Iraq Moratorium comes up against Feds

Feb 15, 2008 Southeast Corner
I just got back from an invigorating Iraq Moratorium street- side demonstration. The cold wasn’t so bad, the IVAW boys held down a corner, one participant traveled a ways to be here, a Gazette reporter came with a photographer, and we were deluged with the usual honks of support. Then two supervisors from the nearby Post Office visited to tell us whichever of us had parked in their lot better move our cars or expect to be towed.

I stepped forward but noted the parking lot was only a third full, plus by coincidence I had a time-dated receipt from their counter. No matter they said, the parking was private, and/or you can’t protest on government property. They incorrectly asserted plenty more, finishing with “sue me” but wouldn’t give their names. One called out for security as I entered the post office to stand in queue, shouting to everyone that I was likely to cause a scene. The clerks volunteered the info I needed: Jim Hickle and Bill Schafner, big-for-their-britches USPS supervisors of customer relations, wannabe feds.

I’m always perplexed by the politics of the postal worker. I regard a number of them as my friends actually, whom I see everyday, including the late John S, about whose horrible political ethics I’ve already written. Why are workers, who benefit mightily from the APW Union, and who more likely than not are veterans, stand so passionately behind the right-wing? Postal workers are losing their jobs to privatization, their jobs are as blue collar as any, they come face to face with so much of the local community. Why would their personal opinions be so regressive?

Mark and Garrett help on Northeast corner

UPDATE: After I left, another activist of our group was sitting in his car, having taken medication which called for a pause before he could begin driving. He was parked, as I had been, at the extreme north of the lot, far from any customer traffic. The same two postal authorities, Jim and Bill, approached his window and insisted he had to leave. My friend explained that we was quite willing, but that he was required to wait until his medication permitted it. They insisted he leave immediately or they would call the police. My friend complied, in a hallucinogenic state, and thankfully he made it home safely.

The Germans have their shepherds

I was watching the Westminster Dog Show and learned about the most improbable breed of dog. It’s Jewish.

Anti-anti-semitic hundWould you believe it? It’s called the Canaan Dog. It’s named after the biblical lands, and it shares the mystical stewardship connection the Jews have with the Holy Land. Only they are fit to look after it.

Who knows why, or who knows if it’s really true. The Bedouin keep these dogs, as have the Druze, but because the Kelef K’naani is the official dog of Israel, the exclusive lineage, which we are informed is deserving of preservation, excludes the Arab connections like they were pariah.

(Exclusive- Do you think you might have a Canaan dog? Well you don’t. They’re that exclusive. And the Canaan Dog Rescue is only interested in saving real ones.)

In spite of the Westminster Kennel Club’s waspish ambiance, the voice-over description of the Canaan was similarly Kosher, which is what caught my attention.

Bred in Ancient Judea to be shepherds and watch dogs for the Israelites, the breed suffered a setback when the lands were overrun by the Egyptians. When the Hebrews were scattered in the Great Diaspora their dogs were left to go feral in the Negev desert. There they lived in the wild for, are you ready for this, 2000 years! When Zionism brought the Jews back to Palestine, master and faithful hound were reunited. The Canaan was re-domesticated again in the 1930s [to protect their unpopular owners from their historic rivals]. Bracketed notation mine.

Actually, an animal behavior specialist was recruited from Austria in 1934 by the Haganah, the Jewish paramilitary organization protecting the Zionist settlements in Palestine since 1907. They needed a working dog for what would become the Unit Oketz, the Israeli K-9 special forces. Bred from the pariah dogs which attended the Bedouins, the Canaan dog, actually a Spitz, is noted for its alertness, its bark and its distrust of strangers. I’m reminded of the attack dog trained to be racist in Sam Fuller’s 1982 film White Dog, banned in the US.

Canaan, by the way, encompassed an area which covered present day Israel, the occupied Palestinian territories, and parts of Lebanon and Syria. Who is dragging politics into the dog show?

People’s Republic of Higher Education

Fair enough, the Berkeley City Council is being asked to reconsider whether it really meant to tell US Marine Corps recruiters to go fuck themselves. I hope it’s just a chance to say it again.

Maybe the People’s Republic of Berkeley is due for a new honor. Keeper of the Flame of Freedom. The United States of Berkeley. It used to be the joke to send the Statue of Liberty back to the French, because America wasn’t using it. How about we install Lady Liberty off the shores of Berkeley? They’re showing the temerity to claim her. Berkeley is standing up for everything America used to. What do you make of the vociferous accusations of treason being leveled at Berkeley in the name of patriotism? What fault can you find with the clear headed resolutions being pronounced by their City Council?

The only thing which differentiates Berkley from the rest of the country is level of education. I wouldn’t want to be caught poking fun at, much less belittling, someone smarter than me, especially for taking a more principled stand than I -err- me. You can tease them about inarticulate athletic ability, but the last thing you’d want to do is to presume to correct a grammarian.

How are dumbfuck Americans like Move Forward America so easily goaded to speak derisively of their own who know better? It’s one thing to question authority, another even to be skeptical in general. But Berkeley isn’t filled with the social engineers who’ve got a boot on your throat, it’s full of students, your children, who you sent to acquire an education. Not your education in fact, a better education. A world view beyond your own, a comprehension you were not afforded. That’s Berkeley.

Berkeley is not unique, though perhaps it has the highest visibility. Regionally there are other college towns that fit the leftist stereotype. Boulder and Ann Arbor for example. These are home to progressive populations, teachers, students and alumni which color the demographics significantly to affect the local politics. Why are better educated people always leftists? A dolt could only hope to chance upon the inspiration to ask himself such a doozy.

This dolt would ask the reverse: AS left EQUALS education, SO less-left MUST EQUAL less-education.

Why aren’t more college campuses like Berkeley? What’s going on that our educational institutions are producing idiots to mock the product of real education? It’s a terrible portent.

The sitting on their thumbs liberals

Let’s fact it. American liberals are a total bunch of perpetual losers. They are a perpetual loser machine, and the reason why is that they are completely addicted to the Democratic Party, an apparatus that is more undemocratic than any Diebold voting machine in Florida could ever be.

The head honcho of the Democratic Party Leadership Council was on TV last night, and he assured his audience that he ‘has good ties to both Hillary and Barrack’. Well no shit Sherlock!

And the stupid Green Party ‘democrats’ are waiting, waiting, waiting…. Yawn… they’re out cold already. Liberalism is stupid, stupid, stupid, and not even God himself could save the stupid American liberal from him/herself. All they know how to do is vote, vote, vote. Other than that, they are totally decommissioned folk. ‘Green’ or donkey liberals???… they all be damned.

