Osama on Obama

The usual channels have yielded another video from Osama bin Laden, wherein a still photo of the al-Qaeda godfather accompanies an audio “statement to the American people,” purportedly recorded June 4. Here is the full English translation of the 10 minute tape. First, two questions.

ONE: I find it interesting that the message echoes what most anti-imperialists already believe. From a Chavez, or Ahmadinejad, this text would be timid. Throw in the unverified nature of this transmission, the mystery of whether Osama lives, or whose interest he really served, and this new tape subverts somebody’s message, but whose?

For example, in the new tape, Osama bin Laden recommends three books. The NYT is quick to tell us that any recommendation from bin Laden is certainly unwelcome by any author. The books? The Israel Lobby and US Foreign Policy, Jimmy Carter’s Palestine: Peace not Apartheid, and Confessions of an Economic Hit Man. The NYT just as quickly dismissed the titles as well.

TWO: Why does no one release the full translation of Osama’s message? Newspapers comment on his statements based on interpretations made by US intelligence contractors, who themselves do not release their translations to the public.

Are there no Arabic speakers who wish to translate bin Laden’s words for the international audience? Why is everyone content to hear what the US government says is Osama’s message?

Extracts the US media is reprinting of Osama’s message:

“Reasonable people know that Obama is a powerless man who will not be able to end the war as he promised, but rather, will continue it to the highest point possible.”

“The bitter truth is that the neoconservatives continue to cast their heavy shadows upon you.”

“Ask yourselves to determine your position: is your security, your blood, your children, your money, your jobs, your homes, your economy, and your reputation dearer to you than the security of the Israelis, their children and their economy?

“If you choose your security and cessation of war … this requires you to work to punish those on your side who play with our security.”

“The time has come for you to liberate yourselves from fear and the ideological terrorism of neo-conservatives and the Israeli lobby.”

“The reason for our dispute with you is your support for your ally Israel, occupying our land in Palestine.”

“If you think about your situation well, you will know that the White House is occupied by pressure groups.”

“Rather than fighting to liberate Iraq — as Bush claimed — it should have been liberated.”

“If you stop the war, then fine. Otherwise we will have no choice but to continue our war of attrition on every front… If you choose safety and stopping wars, as opinion polls show you do, then we are ready to respond to this.”

“You have only changed the faces in the White House.”

The full English translation, courtesy of the NEFA Foundation:

“All praise is due to Allah who created [the] creation for His servants and commanded them to justice, and who permitted those who have been unjustly treated to carry out similar vengeance against their oppressors…”

“O’ people of America, my speech to you is a reminder of the reasons behind [September] 11 and what took place in its aftermath in the form of wars, and claims, and the path to escape from its causes. Specifically, I draw attention to the families of those who were killed during these events, and those who have recently called for open investigations to determine the causes that led to them— this is your first step in the right direction amongst many steps that deliberately missed the path throughout eight years of little prosper that have passed you by. And it is correct that the American people should have sympathy for them, because the longer it takes you to recognize the real causes, the higher a price you will pay, needlessly. Thus, since the administration in the White House—one of the sides in this struggle— has appealed to you for years that war is necessary to ensure your security, then, to understand the truth, a wise man would want to heed and listen to both sides of the struggle, so lend me your ears.”

“First, I say: we have shown and declared many times over more than two and a half decades that our dispute with you [is based on] your support of your allies; the Israeli occupiers of our land in Palestine. It was this stance—along with other injustices—that moved us to carry out the events of September 11. If you realized the extent of our suffering caused by the injustices of the Jews backed by your administration, then you would understand that both of our nations are victims of the policies laid down by the White House, which in reality is nothing but a puppet in the hands of powerful interest groups, specifically big corporations and the Israel lobby.”

“And, the best voice who has tried to explain to you the reasons behind [September] 11 is one of your own citizens, the veteran former CIA agent whose conscience awoke in his eighth decade [of age] and he decided to tell the truth despite the pressure against him, and explained for you the message behind September 11. Thus, he carried out some actions for this purpose

specifically, from within that is his book titled, ‘Apology of a Mercenary.’ Similarly, with regards to the suffering of our people in Palestine, Obama recently confessed in his speech in Cairo to the suffering of our people there [in Palestine], under occupation and sanctions. And the matter becomes even clearer if you read what your former president Jimmy Carter has written about the Israeli discrimination against our people in Palestine, or had you listened to his statement some weeks ago, while visiting besieged and ravaged Gaza, when he said, ‘the people of Gaza are treated more like animals than human beings’…”

“And here we should pause for a moment, for anyone with an atom’s weight of mercy is compelled to sympathize with the suffering of the elderly, women, and children under the fatal siege, while above them the Zionists pour down burning American-made white-phosphorus bombs. Life there is miserable beyond any conception, such as the number of children who are dying in the hands of their fathers and doctors because of a lack of food, medicine, and basic electricity. It is truthfully a stain of shame on the forehands of all world politicians who facilitate this, and the people who ally with them with prior knowledge of their intentions—along with the influence from the Israeli lobby in America. The details regarding this have been clarified by two of your citizens, they are John Mearsheimer and Steven Walt in the book ‘The Israel Lobby in the United States.’ Upon reading these various suggested works, you will discover the truth and you will be terribly shocked by the scale of the deception that has been used against you. You will also discover that, even today, those who issue statements from inside the White House and claim that your wars against us are necessary for your security are the same ones who worked under the regime of Cheney and Bush, and marketed their former policies of fear to safeguard the interests of large corporations at the expense of your blood and economy. Truthfully, those are the ones responsible for forcing war upon you, not the mujahideen—as we are [merely] defending the right to liberate our land.”

“And should you consider your situation at some depth, then you will discover that the White House is actually occupied by interest groups, and that it [the White House] should have been liberated, instead of fighting to liberate Iraq as Bush claimed. The role of a White House leader in today’s atmosphere, regardless of his name, is like a train conductor who has no choice but to move forward on the rails laid down by interest groups—or else its path will be obstructed—and who lives in fear that his fate will be that of the former president [John F.] Kennedy and his brother.”

“The conclusion of my speech: it is time to liberate yourselves from the fear and mental terrorism that the neo-conservatives and the Israeli Lobby have used to manipulate you. Put the issue of your alliance with the Israelis up for debate and ask yourselves what your stance is: is your own security, blood, children, money, jobs, homes, economy, and reputation more important to you, or do you prefer the safety of the Israelis, their children, and economy? If you choose your own security and bring the war to a halt—and this is what the opinion polls have shown is most popular—then you must work and replace the hands of those from amongst you who have endangered our safety, and we are ready to respond to this decision in accordance with sound and just principles that have been previously mentioned. And here, there is an important point that requires attention regarding the war and stopping it: when Bush took power and appointed a secretary of defense who had assisted in killing two million suffering villagers in Vietnam, intelligent people predicted on that day that Bush was preparing for new massacres during his term in office, and this is what occurred in Iraq and Afghanistan. Then, Obama took charge and kept Cheney and Bush’s men—those from the senior leadership in the Pentagon—like Gates, Mullen, and Petraeus. Intelligent people understand that Obama is a weak man who cannot stop the war like he promised, but instead, he will postpone it to the greatest possible degree. If he was really in control, then he would have handed over leadership to the generals who have opposed this foolish war—like the former forces commander General Sanchez and the head of Central Command who was forced by Bush to resign shortly before leaving the White House because of his opposition to the war. Instead, he [Bush] appointed someone else who would press on after him.”

“Furthermore, Obama—under the pretext of his willingness to cooperate with the Republicans— has tricked you with a big fraud, as he kept the most important and most dangerous secretary— Cheney’s man—to continue the war. It will become clear to you over the coming days that you have changed nothing in the White House except faces—the bitter truth is that the neo-conservatives are still heavily shadowing you.”

“Returning back to the original point, if you stop the war, then so be it. But otherwise, it is inevitable that we will continue our war of extermination against you on all possible fronts, just as we annihilated the Soviet Union for a decade until it was dismantled, by the grace of Allah. So, go ahead and prolong this war as long as you want, but you are engaged in a miserable losing war for the interests of others that seems to have no end in sight. The Russian Generals—who were shaken by the battles in Afghanistan—warned you what the outcome of the war would be before it began, but you refuse to listen to those who advise you. This war is being financed through ghoulish interests, the morale of your soldiers is collapsing, and they are committing suicide on a daily basis to escape it. It is a failed war, Allah willing.”

“This is has all been prescribed for you by the doctors Cheney and Bush as medicine for the events of September 11, yet, the bitterness and loss this has caused is worse than that of the events themselves. The accumulated debt alone has almost led to the collapse of the entire American economy. It has been said, some illnesses are tolerated more than their medicine. And we, by the grace of Allah, continue to carry our weapons slung over our shoulders, fighting the evil powers in the east and west for thirty years, and in all that time, we have not recorded a single incident of suicide despite the global pursuit targeting us, praise be to Allah. This should tell you something about the righteousness of our doctrine and the justice of our cause. Allah-willing, we are moving forward on our path to liberate our land; patience is our weapon and we seek victory from Allah, and we will not abandon Al-Aqsa Mosque, as our grasp on Palestine is greater than our grasp onto our souls… Thus, you can lengthen the war as you desire, [but] by Allah, we will not compromise in the least over it.”

The original Arabic transcript:

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?? ?????? ??? ?? ??? ??? ?????? ????? ???? , ???? ?? ???? ?????? ???? ?????? ??? ?? ?????? ??? ????????? ??? ??? ???? ??????? ??????? ??? ???????? ??????? ????????? ???? ???? ??? ?? ???? ???? ???? ????? ????? ????? ??? ??? ? ??????? ?? ????? ?? ???? ????? ?????? ????? ?????? ?????? ????? ????? ?? ???? ??? ?????? ?? ????? .????? ????? ??????? ????? ????? ?????? ??????? ?? ????????? ?????? ????? ??? ?? ??????? ? ?????? ?? ????? ???????? , ????? ??????? ??? ???????? ?????? ??????? ????? ????? ? ??????? ??????? ??????? ??????? ?????? ?????? ???? ? ??? ???? ?????? ???? ???? ????? . ????? ????? ????? ??? ???????? ????? ???? ????? ?????? ?????? ??? ? ????? ??????? ???????? ???? ?? ????? ??????? ????? ? ??? ?? ?????? ??????? ????? ???? ??????? ?????? ??? ? ??? ??? : ????? ?? ??? ?????? ????? .????? ???? ???? ????? ???? ?????? ??? ??????? ? ????? ?????? ???? ?? ????? ?????? ??? ?????? ??? ? ??? ??????? ????? ???? ?????? ????? ??? ???????? ??????? ??? ???? ????? ??????? ? ???? ?????? ?? ????? ??????? ?????? ?????? ? ???? ???? ???? ????? ?? ?????? ?????? ????? , ?????? ????? ??? ???? ????? ????? ? ??? ?????? ?? ??????? ??????? ??????? ???? ?? ?????? ???????? .???????????? ??? ?????? ?? ??????? ? ?????? ??? ?????? ???????? ?????? ..???? ???? ????? ?????? ???????? ?????? ????? ?????????? ???? ?????????? ?????
???????? ??? ?? ???? ????? .

The antiwar message directed to whom?

Cindy Sheehan may be glamping again. This time it’s Martha’s Vineyard, where Sheehan is prepared to lay siege to another presidential vacation. Which certainly highlights what’s become undeniable about Barack Obama. He heralds no change. And I’m not prepared to hope the effectiveness of petitioning our leaders has changed either. Bush answered to no one, Obama won’t even dance with them who thought they elected him. The antiwar message has no one’s ear. Let’s put it to the American people.

Who’s empowered our military commanders to direct their war crimes? We. Who’s encouraging our soldiers to execute their assigned tasks? We.

We “support the troops, not the war.” It’s the distinction between manslaughter and premeditated murder. In practice, we fully support the war effort. Of greater horror, by wishing to see the fighting wrapped up properly, we are prepared to condone the gravest brutality.

The war machine has coopted the word “peace.” The soldiers are “peacekeepers” after all. Peace has come to denote “world peace” actually, the Utopian spiritual quest. Like eternal salvation, world peace is paid lipservice, no one is so unreasonable as to expect its fulfillment.

In this life anyway, which defines the religious American’s aversion to participatory antiwar efforts.

I still am warmed when I see a peace symbol unexpectedly. They have become more ubiquitous, haven’t they? Now I see peace stickers on cash registers where cigarettes are sold.

We’re all for peace. It’s what America is doing abroad, via the Peace Corps or The Corps, pacification.

Pam “Heil Hitler” Pilger gets it all wrong

Christian Zionist anti-health care conservative Pam PigglerMuch is being made of the irony that the anti-health teabagger who shouted “HEIL HITLER” at a Jewish man who spoke in favor of universal health care, was herself wearing an ISRAELI DEFENSE FORCES t-shirt.

