighties, is an iconic figure of the Greek left. He told me what he'd like to say to the young people out on the streets: "Welcome to social struggle, my friends. Now you must take care of yourself and your struggle." Following the killing of 15-year-old Alexis Grigoropoulos by a special police unit on 6 December, school and university students have risen up in an unprecedented outpouring of rage. Spontaneous demonstrations, mostly organised by email and SMS, have shaken towns and cities across the country: Athens, Thessaloniki, Patras, Larissa, Heraklion and Chania in Crete, Ioannina, Volos, Kozani, Komotini. This is an uprising with many origins; the most obvious is police brutality. Alexis is not the first victim of the Greek police, only the youngest. But its roots also lie in the economic crisis - a national one which struck hard even before the consequences of the global financial storm made themselves felt. On top of this, Greece is going through a profound political crisis, both systemic and moral; it comes from the duplicity of political parties and personalities, which has broken all trust in state institutions. Alexis's death wasn't an exceptional case, or a blot on the otherwise pristine copybook of the Athens police. The list of student and immigrant victims of torture and murder by the police goes back a long way. In 1985, another 15-year-old, Michel Kaltezas, was murdered by a police officer - a crime whitewashed by a corrupt judicial system. The Greek police may be no worse than police forces in other parts of Europe, but the wounds left by Greece's dictatorship, the military junta of 1967-74, are still open here; and the memory of those seven dark years is deeply ingrained in people's minds. This society does not forgive as readily as some. THE 700 EURO GENERATION This united front is led by a generation of the very young. There is a reason for this: daily life for most young Greeks is dominated by intensive schooling aimed at securing a university place. Selection is tough and children focus hard on it from the age of 12. But once the lucky ones get there, they soon discover the reality of life after university: at best, a job at 700 ($1,000) a month. The Greeks know all about the "700 euro generation". One group has now named a new association after it: Generation 700, or just G700. They try to give a voice to this generation, and give free legal advice too. Those who are lucky enough to get the 700 are freelancers or subcontractors. Even a short-term contract is seen as exceptional, because that would entitle you to some social security, redundancy pay and holidays, whereas a freelance agreement, now common even in the public services, gives you no legal rights or security. Stratos Fanaras, a political analyst and director of the public opinion survey company Metron Analysis, outlines the situation in Greece: "The studies we have recently conducted show that all economic indices as well as people's aspirations for the future have sunk to a record low. People feel let down and disillusioned, and cannot see the situation improving. This reaction is the same for men and women, and across all social classes and educational levels. And studies by the Foundation for Economic and Industrial Research, which has been publishing monthly reports since 1981, also show that economic indices have never been so low." For the young, the political system and parties that represent it have no legitimacy. Three political families have reigned over the Greek political scene since the 1950s. The two main parties, New Democracy on the right and the socialists of Pasok, have shared power for more than 30 years. The Communist Party of Greece (KKE), still Stalinist, is in no position to provide solutions. The Coalition of the Radical Left (Syriza) does at least know how to communicate with the young, and its leap in the opinion polls in the last months has been spectacular: after a modest 5.04% in the national elections of September 2007, it won almost 13% of voter preferences six months later. The election of Alexis Tsipras, 33, as leader of its biggest component, the Coalition of the Left of Movements and Ecology, Synapismos, has also contributed to this rise in support. The original positions it has taken on current issues have helped to gain support from some young people, as have some well-chosen media coups (Tsipras took a young woman immigrant from Sierra Leone as his partner to the Greek president's annual reception to commemorate the restoration of democracy). Even after some levelling out, Syriza is still getting about 8%, well ahead of the KKE (which is finding its decline hard to swallow). NEED FOR A SCAPEGOAT This struggle for primacy on the left may have led the KKE to ally itself with the New Democracy government and the far-right Popular Orthodox Rally (Laos) when the government denounced Syriza as a "haven for rioters". New Democracy needed a scapegoat to divert the public debate from the causes of the uprising. Pasok, meanwhile, is keeping its mouth shut, knowing that its turn to govern is coming sooner than it expected. The government of Kostas Karamanlis has much responsibility for all this. Elected in 2004 on a promise of openness and honesty, it has become embroiled in scandals even worse than those of its predecessors. Bribery, corruption, nepotism - and more. The latest concerns the illegal trading of state land for less valuable land owned by the monastery of Vatopedi on Mount Athos, for which those responsible have still not been brought to justice. The young are right to believe that in such a corrupt country, no one gets punished. And this belief fuels the violence of their response. Their faces hidden by masks or balaclavas, the most radical demonstrators, mostly anarchists or autonomists, often gather in the main square of the Exarchia district in central Athens, the area where Alexis was killed. The police have a longstanding vendetta against the anarchists of Exarchia, particularly because the district is right next to the Athens Polytechnic, where students fought a decisive battle again the junta in 1973. Street-fighting between radicals and the police in Exarchia has a long history. NO LESSONS LEARNED TV coverage of the uprising across the world focused on stock images of burning buildings and petrol-bombers. But there are significant differences between these demonstrations and earlier ones. The crowds of violent protesters are much larger. And the protests are not just in Athens but in a host of towns across mainland Greece and the islands - and they have been going on for some time. That suggests that a great many young people have joined in the violence, and most had no previous contact with the anarchists. On the barricades that have sprung up everywhere you can find kids of 13 or 14. The government of course used the masked petrol-bombers to inspire fear of a "threat to democracy". "What democracy?" ask the protesters. It is true that schoolchildren and university students attacked police stations with rocks and that others damaged banks. But only a few days earlier the government, indifferent to the impoverishment of hundreds of thousands of Greeks, gave those banks a gift of 28bn ($39bn). And these are the banks which use private debt-collection agencies to insult and threaten anyone who owes them small sums of money, and to seize their property. But young people's anger hasn't yet led to their politicisation, at least not in the traditional sense. This is not surprising since the political parties themselves, with the exception of those of the far left, are deaf to the demands of the movement. open discussion, not even any sign that they have got the message, no lessons learned," said Fanaras. "It's as if they're just waiting for the young to get tired of smashing things up and believe that will be the end of the uprising." Some, he thinks, may retreat into passivity and isolation. Others may be drawn into terrorist groups. "It was already like that after the murder of Michel Kaltezas," said Alexandros Yiotis, a former journalist and "anarcho-syndicalist" who had been active in that movement in France, Spain and Greece. "In particular, they swelled the ranks of the [Greek] 17 November terrorist group." There are two striking things in the state propaganda relayed by the media, especially television. The first concerns the role of immigrants in the uprising. It is claimed that all the shops that were burned were targeted by hungry immigrants. And even that in Asia, for example, "it is standard practice: people demonstrate, break into shops and then loot them." But the violent protesters were, for the most part, ordinary Greeks, in revolt against a corrupt political system. And when Roma took part in some of the violence, they were avenging their own people, forgotten victims of police repression. Still, some of the looting was indeed the work of hungry crowds, Greek for the most part. "It's a new phenomenon," said one student. "In protests in the past you'd get students and trade unions at the front, then political parties with Syriza at the back. Behind them would be the anarchists and, when things kicked off, they would move among the ranks of Syriza and everyone would get beaten up. But now, behind the anarchists there's a new bloc - the hungry. Whether they are immigrants, drug addicts or down-and-outs, they know you can usually get something to eat on a protest." WORLD TURNED UPSIDE DOWN A second invention of the government and media is the claim that "angry citizens" have taken the law into their own hands to chase off rioters. On the contrary: they have often tried to chase off the riot police. Small shopkeepers shout at them to get lost; passers-by wade in to try and rescue students they've arrested. Having understood they cannot keep their children at home, parents and grandparents join them on the streets in order to look after them. A world turned upside down. Will the movement continue to grow? "There's plenty of fuel for it," said Dimitris Tsiodras, a journalist and political analyst. "For the global economic crisis will soon begin to bite here and a great many young people will remain marginalised; and the education system isn't exactly going to improve tomorrow morning, and there isn't any sign of an end to political corruption." It is not only a question for Greece. The movement has managed to export itself - or simply converge with others elsewhere. For one good reason: there is a whole generation, the first since the second world war, which has no hope for a better life than their parents. And that is not an exclusively Greek phenomenon. ############# http://www.zmag.org/znet/viewArticle/20040 UPDATE ON THE GREEK UPRISING Interviewing Nikos Raptis ZSpace - December 23, 2008 By Chris Spannos and Nikos Raptis Simmering social and material tensions in Greece were detonated by the police killing of 15-year-old Alexandros Gregoropoulos earlier this month on December 6th. The past three weeks have seen daily and nightly tumultuous clashes between those rising up and the Greek state. Demonstrations, protests, barricades, and riots have rocked the streets. TV stations, universities, high schools, workplaces, and city halls---overall hundreds of institutions---have been occupied. Last Saturday was an international day of solidarity with the Greek uprising. Labor and student demonstrations are scheduled to continue early in the new-year. Nikos Raptis is a resident of Athens and also a long-time contributor to Z, which happens to be named for the Costa-Gavras film, also titled Z, that is about resistance and repression in post-war Greece. Raptis's article, "Greek Teenagers," provides background to the uprising. Z collective member Chris Spannos interviewed Nikos for an update on the current status of the revolt. The interview took place between December 17-23. THE GREEK POPULACE CHRIS: First, moving into the third week of rebellion, can you give an overview of events this week and into the foreseeable future? What is the mood of those protesting and of broader society more generally? NIKOS: Chris, allow me, before we go ahead with the interview, to make a few comments on the mood that I [or any other person] find myself in these days. For example, in the morning of December 18 I read in the news: First: In the New York Times of December 17 we read: "Jose and his brother Romel [two Ecuadorian immigrants] appear to have been misidentified as gay as they walked home, arms around each other, on a predawn morning in the Bushwick section of Brooklyn. Romel managed to escape the three men who emerged from a passing car wielding a baseball bat and shouting anti-gay and anti-Latino epithets. Jose was struck on the head with a bottle, then kicked and beaten into unconsciousness... and expired last Friday night, one day before his mother, who was traveling from Ecuador, could reach him". Second: In today's Greek press we read: Alexis Gregoropoulos, the 15-year-old Greek, was murdered by a Greek policeman on December 6. Yesterday, 12 days after the murder of Alexis, around 11 am, a group of about 10 high school kids, members of the Coordinating Committee of their school, were assembled at an open public space at Peristeri [a rather downgraded part of Athens] discussing the program for the demonstrations of the next day. A shot was fired from some distance and a 17-year-old kid was hit on the palm of his right hand. The kid was operated upon this morning and a 38-caliber revolver bullet was extracted. According to the other kids a second shot was fired 10 minutes later from a closer distance. The government covered up the incident for 14 hours. Whoever did it, he scared the lights out of the parents of the uprisen Greek teenagers. The police have already leaked the "information" that it was a "crazy" [neighbor] that did it. My estimate is that it was done by one of the neo-Nazis that the government uses to do its dirty work. Again, this is my guess. Third: Again from the Greek press: The policeman that murdered the 15-year-old Alexis and the policeman with him during the act, were not jailed in the main Athens prison, as there was fear that the other prisoners might harm them. So, they were imprisoned in a small prison away from Athens. They were put in the same cell. Yesterday, after midnight, the murderer cop attacked his partner-cop in the cell, shouting that he [the partner] was a "demon" and that he [the murderer] wished to have a religious "confession" [to a priest]. The general feeling is that this is "theater" aiming to plead insanity for the pig. Also, as expected, it might be that the cop who did not use his gun is about to start "singing" and therefore the attack was in earnest. One can claim that the reference to the existence of murderous assholes in any society is a truism. That is correct. However, what needs to be answered is: why these murderous assholes feel that in our "order-and-security" societies they will [tacitly] have the protection of the police and of the [by definition conservative] judiciary? This is not an exaggeration! Any honest observer of what is going on in our societies will come to this conclusion. Now to answer your question: THE EVENTS The above items concerning Greece give you the answer for the most important events up to Wednesday, December 17. The wounding of the high school kid, in Peristeri, is taken very seriously by the ordinary Greeks. They are almost certain that whoever shot at the kid was shooting to kill. There is one eyewitness, who has not testified officially, yet. He attests that the shooting came from people dressed in civilian cloths in a car [a white "Citroen"] with a big radio antenna that sped away in a flash after the shooting. The police used to have this kind of car and antenna. This event, naturally, has increased the anger in the populace, especially of the revolted teenagers. On the other hand, after the shooting the parents will try to keep the kids out of the streets. Yet, the name of Peristeri, the site of shooting, is becoming an important word of the uprising. Already there has been a peaceful but massive demonstration at Peristeri to protest the shooting. >From December 17 to this day [Dec. 22] there were demonstrations but there were no burnings and damage of banks, shops, etc. in the downtown Athens area or other cities, as in the first days of the uprising. All these days since about December 17 the action has been precisely targeted and, in general, away from the center. CHRIS: What were the targets and how significant were they? NIKOS: The choice of targets is very revealing and of great sociopolitical significance. The targets were: The headquarters of the riot Police. The Police Academy, in New Philadelphia, in Northern Athens. The French Institute, where the Greek youth acquires French as a second or third language. My estimate is that it was targeted because of the Sarkozy "phenomenon". A government building where the data for people that have trouble paying, taxes, loans, etc. are stored. Sit-in by laborers at the General Federation of Workers of Greece. A US "constructed" labor syndicate, since 1947. Occupation of the law offices of Kougias, the "famous" lawyer who defends the policeman that murdered the young Alexis, and "tidying-up" of the establishment. Also, two attacks against Kougias at the city of Patras, this time the "illustrious" barrister was defended and saved by the police from possible severe "disciplining" by very angry youngsters. Attack against the police unit that guards the central complex of court buildings in Athens. Invasion of the National Theater and stopping of the show. Pelting of the [perennial] rightist Mayor of Salonica, a former M.D. and a track and field athlete, with candy, bon bons and castor sugar. The verbal reaction of the "cultured" mayor towards the young people that "offered" him the sweets: "You social outcasts!" The bystanders approved of the act of the...young people. One of the most important acts of the youths of Greece these last few days is the "creation" of the saga of the Christmas Tree at the very center of Athens, the Constitution Square. By the way, the Preamble of the US Constitution starts with the words "We the People". Article Three of the Greek Constitution dictates: "The established (used to be the "official") religion in Greece is the religion of the Eastern Orthodox Church of Christ. The Orthodox Church of Greece, that recognizes as its head our Lord Jesus Christ...", and so on. No wonder that the mayors of Athens, "socialists" or rightists, always strived to erect the most glorious plastic Christmas Tree in Europe. As most of the people in the world have seen on their TV screens the huge Grecian Orthodox Christmas Tree [a.k.a. Tannenbaum] was burned by the Greek teenagers et al, in the first face of the uprising. The rightist mayor of Athens, a certain Nikitas Kaklamanis [also an M.D.], with zingy energy managed to erect a new glorious plastic Orthodox Christmas Tree, in record time. A few days before that, the personnel [doctors, nurses, etc.] of one of the most important hospitals in Athens stepped out of the hospital on the street and started cleaning the windshields of the passing cars [symbolically] asking for money to buy gauze for the operation rooms of the hospital as there were none in the hospital because of lack of money. In the previous rightist government Kaklamanis was Minister of...Health. On Saturday, Dec. 20, a group of boys and girls, of the Superior School of Fine Arts [of University level] went to the central meat market in downtown Athens and asked the shopkeepers to "donate" to them all the spoiled meat available. The shopkeepers were more than enthusiastic and they added a half-boiled pig head to the donation. Then, securing and a sufficient number of plastic bags full of garbage, they proceeded to the Constitution Square and the Christmas tree. Where they started improving the decoration of the tree. The ordinary citizens present at the time encouraged the students. Finally, the riot police, and the firefighting trucks arrived, beat the hell out of the students and from then on the heroic policemen stand guard in full combat-gear all around the Orthodox Christmas Tree. The "joyful" saga of the Christmas Tree was accompanied by a characteristic act of police brutality a few blocks from the Christmas Tree. A young soldier in mufti walked down a main Athens street with his girl friend. For no reason at all a group of policemen on the sidewalk attack them and beat the young man hurting one of his eyes. An eye-witness, a lawyer, intervenes. He gets rough treatment by the police. The young man is arrested and he is now accused with very serious crimes. The "soldier-case" has become a very serious case of police brutality for the Greeks. About the foreseeable future. It seems that the present "intifada" of the Greek teenagers will not end as the youth uprisings of recent history [May '68, etc]. One new development that corroborates this view has been the spread of support for the Greek youth all over the world. My estimate is that the kids are very serious in the pursuit of their aims. Yet, no one can be certain. The most important future event is the nation-wide demonstration, on January 9, in memory of the murder of Nikos Temponeras, the young high school teacher of mathematics in the city of Patras years ago [in 1991], by the leader of the [rightist] Youth of New Democracy, the party of the present Greek government, who crushed the skull of the young teacher. This rather forgotten murder came back in the forefront because of the murder now of Alexis. My sense that is that the name of Temponeras, the martyr of Patras, will play a significant role with the teenagers as things develop. The 9th of January 2009 is a date to be studied with interest. As to the mood of those protesting and the broader society, Chris allow me to dwell a bit on this subject. As I have written in my previous ZNet Commentaries I think that in any given population, 1/3 of it, for a "strange" reason are people who consider themselves "conservative", that is "cryptofascist". Whether these people [mentioned as the "1/3" from now on] are born or "made" this way is irrelevant. This, naturally, holds also for the Greek population. These "conservative" Greeks think that the murderous armed policeman that killed Alexis, was defending himself, in the presence of half a dozen teenagers, and that he was right in killing the kid, whom they consider to be a bum. Also, they think that Kougias the "famous" lawyer is defending the policeman effectively, by claiming that the death of the kid was the "will of God" and that the "courts should decide if the death was necessary". If I may add a remark here Chris, this "1/3" of reactionary individuals might be the root of all evil in he world. The Minister of Justice, one person named Chatzigakis, or something, in the Greek Parliament stated that the British Government not only forgave the policeman who killed the Brazilian youth during the attack against the London subway a few years ago, "but reinstated him to active service". Therefore the Greek government should, etc. In the notoriously extreme rightist Sparta area, in Peloponnesus, there is a movement to raise money for the family of the murderous policeman! A group of "intellectuals" signed a declaration that confirms Noam Chomsky's opinion about them. The tenor of their text was that the kids were not doing the right thing. The worst reaction about the uprising of the teenagers was that of the Secretary of the central Committee of KKE [the Communist Party of Greece], Aleka Papariga. She insisted that this was not an "uprising", no matter how many the demonstrating youths. She claimed that revolutions happen only when the workers revolt under the guidance of the communist leadership. Also, she insinuated that the "Coalition of the Radical Left" [a formerly eurocommunist split from KKE] was condoning the burning, etc. An accusation that is not only incorrect but dishonest. The most dangerous group in the events of these past weeks was that of the neo-Nazis. The demonstrations, the burnings, the lootings, etc. gave them a golden chance to mix with the demonstrators and carry out their horrid work. [By the way, they call their Nazi organization the "Golden Dawn"!]. During the first days of the uprising they found the opportunity to mix with some shopkeeper that tried to protect their shops at Patras and did what some people called a "Kristallnacht" chasing people and breaking even into their houses. Similar acts by neo-Nazis were performed in the northern Greek city of Komotini. This behavior thrives through the protection of the neo-Nazis by the police. It seems that in the police corps there is a significant number of neo-Nazis of the "Golden Dawn". One of the most significant events during these days has been a video showing neo-Nazis [or policemen dressed as demonstrators] wielding crowbars, etc., walking out of a group of regular policemen and starting to break glass windows of shops. One of them using a regular...sledgehammer. However, what is of greater importance is the fact that the neo-Nazis, who operate in the fringes of the above 1/3, have managed to enter in the Greek parliament as an acceptable political party with a percentage of 3 to 4 % of the votes in the parliamentary elections. Most of the time in the parliament they try to present a "populist" image using the language and the arguments of the...communist party! However, yesterday their leader, bearing the Turkish [!] name Karatzaferis, a former journalist [and amateur boxer], asked the Parliament to vote for a new "special act". The history of the "special act" ["idionymo", in Greek] is one of the most sinister pages of the political life of Greece. This was a law "constructed", in 1929, by the famous "father" of the Greek nation, the "great democrat" Eleftherios Venizelos", whose innumerable marble or bronze statues are dispersed all over Greece. The "special act" was designed to start a brutal persecution of the Greek communists and anarchists, who "intended to overturn the established order". This was the beginning of a pogrom especially against the Greek communists that included, imprisonment, torture and later, after Venizelos, executions in the thousands, that lasted up to 1974. When Venizelos was told that the Greek fascists of that era were intent in overturning the established order, he declined to include the fascists in the "special Act"! Of course, all this shouting by Karatzaferis, the "representative" of the neo-Nazis in the Parliament, is simply posturing, because more than anyone else he knows that if the hoods are removed many of the faces under them will belong to "Golden Dawn" thugs or policemen. Chris, here at this point, I have to describe a situation that is of great importance in the political life in Greece. There are a few persons that dominate the news in the Greek society almost on a daily basis. These are the following: There is an upper level Orthodox Christian priest in Salonica [I don't know his rank but in his rank they call them "Saint"!] that goes by the name of Anthimos. For years now he delivers from the pulpit an incredibly extreme right wing and warlike political preaching that is very dangerous. For example, he threatens the Macedonians [the name, etc.] with invasion by the Greek army, or dares them a la W. Bush "let them (the Macedonians) come!" Who supports him in this kind of behavior? Again in Salonica, there is a guy by the name of Psomiadis, a rabid rightist, who plays the role of the prefect, who is the non-cassocked twin of Anthimos the priest. Although, once he came close to the black-cassocked priest when he donned a black "Zorro" costume and rode a horse. For years and years he appears on the TV screens from early in the morning. What might be his role? Then, there is Theodore Pangalos, a 70-year-old heavily overweight man, who is proud of his weight as is attested by the story that once with the microphones in the European Union[?] forgotten in active state he attacked Angela Merkel verbally by saying: "Has she ever been fucked by a fat man?", intending thus to show his prowess as a fat man. Pangalos is the grandchild of a military general with the same Christian name, who was a dictator [!] of Greece in 1925. As happens in some cases with the progeny of dictators Pangalos, the grandchild named himself a leftist and enter politics. Actually in the 60s he managed to be close to Mikis Theodorakis, the great composer and heroic figure of the Greek left. When the "socialists" won the elections in 1981 Pangalos joined them and for almost two decades he held ministerial positions in the "socialist" governments, mostly in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. The "peak" of his career came when in 1999, as a "socialist" Minister of Foreign Affairs, he delivered Ocalan, the leader of the Kurds, to the Turks who is rotting in the Turkish prisons since then. A couple of days ago Pangalos attacked the "Coalition of Radical Left" as "political bums" who supported the hooded rioters that burned, etc. The accusation is so blatantly false that one should ask himself where is Pangalos aiming, why, and who is supporting him in this provocative behavior for almost a half of a century? The fact is that for the last 48 hours all are talking about the word "bums" that Pangalos spat out of his mouth. The two other persons in the above category of "what-is-their-role" in the Greek society, are Kougias the lawyer and Karatzaferis the Leader of the extreme rightists in the Greek Parliament. There is one more new factor in this uprising in Greece; the immigrants. At first they did not participate in the riots. They only did most of the looting. However, in some cases they participated in the riots. This was a natural and expected thing to do. Most immigrants that were lucky enough to be dragged to a Greek police station, leave it as rabid haters of everything Greek. Sodomizing with broomsticks or clubs is the "mundane" procedure by the brave Greek policemen. The most tragic "description" of the procedure was offered by a young Albanian man, who, years ago, after declining to answer to the insistent questioning by Greek journalists he said that the Greek policemen did to him "what is done to women". The young Albanian was murdered in Albania, by the Albanian police, after having commandeered a Greek Bus. The most recent procedure by the Greek police, captured also on video, was to have an Albanian immigrant torture another Albanian for the enjoyment of the Greek policemen, members of a superior race. CHRIS: So what about the remaining 2/3 of the population? NIKOS: For the first time ordinary Greeks started throwing flower-pots against the police from their upper-floor apartment balconies. For the first time the ordinary Greeks took videos of the actions of the police from these balconies and distributed them to the media making public the brutality of the pigs. Actually the video with the sledgehammer is in black and white, which might mean that the camera was of an older era. Also, a young woman captured with her camera the scene of the departure of the two murderous policemen walking away from the murder scene of Alexis. A bit of information that is going to be used in court. The most proper word to describe the mood of the 2/3 populace is: "participatory". As for the teenagers and the students it is heartening to listen to them stating that they fight for "dignity", that they do not approve of barbaric "competition" in society, that they want real education and not cramming of their minds simply with "information". Also, it is heartening to see students and teenagers trying to extinguish fires or prevent destruction of small shops, while the "disciplined" demonstrators of the KKE were passing by in indifference. It seems that this time in their struggle is very serious. CHRIS: Is there anything particular about Greek society, history, or relations across generations that may help explain the revolt? NIKOS: There is a Greek "particularity" that might help in this struggle. The Greek family is still a very close-knit entity. The present teenagers are two generations away from the generation that experienced the Nazi occupation of 1941-1944 and the bloody revolt of the Left against the British and the US up to 1949. Yet in most Greek families there is a "residue" of that experience which, given the strong bonds in the family, enables the Greek teenagers to understand quite accurately how the world runs. This was corroborated, now, by the maturity of their views, as articulated during the last days. CHRIS: Could you outline some of the material conditions please, the ones affecting those rising up and calling for rebellion, for the youth, students, workers, migrants, etc.? NIKOS: The most important aspects of the material conditions are the joblessness, the salaries of what by now is called the "generation of the 700 Euros" [about US $ 970 per month], the University degrees that are almost useless, the flight of Greek companies to neighboring countries in search of cheap labor, the "flexible" treatment of hiring and firing, the unbelievably high prices in the Greek supermarkets much above the ones in the rest of the European Union, the scandalous treatment of the money of the taxpayers by the Government, the unbelievably bad condition of the National Health System, the exorbitant profits of the Greek banks, and finally the "strange" insistence of the Greek governing elite to follow the "neo-liberal" economic model after what has happened worldwide. THE STATE AND LEGAL SITUATION CHRIS: Tuesday (Dec. 16) Prime Minister Karamanlis said he accepted "a share of the blame" in the scandal involving a monastery which exchanged tracts of farmland in northern Greece for state-owned property in Athens. How has this affected the credibility of Karamanlis and his New Democracy party? Is this crisis of credibility extending beyond the politicians and parties who hold positions in the ruling apparatus, to a critique of the political apparatus itself? NIKOS: Karamanlis has received a savage ridicule from all quarters, except the "strange 1/3", who have invested in him a lot [material and immaterial]. However, even his people consider him as a not very capable "manager", that is they consider him as incompetent. That has been discussed confidentially even among his ministers. Almost all scandals in Greece are swept under the carpet. The principal factor in this rampant dishonesty, beside the politicians, is the extremely corrupt and reactionary judiciary, originally "constructed" by the CIA since 1947 [as most institutions in Greece] and undergoing the necessary "maintenance", ever since. The fact that the judges "used" by the dictators are still powerful in the judiciary is indicative of the truth of this. The "2/3" of the Greeks, as above described, know what is going on, but a part of them is trapped by the "socialists" in a client-relationship as voters, for economic reasons and the rest that are on the "real" left have an animus that has its roots in historical reasons. One way out of this impasse is for the leadership of the KKE [the "traditional" communists] to depart and the base of KKE, the ordinary members, to have the honesty to recognize past faults and join forces with the rest of the Left. The same holds also for the base of the "socialists". Personally I think that the teenager "intifada" will play a role, as the kids have gained a right to a dialogue with the adults in their families and society in general. The legal situation has reached the following point: The bullet that killed Alexis was examined in "Demokritos", the most important research center in Greece, and the findings show that there were traces of "silicon dioxide", which might mean the bullet hit some construction material before entering the body of Alexis. However, all eyewitnesses insist that the shots were horizontal, not in the air. That the fatal shot was horizontal has been confirmed by the in situ investigation by technical experts. The general consensus is that even if the bullet ricocheted, the use of a gun was criminal. Kougias, the defense lawyer, continues to provoke the entire Greek population in a queer way. Many people are really angry against him. It seems that his bravado is based not on courage but on some unfathomable motives. As for the policemen in prison, after the violent "theater" or real attack, there is nothing of importance about them. CHRIS: The police officer who shot dead Gregoropoulos has been charged with murder. How has this affected popular disaffection with the police? How has it affected the broader concern with worsening social and material conditions, and the need to change society? NIKOS: The public disaffection of the majority of the Greeks with the police has been a given for almost half a century. What is new is the reaction of the teenagers. The concern about the police during this period is minimal, in contrast to previous decades when the police could effect the ruining of lives or could bring about everyday misery for a part of the population. CHRIS: The Greek police have a history of violence and brutality. Do you think the Greek state is holding back repression of the uprising for fear of instigating even more militancy and revolt, for example, imagine the consequences if there was a police raid of the Athens Polytechnic University? NIKOS: The state is not holding back repression. The impression of the first couple of days, that the police acted "defensively", is inaccurate. CHRIS: How far can the uprising go? How is the Greek ruling apparatus responding? Do you think there is reason for them to be concerned about losing control? Do elites share a common strategy for how to deal with the uprising or is there differing opinions and fragmenting within their ranks? NIKOS: The uprising can go a long way. The crucial factors are the base of the KKE and the base of the "socialists" [PASOK]. There is no reason to be concerned about losing control. The Greek elites have always been dependent on the favor of the White House. The ones that have reason to be concerned are the people of the CIA station in the US Embassy in Athens. A strong, united Greek Left has historically been a nightmare for the US. CHRIS: Thank you Nikos. NIKOS: Thank you. ########################### From papadop at peak.org Thu Jan 1 21:14:08 2009 From: papadop at peak.org (MichaelP) Date: Thu Jan 1 21:14:23 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Greek rebellion - reflecting Autonomy and SXelf-Management. Message-ID: The author writes -- =========== http://www.zmag.org/zspace/commentaries/3728 ZSpace --December, 31 2008 By Chris Spannos * Chris Spannos is staff with Z, named after the 1969 Costa-Gavras film, also titled Z, that is about resistance and repression in post-war Greece. Chris has edited the book Real Utopia: Participatory Society for the 21st Century (AK Press, 2008). Autonomous, the word (Auto + Nom(os)), is, of course, derived from the Greek. Auto meaning "self," "same," and "spontaneous," and nomos meaning "law" or "custom"---as in, "one who gives oneself his or her own law is practicing the act of self-governance." CORNELIUS CASTORIADIS Inspired by the recent Greek rebellion, I am reminded of the Late Greek/French theorist of Autonomy and Self-Management, Cornelius Castoriadis, who made the distinction between those that think society's institutions, laws, traditions, beliefs, and behaviors are either the product of divine intervention (i.e. god/s) or hardwired into historical outcomes, and those who are aware of their self-conscious ability to transform society into something new and better. He called the latter "Autonomy." Castoriadis, widely considered one of the most serious theorists of democracy, was an ardent proponent of direct democracy. He believed equality and freedom were inseparable. "In Greece," wrote Castoriadis, "democracy was also called at the outset isonomy, equality of the law for everyone." ("Socialism and Autonomous Society," Political and Social Writings, Vol. 3, Minnesota, pg. 316, 1979). In Greece, decades before the police killing of 15-year-old Alexandros Grigoropoulos this December 6th, and in the immediate wave of uprising afterward, Greeks have resisted and rebelled against the material and social inequality that rules every moment and that makes "equality of the law for everyone" impossible. Greek resistance and rebellion is consistent with Castoriadis' autonomous project. Cornelius Castoriadis died eleven years ago on December 26th at the age of 75. He was a professional economist for the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development. As a youth Castoriadis became a Marxist and eventually joined the Greek Communist Party (KKE) but soon left, becoming a Trotskyist and highly critical of the KKE. In December of 1945 Castoriadis left Greece for Paris where he later broke with Trotskyism and founded the legendary revolutionary journal "Socialism or Barbarism" in 1948, launching its inaugural issue in 1949. The journal had such diverse and eclectic members as Claude Lefort, Jean-Francois Lyotard, and Guy Debord. Castoriadis also had connections with C.L.R James and had heavily influenced the London Solidarity Group and Maurice Brinton, a pen name for Christopher Agamemnon Pallis, an Anglo-Greek born in India who not only provided first hand journalistic accounts of key uprisings such as the Belgian general strike of 1960, the Paris uprising in May '68, but also wrote the pivotal pamphlet The Bolsheviks and Workers' Control about the suppression of workers' power in the aftermath of the Russian Revolution. (See Brinton," For Workers' Power, AK Press, 2004 for this collection). Brinton translated many of Castoriadis' writings into English for the London Solidarity Group. Castoriadis wrote under various pseudonyms to avoid French deportation, including Paul Cardan and Pierre Chaulieu. During this period Castoriadis became a leading theorist of the French New Left and proponent of widely held views among youth and student participants, not least via his influence on Daniel Cohn-Bendit and others centrally involved in the May '68 uprising in France which saw ten-million people rise up, turn society upside-down, then drift back into their everyday lives. These views included that orthodox communist movements were conservative and bureaucratic, and that Marxist theory itself was the source of these problems. After being influenced by the 1956 uprisings and worker council formations in both Hungary and Poland, Castoriadis published his classic 1957 Workers' Councils and the Economics of Self-Managed Society ("Socialism or Barbarism," No. 22). This was republished as a pamphlet by the London Solidarity Group in 1972, and their preface states "To the best of our knowledge [until Castoriadis] there have been no serious attempts by modern libertarian revolutionaries to grapple with the economic and political problems of a totally self-managed society." Castoriadis is relevant now not simply because of his Greek origins, and the current Greek uprising, nor his travails through support of but eventual departure from Marxism and communism, (it is interesting that, as Castoriadis would have likely predicted, the KKE has criticized and distanced themselves from today's youth lead uprising in Greece) or the influence of his thinking in '68, but because the world still needs an answer to the hard question he addressed of what a new society might look like. Castoriadis' main contribution one decade after his death is, therefore, that he sought to seriously answer this question. By now the anger and passion of the current Greek rebels, who have also set off solidarity actions across Europe and around the world, is being challenged by exhaustion, fatigue, and the holiday season lull. But all signs indicate that any cooling down period will retain enough smoldering fuel to quickly heat back up with economic crisis, renewed anger at police brutality, state repression and corruption, and steadily worsening social and material conditions. Major labor and student demonstrations are scheduled to take place in the new-year, on the second Friday of the first month of 2009, and so most commentators expect the uprising to continue. The first three-weeks of the revolt---a period when the Kathimerini newspaper published a widely quoted poll indicating that 60 percent of the Greek population shared the understanding that a social "uprising" was occurring---included mass mobilizations and demonstrations, barricades, clashes with police, the taking over of public institutions including three universities in Athens---the Polytechnic, Economics, and Law school buildings---the General Confederation of Workers (GSEE) building, and the law office of Kougias, the lawyer defending the policeman who murdered 15-year-old Alexis. The National Theater, a National T.V. station, radio stations, the French Institute, and various banks and police stations were also targets. There were also repeated attacks on the Christmas Tree, in the heart of Athens, in Constitution Square. In the case of the occupation of the national T.V. station mentioned above, on December 16th students disrupted the televised broadcast of Prime Minister Karamanlis addressing Greek parliament on the state of the country. The televised occupation lasted almost two minutes. Their largest banner read "Stop Watching, Get Out Onto the Streets," and smaller ones "Immediate Release of All Those Arrested," and "Freedom to All of Us." The station then cut to commercials. (Video here) On December 18th those rebelling dropped huge pink banners---calling for international solidarity with the uprising---at the ancient Athens location of the Acropolis. The banners bore the word "Resistance" in large black letters in Greek, English, Spanish, and German. In the third week of revolt reports claimed students were occupying approximately 800 high schools and 200 university departments across Greece. These institutions were taken over and transformed into centers of organizing and activism for revolt, for example the Polytechnic University in the Exarchia district of Athens, but also the "Liberated City Hall Of Aghios Dimitrios" whose communiqudeclared: "Within the frame of this insurrection, the City Hall of Aghios Dimitrios has been occupied since the morning of Thursday Dec. 11, so that it may become a place of counter-information, meeting, and self-organizing of the residents of the wider region and for the collective formation and implementation of actions. A main component of this occupation is the daily popular assembly with participation of up to 300 people, a process that functions in contrast to the entrusting of the management of our demands as well as of our struggles to whichever "representatives," elected or not. A process that tends to be implanted deeply into the consciousness of its participants [in] their role as political beings." While some occupations currently continue many, such as the Polytechnic and other schools have concluded, at least for the time being. According to Castoriadis, those who contest the established order by revolting against existing institutions to transform or create new ones act to serve their own interests. An "Autonomous" action then would be one in which people, as individuals or as a collective, act with their own independent objectives in mind. These objectives are totally different from the objectives of those empowered to rule society as order-givers over those disempowered as order-takers. The agents of change include workers in class struggle, but also students, youth, women, minorities, etc.: "The transformation of society, the instauration of an autonomous society involves a process that cannot be accomplished either uniquely or mainly in the production process. Either the idea of a transformation of society is a fiction without any interest, or the contestation of the established order, the struggle for autonomy, the creation of new forms of individual and collective life are invading and will invade (through conflict and with contradictions) all spheres of social life. Among these spheres, none plays a 'determining' role, even in the 'last instance.' The very idea of any such 'determination' is nonsense." (Political and Social Writings, Ibid. pg.328). Autonomous action addressing the Totality of social relations becomes possible when people defined by their genders, sexuality, class, culture, community, etc., see themselves as agents for themselves concerned with their own material and social fate in society. The struggle against the established order and toward a new society demands new consciousness. Autonomy in consciousness means gaining as much understanding and insight as possible into the influences that shape our thinking and becoming as free as possible from alienation and rationalizing our oppressions. (See also Maurice Brinton, "Solidarity and the Neo-Narodniks," For Workers' Power, AK Press, 2004, original 1972). Realizing autonomy in consciousness is a difficult process. It includes becoming aware of the oppressions that afflict us and their sources in the hierarchical institutions that define society. The struggle to free oneself and others from these oppressions is made very difficult as the oppressions are often produced and re-produced in obscure social and material patterns that surreptitiously shape the human condition and human needs. The struggle for autonomy is the struggle for emancipation from the institutions that produce and reproduce society's alienation, class rule, sexism, and racism and to create new institutions that produce self-management, classlessness, diversity, and participation in all spheres of life. In Castoriadis' vision of a Self-Managed Society economic life is organized by federated workers' councils, council administration, and economic planning. To avoid the command structures and bureaucracy of centrally planned economies the councils "will collect, transmit and disseminate information collected and conveyed to them by local groups." The center and periphery of a council society will have a "two-way flow of information" and there will also be a reorganization and transformation of work including the division of labor. For Castoriadis, equitable and full participation in the economy is key. (Workers' Councils and the Economics of Self-Managed Society, Ibid.) However, while Castoriadis was a pioneer in championing a non-market, worker council vision, much has been learned since by others who have developed more effective planning procedures that allow for greater council self-management than his early model from 1957. (Ibid.) A modern-day leading candidate for a possible Self-Managed Society that is directly within the tradition of Castoriadis, and even inspired by some of his ideas on this topic, would be the Participatory Society vision. This vision shares many commonalities with Castoriadis' proposal, especially in spirit and goals. In their specific conception, however, there are also some important differences. The contemporary vision of a "Participatory Society" I am referring to (and described in greater detail in the book I have edited, Real Utopia: Participatory Society for the 21st Century published by AK Press, 2008) encompasses new social and material relations in all spheres of life. It aims to be a self-managed society, meaning institutions would convey to people decision-making input in proportion to how they are affected by a decision. It also aims to be a solidarity society, meaning its institutions create a context in which people care about one another; and a classless society, meaning, its institutions convey to all economic participants comparable influence and wealth via a balanced division of labor, an equitable and fair remuneration scheme, and self-managed decision-making; finally, it means to be a diverse society, where there are multiple lifestyle outcomes and options to choose from. In the current vision of a Participatory Society, the sphere that is (so far) most developed is the economy, although some insights have also been developed for other spheres of life. The vision is not a blueprint, nor detailed map. It will require further development by all who care to realize such a society. Also, it is not a society conceived for perfect human beings. It does not assume moral purity nor propose some heaven on earth, a place for angels rather than human beings. Instead, this vision comes from past and present struggles and thoughts---not least the work of Castoriadis---and is rooted in real world conditions for real people. Advocates of this new view of a Participatory Society propose that social vision should broadly encompass the core structures for economic production, consumption, and allocation; political adjudication, law making, and legislation; culture and community religious, spiritual, national, ethnic and racial identifications and practices; and kinship procreation, child rearing and socialization of future generations; enabling as well of course, that all of society rests on a sustainable ecological foundation which all species interact with and rely on. This vision is spelled out in much more detail elsewhere and requires more space than is allowed here. Parecon, the economy of a Participatory Society, was initially developed by Michael Albert and Robin Hahnel and is the most developed part of the conception. A parecon is comprised of social rather than private or state ownership of productive assets; nested worker and consumer council's and balanced job complexes rather than corporate divisions of labor; remuneration for effort and sacrifice rather than for property, power, or output; participatory planning rather than markets or central planning; and self-management rather than class rule. We believe that this economic vision, and the overall proposal for a Participatory Society, is in the best spirit of Left history, theory, and practice. In the tradition of Castoriadis' vision, it is an attempt to grapple with the question of what a Totally Self-Managed Society might look like in its basic institutions even as its members define its policies and trajectories. And once again, arriving at such a shared vision is a task that we will all need to participate in. From thinker at thelakebc.ca Thu Jan 1 22:31:31 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Thu Jan 1 22:27:43 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Greek rebellion - reflecting Autonomy and SXelf-Management. In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <200901020427.n024RSpA022592@karma.reboot.ca> I wish our Greek friends the best of luck and future, as I wish for every nation and society on Earth, but their beautiful plans are not going to work, because no economic theories have ever worked on the long run, they were all taken over by ruling classes. I have seen all of them and wish them all to hell. It is time to get rid of theories and replace them with realities. Cheers, Ed. t 07:14 PM 01/01/2009, you wrote: >The author writes -- > >Greek/French theorist of Autonomy and Self-Management, Cornelius >Castoriadis, who made the distinction between those that think >society's institutions, laws, traditions, beliefs, and behaviors are >either the product of divine intervention (i.e. god/s) or hardwired >into historical outcomes, and those who are aware of their >self-conscious ability to transform society into something new and >better. He called the latter "Autonomy."> > > =========== > >http://www.zmag.org/zspace/commentaries/3728 > > >ZSpace --December, 31 2008 > By Chris Spannos > > * Chris Spannos is staff with Z, named after the 1969 > Costa-Gavras film, also titled Z, that is about resistance and > repression in post-war Greece. Chris has edited the book Real > Utopia: Participatory Society for the 21st Century (AK Press, 2008). > >Autonomous, the word (Auto + Nom(os)), is, of course, derived from >the Greek. Auto meaning "self," "same," and "spontaneous," and nomos >meaning "law" or "custom"---as in, "one who gives oneself his or her >own law is practicing the act of self-governance." > > >CORNELIUS CASTORIADIS > >Inspired by the recent Greek rebellion, I am reminded of the Late >Greek/French theorist of Autonomy and Self-Management, Cornelius >Castoriadis, who made the distinction between those that think >society's institutions, laws, traditions, beliefs, and behaviors are >either the product of divine intervention (i.e. god/s) or hardwired >into historical outcomes, and those who are aware of their >self-conscious ability to transform society into something new and >better. He called the latter "Autonomy." > >Castoriadis, widely considered one of the most serious theorists of >democracy, was an ardent proponent of direct democracy. He believed >equality and freedom were inseparable. "In Greece," wrote >Castoriadis, "democracy was also called at the outset isonomy, >equality of the law for everyone." ("Socialism and Autonomous >Society," Political and Social Writings, Vol. 3, Minnesota, pg. 316, >1979). In Greece, decades before the police killing of 15-year-old >Alexandros Grigoropoulos this December 6th, and in the immediate >wave of uprising afterward, Greeks have resisted and rebelled >against the material and social inequality that rules every moment >and that makes "equality of the law for everyone" impossible. Greek >resistance and rebellion is consistent with Castoriadis' autonomous project. > >Cornelius Castoriadis died eleven years ago on December 26th at the >age of 75. He was a professional economist for the Organization for >Economic Cooperation and Development. As a youth Castoriadis became >a Marxist and eventually joined the Greek Communist Party (KKE) but >soon left, becoming a Trotskyist and highly critical of the KKE. In >December of 1945 Castoriadis left Greece for Paris where he later >broke with Trotskyism and founded the legendary revolutionary >journal "Socialism or Barbarism" in 1948, launching its inaugural >issue in 1949. > >The journal had such diverse and eclectic members as Claude Lefort, >Jean-Francois Lyotard, and Guy Debord. Castoriadis also had >connections with C.L.R James and had heavily influenced the London >Solidarity Group and Maurice Brinton, a pen name for Christopher >Agamemnon Pallis, an Anglo-Greek born in India who not only provided >first hand journalistic accounts of key uprisings such as the >Belgian general strike of 1960, the Paris uprising in May '68, but >also wrote the pivotal pamphlet The Bolsheviks and Workers' Control >about the suppression of workers' power in the aftermath of the >Russian Revolution. (See Brinton," For Workers' Power, AK Press, >2004 for this collection). Brinton translated many of Castoriadis' >writings into English for the London Solidarity Group. > >Castoriadis wrote under various pseudonyms to avoid French >deportation, including Paul Cardan and Pierre Chaulieu. During this >period Castoriadis became a leading theorist of the French New Left >and proponent of widely held views among youth and student >participants, not least via his influence on Daniel Cohn-Bendit and >others centrally involved in the May '68 uprising in France which >saw ten-million people rise up, turn society upside-down, then drift >back into their everyday lives. These views included that orthodox >communist movements were conservative and bureaucratic, and that >Marxist theory itself was the source of these problems. > >After being influenced by the 1956 uprisings and worker council >formations in both Hungary and Poland, Castoriadis published his >classic 1957 Workers' Councils and the Economics of Self-Managed >Society ("Socialism or Barbarism," No. 22). This was republished as >a pamphlet by the London Solidarity Group in 1972, and their preface >states "To the best of our knowledge [until Castoriadis] there have >been no serious attempts by modern libertarian revolutionaries to >grapple with the economic and political problems of a totally >self-managed society." > >Castoriadis is relevant now not simply because of his Greek origins, >and the current Greek uprising, nor his travails through support of >but eventual departure from Marxism and communism, (it is >interesting that, as Castoriadis would have likely predicted, the >KKE has criticized and distanced themselves from today's youth lead >uprising in Greece) or the influence of his thinking in '68, but >because the world still needs an answer to the hard question he >addressed of what a new society might look like. Castoriadis' main >contribution one decade after his death is, therefore, that he >sought to seriously answer this question. > >By now the anger and passion of the current Greek rebels, who have >also set off solidarity actions across Europe and around the world, >is being challenged by exhaustion, fatigue, and the holiday season >lull. But all signs indicate that any cooling down period will >retain enough smoldering fuel to quickly heat back up with economic >crisis, renewed anger at police brutality, state repression and >corruption, and steadily worsening social and material conditions. >Major labor and student demonstrations are scheduled to take place >in the new-year, on the second Friday of the first month of 2009, >and so most commentators expect the uprising to continue. > >The first three-weeks of the revolt---a period when the Kathimerini >newspaper published a widely quoted poll indicating that 60 percent >of the Greek population shared the understanding that a social >"uprising" was occurring---included mass mobilizations and >demonstrations, barricades, clashes with police, the taking over of >public institutions including three universities in Athens---the >Polytechnic, Economics, and Law school buildings---the General >Confederation of Workers (GSEE) building, and the law office of >Kougias, the lawyer defending the policeman who murdered 15-year-old >Alexis. The National Theater, a National T.V. station, radio >stations, the French Institute, and various banks and police >stations were also targets. There were also repeated attacks on the >Christmas Tree, in the heart of Athens, in Constitution Square. > >In the case of the occupation of the national T.V. station mentioned >above, on December 16th students disrupted the televised broadcast >of Prime Minister Karamanlis addressing Greek parliament on the >state of the country. The televised occupation lasted almost two >minutes. Their largest banner read "Stop Watching, Get Out Onto the >Streets," and smaller ones "Immediate Release of All Those >Arrested," and "Freedom to All of Us." The station then cut to >commercials. (Video here) > >On December 18th those rebelling dropped huge pink banners---calling >for international solidarity with the uprising---at the ancient >Athens location of the Acropolis. The banners bore the word >"Resistance" in large black letters in Greek, English, Spanish, and >German. In the third week of revolt reports claimed students were >occupying approximately 800 high schools and 200 university >departments across Greece. These institutions were taken over and >transformed into centers of organizing and activism for revolt, for >example the Polytechnic University in the Exarchia district of >Athens, but also the "Liberated City Hall Of Aghios Dimitrios" whose >communiqudeclared: > >"Within the frame of this insurrection, the City Hall of Aghios >Dimitrios has been occupied since the morning of Thursday Dec. 11, >so that it may become a place of counter-information, meeting, and >self-organizing of the residents of the wider region and for the >collective formation and implementation of actions. A main component >of this occupation is the daily popular assembly with participation >of up to 300 people, a process that functions in contrast to the >entrusting of the management of our demands as well as of our >struggles to whichever "representatives," elected or not. A process >that tends to be implanted deeply into the consciousness of its >participants [in] their role as political beings." > >While some occupations currently continue many, such as the >Polytechnic and other schools have concluded, at least for the time being. > >According to Castoriadis, those who contest the established order by >revolting against existing institutions to transform or create new >ones act to serve their own interests. An "Autonomous" action then >would be one in which people, as individuals or as a collective, act >with their own independent objectives in mind. These objectives are >totally different from the objectives of those empowered to rule >society as order-givers over those disempowered as order-takers. The >agents of change include workers in class struggle, but also >students, youth, women, minorities, etc.: > >"The transformation of society, the instauration of an autonomous >society involves a process that cannot be accomplished either >uniquely or mainly in the production process. Either the idea of a >transformation of society is a fiction without any interest, or the >contestation of the established order, the struggle for autonomy, >the creation of new forms of individual and collective life are >invading and will invade (through conflict and with contradictions) >all spheres of social life. Among these spheres, none plays a >'determining' role, even in the 'last instance.' The very idea of >any such 'determination' is nonsense." (Political and Social >Writings, Ibid. pg.328). > >Autonomous action addressing the Totality of social relations >becomes possible when people defined by their genders, sexuality, >class, culture, community, etc., see themselves as agents for >themselves concerned with their own material and social fate in society. > >The struggle against the established order and toward a new society >demands new consciousness. Autonomy in consciousness means gaining >as much understanding and insight as possible into the influences >that shape our thinking and becoming as free as possible from >alienation and rationalizing our oppressions. (See also Maurice >Brinton, "Solidarity and the Neo-Narodniks," For Workers' Power, AK >Press, 2004, original 1972). Realizing autonomy in consciousness is >a difficult process. It includes becoming aware of the oppressions >that afflict us and their sources in the hierarchical institutions >that define society. The struggle to free oneself and others from >these oppressions is made very difficult as the oppressions are >often produced and re-produced in obscure social and material >patterns that surreptitiously shape the human condition and human >needs. The struggle for autonomy is the struggle for emancipation >from the institutions that produce and reproduce society's >alienation, class rule, sexism, and racism and to create new >institutions that produce self-management, classlessness, diversity, >and participation in all spheres of life. > >In Castoriadis' vision of a Self-Managed Society economic life is >organized by federated workers' councils, council administration, >and economic planning. To avoid the command structures and >bureaucracy of centrally planned economies the councils "will >collect, transmit and disseminate information collected and conveyed >to them by local groups." The center and periphery of a council >society will have a "two-way flow of information" and there will >also be a reorganization and transformation of work including the >division of labor. For Castoriadis, equitable and full participation >in the economy is key. (Workers' Councils and the Economics of >Self-Managed Society, Ibid.) > >However, while Castoriadis was a pioneer in championing a >non-market, worker council vision, much has been learned since by >others who have developed more effective planning procedures that >allow for greater council self-management than his early model from >1957. (Ibid.) > >A modern-day leading candidate for a possible Self-Managed Society >that is directly within the tradition of Castoriadis, and even >inspired by some of his ideas on this topic, would be the >Participatory Society vision. This vision shares many commonalities >with Castoriadis' proposal, especially in spirit and goals. In their >specific conception, however, there are also some important differences. > >The contemporary vision of a "Participatory Society" I am referring >to (and described in greater detail in the book I have edited, Real >Utopia: Participatory Society for the 21st Century published by AK >Press, 2008) encompasses new social and material relations in all >spheres of life. It aims to be a self-managed society, meaning >institutions would convey to people decision-making input in >proportion to how they are affected by a decision. It also aims to >be a solidarity society, meaning its institutions create a context >in which people care about one another; and a classless society, >meaning, its institutions convey to all economic participants >comparable influence and wealth via a balanced division of labor, an >equitable and fair remuneration scheme, and self-managed >decision-making; finally, it means to be a diverse society, where >there are multiple lifestyle outcomes and options to choose from. > >In the current vision of a Participatory Society, the sphere that is >(so far) most developed is the economy, although some insights have >also been developed for other spheres of life. The vision is not a >blueprint, nor detailed map. It will require further development by >all who care to realize such a society. Also, it is not a society >conceived for perfect human beings. It does not assume moral purity >nor propose some heaven on earth, a place for angels rather than >human beings. Instead, this vision comes from past and present >struggles and thoughts---not least the work of Castoriadis---and is >rooted in real world conditions for real people. > >Advocates of this new view of a Participatory Society propose that >social vision should broadly encompass the core structures for >economic production, consumption, and allocation; political >adjudication, law making, and legislation; culture and community >religious, spiritual, national, ethnic and racial identifications >and practices; and kinship procreation, child rearing and >socialization of future generations; enabling as well of course, >that all of society rests on a sustainable ecological foundation >which all species interact with and rely on. > >This vision is spelled out in much more detail elsewhere and >requires more space than is allowed here. Parecon, the economy of a >Participatory Society, was initially developed by Michael Albert and >Robin Hahnel and is the most developed part of the conception. A >parecon is comprised of social rather than private or state >ownership of productive assets; nested worker and consumer council's >and balanced job complexes rather than corporate divisions of labor; >remuneration for effort and sacrifice rather than for property, >power, or output; participatory planning rather than markets or >central planning; and self-management rather than class rule. > >We believe that this economic vision, and the overall proposal for a >Participatory Society, is in the best spirit of Left history, >theory, and practice. In the tradition of Castoriadis' vision, it is >an attempt to grapple with the question of what a Totally >Self-Managed Society might look like in its basic institutions even >as its members define its policies and trajectories. And once again, >arriving at such a shared vision is a task that we will all need to >participate in. > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not > > >No virus found in this incoming message. >Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com >Version: 8.0.176 / Virus Database: 270.10.2/1871 - Release Date: >1/1/2009 5:01 PM From glparramatta at greenleft.org.au Fri Jan 2 02:53:06 2009 From: glparramatta at greenleft.org.au (glparramatta) Date: Fri Jan 2 03:07:46 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] What's new at Links: Gaza massacre; economic crisis; French new left party and more Message-ID: <495DD5F1.20606@greenleft.org.au> What's new at Links: Gaza massacre; economic crisis; French new left party; El Salvador; Pakistan; Venezuela; Mexico photos; Zimbabwe debate; Nicaragua; Climate change * * * Subscribe free to Links - International Journal of Socialist Renewal - at http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=343373 Visit and bookmark http://links.org.au and add it to your RSS feed (http://links.org.au/rss.xml). If you would like us to consider an article, please send it to links@dsp.org.au *Please pass on to anybody you think will be interested in /Links/. * * * Palestinians, solidarity activists condemn Israel's mass slaughter in Gaza, call for protests and sanctions (updated Dec. 29) [Please check the comments section below these statements for demonstrations in your part of the world.] Occupied Ramallah, Palestine -- December 27, 2008 -- Today, the Israeli occupation army committed a new massacre in Gaza, causing the death and injury of hundreds of Palestinian civilians [latest reports place the death toll at more than 200], including a yet unknown number of schoolchildren who were headed home from school when the first Israeli military strikes started. This latest bloodbath, although far more ruthless than all its predecessors, is not Israel's first. It culminates months of an Israeli siege of Gaza that should be widely condemned and prosecuted as an act of genocide against the 1.5 million Palestinians in the occupied coastal strip. * Read more Two paths in the face of the capitalism's global fracture By Luis Bilbao, translated from the December 2008-January 2009 issue of America XXI by Federico Fuentes, for Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal. Luis Bilbao will be a featured international speaker at the World at a Crossroads conference , in Sydney, April 10-13, 2009. * Read more France: New Anti-Capitalist Party `a very exciting initiative' December 22, 2008 -- There's been surprisingly little discussion in the UK on the launching of the New Anti-Capitalist Party (Nouveau Parti anticapitaliste or NPA) over the water in France. I thought I'd take a look at this interesting and significant new development and so I spoke to John Mullen, the editor of Socialisme International, to see if I could find out more. * Read more End of neoliberalism? Sorry, not yet By Patrick Bond December 26, 2008 -- Those who declare that the Great Crash of Late 2008 heralds the end of free market economic philosophy -- "neoliberalism" for short -- are not paying close enough attention. * Read more El Salvador: Video -- Unidos por el cambio (Democracy and the 2009 Salvadorean election By Committee with the People of El Salvador (CISPES)(USA) Recent polls in El Salvador show that the leftist FMLN party is 15% ahead over the right-wing presidential candidate from the ruling party. This only confirms what Salvadorans in the social movement, members of the FMLN, and the general public have been saying all along: El Salvador is the next in line to join the Latin American shift to the left! * Read more Pakistan: Joint left demonstration against India-Pakistan war drive By Javed Ahmad December 20, 2008 -- While the danger of war between India and Pakistan is accelerates, a peace demonstration in Lahore on December 20 demanded no war between the two countries. More than 100 activists of the Labour Party Pakistan and the Communist Mazdoor Kissan Party (CMKP) demanded an end of war fanaticism. * Read more Venezuela 2008: Balance sheet of the revolutionary process By Gonzalo Gomez December 17, 2008 -- During 2008, our revolutionary process has had its ebbs and flows. Overall, we had significant progress, especially in the recuperation of sovereignty, with the nationalisations and the electoral victories in the great majority of governorships and mayoralties. The right-wing also had its successes, as it managed to retain and seize several strategic places. The process is not linear, but the revolution needs to move forward in a permanent manner or the hangover of a counterrevolution will raze the achievements obtained, including the crushing of the vanguard. * Read more Photo essay: Oaxaca, Mexico -- `Living Under the Trees' A photo essay by David Bacon December 23, 2008 -- About 30 million Mexicans survive on less than 30 pesos per day -- not quite US$3. The minimum wage is 45 pesos per day. The Mexican federal government estimates that 37.7 per cent of its 106 million citizens -- 40 million people -- live in poverty. Some 25 million, or 23.6 per cent, live in extreme poverty. In rural Mexico, more than 10 million people have a daily income of less than 12 pesos -- a little more than $1. It's no accident the state of Oaxaca is one of the main starting points for the current stream of Mexican migrants coming to the United States. Extreme poverty encompasses 75 per cent of its 3.4 million residents, according to EDUCA, a Mexican education and development organisation. * Read more Lessons of Zimbabwe: An exchange between Patrick Bond and Mahmood Mamdani December 2008 -- Mahmood Mamdani is an inspiring intellectual and political writer, one of Africa's greatest ever. But I think there are a few points raised in his recent London Review of Books article, ``Lessons of Zimbabwe'' (see full text in the appendix at the end of this article; quotes from Mamdani's article are in indented italics) that are worth debating. * Read more A government in pandemonium: The first nine month of Pakistan Peoples Party rule By Farooq Tariq December 22, 2008 -- Instability, price hikes, growing unemployment and rising debts are the hallmarks of the first nine months of the Pakistan Peoples Party (PPP) government. There are daily demonstrations across Pakistan around one or another of these issues. There is a real danger of a war between Pakistan and India after the Mumbai terrorist attack on November 26. The statement by Pakistan's President Asif Ali Zardari about the doubtful Pakistani identity of Ajmal Qasab, the only terrorist captured alive, did not go down very well within the Indian establishment. The joint war-room meeting of all the Indian government's important officials is a very serious matter. * Read more In defence of Nicaragua's sovereignty, in opposition to imperialist destabilisation December 21, 2008 -- This is an appeal in defence of Nicaraguan sovereignty, in opposition to an imperialist destablisation campaign to undermine, and possibly topple, the Sandinista government. The pretext, phoney as usual, is the claim that the municipal elections in November were rigged. But the real aim of this phoney campaign is to blackmail and intimidate the Sandinista National Liberation Front (FSLN) government to back down -- and override the will of the majority as expressed in the election and as recognised by the Supreme Electoral Council that includes both FSLN and opposition party supporters. * Read more Spend the trillions on climate! By Martin Khor December 15, 2008 -- The two crises of our times -- economic recession and global warming -- should be tackled together. The trillions of dollars earmarked for economic recovery can be spent to fight climate change. The economic crisis should not stop governments from serious action to combat climate change, but should instead be an opportunity to fund climate-related activities. * Read more * * * /Links/ seeks to promote the international exchange of information, experience of struggle, theoretical analysis and views of political strategy and tactics within the international left. It is a forum for open and constructive dialogue between active socialists coming from different political traditions. It seeks to bring together those in the international left who are opposed to neoliberal economic and social policies. It aims to promote the renewal of the socialist movement in the wake of the collapse of the bureaucratic model of "actually existing socialism" in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. ATTENTION: Sign up for regular ``what's new'' announcement emails at http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=343373 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090102/74ec55cf/attachment.html From creuss at bluewin.ch Fri Jan 2 06:45:17 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Fri Jan 2 06:46:45 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Greek rebellion - reflecting Autonomy and SXelf-Management. Message-ID: > Autonomy and Self-Management Greece is a member state of the EU. How can there be autonomy and self- management under the Brussels snouts? As for the "black bloc" types torching shops as they "lead" this "uprising": Are they autonomous or hired by Soros? Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From creuss at bluewin.ch Fri Jan 2 07:15:15 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Fri Jan 2 07:16:42 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Re: predators unbound ... Message-ID: Dave Patterson wrote: > I think before I would want to say much else about Quinn I would need to > know exactly why you seem to dislike him so much - it's been awhile since > I read the books, but it seems to me his basic point was that there are > two kinds of people, whom he identified as 'givers' and 'takers', which > would correspond to our producer-predator idea I dislike Quinn for the same reason that I dislike Marx: He's a predator who spreads a false dichotomy, in order to sell some predators as good guys and smear producers as bad guys. Quinn's "takers" include producers and Quinn's "givers" include predators! He assigns progress to the "takers" and backwardness to the "givers" when the opposite is true. > - they're both just metaphors anyway False, misleading metaphors are harmful. > But you can hardly blame an author for what readers take from a work I blame the author for his deliberately fraudulent metaphor. > the world is too big and complex for anyone to explain all of relevance > in a book of a few hundred pages This excuse is absurd considering how wasteful of words Quinn and Marx are. They actually use a sea of words to muddle their swindle. > there will always be mistakes and blind spots No, the fraud is deliberate. It's not a bug, it's a feature. > I don't quite see how you can say you don't believe a talking gorilla has > anything to say, but then say that the gorilla gave you an insight into > what the predators are thinking No, I didn't say a talking gorilla gave me an insight, but Quinn's writing (using a gorilla metaphor and the content of what Quinn has the gorilla say) gave me an insight (or rather, confirmed previous insights) on how predators are misleading/fooling readers into believing false dichotomies. Even you and Yves, who are supposed to be non-lemmings, swallowed Quinn's false dichotomy. > but whatever it is, I don't agree You don't seem to know what you disagree with. > the predators might want to take the condition of the people they rule > back to feudal times, but I don't think they themselves have any desire > to go back to living in cold castles heated imperfectly by wood fires etc I didn't claim the latter. Of course the predators want every luxury for themselves and use the most modern tools of oppression. But what they want for the others is an entirely different thing. (Does Quinn actually live "hairshirt style"?) Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From siamdave at yahoo.ca Fri Jan 2 08:36:45 2009 From: siamdave at yahoo.ca (Dave Patterson) Date: Fri Jan 2 08:36:51 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Re: predators unbound ... In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <200901022136450203.00AA4D2B@smtp-adsl.totonline.net> Two things. 1. Can you square these things for me? In the email that started this small conversation, you said "...What was its effect? To me, Quinn's parable showed once more that predators have a longing to go back to the past, be it stone age or feudalism..." and in this most recent one I say "...I don't think they themselves have any desire to go back to living in cold castles heated imperfectly by wood fires etc..." to which you reply "... I didn't claim the latter..." - In what way did I misinterpret or take out of context your first comment ("...predators have a longing to go back to the past, be it stone age or feudalism..."...) ? 