There is no anger in America, just dull dazed whining liberals who ‘don’t like Dubya’. They are the perfect match for dull dazed reactionary retards, that just don’t like Hillary because she is a cold calculating whore. This dichotomy is ‘politics’ in The Empire.

Inflated liberals, deflated liberals???? It makes no difference. Poor souls, bless them as they sneeze out their good will. Liberals offer no change in the future because they can only leap ahead into yet another of their ‘Anybody but the Republicans’ campaign. Even if they were to ‘win’, the liberal will get another Republican simply because that’s what they deserve.

Liberals or conservatives, America is a dead place. There is no hope at all for such a vacuous nation. We can look into Iraq and see the mirror of America’s soul, our American colony. And at the heart of the matter is that the sitting on their thumbs liberal, who is America’s conscience…. the whiny do-nothing liberal can do nothing but whine and vote, wine and vote.

The liberal will always fail to materialize. The liberal will always fail. The liberal will always be unhappy with the result. The liberal cannot change, nor cannot make CHANGE.

A message from Michael Moore

John Edwards favored by Ralph Nader and Michael MooreIn judging the crop of presidential candidates, who has time to visit every political blog and read the hundreds of analyses put forth daily by credible opinionators? I become overloaded in election years trying divine truth from political rhetoric. Thus, I welcome help, in the form of intelligent research and analysis, when making my decision.
 
Who better than consummate bullshit sniffer Michael Moore to do the legwork for lazy disinterested voters like me?
 
I have to admit, that for purely shallow reasons, I might take an interest in politics were he elected.

Go Team Tibet!

Beijing 2008 Game Over Free TibetI love love love the Olympics. The Olympic Games epitomize humankind’s best and highest physical achievement, our ability to live in peace with other countries, to ignore race and to play fair, if only for a time. Sitius, altius, fortius indeed!

Historically, because the International Olympic Committee has avoided entanglement in world politics, the Olympics have had a larger number of team participants than there are UN-recognized countries. Puerto Rico, Hong Kong, Taiwan have been allowed to send teams to the Games despite their status as possessions of other nations. Even during the Cold War, athletic contests leading up to the Olympics took place behind the Iron Curtain. Talk to any Olympic athlete. They’ve been places that were off-limits to the rest of us. International sport transcends politics. And so it should.

This month the International Olympic Committee betrayed egalitarian tradition and denied the nation of Tibet a place at the 2008 Olympic Games in Beijing. Tibet, illegally-occupied by China since 1949, will not be allowed to field an Olympic team because China claims ownership of their land and their people. To add insult, China has plans to take the Olympic torch to the top of Mt. Everest, a mountain that rightfully belongs to Tibet and Nepal, to solidify its “ownership” of Tibet in the eyes of the world. China has already stepped up its presence at Everest, an easily identifiable landmark to Westerners, in anticipation of the propaganda campaign to come.

China should never have been chosen to host the Olympics in the first place. Countries with a history of egregious human rights violations have traditionally been disqualified as potential Olympic hosts. China bullshitted the IOC with progress and promises. We’re different now! Look how far we’ve come! And for whatever reason, monetary or political gain, good television potential, or maybe just plain old ignorance, the IOC bought the lie. And now they’ve become complicitous in Tibet’s oppression.

So when you see that beautiful Olympic torch, that symbol of good fellowship and unity, carried up Mt. Everest in May by the Chinese, remember that the Tibetan people have been denied their land, their identity, their religious and cultural practices, and a place at the Beijing games. You’ll have to count on memory, because you won’t see any protests during the climb. China has already warned foreigners about engaging in activities concerning the sovereignty and unity of China. Tibetans and Chinese won’t dare make a public spectacle; they know they’ll be shot on sight. Even now, four American citizens are being detained by the Chinese government for unfurling a banner calling for Tibet’s independence during a recent torch relay assessment.

I’m sure the worldwide media will honor the Chinese request for silence and make nary a peep about human rights violations in Tibet and elsewhere. And it’s going to make me sick sick sick.

New Orleans

Police attack crowd with mace and tasers where people were trying to express opposition to tearing down perfectly serviceable Public Housing units in New Orleans. The US government wants Black people not to return to New Orleans for the same racist reasons that they didn’t bother reinforcing the levees in the first place before Katrina hit.

It was then a Black dominated city and the White Dixiecrat political establishment of Louisiana hated having to govern over such a concentration of poor income Blacks. It was an Apartheid city where Blacks had too much sway over the politics of the area in the White Political Establishment’s eyes, so the federal government, too, just didn’t think it important enough to do the job of holding back the flood waters that might occur, and eventually did.

So now they are trying to keep poorer Blacks dispersed by Katrina from being able to return to their former neighborhoods. Nothing has changed. The federal, state, and local governments are engaged in a giant racial relocation program that keeps former Black residents from being able to survive return to their city. White policy here? Divide, keep them away, and conquer. The same policy of divide and conquer used in Afghanistan and Iraq.

Where are you from?

AFAIn college, when asked where I was from, I would proclaim, “I’m from Colorado Springs!” Eyes would light up in recognition. “Isn’t that…?” “Yes,” I would nod. Nestled at the foot of Pikes Peak. The inspiration for America the Beautiful. Home to Garden of the Gods, the Air Force Academy, NORAD, the Olympic Training Center. I could proudly claim them all.

My how times have changed. Still happy to reside in Colorado, I do not readily admit that I live in Colorado Springs. When my secret is uncovered, eyes narrow with suspicion. “Isn’t that…?” “Yes,” I say as my shoulders sag. Focus on the Family, New Life Church, Ted Haggard, Raytheon, General Dynamics, Lockheed Martin.

My home town, my slice of purple mountain majesty, has become ground zero for war profiteers and religious zealots.

Although we don’t know many of them by name, they have a profound impact on our community. They shape local politics. They vote down cultural and environmental initiatives, and deny tax support for helping organizations. They control school boards and change school curricula. They chase away our artists and our young idealists. They drive our gay population back into the closet. And they profit from the spilled blood of our children.

They and their ilk put George W. Bush in the White House. They continue to support our country’s assaults on sovereign nations in order to advance their narrow ideologies and line their gaping pockets. The shame I feel when people discover that I am from Colorado Springs is the same shame felt by many Americans traveling abroad. “We are from the United States,” they mumble. Ground zero for war profiteers and religious zealots….

Oil and Oppression

To those that don’t read the abominable local paper, The Gazette, ‘Oil and Oppression’ was the title of their lead editorial opinion today so that’s what this commentary is responding to.