Irony? I think the association originates from more than “irony.”

Thanks to having been interviewed earlier in the evening by a local TV reporter, the nutjob has been identified as Pamela Pilger of Las Vegas, Nevada. Online sleuths record that she and her husband are Sarah Palin supporters, etc, oink oink. Her telephone and address are available online, and I’m not terribly conflicted about disseminating that info. *

From Mrs. Pilger’s interview we learn she is a conservative, who believes in Christian values, excepting charity obviously.

Pilger is likely a Christian Zionist, explained by her cross earings and IDF t-shirt. How could a politically charged t-shirt worn to a political event, be but chosen on purpose? And a Christian Zionist who mocks Jews, really no surprise there.

What interests me about Mrs. Pilger and the t-shirt which seems at odds with her dimly-improvised retorts, is how she represents the American idiot: completely wrong. Pilger doesn’t know enough to keep from making contradictory outbursts, but she does know: health care NO, Israel PRO.

How is it that opponents of health care reform, for example, are wrong-headed about every issue on the table? Environment, war, labor, human rights, civil liberties, immigration, etc; and in Pilger’s case, anti-health care and pro-Israel. These are not uniformly “conservative” values. They do not comprise an idiot’s manifesto.

Yet in practice, these disparate dictum flock inseparably.

How can idiots be so consistent? If their antics reflected real grass roots idiocy, they’d be all over the board. What does an American idiot know of the Middle East, pro-Palestinian or con?

Wouldn’t an idiot xenophobe bigot most likely be anti-Semitic? Aka Pam Pilger? Whose idea, the IDF allegiance? Whose very consistent guidance are the idiots following? There’s nothing idiotic about the neoliberal, exploitive agenda behind the ideological idiots. Are they such idiots that they cannot see that?

Wingbat Pilger’s t-shirt and her opposition to health care reform –in spite of confessing that her husband lacks insurance– betrays that her idiotic fervor is not even her own.

* (Even as idiot pawns, shouldn’t they take responsibility for the Astroturf populist propaganda they are helping to lay? I hope an archive is being kept of their profoundly insensitive rantings. In the future, when these crackers Google themselves, the first thing they should see is their 15-minutes of infamy, yelling about how they don’t want illegal immigrants stealing their tax-dollars, etc. Hold the bastards accountable for reflecting so poorly the average American.

The idiots may never come around, but maybe their neighbors or associates will better be able to size them up. One day, perhaps their grandchild, improved by a marriage outside the family, will see the footage and marvel- Oh my goodness, my Grandma was not a very kind lady.

More practically, imagine trying to eulogize Pamela Pilger one day, with her video performance for all to see!)

Th-Th-Th-Th-That’s all folks, in lipstick

Full text of Alaska Ex-Governor Sarah Palin‘s poetic address, porky pigwherein she explains that her contract with the voters of Alaska has a “lame duck” escape clause, stuff about a God-given right to despoil, some veiled threats to shoot gun-control revenuers, and the protections of both First Amendments.

Sarah Palin, July 26, 2009, Fairbanks AK:

“What an absolutely beautiful day it is,
and it is my honor to speak to all Alaskans,
to our Alaskan family
this last time as your governor.
And it is always great to be in Fairbanks.
The rugged rugged hardy people that live up here
and some of the most patriotic people
whom you will ever know live here,
and one thing that you are known for
is your steadfast support
of our military community up here
and I thank you for that
and thank you United States military
for protecting the greatest nation on Earth.
Together we stand.

And getting up here
I say it is the best road trip in America
soaring through nature’s finest show.
Denali, the great one, soaring
under the midnight sun.

And then the extremes.
In the winter time
it’s the frozen road that is competing
with the view of ice fogged frigid beauty,
the cold though, doesn’t it
split the Cheechakos
from the Sourdoughs?

And then in the summertime
such extreme summertime
about a hundred and fifty degrees hotter
than just some months ago,
than just some months from now,
with fireweed blooming
along the frost heaves
and merciless rivers that are rushing
and carving and reminding us
that here, Mother Nature wins.
It is as throughout all Alaska
that big wild good life
teeming along the road
that is north to the future.

That is what we get to see every day.
Now what the rest of America
gets to see along with us
is in this last frontier
there is hope and opportunity
and there is country pride.

And it is our men and women in uniform securing it,
and we are facing tough challenges in America
with some seeming to just be Hell bent
maybe on tearing down our nation,
perpetuating some pessimism, and suggesting
American apologetics, suggesting perhaps
that our best days were yesterdays.

But as other people have asked,
“How can that pessimism be,
when proof of our greatness, our pride today
is that we produce the great proud volunteers
who sacrifice everything for country?”
Now this week alone, Sean Parnell and I
were on the, um, on Ft. Rich
the base there, the army chapel,
and we heard the last roll call,
and the sounding of Taps
for three very brave, very young Alaskan soldiers
who just gave their all for all of us.
Together we do stand with gratitude
for our troops who protect all of our cherished freedoms,
including our freedom of speech
which, par for the course, I’m going to exercise.

And first, some straight talk
for some, just some in the media
because another right protected for all of us
is freedom of the press,
and you all have such important jobs
reporting facts and informing the electorate,
and exerting power to influence.
You represent what could and should be
a respected honest profession
that could and should be
the cornerstone of our democracy.

Democracy depends on you,
and that is why, that’s why
our troops are willing to die for you.
So, how ’bout in honor of the American soldier,
ya quite makin’ things up?
And don’t underestimate the wisdom of the people,
and one other thing for the media,
our new governor has a very nice family too,
so leave his kids alone.

OK, today is a beautiful day
and today as we swear in Sean Parnell,
no one will be happier than I
to witness by God’s grace
Alaskans with strength of character
advancing our beloved state.
Sean has that.
Craig Campbell has that.
I remember on that December day,
we took the oath to uphold our state constitution,
and it was written right here in Fairbanks
by very wise pioneers.

We shared the vision for government
that they ground in that document.
Our founders wrote “all political power is inherent in the people.
All government originates with the people.
It’s founded upon their will only
and it’s instituted for the good of the people as a whole.”
Their remarkably succinct words
guided us in all of our efforts
in serving you and putting you first,
and we have done our best to fulfill promises
that I made on Alaska Day, 2005,
when I first asked for the honor of serving you.

Remember then, our state so desired
and so deserved ethics reform.
We promised it, and now it is the law.
Ironically, it needs additional reform
to stop blatant abuse from partisan operatives,
and I hope the lawmakers will continue that reform.
We promised that you would finally see
a fair return on your Alaskan owned natural resources
so we build a new oil and gas appraisal system,
an is an equitable formula to usher in
a new era of competition and transparency
and protection for Alaskans and the producers.

ACES incentivizes new exploration
and it’s the exploration that is our future.
It opens up oil basins and it ensures
that the people will never be taken advantage of again.
Don’t forget Alaskans
you are the resource owners per our constitution
and that’s why for instance last year
when oil prices soared and state coffers swelled,
but you were smacked with high energy prices,
we sent you the energy rebate. See,
it’s your money and I’ve always believed
that you know how to better spend it
than government can spend it.

I promised that we would protect this beautiful environment
while safely and ethically developing resources, and we did.
We built the Petroleum Oversight Office
and a sub-cabinet to study climate conditions.
And I promised I’d govern with fiscal restraint,
so to not immorally burden futre generations.
And we did…we slowed the rate of government growth
and I vetoed hundreds of millions of dollars of excess
and wtih lawmakers we saved billions for the future.

I promsed that we’d lead the charge
to forward funding education,
and hold schools accountable,
and improve opportunities for special needs students
and elevate vo-tech training
and we paid down pension debt.

I promised that we would manage our fish and wildlife for abundance,
and that we would defend the constitution, and we have,
though outside special interest groups
they still just don’t get it on this one.
Let me tell you, Alaskans really need to stick together on this
with new leadership in this area especially,
encouraging new leadership…
got to stiffen your spine to do what’s right
for Alaska when the pressure mounts,
because you’re going to see anti-hunting,
anti-second amendment circuses from Hollywood
and here’s how they do it.

They use these delicate, tiny, very talented celebrity starlets,
they use Alaska as a fundraising tool
for their anti-second amendment causes.
Stand strong, and remind them
patriots will protect our guaranteed,
individual right to bear arms,
and by the way, Hollywood needs to know,
we eat, therefore we hunt.

I promised energy solutions and we have,
we have a plan calling for 50% of our electricity
generated by renewable resources
and we can now insist that those who hold the leases
to develop our resources
that they do so now on Alaska’s terms.
So now finally after decades of just talk,
finally we’re seeing oil and gas drilling
up there at Point Thompson.

And I promised that we would get
a natural gas pipeline underway and we did.
Since I was a little kid growing up here,
I remember the discussions,
especially the political discussions
just talking about and hoping for
and dreaming of commercializing
our clean, abundant, needed natural gas.

Our gas line inducement act, AGIA,
that was the game-changer
and this is thanks to our outstanding gas line team,
and the legislature adopting this law, 58-1.
They knew, they know AGIA is the vehicle
to drive this monumental energy project
and bring everyone to the table,
this bipartisan victory,
it came from Alaskans working together
with free market private sector principles,
and now we are on the road
to the largest private-sector energy project
in the history of America.
It is for Alaska’s future,
it is for America’s energy independence
and it will make us a more peaceful,
prosperous and secure nation.

What I promised, we accomplished.
“We” meaning state staff,
amazing commissioners,
great staff assisting them,
and conscientious Alaskans
outside the bureaucracy –
Tom Van Flein, and Meg Stapleton
and Kristan Cole, so many others,
many volunteers who just stepped up
to the challenge as good Alaskans,
but nothing, nothing could have succeeded
without my right-hand man Kris Perry.
She is the sharpest, boldest, hardest-working partner.
Kris is my right-hand man and much success is due to Kris.

So much success, and Alaska
there is much good in store further down the road,
but to reach it we must value
and live the optimistic pioneering spirit
that made this state proud and free,
and we can resist enslavement to big central government
that crushes hope and opportunity.
Be wary of accepting government largess.
It doesn’t come free and often, accepting it
takes away everything that is free,
melting into Washington’s powerful “care-taking” arms
will just suck incentive to work hard
and chart our own course
right out of us,
and that not only contributes to an unstable economy
and dizzying national debt,
but it does make us less free.

I resisted the stimulus package.
I resisted the stimulus package
and we have championed earmark reform,
slashing earmark requests by 85%
to break the cycle of dependency
on a stifling, unsustainable federal agenda,
and other states should follow this
for their and for America’s stability.
We don’t have to feel
that we must beg an allowance from Washington,
except to beg the allowance to be self-determined.
See, to be self-sufficient,
Alaska must be allowed to develop –
to drill and build and climb,
to fulfill statehood’s promise.
At statehood we knew this.

At statehood we knew this,
that we are responsible for ourselves
and our families and our future,
and fifty years later,
please let’s not start believing
that government is the answer.
It can’t make you happy
or healthy or wealthy or wise.
What can? It is the wisdom of the people
and our families and our small businesses,
and industrious individuals,
and it is God’s grace,
helping those who help themselves,
and then this allows that very generous
voluntary hand up that we’re known for,
enthusiastically providing those who need it.

Alaskans will remember that years ago,
remember we sported the old bumper sticker that said,
“Alaska. We Don’t Give a Darn How They Do It Outside?”
Do you remember that? I remember that,
and remember it was because we would be different.
We’d roll up our sleeves,
and we would diligently sow and reap,
and we can still do this
to carve wealth out of the wilderness
and make our living on the water,
with strong hands and innovative minds,
now with smarter technology.

It is what our first people and our parents did.
It worked, because they worked.
We must be prudent and persistent
and press for the people’s right
to responsibly develop God-given resources
for the maximum benefit of the people.

And we have come so far in just 50 years.
We’re no longer a frontier outpost
on the periphery of the world’s greatest nation.
Now, as a contributor and a securer of America,
we can attain our destiny
in the promise of our motto “North to the Future.”
See, the pressing issue of our time,
it’s energy independence,
because there is an inherent link
between energy and security,
and energy and prosperity.
Alaska will lead with energy,
we will prove you can be both
pro-development and pro-environment,
because no one loves their clean air
and their land and their wildlife
and their water more than an Alaskan.
We will protect it.

Yes, America must look north to the future
for security, for energy independence,
for our strategic location on the globe.
Alaska is the gate-keeper of the continent.