2. Chris, do you understand the difference between taking a position and defending it against all comers, as if life was just a hockey game in which we choose sides and anyone who disagreed with any small thing you said was your enemy to be put down at any cost, and just having a discussion amongst peers trying to arrive at a clearer understanding of a situation, without all the shit and abuse? If the former is how you see these exchanges, as it appears to be, then this really will be the last you hear from me, as it is very much not how I see them, and whilst I enjoy sharing and debating ideas, I have no desire to pretend ideas are 2x4s with which we must subdue the enemy!!! - I'm not intimidated by you, don't get the wrong idea, I just, in my own life, save the serious ammo for the real enemy, which I don't really think you are .... you seem to have a rather black and white view of the world (Chomsky, Quinn, Marx, anyone it appears who dares to have some position you don't agree with immediately becomes the enemy, rather than someone who is mostly doing or saying good stuff) - and I see it as much more of a grey place - some things are fairly clear, certainly, but there are also endless nuances, and I don't pretend to have all the answers. And I tend to regard people who tell me they do have those answers with considerable scepticism. *********** REPLY SEPARATOR *********** On 09-01-02 at 2:15 PM creuss@bluewin.ch wrote: >Dave Patterson wrote: >> I think before I would want to say much else about Quinn I would need to >> know exactly why you seem to dislike him so much - it's been awhile since >> I read the books, but it seems to me his basic point was that there are >> two kinds of people, whom he identified as 'givers' and 'takers', which >> would correspond to our producer-predator idea > >I dislike Quinn for the same reason that I dislike Marx: He's a predator >who spreads a false dichotomy, in order to sell some predators as good guys >and smear producers as bad guys. Quinn's "takers" include producers and >Quinn's "givers" include predators! He assigns progress to the "takers" >and backwardness to the "givers" when the opposite is true. > > >> - they're both just metaphors anyway > >False, misleading metaphors are harmful. > > >> But you can hardly blame an author for what readers take from a work > >I blame the author for his deliberately fraudulent metaphor. > > >> the world is too big and complex for anyone to explain all of relevance >> in a book of a few hundred pages > >This excuse is absurd considering how wasteful of words Quinn and Marx are. >They actually use a sea of words to muddle their swindle. > > >> there will always be mistakes and blind spots > >No, the fraud is deliberate. It's not a bug, it's a feature. > > >> I don't quite see how you can say you don't believe a talking gorilla has >> anything to say, but then say that the gorilla gave you an insight into >> what the predators are thinking > >No, I didn't say a talking gorilla gave me an insight, but Quinn's writing >(using a gorilla metaphor and the content of what Quinn has the gorilla >say) >gave me an insight (or rather, confirmed previous insights) on how >predators >are misleading/fooling readers into believing false dichotomies. > >Even you and Yves, who are supposed to be non-lemmings, swallowed Quinn's >false dichotomy. > > >> but whatever it is, I don't agree > >You don't seem to know what you disagree with. > > >> the predators might want to take the condition of the people they rule >> back to feudal times, but I don't think they themselves have any desire >> to go back to living in cold castles heated imperfectly by wood fires etc > >I didn't claim the latter. Of course the predators want every luxury for >themselves and use the most modern tools of oppression. But what they want >for the others is an entirely different thing. (Does Quinn actually live >"hairshirt style"?) > >Chris > > > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the >keyword >"igve". > > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not > >No virus found in this incoming message. >Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com >Version: 8.0.176 / Virus Database: 270.10.2/1871 - Release Date: 1/1/2552 17:01 From papadop at peak.org Fri Jan 2 10:26:59 2009 From: papadop at peak.org (MichaelP) Date: Fri Jan 2 10:27:28 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] HOW OBAMA LOST CONTROL OF IRAQ POLICY Message-ID: http://mondediplo.com/2009/01/05irak Le Monde diplomatique - English edition --January 2009 ################# US Military planned to subvert agreement on withdrawal Everyone wondered, when Obama won the election, if he would hold to his pledge to withdraw from Iraq. The Pentagon and its political allies had other plans, and were already seeking to reverse the United States' existing agreement with the Iraqi government By Gareth Porter * Gareth Porter is a historian and foreign policy analyst and author of Perils of Dominance: Imbalance of Power and the Road to War in Vietnam, University of California Press, 2005 ################## After Barack Obama's electoral victory in November, one of the major questions was whether he would hold to his pledge during the campaign to withdraw US combat troops from Iraq within 16 months. The fate of that withdrawal plan was seen as an indicator of Obama's broader foreign policy orientation and the role he would play in foreign and national security policy (1). There was conflict between the president-elect and the US military leadership, known to oppose his withdrawal policy. But Obama had unusually strong convictions on Iraq. The struggle reflects a fundamental choice between strategic withdrawal from Iraq and an attempt to prolong the US military presence in the country beyond 2011. Obama's withdrawal plan was not a mere sop to his anti-war Democratic activist base; it reflected a carefully considered personal strategic analysis. The clearest statement of Obama's strategic rationale for a speedy withdrawal came on 15 July 2008 when Obama said the US military involvement in Iraq "distracts us from every threat that we face and so many opportunities we could seize". The Iraq war, he argued, "diminishes our security, our standing in the world, our military, our economy, and the resources that we need to confront the challenges of the 21st century." In a New York Times op-ed on 14 July, Obama said his plan would involve "tactical adjustments" and vowed to "consult with commanders on the ground and the Iraqi government to ensure that our troops were redeployed safely". But at a press conference two days later, he explained that these caveats would not affect the larger 16-month deadline for withdrawal, but related only to the pace of withdrawal "in certain months" to assure the safety of American troops being withdrawn. Obama insisted that he would not adjust his schedule to bring it into line with the recommendation of General David Petraeus, the top commander in Iraq. "The president's job," said Obama, "is to tell the generals what their mission is." And when Obama finally met Petraeus in Baghdad later that month, he rejected his elaborate argument for a "conditions-based" withdrawal, according to Joe Klein's account in Time magazine (2), and insisted that he would make the decision based on his own evaluation of costs of continuing US presence. There was one ambiguity. He suggested that he would keep a "residual force in Iraq" to perform "limited missions", which he defined as including force protection and training of Iraqi security forces, but also "going after any remnants of al-Qaida in Mesopotamia". But he had earlier made it clear that the forces targeting al-Qaida would be based elsewhere in the Middle East. The al-Maliki bombshell Obama, like everyone else in Washington, was expecting the US-Iraqi Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) then under negotiation to allow a long-term US military presence in the country (3). Even in mid-August, the Bush administration was still insisting that the dates for withdrawal of combat forces would be only "time targets" and thus dependent on "conditions". However, Iraqi prime minister Nuri al-Maliki unexpectedly forced Bush to accept the complete withdrawal of all combat troops by the end of 2011, and also the complete withdrawal of all non-combat troops by the same date. He also demanded that US troops withdraw from cities and towns by June 2009 and regroup in bases to be located by agreement with Iraq. The final SOFA agreement accepted by the Bush administration on 6 November requires Washington to turn over a detailed schedule for complete withdrawal and even create "mechanisms and arrangements" to reduce US forces levels within the specified time period. It forbids US troops from operating in the country without full Iraqi approval and coordination, and from detaining Iraqis without an Iraqi court order. It includes an absolute ban on the use of Iraqi territory or airspace to "launch attacks against other countries". The Pentagon plan So by the time Obama had been elected, his 16-month withdrawal timetable was very much in line with the intent of the US-Iraq agreement. But the US military leadership was far from reconciled with his plan - or with the terms imposed by the SOFA. And it soon became apparent that the military and Pentagon bureaucracy had a plan to roll back the agreement. Within 72 hours of Obama's election, Time magazine quoted the commander of US forces in Iraq, General Raymond Odierno, as saying that the withdrawal of US forces would have to be done "slowly, in a deliberate way, so we don't give back the gains we've had". Time reported that "senior US military officials" were likely to advise Obama to "adjust his campaign pledge to withdraw all US combat troops from Iraq by mid-2010". Three days later the Washington Post reported that Admiral Michael Mullen, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, opposed Obama's timeline for withdrawal as "dangerous" and still held to the military's insistence that "reductions must depend on conditions on the ground". Citing "defence experts", the Post reported that conflict between Obama and these military leaders would be "inevitable" if Obama were to press for the withdrawal of two brigades per month, as he had reaffirmed on his own website after the election. Speaking to reporters on 16 November, Mullen publicly declared his intention to advise Obama to make the pace and scale of withdrawal dependent on events on the ground. That announcement represented an open challenge to the president-elect. The Post reported on 18 November, the day of the signing of the agreement, that Pentagon officials said the time frame envisioned in the agreement gives them adequate time to safely remove all equipment and roughly 150,000 US troops from Iraq, but had "reiterated that such a withdrawal should take place only if conditions warrant it". These officials, who understood that the agreement had rejected the conditions-based approach in favour of a firm timetable, were asserting that in effect the United States should not be bound by the deadline for withdrawal in the agreement it had just signed. It soon became clear that the continued military insistence on a conditions-based approach was part of a broader plan by Bush administration and military officials to evade key provisions of the SOFA. McClatchy newspapers reported on 25 November that Bush administration officials had secretly adopted "interpretations" of the ban on the use of Iraqi bases to launch attacks on other countries and the requirement to notify the Iraqi government in advance of US military operations that would allow the US to "circumvent" those legal constraints. It planned to use the "right of self-defence" in the agreement to justify any strike against targets in Syria and Iran, and to argue that it would only have to inform Iraqi officials of plans for operations in a given province during a given month. The Bush administration had kept these "interpretations" secret from the Iraqi government, which would clearly have rejected them out of hand. In fact, they were not "interpretations" of the agreement but proposals to subvert it. The provision governing US military operations requires not just notification but "the approval of the Iraqi government" and "full coordination with Iraqi authorities". The prohibition against "attacks against other countries" in the agreement is absolute and unconditional. An even more serious ploy conceived by Pentagon planners to subvert the intention of the SOFA was revealed by the New York Times, which reported on 4 December that "Pentagon planners" were proposing "relabelling some units, so that those currently counted as combat troops could be 're-missioned', their efforts redefined as training and support for the Iraqis." The Times suggested, with a straight face, that the proposed "relabelling" was a method by which "Mr Obama's goal could be accomplished at least in part". Of course, it was just the opposite. The Times said the Pentagon planners were projecting that as many as 70,000 US troops would be maintained in Iraq "for a substantial time even beyond 2011". What the plan for keeping combat troops indefinitely in Iraq under the guise of "training and support" troops, the insistence by Adm Mullen and other military leaders on "conditions-based withdrawal", and the devising of justifications for ignoring the limitations on US operations all had in common was the intention by the US military and its civilian allies to reverse both the Obama withdrawal plan and the US-Iraq agreement. Why Gates was necessary Obama was confronted with a Pentagon bureaucracy that was signalling its determination to pursue a course in Iraq that was in direct contradiction to his own policy, and to the clear intent of the Iraqi government. The pressure on Obama to keep the secretary of defence Robert M Gates at the Pentagon should be understood in light of this open challenge to his leadership. The pressure began within 24 hours of Obama's election; the New York Times said the case for asking Gates to stay on at the Pentagon "is being made publicly by columnists and commentators, and quietly by leading Congressional voices of Mr Obama's own party." The public rationale for this unprecedented appointment was continuity and stability at a time when the US was involved in two wars. But according to a source close to the Obama transition team, the reasoning was frankly political: the Democrats were concerned about their presumed political vulnerability on national security and wanted to have Gates, as a Republican, preside over the Iraq policy, to give them political cover. The policy implication of Obama's choice of Gates is clear. Gates was known to be opposed to Obama's withdrawal plan, with the military leadership. And it is inconceivable that he was not fully involved in the Pentagon planning for a policy that would seek to reverse the US-Iraq withdrawal agreement and prolong the US military presence indefinitely. Given its broad scope and multilevel character, it is likely that he was at the centre of it. Although Obama may continue to issue statements on Iraq policy, the Gates nomination signalled that control of the issue has already passed from the White House to the Pentagon. If he is displeased with what Gates does on Iraq, Obama cannot threaten to fire him. Based on the evidence that has already come to light, the Pentagon can be expected to continue, under Obama, to use all means available to subvert the agreement - and the Iraqi regime - in order to establish a long-term military presence. The story of how Obama came to yield effective control over his Iraq policy is a profound lesson on the nature of power on an issue of particular interest to the military leadership and its civilian allies. It has shown just how weak the democratic system's defence is against the influence of the US military and its allies when they are determined to have their way. FOOTNOTES (1) See Michael Klare, "Obama v McCain: foreign policy ", Le Monde diplomatique, English edition, October 2008. (2) Time magazine, New York, 22 October 2008. (3) See Security Agreement. From creuss at bluewin.ch Fri Jan 2 12:41:03 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Fri Jan 2 12:42:37 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Re: predators unbound ... Message-ID: Dave Patterson wrote: > In what way did I misinterpret or take out of context your first comment > ("...predators have a longing to go back to the past, be it stone age or > feudalism..."...) ? I was talking about how society (and the map) is organized. > you seem to have a rather black and white view of the world (Chomsky, > Quinn, Marx, anyone it appears who dares to have some position you don't > agree with immediately becomes the enemy It's not about "having some position I don't agree with", but about using a particular fraudulent scheme (dichotomy) that misleads people in order to perpetuate predator rule. I have become allergic to that because I myself have fallen for this fraud for a long time and wasted years of good idealistic energy for it, just to realize in the end that I was duped by cynical predators who actually give a damn about ideals and their pretended principles (such as environmentalism) -- they just (mis)use it for their egoistic goals, and to fool/divide producers. So yes, in practice, they are "the enemy" (in sheep's clothing). Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Fri Jan 2 20:12:02 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Fri Jan 2 20:12:08 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] HOW OBAMA LOST CONTROL OF IRAQ POLICY In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090103021203.CFB71F509@fep07.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090103/3bbfd008/attachment.html From jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca Sat Jan 3 06:43:59 2009 From: jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca (Janet M Eaton) Date: Sat Jan 3 06:42:20 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Dr Mahathir Mohamed, former PM Malyasia - Open Letter to Obama with New Year's Resolutions Message-ID: <495F254F.12231.AA16597D@jmeaton.ns.sympatico.ca> 1) Stop killing people. 2) Stop indiscriminate support of Israeli killers 3) Stop applying sanctions 4) Stop .. inventing new and more diabolical weapons to kill more people more efficiently. 5) Stop your arms manufacturers from producing them. 6) Stop trying to democratize all the countries of the world. 7) Stop the casinos which you call financial institutions. 8) Sign the Kyoto Protocol and other international agreements. 9) Show respect for the United Nations. fyi-janet =================== URL of article http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=11584 Open Letter to Barack Hussein Obama, President-elect of the United States of America by Dr. Mahathir Mohamad, Former Prime Minister of Malaysia Global Research? January 2, 2009 January 1, 2009 Dear Mr. President, I did not vote for you in the Presidential Election because I am Malaysian. But I consider myself one of your constituents because what you do or say will affect me and my country as well. I welcome your promise for change. Certainly your country, the United States of America needs a lot of changes. That is because America and Americans have become the most hated people in the world. Even Europeans dislike your arrogance. Yet you were once admired and liked because you freed a lot of countries from conquest and subjugation. It is the custom on New Year's day for people to make resolutions. You must have listed your good resolutions already. But may I politely suggest that you also resolve to do the following in pursuit of Change. 1) Stop killing people. The United States is too fond of killing people in order to achieve its objectives. You call it war, but today's wars are not about professional soldiers fighting and killing each other. It is about killing people, ordinary innocent people by the hundreds of thousands. Whole countries will be devastated. War is primitive, the cavemen's way of dealing with a problem. Stop your arms build up and your planning for future wars. 2) Stop indiscriminate support of Israeli killers with your money and your weapons. The planes and the bombs killing the people of Gaza are from you. 3) Stop applying sanctions against countries which cannot do the same against you. In Iraq your sanctions killed 500,000 children through depriving them of medicine and food. Others were born deformed. What have you achieved with this cruelty? Nothing except the hatred of the victims and right-thinking people. 4) Stop your scientists and researchers from inventing new and more diabolical weapons to kill more people more efficiently. 5) Stop your arms manufacturers from producing them. Stop your sales of arms to the world. It is blood money that you earn. It is un- Christian. 6) Stop trying to democratize all the countries of the world. Democracy may work for the United States but it does not always work for other countries. Don't kill people because they are not democratic. Your crusade to democratize countries has killed more people than the authoritarian Governments which you overthrew. And you have not succeeded anyway. 7) Stop the casinos which you call financial institutions. Stop hedge funds, derivatives and currency trading. Stop banks from lending non- existent money by the billions. Regulate and supervise your banks. Jail the miscreants who made profits from abusing the system. 8) Sign the Kyoto Protocol and other international agreements. 9) Show respect for the United Nations. I have many other resolutions for change which I think you should consider and undertake. But I think you have enough on your plate for this 2009th year of the Christian Era. If you can do only a few of what I suggest, you will be remembered by the world as a great leader. Then the United States will again be the most admired nation. Your embassies will be able to take down the high fences and razor-wire coils that surround them. May I wish you a Happy New Year and a great Presidency. Yours Sincerely, Dr. Mahathir bin Mohamad (Former Prime Minister of Malaysia) Mahathir Mohamad is a frequent contributor to Global Research. ?Global Research Articles by Mahathir Mohamad ?Global Research Articles by Former Prime Minister of Malaysia http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=listByAuthor&authorFirs t=Former%20Prime%20Minister%20of%20Malaysia&authorName=? ? -- From creuss at bluewin.ch Sat Jan 3 08:20:33 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Sat Jan 3 08:22:02 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Dr Mahathir Mohamed, former PM Malyasia - Open Letter to Obama with New Year's Resolutions Message-ID: > 1) Stop killing people. > 2) Stop indiscriminate support of Israeli killers > 3) Stop applying sanctions > 4) Stop .. inventing new and more diabolical weapons to kill more > people more efficiently. > 5) Stop your arms manufacturers from producing them. > 6) Stop trying to democratize all the countries of the world. > 7) Stop the casinos which you call financial institutions. > 8) Sign the Kyoto Protocol and other international agreements. > 9) Show respect for the United Nations. ... = Change we can't believe in! Obama is a zionist puppet if there ever was one in the whitehouse... Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca Sat Jan 3 08:59:39 2009 From: jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca (Janet M Eaton) Date: Sat Jan 3 08:57:41 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Dr Mahathir Mohamed, former PM Malyasia - Open Letter to Obama with New Year's Resolutions In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <495F451B.2402.AA928DF0@jmeaton.ns.sympatico.ca> Dear Chris You wrote in regard to Mahatir's suggestions: ... = Change we can't believe in! Obama is a zionist puppet if there ever was one in the whitehouse... and note also Bill Blum's further insights into who Obama really is from his latest anti-empire report: ------- Forwarded message follows ------- From: BBlum6@aol.com Date sent: Fri, 2 Jan 2009 22:54:28 EST Subject: Anti-Empire Report, January 2, 2009 To: BBlum6@aol.com --snip-- The question that may never go away: Who really is Barack Obama? In his autobiography, "Dreams From My Fathers", Barack Obama writes of taking a job at some point after graduating from Columbia University in 1983. He describes his employer as "a consulting house to multinational corporations" in New York City, and his functions as a "research assistant" and "financial writer". The odd part of Obama's story is that he doesn't mention the name of his employer. However, a New York Times story of 2007 identifies the company as Business International Corporation.[10] Equally odd is that the Times did not remind its readers that the newspaper itself had disclosed in 1977 that Business International had provided cover for four CIA employees in various countries between 1955 and 1960.[11] The British journal, Lobster Magazine -- which, despite its incongruous name, is a venerable international publication on intelligence matters -- has reported that Business International was active in the 1980s promoting the candidacy of Washington-favored candidates in Australia and Fiji.[12] In 1987, the CIA overthrew the Fiji government after but one month in office because of its policy of maintaining the island as a nuclear-free zone, meaning that American nuclear-powered or nuclear-weapons-carrying ships could not make port calls.[13] After the Fiji coup, the candidate supported by Business International, who was much more amenable to Washington's nuclear desires, was reinstated to power -- R.S.K. Mara was Prime Minister or President of Fiji from 1970 to 2000, except for the one- month break in 1987. In his book, not only doesn't Obama mention his employer's name; he fails to say when he worked there, or why he left the job. There may well be no significance to these omissions, but inasmuch as Business International has a long association with the world of intelligence, covert actions, and attempts to penetrate the radical left -- including Students for a Democratic Society (SDS)[14] -- it's valid to wonder if the inscrutable Mr. Obama is concealing something about his own association with this world. --snip-- On 3 Jan 2009 at 15:20, Christoph Reuss wrote: Date sent: Sat, 3 Jan 2009 15:20:33 +0100 To: mai-not@globalproblematique.net From: creuss@bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Subject: Re: [Mai-not] Dr Mahathir Mohamed, former PM Malyasia - Open Letter to Obama with New Year's Resolutions Send reply to: A renewed Mai-Not > 1) Stop killing people. > 2) Stop indiscriminate support of Israeli killers > 3) Stop applying sanctions > 4) Stop .. inventing new and more diabolical weapons to kill more > people more efficiently. > 5) Stop your arms manufacturers from producing them. > 6) Stop trying to democratize all the countries of the world. > 7) Stop the casinos which you call financial institutions. > 8) Sign the Kyoto Protocol and other international agreements. > 9) Show respect for the United Nations. ... = Change we can't believe in! Obama is a zionist puppet if there ever was one in the whitehouse... Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ ~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". _______________________________________________ Mai-not mailing list Mai-not@globalproblematique.net http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not From jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca Sat Jan 3 09:40:16 2009 From: jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca (Janet M Eaton) Date: Sat Jan 3 09:38:28 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] USA Police State 2009: Pentagon to Militarize US with 20, 000 armed troops + Naomi Wolf warnings etc Message-ID: <495F4EA0.18025.AAB7BE62@jmeaton.ns.sympatico.ca> Dear All: Here is more shocking news from Dec 1st that I missed seeing at the time which is further to an earlier post of mine summarizing Naomi Wolfe's insights on fascism and its trend in the US exemplified at the time by the announcement that a 3000 strong battallion of troops returning from Iraq was being commissioned to patrol the steets of the US. We see in this article below the further escalation of that trend In direct violation of the Posse Comitatus Act, which forbids military troops from playing a role in domestic law enforcement. The Pentagon has announced plans to station 20,000 armed, uniformed troops inside the United States [by 2011] where they will walk the streets, ready [presumedly] to "respond to terrorism events." In fact the article goes on to explore underlying roots of the move linked to the possible dissolution of the US into state or regional governments should total financial collapse occur. The author suggests the purpose is to have a military force to prevent the breakup of the United States of America. "There will be a time when Washington is so bankrupt (both financially and morally), so corrupt and so far beyond saving that intelligent states like California will simply declare themselves to be sovereign nations." and that " With a defunct currency and the inevitable riots and social unrest that always follows the massive theft of money from the people, the U.S. will be ripe for Balkanization, or the breaking up of regions that will declare their own sovereignty." " Even today, Hawaii and Vermont are already talking secession. Many regions of Oregon and Texas are also in the same discussions. If Washington becomes weak, you can expect to see the fragmentation of the nation." See also: Naomi Wolf Video On US Martial Law & Coup - Commentary & Transcript By J M Eaton Posted on Friday, October 10 at 13:01 by Janet M Eaton to: Vivelecanada: http://www.vivelecanada.ca/article/235930376-naomi-wolf-video-on-us- martial-law--coup-commentary--transcript-by-j-m-eaton Contains a brief overview of Naomi Wolf's [1] Article on Fascist America, in 10 easy steps [2] Overview of her book "The End of America" [3] My partial transcript of her youtube interview with Michael McCormick -- which outlines her reasons for alerting the public to take action against the quickening slide into fascism in the US... [4] SPP and Deep Integration Implications for Canada and North American Union under US martial law [5] More references on US Martial law from globalresearch.ca fyi-janet ======================= http://www.naturalnews.com/News_000567_Posse_Comitatus_police_state_Pe ntagon.html Police State 2009: Pentagon to Militarize USA with 20,000 Armed Troops by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, December 1, 2008 In direct violation of the Posse Comitatus Act, which forbids military troops from playing a role in domestic law enforcement, the Pentagon has announced plans to station 20,000 armed, uniformed troops inside the United States where they will walk the streets, ready to "respond to terrorism events," says the Pentagon. It's against the law, but since when did the Bush Administration or the Pentagon pay any attention to law in the first place? Here at NaturalNews, we've warned about the coming police state for many years. Now it is upon us, with the mass militarization of our cities and streets. It won't be long before we'll start hearing "papers please" as we try to move about our own cities in a nation many people foolishly believe to still be "free." This recent push, of course, stems from the New York subway threat, which for all we know was entirely made up by the U.S. government for precisely this purpose -- to scare the population into accepting 20,000 troops on the streets. It's a lesson the Bush Administration learned well with the 9/11 terrorist attacks: People will gladly give up their freedoms if you scare them to death with real (or engineered) terrorist events first. Oh, and don't forget what the terrorist hate us for. "They hate America because it's free," say the war apologists. So their plan, it seems, is to take away America's freedoms before the terrorists do! So now, with 20,000 troops walking the streets brandishing military weapons, it is the U.S. population that will be terrorized by the aggressive military presence. Think about it: When you walk into an area with lots of military personnel sporting assault rifles, do you feel comfort, or do you feel fear? Normal people feel more fear. They intuitively think, "Gee, there must be something dangerous here, or there wouldn't be armed military personnel standing guard," and they feel a sense of apprehension. The real reason for 20,000 troops? It's ridiculous to think that 20,000 troops can offer any meaningful response to a terrorism event. If a dirty bomb goes off, or a chemical weapons attack takes place, the only thing left to do will be to clean up the bodies, and you don't need 20,000 military troops to do that (National Guard troops can handle it just fine). 20,000 troops also aren't going to prevent a terrorist attack. Do you think the terrorists walk around in orange jumpsuits with the word "terrorist" painted on the back? No, they blend in like everybody else. They easily got by airport security in 2001, and they can easily make their way through the streets of the USA in 2009, regardless of a military presence. So what's the REAL reason for stationing 20,000 military troops in the U.S.? Think about it. Historically, during what times have military troops ever been used to protect the centralization of power? If you've read much history -- especially European history -- you probably suspect, as I do, that the real purpose of the 20,000 troops is to have a military force to prevent the breakup of the United States of America. You see, a financial collapse in Washington is imminent. This Federal Reserve bailout is just short-term cover that accomplishes nothing. You can't save an economy from endless bad debt by creating yet more bad debt. With the derivatives market hovering somewhere beyond $500 trillion, it will be impossible for the Fed to bail out all the failures without bankrupting the U.S. taxpayers and destroying the U.S. currency first. With a defunct currency and the inevitable riots and social unrest that always follows the massive theft of money from the people, the U.S. will be ripe for Balkanization, or the breaking up of regions that will declare their own sovereignty. One Russian analyst famously predicted several weeks ago that the United States would break into seven new nations, each with its own laws, its own military and its own political power. What's the best way to prevent such a breakup? Show up with 20,000 troops and force the member states to back down at gunpoint. But you might ask why wouldn't the federal government just use the National Guard to accomplish this? Why does it need Pentagon troops? The answer is simple: Because the National Guard troops are controlled by the STATES.. It is, in fact, the National Guard troops that will be fighting for the freedom of their regions, fighting to break off from the tyrannical federal government that has already engineered the greatest financial swindle in history and now wants to maintain power over all the states, too. This is the new civil war that will be shaping up: National Guard troops vs. the Pentagon's troops. And that is why the Pentagon is calling 20,000 troops into the homeland right now: It's preparing for a civil war and the potential breakup of the nation. There will be a time when Washington is so bankrupt (both financially and morally), so corrupt and so far beyond saving that intelligent states like California will simply declare themselves to be sovereign nations. Although there may be the threat of military force to prevent such actions in the short term, ultimately Washington will be powerless to stop it because it will be unable to fund the military effort with worthless U.S. dollars. And if just one state successfully breaks away from the union, it will set a precedent that other states will follow. Even today, Hawaii and Vermont are already talking secession. Many regions of Oregon and Texas are also in the same discussions. If Washington becomes weak, you can expect to see the fragmentation of the nation. It will likely be a bloody event, complete with Martial Law, food shortages, money supply problems and the works. The person offering the best coverage on this topic is Alex Jones at http://www.prisonplanet.com/ He's been predicting this for many years, and although his radio show might be described by some as "inflammatory," he's been right on the money on issues like this one, and he has accurately predicted the mass militarization of the United States by the Pentagon. Check out his daily radio show to learn more about what's really happening with the coming civil war in the United States. His show starts at 11:00 central time, each weekday. --- Related article: Pentagon to Detail Troops to Bolster Domestic Security? (December 1, 2008) http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp- dyn/content/article/2008/11/30/AR2008113002217_pf.html The U.S. military expects to have 20,000 uniformed troops inside the United States by 2011 trained to help state and local officials respond to a nuclear terrorist attack or other domestic catastrophe, according to Pentagon officials.The long-planned shift in the Defense Department's role in homeland security was recently backed with funding and troop commitments after years of prodding by Congress and outside experts, defense analysts said.There are critics of the change, in the military and among civil liberties groups and libertarians who express concern that the new homeland emphasis threatens to strain the military and possibly undermine the Posse Comitatus Act, a 130-year-old federal law restricting the military's role in domestic law enforcement. But the Bush administration and some in Congress have pushed for a heightened homeland military role since the middle of this decade, saying the greatest domestic threat is terrorists exploiting the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. CLIP ------- End of forwarded message ------- From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Sat Jan 3 19:04:08 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Sat Jan 3 19:04:20 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Dr Mahathir Mohamed, former PM Malyasia - Open Letter to Obama with New Year's Resolutions In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090104010411.0BA06F4F5@fep06.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090104/f6c39354/attachment.html From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Sat Jan 3 19:19:02 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Sat Jan 3 19:19:09 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Dr Mahathir Mohamed, former PM Malyasia - Open Letter to Obama with New Year's Resolutions In-Reply-To: <495F451B.2402.AA928DF0@jmeaton.ns.sympatico.ca> References: <495F451B.2402.AA928DF0@jmeaton.ns.sympatico.ca> Message-ID: <20090104011903.D34F6F50E@fep08.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> The insights into the role of the CIA in the racist military coup against the elected Bavadra Government in Fiji, and the reasons for it, are of great interest especially in the light of the CIA's non-military coup in Australia in 1974 for broadly similar reasons. It is worth remembering that this power of the American imperialists to control other countries could not be exercised without the willing co-operation of traitors in the target countries (e.g. Rabuka and the racist ratus in Fiji, Sir John Kerr and the Libs and Bob Hawke in Australia). It is constant vigilance against traitors in Cuba that has for half a century prevented the same outcome there, and enhanced vigilance against traitors in the rest of the world and challenge to their ideology can dampen imperialist power elsewhere. Dion Giles Western Australia At 23:59 03/01/2009, you wrote: >Dear Chris > >You wrote in regard to Mahatir's suggestions: >... = Change we can't believe in! >Obama is a zionist puppet if there ever was one in the whitehouse... > >and note also Bill Blum's further insights into who Obama really is >from his latest anti-empire report: > >------- Forwarded message follows ------- >From: BBlum6@aol.com >Date sent: Fri, 2 Jan 2009 22:54:28 EST >Subject: Anti-Empire Report, January 2, 2009 >To: BBlum6@aol.com > >--snip-- > >The question that may never go away: Who really is Barack Obama? >In his autobiography, "Dreams From My Fathers", Barack Obama writes >of taking a job at some point after graduating from Columbia >University in 1983. He describes his employer as "a consulting house >to multinational corporations" in New York City, and his functions as >a "research assistant" and "financial writer". > The odd part of Obama's story is that he doesn't mention the name >of his employer. However, a New York Times story of 2007 identifies >the company as Business International Corporation.[10] Equally odd >is that the Times did not remind its readers that the newspaper >itself had disclosed in 1977 that Business International had provided >cover for four CIA employees in various countries between 1955 and >1960.[11] > The British journal, Lobster Magazine -- which, despite its >incongruous name, is a venerable international publication on >intelligence matters -- has reported that Business International was >active in the 1980s promoting the candidacy of Washington-favored >candidates in Australia and Fiji.[12] In 1987, the CIA overthrew the >Fiji government after but one month in office because of its policy >of maintaining the island as a nuclear-free zone, meaning that >American nuclear-powered or nuclear-weapons-carrying ships could not >make port calls.[13] After the Fiji coup, the candidate supported by >Business International, who was much more amenable to Washington's >nuclear desires, was reinstated to power -- R.S.K. Mara was Prime >Minister or President of Fiji from 1970 to 2000, except for the one- >month break in 1987. > In his book, not only doesn't Obama mention his employer's name; >he fails to say when he worked there, or why he left the job. There >may well be no significance to these omissions, but inasmuch as >Business International has a long association with the world of >intelligence, covert actions, and attempts to penetrate the radical >left -- including Students for a Democratic Society (SDS)[14] -- it's >valid to wonder if the inscrutable Mr. Obama is concealing something >about his own association with this world. > >--snip-- > > >On 3 Jan 2009 at 15:20, Christoph Reuss wrote: > >Date sent: Sat, 3 Jan 2009 15:20:33 +0100 >To: mai-not@globalproblematique.net >From: creuss@bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) >Subject: Re: [Mai-not] Dr Mahathir Mohamed, former PM Malyasia - Open >Letter to > Obama with New Year's Resolutions >Send reply to: A renewed Mai-Not > > > > > 1) Stop killing people. > > 2) Stop indiscriminate support of Israeli killers > > 3) Stop applying sanctions > > 4) Stop .. inventing new and more diabolical weapons to kill more > > people more efficiently. > > 5) Stop your arms manufacturers from producing them. > > 6) Stop trying to democratize all the countries of the world. > > 7) Stop the casinos which you call financial institutions. > > 8) Sign the Kyoto Protocol and other international agreements. > > 9) Show respect for the United Nations. > >... = Change we can't believe in! > >Obama is a zionist puppet if there ever was one in the whitehouse... > >Chris > > > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >~~~~~~ >SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the >keyword >"igve". > > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Sat Jan 3 19:45:39 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Sat Jan 3 19:45:45 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Challenge settler state's "right to exist" Message-ID: <20090104014540.ABECFF5B0@fep07.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090104/41c1ecf8/attachment.html From creuss at bluewin.ch Sun Jan 4 08:02:13 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Sun Jan 4 08:03:42 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Challenge settler state's "right to exist" Message-ID: > If Hamas and the rocketeers were to accept and press for a democratic > solution of this type, their tactics would change overnight. Hamas was set up by Israel to play out the secular PLO against religious nutcases (after all, the zionists need a partner!) and to recruit terrorists to use as a scapegoat (can't have rational Arabs making legitimate demands, but need evil mad terrorists that can only be killed off). But even considering this, this rocketeering looks like a classic false-flag operation -- what better pretext for the ongoing carnage could Israel get? (Random rockets landing in a field are much better than bus bombings, as they cost no lives, but serve as a pretext for "backlash" nonetheless.) And why would genuine rocketeers pose for press photos in plain daylight? Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Sun Jan 4 16:41:08 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Sun Jan 4 16:41:16 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Challenge settler state's "right to exist" In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090104224111.2C991F5D3@fep08.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> I think Chris is right about this. Problem for Palestinians is that the alternative Fatah accepts the settler state's "right to exist". In the daily media propaganda, violence and rejecting Israel's "right to exist" are coupled. Yet the rational approach seems to be to reject and challenge the right of the settler state to exist (as once a state has a right to exist it has a right to defend its continuation using whatever means it can which include military) - but not to reject meeting violence with violence in the way that Hezbollah met it. While rejecting and challenging the right of the state of Israel to exist neither violence nor non-violence should be elevated to an overall aim - however, random violence directed against citizens based on place of residence is not meeting violence with violence (justified if it works) but competing with the enemy in terrorising Jill and Joe public (never justified). Any Israeli who supports Israel's troops, its racist "law of return" and its supposedly God-given right to exclude Palestinian exiles from their homeland richly deserves whatever rocketry comes his way, but rockets are not fitted with questionnaires and lie detectors. If Hamas was serious about meeting violence with violence it would keep all rockets under wraps until enough, and sophisticated enough, rockets were accumulated for a sudden and devastating blitzkrieg against the atomic weapons facility at Dimona. Dion Giles Western Australia At 23:02 04/01/2009, Chris Reuss wrote: > > If Hamas and the rocketeers were to accept and press for a democratic > > solution of this type, their tactics would change overnight. > >Hamas was set up by Israel to play out the secular PLO against religious >nutcases (after all, the zionists need a partner!) and to recruit terrorists >to use as a scapegoat (can't have rational Arabs making legitimate demands, >but need evil mad terrorists that can only be killed off). But even >considering this, this rocketeering looks like a classic false-flag >operation -- what better pretext for the ongoing carnage could Israel get? >(Random rockets landing in a field are much better than bus bombings, as >they cost no lives, but serve as a pretext for "backlash" nonetheless.) >And why would genuine rocketeers pose for press photos in plain daylight? > >Chris > > > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword >"igve". > > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not From thinker at thelakebc.ca Sun Jan 4 21:10:37 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Sun Jan 4 21:06:42 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Challenge settler state's "right to exist" In-Reply-To: <20090104224111.2C991F5D3@fep08.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> References: <20090104224111.2C991F5D3@fep08.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> Message-ID: <200901050306.n0536VZf003668@karma.reboot.ca> Whether Israel has a right to exist, or not, regardless of all the hot airm, it exists and will stay existing. I would be the last to be an apologist for the long line of crimes committed by a long line of Israeli governments and military, but let's use our heads for a change, and look at the real picture, which also includes the crimes of the neighbouring nations and the so called "leaders" of the Palestinians, who are playing a disgusting game with the lives of their own peoples for ideological and religious reasons. The forced displacement of peoples has been going on through history and the post war years are the best examples. East Prussia was depopulated and Poland was shifted West by hundreds of km. forcing the uprooting of millions, including of Poles in the areas grabbed by the Soviets. Millions of Germans were forced to leave all their possessions behind and were frozen, or massacred on the winter roads by "freedom fighters". The same happened in the Sudetenland. I've spent 3 war months in Silezia and have seen the prosperous villages and farms people were forced to leave behind, with the clothes on their backs. In the nights we could see the burning villages all around us, set on fire by the Russians to light up the dark. It was standard procedure. Also have spent about 3 weeks in Sudetenland, all German for centuries, full of prosperous farms and small manufacturing businesses , especially in the glass art, beautiful and untouched by the war. The horror stories the uprooted inhabitants had to endure, while marching on the roads, from the hands of the Czech "resistance" that was strangely silent in the war years, but woke up after the fighting was over and were killing disarmed troops and refugees, while the Russians laughed their heads off, has been documented in many books and articles. My wife was leading a horse and wagon for weeks , in worn out city shoes, over Austrian Alpine passes, starving, freezing and machinegunned by US fighter bombers. Later, her family and I were voluntary refugees, who refused to be repatriated to the Soviets. There were millions of refugees in Germany and Austria, living in camps, bombed out buildings, starving, in rags, under the worst conditions. I was living in camp conditions, without any furniture, not even a decent bed, no privacy and even the elementary human needs for 5 out of the 6 postwar years, both in Austria and England. So I need no lectures about the plight of refugees. But all we wanted was a new, real home somewhere and slowly we spread out all over the world. Are we, or our children and grandchildren, still supposed to call ourselves "refugees" and carry on with hate and murder campaigns? There haven't been any refugee camps in Germany for decades and the grandchildren of the displaced Silezians and Prussians are not permitted, or intent to send rockets into Poland and the Czech Republic, 60 odd years after their ancestors have been torn up and sent packing. So, why the Palestinians? Why were they hijacking dozens of planes, all over the world, ultimately forcing on the present bodysearch hysteria at all airports . I flew a few times in the 60s , the last time in 1968, and all we had to do was present our tickets and walk on the planes. But the PLO has changed all this 20-30 years after they were evicted from their homes, and in lands and continents that had nothing to do with it. Then, thanks to their brethren in the neighboring countries, instead of permitting them to settle and live like human beings, they're still forcing them to consider themselves "refugees" 3-4 generations later, and to live like animals in "refuge camps", to "prove the point" that their lands have been stolen. What are 1.5 million are doing and are forced to live in the dump of GAZA and why ? What is the point their and the leaders of their cousins are trying to prove ? How long is this madness on all sides is permitted to carry on, blessed by their priesthoods, as the will of God ? Cheers, Ed. At 02:41 PM 04/01/2009, you wrote: >I think Chris is right about this. > >Problem for Palestinians is that the alternative Fatah accepts the >settler state's "right to exist". In the daily media propaganda, >violence and rejecting Israel's "right to exist" are coupled. Yet >the rational approach seems to be to reject and challenge the right >of the settler state to exist (as once a state has a right to exist >it has a right to defend its continuation using whatever means it >can which include military) - but not to reject meeting violence >with violence in the way that Hezbollah met it. > >While rejecting and challenging the right of the state of Israel to >exist neither violence nor non-violence should be elevated to an >overall aim - however, random violence directed against citizens >based on place of residence is not meeting violence with violence >(justified if it works) but competing with the enemy in terrorising >Jill and Joe public (never justified). Any Israeli who supports >Israel's troops, its racist "law of return" and its supposedly >God-given right to exclude Palestinian exiles from their homeland >richly deserves whatever rocketry comes his way, but rockets are >not fitted with questionnaires and lie detectors. If Hamas was >serious about meeting violence with violence it would keep all >rockets under wraps until enough, and sophisticated enough, rockets >were accumulated for a sudden and devastating blitzkrieg against the >atomic weapons facility at Dimona. > >Dion Giles >Western Australia > > >At 23:02 04/01/2009, Chris Reuss wrote: > >> > If Hamas and the rocketeers were to accept and press for a democratic >> > solution of this type, their tactics would change overnight. >> >>Hamas was set up by Israel to play out the secular PLO against religious >>nutcases (after all, the zionists need a partner!) and to recruit terrorists >>to use as a scapegoat (can't have rational Arabs making legitimate demands, >>but need evil mad terrorists that can only be killed off). But even >>considering this, this rocketeering looks like a classic false-flag >>operation -- what better pretext for the ongoing carnage could Israel get? >>(Random rockets landing in a field are much better than bus bombings, as >>they cost no lives, but serve as a pretext for "backlash" nonetheless.) >>And why would genuine rocketeers pose for press photos in plain daylight? >> >>Chris >> >> >> >>~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >>SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword >>"igve". >> >> >>_______________________________________________ >>Mai-not mailing list >>Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >>http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not > > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not > > >No virus found in this incoming message. >Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com >Version: 8.0.176 / Virus Database: 270.10.2/1873 - Release Date: >1/3/2009 2:14 PM From jfos at vic.australis.com.au Sun Jan 4 23:07:07 2009 From: jfos at vic.australis.com.au (john foster) Date: Sun Jan 4 23:22:24 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Fw: Gaza Uni bombed-silence? + CUPE strike at York U Message-ID: <002c01c96ef5$94af7760$44ad57ca@jfos> Excerpt: "Established in 1978 by the founder of Hamas - with the approval of Israeli authorities - the Islamic University is the first and most important institution of higher education in Gaza, serving more than 20,000 students, 60 percent of whom are women. It comprises 10 faculties - education, religion, art, commerce, Shariah law, science, engineering, information technology, medicine, and nursing - and awards a variety of bachelor's and master's degrees."(snip) Where's the Academic Outrage Over the Bombing of a University in Gaza? by Neve Gordon and Jeff Halper Dec 30th 2008 http://chronicle.com/news/article/?id=5725 Not one of the nearly 450 presidents of American colleges and universities who prominently denounced an effort by British academics to boycott Israeli universities in September 2007 have raised their voice in opposition to Israel's bombardment of the Islamic University of Gaza earlier this week. Lee C. Bollinger, president of Columbia University, who organized the petition, has been silent, as have his co-signatories from Princeton, Northwestern, and Cornell Universities, and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Most others who signed similar petitions, like the 11,000 professors from nearly 1,000 universities around the world, have also refrained from expressing their outrage at Israel's attack on the leading university in Gaza. The artfully named Scholars for Peace in the Middle East, which organized the latter appeal, has said nothing about the assault. While the extent of the damage to the Islamic University, which was hit in six separate airstrikes, is still unknown, recent reports indicate that at least two major buildings were targeted, a science laboratory and the Ladies' Building, where female students attended classes. There were no casualties, as the university was evacuated when the Israeli assault began on Saturday. Virtually all the commentators agree that the Islamic University was attacked, in part, because it is a cultural symbol of Hamas, the ruling party in the elected Palestinian government, which Israel has targeted in its continuing attacks in Gaza. Mysteriously, hardly any of the news coverage has emphasized the educational significance of the university, which far exceeds its cultural or political symbolism. Established in 1978 by the founder of Hamas - with the approval of Israeli authorities - the Islamic University is the first and most important institution of higher education in Gaza, serving more than 20,000 students, 60 percent of whom are women. It comprises 10 faculties - education, religion, art, commerce, Shariah law, science, engineering, information technology, medicine, and nursing - and awards a variety of bachelor's and master's degrees. Taking into account that Palestinian universities have been regionalized because Palestinian students from Gaza are barred by Israel from studying either in the West Bank or abroad, the educational significance of the Islamic University becomes even more apparent. Those restrictions became international news last summer when Israel refused to grant exit permits to seven carefully vetted students from Gaza who had been awarded Fulbright fellowships by the State Department to study in the United States. After top State Department officials intervened, the students' scholarships were restored - though Israel allowed only four of the seven to leave, even after appeals by Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. "It is a welcome victory - for the students," opined The New York Times, and "for Israel, which should want to see more of Gaza's young people follow a path of hope and education rather than hopelessness and martyrdom; and for the United States, whose image in the Middle East badly needs burnishing." Notwithstanding the importance of the Islamic University, Israel has tried to justify the bombing. An army spokeswoman told The Chronicle that the targeted buildings were used as "a research and development center for Hamas weapons, including Qassam rockets. ... One of the structures struck housed explosives laboratories that were an inseparable part of Hamas's research-and-development program, as well as places that served as storage facilities for the organization. The development of these weapons took place under the auspices of senior lecturers who are activists in Hamas." Islamic University officials deny the Israeli allegations. Yet even if there is some merit in them, it is common knowledge that practically all major American and Israeli universities are engaged in research and development of military applications and receive money from the Pentagon and defense corporations. Weapon development and even manufacturing have, unfortunately, become major projects at universities worldwide - a fact that does not justify bombing them. By launching an attack on Gaza, the Israeli government has once again chosen to adopt strategies of violence that are tragically akin to the ones deployed by Hamas - only the Israeli tactics are much more lethal. How should academics respond to this assault on an institution of higher education? Regardless of one's stand on the proposed boycott of Israeli universities, anyone so concerned about academic freedom as to put one's name on a petition should be no less outraged when Israel bombs a Palestinian university. The question, then, is whether the university presidents and professors who signed the various petitions denouncing efforts to boycott Israel will speak out against the destruction of the Islamic University. Neve Gordon is chair of the department of politics and government at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev and author of Israel's Occupation (University of California Press, 2008). Jeff Halper is director of the Israeli Committee Against House Demolitions. His latest book is An Israeli in Palestine: Resisting Dispossession, Redeeming Israel (Pluto Press, 2008). +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ What do you get for all your hard work? More hardwork! +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ From: Pat Daley Subject: Help CUPE 3903 win a fair contract and end the strike at York U Date: Wed, 31 Dec 2008 17:25:07 +0000 More than 3,000 teaching, graduate and research assistants and contract faculty at York University have been on strike for two months. The university administration has finally agreed to return to the table on January 3. You can help CUPE 3903 in their fight for a fair wage increase and cost of living allowance, restored job security for contract faculty, and increases in funds for extended health benefits, child care and other measures to catch up to and match the ongoing increase in membership. Please go to http://cupe.ca/action/3903-york to send a message to York's administration and bargaining team. This email was cleaned by emailStripper, available for free from http://www.papercut.biz/emailStripper.htm ------------------------------------------------------ Provided by Australis http://www.australis.com.au/ From creuss at bluewin.ch Mon Jan 5 05:35:28 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Mon Jan 5 05:37:00 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Challenge settler state's "right to exist" Message-ID: Dion Giles wrote: > Problem for Palestinians is that the alternative Fatah accepts the > settler state's "right to exist". No wonder, since Israel forced, bribed and/or killed Fatah leaders until Fatah accepted the "right to exist"... Problem for Palestinians is that Israel defines their "leadership" (killing or at least imprisoning those it doesn't like). > once a state has a right to exist > it has a right to defend its continuation using whatever means it can > which include military No, the point of international law is to define which means aren't acceptable for a state to defend itself. A state that doesn't adhere to these rules is usually called a rogue state and slapped with U.N. sanctions and/or U$ invasion/carpet-bombing, but the zionist state is an exception due to the "tail wagging the dog". > If Hamas was serious > about meeting violence with violence it would keep all rockets under > wraps until enough, and sophisticated enough, rockets were > accumulated for a sudden and devastating blitzkrieg against the > atomic weapons facility at Dimona. Not even this would remove Israel's 200+ nukes. And it's certainly not the task of Palestinians to disarm the rogue state, but the U.N.'s task. If only that wasn't a mere tool of imperialism. Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From creuss at bluewin.ch Mon Jan 5 06:25:48 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Mon Jan 5 06:27:18 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Refugees and revenge (was Re: Challenge settler state's "right to exist") Message-ID: Ed Deak wrote: > ... East Prussia ... Sudetenland ... > There haven't been any refugee camps in Germany for decades and the > grandchildren of the displaced Silezians and Prussians are not > permitted, or intent to send rockets into Poland and the Czech > Republic, 60 odd years after their ancestors have been torn up and > sent packing. The Sudeten refugee organizations explicitly renounced on any violence or terror. What was the "thanks"? Nothing. Now the Czechs are in the EU so the Germans once again pay for them (this time via Brussels), but the Czechs even left their racist Benes decrees standing as law (although this violates EU legislation) and even seized all property of the prince of Liechtenstein just because he speaks German... > So, why the Palestinians? Why were they hijacking > dozens of planes, all over the world, ultimately forcing on the > present bodysearch hysteria at all airports. There remains the question of how much of this is fabricated like 9/11, as false-flag operations for the benefit of Israel (benefit also literally as the "security industry" is Israel's #1 export, with profits in the dozens of $billions). There are many open questions about Mossad connections of famous terrorists like Abu Nidal and for example the perfect timing of bus bombs in Israel whenever the IDF needs an excuse for air raids. Arabs have to be given the image of terrorists to justify Israel's injustice and ongoing violence against them. Also, there's a big difference between Sudeten Germans and Palestinians: The Sudeten Germans were told that their expulsion and disposession was the price Germany had to pay for what it did in WW2 (starting in the Sudetenland). For the same reason, the post-WW2 German state officially compensated these refugees financially (although many didn't receive anything near their actual losses, because their documents had been destroyed or stripped by the Czechs, and witnesses killed). The Palestinians OTOH had neither a "Third Reich" nor an own state that would compensate their losses. Why should they pay? > Then, thanks to their brethren in the neighboring countries, instead > of permitting them to settle and live like human beings, they're > still forcing them to consider themselves "refugees" 3-4 generations > later, and to live like animals in "refuge camps", to "prove the > point" that their lands have been stolen. > What are 1.5 million are doing and are forced to live in the dump of > GAZA and why ? What is the point their and the leaders of their > cousins are trying to prove ? I don't think it's fair to blame the Arabs for the deeds of zionists. If Egypt and Jordan would simply absorb the Palestinians -- as some zionists have demanded --, the injustice perpetrated by Israel would be accepted. Instead, the refugee problem has to be solved at the root, by letting them return. Jews (especially the recent immigrants!) in Israel can simply go back to the countries they came from, and they have enough money to move anywhere, where it's nicer to live than in the war zone they created in Palestine. Ironically, there are quite a lot of zionists who don't even live in Israel, but keep very expensive housing (e.g. in Jerusalem) where they hardly spend a few weeks per year, living mainly in America. The main thing is to take away Palestinian land... Also, the terrible conditions in Gaza -- without electricity, fuels, food, medicine etc. -- cannot be blamed on Arab states, but only on the isolation forced upon the "world's largest prison" by Israel! Cheers, Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca Mon Jan 5 08:14:10 2009 From: jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca (Janet M Eaton) Date: Mon Jan 5 08:12:43 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Closing the 'Collapse Gap': the USSR was better prepared for collapse than the US by Dmitry Orlov [Dec 06] + Related Reference Message-ID: <4961DD72.6316.B4B5A226@jmeaton.ns.sympatico.ca> Dear All: Note that the text inserted below does not capture the excellent slides which also appear on the website. It is worth going to the website and reading this online on the Energy Bulletin website. http://www.energybulletin.net/node/23259 Orlov's presentation is about the lack of collapse-preparedness in the United States. He compares it with the situation in the Soviet Union, prior to its collapse. The rhetorical device he uses is the "Collapse Gap" - to go along with the Nuclear Gap, and the Space Gap, and various other superpower gaps that were fashionable during the Cold War. He reminds us that in a country where the government [political system] provides major public services to the people, the collapse will have a less devastating impact - particularly in regard to housing, transportation, employment patterns, family structure, money, consumer products, food, medicine, education, and energy. He also reminds us that the present system in the US cannot and will not survive because the breakdown will be more complete than in the Soviet Union which recovered within ten years. . Nor is further industrial economic growth desirable for it poses a threat to human survival. Also he says reliance on doomed institutions like that of the US government is harmful and the commercial sector will also soon become useless in a collapse as well. Since they will be useless to you he suggests becoming less dependent on them now. See Slide #28. He also notes If the economy, and your place within it, is really important to you, you will be really hurt when it goes away. You can cultivate an attitude of studied indifference, but it has to be more than just a conceit. You have to develop the lifestyle and the habits and the physical stamina to back it up. It takes a lot of creativity and effort to put together a fulfilling existence on the margins of society. After the collapse, these margins may turn out to be some of the best places to live. His conclusion "The Soviet Union was much better prepared for economic collapse than is the United States" Slide [19] However he also states in Slide [26] : It's important to understand that the Soviet Union achieved collapse- preparedness inadvertently, and not because of the success of some crash program. Economic collapse has a way of turning economic negatives into positives. all the best, janet p.s See also Related "Collapse of Empire" References: Dimitry Orlov's The Five Stages of Collapse http://www.energybulletin.net/node/47157 as well as: (1) Kirkpatrick Sale. Imperial Entropy. Collapse of the American Empire. Counterpunch. February 22, 2005 http://www.counterpunch.org/sale02222005.html "In my reading of the history of empires, I have come up with four reasons that almost always explain their collapse Environmental degradation. Economic meltdown Military overstretch Domestic dissent and upheaval" Sale believes there is no chance to escape the collapse of the American Empire because Americans will cling to the values that made them great- capitalism, individualism, nationalism, technophilia, and humanism (as the dominance of humans over nature) which will only serve to exacerbate the collapse. " --Kirlpatrick Sale, 2005 (2) William Rivers Pitt. The Third Stage of American Empire March 2003 http://www.truthout.org/article/the-third-stage-american-empire " It seems all too clear that this third American empire is threatening to collapse under its own ponderous weight. ... The American military is proving itself to be incapable of sustaining the unreasonable demands being placed upon it. .... The American economy, sustained for sixty years by petroleum and war, stands at grave risk of being subsumed by both. " (3) Thom Hartman Review of After the Empire by Emmanuel Todd http://www.thomhartmann.com/index2.php?option=com_content&do_pdf=1&id= 249 "In Apr?s l' empire ("After The Empire"), a runaway bestseller across Europe and in Japan, Todd points out that many of the same demographic and historic indicators that led him to boldly predict the looming collapse of the Soviet system can now -- with some variations that are even more alarming -- be applied to the United States. " Every American should read this book. First, we must read it to understand how Europe, Russia, China, and Japan (among others) view us. Second, we must read it because its logic, facts, statistics, and conclusions are unassailable." - Thom Hartman (4) After the Empire by Emmanuel Todd Review by Thom Hartmann http://books.google.com/books?id=3zLXMV2HDWQC&dq=Review+of+After+the+E mpire+by++Emmanuel+Todd&printsec=frontcover&source=bn&hl=en&sa=X&oi=bo ok_result&resnum=4&ct=result#PPR18,M1 (5) The Conceited Empire - A historian credited with predicting the downfall of the Soviet Union in the 1970s now says that the US has been on its way out for the last decade [about Emmanuel Todd] http://dominionpaper.ca/features/2003/the_conceited_empire.html "....the US is still the most powerful nation in the world today [2003] , but there are many indicators that they are about to relinquish their position as solitary superpower. In my 1976 book, La chute finale (Before the Fall: The End of Soviet Domination), I based my prediction of the fall of the Soviet Union on the relevant indicators of the time. An analysis of current demographic, cultural, military, economic, and ideological factors leads me to conclude that the remaining pole of the former bipolar world order will not remain alone in its position. The world has become too large and complex to accept the predominance of one power. There will not be an American Empire." --Emmanuel Todd, 2003 =================================== Closing the 'Collapse Gap': the USSR was better prepared for collapse than the US by Dmitry Orlov Published Dec 4 2006 by Energy Bulletin Archived Dec 4 2006 Good evening, ladies and gentlemen. I am not an expert or a scholar or an activist. I am more of an eye-witness. I watched the Soviet Union collapse, and I have tried to put my observations into a concise message. I will leave it up to you to decide just how urgent a message it is. My talk tonight is about the lack of collapse-preparedness here in the United States. I will compare it with the situation in the Soviet Union, prior to its collapse. The rhetorical device I am going to use is the "Collapse Gap" - to go along with the Nuclear Gap, and the Space Gap, and various other superpower gaps that were fashionable during the Cold War. Slide [2] The subject of economic collapse is generally a sad one. But I am an optimistic, cheerful sort of person, and I believe that, with a bit of preparation, such events can be taken in stride. As you can probably surmise, I am actually rather keen on observing economic collapses. Perhaps when I am really old, all collapses will start looking the same to me, but I am not at that point yet. And this next one certainly has me intrigued. From what I've seen and read, it seems that there is a fair chance that the U.S. economy will collapse sometime within the foreseeable future. It also would seem that we won't be particularly well-prepared for it. As things stand, the U.S. economy is poised to perform something like a disappearing act. And so I am eager to put my observations of the Soviet collapse to good use. Slide [3] I anticipate that some people will react rather badly to having their country compared to the USSR. I would like to assure you that the Soviet people would have reacted similarly, had the United States collapsed first. Feelings aside, here are two 20th century superpowers, who wanted more or less the same things - things like technological progress, economic growth, full employment, and world domination - but they disagreed about the methods. And they obtained similar results - each had a good run, intimidated the whole planet, and kept the other scared. Each eventually went bankrupt. Slide [4] The USA and the USSR were evenly matched in many categories, but let me just mention four. The Soviet manned space program is alive and well under Russian management, and now offers first-ever space charters. The Americans have been hitching rides on the Soyuz while their remaining spaceships sit in the shop. The arms race has not produced a clear winner, and that is excellent news, because Mutual Assured Destruction remains in effect. Russia still has more nuclear warheads than the US, and has supersonic cruise missile technology that can penetrate any missile shield, especially a nonexistent one. The Jails Race once showed the Soviets with a decisive lead, thanks to their innovative GULAG program. But they gradually fell behind, and in the end the Jails Race has been won by the Americans, with the highest percentage of people in jail ever. The Hated Evil Empire Race is also finally being won by the Americans. It's easy now that they don't have anyone to compete against. Slide [5] Continuing with our list of superpower similarities, many of the problems that sunk the Soviet Union are now endangering the United States as well. Such as a huge, well-equipped, very expensive military, with no clear mission, bogged down in fighting Muslim insurgents. Such as energy shortfalls linked to peaking oil production. Such as a persistently unfavorable trade balance, resulting in runaway foreign debt. Add to that a delusional self- image, an inflexible ideology, and an unresponsive political system. Slide [6] An economic collapse is amazing to observe, and very interesting if described accurately and in detail. A general description tends to fall short of the mark, but let me try. An economic arrangement can continue for quite some time after it becomes untenable, through sheer inertia. But at some point a tide of broken promises and invalidated assumptions sweeps it all out to sea. One such untenable arrangement rests on the notion that it is possible to perpetually borrow more and more money from abroad, to pay for more and more energy imports, while the price of these imports continues to double every few years. Free money with which to buy energy equals free energy, and free energy does not occur in nature. This must therefore be a transient condition. When the flow of energy snaps back toward equilibrium, much of the US economy will be forced to shut down. Slide [7] I've described what happened to Russia in some detail in one of my articles, which is available on SurvivingPeakOil.com. I don't see why what happens to the United States should be entirely dissimilar, at least in general terms. The specifics will be different, and we will get to them in a moment. We should certainly expect shortages of fuel, food, medicine, and countless consumer items, outages of electricity, gas, and water, breakdowns in transportation systems and other infrastructure, hyperinflation, widespread shutdowns and mass layoffs, along with a lot of despair, confusion, violence, and lawlessness. We definitely should not expect any grand rescue plans, innovative technology programs, or miracles of social cohesion. Slide [8] When faced with such developments, some people are quick to realize what it is they have to do to survive, and start doing these things, generally without anyone's permission. A sort of economy emerges, completely informal, and often semi-criminal. It revolves around liquidating, and recycling, the remains of the old economy. It is based on direct access to resources, and the threat of force, rather than ownership or legal authority. People who have a problem with this way of doing things, quickly find themselves out of the game. These are the generalities. Now let's look at some specifics. Slide [9] One important element of collapse-preparedness is making sure that you don't need a functioning economy to keep a roof over your head. In the Soviet Union, all housing belonged to the government, which made it available directly to the people. Since all housing was also built by the government, it was only built in places that the government could service using public transportation. After the collapse, almost everyone managed to keep their place. In the United States, very few people own their place of residence free and clear, and even they need an income to pay real estate taxes. People without an income face homelessness. When the economy collapses, very few people will continue to have an income, so homelessness will become rampant. Add to that the car-dependent nature of most suburbs, and what you will get is mass migrations of homeless people toward city centers. Slide [10] Soviet public transportation was more or less all there was, but there was plenty of it. There were also a few private cars, but so few that gasoline rationing and shortages were mostly inconsequential. All of this public infrastructure was designed to be almost infinitely maintainable, and continued to run even as the rest of the economy collapsed. The population of the United States is almost entirely car-dependent, and relies on markets that control oil import, refining, and distribution. They also rely on continuous public investment in road construction and repair. The cars themselves require a steady stream of imported parts, and are not designed to last very long. When these intricately interconnected systems stop functioning, much of the population will find itself stranded. Slide [11] Economic collapse affects public sector employment almost as much as private sector employment, eventually. Because government bureaucracies tend to be slow to act, they collapse more slowly. Also, because state-owned enterprises tend to be inefficient, and stockpile inventory, there is plenty of it left over, for the employees to take home, and use in barter. Most Soviet employment was in the public sector, and this gave people some time to think of what to do next. Private enterprises tend to be much more efficient at many things. Such laying off their people, shutting their doors, and liquidating their assets. Since most employment in the United States is in the private sector, we should expect the transition to permanent unemployment to be quite abrupt for most people. Slide [12] When confronting hardship, people usually fall back on their families for support. The Soviet Union experienced chronic housing shortages, which often resulted in three generations living together under one roof. This didn't make them happy, but at least they were used to each other. The usual expectation was that they would stick it out together, come what may. In the United States, families tend to be atomized, spread out over several states. They sometimes have trouble tolerating each other when they come together for Thanksgiving, or Christmas, even during the best of times. They might find it difficult to get along, in bad times. There is already too much loneliness in this country, and I doubt that economic collapse will cure it. Slide [13] To keep evil at bay, Americans require money. In an economic collapse, there is usually hyperinflation, which wipes out savings. There is also rampant unemployment, which wipes out incomes. The result is a population that is largely penniless. In the Soviet Union, very little could be obtained for money. It was treated as tokens rather than as wealth, and was shared among friends. Many things - housing and transportation among them - were either free or almost free. Slide [14] Soviet consumer products were always an object of derision - refrigerators that kept the house warm - and the food, and so on. You'd be lucky if you got one at all, and it would be up to you to make it work once you got it home. But once you got it to work, it would become a priceless family heirloom, handed down from generation to generation, sturdy, and almost infinitely maintainable. In the United States, you often hear that something "is not worth fixing." This is enough to make a Russian see red. I once heard of an elderly Russian who became irate when a hardware store in Boston wouldn't sell him replacement bedsprings: "People are throwing away perfectly good mattresses, how am I supposed to fix them?" Economic collapse tends to shut down both local production and imports, and so it is vitally important that anything you own wears out slowly, and that you can fix it yourself if it breaks. Soviet- made stuff generally wore incredibly hard. The Chinese-made stuff you can get around here - much less so. Slide [15] The Soviet agricultural sector was notoriously inefficient. Many people grew and gathered their own food even in relatively prosperous times. There were food warehouses in every city, stocked according to a government allocation scheme. There were very few restaurants, and most families cooked and ate at home. Shopping was rather labor-intensive, and involved carrying heavy loads. Sometimes it resembled hunting - stalking that elusive piece of meat lurking behind some store counter. So the people were well- prepared for what came next. In the United States, most people get their food from a supermarket, which is supplied from far away using refrigerated diesel trucks. Many people don't even bother to shop and just eat fast food. When people do cook, they rarely cook from scratch. This is all very unhealthy, and the effect on the nation's girth, is visible, clear across the parking lot. A lot of the people, who just waddle to and from their cars, seem unprepared for what comes next. If they suddenly had to start living like the Russians, they would blow out their knees. Slide [16] The Soviet government threw resources at immunization programs, infectious disease control, and basic care. It directly operated a system of state-owned clinics, hospitals, and sanatoriums. People with fatal ailments or chronic conditions often had reason to complain, and had to pay for private care - if they had the money. In the United States, medicine is for profit. People seems to think nothing of this fact. There are really very few fields of endeavor to which Americans would deny the profit motive. The problem is, once the economy is removed, so is the profit, along with the services it once helped to motivate. Slide [17] The Soviet education system was generally quite excellent. It produced an overwhelmingly literate population and many great specialists. The education was free at all levels, but higher education sometimes paid a stipend, and often provided room and board. The educational system held together quite well after the economy collapsed. The problem was that the graduates had no jobs to look forward to upon graduation. Many of them lost their way. The higher education system in the United States is good at many things - government and industrial research, team sports, vocational training... Primary and secondary education fails to achieve in 12 years what Soviet schools generally achieved in 8. The massive scale and expense of maintaining these institutions is likely to prove too much for the post-collapse environment. Illiteracy is already a problem in the United States, and we should expect it to get a lot worse. Slide [18] The Soviet Union did not need to import energy. The production and distribution system faltered, but never collapsed. Price controls kept the lights on even as hyperinflation raged. The term "market failure" seems to fit the energy situation in the United States. Free markets develop some pernicious characteristics when there are shortages of key commodities. During World War II, the United States government understood this, and successfully rationed many things, from gasoline to bicycle parts. But that was a long time ago. Since then, the inviolability of free markets has become an article of faith. Slide [19] My conclusion is that the Soviet Union was much better- prepared for economic collapse than the United States is. I have left out two important superpower asymmetries, because they don't have anything to do with collapse-preparedness. Some countries are simply luckier than others. But I will mention them, for the sake of completeness. In terms of racial and ethnic composition, the United States resembles Yugoslavia more than it resembles Russia, so we shouldn't expect it to be as peaceful as Russia was, following the collapse. Ethnically mixed societies are fragile and have a tendency to explode. In terms of religion, the Soviet Union was relatively free of apocalyptic doomsday cults. Very few people there wished for a planet- sized atomic fireball to herald the second coming of their savior. This was indeed a blessing. Slide [20] One area in which I cannot discern any Collapse Gap is national politics. The ideologies may be different, but the blind adherence to them couldn't be more similar. It is certainly more fun to watch two Capitalist parties go at each other than just having the one Communist party to vote for. The things they fight over in public are generally symbolic little tokens of social policy, chosen for ease of public posturing. The Communist party offered just one bitter pill. The two Capitalist parties offer a choice of two placebos. The latest innovation is the photo finish election, where each party buys 50% of the vote, and the result is pulled out of statistical noise, like a rabbit out of a hat. The American way of dealing with dissent and with protest is certainly more advanced: why imprison dissidents when you can just let them shout into the wind to their heart's content? The American approach to bookkeeping is more subtle and nuanced than the Soviet. Why make a state secret of some statistic, when you can just distort it, in obscure ways? Here's a simple example: inflation is "controlled" by substituting hamburger for steak, in order to minimize increases to Social Security payments. Slide [21] Many people expend a lot of energy protesting against their irresponsible, unresponsive government. It seems like a terrible waste of time, considering how ineffectual their protests are. Is it enough of a consolation for them to be able to read about their efforts in the foreign press? I think that they would feel better if they tuned out the politicians, the way the politicians tune them out. It's as easy as turning off the television set. If they try it, they will probably observe that nothing about their lives has changed, nothing at all, except maybe their mood has improved. They might also find that they have more time and energy to devote to more important things. Slide [22] I will now sketch out some approaches, realistic and otherwise, to closing the Collapse Gap. My little list of approaches might seem a bit glib, but keep in mind that this is a very difficult problem. In fact, it's important to keep in mind that not all problems have solutions. I can promise you that we will not solve this problem tonight. What I will try to do is to shed some light on it from several angles. Slide [23] Many people rail against the unresponsiveness and irresponsibility of the government. They often say things like "What is needed is..." plus the name of some big, successful government project from the glorious past - the Marshall Plan, the Manhattan Project, the Apollo program. But there is nothing in the history books about a government preparing for collapse. Gorbachev's "Perestroika" is an example of a government trying to avert or delay collapse. It probably helped speed it along. Slide [24] There are some things that I would like the government to take care of in preparation for collapse. I am particularly concerned about all the radioactive and toxic installations, stockpiles, and dumps. Future generations are unlikely to able to control them, especially if global warming puts them underwater. There is enough of this muck sitting around to kill off most of us. I am also worried about soldiers getting stranded overseas - abandoning one's soldiers is among the most shameful things a country can do. Overseas military bases should be dismantled, and the troops repatriated. I'd like to see the huge prison population whittled away in a controlled manner, ahead of time, instead of in a chaotic general amnesty. Lastly, I think that this farce with debts that will never be repaid, has gone on long enough. Wiping the slate clean will give society time to readjust. So, you see, I am not asking for any miracles. Although, if any of these things do get done, I would consider it a miracle. Slide [25] A private sector solution is not impossible; just very, very unlikely. Certain Soviet state enterprises were basically states within states. They controlled what amounted to an entire economic system, and could go on even without the larger economy. They kept to this arrangement even after they were privatized. They drove Western management consultants mad, with their endless kindergartens, retirement homes, laundries, and free clinics. These weren't part of their core competency, you see. They needed to divest and to streamline their operations. The Western management gurus overlooked the most important thing: the core competency of these enterprises lay in their ability to survive economic collapse. Maybe the young geniuses at Google can wrap their heads around this one, but I doubt that their stockholders will. Slide [26] It's important to understand that the Soviet Union achieved collapse-preparedness inadvertently, and not because of the success of some crash program. Economic collapse has a way of turning economic negatives into positives. The last thing we want is a perfectly functioning, growing, prosperous economy that suddenly collapses one day, and leaves everybody in the lurch. It is not necessary for us to embrace the tenets of command economy and central planning to match the Soviet lackluster performance in this area. We have our own methods, that are working almost as well. I call them "boondoggles." They are solutions to problems that cause more problems than they solve. Just look around you, and you will see boondoggles sprouting up everywhere, in every field of endeavor: we have military boondoggles like Iraq, financial boondoggles like the doomed retirement system, medical boondoggles like private health insurance, legal boondoggles like the intellectual property system. The combined weight of all these boondoggles is slowly but surely pushing us all down. If it pushes us down far enough, then economic collapse, when it arrives, will be like falling out of a ground floor window. We just have to help this process along, or at least not interfere with it. So if somebody comes to you and says "I want to make a boondoggle that runs on hydrogen" - by all means encourage him! It's not as good as a boondoggle that burns money directly, but it's a step in the right direction. Slide [27] Certain types of mainstream economic behavior are not prudent on a personal level, and are also counterproductive to bridging the Collapse Gap. Any behavior that might result in continued economic growth and prosperity is counterproductive: the higher you jump, the harder you land. It is traumatic to go from having a big retirement fund to having no retirement fund because of a market crash. It is also traumatic to go from a high income to little or no income. If, on top of that, you have kept yourself incredibly busy, and suddenly have nothing to do, then you will really be in rough shape. Economic collapse is about the worst possible time for someone to suffer a nervous breakdown, yet this is what often happens. The people who are most at risk psychologically are successful middle- aged men. When their career is suddenly over, their savings are gone, and their property worthless, much of their sense of self-worth is gone as well. They tend to drink themselves to death and commit suicide in disproportionate numbers. Since they tend to be the most experienced and capable people, this is a staggering loss to society. If the economy, and your place within it, is really important to you, you will be really hurt when it goes away. You can cultivate an attitude of studied indifference, but it has to be more than just a conceit. You have to develop the lifestyle and the habits and the physical stamina to back it up. It takes a lot of creativity and effort to put together a fulfilling existence on the margins of society. After the collapse, these margins may turn out to be some of the best places to live. Slide [28] I hope that I didn't make it sound as if the Soviet collapse was a walk in the park, because it was really quite awful in many ways. The point that I do want to stress is that when this economy collapses, it is bound to be much worse. Another point I would like to stress is that collapse here is likely to be permanent. The factors that allowed Russia and the other former Soviet republics to recover are not present here. In spite of all this, I believe that in every age and circumstance, people can sometimes find not just a means and a reason to survive, but enlightenment, fulfillment, and freedom. If we can find them even after the economy collapses, then why not start looking for them now? Thank you. