Things to consider—

Since early 2011, Obama's been waging proxy war on Syria. Imported death squads masquerade as freedom fighters. The scheme's familiar. It repeats. It reflects US imperialism's dark side. In the 1980s, CIA-recruited mujahideen fighters battled Afghanistan's Soviet occupiers. Ronald Reagan called them "the moral equivalent of our founding fathers." He characterized Contra killers the same way. —Stephen LendmanFor over a century now US ambassadors have acted as fifth columns in the nations they are embedded in, their role chiefly to foster corporate and plutocratic power and coordinate machinations against any truly pro-democratic government.•••••"The dead end identity politics of SF Pride, which sells out a peace hero like Bradley Manning to curry favor with the American ruling class, is what I had in mind. The empire loves your tameness, irrelevance and cowardice, SF Pride. You don’t bother the American ruling class — a five foot two, 105 pound soldier does because he has a conscience and because he didn’t make comfort the guiding principle of his life...." —Randy Shields

ARCHIVES: Louis Proyect on the fraud of “humanitarian interventions”

 ANNOTATED NEWS, BOOK NOTES, GREAT HYPOCRISY, HISTORY, HUMBUG CENTRAL, IMPERIALISM  Comments Off
Apr 302012
 

 

 

Diana Johnstone’s Fools’ Crusade

A Book Review by Louis Proyect

Iraq 2003? No, Serbia, 1999. The NATO bombing of Yugoslavia (code-name Operation Allied Force or, by the United States, Operation Noble Anvil)[36] was NATO‘s military operation against the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia during the Kosovo War. The strikes lasted 78 days, from March 24, 1999 to June 10, 1999. The NATO bombing marked the second major combat operation in its history, following the 1995 NATO bombing campaign in Bosnia and Herzegovina. 

Editor’s Note: We make available this brave article originally published in Swans because —among many things— it presages the arrival of sophisticated “humanitarian interventions” in our midst (in reality a facelift for the old notion that US foreign policy is always a heavenly gift to those it touches, or that it is above reproach, like the Immaculate Conception). Besides, in several passages it zeroes in on the great divide within the self-defined left itself, with people like Noam Chomsky and liberaloid orgs like the Campaign for Peace and Democracy playing at times objectively friendly roles to imperial designs in conformity with their opposition to all forms of “authoritarianism.”  The old “plague on both your houses plague.”—PG Continue reading »

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 Posted by at 1:30 pm

What’s Next for Libya?

 ANNOTATED NEWS, ANTIWAR, IMPERIALISM, The Middle East  Comments Off
Apr 302012
 


Suspect as Western-influenced any demonstrator that looks “too middle-class”, who sports some pamphlet or poster too well made (as in picture), or who proclaims something in English.—Eds.

By Stephen Lendman

NATO’s “responsibility to protect” (R2P) was subterfuge to wage war. Months of terror bombing left Libya a charnel house.

Africa’s most developed country was ravaged, not liberated. Protracted struggle continues. Expect it to persist for years.

When is war not war? It’s when mass killing and destruction are called the right thing. It’s also when terrorizing and traumatizing an entire population continues unaddressed.

Libya was developed and peaceful until NATO intervened. It arrived on cruise missiles, bombs, shells, other munitions, depleted and enriched uranium, other terror weapons, fifth column infiltrators, and media scoundrel complicity, as well as coverup and denial. Continue reading »

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The Last Jewish Prophet

 ACTIVISTS & HEROES, ANNOTATED NEWS, BOOK NOTES, CONTROVERSY, HISTORY  Comments Off
Apr 302012
 

 

The Last Jewish Prophet 

A review of Gilad Atzmon’s new book, The Wandering Who? 

William T. Hathaway

Gilad Atzmon, controversial author and jazz musician, has just published a study of Jewish identity politics. The Wandering Who? chronicles his journey away from his Jewish identity, and by extension away from all exclusive identities, into an inclusive humanness. It’s a painful journey, a brutally honest self exploration of these internalized tribal impulses. He emerges from the struggle deracinated but emancipated, freed of a destructive load of cultural baggage. Continue reading »

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 Posted by at 12:07 pm

The Self-Made Myth: Debunking Conservatives’ Favorite — And Most Dangerous — Fiction

 ANNOTATED NEWS, ASSHOLES, BASTARDS & CRIMINALS, BATTLE OF COMMUNICATIONS, CONSERVATIVES & REACTION  Comments Off
Apr 272012
 

By Sara Robinson, AlterNet

The self-made myth is one of the most cherished foundation stones of the conservative theology. Nurtured by Horatio Alger and generations of beloved boys’ stories, It sits at the deep black heart of the entire right-wing worldview, where it provides the essential justification for a great many other common right-wing beliefs. It feeds the accusation that government is evil because it only exists to redistribute wealth from society’s producers (self-made, of course) and its parasites (who refuse to work). It justifies conservative rage against progressives, who are seen as wanting to use government to forcibly take away what belongs to the righteous wealthy. It’s piously invoked by hedge fund managers and oil billionaires, who think that being required to reinvest any of their wealth back into the public society that made it possible is “punishing success.” It’s the foundational belief on which all of Ayn Rand’s novels stand. Continue reading »

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 Posted by at 3:48 pm

Rising above the duality of our politics

 ACTIVISTS & HEROES, ANNOTATED NEWS  Comments Off
Apr 272012
 

Source: Primitive Times
Thank you, Primitive Times 

Once you’ve become radicalized, it’s always amusing and enlightening to encounter the various stimuli which, in your pre-radicalized days, would have elicited a far different response. This happened to me last week when I was setting up a new email account for my Mom and came across a slew of fundraising emails from the DCCC. Though the messages were authored by a wide variety of familiar names – Biden, Pelosi, Reid and the like – they all contained the same general structure, which went something like this:

Dear Voter/Donor-

Did you hear this? Republicans just released a new attack ad saying Democrats sacrifice kittens. KITTENS!

Oh, and get this – Republicans sacrifice kittens. KITTENS!

We’ve gotta respond. The first quarterly FEC deadline of 2012 is in just 48 hours. Send us money now, and let’s send them a clear message that says we won’t stand for their lies, nor their kitten sacrificing. And if you act in the next 2 hours, we’ll triple the donation! Continue reading »

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 Posted by at 3:25 pm

BOOKS: Keep On Rockin’

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Apr 272012
 

 

 

Keep On Rockin’ 

From the Book

RADICAL PEACE: People Refusing War
By William T. Hathaway

RADICAL PEACE is a collection of reports from peace activists in the USA, Europe, Iraq, and Afghanistan. An American exchange student in one of my courses here in Germany contributed the following essay.

Jason was my boy-friend for a while in high school. It wasn’t a match made in heaven. Looking back, I think the main thing we had in common was that I wanted a boy-friend and he wanted a girl-friend. Other than that there wasn’t much between us, as we discovered whenever we tried to talk about anything. I broke up with him when he asked me to go rabbit hunting with him. We stayed friends, though, probably because since it was obvious we could never be a real couple, neither of us had hard feelings. Continue reading »

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 Posted by at 2:35 pm
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