So, we are here today at a changing of the guard.
Now, people who know me,
and they know how much I love this state,
some still are choosing not to hear
why I made the decision
to chart a new course to advance the state.
And it should be so obvious to you. (indicating heckler)
It is because I love Alaska this much, sir (at heckler)
that I feel it is my duty to avoid
the unproductive, typical, politics as usual,
lame duck session in one’s last year in office.
How does that benefit you?
No, with this decision now,
I will be able to fight even harder for you,
for what is right, for truth.
And I have never felt
like you need a title to do that.

So, as we all move forward together,
let’s vow to keep championing Alaska,
to advocate responsible development,
and smaller government, and freedom,
and when I took the oath to serve you,
I promised… remember I promised
to steadfastly and doggedly guard
the interests of this great state
like that grizzly guards her cubs,
as a mother naturally guards her own.

And I will keep that vow
wherever the road may lead.
Todd and I, and Track, Bristol,
Tripp, Willow, Piper, Trig…I think I got ’em all.
We will forever be so grateful
for the honor of our lifetime to have served you.
Our whole big diverse full and fun family,
we all thank you and I am very very blessed
to have had their support all along,
for Todd’s support. I am thankful too.
I have been blessed
to have been raised in this last frontier.
Thank you for our home, Mom and Dad,
because in Alaska
it is not an easy living,
but it is a good living,
and here it is impossible to lose your way.
Wherever the road may lead you,
we have that steadying great north star to guide us home.

So let’s all enjoy the ride, and I thank you Alaska,
and God bless Alaska and God bless America.”

National Assembly is antiwar exclusively

unite-against-the-warReports are emerging from July’s National Assembly, the vital effort to unite antiwar forces into a common movement. Delegates from the major peace organizations hammered out a strategy to address Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and Palestine. Missing from the consensus? Nonviolence, and good riddance. It goes without saying that humanitarian activists are peaceful. To legislate a dogma of non-confrontation plays right into the hands of the authoritarians. Here’s the official report:

AN ASSESSMENT OF THE FIRST YEAR OF THE NATIONAL ASSEMBLY TO END THE IRAQ AND AFGHANISTAN WARS AND OCCUPATIONS

Address given by Marilyn Levin, member, National Assembly Administrative Body, and Planning Committee, Greater Boston United for Justice with Peace Coalition, to the National Antiwar Conference held July 10-12, 2009 in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania

July 10-12, 2009, 255 people representing diverse organizations and constituencies from all over the country came together in Pittsburgh:

1) To look at where we are today,

2) To articulate our long range goals to rejuvenate the antiwar movement towards building a massive movement capable of forcing an end to their wars and occupations, to take our money back from the war machine to meet pressing social needs, and to save our planet for our children, and

3) To develop and vote for action plans as steps to realize these objectives.

All of our major objectives were accomplished and we leave today with a comprehensive action agenda to carry us through to next spring. Everyone had a chance to speak and differences were aired without rancor or splits to achieve unity in action.

Friday night’s speakers, along with many conference participants, grappled with how to unify and broaden the movement. Saturday afternoon and Sunday morning, we presented a great roster of workshops covering the major issues we face today. Saturday night’s rally was dynamic and inspiring.

There were two highlights of the conference for me. First was the international component where activist comrades joined us from Canada and courageous labor leaders of powerful mass movements in Haiti and Guadaloupe reminded us that imperialism and the struggle against it are global. There was a statement by members of the Viva Palestina aid convoy detained in Egypt. We passed motions in solidarity with the struggles of the people of Haiti, Honduras, and Palestine.

The second highlight was the discussion on Iran, where, in spite of strong passions stirred up by the rapidly evolving events there, we were able to illuminate the issues and debate our differences. Finally, we were able to agree on a unity position that all could embrace, as well as meeting the foremost call of the Iranians – US Hands off! No Sanctions! No interventions! Self-determination for the Iranian people! A wonderful example of a united front –- as inclusive as possible and taking principled positions that most will accept and act on.

So what is the National Assembly? What you saw this weekend explains who we are and how we function.

Democracy. All were invited and all perspectives welcomed. There was acceptance of the will of the conference even when it diverged from the proposals put forward by the leadership body. We were especially gratified that representatives from all the major antiwar coalitions came and addressed our conference.

Our willingness to struggle for unity and compromise when needed in order to move forward, as evidenced by a leadership that did not impose personal political views on others in service to unity.

An organization that admits to and learns from its mistakes and accepts its limitations when the unity we seek can’t yet be achieved.

An organization that has built a growing cadre of leaders that has developed trust, a structure that works, and a strong working relationship.

And finally, confidence, vision, and optimism. Confidence that we can provide leadership in rebooting our movement. A vision regarding how to accomplish that and an understanding of the necessity for these kinds of conferences leading to action. Optimism that masses of people will move in opposition to these horrendous policies that bring death and destruction and that they will have the power to change the world.

I’ve been asked to give an assessment of the first year since our initiation as an ongoing network with a mission, from our first conference in June, 2008 until today. Last year, we weren’t sure anyone would come and lo and behold 400 people came together in Cleveland to inaugurate a year of activities and set up a structure to maintain our work. A lot has transpired in that year and the National Assembly is well on its way as an established organization recognized throughout the movement as providing leadership and promoting a direction towards growth.

I need to start a little earlier and go back to why the National Assembly was called into existence in the first place.

What we saw, in the spring of 2008, was a movement at a low ebb – one that was shrinking rather than growing in spite of the war dragging on — this while the antiwar sentiment couldn’t be higher, and the disapproval rating for the Bush Administration couldn’t have been lower. From the high point of the largest action against the Iraq War in September, 2005 which drew 700,000 people, there was a pulling away from mass action by significant sections of the movement which supported electoral politics as the central strategy, in spite of a recurring pattern of disappointment when Democratic “antiwar” candidates voted again and again for war and war funding, and a split between the two major national coalitions, UFPJ and ANSWER, one that continues to this day. For the first time in five years, there was not enough unity or mass action perspective for any national demonstrations to take place marking the 5th year of the occupation of Iraq. Fundamentally, there was a vacuum of leadership.

Some far-sighted people like Jerry Gordon and Jeff Mackler, with experience gained from leadership in the last powerful antiwar movement that ended the Vietnam War, felt impelled to act. They began to organize a base of diverse but like-minded activists committed to building and expanding an effective antiwar movement in this country. The vehicle to accomplish this was the first national assembly, a national conference to pull activists together, to analyze the present state of the movement, to discuss where we needed to go and the actions that were needed to get us there.

We developed a unity statement with five basic principles that we hold today as the basis for where we stand:

1) Unity – all sections of the movement working together for common goals and actions;

2) Political Independence – no affiliations or support to any political party;

3) Democracy – decision-making at conferences with one person, one vote;

4) Mass Action – as the central strategy for organizing while embracing other forms of
outreach and protest; and

5) Out Now – the central demand to withdraw all military forces, contractors, and bases
from the countries where the U.S. was waging war on the people.

It seems simple but no one else saw it that way. Our conference was unique in the history of the present movement.

The organizers didn’t know what the mood and composition or strength of the conference would be, so we were cautious and minimal in the program we posed to the conference. We focused on Out Now from Iraq and modest action proposals, not being strong enough to initiate national actions on our own. The conference participants were ahead of us and ready to tackle the larger issues. Proposals were passed to add “Out Now from Afghanistan”, “End U.S. Support for the Occupation of Palestine”, and “Hands off Iran” to our set of demands, and given what has transpired in these areas, we were well prepared to take on a major role.

October 10th actions held in 20 cities were endorsed as well as a call for December actions building towards what we hoped would be unified, nationally coordinated bicoastal mass actions in the spring of 2009, the 6th year of the Iraq occupation. When Gaza was brutally assaulted, we joined with ANSWER and others to march in Washington and to demonstrate in the streets all over the country, and we’re still working under Palestinian leadership to bring justice and relief to a beleaguered population.

We made a concerted effort to find a common date for spring bi-coastal mobilizations. As you know, ANSWER chose March 21st as a day of united protests which we endorsed, while UFPJ called for a national march on Wall St. on April 4th. A number of National Assembly supporters who were also delegates to the UFPJ conference in December formed a mass action unity caucus and went to the conference with a resolution to allow delegates to vote for one or both actions but this was rejected. We’ll keep trying for 2010. The National Assembly endorsed and built both actions and marched behind our signs with our demands. The demonstrations were small (but spirited) and still of major importance.

For us, it’s quality, not quantity, as we position ourselves to be in the forefront as the pendulum swings in our direction once again.

Some take the position that mass demonstrations are not effective, unless we can pull 100,000 protestors into the streets. This is short-sighted and does not address how we get from small to large. Any successful movement for change doesn’t start with 100,000 people, and there has never been significant social change without mass actions. I remember my first anti-Vietnam war demonstration was in 1963 in Detroit and we had 15 people. In 1965, SDS called the first national march against the war in Washington. 25,000 people turned out and we thought it was huge!

Everyone talks about reaching out to the thousands of young people who mobilized to elect Obama. We agree, but we say the way to do this is by offering education and action. Action beyond calling, and emailing, and faxing the politicians they placed in office.

Why are mass demonstrations so important to building a powerful movement? It is because they accomplish so much in the process of building them. They provide:

Continuity. You can’t build anything by starting anew each time. Each action should lead to the next action or open national conference, with success building upon success. We need a continuity of leadership that builds trust and a reputation for integrity, and that learns lessons to improve. We need a continuity of organization and structure that can implement the tasks before us.

Visibility. Actions in the street give heart to the people the U.S. is attacking and occupying, letting them know that they are not alone. Mass actions create solidarity, offering support to anti-war soldiers, vets and their families, and a counter-force to the economic draft facing our youth, and they strengthen and deepen the antiwar sentiment of the people.

Inspiration. New people are brought into the movement, especially the youth, through activism. Have you ever talked to young people coming to a mass demonstration for the first time? They are inspired and thrilled to hear powerful speakers who are leaders of social justice movements and soldiers resisting the wars. They see they are not alone and get a taste of the power of large numbers of people marching together. They are energized to go home and join with others to continue to organize opposition to brutal U.S. wars and occupations. This is the way to reach out to the Obama supporters.

Explanation. An analysis of what is going on is offered along with tying together what seem at first to be disparate elements, i.e., war is tied to the economy, the war budget, bail-outs of the rich, the lack of basic needs being met, justice denied, and the impoverishment of the people.

Pressure on Government. People in this country are taught to be quiet. We’re told that our job is to elect officials whom we agree with periodically and then go home and wait while they fix things. This conveniently maintains the status quo but it sure doesn’t put pressure on them, or scare them, or force social change. Mass actions provide the most effective way to make significant change happen.

Let’s look at the present period. Obama’s election was based in large part on the hopes and aspirations of Americans for peace and a better life based on the promises and assumed promises that were made of peace, justice, and prosperity, which have not and will not be met.

Contrary to expectations, the previous administration’s policies are continued with a more handsome and articulate face. We all know that rather than winding down, wars and interventions are escalating and the rapacious greed of this immoral system knows no bounds.

Simultaneously, the economic crisis is causing terrible hardship for working people and for people who are no longer able to find work and their families. They are using this self-created financial disaster to further cut the standard of living and eliminate a secure future for older people and the young.

It was very moving and yet appalling to see this visually demonstrated when Robin Alexander of the United Electrical Workers Union asked people in the audience to stand who were unemployed, personally knew of soldier casualties, lived in communities where services were being cut, or who were otherwise negatively impacted by the wars and the failing economy. Nearly the entire room, a microcosm of the wider society, was standing by the end of that exercise.

It is inevitable that the present period of quiescence and hanging on to the hope that Obama and the new Congress will save us will come to a crashing end. People will not sit idly by forever while the world around them collapses. We are already seeing the beginnings of stirring. There is a greater willingness to go out in the streets to protest. There is more organizing taking place on campuses, more young people joining the movement. The many proposals for October actions are an indication that there is a widespread awareness of the need for actions this fall and the conviction that the movement must find common dates.

Brian Becker, National Coordinator of ANSWER, urged that we all work together to mount nationally coordinated actions next spring. Michael McPhearson, Co-Chair of UFPJ and Executive Director of Veterans for Peace, announced his support for October 17 and his willingness to do what he could to spur unified actions in the spring of 2010. We must have the faith and confidence that the people have the power to end the atrocities resulting from U.S. wars and occupations, and that they will recognize and utilize this power. As this happens, we must build a stronger antiwar movement that is able to provide leadership and the optimism to forge ahead no matter what the opposition throws at us.

The National Assembly to End the Iraq and Afghanistan Wars and Occupations is helping to provide that leadership and the vision that is needed. Although young and small, in one short year, we are now a force to be taken seriously and negotiated with, and by our persistent call for unity and mass action, our demonstrated ability to organize, and our coordinated strategy for revitalizing the movement, we are having an impact larger than our forces would indicate. In some ways, we too are a product of (and some say an antidote to) the 2008 election. To counter the malaise of the movement, we have quietly been building a solid core of activists and leaders around the country that understand the importance of a united front organized around principled demands and mass actions, not just calling Washington politicians when bills come up and crises happen.