But don’t think that The Gazette was writing about Iraq under this heading, since they were writing about Hugo Chavez instead. They say Chavez is a ‘dictator in the making’! Not to worry about Dubya though, I guess?

Think God that we don’t have to worry about dictators in the making here in the USA, right? Our political system is run by a two headed dog instead, so just what are the concerns of Colorado’s finest, as they write from the editorial offices of our favorite local comic book? Well, The Gazette is concerned that Venezuelan democracy is being crushed because the US government is being prohibited from channeling money into Venezuelan politics! How dare this dictator Chavez stop these funds!?

It’s bad news, but our brilliant theoreticians at The Gazette tell us Colorado residents to not be too concerned about ‘his childish fulminations’. That’s a big word there, Guys. A ‘fulmination’ can’t hurt us, but sticks and stones can. So how does The Gazette plan to ward off sticks and stones from The Evil Dictator, Hugo Chavez? The Evil One has oil, you see?

Reading from their Ayn Rand liberry, they say that the correct manner of warding off evil is just to let The System do its work. Translated, that means that we should just let the CIA work to a more successful coup attempt than the one they attempted in the recent past. Meanwhile, at the editorial offices of The Gazette, Atlas Shrugs, basking in the knowledge that ‘liberty’ will prevail. Oil be damned. For more info about the threat from The Evil One, see Mark Weisbrot’s A Bank of Their Own: Latin America Casting off Washington’s Shackles

Columbus Day terrorism in Denver

Oh my, those bad ol’ protesters blocked yet another parade! This time in Denver. When will this terrorism stop?
 
Of course, unlike here in Colorado Springs with the St. Patrick’s Day Parade this year, the people in Denver actually did try to block the parade (see: transformcolumbusday), had the desire to do it, and carried their terroristic plan out. Whoaaaa…… They should have more respect for genocide which Columbus remains a remarkable current symbolic figure for. Especially in Colorado where so many Injun killers’ descendants live and continue to act genocidally in their politics. Right, James (Woolsey)?

Today, the buffalo roam the plains no more, and military profiteers advocate future genocides. But we must not tolerate the terrorists that want to scalp pale faced liars and cons. They must not be allowed to block the parade route! Long Live Columbus and His Kids, the Colorado business community! Now let’s get down to business and bomb Iran! And hand those arrested Injuns some blankets… it gets cold at night in Colorado.

Not all of the Jewish faith are Zionists who desire the US to attack Iran


Meeting between Orthodox Jewish leaders and the President of Iran, New York City, September 23, 2007

Rabbi Yisroel Dovid Weiss, spokesman of Neturei Karta International, issued the following statement on the eve of the group’s meeting with Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

“It is always our pleasure to visit with President Ahmadinejad. This will be the third such meeting, in addition to our many visits to Iran in the past. We have each time emphasized to the Iranian leadership that, despite media hysteria and the statements of some misinformed Jews, we have found the Iranian people and their leaders to be friendly and respectful.”

“Likewise, although we as Jews are not to be involved in politics, (According to Jewish law, Jewish people are required to be loyal citizens to the countries wherein they reside), We have found the Iranian President to be a deeply religious man, dedicated to a peaceful world, based on mutual respect, fairness and dialogue.”

“Judaism seeks peace. Unfortunately, there are some Jews today, influenced by the barely century old, philosophy of Zionism, who feel that the proper Jewish response to enemies, be they real or fantasized, is aggression and calls for violence and unfortunately attempts to drag other nations down the path of war.”

“It as sad that so few have actually attempted to speak to the Iranian President or seek the true opinion of Iranian Jewry who live in peace and practice their faith throughout that nation. We have met this man who has demonstrated time and again that he is sincerely interested in the well being of Iran’s Jewish community and has deep respect for world Jewry and their Torah faith, The Zionist attempt to socially isolate this man and his people is immoral and disastrous”

“Zionism is antithetical to Torah beliefs. It believes in creating our own sovereign entity which is expressly forbidden due to the Divine decree of exile. This ideology leads to aggression against nations and is incarnated in the State of “Israel”. This State continually oppresses other people in the name of Judaism and the entire Jewish people. This movement has exacerbated anti Semitism throughout the world. President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad understands this distinction between traditional Judaism and Zionist distortion.”

“We view our approach to Iran as a model for all Jews and all mankind. The Torah is the Almighty’s blueprint of mercy and justice for all creation. We have followed this modal in our dealings with the Iranian President and found in him an individual dedicated to these same ideals. There is much to be gained by talking and listening and everything to be lost by raising the rhetoric in the direction of war.” Â The grave tragedy of our era is the inordinate power garnered by Zionism, whose acceptance of force as the only means to reconcile conflicts, has influenced some to abandon Torah fundamentals. We hope and pray that they too will adopt the traditional Jewish approach of dialogue, respect and reconciliation.”

“War is a horrible thing. The dark clouds of a future conflict are now on the horizon in the Middle East. Torah Jewry hopes and prays that this may yet be averted.”

In conclusion says Rabbi Weiss, “Out of great respect to the Iranian Nation and their leadership we proudly welcome the Honorable President Ahmadinejad to New York, WELCOME!”

——————————————————————————–

©2002 – 2007 Neturei Karta International

Shelley’s A Declaration of Rights, 1812

[Poet Percy Bisshe Shelley would float waxed-paper boats on the tide outbound from Ireland, hoping to spread copies of this declaration.]
 
GOVERNMENT has no rights; it is a delegation from several individuals for the purpose of securing their own. It is therefore just, only so far as it exists by their consent, useful only so far as it operates to their well-being.

2
IF these individuals think that the form of government which they, or their forefathers constituted is ill adapted to produce their happiness, they have a right to change it.

3
Government is devised for the security of rights. The rights of man are liberty, and an equal participation of the commonage of nature.

4
As the benefit of the governed, is, or ought to be the origin of government, no men can have any authority that does not expressly emanate from their will.

5
Though all governments are not so bad as that of Turkey, yet none are so good as they might be; the majority of every country have a right to perfect their government, the minority should not disturb them, they ought to secede, and form their own system in their own way.

6
All have a right to an equal share in the benefits, and burdens of Government. Any disabilities for opinion, imply by their existence, barefaced tyranny on the side of government, ignorant slavishness on the side of the governed.

7
The rights of man in the present state of society, are only to be secured by some degree of coercion to be exercised on their violator. The sufferer has a right that the degree of coercion employed be as slight as possible.

8
It may be considered as a plain proof of the hollowness of any proposition, if power be used to enforce instead of reason to persuade its admission. Government is never supported by fraud until it cannot be supported by reason.