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Editorial Notes ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Energy Bulletin published an excerpt from this talk yesterday (Dec 3), and Dmitry reported that his small webserver was overwhelmed with requests. Although it's good news that his writing has such a following, PLEASE don't access the document on his web server (Club Orlov). The same content is here, on Energy Bulletin's heavier duty webserver. --- Orlov has many penetrating insights, couched in his dark humor. Particularly striking is the strong case he makes that the peoples of the USSR were actually better prepared for a collapse because they had learned to be more self-reliant many crucial functions (like housing and transportation) were taken care of by the state sector which was more stable than a private sector would have been. Orlov's cynicism about the possibility of intelligent government action was probably justified in the case of the Soviet Union, but I think it would be a tragic mistake to abandon efforts to change the direction of the U.S. The Soviets had little chance to make democratic institutions work. We do have that chance. -BA UPDATE: Dmitri Orlov writes on March 4, 2007: You wrote that "The Soviets had little chance to make democratic institutions work." That's not entirely true. Perestroika and Glasnost were all about democracy, and in my opinion it had the same chance of success as the hopelessly gerrymandered system that passes for democracy in the US, (although much less than any proper, modern democracy, in which the Bush regime would have been put out of power quite a while ago, after a simple parliamentary vote of no confidence and early elections). The problem is that, in a collapse scenario, democracy is the least effective system of government one can possibly think of (think Weimar, or the Russian Interim Government) - a topic I cover in Post-Soviet Lessons. Lastly, I don't think calling me a cynic is exactly accurate: I've been in the US a long time, watching the system become progressively more dysfunctional with each passing political season. It seems to me that it is not necessarily cynical to be able to spot a solid trend, but that it could be simply observant. UPDATE (October 30, 2007): We've noticed an influx of visitors to Dmitry Orlov's article, since its mention on several websites. Dmitry writes that his new book, "Reinventing Collapse," is due from New Society Publishers in the springtime. ==================== From thinker at thelakebc.ca Mon Jan 5 10:33:14 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Mon Jan 5 10:29:52 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Refugees and revenge (was Re: Challenge settler state's "right to exist") In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <200901051629.n05GTd58019786@karma.reboot.ca> Sorry Chris, I'm a realist and not a dreamer. Regardless whether Israel has the "right to exist" , or the crimes of their long line of leaders and governments, it is there and will remain there. Anybody who believes that Israel will just pack up and quit will believe anything What we have here are two opposing sides of religious fanatics, who claim that God gave that particular piece of land and contradicting orders to their "prophets". "This land is mine, God gave this land to me......" as their song says. If Mossad was behind the hijackings and part of 9/11, and I have no doubt it might be the truth, it shows how people can be led by the nose to commit the most disgusting crimes in the name of "faith". Personally, I don't trust either side, as I have seen how closed societies and refugee organizations work. That's why we have turned our backs to all connections with our past, never went back to Europe and don't give a damn what happens there. The point is that we were free to make the choice, unlike billions around the world ,held by their necks of the leaders and priests. But then, all ideologies and economic theories are basic religions, and the world is going to hell in a handbasket. Cheers, Ed . At 04:25 AM 05/01/2009, you wrote: >Ed Deak wrote: > > ... East Prussia ... Sudetenland ... > > There haven't been any refugee camps in Germany for decades and the > > grandchildren of the displaced Silezians and Prussians are not > > permitted, or intent to send rockets into Poland and the Czech > > Republic, 60 odd years after their ancestors have been torn up and > > sent packing. > >The Sudeten refugee organizations explicitly renounced on any violence >or terror. What was the "thanks"? Nothing. Now the Czechs are in the EU >so the Germans once again pay for them (this time via Brussels), but the >Czechs even left their racist Benes decrees standing as law (although >this violates EU legislation) and even seized all property of the prince >of Liechtenstein just because he speaks German... > > > > So, why the Palestinians? Why were they hijacking > > dozens of planes, all over the world, ultimately forcing on the > > present bodysearch hysteria at all airports. > >There remains the question of how much of this is fabricated like 9/11, >as false-flag operations for the benefit of Israel (benefit also literally >as the "security industry" is Israel's #1 export, with profits in the >dozens of $billions). There are many open questions about Mossad >connections of famous terrorists like Abu Nidal and for example the >perfect timing of bus bombs in Israel whenever the IDF needs an excuse >for air raids. Arabs have to be given the image of terrorists to >justify Israel's injustice and ongoing violence against them. > >Also, there's a big difference between Sudeten Germans and Palestinians: >The Sudeten Germans were told that their expulsion and disposession >was the price Germany had to pay for what it did in WW2 (starting in >the Sudetenland). For the same reason, the post-WW2 German state >officially compensated these refugees financially (although many didn't >receive anything near their actual losses, because their documents had >been destroyed or stripped by the Czechs, and witnesses killed). > >The Palestinians OTOH had neither a "Third Reich" nor an own state that >would compensate their losses. Why should they pay? > > > > Then, thanks to their brethren in the neighboring countries, instead > > of permitting them to settle and live like human beings, they're > > still forcing them to consider themselves "refugees" 3-4 generations > > later, and to live like animals in "refuge camps", to "prove the > > point" that their lands have been stolen. > > What are 1.5 million are doing and are forced to live in the dump of > > GAZA and why ? What is the point their and the leaders of their > > cousins are trying to prove ? > >I don't think it's fair to blame the Arabs for the deeds of zionists. >If Egypt and Jordan would simply absorb the Palestinians -- as some >zionists have demanded --, the injustice perpetrated by Israel would >be accepted. > >Instead, the refugee problem has to be solved at the root, by >letting them return. Jews (especially the recent immigrants!) in >Israel can simply go back to the countries they came from, and they >have enough money to move anywhere, where it's nicer to live than in >the war zone they created in Palestine. Ironically, there are quite >a lot of zionists who don't even live in Israel, but keep very expensive >housing (e.g. in Jerusalem) where they hardly spend a few weeks per year, >living mainly in America. The main thing is to take away Palestinian >land... > >Also, the terrible conditions in Gaza -- without electricity, fuels, >food, medicine etc. -- cannot be blamed on Arab states, but only on >the isolation forced upon the "world's largest prison" by Israel! > >Cheers, >Chris > > > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword >"igve". > > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not > >No virus found in this incoming message. >Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com >Version: 8.0.176 / Virus Database: 270.10.2/1873 - Release Date: >1/3/2009 2:14 PM From creuss at bluewin.ch Mon Jan 5 11:40:09 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Mon Jan 5 11:41:39 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Refugees and revenge Message-ID: > Sorry Chris, I'm a realist and not a dreamer. Regardless whether > Israel has the "right to exist" , or the crimes of their long line of > leaders and governments, it is there and will remain > there. Anybody who believes that Israel will just pack up and quit > will believe anything I never believed that Israel will just pack up and quit. But like any rogue state, it could be forced by the world community to agree to a compromise. Such as reducing its territorial claims to about half the size of Palestine (which was the original U.N. partition plan of 1947), removing the Wall it built recently, and disarming (all nukes and much of conventional arms). Think of a Versailles treaty for Israel (which was compared to old Prussia even by Uri Avnery). > What we have here are two opposing sides of religious fanatics, who > claim that God gave that particular piece of land and contradicting > orders to their "prophets". "This land is mine, God gave this land > to me......" as their song says. This "symmetry" is claimed by zionist PR. But rather, the situation around the late 1940s (+/- 20 years) was that there were Palestinians who inhabited the land, and then zionist religious fanatics came there and took the Palestinians' land by force and terror (also terror against the U.N. and the British occupying force). 3 zionist terror organizations literally bombed the state of Israel into existence -- but now the zionists forbid exactly this behavior of "state creation" to the Palestinians! To claim back the stolen land, it doesn't take religious fanatism at all -- actually, the PLO was secular. But Israel didn't like that, so they funded the creation of Hamas to play out against the PLO and to finally have the religious fanatics they needed to vilify those irrational Arabs. Why are there no rational Palestinian leaders left? Israel killed them. As in Iraq now. If you kill the Intelligentia, what remains is a herd of sheeple that are easy to control and manipulate. And a few religious kooks you need to vilify Arabs. > Personally, I don't trust either side, as I have seen how > closed societies and refugee organizations work. That's why we have > turned our backs to all connections with our past, never went back to > Europe and don't give a damn what happens there. You and Martha were victims of injustice and you accepted it. The upside was that you had better opportunities in the West. Could today's Palestinians come to Canada? (I've heard that Canada today only accepts rich or highly skilled immigrants?) Cheers, Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From jomut at yahoo.com Mon Jan 5 12:58:08 2009 From: jomut at yahoo.com (John Mutambirwa) Date: Mon Jan 5 12:58:15 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Re: Dr Mahathir Mohamed, former PM Malaysia - Open Letter to Obama with New Year's Resolutions In-Reply-To: <20090104011903.D34F6F50E@fep08.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> Message-ID: <59010.17285.qm@web31103.mail.mud.yahoo.com> John Mutambirwa (Dreaming Awake) jomut@yahoo.com chakane@hotmail.com http://www.geocities.com/jomut ? Hi, ? Sent that to a friend of mine who thinks that the reference to Wham Bam's first job might be less sinister than it is made out to be in this account of it. According to one of Obama's workmates at the same company, Obama jazzed up the account of his work experience?with the? company for the benefit of his political career. ? John ==================== --- On Sun, 1/4/09, Dion Giles wrote: From: Dion Giles Subject: Re: [Mai-not] Dr Mahathir Mohamed, former PM Malyasia - Open Letter to Obama with New Year's Resolutions To: jmeaton@ns.sympatico.ca, "A renewed Mai-Not" Date: Sunday, January 4, 2009, 1:19 AM The insights into the role of the CIA in the racist military coup against the elected Bavadra Government in Fiji, and the reasons for it, are of great interest especially in the light of the CIA's non-military coup in Australia in 1974 for broadly similar reasons. It is worth remembering that this power of the American imperialists to control other countries could not be exercised without the willing co-operation of traitors in the target countries (e.g. Rabuka and the racist ratus in Fiji, Sir John Kerr and the Libs and Bob Hawke in Australia). It is constant vigilance against traitors in Cuba that has for half a century prevented the same outcome there, and enhanced vigilance against traitors in the rest of the world and challenge to their ideology can dampen imperialist power elsewhere. Dion Giles Western Australia At 23:59 03/01/2009, you wrote: >Dear Chris > >You wrote in regard to Mahatir's suggestions: >... = Change we can't believe in! >Obama is a zionist puppet if there ever was one in the whitehouse... > >and note also Bill Blum's further insights into who Obama really is >from his latest anti-empire report: > >------- Forwarded message follows ------- >From: BBlum6@aol.com >Date sent: Fri, 2 Jan 2009 22:54:28 EST >Subject: Anti-Empire Report, January 2, 2009 >To: BBlum6@aol.com > >--snip-- > >The question that may never go away: Who really is Barack Obama? >In his autobiography, "Dreams From My Fathers", Barack Obama writes >of taking a job at some point after graduating from Columbia >University in 1983. He describes his employer as "a consulting house >to multinational corporations" in New York City, and his functions as >a "research assistant" and "financial writer". > The odd part of Obama's story is that he doesn't mention the name >of his employer. However, a New York Times story of 2007 identifies >the company as Business International Corporation.[10] Equally odd >is that the Times did not remind its readers that the newspaper >itself had disclosed in 1977 that Business International had provided >cover for four CIA employees in various countries between 1955 and >1960.[11] > The British journal, Lobster Magazine -- which, despite its >incongruous name, is a venerable international publication on >intelligence matters -- has reported that Business International was >active in the 1980s promoting the candidacy of Washington-favored >candidates in Australia and Fiji.[12] In 1987, the CIA overthrew the >Fiji government after but one month in office because of its policy >of maintaining the island as a nuclear-free zone, meaning that >American nuclear-powered or nuclear-weapons-carrying ships could not >make port calls.[13] After the Fiji coup, the candidate supported by >Business International, who was much more amenable to Washington's >nuclear desires, was reinstated to power -- R.S.K. Mara was Prime >Minister or President of Fiji from 1970 to 2000, except for the one- >month break in 1987. > In his book, not only doesn't Obama mention his employer's name; >he fails to say when he worked there, or why he left the job. There >may well be no significance to these omissions, but inasmuch as >Business International has a long association with the world of >intelligence, covert actions, and attempts to penetrate the radical >left -- including Students for a Democratic Society (SDS)[14] -- it's >valid to wonder if the inscrutable Mr. Obama is concealing something >about his own association with this world. > >--snip-- > > >On 3 Jan 2009 at 15:20, Christoph Reuss wrote: > >Date sent: Sat, 3 Jan 2009 15:20:33 +0100 >To: mai-not@globalproblematique.net >From: creuss@bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) >Subject: Re: [Mai-not] Dr Mahathir Mohamed, former PM Malyasia - Open >Letter to > Obama with New Year's Resolutions >Send reply to: A renewed Mai-Not > > > > > 1) Stop killing people. > > 2) Stop indiscriminate support of Israeli killers > > 3) Stop applying sanctions > > 4) Stop .. inventing new and more diabolical weapons to kill more > > people more efficiently. > > 5) Stop your arms manufacturers from producing them. > > 6) Stop trying to democratize all the countries of the world. > > 7) Stop the casinos which you call financial institutions. > > 8) Sign the Kyoto Protocol and other international agreements. > > 9) Show respect for the United Nations. > >... = Change we can't believe in! > >Obama is a zionist puppet if there ever was one in the whitehouse... > >Chris > > > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >~~~~~~ >SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the >keyword >"igve". > > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not _______________________________________________ Mai-not mailing list Mai-not@globalproblematique.net http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090105/5206072c/attachment.html From jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca Mon Jan 5 15:32:27 2009 From: jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca (Janet M Eaton) Date: Mon Jan 5 15:30:47 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Bill Richardson - Kissinger-American by Greg Palast Message-ID: <4962442B.26487.B646E422@jmeaton.ns.sympatico.ca> ------- Forwarded message follows ------- Send reply to: palast@gregpalast.net From: "Greg Palast" To: "jmeaton@ns.sympatico.ca" Date sent: Mon, 05 Jan 2009 11:10:41 -0500 Subject: Bill Richardson - Kissinger-American Bill Richardson - Kissinger-American by Greg Palast excerpted from Armed Madhouse January 5, 2009 Bill Richardson is out: Caught with his hand, if not exactly in the cookie jar, at least you could say his sticky finger were near it. I'm not surprised. For years I've been investigating the second-most corrupt state in the USA (after Alaska). I like to check in on the enchanted state with my bud Santiago Ju?rez. I knew it was not a polite question, but it was really bugging me, so I asked him, "Exactly how does a Mexican get the name William Richardson?" Governor Richardson?s dad, Santiago explained, was a Citibank executive assigned to Mexico City. There he met Governor Bill?s mom, and-milagro!-a Mexican-American was born. Richardson gets big mileage out of his mother?s heritage, and that makes him, legitimately, a Mexican-American, a politically useful designation. But it?s just as legitimate to say that Richardson is a Citibank-American. But Governor Richardson is more than that. Between leaving Bill Clinton?s cabinet where he was Secretary of Energy and grabbing a Hispanic-district seat in Congress, Richardson became a partner in (Henry) Kissinger and Associates. That would make Richardson a Kissinger-American as well. In 2004, John Kerry won New Mexico-if you counted the votes. But they didn't - and George Bush won the state and the presidency by just 5,000 ballots. Everyone was talking about the theft of Ohio by Republicans, but few noted that New Mexico was stolen as well. But one fact drove me straight nuts: In the end, this state and its damaged elections were in the hands of Richardson, A Democrat and a Mexican-American one at that. In New Mexico the issue of uncounted votes is more than skin deep. Lots of Mexican-American votes don?t tally, but Citibank-American votes never get lost. Kissinger American votes always count. The story of America?s failed elections is not about undervotes. It?s about underclass. Disenfranchisement is class warfare by other means. It just happens that in New Mexico, the colors of the underclass are, for the most part, brown and red. Class War by Other Means As community organizer Santiago told me: You take away people?s health insurance and you take their right to union pay scales and you take away their pensions-taking away their vote?s just one more on the list. Some New Mexico Democrats have no trouble at the voting booth. In Santa Fe, you find trust-fund refugees from Los Angeles wearing Navajo turquoise jewelry and "casual" clothes that cost more than my car. Each one has a personal healer, an unfinished film script and a tan so deep you?d think they?re bred for their leather. They?re Democrats and their votes count. Voting-or at least voting that gets tabulated - is a class privilege. The effect is racial and partisan, but the engine is economic. The second- and third-highest undervotes in New Mexico were recorded in McKinley and Cibola counties-85% and 72% Hispanic and Native. But the undervote champ is nearly the whitest county in New Mexico: DeBaca, which mangled and lost 8.4% of ballots cast. White DeBaca, whose average income hovers at the national poverty level, is poorer than Hispanic Cibola. No question, disenfranchisement gives off an ugly racial smell, but income is the real predictor of vote loss. And what about those Bernalillo ghost voters for Bush? Those spirits are, it turns out, quite well-to-do, haunting the mesas west of Albuquerque where the real estate provides unobstructed views of Georgia O?Keeffe sunsets. This was my third investigation in New Mexico in twenty years. The first time, the state?s Attorney General brought me in to go over the account books of Public Service of New Mexico (PNM), a racketeering enterprise masquerading as an electric company. Too young to understand what I wasn?t supposed to know, I proudly mapped out the sewerage lines of deceit connecting the gas drillers, water lords and political elite of New Mexico. The AG?s office handed me a nice check - which I took not as a reward, but as a payment to leave the state. After a decade away, I returned as a reporter, to look into prisons- for-pro?t out?t Wackenhut Inc. In September 1999, a company insider told me, Wackenhut was cutting costs at its New Mexico jails by sending guards alone into the cell blocks. Ralph Garcia of Santa Rosa, who?d lost his ranch to drought, took the $7.95-an-hour job guarding homicidal neo-Nazis and Mexican mafia thugs in the local Wackenhut lock-up. Inexperienced, untrained and alone, he was stabbed to death by inmates just two weeks after the insider?s warning. So that?s how Garcia became one more impoverished Chicano who lost his vote. No question, that?s not your typical case of voter disenfranchisement, but that?s the reality of the "Land of Enchantment." New Mexico is the New America, where growing income inequality is creating a feudal divide between the prison-owning class and the prisoner-and-guard class. Vote spoilage is the owning class?s weapon of choice. Whose flag does Bill Richardson carry in the nouvelle class war? When I was checking out the New Mexico vote in 2005, my old friends Public Service of New Mexico hit the front page, sued by the State of California for conspiring with Enron to rig the California power market. It is still in court. It was a scam called "Ricochet." Enron and PNM say it was not illegal. It played out about the time Garcia was walking the cell block. Where was Richardson? He was in Washington, Clinton?s Secretary of Energy, playing chubby cheerleader for PNM?s plan for "deregulation" of the energy market. Deregulation made PNM?s games possible-and Richardson?s employment by Kissinger inevitable. Richardson, Ready for Takeoff What about all those suspect spoiled votes in Hispanic and Indian precincts stuck inside the machines? Why didn?t this Mexican-American Democrat ask for a recount? It didn?t just slip Richardson?s little mind: He actively did everything in his power to stop a recount. I was told that it was Richardson himself who encouraged Secretary of State Vigil-Giron to reject the $114,000 payment from pissed-off Democrats and the Green Party. The Governor was too busy to speak with me about this. Halting the 2004 recount wasn?t enough for Governor Bill, however. He demanded the legislature pass a "reform"law that would require anyone wanting a recount of a suspicious vote to put up a bond of over one million dollars. As a result, "free and fair elections" are now effectively outlawed in New Mexico. You can have a choice of a "free"election or a "fair" election, but not both. Want fair? Then you have to pay a million to recheck the ballots. In other words, it?s against the law to buy votes, but in New Mexico not against the law to buy the vote count. On his phony reform law, Richardson was called out by a fellow Democrat, State Senator Linda Lopez-an act of indiscreet defiance that would not be forgotten by the Governor?s circle. The centerpiece of the law signed by the Governor: Ms. Fox-Young?s proposal to require photo ID for new voters. Maybe the former Cabinet Secretary and United Nations Ambassador Richardson couldn?t imagine that photo IDs would be a problem for some voters. After all, Mexican- Americans in Little Texas may have trouble producing acceptable IDs, but it?s no problem at all for a Kissinger-American like Governor Richardson. The Governor and Jimmy Carter both have passports, they have credit cards and they have chauffeurs who will vouch for them. Richardson wouldn?t speak with me about the 2004 vote fiasco. Instead, he busied himself with his space program. He announced the state would chip in $200 million to build a "spaceport"to land private rocket ships that will be launched beginning in 2009 by Richard Branson, the British billionaire. Passengers have already bought tickets for $200,000 each (round trip, they hope). ************** Read the rest of this story by picking up Greg Palast's Armed Madhouse at Amazon.com or support his investigations by getting an autographed copy of the book at www.PalastInvestigativeFund.org Subscribe to Palast's reports at www.GregPalast.com ------- End of forwarded message ------- -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: - Type: application/octet-stream Size: 10866 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090105/c4bbf1aa/-.obj -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: - Type: application/octet-stream Size: 167 bytes Desc: "AVG certification" Url : http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090105/c4bbf1aa/--0001.obj From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Mon Jan 5 18:25:13 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Mon Jan 5 18:25:17 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Refugees and revenge (was Re: Challenge settler state's "right to exist") In-Reply-To: <200901051629.n05GTd58019786@karma.reboot.ca> References: <200901051629.n05GTd58019786@karma.reboot.ca> Message-ID: <20090106002513.D0644F884@fep05.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090106/c9ee8f4c/attachment.html From oscarptyltd at ozemail.com.au Mon Jan 5 19:31:50 2009 From: oscarptyltd at ozemail.com.au (Clem Clarke) Date: Mon Jan 5 19:32:14 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] [Fwd: [FixGov] Free downloads] Message-ID: <4962B486.2070400@ozemail.com.au> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090106/c7ac297c/attachment-0001.html From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Mon Jan 5 20:34:49 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Mon Jan 5 20:34:56 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Refugees and revenge In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090106023450.4F619F626@fep07.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> Following on the remarks about population migrations, there is not the slightest comparison between people settling in a country with the blessing of those who live there and a horde smashing their way in by armed aggression (not in response to it), seizing the territory, stealing legally titled property, expelling the original inhabitants by force and reserving (and endlessly expanding) their new territory for an extremely narrowly defined ethnic group and maintaining it by armed violence. None of the four million settlers (two thirds of the resident population of Israel) entered with the permission of those who belong there. Genuine immigrants are a precious resource, colonists who barge in at gunpoint are like locusts. The colonists who flooded into the New World at gunpoint died out generations ago. The colonists in Palestine are very much alive and a serious threat to regional and world peace. Dion Giles Western Australia From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Tue Jan 6 00:39:57 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Tue Jan 6 00:40:34 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] The financial Crisis as told by Calvin & Hobbs Message-ID: <20090106063958.9EFE4F929@fep05.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> A good cartoon is worth a thousand economics courses. Thanks to Glenn Hefter at Murdoch University for this one Dion Giles Western Australia -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Calvin_Hobbs_USA_Financial_System.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 166018 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090106/99d45e20/Calvin_Hobbs_USA_Financial_System-0001.jpg From ptuffley at xtra.co.nz Tue Jan 6 01:52:36 2009 From: ptuffley at xtra.co.nz (Peter Tuffley) Date: Tue Jan 6 01:53:17 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] The financial Crisis as told by Calvin & Hobbs In-Reply-To: <20090106063958.9EFE4F929@fep05.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> References: <20090106063958.9EFE4F929@fep05.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> Message-ID: <04A8AEF0-9BA9-41DE-9994-758F061D2D3F@xtra.co.nz> On 6/01/2009, at 7:39 PM, Dion Giles wrote: > A good cartoon is worth a thousand economics courses. Thanks to > Glenn Hefter at Murdoch University for this one Perfect!!! Peter From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Tue Jan 6 03:09:52 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Tue Jan 6 03:10:02 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Economics courses Message-ID: <20090106090953.989AFF553@fep07.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090106/83e15779/attachment.html From creuss at bluewin.ch Tue Jan 6 04:12:21 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Tue Jan 6 04:13:58 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Re: Challenge settler state's "right to exist" Message-ID: Dion Giles wrote: > The colonists who flooded into the New World at gunpoint > died out generations ago. As individuals yes, but their heirs (sic) too often continue in their ways -- domestically and in world politics. That's part of why the U$ identifies so strongly with the settlers in Palestine. They see Palestinians as the "new Injuns"... And the propaganda works the same (remember those John Wayne movies painting the Injuns as the evil attackers of peaceful cowboys who only defended "their" turf!). --- > {Ed: "Israel will remain"} > > That's just what I thought about Algerie Francais in the 1950s, the > British Empire as recently as the early sixties, the American enclave in > Vietnam in the early seventies, the Boer regime in South Africa in the > early eighties. Very many thought the same thing of the Third Reich in > the early forties. They're vile but they'll last. ... > They base their claim to world sympathy on the Nazi > holocaust, and it's effective. Even more effective is to smear anyone who questions zionism as an "anti-Semite" (while they continue to butcher Semites in Palestine). This is a cudgel that the Boers etc. etc. lacked. > Almost nobody has any sympathy with > random rocket attacks on a population That's why Israel is staging them... Ever wondered how the Palestinians are supposed to smuggle in so many heavy large rockets while they can't even smuggle in enough food and medical supplies as they're starving and dying? > (That's not to say a sudden blitzkreig against Dimona using a massive > shower of sophisticated rockets wouldn't do a power of good - true the > Zionists still hold nukes, but nukes are useless against a people cheek > by jowl with their own population). Israel didn't develop nukes against Palestinians, but against the surrounding Arab states. And maybe for a new 9/11 in a U$ city when it comes to needing a pretext to turn Iran into a parking lot... Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From creuss at bluewin.ch Tue Jan 6 04:37:28 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Tue Jan 6 04:39:18 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] BBC incitement to ethnic cleansing (was Re: Challenge settler state's "right to exist") Message-ID: Ed Deak wrote: > The horror stories the uprooted inhabitants had to endure, > while marching on the roads, from the hands of the Czech "resistance" > that was strangely silent in the war years, but woke up after the > fighting was over and were killing disarmed troops and refugees, > while the Russians laughed their heads off, has been documented in > many books and articles. Btw, the BBC helped to incite the Czechs to this post-war ethnic cleansing (the violent expulsion of over 2 million Germans and the death of at least 24,000): According to the London newspaper "News Chronicle" from November 4th, 1944, the BBC radio aired the following message from the Czech general Ingrs on 03-Nov-1944 to his fellow Czech citizens: (when it was clear that Germany was losing the war) "When our day comes, the whole nation will apply the old Hussite battlecry: 'Beat them, kill them, leave none alive.' Everyone should take round now for the appropriate weapon to harm the Germans most. If there is no firearms at band, any other kind of weapon that cuts or stabs or hits should be prepared and hidden." This from an exiled general of the army that didn't fire a single shot when Hitler invaded, and then handed over their Skoda tanks, thereby increasing Hitler's post-Versailles tank park by 50%, which enabled Hitler to invade and occupy France. When asked why they aired this call for ethnic cleansing like Radio Rwanda, the BBC replied in 2008 that it was too long ago to find out the motive... Cheers, Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From creuss at bluewin.ch Tue Jan 6 04:51:01 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Tue Jan 6 04:52:47 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Economics courses Message-ID: > "I agree it's a good cartoon, but I don't think its worth can be > measured by economic courses - even a thousand - that wouldn't even buy > the paints or crayons - let alone the cartoonist's time." Ah, but there's pretty high DEMAND for economics courses.... ;o) Chris From D.Giles at murdoch.edu.au Mon Jan 5 21:49:30 2009 From: D.Giles at murdoch.edu.au (Dion Giles) Date: Tue Jan 6 05:14:39 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] The financial Crisis as told by Calvin & Hobbs Message-ID: <20090106034931.4F1E7F75E@fep04.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> A good cartoon is worth a thousand economics courses. Thanks to Glenn Hefter at Murdoch University for this one Dion Giles Western Australia ?????? -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Calvin_Hobbs_USA_Financial_System.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 166018 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090106/e516853e/Calvin_Hobbs_USA_Financial_System-0001.jpg From creuss at bluewin.ch Tue Jan 6 06:27:27 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Tue Jan 6 06:28:59 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Sarkozy on Gaza situation Message-ID: "We can't understand how a democracy like Israel can allow the humanitarian situation in Gaza to spiral downward", Sarkozy said after talks with Palestinian president Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah. (translated from http://www.20min.ch/news/ausland/story/Tote-bei-Angriff-auf-UNO-Schulen-13924144 -- doesn't seem to get reported by English-language media?) ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Tue Jan 6 20:09:15 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Tue Jan 6 20:09:26 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Sarkozy on Gaza situation In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090107020916.9DCE4F634@fep04.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090107/e6fcf4be/attachment.html From papadop at peak.org Wed Jan 7 01:50:34 2009 From: papadop at peak.org (MichaelP) Date: Wed Jan 7 01:51:03 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] FISK: Israel has opened the gates of hell Message-ID: http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/fisk/rss The Independent (London) Wednesday, 7 January 2009 Robert Fisk: Why do they hate the West so much, we will ask What are these? So once again, Israel has opened the gates of hell to the Palestinians. Forty civilian refugees dead in a United Nations school, three more in another. Not bad for a night's work in Gaza by the army that believes in "purity of arms". But why should we be surprised? Have we forgotten the 17,500 dead -- almost all civilians, most of them children and women -- in Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon; the 1,700 Palestinian civilian dead in the Sabra-Chatila massacre; the 1996 Qana massacre of 106 Lebanese civilian refugees, more than half of them children, at a UN base; the massacre of the Marwahin refugees who were ordered from their homes by the Israelis in 2006 then slaughtered by an Israeli helicopter crew; the 1,000 dead of that same 2006 bombardment and Lebanese invasion, almost all of them civilians? What is amazing is that so many Western leaders, so many presidents and prime ministers and, I fear, so many editors and journalists, bought the old lie; that Israelis take such great care to avoid civilian casualties. "Israel makes every possible effort to avoid civilian casualties," yet another Israeli ambassador said only hours before the Gaza massacre. And every president and prime minister who repeated this mendacity as an excuse to avoid a ceasefire has the blood of last night's butchery on their hands. Had George Bush had the courage to demand an immediate ceasefire 48 hours earlier, those 40 civilians, the old and the women and children, would be alive. What happened was not just shameful. It was a disgrace. Would war crime be too strong a description? For that is what we would call this atrocity if it had been committed by Hamas. So a war crime, I'm afraid, it was. After covering so many mass murders by the armies of the Middle East, by Syrian troops, by Iraqi troops, by Iranian troops, by Israeli troops, I suppose cynicism should be my reaction. But Israel claims it is fighting our war against "international terror". The Israelis claim they are fighting in Gaza for us, for our Western ideals, for our security, for our safety, by our standards. And so we are also complicit in the savagery now being visited upon Gaza. I've reported the excuses the Israeli army has served up in the past for these outrages. Since they may well be reheated in the coming hours, here are some of them: that the Palestinians killed their own refugees, that the Palestinians dug up bodies from cemeteries and planted them in the ruins, that ultimately the Palestinians are to blame because they supported an armed faction, or because armed Palestinians deliberately used the innocent refugees as cover. The Sabra and Chatila massacre was committed by Israel's right-wing Lebanese Phalangist allies while Israeli troops, as Israel's own commission of inquiry revealed, watched for 48 hours and did nothing. When Israel was blamed, Menachem Begin's government accused the world of a blood libel. After Israeli artillery had fired shells into the UN base at Qana in 1996, the Israelis claimed that Hizbollah gunmen were also sheltering in the base. It was a lie. The more than 1,000 dead of 2006 -- a war started when Hizbollah captured two Israeli soldiers on the border -- were simply dismissed as the responsibility of the Hizbollah. Israel claimed the bodies of children killed in a second Qana massacre may have been taken from a graveyard. It was another lie. The Marwahin massacre was never excused. The people of the village were ordered to flee, obeyed Israeli orders and were then attacked by an Israeli gunship. The refugees took their children and stood them around the truck in which they were travelling so that Israeli pilots would see they were innocents. Then the Israeli helicopter mowed them down at close range. Only two survived, by playing dead. Israel didn't even apologise. Twelve years earlier, another Israeli helicopter attacked an ambulance carrying civilians from a neighbouring village -- again after they were ordered to leave by Israel-- and killed three children and two women. The Israelis claimed that a Hizbollah fighter was in the ambulance. It was untrue. I covered all these atrocities, I investigated them all, talked to the survivors. So did a number of my colleagues. Our fate, of course, was that most slanderous of libels: we were accused of being anti-Semitic. And I write the following without the slightest doubt: we'll hear all these scandalous fabrications again. We'll have the Hamas-to-blame lie -- heaven knows, there is enough to blame them for without adding this crime -- and we may well have the bodies-from-the-cemetery lie and we'll almost certainly have the Hamas-was-in-the-UN-school lie and we will very definitely have the anti-Semitism lie. And our leaders will huff and puff and remind the world that Hamas originally broke the ceasefire. It didn't. Israel broke it, first on 4 November when its bombardment killed six Palestinians in Gaza and again on 17 November when another bombardment killed four more Palestinians. Yes, Israelis deserve security. Twenty Israelis dead in 10 years around Gaza is a grim figure indeed. But 600 Palestinians dead in just over a week, thousands over the years since 1948 -- when the Israeli massacre at Deir Yassin helped to kick-start the flight of Palestinians from that part of Palestine that was to become Israel -- is on a quite different scale. This recalls not a normal Middle East bloodletting but an atrocity on the level of the Balkan wars of the 1990s. And of course, when an Arab bestirs himself with unrestrained fury and takes out his incendiary, blind anger on the West, we will say it has nothing to do with us. Why do they hate us, we will ask? But let us not say we do not know the answer. From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Wed Jan 7 02:07:54 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Wed Jan 7 02:08:05 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] FISK: Israel has opened the gates of hell In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090107080755.6E2E2F41A@fep05.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> Fisk wrote: >Yes, Israelis deserve security. Why? And why can't they seek security by moving back to their own countries? Dion Giles Western Australia From creuss at bluewin.ch Wed Jan 7 05:36:24 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Wed Jan 7 05:38:01 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] FISK: Israel has opened the gates of hell Message-ID: > Fisk wrote: > >Yes, Israelis deserve security. > > Why? And why can't they seek security by moving back to their own countries? Because the world is full of evil anti-Semites out to get them, and only in Israel are they protected by Apache gunships, Merkava tanks, anti-Arab nukes etc. Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From creuss at bluewin.ch Wed Jan 7 05:42:04 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Wed Jan 7 05:43:34 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Sarkozy on Gaza situation Message-ID: I found it remarkable that Sarkozy sort of criticized Israel at all. And in the sense of his quote, the "democracy" lie could be used to hold Israel accountable, as it implies responsability. Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From creuss at bluewin.ch Wed Jan 7 05:58:46 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Wed Jan 7 06:00:18 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Gaza War just a "leftist" Election Campaign? Message-ID: Interesting background from an Israeli source: > Oh yes, I forgot to mention: We have parliamentary elections scheduled for > next month. Many suggest that the entire operation, or at least its scale, > are nothing more than a part of the election campaign of Ehud Barak and > Tzipi Livni, the Labor and Kadima party heads respectively, who are expected > to lose out to a Likkud coalition headed by Benjamin Netanyahu. The > situation of the labor party has been looking particularly grim - 11 seats > for a party which used to get 45 and above, and was the ruling party for 29 > years straight - and the campaign has given them 5 more. This question of > motive is even being discussed on mainstream media, which manages at the > same time to support the operation and be somewhat cynical about it. And on the "two-state solution": > Ironically, the prospect of two states - an > incommon future, if you will - is the one losing viability, even among its > supporters, as Israel is proving itself to be intolerable as a regime (both > to its Arab citizens and to the Palestinians in the 1967 OTs), and as the > settlement, land confiscations, and the carving up of the west bank > continue. Some Zionist commentators are warning that if a permanent > agreement is not reached soon, two states may no longer be an option. How > Israeli Jews and Arabs are to interact and relate other than with violence, > hatred and racism (mostly from one side of course) is indeed a question very > difficult to answer. This week at the Technion, my university, the anti-war > demonstration contained not more than two Israeli Jews out of about 200 > people; while on the other side, the counter-demo was chanting "an Arab = a > Saboteur" and "Death to the Saboteurs" and "Arab ingrate, hand back your > diploma". ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From thinker at thelakebc.ca Wed Jan 7 09:38:08 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Wed Jan 7 09:34:16 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Bloc:Syria, Turkey, Iran ? Message-ID: <200901071534.n07FY4PV030825@karma.reboot.ca> Print This Page Inquiry and Analysis - No. 490 January 6, 2009 No. 490 Recent Attempts to Form Strategic Regional Bloc: Syria, Turkey and Iran By: O. Winter * Introduction In August and September 2008, a series of meetings and mutual visits took place among the Syrian, Iranian, and Turkish heads of state. Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad visited Turkey and Iran in the first week of August, and a few days later, on August 14, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad visited Turkey. Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan then visited Damascus in early September. In reference to these visits, it was reported in the Arab press that Syria was attempting to form a strategic bloc with Iran and Turkey, and to establish a trilateral consultation and coordination mechanism with them. The Syrian press stated that the three countries held similar positions on many regional issues, including the Iranian nuclear dossier, the geographical unity of Iraq, and the intra-Palestinian conflict, and that they would be able to shape the future of the region according to their interests. Following are excerpts from statements and articles on this topic. Arab Diplomatic Sources: Syria Trying to Form a Trilateral Strategic Bloc in the Middle East The Qatari daily Al-Watan reported, citing Arab diplomatic sources, that Syria hoped to form a trilateral strategic bloc in the Middle East comprising Syria, Iran, and Turkey, and that this had been the object of Assad's August 2008 visit to Teheran and Ankara. [1] According to the sources, Damascus believes that strengthening ties and coordination among these three countries at this time would promote the achievement of equilibrium in the Middle East. The sources denied, however, that the bloc would be a political axis or an alliance, saying that it would only be a coordination and consultation mechanism for addressing various issues on the regional and international agenda. They added that Syria would be holding a trilateral summit in Damascus in order to determine the exact format of this coordination, and to confront the serious dangers and challenges facing the Middle East. [2] Assad: "There Is Real Cooperation Among These Three Countries" In a September 17, 2008 interview on Iranian TV, Syrian President Bashar Al-Assad discussed the relations among Syria, Iran and Turkey: "At present, there is real cooperation among these three countries; however, this cooperation must be extended to include other countries as well, especially Iraq, because we are neighbors. The main factor prompting [this cooperation] was the lessons we derived from the past. Furthermore, the mistakes made by the enemies have shown that lack of cooperation works against us. "Currently, the [Syrian-Iranian-Turkish] cooperation is mainly on the political level, but we hope to extend it [to other spheres as well]. I discussed this [issue] with the Iranian leadership during my visit to Iran, and [with the Turkish leadership] during my visit to Turkey and during the Turkish prime minister's visit to Syria." [3] On August 6, 2008, the day after Assad's return from Turkey, his political and media adviser Dr. Buthayna Sha'ban explained that the reciprocal visits were part of consultations on regional issues currently underway among the three countries, mainly on the issues of Iraq, Iran's nuclear dossier, and the situation in Palestine. Sha'ban said that the three countries agreed that Iran had the right to pursue its nuclear program for peaceful purposes, in accordance with international charters. She added that consultation among them had always served the security, peace, and stability of the region and had counteracted war and aggression. [4] She said that the three countries were concerned and apprehensive about the situation in Iraq, and that they saw "Iraq's unity, independence, and sovereignty over its resources and land as [a principle of great] importance." [5] Syrian Government Daily Teshreen: Trilateral Coordination Will Shape the Future of the Region In an editorial in the Syrian government daily Teshreen, editor-in-chief 'Issam Dari wrote that Turkey, Iran, and Syria would determine the future of the Middle East: "As prominent countries, Turkey, Syria and Iran can not only play an influential role in the region, but also shape [its] future in accordance with the will of their own peoples and that of the peoples of the entire region. This, in order to stop the brazen interference by outside [forces] - interference that must be rejected outright as incompatible with the supreme interests of the Arabs and those of their neighbors and friends. "The Syrian president's visit to Turkey, and his previous visit to Iran, were part of the joint and persistent effort by the three friendly countries for high-level coordination, aimed at achieving the aspirations of the peoples in the Middle East. Apparently, this coordination alarms those with plans that are hostile to [these] peoples, and as a result [this coordination] has come under unceasing attacks - which are unlikely to stop anytime soon - aimed at distorting and misrepresenting it, and at sabotaging Syria's relations with Iran and Turkey. However, these depraved attempts [to stop the coordination] will not succeed, since the three countries are aware [of them] and are determined to safeguard their supreme national interests, and to safeguard the welfare and the future of the region. "Accordingly, this [tripartite] coordination will determine the nature of the next phase - which will be shaped by parties that are from the region and are interested [in its affairs], and which throughout history have proven their ability to defend themselves and their culture." [6] Syrian Government Daily Al-Ba'th: The Three Countries' Positions Are Similar, If Not Identical An editorial in the Syrian government daily Al-Ba'th contended that Syria, Iran, and Turkey held similar positions on most regional issues: "Syria, Iran, and Turkey are countries of prominence and presence - politically, economically, and in terms of human [resources] - and they have important converging interests. This means that any crisis afflicting a neighboring country invariably affects them, directly or indirectly, as it affects other countries in the world, albeit to a lesser degree. "This conclusion is not new; what is significant, however, is Syria's initiative to broaden its contacts and engage its neighboring countries in a discussion on all issues of regional importance in the spheres of politics, economy, and security. This, in accordance with the common interests and aims of the countries and people of the region, who, in the recent years, have been suffering the consequences of the U.S. occupation of Iraq - and are still suffering from it. "Even more important are [Syria's, Iran's and Turkey's] similar, if not identical, positions on burning issues [such as] the occupied territories in Iraq and Lebanon, Iran's nuclear dossier, support for national conciliation in Palestine, the lifting of the Gaza siege, Iraq's unity and stability and the withdrawal of the occupying forces, support for the Lebanese national dialogue, and support for Iran's right to enrich uranium for peaceful purposes. These were the main issues in President Assad's talks with the Iranian and Turkish leaders. [7] As'ad 'Aboud, editor of the Syrian government daily Al-Thawra, underlined Syria's, Iran's, and Turkey's opposition to the U.S. presence in Iraq: "Who is paying the price of the current situation in Iraq?! Isn't it the Iraqi people, and after them the other countries in the region?! The decision to invade Iraq - wasn't it imposed on the countries of region in [complete] contradiction to their wishes and their efforts to ensure their own stability?! Did Iran support the war against Iraq - despite its [enmity] with [former] Iraqi president Saddam Hussein?! Did Turkey support the war against Iraq?! Didn't the Syrian president clearly declare that Iraq is a quagmire that is difficult to exit, [thus] openly opposing the war?!" [8] Syrian Weekly: Turkey Has Realized Where Its Interests Lie An editorial in the Syrian weekly Abyadh Wa-Aswad stated that Turkey had despaired of joining the Western world and had realized that its real interest lay in renewing its contacts with the Middle East countries: "In light of the economic interests and common denominators shared by Syria, Turkey, and Iran - including geographic [proximity] [and similarities in] religion, beliefs and positions - it has become more important than ever to conduct a political process that reflects this reality and protects these interests. [This move] has prepared the ground for redrawing the map of cooperation among [certain] countries in the region, [namely Syria, Turkey, and Iran], especially since their main common denominator is their categorical rejection of all Western dictates, and their rigorous adherence to the national and regional interests of every country "After soberly scrutinizing the [history of] the previous century, the [Turkish] government realized that dancing to Europe's tune is a waste of time unless it is willing to completely surrender to the West's will - which it refuses to do. It has realized that the right way is to rejoin the Arabs, since its real interests lie in the [Middle East,] with which it shares a common history and family ties [as well as common] religion, ideology and interests. "[Turkey] has rejoined the Arab [world] through the Syrian gate, with the aim of preserving its regional status Perhaps it was the threats to which the West has exposed it - especially after the U.S. invasion of Iraq and its support for the establishment of a Kurdish state which could threaten Turkey from the rear - that caused the young Turkish leadership (Erdogan and Gul) to advance in the correct and logical direction, [i.e.] towards the region to which they belong. [This move] has created a united regional strategic force to safeguard the interests of the people [in the region], which the West wants to harm "The factors uniting the three countries far outweigh their links with the West and the U.S. The rapprochement among Turkey, Syria, and Iran should be a model for other countries, which should [likewise] unite based on mutual interests and respect." [9] Main Headline of Syrian Weekly: "Syria-Iran-Turkey - A New Map of Regional Cooperation" Abyadh Wa-Aswad (Syria), August 10, 2008. Iranian Columnist: The Trilateral Front - A Major Regional Force that Will Restrain America's Rampage in the Region Iranian columnist Dr. Mohammad Sadeq Al-Hosseini, who is secretary-general of the Arab-Iranian Dialogue Forum, wrote in the Kuwaiti daily Al-Jarida: "The prevailing view in knowledgeable circles is that a consensus - if not an alliance - is forming among Teheran, Ankara, and Damascus. [This alliance] will transform these three countries into a major regional force that will act to restrain America's rampage in the region. Similar cooperation emerged during the era of the late [Syrian] president Hafez Al-Assad in the wake of the Kurdish rebellion, which spawned dangerous developments that threatened the security of the three countries. [The Kurdish issue] may be an important factor in reviving this trilateral [alliance today] "The war in the Caucasus, and its ramifications for U.S.-Russia relations, will offer the influential countries of the region a great opportunity to put their own stamp on what Washington envisaged as 'the New Middle East.' This [stamp] will be based on [these countries' own] positions and standards, rather than on those of the U.S., [which] has lost the war in the Caucasus. "Accordingly, it can be said with confidence that a main outcome of this war is [the emergence of] a regional front that is free from U.S. dictates." [10] *O. Winter is a research fellow at MEMRI. [1] According to the London daily Al-Hayat, Assad was visiting Turkey, which is mediating in the indirect Syria-Israel talks to apprise it of issues that had arisen during his meetings in Iran - namely, of Iran's concerns and apprehensions regarding the Syria-Israel negotiations and its request for detailed information about their progress. Al-Hayat (London), August 10, 2008. [2] Al-Watan (Qatar), August 8, 2008. [3] Al-Thawra (Syria), September 18, 2008. [4] Al-Thawra (Syria), August 7, 2008. [5] Al-Watan (Syria), August 7, 2008. [6] Teshreen (Syria), August 6, 2008. [7] Al-Ba'th (Syria), August 7, 2008. [8] Al-Thawra (Syria), August 7, 2008. [9] Abyadh Wa-Aswad (Syria), August 10, 2008. [10] Al-Jarida (Kuwait), August 18, 2008. Print This Page http://www.memri.org/bin/latestnews.cgi?ID=IA49009 MEMRI holds copyrights on all translations. Materials may ONLY be cited with proper attribution. ? All rights reserved. From creuss at bluewin.ch Wed Jan 7 13:35:22 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Wed Jan 7 13:36:53 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Bloc:Syria, Turkey, Iran ? Message-ID: Turkey is a traditional ally of Israel, and the new Assad as well as Ahmadinejad behave more and more like zionist dupes. This "Bloc" looks like "Plan B" to bring the rest of the Middle East under Israeli control. Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca Wed Jan 7 18:37:41 2009 From: jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca (Janet M Eaton) Date: Wed Jan 7 18:35:59 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Impending Destruction of the U.S. Economy Jan 09 [Superpower America .. a ship of fools in denial of their plight ] Message-ID: <49651295.4568.C13D358D@jmeaton.ns.sympatico.ca> Superpower America is a ship of fools in denial of their plight. While offshoring kills American economic prospects, "free-market economists" sing its praises. While war imposes enormous costs on a bankrupt country, neoconservatives call for more war and Republicans and Democrats appropriate war funds, abroad. By focusing America on war in the Middle East, the purpose of which is to guarantee Israel's territorial expansion, the executive and legislative branches, along with the media, have let slip the last opportunities the U.S. had to put its financial house in order. ... Unless the rest of the world decides to underwrite our economic rescue, the chips will fall where they may. --Paul Craig Roberts, former assistant secretary of the U.S Treasury for Economic Policy in the Reagan administration. fyi-janet ======================= http://www.coastalpost.com/09/01/15_The_Impending_Des_13A1D2.html The Impending Destruction Of The U.S. Economy MARIN COUNTY'S NEWS MONTHLY - FREE PRESS (415)868-1600 - (415)868-0502(fax) - P.O. Box 31, Bolinas, CA, 94924 January, 2009 Paul Craig Roberts Hubris and arrogance are too ensconced in Washington for policymakers to be aware of the economic policy trap in which they have placed the U.S. economy. If the subprime mortgage meltdown is half as bad as predicted, low U.S. interest rates will be required in order to contain the crisis. But if the dollar's plight is half as bad as predicted, high U.S. interest rates will be required if foreigners are to continue to hold dollars and to finance U.S. budget and trade deficits. Which will Washington sacrifice, the domestic financial system and overextended homeowners or its ability to finance deficits? The answer seems obvious. Everything will be sacrificed in order to protect Washington's ability to borrow abroad. Without this, Washington cannot conduct its wars of aggression, and Americans cannot continue to consume $800 billion dollars more each year than the economy produces. A few years ago the euro was worth 85 cents. Today, it is worth $1.48. This is an enormous decline in the exchange value of the U.S. dollar. Foreigners who finance the U.S. budget and trade deficits have experienced a huge drop in the value of their dollar holdings. The interest rate on U.S. Treasury bonds does not come close to compensating foreigners for the decline in the value of the dollar against other traded currencies. Investment returns from real estate and equities do not offset the losses from the decline in the dollar's value. China holds over one trillion dollars, and Japan almost one trillion, in dollar-denominated assets. Other countries have lesser but still substantial amounts. As the U.S. dollar is the reserve currency, the entire world's investment portfolio is overweighted in dollars. No country wants to hold a depreciating asset, and no country wants to acquire more depreciating assets. In order to reassure itself, Wall Street claims that foreign countries are locked into accumulating dollars in order to protect the value of their existing dollar holdings. But this is utter nonsense. The U.S. dollar has lost 60 per cent of its value during the current administration. Obviously, countries are not locked into accumulating dollars. The reason the dollar has not completely collapsed is that there is no clear alternative as reserve currency. The euro is a currency without a country. It is the monetary unit of the European Union, but the countries of Europe have not surrendered their sovereignty to the EU. Moreover, the UK, a member of the EU, retains the British pound. The fact that a currency as politically exposed as the euro can rise in value so rapidly against the U.S. dollar is powerful evidence of the weakness of the U.S. dollar. Japan and China have willingly accumulated dollars as the counterpart of their penetration and capture of U.S. domestic markets. Japan and China have viewed the productive capacity and wealth created in their domestic economies by the success of their exports as compensation for the decline in the value of their dollar holdings. However, both countries have seen the writing on the wall, ignored by Washington and American economists: by offshoring production for U.S. markets, the U.S.A. has no prospect of closing its trade deficit. The offshored production of U.S. firms counts as imports when it returns to the U.S. to be marketed. The more U.S. production moves abroad, the less there is to export and the higher imports rise. Japan and China - indeed, the entire world - realize that they cannot continue forever to give Americans real goods and services in exchange for depreciating paper dollars. China is endeavoring to turn its development inward and to rely on its potentially huge domestic market. Japan is pinning hopes on participating in Asia's economic development. The dollar's decline has resulted from foreigners accumulating new dollars at a lower rate. They still accumulate dollars, but fewer. As new dollars are still being produced at high rates, their value has dropped. If foreigners were to stop accumulating new dollars, the dollar's value would plummet. If foreigners were to reduce their existing holdings of dollars, superpower America would instantly disappear. Foreigners have continued to accumulate dollars in the expectation that sooner or later Washington would address its trade and budget deficits. However, now these deficits seem to have passed the point of no return. The sharp decline in the dollar has not closed the trade deficit by increasing exports and decreasing imports. Offshoring prevents the possibility of exports reducing the trade deficit, and Americans are now dependent on imports (including offshored production) for which there are no longer any domestically produced alternatives. The U.S. trade deficit will close when foreigners cease to finance it. The budget deficit cannot be closed by taxation without driving up unemployment and poverty. American median family incomes have experienced no real increase during the 21st century. Moreover, if the huge bonuses paid to CEOs for offshoring their corporations' production and to Wall Street for marketing subprime derivatives are removed from the income figures, Americans experience a decline in real income. Some studies, such as the Economic Mobility Project, find long-term declines in the real median incomes of some U.S. population groups and a decline in upward mobility. The situation may be even more dire. Recent work by Susan Houseman concludes that U.S. statistical data systems, which were set in place prior to the development of offshoring, are counting some foreign production as part of U.S. productivity and GDP growth, thus overstating the actual performance of the U.S. economy. The falling dollar has pushed oil to $100 a barrel, which in turn will drive up other prices. The falling dollar means that the imports and offshored production on which Americans are dependent will rise in price. This is not a formula to produce a rise in U.S. real incomes. In the 21st century, the U.S. economy has been driven by consumers going deeper in debt. Consumption fueled by increases in indebtedness received its greatest boost from Fed chairman Alan Greenspan's low interest rate policy. Greenspan covered up the adverse effects of offshoring on the U.S. economy by engineering a housing boom. The boom created employment in construction and financial firms and pushed up home prices, thus creating equity for consumers to spend to keep consumer demand growing. This source of U.S. economic growth is exhausted and imploding. The full consequences of the housing bust remain to be realized. American consumers lack discretionary income and can pay higher taxes only by reducing their consumption. The service industries, which have provided the only source of new jobs in the 21st century, are already experiencing falling demand. A tax increase would cause widespread distress. As John Maynard Keynes and his followers made clear, a tax increase on a recessionary economy is a recipe for falling tax revenues as well as economic hardship. Superpower America is a ship of fools in denial of their plight. While offshoring kills American economic prospects, "free-market economists" sing its praises. While war imposes enormous costs on a bankrupt country, neoconservatives call for more war and Republicans and Democrats appropriate war funds, abroad. By focusing America on war in the Middle East, the purpose of which is to guarantee Israel's territorial expansion, the executive and legislative branches, along with the media, have let slip the last opportunities the U.S. had to put its financial house in order. We have arrived at the point where it is no longer bold to say that nothing now can be done. Unless the rest of the world decides to underwrite our economic rescue, the chips will fall where they may. Dr. Roberts was assistant secretary of the U.S Treasury for Economic Policy in the Reagan administration. He is credited with curing stagflation and eliminating "Phillips curve" trade-offs between employment and inflation, an achievement now on the verge of being lost by the worst economic mismanagement in U.S. history. From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Wed Jan 7 18:53:43 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Wed Jan 7 18:53:50 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Gaza War just a "leftist" Election Campaign? In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090108005344.31740F5D7@fep07.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> The election they are campaigning over is as fraudulent of the whites-only elections the Boer regime held in South Africa. The counter-demonstrators are foreign interlopers. They do not belong there. They did not settle with the permission of those who do belong there. Failing to challenge and keep on challenging Israel's "right to exist" - and to place this challenge on a democratic basis that applies to any other country or territory -- is to invite an endless cycle of violence based on nothing more than the immediately previous act of violence and leaving out of the equation the question of entitlement. Dion Giles Western Australia At 20:58 07/01/2009, Chris wrote: >Interesting background from an Israeli source: > > > Oh yes, I forgot to mention: We have parliamentary elections scheduled for > > next month. Many suggest that the entire operation, or at least its scale, > > are nothing more than a part of the election campaign of Ehud Barak and > > Tzipi Livni, the Labor and Kadima party heads respectively, who > are expected > > to lose out to a Likkud coalition headed by Benjamin Netanyahu. The > > situation of the labor party has been looking particularly grim - 11 seats > > for a party which used to get 45 and above, and was the ruling party for 29 > > years straight - and the campaign has given them 5 more. This question of > > motive is even being discussed on mainstream media, which manages at the > > same time to support the operation and be somewhat cynical about it. > >And on the "two-state solution": > > > Ironically, the prospect of two states - an > > incommon future, if you will - is the one losing viability, even among its > > supporters, as Israel is proving itself to be intolerable as a regime (both > > to its Arab citizens and to the Palestinians in the 1967 OTs), and as the > > settlement, land confiscations, and the carving up of the west bank > > continue. Some Zionist commentators are warning that if a permanent > > agreement is not reached soon, two states may no longer be an option. How > > Israeli Jews and Arabs are to interact and relate other than with violence, > > hatred and racism (mostly from one side of course) is indeed a > question very > > difficult to answer. This week at the Technion, my university, the anti-war > > demonstration contained not more than two Israeli Jews out of about 200 > > people; while on the other side, the counter-demo was chanting "an Arab = a > > Saboteur" and "Death to the Saboteurs" and "Arab ingrate, hand back your > > diploma". > > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword >"igve". > > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Wed Jan 7 19:16:52 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Wed Jan 7 19:17:00 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Toronto: Jewish protestors occupy Zionist embassy Message-ID: <20090108011653.3FD64F2AC@fep03.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> Sorry there's no workable URL for this (the one given requires log-in and password) but I'm skipping the URL rule because it is very time-dependent - action described is as 11.20 am today Toronto time. Passed on by a member of Alldems, a group arising from the betrayal of the Australian Democrats. ========================================= Matan Cohen sent a message to the members of VIVA Hugo Chavez for Expelling the Israeli Ambassador from Venezuela. -------------------- Subject: israeli consulate in toronto taken over Arrests underway in Toronto Israeli Consulate Sit-in Toronto: Wednesday January 8, 2009 Time: 11:20 am Police have moved in to arrest a group of Jewish Canadian women who are currently occupying the Israeli consulate at 180 Bloor Street West in Toronto. The women took their action in protest against the on-going Israeli assault on the people of Gaza. The group is carrying out this occupation in solidarity with the 1.5 million people of Gaza and to ensure that Jewish voices against the massacre in Gaza are being heard. They are demanding that Israel end its military assault and lift the 18-month siege on the Gaza Strip to allow humanitarian aid into the territory. Israel has been carrying out a full-scale military assault on the Gaza Strip since December 27, 2008. At least 660 people have been killed and 3000 injured in the air strikes and in the ground invasion that began on January 3, 2009. Israel has ignored international calls for a ceasefire and is refusing to allow food, adequate medical supplies and other necessities of life into the Gaza Strip. Protesters are outraged at Israel's latest assault on the Palestinian people and by the Canadian government's refusal to condemn these massacres. They are deeply concerned that Canadians are hearing the views of pro-Israel groups who are being represented as the only voice of Jewish Canadians. The protesters have occupied the consulate to send a clear statement that many Jewish-Canadians do not support Israel's violence and apartheid policies. They are joining with people of conscience all across the world who are demanding an end to Israeli aggression and justice for the Palestinian people. The group includes: Judy Rebick, professor; Judith Deutsch, psychoanalyst and president of Science for Peace; B.H. Yael, filmmaker; Smadar Carmon, an Canadian Israeli peace activist and others. Spokespersons for the group will be outside the Israeli consulate: Dr. Miriam Garfinkle: 416-731-6605 mgarfinkle@sympatico.ca Cathy Gulkin: 416-697-0768 cgulkin@rogers.com Release is online at http://www.facebook.com/l.php?u=http://www.sources.com%2FReleases%2FNR135.htm [Sorry, it's not, unledss you have log-in access - DG] From thinker at thelakebc.ca Wed Jan 7 22:43:56 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Wed Jan 7 22:40:01 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] From the Winnipeg Free Press Message-ID: <200901080439.n084dmgW032457@karma.reboot.ca> SAVE THIS | EMAIL THIS | Close The last occupied people By: Idris Elbakri 1:00 AM | Comments (1) The cycles of history have become too short. History now repeats itself with unsettling frequency. We have seen the cycle of devastating embargo, massive air war, land invasion and subsequent political changes (subdue resistance movements, change regimes, etc.) at least three times in the past decade: the Iraq invasion, the Lebanon war and now the all-out assault on Gaza. In all three cases, the cycle is propagated by Israel, its ally the U.S., or both. Other nations of the world watch, clap or issue void condemnations. In Iraq, the cycle succeeded, in Lebanon it failed, and Gaza still holds its breath for the final outcome. Historians do learn from history. Politicians don't. The Iraq of today is not a modern democracy but a field for guerrilla warfare, terrorism and sectarian violence. Iraq's final farewell to its liberator, George W. Bush, was a shoe in the face. When the dust settles in Gaza, there will be swollen graveyards, debilitated hospitals and a population more driven to extremes than ever. Every household will be in mourning. Like its Lebanon invasion of 1982, its 2006 war on Lebanon and now its war on Gaza, Israel will exact its terrible revenge, kill thousands of people, but eventually leave in moral defeat. With every new adventure, Israel's myth of might is further eroded and its adversaries made even more tenacious. There is no equivalence of adversaries in this war. Palestinian rockets are manufactured in garages and basements and makeshift workshops. In the past eight years, they have killed 20 Israelis. The Israeli bombs and fighter jets are all made in the U.S., and in one day they killed 200 people. The asymmetry is staggering. Israel fights because it is a colonial power. The Palestinians fight because they are an occupied and dispossessed people, and more recently in Gaza, driven to starvation. Like the Algerians in their struggle against French colonialism, like the South Africans struggling against apartheid and like almost every other struggle against occupation and colonialism, Palestinians use violence. Nelson Mandela was once considered a terrorist. The Palestinians are not pathological killers and genetic anti-Semites, as often is the subtle and sometimes explicit message since 9/11. Their quarrel with the world is that they remain the last occupied people. They are desperate. In my comfortable armchair a world away, I have argued against the immorality of the means of Palestinians. Argue all we want about who started what and when, and who responded in self defence. Argue all we want about why Palestinians don't use peaceful means of resistance. We can shout all we want about Israel's right to defend itself. Yet, there remains a fundamental problem, the elephant in the room that everyone ignores: Palestinians want genuine freedom, true independence, return to their homeland, dignity and a seat at the roundtable of nations. As long as all the shuttle diplomacy, numerous peace processes, international peace conferences do not address their grievance, fully and comprehensively, they will erupt again. We are powerless to stop this bloodbath. Many more will be killed. Many more will be maimed. Israeli and Palestinian mothers will mourn more of their sons. The short cycle of history will ensure that this war will repeat itself again, and again. Maybe, at least, we can start by acknowledging our moral defeat: Our much acclaimed values of human rights, freedom and human dignity are not universal. Some people are more deserving of democracy, freedom and life than others. Some people are more deserving of death than others. The Palestinians know this. Their gravediggers are busy. Idris Elbakri is a medical physicist. A Palestinian born in Jerusalem, he moved to Winnipeg with his family four years ago. Find this article at: http://www.winnipegfreepress.com/opinion/westview/the_last_occupied_people.html SAVE THIS | EMAIL THIS | Close Check the box to include the list of links referenced in the article. From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Wed Jan 7 22:40:45 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Wed Jan 7 22:41:03 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Giving the chimp the boot Message-ID: <20090108044046.293D6F87D@fep01.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> Got this from Brian Jenkins on StopMAI(WA) list. Dion Giles Western Australia -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: Shoe1.xls Type: application/octet-stream Size: 98816 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090108/c39b8a08/Shoe1-0001.obj From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Wed Jan 7 22:52:58 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Wed Jan 7 22:53:03 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Zionist cut off at the knees Message-ID: <20090108045259.BE56DF911@fep04.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> Have a look of the nauseating diatribe at http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/bvic-alhadeffb-a-legitimate-right-to-selfdefense/2009/01/07/1231004099824.html (first few pars will give you the drift) and see letter to the Editor copied to another list. The letter is the answer to every self-serving squeal from the latter-day Voortrekkers. Dion Giles Western Australia From glparramatta at greenleft.org.au Thu Jan 8 00:58:54 2009 From: glparramatta at greenleft.org.au (glparramatta) Date: Thu Jan 8 01:13:05 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] What's new at Links: Solidarity with Gaza, Cuba's 50th, French new left party, economic crisis, sport, Russia and feminism, Darfur Message-ID: <4965A42E.30608@greenleft.org.au> What's new at Links: Solidarity with Gaza, Cuba's 50th, French new left party, economic crisis, sport, Russia and feminism, Darfur * * * Subscribe free to Links - International Journal of Socialist Renewal - at http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=343373 Visit and bookmark http://links.org.au and add it to your RSS feed (http://links.org.au/rss.xml). If you would like us to consider an article, please send it to links@dsp.org.au *Please pass on to anybody you think will be interested in /Links/. * * * Israel invades Gaza, Palestinians, solidarity activists call for solidarity and resistance Palestinian citizens of Israel held a massive protest on January 3, 2009, in Sakhnin, an Arab city in northern Israel, against Israel's war on the Palestinian people in Gaza. It was attended by up to 150,000 protesters. Crowds waving Palestinian flags and brandishing pro-Palestinian placards chanted "Gaza will not surrender to the tanks and bulldozers!" and "Don't fear, Gaza, we are with you!". * Read more statements from a range of Palestinian and solidarity organisations Cuba, 50 years on ... and the same challenge of making a revolution By L?zaro Barredo Medina Granma International -- October 30, 2008 -- "The dictatorship has been defeated. The joy is immense. And yet, there still remains much to do. We won't deceive ourselves by believing that everything will be much easier from now on; perhaps it will be much more difficult." This is what Commander in Chief Fidel Castro told the people on January 8, 1959, the day of his entry into Havana. Many people could never imagine the immense challenge that they would live to experience. * Read more 1959-2009: 50 years of the Cuban Revolution -- Fidel Castro: the Untold Story To mark the 50th anniversary of the Cuban Revolution, which triumphed on January 1, 1959, here is filmmaker Estela Bravo's remarkable portrait of Fidel Castro and the Cuban Revolution. * Watch more `We are all Palestinians!' -- International left solidarity with the oppressed people of Palestine Below Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal publishes a range of statements from left parties and groups around the world. * Read more France: From the Revolutionary Communist League to the New Anti-Capitalist Party This contribution was written as part of preparations for the January 2009 congress of the Revolutionary Communist League (LCR). The congress agenda includes the political "self-dissolution" of the LCR, to set the stage for the new challenge of the New Anti-Capitalist Party (NPA). The authors of this piece belong to the generation of activists from the 1960s and 1970s; so while principally addressed to members of the LCR, it may be of interest to many others. * Read more World economic crisis: No room for band-aid solutions in the Third World By Reihana Mohideen December 29, 2008 -- According to recent Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) figures, another 40 million people have been pushed into poverty and hunger so far this year as a result of spiralling food prices, and the total number of people suffering hunger and malnutrition has reached 963 million worldwide. * Read more Capitalism and sport: Sports for a few The competitive frenzy for winning in sports has been fuelled by aggressive marketing. Together they ensure that while a minority is trained with superlative sports facilities, the majority is deprived of even basic amenities to play and breathe fresh air. * Read more Present-day Russia needs a renewal of the feminist movement By Anna Ochkina, translated from Russian for Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal by Renfrey Clarke January 1, 2009 -- In the Soviet Union feminism was elevated to the status of official state policy and ultimately was destroyed as an ideology and a social movement. The dominant concept was one of a general, global equality; as a result, a separate movement for the rights of women simply could not exist. The feminist reference points of Soviet social policy took the form of a set of rights for women: employment in the workforce on an equal basis with men; political rights; equality before the law, and so forth. The gaining of formal rights, however, resulted in the restricting of particular, specific rights of women, which in practice proved very difficult to realise. * Read more Talking points and background on Israel's murderous assault on Gaza By the Coalition Against Israeli Apartheid (Canada) and the Palestine Solidarity Committee (South Africa) * Read more Arabic-language statement from Socialist Alliance (Australia) condemns Israel's Gaza massacre English version below. * Read more Can Washington `save Darfur'? By Kevin Funk and Steven Fake Few humanitarian crises have occasioned as much media and activist attention in the US as the conflict in the Darfur region of western Sudan. Major politicians routinely pay homage to suffering Darfurians in their speeches, well-heeled Darfur advocacy groups take out full-page ads in the New York Times, and commentators regularly fill op-ed ledgers around the country with righteous, indignant calls for the West to act to end the suffering. Yet for all the rhetorical attention and concern afforded to Darfur in the US, what is actually understood about the US role in addressing the conflict? * Read more Venezuela, Cuba condemn Israel's massacres in Gaza Dozens of protesters rallied outside the Israeli embassy in Caracas on December 28, in opposition to what one speaker referred to as "genocide" by the Israeli "occupation forces". The protests will continue in front of the embassy, according to a rally organiser, Hindu Anderi. Anderi, a Palestinian human rights activist, thanked the Venezuelan government for its position on the conflict, but demanded concrete action, saying "solidarity needs to mean taking measures that will affect Israel economically and politically, because otherwise the condition of the Palestinian people will not change". * Read more * * * Links seeks to promote the international exchange of information, experience of struggle, theoretical analysis and views of political strategy and tactics within the international left. It is a forum for open and constructive dialogue between active socialists coming from different political traditions. It seeks to bring together those in the international left who are opposed to neoliberal economic and social policies. It aims to promote the renewal of the socialist movement in the wake of the collapse of the bureaucratic model of "actually existing socialism" in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. ATTENTION: Sign up for regular ``what's new'' announcement emails at http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=343373 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090108/267c569f/attachment.html From creuss at bluewin.ch Thu Jan 8 07:22:43 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Thu Jan 8 07:24:14 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Gaza: "This is an all-out war on civilians." Message-ID: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ev6ojm62qwA Norwegian doctor in Gaza: "This is an all-out war on civilians." "They can't flee ... because they're in a cage." ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From creuss at bluewin.ch Thu Jan 8 07:36:58 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Thu Jan 8 07:38:29 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Kissinger: Crisis is "Great Opportunity to create NWO" Message-ID: Kissinger: Crisis is "Great Opportunity to create a New World Order" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dsUMnW_bye0 Also see http://www.republicbroadcasting.org/index.php?cmd=news.article&articleID=2615 OBAMA VOWS U$ MILITARY RULE OVER PLANET ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From creuss at bluewin.ch Thu Jan 8 13:01:57 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Thu Jan 8 13:04:40 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] IDF delayed Red Cross rescuers for days Message-ID: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090108/ap_on_re_eu/eu_red_cross_gaza_1 Red Cross slams Israel over access to Gaza wounded By FRANK JORDANS, Associated Press Writer Thu Jan 8, 7:38 am ET GENEVA - The international Red Cross accused Israeli forces Thursday of failing to assist wounded Palestinians and of "unacceptable" delays in letting rescue workers reach a Gaza home where four small children were found alive next to their mothers' bodies. The Israeli army had refused rescuers permission to reach the site in the Zaytun neighborhood of Gaza City for days, the International Committee of the Red Cross said. Israeli officials said the delay was caused by fighting in the area. The neutral aid group's head of delegation for the region described the incident as "shocking." "The Israeli military must have been aware of the situation but did not assist the wounded," Pierre Wettach said in a statement. "Neither did they make it possible for us or the Palestine Red Crescent to assist the wounded." Rescuers eventually received permission to go to the site Wednesday, four days after it was hit by Israeli shells, the international Red Cross said. They found 15 dead and 18 wounded in three houses, including the children who were too weak to stand. The organization said requests to be allowed to reach other destroyed houses in this neighborhood, reportedly containing more wounded, were refused by the Israeli army. The Geneva-based group said it believes "that in this instance the Israeli military failed to meet its obligation under international humanitarian law to care for and evacuate the wounded." "It considers the delay in allowing rescue services access unacceptable," the group's statement said. Israel's ambassador in Geneva, Aharon Leshno-Yaar, denied that his country was failing in its humanitarian obligations. "Once the military activity was over then it was possible for humanitarian teams to evacuate the wounded," he told The Associated Press. Leshno-Yaar said Israel respects international humanitarian law and is working with aid groups to allow the wounded to be removed and in some cases transferred to hospitals in Israel. Since Wednesday, Israeli forces have also observed a daily three-hour halt in operations to allow humanitarian evacuations and aid deliveries throughout Gaza. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Thu Jan 8 19:33:41 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Thu Jan 8 19:33:46 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Zionist cut off at the knees - the letter In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090109013342.7F55FF8CD@fep01.