At this conference, we have laid out an ambitious program of action that will take us through the spring of 2010. We are proud that we could provide the kick off for national organizing to bring a massive turnout to Pittsburgh for the G-20 protests September 25. Homeland Security is already making preparations to keep protesters hidden and stifle our right to speak out, but we won’t be silenced.

Following that, are a series of October building actions, culminating in large local and regional demonstrations on October 17 marking dates of significance related to the Iraq and Afghanistan wars and occupations and remembering the legacy of the anti-Vietnam war movement. Throughout the year, we will organize educational programs, support various forms of protest and organize around the inevitable emergencies caused by our government’s unholy interventions and threats to other nations.

We have initiated a Free Palestine Working Committee to ensure this work, which includes the growing boycott, divestment, and sanctions campaigns and the efforts to break the siege of Gaza, continues to be in the forefront and fully integrated in our work until justice and self-determination and return is in the hands of the Palestinians.

And lastly, we will continue to advocate for unity of the movement and once again bring thousands to Washington and the West Coast in the spring, to let our government and the world know that the U.S. movement against wars and occupations is alive and will not be quiet.

We will march and continue to march until all U.S. forces come home, bases are dismantled, and the sovereign people of the world have the right to control their own resources and determine their own futures, and the war budget becomes the peace budget.

Don’t sit on the sidelines and watch history being made. We urge all organizations to join the National Assembly and to play your part in building and shaping the powerful movement that is coming.

All out for the September 25 G-20 march in Pittsburgh! All out for the actions in early October! All out October 17!

Addict, pederast dies, much fanfare

But let’s look past the innuendo and unproven transgressions, to celebrate the man’s contribution to the cannon of Western popular music product. Please!

I hear celebrities dismiss the allegations of Michael Jackson’s pedophilia like too much water under the bridge, which would be true I suppose, if Jackson’s victims were more like John Wayne Gacy’s, buried under Neverland, instead of tucked into San Fernando Valley homes, divvying multimillion-dollar payoffs with their enterprising panderer parents. Will the confidentiality clauses stand between the public ever knowing which pederast was the more prolific? That innuended, I do concur those bottoms were small fry compared to Jackson’s true sick imprint on America.

The Michael Jackson TM projected a perversion of role models. Not even a cynical anti-hero, the self-crowned King of Pop was the nul-idol. Jackson rejected his skin color, his sexuality, even his place of belonging among mortals. Other than pathos for the sick dance-cyborg who never had a childhood, what humanity did Jackson share to communicate? To be fair, it wasn’t Jackson who kept the spotlight trained on his black/white Icarus act, foisting the unnatural deception that man can soar with a single glove.

Now dead, Jocko is heralded as among the greatest. But MJ was an internationally recognized poster child for enfeebled humanity, a glorified counter-renaissance man, resembling a human being like a drag queen pretends femininity. He may have channeled vinyl High Fructose Corn Syrup like no other, walking backward while dancing and such, but worth what legacy exactly? Jackson shares the ignobless of the Big Mac, the Lucky Strike cigarette, and DDT. Iconic and good riddance.

Michael Jackson did nothing for black emancipation, or acceptance of homosexuals, or the plight of the children of poverty. The vast majority of the world’s children are “robbed of their childhoods,” you narcissistic rich dumb-ass, and that didn’t stop you from amassing your vast fortune at their expense.

Jackson probably did more to amplify the phobia against pedophiles, the single minority he did incarnate, by denying the preponderance of indicators, by vilifying his accusers, instead of taking his riches to Dubai right from the start, to show the world into what true debauchers wet their willies.

He might even have championed sympathy for plastic surgery binge-purgers, but he lied about that worm-hole until his nose literally fell off. I remember when Jackson made public appearances in surgery masks, feeding the fiction that he was a germophobe. Meanwhile everyone in Hollywood knew from their own rhinoplasties about the actual face-saving purpose of those masks.

Perversely, it was Jackson’s least aberrant eccentricity that killed him. Drugs. Even as TV viewers watch Jackson’s body pass from helicopter to ambulance, over a red carpet no less, Big Pharma makes sure that the talking heads refer to Jackson’s narcotics as “pain-killers.” Jocko was in constant pain, apparently, like Rush Limbaugh and all overachievers etc, hence their susceptibility to addiction. You’d think the alibi would eventually defy credulity.

Prescription drugs circulate among the well-to-do, with the same ease with which the rich have access to good lawyers. The difference between street and medical drugs is that no one cares about the heroin or crack addict’s “pain.”

All the celebrities speaking in tribute to Michael Jackson want to minimize the ugliness Jacko paraded, even, and especially his drug habit. Some who profess to have been close friends express their utter shock at Jackson’s passing, at his frail condition and the magnitude of his drug use. How close could they have been?! Or how culpable are they still on Big Pharma’s not-yet-upped jig?

Jackson was the King of Sick Culture. His collaborator eulogizers are its second tier whores. What contemptible shills, who’ve got theirs, behind their Beverly Hills gates and their own golden narcotics tickets. Even at the premature passing of a unique creative soul, due without question to drug abuse, his peers don’t want to aggravate the corporate forces which continue to pervert the human social animal to beyond self-recognition.

Stand united against Christian Endtimers who cheerlead colonial war for Zionism

Christians United For Israel
SUNDAY 5/17- Colorado Springs Christians United For Israel has scheduled A Night to Honor Israel to instruct one and all “WHY it is necessary to stand united for Israel: “Biblically, Morally, Geo-politically” on Sunday May 17, from 3pm-7pm at the City Auditorium. Can you guess there will be something to say about this outside?

COLORADANS FOR PEACE will be providing counterbalance to the racist war-mongering outside the City Auditorium, from before 3pm Sunday, until this message is heard: JUSTICE FOR PALESTINE, NO WAR WITH IRAN.

night-to-honor-israelWith the consent and aid of the US, Israel most recently committed horrible atrocities in Gaza and Lebanon, and they continue to seize Palestinian land and oppress the Palestinian people. Inciting America’s Christian community to rally for Zionist racism is exactly what will not serve the cause of peace in the Middle East.

The CUFI invite reads: “Join us for Colorado Springs’ first ever Night to Honor Israel as Christian and Jewish communities gather in a show of support for Israel. The event boasts traditional Israeli song and dance, a beautiful banner presentation of the Tribes of Israel, and dynamic speakers that will convey the importance of standing with Israel and encourage us to action. There will be an Israeli Marketplace, and the event will close with a light reception.”

Which sounds reasonable enough, until of course the mention of “encourage us to action.” By action, the CUFI guest speakers mean war with Iran.

yes-will-stand-with-israelThe Colorado Springs event is one of scores scheduled across the country this weekend, intended as “a gift to Israel on the anniversary of her creation,” an expression of unconditional support “in Israel’s hour of need.” Israel has in the last hour cast Lebanon and Gaza into death throes, as it grades the remainder of Palestine for Jewish settlements. By hour of need, do they mean, the threat posed by Iran acquiring nuclear weapons? Iran has never threatened the “destruction of Israel” other than the expressed hope that her Zionist system of apartheid borders be dissolved and the inhabitants of the region be permitted a democratic regime of their choosing.

Here are some sample banner slogans:
CHRISTIAN RIGHT + ZIONISM = UNHOLY ALLIANCE
WHAT FRIEND OF ISRAEL CONDEMNS JEWS TO HELL?
ISRAEL IS NOT YOUR ESCHATOLOGICAL PAWN
CHRISTIAN ZIONISTS ARE ANTI-SEMITES

Here’s the COLORADANS FOR PEACE invite, please pass it around!

Fellow peace activists,
If you haven’t heard already, we will be protesting “A NIGHT TO HONOR ISRAEL” to be held at the Colorado Springs City Auditorium this Sunday. The event is sponsored by Christians United For Israel, which teaches unconditional support of Israel, and is currently advocating for a US attack on Iran.

This event is touted as the “First Annual” for Colorado Springs, and is among 60 happening on the same day all over the country as “a gift to Israel.” The same featured speakers have been traveling the US over the last several months urging unilateral support for Israel “in her hour of great need.”

COLORADANS FOR PEACE is determined to show that the City of Colorado Springs must not be considered an accomplice to Israel’s racist motives and criminal actions. We believe that peace in the Middle East will not be reached by escalated militarism and preemptive violence.

Please contact whomever you think would be interested. We will assemble on the sidewalk across the street from the City Auditorium at 221 E. Kiowa Street, between Nevada Ave and Weber Street. We’ll be there from 3pm to 6pm or so, serving as peaceful witness against war and racism. We will have Palestinian flags and banners which read OCCUPATION IS A CRIME and STAND WITH GAZA, among others. More information, and updates can be found at http://coloradansforpeace.org

WHAT: Witness for peace at COS Pro-Israel rally
WHERE: Across from City Auditorium at 221 E. Kiowa St.
WHEN: Sunday May 17, from 3 PM to 6 PM,
WHO: Coloradans For Peace with other organizations working toward promoting peace in the Middle East

Feel free to call me if you have any questions. I can be reached at 719.460.2836. Whatever assistance you can provide will be greatly appreciated.

Yours,

Eric Verlo
Coloradans For Peace

Borel & Mine That Bird moon horseracing

Calvin Borel rides MINE THAT BIRD from last place to first at the 2009 Kentucky DerbyTo watch the replay of Calvin Borel’s ride at Churchill Downs is more captivating than it was live. Even anticipating the 50 to 1 upset, Mine That Bird‘s final stretch weave from last place to first looks like an athletic feat for Maradona.

It happened so fast, Mine That Bird was mentioned only once before the end of the race, even then it was almost an omission. Borel was so far behind, laying back after getting squeezed coming out of the gate by Papa Clem and Join In the Dance, that the broadcast announcer missed him entirely, declaring that “the last of them all is Mr. Hot Stuff.” Midway through his next phrase he corrects himself to add that “–well behind the rest of them is Mine That Bird.”

From that point, Mine That Bird’s wild ride is ignored even beyond his breakthrough into the lead. As Borel bursts into contention along the inside rail, the announcer erupts “Pioneer of the Nile!” by mistake, or if even because he was looking elsewhere. It isn’t until Borel pulls to a several length lead that Mine That Bird gets a credit. Such was the upset.

Seen from the aerial view, the finish was not a surprise at all. Accelerating into the last turn, Borel and Mine That Bird wove between the others like they were plotting the shortest line between points. The speed differential reminded me of a Grand Prix racer when he’s passing the cars he’s already lapped. As the improbable pair began gaining, their momentum seemed all but irresistible. Watching the replay, you can see Borel’s attack, and marvel that it escaped the attention of all the professionals who usually weigh in so liberally with effusive expertise.

Horse racing is a legitimization of eugenics, meaning that when there is money on the line, genetic supremacy is hard science. That is perhaps what is so invigorating about the Churchill Downs upset. Calvin Borel, the physical personification of a toothless street-corner imbecile, and Mine That Bird, a horse sold for a price less than your average Paint, trained outside the gated enclaves of Kentucky.

RACE RESULT with ENTRY NUMBERS:
1. Mine That Bird #8
2. Pioneer of the Nile #16
3. Musket Man #2
4. Papa Clem #7
5. Chocolate Candy #11
6. Summer Bird #17
7. Join in the Dance #9
8. Regal Ransom #10
9. West Side Bernie #1
10. General Quarters #12
11. Dunkirk #15
12. Hold Me Back #5
13. Advice #4
14. Desert Party #19
15. Mr. Hot Stuff #3
16. Atomic Rain #14
17. Nowhere to Hide #18
18. Friesan Fire #6
19. Flying Private #20

America, Love it or Leave it? Let’s Go!

Bart SimpsonIn about 3 weeks we will be in South America! Anybody I tell that I will be taking my 12 year old with me to Colombia looks at me a little weird like??? That being the case I will let Bart Simpson explain just why we are doing what we are doing? Keep in mind, too, that my daughter goes to District 11 Schools Colorado Springs, which is quite a bit like Bart’s school, Springfield Elementary, Jack. Now check out Bart Dances the Cumbia for some real music and dancing!

Scary what those African rhythms can do to you, eh? I’m looking forward to hearing some good music on this home schooling education-vacation! It’ll be good to get away some from all these Right Wing American twits we have to put up with in our daily lives!

US Army blankets are generic today

US Army blanketWhen I was assembling my dorm room kit for college, I wanted an army blanket as a bed cover. For reasons I must have understood better then, the heavy duty olive drab wool, emblazoned with a U.S. monogram, was inarguably cool. Its generic quality was iconic, thus it had a caché more authentic than a stack of Izods. I considered my Army blanket to be the No. 2 Pencil of bed linens.