9
No man has a right to disturb the public peace, by personally resisting the execution of a law however bad. He ought to acquiesce, using at the same time the utmost powers of his reason, to promote its repeal.

10
A man must have a right to act in a certain manner before it can be his duty. He may, before he ought.

11
A man has a right to think as his reason directs, it is a duty he owes to himself to think with freedom, that he may act from conviction.

12
A man has a right to unrestricted liberty of discussion, falsehood is a scorpion that will sting itself to death.

13
A man has not only a right to express his thoughts, but it is his duty to do so.

14
No law has a right to discourage the practice of truth. A man ought to speak the truth on every occasion, a duty can never be criminal, what is not criminal cannot be injurious.

15
Law cannot make what is in its nature virtuous or innocent, to be criminal, any more than it can make what is criminal to be innocent. Government cannot make a law, it can only pronounce that which was law before its organization, viz. the moral result of the imperishable relations of things.

16
The present generation cannot bind their posterity. The few cannot promise for the many.

17
No man has a right to do an evil thing that good may come.

18
Expediency is inadmissible in morals. Politics are only sound when conducted on principles of morality. They are, in fact, the morals of nations.

19
Man has no right to kill his brother, it is no excuse that he does so in uniform. He only adds the infamy of servitude to the crime of murder.

20
Man, whatever be his country, has the same rights in one place as another, the rights of universal citizenship.

21
The government of a country ought to be perfectly indifferent to every opinion. Religious differences, the bloodiest and most rancorous of all, spring from partiality.

22
A delegation of individuals for the purpose of securing their rights, can have no undelegated power of restraining the expression of their opinion.

23
Belief is involuntary; nothing involuntary is meritorious or reprehensible. A man ought not to be considered worse or better for his belief.

24
A Christian, a Deist, a Turk, and a Jew, have equal rights: they are men and brethren.

25

If a person’s religious ideas correspond not with your own, love him nevertheless. How different would yours have been had the chance of birth placed you in Tartary or India!

26
Those who believe that Heaven is, what earth has been, a monopoly in the hands of a favoured few, would do well to reconsider their opinion: if they find that it came from their priest or their grandmother, they could not do better than reject it.

27
No man has a right to be respected for any other possessions, but those of virtue and talents. Titles are tinsel, power a corruptor, glory a bubble, and excessive wealth, a libel on its possessor.

28
No man has a right to monopolise more than he can enjoy; what the rich give to the poor, whilst millions are starving, is not a perfect favour, but an imperfect right.

29
Every man has a right to a certain degree of leisure and liberty, because it is his duty to attain a certain degree of knowledge. He may before he ought.

30

Sobriety of body and mind is necessary to those who would be free, because, without sobriety a high sense of philanthropy cannot actuate the heart, nor cool and determined courage, execute its dictates.

31
The only use of government is to repress the vices of man. If man were to day sinless, to-morrow he would have a right to demand that government and all its evils should cease.


Man! thou whose rights are here declared, be no longer forgetful of the loftiness of thy destination. Think of thy rights; of those possessions which will give thee virtue and wisdom, by which thou mayest arrive at happiness and freedom. They are declared to thee by one who knows thy dignity, for every hour does his heart swell with honourable pride in the contemplation of what thou mayest attain, by one who is not forgetful of thy degeneracy, for every moment brings home to him the bitter conviction of what thou art.

Awake!-arise!-or be for ever fallen.

Taps for Larry Craig? Maybe not.

Officer Dave Karsnia
My 9-year-old twins learned about stereotypes in school last week. Ever eager to share social messages they receive while in the hands of the state, knowing that hours of rollicking fun will result, they vomited the latest rhetoric gleefully into my lap.

This is a picture of Dave Karsnia, the Minneapolis cop who took down Larry Craig. He received the Officer of the Year award in 2003 from none other than Dick Cheney, which somehow seems appropriate. Karsnia has, based on my limited exposure to all things gay, the look of a cute young, uh, gay guy. Without the adorable personality no doubt. I wonder what would’ve transpired if the officer had resembled Dennis Franz in NYPD Blue?

Why isn’t the gay community outraged that the state has hijacked its image and used it for nefarious purposes against them? Aren’t we shielded from self-incrimination by the Constitution? Perhaps the Constitution was what Larry Craig was reaching for on the floor of the bathroom stall. To wipe his lyin’ heinie. Thank god he didn’t flush. Whatever.

I actually wanted to post the transcript of a call made, before the big press conference announcing the intended resignation, by Craig to his attorney Billy Martin. Craig accidentally left the message on a complete stranger’s phone. Mother of God. If I were his wife I would be so pissed. Larry! Good Lord, pull your head out now and then!

“Yes, Billy, this is Larry Craig calling. You can reach me on my cell. Arlen Specter is now willing to come out in my defense, arguing that it appears by all that he knows that I have been railroaded and all that.

“Having all of that, we have reshaped my statement a little bit to say it is my intent to resign on Sept. 30. I think it is important for you to make as bold a statement as you are comfortable with this afternoon, and I would hope you could make it in front of the cameras.

“I think it would help drive the story that I’m willing to fight, that I’ve got quality people out there fighting in my defense, and that this thing could take a new turn or a new shape, it has that potential. Anyway, give me a buzz or give Mike a buzz on that. We’re headed to my press conference now. “Thank you. Bye.”

Go figure. I can’t imagine that Arlen Specter is supporting Larry Craig for altruistic reasons. It certainly can’t be indignation about civil liberties under fire, nor state-sponsored stereotyping. It must have something to do with partisan House politics. As usual. I’m sure we’ll find out soon enough.

Democratic Party corruption sinks the heart of Cindy Sheehan

Cindy Sheehan has been grieving a long time, and this Memorial Day after the capitulation of the Democratic Party legislators in Congress was particularly rough. But it is more than that. The pain is made even worse by how inactive so many rank and file Democratic Party voters are in opposing this war.

At street vigils we see this, too. So many liberal minded folk wave and honk their horns in support of our vigil, but then it seems that they never get out of their cars to be the protesters, and not just the driver by-ers. After a while, this becomes disheartening.

We hope that Cindy gets her spirits back up and rejoins the activist antiwar movement after some family time off. She deserves the best, and she has given America her best. Here is her last commentary about how despairing she now feels. Many feel the same alongside her.

We are sad to see it be so, but when push comes to shove, the Democratic Party is not to be relied on. Cindy Sheehan tried to push the Democratic Party into action, but the corporate controllers resisted. She is not the first, and will not be the last to fail in such a project.