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090109/64677ba6/attachment.html From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Thu Jan 8 19:46:59 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Thu Jan 8 19:47:10 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Gaza: "This is an all-out war on civilians." In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090109014704.C7269F8F1@fep01.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090109/d76c8e97/attachment.html From duanebehrens at cox.net Thu Jan 8 22:16:31 2009 From: duanebehrens at cox.net (Duane Behrens) Date: Thu Jan 8 22:16:38 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Re: Harold Pinter In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20090108231631.892LV.500134.imail@fed1rmwml37> Thanks, Mark. Works best to just type in the link as shown below - without the underscores - into your address bar. DB ---- Kangarooratt@aol.com wrote: ============= Here is a text version of his talk. _http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article11239.htm_ (http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article11239.htm) Mark In a message dated 1/8/2009 6:08:45 P.M. Pacific Standard Time, duanebehrens@cox.net writes: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GY2Z27Y-HJE Mark, thanks for sharing this. Wow. This is a 46 minute video. For those of you who have a hard time with that, go to minute 37 to hear his closing. It is perhaps the finest commentary on the human spirit that I've ever seen. Thank you for the gift, Mr. Pinter. Rest in peace. Mark, if there's a link to the text of his talk, please share it with us . . ... and thanks again. Duane Behrens **************A Good Credit Score is 700 or Above. See yours in just 2 easy steps! (http://pr.atwola.com/promoclk/100000075x1215047751x1200957972/aol?redir=http://www.freecreditreport.com/pm/default.aspx?sc=668072%26hmpgID=62%26bcd=De cemailfooterNO62) From creuss at bluewin.ch Fri Jan 9 05:02:41 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Fri Jan 9 05:04:12 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Zionist cut off at the knees - the letter Message-ID: Jason forgot the most important ingredient (which was of course omitted by Alhadeff, like by all zionist scribes, for strategic reasons): The hunger blockade, which was the reason given by the rocketeers in the first place. Hunger and lack of other vital resources is a time-tested zionist tool of genocide, also in other world regions. With biofuels, it will get global. Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From creuss at bluewin.ch Fri Jan 9 06:43:46 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Fri Jan 9 06:45:27 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] UN rights chief wants Gaza investigation Message-ID: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090109/ap_on_re_mi_ea/un_un_gaza_rights_1 UN rights chief wants investigation of Gaza abuses 32 mins ago GENEVA - The U.N.'s top human rights official has called for an independent investigation of possible war crimes in Gaza and Israel. U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights Navi Pillay says the harm to civilians in Israel caused by Hamas rockets is unacceptable. But she says Israel must abide by international humanitarian law regardless of Hamas' actions. Pillay says both parties must care for the wounded and avoid targeting health workers, hospitals and ambulances. She says that violations of international humanitarian law may amount to war crimes for which individuals should be held accountable. Pillay spoke Friday at the start of an emergency meeting of the Geneva-based U.N. Human Rights Council on the situation in Gaza. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From duanebehrens at cox.net Fri Jan 9 08:15:45 2009 From: duanebehrens at cox.net (Duane Behrens) Date: Fri Jan 9 08:15:57 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Fwd: WTC7 - NEW Message-ID: <20090109091545.NESKW.111342.imail@fed1rmwml28> ============= Date: Fri, 9 Jan 2009 8:59:29 -0500 From: Duane Behrens To: Airheads Chat Subject: WTC7 - NEW http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x256070 With thanks to a dear Auntie, who sent me the above link with the caption, "A schoolteacher puts it into words we can all understand." His main point, near the end: The NIST, with its multi-million dollar budget, makes an "error" in its mathematical projections that is clearly exposed by an engineer with no budget whatsoever! Thanks, Auntie. This was great. Nathan, you've been a staunch supporter of each of the Official Conspiracy Theorys (OCTs) - i.e., that the buildings "collapsed" as the result of impact or fire. Go ahead and take a crack at this, but please try to discuss the merits of the points raised rather than slander the author or me - your typical response in the past. Fleischer? Like Nathan, you've been quite vocal in your insults of anyone who doubts the OCT. "Crazies", "Assholes", "virulent anti-Semites", "True Believers", "Tin Hat Conspiracy Theorists", are a just a few of the terms you and Nathan use to describe the OCT skeptics, without ever actually defending the NIST. Let me challenge you now to discuss the video on its own merits. If you trust the NIST report, you should be able to defend it. Do you think you could do that? Anyone ELSE here still believe the NIST? If not . . . for the rest of you . . . what are you DOING about it? Well, for starters, you could forward the link below to any other lists on which you participate. You can call and write your local and federal representative to tell them you don't believe this fairy tale any more. And so on. C'mon, kids. It's fun. For your children's sake, get involved - be a responsible citizen. Or live with your conscience. DB http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x256070 ============= From duanebehrens at cox.net Fri Jan 9 08:15:46 2009 From: duanebehrens at cox.net (Duane Behrens) Date: Fri Jan 9 08:15:57 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Fwd: WTC7 - NEW Message-ID: <20090109091546.F12T5.111343.imail@fed1rmwml28> ============= Date: Fri, 9 Jan 2009 8:59:29 -0500 From: Duane Behrens To: Airheads Chat Subject: WTC7 - NEW http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x256070 With thanks to a dear Auntie, who sent me the above link with the caption, "A schoolteacher puts it into words we can all understand." His main point, near the end: The NIST, with its multi-million dollar budget, makes an "error" in its mathematical projections that is clearly exposed by an engineer with no budget whatsoever! Thanks, Auntie. This was great. Nathan, you've been a staunch supporter of each of the Official Conspiracy Theorys (OCTs) - i.e., that the buildings "collapsed" as the result of impact or fire. Go ahead and take a crack at this, but please try to discuss the merits of the points raised rather than slander the author or me - your typical response in the past. Fleischer? Like Nathan, you've been quite vocal in your insults of anyone who doubts the OCT. "Crazies", "Assholes", "virulent anti-Semites", "True Believers", "Tin Hat Conspiracy Theorists", are a just a few of the terms you and Nathan use to describe the OCT skeptics, without ever actually defending the NIST. Let me challenge you now to discuss the video on its own merits. If you trust the NIST report, you should be able to defend it. Do you think you could do that? Anyone ELSE here still believe the NIST? If not . . . for the rest of you . . . what are you DOING about it? Well, for starters, you could forward the link below to any other lists on which you participate. You can call and write your local and federal representative to tell them you don't believe this fairy tale any more. And so on. C'mon, kids. It's fun. For your children's sake, get involved - be a responsible citizen. Or live with your conscience. DB http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x256070 ============= From creuss at bluewin.ch Fri Jan 9 08:54:54 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Fri Jan 9 08:56:24 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Fwd: WTC7 - NEW Message-ID: Excellent, Duane. > "Crazies", "Assholes", "virulent anti-Semites", "True > Believers", "Tin Hat Conspiracy Theorists", are a just a few of the terms > you and Nathan use to describe the OCT skeptics Nathan and his buddy were obviously talking to themselves -- a trait of schizophrenia which is common among zionists due to inbreeding. Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From thinker at thelakebc.ca Fri Jan 9 09:21:15 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Fri Jan 9 09:17:19 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Righteous fury Message-ID: <200901091517.n09FH8jC006542@karma.reboot.ca> Israel's righteous fury and its victims in Gaza Ilan Pappe, chair in the Department of History at the University of Exeter. The Electronic Intifada, 2 January 2009; http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article10100.shtml My visit back home to the Galilee coincided with the genocidal Israeli attack on Gaza. The state, through its media and with the help of its academia, broadcasted one unanimous voice -- even louder than the one heard during the criminal attack against Lebanon in the summer of 2006. Israel is engulfed once more with righteous fury that translates into destructive policies in the Gaza Strip. This appalling self-justification for the inhumanity and impunity is not just annoying, it is a subject worth dwelling on, if one wants to understand the international immunity for the massacre that rages on in Gaza. It is based first and foremost on sheer lies transmitted with a newspeak reminiscent of darker days in 1930s Europe. Every half an hour a news bulletin on the radio and television describes the victims of Gaza as terrorists and Israel's massive killings of them as an act of self-defense. Israel presents itself to its own people as the righteous victim that defends itself against a great evil. The academic world is recruited to explain how demonic and monstrous is the Palestinian struggle, if it is led by Hamas. These are the same scholars who demonized the late Palestinian leader Yasser Arafat in an earlier era and delegitimized his Fatah movement during the second Palestinian intifada. But the lies and distorted representations are not the worst part of it. It is the direct attack on the last vestiges of humanity and dignity of the Palestinian people that is most enraging. The Palestinians in Israel have shown their solidarity with the people of Gaza and are now branded as a fifth column in the Jewish state; their right to remain in their homeland cast as doubtful given their lack of support for the Israeli aggression. Those among them who agree -- wrongly, in my opinion -- to appear in the local media are interrogated, and not interviewed, as if they were inmates in the Shin Bet's prison. Their appearance is prefaced and followed by humiliating racist remarks and they are met with accusations of being a fifth column, an irrational and fanatical people. And yet this is not the basest practice. There are a few Palestinian children from the occupied territories treated for cancer in Israeli hospitals. God knows what price their families have paid for them to be admitted there. The Israel Radio daily goes to the hospital to demand the poor parents tell the Israeli audience how right Israel is in its attack and how evil is Hamas in its defense. There are no boundaries to the hypocrisy that a righteous fury produces. The discourse of the generals and the politicians is moving erratically between self-compliments of the humanity the army displays in its "surgical" operations on the one hand, and the need to destroy Gaza for once and for all, in a humane way of course, on the other. This righteous fury is a constant phenomenon in the Israeli, and before that Zionist, dispossession of Palestine. Every act whether it was ethnic cleansing, occupation, massacre or destruction was always portrayed as morally just and as a pure act of self-defense reluctantly perpetrated by Israel in its war against the worst kind of human beings. In his excellent volume The Returns of Zionism: Myths, Politics and Scholarship in Israel, Gabi Piterberg explores the ideological origins and historical progression of this righteous fury. Today in Israel, from Left to Right, from Likud to Kadima, from the academia to the media, one can hear this righteous fury of a state that is more busy than any other state in the world in destroying and dispossessing an indigenous population. It is crucial to explore the ideological origins of this attitude and derive the necessary political conclusions form its prevalence. This righteous fury shields the society and politicians in Israel from any external rebuke or criticism. But far worse, it is translated always into destructive policies against the Palestinians. With no internal mechanism of criticism and no external pressure, every Palestinian becomes a potential target of this fury. Given the firepower of the Jewish state it can inevitably only end in more massive killings, massacres and ethnic cleansing. The self-righteousness is a powerful act of self-denial and justification. It explains why the Israeli Jewish society would not be moved by words of wisdom, logical persuasion or diplomatic dialogue. And if one does not want to endorse violence as the means of opposing it, there is only one way forward: challenging head-on this righteousness as an evil ideology meant to cover human atrocities. Another name for this ideology is Zionism and an international rebuke for Zionism, not just for particular Israeli policies, is the only way of countering this self-righteousness. We have to try and explain not only to the world, but also to the Israelis themselves, that Zionism is an ideology that endorses ethnic cleansing, occupation and now massive massacres. What is needed now is not just a condemnation of the present massacre but also delegitimization of the ideology that produced that policy and justifies it morally and politically. Let us hope that significant voices in the world will tell the Jewish state that this ideology and the overall conduct of the state are intolerable and unacceptable and as long as they persist, Israel will be boycotted and subject to sanctions. But I am not naive. I know that even the killing of hundreds of innocent Palestinians would not be enough to produce such a shift in the Western public opinion; it is even more unlikely that the crimes committed in Gaza would move the European governments to change their policy towards Palestine. And yet, we cannot allow 2009 to be just another year, less significant than 2008, the commemorative year of the Nakba, that did not fulfill the great hopes we all had for its potential to dramatically transform the Western world's attitude to Palestine and the Palestinians. It seems that even the most horrendous crimes, such as the genocide in Gaza, are treated as discrete events, unconnected to anything that happened in the past and not associated with any ideology or system. In this new year, we have to try to realign the public opinion to the history of Palestine and to the evils of the Zionist ideology as the best means of both explaining genocidal operations such as the current one in Gaza and as a way of pre-empting worse things to come. Academically, this has already been done. Our main challenge is to find an efficient to explain the connection between the Zionist ideology and the past policies of destruction, to the present crisis. It may be easier to do it while, under the most terrible circumstances, the world's attention is directed to Palestine once more. It would be even more difficult at times when the situation seems to be "calmer" and less dramatic. In such "relaxed" moments, the short attention span of the Western media would marginalize once more the Palestinian tragedy and neglect it either because of horrific genocides in Africa or the economic crisis and ecological doomsday scenarios in the rest of the world. While the Western media is not likely to be interested in any historical stockpiling, it is only through a historical evaluation that the magnitude of the crimes committed against the Palestinian people throughout the past 60 years can be exposed. Therefore, it is the role of an activist academia and an alternative media to insist on this historical context. These agents should not scoff from educating the public opinion and hopefully even influence the more conscientious politicians to view events in a wider historical perspective. Similarly, we may be able to find the popular, as distinct from the high brow academic, way of explaining clearly that Israel's policy -- in the last 60 years -- stems from a racist hegemonic ideology called Zionism, shielded by endless layers of righteous fury. Despite the predictable accusation of anti-Semitism and what have you, it is time to associate in the public mind the Zionist ideology with the by now familiar historical landmarks of the land: the ethnic cleansing of 1948, the oppression of the Palestinians in Israel during the days of the military rule, the brutal occupation of the West Bank and now the massacre of Gaza. Very much as the Apartheid ideology explained the oppressive policies of the South African government, this ideology -- in its most consensual and simplistic variety -- allowed all the Israeli governments in the past and the present to dehumanize the Palestinians wherever they are and strive to destroy them. The means altered from period to period, from location to location, as did the narrative covering up these atrocities. But there is a clear pattern that cannot only be discussed in the academic ivory towers, but has to be part of the political discourse on the contemporary reality in Palestine today. Some of us, namely those committed to justice and peace in Palestine, unwittingly evade this debate by focusing, and this is understandable, on the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT) -- the West Bank and Gaza Strip. Struggling against the criminal policies there is an urgent mission. But this should not convey the message that the powers that be in the West adopted gladly by a cue from Israel, that Palestine is only in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip, and that the Palestinians are only the people living in those territories. We should expand the representation of Palestine geographically and demographically by telling the historical narrative of the events in 1948 and ever since and demand equal human and civil rights to all the people who live, or used to live, in what today is Israel and the OPT. By connecting the Zionist ideology and the policies of the past with the present atrocities, we will be able to provide a clear and logical explanation for the campaign of boycott, divestment and sanctions. Challenging by nonviolent means a self-righteous ideological state that allows itself, aided by a mute world, to dispossess and destroy the indigenous people of Palestine, is a just and moral cause. It is also an effective way of galvanizing the public opinion not only against the present genocidal policies in Gaza, but hopefully one that would prevent future atrocities. But more importantly than anything else it will puncture the balloon of self-righteous fury that suffocates the Palestinians every times it inflates. It will help end the Western immunity to Israel's impunity. Without that immunity, one hopes more and more people in Israel will begin to see the real nature of the crimes committed in their name and their fury would be directed against those who trapped them and the Palestinians in this unnecessary cycle of bloodshed and violence. Ilan Pappe is chair in the Department of History at the University of Exeter. From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Fri Jan 9 19:11:16 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Fri Jan 9 19:11:23 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Fwd: WTC7 - NEW In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090110011118.328F1F503@fep05.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> Near Sydney back in the 70s, environmental activists were worried about contamination entering a creek from a pipe emerging from its banks. Nobody admitted responsibility for it, and it would cost big bucks to explore the pipe back to source. So the activists simply blocked the exit with concrete and waited. Sure enough there were howls of dismay from a particular factory, against which a reluctant government authority was then directed. I often think of that, and in particular when someone who questions the cause of the collapse of the WTC is greeted by cries of "virulent anti-Semitism". Shakespeare got there first, when Queen Gertrude insisted rather too vigorously that she had nothing to do with Hamlet's father's death: "The lady doth protest too much, methinks". Dion Giles Western Australia At 23:54 09/01/2009, you wrote: >Excellent, Duane. > > > "Crazies", "Assholes", "virulent anti-Semites", "True > > Believers", "Tin Hat Conspiracy Theorists", are a just a few of the terms > > you and Nathan use to describe the OCT skeptics > >Nathan and his buddy were obviously talking to themselves -- a trait of >schizophrenia which is common among zionists due to inbreeding. > >Chris > > > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword >"igve". > > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not From duanebehrens at cox.net Sat Jan 10 08:27:51 2009 From: duanebehrens at cox.net (Duane Behrens) Date: Sat Jan 10 08:28:13 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] 10,000 Israelis Protest Gaza Incursion Message-ID: <20090110092751.LL42T.296856.imail@fed1rmwml39> http://www.opednews.com/articles/Israeli-Intel-Targets-Isra-by-TheRealNews-Networ-090109-78.html "Israeli intelligence agency cracks down on [legal, permitted, peaceful]Israeli protesters, as reported by Israel and West Bank freelance journalist Jesse Risen Rosenfeld who also comments on the demonstrations occurring inside Israel." From duanebehrens at cox.net Sat Jan 10 09:04:19 2009 From: duanebehrens at cox.net (Duane Behrens) Date: Sat Jan 10 09:04:22 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] The Difficulty of an Informed American Message-ID: <20090110100419.UZ5NL.297102.imail@fed1rmwml39> "The function of the "mainstream media" is to sell products and to brainwash the audience for the government and interest groups. By subscribing to it, Americans support their own brainwashing." Paul Craig Roberts, "The Difficulty in Becoming an Informed American" http://www.opednews.com/articles/1/The-Difficulty-of-Being-an-by-Paul-Craig-Roberts-090109-642.html From creuss at bluewin.ch Sat Jan 10 16:31:54 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Sat Jan 10 16:33:22 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Michael Moore: another gatekeeper? Message-ID: "Emanuel has controlled Obama for years. Emanuel's brother Ariel is Michael Moore's agent. The day after the election, Moore joked about Emanuel's appointment on the Larry King Show. Moore, a Zionist shill, made a film about 9-11, produced by the Weinstein brothers, that completely avoided mentioning the many Israeli connections to the terror attacks." complete article: The Israeli Who Will Run the Obama White House http://www.bollyn.info/home/articles/polphil/rahm-emanuel-and-barack-obama/ ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From fresch at ica.net Sat Jan 10 17:33:46 2009 From: fresch at ica.net (Fred Schneider) Date: Sat Jan 10 17:33:57 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] A Solution to the Financial Crisis Message-ID: <7.0.1.0.2.20090110174939.0256ade8@ica.net> This article ("A Solution to the Financial Crisis", below) reminds me - and confirms the presentation - of Ed Deak's link to the video submission of "How international bankers gained control of America". http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-515319560256183936 I took the time to listen to the whole thing, often repeating passages because there are too many facts unfamiliar to me. I just can't figure out how we can change the system or how to make those responsible for the abuse of it pay for the corrections necessary to restore normalcy to the world's economies. So many have suffered and died trying to change or expose that "money changer system" in the past. Fred Schneider. Forwarded article: A Solution to the Financial Crisis by Kuzminski Page 1 of 1 page(s) http://www.opednews.com/articles/A-Solution-to-the-Financia-by-Kuzminski-090108-292.html No one really seems to know what to do about the financial crisis. Conservatives who embraced deregulation and limited government have lost all credibility. Their policies are now seen to have been a license for unprecedented greed and corruption, culminating in the Great Crash of 2008. This should the moment for liberals and progressives, who hope to replay the New Deal in an Obama administration, but I wouldn't bet on it. Unlike the 1930s, the debt burden today is astronomical, with total commitments running many times more than actual productivity and little prospect of repayment. Figures are bandied about these days to the point of being meaningless, but it's widely recognized that we face hundreds of trillions of dollars of global debt vs. a productive global economy of less than $50 trillion. It just doesn't add up. Government's share of GDP in 1929 was in the single digits, leaving plenty of room to run Keynesian deficits. By contrast, government's share of GDP today is approaching fifty percent. Corporations are similarly maxed out in debt, compared to the 1930s, with hundred of trillions of dollars in derivatives hanging over them. And households are far more in debt than they were then, with many more mortgages outstanding, not to mention credit card debt, education loans, auto loans, etc. Someone should tell Obama that borrowing our way out of bankruptcy is no longer an option, if historical measures have any meaning. It will only delay and intensify the day of reckoning. Obama may be the American Gorbachev: a decent, intelligent man trying to do the impossible. The progressive-liberal approach of the Obama adminstration is as unlikely to succeed as the attempt by Gorbachev in the 1980s to save the Soviet system by peristroika. The immediate problem is far too much debt; there is no way most creditors are going to be repaid according to their expectations. At some point mass bankruptcies and liquidations seem inevitable, possibly including a breakdown at least in part of the production and distribution system, with mass unemployment, etc. We-- especially the mainstream media--are still in denial about this. Compounding this immediate credit problem is an underlying ecological problem. We have maxed-out our resources globally, especially the most crucial of them (oil) with too many people on the planet now making demands which exceed its carrying capacity. Further, we now we have to deal with climate change. Here too is a major difference from the 1930s, where energy and other resources remained in relative abundance, and the climate was globally (if not always locally) stable. If all this is so, we face a major crisis on the scale of the Great Depression, perhaps even worse. Dmitry Orlov's five stages of collapse -- financial collapse, economic collapse, political collapse, social collapse, and cultural sollapse -- provide a rough map of what could happen. The Soviet Union got as far as stage three, political collapse, before recovering. Our situation might be worse, as he suggests. One outcome might yet be a reestablishment of the Wall Street system, with some modifications, which was the outcome of the last Depression. Once liquidation takes place, and the debt burden is largely reduced, lending at interest might eventually resume, if there are enough new borrowers, if the crash isn't too extreme, and if the financial and political system hasn't been overturned. A return to business as usual would be depressing enough, since it would mean another replay of the cycle, but the other possibilities are even more unpalatable: some kind of authoritarian centralized state power (fascist or socialist) on the one hand, or anarchy--real and total collapse--on the other. Can we avoid these unattractive alternatives? Perhaps not, since our inability to think outside the box seems so deeply entrenched. What is needed, if we can do it, is some kind of genuinely coherent, promising, and viable alternative. It just so happens that such an alternative exists, but we have to go back to nineteenth century American history to find it. The populist tradition in the nineteenth century, based on Jeffersonian visions of decentralized political and economic power, was a staunch opponent of finance capitalism, the the Wall Street system which has been in the cat-bird seat since the Civil War. The essence of that system is a privatized monetary ponzi scheme in which the banking system is allowed to create money and charge usurious rates of interest for doing so. Debt builds up, can't be repaid, leading to a crash, and then things start up again: boom and bust. The populists were on to this, and resisted it as best they could. The most comprehensive populist response to usurious private capital is found in the work of an early populist, Edward Kellogg (1790-1858), a businessman who turned his attention to the business cycle after suffering losses in the crash of 1837. In A NEW MONETARY SYSTEM and other works, Kellogg challenged the privatized, usurious money system and sketched out an intriguing alternative perhaps more relevant than ever today. In brief, Kellogg advocated establishing a nationally regulated but locally run public credit system through which citizens could obtain nominal interest loans on good collateral, such loans constituting the basis of a new currency. He insisted that usurious interest rates be banned, and that all money lent be fixed by law at a nominal rate of about one percent. Usury might be defined as an interest rate in excess of the replacement value of the principal over some normal period of use. It takes 72 years at one percent interest for the interest to equal the principle. It we take 72 years as a rough measure of a human lifetime, the interest on money borrowed at one percent over a lifetime will be exactly equal to the replacement value of the resources consumed in the course of that lifetime with the use of the original loan. What could be fairer? Kellogg's nominal interest public credit currency is designed not to force unsustainable growth and subsequent crashes, as usurious rates do, but rather to replace resources as they wear out. This makes possible something we desperately need: a steady-state economy. Not least, his system gives ordinary citizens the opportunity to access capital for their own improvement as a rate they can sustain; it allows them, not private creditors, to retain most of the value of the money they borrow and put to work. In this system the public truly borrows from itself. By making capital widely available at nominal interest, Kellogg's system strikes at the heart of the system of privatized usury, which concentrates wealth in few hands. It offers a way to naturally distribute capital without directly taking from the rich and suffering the consequences of their resentment. The rich will no longer be able to live off the interest on their capital, however, but must spend it or invest it productively. Here is the answer, in a nutshell, to the age-old problem of the distribution of wealth. Finally, by making it possible for ordinary individuals and households to gain economic control over their lives and to obtain and enjoy private property, Kellogg's monetary system lays the foundation for responsible citizenship and true democracy, which are impossible in our corrupt system of rich and poor. Only private property widely distributed can support a genuine democracy. Kellogg's monetary system is an idea worth taking seriously. I explore it and other populist principles in more detail in my recent book, FIXING THE SYSTEM: A HISTORY OF POPULISM, ANCIENT & MODERN. Adrian Kuzminski is a local activist in upstate New York, and Research Scholar in Philosophy at Hartwick College. He is the author of FIXING THE SYSTEM: A HISTORY OF POPULISM, ANCIENT & MODERN (Continuum Books). My home page: "http://home.ica.net/~fresch/index.htm" ======================================== Fred Schneider, 905-279-7199, Fax: same, call first! #37-425 Meadows Blvd. Mississauga, ON, L4Z 1N3 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090110/f7888505/attachment.html From duanebehrens at cox.net Sat Jan 10 22:31:20 2009 From: duanebehrens at cox.net (Duane Behrens) Date: Sat Jan 10 22:32:11 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] RE: WTC7 - NEW... In-Reply-To: <6F9E7B3DCB4945108F64F2FC478E7633@mbruno93kitchen> Message-ID: <20090110233120.UKY8G.542403.imail@fed1rmwml34> PAUL: Nobody answered Duane's challenge though, I notice. DUANE: Noticed that myself. As I recall, there have been at least three or four members here who, while admitting that Bush and his handlers may have had foreknowledge of 9/11, have nevertheless been steadfast in their support of the NISTs conclusion that all three buildings fell as the result of stress from fire/impact. Now, faced with clear evidence from a high school physics teacher that WTC7 had to have been intentionally demolished - and that the NIST intentionally lied to make it appear otherwise - each of these former NIST supporters have responded as follows. In alphabetical order: Michael Boyle - nil Bob Fleischer - nil Nathan Meyer - nil So, then . . . what has been both fascinating and heartening to me is that when we refuse to be derailed by personal insults and "anti-Semite" distractions - when we instead and continually press upon the singular point . . . that steel and concrete buildings cannot physically fail in the way we're told without an introduced force - When we do THAT, the OCT supporters go strangely, eerily, and completely silent. What to do, then? Press. Duane Behrens -- http://perzuki.smugmug.com/ From ptuffley at xtra.co.nz Sun Jan 11 02:13:26 2009 From: ptuffley at xtra.co.nz (Peter Tuffley) Date: Sun Jan 11 02:14:05 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Fwd: WTC7 - NEW (and newer) In-Reply-To: <20090109091546.F12T5.111343.imail@fed1rmwml28> References: <20090109091546.F12T5.111343.imail@fed1rmwml28> Message-ID: On 10/01/2009, at 3:15 AM, Duane Behrens wrote: > > ============= > Date: Fri, 9 Jan 2009 8:59:29 -0500 > From: Duane Behrens > To: Airheads Chat > Subject: WTC7 - NEW > > http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=385x256070 > > With thanks to a dear Auntie, who sent me the above link with the > caption, "A schoolteacher puts it into words we can all understand." > > His main point, near the end: The NIST, with its multi-million > dollar budget, makes an "error" in its mathematical projections that > is clearly exposed by an engineer with no budget whatsoever! See also (from the same schoolteacher): WTC7: NIST Finally Admits Freefall (Part I) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V0GHVEKrhng WTC7: NIST Finally Admits Freefall (Part II) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtKLtUiww80 WTC7: Nist Finally Admits Freefall (Part III) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vz43hcKYBm4 Peter -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090111/a4052be1/attachment.html From gdy52150 at spiritone.com Sun Jan 11 03:04:04 2009 From: gdy52150 at spiritone.com (gdy52150) Date: Sun Jan 11 02:39:04 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] A Solution to the Financial Crisis In-Reply-To: <7.0.1.0.2.20090110174939.0256ade8@ica.net> References: <7.0.1.0.2.20090110174939.0256ade8@ica.net> Message-ID: <4969B604.6020207@spiritone.com> wealth tax and a good hangman Fred Schneider wrote: > This article ("A Solution to the Financial Crisis", below) reminds me > - and confirms the presentation - of Ed Deak's link to the video > submission of "How international bankers gained control of America". > http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-515319560256183936 > I took the time to listen to the whole thing, often repeating passages > because there are too many facts unfamiliar to me. I just can't figure > out how we can change the system or how to make those responsible for > the abuse of it pay for the corrections necessary to restore normalcy > to the world's economies. So many have suffered and died trying to > change or expose that "money changer system" in the past. > Fred Schneider. > > Forwarded article: > *_A Solution to the Financial Crisis > _*by Kuzminski Page 1 of 1 page(s) > http://www.opednews.com/articles/A-Solution-to-the-Financia-by-Kuzminski-090108-292.html > > No one really seems to know what to do about the financial crisis. > Conservatives who embraced deregulation and limited government have > lost all credibility. Their policies are now seen to have been a > license for unprecedented greed and corruption, culminating in the > Great Crash of 2008. This should the moment for liberals and > progressives, who hope to replay the New Deal in an Obama > administration, but I wouldn't bet on it. > > Unlike the 1930s, the debt burden today is astronomical, with total > commitments running many times more than actual productivity and > little prospect of repayment. Figures are bandied about these days to > the point of being meaningless, but it's widely recognized that we > face hundreds of trillions of dollars of global debt vs. a productive > global economy of less than $50 trillion. It just doesn't add up. > > Government's share of GDP in 1929 was in the single digits, leaving > plenty of room to run Keynesian deficits. By contrast, government's > share of GDP today is approaching fifty percent. Corporations are > similarly maxed out in debt, compared to the 1930s, with hundred of > trillions of dollars in derivatives hanging over them. And households > are far more in debt than they were then, with many more mortgages > outstanding, not to mention credit card debt, education loans, auto > loans, etc. > > Someone should tell Obama that borrowing our way out of bankruptcy is > no longer an option, if historical measures have any meaning. It will > only delay and intensify the day of reckoning. Obama may be the > American Gorbachev: a decent, intelligent man trying to do the > impossible. The progressive-liberal approach of the Obama > adminstration is as unlikely to succeed as the attempt by Gorbachev in > the 1980s to save the Soviet system by peristroika. > > The immediate problem is far too much debt; there is no way most > creditors are going to be repaid according to their expectations. At > some point mass bankruptcies and liquidations seem inevitable, > possibly including a breakdown at least in part of the production and > distribution system, with mass unemployment, etc. We-- especially the > mainstream media--are still in denial about this. > > Compounding this immediate credit problem is an underlying ecological > problem. We have maxed-out our resources globally, especially the most > crucial of them (oil) with too many people on the planet now making > demands which exceed its carrying capacity. Further, we now we have to > deal with climate change. Here too is a major difference from the > 1930s, where energy and other resources remained in relative > abundance, and the climate was globally (if not always locally) stable. > > If all this is so, we face a major crisis on the scale of the Great > Depression, perhaps even worse. Dmitry Orlov's five stages of collapse > -- financial collapse, economic collapse, political collapse, social > collapse, and cultural sollapse -- provide a rough map of what could > happen. The Soviet Union got as far as stage three, political > collapse, before recovering. Our situation might be worse, as he > suggests. > > One outcome might yet be a reestablishment of the Wall Street system, > with some modifications, which was the outcome of the last Depression. > Once liquidation takes place, and the debt burden is largely reduced, > lending at interest might eventually resume, if there are enough new > borrowers, if the crash isn't too extreme, and if the financial and > political system hasn't been overturned. > > A return to business as usual would be depressing enough, since it > would mean another replay of the cycle, but the other possibilities > are even more unpalatable: some kind of authoritarian centralized > state power (fascist or socialist) on the one hand, or anarchy--real > and total collapse--on the other. > > Can we avoid these unattractive alternatives? Perhaps not, since our > inability to think outside the box seems so deeply entrenched. What is > needed, if we can do it, is some kind of genuinely coherent, > promising, and viable alternative. It just so happens that such an > alternative exists, but we have to go back to nineteenth century > American history to find it. > > The populist tradition in the nineteenth century, based on > Jeffersonian visions of decentralized political and economic power, > was a staunch opponent of finance capitalism, the the Wall Street > system which has been in the cat-bird seat since the Civil War. The > essence of that system is a privatized monetary ponzi scheme in which > the banking system is allowed to create money and charge usurious > rates of interest for doing so. Debt builds up, can't be repaid, > leading to a crash, and then things start up again: boom and bust. > > The populists were on to this, and resisted it as best they could. The > most comprehensive populist response to usurious private capital is > found in the work of an early populist, Edward Kellogg (1790-1858), a > businessman who turned his attention to the business cycle after > suffering losses in the crash of 1837. In A NEW MONETARY SYSTEM and > other works, Kellogg challenged the privatized, usurious money system > and sketched out an intriguing alternative perhaps more relevant than > ever today. > > In brief, Kellogg advocated establishing a nationally regulated but > locally run public credit system through which citizens could obtain > nominal interest loans on good collateral, such loans constituting the > basis of a new currency. He insisted that usurious interest rates be > banned, and that all money lent be fixed by law at a nominal rate of > about one percent. > > Usury might be defined as an interest rate in excess of the > replacement value of the principal over some normal period of use. It > takes 72 years at one percent interest for the interest to equal the > principle. It we take 72 years as a rough measure of a human lifetime, > the interest on money borrowed at one percent over a lifetime will be > exactly equal to the replacement value of the resources consumed in > the course of that lifetime with the use of the original loan. What > could be fairer? > > Kellogg's nominal interest public credit currency is designed not to > force unsustainable growth and subsequent crashes, as usurious rates > do, but rather to replace resources as they wear out. This makes > possible something we desperately need: a steady-state economy. Not > least, his system gives ordinary citizens the opportunity to access > capital for their own improvement as a rate they can sustain; it > allows them, not private creditors, to retain most of the value of the > money they borrow and put to work. In this system the public truly > borrows from itself. > > By making capital widely available at nominal interest, Kellogg's > system strikes at the heart of the system of privatized usury, which > concentrates wealth in few hands. It offers a way to naturally > distribute capital without directly taking from the rich and suffering > the consequences of their resentment. The rich will no longer be able > to live off the interest on their capital, however, but must spend it > or invest it productively. Here is the answer, in a nutshell, to the > age-old problem of the distribution of wealth. > > Finally, by making it possible for ordinary individuals and households > to gain economic control over their lives and to obtain and enjoy > private property, Kellogg's monetary system lays the foundation for > responsible citizenship and true democracy, which are impossible in > our corrupt system of rich and poor. Only private property widely > distributed can support a genuine democracy. > > Kellogg's monetary system is an idea worth taking seriously. I explore > it and other populist principles in more detail in my recent book, > FIXING THE SYSTEM: A HISTORY OF POPULISM, ANCIENT & MODERN. > > > > Adrian Kuzminski is a local activist in upstate New York, and Research > Scholar in Philosophy at Hartwick College. He is the author of FIXING > THE SYSTEM: A HISTORY OF POPULISM, ANCIENT & MODERN (Continuum Books). > > My home page: " http://home.ica.net/~fresch/index.htm > " > ======================================== > Fred Schneider, 905-279-7199, Fax: same, call first! > #37-425 Meadows Blvd. > Mississauga, ON, L4Z 1N3 > >------------------------------------------------------------------------ > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not > > From creuss at bluewin.ch Sun Jan 11 07:08:40 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Sun Jan 11 07:10:24 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Chomsky teaches Physics to 9/11-Truth Physicists Message-ID: Noam Chomsky: "If you look at the [9/11 Truthers'] evidence, anybody who knows anything about the sciences would instantly discount that evidence." Then he goes on to lecture that "funny coincidences" and "unexplained events" are just regular parts of science, nothing to raise eyebrows! On the JFK assassination: "Who knows? And who cares? I mean, plenty of people get killed over time... afterwards, it might have been a jealous husband or someone else... what difference does it make? [Inquiring on the real perps] is just taking energy away from the serious issues that matter..." Video with the context: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LoDqDvbgeXM&NR=1 With these statements, Chomsky loses any and all credibility both as a scientist and as a "dissident". Just a lying gategeeper. Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From creuss at bluewin.ch Sun Jan 11 16:42:59 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Sun Jan 11 16:44:33 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Canadians Stuck in Gaza 'coz Harper slept Message-ID: [Perhaps Harper wouldn't mind getting rid of those Pals this way?] http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2009/01/06/gaza-canadian.html Trapped in Gaza, Canadians ask for help Last Updated: Tuesday, January 6, 2009 | 8:23 PM ET By Nahlah Ayed CBC News When Canadian Marwan Diab decided to travel to Gaza with his wife and four children several weeks ago, he hadn't anticipated marking the start of the new year under fire. A Palestinian carries a wounded girl to Shifa hospital in Gaza City on Tuesday. An Israeli bombardment hit outside a UN school where hundreds of Palestinians had sought refuge and Palestinian medics said at least 34 people died. (Hatem Moussa/Associated Press) Diab, a Calgary psychologist, knows all about Gaza's troubles. He was born in the Palestinian territory and often travels back and forth to visit family members who still live there. But what he has endured over the past few days is unlike anything else in recent memory. "This is the worst violence that's ever happened, the most vicious cycle of violence in the past eight years," he told me by telephone. Diab had come to offer condolences after his father-in-law passed away. He and his family got stuck behind the blockade aimed at punishing Hamas for relentless rocket attacks against Israel. Since intense fighting started in late December, it has been a harrowing experience. The family was forced to move when neighbours told Diab the area they were staying in was probably going to be targeted by Israeli air strikes. They left with few belongings - and just in time. The next day, an air attack blew out the windows and obliterated a building nearby. When I spoke to them, the Diab family had been living without electricity for three days. They bought water on the street, from the occasional peddlers brave enough to sell it door to door while the fighting raged on. The sound of explosions fills their home. Diab's children, ranging in age from three to nine, are terrified and won't let their parents out of their sight. "My daughter is clinging to me like there's no tomorrow," he said. "She's scared and shivering, because you cannot imagine the loudness of the rockets that are happening right now. You cannot imagine how extreme it is this time." More than expected Foreign Affairs says 58 Canadians in Gaza had registered with Canadian officials before the conflict started. The actual number is higher - we know that because we have spoken to many of them who had for one reason or another failed to register with the embassy. In either case, the government told us on the weekend that 36 Canadians had requested assistance in evacuating Gaza once hostilities began, among them the six members of Diab's family. Canadian authorities submitted a request to the Israeli government asking for necessary permits so they could pass through Israel at the Erez border crossing on their way to get home. But the timing of the request was unfortunate. Canadian officials say they submitted their request on Jan. 2, a day before the Israeli ground invasion began, and the same day that dozens of other foreign nationals had already safely made it across the border. Russians, Americans, Turks and Norwegians were evacuated on Jan. 1. There wasn't a single Canadian among them. When asked why that was the case, Foreign Affairs said this: "Israeli officials have indicated that Monday, Jan. 5, would be the first window of opportunity for an assisted departure for Canadians." But no Canadian officials could explain why the request didn't come sooner than it did, as it had for all those other countries. At least one Israeli official made it clear that by waiting as long as they did, Canadian officials had erred. It's going to be far more complex - and dangerous - to evacuate Canadians now that a ground operation is in full swing. Diab told to 'hang in' Diab called Canadian officials last week, indicating a desire to be evacuated. He was told that he had registered too late and he would not be among the first group leaving. He had to wait and, as he put it, "hang in there" until a second evacuation could be organized. Diab was extremely frustrated, especially for his children. "I want to get them [out] as soon as possible. You cannot imagine the amount of violence that is happening, the magnitude of this wave of violence." We reported on Sunday, Jan. 4, that the first group of Canadians -18 in all - was scheduled to leave the next day. The night before the planned evacuation, we talked to an Israeli foreign affairs spokesman about the process. "There's nothing we can do to ensure their safety," said Yigal Palmor. "Should they take the main road to the crossing, the army is informed of their movement and no harm should come to them anyway." He added there were no guarantees that the border would be open, depending on the security situation on the ground. As it turned out, the Canadians and others trying to get out that day never made it. The bus they had boarded in Gaza, along with a number of other foreign nationals, had made it within one kilometre of the border crossing under International Red Cross escort. But after a harrowing trip out, they were forced to turn around due to security concerns. They're back in Gaza, waiting for the next opportunity to make a run for it . Visitors cautioned For eight years, Canada has cautioned Canadians and permanent residents against travel to Gaza. But for a variety of reasons, many continue to travel there. In some cases, they take up residence. In others, circumstances dictate only a visit. Take the case of Wafa and Ashraf Zakout, stranded in Gaza City. The ambitious couple had applied for permanent residence status in Canada and were able to finally obtain it in September. But they decided to leave London, Ont., to return to Gaza one more time, to sell their home and settle their affairs before moving to Canada for good. Both want to further their education and that's why they chose Canada as their new home. They also wanted a better life for their son and daughter than the one they endured growing up in Gaza. They expected more from their new adopted country. "We are all under shock," Wafa told me by telephone. "I expected the Canadian Embassy to do (something) and call the people who are under her supervision." "This is the sixth night I didn't sleep. I am so nervous and anxious because of the situation. I expected from them to make it easier for us." We spoke to a number of Canadians who echoed Wafa's complaint. Searching for diapers Others, though, have no choice but to remain in Gaza, no matter what happens. Montrealer Hamad Kashtah is Canadian, but his wife and two of his three children are not. He wouldn't dream of leaving his family behind. So he decided to remain until he could sort out his family's paperwork. Since the blockade started, life for the Kashtah family has never been so difficult. "Sometimes we search for two or three days for a can of baby milk, and two or three days for diapers," he said. "For two months the children haven't seen fruit." His youngest child has missed vaccinations because they were simply unavailable. "We have no reserve at all. We had to make soup for the past week because there's no meat. What are the children going to eat? Vegetables, that's it." Even after all these years of living in Gaza and its troubles, Kashtah cannot believe how it's changed. "This morning, I walked up the street and saw faces of death," he said. "I miss Canada. It's the safest place I ever lived." ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From duanebehrens at cox.net Sun Jan 11 22:13:02 2009 From: duanebehrens at cox.net (Duane Behrens) Date: Sun Jan 11 22:42:29 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Fwd: WTC7 - NEW (and newer) In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20090111231302.KSS8Q.552359.imail@fed1rmwml42> See also (from the same schoolteacher): WTC7: NIST Finally Admits Freefall (Part I) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=V0GHVEKrhng WTC7: NIST Finally Admits Freefall (Part II) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XtKLtUiww80 WTC7: Nist Finally Admits Freefall (Part III) http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vz43hcKYBm4 Peter Thanks for that. I viewed them but am wondering which was first - the set of three (to which you've linked above) or the shorter version which I found. No matter. Each of them clearly exposes the NIST report for what it is; a criminal cover up. The U.S. mainstream press will not report on the issue, let alone this portion of it. Our hope is that international press outlets will continue the pressure and report on these new findings. Best. DB -- http://perzuki.smugmug.com/ From thinker at thelakebc.ca Mon Jan 12 10:34:25 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Mon Jan 12 10:30:32 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Fwd: Woman faces down armed Israeli soldier Message-ID: <200901121630.n0CGULvm027896@karma.reboot.ca> Go to the website at the bottom. This is one courageous lady !!!!!!!!!!!!!! Ed. =========================================== > >The Courage To Resist > >Woman faces down armed Israeli soldiers. > >Please watch this 2 minute video >53 seconds into the video an unknown woman stands in front of >Israeli soldiers and prevents them from firing on unarmed protesters. > >First broadcast on World Wide Weekly - S Korea TV Program edited. >[] > > > > >http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article21676.htm -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: 3b15cb.png Type: image/png Size: 186764 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090112/5e64332e/3b15cb-0001.png From jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca Mon Jan 12 11:07:54 2009 From: jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca (Janet M Eaton) Date: Mon Jan 12 11:10:07 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Question re Fascist regimes Message-ID: <496B40AA.2352.D965071C@jmeaton.ns.sympatico.ca> Hi Ed et al: Wondered if anyone on the list could confirm the following dates and fact thereof which appeared on another list without references. janet Leaders of Countries that suspended Government to avoid a non- confidence vote: Adolph Hitler- Germany 1933 Francisco Franco- Spain 1936 Benito Mussolini - Italy 1939 Augusto Pinochet- Chile 1973 Stephen Harper - Canada 2008 "Once more let me remind you what fascism is. It need not wear a brown shirt or a green shirt - it may even wear a dress shirt. Fascism begins the moment a ruling class, fearing the people may use their political democracy to gain economic democracy, begins to destroy political democracy in order to retain its power of exploitation and special privilege." -- Tommy Douglas __._,_.___ Messages in this topic (1) Reply (via web post) | Start a new topic Messages | Files | Photos | Links | Database | Polls | Calendar MARKETPLACE >From kitchen basics to easy recipes - join the Group from Kraft Foods Change settings via the Web (Yahoo! ID required) Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest | Switch format to Traditional Visit Your Group | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use | Unsubscribe Recent Activity Visit Your Group Yahoo! News Odd News You won't believe it, but it's true Group Charity Food Bank Feeding America in tough times Yahoo! Groups Going Green Zone Find ways to go green. Join a green group. . __,_._,___ ------- End of forwarded message ------- ------- End of forwarded message ------- From thinker at thelakebc.ca Mon Jan 12 13:58:58 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Mon Jan 12 13:54:59 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Question re Fascist regimes In-Reply-To: <496B40AA.2352.D965071C@jmeaton.ns.sympatico.ca> References: <496B40AA.2352.D965071C@jmeaton.ns.sympatico.ca> Message-ID: <200901121954.n0CJsklU010926@karma.reboot.ca> Hello Janet, Looks good to me, but I would say there are a lot more in more obscure nations. My main interest in history for the past 64 years has been the search for the "common denominator of history's tragedies", so I neglected the other details, but when you look even at this short list, it becomes obvious that such actions and the demands for dictatorial rule, have always been for the purpose of ecological exploitation, the only way "wealth" can be "created", and to divert the benefits of resource conversion into the pockets of ruling classes..........always the same predators, operating under various ideologies and flags. This is why I always insist that the main cause of catastrophes has always been, and still is, the misdefinition of economic efficiency. If we'd use the correct, physical definition, these dictators would have no chance to get away with their demands, because an unbreakable law would tie their hands. Which is something the CoC, and all parties, including the Green, has yet to discover. When I copyrighted the correct definition in 1991, I sent a copy to Maude Barlow, having been a member of the CoC from the beginning, my number is 3295. She wrote back that it was "fascinating", but has been running around every since, fighting the shadows and damage caused by the fraudulent definition in present use, without going after the causes and the sources. I'm still a member, but never even read the magazines, or the sendouts any more. Cheers, Ed. At 09:07 AM 12/01/2009, Janet M Eaton wrote: >Hi Ed et al: > >Wondered if anyone on the list could confirm the following dates and >fact thereof which appeared on another list without references. >janet > > >Leaders of Countries that suspended Government to avoid a non- >confidence vote: > >Adolph Hitler- Germany 1933 >Francisco Franco- Spain 1936 >Benito Mussolini - Italy 1939 >Augusto Pinochet- Chile 1973 >Stephen Harper - Canada 2008 > > >"Once more let me remind you what fascism is. It need not wear a >brown shirt or a green shirt - it may even wear a dress shirt. >Fascism begins the moment a ruling class, fearing the people may use >their political democracy to gain economic democracy, begins to >destroy political democracy in order to retain its power of >exploitation and special privilege." -- Tommy Douglas > > > >__._,_.___ Messages in this topic (1) Reply (via web post) | Start > >a new topic >Messages | Files | Photos | Links | Database | Polls | Calendar > >MARKETPLACE > > >From kitchen basics to easy recipes - join the Group from Kraft Foods > > > > > >Change settings via the Web (Yahoo! ID required) >Change settings via email: Switch delivery to Daily Digest | Switch >format to Traditional >Visit Your Group | Yahoo! Groups Terms of Use | Unsubscribe > > >Recent Activity >Visit Your Group >Yahoo! News >Odd News >You won't believe >it, but it's true > >Group Charity >Food Bank >Feeding America >in tough times > >Yahoo! Groups >Going Green Zone >Find ways to go green. >Join a green group. > > > >. > > >__,_._,___ >------- End of forwarded message ------- > >------- End of forwarded message ------- >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not > >No virus found in this incoming message. >Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com >Version: 8.0.176 / Virus Database: 270.10.6/1888 - Release Date: >1/12/2009 7:04 AM From creuss at bluewin.ch Mon Jan 12 16:00:16 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Mon Jan 12 16:01:50 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Question re Fascist regimes Message-ID: Dear Janet, I'm sorry, but the author of this quote must have slept in history classes. > Leaders of Countries that suspended Government to avoid a non- > confidence vote: > > Adolph Hitler- Germany 1933 > Francisco Franco- Spain 1936 > Benito Mussolini - Italy 1939 > Augusto Pinochet- Chile 1973 > Stephen Harper - Canada 2008 A non-confidence vote can only be held against a ruling PM. Trouble is that neither Franco in 1936 nor Pinochet in 1973 were PM (nor did they prevent a non-confidence vote against the PM ruling at that time -- actually, the right-wing LOST a non-confidence vote against Allende!) -- they were generals who couped themselves into power! (in the case of Franco, with 3 years of civil war as "delay") Hitler 1933? He became chancellor BY a non-confidence vote -- Hindenburg's. Musso 1939? Neither -- the opposition parties had been banned since 1922! There was a non-confidence vote in 1943, though -- after his buddies realized that the Allies had occupied Italy... In other words: Forget it... Cheers, Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From d_a_d at telusplanet.net Tue Jan 13 10:34:08 2009 From: d_a_d at telusplanet.net (David A Davidson) Date: Tue Jan 13 10:34:12 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Something for Ed Deak Message-ID: Credit Where Credit Is Due By Ellen Brown Letter to the bank - Dear Sirs, In light of recent developments, when you returned my check marked "insufficient funds," were you referring to my funds or yours? http://www.informationclearinghouse.info/article21732.htm === You might enjoy this Ed. David -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090113/315846ad/attachment.html From creuss at bluewin.ch Tue Jan 13 11:52:07 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Tue Jan 13 11:57:14 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Something for Ed Deak Message-ID: > If banks can create money, why are we suffering from a "credit crunch"? Because the so-called "credit crunch" is a fraud with the sole purpose of redistributing hundreds of $billions from "main street" taxpayers to a few super-rich! It's called "the bankers' 9/11" for a reason... Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From thinker at thelakebc.ca Tue Jan 13 12:43:17 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Tue Jan 13 12:40:23 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Something for Ed Deak In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <200901131839.n0DId4Ln014175@karma.reboot.ca> My feeling and suspicion is that this whole crash is a planned event to cause a depression and force a desperate humanity to beg for a worldwide corporate dictatorship. Wealth can no be created, only taken. Cheers, Ed. At 09:52 AM 13/01/2009, you wrote: > > If banks can create money, why are we suffering from a "credit crunch"? > >Because the so-called "credit crunch" is a fraud with the sole purpose of >redistributing hundreds of $billions from "main street" taxpayers to a few >super-rich! It's called "the bankers' 9/11" for a reason... > >Chris > > > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword >"igve". > > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not > >No virus found in this incoming message. >Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com >Version: 8.0.176 / Virus Database: 270.10.6/1891 - Release Date: >1/13/2009 8:17 AM From creuss at bluewin.ch Tue Jan 13 13:15:16 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Tue Jan 13 13:17:37 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Something for Ed Deak Message-ID: > My feeling and suspicion is that this whole crash is a planned event > to cause a depression and force a desperate humanity to beg for a > worldwide corporate dictatorship. Yep. A "controlled demolition"... Brussels is now blackmailing Switzerland to expand our bilateral treaties with the Western EU countries to Bulgaria and Romania. The Yea-sayers assert this is necessary due to the credit crunch! It's an EU accession in salami slices... Cheers, Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From thinker at thelakebc.ca Tue Jan 13 13:30:55 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Tue Jan 13 13:26:50 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Something for Ed Deak In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <200901131926.n0DJQelP018514@karma.reboot.ca> Yep.... with a plane hitting the top floors................ Cheers, Ed. At 11:15 AM 13/01/2009, you wrote: > > My feeling and suspicion is that this whole crash is a planned event > > to cause a depression and force a desperate humanity to beg for a > > worldwide corporate dictatorship. > >Yep. A "controlled demolition"... > >Brussels is now blackmailing Switzerland to expand our bilateral treaties >with the Western EU countries to Bulgaria and Romania. The Yea-sayers >assert this is necessary due to the credit crunch! It's an EU accession >in salami slices... > >Cheers, >Chris > > > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword >"igve". > > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not > >No virus found in this incoming message. >Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com >Version: 8.0.176 / Virus Database: 270.10.6/1891 - Release Date: >1/13/2009 8:17 AM From creuss at bluewin.ch Tue Jan 13 14:02:46 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Tue Jan 13 14:04:20 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Something for Ed Deak Message-ID: > Yep.... with a plane hitting the top floors................ ......and the upper echelons claiming to be the victims, but actually the janitors and servicemen were the victims................ Cheers, Chris From gdy52150 at spiritone.com Tue Jan 13 17:01:19 2009 From: gdy52150 at spiritone.com (gdy52150) Date: Tue Jan 13 16:37:15 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Something for Ed Deak In-Reply-To: <200901131839.n0DId4Ln014175@karma.reboot.ca> References: <200901131839.n0DId4Ln014175@karma.reboot.ca> Message-ID: <496D1D3F.9030502@spiritone.com> well I agree with you Ed---my thinking was this was planned as a way to implement martial law and hence the one world bullshit. as far as I'm concerned obama is just the other side of the coin. Ed Deak wrote: > > My feeling and suspicion is that this whole crash is a planned event > to cause a depression and force a desperate humanity to beg for a > worldwide corporate dictatorship. > > Wealth can no be created, only taken. > > Cheers, Ed. > > > At 09:52 AM 13/01/2009, you wrote: > >> > If banks can create money, why are we suffering from a "credit >> crunch"? >> >> Because the so-called "credit crunch" is a fraud with the sole >> purpose of >> redistributing hundreds of $billions from "main street" taxpayers to >> a few >> super-rich! It's called "the bankers' 9/11" for a reason... >> >> Chris >> >> >> >> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >> >> SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the >> keyword >> "igve". >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> Mai-not mailing list >> Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >> http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not >> >> No virus found in this incoming message. >> Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com >> Version: 8.0.176 / Virus Database: 270.10.6/1891 - Release Date: >> 1/13/2009 8:17 AM > > > _______________________________________________ > Mai-not mailing list > Mai-not@globalproblematique.net > http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not > From gdy52150 at spiritone.com Tue Jan 13 23:58:24 2009 From: gdy52150 at spiritone.com (gdy52150) Date: Tue Jan 13 23:33:00 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] world trade at a standstill Message-ID: <496D7F00.7070309@spiritone.com> Shipping rates hit zero as trade sinks http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/4229198/Shipping-rates-hit-zero-as-trade- sinks.html By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, International Business Editor Last Updated: 5:42PM GMT 13 Jan 2009 Freight rates for containers shipped from Asia to Europe have fallen to zero for the first time since records began, underscoring the dramatic collapse in trade since the world economy buckled in October From papadop at peak.org Wed Jan 14 00:30:52 2009 From: papadop at peak.org (MichaelP) Date: Wed Jan 14 00:31:18 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] NYTimes -- Olmert Says He Made Rice Change Vote Message-ID: http://www.nytimes.com/pages/washington/index.html NYTimes January 12, 2009 WASHINGTON : In an unusually public rebuke, Prime Minister Ehud Olmert of Israel said Monday that Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice had been forced to abstain from a United Nations resolution on Gaza that she helped draft, after Mr. Olmert placed a phone call to President Bush. 'I said, "Get me President Bush on the phone"' Mr. Olmert said in a speech in the southern Israeli city of Ashkelon, according to The Associated Press. "They said he was in the middle of giving a speech in Philadelphia. I said I didnt care: "I need to talk to him now"' Mr. Olmert continued. "He got off the podium and spoke to me." Israel opposed the resolution, which called for a halt to the fighting in Gaza, because the government said it did not provide for Israel"s security. It passed 14 to 0, with the United States abstaining. Mr. Olmert claimed that once he made his case to Mr. Bush, the president called Ms. Rice and told her to abstain. "She was left pretty embarrassed" Mr. Olmert said, according to The A.P. The State Department disputed Mr. Olmerts account. "Her recommendation was to abstain; that was her recommendation all along" said an official, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the delicate nature of the matter. After the vote, Ms. Rice said the United States "fully supports" the resolution, which called for "an immediate, durable and fully respected cease-fire leading to the full withdrawal of Israeli forces from Gaza" but opted to abstain to see the outcome of an Egyptian-French peace initiative. Ms. Rice did not respond to Mr. Olmert's remarks, which were unusual even in the context of the secretarys occasionally bumpy relationship with the prime minister, according to the official. Privately, Mr. Olmert has said Ms. Rice sometimes had to be reined in for getting ahead of the president on policy. "They have a good relationship, but there have been some ups and downs" the State Department official said. From glparramatta at greenleft.org.au Wed Jan 14 00:15:41 2009 From: glparramatta at greenleft.org.au (glparramatta) Date: Wed Jan 14 00:36:50 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] What's new at Links: Solidarity with the people of Gaza, Raul Castro on Cuba @ 50, more Message-ID: <496D830D.6090306@greenleft.org.au> What's new at Links: Solidarity with the people of Gaza, Raul Castro on Cuba @ 50, Malaysia, El Salvador, Arabic, environment, LGBT rights in Cuba, Nepal * * * Subscribe free to Links - International Journal of Socialist Renewal - at http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=343373 Visit and bookmark http://links.org.au and add it to your RSS feed (http://links.org.au/rss.xml). If you would like us to consider an article, please send it to links@dsp.org.au *Please pass on to anybody you think will be interested in /Links/. * * * Hundreds of thousands across Europe, US, South Africa protest against apartheid Israel's slaughter in Gaza * Read more Hamas: What is really behind Israel's assault on the people of Gaza By Mousa Abu MarzookJanuary 6, 2009 -- Damascus -- While Americans may believe that the current violence in Gaza began December 27, in fact Palestinians have been dying from bombardments for many weeks. On November 4, when the Israeli-Palestinian truce was still in effect but global attention was turned to the US elections, Israel launched a "preemptive" airstrike on Gaza, alleging intelligence about an imminent operation to capture Israeli soldiers; more assaults took place throughout the month. * Read more 50 years of people's resistance and strength -- Interview with Cuba's President Ra?l Castro December 31, 2008 -- Interview with Ra?l Castro, president of the Councils of State and Ministers of Cuba, conducted by Tal?a Gonz?lez P?rez for Cuban Television's News System. From Granma Internacional. * Read more `We are all Gazans!' -- Palestinian trade unionists appeal for solidarity Palestine General Federation of Trade Unions Sisters and brothers: The PGFTU has been working at all levels in Palestine and in its international relations to mobilise international support for peace in the region. This is the ultimate goal for our working families in Palestine, who laboured in every way possible to bring about an end to the Israeli occupation of all Palestinian territories. This occupation is the longest and worst in the modern history. Over the years and even at this moment, these efforts have been met only with terrorism against our people by the Israeli army of occupation, which has indiscriminately destroyed homes and worksites, slaughtered our people, confiscated our land, established and expanded illegal settlements, and limited the movement of workers who are only trying to feed their families. These measures have affected every member of the Palestinian society. The recent construction of the Apartheid Wall stands as a symbol of the extent of Israel's brutal aggression against the Palestinian people and denial of their legitimate rights, dignity and human needs. We call upon all peace-loving people in the world to: * Read more `We are all Palestinians!' -- International left solidarity with the oppressed people of Palestine (updated Jan. 12) Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal publishes a range of statements from left parties and groups around the world. * Read more Malaysian police detain anti-war protesters Malaysiakini -- January 10, 2009 -- The police have arrested 21 people, including member of parliament for Klang MP Charles Santiago and several top leaders of the Socialist Party of Malaysia (Parti Sosialis Malaysia -- PSM, at an anti-war vigil at Dataran Merdeka, Kuala Lumpur. The vigil was organised by Anti-War Coalition to show support to the victims of war and aggression in Palestine and Sri Lanka. * Read more Critical elections in El Salvador Latin Radical -- Burke Stansbury from the Washington office of the US-based Committee with the People of El Salvador (CISPES) talks with community radio about the first round of the El Salvadoran elections -- legislative and municipal -- to be held on January 17, 2009. Burke reports that the chances of an FMLN victory (supported by a 10 to 15 point lead in the polls over the last year) are good, with the voting population shrugging off the scare tactics of the ARENA party's media blitz. * Read more Australian unionists back `boycott apartheid Israel' call Geelong Advertiser -- January 9, 2009 -- Geelong Trades Hall secretary Tim Gooden has backed calls for the Rudd Government to cut ties with Israel over the current crisis in the Gaza Strip. In a letter headed Trade Unionists for Palestine, Mr Gooden and other prominent unionists have called on the Rudd Government to denounce ``the latest Israeli aggression against Gaza''. The signatories include the state president of the Tertiary Education Union, Dr James Doughney, AMWU state secretary Steve Dargeval, the assistant secretary of the Communications, Electrical and Plumbing Union Burt Blackburne. * Read more The Flame, January 2009 -- Green Left Weekly's Arabic-language supplement January 8, 2009 -- With the help of Socialist Alliance members in the growing Sudanese community in Australia, Green Left Weekly -- Australia's leading socialist newspaper -- is publishing a regular Arabic language supplement. The Flame covers news from the Arabic-speaking world as well as news and issues from within Australia. Below is the edition of the Flame published on January 8, 2009. * The Flame * Read more Production-side environmentalism -- Decreasing production while increasing consumption? By Don Fitz Corporate "environmentalism" is consumer-side environmentalism. "Make your dollars work for the Earth." "Buy green!" "Purchase this green gewgaw instead of that ungreen gadget." "Feel guilty about driving your car." Consumer-side environmentalism is loath to discuss production. Consumer-side environmentalism does not challenge the manufacture of cars. Rather, it assumes that producing more and more cars is a sacred right never to be questioned. Production-side environmentalism places blame on the criminal rather than the victim. It looks at the profits oil companies reap from urban sprawl rather than demeaning people who have no way to get to work other than driving a car. Production-side environmentalism looks at an agro-food industry which profits from transporting highly processed, over-packaged, nutrient-depleted junk thousands of miles rather than the parent giving in to a child bombarded with Saturday morning pop-tart-porn TV. * Read more Cuba: Rebuilding after the hurricanes, sustainably Professor Fernando Martirena is from the Centre of Investigation into Structures and Materials (CIDEM) research institute at the University of Santa Clara, Cuba. He visited Australia in November 2008 to speak at a number of meetings organised by the Australian Green Development Forum. In 2007, Martirena's team won the World Habitat Award from the Building and Social Housing Foundation, an independent research organisation that promotes sustainable development and innovation in housing. Trent Hawkins caught up with Martirena, to find out how the CIDEM is helping to build houses in Cuba using sustainable building materials. * Read more The future of socialism and LGBT rights in Cuba -- Interview (video) with Mariela Castro Esp?n * Read and watch more Ferment in Nepal: A dynamic vortex of revolutionary change By Bill Templer January 3, 2009 -- One remarkable laboratory that discussion in much of the world's progressive press tends to neglect is the dynamic vortex of revolutionary change in Nepal. Since spring, Nepal has something that may be making genuine history: a Maoist people's movement, that, led by the CPN (Maoist), and the struggle of the People's Liberation Army over a decade, has come to state power through the ballot box. As Tufts University historian Gary Leupp wrote last April: "It ought to be the ballot heard 'round the world. It ought to be front page news. [...] This moment may in the not distant future be seen as another 1917, another 1949." * Read more * * * Links seeks to promote the international exchange of information, experience of struggle, theoretical analysis and views of political strategy and tactics within the international left. It is a forum for open and constructive dialogue between active socialists coming from different political traditions. It seeks to bring together those in the international left who are opposed to neoliberal economic and social policies. It aims to promote the renewal of the socialist movement in the wake of the collapse of the bureaucratic model of "actually existing socialism" in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. ATTENTION: Sign up for regular ``what's new'' announcement emails at http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=343373 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090114/982e2729/attachment.html From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Wed Jan 14 01:14:39 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Wed Jan 14 01:14:56 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] world trade at a standstill In-Reply-To: <496D7F00.7070309@spiritone.com> References: <496D7F00.7070309@spiritone.com> Message-ID: <20090114071440.D7B5FF634@fep06.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> So there's a silver lining to every cloud. Dion Giles Western Australia At 14:58 14/01/2009, you wrote: >Shipping rates hit zero as trade sinks >http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/4229198/Shipping-rates-hit-zero-as-trade- >sinks.html >By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, International Business Editor >Last Updated: 5:42PM GMT 13 Jan 2009 > >Freight rates for containers shipped from Asia to Europe have fallen to >zero for the first time since records began, underscoring the dramatic >collapse in trade since the world economy buckled in October > > > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not From oscarptyltd at ozemail.com.au Wed Jan 14 02:22:52 2009 From: oscarptyltd at ozemail.com.au (Clem Clarke) Date: Wed Jan 14 02:23:17 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Something for Ed Deak In-Reply-To: <200901131926.n0DJQelP018514@karma.reboot.ca> References: <200901131926.n0DJQelP018514@karma.reboot.ca> Message-ID: <496DA0DC.4000704@ozemail.com.au> I noticed a video of Kissinger the other day saying this is an excellent time for a New World Order. And, the Amero must be getting closer.... Clem Ed Deak wrote: > Yep.... with a plane hitting the top floors................ > > Cheers, Ed. > > > At 11:15 AM 13/01/2009, you wrote: >> > My feeling and suspicion is that this whole crash is a planned event >> > to cause a depression and force a desperate humanity to beg for a >> > worldwide corporate dictatorship. >> >> Yep. A "controlled demolition"... >> >> Brussels is now blackmailing Switzerland to expand our bilateral >> treaties >> with the Western EU countries to Bulgaria and Romania. The Yea-sayers >> assert this is necessary due to the credit crunch! It's an EU accession >> in salami slices... >> >> Cheers, >> Chris >> >> >> >> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >> >> SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the >> keyword >> "igve". >> >> >> _______________________________________________ >> Mai-not mailing list >> Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >> http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not >> >> No virus found in this incoming message. >> Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com >> Version: 8.0.176 / Virus Database: 270.10.6/1891 - Release Date: >> 1/13/2009 8:17 AM > > _______________________________________________ > Mai-not mailing list > Mai-not@globalproblematique.net > http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not > From creuss at bluewin.ch Wed Jan 14 03:58:08 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Wed Jan 14 03:59:44 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Something for Ed Deak Message-ID: > And, the Amero must be getting closer.... "Amero" -- what an appropriate name for bitter times... Chris From thinker at thelakebc.ca Wed Jan 14 09:39:22 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Wed Jan 14 09:35:10 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] world trade at a standstill In-Reply-To: <496D7F00.7070309@spiritone.com> References: <496D7F00.7070309@spiritone.com> Message-ID: <200901141535.n0EFZ8Ew005667@karma.reboot.ca> This is good news. Hope it will stay like this and we get back to making our own products. Cheers, Ed. At 09:58 PM 13/01/2009, you wrote: >Shipping rates hit zero as trade sinks >http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/4229198/Shipping-rates-hit-zero-as-trade- >sinks.html >By Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, International Business Editor >Last Updated: 5:42PM GMT 13 Jan 2009 > >Freight rates for containers shipped from Asia to Europe have fallen to >zero for the first time since records began, underscoring the dramatic >collapse in trade since the world economy buckled in October > > > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not > > >No virus found in this incoming message. >Checked by AVG - http://www.avg.com >Version: 8.0.176 / Virus Database: 270.10.7/1892 - Release Date: >1/13/2009 8:04 PM From jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca Wed Jan 14 09:51:26 2009 From: jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca (Janet M Eaton) Date: Wed Jan 14 09:53:42 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Obama Reaffirms Promise to Renegotiate NAFTA + Power Point on Reneotiating NAFTA Message-ID: <496DD1BE.17185.E36BBDA9@jmeaton.ns.sympatico.ca> In addition to world trade slow down it looks like Obama's administration will be reneotiating NAFTA - all in all growing evidence everywhere that the flawed global economic free market model has failed drastically and is coming to an end as we always knew such an economically, environmentally, culturally and socially unsustainble model would logically have to. fyi-janet QUOTE FROM ARTICLE ON OBAMA: Campaign attacks on NAFTA and promises to renegotiate proved that demands for revision of the free-trade model have reached critical mass in the U.S.A.... The economic crisis only strengthens those demands. If international trade and investment policy is the pillar of the current economic model, its revision must be a foundation of global restructuring plans. The Obama statement from Jan. 12 indicates the president-elect will stand firm on renegotiating NAFTA. It may no longer be a question of "will he or won't he". To confront the crisis and establish mutual well-being in the region, the debate must move quickly now to "how and when." fyi-janet SEE ALSO: See also my power point which addresses most of the subjects and issue considered in this article. http://www.stopthehogs.com/ NAFTA Growing Resistance & Calls for Renegotiation & Oversight. This researched power point, with quotes, references and images, chronicles the resistance to NAFTA that is rapidly emerging across North America in Canada, US and Mexico. It also documents US State level free trade oversight bills, federal level promises that have emerged in the Democratic Primaries, and US Federal legislation in the works, including the June 4, 2008 T.R.A.D.E Act, which reflect growing public opinion to renegotiate NAFTA and free trade in general. It is hoped that by tracking and exposing the breadth and extent of the calls for renegotiation of NAFTA and the push for fair trade policies that citizens and politicians alike will begin to realize that the time has come for action. Given the significant evidence of failure of the present `free trade? system and the extent of resistance documented herein, the recalcitrant and reactionary calls of elite proponents of NAFTA, to maintain the status quo, must be challenged NAFTA Growing Resistance & Calls for Renegotiation & Oversight. http://www.commonfrontiers.ca/ [Canadian references only] Other NAFTA power points found on SCC Atlantic website including ones that relate to Digby Neck and NAFTA at: http://www.sierraclub.ca/atlantic/programs/economies/NAFTA/index.htm =========================================== http://www.huffingtonpost.com/laura-carlsen/obama-reaffirms-promise- t_b_157316.html Obama Reaffirms Promise to Renegotiate NAFTA Laura CarlsenDirector, Americas Program, Center For International Policy Posted January 12, 2009 | 07:59 PM (EST) The courtesy call between President-elect Barack Obama and Mexican President Felipe Calderon turned out to be a little more revealing than anticipated. The statement from incoming White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs gave a pretty clear, if vague, picture of where Obama plans to take the bilateral relationship. On renegotiating NAFTA, he stood his ground as Calder?n lobbied heavily not to re-open the North American Free Trade Agreement. "On trade and the economy, President-elect Obama said that with both countries facing very difficult economic times, it's important to work together to maintain a constructive and comprehensive dialogue. He expressed his continued commitment to upgrading NAFTA to strengthen labor and environmental provisions to reflect the values that are widely shared in both of our countries, and proposed the creation of a consultative group to work on a host of issues important to the United States and Mexico, including NAFTA, energy and infrastructure." This consultative group could be the germ of a renegotiation. Prior to the meeting, a war of words has raged over whether President-elect Barack Obama will hold to his campaign promise of opening up the North American Free Trade Agreement for renegotiation. Campaign attacks on NAFTA and promises to renegotiate proved that demands for revision of the free-trade model have reached critical mass in the U.S.A. post-election report from Public Citizen heralded a net gain of 28 fair-trade members in the House and seven senators. Most of these politicians, it notes, didn't just happen to be critical of the free-trade model. They actively ran on a fair-trade platform and won partly as a result of that position. The economic crisis only strengthens those demands. If international trade and investment policy is the pillar of the current economic model, its revision must be a foundation of global restructuring plans. Why Renegotiate NAFTA? The mainstream press is wrong when it says the United States can't "unilaterally" call for renegotiation. Not only is renegotiation permitted legally -- in fact, any country can unilaterally withdraw with six months notice -- but there have been many calls for renegotiation in Canada and Mexico. Canadians have built a strong grassroots movement to protect natural resources from predatory NAFTA clauses. Broad-based citizen groups like the Council of Canadians oppose NAFTA because of the energy proportionality clause that requires Canada to export oil to the United States even in times of scarcity, the investor-state clauses that give investors the right to sue governments contained in Chapter 11, and the clause that permits bulk-water exports. Polls in the general population show that 61% favor renegotiation. In Mexico, 100,000 people marched in the streets on two separate occasions under the banner of renegotiation to revise NAFTA's agricultural provisions. They demanded protection of basic food production by removing corn and beans from the agreement. In 2003, former President Vicente Fox requested opening up the agreement only to be rebuffed by the U.S. government. For the United States, the main issue is jobs. Senator Sherrod Brown, an Ohio Democrat, cites a loss of 200,000 manufacturing jobs due to NAFTA for his state alone. The nation has lost 3.1 million manufacturing jobs since 1994, and its trade deficit with Mexico and Canada has risen to $138.5 billion in 2007 from $9.1 billion in 1993. The opposition to NAFTA within the United States goes well beyond organized labor. While job loss and insecurity under globalization were major constituency-builders in blue-collar states during the elections, polls taken before the election revealed that a national majority opposes free trade and particularly NAFTA, and that opinion increased during the campaign. A June 2008 Rasmussen nationwide poll showed 56% in favor of renegotiating NAFTA. Many people feel that NAFTA has given companies incentives to move production to where labor is cheaper, exporting jobs and eroding working conditions. In general, U.S. opposition to the trade agreement is split between fair-trade groups that focus on jobs and the environment and a nationalist rightwing that believes NAFTA and its offspring, the Security and Prosperity Partnership, threaten U.S. sovereignty through the nefarious -- and non-existent -- creation of a North American Union. Neither of these currents could properly be called "protectionist," and both call for more transparency in the process. Among the differing priorities, citizen demands concur that the current agreement favors transnational companies and is unfair to citizens in all three nations. Broadly shared priorities for renegotiation are: -- Eliminate Chapter 11. Corporations shouldn't have the right to sue governments and supersede national laws. Trade tribunals lack adequate transparency and accountability, and consistently reflect a strong, pro-corporate bias. -- End the energy proportionality clause between the United States and Canada, and exclude bulk water as a commodity. Canadian national and provincial governments should be able to fulfill their responsibilities in long-term energy planning without restrictions under NAFTA. Get NAFTA out of food and agriculture. Countries should be able to develop national agendas to assure food quality, farm livelihoods, and consumer safety and then adapt the trade agreement to those objectives rather than the reverse. NAFTA favors corporate farms and bans certain policy tools to support small farmers and consumers, including special products protections. Renegotiating the agreement's agricultural provisions shouldn't involve surgical incisions of specific clauses, but a deep reform and reorientation toward food sovereignty. End the Security and Prosperity Partnership. This 2005 NAFTA extension into further trade and investment liberalization and national security has no public mandate in any of the three countries. Further negotiations on expanding integration should be reviewed and, where approved, be channeled into open, representative talks. The U.S. military aid package it spawned, the Merida Initiative, should be converted into a development aid package for the 2010 appropriations. -- Citizen movements also call for national governments to have more development and social policy tools, many of which are prohibited under the competition and privatization terms of NAFTA. Some of these groups together produced a document of 10 areas that should be reviewed: energy, agriculture, role of the state, financial services, foreign investment, employment, migrants, environment, intellectual property, and dispute settlement. Will He or Won't He? Obama's campaign promise was explicit: "NAFTA's shortcomings were evident when signed and we must now amend the agreement to fix them." The president-elect called for enforceable labor and environmental standards in the text, an end to the ability of corporations to sue governments, and emphasizing the needs of "Main Street" over "Wall Street." But some Obama-watchers claim he's waffling on his trade commitments. Although these contentions in the pro-free-trade press are mostly wishful thinking, experts and activists are following the appointments closely. So far it has been a mixed message. The initial nomination of Bill Richardson, point-person for the passage of NAFTA under the Clinton administration, didn't sit well with fair-trade groups and elicited a sigh of relief among free-trade promoters, who instantly chalked up the president-elect's anti-NAFTA statements to electoral propaganda. Obama's economic advisors, led by Larry Summers, and appointee for Treasury, Timothy Geithner, at face value would also indicate a commitment to the status quo on trade. And when Ron Kirk, a former mayor of Dallas who proclaimed his city the "capital of NAFTA," accepted the nomination for U.S. Trade Representative, it reversed satisfaction among fair-traders at the initial nomination of Xavier Becerra, who turned down the job. Pending the new Commerce designate, that leaves Hilda Solis, Obama's nominee for Secretary of Labor, as the only real bright spot for fair- traders. A NAFTA critic, she would wield real clout since jobs will be the pivotal issue for the United States in renegotiation. As a Latina, she also has an acute understanding of the need to make NAFTA fair for all partners. Pessimistically, it's possible to imagine that the Obama presidency could end up merely adopting the Democratic platform on trade, which would stick side agreements in the text, add International Labor Organization core labor standards, and create an expanded U.S. jobs displacement program. Obama voted for the U.S.