I forgot about that blanket until the Ward Churchill trial in Denver, when the contention arose whether the US army spread small pox to North Dakota Indians by means of infected blankets. Native American oral tradition has been retelling this tale, but the White Man’s narrative is pushing back.

The ignoble suggestion remains a penciled notation in American History texts, except by scholars such as Churchill, because anti-revisionists want to see more proof. Deniers seem to willfully overlook that perpetrators might have cloaked their trail, sooner than document their scurrilous coup. Where are the blankets, or invoices for the blankets? With only songs about the blankets, how is anyone to confirm their provenance? It’s hearsay, the defenders say, bitter, vindictive slander to implicate the US Army for the 1837 small pox epidemic, just because the Red Man’s comprehension could not attribute another cause.

Although the Indian accounts aren’t so pointed. They tell of an Indian chief who stole the blankets from the white soldiers, unwittingly bringing the outbreak back to his camp.

Now I’ll not assert that US Army blankets have always had a “U.S.” stenciled on them, nor even that they were army-colored, as khaki wasn’t on the uniform palette until the turn of the century. But governments have always needed to distinguish government property, to discourage their agents from divesting of their standard issue for personal gain.

I will contend that it is only from the perspective of our contemporary culture of abundance, that we presume a blanket is nondescript without a trademark. In our overloaded consumer economy, it is not unreasonable to believe that an item without its receipt cannot be assumed to have come from a particular store. Indeed we need designer logos to differentiate products when we cannot assess the quality for ourselves. Today, even thread-counters are at pains to tell an Eddie Bauer from a CJ Crew by touch. But not so in the Wild West. The carpet-bagger mercantile purveyors of the West may have ushered in mass-produced dry goods, but I hardly think varieties were indistinguishable. Wanna bet there was quite a difference between blankets woven by Indians, blankets bartered from trading posts, and standard army issue?

St Patricks Day Parade photos

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
COLORADO SPRINGS- Peace contingent in St Patrick’s Day parade.

(Click on images to see larger crop.)
St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Devon decorates last minute stand-in for the Bookmobile.

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Assembling at staging area, last position.

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Dancers, as MaryLynn and Dave look on.

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Layla and Andy

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Kat, Debbie and Lily

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Sarah, Dave and Jake on Kazoo.

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Friend of Ryan and Ryan.

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Amanda.

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Distributing the flags

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Mike looks back as we take off.

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
With motorcycle escort.

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Eric and Devon.

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Video grab from Mike Coletta.

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Lead banner. All subsequent photos by Devon.

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Dancers

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Tony leads drumming

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Drummers

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Drummers

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Pattie (three screen grabs from Loring’s video)

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Layla and Andy

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Looking down parade route

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Amanda

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Cheers

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Eric waves Iraq flag

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Amanda rides ahead

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Behind Amanda, are Jonathan, Rita, Loring and Marie.

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
More peace contingent two blocks back.

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Jonathan, tricked out bike, and Don’t Tread On Me.

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Flags of occupied lands.

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Reflection in Plaza of the Rockies.

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
At disbanding point, this police officer suddenly begins shouting MOVE MOVE MOVE!

St. Patricks Day Parade 2009
Patty triumphant.

What the hell is wrong with these freaks

Young Marines I mean.
I have PT in 7 hours and should be sleeping but this is weighing on me.
According to a couple of comments made by a kid who is a Member of their organization they recruited him by saying that if he didn’t join them, he would turn into a Homosexual Drug Addict…
Colorado Springs Celebrates Underage Vets

If “Devilpup” is actually an Adult leader of the organization and trying to sell it to us as a “Character Building” group then the dude is seriously messed up in his head.

If he IS actually just a member of the Junior Terrorist League, Young Marines Division, then the people who sold him that line of Bullshit are the ones who have a Serious Mental Deficit Disorder and are trying to make him, and his fellow kids, grow up as retarded as they are.

Aside from

These organizations are helping the youth of this nation make something of themselves–besides drug addicts, corrupt politicians, and gay pride parade dancers. (And yes, I don’t give a cr*p over political correctness. Wise people don’t.)

Being almost word for word a quote from Adolf Hitler…

They’re recruiting these kids into Paramilitary Organizations based on Fear of being Gay?

They seriously not only told that to the kids once, they apparently make them memorize the Hate.

They teach these kids that they’re better than Perry, who died with a needle in his arm, better than my friend “Hoot” Gibson, I used to work day labor with him, and yeah, he was a wino… Hoot tried to catch a train one day and slipped under the wheels…

Ira Hayes who died drunk in a ditch.

at least according to Private X.

Perry was in the Marine Raiders, went to Vietnam and Cambodia… I saw his commendations and know he was real.
But the Devilpups would, apparently, from the tone of the comment, considered him to be just another junkie.

Same with Clarence, Private X you never met Clarence and I hope for your sake that before you ever do you should clean up your attitude a little… No, make that “Clean it up a Whole Lot”.

Another VietNam Vet, Marine, came back but left some of his soul back in Nam.

Hoot was in the First Marines, a young sergeant when they were island hopping in the Pacific Theater. Operated a flamethrower.
In the years I knew him a lot of people thought of as just another bum, a wino. Yeah, he drank a lot, big deal.

He doesn’t need snot-nosed 14 year olds spitting on his memory. He didn’t tell me a damn thing about his service, other Marines did.

Ira Hayes I never met. He, too, fought in the Pacific Theater, they’ve got a statue of him from a really famous photograph…

He was one of the guys raising the flag on Mount Suribachi.

The Devilpups are teaching you Hatred for your fellow Americans and they should really seriously be ashamed of themselves for doing it.

Oh, and talking about somehow your Hatred Values being Christian or Godly, you should drop that Devil from your groups name.

I’m Brother Jonah, and I approved this message.

I’m Brother Jonah and I also Wrote this message.

I’m not in hiding, you want to brace me up sometime and discuss how your hatred for your fellow Americans is somehow Righteousness, I’m easy to find.

Colorado Springs government and police continue to lie about their raids on the Homeless

liars myersHOMELAND INSECURITY REPORT- The CS police, under the direction of Police Cap Ricky ‘Liars’ Myers, are continuing to fudge and pretend their innocence about their raids and harassment against the Homeless population in the city, on behalf of the Business Community which simply hates these unfortunate people. They want them all gone but can’t find a way to get it done without attracting public attention. So they have to play all sorts of mind games using the local press as conduit for their song and dance.

‘The cleanups first received negative publicity last fall after homeless advocates charged the monthly sweeps include improper searches and that personal belongings are routinely tossed out. The ACLU contends the cleanups violate the Fourth Amendment and the Colorado Constitution. ….. In bullet-point fashion, ACLU staff attorney Taylor Pendergrass describes its findings after it “interviewed dozens of persons who claimed to have had private property seized and destroyed by CSPD and KCSB.” Among them is that the cleanups were typically unannounced and conducted when homeless people were away from their camps and couldn’t protect their belongings. “Numerous different CSPD officers have been involved in seizing and destroying property, but many interviewees consistently identified CSPD Officer’s Olav Chaney and Tracey (sic) Fox,” Pendergrass wrote in the letter.’

Taken from ACLU: Cops look into sweeps at camps

Yellow Journalism meets its fate

BOULDER- How fitting that on the eve of Ward Churchill’s legal challenge against CU, for his firing on the basis of accusations championed by the Rocky Mountain News, that we encounter a pickup truck hauling off the last of that paper’s distribution boxes. No doubt still full! Good riddance!
Rocky Mountain News boxes

Israel is pot calling the kettle non-white

Zionist annual March of the Living
World Jewish leaders urge boycott of Durban conference -because the International Conference on Racism is planning to condemn Israeli racism. So the headlines scream: World Jewish Congress president lauds US’ decision to withdraw from anti-racism conference which he says ignores “plight of victims of true racism.” Head of European Jewish Congress calls on EU to boycott event as well. Then a curious headline invites conference attendees instead to join a pilgrimage to Auschwitz.

First of all, we’re accustomed to hearing that only Jews have been the victims of genocide. Did you know they are racism’s only true victims too?!

AuschwitzThe March of the Living is a Zionist organization dedicated to shepherding young “birthright” Jews to Nazi concentration camp memorial sites to indoctrinate them afresh with the horrors of the Holocaust. The visitors drape themselves with Israeli flags as they tour the iconographic gates and museums. Photographs are taken and reprinted in sepia tone, as if to depict the “Living” visitors in the same circumstances as less fortunate predecessors.

After which, the young charges travel to Israel, to participate in the anniversary of Israel’s creation.

Here is yesterday’s article on the MARCH OF THE LIVING 2009 invitation. I reprint it in its entirety because it is comically oblivious to irony. Here the “living” want to memorialize the dead, at the expense of the living. It’s a repudiation of hatred, by pretending it is vanquished.

Each classic Zionist fallacy is there: 1) to accuse Jews of racism is racism, 2) mankind has suffered no greater evil than the Holocaust, and 3) Auschwitz ergo Israel.

Auschwitz march to protest Durban II

This year’s March of the Living to be held while anti-racism conference convenes in Geneva. Organizers call on all government’s to follow US’ example, withdraw from gathering and attend march instead
Ynetnews

The International March of the Living has announced that precisely while many countries will be convening in Geneva for the Durban II gatherings, 10,000 youths—Jewish and non-Jewish—will be at the gates of Auschwitz on Tuesday, April 21, to give the next generation a strong platform to “Say No to Hatred Today.”

The event will commemorate several important milestone dates: International Holocaust Remembrance Day, the 70th anniversary of the beginning of World War II and the 60th anniversary of the ratification of the International Human Rights Declaration.

Organizers of the March of the Living saluted the decision of the United States Government to abstain from the planned proceedings in Geneva. “This is a compelling moral position by the US leadership, displaying that hatred and intolerance have no place in international discourse.” said Dr. Shmuel Rosenman, Chairman of the International March of the Living.

“We call upon all governments with conscience to follow suit and demonstrate the ultimate repudiation of genocide through participation in the March of the Living 2009 at Auschwitz.”

Global call for action
As a further means to counter the messages that are expected to emerge from the Geneva event, tens of contemporary victims of genocide, offering a united voice against hatred and persecution, have been invited to lead the march, which this year is under the sponsorship of Guma and Jamie Aguiar.

Canadian MP and former Justice Minister Irwin Cotler, internationally recognized human rights advocate, today announced his decision to come to Auschwitz from the conferences he will be attending then in Geneva—together with other well-known human rights activists—to join the youthful participants at March of the Living.

“Auschwitz is the most powerful symbol with which to memorialize evil found in Jewish history – in fact in the history of mankind,” said Cotler who also serves as the honorary co-chair of the International March of the Living Advisory Board. “It is a compelling reminder of the dangers of state-sanctioned incitement to hatred and genocide, and the indifference and inaction left in its wake. This global effort is a call to remembrance and action so that never again will we be indifferent in the face of mass atrocity and injustice.”

In addition to Cotler honorary co-chairs include: Dan Kurtzer, Lord Greville Janner, Jennifer Laszlo-Mizrahi, Tal Brody and Daniel Ayalon .

Since 1988, the March of the Living has brought over 140,000 students to Poland to participate in educational missions aimed at better understanding the horrors of the Holocaust.

The March of the Living, with an expected attendance of over 10,000 young people from around the world, will include a three kilometer march from Auschwitz to the death camp at Birkenau where over 1.5 million Jews perished. Most of the participants will then visit Israel during the week of that nation’s Memorial Day and Independence Day.

Machine men, with machine minds and machine hearts

Charlie-Chaplin-Great-DictatorThis weekend the kids and I watched Charlie Chaplin’s brilliant 1940 movie The Great Dictator. The film was released before the United States’ entry into World War II when our country was still at peace with Nazi Germany. Charlie Chaplin was an outspoken critic of Nazism and fascism while most Americans were either ignorant of or complacent about European goings-on. The Great Dictator is ingenious in its inexorable skewering of Hitler and Mussolini, done with complete levity and irreverance, a task made possible by Chaplin’s lack of foresight into the coming Holocaust. He admits he likely wouldn’t have made the film had he known about Hitler’s final solution.

Chaplin plays two characters in the film: Adenoid Hynkel (Adolf Hitler) and an obscure Jewish barber who resembles the great dictator. Chaplin undertook a meticulous study of Adolf Hitler’s manner of speaking in preparation for the film, and some of the most brilliant scenes are of Hynkel’s speeches, spoken in authentic German-sounding gibberish, delivered with all the wild-eyed passion, choking and spitting of Hitler himself. Hynkel is surrounded by cronies with amusing names: Goebbels is Herr Garbitsch (pronounced Garbage), Göring is Herr Herring, and leading the opposition is Benzino Napaloni — a portmanteau of Benito Mussolini and Napoleon Bonaparte.