Good Riddance Attention Whore
by Cindy Sheehan

I have endured a lot of smear and hatred since Casey was killed and especially since I became the so-called “Face” of the American anti-war movement. Especially since I renounced any tie I have remaining with the Democratic Party, I have been further trashed on such “liberal blogs” as the Democratic Underground. Being called an “attention whore” and being told “good riddance” are some of the more milder rebukes.

I have come to some heartbreaking conclusions this Memorial Day Morning. These are not spur of the moment reflections, but things I have been meditating on for about a year now. The conclusions that I have slowly and very reluctantly come to are very heartbreaking to me.

The first conclusion is that I was the darling of the so-called left as long as I limited my protests to George Bush and the Republican Party. Of course, I was slandered and libeled by the right as a “tool” of the Democratic Party. This label was to marginalize me and my message. How could a woman have an original thought, or be working outside of our “two-party” system?

However, when I started to hold the Democratic Party to the same standards that I held the Republican Party, support for my cause started to erode and the “left” started labeling me with the same slurs that the right used. I guess no one paid attention to me when I said that the issue of peace and people dying for no reason is not a matter of “right or left”, but “right and wrong.”

I am deemed a radical because I believe that partisan politics should be left to the wayside when hundreds of thousands of people are dying for a war based on lies that is supported by Democrats and Republican alike. It amazes me that people who are sharp on the issues and can zero in like a laser beam on lies, misrepresentations, and political expediency when it comes to one party refuse to recognize it in their own party. Blind party loyalty is dangerous whatever side it occurs on. People of the world look on us Americans as jokes because we allow our political leaders so much murderous latitude and if we don’t find alternatives to this corrupt “two” party system our Representative Republic will die and be replaced with what we are rapidly descending into with nary a check or balance: a fascist corporate wasteland. I am demonized because I don’t see party affiliation or nationality when I look at a person, I see that person’s heart. If someone looks, dresses, acts, talks and votes like a Republican, then why do they deserve support just because he/she calls him/herself a Democrat?

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What does ‘Otpor’ have to do with Colorado Springs?

You probably missed the notice, but Otpor will be at Colorado College this week and next, ‘organizing non-violence’ oriented people. Otpor claims credit for itself for supposedly non-violently bringing down Milosevic in Yugoslavia, though the real credit for this feat had more to do with the violence of an illegal war against Yugoslavia organized by the US and its European allies than any local student movement in Belgrade.

And it had more to do with the funds the US government channelled into Yugoslavia to illegally influence the national elections there. Many of these funds went to Otpor.

These days, Otpor ideology acts in many other countries where the US channels funds to subvert local autonomy. It has changed its name to ‘Canvas’ and receives much aid not only directly from the US government, but also from many a rich American think tank. Essentially, it is a Right Wing imperialist US government pushed campaign masquerading as a form of international Leftism. It’s symbols are a clenched fist, even as it plays on the image of being Gandhi-ist and nonviolent, which has become a semi mystical religious cult amongst many US campuses harboring hordes of American middle class student types. Very attractive cover to keep help hide its hidden agenda of backing US government propaganda campaigns and interventions in nations around the world. Imperialists posing as non-violent pacifists recruiting relatively naive and innocent students who often believe in the sugar coated rhetoric being spread. What results is a ‘non-violence’ working side by side with US military and economic subversion of other countries.

The US government in the ’70s and ”80s at one time pushed another camouflaged Right Wing group inside the US disguised as Leftism. The leader of that cult effort was a man named Lyndon LaRouche, who still plies his wares from time to time. To the utter discredit of the Pikes Peak Justice and Peace Commission, this group a few months ago accepted for its newspaper a full page advertisement from this fascist who has many connections with US government and military high officials. A split off of this group operates in Mexico where it postures as being Far Left in a similar manner to how it has operated in the US. OTPOR in a way, is an extension of this type of covert government operation in private politics that Lyndon LaRouche got quite well known for at one time.

Wikipedia has done an excellent job in its coverage of Otpor, whose connections to US funding remain shadowy and hidden though it operates across the planet. Since they will have 2 of their operatives as Colorado College doing their thing, hopefully some of us will be there to challenge them on their real record this week.

Bush threatening military intervention into Sudan (thanks to Democratic Party liberals)

Congratulations go out to the ‘Save Darfur’ community of liberals. How pleased you have to be now. Your campaign to send US troops and US directed troops to intervene in the affairs of yet another nation are now bearing fruit, and the Bush Adminstration is now mobilizing itself with Democrats to invade yet another country, that country being Sudan. Oh for sure you never called it a ‘Send in the Troops campaign’, but called it a ‘Stop the Genocide’ campaign instead. How clever! How so ever decent of you.

Funny though that genocide was never used to describe what happened (and still probably is happening) in the Congo, and not once did I hear you sweethearts call for a campaign to stop the US GENOCIDE in Iraq. Since 1991 the US has killed several million Iraqis through war and economic sanctions, yet somehow that never sparked your indignation and labelling of the US as a genocide perpetrator? Why not? Instead you call upon the genocidal US forces to ‘save’ others, all located far outside US borders. How very bizarre. I just don’t get it? Are you liberals total numbskulls. or what?

Yesterday John Negroponte, Ronald Reagan’s master architect of screwing up Central America during the ’80s, was in North Africa threatening US military intervention into Sudan. Joseph Biden, a leading Democratic Party hack, is also calling for US troops to be sent in. Anbd unbelievably in this context, many liberals ac`tually are holding a week of rallies around the planet in 2 weeks to rally support to this cause! Two weeks from Sunday there is one to be held in Denver, and liberals lost in fantasy land here in Colorado Springs also plan to attend the rally! How about using some of that gray matter in your skulls and reconsider what you are actually mobilizing for?

I will be attending this rally, too, with signs calling for the US to get out of Africa, not into it. What a radical concept, ay? I will have signs calling for the US to get out of Somalia, and calling for the US to terminate its new military African command center called, AFRICOM. We need to be calling for the demobilization of US controlled military forces, not calling for further extension of their warfare. Activists working for US and European intervention into Darfur are doing the absolute worst thing possible at this time when they should actually be working to pull US troops out of Iraq instead. Stop getting yourselves lost in space, Space Cadets! If you are against genocide, then at least educate yourselves enough to know which countries perpetrate it. The US would be at the top of the list, FYI.

Liberals sometimes just seem to be totally living in a fantasy world. Just this week I was at a Justice and Peace event where the speaker was actually praising the United Nations! How ass backwards is that? The US controls the UN Security Council and has these military forces doing its dirty work around the globe. The UN is now a thoroughly controlled and thoroughly reaccionary force everwhere. It specializes in mop up operations for the Pentagon, from the Balkans to Haiti to Iraq and Afghanistan. It will be a blissful day in heaven when liberals in the US can begin to put 2 plus 2 together and begin to differentiate reality from their fantasies some little bit. Praising the UN and/ or calling for African Union troops, NATO troops, and UN troops to intervene in places like Sudan is not a move towards world peace and an end to conflict, but are words and actions that will just help increase US military interventionism everywhere.

