Son of Antiwar State Senator Becky Lourey Killed in Iraq

A poignant interview with Minnisota Senator Becky Lourey whose son died in Iraq 2 weeks ago. Senator Lourey had authored a resolution in the senate signed by 18 other state senators opposing the invasion of Iraq.

I was reminded of a black US friend of mine whose brother was killed in Viet-Nam. When I expressed my concern to her about him enlisting, that black youths were only fodder for US economic interests, she replied that she couldn't dissuade him since he was unemployed and said it would provide him with a job. Less than a year later he was killed in action. Senator Lourey and her husband had been activists in the movement against the war in Viet-Nam.

How The Right-Wing Took Over Another Medium Of Dissent

It seems that more and more I refer to Bill Moyers, one of the few remaining major journalists who hasn't succumbed to the Bush administration's shackling of the free press. Challenged by PBS in the docile corporate media coverage by most major media who obediently presented the Bush spin on events, the Republican "powers that be" moved to silence this opposition to their imperial power. Since the US hasn't yet descended to the traditional dictatorship solution of blowing up opposition offices or assassinating editors, and since the PBS is a government funded organisation, they
simply took over the funding organisation of the government.

Moyers blows the whistle on the coup and details the original hopes of public broadcasting which he helped set up. Audio and video clips can be found here

THIS IS THE WAY FREEDOM ENDS. NOT WITH A BANG BUT A WHIMPER.

The IRON HEEL's noose tightens

gatesid

The right-wing Bush administration slipped a "security measure" into a military expenditure bill which was passed by the US Senate yesterday. Naturally few Senators would be seen opposing a Bill which would benefit "our boys in Iraq"

The Bill authorises the US government to institute an internal passport reminiscent of the infamous "required papers" under the Nazi regime in Occupied Europe. It would be required by all US citizens for identification, superceding state drivers licences and any other existing methods of identification. Among other things it would have means of verifying the identity of the ID Card holder up to such things as photos,fingerprints, or retinal eye-scans. It would include such things as home address, phone number, and occupation.

Bill Gates is shown here in an example he volunteered for in a similar Belgian initiative.

Civil liberty organizations have reponded with consternation at the rapidly introduced and passed bill.

That's the way your liberty dies, not with a bang , but a whimper.

US Democracy in Action

Kevin Sites
Originally uploaded by Little Muddy.

Kevan Sites is a freelance journalist who was "embedded" with US troops attacking the insurgents in Fallujah. He originally edited his video leaving out sensitive footage which he felt could enflame the event. He now regrets that decision and has released the full video coverage.

Sites was on assignment for NBC on Nov. 13, 2004, and was following a squad into a mosque that the day before insurgents were using to fire on U.S. troops. The Marines were part of a U.S.-led offensive to clear Fallujah of its insurgent strongholds.

Sites' video shows five men wounded from the previous day's fighting lying on the floor of the mosque. One Marine can be heard shouting to others that a man was only "playing dead."

The Marine corporal in question appears to fire a round from his weapon into the Iraqi's head, and another Marine says, "Dead now."


The U.S. Marine Corps announced that it won't prosecute that Marine corporal, who was not identified, for his actions.

Don Quixote

quijote

I must confess to less than full dilligence to the duty of faithfully blogging the myriad of news items that have passed my outraged comments. I guess like life, it will go in fits and starts. The current state of affairs in the world is so depressing that it becomes difficult to single out any new hypocrisy with anything more than resignation.

Mea Culpa.

But I do continue, not even sure that I reach even as many as in my daily conversations.
And if my contests with windmills fail I can also find a princess to rescue, tho my attempts to save our local bus service was valliant but not greatly successful.


Little Muddy

The Shit Done Hit The Fan

Captains Quarter Blog

The Gomery Commission's investigation into the Liberal party's Adscam hit a new high the last few days. Jean Brault, the head of a Quebec advertising agency with close ties to the Liberals, and who is facing criminal charges, gave explosive testimony on which the Commission placed a publication ban.

A conservative US blogger managed to get ahold of the details of the testimony and published it on his US blog where the canadian ban isn't effective. Now his blog has been swamped by canadians eager to know the "juicy bits". CTV "outed" the Blog and it can easily be found with a search engine like Gooogle.

Pundits are suggesting this could bring down the liberal government. Harper Conservatives who are salivating at the prospect might find a different outcome than what they hope for. It could result in a Liberal wipe-out in Quebec, where interest is high on the adscam scandal, and many in the rest of Canada who voted for the liberals in fear of a Harper government could turn to the NDP. Another minority government would be likely.