-Peru Free Trade Agreement, which was modified along these lines. But the economic crisis has changed everything. Even as the Bush administration frantically -- and incredibly -- insists that free trade isn't the problem but the solution, most other countries are taking a second look at the model. As the crisis sets in, Europe wants more regulation and developing countries want more policy space. And Americans want more protection from the disaster that's currently befalling them. With every appointment, Obama has insisted he'll be the one calling the shots. For the next few weeks, then, all we really have to go on for predicting trade policy is Washington's current favorite game -- the psychic exploration of Obama's inner mind. A more productive activity for fair-traders is to pull out all the stops in the tri- national campaigns to renegotiate NAFTA and impose a moratorium on new free trade agreements. This is an historic opportunity to change course in crisis. Citizens Organize for Renegotiation Citizen organizations and legislators have called for renegotiation of NAFTA in the United States, Canada, and Mexico. The collapse of the financial sector spells the need for a reconversion strategy for the "real economy;" that is, U.S. productive capacity in the United States. This strategy will require a careful and critical look at NAFTA, our blind reliance on market forces, and the promotion of outsourcing as a competition strategy. The industrial policy that Obama outlined clashes ideologically and legally with NAFTA and other free trade agreements. It hasn't been lost on the rest of the world that the U.S. government is adopting measures such as massive subsidies and bailouts that it has sought to deny developing countries under free-trade rules. Robert Kuttner at The American Prospect refers to this as "the sin of committing industrial policy" and warns that it's only a matter of time before a trade partner registers a suit against Obama's anti-crisis measures. This would be an excellent opportunity to expose the hypocrisy of our trade policies and chart a new course. The new fair-trade members of Congress and others outside the leadership clique will provide new allies and be far more willing to move beyond the stodgy party leadership's position on trade. Some already have. The TRADE Act, introduced into Congress in April 2008, calls for a NAFTA review and lays out fair-trade principles. Meanwhile, poor countries need maximum room for maneuver to help those who are already living on the edge. Mexico is no exception. Although the current government isn't likely to willingly change neoliberal policies and accept NAFTA renegotiation, the citizenry opposes NAFTA two to one. Echoing the phrase that did in John McCain's candidacy, President Felipe Calder?n continues to argue that the Mexican economy will be fine even as reports of job loss, wage declines, inflation, and capital flight pour in. In Mexico, as in the United States, only energetic measures can address the deepening crisis and growing social unrest. Renegotiation can and should be good for citizens in all three countries. With such a high degree of integration, our futures are intertwined. A recent study calculated that when Mexican real wages drop 10%, apprehensions at the border rise around 8%. Real wages in Mexico fell 24% from December 2006 to August 2008 and are plummeting now with the crisis; renegotiation should include a view toward job generation and retention in Mexico, and a compensation fund similar to the European Union's transition funds for less-developed countries. The current security aid in the ill-conceived Merida Initiative should be converted to this end. Review and Redo The first step for renegotiation must be a broad, in-depth review of NAFTA, or rather three reviews, one per country. Review bodies must be independent, representing different orientations and expertise. These should carefully define the criteria of evaluation, including social, economic, political, and cultural indicators. The U.S. TRADE Act, which also calls for a review, lists some criteria for evaluation, but we need precision. Also necessary are public consultations and other mechanisms for incorporating civil society input into the process. The review would achieve several important goals. First, it would open up a debate that in the United States had been practically dormant between NAFTA's passage and the recent presidential campaign. It also would provide valuable information on impacts. The apples-and- oranges debate on trade policy -- one side argues that NAFTA increased international trade and the other argues that international trade isn't all it's cracked up to be -- is sterile and abstract. We should be able to move beyond this debate with additional data and analysis. To convince public opinion of the case for renegotiation, at this critical moment in a process of economic integration gone awry, will require thinking about international trade and investment in the context of new economic arrangements. To do this we need to build both arguments and alliances. Renegotiation demands must be woven into comprehensive proposals for reform that have a coherent logic and go beyond NAFTA articles. Related issues include enforcing antitrust legislation, ending commodity speculation, adopting supply management mechanisms, creating grain reserves, supporting domestic food production, and building local marketing systems. The Obama statement from Jan. 12 indicates the president-elect will stand firm on renegotiating NAFTA. It may no longer be a question of "will he or won't he". To confront the crisis and establish mutual well-being in the region, the debate must move quickly now to "how and when." Laura Carlsen (lcarlsen(at)ciponline.org) is director of the Americas Policy Program in Mexico City, where she has been an analyst and writer for two decades. She is regular columnist for Foreign Policy In Focus Barack Obama Mexico ------- End of forwarded message ------- -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: - Type: application/octet-stream Size: 17731 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090114/e1777332/-.obj -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: - Type: application/octet-stream Size: 168 bytes Desc: "AVG certification" Url : http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090114/e1777332/--0001.obj From thinker at thelakebc.ca Wed Jan 14 13:34:40 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Wed Jan 14 13:30:34 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Unusually large weapons shipments to Israel Message-ID: <200901141930.n0EJUO4K024231@karma.reboot.ca> Unusually Large U.S. Weapons Shipment to Israel: Are the US and Israel Planning a Broader Middle East War? By Michel Chossudovsky Global Research, January 11, 2009 A very large delivery of US weaponry to Israel consisting of 3,000 tons of "ammunition" is scheduled to sail to Israel. The size and nature of the shipments are described as "unusual": "Shipping 3,000-odd tons of ammunition in one go is a lot," one broker said, on condition of anonymity. "This (kind of request) is pretty rare and we haven't seen much of it quoted in the market over the years," he added. "Shipping brokers in London who have specialized in moving arms for the British and U.S. military in the past said such ship charters to Israel were rare. (Reuters, Jan 10, 2009) The Pentagon has entrusted a Greek merchant shipping company to deliver the weapons to Israel: "The U.S. is seeking to hire a merchant ship to deliver hundreds of tons of arms to Israel from Greece later this month, tender documents seen by Reuters show. The U.S. Navy's Military Sealift Command (MSC) said the ship was to carry 325 standard 20-foot containers of what is listed as "ammunition" on two separate journeys from the Greek port of Astakos to the Israeli port of Ashdod in mid-to-late January. A "hazardous material" designation on the manifest mentions explosive substances and detonators, but no other details were given.(Ibid) It is worth noting that a similar unusually large shipment of US ordinance to Israel was scheduled in early December: "Tender documents indicate that the German ship hired by the US in early December also carried a massive cargo of weapons that weighed over 2.6 million kg [2600 tons] and filled up to 989 standard 20-foot containers to Ashdod from North Carolina." (Press TV, 10 Jan 2009) Are These Large Shipments of Ordinance Connected to the Invasion of Gaza? The request by the Pentagon to transport ordinance in a commercial vessel, according to Reuters, was made on December 31, 4 days after the commencement of the aerial bombings of Gaza by F16 Fighter jets. Analysts have hastily concluded, without evidence, that the 2 shipments of "ammunition" were intended to supply Israel's armed forces in support of its military invasion of Gaza. "A senior military analyst in London who declined to be named said that, because of the timing, the shipments could be "irregular" and linked to the Gaza offensive." (Reuters, January 10, 2009) These reports are mistaken. Delivery of ordinance always precedes the onslaught of a military operation. The ordinance required under "Operation Cast Lead" was decided upon in June 2008. Further to Tel Aviv's request under the US military aid program to Israel, the U.S. Congress approved in September 2008 the transfer of 1,000 bunker-buster high precision GPS-guided Small Diameter Guided Bomb Units 39 (GBU-39). The GBU 39 smart bombs produced by Boeing were delivered to Israel in November. They were used in the initial air raids on Gaza: "...The Israel Air Force has used the new lightweight GBU-39 Small Diameter Bomb acquired from the USA, in the recent attacks in Gaza. The [Jerusalem] Post mentioned the new weapons ordered last September having arrived last month [November], and already put to action with the IAF fighters. These weapons could have been deployed by the Boeing/IAF F-15Is, since sofar SDB is cleared for use only with this type of aircraft. It is highly unlikely that the bulk of the weaponry included in these two large shipments, scheduled to arrive in Israel in late January, is intended to be used in Israel's military operation in Gaza. The GBU-39 is lightweight (130 kg). The entire shipment of GBU 39s (1000 units) would be of the order of a modest 130 tons. In other words, the specifications of the GBU 39 do not match the description of the "unusually large" and "heavy" shipment of ordinance. GBU-39 Escalation Scenario The shipment ordered on December 31 is of the order of 3000 tons, an unusually large and heavy cargo of "ammunition" pointing to the transfer of heavy weaponry to Israel. According to US military statements, the ordinance is for stockpiling, to be used "at short notice" in the eventuality of a conflict: "This previously scheduled shipment is routine and not in support of the current situation in Gaza. ...The U.S. military pre-positions stockpiles in some countries in case it needs supplies at short notice." (Reuters, 10 Jan 2009, emphasis added) Whatever the nature of these large weapons shipments, they are intended for use in a future military operation in the Middle East. Since the launching of the Theater Iran Near Term Operation Operation (TIRANNT) in May 2003, an escalation scenario involving military action directed against Iran and Syria has been envisaged. TIRANNT was followed by a series of military plans pertaining to Iran. Numerous official statements and US military documents have pointed to an expanded Middle East war. What these shipments suggest is that the "escalation scenario" not only prevails, but has reached a more active stage in the process of US-Israeli military planning. Whether these weapons will be used or not is not known. The central question, in this regard, is whether the Gaza invasion is part of a broader military adventure directed against Lebanon, Syria and Iran, in which heavier weaponry including US made bunker buster bombs will be used. History of US Weapons Shipments to Israel The stockpiling of US made bunker buster bombs by Israel has been ongoing since 2005: "The United States will sell Israel nearly 5,000 smart bombs in one of the largest weapons deals between the allies in years. Among the bombs the [Israeli] air force will get are 500 one-ton bunker busters that can penetrate two-meter-thick cement walls; 2,500 regular one-ton bombs; 1,000 half-ton bombs; and 500 quarter-ton bombs. The bombs Israel is acquiring include airborne versions, guidance units, training bombs and detonators. They are guided by an existing Israeli satellite used by the military. The sale will augment existing Israeli supplies of smart bombs. The Pentagon told Congress that the bombs are meant to maintain Israel's qualitative advantage [against Iran], and advance U.S. strategic and tactical interests." (Jewish Virtual Library: September 21-22, 2004, Haaretz / Jerusalem Post.) The actual shipments of US made bunker buster bombs started in 2005. The US approved in April 2005, the delivery of: some 5,000 "smart air launched weapons" including some 500 BLU 109 'bunker-buster bombs. The (uranium coated) munitions are said to be more than 'adequate to address the full range of Iranian targets, with the possible exception of the buried facility at Natanz, which may require the [more powerful] BLU-113 bunker buster [a variant of the GBU 28]'" (See Michel Chossudovsky, Planned US-Israeli Nuclear Attack on Iran, Global Research, May 1, 2005) The BLU-109 is smaller than the GBU 28. "It is a 2,000lbs warhead that can be used in combination with a GPS guidance kit [...], and can penetrate up to 15 feet of fortified concrete." (See F16.net) In 2006 at the height of the Lebanon War in August 2006, a major shipment of the 2.2 ton GBU 28 bombs, according to the New York Times, was dispatched to Israel. The GBU 28 is produced by Raytheon. It was used against Iraq in the 1991 Gulf War, has the the capability of penetrating some 20 feet of reinforced concrete. (Haaretz, 9 Nov 2008) In contrast to the GBU 39 smart bombs (130 kg) used against Gaza, each GBU-28 weighs a hefty 2.2 tons. "The Guided Bomb Unit-28 (GBU-28) is a special weapon developed for penetrating hardened Iraqi command centers located deep underground. The GBU-28 is a 5,000-pound laser-guided conventional munition that uses a 4,400-pound penetrating warhead." Federation of American Scientists, (For a visual depiction see "Bob Sherman, How the GBU-28 works", USA Today on-line.). GBU-28 Video of GBU 28 on UTube The recent unusually large shipments of weaponry to Israel are part of the 2004 agreement between Washington and Tel Aviv, financed by US military aid to Israel. As mentioned above, there is a history of delivery of bunker buster bombs (including the GBU 28), going back to 2005. While the nature and composition of these recent weapons shipments to Israel are not known, one suspects that they include the heavier version of the bunker buster bombs including the GBU-28. In this regard, it is worth noting that last Summer, Israel requested the Pentagon to deliver GBU-28 bunker buster bombs. The stated purpose was to use them in the eventuality of a military operation directed against Iran. In September 2008, according to US and Israeli press reports quoting Pentagon officials, Tel Aviv's request was turned down. According to the reports, Washington categorically refused to deliver the shipment of GBU 28 bunker buster bombs, to be used to attack Iran's nuclear facilities. "Instead" Washington accepted to deliver the lightweight GBU-39 for use against Gaza. The U.S. had "rejected an Israeli request for military equipment and support that would improve Israel's ability to attack Iran's nuclear facilities." The Americans viewed [Israel's] request, which was transmitted (and rejected) at the highest level, as a sign that Israel is in the advanced stages of preparations to attack Iran. They therefore warned Israel against attacking, saying such a strike would undermine American interests. They also demanded that Israel give them prior notice if it nevertheless decided to strike Iran. In early September, Haaretz reported that the request had included GBU-28 "bunker-buster" bombs. In mid-September, the U.S. agreed instead to sell Israel 1000 GBU-39 "bunker buster" bombs which Israeli military experts said "could provide a powerful new weapon" in Gaza, AP reported. So: when Israel requested weapons that the U.S. expected would be used for bombing Iran, the U.S. said no, and added explicitly that it did not want to see an Israeli attack on Iran. And there was no Israeli attack on Iran. (Defense Update.com, December 2008) Media Disinformation The official statements and press reports are bogus. Israel and the US have always acted in close coordination. Washington does not "demand that Israel give them prior notice" of a military operation: The report in Haaretz suggests that the Bush Administration was adamant and did not want the Israelis to attack Iran. In fact, the reports suggested that the US would shoot down Israeli planes, if they tried to attack Iran: "Air-space authorization: An attack on Iran would apparently require passage through Iraqi air space. For this to occur, an air corridor would be needed that Israeli fighter jets could cross without being targeted by American planes or anti-aircraft missiles. The Americans also turned down this request. According to one account, to avoid the issue, the Americans told the Israelis to ask Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki for permission, along the lines of "If you want, coordinate with him." (Haaretz Nov 9, 2008) This Israeli report is misleading. Israel is America's ally. Military operations are closely coordinated. Israel does not act without Washington's approval and the US does not shoot down the planes of its closest ally. The Nature and Composition of the Recent US Weapons Shipments to Israel These unusually large shipments of ordinance would normally require Congressional approval. To our knowledge, there is no public record of approval of the unusually large shipments of heavy "ammunition" to Israel. The nature and composition of the shipments are not known. Was Israel's request for the delivery of the 2.2 ton GBU 28 accepted by Washington, bypassing the US Congress? Are GBU 28 bombs, each of which weighs 2.2 tons part of the 3000 ton shipments to Israel. Are tactical bunker buster mini-nuclear bombs included in Israel's arsenal? These are questions to be raised in the US Congress. The two shipments of "ammunition" are slated to arrive in Israel, respectively no later than the 25th and 31st of January. Secretary Robert Gates who remains at the helm of the Department of Defense ensures continuity in the military agenda. Preparing for a Confrontation with Iran: Beefing Up Israel's Missile Defense System In early January, the Pentagon dispatched some 100 military personnel to Israel from US European Command (EUCOM) to assist Israel in setting up a new sophisticated X-band early warning radar system. This project is part of the military aid package to Israel approved by the Pentagon in September 2008: "The Israeli government requested the system to help defend against a potential missile attack from Iran. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates signed off on the deployment order in mid-September. .... Once fully operational, the system will be capable of tracking and identifying small objects at long distance and at very high altitude, including space, according to U.S. Missile Defense Agency officials. It also will integrate Israel?s missile defenses with the U.S. global missile detection network. ?This will enable the Israelis to track medium- and long-range ballistic missiles multiple times better than their current radar allows them to,? Morrell said. ?It will more than double the range of Israel's missile defense radars and increase its available engagement time.? This, he said, will greatly enhance Israel?s defensive capabilities. ?There is a growing ballistic missile threat in the region, particularly from Iran,? Morrell said. ?And no one in the region should feel more nervous about that threat than the Israelis. And they clearly do, and they have asked for our assistance.? (Defense Talk.com, January 6, 2009, emphasis added.) The new X-band radar system 'permits an intercept soon after launch over enemy instead of friendly territory" (Sen. Joseph Azzolina, Protecting Israel from Iran's missiles, Bayshore News, December 26, 2008). The X-band radar would "integrate Israel?s missile defenses with the U.S. global missile detection network, which includes satellites, Aegis ships on the Mediterranean, Persian Gulf and Red Sea, and land-based Patriot radars and interceptors." (Ibid) What this means is that Washington calls the shots. The US rather than Israel would control the Air Defense system: ''This is and will remain a U.S. radar system,' Pentagon spokesman Geoff Morrell said. 'So this is not something we are giving or selling to the Israelis and it is something that will likely require U.S. personnel on-site to operate.'" (Quoted in Israel National News, January 9, 2009, emphasis added). In other words, the US military controls Israel's Air Defense system, which is integrated into the US global missile defense system. Under these circumstances, Israel cannot launch a war against Iran without the consent of the US High Command. The large shipments of US ordinance, slated to arrive in Israel after the inauguration of Barack Obama as President of the United States and Commander in Chief are part of the broader program of US-Israeli military cooperation in relation to Iran. The reinforcement of Israel's missile defenses combined with the large shipments of US weapons are part of an escalation scenario, which could lead the World under an Obama Administration into a broader Middle East war. New Cold War? There has been a military build on both sides. Iran has responded to the Israeli-US initiative, by beefing up it own missile defense system with the support of Russia. According to reports (December 21), Moscow and Tehran have been holding talks on the supply by Russia of "medium-range air defense systems - specifically, S-300 surface-to-air missile systems" (Asian Times, January 9, 2009) ---------- AMERICA'S "WAR ON TERRORISM" by Michel Chossudovsky CLICK TO ORDER America's "War on Terrorism" In this new and expanded edition of Michel Chossudovsky's 2002 best seller, the author blows away the smokescreen put up by the mainstream media, that 9/11 was an attack on America by "Islamic terrorists". Through meticulous research, the author uncovers a military-intelligence ploy behind the September 11 attacks, and the cover-up and complicity of key members of the Bush Administration. The expanded edition, which includes twelve new chapters focuses on the use of 9/11 as a pretext for the invasion and illegal occupation of Iraq, the militarisation of justice and law enforcement and the repeal of democracy. According to Chossudovsky, the "war on terrorism" is a complete fabrication based on the illusion that one man, Osama bin Laden, outwitted the $40 billion-a-year American intelligence apparatus. The "war on terrorism" is a war of conquest. Globalisation is the final march to the "New World Order", dominated by Wall Street and the U.S. military-industrial complex. September 11, 2001 provides a justification for waging a war without borders. Washington's agenda consists in extending the frontiers of the American Empire to facilitate complete U.S. corporate control, while installing within America the institutions of the Homeland Security State. Chossudovsky peels back layers of rhetoric to reveal a complex web of deceit aimed at luring the American people and the rest of the world into accepting a military solution which threatens the future of humanity. The last chapter includes an analysis of the London 7/7 Bomb Attacks. CLICK TO ORDER (mail order or online order) America's "War on Terrorism" ---------- Disclaimer: The views expressed in this article are the sole responsibility of the author and do not necessarily reflect those of the Centre for Research on Globalization. The contents of this article are of sole responsibility of the author(s). The Centre for Research on Globalization will not be responsible or liable for any inaccurate or incorrect statements contained in this article. To become a Member of Global Research The CRG grants permission to cross-post original Global Research articles on community internet sites as long as the text & title are not modified. The source and the author's copyright must be displayed. For publication of Global Research articles in print or other forms including commercial internet sites, contact: crgeditor@yahoo.com www.globalresearch.ca contains copyrighted material the use of which has not always been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. We are making such material available to our readers under the provisions of "fair use" in an effort to advance a better understanding of political, economic and social issues. The material on this site is distributed without profit to those who have expressed a prior interest in receiving it for research and educational purposes. If you wish to use copyrighted material for purposes other than "fair use" you must request permission from the copyright owner. For media inquiries: crgeditor@yahoo.com ? Copyright Michel Chossudovsky, Global Research, 2009 The url address of this article is: www.globalresearch.ca/PrintArticle.php?articleId=11743 ---------- ? Copyright 2005-2007 GlobalResearch.ca Web site engine by Polygraphx Multimedia ? Copyright 2005-2007 From ptuffley at xtra.co.nz Wed Jan 14 21:26:22 2009 From: ptuffley at xtra.co.nz (Peter Tuffley) Date: Wed Jan 14 21:26:46 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] WTC North Tower clip Message-ID: Posted without comment http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtx_GcFCs6c Peter -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090115/3f817354/attachment.html From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Wed Jan 14 22:26:06 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Wed Jan 14 22:26:15 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] WTC North Tower clip In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090115042608.48AC7F5F3@fep06.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090115/1590debb/attachment.html From duanebehrens at cox.net Thu Jan 15 05:31:03 2009 From: duanebehrens at cox.net (Duane Behrens) Date: Thu Jan 15 05:31:11 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] WTC North Tower clip - Commentary In-Reply-To: Message-ID: <20090115063103.NEJ5M.632803.imail@fed1rmwml42> Peter, thanks. I like the way Mr. Chandler just keeps playing the clip over and over . . . . It's a way to pierce through the fog of seven years of propaganda which told us, "the buildings collapsed." Dion mentioned that the pieces exploding outward were inconsistent with a normal demolition. He's right, but in a normal demolition, the contractor isn't tasked to make it appear as if the building is coming down from above. The only way to do THAT was to pulverize it in waves, from the top down, as seen here. As Chris noted, the demolition itself was professionally peformed. And, even though this video clip (and a host of other facts) make it clear that the buildings WERE demolished, the tightly-controlled U.S. press has been obedient by refusing to ask or publish the obvious questions from skeptics. To their dismay, the issue won't go away because the crime is so obvious. Duane Behrens http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dtx_GcFCs6c From duanebehrens at cox.net Thu Jan 15 08:28:06 2009 From: duanebehrens at cox.net (Duane Behrens) Date: Thu Jan 15 08:28:11 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Fwd: Probably Window Dressing Message-ID: <20090115092806.QKH0R.22985.imail@fed1rmwml25> . . . . but possibly a ray of hope . . . see my commentary below the excerpt. DB ------------------------------------------------------ Kucinich to Introduce Gaza Ceasefire Resolution - Who Will Co-sponsor? by Robert Naiman www.opednews.com [excerpt] The war in Gaza continues, largely because the Bush Administration has continued to oppose, in practice, an immediate ceasefire. With each day that passes without a ceasefire, more innocents are killed. Representative Dennis Kucinich plans to introduce a resolution in the House soon calling for an immediate ceasefire. There are a number of whereases in the draft, recounting the human toll of the war and the blockade, but the punchline is very simple: "Resolved, That the House of Representatives calls on the Government of Israel and representatives of Hamas to implement an immediate and unconditional ceasefire and to allow unrestricted humanitarian access in Gaza." [end excerpt] ----------------------------- Someone here (I can't recall who) suggested that the deaths of a few children are unavoidable, even acceptable, when the target is a Hamas "terrorist." But that's a lie, particularly when the opponent is the world's master of targeted assassinations . . . a handy little device used when arrest and trial might be inconvenient. Not used in this war, however. In THIS war, the world's assassin is assassinating women and children with shrapnel. Purposely. There is no other explanation. But they're not calling it assassination or murder. No. What then, you ask, ARE they calling their seige, their blockade, the resulting starvation and disease of thousands of Palestinians, and their ulitmate invasion and occupation of a land to which they have no valid claim? Why . . . they're only "educating the populace." Check out Friedman in yesterday's NYT. Duane Behrens "A clear conscience is its own reward." --- http://perzuki.smugmug.com/ ============= From creuss at bluewin.ch Thu Jan 15 08:31:44 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Thu Jan 15 08:33:20 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] WTC North Tower clip Message-ID: The horizontal debris ejection can be seen much better _in profile_ (debris ejected out of the lower floors when they are still intact!) -- I posted the youtube link in October 2006 but now the video is removed... Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From creuss at bluewin.ch Thu Jan 15 08:55:20 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Thu Jan 15 08:56:54 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Fwd: Probably Window Dressing Message-ID: Duane asked: > What then, you ask, ARE they calling their seige, their blockade, the > resulting starvation and disease of thousands of Palestinians, and their > ulitmate invasion and occupation of a land to which they have no valid claim? They call it the implementation of god's plans for the chosen people... A few facts to remember: - The logo of the zionist terrorist organization Irgun was the map of "Greater Israel", including all of Palestine & Jordania (extending to Iraq and Syria), with the words: "This Way Only". - Irgun and Lehi merged to form the IDF. - Ehud Olmert is said to be an ideological heir of Jabotinsky, the founder and leader of Irgun. Olmert served in the "Jabotinsky youth" (Betar) and his daddy was an Irgun terrorist. Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From thinker at thelakebc.ca Thu Jan 15 09:50:46 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Thu Jan 15 09:46:35 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Preparations for permanent war Message-ID: <200901151546.n0FFkTst016525@karma.reboot.ca> Long, but very interesting, coming from the real source. Forwarded without comment, Ed =================================================================================== Subject: U.S. Joint Forces Command on Mexico and other global hotspots Mexico is in danger of a "rapid and sudden collapse" due to criminal gangs and drug cartels, according to a troubling new report by the U.S. Joint Forces Command on worldwide security threats. The report also cites Pakistan as a nation facing possible collapse. "In terms of worse-case scenarios for the Joint Forces and indeed the world, two large and important states bear consideration for a rapid and sudden collapse: Pakistan and Mexico," the report states. http://images.newsmax.com/pdfs/JOE2008.pdf From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Thu Jan 15 12:37:29 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Thu Jan 15 12:37:43 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Fwd: Probably Window Dressing In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090115183730.DCEED10BD3@fep02.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> After every atrocity the Zionists count on the world focusing on just that and demanding it be brought to an end - until next time. And there's always a next time, and always will be as long as the racist settler State of Israel continues to exist. Attacks by Israel on its neighbours have been going on for more than half a century following the invasion of Palestine and ethnic cleansing in 1948-49. The only solution is a democratic one, following the return of two groups of four million to their homeland: 1. The exiles in the camps 2. The foreign settlers [1] Even one of these returns followed by an election would guarantee the other. A lot better than firing rockets would be organising continuing mass demonstrations of exiles at the gates of Israel seeking to enter and return to their homeland. Great TV spectacle. Dion Giles Western Australia [1] With exception of Mark Regev (http://www.israelnewsagency.com/markregevisraelprpublicrelationsforeignministryprimeministerehudolmertmedia48120207.html) From creuss at bluewin.ch Thu Jan 15 16:36:09 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Thu Jan 15 16:38:23 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] IDF targets non-embedded Journos again Message-ID: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090115/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_israel_gaza_media_1 Journalists group condemns strike on Gaza media By MATTI FRIEDMAN, Associated Press Writer Thu Jan 15, 2:19 pm ET JERUSALEM - Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip on Thursday struck two high-rise buildings housing international media, drawing sharp criticism from the Foreign Press Association. Two journalists were moderately wounded when Israeli fire hit a Palestinian media center that works with international media and is located two floors above the Reuters news agency. TV footage showed the wounded men in flak jackets marked "press" being rushed to the hospital. It was not clear if the building was hit by ground fire or by aircraft. Bullets also flew into the office of The Associated Press in another building several hundred yards away, entering a room where two staffers were working. No one was wounded. Media organizations had given the Israeli military the locations of their offices in Gaza to avoid such incidents. The Foreign Press Association, representing journalists covering Israel and the Palestinian territories, demanded a halt to attacks on press buildings, saying the Israeli military was "severely violating basic principles of respect for press freedom." The organization called the attacks "unconscionable breaches" and demanded assurances such attacks would not happen again. The Israeli offensive against Gaza's Hamas rulers began Dec. 27. The assault has caused widespread damage and killed nearly 1,100 Palestinians, roughly half of them civilians. Julian Rake, the deputy bureau chief for the Reuters news agency in Jerusalem, said the strike hit around the 14th floor, two floors above the agency's office. Reuters had repeatedly provided the military with the coordinates and address of the office, he said. "The military knows what it is, and where it is, and have assured us it is not a target," Rake said. In a statement, the Israeli military said it targets only locations used by Hamas "for terrorist purposes," or to fire at Israeli troops or civilians. "The IDF (Israel Defense Forces) is currently involved in an operation against the Hamas terrorist organization, which, supported by Iran, deliberately and cynically operates from within civilian areas," it said. Rake said his staffers and other journalists in the building were certain that "at no stage" did militants fire from inside the building. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Fri Jan 16 17:05:38 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Fri Jan 16 17:05:54 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Obama set to dump Main Street Message-ID: <20090116230539.BD76CF2E3@fep05.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> On the eve of inauguration, Obama is signalling spectacular measures to send America broke to keep Wall Street and the military empire afloat and deliver tax cuts on top of those put in place by Bush. No mention of cutting funding for Israel. Dion Giles Western Australia ======================================= http://www.nytimes.com/2009/01/07/us/politics/07obama.html New York Times, January 7, 2009 Obama Warns of Prospect for Trillion-Dollar Deficits By JEFF ZELENY and EDMUND L. ANDREWS WASHINGTON ? President-elect Barack Obama on Tuesday braced Americans for the unparalleled prospect of ?trillion-dollar deficits for years to come,? a stark assessment of the budgetary outlook that he said would force his administration to impose tighter fiscal discipline on the government. Mr. Obama sought to distinguish between the need to run what is likely to be record-setting deficits for several years and the necessity to begin bringing them down markedly in subsequent years. Even as he prepares a stimulus plan that is expected to total nearly $800 billion in new spending and tax cuts over the next two years, he said he would make sure the money was wisely spent, and he pledged to work with Congress to enact spending controls and efficiency measures throughout the federal budget. ?We?re not going to be able to expect the American people to support this critical effort unless we take extraordinary steps to ensure that the investments are made wisely and managed well,? Mr. Obama said, speaking about the dire fiscal outlook after meeting with his economic team for a second straight day. In his most explicit language on the subject since winning the election, Mr. Obama sought to reassure lawmakers and the financial markets that he was aware of the long-term dangers of running huge deficits and would take steps to limit and eventually reduce them. Big deficits force the government to borrow more money, saddling future generations with large financial burdens and leaving the nation reliant on foreign governments and other big investors to lend cash. The problem is even more acute now because credit markets, which in recent months have made it much harder and more expensive for businesses and individuals to borrow, could be further strained by financing a huge government deficit. On Wednesday, Mr. Obama plans to name a chief performance officer with the task of finding government efficiencies. He has chosen Nancy Killefer, who is director of McKinsey & Company, a management consulting firm, and was an assistant secretary of the Treasury in the Clinton administration. The Congressional Budget Office will also release its latest budget estimates, providing the first official predictions of the shortfalls tied to the economic slowdown and the fallen financial markets. Mr. Obama has made the economy virtually the sole public focus of his first full week in Washington since winning the election. He called on Tuesday for the creation of an economic recovery oversight board that would include outside advisers to monitor spending ? and find abuses ? of the economic stimulus plan. He also said earmarks for lawmakers? special projects would be banned from the bill. ?When the American people spoke last November, they were demanding change ? change in policies that helped deliver the worst economic crisis that we?ve see since the Great Depression,? Mr. Obama told reporters at his transition offices. He added, ?They were demanding that we restore a sense of responsibility and prudence to how we run our government.? But Republicans and some fiscally conservative Democrats have expressed concern that the need for a substantial economic stimulus plan could sweep away for years any serious effort to bring government spending into line with its revenues. While economists almost universally support running large deficits to combat the kind of steep recession the country is grappling with now, they are increasingly expressing alarm at the prospect of sustained fiscal imbalances heading into a period in which the aging of the population will create huge budgetary strains because of the growing costs of the Medicare and Social Security programs. Still, the deficit now seems likely to be so large that it will inevitably constrain Mr. Obama?s administration to some degree. At a minimum, it seems sure to force him to walk a line between maintaining the confidence of the financial markets, which could drive interest rates up sharply if they doubt his will or ability to improve the government?s financial condition in the long run, and various constituencies that will be pressing him to make good on his campaign promises. Mr. Obama has so far not backed away from any of the big initiatives he ran on, including his plan to expand health insurance. On that issue, as on others, he has begun making a case that the economically prudent course is to invest now in addressing the nation?s big challenges rather than avoiding them in the name of saving money in the short run. Mr. Obama was not specific about the size of the deficit he expects, beyond his reference to ?a trillion-dollar deficit or close to a trillion-dollar deficit? for the fiscal year that ends Sept. 30. Aides said later that the estimate ? in line with what economists have been anticipating given the economy?s rapid deterioration ? did not include the costs of the proposed stimulus package, which could add hundreds of billions of dollars more to the red ink. At $1 trillion, the deficit would not only shatter the largest previous shortfall in dollar terms ? $455 billion last year ? but it could also exceed the post-World War II-era record by the measure more meaningful in economic terms, the deficit as a percentage of total economic activity. Diane Rogers, chief economist at the Concord Coalition, a nonpartisan organization that supports fiscal discipline, estimated that the deficit this year would hit 7 percent of the gross domestic product. The largest previous record in those terms was in 1983, when it hit 6 percent. Mr. Obama declined to say on Tuesday whether the budget that his administration submits to Congress in February would be larger than the $3.1 trillion budget that President Bush submitted for the current fiscal year. He also did not offer any specific examples of how spending could be controlled, saying only that his advisers had been scouring the budget looking for programs that could be eliminated. ?I?m going to be willing to make some very difficult choices in how we get a handle on his deficit,? Mr. Obama said. ?That?s what the American people are looking for and, you know, what we intended to do this year.? But the short-term budget shortfalls are big enough to pose serious headaches in themselves, especially if bond investors start demanding higher interest rates. In just the first three months of the 2009 fiscal year, which began on Oct. 1, the government spent $408 billion more than it took in. About one-third of that shortfall stemmed from the Treasury Department?s rescue program of injecting capital into banks, which the government will book as an ?investment? rather than ?spending.? The recession itself will add hundreds of billions of dollars to the deficit. Even before Congress adds any new stimulus measures, higher outlays will climb for existing unemployment benefits, food stamps and other social programs. Tax revenues will fall because of rising unemployment, falling corporate profits and huge investment losses in the stock and bond markets. Mr. Obama?s stimulus program could add another $400 billion in each of the next two years. ?One thing investors have to be thinking is, what?s the exit strategy? How do we unwind this stuff?? said Robert Bixby, director of the Concord Coalition. ?I would analogize it to what the government is doing with the auto companies. Congress said, we?ll give you the money but you have to show us a plan for sustainability.? Mr. Bixby added, ?Now the government is in the same position of the auto companies, but they haven?t come up with any plan for sustainability.? As the latest budget estimates are released on Wednesday, the good news, at least for the moment, is that the Treasury?s borrowing costs are as almost as low as they have ever been. Short-term Treasury rates are hovering just above zero, but the rates on 10-year Treasury bonds are about 2.5 percent. From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Sat Jan 17 01:37:25 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Sat Jan 17 01:37:39 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] IDF targets non-embedded Journos again In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090117073725.E40E5F688@fep05.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> Calls to mind the American tank targeting the journos in the Palestine Hotel in Baghdad soon after the 2003 invasion, and the missile targeting the journos in the Chinese Embassy in Belgrade. Even tame reporters are feared by criminals. Dion Giles Western Australia At 07:36 16/01/2009, you wrote: >http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090115/ap_on_re_mi_ea/ml_israel_gaza_media_1 > >Journalists group condemns strike on Gaza media > > By MATTI FRIEDMAN, Associated Press Writer > Thu Jan 15, 2:19 pm ET > >JERUSALEM - Israeli attacks in the Gaza Strip on Thursday struck two >high-rise buildings housing international media, drawing sharp criticism >from the Foreign Press Association. > >Two journalists were moderately wounded when Israeli fire hit a Palestinian >media center that works with international media and is located two floors >above the Reuters news agency. TV footage showed the wounded men in flak >jackets marked "press" being rushed to the hospital. > >It was not clear if the building was hit by ground fire or by aircraft. > >Bullets also flew into the office of The Associated Press in another >building several hundred yards away, entering a room where two staffers >were working. No one was wounded. > >Media organizations had given the Israeli military the locations of their >offices in Gaza to avoid such incidents. > >The Foreign Press Association, representing journalists covering Israel and >the Palestinian territories, demanded a halt to attacks on press buildings, >saying the Israeli military was "severely violating basic principles of >respect for press freedom." > >The organization called the attacks "unconscionable breaches" and demanded >assurances such attacks would not happen again. > >The Israeli offensive against Gaza's Hamas rulers began Dec. 27. The >assault has caused widespread damage and killed nearly 1,100 Palestinians, >roughly half of them civilians. > >Julian Rake, the deputy bureau chief for the Reuters news agency in >Jerusalem, said the strike hit around the 14th floor, two floors above the >agency's office. > >Reuters had repeatedly provided the military with the coordinates and >address of the office, he said. "The military knows what it is, and where >it is, and have assured us it is not a target," Rake said. > >In a statement, the Israeli military said it targets only locations used by >Hamas "for terrorist purposes," or to fire at Israeli troops or civilians. >"The IDF (Israel Defense Forces) is currently involved in an operation >against the Hamas terrorist organization, which, supported by Iran, >deliberately and cynically operates from within civilian areas," it said. > >Rake said his staffers and other journalists in the building were certain >that "at no stage" did militants fire from inside the building. > > > > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword >"igve". > > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not From duanebehrens at cox.net Sat Jan 17 11:36:18 2009 From: duanebehrens at cox.net (Duane Behrens) Date: Sat Jan 17 11:36:24 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Smart Car Message-ID: <20090117123618.BFXSA.688493.imail@fed1rmwml30> Been seeing a few of Daimler Chrysler "Smart Cars" on the local roads here in southern Cal. This is a 2 passenger sedan (or roadster) measuring 8 feet long by 5 feet wide. "Tiny" is an understatement. But I found them interesting. Surely, I thought, these little vehicles will do 50 mpg or better! On that basis, I would have purchased one for Jane to schlep O.C. around the hill here in soCal. But no - the car is rated at 33 mpg city, 41 mpg highway. http://www.smartusa.com/smart-car-technical-specifications.aspx My 4-passenger Sentra achieved that. So I guess not, not for now, anyway. Duane Behrens -- http://perzuki.smugmug.com/ From duanebehrens at cox.net Sat Jan 17 16:34:29 2009 From: duanebehrens at cox.net (Duane Behrens) Date: Sat Jan 17 16:34:32 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Wind Farms Message-ID: <20090117173429.SACDR.687491.imail@fed1rmwml36> On my frequent trips to and from Minnesota, I've seen more and more operating wind farms. This despite some pretty hefty opposition from the military, fossil fueled plant developers, even some (possibly misguided) environmental groups. Me? I think they're beautiful. DB http://www.energy-daily.com/reports/South_Dakota_Wind_Farm_Begins_Operations_999.html South Dakota Wind Farm Begins Operations Wessington Springs SD (SPX) Oct 21, 2008 "Babcock and Brown and Heartland Consumers Power District have announced that South Dakota Governor Mike Rounds dedicated the Wessington Springs Wind farm, located just south of Wessington Springs, South Dakota. "The 51-megawatt (MW) Wessington Springs Wind Farm will provide clean and renewable energy to the University of South Dakota (USD) and South Dakota State University (SDSU), which become the first universities in the Midwest to be powered with 100% renewable energy. -- http://perzuki.smugmug.com/ From gdy52150 at spiritone.com Sun Jan 18 03:04:39 2009 From: gdy52150 at spiritone.com (gdy52150) Date: Sun Jan 18 02:39:16 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Wind Farms In-Reply-To: <20090117173429.SACDR.687491.imail@fed1rmwml36> References: <20090117173429.SACDR.687491.imail@fed1rmwml36> Message-ID: <4972F0A7.3000603@spiritone.com> the county I was raised in Minnesota ----Mower ---is building windfarms all over--they allready cover a goodd portion of the east siede of the county and they are still expnding---many of them are built locally there in Dodge Center --the same guy that builds cement mixers builds the towers. There was a wind farm in the western part of the state that was running in the early 90s if not before. Duane Behrens wrote: >On my frequent trips to and from Minnesota, I've seen more and more operating wind farms. This despite some pretty hefty opposition from the military, fossil fueled plant developers, even some (possibly misguided) environmental groups. Me? I think they're beautiful. DB > >http://www.energy-daily.com/reports/South_Dakota_Wind_Farm_Begins_Operations_999.html > >South Dakota Wind Farm Begins Operations >Wessington Springs SD (SPX) Oct 21, 2008 > >"Babcock and Brown and Heartland Consumers Power District have announced that South Dakota Governor Mike Rounds dedicated the Wessington Springs Wind farm, located just south of Wessington Springs, South Dakota. > >"The 51-megawatt (MW) Wessington Springs Wind Farm will provide clean and renewable energy to the University of South Dakota (USD) and South Dakota State University (SDSU), which become the first universities in the Midwest to be powered with 100% renewable energy. > > >-- >http://perzuki.smugmug.com/ >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not > > > From creuss at bluewin.ch Sun Jan 18 07:59:45 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Sun Jan 18 08:01:25 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Smart Car Message-ID: The "Smart" (nicknamed "flower bucket") is way too loud and overpowered. Its only advantage is that it fits into every parking space (even between cars). The 75-mpg car (and I mean car!) "VW Lupo" (on the European market since 1998) was not even put on the U$ market. http://www.autoplenum.de/Bilder/P/p0009076/VW/VW-Lupo-1-6-GTI--2000-2001-.jpg Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From papadop at peak.org Sun Jan 18 21:09:37 2009 From: papadop at peak.org (MichaelP) Date: Sun Jan 18 21:09:57 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] OBAMA at Harvard Law School Message-ID: http://www.thestar.com/news/uselection/article/572960#Comments WHAT WAS BARACK OBAMA LIKE IN 1990? Toronto Star January 18, '08 CAMBRIDGE, Mass.Barack Obama stares silently at a wall of fading black-and-white photographs in the muggy second-floor offices of the Harvard Law Review. He lingers over one row of solemn faces, his predecessors of 40 years ago. All are men. All are dressed in dark-coloured suits and ties. All are white. It is a sobering moment for Obama, 28, who in February became the first black to be elected president in the 102-year history of the prestigious student-run law journal. The post, considered the highest honour a student can attain at Harvard Law School, almost always leads to a coveted clerkship with the U.S. Supreme Court after graduation and a lucrative offer from the law firm of one's choice. Yet Obama, who has gone deep into debt to meet the $25,000-a-year cost of a Harvard Law School education, has left many in disbelief by asserting that he wants neither. "One of the luxuries of going to Harvard Law School is it means you can take risks in your life," Obama said recently. "You can try to do things to improve society and still land on your feet. That's what a Harvard education should buy enough confidence and security to pursue your dreams and give something back." After graduation next year, Obama says, he probably will spend two years at a corporate law firm, then look for community work. Down the road, he plans to run for public office. The son of a Kenyan economist and an American anthropologist, Obama is a tall man with a quick, boyish smile whose fellow students rib him about his trademark tattered blue jeans. "I come from a lot of worlds and I have had the unique opportunity to move through different circles," Obama said. "I have worked and lived in poor black communities and I can translate some of their concerns into words that the larger society can embrace." His own upbringing is a blending of diverse cultures. Born in Hawaii, where his parents met in college, Obama was named Barack ("blessed" in Arabic) after his father. The elder Obama was among a generation of young Africans who came to the United States to study engineering, finance and medicine, skills that could be taken back home to build a new, strong Africa. In Hawaii, he married Obama's mother, a white American from Wichita, Kan. TWO YEARS LATER, Obama's parents separated and he moved to a small village outside Jakarta, Indonesia, with his mother, an anthropologist. There, he spent his boyhood playing with the sons and daughters of rice farmers and rickshaw drivers, attending an Indonesian-speaking school, where he had little contact with Americans. Every morning at 5, his mother would wake him to take correspondence classes for fear he would forget his English. It was in Indonesia, Obama said, where he first became aware of abject poverty and despair. "It left a very strong mark on me living there because you got a real sense of just how poor folks can get," he said. "You'd have some army general with 24 cars and if he drove one once then eight servants would come around and wash it right away. But on the next block, you'd have children with distended bellies who just couldn't eat." After six years in Indonesia, Obama was sent back to the United States to live with his maternal grandparents in Hawaii in preparation for college. It was then that he began to correspond with his father, a senior economist for the Kenyan finance ministry who recounted intriguing tales of an African heritage that Obama knew little about. Obama treasured his father's tales of walking miles to school, using a machete to hack a path through the elephant grass the legends and traditions of the Luo tribe, a proud people who inhabited the shores of Lake Victoria. He still carries a passbook that belonged to his grandfather, an herbalist who was the first family member to leave the small Kenyan village of Alego, move to the city and don Western clothes. "He was a cook and he used to have to carry this passbook to work for the English," Obama recalls. "At the age of 46, it had this description of him that said, `He's a coloured boy, he's responsible and he's a good cook.'" Two generations later, at the most widely respected legal journal in the country, the grandson of the cook is giving the orders. Some of Obama's peers question the motives of this second-year law student. They find it puzzling that despite Obama's openly progressive views on social issues, he has also won support from staunch conservatives. Ironically, he has come under the most criticism from fellow black students for being too conciliatory toward conservatives and not choosing more blacks to other top positions on the law review. "He's willing to talk to them (the conservatives) and he has a grasp of where they are coming from, which is something a lot of blacks don't have and don't care to have," said Christine Lee, a second-year law student who is black. "His election was significant at the time, but now it's meaningless because he's becoming just like all the others (in the Establishment)." Although some question what personal goals motivate Obama, his interest in social issues is deeply grounded. At Occidental College in Los Angeles, Obama studied international relations and spent much of his time helping to organize anti-apartheid protests. In his junior year, he transferred to Columbia University, "more for what (New York City) had to offer than for the education," he said. After graduating, Obama landed a job writing manuals for a New York-based international trade publication. Once his college loans were paid off, he took a $13,000-a-year job as director for the Developing Communities Project, a church-based social action group in Chicago. There, he and a coalition of ministers set out to improve living conditions in poor neighbourhoods plagued by crime and high unemployment. Obama helped form a tenants' rights group in the housing projects and established a job-training program. "I took a chance and it paid off," he said. "It was probably the best education that I've ever had." After four years, Obama decided it was time to move on. He wanted to learn how to use the political system to effect social change. He set his sights on Harvard Law School, where he quickly distinguished himself as a top student. He was soon chosen through the strength of his writing and grades to serve as one of 80 student editors on the Law Review. Unlike many peer-review professional journals, the Law Review is run solely by students. It is widely considered the major forum for current legal debate and consequently is watched closely by courts around the country. In his second year at law school, Obama decided to run for Law Review president after a conversation with a black friend. "I said I was not planning to run and he said, `Yes, you are because that is a door that needs to be kicked down and you can take it down.'" It was a marathon selection process, an arcane throwback to the early days of the Review. The student editors deliberated behind closed doors from 8:30 a.m. until early the next day. The 19 anxious candidates took turns cooking breakfast, lunch and dinner for the selection committee, whose members emerged with a historic decision. "Before I could say a word, another black student who was running just came up and grabbed me and hugged me real hard," Obama recalled. "It was then that I knew it was more than just about me. It was about us. And I am walking through a lot of doors that had already been opened by others." But few students at the Law Review were prepared for the deluge of interview requests for Obama from newspapers, radio and television stations. SOME STUDENTS MADE light of the media invasion, posting a memo titled "The Barack Obama Story, a Made for TV Movie, Starring Blair Underwood as Barack Obama." Yet tensions were building. White students grumbled about the attention paid to Obama's race. Black students criticized him for not choosing more blacks for other top positions at the review. Caught in the crossfire, Obama, who has a tendency toward understatement, downplayed his own achievements. "For every one of me, there are thousands of young black kids with the same energies, enthusiasm and talent that I have who have not gotten the opportunity because of crime, drugs and poverty," he said. "I think my election does symbolize progress, but I don't want people to forget that there is still a lot of work to be done." Describing Obama, fellow students and professors point to a self-confidence tempered by modesty as one of his greatest attributes. "He's very unusual, in the sense that others who might have something approximating his degree of insight are very intimidating to their fellow students or inconsiderate and thoughtless," said Laurence Tribe, a constitutional-law professor. "He's able to build upon what other students say and see what's valuable in their comments without belittling them." As Law Review president, Obama is the last person to edit student articles, as well as longer pieces by accomplished legal scholars. The review publishes eight times a year and receives about 600 freelance articles each year. Referring to his fellow students at the Review, whom he edits, he said: "These are the people who will be running the country in some form or other when they graduate. If I'm talking to a white conservative who wants to dismantle the welfare state, he has the respect to listen to me and I to him. That's the biggest value of the Harvard Law Review. Ideas get fleshed out and there is no party line to follow." Obama spends 50 to 60 hours each week on Law Review business. The full-time volunteer job leaves little time for an additional 12 hours of class, plus homework. When it comes to choosing between the two, as it often does, Obama usually misses class. One of Obama's most difficult tasks as editor-in-chief is keeping the peace amid the clashing egos of writers and editors. "He is very, very diplomatic," said Radhika Rao, 24, a third-year law student from Lexington, Ind. "He is very outgoing and has a lot of experience in handling people, which stands him in good stead." Outside the Review, other blacks at Harvard are skeptical that Obama's appointment will change much at the Ivy League institution, where 180 out of 1,601 law students are black. "While I applaud Obama's achievement, I guess I am not as hopeful for what this will mean for other blacks at Harvard," said Derrick Bell, the school's first black tenured law professor. "There is a strange character to this black achievement. When you have someone that reaches this high level, you find that he is just deemed exceptional and it does not change society's view of all of the rest." From creuss at bluewin.ch Mon Jan 19 07:41:53 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Mon Jan 19 07:43:35 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Brits offer to enforce Gaza Hunger Blockade Message-ID: Britain also enforced the hunger (sea) blockade against Germany during and after WW1 (until 1919) that starved 900'000 Germans to death. Why shouldn't it work again in Gaza? http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/1103ap_eu_britain_brown_gaza.html Brown offers British naval help to monitor Gaza By RAPHAEL G. SATTER ASSOCIATED PRESS WRITER Last updated January 17, 2009 2:51 p.m. PT Protesters face British police officers during a rally in Trafalgar Square against Israel's military operations in the Gaza Strip, central London, Saturday, Jan. 17, 2009. There were continued protests against the Israeli military action Saturday in London and several other British cities. (AP Photo/Akira Suemori) LONDON -- Britain is prepared to deploy naval resources and provide security at the Gaza Strip's border crossing points as part of an effort secure the cease-fire declared by Israel in the tiny coastal territory, Prime Minister Gordon Brown said Saturday. Brown, along with the leaders of France, Germany and Italy, said he was offering military and humanitarian help to implement a cease-fire and ease the suffering in Gaza, where hundreds have died since Israel began its offensive in the territory in late December. "The Israelis, Egyptians and Palestinian Authority know this offer is available," Brown said. "I think this may make it easier for people to come to a cease-fire." Israel's leaders voted late Saturday to halt an offensive aimed a delivering a crushing blow to Islamic militant group Hamas, which has bombarded southern Israel with rockets from its power base in Gaza. The unilateral cease-fire, due to come into effect at 2 a.m. local time (0000 GMT), would halt more than three weeks of fighting that have killed more than 1,100 Palestinians and 13 Israelis. British Foreign Secretary David Miliband said there would be "huge relief" at the announcement. He called on Hamas to end its rocket attacks and on Israeli authorities to allow aid agencies immediate access to Gaza and a guarantee of their safety. "Too many lives have already been lost," Miliband said in a statement released late Saturday. Earlier, Brown had suggested that Britain could help move injured children out of Gaza so they could receive medical care elsewhere. The prime minister said Britain could also help remove unexploded bombs in the Gaza area and would be prepared to increase the level of its humanitarian aid over the next five years. But the nature of the naval and security assistance being offered was unclear: Britain's Ministry of Defense said the specifics were still being worked out. The country's opposition Conservatives accused the prime minister of grandstanding, saying the Royal Navy was already overstretched. Brown was due in Egypt on Sunday for a summit aimed at giving international backing to the cease-fire. It is also to be attended by the leaders of Germany, France, Spain, Italy, Turkey and the Czech Republic - which holds the rotating EU presidency - as well as Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas, Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak and U.N. chief Ban Ki-moon. In Germany, Chancellor Angela Merkel's office released a statement saying that the European leaders all expressed support for "the efforts of the Israeli and Egyptian governments to reach a lasting cease-fire in Gaza." Government spokesman Thomas Steg said the most important issue for Israel and Egypt is "the basic assurance by the European states that they would support the prevention of weapons-smuggling." He said the specifics of the measures would be discussed in the coming days. Germany has already offered to send a team of police experts to Egypt to offer advice on improving border security. There were continued protests against the Israeli military action Saturday in London and several other British cities. Protests turned violent late Saturday when demonstrators broke into stores in the center of London, smashing windows and looting merchandise, according to police. Earlier Saturday morning, a group of activists broke into a weapons factory in the southern English city of Brighton, damaging machinery and causing what authorities said were substantial losses. The group claimed that the EDO MBM Technology Ltd. plant they raided was manufacturing equipment being used in Gaza by the Israeli air force. There was no answer late Saturday at a number for the company. Local police said they made nine arrests. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From creuss at bluewin.ch Mon Jan 19 17:58:02 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Mon Jan 19 17:59:42 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Law of Return is Based on Hoax Message-ID: Zionists came from Khazachstan, not Palestine! http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/959229.html An invention called 'the Jewish people' By Tom Segev Last update - 00:00 29/02/2008 Israel's Declaration of Independence states that the Jewish people arose in the Land of Israel and was exiled from its homeland. Every Israeli schoolchild is taught that this happened during the period of Roman rule, in 70 CE. The nation remained loyal to its land, to which it began to return after two millennia of exile. Wrong, says the historian Shlomo Zand, in one of the most fascinating and challenging books published here in a long time. There never was a Jewish people, only a Jewish religion, and the exile also never happened - hence there was no return. Zand rejects most of the stories of national-identity formation in the Bible, including the exodus from Egypt and, most satisfactorily, the horrors of the conquest under Joshua. It's all fiction and myth that served as an excuse for the establishment of the State of Israel, he asserts. According to Zand, the Romans did not generally exile whole nations, and most of the Jews were permitted to remain in the country. The number of those exiled was at most tens of thousands. When the country was conquered by the Arabs, many of the Jews converted to Islam and were assimilated among the conquerors. It follows that the progenitors of the Palestinian Arabs were Jews. Zand did not invent this thesis; 30 years before the Declaration of Independence, it was espoused by David Ben-Gurion, Yitzhak Ben-Zvi and others. If the majority of the Jews were not exiled, how is it that so many of them reached almost every country on earth? Zand says they emigrated of their own volition or, if they were among those exiled to Babylon, remained there because they chose to. Contrary to conventional belief, the Jewish religion tried to induce members of other faiths to become Jews, which explains how there came to be millions of Jews in the world. As the Book of Esther, for example, notes, "And many of the people of the land became Jews; for the fear of the Jews fell upon them." Zand quotes from many existing studies, some of which were written in Israel but shunted out of the central discourse. He also describes at length the Jewish kingdom of Himyar in the southern Arabian Peninsula and the Jewish Berbers in North Africa. The community of Jews in Spain sprang from Arabs who became Jews and arrived with the forces that captured Spain from the Christians, and from European-born individuals who had also become Jews. The first Jews of Ashkenaz (Germany) did not come from the Land of Israel and did not reach Eastern Europe from Germany, but became Jews in the Khazar Kingdom in the Caucasus. Zand explains the origins of Yiddish culture: it was not a Jewish import from Germany, but the result of the connection between the offspring of the Kuzari and Germans who traveled to the East, some of them as merchants. We find, then, that the members of a variety of peoples and races, blond and black, brown and yellow, became Jews in large numbers. According to Zand, the Zionist need to devise for them a shared ethnicity and historical continuity produced a long series of inventions and fictions, along with an invocation of racist theses. Some were concocted in the minds of those who conceived the Zionist movement, while others were offered as the findings of genetic studies conducted in Israel. Prof. Zand teaches at Tel Aviv University. His book, "When and How Was the Jewish People Invented?" (published by Resling in Hebrew), is intended to promote the idea that Israel should be a "state of all its citizens" - Jews, Arabs and others - in contrast to its declared identity as a "Jewish and democratic" state. Personal stories, a prolonged theoretical discussion and abundant sarcastic quips do not help the book, but its historical chapters are well-written and cite numerous facts and insights that many Israelis will be astonished to read for the first time. The mosquito from Kiryat Yam On March 27, 1948, a meeting was held in Hiafa concerning the fate of the Bedouin of Arab al-Ghawarina in the Haifa area. "They must be removed from there, so that they, too, will not add to our troubles," Yosef Weitz, of the Keren Kayemeth (Jewish National Fund), wrote in his personal diary. Two months later, Weitz reported to the organization's director, "Our Haifa Bay has been evacuated completely and there is hardly a remnant of those who encroached our border." They were probably expelled to Jordan; some were allowed to remain in the village of Jisr al-Zarqa. The fate of the Arab al-Ghawarina Bedouin has recently made the headlines thanks to Shmuel Sisso, mayor of the Haifa suburb of Kiryat Yam. He has filed a complaint with the police against Google. The reason is the addition that one of the site's surfers, a resident of Nablus, attached to the center of Kiryat Yam in the world satellite photo, stating that the city is built on the ruins of a village that was destroyed in 1948, Arab al-Ghawarina. Sisso's complaint says that this is slanderous. The facts are as follows: The lands of the Zevulun Valley were purchased in the 1920s by the JNF and by various construction companies, among them one called Gav Yam. The Zionist Archives have the plan for the establishment of Kiryat Yam, dated 1938, and a letter from 1945 states that there were already 100 homes there. Government maps from the British Mandate period identify the territory on which Kiryat Yam was built by two names: Zevulun Valley and Ghawarina. Thus it appears that this was not a settlement but an area in which Bedouin resided. The Web site of the Israeli organization Zochrot (Remembering) states that there were 720 people at the site in 1948 and that the area was divided among three kibbutzim: Ein Hamifratz, Kfar Masaryk and Ein Hayam, today Ein Carmel. This story has been making the rounds on the Internet and drawing responses, which can be summed up as follows: "If Sisso is suing Google because they stated that he is living on a destroyed Arab village, the implication is that he thinks this is something bad." Sisso, a lawyer of 57 who is identified with Likud and was formerly Israeli consul general in New York, says, "I don't think there is anything bad about it, but other people might think it is bad, especially people abroad, and that is liable to hurt Kiryat Yam, because people will not want to invest here. Since we are not sitting on a Palestinian village, why should we have to suffer for no reason?" Moroccan-born, Sisso arrived in Israel in 1955. "I wandered around the whole region and I saw no trace of anyone's having been here before us and supposedly expelled." He asked an American law professor how, if at all, Google could be sued for slander or for damages. This, he says, is the contribution of Kiryat Yam to the struggle against the right of return (of the Palestinian refugees). It could turn out to be the most riveting trial since Ariel Sharon sued Time magazine, but mayor Sisso has no illusions: "Me against Google is like a mosquito against an elephant," he said this week. Who America belongs to Two professors, Gabi Shefer and Avi Ben-Zvi, were guests this week on Yitzhak Noy's "International Hour" current events program on Israel Radio. The anchor, sounding slightly concerned, asked whether the achievements of Barack Obama show that the United States no longer belongs to the white man. Prof. Shefer confirmed this: Obama is an immigrant, he said. Prof. Ben-Zvi asked to add a remark: Gabi Shefer is right, he said. They are both wrong. If Obama were an immigrant, he would not be eligible to be elected president. He was born in Honolulu, some two years after Hawaii became the 50th state of the union. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Mon Jan 19 18:40:37 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Mon Jan 19 18:41:42 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Law of Return is Based on Hoax In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090120004038.C0C6CF590@fep06.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> The tribes of bandits that the Zionists call "the Jewish people" did not arise in Palestine. They invaded Palestine, murdered the inhabitants, stole the land and everything in it, and boasted about it in their bible. The Romans came later though of course that history is highly relevant too. Might as well get the ancient history, in their own terms, straight as well as the 20th century history including the case of Sisso who entered the land knowing it had been stolen in 1948-9 and the rightful inhabitants exiled, was not born to it and has no birthright claim any more than the rest of the four million settlers. Dion Giles Western Australia At 08:58 20/01/2009, you wrote: >Zionists came from Khazachstan, not Palestine! > > >http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/959229.html > >An invention called 'the Jewish people' > > By Tom Segev > Last update - 00:00 29/02/2008 > >Israel's Declaration of Independence states that the Jewish people arose in >the Land of Israel and was exiled from its homeland. Every Israeli >schoolchild is taught that this happened during the period of Roman rule, >in 70 CE. The nation remained loyal to its land, to which it began to >return after two millennia of exile. Wrong, says the historian Shlomo Zand, >in one of the most fascinating and challenging books published here in a >long time. There never was a Jewish people, only a Jewish religion, and the >exile also never happened - hence there was no return. Zand rejects most of >the stories of national-identity formation in the Bible, including the >exodus from Egypt and, most satisfactorily, the horrors of the conquest >under Joshua. It's all fiction and myth that served as an excuse for the >establishment of the State of Israel, he asserts. > >According to Zand, the Romans did not generally exile whole nations, and >most of the Jews were permitted to remain in the country. The number of >those exiled was at most tens of thousands. When the country was conquered >by the Arabs, many of the Jews converted to Islam and were assimilated >among the conquerors. It follows that the progenitors of the Palestinian >Arabs were Jews. Zand did not invent this thesis; 30 years before the >Declaration of Independence, it was espoused by David Ben-Gurion, Yitzhak >Ben-Zvi and others. > >If the majority of the Jews were not exiled, how is it that so many of them >reached almost every country on earth? Zand says they emigrated of their >own volition or, if they were among those exiled to Babylon, remained there >because they chose to. Contrary to conventional belief, the Jewish religion >tried to induce members of other faiths to become Jews, which explains how >there came to be millions of Jews in the world. As the Book of Esther, for >example, notes, "And many of the people of the land became Jews; for the >fear of the Jews fell upon them." > >Zand quotes from many existing studies, some of which were written in >Israel but shunted out of the central discourse. He also describes at >length the Jewish kingdom of Himyar in the southern Arabian Peninsula and >the Jewish Berbers in North Africa. The community of Jews in Spain sprang >from Arabs who became Jews and arrived with the forces that captured Spain >from the Christians, and from European-born individuals who had also become >Jews. > >The first Jews of Ashkenaz (Germany) did not come from the Land of Israel >and did not reach Eastern Europe from Germany, but became Jews in the >Khazar Kingdom in the Caucasus. Zand explains the origins of Yiddish >culture: it was not a Jewish import from Germany, but the result of the >connection between the offspring of the Kuzari and Germans who traveled to >the East, some of them as merchants. > >We find, then, that the members of a variety of peoples and races, blond >and black, brown and yellow, became Jews in large numbers. According to >Zand, the Zionist need to devise for them a shared ethnicity and historical >continuity produced a long series of inventions and fictions, along with an >invocation of racist theses. Some were concocted in the minds of those who >conceived the Zionist movement, while others were offered as the findings >of genetic studies conducted in Israel. > >Prof. Zand teaches at Tel Aviv University. His book, "When and How Was the >Jewish People Invented?" (published by Resling in Hebrew), is intended to >promote the idea that Israel should be a "state of all its citizens" - >Jews, Arabs and others - in contrast to its declared identity as a "Jewish >and democratic" state. Personal stories, a prolonged theoretical discussion >and abundant sarcastic quips do not help the book, but its historical >chapters are well-written and cite numerous facts and insights that many >Israelis will be astonished to read for the first time. > >The mosquito from Kiryat Yam > >On March 27, 1948, a meeting was held in Hiafa concerning the fate of the >Bedouin of Arab al-Ghawarina in the Haifa area. "They must be removed from >there, so that they, too, will not add to our troubles," Yosef Weitz, of >the Keren Kayemeth (Jewish National Fund), wrote in his personal diary. Two >months later, Weitz reported to the organization's director, "Our Haifa Bay >has been evacuated completely and there is hardly a remnant of those who >encroached our border." They were probably expelled to Jordan; some were >allowed to remain in the village of Jisr al-Zarqa. The fate of the Arab >al-Ghawarina Bedouin has recently made the headlines thanks to Shmuel >Sisso, mayor of the Haifa suburb of Kiryat Yam. He has filed a complaint >with the police against Google. The reason is the addition that one of the >site's surfers, a resident of Nablus, attached to the center of Kiryat Yam >in the world satellite photo, stating that the city is built on the ruins >of a village that was destroyed in 1948, Arab al-Ghawarina. Sisso's >complaint says that this is slanderous. > >The facts are as follows: The lands of the Zevulun Valley were purchased in >the 1920s by the JNF and by various construction companies, among them one >called Gav Yam. The Zionist Archives have the plan for the establishment of >Kiryat Yam, dated 1938, and a letter from 1945 states that there were >already 100 homes there. Government maps from the British Mandate period >identify the territory on which Kiryat Yam was built by two names: Zevulun >Valley and Ghawarina. Thus it appears that this was not a settlement but an >area in which Bedouin resided. > >The Web site of the Israeli organization Zochrot (Remembering) states that >there were 720 people at the site in 1948 and that the area was divided >among three kibbutzim: Ein Hamifratz, Kfar Masaryk and Ein Hayam, today Ein >Carmel. > >This story has been making the rounds on the Internet and drawing >responses, which can be summed up as follows: "If Sisso is suing Google >because they stated that he is living on a destroyed Arab village, the >implication is that he thinks this is something bad." Sisso, a lawyer of 57 >who is identified with Likud and was formerly Israeli consul general in New >York, says, "I don't think there is anything bad about it, but other people >might think it is bad, especially people abroad, and that is liable to hurt >Kiryat Yam, because people will not want to invest here. Since we are not >sitting on a Palestinian village, why should we have to suffer for no >reason?" > >Moroccan-born, Sisso arrived in Israel in 1955. "I wandered around the >whole region and I saw no trace of anyone's having been here before us and >supposedly expelled." He asked an American law professor how, if at all, >Google could be sued for slander or for damages. This, he says, is the >contribution of Kiryat Yam to the struggle against the right of return (of >the Palestinian refugees). > >It could turn out to be the most riveting trial since Ariel Sharon sued >Time magazine, but mayor Sisso has no illusions: "Me against Google is like >a mosquito against an elephant," he said this week. > >Who America belongs to > >Two professors, Gabi Shefer and Avi Ben-Zvi, were guests this week on >Yitzhak Noy's "International Hour" current events program on Israel Radio. >The anchor, sounding slightly concerned, asked whether the achievements of >Barack Obama show that the United States no longer belongs to the white >man. Prof. Shefer confirmed this: Obama is an immigrant, he said. Prof. >Ben-Zvi asked to add a remark: Gabi Shefer is right, he said. They are both >wrong. If Obama were an immigrant, he would not be eligible to be elected >president. He was born in Honolulu, some two years after Hawaii became the >50th state of the union. > > > > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword >"igve". > > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not From creuss at bluewin.ch Tue Jan 20 07:16:08 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Tue Jan 20 07:18:00 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Law of Return is Based on Hoax Message-ID: Dion Giles wrote: > The tribes of bandits that the Zionists call "the Jewish people" did > not arise in Palestine. They invaded Palestine, murdered the > inhabitants, stole the land and everything in it, and boasted about > it in their bible. The Romans came later though of course that > history is highly relevant too. No, the point of the article is that the Khazars did not even pass through Palestine, but migrated directly from Khazachstan to central Europe: | The first Jews of Ashkenaz (Germany) did not come from the Land of Israel | and did not reach Eastern Europe from Germany, but became Jews in the | Khazar Kingdom in the Caucasus. These are known as "Ashkenazi Jews" and are the large majority of today's Jews and the ardent zionists come from their ranks, whereas those few who prefer a peaceful coexistence with Arabs ("one-state solution") are traditionally Mizrahi Jews -- the original Jews who actually came from Palestine. One may ask: Why, then, do the zionists insist to "return" to Palestine? It's the oil! Notice the timing: The first world zionist conference was convened a few years after oil was discovered in Arabia. Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From duanebehrens at cox.net Tue Jan 20 13:58:52 2009 From: duanebehrens at cox.net (Duane Behrens) Date: Tue Jan 20 14:00:00 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Fwd: OPINION: Forgive and Forget Bush Crimes? Message-ID: <20090120145852.DP9RD.729708.imail@fed1rmwml42> "Why, then, shouldn't we have an official inquiry into abuses during the Bush years? One answer you hear is that pursuing the truth would be divisive, that it would exacerbate partisanship." --------------------------------------------- Of course, the answer you DON'T hear is that any true investigation of the Bushies would begin with an examination of the events of 9/11, starting with WTC7's impossible "collapse." And that would place sunshine on more than just the Bushies. And THAT'S why we'll just be "moving on . . . looking forward, not behind us." Duane -- http://perzuki.smugmug.com/ -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Forgive and Forget the Crimes of the Bushies? I Don't Think So By Paul Krugman, The New York Times. Posted January 19, 2009. So Mr. Obama should reconsider his apparent decision to let the previous administration get away with crime. Last Sunday President-elect Barack Obama was asked whether he would seek an investigation of possible crimes by the Bush administration. "I don't believe that anybody is above the law," he responded, but "we need to look forward as opposed to looking backwards." I'm sorry, but if we don't have an inquest into what happened during the Bush years -- and nearly everyone has taken Mr. Obama's remarks to mean that we won't -- this means that those who hold power are indeed above the law because they don't face any consequences if they abuse their power. Let's be clear what we're talking about here. It's not just torture and illegal wiretapping, whose perpetrators claim, however implausibly, that they were patriots acting to defend the nation's security. The fact is that the Bush administration's abuses extended from environmental policy to voting rights. And most of the abuses involved using the power of government to reward political friends and punish political enemies. At the Justice Department, for example, political appointees illegally reserved nonpolitical positions for "right-thinking Americans" -- their term, not mine -- and there's strong evidence that officials used their positions both to undermine the protection of minority voting rights and to persecute Democratic politicians. The hiring process at Justice echoed the hiring process during the occupation of Iraq -- an occupation whose success was supposedly essential to national security -- in which applicants were judged by their politics, their personal loyalty to President Bush and, according to some reports, by their views on Roe v. Wade, rather than by their ability to do the job. Speaking of Iraq, let's also not forget that country's failed reconstruction: the Bush administration handed billions of dollars in no-bid contracts to politically connected companies, companies that then failed to deliver. And why should they have bothered to do their jobs? Any government official who tried to enforce accountability on, say, Halliburton quickly found his or her career derailed. There's much, much more. By my count, at least six important government agencies experienced major scandals over the past eight years -- in most cases, scandals that were never properly investigated. And then there was the biggest scandal of all: Does anyone seriously doubt that the Bush administration deliberately misled the nation into invading Iraq? Why, then, shouldn't we have an official inquiry into abuses during the Bush years? One answer you hear is that pursuing the truth would be divisive, that it would exacerbate partisanship. But if partisanship is so terrible, shouldn't there be some penalty for the Bush administration's politicization of every aspect of government? Alternatively, we're told that we don't have to dwell on past abuses, because we won't repeat them. But no important figure in the Bush administration, or among that administration's political allies, has expressed remorse for breaking the law. What makes anyone think that they or their political heirs won't do it all over again, given the chance? In fact, we've already seen this movie. During the Reagan years, the Iran-contra conspirators violated the Constitution in the name of national security. But the first President Bush pardoned the major malefactors, and when the White House finally changed hands the political and media establishment gave Bill Clinton the same advice it's giving Mr. Obama: let sleeping scandals lie. Sure enough, the second Bush administration picked up right where the Iran-contra conspirators left off -- which isn't too surprising when you bear in mind that Mr. Bush actually hired some of those conspirators. Now, it's true that a serious investigation of Bush-era abuses would make Washington an uncomfortable place, both for those who abused power and those who acted as their enablers or apologists. And these people have a lot of friends. But the price of protecting their comfort would be high: If we whitewash the abuses of the past eight years, we'll guarantee that they will happen again. Meanwhile, about Mr. Obama: while it's probably in his short-term political interests to forgive and forget, next week he's going to swear to "preserve, protect, and defend the Constitution of the United States." That's not a conditional oath to be honored only when it's convenient. And to protect and defend the Constitution, a president must do more than obey the Constitution himself; he must hold those who violate the Constitution accountable. So Mr. Obama should reconsider his apparent decision to let the previous administration get away with crime. Consequences aside, that's not a decision he has the right to make. ============= From creuss at bluewin.ch Tue Jan 20 15:04:10 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Tue Jan 20 15:05:46 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Fwd: OPINION: Forgive and Forget Bush Crimes? Message-ID: > "I don't believe that anybody is above the law," he responded, but > "we need to look forward as opposed to looking backwards." This single phrase says it all about this zionist puppet. "His" inauguration speech was pure newspeak! Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Tue Jan 20 18:57:27 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Tue Jan 20 18:57:32 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Law of Return is Based on Hoax In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090121005728.44163F597@fep06.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090121/e6e8ad97/attachment.html From duanebehrens at cox.net Wed Jan 21 00:21:05 2009 From: duanebehrens at cox.net (Duane Behrens) Date: Wed Jan 21 00:21:14 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Thought for Today Message-ID: <20090121012105.JDBE5.749352.imail@fed1rmwml35> "Patriotism is proud of a country's virtues and eager to correct its deficiencies. It also acknowledges the legitimate patriotism of other countries, with their own specific virtues. The pride of nationalism, however, trumpets its country's virtues and denies its deficiencies, while it is contemptuous toward the virtues of other countries. It wants to be, and proclaims itself to be, "the greatest." But greatness is not required of a country. Only goodness is. -Sydney J. Harris, journalist and author (1917-1986) -- http://perzuki.smugmug.com/ From creuss at bluewin.ch Wed Jan 21 06:50:37 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Wed Jan 21 06:52:20 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Law of Return is Based on Hoax Message-ID: Dion Giles wrote: > That was the point of the article, but in my view a mere > addendum to the rationale for Israel, which is based in a claimed > continuity with those who crossed into Palestine and plundered it. > A section of the supposed "Jewish people" are not descended > biologically from that particular gang of thieves but the entire Zionist > project is descended *ideologically* from it If the zionist landgrab was only based on a reference to earlier landgrabs (by others!) in the location of their present landgrab, then the zionist Theme Park known as Israel could _just as well_ be built in New Mexico or Australia, leaving the whole Middle East alone and giving no pretext for a "global war on terror"! No, the hoax that Palestine is the "HOMELAND" of zionists is absolutely essential -- the conditio sine qua non -- for the zionist grab of the Middle East's oil and their phony global sales pitch for "security" and armaments. Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Wed Jan 21 07:10:36 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Wed Jan 21 07:10:49 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Law of Return is Based on Hoax In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090121131037.4B63810D2D@fep02.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> New Mexico, fine. Australia - no thanks! NIMBY - Not In My Back Yard. The Zionists themselves were once not all that fixated on Palestine for their racist homeland and it might well be access to oil that attracted them. Oil that won't help them till they can expand into Greater Israel. But the myths associated with the site are a powerful propaganda tool and drawcard for settlers. Dion Giles Western Australia. At 21:50 21/01/2009, Chris Reuss wrote: >Dion Giles wrote: > > That was the point of the article, but in my view a mere > > addendum to the rationale for Israel, which is based in a claimed > > continuity with those who crossed into Palestine and plundered it. > > A section of the supposed "Jewish people" are not descended > > biologically from that particular gang of thieves but the entire Zionist > > project is descended *ideologically* from it > >If the zionist landgrab was only based on a reference to earlier landgrabs >(by others!) in the location of their present landgrab, then the zionist >Theme Park known as Israel could _just as well_ be built in New Mexico or >Australia, leaving the whole Middle East alone and giving no pretext for a >"global war on terror"! > >No, the hoax that Palestine is the "HOMELAND" of zionists is absolutely >essential -- the conditio sine qua non -- for the zionist grab of the >Middle East's oil and their phony global sales pitch for "security" >and armaments. > >Chris > > > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword >"igve". > > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not From creuss at bluewin.ch Wed Jan 21 12:41:32 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Wed Jan 21 12:43:25 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Law of Return is Based on Hoax Message-ID: Dion Giles wrote: > The Zionists themselves were once not all that fixated on Palestine > for their racist homeland and it might well be access to oil that > attracted them. Oil that won't help them till they can expand into > Greater Israel. The zionists don't need Greater Israel to control the Mid-East's oil -- they just need puppet regimes all over the Mid-East. In 2003, Dubya announced a Middle-East Free Trade Area, to be completed until 2013: http://web.archive.org/web/20080306174643/http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/rel eases/2004/06/20040609-37.html (The original page disappeared a few days ago, due to Obama's CHANGE.) The Iraq war was a crucial step in this plan: For the oil pipeline from Iraq to Haifa: Iraq-to-Haifa oil pipeline could spur economic rebirth http://www.jewishsf.com/content/2-0-/module/displaystory/story_id/20157/edit ion_id/411/forma Israel seeks pipeline for Iraqi oil http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2003/apr/20/israelandthepalestinians.oil Today, the only states not yet under Israeli puppets are Iran and Syria. I guess they'll be done until 2013 too. Then, Israel controls all the oil. Who needs Greater Israel? Just gives bad press... Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Wed Jan 21 19:58:40 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Wed Jan 21 19:59:13 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Law of Return is Based on Hoax In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090122015842.94D0B1109D@fep07.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> Shouldn't knock Obama's programme of change. Change will be delivered. Wall Street, the brasshats and Israel will get the banknotes and Main Street will get the change. Dion Giles Western Australia At 03:41 22/01/2009, Chris wrote: >Dion Giles wrote: > > The Zionists themselves were once not all that fixated on Palestine > > for their racist homeland and it might well be access to oil that > > attracted them. Oil that won't help them till they can expand into > > Greater Israel. > >The zionists don't need Greater Israel to control the Mid-East's oil -- >they just need puppet regimes all over the Mid-East. In 2003, Dubya >announced a Middle-East Free Trade Area, to be completed until 2013: > >http://web.archive.org/web/20080306174643/http://www.whitehouse.gov/news/rel >eases/2004/06/20040609-37.html > >(The original page disappeared a few days ago, due to Obama's CHANGE.) > >The Iraq war was a crucial step in this plan: For the oil pipeline from >Iraq to Haifa: > >Iraq-to-Haifa oil pipeline could spur economic rebirth >http://www.jewishsf.com/content/2-0-/module/displaystory/story_id/20157/edit >ion_id/411/forma > >Israel seeks pipeline for Iraqi oil >http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2003/apr/20/israelandthepalestinians.oil > >Today, the only states not yet under Israeli puppets are Iran and Syria. >I guess they'll be done until 2013 too. Then, Israel controls all the oil. >Who needs Greater Israel? Just gives bad press... > >Chris > > > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword >"igve". > > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Wed Jan 21 22:15:09 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Wed Jan 21 22:15:20 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Bombshell from Obama Message-ID: <20090122041510.B829A10B9D@fep02.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090122/9d1be93b/attachment.html From glparramatta at greenleft.org.au Wed Jan 21 22:32:09 2009 From: glparramatta at greenleft.org.au (glparramatta) Date: Wed Jan 21 22:46:36 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] What's new at Links: Solidarity with Gaza from Bolivia & Venezuela, Jewish and Israeli opposition; Thailand, S. Africa, Apartheid Israeli, Tariq Ali, Malaysia Message-ID: <4977F6C9.7050508@greenleft.org.au> What's new at Links: Solidarity with Gaza from Bolivia & Venezuela, Jewish and Israeli opposition; Thailand, S. Africa, Apartheid Israeli, Tariq Ali, Malaysia * * * Subscribe free to Links - International Journal of Socialist Renewal - at http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=343373 Visit and bookmark http://links.org.au and add it to your RSS feed (http://links.org.au/rss.xml). If you would like us to consider an article, please send it to links@dsp.org.au *Please pass on to anybody you think will be interested in /Links/. * * * Bolivia breaks ties over Gaza, will take Israel to ICC/Bolivia rompe relaciones diplom?ticas con Israel en solidaridad con Gaza January 14, 2009 -- Al Jazeera -- Evo Morales, the president of Bolivia, says he is breaking off ties with Israel in protest against its war in Gaza, which has left more than 1000 Palestinians dead. Morales said on Wednesday that he would seek to get top Israeli officials, including Ehud Olmert, the Israeli prime minister, charged with "genocide" in the International Criminal Court. * Read more Jewish and Israeli opposition to Israel's Gaza slaughter (updated Jan. 17) * Read more Thailand: Petition -- Defend freedom of speech. Stop the use of `lese majeste' laws Please sign this open letter and ask others to sign. Stop the use of lese majeste laws in Thailand. Defend freedom of speech We, the undersigned, oppose the use of lese majeste in Thailand in order to prevent freedom of speech and academic freedom. We demand that the government cease all proceedings in lese majeste cases. * Read more Palestine government salutes Venezuela's Hugo Chavez President Hugo Chavez, Your Excellency, President Hugo Chavez, We, the people of Palestine, commend your courage to speak and act upon your conscience regardless of your detractors' criticism or cowardice. Mr. President, we have watched death rain upon our families and children in Gaza for weeks; and yet we stand proud and ready for any outcome. We are a resilient people who wish for peace but will fight rather than bow to injustice. We live and die by the codes of our forefathers -- codes of honor, integrity, truth and bravery. Throughout history, in a just conflict, there always emerges a champion, a single hero who, by his actions, embodies all the virtues the masses aspire to. You have demonstrated that you are such a man. * Read more South Africa's new opposition party: Face to face with `Terror' The following was presented by social movement activist Ashwin Desai as part of the December 18, 2008, Harold Wolpe lecture and debate with Mosiuoa ``Terror'' Lekota, leader of the newly formed Congress of the People (COPE). It was held at the Centre for Civil Society, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban. COPE was formed by supporters of the former president of the ANC Thabo Mbeki in protest at his replacement by Jacob Zuma. * Read more COSATU leader Zwelinzima Vavi: Sanction and boycott apartheid Israel! By Zwelinzima Vavi, general secretary, Congress of South African Trade Unions (COSATU) January 14, 2009 -- From our own experience, we know how painful and dehumanising is the system of segregation, otherwise known as apartheid. Apartheid is a system based on the assumption that one group or race is superior to others and therefore has a right to all the privileges and virtues associated with that particular status. It has a right to run and determine the lives of others, excluding them from certain privileges, merely because they do not belong to the "chosen" group. What other definition would so fittingly define a system based on different rights and privileges for Jews and Arabs in the Middle East? The bantustanisation of Palestine into pieces or strips -- West Bank, Ramallah, Gaza Strip and so on -- run by Israel and with no rights whatsoever for the Palestinians, is definitely an apartheid system. * Read more Young Israeli socialist speaks out for a free Palestine January 7, 2009 -- Isaac Shuisha, an Israeli citizen and student involved in the Palestine solidarity movement in Sydney, spoke to Green Left Weekly's Simon Butler about the reasons behind Israel's assault on Gaza and the campaign for a free Palestine. Shuisha is a member of the socialist youth organisation, Resistance. * Read more Israel -- an apartheid state By Tony Iltis January 6, 2009 -- In a 1969 interview, then-Israeli PM Golda Meir, referring to the creation of the State of Israel in 1948, said: "It is not as though there was a Palestinian people ... and we came and threw them out and took their country ... They did not exist." Of course, the Palestinian people did, and still do, exist. This inconvenient fact helps explain why Israel is forced to continuously resort to brutal military force. * Read more Tariq Ali on Israel's massacres in Gaza Tariq Ali addresses the Stop Gaza Massacres meeting in London, January 8, 2009. Organised by Stop the War Coalition UK. Watch at http://links.org.au/node/852 Thailand: Activist Giles Ji Ungpakorn faces arrest for `insulting' monarchy (now with excerpts from Coup for the Rich) Readers of Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal are urged to send letters of protest and calling for all charges against Giles Ji Ungpakorn to be dropped. Send them to the Thailand's Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva at Government House, Bangkok, Thailand, fax number +66 (0) 29727751. Please also write letters of protest to the ambassador of the Royal Thai embassy in your own country. * Read more Malaysian police detain anti-war protesters; PSM slams minister's 'double standards' January 10, 2009 -- The police have arrested 21 people, including member of parliament for Klang MP Charles Santiago and several top leaders of the Socialist Party of Malaysia (Parti Sosialis Malaysia -- PSM, at an anti-war vigil at Dataran Merdeka, Kuala Lumpur. The vigil was organised by Anti-War Coalition to show support to the victims of war and aggression in Palestine and Sri Lanka. * Read more * * * Links seeks to promote the international exchange of information, experience of struggle, theoretical analysis and views of political strategy and tactics within the international left. It is a forum for open and constructive dialogue between active socialists coming from different political traditions. It seeks to bring together those in the international left who are opposed to neoliberal economic and social policies. It aims to promote the renewal of the socialist movement in the wake of the collapse of the bureaucratic model of "actually existing socialism" in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. ATTENTION: Sign up for regular ``what's new'' announcement emails at http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=343373 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090122/8bd7fe5f/attachment.html From papadop at peak.org Thu Jan 22 01:06:00 2009 From: papadop at peak.org (MichaelP) Date: Thu Jan 22 01:06:32 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] REUTERS: Q+A - How could Obama close Guantanamo prison? Message-ID: http://uk.reuters.com/article/topNews/idUKTRE50K60W20090122?rpc=401& REUTERS--Thu Jan 22, 2009 2:57am GMT WASHINGTON (Reuters) - President Barack Obama will direct that the U.S. prison at the naval base at Guantanamo Bay in Cuba be closed within a year if he signs a draft executive order obtained by Reuters on Wednesday. Obama administration officials, including his choice for attorney general, Eric Holder, have pointed to the many obstacles ahead in closing the prison for terrorism suspects. The most obvious question is where to put the detainees, some of whom are deemed too dangerous to free. Here are questions and answers on options open to Obama and some information about the high-security prison, which is seen as a stain on America's human rights record. Q: How many detainees are still at Guantanamo Bay and why was it opened? A: About 245 detainees remain at Guantanamo, which was set up in January 2002 to hold terrorism suspects captured after the September 11, 2001, attacks on the United States. Most have been held for years without being charged and many have complained of abuse. At least 525 have been released, five died in custody -- four of suicide by hanging and one of cancer. Q: If Guantanamo Bay prison is closed, where will the detainees go? A: The Bush administration negotiated for many months with countries whose nationals are still at Guantanamo, trying to get them to take in detainees. Some governments have denied the Guantanamo prisoners are in fact their citizens while others have been reluctant to agree to U.S. requests to imprison or monitor returnees. From papadop at peak.org Thu Jan 22 01:16:59 2009 From: papadop at peak.org (MichaelP) Date: Thu Jan 22 01:18:46 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Fisk: So far, Obama's missed the point on Gaza... Message-ID: http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/fisk/robert-fisk-so-far-obamas-missed-the-point-on-gaza-1488632.html The Independent (London) Thursday, 22 January 2009 It would have helped if Obama had the courage to talk about what everyone in the Middle East was talking about. No, it wasn't the US withdrawal from Iraq. They knew about that. They expected the beginning of the end of Guantanamo and the probable appointment of George Mitchell as a Middle East envoy was the least that was expected. Of course, Obama did refer to "slaughtered innocents", but these were not quite the "slaughtered innocents" the Arabs had in mind. There was the phone call yesterday to Mahmoud Abbas. Maybe Obama thinks he's the leader of the Palestinians, but as every Arab knows, except perhaps Mr Abbas, he is the leader of a ghost government, a near-corpse only kept alive with the blood transfusion of international support and the "full partnership" Obama has apparently offered him, whatever "full" means. And it was no surprise to anyone that Obama also made the obligatory call to the Israelis. But for the people of the Middle East, the absence of the word "Gaza" ? indeed, the word "Israel" as well ? was the dark shadow over Obama's inaugural address. Didn't he care? Was he frightened? Did Obama's young speech-writer not realise that talking about black rights ? why a black man's father might not have been served in a restaurant 60 years ago ? would concentrate Arab minds on the fate of a people who gained the vote only three years ago but were then punished because they voted for the wrong people? It wasn't a question of the elephant in the china shop. It was the sheer amount of corpses heaped up on the floor of the china shop. Sure, it's easy to be cynical. Arab rhetoric has something in common with Obama's clich?s: "hard work and honesty, courage and fair play ... loyalty and patriotism". But however much distance the new President put between himself and the vicious regime he was replacing, 9/11 still hung like a cloud over New York. We had to remember "the firefighter's courage to storm a stairway filled with smoke". Indeed, for Arabs, the "our nation is at war against a far-reaching network of violence and hatred" was pure Bush; the one reference to "terror", the old Bush and Israeli fear word, was a worrying sign that the new White House still hasn't got the message. Hence we had Obama, apparently talking about Islamist groups such as the Taliban who were "slaughtering innocents" but who "cannot outlast us". As for those in the speech who are corrupt and who "silence dissent", presumably intended to be the Iranian government, most Arabs would associate this habit with President Hosni Mubarak of Egypt (who also, of course, received a phone call from Obama yesterday), King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia and a host of other autocrats and head-choppers who are supposed to be America's friends in the Middle East. Hanan Ashrawi got it right. The changes in the Middle East ? justice for the Palestinians, security for the Palestinians as well as for the Israelis, an end to the illegal building of settlements for Jews and Jews only on Arab land, an end to all violence, not just the Arab variety ? had to be "immediate" she said, at once. But if the gentle George Mitchell's appointment was meant to answer this demand, the inaugural speech, a real "B-minus" in the Middle East, did not. The friendly message to Muslims, "a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect", simply did not address the pictures of the Gaza bloodbath at which the world has been staring in outrage. Yes, the Arabs and many other Muslim nations, and, of course, most of the world, can rejoice that the awful Bush has gone. So, too, Guantanamo. But will Bush's torturers and Rumsfeld's torturers be punished? Or quietly promoted to a job where they don't have to use water and cloths, and listen to men screaming? Sure, give the man a chance. Maybe George Mitchell will talk to Hamas ? he's just the man to try ? but what will the old failures such as Denis Ross have to say, and Rahm Emanuel and, indeed, Robert Gates and Hillary Clinton? More a sermon than an Obama inaugural, even the Palestinians in Damascus spotted the absence of those two words: Palestine and Israel. So hot to touch they were, and on a freezing Washington day, Obama wasn't even wearing gloves -------------------------------------------------------------------- mail2web.com ? Enhanced email for the mobile individual based on Microsoft? Exchange - http://link.mail2web.com/Personal/EnhancedEmail From creuss at bluewin.ch Thu Jan 22 06:06:59 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Thu Jan 22 06:08:49 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Bombshell from Obama Message-ID: The most important transparency issue is 9/11 and Obama already said what he thinks about this: "we need to look forward(*) as opposed to looking backwards." So much for transparency... (*) Read: The perps can __look forward__ to getting away with mass murder. Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From creuss at bluewin.ch Thu Jan 22 06:24:32 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Thu Jan 22 06:26:05 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] The Cynicism of Obama's Slogan Message-ID: "Change you can believe in." This slogan is cynical in its legalistic perfidy as only a lawyer can devise: It is formally true although its content is a lie! People "can believe in" gods, although these gods don't even exist. People "can believe in" the OTC about 9/11, although it's a hoax. People "can believe in" Obama's change, even though he won't bring change (he didn't even change Dubya's war minister for eternal war!). The slogan "Change that is genuine" would be a lie, demonstrably false. But Obama's slogan is not demonstrably false -- it's a truism! And it's a particularly cynical wording because it uses a religious concept -- belief --, after people have been duped so badly by Dubya's "faith-based" politics. I.e. the slogan _contains_ the "same old" while promising change! Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From creuss at bluewin.ch Thu Jan 22 07:37:05 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Thu Jan 22 07:38:37 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] REUTERS: Q+A - How could Obama close Guantanamo prison? Message-ID: Obama was not only shameless enough in Berlin to ask for more German troops in Afghanistan so the body bags will have a different flag on them, he also expects European countries to give asylum to Gitmo prisoners deemed too dangerous for the U$ and their home countries. And it looks like the Brussels snouts will actually take the offer so they have another pretext to increase their police state. Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca Thu Jan 22 07:53:49 2009 From: jmeaton at ns.sympatico.ca (Janet M Eaton) Date: Thu Jan 22 07:54:26 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Obama Should Worry About the Bush Family Tentacles Undermining His Plans [Russ Baker, Alternet Jan 22 ] Message-ID: <4978422D.30880.C3167C6@jmeaton.ns.sympatico.ca> As George W. Bush leaves office and Barack Obama takes over, we are in danger of missing the opportunity for change our new president has promised -- unless we come to grips with what the great historian and Librarian of Congress Daniel Boorstin called our "hidden history," not just of the past eight years but of the past half-century and more. ... Like most people, I took the failings of George W. Bush at face value: an inattentive, poorly prepared man full of hubris, who committed colossal blunders as a result. Then I spent five years researching my new book, Family of Secrets and came to see that the origins go much deeper. This backstory is getting almost no attention in the talking-heads debate over the Bush legacy. Yet it will continue to play, affecting our country and our lives, long after Bush leaves office..... We must begin to take seriously, and speak openly about, the true nature of the forces behind the Bush family enterprise. If we do not, we will find ourselves, several years from now, shaking our heads at new disaster, still unable to comprehend what has happened -- and why." --- Russ Baker*, Alternet, Jan 22 * Russ Baker is an award-winning investigative reporter. He has written for the New Yorker, Vanity Fair, The Nation, the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Village Voice and Esquire. Baker received a 2005 Deadline Club award for his exclusive reporting on George W. Bush?s military record. Information on his new book, Family of Secrets: the Bush Dynasty, the Powerful Forces That Put It in the White House, and What Their Influence Means for America, can be found at www.familyofsecrets.com. fyi-janet ============== Obama Should Worry About the Bush Family Tentacles Undermining His Plans By Russ Baker, AlterNet. Posted January 22, 2009. Bush may be gone, but his influence -- and the forces that put him in office -- aren't. As George W. Bush leaves office and Barack Obama takes over, we are in danger of missing the opportunity for change our new president has promised -- unless we come to grips with what the great historian and Librarian of Congress Daniel Boorstin called our "hidden history," not just of the past eight years but of the past half-century and more. President Obama will face a staggering array of challenges, most, if not all, of which stem from the policies of Bush. But efforts at reform will fall short if we fail to probe and confront the powerful forces that wanted this disastrous administration in the White House in the first place -- and that remain ready and able to maintain their influence behind the scenes today. Like most people, I took the failings of George W. Bush at face value: an inattentive, poorly prepared man full of hubris, who committed colossal blunders as a result. Then I spent five years researching my new book, Family of Secrets and came to see that the origins go much deeper. This backstory is getting almost no attention in the talking-heads debate over the Bush legacy. Yet it will continue to play, affecting our country and our lives, long after Bush leaves office. A more profound explanation for the rise of George W. Bush came as I studied the concerted effort to convince the public that he was independent of, and often in disagreement with, his father. The reason for this, it turned out, was that exactly the opposite was true. W. may have been bumptious where his father was discreet, but in fact the son hewed closely to a playbook that guided his father and even his grandfather. Over much of the last century, the Bushes have been serving the aims of a very narrow segment from within America's wealthiest interests and families -- typically through involvement in the most anti-New Deal investment banking circles, in the creation of a civilian intelligence service after World War II, and in some of that service's most secretive and still-unacknowledged operations. Through declassified documents and interviews, I unearthed evidence that George W. Bush's father, the 41st president of the United States, had been working for the intelligence services no less than two decades before he was named CIA director in 1976. Time and again, Bush 41 and his allies have participated in clandestine operations to force presidents to do the bidding of oil and other resource- extraction interests, military contractors and financiers. Whenever a president showed independence or sought reforms that threatened entrenched interests, this group helped to ensure that he was politically attacked and neutralized, or even removed from office, through one means or another. We are not dealing here with what are commonly dismissed as "conspiracy theories." We are dealing with a reality that is much more subtle, layered and pervasive -- a matrix of power in which crude conspiracies are rarely necessary and in which the execution or subsequent cover-up of anti-democratic acts become practically a norm. In 1953, 23 years before he became CIA director as a supposed neophyte, George H.W. Bush began preparing to launch an oil- exploration company called Zapata Offshore. His father, investment banker Prescott Bush, had just taken a Senate seat from Connecticut; and his father's close friend Allen Dulles had just taken over the CIA. A staff CIA officer, Thomas J. Devine, purportedly "resigned" to go into the oil business with young George. Bush then began to travel around the world. His itineraries had little apparent relationship to his limited and perennially unprofitable business enterprises. But they do make sense if the object was intelligence work. When his company at last put a few oil rigs in place, they ended up in highly sensitive spots, such as just off Castro's Cuba before the Bay of Pigs invasion. As part of his travels, Bush senior even appeared in Dallas on the morning of the Kennedy assassination, although he would famously claim that he could not recall where he was at that historic moment. After leaving the city, he called the FBI with a false tip about a possible assassin, pointedly emphasizing that he was calling from outside Dallas. It is also intriguing to learn that an old friend of Bush's, a White Russian ?migr? with intelligence connections, shepherded Lee Harvey Oswald upon his return to America in the year preceding the assassination. In any event, when Lyndon Johnson replaced Kennedy, the oilmen and the intelligence-military establishment once again had a friend in the White House. The pattern continued. New evidence suggests that Bush senior and his associates in the intelligence services, far from being the loyalists to Richard Nixon they claimed to be, had turned on the 35th president early in his administration, unceasingly working to weaken and eventually force him out. These efforts culminated in what appears to have been a deliberately botched Watergate office burglary -- led by former CIA officers. Ironically, Nixon's career had been launched with the quiet backing of Wall Street finance figures upset with the man Nixon would defeat, a leading congressional supporter of banking reform, and Prescott Bush himself had played a key role. Yet, when Nixon finally achieved the presidency, he became surprisingly resistant to pressure from the very power centers that had helped him get to the top. He turned a deaf ear to the demands of the oil industry, battled with the CIA and cut the Pentagon out of the loop as he (and his aide Henry Kissinger) negotiated secretly with Moscow and Beijing. These acts estranged Nixon from those who felt he had betrayed his sponsors -- men who had the means to do him in. Bush senior, it turns out, was closely allied with the surprising number of White House officials with covert ties to the intelligence service that surrounded Nixon. Through it all, Bush senior would routinely claim to be "out of the loop," as he would later pretend during the Iran- Contra scandal of the Reagan era, although we know that as vice president he was at the center of that and other abuses of power. None of this let up after Nixon was forced to resign. His pliant successor, Gerald Ford, brought in young staffers named Richard Cheney and Donald Rumsfeld, and the two participated in the so-called Halloween massacre, which saw the administration veer in a far-right direction on foreign policy, a development that paved the way for the appointment of Bush senior as CIA director. This happened just as Congress was launched into the deepest investigation ever of intelligence abuses, and public voices were clamoring to reopen official inquiries into the assassinations of John F. Kennedy, his brother, Robert F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. Then came Jimmy Carter, whose plans to reform the CIA were an echo of JFK's intent to scatter the CIA to the winds after the ruinous Bay of Pigs invasion. When Carter defeated Ford, ousted Bush from the CIA helm and sought to bring the intelligence juggernaut under control, he ended up deeply compromised by complex financial shenanigans orchestrated by figures from the same intelligence circles -- and undermined by the crisis with Iran, exacerbated by covert dissident CIA elements tied to Bush. Carter was a one-term president, defeated by a ticket with none other than George H.W. Bush, backed by a phalanx of CIA officers, as vice president. And then Bush senior became president himself. Bill Clinton apparently grasped the pattern. He cultivated a friendly relationship with the elder Bush and instituted virtually no significant reforms in, or issued challenges to, either the intelligence or military establishments. All this is relevant today because the furtive forces and pressures that haunted, and ultimately dominated, these past presidents have not abated. Indeed, what the presidency of George W. Bush truly represented was the unfettered, most reckless manifestation of the objectives this group has pursued for many decades. In Bush 43's trademark pattern of showing the old man how it's done, the son was bringing virtually into the open the kinds of things his father preferred pursued sub- rosa. But behind the different fa?ade it was the same game all over again. The dirty tricks of Karl Rove, who got his first job under Bush 41 at the Republican Party during Watergate; the use of the Supreme Court to force an election their way; an early move to suppress the records of prior presidencies; the maniacal secrecy of Vice President Cheney; the false rationale used to justify the seizure of Iraqi oil reserves through invasion; the clampdown on dissent and the unauthorized domestic eavesdropping, the efforts to smear independent voices like Joseph Wilson (the husband of CIA officer Valerie Plame) and newsman Dan Rather; and last and perhaps most significant, the unleashing from government oversight of their friends and allies in finance and industry -- these and more emerged from the old dreams and methods of this anti-democratic culture. Now, as a new president enters the White House promising reform, how much will he be able to achieve if his reforms step on the same big toes? We must begin to take seriously, and speak openly about, the true nature of the forces behind the Bush family enterprise. If we do not, we will find ourselves, several years from now, shaking our heads at new disaster, still unable to comprehend what has happened -- and why. From creuss at bluewin.ch Thu Jan 22 09:39:15 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Thu Jan 22 09:40:57 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Obama Should Worry About the Bush Family Tentacles Message-ID: > All this is relevant today because the furtive forces and pressures > that haunted, and ultimately dominated, these past presidents have > not abated. Does Baker suggest that Bush I is also behind Obama's selection of the eternal war minister and his puppeteering by Rahm Emanuel? Isn't the question rather why "Mr. Change" is playing along? (Oh, the poor guy is under pressure of the Bush gang? Then why does he tell the world that big change is coming?? Ah yes, that's part of his contract...) Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From radred at ix.netcom.com Thu Jan 22 12:40:44 2009 From: radred at ix.netcom.com (Carol) Date: Thu Jan 22 12:40:47 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Obama's inaugural address: amid banalities, a call for austerity Message-ID: <15262377.1232649644453.JavaMail.root@elwamui-polski.atl.sa.earthlink.net> http://www.wsws.org/articles/2009/jan2009/pers-j21.shtml World Socialist Web Site Obama's inaugural address: Amid banalities, a call for austerity 21 January 2009 by Bill Van Auken In his inaugural address Tuesday, President Barack Obama offered nothing in the way of concrete pledges or programs to confront the economic crisis or bring an end to war. Instead, he indicated that the American people would have to accept even greater sacrifices. The pomp and ceremony dating back 220 years to the birth of the American republic, reinforced by the accession of the first African-American to the presidency, stood in sharp contrast to the banality of Obama's words and the hollowness of his message. For the millions who packed the Washington Mall, the emotions of the day were driven by hopes that the coming to power of an African-American would signify genuine change and by relief at the exit of George W. Bush, whose first appearance on the Capitol steps drew loud boos from the assembled crowd. At the end of the ceremony, the departure over the Mall of the helicopter bearing Bush, the most hated president in the country's history, drew a chant from the crowd most often heard from sports fans jeering an opposing team: "Na-na-na-na, Na-na-na-na, Hey Hey, Goodbye." There was a general hope that the inauguration of a new president would signal an end to an eight-year national nightmare that began with a stolen election and brought two wars of aggression, historically unprecedented attacks on constitutional rights, an uninterrupted growth of social inequality and the deepest economic crisis in modern American history. These sentiments were shared by people around the world who watched international broadcasts of the ceremony. Yet Obama's speech seemed crafted in large measure with the aim of damping down such expectations. The message universally trumpeted by the corporate media, headlining the lead stories on the web sites of both the New York Times and the Washington Post, was Obama's call for a "new era of responsibility." There is more than a small dose of irony in this invocation, as the principle of responsibility is to be very selectively applied. In recent weeks, Obama and his advisors have repeatedly made clear that they have no intention of holding Bush, Cheney or other senior officials in any way accountable for policies that constituted war crimes and crimes against the Constitution during their tenure in office. As for the deepest financial crisis in the history of American capitalism, no one at the top bears any particular responsibility, at least in Obama's estimation. "Our economy is badly weakened, a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age," he declared at the beginning of the speech. This formulation holds tens of millions of workers facing the loss of their jobs and homes through no fault of their own equally responsible for the present crisis as Wall Street executives and hedge fund managers whose financial parasitism and criminality helped drag their own institutions and the world economy into ruin. Now Obama is telling working people that they must take "responsibility" for the crisis that is destroying their livelihoods by accepting deeper attacks on jobs, wages and social benefits, even as trillions of dollars in public funds are used to bail out Wall Street while its CEOs continue to draw down their seven- and eight-figure compensation packages. In some of Obama's rhetoric there were indications that he and his speechwriters had attempted to mine the first inaugural address given by Franklin D. Roosevelt in 1933, in the depths of the Great Depression. Clearly there are historical parallels, made ever more apparent as the stock market plunged below the 8,000 mark Tuesday, its broadest index losing over 5 percent of its value even as Obama was being sworn in. Yet what was most notable was Obama's inability to speak in the frank manner of Roosevelt 76 years ago. What characterized the new president's inaugural address above all was an appalling lack of concreteness about anything. When Roosevelt addressed the nation, he vowed to "speak the truth, the whole truth, frankly and boldly." While he certainly did not do that, and his aim was to save capitalism from social revolution, he did speak in fairly explicit terms about what had created the crisis and what he intended to do about it. The crisis of the 1930s, Roosevelt declared, had arisen not because of any lack of nature's bounty" or "human efforts" to multiply it, but because "the rulers of the exchange of mankind's goods have failed, through their own stubbornness and their own incompetence." He continued: "Practices of the unscrupulous money changers stand indicted in the court of public opinion, rejected by the hearts and minds of men." Obama appeared to have drawn part of his speech from the first part of this conception, declaring, "Our workers are no less productive than when this crisis began. Our minds are no less inventive, our goods and services no less needed than they were last week or last month or last year." Left unstated, however, was why, if this is the case, the economy is spiraling downward into depression with nearly 3 million jobs wiped out in the US over the last year alone. Involved in this evasion is a stunning level of contempt and condescension towards those who support him. He obviously feels he owes them no such explanation, and the less said the better. Obama is unable to even mention the role of today's "money changers," who paid a large share of the money for his campaign and bankrolled the inauguration itself. All of the vague rhetoric about "equality" notwithstanding, it is their interests he intends to defend at the expense of the broad mass of American working people. This is the real significance of his claims to have transcended the "stale political arguments of the past" about the role of government and the capitalist market, and his vow that the time for "putting off unpleasant decisions has ended." "The question we ask today is not whether our government is too big or too small, but whether it works... Where the answer is yes, we intend to move forward," he said. "Where the answer is no, programs will end." Again, there was no specificity about what programs will be terminated, but in the past week he has indicated his intention to radically cut back bedrock social programs, including Social Security and Medicare, as a means of attacking the government's fiscal crisis. "Nor is the question before us whether the market is a force for good or ill," Obama continued. "Its power to generate wealth and expand freedom is unmatched." He allowed that the present crisis showed the need for a "watchful eye" and voiced the belief that the "reach of prosperity" should be extended by offering "opportunity to every willing heart." There is nothing here that could not have been lifted from the speeches of Ronald Reagan or any of the other right-wing politicians that have ruled on behalf of Wall Street and corporate America for the last three decades. It was no accident that, in illustrating the kind of actions he sees as vital to overcoming the crisis, Obama cited the "the selflessness of workers who would rather cut their hours than see a friend lose their job." This, under conditions where workers all over the country are being hit with cuts in hours and pay in the name of saving jobs, even as bailed-out bankers reject any sacrifice whatsoever. "War on terror" to go on: There was a second fundamental theme that ran through the speech,which was that America's bellicosity and militarism will continue, albeit with slightly greater attention to wrapping a predatory foreign policy in the rhetoric of morality and altruism. In the first substantive line of the speech, Obama declared, "Our nation is at war against a far-reaching Network of violence and hatred." The implication was unmistakable: The "global war on terror," the pretext used by the Bush administration for launching two wars of aggression, carrying out torture, extraordinary rendition, unlawful detentions and domestic spying, continues unabated. Obama vowed that under his administration, "We'll begin to responsibly leave Iraq to its people and forge a hard-earned peace in Afghanistan." There was not a word of criticism, however, for the decision to launch these wars. Indeed, the incoming administration has already indicated that far from leaving Iraq "to its people," occupation, on a more economical scale, will continue indefinitely, while tens of thousands of additional US troops are to be sent to Afghanistan in an escalation of the war there. There was an ugly note of arrogance and jingoism in the speech, with Obama declaring, "We will not apologize for our way of life, nor will we waver in its defense" and his chastisement of foreign leaders--presumably in the historically oppressed countries of Africa, the Middle East, Asia and Latin America--who "blame their society's ills on the West." He issued a rhetorical challenge to "those who seek to advance their aims by inducing terror and slaughtering innocents," vowing, "We will defeat you." Coming in the wake of Israel's three-week onslaught against Gaza in which thousands of Palestinian innocents were killed or maimed with US supplied weapons and the tacit support of a silent Obama, these words reeked of hypocrisy. Finally, Obama paid tribute to the US troops "who at this very hour patrol far-off deserts and distant mountains," declaring "their spirit of service" to be "precisely [the] spirit that must inhabit us all." The newly inaugurated president thus provided a textbook definition of modern militarism--upholding the ethos and spirit of the military as the ideal for the nation--as the substance of his "vision" for reviving America. It was noteworthy, given the inauguration of the first African-American president, that what went completely unmentioned was the civil rights struggle or, for that matter, any form of social struggle. There are two reasons for such an omission. Obama has no intention of encouraging such mass social struggles today, and he is anxious not to offend the forces of social reaction upon which he rests and which now surround him. Whatever his intentions, however, the immense economic and social crisis that is now unfolding in America and across the globe will produce such struggles and on an even greater scale. The policies that are only hinted at in what was a banal and dishonest inauguration speech are completely at odds with the social interests and aspirations of the vast majority of the American people. Sooner rather than later, they will produce a political confrontation and a new eruption of class struggle that will challenge the foundations of US capitalism. Bill Van Auken Copyright ) 1998-2009 World Socialist Web Site - All rights reserved From siamdave at yahoo.ca Thu Jan 22 21:41:28 2009 From: siamdave at yahoo.ca (Dave Patterson) Date: Thu Jan 22 21:41:37 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] obama and conspiracies ... Message-ID: <200901231041280859.00B1E523@smtp-adsl.totonline.net> - another good essay from Sam http://prorev.com/2009/01/thinking-about-obama.html THINKING ABOUT OBAMA Sam Smith Once again I'm in trouble and once again it has little to do with politics or ideology. I just don't think right about Obama. Most people of power are inherently deductive thinkers. They have learned a set of respected principles by which those of power can continue to have power by applying these principles to the facts they find around them. These principles change from time to time, which is why we have things like the op ed pages of the Washington Post that helpfully inform us, for example, when the age of the "free market" is over and it's okay to quote Keynes again. Sometimes key principles have to be dispensed with in a less elegant manner, such as the "domino theory" of the Vietnam war or the "weapons of mass destruction" that took us into Iraq. And sometimes key principles prove a bit shaky at which time it is fitting and proper to have them undergo thoughtful reexamination by approved theorists as is happening now with the "war on terror." These theories are typically either reconfirmed or replaced with others, preferably of three or less words. In each instance, the key element is a theory that is presumed to be true, even if lacks empirical confirmation. For example, in the case of Barack Obama, one theory is that he will be a great president because he is our first black president. Everyone is either too polite or too enthralled by the theory to ask such simple questions as: would this be true if our first black president were Clarence Thomas? Another theory is that he will be a great president because he is a great man, a subset of the theory that history is the purview of great men [sic], which overlooks the role of chance, culture, the environment, and lesser souls such as those who created the decline in the birth rate or the anti-slavery, women's, labor and environmental movements. Another theory, particular popular among the Washington elite, is that he will be a great president because he preaches centrism, even though there is no historical evidence that centrism produces anything much more than the status quo and even though, in America's case, most profound and progressive improvements have been the result of a raucous and irrepressible left. I don't buy such theories. My learning disability is not that I'm of the wrong political persuasion, but that I think inductively. In other words, I move from evidence towards the theory rather than the other way around. While there are some academic fields where inductive reasoning gets respect - social history and anthropology, in which I majored, being among them - it is widely thought of as unprofessional empiricism at best, conspiracy theory at worst. In fact, the term 'conspiracy theory' was invented by elite media and politicians to denigrate questions or critical presumptions about events about which important facts remain unrevealed. The intelligent response to such events is to remain agnostic, skeptical, and curious. Theories may be suggested - just as they are every day about less complex and more open matters on news broadcasts and op ed pages - but such theories should not stray too far from available evidence. Conversely, as long as serious anomalies remain, dismissing questions and doubts as a "conspiracy theory" is a highly unintelligent response. It is also ironic as those ridiculing the questions and doubts typically consider themselves intellectually superior to the doubters. But they aren't because they stopped thinking the moment someone in power told them a superficially plausible answer. There is the further irony that many who ridicule doubts about the official version of events were typically trained at elite colleges where, in political science and history, theories often take precedent over facts and in which substantive decisions affecting politics and history are presumed to be the work of a small number of wise men [sic]. They are trained, in effect, to trust in theories and benign confederacies. Most major media political coverage is based on the great man theory of history. This pattern can be found elsewhere in everything from Skull & Bones to the NY Times editorial board to the Council on Foreign Relations. You might even call them beneficent conspiracy theorists. Homicide detectives and investigative reporters, among others, are inductive thinkers who start with evidence rather than with theories and aren't happy when the evidence is weak, conflicting or lacking. They keep working the case until a solid answer appears. The inductive thinker considering Obama is naturally drawn to things like his record and his statements on various issues. I compiled these over the campaign and came up with around 30 issues with which progressives might disagree. However you might argue each case, one fact is indisputable: the media did not let the voters in on the secret. Thus, most of the one million plus enthusiasts on the Mall during the inaugural celebration were cheering a theory rather than facts, supported by the almost universal absence of the mention of actual issues when the fans were interviewed by roving TV crews. In philosophical terms, Barack Obama might be called a beneficent conspiracy theory, a black helicopter come to save rather than endanger us. The irony is that I suspect he knows this, because he has achieved his success in part by being an inductive reasoner in practice and a deductive one in rhetoric. Cleverly ignoring Mahalia Jackson's warning against being a "saint in church and a devil under cover," Obama is street smart in his walk and ethereal in his talk. And in the latter, he is blessed by being able to draw on the grand theories of both the white Ivy League and black theology. It is this combination of intellectual and Christian theory that appeals to those inclined to faithfulness. I learned about the Ivy League approach when I attended Harvard. Later I would write: "Whatever intelligence I possessed did not seem the sort required to excel at Harvard. Long afterwards I would figure out that much of what Harvard was about was a giant game of categories, in which real people, real events and real phenomena were assigned to fictitious groupings such as The Enlightenment, the Industrial Revolution, or the Freudian Tradition. To those immersed in this game, the imaginary assumed a substance of its own; as classics professor John Finley is said to have remarked, 'Sometimes, I fear my son thinks that life is real.' "I had come to Harvard full of passion for phenomena I could see, feel and touch; now it was implicitly suggested that these were childish things to be put away. The educated man concerned himself primarily with what they meant, with which other phenomena they belonged, and what theories could best explain their existence in the first place. I didn't want to spend my life putting things into little boxes; I wanted to take them out, turn them over, examine them closely, do something with them, and tell others what I had found. "If you were brazen enough to think inductively, that is to say to examine evidence and consider what it might all mean -- in short to use one's innate capacity to imagine, to dream and to create -- you risked being regarded ignorant, or at least odd. You were, after all, being educated to digest grand principles, major paradigms and random certainties and then to sort and file all of life's phenomena by these convenient categories. "In such a cataloging system, the accidental, the chaotic, the imagined, the malevolent, the culturally unfamiliar, and the unique often got misplaced. I had come to Harvard with some vague notion that it would teach me how to use my own intelligence better, that I would learn how to educate myself. I didn't understand then, and wouldn't until many decades later, that the American establishment wasn't really all that interested in that sort of thing. "From the intellectual epicenter of Cambridge to the political apex of Washington, education was something one received, rehearsed, and regurgitated. You didn't play with it, experiment with it, and you certainly didn't make it your own -- even if, like the shape of Harvard Square, it turned out not to be as officially described. Life at Harvard was thus several steps removed from life as I knew and hoped it to be." The dean of freshman, F. Skiddy von Stade Jr, once said to me, "You people from Germantown Friends School look so good on paper. Why do you do so badly here?" It was a fair question; a number of GFS graduates were on probation and one had dropped out. It took me decades to understand and appreciate the difference in two systems of learning, for at my Quaker high school I had been given few grand theories. Instead, in the 1950s I had been introduced to how the world really worked - for example, an 8th grade English course that included a segment on the secrets of advertising, a 9th grade course in anthropology and a 12 grade math course that explained the Boolean calculations of computers I wouldn't see for 20 years. The Quakers themselves were refreshingly devoid of grand theories - once a debate in Friends meeting over the divinity of Christ, for example, was gently diverted by one of the elders - but the respect and encouragement of critical thought and examination was far greater than I would find at Harvard or in the media I would late join. Part of the problem with the grand theory approach to politics is that politics isn't a science. The deductive premises of science can be constantly tested, reviewed and dumped if necessary. In politics, these theories are not sanctified by the confirmation of experimentation and analysis, but primarily by the effectiveness of the propaganda those projecting them. Besides, as Benjamin Franklin noted, you don't need to know the law of gravity to realize that a plate will likely break if you drop it on the floor. The problem with inductive reasoning in politics is that you seldom come up with definitively accurate answers. But the same is true of deductive reasoning. The difference is that with the latter, it is easier to pretend that it is true. With inductive reasoning you are constantly reminded of the weakness of thought; with deductive reasoning it is too easy to become a prisoner of myth. Evan Heit, in the Cambridge Handbook Of Computational Psychology describes the process well: "How do you make a prediction about the unpredictable? Inductive reasoning is about drawing conclusions that are not certain or logically valid, but still likely. Let's say you are buying a new CD for your friend. It's impossible to know with certainty what she will like, and it doesn't seem that the rules of logic will tell you which CD to buy. There's no correct answer. Nonetheless, you can make an informed guess, and indeed she will probably like the CD that you buy. The more you know about her taste in music, and which categories of music she likes and does not like, the more likely it is that your prediction will be correct. Our everyday experiences are filled with predictions of this nature - we use inductive reasoning to make likely but not certain predictions about how people will act and about things we have not seen, e.g., that when we open a door to a room, the room will have a floor and ceiling. In spite of the uncertainty, we manage to be fairly successful in our predictions - we can buy gifts that our friends will enjoy and avoid walking into rooms without floors. When it comes to making predictions about the unpredictable, computational models are in a similar position to people. Because the judgments being modeled are themselves uncertain, it's unlikely that models of inductive reasoning will be perfectly correct. Any computational model of inductive reasoning could probably be improved by taking account of more knowledge or more principles of prediction. Nonetheless, current models of inductive reasoning already do a fairly good job." So if I do not react to Barack Obama the way you would like, do not consider me cynical. It's just that where others see a god, I see a politician; where others feast on adjectives, I dine on facts and where some find faith sufficient, I prefer the Missouri motto that some say stems from an 1899 speech by Congressman Willard Vandiver, when he declared, "I come from a country that raises corn and cotton, cockleburs and Democrats, and frothy eloquence neither convinces nor satisfies me. I'm from Missouri, and you have got to show me." -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090123/debf2b85/attachment.html From duanebehrens at cox.net Thu Jan 22 23:06:51 2009 From: duanebehrens at cox.net (Duane Behrens) Date: Thu Jan 22 23:06:47 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] On "Conspiracy Theories" Message-ID: <20090123000651.1UMIV.416814.imail@fed1rmwml40> In fact, the term 'conspiracy theory' was invented by elite media and politicians to denigrate questions or critical presumptions regarding events about which important facts remain unrevealed. The intelligent response to such events is to remain agnostic, skeptical, and curious. Theories may be suggested - just as they are every day about less complex and more open matters on news broadcasts and op ed pages - but such theories should not stray too far from available evidence. Conversely, as long as serious anomalies remain, dismissing questions and doubts as a "conspiracy theory" is a highly UNintelligent response. It is also ironic, as those ridiculing the questions and doubts typically present themselves as intellectually superior to the doubters. But they aren't - because they stopped thinking the moment someone in power told them a superficially plausible answer. Sam Smith ============= From thinker at thelakebc.ca Fri Jan 23 22:33:11 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Fri Jan 23 22:29:08 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Gorbachev on Obama Message-ID: <200901240428.n0O4SkoK028862@karma.reboot.ca> America's next step By Mikhail Gorbachev Friday, January 23, 2009 Support for President Barack Obama among Americans, including many who did not vote for him, is unprecedented. Globally, too, there has been deep interest in the election and widespread hope for change in U.S. policy. Practically everyone the world over now wishes Obama success. The main reasons for this are the pressures of global economic and political tensions that have been piling up for decades. In his inauguration speech, Obama somberly cited these problems. The crisis, he said, is "a consequence of greed and irresponsibility on the part of some, but also our collective failure to make hard choices and prepare the nation for a new age." Understandably, the president will focus first on the economic crisis. But solving America's economic problems without cardinal changes in the world will be impossible. The "Washington consensus" that assumed that the global economy could be designed from a single center has been discredited. It was based entirely on the profit motive, over-consumption and failed, outdated institutions. A new model must recognize the need for multilateral cooperation. In his speech, Obama acknowledged that today's threats demand "even greater cooperation and understanding between nations." I am sure that however strong the criticism and even anger over some U.S. actions has been throughout the world - in Europe, China, India, Russia, Latin America - leaders and the general public understand the importance of America's role and are ready to cooperate with it. But is America ready? In his speech, Obama said, "The world has changed, and we must change with it." The commitment to those words must be proven by specific deeds and decisions. This will require a realistic analysis of the global situation - the kind of analysis that has been lacking in the United States for nearly two decades. America has been widely seen as almost omnipotent. But arrogance and triumphalism blinded it as a policy-maker; slogans replaced serious thinking. The 20th century was an American century - let's make the 21st another American century. Those words, spoken by President Bill Clinton, were echoed by those who have guided American policies in recent years. But the world will not agree to play the role of an "extra" in a movie scripted by the United States. Finally, recognition of that attitude seems to be emerging in the United States. The outcome of the presidential election is an acknowledgement that America's strength does not come from empire-building or military adventures but from its ability to correct its mistakes. A course for foreign policy is not plotted overnight, particularly when what's needed is not a mere adjustment but a full revision. What the president and members of his team have said thus far is not enough to discern the direction they will take. Obama is getting all kinds of advice. Zbigniew Brzezinski is proposing a focus on relations with China. His recent remarks in Beijing seem to suggest a kind of condominium, a U.S.-China G-2. Of course, China's global economic and political importance will keep growing, but I think those who would like to start a new geopolitical game will be in for a disappointment. China is unlikely to accept; more generally, such games belong to the past. Similarly, Henry Kissinger's proposals for "a new world order" seem to assume a new geopolitical division of the world. What we really need are new, more modern approaches. A number of European public figures have urged Obama to reconsider past policies that have long been taken for granted. The United States, which in 1990 signed the Paris Charter for a New Europe, could be a natural partner in creating a new European security structure - a project now under discussion. I also hope the president sees the great potential inherent in relations with Russia, which have been mishandled in recent years. A change for the better could be achieved relatively soon, helping to move toward healthier relations with Russia's neighbors and within Europe as a whole. In shaping Mideast policy, a real battle is inevitable. If anything should have become crystal clear in recent years, it's that "business as usual" only makes the Middle East more dangerous. Current U.S. policies have not been good for the region as a whole or, in particular, for Israel, a nation with which the United States has special relations. Two long-term problems have taken on a special urgency and will require Obama's close attention: nuclear proliferation and the environmental crisis. It will not be easy to disentangle the intricate web of contradictions surrounding these issues. Reducing nonproliferation to the demand that Iran and North Korea cease their nuclear programs will lead to a dead end. The nuclear powers will not be able to hold on to their monopoly indefinitely, and the nonproliferation treaty does not allow it. The solution is to move toward a world without nuclear weapons. But this goal cannot be achieved if one country retains an overwhelming superiority in conventional weapons. Without specific steps to reduce these weapons - more generally, without demilitarizing international politics - we will have only empty talk. What's needed is a real breakthrough, like the one achieved in the late 1980s. Judging by Obama's inaugural speech, he understands that even while he faces the immediate challenges of the economic crisis, he should not push to the sidelines problems like poverty and environmental issues, particularly climate change. Fostering economic development and preserving the planet for future generations can be contradictory; the only way to resolve this clash of priorities is to develop policies multilaterally. This is true of practically every problem, in all areas. I suspect that many people are pondering Obama's call for a new era of responsibility. Perhaps neither he nor we can yet see what shape it will take. One thing is already clear, though: We are indeed on the cusp of a new age, on the road to a new world, one we must travel together. Mikhail Gorbachev, the last leader of the Soviet Union, is president of the International Foundation for Socio-Economic and Political Studies in Moscow. Correction: Notes: Copyright ? 2009 The International Herald Tribune | www.iht.com From creuss at bluewin.ch Sun Jan 25 06:56:13 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Sun Jan 25 06:58:06 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Google ad: Genetic test for zio-racists Message-ID: A company uses google ads to advertise genetic testing for zio-racists to determine how closely they belong to the "Chosen People": http://www.igenea.com/index.php?content=40&adwords=gochde_s_juden ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From creuss at bluewin.ch Sun Jan 25 08:16:16 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Sun Jan 25 08:18:16 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] not everyone lost in the "global financial crash" Message-ID: Asked by a journo how much money he personally and his WEF foundation lost in the global financial crash, WEF founder & boss Klaus Schwab answered: "Zero." ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From thinker at thelakebc.ca Sun Jan 25 09:58:56 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Sun Jan 25 09:54:47 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Fiat lux # 227 Message-ID: <200901251554.n0PFsRUR031244@karma.reboot.ca> To: record@cablerocket.com Subject: Fiat lux 227 Fiat lux # 227 January 23, 2009. My last column was about the benefits of the highest degree of self sufficiency, but it barely scratched the surface, especially in these uncertain times. In future columns I intend to carry on with our experiences, hoping that they may come useful for some, but now the whole country, and the world has some very serious problems, which, in many ways, are also proofs that self sufficiency, from the private to the societal levels, is the only way to preserve any degree of human rights, freedoms and vestiges of democracy, preventing the total mental enslavement I grew up in. The most important item on the present agenda is to prevent Stephen Harper from achieving any kind of parliamentary majority. I have no problem with the proposed coalition. Many governments all over the world have them and are doing well. At least it prevents some psychopaths from going completely wild and destroy everything in the name of some screwball faith, ideology, or barefaced larceny, including post politics directorships. The question now is whether Stevie can once again browbeat the Governor General to break the parliamentary rule of government by a majority, regardless whether it is by a single, or a coalition of multiple parties ? We'll find out very soon. For now, let's take a "conspiracy theorist" kind of look at the present world situation, which is nothing new, with the exception of the scale of the fraud various ruling sectors have always used for stealing the the public blind. Albeit never more than right now, with the ultimate prize of world domination, total colonization and enslavement well within their reach. In the name of "competitive free trade", of course. The word "free", like Milton Friedman's "free to choose" must appear in the propaganda of all slave masters and their prophets, including in Hitler's, Stalin's and Mao's. Wealth can not be created, only taken from other sectors, the environment and the future. The expression "conspiracy theory" is propaganda buzz to make anybody, who dares to question their plans and actions, look like fools and maniacs. Yet, it can be proved that, regardless of race colour, or creed, history has always been ruled by the conspiracy of three sectors: The Merchants, now the banks and multinational corporations, who come up with the demands. The Priesthoods, who invent the excuses and the legalization of crimes as "divine orders", now represented by fundamentalist religions and economists. The Military who does the dirty work, hoping for the absolution of their crimes by the Priests. Never has this conspiracy been more obvious than during the past forty years since the Friedmanite, Chicago School's crime wave of neoclassical market economist capitalism has been forced on Earth, eagerly supported by politicians and the pseudo priesthoods of university economics departments. How about the prestigious Nobel Prize for Economics? Even that is just another lie, to give the present crime wave waged against the environment and the human race a form of respectability and perceived legality. In reality, it is the Bank of Sweden Prize, set up in 1968, falsely attributed to Alfred Nobel, who had enough sense to distrust economists over a hundred years ago. If these people are so clever and dare to call their childish racket a science, how is it that the world keeps falling from one economic crisis into another, with some thirty million children dying every year of starvation, bad water and easily preventable illnesses. How many know that the first foodbank in Canada was opened in Edmonton, in the great, wealthy and good conservative province of Alberta in 1981 ? Was it a coincidence that it happened only a few years after the introduction of the neoclassical theory, and that we now have almost 700 of them across this, the richest country on Earth? How is it that many of them are feeding employed people, forced to work in part time jobs at starvation wages, while some of their bosses often walk away with tens of millions, every year ? Is it "socialism" to ask these simple questions by a dedicated private enterpriser, such as myself, who never even thought of stealing from their employees with part time jobs and minimum wages ? According to the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, the average income of the top 100 Canadian CEOs' was $10,408,054. in 2007. One guy, by the name of Michael Lazaris of Research in Motion, walked home with $51.515,518.or $25,757. per hour. Gordon Nixon of the Royal Bank with $44,270,084. or $22,135 per hour, which is just under of what we're receiving as our pensions for a whole year. This list just goes on and on, and yet with all the propaganda against "socialist" governments and "conspiracy theorists", there's never any mention that these obscene payments are stolen from their employees and the pockets of all of us, every time we buy something on a credit card and the basic necessities for our survival. What we get is their media pimps filling our lives with anti union propaganda and covering up the secret negotiations by the Harper government for the free movement of labour between the three NAFTA countries, to replace Canadians with Mexicans, whose country has already been ruined by the criminal NAFTA treaty, so that our masters can become "more competitive" by stealing more from more. When our so called "conservatives" have legalized the deregulated money creation system by the private banks, they flooded the world with a huge inflation of worthless, imaginary capital, raising our costs of living by over 1,000 percent in the past 35 years. At the same time, they also licenced the control and takeover of the world's resources by an international, criminal mafia of corporations, who are now in position not only to crash the present monetary system , as they have nothing to lose, and establish a global dictatorship under ideologically brainwashed, fully owned governments, as we now have here in BC and across North America and the EU. Is the present "financial crisis" for real, or is it an invented excuse to scare humanity into begging for their dictatorship, as the Germans have in 1933, by the corporate mafia who shouted the loudest that democracy doesn't work, while calling themselves "socialists" and "freedom fighters". From thinker at thelakebc.ca Mon Jan 26 09:49:41 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Mon Jan 26 09:47:41 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] From Wall St.Journal Message-ID: <200901261545.n0QFjDWI015282@karma.reboot.ca> * JANUARY 23, 2009, 11:32 A.M. ET The World Won't Buy Unlimited U.S. Debt We're asking others to sacrifice for our 'stimulus.' * By PETER SCHIFF Barack Obama has spoken often of sacrifice. And as recently as a week ago, he said that to stave off the deepening recession Americans should be prepared to face "trillion dollar deficits for years to come." But apart from a stirring call for volunteerism in his inaugural address, the only specific sacrifices the president has outlined thus far include lower taxes, millions of federally funded jobs, expanded corporate bailouts, and direct stimulus checks to consumers. Could this be described as sacrificial? The Opinion Journal Widget Download Opinion Journal's widget and link to the most important editorials and op-eds of the day from your blog or Web page. What he might have said was that the nations funding the majority of America's public debt -- most notably the Chinese, Japanese and the Saudis -- need to be prepared to sacrifice. They have to fund America's annual trillion-dollar deficits for the foreseeable future. These creditor nations, who already own trillions of dollars of U.S. government debt, are the only entities capable of underwriting the spending that Mr. Obama envisions and that U.S. citizens demand. These nations, in other words, must never use the money to buy other assets or fund domestic spending initiatives for their own people. When the old Treasury bills mature, they can do nothing with the money except buy new ones. To do otherwise would implode the market for U.S. Treasurys (sending U.S. interest rates much higher) and start a run on the dollar. (If foreign central banks become net sellers of Treasurys, the demand for dollars needed to buy them would plummet.) In sum, our creditors must give up all hope of accessing the principal, and may be compensated only by the paltry 2%-3% yield our bonds currently deliver. As absurd as this may appear on the surface, it seems inconceivable to President Obama, or any respected economist for that matter, that our creditors may decline to sign on. Their confidence is derived from the fact that the arrangement has gone on for some time, and that our creditors would be unwilling to face the economic turbulence that would result from an interruption of the status quo. But just because the game has lasted thus far does not mean that they will continue playing it indefinitely. Thanks to projected huge deficits, the U.S. government is severely raising the stakes. At the same time, the global economic contraction will make larger Treasury purchases by foreign central banks both economically and politically more difficult. The root problem is not that America may have difficulty borrowing enough from abroad to maintain our GDP, but that our economy was too large in the first place. America's GDP is composed of more than 70% consumer spending. For many years, much of that spending has been a function of voracious consumer borrowing through home equity extractions (averaging more than $850 billion annually in 2005 and 2006, according to the Federal Reserve) and rapid expansion of credit card and other consumer debt. Now that credit is scarce, it is inevitable that GDP will fall. Neither the left nor the right of the American political spectrum has shown any willingness to tolerate such a contraction. Recently, for example, Nobel Prize-winning economist Paul Krugman estimated that a 6.8% contraction in GDP will result in $2.1 trillion in "lost output," which the government should redeem through fiscal stimulation. In his view, the $775 billion announced in Mr. Obama's plan is two-thirds too small. Although Mr. Krugman may not get all that he wishes, it is clear that Mr. Obama's opening bid will likely move north considerably before any legislation is passed. It is also clear from the political chatter that the policies most favored will be those that encourage rapid consumer spending, not lasting or sustainable economic change. So when the effects of this stimulus dissipate, the same unbalanced economy will remain -- only now with a far higher debt load. In Today's Opinion Journal REVIEW & OUTLOOK * The Jack Bauer Exception * Party Line Central Banking * Torture Inquisition TODAY'S COLUMNISTS * Declarations: What I Saw at the Inauguration * ? Peggy Noonan * Potomac Watch: Congress Will Test Obama's New Tone * ? Kimberley A. Strassel COMMENTARY * Investors Want Clarity Before They Take Risks * ? Michael Boskin * Expect the World Economy to Suffer Through 2009 * ? Ian Bremmer and Nouriel Roubini * How Government Looks at Pundits * ? Eliot A. Cohen * The Economy Needs Corporate Governance Reform * ? Carl C. Icahn If any other country were to face these conditions, unpalatable measures such as severe government austerity or currency devaluation would be the only options. But with our currency's reserve status, we have much more attractive alternatives. We are planning to spend as much as we like, for as long as we like, and we will let the rest of the world pick up the tab. Currently, U.S. citizens comprise less than 5% of world population, but account for more than 25% of global GDP. Given our debts and weakening economy, this disproportionate advantage should narrow. Yet the U.S. is asking much poorer foreign nations to maintain the status quo, and incredibly, they are complying. At least for now. You can't blame the Obama administration for choosing to go down this path. If these other nations are giving, it becomes very easy to take. However, given his supposedly post-ideological pragmatic gifts, one would hope that Mr. Obama can see that, just like all other bubbles in world history, the U.S. debt bubble will end badly. Taking on more debt to maintain spending is neither sacrificial nor beneficial. Mr. Schiff is president of Euro Pacific Capital and author of "The Little Book of Bull Moves in Bear Markets" (Wiley, 2008). Please add your comments to the Opinion Journal forum. Printed in The Wall Street Journal, page A13 Copyright 2008 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved This copy is for your personal, non-commercial use only. Distribution and use of this material are governed by our Subscriber Agreement and by copyright law. For non-personal use or to order multiple copies, please contact Dow Jones Reprints at 1-800-843-0008 or visit www.djreprints.com More In Opinion * Email * Printer Friendly * Order Reprints * Share: * Yahoo! 