US OUT OF AFRICA NOW, not into it! Nobody likes the mass deaths inside Africa and that’s why we need the imperialists out, and not in. Demonstrate to withdraw US forces now. Get the US Out of all the foreign places where they are now repressing the world’s peoples. Our government has absolutely no progressive role to play in world politics until we can radically alter it. Since we are not even close to doing that at this point, the call for troops to be used elsewhere is about as backwards as liberal Democrats can be. You should be trying to demobize the military-industrial complex, not use it abroad! Get with the program, Liberals. And I’m not talking about getting with the Bush program for Africa, as you are currently doing.

The farce

America’s idiotic politics has been never more pathetically framed than in the grand pseudo debate over the nonbinding resolution on whether to ‘surge’ or not. All the Democratic Party posturing done here doesn’t add up to a bean of real opposition to the Bush Administration’s constant war plans. Instead, we the public, got merely a grand show, a grand farce of pretend ‘opposition’ that is not a real opposition by any yardstick of measurement.

What delusion, what illusion, that the Democratic Party in actuality even opposes any of the torture, war, and bankruptcy being engaged in by ‘our’ Empire. The Democratic Party leadership is more delusional about Bush’s war than even the Republican Party itself is! And folk that follow behind them are as much the problem as the rabble of Republican Party nitwits themselves.

Iraq is not even the main issue, a new war against Iran is not just the issue neither. Torture and destruction of the Constitution of the US is not the issue. Destruction of the environment is not the issue. The real issue is whether the US population has anything other than total lethargy and apathy within itself to offer up for self-protection? The issue is whether the US public can ever begin to mount any campaign to rein in the fascistic minded corporate power that is sinking the whole ship? Or will it just allow itself to be pacified by nonbinding do-nothing irresolutions and pathetic babbling by a phoney play pretend opposition? The real issue is whether the public is going to ever be able to dump both of the two corporate parties, or not? They both got to be thrown out and not just one, for things to ever begin to start to change.

Nonbinding resolutions what a crock! There is no real national opposition to the war machine other than what we can put together from near total scratch. We’re staring into the possibility of Bush using nuclear weapons soon and all the Democrats can come up with are nonbinding resolutions? It’s beyond nauseating and meanwhile the public just goes on driving around in circles nonstop in their oversized and imbecilic vehicles! That’s what the real issue as our population acts more like a deer in the glare of the headlights of an oncoming truck than anything else. One out shopping…. One out to lunch.

Democracy cannot be built nor sustained on such a foundation of immobilization. We need a third party. We need a movement. Any more of this business as normal by liberals hooked into the Democratic Party is a dead end.

Fidel with Hugo Chavez

The collection of CIA operatives down in South Florida are just waiting to celebrate the death of Fidel Castro with a big party, but oops!, Fidel’s dream of fully liberating Latin American from US imperialism lives on in the personage and politics of Hugo Chavez. The collection of rif-raf that will come to the Miami stadium to dance and sing about Fidel’s death when he passes away, are not representative of how most Latinos feel about Castro. To many millions he is a great hero. Fidel with Hugo Chavez is worth watching for the first 9 minutes even if you don’t speak a word of Spanish. Otherwise, well worth watching all 19 minutes as the later 10 minutes present a very interesting discussion of Venezuela in the world today.

I don’t understand all this talk about impeachment?

I don’t understand why liberals obsess about impeaching Bush? Just the word ‘impeach’ is something that has strong negative connotations like with the phrase, ‘they tried to impeach his credibility.’ In fact, isn’t that what the Republicans and Kenneth Starr did exactly when they tried to impeach Clinton? They tried to impeach Slick Willy’s credibility, besmirch it. Fancy that from such scoundrels as the Republicans? Besmirching someone’s character rather than honestly challenging their politics is certainly what they do best.

Let’s look at what’s wrong with the impeachment process. When Nixon was impeached, he was removed from the office of the Presidency, and then promptly pardoned for his actual crime of committing burglary! Wouldn’t due process be to actually have given him a criminal trial, convict him of what he did, and only then, remove him from office?

Imagine if other criminals were treated as Nixon was? Imagine if somebody burglarized your house and stole and otherwise trashed all your precious possessions inside. The police get the guy, but the District Attorney and the men in blue, before a criminal trial of any sort, have the guy fired from his job (assuming he has one other than fencing and burglary?). Then, the District Attorney informs you that this criminal who ransacked your castle has been given a pardon, and that there will never be any trial regarding his criminal act! Then the criminal burglar goes and opens up a big library (something presidential) with his name on it, and retires in bliss. While you, the victim, sit in wonder at the whole damn charade of process!

America, supposedly has one set of laws for all. We all know by now that is a total crock of shit, but still? Shouldn’t the public demand enforcement of laws on the books, even when the president, the vice-president, and his high officials break them? Torture, assassination, and robbery are a few of the crimes committed by Bush and his Klan. Shouldn’t we demand that they be criminally prosecuted rather than just timidly asking that Bush be quietly removed from office?

The most popular sign I ever use protesting against the illegal invasion of Iraq and looting of that country states, JAIL BUSH, FREE IRAQ. Can you get any simpler than that?

Does anybody really think that criminals are really afraid of ‘impeachment’? They make jokes about it down in Florence no doubt. ‘Hey, Guards, let me go. Impeach me instead.’ Why such a blatantly double standard of legal process when it comes to high officials?

Impeachment works this way. You first try to smear the character of a person you can’t get to totally go along with your corruption. The impeachment of the character, Slick, began way before the proceedings in the House and Senate. ‘His wife is a lesbian, you know? Slick sells used cars, etc, etc.’ And then came that magic moment! ‘Slick gets blow jobs! Under the table when his lesbian wife is out shopping.’ That’s what an impeachment proceeding is all about.

Any crimes no longer matter. Was it that Dick burglarized the Democratic Party HQ and slaughtered a few million or so? Or was it that he used foul language on tapes that allowed the character of this criminal to be impeached, even as his crimes went none prosecuted? Slick almost fell for ‘lying’ and getting a blow job without permission form the Senate and House, not for his invasion of Yugoslavia. Why are liberals trying to use such a travesty of character assassination against Dubya? Revenge? Because the guy sure has plenty criminal abuses against the People that he needs ot be prosecuted for instead. Impeachment is a shameful avoidance of what really should be done.