View from the West : Canada

Loyd Axworthy, a former Foreign Minister for the Chretien government and now President of Winnipeg University takes a gutsy stand on the Bush administration's Star Wars system. It reflects the views of most canadians.

Free Mojtaba and Arash Day Feb 22

The Committee to Protect Bloggers was established to counter the increasing
number of bloggers who are being subjected to arrest and harrassment world-wide.
The Committee's first campaign is 'Free Mojtaba and Arash Day' to be held today. And it is getting a lot of publicity. "Overwhelming, between PRI's The World, BBC, Slashdot, BoingBoing, we have over twice as much traffic as usual, halfway through the day. People are planning to do the day by the score," said Curt. When asked if this campaign will work and if the Iranian government will listen and release both Mojtaba and Arash, he told me about Sina, a freed Iranian blogger, "Sina credited the attention of the blogosphere for making the Iranian authorities extremely uncomfortable and letting him go. We're hoping the same thing will happen here."

The Suicide Economy Of Corporate Globalisation

In 1998, the World Bank's structural adjustment policies forced India to open up its seed sector to global corporations like Cargill, Monsanto, and Syngenta. The global corporations changed the input economy overnight. Farm saved seeds were replaced by corporate seeds which needed fertilizers and pesticides and could not be saved.

As seed saving is prevented by patents as well as by the engineering of seeds with non-renewable traits, seed has to be bought for every planting season by poor peasants. A free resource available on farms became a commodity which farmers were forced to buy every year. This increases poverty and leads to indebtedness.

As debts increase and become unpayable, farmers are compelled to sell kidneys or even commit suicide. More than 25,000 peasants in India have taken their lives since 1997 when the practice of seed saving was transformed under globalisation pressures and multinational seed corporations started to take control of the seed supply. Seed saving gives farmers life. Seed monopolies rob farmers of life.

Vananda Shiva

Suicide Seed: Bombshell in Bangkok

Farmers-Struggle-Against-GMO

While the servile canadian press was strangely silent on the event, the internet was certainly abuzz with Canada's turnabout at a UN meeting in Bangkok where they attempted to overturn an international moratorium on the universally condemned "suicide seed" technology which prevents 2nd generation seeds from regenerating. The original leak came from the canadian-based ETC Group. It was followed up with a report of a speech to the conference by Percy Schmauser, the Saskatchewan farmer who was sued by Monsanto for allegedly using "their" patented Canola seeds.
Monsanto versus Schmauser

The Canadian National Farmers Union, has initiated a
"Seed Saver Campaign" to prevent regulatory changes proposed by the federally-funded and corporate-dominated "Seed Sector Review Panel" preventing canadian farmers from saving and using seeds developed over decades, many in association with taxpayer funded agencies and universities. The NFU also issued a statement condemning the canadian delegation's Bangkok proposals.
There are at least 2 quickly-organized US letter-writing campaigns and a British one. here and here
After being swamped this week by protest emails and letters, the Canadian government was forced to soften its public position on terminator, but it continued to press a solidly pro-terminator view in the corridors and in a committee to negotiate a draft text on Terminator.

"The draft text on Terminator released thursday morning was appalling-it looked like it was written by the multinational seed industry", sid Jim Thomas of the ETC Group, speaking from Bangkok. "It strongly reflected the Canadian government's pro-terminator position as revealed earlier this week in the leaked document"

Thomas reported that the Canadian bid to overturn the moratorium on GM Terminator Technologies (GURTS) was backed only by the Governments of New Zealand and Australia in the UN meeting. The United States has never ratified the Treaty and was not part of the 174 nation deliberations. It has always been a strong proponent of "Terminator" technology.

The UN conference rejected the draft report proposal.

Paranoid shift

paranoid.101

Michael Hasty makes a good case for your justified
fears in this Online Journal article.

By Michael Hasty
Online Journal Contributing Writer

January 10, 2004—Just before his death, James Jesus Angleton, the legendary chief of counterintelligence at the Central Intelligence Agency, was a bitter man. He felt betrayed by the people he had worked for all his life. In the end, he had come to realize that they were never really interested in American ideals of "freedom" and "democracy." They really only wanted "absolute power."

Angleton told author Joseph Trento that the reason he had gotten the counterintelligence job in the first place was by agreeing not to submit "sixty of Allen Dulles' closest friends" to a polygraph test concerning their business deals with the Nazis. In his end-of-life despair, Angleton assumed that he would see all his old companions again "in hell."