In a plot twist near the end of the film, the Jewish barber is mistaken for Adenoid Hynkel and is called on to make a victory speech to thousands of Germans cheering the successful invasion of neighboring Osterlich (Austria). Bumbling to center stage completely unprepared, the imposter Herr Hynkel delivers this address to his buoyant followers:

I’m sorry but I don’t want to be an Emperor – that’s not my business – I don’t want to rule or conquer anyone. I should like to help everyone if possible, Jew, gentile, black man, white. We all want to help one another, human beings are like that.

We all want to live by each other’s happiness, not by each other’s misery. We don’t want to hate and despise one another. In this world there is room for everyone and the earth is rich and can provide for everyone.

The way of life can be free and beautiful.

But we have lost the way.

Greed has poisoned men’s souls – has barricaded the world with hate; has goose-stepped us into misery and bloodshed.

We have developed speed but we have shut ourselves in: machinery that gives abundance has left us in want. Our knowledge has made us cynical, our cleverness hard and unkind. We think too much and feel too little: More than machinery we need humanity; More than cleverness we need kindness and gentleness. Without these qualities, life will be violent and all will be lost.

The aeroplane and the radio have brought us closer together. The very nature of these inventions cries out for the goodness in men, cries out for universal brotherhood for the unity of us all. Even now my voice is reaching millions throughout the world, millions of despairing men, women and little children, victims of a system that makes men torture and imprison innocent people. To those who can hear me I say “Do not despair”.

The misery that is now upon us is but the passing of greed, the bitterness of men who fear the way of human progress: the hate of men will pass and dictators die and the power they took from the people, will return to the people and so long as men die [now] liberty will never perish…

Soldiers – don’t give yourselves to brutes, men who despise you and enslave you – who regiment your lives, tell you what to do, what to think and what to feel, who drill you, diet you, treat you as cattle, as cannon fodder.

Don’t give yourselves to these unnatural men, machine men, with machine minds and machine hearts. You are not machines. You are not cattle. You are men. You have the love of humanity in your hearts. You don’t hate – only the unloved hate. Only the unloved and the unnatural. Soldiers – don’t fight for slavery, fight for liberty.

In the seventeenth chapter of Saint Luke it is written ” the kingdom of God is within man ” – not one man, nor a group of men – but in all men – in you, the people.

You the people have the power, the power to create machines, the power to create happiness. You the people have the power to make life free and beautiful, to make this life a wonderful adventure. Then in the name of democracy let’s use that power – let us all unite. Let us fight for a new world, a decent world that will give men a chance to work, that will give you the future and old age and security. By the promise of these things, brutes have risen to power, but they lie. They do not fulfil their promise, they never will. Dictators free themselves but they enslave the people. Now let us fight to fulfil that promise. Let us fight to free the world, to do away with national barriers, do away with greed, with hate and intolerance. Let us fight for a world of reason, a world where science and progress will lead to all men’s happiness.

Soldiers – in the name of democracy, let us all unite!

Look up! Look up! The clouds are lifting – the sun is breaking through. We are coming out of the darkness into the light. We are coming into a new world. A kind new world where men will rise above their hate and brutality.

The soul of man has been given wings – and at last he is beginning to fly. He is flying into the rainbow – into the light of hope – into the future, that glorious future that belongs to you, to me and to all of us. Look up. Look up.

“Persecution” of White Christian Males…

And of Course, either Black, Hispanic, Asian etc Christian males aren’t persecuted or they’re not considered as “good” in the Kingdom of God as the White Ones.
 
I personally believe the second half of that sentence is the correct interpretation.

But…

It’s taken on an absurd level to which even I did not believe the Wreligious Wrong would sink.

First they fill our heads with “facts” like W.C.M.s make more money than the rest of combined.

Ok, that part actually is probably true.

Then they say “W.C.M.s give more money to Charity than all others combined”

That starts the Fudge Factor going a little.

First their definition of Charity includes such Noble Acts of Righteousness as

  • starting Young Republicans chapters,

    throwing a Chastity Ball (for those of you who aren’t in Colorado Springs that’s a Father-Daughter Formal Dance and Medieval Pseudo-Religious Ritual)

    and providing Political Propaganda “educational materials” for groups as diverse as Military Recruits, Kindergartners and Prisoners, books like “Jesus says to obey your Masters or Burn in Hell Forever”

  • Then of course, given Point 1 about W.C.M.s having more money than everybody else combined the Parable of the Widows Mite comes into play.

    AND NOW…

    They’re claiming that 9/11 was an act of Religious Persecution.

    By “attacking the symbols of our Economic Mastery and Capitalist Empire”

    I can see it.

    World Trade Center WAS a religious institution, an Idolatrous Temple dedicated to worship of the lower case “g” god of this world,

    the almighty yankee dollar

    They even call it “The Almighty”

    Hardly a Christian Concept.

    But at least, they’re partially admitting that their god means more to them than God.

    Israel’s initial response was to lie and deny it was using white phosphorus in Gaza

    burning-at-the-stakeWhen a criminal defendant lies in Court and gets caught at it, then the Court is less likely subsequently to believe anything else that might be said by the defendant. Israel initially totally denied using White Phosphorus in Gaza but now has retreated to its second line of lies, saying that it did use White Phosphorus but only to light up the sky! Here is Israel in the beginning with its first lie thrown out to the world public…

    On 13 January Brig-Gen Avi Benayahu, chief spokesman for the Israel Defense Force (IDF), said that in its assault on Gaza Israel was using weapons in accordance with international treaties and conventions. He denied Israel was using white phosphorus. ”I repeat Commander in Chief Ashkenazi’s words: The allegations of the IDF using WP [white phosphorus] are false.”

    That was taken from ISRAEL-OPT: Israel denies using white phosphorus in Gaza But Israel has moved on to its next line of fortified lies to the world public…

    “In response to the claims of NGOs and claims in the foreign press relating to the use of phosphorus weapons, and in order to remove any ambiguity, an investigative team has been established in the Southern Command to look into the issue,” said an Israel Defense Forces (IDF) spokesman. “It must be noted that international law does not prohibit the use of weaponry containing phosphorus to create smoke screens and for marking purposes. The IDF only uses weapons permitted by law.”

    An Israeli foreign ministry statement pointed to findings by the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), which said in mid-January that it found no evidence of illegal phosphorus use. “The investigation of this matter,” the spokesman said, was part of “routine IDF checks of its internal operating procedures and in no way indicated any illegal use.”

    The ICRC has since clarified its position. “The fact that International Humanitarian Law does not specifically prohibit phosphorous weapons does not imply that any specific use of weapons containing this substance is legal,” said Peter Herby, head of the ICRC’s Arms Unit. “The legality of each incident of use has to be considered in light of all of the fundamental rules I have mentioned. It may be legal or not, depending on a variety of factors.”

    That was taken from The Christian Science Monitor’s After the war, Gazans seek answers on white phosphorus

    The Godless God fearing Americans

    What is all this Goddamn pomp? “Non-believers” got a mention in Barack Obama’s inaugural address, dead last after Christians, Muslims, Jews and Hindus, even though they rank second, and even though church abstainers actually comprise the majority of Americans. Yet even this second day, mentions of God, Lord, and prayer, continue ad nauseum. Talk about disrespect.

    And why are atheists and agnostics named in the negative? Why aren’t they called rationalists? Churchgoers should be called reason disabled. What a farce. Are Americans to believe that Obama and his wife, Harvard grads, are religious? And which of the shysters of DC can be considered spiritual?

    I’m watching the service at the National Cathedral, which, taking into account the time zones, is eating well into Obama’s first day in office. Assembled are a bunch of pharisees, a disproportionate sampling for certain, to voice their prayers for our lawmakers. Where were they when Bush and cronies were in attendance?

    NOTE:
    Was Obama’s multi denominational ceremony representative of American believers? Let’s have a look at the distribution of the 20 religious leaders attending the National Prayer Service, as they relate to their corresponding population segments, in descending order of size:

    5 PROTESTANT EVANGELICALS, representing 27% of the US population:
    Rev. Sharon Watkins, president, Disciples of Christ in North America
    Rev. Andy Stanley, North Point Community Church
    Rev. Suzan Johnson-Cook, Believers Christian Fellowship Church
    Rev. Cynthia Hale, Ray of Hope Christian Church
    Rev. Jim Wallis, Sojourners

    7 MAINLINE PROTESTANTS, 21%
    Katharine Jefferts-Schori, presiding bishop, Episcopal Church
    Rev. John Bryson Chane, Washington Episcopal Bishop
    Rev. Samuel Lloyd, dean of the cathedral, Episcopal Church
    Canon Carol Wade, cathedral’s precentor
    (Note: Episcopalians represent !.3%, but are third richest group)
    Rev. Otis Moss Jr., father of pastor, Trinity United Church of Christ
    Kirbyjon Caldwell, Windsor Village United Methodist Church
    Rev. Wesley Granberg-Michaelson, Reformed Church in America

    2 CATHOLICS, 22%
    Donald Wuerl, Washington Catholic Archbishop
    Rev. Francisco Gonzalez, auxiliary bishop, Washington archdiocese

    1 MUSLIM, at 3%
    Ingrid Mattson, president, Islamic Society of North America

    1 each, HINDU and ORTHODOX, in sum 1.7%
    Uma Mysorekar, president, Hindu Temple Society of North America
    Archbishop Demetrios, primate, Greek Orthodox Church in America

    3 JEWS, at 1.5% (but richest)
    Rabbi Jerome Epstein, United Synagogue of Conservative Judaism
    Rabbi Haskal Lookstein, Congregation Kehilath Jeshurun
    Rabbi David Saperstein, Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism

    (Is that AIPAC’s influence extending to America’s Christians?)

    How about that corpulent Saddleback creep Rick Warren, reciting a completely forgettable invocation at yesterday’s inauguration?

    Unheard by the masses was Episcopal Bishop Gene Robinson’s earlier invocation, which was fathoms deeper than any of these high priests. HBO didn’t air it in their coverage of the Sunday inaugural buildup, but it’s available on Youtube. Here’s the transcript:

    A Prayer for the Nation and Our Next President, Barack Obama
    (Opening Inaugural Event, Lincoln Memorial, Washington, DC, January 18, 2009)
    By The Rt. Rev. V. Gene Robinson,
    Episcopal Bishop of New Hampshire

    Welcome to Washington! The fun is about to begin, but first, please join me in pausing for a moment, to ask God’s blessing upon our nation and our next president.

    O God of our many understandings, we pray that you will…

    Bless us with tears – for a world in which over a billion people exist on less than a dollar a day, where young women from many lands are beaten and raped for wanting an education, and thousands die daily from malnutrition, malaria, and AIDS.

    Bless us with anger – at discrimination, at home and abroad, against refugees and immigrants, women, people of color, gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender people.

    Bless us with discomfort – at the easy, simplistic “answers” we’ve preferred to hear from our politicians, instead of the truth, about ourselves and the world, which we need to face if we are going to rise to the challenges of the future.

    Bless us with patience – and the knowledge that none of what ails us will be “fixed” anytime soon, and the understanding that our new president is a human being, not a messiah.

    Bless us with humility – open to understanding that our own needs must always be balanced with those of the world.

    Bless us with freedom from mere tolerance – replacing it with a genuine respect and warm embrace of our differences, and an understanding that in our diversity, we are stronger.

    Bless us with compassion and generosity – remembering that every religion’s God judges us by the way we care for the most vulnerable in the human community, whether across town or across the world.

    And God, we give you thanks for your child Barack, as he assumes the office of President of the United States.

    Give him wisdom beyond his years, and inspire him with Lincoln’s reconciling leadership style, President Kennedy’s ability to enlist our best efforts, and Dr. King’s dream of a nation for ALL the people.

    Give him a quiet heart, for our Ship of State needs a steady, calm captain in these times.

    Give him stirring words, for we will need to be inspired and motivated to make the personal and common sacrifices necessary to facing the challenges ahead.

    Make him color-blind, reminding him of his own words that under his leadership, there will be neither red nor blue states, but the United States.

    Help him remember his own oppression as a minority, drawing on that experience of discrimination, that he might seek to change the lives of those who are still its victims.

    Give him the strength to find family time and privacy, and help him remember that even though he is president, a father only gets one shot at his daughters’ childhoods.

    And please, God, keep him safe. We know we ask too much of our presidents, and we’re asking FAR too much of this one. We know the risk he and his wife are taking for all of us, and we implore you, O good and great God, to keep him safe. Hold him in the palm of your hand – that he might do the work we have called him to do, that he might find joy in this impossible calling, and that in the end, he might lead us as a nation to a place of integrity, prosperity and peace.