Let’s begin to demand that Bush, Cheney, Alberto Gonzalez, Rumsfield, and Rice be investigated for their criminal acts, and convicted of them. Just one example. Authorizing kidnappings and ‘renditions’ is a criminal act. If you are I were to grab somebody off the street, carry him to a basement, and then torture him as the Bush Klan have done with people, we would maybe even get the death penalty. Saddam Hussein certainly did. Shouldn’t we being asking at least for life imprisonment for our own officials that commit these exact same crimes. Aw heck, I’m even going to ask that Rumsfield be hanged by his neck, after the due process of convicting this mass murderer and master thief for his thousand and one crimes.

Asking for impeachment to be applied, and only alone to Bush, is a totally wimpy thing. A cheap revenge for those the liberal community oppose. Why not ask for the full extent of the law to be applied? Last, I am going to link with a speech that George Galloway just gave in Great Britain, and this great statesman does not call for impeachment of Tony Blair, British arch criminal. He calls for prosecution instead. That’s what we need to be doing here in America, too, when our corporate government creeps (pardon me, Tricky Dick) break the law. It’s due process.

George Galloway speech

The corporate press blanks out coverage of the antiwar demonstrations

The coverage of the antiwar demonstrations everywhere has been abysmal. There is a conspiracy of silence by the major press to use silence to try to demoralize us. Antiwar activists now have the majority of population with us, but due to poor organizing, poor strategy, and a feeling of hopelessness amongst many of us, we have failed to adequately engage the public to do much more than support us while remaining inactive.

It appears that the main demonstration in Washiington drew 100,000 plus, but it is impossible to tell yet the actual numbers, since the media has been so uninformative. It also appears that the demonstration in Denver of 1200 to 1500 was one of the largest in the county in a comparable city. Salt Lake City drew 500 to their rally. Thousands came out in Seattle and Portland, with perhaps 5,000 or more in both LA and San Francisco. These are not great turnouts considering that the US government is going to ramp up this war, rather than end it.

Where is the anger? I went ot Znet and antiwar.com this AM, and cannot even find reportagre of these events. Same with a marxist list, same with IndyMedia, same with commondreams, though that site screams out that 1/2 million turned out in the streets of Washington. If that is so, why is this the only site yet saying so? The lack of mainstream coverage with the lack of coverage and participation by our own media is contributing to a hopelessness amongst the general population that any successful fight can be waged.

The anger is building, but yet has not reached a sufficient boiling point. In fact, many amongst our ranks think it wrong to even display anger, since it conflicts with their wrong notions about nonviolence! To them I say, Jesus spoke out, he was not a church mouse like so many of you think it right to be.

I the other great immobilizer amongst us is the idea that electoral activity trumps all other politics. Have you guys and gals ever thought that it is what inactivates protest, instead of making it work? Why do you think that he presidential campaign has begun almost 2 years ahead of the election? It is simply because the media can use this campaign to hypnotize Democrats into a somnolent state of paralysis. They do it ever election period, and the campaigning gets longer and longer. I wouldn’t be surprised that some liberal Democratic party presidential nitwit doesn’t announce that he is a candidate for president in the 2112 race, all to paralyze us with false hope and inactivation for a yet longer time.

Even as I am writing this commentary now, the TV is telling us that the Democrats are planning legislation to stop funding. Hidden message for us from the boobtube, is that action is underway, and no need to do a thing personally to help stop the War. It’s already taken care of! Wrong, and if you buy it you are a fool.

Keith Ellison, DP Muslim Congressman for Zionism

Keith Ellison, newly elected Congressman from Minnesota and the first Muslim ever elected to House or Senate, at first seems to be the ideal liberal politician to support.

On abortion rights, social security, reform of the medical system, immigration, support for public education, and even calling for immediate withdrawal from Iraq, he seems to be quite supportive of a progressive agenda. Plus, it is impressive that liberal Jewish groups were there backing him, a Muslim candidate for Congress. All seems to look quite good.

Unfortunately, the devil can sometimes be found in the details. At his ‘On the ISSUES’ page, intermeshed in with all the nice liberal rhetoric one finds out that Ellison is ‘a strong supporter of law enforcement’, and for reinstatement of Clinton’s COPS program. In other words, he is for maintaining a police state environment, where police and prisons are grossly and constantly overfunded. He actually seems to hint that Bush and the Republicans are underfunding policing, whereas he would change that! His concern is the ‘middle class’ and not the working poor that have to live in so many inner cities where police rampage throughout their communities like an occupation army.

And look in at his ‘Israel and the Middle East’ page. This is truly telling for we see not a word about Abu Ghraib, US support for ‘renditions’ and torture, condemnation of the US/ Israeli invasion of Lebanon, etc. Instead, we learn from this Muslim for Zionism, that supposedly Iran is a nuclear terror threat, that the Palestinian Authority has not dismantled a terrorist superstructure in the Occupied Territories, that Hamas supposedly represents the greatest obstacle to peace, etc. In short, we see the full agenda of Zionism represented as progressive agenda, by a Muslim! Israel comes in for ZERO condemnation!

I would say, the Keith Ellison is about as representative of the majority of the American Muslim community, as Clarence Thomas and Condi Rice are of the Black community in our country. Not very. In short, the American media are guilty of a big con, as they spread news of Ellison’s victory at the polls as being a historic victory for the Muslim community. It is not. Electing a Zionist Muslim into office is about par for what liberal Democratic electoral politics brings, but that is nothing really to boast of.

How sad to see all the liberal community behind such a man, whose web page clearly paints Iran as being a nuclear danger to Western Civilization, and not Israel. Is this not liberalism backhandedly pushing another Bush Administration assault on yet another country? It is reminiscent of when liberals rallied around Clinton’s illegal war on Yugoslavia. That’s right, it is illegal in international law to invade and bomb another country, yet liberal Democrats supported that. And liberal Democrat, the Zionist Muslim Ellison, seem to be very eager to push the buttons to get a new conflict goin with Iran and its multiple supporters in the ME. Straight zio-con agenda.

Who is the big supporter of Keith Ellison that he list on his website? He lists him as this… ‘Vice President Walter Mondale’! (And I mistakenly thought it was Dick Cheney that held that post! Stupid me.) Lest we forget, Walter Mondale WAS VP under Jimmy the peanut farmer Carter, and WAS a longtime supporter of the Vietnam War with his cohort, Hubert Humphrey. He only seemed mildly to turn against the war then, when it was Richard Nixon that came to head up the presidency and US government’s efforts to terrorize SE Asia. In other words, Keith Ellison’s big behind the scenes supporter, is the grand guru of the constantly pro-war Northern liberal wing of the Democratic Party, Mondale. Mondale, Zionist backer all the way.