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Bush Presidential Library is now in the planning stages and accepting donations. The Library will include: 1. The Hurricane Katrina Room, which is still under construction. 2. The Alberto Gonzales Room, where you won't be able to remember anything. 3. The Texas Air National Guard Room, where you don't even have to show up. 4. The Walter Reed Hospital Room, where they don't let you in. 5. The Guant?namo Bay Room, where they don't let you out. 6. The Weapons of Mass Destruction Room, which no one has been able to find. 7. The WTC Room. Not well-publicized, this one truly is a blast. Enter at your own risk. 8. The National Debt Room, which is huge and has no ceiling. 9. The Tax Cut Room, with entry only to the wealthy. 10. The Economy Room, which is in the toilet. 11. The Iraq War Room. (After you complete your first visit, they make you go back for a second, third, fourth, and sometimes fifth visit.) 12. The Dick Cheney Room, in the now-famous undisclosed location, complete with shooting gallery. 13. The Environmental Conservation Room, still empty. 14. The Supreme Court Gift Shop, where you can buy an election. 15. The Airport Men's Room, where you can meet some of your favorite Republican Senators. -- http://perzuki.smugmug.com/ From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Mon Jan 26 17:36:11 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Mon Jan 26 17:37:12 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] A silly question? Message-ID: <20090126233614.88FCCF81A@fep06.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> Collapse in "the financial system" is billed as causing a collapse in production of goods and services. But do we NEED a financial system? What goods does the financial system produce? What services does it offer the people? Is the financial system not merely a network of non-productive gatekeepers who presume to decide who may produce what? It is easy to identify *materials, *labour and *knowhow as essential for production of goods and services, but where does a "financial system" come into the picture? Why are the billionaires being allowed to decree that because they are having profitability problems the world must stop producing goods and services? Well, they're being allowed to do this as the billionaires own the politicians, the mandarins and the education systems, and because faith in the sirs has been inculcated almost without challenge. Democracy would grind this racket to a halt. That is why a shift from representative government to democracy (or, in debased police states like China, a shift from dictatorship to democracy) is so important. Elitists and sundry social engineers (including of course Mr Greed) will of course claim that the mug public can't make decisions and need to be led by sirs. This is rather like saying children who have never been on a bicycle shouldn't be allowed bikes because they can't ride. A pretext: of course they can't - and without access to bikes they never will. More than high time to say it and say it again: Rely on reason - the emperors of faith have no clothes. Dion Giles Western Australia From creuss at bluewin.ch Tue Jan 27 06:59:40 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Tue Jan 27 07:01:51 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] A silly question? Message-ID: Dion Giles wrote: > Collapse in "the financial system" is billed as causing a collapse in > production of goods and services. > > But do we NEED a financial system? The collapse in the productive sectors is mainly due to the collapse in consumer demand, i.e. _sales_ (consumers have lost savings or even jobs, so they delay or stop purchases that are not essential). Only secondary is the collapse in lending to productive projects, taking away their financial feasibility. > What goods does the financial > system produce? What services does it offer the people? Is the > financial system not merely a network of non-productive gatekeepers > who presume to decide who may produce what? The "productive" service of the financial system is to organize the lending of money to productive projects. Of course this should be taken over by Producers. > Elitists and sundry social engineers (including of course Mr Greed) > will of course claim that the mug public can't make decisions and > need to be led by sirs. This is rather like saying children who have > never been on a bicycle shouldn't be allowed bikes because they can't > ride. A pretext: of course they can't - and without access to bikes > they never will. The problem with this analogy is that if people "learn by doing" votes, it can go wrong too badly (as in electing a Hitler). The political education should be provided in advance (which is possible, unlike in learning to ride a bike). Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From creuss at bluewin.ch Tue Jan 27 07:36:38 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Tue Jan 27 07:38:31 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Did Iceland's Billions Vanish in Israel? Message-ID: Iceland is the only state in Europe that went bankrupt. In 2003, Iceland's president Olafur Ragnar Grimsson married on his 60th birthday the Israeli jet-setter Dorrit Moussaieff, granddaughter of Jerusalem's billionaire real-estate czar Shlomo Moussaieff. Grimsson turned Iceland into a bankster's heaven with Madoffian constructs. Before Iceland's banks crashed as billions "vanished", Grimsson visited Israel to meet big bosses of finance. Now, Iceland's taxpayers and bank customers have to bail out billions. Grapevine: Iceland's Israel Connection http://www.jpost.com/servlet/Satellite?apage=1&cid=1220802296061&pagename=JP ost/JPArticle/ShowFull ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From jomut at yahoo.com Tue Jan 27 13:55:29 2009 From: jomut at yahoo.com (John Mutambirwa) Date: Tue Jan 27 13:55:48 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] whither obama!? or, wither? Message-ID: <613971.2318.qm@web31108.mail.mud.yahoo.com> John Mutambirwa (Dreaming Awake) jomut@yahoo.com chakane@hotmail.com http://www.geocities.com/jomut ? hi, ? Received an interesting commentary?the other day on the maiden Wham Bam administration and the host of structural difficulties which he nimbly, glibly and strategically sidestepped during his heady campaign?but??will now have to face with a measure of both well rehearsed caution and genuine, private?trepidation! Never mind the possible evasions! ? In sum, the commentary casts a critically cynical glance at the overtures of conciliation that Obama has?made towards lots of people, whose predatory instincts are a matter of routine knowledge among even sparely informed members of the public, and wonders anxiously what social good will result from all of this. ? The links he provides are a treasure well worth more than a spirited hunt that?could informatively enrich those that would risk the pleasure of searching for it. ? Great comments by the economist, Michael Hudson,? who was Kucinic's chief economic advisor during the last Democratic leadership race.? His website is littered with captivating nuggets of both economic and political wisdom. ? John ======================= ? -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090127/9c983839/attachment.html From glparramatta at greenleft.org.au Tue Jan 27 17:32:38 2009 From: glparramatta at greenleft.org.au (glparramatta) Date: Tue Jan 27 17:46:58 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] What's new at Links: Obama; Thailand; Kanaky; Sri Lanka; Venezuela; Cuba; Palestine; Lenin; El Salvador Message-ID: <497F9996.4030605@greenleft.org.au> What's new at Links: Obama; Thailand; Kanaky; Sri Lanka; Venezuela; Cuba; Palestine; Lenin; El Salvador * * * Subscribe free to Links - International Journal of Socialist Renewal - at http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=343373 Visit and bookmark http://links.org.au and add it to your RSS feed (http://links.org.au/rss.xml). If you would like us to consider an article, please send it to links@dsp.org.au *Please pass on to anybody you think will be interested in /Links/. * * * Black president in the White House: Not the `same old white supremacy' but ... By Mike Ely For literally millions of people, for many of a new generation, the awakening to politics starts in these moments. This is the world, the arguments, the summations, the claims, the promises that they hear and that they will see unfold in the days ahead. We need to understand this moment, we need to also inhabit this world that they are seeing -- in order to craft from among them a revolutionary force that can actually connect with and represent their highest hopes. * Read more Kanaky (New Caledonia): Anti-capitalism and independence By Bernard Alleton, translated by Sam Wainwright for Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal The balance sheet of first year of the Kanaky PT (Workers Party) is largely positive. In the municipal elections in March, four months after it was formed, the PT ran candidates in fourteen of the territory's thirty-three communes resulting in thirty elected representatives. This demonstrates its genuine implantation. More generally, the PT knew how to take on the lethargy of the other parties that claim to struggle for independence. * Read more Thailand: Petition for freedom of speech; Interview with Giles Ji Ungpakorn on the use of `lese majeste' laws Please sign the petition (below the videos ) and ask others to sign. * Read more What does Obama mean for the world? By Barry Sheppard, San Francisco January 23, 2009 -- More than 1 million people gathered in bitter cold in Washington DC to witness the historical inauguration of an African American as president. The crowd was disproportionately Black, but majority white -- and jubilant. Celebrations were held in Black communities throughout the country, and in other sectors of the population. He was sworn in by his full name, Barack Hussein Obama, itself historic. In the aftermath of the election, he enjoys overwhelming support according to polls, far higher than his margin of votes. This indicates a large swing of whites among those who voted for the Republican candidate John McCain. * Read more Obama and the change the world demands By Kavita Krishnan The United States - and the world - has just witnessed Bush's exit from and Barack Obama's entry into the White House. The mood at Obama's inauguration - an event replete with symbolic resonances, situating the Obama presidency in the history of the civil rights movement against racism in the US - indicates the endurance of that groundswell of popular hope in the US which powered Obama's election campaign. For a US people reeling from financial crisis and the highly unpopular Bush presidency, Obama has offered a promise of ``change''. * Read more Sri Lanka: Behind the genocidal war against the Tamils By Tony Iltis January 17, 2009 -- The January 14 announcement by the Sri Lankan government that its forces had completed the capture of the Jaffna Peninsular, effectively bringing all of the historic Tamil nation in Sri Lanka's north-east under military occupation, was a grim reminder that the Israeli assault on the Gaza ghetto is not the only holocaust at the start of the new year. The Tamil people have been fighting for independence from Sri Lanka since 1983 when an island-wide pogrom (the most violent of several that had regularly occurred since 1956) convinced Tamils that they would not attain equality or security under the Sinhala-chauvinist state that has ruled Sri Lanka since independence in 1948. * Read more Venezuela: Mass support for constitutional reform campaign By Tamara Pearson Over the January 17-18 weekend, committees from various sectors of society swore to campaign hard to win the approval by public vote of the amendment to the constitution to get rid of the two-term limit on all elected offices in Venezuela. More than 20,000 people attended the swearing in of the heads of logistical and operational patrols of the United Socialist Party of Venezuela (PSUV) in Caracas on January 17. Venezuela's President Hugo Ch?vez stated at the event that there are now about 100,000 "Yes committees" organised, or in formation, to campaign in favour of changing the five articles of constitution so that all popularly elected positions are not limited to two terms. * Read more African American students discuss Cuba's healthcare revolution Radio Open Source carried this interview with three medical students from the United States studying in Cuba. But the core of our long conversations is medicine, the Cuban way. This is aggressive, free, hands-on healthcare that makes house calls, and lingers for the feel of emotions and homelife. Doctors' training -- like doctors' care -- is free: the payback required of the students here from all over the hemisphere is only that they return to under served areas of their home countries...Their thinking on social determinants of health, on the primacy of public health and the vital role of prevention strategies are unmatched in the world. With spending of less than US$200 per person per year for health care, they have achieved health outcomes no different than in the USA where expenditures now exceed $7000 per person annually!". * Read more `What we expect from President Obama on Palestine' (+COSATU solidarity message to the people of Gaza) Joint statement by the Palestine Solidarity Committee (South Africa) and the Congress of South African Trade Unions * Read more Thailand: Activist Giles Ji Ungpakorn charged with `insulting' monarchy [Please sign the petition HERE against the attack on freedom of speech in Thailand, which the use of lese majeste represents.] By Giles Ji Ungpakorn January 20, 2009 -- Today, the police informed me that I have been charged with lese majeste because of eight paragraphs in Chapter 1 of my book A Coup for the Rich. The paragraphs are listed below. According to the police charge sheet, the charges arise from the fact that the director of Chulalongkorn University bookshop decided to inform the police Special Branch that my book "insulted the Monarchy". The bookshop is managed by the academic management of the university. So much for academic freedom! * Read more Good riddance, Dubya! * Street art/photo essay, see more Lenin on liquidationism By Chris Slee In recent years there have been a number of cases where revolutionary Marxist parties have initiated or participated in attempts at building broad left parties. Examples include the Scottish Socialist Party; the Socialist Alliance and later Respect in England; the Socialist Alliance in Australia; Papernas in Indonesia; the participation of Italian Trotskyists in the Party of Communist Refoundation; and the New Anti-Capitalist Party initiated by the Revolutionary Communist League (Ligue Communiste Revolutionnaire) in France. Sometimes Marxist groups that participate in such broad formations are accused of "liquidationism". This was a term used by Lenin to refer to the policy of certain members of the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party who wished to dissolve ("liquidate") the RSDLP after the crushing of the 1905 revolution. * Read more El Salvador: Election results add to tension as presidential race heats up January 20, 2009 -- Amanda Peters was on the spot as an official observer, and as part of a delegation from CISPES (Committee in Solidarity with the People of El Salvador). She spoke with community radio's Latin Radical as the first results started coming in, and gives her nervous prognosis for the presidential round coming up on March 15. Also CISPES' assessment of the municipal and legislative elections. * Read more * * * Links seeks to promote the international exchange of information, experience of struggle, theoretical analysis and views of political strategy and tactics within the international left. It is a forum for open and constructive dialogue between active socialists coming from different political traditions. It seeks to bring together those in the international left who are opposed to neoliberal economic and social policies. It aims to promote the renewal of the socialist movement in the wake of the collapse of the bureaucratic model of "actually existing socialism" in the Soviet Union and Eastern Europe. ATTENTION: Sign up for regular ``what's new'' announcement emails at http://www.feedblitz.com/f/?Sub=343373 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090128/778b0be8/attachment.html From creuss at bluewin.ch Wed Jan 28 07:23:29 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Wed Jan 28 07:25:13 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] al-Qaeda 1970 in Australia! Message-ID: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/theroyalfamily/4359649/Queen-and- Prince-Philip-were-victims-of-Australian-assassination-attempt.html Queen and Prince Philip were 'victims' of Australian assassination attempt Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip were the victims of an alleged assassination attempt on an official tour of Australia almost 40 years ago, it has emerged. ... McHardy said that on April 29, 1970, the Queen and Duke were travelling by train to the farming town of Orange. When the train entered a winding cutting near the Blue Mountains town of Lithgow, two hours to the west of Sydney, it struck a large log wedged across the rails. Mr McHardy insists that it was an act of deliberate sabotage to force the train off the tracks. ... He told The Daily Telegraph: "The log had been moved onto the line in darkness, by one or two people who had prior knowledge of the area," ... ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Wed Jan 28 07:48:42 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Wed Jan 28 07:48:53 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] al-Qaeda 1970 in Australia! In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090128134843.AA407F92F@fep03.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> Typical Brit beat-up. "It has 'emerged' " indeed. The whole thing was dismissed at the time as a nasty prank akin to hoons who throw rocks from freeway bridges at passing cars. I tried to read the story but the Tele has pulled it. Much of the readership to whom the Tele panders are the worst elements of a caste-ridden backwater, best described as squires with an ancient and unjustified sense of entitlement. Why on earth would any terrorist organisation bother to try to assassinate a couple of palace freeloaders? At 22:23 28/01/2009, Chris wrote: >http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/newstopics/theroyalfamily/4359649/Queen-and- >Prince-Philip-were-victims-of-Australian-assassination-attempt.html > >Queen and Prince Philip were 'victims' of Australian assassination attempt > >Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip were the victims of an alleged >assassination attempt on an official tour of Australia almost 40 years ago, >it has emerged. > >... > >McHardy said that on April 29, 1970, the Queen and Duke were travelling by >train to the farming town of Orange. When the train entered a winding >cutting near the Blue Mountains town of Lithgow, two hours to the west of >Sydney, it struck a large log wedged across the rails. Mr McHardy insists >that it was an act of deliberate sabotage to force the train off the >tracks. > >... > >He told The Daily Telegraph: "The log had been moved onto the line in >darkness, by one or two people who had prior knowledge of the area," > >... > > > >~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ >SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword >"igve". > > >_______________________________________________ >Mai-not mailing list >Mai-not@globalproblematique.net >http://www.globalproblematique.net/mailman/listinfo/mai-not From creuss at bluewin.ch Wed Jan 28 10:09:46 2009 From: creuss at bluewin.ch (Christoph Reuss) Date: Wed Jan 28 10:11:31 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] al-Qaeda 1970 in Australia! Message-ID: > Why on earth would any terrorist organisation bother to > try to assassinate a couple of palace freeloaders? Sorry, the al-Qaeda part was just my satirical take on the story, not a claim by the Telegraph. If you copy&paste the 2nd line of the link, the full article is still there. Or click http://tinyurl.com/as8ypg Anyway, to your question above: The Brit press did justify the all-too-early withdrawal of Lizzy's grandson from Afghanistan with the assertion that royals are a special target of al-Qaeda! Cheers, Chris ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ SpamWall: Mail to this addy is deleted unread unless it contains the keyword "igve". From diongiles1 at aapt.net.au Wed Jan 28 13:51:30 2009 From: diongiles1 at aapt.net.au (Dion Giles) Date: Wed Jan 28 13:51:45 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] al-Qaeda 1970 in Australia! In-Reply-To: References: Message-ID: <20090128195131.565E3F782@fep08.mfe.bur.connect.com.au> An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090129/01cd0701/attachment.html From thinker at thelakebc.ca Wed Jan 28 18:51:28 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Wed Jan 28 18:47:05 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Obama intwerview Message-ID: <200901290046.n0T0kq0e031556@karma.reboot.ca> Subject: transcript obama interview on al-arabiya tv FYI DUBAI (AlArabiya.net) In his first interview since taking office, President Barack Obama told Arab satellite station Al Arabiya that Americans are not the enemy of the Muslim world and said Israel and the Palestinians should resume peace negotiations. ?My job to the Muslim world is to communicate that the Americans are not your enemy,? Obama told Al Arabiya?s Hisham Melhem in an interview broadcast Tuesday morning. During the presidential election campaign last year, Obama vowed to improve U.S. ties with the Muslim world and after he won promised to give a speech in a Muslim capital in his first 100 days in office. The President repeated this pledge in the interview but did not give a time or specify the venue. [] The President repeated a pledge to adress the Muslim world from a major Islamic city [] Obama pointed out that he had lived in the world?s largest Muslim nation, Indonesia for several years while growing up, and said his travels through Muslim countries had convinced him that regardless of faith, people had certain common hopes and dreams. In the interview, Obama called for resumed negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians and said his administration wanted to begin by listening and talking to all parties involved in the conflict without prejudging their concerns. He also praised Saudi King Abdulla for putting forward an Arab peace plan and said his administration would adopt a more extensive and regional approach in its relationship with the Muslim world. ?[W]e are ready to initiated a new partnership based on mutual respect and mutual interest,? said Obama, noting that only then can progress be achieved. " I think it is possible for us to see a Palestinian state ? I?m not going to put a time frame on it ? that is contiguous " President Barack Obama Obama, who took office a week ago, said he had already begun to fulfill the promises he made during his campaign by naming former U.S. Sen. George Mitchell as his Middle East peace envoy and sending him to the region within days of becoming president. Mitchell arrived in the region Monday evening on the start of a nine day tour. Although Obama expressed support for a contiguous Palestinian state, he hedged on specifying when or with what borders. ?I think it is possible for us to see a Palestinian state ? I?m not going to put a time frame on it ? that is contiguous,? the president told Al Arabiya. Obama reiterated America?s support to Israel and the ?paramount? importance of the Jewish state?s security, making no mention of the suffering of Palestinians, the Gaza war, or the continuing Israeli blockade of the beleaguered territory. Prior to his Jan. 20 inauguration Obama had remained silent about his views on the 22-day Israeli offensive in Gaza that left more than 1,300 Palestinians dead. He also reiterated his promise to withdraw troops from Iraq, close the infamous Guantanamo prison and respect the rule of law. Breaking with his predecessor George W. Bush, who had a penchant for adopting terms like Islamofacism and crusade that heightened tensions with the Muslim world, Obama underscored the importance of language and repeated the importance of listening as a part of communication. ?[M]y job is to communicate the fact that the United States has a stake in the well-being of the Muslim world that the language we use has to be a language of respect,? he said. ?[T]he language we use matters,? he continued. ?We cannot paint with a broad brush a faith as a consequence of the violence that is done in that faith?s name.? Yet his continuing silence on the enormous amount of civilian casualties during the Israeli offensive and accusations by the U.N. and humanitarian organizations that Israel committed war crimes also spoke volumes to an audience that has waited for America to take a more balanced approach to the conflict. Top TRANSCRIPT The President said the US cannot tell either the Israelis or the Palestinians what is best for them [] The following is a full transcript of Hisham Melhem's interview with President Obama on Al Arabiya TV: Q: Mr. President, thank you for this opportunity, we really appreciate it. THE PRESIDENT: Thank you so much. Q: Sir, you just met with your personal envoy to the Middle East, Senator Mitchell. Obviously, his first task is to consolidate the cease-fire. But beyond that you've been saying that you want to pursue actively and aggressively peacemaking between the Palestinians and the Israelis. Tell us a little bit about how do you see your personal role, because, you know, if the President of the United States is not involved, nothing happens ? as the history of peace making shows. Will you be proposing ideas, pitching proposals, parameters, as one of your predecessors did? Or just urging the parties to come up with their own resolutions, as your immediate predecessor did? THE PRESIDENT: Well, I think the most important thing is for the United States to get engaged right away. And George Mitchell is somebody of enormous stature. He is one of the few people who have international experience brokering peace deals. And so what I told him is start by listening, because all too often the United States starts by dictating -- in the past on some of these issues --and we don't always know all the factors that are involved. So let's listen. He's going to be speaking to all the major parties involved. And he will then report back to me. From there we will formulate a specific response. Ultimately, we cannot tell either the Israelis or the Palestinians what's best for them. They're going to have to make some decisions. But I do believe that the moment is ripe for both sides to realize that the path that they are on is one that is not going to result in prosperity and security for their people. And that instead, it's time to return to the negotiating table. And it's going to be difficult, it's going to take time. I don't want to prejudge many of these issues, and I want to make sure that expectations are not raised so that we think that this is going to be resolved in a few months. But if we start the steady progress on these issues, I'm absolutely confident that the United States -- working in tandem with the European Union, with Russia, with all the Arab states in the region -- I'm absolutely certain that we can make significant progress. Q: You've been saying essentially that we should not look at these issues -- like the Palestinian-Israeli track and separation from the border region -- you've been talking about a kind of holistic approach to the region. Are we expecting a different paradigm in the sense that in the past one of the critiques -- at least from the Arab side, the Muslim side -- is that everything the Americans always tested with the Israelis, if it works. Now there is an Arab peace plan, there is a regional aspect to it. And you've indicated that. Would there be any shift, a paradigm shift? THE PRESIDENT: Well, here's what I think is important. Look at the proposal that was put forth by King Abdullah of Saudi Arabia -- Q: Right. " I might not agree with every aspect of the proposal, but it took great courage " President Obama on the Saudi peace plan THE PRESIDENT: I might not agree with every aspect of the proposal, but it took great courage -- Q: Absolutely. THE PRESIDENT: -- to put forward something that is as significant as that. I think that there are ideas across the region of how we might pursue peace. I do think that it is impossible for us to think only in terms of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and not think in terms of what's happening with Syria or Iran or Lebanon or Afghanistan and Pakistan. These things are interrelated. And what I've said, and I think Hillary Clinton has expressed this in her confirmation, is that if we are looking at the region as a whole and communicating a message to the Arab world and the Muslim world, that we are ready to initiate a new partnership based on mutual respect and mutual interest, then I think that we can make significant progress. " Now Israel is a strong ally of the United States. They will not stop being a strong ally of the United States " Now, Israel is a strong ally of the United States. They will not stop being a strong ally of the United States. And I will continue to believe that Israel's security is paramount. But I also believe that there are Israelis who recognize that it is important to achieve peace. They will be willing to make sacrifices if the time is appropriate and if there is serious partnership on the other side. And so what we want to do is to listen, set aside some of the preconceptions that have existed and have built up over the last several years. And I think if we do that, then there's a possibility at least of achieving some breakthroughs. Q: I want to ask you about the broader Muslim world, but let me ? one final thing about the Palestinian-Israeli theater. There are many Palestinians and Israelis who are very frustrated now with the current conditions and they are losing hope, they are disillusioned, and they believe that time is running out on the two-state solution because ? mainly because of the settlement activities in Palestinian-occupied territories. Will it still be possible to see a Palestinian state -- and you know the contours of it -- within the first Obama administration? " I think it is possible for us to see a Palestinian state " THE PRESIDENT: I think it is possible for us to see a Palestinian state -- I'm not going to put a time frame on it -- that is contiguous, that allows freedom of movement for its people, that allows for trade with other countries, that allows the creation of businesses and commerce so that people have a better life. And, look, I think anybody who has studied the region recognizes that the situation for the ordinary Palestinian in many cases has not improved. And the bottom line in all these talks and all these conversations is, is a child in the Palestinian Territories going to be better off? Do they have a future for themselves? And is the child in Israel going to feel confident about his or her safety and security? And if we can keep our focus on making their lives better and look forward, and not simply think about all the conflicts and tragedies of the past, then I think that we have an opportunity to make real progress. [] Obama praised Saudi King Abdullah for his Middle East peace plan [] But it is not going to be easy, and that's why we've got George Mitchell going there. This is somebody with extraordinary patience as well as extraordinary skill, and that's what's going to be necessary. Q: Absolutely. Let me take a broader look at the whole region. You are planning to address the Muslim world in your first 100 days from a Muslim capital. And everybody is speculating about the capital. (Laughter) If you have anything further, that would be great. How concerned are you -- because, let me tell you, honestly, when I see certain things about America -- in some parts, I don't want to exaggerate -- there is a demonization of America. THE PRESIDENT: Absolutely. Q: It's become like a new religion, and like a new religion it has new converts -- like a new religion has its own high priests. THE PRESIDENT: Right. Q: It's only a religious text. THE PRESIDENT: Right. Q: And in the last -- since 9/11 and because of Iraq, that alienation is wider between the Americans and -- and in generations past, the United States was held high. It was the only Western power with no colonial legacy. THE PRESIDENT: Right. Q: How concerned are you and -- because people sense that you have a different political discourse. And I think, judging by (inaudible) and Zawahiri and Osama bin Laden and all these, you know -- a chorus -- THE PRESIDENT: Yes, I noticed this. They seem nervous. Q: They seem very nervous, exactly. Now, tell me why they should be more nervous? " Now, my job is to communicate the fact that the United States has a stake in the well-being of the Muslim world that the language we use has to be a language of respect " THE PRESIDENT: Well, I think that when you look at the rhetoric that they've been using against me before I even took office -- Q: I know, I know. THE PRESIDENT: -- what that tells me is that their ideas are bankrupt. There's no actions that they've taken that say a child in the Muslim world is getting a better education because of them, or has better health care because of them. In my inauguration speech, I spoke about: You will be judged on what you've built, not what you've destroyed. And what they've been doing is destroying things. And over time, I think the Muslim world has recognized that that path is leading no place, except more death and destruction. Now, my job is to communicate the fact that the United States has a stake in the well-being of the Muslim world that the language we use has to be a language of respect. I have Muslim members of my family. I have lived in Muslim countries. Q: The largest one. THE PRESIDENT: The largest one, Indonesia. And so what I want to communicate is the fact that in all my travels throughout the Muslim world, what I've come to understand is that regardless of your faith -- and America is a country of Muslims, Jews, Christians, non-believers -- regardless of your faith, people all have certain common hopes and common dreams. " Sending George Mitchell to the Middle East is fulfilling my campaign promise that we're not going to wait until the end of my administration to deal with Palestinian and Israeli peace, we're going to start now " And my job is to communicate to the American people that the Muslim world is filled with extraordinary people who simply want to live their lives and see their children live better lives. My job to the Muslim world is to communicate that the Americans are not your enemy. We sometimes make mistakes. We have not been perfect. But if you look at the track record, as you say, America was not born as a colonial power, and that the same respect and partnership that America had with the Muslim world as recently as 20 or 30 years ago, there's no reason why we can't restore that. Andthat I think is going to be an important task. But ultimately, people are going to judge me not by my words but by my actions and my administration's actions. And I think that what you will see over the next several years is that I'm not going to agree with everything that some Muslim leader may say, or what's on a television station in the Arab world -- but I think that what you'll see is somebody who is listening, who is respectful, and who is trying to promote the interests not just of the United States, but also ordinary people who right now are suffering from poverty and a lack of opportunity. I want to make sure that I'm speaking to them, as well. Q: Tell me, time is running out, any decision on from where you will be visiting the Muslim world? THE PRESIDENT: Well, I'm not going to break the news right here. Q: Afghanistan? THE PRESIDENT: But maybe next time. But it is something that is going to be important. I want people to recognize, though, that we are going to be making a series of initiatives. Sending George Mitchell to the Middle East is fulfilling my campaign promise that we're not going to wait until the end of my administration to deal with Palestinian and Israeli peace, we're going to start now. It may take a long time to do, but we're going to do it now. " We cannot paint with a broad brush a faith as a consequence of the violence that is done in that faith's name " We're going to follow through on our commitment for me to address the Muslim world from a Muslim capital. We are going to follow through on many of my commitments to do a more effective job of reaching out, listening, as well as speaking to the Muslim world. And you're going to see me following through with dealing with a drawdown of troops in Iraq, so that Iraqis can start taking more responsibility. And finally, I think you've already seen a commitment, in terms of closing Guantanamo, and making clear that even as we are decisive in going after terrorist organizations that would kill innocent civilians, that we're going to do so on our terms, and we're going to do so respecting the rule of law that I think makes America great. Q: President Bush framed the war on terror conceptually in a way that was very broad, "war on terror," and used sometimes certain terminology that the many people -- Islamic fascism. You've always framed it in a different way, specifically against one group called al Qaeda and their collaborators. And is this one way of -- THE PRESIDENT: I think that you're making a very important point. And that is that the language we use matters. And what we need to understand is, is that there are extremist organizations -- whether Muslim or any other faith in the past -- that will use faith as a justification for violence. We cannot paint with a broad brush a faith as a consequence of the violence that is done in that faith's name. And so you will I think see our administration be very clear in distinguishing between organizations like al Qaeda -- that espouse violence, espouse terror and act on it -- and people who may disagree with my administration and certain actions, or may have a particular viewpoint in terms of how their countries should develop. We can have legitimate disagreements but still be respectful. I cannot respect terrorist organizations that would kill innocent civilians and we will hunt them down. But to the broader Muslim world what we are going to be offering is a hand of friendship. " But I do think that it is important for us to be willing to talk to Iran, to express very clearly where our differences are, but where there are potential avenues for progress " Q: Can I end with a question on Iran and Iraq then quickly? THE PRESIDENT: It's up to the team -- MR. GIBBS: You have 30 seconds. (Laughter) Q: Will the United States ever live with a nuclear Iran? And if not, how far are you going in the direction of preventing it? THE PRESIDENT: You know, I said during the campaign that it is very important for us to make sure that we are using all the tools of U.S. power, including diplomacy, in our relationship with Iran. Now, the Iranian people are a great people, and Persian civilization is a great civilization. Iran has acted in ways that's not conducive to peace and prosperity in the region: their threats against Israel; their pursuit of a nuclear weapon which could potentially set off an arms race in the region that would make everybody less safe; their support of terrorist organizations in the past -- none of these things have been helpful. But I do think that it is important for us to be willing to talk to Iran, to express very clearly where our differences are, but where there are potential avenues for progress. And we will over the next several months be laying out our general framework and approach. And as I said during my inauguration speech, if countries like Iran are willing to unclench their fist, they will find an extended hand from us. Q: Shall we leave Iraq next interview, or just -- MR. GIBBS: Yes, let's -- we're past, and I got to get him back to dinner with his wife. Q: Sir, I really appreciate it. THE PRESIDENT: Thank you so much. Q: Thanks a lot. THE PRESIDENT: I appreciate it. Q: Thank you. THE PRESIDENT: Thank you -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image00183.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 4534 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090128/34d43538/image00183.jpg -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image00241.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 435 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090128/34d43538/image00241.jpg -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image00312.gif Type: image/gif Size: 213 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090128/34d43538/image00312.gif -------------- next part -------------- A non-text attachment was scrubbed... Name: image00422.jpg Type: image/jpeg Size: 4767 bytes Desc: not available Url : http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090128/34d43538/image00422.jpg From duanebehrens at cox.net Thu Jan 29 13:57:32 2009 From: duanebehrens at cox.net (Duane Behrens) Date: Thu Jan 29 13:57:46 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] World Clock Message-ID: <20090129145732.AYDIR.459780.imail@fed1rmwml29> Real-time, updated statistics you'd rather not know . . . http://www.poodwaddle.com/worldclock.swf -- http://perzuki.smugmug.com/ From jfos at vic.australis.com.au Wed Jan 28 22:14:14 2009 From: jfos at vic.australis.com.au (john foster) Date: Fri Jan 30 01:24:21 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Fw: [S] FW: Two pertinent quotes about the mess we're in thanks toCheney/Bush/Wall Street/BigPentagon/BigPharma/BigCorporation/etc Message-ID: <023201c982ab$bc470800$0100007f@jfos> To: 911Truth Australia Sent: Wednesday, January 28, 2009 12:52 PM Subject: [S] FW: Two pertinent quotes about the mess we're in thanks toCheney/Bush/Wall Street/BigPentagon/BigPharma/BigCorporation/etc ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Information Clearing House Newsletter News You Won't Find On CNN January 26, 2009 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ "A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious. But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that it can no longer resist. A murder is less to fear: Cicero Marcus Tullius - Born on January 3, 106 BC and was murdered on December 7, 43 BC. http://www.iep.utm.edu/c/cicero.htm "There will be, in the next generation or so, a pharmacological method of making people love their servitude, and producing dictatorship without tears, so to speak, producing a kind of painless concentration camp for entire societies, so that people will in fact have their liberties taken away from them, but will rather enjoy it, because they will be distracted from any desire to rebel by propaganda or brainwashing, or brainwashing enhanced by pharmacological methods. And this seems to be the final revolution." - Aldous Huxley, Tavistock Group, California Medical School, 1961 -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090129/33b3f20d/attachment.html From thinker at thelakebc.ca Sat Jan 31 10:15:50 2009 From: thinker at thelakebc.ca (Ed Deak) Date: Sat Jan 31 10:11:42 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Insight on how decisions are made. Message-ID: <200901311611.n0VGBM47028580@karma.reboot.ca> We have to remember that these people are talking about and deciding over the lives of literally billions of human beings. No wonder the world is going to hell. Cheers, Ed. =========================================================================================== Farewell to All That: An Oral History of the Bush White House .......The contrast with having briefed his father and Clinton and Gore was so marked. And to be told, frankly, early in the administration, by Condi Rice and [her deputy] Steve Hadley, you know, Don?t give the president a lot of long memos, he?s not a big reader?well, shit. I mean, the president of the United States is not a big reader? .......That night, on 9/11, Rumsfeld came over and the others, and the president finally got back, and we had a meeting. And Rumsfeld said, You know, we?ve got to do Iraq, and everyone looked at him?at least I looked at him and Powell looked at him?like, What the hell are you talking about? And he said?I?ll never forget this?There just aren?t enough targets in Afghanistan. ......September 15, 2002 In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, the assistant to the president for economic policy, Lawrence Lindsey, estimates the cost of a war with Iraq to be in the neighborhood of $100 billion to $200 billion. Mitch Daniels, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, quickly revises the figure downward to $50 billion to $60 billion, and Defense Secretary Rumsfeld calls Lindsey?s estimate ?baloney.? Lindsey is fired in December. Treasury Secretary Paul O?Neill is dismissed the same day. Years later, an analysis by Nobel-laureate economist Joseph E. Stiglitz and Harvard professor Linda J. Bilmes will estimate the cost of the Iraq war to be $3 trillion. ......February 25, 2003 General Eric Shinseki, the army chief of staff, tells a congressional hearing that ?something on the order of several hundred thousand soldiers? will be required to mount a successful occupation of Iraq. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz publicly rebukes Shinseki, stating that the general?s estimate is ?wildly off the mark.? Shinseki is forced to retire early. ......I?ll never forget the discussion?we?re sitting around the table, and someone says, I know what we should do. We should tackle chronic homelessness. I hear there are like 15,000 homeless people in America. What can you say to that? ......I think a lot of the problem the president had is: people around him were doing what he said, and nobody was doing the analytical questioning of the things we were doing where you could do all the puts and takes and say, O.K., Mr. President, here?s all the pros to do this and here?s all the cons to do this, and here?s the likely outcome. Now, let?s make a decision. I don?t think that ever happened. I never saw anything like that. .....He has a tremendous sense of calm and certitude about the positions he takes, and is unusually doubt-free about them. Most people, when they make monumental decisions, understand that they?re doing it under conditions of great uncertainty, and are not fully at the time really able to understand what the consequences might be?and that frightens them, or at least they have concern, disquietude about it. This president has none of that, as far as I can tell. ........June 7, 2005 Documents emerge indicating that the decision to withdraw from the Kyoto Protocol on climate change, in 2001, was influenced by the Global Climate Coalition, an industry group with ties to Exxon. One State Department letter to the coalition states: ?Potus [president of the United States] rejected Kyoto in part based on input from you.? Several days later, Philip Cooney, a former American Petroleum Institute lobbyist and the chief of staff of the president?s Council on Environmental Quality, resigns after it is revealed that he had edited government reports to downplay the threat of climate change. Cooney takes a job at Exxon. ........I was invited to a conference in Saudi Arabia on Iraq, and a Saudi said to me, Look, Mr. Fischer, when President Bush wants to visit Baghdad, it?s a state secret, and he has to enter the country in the middle of the night and through the back door. When President Ahmadinejad wants to visit Baghdad, it?s announced two weeks beforehand or three weeks. He arrives in the brightest sunshine and travels in an open car through a cheering crowd to downtown Baghdad. Now, tell me, Mr. Fischer, who is running the country? ......And in fairness, rather than blame subordinates, you had a president who basically took until late 2006 to understand how much trouble he was in in Iraq and seems to have taken till late 2008 to understand how much trouble he was in in Afghanistan. .......August 8, 2008 Russia invades the Republic of Georgia. Bush says in a Rose Garden appearance that the United States ?stands with? Georgia. Bush makes his comments during a brief stop in Washington between a trip to Beijing for the Olympics and a vacation at his ranch in Crawford. Since taking office Bush has spent more than 450 days at the Crawford ranch and more than 450 days at Camp David. During the last six months of his presidency, Bush is largely absent from public view, even as the economic crisis continues to build. http://www.vanityfair.com/politics/features/2009/02/bush-oral-history200902?currentPage=1 ============================================================= Go Back Print this page Skip to content Preview the current issue of Vanity Fair Print E-Mail RSS Share Yahoo! Buzz The Presidency George W. Bush and his inner circle, photographed in the Cabinet Room of the White House in December 2001. From left: Secretary of State Colin Powell, Vice President Dick Cheney, the president, National-Security Adviser Condoleezza Rice, White House chief of staff Andrew Card, C.I.A. director George Tenet (seated), and Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld. Photograph by Annie Leibovitz. Farewell to All That: An Oral History of the Bush White House The threat of 9/11 ignored. The threat of Iraq hyped and manipulated. Guant?namo and Abu Ghraib. Hurricane Katrina. The shredding of civil liberties. The rise of Iran. Global warming. Economic disaster. How did one two-term presidency go so wrong? A sweeping draft of history?distilled from scores of interviews?offers fresh insight into the roles of George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, and other key players. by Cullen Murphy and Todd S. Purdum February 2009 With assistance from Philippe Sands. January 20, 2001 After a disputed election and bitter recount battle in Florida whose outcome is effectively decided by the Supreme Court, George W. Bush is sworn in as the 43rd president of the United States. In foreign affairs he promises an approach that will depart from the perceived adventurism of his predecessor, Bill Clinton, in places such as Kosovo and Somalia. (?I think the United States must be humble,? Bush said in a debate with his opponent, Al Gore.) In domestic affairs Bush pledges to cut taxes and improve education. He promises to govern as a ?compassionate conservative? and to be ?a uniter, not a divider.? He comes into office with a $237 billion budget surplus. On the day of the inauguration the White House chief of staff, Andrew Card, declares a moratorium on the Clinton administration?s last-minute regulations on the environment, food safety, and health. This action is followed in the coming months by disengagement from the International Criminal Court and other international efforts. Nonetheless, the early presumption is that the administration?s affairs are in steady hands, though some disquieting signs are noted. In the Oval Office on January 20 the first President Bush and the new President Bush greet each other with the words ?Mr. President.? Revisit the first draft of history with our Bush-administration archive, ?Mission Unaccomplished.? Illustration by Risko. Dan Bartlett, White House communications director and later counselor to the president: It was a bitterly cold day. They got back to the residence from the inauguration. The president was going over to have his first moment in the Oval Office as president of the United States. And he called for his father because he wanted his father to be there when it happened. If I recall correctly, George H. W. Bush was soaking in the tub trying to warm up, because it had been so cold on the viewing stand. Not only did the former president quickly get out of the tub, but he put his suit back on, because he was not going to enter the Oval Office without a suit. His hair was still kind of wet. Joschka Fischer, German foreign minister and vice-chancellor: We thought we were going back to the old days of Bush 41. And ironically enough Rumsfeld, but even more Cheney, together with Powell, were seen as indications that the young president, who was not used to the outside world, who didn?t travel very much, who didn?t seem to be very experienced, would be embedded into these Bush 41 guys. Their foreign-policy skills were extremely good and strongly admired. So we were not very concerned. Of course, there was this strange thing with these ?neocons,? but every party has its fringes. It was not very alarming. Lawrence Wilkerson, top aide and later chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell: We had this confluence of characters?and I use that term very carefully?that included people like Powell, Dick Cheney, Condi Rice, and so forth, which allowed one perception to be ?the dream team.? It allowed everybody to believe that this Sarah Palin?like president?because, let?s face it, that?s what he was?was going to be protected by this national-security elite, tested in the cauldrons of fire. What in effect happened was that a very astute, probably the most astute, bureaucratic entrepreneur I?ve ever run into in my life became the vice president of the United States. He became vice president well before George Bush picked him. And he began to manipulate things from that point on, knowing that he was going to be able to convince this guy to pick him, knowing that he was then going to be able to wade into the vacuums that existed around George Bush?personality vacuum, character vacuum, details vacuum, experience vacuum. Richard Clarke, chief White House counterterrorism adviser: We had a couple of meetings with the president, and there were detailed discussions and briefings on cyber-security and often terrorism, and on a classified program. With the cyber-security meeting, he seemed?I was disturbed because he seemed to be trying to impress us, the people who were briefing him. It was as though he wanted these experts, these White House staff guys who had been around for a long time before he got there?didn?t want them buying the rumor that he wasn?t too bright. He was trying?sort of overly trying?to show that he could ask good questions, and kind of yukking it up with Cheney. The contrast with having briefed his father and Clinton and Gore was so marked. And to be told, frankly, early in the administration, by Condi Rice and [her deputy] Steve Hadley, you know, Don?t give the president a lot of long memos, he?s not a big reader?well, shit. I mean, the president of the United States is not a big reader? March 6, 2001 Secretary of State Colin Powell tells reporters that the United States intends to ?engage with North Korea to pick up where President Clinton and his administration left off.? The next day, Powell is forced by the administration to backpedal. Other early administration actions?abrogation of the Anti-Ballistic-Missile Treaty, abandonment of the Kyoto Protocol on climate change?signal that America?s way of doing business has changed. In time, Defense Secretary Rumsfeld will characterize traditional U.S. allies as ?old Europe.? Joschka Fischer, German foreign minister and vice-chancellor: During the Kosovo war we had developed a format which was, I think, one of the cheapest models for policy coordinating in the interests of the U.S. [Secretary of State] Madeleine Albright was in the driver?s seat, and the four European foreign ministers discussed with her on a daily basis how the war develops and so on. This was U.K., France, Italy, and Germany, together with the U.S., on the phone. We continued after the war, not every day, but this was the format, to discuss problems and understand the positions. And suddenly it stopped. We had very, very few?I don?t know, two or three times. Only for a very short period when Colin came in, and then it stopped, because the new administration was not interested any longer in a multilateral coordination. Bill Graham, Canada?s foreign minister and later defense minister: My experience with Mr. Rumsfeld was: obviously an extremely intelligent person, with a lot of experience. But compared to Colin he was cold in terms of his personal relationships. He could have a sense of humor. I remember being at the famous Munich Security Conference that takes place every year. And I think Sergei Ivanov, who was the Russian defense minister at the time, went after him about some issue, and how the Americans had altered their position. And Rumsfeld?s answer was ?Well, that was the old Rumsfeld, and I am now the new Rumsfeld.? And of course it brought a great laugh. But he was terribly determined to have his way; there was no question about that. One of his shticks?if I can call it that?at the nato meetings was always about caveats. He would pronounce the word ?caveat? the way you and I might speak of some sort of sexual deviation. You know, people who had ?caveats? were really evil, bad people. Some caveats are not about an unwillingness to fight; some are about fundamental constraints on what you can do as a country. But Mr. Rumsfeld was not about listening and being cooperative. Mr. Rumsfeld was about getting the way of the United States, and don?t get in my way or my juggernaut will run over you. May 16, 2001 A task force assembled and led by Vice President Dick Cheney unveils a blueprint for the administration?s energy program. The report, ?National Energy Policy,? which had been in the works since shortly after the inauguration, calls for increased drilling for oil and more nuclear power. The energy task force becomes an immediate focus of controversy?and lawsuits?because its records and the list of advisers, mainly representatives of the oil and gas industries, are never divulged by the White House. The administration?s environmental policy is heavily politicized from the outset. Rick Piltz, senior associate, U.S. Climate Change Science Program: Christine Todd Whitman, the E.P.A. administrator, was one of several people in the Cabinet, along with Treasury Secretary Paul O?Neill, who strongly supported a proactive position on climate change. And she was, I think, in Europe telling European governments that the U.S. position was to regulate carbon dioxide. And when she got back home, she had an interaction with the president in which she was very brusquely told that that was off the table. The turning point, essentially, was that Cheney grabbed hold of this issue and took down the whole notion of regulating CO2. George W. Bush: ?He always gets asked, Have you changed?,? says Dan Bartlett, a former counselor to President Bush, ?and he instinctively recoils at that kind of question.? Photograph by Annie Leibovitz. May 24, 2001 Vermont senator Jim Jeffords, a Republican, changes party, and control of the Senate shifts to the Democrats, making Tom Daschle the Senate majority leader and testing the administration?s public face of bipartisanship. David Kuo, deputy director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives: I went to a communications meeting the day after Jeffords switched. I remember feeling like I was looking at people who had won a reality-game ticket to head up the White House. There was this remarkable combination of hubris, excitement, and staggering ignorance. Someone made the suggestion that perhaps the president should call the new majority leader. And it?s like, Well, I?m not sure that?s really necessary. Margaret Tutwiler [assistant to the president and special adviser for communications] was there, and I remember her sitting at the head of the table, her eyes just sort of wide, and she sort of lost it. She?s like, Are you fricking kidding me? She goes, The president of the United States calls the new majority leader. The president of the United States calls the new minority leader, right? The president does these things because, you know, these things have to be done. And, you know, people around the table?Karl [Rove], Karen [Hughes]?all these people were like, Oh, well, do we have to? It was like an absolutely serious debate. Noelia Rodriguez, press secretary to Laura Bush: In the first weeks after he took office, I was in those daily communications meetings, and the conversation I remember one morning turned to, you know, Tom Daschle was going to be coming to the White House?should we allow him to come in the door of the West Wing entrance, while the camera?s on, or should he come in on the side, so that cameras won?t see him? And I?m thinking, You know, the president should go out there and greet him just like he would if he was coming to his own house?which, by the way, it is. But they ended up having him come in on the side. Mark McKinnon, chief campaign media adviser to George W. Bush: My view is that civility was a heartfelt, well-intended objective that went right off the rails the day of the recount. The recount poisoned the well from the beginning. A good number of people in this country didn?t believe Bush was a legitimate president. And you can?t change the tone under those circumstances. There was a genuine effort, and I think there was some early success with Ted Kennedy and the education stuff. But it was acrimonious from the beginning. Matthew Dowd, Bush?s pollster and chief strategist for the 2004 presidential campaign: There is a toxic nature to Washington that thrives on food fights and thrives on controversy and thrives on people not getting along. But I don?t think that?s the biggest part of the problem. It?s like the old argument of: somebody?s thrown in jail, and then they blame it on their environment. You?ve got to bear some accountability, even in a bad environment, for having a strength of will and a capacity to bring diverse opinion and not be bubbled in. We too easily say, Blame it on the Washington culture. Well, Washington is made up of people. It?s not like there?s this, like?you know, it?s not like some Star Trek episode where some room made me do it. Ari Fleischer, Bush?s first White House press secretary: After the recount, the disputed election, a lot of people said you needed to start to trim your sails: What are you going to cut back on as a way to show outreach to the other party? The president rejected that line of thinking, making the case that mandates are created by presidents with ideas, and he was going to follow through on the ideas that he ran on. May 26, 2001 With big bipartisan majorities, Congress passes Bush?s $1.35 trillion package of tax cuts, the centerpiece of the administration?s economic program. The tax cuts are skewed heavily toward the affluent. Those making $1 million a year receive an average tax cut of $53,000. Those making $20,000 a year receive an average tax cut of $375. A second round of tax cuts will be enacted in 2003. By 2004 the budget deficit will exceed $400 billion. David Kuo, deputy director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives: When Bush announced his ?compassionate conservatism? [during the 2000 campaign], Elizabeth Dole?s communications director mocked him. He goes, Oh, that?s a great thing if you want to be president of the Red Cross, right? And that man was Ari Fleischer. Those are the people that ended up populating the White House. When the president?s tax package first came through Congress and first came through the Senate Finance Committee, his promise to have a tax cut for charitable giving for people who don?t itemize their tax deductions wasn?t even in the plan. [Senator] Charles Grassley looked at this and went, Oh, gosh, there must have been some oversight. And he was the one who inserted it into the tax plan. And the White House is the one that pulled it out. June 16, 2001 During a five-day foreign tour Bush meets with President Vladimir Putin, of Russia. After the meeting, in Slovenia, Bush declares, ?I looked the man in the eye. I found him to be very straightforward and trustworthy. I was able to get a sense of his soul.? By all accounts, including his own, Bush puts great stock in the primacy of personal relationships. Noelia Rodriguez: I wish that more people could have seen the president the way I experienced him. Even if you don?t agree with him or respect his opinions or his decisions?strip that away, if you?re able to?he is a caring human being. I brought my mom to the White House, to get a tour the day before Thanksgiving. The president came in and greeted her?it was a total surprise. And on the spot he invited us to go to Camp David for Thanksgiving. Of course, we went, and it was Disneyland for adults. We went to chapel services before dinner. I remember we got there early. A few minutes later the president walks in with Mrs. Bush and the family, and you could see him looking around, and he sees my mom in the distance, and he literally shouts at her from across the chapel, ?Grace, come sit over here with me.? And at dinner, again, he sees her, and he says, ?Grace, you?re going to sit over here next to me.? And he tilted the chair against the table so that nobody would take her place. Ed Gillespie, campaign strategist and later counselor to the president: Picking up the phone, calling people who are visiting an ailing father in the hospital, personal notes to people whose child just had surgery. Things big and small. It?s hard to describe it all, but they are the kinds of things that do inspire great loyalty?and that?s not why he does it, by the way. August 6, 2001 While vacationing at his ranch, in Crawford, Texas, Bush is given a Presidential Daily Briefing memorandum whose headline warns that the al-Qaeda terrorist leader, Osama bin Laden, is ?determined to strike in U.S.? After being briefed on the document by a C.I.A. analyst, Bush responds, ?All right, you?ve covered your ass now.? Richard Clarke, chief White House counterterrorism adviser: We went into a period in June where the tempo of intelligence about an impending large-scale attack went up a lot, to the kind of cycle that we?d only seen once or twice before. And we told Condi that. She didn?t do anything. She said, Well, make sure you?re coordinating with the agencies, which, of course, I was doing. By August, I was saying to Condi and to the agencies that the intelligence isn?t coming in at such a rapid rate anymore as it was in the June-July time frame. But that doesn?t mean the attack isn?t going to happen. It just means that they may be in place. On September 4, we had a principals meeting. The most telling thing for me about the attitude of these people was on the decision that had been pending for a long time to resume Predator [remote-controlled drone] flights over Afghanistan, and to now do what we couldn?t have done in the Clinton administration because the technology wasn?t ready: put a weapon on the Predator and use it as not only a hunter but a killer. We had seen bin Laden when we had it in the Clinton administration, as just a hunter. We had seen him. So we thought, Man, if we could get this with a hunter-killer, we could see him again and kill him. So finally we have a principals meeting and the C.I.A. says it?s not our job to fly the Predator armed. And D.O.D. says it?s not our job to fly an unarmed aircraft. Dick Cheney: ?We thought we were going back to the old days of Bush 41,? says Joschka Fischer, the former German foreign minister. ?So we were not very concerned.? Photograph by Annie Leibovitz. I just couldn?t believe it. This is the chairman of the Joint Chiefs and the director of C.I.A. sitting there, both passing the football because neither one of them wanted to go kill bin Laden. August 9, 2001 Bush issues a directive that permits federal funding for research on stem cells from human embryos?but only on the 60 stem-cell lines already in existence. That evening, he gives the first nationally televised speech of his presidency, explaining his decision. Five years later, Bush will use his veto power for the first time to kill legislation that would permit broader federal funding for stem-cell research. In the late summer of 2001, stem-cell research is the most contentious political question facing the nation. Matthew Dowd, Bush?s pollster and chief strategist for the 2004 presidential campaign: I had done a poll that finished the morning of 9/11. I was going to go to Washington that day to present the findings to Karl [Rove]. The amazing thing about that is: not a single question was asked about foreign policy, terrorism, national security. In the poll I?d been sitting on, Bush?s approval I think was 51 or 52 percent. Twenty-four hours later his approvals are 90 percent. September 11, 2001 Terrorists crash two commercial airliners into New York?s World Trade Center, bringing both buildings down with a loss of some 3,000 lives. A third aircraft crashes into the Pentagon, killing 184. A fourth aircraft, its likely destination the U.S. Capitol, is brought down by the passengers in a field in Pennsylvania. It is known quickly that the perpetrators are members of bin Laden?s al-Qaeda organization, based in Afghanistan, but the search for a connection to Saddam Hussein and Iraq begins immediately. Sandra Kay Daniels, second-grade teacher at Emma E. Booker Elementary School, in Sarasota, Florida, whose classroom the president was visiting when he received news of the attacks: When he came into the classroom, our principal introduced him to the children, and he shook a couple of the kids? hands and introduced himself, tried to kind of lighten the room up a little, because the kids were in awe. They were like little soldiers, quiet and just struck by the sight of the president. And he said, Let?s get started with reading. I?m here to celebrate you?maybe not those exact words, but that was the feeling in the room. The story was ?My Pet Goat? from our reading series. And we started our lesson. And all I remember is someone walking over to him, and I knew that was totally out of character, because this was a live broadcast and nobody was supposed to move. I mean, everybody was in their position. And when I saw this man, who I now know is Andy Card, walk over to him and whisper in his ear, I could see and I felt his whole demeanor change. It?s like he left the room mentally. He wasn?t there anymore mentally. When it was time for the kids to read with him, he didn?t pick his book up. His book was sitting on the easel, and he didn?t pick it up. I knew something was wrong, but I didn?t know what was wrong. And I?m thinking all the time, O.K., President Bush, pick up your book, that type of thing, you know. The cameras are rolling. My kids are here. And he left us mentally. I knew I had to continue with the lesson, and I did. I?m a teacher. I?ve got eyes all around the room. I?ve got eyes in the back of my head. I see everything that goes on. And I?m thinking, O.K., he?ll join us in a minute. And he did. Mary Matalin, assistant to the president and counselor to the vice president: My enduring memory is how calm people at the White House were, and focused on getting their job done. Right from the get-go, people were mature. That?s not the right word, but there wasn?t hand-wringing and hair on fire and Keystone Cops or anything like that. It was how you hope that any government would function. ?Professional? doesn?t even scratch the surface. They were all so fully functioning and integrated in everything that they did. Everybody was confident in the other guy?s ability. Richard Clarke: That night, on 9/11, Rumsfeld came over and the others, and the president finally got back, and we had a meeting. And Rumsfeld said, You know, we?ve got to do Iraq, and everyone looked at him?at least I looked at him and Powell looked at him?like, What the hell are you talking about? And he said?I?ll never forget this?There just aren?t enough targets in Afghanistan. We need to bomb something else to prove that we?re, you know, big and strong and not going to be pushed around by these kind of attacks. And I made the point certainly that night, and I think Powell acknowledged it, that Iraq had nothing to do with 9/11. That didn?t seem to faze Rumsfeld in the least. It shouldn?t have come as a surprise. It really didn?t, because from the first weeks of the administration they were talking about Iraq. I just found it a little disgusting that they were talking about it while the bodies were still burning in the Pentagon and at the World Trade Center. Dan Bartlett, White House communications director and later counselor to the president: The real change in the president, in my opinion, didn?t actually happen until that Friday, when he traveled to New York. The situation on Tuesday was so?you really didn?t have time to reflect. In New York, the range of emotions that he went through?standing on the rubble, the bullhorn moment, but just as important, when he sat there in that room in private and met with those people who were still trying to learn the whereabouts of their loved ones, and hugging them, and where he got the badge. He always gets asked, Have you changed?, and he instinctively recoils at that kind of question. But when something like this happens on your watch, there?s no way it can?t change you. It can?t not change your worldview?and it obviously changed his in a way that has been controversial for a lot of people. September 18, 2001 Envelopes containing anthrax spores are mailed to media outlets in New York and Florida. This first attack is followed by a second, aimed at government offices in Washington. All together 5 people die and 22 are infected. The administration?s initial reaction, which turns out to be wrong, is to suggest that al-Qaeda is responsible. (It knows ?how to deploy and use these kind of substances, so you start to piece it all together,? Cheney explains.) Michael Brown, director of the Federal Emergency Management Agency: Very shortly after 9/11 I was leading a briefing in the Roosevelt room about smallpox. The president was there, the vice president. Condi was there. The president didn?t ask a lot of questions. Don?t get me wrong?he did ask some questions. But the majority of the questions came from either Condi or the vice president. As the president was leaving the room, he turned to everybody and said, God help us all. We should all say very strong prayers tonight for guidance. It really stuck in my head. You?re the president of the United States basically saying, I?m going to pray tonight, and I hope all of you pray, too, because this is much bigger than all of us. September 27, 2001 At O?Hare International Airport, Bush advises Americans on what they can do to respond to the trauma of September 11: ?Get on board. Do your business around the country. Fly and enjoy America?s great destination spots. Get down to Disney World in Florida. Take your families and enjoy life, the way we want it to be enjoyed.? Matthew Dowd: He was given a great, great window of opportunity where everybody wanted to be called to some shared sense of purpose and sacrifice and all that, and Bush never did it. And not for lack of people suggesting various things from bonds to, you know, some sort of national service. Bush decided to say that the best thing is: Everybody go about their life, and I?ll handle it. There?s this West Texas thing in him, which is the?you know: Bad people are comin? to town. Everybody go back to their house. I?ll take the burden on. Which, you know, may work in a Western town, but doesn?t work for a country that wants to be part of that conversation. Mary Matalin: There was so much to do that was more important than?I mean, looking back, the national-unity thing is important, but it was way more important to re-structure the intelligence communities, way more important to harden targets. Know what I mean? It was all hands on deck. We were working on other shit. Everyone?s pulverized and beat, and there?s 24 hours in a day, so woulda, coulda, shoulda, but, you know, there was no office to do ?feel-good? stuff. Matthew Dowd: Karl wasn?t receptive to ideas that would?ve called the country to certain things and brought them to a common purpose and a sense of shared sacrifice. Karl came from a perspective of: you defeat people in politics by calling one side bad and one side good. Scott McClellan, deputy White House press secretary and later press secretary: I remember Karl Rove was out there talking at some events about how we?d use 9/11, run on 9/11 in the midterms, and that it was important to do so. October 7, 2001 American and British forces begin an aerial campaign against Taliban-controlled Afghanistan, where al-Qaeda has its base, followed weeks later by a ground invasion. The Taliban government falls and al-Qaeda is routed from some of its strongholds. One person captured is John Walker Lindh, the so-called American Taliban. His handling proves to be a harbinger. The Defense Department?s general counsel, Jim Haynes, authorizes military intelligence to ?take the gloves off.? Jesselyn Radack, ethics adviser at the Department of Justice: I was called with the specific question of whether or not the F.B.I. on the ground could interrogate [Lindh] without counsel. And I had been told unambiguously that Lindh?s parents had retained counsel for him. I gave that advice on a Friday, and the same attorney at Justice who inquired called back on Monday and said essentially, Oops, they did it anyway. They interrogated him anyway. What should we do now? My office was there to help correct mistakes. And I said, Well, this is an unethical interrogation, so you should seal it off and use it only for intelligence-gathering purposes or national security, but not for criminal prosecution. A few weeks later, Attorney General Ashcroft held one of his dramatic press conferences, in which he announced a complaint being filed against Lindh. He was asked if Lindh had been permitted counsel. And he said, in effect, To our knowledge, the subject has not requested counsel. That was just completely false. About two weeks after that he held another press conference, because this was the first high-profile terrorism prosecution after 9/11. And in that press conference he was asked again about Lindh?s rights, and he said that Lindh?s rights had been carefully, scrupulously guarded, which, again, was contrary to the facts, and contrary to the picture that was circulating around the world of Lindh blindfolded, gagged, naked, bound to a board. October 26, 2001 Bush signs the USA Patriot Act, which among other things gives the government far-reaching powers to conduct surveillance. In addition, Bush will issue a secret executive order authorizing the National Security Agency to conduct warrantless wiretaps on American citizens and others living in the United States, bypassing the procedures mandated by Congress. Jesselyn Radack, ethics adviser at the Department of Justice: When Ashcroft initially came on board as attorney general, he was a somewhat beleaguered person. He had just lost an election to a dead man [Mel Carnahan, his opponent in the Missouri senatorial race, who had been killed in a plane crash]. We were told that he liked to conduct things more in a top-down corporate manner, rather than with Janet Reno?s glasnost openness. The real shift came after 9/11. It wasn?t that we were sent a memo saying all the laws were out the window, but that was definitely the tone that pervaded the department. November 1, 2001 A presidential executive order exempts presidents, vice presidents, and their designees from provisions of the 1978 Presidential Records Act and permits unclassified archived materials to be kept sealed in perpetuity, rather than being released after 12 years, as the law allows. Robert Dallek, presidential biographer: I?ve testified twice before the House Oversight and Government Reform subcommittee, protesting this executive order. Now, there are two constraints that operate in relation to all executive materials. One is that if you?re going to violate someone?s privacy you are constrained from releasing the material. A much bigger issue is one of national security, and that?s what causes years to go by before many, many documents are released. So those are the two constraints. But broadening this?and not only in relation to the president, but in relation to the vice president?reflects, I think, the Cheney proposition that the Watergate crisis put too many limitations on executive power. And so we now have the issue of what sort of documentary record we?re going to find. I mean, this is a separate issue, I guess, but will they have sanitized the records? November 13, 2001 Bush issues an order declaring that accused terrorists will be tried by secret military commissions that dispense with traditional rights and protections. John Bellinger III, legal adviser to the National Security Council, and later to the secretary of state: A small group of administration lawyers drafted the president?s military order establishing the military commissions, but without the knowledge of the rest of the government, including the national-security adviser, me, the secretary of state, or even the C.I.A. director. And even though many of the substantive problems with the military commissions as created by the original order have been resolved by Congress in response to the Supreme Court?s decision in the Hamdan case, we have been suffering from this original process failure ever since. December 2001 Osama bin Laden and many of his followers have taken refuge in the mountains of Tora Bora, on Afghanistan?s border with Pakistan, where an attempt to dislodge and capture them proves unavailing. A decision by Washington has the effect of allowing bin Laden to escape into the tribal areas of Pakistan. Revisit the first draft of history with our Bush-administration archive, ?Mission Unaccomplished.? Illustration by Risko. Gary Berntsen, C.I.A. intelligence commander at Tora Bora: We knew he was there?he had fallen into the mountains with about a thousand of his followers. That?s why we threw a BLU-82 [the bomb known as a ?daisy cutter?] at him. At one point we knew where he was; we allowed food and water to go in to him. And then we came in with a 15,000-pound device. Bin Laden was outside the lethal effects of that blast. I understand he was injured. I got a message out and made my request for inclusion of what I believed was needed?800 Rangers. The army of the Eastern Alliance on the north side had blocking positions there, so al-Qaeda couldn?t get back out into Afghanistan. But I was always concerned about the Pakistani side. I explained clearly that this was our opportunity to, so to speak, kill the baby in the crib. I was very concerned about them breaking out [south] into Pakistan, because I knew, if they did that, containing this thing would be a significant problem. Unfortunately, the decision was made at the White House to use the Pakistani frontier force. What the White House didn?t understand is that the frontier force had cooperated with the Taliban. So they used individuals who were very, very sympathetic to the Taliban to set up purported blocking positions. December 17, 2001 Kellogg, Brown & Root, a subsidiary of Halliburton, where Dick Cheney had been C.E.O., is awarded a 10-year omnibus contract to provide the Pentagon with support services for everything from fighting oil-well fires to building military bases to serving meals. As defense secretary under George H. W. Bush, Cheney had pushed strenuously to outsource a variety of military functions to private contractors?part of a broader effort to transfer government functions of all kinds to the private sector. Lawrence Wilkerson, top aide and later chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell: Cheney brings this accumulation of power and ability to influence the bureaucracy to a fine art. He surpasses Kissinger even. This is all the more ironic because Cheney was the antithesis of this when he was chief of staff of the White House under Gerald Ford and when he was secretary of defense. He was very deferential. He was not trying to insinuate himself. But he turns everything on its head and he becomes the power. And he does it through his network. This is a guy who?s an absolute genius at bureaucracy and an absolute genius at not displaying his genius at bureaucracy. He?s always quiet. So are most of his minions, not all of them. [David] Addington [the vice president?s counsel] is brilliant, and Addington is a strange beast, and Addington is sort of the Ayman al-Zawahiri for Cheney, the brains trust. [Chief of Staff Lewis] Libby was the doer. Libby was a real bureaucrat?s dream. January 8, 2002 Bush signs the No Child Left Behind Act, which, among other things, mandates that, in return for continued access to federal funding, states must institute standardized tests to ensure that students meet educational goals. The bill, co- authored by Senator Edward Kennedy, passed with a large bipartisan majority. Margaret Spellings, Bush?s domestic-policy adviser and later secretary of education: George Bush ran for office as a different kind of Republican and called for some things like annual measurement, accountability, closing the achievement gap?things that other Republicans hadn?t talked about. I mean, the standard Republican stock fare was Abolish the Department of Education. So he had had some equities on an issue that few Republicans previous to him had really talked about, especially on behalf of poor kids. I?ve learned a lot from [Ted Kennedy], and I think he?s the consummate legislator. He is a person of his word. I remember the very first time that the so-called Big Four?it was Kennedy, Jeffords, John Boehner, and George Miller?met in the Oval Office to talk about how we were going to proceed. It was in the first week of the administration. At the end of the meeting?after we had agreed that we really needed to get something done, we had to close the achievement gap, I?m really serious, I?m going to put my money where my mouth is, all of those sorts of things?the president, in closing the meeting, as the press was about to come in, said something like: You know, they?re going to ask us about vouchers. They?re going to?the press is going to try to find division immediately. And I am not going to talk about vouchers today. I?m going to say we talked about how we?re going to close the achievement gap. And, you know, we got to work. January 11, 2002 A new detention-and-interrogation center at Guant?namo Bay receives the first of an eventual 550 ?unlawful combatants? from the war in Afghanistan and the broader war on terror. Guant?namo is chosen because it is not officially U.S. soil and thus provides a rationale for denying detainees protections under American and international law, creating a ?legal black hole.? Jack Goldsmith, legal adviser at the Department of Defense and later head of the Justice Department?s Office of Legal Counsel: After 9/11 the administration faced two sharply conflicting imperatives. The first was fear of another attack. This permeated the administration. Everyone felt it. And it led to the doctrine of pre-emption, which has many guises, but basically means that you can?t wait for the usual amounts of information before acting on a threat because it may be too late. They were really scared. They were afraid of what they didn?t know. They were very afraid they didn?t have the tools to meet the threat. And they had this extraordinary sense of responsibility?that they would be responsible for the next attack. They really thought of it as having blood on their hands, and that they?d be forgiven once but not twice. On the other hand, there was a countervailing imperative, and that was the law, because there had grown up since the 70s?for a lot of good reasons?some extraordinary restrictions on presidential power and presidential war power, many of them embodied in criminal laws, many of them vague or uncertain, never having been applied before, certainly none of them ever applied in this new context. And there was enormous legal uncertainty about how far we could go. John Bellinger III, legal adviser to the National Security Council, and later to the secretary of state: The Department of Justice often was the decisive voice on detainee matters, but the Justice Department really never lived up to its name. It was not the Department of Justice?it was often the Department of Litigation Risk, and they saw everything through the perspective of whether a decision might result in some kind of liability, whether someone might get sued or prosecuted. But that?s not the only role of the lawyer. The role of the lawyer is also to exercise good judgment and to look at long-term consequences, and ultimately to do what?s the ethically and morally correct thing. January 29, 2002 In his State of the Union message, Bush invokes the specter of an ?axis of evil??Iraq, Iran, North Korea?and vows that the United States ?will not permit the world?s most dangerous regimes to threaten us with the world?s most destructive weapons.? Afghanistan remains unstable, but resources and attention are shifting elsewhere. Bob Graham, Democratic senator from Florida and chairman of the Senate intelligence committee: In February of ?02, I had a visit at Central Command, in Tampa, and the purpose was to get a briefing on the status of the war in Afghanistan. At the end of the briefing, the commanding officer, Tommy Franks, asked me to go into his office for a private meeting, and he told me that we were no longer fighting a war in Afghanistan and, among other things, that some of the key personnel, particularly some special-operations units and some equipment, specifically the Predator unmanned drone, were being withdrawn in order to get ready for a war in Iraq. That was my first indication that war in Iraq was as serious a possibility as it was, and that it was in competition with Afghanistan for mat?riel. We didn?t have the resources to do both successfully and simultaneously. February 7, 2002 Bush issues an executive order denying any protections of the Geneva Conventions to Taliban and al-Qaeda detainees. The order comes after an intense behind-the-scenes battle pitting the State Department against the Justice Department, the Defense Department, and the Office of the Vice President. Lawrence Wilkerson, top aide and later chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell: Based on what the