    AMEN.

    Compare and contrast to Rick Warren’s pop Sunday School simpleton-centric tripe. Transcripts have been posted online, discreetly correcting Warren’s 44/43 arithmetic error.

    Almighty God, Our Father, everything we see and everything we can’t see exists because of You alone. It all comes from You, it all belongs to You, it all exists for Your glory. History is your story. The Scripture tells us, ‘Hear, oh Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord is one’ and You are the compassionate and merciful one and You are loving to everyone You have made.

    Now today we rejoice not only in America’s peaceful transfer of power for the 44th time, we celebrate a hinge-point of history with the inauguration of our first African American president of the united states. We are so grateful to live in this land, a land of unequaled possibility, where a a son of an African Immigrant can rise to the highest level of our leadership. And we know today that Dr. King and a great cloud of witnesses are shouting in heaven.

    Give to our new president, Barack Obama, the wisdom to lead us with humility, the courage to lead us with integrity, the compassion to lead us with generosity. Bless and protect him, his family, Vice President Biden, the Cabinet and every one of our freely elected leaders.

    Help us, oh God, to remember that we are Americans. United not by race or religion or by blood, but to our commitment to freedom and justice for all. When we focus on ourselves, when we fight each other, when we forget you, forgive us.

    When we presume that our greatness and our prosperity is ours alone, forgive us. When we fail to treat our fellow human beings and all the earth with the respect that they deserve, forgive us. And as we face these difficult days ahead, may we have a new birth of clarity in our aims, responsibility in our actions, humility in our approaches and civility in our attitudes—even when we differ.

    Help us to share, to serve and to seek the common good of all. May all people of good will today join together to work for a more just, a more healthy and a more prosperous nation and a peaceful planet. And may we never forget that one day, all nations, all people will stand accountable before You. We now commit our new president and his wife Michelle and his daughters, Malia and Sasha, into your loving care.

    I humbly ask this in the name of the one who changed my life—Yeshua, Esa, Jesus, Jesus—who taught us to pray:

    Our father, who art in heaven, hallowed be Thy name. Thy kingdom come, Thy will be done, on earth as it is in heaven. Give us this day our daily bread, and forgive us our trespasses, as we forgive those who trespass against us. And lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil, for thine is the kingdom and the power and the glory forever. Amen.

    They killed Bambi, and now Mumble too

    Bambi meets GodzillaGenerations of American children have grown up witnessing Bambi orphaned by evil mother-killing hunters. In my theater seat, I was sure that deer stalking, as it’s called in England, would evolve the way of Neanderthals. The Happy Feet generation might have held the same hope for the survival of Emperor Penguins, but our George Bush Caligula has just given them a thumbs down.

    In spite of the fact that the Academy Award for best documentary went to the March of the Penguins, which told of the heart-breaking travails of the Emperor Penguins, whose natural challenge is to face the most bitter climate on Earth.

    Now Climate Change is pulling the ice from under their egg-nestling feet. Environmentalist groups want the Emperor Penguins declared an endangered species, to give clout to efforts to fight the causes of global warming, but the industrialists and fossil fuel companies are having none of it.

    Remember the Rockhopper Penguin in Happy Feet, slowly strangling in his plastic six-pack necklace? He too was denied protection from the peril of melting ice and over-fishing.

    I can’t visit a penguin exhibit at the zoo without thinking of Mumble, the Happy Feet star, gone crazy from confinement, at last breaking into the soft shuffle which enabled him to communicate with man, to pique man’s interest into his human-like behavior, and lure civilized man’s sympathy for Mumble’s kind, and their helplessness in the face of the human’s destructive fisheries.

    At the Omaha Zoo, the scene on the ice with all the aimless penguins was so identical, I was certain the transformative scene had been filmed there, until I reminded myself that Happy Feet was a computer animation.

    I was uncomfortable with the Stepin Fetchit quality of Happy Feet’s master-pleasing tap dance. It may have helped humanize black people in the eyes of racists, but it didn’t change white condescension.

    Of course, neither penguins or polar bears can do a thing to slow the melting of their habitat. Their fate is in our hands. That was the message of Happy Feet, a message you might not have conceived could have gone over anyone’s head, even George Bush.

    America’s Biblical fairy tale- The President’s caring capitalism

    It’s that time of year again, where fairy tales abound. Ho-Ho-Ho!
    obama santa 
    America’s fairy fairytale of Biblical proportions is the one about the President guiding a caring capitalism forward to the little American kids. On, Dancer! On, Torturer! On, Sniper! On, Bomber! We’ve got presents of democracy, liberty, and freedom to deliver to you all!

    You gotta believe in the God of American capitalism though, otherwise a great horde of locusts will descend on your tribe! And our Almighty President will OK it that we rape your women, kill your first born sons, and then rain down a flood of horror which will awash your lands, and sink all except the aircraft carrier with the American flag! …if you do not believe? The President cares, but you must believe or? … well else!

    Moses first brought the fairy tale of the caring Almighty God! Then Paul spread the message of the Almighty God’s son, who cared for those sinners… as long as they believe in him. Otherwise, this gentle man and his father promised an eternal Hell to you.

    Today our Almighty caring president promises his caring capitalism will free your souls through the power of your faith in it all. You Must have faith in America’s Biblical fairy tale! Children, sleep! Inaugeration Day comes soon! The President cares, and caring capitalism will be your Almighty Salvation! Onward, Silly Christian soldiers carrying the Cro… no the caring Capitalism forward to the Turks! Ho-Ho-Ho! Seasons Greetings!

    TWILIGHT vampires resemble predators of the less mystical sexual variety

    stephanie meyer dreams of Babe the PigTWILIGHT- For those parents who have unwittingly encouraged their daughters to delve into Twilight, where our episodic fascination with Dracula lore is adapted for the young adult romance genre, be forewarned that author Stephenie Meyer may have fogged her rose-colored glasses with romantic nostalgia from her Mormon upbringing: old older men, arranged marriages, and, if you’ll pardon the dropped pretense, date rape.

    DESPOILER ALERT.
    Better you than your child?

    Old fashioned matchmaking
    First, Meyer’s teenage vampires are generations-old men, stuck reliving their teens, repeating high school to prey on each successive year of students. Matthew McConnaughey played it, minus fangs, in Dazed and Confused: “That’s what I love about these high school girls, man. I get older, they stay the same age.”

    Off campus, some of the undead “imprint” on newborns. Want that explained? Meyer’s succubus babies are born fully-conscious, if that’s any excuse, but elders are able to perceive them as soul-partners, and claim dibs to pair with them later. When they are of consumable age, I presume.

    Perhaps you find these details to be inconsequential “vampire” technicalities protected by Meyer’s un-poetic license. There’s a zinger in the fourth book which you may find less palatable.

    Vampire sex
    Because your tween-ager should know to make the distinction?

    In book four, Bella marries the 117-year-old high school hold-back Edward Cullen, and finally he consents to consummate their marriage. He’s been withholding his afflictions for fear that vampire sex would kill her. By the way, that’s the romantic dynamic of the first three books, in case you wonder what’s titillating your acts-beyond-her-age young reader.

    Typical of respectable novels, and the romance genre too perhaps, the sex scene is glossed over. Bella disrobes and joins Edward for a midnight swim, where he “leads her to deeper waters.” The narrative returns as the sun rises the next morning.

    Classy enough for this lowbrow storytelling, except that Meyer earns no credit for obscuring the steamy bits, because the exact details are lost on her post-coital heroine as well. A fog of amnesia covers Bella as she spends the morning trying to reconstruct what exactly happened to her. With only her bruises for clues.

    Meyer describes Bella waking feeling as if her skeletal-structure has been crushed like a wishbone, “but in a good way.” Bella discovers that she’s covered in bruises which grow still darker in severity, obscured by a dusting of feathers. Nevermind the injuries apparently, why the feathers? Her ravisher reveals he had to bite “one or two pillows” to keep himself from eviscerating her. For this act of consideration, Bella, and the readers, find Edward all the more endearing. Since vampires kill humans, how sweet that Edward merely vampire-man-handled her.

    Bella survived the Twilight climax, and although she doesn’t remember the act, she’s feeling sexually satisfied. I’m open to the possibility that a gender gap might be confusing me. About what is Bella all aglow, if she doesn’t recollect what happened? Conquest? Having hosted a smashing party? I’ll tell you what I think has quenched Bella’s desire, if the Mormon motif is any indication. She’s fulfilled her biological drive. Not to possess Edward, but to become pregnant. In Meyer’s grandiose predestined sense, Bella is triumphant in having attained motherhood.

    Do these themes fly over the heads of her impressionable readers? Why put them there.

    The scene reads to me like waking from a date-rape drug, although the experience might more likely describe a young Mormon girl coming out of the state of shock induced by the violence of her older experienced polygamist husband rapist. At the least, how she might cope with having endured the brutality of a sexual drive unmatched by her own, and beyond her comprehension.

    Men are not to blame, they are but slaves to their monstrous sexual urges. Obviously this is where Meyer looks for humanity in her vampires. Your daughter’s assignment? Assure her presumptive taker that she’s up for the worst he can unleash. She can favor the monster who feigns leniency.

    Four books versus two
    You may not have to worry about your child reaching the S&M sex, pregnancy, and monstrous-birth scene of Book Four. There’s a good hope that your young sophisticate will tire of Meyer’s underwhelming literary skill before the end of the first tome. There’s an even more likely chance that books three and four will bore her into maturity. Even Meyer’s fans hate the vacuity of those stretches.

    Apparently the fourth volume was written as the original sequel, but was rewritten later to make room for the two filler episodes. They upped the Twilight movie take by fifty percent. Every fan is saying you appreciate the movie the most if you’ve read all the material.

    What a great publishing scheme! The movie tickets are eight dollars, but the requisite quartet box set, sets you back $100. Ravaging the innocence of America’s tweens? Priceless.
    Edward Cullen Robert Pattinson
    Twilight the Movie
    The biggest anxiety I heard expressed about the movie, was not if it could do the books justice, but whether the character of Edward could possibly live up to his physical perfection in the novel. Judging from audience reviews, film Edward was an exact match, which means Meyer left no room for a reader’s imagination. Is that what young-adult fiction is about?

    Stephenie Meyer’s dream crush, as cast in Twilight the Movie, resembles the fittingly abusive Stanley of A Streetcar Named Desire, literally Marlon Brando’s brooding stage turn as the violent husband, wearing an Elvis wig, on lithium, as viewed through a camera lens smeared with Vaseline, probably also a polygamist staple.

    How about just a bite?
    You might be thinking, what’s wrong with just the first book? Can’t a girl luxuriate in the hyper-romantic swoon over the opening story?

    I don’t know. I’ve often been perplexed about the teen Goth living death fixation, nihilism and teen suicide. I suspect they get fuel from mall rat romantics like Stephenie Meyer.

    You be the judge. I was able to wrestle a few minutes with our household copy, to see that Meyer opens with this quote:

    But of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, thou shalt not eat of it: for in the day that thou eatest thereof thou shalt surely die.
    Genesis 2:17

    Does that equate vampirism with the forbidden fruit of knowledge? Meyer followed Dan Brown’s example to find a biblical passage to provide coded authority. More proof that insipid writing multiplies with inbred fiction authors.

    In the spirit of taking guidance from a quotation, I entreat you to sample the preface of Twilight, because the Amazon Look Inside sample astutely skips it. If you’ve already read Twilight, please slap yourself on the cheek and try to extricate yourself enough to look at these paragraphs one by one.

    Here it is, adulteration entirely courtesy of Meyer. Even if she was twelve when she wrote this, I hope your daughter can show more acuity than she.

    PREFACE

    I’d never given much thought to how I would die — though I’d had reason enough in the last few months — but even if I had, I would not have imagined it like this.

    I stared without breathing across the long room, into the dark eyes of the hunter, and he looked pleasantly back at me.

    Surely it was a good way to die, in the place of someone else, someone I loved. Noble, even. That ought to count for something.

    I knew that if I’d never gone to Forks, I wouldn’t be facing death now. But, terrified as I was, I couldn’t bring myself to regret the decision. When life offers you a dream so far beyond any of your expectations, it’s not reasonable to grieve when it comes to an end.

    The hunter smiled in a friendly way as he sauntered forward to kill me.

    I bet Stephenie Meyer cannot even gag herself with a spoon.

    Who did not play Faust for George Bush

    I’d like to compile a collection of letters from famous personages in which they decline to dance with the Bush Administration. Were there many?

    Shouldn’t any artist/musician/author or intellectual/humanitarian of note have publicly refused to collaborate with the immoral tyrant and his saccharine-smile patronizing librarian wife?