The transformation of James Jesus Angleton from an enthusiastic, Ivy League cold warrior, to a bitter old man, is an extreme example of a phenomenon I call a "paranoid shift." I recognize the phenomenon, because something similar happened to me. .....more

Who was the "ordinary" Iraqui Woman at The SOTU Session

It seems the "ordinary Iraqui" woman pointed out by Dubya in his State of the Union speech, who held up a purple-stained finger, showing she voted, is a very important figure in the ruling elite and strongly linked to US hardline front organisations and possibly linked, like Chalabri, to the CIA.
Brings to mind the little girl whose tearful testimony about Saddam's troops throwing babies from incubators to the floor, turned out to be the daughter of the Kuwaiti Ambassador in Pere Bush's campaign to whip up support for his Iraqui campaign. It was later completely discredited.
This post was quick off the mark in pointing out the latest subtle deception.

Scoop: William Rivers Pitt: The Story of the Ghost

"United States officials were surprised and heartened today at the size of turnout in South Vietnam's presidential election despite a Vietcong terrorist campaign to disrupt the voting. According to reports from Saigon, 83 percent of the 5.85 million registered voters cast their ballots yesterday. Many of them risked reprisals threatened by the Vietcong. A successful election has long been seen as the keystone in President Johnson's policy of encouraging the growth of constitutional processes in South Vietnam."
- Peter Grose, in a page 2 New York Times article titled, 'U.S. Encouraged by Vietnam Vote,' September 4, 1967

Chuckman: Freedom on Steroids

chuckman-freedom%20march

John Chuckman is a former chief economist of Texaco Canada and an excellent journalist who has a different perspective than one could imagine from a corporate executive. His articles appear in dissadentvoice, yellowtimes, and counterpunch among others. He also has an ability with graphics which cut to the quick.

Freedom on Steroids: John Chuckman

A writer at The NY Times counted 27 references to freedom in Bush's inaugural speech. The speech contained not one reference to his ugly war in Iraq, but for hundreds of thousands of Iraqis the only freedom established by Bush's invasion was their freedom to miserable deaths or future lives as cripples.more...

Some other examples of his caustic art can be found here

Canada: A pawn of the US in Haiti

Yves Engler, a Montreal-based jounalist recently spent time in Haiti and points out the yellow journalism of the Canadian media as it relates to the Canadian role in Haiti.

Bill Moyers-Global Environment Citizen Award

Bill Moyers is still one of the most astute liberal journalists who hasn't succumbed to the cowardice of of corporate news-speak. Link to his acceptance speech at the Harvard Medical School's Global Environment Citizens Award.

One of the biggest changes in politics in my lifetime is that the delusional is no longer marginal. It has come in from the fringe, to sit in the seat of power in the oval office and in Congress. For the first time in our history, ideology and theology hold a monopoly of power in Washington. Theology asserts propositions that cannot be proven true; ideologues hold stoutly to a world view despite being contradicted by what is generally accepted as reality. When ideology and theology couple, their offspring are not always bad but they are always blind. And there is the danger: voters and politicians alike, oblivious to the facts.
Remember James Watt, President Reagan's first Secretary of the Interior? My favorite online environmental journal, the ever engaging Grist, reminded us recently of how James Watt told the U.S. Congress that protecting natural resources was unimportant in light of the imminent return of Jesus Christ. In public testimony he said, 'after the last tree is felled, Christ will come back.' ....more

The Blacklisted Journalist

Al Is Back

An excellent site hosted by Al Aronovitch with other guest writers.
Aronovitch was one of the most "Gonzo" of the cultural jounalists
of the 60's and a confrere of many of the top cultural icons.

A Real View of the US Election Results

wakeup_america_sm

I had contemplated putting up some of the many pages bemoaning the GOP victory in the US presidential victory. A front page from a UK paper totally in black with a small caption. "Are that many Americans so stupid"? Another black-page simulation of a Time Magazine cover with the caption "W'hy". Or one of the many commentaries of uplifting consolation to the US people. This interview with the Indian writer Arundhati Roy just before the election best puts things in perspective.

I think one of the dangers that we face is that politics becomes a discussion only about personalities, and we forget that the system is in place, and it doesn’t matter all that much who is piloting the machine. So as I said in my talk at the American Sociological Association in San Francisco, this whole fierce debate about the Democrats and the Republicans and whether Bush or Kerry is better is like being asked to choose a detergent. Whether you choose Tide or Ivory Snow, they’re both owned by Procter & Gamble

THERE IS an alternative to terrorism. What is it?

JUSTICE.

Arundhati Roy

Letter from a Minnesota Highway

Bush and Company Have Already Won

As Ralph Nader points out in this article, the
"Anyone but Bush" strategy adopted by US liberals,
progressives, and peace activists has allowed the
corporate agenda full sway in the coming election.

AlterNet: Fight For Your Freedom to Read

Another victory for creeping fascism in the US as the Congress denies passage of the "Freedom to Read Protection Act"