With Keith Ellison, we see what a ‘good Muslim’ is like, to the constantly pro war, pro imperialist US ruling class. Keith Ellison, not so liberal after all. Another carnivore hiding in a sheep’s wool that the Establishment would like to pull over our eyes.

Ney gets 30

Representative Bob Ney gets 30 months? What in the name of sleezy Ohio politics is that for justice?! I’m sorry to sound so punitive, but where can a corrupt bureaucrat get a fitting reprimand? Abramoff payeeIn developing nations, government officials who profit illegally from their station are executed in public. This is meant as a lesson to others who may be tempted to take advantage of the public trust. It’s a trust the public has no recourse but to offer. That’s why punishment must be severe.

What of the misrepresentation for which Ney was convicted? How many people were hurt by Ney not representing them? What public-good legislation was prevented from passing because of Ney and the corporations he was protecting? What detrimental laws were passed for their benefit? Going further, who did Ney help get elected, and what wave of murderous manslaughter did Bob Ney and his fellow cronies help unleash? Should those consequences not have weighed into his sentencing?

Compounding Bob Ney’s crime of misrepresentation is that the results persist. The laws he was influenced to pass still stand. It’s as if a bankrobber, caught, is let to keep the money. Bob Ney was fined $6,000. Is that restitution?!

There is no restitution for the victims, the American people, who suffer from corrupt laws and elected administrators. And fellow cronies continue to represent their malevolent corporate interests against the voters who thought their candidates represented them.

You may say even thirty days in jail is a sufficient deterrent. I say we should demand the heads and bank accounts of all a crony’s progeny. And business partners. Everyone who benefited from the crime of corruption. I’ll be satisfied to meet in the middle, a pound of flesh.

Bush ‘renders’ US citizen to Israel

Israel extradites a dissidentFawaz Damra, a US citizen was stripped of his citizenship, held in jail for months for no crime what-so-ever, and finally ‘rendered’ to Israel 2 weeks ago, possibly to be tortured?. His crime? He was born a Palestinian.

He was deported to Israeli military forces without being allowed contact with either his family or his lawyer beforehand. He has 3 teenage daughters and a wife, all who are also US citizens. I bet they are really glad to enjoy the benefits of American citizenship? What a grand civics lesson they are receiving.

It is apparent to more and more American Muslims now, that it is barely legal to be a Muslim here. Muslims do not now have to wear a Crescent like the Star of David that Jews once had to wear for Germans, but that’s more due to advances in surveillance technology. But you really are taking your life in your hands as an American Muslim, to enter your place of worship or to make a charitable donation to a church cause. I bet the family of Damra are really impressed by what religious freedom us Americans have? How protected they must feel in being citizens, too.

Fawaz, upon immigrating to the US, became a moderate imam and headed up the Cleveland mosque. Just the type of person that the US people as a whole need most amongst us, to counter the threats of future terrorism. I’m sure that stripping this man of his citizenship and then deporting him into the custody of Israeli military torturers, is certainly going to do wonders for our National Security, the Bush neo-con Klan are so fond of barfing on about so continuously! They are brilliant strategists for sure!

It shouldn’t surprise us at all, I guess? The US was very good under the Democrats of FDR at turning back Jews trying to escape from the Nazis. But the Zionist Jews of Israel are now our Aryan Empires allies, and so things are the same as back then, yet so very topsy turvy. It is now the Jews that run the show and Arabs that are in ghettos. Looking over all this, of course, is the great Christian Church of imperialism.

Let me mention here, that my last name is really Arabic, though I am really totally Aryan. I wonder how I fit into the computers of our new national security state observation deck? But just for the record let me state, that I am still for jailing the terrorists that run our country. Oh how anti-US I must be with my Arab last name! How suspect my politics.

And to you fascistic dittohead thugs out there? Well, I am ashamed of the US. If you weren’t such ignorant backward bastards, so would you be, too. I wonder just how far out nutty this government terrorism against us will go? Let’s just say, I don’t think I can just go down to the airport and hop on a plane nowadays. But why should I leave? This is my country, and the Right Wingers should get out of it and Go to Hell, not me. They are nothing but traitors to everything decent, they are, and are not the real patriots out there, not in the least. All their good Americanism is a big fat sham, same as the good Germans back 90 years ago were with their ‘patriotism’..

To follow more the history of this case somewhat, go to the Cleveland newspaper’s coverage page on Fawaz Damra

Rose Bowl Impeach Bush Parade

As you can see I’ve been reading and writing a lot. So I was on the pacifism tab. Got to the one about the parade in Manitou.
 
Empire rebellion banner in PasadenaOn New Years, somebody at the Tournament of Roses parade was across from the grandstand, where the cameras would be sure to catch it every time a float or band or whatever passed by, holding up a sign made of each letter on a separate square of cloth, I M P E A C H.
I pointed that out to my landlady, who had oohed and ahhed when the Air Force did a flyover with a couple of fighters and a stealth bomber, right after some insipid songfest about how good and nice everybody in America is, and we should all be so very proud of our goodness and nicene….aaaaaarrrrggggggghhhhhhh!

But for a half hour every float that passed by had the impeach sign flying prominently in the background.

Then the marching Storm Troopers, literally, it was a tribute to Star Wars, and the sign was nowhere in the shot. I noticed that they were keeping the shots kind of tight from there on, so I don’t know if the cops made them take down their banner or if the cameramen had specific orders not to show it ever again.

I mentioned this to my landlady and she said Good,! That’s just disrespectful to put politics into a parade where everybody is just out to have a little fun.

I told her that since we are being shut out by every media outlet there is over the peace marches, she said there is a Proper Time for everything, and some bullshit about working within the system….

And not a word of protest about the government sponsored anti-peace demonstrations.

The Moon Fades- the beauty of the oud

If I had any ability as a musician, my instrument of choice to play would be the oud. In the US it is rare to have the opportunity to ever hear a live oud concert. Luckily, as a student at the University of Texas, I was able to attend several concerts of the legendary Sudanese oudist, Hamza El Din. I have been hooked on this instrument ever since.

A good introduction to the oud also can be found at Naseer Shamma’s website. He is Iraq’s master oudist. His site has seven albums by him showcased, with very good musical clips of one piece from each album. My favorite is the clip from the second album listed, The Moon Fades. Beautiful cover, beautiful melody, beautiful instrument, the oud. Go and enjoy.

If you are curious about the politics of this master musician from Iraq, check out an article about him at the newspaper, al Ahram.