    I have some favorites:
    Mr. Feiffer Regrets -by Jules Feiffer, 2002
    Poets Against War -Sam Hamill, 2003
    Statement of Conscience -by Jennifer Warn, 2003
    Open Letter to Laura Bush -by Sharon Olds, 2005

    Archived copies are below:

    Mr. Feiffer Regrets

    October 12, 2002

    Mrs. George W. Bush
    The White House
    Washington, DC

    Dear Mrs. Bush,

    I wish that I could come to your National Book Festival breakfast at the White House on Saturday, but after giving it much thought, I can’t attend.

    I was thrilled to be invited, along with other writers and illustrators, to help celebrate your campaign to inspire young people in the pleasures of reading.

    But I find it unbearably ironic that, while the uses of language are celebrated by you and your renowned guests, elsewhere in the White House language is being traduced and transformed to nudge us into war.

    There are honest arguments on both sides of the Iraq debate (such as it is), but it seems necessary on the occasion of a celebration of reading to press the point that words, at their finest, don’t set out to confuse or obscure. Their aim is to clarify.

    But clarity is not what we’re getting from your husband’s White House. It seems that clarity would deny him a war.

    I am a father and a grandfather. As every parent knows, most children can intuit whether the stories their parents tell them are true or if they’re making them up.

    The American people are able to tell too.

    I am delighted to participate in National Book Festival events scheduled for the Library of Congress and the Capitol grounds. But as for your breakfast, may I convey my regrets and best wishes to you and your guests.

    Sincerely,
    /s/Jules Feiffer

    Sam Hamill

    Dear Friends and Fellow Poets:

    “When I picked up my mail and saw the letter marked “The White House,” I felt no joy. Rather I was overcome by a kind of nausea as I read the card enclosed:

    Laura Bush requests the pleasure of your company at a reception and White House Symposium on “Poetry and the American Voice” on Wednesday, February 12, 2003 at one o’clock

    Only the day before I had read a lengthy report on George Bush’s proposed “Shock and Awe” attack on Iraq, calling for saturation bombing that would be like the firebombing of Dresden or Tokyo, killing countless innocent civilians.

    I believe the only legitimate response to such a morally bankrupt and unconscionable idea is to reconstitute a Poets Against the War movement like the one organized to speak out against the war in Vietnam.

    I am asking every poet to speak up for the conscience of our country and lend his or her name to our petition against this war, and to make February 12 a day of Poetry Against the War. We will compile an anthology of protest to be presented to the White House on that afternoon…

    Statement of Conscience -Jennifer Warn

    February 12, 2003

    Mrs. Laura Bush
    1600 Pennsylvania Avenue
    Washington, D.C.

    Dear Laura Bush,

    Thank you for inviting me to the White House symposium on Poetry and the American Voice. Your call to better understand and celebrate the poetry of Walt Whitman, Emily Dickinson and Langston Hughes led me and many thousands of American poets to find their voices of dissent.

    Since January 30th poets in many countries have joined in an upsurge of conscience and compassion, submitting over [15,000] poems to the Poets Against the War web site (www.poetsagainstthewar.org), organizing hundreds of anti-war poetry readings around the world, and joining with millions of others in vigils, processions, prayers and intercessions, lobbying and rallying for peace.

    You have inadvertently presented a gift to the American people and to the world by providing poets an opportunity to express their most passionately held beliefs about their vision for the world’s future. Your gesture has revealed the very relationship it was meant to deny: the connection between poetry and politics, between literature and reality. Another great American poet, Wallace Stevens, presented this relationship succinctly:

    “In life what is most important is the truth as it is, while in arts and letters what is most important is the truth as we see it.”

    This wisdom is excerpted from “Imagination as Value,” an essay in the long tradition of poets puzzling over the power of poetry and asserting its place in a world primarily shaped by the machinations of politics and money.

    What is poetry’s power? Why should you, vested with the power of the White House as First Lady, pay attention to such a rush of words at this late hour?

    Poetry’s power lies in its perceptive ability to describe both inner and outer realities. In reading a poem we experience the paradoxical delight and anguish of human life. Poetry holds a mirror to the reality that our political systems and values create and in doing so reveals both the limitations of our current state and life’s endless possibilities. In its refracted light we see our intangible connections, the irrefutable unity of all people and beings on the planet.

    We invite you to read this selection of poems which represents some of the most powerful in the Poetry Against the War Anthology. These poems were written by Pulitzer Prize winners, former U.S. poets laureate, and poets who work as professors, business people, homemakers and veterans. Those who have submitted poems or personal statements to register their opposition to ill-considered military action, including a pre-emptive strike on Iraq, honor a long and rich tradition of thoughtful and moral opposition by poets and other artists to senseless and murderous policies, including those of our own government.

    We believe that the world is poised on the knife-edge of a decision between war and peace. It is our hope and conviction that peaceful American voices, conveyed in part and without historical precedent by the poets of this country, may help to avert a disaster of tragic proportions.

    We call upon the Bush administration to halt the headlong rush toward war, to heed the voices of the people of the world, and to seek peaceful means of resolving conflicts in company with the world community.

    Never before in history have so many poets gathered to speak in a single voice.

    Sincerely,

    Emily Warn
    Poets Against the War

    Open letter to Laura Bush -Sharon Olds

    September 19, 2005

    Laura Bush
    First Lady
    The White House

    Dear Mrs. Bush,

    I am writing to let you know why I am not able to accept your kind invitation to give a presentation at the National Book Festival on September 24, or to attend your dinner at the Library of Congress or the breakfast at the White House.

    In one way, it’s a very appealing invitation. The idea of speaking at a festival attended by 85,000 people is inspiring! The possibility of finding new readers is exciting for a poet in personal terms, and in terms of the desire that poetry serve its constituents–all of us who need the pleasure, and the inner and outer news, it delivers.

    And the concept of a community of readers and writers has long been dear to my heart. As a professor of creative writing in the graduate school of a major university, I have had the chance to be a part of some magnificent outreach writing workshops in which our students have become teachers. Over the years, they have taught in a variety of settings: a women’s prison, several New York City public high schools, an oncology ward for children. Our initial program, at a 900-bed state hospital for the severely physically challenged, has been running now for twenty years, creating along the way lasting friendships between young MFA candidates and their students–long-term residents at the hospital who, in their humor, courage and wisdom, become our teachers.

    When you have witnessed someone nonspeaking and almost nonmoving spell out, with a toe, on a big plastic alphabet chart, letter by letter, his new poem, you have experienced, close up, the passion and essentialness of writing. When you have held up a small cardboard alphabet card for a writer who is completely nonspeaking and nonmoving (except for the eyes), and pointed first to the A, then the B, then C, then D, until you get to the first letter of the first word of the first line of the poem she has been composing in her head all week, and she lifts her eyes when that letter is touched to say yes, you feel with a fresh immediacy the human drive for creation, self-expression, accuracy, honesty and wit–and the importance of writing, which celebrates the value of each person’s unique story and song.

    So the prospect of a festival of books seemed wonderful to me. I thought of the opportunity to talk about how to start up an outreach program. I thought of the chance to sell some books, sign some books and meet some of the citizens of Washington, DC. I thought that I could try to find a way, even as your guest, with respect, to speak about my deep feeling that we should not have invaded Iraq, and to declare my belief that the wish to invade another culture and another country–with the resultant loss of life and limb for our brave soldiers, and for the noncombatants in their home terrain–did not come out of our democracy but was instead a decision made “at the top” and forced on the people by distorted language, and by untruths. I hoped to express the fear that we have begun to live in the shadows of tyranny and religious chauvinism–the opposites of the liberty, tolerance and diversity our nation aspires to.

    I tried to see my way clear to attend the festival in order to bear witness–as an American who loves her country and its principles and its writing–against this undeclared and devastating war.

    But I could not face the idea of breaking bread with you. I knew that if I sat down to eat with you, it would feel to me as if I were condoning what I see to be the wild, highhanded actions of the Bush Administration.

    What kept coming to the fore of my mind was that I would be taking food from the hand of the First Lady who represents the Administration that unleashed this war and that wills its continuation, even to the extent of permitting “extraordinary rendition”: flying people to other countries where they will be tortured for us.

    So many Americans who had felt pride in our country now feel anguish and shame, for the current regime of blood, wounds and fire. I thought of the clean linens at your table, the shining knives and the flames of the candles, and I could not stomach it.

    Sincerely,
    SHARON OLDS

    See Ann Wright in action or at the PPJPC

    DNC arrest-bushCOLORADO SPRINGS- The PPJPC is collecting money to bring noted antiwar activist Ann Wright to Colorado Springs. They’re hoping to have her speak for a fundraiser. I’ve had a chance to meet the retired colonel/diplomat in person a number of times. You can too, with no fund-raising necessary. Go to an action.

    The first time I met Wright was in Crawford Texas when a delegation from Colorado Springs joined Cindy Sheehan’s encampment outside George Bush’s ranch. Ann Wright and Medea Benjamin were the primary organizers behind Sheehan’s “Camp Casey” PR coup. When our group convened our own Camp Casey at Nevada Avenue and Dale Street, Wright was our liaison to the continued national effort.

    Most recently we ran into Wright at the DNC in August. Ann Wright brought the white faceless masks to the Denver demonstrations. She spoke at the rallies and participated in several marches. Even now, whether the issue is closing Guantanamo or saying no to the Fed, you’ll see Wright’s squad with their masks, representing the faceless victims of America’s destructive imperialism.

    While I look forward to Ann Wright’s upcoming visit, I think it is unfortunate that local energy for activism be dissipated with an in-house lecture. What would Wright rather see us doing? Hopefully she can illuminate the hole into which the PPJPC is burying its head. Perhaps a study of her successes can show that a nonviolent ethos need not limit one’s actions to the avoidance of confrontation.

    Colo. Springs celebrates underage vets

    vet-parade
    COLORADO SPRINGS- The average age of a uniformed participant in this year’s Veteran’s Day Parade was underage! The high school Junior ROTCs, the Young Marines, the Devil Pups, and the scouts, pulled the age downward against the ever diminishing number of retired combat vets. I think the Hussar-clad HS marching bands brought the mean down too.

    While officially the youthful paraders were there to cheer the old vets, it’s hard to imagine the cries of “thank you” were not intended for the ears of those in attendance who were still part of the military. Actually a large number of those involved in the Veteran’s Day Parade are active duty, when not on deployment.

    vet-parade
    Belonging to a pro-militant fan club such as the Colorado Springs Young Marines does not make you a soldier, nor I should hope a soldier-to-be. But their recruits are already veterans of US militarism and the warrior indoctrination process.

    vet-parade
    The Young Marines are sponsored by the Marine Corps, a rather audacious recruiting beachhead considering Colorado Springs is an Army and Air Force town. Note: the Marines have no JROTC program here, and the fewest nationwide. What does that say about the age they target?

    vet-parade
    Not to be outdone by the Young Marines, the Colorado Springs Youth Marine Club goes by the name DEVIL PUPS, although it offers its conscripts the chance to “learn code of conduct from Godly Veterans.”

    vet-parade
    Note the better fitting uniform and helmet, sized for infants. The Devil Pups are affiliated with a Camp Pendleton Devil Pups Inc. Though They claim to be neither a mini-boot-camp, nor a para-military outfit, the Devil Pups require that children “must pass a Physical Fitness Test, cannot be on any type of medication for any reason, [and] cannot have asthma (no exceptions).”

    vets-parade-scouting.jpg
    Do you doubt the Boy Scouts are a para-military organization? These scoutmasters don’t. STILL SERVING THROUGH SCOUTING read one banner. Another read RETURNING TO THE VALUES SCOUTING NEVER LEFT. Were those the values of Kit Carson to which you’re alluding?

    vets-parade
    Here are elementary school students riding on a float sponsored by the Globe Charter School. They hold posters celebrating the four branches of the military, plus the National Guard and the Coast Guard.

    rampart high school band
    Rampart High School’s marching band, the “Rampart Regiment” costumed in deaths-head Hessian uniforms.

    vets-parade
    Our land-locked state also has a JROTC for students interested in the Navy. Three out of the four Colorado high schools enrolled in the Navy program are in Colorado Springs. They are Mesa Ridge, Wasson and Widefield. Oddly, none of Colorado’s 21 Army JROTC high school programs are in COS. The Air Force has five of seven participating high schools: Harrison, William Mitchell, Air Academy, Falcon and Sand Creek.

    vet-parade
    The parade of vintage cars provides a suitable reminder that all modern wars, post WWI, like these models, have been fought over the resource needed to fuel them.

    vets-parade
    Unafraid to make that point directly, the Military Vehicle Collectors Club solicits donations to KEEP ‘EM ROLLING.

    vets-parade
    This 40s staff car ferried former Waves who served the Navy in WWII. Resembling what most of us expect from a parade for honored veterans.