secretary and [State Department legal adviser] Will Taft were telling me, I think they both were convinced that they had managed to get the president?s attention with regard to what they thought was the governing document, the Geneva Conventions. I really think it came as a surprise when the February memo was put out. And that memo, of course, was constructed by Addington, and I?m told it was blessed by one or two people in O.L.C. [Office of Legal Counsel]. And then it was given to Cheney, and Cheney gave it to the president. The president signed it. Jack Goldsmith, legal adviser at the Department of Defense and later head of the Justice Department?s Office of Legal Counsel: To conclude that the Geneva Conventions don?t apply?it doesn?t follow from that, or at least it shouldn?t, that detainees don?t get certain rights and certain protections. There are all sorts of very, very good policy reasons why they should have been given a rigorous legal regime whereby we could legitimatize their detention. For years there was just a giant hole, a legal hole of minimal protections, minimal law. February 14, 2002 The Bush administration proposes a Clear Skies Initiative, which relaxes air-quality and emissions standards. This is followed by a Healthy Forests Initiative, which opens up national forests to increased logging. Climate change becomes a forbidden subject. Rick Piltz, senior associate, U.S. Climate Change Science Program: At the beginning of the Bush administration, Ari Patrinos, a very senior science official who had run the Department of Energy?s climate-change research program for many years, and a half-dozen high-ranking federal science officials were brought together and told to explain the science and help develop policy options for a proactive climate-change policy for the administration. They moved into an office downtown, and they worked very hard and were briefing at the Cabinet level, in the White House. Cheney was there, Colin Powell was there, Commerce Secretary [Don] Evans was there. They were making the case on climate change. And one day they were told: Take it down, pack it up, go back to your offices?we don?t need you anymore. May 6, 2002 The effort to create an International Criminal Court, to which the United States and more than a hundred other nations have signed on, encounters a setback when Bush withdraws American participation by ?unsigning? the I.C.C. treaty. Luis Moreno-Ocampo, prosecutor of the International Criminal Court: When I started at the I.C.C., in 2003, the Bush administration appeared hostile towards the court, as though we were radioactive. But what started with hostility over time became less so. All of a sudden the court was seen to be useful. On Darfur, for example, the administration could have vetoed the Security Council vote referring Darfur to my office. They didn?t. That was a big change. But I?ve kept a respectful distance. They don?t give me intelligence. They cannot control me. When I received the U.N. Commission report on Darfur, inside the boxes there was a sealed envelope which appeared to contain classified U.S. information. We returned it to the U.S. Embassy, without opening it. Ironically, the hostility has helped in my dealings with countries that might otherwise perceive me to be in the pocket of the Americans. It has been one positive factor in the Arab and African worlds. The U.S. distance from the court seems to have had the very opposite effect of that intended?of strengthening it. June 1, 2002 In a graduation speech at West Point, Bush advances a new strategic doctrine of pre-emption, stating that the United States reserves the right to use force to deal with threats before they ?fully materialize.? Preparations for war with Iraq are not yet publicly acknowledged, but earlier in the spring, as Condoleezza Rice discusses diplomatic initiatives involving Iraq with several senators, Bush pokes his head into the room and says, ?Fuck Saddam. We?re taking him out.? Donald Rumsfeld: ?He?s sort of like a snake on a hot summer day sleeping on the road in the sun,? a Canadian general once observed. ?If an eyelid flickers, you say it?s very animated.? Photograph by Annie Leibovitz. July 23, 2002 Senior British defense, diplomatic, and intelligence officials meet in London to discuss the American position on war with Iraq. An account of the meeting, known as the Downing Street Memo, is drawn up by one of the participants, but remains secret for several years. In the meeting, Sir Richard Dearlove, the head of British intelligence, gives an assessment of his recent talks in Washington: ?Bush wanted to remove Saddam, through military action, justified by the conjunction of terrorism and WMD. But the intelligence and facts were being fixed around the policy.? Bob Graham, Democratic senator from Florida and chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee: I asked George [Tenet, the C.I.A. director], What did the national intelligence estimate [N.I.E.] that we had done on Iraq tell us about what would be the conditions during the period of combat, what would be the conditions post-combat, and what was the basis of our information on the weapons of mass destruction? Tenet said, We?ve never done an N.I.E. Paul Pillar, national intelligence officer for the Near East and South Asia at the C.I.A.: The makers of the war had no appetite for and did not request any such assessments [about the aftermath of war]. Anybody who wanted an intelligence-community assessment on any of this stuff would?ve come through me, and I got no requests at all. As to why this was the case, I would give two general answers. Number one was just extreme hubris and self-confidence. If you truly believe in the power of free economics and free politics, and their attractiveness to all populations of the world, and their ability to sweep away all manner of ills, then you tend not to worry about these things so much. The other major reason is that, given the difficulty of mustering public support for something as extreme as an offensive war, any serious discussion inside the government about the messy consequences, the things that could go wrong, would complicate even further the job of selling the war. August 1, 2002 A secret memorandum prepared by Justice Department lawyers Jay Bybee and John Yoo sets out the limits on coercive interrogation by U.S. government officials of those captured in the war on terror, finding that there are essentially none. The memo abandons international constraints and raises the threshold of what constitutes ?torture.? September 8, 2002 In a television interview, Condoleezza Rice builds the case against Saddam Hussein by invoking the nuclear threat. ?We know that he has the infrastructure, nuclear scientists to make a nuclear weapon. We don?t want the smoking gun to be a mushroom cloud.? This assertion is echoed by Vice President Cheney, even though Iraq?s nuclear capability is widely questioned by numerous experts. Sir Jeremy Greenstock, British ambassador to the United Nations and later the British special representative in Iraq: When I arrived in New York, in July 1998, it was quite clear to me that all the members of the Security Council, including the United States, knew well that there was no current work being done on any kind of nuclear-weapons capability in Iraq. It was, therefore, extraordinary to me that later on in this saga there should have been any kind of hint that Iraq had a current capability. Of course, there were worries that Iraq might try, if the opportunity presented itself, to reconstitute that capability. And therefore we kept a very close eye, as governments do in their various ways, on Iraq trying to get hold of nuclear base materials, such as uranium or uranium yellowcake, or trying to get the machinery that was necessary to develop nuclear-weapons-grade material. We were watching this the whole time. There was never any proof, never any hard intelligence, that they had succeeded in doing that. And the American system was entirely aware of this. September 15, 2002 In an interview with The Wall Street Journal, the assistant to the president for economic policy, Lawrence Lindsey, estimates the cost of a war with Iraq to be in the neighborhood of $100 billion to $200 billion. Mitch Daniels, the director of the Office of Management and Budget, quickly revises the figure downward to $50 billion to $60 billion, and Defense Secretary Rumsfeld calls Lindsey?s estimate ?baloney.? Lindsey is fired in December. Treasury Secretary Paul O?Neill is dismissed the same day. Years later, an analysis by Nobel-laureate economist Joseph E. Stiglitz and Harvard professor Linda J. Bilmes will estimate the cost of the Iraq war to be $3 trillion. Ari Fleischer, Bush?s first White House press secretary: What happened was the president made the point to the staff that, if America ever goes to war, we go to war because it?s the right thing to do regardless of the cost. That is a moral issue, and so we should not be talking to anybody about how much it may or may not cost; the whole issue is, do you or don?t you go? And if you go, you pay whatever the cost is to win. The day the president dismissed Larry and Secretary O?Neill, I remember he said to me that he noticed that morning that everybody in the Situation Room was sitting up a bit straighter. October 10?11, 2002 By an overwhelming vote, and at a politically delicate moment, Congress passes the Authorization for Use of Military Force Against Iraq Resolution, which gives the president a free hand to take military action. Hans Blix, the chief U.N. weapons inspector, invited to the White House before the vote, has as yet found no evidence that Iraq has an active program to produce biological, chemical, or nuclear weapons. Bob Graham: Unlike the first George Bush, who had purposefully put off the vote on the Persian Gulf War until after the elections of 1990?we voted in January of 1991?here they put the vote in October of 2002, three weeks before a congressional election. I think there were people who were up for election who didn?t want, within a few days of meeting the voters, to be at such stark opposition with the president. Hans Blix, chief U.N. weapons inspector for Iraq: The most remarkable thing was the talk that we had with the vice president before we were taken to Mr. Bush. To our surprise, we had no idea we would be taken to Mr. Cheney first, but we were, and we sat down, and I thought it was more a sort of a courtesy call before we went on to President Bush. Much of it was a fairly neutral discussion, but at one point he suddenly said that you must realize that we will not hesitate to discredit you in favor of disarmament. It was a little cryptic. That was how I remembered it, and I think that?s also how Mohamed [El Baradei, the head of the International Atomic Energy Agency, who was present], remembered it. I was a little perplexed, because it was a total threat, after all, to talk about the discrediting of us. Later, when I reflected on it, I think what he wanted to say was that if you guys don?t come to the right conclusion, then we will take care of the disarmament. November 4, 2002 Defying precedent, the Republicans make decisive gains in the midterm elections; the White House interprets the results as an across-the-board green light. In an interview with Esquire released in December, John J. Dilulio Jr., the former head of the Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, complains that the ?compassionate conservative? agenda is dead and that politics alone drives the White House. David Kuo, deputy director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives: I happened to be in the stairwell of the West Wing when the president was walking down, and he goes, Hey! He goes, Dilulio piece. He goes, Is this true? Is this I mean, is this stuff is this, is he right? What the hell?s goin? on? And whoever was with him at the time?it was probably Andy Card, Andy and Karl?they were like, Oh, no, no, no, no, no, it?s fine. We?ll get back to it. That afternoon we get a call from Josh Bolten, who was at the time the head of domestic policy, saying, O.K., we need to have a ?compassion? meeting. I?ll never forget the discussion?we?re sitting around the table, and someone says, I know what we should do. We should tackle chronic homelessness. I hear there are like 15,000 homeless people in America. What can you say to that? November 25, 2002 The Department of Homeland Security comes into being. The new department, an amalgam of nearly two dozen existing agencies, soon emerges as perhaps the most dysfunctional and unwieldy of all the federal departments. By presidential directive D.H.S. issues a daily color-coded advisory of ?threat conditions.? Its secretary, Tom Ridge, later acknowledges that the alerts were sometimes heightened under pressure from the administration. Michael Brown, director of fema, which becomes part of the Department of Homeland Security: Bush?s strength was?he would say to everybody in the room, Tell me what the problem is and I?ll make a decision. The detrimental aspect of that is the president would make a decision and in his mind it was over with. There was no changing course. The blinders are on. You had to work incredibly hard to get back in front of that line of sight to say, We need to take a different tack here. Condoleezza Rice: ?You thought you had the dream team of foreign-policy experts,? says Charles Duelfer, the former weapons inspector in Iraq, ?but they weren?t a team at all.? Photograph by Annie Leibovitz. I?m asked at one point for my input, and I basically say we should not have a Department of Homeland Security, because it?s going to be disruptive to create it in the midst of all of these things going on. [Later,] I remember being in the car alone with Bush, where I?m talking to him about the department and how it?s not working and how we really need to make some changes. And while I thought he may have been listening, I quickly came to the conclusion that he wasn?t, because his answer to it was: Well, we?re bringing in a new leader, a new secretary or deputy secretary, and he?ll be able to fix all these things. He had made the decision, and we?re going forward. And if things aren?t working, we don?t need to revisit the original decision. We?ll just put somebody else in there. David Kuo: Every time you had a conversation with him, he would make it clear the subject was important. Bush would say, I care about this. Let?s get this done. But it was like a ship whose wheel is not attached to the rudder. December 2, 2002 Donald Rumsfeld signs off on a memo from the Defense Department?s legal counsel, Jim Haynes, permitting the use of aggressive interrogation techniques at Guant?namo, including stress positions, isolation, and sleep deprivation. Rumsfeld writes on the memo, ?I stand for 8?10 hours a day. Why is standing limited to 4 hours?? The memo is eventually rescinded, after strenuous objections from the general counsel of the Navy, Alberto Mora, among others, but policies and practices continue to be influenced by the philosophy outlined in the earlier Bybee-Yoo ?torture memo.? Alberto Mora, navy general counsel: When I saw the [Haynes] memorandum, I thought this was all a mistake. My assumption going into my first meeting with Haynes was that once these mistakes were pointed out the authorization would be instantaneously reversed. So I had a meeting with Jim, in which I indicated that I felt the document authorized abusive treatment that included torture. Jim?s instantaneous response was that, no, it didn?t. I asked him to think carefully about this, and I took him through the analysis that this could be torture, that it would necessarily have legal repercussions, including to the military-commission process, and could also engender liability for all individuals associated with this process. I spent about an hour with him, and my sense was that he?d be picking up the phone and calling the secretary to have those authorizations rescinded. The next day I flew to Miami for Christmas vacation, thinking the problem was solved. I then got a phone call saying that the reports of abuse were continuing. That?s when I realized that this was not a simple mistake but that, in fact, people had adopted this course of action consciously. As soon as I got back, I requested a second meeting with Haynes, in which I took him through some of the same reasoning but in much greater detail. I also discussed much more heavily the potential liability of individuals involved in authorizing these kinds of techniques. I pointed out Secretary Rumsfeld?s handwritten notation at the bottom of the authorization page. I said, This may be a joke, but it would not be regarded as a joke potentially by a prosecuting attorney or a plaintiff?s attorney, and I said that this would lead to very painful cross-examination of Secretary Rumsfeld on the stand. The implication or allegation by opposing counsel would be that this constituted a wink and a nod to the interrogators. I closed by saying, Protect your client?thinking that was the most powerful message one attorney could deliver to another. John Bellinger III, legal adviser to the National Security Council and later to the secretary of state: One of the great tragedies for this administration has been the damage caused by its detainee policies?the decision to set up Guant?namo without the involvement of the international community, the issuance of the president?s executive order creating military commissions, aspects of the C.I.A. interrogation program, the conduct of certain renditions [sending detainees to other countries for interrogation], and the decision about the inapplicability of the Geneva Conventions. The most serious error is not any of these decisions individually or even collectively, but the administration?s inability to change course as the magnitude of the problems caused by these decisions became apparent. January 28, 2003 Bush delivers his State of the Union message and continues to make the case for war with Iraq. The speech includes the assertion, later shown to be based on a crude forgery, that Saddam Hussein has ?recently sought significant quantities of uranium from Africa.? The administration had been warned that the information was unreliable. Hans Blix, chief U.N. weapons inspector for Iraq: I think [Tony] Blair, whom I admire for many things and respect for many things, but when he went out and he talked about the Iraqis? being able to use weapons of mass destruction within 45 minutes, now that went much too far. There was another example, and that was the famous case of the alleged contract between Iraq and Niger for the import of yellowcake, uranium oxide. I was very curious about that, because I could not see why Iraq should at this stage, in 2002, want to import yellowcake. That?s a long, long way from the enriched nuclear materials they can use in a bomb. I didn?t suspect that there was a forgery behind it. January 31, 2003 Bush meets at the White House with Tony Blair. A secret account of the meeting, written by Sir David Manning, Blair?s chief foreign-policy adviser and later ambassador to Washington, will become public three years later. The administration?s public stance is that it hopes to avoid war with Iraq. In the meeting, however, Bush and Blair agree on a start date for the war, irrespective of the outcome of U.N. inspections: March 10. Bush proposes that a pretext for war might be provided if an aircraft were painted with U.N. colors and sent in low over Iraq, in the hope that it would draw fire. According to the memo, Bush also ?thought it unlikely that there would be internecine warfare between the different religious and ethnic groups? in Iraq once Saddam was removed from power. Meanwhile, the Pentagon belatedly turns attention to planning for the aftermath of war. Jay Garner, retired army general and first overseer of the U.S. administration and reconstruction of Iraq: When I went to see Rumsfeld at the end of January, I said, O.K., I?ll do this for the next few months for you. I said, you know, Let me tell you something, Mr. Secretary. George Marshall started in 1942 working on a 1945 problem. You?re starting in February working on what?s probably a March or April problem. And he said, I know, but we have to do the best with the time that we have. So that kind of frames everything. February 5, 2003 Colin Powell appears before the United Nations Security Council to present evidence that Iraq is actively seeking to make or acquire weapons of mass destruction. In the ensuing months, it will emerge that, although Powell was unaware of the fact, many of his claims are unfounded. Joschka Fischer, German foreign minister and vice-chancellor: I spoke over and over and over with Colin Powell. He always looked, I don?t know, not at me, but I could see the pain in his eyes. These are very powerful questions, he used to say. I understood. It meant: I have serious problems inside the administration. Hans Blix: In March 2003, when the invasion took place, we could not have stood up and said, There is nothing, because to prove the negative is really not possible. What you can do is to say that we have performed 700 inspections in some 500 different sites, and we have found nothing, and we are ready to continue. If we had been allowed to continue a couple of months, we would have been able to go to all of the some hundred sites suggested to us, and since there weren?t any weapons of mass destruction, that?s what we would have reported. And then I think that, at that stage, certainly the intelligence ought to have drawn the conclusion that their evidence was poor. I now feel sorry for Colin Powell. He was given the material by the C.I.A., and we read in the newspapers how he threw out a lot of it. But he retained some. And then he came to the Security Council, and, of course, in a way, this was to tell the world that, Look, this is what we?ve found. We have the means to do it. The inspectors are very good boys and nice, and we listen to them, but they haven?t seen this, and this is what there is. February 25, 2003 General Eric Shinseki, the army chief of staff, tells a congressional hearing that ?something on the order of several hundred thousand soldiers? will be required to mount a successful occupation of Iraq. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz publicly rebukes Shinseki, stating that the general?s estimate is ?wildly off the mark.? Shinseki is forced to retire early. Jay Garner: When Shinseki said, Hey, it?s going to take 300,000 or 400,000 soldiers, they crucified him. They called me up the day after that, Wolfowitz and Rumsfeld. They called me the next day and they said, Did you see what Shinseki said? And I said yes. And they said, Well, that can?t be possible. And I said, Well, let me give you the only piece of empirical data I have. In 1991, I owned 5 percent of the real estate in Iraq, and I had 22,000 trigger pullers. And on any day I never had enough. So you can take 5 percent?you can take 22,000 and multiply that by 20. Hey, here?s probably the ballpark, and I didn?t have Baghdad. And they said, Thank you very much. So I got up and left. March 19, 2003 The Iraq war begins. Two weeks of ?shock and awe? bombardment herald the invasion by ground forces. U.S. and British troops make up 90 percent of the ?international coalition,? which includes modest support from other countries. The defeat of Iraqi forces is a foregone conclusion, but within days of the occupation Baghdad is beset by looting that coalition forces do nothing to stop. Rumsfeld dismisses the breakdown of civil order with the explanation ?Stuff happens.? Kenneth Adelman, a Rumsfeld-appointed member of a Pentagon advisory board, and initially a supporter of the war, later confronts the defense secretary. Revisit the first draft of history with our Bush-administration archive, ?Mission Unaccomplished.? Illustration by Risko. Kenneth Adelman, a member of Donald Rumsfeld?s advisory Defense Policy Board: So he says, It might be best if you got off the Defense Policy Board. You?re very negative. I said, I am negative, Don. You?re absolutely right. I?m not negative about our friendship. But I think your decisions have been abysmal when it really counted. Start out with, you know, when you stood up there and said things??Stuff happens.? I said, That?s your entry in Bartlett?s. The only thing people will remember about you is ?Stuff happens.? I mean, how could you say that? ?This is what free people do.? This is not what free people do. This is what barbarians do. And I said, Do you realize what the looting did to us? It legitimized the idea that liberation comes with chaos rather than with freedom and a better life. And it demystified the potency of American forces. Plus, destroying, what, 30 percent of the infrastructure. I said, You have 140,000 troops there, and they didn?t do jack shit. I said, There was no order to stop the looting. And he says, There was an order. I said, Well, did you give the order? He says, I didn?t give the order, but someone around here gave the order. I said, Who gave the order? So he takes out his yellow pad of paper and he writes down?he says, I?m going to tell you. I?ll get back to you and tell you. And I said, I?d like to know who gave the order, and write down the second question on your yellow pad there. Tell me why 140,000 U.S. troops in Iraq disobeyed the order. Write that down, too. And so that was not a successful conversation. Sir Jeremy Greenstock, British ambassador to the United Nations and later the British special representative in Iraq: The administration of Iraq never recovered. It was a vacuum in security that became irremediable, at least until the surge of 2007. And to that extent, four years were not only wasted but allowed to take on the most terrible cost because of that lack of planning, lack of resources put in on the ground. And I see that lack of planning as residing in the responsibility of the Pentagon, which had taken charge, the office of the secretary of defense, with the authority of the vice president and the president, obviously, standing over that department of government. May 1, 2003 Aboard the aircraft carrier U.S.S. Abraham Lincoln, under a banner reading, mission accomplished, Bush proclaims that ?major combat operations in Iraq have ended.? Meanwhile, decisions have been made that will inadvertently prolong major combat operations, chief among them the disbanding of the Iraqi Army. The responsibility for this decision, which is promulgated by the new U.S. administrator in Iraq, L. Paul Bremer III, remains unclear. Jay Garner, retired army general and first overseer of the U.S. administration and reconstruction of Iraq: My plan was to not disband the Iraqi Army but to keep the majority of it and use them. And the reason for that is we needed them, because, number one, there were never enough people there for security. I mean, I?ll give you an example. My first day in Baghdad, I went to see Scott Wallace, who was the corps commander, the V Corps commander, and I said, Scott, I need a lot of help here on security. And he said, Let me show you my map. I walked over to the map. And he had 256 sites that day he was guarding that he had never planned on. He just didn?t have the force structure to do it. So we said, O.K., we?ll bring the army back. Our plan was to bring back about 250,000 of them. And I briefed Rumsfeld. He agreed. Wolfowitz agreed. Condoleezza Rice agreed. George [Tenet] agreed. Briefed the president on it. He agreed. Everybody agreed. So when that decision [to disband] was made, I was stunned. Charles Duelfer, U.N. and U.S. weapons inspector in Iraq: One Iraqi colonel told me, You know, our planning before the war was that we assumed that you guys couldn?t take casualties, and that was obviously wrong. I looked at him and said, What makes you think that was wrong? He goes, Well, if you didn?t want to take casualties, you would have never made that decision about the army. May 27, 2003 Bush signs legislation authorizing the President?s Emergency Plan for aids Relief (pepfar). He visits Africa, a main focus of the legislation, soon thereafter. pepfar commits some $15 billion for aids prevention and treatment over a period of five years. New York Times columnist Nicholas Kristof concludes, ?Mr. Bush has done much more for Africa than Bill Clinton ever did.? Michael Merson, M.D., international aids researcher, who has evaluated the relief program: Look, pepfar is the largest commitment ever made by any nation for a global health activity that?s dedicated to a single disease. I mean, that?s just not disputable. It has a prevention component, a treatment component, and a care component, but treatment is the centerpiece. The last number I?ve seen is that this initiative has led to treatment of more than 1.7 million people, most of them in Africa. Now, that?s not all the people who need treatment, but it?s a huge amount. pepfar at least tripled our aid flow to Africa?I?m talking about total aid flow. August 19, 2003 A month after Bush indicates little concern about an insurgency in Iraq with the remark ?Bring ?em on,? a car bomb in Baghdad destroys the headquarters of the United Nations mission, killing the U.N. chief, Sergio Vieira de Mello. President Bush receives the news of the bombing while playing golf, and by his own account decides at that moment to give up the game in solidarity with troops serving in Iraq and Afghanistan (although two months later he plays a round at Andrews Air Force Base). The U.N.-headquarters bombing is seen as the start of the full-blown insurgency. Jay Garner: I think a lot of the problem the president had is: people around him were doing what he said, and nobody was doing the analytical questioning of the things we were doing where you could do all the puts and takes and say, O.K., Mr. President, here?s all the pros to do this and here?s all the cons to do this, and here?s the likely outcome. Now, let?s make a decision. I don?t think that ever happened. I never saw anything like that. And I think the Defense Department was enamored with what they felt they?d accomplished in Afghanistan with a very small force of basically special-ops guys and the air force. And they looked at it as a high-tech thing. Nation building is a low-tech thing. Get a whole bunch of you. Roll up your sleeves. Get a bunch of shovels, and then everybody goes out and busts their ass every day. We just didn?t have enough soldiers to do that. January 23, 2004 David Kay, the chief U.S. weapons inspector, resigns his position, affirming his belief that no W.M.D. stockpiles will be found in Iraq; the following week he discusses his conclusions at the White House. Nine months later his successor, Charles Duelfer, will conclude officially that Iraq not only did not possess W.M.D. but did not have an active program in place to develop them. The structural supports of Powell?s U.N. presentation begin to crumble. Karl Rove: ?Karl came from a perspective of: you defeat people in politics by calling one side bad and one side good,? says Matthew Dowd, a onetime Bush-campaign strategist. Photograph by Henry Leutwyler/Contour/ Getty Images. Lawrence Wilkerson, top aide and later chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell: Well, [Powell] got a telephone call each time a pillar fell. It was either John [McLaughlin, deputy C.I.A. director], calling Rich [Armitage], and Rich telling him, or it was George [Tenet] or John calling the secretary. And I remember this vividly because he would walk through my door, and his face would grow more morose each time, and he?d say, Another pillar just fell. I said, Which one this time? And, of course, the last one was the mobile biological labs. Finally, when that call came, the secretary came through the door and said, The last pillar has just collapsed. The mobile biological labs don?t exist. Turned around and went back into his office. David Kay, chief U.S. weapons inspector in Iraq: As we turned to the trailers, it was probably?I guess the single biggest shock I had during the entire inspection process, because I?d been powerfully moved by Powell?s statement to the Council. Well, when we started tearing it apart, we discovered it was not based on several sources. It was based on one source, and it was an individual [code-named Curveball] held by German intelligence. They had denied the U.S. the right to directly interview him. And they only passed summaries?and really not very good ones?of their interrogations with him. The Germans had refused to pass us his name even. As you delved into his character and his claims, none of them bore any truth. The case just fell apart. Joschka Fischer, German foreign minister and vice-chancellor: I was astonished that the Americans used Curveball, really astonished. This was our stuff. But they presented it not in the way we knew it. They presented it as a fact, and not as the way an intelligence assessment is?could be, but could also be a big lie. We don?t know. April 13, 2004 At a press conference Bush is asked by John Dickerson of Time to name the biggest mistake he has made since 9/11. Bush is unable to come up with an answer. He replies, ?I wish you would have given me this written question ahead of time, so I could plan for it.? David Kay: He has a tremendous sense of calm and certitude about the positions he takes, and is unusually doubt-free about them. Most people, when they make monumental decisions, understand that they?re doing it under conditions of great uncertainty, and are not fully at the time really able to understand what the consequences might be?and that frightens them, or at least they have concern, disquietude about it. This president has none of that, as far as I can tell. April 28, 2004 A televised report on 60 Minutes II reveals widespread abuse and humiliation of detainees by U.S. military personnel and private contractors at the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq, dating back to October 2003 and known to the Defense Department since January. Kenneth Adelman, a member of Donald Rumsfeld?s advisory Defense Policy Board: I said to Rumsfeld, Well, the way you handled Abu Ghraib I thought was abysmal. He says, What do you mean? I say, It broke in January of?what was that, ?04? Yeah, ?04. And you didn?t do jack shit till it was revealed in the spring. He says, That?s totally unfair. I didn?t have the information. I said, What information did you have? You had the information that we had done these?and there were photos. You knew about the photos, didn?t you? He says, I didn?t see the photos. I couldn?t get those photos. A lot of stuff happens around here. I don?t follow every story. I say, Excuse me, but I thought in one of the testimonies you said you told the president about Abu Ghraib in January. And if it was big enough to tell the president, wasn?t it big enough to do something about? He says, Well, I couldn?t get the photos. I say, You?re secretary of defense. Somebody in the building who works for you has photos, and for five months you can?t get photos?hello? Lawrence Wilkerson: The twin pressures were from Rumsfeld, and they were: Produce intelligence, and the gloves are off. That?s the communication that went down to the field. Matthew Dowd, Bush?s pollster and chief strategist for the 2004 presidential campaign: When Abu Ghraib happened, I was like, We?ve got to fire Rumsfeld. Like if we?re the ?accountability president,? we haven?t really done this. We don?t veto any bills. We don?t fire anybody. I was like, Well, this is a disaster, and we?re going to hold some National Guard colonel responsible? This guy?s got to get fired. For an M.B.A. president, he got the M.B.A. 101 stuff down, which is, you know, you don?t have to do everything. Let other people do it. But M.B.A. 201 is: Hold people accountable. Bill Graham, Canada?s foreign minister and later defense minister: We were there in Washington for a G-8 meeting, and Colin suddenly phoned us all up and said, We?re going to the White House this morning. Now, this is curious, because normally the heads of government don?t give a damn about foreign ministers. We all popped in a bus and went over and were cordially received by Colin and President Bush. The president sat down to explain that, you know, this terrible news had come out about Abu Ghraib and how disgusting it was. The thrust of his presentation was that this was a terrible aberration; it was un-American conduct. This was not American. Joschka Fischer was one of the people that said, Mr. President, if the atmosphere at the top is such that it encourages or allows people to believe that they can behave this way, this is going to be a consequence. The president?s reaction was: This is un-American. Americans don?t do this. People will realize Americans don?t do this. The problem for the United States, and indeed for the free world, is that because of this?Guant?namo, and the ?torture memos? from the White House, which we were unaware of at that time?people around the world don?t believe that anymore. They say, No, Americans are capable of doing such things and have done them, all the while hypocritically criticizing the human-rights records of others. Alberto Mora, navy general counsel: I will tell you this: I will tell you that General Anthony Taguba, who investigated Abu Ghraib, feels now that the proximate cause of Abu Ghraib were the O.L.C. memoranda that authorized abusive treatment. And I will also tell you that there are general-rank officers who?ve had senior responsibility within the Joint Staff or counterterrorism operations who believe that the number-one and number-two leading causes of U.S. combat deaths in Iraq have been, number one, Abu Ghraib, number two, Guant?namo, because of the effectiveness of these symbols in helping recruit jihadists into the field and combat against American soldiers. July 22, 2004 The bipartisan 9/11 commission?whose creation was fiercely opposed by the administration?issues its report. It provides a detailed reconstruction of events leading up to the attacks, and of the attacks themselves; an earlier staff report found ?no credible evidence? of a link between al-Qaeda and Iraq. The final report also determines that many warning signs of an impending attack were ignored. Lawrence Wilkerson: John [Bellinger] and I had to work on the 9/11-commission testimony of Condi. Condi was not gonna do it, not gonna do it, not gonna do it, and then all of a sudden she realized she better do it. That was an appalling enterprise. We would cherry-pick things to make it look like the president had been actually concerned about al-Qaeda. We cherry-picked things to make it look as if the vice president and others, Secretary Rumsfeld and all, had been. They didn?t give a shit about al-Qaeda. They had priorities. The priorities were lower taxes, ballistic missiles, and the defense thereof. Lee Hamilton, former Indiana congressman and vice-chair of the 9/11 commission: Intelligence reform was our big recommendation. The principal conclusion we reached was that the 15 or 16 agencies of the intelligence community did not share information and that there had to be some mechanism put in place to force the sharing of information. In the intelligence business, you don?t get, or you usually don?t get, information saying that the terrorists are going to strike at nine in the morning in the World Trade towers in New York City on September 11. You get bits and pieces of information that have to be put together. We knew, for example?when I say we, I mean the F.B.I. in Minneapolis knew?that those guys in flight-training school were more interested in flying the airplane than they were in taking off and landing. They knew that. Who didn?t know it? The director of the F.B.I. didn?t know it. The director of the C.I.A. did know it. His response was that it was none of his business. Technically correct, because his business is foreign intelligence. That?s one of many, many examples. November 2, 2004 Election Day. Bush defeats Kerry by a margin of three million popular votes and 35 electoral votes. In a press conference two days later Bush says, ?I earned capital in the campaign, political capital, and I now intend to spend it. It is my style.? Mark McKinnon, chief campaign media adviser to George W. Bush: The interesting thing about both Bush campaigns is that they strategically defied conventional wisdom and turned it on its head. In 1999, on the old ?right track, wrong track? question, which we ask on every poll?the reason we ask it is because it determines whether or not it?s a change environment or a status-quo environment?in 1999, the ?right track? was 65 percent or 70 percent, which under conventional wisdom would indicate that it was a great environment for the Democrats and for Al Gore. The strategic challenge we had was?we were in the position of trying to argue everything?s great, so it?s time for a change, right? Flash forward to 2004. It?s just the opposite. This time, the ?wrong track? is like 65 or 70 percent. We?re in a very difficult war, uncertain economy, and so now we?re in the strategic position of saying, you know, everything?s all screwed up. Stay the course. We?re all f?d up. Stay the course. November 15, 2004 Colin Powell announces his resignation as secretary of state. He is succeeded by Condoleezza Rice, who will in time have limited success charting a new direction on issues such as Iran and North Korea. Lawrence Wilkerson, top aide and later chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell: I?m not sure even to this day that he?s willing to admit to himself that he was rolled to the extent that he was. And he?s got plenty of defense to marshal because, as I told [former defense secretary] Bill Perry one time when Bill asked me to defend my boss?I said, Well, let me tell you, you wouldn?t have wanted to have seen the first Bush administration without Colin Powell. I wrote Powell a memo about six months before we were leaving, and I said, This is your legacy, Mr. Secretary: damage control. He didn?t like it much. In fact, he kind of handed it back to me and told me I could put it in the burn basket. But I knew he understood what I was saying. You saved the China relationship. You saved the transatlantic relationship and each component thereof?France, Germany. I mean, he held Joschka Fischer?s hand under the table on occasions when Joschka would say something like, You know, your president called my boss a fucking asshole. His task became essentially cleaning the dogshit off the carpet in the Oval Office. And he did that rather well. But it became all-consuming. I think the clearest indication I got that Rich [Armitage] and he both had finally awakened to the dimensions of the problem was when Rich began?I mean, I?ll be very candid?began to use language to describe the vice president?s office with me as the Gestapo, as the Nazis, and would sometimes late in the evening, when we were having a drink?would sometimes go off rather aggressively on particular characters in the vice president?s office. Charles Duelfer, U.N. and U.S. weapons inspector in Iraq: You thought you had the dream team of foreign-policy experts, but they weren?t a team at all. Some of the wags over at the Department of Defense would call John Bolton?s office over at State the ?American Interests Section.? Very funny, but it showed you how badly divided this administration had become. Lawrence Wilkerson: The imbalance is huge. The Pentagon now gets three quarters of a trillion dollars every year and State gets $35 billion. Rumsfeld remarked one time, I lose more money than you get. He has two and a half million men. State is not even a combat brigade, you know? Bill Graham, Canada?s foreign minister and later defense minister: We came out of our meeting, and our nato ambassador said, ?Oh, Mr. Rumsfeld was really quite cordial and animated today.? And [one of our generals], his remark was something like: Oh, he?s sort of like, it?s like a snake on a hot summer day sleeping on the road in the sun. If an eyelid flickers, you say it?s very animated. December 26, 2004 An undersea earthquake off the western coast of Sumatra?the second-largest earthquake ever recorded?unleashes a wave of tsunamis throughout the Indian Ocean, killing more than 200,000 people. Bush orders the U.S. Navy to spearhead emergency relief efforts, which are widely praised. Distracted elsewhere, the administration?s Asian initiatives are otherwise few. There is one clear beneficiary. Kishore Mahbubani, Singapore?s former ambassador to the United Nations: The Chinese never said so, because they are the best geopolitical strategists in the world, but it was immediately obvious that with 9/11 the U.S.-China relationship improved. The Chinese were smart. They didn?t put any real obstacles in the way of action in Afghanistan, and even if they strongly opposed the war in Iraq, they did so in a way that minimized the difficulties for the U.S. I saw that firsthand, in the period after the invasion was over, when the U.S. needed a Security Council resolution to get the oil sales flowing again. They got the resolution, and I remember asking a U.S. diplomat which country had been most helpful in getting the resolution passed. China, he replied. That 2003 resolution was a double win for the Chinese leaders: they obtained valuable political goodwill from the Bush administration, which translated into gains on the Taiwan issues, and they helped to ensure that American troops would remain bogged down in Iraq for a long time. The Chinese have been brilliant in playing the Bush years. Asia is one part of the world where many will see George Bush in a positive light, although not necessarily for the reasons he may have wished. February 2, 2005 In his State of the Union address, Bush starts spending his political capital with a plan to take the Social Security system in the direction of privatization by allowing individuals to divert payments to their own retirement accounts. The partial-privatization scheme is widely opposed?the public sees reliable benefits at risk?and in the end the proposal goes nowhere. Meanwhile, despite significant turnout by Evangelicals in the election, faith-based initiatives make little headway on the president?s agenda. David Kuo, deputy director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives: After the 2004 election they cut the White House faith-based staff by 30 percent, 40 percent, because it became clear that it had served its purpose. There?s this idea that the Bush White House was dominated by religious conservatives and catered to the needs of religious conservatives. But what people miss is that religious conservatives and the Republican Party have always had a very uneasy relationship. The reality in the White House is?if you look at the most senior staff?you?re seeing people who aren?t personally religious and have no particular affection for people who are religious-right leaders. Now, at the end of the day, that?s easy to understand, because most of the people who are religious-right leaders are not easy to like. It?s that old Gandhi thing, right? I might actually be a Christian myself, except for the action of Christians. And so in the political-affairs shop in particular, you saw a lot of people who just rolled their eyes at everyone from Rich Cizik, who is one of the heads of the National Association of Evangelicals, to James Dobson, to basically every religious-right leader that was out there, because they just found them annoying and insufferable. These guys were pains in the butt who had to be accommodated. June 7, 2005 Documents emerge indicating that the decision to withdraw from the Kyoto Protocol on climate change, in 2001, was influenced by the Global Climate Coalition, an industry group with ties to Exxon. One State Department letter to the coalition states: ?Potus [president of the United States] rejected Kyoto in part based on input from you.? Several days later, Philip Cooney, a former American Petroleum Institute lobbyist and the chief of staff of the president?s Council on Environmental Quality, resigns after it is revealed that he had edited government reports to downplay the threat of climate change. Cooney takes a job at Exxon. Rick Piltz, senior associate, U.S. Climate Change Science Program: In the fall of 2002, I was doing something I?d been doing for years, which was developing and editing the [Climate Change Science Program?s] annual report to Congress. And it had been drafted with input from dozens of federal scientists and reviewed and vetted and revised and vetted some more. And then it had to go for a White House clearance. It came back to us over the fax machine with Phil Cooney?s hand markup on it. I flipped through it and saw right away what he was doing. You don?t need to do a huge amount of re-writing to make something say something different; you just need to change a word, change a phrase, cross out a sentence, add some adjectives. And what he was doing was, he was passing a screen over the report to introduce uncertainty language into statements about global warming. The political motivation of it was obvious. June 24, 2005 Mahmoud Ahmadinejad is elected president of Iran, a country whose regional sway has been enhanced by the implosion of neighboring Iraq under U.S. occupation. Iran steps up its efforts to enrich uranium, and Bush states more than once that he will not rule out the use of force if Iran seeks to develop nuclear weapons. Joschka Fischer, German foreign minister and vice-chancellor: The big problem was that the administration was in a permanent state of denial?that they are doing the job for Tehran. That?s another irony, a very tragic one. Because if you look to the basic parameters of Iran?s capability or strategic strength, this is not a superpower?they?re far from a superpower. They never could have achieved such a level of dominance and influence if they would have had to rely only on their own resources and skills. America pushed Iran in that way. I was invited to a conference in Saudi Arabia on Iraq, and a Saudi said to me, Look, Mr. Fischer, when President Bush wants to visit Baghdad, it?s a state secret, and he has to enter the country in the middle of the night and through the back door. When President Ahmadinejad wants to visit Baghdad, it?s announced two weeks beforehand or three weeks. He arrives in the brightest sunshine and travels in an open car through a cheering crowd to downtown Baghdad. Now, tell me, Mr. Fischer, who is running the country? Hans Blix, chief U.N. weapons inspector for Iraq: In my experience of negotiations, about the worst you can do is to humiliate the other side. And I think that this is one error that has been with the U.S.?they reject any talk with Ahmadinejad because he is someone who is regarded as a rogue and playing to the galleries and so forth. Lee Hamilton, former Indiana congressman and vice-chair of the 9/11 commission: I was in the Congress when we began talking to members of the Supreme Soviet under the old Soviet Union. I?d get up and give a speech. My Soviet counterpart would get up and give a speech. Then we?d toast each other with vodka and say that we were for peace in the world and prosperity for our grandchildren, and then we?d go home. And we did that year after year after year. After doing it 10 or 15 years, we put aside the speeches and we began to talk with one another. That was the beginning of the thaw. It might not take 40 years with the Iranians, but it?s going to take a long time. You?re going to have to have patience. You have to put on the table not just our agenda but their agenda as well. But the conversation is critical, and I don?t know how you deal with differences without talking to people. If you know a way to solve problems without talking to people, let me know, because I haven?t found out about it yet. August 29, 2005 Hurricane Katrina, one of the most powerful hurricanes ever recorded, strikes the Gulf Coast. The storm surge breaches the levees in New Orleans; the city is flooded and eventually evacuated amid a complete breakdown of civil order. Bush flies over the city on his way back from a fund-raiser out West. Days later, visiting the destruction as relief efforts falter, the president praises the fema director, Michael Brown: ?Brownie, you?re doing a heckuva job.? Bush vows to rebuild New Orleans, and Brown, whose performance is widely criticized, is effectively fired; the president?s approval rating sinks to 39 percent. Three years after Katrina the population of New Orleans will have dropped by one-third. The city?s defenses against storms and floods will remain a vulnerable patchwork. Dan Bartlett, White House communications director and later counselor to the president: Politically, it was the final nail in the coffin. Matthew Dowd, Bush?s pollster and chief strategist for the 2004 presidential campaign: Katrina to me was the tipping point. The president broke his bond with the public. Once that bond was broken, he no longer had the capacity to talk to the American public. State of the Union addresses? It didn?t matter. Legislative initiatives? It didn?t matter. P.R.? It didn?t matter. Travel? It didn?t matter. I knew when Katrina?I was like, man, you know, this is it, man. We?re done. Michael Brown, director of fema, which becomes part of the Department of Homeland Security: There were two things that went wrong with Katrina. One is personal on my part. I failed after having briefed the president about how bad things were in New Orleans and telling him that I needed the Cabinet to stand up and pay attention. When that didn?t happen, I should?ve leveled with the American public instead of sticking to those typical political talking points about?how we?re working as a team and we?re doing everything we can. I should?ve said this thing is just not working. Probably would?ve been fired anyway, but at least it would?ve caused the federal government to stand up and get off their butts. The second thing that happened was this. [Homeland Security Secretary Michael] Chertoff inserted himself into the response, and suddenly I had this massive bureaucracy on top of me. I should have basically told Chertoff to kiss off, that I would continue to deal directly with the president. But he?s the new kid on the block and the White House deferred to him, and it gave me no choice but to work through him, which then scoped things down and caused it to just completely implode on itself. Lee Hamilton, former Indiana congressman and vice-chair of the 9/11 commission: When you have a disaster strike, you have to have someone in charge. They didn?t have anybody in charge in New York during 9/11. They didn?t have anybody in charge in Katrina. And you get a mess. Politically it?s a very difficult thing. You?ve got the counties, the cities, and the federal government and all the rest to work it out. Nobody wants to give up authority prior to the fact. The governor of Louisiana wants to be in charge. The governor of Mississippi wants to be in charge. The mayor of New Orleans wants to be in charge. You?ve got 50 other cities that want to be in charge. I have come to the view in these massive disasters?like Katrina or New York on 9/11?that the federal government has to be in charge because they?re the only one that has the resources to deal with the problem. But presidents don?t like to stomp on governors and override them. When these kinds of problems are not resolved, people die. December 6, 2005 nasa scientist James Hansen gives a lecture on climate change at a meeting of the American Geophysical Union, in San Francisco. nasa reacts by ordering his future public statements to be vetted in advance. Earlier in the year Rick Piltz had resigned from the Climate Change Science Program over other instances of political interference. Rick Piltz, senior associate, U.S. Climate Change Science Program: To me, the central climate-science scandal of the Bush administration was the suppression of the National Assessment of Climate Change Impacts report. In the 1997?2000 time frame, the White House had directed the Global Change Research Program to develop a scientifically based assessment of the implications of climate change for the United States. It was a vulnerability assessment: If these projected warming models are correct, what?s going to happen? And over a period of several years a team made up of eminent scientists and other experts produced a major report. To this day, it remains the most comprehensive effort to understand the implications of global warming for the United States. And the administration killed that study. They directed federal agencies not to make any reference to the existence of it in any further reports. Through a series of deletions it was completely excised from all program reports from 2002 onward. It was left up on a Web site. There was a lawsuit filed by the Competitive Enterprise Institute, which is an ExxonMobil-funded ?denialist? group, demanding that the report be deleted from the Web. Myron Ebell of the institute said, Our goal is to make that report vanish. December 16, 2005 The New York Times reveals the existence of a massive warrantless-surveillance program conducted on American soil. Bush contends that the September 2001 war-on-terror authorization by Congress??to use all necessary and appropriate force? against relevant ?nations, organizations, and persons??effectively gives the president unlimited power to act. Other kinds of snooping occur inside the administration. Lawrence Wilkerson, top aide and later chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell: The Cheney team had, for example, technological supremacy over the National Security Council staff. That is to say, they could read their e-mails. I remember one particular member of the N.S.C. staff wouldn?t use e-mail because he knew they were reading it. He did a test case, kind of like the Midway battle, when we?d broken the Japanese code. He thought he?d broken the code, so he sent a test e-mail out that he knew would rile Scooter [Libby], and within an hour Scooter was in his office. December 30, 2005 Bush signs into law the Detainee Treatment Act. The legislation was passed by Congress in order to prohibit the inhumane treatment of prisoners, but Bush appends a ?signing statement? laying out his own interpretation and indicating that he is not otherwise bound by the law in any meaningful way. This is one of more than 800 instances in which Bush deploys signing statements to finesse congressional intent. Jack Goldsmith, legal adviser at the Department of Defense and later head of the Justice Department?s Office of Legal Counsel: Every president in war time and in crisis?Lincoln, Roosevelt, John F. Kennedy, just to name three?exercised extraordinarily broad powers. They pushed the law and stretched the law and bent the law, and many people think they broke the law. And we?ve largely forgiven them for doing so because we think that they acted prudently in crisis. So Lincoln?he did all sorts of things after Fort Sumter. He spent unappropriated moneys. He suspended the writ of habeas corpus. Now, there?s a way of looking at the Cheney-Addington position on executive power which is not unlike some of the most extreme assertions of Lincoln and Roosevelt. But there are important differences. One is that both Lincoln and Roosevelt coupled this sense of a powerful executive in times of crisis with a powerful sense of a need to legitimate and justify the power through education, through legislation, through getting Congress on board, through paying attention to what one might call the ?soft? values of constitutionalism. That was an attitude that Addington and I suppose Cheney just did not have. The second difference, and what made their assertion of executive power extraordinary, is: it was almost as if they were interested in expanding executive power for its own sake. June 29, 2006 The Supreme Court in Hamdan v. Rumsfeld rules that detainees at Guant?namo have rights under the Geneva Conventions, including fundamental rights of due process. Two months later, Murat Kurnaz, a Turkish citizen and legal resident of Germany who had been held at Guant?namo for nearly five years, will be released from custody and flown back to Germany. John le Carr?, novelist and former intelligence officer whose novel A Most Wanted Man was inspired by the Kurnaz case: Murat Kurnaz, a German-born-and-educated Turkish resident of Bremen, in northern Germany, by trade a shipbuilder, was released from Guant?namo on 24 August 2006 after four years and eight months without charge or trial. He was 24 years old. In December 2001, at the age of 19, he had been arrested in Pakistan, sold by the Pakistanis to the Americans for $3,000, and tortured for five weeks and nearly killed at an interrogation center in Kandahar before being flown in chains to Cuba. His family was first informed of his situation in January 2002. Despite repeated brutal treatment and repeated interrogation at Guant?namo, no evidence was found to link him with terrorist activities, a fact acknowledged by both U.S. and German intelligence. Yet it took years of intense lobbying by lawyers, family, and NGOs to secure his release. Two weeks after Murat?s release, I was in Hamburg to take part in a television discussion on the anniversary of al-Qaeda?s attack on America. A woman journalist attached to the program had been assigned the task of looking after Murat while the program?s producers prepared a documentary about him. Would I like to meet him? I would, and spent two days listening to him in a hotel suite in Bremen. Despite a disgraceful campaign of innuendo orchestrated by the complicit German authorities, I shared the view of practically everyone who had met him that Murat was remarkably truthful and was a reliable witness to his own tragedy. September 21, 2006 The Environmental Protection Agency declines to tighten regulations on annual emissions of soot. November 7, 2006 The Republicans suffer a stinging defeat in the midterm elections; Democrats take control of both the House and Senate. The following day, Rumsfeld resigns as defense secretary. He is replaced by Robert Gates. November 26, 2007 Secretary of State Rice convenes a Middle East peace conference in Annapolis, Maryland. The Bush administration had from the outset paid scant attention to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and attempts by Rice to revive the peace process come to little. Anthony Cordesman, national-security analyst and former official at the Defense and State Departments: In reality, a great deal of what Secretary Rice did seems to have been based as much on a search for visibility as any expectation of real progress. The fact was that you did not have to contend with Chairman Arafat, but you did have to contend with a deeply divided Israel, which was far less willing to accept or make compromises over peace. And with the Palestinian movement, which was moving toward civil war. The United States can only make serious progress when both the Israelis and Palestinians are ready to move toward peace. Setting artificial deadlines and creating yet another set of unrealistic expectations did not lay the groundwork for sustained real progress. It instead created new sources of frustration and again made people throughout the Arab and Muslim world see the United States as hypocritical and ineffective. December 6, 2006 The independent Iraq Study Group, chaired by former secretary of state James Baker and former congressman Lee Hamilton, issues a report setting out 79 recommendations for the future conduct of the Iraq war. The report is brushed aside by the president. Lawrence Eagleburger, one of the group?s members, says of Bush after the report is delivered, ?I don?t recall, seriously, that he asked any questions.? Alan K. Simpson, former senator from Wyoming and a member of the Iraq Study Group: It was an early-morning session, seven a.m., I think, breakfast, the day we trotted it out. And Jim and Lee said, Mr. President, we will?and Dick was there, Cheney was there?just go around the room, if you would, and all of us share with you a quick thought? And the president said fine. I thought at first the president seemed a little?I don?t know, just maybe impatient, like, What now? He went around the room. Everybody stated their case. It just took a couple minutes. I know what I said. I said, Mr. President, we?re not here to present this to vex or embarrass you in any way. That?s not the purpose of this. We?re in a tough, tough situation, and we think these recommendations can help the country out. We?ve agreed on every word here, and I hope you?ll give it your full attention. He said, Oh, I will. And I turned to Dick, and I said, Dick, old friend, I hope you?ll gnaw on this, too. This is very important that you hear this and review it. And he said, I will, I will, and thanks. Then the president gave an address not too far after that. And we were called by [National-Security Adviser Stephen] Hadley on a conference call. He said, Thank you for the work. The president?s going to mention your report, and it?ll be?there will be parts of it that he will embrace, in fact, and if he doesn?t happen to speak on certain issues, you know that they?ll be in full consideration in the weeks to come, or something like that. And we all listened with a wry smile. We figured that maybe 5 of the 79 recommendations would ever be considered, and I think we were pretty right. Lee Hamilton: Cheney was there, never said a word, not a?of course, the recommendations from his point of view were awful, but he never criticized. Bush was very gracious, said we?ve worked hard and did this great service for the country?and he ignored it so far as I can see. He fundamentally didn?t agree with it. President Bush has always sought, still seeks today, a victory, military victory. And we did not recommend that. The gist of what we had to say was a responsible exit. He didn?t like that. December 7, 2006 The Justice Department fires seven United States attorneys without explanation. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales calls the controversy an ?overblown personnel matter,? but the legal battle over the firings plays out to this day as it becomes clear that the attorneys were fired for having insufficient partisan zeal. Harriet Miers, the White House counsel, and Karl Rove are cited for contempt of Congress when they refuse a summons by the House Judiciary Committee to discuss the firings. David Iglesias, former U.S. attorney in New Mexico and one of the fired prosecutors: When I got the phone call, on Pearl Harbor Day, it came completely out of the blue. Mike Battle, the head of the executive office of U.S. attorneys, said very directly, Look, you know, we want to go a different way, and we?d like you to submit your resignation by the end of next month. I said, What?s going on? Mike said, I don?t know, I don?t want to know. All I know is that this came from on high. I knew that U.S. attorneys were only asked to resign essentially for misconduct, and I knew I hadn?t committed any misconduct. I knew my office was doing well by the Justice Department?s internal metrics. Logically that only left one possibility, which was politics. I started thinking back to, well, Who within the party have I angered? The first thing that came to mind were two very inappropriate phone calls that I got in October 2006. One was from Congresswoman Heather Wilson. She called me directly on my cell phone and was snooping around, asking about sealed indictments. I was very vague in my answer and basically gave her reasons why U.S. attorneys can seal something. She seemed very unsatisfied. Approximately two weeks later, I got a second phone call. This one was from Pete Domenici, who had been my sponsoring senator, and he called me at home. He started asking about the political-corruption cases [against Democrats] and matters he?d been reading about in the local media. He just came out and asked me point-blank, Are these going to get filed prior to November?, and I was absolutely stunned by that question. I tried to be responsive without violating any regulations or rules myself, and I told him I didn?t think so. At which point he said, I?m very sorry to hear that, and then he hung up the phone. I had a very sick sense in my stomach. December 20, 2006 In a news conference Bush states that the year ahead will ?require difficult choices and additional sacrifices.? Noting that it is important to maintain economic growth, he adds, ?I encourage you all to go shopping more.? January 10, 2007 Bush announces a surge in American troop strength in Iraq, from 130,000 to more than 150,000. The aim is to suppress the level of violence and overt sectarian strife and thus to provide a breathing spell in which the Iraqi government can make progress toward a set of stated political benchmarks. By fall the level of violence has indeed subsided?observers disagree on why?though many of the political benchmarks remain unmet. Anthony Cordesman, national-security analyst and former official at the Defense and State Departments: We can all argue over the semantics of the word ?surge,? and it is fair to say that some goals were not met. We didn?t come close to providing additional civilian-aid workers that were called for in the original plan. And often it took much longer to achieve the effects than people had planned. But the fact was that this was a broad political, military, and economic strategy, which was executed on many different levels. And credit has to go to General Petraeus, General Odierno, and Ambassador Crocker for taking what often were ideas, very loosely defined, and policies which were very broadly stated, and transforming them into a remarkably effective real-world effort. It?s important to note that we made even more mistakes in Afghanistan than we did in Iraq. We were far slower to react, but in both cases we were unprepared for stability operations; we had totally unrealistic goals for nation building; at a political level we were in a state of denial about the seriousness of popular anger and resistance, about the rise of the insurgency, about the need for host-country support and forces; and we had a singularly unfortunate combination of a secretary of defense and a vice president who tried to win through ideology rather than realism and a secretary of state who essentially stood aside from many of the issues involved. And in fairness, rather than blame subordinates, you had a president who basically took until late 2006 to understand how much trouble he was in in Iraq and seems to have taken till late 2008 to understand how much trouble he was in in Afghanistan. June 28, 2007 Bush?s immigration plan, a bipartisan effort that represents the most ambitious attempt to overhaul U.S. immigration policy in a generation, goes down to defeat in the Senate. The most controversial element is a provision that would permit an estimated 12 million illegal aliens already in the United States to take steps to legalize their status, with citizenship an eventual possibility. The provision enrages many in Bush?s own party, who call it amnesty and see it as a security threat. Mark McKinnon, chief campaign media adviser to George W. Bush: My suspicion would be that that is a real regret [of the president?s]. It?s an issue we talked about early on in the 2000 campaign, and he was told by advisers that it was the third rail, or maybe the fourth rail?Social Security?s the third rail. But it?s also an issue that attracted people like me to him. Centrist types, independent types in Texas were attracted to him because he was a Republican who was talking about a limited yet appropriate role for government on issues like education and immigration. Immigration was one of his most heartfelt issues. Dan Bartlett, White House communications director and later counselor to the president: The repercussions of that decision by our party are going to be felt for decades. As I sit here in Austin, I see the demographic changes that are happening in our state?in less than 20 years, Hispanics are going to be a majority of the population. And we are on the wrong side of that issue. It?s that simple. January 1, 2008 As the new year begins, the United States is faced with an accelerating economic crisis. The price of oil will soon top $100 a barrel for the first time in history, driven by rising demand in the developed world and in India and China?and by the prospect of continuing Middle Eastern uncertainties. Although the fact will not be established for another year, when the National Bureau of Economic Research issues its December 2008 report, the U.S. economy has entered a recession. The catalyzing event is the collapse of the subprime-mortgage market. During the past 12 months there have been nearly 1.3 million foreclosure filings. The losses flow upward. In March, J. P. Morgan Chase and the Federal Reserve Bank of New York provide massive emergency loans to prevent a default by Bear Stearns, one of the nation?s largest financial institutions; Bear Stearns is ultimately absorbed by J. P. Morgan. A cascade of economic woe ensues. Some regulators had been warning for years about the threat posed by bad mortgages and the housing market, but steps to tighten the rules were successfully opposed by lenders. Robert Shiller, Yale economist who warned of a housing bubble: The Bush strategists were aware of the public enthusiasm for housing, and they dealt with it brilliantly in the 2004 election by making the theme of the campaign the ownership society. Part of the ownership society seemed to be that the government would encourage home ownership and, therefore, boost the market. And so Bush was playing along with the bubble in some subtle sense. I don?t mean to accuse him of any?I think it probably sounded right to him, and the political strategists knew what was a good winning combination. I don?t think that he was in any mode to entertain the possibility that this was a bubble. Why should he do that? Attention wasn?t even focused on this. If you go back to 2004, most people were just?they thought that we had discovered a law of nature: that housing, because of the fixity of land and the growing economy and the greater prosperity, that it?s inevitable that this would be a great investment. It was taken for granted. John C. Dugan, comptroller of the currency A lot of mortgages got made to people who could not afford them and on terms that would get progressively worse over time, and that created the seeds of an even bigger problem. As the whole market became even more dependent on house-price appreciation, when house prices flattened and then started to decline the whole situation began to unravel. The question you have to ask yourself: Why did credit become so easy? Why would lenders make mortgages that became increasingly less likely to be repaid? Part of the answer is that there was a huge chunk of the mortgage market that was not regulated to any significant extent. The overwhelming proportion of subprime loans were being done in entities that were not banks and not regulated as banks?I?m talking here about mortgage brokers and non-bank mortgage lenders that could originate these mortgages and then sell them to Wall Street firms that could package them into new kinds of mortgage securities, which arguably could take into account the lower credit risks and still be salable to investors worldwide. Unfortunately, the theory was not in accord with the reality. Although they thought they had accurately gauged that risk, they too were in fact depending?when you get to the bottom of it?on house prices continuing to go up and up and up. And they did not. Henry Paulson, secretary of the Treasury: I easily could imagine and expected there to be financial turmoil. But the extent of it, O.K., I was na?ve in terms of?I knew a lot about regulation but not nearly as much as I needed to know, and I knew very little about regulatory powers and authorities. I just had not gone into it in that kind of detail. This?ll be the longest we?ve gone in recent history without there being turmoil, and given all the innovation in the private pools of capital and the over-the-counter derivatives and the excesses around the world, we figured that when there was turmoil, and these things were tested for the first time by stress, it would be more significant than anything else. I said at the time, I have a concern that every rally we?re going to have in the financial markets will be a false rally until we break the back of the price correction in real estate. And these things are never over until you have a couple of institutions go that surprise everyone. Bear Stearns can hardly be a shock. But having said that, it?s one thing to see it intellectually and it?s another to see where we are. June 12, 2008 The Supreme Court in Boumediene v. Bush strikes down a provision in the Military Commissions Act, ruling that the denial of the right to petition for habeas corpus is unconstitutional. July 9, 2008 The annual summit of the G-8 nations, held in Japan, concludes with a tepid pledge to cut greenhouse gases by 50 percent by the year 2050. It is the last G-8 summit that Bush attends. He bids farewell to the other heads of state with the words ?Good-bye from the world?s greatest polluter.? July 30, 2008 As the subprime-mortgage crisis continues to ripple through the economy, Bush signs emergency legislation to rescue the mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. A Wall Street bailout will follow in October. The budget deficit for the year is expected to exceed $1 trillion. Ari Fleischer, Bush?s first White House press secretary: [The housing bubble] was not on my radar screen. Now, after everything broke with Fannie and Freddie, I guess the White House released some document that, if I remember it, said the president 17 times cited Fannie and Freddie problems going back to the initial budget that we submitted in 2001. So the wonks were onto it, but in the post-9/11 world and then the Iraq-war world, all the visible focus, all the news, was on other issues. I think it just got drowned out and it didn?t get met with any sense of urgency from people in both parties. August 8, 2008 Russia invades the Republic of Georgia. Bush says in a Rose Garden appearance that the United States ?stands with? Georgia. Bush makes his comments during a brief stop in Washington between a trip to Beijing for the Olympics and a vacation at his ranch in Crawford. Since taking office Bush has spent more than 450 days at the Crawford ranch and more than 450 days at Camp David. During the last six months of his presidency, Bush is largely absent from public view, even as the economic crisis continues to build. September 1, 2008 Republicans meet in St. Paul to nominate John McCain as their presidential candidate; with an approval rating in the polls hovering below 30 percent, Bush becomes the first sitting president since Lyndon Johnson not to appear at his own party?s nominating convention. (He had been scheduled to attend, but his appearance was canceled when a hurricane once again threatened the Gulf Coast.) The president travels to Gettysburg for a tour of the battlefield, accompanied by his wife, Laura, and a number of former aides?Alberto Gonzales, Karl Rove, Karen Hughes, and Harriet Miers. Among the guides are Gabor Boritt, a Lincoln scholar, and his son Jake Boritt, a filmmaker. Jake Boritt, filmmaker and Gettysburg tour guide: We?re standing in front of the Virginia monument, which is more or less where Robert E. Lee ordered Pickett?s Charge from. When Lee invaded the North, his hope was that he could get far enough in, win a great battle, demoralize the Northern will to fight, and then there would be pressure on Lincoln to stop the war. Everybody in the North was terrified. Lincoln was not. He was looking at it as an opportunity, because finally Lee was going to be off his home turf in Virginia. Lincoln was actually excited at the possibility that the Confederate Army was invading Pennsylvania. And Bush said, Well, did the president say, ?Bring it on?? We do this one thing where you line people up shoulder to shoulder to show how the Confederates moved across a mile-long field to attack the Union line. So we lined them up?it was roughly 20 people, all mostly important White House people, and you?re pretending you?re shooting at ?em with cannon shells as you pretend to take them out. October 3, 2008 After much wrangling, and with a sense of urgency and dismay, Congress passes the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act, which authorizes the secretary of the Treasury to spend $700 billion to shore up U.S. financial institutions and otherwise address the fallout from the subprime-mortgage crisis. Eric Cantor, G.O.P. congressman from Virginia and Republican chief deputy whip: It was almost as if panic had struck the capital. When the news came out about how dire the situation was, not only for the U.S. capital markets but for the global financial scene, [there was real worry that] all the sort of nightmare scenarios that one learned in school could actually be occurring. I was a little bit concerned, though, about the haste with which the administration was moving, given the enormity of the package that they were proposing to bring to the Hill in a matter of days. The amount of money was so gargantuan?more than what Social Security spends in a year. It was really unheard of. In hindsight I can see now that the panic was such that they felt they needed to do whatever was possible to make sure that we did not have a repeat of the Great Depression. I felt like the weight of the world and the weight of the national economy and the well-being of every family across this country was resting on our shoulders. The level of anxiety and panic found on the face of Secretary Paulson, [Federal Reserve Board] Chairman [Ben] Bernanke?you could see in person that it was severe. I do not think that anyone foresaw the level of seriousness of the problem we were faced with. November 4, 2008 Barack Obama is elected president in an electoral-college landslide. The Republicans lose at least seven seats in the Senate and a score in the House, dashing Karl Rove?s hopes of a permanent Republican majority. As the administration prepares to leave office, it promulgates a raft of ?midnight? orders to weaken environmental, health-care, and product-safety regulations. The unemployment rate is nearly 7 percent and rising. Income inequality is at the highest level since the 1920s. As of a week before the election, the stock market had lost a third of its value over a period of six months. Revisit the first draft of history with our Bush-administration archive, ?Mission Unaccomplished.? Illustration by Risko. Ed Gillespie, campaign strategist and later counselor to the president: Politics goes in cycles, and my old boss, [Mississippi governor] Haley Barbour, who was a mentor to me, has a saying that in politics nothing?s ever as good or as bad as it seems. Dan Bartlett, White House communications director and later counselor to the president: At the end of the day I think the divisiveness of this presidency will fundamentally come down to one issue: Iraq. And Iraq only because, in my opinion, there weren?t weapons of mass destruction. I think the public?s tolerance for the difficulties we face would?ve been far different had it felt like the original threat had been proved true. That?s the fulcrum. Fundamentally, when the president gets to an approval rating of 27 percent, it?s this issue. Lawrence Wilkerson, top aide and later chief of staff to Secretary of State Colin Powell: As my boss [Colin Powell] once said, Bush had a lot of .45-caliber instincts, cowboy instincts. Cheney knew exactly how to polish him and rub him. He knew exactly when to give him a memo or when to do this or when to do that and exactly the word choice to use to get him really excited. Bob Graham, Democratic senator from Florida and chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee: One of our difficulties now is getting the rest of the world to accept our assessment of the seriousness of an issue, because they say, You screwed it up so badly with Iraq, why would we believe that you?re any better today? And it?s a damn hard question to answer. Meanwhile, the Taliban and al-Qaeda have relocated, have strengthened, have become a more nimble and a much more international organization. The threat is greater today than it was on September the 11th. David Kuo, deputy director of the White House Office of Faith-Based and Community Initiatives: It?s kind of like the Tower of Babel. At a certain point in time, God smites hubris. You knew that right around the time people started saying there?s going to be a permanent Republican majority?that God kinda goes, No, I really don?t think so. Matthew Dowd, Bush?s pollster and chief strategist for the 2004 presidential campaign: You know, the headline in his presidency will be missed opportunity. That is the headline, ultimately. It?s missed opportunity, missed opportunity. Cullen Murphy is Vanity Fair?s editor-at-large. Todd S. Purdum is Vanity Fair?s national editor. Philippe Sands is an international lawyer at the firm Matrix Chambers and a professor at University College London. Print E-Mail RSS Share Yahoo! Buzz From glparramatta at greenleft.org.au Sat Jan 31 16:09:42 2009 From: glparramatta at greenleft.org.au (glparramatta) Date: Sat Jan 31 16:30:01 2009 Subject: [Mai-not] Book now! International conference on 21st century socialism, Sydney, Australia, April 10-12, 2009 Message-ID: <4984CC26.7060104@greenleft.org.au> PLEASE FORWARD TO ALL INTERESTED Mark it in your diaries! WORLD AT A CROSSROADS: FIGHTING FOR SOCIALISM IN THE 21st CENTURY International speakers from: VENEZUELA, ARGENTINA, CANADA, PAKISTAN, INDONESIA, MALAYSIA, PHILIPPINES, TIMOR LESTE, INDIA, AUSTRALIA ... and more (initial list of speakers below) Easter 2009, April 10-12 Sydney, Australia Venue: Sydney Girls High, Cnr Anzac Pde & Cleveland St, Surry Hills For more info' and to book your tickets: Email: dsp@dsp.org.au or sydney.resistance@gmail.com Phone: (+ 61 2) 9690 1230 Visit: www.WorldAtACrossroads.org A conference that brings together socialists and progressive activists from around Australia, Latin America, Asia-Pacific and North America in dozens of panel presentations and workshops over four days to discuss the urgent questions of our time, including: * The capitalist economic crisis: Putting people and planet before corporate profits * Stopping global warming: Social change, not climate change * Emerging alternatives to capitalism: The Venezuelan revolution and anti-imperialist rebellion in Latin America * Crisis in the Middle East: Resisting imperialism and war * Organising to fight for a better world: Building mass movements, alliances and left parties * and more.....see below for more info on panels and workshops, or visit www.WorldAtACrossroads.org Initial list of international speakers: MICHAEL LEBOWITZ, Venezuela & Canada - Reknowned Marxist economist; researcher at the Centro Internacional Miranda, Caracas, Venezuela; author of Beyond Capital: Marx's Political Economy of the Working Class, winner of the Isaac Deutscher memorial prize (2004). REIHANA MOHIDEEN, Philippines - Chairperson of Transform Asia, a gender and labour institute, Party of the Laboring Masses (PLM) International Department. IAN ANGUS, Canada - Founder of the Ecosocialist International Network; editor of Climate and Capitalism, Marxist historian; and writer and activist on environmental issues. LUIS BILBAO, Venezuela & Argentina - Marxist journalist and author, central participant in the construction of the mass United Socialist Party of Venezuela. KAVITA KRISHNAN, India - Former president of the All India Students' Association (1999-2006), Central Committee member of the Communist Party of India (Marxist Leninist); editor of Liberation. PLUS: Roger Annis, Socialist Voice and Haiti solidarity in Canada; Daphne Lawless and Vaughan Gunson, Socialist Worker-New Zealand; Tomas Freitas, Luta Hamutuk, Timor Leste; Nelson Davila, Venezuelan Ambassador to Australia; and representatives from the People's Democratic Party in Indonesia, the Socialist Party of Malaysia and the Labour Party Pakistan. Topic streams include: GLOBAL ECONOMIC CRISIS Capitalism's crisis and socialist economic alternatives Capitalist economic crisis: Its impacts and responses in South-East Asia Models and experiences of public and social ownership The history of anti-capitalist activism during economic crises Understanding Marxist economics Recessions, jobs and workers' control GLOBAL WARMING & ENVIRONMENTAL CRISIS Achieving a just transition to environmental sustainability Constructing a red-green alliance to save the planet The social roots of the climate crisis Working for green unions in the 21st century Food and water crisis: Capitalism, agribusiness and the food sovereignty alternative Climate refugees and the "overpopulation" debate Climate change solutions: What role for the market? Sustainable cities: The social versus the individual Constructing a red-green alliance to save the planet LATIN AMERICAN REVOLUTION: ALTERNATIVES TO CAPITALISM Latin America: Revolt, revolution and socialism in the 21st century Building popular power: Workers' control, communal councils and the United Socialist Party of Venezuela 50 years of the Cuban Revolution A history of Central American revolutions: Cuba, Nicaragua, El Salvador Defeating capitalism and counter-revolution: The struggle for socialism in Venezuela Latin American integration: Anti-imperialist cooperation or regional capitalist development? Evo Morales and Bolivia's Indigenous revolution CRISIS IN THE MIDDLE EAST: RESISTING IMPERIALISM AND WAR What solution to the crisis in the Middle East? The world after Bush: Obama and US imperialism Who are Hamas and Hezbollah? The undeclared war against Pakistan Israel - An apartheid state Iraq and Afghanistan; The US' unwinnable wars for oil War on terror or war on Muslims? LEFT UNITY: ALLIANCES, MOVEMENTS AND REVOLUTIONARY ORGANISATION Building socialist parties in the 21st century Theory and practice of left unity in Australia and internationally Socialists in parliament: Constructing left electoral alliances The crisis of social democracy Stalinism, Leninism and the legacy of the Russian Revolution AND MORE, INCLUDING ... Australia's radical history Why be a Marxist today? Introduction to Resistance and the DSP Women's oppression and liberation Australia's black history: Struggles for Aboriginal rights Same-sex marriage rights Marxism and nationalism Reports on the people's struggles in Asia, Middle East, Latin America, Africa and Oceania Organised by the Democratic Socialist Perspective and Resistance Sponsored by Green Left Weekly www.WorldAtACrossroads.org -------------- next part -------------- An HTML attachment was scrubbed... URL: http://www.globalproblematique.net/pipermail/mai-not/attachments/20090201/591423e8/attachment.html